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Having my Mom read to me is one of my favorite childhood memories. I specifically remember one book in particular - I don't remember the name of the book, but I do remember it was a Christmas story. She must have read that book to me more than a thousand times, per my request I must add. :) Even in the middle of summer, it was my book of choice because I was slowly learning to read it and there was nothing I wanted more than to learn how to read.
Now that I am the Momma to 2 (soon to be 4!) young children, it's my turn to pass the love of reading to them. My husband and I started reading to them when they were still in the womb. I would check out books from the library to read to my unborn children - that is how much I love reading and want to pass my love of it onto them! Having story-time has not stopped since then and both our boys LOVE being read to or just flipping through books on their own.
I couldn't imagine my childhood or my children's lives without books - it honestly makes me sad to even try and imagine it. So much joy and learning would be gone from our lives. When I heard that Champions for Kids' September SSP (Simple Service Project) was to help get books to children who need them - I was game. Reading is something I hold very close to my heart and knew I needed to help somehow.
Did you know that 61% of low income families have no books for children in their homes? And more than 80% of the preschool and after-school programs serving at-risk children have no books at all? The numbers are very upsetting, as I think 1 child with no books is already 1 too many.
So, Champions for Kids teamed up Nickelodeon this month and came up with the Nickelodeon Big Help Book Drive. The ways we can help are so easy! Whether it's starting up your own book drive amongst friends and collecting children's books to donate or putting together a donation of gently used books you have on hand already - every little bit helps. Even 1 book is going to help that 1 kid who doesn't have a book of his/her own.
We decided to buy a few new books to start off our donation, and since it is Nickelodeon who teamed up with Champions for Kids this month - we headed to Walmart (check out our shopping trip on Google+) where I knew some Nickelodeon books would be! I had heard that there was a new Dora the Explorer book out, Dora the Gymnast, but was unable to find it. Lucky for us, there were other Nickelodeon books on hand!
I even had a helper to find books with me. :)
Not to mention was able to check out some extremely cute Halloween items!
I am very happy with the start of our donation. This week we will be searching for more books to add - some from around our house, our friends/family or perhaps even second-hand stores. I can't wait to see how many books we come up with!
The books we collect will be donated to Sacramento Children's Home. I was looking for local organizations that not only help children, but also NEEDS books. Sacramento Children's Home has a wishlist on their site and books is one of the items listed!!
Make sure to check back next week and see how our donation turned out, I am very excited. :)
I am a member of the Collective Bias™ Social Fabric® Community. This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias™ and Champions for Kids. #NickCFK #CBias

subset: commoncrawl


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By the time we got home it was superlate. So we woke up Texas-early this morning to get Dutch back from Bellatrix's mom. She works way out in Guam and it was raining so it took longer to drive there than it did to fly to Texas.
I was kinda excited to see Dutch, but he wasn't excited to see me at all. Or our human. He just stood there with Bellatrix's mom and stared at us like we were complete strangers or something. Even after he smelled my butt - nothing.
Ever since we got home, I've been hanging out under my human's chair and Dutch has been on our bed. He doesn't want anything to do with me or my human and I think it's because we smell like Texas. It's kinda sad. A little heartbreaking, my human says.
Does anyone know how to get rid of the Texas smell?? I want Dutch to love us again.


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Cure By Design Therapeutic Body Oil for Stress is made from pure essential oils of the best quality, they are natural essences and not synthetic.
Cure By Design Therapeutic Body Oil for Stress aroma oils has been specially blended to help bring balance into your life and heal your body, mind, and soul. When infused with the perfect Carrier Oil (Hemp Seed Oil), which is well known to have amazing skin benefits the combination is sensational.
Our blends are made after intense study and research to give you a blend to combat our claims.
Healing through the power of smell is not a new holistic remedy, it has been used by our ancestors for decades.
When used on a regular basis, especially in combination with diet, yoga, and affirmations, you will see phenomenal benefits.
Ingredients and their benefits:
- Anti-inflammatory
- Delays aging of the skin
- Facial Cleanser
- Moisturizer
- Soothes Dermatitis
- Fights Acne & Skin Lesions
- Relieves Eczema & Psoriasis
- Prevent Tissue Damage
Ylang Ylang oil
- Boosts mood.
- Reduces depression.
- Alleviates anxiety.
- Lower blood pressure.
- Decrease heart rate.
- Stimulate oil production in the skin and on the scalp.
Clary sage oil
- Stress reduction
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- Natural antidepressant
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Lemon Oil
- Refreshing
- Mood Booster
- Antiseptic
- Relieves Pain
Orange Oil
- Anxiety
- Colds and flu
- Constipation
- Depression
- Anti Inflammatory
- Stress
- What is aromatherapy?
Aromatherapy is a holistic healing treatment that uses natural plant extracts to promote health and well-being.
Sometimes it's called essential oil therapy. Aromatherapy uses aromatic essential oils medicinally to improve the health of the body, mind, and spirit. It enhances both physical and emotional health.
Aromatherapy is thought of as both an art and a science. Recently, aromatherapy has gained more recognition in the fields of science and medicine.
Humans have used aromatherapy for thousands of years. Ancient cultures in India, Egypt, China and elsewhere incorporated aromatic plant components in resins, balms,
and oils. These natural substances were used for medical and religious purposes. They were known to have both physical and psychological benefits.
What Are Essential Oils?
Essential oils are made from flower, herb, and tree parts, like bark, roots, peels, and petals. The cells that give a plant its fragrant smell are its "essence." When an essence is extracted from a plant, it becomes an essential oil.
Why infuse Hemp Seed Oil??
Obtained from the Cannabis Sativa plant, hemp seed oil provides some pretty amazing health benefits.With high concentrations of both linoleic and alpha-linolenic acids, the hemp seed oil is a brilliant anti-inflammatory and has valuable antioxidant properties which help with skin cell regeneration and prevent premature aging.
Being non-greasy it is great to use on oily skin or for full-body massages. Hemp seed oil is also a natural analgesic (pain-reliever), making it a good choice for muscle and joint pain, especially when mixed with essential oils that have analgesic properties like the ingredients used to create our blends.
How to Use?
Can be used topically on the face or body and then massaged.
Can be applied behind the ears, wrist and temples, and other pulse points.
Can be applied to affected areas directly.
Since it has been mixed with a carrier oil, it cannot be used in a diffuser.


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With the increasing globalisation of retailing, both in terms of their points-of-sale and their points-of-supply; the information technology (IT) spend in the retail sector has increased significantly. IT plays an increasingly important role in the management of complex retail operations.
Market knowledge, as well as control of data and information, is key to obtaining a competitive advantage in the retail sector. Markets are continuing to grow and become more complex; the simple process of retailing has started to deploy more advanced retail information systems to cope with all the transactions involved.
Today, retailers need to transform their IT capabilities for multiple reasons, including:
- To increase the company's ability to respond to the evolving marketplace through enhanced speed and flexibility.
- To collect and analyze customer data while enhancing differentiation.
- To work effectively; retailers need one system working across stores (or even across national borders) to make sure the most effective use of stock and improve business processes.
Retailers are beginning to notice that technology's role is one of an enabler. Essentially, information technology can speed up processes and deliver cost saving benefits to the company.
The retail industry faces many specific challenges related to IT management, including:
- Customer data
Many retailers struggle with information overload because they're required to collect and sift through mass amounts of data, then convert it into useful information in a customer-centric industry.
- Transparency and tracking
Retailers must increase transparency between systems, as well as obtain better tracking to integrate systems from manufacturer through to the consumer while obtaining customer and sales information.
- Global data synchronisation
Due to radio frequency identification/electronic product coding, the entire supply chain has become more intelligent. Retailers must enable the use of real-time data to watch inventory levels. In addition, radio frequency identification tagging positions the company to be able to safeguard its shipments by allowing products to be tracked from manufacturer through the entire supply chain.
- PCI Security Compliance
PCI Security Compliance addresses the retailer's internal security setup and practices, in order to mitigate payment security risks. Every business engaged in credit card payment processing is required to comply with PCI Security Standards. If a retailer collects or stores credit card information that becomes compromised, the retailer may lose the ability to accept credit card payments. Other possible consequences include lawsuits, insurance claims, cancelled accounts, and government fines.
The retailers who take advantage of outsourcing IT will obtain optimal advice and benefits from outsourcing. Many retailers have turned towards IT outsourcing as a way to control costs and improve their service delivery.
Have questions about IT for your retail store? We are here to help you. Contact us today by calling (02) 8212 4722 or emailing our Sydney IT support team at [email protected]. We look forward to helping you with all your IT needs.


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Living Free Every Day®
Today's Scripture
"You prepare a feast for me in the presence of my enemies. You honor me by anointing my head with oil. My cup overflows with blessings. Surely your goodness and unfailing love will pursue me all the days of my life, and I will live in the house of the Lord forever." Psalm 23:5-6 NIV
Thoughts for Today
In the culture of David's day, it was customary for the host of a feast to anoint guests with oil and to protect them from any potential enemies. David said God, his Host, honored him by anointing his head with oil. The Shepherd protected him from his enemies.
And so God does for those who follow him. He honors and cherishes us as his children. As anointed ones, we can be in the presence of the enemy but not associated with the enemy. In the world but not of the world.
Jesus lived in the world but was not of the world. Just before going to the cross, he prayed for his disciples that they might follow his example . . .
I'm not asking you to take them out of the world, but to keep them safe from the evil one. They do not belong to this world any more than I do. Make them holy by your truth; teach them your word, which is truth. (John 17:15-17 NIV)
With our Shepherd's help, we too can live in the world but not of the world.
Consider this
As we choose to follow Jesus' example and with his help live in the world but not of the world, God's goodness and unfailing love will follow us here on earth . . . and on into eternity.
So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. (Romans 12:1-2 MSG)
Father, thank you for your blessing and protection. Help me to live in this world but not of it. Help me share your love with those who are lost, but not to be so involved in the world that I begin conforming to it. Help me embrace what you do for me and follow you in all I do. In Jesus' name . . .
These thoughts were drawn from
Knowing God My Father: Applying the Names of God to My Personal Life by Jimmy Ray Lee, D.Min. This curriculum is designed to help people strengthen their relationship with their heavenly Father by applying His names to their personal life. Along with helping Christians know God better, it can serve as an evangelistic tool by giving a true picture of God to people who may have a distorted view of Him because of an absent or abusive earthly father who did not or does not provide for them. This group can also help men who want to be better fathers. Note: This curriculum was written especially for small groups, and we encourage people to use it that way. However, it can also be used effectively as a personal study for individuals or couples.
Would you like to have these devotions appear daily on your church or ministry website? Learn More


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Introduction – MSI Z87I Gaming and GTX 760 Gaming Mini
MSI's gaming line has now seen a few entries for board and GPU models and this set I have to say is extremely interesting as these models are made for the very popular mini PC builds which are becoming very popular.
Mini ITX systems are growing greatly in popularity as smaller systems become much more powerful and solutions like this are very interesting as it specially builds specific targeted models based around a small sized build. starting with a Z87 board with gaming feature sets and also a GTX 760 card which is a great price/performance model built to a size to fit within a super compact Mini ITX chassis.
The board comes in at a MSRP of $200.00 whereas the GTX 760 ITX model comes in at $269.99 both of which are rather reasonable when you consider some of its main competition they are gunning for are right at the same price point or possibly a bit more. This puts it right in line with key competitors and the fact that ASUS the main mini card competitor at this point has as of now still chosen to not bring their mini 760 to market in the USA means that MSI is the only one in the show at the moment.
Features & Specifications (Motherboard)
Military Class Components
When MSI puts military class components to the fire they are not joking as they come to the table claiming to have passed multiple tests following Mil spec (MIL-STD-810G) Tests including:
- Temperature Shock testing: Sudden thermal changes which can normally wreak havoc on electrical components are fully tested on these components to ensure they can last through some of the worst conditions like what the extreme enthusiasts community may employ them for.
- Humidity Testing: Testing of components in different humidity conditions can make a big difference as to the capabilities of the cards as different areas can have much different environments and not every deployment will be like a sterile lab and knowing they can take that kind of abuse once again is a major plus.
- Vibration tests: This one is a little nuts but being in California we suppose in an earthquake, MSI can ensure the shaking won't affect the components.
- Low Pressure Testing: This once again is a little extreme as deployment for different elevations especially extreme enough to require low pressure testing will be extremely rare if ever but it will handle it.
- High Temperature Testing: This one should be a standard for every component in a high end PC as thermals are the enemy of every enthusiasts rig so I like to see such attention paid here.
- Low Temperature Testing: Once again this is something more targeted at the Lightning model, but the fact that they test these cards to withstand LN2 benchmarking temperatures tells us that under standard gaming stresses this card is gonna run and keep on running.
- Shock Testing: This is once again more extreme as these are similar to drop or rough impact testing which wel even if the card survives we're sure other components may not fare so well in this kind of scenario.
Basically this means that this board/components should last the test of time and offer excellent performance pretty much through anything it would ever experience in a extreme gaming PC.
Killer E2205 Gaming Network Controller
The Gaming series of MSI boards carry specialized gaming features well one of these is the Killer Gaming grade Network controller which when utilized with the included software can help shape traffic and even allow gaming applications to get packet priority over other network traffic. This can allow for the extra edge when milliseconds count during an online game.
Audio Boost
One of the key features for a gaming board has to be audio as it is what gives you the experience the most besides graphics. Well for this MSI put a lit cover over the audio codec which is a Realtek ALC1150 model which is a very nice quality unit and also with this package even the audio ports are gold plated to allow for maximum clean signal contact and optimum audio quality. After the codec you get a high performance amplifier which ensures a nice powerful audio signal which makes its way to the high quality audio Caps and to the terminating end on the audio panel at the rear. Overall this makes for a excellent audible experience especially for those with tuned gaming audio headsets since the amplifier will really make them come to life.
USB Audio Power
MSI employs a special 5V USB circuit for the power feed to ensure that the most stable power is delivered no matter how many devices are connected. This ensures that USB audio cards or DACs can achieve full audio performance via the more power stable power delivery provided by the advanced MSI circuitry.
Gaming Ports
We have seen this before from MSI with the "Gaming" ports which are special ports which are tuned for using high sensitivity or quick response mouse technologies as many mice now can adjust the polling rate but the effect could be lessened depending on your port configuration. With the MSI gaming ports they are tuned for this along with having higher gold content in the contacts for these ports which allows for more reliable and consistent signal transfer.
WiFi AC & Intel WiDi Support
MSI also employed new WiFi AC onto the gaming ITX board via an internal Intel based card and with that also comes Intel WiDi wireless display support. This is a pretty big gain for this board as it allows some of the fastest and newest in connectivity now.
MSI Click 4 BIOS
MSI has revised their UEFI to add even more options along with increasing the smoothness of it as well for a better end user experience. We have included a few screenshots of it especially the new features below in the BIOS section.
Even More Features
the MSI Gaming board is exploding with features such as.
- Total Fan control: MSI has some pretty nice fan control in their BIOS allowing for full control and profiling of the fans based on thermals and fan RPMs.
- The Dragon heatsink is basically your PCH heatsink and even VRM heatsinks both carry the dragon design and this is all about style over anything else.
Features & Specifications (GTX 760 Mini)
Next Gen cooling (RADAX Fan)
MSI has engineered a new fan design labeled RADAX which is a swept blade fan design with a shrouded edge to help ensure more focused airflow is pushed through the fin array below, but also to ensure lateral airflow is also achieved there are outer small fins that scoop air outward into the surrounding fin array to ensure maximum cooling performance.
MSI Gaming App
The Gaming app is a cool design as it offers a simple to use interface where users can quickly set a overclock or even Eco setting without having to work with the Afterburner app which for some can be a bit confusing especially for a newer or inexperienced user
This app is nice as it also has a snowflake icon which is made for quick cool downs at a high fan speed for situations such as maybe between runs of a benchmark using the air cooling solution.
MSI Afterburner
MSI offers its own software utility. MSI Afterburner is co-developed with Rivatuner which is very similar to what the other top manufacturers are offering.
There we see it above with multiple options including voltage control and power limit controls to ensure our overclock ceiling is just a little bit higher. Do note that some options may not show up right away and need to be enabled in settings otherwise they will be hidden.
Review Overview
Performance - 9
Value - 9
Quality - 9
Features - 9.5
Innovation - 9
MSI stepped into the Mini ITX game ready to run with both a capable motherboard with good feature set and even a mini card to ensure you have the whole package.


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What is a cookie economy? | |
A Cookie Economy is what we call the exchange of cookies in Dreams to play games or activate DS. There are special DragonSpeak commands that allow Dream Owners to manipulate cookies and make interesting games and activities. You can do this too with the free tools on the PC version of Furcadia. Here's a page that gives more information about the Cookie Economy. |
What are cookies? | |
Cookies are a fun little game-wide exchange and gift currency that last only a day. They show up as a desctag when you are given one. You will have "unmade" or inactive cookies at the start of each day, and you can use typed commands to "bake" your cookies and give them to friends. You can read all about cookies here. |
What do I do with them? | |
You can share cookies with friends, eat them, or use them to play games. Often the DragonSpeak or NPCs in Dreams will request cookies to be able to play a game. When requested, just choose a selection on the pop-up to indicate whether or not you would like to give a cookie (or multiple cookies). |
What is an inactive cookie? | |
By typing "info" in the Text Input Box, you can see how many active and inactive (unbaked) cookies you have. Type make-cookie |
How many cookies do I get? | |
Players get three free cookies a day, while Silver Sponsors get 12 and Dream Packages get 48. They will only last a day unless you have a dream with a cookie bank -- then they will last a bit longer. They are generally meant to be used each day though! |
Can I get more cookies? | |
Yes! You can get more cookies in some dreams like Lake Resort through playing games and completing activities such as fishing. Other furres can also give you cookies if you run out. Another way to get cookies is by purchasing them with DragonScales on Digo Market! |
Can I eat cookies? | |
Eating cookies is always a lot of fun. Type "eat-cookie" and one of the cookies from your description will disappear. You will then get a cookie fortune! There's a rumor that no furre has ever gotten the same fortune twice! |
Can I give cookies to friends? | |
You can give cookies to friends and to furres that help you. They are a great way to say "Hello!" or "Thank you!". Try giving your inactive ("unbaked") cookies away first by typing make-cookie |
Why can't I give cookies to some furres? | |
If you don't want furres to give you cookies type cookies-off. Some furres do not wish to use cookies and turn that feature off. |
Do cookies work the same everywhere? | |
Cookies' basic behavior works the same everywhere in Furcadia. In Any Dream you enter cookies can be given, eaten and used in games. However, some dreams allow cookie giving to be seen out loud and some don't. Furthermore, what you do with cookies in different Dreams will change. One Dream might require a cookie to enter a secret area and another might want you to give one to get a prize. |
Why do cookies look different in some dreams? | |
One of the ways that Dream Owners can manipulate cookies is to make them be something other than cookies! They can change the cookie graphic to look like a kiwi, for instance, and change the text in the dream to say "You are collecting kiwis". Your cookies will look like cookies again when you leave their dream! |
Can you trade cookies for Scales? | |
Players can trade cookies to each other for DragonScales if they want to, but there is no official way to trade Cookies in for Scales. You can, however, use Scales to buy cookies on Digo Market. |
What do I use cookies for in Lake Resort? | |
In Lake Resort you can use cookies to give to other furres, to eat, or to play the many games. If you run out of cookies, you can even go fishing for more! |
What kind of cookies are they? | |
They are Chocolate Chip Snickerdoodles made from a special recipe! If you want to make them at home you will need to gather 3 kiwi eggs, a cup of ostrix butter, Chocolate flox chips, wisdom tree bark, pongo extract, and wheatberries! |


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Is it possible to automate the key press of a key (such as "a" or "<") in Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome or Safari (in this order)?
I'd like to automate the key press of "a" for example in Mozilla Firefox for 100 times every x
seconds. With x
being a value between 1 second and 10 seconds chosen randomly at every key press. What Applescript could make the trick?
Also, where can I find a list of all codes for each key of the keyboard?


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Posts Tagged
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Food Review Meat Market Palm Beach, It's Hot!
It's easy to understand why the Meat Market in Palm Beach is not only one of Palm Beach's hottest spots but is considered one of the top restaurants in South Florida. It's a winner from the minute you enter the door. There is a chic bar and lounge area that provides


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Critical race theory, or CRT, has been discussed in academic circles for nearly 40 years, but the term has only recently been weaponized in backlash of the racial reckoning that spread across the country following the police killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor in 2020. Law professor Kimberle Williams Crenshaw is a pioneering scholar and writer on race, civil rights and law. She teaches at Columbia University and UCLA. She's also a co-founder and executive director of the African American Policy Forum. I spoke with her about CRT and its importance in this moment.
So, Professor, since you coined the term critical race theory, could you start us off with what it is?
KIMBERLE WILLIAMS CRENSHAW: It is effectively an embodiment of what I call racial literacy. How do we read the world? How do we understand the relationship to its history? We frame it that way not simply as a way of marking history and showing, for example, how segregated neighborhoods were the product of federal policy that continues to create material differences in wealth and in health to this day. It's important to understand the history of it to do something about it.
MARTÍNEZ: You wrote an article - an op-ed actually - in the LA Times in January, and the headline is "Martin Luther King Was A Critical Race Theorist Before There Was A Name For It." In what way, Professor?
CRENSHAW: Well, in several ways. No. 1, he was a critic of the contradiction between what America says it is, what its deepest aspirations are and what its material reality is. You know, a lot of people like to quote his March on Washington speech, particularly the part where he talks about how our aspiration is to be judged on the content of our character, not the color of our skin. That was his sort of aspirational moment. The rest of the speech was a trenchant critique of the idea that America had given African Americans a rubber check. Basically, the promises of the 13th and the 14th Amendment came back marked insufficient funds. So his entire point of that speech was to make good on the Democratic promises.
MARTÍNEZ: But has the anti-CRT wing of society, as you put it, Professor - are they in full control of the narrative surrounding CRT?
CRENSHAW: What's that saying? - that a lie gets around the world three times before truth puts its boots on. I would say that the MAGA faction has used CRT, and it's gone around the country multiple times before the Democrats and our president finally stepped up to say, our country is hanging in the balance. And the attack on our democracy and the attack on anti-racism are one in the same. It's not an accident that the Confederate flag made an appearance in the Capitol during January 6. It's not an accident that the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys and many other neo-nationalists and white supremacist groups are all behind the idea that the election is stolen. You can't fight against that without naming and being clear about the role of neo-nationalism and white supremacy in stoking these fears.
MARTÍNEZ: So then on the point of history and learning those lessons from the past, Professor, in what ways has historical erasure impacted our society and culture as it relates to CRT?
CRENSHAW: If you don't know about the federal housing role in creating the middle class and doing it racially, if you don't know what happened after World War II when white GIs were able to use the GI Bill to actually create the white middle class and use federal housing dollars to create white suburbs, but those dollars were denied to African Americans - if you don't know that story, if that has been erased, then you're able to infer that the lack of wealth, that the disproportionate enjoyment of middle-class and upper-class status is simply the product of the failure to work hard or the decision to work hard.
MARTÍNEZ: When it comes to our democracy then, or actually the threats to our democracy, you said that we can't talk about that without including critical race theory. How are they connected?
CRENSHAW: They're connected because, No. 1, our democracy - one has to remember for the majority of our existence, Black people were not able to contribute to this democracy, as were women and other people of color. So our actual democracy is one that has been shaped by a notion of democracy for a few.
MARTÍNEZ: So what actions would you like to see President Biden take?
CRENSHAW: I would love to see him actually speak directly to the role of race and racism in the lies about the election. I would like to see him call for greater literacy. I would like to see him talk about how un-American it is to ban books, including books by some of the heroes of American society - Martin Luther King, Ruby Bridges, who integrated New Orleans schools and told her story from the perspective of a child. I would love to see him say that it is un-American to try to win by depriving us of knowledge. Knowledge and political participation and freedom go hand in hand in a democracy. Denying that goes hand in hand in a democracy that's sliding towards fascism.
MARTÍNEZ: How can people better explain what CRT is?
CRENSHAW: Critical race theory is something that people practice every day. If you yourself put your hands on the steering wheel at the 10 and 2 o'clock position when you see those lights in the rearview mirror, you are practicing critical race theory. Critical race theory is practiced by any number of people and groups who recognize that colorblindness is an aspiration, but it's not the reality in American society. And to survive and to thrive, you have to be aware of how race plays a role. You have to pass it on to your children. You have to practice it in your workplace. You practice it in the stores. You practice it wherever you go.
MARTÍNEZ: Kimberle Crenshaw is a professor at the Columbia and UCLA Law Schools and executive director of the African American Policy Forum. Professor, thank you very much.
CRENSHAW: Thank you.
(SOUNDBITE OF TALIB KWELI SONG, "PUSH THRU") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.


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[ For those of you who haven't heard the story or checked it out, I highly encourage you to check out Renew Newcastle, which is a great urban success story out of Newcastle, Australia. There are a lot of lessons here to be learned, particularly for places that struggle with a lack of financial resources. Hopefully this article can give you some ideas and some hope – Aaron. ]
This article was written for the latest edition of the Dutch architecture/ design journal Volume…
Let me put a scenario to you. Say you live in an aging, fading industrial town. One that has been on receiving end of repeated shocks from earthquakes and natural disasters to the closure of its largest industries and mass unemployment. A city where an old urban core — a legacy of an era of trams and public transport long gone — has hollowed out and emptied. Retail has moved to the suburbs and a growing suburban sprawl. A city with dozens, if not hundreds of empty buildings in the old downtown. A place where the feedback loop has become so desperately negative that many of the shops and offices that remain are forced to leave by the growing vacancies around them.
How do you turn such a place around? How to bring life and people back to it? How to bring interest, curiosity and commerce? How to make it — or at least some of it — liveable and desirable again and to bring its decaying urban character back into flower?
Almost always, the answers to those questions are about physical things. They involve long planning process, research, workshops and facilitation followed by attempts to attract large amounts of capital to invest in new buildings, public amenities or to kickstart new industries.
But what if you can't do that?
Suppose you have access to none of the above. Suppose that to varying degrees of quality and effectiveness all of the above has been tried and failed or at least stalled — lost in posturing and process.
Imagine that you have no money. That you cannot buy or build anything — that you are stuck with the building stock and the hard infrastructure. Imagine you are not the government and have little or no capacity to persuade them to make major investments or decisive changes.
If all that doesn't make things difficult enough, let's say the budget you have to work with is tiny — amounts you can put on a credit card. All you have is the city — beautiful, fading but endowed with many interesting small scales spaces, a talented enthusiastic creative community and a generous broader community willing to donate their skills and time and resources in kind.
What could you do?
Actually, this is not a thought experiment. It's a real place. It's my home town of Newcastle, Australia. As recently as 2008 the situation in Newcastle was pretty much as described above. Yet as of a few months ago more than sixty new creative projects, initiatives, galleries, studios, and creative businesses — all experiments of various kinds — had started up in the old downtown. The city — far from being a failed post industrial basket case — was being hailed by the world's biggest travel publishers Lonely Planet as one of the top 10 cities in the world to visit in 2011 on account, in large part, of a vibrant creative resurgence that had taken place in the long dead downtown.
So how did we get here from there? Two years is too short and the budget was too limited to address any of the city's real hardware problems. Instead, Newcastle took a different tack. To do so we engaged the immediacy of enthusiasm and activity and stepped back from the contentious and divisive debates about what should and shouldn't happen in the long term. To do that you need to start by rewriting — or hacking — the software to change not what the city is but how it behaves.
Perhaps this is an Australian thing but virtually every urbanist I know is a hardware person. They come from backgrounds in town planning, engineering, design, architecture or activism around the preservation or possibilities of the built environment. They like to draw things, design things, build things. They like tangible things. The futures that they desire, imagine and will into being are full of hard physical things from bike lanes to green buildings, transport links and physical amenities imagined and preserved.
The built environment and geography of a city is its hardware. It defines much of what a city can and cannot be. The hardware of the city — its topography, the scale of its spaces, its architecture, its patterned dense grid or its narrow laneways or its chaotic sprawl — places a hard limit on what is and isn't possible. While the hardware of cities can and does change and evolve slowly over time, in the short term it remains relatively fixed — major changes are invariably expensive, can be paralysingly slow and often contentious.
The ability to design, imagine and build the hardware of a city are valuable skills and important catalysts but for better or for worse I am not a hardware person. I've spent much of my life as a festival director. Festivals — or at least the kind of un-institutional ones that I have been involved in — are places where artists, DIY media makers, installationists treat cities as places of opportunity and experimentation.
Unencumbered by the possibilities of permanence, they treat cities not as fixed places in which to build fixed things but as laboratories in which to try and experiment. The extent to which they can and can't is defined only in part by what the city is — creative people are usually capable of hammering their own ideas around whatever starting position or location you give them. To a much larger extent their possibilities are defined by how a city behaves in response to their initiative. It is the software of the city — which is often intangible, bewildering and complex — that defines their possibilities.
Cities are also software — they actually have many layers of software. They have an operating system — a hard set of rules and constraints that are imposed and enforced by governments. Operating systems are hard boundaries too — they are laws that forbid and allow. They define what you can and can't do as much as the hardware does. Far from open to opportunities, the operating systems of cities are often defensive, risk averse and closed to possibility.
In many respects the operating system needs to be defensive — it is vulnerable to exploitation and malicious intent. In Australia at least, many who seek to use the city are attempting to do little more than run a virus — a parasite of a program — called something along the line of Maximising_my_commercial_return.exe. They are attempting to do little more than build the cheapest building, with the greatest amount of saleable space, in the shortest time possible. Cities have quite rightly developed a series of strategies to mitigate the virus and its impact.
Yet processes that assume that this is all that people wish to do with a city misses the point. Artists, creative types and community minded collectives are often caught up in the same defensive systems. The fact that they have limited capital, their limited access to political processes and specialist expertise, their limited opportunity to recoup an expensive investment, and their precarious ability to survive complex and time consuming processes means that they are often more vulnerable to being stopped by process than malicious developers.
In my previous life as a festival director I was often asked by artists "can I do this?" Too often I had to tell them no, they could not — despite the obvious benefits it would bring. More often than not it was not for any particular reason but for the absence of a process — a software error. A failure to distinguish the nature of the activity. A category error around scale that could inadvertently treat a one night only event for 30 or 300 people in process terms in the same way that it treats the building of a new development or planning a subdivision. It's a software error that fails to distinguish between creative and commercial intent. A process error that did not allow — or did not easily allow — the intended use despite the absence of objections or even wide community consent. A bug that introduces compliance, complexity and costs to people incapable of navigating it. Cities often fail to recognise the transformative powers of momentum and enthusiasm by blunting it with confusion, cost and complexity.
In many respects the software of the city is subtle — it is at least partially the cultural context, its history and its economic circumstances. Yet, in most respects the software of the city is codified and hard-coded — height and noise restrictions, planning processes, rules that enable certain possibilities and disable others. They can be embedded in common law rights and privileges. As an ephemeral user of cities I had inadvertently spent many years experimenting with the limits of what types of a behaviour a city will and will not tolerate. The more you do so the more it becomes apparent that cities can be arbitrary, irrational and incentivise entirely the wrong the things.
Renew Newcastle, the not-for-profit company that we established in late 2008 is a piece of software. It is a broker. It is an enabler. It is an interface between the aging, decaying, and at times boarded-up built environment and those who seek to use and activate it. It connects the many empty spaces in the city with the passion of people who want to experiment and try things in them. It has facilitated more than 60 projects in more than 30 once empty spaces in just over two years. It has done so without building, buying or owning anything other than some computers and some second-hand furnishings. It does not fund things — nor was it funded itself in its early stages — it just allows them to happen.
It has done so by changing the software of the city. Not in the slow and traditional way — the hard way — of seeking the political power to amend the rules, change the laws and rewrite the operating system. It has done so in an easier but less obvious way — it has followed the path of least resistance. Rather than rewrite the operating system it has hacked it and made it work in new ways.
Renew Newcastle started by hacking how much spaces cost and the terms they were available on. While there were over 150 empty buildings in Newcastle few if any of them were cheap or simple to access. They were bound up in complex rules — from bad tax incentives to complex, costly and long-term commercial leases that made it difficult to access them flexibly. Renew Newcastle traded cost for security. We created new rules, new contracts, and convinced owners to make spaces available for what was effectively barter — we would find people to clean them use them and activate them and they could have them back if and when they needed them. We stepped outside the default legal framework in which most property in Australia is managed and created a new one. We used licenses not leases, we asked for access not tenancy and exploited the loopholes those kinds of arrangements enabled. While such schemes are institutionalised in many European countries they have little precedent in Australia — in Newcastle, the entire scheme was devised, brokered and implemented directly from the community without the involvement of a government or formal development authorities still grasping at hardware based solutions. Only after the first dozen buildings had been activated did any funding appear. More than two years later any changes to rules and regulations — to the operating system — are yet to transpire.
Yet cheap space is not in itself enough. It is not enough to simply change how much space costs, it is also vitally important to change how it behaves in the face of initiative. Renew Newcastle created a whole system to lower barriers to initiative and experimentation. We created another layer — between the operating system and the users to make it simpler and easier to enable experimentation and risk.
Again we followed the path of least resistance. We decided to make things simple that could be made simple and not butt up against what would remain impenetrably hard. We managed to do what is easy rather than get caught up in waiting for the ideal — to find spaces that were usable and use them. Renew Newcastle designed systems — an API in programming terms — that made activation simple. We took spaces, brokered cheap access to them and gauged what could be done in them easily — what they were already approved for — and set out to find it and plant and water it.
In doing so we effectively made a whole system to make space behave as quickly and responsively. To allow people with enthusiasm and passion to direct it into the city. We made it quick for people to try and cheap for them to fail. We removed capital and complexity from the equation and in doing so we seeded more than 60 experiments — unleashing the energy of hundreds of people.
We made the city work for people for whom it had not worked in a long time. People without capital for whom low barriers to entry and not certainty of outcome were the defining issues. Those who were operating digital cottage industries and Etsy stores, artists and fashion designers, bedroom record labels and Flickr photographers. In effect we made the physical space behave as their virtual spaces did — easy to get into and out of, allowing of experimentation and failure and most importantly full of tools and structures and plugins designed to make it simple and cheap for them to do what they are passionate about.
As cities age, the challenge is not always to rebuild them physically but to re-imagine how they might function and adapt. In Newcastle in many respects nothing has changed since 2008. The buildings are mostly the same. The hardware is unchanged. Nothing has been built. No government has fallen. No revolution has taken place. Yet, on another level much has changed — dead parts of the city are active and vibrant, 60 projects have started, hundreds of new events have been created, and whole new communities are directly engaged in creating whatever it is that the city will become. The software — the legal templates, the contracts and the thinking — that has enabled has changed Newcastle is becomng a kind of shareware — downloaded, hacked and implemented in cities and towns across Australia from Townsville to Adelaide.
Cities are software. Yet as hard as the software of the city is to conceptualise the consequences of changing it are very real. It is only the results that give it away. They are as evident and visible as the process that led to them is invisible. There are new stories and narratives, new people and new possibilities, and a glimmer of renaissance where there was previously only ruin.
This article is reposted from MarcusWestbury.net with permission of the author.


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Coach Karl "takes one" for the team.
George Karl is my all-time favorite coach. Maybe not the best, but my favorite. He is old-school, he is funny, and he has a love for the game that is downright obscene (Read Life on the Rim by David Levine and Karl will be your favorite coach too).
In Saturday's New York Daily News (!), Karl pretty much sums up my feelings regarding Team USA:
"I'm going to tell you something no one wants to write and no one in the league wants to talk about: American players aren't as coachable as their opponents. And it shows up when you've only got a few weeks. Because you don't end up coaching as much as managing egos."Hey! Is he reading my posts or something? George, if you're reading this, come back to Seattle, man. COME BACK!!!


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On February 18, members of extremist Jewish groups raided the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Occupied Al-Quds (Jerusalem). They clashed with Palestinian worshippers, as the settlers attempted to shut down the gate of Al-Aqsa itself.
The clashes involved the Israeli army and police as well, who opened fire and brutally assaulted Palestinians, leading to scores of injuries.
On February 19, the Israeli army carried out the unusual step of shutting down Al-Rahma Gate, which leads to a section of the Al-Aqsa compound that has, itself, been shut down by the Israeli army since 2003.
The provocative decision to seal the gate was clearly made in advance, and the lock and key have the fingerprints of Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.
It is quite typical for Israeli politicians to carry out confrontational measures against Palestinians shortly before general elections are due. The nature of these measures is determined by the kind of political constituency that Israeli leaders aim to appease.
However, a war on Gaza, at least for now, is too risky an option for Netanyahu as it would take place too close to the April 9 elections date. Moreover, a botched Israeli attack on the Strip on November 11 caused Netanyahu a major embarrassment, forcing him to shelve the Gaza option for now.
That said, if the Israeli Prime Minister's political standing grows too desperate in the coming weeks, a Gaza war may, once again, be placed on the table.
Indeed, the political union between Benny Gantz and Yair Lapid, which was declared on February 21, has certainly upped the ante for Netanyahu who has assumed that his election victory is a foretold conclusion.
Gantz and Lapid merged their two parties into one election list called Kahol Lavan ("Blue and White"), the single most serious electoral challenge for Netanyahu in years.
For the time being, Netanyahu has decided to appeal to the most messianic religious segments of Israeli society in order to keep his challengers at bay. This should come as no surprise as the religious, ultra-national far right has been backbone of the Israeli leader's coalitions for a decade.
In fact, weeks before the Gantz and Lapid union, Netanyahu had taken several measures to show signs of goodwill towards his religious constituency.
One such overture was made on January 28, when Netanyahu ordered the UN unarmed international observers to leave the Occupied Palestinian city of Al-Khalil, where a few hundred armed Jewish settlers have been a constant source of violence. The Jewish settlers of Qiryat Arba'a live under the protection of a massive Israeli army contingent. Both groups have worked together to terrorize the Palestinian inhabitants of the city for many years.
A joint statement issued by several humanitarian organizations, including Oxfam, Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) and Save the Children warned of the terrible fate awaiting the Palestinian community as a result of Netanyahu's decision in Al-Khalil.
"Hundreds of civilians, including children, will see their safety put at risk by the withdrawal of international observers deployed in the city of Hebron," the statement read.
True to form, attacks by Jewish settlers followed, as media and rights group reports point to a surge of violence against Palestinian civilians in the city.
By unleashing the wrath of Jewish settlers in Al-Khalil, Netanyahu wanted to communicate to his supporters that he remains committed to their settlement project, an unworthy cause that violates international law and comes at the price of protracted human suffering.
Similarly, the Israeli decision to shut down Al-Rahma Gate on February 19 was a pre-calculated move, aimed at uniting the entirety of the Israeli right, including the most extremist of all religious and settler groups behind Netanyahu's leadership in the coming elections.
In fact, a trend began a few weeks earlier. On January 9, the Palestinian Ministry of Endowment documented a sharp increase of Israeli violations, involving the Israeli army and Jewish settlers at holy Palestinian sites throughout the month of December. According to the Organization, over 100 such violations were reported, including 30 different incursions into Al-Aqsa itself.
A raid on Al-Aqsa on January 7 involved more than the usual suspects, but was led by Israeli Agriculture Minister and a strong ally of Netanyahu, Uri Ariel.
This type of politically-motivated and highly militarized 'visits' to Al-Aqsa are reminiscent of the infamous 'visit' by late Israeli right-wing leader, Ariel Sharon in September 2000. At the time, Sharon wanted to increase his chances of becoming Israel's next prime minister, and to ensure that his arch-rival (then, interestingly enough, the very Benjamin Netanyahu) did not win the Likud Party nomination. The gambit worked. Sharon sparked the Second Palestinian Uprising (2000-05), leading to the deaths of thousands and, of course, securing his seat at the helm of Israeli politics for years.
Netanyahu, ever studious and resourceful, has, indeed, mastered the art of political manipulation as his mentor and, once again, Al-Aqsa is the platform for this sinister Israeli politicking.
Netanyahu's decision to strike an alliance with Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) – the rebranded party of the extremist late Meir Kahane – further demonstrates how the current surge of violence around the holy Palestinian sites is a pre-calculated political move by Netanyahu and his government.
The fact that Netanyahu would bring into his future coalition groups that are the ideological mutation of the Jewish Defense League – which is classified as 'terrorist organization'' by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) – speaks volumes about the changing relationship between the US and Israel. Thanks to Washington's blind support of Israel, Netanyahu feels politically triumphant and invincible, even above US' own laws.
However, to achieve his pathetic dream of being Israel's longest serving Prime Minister, Netanyahu should be wary of the bloody consequences that his reckless action is sure to yield. Indeed, Netanyahu may be provoking the kind of violence that is much bigger than his own ability to contain.
Al-Aqsa Mosque has served not only as a religious symbol for Palestinians, but a national symbol as well, representing their coveted freedom and serving as a source of hope and unity over the course of generations.
While the blood of Palestinians is irrelevant in Netanyahu's quest for political dominance, the international community should take immediate measures to prevent what could become an Israeli-induced bloodbath in the coming weeks.


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Last month, we posted information about how the SECURE Act has increased the age for required minimum distributions (RMDs) from 70-1/2 to 72 starting this year, 2020.
If you turned age 70-1/2 in 2019, your RMDs were required for the 2019 tax year, and WILL BE required for 2020, 2021 and every year from now on.
For everyone turning 70-1/2 in 2020, your RMDs will not be required until the year you turn 72, even if you have received notification from your custodian to the contrary.
Because the law was passed and became effective within two weeks of passage, automated computer notifications and settings have not been changed yet. Call us if you have any questions!
Remember that inherited "stretch IRAs" have been shortened to 10 years in many circumstances due to the passage of the SECURE Act.
Let's get together and discuss how this may affect your current estate plan, what burdens your heirs may face, and what we need to do now in conjunction with your estate attorney.
Unless there is a collectively-bargained plan in place (such as a union agreement), you may be eligible for your employer's 401(k) or similar retirement benefit plan even if you work part time. If you have worked for your employer for one year consecutively for at least 1,000 hours, or for three consecutive years for at least 500 hours (roughly 25 work-weeks of 20 hours per week), you will be eligible.
- ANNUITY OPTIONS IN 401(k) PLANS
Even though employers were already allowed to offer annuities in their 401(k) plans, only about 9% of them did. The SECURE Act shifts the burden of legal liability away from employers who offer annuities in their plans; you will need to be diligent about examining them before choosing. (We can help you with this.) The DOL will require standardized monthly retirement income projections to help you compare; they are expected to issue guideline regulations about this in the coming months.
Within a retirement plan, an annuity portability requirement has been added by the SECURE Act. If an annuity offering is removed from a 401(k) plan menu, you will be able to roll that annuity investment over into your own IRA with no penalty.
The SECURE Act raised the tax credit for employers to $15,000 to set up, administer and educate employees about retirement plan changes over a three-year period. (NOTE: Employer contributions to 401(k) plans have been and still are tax deductible.) There is a new tax credit of $500 per year for automatic enrollment of employees into a company's 401(k) plan—and the cap for auto enrollment has been raised from 10% to 15% of wages.
If you have any questions about this information, feel free to EMAIL US or Phone at 833-872-3762
The SECURE Act is a complex new law still being analyzed and assessed by industry experts. IRS clarifications may follow. The information in this article is provided for general information and educational purposes only. It is not designed nor intended to be applicable to any person's individual circumstances. It should not be considered investment advice, nor does it constitute a recommendation that anyone engage in or refrain from a particular course of action.
Do not rely on this information for tax advice. Check with your CPA, attorney or qualified tax advisor for precise information about your specific situation.


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There's no getting around it: technology has spoiled us. We have had access to 4G mobile data speeds since 2009, and we're already clamoring for the next thing. While 5G has been in development for some time now, it will likely be quite a while before it is available for common use. Here, we examine why 5G is likely going to take at least a few more years to arrive.
Technological Hang-ups and Impracticalities
The technology that is currently being proposed and developed to power 5G connectivity is rife with shortcomings and conflicts, many of which make its practical use unrealistic and complicated, if not effectively impossible. For example:
One of the biggest issues is the range that the anticipated 5G signals are projected to have – more specifically, the range that Enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB) through millimeter wave (mmWave) is capable of reaching. This eMBB is what smartphones would utilize.
A 4G signal, the current standard, has a range of anywhere from three to thirty miles. In comparison, mmWave reaches about a third of a mile. Just imagine how many new cell towers would have to be added to the existing infrastructure for 5G to be implemented. Of course, it's also likely that looming cell towers will be replaced by then, through the adoption of microwave oven-sized femtocells that can be affixed to other pieces of infrastructure, like traffic signs, light poles, and even buses.
Unfortunately, it would seem that there would need to be quite a few of these femtocells, just to ensure a clear signal to a device at any given time. This is because, in addition to being relatively short-ranged, mmWave is a notoriously easy signal to block.
Furthermore, there is also the question of providing each femtocell with enough bandwidth to support the high volume of use. This will require expensive high-speed fiber wiring to connect them, as the femtocells won't be able to share their data with each other efficiently enough to make up for the difference.
Cloud Complications
Cloud computing has made it easier to manage networks by far, so it is only to be expected that these femtocells will leverage the cloud as a management tool. Virtual networks can be created in the cloud to help manage 5G through the utilization of software-defined networks (SDNs) and network function virtualization (NFV).
The problem here is that there are multiple SDNs and NFVs, which means there is no unified standard. While there is an effort being made by the Linux Foundation to resolve this, it will take some time before this can be resolved.
Don't get us wrong, 5G is definitely on its way. There are too many potential benefits for femtocells to be abandoned as a solution (did we mention how cheap they are to use?) and demand for better mobile bandwidth is too high to ignore. It is just going to take some time to overcome some of the technical hurdles.
In the meantime, CTN Solutions can help you optimize your current business connectivity. Give us a call at (610) 828- 5500 to learn more.


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Heritage Area At a Glance
11:00 am - 11:00 pm
Driving Directions:
Rt 219 (Garrett Highway) North toward Marinas and Archies BBQ. Veer Left at Rt. 42 about 1/8 mile passed Archies BBQ, Fun Unlimited on left side 300 feet later.
Amusement center with 94 games. Vintage arcade room for 16 and over that has 30 social and vintage games from the 1960's. Internet cafe with free Wi-Fi. Snack bar with the best pizza at the lake!


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It started out with altitude sickness and ended with food poisoning, but my family and I still had a great time on our trip to Colorado. Here, in mostly photos, are the highlights:
We arrived at our rental "cabin," a three-bathroom house on Mt. Lincoln above Alma, Colorado (the highest town in the U.S.), at around 4:30 on Sunday afternoon. We'd gotten up at 4:00, flown out of Jackson at 6:00, and arrived and rented a car in Denver at 11:00. Our first stop was at WaterCourse Foods for lunch, where we went crazy and ordered two appetizers, Nachos and Seitan Buffalo Wings, that came in such huge portions that none of us had any appetite for our main courses, even though we managed to stop ourselves halfway through the wings (which were delicious but not remotely low-fat) and have them put in a to-go box. The rest of the food was good but didn't make much of an impression since we were already stuffed. We waddled out the door and headed to the nearby Whole Foods where we stocked up for a week of cooking for ourselves.
We'd been warned about altitude sickness, but I still wasn't prepared for all of us to feel as bad as we did. Coming from under 300 feet to over 10,000 feet, it's to be expected, but if I hadn't read up about it ahead of time, I would have thought that my pounding heart, shortness of breath, and exploding headache were signs of a heart attack. We decided to take it easy and rest the first afternoon and morning at the cabin, which gave us lots of time to enjoy the view of the mountains and the animals that came to the feeder on our deck for birdseed.
The chipmunks were hard to photograph, but the Golden-Mantled Ground Squirrels, which look like large chipmunks without stripes on their heads, let us get fairly close to them as they stuffed their cheeks full of seeds. And one of the "regular" tree squirrels was so bold that I actually managed to touch its tail as it stared me down. The most surprising animal encounter came from this fox:
My husband spotted it as we were backing our car out of the driveway. I jumped out of the car to get a good photo of it, thinking that it would run away, but it came around the back of the car and headed toward me. I dove back into the safety of the car and got some great photos of it panting, "smiling," and basically looking like a skinny red-furred dog.
We saw only three deer during our week in the mountains, but this one posed for us at the edge of "our" yard for a while.
As much as we enjoyed the antics of the animals (and I have a whole CF card full of squirrels and chipmunks), even more impressive was the ever-changing view of the mountains. Every day but one, afternoon thunderstorms–sometimes several of them, from different directions–rolled in, changing the light and the look of the mountains. The photo above is of the storm clouds in the distance, while the one below is of the same view just after the storm:
We finally felt well enough to do a little sight-seeing on Monday afternoon. We drove to nearby Fairplay, whose current claim to fame is that the setting of the TV show South Park is loosely based on it. This, of course, was enough to make it the highlight of the vacation for my South Park-loving daughter (she'd even bought a florescent-orange hoodie like one of the characters wears, which turned out to be perfect for locating her in a crowd or up a mountain). I'm not sure she completely understood that the museum we were going to see in Fairplay, South Park City, was actually a recreation of a Colorado mining town.
Still, she enjoyed checking out the restored buildings, each of which was filled with artifacts from everyday life during the 1800's.
And, of course, there was the obligatory stop at the South Park photo op:
The next day, Tuesday, we were all feeling better, so we took a trip up a long dirt road to Kite Lake.
Kite Lake is the starting point of a trail that leads up to three 14,000 foot mountains (14ers) that people often climb in one day. We weren't quite up to making that hike, and besides, we'd lazed around the cabin too long and gotten such a late start that thunderstorms were already gathering (and you don't want to be at the top of a bald mountain during a storm). Still, it was a beautiful place for a picnic, and afterward, E took off on her own for a hike around the lake.
This is where that orange hoodie E bought came in very handy! The lake is bigger than it looks, but I was able to keep an eye on her because of the glow of her orange jacket. In the photo above, look for a tiny orange dot just below and to the right of center. That's E! And that's how huge these mountains were. E and D managed to walk right up to a waterfall while I stayed behind taking photos of wildflowers.
On Wednesday we took an all-day trip to Colorado Springs. Along the way we stopped at Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument, where I didn't get good photos, and at the Wilkerson Pass visitor's center, where we were treated to a gorgeous view of the mountains across the South Park Basin:
We had a good lunch at Adam's Mountain Cafe in Manitou Springs (since this is a food blog, I feel compelled to note that I had curried red lentil soup and a falafel wrap, even though I didn't feel compelled to take photos of them), and then we headed for the main attraction, the Garden of the Gods:
Once again, we'd taken a little too long to get to the great outdoors, and about halfway through our walk around the park, dark clouds began to appear:
Even though the paths were wide and there were maps (though none with a helpful "You Are Here" arrow), we managed to get turned around a couple of times and just barely made it back to the car without getting drenched.
The final two full days are a blur. On Thursday, we took a drive to Leadville, an old mining town, stopping on the way at Twin Lakes for a picnic. If I had it to do over again, I would skip the picnic and look for vegan food in Leadville because the next morning I woke up in gastrointestinal agony (I suspect I touched something I shouldn't have before eating my sandwich). I'll skip the gory details, but after spending the day (which turned out to be the only one it didn't rain) in bed, I wasn't getting better, and because we had to travel all the next day, we decided to see the doctor at South Park Medical Clinic in Fairplay. I can't praise the doctor enough: She agreed to see me though there were no openings in her schedule and stayed two hours after closing, alone, to give me IV fluids and anti-nausea meds. By the next day, I was feeling well enough to travel 12 hours by car and plane, and I owe it all to her.
And yes, some of you will remember that last year's family vacation involved a trip to the emergency room when E broke her foot. Let's hope doctor's visits aren't a new family vacation tradition!
As you may suspect, I'm sharing these photos with you because after a week away and several days recovering at home, I don't have a new recipe to post just yet. Give me a few days and I'll be cooking again!


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A. W. Lawrence, Auda Abu Tayi, Burbank, Columbia Tristar Home Video, Damascus, Emir Abdullah, Feysal, Jidda, Lawrence of Arabia, motion picture, Mukheymer, Nawaf Shaalan, New York, Oxford, Saad el Sikeinj, Scott Beadles, Seven Pillars of Wisdom, Shakir, T. E. Lawrence
"Some of the evil of my tale may have been inherent in our circumstances."
— T. E. Lawrence
Seven Pillars of Wisdom
T. E. Lawrence (1888-1935)
Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc., 1935
History of the printing of Seven Pillars:
"Text I — '…I lost it.'
Text II — '…All but one page of this text was burned by me in 1922.'
Privately Printed Texts
Oxford 1922
'…eight copies were required. Five copies (bound in book form, for the convenience of those former members of the Hejaz Expeditionary Force who undertook to read it critically for me) have not yet (April 1927) been destroyed.'
Subscribers' Text I. xii. 26
'…Beginners in literature are inclined to fumble with a handful of adjectives round the outline of what they want to describe: but by 1924 I had learnt my first lesson in writing, and was often able to combine two or three of my 1921 phrases into one…The Seven Pillars was so printed and assembled that nobody but myself knew how many copies were produced. I propose to keep this knowledge to myself.'
Published Texts
New York Text
'Ten copies are offered for sale, at a price high enough to prevent their ever being sold. No further issue of the Seven Pillars will be made in my lifetime.'"
–T. E. Lawrence
"To bring the information up to date, I add that the remaining copies of the Oxford printed Text of 1922 are still in existence, but will not be made public for at least ten years, and then only in a limited edition…The text of the present edition is identical with that of the thirty-guinea edition of 1926, except for the following omissions…necessary to save hurting the feelings of persons still living…" — A. W. Lawrence
The movie that inspired the art.
Lawrence of Arabia
Burbank, CA: Columbia Tristar Home Video, 1002
Originally produced as a motion picture in 1962. Directed by David Lean. Starring Alec Guinness, Anthony Quin, Jack Hawkins, Jose Ferrer, Anthony Quayle, Claude Rains, Arthur Kennedy, Omar Sharif, Peter O'Toole. Music composed by Maurice Jarre. Lawrence of Arabia won the Academy Award for Best Picture, 1962.
And one more for good measure:
"He sat, fireless, in very cold weather, wearing a leather, wool-lined flying suit, with the fattest fountain pen I have ever seen — where he got it I don't know — and wrote in a splendid great Kalamazoo notebook, leather bound and secured with a patent lock that delighted him."
T. E. Lawrence, Book Designer: His Friendship with Vyvyan Richards
Vyvyan Richards
Wakefield, West Yorkshire: Fleece Press, 1985/86
Reprinted from T. E. Lawrence and His Friends edited by A. W. Lawrence, 1937. From the colophon: "…printed in an edition of 250 copies, on Velin Arches Blanc by Simon Lawrence, who also set the 14pt Caslon, at his Fleece Press…200 copies are bound in quarter cloth and Sage Reynolds paste paper over boards, & 50 are bound in quarter sheepskin parchment and paste paper, signed by Peter Reddick, who engraved the frontispiece portrait of T. E. Lawrence. The book was bound in Otley by Smith Settle…"


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Just Host Web Hosting Help
How To Check Email - Webmail & Email Applications
Email is one of the most widely used forms of communication, so having a professional email address @ your domain is crucial. If you're still using sillyname + [email protected], you may be giving the impression that your company is inexperienced or—even worse—raising doubts as to whether you're a legitimate company. Take control of your reputation and check out Email Account Setup to learn how to create an email account at your domain.
Once you've created your professional email address, how're you supposed to check your email? You're going to need an email client for that. And what is an email client? Email clients come in two varieties: webmail and email applications.
Webmail, or web-based email, is portable and accessible anywhere that has an internet connection because the application that sends and reads your mail is accessed on a website from your browser. Examples of webmail we offer are Roundcube and Horde and can be accessed at justhost.com/webmail.
A few advantages of using webmail to access your email are:
- Simplicity. No setup required.
- Portable and accessible anywhere.
- Great if you can't install software on your work or school computer.
- Save space on your computer; email is stored online.
Webmail Client Comparison
We offer two options for webmail that are built into your account. Each individual email user can choose which webmail client they want to use: Roundcube or Horde.
- Roundcube. As our most popular webmail client, it has the look and feel you'd expect from an email application, but is available inside a browser. You can import and use an address book and use IMAP folders with drag-and-drop organization. When composing emails, you can set up preset responses to save time, and write with spell check in a rich text html composer.
- Horde. It's more than just a webmail client—it's a collection of simple online apps for collaboration including webmail, calendar, notes, and tasks. These extra features do have some limits, however. For example, the collaborative features only work inside Horde; so to share a calendar entry or a note, the person you're sharing it with would also need to use Horde.
Email Applications
An email application is software installed on your computer or mobile device that is used to read and send email. Your email is stored on your computer, including deleted and sent mail, giving you the ability to manage your email offline. Not everyone needs offline access to their email, but if you do, being able to work from a train or on a long flight without Wi-Fi is definitely an advantage to using an email application. Some common email applications are Outlook, Thunderbird, and Apple Mail.
A few advantages of using an email application are:
- Accessible offline.
- Immediate notifications to your device.
- Manage multiple email addresses in one interface.
- Easily back up your mail and store it on your computer.
- Use advanced mail rules and filtering based on multiple factors, such as words, senders, subjects, headers, etc.
IMAP and POP
When an email is sent, the message is stored on an email server where it waits to be retrieved. Your email application can be set up to retrieve email from the email server using one of two different protocols: IMAP or POP3. The protocol you'll use mostly depends on the number of devices you'll use to access your email.
- IMAP. This is the setting you'll use if you want to access your email on multiple devices or if multiple users access the same account. When you read, reply, delete, forward, or otherwise manage your email, the changes are made on the server and sync with your webmail and other IMAP-connected email clients. IMAP is limited to 20 connections per IP address, but that shouldn't be an issue for most users.
- POP3. If you intend to access your email on only one device, this is the setting for you. Most email clients set up with POP3 will delete the message on the server once it's been downloaded to your email application. This means that your email application will have the only copy of the email, and it cannot be retrieved again using webmail or another email application. Do not use POP3 if you want to access your email from multiple devices.
What's next? Spam


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Pierre et alter
Hello !
• To get a transparent background on the bitmap-strip of icons one has to use Magenta pink (255 - 0 - 255) for it.
That stands for images up to 24 BPP.
- So far, so good…
- But when one wishes to add extra icons for missing patterns,
naturally that feature doesn't work, the Magenta is displayed "as is".
- That's annoying when a user who has not any specialized icon editor needs to draw some pattern quickly
with i.e. MS-Paint and XnView to convert.
• With 8 BPP icons, now it's no longer possible to edit the palette (colour-map) and set a transparent colour,
since all *.ICO are processed as 32 BPP.
- That worked in old 1.8… versions though, but indeed all users don't keep old versions…
• So, like I suggested already, maybe another way could be found to add icons
for patterns beyond the current last #44 one…
¤ I thought to :
1. Use standalone bitmaps instead of *.ICO (one per pattern). Hm… I guess there is no fat chance it works…
2. Allow a second bitmap like i.e. <main2.bmp> as the continuation of the current one.
- Of course, the order of the patterns might be defined officially, the first being #45.
- This could have an advantage : It could ease the updates, instead to rebuild the single main bitmap to add patterns.
<Main.bmp> got very wide and it's inconvenient to draw on such endless strips…
That should avoid to reach i.e. 86 patterns on a single strip
(Yes, that exists, I have this in a soft, and drew a set of bitmaps, not a piece of cake ! ).
• What do you think ?
Minor issue with extra *.ICO for the tool-bars…
Moderators: XnTriq, helmut, xnview
- XnThusiast
- Posts: 4441
- Joined: Sun Oct 17, 2004 4:57 am
- Location: Bordeaux, France
Minor issue with extra *.ICO for the tool-bars…
Old user ON SELECTIVE STRIKE till further notice •


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Pivotal Makes First Big Move, Acquiring Mobile App Dev Firm Xtreme Labs
San Francisco-based Pivotal, in a Wednesday press release, said Xtreme Labs brings "deep expertise and knowledge in mobile strategy and development" which complements its own in-house cloud app development talent.
Building mobile apps is a time-consuming process for enterprises, so while $65 million might seem like a steep price for Pivotal to pay, it's actually well within reason, Jamie Shepard, regional vice president at Lumenate, a Dallas-based EMC partner, told CRN.
[Related: NSA Revelations Rattle The Cloud Market: What Are You Doing To Calm Customers' Fears? ]
Xtreme Labs' development expertise combined with the Pivotal One enterprise platform-as-a-service will let enterprise customers lessen strain on internal IT and build apps more quickly, Shepard said.
"Pivotal and Xtreme Labs can now address the many firms that have begun -- or have actually delayed -- building mobile apps because it is costly, time consuming and disruptive to corporate business flow," Shepard said in an email.
With Xtreme Labs' staff on board, Pivotal said it'll now have a team of 500 employees "dedicated to agile application development." Pivotal was formed earlier this year with 800 EMC employees from EMC and 600 from VMware.
In a joint blog post, Xtreme Labs founders Amar Varma and Sundeep Madra said they're fully on board with Pivotal's goal of building apps that meld data, analytics and the cloud, describing their company as the "perfect complement to Pivotal."
"When the opportunity to explore a relationship with Pivotal came up, it immediately became clear that we shared a common vision," Varma and Madra said in the blog post.
Founded in 2007, Xtreme Labs' customer list includes Facebook, Twitter, American Express and others. It also has OEM partnerships with Apple and Microsoft and enterprise partnerships with BlackBerry and Google.
Pivotal, led by former VMware CEO Paul Maritz, aims to slow down Amazon Web Services conquest of the cloud infrastructure-as-a-service space, but its goals go far beyond that.
Pivotal is about letting customers build "data-centric applications" with tools that are more open and flexible than what Amazon has to offer, Maritz told CRN in April.
GE, which has a 10 percent stake in Pivotal by virtue of its $105 million investment in the spin-off, inked an R&D agreement with Pivotal in April. Together, Pivotal and GE are working to identify use cases for the powerful next-generation apps that the combination of big data and cloud promises to make possible.
PUBLISHED Oct. 2, 2013


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Try Not to Laugh Challenge (Misheard Lyrics Edition)
If you're able to get through this entire video without laughing, you're far more mature than we are. We compiled some of the most infamous misheard lyrics in rock and metal history into this new YouTube challenge. Your job? Don't laugh, giggle or crack a smile.
We're hitting you hard right away with this challenge, sampling a section of Meshuggah's "Rational Gaze." If you've spent enough time on Reddit or YouTube comment sections for the song, you know exactly what we're talking about, and fear of unstoppable laughter has possessed your very soul.
In classic "Weird Al" tradition, many of these lyrics have been reimagined to be about food. Have you ever wondered why James Hetfield seems to be singing about apple pie, Mikael Akerfeldt about tacos or Tom Araya about bacon? You're not alone, and these hilarious misheard lyrics have been the subject of Internet lore for seemingly the entirety of YouTube/Reddit history.
We couldn't compile this challenge without adding some of the all-time classics. Jimi Hendrix singing, "Scuse me while I kiss the sky" has been misinterpreted for five whole decades, while one of Freddie Mercury's lines in Queen's "We Will Rock You" has left feline lovers confused about the livelihood of their pets. Yep, once you hear a lyric one way, you can never hear it the same ever again.
Take our Try Not to Laugh Challenge (Misheard Lyrics Edition) in the video above. Good luck!
Top 10 Marilyn Manson Cover Songs
10 Unforgettable Vinnie Paul Moments


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Military Application of Consumer Goods
27 04 2009In the United States over the last half century a large amount of consumer goods were originally government sponsored military devices that trickled down to the consumer market. Think GPS, handheld radios, Toughbooks, Nextel cellphones, Roomba, the internet, and modern computers started originally as a military project. All of these things started out in the hands of Uncle Sam, and then went on to the consumer market to become what we know today.
However, now the military has started to look at consumer goods and apply them for military usage. The iPod Touch is starting to become integrated into the US military. They can be used (soon) to help soldiers communicate with the local population. Snipers use a calculator on the iPod to make better precision shots. The reason they are looking into consumer products is because consumer products are made to be cheap. To have a military standard device capable of less than what a $230 iPod can do can be twice or more the price purely because less of them are made. Because iPods are made to be mass produced, they end up being cheaper to configure the iPods (like add a screen protector or case) then it would be to have a military specific device.
This of course benefits us as consumers because if the government starts buying something on the cheap, it requires less of our national budget to buy military goods, which in turn means either less taxes, or more welfare for the needy.
The US military has always had a problem with their development cycles for new products they need. If the military wanted a iPod touch like device for soldiers to use in order to communicate with locals, they would put out a contract to engineering firms around the country to design something. The thing would end up being bulky and durable, but would most likely be limited to just communication features. And on top of that, it would take 5-10 years until the device was finalized and accepted by the branches in order to start deploying them. This is on top of what I said earlier, compared to the consumer market there would be a very limited number of these things made, meaning their price would be through the roof. And if they ever wanted to upgrade or modify it, that would be another 5-10 years cycle of intense research and development with a large amount of expenditure.
At this point, hardware isn't the issue, software is all the military really needs to worry about. There are plenty of things we at home already use day-to-day that can be retrofitted to survive in harsh environments and that only really need new software to do what they need.
Categories : Apple, Hardware, iPod


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Oak Hill leaders are Scott, Furyk
Published 12:36 am Friday, August 9, 2013
PITTSFORD, N.Y. — Adam Scott began the final major of the year with a tee shot deep into the trees. He ended the opening round of the PGA Championship by having to gouge out of deep rough. It was the golf in between that was some of the best he has ever played, even for an Australian with a green jacket.
Showing that he's not satisfied as only being a Masters champion, Scott ran off five straight birdies early in his round Thursday on soft and vulnerable Oak Hill, and a 15-foot par putt at the end gave him a 5-under 65 and a share of the lead with Jim Furyk.
"Probably the best run I've ever had," Scott said of his five straight birdies. "I just hit really nice shots and didn't leave myself too much work. You have to take advantage of that if you're feeling that. It was a dream start after kind of a nervous first couple of holes."
It felt like an easy start to so many others.
Oak Hill has such a strong reputation that it has yielded only 10 scores under par over 72 holes in five previous major championships. The last time the PGA Championship was held on this Donald Ross design in 2003, there were only 12 rounds under par on the first day.
But with overnight rain, humid conditions and a 71-minute delay for storms in the afternoon, Thursday might be as easy as it gets. Scott and Furyk had plenty of company, two of 35 players who broke par.
Tiger Woods was not among them.
The world's No. 1 player made only two birdies despite playing in the still of the morning, and he watched his round fall apart with a bogey on par-5 fourth and a double bogey on his final hole when his flop shot out of a deep rough floated into a bunker. Woods had a 71, not a bad start at Oak Hill, except on this day.
"The round realistically could have been under par easily," Woods said.
Furyk, who won his lone major at the U.S. Open in 2003 at Olympia Fields, has gone nearly three years since his last win at the Tour Championship to capture the FedEx Cup and win PGA Tour player of the year. Still fresh are the four close calls from a year ago, including the U.S. Open.
He was as steady as Scott, rarely putting himself in trouble until the end of the round. Furyk missed the fairway to the right and had to pitch out because of thick rough and trees blocking his way to the green. That led to his only bogey, but still his lowest first-round score in 19 appearances at the PGA Championship.
"Usually disappointed with ending the day on a bogey," Furyk said. "But you know, 65, PGA, is not so bad."
David Hearn of Canada, an alternate until a week ago, had a 66 in the morning. Also at 66 was Lee Westwood, who had his best score ever in the PGA and offered evidence that there was no hangover from losing a 54-hole lead in the British Open last month.
There were no record scores at Oak Hill despite the soft conditions, just a lot of low rounds.
"If you don't hit it in the fairways, then you won't score well," Westwood said. "These guys are good. There are a lot of good players playing in the tournament. Somebody is going to hit it straight, and somebody is going to shoot a good score."
Scott certainly didn't start out that way. He had to pitch out from the trees on No. 1, but managed to get up-and-down from about 85 yards in front of the green, and after two more pars, he began his big run of birdies.
"Just got on a bit of a roll and hit a few shots close," Scott said. "I didn't have too much putting to do. You've got to take advantage when it happens, because it doesn't happen too much in the majors. Nothing to complain about in 65."
He felt similar to the opening round at Royal Lytham & St. Annes last year in the British Open, when he flirted with a 63 and had to settle for a course record-tying 64. Scott was on pace to tie the Oak Hill record for majors when he birdied the 14th, but he three-putted two holes later for bogey and was pleased to walk away with par on the 18th.
"I felt good out there today," he said. "I felt like I could swing freely and I was hitting all the shots that I wanted to hit. When you get something going for you in a major, sometimes you have got to be not afraid to get out of your own way and let go. I did that at Lytham, and I did that here for 10 or 11 holes."
Just last month at Muirfield, the 31-year-old Australian had the outright lead on the back nine in the British Open until he made four straight bogeys and couldn't keep up with Phil Mickelson and his great finish. Even so, it was evident that Scott was serious about adding more majors to that green jacket he won at Augusta National in April.
"I put a lot into my game the last two years with a focus on the big tournaments," Scott said. "Everyone around me has had the same focus, as well. We come here to do business."
Even Rory McIlroy got in on the act. The defending champion, at the end of a major season that has been a major disappointment, came out firing with three birdies on the opening four holes and made the turn in 32 until back-to-back bogeys. He wound up with a 69.
A resurgent Paul Casey was in the group at 67, while U.S. Open champion Justin Rose, British Open runner-up Henrik Stenson and the ageless Miguel Angel Jimenez were among 11 players at 68.
Mickelson wound up with the same score as Woods, only they arrived at 71 much differently. Woods had only two birdies. Mickelson shot 71 despite two double bogeys, including one on the 18th hole. On the par-5 fourth hole, he hooked his tee shot out-of-bounds and nearly lost the next tee shot in the same place.
"The first four holes was like a shock to my system," Mickelson said. "Hitting it out-of-bounds on 4 … out-of-bounds is not even in play. So I got off to a terrible start. I was actually under par for a little while, but that took a lot of fight. And unfortunately, I'm in a position where if I hit a low round tomorrow, I can get back in it."
He headed straight to the practice range, even summoning coach Butch Harmon down from the Sky Sports television booth.
Asked when he finished his work if he was worried about his game, Mickelson replied, "Not now. I was."


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*stolen from Dragons' blog*
Yeah so most amazing lesson ever today. For the rider that is, not the horse. Reminded me of my first lesson ever w/ Marg :) hahaha I was pretty impressed by that one too. So first of all, I was thrilled to discover Sienna was sound when I got there today. Stunned (my backup plan was to borrow a student's horse, and I def had her groomed and ready to go too in case I had to make a quick change! Just as well I didn't though cause she had an amazing lightbulb ride herself! Woohoo!) Anyways back to my story. She can write her own >;-P C lunged sound so I got on, fully expecting to feel what I couldn't see... But no -- she felt sound. Which of course left me doubting my judgement -- but honestly I'm usually pretty good at feeling that and tend to be far more likely to deem a sound horse unsound than the reverse. So I trusted myself and kept riding and when my coach got there the first thing I said was something about "question of the day -- is she sound?" I *might've* said hi first, but hey - he's a horse person, he gets it. Says yes she looks sound, why does she feel off? Nope -- feels fine, I just expected her to be off cause she got kicked on Tues and has been off since. hahaha
So decision is promptly made that lesson will focus on the rider rather than the horse. Last lesson also at least involved the rider (as in he told me when I was doing something dumb and I tried to fix it) but significantly more horse (things like rhythm, balance, bend etc... All those fun details :). This lesson -- well let's put it this way: I rode for an hour and we never made it past the trot. hahahaha We *did* jump -- but even that was in the trot!
We start at the halt where my position got thoroughly shredded and very carefully put back together. N of course I just laugh when I hear "well this is very good but . . . " cause of course that's my standard line :) Eventually after much stretching and repositioning we graduated to the walk (C was loving this lesson "so, I just hang out here and you guys chat huh? Ok..." Just like w/ Zel -- amazingly well behaved when they realize being quiet means not being asked to work. Like a child who doesn't want their parent to realize they're up past their bedtime!) Gotta admit though -- the walk we got was brilliant. Eventually graduated to the trot. Wasn't pretty -- but def fell under the whole 'break a few eggs to make a cake' analogy cause I could feel the difference! N when it clicked, even for a second, it was pretty amazing. Seriously though -- trying to do dressage in XC saddle -- way less than good! However -- he managed to fix leg, shoulder, elbow, pelvis position all in one go. (yeah when I said take it all apart and put it back together again, I meant *all* :) Was the first time in a looonnnggg time that my little brain was absolutely spinning trying to remember everything I was supposed to be doing at once!
The other thing I really liked is that even w/o the crazy positional corrections he asks questions that actually make me think. Where being able to rhyme off the standard text-book answer isn't going to cut it. And that, as much as anything, will help improve both my riding and my teaching. And I'm pretty excited about that :)
When it came to jumping we were just doing a single fence w/ placing poles on takeoff and landing. Focus on "let baby figure it out" and "fix rider's position" -- to the millimeter. It was amazing. HUGE difference. Now I just need that every day for the next 6 mths and I'll be set >;-P hahaha ah well have to settle for the once/wk and "coach yourself" versions. Did get invited to crash the XC school next week so definitely booked that off work *g* hahaha priorities eh? Fingers crossed the weather holds!
Ok enough of that -- off to teach now :)


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This week the California legislature is voting on a bill that will make bio cremation another legal way to dispose of human remains; it will provide an eco-friendlier alternative to the current choices – burial or cremation.
What makes bio cremation via resomation different?
The current alternatives – traditional cremation and burial pose threats to the environment.
Cremation uses fossil fuels which are regulated by environmental officials and which have the potential to add to pollution because of their green house gas emissions. Burial poses another environmental threat, primarily because of the chemicals such as formaldehyde that are used in embalming fluids; formaldehyde is a toxic chemical that eventually leaks into the ground as the body decomposes.
Bio cremation via resomation, on the other hand, does not use anything toxic or harmful to the environment. According to a representative of Matthews International, exclusive distributor of bio cremation equipment for the United States, this new option uses a process called alkaline hydrolysis. This process reduces a body to dry bone residue which can be buried in a cemetery or returned to the family in an urn just like the currently available options. In case you've never heard of alkaline hydrolysis, it's basically the same natural process that occurs in our small intestines to aid digestion of foods after we eat. But for bio cremation it's done in a big stainless steel cylinder and uses 95% water in an alkaline solution.
What does bio cremation cost?
In the short run, the cost to the consumer should be no more than $300 – $500 higher than that of traditional cremation, a small premium to pay to better protect our environment. This premium is necessitated by the high initial investment that will need to be made by crematoriums, etc. to purchase the necessary equipment.
Where is the process legal?
Although the bio cremation process has been legal in Europe for awhile, it is just gaining approval in the United States.
Florida was the first state to legalize this process, followed closely by Maine and Minnesota. It is anticipated that the California legislature will approve bio cremation this week. And approval by legislatures in Colorado, Nebraska, Arizona and Washington State is expected soon.
Adoption will be slower in other states, due in part to the fact that many of their legislatures don't meet again until 2011.
What do consumers think?
Consumer testing of the concept has been very positive with some people commenting that they are pleased that there is finally a funeral service offering that is relevant to today.