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EG 5.1 1Settlement and the FCA – an overview
1The FCA resolves many enforcement cases by settlement. Early settlement has many potential advantages as it can result, for example, in consumers obtaining compensation earlier than would otherwise be the case, the saving of FCA and industry resources, messages getting out to the market sooner and a public perception of timely and effective action. The FCA therefore considers it is in the public interest for matters to settle, and settle early, if possible.
1The possibility of settlement does not, however, change the fact that enforcement action is one of the tools available to the FCA to secure our statutory objectives. The FCA seeks to change the behaviour not only of those subject to the immediate action, but also of others who will be alerted to our concerns in a particular area. There is no distinction here between action taken following agreement with the subject of the enforcement action and action resisted by a firm before the RDC (including action taken following a focused resolution agreement)2. In each case, the FCA must be satisfied that its decision is the right one, both in terms of the immediate impact on the subject of the enforcement action but also in respect of any broader message conveyed by the action taken.
1Settlements in the FCA context are not the same as 'out of court' settlements in the commercial context. An FCA settlement is a regulatory decision, taken by the FCA, the terms of which are accepted by the firm or individual concerned. So, when agreeing the terms of a settlement, the FCA will carefully consider its statutory objectives and other relevant matters such as the importance of sending clear, consistent messages through enforcement action, and will only settle in appropriate cases where the agreed terms of the decision result in acceptable regulatory outcomes. Redress to consumers who may have been disadvantaged by a firm's misconduct may be particularly important in this respect. Other than in exceptional circumstances, FCA settlements that give rise to the issue of a final notice or supervisory notice will result in some degree of publicity (see chapter 6), unlike commercial out of court settlements, which are often confidential.
1In recognition of the value of early settlement, the FCA operates a scheme to award a discount2 for early settlement of cases involving financial penalties, suspensions, restrictions and disciplinary prohibitions2. Details of the scheme, which applies only to settlement of cases where investigators were appointed on or after 20 October 2005, are set out in DEPP 6.7. This chapter provides some commentary on certain practical aspects of the operation of the scheme.
Some decisions2 on settlements and statutory notices arising from them are taken by two members of the FCA's senior management, rather than by the RDC (DEPP refers to these individuals as the 'settlement decision makers'). Full details of the special decision making arrangements for settlements are set out in DEPP 5.


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She made good her word, and came crashing in, fresh-faced and chic. Careless me did not only fail to prepare bananas, but in fact, was so bogged down by some stupid partial fraction expansion problems, that she had to spend the first half an hour reading the previous day's paper. Nevertheless, she remained cheerful, and was even thoughtful enough to share a funny article about hopeless Asian dads with a grumbling i-hate-maths me.
I could not even begin to fathom how I was to keep her entertained. My office was so bare - void of good food, of high-tech toys, definitely of bars for climbing and swinging around. So how could I keep the active, energetic Monkey adequately occupied and happy? But of course, I needn't had worried - she kept herself busy enough checking out what's outside the window, what's on my bookshelves, and photographing everything from my miserly collection of instant coffees and biscuits to the academic calendar on the wall.
Those were all very well, but the highlight of the day which kept her elated all throughout was our long-awaited KFC lunch. Add a couple of hours of uuu-aaarrkkkking monkey chatter to it, and we had the most perfect visiting-monkey day ever!

subset: commoncrawl


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APTA EXPO is arriving in 2 weeks, and acrosser is pleased to announce the official launch of its APTA EXPO micro site! With various interactive features and EXPO-related information, the micro site can greatly benefit both event participants and nonparticipants. The first feature of the micro site that we would like to introduce is the online reservation function. With an estimated 15,000 professionals present at this 3 day event, scheduling a meeting session with Acrosser Sales Team prior to your visit will ensure that you can maximize your time with us. Make a reservation now and visit Acrosser at Booth #1760 to guarantee a smooth business meeting at APTA EXPO 2014!
For those who cannot make it to Houston, we have displayed the products we will be demonstrating at APTA EXPO at the bottom of the micro site, making you an online APTA EXPO visitor instantly. Do not hesitate to leave a sales quote if you find a vehicle PC suitable for your vehicular solutions. To inspire potential customers to consider new business opportunities, Acrosser has also published two client success stories, related press announcements, and videos on the micro site. With so many features on this tiny micro site, Acrosser looks forward to fruitful discussions with customers, and wishes all professionals a wonderful APTA EXPO experience both online and offline.
Acrosser USA Inc.
Visit our APTA EXPO micro site!
Contact Us:


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This will speed up the checkout process, store your delivery address, track your orders and show your order history.
For customers who have an existing CleverPatch business account with terms, click below to link your email address to your existing account so we can invoice you. Alternatively, please call us on 1300 836 522 and we can link you over the phone.
NSW DoE Customers – CleverPatch™ is now an External Catalogue supplier on the DoE Online Catalogue! NSW DoE customers can now purchase from CleverPatch™ by entering the External Catalogue.
Have you seen our weekly special? Selected item for 50% off. Hurry ends Sunday.
Search terms: garden art, wall art
Did you know we collaborate with a number of Indigenous Artists to create resources and craft products? Click here to view our full range of Indigenous Designed products!


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Oct 01, 1991 | ISBN 9780679735946
Sep 29, 2010 | ISBN 9780307766281
The Smiles of Rome
The Peron Novel
In Motion
You Lost Me There
Fisherman's Blues
The White and the Gold
Concrete Reveries
"A significant new book…has awesome implications for the future of real-estate development, land-use planning, architecture and health…Tony Hiss illuminates the real nitty-gritty meaning of the dawning environmental era." — Boston Globe
Why do some places — the concourse of Grand Central Terminal or a small farm or even the corner of a skyscraper — affect us so mysteriously and yet so forcefully? What tiny changes in our everyday environments can radically alter the quality of our daily lives? The Experience of Place offers an innovative and delightfully readable proposal for new ways of planning, building, and managing our most immediate and overlooked surroundings.
"Tony Hiss…describes subtle but practical ways to improve mediocre places and transform even some unpleasant ones. Hiss's book itself is like a splendid place-experience: it draws one in, surprises and charms, and enhances the landscapes of the mind." — Jane Jacobs
"To read [The Experience of Place]…is to come away convinced not only that things can be put right, but that the job is well underway."
— Newsweek
21 Books You've Been Meaning to Read
Just for joining you'll get personalized recommendations on your dashboard daily and features only for members.
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Jihad and the Collapse of the Swedish Model
From the desk of Fjordman on Thu, 2007-04-19 18:27
I decided to write this essay following the riots in Malmö this weekend. Malmö is Sweden's third largest city and by far the worst city in Scandinavia when it comes to Muslim aggression. I read recently that an Arab girl interviewed in Malmö said that she liked it so much there, it felt almost like an Arab city. Native Swedes have been moving away from the city for years, turned into refugees in their own country by Jihad, not too different from the non-Muslims in some regions of the Philippines, southern Thailand or Kashmir in India, or for that matter Christian Serbs in Kosovo.
Sweden was presented during the Cold War as a middle way between capitalism and Communism. When this model of a society collapses – and it will collapse, under the combined forces of Islamic Jihad, the European Union, Multiculturalism and ideological overstretch – it is thus not just the Swedish state that will collapse but the symbol of Sweden, the showcase of an entire ideological world view. I wrote two years ago that if the trend isn't stopped, the Swedish nation will simply cease to exist in any meaningful way during the first half of this century. The country that gave us Bergman, ABBA and Volvo could become known as the Bosnia of northern Europe, and the "Swedish model" will be one of warning against ideological madness, not one of admiration. I still fear I was right in that assessment.
Jonathan Friedman, an American living outside Malmö, mentions that the so-called Integration Act of 1997 proclaimed that "Sweden is a Multicultural society." Notes to the Act also stated that "Since a large group of people have their origins in another country, the Swedish population lacks a common history. The relationship to Sweden and the support given to the fundamental values of society thus carry greater significance for integration than a common historical origin."
Native Swedes have thus been reduced to just another ethnic group in Sweden, with no more claim to the country than the Kurds or the Somalis who arrived there last Thursday. The political authorities of the country have erased their own people's history and culture.
Jens Orback, Minister for Democracy, Metropolitan Affairs, Integration and Gender Equality from the Social Democratic Party said during a debate in Swedish radio in 2004 that "We must be open and tolerant towards Islam and Muslims because when we become a minority, they will be so towards us."
This is a government that knows perfectly well that their people will become a minority in their own country, yet is doing nothing to stop this. On the contrary. Pierre Schori, Minister for immigration, during a parliamentary debate in 1997 said that: "Racism and xenophobia should be banned and chased [away]," and that one should not accept "excuses, such as that there were flaws in the immigration and refugee policies."
In other words: It should be viewed as a crime for the native population not to assist in wiping themselves out.
Orback's attitude is what follows once you declare that culture is irrelevant. Our culture, even though we try to forget it, is steeped in a Judeo-Christian morality based on the Golden Rule of reciprocity: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." (Luke 6:31)
Muslims, on the other hand, are steeped in an Islamic tradition based on Muslim supremacy. Muslims view lack of force as a sign of weakness, and they despise weakness, which is precisely why Adolf Hitler stated his admiration for Islam, and thought it would be a better match for Nazism than Christianity, with its childish notions of compassion.
A Swedish man was nearly killed for the crime of wearing clothes with his own national flag while Sweden was participating in the 2006 football World Cup. Some "Multicultural youths" found this to be an intolerable provocation, and the 24-year-old man was run down by a car in Malmö, where Muhammad is becoming the most common name for newborn boys.
Feriz and Pajtim, members of Gangsta Albanian Thug Unit in Malmö, explain how they mug people downtown. They target a lone victim. "We surround him and beat and kick him until he no longer fights back," Feriz said. "You are always many more people than your victims. Cowardly?" "I have heard that from many, but I disagree. The whole point is that they're not supposed to have a chance." They didn't express any sympathy for their victims. "If they get injured, they just have themselves to blame for being weak," said Pajtim and shrugged.
The wave of robberies the city of Malmö has witnessed is part of a "war against the Swedes." This is the explanation given by young robbers from immigrant background in interviews with Petra Åkesson. "When we are in the city and robbing we are waging a war, waging a war against the Swedes." This argument was repeated several times. "Power for me means that the Swedes shall look at me, lie down on the ground and kiss my feet." The boys explain, laughingly, that "there is a thrilling sensation in your body when you're robbing, you feel satisfied and happy, it feels as if you've succeeded, it simply feels good." "We rob every single day, as often as we want to, whenever we want to. The Swedes don't do anything, they just give us the stuff. They're so wimpy."
"Exit Folkhemssverige - En samhällsmodells sönderfall" (Exit the People's Home of Sweden - The Downfall of a Model of Society) is a book from 2005 about immigration and the Swedish welfare state model dubbed "the people's home," written by Jonathan Friedman, Ingrid Björkman, Jan Elfverson and Åke Wedin. According to them, the Swedish Multicultural elites see themselves first of all as citizens of the world. In order to emphasize and accentuate diversity, everything Swedish is deliberately disparaged. Opposition to this policy is considered a form of racism:
"The dominant ideology in Sweden, which has been made dominant by powerful methods of silencing and repression, is a totalitarian ideology, where the elites oppose the national aspect of the nation state. The problem is that the ethnic group that are described as Swedes implicitly are considered to be nationalists, and thereby are viewed as racists."
The authors fear that the handling of the immigration policies has seriously eroded democracy because the citizens lose their loyalty towards a state they no longer consider their own. "Instead of increasing the active participation of citizens, the government has placed clear restrictions on freedom of thought, freedom of speech and freedom of congregation."
Mona Sahlin has held various posts in Social Democratic cabinets, among others as Minister for Democracy, Integration and Gender Equality. Sahlin has said that many Swedes are envious of immigrants because they, unlike the Swedes, have a culture, a history, something which ties them together. Notice how Swedish authorities first formally state that Swedes don't have a history or a culture, and then proceed to lament the fact that Swedes don't have a history or a culture. A neat trick.
Sahlin has also stated that: "If two equally qualified persons apply for a job at a workplace with few immigrants, the one called Muhammad should get the job. […] It should be considered an asset to have an ethnic background different from the Swedish one." In 2004, she was quoted as saying that "A concerted effort that aims at educating Swedes that immigrants are a blessing to their country must be pursued," stressing that her compatriots must accept that the new society is Multicultural. "Like it or not, this is the new Sweden."
Mona Sahlin was elected leader of the Social Democratic Party, as thus a future contender for the post of Swedish Prime Minister, in 2007.
Why does the government dispense with the social contract and attack its own people like this? Well, for starters, because it can. Sweden is currently arguably the most politically repressive and totalitarian country in the Western world. It also has the highest tax rates. That could be a a coincidence, but I'm not sure that it is. The state has become so large and powerful that is has become an autonomous organism with a will of its own. The people are there to serve the state, not vice versa. And because state power penetrates every single corner of society, including the media, there are no places left to mount a defense if the state decides to attack you.
It has been said jokingly that while other countries are states with armies, Pakistan is an army with a state. Likewise, it could be argued that Sweden started out being a nation with a bureaucracy and ended up being a bureaucracy with a nation. In fact, the bureaucracy formally abolished the very nation it was supposed to serve. Its representatives are no longer leaders of a people, but caretakers preoccupied only with advancing their own careers through oiling and upholding, if possible expanding, the bureaucratic machinery.
Swedes pay the highest tax rates of any (supposedly) free nation, and for this they get flawed social security, non-existent physical security and a state apparatus dedicated to their destruction.
Anna Ekelund in the newspaper Aftonbladet writes that: "We are a people who allow ourselves to be insulted by the government on a daily basis. We are not expected to be capable of thinking for ourselves, of deciding what we will read, or managing our own money. […] Swedes are as co-dependent as an alcoholic's wife. Yet we do not hurry to the ballot box to remove the prevailing systems. Not because we don't want to but because too many of us have painted ourselves into their corners."
Moreover, Swedes are keenly aware of the fact that their country is viewed by many outsiders as a "model society." Sweden is a deeply ideological state dedicated to imposing a certain world view on its citizens, and because the state is ideological, dissenters are quite literally treated as enemies of the state.
In the book The New Totalitarians, the British historian Roland Huntford in the early 1970s pointed out that it was easier to establish the Fascist model of the corporate state in Sweden than in Mussolini's Italy for cultural reasons, since Sweden had a centralized bureaucracy whereas Italians are skeptical of state authority. Put simply: Swedes have tended to trust their bureaucrats, which no Italian in his right mind would ever do.
According to him, "The Swedes have a horror of controversy as something unpleasant, inefficient and vaguely immoral. They require for peace of mind, not confrontation, but consensus. Consensus guides everything: private conversation, intellectual life and the running of the State."
The then Minister of Education, Mr. Ingvar Carlsson, defined the purpose of schooling: "It is to produce a well adjusted, good member of society. It teaches people to respect the consensus, and not to sabotage it" He also on one occasion said that "School is the spearhead of Socialism." Mr. Carlsson was Swedish Prime Minister as late as 1996.
Mr. Carlsson's mentor in the Social Democratic Party and predecessor as Swedish Prime Minister (1969 to 1986), Mr. Olof Palme, openly flaunted his disregard, if not contempt for, Western civilization: "The Renaissance so-called? Western culture? What does it mean to us?" Under the watchful eye of the Labor movement, Swedish education has for decades mounted deliberate attacks on Western culture, making it look suspect.
According to Mr. Huntford, "When the Swedes change ideas, they do it to the full, leaving no room for criticism or reservation. The country lacks intellectual defences; anything new will conquer without resistance being offered." The consensus "assumes that technological advancement is the sole path to happiness, and the Gross National Product the only measure of national success. It also assumes that the good of the collective at all times must take precedence over the good of the individual. It prescribes that the fundamentals of Swedish society must never be questioned or discussed."
This is how Mrs Maj Bossom-Nordboe, then departmental chief of at the Directorate of Schools, expressed it: "It's useless to build up individuality, because unless people learned to adapt themselves to society, they would be unhappy. Liberty is not emphasized. Instead, we talk about the freedom to give up freedom. The accent is on the social function of children, and I will not deny that we emphasize the collective."
Roland Huntford ended his book with a warning that this system of soft-totalitarianism could be exported to other countries. He has been proven right since:
"The Swedes have demonstrated how present techniques can be applied in ideal conditions. Sweden is a control experiment on an isolated and sterilized subject. Pioneers in the new totalitarianism, the Swedes are a warning of what probably lies in store for the rest of us, unless we take care to resist control and centralization, and unless we remember that politics are not to be delegated, but are the concern of the individual. The new totalitarians, dealing in persuasion and manipulation, must be more efficient than the old, who depended upon force."
Following the September 2006 elections, Fredrik Reinfeldt became Prime Minister of Sweden, presiding over a center-right coalition government. This is, in my view, positive. Sweden has been described by some as a "one-party state," since the Social Democrats have been in power for 65 of the last 74 years. However, the differences between the left-wing and the right-wing in Sweden are not always that big.
The last time these parties were in power, under the leadership of PM Carl Bildt from 1991 to 94, they presided over massive immigration, and have not been vocal in their opposition to the Multicultural policies since. The new Foreign Minister Bildt as a UN Commissioner to the Balkans called for recognizing Islam as a part of European culture.
PM Reinfeldt has stated that the original Swedish culture was merely barbarism: "It can sometimes be good to humbly remind of the fact that a great deal of what constitutes Sweden has been created in [a process of] evolution, exactly because we have been open to accept other people and experiences."
Reinfeldt said this following a visit to an area called Ronna in Södertälje, near Stockholm. One year earlier a police station in Södertälje was hit by shots from an automatic weapon following a major confrontation between immigrant youths and police. The trouble in Ronna started after a Swedish girl had been called a "whore" and reacted to this. Ethnologist Maria Bäckman, in her study "Whiteness and gender," has followed a group of Swedish girls in the immigrant suburb of Rinkeby outside Stockholm. Bäckman relates that several of the blond Swedish girls stated that they had dyed their hair to avoid sexual harassment.
I have called Sweden a soft-totalitarian country, but I am sometimes not so sure about the "soft" part. Opinion polls have revealed that two out of three Swedes doubt whether Islam can be combined with Swedish society, and a very significant proportion of the population have for years wanted more limitations on immigration. Yet not one party represented in Parliament is genuinely critical of the Multicultural society.
Is it just a coincidence that the one country on the European continent that has avoided war for the longest period of time, Sweden, is also arguably the one Western nation where Political Correctness has reached the worst heights? Maybe the prolonged period of peace has created an environment where layers of ideological nonsense have been allowed to pile up for generations without stop. I don't know what Sweden will look like a generation from now, but I'm pretty sure it won't be viewed as a model society. And if the absence of war is one of the causes of its current weakness, I fear that is a problem that will soon be cured.


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I am a web designer & developer living in Scarborough, North Yorkshire. I began making websites over 10 years ago, and I have the awesome privilege of truly enjoying the work I do. I moved to Scarborough in 2009 to study BSc Web Design & Development, and I graduated in 2012 with a 2:1.
I love Yorkshire Gold tea nearly as much as I love my wife (don't tell her I said that). When I'm not working, I'm probably either playing with a new creative project, enjoying board games with friends or doing something at my church, Kingdom Faith Yorkshire. My faith is important to me, and I love to hear different people's points of view on life.
I am fluent in PHP5, HTML5, CSS3, Javascript (and jQuery), and SQL. Making websites is my passion - the bigger the better, but no project is too small! Why not start your project by emailing me?
Jon's just one of those guys. When I first met Jon I wasn't sure where his strengths lay, but he has a knack of being able to go above and beyond expectations. I expect this relationship to last for many years to come.
Jon has charisma, intelligence, and most importantly, a strong sense of programming aesthetic. I would work with him again on another project in a heartbeat.
We found his willingness to listen to our desires, his ability to communicate the options and his speedy and efficient approach to the task outstanding. Further, when we have needed to contact him regarding problems or advice he has been accessible and helpful. It's a pleasure to recommend his work.
Jon is an excellent collaborator. I greatly enjoy working with him, as he tends to bring more than you expect - he always surprises me with the speed and particularity of his work. I hope to work with him on many future projects!
Mackrell International is a global law firm network, allowing its member firms' clients access to seamless international representation.
One of the network's chief goals is to host events for member firms to attend. I built a robust event management system from the ground up, bespoke to Mackrell International's needs. The system allows for events to be created, registrations and hotel bookings to be made, payments processed and much more.
6Connex provide virtual spaces for special events, information centres and conferences. Their technology is used around the world to connect people and organise information.
Mark Oliver designed the visuals for this website, and I implemented that design, producing many key animations and creating a content management system for the website's future use.
Greater Life is a church in Staines, UK. Their vision is to be an inspiring, life-changing force for good in their locality.
I was contacted by Greater Life Church to totally reinvent their website in a very limited time frame — only 3 weeks! The end result is a slick, easy to read website with a powerful custom-built content management system that allows them to edit every page, post new events, upload podcasts and more.
If you want to work with me, or have any questions, don't hestitate to get in touch. Email me at email@example.com.


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If you sell services to your customers, you'll need to understand how to use QuickBooks' time-tracking features.
Small businesses that sell products have to do a constant balancing act. Keep too much inventory on hand, and you're sitting on potential profits. If you don't order enough and you run out, your customers may go to a competitor. QuickBooks provides tools and reports that can help you manage this ongoing challenge.
Selling time and services is a different story. There's no real inventory tracking involved — except in terms of knowing how much manpower you have available at any given time. But just like you wouldn't want customers to walk off with merchandise they haven't bought, you don't want any billable minutes or hours to be ignored. Both scenarios eat into your profits.
Gone are the days when you had to count on employees to fill out detailed timecards and hope that they remembered to document everything. QuickBooks can help ensure that you're getting paid for all time and services rendered.
Building Your Records
Before you can ask employees to start tracking the hours they put in, you need to create a record for every time-based activity so that QuickBooks knows how much to charge when billable time is entered. The software creates and stores these in the same way it builds records for physical inventory items.
Start by clicking on the Items & Services icon on the home page (or go to Lists | Item List). Click the down arrow next to Item in the lower left of the screen that appears, and then select New from the menu (or right-click in the main part of the screen and select New).
Figure 1: Once you've created a record for a service item, you can use it throughout QuickBooks.
A list of options will drop down under TYPE. Select Service. Type in the Item Name/Number and click in the box to the left of Subitem of if the time item should be grouped under another. In this example, the relationship is Labor/Removal (labor). U/M Set is not an option in your version of QuickBooks.
Note: If you will be working with subcontractors, let us help you set up these services. It's a little more complicated.
Enter a description for your service and a rate, then click on the drop-down arrow and select a tax rate if appropriate (click on <Add New> to create one on the fly). Select an Account from the list. It should be some kind of income; in this case, it's Construction Income. Ask us if you have any doubts here. Click OK when you're done. Now this service will appear in your Item List.
Tracking Time
When you want to create a record for a work session, click the arrow to the right of Enter Time on the home page and select Time | Enter Single Activity (or open the Customers menu and select the same). Make sure the date for the activity is correct; you can click on the calendar and select if it's not. Click on the arrow in the field below to select the correct employee.
Figure 2: You can either start the timer to record an activity's duration or simply enter it in the box.
Click the arrows next to the CUSTOMER:JOB and SERVICE ITEM fields to open those drop-down menus and select the desired options. If you want to time the activity, use the Start, Stop, and Pause buttons below the duration box, or simply enter the amount of time it took. The CLASS and NOTES fields are optional.
If the time spent is billable, be sure that there's a check in the box next to Billable in the upper right corner. If it's not, click on the box.
Data you enter here will automatically appear on timesheets. You can enter time directly on timesheets by clicking Enter Time | Use Weekly Timesheet.
When you start an invoice for a customer who has accumulated billable time, you'll see this message:
Figure 3: If you've entered billable time for a customer, this message will appear the next time you create an invoice for him or her.
Make sure that your employees understand the importance of documenting every billable minute. Lost time can eat into profits, and that has an impact on everyone in the company.


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Keys, watches, occasionally a wallet, small nails and screws when we are building something. And once, for me, my passport. Those who understand the Fey world often say, "The fairies took it."
I'm writing today to let you know that it isn't always the fairies. These things go away on their own. Continue reading and add your comment


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New report by research and consulting firm PAC evaluates the expertise of management and technology consultancy BearingPoint as a leading provider of consulting and system integration services to the automotive industry
Frankfurt, June 5, 2015 – Management and technology consultancy BearingPoint has been rated as 'Excellent' in a current vendor evaluation by PAC (Pierre Audoin Consultants) of the leading providers of consulting and system integration services in the automotive industry in Germany.
According to the report, BearingPoint is above average of their peer groups in:
Alongside sound IT expertise, BearingPoint has comprehensive sector-specific expertise about business processes in the automotive industry. The management and technology consultancy especially stands out in the criteria client satisfaction and reference customer assessment.
Klaus Holzhauser and Stefanie Naujoks, the authors of the report
We are proud to be rated as 'excellent' in consulting and system integration services to the automotive industry. This is also a recognition of our strong capabilities in the field of connected cars and in the management of the digital ecosystem.
Matthias Loebich, Firm-wide leader for the Automotive segment at BearingPoint
Read other industry analyst reports on BearingPoint: http://bit.ly/BearingPointAR
BearingPoint consultants understand that the world of business changes constantly and that the resulting complexities demand intelligent and adaptive solutions. Our clients, whether in commercial or financial industries or in government, experience real results when they work with us. We combine industry, operational and technology skills with relevant proprietary and other assets in order to tailor solutions for each client's individual challenges. This adaptive approach is at the heart of our culture and has led to long-standing relationships with many of the world's leading companies and organizations. Our global consulting network of 9,700 people serves clients in more than 70 countries and engages with them for measurable results and long-lasting success.
For more information, please visit: www.bearingpoint.com
Alexander Bock
Global Senior Manager Communications
Telephone: +49 89 540338029


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My startup history goes back a few years.
In 5th grade I sold comic books to my classmates at a 30-40% markup. I was a voracious marketer; I handed out homemade flyers, created checklists so customers could see "at-a-glance" which issues they needed, and even started a subscription service. Whenever kids in my school had extra money the first thing they thought of was buying comics.
In 8th grade I sold candy at a 500-800% markup because kids couldn't buy it within walking distance of school. I made money hand over fist, and quickly learned that you should re-invest your profits instead of purchasing DJ equipment that you think will make you cool, but will actually collect dust in the back room of your house because you never spend the time to perfect your cross-fade.
In high school I wrote a booklet about comic collecting and sold it through classified ads. Technically I broke even, but realistically I lost money on the 50+ unpaid hours I spent researching and writing. This was the first business I launched "in the wild," and I learned a lot about what it takes to market a product in the real world (i.e., to someone other than my classmates).
During college I sold $5,000 worth of comic books on newsgroups and eBay (this was circa 1997, when eBay was still black and white and so slow you had to snipe 40 seconds before the auction ended or your bid wouldn't hit the servers in time). This business funded my entertainment expenses for two years. I had many Silver Age books that were some of the few copies for sale on the internet at the time.
Fresh out of college I started an ISP with my best friend. We closed down after a few months, but the technical experience we gained resulted in lucrative web development jobs for both of us.
Lessons learned so far? Be the sole source, market like hell, go for big markup, and learn something from your business.
These are basic business principles, but I learned them from hard-knox experience by the time I was 22.
Several years later I started my consulting firm, The Numa Group, which has been going strong in one form or another for five years.
In the past two years I've found time to build and launch FeedShot, Flogz (now defunct), and buy and sell an ASP.NET discussion forum package called ChitChat.NET (now owned by Moon River Software).
But the next entry in this saga, an ASP.NET billing software package, is quite a story. So let me start from the beginning.
Two Types of Leverage
There are two types of leverage: people and products1.
A consulting firm leverages people. The employees work for a lower rate than the company bills, and the owners keep the difference.
Leveraging people is lucrative if you can hire good people and keep them busy. There is little up-front risk as the company is (theoretically) paid by the client for most hours an employee works. The downside is that resource loading is difficult and you often wind up with people who are too busy, or not busy enough. Consulting firms are also notoriously hard to sell.
I was talking about leverage with Joel Spolsky at one of his recent appearances on the FogBugz World Tour (yes, that was a conspicuous name drop), and he nailed it: "The problem with consulting is that you can't find people who are as good as you." You may find a few, but the better they are, the more likely they are to go off on their own. So your growth, and thus your leverage, is limited by personnel (one of those human sides of software people keep talking about).
Now to product leverage: Microsoft, Oracle, and PeopleSoft are examples of companies that leverage products. They invest in building a product once, and then sell it to many customers.
Leveraging products is extremely lucrative if you can sell enough copies to make back your initial investment, knows as "sunk costs." Knowing how to market software, which I'm convinced is some kind of freaky black art, is crucial to generating enough sales.
One of the benefits of a product company is that it can be sold more easily than a consulting firm.
The downside is that the investment to bring a product to market can be sizable, and typically requires outside funding (or, for a smaller product, a lot of evenings and weekends), and that freaky black art of software marketing is harder than you think.
What's Next?
I come from the consulting world; I worked for small consulting firms on and off for five years. Climbing the ranks in consulting is obvious if you work for a large firm, but there's not much room to advance in a six person company. Seeking to learn more about the business side of things and to take the next step in my career, I started The Numa Group in 2002 and we are now a thriving three-person .NET development shop.
And in the midst of all this I've been looking for new skills to augment my consulting background; something new to keep the fire burning as brightly as in the early years of my career.
The Product
Earlier this year I was scanning through a forum and came across a developer who was looking for marketing help. He and a partner had written an ASP.NET invoicing package that was selling reasonably well, but they knew someone with more marketing experience could have a serious impact on sales. I looked at the online demo and I was blown away. The UI was simple, clean, filled with AJAX, and the product was easy to use.
The first thought that ran through my head? Buy it. An ASP.NET invoicing package was one of the ideas in my product idea notebook, and buying the application would eliminate one of the major drawbacks to leveraging a product: the initial investment to bring it to market.
So I emailed the developer to see if he'd be interested in selling.
1. A third type of leverage isn't really leverage. Some people say you can leverage fame or popularity. Someone who writes books and articles can become a household names in a software community and command a high hourly rate for their consulting services. While it's true they can make substantially more money than their colleagues there is a limit to their earning potential, and that's why it's not truly leverage. Leverage scales. You can hire 10 or 1,000 consultants, or sell 10,000 or 100,000 copies of your software and earn egregious amounts of money without substantially more work. But no matter how much popularity someone achieves, their hourly rate will hit a cap, and they will still work 1 hour for x dollars. This is not a bad thing, mind you, it's just that it doesn't fit my definition of leverage.
[tags]startup, software startup, asp.net, dotnetinvoice[/tags]


text:
Following up the 2009's forgettable "G.I. Joe: The Rise of the Cobra" isn't exactly a difficult task -- but this weekend's sequel definitely delivers the goods.
"G.I. Joe: Retaliation" features boys and their lethal toys, The Rock being a badass, some pleasing eye candy and the kid from "Jurassic Park" ... all grown up. What's not to like?
The new movie is a quasi-sequel to the 2009 film, with only Channing Tatum, Ray Park, Lee Byung-hun and Jonathan Pryce returning for another go-around.
Joining the Joes this time are Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as Roadblock, Adrianne Palicki as Lady Jaye and D.J. Cotrona as Flint, who try to clear their names after being framed by one of the Cobra Commander's henchmen (who is impersonating the President).
While the newcomers are serviceable additions to the cast and Bruce Willis shows up in a minor role, it's Johnson who really shines.
The charismatic and unbelievably likable wrestler-turned-actor more than carries the film, which should solidify his place as a bankable movie star.
But, like most blockbusters, the movie isn't perfect.
"Retaliation" feels a bit disjointed at the beginning, with scenes jumping around the world at warp speed for the first half of its two-hour running time.
A secondary storyline between Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow is mostly unnecessary as well ... but eventually pays off in a big way.
About an hour into the movie, there's a sky-high, zip-line sequence that the rest of the movie never comes close to topping. It's a really impressive set piece that's exhilarating to watch, packed with some killer fight choreography and special effects.
If the rest of the flick had the same level of flair, this would be a glowing review ... instead of just a generally favorable one.
All that being said, "Retaliation" is the best movie based off a Hasbro property yet.
It's far superior to "Rise of the Cobra" and "Battleship," isn't anywhere near as annoying as the "Transformers" franchise and is a fun ride. Just don't expect "Saving Private Ryan" ... it's still based on a line of toys.
The ending leaves room for another sequel, so if this does well (and it likely will) you can probably expect #3 Summer 2015.
"G.I. Joe: Retaliation" opens today.


text:
So we went. And I got naked. And when I stepped on the scale it said this:
26.6!?! |
Scales = bad news!
There is some maybe-good though. I kinda hurt my foot jumping out of the car and am a little gimpy now. Am thinking maybe if I act extrasuperpathetic, my human might give me SOMETHING with a little bacon on it to make me feel better. Maybe not a Baconator. Maybe not even a Son of Baconator. But some sort of bacon. Because I'm pretty sure bacon makes anything better. Even a gimpy foot.
(this is where you all say riiiiiiiight)


text:
The Divine Pymander: The Tenth Book, the Mind to Hermes
FORBEAR thy Speech, O Hermes Trismegistus, and call to mind to those things that are said; but I will not delay to speak what comes into my mind, sithence many men have spoken many things, and those very different, concerning the Universe, and Good; but I have not learned the Truth.
2. Therefore, the Lord make it plain to me in this point; for I will believe thee only, for the manifestation of these things.
3. Then said the Mind how the case stands.
4. God and All.
5. God, Eternity, the World, Time, Generation.
6. God made Eternity, Eternity the World, the world Time, and Time Generation.
7. Of God, as it were, the Substance, is the Good, the Fair, Blessedness, Wisdom.
8. Of Eternity, Identity, or Selfness.
9. Of the World, Order.
10. Of Time, Change.
11. Of Generation, Life and Death.
12. But the Operation of God, is Mind and Soul.
13. Of Eternity, Permanence, or Long-lasting, and Immortality.
14. Of the World, Restitution, and Decay, or Destruction.
15. Of Time, Augmentation and Diminution.
16. And of Generation qualities.
17. Therefore, Eternity is in God.
18. The World in Eternity.
19. Time in the World.
20. And Generation in Time.
21. And Eternity standeth about God.
22. The World is moved in Eternity.
23. Time is determined in the World.
24. Generation is done in Time.
25. Therefore, the Spring and Fountain of all things is God.
26. The Substance Eternity.
27. The Matter is the World.
28. The Power of God is Eternity.
29. And the Work of Eternity, is the World not yet made, and yet ever made by Eternity.
30. Therefore, shall nothing be at any time destroyed, for Eternity is incorruptible.
31. Neither can anything perish, or be destroyed in the World, the World being contained and embraced by Eternity.
32. But what is the Wisdom of God? Even the Good and the Fair, and Blessedness, and every Virtue, and Eternity.
33. Eternity, therefore, put into the Matter Immortality and Everlastingness; for the Generation of that depends upon Eternity, even as Eternity doth of God.
34. For Generation and Time, in Heaven and in Earth, are of a double Nature; in Heaven they are unchangeable and incorruptible; but on Earth they are changeable and corruptible.
35. And the Soul of Eternity is God; and the Soul of the World, Eternity; and of the Earth, Heaven.
36. God is in the Mind, the Mind in the Soul, the Soul in the Matter, all things by Eternity.
37. All this Universal Body, in which are all Bodies, is full of Soul, the Soul full of Mind, the Mind full of God.
38. For within he fills them, and without he contains them, quickening the Universe.
39. Without, he quickens this perfect living thing the World, and within all living Creatures.
40. And above in Heaven he abides in Identity or Selfness, but below upon Earth he changeth Generation.
41. Eternity comprehendeth the World either by necessity, or Providence, or Nature.
42. And if any man shall think any other thing, it is God that actuateth, or operateth this All.
43. But the operation or Act of God, is Power insuperable, to which none may compare anything, either Humane or Divine.
44. Therefore, O Hermes, think none of these things below, or the things above, in anywise like unto God; for if thou dost, thou errest from the Truth.
45. For nothing can be like the unlike, and only, and One; nor mayest thou think that he hath given of his Power to any other thing.
46. For who after him can make anything, either of Life or Immortality: of Change or of Quality? and himself, what other things should he make?
47. For God is not idle, for then all things would be idle; for all things are full of God.
48. But there is not anywhere in the World, such a thing as Idleness; for Idleness is a name that implieth a thing void or empty, both of a Doer, and a thing done.
49. But all things must necessarily be made or done both always, and according to the nature of every place.
50. For he that maketh or doth, is in all things, yet not fastened or comprehended in anything; nor making or doing one thing, but all things.
51. For being an active or operating Power, and sufficient of himself for the things that are made, and the things that are made are under him.
52. Look upon, through me, the World is subject to thy sight, and understand exactly the Beauty thereof.
53. A Body perpetual, than the which there is nothing more ancient, yet always vigorous and young.
54. See also the Seven Worlds set over us, adorned with an everlasting order, and filling Eternity with a different course.
55. For all things are full of Light, but the Fire is nowhere.
56. For the friendship and commixture of contraries and unlike, become Light shining from the Act or Operation of God, the Father of all Good, the Prince of all Order, and the Ruler of the Seven Worlds.
57. Look also upon the Moon, the forerunner of them all, the Instrument of Nature, and which changeth the matter here below.
58. Behold the Earth the middle of the Whole, the firm and stable Foundation of the Fair World, the Feeder and Nurse of Earthly things.
59. Consider, moreover, how great the multitude is of immortal living things, and of mortal ones also; and see the Moon going about in the midst of both, to wit, of things immortal and mortal.
60. But all things are full of Soul, and all things are properly moved by it; some things about the Heaven, and some things about the Earth; and neither of those on the right hand to the left; nor those on the left hand to the right; nor those things that are above, downward; nor those things that are below, upwards.
61. And that all these things are made, O beloved Hermes, thou needst not learn of me.
62. For they are Bodies, and have a Soul, and are moved.
63. And that all these should come together into one, it is impossible without something to gather them together.
64. Therefore, there must be some such ones, and he altogether One.
65. For seeing that the motions are divers, and many, and the Bodies not alike, and yet one ordered swiftness among them all; It is impossible there should be two or more Makers.
66. For one order is not kept by many.
67. But in the weaker there would be jealousy of the stronger, and thence also contentions.
68. And if there were one Maker, of mutable mortal living Wights, he would desire also to make immortal ones, as he that were the Maker of immortal ones, would do to make mortal.
69. Moreover, also, if there were two, the Matter of being one, who should be chief, or have the disposing of the future?
70. Or if both of them, which of them the greater part?
71. But thinks thus that every living Body hath its consistence of Matter and soul; and of that which is immortal, and that which is mortal and unreasonable.
72. For all living Bodies have a Soul; and those things that are not living, are only matter by itself.
73. And the Soul likewise of itself drawing near her Maker, is the cause of Life and Being, and Being the cause of Life is, after a manner, the cause of immortal things.
74. How then are mortal Wights other from immortal?
75. Or how cannot he make living Wights, that causeth immortal things and immortality?
76. That there is some Body that doth these things it is apparent, and that he is also one, it is most manifest.
77. For there is one Soul, one Life, and one matter.
78. Who is this? who can it be, other than the One God?
79. For whom else can it benefit to make living things, save only God alone?
80. There is therefore One God.
81. For it is a ridiculous thing to confess the World to be one, one Sun, one Moon, one Divinity, and yet to have, I know not how many gods.
82. He therefore being One, doth all things in many things.
83. And what great thing is it for God, to make Life, and Soul, and Immortality, and Change, when thyself dost so many things?
84. For thou both seest, speaketh, and hearest, smellest, tastest, and touchest, walkest, understandest, and breathest.
85. And it is not one that sees, and another that heareth, and another that speaketh, and another that toucheth, and another that smelleth, and another that walketh, and another that understandeth, and another that breatheth; but one that doth all these things.
86. Yet neither can these things possibly be without God.
87. For as thou, if thou shouldest cease from doing these things, were not a living wight, so if God should cease from those, he were not (which is not lawful to say) any longer God.
88. For if it be already demonstrated that nothing can be idle or empty, how much more may be affirmed of God?
89. For if there be anything which he doth not do, then is he (if it were lawful to say so) imperfect.
90. Whereas, seeing he is not idle, but perfect, certainly he doth all things.
91. Now give thyself unto me, O Hermes, for a little while, thou shalt the more easily understand, that it is the necessary work of God, that all things should be made or done that are done, or were once done, or shall be done.
92. And this, O best beloved, is Life.
93. And this is the Fair.
94. And this is the Good.
95. And this is God.
96. And if thou will understand this by work also, mark what happens to thyself when thou will generate.
97. And yet this is not like unto him, for he is not sensible of pleasure, for neither hath he any other Fellow Workman.
98. But being himself the only Workman, he is always in the work, himself being that which he doth or maketh.
99. For all things, if they were separate from him, must needs fall and die, as there being no life in them.
100. And again, if all things be living wights, both which are in heaven, and upon earth, and that there be one Life in all things which are made by God, and that is God, then certainly all things are made or done by God.
101. Life is the union of the Mind and the Soul.
102. But death is not the destruction of those things that were gathered together, but a dissolving of the Union.
103. The Image therefore of God, is Eternity; of Eternity, the World; of the World, the Sun: of the Sun, Man.
104. But the people say, That changing is Death, because the body is dissolved, and the Life goeth into that which appeareth not.
105. By this discourse, my dearest Hermes, I affirm as thou hearest. That the World is changed, because every day part thereof becomes invisible, but that it is never dissolved.
106. And these are the Passions of the World, Revolutions and Occultations, and Revolution is a turning, but Occultation is Renovation.
107. And the World being all formed, hath not the forms lying without it, but itself changeth in itself.
108. Seeing then the World is all formed, what must he be that made it! for without form, he cannot be.
109. And if he be all formed, he will be kept like the World, but if he have but one form, he shall be in this regardless of the world.
110. What do we then say that he is? We will not raise any doubts by our speech, for nothing that is doubtful concerning God is yet known.
111. He hath therefore one Idea, which is proper to him, which, because it is unbodily, is not subject to the sight, and yet shows all forms by the Bodies.
112. And do not wonder if there be an incorruptible Idea.
113. For they are like the Margents of the Speech, which is in writing; for they seem to be high and swelling, but they are by nature smooth and even.
114. But understand well this that I say, more boldly, for it is more true: As man cannot live without life, so neither can God live not doing good.
115. For this is, as it were, the Life and Motion of God, to Move all things, and Quicken them.
116. But some of the things I have said, must have a particular explanation; Understand then what I say.
117. All things are in God, not as lying in a place, for Place is both a body and immoveable, and those things that are placed, have no motion.
118. For they lie otherwise in that which is unbodily, than in the fantasie, or to appearance.
119. Consider him that contains all things, and understand that nothing is more capacious, than that which is incorporeal, nothing more swift, nothing more powerful, but it is most capacious, most swift, and most strong.
120. And judge of this by thyself, command thy Soul to go into India, and sooner than thou canst bid it, it will be there.
121. Bid it likewise pass over the Ocean, and suddenly it will be there; not as passing from place to place, but suddenly it will be there.
122. Command it to fly into Heaven, and it will not need no wings, neither shall anything hinder it, not the fire of the Sun, not the Aether, not the turning of the Spheres, not the bodies of any other Stars, but cutting through all, it will fly up to the last and furthest body.
123. And if thou wilt even break the whole, and see those things that are without the world (if there be anything without), thou mayest.
124. Behold, how great power, how great swiftness thou hast! Canst thou do all thee things, and cannot God?
125. After this manner, therefore, contemplate God to have all the whole world to himself, as it were, all thoughts, or intellections.
126. If therefore thou wilt not equal thyself to God, thou canst not understand God.
127. For the like is intelligible by the like.
128. Increase thyself unto an immeasureable greatness, leaping beyond every Body, and transcending all Time, become Eternity, and thou shalt understand God: If thou believe in thyself, that nothing is impossible, but accountest thyself immortal, and that thou canst understand all things, every Art, every Science, and the manner and custom of every living thing.
129. Become higher than all height, lower than all depths, comprehend in thyself the qualitites of all the Creatures, of the Fire, the Water, the Dry, and Moist, and conceive likewise, that thou canst at once be everywhere, in the Sea, in the Earth.
130. Thou shalt at once understand thyself, not yet begotten in the Womb, young, old, to be dead, the things after death, and all these together, as also times, places, deeds, qualities, quantities, or else thou canst not yet understand God.
131. But if thou shut up thy Soul in the Body, and abuse it, and say, I understand nothing, I can do nothing, I am afraid of the Sea, I cannot climb up to Heaven, I know not who I am, I cannot tell what I shall be: What hast thou to do with god? for thou canst understand none of those Fair and Good things, and be a lover of the body and Evil.
132. For it is the greatest Evil, not to know God.
133. But to be able to know, and to will, and to hope, is the straight way, and Divine way, proper to the Good, and it will everywhere meet thee, and everywhere be seen of thee, plain and easy, when thou dost not expect or look for it; it will meet thee waking, sleeping, sailing, travelling, by night, by day, when thou speakest, and when thou keepest silence.
134. For there is nothing which is not the Image of God.
135. And yet thou sayest, God is invisible; but be advised, for who is more manifest than He?
136. For therefore hath he made all things, that thou by all things mayest see Him.
137. This is the Good of God, this is the Virtue, to appear, and to be seen in all things.
138. There is nothing invisible, no, not of those things that are incorporeal.
139. The Mind is seen in understanding, and God is seen in doing or making.
140. Let these things thus far forth, be made manifest unto thee, O Trismegistus.
141. Understand in like manner, all other things by thyself, and thou shalt not be deceived.
The End of the Tenth Book,
Next: The Eleventh Book of the Common Mind, to Tat


text:
In particular, she describes a patient who lost her insurance and paid $900 out-of-pocket for treatment to save her eyesight. She didn't have $900 immediately, but was able to work out a time payment plan with the treating physician.
In contrast, she describes what would have happened if the patient had "coverage" from the government:
...Now, what would have happened if the Medicaid program hadn't cut her off -- because she earns $100/month too much? In that case, she wouldn't have had to worry about the bill.(Read the full text of "Is it Always Better to Have Health Insurance?"; link via JG.)
But -- the receptionist would have had to say: "You'll need to fax over a referral."
A Medicaid patient can't be billed, except for a nominal copayment. Without a referral, Medicaid can''t be billed. So if the specialist, or in this case subspecialist, sees the patient, he cannot be paid. Moreover, he is probably violating a rule and conceivably might be prosecuted for soliciting business (that's called "fraud"). Discounts and freebies are marketing strategies, after all, and the poor and vulnerable have to be protected.
Not just any doctor can give the patient a referral. This doctor couldn't. It has to be the patient's primary care provider, who is contracted with the patient's plan. And the specialist has to be in the plan too.
Say that a seizure patient needs to see a neurologist promptly to have his medications adjusted. Sorry, the emergency room doctor can't write the referral. Neither can the hospitalist who is discharging the patient from the hospital. It has to be the "primary." If the primary happens to know the patient, he might just send the referral. But most of the time, the patient will have to come in. The primary won't want to risk getting an unnecessary referral or an incident of "inadequate documentation" on his report card.
For a retinal problem, there are probably three hurdles: the primary gatekeeper (who might not even think of the diagnosis), then the general ophthalmologist (who will make the diagnosis but can't treat it), and finally the subspecialist. All probably have waiting times for appointments, especially for Medicaid patients. Most doctors can't afford to see very many of those.
Not just Medicaid, but all managed-care plans have a structure like that. It's part of the cost-containment strategy. I know of three insured patients who had retinal detachments. They all had premonitory symptoms, and they all -- eventually -- had elaborate and costly operations, as many as six procedures. They were "covered," and they didn't get a bill for $900, but they had a poor visual outcome that might have been prevented by prompt treatment.
Dr. Orient's analysis vividly illustrates the point that "coverage" does not equal care.
Furthermore, government policies that attempt to guarantee "coverage" will create bureaucratic regulations and cost-control guidelines that will restrict the ability of physicians to offer actual care to their patients.
Or as Dr. Orient puts it:
Insurance is supposed to help you pay bills in the rare event of a catastrophe. If it morphs into a scheme for emptying your wallet in advance, and then prevents bills by preventing treatment, we just might be better off without it.


text:
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text:
- There is no spark when lighting the gas hob
- Hob blows / trips fuse
Applies to
- integrated gas hob
- freestanding cooker with gas hob
In the case of a new installation, the above-mentioned problems usually indicate that the appliance was incorrectly installed.
Note: A new installation means one of the following:
- A brand new appliance is connected to an electrical supply for the first time.
- The appliance is connected to a different socket.
1. Check if there is power coming from the socket.
Check whether there is power at the socket by plugging in another appliance and seeing whether that works as it should.
If the socket does not work, contact a qualified electrician to help resolve the problem.
2. Check the fuse for any possible faults.
Make sure that the fuse is the cause of the malfunction.
If the fuse releases again and again, contact a qualified electrician.
3. Contact the qualified electrician who installed the appliance.
4. Contact an Authorized Service Center.
If the above advices do not resolve the problem, we recommend requesting a visit by a service engineer.


text:
2012-05-18: Déjà-vu …
" In the early hours of the morning of Saturday, 14th February 1981, a disastrous fire swept through a building called the Stardust in the North Dublin suburb of Artane during the course of a St. Valentine's Night 'disco' dance. Forty eight people were killed and one hundred and twenty eight seriously injured. The overwhelming majority of the victims were young people. "
'Introduction', Report of the Tribunal of Inquiry on the Fire at the Stardust, Artane, Dublin, on the 14th February 1981. Report dated 30 June 1982.
As a young architect in private practice … I witnessed, at first hand, the Dublin Fire 'Establishment' disappear from public view, without trace, after the Stardust Fire Tragedy. It was almost impossible, for at least a year afterwards, to have a meeting with any Fire Prevention Officer in the Dublin Fire Authority. This was a very valuable lesson.
Later, following the publication of the Stardust Tribunal Report … were its Recommendations implemented … with urgency … and conscientiously ? No way. For example, it was more than ten years after the Stardust Fire before an inadequate system of legal National Building Regulations was introduced in Ireland. And to this day, the system of AHJ monitoring of construction quality, throughout the country, is weak and ineffective … lacking both competent personnel and resources !
The proof of the pudding is in the eating … and one of the results, also in Dublin, has been last year's debacle at the Priory Hall Apartment Complex … where all of the residents had to leave their expensive apartments for fire safety (and many other) reasons. The tip of a very large iceberg. See my post, dated 18 October 2011 .
And this is where the problems usually begin …
" There has been a tendency among students of architecture and engineering to regard fire safety as simply a question of knowing what is required in terms of compliance with the regulations. The recommendation of the Tribunal of Enquiry into the Summerland Disaster that those responsible for the design of buildings should treat fire safety as an integral part of the design concept itself, has not yet been reflected in the approach to the subject at university level. There is still clearly a need for a new approach to the structuring of such courses which will in time bring to an end the attitude of mind, too prevalent at the moment, that compliance with fire safety requirements is something that can be dealt with outside the context of the overall design of the building. "
'Chapter 9 – Conclusions & Recommendations', Report of the Tribunal of Inquiry on the Fire at the Stardust, Artane, Dublin, on the 14th February 1981. Report dated 30 June 1982.
This Recommendation has still not been implemented … and note the reference to the earlier fire at the Summerland Leisure Centre in 1973, on the Isle of Man, when 50 people were killed and 80 seriously injured.
Today … the same attitude of mind, described so well above, stubbornly persists in all sectors, and in all disciplines, of the International Construction Industry … even within ISO Technical Committee 92: 'Fire Safety' !
Which brings me, neatly, to the recent question posed by Mr. Glenn Horton on the Society of Fire Protection Engineers (SFPE-USA) Page of LinkedIn ( http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=96627 ). As usual, the shortest questions can prove to be the most difficult to answer …
" Can you expand on, or point to where anyone has discussed, the 'very flawed design approach' please ? "
1. Foundation Documents
I am assuming that 'people-who-need-to know', at international level, are familiar with the Recommendations contained in these 2 Reports …
- NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology). September 2005. Federal Building and Fire Safety Investigation of the World Trade Center Disaster: Final Report on the Collapse of the World Trade Center Towers. NIST NCSTAR 1 Gaithersburg, MD, USA ;
- NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology). August 2008. Federal Building and Fire Safety Investigation of the World Trade Center Disaster: Final Report on the Collapse of World Trade Center Building 7. NIST NCSTAR 1A Gaithersburg, MD, USA ;
… and the contents of the CIB W14 Research WG IV Reflection Document … which, together with its 2 Appendices, can be downloaded from this webpage … https://www.cjwalsh.ie/progressive-collapse-fire/ … under the section headed: 'April 2012'.
However … I am utterly dismayed by the number of 'people-who-need-to know' … who do not know … and have never even bothered to dip into the 2 NIST Reports … or the many long-term Post 9-11 Health Studies on Survivors which have already revealed much priceless 'real' information about the short and medium term adverse impacts on human health caused by fire !
CIB W14 Research Working Group IV would again strongly caution that Fire-Induced Progressive Damage and Disproportionate Damage are fundamental concepts to be applied in the structural design of all building types.
2. Technical Terminology
While attending the ISO TC92 Meetings in Thessaloniki, during the last week of April 2012, I noticed not just one reference to 'fire doors' in a Draft ISO Fire Standard … but many. It surprised me, since I thought this issue had been successfully resolved, at ISO level, many years ago. There is no such thing as a 'fire door' … and the careless referencing of such an object, which has no meaning, in building codes and standards has caused countless problems on real construction sites during the last 20-30 years.
Please follow this line of thought …
Fire Resistance: The inherent capability of a building assembly, or an element of construction, to resist the passage of heat, smoke and flame for a specified time during a fire.
Doorset: A building component consisting of a fixed part (the door frame), one or more movable parts (the door leaves), and their hardware, the function of which is to allow, or to prevent, access and egress.
[Commentary: A doorset may also include a door saddle / sill / threshold.]
Fire Resisting Doorset / Shutter Assembly: A doorset / shutter assembly, properly installed or mounted on site, the function of which is to resist the passage of heat, smoke and flame for a specified time during a fire.
… and so we arrive at the correct term … Fire Resisting Doorset … which, as an added bonus, also alerts building designers, construction organizations, and even AHJ inspectors, to the fact that there is more involved here than merely a door leaf.
Now then, I wonder … how, in any sane and rational world, can the term Fire Resistance be used in relation to structural performance during a fire, and the cooling-phase afterwards ? Yet, this is exactly what I read in the building codes of many different jurisdictions. Do people understand what is actually going on ? Or, is the language of Conventional Fire Engineering so illogical and opaque that it is nearly impossible to understand ?
And … if this problem exists within the International Fire Science & Engineering Community … how is it possible to communicate effectively with other design disciplines at any stage during real construction projects. The artificial environments found in academia are not my immediate concern.
3. Fire Research & Development outside CIB W14 & ISO TC92
In 2012 … there is something very wrong when you have to struggle to persuade a group of people who are developing an ISO Standard on Design Fire Scenarios … that they must consider Environmental Impact as one of the major consequences of a fire to be minimized … along with 'property losses' and 'occupant impact'. This is no longer an option.
Environmental Impact: Any effect caused by a given activity on the environment, including human health, safety and welfare, flora, fauna, soil, air, water, and especially representative samples of natural ecosystems, climate, landscape and historical monuments or other physical structures, or the interactions among these factors; it also includes effects on accessibility, cultural heritage or socio-economic conditions resulting from alterations to those factors.
So … how timely, and relevant to practitioners, are ISO Fire Standards ? Perhaps … obsolete at publication … and not very ??
And … there is lot more to the Built Environment than buildings …
Built Environment: Anywhere there is, or has been, a man-made or wrought (worked) intervention in the natural environment, e.g. cities, towns, villages, rural settlements, service utilities, transport systems, roads, bridges, tunnels, and cultivated lands, lakes, rivers, coasts, and seas, etc … including the virtual environment.
We should be very conscious that valuable fire-related research takes place outside, and unrelated to, the established fire engineering groupings of CIB W14 & ISO TC92. But I am curious as to why this research is not properly acknowledged by, or encouraged and fostered within, the 'system' ?
Example A: Responding to Recommendation 18 in the 2005 NIST WTC Report … a Multi-Disciplinary Design Team published an article in the magazine Bâtiment et Sécurité (October 2005) on The PolyCentric Tower. I very much enjoy giving practitioners a small flavour of this work, whenever I make presentations at conferences and workshops …
Example B: In spite of a less than helpful submission (to put it mildly) from ISO TC92 Sub-Committee 4 … ISO 21542: 'Building Construction – Accessibility & Usability of the Built Environment' was finally published in December 2011 … but it was developed by a Sub-Committee of ISO TC59: 'Buildings & Civil Engineering Works' …
With the involvement and support of ISO Technical Committee 178: 'Lifts, Elevators & Moving Walks' during its long gestation … ISO 21542 is now able to indicate that all lifts/elevators in a building should be capable of being used for evacuation in the event of a fire. This is already a design feature in a small number of completed Tall Building Projects. Once more, this is no longer an option.
In addition … if a Fire Evacuation Staircase has a minimum unobstructed width of 1.5 m (from edge of handrail on one side of the staircase to edge of handrail on the opposite side) … this will be sufficient to facilitate the following tasks …
- Assisted Evacuation by others, or Rescue by Firefighters, for those building users who cannot independently evacuate the building, e.g. people with activity limitations … shown above, on the right, is assistance being given by three people (one at each side, with one behind) to a person occupying a manual wheelchair ;
- Contraflow Circulation … emergency access by firefighters entering a building and moving towards a fire, while people are still evacuating from the building to a 'place of safety' remote from the building … shown above, bottom left, is how not to design an evacuation staircase (!) ;
- Stretcher Lifting … lifting a mobility-impaired person, who may be conscious or unconscious, on a stretcher ;
- Firefighter Removal & Contraflow … shown above, top left, is removal of a firefighter from a building by colleagues in the event of injury, impairment, or a fire event induced health condition … while other firefighters may still be moving towards the fire.
Note that in a Fire Evacuation Staircase … all Handrails are continuous … each Stair Riser is a consistent 150 mm high … each Stair Tread/Going is a consistent 300 mm deep … and there are No Projecting Stair Nosings.
Most importantly … in order to assign sufficient building user space in the design of an Area of Rescue Assistance … ISO 21542 also provides the following Key Performance Indicator … just one aspect of a 'maximum credible user scenario' …
10% of people using a building (including visitors) have an impairment, which may be visual or hearing, mental, cognitive or psychological, or may be related to physical function, with some impairments not being identifiable.
Is There Any Connection Between Examples A & B ? There is, and it is a connection which is critical for public safety. The following Performance Indicator illustrates the point …
Innovative Structural Design – Perimeter Core Location – Design for Fire Evacuation – Evacuation for All
" A Building must not only remain Structurally Stable during a fire event, it must remain Serviceable for a period of time which facilitates:
- Rescue by Firefighters of people with activity limitations waiting in areas of rescue assistance ;
- Movement of the firefighters and those people with activity limitations, via safe and accessible routes, to Places of Safety remote from the building ;
- With an assurance of Health, Safety & Welfare during the course of this process of Assisted Evacuation. "
[Refer also to the Basic Requirements for Construction Works in Annex I of the European Union's Construction Product Regulation 305/2011 – included as Appendix II of the CIB W14 WG IV Reflection Document. Are the Basic Requirements being interpreted properly … or even adequately ??]
The Greek Paper is included as Appendix I of CIB W14 WG IV Reflection Document … in order to show that Fire-Induced Progressive Damage is also an issue in buildings with a reinforced concrete frame structure. It is more straightforward, here, to concentrate on buildings with a steel frame structure.
a) Use of 'Fire Resistance'(?) Tables for Structural Elements
We should all be familiar with these sorts of Tables. The information they contain is generated from this type of standard test configuration in a fire test laboratory …
… and this sort of criterion for 'loadbearing horizontal elements' in a fire test standard …
A single isolated loaded steel beam, simply supported, is being tested. As deflection is the only type of deformation being observed and measured … the critical temperature of the steel, i.e. the point when material strength begins to fail rapidly and the rate of beam deflection increases dramatically … is the sole focus for all stakeholders.
Using these Tables, it is very difficult to escape the conclusion that we are merely interior decorators … applying flimsy thermal insulation products to some steel structural elements (not all !) … according to an old, too narrowly focused, almost static ('cold form') recipe, which has little to do with how today's real buildings react to real fires !
This 'non-design' approach is entirely inadequate.
With regard to the use of these Tables in Ireland's Building Regulations (Technical Guidance Document B), I recently submitted the comments below to the relevant Irish AHJ. These same comments could just as easily apply to the use of similar Tables in the Building Regulations for England & Wales (Approved Document B) …
" You should be aware that Table A1 and Table A2 are only appropriate for use by designers in the case of single, isolated steel structural elements.
In steel structural frame systems, no consideration is given in the Tables to adequate fire protection of connections … or limiting the thermal expansion (and other types of deformation) in fire of steel structural elements … in order to reduce the adverse effects of one element's behaviour on the rest of the frame and/or adjoining non-loadbearing fire resisting elements of construction.
In the case of steel structural frame systems, therefore, the minimum fire protection to be afforded to ALL steel structural elements, including connections, should be 2 Hours. Connections should also be designed and constructed to be sufficiently robust during the course of a fire incident. This one small revision will contribute greatly towards preventing Fire-Induced Progressive Damage in buildings … a related, but different, structural concept to Disproportionate Damage …
Disproportionate Damage
The failure of a building's structural system (i) remote from the scene of an isolated overloading action; and (ii) to an extent which is not in reasonable proportion to that action.
Fire-Induced Progressive Damage
The sequential growth and intensification of structural deformation and displacement, beyond fire engineering design parameters, and the eventual failure of elements of construction in a building – during a fire and the 'cooling phase' afterwards – which, if unchecked, will result in disproportionate damage, and may lead to total building collapse. "
Coming from this background and heritage … it is very difficult to communicate with mainstream, ambient structural engineers who are speaking the language of structural reliability, limit state design and serviceability limit states.
b) NIST Report: 'Best Practice Guidelines for Structural Fire Resistance Design of Concrete and Steel Buildings' (NISTIR 7563 – February 2009)
At the end of Page 18 in NISTIR 7563 …
" 2.7.2 Multi-Storey Frame Buildings
In recent years, the fire performance of large-frame structures has been shown in some instances to be better than the fire resistance of the individual structural elements (Moore and Lennon 1997). These observations have been supported by extensive computer analyses, including Franssen, Schleich, and Cajot (1995) who showed that, when axial restraint from thermal expansion of the members is included in the analysis of a frame building, the behaviour is different from that of the column and beam analyzed separately.
A large series of full-scale fire tests was carried out between 1994 and 1996 in the Cardington Laboratory of the Building Research Establishment in England. A full-size eight-storey steel building was constructed with composite reinforced concrete slabs on exposed metal decking, supported on steel beams with no applied fire protection other than a suspended ceiling in some tests. The steel columns were fire-protected. A number of fire tests were carried out on parts of one floor of the building, resulting in steel beam temperatures up to 1000 °C, leading to deflections up to 600 mm but no collapse and generally no integrity failures (Martin and Moore 1997). "
Those were Experimental Fire Tests at Cardington, not Real Fires … on 'Engineered' Test Constructions, not Real Buildings !! And … incredibly, for a 2009 document … there is no mention at all of World Trade Center Buildings 1, 2 or 7 !?! Where did they disappear to, I wonder ? Too hot to handle ???
Computer Model Verification and Validation (V&V) are very problematic issues within the International Fire Science and Engineering Community. The expected outcome of a Model V&V Process, however, is a quantified level of agreement between experimental data (and, if available, real data) and model prediction … as well as the predictive accuracy of the model.
Now … please meditate carefully on the following …
" NCSTAR 1A (2008) Recommendation D [See also NCSTAR 1 (2005) Recommendation 5)
NIST recommends that the technical basis for the century-old standard for fire resistance testing of components, assemblies and systems be improved through a national effort. Necessary guidance also should be developed for extrapolating the results of tested assemblies to prototypical building systems. A key step in fulfilling this Recommendation is to establish a capability for studying and testing components, assemblies, and systems under realistic fire and load conditions.
Of particular concern is that the Standard Fire Resistance Test does not adequately capture important thermally-induced interactions between structural sub-systems, elements, and connections that are critical to structural integrity. System-level interactions, especially due to thermal expansion, are not considered in the standard test method since columns, girders, and floor sub-assemblies are tested separately. Also, the performance of connections under both gravity and thermal effects is not considered. The United States currently does not have the capability for studying and testing these important fire-induced phenomena critical to structural safety.
Relevance to WTC 7: The floor systems failed in WTC 7 at shorter fire exposure times than the specified fire rating (two hours) and at lower temperatures because thermal effects within the structural system, especially thermal expansion, were not considered in setting the endpoint criteria when using the ASTM E 110 or equivalent testing standard. The structural breakdowns that led to the initiating event, and the eventual collapse of WTC 7, occurred at temperatures that were hundreds of degrees below the criteria that determine structural fire resistance ratings. "
The design approach outlined in NISTIR 7563 is not only very flawed … it lacks any validity … because very relevant and important real fire data has been totally ignored. The Cardington Experimental Fires were not all that they seemed.
c) Current ISO TC92 International Case Study Comparison
Structural Fire Engineering Design of an Airport Terminal Building serving the Capital City of a large country (which shall remain nameless) … constructed using Portal Steel Frames …
My first concern is that the Structural Fire Engineering Design has been undertaken in isolation from other aspects of the Building's Fire Engineering Design.
On Page 3 of the Case Study Report …
" 4.2 Objectives & Functional Requirements for Fire Safety of Structures
The fire safety objectives of the airport terminal emphasize the safety of life, conservation of property, continuity of operations and protection of the environment. "
Should these not be the Project-Specific Fire Engineering Design Objectives ? Since when, for example, is 'continuity of operations' a concern in building codes ??
On Page 7 of the Case Study Report …
" 5.3 Identify Objectives, Functional Requirements & Performance Criteria for Fire Safety of Structure
The Fire Safety Objective of the Steel Structure: There should be no serious damage to the structure or successive collapse in case of fire.
The Functional Requirements are defined as the followings:
(1) Prevent or limit the structural failure in case of fire so as to prevent the fire from spreading within the compartment or to the adjacent fire compartment or the adjacent buildings (to prevent fire spread) ;
(2) Prevent or limit the partial structural failure in case of fire so as to protect the life safety of the occupants and firefighters (to protect life safety) ;
(3) Prevent or limit the structural deformation or collapse so as not to increase the cost or difficulties of the after-fire restoration (to reduce reconstruction cost).
One of the following Performance Requirements shall be met:
(1) The load-bearing capacity of the structure (Rd) shall not be less than the combined effect (Sm) within the required time, that is Rd ≥ Sm. (The maximum permitted deflection for the steel beam shall not be larger than L/400, and the maximum stress of the structure under fire conditions shall not be larger than fyT) ; or
(2) The fire resistance rating of the steel structure (td) shall not be less than the required fire resistance rating (tm), that is, td ≥ tm ; or
(3) Td – the critical internal temperature of the steel structure at its ultimate state shall not be less than Tm (the maximum temperature of the structure within required fire resistance time duration), that is Td ≥ Tm. (300 ℃) "
Once again … we see an emphasis on critical temperature, beam deflection (only), and material strength. L/400 is an impressive Fire Serviceability Limit State … a different world from L/20 or L/30 … but what about other important types of steel structural member deformation, e.g. thermal expansion and distortion ??
Furthermore … if there is a major fire in the area under the lower roof (see Section above) … because of structural continuity, any serious impact on the small frame will also have an impact on the large frame. For Structural Fire Engineering reasons … would it not be wiser to break the structural continuity … and have the small and large portal frames act independently ?
It is proposed that the Portal Frames will NOT be fully fire protected … just the columns, up to a height of 8 metres only. If 'conservation of property' and 'continuity of operations' are important fire engineering design objectives in this project … why isn't all of the steel being fully protected ??? What would be the additional cost, as a percentage of the total project cost ?
What exactly is infallible about current Design Fires and Design Fire Scenarios ??? Not much. And in the case of this particular building, should a 'maximum credible fire scenario' be at least considered ?
And … what is the fire protection material, product or system being used to protect the Portal Frames ? Will it be applied, fixed or installed correctly ? What is its durability ? Will it be able to resist mechanical damage during the construction process … and afterwards, during the fire event ? What is the reliability of this form of fire protection measure ??
So many questions …


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text:
by Michelle Abbott
I can do this. I can make it. Wet hair plastered to my head, gasping, I propel myself toward my target. The 136 bus. My heel catches on a crack in the pavement. My ankle twists sideways, sending a sharp pain up my leg. Wincing, I hobble towards the stop, just as the bus closes its doors and pulls away.
"Ahhh," I scream in frustration.
"Here, use my umbrella."
His voice startles me. I was so focused on catching the bus, I never noticed him until now. I must have had a serious case of tunnel vision, because he stands out a mile with his cornflower blue, spiky hair. He holds a large, black umbrella out to me.
Leaning against the post of the bus stop, to take the pressure off my throbbing ankle, I shake my head.
"Thank you, but you keep it. I'm already wet, and it would be a shame to ruin your hair."
He shrugs. "It's only hair. My umbrella is big enough for two."
I get a sinking feeling in my stomach. Is he hitting on me? What's wrong with the man? He looks twenty-five if he's a day. I'm twice his age. Old enough to be his mother.
I pick tendrils of damp hair from my forehead.
"I know what you must be thinking, but I'm just trying to do a good turn. You have nothing to fear from me, I promise." He shelters us both with his umbrella. "You look like you're having a bad day."
As I listen to the rain split splat, I lean down to rub my sore ankle.
"Please let me help you." He slips his arm through mine. "We can sit on that bench. We'll be able to see the bus coming from there."
With his assistance, I limp across to the empty, wooden bench that faces the road. "I just missed my bus; the next one won't be along for an hour." I sit down, past caring whether I get a wet spot on my skirt. "Are you waiting for a bus?"
He looks so calm, and serene.
"Yes, the 136."
"Oh no. You didn't miss it because of me, did you?" I frown.
"I wasn't running for it." He gives me a kind smile. "I have all the time in the world."
A car drives through a puddle, splashing dirty water onto the pavement.
"I've got no one to rush home to either." Maybe it's his kind smile, maybe I just need to off load. "My husband moved out last week, left me for a woman your age."
I hope he feels every bit his fifty-four years every second he's with her.
"I'm sorry."
What has it come to when I'm sitting in a downpour, telling my sob story to a stranger with blue hair? "She's all form and no substance. If his head was turned that easily, he's no loss." I hold out my hand. If I'm telling the poor man my life story, the least I should do is introduce myself. "My name's Carol." I look into his ice blue eyes, surprised by the wisdom I see there.
"Do you have children together, Carol?"
I stare at my feet. My heel is scuffed, and my stockings are damp. "Two daughters, they're both grown-up."
"Nothing beats a mother's love for her children." He reaches into the pocket of his long black coat, and pulls out a pack of mints. "Would you like one?"
We sit in silence, sucking on mints. The sky turns orange as the sun sets. I pull my jacket around me to keep out the chill. Behind us, a shop owner pulls down the metal security shutters of his store.
I'm curious to know more about this man, who claims he has all the time in the world. "It will be late when you get home. Do you have someone, or do you live alone?"
The street lamps come on. I watch the reflection of the light in the puddles.
"I have a loving family."
In this moment, I feel so alone. Tears mingle with the raindrops on my cheeks. "I'm pregnant."
The events of last week replay in my mind. Me, feeling sick every morning. Me, looking at the blue line on the pregnancy test. Me, buying a second test that gave me the same result.
"How does something like this happen to a woman my age? I'm going through the menopause; I haven't had a period in a year. How can I be pregnant? How? Why? Why did this happen when my husband has left me?"
"What doesn't kill us makes us stronger." He rests his hand on my shoulder.
"That was my mother's favourite saying." I wipe my cheeks. "She passed away five years ago."
He hands me a tissue. "I'm certain she's watching over you, and that you make her proud."
"Pregnant at fifty-one." I blow into the tissue. "I'm sure she's delighted." I let out a hollow laugh.
"How old were you when you had your daughters?"
"I was twenty-two when I had Patricia. Diane came along when I was twenty-five."
"You learn as you go with your first, don't you?"
For the first time I smile. "Yes, I was clueless. None of the classes prepare you for being a mother. You hold the life of your child in your hands. It's so much responsibility." I turn to face him. "Do you have children?"
He shakes his head. "I'm sure you know more about parenting now, than you did then."
"Yes I do."
"It's hard when you're young isn't it? You're trying to make your way up the career ladder. Struggling to save for a home."
I nod.
"Those things get easier as you get older, don't they?"
"Yes they do." I'm on a good wage. I own a spacious home in a good area.
"You have more time, more understanding, and more patience."
I nod.
"And you're wiser. You know what really matters."
I let out a laugh. "You make being old sound wonderful." He really does.
He raises an eyebrow. "Isn't it?"
I recall my childhood, how I hated having to do as I was told. How I would get upset at the smallest things. I remember my angst filled teenage years, being unhappy with my appearance. The heartbreak when the boys I thought I loved dumped me. I have a vivid memory of how stressful early parenthood was.
I study him. "You're wise for someone so young."
"Am I?"
The rain has stopped. He collapses his umbrella.
"Nothing is ever as bad as it seems, Carol. A child is a gift. A new start. Someone to love."
Someone to love. A new start.
I sit up straighter. He's right. I can do this. I have a nice home, money, and a heart full of love.
"Oh look, here's your bus."
Already? Have we been talking for an hour? I glance at my watch. Only twenty minutes have passed. The brakes of the bus screech as it pulls up.
As I root in my purse for my fare, I hear him say, "I'm glad I could help."
"Let's sit together." I glance behind me. "I want to thank..." The words die in my throat. No one is there. I look left and right, but the street is empty. Goosebumps spread across my skin.
"Are you getting on love?" the driver calls.