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Happy birthday to the New York Times bestselling and award-winning Jeff VanderMeer
The New York Times bestselling writer, editor, teacher, and publisher, Jeff VanderMeer has won the Rhysling Award, British Fantasy Award, BSFA Award, the World Fantasy Award three times, Nebula Award, and Shirley Jackson Award. His acclaimed novels include Dradin, in Love (1996), Veniss Underground (2003), Shriek: An Afterword (2006), South China Sea (2008), Finch (2009), The Southern Reach trilogy (Annihilation [2014], Authority [2014] and Acceptance [2014]), Borne (2017), The Strange Bird (2017), Dead Astronauts (2019), and A Peculiar Peril (2020). The film Annihilation, directed by Alex Garland and starring Natalie Portman, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Tessa Thompson and based on the VanderMeer novel, premiered in 2018 to rave reviews.
Many of his shorter works have been collected in The Book of Frog (1989), Lyric of the Highway Mariner: A Collection of Poems (1991), The Book of Lost Places (1996), City of Saints and Madmen (2001), The Day Dali Died (2003), Secret Life (2004), Ein Herz für Lukretia [German] (2007), Secret Lives (2008), The Surgeon's Tale and Other Stories (2007; with Cat Rambo), THE THIRD BEAR (2010), Balzac's War (2011), and The Compass of his Bones and Other Stories (2011).
Cover by Jacob McMurray Cover by John Coulthart Cover by Ann Monn
VanderMeer co-edited (unless otherwise noted all alongside award-winning editor Ann VanderMeer) several groundbreaking and popular anthologies including Leviathan, Volume One: Into the Gray (1996 with Luke O'Grady), Leviathan 2 (1998 with Rose Secrest), Leviathan 3 (2002 with Forrest Aguirre), The Thackery T. Lambshead Pocket Guide To Eccentric & Discredited Diseases (2003; with Mark Roberts), Best American Fantasy (2007; Vol 2 2008), Fast Ships, Black Sails (2008), THE NEW WEIRD (2008), STEAMPUNK (2008), Last Drink Bird Head: Flash Fiction for Charity (2009), STEAMPUNK II: STEAMPUNK RELOADED (2010), ODD? (2011), The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities (2011), The Weird (2011), The Time Traveler's Almanac (2013), Sisters of the Revolution: A Feminist Speculative Fiction Anthology (2015), The Big Book of Science Fiction (2016), and The Big Book of Classic Fantasy (2019). Also with Ann, he created THE KOSHER GUIDE TO IMAGINARY ANIMALS (2010).
Cover by Ann Monn Cover by Dan Jones (Tinketbots)
Design by Ann MonnCover by John Coulthart
Among his numerous nonfiction volumes are the acclaimed Why Should I Cut Your Throat? Excursions in the World of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror (2004), BOOKLIFE: STRATEGIES AND SURVIVAL TIPS FOR THE 21ST CENTURY WRITER (2009), Monstrous Creatures: Explorations of Fantasy through Essays, Articles and Reviews (2011), The Steampunk Bible (2011; with S. J. Chambers), and Wonderbook: The Illustrated Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction (2013), and The Steampunk User's Manual: An Illustrated Practical and Whimsical Guide to Creating Retro-Futurist Dreams (2014 with Desirina Boskovich).
All of us at Tachyon wish the multi-faceted Jeff a squidastic birthday, full of fungi and other things that creep in the darkness.


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S.M.A.R.T. is an acronym for Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology.
S.M.A.R.T. is an industry standard for monitoring and reporting fault conditions in a peripheral storage device, whether from damage or normal wear-and-tear. S.M.A.R.T. is intended to decrease the chance of data loss by giving adequate warning to these conditions, but it is no replacement for good disaster-recovery planning.
A S.M.A.R.T. drive monitors the internal performance of the motors, media, heads, and electronics of the drive, while our software monitors the overall reliability status of the drive. The reliability status is determined through the analysis of the drive's internal performance level and the comparison of internal performance levels to predetermined threshold limits. S.M.A.R.T.-capable drives can monitor several key performance factors to assess reliability and predict an impending device failure. However, S.M.A.R.T. cannot possibly detect all impending failures. S.M.A.R.T. should be treated as an advisory service, and not a substitute for regularly backing-up your files. Keeping your data safe can only be ensured by making back-up copies on a regular basis. The S.M.A.R.T. features of any device should not be considered a substitute for planning-ahead.
In an effort to help users avoid data loss, drive manufacturers are now incorporating logic into their drives that acts as an "early warning system" for pending drive problems. This system is called Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology or SMART. The hard disk's integrated controller works with various sensors to monitor various aspects of the drive's performance, determines from this information if the drive is behaving normally or not, and makes available status information to software that probes the drive and look at it.
The fundamental principle behind SMART is that many problems with hard disks don't occur suddenly. They result from a slow degradation of various mechanical or electronic components. SMART evolved from a technology developed by IBM called Predictive Failure Analysis or PFA. PFA divides failures into two categories: those that can be predicted and those that cannot. Predictable failures occur slowly over time, and often provide clues to their gradual failing that can be detected. An example of such a predictable failure is spindle motor bearing burnout: this will often occur over a long time, and can be detected by paying attention to how long the drive takes to spin up or down, by monitoring the temperature of the bearings, or by keeping track of how much current the spindle motor uses. An example of an unpredictable failure would be the burnout of a chip on the hard disk's logic board: often, this will "just happen" one day. Clearly, these sorts of unpredictable failures cannot be planned for.
The main principle behind failure prediction is that some failures cause gradual changes in |
Image by Quantum Corporation |
The drive manufacturer's reliability engineers analyze failed drives and various mechanical and electronic characteristics of the drive to determine various correlations: relationships between predictable failures, and values and trends in various characteristics of the drive that suggest the possibility of slow degradation of the drive. The exact characteristics monitored depend on the particular manufacturer and model. Here are some that are commonly used:
(Some of the quality and reliability features I am describing in this part of the site are in fact used to feed data into the SMART software.)
Using statistical analysis, the "acceptable" values of the various characteristics are programmed into the drive. If the measurements for the various attributes being monitored fall out of the acceptable range, or if the trend in a characteristic is showing an unacceptable decline, an alert condition is written into the drive's SMART status register to warn that a problem with the drive may be occurring.
SMART requires a hard disk that supports the feature and some sort of software to check the status of the drive. All major drive manufacturers now incorporate the SMART feature into their drives, and most newer PC systems and motherboards have BIOS routines that will check the SMART status of the drive. So do operating systems such as Windows 98. If your PC doesn't have built-in SMART support, some utility software (like Norton Utilities and similar packages) can be set up to check the SMART status of drives. This is an important point to remember: the hard disk doesn't generate SMART alerts, it just makes available status information. That status data must be checked regularly for this feature to be of any value.
Clearly, SMART is a useful tool but not one that is foolproof: it can detect some sorts of problems, but others it has no clue about. A good analogy for this feature would be to consider it like the warning lights on the dashboard of your car: something to pay attention to, but not to rely upon. You should not assume that because SMART generated an alert, there is definitely a drive problem, or conversely, that the lack of an alarm means the drive cannot possibly be having a problem. It certainly is no replacement for proper hard disk care and maintenance, or routine and current backups.
If you experience a SMART alert using your drive, you should immediately stop using it and contact your drive manufacturer's technical support department for instructions. Some companies consider a SMART alert sufficient evidence that the drive is bad, and will immediately issue an RMA for its replacement; others require other steps to be performed, such as running diagnostic software on the drive. In no event should you ignore the alert. Sometimes I see people asking others "how they can turn off those annoying SMART messages" on their PCs. Doing that is, well, like putting electrical tape over your car's oil pressure light so it won't bother you while you're driving!

subset: commoncrawl


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He came and he went: that was the joke that circulated in 1979 when 70-year-old former Vice President Nelson Rockefeller had a heart attack and died in his Manhattan townhouse in the presence of his evening-gown-clad 25-year-old assistant. In a sense, the same might be said of retired CIA operative Robert Seldon Lady.
Recently, Lady proved a one-day wonder. After years in absentia — poof! — he reappeared out of nowhere on the border between Panama and Costa Rica, and made the news when Panamanian officials took him into custody on an Interpol warrant. The CIA's station chief in Milan back in 2003, he had achieved brief notoriety for overseeing a la dolce vita version of extraordinary rendition as part of Washington's Global War on Terror. His colleagues kidnapped Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, a radical Muslim cleric and terror suspect, off the streets of Milan, and rendered him via U.S. airbases in Italy and Germany to the torture chambers of Hosni Mubarak's Egypt. Lady evidently rode shotgun on that transfer.
His Agency associates proved to be the crew that couldn't spook straight. They left behind such a traceable trail of five-star-hotel and restaurant bills, charges on false credit cards, and unencrypted cell phone calls that the Italian government tracked them down, identified them, and charged 23 of them, Lady included, with kidnapping.
Lady fled Italy, leaving behind a multimillion-dollar villa near Turin meant for his retirement. (It was later confiscated and sold to make restitution payments to Nasr.) Convicted in absentia in 2009, Lady received a nine-year sentence (later reduced to six). He had by then essentially vanished after admitting to an Italian newspaper, "Of course it was an illegal operation. But that's our job. We're at war against terrorism."
Last week, the Panamanians picked him up. It was the real world equivalent of a magician's trick. He was nowhere, then suddenly in custody and in the news, and then — poof again! — he wasn't. Just 24 hours after the retired CIA official found himself under lock and key, he was flown out of Panama, evidently under the protection of Washington, and in mid-air, heading back to the United States, vanished a second time.
State Department spokesperson Marie Harf told reporters on July 19th, "It's my understanding that he is in fact either en route or back in the United States." So there he was, possibly in mid-air heading for the homeland and, as far as we know, as far as reporting goes, nothing more. Consider it the CIA version of a miracle. Instead of landing, he just evaporated.
And that was that. Not another news story here in the U.S.; no further information from government spokespeople on what happened to him, or why the administration decided to extricate him from Panama and protect him from Italian justice. Nor, as far as I can tell, were there any further questions from the media. When TomDispatch inquired of the State Department, all it got was this bit of stonewallese: "We understand that a U.S citizen was detained by Panamanian authorities, and that Panamanian immigration officials expelled him from Panama on July 19. Panama's actions are consistent with its rights to determine whether to admit or expel non-citizens from its territory."
In other words, he came and he went.
Edward Snowden: The opposite of a magician's trick
When Lady was first detained, there was a little flurry of news stories and a little frisson of tension. Would a retired CIA agent convicted of a serious crime involving kidnapping and torture be extradited to Italy to serve his sentence? But that tension had no chance to build because (as anyone might have predicted) luck was a Lady that week.
After all, the country that took him into custody on that Interpol warrant was a genuine rarity in a changing Latin America. It was still an ally of the United States, which had once built a canal across its territory, controlled its politics for years, and in 1989 sent in the U.S. military to forcefully sort out those politics once again. Italy wanted Lady back and evidently requested that Panama hand him over (though the countries had no extradition treaty). But could anyone be surprised by what happened or by the role Washington clearly played in settling Lady's fate? If you had paid any attention to the global pressure Washington was exerting in an "international manhunt" to get Edward Snowden, the NSA whistleblower it had already charged under the draconian Espionage Act, back to its shores, you knew which direction Robert Seldon Lady would be heading when he hit the nearest plane out of Panama — and I don't mean Italy.
But here was the curious thing: when Panama sent him north, not east, there wasn't the slightest ripple of U.S. media curiosity about the act or what lay behind it. Lady simply disappeared. While the Italian minister of justice "deeply regretted" Panama's decision, there was not, as far as I can tell, a single editorial, outraged or otherwise, anywhere in this country questioning the Obama administration's decision not to allow a convicted criminal to be brought to justice in the courts of a democratic ally or even praising Washington's role in protecting him. And we're not talking about a media with no interest in trials in Italy. Who doesn't remember the wall-to-wall coverage of the murder trial (and retrial) of American student Amanda Knox there? For the American media, however, Lady clearly lacked Knox's sex appeal (nor would he make millions off a future account of his Italian sojourn).
In this same period, there was, of course, another man who almost magically disappeared. In a transit area of Moscow's international airport, Edward Snowden discovered that the U.S. government had deprived him of his passport and was determined to bring him back to Washington by just about any means to stand trial. That included forcing the plane of Bolivian President Evo Morales, returning from Moscow, to make an unscheduled landing in Austria and be searched for Snowden.
The NSA whistleblower was trapped in a kind of no-man's-land by an Obama administration demanding that the Russians turn him over or face the consequences. After which, for days, he disappeared from sight. In his case, unlike Lady's, however, Washington never stopped talking about him and the media never stopped speculating on his fate. It hasn't yet.
He's only appeared in public once since his "disappearance" — at a press conference at that airport with human rights activists from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. The U.S. government promptly deplored and denounced the event as something Moscow "facilitated" or "orchestrated," a "propaganda platform," and a State Department spokesperson even suggested that Snowden, not yet convicted of anything, shouldn't have the right to express himself in Moscow or anywhere else.
The truth is: when it comes to Snowden, official Washington can't shut up. Congressional figures have denounced him as a "traitor" or a "defector." The world has repeatedly been lectured from the bully pulpit in our national capital on how necessary his return and trial is to freedom, justice, and global peace. Snowden, it seems, represents the opposite of a magician's trick. He can't disappear even when he wants to. Washington won't let him, not now, not — as officials have made clear — ever. It's a matter of morality that he faces the law and pays the (already preordained) price for his "crime." This, in today's Washington, is what passes for a self-evident truth.
The Lady vanishes
It's no less a self-evident truth in Washington that Robert Seldon Lady must be protected from the long (Italian) arm of the law, that he is a patriot who did his duty, that it is the job of the U.S. government to keep him safe and never allow him to be prosecuted, just as it is the job of that government to protect, not prosecute, CIA torturers who took part in George W. Bush's Global War on Terror.
So there are two men, both of whom, Washington is convinced, must be brought in: one to face "justice," one to escape it. And all of this is a given, nothing that needs to be explained or justified to anyone anywhere, not even by a Constitutional law professor president. (Of course, if someone had been accused of kidnapping and rendering an American Christian fundamentalist preacher and terror suspect off the streets of Milan to Moscow or Tehran or Beijing, it would no less self-evidently be a different matter.)
Don't make the mistake, however, of comparing Washington's positions on Snowden and Lady and labeling the Obama administration's words and actions "hypocrisy." There's no hypocrisy involved. This is simply the living definition of what it means to exist in a one-superpower world for the first time in history. For Washington, the essential rule of thumb goes something like this: we do what we want; we get to say what we want about what we do; and U.N. ambassadorial nominee Samantha Powers then gets to lecture the world on human rights and oppression.
This version of how it all works is so much the norm in Washington that few there are likely to see any contradiction at all between the Obama administration's approaches to Snowden and Lady, nor evidently does the Washington media. Its particular blind spots, when it comes to Washington's actions, remain striking — as when the U.S. effectively downed the Bolivian president and his plane. Although it was an act of seemingly self-evident illegality, there was no serious reporting, no digging when it came to the behind-the-scenes acts of the U.S. government, which clearly pressured four or five European governments (one of which may have been Italy) to collude in the act. Nor, weeks later, has there been any follow-up by the Washington media. In other words, an act unique in recent history, which left European powers disgruntled and left much of Latin America up in arms, has disappeared without explanation, analysis, punditry, or editorial comment here. Undoubtedly, given the lack of substantial coverage, few Americans even know it happened.
The lucky Mr. Lady's story has followed a similar trajectory. Having vanished in mid-air, he has managed so far not to reappear anywhere in the U.S. press. What followed was no further news, editorial silence, and utter indifference to an act of protection that might otherwise have seemed to define illegality on an international level. There was no talk in the media, in Congress, or anywhere else about the U.S. handing over a convicted criminal to Italy, just about how the Russians must return a man Washington considers a criminal to justice.
This, then, is our world: a single megapower has, since September 2001, been in a financing and construction frenzy to create the first global surveillance state; its torturers run free; its kidnappers serve time at liberty in this country and are rescued if they venture abroad; and its whistleblowers — those who would let the rest of us know what "our" government is doing in our name — are pilloried. And so it goes.
All of it adds up to a way of life and the everyday tradecraft of a one-superpower world. Too bad Alfred Hitchcock isn't around to remake some of his old classics. Imagine what a thriller The Lady Vanishes would be today.


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Sapphire Stars in Nanotube Support Role
On crystal surfaces, nanotubes self-guide themselves into dense structures with exciting potential applications as sensors or integrated circuits
USC researchers have found that sapphire surfaces spontaneously arrange carbon nanotubes into useful patterns - but only the right surfaces.
Nanotubes are one-atom thick sheets of carbon rolled into seamless cylinders. They can be used to work as chemical sensors and transistors, like devices made from carbon's close chemical cousin, silicon.
Image: Taking the a-plane: Nanotube (mesh) on representation of appropriate crystal surface; below: nanotubes growing on actual surface
As a substrate for the creation of single wall nanotube (SWNT) devices, sapphire has a critical advantage, says Chongwu Zhou of the USC Viterbi School of Engineering's department of electrical engineering.
Single walled carbon nanotubes will grow along certain crystalline orientations on sapphire. No template has to be provided to guide this structuring: it takes place automatically.
Or more accurately, it sometimes happens automatically. With an elegant experiment, Zhou has resolved how and why this occurs. The process is potentially predictable and controllable, opening the door for systematic exploration of sapphire as a SWNT (single walll nanotube) transistor medium.
In a paper accepted by the Journal of the American Chemical Society (V127, P5294, 2005), Zhou says the understanding "may allow registration-free fabrication and integration of nanotube devices by simply patterning source/ drain electrodes at desired locations, as the active material (i.e., nanotubes) is all over the substrate," to build such devices as sensors and integrated circuits for various uses.
According to Zhou, nanotube transistor devices now have to be painstakingly positioned and aligned using methods such as flow alignment and electrical-field-assisted alignment and then individually connected. Experimental techniques can create some more extensive groups of tubes but "it remains difficult to produce planar nanotube arrays over large areas with sufficiently high density and order," Zhou wrote.
Zhou believes exploitation of the properties of sapphire his team investigated may allow production of the right kinds of dense, ordered arrays necessary.
Sapphire is aluminum oxide, also known as the mineral alumina, the abrasive corundum, and when colored by small quantities of iron, ruby. It is readily available as a cheap synthetic.
The crystal is six-sided, rising from a flat base, and has four natural planes on which it can be split to form thin, smooth slices: one parallel to the base, and three other vertical ones. The self-guiding phenomenon was first reported last year by a research team at the Weizman Institute in Israel.
Zhou's team systematically investigated the phenomenon. Certain vertical slices, particularly the a- and r-planes, exhibit the self-guiding nanotube behavior. The c-plane, parallel to the base did not.
Image: Different strains on different planes. Clockwise from top left, growth on the r, m, c, and a-planes. Note the resulaties on the r- and a-plnaes (upper left). On others, they grow at random. Zhou's research has elucidated understanding and control of the self-guiding property.
According to Zhou, two possibilities might explain the difference. One would be the arrangement of the atoms in the matrix; the other, differences in the "step edge" properties of the surfaces.
Step edges are nanoscopic surface irregularities, minute rises from the suface level.
To eliminate step edges as a possibility, Zhou's group annealed (treated with high, long-lasting heat) samples of both forms, and then tested. Annealing emphasizes step edges, and would accordingly emphasize the arrangement effect, if the effect was dependent on the edges. It did not.
The basal, horizontal slices remained unable to self-guide nanotubes. The two of the vertical slices continued to do so. The behavior seems to be due to the varied arrangement of aluminum and oxygen atoms on the surface. Zhou's team is now investigating how the exact mechanisms at work, in order to further control the process.
Zhou and his team have also, worked with quartz substrates for nanotube synthesis, which did not exhibit any guided growth.
Zhou worked with Xiaolei Liu and Song Han on the research, which was supported by an NSF career Award, an NSF-CENS grant, and an SRC MARCO/ DARPA grant.
Source: University of Southern California


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President-elect Joe Biden had a stark warning if there is not collaboration on national efforts to combat the coronavirus.
"More people may die if we don't coordinate," President-elect Biden said Monday during remarks from Wilmington, Delaware. He urged a coordination effort not only between administrations, but also with Congress, business owners, educators, and governors.
"We are at war with the coronavirus," Biden said.
President Donald Trump has not conceded the presidential election, and his administration has not formally signed an ascertainment that would allow the incoming Biden administration access to intelligence briefings and department leaders, including the coronavirus team, and funding for transition efforts.
Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris spoke about the economy, and their strategy to "hit the ground running" in January when they are sworn in.
Biden shared his frustration that President Trump and Congress has not passed more relief as Americans struggle, referencing long-term unemployment numbers and rising evictions.
Harris said they had spent Monday talking to business owners representing leaders from corporations, small businesses, and those in between.
"The road ahead, it will not be easy. But the president elect and I are hitting the ground running," Harris said.
She also addressed the disparities in how the coronavirus pandemic is effecting communities of color.
"Last month, the unemployment rate of Black Americans was almost twice those of others," Harris said, adding that Native Americans were four times more likely to be hospitalized with the coronavirus.
Biden repeated proposed policies that would increase the corporate tax and increase taxes for the wealthiest Americans while keeping the tax rate for the middle-class consistent. He's also called for more COVID-19 stimulus and more widespread use of the Defense Production Act in order to create jobs while producing more personal protective equipment.
"There's so much we can do, and we can't do any of this without working together," Biden said. He also urged Congress to pass coronavirus relief funds.
Biden's address comes as millions of Americans remained unemployed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Earlier this month, the Labor Department reported better than expected unemployment numbers from October through the unemployment rate remains at just under 7%.
Prior to the pandemic, the last time unemployment was as high as 7% was about six years ago, as the country continued to recover from the Great Recession.
Biden's comments also come as the stock market has jumped on encouraging news of a potential COVID-19 vaccine. Following Moderna's Monday announcement that its vaccine candidate has been 95% effective in Phase 3 trials, the Dow jumped more than 400 points for an increase of about 1.5%.
Despite historic losses in February and March, the Dow remains in the black from the beginning of 2020.
Biden also shared that he and his wife Dr. Jill Biden spent the morning deciding who they would spend Thanksgiving with. Saying they were encouraged by health experts to limit their gathering to a maximum of ten people, while still wearing masks and social distancing.


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Calling all gardeners!
Mark your calendar; save the date! Blithewold's Fall Gardener's Day falls on September 22 this year and looks like it's going to be a blast. Between 10 am and 3pm, workshops and demonstrations will be given all over the property and look so good it might be a little difficult to choose where to be. (My advice is to bring a friend/spouse with a notebook, split up and attend everything!) All of the programs, from flower drying and arranging to post-season fresh veggie possibilities and fall container planting, are geared to keep the got-to-garden fire lit in you — remember how jazzed you were heading into spring? We say, don't give up yet!
I personally won't want to miss Fred and Dan's demos on shrub pruning and grass growing (I'm pretty sure my motivation to go to theirs is to be supportive – not to make faces). I want to see Kathy Tracey's (owner of Avant Gardens) demo on fall container planting because she's a genius and Barney Webster's (owner of Nelumbo Water Gardens) talk about low-maintenance water gardens because he cleaned and stocked our cement pond – he's the man behind the lotus! I don't really want to miss Gil Moore's (star volunteer and gardener extraordinaire) demo on flower drying or the medicinal herb walk either… But most likely, if I'm not wandering around with my camera, I'll be spending most of the day at a table hawking some beautiful babies from our greenhouse. And I want you to find me! Calling all gardeners, garden bloggers, and Blithewold blog readers – wherever you are, if you can make the trip – let's have a meet-up!
Gardener's Day goes on rain or shine so if the weather looks iffy, bring an umbrelly and your dancing shoes (for celebrating an end to the dry spell) and don't forget to pack a picnic. Oh – and bring wine tasting taste buds (Sakonnet Vineyards will have samples) and a little cashola too for spending on plants, previously loved gardening books, local veggies and flowers, herbal products, and Art. Be there or be square! (See you there??)


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Saturday's loss to Cincinnati was a microcosm of Pitt's season: things look incredibly promising, and in the blink of an eye, you're wondering where and when it all went wrong. Instead of celebrating the second BCS appearance in school history, we're left wondering where to place this on the ever-growing list of crushing moments in Pittsburgh sports history.
To say this was a bad couple of days for the Pitt athletic department is the understatement of understatements. First, Foge Fazio loses his fight with cancer. A truly sad moment for Pitt Nation. Then, the Panther basketball team, so dominant for the better part of a decade, is part of the worst first half in the shot-clock era, and against New Hampshire, no less. To complete the hat trick of misery, the Panthers gifted us with a 21-point blown first half lead at home in losing the Big East Championship. After this, I may start a petition to move all championship games away from Heinz Field, because they usually don't end well (with one obvious exception).
Fingers are being pointed in all directions. Dave Wannstedt. Frank Cignetti. The refs. The holder. The secondary. The quarterback. Special teams. It's a natural reaction. When a sure thing combusts in such dramatic fashion, it's preferable to correct the problem, so it doesn't happen again. But the sheer volume of possible scapegoats should prove only that this was a team loss. It's not any one of these individuals' fault. But collectively, this is more than enough to explain how the Panthers cost themselves a conference championship, millions of dollars, and a month of national media hype. In the end, the Panthers beat themselves as much as Cincinnati beat them. With a list that long, do you really deserve to win a championship game?
I feel bad for the players. I feel bad for Dave Wannstedt. I feel bad for the school. But the fact of the matter is that Pitt was the third-best team in the Big East this season. They couldn't beat Cincinnati and they couldn't beat West Virginia. Sure, they were close games, but winning and losing is strictly black and white. There is no gray area in college football. There are no ties.
The result on Saturday might have been just a tad easier to swallow if this team wasn't so close to breaking through this season. But that just complicated things. When you look at Pitt's three losses this year, you can only shake your head in disbelief. A blown lead against NC State. One long Noel Devine run against WVU. A missed PAT against Cincinnati. Each loss was more devastating and disappointing than the next.
Pitt had numerous great moments on Saturday. Dion Lewis was mentioned in the same breath as Barry Sanders (even if it was Matt Millen doing the mentioning). Jonathan Baldwin continued to amaze the country with his knack for the big play. And Heinz Field rocked for a Pitt game like it's rarely rocked in the past. No doubt about it, this program is definitely headed in the right direction. Unfortunately for everyone emotionally involved with the Panthers, they're in the midst of some serious growing pains. After all, learning how to take the next step is no small task.


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As many other students, I have a part-time job to be able to afford living on my own, buying groceries, and going to university. My job is at a well-known retail shop at a very busy train station, a place where a lot of people come by every day. Many of my colleagues are other students my age, around 20 years old, and working part-time. But, besides the older full-timers, there are also many colleagues my age who work there full-time and no longer go to school or college. These young full-timers grabbed my attention. I became interested in their experiences in their 'working life' at this young age, as well as their aspirations for the future. I could understand why they work full-time, because it earns them money and they can live off of that money. Yet to me it did not make much sense for young people not to study, because, in my view, young people can develop themselves fully through studying. However, in my research I found that young full-timers also learn from their everyday experiences and develop their own skills and sense of self-worth through their performances at the workplace.
Working youth
Because youth are seen as being of great importance to a society's future, youth studies generally focus on the development of youth through education and cultural activities. Little attention is paid to young people in the work field. The little literature there is, is mostly concerned with part-time working youth, assuming that they combine paid work with study. Also, research on young workers' behavior, attitudes and values is primarily focused on family background and influences (Loughlin & Barling, 2001). Very little is known about the everyday experiences and practices of young employees during their time at work.
According to Loughlin and Barling (2001), working at a young age can be harmful. Early and long exposure to work has been related to more stress, lower school performance, alcohol abuse and illegal activities. The authors suggest a correlation between the age young people start working part-time and a predisposition towards remaining in the workforce full-time. They further point out that the quality of work plays an important role in the development of young workers' attitudes, values and beliefs. When working in 'poor'-quality jobs – associated with insecurity, low income and no opportunities for learning new skills – they are more likely to be cynical about their job and less motivated. When working in 'good'-quality jobs – associated with learning new skills and developing themselves in their work and social interactions – they are more likely to be motivated and happy in their 'working life' (Loughlin & Barling 2001). The question remains whether these definitions of 'poor' and 'good'-quality jobs also correspond to the experiences of the young workers themselves.
For a different approach to the experiences of young workers, I will use Goffman's theory of performance (1959, discussed in Calhoun et al., 2012). Goffman compares life with acting, setting a stage for the performer, with an audience observing. The audience influences the performer and the performer influences the audience. In this case, the workplace – the well-known retail shop at the busy train station, let us call it Shop X – is the stage. The young worker is the performer. The young worker has a way of acting and he or she accepts the audience: the coworkers, the managers and the customers. I am interested in those ways of acting. By observing the performances of young full-time employees, and comparing them with those of older employees and part-time employees, I have aimed to gain deeper insights into their values and attitudes.
In Domination and the Arts of Resistance, Scott (1990) provides further insights that are also useful for this research. He also focuses on performance, using terms as public transcripts and hidden transcripts. Hidden transcripts refer to discourses, gestures, speeches, or practices that are excluded from the public transcripts. The public transcripts are those speeches, practices and gestures resulting from the exercise of power. My research is mostly concerned with hidden transcripts, which represent critiques from the oppressed social group. The critiques go on offstage, where power-holders cannot see or hear them. This can be seen as a form of agency. Scotts' theory can thus be related to Goffman's theory and more general literature about oppressed social groups. In this case, the young full-timers at Shop X can be seen as an oppressed group, being dependent on the company they work for, the company that owns all the retail shops at this train station. They don't have much to say for themselves at the workplace and rely on the decisions made by the invisible big bosses and the managers on site. But like the oppressed social groups discussed by Scott, they don't undergo oppression passively. Dealing with oppression, young full-time employees can have the urge to put their own stamp on things.
This view of young full-time employees as an oppressed group can also be seen in the larger context of the global economy. One hallmark of the current global economy is the process of individualization of risk and performance. There is a need for more flexibility, plurality and risky forms of employment in the workforce. Employers consider what is best for them, and not specifically for their employees. Therefore they prefer part-time workers, such as students like myself, who are more likely to be able to work the increasing irregular work hours. Regardless of the work hours, young employees are preferred as they are more easily discarded in case of necessary lay-offs. Young full-time employees are thus dealing greatly with these new risks and insecurities (Mills, 2004). How does that affect their visions and aspirations for their future?
The research
My research was guided by the following main question: How do the everyday work experiences of young full-time employees at Shop X shape their self-performance at the workplace and their work-aspirations for the future? The three points of interests – everyday work experiences, self-performance and work-aspirations – formed the basis for the following sub-questions: What are young full-time employees' everyday experiences at the workplace? What acts – of resistance and adjustment – do they develop in their self-performance? How do young full-time employees view their future?
Performance can best be studied through participant observation. Since I myself work part-time at Shop X, I am already participating. During the participant observation, in-between serving customers and doing the other tasks I get paid to do, I have focused on the performances of the young full-time employees, but also on those of other young part-time employees and older full-time employees. How do they handle customers? How do they talk with coworkers? What do they say about their work? What do they say about their work environment? Do they seem happy with their work? These are some of the questions that I considered during the observations.
In addition to the participant observation, I have interviewed five young coworkers. Loosely framed around the theoretical concepts discussed above, the interviews were meant to reflect deeper on their views and experiences. This paper presents the results of these interviews and several weeks of observation. First, a day in the life of a young full-timer will be described. Then, four themes will be discussed based on the research findings, thoughts and ideas from myself and the young full-timers interviewed. These themes are affectivity; complaining; handling criticism and complaints; and aspirations. The paper will conclude with answers to the research questions, linked to previously described theories and youth agency.
A day in the life of
The train station where Shop X is located is the most important central point in the city. It is also one of the busiest train stations in the Netherlands, being connected to a lot of foreign stations. Thousands of people come and go by this station every day; commuters, students, tourists and people taking a day trip to the city. The shops in the station vary from food stands, book shops, magazines and even clothing stores. Because the trains ride almost 24/7, those shops also have very long opening hours. Most open at 6 o'clock in the morning and close at midnight, and often even later than that. Because of this there are several 8-hour shifts for employees in the shop I work at. The morning shift starts at 5.30 AM, and ends at 2 PM. At 2 PM there is an in-between shift that ends at 10 PM. At 4 PM the employees for the evening shift come in, they close the store at midnight. Next to these shifts, there are also more flexible shifts, based on rush-hours. These hours are between 7 AM and 9 AM, 11 AM and 14 PM and 17 PM and 19 PM. Those are the times commuters come to go to their work, lunchtime and the time commuters go home from their work.
What does a day of work at Shop X look like? Having an in-between shift, I start at 2 PM. I come in fifteen minutes early, because we are supposed to be present at least five minutes before our shift starts. This is because coworkers from the morning shift want to go home on time, and we have to take over. While I am on my way to the canteen to get dressed into my working clothes, I meet the supervisor of that day and also the manager. I get instructions as to where, at which department, I am positioned that day. Today it is the 'take-away'. It is the part of the store where we prepare sandwiches, sweet treats, our typical sausages and other hot meals out of the oven. This part of the store is relatively small, and it is almost always very busy with customers, so we have to work hard to make sure all the products are ready to be sold. Usually we work at this department with at least four people. Two at the service and cash desks, one at the oven to bake and one making sandwiches. Every position involves specific tasks that have to be done.
When I come in at the 'take-away' I say hello to my coworkers and check the day planner. This day planner holds information about who works which hours and who is at which department. Today, I am taking over the person making sandwiches. Before I start my shift she explains how things are going. She tells me how busy it has been so far, what sandwiches she has already made in advance and what things she has already cleaned. The one making sandwiches always has to make sure the workspace is clean and the products are cooled.
When I have taken over the sandwich department I start making the sandwiches that are sold out. This is actually what I will be doing most of the time; making the sandwiches that are sold out or almost sold out. Sandwiches are always fresh this way. I also make sure I make some extra before rush hour starts. During rush hour, I can never keep up. The person at the oven also has to deal with this; making sure that everything is baked in time to be sold during rush hour. Because of this, all employees working at the take-away try to help each other. We work closely together and communication is really important. Especially the person making the sandwiches and the person at the oven give each other a lot of instructions and help each other out. Sometimes working that close together can have quite negative effects. Not everyone agrees with each other all the time, and a lot of irritation can build up. Overall, the principal attitude at work is: 'Just do it, and try to have fun while you're at it'.
Because of the fact that it is always very busy at the shops at this train station, there are also a lot of people at work there. Most shops are very small, so they literally work close together. The social environment is very important for the employees, since we have to work with people all 8 hours of the shift. Those coworkers are also very different. There seems to be some sort of division in employees. First, there are the older full-timers, mostly working morning shifts, and needing to take care of their families; second, there are the part-timers, mostly students working the afternoons or evenings; third, there are the young full-timers who have chosen this for job; and finally, there are the young full-timers who didn't choose this job. This division is actually maintained by the management; it is practical for planning purposes.
The young full-timers are the most flexible employees when it comes to being available for shifts. They don't go to school and are not yet dealing with children they have to take care of. So they are often used to fill all the shifts that the older full-timers and the part-timers cannot fill. Their hours can be very different. One week they can work the in-between shifts, but the next week they can also work the evening shift or morning shift when there is a shortage. Because of that they work a lot with both the older full-timers and the part-timers, while older full-timers and part-timers almost never work together.
This puts the young full-timers in an 'in-between' position. This becomes especially clear in the different sense of humor and how people act and react around each other. The young full-timers seem to understand both the older full-timers and the young part-timers, while the latter two groups often don't understand each others' ways and jokes. Or they just don't think their humor is funny. For example, when older full-timers work together, they can act quite weird, they make funny noises, sing silly songs and make sexually tinted jokes. But that can change in a matter of seconds. The whole atmosphere of making jokes and laughter can come to an end because of one single word or action. The part-timers are almost always joking, but in a subtler manner. It seems they can do both things, joke and work, at the same time.
One young full-timer sort of described her own 'in-between' position. She mentioned that she sometimes doesn't understand why older full-timers can suddenly act so angry and serious, just like that. She sometimes wished that the older full-timers that she works a lot with could also make jokes all the time. She likes the fact that part-timers do that, but then she often feels she cannot make the same sort of jokes as they do. She thinks part-timers joke a lot about things they experience in college or when going out to party and the things they experience there. She finds those stories very nice and interesting. On the one hand, she can relate to those stories, being young and liking to party too. On the other hand, she cannot understand them, because she doesn't experience those same things in the same way. For example:
'Those part-timers often live with roommates, you know, that must be very nice. They experience a lot of funny things, like playing around the house and being able to go out and come home when they want to. I would like that but I am still living with my mother. I don't really have another choice, because I don't get the finances that they get for their studies. And I also don't make that much money here. So yeah, my life at home is a lot more boring I think. I still have to take my mothers' wishes into account, I can't go partying and come home at 5 AM on a Thursday, because I'll wake up my mother but also because I have to work the next day!'
One aspect that is clearly present in the everyday lives of all employees at the train station, especially at one particular store, is complaining. It seems that not a day goes by correctly. There is always something wrong. Issues everyone complains about include the planning of the shifts, the actions of the manager and the assistants, the ideas that come from the bosses at the headquarters, and the behavior of some customers.
Everyone that comes in at work always first checks the day planning. And it is almost always the case that not enough people are present during the day. When someone calls in sick, it is even worse. Employees talk about it with each other, and they come to the conclusion that there is always at least one person missing and that there are just too many things to do for which at least one person extra is needed. So when someone calls in sick there is never any back-up. In that case employees will say:
'We'll do our best to get everything done and to make sure the line of customers doesn't get too long, but it's not our fault if at the end of the day a lot of things aren't finished.'
This statement is mostly made by employees working the evening shift, they have to end the day. Those evening shifts are mostly filled by young full-timers or part-timers. With such a statement they make clear that some things are not their responsibility, but that they do have the motivation and skills to try to fix the things that the managers failed to do. It is the managers, or the bosses at the headquarters, that failed in making good arrangements for the back-up plan and the necessary extra employees.
One other thing that a lot of employees complain about is the manager and his assistants. Employees tell each other that they are the only ones working hard and that the manager and assistants are often not doing anything or just checking their phones, joking around with each other and telling others what to do. All employees, both full-timers and part-timers, are also annoyed by the fact that they often have to work overtime to help and get things done, and that especially the manager always leaves exactly at 4 PM, and sometimes even earlier.
'That is just not fair, it's like he doesn't even care!'
The big bosses at the headquarters are not liked very much by the employees either. According to the employees, those bosses have no clue whatsoever about the work and activities nor any practical knowledge. Sometimes they come to the store and have a look around to see how things are going. At that moment they always have a lot to say and new ideas that they think will work very well. Not only when they are coming by, but also through emails they send in ideas to keep employees posted. The big bosses are often the subject of jokes. Employees, mostly the young and older full-timers, can have a big laugh about the idea of working closely together one day with one of them, and then trying to explain the simplest things to them:
'Simple things they probably can't even do!'
The behavior of some customers is also very often the source of complaints. Most employees get annoyed by the fact that some customers don't greet and are rude towards them. Some customers are very arrogant and act very 'diva-ish'. These complaints seem to provoke a specific form of behavior, especially among the older full-timers. For example, one time I saw an older coworker refuse to help a customer until he responded to her saying 'Hello' or 'Good afternoon'. She kept repeating her greeting for minutes, until the customer understood that he had to respond. Only when he did, did she help him. A few days later, when I was working a morning shift with one young full-timer and two older full-timers, I noticed that the young full-timer did the very same thing. Later on, I interviewed her and she told me she was very proud of her work and she wanted to do her job properly, but she couldn't stand it if customers were not nice to her or seemed to look down on her. She had seen how that older full-timer handled those rude customers, and she decided that was a very smart thing to do.
'We have to stand up for ourselves sometimes, you know. I work very hard here and I like doing it. So when some people come in that are acting stupid, I have to show my confidence and react to them'.
This shows that experiences at work can influence performances directly. This young full-timer has been socialized at the workplace in a specific way, seeing and learning how other full-timers handled specific experiences and then using this in her own performance. Which for her increased her sense of self-worth as a proud employee.
The statement above comes from a young full-timer who had chosen to do this job. It seems that she, and other young full-timers who chose this job, view the behavior of the older full-timers as an example. The effects of rude and arrogant customers are different for the part-timers and the young full-timers who didn't choose this job. Even though they also complain about some customers, they seem to not take it too seriously and just let it go by. The part-timers and these other young full-timers are not as actively adapting their performance to those customers as the older and younger full-timers who chose this job do.
Handling criticism and complaints
Next to the fact that employees are complaining, they also have to deal with complaints and criticism on their account. The headquarters and the management, other employees and even some customers sometimes complain about employees or criticize their work.
The division of the four groups described before becomes clear again in dealing with criticism, especially criticism coming from the headquarters or the management. The young full-timers who chose this job and older full-timers are often very proud and motivated and they want to do well. They listen carefully to criticism and make a well thought of decision in how to handle it. They take it seriously. Even when the criticism turns out to be unfounded and the management or headquarters has the wrong ideas, they first listen before they 'make fun' of management and headquarters or change it into complaining about them. The young full-timers who didn't choose this job and most of the part-timers seem to not take criticism so seriously. They often just let it pass by, just like the unfriendly behavior of some customers.
Employees also have some things to say about each other and the way they work and do things. Especially the older full-timers seem to criticize the part-timers a lot. Mostly about the way they do their job-related activities but also about their attitudes. Older full-timers tend to think that part-timers are lazy and not serious enough. But while the behavior of the part-timers resembles that of young full-timers who didn't choose this job, the older full-timers never seem to criticize those young full-timers the way they criticize part-timers. They seem to feel more sympathy for young full-timers, even if the latter didn't choose the job and aren't as proud of it.
Part-timers seem to be the ones dealing with the most criticism coming from other employees, but they are also the most accepting of that criticism. They are more likely to accept criticism coming from either older or younger full-timers. Some casual conversation with other part-timers made clear that they accept this criticism because they do not really care about it. One part-timer said:
'Whatever makes them happy.'
While the young full-timers seem to be more reluctant than the older ones to criticize part-timers, they also won't accept criticism coming from part-timers. This is also true for older full-timers, criticism coming from part-timers is not appreciated. Criticism coming from young full-timers, whether they chose this job or not, will not be accepted by older full-timers either. One day, a part-time employee criticized the way in which an older full-timer did her job. There was a very long line of customers and one customer wanted something that was sold out, a sandwich. The part-timer stated that the full-timer, who was in charge of the sandwiches that day, could make one for the customer. The older full-timer did not agree with this, because she was busy cleaning and planned to make the sandwiches in about half an hour. The part-timer objected and they began fighting. All other employees, especially the young full-timers, were shocked when the part-timer then decided to quit. She stated that she couldn't handle this kind of attitude and that she couldn't work with her again. Casual conversations after this event made clear that most young full-timers were going to keep their criticisms to themselves for a while. They did not want to start a big fight and work with irritation and awkward situations. There was no use for these fights.
Sometimes customers criticize or complain about employees. A customer may complain, for example, about an unfriendly employee, not being able to understand or hear the employee, or wanting something that is sold out. A tense or uncomfortable situation can arise from that. Most of the time those criticisms from customers are not fair from the viewpoint of the employees. Sometimes employees just let it go, but other times they can react in a way that can create a big fight. One time, a customer began yelling at a young full-time employee and even invited her to go outside and fight because she started to yell back. A customer can also complain through the telephone or an email. They can fill in a form to make an official complaint about someone. A manager first sees the complaint and then decides whether or not it is necessary to talk to the employee at issue. Handling those complaints is mostly done in a quiet and calm way.
In general, it seems that complaints and criticisms coming from headquarters, management and other employees have more impact than complaints coming from customers. The information coming from customers almost never influences further behavior, only prompting direct reactions such as an argument. Criticisms coming from headquarters, management and other employees can change some actions, as employees take it in, reflect on it and adjust their further behavior.
When it comes to ideas and wishes for the future the division in young full-timers is of great importance again. The young full-timers who did not choose this job are often more pessimistic about their workplace and about their future there. One young full-timer, for example, has a diploma in hairdressing and wants to find a job as a hairdresser in the near future. For now she thinks it is fine to work at the shop, but she does not expect it to last. This aspiration resembles the ideas that part-time employees have about the future. These students also have different goals than to work at Shop X at this busy train station forever.
As for the young full-timers who did choose this job, their wishes for the future also vary. One young full-timer I had a conversation with told me that she used to be team leader, a supervisor, but that she had been set back to be a normal employee, because of some issues she had with another supervisor. She said she had a lot of thoughts and ideas about how to improve the workplace and generally how to make the store more successful. But because of her earlier experiences as a supervisor and the fact that she had been set back, she did not want to be in that position again.
'It's fine like this I guess. It's not like they are going to listen to me this time. It isn't even that special, to be a supervisor'.
She based this statement on the fact that she wasn't listened to the first time, and that, even as a supervisor, she had no 'special' or different influence on decisions or anything than any normal employee had. This can be seen as one form of hidden transcript, a complaint about the fact that there are differences in status of employees, but not really differences in job-activities and influence. At least from her point of view.
Other young full-timers who had chosen to work at this job seemed to be more motivated to continue. One person I spoke with thought he could teach the older employees to be more flexible, stating that many of them could learn from the young full-timers. Another young full-timer who is very motivated and proud of her work did think that she could grow and develop herself in this particular workplace, but she also thought that:
'[Being a supervisor] or something like that would be too hard. What I do now is also really important.'
The difference between this employee and the employee who used to be supervisor lies in the fact that the latter had experience in both situations, and that the former accepts the ideas about supervisors that are 'written in the public transcript', as employees with more influence and more difficult tasks to handle.
It is clear that not all young full-time employees share the same position, thoughts and aspirations regarding the workplace, at Shop X in this busy train station. However, there are some interesting patterns in work experiences, self-performances and work-aspirations. Regarding the first sub-question of my research – What are young full- time employees' everyday experiences? – I have found that working with people, coworkers and customers, and complaining and dealing with complaints are important aspects of the everyday work-experience.
To answer the second sub-question – 'What acts do they develop in their self-performance?' – we need to take into account the division in employees. Young full-timers who chose the job seem to adopt the acts of older full-timers, for example in the way in which they handle rude and arrogant customers. Humor also plays a major part in developing appropriate acts. Young full-timers seem to be able to switch between different senses of humor, relating to both older full-timers and part-timers. Some ways of joking are directed at the management or the headquarters, and also include complaining. Making jokes, behind the bosses' back, is a way of resisting. Scott's (1990) theory is thus very present in this research. The way employees make jokes about the bosses is a hidden transcript. It is also a way to influence their work and the workplace where they can. Being at the whims of the changing global economy (Mills, 2004), their acts of complaining and making jokes are one form of agency that also gives them a sense of control.
The answer to the last sub-question is made clear in the last theme about aspirations. 'How do young full-time employees view their future?' This is different for each young full-timer. Some want to develop themselves at this workplace and others want to continue their 'working life' elsewhere, based on different ideas. It seems that work aspirations for the future are not very present in the daily lives of young full-time employees.
To answer the main question – How do the everyday work experiences of young full-time employees at a busy train station shape their self-performances in the workplace and their work-aspirations for the future? – it can be concluded that everyday work experiences differ for each group of employees. Yet they all include and influence complaining, handling complaints and dealing with coworkers and customers. Work-aspirations are partly based on the direct experiences of working at Shop X at the busy train station, and partly on earlier experiences in workplaces or school programs. Aspirations are also very different for each individual young full-timer. Each individual has his or her own story that influences their performances at the workplace as well as their aspirations. This means that we cannot make general statements about young full-timers as one 'oppressed' or 'resistive' social group.
In the introduction I stated that I believed young people can develop themselves fully through education, and that part of me couldn't make sense of the fact that some young people choose to work full-time instead of studying. Now, having done this research and having paid close attention to the activities, experiences, and performances of young full-timers, my coworkers, I believe the workplace can also be of great importance for the development of young people, and not only for making money. At the workplace young people are dealing with all sorts of people, customers, coworkers, managers, and a work-system. Just as students are dealing with other students, teachers and education-systems. The work-place can also be seen as a learning environment.
(Written for Youth Cultures in a Transnational Context)
Calhoun, C., Gerteis, J., Moody, J., Pfaff, S. & Virk, I. (2012). Contemporary sociological theory. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.
Loughlin, C., & Barling, J. (2001). Young workers' work values, attitudes and behaviours. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 74, 543-558.
Mills, M. (2004). Demand for flexibility or generation of insecurity? The individualization of risk, irregular work shifts and Canadian youth. Journal of youth studies, 7(2), 115-139.
Scott, J. (1990). Domination and the arts of resistance: Hidden transcripts. Yale University Press.


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Reading 1 Dt 4:32-34, 39-40
Moses said to the people:
"Ask now of the days of old, before your time,
ever since God created man upon the earth;
ask from one end of the sky to the other:
Did anything so great ever happen before?
Was it ever heard of?
Did a people ever hear the voice of God
speaking from the midst of fire, as you did, and live?
Or did any god venture to go and take a nation for himself
from the midst of another nation,
by testings, by signs and wonders, by war,
with strong hand and outstretched arm, and by great terrors,
all of which the LORD, your God,
did for you in Egypt before your very eyes?
This is why you must now know,
and fix in your heart, that the LORD is God
in the heavens above and on earth below,
and that there is no other.
You must keep his statutes and commandments that I enjoin on you today,
that you and your children after you may prosper,
and that you may have long life on the land
which the LORD, your God, is giving you forever."
Responsorial Psalm Ps 33:4-5, 6, 9, 18-19, 20, 22
R. (12b) Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Upright is the word of the LORD,
and all his works are trustworthy.
He loves justice and right;
of the kindness of the Lord the earth is full.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
By the word of the LORD the heavens were made;
by the breath of his mouth all their host.
For he spoke, and it was made;
he commanded, and it stood forth.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
See, the eyes of the LORD are upon those who fear him,
upon those who hope for his kindness,
To deliver them from death
and preserve them in spite of famine.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Our soul waits for the LORD,
who is our help and our shield.
May your kindness, O LORD, be upon us
who have put our hope in you.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Reading 2 Rom 8:14-17
Brothers and sisters:
For those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.
For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear,
but you received a Spirit of adoption,
through whom we cry, "Abba, Father!"
The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit
that we are children of God,
and if children, then heirs,
heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ,
if only we suffer with him
so that we may also be glorified with him.
Alleluia Rv 1:8
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Glory to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit;
to God who is, who was, and who is to come.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel Mt 28:16-20
The eleven disciples went to Galilee,
to the mountain to which Jesus had ordered them.
When they all saw him, they worshiped, but they doubted.
Then Jesus approached and said to them,
"All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations,
baptizing them in the name of the Father,
and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,
teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.
And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age."
Lectionary for Mass for Use in the Dioceses of the United States, second typical edition, Copyright © 2001, 1998, 1997, 1986, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine; Psalm refrain © 1968, 1981, 1997, International Committee on English in the Liturgy, Inc. All rights reserved. Neither this work nor any part of it may be reproduced, distributed, performed or displayed in any medium, including electronic or digital, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.


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Steady gaze.
Mount Fuji.
Our eyes let us see further than a dragonfly can, but from the time of Galileo we have explored how we can extend our reach, not just to gaze at the mountains, but to penetrate the heavens. And for that we use telescopes.
The first optical telescopes were very small, at least by modern standards. For example, one of Newton's seems to have a diameter of about 50 mm.
But subsequently the diameter of telescopes has doubled and redoubled many times, as various construction problems have been overcome.
The first telescopes used lenses, but starting with Newton's, reflecting telescopes have dominated, because it's much less difficult to manufacture big mirrors than it is big lenses.
Why does size matter? Because a bigger diameter means, in simple terms, a bigger magnification.
So there are three really big telescopes planned to come into operation 2020s (hopefully). The biggest telescope at present is the Keck, which is 10 m across, so collects 40,000 times as much light as Newton's, if I have my sums right. The new ones proposed will be 25 m, 30 m, and the largest of all, the European Extremely Large Telescope, at 39 m.
This giant dragonfly eye won't be just one huge mirror, it will be made of 798 hexagons, each 1.44 m across a compound mirror, just as dragonfly sees through compound lenses.
And in case you wondered the EELT won't physically be in Europe, for practical reasons, but in Chile.
The EELT and the other big telescopes will let us take pictures of exoplanets. These are planets orbiting other stars from ours. Many of these have been discovered but usually their existence is only inferred, from regular periodic changes in the light we observe from the star, as the planet comes between it and us. Only in a score of cases can we even observe the planet as a separate object from its star.
When a promising new exoplanet is discovered the media often feature illustrations of what it looks like, particularly if there is any possibility that it could harbour life. But these are merely the imaginative work of artists, not real pictures captured by telescopes.
The new generation telescopes will change this. For the first time we shall be able to actually see exoplanets orbiting their stars. We shall have come a long way from Galileo's observation of Jupiter being circled by its moons.


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Pain medication is frequently prescribed for patients with sciatica, but a new article from the prestigious British Medical Journal reveals that there may be little efficacy in this practice.
In the article, researchers reviewed 23 studies that compared placebo pills to various drugs typically prescribed for sciatica. In study after study, drugs were found to be no more effective than a placebo in relieving pain. Drugs also did not significantly help radiating leg pain, one of the primary symptoms of sciatica. Though two drugs did reduce overall pain, it was unclear how effective they were in the long-term.
This led researchers to conclude that there is no clear evidence demonstrating the efficacy or tolerability of common pain medications prescribed for sciatica.
Chiropractic is a better approach to sciatica than drugs. A 2010 study found that chiropractic does not pose the same risks as surgery yet it is just as effective.
Call our office today for natural, effective treatment of sciatica.
McMorland G, Suter E, Casha S, du Plessis SJ, Hurlbert RJ. Manipulation or microdiskectomy for sciatica? A prospective randomized clinical study. Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics. 2010; 33(8): 576-584.
Pinto,Rafael Zambelli. Chris G Maher, Manuela L Ferreira, Paulo H Ferreira, Mark Hancock, Vinicius C Oliveira, Andrew J McLachlan, Bart Koes.Drugs for relief of pain in patients with sciatica: systematic review and meta-analysis. British Medical Journal. 2012, February; 344:e497 doi: 10.1136/bmj.e497.


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Every Monday night, A Foreign Affair hosts a free, live phone conference where you can talk candidly about international dating with someone who truly knows it inside and out. Bud Patterson, Vice President of A Foreign Affair and author of Foreign Bride 101: A How-to For Nice Guys, has proudly hosted Monday night conference calls each week for the past 10 years! Bud's insight, experience, and desire to help will truly open your eyes to the opportunities waiting for you in the world of international dating. Hundreds of men have told us that this conference call is the reason they finally made the decision to go on a tour! The Monday night conference call is a candid, honest conversation about how you can invest the time and effort into finding the international partner who will complete your life; you will not hear any fluff or fantasy marketing. You will learn the honest truth about international dating tours, foreign women's cultures and customs, Fiancée Visas, tour destinations, online profiles, ways to protect yourself, how to communicate through a translator, and any other topics that you want to discuss!
Monday Night - General Conference call - This is our oldest and most popular call hosted by the veteran himself, Bud Patterson. We have hosted the "Monday Night Call" for over 10 years running! All issues are covered and Bud shares his years of experience and knowledge, callers interact with Bud and each other. this is a very informative call and a must for the first time user!
Wednesday Night - Philippine Call - This call focuses on the Philippines and everything associated with Filipino women.
Again Participation in any of these calls is free and easy. All calls take place at the same time, 9:30 Eastern time! Call 1-(209) 689-0007 and when prompted enter conference code 103766 Once you have joined the conference simply press 5 * to join the conversation!
IMBRA ("International Marriage Broker Regulation Act") is current Federal legislation that was first passed in 2006. The law was intended to provide more information to foreign women about the men who were writing to them before they decided to exchange personal contact information. IMBRA does not prevent you from corresponding with or meeting the women profiled on the site, and you can still exchange personal contact information once the woman has received a copy of your IMBRA form which is found on the members section of the site. It is important that you only use sites that are compliant with IMBRA, otherwise you may experience difficulties when applying for a Fiancée visa for the woman to travel to the United States as IMBRA is now a question that is asked as part of the process.
The Imbra form is fast, easy, and safe to complete and only needs to be completed once no matter how many women you are corresponding with or meeting, we will store it, translate it, and provide it to the women with whom you have an interest. The form consists of questions concerning certain past criminal acts, marital status, children, restraining orders, if you have ever sponsored a fiancée in the past, and the states in which you have resided, and is affirmed by you as being true and correct. We will also conduct a sex offender search using the national sex offender date base. There is no personal information asked for or given on the IMBRA form, (such as your address or even E-mail address), thus there is no possibility of any misuse of information. Your personal information such as your address or E-mail address is never released to any of the women, (or anyone else for that matter) unless you do so yourself.
We have implemented a system for those women who have their own E-mail addresses that will still make it easy for you to contact them in light of IMBRA.
In order to exchange contact information Imbra requires that you complete the form and the woman receives and signs for it. The form is then translated into the woman's native language and viewed by every woman prior to any exchange of personal contact information.
Once the form is completed you can order addresses and you will receive a virtual E-mail address that will go to her actual E-mail address through our system. She will receive your personal background information when you send the initial E-mail, and if she likes she can respond directly back to you using her real E-mail address. From that point you can correspond directly. There are no extra charges to send or receive E-mails using the virtual E-mail system!
For those women who do not have an E-mail address the E-mail Forwarding service is the best option for a quick contact. We will send a copy of your personal background information to every new woman with whom you correspond, and before contact information can be exchanged they will have to come in and sign it but you can correspond as much as you like using the system prior to that. There is a fee of $9.99 per letter, (7.49 for Platinum Members) however that also includes our staff calling and letting the woman know that she has a letter from you and the translation of the letters. For more information on this service please log-in to your members home page and also review our Express Mail Forwarding FAQ's.
Our Romance tours and personal one on one introductions will remain essentially unchanged. You will be asked to complete the personal background form and it will be given out to the women you will be meeting during the tour. Other than that, there will be no difference in the way the tours or introductions are conducted.
If you have any questions concerning this or any other questions please call us at (602) 553-8178 (602) 553-8178
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As a former professional athlete, I understand team code as well as anyone. In fact, I understand why it is a necessary part of the landscape. When you are at the highest level, you also endure the highest level of scrutiny, invasion of privacy and accountability. And you seek refuge by creating an environment which contains people with a common understanding about how to navigate such a world. An environment also known as the locker room.
Over time, your teammates became brothers, coaches became father figures, managers became sage godfathers, all representing different generations of what makes up the family. And you are very cautious about what you publicly say about a family member.
This isn't an environment that you understand on day one of a professional career. You learn it earlier, and there is no better place than college to plant the seed of that family tree.
Like most college athletes, I was finding myself in those critical years, slowly building trust in others in tandem with gaining confidence in myself. My biggest challenge often revolved around being the only everyday black player on an Ivy League college baseball team. I spent time dispelling the idea that I only got into the school because of my athletic skill when out of uniform. And while in uniform, I was fighting the idea that all of my athletic ability was biologically given to me. Everyone was soul-searching between fraternities and majors while working on how to fit into the culture, how to turn at the right time towards the sun, how to perform and keep everyone in the family shade. Since we had an excellent team for the first two years, we were doing a lot of things right on the field. We were, baseball-wise, successful.
(MORE: The Firing of Joe Paterno: Why the Penn State Unrest Was Senseless)
We attributed a lot of that success to our culture. How we protected each other, managed our roles, how tactical decisions were executed, even when we were to talk. We had captains who led the discussions, we had a tag team of coaches who ultimately would work together for 30-plus years. With this kind of intimacy, you would think you would know just about everything there is to know about each other. But not really.
Whether it is more of a macho construct or just a team construct is worth exploring, but either way, there are questions not to ask. You don't ask how someone's father made his fortune, you don't ask why an aunt of one of your teammates is smitten by barely 20-year-old college athletes, you don't ask why a player could practice with a Confederate flag draped around his waist. These details can be conduct unbecoming of a team player.
You can know too much in a locker room. Or focus on the wrong information. I couldn't tell you where any of my managers spent their time after the game was over and I saw these men more than I saw my own family. We spent an inordinate amount of time together in the locker room, on the field or on a plane for most of a day. At first glance that was considered the ultimate in intimacy, but in reality, it was just close proximity.
And close proximity can create a survival mode of another kind. One that can work seamlessly on the field, can execute fly patterns and call curveballs, but you are most likely not the emergency contact on your teammate's medical records. When it came to personal questions, I knew only the answers that people offered to give without prodding. The rest was empirical evidence, manifestations while in-game, revelations from bumping into someone at a campus party. Good data, but incomplete data. Then, once you do know intimate details, they are not to be shared. If you're playing for an iconic, highly-visible institution like Penn State, you have even more silence.
(MORE: Time to Go, Joe: Paterno To Step Down in Penn State Sex Abuse Scandal)
But the silence isn't just directed towards the media or away from ethical obligation. It's endemic to the inter-personal relationships on any given team. It can be explained in how I could have a teammate for years and couldn't tell you if he had a sister. However, I could tell you how well he blocks. Yes it is a code, but it's often steeped in a lack of true intimacy. And in reality, this kind of silence proves to be much more deadly than any other kind.


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Wide bend by old lady
See these fattie old lady doing naughty to her fucking self. She was fucking herself with her toy a dildo who always with her every she needs to fuck fat old pussy. So one time she got horny on her house coz her husband was out of the country doing some business meeting, so when she got horny only her dildo can make her naughty mind feel satisfy and completely okay, so she start fucking herself using her toy inserting it to her fucking old pussy, after she has done doing that crazy thing she still Nude lying on her bed.


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ISBN13: 9780310113607 ISBN10: 0310113601 Condition: Standard All Product Details
A New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestseller
An acclaimed, timely narrative of how people of faith have historically--up to the present day--worked against racial justice. And a call for urgent action by all Christians today in response.
The Color of Compromise is both enlightening and compelling, telling a history we either ignore or just don't know. Equal parts painful and inspirational, it details how the American church has helped create and maintain racist ideas and practices. You will be guided in thinking through concrete solutions for improved race relations and a racially inclusive church.
The Color of Compromise
The Color of Compromise is not a call to shame or a platform to blame white evangelical Christians. It is a call from a place of love and desire to fight for a more racially unified church that no longer compromises what the Bible teaches about human dignity and equality. A call that challenges black and white Christians alike to standup now and begin implementing the concrete ways Tisby outlines, all for a more equitable and inclusive environment among God's people. Starting today.


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President Obama Continues Assault on the Second Amendment
By John Velleco
Director of Federal Affairs
President Obama is determined to eradicate the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding American citizens.
In recent meetings with Mexican President Felipe Calderón, the American President promised to urge the U.S. Senate to pass an international arms control treaty.
The treaty, cumbersomely titled the "Inter-American Convention Against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives, and Other Related Materials" (known by the acronym CIFTA), was signed by President Bill Clinton, but never ratified by the Senate.
President Obama is hoping to capitalize on an increased Democrat majority and push its quick ratification. The U.S. is one of four nations that have not ratified the treaty.
If ratified and the U.S. is found not to be in compliance with any provisions of the treaty — such as a provision that would outlaw reloading ammunition without a government license — President Obama would be empowered to implement regulations without Congressional approval.
Supporters of CIFTA claim the treaty is not a threat to the Second Amendment, but only a "symbolic" gesture. But symbolic of what? That America really is to blame for problems of violence and drug gangs in a foreign country? That the American government can be pressed by a foreign country to alter the Second Amendment?
If the kind of "change" that Obama wants is for the United States to take its marching orders from third world countries regarding our gun rights, we're in big trouble!
The fact is, this treaty will do NOTHING to combat the violence in Mexico, but it will go a LONG WAY toward eroding our ability to protect the right to keep and bear arms through our elected officials.
Even if America BANNED ALL GUNS, the violence in Mexico would not go away. After all, the cartels are funded — to the tune of billions of dollars — by products (illegal drugs) that are already completely banned. How much more evidence is needed that a "prohibition" will not work?
Actually, gun control proposals such as reinstating the ban on semi-automatic firearms will make Americans less safe, especially if violence spills over to this side of the border.
As Wyoming Senator John Barasso pointed out in a recent trip to El Paso, Texas: "Why would you disarm someone when they potentially could get caught in the crossfire?… The United States will not surrender our second-amendment rights for Mexico's border problem."
President Obama disagrees and he continues to spread the myth about how many guns recovered in Mexico come from the U.S. "More than 90% of the guns found in Mexico are not bought [in Mexico], but in the United States," he said.
William La Jeunesse and Maxim Lott set the record straight and debunked "the 90% number" in a FOXNews.com report: "It's just not true," they said. According to their report, the real number is closer to 17%.
In other words, the Obama administration is pushing to disarm law-abiding Americans based on a massive misinformation campaign.
So how are the cartels armed if firearms are not pouring across the U.S. border? Keeping in mind that the cartels control BILLIONS of dollars, La Jeunesse and Lott shed some light on how they obtain the overwhelming majority of their guns:
— The Black Market. Mexico is a virtual arms bazaar, with fragmentation grenades from South Korea, AK-47s from China, and shoulder-fired rocket launchers from Spain, Israel and former Soviet bloc manufacturers.
— Russian crime organizations. Interpol says Russian Mafia groups such as Poldolskaya and Moscow-based Solntsevskaya are actively trafficking drugs and arms in Mexico.
— South America. During the late 1990s, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) established a clandestine arms smuggling and drug trafficking partnership with the Tijuana cartel, according to the Federal Research Division report from the Library of Congress.
— Asia. According to a 2006 Amnesty International Report, China has provided arms to countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Chinese assault weapons and Korean explosives have been recovered in Mexico.
— The Mexican Army. More than 150,000 soldiers deserted in the last six years, according to Mexican Congressman Robert Badillo. Many took their weapons with them, including the standard issue M-16 assault rifle made in Belgium.
— Guatemala. U.S. intelligence agencies say traffickers move immigrants, stolen cars, guns and drugs, including most of America's cocaine, along the porous Mexican-Guatemalan border. On March 27, La Hora, a Guatemalan newspaper, reported that police seized 500 grenades and a load of AK-47s on the border. Police say the cache was transported by a Mexican drug cartel operating out of Ixcan, a border town.
In addition, despite efforts to clean up the system, corruption in the Mexican government is rampant. An article in the New York Times late last year noted that, "One of Mexico's most notorious drug cartels made huge cash payments to officials in the Mexican attorney general's office in exchange for confidential information on anti-drug operations… the cartel might have had an informant inside the American embassy."
The bribes ranged from $150,000 to $450,000 each. Clearly, these gangs have the resources not only to buy firearms by the planeload, but they can buy the planes, too! Politicians on both sides of the border seem to ignore that they're dealing with multi-billion dollar criminal organizations that will always be able to get firearms.
One would think that Mexico President Felipe Calderón and Attorney General Eduardo Medina Mora would have their hands full cleaning up a huge mess in their own country, but they're not too busy to meddle in U.S. affairs.
As the Times noted in an article that coincided with Obama's Mexico trip, "Mexican officials have repeatedly called on the United States to clamp down on the flow of weapons and are likely to bring it up again with President Obama on Thursday."
Mr. Mora even lectured that "The Second Amendment was never meant to arm foreign criminal groups."
American office holders should be more concerned about upholding their oath to support and defend the U.S. Constitution than kowtowing to "blame America first" foreign politicians.


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VALIANT Solicitations For OCTOBER 2012
Written by FRED VAN LENTE
Art by CLAYTON HENRY
Cover by ARTURO LOZZI
Character Design Cover by DAVID AJA
Those email forwards Grandma sends you? ALL TRUE. Every lurid cover of every supermarket tabloid? ALL TRUE. That impossible-to-read GeoCities site rambling on about truthers, birthers and black ops alien greys working for the U.N.? ALL TRUE. The Sect has dragged a curtain of confusion across the inner workings of your world, but fear not, the conspiracy-busters Archer & Armstrong are here to deliver Truth in the form of ass-kicking! (And ass-kicking in the form of ass-kicking.) Our heroes' newfound friendship will face its greatest test as they battle The Sisters of Perpetual Darkness – the Nunjas ("ninja" + "nun") who guard Rome's blasphemous secrets. Obadiah Archer thought he had been betrayed by his family before, but nothing can prepare him for this!
Also: the existence of God will be proven for all time. Or disproven. One of the two.
$3.99/Rated T+/32 pgs.
ON SALE OCTOBER 10th
Written by DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI
Art by MANUEL GARCIA
Cover by ARTURO LOZZI
Character Design Cover by DAVID AJA
They call you Project Bloodshot, but you had a real name once.
You were born, raised, maybe even loved. And at some point, some evil bastards filled your head with dozens of false memories to motivate you, restrain you, control you. And oh, what they made you do in the name of national security… But what if one of those memories wasn't false? What if you had a real wife and a child somewhere in the world who thought you were dead? Wouldn't you go through seven kinds of violent hell to find them? Congrats. Your wish is about to be granted…
$3.99/Rated T+/32 pgs.
ON SALE OCTOBER 10th
Written by JOSH DYSART
Art by KHARI EVANS
Cover by MICO SUAYAN
Character Design Cover by DAVID AJA
Toyo Harada and Peter Stanchek. Master and apprentice. Creator and destroyer. Alpha and omega.
Humanity's most powerful psionic, Pete Stanchek, has been run to ground. His few friends and family are gone. He is loved is by no one. At the nadir of his brief, 18-year existence, he has been drugged, deceived and deluded by a corporate master. But now he's finally had enough. Tonight, the human race will find out exactly how powerful he is. Tonight, the boy who has nothing will go to war against the man who has everything. And soon the Valiant Universe will discover that anything can end – even the world.
$3.99/Rated T+/32 pgs.
ON SALE OCTOBER 17th
Written by ROBERT VENDITTI
Art by LEE GARBETT
Cover by DOUG BRAITHWAITE
Variant Cover by PATRICK ZIRCHER
Character Design Cover by JELENA KEVIC-DJURDJEVIC
Ninjak vs. X-O Manowar: Round II!
Aric of Dacia has bonded with the most powerful weapon in the universe, but his command of the sentient X-O Manowar armor will lead him to cross swords with Ninjak, the world's most skilled weapons specialist. Hired by members of The Vine hidden deep within Earth's governments, Ninjak has been sent to bring back the Manowar armor at any cost. It's raw power versus stealth and cunning in the second installment of the espionage-edged thriller that pits two of Valiant's most popular heroes against each other – to the death.
$3.99/Rated T+/32 pgs.
ON SALE OCTOBER 17th
Written by Kevin VanHook
Art by Don Perlin, Andrew Wendel and Ted Halsted
Cover by Barry Windsor-Smith
The first in an all-new library of Valiant classics!
Collected for the first time anywhere, the best-selling title of the 90s is back! Re-presenting the first arc of his original adventures in the VH1 Valiant Universe, Bloodshot comes armed to the teeth with bullets, nanites – and questions. With all of New York as his battlefield, Bloodshot wages a one-man war for the secrets to his past. But with the whole of New York's mafia underground hot on his tail, he'll soon realize that some questions are better left unanswered! With appearances from Ninjak, Eternal Warrior, Rai and more, no fan can miss this essential piece of Valiant history! Collecting BLOODSHOT (1994) #1-8 and featuring AN ALL-NEW, NEVER–BEFORE-SEEN STORY by the original creative team of Kevin VanHook and Don Perlin.
$24.99/Rated T+/200 pgs.
ON SALE OCTOBER 24th