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Florida woman says airline told her to flush emotional support hamster down the toilet
MIAMI -- A Florida woman says an airline told her to flush her hamster down an airport toilet because the emotional support rodent wasn't allowed to fly with her. The Miami Herald reports before Belen Aldecosea flew home from college to South Florida, she twice called Spirit Airlines to ensure she could bring Pebbles, her pet dwarf hamster. No problem, the airline said.
But when Aldecosea arrived at the Baltimore airport, Spirit refused to allow the animal onboard. The 21-year-old told the paper she flushed Pebbles at an airline employee's suggestion, after running out of other options.
Panicked and needing to return home promptly to deal with a medical issue, Aldecosea was unable to rent a car and agonized for hours.
"She was scared. I was scared. It was horrifying trying to put her in the toilet," Aldecosea said. "I was emotional. I was crying. I sat there for a good 10 minutes crying in the stall."
A spokesman for Spirit acknowledged the airline mistakenly told Aldecosea that Pebbles was allowed. But he denied that a Spirit employee recommended flushing her pet in an airport restroom.
"To be clear, at no point did any of our agents suggest this guest (or any other for that matter) should flush or otherwise injure an animal," spokesman Derek Dombrowski said.
But Aldecosea said she's considering suing Spirit over the conflicting instructions that pressured her into making the decision. She shared her tale with the newspaper after the story of an emotional support peacock -- denied entrance to a United Airlines flight -- went viral on the Internet.
This case is different, said her Florida attorney, Adam Goodman. "This wasn't a giant peacock that could pose a danger to other passengers. This was a tiny cute harmless hamster that could fit in the palm of her hand," he said.
Animals on flights have become controversial. Some say travelers are taking advantage of federal law to get household pets on planes. Several airlines have recently tightened restrictions on such animals.
The U.S. Transportation Safety Administration has no problem with carry-on hamsters. "Hamsters are welcome in our checkpoint. Their container would typically go through the X-ray while the owner would hold the hamster as the passenger walks through the metal detector so the creature is not subjected to radiation," according to TSA spokeswoman Sari Koshetz.
It's up to airlines whether they allow hamsters on board. Most major carriers such as American, Delta and United, say no, citing concerns safety and health concerns.
Aldecosea said she had her doctor's letter certifying Pebbles.
During her first semester at a school in Pennsylvania, Aldecosea developed a painful growth in her neck, leading to a cancer scare. That's when she bought Pebbles for comfort. In November, Aldecosea learned the growth was benign but still painful. Withdrawing from school and going home hoping to have it removed, Aldecosea booked a Spirit flight from Baltimore to Fort Lauderdale.
She twice called Spirit in advance, to verify the hamster could fly. The rep told her it was fine -- an assurance that Spirit agrees was given to Aldecosea. "Our reservation representative, unfortunately, did misinform the guest that a hamster was permitted to fly as an emotional support animal on Spirit Airlines," spokesman Dombrowski wrote in an email.
When Aldecosea showed up that day, she said, the first Spirit agent checked her emotional support pet in with no problem. Pebbles was in a small cage that fit regulations for carry-on luggage.
But as she approached the security checkpoint, a second Spirit employee chased her down, hollering that rodents weren't allowed. Aldecosea said Spirit agents told her she couldn't put the hamster in the cargo hold either.
After hectic discussions, an outraged Aldecosea accepted a flight later that day. She said she had no friends or family in town to pick up Pebbles. It was then, Aldecosea insists, that an employee suggested letting Pebbles go free outside or flushing her down the toilet.
With her flight boarding soon, she pondered whether to let Pebbles free outside. She said she considered it more humane to end her life right away, and not let her run around scared in the cold, only to die getting hit by a car.
"I didn't have any other options," she said.
© 2018 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.


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Monday morning, I took the early flight to London to attend the first Breitling Summit, where the brand's new Premier collection and additional distinguished products in all of their four universes, Air, Land, Sea, and Professional were introduced. The day started already beautiful with a breathtaking landing over the city in full sunshine.
A brand with a rich heritage
Breitling was founded in 1884 by Léon Breitling with the mission to create toolwatches with optimum functionality. Based in the Swiss Jura, he specialized in chronographs and precision timers. Until today, the watch company has been famous for its pilot-themed chronographs.
In 2017, Breitling, one of the last family-owned watch brands of note, was sold to one of the biggest private equity firm in Europe, CVC Capital Partners. I was curious how the watch company had evolved during the past 12 months after Georges Kern took over the helmet as CEO and also as an investor.
Breitling CEO Georges Kern
The day started with a presentation about Breitling's journey over the past year and its vision for the future by Kern himself. For me, he is a marketing genius. In this short amount of time, he managed that Breitling is on everyone's lips and he is proud of this achievement himself. His mission and energy to create a #legendaryfuture seems well on its way. With him in charge, the brand has a great chance to live up to its own spirit and to be flying high again.
Let's take for example the #squadonamission campaign that is throughly thought through, celebrating the collective spirit of squads united in pursuit of their mission and featuring leading figures from the worlds of aviation, exploration, cinema, and sport. It was a pleasure listening to iconic photographer Peter Lindbergh who appeared on screen to tell us how much fun he had shooting Charlize Theron, Brad Pitt and Adam Driver for Breitling's Cinema Squad campaign.
Kern said that «this clearly differentiates Breitling from the rest of the industry as Breitling is communicating with teams instead of individuals.» In a round table discussion he also wheeled out his top team.
My favorite: the new B01 Chronograph in Bentley Racing Green
His first steps to turn the brand around was to simplify the product range to four categories of Land, Air, Sea and Professionals and to speak to a broader customer base. On Monday, Breitling also announced new watches in each segment. One presented during the summit will be launched in partnership with Bentley, a collaboration that has been running since 2003, and that will be renewed in 2018 with the new B01 Chronograph in Bentley Racing Green – my favorite watch seen this Monday in London.
Combining purpose with style, the new Premier collections are worthy of Breitling's legacy.
It is part of the probably most important launch, the elegant and stylish Breitling Premier collection that will be available from the end of October 2018. A reintroduced name that has a special significance for the brand as it was in the 1940s, when Breitling introduced its first collection of truly elegant watches, which were defined by their fashionable flair. Willy Breitling wanted to attract a new customer base and Kern wants to achieve the same with these new watches. Kern is clear about the role the Premier watches play in the brand's product portfolio: «This is the first modern Breitling collection dedicated to everyday elegance. With outstanding quality and performance, these watches bear our unmistakable brand DNA, but they have been created with a focus on style that beautifully complements their purpose.»
Breitling's new Superocean Héritage II Chronograph 44 Outerknown
Going with the zeitgeist and focusing on the sustainability aspect, Breitling's new Superocean Héritage II Chronograph 44 Outerknown celebrates the brand's partnership with Outerknown, a sustainable clothing company committed to improving environmental conditions for the entire planet. The watch features a first for Breitling: the strap is crafted from ECONYL® yarn, an innovative material created from nylon waste, one source of which is fishing nets from oceans around the world.
Preview at the summit: Navitimer 8 inspired by Curtiss will be launched in 2019
Another very cool model that will hit the shelves in 2019 is for Breitlings' aviation watch enthusiasts and «flying tigers»: the Navitimer 8 camouflage green dial will be produced in conjunction with Curtiss, an aircraft company best known for its WWII P-40 Warhawk fighter jet that is painted with a shark's mouth under its nose.
During the round table Kern explained a little more about his sales strategy. He will increase their own retail and decrease wholesale. He closed most of the stores in South America and opened new ones in Asia and the US. In Paris, Breitling will open a flagship store in the next weeks featuring the new very masculine look, imagine a loft apartment with a pool table and a living room area with leather sofas, brick and concrete walls. «We call it modern retro,» Mr Kern said. Through their interior design, all stores offer an outstanding buying experience. Something that is key for Kern.
His biggest advantage in his new challenge? The independency of Breitling which gives him the capability to act faster than in a conglomerate. Kern is involved in every little step, even the design process of the watches.
Trying the new Premier Chronograph 42 with blue dial and brown alligator leather strap
An outlook for the upcoming year: Ladies, great news is that 2019 will mark the launch of a designated women's watch collection. Stay tuned!
To a legendary future… I am wishing the whole Breitling team good luck for this thrilling journey!
LoL, Sandra
Photo: Courtesy of Breitling
Harold Cunningham/Getty Images for Breitling
@Breitling #breitling #squadonamission #legendaryfuture #premierstyle

subset: commoncrawl


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I propose formless and undetermined fancies, like those who publish doubtful questions, to be after disputed upon in the schools, not to establish truth but to seek it; and I submit them to the judgments of those whose office it is to regulate, not my writings and actions only, but moreover my very thoughts. Let what I here set down meet with correction or applause, it shall be of equal welcome and utility to me, myself beforehand condemning as absurd and impious, if anything shall be found, through ignorance or inadvertency, couched in this rhapsody, contrary to the holy resolutions and prescriptions of the Catholic Apostolic and Roman Church, into which I was born and in which I will die. And yet, always submitting to the authority of their censure, which has an absolute power over me, I thus rashly venture at everything, as in treating upon this present subject.
I know not if or no I am wrong, but since, by a particular favour of the divine bounty, a certain form of prayer has been prescribed and dictated to us, word by word, from the mouth of God Himself, I have ever been of opinion that we ought to have it in more frequent use than we yet have; and if I were worthy to advise, at the sitting down to and rising from our tables, at our rising from and going to bed, and in every particular action wherein prayer is used, I would that Christians always make use of the Lord's Prayer, if not alone, yet at least always. The Church may lengthen and diversify prayers, according to the necessity of our instruction, for I know very well that it is always the same in substance and the same thing: but yet such a privilege ought to be given to that prayer, that the people should have it continually in their mouths; for it is most certain that all necessary petitions are comprehended in it, and that it is infinitely proper for all occasions. 'Tis the only prayer I use in all places and conditions, and which I still repeat instead of changing; whence it also happens that I have no other so entirely by heart as that.
It just now came into my mind, whence it is we should derive that error of having recourse to God in all our designs and enterprises, to call Him to our assistance in all sorts of affairs, and in all places where our weakness stands in need of support, without considering whether the occasion be just or otherwise; and to invoke His name and power, in what state soever we are, or action we are engaged in, howsoever vicious. He is indeed, our sole and unique protector, and can do all things for us: but though He is pleased to honour us with this sweet paternal alliance, He is, notwithstanding, as just as He is good and mighty; and more often exercises His justice than His power, and favours us according to that, and not according to our petitions.
Plato in his Laws, makes three sorts of belief injurious to the gods; "that there are none; that they concern not themselves about our affairs; that they never refuse anything to our vows, offerings, and sacrifices." The first of these errors (according to his opinion, never continued rooted in any man from his infancy to his old age); the other two, he confesses, men might be obstinate in.
God's justice and His power are inseparable; 'tis in vain we invoke His power in an unjust cause. We are to have our souls pure and clean, at that moment at least wherein we pray to Him, and purified from all vicious passions; otherwise we ourselves present Him the rods wherewith to chastise us; instead of repairing anything we have done amiss, we double the wickedness and the offence when we offer to Him, to whom we are to sue for pardon, an affection full of irreverence and hatred. Which makes me not very apt to applaud those whom I observe to be so frequent on their knees, if the actions nearest to the prayer do not give me some evidence of amendment and reformation:
Si, nocturnus adultery,
Tempora Santonico velas adoperta cucullo.
[If a night adulterer, thou coverest thy head with a Santonic cowl. —Juvenal, Sat., viii. 144. (The Santones were the people who inhabited Saintonge in France, from whom the Romans derived the use of hoods or cowls covering the head and face.)]
And the practice of a man who mixes devotion with an execrable life seems in some sort more to be condemned than that of a man conformable to his own propension and dissolute throughout; and for that reason it is that our Church denies admittance to and communion with men obstinate and incorrigible in any notorious wickedness. We pray only by custom and for fashion's sake; or rather, we read or pronounce our prayers aloud, which is no better than an hypocritical show of devotion; and I am scandalised to see a man cross himself thrice at the Benedicite, and as often at Grace (and the more, because it is a sign I have in great veneration and continual use, even when I yawn), and to dedicate all the other hours of the day to acts of malice, avarice, and injustice. One hour to God, the rest to the devil, as if by composition and compensation. 'Tis a wonder to see actions so various in themselves succeed one another with such an uniformity of method as not to interfere nor suffer any alteration, even upon the very confines and passes from the one to the other. What a prodigious conscience must that be that can be at quiet within itself whilst it harbours under the same roof, with so agreeing and so calm a society, both the crime and the judge?
A man whose whole meditation is continually working upon nothing but impurity which he knows to be so odious to Almighty God, what can he say when he comes to speak to Him? He draws back, but immediately falls into a relapse. If the object of divine justice and the presence of his Maker did, as he pretends, strike and chastise his soul, how short soever the repentance might be, the very fear of offending the Infinite Majesty would so often present itself to his imagination that he would soon see himself master of those vices that are most natural and vehement in him. But what shall we say of those who settle their whole course of life upon the profit and emolument of sins, which they know to be mortal? How many trades and vocations have we admitted and countenanced amongst us, whose very essence is vicious? And he that, confessing himself to me, voluntarily told me that he had all his lifetime professed and practised a religion, in his opinion damnable and contrary to that he had in his heart, only to preserve his credit and the honour of his employments, how could his courage suffer so infamous a confession? What can men say to the divine justice upon this subject?
Their repentance consisting in a visible and manifest reparation, they lose the colour of alleging it both to God and man. Are they so impudent as to sue for remission without satisfaction and without penitence? I look upon these as in the same condition with the first: but the obstinacy is not there so easy to be overcome. This contrariety and volubility of opinion so sudden, so violent, that they feign, are a kind of miracle to me: they present us with the state of an indigestible agony of mind.
It seemed to me a fantastic imagination in those who, these late years past, were wont to reproach every man they knew to be of any extraordinary parts, and made profession of the Catholic religion, that it was but outwardly; maintaining, moreover, to do him honour forsooth, that whatever he might pretend to the contrary he could not but in his heart be of their reformed opinion. An untoward disease, that a man should be so riveted to his own belief as to fancy that others cannot believe otherwise than as he does; and yet worse, that they should entertain so vicious an opinion of such great parts as to think any man so qualified, should prefer any present advantage of fortune to the promises of eternal life and the menaces of eternal damnation. They may believe me: could anything have tempted my youth, the ambition of the danger and difficulties in the late commotions had not been the least motives.
It is not without very good reason, in my opinion, that the Church interdicts the promiscuous, indiscreet, and irreverent use of the holy and divine Psalms, with which the Holy Ghost inspired King David. We ought not to mix God in our actions, but with the highest reverence and caution; that poesy is too holy to be put to no other use than to exercise the lungs and to delight our ears; it ought to come from the conscience, and not from the tongue. It is not fit that a prentice in his shop, amongst his vain and frivolous thoughts, should be permitted to pass away his time and divert himself with such sacred things. Neither is it decent to see the Holy Book of the holy mysteries of our belief tumbled up and down a hall or a kitchen they were formerly mysteries, but are now become sports and recreations. 'Tis a book too serious and too venerable to be cursorily or slightly turned over: the reading of the scripture ought to be a temperate and premeditated act, and to which men should always add this devout preface, 'sursum corda', preparing even the body to so humble and composed a gesture and countenance as shall evidence a particular veneration and attention. Neither is it a book for everyone to fist, but the study of select men set apart for that purpose, and whom Almighty God has been pleased to call to that office and sacred function: the wicked and ignorant grow worse by it. 'Tis, not a story to tell, but a history to revere, fear, and adore. Are not they then pleasant men who think they have rendered this fit for the people's handling by translating it into the vulgar tongue? Does the understanding of all therein contained only stick at words? Shall I venture to say further, that by coming so near to understand a little, they are much wider of the whole scope than before. A pure and simple ignorance and wholly depending upon the exposition of qualified persons, was far more learned and salutary than this vain and verbal knowledge, which has only temerity and presumption.
And I do further believe that the liberty every one has taken to disperse the sacred writ into so many idioms carries with it a great deal more of danger than utility. The Jews, Mohammedans, and almost all other peoples, have reverentially espoused the language wherein their mysteries were first conceived, and have expressly, and not without colour of reason, forbidden the alteration of them into any other. Are we assured that in Biscay and in Brittany there are enough competent judges of this affair to establish this translation into their own language? The universal Church has not a more difficult and solemn judgment to make. In preaching and speaking the interpretation is vague, free, mutable, and of a piece by itself; so 'tis not the same thing.
One of our Greek historians age justly censures the he lived in, because the secrets of the Christian religion were dispersed into the hands of every mechanic, to expound and argue upon, according to his own fancy, and that we ought to be much ashamed, we who by God's especial favour enjoy the pure mysteries of piety, to suffer them to be profaned by the ignorant rabble; considering that the Gentiles expressly forbad Socrates, Plato, and the other sages to inquire into or so much as mention the things committed to the priests of Delphi; and he says, moreover, that the factions of princes upon theological subjects are armed not with zeal but fury; that zeal springs from the divine wisdom and justice, and governs itself with prudence and moderation, but degenerates into hatred and envy, producing tares and nettles instead of corn and wine when conducted by human passions. And it was truly said by another, who, advising the Emperor Theodosius, told him that disputes did not so much rock the schisms of the Church asleep, as it roused and animated heresies; that, therefore, all contentions and dialectic disputations were to be avoided, and men absolutely to acquiesce in the prescriptions and formulas of faith established by the ancients. And the Emperor Andronicus having overheard some great men at high words in his palace with Lapodius about a point of ours of great importance, gave them so severe a check as to threaten to cause them to be thrown into the river if they did not desist. The very women and children nowadays take upon them to lecture the oldest and most experienced men about the ecclesiastical laws; whereas the first of those of Plato forbids them to inquire so much as into the civil laws, which were to stand instead of divine ordinances; and, allowing the old men to confer amongst themselves or with the magistrate about those things, he adds, provided it be not in the presence of young or profane persons.
A bishop has left in writing that at the other end of the world there is an isle, by the ancients called Dioscorides, abundantly fertile in all sorts of trees and fruits, and of an exceedingly healthful air; the inhabitants of which are Christians, having churches and altars, only adorned with crosses without any other images, great observers of fasts and feasts, exact payers of their tithes to the priests, and so chaste, that none of them is permitted to have to do with more than one woman in his life—[What Osorius says is that these people only had one wife at a time.]—as to the rest, so content with their condition, that environed with the sea they know nothing of navigation, and so simple that they understand not one syllable of the religion they profess and wherein they are so devout: a thing incredible to such as do not know that the Pagans, who are so zealous idolaters, know nothing more of their gods than their bare names and their statues. The ancient beginning of 'Menalippus', a tragedy of Euripides, ran thus:
O Jupiter! for that name alone
Of what thou art to me is known.
I have also known in my time some men's writings found fault with for being purely human and philosophical, without any mixture of theology; and yet, with some show of reason, it might, on the contrary, be said that the divine doctrine, as queen and regent of the rest, better keeps her state apart, that she ought to be sovereign throughout, not subsidiary and suffragan, and that, peradventure, grammatical, rhetorical, logical examples may elsewhere be more suitably chosen, as also the material for the stage, games, and public entertainments, than from so sacred a matter; that divine reasons are considered with greater veneration and attention by themselves, and in their own proper style, than when mixed with and adapted to human discourse; that it is a fault much more often observed that the divines write too humanly, than that the humanists write not theologically enough. Philosophy, says St. Chrysostom, has long been banished the holy schools, as an handmaid altogether useless and thought unworthy to look, so much as in passing by the door, into the sanctuary of the holy treasures of the celestial doctrine; that the human way of speaking is of a much lower form and ought not to adopt for herself the dignity and majesty of divine eloquence. Let who will 'verbis indisciplinatis' talk of fortune, destiny, accident, good and evil hap, and other suchlike phrases, according to his own humour; I for my part propose fancies merely human and merely my own, and that simply as human fancies, and separately considered, not as determined by any decree from heaven, incapable of doubt or dispute; matter of opinion, not matter of faith; things which I discourse of according to my own notions, not as I believe, according to God; after a laical, not clerical, and yet always after a very religious manner, as children prepare their exercises, not to instruct but to be instructed.
And might it not be said, that an edict enjoining all people but such as are public professors of divinity, to be very reserved in writing of religion, would carry with it a very good colour of utility and justice—and to me, amongst the rest peradventure, to hold my prating? I have been told that even those who are not of our Church nevertheless amongst themselves expressly forbid the name of God to be used in common discourse, nor so much even by way of interjection, exclamation, assertion of a truth, or comparison; and I think them in the right: upon what occasion soever we call upon God to accompany and assist us, it ought always to be done with the greatest reverence and devotion.
There is, as I remember, a passage in Xenophon where he tells us that we ought so much the more seldom to call upon God, by how much it is hard to compose our souls to such a degree of calmness, patience, and devotion as it ought to be in at such a time; otherwise our prayers are not only vain and fruitless, but vicious: "forgive us," we say, "our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us"; what do we mean by this petition but that we present to God a soul free from all rancour and revenge? And yet we make nothing of invoking God's assistance in our vices, and inviting Him into our unjust designs:
Quae, nisi seductis, nequeas committere divis
[Which you can only impart to the gods, when you have gained them over. —Persius, ii. 4.]
the covetous man prays for the conservation of his vain and superfluous riches; the ambitious for victory and the good conduct of his fortune; the thief calls Him to his assistance, to deliver him from the dangers and difficulties that obstruct his wicked designs, or returns Him thanks for the facility he has met with in cutting a man's throat; at the door of the house men are going to storm or break into by force of a petard, they fall to prayers for success, their intentions and hopes of cruelty, avarice, and lust.
Hoc igitur, quo to Jovis aurem impellere tentas,
Dic agedum Staio: 'proh Jupiter! O bone, clamet,
Jupiter!' At sese non clamet Jupiter ipse.
[This therefore, with which you seek to draw the ear of Jupiter, say to Staius. 'O Jupiter! O good Jupiter!' let him cry. Think you Jupiter himself would not cry out upon it? —Persius, ii. 21.]
Marguerite, Queen of Navarre,—[In the Heptameron.]—tells of a young prince, who, though she does not name him, is easily enough by his great qualities to be known, who going upon an amorous assignation to lie with an advocate's wife of Paris, his way thither being through a church, he never passed that holy place going to or returning from his pious exercise, but he always kneeled down to pray. Wherein he would employ the divine favour, his soul being full of such virtuous meditations, I leave others to judge, which, nevertheless, she instances for a testimony of singular devotion. But this is not the only proof we have that women are not very fit to treat of theological affairs.
A true prayer and religious reconciling of ourselves to Almighty God cannot enter into an impure soul, subject at the very time to the dominion of Satan. He who calls God to his assistance whilst in a course of vice, does as if a cut-purse should call a magistrate to help him, or like those who introduce the name of God to the attestation of a lie.
Tacito mala vota susurro Concipimus.
[We whisper our guilty prayers. —Lucan, v. 104.]
There are few men who durst publish to the world the prayers they make to Almighty God:
Haud cuivis promptum est, murmurque, humilesque susurrus
Tollere de templis, et aperto vivere voto
['Tis not convenient for every one to bring the prayers he mutters out of the temple, and to give his wishes to the public ear. —Persius, ii. 6.]
and this is the reason why the Pythagoreans would have them always public and heard by every one, to the end they might not prefer indecent or unjust petitions as this man:
Clare quum dixit, Apollo!
Labra movet, metuens audiri: Pulcra Laverna,
Da mihi fallere, da justum sanctumque videri;
Noctem peccatis, et fraudibus objice nubem.
[When he has clearly said Apollo! he moves his lips, fearful to be heard; he murmurs: O fair Laverna, grant me the talent to deceive; grant me to appear holy and just; shroud my sins with night, and cast a cloud over my frauds. —Horace, Ep., i. 16, 59. (Laverna was the goddess of thieves.)]
The gods severely punished the wicked prayers of OEdipus in granting them: he had prayed that his children might amongst themselves determine the succession to his throne by arms, and was so miserable as to see himself taken at his word. We are not to pray that all things may go as we would have them, but as most concurrent with prudence.
We seem, in truth, to make use of our prayers as of a kind of jargon, and as those do who employ holy words about sorceries and magical operations; and as if we reckoned the benefit we are to reap from them as depending upon the contexture, sound, and jingle of words, or upon the grave composing of the countenance. For having the soul contaminated with concupiscence, not touched with repentance, or comforted by any late reconciliation with God, we go to present Him such words as the memory suggests to the tongue, and hope from thence to obtain the remission of our sins. There is nothing so easy, so sweet, and so favourable, as the divine law: it calls and invites us to her, guilty and abominable as we are; extends her arms and receives us into her bosom, foul and polluted as we at present are, and are for the future to be. But then, in return, we are to look upon her with a respectful eye; we are to receive this pardon with all gratitude and submission, and for that instant at least, wherein we address ourselves to her, to have the soul sensible of the ills we have committed, and at enmity with those passions that seduced us to offend her; neither the gods nor good men (says Plato) will accept the present of a wicked man:
Immunis aram si terigit manus,
Non sumptuosa blandior hostia
Mollivit aversos Penates
Farre pio et saliente mica.
[If a pure hand has touched the altar, the pious offering of a small cake and a few grains of salt will appease the offended gods more effectually than costly sacrifices. —Horace, Od., iii. 23, 17.]


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Family Support
Families are overwhelmingly the primary source of support for their family member with I/DD. Nearly three quarters of people with I/DD live in the family home and, according to The Arc of the U.S.'s Family and Individual Needs for Disability Supports (FINDS) survey, most of these family caregivers provide more than 40 hours of care per week (including 40% who provide more than 80 hours of care per week). Our service system is increasingly being built around the expectation that adults with I/DD will reside in the family home.
Very little federal and state funding for persons with I/DD is committed to family support, despite increasing numbers of people with I/DD living with family for longer periods. Consequently, though family support is critical for avoiding placement in costly and inappropriate institutions for the family member with I/DD, the needed supports are frequently insufficient or unavailable.
There is no comprehensive family support system in the Pennsylvania. Philadelphia IDS can, in some circumstances, assist families through Base funded services or supports. Some people are able to get respite and other services through either the Person/Family Directed Services, Consolidated or Autism waiver.
The Arc of Philadelphia's Position
The Arc of Philadelphia supports comprehensive family support. Family support should be available across the lifespan of Pennsylvanian's with I/DD, involve parents, siblings and extended family and should include the following: availability of respite care, connection to respite resources, family training, peer networks/support, facilitation of person-centered planning.
What are we doing?
1 to 1 advocacy


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Euro babe Alexis Crystal is on her way on the store when she literally bumps into Ricky Rascal, who has traveled abroad to learn more about a distant relative. The two hit it off right away and joke about how funny it would be if they were related. Alexis lets him into the building, then invites him in for tea so he can tell her about his family. Since Ricky has been so open with her, Alexis shares that everyone in her family has a v-shaped birthmark on her butt. She agrees to show it to Ricky. Pulling down her jeans, Alexis shows off her birthmark as well as her juicy delight of her pussy. Ricky asks to take a picture and Alexis allows it as long as it's just of her birthmark. Ricky secretly takes a bunch of other pics, too. When Alexis turns around, she sees that Ricky has also pulled his hardon out of his pants. He admits it's bad, but she makes him horny. Alexis likes bad and she likes the look of Ricky's dick. Dropping to the ground with her pants still around her knees, Alexis takes the large fuck rod in hand and mouth to explore it further. Her mouth slides along the shaft and engulfs Ricky's balls before she starts a full-on, deep throat BJ.Climbing onto Ricky's lap, Alexis takes him for a spin as she rides him in cowgirl and then reverse cowgirl. Then she lets her new lover bend her over the table and dominate her greedy snatch from behind. Loving every moment of it, Alexis hops onto the table so Ricky can feast on her landing strip twat before he shoves himself back inside. When Ricky pulls out and covers Alexis's belly with jizz, Alexis grabs a biscuit and enjoys it topped with her salty treat. It's only when Ricky is on his way out the door to clean up that Alexis realizes that her new lover has aa v-shaped birthmark on his butt, too, marking him as a distant relative.
Family Secrets – S13:E4
Date: December 8, 2021
Alexis Crystal


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Transcript: Blogging (Part 13): On frequency
Posted: - Modified: | blogging, tips, writingHat-tip to Holly Tse for organizing this interview!
Holly Tse: This is a question that probably is worth asking again, because Charles has sent another question about your recommendation if you should write every day, or every week, or just write when the fancy takes us. He says, "I know that having a regular deadline or writing quota has a positive benifit." Do you use any deadlines or quotas when you're writing your blog?
Sacha Chua: In terms of choosing a quota for my blog – and I have a blog post about this called "One post a day" – my quota is actually in the reverse direction. I found myself so excited that I was writing so much… I thought, well, all these people are getting e-mails, and they're subscribed to all this stuff… Maybe I should throttle it down to one blog post a day. If you stop and you think about it, you learn so much each day. You experience so much each day. If you don't have at least one thing worth writing about each day, there's more in your life that you can hack and improve. There's so much going on each day. For me, blogging has become such a useful tool that I like writing every day.
Some days are a little slower than others. Maybe I have a hard time grasping for the right thing to say. I've posted my thoughts on grocery shopping, for example. For the most part, I just sit down and I think, "What did I learn today that somebody else might want to learn?" "What do I want to do to make things better the next day?" There's always an opportunity to do this.
It all depends on your comfort level. You can write every week, every month, sporadically if you want to… On the other hand, if you flipped it around and you stopped thinking, "I'm going to have to blog; what do I blog today?" and you think, "Well, there's so much happening in life; what do I want to write about most? What do I most want to remember? What do I most want to share?" You're surrounded by stories. You're surrounded by ideas. Then you just have to deal with the frustration of not being able to get it all out and into other people's heads as easily as you want to do so! There's just so much to write about. Write as often as you can. Write because it helps you, not just because you need to. Write as a way to have fun, and learn more about yourself and life and everything.
HT: Good answer. Basically, whatever works for you.
SC: Whatever works for you, but you know, this writing daily thing is actually really really awesome. Of course, I'm going to be nice. I'm not going to stand over you with a whip and say, "Back to work! You haven't written your blog post for the day." But life is just full of awesome amazing things. Even though it seems like sitting down and writing for fifteen minutes or thirty minutes is an interruption that takes you away from your day, if you flip it around–if you write in the process of doing something…
For example, if I'm working with a particularly knotty programming problem or I'm trying to figure out a difficult decision, I'm not waiting until the end, when I'm busy and other things demand my time; I'm writing in the process of figuring things out. Then, afterwards, it's just: Can I tidy these notes up and share them with other people? Which parts am I saving in my private notes, and which parts am I sharing on my blog? That takes five minutes, ten minutes to clean things up for other people after I've been writing in the process of learning.
Something I'd recommend too: don't just sit down and think, "I've got to write a blog post; what am I going to write about?" Use it to learn. Use it in the process of living. Then decide: Is this something I can share with other people? What can I do to this so that I can share it with other people? Then you'll find that your life is full of material.


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The jaguar (Panthera onca), is a wild cat species and the only extant member of the genus Panthera native to the Americas. The jaguar's present range extends from Southwestern United States and Mexico across much of Central America and south to Paraguay and northern Argentina. Though there are single cats now living within the western United States, the species has largely been extirpated from the United States since the early 20th century. It is listed as Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List; and its numbers are declining. Threats include loss and fragmentation of habitat.
The jaguar is the largest cat species in the Americas and the third-largest after the tiger and the lion. This spotted cat closely resembles the leopard, but is usually larger and sturdier. It ranges across a variety of forested and open terrains, but its preferred habitat is tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forest, swamps and wooded regions. The jaguar enjoys swimming and is largely a solitary, opportunistic, stalk-and-ambush predator at the top of the food chain. As a keystone species it plays an important role in stabilizing ecosystems and regulating prey populations.
While international trade in jaguar or its body parts is prohibited, the cat is still frequently killed, particularly in conflicts with ranchers and farmers in South America. Although reduced, its range remains large. Given its historical distribution, the jaguar has featured prominently in the mythology of numerous indigenous American cultures, including those of the Maya and Aztec.
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A decade ago, I went to lunch with Gore Vidal at his house in Ravello. That house (since abandoned) and that sort of occasion have been written about so often by Vidal's guests and interviewers, and by Vidal himself, that there is little to say that hasn't been said. It is a beautiful place, if you like houses perched on cliffs, with an epic view of the Tyrrhenian Sea (somewhere in the hazy distance south of Salerno are the remains of the Greek settlement at Paestum). If you don't like houses perched on cliffs, then the blinding absence of a horizon at noon on a summer's day and the steep plunge to the road below are unnerving.
Before lunch there was swimming, and the vague sense of being sized up. The host reclined on a beach chair under an umbrella dressed in a faded denim shirt and a pair of ancient, stained trousers, his white hair immaculately whipped above a face somewhat hidden by a pair of huge Imelda Marcos dark glasses – this combination of tremendous care and inattention the style of a Sicilian mafioso, his patrician composure suggestive of Burt Lancaster playing Lampedusa's Leopard. Neither Vidal nor Howard Auster, his long-standing companion, swam in the pool, which was even more impressively blue than the sea at the foot of the cliff. Sunshine, cypresses, cicadas, scented air, the physical drama: all the sense-heightening Mediterranean stuff. Kurt Vonnegut, a house guest, had disappeared: his photographer wife, Jill Krementz, couldn't find him anywhere on the eight acres of the Vidal estate. Vidal, who seemed to know something about Vonnegut his wife didn't, presumed that Vonnegut only wanted for a while to be out of range of the marital camera. This was true; Vonnegut eventually returned.
Lunch inside the house at a glass table, the throne-like chairs used in a scene in Ben Hur: four were made for the movie, which Vidal helped script – uncredited, he said – and he had two more made for his dining-room. As I sat down, opposite Vidal and next to Auster, I accidentally knocked Auster's shin. 'I like it harder,' he said. The drawing-room, sofas, books. On a console table, photographs of many famous people. 'Some family, some friends,' Vidal said, with weary affection. Those on display were some of the people Vidal writes about in Palimpsest and Point to Point Navigation, his new memoir, people he's not always generous about. His affection for and dislike of those he knows, or knew: this is central to Vidal's ambivalence about America and Americans, friends and friends as enemies, his loving and loathing of it and them, and more generally his two minds about the United States. Some are in two minds about Gore Vidal: they admire his wit but consider him insufficiently American or, some say, anti-American. They're wrong: what he's against is anyone who is willing to be led, anyone who says they must be followed.
'Likeable' isn't a word you would use to describe Vidal. 'Irrepressible' is one word you would. He's written 29 novels, hundreds of essays and the two memoirs: it is a daunting bibliography, and no obvious starting-point presents itself, other than the man himself. In Two Sisters, his 'novel as memoir, memoir as novel', the narrator, V., an idealised Vidal, says: 'In a sense, the only purpose of life is the creation of a self and what matters is the sum total of all one's attempts.' There have been many attempts, and many lives. As well as being a novelist, satirist, playwright, essayist, formerly an American abroad now an American at home, Vidal is a television and radio wit, patrician, actor, conversationalist, self-made man, host and sometime Congressional candidate. Anti the American empire he is, but he's a bit of an empire himself. Or a caste.
There's the Vidal who appears in Two Sisters and the Vidal who appears as his young self in his Roosevelt novel, The Golden Age. There's the ventriloquist Vidal, recognisable in some of his historical characters – Aaron Burr and the Emperor Julian – as well as in his satires. In Burr, Charles Schuyler, a character invented by Vidal to be this vice president's biographer, says his subject is 'a man of perfect charm and fascination. A monster, in short.' Not unlike the novel's author. 'I suspect Cromwell was right,' Vice President Burr tells Schuyler, 'the man who does not know where he is going goes farthest. Talleyrand used to tell me that for the great man all is accident. Obviously, he was not a great man since he survived by careful planning, by never showing his true feelings. You must learn that art, Charlie.' Vidal hasn't known many accidents, or he's chosen not to write about them if he has. He doesn't show his feelings, but he doesn't hide himself either. He is at his fullest as a memoirist. His essays are his achievement, but Palimpsest is his best book. You can't help wondering if he isn't gloomy about the essayist's reputation and its fragility. Essays are addressed to the times in which they are written, as they must be, alive one moment, often inert the next, but he has little reason to be concerned about that: Vidal knows as well as anyone that in America things have a habit of repeating themselves; many of his old essays have more life than recent ones.
The political Vidal dominates. If you don't believe that every human action is motivated either by politics or considerations of personal gain, then Vidal's writing, his novels especially, will be less rewarding. His protagonists are forceful, knowing, rational, sometimes monsters. Power and fame, getting ahead: these are essential American themes; and the lengths some go to achieve power and, once in possession of it, go about protecting and expanding it the better to coerce others, these are Vidal's favourite subjects. His versions of Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt and Emperor Julian are all more or less dictatorial. 'How candid I am,' Vidal's Julian says. 'I have never admitted to anyone that in my first encounter with Constantius, all that I could think about was how much I should like the dominion of the earth.' One of Vidal's best essays is on the Oz novels of L. Frank Baum, and like Baum, Vidal is curious about the extreme forms of power that arise in democracies. In Glinda of Oz, the last in the series, the Supreme Dictator explains himself: 'I'm the Supreme Dictator of all, and I am elected once a year. This is a democracy, you know, where people are allowed to vote for their rulers. A good many would like to be Supreme Dictator, but as I made a law that I am always to count the votes myself, I am always elected.' Vidal read Baum as a child, but the influence of the Oz books has lasted, and like many Americans, Vidal believes that some out-of-the-ordinary voting has gone on in recent US elections. The computerised voting machines selected by some states for elections can't even produce a paper record of the votes they've collected: it's impossible to count them by hand. What wizard came up with that idea, and why such mania to improve on a piece of paper?
From the beginning, Vidal was a writer who set out to prevail. He went about trying to outperform, or push aside, those who challenged what he believed was his position at the head of the post-World War Two pack. He wasn't pleased when Truman Capote appeared on his tail, and was infuriated when Capote professed an intimacy with André Gide greater than his own – though this proved to be Capote's embellishment, proof for Vidal that embellishment was what Capote was best at. Nor was he tremendously happy when Norman Mailer published The Naked and the Dead. He caught up, and in the seven years after 1945 wrote seven novels. He wasn't satisfied with the first few. The one he likes least, In a Yellow Wood (1947), was written when he was briefly an editor at a New York publishing house, and is about a man presented with a choice between the office and life. He thinks his authorial voice didn't properly appear until The Judgment of Paris (1952), a tale of an American living in Europe among Americans far wealthier than himself, who decides as he meanders from Paris to Rome that life isn't about choices but doing what you want to do. Avoiding other people's demands is the best way to keep going. That was the path taken by Vidal.
In New York in the late 1940s and early 1950s, he pursued a life on the town, and was intimate with Anaïs Nin, who was besotted with his good looks, as he with hers for a time. He bought a Neoclassical pile upstate, with views over the Hudson and a colonnade painted white to give the appearance of marble when seen from a distance. Edgewater, Vidal's Hudson home, is identical to the New York houses described by Tocqueville in Democracy in America, constructions with wooden columns that proved to Tocqueville that in the US appearance counted more than reality. Vidal, too, thinks that reality is less important than appearance, and one of his aims has been to appear more American than anyone else.
As he made his name, the US went to war in Korea. The US was also involved in covert activities, such as massaging a coup in Iran and another in Guatemala, where Vidal bought a convent, cheaply, and lived for several years in the late 1940s, having persuaded his father to give him the money that might have been spent on the Harvard education he declined. Guatemala led to Dark Green, Bright Red (1950), a novel about the way the US and the United Fruit Company went about furthering their interests in Central America. Vidal was quick to notice the consequences of the Cold War in the US, and the conformity he thought it inspired. Like Mailer, he believed that American society in the 1950s had been put to sleep by government-manufactured fears and hatreds, by religion, and by the relentless talk that all was well in the US when it wasn't. His response was to talk and to write, just as relentlessly.
Tennessee Williams, who first met Vidal in Rome in 1948, the year the CIA orchestrated the outcome of the Italian elections, said: 'I wonder if any other living writer is going to keep at it as ferociously, unremittingly as Vidal. He has a mania for bringing out one book a year. They are now stacked up like planes over an airport, waiting for the runway.' Williams probably didn't know when making his dig that Vidal's father, Gene, one of Amelia Earhart's lovers, was a founder of the US airline business and served as Roosevelt's air commissioner in the 1930s. He may not have known either that Vidal's mother, judging from Vidal's account, resembled one of Williams's 'monster women' – Vidal's phrase for those figures of self-destruction in Williams's plays. Nina Gore, the daughter of a blind senator from Oklahoma, divorced Vidal's father in 1935 and next married Hughdie Auchincloss, who later became stepfather to Jackie Kennedy. She had eight children with different husbands, but wasn't apparently much of a mother to any of them. She was a drinker, and a lover of Clark Gable's. Vidal isn't entirely forthcoming about his mother and father: his parents' lovers, it seems, are more important for him, and count as evidence that everyone is so very closely connected with everyone else in the US, and so very closely connected with Vidal.
Vidal couldn't stop writing books; nor did he stop going to bed with men: more than a thousand, he's said of his immediate postwar conquests. 'Not a world record': which isn't intended as modesty. 'I have always depended upon the kindness of strangers,' says V. in Two Sisters. 'Why is that such a powerful line? It keeps going through my head. Maybe it's because it's strangers I like in bed.' Maybe, but the line is Blanche DuBois's in A Streetcar Named Desire, and echoes what she's already said: 'Yes, I had many intimacies with strangers. After the death of Allan intimacies with strangers was all I seemed able to fill my empty heart with. I think it was panic, just panic, that drove me from one to another, hunting for protection.' You couldn't say that Vidal has hunted for protection, or known panic, but he has hunted for trouble.
There is some confusion about these matters in Palimpsest, and again in Point to Point Navigation. His boyhood love, Jimmy Trimble, was, he says, his twin, a perfect double self. He died at Iwo Jima. He appears under his own name in Vidal's Lincoln, popping up as a steward. But Trimble's death as motivation for Vidal's will to succeed? Suppressed love as the engine for Vidal's enormous output? Fifty years ago, Vidal told Christopher Isherwood that he was an enemy of love. It involved too much entanglement; and entanglements of any kind, whether they are conducted by an individual or by the US government, were too European for this American, for whom everything personal has a political dimension. For him, entanglements can't fail to end with friendships destroyed and people getting hurt.
In 'Reflections on Glory Reflected', the last essay in his massive omnibus United States, Vidal tries to explain why he left New York for Rome before he turned 40. He says it was important to distance himself from his illustrious family. But how illustrious was that family, really, and doesn't his associating himself with its illustriousness, such as it was, detract from the more interesting self-made life? 'I knew from the start that I was out for Glory,' he wrote in that essay. 'Unlike Henry Adams' – the writer Vidal fondly compares his own work to – 'I got out at 17, and vowed that if I was not elected to anything, I would not come back to live in the capital when there were so many other worlds and glories elsewhere.' He hasn't gone back, but he has marked his grave in Washington's Rock Creek cemetery, not far from Henry Adams's tomb and next to the grave of Howard Auster, who died three years ago. A more plausible explanation for his departure from America was this: 'I live in Italy because it's a good vantage point from which to look at the United States. After all, I don't write about anything other than the fact of being American. I have no other subject.'
There were, of course, many worlds for Vidal elsewhere: travels through Greece with Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, gluttonous and bibulous tours of French restaurants with his editor Jason Epstein, conversations with his Roman neighbour Italo Calvino, lunch with E.M. Forster, chat with Princess Margaret. But in Rome there were only months of reading, and Old Glory. Few people have identified themselves as closely with the history of their own country as Vidal has – General de Gaulle maybe. In Italy, he began his series of historical novels on the making of the American empire. In his essays, he pours acid over glamorous versions of the US and its history, attacking those who were too cosy with power or who idealised American democracy or thought too much of US leaders, or who created myths about the so-called founding fathers.
'Even those who write knowledgeably about politics tend to make certain fundamental errors,' he wrote in 'Barry Goldwater: A Chat', an essay published in the early 1960s. 'They look for subtle motives where there are none. They believe there is a long-range plan of war when there is seldom anything more than quick last-minute deployments of troops before unscheduled battle. In a society like ours, politics is improvisation. To the artful dodger rather than the true believer goes the prize.' This is a view of American politics Vidal no longer seems to hold as firmly as he did, or so Point to Point Navigation suggests. He believes the Bush administration did have a long-range plan of war in the Middle East, even if the president himself is an artful dodger – the better to hide the true believers, the neocons, who hid in the wings and went about what Vidal considers their imperial work. 'It suits courtiers to keep the great people apart,' he writes in Julian, 'thereby increasing the importance of intermediaries who are able to hurry from one wing of the palace to another, making mischief and policy as they go.' That's a passage that might have come straight from the pages of Castiglione's The Courtier, but it's also a fair description of the way the neoconservatives conduct their business.
A palimpsest is a parchment on which words are written over and over again, each act of writing partially erasing the earlier ones. All of Vidal's books are to a greater or lesser extent palimpsests. Refrains from Palimpsest reappear in Point to Point Navigation, just as in Palimpsest echoes of Vidal's essays and novels and interviews are heard again. In Palimpsest, there's the sense of a life coalescing, but in Point to Point Navigation something stranger is going on. It's as if Vidal is trying to cancel himself out until there's nothing left to write, like someone finally drinking up the wine cellar they have been laying down throughout their life. But it would be a mistake to think that Point to Point Navigation represents the musings of an elderly man whose disappointments are only now surfacing, just as it would be wrong to dismiss Vidal as a know-it-all with a grating I-told-you-so style. He's been as alert to the troubles the Bush administration has created as anyone else.
One question Vidal asks of his readers is: how American are you if you aren't in two minds about the US? Another is: how well can you know the US if you're not? These two questions tended not to be asked in the patriotic boom that followed 9/11, a time that allowed for authoritarian measures and actions that Vidal has warned Americans about for years. It is astonishing that the best American critics of the Bush administration have been successful, well-known novelists and writers over the age of 70: Vidal, Norman Mailer, Philip Roth, Arthur Schlesinger, Susan Sontag and Joan Didion among them. Jaundiced about American good intentions, unaffected by the roar of sentimentality after 9/11, they saw what armies of better informed, younger journalists couldn't or refused to see.
'The line between liberating the world and enslaving the world is amazingly thin,' the liberal Paul Berman wrote in 1996, before later endorsing Bush's wars. 'Likewise, the line between liberating the world and throwing yourself off a cliff.' Vidal thinks the US left the top of the cliff years ago: it's what happens at the bottom that's more the concern.
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According to local people about a century ago, a man was hired to clean the bush on top of the hill on the outskirts of Penal. After clearing some bush, he tried to sharpen his sword on a stone protruding on hill. Suddenly, the stone chipped and milk flowed from the stone. Some people also say that blood flowed from it. After the incident the man lost his eyesight.
But he realized the power existing there and soon a small Shiva shrine was erected and he took care of the divine Shivling. Being blind he could not take care of the lingam properly and the man prayed to Shiva to have his eyes restored. It is said that soon he got back his sight and devoted his entire life to the care of temple. Now, his family members are the custodians of the temple.
Thousands of devotees visit the shrine during Shivratri and on holidays. A highlight of the place is the numerous flags left by devotees known as jhandi flags.


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Missouri Tornado Deadliest In U.S. History [PHOTOS]
Sunday's tornado in Joplin, Missouri is now the deadliest in the U.S. since records of tornado fatalities began being kept more than 60 years ago, CNN reported.
As of Tuesday, 118 people were reported killed by the twister, and Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon said he expected that number to rise as more bodies are uncovered from the rubble.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency reported that about 2,000 structures were destroyed by the tornado. Below are images of the widespread devastation.


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Austin, TX – Operation Rescue has been informed that the Texas Medical Board (TMB) has scheduled five more abortionists to appear at Informal Show Compliance and Settlement Conferences based on complaints of abortion abuses made by Operation Rescue. The complaints were the result of a three-month undercover investigation conducted by Operation Rescue with the assistance of The Survivors.
Robert L. Prince, Margaret Kouril Kini, Pedro J. Kowalyszyn, H. Brook Randal, and Sherwood C. Lynn are scheduled to appear before the TMB on July 25, 2012, beginning at 11:00 AM. Operation Rescue's complaints included evidence of numerous violations, including the illegal dumping of private patient medical records, violations of the informed consent laws, and failure to report suspected child sex abuse.
In all ten abortionists, known as the "Texas Ten", have been summoned for hearings by the TMB.
Last month, the TMB disciplined two abortionists from the troubled Whole Women's Heath abortion chain, Alan H. Molson and Robert E. Hanson, based on Operation Rescue complaints. Molson, 60, and Hanson, 72, both admitted before the Board to conduct that constituted violations of the standards of patient care. Each were fined $3,000 and ordered to take continuing medical education classes in risk management.
Also as a result of Operation Rescue complaints, Whole Women's Health in Austin and McAllen, along with the waste disposal company Stericycle, were fined $83,000 for the illegal dumping of identifiable remains of aborted babies.
"During our undercover investigation of abortion clinics in Texas, we did not find a single abortion clinic that complied with the law," said Troy Newman, President of Operation Rescue and Pro-Life Nation. "There is now an official record that Whole Women's Health and other abortion businesses in Texas have broken the law. But our investigation revealed just the tip of the iceberg. This problem of abortion clinics violating health codes, standards of patient care, and even criminal statutes is prevalent at abortion clinics in every state."
Abortionists Franz Theard and Douglas A. Karpen are also facing Board discipline. Their hearings have been set for May 16, 2012.


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10K Training Plan - Level 7
10K Training Plan - Level 7
12 Weeks
Plan Description
The Cutting-Edge Runner 10K Training Plan, Level 7, is recommended for runners who want to complete a successful 10K race in 9 to 12 weeks and whose current fitness level allows them to run about 6 times per week, 40 to 60 minutes per run. You should also have recent experience with high-intensity workouts such as speed intervals and tempo runs before starting this plan.
The first 3 weeks of the plan are optional, making it adjustable from 9 to 12 weeks. If you choose to do fewer than 12 weeks of the plan, it is hoped that your recent training has been similar to the first 1-3 weeks of this plan.
The workout schedule includes 6 runs per week, plus 2 optional strength workouts per week. It begins with a weekly total of 4 hours and 5 minutes of running and builds up to 5 hours and 14 minutes.
All of the running workouts are based on the Cutting-Edge Runner Pace Zone Index (PZI), which allows you to do every step of every workout at precisely the right effort level for you. Learn more about the PZI system here: https://www.trainingpeaks.com/blog/using-pace-zone-index-pzi/ The PZI table that you will use to determine your zones based on a race race or time-trial performance is attached to the first workout in the plan itself.
Key workouts in this plan include the following:
Foundation Runs: Steady runs of 40 to 55 minutes done mainly at Moderate Aerobic pace (Pace Zone 3)
Foundation Runs + Strides: Foundation Runs followed by 4-6 30-second bursts at Speed pace (Pace Zone 10)
Long Runs: Steady runs of 1:00 to 1:45 done mainly at Moderate Aerobic pace
Fartlek Runs: Foundation-type runs including 30-second bursts at VO2max pace (Pace Zone 8)
Short Intervals (1): Runs featuring 30- to 60-second intervals at VO2max pace separated by jogging recoveries at Low Aerobic pace (Pace Zone 2)
Short Intervals (2): Runs featuring 60- to 90-second intervals at Speed pace (Pace Zone 10) separated by longer, 3-minute jogging recoveries
Long Intervals: Runs featuring 3-minute intervals at VO2max pace separated by jogging recoveries at Low Aerobic pace (Pace Zone 2)
Mixed Intervals: Runs featuring a mix of short and long intervals run in a variety of Pace Zones.
Cruise Intervals: Runs featuring a couple of longer intervals run at Threshold pace (Pace Zone 6)
Tempo Runs: Runs featuring a sustained segment of Threshold pace running sandwiched between a warm-up and cool-down
Weeks 4, 7, and 10 of the plan are recovery weeks. Training is slightly reduced in these weeks to afford an opportunity to absorb recent training and prepare for more challenging training to follow. Week 12 – race week – is a taper week, meaning training tapers down during the week to ensure you're rested and ready to perform on race day.
How it Works
Training Plan Sample Week
Average Weekly Breakdown
Workouts | Weekly Average | Longest Workout |
04:27:00 | 01:45:00 |
00:38:00 | 00:20:00 |
Day Off
—— | —— |
Workouts Per Week | Weekly Average | Longest Workout | |
04:27:00 | 01:45:00 | |
00:38:00 | 00:20:00 | |
—— | —— |
Training Load By Week
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Refund Policy
This plan is protected by our Refund Policy and may, with the author's approval, be exchanged for a plan of equal value from the same author.
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Breast cancer may or may not cause symptoms. Some women may discover the problem themselves, while others may have the abnormality first detected on a screening exam. Common breast cancer symptoms, when they occur, include the following:
Non-painful lumps or masses
Lumps or swelling under the arms
Nipple skin changes or discharge
Noticeable flattening or indentation of the breast
Change in the nipple
Unusual discharge from the nipple
Changes in the feel, size, or shape of the breast tissue
Inflammatory breast cancer is a rare type of cancer that often does not cause a breast lump or mass. As seen in this photo, it often causes thickening and pitting of the skin, like an orange peel. The affected breast may also be larger or firmer, tender, or itchy. A skin rash or reddening of the skin is common. These changes are caused by cancer cells blocking lymph vessels in the skin. Inflammatory cancer of the breast typically has a fast growth rate.
Invasive Ductal Carcinoma
Invasive (or infiltrating) ductal carcinoma (IDC) is the most common type of breast cancer. About 80% of all breast cancers are invasive ductal carcinomas. Invasive ductal carcinoma refers to cancer that has broken through the wall of the milk ducts and has invaded the breast tissues. Invasive ductal carcinoma can spread to the lymph nodes and possibly to other areas of the body.
Ductal Carcinoma in Situ (DCIS)
Ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) is considered to be a non-invasive or pre-invasive breast cancer. Ductal means that the cancer starts inside the milk ducts, carcinoma refers to any cancer that starts in the skin or other tissue (including breast tissue) that line or cover the internal organs, and in situ means "in its original place." The difference between DCIS and invasive cancer is that in DCIS, the cells have not spread through the walls of the milk ducts into the surrounding breast tissue. DCIS is considered a 'pre-cancer', but some cases can transform into more invasive cancers.
Invasive Lobular Carcinoma
Invasive (or infiltrating) lobular carcinoma (ILC) is the second most common type of breast cancer after invasive ductal carcinoma. Lobular means that the cancer started in the milk-producing lobules, which empty out into the ducts that carry milk to the nipple. Invasive lobular carcinoma refers to cancer that has broken through the wall of the lobule and begun to invade the breast tissues. Invasive lobular carcinoma can spread to the lymph nodes and possibly to other areas of the body.
Mucinous Carcinoma
Mucinous (or colloid) carcinoma of the breast is a rare form of invasive ductal carcinoma. In this type of cancer, the tumor is composed of abnormal cells that "float" in pools of mucin, part of the slimy, slippery substance known as mucus. Mucus lines most of the inner surface of our bodies, such as our digestive tract, lungs, liver, and other vital organs. Breast cancer cells can produce some mucus. In mucinous carcinoma, mucin becomes part of the tumor and surrounds the breast cancer cells.
"Pure" mucinous carcinomas make up only 2-3% of invasive breast cancers. Approximately 5% of invasive breast cancer tumors have a mix of mucinous components in addition to other types of breast cancer cells.
Testing negative for estrogen receptors (ER-), progesterone receptors (PR-), and HER2 (HER2-) on a pathology report means the cancer is "triple-negative". These negative results indicate the growth of the cancer is not supported by the hormones estrogen and progesterone, nor by the presence of too many HER2 receptors. Therefore, triple-negative breast cancer does not respond to hormonal therapy (such as tamoxifen or aromatase inhibitors) or therapies that target HER2 receptors, such as Herceptin. However, other medicines can be used to treat triple-negative breast cancer.
Paget's Disease of the Nipple
Paget's disease of the nipple is a rare form of breast cancer in which cancer cells collect in or around the nipple. The cancer usually affects the ducts of the nipple first then spreads to the nipple surface and the areola. A scaly, red, itchy, and irritated nipple and areola are signs of Paget's disease of the nipple. One theory for the cause of Paget's disease is that the cancer cells start growing inside the milk ducts within the breast and then break through to the nipple surface. Another possibility is that the cells of the nipple itself become cancerous.
Certain genes control the life cycle-the growth, function, division, and death-of a cell. When these genes are damaged, the balance between normal cell growth and death is lost. Normal breast cells become cancerous because of changes in DNA structure. Breast cancer is caused by cellular DNA damage that leads to out-of-control cell growth.
Causes of Breast Cancer: Genetics & Mutations
Inherited genes can increase the likelihood of breast cancer. For example, mutations of genes BRCA1 and BRCA2 (linked to an increased risk of breast and ovarian cancers) can inhibit the body's ability to safeguard and repair DNA. Copies of these mutated genes can be passed on genetically to future generations, leading to a genetically-inherited increased risk of cancer.
Causes of Breast Cancer: Lifestyle
Lifestyle choices can lead to breast cancer as well. Eating a poor diet, inactivity, obesity, heavy alcohol use, tobacco use including smoking, and exposure to chemicals and toxins are all associated with a greater breast cancer risk.
Causes of Breast Cancer: Medical Treatment
Medical treatment with chemotherapy, radiation, or immunosuppressive drugs used to decrease the spread of cancer throughout the body can also cause damage to healthy cells. Some "second cancers," completely separate from the initial cancer, have been known to occur following aggressive cancer treatments. Radiation theraspy to the chest to treat other conditions or cancers also increases the risk of developing breast cancer.
Early detection of breast cancer is the key to survival. Mammograms are X-rays of the breast that can detect tumors at a very early stage, before they would be felt or noticed otherwise. During a mammogram, your breasts are compressed between two firm surfaces to spread out the breast tissue. Then an X-ray captures black-and-white images of your breasts that are displayed on a computer screen and examined by a doctor who looks for signs of cancer. 3D mammograms, or breast tomosynthesis, is a breast imaging procedure that also uses X-rays to produce images of breast tissue in order to detect abnormalities.
Breast MRI
MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) is a technology that uses magnets and radio waves to create detailed, 3D images of the breast tissue. Before the test you may be injected with a contrast solution (dye) through an intravenous line in the arm. The contrast solution will allow potential cancerous breast tissue to show more clearly. Radiologists are able to see areas that could be cancerous because the contrast tends to be more concentrated in areas of cancer growth.
During a breast MRI the breasts are exposed as the patient lies flat on a padded platform with cushioned openings for the breasts. A breast coil surrounds each opening and works with the MRI unit to create the images. MRI imaging is a painless diagnostic tool. The test takes between 30 and 45 minutes.
Sometimes a breast ultrasound is ordered in addition to a mammogram. An ultrasound can demonstrate fluid-filled cysts that are not cancerous. Ultrasounds may also be recommended for routine screening tests in some women at a higher risk of developing breast cancer. During a breast ultrasound a small amount of water-soluble gel is applied to the skin over the area to be examined. Then, a probe is gently applied against the skin. You may be asked to hold your breath, briefly several times. The breast ultrasound takes about 10 minutes to complete.
Experts recommend that women be aware of their breasts and notice any changes, rather than performing checks on a regular schedule. Women who choose to do self-exams should be sure to discuss the technique with their doctor.
What is a Breast Self-Exam?
A breast self-exam is a way to check your breasts for changes such as lumps or thickenings. Early breast cancer detection can improve your chances of surviving the disease. Any unusual changes discovered during the breast self-exam should be reported to your doctor.
Remember that the majority (about 80%) of breast lumps are not due to cancer. Cysts, benign tumors, or changes in consistency due to the menstrual cycle can all cause benign breast lumps. Still, it's important to let your doctor know about any lumps or changes in your breast that you find.
A biopsy is the most certain way to determine whether a breast lump is cancerous. Biopsies may be taken through a needle or through a minor surgical procedure. The results can also determine the type of breast cancer that is present in many cases (there are several different types of breast cancers). Treatments are tailored to the specific type of breast cancer that is present.
Needle Biopsies
A needle biopsy uses a hollow needle to remove tissue or cell samples from the breast. A pathologist studies the samples under a microscope to see if they contain cancer. There are two types of needle biopsies: core need biopsy and fine needle aspiration (fine needle biopsy).
Core Needle Biopsy
If a lump can be felt in the breast (palpable mass), a core needle biopsy may be performed. The doctor will use a small amount of local anesthetic to numb the skin and the breast tissue around the area. The doctor will insert the needle and remove a small amount of tissue to be examined.
Ultrasound-Guided Core Needle Biopsy
This is one type of biopsy for lumps or abnormalities that cannot be felt (nonpalpable mass). A core needle is placed into the breast tissue and ultrasound helps confirm the exact location of the potential cancer so the needle is placed correctly. Tissue samples are then taken through the needle. Ultrasound can see the difference between cysts and solid lesions.
MRI-Guided Core Needle Biopsy
For this test, you will be given a contrast agent through an IV. Your breast will be numbed and compressed and several MRI images will be taken. The MRI images will guide the doctor to the suspicious area. A needle will be used in the biopsy device to remove tissue samples with a vacuum assisted probe.
Stereotactic Biopsy
If the lump is nonpalpable you could be also given a stereotactic biopsy. Using a local anesthetic, the radiologist makes a small opening in the skin. A needle is placed into the breast tissue, and imaging studies help confirm the exact placement. Tissue samples are taken through the needle.
Surgical Biopsies
A surgeon makes a cut (incision) in the breast to remove tissue.
Open Excisional Biopsy
This surgery removes an entire lump and the issue is examined under a microscope. If a section of normal breast tissue is taken all the way around a lump, it is called a lumpectomy. In this procedure, a wire is put through a needle into the area to be biopsied. The X-ray helps to make sure it is in the right location and a small hook at the end of the wire keeps it in position. The surgeon uses the wire as a guide to locate the suspicious tissue.
Incisional Biopsy
An incisional biopsy is very similar to an excisional biopsy, but less tissue is removed. Local anesthetic will be used, and you will also get IV sedation. An incisional biopsy removes part of the tumor, which means that more surgery may be needed to remove the remaining cancer.
A biopsy can tell whether the breast cancer has receptors for estrogen (ER-positive) and/or progesterone (PR-positive), indicating which hormone stimulates tumor growth. About two-thirds of breast cancers are hormone receptor-positive. Medications can be given that act to help prevent growth of the tumor from stimulation by these hormones.
ER-positive breast cancer is sensitive to estrogen, whereas PR-positive breast cancer is sensitive to progesterone. Both ER-positive and PR-positive breast cancers may respond to hormone therapy. Hormone receptor (HR) negative is a type of cancer that does not have hormone receptors and will not be affected by hormone blocking treatments.
HER-2 (human epidermal growth factor receptor 2) is a protein that is expressed at a high level by about 20% of breast cancers. Having this receptor means the cancer tends to grow and spread faster than other forms of breast cancer. However, there are special targeted treatments available for this type of tumor.
Treatments specifically for HER2-positve breast cancer include:
Herceptin (trastuzumab)
Kadcyla (ado-trastuzumab emtansine)
Perjeta (pertuzumab)
Tykerb (lapatinib)
Breast cancer stages are classified according to cancer tumor size, location, and extent of spread. Staging helps doctors determine the prognosis and treatment for cancer. The TNM staging system classifies breast cancers according to the following criteria:
Tumor (T): Primary tumor size and/or extent
Nodes (N): Spread of cancer to lymph nodes in the regional area of the primary tumor
Metastasis (M): Spread of cancer to distant sites away from the primary tumor
Breast cancer survival depends upon a number of factors. Cancers that are found early are often localized to the breast. Statistics on the survival rate of breast cancer are often given as 5-year survival rates. The 5-year survival rate is the percentage of people who live at least 5 years after being diagnosed with breast cancer. According to the American Cancer Society, women with early stage (stage 1) breast cancer have a 5-year survival rate of 100%. Women with breast cancer that has spread to distant sites in the body (stage 4) have only a 22% chance of surviving 5 years; but this rate can improve as treatment advances are made.
Breast-conserving surgery removes the cancer and some healthy tissue around it, but not the breast. Some lymph nodes under the arms may be removed for biopsy. If the cancer is near the chest wall, part of it may be removed. Breast-conserving surgery is also known as breast-sparing surgery, lumpectomy, partial mastectomy, quadrantectomy, and segmental mastectomy.
Mastectomy is the removal of the entire breast and all the surrounding tissue and possibly nearby tissues. There are different mastectomy surgeries available, depending on how much additional tissue is removed.
High-energy beams of localized radiation are used to kill targeted cancer cells. Radiation therapy can be used after breast cancer surgery, or it may be used in addition to chemotherapy for widespread cancer. This treatment does have side effects, which can include swelling of the area, tiredness, or a sunburn-like effect. There are two ways to administer radiation therapy.
External Beam Radiation
A beam of radiation is focused onto the affected area by an external machine. The treatment is usually given five days a week for five to six weeks.
This form of radiation involves radioactive seeds or pellets that are implanted into the breast next to the cancer.
Chemotherapy drugs are given to kill cancer cells that are located anywhere in the body. It can be administered by a slow IV infusion, by pill, or by a brief IV injection, depending upon the drug. Sometimes chemotherapy is given after surgery to help prevent the cancer from recurring (adjuvant therapy). Side effects of chemotherapy can include an increased risk of infection, nausea, fatigue, and hair loss.
Adjuvant Chemotherapy
If all visible cancer has been removed, there is still the possibility that cancer cells have broken off or are left behind. Adjunct chemotherapy is given to assure that these small amounts of cells are killed. Since some women have a very low risk of recurrence even without chemotherapy, it is not given in all cases.
Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy
Neoadjuvant chemotherapy is given before surgery. There is no correlation between neoadjuvant chemotherapy and long-term survival, but there are advantages to see if the cancer responds to the chemotherapy before surgical removal. This can also reduce the size of the cancer and allow for a less extensive surgery in some patients.
Chemotherapy for Advanced Breast Cancer
Chemotherapy can be used if the cancer has metastasized to distant sites in the body. In this case, doctors will determine the most appropriate treatment.
Chemotherapy Side Effects
Different drugs cause different side effects. Certain types of chemotherapy have specific side effects, but each patient's experience is different. The following are common side effects of chemotherapy:
Pain (headaches, muscle pain, stomach pain, and pain from nerve damage)
Mouth and throat sores
Nausea and vomiting
Blood disorders
Changes in thinking and memory
Sexual and reproductive issues
Appetite loss
Hair loss
Permanent damage to the heart, lung, liver, kidneys, or reproductive system
Some breast cancer cells are activated by female hormones estrogen and/or progesterone (ER- and PR-positive breast cancers). Hormone therapy can stop or slow the growth of hormone receptor-positive tumors by blocking the cancer cells from receiving the hormones they need to grow. Hormone therapy is usually given after surgery, but it can also be given to reduce the chance of developing breast cancer in women at high risk.
Targeted therapies are newer treatments for breast cancer patients. They utilize specific proteins within cancer cells, like the HER-2 protein. Targeted therapies can stop the HER-2 protein from stimulating tumor growth in cancer cells that have this protein. Targeted therapies have fewer side effects than traditional chemotherapy because they only target cancer cells. They are often used in combination with chemotherapy.
Breast cancer treatment can be both physically and emotionally exhausting. There are many changes taking place that may be difficult to cope with. "Chemobrain" is a term coined to describe the mental changes caused by chemotherapy treatment. Patients have experienced memory deficits and the inability to focus. Breast cancer treatments can also leave patients fatigued, which is normal.
It can be difficult to keep up with activities of daily life, and make patients feel isolated or overwhelmed. Friends and family can be invaluable sources of support and assistance during this time. Some people choose to join a local or an online support group to share their experiences and spread breast cancer awareness.
Many women opt to have reconstructive surgery after breast cancer surgery. Reconstructive procedures use implants or tissues obtained from other locations in the body. These procedures can be done at the time of mastectomy, or they may be performed months or even years later.
A tissue expander will be inserted un the skin, for a few weeks, to stretch the skin and allow a silicone-gel or saline implant to be inserted. Each week preceding the implant insertion, the tissue expander is filled to a desired volume until the patient is satisfied with their new breast size.
Tissue Flap Procedure
A woman's own tissue is taken from the abdomen or back to create a mound to reconstruct the breast. The tissue is sometimes kept attached to its original blood supply or it is disconnected and reconnected to a blood supply near the new location. Some patients also have nipple reconstruction, which is created using tissue from the back or abdomen flap. The nipple is then tattooed in order to resemble the color of a nipple. A prosthetic nipple is also an option and can be created by making a copy of your natural nipple.
A prosthesis, or breast form, is an alternative to reconstructive surgery. A prosthesis offers the appearance of breasts without surgery. This is a device that is worn inside a bra or bathing suit to permit a balanced appearance when clothed. Breast prostheses come in many shapes, sizes, and materials (silicone gel, foam, or fiberfill interior). Breast prosthetic devices are often covered by insurance plans.
Breast cancer occurs in both men and women, but it is about 100 times more likely to affect women than men. Women over age 55 and those with a close relative who have had the condition are at greatest risk for developing breast cancer. Still, up to 80% of women who do get breast cancer do not have a relative with the disease. Certain inherited genetic mutations dramatically increase a women's risk of breast cancer. The most common of these are genes known as BRCA1 and BRCA2. Women who inherit mutations in these genes have up to an 80% chance of developing breast cancer.
Several tests are available to look for the Breast Cancer (BRCA) gene. A blood test can be given to analyze DNA mutations in BRCA1 and BRCA2. Women who have inherited mutations have a much higher risk of developing breast cancer. The BRCA test is typically only offered to people who may have inherited the mutation. You may be a candidate for the BRCA gene test if you have the following:
Personal history of breast cancer
Personal history of ovarian cancer
Family history of breast cancer in parents, siblings, and/or children
A male relative with breast cancer
A family member with both breast and ovarian cancers
A family member with bilateral breast cancer
Two or more relatives with ovarian cancer
A relative with known BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutation
Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry with a close relative with breast or ovarian cancer
Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry and a personal history of ovarian cancer
Factors that can raise the risk of getting breast cancer include not getting enough exercise, drinking more than one alcoholic drink per day, and being overweight. Breast cancer prevention also includes avoiding exposure to carcinogens, chemicals, and radiation from medical imaging. Some kinds of hormone therapy and birth control pills can also elevate risk, but the risk returns to normal after stopping these medications. Some studies have shown that regular physical activity may help lower the risk of recurrence in women who have survived breast cancer.
Preventative surgery (prophylactic mastectomy) may also prevent breast cancer. Bilateral prophylactic mastectomy is the removal of both breasts in order to prevent breast cancer. Women with a strong family history and BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations may choose to have bilateral prophylactic mastectomy in order to lower their risk of developing breast cancer.
Doctors continue to search for more effective and tolerable treatments for breast cancer. The funding for this research comes from many sources, including advocacy groups throughout the country. Many breast cancer survivors and their families choose to participate in walk-a-thons and other fundraising events. This links each individual fight against cancer into a common effort for progress.