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Critical Aspects For Bankruptcy Lawyer Explained
Personal bankruptcy is a very major issue which could destroy the lives of numerous individuals and also render them totally defenseless. Bankruptcy is also referred to as bankruptcy and also is a legal state of being unable to pay off financial debts owed to creditors.
When insolvency takes place to a company, many creditors will typically submit a personal bankruptcy application in an effort to recover a portion of the cash owed to them by the business or company. A personal bankruptcy lawyer is someone who is proficient with insolvency regulation and also will be able to defend you against the request submitted by the financial institutions.
Tips on how you can work with a good bankruptcy attorney?
The increase in bankruptcy petitions has resulted in an increase in demand for bankruptcy lawyers. Some of the suggestions you can utilize when trying to determine a great insolvency attorney are provided listed below.
Examination: Many individuals commonly worry when they proclaim personal bankruptcy and also will certainly pick the initial personal bankruptcy legal representative that they find. This is not a sensible action because you should perform a thorough investigation. This investigation should involve a thorough background check of the lawyer and should be done before the bankruptcy claim is made. This will also give your lawyer enough time to plan for the instance.
Word of mouth: A great insolvency attorney will be well-known, especially in the business globe, so it is crucial to ask about and also collect info regarding business that have filed for bankruptcy and also that represented them. It is additionally crucial to understand the result of the cases. You are bound to get information that is helpful. Experience needs to be your major emphasis in the look for a great lawyer who can appropriately represent you.
The courts: A personal bankruptcy court is a great source about bankruptcy legal representatives. You must constantly take a while off and visit a personal bankruptcy court so about experience a bankruptcy and also see instance. This will certainly provide you an idea of how an excellent attorney ought to conduct the trial when safeguarding somebody.
The panel of legal representatives: The very best place to learn about the most effective as well as most highly regarded lawyers is by seeing the insolvency lawyer's panel. The reputations of these legal representatives precede them as well as you are likely to locate a great attorney who manages insolvency problems and is experienced in the field. Seeing the workplace of the lawyer could additionally provide an indication concerning the attorney's reputability.
Participating in complimentary assessment sessions: Free consultation sessions are the systems that make it feasible for you to ask as numerous inquiries as feasible regarding bankruptcy and also where to discover good legal representatives. Because you could get good calls which will certainly click here help you in the future, it is additionally the start of a good working partnership in between you and the legal representatives. An insolvency attorney will make the distinction in the outcome of your instance so you must guarantee that the lawyer you pick is able to turn the outcome in your favor.
The Personal bankruptcy Lawyer will certainly aid those individuals if they have applied for insolvency so that, the common people do not overcome burdened with the debt which will certainly be impossible for them to repay. Visit this site for Bankruptcy legal representative.
An insolvency lawyer is a person who is conversant with insolvency law and also will certainly be able to defend you versus the petition submitted by the lenders. The increase in personal bankruptcy requests has actually resulted in a boost in demand for personal bankruptcy attorneys. Examination: Lots of people usually stress when they proclaim insolvency and will certainly choose the initial insolvency lawyer that they come across. Word of mouth: An excellent bankruptcy legal representative will be popular, particularly in the business globe, so it is very vital to ask around and also collect information concerning companies that have actually filed for personal bankruptcy as well as who represented them. The courts: An insolvency court is a good resource about personal bankruptcy lawyers.


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The cast is great/The film is good/Into the woods/To go to the movies!
Director Rob Marshall, who was nominated for an Oscar for his film version of the musical "Chicago" back in 2003, returns this holiday season with another big screen adaptation of a Broadway hit musical. This time he takes on Steven Sondheim's storied (pun intended) 1987 mega-hit Into the Woods, an extraordinarily entertaining mishmash of several of the Grimm Brothers classic fairy tales. Produced by Disney, the film had been the subject of widespread speculation that the darker edges of the Sondheim/James Lapine fantasy might be smoothed too much. Purists need not worry, however; Marshall's version retains the mature themes and disquieting tone of the original, and has the added benefit of a terrific cast.
For those unfamiliar with the story, the plot takes characters from Rapunzel, Jack and the Beanstalk, Cinderella, and Little Red Riding Hood and puts them all in a fairy tale of their own. A Baker (James Corden) and his Wife (the marvelous Emily Blunt) desperately want a child, but a Witch (Meryl Streep) has cast a spell on them denying their wish. To lift the curse, they must gather four items for the witch: hair as yellow as corn, a cow as white as snow, a slipper as pure as gold, and a cape as red as blood. Thus the couple ventures "into the woods," as it were, to try and collect the items, and that's where Jack (Daniel Huttlestone) of Beanstalk fame, Cinderella (Anna Kendrick), Rapunzel (Mackenzie Mauzy) and Little Red (Lilla Crawford, channeling Wednesday Addams) come in, each possessing the cow, slipper, hair, and cape, respectively.
Of course, much danger lies in the woods, which, ultimately is one of the film's principal themes, as expressed through catchy, if somewhat prosaic, songs ("You decide what's right/You decide what's good/Sometimes people leave you halfway through the woods.") and brilliant cinematography. The trials and tribulations faced by the characters serve as metaphorical reflections of the often fraught process of growing up itself.
The story is one from the ages, then; it's a tale of growing up and letting go (Meryl Streep's Witch is perhaps the ultimate overprotective helicopter parent), all while remembering that "No one is alone/Someone is on your side." What sounds hokey on paper, though, translates exceedingly well to a rousing good time on the big screen. With an exceptional cast, gorgeous costumes, foreboding set pieces, and a soaring score, Marshall's picture is one of the most fun holiday pictures we've had in years.
What contributes hugely to that sense of fun is the ensemble cast; they find the comic energy in even some of the story's darker elements, and throw themselves into their roles with gusto. Emily Blunt and James Corden have terrific chemistry, and both are accomplished singers; Blunt is lovely, and by far the best singer in the movie. Her expressive face beautifully registers conflicting emotions, as seen in an expertly choreographed moment she shares with Cinderella's Prince (Chris Pine).
Pine himself is perhaps the unintentional star of the movie; not only does he get all the best lines ("I was raised to be charming, not sincere,"), but he plays the Prince with the same self-confident, breezy swagger that he brought to the roles of Captain Kirk and the young Jack Ryan. He seems delighted to be hamming it up and poking fun at his pretty-boy image, and the kitschy duet of "Agony" that he shares with Rapunzel's Prince (Billy Magnussen) is by far the movie's highlight. Pine seems to know he has a terrible singing voice (not to mention that he can't seem to sustain his British accent), but he doesn't seem to care one bit, which makes the scene all the more impressively fun. He gives what might be the most over-the-top, campy musical performance since Pierce Brosnan butchered "SOS" in "Mamma Mia!"
The other actors, too, infuse the film with obvious joy and passion, which makes watching them feel like a privilege. Johnny Depp is a standout in a few brief scenes as the smarmy Wolf (and kudos for Disney for not caving and dialing down the Wolf's more unsavory, sexually suggestive elements), single-handedly personifying the worst fears of parents and children alike. In smaller roles, Christine Baranski as Cinderella's stepmother and Tracey Ullman as Jack's mother get great scenery-chewing moments, and, in the larger roles, Streep, Kendrick, Blunt and Corden outdo themselves. Even little Daniel Huttlestone, who previously started as Gavroche in Les Miserables, proves his success in that role was no fluke, and that he's a talent worth watching.
Speaking of Les Miz, if you're one of those people who think you don't like musicals because of all the singing, you'll be happy to know that Into the Woods does have long sections featuring extended, spoken dialog. Because – let's be honest – sometimes you just want a break from all that singing, and the fact that the characters can actually talk without music just proves that, indeed, anything really can happen in the woods. Venture in and see for yourself.
Into the Woods opens today at Bay Area theaters.

subset: commoncrawl


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Thanks to everyone who donated to our recent appeal!
We reached our goal in our online Crowdrise campaign and in mailed donations, and received a $750 match from GXT Green! With your support, we'll be able to work even harder to protect marine life in 2017.
Some of our current and upcoming projects:
- Studying the return rate of humpback calves to Jeffreys Ledge (interestingly, they don't seem to be coming back!)
- Re-vamping our educational programs to provide even more of a hands-on experience and inspire students to take action to protect marine life
- New exhibits for our Blue Ocean Discovery Center in Hampton Beach
- Increasing the number of groups doing monthly cleanups through our Adopt-a-Beach program, and increasing our effectiveness at responding to storm debris.
Want to be involved? Click here for ways to help
Check out the video from the plunge:


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(Great Authors of World Literature, Critical Edition)
The works of Louis Dean Owens, a novelist and cultural critic of mixed Choctaw, Cherokee, Irish, and French ancestry, express observations from his mixed-blood perspective about contemporary American culture, with a particular focus on ethnicity and class. He was the son of Hoey Louis and Ida Brown Louis, who had nine children. Hoey Louis worked at various jobs, including farm labor, managing a chicken ranch, dowsing for a well-driller, working in a laundry, and driving a truck. Ida Louis sometimes worked as a waitress. The family moved back and forth between Mississippi, where they lived in a two-room cabin on the Yazoo River, and California, where they lived in the Santa Lucia mountains, the Salinas Valley, San Leandro, and finally, Atascadero. Owens wrote autobiographically of his working-class childhood and his family history in Mixedblood Messages and I Hear the Train. He worked at various places from the age of nine, including in fields, a chicken ranch, a mushroom farm, and a can factory.
Gene Owens, Louis's older brother, was the first member of the extended family to graduate from high school, and Louis Owens became the second. He attended community college for two years, then was admitted to the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), under an equal opportunity program. He worked summers fighting fires for the United States Forest Service. While at UCSB he met Kiowa novelist and professor N. Scott Momaday, who influenced Owens to pursue his study of American Indian literature. Owens received his B.A. in 1971 and an M.A. in English in 1974. In 1975, he married his wife, Polly, whom he had met while a student at UCSB; they would have two daughters, Elizabeth and Alexandra.
Owens began and then dropped out of a graduate program...
(The entire section is 730 words.)


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The small nonprofit I work for has lost four of its largest funding grants in the past few months due to budget cuts and changes in priority funding from foundations and granting organizations. That equates to a huge budget shortfall for my organization. I hear and see all the time how the bad economy has impacted businesses and individuals. Heck, I meet people every day who have been impacted by the economy and I have always been silently (maybe too much so) grateful that I wasn't in a position where I was impacted in any way other than meeting these people who needed help from my organization.
But today all of that changed. Pardon my French, but $h!t just got real.
All of the staff at my organization have to take a 20% pay cut and reduction in hours starting next Monday to help make up for the budget shortfall. We will be closed every Friday from now through June. That means that I lose one pay day a week, which is 20% of my income, for at least the next two months. That's 20% of my income that I can't afford to lose right now.
My initial thought is that I need a second job. I NEVER thought I'd have to do that, EVER. It is scary and frustrating and part of me wants to just stomp my feet and complain about how unfair this is. But I can't. I have got to find a way to make up for the income that will be missing from my paycheck starting next week. I've been completely unfocused at work and browsed through Craigslist throughout the day to see what is out there. Only a few things posted offer hours on only Friday/Saturday/Sunday and the ones with that availability pay somewhere between $7.50 and $9 an hour. Yikes! I can see that it is going to be hard to balance my "career job" with one to supplement my income.
So, why am I sharing all of this with you? Well, the first reason is kind of selfish; I want to be able to look back on this and remember how I felt, what I did and how I got through it. Because I WILL get through it, eventually. I want to be even more grateful for what I have after this time has passed. Second, I want anyone out there in a similar situation to know that I not only understand what you're going through, but I also feel your pain... and frustration, and fear, and stress, and anxiety and sadness. You no longer have just my sympathy, you have my empathy. Third, this is real life. Not everything in this life is all beer and skittles and I would be a big liar to pretend that everything going on with me is happy and fun all of the time by only posting the fun things.
After nearly twelve hours of


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The closing words of President Obama's commencement address at ASU last night have the ring of an ancient parting: "Godspeed on the road ahead". It hearkens back to a time when travelers were wished a speedy (and safe) journey to their next destination with the divine protection of God. It is more cliche these days albeit an archaic one at that. I trust our nation's top executive meant it as a pseudo-Christian parting comment, meant to appease those who would look for a more familiar "God bless you" greeting while not offending those who despise the mention of "God". It was a safe, down-the-middle-of-the-road phrase. It falls into the same category of the now familiar "Bless you!" when one sneezes. Few dare to utter "God Bless You!" any more.
For the man who downplayed the National Day of Prayer to such an extent that it came and went with nary a mention, it is not surprising. This is the same president who was absent from any church for enough time in his presidential infancy so as to pique the curiosity of even the liberal media. He did eventually attend a church service but very little has been seen or heard about his faith-life since.
While we do not need our president to tell us to pray, nor do we need a specific day on which we should pray, it would be encouraging to see a national leader who is humble enough to acknowledge that he is NOT the greatest—that there is One greater still. Even the king ruling Nineveh in the days of Jonah repented, called his nation to prayer and fasting, and donned sack-cloths and put ashes on his body. I don't expect President Obama to go to that extreme, but I also don't expect him to openly and brazenly cozy up to the anti-God camp either.


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{ spa party | get posh day spa | lantana | kierra's 7th birthday }
A spa party, celebrating my daughter Kierra's 7th birthday, was recently held at Get Posh! Day Spa for Girls in Lantana. The girls, donned matching purple robes, and were treated to a day of pampering, including facials, makeovers, + hair styling.
The orchid + black zebra spa decor, lovingly created by Camden Gardens Florals, set the perfect theme. The girl's snacked on tea sandwiches, fruit, and confections between treatments, and even got to create their own flavored lip gloss. Once the makeovers were complete, the girls toasted sparkling fruit punch, had cake, opened gifts, then all took a turn on the karaoke stage at being fabulous little divas!!!
venue: get posh day spa for girls, lantana
florals + decor: cary for camden gardens floral
spa pops + confections: fontainbleu, miami pastry chefs
invites + graphic design + signage: mommy
cake + cupcakes: papa frankie + mommy
spa fruit bouquet: nanny gayle
2 responses
LOVE IT!!!! You throw the best parties. Funny, I'm planning my sons surprise 30th. Going to Fundraiser at Pompano Panache�.everyone in biz will be there�I'm styling at least 5 different tables. Any chance you can join us for a sit down dinner and cocktail party?? Would love to get pics of my tables�. everyone from Breakers will be there�best networking night of the season. Marji
September 27, 2013 at 2:24 pm
Sent from my iPad
September 27, 2013 at 8:51 pm


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Czech PM accepts new finance minister to end government split
Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka on Wednesday accepted the nomination of former Microsoft executive Ivan Pilný to be the new finance minister. Pilný belongs to the centrist ANO party, the ruling Social Democrats' coalition partner. He was the head of Microsoft's Czech operations in the 1990s and now leads the economic affairs committee in the lower house of parliament.
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Bad Jeff's Barbeque (What's Up Prague) Monday, April 23
Every week, 5 events! What's Up Prague (23.04.2018)! Every Monday we will let you know what to do in Prague for the current week. This video is produced by Prague.TV and supported by OpenCall mobile.
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Rent apartment Prague from CZK 14.900, 0% commission.
Book online cheap and reliable Prague Airport Shuttle Transport.
Prague Expat Guide - Prague.TV - Living Like a Local!.


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A dental implant is necessary when your existing tooth is beyond salvage. In general a dentist will always try to salvage your existing teeth since it is common knowledge that there nothing can be as good as your natural teeth. But when your natural teeth cannot be salvaged due to some reason be it an accident, tooth decay or a medical condition it has to be removed in order to avoid any infection. In such cases dental implant is usually the best option to restore your set of teeth and jaw structure.
What is Dental Implant?
A dental implant is an artificial too tooth root that is inserted into the jaw so that it can hold the artificial tooth in place. This process is used on one tooth and can be used on several at a time. At the same time this can be either permanent or temporary. In addition to this, dental implants can help stabilize the jaw bone's shape that may be deformed due to loss of tooth and broken jaw bones. Dental implants are often viewed as very convenient alternative to the much dreaded dentures. The word dentures usually puts chills down ones spine, besides which they require more attention and maintenance.
In general dental implants are considered better than the usual bridges and crowns since they are not simply cemented in place. The process of fusing of bone and implant occurs which is also called Osseointegration. This is a special characteristic of Titanium.
Endosteal is one of the two types of dental implants. This type of implant is need you to have strong gums and jaw bones sine it need hold the tooth in place. However the other type of implant consist of a metal plate that is placed on the top of the jaw and below the gums. This is the less common of the two and is usually used if necessary, generally when the patient has minimal haw height or thickness.
The procedure of Dental Implants
This is a fairly simple procedure which does require some preparation. Before starting the procedure it is necessary to collect vital information regarding the patient. This preparation helps identify if there are any issues since it involves the analysis of nerves, sinus and the jaw bone structure around the area to be operated. Often X-Ray scans are used to be absolutely sure there is no issue. Such scans have the ability to show the entire upper and lower teeth and bone structure which helps determine the bone health, thickness and height. The preparation also includes the making sure there is not gum decay or disease.
The procedure of dental implant can be performed at a well-equipped dentist clinic itself. It also may require some form of anaesthesia hence this could be local, general or intravenous sedation. Optionally it can also involve the use of nitrous oxide.
This is not a very lengthy procedure but it does span over 3 – 5 days, each session being approximately 30 minutes. Each stage of the procedure has the tasks clearly laid out.
- The First Stage involves making incision into the gums in order to expose the bones. A hole is also drilled into the bone for the implant to be placed.
- The implant is then inserted into the jaw bone such that it lies below the gum tissue.
- The tissue then needs to be sealed back in place to protect it from any issues due to chewing.
Once the healing process is over (in generally 4 – 6 month) the bonding process is over and the implants bonds itself to the bone.
The second part of the procedure takes place after the ossoinergratoin is complete. Hence once the bonding is successful there will need to be another session arranged with the dentist where the abutment is then installed. The abutment is what keeps all in place. It connects the crown with the implant. The process does involve opening the gums again to place the abutment after which it is closed.
At times the dentist may choose to place the abutment along with the implant (in the same surgery). This is perfectly normal and is also practiced if the dentist thinks it is suitable to do so. However a little extra care is required by the patient during the healing process following the procedure.
The gums will heal in roughly 2 weeks after which the artificial tooth is attached to the abutment. This artificial tooth is specially made based on the impression of your teeth on a model.
This is fairly risk free procedure and at the most may result in some minor bleeding of the gums during the procedure.
The cost factor
Dental implants can be expensive. Hence it is quite common for people to opt for doing it in a foreign country where it is slightly cheaper. Not everyone knows how must the cost hence the first thing that pops up in their mind is "What do dental implants cost?" There are many popular destinations as listed below along with the cost.
United States = $4250
Spain = $2750
Italy = $1800
Mexico = $1600
Romania = $1400
Lithuania = $1400
Costa Rica = $1000
Turkey = $1000
Hungary = $900
Thailand = $900
India = $850
Croatia = $850
That said there are several elements than affect the cost of the surgery like the initial examination, type of material used (like branded or not branded), the number of teeth to be replaced,
Pros and Cons
When it comes to picking from two possible solutions there are bound to be some advantages and disadvantages of choosing for either one. Hence I have listed them out for you so that you can make a more informed decision instead of playing guessing games or opting for the trial and error method.
Advantages of opting for Dental Implant:
- The dental implant is durable and more or less permanent.
- It is also affordable considering it is a one time solution.
- It ensures great comfort almost like the original and at the same time also looks natural.
- It doesn't require any special maintenance.
- It doesn't require disturbing any other teeth during the process.
- Has a very high success ratio.
Disadvantage of option for Dental Implant:
- It is a high onetime cost.
- There is the risk that the bone does not accept the implant, although this does not normally occur.
- The surgery can be painful and cause swelling and minor bleeding.
- The risk of damaging nerves of the adjacent muscles is small, but present as is risk of damaging the sinus cavity.
- The danger of infection exists if there is any break
Are you covered?
Many of us have the same question when we are seeking information about Dental Implant surgery and that is: "What do dental implants cost?" The fact of the matter is that the dental implant surgery can get quite expensive, hence the first thing to check is whether your insurance company covers them for you. Not all insurance plans will cover it hence you also have the option of talking to the Dentist himself to inquire about any payment options they can suggest. A dentist can help you with your teeth but he can also help you work out a good payment solution hence do not hesitate to ask him.
Designer Smiles Dentistry:
Designer Smiles Dentistry always makes sure you receive personalized care are treatment. They are a dedicated team of dentist 77459 and there is more to them just fixing or caring for your teeth. Here it is free to find the source of that excruciating pain or a quick examination. You will be treated if you are over the age of 5.


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Speak to one person at a time when you present. Can you imagine interviewing a person who looked at the wall or floor when answering your questions? This would not inspire your confidence in that person. In our culture we expect good, direct eye contact. (Note: This is one of the biggest cultural variables, always find out what the audience is comfortable with if you are presenting in a culture outside your own.) Yet in many presentations, a speaker will look at a spot on the back of the wall, or at a screen, or at notes—everywhere but into the eyes of the audience.
Eye contact opens the channel of communication between people. It helps establish and build rapport. It involves the audience in the presentation, and makes the presentation more personable. Good eye contact between the speaker and audience also helps relax the speaker by connecting the speaker to the audience and reducing the speaker's feeling of isolation.


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Perhaps to be a regular feature.
What's on your mind? What gets your goat?
Jason Matthews: Red Sparrow: A Novel (The Red Sparrow Trilogy)
Michael J. Totten: Where the West Ends: Stories from the Middle East, the Balkans, the Black Sea, and the Caucasus
Dennis Taylor: We Are Legion (We Are Bob) (Bobiverse) (Volume 1)
« Consultants, Scavengers & Squishy Meritocracy | Main | Thursday Fragments »


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''Mum look'' Ray cried. ''Look at the beautiful birds, they fly so quickly''. Ray pointed to the sky. His jeans were torn, his shoelaces untied.
''Yes Darling,'' Kat was frantic. ''Wonderful''. She was absent minded as she admired her newly manicured nails.
Kat heard her Mother's voice in her head. ''Pay attention to the boy Kat''.
Where had it gone? It was there a moment ago, and when she held up her hand to admire it, it was no longer there.
''I think I need a smaller size,'' she had mused, flicking her hair out of her face admiring her diamond ring set in a gold platinum. ''It seems a little loose''.
''Mum look''. Ray cried invading her thoughts. ''There's a rainbow''. He pointed at the blue sky above. ''One day I'll get you a gift wrapped in multi coloured ribbons''. His hair was dirty and unkempt.
Her Mother's voice came through her thoughts again. ''Pay attention to the boy Kat''.
'Yes Ray'', Kat grabbed his hand. 'Beautiful rainbow. Wonderful gift''. Her 6 inch heels clicked on the ground as she strode along.
She'd been out on a shopping spree. ''Pick up my things for me Ray.'' Kat pointed at her bags as she searched all around.
Her thoughts were elsewhere as she looked high and low. In the playground park, out on the street, re-tracing every step.
Where in the world was it? Her heart beat fast as she thought of the loss. She glanced at her expensive watch and smeared on her lipstick.
''Ray, please, could you help Mummy find her ring? It's the most important thing right now.'' Kat pulled Ray along. ''She's lost it, have you seen it?''.
Ray pulled his coat closer to him, he was cold and shivering.
She ran to and fro, asking around. Sweet shop keepers nodded no, ''Sorry love''.
Butchers were busy selling the latest piece of meat. ''Sorry, no''.
The homeless man replied ''No, but could you spare some change please?''.
Kat dragged Ray along as he pulled at her coat tail.
''Mum look''. He said, his eyes welled with tears as he held out his hand.
''Not now Ray, I have more important things to think about!''.
Back at home Kat raved on the phone to her Mother.
''I don't know, Mum, I told you, it was there one moment, and then the next, it had disappeared''.
''Mum look'' Ray patted her thigh, holding out his hand. His lips were blue, his tiny body shook.
''Ray please! I am on the phone. Make yourself a hot drink and go to bed!'' Kat's voice was sharp.
''You know, you should take it easy on him'' Her Mother said softly. ''Take some time out for him. Pay attention to the boy''.
''Yes, OK Mum. Off course.'' Kat paced up and down, looking under the couch, out on the balcony, behind the curtains.
She threw back her duvet and found nothing. She sighed, exasperated, running her fingers through her hair.
She hear a sudden crash and Ray scream.
''Mum!!'' He called.
She found him unconscious, milk all over the kitchen floor. His body was cold. Kat looked at his torn jeans, untied shoe laces, unkempt hair, dirty face, and touched his cold blue lips.
''Somebody help me!" She cried.
At the hospital the Doctor was sympathetic, he consoled Kat in a hug.
"I'm sorry''. He shook his head. ''Meningitis. There was nothing we could do''.
''No!!" Kat howled.
Back at home, Kat fell to her knees. Her hair was messy, face tear stained, mis-matched clothes thrown on at her rush to the hospital.
''Please forgive me.'' She cried to open air. She called her Mother. ''Mama, you were right. I should have paid more attention'', she whispered, heart broken, tears rolling down her face, the phone fell from her hand.
She walked bleary eyed into Ray's room, and sat on his bed.
She looked around his room, pale, tear streaked face. She glimpsed something shiny from his bedside table. A note and a gift wrapped in multi coloured ribbons.
She picked up the note. ''Mama Look... I got you a gift''. It read. ''I found it in the park and I tried to tell you, but you were too busy. Even though I didn't feel too good, I wanted to help you because you were the most important thing to me...and I knew this was the most important thing to you''.
She unwrapped it to find a beautiful diamond set in a gold platinum ring.
Kat closed her eyes and wept.


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Mass Customization Monday #15
Yet another edition of Mass Customization Monday where we've searched high and low on the internets to find you the very best mass customization news.
Mass customized packaging on demand with MyLabel.One
The MyLabel.One online tool
This article tells us that people are willing to pay up to 60% more for a mass customized product. Mylabel.One is a German company that is offering mass customization and personalized labels with a minimum order quantity of one. That means that you could buy a single item and then they will put your logo on it and also further enable the personalization of that item with your customer's name. MyLabel.One is an online tool that lets you personalize and mass personalize and also offers you the online renderings of how the personalized packaging will look.
Some Rathgeber label customers.
MyLabel.One is a subsidiary of the third generation family owned Rathgeber group which has over 23,000 enterprise customers in aluminium labeled plates, metal signs, product seals and other labeling solutions.
A typical Rathgeber product, an anodized aluminium plate for Bernecker & Rainer, a company also on the mass customization path.
German family owned companies are generally seen as conservative. These often high engineering, high value, high R&D firms typically have quality products that dominate niches. Labeling is a wide application area with a lot of competition and Rathgeber is one of only a handful of companies that have been able to evolve over the past 65 years with the market of high quality labels of all kinds. In essence their products often were already mass customized with the company making a compliance label which would then be stamped on printed on in order to label an individual product. Now they've evolved and are directly offering to anyone unique personalized labels. This seems to be a very astute move by the company. More brands, lower barriers to entry and the growth of mass customization could all point to firms, designers and entrepreneurs using their MyLabel.One tool.
Newegg offers outsourced customization and logistics services
Electronics e commerce company Newegg, which is one of the US's largest online electronics retailers is offering outsourced customization and logistics services. Newegg now offers customers warehousing and order processing, reverse logistics to take back returns and customers can also piggyback on Newegg's low parcel shipping rates. Companies can also get mass customized leaflets, packaging and even assembly help with their products. Manufacturers, resellers and distributors can now use Newegg to ship to their customers.
Newegg's Indianapolis Smart Fulfillment Center.
On the one hand this is an effect stemming from Amazon's incredible reach and scale. Amazon made its infrastructure available by letting people rent its AWS servers and space. Companies can also sell via Amazon on its marketplace and make use of services from the company. By turning itself inside out and letting customers make use of its infrastructure Amazon has made a smart (and very profitable!) move into making money while offsetting the costs needed to build new infrastructure and maintain it. It will be interesting to see if many companies can and will copy such an arrangement as Newegg has done. How else could one in the long run compete with Amazon? At the same time this move democratizes retail and branding even more. Anyone can now sell on eBay, Etsy, Amazon and other online retailers. Anyone can also buy from AliBaba and directly from many vendors. One person companies can buy advertising on Facebook and Google as well. Commerce is being democratized. Newegg now lets you piggyback on their infrastructure and could make you an online merchant with your own brand.
Okuma Corporation and Hitachi to set up IoT and mass customization factory
Okuma Corporation and Hitachi are working together to set up a demonstration factory to use mass customization and IoT in an efficient way at the Okuma Dream Site 2.
"The target of this demonstration experiment is to increase productivity by twice and to reduce production lead time by 50% at DS2. Given recent trends in the manufacturing industry, such as the rapid development of diversification in customers' needs and digital technology as well as intensified global competition, manufacturers are required to achieve mass customization that delivers productivity equivalent to that of mass production, even in ultra-high-mix low-volume manufacturing, which caters to the needs of individual customers. With this background, production planning often needs to be changed due to order interruptions for the quick delivery of a product or an unexpected change in the deadline or specifications, creating issues of interrupt production reduce. Using big data collected from the field and accumulated by the monitoring system regarding the progress and operational status and employment of the advanced automatic learning simulation AI technology, the next step is to develop this into a system that automatically and dynamically generates a high-precision production schedule according to the ever-changing situations in the field,"
The Okuma corporation is a machine tool builder that makes CNC machines as well as factory automation. Hitachi is a global conglomerate that makes everything from harddisks to air conditioners to trains & elevators. The two companies have previously worked together on Okuma Dream Site 1, a factory meant to look at variable mix variable volume production of lathes in a highly automated way.
The first Okuma Dream Site. In the future the only people may be visitors or tour guides.
This was their initial step in 2013 into looking at Industrie 4.0 or smart factories. These factories deploy automation, sensors and robots in a more fundamental way and ideally can do variable mix variable volume production in a fully automated way. By incorporating IoT into their next factory the company aims to harvest more sensor data in an automated way and analyze this with AI and learning algorithms to improve production as well as make their production methods more suitable for mass customization. Hitachi also has a Lumada platform which is meant to be a single 'universe' for implementing and tracking with IoT.
Hitachi's Lumada platform.
This seems like a very good step for both Okuma and Hitachi. Not only can both companies learn to use IoT and AI to manufacture more efficiently they could then resell their offerings and expertise to customers. In face of increasing competition globally from lower cost competitors companies have to increasingly provide value in the intelligent optimization of processes, monitoring and overall production. Siemens, GE and other companies are also devoting significant resources in making AI, IoT, digital personas and mass customization a reality in manufacturing.
Corydon Customs makes custom Diecast Models
Corydon Customs makes personalized die cast models. Diecast automobiles were some of the most popular toys years back. The company now lets you mass customize cars, fire trucks and police cruisers. Names, logos and other identifying marks of departments can be added to the die cast models. The company is targeting fire departments and police departments in the US with its mass custom toy cars. They also have made logo cars, trucks and vans for brands. Packaging can be customized as well to include the name of the recipient.
Nostalgia, pride and desk toys are all combined in this mass customized gift. This is a very cost effective way to build team spirit and pride in an organization especially one where a lot of your employees are in cars. The die cast car can be kept as a memento, desk toy or given to a child. What other personalized things could similarly combine team building with nostalgia?


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Customers Also Bought
Jun 2014
jus as expected- recommendable. I really can not say very much about this product, it is a simple connector, of course, I bought it, and I really recommend it, in fact I have ordered 2 more, it is a simple design, it complies with all the international I... – translate
Mar 2013
Good price and good product. It is realy inexpensive. It work pretty well with my stereo. I use it for connecting 2 audio RCA device in my stereo who only have 1 input. I buy 2 for doing my setup. Both work well. Nothing! except the little bending to... – translate
see more reviews...
Mar 2013
good. Handy for video editing, like putting both sound tracks onto one channel, ******************************************* They do take up a little room, so if you are using them on a unit that has rows of jacks close together,... – translate


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WHATEVER use early human ancestors had for the stone tools of the Gona River region of Ethiopia, now dated as the oldest such implements ever found, some archeologists and other scientists are wielding them as cudgels in a war of words resounding with charges of claim-jumping, fossil theft and neocolonialism.
The battle pits Ethiopian archeologists, backed by American allies, against the Institute of Human Origins in Berkeley, Calif., home base of Dr. Donald C. Johanson, discoverer of the famous Lucy fossils and one of the world's most prominent paleoanthropologists. Over the last year, the institute has been beset by troubles, including internal dissension and the loss of a major source of financial support.
The allegations were first made publicly last month at the annual meeting of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists in Oakland, Calif. At the conclusion of his announcement of the 2.6-million-year date for the tools, Sileshi Semaw, an Ethiopian doctoral student at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J., stunned the audience by adding, "I would like to bring to your attention a violation of professional ethics."
Mr. Semaw charged that last October a team of scientists from the Berkeley institute invaded his excavation site near the Gona River, where he said he had an exclusive license from the Ethiopian Government to dig. The team found teeth from the human ancestors, or hominids, the species of which is as yet unidentified, who had lived there and presumably made and used the stone tools.
The institute team, Mr. Semaw further charged, "sieved the spot, picked up the hominid and left the dirt on the underlying fauna and stone artifacts." This not only robbed him of important evidence he needed to complete his interpretation of the tools for his doctoral dissertation, he said in an interview, but disturbed the site for future research. Formal complaints have been filed with the Ethiopian Ministry of Culture, he said.Continue reading the main story
Later at the meeting, Dr. Johanson, who had not been with the team, denied the allegations. Dr. William Kimbel, director of science at the institute, was with the team, and in an interview last week he said, "The allegations are outrageous and absolutely false."
Dr. Ian Tattersall, a paleoanthropologist at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, said, "I find it extremely unlikely that Bill would indulge in anything like claim-jumping."
But one of Ethiopia's most experienced anthropologists, Dr. Berhane Asfaw, came to his colleague's defense at the conference, issuing a politically charged warning that his country would not tolerate "neocolonialist paleoanthropologists." He repeated the warning in a recent lecture to the Rutgers anthropology department, where he is a visiting professor this semester.
Once before, in the 1980's, Ethiopia closed its borders to foreign fossil hunters. Anthropologists were worried that the new tempest might provoke another ban on explorations in these regions abounding in hominid fossils and artifacts.
Dr. Jack W. K. Harris, chairman of the anthropology department at Rutgers and Mr. Semaw's dissertation adviser, joined in the accusations against the Berkeley institute. "This is totally unethical," he said. "A doctoral student's research is supposed to be original. You can't go into his territory, where he's been working for years, and take away some of his material."
At the bottom of the dispute may be an honest misunderstanding of site boundaries, exacerbated by rivalries and jealousies of long standing. Ethiopian officials may have issued overlapping excavation permits to the two groups.
Dr. Paul R. Renne, president of the Berkeley Geochronology Center, a research organization founded last year by a group of geologists that split off from the Institute for Human Origins, said that site maps show "pretty clearly" that the area claimed by the institute "got bigger and bigger in the course of several years." He added that this could be the result of "sloppy work on the part of the Ethiopian ministry, or there could be other explanations." He would not be more specific.
Dr. Renne had worked with the institute team in the contested area. But when Gordon Getty, a San Francisco philanthropist whose money helped start the institute, withdrew his financial support in an apparent falling-out with Dr. Johanson, the institute decided to cut costs by closing its geochronology department, dismissing Dr. Renne and seven other scientists. Their subsequent lawsuit against the institute, Dr. Renne said, is "now on the verge of settlement."
The disputed exploration area lies in the eastern part of the land around two branches of the Gona River where Mr. Semaw, with his adviser, Dr. Harris, have had a permit to work since 1987. That area is adjacent to the region, known as Hadar, where Dr. Johanson has been searching for fossils since the early 1970's. It was there in 1973 that he discovered the three-million-year-old Lucy skeleton, then the earliest known hominid, which was given the scientific name of Australopithecus afarensis.
Permits for research sites are reviewed annually, and, as Dr. Kimbel explained, the institute requested and in 1991 was granted a new permit that extended its Hadar site into part of the eastern Gona region. In 1992 and again in 1993, he said, the institute conducted research in the eastern Gona area, accompanied by Mr. Semaw and Dr. Harris, who were concentrating on archeology, as well as Dr. Renne and Dr. Ray Bernor, a paleontologist at Howard University who is now supporting Mr. Semaw's charges.
"No one on the teams at the time ever questioned for one minute our presence at that site," Dr. Kimbel said.
To support his complaint, Mr. Semaw has circulated a photocopy of the institute's 1990 permit application, which stated that "the Gona archeological sites lie outside the permit area." That was true for 1990, Dr. Kimbel countered, but not after 1991. Mr. Semaw said, however, that he had received assurances from Ethiopian officials that his right to work the Gona site had not changed.
The first Dr. Kimbel knew of the problem was a year ago, he said. When he invited Mr. Semaw to join the institute team again, Mr. Semaw responded with charges of trespassing on his site and collecting fossils behind his back. As a result, Dr. Kimbel said he had Ethiopian officials drive with him around the boundaries of the institute's permit site and confirm that they incorporated the disputed eastern Gona zone.
The Ethiopian Ministry of Culture has yet to comment on the controversy.
Each side in the dispute ascribes ulterior motives to the other, and scientists looking on tend to agree that other factors contributed to the escalation of the controversy.
Those backing Mr. Semaw suspected the institute team of being jealous of recent successes of others working in Ethiopia and of coveting a promising site in the hope of restoring its reputation after last year's damaging internecine battles. The institute, Dr. Renne said, "is dependent on hitting scientific home runs and this blinded them to the normal sensibilities scientists should have."
Others suggested that it was no coincidence that scientists like Dr. Renne who were dismissed by the institute are allied with Mr. Semaw, perhaps out of resentment. The Ethiopians themselves, some paleontologists said, might be frustrated because they feel they get little credit for their part in the fossil discoveries and receive inadequate compensation from foreign teams.
But Dr. Kimbel said the Berkeley institute has given Ethiopian scientists more than $224,000 in computers and other equipment, and in scholarships. The institute provided Mr. Semaw with grants totaling $95,000 for his education in the United States, he said.
Controversy is not new to paleoanthropology, where egos can be big, the scramble for money never ending and the prospect of understanding human origins alluring but elusive. "Paleoanthropology is likely to suffer from all this," lamented Dr. Tattersall of the American Museum of Natural History. "I thought we'd got beyond those issues of personalities and could concentrate on the issues of science."Continue reading the main story


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a. Look her up and down and say to him "wow", your standards have really come down.
b. Politely introduce yourself, give him a kiss on the cheek, and walk away.
c. Focus on having fun with your friends and totally ignore them.
a. Flag down an usher and ask him to have a word with the guy.
b. Whip around and say "dude", they can hear you across the stadium.
c. Flash a huge grin and tell him " Keep it down" and I might let you buy me a beer when we win.
a. Tell him a funny vacation story that involves you in a teeny bikini.
b. Ask about his job, hobbies and family. Maybe he'll reciprocate by asking you about yourself.
c. Say "I'm not feeling well" let's get the check and then give him the silent treatment until you leave.
a. Will this help? and slip him a $20.
b. My supercute girlfriends are at the end of the line. Can you pull some strings for us?
c. You're not seriously going to make me wait, are you?
a. Give him a hands on tutorial of your hot spots.
b. Tell him it's not working and flip on the TV.
c. Figure you,re just hard to satisfy and make the best of it.
1. a=2, b=1, c=0
2. a=0, b=2, c=1
3. a=1, b=0, c=2
4. a=0, b=1, c=2
5. a=1, b=2, c=0
You live every week like it's Shark Week, anyone who crosses your path risk losing a limb. Being snide about your ex boyfriend's new girl or bitchy to a bouncer is unattractive and it won't win anyone over.
You have the perfect combo of charisma and confidence, with a splash of sex bomb. People help you because you're charmingly disarming and present requests that benefits the offender. Also you know that when you don't have the upper hand, it's better to work your assets that to kick ass.
You may fell shy or fearful about stepping on toes. But muzzling yourself comes off as insecure and people don't respect doormats. So ask for what you desire when a dude can't turn you on and don't be afraid to flirt your way to the front of a line.
Feel free to grab this.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Sunday, October 26, 2008
The newly wed couple. Mr and Mrs. Forest Wayne EatonMy family. Mom Debbie, my brother in law Bobby, my husband,me,Helen,my brother in James and dad Jim.Dad and mom,my husband and me and granny ViMy bridesmaid Helen. I will be posting more pictures soon guys.
Friday, October 24, 2008
It's our first year anniversary today and tomorrow were going to get married,were so excited and we thank God that we found each other. I love my baby so much. Happy anniversary mahal ko
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Granny,me,miss and mom.
My baby and mom fixing the stuff we got.
The stuff we got so far.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Sunday, October 19, 2008
This is my cousin Sheila Mae Baluran. She's the eldest daughter of my dad's elder sister. We grew up together but she is a year older than me. We are like sisters. We use to go out all the time when we were still together and I really miss her since I'm already here in the states. But we still talk online. She is a teacher and this woman as I call her a small but terrible woman. She's not afraid to do things and will really stand on her belief and will fight for it. She is such a wonderful woman and she's always there for me whenever I need her. I also use to call her my diary because I just tell everything that I've been through in my life. She never complain but instead she's always a shoulder to cry on. To my cousin I thank you so much for always being there for me that eventhough I'm here in the states now you are always there to support me and will always give some advice. I know saying thank you is not just enough for all the things you've done for me and I know one day I will give it back to you. I know you are not asking for any payback but you deserve it. I only wish that you stay strong. Stay as good as you are and to be always happy and I know you are with your special someone. HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY CUZ, I just wish I was there to greet you personally but one day soon we will see each other again. Just a bit of information about the two of us when we are together. We can stay up all night long and just keep talking of everything underneath the sun. We love to share stories,we love to share updates in our lives and I really miss that. But to my cousin, you are such a blessing to each one of us. I love you cuz and HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Went to the flea market and garade sale
|Around the eighth century, the Christian church made November 1 All Saints' Day to honor all of the saints that didn't have a special day of their own. The mass held on All Saints' Day was called All Hallowmas (the mass of all Hallows -- saintly people). The night before was known as All Hallows Eve. Eventually this name became Halloween.
In the 5th century BC, in Celtic Ireland, summer officially ended on October 31. The holiday was called Samhain , the Celtic New year. On that day, the disembodied spirits of all those who had died throughout the preceding year would come back in search of living bodies to possess for the next year. It was believed to be their only hope for the afterlife. The Celts believed all laws of space and time were suspended during this time, allowing the spirit world to intermingle with the living. Naturally, the living did not want to be possessed, so on the night of October 31, the villagers would extinguish the fires in their homes, to make them cold and undesirable. They would then dress up in and parade around the neighborhood, being as destructive as possible in order to frighten away spirits looking for bodies to possess.
The custom of Halloween was brought to America in the 1840's by Irish immigrants fleeing their country's potato famine. At that time, the favorite pranks in New England included tipping over outhouses and unhinging fence gates.
The custom of trick-or-treating is thought to have originated with a ninth-century European custom called souling. On November 2, All Souls Day, early Christians would walk from village to village begging for "soul cakes," made out of square pieces of bread with currants. The more soul cakes the beggars would receive, the more prayers they would promise to say on behalf of the dead relatives of the donors. At the time, it was believed that the dead remained in limbo for a time after death, and that prayer, even by strangers, could expedite a soul's passage to heaven. The Jack-o-lantern custom probably comes from Irish folklore. As the tale is told, a man named Jack, who was notorious as a drunkard and trickster, tricked Satan into climbing a tree. Jack then carved an image of a cross in the tree's trunk, trapping the devil up the tree. Jack made a deal with the devil that, if he would never tempt him again, he would promise to let him down the tree.
According to the folk tale, after Jack died, he was denied entrance to Heaven because of his evil ways, but he was also denied access to Hell because he had tricked the devil. Instead, the devil gave him a single ember to light his way through the frigid darkness. The ember was placed inside a hollowed-out turnip to keep it glowing longer. The Irish used turnips as their "Jack's lanterns" originally. But when the immigrants came to America, they found that pumpkins were far more plentiful than turnips. So the Jack-O-Lantern in America was a hollowed-out pumpkin, lit with an ember.
Many people view Halloween as a time of innocent fun. Children love to dress up as their favorite characters. They will go door to door saying the infamous words "trick or treat". Many adults also love Halloween, because it gives them a chance to let loose and act silly. Every year in the U.S.A. alone, millions of dollars are spent on Halloween goods. Halloween is the second highest grossing money maker outside of Christmas. The promotion of Halloween by the television moguls, the advertisers, and not to mention the blockbuster sales of movies and rentals this time of year. Everyone can see Halloween is big business. Allot of people do not see the harm in all of this Halloween hoopla. But yes, there is a darker side to Halloween than anyone dares to imagine.
Unlike our modern-day Halloween, theirs was not a children's holiday. The Celts and their priests, the Druids, from Great Britain and Ireland. They celebrated "SAMHAIN". It was a festival that marked the eve of the Celtic New Year, which began on November 1. The fall harvest was complete and winter was looming ahead. The Celts believed the sun was fading away, at this time of the year. For the next several months, darkness prevailed. The Celts believed that during "Samhain" the veil separating life from death was at its thinnest. On the evening of October 31, the evil spirits and souls of the dead passed through the barrier and visited the world of the living. The Celts believed these spirits could cause all kind of havoc. They also believed that they could talk with the dead, departed loved ones and such. They also believed that they could Devine the future. The powers of darkness were conjured up on "Samhain". The Devil himself, would be called upon to foretell of future events.
Friday, October 17, 2008
he was walking along the beach with the
Lord. Scenes from his life flashed across
the sky and he noticed two sets of
footprints in the sand: one belonged to him
and the other to the Lord
When the last scene of his life flashed
before him, he recalled that at the lowest and
saddest times of his life there was only one
set of footprints.
Dismayed, he asked, " Lord you said that
once I decided to follow you, you'd walk with
me all the way. I don't understand why, when
I needed you most, you would leave me"
The Lord replied," My precious child. I love
you and I would never leave. During
your times of trials and suffering, when you
only saw one set of footprints...
That was then that I carried you
RAINY FRIDAY and MISSING MY BEHALF
As I sit infront of the computer, I could hear that it's raining outside. It's getting cold again and me personally don't like it. I easily get cold,eventhough it's not raining,I'm still cold. I'm still thinking of what to do today but I guess I will go back to bed and get some sleep. I did'nt slept well last night because I went to bed around 2am if I'm not mistaken and got up at 10:30 in the morning. Well, it's just one of my lazy days especially when it's raining. I don't know how long this rain will last but I am really freezing right now and feeling sleepy again.
As the day passes by, I am missing my behalf more and lately I've been missing him so bad. He is still at work right now and hopefully next week he will be home because I really miss him. I always pray to God to keep him safe in everything he do and protect him from any harm and danger. Talking on the phone helps a bit but it is alot better when I can hold him. But I know not before long now and he will be home and I'm so excited to see him and I could hardly wait. I'm just really miss him right now.
Have a great day everyone
I know most people had experienced how to be stressed,especially now that our economy is down. Stress may sometimes ruin our day and will make us moody to do things around and that's very disappointing because you can't act the way you want to act because somethings bothering you. How we truly overcome stress? As I was reading I found this & new ways to take tension taming to the next level STRESS BUSTERS:
1. GO FOR A WALK when tension strikes, you put on your sneakers and hit the pavement. You can also do self talk while you walk,in that way you probably know that walking walking lowers stress levels significantly because the exercise causes our bodies to release endorphins ( the brain chemicals that calm us).
2. WATCH DANCING WITH THE STARS. You forget your troubles by curling up on the couch to watch celebrities do tango and the cha-cha. Vegging out in front of a favorite TV show can distract you for a time but this escape from reality approach known as avoidance coping,offers no long-term stress reduction.
3.SPEND SOME TIME ALONE. Cooling off by your lonesome helps you clear your head and keeps you from lashing out at your husband or kids.
4. REACH FOR ICE CREAM. Nothing lulls you into a state of relaxation quite like a bowl of rocky road. There's a reason we feel an urge to reach for goodies high in fat and sugar when we're under stress. Eating these foods triggers the release of serotin, a feel good chemical, in the brain.
5. TIDY UP THE HOUSE. Your weapons of choice against stress are a vacuum and a to do list. Your home is often a metaphor for your life. Cleaning and putting stuff back where it belongs relieves tension by giving you a feeling of control and a sense of accomplishment.
6. TREAT YOURSELF TO SOME RETAIL THERAPY. Purchasing a pair of shoes calms every anxiety. Rewarding yourself during tense times, even with something as small as a new lipstick, can make you feel better. A massage is also a perfect example to indulged yourself. It relaxes muscles and lowers blood pressure and heart rate.
7. CONFIDE WITH A FRIEND. When you're feeling frazzled, you pick up the phone to gripe to a friend. Relaying the details of a stressful situation to a friend can be a comforting.
I hope this will help us a bit on how to overcome our stress..Have a stress free day everyone.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Serena Williams is so good in tennis court
Serena Jameka Williams (born September 26, 1981) is a professional tennis player who is currently ranked World No. 2. She has won 18 Grand Slam titles: nine in singles, seven in women's doubles, and two in mixed doubles. She also has won two Olympic gold medals in women's doubles. She is the most recent player, male or female, to have held all four Grand Slam singles titles simultaneously. In 2005, Tennis magazine ranked her as the 17th-best player of the preceding forty years. She is the younger sister of a former World No. 1 professional female tennis player, Venus Williams. Serena currently resides at Ballen Isles in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.
|Serena Jameka Williams
|Williams playing World Team Tennis in 2008
|United States
|Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, U.S. [1]
|Date of birth
|September 26, 1981 (1981-09-26) (age 27)
|Place of birth
|Saginaw, Michigan, U.S.
|5 ft 9 in (1.75 m)[1]
|150 lb (68 kg)[1]
|Turned pro
|Right; Two-handed backhand
|Career prize money
(3nd in all-time rankings)[2]
|Career record:
|Career titles:
|Highest ranking:
|No. 1 (July 8, 2002) (September 8, 2008)
|Grand Slam results
|Australian Open
|French Open
|US Open
|Major tournaments
|WTA Championships
|Olympic Games
|Career record:
|Career titles:
|Highest ranking:
|No. 5 (October 11, 1999)
|Grand Slam doubles results
|Australian Open
|French Open
|US Open
[edit] Early years
Serena was born in Saginaw, Michigan. When she and her four sisters were young, their parents, Richard and Oracene (also called Brandy), moved to the Los Angeles suburb of Compton. Her father dreamed of making at least one of his daughters a tennis superstar, hoping that involvement in sports would give them an opportunity for a better life. The children were homeschooled.
When Serena was four and a half, she won her first tournament, and she entered 49 tournaments by the age of 10, winning 46 of them. At one point, she replaced her sister Venus as the number one ranked tennis player aged 12 or under in California.
In 1991, Richard Williams, saying that he hoped to prevent his daughters from facing racism, stopped sending them to national junior tennis tournaments, and Serena attended a tennis school run by professional player Rick Macci in Haines City, Florida at Greneleaf Resort and Conference Center instead. Macci had already helped the careers of Jennifer Capriati and Mary Pierce, among others. Soon Richard, who had struck a deal on behalf of his daughters with a major clothing company, was able to move the rest of the Williams family to West Palm Beach, to be near Serena and Venus.
[edit] 1995-1998
Williams became a professional in September 1995 at the age of 14. Because of her age, she had to participate in non-WTA events at first. Her first professional event was the tournament in Quebec City, where she was ousted in less than an hour of play.
Williams's biggest achievement of 1997 was her run in Chicago; ranked World No. 304, she upset both Monica Seles and Mary Pierce, recording her first career wins over top 10 players. She finished 1997 at World No. 99.
1998 was the first year that Williams finished ranked in the WTA top 20. She began the year in Sydney as a qualifier, ranked World No. 96, and defeated World No. 3 Lindsay Davenport in a quarterfinal. Williams was then expected to do well in her first Grand Slam tournament, but lost in the second round of the Australian Open to sister Venus.
Williams reached six other quarterfinals during the year. She won the mixed doubles titles at Wimbledon and the US Open with Max Mirnyi, completing the Williams family's sweep of the 1998 mixed doubles Grand Slams. Williams won her first pro title in doubles at Oklahoma City with sister Venus, becoming the third pair of sisters to win a WTA tour women's doubles title. She earned U.S. $2.6 million in prize money during the year.
In 1999, Serena defeated Amélie Mauresmo in the final of the Open Gaz de France tournament in Paris, the same day that Venus won the tournament in Oklahoma City. This was the first time in professional tennis history that two sisters had won titles in the same week.[citation needed]
In March, Williams won the Tier I Pacific Life Open in Indian Wells, California, becoming the second of only five unseeded Tier I champions in WTA history. Williams (ranked 21st) defeated the World No. 2 Lindsay Davenport in the second round, the World No. 8 Mary Pierce in a quarterfinal, and the World No. 7 Steffi Graf in the three-set final.
At the Tier I Sony Ericsson Open in Key Biscayne, Florida, sister Venus halted Serena's 16-match winning streak in the final. This was the first all-sister singles final during the open era. Serena defeated World No. 3 Monica Seles and World No. 1 Martina Hingis en route to the final.
On April 5, 1999, Serena made her top 10 debut at World No. 9. Venus was ranked sixth the same week, marking the first time that two sisters appeared in the top ten simultaneously since April 22, 1991, when Manuela and Katerina Maleeva were in the top ten.
Williams teamed with sister Venus to win the women's doubles title at the French Open but lost in the third round in singles at that tournament. Williams missed Wimbledon because of an injury.
In the summer, Williams won the hard court tournament in Los Angeles, defeating World No. 8 Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, World No. 1 Hingis, and Julie Halard-Decugis.
At the US Open, the seventh-seeded Williams defeated World No. 4 Seles, World No. 2 Davenport, and World No. 1 Hingis to become the lowest seed to win the titleand the second African-American woman (after Althea Gibson in 1958) to win a Grand Slam singles tournament.
Williams went on to take the Grand Slam Cup in Munich, defeating Venus in the final.
Williams won her singles match and doubles match during the tie between the United States and Russia in the final of the Fed Cup. The U.S. won four of the five matches and its 16th title overall. In their doubles match, Serena and Venus defeated Elena Dementieva and Elena Makarova 6–2, 6–1.
Williams finished the year at World No. 4 in just her second full year on the main tour.
Williams became the focus of many ad campaigns, including one with shoe and clothes maker Puma, which signed her to a U.S.$12 million agreement.
Following her breakthrough season, Williams's results declined slightly in 2000. Her best Grand Slam showing was a run to the semifinals at Wimbledon, before losing to sister and eventual champion Venus. Her defense of the US Open title came to a disappointing end when she fell to Lindsay Davenport in straight sets in the quarterfinals.
Perhaps the highlight of Williams's year was picking up the gold medal at the Sydney Olympics for women's doubles, along with Venus. The Williams sisters also teamed up to take the women's doubles title at Wimbledon, while Serena picked up singles titles in Hanover, Los Angeles and Tokyo. She finished the year at number six, a slight decline on her finish the year before.
Williams reached the quarterfinals of the Australian Open for the first time before falling to World No. 1 Martina Hingis. Serena and her sister Venus won the women's doubles title there, becoming only the fifth women's doubles team in history to win all four Grand Slam doubles titles during their career, a "Career Grand Slam".
Williams then won the Tier I Pacific Life Open in Indian Wells, California.
Williams reached the quarterfinals at both the French Open and Wimbledon.
During the North American summer hard court season, Williams captured her second title of the year at the Tier I Rogers Cup in Toronto, defeating World No. 3 and top-seeded Jennifer Capriati in the final. At the US Open, Williams defeated Hingis in the semifinals to reach her second Grand Slam final before losing to sister Venus.
At the year-ending WTA Tour Championships, Williams saved eight match points before defeating Capriati in the semifinals. She then won the final by default when Lindsay Davenport withdrew.
Williams finished the year at World No. 6 for the second straight year.
|This section does not cite any references or sources.
Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. (April 2008)
Williams was forced to withdraw from the Australian Open due to injury but won her first event of the year in Scottsdale, defeating World No. 1 Jennifer Capriati in the final. She then won the Tier I NASDAQ-100 Open in Key Biscayne, Florida, again defeating Capriati in the final. She then captured her first career title on clay at the Tier I Internazionali BNL d'Italia in Rome, defeating Justine Henin in the final.
Williams was the third-seeded player at the French Open and dropped just two sets en route to the final. She then defeated sister Venus 7–5, 6–3. At Wimbledon, Williams won the title without dropping a set, defeating Venus once again in the final. This win earned Williams the World No. 1 ranking (dethroning her sister and becoming the second African-American woman to hold that ranking on the Women's Tennis Association computer). The Williams sisters also won the doubles title at this event.
Williams captured her third straight Grand Slam singles title at the US Open, once again not dropping a set en route, and defeated Venus yet again in the final in straight sets. Williams then won back-to-back titles in Leipzig and Tokyo. She reached the final at the year-ending Home Depot Championships but lost to 19-year-old Kim Clijsters 7–5, 6–3.
Williams finished 2002 with a 56–5 record, eight singles titles, and the World No. 1 ranking.
|This section does not cite any references or sources.
Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. (April 2008)
At the Australian Open, Williams dropped only one set while reaching the semifinals. She then defeated Kim Clijsters 4–6, 6–3, 7–5, recovering from a 5–1 deficit in the third set and saving two match points. She then faced her sister Venus for the fourth consecutive Grand Slam final and won in three sets, to become the fifth woman in the open era to complete a Career Grand Slam, joining Billie Jean King, Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, and Steffi Graf. The Williams sisters won their sixth doubles title together at this event.
Williams then captured titles at the Open Gaz de France in Paris and the Tier I NASDAQ-100 Open in Key Biscayne, Florida and went into the French Open trying to capture her fifth consecutive Grand Slam singles title. However, she lost to eventual champion Justine Henin in the semifinals 6–2, 4–6, 7–5 (having led by a break in the third set) in a match marred by controversy, in which Williams was booed. Two weeks later, however, Williams won her sixth Grand Slam singles title at Wimbledon, defeating Henin in the semifinals 6–3, 6–2 before defeating Venus in the final.
Wimbledon was Williams's last event of the year, as a knee injury forced her to withdraw from all other events (including the US Open). As a result, she lost her World No. 1 ranking to Clijsters in August, having held it for 57 weeks. Williams finished the year ranked World No. 3, despite having played only seven tournaments plus Fed Cup.
Williams's older sister, Yetunde Price, was murdered on the morning of September 14, 2003, by gunshots as she passed by in a car driven by a man in the Compton area.
Williams withdrew from the Australian Open to continue rehabilitating her left knee. After eight months away from the tour, Williams began her comeback at the Tier I NASDAQ-100 Open in Key Biscayne, Florida, where she defeated Elena Dementieva in the final. She then lost in the French Open quarterfinals to Jennifer Capriati 6–3, 2–6, 6–3, which was the first time she had lost before the semifinals at a Grand Slam singles tournament since Wimbledon in 2001. She reached the final of Wimbledon, but in one of the most surprising upsets in the tournament's history, the 17-year old Russian player, Maria Sharapova, defeated Williams 6–1, 6–4.
On July 30, Williams withdrew from her quarterfinal match in San Diego against Russia's Vera Zvonareva with another left knee injury. On August 1, she announced her withdrawal from the Rogers Cup due to the same injury. The injury also forced her to pull out of the Summer Olympics.
Williams's next tournament was the US Open, where she lost a quarterfinal match to Capriati. The match was plagued by disputes over calls with the umpire. Williams protested later on the Ellen show by wearing a bright orange shirt with white capital letters, stating "THE BALL WAS IN!"
At the China Open in Beijing, Williams defeated the newly crowned US Open champion, Svetlana Kuznetsova, in the final. Williams earned enough points there to reach the WTA Tour Championships, where she again lost to Sharapova in the final. Williams suffered a stomach muscle strain during the match after leading 6–4, 2–1, consequently Williams began delivering serves barely reaching the 100 mph mark and Sharapova eventually won the match, 4–6, 6–2, 6–4. Despite the loss, Williams finished the year at World No. 7.
Williams won the Australian Open, her seventh Grand Slam singles title. She defeated three of the tournament's top four seeds (#2 Amélie Mauresmo, #4 Maria Sharapova, and #1 Lindsay Davenport) en route to the title. Williams saved three match points against Sharapova in the semifinals. The win moved her up to World No. 2, and Williams stated she was now targeting the number one spot in the foreseeable future.
Williams did not reach the final at any of her next five tournaments. This period included a loss to sister Venus - her first since 2001 - in the quarterfinals of the Tier I NASDAQ-100 Open in Key Biscayne, Florida.
An ankle injury forced Williams to miss the French Open. At Wimbledon, Williams was defeated in the third round by fellow American Jill Craybas (ranked World No. 85) 6–3, 7–6(4).
At the US Open, Williams lost to her sister Venus in the fourth round 7–6, 6–2. This was the earliest the sisters had met in a Grand Slam tournament since their first meeting at the 1998 Australian Open. Williams played just one more match during the remainder of the year, a loss to World No. 127 Sun Tiantian in Beijing.
Williams finished the year ranked World No. 11 and with just one singles title.
Williams did not participate in any of the official warm-up tournaments for the Australian Open.[6] Williams was the defending champion at the Australian Open but fell to Daniela Hantuchová 6–1, 7–6(5) in the third round, provoking media reports that Williams had lost enthusiasm for the sport, which she denied. Her world ranking then fell out of the top 50 for the first time in many years, and she withdrew from the tournaments in Antwerp, the Dubai, and the Key Biscayne, Florida.
After withdrawing from the Tier I Family Circle Cup in Charleston, South Carolina, Williams's world ranking fell out of the top 100 for the first time in almost nine years. Shortly after, she announced that she would miss both the French Open and Wimbledon because of a chronic knee injury. She said that she would not be able to compete before "the end of the summer," on doctor's orders.
Williams, however, returned to the game earlier than expected, accepting wildcards to summer hard court tournaments in Cincinnati and Los Angeles. Ranked World No. 139 because of her inactivity, Williams upset the Cincinnati tournament's second seed and World No. 11 Anastasia Myskina 6–2, 6–2 in the first round before losing in the semifinals to the eventual champion Vera Zvonareva 6–2, 6–3.[6] Williams's ranking rose to World No. 108 after Cincinnati. In Los Angeles, Williams defeated Hantuchová in the third round but lost in the semifinals to Jelena Janković 6–4, 6–3.[6]
Williams was granted a wildcard into the US Open, as her ranking prevented her from gaining direct entry into the tournament. She was unseeded in a Grand Slam tournament for the first time since 1998. However, she defeated US Open Series champion Ana Ivanović in the third round before losing to top seed Amélie Mauresmo in the fourth round 6–4, 0–6, 6–2. Williams did not play again for the rest of the year.
Williams ended the year ranked World No. 95, her worst end-of-year ranking since 1997 when she finished World No. 99.
Williams finished 2007 ranked World No. 7 and won two singles titles, her best performance in both aspects since 2004. She was also the top-ranked American for the first time since 2003.
Williams began the year by stating that she had no doubt she would be World No. 1 again, a comment that attracted criticism in the press from Pat Cash.
Williams competed at the tournament in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia as a warm-up for the Australian Open. However, she lost to unseeded Sybille Bammer of Austria in the quarterfinals. Williams was unseeded at the Australian Open because of her World No. 81 ranking and was widely regarded as "out of shape". In the third round, however, Williams defeated fifth-seeded Nadia Petrova, which was her first win over a top 10 player since defeating Lindsay Davenport in the 2005 Australian Open final. In the quarterfinals, Williams was two points from losing to Shahar Pe'er before prevailing and then defeated tenth-seeded Nicole Vaidišová in the semifinals in straight sets. In the final, Williams defeated top-seeded Maria Sharapova in straight sets to win her third Australian Open singles title, her eighth Grand Slam singles title, and her sixteenth Grand Slam title overall. Williams dedicated the title to her deceased sister Yetunde. Her performance in the final was described by TENNIS.com as "one of the best performances of her career" and by BBC Sport as "arguably the most powerful display ever seen in women's tennis". Her ranking rose to World No. 14 as a result of the win.
Williams next played at the Tier I Sony Ericsson Open in Key Biscayne, Florida. In the fourth round, Williams again defeated World No. 2 Sharapova 6–1, 6–1.[12] She went on to reach the final, where she defeated World No. 1 Justine Henin in three sets after Williams saved two match points in the second set.
At the Tier I Family Circle Cup in Charleston, South Carolina on clay courts, Williams received a first round bye and then retired from her second round match due to a groin pull. The following week, Williams won her first singles match in the first round Fed Cup tie against Belgium on hard courts but withdrew from the second singles match to rest her knee.
Williams played only one clay court tournament in Europe before the French Open. In Rome at the Tier I Internazionali BNL d'Italia, Williams lost to fourteenth-seeded Patty Schnyder of Switzerland 6–3, 2–6, 7–6(5).[12] After the tournament, however, she re-entered the top 10, moving up to World No. 9.
As the eighth seed at the French Open, Williams lost in the quarterfinals to eventual champion Henin 6–4, 6–3. Following the match, Williams said her performance was "hideous and horrendous" and worse than ever. She also said that she felt "violated."
Despite this loss, Williams was one of the favorites for the Wimbledon title. During her fourth round match against Daniela Hantuchová, Williams collapsed from an acute muscle spasm at 5–5 in the second set. After a medical timeout and holding serve to force a tiebreak, the rain came and play was suspended for nearly two hours. When the players returned to the court, Williams won the match 6–2, 6–7(2), 6–2. Williams then lost her quarterfinal match with World No. 1 Henin 6–4, 3–6, 6–3. Williams started the match with a heavily taped calf and was forced to use a one-handed backhand slice because of an injury to her left thumb. Williams drew criticism when she claimed after the match that she would have beaten Henin had Williams been healthy. After Wimbledon, Williams moved up to World No. 7, the highest she had been since 2005.
Because of the thumb injury, Williams did not play a tournament between Wimbledon and the US Open. At the US Open itself, she beat 2007 Wimbledon runner-up Marion Bartoli in the fourth round, setting up her third consecutive Grand Slam quarterfinal with Henin. Williams lost again, 7–6(3), 6–1, her third straight loss to Henin in the quarterfinals of a Grand Slam event.
In October, Williams lost in the quarterfinals of the tournament in Stuttgart to World No. 2 Svetlana Kuznetsova 6–3, 6–3. Williams then reached her third final of the year at the Kremlin Cup in Moscow, defeating Kuznetsova in the semifinals. In the final, however, she lost to Elena Dementieva. Nevertheless, Williams's performances at these tournaments increased her ranking to World No. 5 and qualified her for the year-ending Sony Ericsson Championships in Madrid. Williams's participation there was short. Because of injury, she retired from her first match with Anna Chakvetadze after losing the first set and then withdrew from the tournament.
Williams started the year by participating on the U.S. team that won the Hopman Cup for the fifth time in Perth, Australia.
Williams entered the 2008 Australian Open as the defending champion and seventh seed but lost in the quarterfinals to World No. 4 and third-seeded Jelena Janković 6–3, 6–4. This was her fourth straight loss in the quarterfinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament. In the women's doubles event, Serena and her sister Venus lost in the quarterfinals to the seventh-seeded team, Zheng Jie and Yan Zi.
Williams then withdrew from the tournaments in Paris, Antwerp, and Dubai due to an urgent need for dental surgery.
Upon her return to the tour, Williams won three consecutive singles titles. At the Tier II tournament in Bangalore, India, Serena defeated sister Venus in the semifinals 6–3, 3–6, 7–6(4) after Serena saved a match point 6–5 in the third set. This was the first time they had played each other since the fourth round of the 2005 US Open. Serena then defeated Patty Schnyder of Switzerland in the final. At the Tier I Sony Ericsson Open in Key Biscayne, Florida, Williams won her fifth career singles title there, tying Steffi Graf for the most singles titles at this tournament. Williams defeated World No. 1 Justine Henin in the quarterfinals, World No. 3 Svetlana Kuznetsova in the semifinals, and World No. 4 Janković in the final. This was Williams's 30th career singles title. At the clay court Tier I Family Circle Cup in Charleston, South Carolina, Williams defeated, for the fourth consecutive time, second-seeded Maria Sharapova in the quarterfinals 7–5, 4–6, 6–1. In the final, Williams defeated Vera Zvonareva[25] to capture her tenth career Tier I title and first clay court title since the 2002 French Open.
Williams's 17-match winning streak was ended by Dinara Safina in the quarterfinals of the Tier I Qatar Telecom German Open in Berlin 2–6, 6–1, 7–6(5). Williams was the fifth-seeded player at the Tier I Internazionali BNL d'Italia in Rome and made it to the quarterfinals, where Alizé Cornet received a walkover over Williams because of a back injury.
Williams was the fifth-seeded player at the French Open. Although she was the only former winner of this tournament in this year's draw, she lost in the third round to 27th-seeded Katarina Srebotnik 6–4, 6–4.
At Wimbledon, the sixth-seeded Williams reached the semifinals for the first time in four years. She defeated former World No. 1 and 2006 Wimbledon champion Amélie Mauresmo in the third round 7–6(5), 6–1. She then defeated Agnieszka Radwańska in the quarterfinals and Zheng Jie, a Chinese wild card, in the semifinals. Williams, however, lost the final to her older sister Venus in straight sets.Serena and Venus then teamed to win the women's doubles title without dropping a set the entire tournament, defeating Lisa Raymond and Samantha Stosur in the final.
Williams then played four World Team Tennis matches for the Washington Kastles, contributing 49 points for her team.
Williams was seeded first at the tournament in Stanford, California. After defeating fifth-seeded Schnyder in the quarterfinals, Williams retired from her semifinal match against qualifier Aleksandra Wozniak while trailing 6–2, 3–1 because of a left knee injury. That injury caused Williams to withdraw from the tournament in Los Angeles the following week.
At the Beijing Olympics, Williams was the fourth-seeded player in singles but lost to fifth-seeded and eventual gold-medalist Elena Dementieva in the quarterfinals 3–6, 6–4, 6–3. Serena and her sister Venus were the second-seeded team in doubles. They won the gold medal, beating the Spanish team of Anabel Medina Garrigues and Virginia Ruano Pascual 6-2, 6-0 in the final.
Williams was seeded fourth at the US Open and defeated her seventh-seeded sister Venus in the quarterfinals 7–6(6), 7–6(7). Serena trailed 5–3 in both sets and saved two set points in the first set and eight set points in the second set. Williams then defeated Safina in the semifinals 6–3, 6–2. She went on to win the title, defeating Janković in the final, and became the new World No. 1.
At the Tier II Porsche Tennis Grand Prix tournament in Stuttgart, Serena was the top seed, but lost to World no. 30 Li Na 6-0, 1-6, 4-6 in the second round.
Williams also entered the doubles draw in Stuttgart with her sister Venus, and are the fourth seeds. They beat the team of Daniela Hantuchova and Agnes Szavay in the first round, 6-4 6-1. But due to a left ankle injury to Serena, they had to withdraw from the tournament.
Williams issued a statement on 3rd October 2008 announcing her withdrawal from the Kremlin Cup in Moscow, citing a continuing left ankle injury and a desire to give her body time to recover from a packed 2008 playing schedule. In her statement, Williams recognised that her withdrawal from the Kremlin Cup significantly hindered her chances of finishing the season ranked No.1 in the world


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Tango Pogba bomber jacket
Black and gold Tango Pogba bomber jacket from Adidas featuring a ribbed collar, a front zip fastening, a printed logo to the front, two slanted front pockets, long sleeves, a zipped patch pocket at the sleeve, ruched details, a ribbed hem and cuffs and a printed full lining.
Designer Style ID: BQ9280
Farfetch ID: 11882988
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Measurement Information
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Model is wearing size: S
- Height:
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Model is wearing size: S
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