text:
ARIES (March 21-April 19). You feel somewhat responsible for the happiness of those you love. There's no reason to hold back any advice you have that might help to enhance and augment their well-being, but do keep in mind that timing is everything.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20). If you burn the bridge behind you, there still will be ways to get back. You could swim, build a boat or hitch a ride on a plane, but all of these ways are uncertain and time consuming. Be nice to the bridge.
GEMINI (May 21-June 21). The contradictions will seem to stand in defiance before you, daring you to make sense of them. This cannot be done with force or hard-line thinking. Gentleness and time will eventually bring all things into order.
CANCER (June 22-July 22). You don't want to owe anyone, and yet, if you were to swallow your pride and accept some help, you would quickly find yourself in a much better position. You could help others from that place, too. Take the help.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22). Difficult tasks are just a series of easy steps — a really long series, to be sure. But since you're only tackling one step at a time, there is little difference between choosing a difficult task and an easy one.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22). You'll encounter two types of people now: the talkers and the doers. They need each other. The talkers will be the marketers and the publicity for all that the doers need to advertise.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 23). If you don't guess right or make a smart move right off the bat, don't worry. This is just part of how you gain the experience you need. If you're always correct the first time, you won't make a good teacher later.
SCORPIO (Oct. 24-Nov. 21). Just because love is true doesn't mean it is also easy. You're up for the adventure, though. Loyalties will be tested. You'll learn even more about the person you love and about yourself.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21). Turn up the tunes and be carefree. One of your sign mates said this well: "I wish you music to help with the burdens of life, and to help you release your happiness to others." — Ludwig van Beethoven
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19). It will be tempting to veer off course and set your sights on an entirely different goal. But you will gain so much confidence from doing what you set out to do, if only to prove the point that you're a person who follows through.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18). People think you're brave for speaking your mind, but what they don't understand is that you're just not the type to bottle things up. To you, that would be far more painful than just telling the truth.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20). What is it you most want people to feel around you? Your clear intentions have power. You'll cultivate and spread that emotion. Don't worry about how. The result you want will shape your decisions unconsciously.
TODAY'S BIRTHDAY (June 14). You already feel that life is good, but you're about to believe it's absolutely phenomenal. The next seven weeks bring an answer for every question, a date when you want one and opportunities galore. Give yourself a deserved break in August. September shows you rising up through the ranks of an organization. Pisces and Aquarius people adore you.


text:
"In fiscal year 2000, (Bill) Clinton's last as president, the federal government spent $1.77 trillion. Multiply that number by two, and you're almost to federal spending in FY 2010: $3.72 trillion in (President) Obama's first wholly owned budget. If we had limited government's growth — not actually cut government, mind you, but limited its growth — at the rates of inflation and population expansion, the 2010 federal budget would have been a much more affordable $2.50 trillion. Instead of 'fiscal cliff' on Jan. 1, 2013, we'd be facing a federal budget surplus. Faced with the overwhelming evidence that the debt and deficit problem is a spending problem, negotiators and commentators are talking about everything except cutting the size of government."
— Matt Welch of Reason magazine, explaining why no one on either political side is talking about cutting the size of government, Nov. 30
Read more of this story and more!
7-Day Subscribers have FREE access to everything on rep-am.com and our E-Edition.
CLICK HERE to register and activate your access,.
Not a subscriber?
You can purchase a single-day subscription for only $0.75 to read this and access all of our content and our E-Edition.
CLICK HERE purchase a single day subscription.
Become an electronic subscriber to the Republican-American for only $8 a month. CLICK HERE.
Follow Us
Post a reader commentWe encourage your feedback and dialog.
Please be civil and respectful.
If you're witty, to the point and quotable, your reader comments may also be included on the Around the Towns page of The Sunday Republican.
Readers must be registered and logged in to post comments on the site. Registration is free. Click Here to register.
A Subscription is not required to post comments only a Registration.
Log In
|Register / Forgotten Password?

subset: commoncrawl


text:
- Jena Economic Resea...
- Volume 6
- How Much of a Socia...
- Pictured person
- Published
- Mon Jul 16 2012
- Number of discussion paper
- keyword(s)
East Germany
new business formation
- abstract
The 40 years of socialist regime in East Germany were characterized by a massive anti-entrepreneurship policy. We investigate the reemergence of entrepreneurship in East Germany during its transformation to a market economy following the collapse of the East German state in 1989. It took about 15 years until self-employment levels in East Germany reached those of West Germany. Despite this catch up, we find a number of peculiarities in East German self-employment that appear to be a continuing legacy of the socialist period. In particular, older and better-educated East Germans have a relatively low propensity for starting an own business. Moreover, East German workers tend to have a lower variety of skills than their West German counterparts, which could explain a lower propensity for start up in the early years after reunification. Despite this socialist imprint, we also find considerable continuity in the levels of self-employment in the 1920s and those after transition to a market economy, suggesting the existence of a long-lasting regional entrepreneurship culture.
- article pub. typess JER
- Research article
- article languages JER
- Englisch
- JEL-Classification for JER
- L26 - Entrepreneurship ; O11 - Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development


text:
I am looking for references on the architecture of automated trading systems and the trading algorithms behind them. I am more interested in system development than analysis. A couple of books I found are Building Automated Trading Systems by van Vliet and Quantitative Trading by Chan. Any other tips or references on this matter would be appreciated.
In addition to Chan's Quantitative Trading, I have also found the description of trading systems in Rishi Narang's Inside the Black Box to be informative and interesting. There are a few chapters there that give some details on system development, but they are very broad overviews.
DSpace@MIT - High frequency trading system design and process management (non-printable)
It's just a thesis and you should not consider this as a state of art which is used in a production environment on Wall street. However it's at least something to begin with and become familiar with some approaches which are conisdered in this work.
Additionally I would recommend Evidence-based technical analysis by David Aronson
It explains the whole process (including the complete statistical background) of rigorously setting up the basis for your trading system.
See for a short summary of important points here: CXO Advisory
See for a review here (including some practical advice and programs how to use the recipes in the book): Automated trading system (This whole blog is btw a good starting point on its own for your endeavor!)
I just finished "High-Frequency Trading: A Practical Guide to Algorithmic Strategies and Trading Systems" by Irene Aldridge -- I think it provides a very good overview of HFT, considerations of different aspects of trading systems, and good introductions to many formulas and research.
In terms of system design, I learned the most by reading the developer guides and exchange connectivity specs for various exchanges. You probably won't be connecting to these directly, but understanding how the sessions, book updates, snapshotting works, and what events can occur is very useful.
Also, google for the Max Dama automated trading PDF, which gives a brilliant and concise overview of what's involved in building a working automated trading system, including architecture, and a who you are vs what you need to build table.
Check out the following link with videos: I believe Richard Olsen organised the first high-frequency trading conference: http://www.birs.ca/events/2013/5-day-workshops/13w5008/videos


text:
Site Navigation
- • Forums
- • Classified Ads
- • TechPB Videos
- • Tactics Guide
- • Chat Room
- • Contact Staff
Online Chat Room
Online Users0 members, 2261 visitors and 0 anonymous users
Bing, Yahoo, Google
Recently Added Posts
Has techpb officially died?
andrewthewookie - Yesterday, 01:14 AM
This 'n that.
3RD PERSON ACTION [MILSIG M17] - Global Warfare
InBlack - Jul 27 2016 10:57 AM
We head down to Global Warfare at Adrenaline Paintball in London Ontario to try out our new 3rd person camera rig with the MILSIG M17. Check out the results! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_...
Has techpb officially died?
Baux18 - Jul 24 2016 10:04 PM
Spurlock goes to your field? Also: hey Baux. andrew ^_^ what have you fellas been up too
Has techpb officially died?
Morgan-Crp - Jul 24 2016 07:30 PM
It was the first time I've ever seen him there but he lives somewhere around the gulf if I'm not mistaken
Has techpb officially died?
andrewthewookie - Jul 24 2016 05:10 PM
Spurlock goes to your field? Also: hey Baux.
Has techpb officially died?
Morgan-Crp - Jul 24 2016 05:04 PM
I went to Goodwill today and there was a Trilogy Pro for 20 dollars and I bought it but they only charged me 13. Went to the field to test it out and it didn't shoot. Took the bolt out, it was upsi...
Has techpb officially died?
Baux18 - Jul 24 2016 01:08 PM
I'm genuinely surprised some of the old regulars are still posting here. Actually got out and played this past weekend. Was fun, but not working at a field and actually paying for paint...
Video poll
ragu - Jul 23 2016 10:52 PM
Just discovered I can do spilt screen, which one do you think is better?The one I spent time editing and splitting separate cams or this one side by side? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yghgd...
Newest Members
1. Elrey24
Joined: Jul 26 2016 03:27 AM
2. SciespoI46
Joined: Jul 25 2016 02:37 AM
3. beobung
Joined: Jul 18 2016 11:50 PM
4. Alabaster_Syndicate
Joined: Jul 18 2016 11:05 PM
5. glrousseau
Joined: Jul 13 2016 07:15 PM


text:
Uses the Sweet 'N Sassy Rhombus Template™ by Creative Grids® The ultimate bag for travel and shop hopping has arrived! It's roomy, light in weight and features a huge zippered pocket for valuables plus a magnetic snap closure to keep your "treasures" inside. The rhombus "tiled" diamonds allows one to play with both color and pattern while the unique twist of the handles adds interest and texture. Finished size is 15"w x 15"h x 4"d and is designed by Margaret Travis
Item : EPQ117


text:
Please enter a maximum of 5 recipients. Use ; to separate more than one email address.
Crews worked to clean up some 2,500 bbl of crude that spilled over the weekend at an oil storage terminal in Cushing, Oklahoma, the third biggest crude spill seen in the US this year. The Enbridge spill took place at a crude gathering site. It follows the rupture in March of Exxon Mobil's Pegasus pipeline.
By ALISON SIDER
The leak, at an Enbridge Energy Partners pipeline connected
to one of the more than 85 tanks at Enbridge's Cushing storage
facility, comes as many pipeline companies seek to expand their
networks to accommodate growing energy production in North
America. At least one major project, the Keystone XL pipeline
proposal to connect Alberta's oil sands with Texas refineries,
is facing significant backlash from environmentalists concerned about
The Enbridge spill took place at a crude gathering site. It
follows the rupture in March of Exxon Mobil's Pegasus pipeline,
which spilled an estimated 5,000 bbl of heavy Canadian crude
into a Mayflower neighborhood. Earlier that month, more than
5,000 bbl of oil leaked from a Lion Oil Trading &
Transportation storage tank in Magnolia, with some flowing into
a bayou.
Also in March, a Chevron Corp. pipeline leaked an estimated
600 bbl of diesel near a freshwater lake in Utah's Willard Bay
State Park. And an inactive Marathon Petroleum pipeline leaked
about 500 bbl of diesel in Indianapolis earlier this month.
The recent spills could chip away at the local and
regulatory support needed by pipeline companies to get projects approved, said Amy Myers
Jaffe, Executive Director of energy and sustainability at University
California, Davis, Graduate School of Management. "The more
accidents there are, the more resistance you're going to see,"
she said.
Enbridge said it is stepping up its inspection and
monitoring systems to meet higher expectations of governments,
regulators, landowners and the public. "All the expansion activity we're undertaking
is happening against a backdrop of heightened public
awareness," a company spokesman said in an email.
Enbridge said the Cushing spill was isolated and that oil
didn't make it past containment systems. By Monday, 2,400 bbl
of oil and water had been recovered, the company said.
Brigham McCown, a former deputy administrator of the United
States Department of Transportation's Pipeline and Hazardous
Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), said the spill proves
safety measures at facilities are working. Earlier this
year, PHMSA proposed a $78,700 fine against Enbridge for
problems with tank inspection procedures and corrosion control
on some tanks in Cushing. Enbridge spokesman Terry Larson said
those issues were unrelated to the recent spill.
All comments are subject to editorial review.
All fields are compulsory.
Sign-up for the Free Daily HP Enewsletter!
A searchable database of project activity in the global hydrocarbon processing industry
Engineers and designers are highly skilled individuals. Forcing them to enter design changes using tables, forms and spreadsheets is unproductive and uneconomical, and it increases the likelihood of human error—this is the way that most instrumentation software systems currently work. For too long, software vendors have denied engineers and designers the simple practicality of a graphical visual engineering interface with "drag and drop" capability and inbuilt intelligence, ensuring changes are automatically replicated into all the associated data and databases.
Is 2016 the peak for US gasoline demand?
Too soon to tell
July 2016


text:
Let $M$ be a centered parallelepiped, the intersection of $M$ and any plane $P$ that passes through the origin is a parallelogram or hexagon. Each parallelogram or hexagon has a cubic box that is the smallest box that can contain the parallelogram or hexagon. Denote the cubic box by $B(P)$. There exist planes $P_{0}$ such that $B(P_{0})$ is the smallest among all the boxes $B(P)$.
Is it true that there is always one of the planes $P_{0}$ such that the cross-section of the centered parallelepiped $M$ by $P_{0}$ is a parallelogram?


text:
Are there some recomendations on Open Source or Free PHP Encoder systems? Is something available?
Sign up
- Anybody can ask a question
- Anybody can answer
- The best answers are voted up and rise to the top
closed as not constructive by gnat, Kilian Foth, GlenH7, Dan Pichelman, MichaelT Jun 24 '13 at 13:52
As it currently stands, this question is not a good fit for our Q&A format. We expect answers to be supported by facts, references, or expertise, but this question will likely solicit debate, arguments, polling, or extended discussion. If you feel that this question can be improved and possibly reopened, visit the help center for guidance.If this question can be reworded to fit the rules in the help center, please edit the question.
Obfuscating PHP just makes it difficult for the casual observer to study the code. It will not keep someone who is determined at bay for very long. Granted, the unobfuscated version they're able to produce might not match your code line by line, but it will be close enough.
The only reason I could see to use one would be to ensure that people did not short circuit a licensing check, however even that is trivial to accomplish in most cases.
I recommend just trusting your customers, or build offerings that are designed to be delivered mostly, if not entirely as a service.
That being said, you can try actually compiling your PHP apps into native executables that work via FCGI dispatch or come complete with an embedded web server. Tools to help you do that are the PHP Compiler (phpcompiler.org) and Roadsend.
Still, you won't stop someone who is determined to modify their copy, or study how it works.
Don't fool yourself. You don't need an encoder. If you still feel like it, there is a Raiz Labs PHP Obfuscator. Any many others, just use Google.
If what you look for is a compiler, not encoder, check out hiphop. Otherwise, it is rather hard to write an encoder that would sufficiently hide details about your PHP script, so don't put high hopes in obfuscators beings secure or making your code un-recoverable.


text:
COPPERAS COVE (February 3, 2013) --- Neighbors were still in the dark Sunday night about an ongoing investigation into an incident that happened Saturday night on their street.
A dispatcher with the Texas Department of Public Safety confirmed that police were called out to a residence on Westview Lane in Copperas Cove sometime around 6:30 p.m. after someone barricaded themselves inside a home.
Copperas Cove City Manager Andrea Gardner confirmed police responded to the call but wouldn't say what happened.
No details were released from the Copperas Cove Police Department on Saturday or Sunday.
Gardner did confirm that The Texas Rangers have taken over the investigation.


text:
I want to perform multiple browser testing: While working on a project i needed to open multiple browsers simultaneously using Webdriver script.
Does anyone have experience in implementing this ?
Whether you want the ability to change the driver per execution of your tests, or simply rerun each test with multiple drivers, it's pretty straightforward. First you need to follow all of the instructions to get your drivers and browsers set up for the first execution. http://seleniumhq.org/docs/03_webdriver.jsp#selenium-webdriver-s-drivers.
In your code, it's also pretty straightforward, however you didn't mention a specific language or tool you're using to drive the automated tests... In C# some code may look like this:
If you wanted to execute everything in every browser (or at least every browser installed on a single machine), you could either create a foreach loop in your code, or if you're using something like nunit to execute the test cases, you could create parameterized tests that execute once for each parameter.
If you want additional info about how to execute on multiple versions of the same browser, or more detail about using a tool like nunit (or your specific tool) please clarify in your question.
I am not familiar with "Webdriver script", so I assume you are referring to a program that uses Selenium. You can write a program that opens multiple Drivers to talk to multiple simultaneous browsers. If you want that activity to happen in parallel, you will need to use multiple threads.
The specifics around how you open Drivers and use multiple threads depend upon the programming language.


text:
Syndicated Columnists
Taking America's pulse
PRESIDENT: The leading figure in a small group of men of whom — and of whom only — it is positively known that immense numbers of their countrymen did not want any of them for president. — Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" (1906)
WASHINGTON — What another lexicographer, Samuel Johnson, said of Milton's "Paradise Lost," can be said of this campaign: No one ever wished it longer. Voters, having heard enough, might agree that it is splendid that in "Hamlet" Polonius gets stabbed. He deserved this because his speech to Laertes taught politicians how to speak bromides.
Read more of this story and more!
7-Day Subscribers have FREE access to everything on rep-am.com and our E-Edition.
CLICK HERE to register and activate your access,.
Not a subscriber?
You can purchase a single-day subscription for only $0.75 to read this and access all of our content and our E-Edition.
CLICK HERE purchase a single day subscription.
Become an electronic subscriber to the Republican-American for only $8 a month. CLICK HERE.
Follow Us
Post a reader commentWe encourage your feedback and dialog.
Please be civil and respectful.
If you're witty, to the point and quotable, your reader comments may also be included on the Around the Towns page of The Sunday Republican.
Readers must be registered and logged in to post comments on the site. Registration is free. Click Here to register.
A Subscription is not required to post comments only a Registration.
Log In
|Register / Forgotten Password?


text:
DiDio & Lee Say Early "Rebirth" Response is 'Uncharted Territory' for DC Comics
Comic Books
Showing results 5293-5342 of 9514
Savage Dragon #177
Dragon's kids fight a Hulked-Out Osama Bin Laden, while the subplots keep rolling.
|December 21st, 2011
Batman #4
Explosions, owls, dusty old attics and Batman. That combination sure makes for a good comic.
|December 21st, 2011
Frankenstein, Agent of S.H.A.D.E #4
How do you defeat a Monster Planet? With the War Wheel, son. With the War Wheel.
|December 19th, 2011
Carnage USA #1
Carnage invades a small American town, planning to create a new home for himself.
|December 18th, 2011
Battle Scars #2
Marcus Johnson gets taken into SHIELD custody. For about 5 minutes.
|December 18th, 2011
Most comics travel to the future. "S.H.I.E.L.D." travels to three futures at the same time.
|December 18th, 2011
Journey into Mystery #632
Merry Yule, Loki! Have a puppy! In fact, puppies for everybody!
|December 18th, 2011
Sacrifice #1
Epilepsy can cause time travel. Huh. You learn something new in every comic.
|December 17th, 2011
Grifter #4
"Grifter" is losing a little steam, and a pointless encounter with Green Arrow is part of the problem.
|December 17th, 2011
Green Lantern #4
"Green Lantern" is showing potential, but the pace is far slower than it needs to be.
|December 17th, 2011
Jim Henson's The Storyteller
Jim Henson's properties have made quite an impact on the publishing schedule for Archaia. That trend continues in fine fashion right here.
|December 17th, 2011
Legion Lost #4
Dawnstar is the focal character for this issue of "Legion Lost," but the others get plenty of panel time.
|December 17th, 2011
Northanger Abbey #2
Nancy Butler and Janet K. Lee continue their solid work adapting the novels of Jane Austen with Marvel's "Northanger Abbey" limited series.
|December 17th, 2011
Ultimate X-Men #4
While technically competent, this issue falls decidedly flat just when it should be ramping up.
|December 17th, 2011
Severed #5
Scott Snyder and Scott Tuft continue to offer up turn of the century creepiness in a most unsettling manner here. Just ask Chuck.
|December 17th, 2011
Suicide Squad #4
"Suicide Squad" continues to improve every issue, and this issue is no exception.
|December 15th, 2011
Avengers Academy #23
X-23 joins "Avengers Academy" right as everything is poised for disaster.
|December 15th, 2011
Star Wars: Agent of the Empire -- Iron Eclipse #1
The "scalpel" of the Empire. Not quit as intimidating a title as "Dark Lord of the Sith," but it has potential for coolness.
|December 15th, 2011
The Walking Dead #92
A cloaked figure fights it out with Michonne and Abraham. And his revelation could set up the next new status quo for the series.
|December 15th, 2011
The Ray #1
Lucien Gates is The Ray, a powerful (new) superhero who, in the hands of a fantastic creative team, delivers a funny and action- packed first issue.
|December 15th, 2011
Jim Henson's Tale of Sand #1
Ramon Perez adapts an unfilmed screenplay by Jim Henson from the 1960s, and the results are spectacular.
|December 15th, 2011
Uncanny X-Force #18
The Dark Angel Saga comes to its long-awaited conclusion.
|December 14th, 2011
New Avengers #19
The New Dark Avengers make their public debut.
|December 14th, 2011
Batwoman #4
Still gorgeous, and the story's picking up, to boot.
|December 14th, 2011
Batman and Robin #4
Batman, Robin, and Nobody share a little heart-to-heart-to-heart. Also, Damian's dog gets a name.
|December 14th, 2011
The Shade #3
"The Shade" heads down under for what, to this non-Australian, feels like a nice change from cliché.
|December 14th, 2011
American Vampire #21
A young gun goes down in a blaze of glory and so chooses his bed of nails.
|December 14th, 2011
Avengers: X-Sanction #1
Cable takes on the Avengers. Actually, it's a lot more than that...
|December 14th, 2011
The Strain #1
This lead in to the horror builds atmosphere and character effectively.
|December 13th, 2011
Venom #10
As Flash is blackmailed, Captain America arrives to shut down the Venom project.
|December 12th, 2011
Action Comics #4
Earth is being invaded and its only hope is an alien! Guess they wish they hadn't tortured Superman so much now, eh?
|December 11th, 2011
Moon Knight #8
After delivering a loss to Count Nefaria, Moon Knight is confident and ready to do more to take the 'kingpin of Los Angeles' down.
|December 11th, 2011
Thought Bubble Anthology #1
A charity showcase anthology spearheaded by the Thought Bubble convention.
|December 11th, 2011
X-Club #1
The X-Men (of Utopia) have given their "Science Club" a mini-series that is oddly named "X-Club" where these characters will apparently "do science."
|December 11th, 2011
X-Factor #228
Jamie Madrox is dead (or is he?), and the rest of the team works hard to eliminate Bloodbath, Jamie's killer. Oh, and it turns out Guido has no soul. Guy is pretty funny and charming for the soulless.
|December 11th, 2011
Breed III #7
Ray Stoner and his half-brother Pat take on their father, the leader of the demons! It's a battle of shapeshifters and Stoner is way out of his league... or is he?
|December 10th, 2011
Penguin: Pain & Prejudice #3
This issue features the continuing story of loss and how the Penguin copes with it. "Not well" factors in.
|December 10th, 2011
Punisher #6
Punisher in the wintertime. It's still black and white and red all over. Just lots more white and slightly more red.
|December 10th, 2011
Hellblazer Annual 2011
23 years after the first one, "Hellblazer" gives us another Annual. It was actually worth the wait.
|December 9th, 2011
Betrayal of the Planet of the Apes #2
"Ape does not kill ape" may be the most sacred law on the Planet of the Apes, but someone killed someone else here. That always makes for a good story.
|December 9th, 2011
Animal Man #4
It might be a man in the title, but it's a family in the spotlight and everyone gets their moment.
|December 9th, 2011
Static Shock #4
"Static Shock" is a little jumpy in places, but there are moments in here which are fantastic.
|December 8th, 2011
Justice League International #4
"Justice League International" is superheroes by the book, in every single way.
|December 8th, 2011
Valen the Outcast #1
"Valen the Outcast" has a great concept; now we need to see where it goes from here.
|December 8th, 2011
Hulk #45
"Hulk of Arabia" gets a little sand in its shoe with this issue, but the story is still entertaining.
|December 8th, 2011
Villains for Hire #1
"Villains for Hire" is absolutely nothing like "Thunderbolts," in more ways than one.
|December 8th, 2011
O.M.A.C. continues to be absolutely nothing like you would expect it to be. Unless you expect it to be fun, entertaining, and enjoyable.
|December 7th, 2011
Stormwatch #4
The conclusion is a little too deus ex machina, but there's still a lot to like in "Stormwatch" #4.
|December 7th, 2011
Avenging Spider-Man #2
"Avenging Spider-Man" is fun and pretty, but it's also a little slight.
|December 7th, 2011
Reed Gunther #6
"From Cowboy to Cowman!" gives us the secret (or not-so-secret) origin of Reed Gunther.
|December 7th, 2011


text:
Where can I get new Aegisub? Ubuntu reps have only 2.1.9 which is VERY buggy (it doesn't support cyrillic lower case, it's unaceptable for me). I found only source, but I'm not sure, that I can do everything right. Where to get new package (at least newer)?
You have two options: compile from source (which is easy if you follow the instructions) or use a precompiled package for 12.04 with your 12.10 version. In both cases you will get
Install from precompiled package
On this page someone provides precompiled packages of aegisub and wxWidgets (install both packages) for Ubuntu 12.04. Despite the warning that the package is of low quality, the installation should work with Ubuntu 12.10 as well.
Compile from source
I've found step by step instructions in the aegisub forum. Please take a look at the post, the poster explains all steps.
A short version in case the link goes down:
when reaching the step of
I get the error
I tried to install libicu-dev or libicu48, but it gives the same error..


text:
KILLEEN (January 10, 2013)--The Central Texas HOP bus has added a route to and from the Texas A&M University-Central Texas campus.
The stop will be added to Route 7 providing inbound and outbound service to the main campus, located at 1001 Leadership Place.
The bus will arrive every hour beginning at 5:48 a.m. and ending at 4:48 p.m.
Other locations on this route include: Metroplex, Gus & Robinette, Elms & Hitchrock and the airport.
There is no Saturday service.
For more information, call the Killeen Director of Urban Operations Robert Ator at (254) 616-6800.


text:
The reviews are in and these Polarized Swim Goggles get the highest marks for quality and value! See clearly in the water without compromising visibility – these goggles also remove glare. Polarized glare protection lenses provide optimal clarity while reducing eye strain – 99% of vertical glare is removed. Lenses include UVA/UVB protection. Swimmers will appreciate the wide curved lenses, which reduce distortion for optimal peripheral viewing, and a split silicone strap that provides added comfort and security. One piece latex-free frame delivers a comfortable fit because pressure is distributed evenly across face. Features anti-fog lenses.
See more details
Item # 201331
Every aspect of these Polarized Swim Goggles has been well designed by discerning product testers. The anti-glare lenses do a great job of removing glare from bright sunlight or artificial pool light, and the lenses won't fog. Plus, they're wide and curved, yet reduce distortion. The frame is latex-free, and made from a comfortable one piece construction for even distribution. Available in silver/black – use these to get ready for competition!
• Goggles designed for open water or triathlon training
• Polarized lenses provides optimum clarity and reduces eye strain
• Features glare protection - 99% of vertical glare is removed
• Includes UVA/UVB protection
• Silicone strap - split strap provides added comfort and security
• Wide curved lens reduces distortion for optimal peripheral viewing
• Patented side button clips makes fitting and adjustments simple
• Anti fog lenses
• Comfortable one piece frame over molded polyurethane - distributes pressure evenly across face
• Latex free
• Comes in silver/black color combination
Length: 9.00
Width: 3.00
Height: 2.00
Weight: 0.20 Lbs
Our Price: $39.99
Enter your promo code at checkout to see your savings!
Enter your email address to instantly receive your promo code and see your savings at checkout!
No Thanks, I like paying full price.
Please note: We do not sell or share our customer's email addresses.
Call Us 1-877-202-9337
The Sharper Image® name and logo are registered trademarks.
©The Sharper Image. All Rights Reserved.
Your browser blocks some 3rd party cookies by default. By clicking on this page you allow our partner Criteo to place its cookies and serve personalized ads. You can read more or disable Criteo ads
This notice only appears once.


text:
On Lion, Xcode quit on its own when it was downloading documentation with no windows open. Is it safe to have Xcode download documentation in Mountain Lion or will it still quit on its own if all windows are closed?
OS X 10.8.1 no longer automatically terminates Xcode 4.4.1 while Xcode is downloading documentation with no windows open. It looks like "they fixed the glitch" of Xcode not properly communicating its "working" status to OS X. Have not tried on Lion, but I would guess that Xcode 4.4.1 no longer is auto-terminated there too when downloading documentation.
According to OS X Daily, you can disable auto-terminate in Lion and Mountain Lion with the following terminal command:
This sets the NSDisableAutomaticTermination flag in the
Note that this will disable automatic termination for all applications, not just Xcode.


text:
INCREDIBLE Plastics 18-Gallon General Tote for $4 + shipping
One word: plastics.
19 Comments add a comment
time to make that 18 gallon pond i promised my gf for xmas :)
Just a note, these are available for free store pick up at my Lowe's. Which is a good thing, because it says that parcel delivery is unavailable and the only other option is the Lowe's Truck delivery (which costs 55 dollars).
could i fit a zombie in here?
do these really qualify to be called incredible?
keep getting an error that the store i'm trying to shop is unavailable. Although it shows they have almost 200 in stock.
based on some of the reviews it doesn't sound too incredible...
Where are Admiral Cardboard Box and Lieutenant Crate?
Why you got me running around Woot trying to find some stupid piece of plastic when I have a perfectly good tub I can use?
@finzup: I was considering it, but a lot of the reviews say they crack or break...thinking I'll skip these.
@stipo... well silly, they are in the galley with Major Container and Seaman Vessel
@bighamms: heehee... seaman vessel...
While they may not be the best quality, I'm not going to be putting real heavy items in them or moving them often. Along with other coworkers - we're in for 15.
When it comes to unexpected flooding:
$4 plastic tote > $0 cardboard box
@futility: Will these withstand Hydroflouric Acid?
@fit410s: If you cut him into appropriately-sized pieces, yes.
Made in the USA!
This might be the first item ever sold as a sponsored link that was made in USA? That said, based on the reviews it might not be so great - though who comments on a storage bin if it woks well for them?
@littledude90: only if you pre-coat with olive oil
They are very rigid plastic, so if dropped, set down on corners improperly, picked up with too much weight in them, they will break. They often enough come in with the bottom two or three already broken. That being said, if you are just putting things such as Christmas ornaments or whatnot, they will not bow/cave so you don't have to worry about anything pushing on it enough to break whats inside first.
Really it just depends on what you wish to store.
I picked up 5 in the store.
They seem decent quality for $4 to me... better than i expected.
Though the bottom 2 in the stack were bent up some on the bottom. I'd assume that means you should not put that much weight when / if stacking them.


text:
In a common wood fire such as a campfire, is matter converted to energy or is it simply an exothermic chemical reaction and all the mass can be accounted for in the ash and soot?
This is a common question that applies to chemical reactions, batteries, and other common forms of energy conversion. The short answer is yes, but of course the change is negligible.
In a chemical reaction you have a set of reactants and a set of products. If you were to take the mass of the reactants and sum them up, you would find them to be more than the sum of the mass of the products. This mass difference time $c^2$ is the energy of the reaction. Again, this is by an amount that is so small that it is unmeasurable. The mass change from of nuclear reactor fuel after burning it at a large heat rate for 4 years is barely measurable itself, if you're talking about putting the fuel on a scale and measuring it.
Now come the qualifiers. If you put air and wood in a completely closed container and let it burn what would happen to the total mass of the container? It would stay the same. The temperature would increase, and as the molecules move faster the mass increases (basic relativity). If you preformed a chemical reaction, then cooled the products, you could try to measure a mass difference that is theoretically predicted. But even assuming you have a scale that is precise enough, you'll have to look into other things like tidal forces. Experimentally measuring these mass changes would be a futile effort.
Even burning in a closed container would result in a loss of mass via the electromagnetic radiation emitted (i.e. visible light and infrared), and as stated, it would be immeasurably small.


text:
The Tabor Mennonite Youth Fellowship will share their annual living nativity, Night in the Barn, from 6 to 8 p.m. Dec. 15 and 16.The llama that gives kisses, the big cow with her little calf, the sheep wearing bells, and the donkeys that share their love of people — these are a few of the critters who will assemble in the barn of Maynard Knepp and Carol Duerksen between Goessel and Hillsboro.The come-and-go event will feature unique perspectives from the innkeeper and a shepherd and Christmas carols. Visitors are welcome to gather around a bonfire and enjoy hot drinks as part of the evening's activities. Donations to the youth group will be accepted.Directions to Night in the Barn: - From Goessel: 3 miles north on Highway 15, 4 miles east on 150th, 3/4 north on Falcon. - From Hillsboro, 4 miles south on Indigo, 3 west on 150th, 3/4 north on Falcon. - From McPherson, Highway 56 to Highway 15 south, 5 miles on Highway 15 to 150th, 4 miles east on 150th and 3/4 north on Falcon. (Follow these directions and not GPS directions.)For more information, call (620) 367-8432 or (620) 386-0709.
Location, ST | website.com


text:
I have a non-Gmail Google Account that I use for Google Plus.
In Google Plus, I can chat with my contacts but I wish I could use the Google Talk software to chat outside the browser.
How can I get my ID to work?
I tried to fill out this form, but it replied that the email is already a Google account.


text:
|Product Information
|Color :
|Classroom Paper Type :
|Construction Paper
|Paper Size :
|9" x 12"
|Paper Weight :
|45 lb.
|Sheets Per Pack :
|50 Sheets
|Brand :
|Quill Brand
|Weight :
|0.65 lbs. per Pack
See what other informed Quill customers purchased after viewing this product
Can't find what you need? Contact Us
©Quill Lincolnshire, Inc. 2016, All Rights Reserved.
This Web site is intended only for use by U.S. residents.


text:
Please enter a maximum of 5 recipients. Use ; to separate more than one email address.
| Letzsch, W., The Shaw Group, Houston, Texas
Future challenges in environment and product specifications involve more sophisticated catalyst systems
The catalyst business continues to reflect the trends of the
refining and petrochemical businesses it serves. These trends
include globalization, consolidation, integration and diversification.
The worldwide refining community is shifting from North
America and Western Europe to the Middle East and
Pacific Rim. This is a consequence due to the location of major
crude reserves and growth markets for refined-oil products.
Catalyst suppliers have stepped up their presence in
Asia-Pacific, and they are facing a new competitor in Sinopec.
The Chinese are producing most of the standard refining
catalysts for their own use and have started exporting some
catalysts to neighboring countries.
Fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) catalysts made in China are
now being used in several catalytic cracking units in the US,
and a sales office has been opened in Texas. China is doing
extensive research in catalysis for refining and petrochemical processes, and this is
reflected in their many contributions to the technical
literature in recent years. At some American Chemistry Society
(ACS) meetings, conference papers presented by Chinese
companies make up more than half of the papers in particular
sessions. In due time, China will actively compete in the full
spectrum of refining and petrochemical
China currently controls about 97% of the rare earth market;
this nation cornered the market through pricing strategies that
made all other sources uneconomical. Recently, there have been
large price hikes for rare earth materials, and China has
capped exports. Rare earth elements are used in a variety of
strategic applications and have been used for years as a
stabilizer for fluid cracking catalysts. This has catalyst
suppliers both scrambling to secure supplies and to find ways
to minimize the rare earth components in catalyst structures
and makeup. Previously closed mines around the world will be
reopened in the next few years, and some type of price floor
will need to be established to ensure the mines on-going
The evolution of the catalyst business is a natural
phenomenon in the world of commerce. In the beginning, catalyst
plants served indigenous markets and survived due to limited
competition and protective trade laws. The elimination of trade
barriers and more sophisticated technologies have caused many
small plants to shut down. Those remaining have been increased
in size, thus taking advantage of the economies of scale. This
poses challenges to the catalyst manufacturer since clients
want products customized to their specific applications.
When the industry that buys your product is being squeezed
economically, all of its suppliers will feel the pinch. This
prompts all companies to back integrate into raw materials and
to find ways to lower costs while meeting ever more stringent
environmental regulations for air
and water emissions and solids disposal.
Energy usage is a major cost to hydrocarbon processing industry (HPI)
plants. The drop in US natural gas prices makes all of the US
catalyst works more competitive. The depreciation of the US
dollar compared to other currencies causes catalysts made in
North America to be more financially attractive. Advanced
automation and instrumentation can help reduce costs and
improve product quality.
With refineries growing in size and complexity and now
increasingly being integrated with petrochemicals, it is natural that
catalyst suppliers would want to serve both markets. Hydrogen
plants are being installed in more refineries as the need for
hydroprocessing of all refined products processed in the refinery is required to meet new
product sulfur specifications. Other petrochemical catalysts,
such as those used to make polyethylene, polypropylene and
styrene, are used in these large, integrated refining-petrochemical complexes. Some of the
major catalyst suppliers currently serve both segments. Expect
more moves in the future in this direction.
Another area of market integration is combining refining with environmental catalysts. New
regulations are reducing the level of all contaminants in the
water and air as well as in refined products produced.
Catalysts that reduce the amount of sulfur in flue gases or
exhaust streams or in the various products have a lot in common
with refinery catalysts. They tend to
share in the same base materials such as silica gels, aluminas
or combinations thereof. By increasing the volumes of these
materials, the catalyst supplier can put in a large-scale plant
to make base materials rather than having to purchase from an
outside source. Similar products can be used as bases for
treating transportation exhaust gases to remove nitrogen oxides
(NOx),carbon monoxide (CO) and
hydrocarbons. Metals impregnation techniques are also crucial
for many catalyst systems to ensure maximum catalyst
performance and to minimize the use of expensive raw materials
such as platinum, cobalt, nickel and molybdenum.
The use of ethanol in gasoline has generally
made octane a surplus commodity. More than half of the
reformers in the US are operated for hydrogen production rather
than for octane. Going to 15% ethanol would put almost every
refiner in this category. Refiners are integrating into ethanol
facilities, but the impact on the
refinery would be very significant. The base blendstocks would
have to be very low in vapor pressure (Rvp), and this would
impact other refinery processing units. The
conversion on the catalytic cracking unit might have to be
lowered, isomerization units bypassed and continuous reformers
operated for octanes of 90 or less. Hydrocrackers may split
their naphtha into fractions, with the heaviest fraction
becoming a blendstock.
New processes may be introduced that create high-boiling
naphtha that can be used as a gasoline blending stock.
Alkylation of single-ring light aromatics may become
attractive. Some overcracking of gasoline would possibly be
practiced to increase the amount of alkylate in the gasoline
pool and amylenes (C5 olefins) could be a much more
common alkylation feedstock.
Ethanol usage could grow even
further if the current ethanol fuel mandate is left in place
and enforced. This would require at least a doubling of the
current production, along with the development of new
technologies to make the ethanol using cellulosic material.
Diesel made from biomass is also being pursued, which will
require further processing. This will require processing with
diesel streams produced from conventional oil. Hydrotreating
will also be used in this service.
The use of ethanol would reduce the amount of
oil processed in the US but it will not reduce greenhouse gas
(GHG) emissions and could have adverse
effects on water usage and storm-water run-off from
agricultural lands. These facts could prompt a revision of
present laws.
In looking forward, the major trends in crude-oil refining
are dieselization and the reduction in fuel-oil usage. Both of
these are being addressed by the use of more hydrocracking and
bottoms-conversion technologies such as coking, residual catalytic cracking
and hydrocracking. Residual desulfurization is sure to increase
due to mandated sulfur reductions that will be mandated over
the next 10 years. Total catalyst consumption for all of these
processes will grow significantly.
Improved refining processes continue to be developed as
venders probe every aspect of a particular unit. Fixed-bed
reactors used graduated supports made of ceramic material both
on the bottom and top of the bed. These were replaced by
active-support products that had catalytic activity. Today, the
supports not only have activity but may also possess a pore
structure to trap and hold contaminants that could cause high
pressure drops.
The marketplace is always demanding new products, and
suppliers work harder to deliver them. In the area of
hydrotreating, the ultra-low-sulfur diesel (ULSD)
specifications implied that refiners would need to add
additional reactor volume to deal with the most
difficult-to-treat molecules. Hydrotreating catalysts had been
in use for 40 years and any major breakthroughs seemed unlikely
to occur. Use of more sophisticated equipmentin this case
a very powerful scanning, tunneling electron
microscopegave researchers a better look at the catalyst
surface, and they were able to see what sites needed to be
created to enhance the catalyst activity. Application of
high-activity hydrotreating catalysts has saved considerable
capital and energy since start-of-run temperatures can be
One of the new FCC catalysts introduced was accidentally
discovered. The research program was trying to improve gasoline
desulfurization, but a sample prepared that did not show
promise for those reactions, was found to have exceptional
activity. That provided a lead to the development of a whole
new catalyst family.
Whether the innovations are incremental or breakthrough, one
thing is sure: they will continue to occur, driven by a very
competitive marketplace. Since the catalyst is the heart of
most HPI processes, refiners and petrochemical plant operators can
expect continued improvements that will increase capacity and
product selectivity as well as reduce energy usage.
Breakthroughs may even require substantial modifications to
existing processes. HP
All comments are subject to editorial review.
All fields are compulsory.
Sign-up for the Free Daily HP Enewsletter!
A searchable database of project activity in the global hydrocarbon processing industry
Engineers and designers are highly skilled individuals. Forcing them to enter design changes using tables, forms and spreadsheets is unproductive and uneconomical, and it increases the likelihood of human error—this is the way that most instrumentation software systems currently work. For too long, software vendors have denied engineers and designers the simple practicality of a graphical visual engineering interface with "drag and drop" capability and inbuilt intelligence, ensuring changes are automatically replicated into all the associated data and databases.
Is 2016 the peak for US gasoline demand?
Too soon to tell
July 2016


text:
A Few Clouds ~
High: 87°F ~ Low: 73°F
Sunday, July 31, 2016
Walk safelyPosted Wednesday, May 11, 2011, at 10:01 PM
It's great to see so many people out walking in the early evenings. It's good for morale, good for your health-- but I do wish people would use the sidewalks when they're available.
Why don't they? The sidewalk is to give pedestrians a safe place to travel, where they are in little danger from vehicles using the street. What's more, many people don't even bother to move over a little when vehicles approach. That's assuming a lot. What if the driver doesn't see the pedestrians in time to avoid them?
Showing comments in chronological order
[Show most recent comments first]
I had noticed that also, and the other day, I almost hit someone who was walking on the road.
-- Posted by Chris Jones, Production Manager on Wed, May 11, 2011, at 11:49 PM
I haven't seen that problem myself. I've had more of a problem finding a safe place to walk with so many busy streets like Ash with NO sidewalk. Just 1 or 2 feet from the pavement the ground steeply slopes down into the water run off ditch. You either go in the street or try to walk on that 1ft or so of level ground. I know this is a small town and we probably don't need sidewalks on every street but the pedestrians and bicyclists have nowhere else to go on some of our busiest streets. This is not just a problem for the motorists, others have to travel on these streets too.
-- Posted by undeded on Thu, Oct 13, 2011, at 10:25 AM
Respond to this blog
Posting a comment requires free registration:
What's there to do?
- Archives
- Blog RSS feed
- Comments RSS feed
- Login
Exploring the obvious and the not so obvious in search of the oh, so elusive "something to do' that's all around us.
Hot topicsBringing back the Show Me Challenge
(7 ~ 3:41 PM, Apr 15)
Remembering Cross Carrier Chuck
Shop with a cop
Chocolate cake
Losing a cousin


text: Calculus:The Musical! is a comic 'review' of the concepts and history of calculus. A blend of sketch comedy, musical theatre and classroom lecture. Using musical parodies that span genres from light opera to hip hop, we introduce and illuminate such concepts as limits, integration and differentiation. With our unique comic style we dramatize some high points of calculus' history. © Mikki Schaffner 2012. From Archimedes to Riemann, the quest for the instantaneous rate of change and the area under the curve comes to life through song! Musical tributes to Lorde, Gilbert & Sullivan, Bonnie Tyler and even Eminem are just a few of the artists who have inspired this engaging and educational lesson that is nothing at all like your high school textbooks. Calculus: The Musical! promises to be entertaining to the arithmophobe and the rocket scientist alike.


text:
Please enter a maximum of 5 recipients. Use ; to separate more than one email address.
| Clarke, K., Permasense, UK
Operators with permanently-installed continuous corrosion monitoring systems have better understanding of the corrosion and erosion rates occurring within their facility.
A major problem for the hydrocarbon processing industry (HPI) is
the effective monitoring of asset integrity while minimizing
the exposure of personnel to
difficult and potentially hazardous working environments. The
application of permanently installed ultrasonic wall-thickness
monitoring equipment and wirelessly transmitted data can
provide continuous information on the rate of metal loss, even
in the most severe environments and at extreme
Asset and integrity managers are utilizing these systems as
a critical component of safety, integrity and risk management
programs to monitor the potential loss of containment due to
corrosion and erosion. The data is also increasingly being used
to drive risk-based operational decision-making in areas such
as determining the consequences of processing more aggressive
feedstocks, optimizing process
conditions, applying corrosion inhibitor strategies, choosing
metallurgy for plant upgrading and extending run lengths
between turnarounds. This article will review key drivers and
possible benefits related to continuous corrosion
Steel pipework and vessels are always at risk of corrosion
or erosion, depending on the metallurgy of the equipment,
aggressiveness of the process fluids, and operating conditions.
Unless managed carefully, there is a potential risk of failure.
Such events could result in a release of hydrocarbons, with a
possible consequential impact on the environment and/or
personnel, apart from the financial costs of equipment repairs
and unplanned operational interruptions or damaged
There are various well-established, manual techniques for
the periodic assessment of equipment integrity. The drivers of
corrosion and erosion include: process conditions, feedstock
constituents and the presence of abrasive solids. The chemical
inhibitors to mitigate corrosion rates are familiar to the HPI.
The present situation, such as operating aging/older plants and
equipment; greater fluid corrosiveness and erosiveness; tighter
health, safety and environmental (HSE) regulations; the
environmental and reputational costs from leak/release events;
and the growing shortage of skilled inspection staff are
hurdles confronting traditional plant integrity monitoring
Plant operators have three levers for assuring plant
integrity against corrosion or erosion. These are inhibition,
metallurgy and monitoring, as shown in Fig. 1.
Equipment metallurgy can be upgraded, often at substantial
capital expense (CAPEX). An alternative option is to adopt a
combination of corrosion monitoring and inhibition; this action
plan is an operating expense (OPEX). Thus, the choice of
strategy often evolves as tension between available CAPEX vs.
the drive to minimize OPEX. In capital-constrained situations,
the monitoring/inhibition strategy is very popular.
However, in this case, the widely adopted approach of
periodic manual inspections does not capture the often
intermittent, and sometimes accelerated and nonlinear nature of
corrosion. It is, therefore, very difficult to use this data to
correlate directly with either corrosion drivers or inhibitor
applications to enable an understanding of the effects of
feedstock and process decisions and the use of inhibitors on
plant integrity. Manual ultrasonic wall-thickness measurement
is also subject to repeatability and reproducibility errors,
from inspectors, different ultrasound test sets and small
differences in measurement locations, which is not the case
with permanently mounted systems.
Permanent corrosion monitoring can represent progress in
enabling effective use of corrosion inhibitors and in providing
asset and integrity managers with a real-time picture of how
the infrastructure is coping with the demands placed upon
At the core of the permanent continuous corrosion monitoring
systems is an ultrasonic sensor mounted on stainless-steel
waveguides. The waveguides isolate the sensor electronics from
high process temperatures and guide the ultrasonic signal to
the pipe wall and back, as illustrated in Fig.
2. The sensors are powered by long-life batteries, and
transmit their data by wireless transmitter. As a result,
cabling to monitoring locations is not required, thus
substantially reducing the cost of installation. It enables
rapid deployment in difficult to access and remote areas, as
shown in Fig. 3.
Direct, accurate and sufficiently frequent measurements of
pipework thickness to accurately identify trends are rarely
practically feasible with manual inspection methods when
coupled with the problems of accessibility and mitigating
safety risks to personnel.
Conversely, permanently installed sensor systems deliver
continuous high-quality data. Installed on pipes and vessels
operating at up to 600°C (1,100°F), these sensors have
been certified as intrinsically safe for use in hazardous
environments. They have been proven in operation for a number
of years in refinery environments, along with onshore and
offshore upstream facilities.
Fig. 4 shows the range of drivers that are
motivating plant operators to invest in permanently installed
corrosion monitoring systems. Typical investment decisions are
justified by safety and operational risk mitigation factors
including assuring plant integrity, improving equipment
availability, determining better accessibility of measurement
points from an inspectors point of view, or changing the
role of limited resources (such as qualified inspectors) from
making measurements to analyzing the causes and mitigation of
The permanent corrosion monitoring sensors were installed on
cast carbon steel u-bends with a wall
thickness of approximately 25 mm (1 in.), operating at
380°C (720°F) at the Gelsenkirchen refinery operated by
BP. The corrosion/erosion rates at these locations were a
critical determinant for the timing of the next turnaround.
High temperatures would have exposed inspectors to a
significant hazard if manual methods had been used. The sensor
data enabled the refinery management to manage operations with
confidence until the turnaround. The system has been delivering
reliable measurement data for over four years (Fig.
Continuous corrosion monitoring is also being used to
support more strategic decision-making processes such as
feedstock selection and diversification. One refiner carried
out a month-long trial of a crude that it had not previously
processed, to gain a better understanding of the potential
integrity impacts. The crude was processed at 20%25% of
the total slate during the test period. The sensors installed
on the kerosine draw-off from the crude tower showed a marked
increase in the corrosion rate (Fig. 6). The
test-run data provided a valuable insight; the refiner used the
information to develop operational guidelines and inhibitor
strategy for future processing of the crude on an ongoing
Fig. 7 is an example of such sensor arrays.
The sensors are installed circumferentially across five
locations along a crude or vacuum heater transfer line. Data
from the sensor system can give the refiner confidence to
gradually increase the acidity of the crude oil processed while
closely monitoring known-risk areas for an increase
in corrosion activity.
A key weapon in the fight to control corrosion is an
inhibitor chemical. The sensor trend, as shown in Fig.
8, illustrates how an operator systematically adjusted
the inhibitor dose over a one-month period, until the sensor
data showed that the corrosion rate was stabilized.
The data shown in Fig. 9 is from the
overhead system of a sour-water stripper. For this system, the
corrosion rate was moderate, but steady. The refiner used the
sensor data to alter the process conditions of the tower until
the corrosion rate stabilized from October forward.
Another refiner installed the continuous-corrosion
monitoring sensors 18 months before a major turnaround so that
it could track corrosion over a one-year period through the
crude tower and associated pipework. The objective was to
better understand the dominant corrosion mechanismeither
uniform thinning corrosion from sulfidation or localized attack
from naphthenic acids. The output would inform their
decision-making process to determine the preferred metallurgy
to be used in upgrading the equipment.
The sensor data demonstrated that localized corrosion from
naphthenic acid attack was the dominant mechanism. As a result,
the refinery selected the appropriate
metallurgy to be installed in the upcoming shutdown.
The installation of permanently installed sensors eliminates
the cost of repeat measurements; for example, the cost in
building scaffolding to access measurement points. There is no
personnel exposure to high-risk locations or adverse ambient
conditions. In extreme environments, such as offshore oil and
gas production facilities, the technology is being used to
systematically limit the amount of inspector time required on
the platform, to reduce costs of transferring staff from shore
by helicopter and to add flexibility within constraints on the
total numbers of staff offshore at any one time.
In Northern Alberta, Canada, and on the North Slope in
Alaska, permanently installed sensors are being used to deliver
a reliable picture of piping condition. In Canada, the key
driver is the rapid turnover of inspectors due to the harsh
working environment, with associated uncertainty of reliability of measurements. In
Alaska, sensor deployment is being driven by limitations on
accommodations for inspectors, due to environmental constraints
preventing an expansion of local living facilities.
In Europe, refiners are installing
sensors at high-risk locations in HF alkylation units to
significantly reduce the time that inspectors must spend
working within the unit, wearing full chemical suits and
breathing apparatus. In parallel with the obvious safety
benefits, the refiner was able to reduce the cost of having a
large number of inspection staff trained and qualified for
working within the alkylation unit. The simplicity of
installation is also a significant advantage when being
installed in these process units, avoiding the need for
multiple personnel to fit cables and mechanical hardware over
an extended period.
Operators using permanently installed continuous corrosion
monitoring systems have a more accurate and timely
understanding of the corrosion and erosion rates occurring
within their facility. While often installed as part of safety
or operational risk management programs, the data from such
systems is providing plant operators with valuable insight into
the effect of changing operations on corrosion/erosion rates,
and supporting more effective risk-based decision-making around
issues such as feedstock cost reduction, chemical
inhibition strategy, shutdown timing, and the selection of
metallurgy for plant upgrades. Permanently installed systems
are also enhancing inspection strategies in locations where
access is costly, dangerous or physically restricted, while the
availability of wireless transmission of data significantly
reduces the time needed to install such equipment in these
tough environments.
All comments are subject to editorial review.
All fields are compulsory.
If I use drawn arc welding for bolt welding, PWHT can be exempted? If so, I'd like to know relating code or other? Otherwise, could you recommend other method for bolt weld to exempt PWHT?
Antonio Martinez Niembro
Very good article. A way forward would be to design such sensors for cathodically protected pipelines underground and offshore.
very educational indeed
thank u for your answers,is the silicone water or oil baced?thxFahad
thank u for your answers,is the silicone water or oil baces?thxFahad
Kevin Clarke
Sensors are attached in two ways - either welding a pair of stainless steel stud bolts, or by using a clamped assembly. We recommend drawn arc method, but customers have used capacitive discharge, TIG and friction welding. Clamps are suitable for lower temperature applications (<150 degC); studs for all temperatures from -150 degC to +600 degC. We have installed sensors on most commonly found metallurgies in refineries, petrochemical plants, offshore oil and gas production, including P5/5 Chrome, P9/9 Chrome, 1% Cr (5130), Duplex, P265GH (430-161), 1.4571 (316Ti), P295GH (17Mn4), Monel, HR120, Inconel, Incoloy, Hastelloy
The measurements are localised to the sensor - about 2 cm squared below the tip, so it doesn't need to consider fittings, etc. Coating would need to be removed just under the tip - a very small area - to ensure good metal-to-metal contact. We provide a silicone tip seal to protect the exposed area and mitigate any possibility of external corrosion.There is no interaction with CP system.
The Permasense technology provides wall thickness measurements accurate to +/- 0.1mm, which is in in-line with manual ultrasonic testing. However, being permanently mounted in location, there are no repeatability/reproducibility issues that you get with manual measurements because of slight differences in probe location, different UT set, different operator.
Anyone with specific questions can contact us via our website www.permasense.com
Keep me updating really interesting one.
K. Laxma Reddy
Good article asset integrity preservation.KNPC, corrosion specialist
Is longitudinal waves system of UT able to measure thicknesses accurately?Is it design to consider wall variations or geometrical shapes of the monitored lines or systems?(such as fittings, reinforcement, maintenance patches etc )Fahad
Would this system interact with existing cathodic protection ststem.Do we have to remove pipeline coating (fpe) to install the sensors. (localized removal)thanksFahad
Hector Trujillo, P.E.
Is there a way to remotely measure steel corrosion underwater (ocean)?
what method used to attach sensors to the main run pipe.?what if we use high alloy steel , for acidic comodity?thaksfahad .
Sign-up for the Free Daily HP Enewsletter!
A searchable database of project activity in the global hydrocarbon processing industry
Engineers and designers are highly skilled individuals. Forcing them to enter design changes using tables, forms and spreadsheets is unproductive and uneconomical, and it increases the likelihood of human error—this is the way that most instrumentation software systems currently work. For too long, software vendors have denied engineers and designers the simple practicality of a graphical visual engineering interface with "drag and drop" capability and inbuilt intelligence, ensuring changes are automatically replicated into all the associated data and databases.
Is 2016 the peak for US gasoline demand?
Too soon to tell
July 2016


text:
Over on Serious Eats Talk, Cary asks:
I finally managed to make a double batch of my current favorite pizza dough (new KA 600 mixer, replacing old worn down KA) and I want to freeze half. It's been doing the cold rise for several days. So, do I punch it down before freezing, and how and how long do I thaw it when I'm ready? I don't expect to freeze dough often, but I'd like it to work when I do!
If you want to take or leave intel, click on through »


text:
KANSAS CITY, THE PLAZA (CNN) -- An employee of a subcontractor laying fiber optic cable hit a 2-inch gas line with an underground boring machine about an hour before an explosion killed one person at a popular restaurant in Kansas City, Missouri.
Fire Chief Paul Berardi told reporters the subcontractor, Heartland Midwest, called 911 at 4:55 p.m. CT to report the accident.
Authorities do not know what caused the leaking gas to ignite, according to Rob Hack, chief operating officer of Missouri Gas Energy.
"But all the damaged points to ignition inside the restaurant," he said.
One body was pulled Wednesday from the debris at JJ's restaurant, a popular place near Country Club Plaza, a locale with upscale shops and restaurants. A female employee of the restaurant, Megan Cramer, was identified by her family as the lone fatality of the Plaza tragedy, although authorities will wait for a positive identification this week. Megan has not been seen or heard from since the explosion.
The body of the female victim was located near the restaurant's bar area.
Officials said Wednesday afternoon they believed there were no more missing people or undiscovered bodies. 15 others were hurt.
"The people stage has basically concluded," Mayor Sly James told reporters. Authorities were moving into the investigation phase, he said.
Six people remained hospitalized Wednesday, three in critical condition, according to Fire Chief Paul Berardi.
Berardi released a timeline of events that began with the subcontractor calling 911 shortly before 5:00 to report the accident.
A Missouri Gas Energy employee showed up about 20 minutes later and, after some initial readings on gas-measuring devices, called for backup, Hack said.
MGE employees on the scene went into businesses and asked people to leave because levels were above the state's threshold for gas concentrations in the air.
The gas company also brought in excavating equipment to try to vent the pipe, but the explosion occurred before they could alleviate the problem. Three of the company's workers were hospitalized, Hack said.
The odor of natural gas led to the early closure of JJ's restaurant, but hostess Deidre Estes and other employees weren't in a rush to leave, unaware of the danger they were in.
Then, "Boom! And everything was black," Estes told CNN affiliate KCTV5.
The blast ripped the roof off of the restaurant.
"I thought I was going to die. Honestly, I thought I was trapped in there," Estes told KCTV. "I saw the flames, and I was scared I was going to burn up. And then with all my might, I got this strength and lifted the rubble off."
A utility crew investigating the odor had suggested that the restaurant close, but gave no sense of urgency or the potential for an explosion.
The mayor confirmed that the fire department responded to a call about the gas odor, about 50 minutes before the blast, but left the scene after being told by the utility company that everything was under control.
"When these situations exist, the fire department defers to the expertise of any utility who is there," James said.
Debris was stacked 3- to 4-feet high where the restaurant once stood. Among the rubble was the gas company's destroyed backhoe.
Jennifer Carter, who was in the restaurant, told CNN affiliate KSHB that a man who had a hand-held device came in before the blast and told her and 10 others to leave. Employees had already turned off appliances after smelling gas, she said.
Carter complied. She was just a few blocks away when she heard the explosion.
The gas sent flames a few stories high into the night sky. More than 100 firefighters responded, Berardi said.
Dr. Leonardo Lozada heard the explosion a block and a half away at St. Luke's Health Systems, where he is chief physician.
"It was pretty loud. I just heard it; it wasn't that traumatic," he said.
The restaurant's owner, James Frantze, was in Oklahoma at the time of the blast. A message on the restaurant's Facebook page made a simple request of patrons:
"Please keep our friends and families in your hearts and prayers."


text: From the Keys Collection, this console has a weathered antique finish and is big enough to store away many items in your home. Place the console in your living room your bedroom and use it to store everything from books to DVDs. Add warmth to your home; order yours now.


text:
In a calendar I saw this in reference to the Children's Day:
Happy Children's Day!
I guess 六一 is a shorter form of 6月1日.
Is that form of writing dates only used for special dates? How widespread is that usage?
This form of abbreviation is only reserved for special dates. Some popular Chinese holidays take this abbreviated form:
Any date can potentially become "special" following a major event or incident that occurred on that date or for a short period of time surrounding the said date. The abbreviated form is, therefore, used to identify the event:
This is predicated on the fact that the listener is fully aware of both the date and the event in question. The abbreviated form would be meaningless otherwise.
A dot, "·", may be added between the month and the day in writing, especially when there is a possible ambiguity:
The reading stays the same, however.


text:
Starting At $2,500 | Call 855-855-9205 to book this suite
PH Bay Suite
What Makes This Room Different
Get ready for a star-studded celebration with your entourage. This Planet Hollywood Las Vegas suite takes your average hotel stay to the next level. Ideal for wedding receptions, family reunions and any large event, the gigantic living and dining area includes multiple couches, a massive flat-screen TV, a wet bar and an eight-seat dining table. The suite also features a spacious kitchen, a separate office and remarkable Strip views. Unwind in one of two bedrooms, each on opposite sides of the suite. Complimentary round-trip airport limo service is included in your reservation. Stay connected with enhanced Wi-Fi across all Caesars Entertainment Las Vegas hotels.
Square Footage : 2600+
Smoking/Non-Smoking : Optional
View : Strip
Decor : Upscale Traditional
Sheets : White Duvets
Mattress : Plush Pillow Top
Workspace : Yes
Furniture : Formal Entry and Sitting Area
Window Treatments : Yes
Bath Products : Gilchrist & Soames
Vanity : Yes
Makeup Mirror : Yes
Tub/Shower : Yes
Whirlpool : Yes Jetted Tub
Shower Head : Standard and Body
Robes : Yes
Phone : Yes
Television : Yes HD Flatscreen
Telephone : Yes
DVD Player : Yes
iPod Stereo : Yes
CD Player : Yes
Alarm Clock : Yes
Iron w/ Board : Yes
Coffee Maker : Yes


text:
If you don't see it in the account list, tap
other account.
If what you've set up is your
Google Account, your phone will sync and download your
Gmail™ as well as your
Google contacts and calendar from your account.
If you've set up other POP3 or IMAP accounts, your phone will sync email from those accounts.


text:
Two Bedroom Penthouse
Sirena del Mar
Sirena Del Mar offers two-bedroom penthouse suites. Each has a large private balcony with breathtaking views of the Sea of Cortez.Special features include granite counter tops, LCD flat panel TVs, Bose® Wave system, stainless steel appliances, wireless internet and custom bedding.
Two Bedroom Penthouse
- 1,376 square feet
- Living/dining area with queen sofa sleeper, wall-mounted LCD TV, Bose® Wave music system, DVD player
- Kitchen with dishwasher, microwave, range, refrigerator, washer/dryer
- Master bedroom with king bed, LCD TV
- Two bathrooms each with dual sinks; master bath has dual rain shower heads
- Private balcony with ocean view
- Whirlpool bath in master bedroom or on deck, depending on floor plan


text:
1963 Pontiac Tempest LeMans - "Oh, This Old Thing?"Written by on January 24, 2008 Contributors: Rich Chenet Go Ahead, Line Up Against Rob Freyvogel's Tattered '63 Tempest LeMans. All You Are Likely to Get Is a Big Surprise.
Hot rodders have always been fascinated with sleepers. More than just about anyone, we have a special appreciation for the car that looks like junk but goes like stink. Somehow going fast just seems more special in a car that looks slow. Ha ha, fooled you-you lose, pal. Sleepers and sandbagging are woven into hot rod mythology: Recall the little Nash Rambler, the hot rod Lincoln, the little old lady from Pasadena. She's my little Deuce coupe, you don't know what I got.
So maybe it's just our shady background, lurking in the back alleys of the motoring world as we do, but hot rodders love to see the rat sneak in and steal the cheese. All this was driven home to us once again by the reader reaction to Kurt Urban's outrageous green '72 Nova ("Sucker's Bet," Nov. '06.) It was crusty on the outside, tricked out to the nines on the inside, and you guys went nuts over it just like we did. A car that devious becomes a legend in its own time.
We know you are going to like this car too-it's really sneaky. But the funny thing is, Rob Freyvogel and Tom Napierkowski didn't set out to build a sleeper with their '63 Pontiac LeMans. Rob says it just sort of evolved that way. (Rob has since bought out Tom's half of the car so Tom could move on to his next project.) For example, note the two big honking turbochargers, hidden away out of sight under the rear of the car. That wasn't premeditated; the location was forced by the Tempest's tight engine bay. "There was no place else to put them," says Rob. But since the Pontiac Y-body (same basic platform as the Corvair) was originally equipped with a transaxle out back, there was ample room for the turbos and associated plumbing under the floorpan's rear kickup.
Then there's the scabby red paint-the very same paint, bleached and peeling, that was on the car when Rob and Tom found it out in the California desert. The Tempest body shell, minus its engine and driveline, was resting on top of another car when they dragged it away for $400. As the project was approaching completion, Rob says, "We really were going to paint the car, but then we thought, No, this is good the way it is. This way we don't have to worry about scratching it every time we lean over a fender." There's another reason we are drawn to sleepers: Here function rules over form. It's not about looking good. It's about running good, and we can respect that.
So the LeMans was originally built not so much to scam anyone, but to have some fun, to serve as a testbed for Rob and Tom's homebrewed performance inventions, and to do it without spending a ton of money. The engine is a 427 big-block Chevy that he says is "mainly circle-track flea market stuff." A Lunati steel crank, Eagle rods, and 0.030-over SLP pistons with 8.5:1 compression ratio make up the short-block. The heads are Brodix Big Brodies, while the intake is an old Holley Strip Dominator with some porting work. Bullet Racing Cams supplied the mechanical roller grind with 0.630-inch lift, 246-degree duration, and 116-degree lobe separation. The headers are homemade tri-Ys. There's nothing terribly outlandish here; the big power is in the turbocharger system.
It's funny how things come full circle. Back in the early '60s when rodders began to experiment with turbos, the blowers themselves were mainly pirated from diesel truck and tractor engines. That was essentially the only supply path at the time. Now, 40 years later, guys are finding that it is the cheapest path. The Holset HT3B turbos on the LeMans are from a Cummins-powered earthmover, and "you can buy them all day on eBay for 150 bucks each," says Rob. (Rebuild kits are $40.) A big fat charge cooler resides in the trunk, adjacent to an insulated plastic picnic cooler that carries the ice water. "It really works nice," Rob says. "It doesn't sweat all over the place and make a big mess like an aluminum tank will." The remote rear turbo installation was mulled over carefully. "At first we thought it would produce turbo lag, so then we figured maybe that would help launch the car off the line. But in practice we haven't experienced any significant turbo lag." The aft-mounted turbos also aid weight distribution. "You can add 100 to 150 pounds to the nose of the car or to the rear of the car," Rob observes sagely.
Rob manages the fuel delivery with a FAST control unit driving a set of eight Bosch 60-lb/hr injectors, while the ignition system includes Rob's own Frankenstein-inspired ignition amplifier that consumes 50 amperes. Yikes. "When you are working with high boost levels and combustion pressures you need lots of spark," Rob says. A mechanical engineer whose company supplies textured carbide coatings, Rob has launched another business, Engine Logic Systems, to develop his high-output ignition, which he calls Variable Spark Injection. Triggering eight OMC outboard marine coils with a 70:1 turn ratio ("I find they really hold up," he says) Rob can hike up the primary circuits to 620 volts for racing, then back them down to 250 volts for cruising to give the secondary insulation a break. The system is configured to operate at double-spark up to 2,000 rpm and single-spark thereafter.
With its flexible fuel-mapping capability, the LeMans has been run on everything except fondue fuel: pump gas, race gas, methanol, E85 ethanol, and Rob's current favorite, E98 ethanol. "It's nice because you don't need as much volume as with methanol," he says. And along with the greater energy density, the E98 makes plenty of power, has a wide and forgiving tuning window, is lots cheaper than race gas, and has decent availability in Rob's part of the world. Western Pennsylvania is Sprint Car country, and he learned about the fuel driv-ing in a limited Sprint series that runs LS1 spec engines on E98. So while the Tempest may appear socially irresponsible from nearly every other angle, its carbon footprint is comparatively minuscule.
Early on in the learning curve the LeMans was strapped to the chassis dyno, where it made 875 hp at the rear wheels at 22 psi boost. With some tuning experience under his belt, Rob now calculates that he can make 1,162 flywheel horsepower at 5,800 rpm with 27 psi. And he's confident he can turn the screw up to 30 or 32 pounds if need be. At 25 psi Rob has run a best of 9.86 at 149 mph, and that was "banging, popping, and missing all the way down the track," he says. Rob knows there's more there to be had with additional tweaking, but the next order of business is to install a full rollcage so he can be both quick and safe. That addition will negate much of the car's sleeper image, but as Rob sees it he has no choice. "A rollcage just screams race car, but it has to happen," he says. But that's OK because the Tempest is still go for its original mission: having fun and inventing new ways to go fast. "I love this," Rob says. "This is how guys did it back in the '50s. This is basic hot rodding-doing stuff on your own."
Quick Inspection:
'63 Pontiac Tempest LeMans
Rob Freyvogel
Butler, PA
Engine: In 1963 the Tempest LeMans was powered by a 326ci Pontiac V-8. The engine in the car now may be painted blue, but it's no Pontiac. That's a 427 big-block Chevy with a 0.030-inch overbore and Brodix aluminum heads. The build is on the conservative side to accommodate the pair of Holset turbos stashed away under the rear of the car. The homemade 4-2-1 headers use 2-inch primary tubes and 3-inch collectors, while the throttle body is a 1,600-cfm airdoor from Electromotive.
Power: The car made 875 hp at the rear wheels on a chassis dyno, but that was early on the development curve. Based on the car's e.t. and trap speed, Rob now estimates that he has over 1,100 hp available.
Transmission: Rob axed the Tempest's original drivetrain configuration, an odd setup that employed a rear-drive transaxle and enclosed driveshaft. He opted instead for a GM Turbo 400 with a transbrake and electronically actuated valvebody.
Rearend: Rob says he learned about the virtues of the '57-'64 Olds-Pontiac rear axle reading HOT ROD. His uses a Strange 35-spline spool and axles with a 3.08 ring-and-pinion.
Frame: Except for a pair of fabricated subframe connectors, the Tempest's unitbody structure is stock and original.
Suspension: While the front suspension is stock, the rear now employs coilover spring/shock assemblies and a pair of Chassis Engineering ladder bars.
Brakes: The rotors and calipers are Wilwood Super Lights, while the master cylinder and power booster are from an '86 Buick Grand National-no engine vacuum required.
Wheels: The steel rear wheels- 9x15s using the GM big-car 5x5 bolt pattern-were custom-built by Stockton Wheel Service in Stockton, California. The front steelies are 14-inch GM stockers, and Pontiac dog-dish hubcaps are installed on all four corners.
Tires: Hoosier 28.5x10.5 Quick Times are on the rear, with Goodyear radials on the front.
Body: The GM Y-body platform, used by the Buick, Olds, and Pontiac compacts from 1961 to 1963, was a bit of a strange ranger, sharing some architecture with the Corvair. But the lines were pretty clean, especially on Pontiac's Sport Coupe version for '63. Rob didn't change a thing on his.
Paint: Rob believes his LeMans was repainted sometime in the mid-'80s in its original factory metallic red. That's the same paint it wears today.
Interior: Except for a set of Auto Meter gauges artfully spliced into the dash, the cabin is pretty much all stock, with factory bucket seats resplendent in early-'60s GM red vinyl.
More Photos From This Article View Slideshow
Rob Freyvogel drives his Tempest on the street and races it at Flashlight Drags events in the western Pennsylvania area. The organization runs eighth-mile events mainly at rented airports, guided by a very thin rulebook. Hence the lack of a rollcage in the 9-second car, which Rob intends to remedy as soon as possible.The turbos are Holset HT3Bs scrounged from eBay, with 20cm exhaust housings swapped in. Note the high-dollar plumbing for the oil returns. The wastegates are Chinese knockoffs also found on eBay, but Rob reports they've worked just fine for him.The twin turbos and their plumbing are tucked away under the floorpan where the transaxle used to abide. The carrier-type rear axle is '57-'64 Olds/Pontiac fullsize, suspended by coilovers, ladder bars, and a Panhard rod. The 3.08:1 gear, spool, and 35-spline axles are from Strange.Nothing to see here, just a ratty old '63 Tempest. Hmm, what are all those odd buttons and gauges for? And what's that notebook PC hooked up to?Rob has nearly infinite control via the laptop, allowing him to change spark advance, fuel mapping, and boost at will. The black box on the dash is the programmer for the electronically controlled Turbo 400 transmission.


text:
Welcome to our online bookstore.
Our goal is to provide for all your medical book buying needs whether
you're a student, on rotation, completing residency, or a practitioner.
We have over 100,000 titles from more than 300 publishers. Discover
everything that we have to offer...begin your search now!
How Do I Find Books?
How Do I Order?
Complete FAQ List
Terms of Use
Christiansen: Occupational Therapy
comprehensive occupational therapy text that introduces students to core knowledge in the profession and the foundations of practicethe occupations, person factors, and environment factors that support performance, participation, and well-being.
Price: $92.95
Weinmann: Photoshop CC
This best-selling guide from authors Elaine Weinmann and Peter Lourekas has been the go-to tutorial and reference book for photography/design professionals and the textbook of choice in college classrooms for decades.
Price: $39.99


text:
#3. Felicity
The Show:
Once upon a time in 1998, high school senior Felicity is graduating. Hunky Ben signs her yearbook and tells her he wished he'd known her better. He should have just signed "have a cool summer!" because, like any rational person would do, Felicity interprets this completely offhanded comment as a "sign" and dramatically alters her plans so she can follow Ben to college in New York.
Once she gets there, she learns that life in the Big Apple is, like, hard and stuff. She gets a witch with a capital W for a roommate--no, really, she does; the roommate is a Wiccan--and over the course of four increasingly painful seasons, Felicity embarks on a magical journey of personal discovery.
So, What Happened?
Sorcery and time travel.
In 2002, after graduating college, Felicity realizes that she made some pretty poor choices. The rational, adult way to handle things would be to examine her life, steel her resolve and start establishing a fine path to personal success. However, this would require an iota of fortitude, something Felicity never once demonstrated in her three-and-a-half seasons of "following her heart," i.e. being totally selfish.
Instead of forcing Felicity to grow up and learn from her mistakes, the show proves it is truly made of the stuff spoiled girls dream about by concocting a ridiculous plot twist. To help her cope, Felicity's Wiccan roommate sends Felicity back in time one year.
Back. In. Freaking. Time.
Rather than do something worthwhile such as, say, warn her fellow New Yorkers about the now-pending 9/11 attacks, Felicity tries to use her knowledge of future events to make her life superficially better.
Once back in time, Felicity uses the ripple effect to alter the future timelines of her and her friends. She achieves her primary objective: To use her knowledge of the future to engineer a relationship with a man (her freshman year dorm manager) whom she believes to be her ideal mate. Soon, her dream man is in her arms. However, one short episode later, Felicity has already cheated on him. Yes, the miraculous, universe-bending opportunity to travel in time is squandered on a total whore. It was like that show Quantum Leap, if instead of trying to make people's lives better, Scott Bakula had just tried to bone them.
Learning nothing from this entire experience, Felicity begins longing for her old life. Again, the rational, adult thing would be to buck up and try harder. At least bet on some sports and make millions with her future-knowledge. But, no. Instead, she finds some crazy-ass magician, and starts working out a deal. The final episode is spent watching Felicity putting all sorts of now-magic artifacts together for a huge spell that (SPOILER ALERT) may or may not have worked. Who cares?
#2. The Flintstones
The Show:
It's the early 60s, and TV was hurting for an unfunny spoof of life from a million years ago--you know, something the kids could relate to. Instead, the world got The Flintstones, the tale of a prehistoric family who enjoyed a bygone time when it was legal to blatantly rip off The Honeymooners.
For those of you unfamiliar with the back-story behind the vitamin, the gist of it is that fat and unattractive chauvinist pigs Fred and Barney are married to subservient but hot women who are far out of their league. Along for the ride are pet dinosaur "Dino" and, later, babies Pebbles and Bam-Bam, who would later hook up in their own spinoff, in case you cared, which we know you don't.
Most of the shows revolved around Fred and Barney trying to find ways to avoid work and threaten their wives with physical violence. There was a laugh track, because nothing says realism like the idea of a live studio audience present for the taping of an animated show. Oh, and occasionally Fred and Barney shilled for the cigarette companies, as evidenced by this artifact from a more innocent time:
So, What Happened?
Alien astronauts.
After following the daily life of a blue-collar worker in prehistoric times for five seasons, The Flintstones decided they weren't being inaccurate enough in their portrayal of ancient history (for real, who besides Wilma ever used saber-tooth-tiger-tail tampons?) Thus ushered in the mercifully-short-lived era of the Great Gazoo, a squeaky creep who wore some sort of testicle hat.
Gazoo was an honest-to-gosh alien banished from his planet for creating a nuclear device that could kill the entire universe with a push of a button (playing on Cold War apocalypse scenarios is a great way to unite the whole family for a hearty laugh).
Another important aspect of the Great Gazoo is that he can apparently make individual atoms his bitch, allowing him to do anything. For those of you keeping score at home, God is not dead. He's just a tiny green alien with a huge weapon who's trapped in the Stone Age. Breathe easier, mankind.
Gazoo transports Fred and Barney to the future, just to prove a wicked-dumb point about whether a magazine is correct. Frankly, having an all-doing deity at their hands would probably be totally awesome, if only other people could see his work. But only Fred, Barney, Pebbles and Bam-Bam can see him, because they "truly believe." The women? Well, they're less enlightened. And lazy.
Still, he's magic, right? Fred and Barney can get set up like playboy millionaires. Or, this all-knowing, all-seeing power can be needlessly squandered like a $50 bill at a strip club. They use Gazoo's power for the benevolent purpose of winning a few bucks at the racetrack. Later, Gazoo creates two clones of Fred and Barney who are somehow even more mentally challenged (if you were wondering, Fred and Barney use these clones to trick their wives and go bowling).
There must've been some legendary pot going around Hollywood writers' rooms in the 1960s. The show was canceled less than one season later, and it probably took the staff another year to realize it.
#1. Airwolf
The Show:
To explain the premise of what is already a pretty baffling show before it decided to lose all its marbles, let's let Wikipedia sum it up:
The series' protagonist is Stringfellow Hawke (Jan-Michael Vincent), a loner who lives in a cabin in the mountains, only accompanied by his Bluetick Coonhound, "Tet", and the surrounding wildlife. Hawke is a recluse, spending most of his time alone with his priceless collection of paintings, and serenading eagles with his equally priceless Stradivarius cello. His only real friend and mentor is the older, eternally cheerful Dominic Santini (Ernest Borgnine).
We're sold! When can we tune in? Nothing says "surefire hit" like creepy backwoods loner who "serenades eagles." Who can't relate to that? Isn't there a little recluse schizophrenic in all of us?
Fortunately, or unfortunately, the main character is actually a helicopter named Airwolf, and everyone else is just along for the ride. A series of incredibly convoluted plot twists occur involving kidnap, espionage, a volcano and Airwolf, the world's greatest fighting machine unless you have stealth-detecting radar and surface-to-air missiles.
Together, they start running covert ops for a mysterious branch of the CIA called FIRM, and the rest of the series was spent watching Airwolf's crew spend most of their time trying to not run out of plots entirely centered around a helicopter.
So, What Happened?
The show became a zombie.
Airwolf ran successfully on CBS for three seasons before being canceled. Not content with their 24-hour schedule of awful movies and cleavage, the U.S.A. Network decided to pick up the show and make it themselves.
However, they had a shoestring budget, which is bad news on a TV show based entirely around futuristic helicopter fight scenes. This led the minor problem of not actually having access to the helicopter at all (they no longer owned it). That's right. They were trying to do an Airwolf series without using any shots of Airwolf.
Thus each episode was carefully constructed from previously aired footage of Airwolf, walking a fine line between hysterically shitty and just plain sad.
Having "solved" the budget problem of a show starring a multi-million-dollar machine, U.S.A. just had to eliminate the only other major expense: actor's salaries. U.S.A. certainly couldn't afford the veteran cast of Airwolf, which included the high-profile star Ernest Borgnine.
There of course was only one solution: HELICOPTER EXPLOSION:
Borgnine's character, played by Borgnine's stunt double, is conspicuously seen only from behind:
...and then dies in the way he knew he always would: in a grainy, poorly-edited stock footage explosion.
They were able to afford to get a couple of minutes of Jan-Michael Vincent, so he was only injured in the explosion. Still, his Airwolfing days were over.
Airwolf was canceled at the end of the first season, though they were probably long out of old Airwolf footage anyway and were on the verge of flinging a toy helicopter through the air with a slingshot. In retrospect, the entire U.S.A. Network should probably have been canceled with it.
Evan Hoovler co-wrote the National Lampoon book, "Pimp It Yourself." In addition to Cracked, he can also be read regularly at Gamespy, Comedy.com, Asylum, and Amog.
Do you have something funny to say about a random topic? You could be on the front page of Cracked.com tomorrow. Go here and find out how to create a Topic Page.
For more boob-tube failures, check out 6 Beloved TV Shows (That Traumatized Cast Members For Life) and The 10 Most Disastrous Saturday Morning Cartoon Adaptations.
And stop by our Top Picks (Updated 12.15.2009) to see us filming new episodes of The Cosby Mysteries.
And don't forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter to get dick jokes sent straight to your news feed.


text:
Quinton Ward
Quinton Ward lies around five miles west of the city centre along the Hagley Road West. Originally it was a small village, also known as "Ridgeacre", and was home to a mixture of small farms and nail-making industries. It now stretches to the borders of Halesowen, Warley and Harborne.
In 1894 a map showed Quinton as being along High Street and Bissell Street, whilst the agricultural land around it was known as Ridgeacre. Farms included, Red Hall Farm, near to where Quinton Library now is; Windmill Farm along Ridgeacre Lane; Ridgeacre Farm by the junction of Quinton Road West and Ridgeacre Lane; Four Dwellings Farm where Four Dwellings School is and Mopbeggar Farm near to Moats Meadow.
On November 9th 1909, Quinton became part of the ever-expanding Birmingham. Only residential homes were planned for the area. This was due to the gentry of Edgbaston not wanting unpleasant odours from factories reaching them, as the wind blew from Quinton to Edgbaston!
The next century saw a constant expansion in the provision of housing. Today, the area is still residential. Most of its green spaces have disappeared, although some do remain. Quinton Meadows (a site of importance for nature conservation) borders the 1960s M5 development and a new business park recently built on some of the Meadowland. The recreation ground still remains and Woodgate Valley Country Park and Pitts Wood provide timely reminders of the wards rural, Greenfield heritage.
Find out more about the history of Quinton Ward.
Quinton Ward Committee meetings
Contact for meeting arrangements: Errol Wilson, Area Democratic Services Officer.
Tel: 0121 675 0955 or 0121 303 4772. Email: email@example.com
Related links
Councillors Advice Bureaux - Quinton Ward
Woodgate Valley Country Park
Transport Information