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Each Apollo astronaut was equipped with a specially modified Hasselblad camera, resulting in thousands of iconic space images that are now collated in one place.
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As seniors make up a larger and larger percentage of its population, Singapore plans to roll out robotic care-givers to help the elderly exercise.
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The Institute for the Public Life of Arts and Ideas offers a range of internship and fellowship opportunities for McGill undergraduate and graduate students.
Archie Malloch Internship Awards in Public Learning
The Archie Malloch Internship Awards in Public Learning are intended for students entering the final year of their undergraduate programs. In support of this program, IPLAI has partnered with an excellent group of Montreal-based organizations concerned with the arts and social policy with whom the selected interns would be paired according to their academic expertise and professional interests. Students are invited to apply directly to IPLAI.
Fred and Betty Price Research Award and Max Stern McCord Museum Research Award
The Fred and Betty Price Research Award and the Max Stern McCord Museum Fellowship both offer financial support to research-stage graduate students whose work involves the collections of the McCord Museum. Students are invited to apply directly to IPLAI.
Archie Malloch Graduate Fellowships in Public Learning
The Archie Malloch Graduate Fellowship in Public Learning offers financial support to students in the final stages of thesis completion who show exceptional academic promise and whose intellectual pursuits are reflected in and may be supported by the work of the Institute. IPLAI welcomes applications from graduate students in any discipline.

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text: Second stay in a month and why, on previous occasions over the past year I decided to stay in a (more expensive) motel is beyond me. Forgive me Catherine.....promise I'll never do it again. Nearby transport, on-street parking, the quietness of inner Brisbane.....a real home away from home. Tasteful suites, space to move, the thoughtful amenities, and the care that... More


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Foo Fighters added the opener of Pink Floyd's 'The Wall' to their list of cover songs in Austin, Texas.
Genesis released their self-titled album in October 1983.
When a crowd of cops invaded Aerosmith's Oct. 3, 1978, concert in Fort Wayne, Ind., they found dozens of kids possessing pot.
Paul Simon wrote, scored and starred in the film, 'One-Trick Pony,' which was released on Oct. 3, 1980.
Sebastian Bach said that inviting fans to his wedding reception was no different than a meet-and-greet.


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Archived Posts from this Category
Archived Posts from this Category
Posted by TheShot on 09 May 2013 | Filed under: Foreign Brew, Machine, Roasting, Starbucks
La Colombe continues to play an interesting role in the modern evolution of consumer coffee tastes. Starting in 1985 in Seattle, co-founders Todd Carmichael and Jean Philippe (JP) Iberti joined forces and decided to set up their idea for a great American roaster in Philadelphia. Which was no small risk, given that Philadelphia isn't the friendliest environment to start a froofy coffee business peddling $4 lattes. National accolades followed in the 1990s and early 2000s from many in the food journalism world — many who were simply taken aback that someone dared to do something interesting with coffee when Starbucks was presumed to be its final word.
Fast forward to today, and you can't swing a dead cat in most cities without hitting a local microroaster who deals in Direct Trade. In terms of this absurd coffee wave business, this made La Colombe something of a genetic missing link — a kind of coffee wave version number 2.6. Given that La Colombe has not succumbed to faddish trends of trying to make all coffee taste like hibiscus and blueberries (and worst of all: lawn clippings), this has sometimes made them seem a bit passé in the eyes of many who would rather fawn over coffee's latest Young Turks/poster boys like the K-Pop idol band flavor of the month.
Thus while a lot of industry attention has focused obsessively on "what's next", as if in daily anticipation of a coming Ray-Kurzweil-inspired coffee singularity, La Colombe as fallen a bit off the radar — quietly building out coffeehouses in New York, Chicago, and Seoul and establishing wholesale operations.
Opening back in the Summer of 2011, the first Chicago outlet started in the transforming neighborhood of the West Loop on Randolph St. This is an old neighborhood of butchers and meat delivery trucks … of Greek markets where students at the nearby University of Illinois at Chicago knew they could buy alcohol without ever being carded. (I know this, because I was one of them.)
In the past decade, this neighborhood has transformed: giving way to luxury lofts, fine foods, dog care salons, and — shockingly — al fresco dining along the sidewalks. La Colombe is part of this new neighborhood breed. Though they also plan to open a second Chicago location in Bucktown.
This location is an open space with wood floors, wide windows that open in front, a large wooden bench, and a few café tables for seating. It's a rather spacious place, with roasting operations taking place in the back with a sparkling, classic Officine Vittoria roaster from Bologna, Italy. La Colombe co-founder, JP Iberti, loves to roast on the same equipment put into popular use in the 1980s by Seattle's Bizzarri family.
But that's not the only curious device obsession here. They have a red, three-group La Marzocco FB/70 for espresso. And they recently replaced one of their grinders (for a second espresso option besides their Nizza blend) with a Alpha Dominche Steampunk 4.0 siphon brewer. La Colombe co-founder (and TV personality), Todd Carmichael, is a healthy skeptic when it comes to the latest coffee gadgetry, but he swears by the Steampunk brewer. He made a big point of it at the last SCAA conference, and all La Colombe locations are in the process of installing them.
Some coffee personalities, like Blue Bottle's James Freeman, are enamored with rare and elegant classics when it comes to their coffee machinery. Others, like the Morrison brothers behind Sightglass, gravitate to the newest fads available so that they may play around with them in their toyshop. Curiously, La Colombe seems to operate a little at both ends of the spectrum.
As for the Steampunk, it's a bit of a throwback to the fleeting halcyon days of the Clover brewer. We personally found that it produces a clean cup, requires its own staffing plan, and generates a little grit at the bottom. However, it didn't really change the filter coffee equation for us — at least for the trial we joined in with the staff that day. (Sorry, Steampunkers — we're just not feeling the love yet.)
As for their Nizza espresso, they pull shots with an even layer of medium brown crema and a decent body. There's an exceptional balance to the cup, with a flavor of spices, mellow pungency, and orange zest. That's the thing so few North American roasters fail to achieve: the art and complexity of a well thought out, balanced blend. Roasters seem to forget that if you listen to a symphony, 98% of the instruments are wasted if something is screaming to the level that you can't hear anything else.
Read the review of La Colombe in Chicago's West Loop.
Posted by TheShot on 25 Apr 2013 | Filed under: Beans, Foreign Brew, Machine
Of the coffeehouses in Boston I visited this month, this was my favorite. Sure, I didn't make it over to Barismo or Voltage, but that was somewhat deliberate. Of all the times I've come to Boston, I've always stayed in the 'burbs like Cambridge and Somerville but never Boston proper. This time I never left Boston, and I only wanted to walk or take public transit.
This coffeehouse is located a short walk from where the SCAA conference was held in South Boston. Despite hosting a number of tie-in events, conference attendees were surprisingly few here. It seemed most conference attendees did not venture outside of the Boston Convention Center fortress except by car or cab, and then they were immediately exiting onto a freeway headed someplace else. Because cities place their newer convention centers in undesirable places where space is cheap, and Boston is no exception.
Hence the conference area in South Boston is pretty much an industrial empty lot with fencing, abandoned railways, and other obstacles discouraging most pedestrians from ever accessing it on foot. This much was a bit maddening about Boston: while the Boston Logan airport loudspeakers continually boasted of their "green airport" status with the heavy use of public transportation, walking up to the SCAA conference from my hotel in downtown Boston was a bit like crossing the barbed-wire-laden bits of the Korean DMZ.
It's as if Boston willfully did everything it could to treat pedestrians as second-class citizens. Moments like this give me guilty thanks for the Loma Prieta earthquake and how it got SF's Embarcadero Freeway torn down.
This café — located in the much less dismal parts on the north end of South Boston — opened as a retail beverage operation to complement their roasting. And they've done a stellar job of it. It's a very open space, with tall ceilings, modern light fixtures, and an exposed concrete floor. There's a large, round central table for standing at, a few side tables, and stool seating at the Congress St. tall windows.
They earn major points for offering three different choices of coffee for their espresso. At review time it was the Barrington Gold blend (their standard), a Brazil Conquista Reserve, or a Hawaiian Maui Mokka in Anfim grinders. And anybody supporting Maui Moka gets high praise in my book. A well-travelled Yemen mocha descendant, and a favorite of home roasters at the turn of the millenium for the intensely chocolate espresso it produces (and I was one of them), the bean almost went extinct in 2002 when its Ka'anapali Estates home was nearly paved over by Maui condo developers. Every time we can experience it, it's like seeing a coelacanth.
Using a three-group Synesso (with naked portafilters, we might add), they pull shots of Barrington Gold (used in our rating linked at bottom) with an even, medium brown crema that dissipates, but it remains an integral, time-sensitive cup. It has a heavy mouthfeel and a dense body underlying flavors of tobacco smoke and molasses. Smooth, heavy, and very tasty. Though acid fruit bomb fanatics may want to steer clear.
Their milk-frothing is good, with detailed latte art, but it is a bit milky and lacks integration with the espresso.
Just to prove it can get even better than the ratings here for the Gold, their Maui Mokka shot has an even, darker brown crema, a bit of firewood in the nose, and that lovely, characteristic deep chocolate bomb flavor that made us fall in love with the bean well over a decade ago. One of our favorite shots in Boston — and one of our more favorite places to have it.
Read the review of Barrington Coffee Company in Boston.
Posted by TheShot on 28 Mar 2013 | Filed under: Consumer Trends, Machine, Quality Issues, Restaurant Coffee
As CoffeeRatings.com celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, it's hard not to feel a little jaded by some of the coffee topics that simply refuse to die. Like Jason in Friday the 13th Part 1.30E+02, some subjects are the undead zombies of the coffee world, no matter how times you try to kill them with fire. (Kopi luwak, anyone?) All of which explains a little of why our blog posting cycle has gone from a few times per week to more like once a month: you're tired of reading about the same stuff, and we're tired of writing about it.
However, today we were inspired to reminisce down memory lane about bad restaurant coffee and the commoditized coffee fodder known as Nespresso. This time we blame Sprudge.com and Oliver Strand for exhuming the dead: Oliver Strand On Specialty Coffee's Restaurant Gap » Sprudge.com. Now that the blame is out of the way, we'll join in this zombie apocalypse fight club with the nearest chainsaw we can grab.
The premise of Mr. Strand's article is rooted in trends towards two polar opposites of coffee service at fine dining establishments — and the TwitCon Level 3 general alert that surrounds them (i.e., don your hardhats and make for your nearest social media fallout shelter, boys).
The first concerns famed restaurants such as Copenhagen's Noma (repeat finalist for best restaurant in the world, and also home of the famed norovirus cocktail) who are producing coffee with care, sourced from the likes of Tim Wendelboe. The second, counter-movement concerns a Grub Street report that 30 percent of Michelin-starred restaurants have punted on coffee service by offering Nespresso — coffee's version of Crocs.
Nespresso: the universal symbol of a restaurant that has given up coffee hope.
Given that we wrote about the trend of some high-end restaurants surrendering to Nespresso systems back in 2007, this isn't exactly news. But our key points back then remain true as ever: introducing the mundane at an exclusive restaurant is always a losing strategy. This doesn't matter whether your restaurant is putting Yellow Tail Cabernet on its wine list, serving San Pelligrino mineral water bought from the Costco across town, or slinging shots of Nestlé espresso served from a push-button machine: commodity products are the antithesis of why we're paying $200-a-head and up to eat at your fine dining establishment.
The worst part is that stooping to Nespresso for your coffee service not only shows a lack of thought or creativity, but it is also completely unnecessary. A restaurant need not get in over its head in coffee minutia to do a memorable job of it. One of our most memorable coffee experiences anywhere involved little more than a restaurant that served fresh coffee, sourced from a unique Kona producer, and served in a French press. Simple, elegant, unique, excellent, and highly memorable.
That said, we have experienced some excellent coffee at local restaurants that have really invested in doing it right. We're saddened by the recent demise of Bar Bambino, who once served one of San Francisco's best restaurant espresso shots. But we were recently blown away by both the invested attention and quality of the end-product on a recent trip to Redd Restaurant in Yountville. (Great restaurant espresso?! And from Equator Estate Coffee?!?!)
In closing, we do have to politely chastise Mr. Strand's standards of full-meal etiquette when he says, "I never order coffee at the end of a knockdown meal. Not after all of those courses and all of those wines." (I.e., the "you're doing it wrong" argument.) There's no better way to close out an audacious meal with a short, well-made espresso — and perhaps this is where the volumetric studies of the latent filter drip coffee re-obsession tends to backfire — followed by the digestivo effects of a fine grappa. Though we do draw the line at cigars.
Posted by TheShot on 25 Nov 2012 | Filed under: Café Society, Home Brew, Local Brew, Machine, Roasting
Trish Rothgeb and Nick Cho are coffee notables from the Northwest and D.C. area, respectively, and they've combined forces in recent years as the roasting/brewing partnership behind Wrecking Ball Coffee Roasters. Nearly seven years ago on this Web site, Trish and Nick became a rather infamous pairing ever since Trish was first credited with coining the coffee term "third wave" — i.e., before it was immediately co-opted by coffee hucksters and carnival barkers.
The idea behind Wrecking Ball is that Trish — a former Director of Coffee for Seattle's Zoka — focuses on the coffee roasting. Meanwhile, Nick — portafilter.net podcast host, former Murky Coffee owner, and famous wannabe cockpuncher — focuses on the brewing and coffee service.
While their roasting operations are near Redwood City, they have a lone retail café in SF in the Firehouse 8 event space. A former firehouse (there's even a brass fire pole towards the back), it's a vast, airy space that's frequently inhabited by pop-ups that sell jewelry & clothing or weekend waffles. There are occasional display cases to show off some of these wares (giving it a slight museum feel), plus brick masonry at the entrance, stone floors, tall ceilings, and a row of simple café tables lined up at the entrance. Wrecking Ball is something of a permanent fixture here, however — just opening earlier this month.
In a rear corner they sport Kalita Japanese brewers (Nick has long been quite a fanboy) and scales for measuring coffee grounds precisely. They also sport a two-group La Marzocco Strada and a La Marzocco Vulcano grinder. For their espresso they use their 1UP blend ($2.25 for a doppio) and pull shots with a dark, even, textured crema. There's a strong herbacity to it, and fortunately it tastes more like coffee and less like blueberries and flower petals like many new roasters seem to profile too heavily.
Solid stuff: this is definitely one of the finer (if not quieter) places for an espresso in the city. And credit to Trish, as the take-home 1UP beans worked great on our home espresso setup as well. We only wish the roast dates weren't approaching two weeks old when we bought it.
Read the review of Wrecking Ball Coffee Roasters.
Posted by TheShot on 23 Oct 2012 | Filed under: Add Milk, Consumer Trends, Home Brew, Machine, Quality Issues, Starbucks
Two months ago we reported on our trials with a superautomatic home espresso machine representing much of the state-of-the-art: the Philips Saeco Syntia Focus. Reading Saeco's product literature and marketing communications, you'd be led to believe that this machine made "the perfect espresso" every time. But to most people who read our original post two months back, the Saeco committed unforgivable crimes against coffee.
The truth lies somewhere between those polar opposites. And now that we've had two months of regular use to better explore the machine's merits and limitations, here we revisit this topic in greater detail.
First of all, it's critical to note that there's very little (if anything) uniquely problematic with the Saeco Synthia Focus that you won't also find in many of its up-market, superautomatic home espresso machine bretheren — whether they are made by the likes of Jura, Capresso (and now Jura-Capresso), Nespresso, or the decidedly more dubious Breville, DeLonghi, or (*gag*) Krups.
However, when talking about superautomatics for the home, the source of their coffee is a major differentiator within these product lines: there are coffee pod machines, and there are machines that use real coffee. That we use the term "real" coffee — to differentiate what most people recognize as coffee from anything that comes packaged in a proprietary system of cartridges — is only partly facetious.
Pod machine coffee may be marketed and priced as if it were elite quality coffee, but in truth it is arguably just a step up from instant coffee. Top Chef host Padma Lakshmi may have signed on as ambassador to Nespresso. But since Nespresso is pre-ground coffee produced by the world's largest food conglomerate, she may as well be the ambassador to Del Monte canned peas.
Any coffee brewing system with the option of using whole bean coffee, ground to order, and where the consumer can vouch for the coffee's roast date, should theoretically have a massive freshness advantage over its pod machine competition. Except that's not exactly what happens in practice. The Saeco Syntia Focus has this great advantage. But like many of its peers, it squanders it — producing espresso shots that hardly seem like an improvement over pod coffee. Most visibly notable is how sickly pale the crema is on the shots it produces.
To improve the shots, we took advantage of several machine adjustments: setting the built-in grinder to its finest grind, setting the volume of coffee deposited in its filter basket to its maximum, and reducing the overall volume of the shots. The first shot the machine produces after powering up is always a ghostly pale blonde and is rather insipid. So we let its built-in "Adapting System" tune itself to the coffee with a few successive shots, which do noticeably improve to a crema that's slightly fuller, darker, and with more texture that might even include microbubbles.
Hence one of the myths we discovered about superautomatic espresso machines: despite their promise of robotic consistency, the shots are somewhat variable.
Yet despite all of our improvement measures, the best shots we could muster with the Saeco Syntia Focus quite literally paled in comparison to the routine shots we pulled with our Gaggia G106 Factory (with a new brass piston) + Mazzer Mini home set-up. Once we fixed our old home machine, we used a four-day-old roast of The Boss from Barefoot Coffee Roasters to run side-by-side experiments. The flavor and body of the Saeco shots didn't measure up to the Gaggia pulls, but the visual difference was even more dramatic.
As if the question isn't rhetorical, which of the two espresso shots looks more appealing in the photo at left? Hint: a friend pointed out that the shot made with the Gaggia "looks like cocoa". The other shot looks like weak drip coffee mixed with milk. Meanwhile, a brochure that comes with the Saeco (called a "Passport") states that the crema "should be hazelnut brown with occasional darker shades."
Despite our Saeco machine adjustments, clearly something is wrong with its extraction. We managed to rule out the Saeco's built-in grinder as a major problem, as the Saeco offers an option to bypass its grinder with pre-ground coffee. Using our Mazzer Mini, we poured fresh grinds of the same coffee directly into the machine and didn't notice a significant difference in the resulting shots.
After a lot of trial and error, we narrowed down the Saeco's failures to brewing times. After a pre-infusion of around 4.5 seconds, the machine runs an extraction for only about 10.7-11.3 seconds. This is significantly less than the 20-second-plus extraction times recommended in most reputable espresso guides. And unfortunately, extraction time is one variable that the Saeco machine does not let you adjust. (A Saeco customer support woman in Ohio attempted to follow up with us to help "correct" our problems, but she never returned our call.)
While the pressure of espresso extraction certainly accelerates the necessary 3-4 minute brew times of proper coffee-to-water contact in a pour-over cup, a mere 11 seconds is far too little brewing time for espresso. We've recently seen reviews boasting of a coffee machine's 45-second end-to-end brewing times, and here the Saeco Syntia Focus requires a mere 33 seconds from button-push to serving.
This is akin to a hospital's maternity ward boasting that you can have your baby there in only 7 months. Premature babies are bad, and so is premature espresso. Is waiting 10 more seconds that unreasonable to get a properly extracted espresso? How is this a selling point?
Despite its obvious quality limitations, we honestly like the Saeco machine and have even grown somewhat fond of it. We still use it quite a lot and even look forward to the so-so espresso that it produces. Why we still use it is largely a matter of push-button convenience. Call it "laziness" or less time spent making acceptable espresso.
Because time is money, despite what the home finance trolls keep telling us. Even the pod machines aren't quite as convenient as the Saeco, because you can go through several rounds of push-button espresso before having to empty out the tray of spent pucks.
But speaking of spent grounds, the Saeco is far from "self-cleaning". It's a bit like automating your own sloppy minimum wage employee, given the internal mess you have to clean up every few days.
The Saeco's product designers clearly took some shortcuts on keeping it clean back there: the black plastic and embedded compartment make visibility of any coffee ground mess particularly difficult to see without a small flashlight, and the stuff accumulates in the oddest random corners. Let it accumulate too long, and the machine will jam up like a printer — continually spitting perfectly fine ground coffee into its spent puck dumpster, with only a momentary warning light flashing just before nothing comes out of its brew head. Then the lights proudly tell you the machine is ready to brew another shot.
This is perhaps the most aggravating thing about the machine: the "Saeco Adapting System" will waste multiple shots of your best new coffee beans — immediately dumping them in the spent grounds litter bin without even extracting so much as an ounce of coffee — while it tries to adjust itself to the new coffee. There are few things more agonizingly wasteful than seeing your prized, expensive coffee beans being ground up and spit out in a wet, dirty waste bin for several cycles with no indication of when it might decide to produce any espresso.
One surprise was that its milk frothing, with its wacky pannarello wand attachment, is surprisingly good — blowing away my Gaggia G106 Factory in terms of steam pressure and foam consistency.
All things considered, we still wouldn't pay more than $350 for the Saeco — despite its $1,000 retail price tag. And even for that money, we would rather have a simple, used Rancilio Silvia. Despite its obvious conveniences, we're reluctant to put top-quality coffee in the Saeco. We certainly wouldn't waste our best home roasting labors on the mediocre espresso it produces. Fresh roasted beans do make a difference, but beans of the highest quality are largely lost on this machine.
Thus there's a sort of arrogant hubris to the Saeco Syntia Focus and virtually all of its $1,000 superautomatic home machine competitors. Consumers are promised the "perfect" espresso every time by these devices, and for a cool grand who wouldn't expect that? But clearly these machines have not benchmarked themselves against what's long been possible among home espresso enthusiasts.
Instead, what consumers get is closer to Starbucks' home Verismo machine — a home version of the automated push-button espresso experience that CEO Howard Schultz arguably said sucked the soul out of the company several years ago. Rather than offering technology and features that enable home consumers to enjoy the wealth of freshly roasted, top-quality coffee varieties now available on the market, consumers are given the bland, mass-produced experience common to any of 40,000 identical cafés. Worst of all, these home machine manufacturers tell consumers that this is perfection — and that consumers thus have no need to aspire for anything better than the mediocrity they offer.
This was a bit of a shock, given previous underwhelming results. Grand Cru coffees mark one of the true differentiators for whole bean machines like the Syntia Focus over their pod-based brethren: the world's elite coffees simply do not have the supply volume to make them a viable option for packaging, mass distribution, and mass production in coffee pods.
Posted by TheShot on 12 Sep 2012 | Filed under: Machine, Starbucks
Sometimes life surprises you when what seem like different compartmentalized aspects of it suddenly cross over. Such was the case today where, at one of the more famous technology start-up conferences here in San Francisco, I stumbled across a team building prototype coffeemaking equipment who were performing demonstrations. The company is SF-based Blossom Coffee Inc., and they're building what they believe is the rightful successor to the Clover brewer — which just a few years back, over the period of several months, essentially entered and left the premium coffee world like a comet.
First: a little background. You see, my "day job" is doing entrepreneurial work to get an education technology start-up off the ground. The coffee thing is largely a rather indulgent hobby with occasional fringe benefits. And the TechCrunch Disrupt conference focuses on technology start-ups with the lofty intent of "disrupting" many of the existing ways of doing business. It's part wannabe terrorist camp — with targets of economic business models instead of the soft bodies of civilians — and part religious revival — with many attendees trying to prove their worthiness to be a part of, and not subject to, the destruction ahead that leads to salvation within the next "regime".
Like Blossom Coffee, on Monday I was pitching my start-up on the conference showroom floor. But today (Wednesday) the conference devoted the floor to hardware companies of all kinds.
Attending a conference like this is a bit of a geek fest. Think of all the nerds in school who weren't cool enough to start bands, so they started companies instead. Despite the thick layer of hubris at events like this, there are typically a few great ideas, many so-so ideas, and the majority are things none of us will probably ever see again in two years. And to peel off any self-important luster even further, you have to remember that building Web sites and mobile apps in SF today is a bit like building cars in Detroit was some 50 years ago.
That said, this year the conference attempted to emphasize both more international start-ups (I never knew so many Brazilian consumer wine Web sites existed) and start-ups featuring hardware products. Hence Blossom Coffee.
Coffee hardware start-ups are hardly new. The Clover Equipment Company was certainly one such example. Recent notable examples also include a Kickstarter project for a PID-controlled espresso machine and, like a bad acid flashback of 1998's joke Hyper Text Coffee Pot Control Protocol, an espresso machine that takes orders by SMS texts.
Talking with Blossom President, Jeremy Kuempel, we connected over our past experience taking thermodynamics classes in engineering college. Except when Jeremy learned the Ideal gas law equation of PV=nRT, often demonstrated by illustrations of pressurized gas in a piston, Jeremy immediately thought to put coffee in the cylindrical chamber. Pretty cool.
The primary goal of the Blossom Coffee brewer (the "Blossom One Limited") is to succeed the Clover brewer in its degree of digitally configurable, stable temperature control. With a +/-2% accuracy from 160-212℉, it may not be coffee sous-vide just yet — but it's getting there. Using two highly functional prototypes with La Marzocco group heads, Jeremy and team were experimenting for passersby at the event with some 16 pounds of coffee from Highwire Coffee Roasters. In addition to demonstrating some of the visual "romance" that's important to high-end pressurized brewing equipment, Jeremy also hinted at some of the WiFi-enabled digital reading and control features planned for the brewer (recipe downloading, fleet management, etc.).
Alongside the working prototypes at their station was a rather sexy finished casing for the proposed end product, as they currently are only accepting pre-orders. They are initially targeting small, high quality coffee chains of some 5-10 stores each. And the taste in the resulting cup seemed promising.
We've seen attempted successors to the Clover brewer before — even from Clover. Now we may love our old school pour-over coffee, but anything that gets us to think once again about moving beyond the 104-year-old practice of manual pour-over brewing in today's cutesy name of "slow coffee" (blech) is a welcome addition in our books. Traditions are good; having few viable alternatives after over a century is not. That's not so much "slow coffee" as "inertia coffee."
Thus we hope to find a Blossom brewer soon at a coffee shop near us.
If so, these Blossom guys are more clever than we thought; they've made an insider's joke that knows all too well what buttons to push for a news item to propel itself across the Internet via meme theory. Send in the trolls!
Posted by TheShot on 02 Aug 2012 | Filed under: Home Brew, Machine, Quality Issues
The sad state of home espresso machines is a topic we've tried to avoid for long stretches. After our last depressing installment in 2009, we've been blissfully ignorant — ratcheting up the solid-but-rarely-outstanding shot pulls on our relatively decent home espresso setup of a Gaggia G106 Factory manual lever machine and a Mazzer Mini grinder.
That is until May, when disaster struck. After 10 years of abuse — where I tuned the coffee grind to the limits of what my "one-armed bandit" could handle before it choked — the central piston finally gave out with one fateful pull. Feeling the physical resistance of its lever vanish in one quick slip, I knew right away it was more than just the final, releasing grasp of an dying gasket.
Upon disassembly and inspection, part of the otherwise-durable Ryton plastic molding that holds the piston gaskets in place had clearly broken away. It's no surprise that Gaggia discontinued this part and now only produces a brass version. While replacement parts are easy to look up, my replacement piston was put on back-order from Italy until who-knows-when.
Now I like my Hario V60 or Chemex as much as the next guy. But a steady and exclusive diet of coffee masquerading as tea — i.e., tasting primarily of berries and flower gardens and lawn clippings — is most unsatisfying. Sure, I had the perfect excuse to have more espresso out again, but sometimes you want your quality espresso without leaving the house. Fortunately, life's misfortune sometimes creates the occasional unexpected opportunity. It arrived in June in the form of an email to coffeeratings.com from a Philips Saeco rep, with the subject-line come-on of "The Perfect Espresso from Philips Saeco":
Dear Greg,
Searching for the perfect espresso? We believe you can make it yourself, in the convenience of your home. I'm working closely with my client, Philips Saeco, to share their espresso machines with coffee experts like you. If it's a good fit, we'd like for you to send you one of these machines.
The normal Greg would have spewed out his home-roasted espresso blend across the kitchen table upon reading that. ("Perfect espresso"? Have they read my blog?) But home espresso beggars can't be choosers. And if there was ever an opportunity where I could dedicate my time and attention to make an honest attempt at decent espresso with one of these dubious, hulking plastic, overpriced, and underachieving superautomatic home espresso machines, this was it.
So last week, without notice, a giant Saeco box arrived on my front porch. Opening it up, I felt a little like Darren McGavin in A Christmas Story. But inside wasn't a glowing leg lamp. Rather, it was a Saeco Syntia HD8833. To my surprise, rather than sending a throwaway economy job, Saeco sent one of their better models — listing for about $1,000 retail.
If we are going to be outraged about the poor espresso quality from a superautomatic home machine, all the better not to dismiss the verdict on the basis of a cheap machine. We may have seen some of this machine's siblings in the showroom at the Saeco Caffè in Cape Town, South Africa — and the espresso there may not have been too shabby. But our experience with superautomatic home espresso machines like it has been flattering to the Nespresso machine, and we don't like Nespresso.
While I am no home espresso novice, the contents of the Saeco box seemed practically alien. What's with all the plastic? Where's the metal? You mean there's more to today's home espresso machine electronics than a heating element? And what's that vibrating noise that sounds like a cheap home aquarium filter?
The device seems large, and yet it's considered "compact" by many of today's standards. Its side opens up like an ink jet printer — not exactly the mental analogy you want to be making for consumables. And it's ridiculously robotic. Everything has been automated to death: coffee grinding, dosing, tamping, extraction. Hope still lied in the fact that a number of its automated tasks were adjustable: fineness of the grind, the volume of coffee, and the extraction time. But I am leery of any coffee machine that tries to be smarter than you.
I gained back a little confidence when much of its accompanying printed documentation emphasized the importance of descaling and cleaning. I've lost count of how many horrific, Exxon-Valdez-sized coffee oil Superfund sites we've stumbled upon in various Nespresso machine kitchens — with their delusional, convenience-obsessed owners believing that these devices also automated their cleaning and maintenance.
The machine required an extended "priming" operation, where the machine went through a series of button pushes, water cycles, and its display performed its best rendition of a Pink Floyd laser light show. Once primed and good beans (a nice Full City+ roast on Guatemala Antigua beans with ~ 1 week since roasting) were added to the hopper, we pushed the button for out first shot — with the maximum dosing ("aroma" in its manual's parlance) and the smallest-sized shot from the factory presets.
The resulting shot was very large (at the rim of a regulation IPA demitasse), with a shockingly white thin crema, and a watery body. It tasted like what most horrible espresso shots tasted like in San Francisco back in the 1980s: overdrawn, over-extracted, and lacking any potency, body, or creaminess. The spent puck it spewed out was well-shaped but thoroughly soggy; gently touching the puck caused it to disintegrate into wet sludge.
Our immediate reaction was to head to the "Troubleshooting" section of the manual. It said much about the "Saeco Adapting System" and why your first shots might, well, suck. For example: "coffee is too weak" states that it is a "Rare event that occurs when the machine is automatically adjusting the dose. Brew a few coffees as described in section 'Saeco Adapting System'." Another measure of assurance was in the notes: "Note: These problems can be considered normal if the coffee blend has been changed or if the machine has just been installed."
The first shot was followed by a second identical espresso shot … followed by a third identical shot. Yes, superautomatic consistency alright. Which is great if the espresso is good, but it's a horrible curse and a waste of good coffee beans when the espresso sucks. We barely resisted the compelling urge to change practically every possible adjustment right away. Part of the reason was to let the machine invoke its "Adapting System" as advertised, and another part was to minimize the chaos of changing multiple variables at the same time.
Even so, how could an Italian company claim that such a machine is normally factory-tuned to produce "the perfect Italian espresso" right out of the box? I've been to Italy numerous times, and the espresso is never close to this bad — anywhere. Worse, Saeco's documentation warns that you might find some residual coffee grounds on your new machine, as they have been put through testing before packaging. Testing for what? The taste of watery 1980s San Francisco espresso made by clueless minimum-wage employees?
It's not just Saeco: we've found every other manufacturer of four-figure superautomatic home espresso machines guilty of the exact same failures. Yet despite this distasteful — but not unexpected — start, in our next installment we will write about the adjustments we made and how it may, or may not, have affected the quality of the resulting espresso shots.
"Secret, secret, I've got a secret. And it's how to make decent espresso out of me."
Posted by TheShot on 19 Jun 2012 | Filed under: Café Society, Machine
The Internet is so overstuffed with information, it suffers from a kind of amnesia. Something may have been posted 20,000 times before, but that 20,001st time — as if we all really needed it — might still be worth a mention because Internet users have either forgotten or have yet to notice.
Which explains the endless rehashing of tired, old coffee topics on brain-dead sites like SeriousEats and LifeHacker: Should you freeze coffee for storage? How to steam milk at home? How do you draw rosetta latte art? How does coffee go from cherry to bean? Basically, a plagiarized recycling of stale information written more for search engines than for any human reader yet to succumb to Alzheimer's disease.
But just because we crave original thought once in a while doesn't mean that history has no value. However, if you're digging up old bodies, who better than The Smithsonian? — who recently published this great piece on the history of the espresso machine: The Long History of the Espresso Machine | Design Decoded. Angelo Moriondo, Luigi Bezzerri, Desiderio Pavoni, Pier Teresio Arduino, Achille Gaggia, and Ernesto Valente's Faema E61 — it's all there, just as we like it.
Posted by TheShot on 15 Mar 2012 | Filed under: Beans, Foreign Brew, Machine
My brother lived in Austin years ago, and the town has changed a lot since then. That is, besides the construction of a fence and pillars at the North Congress Ave. end of the Great Walk in front of the Texas state capitol — to prevent people like my brother from accidentally driving vehicles down the front steps and chipping the pavement.
Talking with the locals, the biggest attraction to living there seemed to be, "it's fun and it's cheap." It certainly isn't the surface-of-the-sun heat in summer.
But being a college down, Austin also seems to try to capitalize on its "Keep Austin Weird" vibe — and yes, they sell T-shirts that say that, just as in Santa Cruz. However, looking down on the Austin walk-of-fame sidewalk on Trinity St. between 4th & 5th Sts., you'll find a star for Sandra Day O'Connor right next to a star for Mean Joe Greene. So who is going to argue?
Another change in Austin is the improvement of its coffee scene. Patika Coffee is one of several examples. Except this example is really a coffee cart that sits in an otherwise vacant-looking parking lot downtown, next to the beached trailers of a couple of other food purveyors. Think of it like Réveille Coffee Co. — just grittier, less mobile, and with sketchier neighbors.
The parking lot is separated from the sidewalk traffic by handrails, and there's an outdoor table/picnic bench and an over-hanging tarp for shade.
Inside their two-person cart, two staffers run the operation with a two-group Synesso machine, using Cuvée Coffee. They are apologetically required to use paper cups by city ordinance, as they are classified as a "food truck" and thus have limitations on the vessels and utencils they can pass out. (Apparently, food trucks are required by Austin law to generate disposable waste.)
They pull shots with a rich, medium brown, even crema on a layer of a thinner-bodied, more acidic espresso than served by the Caffé Medici serving Cuvée across the street. It's potent, narrower in flavor profile, and lighter on body: a stereotypical "third wave" North American espresso — you know, the kind that's high on punch and low on balance and finesse.
Read the review of Patika Coffee in downtown Austin, TX.
Posted by TheShot on 26 Feb 2012 | Filed under: Beans, Consumer Trends, Home Brew, Machine, Quality Issues
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Saturday, February 25, 2012 offered a curious contrast between the very different worlds of consumer appreciation for wine and coffee. For the former, I attended La Paulée de San Francisco 2012 — arguably the most over-the-top consumer wine event in America. For the latter, my brother Vince simultaneously attended CoffeeCon 2012 — billed as the "first-ever international consumer coffee conference" — in the global coffee Mecca (and his hometown) of Warrenville, IL.
First off, I'd like to apologize for continuing to harp on the hackneyed wine analogy for coffee. However, I still often feel like one of the few people who knows just enough about both wine and coffee appreciation to make a comparison when attending events for either beverage.
Because the facts remain that we read plenty about how much coffee wants to be taken as seriously as wine. And yet the coffee industry still craps on its customers at virtually every opportunity. This weekend's events provided evidence of that in great contrast.
First up: the consumer coffee event. Kevin Sinnott has been a layman coffee enthusiast for years (and he also just so happens to a neighbor and friend of my brother back in the dark recesses of the Chicago suburbs). He may be an independent video production consultant for his "day job", but coffee is far more than just a hobby for him. And more power to him, because he recognized the need for a consumer-oriented coffee event — which inspired him to put on the first ever CoffeeCon.
The best opportunity coffee consumers had to get involved with the coffee industry was to muscle in to events such as the SCAA's annual conference — all under a sort of "don't ask, don't tell" policy. Since then, the policy has shifted towards outright consumer abolishment. But even if you buy the argument that the industry needs its own for its own, it has offered nothing even close to an olive branch. We hear the coffee industry give plenty of lip service to the importance of "educating the customer", and yet opportunities to do so are turned into closed-door industry events where the consumer is treated like an unwelcome leper.
Slow Food Nation '08 was perhaps another example, but it turned out to be a one-time event. Out of it came the Good Food Awards. But even if you look past coffee playing the red-headed stepchild under the "Food" banner, here the focus of a once-public event has again turned to industry insiders locking out consumer participation. Or take the related Coffee Common effort. Even putting my disdain for the shallowness and faux elitism of TED aside, public events that require over $1,000 in membership and registration fees to attend are hardly "consumer friendly". This makes the steep $300 I shelled out to attend La Paulée's Grand Tasting seem like a bargain by comparison.
CoffeeCon suffered from an almost accidental location (Warrenville's "IBEW Local Union 701") and virtually zero coverage among the coffee industry — most of the industry being preoccupied with the self-absorbed, industry navel-gazing going on at the Northeast Regional Barista Competition (or NERBC). But CoffeeCon managed to draw about 1,000 attendees and even pull a few coffee luminaries including the likes of George Howell, home espresso legend Jim Schulman, and Intelligentsia's Geoff Watts.
Attendees apparently got to taste a lot of different coffee, experiment with different brewing methods, meet a few others in the coffee industry, learn more about coffee farming and production, and even witness a poor tongue-in-cheek debate on coffee vs. wine. My brother reported that they had a huge crowd, a good representation from nationwide roasters and equipment manufacturers, and the unveiling of a new Bunn Trifecta at a "lab" event.
While not a bad event and certainly a promising attendance, this is, folks, about as good as it gets for coffee consumers today. And good luck getting anybody in the coffee industry to acknowledge that it existed.
One thing I like from the CoffeeCon FAQ — which flies in the face of Coffee Common's "Exceptional coffee. No sugar." byline — is this bit:
Can I take cream and sugar in my coffee or will I be asked to leave? No worries. Serious coffee lovers know how different everyone's palate is. 80% of coffee consumed in the world is taken with milk and/or some sweetener.
This week I had dinner again at one of my favorite SF restaurants who also makes some of the best restaurant espresso in the entire city. The two owners, in their own polite and self-depreciating ways, each relayed to me the story of a recent visit to Sightglass where they were essentially made to feel as if they were both clueless about both coffee and their flavor palates. (I've omitted their names as they mentioned this in personal confidence.)
Interestingly, they both felt that Sightglass' coffee tasted "too salty." When they asked the Sightglass barista to cut the shot pour short, as a sort of ristretto, he replied that he could not interrupt the espresso machine from running its full cycle. And when they asked for sugar, they were looked upon as if they must have walked in thinking Sightglass was a Dunkin' Donuts.
Here were two people who grew up with high coffee standards in Italy, developed a much-loved and highly regarded regional Italian restaurant in SF, serve some of the best espresso in the city at said restaurant (and I virtually never have coffee with sugar), where one of the owners previously served as a sommelier at another Michelin-starred SF restaurant with a legendary wine list — and they were basically told that they were coffee Philistines, purely because of coffee orthodoxy. As snobbish as you might think the wine world might get, this simply does not happen with wine.
Speaking of sommeliers and a barista's desire to become an equivalent of one, let's contrast with La Paulée's Grand Tasting at the Westin St. Francis. Daniel Johnnes, a noted wine director for noted New York restaurants that today includes Restaurant Daniel (read: a guy who works in the industry), started the event about a decade ago, alternating between New York an San Francisco. It is based in a traditional Burgundian event, and in Mr. Johnnes' words for the SF event:
La Paulée is my homage to La Paulée de Meursault, a convivial Burgundian fête shared by growers and their guests. At La Paulée guests will sample current releases and older vintages from nearly thirty of the most sought after Domaines of Burgundy. The wine service will be led by fifty of our nation's most noted sommeliers.
They ain't messing around. (Here's a magazine write-up [PDF] on last year's La Paulée in New York.) The Grand Tasting may cost $300, but that's cheap compared to the $1,400 Gala Dinner (or compared to the registration fee to experience Coffee Commons at TED2012 in Long Beach).
There are people in traditional Burgundian wear, regularly breaking into traditional Burgundian drinking songs, flown in from Burgundy for this event — Les Cadets de Bourgogne. And there are many booths of elite winemakers, offering wines that you could only be lucky enough to even access a bottle to purchase, all poured by notable sommeliers. In coffee terms, this is akin to an event featuring several of the world's Cup of Excellence microlots for tasting, each served by award-winning baristas.
And they don't skimp on the food either, with restaurant representation from the likes of Boulevard, Farralon, Gary Danko, Napa's Meadowood and REDD, Quince, RN74, etc. You know that the food world takes the event seriously when not only are sommeliers from New York pouring at the event, but the likes of Traci des Jardins (of Jardinière and Top Chef Masters fame) is there personally cooking up and handing out plates of food.
As a consumer event, what's not there? No hucksters promoting the latest technology in synthetic corks. No pitchmen telling you how to expand your revenue lines with wine coolers. No patent-pending bottle openers that promise to revolutionize wine consumption. Just a lot of people who want to share great wines and learn more about them and an industry that is trying to make that possible in ways it previously was not.
We can only hope just a fraction of that is possible with coffee — if only the industry would allow it, let alone participate in it. It's beyond the time for quality coffee to get out of its insular ivory towers and to start reaching out to the many customers it so claims to love and adore.


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CBNNews.com - GAZA STRIP - An Israeli air strike Monday night killed 42-year-old Ibrahim Abu Olba, senior commander of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP).
The strike took place in the Arab town of Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip, near the border with Israel. DFLP has claimed responsibility for many of the Kassam rocket attacks on southern Israeli communities.
Besides his involvement in rocket and mortar shell attacks, Olba masterminded attacks on Israel Defense Forces (IDF) troops and coordinated infiltration attempts to murder and kidnap Israelis.
According to defense officials, Olba was working on more of the same.
The DFLP commander died of his injuries in a Gaza hospital. Three bystanders were also wounded in the strike.
In a separate incident, Palestinian gunmen fired antitank missiles and mortars at the troops, but no soldiers were injured in the ensuing gun battles.
Later Tuesday morning, Givati Brigade infantrymen and Armored Corps opened fire on a Kassam rocket-launching terror cell in central Gaza, injuring several of its members.
Sources: YNet news, Haaretz, The Associated Press
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ABC's Music Lounge is Live With This Week's Edition of NASHVILLE-Inspired Docu-Web Series 'On the Record'
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ABC Music Lounge's "Nashville"-inspired docu-web series, "On the Record," is live at www.abc.com/musiclounge with the original song, "Sideshow," co-written by songwriters Aaron Scherz and Brad Turi and performed by Charles Esten as Deacon Claybourne. "Sideshow" is featured on the much anticipated soundtrack for the show, which is available today on iTunes and http://abc.go.com/music-lounge/.
"On the Record: Sideshow" goes behind the scenes with the song's co-writers, Aaron Scherz and Brad Turi. Interviews from CALLIE KHOURI (creator/executive producer), Dawn Soler (SVP of Music, ABC Studios) and Frankie Pine (music supervisor) reveal how some songs, when found, lend themselves so perfectly to the storytelling.
"'Sideshow' was one of those that came in the hundreds of thousands of songs that we heard," said Soler.
"I sent it over to the producers. They thought it would be great for Deacon," added Pine.
"In the pilot, he [Deacon] says, 'How come you never sang any of my songs?,' and she [Rayna] said, 'Cuz sometimes I just think they're all about me.' And they are, and this is one that is a perfect example," Khouri said.
The soundtrack for "Nashville," which is getting rave reviews from music critics nationwide, includes the following tracks: "Buried Under," performed by Connie Britton; "If I Didn't Know Better," performed by Sam Palladio and CLARE BOWEN; "Undermine," performed by Hayden Panettiere and Charles Esten; "Sideshow," performed by Charles Esten; "Wrong Song," performed by Connie Britton and Hayden Panettiere; "No One Will Ever Love You," performed by Connie Britton and Charles Esten; "Twist of Barbwire," performed by Jonathan Jackson; "Love Like Mine," performed by Hayden Panettiere; "Telescope," performed by Lennon Stella and Maisy Stella; "When the Right One Comes Along," performed by CLARE BOWEN and Sam Palladio; and "Telescope" (Radio Remix), performed by Hayden Panettiere.
T Bone Burnett serves as executive music producer for the series. All original music is released by ABC Studios, Lionsgate and ABC Music Lounge in association with Big Machine Records.
"Nashville" airs WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 12 (10:00-11:00 p.m., ET) with a new episode and new music.
Sponsored by Samsung, "On the Record" is a documentary web series that follows the life of original songs performed on "Nashville" written by singer/songwriters in the music scene, from the songs' inception to on-air premiere. The series offers an intimate look into the songwriting process, from guitar demo to music video and all the steps in between.
"Nashville" stars Connie Britton as Rayna Jaymes, Hayden Panettiere as Juliette Barnes, CLARE BOWEN as Scarlett O'Connor, ERIC CLOSE as Teddy Conrad, Charles Esten as Deacon Claybourne, Jonathan Jackson as Avery Barkley, Sam Palladio as Gunnar Scott, Robert Ray Wisdom as Coleman Carlisle and Powers Boothe as Lamar Wyatt.
"Nashville" is executive-produced by Dee Johnson, R.J. Cutler, CALLIE KHOURI who is also creator and Steve Buchanan. The series is produced by Lionsgate, ABC Studios and Gaylord Entertainment.
ABC Music Lounge, which launched in May 2009 on ABC.com, provides users with an interactive online music experience that is uniquely ABC. Reflective of the network's commitment to using digital platforms to deepen its relationship with viewers, the ABC Music Lounge showcases everything about the music and artists featured on ABC's popular primetime schedule, offering a deep catalog of music-related content. The site features a 24-hour streaming radio station programmed with music featured on such ABC series as "Body of Proof," "Castle," "Dancing with the Stars," "Grey's Anatomy," "Private Practice," "Revenge" and "Once Upon a Time," among others. Visitors to the site can get access to exclusive weekly free downloads and get a glimpse of ABC's music future, as the radio station also showcases new music picked by series producers, music supervisors and others involved in the music selection process for shows that have previously seen great success. In addition to a streaming radio station, ABC Music Lounge is home to music videos, exclusive performance footage, photos and behind-the-scenes interviews with artists, series producers and music supervisors.
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Every month we will feature a map or application created in BostonMaps
Meet the winners of this year's Garden Contest and view their incredible gardens. The contest recognizes gardeners who have landscaped, planted flowers, trees and shrubs, and, in the process, have helped beautify Boston's neighborhoods.
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At the 2011 ESRI International User Conference, representatives from the City of Boston demonstrated the City's use of GIS applications to attendees, highlighting how the applications are being used to engage citizens and improve the City's efficiency and effectiveness.
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Last week's inflation figures highlighted how the Abbott Government has been extremely successful in making climate change policy more about electricity prices than about climate change. While such a tactic worked well for th… More
Gough Whitlam's 1971 visit to China helped build economic ties that have been a boon for Australia. But with China's economy now stumbling, where are we heading? More
The move to lower the renewable energy target has already claimed the jobs of 100 workers at a major wind farm manufacturer. This is just the beginning if Labor doesn't successfully put up a fight. More
The agenda for the G20 in Brisbane next month is ambitious and targeted, with taxation, infrastructure and global growth the headline items. But when Prime Minister Tony Abbott threatened to shirtfront Russian leader Vladimir… More
Institutions like the ANU are free to divest shares in undesirable industries, but not if it means taxpayers cover the losses of doing so. You can't have your publicly funded cake and eat your private progressive values too. More
A message to those who want the free market to solve the problem of climate change - that's exactly what the Australian National University is helping it to do. More
As advocates for the disadvantaged raise their voice in anti-poverty week, it is heartening to see the rich aren't taking all this talk of wealth redistribution lying down. But when defenders of Team Rich argue that we should… More
There is a growing mountain of evidence that Australia has fundamental housing market problems, and the nature of those problems is clear. More
Your savings could be financing all sorts of unsavory companies, depending on the bank they're with. Ethical banking aims to make lending policies more transparent. MoreComments (5 comments)
Go back a century and Australia and Argentina - with vast expanses abundant in beef, grains and natural resources - were youthful southern hemisphere twins cavorting among the global Top 10 economies. Yet our economies have s… More


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Basketball: Estero girls' season ends against LaBelle
Just like a year ago, Estero's season ended with a quarterfinal loss in the Class 4A-District 11 girls basketball tournament, 58-43 to LaBelle.
But what a difference this time.
Junior guard Megan Phillips made sure the Wildcats didn't endure another embarrassing exit like the team did last year when they scored just three points against South Fort Myers.
Phillips drained a game-high 21 points Tuesday night, but it wasn't enough for No. 6 Estero to pull off an upset against No. 3 LaBelle.
The Cowgirls used 17 points from Ada Johnson and 14 points from Chelsey Ramos to advance at Cypress Lake High.
Estero (6-17) trailed 20-9 after the first quarter and never sliced the deficit to single digits, but they didn't go quietly.
"They're a well-coached team," said LaBelle coach Jeff Burton. "You've got to be in shape and ready to play because they throw so many people at you."
Phillips nearly single-handily kept Estero in the game.
The Wildcats trailed 37-21 at halftime and were down by as many as 21 in the third when Phillips scored eight straight points, including two of her four 3-pointers on the night.
"She had a great game," said Burton.
LaBelle (18-5) always maintained a safe double digit lead, including a 45-31 advantage heading into the fourth quarter. But this was a much tougher win for the Cowgirls than when the teams met in the regular season.
"I was extremely proud of my team," said Estero coach Jay VanHook. "LaBelle beat us by (38 points) the last game. We came back with enthusiasm and intensity."
Freshman Maya Rismay (9 points) and junior Jackie Murray (7 points) also contributed offensively for the Wildcats. Murray left the game with six minutes left due to a leg injury.
On Friday at 7 p.m., LaBelle will play the winner of Tuesday's late quarterfinal between No. 2 Cypress Lake and No. 7 Clewiston. Friday's other semifinal pits No. 1 South Fort Myers against No. 4 Lemon Bay at 5 p.m.
The championship will be Saturday at 7 p.m. All games are at Cypress Lake.
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Surya 22 in. Round Cotton Pouf - MaroonItem # HN-SYR3640
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Tarick Salmaci
From BoxRec
Alias: The Arabian Prince
Born: 1972-02-28
Birthplace: Lebanon
Hometown: Dearborn, Michigan, USA
Stance: Orthodox
Height: 6′ 1″ / 185cm
Reach: 73″ / 185cm
Boxing Record: click
Contestant on the NBC boxing reality television show. Former NABO Middleweight Champion The Contender.
- Salmaci works as a real estate agent in Detroit, MI, USA
- Official Site


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Sacramento Pro Circuit ChallengerSacramento, Calif.
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Since The End is one of my favorite clubs in town, and I love the Internet, this is truly a joyous day. I hope you go and look at their new website right now, scroll a bunch, click on a bunch of shit, and feel as good as I do because now, even though you can still get into most shows for 1996 prices, the club has blasted right past 1996 and straight to 2002 by going "online," as the kids say. Did you know Ted Leo's playing there Feb. 3? Well, here's a link to buy tickets. How about Cults and Asobi Seksu on Mar. 22? All right. Yes, there have been links to tickets for End shows in the past, but they were not easy to know about. Now they are, and we rejoice. Welcome to the Internet, The End!
Showing 1-6 of 6


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If I'm applying polish over gels, do I need to use clear sealer, then base coat?
The sealer will make the nail non-porous, so you don't need base coat to prevent discoloration of the finished nail. Since the finished gel surface does not produce oil, there should not be any issues with polish chipping. I would follow with a good top coat for color protection and a prolonged shine. — Michelle DiAngelo is an educator for EZ Flow.
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Product Description
Engine Fan Shroud Bracket 3 Row Set Of 4 1964-1966Engine Fan Shroud Bracket 3 Row Set Of 4 1964-1966
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Engine Fan Shroud Bracket 3 Row Set Of 4 1964-1966 is rated out of 5 by 1.
Rated 5 out of 5 by Knuckle1 from Fan shroud brackets The three row fit perfectly. I had originally ordered the two row. They were about an inch short. I used these on the original style shroud and it significantly improved the cooling of the engine. To make the screw fit better I scrapped the hole a few times with a file.
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Community Action
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From The Heart
Whether it's the feet or the hands, the Manduka gives you the grounding and stability to uplift your daily practice!
-Dimitris Papadakis
Attica, Greece
Let's Connect
Anja Brenko
Slovenia, EU
Why Manduka?: My Manduka mat is my home. Whenever I go, I'm home.
What does your Manduka help you #practice?: My Manduka helps me practice joy.
Yoga Style: Ashtanga, Vinyasa Flow
Practice with me here: Studio Maja
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Anja Brenko fell in love with Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga in 2000 when she tried to breath and move after a calming sound of David Swensons words on the DVD she bought. And there she decided that's what she wanted to do and after some years of dedicated practice ... also teach. Anja now teaches in Slovenia and around Europe.


text: Economy Lab Video: Why even a minor recession could be disastrous for U.S. Add to ... Mike Moffatt Special to The Globe and Mail Published Tuesday, Nov. 20, 2012 3:55PM EST Last updated Wednesday, Nov. 21, 2012 6:40AM EST When asked about the U.S. budget deficit, former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan was quoted as saying "If the cost of getting out of this is a modest recession, I think that is a cheap price." In this video, Economy Lab's Mike Moffatt explains why he disagrees. Watch More Video: World Bank cuts East Asia economic forecasts Are near zero interest rates working? Fort McMurray, Edmonton mayors in spat over crime comments Opposition leaders outline focus for final election debate What do the weak U.S. jobs numbers mean for the Fed? Disappointing U.S. jobs data sends stock futures 200 points lower Air France warns of job cuts ahead Obama calls for gun reform after Oregon shooting U.S. jobless claims up slightly: What it means for the Fed Ontario warns TPP would hurt auto, dairy industries Minimum wage going up in several provinces How about that economy? (And how about those Blue Jays?) How Canada can handle its aging population demographic France eyes better times with new budget Climate change warning from Carney Canadian GDP: worst likely over Deflation puts more pressure on ECB Why Atlantic Canada will reap the benefits if TPP goes through Are we headed for a global recession? How the sinking loonie has fewer Canadians cross-border shopping Comments AA More Related to this Story Market View Video: Market View: CNOOC accepts Canadian government's Nexen conditions Video: Shareholders reject pay plan in Glencore Xstrata approval Debt Crisis Video: Euro zone on brink of Greek aid deal Follow Mike Moffatt on Twitter: @mikepmoffatt


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text: I like to support the local businesses rather than constantly eat at the many chain restaurants in Edmond. Lottinvilles never disappoints. I like the way the tables are arranged so that you don't feel like you are intruding on other diners & their conversations. You can see into the open kitchen... read more


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Daniel Dae Kim of "Lost"
When Locke learns that Boone wants to tell their "secret" to Shannon, Shannon's life is placed in sudden peril, and the shocking truth about her past with Boone is revealed. Meanwhile, Kate is puzzled by Sun's mysterious behavior, and a hungry Hurley must repay a debt to Jin, on "Lost," WEDNESDAY (8:00-9:00 p.m., ET), on the ABC Television Network. ABC/MARIO PEREZ


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As practical as they are pretty, these white Dolce & Gabbana briefs will sit under light colored clothes perfectly. Wear with matching bra.
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text: Not much to complain about. 5 min. Walk to shopping and beautyfull harbor. Only used the hotel for one Night with 3 kids, to do some shopping. Not the Best extra bed for the youngest kids, but clean and space for clothes. Nice breakfast, friendly staff, and parkingarea just next to the hotel. A standard hotel to a good Price.


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7.5 ft. Natural Fraser Slim Fir Hinged Pre-Lit Christmas Tree - Multi-ColoredItem # HN-NATC289
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Our own Jeff Carlson has written a piece for 500px explaining how to use your iPad to up your photography game. No, not by taking photos with its built-in camera, but by using the iPad to preview, edit, sort, and share photos, and even to control your camera remotely.follow link
Thoughtful, detailed coverage of the Mac, iPhone, and iPad, plus the best-selling Take Control ebooks.
Record HD in Game Your Video
With Game Your Video you can you also record HD videos. To do this, go to the record screen, tap and hold your finger on this screen for about a second, and you'll see the video resolution pop-up. Choose the HD option to record videos in higher quality.
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text: 7 The Yankees landed Mariners outfielder Ichiro Suzuki in a trade that sent minor league pitchers D.J. Mitchell and Danny Farquhar to Seattle, according to Jack Curry of the YES Network. Ichiro, 38, has struggled offensively for the second consecutive year after an amazing first 10 seasons in MLB. Over 95 games […] Yankees trade for Ichiro Suzuki23 Jul, 2012 in Transactions by Rob Abruzzese


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Rep. Mack issues statement on opening travel to Cuba
WASHINGTON - U.S. Rep. Connie Mack, R-Fort Myers, issued the following statement Monday after President Obama announced that he will lift certain travel restrictions on Cuba.
Mack, the ranking Republican of the House Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, said:
"The Castro brothers' iron grip on Cuba continues to be a clear example of a totalitarian regime that is determined to control the thoughts, hearts and actions of the Cuban people.
"This dictatorship is one of the most brutal in the world. The U.S. economic embargo must remain in place until tyranny gives way to freedom and democracy.
"At the same time, we should find ways to strengthen the bonds of families torn apart by the Castro regime simply because of family members who yearn for freedom.
"President Obama, however, should not make any unilateral change in America's policy toward Cuba. Instead, Congress should vigorously debate these and other ideas before any substantive policy changes are implemented.
"None of us should be satisfied, however, until the Cuban people are free and the Castro regime is but a footnote of history."
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Wilh. Wilhelmsen ASA and Callenberg Technology Group were presented the 2015 SHIPPINGInsight Award was today at the SHIPPINGInsight 2015 Fleet Optimization Conference & Exhibition in Stamford, Conn.
Eying a rapidly growing cruise market, Carnival Corporation announces plans to sail more ships from China
The Chinese cruise market, expected to become the world's
Matthew Paxton is President of the Shipbuilders Council of America (SCA), and a partner at the law firm of Adams and Reese. SCA is the national trade association
JMS Naval Architects will complete the Contract Design Package next month of a 93-foot research vessel for Virginia Institute of Marine Science to replace its current research vessel, Bay Eagle.
Bibby Ship Management has successfully completed its second Global Management Programme which, it says, has helped to develop the management skills of all its
Kongsberg Maritime and Algoryx Simulation have entered a five year agreement, which supports Kongsberg Maritime's continuing development of fidelity and realism


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Criminal Vehicular Homicide
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Man Charged In Crash That Killed 2 In Northern MinnesotaA 29-year-old man is accused of driving drunk in a crash that killed two people in northern Minnesota. Itasca County Attorney John Muhar says Derrick Lee Cloud of Deer River was charged this week with two counts of criminal vehicular homicide.
Man Gets Jail Sentence In Fatal March CrashThe man who pleaded guilty in the crash that killed a Fulbright Scholar from Richfield in March has been sentenced to one year in jail. In July, Neftali Paolo Ramirez pleaded guilty to drinking before the fatal March 8 crash in Burnsville.
Golden Valley Man Guilty Of Fatal High-Speed, Drunk Driving CrashA Golden Valley man was found guilty Tuesday of killing a young Minneapolis couple while driving drunk at over 100 mph in 2003. Philip Scott Bertelsen, 56, was convicted of criminal vehicular homicide in connection with the deaths of Brandy Banks-Sutta and Melvin Jones on Nov. 3, 2013.
Drunk Driver Who Killed Fulbright Scholar SentencedA Bloomington man pleaded guilty Wednesday to one count of criminal vehicular homicide for a crash that killed a Richfield woman. The Dakota County Attorney's Office says 26-year-old Neftali Paolo Ramirez admitted to drinking before the fatal crash in Burnsville on March 8.
Driver In Weekend Boat Accident Charged With Vehicular HomicideThe boat driver involved in last weekend's deadly Fourth of July accident in northern Minnesota is now charged with criminal vehicular homicide.
Man Guilty Of Running Over Wife With Vehicle While DrunkA Minnetonka Beach man was found guilty of criminal vehicular homicide after he ran over his wife with a vehicle while drunk last July. The guilty verdict against David Christopher Meder was declared Wednesday in Hennepin County court.
Woman Sentenced In Meth-Fueled Crash That Killed Cambridge ManA 43-year-old Princeton woman has been sentenced to four years in prison for causing a crash that killed a 62-year-old Cambridge man, according to the Anoka County Attorney Tony Palumbo.
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Apple Valley Woman Gets 90-Day Sentence In Distracted Driving Fatal CrashA 29-year-old woman who caused a fatal crash when she ran a red light while dialing her phone will spend 90 days behind bars, according to the Dakota County Attorney's Office.
North Dakota Man Facing Charges In Fatal Crash In MinnesotaA 29-year-old man is facing charges in a fatal 2013 crash that killed one person near the border of North Dakota and Minnesota. Robin Olson of Wheatland, North Dakota, is charged with criminal vehicular homicide and criminal vehicular operation. Reports say he was driving when his vehicle collided with a minivan on U.S. Highway 75 south of Moorhead, Minnesota.
Man, 34, Charged In Crash That Killed Sandstone TeenA 34-year-old man accused of drunken driving likely will be charged with criminal vehicular homicide in the death of a Sandstone teenager. Seventeen-year-old Colton Nelson was killed last week in a two-car accident near his home in rural Kanabec County. The driver of the other vehicle was taken to a hospital in critical condition.
8 Years After Fatal Crash, Toyota Lawsuit Heads To TrialA Minnesota driver who went to prison for a crash that killed three people grabbed national attention when he was freed amid reports of Toyota Camrys that would mysteriously accelerate. Eight years after that accident, his lawsuit against the Japanese automaker goes to trial Wednesday. Koua Fong Lee and other survivors of the crash are seeking damages from Toyota.


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Brazil's Straw Hat project helps women leave abusive situations
Saudi, Iran and the 'war' over the Hajj stampede
31 Jul 2014 16:26 GMT | Politics, US & Canada, Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel
Marwan Bishara is the senior political analyst at Al Jazeera.
"Dealing w/ Hamas is like dealing w/ a crazy woman who's trying to kill u - u can only hold her wrists so long before you have to slap her.." tweeted Americancomedian and satirist, Bill Maher, who's once again, even in jest managed to demonstrate his worldly ignorance and bigotry.
This presumed progressive continuously picks on women and ridicules Muslims and other people at the receiving end of power. He argues, rather ignorantly, that all religions are bad, but Islam is worse than the rest.
One dismayed writer responded to Maher with stunned incredulity, "So much sexism packed into one tweet!" adding: "his Israeli-Palestinian conflict commentary is dumb." Amen.
Bill Maher and his ilk are either indifferent or refuse to see the full picture. They can't see how the "crazy woman" is merely resisting
"Dealing w/ Hamas is like dealing w/ a crazy woman who's trying to kill u - u can only hold her wrists so long before you have to slap her.." tweeted American comedian and satirist, Bill Maher, who's once again, even in jest managed to demonstrate his worldly ignorance and bigotry.
One dismayed writer responded to Maher with stunned incredulity, "So much sexism packed into one tweet!" adding: "his Israeli-Palestinian conflict commentary is dumb." Amen.
Bill Maher and his ilk are either indifferent or refuse to see the full picture. They can't see how the "crazy woman" is merely resisting rape under the gun; how a military occupation, like rape, is a horrific forceful violation, whether it involves one person or an entire people. It's just not funny.
But then, idiocy, misogyny, vulgarity, and racism are not uncommon bedfellows. And these are mostly, but not exclusively the specialities of men, and in this case western men.
Misogyny and racism
Sadly, when it comes to this war, there are more than a few American and Israeli Mahers. Like-minded misogynists in Israel are usually thrilled by the war and amused by the abuse of women.
David Sheen reports that the city council of the coastal city of Or Yehuda hung a public banner that read: "Israeli soldiers, the residents of Or Yehuda are with you! Pound their mother and come back home safely to your mother."
Such voices also make it to the mainstream Israel media and academia. Mordechai Kedar, a lecturer from Bar IIan University, told Israelis during a live radio broadcast that if Israel threatens to dispatch agents to rape a Palestinian militant's mother or sister as retribution for his crimes, it would serve as an effective deterrent.
Similar misogyny and racism was also expressed on social media with Gaza portrayed as an erotic woman to be violated.
This projection of male domination into collective violence and hatred through terrible physical abuse is widespread in the United States and Israel. In the latter, 61 percent believe that forced sex on an acquaintance is permissible. Indeed, Chris Hedges, in his two recent contributions: War is a Force That Gives us Meaning and Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle, attempts to understand why support for war is so pervasive and how for men, war and pornography are intertwined. In both cases, violence or abuse is endemic.
"Porn has always primarily involved the eroticisation of unlimited male power, but today it also involves the expression of male power through the physical abuse, even torture, of women. Porn reflects the endemic cruelty of our society. This is a society that does not blink when the industrial slaughter unleashed by the United States and its allies kills hundreds of civilians in Gaza or hundreds of thousands of innocents in Iraq and Afghanistan."
It's estimated that porn makes up as high as a third of all online traffic; users spend more than double or triple the time on porn sites than on average news site. One major porn site generates 4.4 billion page views a month, more traffic than the most popular sports channel, ESPN or CNN. The same goes for the pervasiveness of violence and its glorification in cinema and other forms of entertainment - a subject for another day.
Abuse of women in Israel isn't limited to political slogans. Former Israeli President Moshe Katsav was indicted for sexual harassment, and as Sheen reports, two potential presidential candidates, Silvan Shalom and Meir Sheetrit, were both accused of committing serious sex crimes during the presidential election campaign.
No wonder, the feminist and the peace movements have long been mutually inclusive and intertwined causes.
As for the Palestinian women, the suffering has been too great to imagine and gets even worse with each and every war. They are at the centre of the family, the community and the nation. And it's they who tend to bear the brunt of the consequences of wars and violence. As the scholar Hamid Dabashi commented recently, nothing can express the terrible ordeal of children than "the reflection of their terror on the face of their grieving mothers."
That's not lost on other women, no less in the United States where a majority of men polled reckon Israel is justified in its offensive against Gaza. A recent Gallup poll shows that greater number among women and youth, believe Israel is not justified in its war in Gaza. Only a minority among the two demographics think the opposite. This is particularly important considering the government and mainstream US media are terribly slanted towards Israel.
As the Canadian writer, Naomi Klein noted two decades ago: "So long as Israel continues to usurp Palestine, it will be a country with racism and misogyny at the core of its being. Until this brutality ends, Israel is a country with blood on its hands and on its profile. […] Women's concerns about rape and brutality are considered trivial when men are busy worrying about death and war. But, in Israel, the feminist and the peace movements are closely connected."
War is the "macho extension of diplomacy" argues the prolific Duch-Israeli military historian, Martin van Creveld, who is anything but a feminist and perhaps an anti-feminist. While he dismisses all bleeding hearts that loathe war, he reckons how, at the end of the day, war is about bored men looking for excitement.
Indeed, it's a man's war. But that's all to the reason why it's high time for women to step in and help end the horrific spectacle.
Marwan Bishara is the senior political analyst at Al Jazeera.
Source: Al Jazeera
What is Israel's greatest chutzpah?
The International Criminal Court has to take a number of issues into consideration before launching an investigation.
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Enbridge Energy is eyeing a major pipeline in Minnesota state, but the project faces fierce environmental opposition.
Environment, Oil spill, Energy
Plunder of Somali waters by foreign fishing vessels could mean the return of hijackings, locals warn.
Environment, Somalia, Africa
Once-thriving northeast factories waylaid by '90s economic reforms as millions of former 'employees-for-life' laid off.
Business & Economy, Unemployment, China
Frustrated by long queues, thousands of refugees register with German authorities struggling with the recent influx.
Refugees, Humanitarian crises, War & Conflict
We speak to former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, and ask a former KGB general about Russia's air strikes in Syria.
War & Conflict, Middle East, Israel
101 East follows the lives of seven people in Nanjing and asks what they think of the direction their country is taking.
Politics, Asia Pacific, China
In a Delhi slum, puppeteers, musicians, jugglers and acrobats try to unite as they wrangle with an approaching eviction.
Business & Economy, Arts & Culture, Poverty & Development
An investigation into the high rate of child sex abuse in Jamaica and the government's failure to protect its children.


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Sept. 11 pile workers discuss Zadroga
Three medically disabled Sept 11 pile workers talk about the Zadroga Bill and what it means to them. Videojounalist: Thomas A. Ferarra (Sept. 4, 2013)
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Port Jeff students learn about chainsaw art Under the helmet: Inside LI football helmets FDR's son's home for sale in Woodbury 3 injured in police patrol car crash Crash closes Sunrise Highway in East Patchogue Off-duty Suffolk County officer helps revive hockey player North Amityville gas station attendant robbed, say cops One dead after bar dispute 'Blessing of the Animals' in Brentwood Making apple cider in Northport Tom Cutinella anniversary vigil on football field Coastal concerns for Fire Island as Joaquin nears


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About the ManufacturerFrom childhood to pre teens, SportsPlay and it's own brand PlayTown offers a huge selection of fun and safe products manufactured for ultimate quality and lifetime performance. Their mission is to provide fun equipment and exceptional safety on the playground, in the backyard and in the neighborhood. SportsPlay is proud to offer a massive selection with hundreds of products ranging from Playgrounds, Sports Equipment, Classic Play Pieces and more. Also, SportsPlay stands alone because of their products which cater to the disabled population. A wide variety of swings, ramps, support pieces and more allow for handicapped and disabled people of all ages to enjoy all the fun SportsPlay provides as well.
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