text:
2 Samuel 24
English Standard Version
David's Census
24 (A)(B)Again the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he incited David against them, saying, (C)"Go, number Israel and Judah." 2 So the king said to Joab, the commander of the army,[a] who was with him, "Go through all the tribes of Israel, (D)from Dan to Beersheba, and number the people, that I may know the number of the people." 3 But Joab said to the king, (E)"May the Lord your God add to the people a hundred times as many as they are, while the eyes of my lord the king still see it, but why does my lord the king delight in this thing?" 4 But the king's word prevailed against Joab and the commanders of the army. So Joab and the commanders of the army went out from the presence of the king to number the people of Israel. 5 They crossed the Jordan and began from (F)Aroer,[b] and from the city that is in the middle of the (G)valley, toward Gad and on to (H)Jazer. 6 Then they came to Gilead, and to Kadesh in the land of the Hittites;[c] and they came to Dan, and from Dan[d] they went around to (I)Sidon, 7 and came to the fortress of Tyre and to all the cities of the (J)Hivites and (K)Canaanites; and they went out to the Negeb of Judah at Beersheba. 8 So when they had gone through all the land, they came to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days. 9 And Joab gave the sum of the numbering of the people to the king: in Israel there were 800,000 valiant men (L)who drew the sword, and the men of Judah were 500,000.
The Lord's Judgment of David's Sin
10 But (M)David's heart struck him after he had numbered the people. And David said to the Lord, (N)"I have sinned greatly in what I have done. But now, O Lord, please take away the iniquity of your servant, for I have done (O)very foolishly." 11 And when David arose in the morning, the word of the Lord came to (P)the prophet Gad, David's (Q)seer, saying, 12 "Go and say to David, 'Thus says the Lord, Three things I offer[e] you. Choose one of them, that I may do it to you.'" 13 So Gad came to David and told him, and said to him, "Shall (R)three[f] years of famine come to you in your land? Or will you flee three months before your foes while they pursue you? Or shall there be three days' pestilence in your land? Now consider, and decide what answer I shall return to him who sent me." 14 Then David said to Gad, "I am in great distress. Let us fall into the hand of the Lord, (S)for his mercy is great; but let me not fall into the hand of man."
15 (T)So the Lord sent a pestilence on Israel from the morning until the appointed time. And there died of the people from (U)Dan to Beersheba 70,000 men. 16 And when (V)the angel stretched out his hand toward Jerusalem (W)to destroy it, (X)the Lord relented from the calamity and said to the angel (Y)who was working destruction among the people, "It is enough; now stay your hand." And (Z)the angel of the Lord was by the threshing floor of (AA)Araunah the Jebusite. 17 Then David spoke to the Lord when he saw the angel who was striking the people, and said, "Behold, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly. But these sheep, what have they done? Please let your hand be against me and against my father's house."
David Builds an Altar
18 And Gad came that day to David and said to him, "Go up, raise an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor of (AB)Araunah the Jebusite." 19 So David went up at Gad's word, as the Lord commanded. 20 And when Araunah looked down, he saw the king and his servants coming on toward him. And Araunah went out and paid homage to the king with his face to the ground. 21 And Araunah said, "Why has my lord the king come to his servant?" David said, "To buy the threshing floor from you, in order to build an altar to the Lord, that the plague (AC)may be averted from the people." 22 Then Araunah said to David, "Let my lord the king take and offer up what seems good to him. Here are the oxen for the burnt offering and the (AD)threshing sledges and the yokes of the oxen for the wood. 23 All this, O king, Araunah gives to the king." And Araunah said to the king, "May the Lord your God (AE)accept you." 24 But the king said to Araunah, "No, but I will buy it from you for a price. I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God that cost me nothing." So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels[g] of silver. 25 And David built there an altar to the Lord and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. (AF)So the Lord responded to the plea for the land, and the plague was averted from Israel.
- 2 Samuel 24:2 Septuagint to Joab and the commanders of the army
- 2 Samuel 24:5 Septuagint; Hebrew encamped in Aroer
- 2 Samuel 24:6 Septuagint; Hebrew to the land of Tahtim-hodshi
- 2 Samuel 24:6 Septuagint; Hebrew they came to Dan-jaan and
- 2 Samuel 24:12 Or hold over
- 2 Samuel 24:13 Compare 1 Chronicles 21:12, Septuagint; Hebrew seven
- 2 Samuel 24:24 A shekel was about 2/5 ounce or 11 grams
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.


text:
Managed Dedicated SmarterMail Mail Server
Why spend another moment managing, maintaining, updating, upgrading, supporting and complaining about your shared email server. If you want a reliable email service that is 100% dedicated to your domain(s) and not shared with anyone else, then free up your time and let us handle it. We'll keep your email up and running so you can keep your business up and running.
We provide an "Admin User" account so you can add, change, and delete users at any time via your web based email portal. You can access your mail server via SMTP, POP3, IMAP or webmail. Our managed mail servers are on a daily backup schedule and are monitored by our monitoring services. We also provide advanced filtering capabilities which allow you to capture unwanted email before it is delivered to your inbox.
Pricing depends on diskspace required and the edition of SmarterMail choosen (Professional/Enterprise), number of domains/users, anti-virus and anti-spam addons that you choose above the defaults.
We directly sell you your SmarterMail License or we can wrap the cost of the license into your monthly payment.
Our Managed Dedicated SmarterMail Mail Servers come with an SLA.
Please contact our Sales Department for more information.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Whole-Grain & Seed Power Breakfast Waffles or Pancakes
If you received this post via email, click here, to get to the web version with the photos, links & to write a comment.
On Saturday, Deb, an ultramarathoner and endurance athlete sent me the recipe for her favorite waffles & pancakes.
I tried the recipe out immediately & we liked the waffles so much, that I made a second batch on Tuesday--working the kinks out of the recipe so I could share it with you.
The Lab Rat & I couldn't believe how delicious & filling these waffles were. On Sunday, just one waffle kept me full & fueled for 5 hours & over 2 hours of exercise. Had one for breakfast today with PB2 & berries--and I'm just getting hungry now--6 hours later. That's something!
Thank you, Deb!
Here's what Deb emailed me:
My favorite breakfast!
- Whole grains
- Whole foods
- Gluten-free
- Lots of flax
- Seed + Grain = Complete protein
- Spices, like cinnamon for improved insulin response
- Plant-based & no chemical leavening
- No added-sugar
I ate one before a 25 mile mountainous trail run last weekend, and all i had later was a gel and a bite size snickers bar (yeah, i know, but it tasted good!) for the whole day...
Here's the recipe.......
The Breakfast with Big Benefits
For the many benefits of consuming oats & buckwheat groats click here. Whole grains, protein, soluble & insoluble fiber, low-glycemic, gluten-free, steadies blood glucose, B-vitamins, increases nitric oxide production. Need I say more?
Flax is fiber, lignans, & a fantastic source of plant-based omega-3's rolled into one package. Read more about its benefits here.
As for pumpkin seeds, although I don't eat them regularly, they are loaded with nutrients. Read more here. Dr. Mladen Golubic, the Medical Director of the Cleveland Clinic Center for Lifestyle Medicine rarely consumes nuts, but, pumpkin seeds are a different story for him. They are a regular favorite snack of his, owing to their high nutrient-content. Plus, pumpkin seeds are a snack he's eaten throughout his life.
Deb's Back Story
I first heard from Deb over 2 1/2 years ago--soon after she had started on the E2 version of a plant-based diet. I figure that if a plant-based no-oil diet can fuel an endurance athlete--it certainly will work for mere mortals like us. But, even with all those years of running Deb was never able to lose those extra pounds or belly fat until she switched to plant-based & no-oil. That made an impression on me. My exact same experience, too!
Here are some bits & pieces of Deb's story:
"I am a 58 year old woman, and I have seen an amazing difference in the way I feel, and how I can train now.
I was "mostly vegetarian" for a number of years, until switching to plant-based no-oil over 2 1/2 years ago.
However, even with running 50+ miles a week, and eating a healthy diet without a lot of processed foods, I could not lose weight or get rid of that blob around my middle!! Looking back, I realize we ate refined flour in the form of pizza dough and in our "multi-grain" (but not whole grain) bread, and occasional crackers and bagels... and white rice.
Since switching to plant-based, my joint pain disappeared, other seemingly unrelated symptoms (dry eye, allergies, sinus problems, asthma and digestive issues) all went away!
I lost weight, about 20 pounds, got leaner, have more energy, I don't need as much sleep, I feel GREAT!
I am never hungry, I am able to keep training hard on this diet, and actually, am even running better than before (gotta be not lugging that extra weight around!) I love this way of eating!!
Of course, after only a short time on this eating plan, all of my numbers also dropped - cholesterol was 156 after only a week and a half, down from the 180's, and is probably lower now... blood sugar down, blood pressure healthier.. all good stuff!
And how many almost 60 year old women do you know who can regularly run 30+ miles, and race at distances of 50-100 miles? I have gotten my hubby, also an ultramarathoner, off of almost all animal products, but with a great increase in good plant based foods... he even eats kale!
Even at my age, there are markedly positive results from changing to a healthier way of eating. And maybe that's worth sharing - "it's never too late" sort of thing...
Waffles for a Week - If You Can Eat Just One at a Time
Nine Golden-Brown Slightly Sweet Waffles for the Week
Peanut Butter (PB2) & Blueberry Waffles for a Protein Boost
I hope this waffle recipe will soon be your fave, too.
The recipe makes 9 medium size delicious-hearty-slightly-sweet waffles that can be stored in the refrigerator or freezer to eat throughout the week. They're perfect plain, with maple syrup, topped with blueberries, or even spread with 2 tablespoons of PB2 & blueberries.
What's PB2? It's defatted peanut flour (1.5 grams of fat per 2 tablespoons) that reconstitutes into a creamy "peanut butter" with just 2 tablespoons of water. It's now available at Whole Foods & even my local grocery store. You can order a pound or more at a time through the company's website. That's how we do it.
Without a topping, these make a very portable take-with power snack.
Power-Packed Plant-Based Whole-Grain & Seed Waffles/Pancakes
Makes 9 waffles=1/2 cup of batter
For a copy of the recipe on one page, click here:
- 1 cup of oats (rolled oats or steel-cut) I've used both. Rolled oats might grind more easily.
- 1 cup raw buckwheat groats (buy in bulk at Whole Foods or Nuts.com We buy 10 lbs at a time)
- 1/2 cup ground flax seeds/flax meal
- 1/2 cup pumpkin seeds or sunflower seeds (I use pumpkin seeds!)
- 1/4 cup raisins or currants
- 1 very ripe medium to large speckled banana
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon nutmeg
- Optional spices include: pumpkin pie, allspice, ginger, cloves, vanilla to taste
- 3 cups of unsweetened almond milk--or your favorite non-dairy milk. Water can also be used--although I've only made this with milk.
1. Before you start, soak the 1/4 cup of raisins in about 1 cup of the milk needed for the recipe.
2. SEPARATELY grind each of the grains & seeds in a power blender, like a VitaMix. Emptying the contents into a large bowl after each one is ground. Works beautifully--& this won't clog up your blender. DO NOT try to grind everything together at the same time. DO NOT GRIND or blend the raisins in anything--except the milk.
I'm sure a food processor will also work, but, I haven't tested that out.
NOTE: Raisins or currants are too gooey & must be blended separately with the milk, or they'll get stuck around the blades. Because the pumpkin seeds have fat in them, they don't grind up as "cleanly" as do the grains.
3. Pour the remaining milk--2 cups--into an empty blender, along with the raisins & their 1 cup of soaking milk & the banana. Add the cinnamon & nutmeg & mix until well-blended.
4. Pour the milk into the bowl with all the ground up grains & seeds & mix until just smooth with a whisk or a mixer on slow speed.
5. Preheat your waffle iron or griddle, if you're making pancakes. I have a non-stick waffle iron, but I still had to spray it with Spectrum's high-heat canola spray before each waffle, or they stuck. The trick for me was figuring how long each waffle took to cook & not opening the waffle iron until then. Using 1/2 cup of batter, each waffle took 4 minutes to be done. Larger waffles will take longer. NOTE: I hear that pancakes brown up perfectly, without oil or spray, with a Scanpan. I'm seriously ready to purchase their Classic 12 1/2 inch non-stick fry pan.
6. USE 1/2 cup of batter per waffle in order to make 9 waffles.
7. Store extras in the refrigerator or freeze them. Heat them up in a toaster oven for crispness. Top with thawed wild blueberries or a fruit of your choice. The Lab Rat insists on maple syrup. I skip the syrup. For an extra 5 gram protein boost (45 calories), spread with 2 tablespoons of PB2.
Nutrition Facts based on making 9 waffles from this recipe.
1/2 cup of batter per waffle or pancake.


text:
The Warcraft manga[1] is a line of comics from various artists (including Korean-style comics, or manhwa). So far several series have been released.
Warcraft: The Sunwell Trilogy[]
- Volume 1: Dragon Hunt
- The Prey of Harkyn Grymstone
- Pursued
- Dar'khan
- Legacy of the Sunwell
- Tarren Mill
- Against the Scourge
- Volume 2: Shadows of Ice
- Terror on the Mountain
- Baron Mordis
- Caverns of the Dead
- The Dwellers beneath
- The Orb of Ner'zhul
- Death on the Mountain
- Volume 3: Ghostlands
- The Nightmare Plains
- Master of the Dead
- Cry of the Banshee
- Dark Reunion
- Edge of the Abyss
- Fire and Fury
- Volume 1: Dragon Hunt
Warcraft: Legends anthology[]
World of Warcraft: Character class series[]
- Volume 1: Death Knight
- Volume 2: Mage
- Volume 3: Shaman
World of Warcraft: Shadow Wing duology[]
- Volume 1: The Dragons of Outland
- Volume 2: Nexus Point
- Korean-style comics or manhwa are comics produced by Korean comic artists. Their style varies from that of Japanese manga (Japanese comics) and western comics. Blizzard and Tokyopop markets all of its original English language manhwa as manga, as the term is well established in its target audience market and manhwa is not.
See also[]
External links[]
Wikipedia Manga


text:
Hannibal's Last Meal: Does Will End up Being the Main Course?
This is a guest post by Dead Derrick. At long last, the series finale for "Hannibal" has arrived and this is my final write-up. NBC's "Hannibal" is a series that really never should have been as great as it actually turned out to be. After all, this is a series … Read More


text:
Exposure to chemical found in personal care products may contribute to childhood obesity
Phthalates could play a role in rising childhood obesity rates
Researchers from the Children's Environmental Health Center at The Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York have found an association between exposure to the chemical group known as phthalates and obesity in young children – including increased body mass index (BMI) and waist circumference.
Phthalates are man-made, endocrine-disrupting chemicals that can mimic the body's natural hormones. They are commonly used in plastic flooring and wall coverings, food processing materials, medical devices, and personal-care products. While poor nutrition and physical inactivity are known to contribute to obesity, a growing body of research suggests that environmental chemicals – including phthalates – could play a role in rising childhood obesity rates.
This study was the first to examine the relationship between phthalate exposure and measurements used to identify obesity in children. The paper is available online in the journal Environmental Research. The project was funded by the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences, the National Cancer Institute, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Mount Sinai researchers measured phthalate concentrations in the urine of 387 black and Hispanic children in New York City, and recorded body measurements including BMI, height, and waist circumference one year later. The urine tests revealed that greater than 97 percent of study participants had been exposed to phthalates typically found in personal care products such as perfume, lotions, and cosmetics; varnishes; and medication or nutritional supplement coatings. The phthalates included monoethyl phthalate (MEP) and other low molecular-weight phthalates. The team also found an association between concentrations of these phthalates with BMI and waist circumference among overweight children. For example, BMI in overweight girls with the highest exposure to MEP was 10 percent higher than those with the lowest MEP exposure.
"Research has shown that exposure to these everyday chemicals may impair childhood neurodevelopment, but this is the first evidence demonstrating that they may contribute to childhood obesity," said the study's lead author Susan Teitelbaum, PhD, Associate Professor in the Department of Preventive Medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine. "This study also further emphasizes the importance of reducing exposure to these chemicals where possible."
The percentage of obese children ages six to 11 in the United States has grown from seven percent in 1980 to more than 40 percent in 2008, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than 15 percent of American children between the ages six and 19 are characterized as obese. In New York City, more than one in five children in public schools are obese.
Dr. Teitelbaum and the team at the Children's Environmental Health Center plan to further evaluate the impact of these chemicals on childhood obesity. "While the data are significant, more research is needed to definitively determine whether phthalate exposure causes increases in body size," she said.
The Mount Sinai Hospital / Mount Sinai School of Medicine, Exposure to chemical found in personal care products may contribute to childhood obesity, January 20, 2012


text:
Chiropractic is a health care profession that focuses on the relationship between the body's structure—mainly the spine—and its functioning. Although practitioners may use a variety of treatment approaches, they primarily perform adjustments (manipulations) to the spine or other parts of the body with the goal of correcting alignment problems, alleviating pain, improving function, and supporting the body's natural ability to heal itself.
Most research on chiropractic has focused on spinal manipulation. Spinal manipulation appears to benefit some people with low-back pain and may also be helpful for headaches, neck pain, upper- and lower-extremity joint conditions, and whiplash-associated disorders.
Side effects from spinal manipulation can include temporary headaches, tiredness, or discomfort in the parts of the body that were treated. There have been rare reports of serious complications such as stroke, but whether spinal manipulation actually causes these complications is unclear. Safety remains an important focus of ongoing research.
Tell all your health care providers about any complementary health approaches you use. Give them a full picture of what you do to manage your health. This will help ensure coordinated and safe care.
The term "chiropractic" combines the Greek words cheir (hand) and praxis (practice) to describe a treatment done by hand. Hands-on therapy—especially adjustment of the spine—is central to chiropractic care. Chiropractic is based on the notion that the relationship between the body's structure (primarily that of the spine) and its function (as coordinated by the nervous system) affects health.
Spinal adjustment/manipulation is a core treatment in chiropractic care, but it is not synonymous with chiropractic. Chiropractors commonly use other treatments in addition to spinal manipulation, and other health care providers (e.g., physical therapists or some osteopathic physicians) may use spinal manipulation.
In the United States, chiropractic is often considered a complementary health approach. According to the 2007 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), which included a comprehensive survey of the use of complementary health approaches by Americans, about 8 percent of adults (more than 18 million) and nearly 3 percent of children (more than 2 million) had received chiropractic or osteopathic manipulation in the past 12 months. Additionally, an analysis of NHIS cost data found that adults in the United States spent approximately $11.9 billion out-of-pocket on visits to complementary health practitioners—$3.9 billion of which was spent on visits to practitioners for chiropractic or osteopathic manipulation.
Many people who seek chiropractic care have low-back pain. People also commonly seek chiropractic care for other kinds of musculoskeletal pain (e.g., neck, shoulder), headaches, and extremity (e.g., hand or foot) problems.
An analysis of the use of complementary health approaches for back pain, based on data from the 2002 NHIS, found that chiropractic was by far the most commonly used therapy. Among survey respondents who had used any of these therapies for their back pain, 74 percent (approximately 4 million Americans) had used chiropractic. Among those who had used chiropractic for back pain, 66 percent perceived "great benefit" from their treatments.
During the initial visit, chiropractors typically take a health history and perform a physical examination, with a special emphasis on the spine. Other examinations or tests such as x-rays may also be performed. If chiropractic treatment is considered appropriate, a treatment plan will be developed.
During followup visits, practitioners may perform one or more of the many different types of adjustments and other manual therapies used in chiropractic care. Given mainly to the spine, a chiropractic adjustment involves using the hands or a device to apply a controlled, rapid force to a joint. The goal is to increase the range and quality of motion in the area being treated and to aid in restoring health. Joint mobilization is another type of manual therapy that may be used.
Chiropractors may combine the use of spinal adjustments and other manual therapies with several other treatments and approaches such as:
Heat and ice
Electrical stimulation
Relaxation techniques
Rehabilitative and general exercise
Counseling about diet, weight loss, and other lifestyle factors
Dietary supplements.
Researchers have studied spinal manipulation for a number of conditions ranging from back, neck, and shoulder pain to asthma, carpal tunnel syndrome, fibromyalgia, and headaches. Much of the research has focused on low-back pain, and has shown that spinal manipulation appears to benefit some people with this condition. (For more information, see the Spinal Manipulation for Low-Back Pain fact sheet.)
A 2010 review of scientific evidence on manual therapies for a range of conditions concluded that spinal manipulation/mobilization may be helpful for several conditions in addition to back pain, including migraine and cervicogenic (neck-related) headaches, neck pain, upper- and lower-extremity joint conditions, and whiplash-associated disorders. The review also identified a number of conditions for which spinal manipulation/mobilization appears not to be helpful (including asthma, hypertension, and menstrual pain) or the evidence is inconclusive (e.g., fibromyalgia, mid-back pain, premenstrual syndrome, sciatica, and temporomandibular joint disorders).
Side effects from spinal manipulation can include temporary headaches, tiredness, or discomfort in the parts of the body that were treated.
There have been rare reports of serious complications such as stroke, cauda equina syndrome (a condition involving pinched nerves in the lower part of the spinal canal), and worsening of herniated discs, although cause and effect are unclear.
Safety remains an important focus of ongoing research:
A 2007 study of treatment outcomes for 19,722 chiropractic patients in the United Kingdom concluded that minor side effects (such as temporary soreness) after cervical spine manipulation were relatively common, but that the risk of a serious adverse event was "low to very low" immediately or up to 7 days after treatment.
A 2009 study that drew on 9 years of hospitalization records for the population of Ontario, Canada analyzed 818 cases of vertebrobasilar artery (VBA) stroke (involving the arteries that supply blood to the back of the brain). The study found an association between visits to a health care practitioner and subsequent VBA stroke, but there was no evidence that visiting a chiropractor put people at greater risk than visiting a primary care physician. The researchers attributed the association between health care visits and VBA stroke to the likelihood that people with VBA dissection (torn arteries) seek care for related headache and neck pain before their stroke.
Chiropractic colleges accredited by the Council on Chiropractic Education (CCE) offer Doctor of Chiropractic (D.C.) degree programs. (CCE is the agency certified by the U.S. Department of Education to accredit chiropractic colleges in the United States.) Admission to a chiropractic college requires a minimum of 90 semester hour credits of undergraduate study, mostly in the sciences.
Chiropractic training is a 4-year academic program that includes both classroom work and direct experience caring for patients. Coursework typically includes instruction in the biomedical sciences, as well as in public health and research methods. Some chiropractors pursue a 2- to 3-year residency for training in specialized fields.
Chiropractic is regulated individually by each state and the District of Columbia. All states require completion of a Doctor of Chiropractic degree program from a CCE-accredited college. Examinations administered by the National Board of Chiropractic Examiners are required for licensing and include a mock patient encounter. Most states require chiropractors to earn annual continuing education credits to maintain their licenses. Chiropractors' scope of practice varies by state in areas such as the dispensing or selling of dietary supplements and the use of other complementary health approaches such as acupuncture or homeopathy.
Ask about the chiropractor's education and licensure.
Mention any medical conditions you have, and ask whether the chiropractor has specialized training or experience in the condition for which you are seeking care.
Ask about typical out-of-pocket costs and insurance coverage. (Chiropractic is covered by many health maintenance organizations and private health plans, Medicare, and state workers' compensation systems.)
Tell the chiropractor about any medications (prescription or over-the-counter) and dietary supplements you take. If the chiropractor suggests a dietary supplement, ask about potential interactions with your medications or other supplements.
Tell all of your health care providers about any complementary health approaches you use. Give them a full picture of what you do to manage your health. This will help ensure coordinated and safe care.
NCCIH-supported research on chiropractic care includes projects that have focused on:
Spinal manipulation for back pain, neck pain, and headache, as well as for other health conditions such as temporomandibular disorders
Development of a curriculum to increase the understanding of evidence-informed practice in chiropractic educational institutions
Influence of patients' satisfaction with care on their response to treatment, in a study that compared chiropractic and medical care in a group of back-pain patients.
NCCIH also funded establishment of a developmental center for research in chiropractic at the Palmer Center for Chiropractic Research. Investigators at Palmer and at other partnering institutions conduct basic and clinical research on chiropractic treatment approaches, how they might work, and diseases and conditions for which they may be most helpful.
Agency for Health Care Policy and Research. Chiropractic in the United States: Training, Practice, and Research. Rockville, MD: Agency for Health Care Policy and Research; 1997. AHCPR publication no. 98–N002.
Barnes PM, Bloom B, Nahin RL. Complementary and alternative medicine use among adults and children: United States, 2007. CDC National Health Statistics Report #12. 2008.
Bronfort G, Haas M, Evans R, et al. Effectiveness of manual therapies: the UK evidence report. Chiropractic & Osteopathy. 2010;18(3):1–33.
Cassidy JD, Boyle E, Côté P, et al. Risk of vertebrobasilar stroke and chiropractic care: results of a population-based case-control and case-crossover study. Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics. 2009;32(2 Suppl):S201–S208. (Republished from Spine. 2008;33(4 Suppl):S176–S183.)
Coulter ID, Hurwitz EL, Adams AH, et al. Patients using chiropractors in North America: who are they, and why are they in chiropractic care? Spine. 2002;27(3):291–296.
The Council on Chiropractic Education. Standards for Doctor of Chiropractic Programs and Requirements for Institutional Status January, 2007. The Council on Chiropractic Education Web site. Accessed at www.cce-usa.org/Publications.html(link is external) on November 23, 2009.
Dagenais S, Haldeman S. Chiropractic. Primary Care. 2002;29(2):419–437.
Eisenberg DM, Cohen MH, Hrbek A, et al. Credentialing complementary and alternative medical providers. Annals of Internal Medicine. 2002;137(12):965–973.
Ernst E. Chiropractic: a critical evaluation. Journal of Pain and Symptom Management. 2008;35(5):544–562.
Gouveia LO, Castanho P, Ferreira JJ. Safety of chiropractic interventions: a systematic review. Spine. 2009; 34(11):E405–E413.
Kanodia AK, Legedza AT, Davis RB, et al. Perceived benefit of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) for back pain: a national survey. Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine. 2010;23(3):354–362.
Kaptchuk TJ, Eisenberg DM. Chiropractic: origins, controversies, and contributions.Archives of Internal Medicine. 1998;158(20):2215–2224.
Meeker WC, Haldeman S. Chiropractic: a profession at the crossroads of mainstream and alternative medicine. Annals of Internal Medicine. 2002;136(3):216–227.
Nahin RL, Barnes PM, Stussman BJ, et al. Costs of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) and frequency of visits to CAM practitioners: United States, 2007. CDC National Health Statistics Report #18. 2009.
Theil HW, Bolton JE, Docherty S, et al. Safety of chiropractic manipulation of the cervical spine: a prospective national survey. Spine. 2007;32(21):2375–2378.


text:
Reproduced with permission from The Christian Science Monitor
Michael von der Schulenburg drove deliberately into the riot. Angry men filled a main road here in Freetown; they quickly surrounded his car. They were members of the APC, the All People's Congress, and their leader, Ernest Koroma, was Sierra Leone's president. They were in a dispute with their opposition over a local election that had taken place a day's drive deep into the countryside.
That rural dispute turned national and urban, and threatened to turn violent in Freetown. Thousands of APC men thronged toward the headquarters of the opposition party. They were drunk, and they were being used. Men here are cheap – a beer buys a vote – but they are not usually violent.
Mr. Schulenburg, the United Nation's top man in Sierra Leone, hadn't been in the country for long, but he did know this: So many men don't gather by accident, nor do they spontaneously decide to fight over such a paltry political event as a rural vote. Schulenburg didn't know who had reported the crowd, or why. He's friendly with Sierra Leone's "Big Men" – he chats daily with Mr. Koroma by phone. But that day, no one would take his calls.
As he approached the action, he wondered: Was this the kind of raucous discontent typical of Sierra Leonean politics, or was the street rumor right? Could it be the moment that the war comes back?
He focused again on the building, where 22 men cowered on the roof. Below them, the crowd shouted, "Hand them over! Hand them over!"
When Schulenburg retells this story, he pauses here. He doesn't want to sound like a hero. Not because his presence didn't calm things – it did – but because casting him as a hero misses the point. For him, the drama is in the diplomacy.
"We had so much credibility, they let us go through," he says of the crowd. "We reorganized the police; we negotiated so that people could come off the roof. And afterwards, we negotiated a sort of peace deal between the two parties."
And Schulenburg did this all remarkably quickly. The men were moved off the roof in a matter of hours, and discussions held over a matter of days. Only two weeks after the 2009 standoff that observers feared would mark Sierra Leone's return to war, its two major parties announced a new agreement that became the foundation for political fair play.
If Schulenburg hadn't driven into that crowd, chances are high that the 22 men would have been murdered by the mob below – even that the violence may have escalated. "I can do that because I have a political mandate," he says. That's UN-speak for saying that Schulenburg has a form of permission no one else has – not ambassadors, not World Bank officials, not aid workers with the deepest of pockets: He has "peacebuilding."
Peacebuilding is a new approach to ending war, and it's becoming a global buzzword. It's different from peacemaking, which brings politicians around a table to hammer out a peace deal. And it's different from peacekeeping, which sends foreign soldiers to monitor peace agreements, separate warring parties, and protect civilians in conflict zones.
"Everybody understands peacemaking," says Judy Cheng-Hopkins, the UN assistant secretary-general for peacebuilding. "And in a way we also understanding peacekeeping.... Peacebuilding goes beyond either [of these]."
Peacebuilding is about what comes next – the slow and thankless slog of building a country back up. For generations, that job has been piecemeal: a little emergency aid here, some development projects there. But those professionals are trained differently, rarely coordinate, and are sometimes outright antagonistic. Their projects, meanwhile, are not overtly about peace. Aid is about relief; development is about economic growth. But post-conflict states also have a host of other needs.
Ex-soldiers need to feel productive and engaged as civilians, or they cause trouble. Returning refugees need a legal process for lodging complaints when they find their old homesteads occupied. Courts need competent judges and lawyers; armies need barracks; police need jail cells. Often, these countries need all these things, and all at once.
None of these needs is especially surprising. "There is this sense that everyone knows what we're talking about. We're talking about a specific set of challenges in a specific set of circumstances," says Vanessa Wyeth, coeditor of "Building States to Build Peace." "They're based on a lot of experience but not a lot of specific evidence about things that we know can help support peace."
The UN Peacebuilding Commission (PBC) is setting out to build that evidence. With $155 million so far, the UN's newest office is testing theories about war, peace, and development in six African countries – Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, in West Africa, and Burundi and the Central African Republic (CAR) in central Africa.
"Usually people say, 'We have so many UN bodies, we have so many UN agencies in different countries – one more? What for?' " says Jorge Tagle, a counselor with the Chilean mission to the UN, which formerly chaired the PBC. But he and others think its design and membership mean this little commission could have big influence – over major UN decisions, and in the countries with which it works. [Editor's note: The original version incorrectly identified the nationality of the mission Mr. Tagle represented.]
That's because the PBC is something other organizations aren't allowed to be: overtly political. Schulenburg's negotiations in the midst of the Freetown riot were not just a bit of practiced conflict resolution. It is, he acknowledges, an "interference in national sovereignty."
The PBC gets that leeway because it's part of the UN, and because it's invited. Countries must ask for PBC help. In return, they get a dedicated, if unofficial, ambassador for their cause. So far, the arrangements have paired neglected countries like the CAR with power-hitters like Belgium, who advocate for their partner countries at donor roundtables and in political meetings for funding, attention, and that elusive, powerful ingredient of action – political will. In the CAR's case, donor money to the country increased more than 50 percent the year it joined the PBC.
In its first five years, the PBC has succeeded most where it exploits its permission to be so political and interfere so heavily.
In Burundi, the commission's support helped to decrease the reported use of torture by intelligence forces friendly to the president by as much as 80 percent, says a local human rights group. In the CAR, it helped push forward a political dialogue that brought an end to an ugly rebellion.
From refugee return to building army barracks to elections, "all of it is very, very political, and for that you need a political body," says Ms. Wyeth. "You have a lot of different international actors playing a lot of different roles in these countries, and you need some political mechanism to bring all these actors together, to hold them more accountable, and to have more transparency about what the international community is doing in a country."
So far, the commission works only in Africa. Technically, that's because only African countries have so far asked to be PBC partners – which in turn may influence which countries ask for help. "There's a kind of stigmatization, but I think it's ill-placed," says Ms. Cheng-Hopkins. "This is not a poverty commission.... Unfortunately ... it happens that, so far, a lot of the [countries] that come on belong to the very poorest in the world."
Still, as a word, 'peacebuilding' sounds weak, It's an awkward compound noun – an aspiration, composed – as if shoving into a single word two pretty good ideas clears the way toward achieving them. "If you ask me to show you the thing called peacebuilding, I can't," says Peter Ngu Tayong, a media adviser in the UN's Sierra Leone headquarters. "Nobody has seen the animal called peacebuilding."
The PBC's funding arm, with money from 47 UN states, supports 173 projects in 19 countries. But they, alone, are not a measure of peacebuilding. In a world glutted with aid projects, it's easy to miss what may be the revolutionary part of peacebuilding: It demands attention to process.
For most of modern history, peace was a matter of paper. Politicians sat around a table, hammered out a cease-fire, and signed it. Peace was a matter of what powerful men decided in consultation with one another, not a condition to be rebuilt and sustained for a broader community.
That neglect often turns into state failure. Paul Collier, author of "Wars, Guns and Votes," writes that 40 percent of postconflict countries slip back into violence within a decade – and that those relapses make up 50 percent of the world's civil wars. Examples of reversions to violence are plentiful – Rwanda and Burundi; Liberia and Côte d'Ivoire; Uganda and Sudan – but they aren't confined to Africa. The condition holds in Indonesia, Georgia, the Philippines, Colombia, Lebanon, and Haiti.
As the United Nations examined its own failures in the 1990s – especially the peacekeeping debacles in Rwanda and in Bosnia, where hundreds of thousands of civilians were slaughtered as the UN stood by – its leaders brainstormed a new approach to peace. "Our record of success in mediating and implementing peace agreements is sadly blemished by some devastating failures," acknowledged Kofi Annan, then secretary-general of the United Nations, in a 2005 speech that first proposed the PBC. "Indeed, several of the most violent and tragic episodes of the 1990s occurred after the negotiation of peace agreements."
Peacebuilding happens outside the halls of power – in the fields, where men who once fought now farm; in schools where child soldiers learn trades; in courtrooms and parliamentary chambers, where problems once solved with weapons are submitted to tedious democratic resolution.
These are not usually the priorities of politicians divvying up the spoils of war. Yet work by Collier and others suggests that these are precisely the processes that can help prevent the next war.
That possibility is acutely felt in places like Guinea-Bissau. The small West African coastal nation is known, if at all, as a narcotrafficking hub between South America and Europe, or as home to frequent, bloody coups.
Ordinary Bissau-Guineans articulate the same thing that social scientists do. From 2008 to 2009, the grass-roots community organization Voz di Paz ("Voice of Peace") undertook a survey, asking people to list what they thought causes violence. "Bad governance" topped the list, followed by poverty.
When a new peace doesn't stick, the rest of the world pays the price. UN peacekeeping missions cost $8 billion in 2010; the United States paid 27 percent of that bill. Peacebuilding costs pennies in comparison. "If Sierra Leone had ended peacekeeping just six months earlier, the savings would have paid for 20 years of peacebuilding," says Schulenburg.
Talking to peacebuilders can leave the impression that the PBC revolution is really about easing UN bureaucracy. But in the countries where it works, it's more than that. Some say this new idea is the best barometer of whether the massive, often unwieldy, good intention that is the UN works at all. "The UN's relevance ... is what we do on the ground," says Schulenburg. "That's our litmus test. There's nothing else.... It's: Do we get it right here?"
Freetown's Siaka Stevens Street throbs with people, even when it rains. Pedestrians vie for precious sidewalk space with vendors and their goods. Men sell shoes and pirated mix CDs; women offer peanuts and panyas, long strips of colorful African fabric. On a busy corner, a man sells coconuts out of a wheelbarrow. Informal commerce is everywhere.Not far from the coconut vendor, near a favorite expatriate lunch spot, is commerce of the formal kind: bustling banks. Inside one, Joseph Sam and Tejan Sesay, two tellers, sit beside fat turquoise bricks of leones, the local currency. Clients wait patiently as the counting machine slurps up a stack and spits them back out; then they stash colorful stacks of cash in paper bags and walk out.
Mr. Sam wears a black suit; Mr. Sesay wears a button-down shirt with an embroidered collar and cuffs, and both young men wear cufflinks – a subtle show of disposable income. They would have been children during Sierra Leone's decade-long civil war, not much older than the child soldiers infamously impressed into militias and drugged into committing horrible crimes.
They have never heard of the UN Peacebuilding Commission – nor have many ordinary citizens in any of the PBC's partner countries. But for Sam, the idea inspires fatigue: "Nobody needs to tell me not to go to the bush and take up arms. We are here at 7 in the morning and we leave at 7 at night. It takes an hour to get to and from home. We don't have time for fighting." Sesay nods: "It's the idle mind that thinks a lot of silly things."
"We already have peace," Sam adds. "What we need is investment.... So-called donors need to push money into industry."
Freetown buzzes with this new feeling of being over it all. Even several hours from the capital city, in a town called Makeni, there's an impatience with the image of a war-haunted nation. "Obviously, the country is over the war. Obviously," says Alfa Kamara. He rattles off signs of progress: A paved road connects locals to the capital in just two hours, a trip that used to take most of a day. Tractors have begun to appear in the fields. Hospital visits are free for kids younger than 5.
But Kamara, an experienced mason and the father of two young children, can't find a steady job – or, at the moment, any work at all. Most of his friends are in the same position, he says. So he sits outside a small shop, near the pavement, and plays the lottery with friends. He comes here every day, trying his luck with small sums. (He's won only once, he says, the equivalent of about $15, or about 10 days of work.)
"We are very angry. Very angry," Kamara concedes. "But we are not going to take up weapons again."
That's because he feels heard; Kamara says radio call-in shows give him and his friends a chance to air their grievances and sometimes to talk directly to a politician. That communication was missing before the war, which made people resentful, he says.
Kamara's words are a peacebuilder's solace. Local government officials and international observers agree that a key cause of the war was the feeling by frustrated, unemployed young men that rebellion was their only option. Indeed, the PBC's financial arm has invested $4.1 million in youth employment and "empowerment" programs in Sierra Leone, hoping that targeting a cause of the past war will prevent future fighting.
Getting the theory right is only part of the job. It's common postconflict wisdom that swollen armies need to be reduced, and ex-fighters from all sides reintegrated into civilian lives. But in Burundi, where ethnic conflict and civil war have ravaged the country since independence in 1962, the demobilization of ex-soldiers has been problematic. The PBC began working here in 2007; the last rebel group signed a peace deal in 2009. Yet the reintegration – of ex-rebels and redundant soldiers alike – has been delayed by interminable national politics. So in Gitega, a provincial hub two hours north of the capital city of Bujumbura, no one is counting on a promise like Kamara's.
"There were lots of promises for ex-soldiers from different institutions," says Jean-Marie Nindorera, who leads an association of nearly 150 ex-combatants near Gitega. "When they didn't come true ... [ex-combatants] were not satisfied."
"I can see they're just waiting, waiting. They're very angry," says Oscar Ndiswarugira, who works with ex-combatants on behalf of the Ministry for Peace and Reconciliation Under the Cross (MIPAREC), a grassroots organization. "Some of them are very powerful.... The issue is how long they are going to be patient."
If peace deals themselves may not be enough to make peace, it's also not always enough, after war, to tackle institutions and infrastructure. Where the PBC has tried to play it safe, it hasn't worked: Despite $3 million in political dialogue workshops that got rave reviews from external evaluators, actual political dialogue in Burundi – between the workshop participants – came to a halt during national election disputes last spring.
Burundi's electoral experience does raise the question: Is peacebuilding working? Some of the new UN programs are clear successes, like the reduction of torture in Burundi. Others have been hampered by the usual spoilers – inertia and corruption. In the CAR, for example, the demobilizing of ex-combatants was delayed for more than six months, and a government minister in charge of overseeing the project absconded with half a million dollars, according to local UN workers. Several UN staff in peacebuilding field missions say the blank-check model of the commission's funding arm, the Peacebuilding Fund, posed problems on the ground. The fund positions itself as a flexible funder interested in "quick impact" projects.
"Money was suddenly on the table with nothing around it, and everybody tried to grab something from it. That was a fundamental mistake," says one Sierra Leonean staffer.
And another Sierra Leonean staffer, who also didn't want to be named, warned that a preoccupation with funding peacebuilding projects risks distracting the commission from the processes it uniquely can influence: "My own sense is that the PBC needs to help with dealing with real fundamental issues. You can't see them, you can't touch them, but you know they're there ... and those are the last things to change."
Still other countries seem like odd cases for peacebuilding. "Guinea-Bissau was maybe, in a way, the wrong evaluation of the PBC," says Frank Jarasch, at the time an adviser to peacebuilding chair Peter Wittig, the German ambassador to the UN. After a 2008 coup and an ongoing stalemate between the civilian government and the military, he says, "it's certainly going to be difficult to get back to a stage where peacebuilding might be concrete and successful."
Even so, Mr. Jarasch thinks any international engagement in such fragile situations is worthwhile. Others concur, because the PBC shows a troubled and troublesome government that someone is watching.
"I certainly think you have a lot more attention paid to [PBC member countries], and much more sustained attention, than you had had," says Wyeth. At the same time, she says, "you've certainly seen governments held to higher levels of scrutiny by the PBC in New York."
Still, it may be too early to tell.
"Nation-building in all of our countries has been an extremely long, bloody affair.... This is a country which still tries to create a nation that people feel like they belong to, together," says Schulenburg. "They're trying to bring democracy, and to do it peacefully. That's not been done in history. So let's not be arrogant about the whole thing. Let's see how we can help to speed it up."


text:
Man Admitted to Hospital for Kidney Stone, Discovers He's a Woman
A Colorado man who was admitted to the hospital for a kidney stone received surprising news when the nurse came back with test results revealing he was actually a woman.
Denver photographer Steve Crecelius said he's felt a little different all his life.
"When I was about 6 years old, I started having these feminine feelings, but that was in the '60s. Wearing my mom's makeup, I thought I looked pretty," Crecelius told ABC News.
So when he went to the emergency room five years ago, he wasn't too shocked when the nurse told him she found traits of both genders in his ultrasound results.
He was intersex, meaning he had both male genitalia and internal female sex organs.
"The nurse is reading the ultrasound and says, 'Huh, this says you're a female,' Crecelius said. "It was very liberating. I had spent so much energy after the age of 13 constantly evaluating how people looked at me and acted towards me."
Steve, who now goes by "Stevie," said his wife and their six children accepted his new identity right away.
"We told them individually. Some were in person and some weren't," Crecelius said. "Every one of them said, 'We don't care one way or the other. We love you for who you are and you're still my dad.'"
Crecelius and his wife, Debbie, have been together for 25 years and she's supported him every step of the way, including taking him to buy his first bra.
She told Crecelius, "You know, when I first saw you, I said to myself, 'He runs like a girl.'"
"I think we were pretty good when she began to mourn the loss of her husband," Crecelius said. "We worked through what we needed to. The concept of unconditional love is a larger story."
Intersex is a term used to describe people who bear both external genitals and internal organs, such as testes and ovaries.
A person with the condition may have male genitals along with fallopian tubes and ovaries.
"The condition used to be called hermaphroditism, meaning that person can't be identified as male or female," Crecelius said.
According to the Intersex Society of North America, more than 1,500 children a year are born intersex.
For Crecelius, he hopes he can be an advocate for those born intersex and same-sex couples.
"I think of bullying, because I haven't heard anyone talk about this. It's important to talk about," Crecelius said. "People need to be accepting and understand. I was born this way, and loving each other and supporting each other will always be the main factor in our household."


text:
Inspiration with Instruction: A Journey to Iceland to Master Adobe's Lightroom 1.1
"Field testing in Iceland turned out to be a stroke of brilliance," enthuses George Jardine, pro photo evangelist for Adobe Systems, about Mikkel Aaland's new book, Photoshop Lightroom Adventure (O'Reilly, $39.99).
Aaland turned his experiences from a once-in-a lifetime photography expedition to Iceland into a striking guided tour of Lightroom. Along the way he shows readers how they, too, can use Lightroom to create exciting new images. More importantly, Aaland, an award-winning photographer and bestselling author, inspires readers--everyone from photography enthusiasts to working professionals--by providing a far deeper experience than most instructional manuals. Part Icelandic road trip, part photo essay, "Lightroom's" photo-rich pages come packed with beautiful, exciting, and emulate-able photographs from a dozen talented working photographers.
"Yes, it's a technical book. Yet it's not only a complete guide to the latest version of the application, but a pleasure to look at, too," explains Aaland. For this is not an update of previous Lightroom versions, but the first book written specifically for Lightroom 1.1. "And my new book honors photography through the beautiful images that fill every chapter," adds Aaland.
Both the title and most of the content of his new book emerged from Aaland's singular passion to road test Lightroom in a wild and light-filled setting. So last year Aaland convinced 11 colleagues, including Jardine, and five Adobe Lightroom team members to travel with him last July to Iceland, long known Nature's Lightroom. In July the picturesque arctic nation is suffused in various shades of dappled light for nearly 24 hours--making it the perfect landscape to test and experiment with Adobe's revolutionary, all-in-one imaging application.
"I wanted to road test Lightroom in a visually exciting environment and we did," writes Aaland. "At the end of a long day of shooting, we all gathered in workrooms, fired up our computers, and got to work."
The result is the most beautiful digital photography software book available. Illustrated with extraordinary images taken by the bold team of renowned photographers, this unmatched tutorial walks readers step-by-step through Lightroom 1.1's:
- Library module for uploading, sorting, tagging, ranking and adding
keywords to your images - Develop module with Adobe Camera RAW for complete non-destructive
color and tonal adjustments - Slideshow module, where you select and size images, and export the
show to HTML, Flash, or PDF formats - Print module, which includes several templates for printing contact
sheets or full images - Web module, where you can create Flash or HTML web galleries
"My book is for anyone who uses Lightroom. I tried to strike a balance between basic instruction and advanced technique so it should be valuable to both the serious photographer and the professional," says Aaland. "I worked with a group of photographers I know pretty well, and they are not only great photographers but really good people who I enjoy being around. My adventure in Iceland was a dream come true, and I can't say how much I appreciate all of their help on this project, not to mention the great images they provided for the book."
It wouldn't have been an adventure without these intrepid contributors:
Bill Atkinson--Although Bill is now a full-time nature photographer, his name is also well known in the field of software design. Bill is being empowered in his own art by the accuracy and fine control made possible with the digital printing process. See his work at www.billatkinson.com.
Russell Brown--Russell's job at Adobe is to facilitate the exchange between digital designers and software developers. In addition, he's the prolific creator of an entertaining collection of Photoshop tips and tricks, some of which can be found at www.russellbrown.com.
Angela Drury--Angela is a fine art photographer whose work has received numerous awards and been shown in shows around the country. Her work has also been featured in several publications, including the premiere issue of Darkroom magazine. More at www.angeladrury.com.
Melissa Gaul--Melissa is an accomplished photographer and a member of the original Adobe Lightroom engineering team based in Minnesota. Her midnight Lightroom instructional sessions to the Adventure team were well attended and much appreciated.
Jóhann Gudbjargarson--Jóhann has lived all his life in Iceland. He has a degree in computer science and his hobbies are books, computers, traveling, and photography (talk about being lucky being on this adventure). Jóhann's work can be seen at www.gudbjargarson.net.
Maggie Hallahan--Maggie is an accomplished photographer with over twenty years of experience shooting advertising and editorial assignments. Her work has appeared in numerous magazines and can be seen online at www.maggiehallahan.com.
John Isaac--John is an award winning photojournalist and documentary photographer, who's traveled to more than 100 countries in his photographic career. He was a photographer for the UN for 20 years. His work can be seen at www.johnisaac.com.
George Jardine--George took his degree in photography in 1972. He has photographed food, fashion, architecture and sports, with his work appearing in many well-known publications. George is currently the Pro Photography Evangelist at Adobe.
Peter Krogh--Peter owns and operates a full service commercial photography studio in the Washington, DC area. Peter is both an award-winning photographer and the author of the definitive work on digital asset management. His work can be seen at www.peterkrogh.com.
John McDermott--John is a San Francisco photographer who shoots corporate annual reports, portraits, and sports for editorial and advertising clients. But mostly, he'd rather be wandering the streets of some strange city pretending to be Cartier-Bresson or Jay Maisel. You can see his work at www.mcdfoto.com.
Richard Morgenstein--For over twenty years, Richard has photographed people for magazines, corporations and private clients. The common denominator in Richard's work is his interest in all kinds of people, their passions, and their environments. See his work online at www.richardmorgenstein.com.
Michael Reichmann--Michael is a fine-art landscape, nature, and documentary photographer with more than 40 years of experience. He is a well known photographic educator and author, and the publisher and primary author of The Luminous Landscape website, www.luminous-landscape.com.
Addy Roff--Addy works for Adobe and basically solves problems and makes life better for everyone around her. "Addy" is short for something exotic and Icelandic, which only George Jardine has ever been heard to utter in public. To quote an adventure blog post, "The horses loved Addy."
Sigurgeir Sigurjónsson--Sigurgeir is a photographer based in ReykjavIk and has a broad selection of clients in Iceland and other countries. He is presently working on two books: the Icelandic horse and a new book on Iceland that will be out in the summer and autumn 2007. See his work at www.portfolio.is.
Derrick Story--Derrick is the digital media evangelist for O'Reilly digitalmedia.oreilly.com. He's the author of Digital Photography Hacks and Digital Photography Pocket Guide. You can listen to his photo podcasts and read his tips at thedigitalstory.com.
Martin Sundberg specializes in capturing imagery of people who are passionate about what they do, while they are doing it. By land or by sea, he embraces every opportunity to make pictures that move and inspire. Martin is based in San Francisco. His work can be found at www.martinsundberg.com.
Sonja Thórsdóttir--Sonja is Icelandic and has lived in Iceland most of her life. Her main hobby is photography and traveling all over the world. Sonja thought the adventure was a wonderful opportunity to be able to combine this and join a team of great people in Iceland.
For a review copy or more information please email [email protected]. Please include your delivery address and contact information.
Mikkel Aaland is an award-winning photographer and author of 10 books, including Photoshop CS2 RAW (O'Reilly), Shooting Digital: Pro Tips for Taking Great Pictures with Your Digital Camera(Sybex), and The Sword of Heaven(Travelers' Tales). Visit his web site at http://www.shooting-digital.com.
Additional Resources:
For more information about the
book, including table of contents, index, author bios, and cover graphic, see: http://www.oreilly/catalog/9780596100995
Lightroom Adventure
Mikkel Aaland
ISBN: 0-596-10099-X, 350 pages,
[email protected]


text:
Author and Illustrator: Sarah Graley | Age: 8-12 | Page: 192 | Paperback | 23 x 15.3 cm
From comics rising star Sarah Graley, a fresh and funny middle-grade graphic novel featuring a girl who must save a virtual world... and her own!
Izzy has an incredible secret -- she can enter the world of her new video game! She meets Rae, a robot who says Izzy is destined to save Dungeon City from the Big Boss. How is this possible?! And how can she fight for this virtual world when she's got a whole real life to keep up with: her family (though she could do without her mom's annoying cat), and her best friend, Eric. Things get even weirder when Izzy loses a life while inside the game, and she starts to worry about what might happen if she gets a Game Over for good. Meanwhile, Eric has been super upset with Izzy since she's been keeping secrets and bailing on their plans. Can Izzy survive Dungeon City and save their friendship?


text:
Table of Contents
The Internet Domain Name System (DNS) consists of the syntax to specify the names of entities in the Internet in a hierarchical manner, the rules used for delegating authority over names, and the system implementation that actually maps names to Internet addresses. DNS data is maintained in a group of distributed hierarchical databases.
The Berkeley Internet Name Domain (BIND) implements a domain name server for a number of operating systems. This document provides basic information about the installation and care of the Internet Systems Consortium (ISC) BIND version 9 software package for system administrators.
This version of the manual corresponds to BIND version 9.9.
In this document, Chapter 1 introduces the basic DNS and BIND concepts. Chapter 2 describes resource requirements for running BIND in various environments. Information in Chapter 3 is task-oriented in its presentation and is organized functionally, to aid in the process of installing the BIND 9 software. The task-oriented section is followed by Chapter 4, which contains more advanced concepts that the system administrator may need for implementing certain options. Chapter 5 describes the BIND 9 lightweight resolver. The contents of Chapter 6 are organized as in a reference manual to aid in the ongoing maintenance of the software. Chapter 7 addresses security considerations, and Chapter 8 contains troubleshooting help. The main body of the document is followed by several appendices which contain useful reference information, such as a bibliography and historic information related to BIND and the Domain Name System.
In this document, we use the following general typographic conventions:
To describe: |
We use the style: |
a pathname, filename, URL, hostname, mailing list name, or new term or concept |
literal user input |
program output |
The following conventions are used in descriptions of the BIND configuration file:
To describe: |
We use the style: |
keywords |
variables |
Optional input |
[Text is enclosed in square brackets] |
The purpose of this document is to explain the installation and upkeep of the BIND (Berkeley Internet Name Domain) software package, and we begin by reviewing the fundamentals of the Domain Name System (DNS) as they relate to BIND.
The Domain Name System (DNS) is a hierarchical, distributed database. It stores information for mapping Internet host names to IP addresses and vice versa, mail routing information, and other data used by Internet applications.
Clients look up information in the DNS by calling a resolver library, which sends queries to one or more name servers and interprets the responses. The BIND 9 software distribution contains a name server, named, and a resolver library, liblwres. The older libbind resolver library is also available from ISC as a separate download.
The data stored in the DNS is identified by domain names that are organized as a tree according to organizational or administrative boundaries. Each node of the tree, called a domain, is given a label. The domain name of the node is the concatenation of all the labels on the path from the node to the root node. This is represented in written form as a string of labels listed from right to left and separated by dots. A label need only be unique within its parent domain.
For example, a domain name for a host at the
company Example, Inc. could be
where com
is the
top level domain to which
a subdomain of com
, and
is the
name of the host.
For administrative purposes, the name space is partitioned into areas called zones, each starting at a node and extending down to the leaf nodes or to nodes where other zones start. The data for each zone is stored in a name server, which answers queries about the zone using the DNS protocol.
The data associated with each domain name is stored in the form of resource records (RRs). Some of the supported resource record types are described in the section called "Types of Resource Records and When to Use Them".
For more detailed information about the design of the DNS and the DNS protocol, please refer to the standards documents listed in the section called "Request for Comments (RFCs)".
To properly operate a name server, it is important to understand the difference between a zone and a domain.
As stated previously, a zone is a point of delegation in the DNS tree. A zone consists of those contiguous parts of the domain tree for which a name server has complete information and over which it has authority. It contains all domain names from a certain point downward in the domain tree except those which are delegated to other zones. A delegation point is marked by one or more NS records in the parent zone, which should be matched by equivalent NS records at the root of the delegated zone.
For instance, consider the example.com
domain which includes names
such as host.aaa.example.com
even though
the example.com
zone includes
only delegations for the aaa.example.com
zones. A zone can
exactly to a single domain, but could also include only part of a
domain, the rest of which could be delegated to other
name servers. Every name in the DNS
tree is a
domain, even if it is
terminal, that is, has no
subdomains. Every subdomain is a domain and
every domain except the root is also a subdomain. The terminology is
not intuitive and we suggest that you read RFCs 1033, 1034 and 1035
gain a complete understanding of this difficult and subtle
Though BIND is called a "domain name
it deals primarily in terms of zones. The master and slave
declarations in the named.conf
zones, not domains. When you ask some other site if it is willing to
be a slave server for your domain, you are
actually asking for slave service for some collection of zones.
Each zone is served by at least one authoritative name server, which contains the complete data for the zone. To make the DNS tolerant of server and network failures, most zones have two or more authoritative servers, on different networks.
Responses from authoritative servers have the "authoritative answer" (AA) bit set in the response packets. This makes them easy to identify when debugging DNS configurations using tools like dig (the section called "Diagnostic Tools").
The authoritative server where the master copy of the zone data is maintained is called the primary master server, or simply the primary. Typically it loads the zone contents from some local file edited by humans or perhaps generated mechanically from some other local file which is edited by humans. This file is called the zone file or master file.
In some cases, however, the master file may not be edited by humans at all, but may instead be the result of dynamic update operations.
The other authoritative servers, the slave servers (also known as secondary servers) load the zone contents from another server using a replication process known as a zone transfer. Typically the data are transferred directly from the primary master, but it is also possible to transfer it from another slave. In other words, a slave server may itself act as a master to a subordinate slave server.
Usually all of the zone's authoritative servers are listed in NS records in the parent zone. These NS records constitute a delegation of the zone from the parent. The authoritative servers are also listed in the zone file itself, at the top level or apex of the zone. You can list servers in the zone's top-level NS records that are not in the parent's NS delegation, but you cannot list servers in the parent's delegation that are not present at the zone's top level.
A stealth server is a server that is authoritative for a zone but is not listed in that zone's NS records. Stealth servers can be used for keeping a local copy of a zone to speed up access to the zone's records or to make sure that the zone is available even if all the "official" servers for the zone are inaccessible.
A configuration where the primary master server itself is a stealth server is often referred to as a "hidden primary" configuration. One use for this configuration is when the primary master is behind a firewall and therefore unable to communicate directly with the outside world.
The resolver libraries provided by most operating systems are stub resolvers, meaning that they are not capable of performing the full DNS resolution process by themselves by talking directly to the authoritative servers. Instead, they rely on a local name server to perform the resolution on their behalf. Such a server is called a recursive name server; it performs recursive lookups for local clients.
To improve performance, recursive servers cache the results of the lookups they perform. Since the processes of recursion and caching are intimately connected, the terms recursive server and caching server are often used synonymously.
The length of time for which a record may be retained in the cache of a caching name server is controlled by the Time To Live (TTL) field associated with each resource record.
Even a caching name server does not necessarily perform the complete recursive lookup itself. Instead, it can forward some or all of the queries that it cannot satisfy from its cache to another caching name server, commonly referred to as a forwarder.
There may be one or more forwarders, and they are queried in turn until the list is exhausted or an answer is found. Forwarders are typically used when you do not wish all the servers at a given site to interact directly with the rest of the Internet servers. A typical scenario would involve a number of internal DNS servers and an Internet firewall. Servers unable to pass packets through the firewall would forward to the server that can do it, and that server would query the Internet DNS servers on the internal server's behalf.
The BIND name server can simultaneously act as a master for some zones, a slave for other zones, and as a caching (recursive) server for a set of local clients.
However, since the functions of authoritative name service and caching/recursive name service are logically separate, it is often advantageous to run them on separate server machines. A server that only provides authoritative name service (an authoritative-only server) can run with recursion disabled, improving reliability and security. A server that is not authoritative for any zones and only provides recursive service to local clients (a caching-only server) does not need to be reachable from the Internet at large and can be placed inside a firewall.


text:
Each talk starts at 1:05pm. Free. Just turn up. |
Organised by Eneclann and Ancestor Network, each of the talks covers an important area of potential genealogical discovery and is followed by a Q&A session when researchers can raise issues relating to that day's topic. The speakers include genealogists, historians, service providers and other specialists and the range of topics is wide.
The first lecture will be delivered by Brian Donovan of Eneclann and FindMyPast who will be talking about digital sources for Irish family history.
Allowing for the bank holiday on Monday, the second lecture will be on Tuesday 5 August, and will see Rev Patrick Comerford present his talk "Hatch, match and beyond… finding trails and tales in parish records".
The series then continues on every remaining weekday in August.
If you haven't already selected the talks you want to attend, it's about time to do so. You can see the full list of topics and speakers posted in May (it's been slightly updated since then). Alternatively, the list is on the NLI website; click the image above.


text:
The only dash cams that include real-time alerts from the ESCORT/Cobra community of drivers, our new SC series cameras feature multiple connectivity options, cloud video management, and advanced safety and security features so you can drive smarter and safer.
The perfect dash cam for your ESCORT driver alert system. ESCORT's industry-leading driver alert systems now have the perfect companion. Capture crystal clear video and easily share, edit and save your video clips.
The SC 201 smart dash cam is perfect for the driver who wants to record and monitor both the front-view and interior cabin-view of the vehicle. With infrared cabin night vision, you'll get interior and exterior security, day or night.
The SC 200D smart dash cam is ideal for drivers who need the flexibility to record and monitor multiple camera views, including the front and rear. The SC 200D includes the SC 200 main camera and the rear-view accessory camera.
Cobra SC 201
Cobra SC 200D
Join our community of real drivers—an alliance of enthusiasts. Over 100 million real-time alerts shared and received every year. This is the true meaning of ESCORT/Cobra.


text:
May 05, 2011 | |
Forecast calls for nanoflowers to help return eyesight |
(Nanowerk News) University of Oregon researcher Richard Taylor is on a quest to grow flowers that will help people who've lost their sight, such as those suffering from macular degeneration, to see again. | |
These flowers are not roses, tulips or columbines. They will be nanoflowers seeded from nano-sized particles of metals that grow, or self assemble, in a natural process -- diffusion limited aggregation. They will be fractals that mimic and communicate efficiently with neurons. | |
Richard Taylor, physics professor and director of the University of Oregon Material Science Institute, is leading an effort to design a fractal-based retinal implant to help return vision to the blind. | |
Fractals are "a trademark building block of nature," Taylor says. Fractals are objects with irregular curves or shapes, of which any one component seen under magnification is also the same shape. In math, that property is self-similarity. Trees, clouds, rivers, galaxies, lungs and neurons are fractals, Taylor says. Today's commercial electronic chips are not fractals, he adds. | |
Eye surgeons would implant these fractal devices within the eyes of blind patients, providing interface circuitry that would collect light captured by the retina and guide it with almost 100 percent efficiency to neurons for relay to the optic nerve to process vision. | |
In an article titled "Vision of beauty" for Physics World, Taylor, a physicist and director of the UO Materials Science Institute, describes his envisioned approach and how it might overcome the problems occurring with current efforts to insert photodiodes behind the eyes. Current chip technology is limited, because it doesn't allow sufficient connections with neurons. | |
"The wiring -- the neurons -- in the retina is fractal, but the chips are not fractal," Taylor says. "They are just little squares of electrodes that provide too little overlap with the neurons." | |
Beginning this summer, Taylor's doctoral student Rick Montgomery will begin a yearlong collaboration with Simon Brown at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand to experiment with various metals to grow the fractal flowers on implantable chips. | |
The idea for the project emerged as Taylor was working under a Cottrell Scholar Award he received in 2003 from the Research Corporation for Science Advancement. His vision is now beginning to blossom under grants from the Office of Naval Research (ONR), the U.S. Air Force and the National Science Foundation. | |
Taylor's theoretical concept for fractal-based photodiodes also is the focus of a U.S. patent application filed by the UO's Office of Technology Transfer under Taylor's and Brown's names, the UO and University of Canterbury. | |
The project, he writes in the Physics World article, is based on "the striking similarities between the eye and the digital camera." (Physics World article is available at: http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/indepth/45840) | |
"The front end of both systems," he writes, "consists of an adjustable aperture within a compound lens, and advances bring these similarities closer each year." Digital cameras, he adds, are approaching the capacity to capture the 127 megapixels of the human eye, but current chip-based implants, because of their interface, are only providing about 50 pixels of resolution. | |
Among the challenges, Taylor says, is determining which metals can best go into body without toxicity problems. "We're right at the start of this amazing voyage," Taylor says. "The ultimate thrill for me will be to go to a blind person and say, we're developing a chip that one day will help you see again. For me, that is very different from my previous research, where I've been looking at electronics to go into computers, to actually help somebody ? if I can pull that off that will be a tremendous thrill for me." | |
Taylor also is working under a Research Corp. grant to pursue fractal-based solar cells. |
Source: University of Oregon |


text: Versace is one of the high-end designers who make fairly affordable perfumes, and Bright Crystal is one of Versace's best. Sweet, musky, and fruity, this floral fragrance is is perfect for daytime wear. Comprised of notes of pomegranate, yuzu, frost, peony, magnolia, lotus, amber, musk, and mahogany, this scent is absolutely perfect for daytime wear, especially in the spring and summer months.


text:
Over the last year or so, I've cobbled together a couple Illustrator scripts that export multiple artboards in an Illustrator document as PNG files, and export multiple layers as PNG files. (See my previous blog posts here and here.) I'd been meaning to merge them into one script, but had never quite gotten around to it until Khoi tweeted that he was looking for a script that did just that, but to PDF format.
So, a couple train rides later, I've finally combined the two scripts into a single one with a couple more added features: you can choose to export as PDFs in addition to PNGs, and you can also export the product of artboards and layers.
To use the script, download MultiExporter.jsx and put in your Illustrator scripts folder (usually in Applications/Adobe Illustrator/Presets/Scripts/). Restart Illustrator, and run the script by going to "File > Scripts > MultiExporter".
A few notes:
- You can choose whether you want to export all the artboards in the document with the currently visible layers showing, or if you want to export files for each of the layers in a document on the currently active artboard, or if you want to export a combination of all the artboards multiplied by all the layers.
- Files are named based on their layer name. It only exports layers where their name has been changed from the default "Layer 1″, "Layer 2″ or "Artboard 1", "Artboard 2", etc.
- If you put a minus sign (-) in front of a layer name or artboard name, it will skip that layer or artboard. (Useful for when you no longer decide you like a particular mockup, but don't want to delete it from the master Illustrator document.)
- For layers only: If you put a plus sign (+) in front of a layer name, that layer will always be visible. Useful for if you want to have a layer that always appears in the background of each exported image.
- It stores its settings in a nonvisible, nonprinting layer named "nyt_exporter_info"
- It has an option for transparency, and lets you choose between PNG8, PNG24 and PDF.
You can try it out on the sample file artboard-layer-test.ai.
The sample file contains artwork for buttons on three artboards — "Red", "Blue" and "-Green" — and has seven layers.
- If you run the script and choose "Export Artboards (with currently visible layers)" it will generate two files: Red.png and Blue.png that include whatever layers are currently showing at the time you run the script. (It skips the "-Green" artboard because the artboard name begins with a minus sign.
- If you chose "Export Layers (on currently selected artboard)" it will generate two files: Play.png and Pause.png. The "+Button" and "+Gradient" layers will appear in the background of both exported files, and it will skip the "-Pause 2″ and "Layer 5″ layers.
- And if you choose the "Artboard + Layers", it will do a combination of the two other options and generate four files: Red-Play.png, Red-Pause.png, Blue-Play.png and Blue-Pause.png.
Try it out, and leave a note in the comments if you have any problems or suggestions.


text:
Yep. This is the final week, and the personal filing deadline (April 15th) is *so* close.
It's officially the final week of tax season — and we are working our tails off for you and our other Louisville clients.
But I'm still taking the time to step away for a moment and write to you, my friend. And if you have all your papers in, and are waiting for our completion — fear not — my team is hard at work, as I type…
Oh, and if for some reason you haven't done ANYTHING with your taxes yet, it's actually not too late. More about that in a moment.
But first, there's a lot of "business" in this note, so please make sure you read it all — it could make a huge difference. (Honestly, I much prefer writing the notes that are a little more "interesting", but this is really crucial information.)
And you know what else would make a huge difference? If we heard from you. Would you leave us a review on Google or other online platforms for potential clients to see? We have found that these sources can be so helpful for people evaluating their options, and would love to have as much information there as possible. Thank you!
But yes — this is often our busiest week of the year (so please be understanding), and it's also the week when we receive, with clockwork regularity, many questions about extensions and payment options.
But before I get to that: other deadlines that fall on April 15th this year:
1) Estimated taxes for the first quarter are due.
2) Want to open or contribute to an IRA or Roth IRA for 2018? Gotta get that done by Monday the 15th.
3) Final day to max out contributions for your 2018 HSA (Health Savings Account).
4) Claim any refund money from an unfiled 2015 return. (There is $1.4 BILLION in unclaimed refund money out there for that year — but only available if you didn't file.)
5) Most states' tax deadlines also fall on the 15th. (Exceptions – DE 4/30; HI 4/22; IA 4/30; LA 5/15; ME 4/17; MA 4/17; OK 4/20; SC 5/1; VA 5/1; any state with no income tax.)
Alright — let's dive into my thoughts on extensions and payment options (if you aren't able to pay your tax bill right away)…
2018 Tax Extensions and Payment Options for Louisville Taxpayers
"If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you'll never get it done." – Bruce Lee
As you know, this upcoming Monday, April 15th is the filing deadline for a federal tax return (except for you Maine and Massachusetts people — you get until the 17th). If you need more time to get your paperwork complete, you need to file (or have us file on your behalf) this form: http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f4868.pdf with the IRS by the end of the day on the 15th (the 17th for ME and MA residents). This gives you an automatic six-month (until October 15, 2019) extension of time to file.
Here's the deal: An "Extension of Time to File" is not an "Extension of Time to Pay", unfortunately. The extension simply gives you an automatic six months of additional time to get your paperwork together and file that return. But, if you owe more than what you paid with your estimate, you'll be accumulating penalties and interest on the difference — so PLEASE don't take the entire six months to do this!
So, when filing your "Extension of Time to File", you'll need to estimate what you think you owe to the IRS. This should not be pulling numbers out of thin air (or other various body parts). You'll still need to go through your receipts and tax documents and get them "somewhat" organized.
From here, you can estimate both your income and your expenses, and then approximate what you owe Uncle Sam. Keep in mind that this is an ESTIMATE. Then you'll have to pay what you estimate you owe at the time we file for the extension.
You can do this all electronically through our office, you can mail in the form WITH estimated payment (must be postmarked by the 15th), or you can call a specialized provider and pay by credit card. We can provide you with the appropriate number to call.
If you cannot pay your taxes due for some reason:
1) Pay as much as you possibly can right now.
2) You can ask for (and often receive) an extension of up to 120 days to PAY: https://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc202.html. It requires a phone call to the IRS. 🙁
3) "Financial hardship" delay: This is if paying your tax bill would demonstrably affect your ability to pay your other bills. Interest and penalties still accrue, but it's better to register this with the IRS than to simply ignore the bill.
4) Installment payment plan: If you owe less than $50K in taxes, you should usually be able to get an installment payment plan of up to 72 months, simply by asking for it. If this is something you are considering, please let's talk it over to make sure we come up with the best plan. But you can apply online for this here: https://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Online-Payment-Agreement-Application
5) Negotiate: This is NOT something to try on your own. We can help, but the number of "Offers in Compromise" that get accepted each year are quite small and a knowledge of how the system works is important.
6) Using existing credit sources (credit card, HELOC, private loans): Some tax advisors would quickly recommend this, but I would NOT recommend you go this route. If you've exhausted the options above, do this instead…
7) Sell something you don't need anymore. Always a pretty good plan anyway.
That was a lot of information. I truly hope it is helpful.
But regardless, we're in your corner.
Kevin Roberts
(502) 426-0000
Roberts CPA Group