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Who would think the surroundings of an insurance or investment office could startle and amaze? Or that a hospital's appearance could offer joy and hope? In San Antonio, curated art is becoming part of corporate culture one office and conference room at a time.
The Argo Group, Joeris General Contractors, health-related businesses, and others have invested in art because their CEOs want to share their personal passions with employees and clients. Their choices have ended up benefiting their businesses in unexpected ways.
Incorporating art into local offices made a modern-era debut when the Matthews & Branscomb law firm, which joined Dykema Cox Smith in 2004, designed its office space to showcase local art in 1983. The firm made a bold statement by placing a sculpture by Sir Henry Moore in front of its office building at East Commerce and South St. Mary's streets. Today, the Phipps law firm, whose building on the San Antonio River projects an industrial vibe on the Museum Reach, is filled with dynamic art that reaches to the rooftop Paramour bar.
As one business owner noted, employees spend more time in the office than at home. It turns out that art in the office also breaks ice with clients and helps in recruiting. Each collection incites excitement as elevator or entryway open to the unexpected.
The Argo Group
To one side of the 13th-floor reception area at the Argo Group's office in downtown's IBC Centre, sparkling beads twisted on wire suspend into an atrium below, leading visitors to marvel at the incongruity of arresting art hovering above desk cubicles. Woodcut prints, photographs, digital images, pen and ink drawings, and even art furniture serve as a "good stimulant" for employees and clients alike, said Mark E. Watson III, the company's CEO and chief art lover.
"I think it reflects who we are, which is a thoughtful company as opposed to another run-of-the-mill, stodgy company," he told the Rivard Report by telephone from Argo's Bermuda office. The company provides high-risk insurance and has offices in London, Bermuda, Brazil, and New York, among others.
Displayed throughout the company's four floors, the collection includes a series of photos of the King Ranch by Mexican photographer Graciela Iturbide; 10 woodcuts by local artist Nate Cassie; a full series of grocery bag digital photos by the late Chuck Ramirez; etched metal chairs by sculptor George Schroeder; photos by Dan Borris, George O. Jackson, and the late Rick Hunter; and works by painters Ana Fernandez, James Cobb, and many others.
While clients say they are comfortable in Argo's offices, Watson is particularly thrilled when they are inspired enough to contact an artist and purchase their own works. As art sources, he favors Artpace and Blue Star Contemporary, and also relies on Patricia Ruiz-Healy, owner of the gallery in Olmos Park bearing her name.
Group 42
When Group 42, an energy-focused holding company, moved its offices to the Pearl, President and CEO Paul Bell saw the new space as a place to "showcase local artistic talent as an investment in a culture of creative thinking." The offices include artwork by local and international artists, including Rudy Choperena, Ansen Seale, Larry Graeber, Martha Durke, Ben Mata, and the late Reginald Rowe. Even the furniture is art. To furnish a three-sided meeting room, Harold Wood designed a triangular conference table using 400-year-old reclaimed wood handcrafted without nails or glue by cabinetmaker John O'Brien.
"We work with a lot of people internationally, and the art gives a nice talking point about our progressive culture and support of local artists," Bell said. "Also, it's a very calming and clean space, and employees appreciate that."
San Antonio-based art curator Allison Hays Lane consulted with Bell and his wife, Audrey Mangold on the collection, making purchases in Basel, Switzerland, New York, Dubai, Berlin, and London. They also agreed on acquiring works on paper from national presses "to give a mixed-media feel to the art program," Lane said.
"I like working with clients like Paul and Audrey who have an excellent art compass, but also enjoy pursuing new avenues and are willing to take a chance," Lane said.
Phipps Law Firm
Employees at Phipps LLC, encompassing two specialty law firms, seem to be having fun. Maybe it's the environment: the landmark modern Phipps building, overlooking the River on the Museum Reach, pops with sassy art. Superheroes prevail on one floor, including two portraits of Batman, one eating a donut and one brushing his teeth. A work by international graffiti superstar Banksy showing a street person holding a sign reading "Keep your coins. I WANT CHANGE," hangs behind a coffee maker. On each of the building's four floors, a mural by local graffiti artists Los Otros surrounds the elevator, including a rendering of owner Martin Phipps' children.
"Art and law are my passions," Phipps told the Rivard Report. "It seems like they are strange bedfellows, but not to me. Art and law, in theory, both search for the truth. Looking into the human soul to discover and reveal our inner selves that many times, we do not want to reveal. Art and law are actually kindred spirits."
Phipps chooses the artworks himself and encourages lawyers to hang personal pieces in their offices. Most of the works are by artists outside of San Antonio, but Phipps' desk was hand-hewn by local craftsman John Brackenridge, as were employee work tables. A wood sculpture titled The Inevitable Invention of Mythology is by local artist Danville Chadbourne. Art extends even to stairway landings, reflecting Phipps' love of movies. One shows "Cat" in Breakfast at Tiffany's clawing Holly's face. One is a wrinkled, elderly "Tweety Pie."
In the fourth floor Paramour, a coffee shop and cocktail lounge (depending on the hour), art on the walls seems almost superfluous amid brightly colored furniture loaded with arty pillows, inside and on the sizable balcony. It serves as an inspiring backdrop for brainstorming.
"To be successful at law, you must be creative," Phipps continued. "Most lawyers are not creative, relying on decisions made in the past. But the great social changes to our society have come through brilliant but creative arguments to protect our individual freedoms."
South Texas Blood and Tissue Center
At the South Texas Blood and Tissue Center, any anxiety blood donors feel may evaporate when they enter the lobby and find themselves amid hundreds of shiny origami shapes dangling from the high ceiling like rain, which is the title of the mobile. San Antonio artist Anita Valencia folded hundreds of crushed beer and soda cans to create a dazzling effect.
On another wall, a massive two-dimensional work called Shrine depicts hazy columns and arches. As the drawing's title implies, these architectural features belong to the Alamo; deceased architect Henry Rayburn drew the image on recycled drawing boards. Along with Rain's use of recycled materials, the center's artwork reinforces the facility's mission.
The idea of filling the original corporate headquarters off of IH-10 and First Park ten Boulevard, completed in 1994, and two later wings in 2002 and 2008, began when Tim Blonkvist, Overland Partners' lead architect for the project, told the Blood & Tissue Center's board he had designed the limestone building with art in mind.
Once the art was installed in donation rooms, offices, hallways, and elsewhere, not everyone was thrilled. After an employee tried to pry off a plywood frame from Graeber's painting Sky, thinking it was part of its crate, employees were invited to a seminar to talk and learn about art. Don Bacigalupi, then the San Antonio Museum of Art's contemporary curator of art, explained that strong negative feelings about a work are a good place to start learning more about art and ourselves.
Joeris General Contractors
At Joeris General Contractors, employee response to the company's works of art also has been mixed.
"Art is highly personal and, as such, evokes responses from enthusiasm to jokes or questions like, 'What is that supposed to be?,'" CEO Gary Joeris told the Rivard Report. "However, the consensus is an appreciation of our art and the overall feel it provides our office environment."
In addition to collecting art with the help of local gallery Art Incorporated, the company has commissioned artworks "to honor iconic structures and architecture, since we are in the construction business," Joeris said.
Most of the commissions have been given to clients as gifts, he added.
"Several clients have multiple pieces on display in their offices, extending the reach of the art and the artists," Joeris said.
As other corporate collectors observed, the impetus for collecting art is personal. That it makes the company more interesting to clients and other visitors is a bonus.
"It's a great conversation starter and a wonderful story about how our relationships with artists connect us to architecture, construction, and our hometown," Joeris said.
University Health System
It's hard to feel anything but joy as you approach University Health System's Sky Tower or Robert B. Green Campus. Both exude life and elation, humanity and hope.
"When you go to a hospital, you don't want to be there unless you're having a baby," said Mark Webb, CEO of University Children's Health and director of the hospital system's building program. "Part of the idea in the way we designed the spaces, the colors, the art, was to create something different, a place of healing, so when you walked through your anxiety kind of lowers. You can see that in people's faces, that they feel a sense of calm."
The Robert B. Green Campus, which opened in 2013, contains more than 300 works by 75 artists. Its signature work, visible from downtown, is Bill Fitzgibbons' San Antonio Colorline computerized LED lights that wrap around the top of the building and south-facing facade. Art from lobby to exam room aims to blow the minds – and hopefully the fear – of incoming patients, while exposing them to a caliber of art they may not have experienced otherwise.
University Health's Sky Tower hospital in the South Texas Medical Center integrates 1,200 artworks by more than 275 artists from eight countries into its waiting rooms, nurses stations, walkways, patient rooms, rooftop garden, and even driveway and parking lots. The patient-drop off zone feels like the porte cochère of a Vegas hotel, though many people coming and going are in scrubs. Thousands of bluebonnets covering a sandstone wall at the drop-off and colorful suspended sculptures in the lobby intend to make hearts heal and swell. The bluebonnets were cast by artist Riley Robinson in steel and powder-coated in blue and green. They bloom continuously, no matter the season.
"There's some science between art and healing, and the impact that colors, textures, and the way things look have on the way people go through the healing process," Webb said.


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subset: commoncrawl


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Select a fictional character from history, television, or film. Prior approval from the instructor of your chosen character is required. Film selections may include:
The Blind Side
A Beautiful Mind
Pursuit of Happy-ness
The Fisher King
Fatal Attraction
What about Bob?
Girl Interrupted
Write a 1,050- to 1,400-word paper in which you analyze your chosen characters personality using one theorist or theory from each of the following columns:
Column A Column B Column C
Jung Allport Five-factor model
Adler Cattell Object relations
Freud Kelly Maslow
Horney Ellis
Search the University Library, the Theory Tables Learning Team Assignment, and other resources for information on each of the theorists or theories you selected.
Describe the connection between the characters personality and the theory used to explain it using relevant information such as direct quotes, descriptions of life events, examples of interpersonal behavior, and so on.
Include the following in your paper:
A short introduction outlining the demographic and background information of the chosen character
An evaluation of how each of the chosen personality theorists or theories explains the personality of the chosen character
A discussion of how the selected characters behavior might be interpreted differently, depending on which theoretical approach is used
A discussion of the extent to which each chosen theorist or theory would address relevant social, cultural, environmental, biological, or unconscious factors that may be influencing the characters behavior
Format your paper consistent with APA guidelines.


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We Finally Haul Out
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.
Our Ha Ha socializing also began well before the event. We met our first Ha Ha bound boat cruising the west coast of Vancouver Island in August. At the time, we were not very diligent about writing stuff down so we promptly forgot their name and boat. It's embarrassing.
Emeryville in the Bay Area was a positive haven of Ha Ha boats. It helped that by September, the rally committee had sent out our cruising packages which included a Baja Ha Ha sky blue and white flag. By running this up the spreader, we were able to attract the attention of boats all over the marina. Because we had our good friends s/v Rubber Duckies, Excellent Adventure, and Totem to distract us, we didn't spend much time with Ha Ha'ers in Emeryville. However, ever since, it's been almost a default stance.
There was s/v Wish on the dock at KKMI. s/v Vindsong and s/v Sea Horse trapped with us in San Simeon. s/v VictoryCat on the hard here in San Diego. There was s/v Sirius Star -- a father and young daughter team looking for other kid boats -- and at every turn we hear about another family "desperately seeking kids." Dinners, movies, drinks, and long chit chats on the VHF quickly become the norm, with those bright blue and white banners waving an introduction from any distance.
But what consistently slows down our socialization is work work and more work. Three years of constant effort to make us ready to cross the border was apparently insufficient. We've been in the yard far more than we've been out during the past month. We've spent an obscene amount of money and the yard grime is ground into my heels so badly that I think the only way to restore their original pink color is to slice them off.
We are, however, all done with that. I don't know if our alternators will ever work correctly. I think that's an open question. We've now got folks who know what they are talking about saying we should strip the whole thing out and start over with a considerably more simple system. Okay. If that worked, I'd do it. If dancing naked on the beach singing Disney show tunes with a string of Christmas lights draped over my shoulders worked, I would do it. The good news is that everything else is ready to go.
SSB? Check
Outboard? Check
Autopilot? Check
Provisioning? Check
Paperwork? Check
Cat? Check
Haircut? Check
Engines? Check
So we head out for the Baja Ha Ha with only two things that hover over our boat like Damocles sword: those alternators for whom voodoo is apparently the strongest form of mechanical improvement option available and a complete lack of Mexican currency. The good news on that later is that with the peso plummeting along with the dollar, we don't expect folks to have any trouble taking dollars at our first port until we can get to a Mexican bank.
Good bye United States. I'll be back in a few years. Take care of yourself.


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Posadas: Carrying Our Tradition in Our Nation's Capitol
On December 11, 2013 By Ricardo Zamudio
Editor's note: Members of AZ2DC recently traveled to Washington, D.C. to share their stories with our Congressmen and to pray for them. This post originally appeared on AZ2DC's blog. Permission was given by the moderator to repost. Around this time of year in the Latino community, posadas–songs and […]Continue Reading →


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ORIZARI + is a result of different researches which revealed the necessity to offer to potential investors, employers
|Kivo-ebiz Ltd
Kivo-Ebiz Ltd was set up as a social enterprise in 2006, selling items on e-bay on behalf of local people. The enterprise is run by volunteers, uses 100% recycled materials for packaging and all profits go towards local community projects. We also provide training on two levels for internet trading – increasing local skills and volunteer numbers. This has recycled thousands
|Sustainable Construction
In the United Kingdom, the 'built environment' – meaning constructing homes, offices and factories and then living and working in them – is responsible for almost half of the country's carbon emissions, half of water consumption and a third of landfill waste. So, giving 'green skills' to the men and women who design, build, renovate and manage
|Clear About Carbon
Clear About Carbon is an innovative project in Cornwall with a mission to find new ways to raise awareness among businesses and the public sector about carbon-based gas emissions and their impact on our climate. Working with staff in Cornish SMEs and public sector organisations, the project identifies the most successful ways of getting them actively involved in reducing carbon within their
Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations are now at their highest for 3 million years and as a result urban areas are vulnerable to increased temperatures and flooding. Regional spatial planning and urban design can provide solutions that make our communities less vulnerable to these risks. Green infrastructure including gardens, parks, productive landscapes, green corridors, green roofs and
|Un Comune rurale sceglie l'energia sostenibile
A small town in the Po Valley has switched to 100% renewable energy for its municipal energy users. A mix of different technologies now provides all the heat and air conditioning it requires during traditionally cold winters and hot summers.Roncoferraro is located some 140 km south-east of Milan. Its 6 700 inhabitants are spread over a wide area, with most working in the agricultural sector.
|Valutazione del potenziale delle tecnologie legate alle energie rinnovabili
Projects such as this are helping the EU to become a smart, sustainable and inclusive economy by 2020, as set out in the EU 2020 growth strategy. The EU is facing some tough challenges, including an ageing population, an insufficiently qualified workforce, the need for greater innovation, striking a balance between economic growth and environmental degradation, and ensuring secure, clean
|Migliorie di carattere ambientale per il trattamento dei rifiuti
Support from the European Regional Development Fund has enabled municipal waste from the city of Salerno, in Italy's Campania region, to be processed to higher environmental standards.
|POWERED Project of Offshore Wind Energy: Research, Experimentation, Development
POWERED aims to define a set of strategies and shared methods for the development of the off-shore wind energy in all the Countries overlooking the Adriatic Sea. Such energetic choice could allow a rapid increase of installations, thanks to the reduction of the problems related to landscape topic that are frequently the main obstacles to the creation of wind parks in high density population
|Abbattimento e ricostruzione delle ex- scuole elementari in località "Castelli"
L'immobile per come è stato concepito non consente interventi strutturali e architettonici tali da poterne valorizzare adeguatamente l'uso previsto, sia come residenziale che ad uso attività sociali e associative. E' pertanto nostra intenzione procedere alla demolizione e ricostruzione dell'intera struttura per ricavare due


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Last week we talked about how to manage a property yourself, and the week before that we covered how to let a property yourself.
If you do all of that properly, most of the time you should find that your properties run smoothly. But every so often, however careful you are, you'll experience a phenomenon that makes any landlord's blood run cold…the nightmare tenant!
We run through how to deal with this unfortunate situation, including:
It's an episode that hopefully you'll never need to use, but it's worth being prepared for when the worst doesn't happen.
What's better than an interactive map? Well, two interactive maps of course! These both come from the Office for National Statistics.
First, a handy visualisation of house prices in your area. When you're in the broad stage of your property search, it's a nice way to spot pockets of cheaper properties and get a sense for how average prices vary.
Then you can see how prices got that way, with this animated map of house price changes since 1995. It really shows the ripple effect out from London over the years – and how different regions reacted after the 2008 crash.
The proportion of landlords in Central London thinking about selling up has quadrupled since last year's budget, according to this survey from the NLA.
In fact, the intention to sell has increased by an average of 12% across the whole UK. It could mean more stock coming onto the market…but it's hard to know what proportion of those landlords will eventually decide to sell after weighing up all the factors.
Subscribe in your favourite podcast app to get every episode automatically sent to your phone.
Share your thoughts on this episode – and find out what others are saying – in the Property Hub Forum.Go to the forum
Did you enjoy this episode? Then please leave us a review: it's the best way to say thank you, because it helps others find us.
To show our appreciation, we'll read out your review on the show! Learn how to leave a review in Apple Podcasts.


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We are NOT located on the Lake, but if you are planning on water sports,
fishing and boating, we are only minutes away from Lake of the Ozarks State Park
public beach and marina for swimming, picnics, boat or jet ski rental. If you bring
your own watercrafts, we have plenty boat parking area with battery recharging plugins and
we are just minutes from a public launch area.
Plan for your next Quail's
Nest get away around our special Hot
Rates for select dates! Hot rates are offered
November thru April only on certain days. Click the link to check out just
how much you can save.
When you plan your family vacation,
attend a special event, or just get away from
it all, walk next door and do a little power shopping at the
Premium Outlets. Also, ask our staff about their suggestions for some of the
Lake's great restaurants. Several restaurants are within a short walk.
It's easier to plan if you know when all of the Lake's special events are taking
Try the lake's Special Events Calendar
It's easier to plan if you know when all of the Lake's special events are taking
Try the lake's


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This summer, two Grantlanders will gather to discuss the weekend's mega-franchise, counterprogramming comedy, or teen weepie to consider truth, spoilers (!), and the Hollywood way. This week: Robert Mays and Rafe Bartholomew lock and load for the improbable third installment of Sylvester Stallone's ensemble action franchise, The Expendables 3.
Robert Mays: It's not an accident, Rafe, that you and I were the ones saddled with the mission of seeing Sly and the Family of Stone Faces get the band back together for another round of The Expendables. We both have an affinity for action movies that some people might deem unhealthy — to the point that 10 seconds ago, you excitedly waved me into the living room because the unitard pool-fight scene from Lionheart was on.
Back when the first Expendables was released in 2010, Stallone's entire press-tour message, his stated reason for wanting to roll out of bed at 64 to wear berets and blow shit up, was that he thought movies in America had gone soft. He saw The Expendables, a script he stumbled onto and eventually rewrote, as a chance to breath life into the old-school, popcorn-scarfing action genre he defined in the '80s.
There were plenty of in-jokes and homage in this one. Arnold says, "Get to the chopper!" not once, but twice. Wesley Snipes, with a perfectly demented look in his eye, makes a tax evasion crack. Just like in the first two, there's a steady stream of obligatory cameos moving down the checklist of old action stars. At this point, with Harrison Ford and Mel Gibson getting their run this time around, it would be easier to find someone who led an '80s action movie and hasn't made it into one of these things. The only one I could come up with was Carl Weathers.
So I guess my first question for you is this: If these movies are supposed to pay tribute to the action flicks we love so much, why the hell are they about 5 percent as enjoyable?
Rafe Bartholomew: How can I answer that question without first responding to 15 other points you made? For starters, I just assumed I was chosen for the Expendables 3 assignment because our coworkers dislike me. Secondly, there's nothing unhealthy about starting your day by watching JCVD and the Gerardo-haired villain from Only the Strong flash their bulges in black spandex during a poolside brouhaha.
The glaring absence in Expendables casting through three films remains Steven Seagal.1 This will sound absurd to normal moviegoers, but seasoned Seagalogists will know that Seagal's self-regard is so earnest and delusional that he would never let himself participate in a gimmicky retread project like the Expendables movies. He explained his choice not to appear in the series earlier this year: "I just didn't like some of the people involved. Life is too short to work with funny people." As ESPN.com boxing editor and noted Seagalogist Brian Campbell wrote in June, "No one in the history of the free world takes himself more seriously than Seagal does, even today."
It was hard not to interpret the Native American–patterned jacket Stallone wore at one point in The Expendables 3 as some kind of coded message to Seagal. Whether it was an olive branch to express solidarity with Seagal's spiritual and preservationist causes or a simple insult — THIS JACKET LOOKS RIDICULOUS, YOU POMPOUS AIKIDO TURD — we may never know.
But you know what? This time I'm siding with Seagal. The Expendables films aren't as enjoyable as classic action movies because there doesn't seem to be any creative impulse behind them. I know I'm walking onto the thinnest of ice by championing the creativity that went into Commando, Bloodsport, and Drop Zone, to name a few, but at least those movies felt like they made an honest attempt to entertain action fans with a paper-thin plot, an enjoyably goofy conceit, and a handful of cool heroes and villains and fight scenes. Those movies had some earnesty. Maybe it wasn't a good idea to build a movie around Snipes infiltrating a gang of skydiving bank robbers, but at least somebody once thought it was. With The Expendables, the only idea seems to be corralling a bunch of marquee names so they can swindle $12 out of nostalgic 28- to 45-year-old men.
I'm glad Seagal refuses to take part in such transparently cynical cash-grabbing. He mails it in the honorable way — by starring in straight-to-video junk that makes you regret subscribing to Netflix.
Mays: Oh, man. I can't believe I forgot Seagal. And by the way, Stallone followed up the jacket with a shirt that had the same Native American–esque pattern on the shoulders. He was clearly sending a message.
The creativity point is a good one, and Drop Zone is a perfect example. At least "Snipes infiltrates a gang of skydiving bank robbers" is something. A good action movie should have a conceit that can be summed up in no more than one sentence: "A wisecracking New York cop gets trapped in a skyscraper full of terrorists and has to shoot his way out." I don't even know where I'd start explaining the conceit for this movie. They're a group of mercenaries, but they work for the CIA, and they have to free one of their old buddies to stop an arms dealer, who's also one of their old buddies, but they're too over the hill to pull it off, so they have to recruit a group of young guns to get the job done, but not without realizing before it's over that they needed the old dudes ALL ALONG.
A lot of people who've written about The Expendables 3 have leaned on some form of AARP joke to characterize its badness, but I'm not even sure you can call that fruit low-hanging anymore. It's fruit that's fallen off the tree and been trodden over again and again. In a fortuitous turn, Escape Plan just happened to be on TV a few hours after I got done with The Expendables 3. This is a movie starring Sly and Arnold that came out a year ago, and it also happens to be really damn entertaining. Age isn't the problem with The Expendables. Scope is. Think about the most fun action movies of the past few years — movies like The Raid, Dredd, and Lockout. Those movies, like Escape Plan, are all self-contained. They're enjoyable because they go deep instead of going wide. And wide is all that The Expendables is going for. Seriously, look at the billboards.
Rafe: Let me try to nail down the conceit of The Expendables 3 for you: Everyone will wear funny hats. Dolph Lundgren was the headwear MVP, from the Somali do-rag he wraps around his blocky noggin in the opening scene to his actual hair, brushed down into forehead-covering, prepubescent Bieber bangs. Poor Snipes's character was reduced to little more than matching Kangol-and-vest outfits after his genuinely cool introduction as a shell-shocked former Expendable who spent the previous decade in some warlord's dungeon in the Central Asian steppe. And the rest of the cast was outfitted in so many tacky fedoras that I sat through the credits just to see if they'd toss in a fedora parkour scene for shits and giggles.
So if the world is as craven and hollow as we think it is and we can expect The Expendables 4 to hit theaters sometime in 2016, what can Stallone do to improve the franchise? He's made a number of enjoyable, throwback action films in recent years — you mentioned Escape Plan, and I'd nominate Sly's over-the-top pulp noir Bullet to the Head and 2008's ultraviolent Rambo redux, which treated every bad guy's head like one of Gallagher's watermelons. So how would you fix The Expendables?
I'd tweak the casting of Stallone's handpicked new breed of action stars. We know Sly loves combat sports and admires boxers and mixed martial artists who actually know how to deliver a beatdown. But this is not a boxing ring or the UFC octagon. It's a fictional film, and rather than foist Randy Couture and Ronda Rousey and Victor Ortiz on moviegoers, why not look for some actors with action-star potential? Grantland's Andy Greenwald has long been beating the drum for Banshee lead Antony Starr's genre film potential. Khal Drogo from Game of Thrones played a fabulous heavy in Bullet to the Head, but he's already taken his comic-book physique to comic-book movies; still, why not pluck one of the show's gargantuan, head-squishing sword swingers who hasn't made it big yet? How about ANYONE from the Raid movies? Doesn't that make more sense than hiring a guy whose most significant screen credit before The Expendables 3 was the commercial for his signature line of "FaceLube" moisturizers?
Mays: Let's table Mr. FaceLube for a second. We need to get back to him, but I want to address the Snipes situation first.
Anyone who cared about the release of this movie even a little bit cared because it carried the possibility of a Snipes comeback, and honestly, he didn't disappoint! The five minutes we got of Snipes acting insane and using an entire train to destroy a military compound was one of my two favorite parts of these proceedings, but aside from some clearly-a-body-double parkour, that's pretty much all we got. I don't think he spoke again. The other element I enjoyed was what Antonio Banderas brought to the table. I was genuinely entertained by his shtick, which belonged in a movie that is having a way better time than this one.
When I was talking about scope earlier, those are the two people I had in mind. I think there's an entertaining movie in here somewhere, but to me, it's a movie that delves into why they needed to break Snipes out of prison, why Gibson bailed on his bros to become an art-slinging weapons dealer, and why Banderas is the final piece to make the whole thing work. I'm not asking for in-depth backstories here. I just need one cool thing about each of these guys. When we met Snipes's character, Stallone says he's a medical genius that they just call Doc. That never comes up again! Every scene of these movies is a chance for someone to perform life-saving surgery with some gum and a paper clip, and we get nothing.
It's the same problem I have with that Save the World: The New Class crew that Stallone puts together. The "let's meet the gang" scenes from movies are typically a blast — Ocean's Eleven, even something like the second Mighty Ducks movie — but aside from Banderas, I didn't react to a single one of these guys. Stallone presents Kellan Lutz (best known for being the sixth lead in the Twilight movies) as the heir to the action movie throne by telling us his character threw a boxing match to make some cash. Really, Sly? He couldn't even win the fight?
The lackluster group of "youngs" is where this whole thing falls shortest. The point of The Expendables 3, if I can call it that, is the speech Stallone gives to his old dudes in a bar after they fail to thwart Gibson's plans. "We aren't the future anymore," he says, on-the-nose-ingly. "We're part of the past." The issue is that the future presented here sucks. The last time you and I watched an Ortiz production together, he was getting punched in the face really hard by Floyd Mayweather, but I'm worried we don't have any clearly superior options.
Jason Momoa is a great suggestion — and this movie could have been seriously helped by some ax-wielding craziness — but that's about where my list ends. The path to the next generation of action hero is littered with the bones of Jai Courtney and a dozen dudes who look and sound just like him. And here's an even more depressing thought: Do people really even want this type of movie anymore?
Rafe: Man, I don't know what kind of movies people want. Nor do I really care. I just know what I like and what I want to see when I punch my Regal club card. So, yes, I still like action movies — I watch Bloodsport twice a year and once taped together a homemade, rasterized poster of Chong Li to impress a girl I was trying to date.
Every time a movie like The Raid or Escape Plan comes out and it's somewhere on the spectrum from not bad to face-meltingly awesome, I'm excited. Chances are, I'm not the only person who feels that way. Unfortunately, though, I don't have much control over how the entertainment industry chooses to make its money. And maybe that's a good thing, because if I had my druthers, the summer of 2014 would be dominated by blockbuster franchises like Happy Gilmore 7, an Oz prequel about Simon Adebisi called Give Me Some Tits, and The Raid 2. Hey, one out of three ain't bad.
Mays: I'm in on Happy Gilmore 7, for whatever that's worth.
I still feel the same way. When I initially saw the trailer for Non-Stop, I copied and pasted the link into every Gchat window I had open ("Taken on a planeeeeee"). Plenty of movies still do that for me, including each of the past few Fast and Furious installments. What I'm worried about, based on both recent history and the awful collection of talent Stallone tried to sell us, is that it's getting harder for movies without ties to a franchise or without a major star to get traction. I'll be seeing Fast 7, and I'll be seeing Taken 3, too, but I always get more of a kick out of being surprised by a movie I wasn't expecting. It doesn't help that The Expendables is pretty much the exact opposite of whatever that movie is.


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Surreal and at times a bit eerie, a rainbow road made of pure light winds through muted landscapes as if illuminating a path to another world. As it makes its way through snowy forests, across rocky creeks and along the seashore before pausing within an abandoned shed, it almost seems alive. For filmmaker and photographer Daniel Mercadante, there's a sense of hope to it, a narrative that only becomes apparent when you see all of the images in the series on his Instagram. "When the journey felt long and lonely, can you remember you're on the Rainbow Road?"
Rainbow Road as a seafaring commutation atop a lake. HUGE thank you to @atinaka for the idea, producing this, and for gracefully carrying the RainbowRig from a boat! ??? . . . #tbt #rainbowroad #rainbow #lake #boatlife #somewheremagazine #art_spotlight #imaginarymagnitude #longexposure #lightpainting #trippy #magical
The rainbow first appears in a dark and mysterious forest. It travels throughout the many diverse landscapes of California, skips all the way down to the lush jungles and weathered alleyways of Guatemala, reappears briefly on the West Coast and then finds its way to Connecticut before encircling Mercadante's wife and creative partner, Katina Mercadante, in celebration of their anniversary.
Happy Anniversary to this magical dream of an ethereal being. Often found somewhere near rainbow road with a mythical woodland beast. @atinaka I love you. . . . #rainbowroad #rainbow #love #womansbestfriend #magic #imagination #art_spotlight #somewheremagazine #imaginarymagnitude #popmyeyes #thepinklemonade #lovewatts #watts #love #?
The project is a gorgeous example of just how magical long-exposure photography can be. It's so simple to make – you just wave sources of light against a darkened backdrop while keeping the camera shutter open longer than usual – yet it seems to open a portal to another universe. Check out the Mercadantes' Instagram to see the whole journey, or their website for their collaborative film projects.


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Letter of Authorization (LOA)
An Letter of Authorization (LOA) is a legal document in which the executing party makes certain assertions to a service provider about their authorization to switch (port) services and telephone numbers from one provider to another. Traditionally, this would be a paper document requiring an actual signature. However, the industry currently supports LOAs which may be generated from a variety of electronic and verbal methods.
How Bandwidth is Involved with LOA
Bandwidth requires its customers to obtain an LOA for all port in orders. While Bandwidth may not require that an LOA be included when submitting a port in order, we do require that our customers are able to provide an LOA to us when requested.
What Are the Benefits of Bandwidth's Involvement with LOA
An LOA helps to ensure that telephone numbers are not moving between carriers without the authorized end user's permission.


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I have personally found positive results with equine health problems such as colic, anxiety, phobias, allergies, wounds, and fractures (as well as sports enhancement) using natural homeopathic medicines.
The following case is a personal example of how one of my horses with a severe case of colic was remarkably cured with homeopathic remedies.
courtesy Arenus
Colic horse
Symptoms of a colicky horse include rolling and sweating.
I had purchased a very well-bred Arabian mare for a special breeding program. She was a beautiful but nervous mare who didn?t socialize well with other mares. As with other horses of a high-strung nature, it was difficult to keep weight on her. One morning we found her down with colic. We had a most difficult time getting her up on her feet. She had actually rubbed the hair off one side of her face and portions of her body.
Our veterinarian, after thorough examination, strongly recommended euthanasia. I chose instead to try a natural medicine that I have successfully used on colic on many less severe cases in the past. The vet left me his euthanizing drug thinking I would need to use it soon.
We administered a homeopathic indigestion/colic formula every 15 minutes for one hour and noticed a slight improvement within that hour. Over the next three hours, we gave two doses per hour with continual improvements. We gave one dose every hour until bedtime and one dose in the middle of the night; by morning the mare seemed normal, minus a lot of hair on one side. We continued one dose in the water bucket per day for about three weeks.
What amazed me is how this mare blossomed since the life and death colic incident. She put on more muscle than ever, was much calmer and thrived on minimal feed?.what was a constitutional weakness now became a constitutional strength. Her digestion and assimilation system were functioning incredibly well. She became one of our easiest keepers!
Natural homeopathic medicines can be used without side effects or reactions with other drugs. They can safely be used with conventional therapies to maximize the healing and recovery of your pets, farm animals, or any of earth's creatures.
After many years as a practicing classical homeopath I have been convinced the newer contemporary approaches work. Through many years of clinical challenges among multiple practitioners of various strong opinions, pure raw results have ruled in favor of the contemporary homeopathic applications. The contemporary methods of combining appropriate homeopathic ingredients, multiple potencies in an energetically cleansed pure water base, have produced a broader therapeutic spectrum that has provided deep acting curative results of the older traditional methods. The only difference is in the ease and speed of use and the higher percentage of results.
We have found many of the minor remedies have shown to be major solutions to many of today's more perplexing conditions. It was difficult in the past to discern the effective use of the minor remedies due to the small number of provings done. Of the 1300 official homeopathic remedies, the great majority are minor remedies.
The safe and effective time-tested results of homeopathy are unprecedented in the history of medicine.
Colic is one of the most dangerous medical problems affecting horses each year with its crippling and killing results. Promptly and efficiently using homeopathic remedies, along with your veterinarian' care, for this ailment can vastly reduce the number of equine deaths from colic! Every stable should have a contemporary formulated colic formula on hand for these types of emergencies.
Dr. Frank J. King, Jr., ND, DC, is a nationally recognized researcher, author and lecturer on homeopathy. He is the founder and director of King Bio Homeopathics and Natural Pet Pharmaceuticals, a registered 14-year-old homeopathic manufacturing company dedicated to completing chiropractic destiny with the marriage of homeopathy. He can be contacted through his website at www.kingbio.com or www.natural-pet.com or toll-free at 888-827-6414.
Digestive & Colic Reliever(tm) -- Indications for use: For fast, safe relief of gas, cramping, bloating, pain, colic and other abdominal discomforts associated with indigestion. Aids digestion.
Ingredients (Boericke's):
Aethusa Cynapium
Disocorea Villosa
Magnesia Phosphorica
Natrum Phosphoricum
Nux Vomica
Plumbum Metallicum
Valeriana Officinalis
Complementary Medicines: Foul Gas & Stool Relief, Stress Control


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With uninterrupted power supply to hospitals & labs, discoms playing key role in fight against COVID
• Ganesh Srinivasan, Chief Executive Officer, Tata Power-DDL said the discom is committed towards ensuring safety and convenience of its consumers in these testing timesRead the story
Tata Power-DDL lab recognised as in-house R&D unit
• Lab provides a test bed to showcase the Information Technologies (IT) and Operational Technologies (OT) implemented by Tata Power-DDLRead the story
National Consumer Day Special - Tata Power-DDL launches 'Samajhdari Ki Choice' Campaign to encourage consumers to Opt for E-bill
• Enhanced consumers security as e-bill reduces the risk of lost statement and identity fraud
• Contact less delivery of e-bills to help in eliminating chances of virus spreadKnow More
Tata Power-DDL launches Chat-Bot 'Roshni' to enhance Digital Experience of Consumers
• To enable quicker resolution of queries & complaints; has both English and Hindi language capabilities
• Integrated with company's Website, Mobile App, WhatsApp Number and official Facebook PageKnow More
Tata Power-DDL distributes Tablets to students across Delhi Govt. Schools supporting 'Education for All' during the ongoing pandemic
• Hon'ble Deputy CM of Delhi, Shri Manish Sisodia; Mr. Ganesh Srinivasan, CEO, TPDDL graced the event
• Initiative taken to support students pursue their education without any hindrance amid pandemicKnow More
Tata Power- DDL launches 'SAMVAAD' Mobile Messenger App to enhance digital experience of consumers
• Reduces wait time for consumers for availing basic services; helps find answers to FAQs in one place
• Facilitates two way communication, including broadcast messages from company's sideKnow More
Opinion Article of Mr. Ganesh Srinivasan, CEO, Tata Power-DDL in Fortune India Magazine
Read the opinion article of Mr. Ganesh Srinivasan, CEO, Tata Power-DDL as he shares his views on the value proposition of Smart Meters especially during Covid-19 and how this will ensure consumer convenience.Read On
Interview of Mr. Ganesh Srinivasan, CEO, Tata Power-DDL in PowerLine Magazine
Read the interview of Mr. Ganesh Srinivasan, CEO, Tata Power-DDL as he shares his views on the privatisation of discoms in union territories, proposed amendments to the Electricity Act, 2003 and the impact of Covid-19 on the power sector.Read On
Tata Power-DDL empowers its senior citizen consumers, engages with them digitally during ongoing Covid-19 pandemic
• Interacts with senior citizen consumers through web meetings
• Apprises consumers about the digital initiatives being taken by the company for consumer safetyKnow More
Smart Meters - a boon for Tata Power-DDL and its Consumers during Covid-19
• Raises 3.5 lakh bills with Actual Readings instead of Provisional ones during lockdown(Apr-May 2020)
• Prevents over 1.5 lakh visits/month to consumer premises during lockdownKnow More
New Missed Call Service to register 'No Power Supply Complaint'
• Consumers to give missed call on 9619619124 to register their NPS complaints
• Move will ensure consumer ease and safety while registering NPS complaintsKnow More
Self-Meter Reading to ensure consumer safety during Covid-19
• Consumers can now capture their meter readings through a link sent on their registered mobile numbers
• Information to be safely stored on company's official websiteKnow More
Q&A session of CEO, Mr. Ganesh Srinivasan on Zee News
Watch the full Q&A session of CEO, Mr. Ganesh Srinivasan on Zee News as he invokes everyone to make 9PM-9Mins a success and help dispel darkness through the light of hope.Know More
In power sector, lighter load but work as usual
Tata Power-DDL has taken a number of measures, ranging from arranging places to stay for its maintenance staff, to developing a mechanism for its call centre operators to work from home.Know More
Be Delhi's Hero
• Tata Power-DDL urges consumers to help power the collective fight against Corona
• Appeals to consumers to make bill payments on time using Digital Modes
• Requests consumers not to visit consumer care centres; (Toll Free - 19124)
Get registered for e-bill via WhatsApp - Tata Power-DDL
• Consumers to give a missed call on 7303482071 to opt for e-bill from their registered mobile number
• Ensuring safety and convenience along with timely delivery of bills amid lockdownKnow More
Ensuring uninterrupted power supply amidst COVID-19 crisis
• Necessary arrangements made to ensure uninterrupted power supply
• Reliable power to other essential service sectors/ utilities, facilitate effective practicing of work from home for its working class consumersKnow More
Tata Power-DDL is proud of its Power Victors for their dedication.
Read the story of one of our heroes, Bablu Mandal, who works relentlessly amidst the COVID-19 crisis to ensure that the city never goes dark.Know More
CEO's Article featured in ET Energyworld - Safe Power for All is the Need of the Hour
Safety needs thought, commitment and focus 24x365 days and hence needs continuous communication with customers to nudge them to take action and make themselves safe.Read On


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My answer to How did Donald Trump win the 2016 US Presidential Election?
Answer by Desmond Last:
Donald Trump won the Presidential Election by one of two ways.
He told the People of America what they wanted to hear.
Or he spoke for the People he wanted to make America great again for.
He is not yet the President so the Jury is still out. However, he said he was going to be big on Law and Order. That means there will only be one legal system for everybody.
You do not need to be the President of the U.S.A to ensure that the law is enforced.


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The Biggest Little City, Reno, Nevada, hosts the sixth annual Reno Bites Week Oct. 9-15 as chefs present their culinary creations citywide. This year, the event celebrates the great American road trip with local restaurants presenting their chefs' individual takes on road trip food memories.
The 2017 edition, presented by Sysco Corporation, features over 20 local restaurants, each presenting a unique and competitively priced prix fixe menu. Each evening features a distinctive event culminating with the Chef Showdown, sponsored by Czyz's Appliance and Sierra Meat & Seafood, as eight of the city's top chefs go head to head in a culinary cookoff with the winning chef taking home a Williams-Sonoma gift card and the all-important bragging rights.
Reno Bites Week co-founder and celebrity chef Clint Jolly said he is thrilled with the reception this event has received in the community.
"All these chefs and restaurants coming together year after year for this event is an exciting adventure for Reno," he said. "This year, our Road Trip theme evokes memories of family vacations and I can't wait to see how each restaurant creates a menu on this theme."
Signature events during Reno Bites Week include a kickoff dinner at Roundabout Grill, the Downtown Walkabite progressive dinner, Road Trip dinner events and the perennial favorite Chef Showdown. The Reno Bites Week Passport returns in 2017, sponsored by and available at Whole Foods Market, providing culinarians a pocket-sized guide for all events and serving as the end-of-week contest entry for a Whole Foods shopping spree.
This year Reno Bites Week partners with TravelNevada, Nevada's Division of Tourism, for the Reno Bites Road Trip promoting food-themed travel throughout the region. Foodies who post pictures with the hashtags #RenoBitesRoadTrip, #DFMI, and #TravelNevada will be entered into a drawing to win a spot on the judging panel for the Chef Showdown and a dinner for two.
More information about the special events, participating restaurants and a complete schedule are available at www.RenoBitesWeek.com and by following social media on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Signature Events for 2017
Reno Bites 2017 Kick Off Party
Monday, Oct. 9, 6-9 p.m.
Roundabout Grill, 255 N. Virginia St.
Hit the Road Bottle Tour
Tuesday, Oct. 10, 5-9 p.m.
Mellow Fellow Gastropub, 300 E. Second St.
Road Trip to Becoming Blend
Wednesday, Oct. 11, 6-10 p.m.
Tannenbaum Events Center, 20007 Mt. Rose Hwy.
Roaring '20s Murder Mystery Dinner
Thursday, Oct. 12, 7-9 p.m.
Homage, 519 Ralston St.
Downtown Walkabite
Friday, Oct. 13, 6-11 p.m.
Creazian, chez louie, Washoe Public House, and Liberty Food & Wine Exchange
Chef Showdown
Saturday, Oct. 14, 2-5 p.m.
Czyz's Appliance, 9738 S. Virginia St.
Pigtoberfest III
Saturday, Oct. 14, 4-10 p.m.
Pignic, 235 Flint St.
The Grand Illusion
Sunday, Oct. 15, 6-9 p.m.
Zozo's Ristorante, 3446 Lakeside Dr.
About Reno Bites Week
Reno's first and only restaurant week is now in its sixth year. Featuring over 20 restaurants throughout the city, Reno's top chefs and restaurants participate in creating exciting prix fixe menus for patrons to enjoy during the week. The event culminates with the Chef Showdown—a head-to-head cooking challenge for bragging rights as the Showdown Champion. For more information, visit www.RenoBitesWeek.com.


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I visited my friend Alice the other day and was inspired by the peaceful tidyness of her home. Most of all, I was floored by her closet. ALL her dresses fit in about eight inches of closet space. And somehow she always looks fabulous – full disclosure: she's the type of person who can pair a hospital gown with a cute scarf and make it look couture. But still – eight inches!
Un-Fabulous Bargains
I came home realizing I still have plenty more I can pare down – so I went through my closet and made a big giveaway pile. My goal was to only keep the things that I really feel like I look my best in. Now I'm no Alice, so "best" is more of a relative term. But it was very clear that the giveaway pile was filled the items I'd gotten on the sale rack, knowing even when I bought them that they weren't fabulous – but they were such bargains! Well, months later, they still don't look fabulous.
Fabulous Splurges
The items that ARE on my "fabulous" list are the ones that – I confess – tended to be splurges. Things that really looked great and I really felt great in. And I have gotten full value out of these splurges – I wear them plenty and feel great when I do.
Do the Math
Splurges don't necessarily cost more. I just gave away 10 $20 shirts – 200 bucks down the drain. What if I had just bought two $100 shirts (ooh la la!) and spent the same amount? Or four $50 shirts? Let me say I've only spent more than $100 on a shirt twice in my 40+ years. But I wore each one at least five times more than any of the shirts in my giveaway pile, and felt at least five times as good.
No More Random Shopping Trips
I think this 10-minute strategy will keep me away from those dangerous random shopping trips that keep me buying useless bargains. Before, when I had a free half hour, I might stop in a clothing store for a quick browse to kill time. Now, I've found better ways to fill the time! Where do you come down on the bargain v. splurge debate?
About the Author
While Laura's official job title is "Stay-at-Home Mom", her motto is "Give Me 10!" — as in, "Please, just give me 10 minutes a day for myself!" Since 10 minutes is about all the unscheduled time we get in our days, Laura suggests taking those moments to "advance the ball" on your own goals – and little by little you'll reach them. Through her on-the-job training as a mom of 3, as well as her background in management consulting after graduating from Northwestern University and The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, Laura's come up with a plan that works because it fits into your life — you don't need a full-time nanny or a chauffeur. Take a look at her tricks and tips and share your own at www.GiveMe10.info.


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Exciting news to those who are doing this Bible Study! In the next few months I hope to be posting videoblogs that will help you look at The Bible with new insights from some of my amazing friends.
First up is Lori Bryant (www.loribryantsstories.com) who will be taking a closer look at Eve in the youtube video entitled BUT GOD #1 and Christine Annunziato will be discussing Adam in the Wordpress blog BUT GOD #1. Please make sure to click on the links on the home page for Wordpress blog and YouTube to get you where you need to go!! I'd love to hear what you think so leave comments here!


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Walter M. Shaub Jr. announced his resignation as director of the United States Office of Government Ethics on Thursday, which is surprising mostly because of how long it took.
Shaub posted his letter to the White House on Twitter, and though he doesn't say, "I'm leaving because you're a clown car full of liars and conmen," he does emphasize that the Office of Government Ethics is based on the "principle that public service is a public trust, requiring employees to place loyalty to the Constitution, the laws, and ethical principles above private gain." Kind of implies that's not what's happening with the Trump administration, doesn't it?
The New York Times reports that the Obama-appointed Shaub has been anticipating his termination since Trump was inaugurated, going so far as to pack up his office. In January, Shaub publicly chastised the members of Trump's cabinet and Trump himself for failing to disentangle themselves form their various businesses that are obvious conflicts of interest while working in the White House. He's butted heads with the administration constantly, from conflicts with Kellyanne Conway to the White House's refusal to comply with a standard waivers request.
Shaub is going to work for the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan group that works on campaign finance reform and voting rights cases.
The exciting news is that now that Shaub's position is empty, a candidate will need to be appointed and put through confirmation hearings. It's possible the administration will allow an acting director to sit in his place indefinitely, but if not, you can probably look forward to live-tweeting your rage as some old white guy evades questions about ethics.


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Strings Implementations
The CString class provides a mechanism for deleting an occurrence of a certain string in another string. The function for performing this is called Replace. The CString::Replace() function allows you to control the content of a string especially if you are getting the string from an unpredictable source.
Image the user is supposed to type a quadratic equation such as 3x^2+5. There are millions of ways the user can type it. The problem is that if you are planning on resolving the equation, before even getting to the solutions of the equation, you need to be able to "know" what the equation is made of; you cannot just try to retrieve a, b, and c. The user could type 3 x^2+ 5 or 3x ^2 +5 or 3 x ^ 2 + 5 or 3x ^2+ 5. As you can see, the possibilities are as numerous as imaginable. Remember that a string can consist of an empty space. Therefore, one of the first things you should perform is to remove any empty space in the equation. Eventually, you will use other functions to analyze the equation, find the parentheses if any, find the special characters such as ^ usually used to express the power in computer languages; you might also want to know if the user typed the equation in the form of Ax^2 + B = C.
|Copyright © 2002-2005 FunctionX, Inc.


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More Pictures from Þórsmörk
The morning after completing the 25-kilometer Fimmvörðuháls hike, we awoke with muscles so sore that just leaving our tent took almost half an hour. The last thing we felt like was more hiking, but we had six hours to kill until the bus back to Reykjavík. And in Þórsmörk, there aren't a lot of other options. More hiking it is!


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Contact Us Today
The best way to see why we have been highly recommended by parents for more than 30 years is to make an appointment that's convenient for you and visit our center with your child. You can talk to Loretta, our director, meet the teachers, and observe our programs.
We encourage you to compare the consistency and longevity of our staff, our high education standards, and the personal attention you and your child receive with that of any other early childhood school.
Registration Procedures
We are conveniently located in the leased wing of the Northminster Presbyterian Church at 3633 W. Big Beaver in Troy, Michigan between Coolidge and Adams Roads. Discovery Corner is a non-denominational early childhood center.
Make plans to stop in and visit with your child. Loretta will be happy to answer your questions and help you select the program that best meets the needs of your family.
Please call Loretta today at (248) 645-6448.
We look forward to meeting you.Top of Page


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8853 Rockville Road
Indianapolis, IN 46234
A negative self image can be detrimental to many facets of your life. Indianapolis area dentist Dr. Brad Houston understands the positive life-changing power that a healthy and beautiful smile can bring to you. Here at Comfort Dental Care, we don't want you to be embarrassed any longer. Why not take your smile - and even your life - to a new level of self-confidence and beauty?
For comfortable tooth cleaning in the Indianapolis, Indiana area, Dr. Brad Houston is known for having a gentle touch. The friendly team at Comfort Dental Care provides dental hygiene treatments for a whiter smile.
Maintaining good dental hygiene is the foundation for healthy teeth and gums. We're committed to helping you have a lifetime of oral health.
Don't let untreated dental problems get you down. Rebuild your confidence with a beautiful new smile. From simple treatments that make a big difference, to more extensive work, unveiling the smile you were meant to have can have profound life-changing effects. Serving the Indianapolis, IN area and offering sedation dentistry, Dr. Houston can help you develop an affordable treatment plan you'll feel good about.
Safe, anxiety-free dentistry with Indianapolis area dentist Dr. Brad Houston means you can have dental treatments done quickly while you're lightly sedated, with little or no discomfort.
You no longer have to tolerate feeling uncomfortable, hiding your smile, or putting off dental work because of a busy schedule. You'll feel relaxed during your dental appointment, and relieved that your oral health is in good hands.
For comfortable dental hygiene treatment in the Indianapolis, Indiana area, Dr. Brad Houston is known for having a gentle touch. The friendly team at Comfort Dental Care provides teeth cleaning for a whiter smile.
Maintaining good dental hygiene is the foundation for healthy teeth and gums. We're committed to helping you have a lifetime of oral health.
Saloum, Fadi S D.D.S.
135 N Shortridge Rd # B3
Indianapolis, IN, 46219-8905
Sexauer, John H D.D.S.
6450 W 10th St
Indianapolis, IN, 46214-6500
Nasser, Thomas K D.D.S.
12188a N Meridian St # 300
Carmel, IN, 46032-4410
Allen, Ronald K D.D.S.
9524 E Washington St
Indianapolis, IN, 46229-3031
It's called sedation dentistry (performed by a specially trained dentist called a sedation dentist), and it may well be the greatest advance ever made towards truly comfortable and anxiety free dentistry procedures.
For a lot of people, the unpleasantness of a dental appointment isn't so much fear as it is stress from that "in-your-face" aspect of the procedure.
We all have our own sense of personal space. And when hands and tools enter the mouth, as they must, the feeling can get downright claustrophobic. Fortunately, there's an antidote to this problem, anxiety-free dentistry!
After an initial consultation with a sedation dentist you'll take a medication just before your next visit. You'll need a friend to help transport you to and from the office safely.
When you arrive for your appointment you'll be awake, but drowsy. Most important, you'll be relaxed and anxiety free. While you're in the chair, the sedation dentist and team monitors you closely. You won't be unconscious, you'll just enjoy a soothing mental and emotional "distance" from the goings on.
Next thing you'll know, your dentist is telling you the procedure is complete and it is time to go home - thanks to anxiety-free dentistry.
There are many reasons 50% of the population put dental care at the bottom of the healthcare list: Some people are downright fearful, others have suffered bad experiences in the past and now suffer from dental anxiety. Then there are those who have a very strong gag reflex, and going to the dentist is a real ordeal. Or maybe extensive care is needed and there simply aren't enough hours in the day to accomplish it.
After an initial consultation, your dentist will give you a dental anesthesia to take, it's called Triazolam, before your visit. You must bring a friend along to get you home after your appointment. At your appointment, you'll be drowsy, but thoroughly responsive (conscious sedation). The sedation dentistry team will monitor your every move throughout. The big plus: Most patients don't feel anything, and all your dentistry needs can be accomplished at one time, sometimes in as little as two to six hours, from straightforward care to the most complicated.
For anxious patients, this new treatment is a kind of miracle, a boon to dental health. For the medically compromised, it works wonders, too. Dentistry keeps getting better and better, you'll be convinced.
Your sedation dentist understands your dental fear, where it comes from, and what health problems can arise as a result. Now you're lucky to have a means to overcome it, and dentists are so pleased to be able to offer dental sedation to their patients.


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New Bedford's New Trampoline Park Opening This Week
Here's your chance to get a jump on New Bedford's newest attraction.
Tomorrow, the all-new FunZ New Bedford trampoline park will have a "soft opening."
FunZ New Bedford is located at 1024 Kings Highway, in the former Work Out World spot. Folks on the SouthCoast have been anxiously awaiting its arrival since a website first launched announcing it was "coming soon" to New Bedford over a year ago.
Now, the trampoline park is finally set to open, and it will feature numerous trampolines, as well as a spider wall, rock wall, ninja course, arcade and more. Click on this photo to get a little bit of a 360-degree view of what's in store:
Prices are $15 for a 60-minute jump, $20 for a 90-minute jump and $25 for a 120-minute jump. There are also toddler prices and a military discount. Jumpers must wear socks, or they can purchase a pair from FunZ for $2.50.
FunZ New Bedford will be open from 10 a.m. until 9 p.m. tomorrow; the rest of the hours for the week will be published on FunZ's website, which is set to launch on February 1.
For now, you can get more information on FunZ New Bedford's Facebook page.


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Here is the description from Amazon:
More than two centuries after World War III poisoned the planet, the final bastion of humanity lives on massive airships circling the globe in search of a habitable area to call home. Aging and outdated, most of the ships plummeted back to Earth long ago. The only thing keeping the two surviving lifeboats in the sky are Hell Divers - men and women who risk their lives by diving to the surface to scavenge for parts the ships desperately need.
When one of the remaining airships is damaged in an electrical storm, a Hell Diver team is deployed to a hostile zone called Hades. But there's something down there that's far worse than the mutated creatures discovered on dives in the past - something that threatens the fragile future of humanity.


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The SlingFin Hardshell is the winner of the 2013 OutDoor Industry Gold Award for outstanding achievement in design and innovation.
According to Outdoor Gear Lab, "The SlingFin HardShell tent is the equivalent of Air Force One for mountain climbers and polar explorers... We suspect that the HardShell is the best 3-4 person four-season dome tent on the planet."
The HardShell has been tested on the largest mountains across the globe, serving even as a wind block for other tents. It goes up quickly and intuitively, even in harsh conditions, thanks to four equal-length poles and a WebTruss™ system. It includes a two-pole High Wind Kit that adds even more strength when the weather turns ugly. The WebTruss™ effectively locks the poles in place, independent of the tent and fly, giving the structure maximum strength with or without the tent body. The HardShell is an ideal basecamp or mid-mountain shelter for four people, or three plus plenty of gear.
- Four equal length body poles for quick setup
- WebTruss increases strength and makes setup in high winds easy
- Large pole-supported vestibule
- Ample interior pocket space
- Snow flaps on fly can be extended outwards or clipped under WebTruss to seal out spindrift
- Internal guyline compatible
|Trail Weight
|11lbs 15.6oz
|HiWind Kit
|Floor Area
|50 sq ft
Interior Height
|Vestibule Area
|11 sq ft
|Number of poles
|4 body, 1 fly, 2 HiWind Kit (optional)
|Number of doors
|Tent Body Fabric
40D Nylon Ripstop DWR
|Floor Fabric
|70D Nylon Taffeta PE 2000mm
|Fly Fabric
|30D Nylon 66 Ripstop Sil/Sil
|4 DAC Pressfit 9.0mm (body), Pressfit 9.5mm (vestibule)
Customer Reviews
I just spend 6 days road tripping and in the field with this tent. By the 3rd night we could get the tent set up in under 5 mins. The intuitive frame design and carabiners are make for easy set up. The future I think the pole frame should have a full bottom so you wouldn't need a ground tarp. The mesh pockets on the inside are awesome for storing things. We slept two in the tent with loads of extra room.
I want to buy a hard shell, please make a hard shell, I have waited for 6 months already. Do you have no further production plans?
I want to buy a hard shell, please make a hard shell. . .


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Then, it occurred to me there are no American ships anymore. Since World War II, we have systematically destroyed our American merchant marine industry. As we end the 20th Century, passengers and goods move on ships flying the flags of much lesser nations.
We became a great power because of a vital maritime industry backed by what was the greatest navy on Earth. Indeed, at the end of World War II, the United States surpassed Great Britain as the greatest naval power the world has ever seen. Ironically, we about to give the Panama Canal to the Panamanians who just signed a contract with a Red Chinese company to operate the Canal for them. I don't think that is what President Jimmy Carter had in mind.
As part of the demobilization that follows every war, thousands of ships were converted to scrap or mothballed. American maritime power literally sank until President Ronald Reagan built a 600-ship US Navy that called the Soviet's bluff. But, today, under Clinton, our Navy is down to about 300 under-staffed ships --many so short of sailors they cannot go to sea.
On the merchant marine side, our decline is even worse. Due to outlandish demands by Big Labor and due to stifling over-regulation by the U.S. Government, our maritime shipping industry is gone. Visit any U.S. port today and you will see virtually every sea-going vessel is flying a foreign flag. American shipping companies simply cannot afford the labor costs and the costs of compliance with the regulations that now govern ships flying the American Flag.
While aircraft do move a certain amount of cargo, it is still the ship that transports the vast majority of the world's commercial and military goods. During World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War, and the Balkan War build-up, it took tons and tons of shipping to get the needed tanks, ammunition, fuels and rations into position. That is why those build-ups took so long.
Yes, we can drop an airborne division most anywhere in the world in a few days. But airmobile troops cannot stay in the fight for long. It takes heavy lifting by ships to enable us to fight over the long term and prevail.
In the wake of the Kennedy air crash tragedy, we may see a similar tightening of the regulatory noose around the neck of our aviation industry. Well-meaning, but uninformed, activists are pressuring Congress to enact new laws -- none of which will keep individual pilots from exercising bad judgment. But they will have the cumulative effect of increasing the costs of our aviation industry.
The Europeans have regulated their general aviation industry virtually out of business. In 1973, I helped start a flying club on a military base in Germany. By 1974, we had to shut it down because of excessive regulation and the resulting costs.
Somehow, in all the hysteria over the Kennedy plane crash, the fact that travel by air is overwhelmingly safer than travel by car got lost in the media shuffle. The sad reality is that every newscast tells us of yet another batch of traffic accidents claiming thousands of lives and the public takes little notice. But let one celebrity pilot make a series of judgment errors and take himself and two others to a watery grave and you would think the Wright Brothers should be exhumed from their graves and tried for war crimes against humankind.
Today, the United States enjoys the world's finest air transportation system. Granted, we can use more and better airports. But our system of aircraft manufacture, periodic safety inspections, pilot training and air traffic control is the envy of the free world. Hopefully, the most recent Kennedy tragedy won't lead us to do to general aviation what we have done to our shipping industry.
William Hamilton is a nationally syndicated columnist and featured commentator for USA Today.
Dr. Hamilton can be contacted at:
P.O. Box 2001
Granby, CO 80446
Email: firstname.lastname@example.com


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If an elegant detective story by Agatha Christie becomes a game some day, it will surely be a tricky hidden-objects investigation through multiple rooms and locations, with interrogations levels and of course the game will be based on the gripping mystery of life and death.
Actually, this has already happened as Agatha Christie: Death on the Nile, developed by Flood Light Games and published by Oberon Games (one of casual games sharks who gave Dream Day Wedding to the world) is now released at Big Fish Games.
So, the game begins with the murder of rich heiress Linnet Doyle, who got killed while cruising on the Nile on a high-class ship S.S. Karnak with her husband. Hercule Poirot, who turns out to be in the right place at the right time, is to carry out an investigation and track down the murderer.
In order to do this, Poirot(who in fact is you) will need to sleuth for clues in all the rooms of the liner, and question each of the passengers.
A large percentage of levels feature typical hidden-objects mechanics. You are to find the clues to solve the mystery of Linnet's Death.
But in Agatha Christie: Death on the Nile the hidden object mechanics is especially tricky. From now on in order to find the clues, you can check different objects. From now, background of each location is no longer a steady picture, but it contains animated elements!
Just like in real life, you can lift a book resting on the floor, turn its pages in order to find the clue hidden behind the pages, or watch the wall clock ticking etc.
Another stage of levels includes questioning the suspects (as every passenger is suspected). On this sort of level, you'll have a chance to meet the passengers and familiarize with their biographies to sort out who was involved in this dreadful story.
Impressive visuals of the game indicate a profound knowledge by game designers and artists not only of Agatha Christie's work, but also the history and culture of the first part of 20th century. Art is just classy and elegant, and so is the sound of the game.
Agatha Christie: Death on the Nile is another hidden objects chef-d'oeuvre that will take its place among such all-time state-of-art games as Mystery Case Files: Ravenhearst.
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Some would consider this whole viral phenomenon, the most useful type of metrics in the past few years of social software. Gaining traction by the whole Facebook development kickoff in 2007, the viral factor is nothing but a number from 0.0 to 1.0. It can go further to describe the business issues faced by any and every business around the world. Simply put, viral growth is when one customer brings you more than one referral. For instance, if you get a new customer today, how many new customers will they bring you over N days? The viral loop is responsible for making a product go viral and is quite often rooted in the features and the designs of the product as well. Managing to achieve a viral loop can also be explained by changing the user flow:
Register –> Tell Friends –> Use Product –> Evaluate Product
What is the viral loop?
The viral loop is a system designed to spread a product, before or right at the point where it might be absorbed by a user. For instance, the Washington post shares news that you might be reading on your Facebook feed, all the way to when you are about to click and read the article. It is important that the viral loop should be connected to a positive user experience otherwise, all your efforts would be in vein and your content would be deemed spam.
If we listen to Adam Nash, CEO of Wealthfront when it comes to designing a virality, he says you should focus on these 3 steps:
- Clearly, design and come up with the features that would connect members to non-members. Doesn't have to be in complete detail, your wireframes and flows should be enough to do the trick. After it is successful, go through the numbers since you would need a coefficient of 1.1.
- Go through the flows again but this time, handle it with a detailed metrics. This is important for each step of the viral cycle to match your model.
- Follow the same process of development, release, measurement and change accordingly. The length of your product cycle would make all the difference at this point. If you release an iteration every two days, don't be put off by not receiving any immediate results just yet, it might take 2 weeks. After a 3-4 week iteration, it might even take you half a year before hitting your cycle on the head. Speed does matter.
How to build the perfect viral loop?
According to viral marketing expert Andrew Chen, follow the steps below to build a good viral loop.
What's your viral media?
The most important choice you have to make is how people are going to enter into your viral loop. You can do this through email, Facebook, news feed, blogs and so on.
What're your products viral hooks?
This is the part that forces your users to share your product and swear by it. It might be a basic appeal to their curiosity (I want to see the photo I have been tagged in), social proof (many friends joined a group, I want to see what all the fuss is about) or a viral hook that makes users take action.
What are the on-ramps of your viral loop?
After you have finished working on a tight viral loop, come up with the on-ramp. In some cases you might be looking at places like websites, homepages paid advertising, marketing campaigns, SEO, etc. where you would be coming up with places where users from your viral loop can begin the process.
What's your funnel design?
Now that you have chosen the viral loop you want to work with, you have to go through the designs of the same. It should be easy to access and short so you don't lose anyone's interest along the way. You might lose quite a few of them if you are asking them to register with a username or password, basically making a process tougher. If you can make the process short and ask them for only their personal information along the way, they are more committed to staying along with you.
If you follow the traditional marketing plan, you will come to terms with the fact that it has a very broad focus, which might not be the best idea. Another aspect to remember is discipline, however, the rule might change a little for a startup since sticking to strict rules, especially in the early formative stages will not take them too far. Startups have to make sure they have the right priorities when moving through the ropes of getting themselves established. If you are just starting up, you do not have to focus on building and managing a marketing team to get the right exposure, managing and better understanding outside vendors, or even trying to get a marketing team with a plan to achieve corporate objectives, there is a time for this and the time is not in the initial stages. Keep your eyes on one thing and one thing only, growth. Growth hacking is not something that has been around for a long time and it has recently started gaining traction, while most even consider it controversial. More than a discipline through, growth hacking is a way of thinking that startups should follow when they are carrying out their strategies to get more users.
Breaking the process of growth hacking down further:
It involves creativity
If you have a growth hacker way of thinking, you would automatically start thinking about ideal and novel ways to drive growth, something being as far from mainstream as possible. This is miles away from creative forms of advertising, might also include a novel feature of a product, or finding interesting ways of getting to new customers. An instance of the way growth hacking can be used is cross-promoting an Instagram post across Facebook and Twitter, which would allow Instagram to get their hands on the large audience that is already out there using Facebook and Twitter.
Involves some critical thinking
Growth hackers do not just assume that various ideas that pass through their heads are good or that they would help elevate growth, thereby making it a good growth hack. They would make sure they handle a ton of research first. It might even involve some experiments, making sure they aren't investing a lot into it, and then they would measure the results. This would give them an idea if what they were handling made sense.
Either win or learn.
A major part of growth hacking is going through experiment after experiment and measuring the results. After handling a couple of them, comparing them and looking for the best strategies and giving you the most profitable returns on your investment. It would also involve working through and coming with better strategies to increase your investments Simply put Idea – Test – Measure – Learn – Repeat.
Why is it better than marketing?
Growth hacking can be best explained as a mixture or a cross-discipline between analyzing data, managing a product, handling a small bit of marketing but also touching a little on the growth of your product.
Does growth hacking really make sense?
The life of a startup is quite unpredictable
Since startups are not like a lot of the big companies and multinationals, or even being unlike more established small businesses, other than having a brilliant idea and interesting business model, they have very little time to shine. If they do not manage to succeed in their small window, they would rarely get another. Most established industries have their very predictable marketing models and the general way that they can go about, while startups barely have guard rails that they can move with. Startups have to begin from the basics and figure out their own ropes as they move along. They also have to work on their own customers and business routes.
Everything revolves around getting there quick
The major distinguishing factor between startups and smaller establishments is that the former tries to make a big impact in very little time, the latter is all about standing the test of time. For instance, restaurants are all about the next season and the one that follows, while startups like Facebook have to begin and get there quick otherwise, they might get beaten to the punch. Startups have a whole new set of issues and have to think about issues that smaller companies might not even need to consider, like getting 1000x the number of users than the other mainstream companies in the same space.
It's all about the money
We already know that startups have a small fixed amount of time to succeed, but add another major restriction to make matters worse, they also have limited funding. Assuming a startup started with about $ 150,000, Coca-Cola spends the same amount on their newspaper adverts. Running a startup, you would not have the luxury of spending money the way Coca-Cola does, you instead have to focus on breaking even and making sure you have something to show for. Prove that you have the ability to grow and push toward the next round of funding, everything you do is all about taking a chance at getting more finance.
Everything done should be effective
Growth hacking is all about handling as many experiments as you can in search of your scalable and repeatable strategy to acquire users, and you have to make sure to handle this in as little time as possible. There are no limits to growth hacking either, which means once the startup has found what it is looking for, its scalable model, it has to keep working to make it better. It is crucial to increase the returns on investment as well and keep the few users you managed to get your hands on.


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Although the typical cliché for a mad scientist usually involves Bunsen burners, beakers, and retorts, most of us (with some exceptions, of course) aren't really chemists. However, there are some electronic endeavors that require a bit of knowledge about chemistry or related fields like metallurgy. No place is this more apparent than producing your own PCBs. Unless you use a mill, you are probably using a chemical bath of some sort to strip copper from your boards.
The standard go-to solution is ferric chloride. It isn't too tricky to use, but it does work better hot and with aeration, although neither are absolutely necessary. However, it does tend to stain just about everything it touches. In liquid form, it is more expensive to ship, although you can get it in dry form. Another common etchant is ammonium or sodium persulphate.
There's also a variety of homemade etchants using things like muriatic acid and vinegar. Most of these use peroxide as an oxidizer. There's lots of information about things like this on the Internet. However, like everything on the Internet, you can find good information and bad information.
When [w_k_fay] ran out of PCB etchant, he decided to make his own to replace it and wrote a great guide on how this is done. He found a lot of vague and conflicting information on the Internet. He read that the vinegar solution was too slow and the cupric acid needs a heated tank, a way to oxygenate the solution, and strict pH controls. However, he did have successful experiments with the hydrochloric acid and peroxide. He also used the same materials (along with some others) to make ferric chloride successfully.