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iDirect CTO Bettinger Discusses Ka-band Challenges Beyond the Consumer
[Satellite News 05-03-12] Like many other tech-focused executives in the satellite broadband industry, iDirect CTO David Bettinger is very familiar with what makes Ka-band so alluring – the bandwidth offers high performance for a high-demand market.
Satellite News spoke with Bettinger about how Ka-band has enabled the emergence of the consumer business, brought high-speed connectivity to mobile consumer devices in every environment and has largely conquered the technological obstacles that were previously factored into the risk equation of launching new services.
Satellite News: How does Ka-band compare with Ku-band in terms of investing in future satellite platforms?
Bettinger: As orbital slots have filled with Ku-band satellites, Ka-band has become increasingly more attractive to satellite service providers. Historically, the poorer rain-fade characteristics of Ka-band made the band less attractive. However, the dramatic increase in available satellite power coupled with spot beam architecture has made Ka-band an excellent choice, especially for enterprise and military applications.
Satellite News: What are ground segment developers doing to support the new Ka-band segment in orbit?
Bettinger: To serve the spot beam architecture of the high-throughput Satellite, providers are investing huge amounts of resources into ground segment infrastructure centrally located at the feeder link for the satellite. The ground segment infrastructure needs to support much faster speeds. The hub architecture also needs to support different ratios of inbound and outbound channels that exist in Ka networks and also needs to scale to support a large number of terminal deployments.
One challenge to the take rate of Ka-band will be the cost and feasibility of converting existing Ku-band terminals to Ka-band. Ka-band RF equipment including antennas, BUCs, etc., are typically more expensive than Ku-band. There is however, an enormous number of existing Ku-band terminals which could benefit from the transition to Ka-band.
Satellite News: When do you think we will see a defining moment for the Ka-band evolution?
Bettinger: On the commercial side, it will happen when we start to see massive adoption by enterprise customers. The fact that an abundance of capacity is about to be unleashed will spur adoption with the promise of lower costs and higher speeds. On the military side, the adoption of Ka-band on the WGS constellation was a defining moment. Quite often, the military leads the way in adopting these types of technologies.
Satellite News: How will Ka-band service roll outs in emerging markets compare with those that we've seen in Europe and North America?
Bettinger: Emerging markets may see a slower take rate for Ka-band than we have seen in Europe and North America. One reason is that emerging markets tend to be more sensitive to remote terminal pricing. As mentioned previously, Ka-band terminals tend to be more costly than Ku-band. Of course, as more Ka-band terminals are produced and Ka-band becomes more popular, economies of scale may drop Ka-band terminal pricing closer to the equivalent Ku-band terminal price.
Satellite News: How do you think the military will start switching over to Ka-band?
Bettinger: We are seeing a very rapid shift to Ka-band, especially for airborne COTM networks. Ka-band is particularly attractive to the military because of the availability of Ka-band on WGS and the global Ka-band coverage being launched over the next few years. The combined military and commercial Ka-band spot beam coverage provided the ideal satellite topology for airborne COTM networks.


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In view of Mariano Suárez-Alvarez's answer I see how badly phrased my question was, and decided to rewrite it. The drawback is that some comments of Martin Brandenburg are now incomprehensible, but I thought it would suffice to say here that Martin made some legitimate constructive criticisms to the original wording of the question. By the way, thank you also to Vladimir Dotsenko for his comments.
Let $K$ be a commutative ring, and let $X_1,\dots,X_n$ be indeterminates. Here $n$ is an integer $\ge3$. For $1\le i < j\le n$ put $$ x_{ij}:=\frac{1}{X_i-X_j} $$ and let $Y_{ij}$ be an indeterminate. Let $I$ be the kernel of the $K$-algebra morphism $$ \varepsilon:K[(Y_{ij})]\to K[(x_{ij})],\quad Y_{ij}\mapsto x_{ij}. $$
Is $I$ finitely generated? If it is, can one give an explicit finite set of generators?
Note that the identity $$ \frac{1}{a-b}\ \frac{1}{a-c}+\frac{1}{b-a}\ \frac{1}{b-c}+\frac{1}{c-a}\ \frac{1}{c-b}=0. $$ shows that $I$ is nonzero.
(I put the homological algebra tag because the ultimate goal is to know whether there is a functorial free resolution of $K[(x_{ij})]$, viewed as a $K[(Y_{ij})]$-module, and, if it exists, what can be said about it.)
The question had been posted before on Mathematics Stack Exchange (link).

subset: commoncrawl


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Partner: UNT Libraries
Department: Department of Home Economics
Language: English
An Analysis of Grooming Problems of the High School Girl
Date: 1940
Creator: Burks, Jasmine Rudd
Description: The purpose of this study is to analyze the grooming problems of high school girls in Oakwood High School, and to compare the grooming problems of girls who have had a clothing course in Home Economics to those who have not.
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries
An Anthropometrical Study in the Nutrition of Children, Using the Wetzel Grid
Date: 1945
Creator: Drew, Bennie P.
Description: In this study, an appraisal of the nutritional status of eighty-eight school children has been made, using the Wetzel Index with the Baldwin-Wood Index and the Pryor Index for the determinations.
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries
The Ascorbic Acid Content of Orange Marmalade Made With and Without Commercial Pectin
Date: 1943
Creator: Burt, Dorthy Farris
Description: The purpose of the present study is to determine the ascorbic acid values of orange marmalades made with and without commercial pectin; and to compare these values with those obtained by testing random samples of home and commercial prepared orange marmalades.
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries
The Ascorbic Acid Content of School Lunches Served at the North Texas State Teachers College Demonstration School During March and April, 1944
Date: 1944
Creator: Bryan, Ada Ruth
Description: The purposes of the present study are to determine the ascorbic acid values of foods served in the lunch room of North Texas State Teachers College Demonstration School at the time food preparation is completed, at the beginning of the serving period, and at the end of the serving period; to ascertain the loss of ascorbic acid during these intervals; and to determine the quantity of ascorbic acid present in the size portions served primary, elementary, and high school students.
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries
Background Variables Affecting the Clothing Interests of High School Girls in Metropolitan Groups
Date: 1958
Creator: Boswell, Mary Middleton
Description: Using the data collected in the CYS (5), it is the purpose of the present study to show the relationships of certain background variables to the clothing interests of high school girls in metropolitan groups. Specifically, it proposes to answer the question, does the student's age, the number of siblings, the father's education, or the father's occupation influence these interests?
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries
Biological Assay of Vitamin A of Certain Texas Foods
Date: 1942
Creator: Ballew, Jewell Elizabeth
Description: The purpose of the present study was to compare the amounts of vitamin A in sweet potato flour with that of carrot flour and dehydrated carrots by using the biological assay method.
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries
A Check List for the Selection of Homemaking Films from Film Description Catalogs
Date: 1948
Creator: Borth, Helen Agnes
Description: The purpose of this study is to further the effective utilization of films by developing an instrument for their selection from descriptions in catalogs.
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries
A Comparative Nutritive Study of the Growth-Promoting Factors of Four Varieties of Cowpeas
Date: 1942
Creator: Wilson, Eileen P.
Description: The purpose of the present study is to compare the growth-promoting properties of four varieties of the green cowpea: the blackeye, the red and white crowder, the brown crowder and the cream cowpea.
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries
Dark Adaptation of Second and Third Grade Children
Date: 1940
Creator: Rohrer, Lois Young
Description: The purpose of the study is to determine the dark adaptation of second grade children in Denton, Texas.
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries
Dark Adaptation Studies with Adults and Children, Using the Biophotometer
Date: 1942
Creator: Collins, Mary Margaret
Description: The present study is a part of a long-time cooperative study of the Home Economics Department of the North Texas State Teachers College, begun in 1940. The purpose is to compare the dark adaptations of second and third-grade children made in 1940 with those made of the same children in 1941 and in 1942. Also included in this study is the comparison of a group of freshmen college men made in 1940 with a group of twenty-five men made in 1942. An attempt is also made to determine whether an individual has higher dark adaptation on sunshiny days than on cloudy days.
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries


text:
Logo Licensing Program
Logo Licensing Program Overview
The ¡Salud! Logo Licensing Program allows wineries to join our mission by making a direct gift to ¡Salud! in exchange for access to the logo and association with the ¡Salud! brand. This contribution is flexible according to donor giving abilities and is 100% tax deductible.
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text:
During my last vacation in Barcelona I found out that some bicycle stations are made for citizens, where they can pick up a bike, ride on it to the other station, and leave it there. Unfortunately, this was not available for guests of the city.
Are there any cities in Europe I can pick up bicycle for my needs for a short time?
During my last vacation in Barcelona I found out that some bicycle stations are made for citizens, where they can pick up a bike, ride on it to the other station, and leave it there. Unfortunately, this was not available for guests of the city.
locked by mindcorrosive♦ Apr 18 '13 at 15:21
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The Bike Rental in London supports casual hire, which is aimed at tourists.
In German cities you can use "Call a Bike" from the Deutsche Bahn. You need only a credit card to open the lock of the bike. You can drive wherever you want and leave it wherever you want. There are a iPhone and Android-App, too. More details at: http://www.callabike-interaktiv.de/index.php?id=401& (unfortunately only in German, but maybe you'll find an english website).
Copenhagen has "city bikes" available for use by anybody. You can pick them up from one of the bike racks scattered across town, insert a 20DKK coin as a deposit, and off you go. You get the 20DKK back when you return the bike to a bike stand.
The only negative thing I found when using them was that they were very popular and thus quite hard to come by.
In Brussels, there's a network of 2500 bicycles available spread over 180 stations, run by Villo.
You can buy day-tickets for 1,5 euro, week-tickets for 7 euro, or a year-subscription for 30 euro.
Further there's a similar rule like in Paris, you have to bring the bike back every 30 minutes, or you pay extra.
You can pay at every station using a bank card.
There's even a mobile app with which you can easily find the nearest station.
Dublinbikes offers a 3 Day Ticket for EUR 2. The first half-hour is free, you should pay a small amount if you use the bike longer. You should also know that:
In Paris, all you need is a credit card (Visa, Mastercard, Amex, Blue Visa). It will charge you 1.70€ for the entire day, provided you return the bicycle every 30 minutes. Renting it for 30-60 minutes will set you back €1, but be aware that longer rental periods can be a bit expensive. You only need to drop the bike back for 2 minutes before you can take it out again, so just take pauses whenever you pass a docking station!
It's not possible to pay with coins, you must pay with a credit or debit card. As a casual user, the bike deposit will be reserved on your card that day (about €150), which gets returned when you return the bike back.
Note that many other cities in France have a system working similarly (same provider: JCDecaux Cyclocity), with prices in the same range: Lyon, Marseille, Nantes, Toulouse, ...
Bordeaux, Grenoble, Marseille and a lot of other cities use competing systems. Nice also has a system but it is not as user-friendly for tourists (calling a number and giving your credit card number... - but there is also a web interface available).
In the Netherlands you can rent a bicycle at almost any railway station for €6,50 per day. They require a deposit. Depending on the model the deposit ranges between €50 - 145.
Credit card use in the Netherlands is not that common, so often you need to bring cash to rent a bike.
In Oslo, Norway, tourists can rent a bike at the Tourist Information Center(s). The price is NOK 80/day, which is about $15 USD.
More info can also be found on this page.
In Ljubljana, Slovenia, they implemented bike service last month. You use it with smart card, which can be purchased at newsstands or special machines located at bus stations. After you buy the card, you have to register via internet (you need credit card). It's free if you check in your bike at a station after an hour. Here it is, explained into details: http://en.bicikelj.si/
Also, an Android app with map of stations and counter of free bicycles and slots.
In Lyon there is such a service (Vélo'v). You will be able to get a short-term card but only if your payment card comes with a chip. If it only has a magnetic band you cannot buy the card.
There is a system in Wrocław, Poland. There are 31 stations in the city. First 20 minutes is free, but you need to register first at http://www.nextbike.pl/ where you need to make a small (1 PLN) bank transfer to authorize yourself, and then you also need a mobile phone or a paypass debit/credit card to unlock the bike.
Stockholm has rentals run by citybikes.
We're looking for long answers that provide some explanation and context. Don't just give a one-line answer; explain why your answer is right, ideally with citations. Answers that don't include explanations may be removed.
Many cities in Denmark offer free bikes with only a 20 DKK (3-4 US$) deposit.
This include:
Also a similar, but non-free, service is offered in Odense (Danish link).
Gothenburg (Sweden) has 50 bicycle stations spread through the center which are perfect for tourists. You can get a seasonal (250 SEK) or 3-day ticket (10 SEK). You can even grab a bike for 30 minutes without paying anything. The bikes are removed during winter time (October 31st - April 1st). The city itself has many bike lanes which make it a nice place to bike. (But when I compare it to The Netherlands, my home country, it has some points of improvement.)
Sources: Short summary here and Official website
We're looking for long answers that provide some explanation and context. Don't just give a one-line answer; explain why your answer is right, ideally with citations. Answers that don't include explanations may be removed.
Milan (Italy) has bikeMi. Most of the interesting parts of the city are covered with stations.
I have some additional information about Liechtenstein. I'll also add hints how to get from the shop to the capital, since there are the most sights. In Liechtenstein, there are four different bike shops that also rent bikes. These shops are:
A small shop in Balzers, right in the South of Liechtenstein. It is approximately 10 kilometers away from the capital, Vaduz. From Balzers to Vaduz there are some signed bike ways that are really beautiful. It is also possible to do a small mountain bike tour in Balzers. On this tour you will also visit Switzerland. The shop owner is also very kind and you can test you bike before you have to rent it.
I don't know a lot about this shop, but it is located in Mauren, which is in the northern part of Liechtenstein. But also from there it is not more than 8 or 9 kilometres to the center of Liechtenstein.
This is a really well established bike shop that is directly in the village next to Vaduz, so you will be able to easily cycle to the main sights. The shop has a very good reputation and particularly offers mountain bikes.
Adolf's Bike shop is located in Triesenberg, a village in the mountains of Liechtenstein. As Bike Garage this shop is particularly interesting if you're looking for a mountain bike. Be aware that this shop is in the mountains, and therefore if you will cycle directly from the shop you won't find a flat area. You either have to go down- or uphill biking.
In Turin, Italy, there is [TO]BIKE, which offers rental of bicycles in various places in the city.
Vienna has a substantial and well-used system with a dense presence in the city center, as well as an extensive system of well-marked and well maintained bike trails (on the sidewalks!).
Unfortunately, the system itself is a bit awkward to use compared with the modern Bixi system deployed in London, Montreal, and Boston (and soon, New York City).
To use a Citybike, you need a bankomat (ATM) card. With that card you register at the machine. Then you can rent a bike with your card at any of the stations in the city. You return your bike at any of the stations. It is free for the first hour, and next hour costs 1 €. Registration is also 1 €.
Batumi, on the Black Sea coast in Georgia, has a bike rental system that's available for casual hire called BatumVelo.
There are references to it on the Batumi Wikipedia page and the Batumi Wikitravel page.
Kraków, Poland has a bike rental system called BikeOne. You need to register at the website before you can rent your first bike.
Apart of that there are several private bike rental agencies, mostly in the city center.
The city of Cascais, in Portugal has one place to rent them. You only need a citizen Id-card and it's almost free, but the bikes are not too good :). You can use them for one day (from 9 am to 5:30 pm).
Cascais site in Portuguese only, sorry.
In Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (part of Europe politically), there is biciambiental, which seems to be funded by tax money. You can rent bikes for free for up to three hours, after registering by SMS. There are various stations in the city.
In March 2013 I preregistered online, then received a PDF that I printed and signed. With the printout, I went to the office responsible for the area where I live, signed another paper, and finally got the password for renting bikes by SMS.
What I had to specify as a non-resident:
For more information read the FAQ.
In Barcelona you can rent the Bicing or private companies.
And here you can find the private ones: http://dicasdomundo.com.br/c/barcelona-bicicleta-13.html
protected by Mark Mayo♦ Mar 6 '13 at 9:30
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FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. (AP) - Dorian Finney-Smith scored a career-high 22 points as No. 10 Florida overcame the absence of leading scorer Casey Prather to snap Arkansas' 23-game home winning streak with an 84-82 overtime win on Saturday.
Finney-Smith, starting in place of Prather, also added a season-high 15 rebounds as the Gators (13-2, 2-0 Southeastern Conference) won their seventh in row.
Florida trailed 66-57 in the closing minutes of regulation, but Scotie Wilbekin sent it into overtime with a jumper with two seconds left that tied the game.
Wilbekin finished with 18 points, while Michael Frazier had 15 and Patric Young 10.
Ky Madden led the Razorbacks (11-4, 0-2) who had five players finish in double figures, with 23 points.


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By ANGIE FENTON
Managing Editor
The Voice-Tribune
Levon Wallace is sandbagging.
"I like to have a little bit of fun in the kitchen," says the Proof on Main executive chef with a slight shrug and half smile, moments after he's convinced this writer to try a hay-flavored gelato. (Yes, hay – and it was delicious.)
A little bit of fun? That's a bit of an understatement.
Wallace's affinity for the whimsical was evident in his ever-changing selections of gelato this past summer, but the depth of his talent is on its most spectacular display when the chef has the opportunity to share what he's done to a dish – and why – prior to its consumption. In short, he makes food fun and accessible to even the unsophisticated palate.
A small group of eaters becomes almost giddy while listening to Wallace describe a dish of pan-roasted dish scallops with squid ink and pea-sized tomatoes from Woodland Farm, which is owned by 21c founders Laura Lee Brown and Steve Wilson. "They're like BBs of goodness. They take this dish to outer space," said Wallace. Dear goodness, he's right.
Turning to the dessert he named I'll Have Another, an apple-pear fritter with toasted oats, hay gelato and local honey, Wallace explains, "It's a very pragmatic, honest, rustic dish. … Someone recently ate the dessert and said this tastes like Kentucky – in the best way possible."
That's high praise for a West Coast native, I joke with the tattooed chef who, at least when he's not smiling, can look a bit imposing and would never be mistaken for a native Louisvillian. "Yes it is," he laughs, breaking into a wide grin. Three of us sample the dish and agree: We've just consumed a bite of the Bluegrass State – and we're really glad the chef's career path led him here.
Wallace grew up watching Julia Child and The Frugal Gourmet – "all those great PBS shows" – but initially enrolled in the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco just because "I needed to do something." Soon, he realized he'd found his calling and began apprenticing at a number of the city's finest restaurants.
According to his official biography on www.proofonmain.com, Wallace "has cooked for several prestigious inns where his culinary leadership has provoked recognition from Zagat and the Los Angeles Times in addition to receiving both AAA Four and Five Diamond Restaurant Awards for Maravilla at the Ojai Valley Inn as the Chef de Cuisine."
After a spell at the highly-regarded Charlie Trotter's in Chicago, Wallace went to work at the Harbor View Hotel & Resort and The Kelley House on Martha's Vineyard in 2008 as executive chef. He took a "more global" turn as corporate executive chef for Scout Hotel & Resort Management in 2010 before taking over for Michael Paley at Proof on Main this summer when Paley transferred to 21c Museum Hotel Cincinnati, which will open to the public with a grand opening in the coming weeks. (By the way, close friends of Brown and Wilson were invited to a sneak peek of the new venture this past weekend. By all accounts, it's absolutely fabulous.)
"Eight years ago, I first visited the middle south," says Wallace. "I was instantly enamored not only by the culture but by the way people interact with each other. You certainly don't find that in L.A. and definitely not on the East Coast. … Chef Paley is a figure in the Southern food scene. When I found out (about the opportunity at Proof and 21c), I couldn't pass it up."
Even though Wallace is clearly in command in the kitchen, he's unafraid to exhibit genuine awe and excitement about his position, which is endearing. "Who has a business meeting about what we're going to plant on the rooftop (of 21c) overlooking Louisville and the river?" he asks.
After a recent trip to Woodland Farm, a visit he makes often, Wallace said he stood there for a moment and looked around, literally stopping to smell the flowers – and everything else. "There's something about that property. There's just something about the ground there, the environment. There's magic. Everything is raised with love. Not to be too hippy dippy, but there's magic."
Seated at a table inside Proof, Wallace looks out the window at a group of people walking toward the entrance and prepares to get back to work. "I love Louisville. Here," he says gesturing around the room, "I really am at one of those places in the whole wide world."
Follow Chef Wallace on Twitter @Levon_Wallace. Contact writer Angie Fenton at firstname.lastname@example.com or @angiefenton on Twitter.


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Doctor Whom
M.D., M.P.H. Currently in my residency at a large university on the west coast of the US. I am also engaged in Public Health activism and quality improvement initiatives, alongside clinical practice in primary care. My undergraduate degree is in Biology.
I am a scientist who sees a necessity for the existence of an Unmoved Mover. Through logical argument, this has led me to a firm faith in the God of the Bible. I follow the teachings of Jesus Christ from the gospels, but do not associate with any denomination or church, as I have been repeatedly disappointed in how many of them distort His words to fit what they want to believe. Small group Bible study has been the best model for learning and discussing faith in my experience.
I support universal health care and political finance reform, with a robust revision of our political and economic policies that allow for the profound inequities within this nation.
I believe that the only solution to the issue of abortion is to promote contraception and aggressively address the socioeconomic stressors underlying the reasons why women decide to terminate pregnancies. Economic distress, limited healthcare access, employment instability, childcare unavailability, and domestic abuse are the primary reasons cited by the vast majority of women seeking abortion. When Christians demand abortion be illegal, but are unwilling to follow the commandments that Jesus gave on loving one another as oneself, caring for the poor, redistributing wealth to those in need, humility, avoiding excess... their hypocrisy causes others to reject Christ. Pseudo-Christians could be the greatest reason for atheism in this world.
The debate over abortion is similar to the war on drugs, which has failed astronomically - because it put its efforts into making drugs illegal and enforcing its legality, rather than investing all effort into solving the problem at its roots: the factors that influence the consumption of drugs in the USA. As the ravenous consumers of drugs, what right do we have to attack the producers and distributors of what we eagerly spend billions of dollars to ravenously consume?
I am a native English speaker married to a native Spanish speaker. I have been fluent in Spanish for 13 years, a Certified Healthcare Interpreter for 5 years, and initially came to Stack Exchange to continue refining the fine details and nuances of the language. Prior to learning Spanish, I had studied French for 9 years. More recently, I have begun to study Japanese.
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Anatolian Kilims at the de Young Museum
Kilim, 18th century, Turkey, Anatolia - wool, cotton; slit tapestry weave. The Caroline & H. McCoy Jones Collection.
Image by de Young Museum.
The latest textile exhibit at the de Young Museum – The Art of the Anatolian Kilim – once again provides perspective on the source of a contemporary trend. If the patterns and colors of these kilims look familiar, it is because designers of every variety have been using them for inspiration in the past few years. Like their previous exhibit, To Dye For, which focused on resist dye techniques such as ikats and batiks, the de Young's new exhibit is pitch-perfect for our time.
Looking around at some of the major home retailers, one can see new and antique kilims for sale, and even textiles inspired by the surface patterns on traditional kilims. There is definitely something relevant to appreciate and learn about this ancient textile art.
Commonly known as a "flat-weave" woolen rug, kilims have traditionally come from Turkey – the modern-day name of Anatolia. This exhibition shows pieces dating between the 15th and 19th centuries, showcasing the textile traditions of tribal life in their motifs, colors, and composition. Woven from the wools of sheep, goats, and camels, these textiles gain their eye-popping palettes from natural dyes derived from locally-harvested sources. Their bold abstract designs are both invigorating and modern, appealing to our current taste for geometrics and zig zags.
Detail of an Anatolian Kilim at the de Young Museum. Image by Poetic & Chic.
These surface designs have a two-fold purpose: they serve as symbolic renderings of architectural, human, animal, and floral motifs dating back to Neolithic times, while they also serve as a way to identify the different tribes of Anatolia. Like the stunning quilts of the Amish Abstractions exhibit of a few years ago, the kilims are produced within a certain set of parameters around pattern and structure. This makes them consistent, while still allowing enough room for individual interpretation and improvisation. Both the technique and design of kilims have been passed down from generation to generation of Anatolian women, resulting in a sort of historical document of the different tribes.
As each tribe wove kilims with signature elements, they put their kilims to work in their community. In a nomadic tent in Anatolia, kilims will serve as the walls, floors, and storage space – covering nearly everything to make the tent comfortable. Stacks of valuables are placed against the walls of a tent and then a large kilim is draped over them for protection and weight.
Since the kilims served as an expression of identity, they also served as a commodity between the tribes, representing wealth and currency. While the kilims were crafted in a tribal environment, they were often given to mosques in tribute to serve as both floor coverings for prayer and as an asset for the community. Later in the 20th century, mosques sold their collections of kilims in order to fund improvements or other projects. Those on display at the de Young are from the famous McCoy Jones collection, whose kilims were originally gathered in Anatolia during the 1970s and 1980s, until it was finally gifted to the de Young in 1988-89. The collection was originally displayed in 1990.
Curator Jill d'Alessandro explains an Anatolian Kilim - and provides a sense of scale. Image by Poetic & Chic.
Some of the kilims in the McCoy Jones collection are massive. Curator Jill d'Alessandro went so far as to say that their scale prompted de Young architects Herzog & de Meuron to create the textile galleries with a generous height. The 18-foot ceilings are the perfect showcase for the kilims hung vertically; their colorful rhythms are shown to best advantage. In the next gallery (where the ceiling slopes gradually downward to a more intimate size), the kilims are hung horizontally, giving a reference to the Anatolian landscape.
Given the time and effort put into restoring and re-mounting the kilims, this current exhibition will be on display until June 2012. The McCoy Jones collection of Anatolian kilims is the most important group of these textiles outside of Turkey. We are all fortunate to have the de Young present it for a new generation of textile and graphic enthusiasts.
The Art of the Anatolian Kilim: Highlights from the McCoy Jones Collection is now open at the de Young museum. General museum admission ticket prices apply for this exhibition.


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I recently learned about SCCs in directed graphs and how to find them, yet I have no clue what they are useful for.
If you collapse each SCC into a node, you get a new graph that has no cycles. But what - again - is that useful for?
Applications other then in computer science are welcome, too.


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The City of Augusta Snow Emergency Ordinance will go into effect at 5 p.m., Sunday, February 24, 2013. Residents are reminded that while the Snow Emergency is declared, no parking is allowed on streets designated as "Snow Routes" until the emergency is lifted. Snow Routes are marked with square blue signs showing a white snowflake; signs along downtown State Street are marked with red and white signs with no snowflake. View the Emergency Snow Routes Map on the City's Website at www.augustagov.org.
The Snow Emergency will remain in effect until further notice. All vehicles parked on emergency snow routes must be removed within two hours after notice of a traffic emergency has been given. Any vehicle parked on an emergency snow route after such period of time may be removed or caused to be removed by a public safety officer,
to the nearest garage or other place of safety and the vehicle may not be recovered until the towing charges have been paid.
During snow storms, City Public Works crews focus on keeping the snow routes and major streets open through the duration of the storm. This allows essential and emergency travel around town even in the worst of conditions. Once the snow stops, the focus shifts to clearing the side streets and residential areas.
During winter storms, City, County and State snowplows work hard to make roads passable. All motorists should be mindful that plow drivers cannot see directly behind their trucks and often stop or back up. Staying a safe distance behind a snowplow will protect you from possible injury and protect your car from sanding material that plows
spread on slick roadways.
Designated Emergency Snow Routes:
a) Walnut Street from south city limits to Seventh Street;
b) Seventh Street from the west city limits to the east city limits;
c) Osage Street from Seventh Street north to Main Street;
d) Main Street from Osage Street east to Ohio Street;
e) Ohio Street from Main Street north to the north city limits;
f) Lulu-Money Street from Seventh Street north to Kelly Avenue;
g) Kelly Avenue from Money Street east to Custer Lane;
h) State Street from Second Street north to Fanny Avenue;
i) Custer Lane from 100th Street north to Belmont Avenue;
j) 12th Street from Ohio Street east to Custer Lane;
k) High Street from State Street east to Ohio;
l) Park Lane Drive from Kelly Avenue north to Highland Drive;
m) Fanny Street from State Street east to Ohio Street;
n) Dearborn Street from Fanny Avenue north to Belmont Avenue;
o) Belmont Avenue from Dearborn Street east to Custer Lane
Page 2 of 2 - p) Augusta Avenue – Greyhound Drive east from Ohio Street and north to Belmont Avenue;
q) Stadium Drive from Ohio Street east to Fairway Drive;
r) Fairway Drive from Stadium Drive south to Kelly Avenue;
s) Lakepoint Drive from Ohio Street east to where the street enters into private property;
t) David Avenue from Ohio Street east to Stone Lake Drive.
Location, ST | website.com


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06 August 2011
Please God.
Lorelei unfortunately has severe allergies that she inherited from her mother me! I should have known to give Lorelei her medicine and a breathing treatment when I started coughing last night, but she seemed perfectly fine at the time. I tend to be very conservative with medicine due to some of my family members having prescription drug addictions.
Never again will I be conservative in this department.
As I write this I haven't yet decided if I am going to post this. Tony and I are normally very private people when it comes to hardships.
Last Saturday we got stuck on the lake in the boat and Anton paddled the 300 horsepower boat all the way back to the dock. Every time a boat would come by he would quickly pull the oar back into the boat and pretend that everything was fine until they drove on by.
I realized at that moment that is how we are in general with our lives. In our past 8 years of our relationship we have endured hardships that literally no one outside of our marriage is completely aware. (no infidelity was not involved!) We tried really hard to put up a smile and walk through our days. We would rarely speak of anything and if we did give people a glimpse of our pain I felt like I just released too much information and felt dirty and guilty. I still feel guilty looking back at the times I opened up to someone. I tried really hard a couple of weeks ago to open up to our church small group thinking I have been healed and the scars were gone. I couldn't even give up more than a glimmer of my pain with out having to embarrassingly leave.
Lorelei had some blood test come back that are high. I actually opened up somewhat and told two other people than my husband. My grandma and cousin. That is huge for me. I really want people to pray. We have to wait to retest on August 12th to rule out the possibility of cancer. The nurse says they are not too concerned right now since they think the elevated counts are probably due to her previous illness. I don't have my normal laid back attitude that everything will be fine anymore.
I know what it is like to sit in the shower alone, praying from the deepest part of your soul, full of trust, tears streaming down and God still giving me a BIG NO.
I know that God isn't a genie and I have no clue why he makes the decisions he does.
I his unworthy servant is frustrated why he can't just tell me why or what on earth he is thinking.
I pray every second of my day please not Lorelei, please not Lorelei. Don't let any harm come to my sweet Lorelei, Hunter, and Anton. I never want to experience that kind of pain. Never! Never!
Let not a single strand on their head be touched in a harmful way!
Please, please let this be something simple, no biggie thing and me the normally non over reactor just have over reacted! Please!
So if I decide to post. Please keep my sweet family in your prayers and forgive my utter indulgence of letting out too much information.
(if I decide to post this and you see me even if you are family please pretend that you never read it. I will not want to talk about it in person. At least in the blogosphere I falsely feel anonymous.)
8 comments:
- Jenae said...
Oh Mercedes, we will be praying!!! I'm so sorry you had such a terrible scare! We'll pray that the levels are perfectly normal by the 12th. Thinking of you, sweet friend!!!
- August 6, 2011 at 8:59 PM
- Rachel@I Heart Crafty Things said...
I am practically in tears reading this. I just barely came across your blog today and I know I don't know you but I want you to know how touched I feel by your story and that your family and Lorelei will by in my prayers. I hope you get positive, reassuring news from the tests.
- August 6, 2011 at 11:18 PM
- Mercedes said...
Thank you
- August 7, 2011 at 3:07 PM
Remember, God is faithful and by your side. He did not promise easy times, but that he would never leave us. God bless you.
'When I understand that everything happening to me is to make me more Christlike, it solves a great deal of anxiety.' - A.W. Tozer
Exodus 14:14
The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still.
- August 7, 2011 at 3:44 PM
- a happy wanderer said...
sending lots of hugs your way... and lots of warm thoughts. feel what you need to feel, and do what you need to do... whatever that may be.
- August 7, 2011 at 4:37 PM
- Kelley with Amy's Angels said...
This is a hard decision, isn't it? Once you cross over the "share everything in my life" on a blog, there is no going back.
I will keep you guys in my thoughts and prayers!
Great thing is....there's always the delete button if you change your mind later. :)
- August 7, 2011 at 6:01 PM
- Sarah said...
Hang in there. My thoughts are with you and hopefully August 12th will bring nothing but good news.
- August 8, 2011 at 9:02 AM
- Ruth @ atnumber29 said...
I just found your blog today. I'll pray (and also will now have to follow to see how it all works out.) We can cast all our cares upon him for he cares for us!
- August 3, 2012 at 9:31 AM


text:
Keeping your family safer with Windows 8
- Posted: May 23, 2012 at 2:41PM
- 91,185 views
- 2 comments
Loading user information from Channel 9
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Loading Visual Studio Achievements
Something went wrong getting the Visual Studio Achievements
Right click "Save as…"
This blog post shows how to set family safety settings to keep your kids safe. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012/05/14/keeping-your-family-safer-with-windows-8.aspx
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This is excellent, can't wait to see!
Good feature to monitor the kids !!
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Back to work Update
There was much nonBenedict news this week-end. You may have missed the Green Issue of the NYTimes Magazine (let us not inquire into that carbon footprint, or even its bs footprint). But amazingly enough, there is a long set of short pieces about what we can all do to "save the planet." It's here: http://www.nytimes.com/pages/magazine/index.htmlMy favorite so far is a site that will tell you about the walkability of any address in the U.S., including your home, or the home you are thinking of buying, or where you go on vacation, etc. Try it: www.walkscore.com
About the Author
Margaret O'Brien Steinfels, a former editor of Commonweal, writes frequently in these pages and blogs at dotCommonweal.
15 comments
- All
- Editor Featured
I am going to be a real party pooper and refer everyone to this story in today's Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/20/AR200804... unprecedent lowering of the cost of food over the last 50 years or so has kept the issue of birth control in the realm of philosophy. What happens when it creeps into the realm of actual hunger?
My home got a reasonable "walk score," I suppose, of 60. What it didn't take into account is that, although there are many businesses within walking distance, to get to the ones to the east you have to cross over a four lane road that has no crosswalk or pedestrian signal at the intersection, and to get to the ones to the west, you have to walk on the road under a dark, narrow bridge, on a curve, with absolutely no sidewalk or shoulders. Our entire road system is built on the assumption that I will drive my car to the supermarket less than half a mile away, and there's no safe way to walk, or even bike, there. When I've brought these issues up with local planners, they say that there's no money to change them and very little demand to do so. That's where we need to work to make a difference.
I tried my childhood home address in Chicago (no longer family; no longer the same house) and found it had a 78 walkability score. When I was a child, it was 100--of necessity because we had no car. But the butcher delivered; the fruit and vegetable man came around in a truck, etc. Still I remember walking to the local grocery store and helping my mother carry home the groceries. Different world. My current address is a 100, but in the street level view of my building (also available on the site) there was a Fresh Direct truck (not for us, that's sure) so it's possible, as Terri writes, that walkabillity may not be accompanied by a decline in driving.
I just returned from a walk to the post office and library! My village was rated only 51, but I think it's actually higher. We don't have a clothing store, movie theater or coffee bar. But the local restaurant serves whatever you want, bottomless cuppa joe, pretty much 24/7, and there's a good DVD rental downtown. And a couple of newer businesses aren't listed.
I live next to two parks and a long canal path that offer miles of relaxing and beautiful walking, but they were completely ignored by walkscore.
My little wheel was still spinning. Anyway, I'm within a 10-15 walking distance (including ped crossing lights and sidewalks) of my neighborhood library, credit union, barber shop, and post office.A 5-minute drive to the grocery store and a 3-minute drive to the gas station.Neighborhoods are excellent for walking and bicycling. A parkway with parallel dedicated walking & bicycling asphalt path to large wooded city park is within 10 minutes of my residence. If I want to get a good fish sandwich on Fridays, the AmLegion post is directly across the street. Our commercial airport is 10 minutes via two straight streets from my residence. Fast-food joints are 5-minute drives from my residence but not "near" it.Local Catholic hospital is less than 10-minute drive from my domicile, and my dentist is 15 minutes away (by walking).O, yes, I learned that an erotic book store is 1.7 miles away :)
Second paragraph should read, in part, "10-15 minute walking distance..."
Mr. Lafond: I think Walkscore's mission is to calculate the walking distance between your home and your everything else of practical/consumer use: grocery store, cleaners, drug store, book store, etc. Just to have a beautiful place to walk may not be on their radar screen, though clearly it's on yours.
Walking to all the places I need to visit during the week would leave me significantly less time to do the things I enjoy doing at home. I enjoy urban civilization (camping in the wilderness bores me), and driving is for me the most efficient means for that enjoyment. In addition, I resent the school-marmish meddling in my affairs that increasingly characterizes the "save the planet" din.This din is beginning to resemble the mass-conformity inducing hysteria one finds in totalitarian regimes, as for instance, the Chinese cultural revolution of recent memory...
Is it possible that driving around in a car is a form of "mass-conformity," visited upon us by the totalitarian regimes of GM, Ford, Standard Oil, Hess, and the Federal Highway Administration? Just asking!
I can boast an 86 walk score and with $4.01 a gal gas we walk almost all the time.
No, because I have the option of walking or driving; its my free choice. I have no idea what you men by the totalitarian regimes of GM, Ford, Standard Oil, Hess, and the Federal Highway Administration. And I drive Toyotas exclusively, at the moment. Please Margaret, tell me you're not into evil conspiratorial corporations; you are much too intelligent and educated to buy into that kind of stuff.
Mr. Schwartz: As I said, "just asking." Testing out your "free choice." So let me ask, how much will a gallon of gas have to cost before you decide to walk say, half the time you would otherwise drive. We are free creatures, I agree; don't particularly hold to any conspiracy theories; still, we must all face certain limits. We (the Steinfelses) have no car because New York City sets a boundary. There is good public transportation, a dense city lets you walk to most places you want to go, a car is a pain in the neck, and you can rent one when you need it for a lot less money than it costs to buy and maintain one. I was just raising a question to your intelligent and educated self in relation to cars and gas and, as we began, the walkability of your home and its neighborhood.
Ms. Steinfels:I don't have a firm number; I suppose that it would be somewhere around $10/gallon. I live in the greater Los Angeles area. Its not so much that we have a poor transportation system here; its that everything is so spread out that walking or taking PT are very limited options. You folks in NYC, and those in San Francisco as well, are extremely fortunate in that most things are within a reasonable walking distance. In addition, your PT fits your urban areas very well. When I visited NYC in 2004 I was pleasantly amazed at the subway system - outstanding!
Subway system! not only outstanding, but as Grant recounted--has its small amusements as well: always something: http://www.commonwealmagazine.org/blog/?p=1911


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Can a mark from a
Battlemind, etc. be maintained when the target goes invisible?
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An attacker takes a -5 penalty to attacks against an invisible target. Invisibility has no special effect on marking, just that if the marking attack requires a hit it would be harder to achieve.
Turning invisible while marked does not remove it from you. Marks last either until the specified duration on the effect or until the marked target dies or falls unconscious.


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Is there a way to get line segments from a linestring using points with lat/lng coordinates?
ST_Line_Substring is taking float8 start/end points. Is there a way to replace the float8 with lat/lng? I have also seen ST_pointN but I have random points that are not the same as the linestrng edges. ST_Split is useful but I need to install postgis 2.0 and that will require a configuration of my whole system which is in my plan but not yet..
Regards, A


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Is there a law against saying obscenities? If yes, what is considered obscene? Does it apply to any language or only to Hebrew?
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The Talmud (Shabbos 33a) states (using Is. 9:16 as a prooftext) that obscene speech causes various national troubles, G-d forbid. It then goes on to say:
"Rabbi Chanan bar Rava says: Everyone knows why a bride enters the bridal chamber. Nevertheless, if one speaks obscenely about it, even if there was a Divine decree that he enjoy seventy years [the average human lifespan] of goodness, it can thereby be turned into bad."
So there may not be a formal black-letter law against obscene speech, but we see from this passage that it is definitely something to be avoided. To the best of my knowledge, there is no difference in this regard what language is used. As for "what is considered obscene," perhaps we might best adopt Justice Potter Stewart's definition: "I know it when I see it."
As a punishment for obscenity, troubles multiply, cruel decrees are proclaimed afresh, the youth of Israel's enemies. (Shabbat 33a)
All know for what purpose a bride enters the bridal canopy, yet against whomsoever who speaks obscenely [thereof], even if a sentence of seventy years' happiness had been sealed for him, it is reversed for evil.(Shabbat 33a)
Even a superfluous conversation between a man and his own wife is mentioned to him at the time of his death. (Chagiga 5b)
Therefore the Lord shall have no joy in their young men, neither shall He have compassion on their fatherless and widows; for every one is ungodly and an evil-doer, and every mouth speaketh wantonness. For all this His anger is not turned away, but His hand is stretched out still. (Isaias 9:16)
(from messilat yesharim)


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April 22, 2013
V&A mermaid – Flickr pic of the day
This beautiful image of a stained-glass mermaid at the V&A Waterfront was captured by our Cape Town. Live it. Love it. Flickr group member Anna Phillips.
Says Anna: "Although I've visited Cape Town many a time over the past five years, I'm still happily surprised each time I visit as I come across something I've never seen before, such as the beautiful window at the Victoria Wharf Mall at the V&A Waterfront."
Do you have images of Cape Town you'd like to share with us? We'd love you to join the Cape Town. Live it. Love it. Flickr group!


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Is there a construction of an order preserving hash function that keeps the preimage property of a crypto hash function? By order preserving hash function (OPHF) i mean for $x<y$ then $OPHF(x) < OPHF(y)$
The problem with a hash function like you ask for is that, if you hash an $n$-bit string and give the hash to someone else, they can recover the string using $n$ hash calculations with a binary search.
For a simple example, let's say the $n=8$, your string is $01011001$ in binary, and its hash is $Y = H(01011001)$.
This flaw is inherent in the idea of order-preserving hashing: if I can obtain the hash of any valid string, then I can always carry out such a search. In fact, even if I can't get the actual hashes, but can only ask you for the result of the comparison between $H(s)$ and $Y$ for some input string $s$, I can still recover your original string without even seeing its hash value!
Basically, if you ever played the "guess what number I'm thinking of?" game as a child, this is exactly the same situation. You have a secret string, and I get to guess a string and see if it's less than or greater than your secret. As in the game, with the right guessing strategy I won't need too many guesses to find the right answer.


text:
Steam-Driven Seduction
Steampunked Lust, Book 3
by Corinne Davies
eBook ISBN: Unknown
Kassandra fled from Julian but the time has come to face her fears. Miguel's passion still burns for Kassandra and Julien, and he hopes to build a future with them. Can the dominant trio set aside their natures to find a love that will span the skies and seas?
Buy Now:
Chapter One


text:
Men's Nike LIVESTRONG Hyperwarm Fusion Tights
Buy Online & Pick Up In-Store
Cold winter weather has nothing on you when you sport the Nike LIVESTRONG Pro Combat Hyperwarm Fusion Tights. These breathable, insulating tights are designed to protect you from the elements, so you can keep up your favorite outdoor activities, even when the weather is nasty.
You'll never have to worry about chafing or range of motion in these tights, as they are made with ergonomic flat seams. Mesh panels at the inner thighs and gussets add ventilation, while the stretch waist offers a snug, yet comfortable fit. Dri-FIT material wicks away sweat, while the screen print at the left hip, right thigh and right hem add sporty style.


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The Southeast social work major is a professional degree that prepares students for entry-level practice in professional social work.
Welcome to the Southeast Missouri State University baccalaureate social work program Web site.
The social work major was established by the University in the 1970s and has been continually accredited by the Council on Social Work Education since 1990. Accreditation was reaffirmed in 2011 to 2019. Since its inception, the program has served the state and the region by providing quality social work education, community service and scholarship. Currently, we have approximately 170 majors and eight full-time faculty members. We offer a generalist curriculum that prepares undergraduate students for entry-level professional social work practice in a variety of settings.
We have excellent faculty who strive to make your educational experience a good one. We emphasize a student-centered educational philosophy, and make every effort to work with each student by providing a stimulating and welcoming environment. The faculty are proud of the program, its students and the alumni who have made and continue to make significant contributions to the profession of social work in the region and the state.
I invite you to review the information at this Web site, and feel free to contact me or any of our faculty to find out more about our program. Prospective students are always welcome to our campus, and we encourage you to visit our classes and meet with our faculty. We look forward to you joining us as you begin your professional social work career.
Cathy McElderry, PhD, MPH, LCSW
Department Chair


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Originally Posted by shabbirWhen you configure your IIS webserver and find the following message
Service Unavailable
Then the first solution to the above error is http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?id=823552 but if this does not solve the problem try doing the following stuff.
Open the IIS Manager, right click Web Sites and select properties:
Switch to the Service Tab
Check "Run WWW Service in IIS 5.0 Isolation Mode".
You will be asked for Restart of IIS. Click yes to restart IIS. If you are not asked just restart IIS.
I have installed IIS 5.1 from the Win pro service pack 2 cd after installing the IIS 5.1 I tried the following link
But I am not able to create IIS_WPG
so I tried the other options you mentioned. When I opened the IIS Manager I was not able to find the Application Pool.
Then I right click on the websites and then tried for service tab and I was not able to find the service tab.
I am enclosing the screen shot of the same.
Kindly advice what is wrong


text:
Soccer's player of the year: Who will challenge Messi?
By Michelle KaufmanThe Miami Herald (MCT)
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.


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Republicans Consistently Turn To Lobbyists For Strategies To Block And Kill Legislation
Yesterday, The Hill reported that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) may not have the votes to begin debate on a $15 billion jobs package. Reid, for his part, is reaching out to Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA), in the hopes that he will provide support to overcome a GOP filibuster. A Reid spokesman said simply that "the vote is in the hands of Republicans."
However, as Roll Call reported, the Senate Republican leadership is trying to persuade members to simply block the legislation. And this push comes after the GOP spent an afternoon huddled with more than 100 lobbyists, trying to figure out how to react to Reid's bill:
Senate Republican leadership staff are huddling with K Streeters this afternoon over Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's (D-Nev.) decision to forgo a bipartisan jobs package in favor of a smaller, targeted plan…The business community has been up in arms since Reid decided to ditch a bipartisan job-creation bill last week.
And this is not the first time that Republicans have organized a pow-wow with lobbyists in order to devise a strategy and gin up support for killing a significant Democratic initiative:
— Regulatory Reform: In December, more than 100 financial services lobbyists met with House Republicans "to try to fight back against financial regulatory overhaul legislation." According to one lobbyist who attended the meeting, the Republican message was "look, you all oppose this bill, but only a few of you have come out publicly."
— Health Care Reform: In June, Senate Republicans met with health care lobbyists in order to "recruit stakeholders to oppose options such as a government-funded insurance plan and a mandate requiring employers to help pay for heath insurance." "We're trying to engage them because as more and more of this comes out, we think a lot of them have been told out of fear to keep silent," said Sen. John Thune (R-SD). Republicans also requested that health care lobbyists be given at least 72 hours to review any legislative language in the Senate Finance Committee.
— Cap and Trade: In June, Senate Republicans organized a "hearing" with energy industry representatives, which the GOP characterized as an attempt "to poison the well for cap-and-trade policies."
A report released this week by the Center for Responsive Politics revealed that $1.3 million was spent on lobbying for every hour that Congress was in session last year. All told, lobbyists' clients spent more than $3.47 billion last year on efforts to influence legislation, which was a new record, topping the $3.3 billion spent in 2008.
Cross-posted on The Wonk Room.


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Prescribing Opioids to Treat Pain in Injured Workers
Improve the care of injured workers and help save lives by using the best practices in the following guidelines:
- Prescribing Opioids to Treat Pain in Injured Workers (660 KB PDF). (Labor and Industries, July 1, 2013).
- Agency Medical Directors' Group's (AMDG) 2015 Interagency Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Pain.
L&I has adopted rules that support key concepts in the department's opioid guidelines and to ensure consistency with the Department of Health's pain management rules. The rules describe specific prior authorization requirements for the payment of opioids.
FREE CME Online: Opioid Prescribing for Injured Workers


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5 Terrifying Things Nobody Tells You About Health Care
If you're reading this, congratulations! You're probably not currently unconscious in an intensive care unit, surrounded by a gaggle of improbably sexy doctors who use your humorously gained pelvic injuries as a metaphor for their relationship issues. However, as a Cracked reader, there's a pretty good chance that someday you will be (we know our audience).
Still, there is no need to go unprepared! Here is a handy manual for the unexpected shocks and nasty surprises you are likely to encounter during your time on the health care carousel.
#5. Doctors Can't Read the Test Results
Jupiterimages/Comstock/Getty Images
Ever had an X-ray taken? Or one of those fancy scans or lab tests? Did the process strike you as professional and trustworthy? Sure it did -- it's science.
In reality, though, all those scans and tests and results are basically Rorschach tests for doctors. For instance, a study done on one type of test (coronary angiograms) discovered that if you give two different doctors a copy of the same test, they'll disagree up to half of the time. In fact, if you give the same doctor the same angiogram twice, he will disagree with himself up to one-third of the time.
"Still a better rate than my marriage choices ... "
Yet another study found that a group of physicians simply couldn't agree on whether any given patient was showing physical signs of goddamn heart failure. Man, we're not medical professionals, but we've always assumed that the bare minimum qualification is knowing if the patient's heart is working.
What's Going on Here?
As high tech as hospital equipment is, they have no Star Trek scanners that pop out easy diagnoses when swiped over patients. All scans, tests, and even standard lists of symptoms must be interpreted by humans. That means you're always relying on one part accurate science, one part unpredictable humanity, and the results can be seriously affected by that particular doctor's training, his knowledge, and how hard he is thinking about the taco he's going to have for lunch. Hell, he could have just smoked a bunch of meth, we don't know your doctor.
Jupiterimages/Photos.com/Getty Images
Like what's with all those weird black light posters all the time?
But new techniques are surely fixing the situation, even if slowly, right? Nope! These days, many hospitals use teleradiology, a fancy term for outsourcing the interpretation of your scans and tests to workers (who may or may not have medical training) outside the hospital, anywhere from the next state over to India. This is especially popular in emergency medicine, because smaller hospitals don't want to keep a radiologist in their payroll just for the times Cousin Ronnie stumbles in with a cow-tipping injury.
This trend chips heavily at the doctors' diagnosis skills; in the old days, resident radiologists and ER doctors could consult each other on the fly about your symptoms and history as they relate to test results. Now, that X-ray of your butt is nothing but a context-free image on a screen in Pakistan, with no crucial patient information included. You don't need to be a doctor to realize that this leaves you wide open for a very unfortunate variation of Broken Phone.
Comstock Images/Comstock/Getty Images
"Based off your X-rays, they'd like us to check you for possible ovarian bleeding."
#4. Hospital Staffs Suck at Hygiene
Comstock/Comstock/Getty Images
Every year, about 1.7 million people in America alone wind up with an infection they got at the hospital. That means you have a 5 to 10 percent chance of getting one every goddamn time you stay in one. And, since these are infections that continuously hang around antibiotics and other medications, their resistance is getting stronger, and the situation is only going to get worse.
But how is it possible that a place dedicated to keeping germs at bay has become such a festering disease hole?
Jupiterimages/liquidlibrary/Getty Images
Doctors aren't that different from us. They also have a limited capacity for giving a shit.
What's Going on Here?
You know that time you ate at a taco joint and spent the remainder of the night hate-pooping your guts out because the guy behind the counter doesn't wash his hands? Well, it turns out your doctor doesn't, either.
Preventing most of the hospital-induced illnesses would be stupidly easy: Doctors and other staff just need to wash their hands between patients so that germs can't spread from one to another. The bad news is that they rarely bother doing this. It's estimated that only around 40 percent of hospital staff complies with hand-washing standards, despite the obvious, proven risk of transferring disease. Carefully placed disinfectant gel dispensers and washing sinks fill the hallways, and awareness projects in the vein of "January Is Let's Try to Kill Fewer Patients With Our Filth Month" are frequent. Alas, the medical professionals maintain a bullheaded "not gonna" attitude, which is fine for a 5-year-old but rather less amusing when displayed by the doctor who has your life in his dirt-encrusted hands.
Jochen Sands/Digital Vision/Getty Images
"That's not dirt."
The problem is so bad that there are special doctor wristbands that'll let people know whether the wearers have washed their hands sufficiently. Seriously. We're assuming the next step will be making non-complying doctors wear "I have poop on my hands!" badges.
It turns brown.
#3. Lots of Doctors Are Shockingly Behind the Times
Jupiterimages/Creatas/Getty Images
The medical profession is one of those rare paths of employment where the word "old" isn't immediately followed with "fart." A lot of us prefer our authority figures with a little mileage -- just summon the mental image of an accomplished, white-haired senior doctor and one of a pimply, overworked intern and see which one you'd prefer as an emergency appendectomist.
You chose the old guy, didn't you? Bad move.
Jupiterimages/Photos.com/Getty Images
Sorry, but the correct choice was "Contact-High Condoleezza Rice" in the back.
While the interns may sometimes mess up because they're inexperienced and overworked, the older doctors can be at least as dangerous because they don't keep their skills up to date. They've been on the job for a long time and know how it's done -- no young whippersnapper of a groundbreaking medical discovery is going to tell them otherwise, goshdarnit. As a result, the amount of time your doctor has been practicing medicine tends to correlate with lower quality care, and people getting complex surgery are more likely to die if older doctors are operating on them.
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"I'm sorry about your son. The leeches simply weren't strong enough."
Hey, did we mention that 20 percent of America's doctors today are over 65, and that percentage keeps rising?
What's Going on Here?
Unlike pilots and various other "people's lives are in my hands" occupations, doctors have no federally mandated retirement age. Not even surgeons. This allows many older doctors to keep going well past their mental prime, to the point where it's estimated that thousands of practicing doctors in America have full-blown dementia.
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"President Obama? It's a honor, sir."
That's not the real problem, though -- it's a telltale sign of trouble when your cardiologist tackles you to the ground and starts screaming that you're a Soviet spy. The real problem is that many older doctors are simply repeating what they learned in medical school back in the day, and obviously medicine, particularly surgery, has improved massively since then. Today, it involves modern humbug such as robots and lasers and decent odds for survival. Still, there's no standardized retraining system in place that makes doctors keep up with it. And while some older surgeons are diving scalpel-first into robot surgery, there are others who are sticking with the tried-and-true method they learned in 1971 from Hacksaw Harrison.