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by Trudy Rubin, Inquirer Opinion Columnist | Philly.com | October 30, 2011
CAIRO, Egypt - The growing strength of Islamist political parties in the Mideast's new democracies makes one wonder what will happen to Arab women's rights.
I'm not talking of women in Saudi Arabia, where they are still fighting for the right to drive and are relegated to segregated workplaces, but of countries where working women have long been the norm.
Thousands of women took part in Egypt's Tahrir Square demonstrations, and young Tunisian women played a major role in their revolution. In Egypt, middle-class women have long held professional jobs.
On this trip, I've met impressive Egyptian women business executives in banking, food production, and marketing. I met Tunisian women who were diplomats, engineers, professors, and pharmacists. (Forty percent of Tunisia's doctors are women, along with 30 percent of its dentists and judges.)
Yet now that the Islamist party Ennahda has won a plurality in Tunisia, and the Freedom and Justice Party (a Muslim Brotherhood offshoot) is set to do likewise in Egypt, many active women in both countries are nervous.
Leaders of both these Islamist parties insist they won't reverse women's progress. Whether they keep their promises will be the litmus test of whether they are as moderate as they claim.
The pledge to respect women's rights appears much more credible in Tunisia. Ennahda party leaders insist they support the family status law that bans polygamy and gives women the right to divorce, get child custody, hold property, work, and travel. Indeed, Ennahda's top leader Rashid Ghannouchi told me in an interview that he would try to expand the law to ensure that women get equal pay for equal work.
"We hope [this law] can't be rolled back," says Lilia Labidi (Pictured), a professor of anthropology and clinical psychology - who is Tunisia's energetic minister of women's affairs. She arrived at a breakfast meeting in a neat black pantsuit, with a large white flower pin, having just stood in line for more than three hours to cast her first vote in a free election. She had refused to jump the long queue on account of her ministerial position. (Ghannouchi jumped the queue at his polling place and was booed.)
"If Ennahda does what it says, things will be OK," Labidi declared.
Tunisia's election law required every other candidate on party lists to be female, so there should be a substantial bloc of women in the new constitutional assembly. Yet, even in Tunisia - where urban women are as likely to have uncovered hair as to wear head scarfs - women's future progress is uncertain.
Many Tunisian women still live in dire situations. Labidi says that 30 percent of girls in poor areas can't go to school - even though the law requires it - because the roads are bad and there are no buses to take them. And almost a third of Tunisian women are still illiterate.
At a time when the Tunisian economy is flailing, women's issues may be low on the agenda. And the funds to address the problems are lacking. Labidi says her ministry has a tiny budget and a small, insufficient staff.
Nor, she believes, is the world paying enough attention. In September she left the U.N. General Assembly early because she felt no one was focused on the needs of women in the Arab Spring. She said the $700-per-night cost of her hotel room could be better spent on a project for rural women.
Many secular Tunisians told me they feared that, in a bad economy, women might be pressured to give up government jobs to men. (This happened in Iraq.) They also feared that Islamists' focus on the family may produce social pressure for women to stay home - and to veil.
Hard-line salafi groups and imams have emerged in Tunisia since the revolution; their numbers are still small, but they openly demand curbs on women's rights. And the Ennahda rank and file may be more conservative than its leaders.
I could see the different tendencies within the party when I attended a large election rally the day before the Oct. 23 elections. Women were shepherded into a separate seating section from men; but on the podium, one of the top Ennahda candidates was an unveiled woman.
Yet Ennahda has the possibility of becoming the model of moderate Islam, and demonstrating that women's rights are compatible with that religion. Its leaders say they recognize they can't win without wooing women, who make up half of the voters. How this Islamist party handles the women's issue will define its image - at home and abroad.
That positive role model becomes all the more important since Egypt's Freedom and Justice Party looks unlikely to provide it. The party has two women among its 12 party leaders, but the Muslim Brotherhood, from which it springs, has none in its innermost circle. The party does have an active women's movement, and it will field female candidates. But, I'm told that most if not all are the wives of Brotherhood activists.
There has been progress: In 2007, Brotherhood leaders famously said that no woman should be president; now they say their party would not nominate a woman. Party lists are only required to contain one woman, and they don't get top slots.
Moreover, the influence of salafis here, with their satellite TV stations and donations from the Arab Gulf, has fed a sweeping conservative mood that does not bode well for women's rights. The only national organizational platform for women - the National Council on Women - has been shut down because it was linked to Suzanne Mubarak, wife of the deposed president.
Women in Egypt need help in organizing to defend their rights, as well as to start businesses. Tunisian women need that help, too. Western governments and nongovernmental organizations should target aid and loans to empower women, and offer them training for jobs, starting small businesses, and running for office.
In this uncertain time of transition, Western countries should be helping Arab women help themselves.
Source: http://www.philly.com/philly/news/columnists/132865438.html


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Gilad Doitsh, PhD
- Research Scientist, Gladstone Institutes
I am a Staff Research Scientist, and the head of HIV Pathogenesis Group at the Gladstone Institute of Virology and Immunology, UCSF. My group focuses on two of the most fundamental questions in AIDS: How HIV causes the depletion of CD4 T cells, and the role of inflammation as a driver of HIV pathogenesis. We explore this question using a unique, physiological relevant experimental system formed of fresh human lymphoid cultures. In many regards, this system is one of the most powerful experimental approaches to modeling molecular and cellular events during HIV infection in human patients. More about our finding could be found in our papers: Doitsh, G., et al. Cell. 143, 789-801, (2010); Doitsh, G., et al. Nature 505, 509-514, (2014); Monroe, K.M., et al. Science 343, 428-432, (2014).


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How to Prevent Sun Spots
Hi, I'm Dr. Elissa Lunder. I've been practicing dermatology at Dermatology Partners in Wellesley, Massachusetts for the past 10 years. I believe that skin care doesn't have to be complicated. With a few simple steps you can have beautiful skin. You can visit Dermatology Partners on the web at dermatologypartnersinc.com. So today we're gonna talk about skin care. So sun spots are brown spots that appear in the sun exposed areas of your body. You commonly can see them on your face, on the anterior chest and on the back of your hands. You wanna use sunblock, sunblock, sunblock. When you look at sun spots, it's not aging that causes them, but rather the sun. For example if you look at the skin on your chest compared to the skin on your buttocks you'll see that the sun is really what's causing the brown spots to appear. So you wanna make sure you're using a good sunscreen. Even better than that are sun protective clothing. There's some clothing lines that are made specifically with SPF engrained in the fabric. And that is a much easier and better way to protect yourself against the sun. So, you wanna seek shade whenever possible. When walking down the street if one side of the street is sunny and the other one's shady, pick the shadier side of the street. You also can use a titanium sun umbrella. Those are fantastic umbrellas that are made to reflect the sun and protect your skin. Sunblock you ideally wanna reapply every two to three hours. In general it's about one ounce or a shot glass full of sunscreen to cover your entire body. And if you go swimming or if you're getting excessively sweaty, you have to remember to reapply more often.


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Художественная литература
Владимир Набоков
Vladimir Nabokov. Conversation Piece, 1945© 1945 Copyright by Vladimir Nabokov I happen to have a disreputable namesake, complete from nickname to surname, a man whom I have never seen in the flesh but whose vulgar personality I have been able to deduce from his chance intrusions into the castle of my life. The tangle began in Prague, where I happened to be living in the middle twenties. A letter came to me there from a small library apparently attached to some sort of White Army organization which, like myself, had moved out of Russia. In exasperated tones, it demanded that I return at once a copy of the Protocols of the Wise Men of Zion. This book, which in the old days had been wistfully appreciated by the Tsar, was a fake memorandum the secret police had paid a semiliterate crook to compile; its sole object was the promotion of pogroms. The librarian, who signed himself "Sinepuzov" (a surname meaning "blue belly, '" which affects a Russian imagination in much the same way as Winterbottom does an English one), insisted that I had been keeping what he chose to call "this popular and valuable work" for more than a year. He referred to previous requests addressed to me in Belgrade, Berlin, and Brussels, through which towns my namesake apparently had been drifting. I visualized the fellow as a young, very White emigre, of the automatically reactionary type, whose education had been interrupted by the Revolution and who was successfully making up for lost time along traditional lines. He obviously was a great traveler; so was I-- our only point in common. A Russian woman in Strasbourg asked me whether the man who had married her niece in Liиge was my brother. One spring day, in Nice, a poker-faced girl with long earrings called at my hotel, asked to see me, took one look at me, apologized, and went away. In Paris, I received a telegram which jerkily ran, "NE VIENS PAS ALPHONSE DE RETOUR SOUPCONNE SOIS PRUDENT JE T'ADORE ANGOISSEE," and l admit deriving a certain grim satisfaction from the vision of my frivolous double inevitably bursting in, flowers in hand, upon Alphonse and his wife. A few years later, when I was lecturing in Zurich, I was suddenly arrested on a charge of smashing three mirrors in a restaurant-- a kind of triptych featuring my namesake drunk (the first mirror), very drunk (the second), and roaring drunk (the third). Finally, in 1938, a French consul rudely refused to stamp my tattered sea-green Nansen passport because, he said, I had entered the country once before without a permit. In the fat dossier which was eventually produced, I caught a glimpse of my namesake's face. He had a clipped mustache and a crew haircut, the bastard. When, soon after that, I came over to the United States and settled down in Boston, I felt sure I had shaken off my absurd shadow. Then-- last month, to be precise-- there came a telephone call. In a hard and glittering voice, a woman said she was Mrs. Sybil Hall, a close friend of Mrs. Sharp, who had written to her suggesting that she contact me. I did know a Mrs. Sharp and didn't stop to think that both my Mrs. Sharp and myself might not be the right ones. Golden-voiced Mrs. Hall said she was having a little meeting at her apartment Friday night and would I come, because she was sure from what she had heard about me that I would be very, very much interested in the discussion. Although meetings of any kind are loathsome to me, I was prompted to accept the invitation by the thought that if I did not I might in some way disappoint Mrs. Sharp, a nice, maroon-trousered, short-haired old lady whom I had met on Cape Cod, where she shared a cottage with a younger woman; both ladies are mediocre leftist artists of independent means, and completely amiable. Owing to a misadventure, which had nothing to do with the subject of the present account, I arrived much later than I intended at Mrs. Hall's apartment house. An ancient elevator attendant, oddly resembling Richard Wagner, gloomily took me up, and Mrs. Hall's unsmiling maid, her long arms hanging down her sides, waited while I removed my overcoat and rubbers in the hall. Here the chief decorative note was a certain type of ornamental vase manufactured in China, and possibly of great antiquity-- in this case a tall, sickly-colored brute of a thing-- which always makes me abominably unhappy. As I crossed a self-conscious, small room that fairly brimmed with symbols of what advertisement writers call "gracious living" and was being ushered-- theoretically, for the maid had dropped away-- into a large, mellow, bourgeois salon, it gradually dawned upon me that this was exactly the sort of place where one would expect to be introduced to some old fool who had had caviar in the Kremlin or to some wooden Soviet Russian, and that my acquaintance Mrs. Sharp, who had for some reason always resented my contempt for the Party line and for the Communist and his Master's Voice, had decided, poor soul, that such an experience might have a beneficial influence upon my sacrilegious mind. From a group of a dozen people, my hostess emerged in the form of a long-limbed, flat-chested woman with lipstick on her prominent front teeth. She introduced me rapidly to the guest of honor and her other guests, and the discussion, which had been interrupted by my entrance, was at once resumed. The guest of honor was answering questions. He was a fragile-looking man with sleek, dark hair and a glistening brow, and he was so brightly illumined by the long-stalked lamp at his shoulder that one could distinguish the specks of dandruff on the collar of his dinner jacket and admire the whiteness of his clasped hands, one of which I had found to be incredibly limp and moist. He was the type of fellow whose weak chin, hollow cheeks, and unhappy Adam's apple reveal, a couple of hours after shaving, when the humble talcum powder has worn off, a complex system of pink blotches overlaid with a stipple of bluish gray. He wore a crested ring, and for some odd reason I recalled a swarthy Russian girl in New York who was so troubled by the possibility of being mistaken for her notion of a Jewess that she used to wear a cross upon her throat, although she had as little religion as brains. The speaker's English was admirably fluent, but the hard "djair" in his pronunciation of "Germany" and the persistently recurring epithet "wonderful," the first syllable of which sounded like "wan, -"proclaimed his Teutonic origin. He was, or had been, or was to become, a professor of German, or music, or both, somewhere in the Middle West, but I did not catch his name and so shall call him Dr. Shoe. "Naturally he was mad!" exclaimed Dr. Shoe in answer to something one of the ladies had asked. "Look, only a madman could have messed up the war the way he did. And I certainly hope, as you do, that before long, if he should turn out to be alive, he will be safely interned in a sanatorium somewhere in a neutral country. He has earned it. It was madness to attack Russia instead of invading England. It was madness to think that the war with Japan would prevent Roosevelt from participating' energetically in European affairs. The worst madman is the one who fails to consider the possibility of somebody else's being mad too." "One cannot help feeling," said a fat little lady called, I think, Mrs. Mulberry, "that thousands of our boys who have been killed in the Pacific would still be alive if all those planes and tanks we gave England and Russia had been used to destroy Japan." "Exactly," said Dr. Shoe. "And that was Adolf Hitler's mistake. Being mad, he failed to take into account the scheming of irresponsible politicians. Being mad, he believed that other governments would act in accordance with the principles of mercy and common sense." "I always think of Prometheus," said Mrs. Hall. "Prometheus, who stole fire and was blinded by the angry gods." An old lady in a bright blue dress, who sat knitting in a corner, asked Dr. Shoe to explain why the Germans had not risen against Hitler. Dr. Shoe lowered his eyelids for a moment. "The answer is a terrible one," he said with an effort. "As you know, I am German myself, of pure Bavarian stock, though a loyal citizen of this country. And nevertheless, I am going to say something very terrible about my former countrymen. Germans"-- the soft-lashed eyes were half-closed again-- "Germans are dreamers." By this time, of course, I had fully realized that Mrs. Hall's Mrs. Sharp was as totally distinct from my Mrs. Sharp as I was from my namesake. The nightmare into which I had been propelled would probably have struck him as a cozy evening with kindred souls, and Dr. Shoe might have seemed to him a most intelligent and brilliant causeur. Timidity, and perhaps morbid curiosity, kept me from leaving the room. Moreover, when I get excited, I stammer so badly that any attempt on my part to tell Dr. Shoe what I thought of him would have sounded like the explosions of a motorcycle which refuses to start on a frosty night in an intolerant suburban lane. I looked around, trying to convince myself that these were real people and not a Punch-and-Judy show. None of the women were pretty; all had reached or overreached forty-five. All, one could be certain, belonged to book clubs, bridge clubs, babble clubs, and to the great, cold sorority of inevitable death. All looked cheerflilly sterile. Possibly some of them had had children, but how they had produced them was now a forgotten mystery; many had found substitutes for creative power in various aesthetic pursuits, such as, for instance, the beautifying of committee rooms. As I glanced at the one sitting next to me, an intense-looking lady with a freckled neck, I knew that, while patchily listening to Dr. Shoe, she was, in all probability, worrying about a bit of decoration having to do with some social event or wartime entertainment the exact nature of which I could not determine. But I did know how badly she needed that additional touch. Something in the middle of the table, she was thinking. I need something that would make people gasp-- perhaps a great big huge bowl of artificial fruit. Not the wax kind, of course. Something nicely marbleized. It is most regrettable that I did not fix the ladies' names in my mind when I was introduced to them. Two willowy, interchangeable maiden ladies on hard chairs had names beginning with W, and, of the others, one was certainly called Miss Bissing. This I had heard distinctly, but could not later connect with any particular face or facelike object. There was only one other man besides Dr. Shoe and myself. He turned out to be a compatriot of mine, a Colonel Malikov or Melnikov; in Mrs. Hall's rendering it had sounded more like "Milwaukee."' While some soft, pale drinks were being passed around, he leaned toward me with a leathery, creaking sound, as if he wore a harness under his shabby blue suit, and informed me in a hoarse Russian whisper that he had had the honor of knowing my esteemed uncle, whom I at once visualized as a ruddy but unpalatable apple on my namesake's family tree. Dr. Shoe, however, was becoming eloquent again, and the Colonel straightened up, revealing a broken yellow tusk in his retreating smile and promising me by means of discreet gestures that we would have a good talk later on. "The tragedy of Germany," said Dr. Shoe as he carefully folded the paper napkin with which he had wiped his thin lips, "is also the tragedy of cultured America. I have spoken at numerous women's clubs and other educational centers, and everywhere I have noted how deeply this European war, now mercifully ended, was loathed by refined, sensitive souls. I have also noted how eagerly cultured Americans revert in memory to happier days, to their traveling experiences abroad, to some unforgettable month or still more unforgettable year they once spent in the country of art, music, philosophy, and good humor. They remember the dear friends they had there, and their season of education and well-being in the bosom of a German nobleman's family, the exquisite cleanness of everything, the '..songs at the close of a perfect day, the wonderful little towns, and all that world of kindliness and romance they found in Munich or Dresden." "My Dresden is no more," said Mrs. Mulberry. "Our bombs have destroyed it and everything it stands for." "British ones, in this particular case," said Dr. Shoe gently. "But, of course, war is war, although I admit one finds it difficult to imagine German bombers deliberately selecting for their target some sacred historical spot in Pennsylvania or Virginia. Yes, war is terrible. In fact, it becomes almost intolerably so when it is forced upon two nations that have so many things in common. It may strike you as a paradox, but really, when one thinks of the soldiers slaughtered in Europe, one says to oneself that they are at least spared the terrible misgivings which we civilians must suffer in silence." "I think that is very true," remarked Mrs. Hall, slowly nodding her head. "What about those stories?" asked an old lady who was knitting. "Those stories the papers keep printing about the German atrocities. I suppose all that is mostly propaganda?" Dr. Shoe smiled a tired smile. "I was expecting that question," he said with a touch of sadness in his voice. "Unfortunately, propaganda, exaggeration, faked photographs, and so on are the tools of modern war. I should not be surprised if the Germans themselves had made up stories about the cruelty of the American troops to innocent civilians. Just think of all the nonsense which was invented about the so-called German atrocities in the First World War-- those horrible legends about Belgian women being seduced, and so on. Well, immediately after the war, in the summer of 1920, if I am not mistaken, a special committee of German democrats thoroughly investigated the whole matter, and we all know how pedantically thorough and precise German experts can be. Well, they did not find one scintilla of evidence to prove that Germans had not acted like soldiers and gentlemen." One of the Misses W. ironically remarked that foreign correspondents must make a living. Her remark was witty. Everybody appreciated her ironical and witty remark. "On the other hand," continued Dr. Shoe when the ripples had subsided, "let us forget propaganda for a moment and turn to dull facts. Allow me to draw you a little picture from the past, a rather sad little picture, but perhaps a necessary one. I will ask you to imagine German boys proudly entering some Polish or Russian town they had conquered. They sang as they marched. They did not know that their Fuhrer was mad; they innocently believed that they were bringing hope and happiness and wonderful order to" the fallen town. They could not know that owing to subsequent mistakes and delusions on the part of Adolf Hitler, their conquest would eventually lead to the enemy's making a flaming battlefield of the very cities to which they, those German boys, thought they were bringing everlasting peace. As they bravely marched through the streets in all their finery, with their wonderful war machines and their banners, they smiled at everybody and everything because they were pathetically good-natured and well-meaning. They innocently expected the same friendly attitude on the part of the population. Then, gradually, they realized that the streets through which they so boyishly, so confidently, marched were lined with silent and motionless crowds of Jews, who glared at them with hatred and who insulted each passing soldier, not by words-- they were too clever for that-- but by black looks and ill-concealed sneers."' "I know that kind of look," said Mrs. Hall grimly. "But they did not,"' said Dr. Shoe in plaintive tones. "That is the point. They were puzzled. They did not understand, and they were hurt. So what did they do? At first they tried to fight that hatred with patient explanations and little tokens of kindness. But the wall of hatred surrounding them only got thicker. Finally they were forced to imprison the leaders of the vicious and arrogant coalition. What else could they do?" "I happen to know an old Russian Jew," said Mrs. Mulberry. "Oh, just a business acquaintance of Mr. Mulberry's. Well, he confessed to me once that he would gladly strangle with his own hands the very first German soldier he met. I was so shocked that I just stood there and did not know what to answer." "I would have," said a stout woman who sat with her knees wide apart. "As a matter of fact, one hears much too much about punishing the Germans. They, too, are human beings. And any sensitive person will agree with what you say about their not being responsible for those so-called atrocities, most of which have probably been invented by the Jews. I get mad when I hear people still jabbering about furnaces and torture houses which, if they existed at all, were operated by only a few men as insane as Hitler." "Well, I am afraid one must be understanding," said Dr. Shoe, with his impossible smile, "and take into account the workings of the vivid Semitic imagination which controls the American press. And one must remember, too, that there were many purely sanitary measures which the orderly German troops had to adopt in dealing with the corpses of the elderly who had died in camp, and, in some cases, in disposing of the victims of typhus epidemics. I am quite free from any racial prejudices myself, and I can't see how these age-old racial problems have anything to do with the attitude to be adopted toward Germany now that she has surrendered. Especially when I remember the way the British treat natives in their colonies." "Or how the Jewish Bolsheviks used to treat the Russian people-- ai-ai-ai!" remarked Colonel Melnikov. "Which is no more the case, is it?" asked Mrs. Hall. "No, no," said the Colonel. "The great Russian people has waked up and my country is again a great country. We had three great leaders. We had Ivan, whom his enemies called Terrible, then we had Peter the Great, and now we have Joseph Stalin. I am a White Russian and have served in the Imperial Guards, but also I am a Russian patriot and a Russian Christian. Today, in every word that comes out of Russia, I feel the power, I feel the splendor of old Mother Russia. She is again a country of soldiers, religion, and true Slavs. Also, I know that when the Red Army entered German towns, not a single hair fell from German shoulders." "Head," said Mrs. Hall. "Yes," said the Colonel. "Not a single head from their shoulders." "We all admire your countrymen," said Mrs. Mulberry. "But what about Communism spreading to Germany?" "If I may be permitted to offer a suggestion," said Dr. Shoe, "I would like to point out that if we are not careful, there will be no Germany. The main problem which this country will have to face is to prevent the victors from enslaving the German nation and sending the young and hale and the lame and old-- intellectuals and civilians-- to work like convicts in the vast area of the East. This is against all the principles of democracy and war. If you tell me that the Germans did the same thing to the nations they conquered, I will remind you of three things: first, that the German State was not a democracy and couldn't be expected to act like one; secondly, that most, if not all, of the so-called slaves came of their own free will; and in the third place-- and this is the most important point-- that they were well fed, well clothed, and lived in civilized surroundings which, in spite of all our natural enthusiasm for the immense population and geography of Russia, Germans are not likely to find in the country of the Soviets. "Neither must we forget," continued Dr. Shoe, with a dramatic rise in his voice, "that Nazism was really not a German but an alien organization oppressing the German people. Adolf Hitler was an Austrian, Lev a Jew, Rosenberg half-French, half-Tartar. The German nation has suffered under this non-German yoke just as much as other European countries have suffered from the effects of the war waged on their soil. To civilians, who not only have been crippled and lulled but whose treasured possessions and wonderful homes have been annihilated by bombs, it matters little whether those bombs were dropped by a German or an Allied plane. Germans, Austrians, Italians, Rumanians, Greeks, and all the other peoples of Europe are now members of one tragic brotherhood, all are equal in misery and hope, all should be treated alike, and let us leave the task of finding and judging the guilty to future historians, to unbiased old scholars in the immortal centers of European culture, in the serene universities of Heidelberg, Bonn, Jena, Leipzig, Munchen. Let the phoenix of Europe spread its eagle wings again, and God bless America." There was a reverent pause while Dr. Shoe tremulously lighted a cigarette, and then Mrs. Hall, pressing the palms of her hands together in a charming, girlish gesture, begged him to round out the meeting with some lovely music. He sighed, got up, trod upon my foot in passing, apologetically touched my knee with the tips of his fingers, and, having sat down before the piano, bowed his head and remained motionless for several audibly silent seconds. Then, slowly and very gently, he laid his cigarette on an ashtray, removed the ashtray from the piano into Mrs. Hall's helpful hands, and bent his head again. At last he said, with a little catch in his voice, "First of all, I will play 'The Star-Spangled Banner. ' " Feeling that this was more than I could stand-- in fact, having reached a point where I was beginning to feel physically sick-- 1 got up and hurriedly left the room. As I was approaching the closet where I had seen the maid store my things, Mrs. Hall overtook me, together with a billow of distant music. "Must you leave?" she said. "Must you really leave?" I found my overcoat, dropped the hanger, and stamped into my rubbers. "You are either murderers or fools," I said, "or both, and that man is a filthy German agent." As I have already mentioned, I am afflicted with a bad stammer at crucial moments and therefore the sentence did not come out as smooth as it is on paper. But it worked. Before she could gather herself to answer, I had slammed the door behind me and was carrying my overcoat downstairs as one carries a child out of a house on fire. I was in the street when I noticed that the hat I was about to put on did not belong to me. It was a well-worn fedora, of a deeper shade of gray than my own and with a narrower brim. The head it was meant for was smaller than mine. The inside of the hat carried the label "Werner Bros. Chicago" and smelled of another man's hairbrush and hair lotion. It could not belong to Colonel Melnikov, who was as bald "as a bowling ball, and I assumed that Mrs. Hall's husband was either dead or kept his hats in another place. It was a disgusting object to carry about, but the night was rainy and cold, and I used the thing as a kind of rudimentary umbrella. As soon as I got home, I started writing a letter to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, but did not get very far. My inability to catch and retain names seriously impaired the quality of the information I was trying to impart, and since I had to explain my presence at the meeting, a lot of diffuse and vaguely suspicious matter concerning my own namesake had to be dragged in. Worst of all, the whole affair assumed a dreamlike, grotesque aspect when related in detail, whereas all I really had to say was that a person from some unknown address in the Middle West, a person whose name I did not even know, had been talking sympathetically about the German people to a group of silly old women in a private house. Indeed, judging by the expression of that same sympathy continuously cropping up in the writings of certain well-known columnists, the whole thing might be perfectly legal, for all I knew. Early the next morning I opened the door in answer to a ring, and there was Dr. Shoe, bareheaded, raincoated, silently offering me my hat, with a cautious half-smile on his blue-and-pink face. I took the hat and mumbled some thanks. This he mistook for an invitation to come in. I could not remember where I had put his fedora, and the feverish search I had to conduct, more or less in his presence, soon became ludicrous. "Look here," I said. "I shall mail, I shall send, I shall forward you that hat when I find it, or a check, if I don't." "But I'm leaving this afternoon," he said gently, "and moreover, I would like to have a little explanation of the strange remark you addressed to my very dear friend Mrs. Hall." He waited patiently while I tried to tell him as neatly as I could that the police, the authorities, would explain that to her. "You do not understand," he said at length. "Mrs. Hall is a very well-known society lady and has numerous connections in official circles. Thank God we live in a great country, where everybody can speak his mind without being insulted for expressing a private opinion." I told him to go away. When my final splutter had petered out, he said, "I go away, but please remember, in this country-- " and he shook his bent finger at me sidewise, German fashion, in facetious reproof. Before I could decide where to hit him, he had glided out. I was trembling all over. My inefficiency, which at times has amused me and even pleased me in a subtle way, now appeared atrocious and base. All of a sudden I caught sight of Dr. Shoe's hat on a heap of old magazines under the little telephone table in my hall. I hurried to a front window, opened it, and, as Dr. Shoe emerged four stories below, tossed the hat in his direction. It described a parabola and made a pancake landing in the middle of the street. There it turned a somersault, missed a puddle by a matter of inches, and lay gaping, wrong side up. Dr. Shoe, without looking up, waved his hand in acknowledgment, retrieved the hat, satisfied himself that it was not too muddy, put it on, and walked away, jauntily wiggling his hips. I have often wondered why is it that a thin German always manages to look so plump behind when wearing a raincoat. All that remains to be told is that a week later I received a letter the peculiar Russian of which can hardly be appreciated in translation. "Esteemed Sir," it read. "You have been pursuing me all my life. Good, friends of mine, after reading your books, have turned, away from me thinking that I was the author of those deprayed,, decadent writings. In 1941, and again in 1943, I was arrested in trance by the Germans for things I never had. said or thought. Now in America, not content with having caused me all sorts of troubles in other countries, you have the arrogance to impersonate me and to appear in a drunken condition at the house of a highly respected person. This I will not tolerate. I could have you jailed and branded as an impostor, but I suppose you would not like that, and, so I suggest that by way of indemnity. . . " The sum he demanded was really a most modest one.
Владимир Набоков


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If downtown bascule bridges are show ponies—with curved, double-leaf spans painted a deep maroon—vertical lift bridges are Chicago's underappreciated workhorses.
True to their name, their spans lift vertically but stay parallel to their decks—as opposed to bascule bridges, which flip open at an angle ("bascule" is French for "seesaw"). There are seven vertical lift bridges in the city: just one over the Chicago River, but another six across the Calumet River.
If you've noticed them, you've probably seen the one that runs not quite parallel to Canal Street just south of 18th Street, its towers looming above the dry dock next door, its rust-colored bridge house perched precariously in the middle of its span. Or perhaps you've spotted the strange trio of bridges visible from the Skyway, looking like relics, with two of their spans perpetually in the air.
These bridges always seemed to be lost in time: impractical remnants that hark back to Chicago's days as an industrial powerhouse. They're monuments whose real purpose had been lost or obscured—like neighborhood fire-alarm boxes or the water towers on the tops of downtown buildings. Of course, I loved them. They were visually striking, but unwieldy: Surely modern engineering had developed a more efficient solution to waterway traffic in the years since these bridges had first been built?
In time, I would learn the truth. Vertical lift bridges were favored in the 1910s—unlike bascule bridges, they required counterweights only as heavy as the bridge span itself. That meant that the spans could be heavier, and were thus well suited for freight-train traffic.
Today, although a few are abandoned—including three over the Calumet—many are still surprisingly active, and still fill their original purpose.
The bridge near Canal Street is properly called the Pennsylvania Railroad Bridge No. 458. Completed in 1914, it's presently owned and maintained by Amtrak. According to the company, all of its eastbound trains cross this bridge after leaving Union Station—that's ten trains a day to Michigan and another four to the east coast. Add to that a slew of Metra and freight trains that also use the tracks, as well as trains that use the bridge to turn around in a nearby rail yard, and you have an astonishing 110 or so trains using this vertical lift bridge every day. And because river-barge traffic has the right of way (literally because whatever was there first has the right of way and the river was there first), the bridge must also lift to let water vessels past. Amtrak estimates that the bridge is lifted, on average, once every 48 minutes.
When asked if the company had considered replacing the bridge with something more modern, a spokesman said that for the amount of space Amtrak had on-site, there didn't seem to be a bridge solution more practical than the one it already had.
I'm still attached to my misunderstanding of vertical lift bridges as charming and outdated, but I'm happy to know they're more than just symbols of the past. For all the changes to our economy and landscape, vertical lift bridges are evidence that Chicago is still a hub, still the city that works. v


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Dramatic Structure
a Playwriting Class
I consider a large part of my National Playwright Residency Program residency at Marin Theatre Company to be the continual asking and answering of this question: Why theatre? This series of videos will be a collection of asking and answering that question in myriad ways. I will ask myself, my fellow theatre artists, social scientists, and community leaders. Sometimes the answer will be cultural (because art is good for you!), sometimes technical (because story has universal dramatic structure!), sometimes biological (because narrative is an ancient element of our human evolution!). I believe that it is the energetic and open asking and answering that keeps our art form relevant, responsive, and inspired.
The second video in this series "Why Theatre?" starts with an exploration of the ancient, primal origin of story and how it can serve playwrights in their creative process. What is the point of telling and receiving a story? Why do we do it? Why have we always done it? (I reference the book Art As Therapy, which you can read more about here.) At their most fundamental level, I think stories are designed to help us learn, to extract wisdom from others, to empathetically experience crisis to better prepare for should it come our way. This makes the telling and the receiving of stories active endeavors, not just passive entertainment. We engage with characters, we don't just watch. Audiences should be always asking themselves, "What would I do in that situation? Who would I prize myself to be?"
As a story creator, this tells me that I need to put my characters through the most important tests of their lives in my plays because audiences want to learn from characters journeys to prepare for their own. Theatre lets me ask how to live a meaningful life, not answer it. I ask myself, "What would I do?" as I make my characters answer the same question. My characters must come up against fundamental challenges to their beliefs and identities so they can reckon with the decisions that will define them. My characters must be forced to do things, not just say things, that will clarify themselves in their own hearts and the eyes of the world.
Stories are designed to help us learn, to extract wisdom from others, to empathetically experience crisis to better prepare for should it come our way. This makes the telling and the receiving of stories active endeavors, not just passive entertainment.
So. The class covers some of that, plus a discussion about the dramatic structure of plays that unpacks how a writer might journey their protagonist from introduction to crisis to climactic catharsis.
Video editing by Jeff Berlin.
What else would you like to see in this series? I'd love to have your thoughts and ideas in the comments.


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As Apple prepares to introduce the iPhone 5, I've begun reminiscing about a deal I struck with my 13-year-old daughter.
She's always wanted an iPhone. In fact, she's wanted one since they came out in 2007 – when she was 8 years old. But my response was always the same: "No, you don't need one. I know where you are every second of the day. There's no need for a phone."
Then came middle school. That old argument didn't hold up anymore.
As a result, she got her first cell. It wasn't anything fancy (i.e., it wasn't an iPhone), just a basic-feature phone that let her make calls and text. "Mom, I'm over at blah, blah's house. Mom, I'll be home at blah, blah time. Mom, can I go to the blah, blah movie?"
Life was good. No more whining.
Then came her 13th birthday. The whining returned. She wanted an iPhone 4S. A deal was struck. She would have to pay for her own data plan, which meant she would have to do the above-and-beyond chores around our house like gardening, vacuuming, dusting, etc. You get the picture.
But when we were crafting the deal, I did have a big concern. She's a real data hog and could easily blow way a 2GB limit with all the YouTube videos she and her friends watch. Sure, she has a one hour limit of tube time (Computer, TV, Video Games) during the weekdays, but Saturdays are limitless as long as no homework is due on Monday.
Then I had an idea. Why not let her inherit my unlimited data plan? I use my company's smartphone all the time for my email and testing out apps. My data needs are likely a fraction of hers.
So, we switched. She picked up my cell phone number and unlimited data plan and I received her phone number and basic feature phone, which I have to admit is rather yucky. Ahh, the sacrifices we make for our children.


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Incredible opportunity to own 3.64 acres on the Butler Chain of lakes. This exquisite Dave Brewer custom residence features 6 bedrooms, 5.5 baths and its own private entry gate. As you step through the front doors your eyes are immediately greeted by soaring two story ceilings and one of a kind views of the pool and lake. The luxurious master suite is lined with striking arched windows and features a separate sitting area and a spacious master bath with a walk-in shower and oversized soaking tub. The chef in the family will love the large open kitchen with its center island and beautiful cherry cabinetry. Exterior amenities include a hidden motor court with three garages, a sparkling screened pool, picturesque grounds with exotic tropical fruit trees, and a private boat dock perfectly positioned along 250 feet of pristine shoreline. The location simply can't be beat, just minutes from fine dining along S.W. Orlando's famed restaurant row, shopping at local luxury boutiques, and a short drive to all of the area theme parks, this home is all about convenience.
More information about "9221 Charles E Limpus Rd, FL 32836" at Zillow.


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I haven't been able to post as many outfits as I would like on my blog. So today I decided to post this recent #OOTD that I had posted on my instagram page.
I wore this over the weekend for Girls Night Out.
Top & Jeans: Forever21
Shoes: LolaShoetique
I wore this to go explore NYC while me and the family were playing tourist :).
Top, Shorts, Scarf: Forever21
Boots: Justfab
I wore this for my sister in law bday party.
Top: Foever21
Bottoms: Bebe
Shoes: Urbanog


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Denver's Awesome Coworking Spaces
Find the spaces that are in the neighborhood you love the most
What are you looking for?
Let's chat
Quesions about Denver Coworks?
We'd love to answer your questions! Contact our leadership team and other coworking space owners to learn more. Everyone can attend one meeting for free.


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Commonwealth Games: Clare Balding among BBC presenters
Last updated on .From the section Commonwealth Games
Presenters including Clare Balding, Hazel Irvine, Gary Lineker and Gabby Logan will front the BBC's Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games coverage.
The opening and closing ceremonies will be broadcast live from Celtic Park and Hampden Park.
Over the course of the 11 days of the Games, the BBC will broadcast across all major TV and radio networks, online and on the red button.
There will also be Games-themed programmes across TV and radio.
Bruce Malcolm, BBC's Head of Commonwealth Games, said: "BBC Sport will provide the kind of coverage they did so brilliantly during the Olympics but we also want to join in the year-long celebrations both here in Glasgow and throughout the rest of Scotland by bringing our audiences a string of live events, concerts and Commonwealth-themed programmes.
"Both BBC Scotland and BBC Sport's Games team will be based in Glasgow for the duration, with Pacific Quay acting as our Commonwealth Games broadcast engine room."
Television coverage will feature live sport with presenters at the venues - including Balding, Logan and John Inverdale - and will start each day in BBC Breakfast, before Mishal Husain presents the morning action from 09:00-12:00 BST.
Jason Mohammad hosts from 12:00-15:00 BST, followed by Irvine from 15:00-19:00 BST, with Lineker taking over for the evening show. Mark Chapman will then host a highlights programme with Balding co-presenting from various Glasgow locations.
Radio 5 live will be broadcasting from Glasgow, with Nicky Campbell leading the breakfast coverage from 06:00 BST and Mark Pougatch presenting the live evening coverage.


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Not exactly the cutting edge of fashion, but this warm, lightweight jacket folds into a travel pillow. Genius!
I seriously will NOT leave home without my Somme Institute face products.
(And the set comes with an SPF, too!)
Love this fun, patterned dopp kitt. It's perfect for piling full of products.
Dying for some easy, kick-around boots like these
Pad & Quill's super cool, super sleek Kindle cover that's handmade using traditional book binding methods. (Gotta help keep some form of book-creating alive, right?!)
A go-anywhere, go with everything bag.


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ENGLAND v AUSTRALIA 1993
Toss: England
Greg Baum
Toss: England. Test debuts: M. C. Ilott, M. N. Lathwell, M. J. McCague, G. P. Thorpe.
Rarely before can a draw have been welcomed with such rapture in England, for, after seven consecutive Test defeats, this was not only a moral victory but a victory for morale. After three days, another Australian win looked almost certain. That evening, however, Australia were severely censured by the referee, Clive Lloyd, for their deportment on the field after complaints from both umpires. To what extent that influenced the change that overtook the match is problematic. Australian coach Bob Simpson said not at all: if his players were more subdued after the rest day it was just that England gave them nothing to become excited about.
What could be quantified were inspiring centuries from the patriarch Gooch and the initiate Thorpe, the first England player since F. C. Hayes in 1973 to score a century on Test debut. By Tuesday evening, it was England who felt cheated out of victory. But this was a very different England team. At last recognising the stability they had sought for the stagnation it had become, England dropped Gatting, Hick, Foster, Lewis and Tufnell and brought into the squad Igglesden, McCague, Bicknell, Hussain, Thorpe and Lathwell to go along with the uncapped Ilott, left out at Old Trafford and Lord's - seven men, with a total experience of four Tests, none gained in the previous three years.
The selection of McCague to bowl with the New Zealand emigré Caddick provoked a storm in both hemispheres, for although he was born in Ulster, he grew up in Port Hedland in Australia's dusty north-west, graduated from the Australian Cricket Academy, and played Sheffield Shield cricket and high-class Australian Rules football. But when he was made twelfth man for the 1991-92 Shield final, he became disillusioned with Western Australia. He had already joined Kent, where his Irish birth conveniently made him an English player, and now an England player - a rat joining a sinking ship, said a Sydney newspaper.
His Kent partner Igglesden again had to withdraw through injury, and Bicknell was omitted. That left an attack whose total exposure to Test cricket was the four games Caddick and Such had played between them in this series, but a seven-men batting line-up, with Gooch dropping down to No. 5 so that the 21-year-old Lathwell could open, even though the Gooch-Atherton partnership had been just about England's only success of the first two Tests. Australia brought in Julian for the homeward-bound McDermott.
The pitch was predicted to be a spitting, seaming monster, but neither captain could see it and Gooch had no hesitation in batting first. The early portents were familiar. Smith, relieved to have escaped the purge and elevated to No. 3, made a roistering 86 from 113 balls until Julian, seeking only to stop a powerful drive, caught and bowled him with one outflung hand. Hussain, in his first Test for three years, batted elegantly for a maiden fifty, but Hughes and Warne were too good for the others and England were out early on Friday for 321. Hughes, now Australia's premier bowler, took five wickets in an innings for the first time against England.
McCague immediately entered into the affections of uncertain Englishmen by making the first breach in Australia's innings. But Boon and Mark Waugh ran up their third century partnership in successive Tests, 123 at more than five an over, until the brilliant and enigmatic Waugh again threw away a century, swiping at Such for McCague to take a catch in the outfield. Boon proceeded serenely and smoothly to another century; the elusive was now becoming a habit. Australia faltered slightly, but Border, batting laboriously at No. 8 because of illness, and Warne stretched the lead of 52.
Then came the acrimony. Atherton stood his ground after a low catch by Healy. While the Australians clustered around Atherton, Barrie Meyer seemed to waver for a moment before giving him out. Warne cast a spell over Lathwell and deceived Smith with a beautiful leg-break. That left England 122 for four at the close and in familiar waters. However, on Monday, it took a chastened Australia more than an hour to remove the nightwatchman Caddick, who had now batted nearly seven and a half hours in the series, and almost another four to claim the next wicket. Gooch repaid Australia's aggression with 11 boundaries in the first session, and though he was less cavalier later, he achieved his 19th Test century, his 11th as captain and his 8,000th Test run. It was a masterful innings, and yet he could scarcely bring himself to make one celebratory flourish of his bat, for all the statistics would ring hollow if England were to lose another match. Hughes, desperately seeking to get rid of him, bent his back into an especially fast bouncer, strained a groin muscle and was out of the Test match.
Warne eventually turned out Gooch, but Thorpe remained and early on Tuesday reached his century with his patent whipped hook. The Surrey left-hander had batted with a poker-faced stoicism that enabled him to rise above the suspicion that, after four England A tours, he was not good enough for Test level, and the indignation of the public that he was not Gower. He was, at least, verifiably English.
Thorpe and Hussain had put on 113 when Gooch felt able to indulge himself in the rare luxury of a declaration, leaving Australia 371 to win in 77 overs. Slater went before lunch, charging impetuously at Such, and the Australian batsmen suddenly seemed mortal and susceptible to pressure. Australia lost five wickets in a feverish middle session - more than they had lost in the entire second Test - as Caddick began, without notice, to swing the ball disconcertingly. It was 115 for six at tea but Australia need not have feared. Julian, seemingly oblivious to the gravity of Australia's position, stroked his way to 47 and then hoisted Such's arm ball into the stands at long-on to go to his maiden Test fifty. Steve Waugh also rose to Australia's two hours of need. The ball grew soft, the pitch remained firm, the bowlers became tired and, in the finish, Australia averted disaster comfortably.
Before the match, there had been another rash of reports that Gooch would resign his commission if England lost. Asked to verify them afterwards, he answered: "We didn't lose, did we?" In a more emotional man, those words might have caught in his throat; it had been nearly a year since the last Test when he was able to utter them.
Man of the Match: G. P. Thorpe. Attendance: 48,824; receipts £828,100.
Close of play: First day, England 276-6 (N. Hussain 50*, A. R. Caddick 10*); Second day, Australia 262-5 (D. C. Boon 88*, B. P. Julian 5*); Third day, England 122-4 (G. A. Gooch 12*, A. R. Caddick O*); Fourth day, England 362-6 (G. P. Thorpe 88*, N. Hussain 16*).


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Sometimes I curl up in the dark night, wrap myself up with my own arms, and whisper lonesome-ly… "What do you want, baby girl?"
I stare into the darkness and wish it could stare back. In the way that the roots stare at the dirt, willing the nutrients to budge from those grains up into their tendrilled stalks. Looking for sustenance.
Uncertainty loves me like it loves wild things. Like it loves the open plains of Kansas, unzipping them from east to west with space, everywhere. Too much space until the glut of space drives one to the edge. It's this teetering edge that holds me tight, the uncertain forces of maps and lines and attachments from all directions.
Here's the thing: all this flowy writing smacks of the indirect way to say: I'm scared. I am terrified because I don't know what to do. And I don't know what I want. I think I should have known long ago. This is only the rest of my life. Deciding on where to go to graduate school feels to me like deciding if you want to marry the boy. Especially in my field. Where you go to school is many times where you settle, because licensure in counseling is notoriously difficult to transfer from state to state.
So, I made a decision almost 5 years ago that was a mistake… and it was marrying the wrong boy. Does that help with this situation? No.
What makes this harder is that there are several pathways to becoming a therapist. You can go to school for licensed mental health counseling. Or social work. Or a masters in Clinical Psychology. Or a doctorate in Clinical Psychology. Or a doctorate in Counseling Psychology. Or a degree in Marriage and Family therapy. And there are few differences between each of these choices. The most blurry are the differences between licensed mental health counseling and social work. Which one do I choose? Do I want more research base (clinical psych)? Do I want the flexibility of a doctorate? Or the extended flexibility of a social work degree (and higher wage)? Do I just want to be a plain regular counselor with training in trauma work?
This is what I lay in bed and ask myself at night.
I have applied to 5 schools. And I still don't know if I applied to the 'right' places or am going in the right direction. I feel like I'm driving in the dark without any headlights on… which, on a country road at night, is gorgeous and exhilarating yet suffocating.
I'm almost nauseatingly uncertain and I know the spiritual answers but it doesn't take it away. I visited school no. 2 yesterday and I think it made things worse… so now I'm right in the crosshairs of an existential crisis.
But I graduate in 2 days. I take my last undergraduate final tomorrow. So for now… it's time to just be here and live these 2 days up.


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AspectCTRM's Commodity Risk Management Module provides a powerful credit and market risk solution, and an affordable alternative to using spreadsheets. Address a multitude of risks including: price, volume, volatility, quality, delivery counterparty, credit and multi-currency, with a full spectrum of physical and financial tools. The second data is entered into AspectCTRM, users can perform instant analysis and monitor individual portfolios and exposure across the organization. Aspect clients are able to integrate this Module with their internal systems to complete the cycle and gain real-time commodity risk management and analysis controls.
AspectCTRM features best-in-class functionality for credit, counterparty, market, and price-related risks. The global recession has pushed companies to perform better, reduce costs, create more profits, manage counterparty credit risk more closely, and obtain credit in a tight market. The resulting demand on CTRM systems includes more simulation and "what-if" analytics; supporting financial services companies who are taking more active physical positions – and delivering more proactive risk management capabilities and visibility throughout the enterprise.
A series of several studies conducted over the years revealed that 91% of the spreadsheets surveyed contained errors. A simple, honest mistake can cost a company millions in losses, and many have learned firsthand the hard way. What is the use of spreadsheets to manage trading and risk activity costing your business? Waving a spreadsheet at the bank is no longer acceptable in today's climate when trying to secure credit. Banks require risk reporting from professional systems.
Default risk is higher than ever and maintaining credit worthiness is a challenge for companies of all sizes. You're watching your exposure while your customers are watching theirs. With AspectCTRM, you gain best practices reports and management to control credit risk exposure and ensure the companies you're doing business with can pay for services. AspectCTRM delivers all the reports you need, including: Real-time risk exposure reports by counterparty; credit limits and warnings notifications; trade entry preventions for violators; exposure reports for contracted, delivered, invoiced and overdue transactions; over-the- limit and threshold reports and more.
AspectCTRM calculates P&L, exposure and VaR in real time and reports by portfolio, strategy, book, trader, region and more. Like our Trade Management functions, it relies on OLAP reporting tools that are used to continuously update and monitor physical and financial portfolios with exposure reporting intraday and in real-time as market prices are updated. Most vendors perform inter-day risk calculations over many hours which puts AspectCTRM users at an advantage in the market. Aspect Enterprise Solutions also builds risk reports tailored to individual corporations. For example, various versions of a daily report have been produced that provide a quantitative assessment of the various risks in each portfolio, with drill-down/drill-around functions to allow the identification of relevant events which give rise to sudden changes in exposure and position.


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Brighten your patio with colorful pansies and violas!
Open Wednesday through Sunday 9am-5pm.
Closed Thursday for Thanksgiving. Our Gift Shop building is temporarily closed.
The Gardener's Choice sells a variety of trees, both deciduous and evergreen, and woody shrubs to provide structure and shape to your garden. From eye-catching focal accents to tall, deep green privacy screens to border plantings, you'll find a wide…
Brighten your patio with colorful pansies and violas!
Now's the time to start your favorite seeds. Find everything you need to nourish your seedlings including heat mats and seedling mix potting soil!
With one of Portland's top selections of pottery you'll find hundreds of containers to show off your favorite plants.
Many of our Camellias are already in bloom, due to the mild autumn we experienced here in the Pacific Northwest. Always the earliest to bloom, the Sasanqua camellias provide dark green foliage year-round, with a variety of bloom forms from…
One of our most popular fountains the Alfresco combines convenient size with giant sound. Twelve streams of water combine to create a delightful murmur easily worthy of a fountain twice its size. Use it to camouflage less appealing sounds like traffic…
Enjoy vibrant colored globes from local artist Andrew Holmberg!


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R&B artist T-Pain has been known for his flashy and sometimes excessive chain-wearing. With a new year on the horizon, it looks as though he will be adding a new jewelry piece to the collection as he is expected to sign with Young Money Entertainment.
Gabriel "The Jeweler" Jacobs of Rafaello & Co. recently spoke with VladTV.com about the $100,000 chain he has designed for the singer/producer. Describing the center-piece pendant as the "new Nappy Boy/Young Money piece," Jacobs announced, "T-Pain's about to sign to Young Money…He better, after doing this [laughs]."
You can view a video clip of Jacobs unveiling the pendant below.


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Intruder Shanky
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Must-Have Apps for Bonsai Tree ArtistsDo you love gardening? Would you like to try your hands at bonsai tree planting? Here are apps to get you started.4+735+3+
Best Apps for People Who Love Art MuseumsThough you could study art through books or on a computer screen, nothing can substitute seeing the actual pieces of art in a museum. Here's how you can have a better appreciation and understanding of art through apps.6+104+3+
Best Apps to Help You Find a New HobbyIf you realize you have some downtime but you're not sure what to do with it, why not pick up a new hobby? Apps can help you find a hobby that matches your personality and even teach you the skills to enjoy your new activity.6+2.4K+4+
Best Apps for People Who Love Silent MoviesAre you tired of watching the same 10 shows over and over? Use these apps to find entertaining and exciting silent movies or even create your own.4+302+3+
Best Apps That Help You Communicate with CatsAre you looking for a way to communicate with cats? These applications will help you understand and talk to your cats easily.4+138+3+
Must-Have Apps to Manipulate the Sound of Your GuitarIf you're trying to figure out how to get the most out of your electric guitar, use every resource at your disposal to make sure you combine all of its effects for the perfect sound.6+1.2K+5+
Top Apps to Master Creating PotteryBeing creative can be difficult if you don't know the basic techniques of your chosen craft. Find out which apps can help you learn pottery at home and start making masterpieces in no time!3+256+3+
Must-Have Apps for Becoming a SculptorDo you wish to become a master sculptor? Use these awesome apps to carve out a creative niche for yourself.4+63+3+
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Be CreativeWant to be more creative in your life or in the workplace? Find ways to express yourself through art and practicing creative thinking.182 Bundles 25 Categories
Enjoy a HobbyNeed some new hobbies? Find out what hobbies are out there, what the benefits are, and jump right into an interest that's best for you.300 Bundles 29 Categories
Challenge MyselfLooking to better yourself? Find ways to challenge yourself by reading helpful books or articles and practicing better habits to truly be the best you that you can be.149 Bundles 27 Categories
Learn Practical SkillsWant an innovative way to improve your life? Learn practical skills to further your education, advance your career, and make yourself a more well-rounded individual.204 Bundles 28 Categories
Have Hours of FunLooking to have hours of fun? Check out new hobbies, take a hike, settle down for a little meditation. Pass the time doing things you love.249 Bundles 60 Categories
Get a Dream JobWorried you'll never find your dream job? Take the stress out of your job search and establish your ideal career. Improve your resume and make the perfect first impression.127 Bundles 16 Categories
Be ProductiveAre you always lagging behind with your work and wish you could be more productive? Set your goals, manage your time well, stay alert, and always focus on personal growth.207 Bundles 19 Categories
Be SmarterWorried you're not smart enough? Keep your brain active by learning, building good study habits and improving your memory.177 Bundles 34 Categories
Be Successful at My JobWant to become a stand-out employee? Build good working habits to improve your efficiency and impress your superiors with how well you can manage each task.229 Bundles 10 Categories
Achieve Great ResultsFeel like you're incompetent for great things? Get the skills you need and develop a strong mindset necessary to achieve what you want in life.274 Bundles 14 Categories
Have Fun With FriendsReady to have a blast with friends and loved ones? Regardless of the time of the week or who you're with, fill your life with loads of fun and laughter.120 Bundles 17 Categories
Save MemoriesAfraid you will lose precious memories forever? Collecting small keepsakes, gifts, photos, and videos, and keeping a diary or a blog are just some of the options out there.42 Bundles 5 Categories
Save TimeAre you always running out of time? Create a schedule or a to-do list, and stick to it. Track your time, adopt new habits, and always start early so that you can finish early.108 Bundles 17 Categories
Meet New PeopleReady to expand your network and meet new people? Whether you're looking for new acquaintances, friends, or a significant other, grow your circle with total ease.90 Bundles 9 Categories
Earn MoneyLooking for ways to earn money? There are many online opportunities for generating income including freelancing work, buying and selling items, making stock investments, and more.115 Bundles 8 Categories
Play With FriendsWant fun new ways to play with your friends? Have a blast with online mobile games, party games for a group, and even fun indoor games you can play to pass the time.44 Bundles 24 Categories
Be an Independent AdultSick of relying on others financially and mentally? Take your wellbeing in your own hands and build your life the way you want.56 Bundles 8 Categories
Feel RelaxedAre you constantly under stress? In case you have trouble staying relaxed, you should try a good workout routine, meditation, mindfulness exercises, or simply organize your time better.130 Bundles 24 Categories
Run a Successful BusinessWant to make your business - big or small - more successful than ever before? Keep track of your employees, manage your spending, and ensure you have everything you need to run a healthy company.149 Bundles 12 Categories
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Project Here is making substance use prevention resources available to every public middle school in Massachusetts. Learn more about Project Here and how to register your school to participate.
In May 2017, Attorney General Maura Healey and the GE Foundation announced Project Here, an innovative $2 million collaboration, along with Health Resources in Action, Epicenter Experience, and the Herren Project. This first-of-its-kind initiative is making substance use prevention education available to every public middle school in Massachusetts to promote social-emotional learning and empower students to make healthy decisions.
All public middle schools in Massachusetts can register for access to an Online Toolkit containing dozens of research-based resources for classroom instruction; Project Here Games, an award-winning interactive online educational game for students; and, training and technical assistance around Project Here resources. All components are provided at no cost.
Project Here also provided public middle schools in Massachusetts the opportunity to apply for a comprehensive, multi-week, evidence-based curriculum, which has been made available to selected schools through a grant application process.
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Having a travel trailer likely means you have a full, busy lifestyle, whether you're using it for work, leisure, racing, or something else. Trying to find storage for your travel trailer when you're not using it can be a little tough. Washington winters can be kind of harsh, and if you store your trailer outside, it's subject to the whims of Mother Nature, with everything from sleet and snow to the hot sun and extremely hot temperatures. These extreme changes can cause the paint to peel, or other wear and tear. If you've been considering travel trailer indoor heated storage near Highway 2, just look to Toy Garage for all of your travel trailer storage needs – and more.
Here at Toy Garage VIP Storage, we have over 30,000 square feet of space in which you can store much more than just your travel trailer – nearly all of your beloved "toys" belong here. We have plenty of room for you if you are hoping to you store your boat, motorcycle, all-terrain vehicle (ATV), a recreational vehicle (RV), classic car, or other trailers and haulers. We also offer vehicle storage for your car, truck, or SUV.
What's great about indoor, climate-controlled storage is that not only does it protect your vehicle from the elements, it also keeps it at the same temp all year round, so you don't have to worry about damage from the sun or extreme temperatures. Toy Garage also offers round-the-clock indoor access, so it's never a hassle when you need to come to take something for a spin.
For more information about travel trailer indoor heated storage near Highway 2, contact Taylor at Toy Garage VIP Storage today at (425) 212-1168 or Ty at (425) 272-9564 to learn about options or to reserve a spot.


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the Anna dress Part 2: Bodice and buttons
Thank you, thank you! I've been avoiding buttonholes forever but knew I had to get over it to make this darling dress. I just made 5 pretty darn good ones! Can't wait for tomorrow.
my dress is turning out so cute, I think I picked a pretty fabric for this dress, I can't wait to finish =D
Ok, I finished the dress I was working on when you started this, so now I'm going to join in the sewalong a bit late. My daughter will LOVE this dress! Thank you for posting this walk-thru, it's my first shot at making poofy sleeves, and since my little girl is a HUGE fan of poofy sleeves, I think I'll be making them a lot!


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Health system repays $350 million of debt, invests in people and communities
Winston-Salem, N.C., April 3, 2017 – Novant Health today announced the 2016 audited financial results for the not-for-profit health care system. For 2016, Novant Health reported a net income of $412.8 million on operating revenue of $4.34 billion. The not-for-profit health system also reported a community benefit of $725.5 million, including $122 million of financial assistance to the uninsured and those members of our communities who have the greatest needs.
Fiscal year 2016 net income, also referred to as excess of revenues over expenses, was comprised of $258.8 million of operating income, $2.9 million of other (non-operating) income, and investment income of $151.1 million. With strong financial results, Novant Health voluntarily paid down about $350 million of debt and paid team members more than $83 million in bonus income. All team members received a discretionary financial bonus in 2016. The 2016 financial results compare to 2015 operating income of $258.4 million and investment loss of $60 million.
Carl S. Armato, president and CEO of Novant Health, commented that the organization made significant investments in people as the health care industry continues to struggle with provider and nurse shortages across the country, as well as an ever-changing environment.
"In 2016, Novant Health invested heavily in our team members. Novant Health is committed to being world-class at caring for our people so they can be world-class at caring for our patients," Armato said. "In addition to paying every team member a bonus, we also expanded our unique wellness and resiliency program for physicians by offering it to our nurses as well. To date, more than 700 providers and 350 nurses renewed their commitment to medicine through this dedicated effort to improve resiliency and address provider burnout. Our goal is that every nurse will participate in this program."
A healthy balance sheet readies the organization for possible increased turbulence in the health care industry, said Fred Hargett, chief financial officer for Novant Health.
"For years, Novant Health has been taking cost out of its operations while paying down debt and managing a healthy balance sheet," said Hargett. "As the industry continues to be pressured, Novant Health has managed itself responsibly to prepare for the uncertainty of the future, but also to invest smartly in our people and our communities to ensure we are able to provide the care our communities deserve."
Community benefit aligns with community needs
As a not-for-profit health care system, Novant Health provides community benefit programs in alignment with the needs of surrounding communities. Included are unreimbursed health services to individuals with Medicaid and Medicare coverage; community health education; support groups; partnerships with other organizations to provide outreach services; community events and screenings; and participation in medical research and academic health programs.
For example, in 2016, Charlotte-area pediatric providers from Novant Health provided state-required health assessments to hundreds of children at high-poverty schools. Additionally, preventive care and vaccines were delivered to vulnerable children via the Community Care Cruiser.
Also, in Winston-Salem, more than 4,000 women were screened for high cholesterol, blood glucose, blood pressure and other health measures in partnership with the American Heart Association.
In 2016, the unreimbursed costs to provide health care services to Medicare and Medicaid patients were $400.7 million and $110.0 million, respectively. And as with the previous years since the enactment of the Affordable Care Act, Novant Health continued to see a slight reduction in uninsured patients. Bad debt, which is not included in community benefit reporting, was $204.5 million.
Outpatient visits continued to grow as patients increasingly seek to proactively manage their health. Physician visits were up 6.8 percent from 2015, and inpatient visits were flat.
Quality and safety: Reducing costs and improving safety
In 2016, collaboration with independent physicians through the launch of the Novant Health Clinically Integrated Network and the Cigna Collaborative Care program helped Novant Health continue its commitment to delivering high-quality and affordable care. Key contributors to success included placing patients at the center of care, emphasizing preventive care in its clinics, taking a team-based approach and coordinating care for patients.
These partnerships also allowed Novant Health to establish clinical pathways and protocols, identify those at highest risk for hospital readmissions, and determine the most efficient way to deliver high-quality, affordable patient care. For Cigna's more than 60,000 North Carolina customers, Novant Health was able to reduce emergency room (ER) visits by 16 percent over the past year – a welcome cost-savings for patients, for whom the ER is often not the best option for nonemergency medical needs. Novant Health extended office hours, accelerated patient education and partnered with hospitals to get quality health care to patients so that they did not need to visit an ER.
New care-coordination efforts also helped Novant Health improve quality. Patients who have been discharged from the hospital after treatment are vulnerable to suffering another health crisis. In 2016, Novant Health piloted a program among team members and their dependents it insures to prevent such events. The organization targeted outreach and high-touch health care planning for patients at the highest risk for readmission to the hospital. As a result, 30-day readmission rates fell from 13.6 percent in January 2015 to 4.5 percent in December 2016.
Capital investments expand access, complete conversion to electronic health record
In June 2016, Novant Health converted Novant Health UVA Health System Haymarket Medical Center and Novant Health UVA Health System Prince William Medical Center from paper-based records to electronic health records (EHR) – completing the multiyear, $600 million project. Novant Health also achieved a significant milestone when it became the first health system to be revalidated for the Health Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Analytics Stage 7 Ambulatory Award for use of an EHR.
Capital investments in 2016 totaled $288.3 million. Significant construction projects included breaking ground for a new medical center in Mint Hill, North Carolina (scheduled to open in early 2018), finalizing a new bed tower at Novant Health Clemmons Medical Center (opening in 2017), building a new orthopedic hospital in Charlotte, and improving facilities at Novant Health UVA Health System Prince William Medical Center in Virginia.
Financial summary
(in millions of dollars)
Operating revenues
Operating expenses
Operating income
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Popular Garage Storage Ideas
Here are 3 simple storage ideas to keep your garage pleasant and functional for everyday use.
1. Cover your floor using an epoxy floor coating - An epoxy floor covering keeps the floor clean and easy to walk on. The floor will bring a much-needed color to your garage.
2. Garage Cabinets - Keep garage items neatly stored and behind closed doors in a sturdy cabinet.
3. Hanging Hooks - Adapting a system of interchangeable hooks keeps simple items off the floor in tight spaces.


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Dr. Anderson launched a new web site, Anderson Beyond Genome, in the spring of 2005 with an important and urgent message to the world.
Visit: www.AndersonBeyondGenome.com
Most people believe that genes hold the ultimate secrets about life and its living. So, when in 1997 the location of genes on the chromosomes that carry them was described, it was thought that we were close to the ultimate knowledge of whom we are and how we came to be.
In reality, the genome is just a road map in the sense that it tells us where specific genes are located on the chromosomes. There are 46 chromosomes in the nucleus of every cell in the body. Each chromosome carries a medley of genes.
Genes very considerably in how they operate. For example, there are what we may call the "static genes," that is, those that determine the color of our eyes, the shape of our noses, etc. And then there are those that are less static and more attuned to change, such as those that control human function or dysfunction. Each of these latter genes is, at it were, a player in the symphony that constitutes each individual. Being a player, these genes have to interact with each other so that each can play a role in maintaining stability in form and function.
To go Beyond the Genome, therefore, is to examine not only the genes themselves, but the quality of the energy present within the memories embedded within them that control their expression. These energies are inherited not only at conception, but also derive from the environments we experience from conception through pregnancy, birth, childhood and adult life. These energies play a pivotal role in controlling how genes express themselves - for better or for worse.
Research into the role of ENERGY and it's multitude of frequencies has led to knowledge of the vital role it plays in the human mind, body and soul. When the energy frequencies that control human thought, feeling and behavior remain within functional ranges, the opportunities for the functional expression of genes is the greatest. When these energy frequencies are damaged, by whatever means, the expression of the genes is also damaged and dysfunction and/or disease ensues.
We are rapidly moving into knowledge about the roles of memory and consciousness and their energies in human behavior. Thus the time is right to engage general awareness about how they play relentlessly into every function and dysfunction of the body, mind and soul and how the belief systems of culture and religion drive their energies in human thought and behavior.
Please visit www.AndersonBeyondGenome.com to learn more.


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What if in the New Year you had to devote yourself to One Question?
Let's up the stakes: If you do so, you are promised treasures and a fortune so great that you will have all the money you would ever need or want for the rest of your life. All you have to do is focus your work every day of 2016 this single Question.
What would it be?
Sure, it's just a party game. No one will really offer you riches if you promise to winnow your focus to contemplation of a single question for 366 days (2016 is a leap year, we get one extra day to play with!).
On the other hand, maybe there are riches in store, riches of the emotional and spiritual variety that is, if you get the question right, and if you really can attune to it, and stick with it.
I've got one I could commit to: "What is my heart's desire?"
Why this question? Because I trust that the heart knows.
The heart, one of my dear friends reminds me on one of my darkest days, is on a mission. So follow it.
What is my heart's desire? Asking this question would ensure that I live each day guided by love.
Decades ago, when I was a college kid, first semester, first time in therapy, the therapist asked: "How do you feel about that?" Was it a trick question? I was a smart girl, graduated in the top 10 percent of my high school class. What was that question again? My mind drew a blank? What do I feel? Help me out here. My therapist had to list the choices. Start with these: Mad, sad, glad, scared. I eventually got the hang of feelings. I'm pretty good at those now.
Then I started listening to a guided relaxation recording, on which the soothing voice emanating from my iPod would ask me each time, "What is your heart's deepest longing?" Stumped again. What are my choices?
How do I get to the heart of the matter?
My karate teacher once told me to "Choose love over fear." I was to do this each time I needed to decide. This turned out to be a good way to guide the ship that was my life.
Now here I am–here we are–with the sandy shore of 2016 coming into view. As we approach this new year, our world is engulfed in fear, and we see where that is leading us. (Paris, San Bernadino, Ferguson…need I go on?)
For 2016, I'd like to see where love will lead me.
They say "The heart is a lonely hunter." But it need not be so lonely if we scope out this territory—together.
366 days. One question. It's on. Let's see what we can dream up.
Today's post is my response to the question posed by Jonathan Fields, founder of The Good Life Project: He put it like this: You wake up to discover a knock at your door. A wealthy uncle you barely knew has passed and left you a fortune. … but there is a condition. To be eligible to collect, you must commit your full-time working energies to the pursuit of an answer to a single question of your choosing for the next 12 months… What is your question?
This prompt is part of my homework for #Quest2016's inquiry, designed to help creative business artists move with intention into the New Year.


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List of Top 10 Dog Breeds in the World
Dogs are men's best friend and those who look to bring home a companion for them need to chose a better one for their families and thus in this article we have come with top ten dog breeds that will prove to be an awesome choice for everyone.
List of Top 10 Dog Breeds in the World
1. Boxer:-
This dog weights about 30-32kgs in the case of males and 25-27kgs in the case of females. It can go about 50-60 centimeters in size. This one is a short, shiny, smooth and a child friendly dog. This breed remains short sized, short haired dog with a powerful bite sometimes, but remains friendly with its family. People like boxer dog for its head that is enough to describe its name.
2. Beagle:-
This dog weights about 10Kgs approximately and remained short weighed and goes about 33 to 35 centimeters in size. The dog as a short haired coat and comes with its tricolor body. It remains small to medium sized and is famous for its love showing nature for its family and master friendly nature.
3. Dalmatian (Dog):-
This one is a carriage dog that is 55-58cms in size. This dog lives about 10-13 years and is known for its patchful skin. They are large and muscular dogs with excellent features. The puppies look much cute when they are born with plain white patches. This one is often used as a rescue dog and remains adoring with the family.
4. Doberman Pinscher:-
The nickname for this dog is Doberman and it weights about 4-kgs approximately and has a size about 70centimeters. This one is amongst the top breeds that people like to bring home. The tail of this dog is fairly long and often have their ears cropped. They can easily learn to respect and protect their houses and are an awesome breed to bring home.
5. German Shepherd:-
this one weights about 30-40kgs in case of males and 22-32kg in case of females. The dog is a double coat type and lives about 9-13years. These dogs originated in Germany and are a large sized company and are known for its large size. The forehead is doomed and a long square cut muzzle. This one is a guard dog and is known for their intelligence.
6. Golden Retriever:-
The dog is about 29-32 kgs in weight and about 58-60cms in size in case of males and 55-57 cms in case of females. The coat is moderate and wavy and has golden or creamy shade. This one was meant for hunting ducks and birds, but later on people started to bring them home for guarding purposes.
7. Labrador Retriever:-
This one is simply known as Labrador and weights about 25-30kgs and is about 55-60cms in size. The coat is smooth, short, dense and straight and the life span is about 12 to 13 years. This one is playful, and people like to bring it to their homes as it is friendly to its master.
8. Great Dane:-
This one weights about 50-60kgs and is about 70-75cms in size. The dog is known for its instincts, qualities and friendly nature. This one seeks for affection from its owners and is extremely large in size. The dog was used earlier for hunting purposes and now is used as a pet in most of the dog lover's houses. This one has also become a symbol of luxurious lifestyle habits.
9. Rottweiler:-
This one originated in Germany and weights about 35-55kgs in weight. This one goes about 55-60cms in size and is a double coated, short and thick coated breed. The color can vary from black and tan, black or mahogany. The life span is about 8 to ten years. The dog has got abundance of strength and is known for its cunningness.
10. Pug:-
This one is a cute dog with a weak bladder. This one has a wrinkly, short-muzzled face and a curled tail. This breed has a fine glossy coat that comes in variety of colors. The dog is really cute and people like to bring it home. This one has a sociable and gentle behavior and is an awesome choice for those who have children.


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My School Programs
I love school visits! I'm very well-behaved and don't talk during fire drills. My author talks are approximately 50 minutes, and I can do up to four talks in one day. Grade-level school residencies are a minimum of 5 days and limited to 3 classrooms per day.
Here's a short video of my school visit in Harlem, NY with BEHIND THE BOOK.


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Your privacy is our priority. We post our privacy policy to inform you of our commitment to your privacy. If you have any questions about our privacy policy, please do not hesitate to contact us.
As part of our commitment to upholding your privacy, we keep all our corporate documents secure and non-public. All our staff, board members and contractors sign a confidentiality agreement thereby binding them to our principles of confidentiality.


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|Comic Battle >> View Post
Subj: Re: Another Battle Scan: Superman vs. Darkseid: Action Comics #586
Posted: Sun Feb 04, 2018 at 09:53:13 am CST (Viewed 192 times)
Reply Subj: Re: Another Battle Scan: Superman vs. Darkseid: Action Comics #586
Posted: Sat Feb 03, 2018 at 10:30:59 pm CST (Viewed 192 times)
Does not counts as per your own logic. Why are you using Action 586 when it's retc
Quote:A "low level model," not the real Thanos. This has already been repeatedly endlessly in this thread. That you continue to use this example is you either being deliberately obtuse or deliberately misleading.
Here's the blatant difference. I don't consider Action Comics #586 a retcon, gave reasons why, and so use it. You know the Ka-Zar example is a retcon, I know it's a retcon, and you still use it. So you're just being a troll.
I'm ready to accept any retcon provided you do the same.
Quote:Your hypocrisy is showing. You accept DC retcons (although this one, again, is ambiguous) but refuse to accept Marvel retcons.
So you're saying that because I don't accept one single ambiguous retcon that you do, you don't accept ANY retcons. Hilarious.
So did Thanos. When Thanos was at normal power levels, Thor only had belt of strength and he flattened Thanos in three hits.
Quote:Thor started off with a lot more.
No, Thor still has some of the armor Odin gave him, which as stated earlier, imbued Thor with some of the Odin-Force.
How to make an entrance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49xWJJvpjzI
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