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The Davidson County Animal Shelter received close to $20,000 in donations last month. Shelter officials say the gifts will be used to address infrastructure needs.
The Davidson County Animal Shelter received close to $20,000 in donations last month. Shelter officials say the gifts will be used to address infrastructure needs.
Shelter director Judy Lanier said the holiday season is a busy time for donors, who usually prefer to remain anonymous. This past December was very good in terms of fundraising, Lanier said.
"When we get things donated … it improves the life of the animals here," Lanier said. "Our budget isn't necessarily built to handle that."
The funds will be used for a variety of improvements to the shelter's structure and amenities. Some of the money will be used to increase the size of the shelter's concrete back pad, where dogs exercise twice a day. The improvements will allow shelter staff to more easily separate healthy dogs from any other sick or confiscated animals that may be brought in from puppy mills or other poor situations.
"We are doing a lot of things with that space," Lanier said, adding that the pad is also used for overflow space and as a play surface.
The funds will also be used to install new cabinets in a dog exam room. The old cabinets will be installed during a refurbishing project in the cat room, Lanier said.
"I couldn't afford to put these cabinets in the exam room without donations," Lanier said.
The Davidson County Animal Shelter has operated in its current building since 1998. The shelter's maximum capacity is about 160 animals, Lanier said.
Anyone wishing to donate to the shelter can send a check to Davidson County Animal Shelter, 490 Glendale Road, Lexington, NC 27292.
Donations can also be made through Friends of the Shelter at P.O. Box 1036, Thomasville, NC 27361. Donna Grooms, who founded the nonprofit last year, said donations will help pay for kennels, food, toys, treats and beds for the animals at the shelter.
Grooms said it's imperative that all citizens realize donations can save an animal's life.
"I lived here most all of my life and did not know until the year before last that animals had to die in our shelters due to lack of room," Grooms said. "I can't be the only person that did not know. I want everybody in our county and state to know these animals need a home. I believe if they do, we wouldn't have to have a euthanization rate period."
For more information, find Friends of the Shelter on Facebook or go to the animal shelter's website, www.co.davidson.nc.us/animalshelter.
Nash Dunn can be reached at 249-3981, ext. 227, or at email@example.com.


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Toronto FC 3, Columbus Crew 2 | MLS Match Recap
TORONTO – Toronto FC surged past rivals Columbus Crew with a furious late comeback to claim the 2014 Trillium Cup on Saturday, courtesy of a pair of goals from Jermain Defoe and a late, late Doneil Henry header.
Despite Columbus going ahead twice, TFC battled back and eventually claimed the winner off an injury-time free kick won by Dwayne De Rosario. With the match tied 2-2, Dan Lovitz swung the ball into the box and Henry – who was culpable on the Crew's second strike – headed past goalkeeper Steve Clark, giving Toronto a 3-2 win and all three points at BMO Field.
The first chance of the game came courtesy of a Justin Meram shot that hit the post and rebounded out, giving Toronto goalkeeper Joe Bendik a bit of an early scare.
Meram wouldn't miss his next chance, though. In the 18th minute, Meram picked up a pass at the edge of the box on a quick Crew counterattack and curled a shot past Bendik into the top corner for a 1-0 lead. Meanwhile, Toronto head coach Ryan Nelsen was forced to make a substitution, Lovitz coming in for Bradley Orr, who'd pulled up lame just before Meram's goal.
Toronto FC quickly turned on the pressure, and it paid off two minutes later when Jackson found Defoe in the box. Defoe controlled the ball but was pulled down by Tyson Wahl, and referee Sorin Stoica awarded a penalty kick.
Defoe stepped up to the spot and struck his finish into the bottom left corner past Clark, who got a touch on the ball but couldn't make the save.
A pair of free kicks won by TFC and a yellow card issued to Michael Parkhurst would be the only other moments of action in the first half as the two teams went into the locker rooms deadlocked at 1-1, Toronto holding a 3-1 advantage on aggregate for the Trillium Cup.
The second half started out slower than the end of the first, with Toronto pushing forward and Columbus content to sit back. On the hour mark, the match picked up as Stoica doled out a yellow card to Agustin Viana, the first of six second-half cautions. In the 65th minute, Columbus won a corner kick which was swung in and met by Viana, who outjumped Henry and headed home.
Columbus, leading 2-1, then found themselves battling off heavy pressure from Toronto FC. The home side continued to create chances and it finally paid off in the 81st minute, when substitute Gilberto slipped a through ball in for Defoe. He let the ball bounce twice after Gilberto's pass and hit it first time with his left foot, beating Clark in the top corner.
After that, it was all Toronto FC in the dying minutes, until Henry's late heroics secured a gutsy victory for the home side.
Toronto travel to Montreal on Wednesday for the final leg of the Amway Canadian Championship, tied at 1-1 with the Montreal Impact. Meanwhile, the Columbus Crew head to FedEx Field to take on D.C. United on Saturday, the second half of a doubleheader with a Spain vs. El Salvador "Road to Brazil" match.
MLSsoccer.com Men of the Match
|What We Saw
|Jermain Defoe
|He doesn't need many chances to score, and that means TFC can hardly ever be counted out. His budding partnership with countryman Luke Moore also looks promising.
|Justin Meram
|His team's late collapse should not completely obscure the Michigan native's good movement up top, and his exquisite finish on the opener.
|Kyle Bekker
|Aside from a few wobbles, the youngster continues to impress as he attempts the tall task of replacing Michael Bradley in the TFC engine room.

subset: commoncrawl


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The Traditional wedding gifts such as candies are so common that people want to add some personality and uniqueness to their wedding gifts. If you are the one with similar opinion, let's look at this delicious towel cake. At first sight, I mistake it with a real cake and wonder how it can deliver to the customers successfully in good shape after such a long journey. Dedicated with ribbons, cherry, and placing into a transparent box, the towel immediately become luring that everyone may want to know who made it, how long will it took, etc.
Of course, if your time is rich, you can make one by yourself. Creating a towel cake is quite simple. Only 3 steps are needed. Step 1. Roll the towels; Step 2. Assembling the layers; Step 3. Decorate with silk flowers or fall leaves .They are great for wedding favors, bay showers, gift baskets, Christmas stocking items and all other occasions. Four colors, red, purple, pink and coffer can be choose.


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A Fisherman's Feast
St. Louis priest Father Joe Classen's Alaskan wildlife adventures are now a pastoral mission.
After eight years of parish work in the Archdiocese of St. Louis, Father Joe Classen answered another call in 2011: serving the faithful in Alaska. America's northernmost state is always in need of priests, so Father Classen, who has enjoyed outdoor adventures his whole life, jumped at the opportunity to voyage north for domestic missionary work. And not just face-to-face, either; soon after his arrival, he helped to launch a local Catholic station that is now broadcasting Seattle-based Sacred Heart Radio to Alaskan listeners.
Father Classen has written four books, the most recent of which is The Essentials of Catholic Spirituality: Living and Breathing Our Faith (Alba House, 2011). Currently on a hiatus from writing, his main hobby now is wildlife photography on Kodiak Island, where he need not travel far for fascinating photos. This is made quite clear with the enormous "St. Mary's Bear" who visits his parish rather frequently.
Father Classen spoke with Register correspondent Trent Beattie in time for the Nov. 30 feast day of St. Andrew the Apostle (a patron of fishermen who is popular in Alaska).
When did you first want to become a priest?
The human inspiration for me wanting to become a priest was Msgr. Michael Owens, our parish priest at St. Charles Borromeo parish in St. Charles, Mo. He had been a military chaplain in World War II, which impressed me, but so did his work in our community. He was dedicated first and foremost to the Mass, which influenced me greatly.
I remember as a young boy serving at Mass and knowing that something profound and transcendent was taking place at the altar. The reality present before me blew me away, and it was then that I planned on becoming a priest.
In junior high and high school, I was distracted and drifted a bit. I stopped praying, and doubts entered my mind, not only about my vocation, but about God in general. This lasted even into the first two years of college at Central Missouri State University, but it was there that I started to pray again and really search for what was true.
My search led me back to where I had started: in the Catholic Church. The possibility of my priestly vocation came back, and I entered the Kenrick-Glennon Seminary in St. Louis. This was a great but challenging time of learning and formation, and it culminated in my 2003 ordination.
What took you from St. Louis to Kodiak Island, Alaska?
Alaska is always in need of priests. Very few of the priests up here are actually from the state of Alaska. There are priests from the lower states, as well as the Philippines, Poland and Africa.
The change in climate and way of life can be very challenging, and in fact, some priests from Africa recently went back home early.
I had been to Alaska many times before my arrival in 2011, so I knew what to expect. As a boy, I thought of living on Kodiak Island as being the ultimate fantasy. Now I'm living that out in reality, at least until 2014, when I'm scheduled to go back to St. Louis.
Because St. Louis has an abundance of priests — relatively speaking — and because of the relationship between Archbishop Robert Carlson of St. Louis and Archbishop Roger Schwietz of Anchorage (they were high-school classmates and remain friends), it was easy for me to volunteer when a letter was sent around asking if any priests would be willing to come up here.
It's a great way to serve the people of God in a completely different context than most of us are used to.
What are some of the main differences between St. Louis and Kodiak Island?
The surroundings are obviously a lot different. Here on Kodiak Island, we have brown bears, eagles (some of which I can see right now trying to prey on smaller birds) and, of course, many large fish and king crab in the water. There are mountains and forests, and the entire layout is more expansive. The island is almost 3,600 square miles, which is in sharp contrast to the city of St. Louis, which is about 66 square miles. The population density, as you can imagine, is quite different as well.
We have an extremely diverse group of parishioners here at St. Mary's parish. There are Russians, Poles, Filipinos, Samoans and Mexicans here to work in the fishing industry, which is the major source of jobs on the island. It is a tough industry, with many days and nights spent on fishing boats and in canneries. It's not only physically demanding, but also mentally, emotionally and spiritually.
That was a major reason you wanted to have Catholic radio up there, right?
Certainly. I had done some radio programs out of St. Louis, in association with Tony Holman of Covenant Network. The immeasurable benefit of Catholic radio was plain as day, so I was thinking of bringing it to Anchorage, which has many more people than we do on the island. However, there was a permit readily available for Kodiak Island, so we pursued that instead.
I knew Sacred Heart Radio began about 11 years previously in Seattle, Wash., and then expanded across the state to Spokane in 2005. Tony contacted Ron Belter, the general manager of Sacred Heart Radio, who was happy as a clam about the possibility of sending the radio signal up here. The whole thing was an idea in my mind for six to nine months, but once Ron was asked about getting it started, it all came about very quickly.
The first day of broadcasting was June 24, 2012, the feast day of St. John the Baptist, also known as "the voice crying out in the wilderness." Now we are very happy to have a Catholic voice in KBKO 88.3 FM.
You've written a book called Hunting for God, Fishing for the Lord (Our Sunday Visitor, 2006). What hunting and fishing adventures have you had in Alaska?
Years ago, I had many hunting and fishing adventures here, but now there's no need to go on a planned trip to encounter wildlife. I'm actually becoming more and more acquainted with a huge brown bear (he's 10-feet tall) right here at St. Mary's. I've kept the Fish and Game Department and Wildlife Troopers up to date on the bear's whereabouts, in part with a trail camera.
One of the challenges with this "St. Mary's Bear" is that he doesn't hibernate. There's no need to do that here, because the bears have a year-round food supply. Even with a bad salmon run this year, bears can still kill a deer or raid a dumpster quite easily.
Despite their imposing appearance and actual ability to harm us, coastal brown bears are generally well-behaved animals, if you don't get in their personal space or that of their family and if you don't mess with their food. If you keep your distance, things generally go okay, but sometimes it's a matter of adjusting to the bear coming into your own space when he's looking for food.
That's what has been happening at St. Mary's, where we've had some bear lockdowns in the school. Every couple of years, there's a mauling on the island, but we've only had one bear-related death in the last 90 years.
What can be scarier than bears, though, is the price of goods in some places in Alaska. Although it's not too bad here, there are some more remote places in Alaska, such as Bethel, where a gallon of milk is $11.
You've started a website to showcase photographs you've taken of wildlife all over the United States and Canada. How has that been going?
I've been taking photos of beautiful scenery and animals for years, and now there's a special emphasis on what's found here in Alaska. I put the photos on the new website so people can purchase them. The money raised goes to charities.
It's an interesting dynamic found in nature around the world, but in a special way up here. On the one hand, there is the indescribable beauty of nature, but on the other hand, there can be the indescribable tragedy that can occur in that very nature.
When I first came up here, I was told that, "Calamities people in the other states face once in a lifetime happen up here every week. If you don't know someone who's died a tragic death, you will before the year is out." We have a memorial service every spring for the fishermen who lost their lives the previous year. It's a very dangerous business, which contrasts with the splendor around us.
It's also a reminder that you have to be prepared and ready for anything at anytime. A simple outing can turn dangerous or even deadly if you aren't ready for it. The same is true in the spiritual life: You have to be ready for whatever might happen. Readiness comes from various means, but most especially from prayer. A constant prayer life gives us the grace we need to deal with any undertaking.
You were privileged to bring with you to Alaska a chalice that your childhood parish priest, Msgr. Owens, used. What does that mean to you?
It's great to have a physical memory of Msgr. Owens, since he played such a large role in my vocation. He died in 1988, long before I was ordained, but I tried to find his chalice before getting out of the seminary. That didn't happen, although before I came up here last year, I was able to find it through the help of Kathy Kasprzyk, a former St. Charles Borromeo parish employee. From her information, I was able to identify Father Thomas Begley as the one who would know about the chalice. It took a while, but we eventually found it, and I knew Kathy would be thrilled to hear about it.
However, as Providence would have it, she died the very day I received the chalice, which was also the anniversary of Msgr. Owens' death. The first time I used the chalice was at Kathy's funeral.
Time passes, and many things change, but some things never change, regardless of where you are. The chalice is symbolic of that, pointing to the truth that Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever. He unceasingly searches us out and makes himself present in the Eucharist at every Mass.
Register correspondent Trent Beattie writes from Seattle.


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SACRAMENTO (AP) — Gov. Jerry Brown is convening a task force to help determine whether a statewide drought declaration is warranted.
The governor on Wednesday asked staff from state water, agriculture and emergency services agencies to meet every week to help strengthen drought preparations and advise him on next steps.
While a drought has not been declared, 2014 is expected to be the third straight year with low rainfall.
Reservoirs are currently at low levels, and the State Water Project in November said its initial allocation would be just 5 percent of requested deliveries in 2014.
Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein and other state lawmakers have asked Brown and President Barack Obama to declare a drought emergency.
(© Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)


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English Teacher
Is it best for a teacher to set specific goals for a class? If so, how is tha best done? How often should tests be given to see if the goals have been achieved? How does a good teacher correct a student without discouraging the student?
You need to have some form of aim/goal/objective for a class. If you don't, why are you there?
Ideally the objective should be clearly measurable, for example, 'By the end of the lesson, learners will demonstrate their ability to use the form the past tense of {list of x irregular verbs} by writing six sentences about what they did yesterday'. This is measurable in that you can check the six sentences to see if they have formed the past tense correctly.
There is no simple answer to this question. Pick up ideas from colleagues and find out which ways work best with your learners.How does a good teacher correct a student without discouraging the student?
I totally agree with the two posters above and I would add, find yourself a mentor. What the experienced teachers around you for a few weeks and pick out the one you admire most and ask if you can watch their classes to learn from their expertise. Goal setting with students is crucial, so a mentor can really guide you to do this in the best way possible.
Hope this helps,
StephanieCheck out our latest ESL teaching guides, ESL for Beginners Two and Culture Explorers, as well as lots of free downloadables @ Products | Bilingual Learner


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Singapore's economic turnaround is gathering speed. The island-state, whose GDP shrank by 1.3% in 2009, is looking to surpass China to become Asia's fastest-growing economy. Its GDP, up 16% in the first quarter, is forecast to rise an impressive 13% to 15% this year. Though a slower revival elsewhere (notably in the U.S. and in China's lower than expected growth in the second quarter) have tempered the gains, the Straits Times Index has risen 12% since last year. The fortunes of the country's 40 richest reflect this resurgence: Their total net worth is $45.7 billion, up from last year's $39 billion.
The family of Ng Teng Fong, who was Singapore's richest individual last year and died in February, is at No. 1 with a combined net worth of $7.8 billion. While right now it isn't clear how the fortune is split among the family, it is one of the few that declined. Although Singapore's property sector overall has been performing well, their stake in Hong Kong developer Tsim Sha Tsui dropped on fears of a slowdown in China. Banker Wee Cho Yaw moved up two ranks to No. 3, as shares in his United Overseas Bank outperformed the market, gaining 17%.
Overall 26 on the list saw their wealth increase, including Malaysian citizen Ong Beng Seng and his wife, Christina Ong, who together are worth a billion for the first time thanks to the better performance of their hotel and retailing empire. Banker Lee Seng Wee also entered the billionaire ranks, in part because we've included the assets of all his siblings and children in his net worth. Another big gainer was chocolate king John Chuang, who is worth $295 million, up from last year's $190 million. Shares in his Petra Foods, which he founded with his brothers, surged nearly 50% since last year.
New to the list but probably not to Forbes Asia readers: New Zealand-born social entrepreneur Richard Chandler, who debuts at No. 5 with a $3.4 billion fortune. He established his Orient Global investment funds in Singapore in 2006, which he recently renamed R.F. Chandler. John Lim, who cofounded ARA Asset Management with Li Ka-Shings Cheung Kong Holdings, also makes his debut with a net worth of $202 million. Making a comeback after a two-year absence is retailer Ron Sim, whose company, OSIM, which sells massage chairs and health care products, climbed out of the red after writing off its loss-making investment in U.S. retailer Brookstone.
Only seven on the list are poorer than they were in 2009. Concerns about Beijing's interventions in the property market took a toll on real estate tycoon Zhong Sheng Jian, who made his fortune off China's property boom. His net worth of $1.8 billion was off 10% from last year. Vivian Chandran, who cashed out of her late husband's marine fuel company Chemoil earlier this year, took a hit by selling her 51% stake at a 21% discount to the market price.
A minimum net worth of $190 million was needed to make the cut, up from $135 million in 2009. Four of last year's top 40 failed to make the grade, including shipbuilder Brian Chang, who dropped off the list after four years. Wong Ngit Liong, who runs electronics maker Venture Corp., and Goh Lik Tuan also fell just short.
Public fortunes were calculated using share prices and exchange rates as of July 14. For privately held assets, we estimated what they would be worth if public. This ranking, unlike Forbes' list of the world's billionaires, includes numerous family fortunes shared by individuals with their children and grandchildren, or with their siblings. Where family fortunes are held by extended families, such as the Kwek cousins, we split them into separate entries.


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What Might Have Been
I wrote this piece for our CBSSports.com blog and I encourage you to go over there and read the work of the other KSR guys. We have spent five weeks writing on the site and it has been a great experience. Drew, Beisner, Tomlin and I (along with John and Mike Rutherford during Championship Week) put a lot of time into it and tonight was our last night. It was a ton of fun and some of those guys wrote amazing things. I thank all of you that followed it and hope you will check more of it out.
Of All the Words of Mice and Men, the Cruelest Are 'It Might Have Been'
As Gordon Hayward's desperation halfcourt shot banked just a little too hard off the backboard, Kurt Vonnegut's famous phrase from "Cats Cradle" came into my mind. Right now all over the country, people are praising Coach K and his Duke Blue Devils for their fourth title, putting the coach in rarified air amongst his peers and moving Duke past Kansas into sole possesion of fourth all-time in NCAA titles. But I don't care about that. Let the other writers celebrate the winner and crown Coach K the mightiest to ever walk the floor.
I will instead focus on the losers and how close they were to unmatched glory. Think for just a second what would have happened if Hayward hit his shot. It would have set in motion a celebration that would have likely never been topped in NCAA Tournament history. 72,000 in attendance would have joined every American who didnt have a personal connection to Duke University in an unadulterated glee ride celebrating the utlimate victory for the little guy. A small private school in Indiana, filled with players who were not recruited by the big boys and were never considered able to make it this far, had found a perfect ride to the Championship game and in the process, taken down the evil empire of college basketball. It is such a perfect story that it simply does not seem real. But the joy that would have emoted from Lucas Oil stadium would have been real and might have been unsurpassed in sports since the 1980 Miracle on Ice.
Disagree? Think of a better example of an entire country rallying around a story and celebrating together. I can't think of one. In our territorial notion of sports, we celebrate victories over other areas of the country and loyalties are often split based on where you are. We dont do much in the way of nationalism either and because the main sport in which the world competes against each other (soccer) isn't our bag, we dont get off on beating other countries very often. But this would have been the force of a collective nation, minus a few random Dukies, celebrating at the same time. How great would that have been?
And that shot! Had Hayward bankd that shot in, it would have immediately taken its place as the greatest shot in the history of college basketball. Lorenzon Charles, Christian Laettner, Keith Smart and Michael Jordan would have had to scoot over and make room. A new king of the mountain would have taken its place. The circumstances (as the buzzer sounded, from half court, the underdog making it to beat mighty Duke) would have immediately catapulted it into discussion as the GREATEST play in history for any sport. It would have been on commercials from now into eternity and there would never be a moment when its iconic image would have left the collective sports mind.
And the individuals involved. It goes without saying that Gordon Hayward's life would have never been the same. He would become a name that was remembered for generations and it is not an exaggeration to say that his life would have changed forever. In addition to becoming a hero on Butler's campus for eternity, he would also have become a superstar in the nation as a whole. He would have owned the Today Show, David Letterman and the White House and from now until the day he died, he would have been remembered as the guy who hit the greatest shot ever.
And he isnt the only one. Matt Howard would have been a hero as well, with his points down the stretch and a hard pick on the last play that would have lived forever. His wispy moustache would have reached cult status and we would have seen middle school kids growing similar facial hair to be like Matt. Coach Brad Stevens would have been more than just the Coach who looked young and took his team on a magical ride. He would have been a national champion and on the path to be the greatest young coach in the nation. His future is bright regardless, but a 33 year old coach who wins a national championship at Butler on the greatest shot in history would have had the world as his oyster.
Alas, none of this happened. The shot was off just slightly. Duke won and while college basketball fans will remember Butler, it will be as a part of something great, not something iconic and legendary. Butler and its players have nothing to hang their heads about. They put together a magical run and were part of a great championship game. They will forever be able to look back and remember being part of something special and unique. But that doesnt mean that there won't be moments where Vonnegut's words ring true. Because while Butler's season has been extraordinary and their success virtually unprecedented, when it comes to a championship, it might have been.


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SJC rules 'social sharing' of marijuana is not distribution; issues series of rulings clarifying pot law
The state's highest court today stepped into the gray legal area created in 2008 when voters decriminalized the possession of one ounce of marijuana, releasing four rulings aimed at clarifying where police and the public can draw the line between a crime and a civil offense.
In three of the rulings, the Supreme Judicial Court concluded that prosecutions linked to the public consumption of small amounts of marijuana cannot stand because the defendants came to the attention of police due to civil infractions – which are punishable by fines – and not by crimes punished by imprisonment.
In the fourth ruling, the SJC decided that a Western Massachusetts man who had outfitted his closet to grow marijuana could face criminal charges because cultivating cannabis is still illegal, even though Adams police found less than an ounce of marijuana when they raided his home.
At the heart of one of the rulings was the Hempfest held annually at Boston Common, where many attendees publicly smoke marijuana and often – as was the case with defendant Kityan Jackson – share a joint with friends and acquaintances. Jackson was spotted by police sharing a joint, which led police to search his backpack without a warrant, where they found 10 small bags of marijuana weighing 23.5 grams, or less than an ounce.
Jackson was prosecuted for possession of marijuana with intent to distribute. But the SJC said that charge must be thrown out because Jackson was targeted by police after they spotted him committing a civil infraction, sharing a joint, not a crime.
"We now decide that the social sharing of marijuana is akin to simple possession, and does not constitute the facilitation of a drug transfer from seller to buyer that remains the hallmark of drug distribution,'' Justice Fernande R.V. Duffly wrote for the unanimous court.
She added that "we conclude that the observation by police of several individuals using and sharing marijuana in a social setting does not provide the police with justification to conduct a warrantless search. ''
The SJC also threw out illegal gun possession charges lodged against Daniel Clinton and Alyson Tayetto after Boston police stopped the car Tayetto was driving in Dorchester with one headlight out in 2009 and discovered that both smelled like they had been smoking marijuana and that Tayetto possessed a small amount of marijuana.
Duffly also authored this unanimous ruling, which concluded that the gun found in the glovebox of the car was discovered only after police made an unauthorized search of the vehicle based on Tayetto's admission that she possessed a small amount of marijuana.
"Absent articulable facts supporting a belief that either occupant of the vehicle possessed a criminal amount of marijuana, the search was not justified by the need to search for contraband,''Duffly wrote.
The SJC also rebuffed Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley's office on another key issue raised during the appeal. Prosecutors wanted the SJC to make it clear that police have the right to search a car to make sure they do not drive under the influence of marijuana, which remains a criminal offense akin to drunken driving.
The SJC said it would not use its power to grant police that "community caretaker'' authority, in part because none of the evidence against Tayetto suggested she was incapable to drive and also because prosecutors had not raised the issue in the lower courts.
Police "did not observe anything about the driver that would lead a reasonable observer to believe that her capacity to operate a vehicle was impaired by the use of marijuana,'' Duffly wrote.
The SJC also threw out a gun case against Antonio L. Pacheco, who was in a car smoking marijuana when a state trooper stopped him for violating the evening curfew at Heritage State Park in Lynn. The trooper found a small bag of marijuana inside the cab of the car, and then went on to open the trunk, where he found a gun stuffed into a backpack.
Pacheco allegedly admitted the weapon was his, but the SJC said those statements must be thrown out, too, because they were made only after the trooper conducted an illegal search of the car. "The statements were in response to, and as a result of, the illegal search. As such, the statements were the fruit of the impermissible search of the trunk,'' Duffly wrote.
The court also found that the reach of decriminalization has its limits. Justices ruled that Kenneth J. Palmer Jr. could still be prosecuted for cultivating the marijuana Adams police found growing in a closet in his home in 2010 – even though the seized marijuana weighed less than an ounce.
While only an ounce was recovered by police, officers also found he had outfitted the closet with lights, a thermometer, and empty plastic bags.
Justice Margot Botsford wrote that "the word 'cultivate' refers to the process of growing a plant or crop, not the purpose for which the plant or crop is grown. Accordingly, we hold that the cultivation of one ounce or less of marijuana, regardless of its intended use, is a criminal offense.''
In the Palmer case, the ruling was unanimous, but three justices, led by Duffly, said in a concurring opinion that the court should make it clear that cultivation of marijuana for personal use should no longer be considered a crime.
"I believe it is clear that the growing of one ounce or less of marijuana for personal use is not a crime,'' Duffly wrote, alluding to the adoption of the medical marijuana law and the decriminalization of possession of an ounce or less as the basis for her thinking.
"Treating marijuana cultivation for personal use in the same manner as simple possession is treated under … a civil infraction, is also consistent with the recent enactment … of the statute, which legalizes the medical use of marijuana by qualifying patients,'' Duffly wrote.
Be civil. Be kind.Read our full community guidelines.


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I hate people who are ungrateful . BN fellows are the most grateful, throw anything to them, they would grab it fast like a dog waiting for bones. Whatever the Gov does for them, including sometimes screwing them upside down, is well received and welcomed. For MIC particularly, Najib is God.
Their only comeback would be coming up with more porn videos involving Anwar Ibrahim, and other opposition leaders.
Recently they came up with videos relating Nurul Izzah, which shows their mentality and political maturity. Dato Seri Najib, ever since taking over the office from Tun Abdullah Badawi had brought in some of the most remarkable changes in our life. One of the most important thing that he embarked on was 1Malaysia concept. Anywhere you go these days, 1Malaysia follows you. Our PM's face is plastered everywhere, from trains to taxis, from billboards to cupboards,which of course shows how desperate our PM is…
Today, I'm going to introduce to you some of the most remarkable products of 1Malaysia.
The above is Telur1Malaysia. This is not normal telur okay(!), telur1Malaysia is meant to add extra guts onto yourself. It is rumored some BN fellows grew some telur to speak out after eating Telur1Malaysia. It's Grade D eggs, so I'm sure you don't even want to know about the quality.
1Malaysia email.
Since most of us came from hutan and had never seen email before, the Government introduced 1Malaysia email. 1Malaysia email can be used to subscribe to all porn websites including Desibaba.com, Debonair.com and IndianGilma.com. The only Government in the world who invested (although they said it's privately funded as usual of course) RM 50 million for emails. Click HERE to read more.
Don't misunderstand the name. This is a digital tablet. Forget about Samsung Tab. With the technology of Ipad and the screen of helipad , 1MalaysiaPad tops the list as the gadget to have. This dappa China made tablet is another product which was meant to enrich their own cronies , selling at a staggering RM 999. The last known person who bought this tablet committed suicide a day after purchasing it.
1Malaysia Underwear
1Malaysia underwear , the ultimate comfort. Itu Renoma semua kasi buang. If you hate BN and the concept of 1Malaysia, where else would be the best place to put them? Whether you have one the size of Africans or Asians, 1Malaysia underwear ensures your jama is well taken care of…
1Malaysia Chocolate
Forget Cadbury. Forget Ferrero Rocher. The must have chocolate of the season is here. How wonderful would it be to eat a chocolate with Najib's face on it's cover? After eating this chocolate , don't just shit and forget about Barisan Nasional okay!
Remember, Pangkah BN! But you Indians are never grateful, despite all these products and services, look at what the Indian community has to say about BN.
I don't know what to say la…


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Listings in Backdrops/Curtains, Plaques and Tablets, Carts/RMUs and Gels/Filters/Lenses/Diffusers in Lindenhurst
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in Artwork/Graphics, Backdrops/Curtains, Panels/Partitions/Screens, Seasonal, Cubes/Platforms/Risers, Grid Systems, Pegboard/Slatwall, Turntables, Acrylic Fixtures, Custom Metal Fixtures, Custom Wood Fixtures, Laminated Fixtures, Metal Fixtures, Slatwall Fixtures, Wood Fixtures, LED Lighting, Light Fixtures/Luminaires, Lightboxes, Foamboard, Hardboards (poster, particle, corrugated), Laminates (high-pressure/low-pressure/metal), Plastic Sheets and Panels, Veneer, Wood, ADA, Architectural/Exterior, Floor Graphics, Large-Format, Lenticular, Letters, Lightboxes, Murals/Wall Graphics, Neon, Printing, Sign Holders/Frames, Vinyl Graphics, Visual Merchandising, Installation/Transportation/Logistics, Other, Literature Holders
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United States
Fax: 631-321-1058


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Welcome to the School of Ants!
The School of Ants project is a citizen-scientist driven study of the ants that live in urban areas, particularly around homes and schools. Participation is open to anyone interested!
Learn More!
Anyone can participate! Learn how to create your own sampling kit, sample your backyard or schoolyard, and get our collection back to us so that we can ID the ants and add your species list to the big School of Ants map. Together we'll map ant diversity and species ranges across North America! Click here to get started!
NEW: Bring School of Ants into your classroom!
Explore topics of diet, food types, food quality, and ant diversity with your students. Designed by a former teacher, this three-day teaching module is a great complement or alternative to the School of Ants project. Learn More!


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Having wrestled with trying to pin fencing onto the side of platform edges, I stumbled across a really simple way of doing it.
Here's what I was wanting to achieve:
I needed a way to hold the fencing in the right position.....a snug fit along the platform edge and upright. And long enough to allow me to apply epoxy resin to each of the fencing uprights...and for the glue to set!
I had tried using pins to do this....but with the platforms being glued directly onto a strip of plywood, I couldn't get pins to stick in close enough witout using a pin hammer to get them in!! Almost impossible!!!!
What I needed was something (relatively) heavy and rectangular on the platform to push the fencing against. I had just the thing....an aluminium strip that would straddle the platform sections.
All I needed was something to hold the fencing on the edge of the strip. Hang on.....replace "hold" with "stick".....and we have the solution. Out with a Pritt stick....and a layer on the edge. And the fencing sticks!!
I positioned the fencing so the uprights protruded below the bottom by the right amount. The aluminium strip was then simply placed on the platforms in the right position...allowing me to do the glueing:
Once the glue has cured, the aluminium strip will gently ease away....leaving the fence straight and upright and firmly glued on!
For this example, I have a flat and level area to place the metal strip, but I can see the technique working elsewhere...and it doesn't have to be a metal strip. I'm sure thick board or even wood can be used....and these supports pinned into place. The important thing is the glue stick glue being used to temporarily hold the delicate fencing whilst you glue it in place.
Holding fence for glueing
The three Ts. Lift the lid on the secrets of how you do things so others can have a go.....
Post Reply
1 post • Page 1 of 1
Holding fence for glueing
Doug Kightley
Webmaster here and volunteer at the National Tramway Museum http://www.tramway.co.uk
Webmaster here and volunteer at the National Tramway Museum http://www.tramway.co.uk
Post Reply
1 post • Page 1 of 1


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Winrar is a free application which offers us the possibility to compress and unpack any file in a very easy and comfortable way and it doesn't take a long time to do it. The program integrates itself perfectly in the right-button menu, so you will be able to create RAR and ZIP files with no problems, just right-clicking the file -or group of files- and select the 'Add to archive' option.
No matter the format of the compressed file, you'll be able to unpack more than 40 different formats, including CAB, ARJ, LZH, TAR, GZ, ACE, UUE, BZ2, JAR, ISO, RAR, Zip or 7Z, you'll only have to double-click its icon and the content of the file will appear on screen, then choose whether to unpack it or run the files without having to unpack it previously. Furthermore, Winrar offers a very good compression ratio above the average, what means the files you compress using it will be smaller than when compressed using other program. Finally, you can also protect files using Rinjdael (AES-128) encryption system, digital signature or protect it against modifications.
Winrar is probably the best compression tool out there. The high quantity of options, as well as its versatility and easiness of use make it a must have for any user.
Download WinRAR Old Version!
WinRAR is a product developed by RabLab. OldDownload.com is not directly affiliated with RabLab. All trademarks, product names or logos mentioned herein are the property of their respective owners. Our download manager distributes the original unmodified software, obtained directly from RabLab and does not modify it in any way.
- WinRAR 5.40 (64-bit) - 2.08MB
- WinRAR 5.31 (64-bit) - 1.9MB
- WinRAR 5.31 (32-bit) - 1.72MB
- WinRAR 5.30 (64-bit) - 1.87MB
- WinRAR 5.30 (32-bit) - 1.7MB
- WinRAR 5.21 - 1.68MB
- WinRAR 5.2 - 1.68MB
- WinRAR 5.1 - 1.66MB
- WinRAR 5.01 - 1.69MB
- WinRAR 5 - 1.88MB
- WinRAR 4.2 - 1.58MB
- WinRAR 3.8 - 1.18MB
- WinRAR 4.11 - 1.44MB
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How do I uninstall WinRAR in Windows 10 / Windows 7 / Windows 8 / Windows Vista / Windows XP?
- Click "Start"
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- Select "WinRAR" and right click, then select Uninstall/Change.
- Click "Yes" to confirm the uninstallation.


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Anticipates your needs and proactively advises you on productivity boosting enhancements, downtime avoidance, removing barriers to employee adoption, and configuration recommendations.
Provides a communication bridge between you and IBM to channel your technical inquiries and proactively advise you on corrective actions.
Anticipates your challenges and advises on influential actions to increase productivity, reduce costs and maximize your return on investment.


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I have written extensively about the economical and environmental madness of wind power on a large scale. Wind power can be excellent on a small scale IF you live in the right areas.
See for example my post Record cold and snow in November – Wind Power at 12% output where you can find a lot of links to different post on the subject
They really want us back to the Stone Age to "reduce" our "carbon footprint".
And how long do you think the people and the modern societies would survive WITHOUT electricity? And what kind of life that would be?
What they are really advocating is huge price increases in the cost of energy, meaning the cost of everything.
That's it. That's their plan.
Anything else they say is a lie.
This is a scam to enrich the corrupt.
Just the latest example of this is this quote from Steve Holliday, chief executive of the National Grid (UK) from The Daily Telegraph, 2nd March 2011:
'Era of constant electricity at home is ending, says power chief.
Electricity consumers in the UK will need to get used to flicking the switch and finding the power unavailable. Families will have to get used to only using power when it was available, rather than constantly."
What a brilliant future the Global Warming Hysterics have in store for humankind. And remember they have publicly said and written that they would like to halve, or even cut in two thirds, the world population. Well, wind power is on way of getting about it.
These people are so caring are they not? And they REALLY love humankind.
Here are just a few examples around the world of the growing realisation of the huge cost and unreliability of wind/solar power:
For Every Green Job, Four Other are Lost (UK)
"The economic candle in the U.K. is being blown out by wind power. The Verso study finds that after the annual diversion of some 330 million British pounds from the rest of the U.K. economy, the result has been the destruction of 3.7 jobs for every "green" job created.
The study concludes that the "policy to promote renewable energy in the U.K. has an opportunity cost of 10,000 direct jobs in 2009-10 and 1,200 jobs in Scotland." So British taxpayers, as is the case here in the U.S., are being forced to subsidize a net loss of jobs in a struggling economy.
"There's a big emphasis in Scotland on the economic opportunity of investing in renewable energy," says study co-author and Verso research director Richard Walsh. "Whatever the environmental merits, we have shown that the case for green jobs just doesn't stack up."
Again, it's been shown that wind energy can't hold a candle to other more traditional and more reliable forms of energy.
"The Scottish renewable sector is very reliant on subsidies from the rest of the U.K.," co-author Tom Miers adds. "Without the U.K.-wide framework, it would be very difficult to sustain the main policy tolls to promote this industry."
As here, only continuous subsidies and redistribution of resources to an unproductive and uncompetitive source of energy keeps the alternative energy industry alive, politically and economically."
"Calzada noted that these are direct job losses. "The loss of jobs could be greater if you account for the amount of lost industry that moves out of the country due to high energy prices," he said in an interview."
Blow-jobs drive unemployment
"The study concludes that the "policy to promote renewable energy in the UK has an opportunity cost of 10,000 direct jobs in 2009-10 and 1,200 jobs in Scotland". So British taxpayers, as is the case in the US, are being forced to subsidise a net loss of jobs in a struggling economy.
I suppose it could be worse, though … they could be building electric vans."
The real cost of 'global warming'
"The renewable energy industry is helping to destroy the UK economy and drive up unemployment says a new report. For every one of David Cameron's "green jobs" created in the renewable energy sector (mainly solar and wind), another 3.7 jobs are being lost in the real economy, says the independent study by Verso Economics. In total, measurable policies to promote renewable energy cost £1.4 billion in the UK and £168 million in Scotland in 2009/10. But this doesn't take into account the additional economic damage inflicted by the erection of enormous, bird-chopping monstrosities all over some of Britain's most attractive tourist spots – including, for example, the hitherto unspoilt island of Tiree.(H/T Michael Daly)."
Why the £250bn wind power industry could be the greatest scam of our age – and here are the three 'lies' that prove it
"Scarcely a day goes by without more evidence to show why the Government's obsession with wind turbines, now at the centre of our national energy policy, is one of the greatest political blunders of our time.
Under a target agreed with the EU, Britain is committed within ten years — at astronomic expense — to generating nearly a third of its electricity from renewable sources, mainly through building thousands more wind turbines.
But the penny is finally dropping for almost everyone — except our politicians — that to rely on windmills to keep our lights on is a colossal and very dangerous act of self-deception.
Take, for example, the 350ft monstrosity familiar to millions of motorists who drive past as it sluggishly revolves above the M4 outside Reading.
This wind turbine performed so poorly (working at only 15 per cent of its capacity) that the £130,000 government subsidy given to its owners was more than the £100,000 worth of electricity it produced last year.
Meanwhile, official figures have confirmed that during those freezing, windless weeks around Christmas, when electricity demand was at record levels, the contribution made by Britain's 3,500 turbines was minuscule.
To keep our homes warm we were having to import vast amounts of power from nuclear reactors in France.
Wind turbines are so expensive that Holland recently became the first country in Europe to abandon its EU renewable energy target, announcing that it is to slash its annual subsidy by billions of euros.
So unpopular are wind turbines that our own Government has just offered 'bribes' to local communities, in the form of lower council tax and electricity bills."
"So riddled with environmental hypocrisy is the lobbying for wind energy that a recent newspaper report exposed the immense human and ecological catastrophe being inflicted on northern China by the extraction of the rare earth minerals needed to make the giant magnets that every turbine in the West uses to generate its power."
"The first is the pretence that turbines are anything other than ludicrously inefficient.
The most glaring dishonesty peddled by the wind industry — and echoed by gullible politicians — is vastly to exaggerate the output of turbines by deliberately talking about them only in terms of their 'capacity', as if this was what they actually produce. Rather, it is the total amount of power they have the capability of producing.
The point about wind, of course, is that it is constantly varying in speed, so that the output of turbines averages out at barely a quarter of their capacity.
This means that the 1,000 megawatts all those 3,500 turbines sited around the country feed on average into the grid is derisory: no more than the output of a single, medium-sized conventional power station.
Furthermore, as they increase in number (the Government wants to see 10,000 more in the next few years) it will, quite farcically, become necessary to build a dozen or more gas-fired power stations, running all the time and emitting CO2, simply to provide instant back-up for when the wind drops."
"The second great lie about wind power is the pretence that it is not a preposterously expensive way to produce electricity. No one would dream of building wind turbines unless they were guaranteed a huge government subsidy.
This comes in the form of the Renewables Obligation Certificate subsidy scheme, paid for through household bills, whereby owners of wind turbines earn an additional £49 for every 'megawatt hour' they produce, and twice that sum for offshore turbines.
This is why so many people are now realising that the wind bonanza — almost entirely dominated in Britain by French, German, Spanish and other foreign-owned firms — is one of the greatest scams of our age.
The third great lie is that this industry is somehow making a vital contribution to 'saving the planet' by cutting our emissions of CO2 – it is not What other industry gets a public subsidy equivalent to 100 or even 200 per cent of the value of what it produces?
We may not be aware of just how much we are pouring into the pockets of the wind developers, because our bills hide this from us — but as ever more turbines are built, this could soon be adding hundreds of pounds a year to our bills.
When a Swedish firm recently opened what is now the world's largest offshore windfarm off the coast of Kent, at a cost of £800million, we were told that its 'capacity' was 300 megawatts, enough to provide 'green' power for tens of thousands of homes.
What we were not told was that its actual output will average only a mere 80 megawatts, a tenth of that supplied by a gas-fired power station — for which we will all be paying a subsidy of £60million a year, or £1.5billion over the 25-year lifespan of the turbines."
"Then, of course, the construction of the turbines generates enormous CO2 emissions as a result of the mining and smelting of the metals used, the carbon-intensive cement needed for their huge concrete foundations, the building of miles of road often needed to move them to the site, and the releasing of immense quantities of CO2 locked up in the peat bogs where many turbines are built."
Transport Secretary Philip Hammond reveals his ignorance of wind power
"The fact is that no one would dream of building these absurdly inefficient machines unless they were guaranteed a 100 per cent subsidy through the Renewables Obligation. This forces electricity companies to buy the power produced by onshore wind at twice the market rate, paid by all of us through our electricity bills. In the case of the offshore turbines that the Government is so keen on, this subsidy is doubled to 200 per cent."
Solar 'Gold Rush' in U.K. May Die With Incentive Roll-Back
"Britain is moving faster than any other European country to contain a surge in solar power and prevent the boom-and-bust seen in Spain and predicted for the Czech Republic. The risk is scaring off the investors who would create the "green jobs" Prime Minister David Cameron is seeking to revive the economy.
"It's going to completely kill the market," said Tim German, renewable energy manager for the local government in Cornwall at the U.K.'s southwest tip. "Investors are starting to get cold feet."
The Dutch lose faith in windmills
"The new Dutch right-wing government has announced a radical overhaul of Dutch energy policy. It is cutting subsidies for most forms of renewable energy drastically, and is even putting an end to all subsidies for offshore wind, solar power and largescale biomass. It has also announced a warm welcome for new nuclear power stations – the first time a Dutch government has done so since the Chernobyl-disaster in 1986."
The Dutch lose faith in windmills
"It was probably the huge subsidy allocated to a 600 MW offshore wind park by the previous government that induced the new Dutch cabinet to make some drastic changes in the existing subsidy scheme for renewable energy. In May 2010, the previous government announced that the German wind power developer Bard Engineering will receive a whopping (maximum) subsidy of €4.5 billion from the Dutch taxpayer to build two 300 MW offshore wind parks off the country's northern coast. The new right-wing government, a coalition of the liberal party VVD and the Christian-Democrats CDA, supported by the anti-islam party PVV, decided they would not make the same mistake. During the election campaign, the new Prime Minister, Mark Rutte of the Liberals, had been cynical about the large government support for wind power. 'Windmills turn on subsidies', he had said.
Thus, when on 30 November, the new Minister of Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation, heavyweight Maxime Verhagen, a Christian-Democrat, unveiled the new government's policy on renewable energy, it was no surprise that this included a large cutback of green subsidies: from about €4 billion a year to just €1.5 billion. The new scheme is more than a cutback, though – it also aims at a radical overhaul of the existing methodology behind the allocation of subsidies. The plan intends to reward and stimulate "efficient" (cheap) forms of renewable energy, such as onshore wind power, and does not support relatively inefficient (expensive) renewables, such as offshore wind."
Northern New Brunswick wind turbines frozen solid
"A $200-million wind farm in northern New Brunswick is frozen solid, cutting off a potential supply of renewable energy for NB Power.
The 25-kilometre stretch of wind turbines, located 70 kilometres northwest of Bathurst, N.B. has been completely shutdown for several weeks due to heavy ice covering the blades."
Why Wind Won't Work -The social and economic impacts of rural wind farms.
"Wind power is very dilute, and thus a large area of land is required to gather significant energy. Wind energy needs a wide network of roads, transmission lines and turbines which degrades any area containing wind farms. It has a huge land footprint.
The operating characteristics of turbine and generator mean that only a small part of wind energy can be captured.
Wind power is also intermittent, unreliable and hard to predict. Therefore large backup or storage systems are required. This adds to the capital and operating costs and increases the instability of the network.
Wind farms are uniformly hated by neighbours and will not be willingly accepted without heavy compensation payments. Their noise, flicker, fire risk and disturbing effect on domestic and wild animals are well documented.
The wind is free but wind power is far from it. Its cost is far above all conventional methods of generating electricity. Either taxpayers or consumers will pay this bill."
"The blades can only extract part of the energy, thus slowing down the wind in the process. The maximum proportion of the energy that can be extracted by a perfect propeller in a perfect wind is given by the Betz limit and that limit is about 59%. This is referred to as the Power Co-efficient. In the real world the very best turbines in an ideal wind could maybe peak at about 50%. Most large wind turbines built today have a Power Coefficient (PC) of no more than 37%.
If the wind speed is higher or lower than ideal, the PC will be lower. If the wind blows too fast, much kinetic energy slips between the blades and is lost. And in very high winds, the turbines are shut down completely so they do not shake themselves to bits.
But that is not the end of the weaknesses of wind power generation.
The spinning turbine has to be converted into electrical energy at each turbine. This is done using an electric generator. Electrical generators have been used for over 100 years so their technology is mature and their performance well known.
Electric generators achieve maximum efficiency at their design capacity. This is planned to suit the "average" wind speed, and the generator produces maximum safe output at this speed. If the wind drops, so does the power generated. If the wind rises, the energy generated is limited to the design capacity of the generator (by varying the pitch of the blades) and at some point the generator is shut down to prevent burnout. So the generator cuts off all the high-energy infrequent wind, in order to capture the maximum energy from the winds expected by the turbine designers at that location. These unavoidable operating characteristics of the turbine also reduce the power generated."
You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows
"In percentage terms, how much electricity do Britain's 3,150 wind turbines supply to the National Grid?
Is it: a) five per cent; b) ten per cent; or c) 20 per cent? Come on, I'm going to have to hurry you. No conferring.
Time's up. The correct answer is: none of the above. Yesterday afternoon, the figure was just 1.6 per cent, according to the official website of the wholesale electricity market.
Over the past three weeks, with demand for power at record levels because of the freezing weather, there have been days when the contribution of our forests of wind turbines has been precisely nothing.
It gets better. As the temperature has plummeted, the turbines have had to be heated to prevent them seizing up. Consequently, they have been consuming more electricity than they generate.
Even on a good day they rarely work above a quarter of their theoretical capacity. And in high winds they have to be switched off altogether to prevent damage.
At best, the combined output of these monstrosities is equal only to that of a single, medium-sized, gas-fired power station."
Wind power heat warning
"WIND power should not be relied on to guarantee electricity supply during hot days, experts say.
Wind turbines operate at less than three per cent of their total generation in hot weather because limits to prevent overheating and a lack of wind can stifle their output when temperatures soar past 35C.
The State Government and the Australian Energy Market Operator yesterday revealed there would be enough electricity in SA today to meet demand and loadshedding and blackouts would not occur from a lack of power. However, AEMO statistics show the amount of electricity generated by wind turbines in hot weather falls to a bare minimum.
"The reduction in wind generation during peak periods, or at the hottest times of the day, is partially attributed to limits placed on some turbines at high temperatures to prevent overheating," an AEMO spokeswoman said."
This one is 3 years old but an actual and interesting example of the consequences of the unreliability of wind power when most needed.
Loss of wind causes Texas power grid emergency
HOUSTON (Reuters) – A drop in wind generation late on Tuesday, coupled with colder weather, triggered an electric emergency that caused the Texas grid operator to cut service to some large customers, the grid agency said on Wednesday.
Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) said a decline in wind energy production in west Texas occurred at the same time evening electric demand was building as colder temperatures moved into the state."
Wind power gets bent out of shape in Wyoming
"Combine cold temperatures that make steel brittle along with gusty winds, and you have a Titanic recipe for disaster. For those that will argue that I'm being unfair to the promise of wind power, I welcome you to provide photos of any power plant in the USA that has been collapsed due to weather. Downed power poles sure, but power sources?"
Fire in the Sky – The bushfire threat from wind generators.
"In the case of wind generators if there is a measurable likelihood of fires occurring and
with the lack of constant supervision of such high energy equipment it would be a real expectation that the owners of the generators would be liable for all the fire damage, which could reach into the billions if they caused fires on days of extreme fire danger."
"It has been reported that about 20 turbines catch fire and burn each year. The global total number of turbines appears to be around 68 000. All these figures are World Wide Web data and some from Wikipedia. They provide a rough guide to quantifying the bushfire risk but should not be taken as definitive. Applying the global data to the 2000 or so turbines installed in Australia we would expect a 60% probability of one turbine fire each year."
Wind farms becalmed just when needed the most
"Despite high demand for electricity as people shivered at home over Christmas, most of the 3,000 wind turbines around Britain stood still due to a lack of wind.
Even yesterday, when conditions were slightly breezier, wind farms generated just 1.8 per cent of the nation's electricity — less than a third of usual levels.
The failure of wind farms to function at full tilt during December forced energy suppliers to rely on coal-fired power stations to keep the lights on — meaning more greenhouse gases were produced. "
Britain's offshore windpower costs twice as much as coal and gas generated electricity
"Off shore wind farms cost twice as much to produce electricity as gas and coal powered stations and will need subsidies for at least 20 years, a major report warns.
But costs of building the farms have doubled due to spiralling prices for steel and the drop in the value of the pound.
The running costs are also increasing.
The report found that costs have risen for all kinds of generation but off shore wind farms remain by far the most expensive – 90 per cent more than fossil fuel generators and 50 per cent more than nuclear. "
Revealed: Wind farm power twice as costly as gas or coal
"The report, from the UK Energy Research Centre – a Government funded academic think tank – said the costs of offshore wind power were underestimated in the mid-2000s.
Instead of costs falling as predicted, in the last five years the cost of buying and installing turbines and towers at sea has gone up by 51 per cent.
Once the bill for building and maintaining an offshore wind farm is spread over the 25-year lifespan of a typical farm, each kilowatt hour of electricity now costs 15p.
That's nearly twice as expensive as electricity from conventional coal and gas power stations, which costs 8p a unit, and more than nuclear, which costs 10p a unit. "
"The true cost of wind is likely to be much higher than the 15p a unit outlined in the report.
Because wind is intermittent, the National Grid is forced to rely on a fleet of gas and coal power stations to back up the supply when the wind fails. "
Wind Integration Realities: The Bentek Study for Texas (Part I – IV)
"In summary, the Netherlands experience is that at wind penetration of about 3% the fossil fuel and CO2 emissions saving is reduced to zero. As wind penetration is increased, the Colorado and Texas experience shows that the savings become negative, that is, fossil fuel and CO2 emissions are increased."
Solare, Oh No
"Nicht ganz so drastisch wie bei der Sonnen- soll der Schnitt bei der Windenergie sein: Hier soll die Förderung um 22 Prozent gekürzt werden, allerdings auch rückwirkend für bereits in Betrieb befindliche Anlagen. Das Signal wäre auch hier fatal: Verlässliche Investitionspläne würden unmöglich, wenn die Regierung sich die Neudefinition der Fördersätze nach eigenem Gutdünken vorbehält."
Germany cuts solar subsidies by up to 15 pct
"German lawmakers passed on Thursday a law cutting solar power subsidies by up to 15 percent from this summer, six months earlier than originally planned, dealing a blow to the world's biggest photovoltaic market.
The lower parliamentary house voted to introduce the cuts for roof installations from July and for ground-based cell assemblies from September."
Austerity pulling plug on Europe's green subsidies
"The Spanish and Germans are doing it. So are the French. The British might have to do it. Austerity-whacked Europe is rolling back subsidies for renewable energy as economic sanity makes a tentative comeback. Green energy is becoming unaffordable and may cost as many jobs as it creates."
"Sunny Spain became the world's top solar power producer. Since 2002, about €23-billion has been invested in Spain's photovoltaic (PV) industry, which sucked up €2.7-billion in subsidies in 2009 alone, or more than 40 per cent of the freebies doled out to the country's entire renewables sector."
"Renewable energy is fraught with difficulties. In less-sunny climates, PV panels make little sense, though that hasn't stopped Germany and Britain from installing them on rooftops everywhere. Wind power is becoming hugely popular in some parts of the world. But since the wind doesn't always blow, backup power has to be installed. That means consumers have to pay for the capacity twice and the backup power is usually of the fossil-fuel variety. Denmark, which has a reputation as the cleanest of the clean countries, actually generates about half its electricity from coal, the grubbiest fuel. That proportion hasn't varied in a decade in spite of the country's relentless pursuit of wind power."
Mafia's new tactics: putting dirty money into clean energy
ROME — The seizure of a record 1.5 billion euros from a Sicilian businessman known as "Lord of the Wind" has put the spotlight on Mafia money-laundering through renewable energy ventures.
"The Mafia use clean energy to invest dirty money," Sicilian journalist Lirio Abbate told AFP after police confiscated the assets from businessman Vito Nicastri on Tuesday.
The haul included no fewer than 43 wind and solar energy companies and around 100 properties including swank villas with swimming pools in Sicily's western Trapani region, along with cars, a catamaran and bank accounts, the interior ministry said.
The infiltration of organised crime into the renewable energy sector is "a combination that is only now coming to light" in terms of legal action, said Abbate, a specialist in Mafia affairs who is under police protection."
Steve Goreham ("Climatism") quotes US and UK electricity generating costs (excluding the cost of carbon permits and the cost of backup generating facilities for wind and solar):
Goreham (p272) also compares the planned London Array offshore wind field with the planned Kingsnorth Coal fired plant and concludes:
"The wind turbine array requires 563 times more land than the coal plant and delivers electricity intermittently at twice the cost."
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Ex-Klansman found guilty of manslaughter in �64 slayings - Crime & Punishment - MSNBC.com
You can ignore the entire story except for the last paragraph on page 2. This is possibly the most ignorant statement I've ever seen.
Tuesday, June 21, 2005
Posted by OH Bee Juan at 2:21 PM
1 comments:
Mrs. B
You know, whenever someone says "that's the most _____ I've ever seen" or "that's the ____est thing ever," I tend to have my doubts. Usually, when people say that, it's hyperbole.
However, in this case, I will agree. That is probably the most ignorant statement I've ever seen.
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LAST week, Facebook filed documents with the government that will allow it to sell shares of stock to the public. It is estimated to be worth at least $75 billion. But unlike other big-ticket corporations, it doesn't have an inventory of widgets or gadgets, cars or phones. Facebook's inventory consists of personal data — yours and mine.
Facebook makes money by selling ad space to companies that want to reach us. Advertisers choose key words or details — like relationship status, location, activities, favorite books and employment — and then Facebook runs the ads for the targeted subset of its 845 million users. If you indicate that you like cupcakes, live in a certain neighborhood and have invited friends over, expect an ad from a nearby bakery to appear on your page. The magnitude of online information Facebook has available about each of us for targeted marketing is stunning. In Europe, laws give people the right to know what data companies have about them, but that is not the case in the United States.
Facebook made $3.2 billion in advertising revenue last year, 85 percent of its total revenue. Yet Facebook's inventory of data and its revenue from advertising are small potatoes compared to some others. Google took in more than 10 times as much, with an estimated $36.5 billion in advertising revenue in 2011, by analyzing what people sent over Gmail and what they searched on the Web, and then using that data to sell ads. Hundreds of other companies have also staked claims on people's online data by depositing software called cookies or other tracking mechanisms on people's computers and in their browsers. If you've mentioned anxiety in an e-mail, done a Google search for "stress" or started using an online medical diary that lets you monitor your mood, expect ads for medications and services to treat your anxiety.
Ads that pop up on your screen might seem useful, or at worst, a nuisance. But they are much more than that. The bits and bytes about your life can easily be used against you. Whether you can obtain a job, credit or insurance can be based on your digital doppelgänger — and you may never know why you've been turned down.
Material mined online has been used against people battling for child custody or defending themselves in criminal cases. LexisNexis has a product called Accurint for Law Enforcement, which gives government agents information about what people do on social networks. The Internal Revenue Service searches Facebook and MySpace for evidence of tax evaders' income and whereabouts, and United States Citizenship and Immigration Services has been known to scrutinize photos and posts to confirm family relationships or weed out sham marriages. Employers sometimes decide whether to hire people based on their online profiles, with one study indicating that 70 percent of recruiters and human resource professionals in the United States have rejected candidates based on data found online. A company called Spokeo gathers online data for employers, the public and anyone else who wants it. The company even posts ads urging "HR Recruiters — Click Here Now!" and asking women to submit their boyfriends' e-mail addresses for an analysis of their online photos and activities to learn "Is He Cheating on You?"
Stereotyping is alive and well in data aggregation. Your application for credit could be declined not on the basis of your own finances or credit history, but on the basis of aggregate data — what other people whose likes and dislikes are similar to yours have done. If guitar players or divorcing couples are more likely to renege on their credit-card bills, then the fact that you've looked at guitar ads or sent an e-mail to a divorce lawyer might cause a data aggregator to classify you as less credit-worthy. When an Atlanta man returned from his honeymoon, he found that his credit limit had been lowered to $3,800 from $10,800. The switch was not based on anything he had done but on aggregate data. A letter from the company told him, "Other customers who have used their card at establishments where you recently shopped have a poor repayment history with American Express."
Even though laws allow people to challenge false information in credit reports, there are no laws that require data aggregators to reveal what they know about you. If I've Googled "diabetes" for a friend or "date rape drugs" for a mystery I'm writing, data aggregators assume those searches reflect my own health and proclivities. Because no laws regulate what types of data these aggregators can collect, they make their own rules.
In 2007 and 2008, the online advertising company NebuAd contracted with six Internet service providers to install hardware on their networks that monitored users' Internet activities and transmitted that data to NebuAd's servers for analysis and use in marketing. For an average of six months, NebuAd copied every e-mail, Web search or purchase that some 400,000 people sent over the Internet. Other companies, like Healthline Networks Inc., have in-house limits on which private information they will collect. Healthline does not use information about people's searches related to H.I.V., impotence or eating disorders to target ads to people, but it will use information about bipolar disorder, overactive bladder and anxiety, which can be as stigmatizing as the topics on its privacy-protected list.
In the 1970s, a professor of communication studies at Northwestern University named John McKnight popularized the term "redlining" to describe the failure of banks, insurers and other institutions to offer their services to inner city neighborhoods. The term came from the practice of bank officials who drew a red line on a map to indicate where they wouldn't invest. But use of the term expanded to cover a wide array of racially discriminatory practices, such as not offering home loans to African-Americans, even those who were wealthy or middle class.
Now the map used in redlining is not a geographic map, but the map of your travels across the Web. The term Weblining describes the practice of denying people opportunities based on their digital selves. You might be refused health insurance based on a Google search you did about a medical condition. You might be shown a credit card with a lower credit limit, not because of your credit history, but because of your race, sex or ZIP code or the types of Web sites you visit.
Data aggregation has social implications as well. When young people in poor neighborhoods are bombarded with advertisements for trade schools, will they be more likely than others their age to forgo college? And when women are shown articles about celebrities rather than stock market trends, will they be less likely to develop financial savvy? Advertisers are drawing new redlines, limiting people to the roles society expects them to play.
Data aggregators' practices conflict with what people say they want. A 2008 Consumer Reports poll of 2,000 people found that 93 percent thought Internet companies should always ask for permission before using personal information, and 72 percent wanted the right to opt out of online tracking. A study by Princeton Survey Research Associates in 2009 using a random sample of 1,000 people found that 69 percent thought that the United States should adopt a law giving people the right to learn everything a Web site knows about them. We need a do-not-track law, similar to the do-not-call one. Now it's not just about whether my dinner will be interrupted by a telemarketer. It's about whether my dreams will be dashed by the collection of bits and bytes over which I have no control and for which companies are currently unaccountable.


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Developer's Reading List, January 24, 2012 The latest books off the press cover code readability, Java performance, hunting for and prying open security defects, game testing, architecture, and even OpenVMS.
A Bug Hunter's Diary: A Guided Tour Through the Wilds of Software Security
Tobias Klein
No Starch Press
This book, presented in true diary form, aims to show how the author found security exploits in software and hardware. The principal approach he uses is manual static analysis of the code. He reads the source code, as he states, at the point "where user-influenced input data enters the software through an interface to the outside world." He then shows seven defects he found in various operating systems, software, and some hardware (a Tivo player and an iPhone). The explanations are lucid and accompanied by diagrams that give the necessary background to understand exactly why the defect is exploitable and how to do so.
The examples are in C and require you to follow the author carefully through hex address-level discussions to grok the problem. If this is your cup of tea, this will be an entertaining, even fascinating, spelunking through the wilds of low-level, slightly flawed code. Recommended. — Andrew Binstock


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JINDO, South Korea (AP) — A transcript released Sunday shows the South Korean ferry that sank was crippled with confusion and indecision well after it began listing dangerously, possibly adding to a death toll that is officially at 58 but could eventually exceed 300.
Three times in succession, and about half an hour after the ferry Sewol began tilting on Wednesday, a crew member asked Jindo Vessel Traffic Services Center (VTS) whether passengers would be rescued if they abandoned ship off South Korea's southern coast. That followed several statements from the ship that it was impossible for people aboard to even move, and another in which it said it was "impossible to broadcast" instructions.
Many people followed the captain's initial order to stay below deck, where it is feared they remain trapped. About 240 people are still missing.
"Even if it's impossible to broadcast, please go out and let the passengers wear life jackets and put on more clothing," an unidentified VTS official urged at 9:24 a.m., 29 minutes after the Sewol first reported trouble, according to the transcript, released by South Korea's coast guard.
"If this ferry evacuates passengers, will you be able to rescue them?" the unidentified crew member asked.
"At least make them wear life rings and make them escape!" the VTS official responded.
"If this ferry evacuates passengers, will they be rescued right away?" the crew member asked again.
"Don't let them go bare — at least make them wear life rings and make them escape!" the VTS official repeated. "The rescue of human lives from the Sewol ferry ... the captain should make his own decision and evacuate them. We don't know the situation very well. The captain should make the final decision and decide whether you're going to evacuate passengers or not."
"I'm not talking about that," the crew member said. "I asked, if they evacuate now, can they be rescued right away?"
The VTS official then said patrol boats would arrive in 10 minutes, though another civilian ship was already nearby and had told VTS 10 minutes earlier that it would rescue anyone who went overboard.
Only 174 people are known to have survived the sinking of the Sewol, which had been on its way from the South Korean port city of Incheon to the southern island of Jeju. The captain took more than a half hour to issue an evacuation order — an order several passengers have said they never heard.
The confirmed death toll jumped from 33 to 58 within 24 hours as divers, hampered for days by strong currents, bad weather and low visibility, finally found a way inside the sunken vessel. They quickly discovered more than a dozen bodies there in what almost certainly was just the beginning of a massive and grim recovery effort. Some of the bodies found Sunday were recovered outside the ship.
Divers, who once pumped air into the ferry in the slim hope that survivors were inside, have yet to find anyone alive there.
The Sewol sank with 476 people on board, 323 of them students from a high school in Ansan. The 16- and 17-year-old students make up only 75 of the survivors, and about 225 of the missing. At least 23 of those confirmed dead are students, according to coast guard spokesman Kim Jae-in.
A 21-year-old South Korean sailor, surnamed Cho, died from injuries he sustained Wednesday while working on a warship going to help rescue passengers in the ferry, said Cmdr. Yim Myung-soo of the South Korean navy.
The heartbreaking task of recovering the bodies led to yet another: identifying them. Information sheets taped to the walls of a gymnasium on Jindo island where families of the missing are staying listed details of the bodies such as sex, height, length of hair and clothing.
It was too little for Lee Joung-hwa, a friend of a crew member who is among the missing. "If only they could have made some kind of image of the person's face. Who can tell who this person is just by height and weight?" Lee said.
A woman with a blue baseball cap shouted complaints at government officials who were seated nearby, working at their desks. "I can't live like this! I'm so anxious!" she yelled. "How can I trust the police?"
Anguished families of the missing, fearful they might be left without even their loved ones' bodies, expressed their rage over the government's handling of the crisis several times Sunday.
About 100 relatives attempted a long protest march to the presidential Blue House in Seoul, about 400 kilometers (250 miles) to the north, saying they wanted to voice their complaints to President Park Geun-hye. They walked for about six hours before some 200 police officers in neon jackets blocked them from continuing on a main road.
"The government is the killer," they shouted as they pushed against a police barricade.
"We want an answer from the person in charge about why orders are not going through and nothing is being done," said Lee Woon-geun, father of 17-year-old missing passenger Lee Jung-in. "They are clearly lying and kicking the responsibility to others."
Earlier Sunday morning, relatives of the missing blocked the car of Prime Minister Chung Hong-won and demanded a meeting with Park as Chung made a visit to Jindo. Chung later returned to the gymnasium, but met only with a number of representatives of the family members in a side office.
On Sunday evening, dozens of relatives who gathered at the port in Jindo surrounded the fisheries minister, Lee Ju-young. They shouted, swore, yelled threats and pushed him as he was on his way to a meeting with other officials.
Relatives are desperate to retrieve bodies before they decompose beyond recognition, Lee Woon-geun said.
"After four or five days, the body starts to decay. When it's decayed, if you try to hold a hand it might fall off," he said. "I miss my son. I'm really afraid I might not get to find his body."
Park and her Cabinet took a step Sunday to secure funding needed for search and rescue work and relief, designating Jindo county and Ansan city — the students' hometown, south of Seoul — as a special disaster zone, coast guard spokesman Kim said.
The Sewol's captain, Lee Joon-seok, 68, was arrested Saturday, along with one of the ship's three helmsmen and the 25-year-old third mate, on suspicion of negligence and abandoning people in need. The third mate was steering at the time of the accident, in a challenging area where she had not steered before, and the captain said he was not on the bridge at the time. The cause of the sinking is not known, but prosecutors said the ship made a sharp turn before it began to list.
Senior prosecutor Yang Jung-jin said the third mate has refused to tell investigators why she made the sharp turn. He said that she had a "psychological shock" and fainted under questioning, but that she told investigators she did not need medical attention.
Prosecutors have not identified the third mate, but a fellow crew member identified her as Park Han-kyul.
Yang said 30 to 40 people have been barred from leaving South Korea while authorities investigate the sinking.
The captain, as he was taken from court in Mokpo on Saturday, had explained his decision to wait before ordering an evacuation.
"At the time, the current was very strong, the temperature of the ocean water was cold, and I thought that if people left the ferry without (proper) judgment, if they were not wearing a life jacket, and even if they were, they would drift away and face many other difficulties," Lee told reporters. "The rescue boats had not arrived yet, nor were there any civilian fishing ships or other boats nearby at that time."
The Sewol made its first distress call at 8:55 a.m. Wednesday to a different vessel traffic services center on Jeju island; the government released that transcript Friday. "It's impossible to move," the ship told the Jeju VTS at 9 a.m., a message it repeated to the Jindo office.
"I can't move even one foot from where I am. I'm holding the wall, barely standing," the crew member who spoke to the Jindo VTS official said at 9:18 a.m.
By then, a civilian ship was in the area; it told Jindo VTS at 9:14 a.m. that it was ready to help passengers, according to the transcript released Sunday. It is not clear from the transcript whether the Sewol, when it asked about rescue prospects 10 minutes later, realized the civilian ship was nearby.
As the Sewol continued to tilt, the crew member continued to raise questions about the details of an evacuation and rescue. After being told at 9:27 that a helicopter was one minute away, the crew member said, "There are too many passengers. A helicopter is not enough."
At 9:29, the crew member said, "I can see other ships," then asked the Jindo VTS official to tell one of the ships to move from the Sewol's front to its left.
It was not until 9:37 that it was clear to VTS that the ferry had given an order to evacuate: "People are trying to evacuate on their left side. I did broadcast, but it's impossible to move to the left," the crew member said. The ferry's last communication with the official came seconds later.
Associated Press writers Foster Klug, Youkyung Lee, Jung-yoon Choi and Leon Drouin-Keith in Seoul, South Korea, and Minjeong Hong in Jindo contributed to this report.
Sunday, April 20, 2014
Divers Pull Bodies From Sunken Ferry; Toll Tops 50
JINDO, South Korea (AP) — A transcript released Sunday shows the South Korean ferry that sank was crippled with confusion and indecision well after it began listing dangerously, possibly adding to a death toll that is officially at 58 but could eventually exceed 300.
at 12:50:00 PM
Labels: south korea


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I don't know if you came here as you read it on social media, twitter, facebook, google +, stumble upon or anywhere else. thankyou for coming and I hope you like reading this as much as I did.
Why do government agents use two way radios? Because they work! One of the most useful tools I've ever purchased, is my handheld two way radio. I had first bought a couple of them when I was living in New York and was going kind of crazy with the whole prepper thing. I quickly realized they were basically useless because I didn't know anybody else with a two way radio.
That all changed when I got to Keene, New Hampshire, and saw how powerful these devices could be. They were mostly using marine band VHF radios at the time, and I realized I could tune my VHF radio into those frequencies. The libertarian community there uses these radios regularly, along with a group text messaging system they call "Keene 411?. The ability to instantly communicate with other activists proved to be very useful, and built a sense of community and comradery that I have yet to see elsewhere.
They have become so effective at "Robin Hooding" that parking enforcers actually run away from them. They use the radios to track down the parking enforcers, and alert other activists to their location, so they can put coins in parking meters before the meter maid can write a ticket. Additionally, if someone is pulled over, or otherwise harassed by government agents (or anyone else for that matter) you can simply radio for help, and activists will show up with cameras.
At its most basic level, this is so easy to replicate, it's a wonder more people haven't already done it. Just buy a radio for yourself, and encourage a neighbor to do the same, agree on a frequency/channel, and talk. The most difficult part is getting people to buy the radios and monitor them on a regular basis. Once they are in regular use however, once people see their friends using the radios, everybody is going to want one, and they will become a regular part of your daily life.
The question everybody jumps to, is range. "How far can these radios communicate?". There's no easy answer to that question. It depends on frequency, transmit power, interference, topography, antenna type, antenna height, construction, trees, the curvature of the earth, weather, and more variables than I care to list. There's a website that can help you estimate the potential distance of your transmission, called CloudRF. They also make a very useful android app called RFSignal, which I have purchased. This is more for repeaters and towers though, we'll talk about repeaters later.
If you go to Target/Best Buy/Walmart and buy a walkie talkie, it's probably a 22 channel GMRS/FRS radio. This stands for General Mobile Radio Service and Family Radio service, respectively. They will tell you that the radios have a maximum distance of 2 to 50 miles, and that's almost complete nonsense. Unless you have line of sight, as in, no obstacles between you and the person you're communicating with, these radios will not communicate very far at all. I've tried to use them on job sites, and been unable to communicate with coworkers inside the same building.
FRS legally requires no license, is limited to 500 miliwatts, and must have a fixed antenna.
GMRS legally requires an FCC license, which you can purchase for $85, but there is next to zero enforcement on this, and the FCC has proposed to remove the licensing requirement. With an FCC license, you can legally transmit on these frequencies at up to 50 watts, and use pretty much any antenna you like, so long as the antenna is not more than 20 feet above the ground, or above the tree to which the antenna is mounted.
This just in… As I was writing this article, and browsing the FCC website for regulatory information, they shut down the website, because of the government shutdown. Now, they haven't actually gone dark, they just put this silly message on their site. "We regret the disruption, but during the Federal Government-wide shutdown, the FCC is limited to performing duties that are immediately necessary for the safety of life or the protection of property. FCC online systems will not be available until further notice."
The funny thing is, for that message to display, they have to keep their servers up and running, which is what incurs the expense. They just made their content unavailable, I guess to "punish" us for not going along with their incessant demands for greater and greater funding. How childish… Good thing I have absolutely no intention of complying with any FCC regulations, shutdown or no shutdown.
In any case, the radios that you buy in retail stores, while they are capable of communicating on GMRS frequencies, do so under FRS standards. They are half watt radios with fixed antennas, even if you buy a "high power" radio, they usually only transmit at one watt. The upside to these devices is, they are widely available, many people already have them. The downside is, they don't communicate very far, and some of them can be very expensive.
The other type of hand held radio you can buy in some stores is a marine band radio. These are usually 5 watt radios, and will communicate much further than the FRS/GMRS radios. The downside is, these are illegal to use on land, and very few people have them. You also might run into a lot of interference if you live near the water, as I do when I'm in New York, and these radios don't use privacy codes. You can also buy a more high power marine band radio for your home or vehicle, but these will often cost upwards of $200, and transmit at 25 watts.
The ultimate answer, for handhelds, is to buy an open dual band hand held two way radio. I have two of these, a Baofeng UV5R, and a Puxing PX-888k.
These radios transmit at 5 watts on the VHF frequencies, and 4 watts on UHF. You can tune them into the GMRS frequencies, or marine band frequencies. They can use privacy codes to eliminate interference from other radios in the area. They can also use repeaters, which the retail radios cannot.
I prefer the Puxing to the Baofeng, it has some extra features like voice scrambler, the belt clip is also more sturdy, and the newer ones can act as a cross band repeater. The Baofeng however, is a lot cheaper, about half the price.
Either one will suit your purposes just fine. Yes, these are affiliate links, I get paid if you buy them from here. But that's not my motivation for displaying them, I really want more people using these radios. The more of us who have them, the more useful they are.
Once you have the radios, you can manually tune to the frequency you want to use, or you can program in channels. To program channels using a computer you will need a special programming cable, and programming software. The software is free. You can download the Puxing programming software here (Just find your model number). You can download the Baofeng programming software here. Below you will find a link to the programming cable, unless you're using an ad blocking plugin for your browser, in which case, buzz off. This cable will work for both of these radios, and many others as well.
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