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Monday, June 19, 2017
Some Wheelchair Kamikaze Movie Recommendations
In the meantime, I don't want to leave WK readers feeling abandoned. As my mind is filled with MS related flotsam and jetsam as a result of working so hard on the aforementioned article, I figured I'd go in a completely different direction for this blog post. How about some movie recommendations for others like me who find themselves with lots of time to stare at TV screens due to the vagaries and vulgarities of multiple sclerosis?
Here, then, are a few lesser-known films that I hope you might check out and find enjoyable/interesting. If any of you have already seen any of these films or watch them as a result of these recommendations, I'd love to know your thoughts about them. Please feel free to leave your own critiques in the comments section, below.
I've also watched a whole bunch of the campy B-movie 70s horror flicks I so love (I Drink Your Blood, I Spit on Your Grave, etc.), but I know that flicks like these aren't everybody's cup of tea. Depending on what country you live in, most of the above recommended films are available on the popular streaming movie services (Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu). Again, I'd love to get readers' impressions of these films, as well as any recommendations of your own, in the comments section below. I'll be back with our regularly scheduled MS related content in the next few weeks. In the meantime, happy viewing!
20 comments:
Hello Kamikaze,ReplyDelete
I've watched Jarmusch' Paterson, and loved it!
I'm a big Jarmusch fan!
Also watched "Irréversible" original version, being francophone. I liked It, but it is not for everyone, indeed.
I'll take a look at your other suggestions.
Robert, sounds like we share a taste in movies. I'm a bit of a Francophone myself, enjoy the music, food, as well as the films. And, yes, Irreversible definitely is not for everybody…Delete
Thanks for the recommendations.ReplyDelete
I really enjoyed Hunt For the Wildepeople.Replies
Yeah, that one was really a nice little surprise. Hope you enjoy some of my other recommendations…Delete
20th Century Women was terrific and your description was exactly right. I missed Paterson in the theaters so thanks for the reminder, and I'll check out the others except for the Horror/Thriller stuff because I'm fond of being able to sleep at night. I tend to commit ghastly and violent crimes in my nightmares after viewing those categories and that's something I'd rather not know about myself.ReplyDeleteReplies
I realize horror films are not for everybody, but the really good ones can shine some light on aspects of the human condition that can otherwise remain hidden. Then again, maybe they should remain hidden. I've always been kind of fascinated with the darker side, though. Like I said in my post, I'm not really into the supernatural type films, but films about the ghastly things that human beings do each other fascinate me. As long as they are well done. Actually, I really like some of the very bad ones too, but they have to be very bad, so bad that they become good. There's a whole genre of cannibal films made by Italian directors in the 70s and 80s that I've recently discovered. They are horrible, but in a really good way. At least some of them. There are others that are just, well, horrible.Delete
In fact, Marc, you're the first English speaking person I see who likes foreign films.ReplyDelete
Usually they don"t like reading the subtitles.Replies
Robert, I majored in film in college, so I spent many an hour watching subtitled movies.Delete
These days, with all of the absolute crap that comes out of Hollywood, it's difficult to find movies made for adults unless you look to foreign films…
- Holly Powell CoxJune 21, 2017 at 8:29 AM
I haven't seen ANY of these movies, so I'm excited to check them out (especially Irreversible!!). One of my favorite movies is still Siesta - I think I made you watch it, but if not, check it out - Ellen Barkin, Jodie Foster, Martin Sheen, Gabriel Byrne, Julian Sands (who I still feel should have been cast as Lestat!), Isabella Rossellini, and Grace Jones (!!!!).ReplyDelete
Hey Holly, thanks for leaving a comment. Yes, we did watch Siesta. I remember liking it very much.ReplyDelete
I think you'll appreciate Irreversible, but parts of it are rather difficult to get through. Especially the first 20 minutes. The director intentionally includes a barely audible hum in the soundtrack, of a frequency that is very uncomfortable for humans. All the better to make the jarring and upsetting visuals and events even more unsettling. I'm sure this had a greater effect when heard on a movie theater sound system, but even watching it at home I felt the effect. The film really spotlights the fragility of the underpinnings of everyday life, how one casual decision, and the cruelty of fate, can lead to the complete unraveling of seemingly stable lives. So much to think about after viewing this film.
You should definitely check out all the films, and Hunt for the Wildepeople makes for great family viewing, even if it is a bit unconventional. If your son has the same well honed offkilter sense of humor that you have, I'm sure he'll enjoy it.
Thank you for the suggestions. One of my favorite movies, which additionally has to do with using imagination to deal with disability, is The Fall (2006), directed by Tarsem Singh. It's amazingly gorgeous and fairly outlandish film, and the music is great as well. The first time I saw it I was dealing with a steep decline from my MS as well as my mother's terminal cancer diagnosis at the same time, and I needed something to transport me mentally since my life at the time was so emotionally charged. That the subject matter was incidentally relatable was coincidental, but helpful. Not too many movies like this... it's definitely worth renting, if not buying for repeated viewings. Jim Jarmusch is a film hero of mine, in the same bohemian filmmaking spirit as John Sayles, Hal Hartley and the godfather of indies, John Cassavetes.ReplyDelete
Christopher, thanks for the recommendation. It's amazing how great films can both temporarily transport us from our troubles while at the same time illuminating the human condition, which can be simultaneously troublesome and glorious. I will definitely check out The Fall, probably later this week… Jarmusch has been a favorite of mine since his first film, Stranger Than Paradise, back in 1984. A good year for what would later be called indie films If I recall correctly that's the same year that Repo Man was released also…ReplyDelete
I'm a big fan of Big Fish. The disconnect between the father and son, the grandiose stories, the artistic symbolism, and that beautiful ending. Touches all the spiritual foundations upon which I am built.ReplyDelete
I admire your appreciation of "Irreversible" but for me, it was the most depressing piece of film making I have ever seen. I must've missed something from the experience but I failed to see any other emotion that this nauseating film brought to the screen. It fails even as a work of artistic cinema: the camera angles and non-stop, senseless violence, brutalize the viewer and instill as sense of hopelessness and oppression that can't be described without watching it. If the 9 minute rape seen, almost snuff-like in character and unwatchable, isn't enough to disturb you then the opening scene where someone gets repeatedly bashed in with a fire extinguisher will make you lose hope in humanity. I love your other recommendations, but please, pass on "Irreversible". Don't say I didn't warn youReplyDeleteReplies
It was one of the first films I watched when I arrived in France and I didn't understand much... After living in France for a few years, I watched again... To get the full impact, watch it twice. It worked for me. I think it's a masterpiece. Thank you Mark, for mentioning this film.Delete
Certainly valid points, but I disagree about the film as a whole. I did include plenty of warnings that Irreversible is NOT a film for everyone, or maybe even most people.ReplyDelete
The film doesn't include unending violence. There are two very violent scenes in the film, both of which you mentioned. The assault in the nightclub and the rape scene, both of which are extended and quite disturbing. However, the fact that they are disturbing was the filmmakers intent. The director even includes a barely audible hum at a frequency which human beings find very distressing, played throughout the entire first 20 minutes of the film. The violence portrayed is meant to set up the revelations about the characters involved, which we see later in the film (actually, earlier in the unfolding timeline, as it's told in a backwards fashion).
The rape scene is extremely difficult to watch, as any rape scene should be. Some films actually fetishize rape, but Irreversible shows the act in all its vile ugliness. It doesn't depict anything graphically sexual, instead the motionless camera primarily shows us the face of the rapist and his victim. The language used is horrifically ugly as well, and this scene certainly is as unsettling as can be, which again, is the director's intent.
The storyline that unfolds after the scenes, which actually happened before the scenes occur, inform us of the natures of the characters before the eruption of violence that will forever change their lives. The person carrying out the violent assault in the nightclub is revealed to be a philosopher who is much more comfortable within the confines of his own mind than with any sort of physicality, quite the opposite of the kind of person you would expect to unleash such a fearsome fusillade of violence in the club scene.
The rape victim turns out to be a sweet, loving, intelligent woman, who learned just that day that she's pregnant. Her partner, who we also first meet as an apparent violent thug in the nightclub scene, absolutely adores her, and the scene depicting the two interacting as the most intimate of lovers before heading out on that fateful night is almost unbearably heartbreaking since we know what is about to unfold.
Irreversible is quite Gallic in its viewpoints, and leaves the viewer left to contemplate the fragile nature of the normalcy that undergirds everyday life. With one inadvertently wrong choice the lives of any number of people can be irreversibly changed; in the case of the two lovers in the film, their lives are changed at just the moment that might otherwise have been their happiest.
Those of us who are dealing with chronic progressive illness know all too well that the foundations of life are built not of concrete but of gossamer, and the whims of fate can knock them out from under us with no notice, no compassion, and no sense of justice. Irreversible brings these uncomfortable truths to the fore.
Might the film have been just as effective without the graphic violence and drawn out rape scene? I've pondered that one for a while, and honestly can't come up with a definitive answer. The power of the film has its derivations in the disgust and horror wrought upon the viewer in the films first half-hour or so. The director knew very well what he was doing, as the camera work, soundtrack, dialogue, and action all combine for what is certainly one of the most unsettling sequences in cinema. But is this horror just to horrify, or to set up the elucidation of some greater truths revealed by the events and character development portrayed later in the film?
I respect your opinion of the film, but if one can get past the assault on the senses done with absolute intent by the director that consume the first part of the film, in my view the actions afterwards make irreversible a powerful statement on the nature of existence.
Of course, others may disagree and find that the level of violence portrayed ruins the film entirely. Again, irreversible is not a film for the casual viewer.Replies
Thanks for your response. I may have missed what the gestalt of the experience was but I am admittedly a squeamish viewer. For me, the violence distracted me, perhaps, from thinking of the director's full intent. I'm not sure I can go through another viewing to flesh it out but we both agree that this film stats with you for a long time.Delete
Amen Mark. It's a masterpiece which triggers our deepest fears... In one second life can change forever - death is just one aspect people fear.Delete
This film sticks for sure. I watched it as rented DVD or video in 2002 or 2003 in France, but wasn't ready to understand much then... After living here for years, I watched it again, twice to be true. It's a masterpiece.
Thanks again for your blog, you're a great support in MS (research results and clear explanations, daily life etc.)
- AnonymousJuly 13, 2017 at 3:47 PM
Marc, thanks for the film recommendations. We are always searching for hidden gems. Unfortunately, none of these are on netflix streaming. I do agree that in general foreign films are better than homegrown ones. Here are a few gems you may or may not have seen:ReplyDelete
A Man Called Ove
The African Doctor
I know you are a music lover:
'Keep On Keepin On' is a moving documentary about Clarke Terry's last months of life as he tutors a young blind pianist
'This Is Bossa Nova' I love this music, and this documentary is one i can watch over and over.
On another subject - have you ever explored the Dr Coimbra vitamin D protocol or biotin? They both seem to help some folks.
Dear WK, We think your taste in movies is fantastic. We've been watching them in order so Green Room is next. We loved The Drop, Paterson, 20th Century Women and Hunt for Wildepeople. I like horror films too (some of them) but some violence stops me in my tracks so I'm not sure how I'll react to Irreversible. Will find out. Please keep them coming whenever the fancy strikes.ReplyDelete


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seems Artless
|Riverdale fence :: June 2, 2009
|Everything is very green at Riverdale Farm.
|Processed with
Filed under: Architecture
Today's Historic Toronto photos:
I've geotagged and dated a bunch of historic photos from around Toronto. Click here to see photos from today's date in history.
Or you can also see the set of historic photos by Toronto neighbourhoods here.
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License by David Sk, 2004-2016.
(This photo Riverdale fence was taken at Riverdale Farm in Toronto, Ontario on 2009-05-31 )
Toronto map | wallpaper | photography guides

subset: commoncrawl


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The PM66xx is a complete family of DC-DC regulators and controllers designed to provide advanced power management solutions for the mobile PC market segments (notebooks, netbooks, tablet PCs).
This family offers specific control techniques to achieve best-in-class efficiency at low load and a variety of technical solutions to fit all application needs: different integration levels with power MOSFETs (PM6641) or without power MOSFETs (PM6680), both PWM and LDO solutions (PM6670S), different voltage ratings to fit specific applications from 5 V up to 36 V.
The PM669x series provides users with the highest flexibility to supply the CPU and GFX of the next-generation IMVP7 platform. The PM661x series is a set of four high-efficiency, synchronous battery chargers offering low component count for space-constrained, multi-chemistry battery charging applications.
The PM66xxA DC-DC buck-controller series provides a wide input voltage range which covers 5 V, 12 V and 24 V buses for industrial applications. The multiple and adjustable output voltages make this product family the ideal choice to meet the power supply needs of FPGA and MCU systems.
All the devices are available in compact VFQFPN packages, ideal for space-saving design requirements.
Featured Products
Designed to satisfy the complex power demands of highly integrated application-processor based systems


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|Top Online Data Backup Rankings
SAN FRANCISCO, CA – March 26, 2014 — /BackupReview.info/ — Connected Data, the creator of the award-winning Drobo line of smart storage solutions, today announces the release of the latest 4-bay Drobo and the best-selling product in the company's history. This third generation Drobo is more affordable, three times faster than the previous release and includes new features such as USB 3.0, significantly faster rebuild times and enhanced support for Apple's Time Machine®. The company today is also introducing a customer loyalty discount program of $50 USD off for all first and second-generation Drobo customers.
The Most Advanced 4-Bay Drobo Ever: This third generation Drobo features a new low price of $349 and a completely new architecture, making it three times faster than the previous generation. In addition, four times faster rebuild times maximize data availability in the event of a disk drive failure, and the addition of battery back up provides even more protection in case of a power outage.
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Drobo, BeyondRAID, and the Drobo logo are trademarks of Connected Data, Inc., which may be registered in some jurisdictions. Apple and Time Machine are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. All trademarks are the property of the respective trademark owners. All other trademarks used belong to their respective owners.
Andrew Ryan
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The Kanjira is a traditional frame drum from southern India that is played with bending-pitch and split hand techniques. Amazing sounds and complex rhythms are possible from this rich little drum.
MEINL Frame Drum Kanjira FD7KA features: with a set of 3 jingles color: African Brown #AB !!! 3 years Music Store warranty !!!
!!! 30 days Money-back guarantee !!!
I have a real Indian Kanjira which requires wetting the inside of the drumhead in order to achieve the lower tone thats appropriate for the instrument. This process is difficult because over-wetting the head can cause it to go too low and become "flubby"...you then have to wait for the skin to dry a bit before it becomes playable again. And the skin will dry as you play meaning it will start rising in pitch after a short while, thus needing re-wetting. Its a pain to keep the thing in tune.
I therefore purchased the Meinl Kanjira which has tuning screws and doesnt need wetting. I was hoping that this would save me the trouble of maintaining the tuning while practicing.
Unfortunately, the Meinl Kanjira is a poor substitute for the real thing. I guess it shouldnt come as too much of a surprise since mass-produced instruments like this often dont compare to the hand-crafted kind. There are many deficiencies which I will describe here:
The main problem I find is that, compared to a normal kanjira, the thin frame of the Meinl Kanjira makes it difficult to hold steady in the hand...theres not a lot of wood to grip.
Secondly, as a side-effect of the thin frame, the drum has very little mass making it hard to hold it still while playing.
This has a third side-effect in that the "jingle" isnt very sharp because the lightweight drum is flapping about instead of being resilient against the hits.
The pitch bend range is not as wide as Im used to (possibly because the thin frame doesnt provide a lot of structure to bend the head against) and the overall sound just isnt exciting or inspiring.
All these negatives definitely outweigh the only positive, which is that it does maintain its pitch. The key which is held on via velcro is a great touch, but it doesnt matter if the instrument doesnt sound good and isnt fun to play.
I wish I could compare this to the Remo Kanjiras for additional reference, but I havent had a chance to play them yet.
My recommendation is therefore to get a "real" kanjira (which actually costs less on Amazon than this does) and deal with having to keep the head lightly moistened. The playing experience and sound is much better.


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Reserve 1½ cups in a small bowl. Press the remaining mixture onto the bottom of the prepared pan. Bake 10 minutes.
Saturday, December 17
Recipe: Easy, Fudgy Chocolate Streusel Bar Cookies with (or without) Roasted and Salted Almonds
Reserve 1½ cups in a small bowl. Press the remaining mixture onto the bottom of the prepared pan. Bake 10 minutes.
10 comments:
- Anonymous12/17/2011 3:56 PM
Looks devine!ReplyDelete
Oh my, those look sinfully good with the fudgy center and I like the idea of the almonds! Thanks for another great recipe! :)ReplyDelete
- Anonymous12/19/2011 9:55 AM
Made these as soon as I saw the recipe, turned out great and were a big hit at dinner with family. I always get rave reviews with your recipes.ReplyDelete
Thanks, and happy holidays,
I'm gonna have to eat some chocolate now!ReplyDelete
I can't eat this sort of thing, but I made a pan of them last night for my son and his friends on their "Bad Movie Night." They cleaned them out with smiles on their faces.ReplyDelete
Hm, I made these the other day but they did not turn out well. The batter was VERY dry and the part that became the topping just falls off the top along with the chocolate chips. I may have to try again or try another recipe (all the others I've made from your site have been awesome).ReplyDelete
Hi Everybody,ReplyDelete
Thanks for the comments! :)
Kate and Jan,
So glad they were a hit! Thanks for taking the time to let me know.
Hi Katiedid,
I'm so sorry these didn't work out for you. I've gone back and amended the recipe directions to add two things - because flours do vary (by moisture content, etc.), it sounds like your flour mixture, which is very dry, was probably a little too dry. If you want to give the recipe another try, I would simply use two lightly beaten eggs instead of one.
Also, when you sprinkle the streusel topping on top, you can press it lightly into the melted chocolate layer, helping it 'stick.' Depending on the texture of the streusel (sometimes mine is finer, sometimes it has bigger crumbs), it may not want to meld into the chocolate on its own.
I hope this helps. So glad you've had delicious success with my other recipes! :)
Thank you, I definitely think that will help! I should have figured that out at the time but sometimes I blindly follow recipes without logic. They were delicious with a glass of milk but pitiful-looking enough that I didn't want to serve them to anyone but my son and I. ;)ReplyDelete
I will try again! Have a great new year!
- Anonymous12/12/2012 12:35 AM
I read this recipe (sounds yummy) and have the urge to make candied orange peels, chop some up and add them to the topping. This from someone who NEVER messes with recipes! Will also use nuts, not sure which kind.ReplyDelete
The plan is to do it this weekend.
Thanks for all your wonderful recipes and photos!
- Anonymous12/12/2013 1:43 AM
Made these last year the recipe was definitely not a keeper. I think it was the condensed milk that made them weird. Unusual for me to not like something chocolate.ReplyDelete
December 2015 update: Hi! For some reason I can't figure out, Blogger hasn't been letting me leave comments on my own blog (!) for the last several months, so I've been unable to respond to your comments and questions. My apologies for any inconvenience! You're always welcome to email me: farmgirlfare AT gmail DOT com.
Hi! Thanks for visiting Farmgirl Fare and taking the time to write. While I'm not always able to reply to every comment, I receive and enjoy reading them all.
Your feedback is greatly appreciated, and I especially love hearing about your experiences with my recipes. Comments on older posts are always welcome!
Please note that I moderate comments, so if I'm away from the computer it may be a while before yours appears.
I try my best to answer all questions, though sometimes it takes me a few days. And sometimes, I'm sorry to say, they fall through the cracks, and for that I sincerely apologize.
I look forward to hearing from you and hope you enjoy your e-visits to our farm!


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Power Washer Near Hayestown
6 Reasons "Power Wash House" Should Be a Top Priority on Your List of Things to Do This Season in Fairfield County
When it comes to cleaning your Fairfield County home, like a lot of other homeowners in the area, you probably focus most of your attention on the inside. Of course, keeping the interior of your house clean is important, but it's just as important to clean the outside, too. When mildew, moss, dirt, and debris accumulate on the exterior of your home, your curb appeal can seriously suffer. The best way to keep the outside of your home neat and tidy is by hiring a professional power washer.
If you're located in Hayestown, CT and you're looking for power washing companies near me, look no further than Pro Painters & Restoration. For more than 16 years, our team of professionally trained technicians has been keeping the exteriors of Fairfield County homes clean with our power wash service. Using the highest quality equipment, the most cutting-edge techniques, and proven strategies, you can count on our pressure washing business to blast away all types of dirt and grime and make your home shine!
6 Reasons "Power Wash House" Should be High on the List of Things to Do for Your Hayestown, CT Home this Spring
Like a lot of Fairfield County homeowners, the warmer weather and longer days of spring have probably got you itching to clean your house. When you're making up a list of cleaning projects for the season, "power wash house" is something that you're definitely going to want to include.
Here's a look at six great reasons why you should power wash your Hayestown, CT home this spring.
To Prevent Damage
During the winter season, dirt, mildew, moss, algae, and stains can accumulate on the exterior surfaces of your home. If left unattended, that dirt and debris can cause serious damage. If moss takes root on your roof, for example, it can push up the shingles, which can lead to cracks and water intrusion. Mildew can eat away at the siding of your home, and eventually, the materials underneath it. As the intense rays of spring and summer sun beat down on the dirt on your walkway or patio, the surfaces can become permanently stained.
Power washing is the most effective way to erase all of the dirt and grime that has collected on the outside of your home, reducing the risk of extensive damage and costly repairs.
To Extend the Life of Your Home
Because power washing prevents damage, it also extends the life of your home. As mentioned above, mold, mildew, and moss can do serious damage to the surfaces they grow on. These organisms and harbor bacteria that can eat away at roofing and siding materials; they can even eat away at concrete. Over time, they can compromise the structural integrity of your property. A power washer can easily erase the buildup of these materials and extend the life of your home.
To Prevent Infestations
During the spring, insects, and vermin awaken and search for shelter. Moss, dirt, and debris that collect in the cracks and crevices of your home over the winter make the perfect hiding spots for several types of pests. By power washing your home, you can get rid of those hiding spots. The powerful stream of pressurized water from a commercial pressure washer will also blast away nests and webs that animals and insects may have already made around your house. By combining an antibacterial or insecticidal spray with a power washer, you'll really be able to keep those pests at bay.
To Maintain Your Health
If you or anyone in your family suffers from allergies, power washing your home can help to minimize your discomfort during the spring and summer. Moss, mildew and mold are all allergens that can aggravate allergies. As flowers and trees come into bloom, their pollen collects on the exterior surfaces of your Fairfield County home. By blasting these irritants away with a power washer, you'll notice a marked decrease in your allergy-related symptoms.
To Boost Your Property Value
The exterior of your Hayestown, CT home has a direct impact on its value. If the siding, roofing, walkways, driveway, deck, patio, or any other outdoor surfaces are covered in caked-on dirt and debris, your property value will suffer. A power washer can remove mud, moss, dirt, mildew, and even certain types of stains to reveal the beauty that's lying underneath it and boost the value of your home. If you're thinking about selling your house, having the exterior power washed before you put it on the market can help you attract potential buyers, make a faster sale, and get top dollar, too!
To Maximize Your Enjoyment
Spring and summer is the perfect time to enjoy outdoor living in Fairfield County, but it's kind of hard to make the most of the beautiful weather when you're sitting on a dirty deck or patio and when you're looking at filthy siding. A power washer will instantly clean all those surfaces and get the exterior of your home ready to enjoy your time outside to the fullest.
Pro Painters and Restoration: Hayestown, CT's Power Washing Professionals
If you want to take advantage of all the above-mentioned benefits and you're looking for professional power washing near me, get in touch with Pro Painters and Restoration. With our state-of-the-art equipment and proven techniques, you won't believe how clean the exterior of your home Fairfield County home will be after our professionals work their magic.
To learn more about our power washing services or to schedule a consultation, call 203-948-7540 today! At Pro Painters and Restoration, we're proud to be Fairfield County's leading high-pressure cleaning solution.
- Learn more about Hayestown, CT 06811
- Open a Hayestown, CT map
- Find the Hayestown, CT United States Post Office
- Locate nearby Hayestown, CT pharmacies
- View the current Hayestown, CT weather report
- Browse a list of Hayestown, CT public and private schools
- Hayestown, CT is located in Fairfield county in Connecticut State


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by National Board Certified Teacher Bonnie Britt
(Read Bonnie's daily blog here!)
Teachers and parents often ask for suggestions about activities to do with their students/children to help further their mathematical understanding. I've been teaching math to children for many years, and I've found that math games are, from a teacher's point of view, wonderfully useful. Math games put children in exactly the right frame of mind for learning. Children are normally very eager to play games. They relax when they play, and they concentrate. They don't mind repeating certain facts or procedures over and over.
Games are engaging and maintain interest – Dittos or workbook pages rarely are.
Many teachers and parents think of games as being "fluff". Once they begin to watch what happens as children play a game, they quickly change their minds. Children throw themselves into playing games the way they never throw themselves into filling out workbook pages or dittos. And games can, if you select the right ones, help children learn almost everything they need to master in elementary math. Good, child-centered games are designed to take the boredom and frustration out of the repetitive practice necessary for children to master important math skills and concepts.
Playing math games is even more beneficial than spending the same amount of time drilling basic facts using flash cards. Not only are games a lot more fun, but the potential for learning and reasoning about mathematics is much greater, as well. Children will be more focused and retention will be greater.
Games require a variety of problem-solving skills, such as making and testing hypotheses, creating strategies (thinking and planning ahead), and organizing information. Plus, as children play, they further their development of hand-eye coordination, concentration levels, visual discrimination, memory, and their ability to communicate and use mathematical language.
Games can provide an atmosphere where children are encouraged to:
Would any of the above happen with a ditto, workbook page, or flash cards?
Teaching methods that stress rote memorization of basic number facts or algorithmic procedures are usually boring and do not require learners to participate actively in thought, reflection, and their own learning.
Research has demonstrated that students learn more if they are actively engaged with the math they are studying. Constance Kamii, a world renowned expert on how children learn math, puts it this way, "Children who are mentally active develop faster than those who are passive."
Active learning is, in short, anything that children do other than merely listen to a teacher's or parent's explanation. Workbook pages, dittos, and flash cards are on the very low end of the "active learning" scale. Playing math games put children's minds into a much higher-level "active" mode.
Games solidify the achievements of children who are already good at math, and they shore up children who need shoring up.
One of the most useful outcomes of playing math games with children is that they provide some immediate assessment to teacher, parent, and child. The game format allows you to observe and evaluate the thinking and problem-solving strategies children are using.
Games teach or reinforce many of the skills that a formal curriculum teaches, plus a skill that formal learning sometimes, mistakenly, leaves out – the skill of having fun with math, of thinking hard and enjoying it.


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Leslie F. Seidman Named to FASB; Gary S. Schieneman Reappointed to Board
Norwalk, CT, April 29, 2003—At its April 28 Board of Trustee Meeting, the Financial Accounting Foundation approved two appointments to the Financial Accounting Standards Board. Leslie F. Seidman, currently Managing Member, Leslie F. Seidman Consulting, LLC, and the former Vice President, Accounting Policy, at J.P. Morgan & Company where she worked from 1987 to 1996, was named to a three-year term as a member of the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), effective July 1. Ms. Seidman will complete the term of John K. Wulff, who recently announced his resignation from the Board, effective June 30, to return to private industry. The Foundation also reappointed Gary S. Schieneman as a Board member. His new term will commence July 1.
Manuel H. Johnson, Chairman of the Financial Accounting Foundation, commented "The Foundation is fortunate to have recruited Leslie F. Seidman, whose impressive credentials in both accounting and industry, coupled with her previous employment at the FASB, should prove to be compelling assets to the Board. Leslie is well-respected in the accounting profession and, we are delighted to have someone of her caliber join the organization."
Ms. Seidman, who is a CPA, formed her firm in 2000, and provides consulting services to global financial institutions and major corporations. Prior to her consulting practice, she served the FASB in various capacities in the mid-to-late 1990s, first as an Industry Fellow and briefly as a Project Manager and was later promoted to Assistant Director of Research, concentrating on industry issues. In that position, she managed the activities of a team of Practice Fellows sent to the FASB from various firms for two-year assignments.
Ms. Seidman started her career in accounting at Arthur Young in New York, after graduating from Colgate University with a B.A degree in English. She later earned an M.S. degree in Accounting from New York University.
In 2002, Ms. Seidman authored a book on accounting, Miller Financial Instruments, a manual for accountants and other professionals.
Mr. Schieneman, who completed the term of outgoing member Anthony Cope, joined the FASB in July 2001 from Merrill Lynch & Co. where he served as Director, Comparative Global Equity Analysis.
In commenting on Mr. Schieneman's reappointment, Mr. Johnson said "Gary has brought a wealth of experience to the Board and has played an important role in bringing the analyst and investor community closer to the FASB. Gary was instrumental in developing the User Advisory Council, which is a first for the FASB. We are pleased to announce his reappointment."
About the Financial Accounting Standards Board and the Financial Accounting Foundation
Since 1973, the FASB has been the designated organization in the private sector for establishing standards of financial accounting and reporting. Those standards govern the preparation of financial reports and are officially recognized as authoritative by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. Such standards are essential to the efficient functioning of the economy because investors, creditors, auditors and others rely heavily on credible, transparent and comparable financial information.
The Financial Accounting Foundation is responsible for funding, overseeing and selecting the members of the FASB and the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB). For more information on the organizations it oversees, visit the Foundation's websites at www.fasb.org and www.gasb.org.


text: Dear Netters! ============= I would like to invitate all those of you, that are working on the fields of protein-protein-docking, molecular surfaces, energy evaluation, electrostatic interactions in proteins etc. to a little comparison of some results. Especially I would like to compare the shape (geometry) of m o l e c u l a r a c c e s s i b l e s u r f a c e s (MS) with each other. In addition, values of the electrostatic potential on the MS should be compared. It is n o t intended to decide about the correctness of underlying theoretical models, but rather to give all participants a hint, how their results compare empirically with those of others. My background: ============== I am working on the problem of protein-protein-docking. The main idea of our project is to integrate geometrical and chemical surface features in the evalutation of complementarity in an easy and fast manner. To this end I am developing a class library (C++) to calculate and manipulate protein features and features of the molecular surfaces. One of this features is the electrostatic potential on the surface. Now, the question arises: Am I computing the right values? The comparison: =============== Assume you can calculate the MS of a protein and possibly the electrostatic potential on it, i.e. you should be able to write down a file similar to this: x1 y1 z1 e1 x2 y2 z2 e2 x3 y3 z3 e3 x4 y4 z4 e4 ... xN yN zN eN Hereby, xi, yi, zi, and ei are floats. xi, yi, and zi are the coordinates (in Aengstroem, given in the coordinate system of the PDB - entry) of a surface point and ei is the electrostatic potential that you computed at this particular surface point. Since we compare only relative values, it is not important in which unit ei is given. Your MS will be sampled in a 3D grid (isotropic lattice constants 0.5, 0.8, and 1.2 Aengstroem will be used) and by counting hits and missing voxels we will compare the shape (geometry) of the different MSs. In a similar way we will compare by correlation on the grid the values for the electrostatic potential on the MS. You want to make one of the party? ================================== Then please send me a note (friedric at techfak.uni-bielefeld.de) (Name, institution, type of program you use, additional hints for the comparison, references). First all participants will be informed about the IDs of the others and will receive a detailed description of the procedures used for comparison. Then the PDB-IDs of some proteins I suggest to use for comparison and a description of possible file formats will be sent. Afterwords you will calculate the MS and eventually the potential on it and you will send it to me. The comparisons will be performed, and the results will be posted to all participants as a set of upper triangular matrices, containing cross correlations and similar values of every MS with each other. In addition the results will be compiled to a technical report, that will be made electronically available on our ftp server. Schedule: ========= 5.5.1995 Deadline for note on intended participation. 10.5.1995 Posting of PDB-Ids and format descriptions. (Meanwhile eventually changes in procedure of comparisons, depending on hints of participants.) 24.5.1995 Deadline for submission of MS 31.5.1995 Posting of results I would be glad to here from you! Friedrich Ackermann THIS NOTE WAS POSTED BY ME ORIGINALLY TO THE FOLLOWING NEWSGROUPS: bionet.biology.computational bionet.molbio.proteins bionet.software bionet.announce PLEASE FORWARD IT TO POSSIBLY INTERESTED PERSONS, THAT DON'T READ THESE NEWSGROUPS! PLEASE INFORM ME ABOUT OTHER NEWSGROUPS, INTO WHICH I SHOULD POST THIS NOTE!


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The Lost World of the Israelite Conquest is an examination of the Israelite conquest of Canaan as described primarily in the Book of Joshua. John H. and J. Harvey Walton argue the war was fought to properly order Canaan under God's sovereign rule, and not as punishment for the Canaanites. The term herem, normally translated as "place under the ban" or "utterly destroy," should be translated as "remove from human use" or even "purify." The process of establishing sovereignty in an area — called "Making a Name" or "Placing a Name," — is completed by God through the Temple (though Saul, the builders of the Tower of Babel, and many other kings previously tried to make a name for themselves, as recorded both within and outside the Bible). The authors introduce the idea of The Ban as a type, or foreshadowing, of Living in Christ, but do not convincingly argue this. Likewise, the propose an explanation for the apparent presence of inhuman monsters in Canaan. during the Conquest
Seven Days that Shook the World
And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.
This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, before any plant of the field was in the earth and before any herb of the field had grown. For the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the ground; 6 but a mist went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground.
And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.
Genesis 2:2-7
The Book of Joshua is a war story, the third book the Exodus–Numbers–Joshua narrative that chronicles the life of the savior of Israel, Joshua, who follows (and then apparently deposes) Moses and leads an army against the Canaanite cities. Men, families, and entire cities are placed "under the ban" and "doomed to destruction" (herem). It is as exciting as a tale of the rise of ISIS told from the perspective of a military commander would be. Angels, stars, prostitutes, and spies are all characters in a book that makes church ladies uncomfortable all over the world.
But it came to pass on the seventh day that they rose early, about the dawning of the day, and marched around the city seven times in the same manner. On that day only they marched around the city seven times.
And the seventh time it happened, when the priests blew the trumpets, that Joshua said to the people:
"Shout, for the LORD has given you the city!
Now the city shall be doomed by the LORD to destruction, it and all who are in it.
Only Rahab the harlot shall live, she and all who are with her in the house, because she hid the messengers that we sent."
Joshua 6:16-17
This pattern will be created later, when the Temple is opened in seven days. The Creation, the Conquest, and the Indwelling of the LORD in the Temple are are three stages in the proper ordering of the universe. God creates the universe, God is granted title to the land, God is invested in the Temple. A force completely outside the cosmos orders the cosmos and lives in the cosmos. Christians of course will see parallels — antitypes — in this process to the Creation by the Word, the Victory at the Cross, and the Indwelling of the Spirit at Pentecost.
At that time Solomon kept the feast seven days,
and all Israel with him, a very great assembly from the entrance of Hamath to the Brook of Egypt. And on the eighth day they held a sacred assembly,
for they observed the dedication of the altar seven days,
and the feast seven days.
On the twenty-third day of the seventh month he sent the people away to their tents, joyful and glad of heart for the good that the Lord had done for David, for Solomon, and for His people Israel.
2 Chronicles 7:8-10
Under the Ban
The Lost World of the Israelite Conquest could have been written as an extended examination of two verses:
So all the cities of those kings, and all their kings, Joshua took and struck with the edge of the sword. He utterly destroyed them, as Moses the servant of the Lord had commanded. But as for the cities that stood on their mounds, Israel burned none of them, except Hazor only, which Joshua burned.
Joshua 11:12-13
For the land is defiled; therefore I visit the punishment of its iniquity upon it, and the land vomits out its inhabitants.
Leviticus 18:25
Examining the three words in bold, the authors argue
- utterly destroy, or herem, means remove from human (as opposed to Divine) use
- defiled, or tm', means ritually unclean or unfit for use, as in Judges 13:4
- punishment, or pqd, means determine the density, and
- iniquity, or 'awon, means purify as with fire, as in Numbers 31:23
- vomit is accepted as such, but can proceed the proper use of a thing, such as the whale's vomiting of Jonah
The authors argue that Joshua "utterly destroyed" the kings by killing them,t the city of Hazor by burning it to the ground, and the other cities by transferring their sovereignty from the Israelite army (which had it by right of conquest) to God. The authors also argue that that Leviticus 18:25 really should read
For the land is unfit for use; therefore I will determine the density of its cleansing on it, and the land vomits out its inhabitants
The proposed translations are similar to Robert Alter's translation of the verse in Joshua:
And all the towns of these kings and all their kings Joshua took and struck them down with the edge of the sword, he put them under the ban as Moses servant of the LORD had charged. Only all the towns standing on their mounds Israel did not burn, except for Hazor alone that Joshua burned.
as well as Leviticus:
And the land was defiled, and I made a reckoning with it for its iniquity, and the land spewed out its inhabitants
This is persuasive. The Land of Canaan is to be put through an earthly purgatory, but the goal is to make it properly ordered, not to vindicatively punish it. As Rabbi Stuart Federow argues, many Christians ignore the Biblical emphasis on proper ordering by trying to reduce all forms of disorder to sin, just as some Christians ignore the Biblical emphasis on faithfulness by trying to reduce all forms of faithlessness to doubt. The lesson here, that God desires proper ordering of things and our allegiance to Him, means giving up some of pop Christianity.
Make a Name
The Israelite Idea of "Covenant" emphasized that Israel already surrendered to God, and was under an occupation regime similar to Japan's experience after World War II. God, not Israel, was sovereign. Not just certain cities, but the entire nation, was under the General Orders (or "Laws") of the Sovereign God-King.
This pattern (to a smaller extent) already existed in the Near East. The Babylonians, for instance, would grant specific cities or fields to their Gods similar to how modern companies will grant sovereign rights to consular compounds:
As long as heaven and earth and mankind will be, in future no son of man may inhabit [this land. I have offered] it to Tesub my lord, together with fields, farmyards, vineyards… [Let] your bulls Seri and Hurri [make it] their own grazing land
Yet because the other Near Eastern peoples treated Gods as a very powerful external partner, but not their ultimate Sovereign, they could congratulate themselves on entering into alliances with gods who were then bound by law to defend them. As one Assyrian memorial records:
Marduk, the king of gods, is reconciled with the king my lord. He does whatever the king my lord says. Sitting on your throne, you will vanquish your enemies, conquer your foes, and plunder the enemy
Thus, what is happening in Joshua is that the Israelites are conquering a country and then transferring the title to The LORD in keeping with the Instrument of Surrender ("Covenant") negotiated by Moses. By removing Canaan from Israelite use — making it herem — it is God, not Israel, that places his name in the Holy Land as recorded in the Chronicles
Yet I have chosen Jerusalem, that My name may be there, and I have chosen David to be over My people Israel.
2 Chronicles 6:6
This contrasts with King Saul's attempt in The Book of Samuel to indicate that he, and not God, is sovereign
So when Samuel rose early in the morning to meet Saul, it was told Samuel, saying,
"Saul went to Carmel, and indeed, he set up a monument for himself; and he has gone on around, passed by, and gone down to Gilgal."
Then Samuel went to Saul, and Saul said to him, "Blessed are you of the LORD! I have performed the commandment of the LORD."
But Samuel said, ""hat then is this bleating of the sheep in my ears, and the lowing of the oxen which I hear?"
1 Samuel 15:12-14
As well as against the Babylonian's attempt to do likewise with their Tower
And they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth."
Genesis 11:4
Living in Christ
If the theme is the rule of God — His creation of the universe, His sovereignty over Canaan, His indwelling at Zion — what does the King of the Universe want from us? Simple this: the full use of us.
The Waltons connect Herem from the Hebrew Bible with the Christian idea of being in Christ, or putting off the "old man" in the Letter to the Ephesians
But you have not so learned Christ, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.
Ephesians 4:20-24
The old man is "put off" (or "crucified" in Romans 6:6), not as a punishment, but as a necessary preparation for something greater. As the Waltons write:
We don't destroy our former selves because they committed crimes and deserve to be destroyed; we destroy them because they are in the way of God using us for his purposes.
The logic of this is that just as God placed Canaan as herem or "under the ban," God also placed us under the ban as well
Herem of identity in the new covenant means removing from use all identities (which recapitulate the Canaanite nations) other than Christian from the self (which recapitulates the land)
This is fascinating, but not as convincing. For one, the Septuagint Bible used by Bible translates Herem as Anathema, a term he never uses for living in Christ. Further, the Waltons extend the claim to viewing our individual identities not as things for God to use, but as things for us to reject. This seems to lead to a reductio ad absurdum of placing one's identity as male or female under the ban, but the Waltons seem to accept this
On the other hand, and privilege or status that accompanies the identity markers is not to be asserted. Paul has the identity of apostle, but he repeatedly refuses to assert the rights that accompany that identity.
The obvious scriptural counter-argument to this is never addressed:
He created them male and female, and blessed them and called them Mankind in the day they were created.
Genesis 5:2
Inhuman Monsters
A second interesting idea is explaining the otherwise inexplicable inclusion of Rephaism and Nephalim in the Joshua accounts. Rephaim appear to be the ghosts of dead kings (as in the Canaanite Story of Danel), while Nephalim would be the gigantic offspring of half-angelic / half-human hybrids. The Waltons argue that this is part of the trope of invincible barbarians called "umman manda" who are described with inhuman features.
There hands are destructive and their features are those of monkeys; he is one who eats what [a goddess] forbids and does not show reverence. They never stop roaming about…
they are an abomination to the gods' dwellings. Their ideas are confused; they cause only disturbance.
I was fascinated by this. The apparent presence of these supernatural creatures in both Genesis and Exodus is striking, and whether these are thinking creatures or Augustinian symbols, the Divine Author meant something by them. But the Waltons' interpretation does not square with the description in Numbers and Joshua as the Canaanites as having strong, established cities. The Waltons' later claim that Gog represents another form of barbarians, instead of something more bizarre or post-modern, is also questionable.
And as before, the obvious Scriptural complication to a purely human view of inhuman monsters is not mentioned
For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.
Ephesians 6:12
Final Thoughts
I have trouble recommending The Lost World of the Israelite Conquest because of the way it is embarrassed by the Scriptures, and bows too much to church ladies all over the world. Likewise it is not as persuasive a discussion of a concept as was Salvation by Allegiance Alone or even The Lost World of Genesis One. But it gave me a new way to understand herem, and tied it both to later discussions of King Saul and the Apostle Paul, as well as older Near Eastern myths and documents.
I read The Lost World of the Israelite Conquest in the Kindle edition.


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PROMPT Flex Caesarean Section Module
Works with PROMPT Flex Simulators - Light (LIM-80100 & LIM-80106)
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This product is ideal for practicing the necessary skills required when performing a cesarean section. Trainees can have exposure to delivering a difficult baby such as a deeply impacted head, or a transverse lie.
The module can be used to practice any of the following methods of delivering a deeply impacted fetal head:
- Routine maneuvers
- Assist from a vaginal hand (push technique)
- Reverse breech extraction (pull technique)
- Use of a fetal pillow
This module includes two surgical pads for incision and suturing, along with a pre-incised abdomen for repeated delivery practice, to help improve confidence and familiarity of maneuvers.
This product is available in a dark skin-tone (LIM-80203).
- Abdominal and uterine wall opening and closure
- Cephalic and breech delivery
- C-section at full dilation:
- Routine manoeuvres
- Assist from a vaginal hand (push technique)
- Reverse breech extraction (pull technique)
- Use of a fetal pillow
- Transverse lie
- Instrument assisted C-section delivery
- Delivery of the placenta
- Teamwork and human factors training in emergency Cesarean section
- Application of fundal pressure
- Uterus holds baby firmly in position for normal and transverse lies, breech and cephalic presentations
- Uterus support positions baby and directs it towards the pelvis/abdominal incision when fundal pressure is applied
- Pre-incised Delivery Only Skin option allows easy repeat loading of baby into the uterus
- Surgical pad allows realistic dissection and closure and is reversible to allow 2 uses
- Single/double in situ uterine wall closure
- Suturing of rectus sheath, fat and subcuticular or cutaneous skin closure
- Accommodates retraction using metal, plastic or rubber retractors
- Abdominal skin has realistic appearance and soft feel of at-term abdomen
- Realistic feel of uterus interior during delivery
- Head presents at realistic level once incision is made
- Optional insert to allow presentation of head just below ischial spines for Cesarean section at full dilation
- Latex free
- Surgical pad has following anatomical layers:
- Skin
- Fat
- Superficial epigastric vessels
- Rectus sheath
- Rectus muscle
- Parietal peritoneum
- Visceral peritoneum
- Bladder
- Muscular uterine wall
- Amniotic membrane
- LIM-80170 1 PROMPT Flex Uterus
- LIM-80171 1 Pre-incised Delivery Skin Light
- LIM-80172 1 Cesarean Section Abdominal Skin Light
- LIM-80173 1 Cervix Light
- LIM-80138 1 Cesarean Section Perineum Light
- LIM-80175 1 Foam Support
- LIM-80176 1 Full Dilatation Pelvic Insert Light
- LIM-80104 2 Cesarean Section Surgical Pads Light


text: Nine-year-old George Eppard-Annis, a fourth-grader at Berlin Intermediate School, is shown with his mother, Shelly Eppard-Annis, an executive associate at Wor-Wic Community College, on Take Your Child to Work Day. The student spent the day on the job with his mother at Wor-Wic's campus. The purpose of the activity is to help children discover the link between what they do now in school and what they can become in the future.


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Advances in technology tend to spoil us. PCs just a few years old have nothing on today's smart phones, and, whereas megapixel images were once the state of the art in digital photography, gigapixel images (composed of at least one billion pixels, or picture elements) are beginning to show up on the Web in vivid detail.
Gigapixel images also hold tremendous potential for providing law enforcement and the military with detailed reconnaissance and surveillance information. Long-distance images taken today by satellites or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) can capture detail down to a license plate number while flying at altitudes too high for these drones to be spotted from the ground. But these images provide only a narrow view, says Ravi Athale, a consultant to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and a senior principal scientist at MITRE Corp. in McLean, Va. He likens UAV images to seeing a battlefield or city through a "soda straw" and satellite images to an injection needle.
"We are no longer dealing with fixed installations or army tank units or missile silo units," Athale says. "[Fighting terrorism requires] an awareness of what's going on in a wide area the size of a medium city."
Through its Advanced Wide Field of View Architectures for Image Reconstruction and Exploitation program, DARPA has for the past year been working on ways to develop a camera that can take a gigapixel-quality image in a single snapshot. This approach is novel, given that today's gigapixel images actually consist of several megapixel-sized images pieced together digitally to provide a high level of detail over a large area. This is often done using a long-lens digital single-lens reflex (SLR) camera placed atop a motorized mount. Software controls the movement of the camera, which captures a mosaic of hundreds or even thousands of images that, when placed together, create a single, high-resolution scene that maintains its clarity even when the viewer zooms in on a specific area. DARPA plans to invest $25 million over a three-and-a-half-year period in its program, which includes a component called Maximally scalable Optical Sensor Array Imaging with Computation (MOSAIC).
The single-snapshot approach to gigapixel digital photography has its drawbacks. The equipment is bulky, expensive and complicated. In addition, because it may take several minutes or even hours for the automated camera to shoot all of the individual images required to create the larger mosaic, lighting conditions may change and objects (cars, people, aircraft, etc.) can move into and out of the frames. And stitching together the individual images requires software that must match overlapping points—any errors must be corrected manually.
Such images also require special viewing software found on Google Earth, 360world.eu, Gigapan.org (created by Pittsburgh's Carnegie Mellon University, NASA and Google) and other Web sites that allow gigapixel digital photographs to be uploaded, viewed and shared across the Web.
Nor are gigapixel images conducive to being captured by a compact, inexpensive camera. The digital processors and memory used in today's cameras are ill-equipped to manage gigapixel images, which contain more than 1,000 times the amount of information as megapixel images. (A 10-gigapixel image would take up more than 30 gigabytes of hard drive space.) And although pixels are often used in reference to image resolution, this attribute can truly only be measured by taking into account an image's overall dimensions and the number of pixels per inch or per centimeter. For example, an image that is 20.3 by 25.4 centimeters at 60 pixels per centimeter has the same resolution as an image that is 10.2 by 12.7 centimeters at 120 pixels per centimeter.
Computational photography
A team of Columbia University researchers in New York led by computer science professor Shree Nayar thinks a single snapshot gigapixel camera is possible if they can reduce the complexity of such images. "Rather than thinking about it as capturing the final image, you're capturing the information you would need to compute the final image," Nayar says.
In a paper to be presented at the April IEEE International Conference on Computational Photography (ICCP) in Pittsburgh, the Columbia researchers propose three relatively compact camera designs (two of which they have actually built as prototypes) for single-shot gigapixel imaging—each design relies on a ball-shaped lens and one or more digital sensors. Such a lens is one of the simplest because it has perfect symmetry (leading to fewer aberrations) and consists of one element rather than several lenses that must be configured to work together, says Oliver Cossairt, a Columbia computer science PhD candidate who works with Nayar.
The first camera Nayar, Cossairt and their team at the Computer Vision Laboratory (part of Columbia Engineering School's Computer Science Department) created is a single-element, monocentric camera that uses a pan/tilt motor to sequentially scan a single sensor to emulate an array of tiled sensors. The second camera is a system that actually uses an array of five sensors arranged side-by-side that produces a contiguous field-of-view (FOV). In the second system the packaging around each sensor leaves some space between them. To account for this, the researchers added five secondary relay lenses placed between the spherical lens and the sensors. This configuration enables each sensor's FOV to overlap slightly so that there are no gaps in data that might distort the final image.
The third design attaches the secondary relay lenses directly to half of the ball-shaped lens (giving it a bumpy rather than a smooth look) and includes a large number of small sensors around that half of the lens. These sensors could be attached to the inside of a spherical half shell slightly larger than the lens itself. The spherical lens would then be positioned inside the half shell so that each sensor would be coupled with a relay lens. Any images viewed by the smooth part of the lens would be captured by the sensors inside the half shell.
"We want to show there is a path to getting to gigapixel cameras, video or still, using the form factor and the weight and the cost of something that would be a camera today," Nayar says. "It was deemed in the past that you could not do that without building a really complex system. What we are saying is that by using computations and simple systems, you can do it."
Athale acknowledges the potential of the work being done by Nayar, Cossairt and their team, saying, "Computational photography is crucial to providing 'persistent wide-area surveillance.'"
Other single snapshot approaches
Microsoft Research Asia is one of a handful of other groups experimenting with single-shot gigapixel imaging. Researchers there have since 2007 been developing a prototype they call the dgCam, whose high-power accordion-style lens configuration gives the device the look of an old-time large-format camera. The dgCam, which takes 1.6-gigapixel images and is not expected to be sold commercially, also uses a sensor much larger that those used in Columbia's prototypes. The dgCam, which is not intended to be a compact camera, is designed to help museums archive, manage and research ancient paintings and drawings.
Large-format cameras—which in their early days required the use of large photographic plates and films and now rely on sensors much larger than those used by the Columbia researchers—are well-suited for taking detailed pictures of small objects, says Moshe Ben-Ezra, a researcher in Microsoft Research Asia's visual computing group who designed and built the dgCam. "The lens does not move during image capture, which is essential for archival quality imaging of any object that is not entirely flat," he says. The dgCam scans images and, like the Columbia project, uses computational algorithms to capture information about those images.
Another large-format approach to taking gigapixel snapshots is the Gigapixl Project, which physicist Graham Flint formed about a decade ago. Gigapixl's camera uses 23-by-46-centimeter film—the same used in military spy planes such as the U-2, to capture images—which is then scanned and digitized to create images up to four gigapixels in size.
Gigapixel digital imagery is still in its infancy but demand for it will grow quickly as the technology develops. "In 1999, megapixel cameras were a dream," says Christopher Hills, a security consultant with Securitas Security Services who also runs the site gigapixel360.com. Now high-end digital cameras can take 25-megapixel images. "I absolutely believe it's going to be the next big step in the evolution of surveillance and video," he adds. "The world is always going to move toward bigger, faster, less expensive pictures and video."
Slide Show: Columbia Researchers' Prototype and Conceptual Gigapixel Cameras
Draw the Curtains: Gigapixel Cameras Create Highly Revealing Snapshots [Slide Show]
Researchers are developing cameras that can take digital snapshots made up of more than a billion pixels
Advances in technology tend to spoil us. PCs just a few years old have nothing on today's smart phones, and, whereas megapixel images were once the state of the art in digital photography, gigapixel images (composed of at least one billion pixels, or picture elements) are beginning to show up on the Web in vivid detail.


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The Kentucky Tourism Development Finance Authority voted unanimously on May 19, 2011, to grant tax incentives to Ark Encounter, according to the Associated Press (May 19, 2011). Ark Encounter is the proposed creationist theme park in northern Kentucky. According to the Louisville Courier-Journal (December 1, 2010), "Ark Encounter, which will feature a 500-foot-long wooden replica of Noah's Ark containing live animals such as juvenile giraffes, is projected to cost $150 million and create 900 jobs ... The park, to be located on 800 acres in Grant County off Interstate 75, also will include a Walled City, live animal shows, a replica of the Tower of Babel, a 500-seat special-effects theater, an aviary and a first-century Middle Eastern village." Collaborating on the project are Ark Encounter LLC and the young-earth creationist ministry Answers in Genesis, which already operates a Creation "Museum" in northern Kentucky.
The tax incentives will allow Ark Encounter to recoup 25 percent of its development costs by retaining the sales tax generated by the project. With the development costs of the park estimated at 150 million dollars, the incentives would amount to 37.5 million dollars over ten years. Whether it is consistent with the federal and Kentucky constitutions for the state to grant the incentives to the project is still not clear; Erwin Chemerinsky of the University of California, Irvine, School of Law told The New York Times (December 5, 2010) that "if it's the Bible's account of history that they're presenting, then the government is paying for the advancement of religion," while Bill Sharp of the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky told USA Today (December 5, 2010), "Courts have found that giving such tax exemptions on a nondiscriminatory basis does not violate the establishment clause, even when the tax exemption goes to a religious purpose."
In a May 19, 2011, press release, the Reverend Barry Lynn, the executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, declared, "The state of Kentucky should not be promoting the spread of fundamentalist Christianity or any other religious viewpoint ... Let these folks build their fundamentalist Disneyland without government help." Lynn said that Americans United would investigate whether the incentives violated the separation of church and state, but argued that the state's funding of the project was bad policy in any case. "[Governor] Beshear wants to launch this ark on a sea of tax breaks — money that will ultimately have to be made up by Kentucky taxpayers," Lynn said. "This misguided project deserves to sink." He added, "I feel sorry for the children of Kentucky. At a time when they should be learning modern science, their public officials are subsidizing fundamentalist religion."


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P0793 OBD II Trouble Code Intermediate Shaft Speed Sensor A Circuit No Signal
How to easily diagnose, repair, and what causes a P0793 code which indicates a lack of signal from the A intermediate shaft speed sensor circuit.
Symptoms of P0793 OBD II Trouble Code
- Hard shifting
- Numerous instrument panel lights illuminated
- Poor driveability
- Erratic engine speed
Common Causes of P0793 OBD II Trouble Code
- Defective or damaged Intermediate shaft speed sensor
- Electrical fault in the wires between the speed sensor and modules used
- Internal ECM and/or TCM issue
- Other related sensors/solenoids damaged or defective (e.g.: Input shaft speed sensor, Output shaft sensor, Shift solenoid etc.)
- Dirty or low automatic transmission fluid (ATF)
Severity of P0793 OBD II Trouble Code
I would say this fault is moderately severe. Like mentioned earlier, your automatic transmission may still be functioning OK. That said, it could also be indicative if one or more bigger more pressing issues. Diagnosing any transmission issue ASAP is the best strategy.