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HOTSEAT- Natural history: Mallek runs roots campaign for BOS
A visitor driving across a cattle guard and a meadow, and up a hill to the shaded house on top spies a sprinkler going on the very day the Albemarle Board of Supervisors declares a drought warning forbidding lawn watering. Wow.
Could it be that supervisor candidate Ann Mallek is defying watering restrictions?
Nope. All the irrigation on Mallek's Earlysville farm comes not from public supplies but from water from a lake her parents created on the 187-acre spread in 1959.
Which explains why Mallek's garden is lush with sunflowers, corn, tomatoes, and peppers. A deer fence installed last year assures survival of sweet potatoes through the fall harvest. And you can bet it's organic.
When she first started gardening in 1973 in Amherst, Massachusetts, Mallek was advised to grow only Lincoln peas. "Grow something you can't buy," she recalls a faculty member at U-Mass instructing her. Oh, and be sure to befriend 10 non-gardeners to offload the bounty.
Mallek still remembers that advice, but it wasn't her first foray into country living. The Albemarle native, whose father, Dr. John Huckle, started the Hydraulic Road Animal Hospital, grew up on a farm near Ivy Creek before it became a natural area.
"I guess I was destined to be a natural history teacher," muses Mallek, who serves as an outreach teacher and coordinator at the Virginia Museum of Natural History, still in existence despite losing its building on the corner of University and Emmet a few years ago.
Mallek's challenge to incumbent David Wyant for the White Hall seat on the Board of Supervisors isn't her first run at elective office. In 1974, the same year her mother, Jacquelyn "Babs" Huckle, was appointed to the Albemarle Board of Zoning Appeals, Mallek was appointed to the zoning board in Amherst.
She went on to be elected one of 235 town meeting members in Amherst, "true government of the people," she says. "Politics is not a dirty word there."
Mallek and her dentist husband, Leo, returned to Albemarle in the early 1980s, built their house on family property and raised cattle– and two daughters. She says she's been urged to run for office for the past 10 years.
So why now?
"I didn't think we could wait four more years," she answers. "The changes are so big." And she notes the "huge amount of power" invested in the supervisors.
Mallek didn't expect to enjoy going door-to-door, which is on her agenda this particular afternoon and pretty much every afternoon through early November, and she's surprised at the response she gets.
"People are so grateful to have someone ask them what they think," she says. "They're very concerned about water." She describes meeting a retiree who's lived here all his life and who asked why he has to conserve water when new houses keep getting built.
"The rights of current residents seem to take second place to those of new residents," Mallek says, mentioning Biscuit Run and Crozet, two areas projected for major growth.
What would she have done differently from the current BOS? "When Old Trail came up, not make the number of units two-and-a-half times what they were in the master plan," she says.
Growth is the issue in the supes' race, and protecting the rural area is the board's mantra. Both White Hall candidates are natives who grew up in the rural area, and they'll both be touting their rural creds.
Mallek, a Farm Bureau member, distributes campaign literature that features her on a tractor loading a bale of hay. Even if she weren't running for supervisor, her car would still sport the "Buy fresh, buy local," and "No farms, no food" bumper stickers.
Age: 57
Why here? I returned to my native stomping grounds.
What's worst about living here? Loss of remembered places
Favorite hangout? In the tree house with my grandson
Most overrated virtue? Being perfect
People would be surprised to know: I make lists about everything.
What would you change about yourself? I'd be a better listener.
Proudest accomplishment? Bringing Earlysville people together to fight for their community
People find most annoying about you: I believe that the impossible just takes a little longer.
Whom do you admire? Charlotte Humphris
Favorite book? High Hearts by Rita Mae Brown
Subject that causes you to rant? Soil erosion and sediment in waterways
Biggest 21st-century thrill? Receiving a video of my grandson via email
Biggest 21st-century creep out? Those little tracking chips in everything
What do you drive? Subaru Outback, full of cow feed
In your car CD player right now: Soundtrack to the Gilbert and Sullivan musical The Mikado
Next journey? Costa Rica in February
Most trouble you've ever gotten in? At age five I climbed from the fence onto our old horse and galloped around the field without bridle or saddle. Messing with the horses without supervision was a second offense, as earlier I had showed up in the bath with a horseshoe-shaped bruise on my backside.
Regret: Never lived abroad
Favorite comfort food: Chocolate chips
Always in your refrigerator: Yogurt
Must-see TV: Tour de France
Favorite cartoon: Pogo
Describe a perfect day. Rowing in an eight on Beaver Creek on a cool, breezy day
Walter Mitty fantasy: Riding high-level dressage
Who'd play you in the movie? Katherine Hepburn
Most embarrassing moment? Introducing a friend and using the wrong name
Best advice you ever got? Be polite but stand your ground.
Favorite bumper sticker? Roads: If you build them, cars will come


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Fairway Helps Others Through Fairway CaresNovember 19, 2018 12:00 am
For over 22 years, Fairway Independent Mortgage Corporation has made a strong effort to demonstrate deep care for communities and people. Fairway Cares, the charitable arm of Fairway Independent Mortgage Corporation, uses employee referrals to provide comfort through care packages and financial assistance to those in need.
Whether someone is facing a critical illness, has suffered physical trauma or has lost a loved one, Fairway Cares lends a helping hand to provide care, comfort and support.
In the first half of 2018, Fairway Cares shipped over 400 care packages and approved over $200,000 in financial support. Touching others' lives in the times they need it most is something we can do as a company to support those around us.
I am grateful and proud to work for a company that does so much for so many.

subset: commoncrawl


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An apt feeling, conveying the message of government coercion. But they'll get used to it, even the sensitive ones.
From "At Home: A Short History of Private Life," by Bill Bryson (page 112):
We forget just how painfully dim the world was before electricity. A candle—a good candle—provides barely a hundredth of the illumination of a single 100-watt lightbulb. Open your refrigerator door and you summon forth more light than the total amount enjoyed by most households in the eighteenth century. The world at night for much of history was a very dark place indeed.The world at night for much of history was a very dark place indeed. And history extends into the future, where it may not be so dark, but it is cold and creepy.
Occasionally we can see into the dimness, as it were, when we find descriptions of what was considered sumptuous, as when a guest at a Virginia plantation, Nomini Hall, marveled in his diary how "luminous and splendid" the dining room was during a banquet because seven candles were burning—four on the table and three elsewhere in the room. To him this was a blaze of light. At about the same time, across the ocean in England, a gifted amateur artist named John Harden left a charming set of drawings showing family life at his home, Brathay Hall in Westmorland. What is striking is how little illumination the family expected or required. A typical drawing shows four members sitting companionably at a table sewing or reading by the light of a single candle, and there is no sense of hardship or deprivation, and certainly no sign of the desperate postures of people trying to get a tiny bit of light to fall more productively on a page or piece of embroidery. A Rembrandt drawing, Student at a Table by Candlelight, is actually much closer to the reality. It shows a youth sitting at a table, all but lost in a depth of shadow and gloom that a single candle on the wall beside him cannot begin to penetrate. Yet he has a newspaper. The fact is that people put up with dim evenings because they knew no other kind.


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Material: Screw: Steel tensile strength 12.9, black oxide finish.
Ball: Steel, hardened, bright.
Type A: with full ball.
Type B: with flat-faced ball, to clamp surfaces that are not exactly
Temperature range: -60ºC to +350ºC.
The supplied 3D models, pictures and technical drawings are made with reasonable care.Nevertheless liability is excluded for the accuracy and correctness of this data.
Article ID: 65450310
Back to overview


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The Nature Conservancy is governed as a single, tax-exempt 501(c)(3) organization by a worldwide, volunteer Board of Directors and is managed from its worldwide office in Arlington, Virginia USA. Because the Conservancy is organized as a single organization rather than as separate local legal entities, ultimate responsibility for the operation of The Nature Conservancy lies with its Board of Directors. Although the Board of Directors cannot delegate its broad legal and fiduciary responsibilities, it does delegate responsibility for day-to-day operations to the president and chief executive officer, who in turn delegates responsibilities to his or her executive team.
To achieve the Conservancy's place-based mission, the Board of Directors has established chapters of The Nature Conservancy at the state and country level. Each state and country program is run by a director who manages the program's annual plan and budget in support of the Conservancy's mission and goals. State and country directors are managed through clear reporting channels back to the president and, through the president's office, to the Board of Directors. All U.S. state and several country programs are advised and assisted by volunteer Boards of Trustees. The Boards of Trustees advise chapters on strategic issues, assist in setting goals and, importantly, subject the chapter's work to additional critical thinking.


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We welcome your comments and questions about Big Tickets and how we can best meet your needs.
For common ticket buyer questions visit our ticket buyer support portal.
Big Tickets is based Decatur, GA just outside of Atlanta.
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-James Harrison said he can't mention what he was saying to Houston QB Matt Schaub during the Steelers' 38-17 win. Brett Keisel yelled at him to "quit with the happy feet and step into the throw." It was one of those games for the defense.-
PITTSBURGH -- Statistically, the best bookends in Steelers history sacked quarterbacks 24 times. Kevin Greene-Greg Lloyd did it in 1994, and Joey Porter-Jason Gildon matched it in 2000.
Well, make way for James Harrison-LaMarr Woodley. With four sacks in the opener, the duo is on pace to smash the record before the halfway point of the season.
Pick your poison, Aaron Smith said of the two players. Their pressure was unbelievable.
Harrison had three sacks and Woodley had one Sunday. The latter recovered the formers forced fumble, and the former rolled around the end to force the latters interception. The two led the Steelers to a 38-17 win over the Houston Texans in the opener.
James Harrison and LaMarr Woodley; those guys created a little bit of havoc coming off of the edge, said Steelers Coach Mike Tomlin. Thats why we are optimistic about what we are capable of doing, because of those guys.
Harrison didnt care that he led the NFL with three sacks after the early slate of games had finished. But he does care that he has a legitimate pass-rushing threat on the opposite side of the line.
I guess theyre going to have to give Wood some respect, he said of the first-time starter. He might sneak up on them the first couple weeks, but after that theyre going to have to give him the same respect they give me.
So, that would mean eight sacks a game?
I dont know, Harrison said with a diabolical laugh. Well see.
His laughter died when the Texans touchdown was mentioned. Of course, with the Steelers out to 35-3 lead, the lapse in concentration was understandable.
No, its not understandable, Harrison countered. You should play the best no matter what the score is.
So, what about the Texans field-goal drive of negative four yards?
Ill tell you right now, we were a little hot about that, Harrison said. We wanted a turnover. We wanted to block it. Do something.
Teammates call him Deebo and he brings the kind of intensity Porter and Lloyd brought to the position in the past. Its the kind of intensity that produced three sacks and the two turnovers, or the plays rookie left tackle Duane Brown couldnt stop by holding and tripping Harrison.
The first half, my shoes were messing me up and I was doing a lot of bull-rushing on the tackle, Harrison said. I changed my shoes at halftime and I came back out and went back to the basics: started coming around the corner and slapping the hand and reaching with the other hand. It started working.
It turned into a feeding frenzy. Once the Houston running game was stuffed, the Pittsburgh bookends attacked and made plays.
I told them at one point to let us make some plays, said Brett Keisel. Woodley even stole a fumble from me. Im like, Come on dude, give us a little bit. But those guys are playing great, and when those guys are hot and getting after the quarterback, and were sitting in the middle taking up a couple guys, its fun. Its going to be a fun year.
Keisel added that the defenses total of five sacks came out of a basic approach. Very vanilla, he said. We didnt run any of our stuff, really. We ran less today than we did in training camp. We know we have a lot of tough games coming up. Clevelands coming up. Im sure we could probably use a couple of those nice blitzes for them.
Looks like it's going to be a fun year, especially on D.


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The Bookworm Beat — Waiting for Normal Edition (and Open Thread)
The kids return to school on Wednesday and I have the hope — faint, admittedly, but still the hope — that my life will return to normal then. I'm not complaining about life during the summer. I've enjoyed sleeping in every day, I've enjoyed the freedom from schedules, and I've enjoyed the vitality that comes with having the neighborhood teenagers move into my house.
Still, I like normal too. I like being up and about early, I like that wonderful moment when everyone is gone and the house is mine for six hours, and I like the quiet rhythm that enables me to read, think, and blog. During summer, because my quiet time comes so erratically and lasts so briefly, I cannot seem to get in the groove.
Until normal arrives in my life (assuming it ever does), here are a few interesting links.
Making shocking comparisons about Obama, mainstream media turns racist
What's shocking about WaPo editor Jackson Diehl's post discussing Obama's hubris isn't how mean and angry the tone is. No. What's really terrible is that this WaPo editor is no longer comparing Obama to Lincoln or even Reagan; he's comparing him to George Bush Jr. Wow. That's hate speech.
Thomas Frank : fool or plant
Steven Hayward points out that Thomas Frank's advice for Progressives who want to make conservatives happy is to (a) ignore reality and (b) put into place the kind of agenda that conservatives have sought for decades. Hayward is correct that Frank is either as dumb as a post or a brilliant conservative plant.
The perverse pleasure of getting under a Leftist's skin
One of my liberal friends posted on Facebook the fact that the autopsy report revealed that Michael "Big Mike" Brown, formerly of Ferguson, Missouri, sustained six gunshot wounds, two of which were in the head. He commented that this was an excessive number. His boyfriend chimed in — yes, excessive!
I wrote polite words to the effect that if, solely for the sake of argument, one accepts as true the shooting officer's version of events, six is not an unreasonable number of bullets to put into a huge man who is charging towards you with apparently malevolent intent. Not all shots make their mark and a big man may keep moving long after he's sustained serious, even fatal, injuries.
I added that the "shoot to wound" idea exists only in novels and movies. Real cops — and I've spoken with a few — know that, if the situation is bad enough to merit shooting, you shoot to kill. I got this delightful response, not from my friend, but from his boyfriend:
Sorry . . . that just doesn't match up with the facts as reported. It's nothing less than stupendous how those of you on the lunatic right become apologists for the very same fucking governmental forces you shriek are taking us into "socialism", "tyranny", and whatever other crap you come up with. How pathetic and embarrassing to all Americans. UNfuckingbelievable.
When I went to reply, I saw that my friend had deleted both my comment and his boyfriend's response. I was so delighted with the boyfriend's response, though, that I mischievously re-posted my original comment, adding that it was significant that the shots entered front-to-back and not vice-versa. It now appears one of the shots may have been from back to front, which raises the question of whether that was the first, kill shot, with the others coming as he lay helpless on the ground, or if it was a final shot as his body fell.
I thought it would be lovely to elicit another one of those tirades. When someone is so viciously paranoid, it's nice to tease it out so that all the world can see him for what he really is.
Conservatives don't hate gays
I'm part of a majority! Sixty-eight percent of Republicans would willingly vote for a gay candidate who shared their values. I'm in that 68%. Ever since I've been a child, I've been neither racist, nor homophobic, nor religionist, nor anything else but VALUES-IST. If you share my values, I don't care about whatever else you have going on with you.
I'm also with those conservatives (60%) who would be upset if their children were gay. This isn't because I hate gays, and I wouldn't hate my child. It's because gays are statistically less likely to live lives free from substance abuse, spousal abuse, depression, and suicide. It's also because I've known many gays and their lives tend to be less stable and more inclined to excess than the straight people I know. In other words, it's not the sexual orientation that would disturb me, it's my deep worry as a parent that my child would be setting out on a potentially very unhappy and dangerous life path.
Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel
Edward Snowden, who threw himself into Chinese and Russian hands with suitcases full of NSA secrets, dressed himself up in libertarian patriotism: I'm protecting you, the American people, from your government, he promised. As someone who fears overreaching government, I could fully understand those who argued that he was performing an important public service. But how do you explain away the fact that the vast bulk of data he stole related to national security, not homeland surveillance? It looks as if he may be precisely the type of "patriot" scoundrel Johnson was thinking of when he coined his famous saying — someone who covers up despicable acts by waving the flag.
The Left's selective concern for victims of violence
Bernard Goldberg is singing an old, familiar song, but it certainly deserves a reprise — Leftists, including black Leftists, have no sympathy for blacks killed by blacks, or whites killed by blacks. Their outrage is reserved solely for blacks killed by whites, even though their number is exceptionally small, especially when compared to those blacks who die at the hands of their racial fellows. This outrage, then, has nothing to do with victims of violent crime, and everything to do with fomenting race wars.
That Kung Pao something-or-other was delicious! Now, what did you say was in that dish?
I wonder how Thomas Friedman is going to explain this one away in defending his beloved Chinese communist government: dogs are for eating, says Chinese government.
(Thanks, as always, to Caped Crusader, who has a knack for finding these great images and posters.)


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What is NYSOH?
NY State of Health is an organized marketplace designed to help people shop for and enroll in health insurance coverage. Individuals, families and small businesses can use the Marketplace to help them compare insurance options, calculate costs and select coverage. The Marketplace uses a single application that helps people to check their eligibility for health care programs like Medicaid, Child Health Plus, and the Essential Plan and enroll in these programs if they are eligible. The Marketplace also tells what type of financial assistance is available to applicants to help them afford health insurance purchased through the Marketplace. New Yorkers can complete the Marketplace application online, in-person, or over the phone.
Learn more through these key resources:
- Estimate Financial Help with the Plan Comparison Tool
- Plan Maps
- Find In-Person Enrollment Assistance
- Certified Brokers List
- Videos
- Enrollment Periods and Open Enrollment
- FAQs
- NYS Provider & Health Plan Look-Up
- Materials (like fact sheets) in English
- Materials in Additional Languages
- Customer Service Center: 1-855-355-5777
- Enrollment Data
Marketplace History and Development
Under the federal Affordable Care Act, a Marketplace is required to operate in every state as of October 2013. States have the option to either set up a Marketplace or to allow the federal government to set up a Marketplace in their state. New York has chosen to set up its own Marketplace, called NY State of Health. (Previously, it was called the New York Health Benefit Exchange.) On April 12, 2012, Governor Cuomo issued Executive Order #42 to establish it within the NYS Department of Health. On July 9, 2012 Governor Cuomo submitted a declaration letter to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services confirming New York's intent to establish a State-based Health Plan Marketplace consistent with the Affordable Care Act.
NY State of Health has established five Regional Advisory Committees pursuant to Governor Cuomo's Executive Order No. 42 to provide advice and make recommendations on the establishment and operation of the Marketplace, including recommendations about relevant regional factors. The five Committees represent the following regions of the state: Western NY, Central NY/Finger Lakes, Capital District/Mid-Hudson/Northern NY, New York City/Metro, Long Island. Each committee is comprised of representatives of consumers, small business, health care providers, insurance agents and brokers, labor organizations and other stakeholders.
how to apply sign up apply for medicaid medicade medicad medicaid enrollment


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The only continuous rocker shape in our range created for faster/smoother takes offs, and longer rope lengths in mind. Now comes with 1 new ingredient - Speed Walls. The board with the least amount of resistance in our range - now has even less strain on your body. Extend your boat or cable session with this all around high glide speed new shape.
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People in the News – May/June 2008
James Mueller, executive director of architectural firm KMD Justice, was named to the Correctional News Editorial Advisory Board. As a member of the advisory board, Mueller will assist Correctional News staff with content development, among other contributions. KMD has had more than $270 million in billings during the last five years. Public sector project comprise more than 66 percent of the firms annual work load and about 50 percent of those projects are justice facilities.
Hastings and Chivetta Architects Inc., of St. Louis, a firm that focuses on the municipal, corporate and commercial markets, hired three new projects architects and a construction administrator and promoted Kerry Tutor to construction administrative assistant. John Darwin was hired as a project architect and has nearly 20 years of experience. He will be located in University City, Mo. Michelle Meyer, AIA, was hired as a project architect and will work for the company from Ballwin, Mo. She has more than 20 years of industry experience. James Zavist, AIA, was hired as a project architect and has more than 30 years of experience. He will be based at the company's headquarters. Lorraine Logan joined the firm as a construction administrator and will be responsible for preparing project documentation, research and answering information requests submitted by contractors. She has more than 13 years of industry experience.
Worldwide architectural, engineering and consulting firm HDR Architects Inc. promoted six people in its civic group. Gus Ardura, senior vice president of the Alexandria, Va., office, has more than 34 years of experience management and design of federal, institutional and commercial facilities. He is also the director of federal programs for the company. Steve Riojas was promoted to senior vice president of the San Francisco office for HDR and serves at the western region director of civic marketing. Curt Parde, LEED AP, is now the team leader for the company's civic program in the Dallas office. He focuses on the contract document phases and planning of projects. Don Drakulich was promoted to vice president and is the managing principal in the Tucson, Ariz., office. Elaine Solomon is the vice president of the Phoenix office and is the civic program marketing principal in the southwest region. Larry Hartman, is vice president of the Chicago office.
Stanford Richardson joined Kwame Building Group as project engineer. His primary focus is on preparing historical cost data for projects.
The Milwaukee office of architectural and engineering firm HGA promoted Mark Debrauske, Kevin Kerschbaum and Matthew G. Mikolainis to associated vice president.
Portland, Ore.-based architectural firm Yost Grube Hall hired six new employees: Mick Richmond, AIA, LEED AP; Rocco De Brodt, Christof Knorr; Jeanne Jameson, Philip Krueger and Natalie Davis. The company focuses on civic, corporate and healthcare facilities.
Jim Schwartzkopf received LEED accreditation from the U.S. Green Building Council. He is a vice president for North Branch Construction.
Brijot Imaging Systems Inc., a manufacturer of millimeter-wave systems to detect concealed objects based in Lake Mary, Fla., promoted four employees. Troy Techau was named vice president of business development, Russell Waddill has was named the vice president of sales for North America, and Gary Tryon was promoted to sales manager of Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Christine Willard was appointed the director of marketing and has more than 20 years of experience in technology marketing.
Allsteel Inc., a manufacturer of workplace furniture based in Muscatine, Iowa, hired Allison Blaue-Lennox, as a Business Development Manager. She has more than five years of sales experience and will focus on the north central region. Tim Graves and Maureen Malick were promoted to the position of Business Development Manager. They will be responsible for generating sales within the corporate, postsecondary and government markets.
Solar Semiconductor, of Sunnyvale, Calif., hired Perry G. Hayes as its chief financial officer. Hayes brings more than 32 years of experience in the corporate finance sector to the company, which produces solar photovoltaic technology.
U.S. Products, a manufacturer of carpet and hard-surface flooring and cleaning equipment restoration, hired two employees. Stephen Romero will serve as the company's auto industry account executive and head the new division for the automotive product line. Brian Consolino is the new Eastern regional sales manager.
The Construction Specifications Institute elevated nine members to the status of Fellowship. CSI is a national association that creates standards to improve construction documentation and project delivery. Jim Balboni, CSI; R. Michelle Beard, CSI, CDT, SEGD; R. Michael Hill, CDS, CCS, CCCA, AIA, LEED AP; Duane Johnson, CSI, CDT; Howard Levine, CSI, CDT; Dru Meadows, CSI, CCS, AIA; Mary Nowee, RA, CSI, CCS; Thomas Rauscher, CSI; and Edward Smith, CSI, FAIA, were recognized as fellows after nominated by colleagues and selected by CSI's Jury of Fellows.


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Pentagon Discusses Cancellation of Army Brigade's Iraq Deployment
News in Balance:
WASHINGTON, Oct. 19, 2009 -- An Army brigade slated to deploy to Iraq in January was relieved of its deployment orders this weekend without current plans for a new mission, Pentagon and Army officials said here today.
The 10th Mountain Division's 1st Brigade Combat Team was off-ramped by Army Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, because of the improved security situation there, and not to bolster forces in Afghanistan, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told reporters.
"This [decision] is based on General Odierno's assessment of the security environment in Iraq," Whitman explained. "It reflects the continuing improvements in the ability of the Iraqi security forces to be able to safeguard their people as well as their institutions."
The 3,500 soldiers who make up the brigade will continue training and honing their skills, awaiting a new mission, which is the normal posture for troops in garrison. Pentagon officials have no plans, as of yet, to deploy the brigade to Afghanistan, Whitman said.
The strategy assessment involving Pentagon and White House officials and commanders in Afghanistan still is ongoing, and no decisions for additional troops have been made, he added. Cancellation of the brigade's deployment was a decision about Iraq, the Iraqi security environment and the Iraqi security forces that was "based on the situation in Iraq, not Afghanistan," Whitman said.
The brigade was intended to replace the 30th Heavy Brigade Combat Team, an Army National Guard unit from Clinton, N.C. The North Carolina Guard unit still is expected to return from its 12-month deployment on time in February, which will bring the number of brigade-size units in Iraq to 10. That statistic is subject to any future decisions that could be made about forces needed in Iraq, Whitman said.
About 117,000 U.S. servicemembers are now in Iraq.
(Report by Army Sgt. 1st Class Michael J. Carden, American Forces Press Service.)
Labels: Army, Military, News in Balance, Pentagon, Politics


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20/00394/BOATRN Boat Licence
Marigold MN119
Mr K Finch is applying for a Boat Licence in respect of the above for the period of up to 31 Mar 2021.
The application conforms with all Statutory and Local Authority requirements and all consultations have been undertaken where required. The licence may, therefore, be granted and is submitted for authority to issue under Delegated powers.
Decision type: Non-key
Decision status: Recommendations Approved
Notice of proposed decision first published: 28/07/2020
Decision due: 28 Jul 2020 by Corporate Director (Operations and Delivery)
Contact: Karen Townshend, Licensing Manager Email: firstname.lastname@example.com.


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While summer is typically associated with rest and relaxation, George and his production team have been working tirelessly to provide deserving families with some of our most ambitious home transformations yet.
New George to the Rescue episodes begin airing Saturday, September 15th (see below for regional scheduling info), and we're all excited to showcase beautiful work from our dedicated building and design teams.
For the fall premiere, we collaborated with GTTR veteran contractor Eamon Roche (Roundtable Builders) and designer Frances Herrera (Interiors By Francesca) to renovate a Brooklyn brownstone shared by two sisters named Vonnie and Velma. "V and V" are two of our most spirited rescuees ever, and you'll be equally amazed with the before and after.
U.S. & World
Check out sneak peek footage from this episode's surprise here, and be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram (george2rescue) for more GTTR news and behind the scenes content. We appreciate your social media engagement and continued support!
New York (WNBC) Sat 10AM, 7PM / Sun 12AM
Los Angeles (KNBC) Sun 4:30PM
Chicago (WMAQ) Sun 11:35PM
Philadelphia (WCAU) Sat 10AM
DC (WRC) Sun 1:05AM
Dallas (KXAS) Sat 5PM
San Francisco (KNTV) Sun 5:30AM
Miami (WTVJ) Sun 5:30AM
San Diego (KNSD) Sun 4PM
Hartford (WVIT) Sun 12PM
New England (NECN) Sun 11AM
Atlanta (WXIA) Sun 11:30AM
Minneapolis (KARE) Sun 11AM
Copyright LXTVN - LXTV


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Please see: .41 Long Colt (Original)
The .41 CF Long cartridge is also known in many areas by other names, such as: .41 Long Colt (Original), .41 Center Fire, .41 CF, .41 CF Long.
For complete information on this cartridge, Please See: .41 Long Colt (Original)
Cartridge Details
- Bullet Diameter:
- Neck Diameter:
- 0.403 in" (10.24mm)
- 0.407 in" (10.34mm)
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Central Island is an island in the middle part (as the name implies) of Liberty City, based on Manhattan. Thegeography of the island is identical to that of their real counterparts as the name of each neighborhood, which consists of a total of 4 throughout the island:
Northern Part
Central part
South Part
Central Island district is the longest in Liberty City considered an island, located south of Brix and Island View, west of the other districts of the city and east of New Guernsey. Considering that Liberty City is the counterpart of what would later be Liberty City in the Grand Theft Auto III era, Central Island is the equivalent of Staunton Island sharing many similarities between the two.
See Also
- Staunton Island - 3D Universe Equivalent
- Algonquin - HD Universe Equivalent
Community content is available under CC-BY-SA unless otherwise noted.


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(Phoenix, Ariz. – April 28, 2006) Peter Mohammed Sharma, 71, of Anthem was sentenced today to 12 years in prison on fraud and perjury charges.
Sharma is serving a 10-year sentence for a previous conviction for ID theft and unlawful possession of access devices. The new sentence will run concurrently.
Sharma is one of three identity theft defendants prosecuted by the Attorney General's Office who, after learning of the charges, attempted to file a legal name change to the identity theft victim's name.
Their actions prompted the Attorney General's Office to seek legislation prohibiting defendants from changing their names to avoid criminal charges. Gov. Janet Napolitano signed the bill into law on April 17.
Assistant Attorney General Todd Lawson prosecuted this case.


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The primary goal of these case studies was to understand how ICT relates to educational innovation.
Find out more information and a list of case studies for all schools and countries .
View results from the three United Kingdom schools that took part in the study:
Greenfield College
Highgrove School
Littlejohn School
Related Documents


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Horror in Haiti
'His phone died. We don't know if he is alive.'
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Four days after the Jan. 12 earthquake that destroyed much of Haiti's capital, surprising news made its way to Jean-Claude Jérémie, making him jump from his spot at a camp close to the port. Like hundreds of thousands of his compatriots, he now sleeps outdoors, his home destroyed.
It was news of a phone call.
"The call was from Father Benoit, he was missing since the earthquake, everyone thought he was dead."
"So where was he calling from?" I asked.
"He said 'I am under the concrete, buried here."
Apparently he was unable to reach his hand phone until loosening an arm. The call was made to another parishioner, a friend of Jean-Claude's.
Among the estimated 200,000 killed during the 7.0 quake was Archbishop Joseph Serge Miot, leading some newspaper reports to suggest an apocalypse for the Church in Haiti, where Catholicism and Christianity sit in an uneasy relationship with voodoo, which is practiced by some Haitians.
Some stories insinuate that apparently superstitious Haitians will desert Catholicism in droves, due to the destruction wrought on the once-magnificent Notre Dame Cathedral and the loss of so many religious and devout laypeople. Built in the distinctively French style and painted pink and cream, it rose above the downtown Port-au-Prince, now a sea of rubble and pancaked multistory buildings.
"I try to be a very strong Catholic," said a woman named Joissant. She runs a small street stall downhill from the shattered cathedral, close to a Catholic school. The earthquake took place in the evening, meaning that the children were not inside the half-collapsed school building.
"I looked up at the church", she said. "The top (the 100-feet steeple) was swinging round and round, and ground was going updownupdownupdown. The tower fell, through the roof and down onto the floor."
The cathedral itself now looks like it was shelled. The walls still stand, but the roof collapsed, filling the apse and nave with rubble, and burying unknown numbers of clergy and laypeople.
"There was a choir singing in there when it happened", said Joissant, pointing to an annex at the front of the building.
Behind the cathedral, the archbishop's residence is damaged, though not heavily. Next door to that, the Catholic Radio Soleil is destroyed, with many journalists and staff having been killed inside. The station was right behind the towering cathedral, and was crushed.
German and Dominican Republic rescue workers continue to sift through the rubble, mostly removing dead bodies, but also looking for survivors. Eight days after the disaster, two children were pulled from the wreckage of collapsed buildings elsewhere in the city.
Traveling around the city, however, one sees huge rubble heaps everywhere, many untouched since the disaster. On Tuesday, one week after the earthquake, on the hills overlooking the city, an Israeli team worked to find survivors at a four-story high school. Heavy concrete floors had pulverized the light bricks and apparently sparse steelwork beneath.
The focus is moving from rescue to delivering aid, and this has run into problems as well. The U.S. military controls the international airport, a tiny building with only one runway and capacity to station no more than six cargo aircraft at any one time. The seaport is damaged, and the streets are clogged with rubble and debris. Roaming gangs of armed men and escaped prisoners add to the dangers for distressed, bereaved survivors, and for the aid groups trying to get help to them.
But some rescue work will continue, as people can often survive for days if caught in gaps between large slabs of masonry, with access to water, and even food.
"So did you find Father Benoit?" I asked.
Jérémie answered, "No, he is still in there," as he pointed to the remains of the cathedral.
"Is he still alive?"
"We do not know. His phone battery must have died; we cannot get through to him. We have not heard anything from him in four days."
Simon Roughneen filed this story from Port-au-Prince.


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« Special Ed. Center Proposes Research Priorities | Main | Study Asks: Can High School Students 'Catch' Good Grades? »
School Academic Success and Athletic Commitment Boost Each Other, Study Finds
Guest blog by Bryan Toporek. Cross-posted from Schooled in Sports.
High schools that succeed athletically are not necessarily punting on their academic success, according to an analysis published recently in the Journal of Research in Education.
As it turns out, academic and athletic success may actually be correlated. The authors found that schools which emphasize athletic success and participation also tended to have higher scores on standardized tests and higher graduation rates.
The authors, Jay P. Greene, the head of the department of education reform at the University of Arkansas, and Daniel H. Bowen, a distinguished doctoral fellow of education policy at the university, set out to investigate the link between athletic success and academic success in Ohio high schools.
They weren't initially sure what they'd find. In the introduction of the analysis, the authors theorize that "producing success in one arena" (athletics) might cause a reduced "investment in success in another" (academics). However, they also suggest "the potential for synergies in education," with athletics being able to teach students skills such as self-discipline.
As it turns out, the latter theory appears to be more on target.
The authors examined data from 657 public high schools in Ohio over a five-year span and found that "a school's commitment to athletics is positively related to academic success," according to the analysis. A 10 percentage point increase in a school's overall winning percentage was associated with a 1.3 percentage point increase in an estimate of its high school graduation rate.
Football produced the largest impact of any sport, but each sport analyzed "independently produces a positive, significant effect," the authors found.
The number of sports that each high school offers also appeared to have an effect on academic success. The estimated graduation rate of a high school rose by 0.3 percentage points for every new sport added.
Athletic success also appeared to be correlated with academic proficiency. Increasing a school's overall winning percentage by 10 percentage points was associated with a 0.25 percentage point increase in the number of students achieving academic proficiency or better. Adding one sport increased the number of students reaching academic proficiency by 0.2 of a percentage point, the authors found.
They note in the introduction that previous research has suggested a link between athletic participation and academic success in individual students, but their work aimed to determine the effect of high school athletics on academic success for those who don't participate, also.
"Based on these analyses of Ohio high schools, it appears that there is no necessary trade-off between emphasizing high school athletics and producing academic success," the authors conclude.
They stress, however, that they're not definitively suggesting a causal relationship between success in high school athletics and academics. They allow the possibility that schools with "larger and more successful athletic programs" could have "some other quality that is actually the cause of their academic success," such as organizational competence or effective school leadership.
The authors call for further research into determining whether there is a causal relationship between athletic and academic success. Still, they're confident enough to say, based on their findings, that "winning on the field and winning in the classroom tend to go hand in hand."
Want all the latest K-12 sports news? Follow @SchooledinSport on Twitter.


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Season Spotlight: "Amour"
Posted by Zachary Mandinach on 12.19.2012
"A masterpiece about life, death, and everything in between," writes The New York Times' Manohla Dargis of Michael Haneke's Amour, which, after winning the Palme d'Or in Cannes nearly seven months ago, was finally released in select US cities today.
Such an extended wait has cinephiles anxiously awaiting their chance to see Haneke's latest masterwork—latest because, yes, there have been multiple from the Austrian auteur. If you were to analyze the post-millennial work from the greatest working filmmakers, you would be hard-pressed to find a more impressive selection of work than Haneke's. So far this century, Michael Haneke has made seven films, for which he's claimed two Palme d'Ors (Amour and The White Ribbon), one Best Director award at Cannes (2005's Cache), and a Grand Prix award for The Piano Teacher. So you can understand the anticipation and even impatience of film-lovers (this writer included) after hearing about how truly masterful this latest work is for the better part of a year now.
Yet, even before the film was unanimously selected as the best film at the yearly auteurist celebration in Cannes, great expectations had already mounted. A Haneke film about, as Dargis suggests, life and death, starring two of France's most celebrated actors, Emmanuelle Riva and Jean-Louis Trintignant, the latter of whom had to be coaxed out of retirement to appear in the film? It was a dream come true for cinephiles.
Michael Haneke discusses Amour at a press conference during the 50th New York Film Festival. Photo: Olga Bas
Given the fact that Haneke's previous film, The White Ribbon (NYFF '09), had won the top prize at Cannes just a few years ago, few suspected there would be a repeat. But the mastery of Amour proved undeniable. As The Guardian's Peter Bradshaw's wrote in May, the film is "everything that could have been expected from [Haneke] and more: a moving, terrifying and uncompromising drama of extraordinary intimacy and intelligence."
Five months later, the film made a stop here at the Film Society for the 50th New York Film Festival. The celebrated arrival of Haneke, his third appearance at the NYFF in the past decade, demonstrates the passionate global following Haneke has amassed after churning out one great film after another. Such universal acclaim has persisted into the awards season. Last month, Amour swept the European Film Awards, winning awards for Best Picture, Director, Actor, and Actress. Its accolades aren't restricted by continental boundaries, either. With the Boston Society of Film Critics, the film not only took home the prize for Best Foreign Language Film, but also Best Actress. But in the end, any awards and nominations the film receives will only add to what many believe to be a lasting achievement. As The New York Times' A.O. Scott wrote, after declaring Amour his favorite film of the year, "months after its debut at Cannes, the film already feels permanent."
Accolades (So Far):
Winner: Palme d'Or, Cannes Film Festival
Winner: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, European Film Awards
Winner: Best Foreign Language Film, New York Film Critics Circle
Winner: Best Foreign Language Film, Best Actress, Boston Society of Film Critics Awards
Nominated: Best Foreign Language Film, Golden Globes
Pending: Best Foreign Language Film, Academy Awards (Austrian entry) Shortlist to be announced on Friday, December 21 .
Watch David Poland's "Cannes Sneak" with Michael Haneke for the Film Society:
Watch the NYFF50 press conference for Amour with Michael Haneke:
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One cell does it all: Sensory input to motor output in one worm neuron
Caenorhabditis elegans, with just 302 neurons, has long been considered an ideal model system for the study of the nervous system. New research, however, is suggesting that the worms' "simple" nervous system may be much more complex than originally thought. In a new study of worm locomotion, researchers show that a single type of motor neuron harbors an entire sensorimotor loop.
It's one of the basic tenets of biological research – by studying simple "model" systems, researchers hope to gain insight into the workings of more complex organisms.
Caenorhabditis elegans –tiny, translucent worms with just 302 neurons – have long been studied to understand how a whole nervous system is capable of translating sensory input into motion and behavior.
New research conducted by the laboratory of Aravi Samuel in the Harvard Physics Department and the Center for Brain Sciences, however, is uncovering surprising sophistication in the individual neurons of the worms' "simple" nervous system.
As described in a November 21 paper in Neuron, Dr. Quan Wen, a postdoctoral fellow in the Samuel lab who spearheaded the work, has shown that a single type of neuron in the C. elegans nerve cord (the worm equivalent of the spinal cord) packs both sensory and motor capabilities. The locomotory systems of most creatures, including humans, use different neurons to gather sensory information about animal movement or to send signals to muscle cells. C. elegans encodes an entire sensorimotor loop into one particularly sophisticated type of motor neuron.
"This type of circuit is completely new – this is not the way people think about any motor circuit," Samuel said.
The unusual discovery arose from researchers asking a single, simple question: How does C. elegans organize its movements?
"What sent us down this road was a phenomenon that we've observed in the lab," Samuel explained. "If we place the worms in a wet environment, they will swim. On surfaces, however, they crawl. The question was how the animal 'knew' to do each. The answer had to be feedback – something is telling the worm that it's in a low viscous environment here, and a high viscous environment there.
"The general name for this is proprioceptive feedback," Samuel continued. "It's that process that allows your brain to understand what each of your legs is doing and coordinate your ability to walk, it gives you an awareness of your body posture. The real puzzle in this case, however, was that C. elegans has so few neurons – just 302 – we didn't understanding how proprioceptive feedback could come back into the system."
To test how the worms receive that feedback, the lab turned to remarkable microfluidic devices designed by the laboratory of George Whitesides, the Woodford L. and Ann A. Flowers University Professor in the Harvard Chemistry Department. These microfluidic devices – small machines constructed from soft, silicone rubber – can change shape when inflated with air or liquid, ideal for probing the wiggles of worms.
These cleverly designed devices allowed the scientists, for example, to restrain the movement of the worms' midsection while leaving its head and tail free to move. The results were immediately illuminating – while the worms' heads continued to move, their tails remained immobile.
"That very simple experiment was our first clue to what was going on with the worms' neural system," Samuel said. "Basically, the tail is detecting the bending of the middle and then bending. By holding it still, we're interrupting that message."
The finding was surprising, Samuel said, because earlier research had showed that other, similar animals, such as leeches and lamprey, behaved in very different ways.
"If you restrain the middle portions of larger undulatory animals, the head and the tail can move independently," he said. "The role of feedback in bigger animals is simply to coordinate independent rhythmic units. That's not what we see in C. elegans – the tail does not move by itself, feedback is the signal that drives motion itself. The tail cannot move unless the head moves first. By distributing a chain of these sensorimotor reflex arcs along the body, an undulatory wave that starts at the head travels to the tail."
Later tests, in which researchers used microfluidic devices to force the worms' midsection to bend, led to a detailed characterization of this remarkable feedback system in C. elegans.
Definitive proof that the worms' motor neurons can double as sensory neurons was obtained with optogenetics, using genetically-engineered animals with light-sensitive protein that allowed the scientists to activate or inactivate specific cells with focused laser light.
Just as they had in earlier experiments, the worms' tails initially bent in response to movements in their midsections. When hit by a laser, however, the neurons controlling such movement were inactivated, causing the animals' tails to stay locked in a single position.
"That proves that the whole sensorimotor loop is contained in these neurons," Samuel said. "One of the general rules of biology is that the fewer neurons a creature has, the 'smarter' each neuron has to be. With just 302 neurons, each neuron in the worm can become incredibly sophisticated."
"This role of proprioceptive feedback and how it helps organize the movements of this animal, it's an entirely new principle of locomotory control," he continued. "This research shows that all that functionality is in the motor circuit. The head doesn't have to tell every segment of the body what to do, it can just give a master command, and the rest of the body follows through local sensorimotor interactions."
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Official OS version 184.108.40.2069 has been released for the Bold 9790 from WIND Mobile. If you have a Bold 9790 its time once again to get out that USB cord and give your device a fresh OS. And as always, please remember to let us know about any findings/fixes.
Note: The Software Platform and Applications version numbers can be found under Options-About screen on the handheld.


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Court Management Software Market 2019 Global Outlook by Players – MicroPact, Microsoft, Equivant, Relativity
Global Court Management Software Market 2019 by Manufacturers, Countries, Type and Application, Forecast to 2023
Recently published market study research titled Global Court Management Software Market 2019 by Manufacturers, Regions, Type and Application, Forecast to 2024 by MarketandResearch.biz is encapsulated on the basis of estimation of key market segments in the forecast horizon. The report forecast a conclusive study on the specified market, offering an estimation of the overall market size from 2019 to 2024. The market key segments combined with its market share, recent trends, and technologies used in the industry, overview of the key players and geographical augmentation are explained in the report. An extensive analysis covers market growth factors such as market demand and supplier opportunities, drivers, restraints, technological developments and their future impact on the market.
DOWNLOAD FREE SAMPLE REPORT: https://marketandresearch.biz/sample-request/55889
Further in this report, a thorough assessment of the expense, business schemes, business planning, sales, and marketing has been covered. In addition to scanning actions of Court Management Software business decision makers and competitors, the report assesses their policies and aspects. Primary and secondary data collected from various sources is illustrated in the form of tables, pie outlines, figures, and reference diagrams.
The report highlights vital supreme players in the worldwide Court Management Software market :-
Daily Journal Corporation
Hyland Software
Welligent, Inc
Jayhawk Software
On the basis of geography, the Court Management Software market report covers data points for multiple geographies such as North America (United States, Canada and Mexico), Europe (Germany, France, UK, Russia and Italy), Asia-Pacific (China, Japan, Korea, India and Southeast Asia), South America (Brazil, Argentina, Colombia), Middle East and Africa (Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt, Nigeria and South Africa).
ACCESS FULL REPORT: https://marketandresearch.biz/report/55889/global-court-management-software-market-2018-by-manufacturers-countries-type-and-application-forecast-to-2023
Reasons to Buy this Report:
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To assess various perspectives of the market with the help of Porters five forces analysis
Identify the latest developments, market shares, and strategies employed by the major market players
To discover regions that are expected to witness the efficient growth during the forecast period.
Overarching data related to the foremost players in the market are also presented in this research report which includes market share, product offering, new developments and SWOT analysis of the major players. Furthermore, the report expands and formulates market strategies by investing in ultimate partners to influence and traverse business potentials and scope. It adds technological innovations and pinpoints analysis for ever-changing competitive dynamics. Last part of the report describes production, consumption, and rate by product kind and applications forecast year from 2019 to 2024.
Customization of the Report:
This report can be customized to meet the client's requirements. Please connect with our sales team ([email protected]), who will ensure that you get a report that suits your needs.


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A 15-year-old pedestrian, struck by a chauffeur-driven limo carrying NBA star and reality TV fixture Lamar Odom in New York, has reportedly died from his injuries.
A funeral took place for the unidentified teen on Monday, the victim's family confirmed to TMZ.
Odom, who was in town to attend a funeral and shoot a Nike commercial, was traveling through Queens when the accident occurred.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Odom's driver allegedly hit a motorcyclist who then collided into the boy. After the accident, the boy and the motorcyclist were both admitted to Elmhurst Hospital.
U.S. & World
Reports said Odom was attempting to visit a barbershop in his old Jamaica neighborhood at the time of the crash and was sitting in the car's backseat.
Khloe Kardashian, Odom's wife, tweeted "Angels are surrounding me always/ Thank you!!" when she got word that Odom was unharmed. She was not with her husband at the time of the accident.
Selected Reading: New York Daily News, Hollywood Reporter, TMZ


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Dec. 25th, Christmas Caroling at Central Prison
Wednesday, Dec 25th, 10am Christmas Caroling Outside Central Prison- Meet under the railroad trestle on Western Blvd. Enter Boylan Heights through Boylan Ave.
All are invited to the Fr. Charlie Mulholland Catholic Worker House annual Christmas morning witness and caroling at Central Prison at 10 A.M. We will rally around the perimeter of the prison on Christmas morning to sing carols. Drummers will also be there to make a joyful noise. We hold a big Merry Christmas sign and bring the only cheer the inmates get on Christmas (The warden does not allow visiting on Christmas to give more guards the day off). Singing starts around 10 am. Believe me, this is a great way to remember what the season is about. Peace and Blessings, Patrick O'Neill


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What happened?During a heated discussion about what it would take to promote pyjamas to a larger audience, some people got angry with pyjama's main developer and innovator, Luke Leighton. In summary, a few people were not happy with the existing infrastructure used by the project whereas the main developer rather bluntly dismissed the concerns and told people to concentrate on things that really matter instead. Furthermore, Luke told the people that pyjamas is bloody innovative. innovations are disruptive. get used to innovation being disruptive!. . People got really upset and concocted some sort of master plan to prove the world once and for all they were not to be laughed with. Innovation disruptive? They were going to teach Luke about innovation!
The normal procedure when people are not happy with the way an open source project is lead, is to create a fork and let both parties go their own way. This is more or less what happened here too, but with an evil twist (read on, stuff like this doesn't happen every day).
As it turns out Luke Leighton didn't hold the rights to the domain name pyjs.org, and the disgruntled people (at least one of which had admin rights on Luke's server to "help out" with administering it) contacted the rightful owner of the domain, and convinced him to transfer the domain name to the dissidents. Then, suddenly and out of the blue came an [[ANNOUNCEMENT]] on the (now defunct) pyjamas-devel mailing list (although to be honest there had been a vague hint to it in the past). In the announcement it was said how pyjs.org from now on points to a new location, where the pyjamas source code and wiki can be found on github, and the mailing list has been replaced with mailman3 software, and it was pointed out that Luke Leighton from now on was no longer in charge of the project in its new incarnation. Until today it's not entirely clear if private data has been copied from Luke's server to recreate the mailing list using new software. If that is indeed the case, it might consist of a criminal act (data theft) in at least one of the involved countries, and we may not yet have seen the last of this.
Effects of the hijackingWell, the basic aim of the disgruntled people is to have better infrastructure, to make the project look more mature and attract more developers. How well did they succeed in achieving their goals with their actions? The current state of things for an outsider, at the time of writing 4 days after the facts, is not looking very good to say the least (although the dissidents, I'm sure, will disagree):
- The new and "improved" website lacks basic functionality: most links are broken; the manual is offline; the examples are no longer accessible. Most links in google's archives now point to non-existing pages. Contact links still point to the old defunct mailing list, etc. I assume this will be solved over time, but in a proper transition to new infrastructure, this should have been solved before transitioning. Someone clearly was in a lot of haste to pull off this underhand trick, and apparently all this haste lead to getting very tired, too tired to fix the basic functionality. (And oh the irony of fate! While I'm writing this post, the google groups appear to suffer from very slow reply times. Seems like the shiny new technology has its share of flaws as well...)
- During the recreation of the mailing list under the new ownership with new mailing list software, something went wrong and tens of people who had registered to the mailing list, but had asked not to receive emails (e.g. because they follow the group using an nntp reader via gmane) now suddenly got flooded with emails from the pyjamas list and started sending mails to unsubscribe (which were then received by all the other people who also didn't want to receive emails from the mailing list, who then also started to send unsubscribe mails...) The unsubscription emails didn't work, because the new mailing list software expects different commands (but of course no one had been informed about that), which led to an avalanche of "please unsubscribe me" and "please stop unsubscribing" messages, and eventually to killing off the mailing list, and creating a new one here. Looking at the number of people who've subscribed to the new list so far (5 at the time of writing, one of which already made it clear that he doesn't agree to how the changes had been hastily enforced), it would seem that this whole operation is not exactly something a 600+ community of people was waiting for.
- Since the hijacking, only a few individuals have publicly applauded the event. So far, the hijack seems to have happened to serve the interests of those few individuals. No discussion about the matter happened on the mailing lists. No wonder a large part of the existing community is shocked and, frankly, pissed off (including, it seems, many of the current top committers). No matter how many professional tools one uses, without active committers the future of the project looks very uncertain. And with the main developer and innovator basically having been stabbed in the back, it can be expected that he won't be contributing to the project anymore (in the best case he would continue in a fork of his own, perhaps under a new name, but at this moment nothing's certain).
- Corporate users of the framework now consider the whole project to be avoided-at-all-cost. No one in his right mind wants to base a business on a project hijacked by a minority of impulsive hotheads, without clear guarantees for continued development and support.


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The midday sun is high overhead when Captain America steps into the start gate.
The skier is Joel Hunt, dressed in the Captain America suit he wore on Halloween. The fun outfit makes sense: The Wells Fargo Ski Cup is a weekend-long fundraiser at Winter Park for the National Sports Center for the Disabled, and this particular event, the DaVita Corporate Cup, pairs elite racers with disabilities with five-person corporate teams. The results won't count toward Hunt's ultimate goal: becoming a member of the U.S. Paralympic Ski Team and going to the 2014 Paralympics in Russia.
See also:
- Joel Hunt, vet turned ski racer, recounts his struggles: "I wished that I had died in Iraq"
- Video: Joel Hunt, vet-turned-Paralympic hopeful, during pre-skiing slump
Still, big names like Wells Fargo, DaVita and Charles Schwab have paid $5,000 for each of their teams in the race. The pressure is on for pros like Hunt to deliver.
"Joel is a veteran," reports the race announcer. He doesn't go into the details. How, during his three Iraq deployments, Hunt was exposed to more than 100 improvised explosive-device blasts, explosions that left him with a traumatic brain injury that, among other things, has slowly paralyzed his left leg. How, after he was discharged in 2007, he was confined to a wheelchair, struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder. How, until four years ago, he had never even been on skis.
There's no time for Hunt's story. His race is about to begin.
The start gates open and Hunt is off, racing neck and neck with the two other disabled skiers as they weave through the gates on parallel courses. But then, near the bottom, Hunt misses a gate and is disqualified. It's hard enough skiing with a paralyzed left leg, the source of Hunt's skiing disability, hard enough to maneuver through a gate when double vision makes you see multiples. But loud noises also set Hunt off, and the music exploding from the race speakers distracted him.
He pulls to a stop at the bottom of the course, removing his helmet to reveal a hairless dome glistening with sweat. A wispy goatee droops from a disappointed frown. As Hunt stomps through the snow, his ski-boot waddle masks the way he drags his left leg as he walks. Aside from Hunt's eye-blinking tic, there's no hint of his disability, no hint of his wounds. His corporate teammates, drinking cans of Coors by the hospitality tent, lean over the race barrier to offer consolation. "You gotta focus!" one of them teases.
Captain America just smiles.
I'm 29 years old and I feel like I'm 50," said Hunt. It was February 2008, and he and his wife were sitting in an Olive Garden in west Denver, meeting with Andrew Pogany, an investigator for the Washington, D.C.-based National Veterans Legal Services Program. In 2003, Pogany had been accused of cowardice for a breakdown in Iraq. His symptoms were eventually linked to his anti-malarial medication, and he was medically retired and honorably discharged ("The Good Soldier," March 20, 2008). Since then, working out of a Denver office, Pogany had been helping vets untangle the bureaucracy involved with the Department of Defense's medical, military-justice and veterans'-benefits systems. After a few minutes with Hunt, it was clear to Pogany that this was a man who desperately needed help.
Hunt had been medically retired from the Army in October 2007 because of chronic pain in his left foot. The ailment garnered Hunt just a 10 percent disability rating on the Department of Veterans Affairs' 10-to-100 rating system, which meant he didn't qualify for a military pension or health insurance. But it seemed to Hunt that there was much more wrong with him than just a bad leg. He'd been plagued by memory loss and headaches, dizzy spells and blackouts. He couldn't drive anymore, and the only way he could get around was with the help of a cane or in a wheelchair. He was taking a cocktail of fifteen different medications for pain, migraines, seizures, insomnia and survivor's guilt. And yet this potent mix hadn't stopped his thoughts of suicide. "My symptoms keep getting worse and worse and worse," said Hunt, breathing heavily, his Hoosier drawl slurring. "I don't want to be like this forever."
"You have signs of a traumatic brain injury," Pogany replied. "A lot of signs."
Brain injuries caused by head trauma from mortar attacks or roadside bombs have become the signature wounds of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the latter of which began ten years ago this week. Five years ago, Fort Carson was reporting that nearly 18 percent of its soldiers returning from war had suffered a traumatic brain injury, which can lead to a host of lingering psychological and physical symptoms, including cognitive struggles, speech problems, personality changes and loss of limb function. According to 2011 Department of Defense figures, 266,810 soldiers have suffered brain injuries of all kinds since 2000. Many experts suggest that there are tens of thousands more cases that have gone undiagnosed.
At the time that he was talking to Pogany, Hunt was among the undiagnosed. But he seemed to fit the profile for a TBI, considering what he'd gone through during his first two deployments to Iraq, which had come while he was stationed at a U.S. Army base in Bamberg, Germany. An explosive-ordnance disposal technician, Hunt was tasked during both tours with finding and helping to detonate IEDs along "RPG Alley," the violence-plagued roadway between Baghdad and the airport. Even from safe distances, the shockwaves from bombs washed over Hunt and his fellow soldiers with head-rattling force. And not all of the explosions he experienced were part of the plan. Like the time a bomb went off next to the Humvee he was riding in, which made him realize "I wasn't home anymore." Or the time an IED detonated near where Hunt and his fellow specialists were walking, leaving Hunt with a lingering ringing in his skull — and his squad leader in pieces.
After his second rotation, Hunt requested a transfer to Fort Carson. He'd always wanted to go to Colorado, and he'd also heard that he wouldn't be sent back to Iraq if he were stationed here. He was wrong. Although there were fewer bombs during his third deployment, that didn't make this stint any less traumatic. Hunt's left foot started acting up and he began forgetting things. His superiors in Iraq had little sympathy, and he became a target for verbal abuse.
Then Brock, his best friend in Iraq, died. He wasn't with Brock the day the crane malfunctioned, when a chain slipped loose and whipped across his friend's throat. He didn't see what happened with his own eyes — but he could still see it in his head.
Pogany listened to Hunt's story, then laid out a plan: He was going to work on upgrading Hunt's disability rating so that he could get the medical and financial support he needed and deserved. In the meantime, Pogany told him, "You need to give yourself space between what happened in Iraq and what happens now. The only thing you guys should focus on now is your health, your recovery, your return to life. To do the things that you used to enjoy."
But what life was there to return to? What things did he enjoy? Hunt had joined the Army right out of high school, figuring he had no other option. He'd assumed he'd never get accepted by the colleges he'd applied to — although not long after he enlisted, acceptance letters started arriving in the mail.
That's just the kind of kid he was. Growing up in Kokomo, Indiana, Hunt often doubted himself. Even though he was a successful field-goal kicker for the varsity football team, every time he was brought out to the forty-yard line during a game, he'd be thinking to himself, "I don't want to do this, I don't want to do this."
"Everything I did, I found I was scared a little bit in my abilities," Hunt says now. "I lacked confidence."
And in the months following his meeting with Pogany, Hunt's self-confidence continued to falter as his left leg deteriorated. Eventually, he lost all feeling in it. But since he was only 10 percent disabled according to the Army, he didn't qualify for its Wounded Warrior program, which is designed to assist injured soldiers. He learned this when he called Christine Cook, the Denver-based Wounded Warrior advocate. But that didn't stop Cook from advocating on Hunt's behalf, the first of many non-qualifying veterans' cases she'd end up working on from what she called her "covert drawer."
"I learned very quickly that Joel had suffered an injury that had impacted significantly his abilities," says Cook, who retired in 2011 but is still working as an independent soldiers' advocate on a pro bono basis. "He was 'in the trough,' the time when he came out of the military and was still waiting for the VA's exam process for disability compensation. He had no income, and he had bills to pay."
That trough seemed to be getting deeper by the day. After he'd transferred to Fort Carson, Hunt had met a woman through a dating website and they quickly tied the knot, getting married while he was on leave from Iraq. "I wanted someone waiting for me when the bus stopped," he explains. "I didn't want to be the guy who comes home from war and is lucky to have a six-pack in the fridge."
But in truth, he'd married a stranger — and after he left the Army, he found that the stranger wasn't someone he got along with. By late 2007, Hunt and his wife had moved to Denver to be closer to the metro-area VA hospital system, which they'd been told was better suited to helping with Hunt's condition. But he needed help with his home life, too. In March 2008, Hunt's wife was arrested for aggravated assault after she pushed him down the stairs. That was the end of their marriage — and Hunt was left utterly alone.
A few days later, Hunt's parents in Indiana got a call from a representative of the VA. "They said, 'Your son has bottomed out,'" remembers David Hunt, his father. And then the rep said this: "There is no place left but a VA hospital."
His parents weren't going to let that happen. They left Indiana and moved in with their son. They figured that was the best — and maybe only — chance he had. "He was homebound, and he didn't have any friends," his father says. "He never got out, and he had PTSD. The wheelchair kept him confined to a dark place, and he wasn't coming out."
Skiing wasn't for him. That's what Joel Hunt thought in December 2008, when his parents pressured him into attending a three-day ski camp at Breckenridge designed for veterans with TBIs. He'd come a long way since his parents had moved in with him nine months earlier. They'd forced him out of his wheelchair and out on walks — first up and down the street, then around the block. He was even driving again. "He started coming back," says his father. "He was out in society, out in the real world."
But Hunt still had a long way to go until he felt normal. And he didn't think skiing was going to help. "My thought was, 'Screw that. Skiing is for a bunch of snobs who go down a damn mountain and brag about how much money they have,'" he recalls.
But then, clad in a cheap puffy snow jacket he'd bought at a Bass Pro Shop, he got on a pair of skis at Breckenridge — and something clicked. "Hold on," he remembers thinking. "This is like roller skating." He was familiar with that from childhood, and by day three, he was carving. He loved the coldness of being on the slopes, so different from the 125-degree days in Iraq. He loved the egalitarianism of the sport — how when he put on skis, it didn't matter what he looked like or sounded like; he was just like everyone else. And most of all, he loved how racing down the mountain made him feel. "I felt free as a bird," he says. "No one could touch me. For the first time, I was good at something."
At the end of the camp, he turned to his trainer, a young racer, and asked, "With the right motivation, could I race like you?"
The kid just laughed. "No. You're too old."
That was just the sort of motivation Hunt needed.
He called Alfredia Johnson, his military support specialist at Operation TBI Freedom. Part of the nonprofit Rocky Mountain Human Services, Operation TBI Freedom was founded in 2008 to help deal with the unprecedented number of soldiers suffering from head injuries, providing them with counseling, training and benefit-management services. The program also had emergency funds to help clients with various needs. Now Hunt, one of Operation TBI Freedom's first clients, told Johnson he needed a ski pass.
"He shared with me that going down the slopes as fast as he could gave him the greatest sense of freedom he ever had," says Johnson. So she got him a pass to Breckenridge. Hunt was soon well enough for his parents to return to Indiana, well enough to drive himself to and from the ski resort. He used the pass to ski 125 days during the rest of the 2008-'09 season.
The next year, Hunt was determined to enter the National Sports Center for the Disabled's alpine training program at Winter Park. One of the largest outdoor therapeutic recreation programs anywhere, since 1970 the NSCD has been working with children and adults with disabilities, and today from its twin bases at Winter Park and Sports Authority Field at Mile High, it provides more than 3,000 people with athletic opportunities of all kinds. Hunt wanted to participate in the NSCD's elite program, which entailed five-day-a-week training all winter long, but he didn't have the $3,500 needed to cover it. So he turned to another organization for help: the Challenged Athletes Foundation's Operation Rebound program, which helps provide athletic funding for military personnel with disabilities.
Operation Rebound was happy to help, says program manager Nico Marcolongo. "A lot of troops, even if they've never skied before, it's a great outlet," he says. "All these men and women, they are out there serving in combat, and in a millisecond they find themselves missing their limbs or suffering from a traumatic brain injury or paralyzed or blind. And getting out there skiing, they can feel that adrenaline rush again in a healthy way." Not only did Operation Rebound fund Hunt's training, but Marcolongo also scored him some of the best skis around, courtesy of a phone call to Sean Campbell, the U.S. president of Japan-based Ogasaka Ski Company. "He was the underdog," Campbell says of Hunt. "And he put his life on the line for all of us. I wanted to support him as best I could."
Suddenly, Hunt had a major industry sponsor. Hunt and his Ogasaka skis commuted to Winter Park every weekday that season, and the following year he moved up there for the winter. One of two veterans with disabilities in the NSCD elite program, he learned how to navigate changes in snow terrain and fall lines, how to accommodate his double vision and his now completely paralyzed left leg. And unlike when he was in the Army, no one questioned whether Hunt had a disability; medical specialists had confirmed it. A VA doctor had verified his leg paralysis, concluding it was due to his brain injury — although according to Hunt, the connection between the two is not entirely clear. "A TBI is like the AIDS of the '80s," he says. "They are still trying to figure it out." He'd also been diagnosed with PTSD. With this diagnosis and help from Pogany, Cook and other advocates, Hunt successfully upgraded his disability rating to 40 percent, making him eligible for increased benefits.
And there were other benefits, too. After Hunt's divorce, he'd met someone new: Kassie Turgeon. This time, he approached the relationship the right way. They spent months getting to know each other, conversing via e-mail, before getting serious. After they'd been together for a while, Turgeon remarked on something Hunt had been too busy to notice: He no longer needed to rely so much on a cane, and his speech was definitely less slurred. He'd also cut back on his pill consumption. Eventually he was taking just two meds a day. Most important, he wasn't filled with so much self-doubt. "His confidence in himself has grown since he started skiing," Turgeon says now.
Maybe that extra confidence was why, this season, Hunt felt ready to make the move to a new program: the Paralympic Alpine Development Program-Aspen, the first alpine skiing training program associated with the U.S. Paralympics. Since 1988, the Summer and Winter Paralympic Games have followed the regular Olympics games. In the 2010 Winter Paralympics in Vancouver, more than 500 athletes from 44 nations competed in five sports: biathlon, cross-country skiing, wheelchair curling, sledge hockey and alpine skiing. And the Aspen development program is all about getting disabled athletes ready to take home alpine medals in 2014 in Russia.
Hunt hopes to be among the winners. All this season in Aspen, he's been working on racing on the edge of his skis, figuring out on which gate poles he needs to go wide. At times his left leg is such a hassle that he wonders if it would be better to have it removed and race as an amputee, using either a single monoski device or a prosthetic device.
But despite these doubts, his hard work is paying off. Hunt is in the running for the U.S. Paralympic team, as evidenced by the fact that he was just notified that he'll be subjected to regular drug tests by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency. If he skis well enough in certain key races between now and next January, he could be going to Russia as the first Paralympic skier with a TBI.
Barrett Stein, his coach in Aspen, thinks it will happen. "He doesn't give up," he says of Hunt. "He is going and going, and he is skiing so well right now."
The biggest concern, he adds, is that Hunt he might get hurt along the way. "He gives 120 percent every time," says Stein. "He crashes a lot."
Maybe he's scared about what might catch up to him if he ever slows down.
Turn right. Stop. Turn left."
Hunt is navigating a metro Super Target with his service dog, Barrett, while a representative of Freedom Service Dogs follows behind with a clipboard, grading Barrett's ability to steer Hunt through the aisles of lamps and picture frames. It's two days before the start of the Wells Fargo Ski Cup, and Hunt is briefly back in Denver, having left the Aspen training program early in order to squeeze in as many errands as possible before he embarks on a whirlwind tour of ski races, all paid for by Operation Rebound. There's the upcoming fundraiser in Winter Park, for example, followed by events in Park City, Utah; Stowe, Vermont; and Quebec, Canada.
Among his chores is re-certifying his service dog for another year. Freedom Service Dogs paired Hunt and Barrett last March, and since then, they've become inseparable. "That dog is just like a big brother," says Hunt's father, David. "That dog is probably as close to him as anybody I have seen." Like all canines from Freedom Service Dogs, Barrett, a golden retriever-Labrador mix, was a rescue dog trained to work with clients with disabilities. As a puppy, Barrett was stuffed in a pillowcase and thrown in a river, nearly drowning before he was rescued and taken to an animal shelter. On his camouflage-colored harness, Barrett wears a patch emblazoned with one of Hunt's favorite sayings: "Tough times don't last, tough people do."
The same applies to tough dogs.
"Good job," Hunt says to Barrett after he aces the test, having ignored the little kids shouting "Doggie!" from a shopping cart and gently nudging Hunt's hand when he pretends to accidentally let go of his leash. Hunt holds his palm up for a celebratory high-five, and Barrett leaps up and touches it with his nose. Hunt isn't surprised by Barrett's results; the dog does everything well. Thanks to a metal handle attached to his harness, Barrett functions as a four-legged walking cane and positions himself to cushion Hunt if he stumbles during one of his infrequent dizzy spells or blackouts. According to Hunt, Barrett can even iron and fold clothes. And there are other things Barrett does that can't be graded on a certification test. "You can't teach a service dog to deal with someone with PTSD," says Hunt. "You just have to bond with him." When Hunt's at home, Barrett sleeps at the foot of his bed. When he's racing, Barrett waits at the finish line with a friend or colleague, and at night the two share a hotel bed.
Freedom Service Dogs isn't the only non-skiing support program Hunt is using. Last winter, at an NSCD event at Winter Park, he connected with James Ball, founder of the Minnesota nonprofit Tee it Up for the Troops. After hearing Hunt's story, Ball arranged for him to receive a free set of clubs and private golf lessons. "I told him, 'Now there might be another chapter in your life,'" says Ball. "'You might find it on the golf course.'" Hunt took to golf like he'd taken to skiing: The swing of the club and the click of it connecting with the ball reminded him of squeezing the trigger of his old service rifle. By the third day, he was driving the ball to the green.
But even more than golf and skiing, Hunt has embraced his role as an advocate. He doesn't have a job, and spends most of his time volunteering for one organization or another. "My main goal in life other than making the Olympics is to create opportunities for soldiers that didn't exist for me," he says. "Helping people kind of helped me. It built my confidence up."
The once-homebound loner crafted the story of his recovery into a speech, "My Life From the Ski Lift," which he recites at events every chance he gets. "I wished that I had died in Iraq rather than face the difficulties of my situation," he tells his audience. But now, he adds, he hopes to become "the best skier in the world," to show "that if a regular guy like me can make it, anybody can make it."
With a speech like that, Hunt says with a smile, "I make grown men cry."
Hunt volunteers at schools, teaching children about disabilities. As an unpaid liaison for Operation Rebound, he's also arranged veteran excursions ranging from a skydiving trip that made headlines on CNN to a visit to Broncos training camp, where he heard Peyton Manning utter a line that's become another mantra: "Just play well, and the scoreboard will speak for itself." He started an "Operation Freedom" Facebook group to let veterans know about special military memberships at Sam's Club and trips he was organizing to Water World and Comedy Works, to help "individuals who, like me, are trapped in a dark room with no friends, no family and almost giving up on life." And after he realized that his father's longtime introversion and stubbornness were symptoms of PTSD from his military service in Vietnam, he convinced him to get checked out by the VA. David Hunt ended up with a 40 percent disability rating, too.
Seeing where Joel Hunt is now, it's hard for ex-Wounded Warrior Advocate Christine Cook to imagine that this is the same guy who launched her "covert drawer" caseload. "Joel's transition is really almost miraculous," she says. "Who would have thought this three-combat warrior who was blown up countless times would be where he is right now, such a rock star?"
Andrew Pogany agrees that Hunt's recovery since their initial meeting in 2008 has been inspirational. But Hunt's story also illustrates just how much work is often needed to get such soldiers out of their dark place, out of their trough. By this point, he says, Hunt has probably received nearly $250,000 worth of services. "Unfortunately, first we have to find people like Joel. And people have to pretty much work round the clock, on on-on-one assistance with them in navigating the system, in order to overcome the obstacles they will encounter," says Pogany. "It's really sad that people like him have to fight for this. It's a colossal undertaking."
And for Hunt, some obstacles remain.
In 2011, on the day of his wedding to Turgeon, Hunt learned that his mom had pancreatic cancer. He pulled all the strings he could to ensure that she'd be alive to see him receive his Purple Heart, which he'd become eligible for that year when the Pentagon changed the medal's standards to accommodate brain injuries. His efforts paid off: The retired general assigned to pin on Hunt's Purple Heart during a ceremony in early 2012 "looked like I had kicked him in the balls" when Hunt said he wanted his mom to do the honors instead, Hunt remembers. But dealing with his mother's illness and Army bureaucracy was distracting. And at a January 11, 2012, race in New Hampshire, he was so distracted that he crashed, fracturing his T9 vertebra. He was out for the rest of the season.
"With PTSD, it's like eating four candy bars and drinking nine Mountain Dews," he says. Without skiing, and with all that internal energy built up, he fell back into the trough. And one night while Turgeon was working late, Hunt sat on his bed with a full bottle of Percocet in his hand. If Barrett hadn't come over, hadn't put his paw in his lap and looked at him, Hunt says, he probably would have swallowed all the pain meds.
Life has gotten better since then. Learning to play golf has helped, as has working with the Aspen Paralympic training program. And when his mother passed away last October, he recommitted to his goal. "When I started this, I wasn't worried about the Paralympics, just worried about skiing and rehabilitation," he says. "After my mom died, it changed. It's almost like I'm skiing for her. Her dream before she died was for me to go to the Paralympics. And now I don't see it not happening."
But no matter how hard he works, no matter how fast he goes, sometimes a bad dream catches him in the middle of the night. He's in the middle of a field in Iraq, and he sees Brock. When Hunt puts his hand on his friend's shoulder, Brock turns around. His throat is slit open.
"Why did you leave me?" he asks.
Joel Hunt once again steps into the start gate at the Wells Fargo Ski Cup course. This time he's wearing his professional racing outfit, not his Captain America suit. It's the day after the DaVita Corporate Cup, and this race is part of a separate Ski Cup event, the World Disabled Invitational, in which some of the best disabled skiers in the world compete. This isn't the place for Halloween costumes.
This time when the start gates open, Hunt is focused. He doesn't flinch when the racer to his left stumbles. Despite his double vision and bad leg, he hits every gate pole perfectly. But to his right, Serbian racer Jasmin Bambur is even faster. When the two reach the finish line, Bambur is ahead by a fraction of a second.
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But when Turgeon and Barrett, who've been watching from the hospitality tent, meet Hunt at the end of the race, he seems content. Bambur, after all, was a top-ten finisher in the 2010 Paralympic Games, at a time when Hunt had barely begun to ski. Now, three years later, Hunt had nearly beaten him.
And NSCD media-relations staffer approaches: A team of Australian reporters would like to talk to Hunt. "Sure," he says, and walks over to meet them after he finishes autographing his race jersey for the son of a friend. As the reporters shake their heads in disbelief, Hunt offers an abbreviated version of his "My Life From the Ski Lift" speech, the one that makes grown men cry. He has Barrett do his high-five trick, leaping up to touch Hunt's palm as the photographers snap away. And he hands out copies of the official "Joel Hunt" glossy collector's card printed up by Operation Rebound. Hunt made sure his bio on the back included his favorite saying:
"Tough times don't last, tough people do."
"Who would have thought this three-combat warrior who was blown up countless times would be where he is right now, such a rock star?"


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It's Polish Independence Day, and like in any other country, the youngins love celebrating liberty by destroying things. German (?) and Polish "youths" butted heads with (and threw things at) riot cops in Warsaw. Check out the view from above.
Although the whine of the drone is irritating, it sure beats having your skull cracked open by a cop. This is actually a pretty terrific news-gathering tool—can you imagine a tiny, nigh-impossible to destroy camera drone over a battlefield? [YouTube via Reddit, thanks Adrian!]