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Web Design Stockport
Stockports Premium website design company. Outstanding web designs at extremely affordable prices. From brochure type websites to effective, full e-commerce websites that display your company's professional image.
Magento E-Commerce
Compatible with 60+ payment gateways, our search engine optimized e-commerce shopping cart system can be customised to fit almost any business model in one application. All this in a powerful, easy to use CMS.
Stockport SEO Agency
Search Engine Optimisation or SEO is the art of configuring your website so that people searching for your products and services in the major search engines are able to find your site. Our expertise in SEO has had some great success.
Based in Stockport, Marlin Web Design has over 19 years experience in delivering benefits to organisations by maximising their web site investments, Marlin Web Design Services has the experience to ensure that your website delivers on all your organisation's objectives.
The advice given by MWS and suggestions on what could be changed to improve our site, were clear, concise and in plain english. Most importantly they were correct. I wholeheartedly recommend MWS as providing the best service at the best price!" James Hadley
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"Hooray we are live!" I just want to thank you for your professional service and all of your help in getting the site running live. The feedback I am getting from users that are taking a look is really positive so far." Martin James
"I found the consultation phase of the process particularly useful. The newsletter functionality is really easy to use. I especially like the fact that it archives your newsletters on the website making it easy to direct customers to useful information". Dale
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Just to say we're delighted to see our web site up on the front page when you key in order of service designs. That's great considering we've only just launched the site." Hugh
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text: The Dust Devil is a telescopic spout that minimizes dust when loading free-flowing materials. The tough and simple design reduces dust inside a facility, helping to keep equipment and lungs a lot cleaner. Its design uses flexible polyethylene spouts that will last for years. Diameters of 12, 14, and 18 in. are available. An electric model with remote-mounted controls and a manual model with a hand winch are available. The unit can be installed on the end of a conveyor or existing spout in about an hour and used with virtually any free-flowing material. Waconia Manufacturing, Waconia, MN 952-442-4450 www.waconiamfg.com

subset: commoncrawl


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Thursday, February 07, 2013
3d Buildings in Google Maps
This is very impressive. The DTS Dallas Theological Seminary has used polygons to create the effect of 3d buildings on its campus map.
The effect is partly possible because of Google Map's 45 degree aerial view. This bird's eye view imagery is perfect for creating polygons for the roofs and the visible walls of building, which combined create the visual effect of a 3d building.
However it isn't as simple as just combining a few polygons. When the user changes the direction of the view in the 45 degree imagery the polygons will become distorted. Therefore the map developer has to create 4 different polygon image maps for each building and then use an event listener on the map to detect when a user rotates the view. When the map is rotated the building polygons for one point of view have to be removed and the correct polygons have to be loaded in their place for the new point of view.
Posted by Keir Clarke at 2:30 AM
Labels: campusmaps
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In Greece, When Everything Grinds to a Halt, Nobody Is Surprised
Strikes and Slowdowns Are Commonplace; Tax Collectors Walk Out, News Is Recycled
ATHENS—If it's Monday in Athens, it must be radio technicians and pension-fund employees. On Tuesday, it's lawyers and pharmacists.
Strikes, work slowdowns and protest marches have become so common in crisis-hit Greece that it can be hard to keep track of who is demonstrating when, where and against what.
In November alone, there were labor actions by, among others, taxi and bus drivers, subway, train, tram and power-company workers, bank tellers, teachers, journalists, doctors and nurses, judges and prosecutors, engineers and garbage men.
"Every morning when you wake up, you check the weather, you switch on the news and you see what strikes are happening that day," said Yannis Ifantis, a 42-year-old travel agent in the capital. "It's one of the absurdities of life in Greece."
Navigating the chaos caused by the stoppages has become a central fact of life for Athenians, who face longer commutes and myriad other disruptions to their daily routines—from restrictions on where they can shop to whether their airline will be flying.
Around the city's central Syntagma Square, a main protest venue near Parliament, hotels, department stores, restaurants and shops are accustomed to closing abruptly in the middle of the day and pulling metal shutters down over their doors and windows until demonstrators leave.
On Wednesday, hundreds of strikers blocked traffic for a while at one end of the square, holding up a makeshift clothesline with underwear hanging on it. Writing said: "Take these as well," a complaint about austerity measures that they feel have already stripped them of everything else.
Frustrated by the nonstop dislocations, Antonis Gouzias, a 32-year-old computer programmer, his sister, Athina, and a few friends started a website that publishes detailed daily strike schedules to help people plan their lives.
"We were fed up with trawling through other websites and newspapers to find out who was on strike and how we could get to work," Mr. Gouzias said.
These days, their site, apergia.gr (the name means strike), averages about 30,000 hits a day, Ms. Gouzias said. Traffic peaks when there are transit disruptions, she said. The one-day record is 230,000. Over the past three months, they have had three million unique visitors—in a country with 10.8 million residents.
Mr. Ifantis, the travel agent, said he frequently consults the apergia site to plot his journey from home in the northern suburbs to his office in the downtown neighborhood of Pangrati. Normally, the trip takes an hour. On strike days, the travel time often doubles.
Usually he takes a bus. When the buses are on strike, he takes a subway and then has to hoof it about two miles to get to work. When the train isn't running either, he tries to catch a ride into town with a neighbor through the strike-snarled traffic.
Most demonstrations are much smaller—and peaceful—though still troublesome. Some border on the surreal.
A sit-in by civil servants in the northeastern city of Thessaloniki has kept the government there from collecting €2 million ($2.6 million), in badly needed fees, according to the mayor, Yiannis Boutaris.
The Greek finance ministry this year has had to extend the deadline for filing personal income-tax returns three times, in part because of strikes by tax collectors. Infant formula is almost impossible to get when druggists—the only retailers allowed to sell it—shut down.
Parliamentary clerks even walked off the job in November during a critical vote on new austerity measures. Lawmakers caved in to their demands after less than 10 minutes, moving to exempt them from pay and pension cuts imposed on other government workers.
When journalists walk off the job, TV viewers mostly get recycled entertainment shows instead. One big station reruns old newscasts, giving bleary-eyed, early-morning watchers an odd sense of déjà vu.
"The frequent strikes make our lives hell," said Panagiotis Kostopoulos, 38, a sales agent. And strike-day traffic, which can double his commuting time to four hours a day, isn't the worst part of it, the father of two said.
"My wife, who also works in the private sector, has lost nine days' pay in the past year because she had to stay home with the children when the teachers went on strike" and public schools closed, Mr. Kostopoulos said.
Even the holidays aren't providing much respite this year. In mid-December, farmers started using their tractors to block highways in protest against a new tax law. And performances of "The Nutcracker" ballet and "Little Red Riding Hood" at Greece's national opera were canceled this month after technical and support staff declared an impromptu three-day walkout.
—Nektaria Stamouli contributed to this article.
Write to Philip Pangalos at firstname.lastname@example.com and Alkman Granitsas at firstname.lastname@example.com
Corrections & Amplifications
Greece has 10.8 million residents, according to a preliminary estimate from a May 2011 census. An earlier version of this article incorrectly said Greece has 10 million residents.
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Dr Gareth Enticott
School of Geography and Planning
- Email:
- firstname.lastname@example.com
- Telephone:
- +44 (0)29 2087 6243
- Location:
- Room 2.94, Glamorgan Building, King Edward VII Avenue, Cardiff, CF10 3WT
- Media commentator
Gareth Enticott is a Reader in Human Geography in the School of Geography and Planning. His research focuses on biosecurity, practices of environmental regulation and governance, and scientific controversies in animal health. His main focus is on the ongoing controversy surrounding bovine Tuberculosis in the UK, as well as the management of the disease in New Zealand. His work has helped inform policy on bovine Tuberculosis in England and Wales.
- BSc (Hons) in Geography, University of Wales, Swansea, 1993
- MSc City and Regional Planning, Cardiff University, 1995
- Diploma in Social Science Research Methods, Cardiff University, 1996
- PhD, School of City and Regional Planning, Cardiff University, 2000
- Reader, School of Geography and Planning, Cardiff University (2016 - current)
- Senior Lecturer, School of Geography and Planning, Cardiff University (2012 - 2016)
- Research Fellow, School of Geography and Planning, Cardiff University (2003 - 2012)
- Research Associate, Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University (2001 - 2003)
I have conducted peer review for the ESRC and for academic journals including Economy and Society, Agriculture and Human Values, Environment and Planning A, Environment and Planning C, Environment and Planning D, Geoforum, Geographical Review, Health and Place, Journal of Rural Studies, Sociologia Ruralis, Journal of Environmental Policy and Planning, Society and Animals, Policy and Politics, Law and Policy and Political Studies.
Professional memberships
- Treasurer of the Royal Geographical Society-Institute of British Geographers Rural Geography Research Group (2010-present)
- Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society
- Member of the Environment Research Group.
- Associate member of the ESRC Centre for Business Relationships, Accountability, Sustainability and Society (BRASS), 2006-2012.
- Associate member of the Sustainable Places Research Institute (PLACE), Cardiff University, 2011-present.
Current and Past Projects
2012-14: An exploration of factors that influence the expansion of the area affected by endemic bTB (with AHVLA for Defra).
2011-14: The history and governance of bovine Tuberculosis in New Zealand (BRASS/ESRC).
2010-15: Farmers' confidence in vaccines for bovine tuberculosis (Defra).
2013: Expert Advisor - Citizen Dialogue on Bovine TB Policy (Led by OPM for Defra/Sciencewise).
2012-14: Tree health and plant biosecurity: mapping, analysis and improved understanding of stakeholders and the public to help protect tree health (led by Imperial College London and Forest Research).
2011-14: The social and economic consequences of living with animal disease (ESRC/WAG studentship).
2010: Placement Fellowship Welsh Assembly Government (ESRC/WAG).
2008-10: Cultures of veterinary regulation (ESRC).
2008-10: Veterinary Capacity in Wales (WAG).
2006-8: Evaluation of the West Wales Biosecurity Intensive Treatment Area (WAG).
2006-7: Biosecurity and the regulation of animal health: the case of bovine tuberculosis (ESRC).
2005-8: Managing Research and Evaluation within the Department of Environment, Planning and Countryside (WAG).
2004: Rural Dimensions of Local Public Service Agreements (Countryside Agency).
PhD Supervision
I am always keen to hear from anyone interested in developing proposals for PhDs within my areas of expertise.
Past and Current PhD supervision:
- Delyth Crimes: 'Bovine Tuberculosis and Farmers' Well-being in Wales'.
- Emma Glendinning: 'Building Resilience through Post-Productivism: The case of farmers' markets' (completed 2013).


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Two Hood River County entities received surprise financial windfalls from a local estate last month. The Hood River County Education Foundation and the Hood River County OSU Extension were each the recipient of nearly $300,000 from the estate of longtime Hood River Valley residents Horace and Ruth Daum.
Horace died in 1995 and Ruth died in 2001.
"This is twice the amount of anything we've received in the past," said Mike Schend, president of the Hood River County Education Foundation, which provides college scholarships to local high school students. The Daums specified in their will the manner in which they wanted the money for each organization spent. For the Education Foundation, the Daums wished to establish scholarships in music, nursing and science. The Foundation's board decided to establish the Daum scholarships for local students already in college pursuing degrees in those fields. The amount of the scholarships won't be determined until next year, but Schend expects them to be a minimum of $2,500 each.
At the Extension, the longtime orchardists wanted to provide money for research on Bosc pears and other pear varieties as well as other commercial crops in the Hood River Valley.
"(The Daums') farm had one of the first plantings of Bosc pears in the valley," said Clark Seavert, superintendent of the OSU Mid-Columbia Agriculture Research and Extension Center. Seavert said a 1½ to 2 acre research "block" planted with Bosc pears will be created near the OSU Extension's Experiment Station where research will be conducted on water management, minimizing pesticide use and crop profitability.
"This is a sizable sum," Seavert said. "It's going to be sustainable enough so we can do research and do it right." Both the Extension and the Education Foundation will spend only the interest on the investments so the money will continue to benefit both organizations — and, by extension, local people — in perpetuity.
The money came as a surprise to both organization's directors. Before her death, Ruth Daum had asked Seavert to provide her with information about leaving money to the OSU Extension, but that's the last he heard about it until getting a phone call from the estate administrator. Schend was acquainted with Ruth Daum but had no idea she planned to leave money to the Education Foundation.
"You don't expect this kind of thing locally," Schend said. "It's nice that somebody has thought that well in advance about their money and how it can affect other people."
The Daums moved to the Hood River Valley from Seattle in 1965 and purchased a pear orchard on the Westside near the Hood River. They worked the orchard until Horace's health began failing shortly before his death, at which time the orchard was leased. Ruth continued to live in their large farm house until her death.
"(The Daums) deserve recognition," said Schend, who hopes the couple's generous donation will encourage others to think of local non-profit organizations when doing their estate planning.
"They've kept it local," he said. "It's fantastic."
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David Ragan used a sweeping last-lap pass in overtime to pull a huge upset victory Sunday at Talladega Superspeedway.
He got a push from teammate David Gilliland to slide past Carl Edwards to the front and he and Gilliland held on for a 1-2 finish for Front Row Motorsports.
It came at the end of a race that took seven hours to complete after rain stopped it for 3 hours, 36 minutes midway through the event. With darkness quickly closing in, contact between Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and J.J. Yeley triggered a frightening crash that sent Kurt Busch's car airborne and on top of Ryan Newman's car.
NASCAR sent the race into overtime for one attempt at a green-white-checkered finish, and the two Front Row drivers teamed up to steal the win.
Article courtesy of FOXSports.com


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Three new designs to our TV tray tables category on our website will be introduced over the coming holiday months. A preview of one of them can be found in this blog post with the new Portable Folding Tray Table Desk Set. Offered in sets of two and four, expect the Portable Folding Tray Table Desk Set within a few weeks. The concept behind these tray tables began from customer feedback. Many love our Portable Folding Work and Laptop Desk but have requested an offering in set form, rather than solely a single folding tray table. So, with that feedback from you, our customer, we combined the two most popular designs of our TV tray tables – the Contemporary and Portable Folding Work and Laptop Desk to offer you an exclusive variation made perfect for the home or office space.
From Oval, Rectangular, Contour, and Contemporary TV tray set designs to the single 21st-century accustomed Portable Folding Work and Laptop Desk, Manchester Wood has you covered with a quality American classic brought into modern culture design with our handcrafted solid wood folding tray tables.
Sign up for our mailing list on our homepage at ManchesterWood.com, and be on the lookout for these new tray tables that will offer great mobility with a handle, and the same sturdy solid construction you'll find with all our furniture made in the USA. A modern design made perfect for the conventional uses we find in tray tables today.
To shop our existing TV tray tables, click here.


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Nov. 28, 2010
GREENSBORO, N.C. – Florida State's Rodney Hudson has been awarded the 2010 Jacobs Blocking Trophy, Atlantic Coast Conference Commissioner John Swofford announced Sunday. In doing so, Hudson, who also captured the award in 2009, becomes one of just 11 players in ACC history to be a two-time recipient of the Jacobs Trophy.
The Jacobs Blocking Trophy has been awarded annually since 1953 to the player voted the most outstanding blocker in the ACC by a poll of the league's head coaches and defensive coordinators. The trophy is given in memory of William P. Jacobs, who served as president of Presbyterian College from 1935 to 1945. The trophy will be presented at the ACC's Night of Legends event which will be held this Friday (6 pm) at the Charlotte Convention Center as part of festivities held around the Dr Pepper ACC Football Championship Game.
Hudson totaled 23 points, including six first-place votes, in the balloting by the coaches to outdistance Boston College senior offensive tackle Anthony Costanzo (13), Miami senior offensive tackle Orlando Franklin (12) and Clemson senior offensive tackle Chris Hairston (10) to claim his second straight Jacobs Trophy.
One of three finalists for this year's prestigious Outland Trophy, Hudson, a 6-2, 282-pound senior from Mobile, Ala., is seeking to be one of seven players in ACC history to be honored four times with All-ACC honors. A first-team FWAA All-America in 2009, Hudson was a second-team All-ACC selection as a freshman in 2007 and earned first-team honors in 2008 and 2009. He has been the leader of a Florida State offensive line which has paved the way for the Seminoles to average almost 400 yards a game of total offense, despite a rash of injuries which forced FSU to use various starting combinations upfront this year.
Hudson, who has made 46 career starts at guard, has graded out to 87 percent this year with 44 knockdown blocks. He has been penalized only once in 772 snaps this year. He is also the only offensive lineman nominated for ACC Player of the Year by the ACC's football coaches.
"It's with great honor that I've been informed that Rodney Hudson is the Jacobs Blocking Award winner for the second consecutive year," said Florida State head coach Jimbo Fisher. "There's no doubt in my mind that he deserves it. He has been one of the steadiest, hardest working young men I've ever been associated with, along with being one of the toughest. Football is very important to him, not only to himself, but his teammates. He is a super teammate and one of the best offensive linemen and leaders that I've ever been associated with."
The Mobile, Ala., native was named ACC Offensive Lineman of the Week twice during the 2010 season: first for his play on Sept. 20 against Brigham Young, in the Seminoles 34-10 win over the Cougars and then for his play on Oct. 9 in Florida State's 45-17 win over then 13th-ranked Miami. His Player of the Week honors give him eight for his career tying former ACC standouts E.J. Henderson of Maryland, Philip Rivers of NC State and Clarkston Hines of Duke for most career Conference Player of the Week accolades.
Hudson is the fifth Florida State player to win the Jacobs Blocking Trophy, following in the footsteps of Clay Shiver (1991-92), Tra Thomas (1997), Tarlos Thomas (2000) and Brett Williams (2001-02). In all, those five Seminoles have captured eight Jacobs Awards.
He is the 11th two-time winner of the honor joining former conference standouts such as Elton Brown of Virginia (2003-04), Brett Williams of FSU (2001-02), Clay Shiver of Florida State (1994-95), Ray Roberts of Virginia (1990-91), Jim Dombrowski of Virginia (1984-85), Jim Ritcher of NC State (1978-79), Billy Bryan of Duke (1975-76), Art Gregory of Duke (1961-62), Hal McElhaney (1956-57) of Duke and Bill Wohrman (1953-54) of South Carolina.


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Translation Disclaimer
In 2006, Berkeley voters issued a call to action on the climate change challenge by overwhelmingly endorsing ballot Measure G. The mandate was simple but bold: Reduce our entire community's greenhouse gas emissions by 80% below 2000 levels by 2050. The Berkeley Climate Action Plan was written through a community-wide process and was adopted by City Council on June 2, 2009. The community's target for the year 2020 is to reduce community-wide GHG emissions 33% (below 2000 levels). To review Climate Action Plan goals and progress in more detail please visit Climate Action Plan Progress.
Vision for a more sustainable Berkeley outlined in the Climate Action Plan:
Get involved, make the vision a reality! Join one of the working groups of the Berkeley Climate Action Coalition. The Coalition is made up of local non-profits, educational institutions, businesses, faith-based organizations, public health organizations, neighborhood groups, government agencies and committed individuals, all working together to implement the Berkeley Climate Action Plan.
To learn more about the plan itself, download and read the Climate Action Plan:Berkeley Climate Action Plan Executive Summary OR Berkeley Climate Action Plan Full Report
Additional Information:
Back to homepage of Office of Energy and Sustainable Development


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OM TUBES & FITTINGS INDUSTRIES is a manufacturer and supplier of 904l bars. 904l bars is one of our top exported products around the world. Our company is ISO 9001:2008, ISO 14001:2004, OHSAS 18001:2007 & PED 97/23/EC Certified. 904l bars can sustain high pressure and temperature rating. 904l bars are majorly used in hydraulics, pneumatics, oil and gas industry, petrochemical industries, energy projects etc. Our company specializes in fast delivery at best prices. We are the top company in India for manufacture and supply of steel products. Our products have been exported internationally to more than 80 countries. We have clientele all around Europe. We provide MTC in accordance with EN10204 NACE 3.1. Send us your inquiry for 904l bars on email@example.com
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- Stainless Steel FlangesBlind Flange Slip On Flange Weld Neck Flange VIEW THE PRODUCT PAGE
- Stainless Steel TubesStainless Steel Tubing SS Tubes Straight & Coiled VIEW THE PRODUCT PAGE
- Stainless Steel Pipes SS Pipes Seamless Pipes & Welded Pipes ( ERW , EFW ) VIEW THE PRODUCT PAGE
- Stainless Steel SheetsJindal Make - Indian Origin VIEW THE PRODUCT PAGE


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Battery Widget Reborn v2.3.9 PRO APK new stylish battery widget with advanced functionality.
Updated: November 25, 2016
Current Version: 2.3.9/PRO
Requires Android: 2.3 and up
Category: Tools
Size: 7.1M
- Battery widget
circle battery level indicator indicator perfectly fits pure Android design
resizable on Android 4.x+
support for both main and external dock battery (Asus Transformer only)
- Basic battery info
Battery Info
Shortcuts to Power-Summary/Background Sync/Wifi/BT Settings
- Status bar notification of battery status
multiple icon styles
prediction (estimation) how long battery lasts
customizable texts in notification area (estimated time left, voltage, temperature, battery health)
- Power saving functionality – automatic airplane mode during the night (simple but powerful battery saver functionality)
- Charging and discharging chart
- Extended notifications support for Jelly Bean phones
optional charging and discharging chart
power related toggles:
Background Sync
Airplane mode
customizable notification priority
- Additional tools
Settings shortcuts
DashClock Extension
- Specific HW vendor support
supports Motorola 1% increment
supports Asus Transformer secondary (dock) battery
- Holo themes interface on all phones with Android 2.3+
Installation and operation notes
- Task Killer or Task Manager may affect this app. Please don't use them if app does not work as expected
- App is highly optimized and DOES NOT drain you battery
- Due to the limitation of the Android platform, homescreen widgets will NOT be available if application is moved to SD card.
- Some devices indicate battery level every 10% due to their kernel design (known ones are: most Motorola devices including Droid and Atrix series, Samsung Moment series). Try to use Motorola 1% hack feature if your phone is among these devices
- In Android 4.0, the system may shrink and dim level indicator icons in status bar.
Whats new
- bugs fixing
Free Download Battery Widget Reborn 2.3.9
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Blue plastic bull taken from Hillsboro farm stand
November 14. 2012 12:31AM
HILLSBORO - Hillsboro Police are looking for a four- to five-foot tall blue plastic bull weighing about 200 pounds.
The replica animal was taken from Winter Hills Farm, an ice cream stand and produce market on Route 9 over the weekend, police said in a statement released to the media last night, along with a photo of the statue.
According to their website, the Hillsboro Police can be reached at 464-5512 or visit their website at www.hillsboropd.com/contact/.


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The Tomten by Astrid Lindgren and Harald Wiberg
This classic is an introduction to the fabled Swedish gnome, the Tomten. He is the one who looks after everything while the farmer and his family are sleeping. At night, when all is quiet around the farm -- that's when the Tomten wakes up. (Ages 5-8). Adapted from the original text by Karl-Erik Forsslund.
Hardcover, 32 pages.
Astrid Lindgren (1906-2002) was a well-known Swedish writer whose works renewed children's literature in Sweden and Scandinavia. Her best-known characters are independent and unconventional, including the untidy Pippi Longstocking, Karlsson, and Emil and his entertaining pranks. Her books for children received many awards, including the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award for Pippi Longstocking in 1973; the Hans Christian Andersen Award in 1958; and the International Book Award from UNESCO in 1993.


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Former A&B CEO Allen Doane named executive-in-residence at Shidler CollegeUniversity of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
Dolly M. Omiya, (808) 956-5645
Public Information Officer, University of Hawaii at Manoa
Public Information Officer, University of Hawaii at Manoa
Posted: Jan 22, 2013
The University of Hawai'i at Mānoa Shidler College of Business has named former Alexander & Baldwin (A&B) Chairman and CEO Allen Doane executive-in-residence for the spring 2013 semester. He will remain as director of A&B and continue to serve on the boards of First Hawaiian Bank, BancWest Corporation and Pacific Guardian Life Insurance Company.
"It's such an honor to have Allen join us at the College," said Vance Roley, dean of the Shidler College of Business. "Allen has more than 40 years of business leadership experience to share with our students. He is an excellent resource and role model, and represents the best of Hawai'i's business community."
Doane will join former Managing Partner of Ernst & Young Larry Rodriguez and former HEI Chairman, CEO and President Robert Clarke as executives-in-residence.
The Shidler College of Business Executive-in-Residence Program gives students, alumni, and faculty the opportunity to learn and work with prominent business leaders. Participants in the Executive-in-Residence Program share their business knowledge and experiences as guest lecturers, mentors, and advisors.
Doane came to Hawai'i in 1969 while serving in the U.S. Navy. In 1975, he joined C. Brewer and Company and was later transferred to the headquarters of IU International (parent company of C. Brewer) in Philadelphia. In 1983, Doane was appointed vice president of strategic planning of IU and was elevated to group vice president in 1985. In 1988, he returned to Hawai'i as managing partner and COO of The Shidler Group. Doane joined A&B in 1991, directing the real estate and agribusiness sectors. He was named CEO of A&B in 1998 and retired in 2010. He has also served on the UH Shidler College of Business' Advisory Council.
Doane received a BA from Brigham Young University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.


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U.S. News
Alabama: Suit Over HIV Inmate Segregation Going to Trial
September 6, 2012
Adapted from:
A lawsuit challenging Alabama's policy of segregating HIV-positive inmates will proceed to trial this month, thanks to an order issued Wednesday by a federal judge.
In rejecting the state prison system's request that the suit be dismissed, US District Judge Myron Thompson cleared it for a non-jury trial set to start on Sept. 17 in Montgomery.
The judge wrote in his order that Alabama had been segregating HIV-positive prisoners since the 1980s, as many other states also were doing at the time. By 1994, however, only six states continued the practice, and now only Alabama and South Carolina do so. A total of 260 HIV-positive inmates are currently held at four Alabama correctional institutions.
Kim Thomas, the state's prison commissioner, said Alabama won a similar case in 1999 and is prepared for trial on this one.
Thompson rejected the state's claim that it is immune from suit and that inmates are not entitled to medical privacy. However, he did not rule on the question of whether the current suit is too much like one filed in 1997, which the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals decided in Alabama's favor in 1999. Instead, he said he would determine at the end of the trial whether this case was too similar to the earlier one to proceed.
Attorneys for the eight inmates who filed the current suit maintain that conditions today are much different than when the earlier case was settled. They cited medical advances and changing attitudes about HIV, arguing that AIDS is no longer an "invariably fatal disease," as the appeals court declared 13 years ago.
Associated Press
09.05.2012; Phillip Rawls
This article was provided by CDC National Prevention Information Network. It is a part of the publication CDC HIV/Hepatitis/STD/TB Prevention News Update.
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Peter Bennett of Prime Image Cleaners, Greenford
"My partner did the one day carpet course
some years back and said it was excellent. I was really pleased I did
it because although I'm quite new to the industry I was able to go home
and teach him a thing or two! I feel much more technically aware since
doing the course and I am definitely much more successful with stain
removal. I'm also very careful now about over-wetting, which is
something that can really cause the problems. However, my only real
regret was not coming on a two-day carpet course. I can see now that as I
haven't had that much experience yet, it would have been better for me
to come for the two days. In fact I'll probably come back for the
two-day course next year and keep up with what's new on the carpet
cleaning scene".
Course Date:
30 October 2018
4 December 2018


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The Friday verdicts in the child sex abuse trial of Jerry Sandusky represent the conclusion of only one chapter in a scandal that has shadowed Pennsylvania's largest university and much of central Pennsylvania for the past seven months.
At least six of the eight known victims of the former Penn State University assistant football coach have private attorneys who will soon decide whether to file civil lawsuits against Sandusky and the university.
A separate criminal trial looms for Penn State Athletic Director Tim Curley and retired Senior Vice President Gary Schultz, who are accused of related perjury charges, alleging they lied to a state grand jury investigating the abuse charges.
Penn State administration officials also are bracing for the results of an internal investigation headed by former FBI Director Louis Freeh, who was hired by the university to review whether the university ignored or failed to act appropriately on early allegations leveled against the former coach.
At the same time, a state grand jury continues its wide-ranging criminal inquiry, including a review of the university's dealings with the former coach.
"The moment the verdict was announced against Sandusky, the landscape of this scandal shifted toward a new focus on Penn State,'' said attorney Tom Kline, who represents one of Sandusky's victims.
"There is no doubt that we are going to file a claim against Penn State,'' Kline said. "Jerry Sandusky may have been the perpetrator, but Penn State was his enabler.''
Penn State, meanwhile, moved quickly to avert a wave of civil lawsuits, announcing right after the verdicts were announced its intention to "compensate'' victims of Sandusky's abuse.
"Now that the jury has spoken, the university wants to continue that dialogue and do its part to help victims continue their path forward," the university said in a statement.
"To that end, the university plans to invite victims of Mr. Sandusky's abuse to facilitate the resolution of claims against the university arising out of Mr. Sandusky's conduct."
Wes Oliver, a Widener University law professor who has been closely monitoring the case, said it is in Penn State's "best interest to attempt to resolve the lingering matters quickly.''
"The verdicts were so overwhelming against Sandusky,'' Oliver said, "that it suggests there shouldn't have been any doubt early on'' that Sandusky represented a threat to children.
"It could take years to resolve these claims, but it is in everyone's best interest to settle these differences quickly.''
Yet one major part of the scandal the perjury cases against Curley and Schultz is no longer in the university's control.
Specifically, the two administrators are charged with telling a state grand jury that assistant football coach Michael McQueary never told them in 2001 that he saw Sandusky engaged in sexual activity with a young boy in a university shower room.
Like Sandusky's attorney, lawyers for Curley and Schultz have assailed McQueary's credibility, saying that the Penn State assistant coach has given conflicting accounts of what he saw. Those conflicts include a decision to change the date of the incident, initially listed as taking place in March 2002, to February 2001.
McQueary was questioned closely in the Sandusky trial, where he testified that he saw his former coaching colleague with a young boy engaged in what he believed was sodomy.
While McQueary said he could not be "1,000 percent certain'' that the coach was raping the boy, he described the activity as "extremely sexual.''
In its verdict Friday, the Sandusky jury found the former coach not guilty of sodomy, but convicted him on four other sex abuse charges involving the victim, based on McQueary's testimony.
Oliver said the jury's verdict appeared to bolster at least the core of McQueary's account: that he saw Sandusky engaged in some kind of sexual activity.
Lawyers for Curley and Schultz could not be immediately reached through their spokeswoman for comment. And a trial date has not been set.
Meanwhile, Sandusky's attorney, Joe Amendola, said that his client's case is not completely settled even though the 68-year-old former coach sits in a Centre County jail cell under suicide watch awaiting his formal sentencing.
"We think we have a few avenues of appeal and we will be pursuing them," Amendola said.
Among the possible appeals Sandusky will likely pursue is a claim that the defense was rushed to trial. Repeated requests for delays were denied by Judge John Cleland.
Amendola said that he was so concerned about the pace of the case that he sought to withdraw as Sandusky's lawyer on the eve of the trial.
"The judge said, 'Thank you, but you can't,'" Amendola said, recounting the exchange with Cleland.
Since Friday's verdicts, Amendola said he hasn't spoken to Sandusky, who sits in isolation on suicide watch at the Centre County, Pa., jail, awaiting formal sentencing within the next 90 days.
Amendola, who has served as a spokesman for the Sandusky family, said that he spoke to Sandusky's wife, Dottie, and she is "distraught," but the verdicts have not shaken her belief in her husband.
"She believes that what has happened is a tragedy," Amendola said. "She's trying to pick up the pieces."
He said it is unlikely he'll represent the former coach on appeal.
"In any appeal, I'll probably be a witness," he said. "It's probably best that somebody else handle that.'"


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PARIS (AP) — French authorities are trying to figure out whether a man arrested in the West African nation of Mali who was en route to Islamist combatants is the same man charged in Paris with a terror-related offense, a judicial official said Thursday.
Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, or AQIM, is one of three extremist groups who have taken control of the northern half of Mali. The group is made up mainly of foreign fighters. The radical Islamists moved into northern Mali — an area the size of France — after a military coup in March overthrew Mali's democratically elected president.
Western and African leaders are now worried that northern Mali will destabilize Africa's entire Sahel region.
Mali authorities notified France this week of the arrest. French judicial officials are now trying to verify whether the man, who was traveling under an assumed name, is a French-Malian charged in 2010 in another case but released from jail last June, the official said.
The official was not authorized to speak publicly.
The suspected jihadist is being held in Bamako while French officials determine via fingerprints whether he is Ibrahim Aziz Ouattara. He told Mali officials he was trying to get near the ancient city of Timbuktu, where radicals have pillaged tombs of saints, the French official said.
Ouattara has a long history of trips to regions where Islamist radicals are active, including countries like Yemen and Somalia. French authorities also linked him to a plot to kill the head of the Paris mosque, according to the official.
France, Mali's former colonial ruler, is pressing hard for an African military intervention against the Islamists that it and other allies promise to back with logistical support.


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By Jesse Couenhoven, Science of Virtues scholar
It is hard to find anyone
today who does not think of forgiving as virtuous, at least when done under the
right circumstances. Yet this apparent consensus in favor of forgiveness can be
misleading, because there is little accord about what it means to forgive! Some
think of forgiveness as an attitude, others as an action, and still others
consider forgiveness a religious concept unavailable to secular societies. So
how can one go about clarifying the meaning of "forgiveness"? Margaret Urban
Walker suggests in her fine book Moral
Repair that we should not try to settle on one meaning of forgiveness;
forgiveness is a rich concept in part because it is a term with many meanings.
My view, by contrast, is that forgiveness researchers should develop and defend
specific conceptions of forgiveness. If they take advantage of the insights
provided by other views of forgiveness, my hope is that this process of
articulating rival conceptions of forgiveness can be illuminating for all who
value the virtues of forgiveness.
It can be helpful for
scholars to begin the work of clarifying what they think forgiveness is by spending some time delimiting the
concept, attending to what forgiveness is not.
Mercy, pardon, and graciousness, for instance, are ideas that overlap with
forgiveness in some ways, and it is helpful to know what, if anything, makes
forgiveness a term with its own singular significance. One way to begin
figuring out what difference it makes to speak particularly of forgiveness—as
opposed to some other good—is to differentiate forgiveness from what it is
It is widely agreed that
forgiveness differs from excusing—which
says that while a person may seem to have been in the wrong, there is good
reason to consider that person justified for having done what she or he did—or condoning—which says that what a person
did was not wrong even if some might think it was. Saying that something is
"just fine", or is "no big deal", is not the same as saying "I forgive you".
The idea is that forgiveness is an active stance, not simply a way of saying
that something is not problematic, or does not matter. Since what does not
matter does not need to be forgiven, we can say, minimally, that forgiveness is
thought to be possible only when a person has a genuine grievance of some sort.
It is also widely agreed that forgiveness differs from forgetting: because forgiveness is a response to a grievance, one
must have that injury in mind, protest it, and address it in some manner, in
order to forgive.
I find these distinctions
important, and insightful—they begin to help us see what is distinctive and
important about forgiveness. Interestingly, however, our everyday language
tends to run roughshod over these distinctions. For instance, a briefly popular
recent news story recounted the story of a six year old girl who was bitten by
a shark. After surviving the attack, she told reporters that she forgave the
shark, and that she did not believe it meant to harm her. My instinctive
response was critical: talking that way diminishes the idea of forgiveness by
falsely imputing moral intentionality to a fairly unintelligent animal, against
which it is hardly fair to hold a grievance for simply doing what comes
naturally to it. In addition, the girl seemed to be equating forgiveness with
excusing. Yet making use of the idea of forgiveness in these ways is far from
idiosyncratic. Rather than criticize this child for applying the idea of
forgiveness to creatures that lack the agential credentials necessary for
forgiveness, I find it helpful to see her as a guide. Her comments suggest that
she is properly making use of a popular idea of forgiveness—one more broadly
accommodating than the one that began to be hinted at above. The "folk" concept
of forgiveness she is working with involves the ideas that forgiving is not
being angry at, or visiting retribution on, something that has caused you
trouble. And she has rightly perceived that it is now common to justify
forgiveness—meaning, not visiting a punishment or penalty on someone—on the
basis that that one is not really to blame. I find it hard to make philosophical
sense of the claim that one can forgive a shark, because sharks cannot be
blamed for their behavior. But this story reflects a common way of thinking
about forgiveness.
Consider the fact that my
car insurance company believes in something they call forgiveness: as a
platinum customer (because I have been with the company for over six years), I
have "accident forgiveness," which means that Progressive will not hold it
against me if I have a minor or even a major car accident. Here the idea of
forgiveness in play seems to be that of not visiting a penalty on someone for
that one's being involved in something regrettable. Whether the accident was my
fault is not something that the insurance company seems to care about.
Thinking about
forgiveness in these ways—ways that ignore the distinctions between condoning,
excusing, and forgiveness— are now common, but they drain the term of its
significance, avoiding the profound questions about grace in the midst of fault
that the term has traditionally evoked. Such ways of thinking about forgiveness
undermine the meaning and inspiration the idea of forgiveness still widely
evokes. If this is all that one means by forgiveness, we might as well use other
terms, which would seem to serve just as well. But it would be better to
reserve use of the term forgiveness for times when something deeper than
excusing is taking place.
So far, then, my argument
is that the meaning of forgiveness has to be delimited in certain ways in order
for us to do justice to the significance we attribute to the term. For
forgiveness to provide a way towards a positive future, as Bishop Tutu as so
compellingly argued it can, it must be something more than excusing,
forgetting, or overlooking evil. This line of thought can only take us so far,
however. One can agree that the concept of forgiveness should be marked off in
significant ways, yet still disagree about the positive content of the term.
Should we think of forgiveness as overcoming resentment for good reasons, as
avoiding retributive practices for the sake of love, as a divine act of
redemption through atonement…? Since we don't all agree about what it means to
forgive, it seems clear that the meaning of the term cannot be determined by
grammatical fiat. Intuitions about the term's meaning fall all over the map,
and use of the word in common parlance is vague and confused. In professional
work, too, the term has a variety of implications.
In view of these
difficulties, one might simply stipulate a definition for the idea of
forgiveness, and then see what sort of headway one can make in developing that
idea. One might also pursue a number of ideas of forgiveness, exploring their
various strengths and weaknesses, perhaps in the interest of finding one that
would be best, or in the interest of applauding many of them. However, we can
do better than hold to a kind of forgiveness-fideism. And we should aspire to
do more than merely map intuitions, and the relations between them.
The function of forgiveness in our lives begins with the recognition of our own limitations and our own faults. Under the circumstances it seems remarkable to think of it as a virtue of any kind. Presumably, if we were free of faults we would also be above the need to forgive. So that is one paradox of this act, a virtuous act surely. But it is not the only paradox. If there is forgiveness, there is also bring forgiven, but the two are fundamentally different. To forgive is a virtue and to be forgiven is also a virtue of sorts but above both of them stands a third act that is the greater virtue: to accept forgiveness.
Forgiveness is the act of refusing to seek revenge that could arguably be justified, when judged purely on the merits of the case. When someone wrongs one, it is only natural for the aggrieved party to seek revenge, but it is better to forgive. Forgiveness is the decision not to seek revenge. It places the good of the offender ahead of the desires of the victim. One often hears forgiveness invoked in the absence of wrong. For instance, when someone wrongs my neighbor, I am urged to forgive too, but forgiveness without guilt is vain. I have no justification for seeking revenge against third parties, and no basis on which to forgive them.
Revenge above all is pure animus, a pure desire to hurt without regard to guilt or innocence; it is the desire to diminish others because of the way they have diminished me. In this day we are not so very conscious of the reality of revenge and perhaps not so inclined to seek it. For that reason perhaps we are correspondingly hard put to define it, but it has not gone away. It is now what we sometimes called meanness or pettiness, perhaps, but above all it is the desire to hurt those who hurt us, and to do so purely because of the hurt we feel, not out of a sense of justice or right but because of the hurt itself.
Revenge is in principle different from retaliation, though they often come mixed together. Retaliation is a tactic which, if it was forbidden, would leave us no alternative but to strike first. We naturally and wisely prefer to control harms by imposing superior force to prevent injustices, but that is not always feasible. Injustices happen and self-defense is sometimes necessary. In those instances the threat of retaliation is an essential means of preventing or minimizing wrongs. For that reason retaliation is very different from revenge. But the two cannot be kept entirely separate, because while revenge is a passion and retaliation is a tactic, the two often come together in practice. These confront us with knotty dilemmas at times, but at those times we are especially in need of objective judges of right and wrong, who can impose retaliation even when they seek to restrain revenge.
The call to forgive is not a sacrifice of self-defense. As Aquinas reminds us, if the offender wrongs us or wrongs the innocent, it is no favor to him to encourage him in his evils ways. It is better for all to restore rightful order, though to do so with resort to the minimum collateral harm. This also reflects the call to defend the rights and interests of other innocent parties, because we certainly cannot justify greater solicitude for the guilty than we exercise for the innocent. In all things, we bear in mind the injunction that we cannot sacrifice the innocent in order to preserve the guilty.
For every case the rises to the level of harms envisioned in this way, there are hundreds or thousands of small wrongs that occur every day in our lives that call us to forgive. In those cases we should be especially sensible of the slippery nature of harm itself, and of guilt. Uncle So-and-so promised, we firmly believe, a share in his estate at his death, but he left us nothing. So we are outraged. But is that really the truth of the case? And were there other more pressing considerations that interposed themselves between his promise made to us and the needs of his other heirs? When we forgive, we gain some portion of that cool objectivity, that ability to judge honestly, that we profess to admire so much in others. Forgiveness is a demand of honesty; there is no honesty without a capacity for it because we are not the center of the universe and our needs and desires are not the standard of right.
In the same vein we recognize that in the interests of harmony we should surrender even our legitimate desires when the conflict with others. Those desires are legitimate in themselves, given to us, as it were, out of the gracious bounty of nature, and we pursue them without embarrassment or any sort of guilt, but they are not rights. If they are not necessary to our lives, they are gifts given to us so that we can share them freely with others. Everyone is called to draw a line demarking those goods that are needful and those that are convenient so that he or she can live up to the potential that we have to pursue and achieve good ends, and at the same time also have the power to facilitate the good in others around us.
This is the barest minimum that we can say about forgiveness and revenge. What then can we say about being forgiven, because they are naturally conjoined.
Notwithstanding that, they are entirely different. Each of us has the power to forgive, but none of us has the power to make forgiven. If someone injures me I have the power to forgive, and even better than that I may have to ability or opportunity to offer help, offering good for evil. What no one however has the power to do is to make forgiven. This seems to be another paradox. If I forgive my enemy, is he not therefore forgiven, by definition as it were? Sadly no. He always retains the capacity to reject forgiveness. More than that, he retains the power not to accept forgiveness, because if he is in the wrong it is incumbent upon him to accept that and to change. That is an affirmative obligation on him: to accept forgiveness, accepting that he is in need of forgiveness.
That is no small demand, though it is unavoidable and in a sense its absence unforgivable. At the start we posed the question of what is this virtue called forgiveness, or is it a virtue at all. But along the way we have found a perhaps greater virtue, which is to accept forgiveness. That is to say, to accept the need to change and to act on it. To be contrite. To accept correction. That is the greater virtue and the one that we mortals find most galling of all and more at odds with our nature. But it is also the most necessary, because it is truly said that guilt is a thief that steals the soul.
In important matters, the kind of offenses mentioned above, the virtue of forgiveness is obvious, but it is no virtue to forget. If we could impose a state of forgiveness on someone, it might be virtuous simply to overlook the wrongs they are guilty of, on the premise that it is up to us to make them spontaneously disappear. We cannot however impose forgiveness. We do not have the power, or in a sense even the right, to simply makes wrongs disappear. This refers of course to grave wrongs of course. For our part, to do so would be tantamount to assuming complicity in those acts, to condone them. More importantly, for the guilty party the freedom he has to reject forgiveness cannot be taken away because we have been fashioned not only with the power of will, which we take even to be free will, though realistically we ask ourselves who is actually free, but we have the power of effective will. What we do and what we will have consequences. What we will matters for us. What we will is what will be accorded to us. So the guilty must will to be forgiven because no power will force them if they do not will it.
As we all recognize, for every grave offense there are innumerable small ones that, when we are confronted with them we should seek simply to forgive too, and in these matters we have some ability to absolve by forgiving. Simple kindness and thoughtfulness, and simple concern for the wellbeing of others leads us wherever we can to be tolerant and patient of them, as they are perhaps patient with us. This is a genuine sense of forgiveness and it graces our lives and is a real virtue too. So we bear patiently with one another, cherishing the gifts of peace that we have all received in abundance. And in graver matters we still place the good even of those who injure us as worthy of respect, but make the service of what is right and just for all preeminent.
By Joel Clarke Gibbons
Joel Clarke Gibbons is a mathematician and economist, and the principal officer of Logistic Research & Trading Co., a commodity speculator. He writes on the philosophical implications of the social and behavioral sciences, including his recent book, Man and God in the World: a Treatise on Human Nature.
E-mail: email@example.com
Web Site: www.logisticresearch.com
The Virtue of Forgiveness Part II
This definition of forgiveness seems in a somewhat fuzzy way to miss something of what we commonly are thinking about when we say the word "forgiveness." Isn't forgivenss something more?
That simple question is really two questions, with two very different answers. First question: is the measure of forgiveness simply not seking revenge? Isn't there more to forgivenss strictly speaking. I assert that there is not, again "strictly speaking." To the extent that forgivenss is a virtue, this is the virtue. All that is required of us is this. Revenge doubles harms; it deepens wounds; it insures that the evil that men do can live after them and continue to injure. To forgive is to stop the outward spreading circle of evil. It is to insure that at least the harm that men do will be buried with their bones. And it is sufficient. No guilt attaches to the one who forgives.
But there is more. It is not properly forgiveness, and it is not properly a virtue. What is more than forgiveness is love, and it is not only virtue, but it is sanctity. In defining forgiveness we made the point that it arises only as the reciprocal of injury. It is the call to love however that knows no bounds. The call to brotherly love is too vast a topic to address here, but we can at least identify it. It is the call to attempt in every setting to leave those we deal with better off than they were before. If they are guilty of wrong, it extends to reminding them of the wrong and call them to repentance and change. At our best, we treat everyone that way. Of course, those words -- so easily penned -- are far beyond our mortal powers, but we can do this: we can sometimes succeed in leaving someone we meet better off in some useful way than he was before. Then any little good we do can take on a life of its own and grow, while our faults too are buried with our bones.
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BlueStar's New 24" Wide Appliances: City Living Collection
BlueStar has always been a source for great-looking and professionally-functioning gas ranges. But now they're introducing a new line of appliances aimed at us - the city cook -that are all a mere 24" wide:
BlueStar calls it their City Living Collection and it's a line of "petite" gas appliances including free-standing ranges and built-in wall ovens. Aside from the usual stainless steel finish, you'll find a whole bunch of colorful options.
BlueStar's press release quotes Chef Marcus Samuelsson, award-winning chef and owner of New York City's The Red Rooster Harlem (and spokesperson for BlueStar): "If you're living in the city, chances are your kitchen is small. Having a small kitchen doesn't mean you can't cook meals like a pro. In my view, no other residential range can match the cooking performance of BlueStar. You can put pots and pans on a slow simmer, and sear salmon and chicken breast on the griddle. You can set up a restaurant-like kitchen with this range--now even in a small space."
Sounds pretty fantastic to us. And it's true - some of NYC's chefs go home to small yet extremely hard-working kitchens in their apartments. Check out more at BlueStar.
Related: Inspired by Marcus: New Ranges from BlueStar
(Images: BlueStar)


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Wizards fend off Rockets' 3s for 105-103 win
Wizards fend off Rockets' 3s for 105-103 win
Feb. 24, 2013
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Rockets dominated early with an impressive 3-point shooting display and finished with more attempts than any NBA team this season. The Wizards countered by going big and going inside and it paid off when the former league laughingstock took down another winning team.
Bradley Beal scored 21 points and Emeka Okafor had 17 points, 11 rebounds and made the go-ahead free throw with 5.2 seconds remaining to help the Washington defeat Houston 105-103 on Saturday night.
Trevor Ariza added 18 points and John Wall had 12 points and 11 assists for the Wizards, who came back from a 17-point deficit for their second straight win. Washington, winner of 10 of its last 12 home games, scored 54 points in the paint to offset the 57 points Houston scored on 19 3-pointers.
James Harden scored 27 points and Chandler Parsons had 24 with five 3-pointers for the Rockets, who had won their first two games after the All-Star break. Houston attempted 46 3-pointers, the most in the NBA this season and three shy of the league record. The Rockets made 13 from beyond the arc in the first half, one off the NBA record they tied against Golden State on Feb. 5.
"We just wanted to make it tough, make them make contested shots," Wall said. "In the first half they weren't missing. Second half we kind of got into more defensively, changed some of our game plans up and just executed on the other half."
Initially, the Wizards used a smaller lineup to chase down Houston's 3-point threats. In the fourth quarter, they turned the tables by sticking with the interior combination of 6-foot-11 Nene and the 6-foot-10 Okafor.
Trailing 94-88 with 6:21 remaining, the Wizards scored seven straight points, taking the lead on Nene's layup, one of six lead changes in the final 4:58. Wall broke a 101-101 tie with two free throws with 1:13 remaining, but Harden's layup tied the score with 21.4 seconds left.
With Okafor being defended by the 6-foot-6 Carlos Delfino, the Wizards fed the center in the low post and he drew a foul.
"I thought that they would stay small," Wizards coach Randy Wittman said of his plan on the final possession.
After making his first free-throw attempt, Okafor missed the second, but Beal sneaked in for the rebound and was fouled with 1.9 seconds remaining. After Beal split his free throws, Harden's half-court attempt was blocked by Ariza.
"They went inside a little bit more," Rockets coach Kevin McHale said. "But really we had turnovers. We had empty possessions. ... We did not have a good second half."
The Wizards are 11-4 against teams with winning records since Jan. 7.
"We just step up to the challenge," said Wizards reserve Chris Singleton. "We executed the game plan the coaches came up with and down the stretch, we're not our old selves. You see us. We grew up."
Patrick Beverley scored a career-high 15 points with three 3-pointers and Delfino had four 3-pointers and scored 12 points for the Rockets.
McHale limited Jeremy Lin, who scored five points, to 26 minutes due to illness.
The Rockets hit from long range in the first quarter, sinking 8 of 14 3s for a 32-22 lead. Parsons made his three attempts and Harden added one during an 11-4 run to close the quarter.
Three more 3-pointers came during a 14-0 spurt as Harden's trey put Houston ahead 48-31.
The Rockets led 57-46 at halftime, but the Wizards fought back with a 19-6 run highlighted by seven points from Ariza and Wall's jump shot for a 73-72 lead with 3:14 remaining in the quarter. The Rockets regained the lead and entered the fourth quarter up 83-77. Houston missed seven of 10 3's in the fourth.
"We shoot a lot of 3s as a team, but I think we got a little 3 happy," McHale said. "We didn't get enough penetration and enough ball movement."
Wall and Okafor each posted double-doubles in Friday's 119-113 win over Denver.
Houston won the first meeting at home 99-93 on Dec. 12.
NOTES: Dallas attempted 49 3-pointers on March 5, 1996. ... During the same successful stretch against teams with winning records, the Wizards are only 2-5 against sub-.500 teams. ... Veteran Jason Collins, acquired on Thursday from the Celtics, joined Washington on Saturday. Asked pregame how he has stuck around the league, the 34-year-old journeyman known for defense said, "Twelve years of being able to foul people. The stats aren't pretty. I do what I do out there." ... Thomas Robinson, Tyler Honeycutt and guard Francisco Garcia, acquired from the Kings on Tuesday, have not been cleared to play for the Rockets.


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NASHVILLE, TN – Now in its third model year, the highly innovative, industry-leading Nissan LEAF pure electric vehicle added another award to its trophy case with the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) "Top Safety Pick" designation, which recognizes vehicles for excellent performance in four passenger safety tests.
The LEAF achieved the Institute's highest rating of "Good" in front, side, rollover and rear crash tests. Nissan LEAF joins Nissan Altima and Infiniti M37/M56 on the list of 2013 Top Safety Picks.
"Driver and passenger safety are top priorities for Nissan and the 'Top Safety Pick' designation by IIHS reflects the design and innovation that have gone into this car to make it a practical, no-compromise electric vehicle," said Erik Gottfried, Nissan's director of electric vehicle sales and marketing. "The new, U.S.-assembled 2013 Nissan LEAF provides customers with a remarkable level of value, comfort and security at prices competitive with gas-powered cars in a fun-to-drive package."
Standard 2013 LEAF safety systems include Nissan Advanced Air Bag System (AABS) with dual-stage supplemental front air bags with seat belt sensors and occupant classification sensor, front seat-mounted side impact supplemental air bags, roof-mounted curtain side impact supplemental air bags for front and rear-seat outboard occupant head protection, 3-point ALR/ELR seat belts (driver's seat ELR only) with pretensioners and load limiters, child seat upper tether anchor, LATCH (Lower Anchors and Tethers for CHildren) system and child safety rear door locks. Vehicle Dynamic Control (VDC) and Traction Control System (TCS) are also standard on all LEAF models.
"The IIHS 'Top Safety Pick' recognition speaks to the 'zone body construction' design from Nissan's Safety Shield Concept to help protect occupants in a wide variety of crash scenarios," said Robert Yakushi, Nissan director of product safety.
About Nissan
Nissan Motor Co., Ltd., Japan's second-largest automotive company, is headquartered in Yokohama, Japan, and is part of the Renault-Nissan Alliance. Operating with more than 248,000 employees globally, Nissan provided customers with more than 4.9 million vehicles in 2012, generating revenue of 9.4 trillion yen ($US118.95 billion) in fiscal 2011. With a strong commitment to developing exciting and innovative products for all, Nissan delivers a comprehensive range of 64 models under the Nissan and Infiniti brands. A pioneer in zero-emission mobility, Nissan made history with the introduction of the Nissan LEAF, the first affordable, mass-market, pure-electric vehicle and winner of numerous international accolades, including the prestigious 2011-2012 Car of the Year Japan and 2011 World Car of the Year awards.
For more information on our products, services and commitment to sustainable mobility, visit our website at http://www.nissan-global.com/EN/.
About Nissan North America
In North America, Nissan's operations include automotive styling, engineering, consumer and corporate financing, sales and marketing, distribution and manufacturing. Nissan is dedicated to improving the environment under the Nissan Green Program and has been recognized as an ENERGY STAR® Partner of the Year in 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013 by the U.S Environmental Protection Agency. More information on Nissan in North America and the complete line of Nissan and Infiniti vehicles can be found online at www.NissanUSA.com and www.InfinitiUSA.com, or visit the Americas media sites NissanNews.com and InfinitiNews.com.


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Katy Perry Has New 3D Movie Coming Out
Forget voicing the role of Smurfette in 'The Smurfs' movie, like she did last year. Colorful pop starlet Katy Perry will star in her own damn movie of the 3D sort, a la Justin Bieber. Why? Because KP in two dimensions just isn't enough.
Perry tweeted the good news about her big screen bow tonight (March 7), issuing a call to action to her precious and beloved Katycats to spread the word and help her become a trending topic.
The hitmaker with a string of No. 1s also revealed that 'Katy Perry: Part of Me' is a 3D extravaganza that is coming out this summer. We can only assume that it's a hybrid of concert film and documentary, complete with footage of Perry performing, backstage, living life on the road, hanging with friends (like Rihanna, perhaps?), taking part in photo shoots and participating in all the other duties and responsibilities that come with the territory when you are one of the most famous pop stars in the world.
Can you even imagine Katy Perry in 3D? We're not talking about her famously ample, below-the-neck assets, either. Her cotton candy world will literally pop off the screen in 3D.
We're already planning to indulge in a big box of Gummy Bears that we'll wash down with a 32 oz. Diet Coke at the multiplex so we can be sugary sweet like Perry herself.
FINALLY, my MOVIE is coming out with Paramount this summer! It's called "KATY PERRY: PART OF ME" Presented In 3D! KATYCATS-LETS TREND #KP3D
— Katy Perry (@katyperry) March 7, 2012


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Gained in Translation: Lessons from a visit to a Mexican orphanage
A few months ago, I traveled with eighteen other Catholic singles to Casa de Elizabeth—an orphanage in Imuris, Mexico, a region in the state of Sonora, about two hours south of Tucson. It is an area marked by small rivers that flow west from the Sierra Madre, where many of the residents sell their wares, like handmade tortillas, in the middle of the roads. There are about one hundred children at Casa de Elizabeth, ranging from infants to teens. Some have lost both parents and have no other relatives. Others have been victims of violence… READ MORE >
Abortion in Britain: The Case for a New Approach
Britain's lawmakers have voted to extend scientific research on embryos to allow the mixing of human and animal egg and sperm, to allow lesbians to create children through IVF without the need for a father, and against lowering the 24-week legal limit for abortions The promises of brave-new-world cures for diseases swung Members of Parliament behind the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill. Religious objections were parodied as unjustified interference in the lab. But the debate on lowering the abortion limit last week merits careful… READ MORE >
Emancipate the Embryo! Britain set to enter 'brave new world'
British Members of Parliament must decide this month on a vast range of ethical issues contained in the Labour Government's most far-reaching shake-up of fertility and embryology legislation in almost 20 years. The awesomely complex ethical issues raised by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology (HFE) Bill will be hotly contested when its body parts are voted on at the end of this month. On Monday, the bill passed successfully through the Commons after three hours of heated – but also thoughtful – discussion, but many of the MPs… READ MORE >
Beyond Left and Right: Awaiting the Pope's Next Encyclical
G.K. Chesterton once wrote, "The whole modern world has divided itself into conservatives and progressives. The business of progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected." The tired categories of Left and Right, which we associate with Liberal (or Progressive) and Conservative, originated in the French Revolution, and have long outlived their usefulness. They are way too clunky to capture the complex political opinions that most of us make up as we go along,… READ MORE >
Meeting the War Wearied with Christ
"eternally scourged…" Plate 3 Miserere et Guerre—Georges Rouault (1871-1958) One day last week I stood in front of St. Stephen Martyr Church in D.C. with a young religious sister and the pastor of the parish. The scene would have made for a typical beginning to a joke, "A priest, a nun, and a friar, were…" We were talking, laughing, and enjoying the sun; a diocesan priest in black, a Franciscan sister in brown and a Dominican in white. A young lady with olive skin, black hair, and black eyes approached us. Her accented voice… READ MORE >
Gazing Upwards: The Pope's Homily at St. Patrick's Cathedral
Although I'd followed Pope Benedict from event to event during his visit to the U.S., one of the most moving moments for me was watching him on TV as he delivered what I believe was his most personal statement, at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York. As pastor of the Universal Church, the Pope is most at home with the Eucharist and the liturgy. His homily, characteristic of his writing in general, was both understated and profound. Using the architecture of St. Patrick's as his springboard, Benedict offered a beautiful… READ MORE >
After the Pope: Time to Hit the Books?
It's going to take a while for all (or any) of us to absorb the significance of Benedict XIV's first apostolic visit to the United States. Unlike his predecessor, the larger-than-life John Paul the Great, who from the first displayed an actor's genius for what one observer described as "the symbolic gesture", Benedict's public demeanor is that of a mild-mannered intellectual with a professorial penchant for pedantry. He gives speeches before roaring thousands much the way one suspects he used to give… READ MORE >
Valedictory to Pope Benedict XVI
What made me weep, as I watched television coverage of Pope Benedict's visit, was the simple act of the pope giving communion to people. The news media relayed many over-the-top comments about what the pope's visit meant: "It's like Jesus coming to America." I wrote a panegyric myself about Benedict's gifts. But Pope Benedict's leadership and his teachings and all the pomp and circumstance of the visit would have meant nothing if it were not for the Body and Blood of Christ that unites us to God and to one another. … READ MORE >
'The Father of the World'—The Pope at the U.N.
As I listened to the Pope's U.N. address, while driving through Manhattan with Godspy editors John Romanowsky and John Murphy, and my son Gianni, on our way to videotape among the crowds at Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza, just outside U.N. headquarters, I thought to myself—what could I possibly write about the Pope's astonishingly deep and complex address to the world community? Fortunately, later that night, the task was done for me by Simon Fung, a talented, young Catholic graphic designer who works for Grassroots Films. As we stood… READ MORE >
Following Christ in the Footsteps of Peter
I am not a morning person, but this morning I extracted myself from the warmth of slumber at 4:30. I dragged myself to the shower and groggily went out into the chill. My destination was Annunciation Parish in Northwest Washington. There a happy party of about 100 waited to board buses to go to the residence of the Vatican nuncio. We were going to see the Holy Father off, to thank him, wish him well, and simply to be with him. Love is about simply being present to the other. As we waited the church lights went on and a group hurried in… READ MORE >
Reflections on the Pope as he is about to speak at the United Nations
When I first heard that Cardinal Ratzinger had been elected to the papacy, my reaction was, "Good. We're going to stick it to the liberals!" There had been so much discussion following John Paul II's death about whether the Church would now accommodate herself to the secular city via women's ordination, etc., that I could only breathe a sigh of relief that the Tradition was once again safely in the hands of a traditionalist. Then I started actually reading the works of the newly-elected Pope Benedict XVI. I… READ MORE >
With the Pope at Nationals Park
1:30 p.m. I'm just back to St. Stephen Martyr from the Pope's mass at Nationals Park. Without a ticket to get inside the stadium, I watched the mass on a giant TV screen set-up just outside the security gates. (My homemade sign reading "Prayers for a Ticket" didn't land me any supernatural luck – just what I get for trying to use prayers as a bartering tool.) It was an interesting scene: a teeming crowd huddled together beneath the screen, cheering when the popemobile made its appearance, waving to the pope when he waved, and… READ MORE >
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Who Won Project Runway All-Stars?
Jan 17, 2013 10:43 PM EST
Project Runway crowned its second All-Stars champ Thursday night. In a typical all-stars twist to make the competition more difficult (and more torturous!) the remaining three designers only had four days to complete a full mini collection with as ma… Read more


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'Tuscan Sun' author uncorks new line of wines in Fairfield
They say you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but let's face it, most of the time we do. The same can be said about wine. How many times have you made your decision on what wine to buy based on the label alone? That's an observation that stuck with writer Frances Mayes when she set out to create her new line of Italian wines.
Mayes is best known as the author of the wildly popular book, "Under the Tuscan Sun," in which she recounts her experience buying and restoring a 200-year-old farmhouse. The memoir stayed on the New York Times best-seller list for two and a half years and later was made into a movie. She has since published numerous other books, including her most recent work, "Under Magnolia: A Southern Memoir."
Lately, however, Mayes' time has been spending time on the launch of a line of wines in Italy, and is now overseeing their marketing in the United States. "All of the states have business regulations and baroque rules," she said, which is why her wines are just now appearing in stores in Connecticut.
Mayes said the process started last July in Italy. She was having dinner with a friend -- a wine importer -- when the idea came up. "Many good things get decided over dinner," she said. So they set about tasting 115 different wines and finally chose seven for their sources. There are two whites: Abbraccio, a Trebbiano, Chardonnay, Grechetto blend, and Pensiero, a Pinot Grigio. The reds include Auguri, a Sangiovese blend; Permesso, a Cabernet Sauvignon; Sentiero Alla Casa, a Sangiovese Montepulciano blend, and Tondo Tondo, a Sangiovese. In addition, there is Toccare le Stelle, a Prosecco.
Each of the labels features a painting by artist Jennifer E. Young. "I wanted the labels to appeal to women," said Mayes. "In wine stores, the labels all look alike. They're very masculine." These, however, feature scenes from Mayes' life. The Permesso has a depiction of her front door, while Auguri shows her house.
On the back of each bottle, Mayes wrote a personal description. "I didn't want, `This is good with fish,' " she said. In addition, there is a symbol on the back of each label that means something personal to Mayes.
To celebrate the launch of her wines in Connecticut, Mayes held a tasting and wine signing last week at the Twisted Vine shop in downtown Fairfield. Fans of her books came out to chat and sample the vino.
Virginia and John Goodfellow had Mayes sign a copy of "Under Magnolia" as well as several bottles of wine. "We're giving this as a gift to our son, Todd," said Virginia. "It's his 50th birthday."
"I love Frances Mayes," said another fan, Andrea Olynick, "and my husband loves wine, so it's an easy match." Olynick said that, next to the Bible, "Under the Tuscan Sun" is her favorite book. "She is my favorite writer in the world," she said. "She has given so much of herself."
Olynick presented Mayes with a gift: a sparkly bag and a bubble bath cupcake. "You've brought so much joy to my life," Olynick told Mayes. "I've read `Under Magnolia' and I'm about to listen to it on audio."
Mayes laughed. "It's many hours of a southern accent, I have to warn you."
Tuscan Sun wines are now available in Connecticut and range in price from $12 to $26. For more information, visit www.tuscansunwines.com.


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LU partners with LSC-O Ron E. Lewis Library for Big Read
The Lamar State College-Orange Ron E. Lewis Library received a grant in the amount of $11,200 to host The SETX Big Read in Orange and Jefferson Counties. The Big Read is an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) designed to restore reading to the center of American culture. The Ron E. Lewis Library is one of 76 not-for-profits to be recommended for a grant to host a Big Read project between September 2012 and June 2013.
The grant will help to promote and carry out community-based reading programs featuring activities such as read-a-thons, book discussions, lectures, movie screenings, and performing arts events. Participating communities also receive high-quality, free-of-charge educational materials to supplement each title, including Reader's, Teacher's, and Audio Guides.
"The NEA Big Read organization provides curriculum guides, banners and program support for our SETX Big Read," said Mary J. McCoy, director of Library and Learning Resources at LSC-O. "The partners organize programming, but only the community participation will assure a successful SETX Big Read in the spring of 2013."
Partners with the LSC-O Ron E. Lewis Library in the SETX Big Read include the Lamar University Department of English and Modern Languages and Mary and John Gray Library, Orange Public Library, Port Arthur Public Library, Little Cypress-Mauriceville CISD, West Orange-Cove CISD, Bridge City ISD, AAUW Bookends, and the Stark Museum of Art (non-recipient partner).
"We are pleased to be able to partner with other groups in the area to bring the National Endowment of the Arts Big Read to Southeast Texas," said McCoy. "Any programs and events that promote reading benefit all the members of our communities and make our communities better places to live."
The SETX Big Read will focus on the book "Bless Me, Ultima" by Rudolfo Anaya.
"Since 2006, nearly three million Americans have attended a Big Read event, more than 39,000 volunteers have participated locally, and nearly 27,000 community partner organizations have been involved," said NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman. "The Big Read's success depends on these commitments of time, energy, and enthusiasm and I look forward to seeing these 76 communities come together in celebration of a great work of literature."
Any school or group interested in participating in the SETX Big Read can contact Mary J. McCoy at the Ron E. Lewis Library at 409-882-3083.


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This week in Island history
The news of 10 and 15 years ago is from the Jamestown Press. The news of 100 years ago came from the collection of the Newport Historical Society.
100 years ago From the Newport Journal, Feb. 12, 1910
The Parish Aid Society held its last whist before Lent Tuesday evening at the home of Mrs. Ferdinand Armbrust, on Anthony Avenue.
Monday thermometers at various points on the island registered from 2 to 4 degrees.
The Boys Club gave a complimentary dance Friday evening at the Gardner house, an orchestra from Ft. Adams furnishing the music.
Miss Louise Carr has completed her course of studies in Providence and has been engaged to teach the primary grade here. She will assume her duties this term.
75 years ago From the Newport Daily News, Feb. 8, 1935
Mayor Mortimer A. Sullivan, who returned this morning from Washington, with Manager Charles H. Brooks of the Jamestown & Newport Ferry Company, said the delegation which appeared before the Board of Appeals of the PWA on the proposed Jamestown bridge project was courteously received.
Six helmets made…from wool provided by the Red Cross were presented to the fire department.
The School Committee…voted that a plan be proposed for a $75,000 addition to the Thomas H. Clarke School in order to consolidate the schools of the town and to provide for an auditorium-gymnasium. [This would have been a PWA-funded project.]
From the Newport Daily News, Feb. 9, 1935
The 50-pound striped bass caught by Leon Murphy of Howland Avenue, while fishing at Beavertail last summer, proved to be the largest bass caught in the United States.
50 years ago From the Newport Daily News, Feb. 9, 1960
The Jamestown Town Council last night made known that it wants to nullify that provision of state law giving the R.I. Turnpike and Bridge Authority power to take over the Jamestown Bridge and incorporate its tolls towards fi- nancing the proposed Newport-Jamestown Bridge.
From the Newport Daily News, Feb. 17, 1960
The economic necessity of replacing the Jamestown ferry with a bridge over the East Passage was outlined by Francis G. Dwyer, chairman of the Rhode Island Turn- pike and Bridge Authority to the Portsmouth Town Council last night. Dwyer said the current ferry deficit of more than $300,000 will increase over a period of years.
25 years ago From the Newport Daily News, Feb. 12, 1985
A reduced-scale plan for the Bay View Hotel site drew a "receptive" reaction from the Town Council Monday night. Developers, who had originally proposed building 56 luxury condominiums to replace the 90-year-old landmark, presented a new 45- unit plan Monday. It was the second time the number of units had been reduced. The council had also scrapped a 50-unit plan offered in January, because of the size.
A $4.4 million budget recommended by the Town Council Monday requires a 20 percent increase in the tax levy. …Local taxes totaling $3.53 million would have to be generated to support the proposed budget. (The tax rate could rise by $2.)
15 years ago From the Jamestown Press, Feb. 9, 1995
Jamestown will receive $75,000 from the U.S. Department of Justice to hire an additional police officer.
A new mooring buoy, which will keep a vessel's mooring line coiled up neatly out of the water when not in use, will be introduced by Rhode Island Mooring Services Inc. of Jamestown
10 years ago From the Jamestown Press, Feb. 10, 2000
The Water Study Committee recommended to the Town Council last week that it pursue the condemnation of two pieces of property for the purpose of drilling municipal wells. The two areas where the wells would be sited are both along North Main Road, south of the Route 138 overpass.
Today, the Conanicut Island Land Trust released its end-ofthe year statement of new property acquisitions, bringing the total island acreage it is responsible for protecting to nearly 260.


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Balloonfest brings in visitors and dollars
Another Balloonfest hascome and gone and thePoteau Chamber ofCommerce is still reelingfrom the more than 20,000attendees of this year's festival.According to PoteauChamber President, KarenWages, the first year theChamber has organized theevent was a huge success.They set goals for sponsorshipthat were met and thearm band sales were aboveand beyond all they hadimagined.On Friday, the Chamberwas hectic with pre-salescausing them to open a virtualdrive through to meet thedemand of the more than3,000 armbands they soldand over $7,000 in concerttickets. This large turnouthas already caused theChamber to begin preparationsfor next year's festivalwith the promise of biggerand better things to come.The total increase in revenueacross the area due to theBalloonfest will not be availablefor a couple of months,but the numbers are guessedto be substantial."We definitely did our jobin creating income for thelocal businesses and the city,"said Wages. "The hotels werefull, the convenience storesstayed busy, the local restaurantswere packed and visitorswere out shopping duringtheir stay." Not only didthe out of town visitors helpincrease local revenue, thecarnival bought supplies fortheir stands locally, the workersspent money on food andlaundry and several Mud Pitcontestants stayed overnight,purchasing gas, food andsupplies.While the weather playeda part in the disappointingfinal night of the event, rainingout the Saturday nightballoon glow and cancelingthe Kentucky Headhunters,the overall event totaled twodays of festive family fun."The festival is a weatherpermitting event," saidWages. "It was unfortunatethat the rain came when itdid. The KentuckyHeadhunters made the callnot to play due to the lightningand the rain. There waslittle we could do about thedecision. It was in theKentucky Headhunters' contractto make the decision tocancel the concert in case ofinclement weather." Thepossibility of moving theconcert to an indoor venuedue to the outbreak of dangerousweather was unrealisticaccording to Wages. "Ittook two days to set up thestage and to have the soundequipment readied. Therewas no possible way tochange venues and have aconcert in 45 minutes. Ifthere would have been anyalternative to canceling theconcert, we would have doneso."In a statement released bythe Kentucky Headhunterson Tuesday, they voiced theirregret to the people of Poteauand the many fans who traveledto see them live in concert."All day long it was blueskys and great weather. Thenten minutes before we go onstage..it comes a hurricane,"said Richard Young. "Thiswas the first show in 21 yearsthe Kentucky Headhuntersplayed that was completelyflooded out. I know you guyshadn't had rain since April. 1 just wish it would have waiteda couple more hours. When we got home yesterday we hadto unpack all our equipment in storage to dry. We we're verydisappointed we didn't get to play. It was our last officialshow of the year."The chamber, who carried total event insurance that covereda rain-out, is waiting on the official answer from theinsurance company to determine if they are eligible for thereimbursement of the $15,000 cost of the KentuckyHeadhunters.Many people were disappointed by the missing Saturdaynight glow balloons but the Federal Aviation Administrationrepresentatives that were present for the two-day eventordered the balloons out of the sky due to extreme lightningand high winds."The FAA regulate the balloons," said Wages. "They aredependent on the wind entirely, there are no controls. Theyhave to file flight plans and follow all FAA regulations andwhen they were told to shut down, they had no choice."The Chamber would like to remind those planning toattend next year's Balloonfest that it is very important to parkin designated parking."Several people parked along the highway this year," saidWages. "They were asked to move because of the danger toother motorists. Please do not park along the highway or inthe ditches. The safety of everyone attending the event alongwith passerbys is of utmost importance. All entrances andexits need to be clear of vehicles so traffic merging back ontothe highway can clearly see all oncoming traffic to prevent anaccident."The Chamber is already beginning the organization of nextyear's event in preparation of an even larger attendance. Theyare already arranging for more tethered balloon rides, reviewingcarnival contracts and searching for more bigger andbetter attractions.The winners of the various competitions that occurred duringthe 2011 Balloonfest will be featured by PDN later thisweek.


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The summer of 2011 was an unexpectedly crucial period for comic book movies. Four films were debuting with less-than-well-known characters that would define their respective studios and franchises to come. The end result was that Thor and Captain America: The First Avenger established Marvel as a major player beyond the Iron Man series, X-Men: First Class suggested there was life beyond fan-favorite Wolverine, and Green Lantern cemented that Warner Bros. had no idea what to do with their properties. A year later, Sony restarted The Amazing Spider-Man and Disney changed the game with The Avengers, the biggest dominoes to fall in these studios' ever-evolving superhero franchise plans.
2014 looks like a similar summer, cementing this as a crucial period for the evolution of these movies as consistent studio moneymakers. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 continues Sony's efforts to distance themselves from the Raimi films, X-Men: Days Of Future Past is the first step in Fox's next stage of X-films, and Marvel is moving outside the box with Guardians Of The Galaxy. The coming years have a full 10 (!) more superhero films scheduled for release, with countless others to follow, just waiting for a schedule space to clear up. But what happens if these films don't work? What happens if the fans don't want to see certain characters again and again?
Here's a look at the six major onscreen superhero universes and what's at stake for each.
Superman and BatmanFranchise History: This current series of interconnected DC Comics films has but one film: Zack Snyder's Man Of Steel, which grossed $668 million last year. But there may be some audience identification with the very-recent Dark Knight films, which have no bearing on this mythology. That trilogy pulled in a little less than $2.5 billion.
Last Time Out: Man Of Steel batted back some lukewarm reviews and audience notices to register a tally higher than any film featuring either the X-Men, the Fantastic Four or even Thor.
Current Entry: Warner Bros. doesn't have the advantage shared by the Marvel movies: they can really only put out one film at a time, and lately with only their two core heroes. Which is why they're banking heavily on a Man Of Steel follow-up for 2016, not only for keeping Superman in circulation as a major hero, but also introducing Ben Affleck as a new Batman and Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman. It seems clear that the picture will be introducing several heroes new to audiences, possibly in cameo form. Regardless, it re-establishes the Man of Steel and the Caped Crusader as major tentpole characters, ones who will exist on the periphery of franchises populated by lesser-loved characters.
Even if Warner Bros. has been struggling with their DC brand, none of the other studios have a concept that can compete with a clash between Batman and Superman. Those are still the two most popular characters in the comic book canon, and the duo fans and non-fans would most like to see together onscreen. It's a tremendous trump card to have, and it's likely the WB sees this as a bonafide billion dollar hit. A failure would sadly, and finally, place both heroes and the DC Universe at large back into hibernation: it's what they feared when they ditched Wolfgang Petersen's Superman Vs. Batman pitch in the early aughts Unfortunately, they've got a massive hurdle to climb: they'll be opening up against Captain America 3.
Long-Term Prognosis: This isn't just the opportunity for a hit: this is also the WB's chance to launch a series replacing the billion dollars-a-year reaped by the Harry Potter movies. The still-untitled Batman/Superman could not only give the WB a chance to relaunch their immensely successful Batman series, but also give Wonder Woman her own showcase, integrate The Flash into this world, and even try Green Lantern again. It's a lot of pressure, strong enough that it made the studio push their planned release date a full year ahead from '15 to '16.
Trending Down: Man Of Steel is one of the few mega-huge superhero films treated indifferently by critics, with a 55 score on Metacritic and and 56% on Rotten Tomatoes: hardly the most reliable sources, but when we're talking blockbusters, that's a sharp divide with the box office (IMDb has a ranking of 7.4 for the film, also not great). Now the new DC universe is using this film as a base element, but fans who hear that Ben Affleck is Batman can only think of Daredevil. Fans will no doubt turn out for a combination of the two heroes, but Warner Bros. really needs a legit billion dollar hit to save face after years of false starts. And "must earn a billion dollars" is never a great pressure to place on a film.