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Louise of Months of Edible Celebrations is hosting a virtual picnic! It's a spin-off of the childhood favorite: the picnic game. Each blogger picks a letter and a corresponding dish to bring to the picnic.
I'm going on a picnic and I'm bringing:
A: Almond Joy Pie by Marjie @ Modern Day Ozzie and Harriet
B: Baked Beans by Kasha @ Grub and Stuff
C: Chocolate Cake by Janet @ Dying for Chocolate.
D: Dutch Funnel Cake by Julie @ The Sporadic Cook
E: Easy Blender Chicken Pie by Juliana of Simple Recipes.
F: Five Bean Salad by Barbara @ Moveable Feasts
G: Granola Bars from Stephanie of Fun Foods on a Budget.
H: Herb and Cheese Pasta Salad, that's me!
A picnic wouldn't be complete without a pasta salad. This one is packed with over a cup of fresh herbs, two kinds of cheese, olives, red onion, sweet pickled cherry peppers, and grape tomatoes. I used fresh herbs right from my garden including two kinds of basil; regular and 'Aussie' sweet, lemon thyme and parsley. The cheeses include little cubed bites of Swiss and fresh grated Parmesan. I used a hot garlic vinaigrette to infuse flavor into the dressing, allowing it to cool before tossing with the salad. If possible make a day ahead to allow the flavors to develop.
The salad is fully customizable by using your own mix of herbs, your choice of cheese, olives and pasta shapes. A medium sized pasta works best like rotini, bow-ties or penne.
Herb & Cheese Pasta Salad
(by Reeni, Vinaigrette adapted from Bobby Flay)
8 ounces pasta (like Barila Whole-grain Medium Shells)
6-8 ounces Swiss Cheese, 1/4-inch cubes
1 – 6 ounce can Black Olives, halved
1 cup Grape Tomatoes, halved
1/2 cup Red Onion, thinly sliced
1/4 cup Pickled Sweet Cherry Peppers or Fresh Bell Pepper, thinly sliced
1/2 cup Fresh Basil, cut into a chiffonade or chopped
1/2 cup Fresh Parsley, cut into a chiffonade or chopped
1/4 cup Fresh Sweet Aussie Basil, chopped
1/3 cup Fresh Lemon Thyme
1/2 cup Fresh Grated Parmesan
Sea Salt and Fresh Black Pepper, to taste
For Vinaigrette:
1/3 cup Olive Oil
4 large cloves Garlic, chopped
3 tablespoons Red Wine Vinegar or Lemon Juice
Sea Salt and Fresh Black Pepper
1. Cook pasta to al dente according to package directions. Drain and rinse with cold water.
2. Meanwhile make the vinaigrette. In a small skillet or saute pan heat the oil over medium-low heat. Add the garlic and saute until the garlic becomes fragrant and just begins to turn color at the edges. Remove from heat, whisk in vinegar. Allow to cool. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
3. In a large mixing bowl toss the Swiss cheese, olives, tomatoes, red onion, peppers and pasta together.
4. Add the herbs, Parmesan and cool vinaigrette. Toss well. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Refrigerate until serving. Best made a day ahead of time.
Print Recipe
There's still time to get in on the Picnic. Visit Louise to find out what letters are available. Hope to see you there!
foodie_views_link_url = 'BLOG_POST_URL';


text: DL Deadrin Senat of Immokalee, FL has set his official visit with USC for the Gamecocks' primary recruiting weekend of January 18th. Senat talked with his recruiter GA Mangus earlier this week and plans to contact him again Thursday. "I'm really interested," he said. "I haven't surprised them yet and told them that's where I want to go. But I am very interested. I would commit on the visit if they are willing to take my commitment." Senat, who once was committed to Florida State, said he's also talking to Tennessee, Rutgers, Texas A&M and Ole Miss. Senat added that his teammate, All American DB Mackensie Alexander, might join him on the visit to USC though he said that's not a definite. Senat said in his opinion, at this point, he thinks Alexander will choose Clemson.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
New Jersey: Tiger Woods could not pick up where he left off and settled for a par that ended his birdie surge after the weather-hit Barclays tournament resumed on Thursday after a nearly four-hour delay.
Woods had birdied three in a row to stand three under par through seven holes, one shot off the early pace, when the horn sounded to halt play for the second time during the opening round at Liberty National due to lightning and heavy rain.
When play resumed, the world number one faced a 22-foot putt for birdie, but he left the ball inches short of the cup.
Earlier, players had to sit out a delay of more than two-and-a-half hours shortly after the opening tee shots at the first of four events that comprise the FedExCup playoffs.
The second suspension came one hour 42 minutes after players returned to the course that sits hard by the New York harbour with views of the Statue of Liberty and the Manhattan skyline as a spectacular backdrop.
Woods, a five-time winner on the PGA Tour this season, stood one stroke behind Australian Jason Day and Americans Kevin Stadler and Matt Every midway through the morning flight.
Day had completed nine holes, while Stadler and Every had played seven before the skies darkened ominously once again.
Every and Day both used eagles to soar to the top of the leaderboard, while Stadler enjoyed a stretch of four birdies in five holes from the second to join them on four under par.
Woods was among eight players at three under, including Americans Ryan Palmer, Charles Howell III and Jeff Maggert and Colombian Camilo Villegas.
A dozen players were bunched at two under par, including U.S. Open winner Justin Rose of England, defending Barclays champion Nick Watney and fellow Americans Jim Furyk and Matt Kuchar, and Henrik Stenson of Sweden.
PGA champion Jason Dufner was one over par through nine.
Sixty players were on the course when the horn sounded for the second time on Thursday, while the entire afternoon wave waited and wondered when they would get the chance to play.
British Open champion Phil Mickelson and Masters winner Adam Scott of Australia were among those with later tee-off times in the 123-man field.
Woods began quietly before making a charge.
After starting his round at the 10th and opening with four pars, Woods knocked it two feet from the pin at the par-three 14th, sank a six-footer at 15 and a five-foot putt at the 16th for birdies.
England`s Lee Westwood was not so successful, standing last among the early starters after double-bogeys at the third and fifth and a bogey at the eighth put him five over par through eight holes.


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|Manufacturer: Grace #GMC-WN10A
|10 bottle free standing wine rack with a sturdy wrought iron construction. Has a nice tiered , tapered design. Can be used on a counter top or set directly on the floor. Will hold 10 standard and 1.5 liter bottles up to 4 1/2 IN diameter.
When can I expect my order to arrive?
Items are shipped via FedEx Ground or UPS Ground and part on a truck, depending on the item, within 2 weeks.
Product ships from Rome, GA 30161.
This product carries a one year limited warranty from the manufacturer against defects in material and craftsmanship, subject to normal use.
Please contact our Customer Service department at 1-800-530-TAIL(8245) for assistance with warranty questions or claims.


text:
CHICAGO — The Chicago Board of Education voted on Wednesday to close 50 schools – including about 10 percent of all elementary schools in the largest mass school closing in the nation.
The closings in mainly Hispanic and African-American neighborhoods have drawn protests by parents and teachers union leaders who say the closures will put children in danger with longer walks through troubled areas as well as disrupt families.
The Chicago Teachers Union, which has clashed with Mayor Rahm Emanuel over other school issues and held a seven-day strike last fall for better pay and conditions, accused the city of racial discrimination in federal lawsuits filed last week.
The Chicago mayor appoints the schools' chief executive and the school board.
The union blasted Emanuel and the school board in a statement issued after the decision.
"Closing schools is not an education plan. It is a scorched earth policy," teachers union chief Karen Lewis said.
School officials have defended the proposed closings, saying they were necessary to help the district reduce a $1 billion budget deficit. The officials have promised displaced students will be sent to better-performing schools with amenities such as air conditioning, libraries and upgraded facilities.
When the district first announced the proposed closings in March, it estimated it would save $560 million in repairs and maintenance work over 10 years plus $430 million in operating costs. The district has since reduced the capital cost saving to $437 million over 10 years, attributing the discrepancy to outdated assessments.
U.S. urban school districts have been grappling with declining enrollment, and 70 large- or mid-sized cities have closed schools over the past decade, averaging 11 per district, according to the National Education Association, a labor union for school teachers.
This includes Washington, D.C., which closed 23 schools in 2008 and plans to close 15 more over the next two years.
Fueling union anger over the closings in Chicago is the expansion of publicly funded, but mostly non-union charter schools. The number of charter schools has risen even as neighborhood public schools are closed.
Chicago has promised a five-year moratorium on school closings, following this year.
Parents have complained that closing neighborhood schools endanger their children because they are exposed to greater gang violence if they cross neighborhood boundaries in a city that recorded 506 murders in 2012, largely due to gang violence.
Many of the schools being closed are in the same neighborhoods that have seen frequent gun violence.


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Culture, Prejudice, Racism, and Discrimination
John Baldwin
Prejudice is a broad social phenomenon and area of research, complicated by the fact that intolerance exists in internal cognitions but is manifest in symbol usage (verbal, nonverbal, mediated), law and policy, and social and organizational practice. It is based on group identification (i.e., perceiving and treating a person or people in terms of outgroup membership); but that outgroup can range from the more commonly known outgroups based on race, sex/gender, nationality, or sexual orientation to more specific intolerances of others based on political party, fan status, or membership in some perceived group such as "blonde" or "athlete." This article begins with the link of culture to prejudice, noting specific culture-based prejudices of ethnocentrism and xenophobia. It then explores the levels at which prejudice might be manifest, finally arriving at a specific focus of prejudice—racism; however, what applies to racism may also apply to other intolerances such as sexism, heterosexism, classism, or ageism.
The discussion and analysis of prejudice becomes complicated when we approach a specific topic like racism, though the tensions surrounding this phenomenon extend to other intolerances such as sexism or heterosexism. Complications include determining the influences that might lead to individual racism or an atmosphere of racism, but also include the very definition of what racism is: Is it an individual phenomenon, or does it refer to an intolerance that is supported by a dominant social structure? Because overt intolerance has become unpopular in many societies, researchers have explored how racism and sexism might be expressed in subtle terms; others investigate how racism intersects with other forms of oppression, including those based on sex/gender, sexual orientation, or colonialism; and still others consider how one might express intolerance "benevolently," with good intentions though still based on problematic racist or sexist ideologies.
Dance as Intergroup Communication
Rachyl Pines and Howard Giles
Dance is a visual, socially organized form of communication. There are countless forms and styles of dance, each with its own criteria of excellence, with varying degrees of technical training ranging from classical ballet to krumping. This could, at times, lend itself to intergroup antagonism with the various genres of dance as subgroups. However, all types of dancers have the potential to identify with one another as sharing in the superordinate identity, dancer. Dance may be consumed as an artistic performance, or one can engage it as a participant—dancing as a professional, as a form of recreation, or as a form of self-expression. The processes of producing, consuming, and participating in dance as a spectator, choreographer, or performer are all intergroup phenomena. For example, a spectator of a performance learns something about the culture that produced this dance. With this there is potential for intergroup contact and vicarious observation with dancers and the various audiences. This can be powerful for changing attitudes and conceptions of different dance groups. The attitude change may occur as people are exposed to a culture presented as art instead of exposure to information via factual accounts such as textbooks or museums. Also, a spectator or consumer's perception of the performance is informed by group membership. For example, some religious groups discourage dance because they believe it is a sin or evil. These groups, if exposed to a dance performance, will experience it much differently than members of other groups that encourage dancing and actively seek its viewing.
In sum, dance is a vehicle through which group membership and social identity can be expressed. As dancers perform they can, for instance, express gender and sexuality. As choreographers direct movements, they express their conceptions of gender through the dancers. And as spectators view the performance, they are shown something about gender expression. When it is used as a form of protest, as a cultural expression, or as a form of social innovation, dance can express social group membership.
Gayatri Chakravarty Spivak: Relevance for Communication Studies
Raka Shome
Gayatri Spivak is one of the foremost intellectuals of the 20th and 21st centuries. Although a literary critic, her work can be seen as philosophical as it is concerned with how to develop a transnational ethical responsibility to the radical "other," who cannot be accessed by our discursive (and thus institutionalized) regimes of knowledge. Regarded as a leading postcolonial theorist, Spivak is probably best seen as a postcolonial Marxist feminist theorist, although she herself does not feel comfortable with rigid academic labeling. Her work is significantly influenced by the deconstructionist impulses of Jacques Derrida. Additionally, the influence of Gramsci and Marx is prominent in her thinking.
Spivak's work has consistently called attention to the logics of imperialism that inform texts in the West, including in Western feminist scholarship. Relatedly, she has also written significantly on how the nation, in attempting to represent the entirety of a population, cannot access otherness or radical alterity. This is best seen in her work on the subaltern and in her intervention into the famous Indian group of Subaltern Studies scholars. Other related foci of her work have been on comprehending translation as a transnational cultural politics, and what it means to develop a transnational ethics of literacy.
Gay Male Culture and Intergroup Communication
Christopher Hajek
Like members of many social identity groups, gay men within certain racial or ethnic groups (e.g., gay white men in the United States) generally share a sense of group entitativity that is characterized by the experiences of unity, coherence, and organization. Notwithstanding its members' overall sense of entitativity, gay white male culture in the United States, specifically, has formed an array of diverse subgroups along dimensions such as physical attractiveness, musculature, masculinity, and age. These subgroup categorizations often are highly salient to individuals, and they frequently serve these gay men's drive to self-enhance through intragroup comparisons. Given that many of these subgroups are well established, with members who share not only unique physical characteristics but also particular communication patterns and/or traditions that contribute to group stereotype formation, it is possible to consider communication and comparisons across these subgroups to be intergroup in nature as well.
Social psychological theory provides useful frameworks for understanding the intra-/intergroup dynamics among such subgroups of gay men. One framework is self-categorization theory. According to this theory, individuals engage in self-stereotyping. That is, they react to themselves and others not as unique individuals, but as members of a group who share common characteristics and have similar needs, goals, and norms. It is through such categorization that group members differentiate themselves from members of other groups or subgroups. Another framework, social identity theory, also sheds light on intergroup dynamics within the gay white culture in the United States. In line with this theory, gay men may cope with discrimination from the heterosexual mainstream through the adoption of one or more coping strategies. These strategies include leaving their group or changing negative values assigned to the in-group into more positive ones. Additionally, they may avoid the use of the higher-status heterosexual group as a comparative frame of reference, instead making downward comparisons with members of other gay male groups that they consider to be inferior in order to self-enhance. Of course, though not to achieve positive distinctiveness, members of lower-status groups also orient themselves in gay culture by making upward comparisons with members of subgroups they consider to be superior to their own. Again, these subgroup distinctions may include those based on physical attractiveness, musculature, masculinity, and age.
Gay Straight Communication
Fabio Fasoli
Sexual orientation is a private matter that individuals can decide to disclose or conceal. Nevertheless, when interacting with others, people look for cues of sexual orientation. Hence, the person's face, voice, or non-verbal behavior is taken as a cue revealing sexual orientation. As research on "gaydar" has shown, this detecting ability can sometimes be accurate or stereotype-based. Sometimes gay, lesbian, and bisexual people themselves intentionally communicate their sexual identity explicitly or through more subtle cues. Intentional or not, several cues are taken as communicating sexual orientation with the consequences of shaping interpersonal interactions.
Identifying someone as gay or lesbian has several implications. On the one hand, it leads straight men and women to non-verbally behave differently than when interacting with other straight individuals (e.g., more physical distance, more self-touching). On the other hand, it also affects verbal communication (e.g., topics of conversation, questions, and statements). The harshest consequence is hate speech and homophobic language. Research has shown that being labeled as "faggot" or "dyke" not only negatively affects those who are the target of such verbal derogation but also negatively impacts on straight bystanders. Indeed, gay and lesbian targets of homophobic language report a lower level of well-being and self-acceptance, while being exposed to such language increases prejudice toward gay men and lesbians among straight people. In the case of straight men, the use of homophobic language is often associated with identity self-affirmation and self-presentation. Interestingly, a recent trend among gay people has been noticed: they use homophobic labels among them as a form of "reclaimed language," meaning that these derogatory terms are used with a different intent and reframed in a more positive way.
Moreover, communicating sexual orientation can increase self-acceptance, social support, and positive social comparison among gay men and lesbians and can also increase positive attitudes toward gay people, especially when it happens with friends and family members.
Gender and Journalism
Linda Steiner
Understanding the role of gender in the newsroom involves tracing a shift from an initial consensus that women's only journalistic role was to write with "a woman's touch" about women, for women readers, to a claim that women should be allowed to produce the same "unmarked" news as men. The claim became that women's forms—women's sections or other materials intended for women audiences—represented professional ghettos, and that women were needed to produce better, more ethical journalism. That is, within the newsroom, gender was first dichotomized, rendering the interests of women and men as opposites, and then it claimed to be irrelevant. Feminist scholars point out that, over time, men have consistently tried to protect their status, jobs, and salaries, and have failed to acknowledge how journalism was set up as a male enclave with "macho" values and a culture that disadvantaged women, especially mothers, with its tradition of long and irregular hours and lack of childcare.
Research on gender and journalism can be divided into two categories: (a) gender "at work" in newsrooms (including opportunities or inequities in jobs, promotions, and salaries, as well as sexism), and (b) representations of women. Scholars often assume that the first issue over-determines the second. On both issues, research shows improvement, but also continuing problems. Now women journalists appear to be well established; the news includes issues associated with women's quotidian concerns, and it takes women seriously. Yet a variety of gender divides continue to characterize journalism. Researchers find gendered patterns in coverage, especially in politics and sports. Women television journalists are routinely sexualized, and their high visibility in television broadcasting—through explicit scrutiny of their bodies, hairstyles, clothing, and voices—is countered by their invisibility in management. Gendered double standards and a glass ceiling continue to stymie the promotion of women to key decision-making and governance positions in print and broadcast news organizations. Moreover, women are far from enjoying equity in the online context.
Women continue to be concentrated in low-status media outlets and beats: they dominate community, small-town, and regional news organizations, and they produce "soft news," human-interest stories and features. Men still dominate, although they do not monopolize, most of the high status areas of news production, particularly politics and business, as well as the lucrative and popular area of sports, a highly gendered and sexist domain. The most overtly gendered arena is war correspondence. Women who report on war and conflict are judged by very different standards than men. In particular, mothers are condemned when they go off to dangerous conflict areas, although fathers who cover war continue to be largely immune from public criticism. Women war reporters run a high risk of sexual violence and harassment, although women who have been sexually attacked rarely tell their supervisors—probably for fear of being pulled off an assignment.
Countless platforms are now available to citizens to disseminate their views as citizen journalists, including blogs and Twitter; these provide opportunities for challenging gender roles and democratizing relations between men and women. On the other hand, social media threaten the business model of professional journalism; the resulting trend to part-time, freelance, and even unpaid work creates a precarious and potentially highly feminized labor force.
Gender as a Consideration When Designing Health and Risk Messages
E. Michele Ramsey
Given the impact of gender on health, healthcare decisions, and treatments for illness, as well as the increased inequities encountered by non-white men and women, messages about health and health risks are affected by purposeful assumptions about gender identity. While the term sex denotes the biological sex of an individual, gender identity is about the psychological, cultural, and social assumptions about a person associated with that person because of his or her sex. Gender and health are intimately connected in a number of ways, and such connections can differ based on race, ethnicity, age, class, religion, region, country, and even continent. Thus, understanding the myriad ways that notions of gender affect the health of females and males is fundamental to understanding how communicating about risks and prevention may be tailored to each group.
Gender role expectations and assumptions have serious impacts on men's health and life expectancy rates, including self-destructive behaviors associated with mental health and tobacco use, self-neglecting behaviors linked to the reluctance of men to seek treatment for ailments, reluctance to follow a physician's instructions after finally seeking help, and risk-taking behaviors linked to drug and alcohol use, fast driving, guns, physical aggression, and other dangerous endeavors. Because gender role expectations tend to disfavor females, it is not surprising that gender generally has an even greater impact on women's health than on men's. Even though biological factors allow women, on average, to live longer than men worldwide, various gendered practices (social, legal, criminal, and unethical) have serious impacts on the lives and health of women. From sex discrimination in research and treatment regarding issues linked to reproductive health, depression, sexual abuse, alcohol and drug abuse, the sex trade, and normalized violence against women (such as rape, female genital mutilation, forced prostitution/trafficking, and domestic violence), women's lives across the globe are severely affected by gender role expectations that privilege males over females.
While some general consistencies in the relationships between gender, women, and health are experienced worldwide, intersections of race, ethnicity, class, age, country, region, and religion can make for very different experiences of women globally, and even within the same country.
The recent years have seen an increasing call to reconsider the binary means by which we have defined sex and gender. Advances in our understandings of lesbian, gay, bisexual, intersex, and transgendered individuals have challenged traditional notions and definitions of sex and gender in important and complex ways. Such an important shift warrants a stand-alone discussion, as well as the recognition that sexual orientation should not be automatically linked to discussions of sex and gender, given that such categorization reifies the problematic sex/gender binaries that ground sexist and homophobic attitudes in the first place.
Gender Bias and Sexism in Language
Michela Menegatti and Monica Rubini
Language is one of the most powerful means through which sexism and gender discrimination are perpetrated and reproduced. The content of gender stereotypes, according to which women should display communal/warmth traits and men should display agentic/competence traits, is reflected in the lexical choices of everyday communication. As a consequence, language subtly reproduces the societal asymmetries of status and power in favor of men, which are attached to the corresponding social roles. Moreover, the hidden yet consensual norm according to which the prototypical human being is male is embedded in the structure of many languages. Grammatical and syntactical rules are built in a way that feminine terms usually derive from the corresponding masculine form. Similarly, masculine nouns and pronouns are often used with a generic function to refer to both men and women. However, such linguistic forms have the negative effects of making women disappear in mental representations. Although the use of gender-fair linguistic expressions can effectively prevent these negative consequences and promote gender equality, there are even more implicit forms of gender bias in language that are difficult to suppress. By choosing terms at different levels of abstraction, people can affect the attributions of the receiver in a way that is consistent with their stereotypical beliefs. Linguistic abstraction, thus, is a very subtle resource used to represent women in a less favorable way and thus to enact gender discrimination without meaning to discriminate or even be aware that this linguistic behavior has discriminatory results. In order to reduce gender bias, it is necessary to change people's linguistic habits by making them aware of the beneficial effects of gender-fair expressions.
Gender Issues in Intergroup Communication
V. Skye Wingate and Nicholas A. Palomares
Gender is conceptualized as a social construct rather than biologically determined. Gender shapes communication in intergroup contexts. Gender influences communication in assorted domains, such as nonverbal behavior and emotion, language, friendship, self-disclosure, social support and advice, group decision making, leadership emergence, gaming, and aggression. Considering gender-based communication in each of these domains provides insight into the manner in which gender-based communication is conceptualized and understood. Gender is a meaningful factor, but not the sole determinant, of communication because other factors can moderate gender's influence.
Parent–Child Interaction
Haley Kranstuber Horstman, Alexie Hays, and Ryan Maliski
The parent–child relationship is one of the most influential, important, and meaningful relationships in an individual's life. The communication between parents and children fuels their bond and functions to socialize children (i.e., gender, career and work, relationship values and skills, and health behaviors), provide social support, show affection, make sense of their life experiences, engage in conflict, manage private information, and create a family communication environment. How parents and children manage these functions changes over time as their relationship adapts over the developmental periods of their lives. Mothers and fathers may also respond differently to the changing needs of their children, given the unique relational cultures that typically exist in mother–child versus father–child relationships.
Although research on parent–child communication is vast and thorough, the constant changes faced by families in the 21st century—including more diverse family structures—provides ample avenues for future research on this complex relationship. Parent–child communication in diverse families (e.g., divorced/stepfamilies, adoptive, multiracial, LGBTQ, and military families) must account for the complexity of identities and experiences in these families. Further, changes in society such as advances in technology, the aging population, and differing parenting practices are also transforming the parent–child relationship. Because this relationship is a vital social resource for both parents and children throughout their lives, researchers will undoubtedly continue to seek to understand the complexities of this important family dyad.
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A few thoughts: -Using the most advanced perception, combined with extremely detailed maps and pre-planning is the most likely to succeed. -The stabilization for the computation is amazing: the vehicle itself, a custom stabilization mount, internally stabilized racks, disks in suspension, and robust disks for internal stabilization. -Their plans to continue work after the race, regardless of the outcome, is respectable and exciting. -Their win would greatly influence my chances for a good job :) i hope ican have a good time with robot.net
P.S i'm the captain of the wheel robot society for under 13's!!i'm currently making a robot which will go around pincking up litter .cant rite much cos still and thinking stage but who can tell me where to find gd sensors 4 my society???


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Furniture Focus: Rectangular Dining Room Tables
Dining rooms, especially those with large tables, are mainly used for entertaining and that's exactly why it's so important to make a statement. Whether you're going for big and bold or sweet and simple — the dining room table is typically front and center.
An always-popular shape for dining room tables is rectangular. Long rectangular tables are a good choice for large families or those who love entertaining— they often provide ample room for large groups as opposed to square or round tables, as long as you have the luxury of the square footage needed to accommodate the longer, narrow shape.
Of course there's no right or wrong, merely a choice that can easily be made when taking the size of the dining room, number of family members and how often you entertain into careful consideration. Just don't forget - the most important thing that you need is the willingness to make the space welcoming to whoever is lucky enough to be invited over!
Images: 1. Vok Design Group, 2. Sunset, 3. Liezel Strauss, 4. Emma's Blogg, 5. Dan Gordan


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The heroes of Agincourt
IT WAS a battle that, according to Shakespeare, would be remembered till "the ending of the world".
And almost six centuries after the exhausted and disease-ridden army of Henry V defeated the much larger French forces at the Battle of Agincourt, it is still seen as one of this country's greatest victories.
A triumph of the humble English and Welsh longbowmen over the arrogant French knights, it remains a vivid demonstration of the bulldog spirit, ingenuity and bravery against the odds we like to see as some of the finest qualities of our nation.
This week it was revealed that a film is to be made based on those legendary events at Agincourt on October 25, 1415 - 594 years ago next week. Michael Hirst, the screenwriter behind TV series The Tudors and the Cate Blanchett film Elizabeth, is working on the screenplay of the £28million British movie called Azincourt, after the French spelling of the battle site.
Filming is due to begin next year and the story will be based on a novel of the same name by Bernard Cornwell. Instead of focusing on Henry V, as Shakespeare did, it will look at the battle from the point of view of one of the king's archers, Nicholas Hook.
'Henry's men had just a wooden bow and a dagger each'
While many of the details of Hook's life have been imagined, the name at least is authentic. It was taken from a newly discovered list of all the names and duties of the 6,000 men who fought for King Henry on that day. The list has since been analysed and put on the internet by historians from the University of Reading and the University of Southampton.
The database, based on the payment records of the soldiers involved, means that anyone with an internet connection can visit www.medievalsoldier.org to see if any of their ancestors were among the "band of brothers" that fought alongside Henry. It also offers insights into exactly what happened on that historic day.
"Henry V really was every bit the inspirational military leader, there's no doubt about that," says Dr Adrian Bell from the University of Reading, a historian and expert in medieval history who helped to compile the database.
"When he was the Prince of Wales he was shot in the face during the battle of Shrewsbury against the rebellious Earl of Northumbria and his life was only saved by a skilful surgeon, who managed to remove the arrow with the help of some special honey. It left him with a prominent scar for the rest of his life but a legendary reputation as a warrior."
Two years after coming to the throne, Henry found himself embroiled in what would become known as the Hundred Years War, a massively destabilising conflict over who was the rightful king of France that had been going on since Henry's great-grandfather Edward III had claimed the French throne in 1337.
By the time Henry was crowned King of England at 27, the much older King of France, Charles VI, was almost completely insane.
"He genuinely believed his body was made out of glass," says Dr Bell. "In fact he was so convinced of this that he had special, rigid clothing made for him to keep him upright and protect him from shattering."
Charles VI's insanity meant that his uncles and brother were battling for power and Henry decided to use the uncertainty to settle the Hundred Years War once and for all. He crossed the Channel with an army of around 10,000 and lay siege to the fortress of Harfleur on the Normandy coast.
The conflict lasted longer than expected, however, and thousands of his men died from dysentery. Though Henry captured Harfleur, he knew that his troops would not survive the winter and needed to get back to Calais, where boats were waiting to take what was left of his beleaguered force back across the Channel. On his way, however, he found his route cut off at a field near the town of Azincourt by an enormous French army.
Estimates of the size of the French forces vary but French and English eyewitnesses and chroniclers stated the English were vastly outnumbered. One French chronicler described 6,000 English troops facing an army 36,000 strong.
What's more, most of the French were men at arms, fully armoured knights and squires, many of them noblemen, who were well trained and fresh. The roll call of Henry's forces has revealed that the vast majority of them, at least 5,000 of the 6,000 men, were yeoman archers: ordinary men from England and Wales equipped with only a wooden bow and a small dagger. Their armour was a light leather jerkin and possibly a helmet that would have offered pitiful resistance to the swinging sword of a French knight.
In total there may have been only 900 English men at arms including Henry, an inspired fighter at the very centre of the battle.
H OWEVER, although the French had a massive advantage in numbers, the battlefield they had chosen didn't allow them to make the most of it. Heavy woodland on both sides acted like a funnel, corralling them closer together as they attacked and preventing them from attacking Henry from the sides.
"Some say Henry was extraordinarily lucky that the battle ended up being fought in such favourable terrain," says Dr Bell. "But there's also evidence that he may have deliberately chosen this site and cleverly tempted the French into attacking him there."
Yet the French remained confident and began with a cavalry charge of knights which they expected would decimate the English. It turned out to be a fatal mistake. "Their armour was probably strong enough to protect against the arrows of the English archers but it couldn't protect the horses, who became larger, easier targets for the bowmen," says Dr Bell. "As they struggled to reach the English they churned up the already freshly ploughed field with their hooves and turned it into a mud bath."
Those members of the French cavalry that did make it to the English lines ran straight into a barrier of sharpened wooden staves. Learning from their mistake, the French knights dismounted to march up to the English. The mud made the job slow and exhausting, however, and the funnelling effect meant they were easily picked off by archers.
Some of the French ended up in piles of bodies so deep they suffocated, others drowned in the mud and yet more were killed once they were on the ground. The English archers either beat them to death with the wooden mallets they had used to drive in the protective wooden staves, or lifted the enemy's visors and stabbed them through their eyes with daggers.
Many knights begged for mercy and were taken prisoner but when, at the end of the battle, the French re-formed for one final, futile cavalry charge, Henry began to worry that he did not have enough men to repel the charge and prevent prisoners from escaping and attacking his troops from behind their lines. He decided to kill the prisoners. "At first he asked his noblemen to do it but they refused as they had hoped to gain a ransom for many of the French nobility that had been captured," says Dr Bell. "So instead he asked a group of the archers to do it and they had no such qualms. They locked the prisoners in a nearby barn and set it alight." It was an action that has recently seen Henry vilified by French academics as a war criminal.
One scholar has also cast doubt on just how big the odds against Henry were. Professor Anne Curry from the University of Southampton recently concluded that rather than the English being outnumbered six to one it was more likely that around 9,000 English faced an army of 11,000 French. Other historians disagree with her figures but what nobody doubts is the sheer scale of the English victory. While the English deaths numbered 113, more than 5,000 Frenchmen were killed.
T hanks to his incredible victory, Henry was later able to force Charles VI into allowing him to marry his daughter, Princess Catherine. It was also agreed that Henry would inherit the French throne upon Charles's death.
But Henry never did become King of France because King Charles VI outlived him. Though he had made peace with the French king, Henry had to fight more battles against Charles VI's rebellious son, the Dauphin, and in 1422, seven years after Agincourt, he died aged 35.
Henry had fallen victim to an old enemy that killed many more of his men than the French had ever managed: he died of dysentery.


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Santiago pitches 7 sharp innings, but White Sox get just 1 hit in 1-0, 10-inning loss to Mets
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NEW YORK – Hector Santiago was totally ready to trade zeros with New York Mets sensation Matt Harvey.
Santiago did his part, throwing seven sharp innings. But the Chicago White Sox managed just one baserunner Tuesday night and lost to the Mets 1-0 in the 10th.
"I was definitely amped up in the first and second innings. I tried to go out and match what he was doing," Santiago said.
"I knew that as the game wore on, all eyes would be on this game because of the perfect game."
Harvey set down the first 20 batters, and an infield single by Alex Rios with two outs in the seventh marked Chicago's lone breakthrough.
Santiago permitted four singles, struck out eight and walked two. He also drew a few cheers from the crowd, having grown up as a Mets fan in nearby Newark, N.J.
"Santiago was excited to pitch in Citi Field tonight. He had about 60 people in the stands and was overthrowing at first, but as he got tired, he got better," Chicago manager Robin Ventura said.
Harvey struck out a career-high 12 and was pulled when the game went to extra innings.
"Harvey was as advertised tonight," Ventura said. "He was as dominant as anyone they've seen. He's (Justin) Verlander-like — he has velocity, movement and his presence is as good as advertised."
Pinch-hitter Mike Baxter lined an RBI single with one out in the 10th off Nate Jones (0-3).
Mets reliever Bobby Parnell (3-0) struck out two in a perfect 10th.
It was a most rare interleague matchup. Because of schedule quirks, the Mets and White Sox had played just three prior games since AL vs. NL action began in 1997. Only Texas and St. Louis have met so infrequently — they've played three games in the regular season, plus seven in the 2011 World Series.
It was nearly historic, too.
Harvey neared a no-hitter for the second time this season. He held Minnesota hitless for 6 2-3 innings on April 13 until Justin Morneau homered off the foul pole.
The White Sox hadn't come close to a hit when Rios hit a grounder in the hole in the seventh. The crowd instantly gasped, sensing trouble.
Mets shortstop Ruben Tejada did his best, gloving the ball on the edge of the infield dirt and making a jump throw. First baseman Ike Davis made a long stretch and caught the ball cleanly, but Rios was safe by a shade. The fans groaned when first base umpire Mark Carlson correctly called him safe.
"He threw me a slider, middle-away and I just rolled over it. My job was to get to first base so we could try and score a run," Rios said.
Davis drew a leadoff walk in the 10th and moved up on a sacrifice bunt by Juan Lagares. Baxter batted for Parnell and singled into the right-field corner.
The White Sox had never visited the Mets since interleague play began. The White Sox had played in Queens, however — most recently on Aug. 21, 1975, when they beat the Yankees at Shea Stadium. That was during a two-year period when the Yankees moved into the Mets' ballpark while Yankee Stadium was being remodeled.
The only previous Mets-White Sox series was in Chicago in June 2002. Paul Konerko homered three times in those three games while current White Sox coach Joe McEwing played for the Mets.
Ventura helped the Mets reach the 2000 World Series and said before the game "there's good feelings coming in here." Mets owner Fred Wilpon, former Mets teammate John Franco and several stadium workers greeted Ventura on the field during batting practice.
NOTES: Konerko got a day off and Dunn played first. ... There was a brief delay in the sixth when Santiago was due up. He wasn't ready to bat and plate umpire Dan Iassogna went over to the dugout to get him. Santiago came trotting to the plate. ... The Mets visit the White Sox for two games in late June. ... White Sox RHP Jake Peavy, scratched from two starts because of back spasms, is set to start Wednesday night vs. Mets RHP Jeremy Hefner. Santiago had been starting in Peavy's place.


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The Case Against a Darwinian Origin of Protein Folds
One of the paragraphs from the conclusion of Douglas Axe's recent article:
Clearly, if this conclusion (A dawinian search is insufficient to find new protein folds) is correct it calls for a serious rethink of how we explain protein origins, and that means a rethink of biological origins as a whole. Drawing on some of the points developed here, I presented an earlier version of this case several years ago to two prominent experts in the field. Bothered by my conclusion, both felt that it must be in error. When the three of us met for a discussion, they had their own hunches about where my reasoning might have gone wrong. Interestingly, though, after perhaps two hours of heated discussion neither agreed with the other's hunch, and we ended up at a polite but dissatisfying impasse. I left with the distinct impression that my conclusion was being rejected not because it was unfounded but because it was unwelcome.


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01 Nov, 2010
2010 SEMA Camaros Debut! SSX Track Car, Synergy Series, Red Flash Showcar, XM Package
Posted by: admin In: Main
GM has released official info on the 4 official GM built Camaros which will be showing at SEMA all week. The models include: Camaro SSX Track Car Concept: A concept for transforming a street Camaro SS into a closed-course track car, and a showcase for new Camaro performance parts. [Details and Photos] Camaro Synergy Series [...]


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Car Review
2014 Nissan Altima: New Car Review
Fresh from a total makeover last year, the 2014 Nissan Altima arrives little changed but still very desirable. Offering much of the looks, power and performance of the larger Maxima sedan, the Altima costs significantly less than its big brother and even has features not listed on the Maxima's options roster. The Altima is a great driving car that is easy to afford and live with. However, competition in the family sedan segment is fierce, and there are certainly competitors that can best the Altima in rear-seat room, features, power and warranty duration.
To compete, Nissan targeted maximum efficiency for its conventional, nonhybrid version of the Altima, producing the lightest car of this group and continuing the company's class-exclusive use of a continuously variable transmission (CVT) to achieve an impressive 38 miles per gallon on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) highway driving cycle for the 4-cylinder model. Those more impressed with performance can opt for a potent V6, a feature more and more rare in the family sedan category.
What's New for 2014?
The 2014 Nissan Altima is fitted with NissanConnect Apps, an infotainment upgrade that allows apps-driven content from an iPhone or Android smartphone. Once paired, owners will be able to connect with such popular apps as Facebook, iHeartRadio, Pandora (Android only) and Online Search powered by Google (requires navigation). Hands-free text messaging is also included.
What We Like
Handsome styling; cushy seats; innovative CVT technology; easy to use and affordable navigation radio
What We Don't
Vague power steering; engine-induced torque steer; tight rear-seat headroom
How Much?
Fuel Economy
Nissan carried over the existing Altima's engines, a 182-horsepower 2.5-liter 4-cylinder and a 270-hp 3.5-liter V6. The 4-cylinder's EPA ratings are 27 mpg city/38 mpg hwy, while the V6 scores 22 mpg city/31 hwy.
Standard Features & Options
The 2014 Nissan Altima comes in four trims with two engine choices. The 2.5-liter 4-cylinder cars come in base, S, SV and SL, while the V6 powered 3.5-liter comes in S, SV and SL.
The base 2.5 ($22,670) includes 16-inch steel wheels with covers, 6-way manual drivers seat, power windows, locks and mirrors, 4-speaker AM/FM/CD stereo, Nissan Intelligent Key keyless entry and push-button start, remote trunk and front window control via key fob, Bluetooth and steering wheel audio controls.
The 2.5 S ($23,190) adds a 6-way power driver's seat, cruise control and a 6-speaker audio upgrade.
The 2.5 SV ($24,990) brings 16-in alloy wheels, 9-speaker Bose audio with color display, USB and iPod integration, SiriusXM satellite radio, text message assistant, NissanConnect Apps, rearview monitor, dual-zone automatic climate control, rear-seat heat/cooling vents and remote start.
The 2.5 SL ($28,570) includes a heated steering wheel, fog lights, integrated mirror turn signals, leather seating, LED taillights, 8-way power driver's seat with power lumbar, heated front seats, heated folding side mirrors and auto up/down front passenger window.
The 3.5 S ($26,970) has much of the 2.5 S equipment plus the V6 engine and 18-in wheels.
The 3.5 SV ($29,170) is similarly equipped as the 2.5 SV and adds V6, a power moonroof and 18-in wheels.
The 3.5 SL ($31,470) adds a power moonroof over the 2.5 SL.
There are six option packages, varying by trim. More notable is the Convenience Package on the 2.5 SV, which adds a power moonroof, rear A/C vents, fog lamps, integrated side mirror turn signals, HomeLink and more. The Technology Package (SV and SL) adds navigation radio with 7-in screen, Blind Spot Warning, Moving Obstacle Detection, Lane Departure and Online Search powered by Google.
Nissan offers several new safety technologies to help Altima drivers avoid accidents, such as lane departure, blind spot and moving-object warning systems. To supplement the usual new stability control technologies, the Altima features active understeer control. This automatically brakes the inside front wheel when the car is going too quickly into a turn, reducing the understeer effect common to front-wheel-drive cars. Understeer is when a car doesn't turn as much as the driver intends because the front tires are sliding. The Easy Fill Tire Alert system simplifies pumping up the tires by chirping the Altima's horn when you've put in enough air.
In crash tests, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration gives the 2014 Altima a five overall rating (its highest score), with five stars in the front and side-impact tests and four stars in the roof-strength test. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety awarded the Altima a Top Safety Pick, giving it top marks in all but the small overlap front crash test, which was rated as Acceptable.
Behind the Wheel
The Altima's styling, comfort and efficiency all promise to make it an excellent contender against the top-selling family sedans. Unfortunately, the car's steering is a significant letdown, particularly in the V6 version.
In turns, the steering provides no feel for the road, and steering effort remains exactly the same no matter how hard the car is turning or how much grip the tires find. This gives the Altima's steering a disconnected, artificial feeling.
Similarly, the Altima suffers torque steer while accelerating. It isn't the seriously bad kind of torque steer, in which the engine wrenches the front wheels to the side and tries to change lanes when the driver intended to go straight. No, this is the more subtle sort, in which the car resists the driver's attempt to turn the steering wheel -- for instance, when unwinding the wheel while accelerating from a turn.
Other Cars to Consider
Chevrolet Malibu -- The Malibu is a smaller, tauter 4-cylinder-only car.
Ford Fusion -- The Fusion combines winning style with a huge variety of power sources, including a standard 4-cylinder, a turbo, a hybrid electric and a plug-in hybrid.
Honda Accord -- The old standby is still solid, efficient and responsive, though the styling has become stale.
Hyundai Sonata -- The exciting-looking Sonata isn't that exciting to drive, but it is a great car, delivering the combination of price, efficiency and quality that built the Toyota Camry's reputation.
AutoTrader's Advice
Loading the Altima with options quickly runs the price of the V6 version into the low $30,000s, which should scare away family drivers. At that price, Nissan's own Maxima might be the better choice. The responsible family shopper can choose the 2.5 SV trim level for $25,000 and get goodies such as remote start, Pandora radio integration and hands-free text reading with 17-in aluminum wheels and a backup camera, all in a car rated at 38 mpg on the highway.


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With many major retailers making their Black Friday deals available online yesterday, consumers rose early on Thanksgiving Day to begin their holiday shopping and kept on buying. By the time the clock struck midnight on the West Coast, e-retail sales were up 17.4% over Thanksgiving Day 2011, IBM reports.
IBM called it "a break-out day" for mobile devices and noted a surge in post-Thanksgiving dinner shopping on iPads. "In the evening hours, consumers shifted from shopping through their smartphones at the dinner table to buying through their iPad on the couch," IBM noted in summarizing the day's e-retail sales. "At the end of the day the iPad drove more retail traffic than any other device with traffic reaching 10.7% versus the iPhone at 9.1% and Android at 5.8%."
25.3% of traffic to retail sites came from smartphones and tablets, up 66.2% from Thanksgiving Day last year, and mobile devices accounted for 18.3% of purchases, up 65.3%.
For most of the day, only 0.2% of consumers who bought from online retailers came from such social networks as Facebook and Twitter, but that increased in the evening and social networks ended up accounting for 0.63% of sales, IBM says.
The importance of mobile devices also showed up in responses to retailers' e-mails, as the percentage of e-mail opened on phones and tablets increased 23% over last year's holiday, IBM says.
Visits to retail web sites also broke records, with Akamai Technologies Inc. reporting a peak of 7.63 million page views per minute from North American consumers to the web sites of its retail clients at 8:55 p.m. Eastern Time on Thanksgiving Day. That smashed the record of 5.35 million page views per minute Akamai recorded on Monday and suggests consumers were not only visiting retail sites to buy but also to scope out deals stores will be offering in the early morning hours tomorrow, says Lelah Manz, Akamai's chief strategist for commerce. After an overnight trough, traffic to retail sites was back to a robust 5.52 million page views per minute at 8:15 a.m. Eastern on Friday.
Shopping began early on Thanksgiving Day, according to data on traffic to retail sites from Akamai, which operates a global network of servers designed to make web pages load faster. North American consumers were viewing about 1.4 million retail web site pages per minute around 4 a.m. Eastern Time, the low for the day, but that activity began to take off around 7 a.m., reaching a morning peak of 4.96 million page views at 10:40 a.m. Eastern, the second-highest peak in 2012 at that time, based on the client retailer sites Akamai tracks.
That traffic tapered off during the afternoon hours as consumers prepared Thanksgiving dinners and set off to family gatherings, but Akamai predicted it would pick up again later. By 6 p.m. Eastern, traffic had hit 5.5 million page views per minute and kept climbing as the evening wore on.
A surprising amount of the sales generated on retail sites yesterday came from paid search ads, up 22.6% as of 2 p.m. Eastern from same-store sales sparked from such ads on Thanksgiving Day 2011 for clients of online marketing firm ChannelAdvisor Corp. That's a dramatic turnaround from a 10.2% decline from Nov. 1-19 in same-store sales driven by paid search for ChannelAdvisor clients.
That's likely a result of retailers moving up their paid search advertising earlier in the holiday weekend, to promote Thanksgiving Day sales as well as sales today, or Black Friday, says ChannelAdvisor CEO Scot Wingo. "Looking at the data, we are seeing retailers VERY heavily promoting their early Black Friday (also known as Thanksgiving) deals and offers," Wingo wrote on his blog today. "That seems to have moved a very large amount of search spend onto Thanksgiving day that wasn't usually happening in past years."
ChannelAdvisor, which assists retailers in selling on marketplaces like Amazon.com and eBay.com as well as through comparison shopping sites, also reported same-store sales for its clients on Amazon were up 28.5% over the same period on Thanksgiving Day last year, and on eBay up an even stronger 36.4%. Sales through comparison shopping engines were down 3.8%.
Many retailers encouraged this Thanksgiving Day online shopping by making available specials on their web sites yesterday that they will be offering in their stores Friday, a day often called Black Friday because the rush to begin holiday shopping helps put retailers' finances into the black. Among the major retailers featuring Black Friday specials on their home pages Thanksgiving Day were Amazon.com, Walmart.com, JCPenney.com, Target.com and Macys.com.
The early availability of Black Friday sales online that Wingo noted is one of three trends that showed up in pre-Thanksgiving e-mails from major retailers, observed Chad White, research director of e-mail service provider Responsys, on his Retail Email Blog. The other two are the prevalence of free shipping offers and retailers inviting consumers to shop via their mobile devices.
Both those trends were apparent on the home pages of major retailers yesterday. For example, J.C. Penney's web site trumpeted free shipping with no minimum purchase and no discount code required. The central image on Macys.com declared: "Shop Black Friday specials on your phone or tablet!"
Amazon is No. 1 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide, Walmart.com No. 4, Macy's No. 14, J.C. Penney No. 20 and Target No. 23.
Note to readers: Internet Retailer's editors will be providing reports on Thanksgiving weekend sales from Thanksgiving Day through Sunday. Check back for the latest news.


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Yesterday, Wisconsin had near record high temps, it was 83 at 5:30 PM where I live. It was a great day for golf or anything outdoorsy. Today its cooler but still very mild. We usually have our first hard freeze by now, but its not in the forecast for the next week.
Looks like the weather will hold out for the Midwest Cyburbia Laefest on Thursday too!
So...hows the weather over there?


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Jean Marsh still remembers vividly the day she started filming the first new episode of "Upstairs Downstairs," a revival of the signature 1970s British series that premieres Sunday, April 10, on PBS' "Masterpiece Classic" (check local listings).
Reprising her Emmy-winning role as Rose Buck, the actress, now 76, was standing in a re-creation of the stately London home set where she had worked for five seasons when she received some spectacularly unnecessary advice from her director.
"He said to me, 'Now, when you walk into the hall, don't forget that this is the house where you were the happiest, so you must be moved,' " Marsh recalls. "And I thought, 'My God, do you think I'm not moved? I'm moved as Rose, and I'm moved as Jean.' I walked into that replica of the hallway, and I could hear voices. It was just breathtaking. I said, 'You'd better not say that to me again, or you'll just have me crying all the time, and I think the audience should cry, not me.' "
If viewers do shed some tears, they will be happy ones. The original "Upstairs" has remained a fan favorite in the 40-year "Masterpiece" pantheon. Marsh, who co-created that original series with close friend Eileen Atkins ("Cranford"), says several interested parties have approached the two women since the first series ended its run more than three decades ago. Broadway composer Burton Lane ("On a Clear Day You Can See Forever") and lyricist Sheldon Harnick ("Fiddler on the Roof") even took a stab at turning it into a stage musical.
But it was only after "Cranford" screenwriter Heidi Thomas, who fell in love with "Upstairs" as a little girl, decided to tackle a reboot of the series that things started to move forward.
As the new episodes open in 1936, 165 Eaton Place is about to get a new family in residence: Sir Hallam Holland (Ed Stoppard, son of playwright Tom), a diplomat returning from a stint in Washington, D.C., and his wife, Agnes (Keeley Hawes, "Wives and Daughters"), soon joined by his recently widowed mother, Lady Maud (Atkins), and Agnes' headstrong younger sister, Lady Persie (Claire Foy, "Little Dorrit").
Originally hired by Agnes to assemble a household staff, Rose eventually is pressed into service as the housekeeper of the residence, joined by Mrs. Thackeray (Anne Reid, "Bleak House"), the cook, and Mr. Pritchard (Adrian Scarborough, "Cranford"), the butler.
"In Britain, 1936 was known as 'the year of three kings,' because George V died in January, Edward VIII came to the throne and then abdicated in December, giving way to George VI," Thomas explains of the new historical setting. "It was just a year of enormous change. It was a crucial point in European history, with the rise of fascism, and it also gave us a chance to look at what was happening in the working class, and the riot in Cable Street, when the ordinary British working man rose up against that specter of fascism."
Thomas pitched the idea to Atkins during a long flight back to England following a U.S. press tour for "Cranford" and had an informal deal worked out by the time their plane landed. Marsh, however, admits to being a trifle wary when she heard about the proposed project.
"I was instantly nervous," she says. "I was anxious about the past and the possibility of letting so many people down. Not just me and Eileen, but also all the actors who were now dead. I thought it probably was a good idea, but I wasn't sure. When I actually sat at the first read-through with all of the actors around me -- I sat between Mrs. Thackeray the cook and Mr. Pritchard the butler -- and they were so fabulous that I knew both Gordon Jackson and Angela Baddeley (who played butler Mr. Hudson and cook Mrs. Bridges in the original) would approve of them. That's when I thought, 'It's going to be all right.' "
Actually, it's quite a bit more than just all right. The three episodes that make up this initial miniseries, with the happy possibility of more to follow, are a triumph, perfectly recapturing the spirit of the original yet picking up the storytelling pace to appease modern attention spans. As Marsh's first impression reflected. Reid and Scarborough not only stand up to fond memories of Baddeley and the Emmy-winning Jackson but they also make indelible impressions of their own as Eaton Place's new cook and butler. And Atkins, whose busy stage career kept her from appearing in the original "Upstairs," is a crusty delight as Lady Maud.
Rebecca Eaton, the American executive producer of "Masterpiece," is confident fans will find that the new series was well worth the wait.
"I think I have been looking for a new 'Upstairs Downstairs' from the moment I walked into this office and took this job 25 years ago," says Eaton, who ranks the original "Upstairs" in the all-time top five of "Masterpiece" offerings. "It's the perfect sequel, and we've all dreamed about it."
In fact, she's hoping that the new "Upstairs," which the BBC is releasing on DVD April 26, will remind viewers of how much pleasure "Masterpiece" has given them over the years, enough to consider joining the Masterpiece Trust, a funding initiative started in honor of the series' 40th anniversary. In return for a $25,000 contribution, supporters receive on-screen recognition on at least three new "Masterpiece" programs, with a significant portion of their donations going directly to their local PBS stations.


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DOE A to Z: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z #
NJDOE NewsFor More Information Contact the Public Information Office:
For Immediate Release: September 4, 2009
DOE to Host Workshop On Early Action Charter School Application;
Technical Information on New Process to be Reviewed
Commissioner Lucille E. Davy today announced that the Department of Education will hold a workshop next week about the proposed early action charter school application for people who are interested in learning how the new process will unfold.
The anticipated expedited process is designed to add a shortened application and approval timeline for new charter schools while maintaining the extensive and rigorous review by DOE. It is expected that people who have experience initiating and operating quality charter programs will utilize the shortened timeframe.
The accelerated timeline stems from Commissioner Davy's review of charter school application procedures. The review was conducted at the request of Governor Jon S. Corzine in an effort to expand options for experienced charter school operators without sacrificing the longer review and support timeline for new applicants.
The technical assistance workshop for potential applicants will be held from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Wednesday, September 9 in the first-floor board room of 200 Riverview Plaza, Trenton.
Anyone interested in attending the workshop is asked fill out the registration form that can be found at http://www.nj.gov/education/chartsch/app/docs/ta.pdf. Completed forms can be e-mailed to firstname.lastname@example.com or faxed to 609-633-9825.
Early action applications are due by October 15, 2009, with the Commissioner's decision being announced by January 15, 2010. This will reduce to 11 months the time period between submission of applications and the opening of new charter schools. The regular application process takes 18 months; those applications are due March 31, 2010. In conjunction, another technical assistance workshop will be held on January 12, 2010.
New Jersey currently has 68 charter schools, six of which opened their doors for the first time this month. Twenty-seven applications for new charters were received earlier this year and the Commissioner's decisions will be made by September 30.


text:
When I'm in a Linux terminal, I often find myself typing
date just to see the time. To make life a bit easier, I wrote a script to always display a clock in the top right corner of the screen.
The script saves the current cursor position with an ANSI escape sequence instruction. Then, using the
tput command, the cursor is sent to row 0 (the top of the screen) and the last column minus 19 characters (19 is the length of HH:MM:SS YYYY-MM-DD). The formatted date command is displayed in green inverted color. The cursor is then sent back to its original position with another ANSI sequence that restores the original saved position.
If you're in an X Window System terminal, you can resize the window, and the clock will adjust its position because it is displayed at the last column minus 19 characters. The ANSI escape sequences don't work in all terminal emulators, but they do fine in xterm. Here's the script:
# clock.sh
# the script is executed inside a while without conditions
while :
# time and date are formatted to show HH:MM:SS YYYY-MM-DD
cmd=`date +"%H:%M:%S %F"`
# cursor's current position is saved through an escape sequence
echo -n -e "\033[s"
# Uncomment the next two lines to clean up the whole first line, although it causes a lot of blinking
#tput cup 0 0 # positions on row 0 col 0 (left top corner)
#tput el # cleans from position to end of line
# to place the clock on the appropriate column, subtract the length of 'HH:MM:SS YYYY-MM-DD', which is 19,
# from the total number of columns
C=$((`tput cols` - 19))
tput cup 0 $C # positions cursor at row 0 col $C
# clock will be shown green inverted
# setaf 2 = green, smso = inverted
COLOR=`tput setaf 2; tput smso`
# back to normal screen colors
NORMAL=`tput sgr0`
# print the time-date output on the above position
echo -n $COLOR$cmd$NORMAL
# restore the cursor to whatever was its previous position
echo -n -e "\033[u"
# script is executed every second
sleep 1
Save the script as clock.sh,
chmod to 755, and run it with
./clock.sh&. The time and date should now appear at the top right of your screen.
When you run clock.sh, the terminal will return the job number and process identifier (PID) of the clock.sh process. You can end the execution of the script by using the
kill command and specifying the job number.
With this script, you can display not only a clock, but other useful information as well. For example, suppose you want to monitor your CPU's load average from the
uptime command:
09:19:56 up 1 day, 1:54, 4 users, load average: 0.29, 0.39, 0.42
The last three values are the average load for the last one, five, and 15 minutes. You can extract these values with a
gawk command:
0.72, 0.54, 0.47
NF is the total number of fields in the output, and
$NF is the value of the last field. In clock.sh, change this line:
cmd=`date +"%H:%M:%S %F"`
to this:
cmd=`uptime | gawk '{print $(NF - 2), $(NF - 1), $NF}'`
or this, to leave the time and date:
cmd=`date +"%H:%M:%S %F" ; uptime | gawk '{print $(NF - 2), $(NF - 1), $NF}'`
Since the length of the string is no longer 19, let the
wc command help you determine the display offset. Change this line:
C=$((`tput cols` - 19))
to this:
C=$((`tput cols` - (`echo $cmd | wc -c` - 1) ))
The length of the output is calculated with
wc -c (the
-c option tells
wc to count the number of characters in the string being piped to it).
-1 subtracts the
\r at the end of the
$cmd output.
You could also display the total size or available space of a growing partition with
df, the number of users online with
uptime or
w, or the number of processes with
ps. Samba, Apache, and many other servers have status commands where you can extract pieces of information to show this way. Use your imagination to create your own modified version of clock.sh.


text:
tour banner
Title: Game. Set. Match.
Author: Jennifer Iacopelli
May Contain Spoilers
From Amazon:
Nestled along the North Carolina coast, the Outer Banks Tennis Academy is the world's most elite training facility. In this pressure-cooker environment, futures are forged in blood and sweat, and dreams are shattered in an instant.
Penny Harrison, a rising female star, is determined to win the French Open and beat her archrival, Zina Lutrova. But when her coach imports British bad boy Alex Russell as her new training partner, will Penny be able to keep her laser-like focus?
Tennis is all Jasmine Randazzo has ever known. The daughter of two Grand Slam champions, she's hell-bent on extending her family's legacy and writing her own happily-ever-after…until her chosen Prince Charming gives her the just-friends speech, right before the biggest junior tournament of the year, the Outer Banks Classic.
With a powerful serve and killer forehand, newcomer Indiana Gaffney is turning heads. She's thrilled by all of the attention, especially from Jack Harrison, Penny's agent and hot older brother, except he keeps backing off every time things start heating up.
With so much at stake, dreams—and hearts—are bound to break.
Wow! Coliloquy does it again! Here's another book with lots of angst, set amid the ultra competitive world of tennis. Here's a secret; I can't stand tennis, and yet I couldn't put this book down! The interpersonal relationships had me hooked. Would Penny get over her fling with tennis bad boy Alex? Would Jasmine live up to her parents' legacy? Would Indy ever fit in at OBX and make her dreams of being a top tennis player come true? Will I get over the cruelty of those painful little words – THE END??
While I don't enjoy tennis, I was drawn to this book because I love sports stories. It doesn't matter what the sport is, either. As long as the protagonists are committed to training hard and being the best they can be, I'm onboard. There is just something about a competitor refusing to be second best that keeps me engaged in their struggles. I want to see them persevere, to overcome all obstacles in their path, and become the best they can be. Throw in rivals, disinterested parents, interfering parents – in short, any emotionally distracting relationship, and I am that much more invested in the story.
Game. Set. Match. has three central characters, and the book is told in alternating POVs. Penny has just won her first major tournament, defeating the world's number one player. She's determined to win the French Open next, but she's still having flashbacks to a disastrous competition where Alex Russell messed with her mind, her heart, and destroyed her game. To her utter dismay, her coach has brought Alex to OBX to help her train. Can she keep herself together and ignore the attraction raging between them? Can she ever trust him again? I loved this story line, because Alex is such a player, yet he's ready to make a commitment to Penny, if only she'll give him the time of day. There was a lot of great tension between Alex and Penny, as they both strove to train for their matches at the French Open. Penny has so many pressures now that she's finding success, from potential sponsors to rivals waiting in the wings to take her down a notch. Great stuff here!
Jasmine is probably my least favorite character, because she came across as a spoiled princess. Her parents were both tennis superstars, and since she was seven, all she's wanted was to follow in their footsteps. When Indy shows up at OBX and promptly derails her dreams and hopes for the future, she lashes out at her new tennis opponent. Jasmine lost the mental game long before she even stepped out on the court. She expected that success would just fall into her lap, without her truly working for it. While I did like her better by the end of the book, it took a lot for her to win me over.
Indy gave up on tennis after her mother's death. After Penny wins the Madrid Open, her fire to play tennis is re-ignited. She is surprised that her offer to attend OBX is still open, and jumps at the chance to train at the best tennis academy in the country. I really liked Indy and found her story arc highly engrossing. Still reeling from her mother's death, she and her father have a distant relationship at best. She's never been as interesting to him as his work, and Indy has resented his indifference for years. Now she's facing the toughest competition of her life, and she's learning the hard way that tennis is more about the mental game than she realized. Her early success at OBX hasn't earned her any friends among her classmates. She's surprised to discover how down to earth Penny is, and the two girls soon become close, which leads to more rivalries with the other girls at the academy. Indy's story was my favorite, and I thought that her romantic pursuit of Jack, Penny's older brother, was very sweet.
Game. Set. Match is a great read with lots of emotion. Even if you don't usually enjoy sports stories, give this a try. It's more about relationships and chasing your dreams than tennis.
Grade: B / B+
Review copy provided by publisher


text:
According to the headlines, mobile technologies boomed and stole the limelight from traditional computing in 2012, making it a down year for PCs proper. Balderdash! If the PC industry's dying, it's doing so in style, shipping an estimated 367 million units in 2012 and stuffing store shelves with legions of top-notch products that blew the pants off previous generations of computers and computer components alike.
What, you want examples? I have examples. After spending the year tinkering with the best – and worst –the industry has to offer, I've managed to narrow the field down to just ten interesting and intriguing products that caught my eye and held my attention in 2012. These, folks, are the cream of this year's computing crop.
Windows 8
I might as well get the controversial pick out of the way first. Yes, Windows 8 looks a lot different from Windows 7, and yes, the new (and somewhat non-intuitive) interface works best on touchscreens –touchscreens that most traditional laptops and desktops don't have. And where are all the apps?
However, once you roll up your sleeves, replace the missing Start menu, and pick up a few tips and tricks, Windows 8 becomes a lot more palatable. In fact, I almost never lay mine eyes upon the controversial Start Screen; and once you eliminate the modern UI from your life, Windows 8 is basically a faster, better version of Windows 7. Try booting up a Windows 7 PC after getting used to Windows 8's lightning-quick start – it's almost as bad as watching paint dry.
Is Windows 8 a must-have upgrade for satisfied Windows 7 users? No, not at all. In fact, most mainstream types – I'm looking at you, mom – would be better off avoiding it until absolutely necessary. But if you take the plunge and don't mind making a couple of usability tweaks, you'll find a lot to like in Microsoft's latest OS.
Dell XPS 12
Speaking of Windows 8, the operating system shines on tablet/laptop hybrids, which help bridge the gap between the touch-focused UI and the keyboard-and-mouse productivity chops Windows is known for. I've tested the majority of the hybrids released thus far and the Dell XPS 12 is the hands-down standout, sporting an attractive (and lightweight) carbon fiber design, a stunning 1080p IPS display, excellent ergonomics, and the best tablet-to-laptop conversion mechanism I've seen. It's pricey – starting at $1,200 – but it's speedy and an early shining star for the mostly "meh" Windows 8 lineup.
In a nutshell, the Dell XPS 12 easily earned Digital Trends' Editors' Choice award. 'Nuff said.
Raspberry Pi
All that being said, the breakthrough computing star of 2012 wasn't a Windows hybrid or a fancy-schmancy, multi-thousand-dollar, multi-core, water-cooled behemoth of a gaming system. No, the most intriguing computer of 2012 was the Raspberry Pi: a credit card-sized PC built with modest specs and the intention of bringing computer programming to the masses thanks to its price tag of $25 to $35.
It worked. There's been a consistently long wait time to buy the Raspberry Pi since its launch at the end of last February as youngsters, curious minds, and hardcore enthusiasts alike took to the device in droves. Initial orders came in at more than 700 per second. Even if you're not interested in learning Python or hooking your Pi up to an Arduino microcontroller, the mini-PC offers solid value as a low-cost 1080p media streamer or even a basic network attached storage device (with the help of an external hard drive). The possibilities truly are endless with the Raspberry Pi.
Intel Core i5-3570K
When it comes to computer processors, it's all too easy to give the crown to the biggest, baddest CPU around and call it a day. There's one problem, though: most people don't need the raw power of a Hyper-Threaded Core i7. Intel's 3.4GHz Core i5-3570K Ivy Bridge processor delivers the best bang for your enthusiast buck, delivering four cores of overclockable, Turbo Boosted power that can handle most tasks without breaking a metaphorical sweat – and that includes cutting-edge gaming. This chip beats at the heart of my most recent PC build.
Nvidia GeForce GTX 670
Mainstream gamers will find their itches scratched by the more modestly priced AMD Radeon 7850 and Nvidia GeForce GTX 660, but for my bottom dollar, Nvidia's GTX 670 was most intriguing GPU of 2012. GTX 670 graphics cards can now be found for around $370 and deliver frame rates nearly on par with the performance pushed out by AMD and Nvidia's high-end offerings, despite costing $70 to $200 less than said high-end offerings.
Samsung 840 SSD
Upgrading to a speedy solid-state drive can make your computer feel like new again. If you're in the market for an SSD, the Samsung 840 is the one to buy. The drive delivers blazing fast read and write times, and features easy-to-grasp software that alleviates most of the very mild headaches associated with SSD ownership. Combine it with one of those newfangled 4TB hard drives and you're good to go for years to come. Of course, a 1TB hard drive works too, if your PC building budget more closely mirrors mine and you don't mind backing off from the bleeding edge.
NOFAN CR-95C Copper
A passive (read: fanless and silent) CPU cooler this big may be impractical for most builds, but the Nofan CR-95C Copper is nothing less than a thing of beauty. It fits all the latest mainstream Intel and AMD sockets, and with a 95W Thermal Design Power rating, it should theoretically cool even the beefiest of Ivy Bridge chips. Just don't expect to get much overclocking done.
MacBook Pro with Retina display
In case you didn't get the hint by this point, I'm more of a PC guy than a Mac guy. That being said, the Retina displays on the new MacBook Pros are jaw-droppingly gorgeous, and they're backed by powerful hardware to boot. MacBook Pro with Retina Display, you still bring me down, but your pretty face tickles me with envy nonetheless.
What The Walking Dead did for zombies on TV, DayZ did for zombies in video games. A mod built atop the hyper-realistic ARMA II military shooter, DayZ drops players into a similarly hyper-realistic Russian state populated by zombies and bandits. The game has one simple goal: survive. It's harder than it sounds, especially when you consider the game's authentic hunger, thirst, and damage mechanics, and the fact that the other players you run into in this multiplayer release may be more dangerous than the zombies themselves. (Getting hold of a sniper or assault rifle helps.)
It's awesome, and there's nothing else quite like DayZ. Don't take my word for it: DayZ's popularity propelled the three-year-old ARMA II to the top of the Steam sales charts and prompted Bohemia Interactive – ARMA's developer – to snatch up DayZ's creator for a stand-alone DayZ game coming in 2013.
Razer Tiamat headset
While you're sneaking your way through a zombie apocalypse, it helps to have full awareness of your surroundings. The long-delayed Razer Tiamat is the first gaming headset to pack 10 directional drivers for true 7.1 surround sound and a low-end bass punch that puts most competing cans to shame. Make sure you have a motherboard or sound card capable of 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound, though – at $180, you don't want to invest in these bad boys if you're going to be stuck on stereo sonics.
The views expressed here are solely those of the author and do not reflect the beliefs of Digital Trends.


text:
Sunday, August 28, 2005
IMBB#18: Summer Frying
It occurred to me that I could set the tabletop burner that I use for hotpots in the winter in the yard to heat up a pot of oil and fry my heart out without leaving a trace of smell in the house. Brilliant, isn't it? Why didn't I think of it earlier?!
For my first frying experiment, I made Jason's favorite Chinese dish – General Tsao's Chicken. Ask any real Chinese and they'll tell you that General Tsao's chicken is the type of quasi-Chinese food invented to suit the American palate. I've never seen it on any menus in restaurants in China, or any country outside the United States for that matter. But hey, if that's what my man wants, that's what I'll cook.
This dish being an Americanized Chinese invention actually has its merits: I was able to find an English recipe with exact quantities for all the ingredients (none of the vagueness of "some", "the right amount" that are so typical of Chinese recipes). So on a hot summer day I set out to make General Tsao's chicken. The recipe is pretty much self-explanatory except you do not need to mix in so much starch. Being a frying novice, the hardest thing for me was trying to determine when the chicken was done, but it was nothing a few pokes with a chopstick wouldn't solve.
This was the finished product and it was a huge hit if I might say so myself, well worth the frying trouble. Not only did Jason eat loads of it and brought the leftover to lunch, he talked about if for the next couple of days. The only thing I would change when I make it again is to coat the chicken in the starch after dipping it in the marinade, instead of mixing the starch in from the beginning. I think this will give the chicken a crispier outer layer and make the dish perfect, just the way they serve it in restaurants.
Fueled by the success, I fried up some sea bream a couple of days later, and topped it with a sweet and sour sauce. I also made fried tofu in lemongrass sauce. Believe me when I tell you it tastes so much better than the soggy pre-fried tofu you get in stores. When I come back from my trip, I'm making spring rolls! Oh yeah!
Thanks Linda, for hosting this event and taking my early entry!
13 comments:
- Hsin said...
Hey, looks very yummy!!! How about General Tsao's chicken the next time we meet up???
- Lynn said...
Sure thing! Let's have a Chinese night when I come back. Just have to check weather and make sure there isn't a typhoon!
- Michelle B said...
I love General Tsao's! The sweet, artificially red, hot, sticky, deep fried, crispy stuff I get from the local "Chinese" Restaurant (Chinese has to be in quotation marks because the restaurant is run by a Korean family LOL). Maybe I shouldn't admit it but I like Almond Chicken too. The kind with the brown gravy over it that you never really know exactly what it is made of.
Lynn, I was just looking through your photo gallery on allrecipes.com and I am soooooooo hungry now! You take absolutely beautiful photos and should be proud of the lovely food you make. Are you always shopping for plates and other servingware? So many of the photos posted by others on Allrecipes make me shudder because the dishes they are on are so unappetizing or the food itself just looks so tired and unappealing. I don't know how you do it!
- Nic said...
Your batch looks better than most of the I've ordered General Tsao's chicken I've had. And I'm sure it tasted better. Great entry!
- Karen said...
Oh no wonder I don't recognise the name. Hahaha! But it does look scrumptious Lynn!
- joey said...
Ooooh! Yummy looking chicken! I love fried-things-with-sticky-sauce dishes :-)
- Kevin said...
That looks wonderful! General Tsao's Chicken is _so_ good when it's good and _so_ bad when it isn't.
- Ruth said...
The dish looks wonderful, and I love your writing
- Michelle B said...
OK, it is making me crazy, I want my blog http://tuckerthecairn.blogspot.com/to have expandable post summaries with the "read more" link instead of the whole thing on the main page. Lynn, were you able to accomplish it on yours with *just* the instructions blogger provides? CSS wasn't invented when I took web programming LOL, so I'm struggling!
- Lynn said...
Thanks everyone for you kind comments. Sorry for the late reply, just got back from my trip. It was really yummy and besides all the dirty dishes it generates, it really isn't that hard to make.
Karen, like I said, it's not "real" Chinese, but hey, if it tastes good =o)
Michelle, I'm an equal-opportunity dish buyer. I buy my dishes from Tiffany's as well as 100yen shop. I think I might have an addiction. (re: the read more thing, I'll write you later with details, gotta unpack first)
- Karen said...
Oh you're back! You're back!
Do get some rest and I promise to be patient - waiting for your vacation stories and photos. ;-)
- Michelle B said...
Thank you Lynn, I really appreciate any pointers or links on the "read more" issue. You can leave me a comment about it on my blog http://tuckerthecairn.blogspot.com/ so I won't clog your comments up with my questions. Or you can email me. I'm a little scared to publish my email address on my profile for fear of a spam flood but I'll post it here with the puctuation spelled out to avoid email harvester attention. To get the real address just change back to @ and . (And maybe delete my comment once you've read this). The email is mbuenzliatcomcastdotnet Thanks again!
- Gonzalez Lewis said...
WOW (impressed look). Your version looks so yummy.
Here I bought a sauce pack for mapo tofu so as to skip all the seasonings! and i will try this friday after work.


text:
Bungie's recent Destiny press event serves as a harsh reminder that if major game reveals aren't managed perfectly, they'll fail to completely satisfy the core gamer. The world awaits a new PlayStation, and Sony can't hold back the important details...
Wow, even something not related to Sony manages to get skewed to relate to Sony.
Interestingly enough, the whole "Destiny" thing seems to be getting little to no attention on major gaming sites. Joystiq, for example, posted something like 5 different articles in a short span, yet all of them received less comments than the "Future of PlayStation" video on the same site.
Kotaku seems similarly disinterested; page views on the majority of their Destiny articles are rather low.
"No screenshots were released, no real gameplay was shown, and at least one journalist was said to have been overheard questioning how on Earth he was going to 'describe the game to my readers'."
Ummm... screenshots were released along with Artwork, in game play was shown during the vid doc briefly... but beyond that, when did Bungie ever promise anything more than releasing details? Details were released...not a ton, but there were some.
If you think CVG that you are going to get some avalanche of info out of the Sony Presser you are in for another rude shock. News flash...Sony is going to hold back much of the details and save that for future events to help ramp the hype up.