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For those of you who don't know, Doctor Who is a nerdy British sci-fi show, celebrating its 50th anniversary next month. And whether you've heard of it or not, I can tell you that fans, known as "Whovians", are close to nerdgasm today.
That's because nine episodes that originally ran from 1967 to 1968 have been discovered in Nigeria, restored, and were released today for download on iTunes.
Doctor Who has become more popular over the years, while retaining its challenging premise and imaginative writing, and its quirky title character, the Doctor. While every season produces a new crop of diehard fans, critics dislike its formulaic pattern, cheap special effects and more-than-occasional bad acting.
The newly-discovered shows consist of two complete story lines, nine episodes in all.
They include the classic story, Web of Fear, from 1968, when yetis invade the London Underground. Yes, abominable snowmen running amok on the London subway.
All the episodes feature Patrick Troughton, the second doctor. I say second doctor, because if you didn't know, the doctor regenerates every so often. It's a good way to cycle in fresh acting talent and keep the show going. The BBC just announced the next doctor will be played by Peter Capaldi.
Boston-area fan, Dave Donohue, describes the lengths he and fellow fans went to before now to see the old episodes:
"They were reconstructed as slideshows of stills from the set, and the audio tracks," he said. "For the very early ones - the ones that were lost - it's often more like listening to a radio show."
Actually the shows were lost because the BBC, in its wisdom, destroyed the tapes. It couldn't imagine back then that anyone would want to see them again.
That was, of course, before its new-found popularity among a growing international audience.
But copies were put onto film for global distribution. And that's how these lost episodes ended up in Nigeria and were found.
Phillip Morris is the man who made the discovery. "I wouldn't normally describe myself in the manner that other people do," he said. "They normally describe me as the Indiana Jones of the film world."
Morris is head of "Television International Enterprises and Archives," a company that scours the world for copies of lost shows.
He found these lost episodes of Doctor Who in Nigeria, "just sitting on the shelf. I can remember now seeing a piece of masking tape that said 'Dr Who' on it, and I thought, that's interesting. I pulled the cans down, read the story codes and realized they were missing from the BBC archive."
Fan Dave Donohue hopes this is just the beginning. "I want to hope that this kindles an on-going search, because how many more of these episodes are on some tape or some reel, even just unlabelled, in some relay station somewhere in the world."


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Department of Natural Resources (DNR) officials announced today that various sections of snowmobile trails in Cheboygan, Kent, Mecosta, Montcalm and Ottawa counties will not be groomed due to the extremely large snow drifts blocking the trails. The affected sections of snowmobile trails include:
- Trail #9 from Cheboygan to Mackinaw City, and sections of Trail #9 on the east side of Mullet Lake;
- Trail #5 in parts of Kent, Mecosta and Montcalm counties, from Polk Road to Russell Road; and
- Trail #19 in Ottawa County and Ravenna Township.
Snow drifts as high as 5 feet to 8 feet tall are making it impossible for the grooming equipment to lay down a smooth trail surface. Current grooming equipment is designed to smooth out the trail surface, and not designed for plowing through tightly compacted snow drifts. The DNR and local snowmobile clubs are looking at options to break through the drifts, including bringing in heavy equipment such as front-end loaders and backhoes to remove the drifts. Grooming will commence once trails are sufficiently cleared to allow the grooming equipment to run without getting stuck. Snowmobilers are urged to either avoid these sections of trail, or use extreme caution if riding in these drifted areas. Questions may be directed to Todd Neiss, DNR trails specialist, at 231-775-9727 ext. 6045. Information regarding other snowmobile riding opportunities may be found on the DNR's website at www.michigan.gov/snowmobiling.

subset: commoncrawl


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Kim and Chris Anderson hosted our June meeting at their lovely home in Ballston Spa.
Kim presented on her recent trip to the Dominican Republic. Her trip was sponsored by Fair Trade Towns USA and led her to cacao, coffee, and banana farms.
Chris offered tastings of organic free-trade chocolate products, vino de cacao, cacao marmalade, and free-trade Dominican coffee. Yes, they were all delicious-though some thought the vino de cacao was "too sweet." For more information, visit Mango Tree Imports, the Andersons' store in Ballston Spa.
Thanks to all who attended and for the Andersons for hosting us. Check our calendar for upcoming events.


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Classification for Kingdom
Plantae Down to
Physocarpus opulifolius (L.) Maxim. var. intermedius (Rydb.) B.L. Rob.
Click on names to expand them, and on P for
PLANTS profiles.
Enter a scientific or common name at any rank. The report
will display the kingdom and all descendants leading down to
the name you choose.


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| Acutron
Alpha Electronics
Audio Precision
| Benchmark Media
Dr. Jordon Design
Fluke Corp
Helmut Singer Elektr.
Lindos Electronics
| MJS Electronics AB
Segue data Systems
Sound Level Meter
Understanding Peak
| Wavetek
On the top of this page you can find an overview of all brands that supply measurement devices.
Electronic test equipment (sometimes called "testgear") is used to create signals and capture responses from electronic Devices Under Test (DUTs). In this way, the proper operation of the DUT can be proven or faults in the device can be traced and repaired. Use of electronic test equipment is essential to any serious work on electronics systems.
Practical electronics engineering and assembly requires the use of many different kinds of electronic test equipment ranging from the very simple and inexpensive (such as a test light consisting of just a light bulb and a test lead) to extremely complex and sophisticated such as Automatic Test Equipment.
Generally, more advanced test gear is necessary when developing circuits and systems than is needed when doing production testing or when troubleshooting existing production units in the field.
Types of test equipment
Basic equipment
The following items are used for basic measurement of voltages, currents, and components in the circuit under test.
- Voltmeter (Measures voltage)
- Ohmmeter (Measures resistance)
- Ammeter, e.g. Galvanometer or Milliameter (Measures current)
- Multimeter e.g., VOM (Volt-Ohm-Milliameter) or DVM (Digital "Volt" Meter) (Measures all of the above)
The following are used for stimulus of the circuit under test:
- Power supplies
- Signal generator
- Digital pattern generator
- Pulse generator
The following analyze the response of the circuit under test:
- Oscilloscope (Measures all of the above as they change over time)
- Frequency counter (Measures frequency)
And connecting it all together:
- Test probes
Advanced or less commonly used equipment
- Meters
- Solenoid voltmeter (Wiggy)
- Clamp meter (current transducer)
- Wheatstone bridge (Precisely measures resistance)
- Capacitance meter (Measures capacitance)
- LCR meter (Measures inductance, capacitance, resistance and combinations thereof)
- EMF Meter (Measures Electric and Magnetic Fields)
- Electrometer (Measures charge)
- Solenoid voltmeter (Wiggy)
- Probes
- RF probe
- Signal tracer
- RF probe
- Analyzers
- Logic analyzer (Tests digital circuits)
- Spectrum analyzer (SA) (Measures spectral energy of signals)
- Protocol analyzer (Tests functionality, performance and conformance of protocols)
- Vector signal analyzer (VSA) (Like the SA but it can also perform many more useful digital demodulation functions)
- Time-domain reflectometer for testing integrity of long cables
- Logic analyzer (Tests digital circuits)
- Signal-generating devices
- Signal generator
- Frequency synthesiser
- Function generator
- Digital pattern generator
- Pulse generator
- Signal injector
- Signal generator
Miscellaneous devices
- Continuity tester
- Cable tester
- Hipot tester
- Network analyzer (used to characterize components or complete computer networks)
- Test light
- Transistor tester
- The Energy Detective
An ammeter is a measuring instrument used to measure the electric current in a circuit. Electric currents are measured in amperes (A), hence the name.
The earliest design is the D'Arsonval galvanometer or moving coil ammeter. It uses magnetic deflection, where current passing through a coil causes the coil to move in a magnetic field. The voltage drop across the coil is kept to a minimum to minimize resistance across the ammeter in any circuit into which it is inserted.
Moving iron ammeters use a piece of iron which moves when acted upon by the electromagnetic force of a fixed coil of wire. This type of meter responds to both direct and alternating currents (as opposed to the moving coil ammeter, which works on direct current only).
To measure larger currents, a resistor called a shunt is placed in parallel with the meter. Most of the current flows through the shunt, and only a small fraction flows through the meter. This allows the meter to measure large currents. Traditionally, the meter used with a shunt has a full-scale deflection (FSD) of 50 mV, so shunts are typically designed to produce a voltage drop of 50 mV when carrying their full rated current.
Zero-center ammeters are used for applications requiring current to be measured with both polarities, common in scientific and industrial equipment. Zero-center ammeters are also commonly placed in series with a battery. In this application, the charging of the battery deflects the needle to one side of the scale (commonly, the right side) and the discharging of the battery deflects the needle to the other side.
Digital ammeter designs use an analog to digital converter (ADC) to measure the voltage across the shunt resistor; the digital display is calibrated to read the current through the shunt.
Since the ammeter shunt has a very low resistance, mistakenly wiring the ammeter in parallel with a voltage source will cause a short circuit, at best blowing a fuse, possibly damaging the instrument and wiring, and exposing an observer to injury. In AC circuits, a current transformer converts the magnetic field around a conductor into a small AC current, typically either 1 or 5 Amps at full rated current, that can be easily read by a meter. In a similar way, accurate AC/DC non-contact ammeters have been constructed using Hall effect magnetic field sensors. A portable hand-held clamp-on ammeter is a common tool for maintenance of industrial and commercial electrical equipment, which is temporarily clipped over a wire to measure current.
The Avometer was a British brand multimeter. The most recent version, in production from 1950s until 2008, was the Model 8 Mk 7 by Megger.
It is often called simply an AVO and derives its name from the first letter of the words amperes, volts, ohms. It was conceived by a Post Office engineer Donald Macadie in 1923.
It was by far the best instrument of its kind in the UK from 1923 to at least the 1960s. Almost uniquely for a radio repairman's multimeter it measures alternating current up to 10 A as well as the standard AC and DC voltages up to 1000 V; as an ohmeter it measures from 0.1 up to 200 k in three ranges. The instrument had an accuracy of plusminus 1% of FSD on DC ranges and plusminus 2% on AC ranges. Its maximum current consumption was 50 (corresponding to 20,000 ohms per volt), which was sufficient (in most circuits) to reduce the voltage measurement error, caused by connection of the meter, to an acceptable level. A pair of rotary switches are used to select the range to be measured, being arranged in such a way as to minimise the risk of damage to the instrument should the wrong range be selected. Further protection is provided by an overload cut-out and fuses for each mode. It was a superb example of British radio engineering in its heyday and was found in virtually every radio repair workshop throughout the country and can still be found in regular use.
Despite continuing demand from the customers the production was stopped in 2008 due to increasing problems with suppliers of mechanical parts.
A multimeter or a multitester, also known as a volt/ohm meter or VOM, is an electronic measuring instrument that combines several measurement functions in one unit. A typical multimeter may include features such as the ability to measure voltage, current and resistance. There are two categories of multimeters, analog multimeters (or analogue multimeters in British English) and digital multimeters (often abbreviated DMM or DVOM.)
A multimeter can be a hand-held device useful for basic fault finding and field service work or a bench instrument which can measure to a very high degree of accuracy. They can be used to troubleshoot electrical problems in a wide array of industrial and household devices such as batteries, motor controls, appliances, power supplies, and wiring systems.
Multimeters are available in a wide ranges of features and prices. Cheap multimeters can cost less than US$10, while the top of the line multimeters can cost more than US$5000.
Early Avometer.Scientists originally used galvanometers to measure current. A galvanometer may be wired to measure resistance (given a known voltage source) or voltage (given a fixed resistance). While appropriate for primitive lab use, switching from one setup to another is inconvenient in the field.
Multimeters were invented in the early 1920s as radio receivers and other vacuum tube electronic devices became more common. The invention of the first multimeter is attributed to a Post Office engineer Donald Macadie[1], who became dissatisfied with having to carry many separate instruments required for the maintenance of the telecommunication circuits. Macadie invented a first instrument, which could measure Amps, Volts and Ohms, so the multifunctional meter was then named Avometer. The meter comprised of a galvanometer, voltage and resistance references, and a switch to select appropriate circuit for the input under test.
Macadie took his idea to the Automatic Coil Winder and Electrical Equipment Company (ACWEEC, founded probably in 1923) The first AVO was put on sale in 1923, and although it was initially a DC-only instrument many of its features remained almost unaltered right through to the last Model 8.
As modern systems become more complicated, the multimeter is becoming more complex or may be supplemented by more specialized equipment in a technician's toolkit. For example, where a general-purpose multimeter might only test for short-circuits, conductor resistance and some coarse measure of insulation quality, a modern technician may use a hand-held analyzer to test several parameters in order to validate the performance of a network cable.
Quantities measured
Contemporary multimeters can measure many quantities. The common ones are:
- Voltage in volts.
- Current in amperes.
- Resistance in ohms.
Additionally, multimeters may also measure:
- Capacitance in farads.
- Frequency in hertz
- Duty cycle as a percentage.
- emperature in degrees Celsius or Fahrenheit.
- Conductance in siemens.
- Inductance in henrys
- Audio signal levels in decibels.
Digital multimeters may also include circuits for:
- Continuity that beeps when a circuit conducts.
- Diodes and Transistors
Various sensors can be attached to multimeters to take measurements such as:
- Light level
- Acidity/Alkalinity(pH)
- Wind speed
- Relative humidity
An oscilloscope (commonly abbreviated to scope or O-scope) is a type of electronic test instrument that allows signal voltages to be viewed, usually as a two-dimensional graph of one or more electrical potential differences (vertical axis) plotted as a function of time or of some other voltage (horizontal axis). Although an oscilloscope displays voltage on its vertical axis, any other quantity that can be converted to a voltage can be displayed as well. In most instances, oscilloscopes show events that repeat with either no change, or change slowly. The oscilloscope is one of the most versatile and widely-used electronic instruments.
Oscilloscopes are widely used when it is desired to observe the exact wave shape of an electrical signal. In addition to the amplitude of the signal, an oscilloscope can measure the frequency, show distortion, show the time between two events (such as pulse width or pulse rise time), and show the relative timing of two related signals. Some better modern digital oscilloscopes can analyze and display the spectrum of a repetitive event. Special-purpose oscilloscopes, called spectrum analyzers, have sensitive inputs and can display spectra well into the GHz range. A few oscilloscopes that accept plug-ins can display spectra in the audio range.
Oscilloscopes are used in the sciences, medicine, engineering, telecommunications, and industry. General-purpose instruments are used for maintenance of electronic equipment and laboratory work. Special-purpose oscilloscopes may be used for such purposes as analyzing an automotive ignition system, or to display the waveform of the heartbeat.
Originally all oscilloscopes used cathode ray tubes as their display element and linear amplifiers for signal processing, but modern oscilloscopes can have LCD or LED screens, high-speed analog-to-digital converters and digital signal processors. Although not as commonplace, some oscilloscopes used storage CRTs to capture single events and display them for a limited time. Oscilloscope peripheral modules for general purpose laptop or desktop personal computers use the computer's display, and can turn them into useful and flexible test instruments.
Examples of use
One of the most frequent uses of scopes is troubleshooting malfunctioning electronic equipment. One of the advantages of a scope is that it can graphically show signals: where a voltmeter may show a totally unexpected voltage, a scope may reveal that the circuit is oscillating. In other cases the precise shape or timing of a pulse is important.
In a piece of electronic equipment, for example, the connections between stages (e.g. electronic mixers, electronic oscillators, amplifiers) may be 'probed' for the expected signal, using the scope as a simple signal tracer. If the expected signal is absent or incorrect, some preceding stage of the electronics is not operating correctly. Since most failures occur because of a single faulty component, each measurement can prove that half of the stages of a complex piece of equipment either work, or probably did not cause the fault.
Once the faulty stage is found, further probing can usually tell a skilled technician exactly which component has failed. Once the component is replaced, the unit can be restored to service, or at least the next fault can be isolated. This sort of troubleshooting is typical of radio and TV receivers, as well as audio amplifiers, but can apply to quite-different devices such as electronic motor drives.
Another use is to check newly designed circuitry. Very often a newly designed circuit will misbehave because of design errors, bad voltage levels, electrical noise etc. Digital electronics usually operate from a clock, so a dual-trace scope which shows both the clock signal and a test signal dependent upon the clock is useful. Storage scopes are helpful for "capturing" rare electronic events that cause defective operation.
Another use is for software engineers who must program electronics. Often a scope is the only way to see if the software is running the electronics properly.


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You are Here:
Technical Resources
Natural Resources Assessment
Conservation Effects Assessment Project (CEAP)
Watershed Studies
/ NRCS Special Emphasis Watershed Studies
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Technical Resources
Ten Special Emphasis Watershed studies managed by the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) support the National Assessment component of the Conservation Effects Assessment Project (CEAP). They complement the CEAP National Assessment with in-depth watershed-level studies that address specific resource concerns such as manure management on animal feeding operations, water use on irrigated cropland, drainage management, wildlife habitat and riparian restoration.
The National Agricultural Library maintains a dynamic bibliography cataloging all watershed studies from 2003 to the present.
The Current Research Information System (CRIS) is USDA's documentation and reporting system for ongoing and recently completed research and education projects.
NRCS Home | USDA.gov | Site Map | Civil Rights | FOIA | Plain Writing | Accessibility Statement
Policy and Links| Non-Discrimination Statement | Information Quality | USA.gov | WhiteHouse.gov


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Let $FO$ be first-order logic and $FO^k$ be $k$-variable segment of $FO$, i.e. $FO^k$ has only $k$ variables.
To my understanding, for every sentence $\varphi\in FO$ there exists a sentence $\psi\in FO^2$ such that for all finite structures $\mathfrak{A}$ with linear order it is the case that $\mathfrak{A}\vDash\varphi$ iff $\mathfrak{A}\vDash\psi$.
Is this true? Are there any assumptions about the vocabulary?


text: Gypsy Cattle Drive is high octane gypsy swing with rhythms that borrow from Bluegrass, Latin, Western Swing, Bluegrass, and Celtic music's. The trio was born in Silver Plume Colorado, 2013 and consists of Texas Fiddle Champion Coleman Smith, Texas A&M bass virtuoso Carl Meinecke, and free-skiing guitarist Mark Morris. The group thrives off natural dynamics and energy while keeping a keen sense of musicianship in every song. The strongest aspect of the trio is their ability to take songs to the limit while exploring rhythms and tones from around the world.


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You can preach it, Chip, but I don't think anyone's listening.
As part of the NCAA sanctions levied against Oregon today, the former Ducks coach received an 18-month show-cause penalty that effectively makes him unemployable at the NCAA level until the end of 2014. That's not a problem for Kelly, who is now the coach of the Philadelphia Eagles and would need a catastrophic tenure Philly and/or an incurable itch to return to the college game for the penalty to even apply.
Though Kelly is gone, he did issue the following brief statement on today's decision by the Committee on Infractions:
"I want to apologize to the University of Oregon, all of its current & former players & their fans," Kelly said. "I accept my share of responsibility for the actions that led to the penalties."
Additionally, Kelly once again shot down any notion that the NCAA findings had anything to do with his decision to leave Eugene.
"The NCAA investigation and subsequent ruling had no impact on my decision to leave Oregon," Kelly said via ESPN's Joe Schad.
In April, I wrote that Kelly departing for the NFL without the NCAA in the forefront of his mind wasn't too farfetched. Based on the reaction from many (all?) of you, I was, shall we say, "in the minority" with that line of thought.


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Politico: Romney's the One With an Adviser-Related Libya Problem
Let's see. Who has the bigger problem with Libya and the Middle East? Is it the guy who's in charge with a foreign policy in disarray who has described the first murder of a U.S. ambassador in 33 years a "bump in the road"? Or his presidential campaign challenger Mitt Romney?
If we're to believe Mike Allen, Jim VandeHei, and Politico, it's Romney, where "Romney advisers at odds over Libya" was the only thing visible on my computer screen when I went to the web site's home page at 10 p.m. ET. You have to go almost all the way to the bottom of the home page to see stories about how "at odds" Obama administration advisers have been and still are about the U.S. positions on Libya, terrorism, Israel, and the Middle East during the past several weeks. Several paragraphs from the Romney story, wherein one learns that there really isn't much in the way of conflict, accompanied by yet another round of "the polls say Romney's doomed," follow the jump (bolds are mine):
Advisers to Mitt Romney are split over how broadly and aggressively to attack President Barack Obama for his handling of foreign policy following the death of the U.S. ambassador to Libya, according to top Republicans close to the campaign.
Some aides are arguing that the campaign has been given a huge gift: a new opening to argue White House failure and incompetence. "Across the board – domestic, economic and foreign-policy issues – President Obama has been outmatched by events," said a Romney adviser advocating an aggressive response to the chaos in the Middle East. "He's an observer of events, not a shaper of events. Everywhere you look, he's been outmatched."
… The truth is Romney now finds himself besieged with conflicting advice, internally and externally: Attack Obama harder. Offer a detailed agenda. Pivot to foreign policy. Pivot back to the economy.
Romney's response: Ignore it and stick to the game plan, which does not include any serious, sustained detour into foreign policy. His internal polls show the same thing as Obama's: Voters just don't care much about foreign policy in this election. This is the reason Obama was so quick to drop his attack on Romney for not mentioning the troops or Afghanistan in his convention speech. Voters didn't seem to care.
This is basically the Stuart Stevens doctrine. And regardless of the passionate arguments of some other aides, including several outside foreign-policy advisers, the boss is going with Stevens on this until further notice.
… The Romney advisers who want to exploit the Libya issue call it an opportunity to go all-in on the foreign policy failures as a stand-in for overall failure of the president. "If you're running a campaign and you're failing, then you've got to try to change the subject to something that will help you succeed," one of these advisers said.
The campaign's internal polls of key states show a broad hardening of support for Obama and softening support for Romney. And the campaign expects forthcoming public polls from Ohio, Virginia and Nevada will be terrible for Romney.
Would anyone at Politico want to try to explain, in light of this alleged "hardening" of support for Obama, why the President's approval rating at Gallup in what is supposed to be a three-day rolling average poll has "somehow" dropped by four points in the past two days?
Maybe it's because the Obama administration's self-implosion on foreign policy has finally become sufficiently visible, in which case the old adage that "when your opponent is self-destructing, just stay out of the way" would appear to apply. If so, Team Romney's posture looks appropriate — and Politico is making a mountain out of something that isn't even a molehill.
Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.


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"Styana: A person suffering from languor has no goal, no path to follow and no enthusiasm. His mind and intellect become dull due to inactivity and their faculties rust. Constant flow keeps a mountain stream pure, but water in a ditch stagnates and nothing good can flourish in it. A listless person is like a living corpse for he can concentrate on nothing."
-B.K.S. Iyengar, Light on Yoga, 35th paragraph of the Introduction.
Complacency. Just doing what you are supposed to do. Unexamined experience. Trapped. Without an object for the imagination, we might loll around waiting forever.
A goal can change your world. Even a rediculous one. Reach. It can be a career goal, relationship goal, a creative goal, or maybe a Yogic Goal.
Lacking direction, a dull sensibility, languishing in languor is a block to personally growing through Yoga. Maybe we are "too busy" to address this. There is always a choice. We can always stir the pot. When everything has settled to the bottom in a cooking pot on the stove, it may congeal together and eventually become homogenously charred. So even if there were originally different components making an interesting mix, if left neglected you might end up with a mess. The same might be true for a neglected personality. We can't always expect others to keep us moving, the spoon might not reach down deep enough to keep it interesting.
Set a course. Fly. You don't even have to change a lot to others--or maybe you do. I can't speak for others, I just know that I have more work to do.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone


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Welcome to www.layered-nylons.com - the site dedicated to the sexiest UK and European glamour models teasing you wearing both stockings and pantyhose worn together. It can be stockings and suspenders worn over pantyhose, or pantyhose worn over holdup nylons. This classic, sexy look, provides some amazing patterns when the sheen of the pantyhose and stockings are layered together - providing a unique and sexy look and feel.
Whilst there is some nudity in www.layered-nylons.com - the focus of the site is not nudity, but the stunning effect created when pantyhose and stockings are worn together! The site is updated 4 times a week with a brand new 100% exclusive photo set or video. And as the images come in 4 sizes, the largest being 5,000 pixels in size, and ultra high-resolution HD videos, this layered nylon content will drive any enthusiast crazy!


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Jon Masters
- Email: email@example.com
JonMasters is a software engineer working at Red Hat. At Red Hat, Jon focuses on the RHEL5 and RHEL6 kernels, internal tools, and upstream work on kernel driver infrastructure. He has also been involved with the Real Time (MRG) product. When not working on that stuff, Jon enjoys hiking, unicycling, making music, astronomy, writing books (mostly "Embedded" Linux), and many other things. He is a Fedora user and maintains several packages. Jon would like to see Fedora strive to achieve a balance between being a desktop-friendly modern Linux distribution and remaining true to its roots as a UNIX-like environment also suited to server use. This also means that he would like to see improvements in update policy, and a higher bar to entry for experimental features before they are released to a wider set of the user base (who are not guinea pigs).
For further information, personal blog, etc.: jonmasters.org.


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Since its establishment in 1987, the Central Japan Railway Company (JR Central) has vigorously promoted technological development. July 2002 saw the opening of their newest research centre in Komaki in southern Japan.
With a responsible focus on the environment, the new facility incorporates ecological technology in a number of applications, including solar power, cogeneration and ice storage.
The Situation
The 20 hectare complex in Komaki contains over 12,500 square metres of offi ce space, large-scale test equipment, an outdoor test track, a wind tunnel, a Shinkansen Bullet Train driving simulator as well as global environment conservation facilities.
The global environment conservation facilities were to include a 560kW energy-saving cogeneration system. JR Central wished not only to make a contribution to conserving the global environment, but also to be able to pursue technical development in the fi eld of new energy sources.
The Grundfos Solution
Over 50 multistage CR pumps have been installed, playing an important part in the centre's cogeneration system. In cogeneration, heat energy and electrical or mechanical power is produced from the same fuel in the same facility. Here, waste heat (as in steam) can be used to produce electricity or employed as a heating source.
The Outcome
JR Central presently enjoys low energy consumption, a large amount of free fl oor space and elegant installation where Grundfos is incorporated into their systems.
Grundfos pumps provide high-quality, reliable operation within hot water circulation, as just one example. The vertical pump category furthermore suits the Japanese market well, where land is sparse.
Efficient operation - Energy savings - Integrated system solution
The Central Japan Railway Company (JR Central)
- Effi cient operation
- Energy savings
- Integrated system solution
- 51 CR/CRN pumps
Site designer Takeshi Ushikoshi says: "First of all, the Grundfos CRN multistage pump has an outstanding effi ciency and superior running cost parameters. The high effi ciency suits our energy saving demands. Moreover, designing the pump installations was facilitated by their in-line design, where we also saved valuable fl oor space."
Ha hasonló megoldást keres, vegye fel a kapcsolatot velünk.
Ha hasonló megoldást keres, vegye fel a kapcsolatot velünk.


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When only the best will do for Mother's Day, surprise her with this incredible gift! Large and lush, this bouquet of hot pink roses, pink stargazer lilies and lavender mums is fragrant, feminine and fabulous. What an unforgettable treat when hand-delivered in this exquisite blown glass vase!
This elegant bouquet features hot pink roses, pink stargazer lilies, burgundy stock, lavender cushion spray chrysanthemums, pink snapdragons, spiral eucalyptus, and lemon leaf. Delivered in a Bold Elegance vase.Approximately 19 1/2" W x 24 1/2" H
Orientation: All-Around
The Bouquet you selected can be upgraded by our expert florist.
this is the product detail upsell text
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As Court Fees Rise, The Poor Are Paying The Price
From NPR- All Things Considered
Listen To The Radio Show Here.
In Augusta, Ga., a judge sentenced Tom Barrett to 12 months after he stole a can of beer worth less than $2.
In Ionia, Mich., 19-year-old Kyle Dewitt caught a fish out of season; then a judge sentenced him to three days in jail.
In Grand Rapids, Mich., Stephen Papa, a homeless Iraq War veteran, spent 22 days in jail, not for what he calls his "embarrassing behavior" after he got drunk with friends and climbed into an abandoned building, but because he had only $25 the day he went to court.
The common thread in these cases, and scores more like them, is the jail time wasn't punishment for the crime, but for the failure to pay the increasing fines and fees associated with the criminal justice system.
A yearlong NPR investigation found that the costs of the criminal justice system in the United States are paid increasingly by the defendants and offenders. It's a practice that causes the poor to face harsher treatment than others who commit identical crimes and can afford to pay. Some judges and politicians fear the trend has gone too far.
A state-by-state survey conducted by NPR found that defendants are charged for many government services that were once free, including those that are constitutionally required. For example:
- In at least 43 states and the District of Columbia, defendants can be billed for a public defender.
- In at least 41 states, inmates can be charged room and board for jail and prison stays.
- In at least 44 states, offenders can get billed for their own probation and parole supervision.
- And in all states except Hawaii, and the District of Columbia, there's a fee for the electronic monitoring devices defendants and offenders are ordered to wear.
These fees — which can add up to hundreds or even thousands of dollars — get charged at every step of the system, from the courtroom, to jail, to probation. Defendants and offenders pay for their own arrest warrants, their court-ordered drug and alcohol-abuse treatment and to have their DNA samples collected. They are billed when courts need to modernize their computers. In Washington state, for example, they even get charged a fee for a jury trial — with a 12-person jury costing $250, twice the fee for a six-person jury. (more…)


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I have been experimenting with LXC virtualisation in order to run virtual machines on a dedicated server, but am having trouble setting up the networking properly.
I am using veth bridged networking, as instructed here: http://blog.foaa.de/2010/05/lxc-on-debian-squeeze/ (the guide I used to setup the LXC container)
When I start the container, it functions fine, can access the Internet and accepts incoming connections to it's own IP. However, as soon as I start it, the networking on my host box (dedicated server) goes down completely, and will not come back until the server is rebooted.
The only thing I can think of that would be causing this is incorrectly configured bridging settings, however I'm not sure entirely what the proper ones should be. Any advice on how I could reconfigure this? Thanks.
Both the host node and the container itself are running Debian Squeeze, with packages upgraded to the latest versions.
Host node (dedicated server) network configuration (/etc/network/interfaces):
allow-hotplug eth0
auto br0
iface br0 inet static
bridge_ports eth0
bridge_fd 0
bridge_stp off
bridge_maxwait 0
address 188.8.131.52
netmask 255.255.255.0
network 126.96.36.199
broadcast 22.214.171.124
gateway 126.96.36.199
LXC container network configuration (/etc/network/interfaces):
auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
address 184.108.40.206
netmask 255.255.255.0
broadcast 188.8.131.52
post-up route add 188.8.131.52 dev eth0
post-up route add default gw 184.108.40.206
post-down route del 220.127.116.11 dev eth0
Container network configuration (from LXC config file):
lxc.utsname = paradox
lxc.network.type = veth
lxc.network.flags = up
lxc.network.link = br0
lxc.network.hwaddr = 02:00:00:ba:47:a0
lxc.network.ipv4 = 22.214.171.124


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A little boy named Joey talked a number of times about how his "other mother" had died in a car accident. One night at dinner when he was almost four years old, he stood up in his chair and appeared pale as he looked intently at his mother and said, "You are not my family—my family is dead." Joey cried quietly for a minute as a tear rolled down his cheek, then sat back down and continued with his meal. His parents—and their dinner guest—sat stunned.
At the University of Virginia Division of Perceptual Studies, we have investigated over 2,500 cases in which young children reported memories of past lives. Parents frequently ask us for advice on how to handle their children's statements. While each case has individual differences, we can offer some general guidance that may be helpful.
First, it is important to know that these statements do not, by themselves, indicate mental illness. We have talked with many families in which a child claimed to remember another set of parents, another home, or a previous death, and the children rarely show mental health problems. These statements are generally made by children whose development appears to otherwise be just like that of their peers. They can occur in families with a belief in reincarnation or in families where the idea of reincarnation had never been considered before the child began making the statements.
When children talk about a past life, parents are sometimes unsure how to respond. We recommend that parents be open to what their children are reporting. Some of the children show a lot of emotional intensity regarding these issues, and parents should be respectful in listening just as they are with other subjects that their children bring up.
When a child talks about a past life, we suggest that parents avoid asking a lot of pointed questions. This could be upsetting to the child and, more importantly from our standpoint, could lead the child to make up answers to the questions. It would then be difficult or impossible to separate memories from fantasy. We do think it is fine to ask general, open-ended questions such as, "Do you remember anything else?" and it is certainly fine to empathize with a child's statements ("That must have been scary" when, for instance, a child describes a fatal accident).
We encourage parents to write down any statements about a past life that their children make. This is particularly important in cases where the children give enough information so that identifying a deceased individual that they are describing might be possible. In such a situation, having the statements recorded ahead of time would be critical in providing the best evidence that the child actually had experienced memories from a previous life.
At the same time, parents should not become so focused on the statements that they and their children lose sight of the fact that the current life is what is most important now. If children persist in saying they want their old family or old home, it might be helpful to explain that while they may have had another family in a previous life, their current family is the one they have for this life. Parents should acknowledge and value what their children have told them while making clear that the past life is truly in the past. We do not recommend that children undergo past-life regression hypnosis.
Parents are sometimes more upset by the statements than their child is. Hearing a child describe the experience of dying in a painful or difficult way can be hard, but both parent and child can know that the child is safe now in this life. Some parents may be comforted to know that the vast majority of these children stop talking about a previous life by the time they are five to seven years old. This is the age at which children become involved with school and also the age at which they lose their memories of early childhood, and the talk about a past life fades along with those memories. Very rarely, the memories will persist into adolescence or adulthood, though with much less intensity than during the younger years. In many cases, however, as children get older they do not even remember that they ever talked about a past life.
Overall, parents often find children's claims to remember previous lives more remarkable than do the children, for whom the apparent memories are simply part of their experience of life. The children then move on from the memories to lead typical childhoods.
Blog from OpenCenter.org reprinted by permission of the author


text: When self-described "Pinball Amasser" Richard Conger stumbled onto what he believed to be the world's first pinball machine, it was sitting in a farmhouse basement. The owner refused to sell him the game by itself, so Conger bought the entire farm. That was 40 years ago. Today, at age 72, Conger has a truly impressive collection. He owns more than 500 different pinball games, 700 machines if you count duplicates (he sometimes has three of the same game). About 200 are in working order, and he intends to fix the rest. "My time is measurable," says Conger, a retired high school teacher. "In another 30 years I won't be able to fix pinball." Most of the machines are in various states of disrepair. They are piled floor-to-ceiling in storage rooms, and fill up what he calls a "barn," though the structure was erected not for livestock and hay bales but for broken pinball games. He still owns the farm he bought for just that one machine, but Conger lives on a separate eight-acre spread in Northern California that accommodates his collection — a sleepy property he dubbed the Silver Ball Ranch. Pull the plunger and read on to tour the ranch and dust off this impressive collections of aging relics.Invention of Flippers Conger's collection is not the splurge of a midlife crisis, but a life-long pursuit. His almost-60-year obsession started with a game called Formation, a gift from a neighbor when he was 13. Formation had no flippers, so the ball could be manipulated only be what Conger calls "body English." The term subsumes several techniques of exerting indirect force on the ball, including smacks to the side of the machine and pelvic thrusts that lift its legs slightly off the ground. If stranded on a desert island with just one game, he says, this would be it. Today, Conger has more than 100 working games that date back to the "pre-flipper" era that ended in 1947, with the debut of the of Humpty Dumpty. Declared by its manufacturer to be "The Greatest Triumph in Pin Game History!" Humpty Dumpty was the first machine to sport the electromechanical flippers that now define the game. With this simple innovation, pinball became a challenge rather than a crapshoot, and flippers sparked a rapid increase in the game's popularity.Parts The Silver Ball Ranch runs the gamut from chaos to perfect order, depending on the room. Two sparkling arcades embody Conger's fastidious side, and are the realization of his goal of getting his entire collection into good condition. In the ranch's half-dozen storage areas, the size of that goal becomes clear. Some spaces are repair shops for nearly perfect machines, while others are warrens of legless plywood carcasses with peeling paint.Apples, Autos and Wrenches In addition to collecting and restoring pinball games, Conger operates an apple orchard, owns 15 classic cars (none of them running) and has a collection of more than a thousand nonadjustable wrenches. And somehow he still finds the time to be married. Though he is now retired, Conger sustained these numerous projects during his career as a high school teacher and through the demands of raising a family. Reflecting on the countless hours he has dedicated to his pastimes, Conger admits there were times that he put off family obligations in order to pursue his pinball and work on his apple orchards.Den of Iniquity When pinball machines first appeared in the 1930s, they were used exclusively for gambling. The games of that era weren't good for much else. There were no flippers or other formal means of controlling the ball, so the only hope for changing its trajectory was banging the side of the machine. Like modern pinball, the player would launch the ball onto the playing field with a spring-loaded plunger. As the ball descended towards the bottom, it banged into bumpers and buttons, generating points for each impact. Pinball games were mostly found in bars and dens of iniquity. Though the gambling was not official, it was understood that racking up a certain number of points entitled the player to a free beer. Some machines did actually pay out like slots, employing secret drawers to hide the jackpot from vice cops and tax collectors.Pinball Propaganda During World War II, pinball machine factories, like the rest of America's manufacturing sector, switched to making products for the war effort. Kits became available for replacing the back glass and other artwork in existing machines with patriotic themes and, in some cases, racist caricatures of the enemy. Conger doesn't support any bigoted rancor, but he wants his collection to be historically comprehensive. The games represent "part of what we went through" during the war years he says. Hit the Japs was released in 1943.Who's the Boss? When asked what his wife thinks of his hobby, Conger replies with a laugh, "First wife or second?" He jokes that his first wife left after the first 100 games, but acknowledges that "there was probably more to the story than that." Conger's current wife, Valerie, is also retired. Her use of the word hoarding to describe her husband's hobby carries the weight of a master's in psychology, but is said with a bit of a chuckle. Though there are disorderly heaps of pinball detritus on the Silver Ball Ranch, they are all tucked away in neat, unassuming structures. And, Conger says, no machines are allowed on the second floor of the house where the living spaces and bedrooms are located. This, he admits, is his wife's rule.Glass-Topped Coffins In the late '70s, videogames began to compete for space in the arcades and bars that until then had been the sole province of pinball. Not only were video games far more diverse in their gameplay, they were also cheaper to maintain. Pinball games — filled with light bulbs that fizzled out and mechanical gizmos that broke down — became glass-topped coffins for money. Surprisingly, after a decade of slumping demand, pinball had a minor resurgence in the early '90s. Arcade games were losing ground to home consoles, and pinball manufacturers cut smart deals for movie tie-ins. The Addams Family sold more than 20,000 units, making it the most successful pinball game in modern times. The bubble burst by the beginning of the next decade, leaving only one major manufacturer, Stern, to carry on the pinball tradition.One Man's Junk ... Conger has been fixing pinball machines since he acquired his first in 1952. He collects dilapidated junkers with the goal of restoring them or harvesting the parts. Lately he has hired an assistant to help revive some of the hundreds of nonworking machines that are literally piling up to the rafters of his storage rooms. Conger wants his collection to live on after he's gone and plans to donate all of his games to the Pacific Pinball Museum and other collections. Despite his affection for older models, Conger actually prefers the gameplay of more recent machines like Guns 'n Roses, guitar riffs included. They feature prominently in the game room which he uses as a showplace when entertaining guests. Though collecting can be a solitary pastime, Conger is eager to share his enjoyment of pinball. He hosts vintage car owners, local kids and scruffy journalists with equal enthusiasm.Dressing the Ranch The welcome sign at the Silver Ball Ranch evokes the friendliness of summer camps and public parks. Sporting a chrome orb that represents a giant pinball, the sign reflects Conger's desire to share a love of pinball and displays the pride he takes in his collection. The DIY touch also proves Richard Conger cannot pass up the opportunity for a good project.All photos: Jon Snyder/Wired.com


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Daily Spot Quotations, Entire Report -- PDF announcement only
mp_cn800 Daily Spot Quotations - PDF report release notice The PDF format version of the Daily Spot Quotations for January 16, 2020 has been released and is available at http://www.ams.usda.gov/mnreports/cnddsq.pdf Acrobat Reader 4.0 or higher is required to view and print this document. To download and get help using the Adobe Acrobat Reader, please go to: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep.html. To unsubscribe, change your e-mail address, or change the reports you subscribe to, go to http://usda-reports.mannlib.cornell.edu and follow the instructions. USDA, AMS, Cotton and Tobacco Program 3275 Appling Road Memphis, TN 38133 Phone (901)384-3016 Fax (901)384-3036


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how would you fight pacific rim's giant monsters in the real world?
Yes, Pacific Rim is a loud popcorn movie best viewed with your brain operating at half capacity, just enjoying the show without asking any questions. And that's exactly what makes it fun. This may shock film snobs and critics who review Oscar bait, but not every movie in theaters needs to be an epic character drama that explores the fundamental issues with existence and the human condition, or brutally cataloging a bloody genocide while repeatedly beating its viewers over the head with heavy-handed questions about morals, ethics, free will, and what lurks within us all. At the same time though, big budget Hollywood spectacles with thin plots are usually outsourced to Michael Bay, or directors who emulate his style, who latch on to formulas that even the writers of Adam Sandler and Ben Stiller movies would find too flimsy and groan-inducing, then proceed to viciously drill them into your eyes to a soundtrack of explosions. Pacific Rim was thankfully made by Guillermo del Toro and easily avoids this trap by being a simple and very straightforward little tribute to giant robot vs. giant monster anime many twenty-somethings watched as kids.
But that said, there's something just not right about humanoid robots brawling with giant beasts sent from another world through an undersea portal called The Breach. Jaegers might deliver a knockout punch to a 30 story Kaiju or pound one over the head with a container ship to give the monster a hell of a concussion, but the mechanics just don't quite work. Kaijus are fleshy, which means they're more flexible and heal minor cuts and scrapes quickly. By comparison, a Jaeger would be made of comparatively brittle metal alloys and have to be refurbished after every fight, making it extremely expensive and labor-intensive to operate. When the Kaijus appear every six months or so as they did at the beginning of the war, the cost can be managed. But as the giant brutes keep getting bigger and bigger, and start appearing as often as once a week, resources are quickly going to start running dry, so building ever more Jaegers would quickly become very difficult. No wonder that the bureaucrats who run the world in Pacific Rim want to shut down this once promising program for a wall to keep the Kaijus out. They can't afford it anymore.
Of course one also wonders how they got the Jaegers to be bipedal at such a scale. Walking on two legs is very computationally expensive for a machine that's as big as a high rise, and even a small bump in the road could send these robots falling, and falling badly. Not only that, but they give the Kaijus excellent points of attack: the ankles and the knees. To truly make their punches count, the Jaeger pilots have to get their robots to behave just like a human fighter and put the core and hips into the blow. Punching in a basic one-two sequence, the weight would swing from leg to leg, so a counter-attack from a Kaiju aimed at the thigh or the side of the knee could send a million tons of robot down hard with its head lined up for a finishing blow from above. You can see the same idea in mixed martial art disciplines which use stomps and side-knees in a clinch to shift an opponent's weight so you can topple him and get full mount for a well placed elbow, or a swift hammer fist to the side of the head. Jaegers would simply not be flexible enough to survive this sort of assault in the real world. Many much less brittle and more coordinated humans aren't without at least a little training or a whole lot of mass to counteract the impacts.
For better fight mechanics, I would have designed Jaegers to look more like sumo wrestlers. An extremely wide base either on tracks or hovering with the aid of nuclear powered jet engines, no legs, and stuffed with ranged weaponry to soften up the Kaiju as it charges. Large, thick, heavy arms with huge claws would pummel the monsters at close range and its barrel-like core would spin naturally, so tipping it over or even getting it off-balance would be a Herculean task, even for the fat Category 4 Kaiju which attacks Hong Kong in the movie's second act. Its hull could be made of something flexible like kevlar to make it tougher for a Kaiju to bite through and diffuse a good deal of the force that would be generated by a direct hit. One could even imagine it pulling off a complicated sequence just by rotating around its axis. For example, it could hit a Kaiju with an enormous left hook starting about 30 degrees left off center, keep spinning until it can follow the punch with a right elbow at between 60 and 120 degrees right off center, and returning back with a left hammer fist and a right hook, using the hits on the Kaiju to redirect its momentum.
And while we're redesigning the Jaegers, we should ask why they can't be piloted remotely. We can control drones halfway across the world in real time and all of the infrastructure to pull off a similar feat with a giant robot seems to be in place in the film. To minimize lag, the pilots should be in the base from which their Jaegers would be launched, but they wouldn't have to be in their robot. Their brain-machine interfaces with their co-pilots and with their machine are going to be implemented as an abstraction over the kernel of the Jaeger's operating system anyway so the pilots could fight, lose, and be ready to fight again as soon as a new machine is ready to go. It's actually kind of a no-brainer that allows them to switch tactics, pushing the Jaegers further and taking risks that could kill them if they were in the actual robot but win the day in the end. There would be a huge psychological boost from seeing a Kaiju on a big screen in a bunker instead of up close and personal, its fangs tearing through the cockpit and rattling the robot around. Yes, it's not as heroic or dangerous, but much more militarily effective and politically beneficial.
But then again, all of this is based on the idea that Jaegers make for the best front-line defense when a Kaiju attacks. That's not necessarily true. We know they can be killed by nukes, but the proposition of turning the world's most populated coastlines into radioactive deserts is a tough sell and actually doing that will kill food production and give the Kaijus a beachhead from which they can mount assaults further and further inland. However, launching a very large kinetic kill vehicle from orbit, basically a huge spike dropped from a satellite, could hit a Kaiju with roughly the same yield as a 300 kiloton nuclear warhead without all the radiation. Currenly we can't build and launch wepaons like this because they violate the Outer Space Treaty, but when there's an angry horde of aliens that can flatten a city block with each step rampaging on Earth and all of the nations unite in building and deploying Jaegers, I'm sure exceptions could be made and the current space faring powers can launch a system of satellites ready to drive a super-heated alloy slug into a Kaiju at hypersonic speeds at a moment's notice. Should that somehow fail and some time needs to be bought for another shot, Jaegers can coral the beast into the kill zone.
This is how you would fight a Kaiju in the real world. Orbiting KKV launchers that can fire off an exceptionally engineered slug at the planet below at a moment's notice, drone bomber swarms, and giant mobile weapon platforms known as Jaegers, remotely piloted as a last line of defense against the nightmarish beasts. Pacific Rim's spectacle is great for a live action anime movie, a solid tribute to the genre, and it creates tension by putting the main characters in real danger in the maws of the Kaiju, but if we were to translate any of it to the real world, it would be a militarily unsustainable strategy with little chance of actually working. The only worse strategy would be a giant wall to keep the monsters out, i.e. the Wall of Life being built in the movie, but it seems like the competent commanders in the Pacific Rim universe were all on leave throughout the war and this is why the world has been stuck with worse and worse ideas for fighting the alien titans. But hey, how mad can you be at a movie's plot holes if it lets you mentally design giant robots and a swarm of global space-based defenses to fight aliens the size of an office block?


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By Jonathan Kimak
So what do you do when a show nicknames a robotic species a toaster? You take a regular toaster and modify it and sell it for $65.
NBC/Universal has released a limited edition toaster that comes with the Battlestar Galactica logo on the side and imprints an image of a Cylon centurion on the toast. The toaster was made for the San Diego Comic-Con but is also being sold online. The NBC site states that only one production run of the toaster will occur.
If no one's the wiser you might get away with selling the miraculous toasted image on ebay for thousands of dollars, or maybe learn what a holding cell looks like. At least you can help the war effort by eating the heads of Cylons each morning.
[ NBC Store ] VIA [ New Launches ]


text:
Game 2
June 29, 2007, 5:42 p.m.
Tonight's Lineup
Rollins, ss; Bourn, rf; Utley, 2b; Howard, 1b; Rowand, cf; Burrell, lf; Nunez, 3b; Ruiz, c; Hamels, p.
Emptying Out
Fans were great in exiting Citizens Bank Park so the 300-person cleaning crew could begin getting the placed clean so the gates can open at 6:05 p.m. for the 7:05 game. Ten minutes after the game had ended, crews were in the lower and upper levels working their way up from field level picking up cups, hot dog/hoagie wrappers, pieces of funnel cake, sticky globs of cotton candy, rejected soft pretzels, etc.
Another Roster Move
Following the game, the Phillies designated RH reliever Clay Condrey for assignment to make room for LH reliever J. C. Romero. Charlie Manuel now has two lefties in the pen.


text:
Catholic Church in La Jolla (below)
Que viva la raza on this one. Long live Mexican weddings. The Vildosola family is very special to me. Even McTrepidation kept commenting on what a nice family they were by the end of the night. Mariachis galore. Karlita, the bride having a bucket of Diet Coke and McNuggets brought in from McDonalds during the reception. In-N-Out Burgers delivered to the dancing-weary revelers at midnight? You bet your culito. Karlita's personality came through on EVERY detail of this wedding. Thankfully the airport in San Diego opened back up (after being closed to incoming flights due to heavy fog) and we were only an hour late to the two hour Catholic Mass (in spanish). Mr. McNoHablaEspanol was not saddened by this delay.


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December 4th, 2012
David Galjaard: On Concresco
In 2009, David Galjaard began photographing the landscape of Albania, which is dotted with over 700,000 abandoned concrete bunkers built during the Communist dictatorship of Enver Hoxha. Galjaard's work in Albania culminated in a self-published photobook, Concresco, which won the First PhotoBook Award in this year's Paris Photo–Aperture Foundation PhotoBook Awards. Thomas Bollier spoke with the Dutch photographer about his work.
Thomas Bollier: Can you tell me a little about your history as a photographer—when and how you got started and what's brought you to here?
David Galjaard: To go way back, it feels like I got started as a photographer when I was fifteen. My father gave me a copy of the book Amsterdam by Ed van der Elsken, and as soon as I saw that book I knew I wanted to be a photographer—and that never changed. I studied at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, and while I was there I mainly worked the way van der Elsken did—with small film, really close to my subject, producing sort of emotional, social documentaries. As soon as I finished school, though, I found that that approach didn't work for me anymore. I still love looking at those pictures but I wanted to do something else.
Around this time I got my own page in a national newspaper, called NRC Next, which had just started and hadn't yet developed its visual vocabulary. They asked if I wanted to work for them as a freelance photographer, and that's where I feel my work as a photographer really began. We had an agreement that I would do a piece, and if they didn't like it they would just tell me. But they never did. I could experiment while working, which was a big luxury. After three years at the paper, though, I felt the urge to work on a longer documentary project.
Around this time I also became interested in representing physical space in my photographs, exploring what environments without people can express. I had made a small series, When the siren goes, in which I wanted to see if I could capture, in photographs, what I felt when I entered a space myself. I had explored Cold War bunkers in The Netherlands, in which I always felt a sort of ominous, uncanny feeling. I was wondering if it was possible to somehow capture that feeling . . . to take a photograph and show it to other people, and have them experience that place the same way. It was just a small experiment, but coming from the social documentary I was doing on the street, it was completely new to me.
One of the journalists from the newspaper saw my pictures from this series, and he asked me if I'd heard of the bunkers in Albania. I had traveled a lot through Eastern Europe, but never to Albania, and knew nothing of the history of the country. So I started reading about it, and bells started ringing when I read about the 750,000 to one million aboveground bunkers that were built in such a small country. I then traveled to Albania, just to look around. My first plan was to research how those bunkers have influenced the landscape and to see how, to the people who were still living there, those bunkers were still a reminder of a dictatorship that had lasted for almost fifty years. I traveled around Albania for a month, and took some good pictures, but it wasn't much more than a small series, like something that would work in a magazine. I wanted to do more, but didn't know what exactly. I kept reading and thinking about it, and after a couple of months realized that I wasn't going to figure out what I wanted to do in Holland, so in October 2009 I traveled back to Albania. It was then that I decided that I should make a book.
TB: Albania, over the course of the past century, has experienced hardship and setbacks, and is still today finding its place in modern Europe. Were you daunted by the task of representing the complicated history and current problems of a country that is not your own?
DG: Yes, there were two big questions for me. Can I use the bunkers as a visual metaphor in the telling of a larger social story? And can I tell a story about a country that I don't live in? I read a lot and spoke to a lot of people, and I tried to work as closely to facts as I could. But in the end every text, from The Pillbox Effect by Slavenka Drakulić, to the interviews, to my pictures, are all personal impressions. There are even texts in the book that contradict each other. My mission was not to say, "This is truth. This is Albania." It's just an impression of a country, as close to a truth as possible, but perhaps just one of many truths. I hope I found a way to not approach the country in an arrogant way, coming in and telling everybody, "This is Albania," because that is not what I intended to do.
TB: The texts in Concresco are important for contextualizing the photographs, and I found that reading the intermittent booklets of personal testimonials heightened my interest in the images—the more I read, the more I wanted to see. Was it always your intention to include texts in the book, or did you ever consider Concresco exclusively as a book of photographs? How important for you is the interaction of words and images?
DG: I read [Drakulić's] essay The Pillbox Effect during my second trip to Albania, and that really helped me decide that this project had to become a book. I was working with all this information I had about the country, and I was trying to put as much information as possible into my pictures. But I knew even without seeing my pictures yet that they would not be enough to tell the whole story. I wanted to do the best I could, but at a certain point you hit a wall, and need something more to really explain the story. I make my images with a lot of information in them, but you also need other information to understand them.
On my second trip, I was approached by a Dutch documentary filmmaker who was making a movie about the bunkers and we made a deal that I could use the raw material of his interviews and I would show him all the locations he needed. So the interviews of the [older] Albanians came from him. I did the interviews with the younger people myself, because I wanted to know more about the present and future [of Albania], and I could speak English with those people. The older people, who built the bunkers, or were trained in them, were interviewed by Sarah Haaij and Martijn Payens. You can find texts from my book in their film Mushrooms of Concrete, and they used one of my pictures for the film poster, and my designer did the design of the poster, so there were some other crossovers.
I knew quite early in the process that I needed text, so I also wrote to Drakulić and asked if I could use this essay from her book, and she said yes. So there are two different kinds of text in the book, the two longer stories [from Drakulić and Jaap Scholten] and the short interviews with Albanian people.
Regarding the different sizes of paper, first it started off as a solution to a practical problem, because I wanted to use as little text as possible. I'm a photographer, so of course I want to tell as much as possible with images, and only use text when I must. In the end we only had short pieces of interviews, and it just didn't work out in the design to put them on a big page. So, we put them on a smaller page, and it was at that moment that I found out that it was a really great way to play in the editing, and things got exciting from there. It turned out to be a great way to make new connetions between the images and the text, and it gave me a lot more room to play, and that felt amazing. It really added another dimension to the book.


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Cyn.in Developers
A Space for developers, Plone service providers to get involved, discuss buildout, hacks and development of Cyn.in
- If you have a question or need help in setting up Cyn.in, please use the discussion boards. Its the best place to ask questions and get answers.
- Bug reports should be reported as an issue, but please do search the issue tracker to make sure nobody else has already reported this or it hasn't already been fixed in a new version
- To contribute to building / implementing a new feature, please refer to the Cyn.in Contribution Process
- Contribute to Translate and localize Cyn.in. Translation contribution process can be accessed here and list of translations required / worked upon here. Bugs related to translations should be filed in the dedicated translation issue tracker


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Offers major enhancements for maximizing productivity
MOORPARK, CA – September 27, 2012 - Gibbs and Associates, developer of GibbsCAM® software for programming CNC machine tools and a Cimatron (NASDAQ and TASE: CIMT) company, announced today that it will be demonstrating its new GibbsCAM 2012+ version at the BI-MU trade show to be held in Milan, Italy, from October 2-6, 2012.
"The outstanding new and enhanced features in GibbsCAM 2012+ afford customers the ability to achieve the highest speed, accuracy, efficiency and reliability in programming even the most complex parts, using most sophisticated multi-axis machines," said Mr. Gianluca Renzi, CEO of Microsystem, Cimatron Group's Italian subsidiary.
"Powering everything from simple lathe and milling machines to the most advanced multi-turret, multi-spindle machines, our goal is to maximize the investments made by our customers in their machine tools. GibbsCAM offers unparalleled programming and synchronization capabilities and unmatched post processors to maximize the utilization and output of the latest machine tools available today.
"GibbsCAM also offers an easy to learn and use interface that walks our customers through the programming, no-matter how complex the job or machine."
Highlights of GibbsCAM 2012+ include:
- Multi-axis rendering for increased speed and display accuracy for rotary milling.
- Part rendering speed increases up to 33 times faster.
- Helical toolpath capability for radial milling, producing shorter programs and faster machine cycle time.
- New machining strategies for parts with open-sided pockets, extremely thin walls, shallow-cut areas, and material-only area clean-out.
The Microsystem display at BI-MU will be at booth Pav.11, Stand F50.
For more information on GibbsCAM 2012+, visit www.gibbscam.com.
About Gibbs and Associates and GibbsCAM
For thirty years, Gibbs and Associates has been a leader in providing cutting edge CAD/CAM technology, while maintaining its signature ease-of-use and
productivity. Powerfully Simple, Simply Powerful is the guiding philosophy at Gibbs. Gibbs believes in empowering the NC programmer, machinist, and manufacturing engineer, not eliminating them. Gibbs' goal is to introduce manufacturers to new technologies and new ways of working that makes their machining easier and their businesses more profitable. To achieve this goal, Gibbs creates tools that are naturally intuitive, graphically interactive, extremely visual, associative, and just plain enjoyable to use. Gibbs provides a total quality solution with the service and support that successful customers require.
The current GibbsCAM product line supports 2- through 5-axis milling, turning, mill/turning, multi-task simultaneous machining and wire-EDM. GibbsCAM also provides fully integrated manufacturing modeling capabilities that include 2D, 2.5D, 3D wireframe, surface, and solid modeling. GibbsCAM is Compatible with Windows 7 and Certified for Windows Vista. GibbsCAM's data exchange capabilities are able to access the broadest range of native and industry standard CAD data formats. GibbsCAM is certified under the Autodesk Inventor Certified Program, is a Siemens Solution Partner Program-PLM for Solid Edge product, and is a SolidWorks Certified CAM Product. GibbsCAM is either offered or endorsed by a number of leading worldwide control and machine tool manufacturers, including GE Fanuc, Infimatic, Siemens, Doosan Infracore, Haas, Index, MAG Fadal, Mazak, Mitsubishi, Mori Seiki, and Tornos. Gibbs and Associates distributes its products worldwide through a network of international Resellers.
In January 2008, Gibbs and Associates merged with Cimatron Ltd., and is now operating as a wholly owned subsidiary. For more information about Gibbs and Associates and its CAM software packages, visit its web site (www.GibbsCAM.com) or call 1-800-654-9399 (outside of North America, call +1-805-523-0004).
About Cimatron
With 30 years of experience and more than 40,000 installations worldwide, Cimatron Ltd., or Cimatron, is a leading provider of integrated, CAD/CAM software solutions for mold, tool and die makers as well as manufacturers of discrete parts. Cimatron is committed to providing comprehensive, cost-effective solutions that streamline manufacturing cycles, enable collaboration with outside vendors, and ultimately shorten product delivery time.
The Cimatron product line includes the CimatronE and GibbsCAM brands with solutions for mold design, die design, electrodes design, 2.5 to 5 axes milling,wire EDM, turn, mill-turn, rotary milling, multi-task machining, and tombstone machining. Cimatron's subsidiaries and extensive distribution network serve and support customers in the automotive, aerospace, medical, consumer plastics, electronics, and other industries in over 40 countries worldwide.
Cimatron's shares are publicly traded on the NASDAQ exchange and the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange under the symbol CIMT. For more information, please visit Cimatron's web site at: http://www.cimatron.com.
The Gibbs logo, GibbsCAM, GibbsCAM logo, Virtual Gibbs, and "Powerfully Simple. Simply Powerful." are either trademark(s) or registered trademark(s) of Gibbs and Associates in the United States and/or other countries. Microsoft, Windows and the Windows logo are trademarks of the Microsoft group of companies. All other brand or product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.
Safe Harbor Statement
This press release includes forward looking statements, within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, which are subject to risk and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated. Such statements may relate to Cimatron's plans, objectives and expected financial and operating results. The words "may," "could," "would," "will," "believe," "anticipate," "estimate," "expect," "intend," "plan," and similar expressions or variations thereof are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Investors are cautioned that any such forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond the company's ability to control. The risks and uncertainties that may affect forward looking statements include, but are not limited to: currency fluctuations, global economic and political conditions, marketing demand for Gibbs and Associates or Cimatron products and services, long sales cycles, new product development, assimilating future acquisitions, maintaining relationships with customers and partners, and increased competition. For more details about the risks and uncertainties related to Cimatron's business, refer to its filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company cannot assess the impact of or the extent to which any single factor or risk, or combination of them, may cause. Gibbs and Associates and Cimatron undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.


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Reel World
Maori Movie—The UNM Department of Anthropology will be welcoming special guest Maori filmmaker Mereta Mita to town as part of the International Indigenous Film Festival. The New Zealand native will be on hand Thursday, March 4, at 7 p.m. to screen and discuss her feature-length drama Mauri. The film centers on the trauma of a disturbed Maori man who confronts his tragic deception with courage and humility. The screening will take place in the anthropology lecture hall, north of UNM's Maxwell Museum. Tickets are $12 at the UNM box offices or at Tickets.com outlets. You can also obtain tickets by calling the Anthropology department at 925-5858. Proceeds will benefit the UNM Anthropology Graduate Student Scholarship Fund.
Film Review
The Dreamers
Bertolucci takes us on a historical tour of sex and the cinema
At age 64, Bernardo Bertolucci (Stealing Beauty, The Sheltering Sky, The Last Emperor, 1900) is one of the last surviving members of the second generation, postwar filmmakers—those young lads from England, Italy, France, wherever, who grew up besotted by the product that Hollywood cranked out in the '30s and '40s. Throughout the '50s, educated young teens like Bertolucci, Casavettes, Godard, Antonioni, Pasolini, Fellini, Truffaut were raised on a steady diet of Ford, Capra, Hawks, Hitchcock, Lang, Keaton, Welles. The works these "New Wave" directors eventually produced were part homage, part angry response. But unlike the filmmakers of the earlier generation, whose only point of artistic reference was the legitimate theater, the postwar filmmakers of the '60s and '70s were all about the silver screen.
Film Review
My Architect
Son's quest to understand father's love is built to last
Last Sunday, My Architect lost out to Fog of War at the Academy Awards in the Best Documentary Feature category. Their inclusion in the 76th Annual Academy Awards was not the only similarity between the two films, however. Both are cinematic portraits struggling to define controversial historical figures. Fog of War is certainly the splashier of the two, since the figure in question (Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara) is far more controversial, and he's still alive to explain himself. My Architect, on the other hand, is far more personal, tracing the journey of filmmaker Nathaniel Kahn to understand his long-dead father, famed architect Louis I. Kahn.


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The Hell seems to be a very sexy and nice place to be in; if the Red Hot Devil is ruling it. At least that's what Microgaming was thinking, when it rolled out this 5 reel 25 payline slot game. Playing comfortably from your homes, you can sign a contract with the hot seductress for winning up to 105,000 coins as your jackpot money.
Red Hot Devil symbols
Brilliant animation and graphic, in the fiery red colour scheme, the Red Hot Devil game will make you wonder if this is the real Hell. Being ruled by the beautiful seductress with red flaming lips, she uses snakes, scorpions and the devil's pitchfork as her means of control. Burning roses, flaming 7's, dice, cherries, decks of cards are the other classic icons which are scorching the 5 reels.
The Red Hot Devil slot game is a 5 reel 25 payline slot game from Microgaming. A hell themed game, it is the ideal slot for the low to medium bet players to try and win up to 105,000 coins during the base game.
荒野: の Red Hot Devil logo will substitute for all the symbols except for the scattered heart symbol. It appears only on the middle three reels.
散布図: The most important symbol of the Red Hot Devil is the scattered heart symbol. It will trigger the Bonus Choice feature, whenever 3 or more of them are seen on the reels. Here is your chance to make the best choice and play one of the three games.
Red Hot Multiplier: You can win 10 free spins and up to 10 times the total bet during this feature. Depending on the number of scatters seen on the reels 1 or 5; the multiplier increases by up to 10 times the total bet.
Plus, you can even win 10 free spins whenever the flaming heart symbol is seen on both the reels 1 and 5, but it will not increase the multipliers. There is a chance that you can even win up to 50 free spins as more of the scatters are seen on the reels during this feature.
Red Hot Wild Reels: The middle three reels 2, 3 or 4 will randomly turn entirely into the wilds during this feature. If you find the scattered heart symbol on the reels 1 and 5, you can retrigger the 10 free spins. In addition, you can also turn the reels 1 or 5 entirely into the wilds, whenever the scatters are seen on them.
Wheel of Fire bonus: Keep picking from among the 10 red orbs to add instant wins to your bankroll. There is the 2x or 3x multiplier for your winnings, and if you pick the joker symbol, it ends the bonus game.
スピンあたりの最小/最大ベット(£/ $ /€): 0.01〜0.25
ジャックポット(£/ $ /€): 105,000 coins (base game), 240x total bet (bonus game)
Closing thoughts
A gripping slot game with the profitable wins thrown in; the Red Hot Devil game is the most hot and sexy looking game coming from the Microgaming game collection. For a quick break from your daily grind, it is the best fix for you.


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A Savory Feast
Creatively delicious recipes
June 23, 2020 by A Savory Feast Leave a Comment
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- About
- Services
- Collections
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We are currently closed due to concerns about Covid-19. See our update on services for more information. Need research assistance? Contact us.
Printing, Copying, & Scanning
PaperCut System
The Styberg Library's copying and printing services are managed through a web-based payment system called PaperCut. With this system users can check their printing balance from any internet-capable device, see their environmental impact, and even use the copy/printers without having their physical print card with them. Follow the link on the library website to check your balance at anytime.
How it Works
An account has been created for all registered students. When a student activates his or her account, a microchip is placed on the student's ID card which associates the card with the account. To use the printer or the copier, simply pass the card over the chip reader on the machine. The microchip tells the machine who you are, what your balance is and if you have any jobs waiting to be released.
Activating your Account
In order to activate an account, students need to stop by the circulation desk, create a password, and receive a microchip.
Paying for Prints & Copies
- Money can be added to PaperCut accounts right at the circulation desk.
- We accept cash or checks only.
|Black & White
|Double-sided B&W
|Double-sided Color
Sending Print Jobs
When you are ready to send a print job over from a library computer to the printer, the computer will ask you to type in your username and password. Then walk up to the printer, wave your card, and select the document to release. The default printer is the smaller, Black & White printer.
You may also send a print job remotely from your own device, provided it is connected to the internet. Follow the link on our home page or here to send your document.
Additional Information:
Upon separation from the institution, either by graduation or for other reasons, a patron may request in person at the circulation desk a refund of the funds remaining on their PaperCut account. All requests for refunds by graduating students must be made by May 31st of the year of graduation. All others must request a refund within 30 days of the date of separation.
PaperCut Account Policy
The Zeta Scanner
The library now has a state of the art Zeta scanner. The use of this machine is free to the members of our community. The Zeta Scanner allows you to save your scans on a USB drive or email them. Some of the advantages of this machine as opposed to flat bed scanners are that it is open faced, so it better protects the binding on some of our more delicate items. The Zeta also has embedded software that automatically corrects for the natural bend of the pages in thicker materials and will even scrub out your fingertips should they make their way into the scanning frame. The video below provides information about how the scanner works. (Note that our machine does not print and offers varied editing features.)


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With Skuid's robust cloud UX design-and-deploy platform, companies seamlessly unite their data, apps, and processes to unleash productivity and engagement, particularly in sales organizations. More than 5.2 million users across 32 countries use Skuid to drive deeper customer obsession and increase pipeline 70-90% faster.
Skuid is a 1% pledge company.
© Copyright 2020 Skuid, Inc. All rights reserved. Skuid, skuidify and the Skuid mark are registered trademarks of Skuid, Inc. Salesforce1, Force.com, Visualforce, and Chatter are trademarks of salesforce.com, Inc.


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by Susan Thomas
As spring struggles to take hold and overcome the last vestiges of our stubborn winter, the budding leaves and emerging flowers hold the promise of renewal for the natural world around us. The lighthearted feeling that warm sunshine and chirping birds induces within us reflects how these changes can bring us out of the doldrums, lift our sagging spirits, and sometimes inspire us to smile despite our problems.
But renewal from without can be limited and ephemeral, especially in today's world where the frenetic pace and our overloaded schedules loom like a cloud over us daily. We worry constantly that we've forgotten something. And when we remember, we worry that there is not enough time to accomplish whatever we've finally recalled. We need renewal from within.
Finding sources of personal renewal can be challenging. Hardly anyone goes anywhere these days without some technological device tethered to them, and new wearable devices will exacerbate the problem being connected presents for us. Overuse of cell phones can be dangerous, of course, and we've all seen people of all ages misusing their devices, motorists texting while driving, swerving in their lanes, pedestrians stepping out in front of oncoming cars. A few years ago, someone talking on their phone while driving sideswiped my car.
Even when we share meals with one another, we are constantly checking in to see what we may have missed, sometimes to the extent of ignoring the person across the table. But it isn't so much the rudeness or the lack of safety that such use represents, it is how it limits our opportunities to engage, learn, and grow from each other and from tech-free activities. It prevents us from living in the moment.
Admittedly, it is not always possible to cut ourselves free of the daily grind. Reports still have to be submitted, email still has to be answered, phone calls still have to be made, evaluations still have to be conducted, and the list goes on. Both personally and professionally, our time is seldom our own. But even a few moments can make a difference. The key is to consciously think about small ways to free your mind. I'm not advocating that everyone should take up meditation or practice yoga. Just find something that works for you. It could be a beautiful image or meaningful music, or even deep breathing. Life is too short to neglect what's most important.


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A team of state insurance regulators is trying to figure out how the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) might affect — and not affect — health plans that operate outside the PPACA health insurance exchange system.
PPACA could have a huge effect on many categories of non-exchange plan rules, such as underwriting rules, but it may have little direct effect on other categories of plan rules, such as marketing standards and provider network standards, according to the Health Care Reform Regulatory Alternatives Working Group.
PPACA will prohibit the "qualified health plans" (QHPs) that sell coverage through PPACA exchanges from employing "marketing practices that discourage enrollment by individuals with significant health needs," but those PPACA provisions "only apply to QHPs" and will have no direct effect on non-exchange plans, the working group says in a draft non-exchange market paper.
Similarly, PPACA imposes quality standards on QHP provider networks and network provider directories, and it requires a QHP to give providers financial incentives to improve the quality of care. But those provisions seem to apply only QHPs, the working group says.
But PPACA will preempt or severely weaken state laws that deal with many other matters, such as rating rules and solvency rules, the working group says.
The working group, an arm of the Health Insurance and Managed Care Committee at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC), posted the draft paper on its section of the NAIC website.
The NAIC formed the working group at its 2012 summer meeting, to give states that are not setting up PPACA exchanges a chance to share their ideas about PPACA.
Opponents of PPACA continue to try to block or delay implementation of the law. If it takes effect on schedule and works as drafters expect, it will require states to set up exchanges, or health insurance supermarkets, for individuals and small groups by Oct. 1 or let the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) provide exchange services for their residents.
PPACA also will impose many other health insurance restrictions and mandates, such as a ban on insurers' ability to use health status when deciding whether to issue individual coverage and tight restrictions on use of health status information on the pricing of individual coverage.
Analysts at the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) have speculated that only a few million workers will get coverage through the Small Business Health Options Program (SHOP) exchanges for small groups, and that the market for non-exchange group coverage may continue to be about as big as it is today.
See also:


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Kurt Busch NASCAR Cup Series Preview - Atlanta
October 21, 2008
"It's over - Jimmie times three," Busch said during an interview on Tuesday morning. "If there's anyone out there who knows from experience enough to make such a statement, it's probably me. After all, we went down to the wire with those guys (Jimmie Johnson and the Chad Knaus-led No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Team) in 2004 and were so fortunate to beat them by eight points for the championship."
If Busch says Johnson is en route to his third consecutive title, you can take that to the bank.
After all, it was the Penske Racing driver who back on Sept. 23, after only two 2008 Chase races were in the record book, made the bold statement that young brother Kyle's chances for a title were over. Kurt's prediction proved prophetic as even after winning eight races during the "regular season," Kyle's season went south to the point that he is currently last (12th) among Chase drivers. He is a whopping 445 points out of first with no chance of winning his first title.
"I love my little brother and really wanted him to go on and win him a championship, but you could see the writing on the wall, even back then," Busch said when reminded of his calculation made a month ago.
"Along those same lines, it's not too difficult to see what the situation is out there right now and say it's over, that Jimmie is heading toward his third straight Sprint Cup points championship," said Busch, who has been winning races and championships since starting his career in 1993 at age 15.
"It's very impressive," Busch said of Johnson's performance in the 2008 edition of the Chase. "It looks like those guys are just now peaking. They're at the top of their game and are the strongest they have been all season.
"They have a 150-point lead over 'Biff' with only four races to go," Busch said of Johnson's current 149-point advantage over second-place Greg Biffle. "I realize that we're coming up on the tracks where the 16 team (Biffle) and the Roush cars traditionally run really well, but the 48 team (Johnson) are no slouches there.
"Their run this year is shaping up like ours did back in 2004 where they've built up enough cushion in the points that they can afford to have an off week or a bad race," said Busch. "It was this weekend's race at Atlanta where we had our one bad race, when we blew the engine and finished 42nd. Even with Jimmie winning that particular race, we came out of there with enough of a buffer that we were able to hang on down the stretch through the incredible run we had in the final race at Homestead.
"I'll go on record saying that I think Jimmie, Chad and the 48 team are the best in the business at knowing how to win championships," said Busch. "Just think how far they've come since the 2004 season. I've always heard that you have to lose a championship in order to know how to win one. They've won two of the last three since then and seem to always be at the top of their game at the right time."
Busch entered the 2004 Atlanta race with a smaller "buffer" over second than Johnson currently enjoys, his Roush Racing Team leading by 96 points over second. After the dismal 42nd-place finish at Atlanta, Busch led Johnson by only 59 points. But a 10th-place finish at Phoenix (Johnson finished sixth), a sixth at Darlington (Johnson finished first) and a fifth at Homestead (Johnson finished second) led to an eight-point advantage for Busch in the battle for the title. Busch picked up 55 bonus points (for leading laps and leading most laps) during the Chase to Johnson's 30.
Busch's championship season saw him bring a record of two wins, four top-five finishes and 12 top-10s into the final 10-race Chase run. He added another win, six top-five finishes and nine top-10s during those 10 races. He posted a 13.8 average finish for the first 26 races, but had an incredible 8.9 average finish during the Chase. Johnson had a better 12.8 average finish for the first 26 races, but he had a 10.2 average finish for the Chase races.
"I think this is an even stronger version of the 48 team this season than what we saw back in 2004 and that's downright remarkable," Busch added. "It's an incredible perennial powerhouse that's evolved over there and I congratulate Jimmie, Chad and team owner Rick Hendrick for what they have going."
Johnson carried a record of four wins, nine top-five finishes and 14 top-10s into this year's Chase. He had a 12.4 average finish. His incredible performance in the six Chase races thus far boasts a record of two wins, four top-five finishes and six top-10s, which add up to an unbelievable 4.0 average finish.
"Jimmie's run to his third consecutive championship this season should produce all kinds of statistical records," Busch concluded.
--On the battle for the 2008 NASCAR Sprint Cup Championship, Kurt says, "It's over." Read much more on this in the release that follows and is attached.
--Kurt, Pat and crew will be racing their "PRS-579" Miller Lite Dodge this weekend in the Pep Boys Auto 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway. "The car debuted at Michigan on Aug. 17, where Kurt started 13th and finished 36th. It was raced again at Kansas on Sept. 28, where Kurt started 31st and finished 30th. "It's a car that has been strong during the beginning of the races and we're looking to having another whole race like we did at Charlotte (Lowe's Motor Speedway where the team finished third two weeks ago) with it," Pat said. "I really think that we learned some things there in that race that we can apply this weekend, at least that's the game plan."
--Kurt will be racing for a $100,000 bonus contribution to "Operation Homefront-Texas" if he can pull off the win in the Nov. 2 Dickies 500 at Texas Motor Speedway. Regardless of the final race outcome, Kurt's efforts on the track will yield a minimum $10,000 donation in his honor. It's all part of an engaging statewide promotional campaign that sponsor Miller Lite launched several weeks back. The campaign recognizes, celebrates, honors and rewards military veterans, both past and present, for their commitment to serving our country. Miller Lite is teaming with Operation to support Texas troops and their families. Miller Lite has donated more than $150,000 over the last two years to support the cause. Consumers can also make donations by purchasing Miller Lite - Operation Homefront commemorative gear. Log on to the Web site, www.operationhomefront.net/texas to learn more about how you can support Texas Troops.
--Kurt's "Law of the Chase Averages" that he laid down a month ago have proven prophetic. After only two Chase races had been put into the record book, he already predicted that brother Kyle's quest for a season title was over. "The law of averages shows that you can afford one bad finish - you can take one mulligan if you will - during the Chase and still have a chance to win it," Kurt said at the time "If you have two bad finishes, you might as well write the year off and go ahead and start planning for the next season.
"It's so competitive out there these days that even allowing one bad finish, you better come back and run up front in all the other races," he added prior to the third Chase race. "You better be getting the top-fives and the top-10s. If you're having only a mediocre day, you better be finding some way to get your (rear end) up front to lead laps and get those bonus points."
"You better be ready to bring your 'A-game' into the playoffs - you better be in high stride for those final 10 races," Kurt said.
Current points-leader Jimmie Johnson is a perfect example of what Kurt was referring to.