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Customer Support 101: Things Not to Say to Angry Customers
Providing excellent customer service can be a game-changer for businesses. Lousy customer service impacts a business's overall performance and may even lead to its failure.
According to American Express, 68% of customers say that the key to their positive service experience was a pleasant customer service representative (CSR).
However, no matter how pleasant a business's customer service representatives are, there will still be angry customers that will reach for support.
While a company can't avoid problems, their customer service representatives can control how to respond to customer complaints.
While saying the right words can diffuse an angry customer and settle the situation, saying the wrong words can escalate the tense situation and damage customer relations.
Therefore, it is mandatory to remind customer service representatives that they have control over what not to say to an angry customer. Below are some of the words and phrases customer service agents should avoid to annoy an angry customer further.
Words and phrases not to say to an angry customer
1. "Can you wait for a moment?"
Customers value their time, and angry customers don't have time to wait. The last thing customer service agents want their customers to feel is unappreciated. Customers feel this way by being put on hold, and this applies to any caller, angry or not.
Agents should remember that dealing with an angry customer means dealing with a person whose judgment may be clouded by their emotions. Making them wait, especially putting them on hold, only heightens their anger.
It makes them feel like they are being ignored, especially over the phone, where they can't see what the agent on the other end is doing.
It is essential to never leave customers on hold without giving them an idea of what is happening on the other end of the line. Customer service agents should stay on the line and explain what they are doing (while simultaneously troubleshooting the problem) to fix it.
2. "I don't know."
While honesty is vital for agents to build trust with customers, saying that they don't know the answer or solution to the customer's problem should be avoided.
Customers reach out to customer support because they don't know how to solve an issue, and hearing their agents say that they don't know the answer as well can further irritate an angry customer.
It implies a lack of knowledge, even incompetence on the part of the agent. Instead of brazenly admitting ignorance, agents can say the following:
"That's a good question, let me check with our team and update you."
"This question is out of my expertise, but let me clarify it with our team and get back to you shortly." or
"I'm not sure, but I'll be happy to find out for you."
These statements imply that the customer service agent is trying their best to provide solutions and answers to the client.
3. "It's not my/our fault."
When dealing with angry customers, it is important never to point fingers. Customer service agents must remember that they are there to support and resolve their customers' problems, no matter whose fault it is.
Instead, agents should show that they are empathetic towards the customer and their situation, and then offer solutions. Instead, they should say, "I'm sorry for this inconvenience; let me see what I can do to make things right."
4. "It's not my job/responsibility."
At the height of an angry customer's frustration, they don't know, nor do they care whose job it is to solve their problem; they just want someone to fix it.
Suppose the problem is beyond the customer service agent's expertise. In that case, they should explain that someone else in their team can provide better support instead of merely saying that it's not their responsibility.
5. "There's nothing I/we can do." or "We can't."
Customers reach out to customer support because they expect them to have all the answers and solutions to their problems. Telling the client that there's nothing they can do about their concern will only fuel an angry customer.
Although there may be instances where customer service agents can't provide exactly what the customers want, they can always provide an alternative. Agents should focus on what they can do, instead of saying what they can't and further anger their customer.
6. "You're wrong." or "That's not right."
Telling customers, especially angry customers, that they are wrong makes them defensive and fuels their anger more. Although it may not always be the case, customers don't like being told that they are wrong or that they made a mistake that caused their problem.
So instead of convincing customers that they are wrong, customer service agents should focus on the solution. Use the word "miscommunication" to suggest that someone could have conveyed things wrong and then offer alternatives.
7. "Why didn't you…"
Customer service agents should never second-guess their customers. Asking them why they didn't do something sounds like an accusation, making customers feel like they failed to do something and further invites them to blame.
Pointing fingers, instead of asking 'why,' ask 'what,' 'where,' 'when,' 'how' and 'who' if more information is needed to resolve the situation.
8. "You shouldn't have done that."
Like asking why something wasn't done, customers also hate it when they are told that they shouldn't have done something. After all, what's done is done. Telling them off won't change the circumstance they're already in, but it will surely make them feel embarrassed and angry.
Instead of highlighting their mistake, emphasize the root cause of the problem, and immediately offer the solution.
9. "Please calm down."
Angry customers may need to calm down, but they do not necessarily want to be told off. Telling them to calm down makes them think that the problem they are dealing with may not be as significant to the agent as it is to them.
And this can make them hit the limit of their anger. Remember, some customers call for support just to vent out their frustrations. Customer service agents need to listen and show them patience, empathy, and understanding of the situation.
10. "Let me speak." or "Listen to me."
The foundation of excellent customer service is listening to customers about their needs or problems to provide solutions. Cutting off angry customers can imply that the agent is not taking their situation seriously or with less gravity than the customer.
Again, let the customers finish speaking before answering or asking another question. Encourage them to keep talking with brief verbal prompts to let them know that they are being heard and that their concerns are valid.
11. "It's not a big deal."
Never tell a customer that their concern is not a big deal, no matter how minor it is. It may not be a big deal to customer support agents because it's their expertise, but it may be a big deal to the customer seeking help. Customers would often opt to solve problems on their own if they can.
Calling in for support often means that they think the situation is severe enough to be taken in customer support's hands to be resolved. Instead of saying that it's not a big deal, just listen to them and provide solutions to their concern.
12. "That's against our policy."
While policies are made to keep a company running smoothly when customers complain, they don't want to hear your rules and regulations. Customers call to solve their predicament as soon as possible, and explaining the company's policy can't solve their problems.
Instead of hiding behind the word 'policy,' use the word 'guidelines' while explaining the situation. This makes customers feel that these guidelines are flexible for consideration of their situation.
13. "So, what do you want me to do?"
Customer support should never ask their customers what they want them to do. This implies the customer service agent is helpless in the situation at hand. It also puts the thinking process on the customer's hand.
It may also result in a customer response or request that the agent can't provide. Instead, offer suggestions that can help in the customer's situation. This makes them feel that they are not the only ones actively trying to resolve their problem.
14. "Please bear with us."
When angry customers call for support regarding products or services they paid for, a customer service representative should never make excuses. While it's true that problems are out of a customer service agent's control, it is their responsibility to find a solution.
Don't ask them to bear with the problem. Instead, apologize and fix it. If it can't be resolved, own up to it and give the customer compensation or a refund.
15. "I'm sorry, but…"
The last item on the list of what not to say to an irate customer is an inauthentic apology. Being apologetic may seem a good idea to diffuse an angry customer, but saying "Sorry" will not fix anything.
And while apologizing for the mistake means that a customer agent is taking responsibility for the situation, following it with the word 'but' nullifies the essence of the apology since and invites the start of an argument. Instead, say, "I apologize for…" and immediately offer a solution.
In summary, never offend your customers by undermining the gravity of their concerns. Remember that they are already angry, and questioning their integrity will only fuel their anger and increase your frustrations.
Keep in mind that they call to find solutions to their problems and not for an earful of dos and don'ts.
While it is necessary to remember what you should not say to an angry customer, it is more important to remember the purpose of customer support. That is providing solutions and answers to your customer's problems and concerns.
- Active Listening And Its Role In Improving Your Customer Service - January 24, 2021
- Customer Support 101: Things Not to Say to Angry Customers - December 15, 2020
- Chatbots and Human – Finding the Right Balance for Customer Service - December 8, 2020


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For our client's 20th Anniversary we redesigned an existing ring that had always been uncomfortable to wear and therefore rarely worn. She wanted this ring to serve as a reminder of this special milestone and also include her two daughters, who are represented by their birthstones tucked underneath.
"It is amazing that you had a vision for my ring that captures exactly what I was looking for in this piece! Thank you for a wonderful work of art that I will enjoy for many years to come!"
Let us tell YOUR story.
We're open Monday to Saturday 10am-5pm.
Book your in store Design Consultation today. Visit our homepage for more information or email us at email@example.com.

subset: commoncrawl


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On Ego
Mick Gordon
Mind Over Matter Theatre Collective
Studio Theatre, Department of Theatre, Film and Television, University of York
Following its successful debut at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival earlier this year, Mind Over Matter Theatre Collective has brought its production of Mick Gordon's acclaimed play On Ego (2005) to the University of York. No doubt this will have been a source of great pleasure and anxiety for the cast and crew, as they are all recent graduates from York's Department of Theatre, Film and Television.
The mysteries of the human brain—particularly the connection between memory and identity—have provided creative inspiration for numerous playwrights in recent years, including Tom Stoppard (The Hard Problem, 2014) and Nick Payne (Elegy, 2016). First staged at the Soho Theatre in 2005, On Ego is largely inspired by the work of the neuropsychologist Paul Broks, whose acclaimed volume Into the Silent Land (2002) is a poetic meditation on the nature of the brain and the creation of the self.
The play's intricate plot focuses on the entangled lives of three characters: two men and one woman. Alex (Oliver Henn), a neuroscientist in his mid-thirties, agrees with Francis Crick's contention that "conscious experience is not caused by the behaviour of neurons, it is the behaviour of neurons." Cleaving to this idea, Alex conducts experiments with his colleague Derek (Harry Whittaker), a professor in his late fifties, involving transporters capable of taking human beings apart and then reassembling them in other locations. However, much like David Cronenberg's The Fly (1986), these experiments have tragic repercussions.
The third character in the drama is Alice (Yoshika Colwell)—Alex's wife and Derek's daughter—who is diagnosed with a brain tumour that slowly erodes her faculties. If selfhood relies on memories, then Alice is in danger of disappearing forever.
Although the three performers are in their early to mid-twenties, they manage to convincingly inhabit the roles of much older characters. Oliver Henn captures Alex's intellectual bravado and is particularly effective in the play's opening scene in which he delivers a lecture on the inner workings of the human brain. Yoshika Colwell gives a moving performance as Alex's dying wife, particularly in the scenes where she falters with language. As Derek, Harry Whittaker provides much of the production's levity.
Director Lauren Moakes deserves credit for creating such a slick, fast-moving production. Her assured direction allows the audience to follow the intricate narrative of Gordon's play, although some audience members may lose the thread towards the end when the action becomes more ambiguous. Anna Mawn and Will Heyes's simple yet effective set design—which consists principally of portable white screens—contributes to the fluidity of the piece, and Ella Dixon's lighting design is suitably moody and atmospheric.
Amy Warren's movement direction provides some of the production's most dynamic moments and underlines the emotional trajectory of the characters. At one point, for example, the estrangement between Alex and Alice explodes into a violent tussle and then morphs into a piece of modern dance in which the latter tries desperately to escape her husband's grip.
This is an impressively bold multimedia production, in which the use of film and music serve the overall purpose of the piece. Tom Leatherbarrow's visual designs illuminate the intellectual questions of the play, and Scott J Hurley's insinuating musical score complements the science fiction elements of the plot.
In its mission statement, Mind Over Matter stresses its commitment to creating theatre that "explores the connections between the emotional and the physical, and the body and the brain." By turns thought-provoking and heart-wrenching, On Ego is an ambitious production that allows the young cast and crew to exhibit their diverse talents.
Reviewer: James Ballands


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This is a video from Halibut Cove, Alaska, of an otter that repeatedly jumps aboard Captain John's boat to avoid an orca that wants to eat it. A bunch more info while I accept I wouldn't last a day as an otter or anything else that isn't already at the top of the food chain, and even then I'd probably still struggle to catch my meals and not starve to death:
Fascinating stuff. I like how the orca blows air out of its blowhole as it surfaces near John the first time after the otter jumps on his boat, as if it say, "Wow, thanks for aiding and abetting my lunch, jerk. You do know it's supposed to be a CIRCLE of life, right? Jesus, John, have you ever even seen The Lion King?"


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Christy Marie Designs
I'M A PLANNER BABE (Fuchsia Bag/Gold Foil)
Regular price
Sale price
Shipping calculated at checkout.
The perfect Fuchsia canvas bag to hold all you belongings. *Props shown are not included.
Bag Color: Fuchsia
Phrase Color: Gold Iron-on Foil
13.5" by 13.5" Canvas Bag
9" Handle Drop
3" Bottom Gusset
*Hand wash and lay flat to dry.
*Quantities are limited. Please contact me with any custom or special requests.
*Colors may vary slightly due to monitor settings. Product is handmade and may have slight imperfections.
*Ready to ship.


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Part of Neural Information Processing Systems 0 (NIPS 1987)
Gene Tagliarini, Edward Page
Networks of simple analog processors having neuron-like properties have been employed to compute good solutions to a variety of optimization prob(cid:173) lems. This paper presents a neural-net solution to a resource allocation prob(cid:173) lem that arises in providing local access to the backbone of a wide-area com(cid:173) munication network. The problem is described in terms of an energy function that can be mapped onto an analog computational network. Simulation results characterizing the performance of the neural computation are also presented.


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What words do you want on your tombstone?
Our discussion began with a list of 35 ways to broach the subject of death, and covered traditions of death and dying from the Victorian era to present — from grooming of the deceased and medical cadaver studies to mourning fashion. The crowd was a heterogeneous mix of students, medical practitioners, retirees, and goth aficionados. The event concluded with an edifying tour of historical monument styles led by Victorian Era Connoisseur, Michael Brooks, Ph.D.
Now designated as a National Historic Landmark, Laurel Hill Cemetery was founded in 1836 by Quaker John Jay Smith as one of the nation's pioneering garden cemeteries. In traditional Quaker style, Laurel Hill's earliest burial plots are marked with modest, trip-hazard sized stones simply engraved with names and dates. It wasn't until after 1837, the start of the Victorian era, that flamboyant stone monuments became prominent. Today, Laurel Hill features over 33,000 eclectic monuments, ranging from massive Egyptian obelisks, conventional tombstones, religious relics and tiny-house scaled mausoleums, to rather uncanny life-like sculptures of the deceased.
Touring the graveyard
We arrive in the Victorian section of the cemetery where an inscription "Crushed Hopes" shines like a neon sign from the stone patina on the grave of a newborn. Grave sentiments such as this were not uncommon, particularly on children's monuments, due to mass casualties from widespread disease. Despite these despairs, 19th century monument design was heavily rooted in the symbolism of optimism and renewal (e.g., vegetation, butterflies, and other springtime creatures), as well as in the declaration of one's homeland.
Michael points to a monument that resembles a meteorite haphazardly situated among the nearby crosses and mausoleums. Perched on top of the rock is a sculpture of an urn covered in ivy, representing immortality. Because this lad was Scottish, his grave has been marked with a cairn —the conglomerate pile of rocks historically used as burial monuments in Great Britain. Less optimistic but still exemplary of the era is the monument of Mary Barton Cooke, who died in Cairo and was interred here beneath a marble sarcophagus adorned with Romanesque ornamentation and symbolism of her Egyptian life. Among the eroded pyramid reliefs are two palm trees, representing Mary and her husband John. Mary's tree is snapped in half — a rather grim interpretation of her state of well-being.
Monuments of Today
Next, we walk towards the Schuylkill where recent monuments overlook the river on terraced hills retained by the walls of sumptuous mausoleums. Symbolism in contemporary monument design is arguably less poetic as it was in the Victorian era, having evolved from references of religion and renewed hope, to a more literal and individual translation of one's greatest contributions and passions. The monument of Phillies sportscaster, Harry Kalas, is perhaps the epitome of this trend. Resting on a prime piece of real estate, Kalas' grave is marked with a bulbous microphone-shaped sculpture, sod from Citizens Bank Park (where the Phillies won the '08 World Series), and folding stadium seating, awaiting visitors.
I step over a small flush stone engraved "Dancing in the Dark," which I can only assume belongs to a die-hard fan of The Boss, in order to read a black, rectangular pillar with an inspiring Emerson quote, "Do not go where the path may lead, go where there is no path and leave a trail." Next to it sits a modern sculpture of a forlorn figure nestled on a rock, reminiscent of Rodin's The Thinker. I wonder where this adventurous soul must have traveled or the type of art he might have admired. In addition to exploring the cemetery's vast picturesque landscape, one could easily spend hours lurking around the allegorical monuments of Laurel Hill, postulating stories about the lives of the deceased.
Monuments of tomorrow?
Recently, there has been a shift in burial trends from traditional interment to more ephemeral methods. According to the Cremation Association of North America (yes, that's a thing), cremation rates in North America hit just over 50% in 2016 and continue to steadily rise. Likewise, "green" burials, where a non-embalmed body is wrapped in an "artisanal" wicker basket, pine wooden coffin, or organic shroud and lowered into a hand-dug grave, have become popular. In lieu of traditional headstones, small trees, shrubs, engraved natural stones, or GPS homing devices placed on the deceased are used to locate graves. By the end of the year, Laurel Hill will open its crematory scatter garden, and just across the river, West Laurel Hill features a Nature's Sanctuary where one can rest amidst a native meadow and even apiaries. In the era of grave tracking apps, Michael Jackson hologram concerts, and high-demand for prime real estate, will physical grave monuments still retain their relevance?
Despite current trends, Laurel Hill Program and Volunteer Coordinator, Beth Savastana, does not see monuments losing their appeal anytime soon, at least not at historic Laurel Hill. "People like to find a tangible piece of the past. If you're buying the spot, you might as well decorate it." In fact, Laurel Hill has a dedicated team of designers to make your wildest monument dreams a reality. In the end, whether you fancy a Darth Vader engraving, a tomato plant for visitors to snack on, or absolutely nothing at all, marking your place of eternal rest all comes down to personal preference. It's your monument, your flair, so what will you choose?


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Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 - DVD
1 ctUPC: 0078693689771
Purchase Options
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Product Details
Still reeling from the loss of Gamora, Peter Quill must rally his team to defend the universe and protect one of their own. If the mission is not completely successful, it could possibly lead to the end of the Guardians as we know them.


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Results 1 - 20 of 265
NASB, Switch to Amplified 2015
Searched for: 1285 | |||||
Gen 6:18 "But I will establish6965 My covenant1285 with you; and you shall enter935 the ark8392--you and your sons1121 and your wife802, and your sons'1121 wives802 with you. | |||||
Gen 9:9 "Now behold2009, I Myself589 do establish6965 My covenant1285 with you, and with your descendants2233 after310 you; | |||||
Gen 9:11 "I establish6965 My covenant1285 with you; and all3605 flesh1320 shall never3808 again5750 be cut3772 off3772 by the water4325 of the flood3999, neither3808 shall there again5750 be a flood3999 to destroy7843 the earth776." | |||||
Gen 9:12 God430 said559, "This2088 is the sign226 of the covenant1285 which834 I am making5414 between996 Me and you and every3605 living2416a creature5315 that is with you, for all5769 successive5769 generations1755; | |||||
Gen 9:13 I set5414 My bow7198 in the cloud6051, and it shall be for a sign226 of a covenant1285 between996 Me and the earth776. | |||||
Gen 9:15 and I will remember2142 My covenant1285, which834 is between996 Me and you and every3605 living2416a creature5315 of all3605 flesh1320; and never3808 again5750 shall the water4325 become1961 a flood3999 to destroy7843 all3605 flesh1320. | |||||
Gen 9:16 "When the bow7198 is in the cloud6051, then I will look7200 upon it, to remember2142 the everlasting5769 covenant1285 between996 God430 and every3605 living2416a creature5315 of all3605 flesh1320 that is on the earth776." | |||||
Gen 9:17 And God430 said559 to Noah5146, "This2088 is the sign226 of the covenant1285 which834 I have established6965 between996 Me and all3605 flesh1320 that is on the earth776." | |||||
Gen 14:13 ¶ Then a fugitive6412a came935 and told5046 Abram87 the Hebrew5680. Now he was living7931 by the oaks436 of Mamre4471 the Amorite567, brother251 of Eshcol812 and brother251 of Aner6063, and these1992a were allies1167,1285 with Abram87. | |||||
Gen 15:18 On that day3117 the LORD3068 made3772 a covenant1285 with Abram87, saying559, "To your descendants2233 I have given5414 this2088 land776, From the river5104 of Egypt4714 as far5704 as the great1419 river5104, the river5104 Euphrates6578: |
Gen 17:2 "I will establish5414 My covenant1285 between996 Me and you, And I will multiply7235a you exceedingly3966." |
Gen 17:4 "As for Me, behold2009, My covenant1285 is with you, And you will be the father1 of a multitude1995 of nations1471. |
Gen 17:7 "I will establish6965 My covenant1285 between996 Me and you and your descendants2233 after310 you throughout their generations1755 for an everlasting5769 covenant1285, to be God430 to you and to your descendants2233 after310 you. | |||||
Gen 17:9 ¶ God430 said559 further to Abraham85, "Now as for you, you shall keep8104 My covenant1285, you and your descendants2233 after310 you throughout their generations1755. | |||||
Gen 17:10 "This2088 is My covenant1285, which834 you shall keep8104, between996 Me and you and your descendants2233 after310 you: every3605 male2145 among you shall be circumcised4135. | |||||
Gen 17:11 "And you shall be circumcised4135 in the flesh1320 of your foreskin6190, and it shall be the sign226 of the covenant1285 between996 Me and you. | |||||
Gen 17:13 "A servant who3211 is born3211 in your house1004 or who4736 is bought4736 with your money3701 shall surely4135 be circumcised4135; thus shall My covenant1285 be in your flesh1320 for an everlasting5769 covenant1285. | |||||
Gen 17:14 "But an uncircumcised6189 male2145 who834 is not circumcised4135 in the flesh1320 of his foreskin6190, that person5315 shall be cut3772 off3772 from his people5971b; he has broken6565a My covenant1285." | |||||
Gen 17:19 But God430 said559, "No61, but Sarah8283 your wife802 will bear3205 you a son1121, and you shall call7121 his name8034 Isaac3327; and I will establish6965 My covenant1285 with him for an everlasting5769 covenant1285 for his descendants2233 after310 him. | |||||
Gen 17:21 "But My covenant1285 I will establish6965 with Isaac3327, whom834 Sarah8283 will bear3205 to you at this2088 season4150 next312 year8141." | |||||
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Check out our video interview with UCF Knights head volleyball coach Todd Dagenais, as Eric and Jeff preview the Spring 2021 season with the Knights all-time winningest head coach.
Dagenais discusses the weirdness of coaching through COVID-19, his returning players, the schedule, the rest of the conference, and a wide range of other topics (unfortunatley we didn't have time for any pro wrestling or Green Bay Packers talk).
UCF is aiming for their third consecutive conference crown and their fourth under Dagenais this season. The Knights also picked up their first NCAA Tournament victory since 2003 in the fall of 2019, defeating Florida State in Gainesville.
However, that was 13 1⁄2 months ago, thanks to COVID-19. After the cancellation of the regular fall season, this season will be a short one with only 16 matches - 11 of them at home.
The Knights open their season Tuesday at 4 p.m. against Florida Atlantic.


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Timson Immigration
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Investor Stream
Business Innovation and Investment (Provisional) visa (subclass 188)
1. Overview
This provisional visa is one of the three categories of 188 immigrant visas, implemented by the Australian Department of Home Affairs. This scheme is a 5-year temporary residence visa, suitable for investors who plan to engage in investment activities (stocks, real estate, bonds, etc.) or manage a business in Australia.
2. Prerequisites
- You are aged under 55 at the time of the invitation to apply for the visa
- You must be nominated by an Australian State or Territory government agency before being invited to apply for this visa.
- You must have at least 3 years of experience managing one or more qualifying businesses or eligible investments
- For at least 1 of the 5 fiscal years immediately before you are invited to apply, have directly managed one of the following:
*a qualifying business in which you, your partner or you and your partner combined had at least 10% ownership interest, or
*an eligible investment of at least AUD 2.5 million owned by you, your partner, or you and your partner combined
- For the 2 fiscal years immediately before you are invited to apply, you, your partner, or you and your partner together, have business and personal assets with a net value of at least AUD2.5 million
- A complying significant investment of at least AUD2.5 million. You must hold complying significant investments continuously for the life of your provisional visa. (See 4. Complying Investment Framework for details)
- You must score at least 65 points on the points test
3. Points Test
- You can get points for several reasons, check how many points you might get
4. Complying Investment Framework
You must make a complying significant investment of at least AUD2.5 million and it must be invested in the following proportions:
(1) At least AUD500,000 in venture capital and growth private equity funds which invest in start-ups and small private companies
(2) At least AUD750,000 in approved managed funds. The managed funds must invest in emerging companies listed on the Australian Stock Exchange
(3) A 'balancing investment' of at least AUD1.25 million in managed funds
Business Innovation and Investment (Permanent) visa (subclass 888)
If you are the holder of a Business Innovation and Investment (Provisional) visa (subclass 188), you must have been physically present in Australia for at least 2 years in the 3 years immediately before you apply for the permanent visa
With this visa you can enjoy:
- Free public education
- Australian public health care
- Exemption from overseas purchase tax
- Real estate for rent in Australia
Note: This document is for reference only, all terms are subject to the written contract.


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Ensure that your business' image and message is always on display with our premium quality Car/Truck Magnets! This product is printed on heavy-duty glossy material ideally suited for car/truck doors and van bodies.
Simply drive around town with your own mobile billboard and promote your business, introduce new products & services, etc.
Car / Truck magnet signs can also be used on other surfaces. Use these magnets as temporary signs at construction sites or any other changing work environments where metal surfaces are present.


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Location about 5km from Cat Ba town. With the gorgeous unspoiled natural scenery together with wonderful beaches, Monkey island is one of the most attractive addresses tourists shouldn't miss in Cat Ba Island
To get to this beautiful island there is only one way by boat. You can take about 10 minutes from Beo dock throughout Cai Beo fishing village along with a few tiny islands. Almost tourist boat have stop here in order that tourists have a chance admire the masterpieces that nature has bestowed on Cat Ba.
Monkey Island is well worth the highlight of Cat Ba island particularly and probably the most bewitching attractions for tourist in Hai Phong generally bring numerous tourists. The island was previously known as Cat Dua Island. At Cat Dua since you will find a large amount of wild pineapple shading around. The fruits of the pineapple here look good, however it's not able to eat. The local people use them to make traditional medicine.
Monkey island is also an ideal for swimming in the blue water and white sandy beaches. Thanks to the existence of many dozen of monkeys that why they name for this island as Monkey island. Virtually all of monkeys in Cat Dua are attracted here for dwelling by the rangers. They're very adventurous with the locals and tourists. They grab food right from tourists palms and may bite if provoked. But, it's the untouched uniqueness which makes the island become renowned appealing a large number of tourists to this island.
Discovering Monkey Island is unquestionably probably the most memorable things to do in Cat Ba. The scenery surrounding the island is credible. It will be perfect for developing eco tourism here. Monkeys on the island also play an essential role to make the achievement of Cat Dua Island.


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Halifax is lucky to have dedicated residents who care about their city. With so many talented professionals and passionate activists, it's not surprising there are great city building events coming up. The term 'world-class' gets used too often, but all of the speakers at these events are absolutely world class. Come out and learn about building beautiful, successful cities from some of today's leading city builders.
The Art of City Building – October 28th and 29th
Most of the action takes place at the central library. Speakers from across North America and Europe will focus on design, city-governance, transportation and creating places for people. Some of the giants in the planning and design field will be here. Come hear from Project for Public Spaces, Gehl Architects, The City at Eye Level and more!
Details and registration are online.
Curbside Chat with Chuck Marohn – November 7th
Chuck Marohn is the founder of Strong Towns, an organization devoted to creating economically and socially strong places. Chuck's ideas help strengthen our cities and ensure their economic success, by exploring traditional ways of building communities. He shows how active citizens, local officials and designers can help places to become strong and resilient — no matter what challenges lie ahead. Planetizen named Chuck one of the ten most influential urban thinkers – of all time!
Details: Wednesday, November 7, 2018 at 6:30 PM – 9 PM. Marianne McCain Building, 6135 University Avenue, Dalhousie University.
Come enjoy some great chats about how to build great places. Thanks again to TJ Maguire for another wonderful picture.


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Our Top 5 Fixes For The AT&T Broadband Red Light – HomeNetworkON
One of the problems AT&T users report from time to time is the AT&T Broadband red light. For most people today having no internet can be a real nightmare. We can say that it is totally understandable because many devices in our household rely on the internet connection. Our smartphones and laptops are almost useless without the internet, and a good part of our working time, as well as the free time is somehow closely connected to using the internet.
So, is there anything to do in order to fix that red flashing light and what does it exactly mean? This article will guide you through the recommended steps required to fix this issue and have your internet connection up and running again.
What does the AT&T Broadband red light mean?
According to AT&T the flashing red broadband light indicates that the router has detected the broadband signal, but it wasn't able to establish a connection.
If you see the light is solid red light it means that there is no internet signal at all.
Since both these cases result in no internet connection most people are pretty frustrated when they experience this issue and mostly don't know what to do. The good thing is that there are some things you can try that have helped other people to fix the problem on their own. So, let's begin with the easiest ones.
Restart the AT&T Gateway
Restarting the gateway is a simple and effective thing to do. Sometimes it takes just that to fix the AT&T Broadband red light issue. You can restart the AT&T gateway manually or via the Smart Home Manager.
In case your router supports the Smart Home Manager, you need to Sign In to it first. After that select Network. Now you scroll down just a little more and click on Home Network Hardware. Click on WiFi Gateway and then click on Restart. Confirm your selection by clicking Restart once more.
However, if you want to do it manually, you need to:
- Disconnect the power cord from the electricity outlet or from the gateway or modem.
NOTE: If there is an internal battery remove it, and if you are on DSL, disconnect the power cord as well.
- Wait 20-30 seconds.
- Put the battery back if you have removed it and connected the phone cable if you are on DSL.
- Plug the power cord back into the electricity outlet or the router.
- Leave the gateway to boot up completely. It shouldn't take more than 10-15 minutes. After that you should see a solid green Broadband light which indicates that the connection is good.
- Try to connect to the internet now.
If there is still no internet connection and the red status light is still blinking we need to try the next step.
Any Loose Cables and Connectors?
This step to fix the AT&T Broadband red light requires from you to check all the connectors and cables and logically, to pay special attention to the green DSL Broadband cable if you have it. This green data cable should go from the Wall jack to the green broadband port at the back of the router. Ideally you should disconnect this cable and connect it back firmly to the AT&T gateway, and repeat this on the wall jack side.
It is not that easy to spot a loose connection visually. Therefore it would be best to disconnect and connect each cable. Just make sure everything is firmly connected.
While you are disconnecting and connecting the cables please check whether everything is connected properly. Sometimes we make mistakes when we replace our equipment and connect a cable to the wrong port, or if we accidentally disconnect a cable there is a chance to plug it back into the wrong port. So, while checking the cables check if they are connected to the right ports.
Damaged cables can also be an issue so if you notice any visible damage on the cables during the inspection, replace them with new ones if possible.
As a result, if you have confirmed that there were indeed some loose or incorrectly connected or damaged cables, the red light should be replaced by a green solid one after you fix the issues.
Is AT&T Experiencing Some issues?
The AT&T Broadband red light is often caused by a power or service outage, in most cases after bad weather or because of maintenance performed on their side.
To confirm that this is causing the red light and no internet issue please visit the AT&T outage page. This page will give you information if AT&T is having some service outage at or near your location. You can also choose to get notified when a service outage ends.
There are also some third-party websites that can give you the same information, for example DownDetector or Outage.report.
Factory Reset the AT&T gateway
Before we proceed with this solution we need to tell you the following:
When factory reset is performed, all the custom settings you have saved earlier (wireless password, network name, port forwarding, guest network, parental controls and so on) will be deleted. After that you will need to set up the gateway from the beginning since all the settings are being restored to their default factory defaults during the process.
Now if you want to continue with this procedure to fix the AT&T Broadband red light, here is how to do it properly.
- The back of the router has a small red Reset button which is actually hidden in a pinhole. Find this button.
- Now take a sharp object like a pen or a paperclip, and press and hold this button for 10 to 15 seconds or more. This is important because if you release the button earlier the factory reset won't happen.
- When you release the button, the device will reboot.
- Wait for it to boot up again and all the LED lights to become stable.
- Normally when the factory reset process is successful you will see a solid green light on the Service and Broadband lights.
Contact AT&T
If none of the given fixes hasn't helped you resolve the AT&T Broadband red light you should contact the AT&T support for additional assistance. They can either inform you about an ongoing downtime that makes the gateway unable to connect thus resulting in the red LED light on your AT&T gateway. They can test the line between your home and their network, fix the faults if they detect them, reboot your gateway for you or guide you through the troubleshooting process. As a result, you can expect to get the red light issue fixed pretty quickly.
If you are an AT&T user you have probably run into this issue at one moment or you are experiencing it right now. If you want to have your broadband connection working again, you need to know what to do to fix the AT&T Broadband red light issue. There is no reason to worry just follow the given solutions one by one or just get in touch with the AT&T support and ask for their help. Whatever you decide we are sure you will surf the internet again by the end of this article.


text:
Book Chronicles The Building Of Roger Ailes' Fox News Empire.
Gabriel Sherman traces the beginning of Fox News' success back to its wall-to-wall coverage of Monica Lewinsky. He says, "Ratings during the Lewinsky scandal exploded more than 400 percent, so you saw instantly that there was a market for this type of ... television." Sherman's book is called The Loudest Voice In The Room.
Related Topics
Other segments from the episode on January 16, 2014
January 16, 2014
Guest: Gabriel Sherman
TERRY GROSS, HOST: This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross. Roger Ailes, the chairman of Fox News, has succeeded in turning a television news network into an unprecedented political force, writes my guest Gabriel Sherman. His new book is called "The Loudest Voice in the Room: How the Brilliant, Bombastic Roger Ailes Built Fox News - and Divided a Country."
Sherman writes, quote, Ailes both remade American politics and media. More than anyone of his generation, he helped transform politics into mass entertainment, monetizing the politics while making entertainment a potent organizing force. Through Fox, Ailes helped polarize the American drawing sharp with-us-or-against-us lines, demonizing foes, preaching against compromise, unquote.
The book is not just about Ailes' years at Fox News. It's also about his childhood, his years in show business and his work as a political consultant. Sherman is a contributing editor at New York Magazine, where he's written cover stories on media, politics and business. Gabriel Sherman, welcome to FRESH AIR.
GABRIEL SHERMAN: Thank you for having me.
GROSS: Why did you want to write a book about Roger Ailes?
SHERMAN: Well, I set out to write a book about Fox News. I've been covering media for a decade now, and Fox is the most dominant media organization in America. It generates over a billion dollars of profit. It is - it has the highest ratings of any cable news network. It doubles the ratings of CNN and MSNBC. So I knew that was a tremendous story.
And very early on into my reporting, more than three years ago, I realized that the story at the heart of the story is Roger Ailes. You know, Fox News is a complete expression of his world view. You know, he said in an interview several years ago, which I quote in the book, that he built this network from his life experience, and it's true. It is really amazing how this, you know, giant media organization is run as the expression of one man, and his rule inside the company is absolute.
GROSS: You write that in the early years of Fox News, Ailes kept a healthy distance between his own world view and the product on the air. How did that change? What are some of the things you learned that he does to control the political agenda?
SHERMAN: It happens two ways. There's a morning meeting at 8 AM which is in his office. If he doesn't attend, he calls in by speakerphone. And Ailes will monologue and give his take on the news, and his executives absorb those ideas. And they know that's the way Fox is supposed to play the stories of the day.
He even goes beyond that. During the health care debate, Ailes was vehemently opposed to the health care reform, and he gave a Fox pundit a stack of the bill as a prop. He literally gave an anti-health care reform activist a prop, which was a stack of 2,000 pages of bills, and he wanted her to wave it on air to make that political point that this bill was, you know, massive an unwieldy and shouldn't pass.
So both in his, you know, morning directives in the editorial meeting and then actually in specific kind of programming instincts, such as handing out the health care bill, he is pushing his message onto the airwaves.
Another way he does it is there are selected personalities on the channel that literally will take dictation from him. One example is his lawyer, Peter Johnson Jr., who is his lawyer, but he's also a Fox host. He occasionally will host the morning show "Fox and Friends," and he offers legal analysis on other segments.
And Ailes will give Johnson things to say, and one source told me that when Peter Johnson goes on "Fox and Friends" and says something incendiary, it's not Johnson, it's Roger plugged in. And so there are certain people if you watch closely and you know how the channel works that it's actually Roger Ailes speaking to the camera, not - you know, he's using these people to speak for him.
GROSS: If you're just joining us, my guest is Gabriel Sherman, author of the new book "The Loudest Voice in the Room," and it's about Roger Ailes. He's a contributing editor at New York Magazine. Roger Ailes really has had a very interesting life, filled with twist and turns that I found fascinating that I didn't know about until reading your book. So I'd like to talk with you about the earlier part of his life, before he joined Fox News, and then talk some more about his life at Fox News.
He gets his start in the entertainment business on "The Mike Douglas Show" as a producer there. And that was an afternoon variety that I think started in Ohio and then moves to Philadelphia, it's produced out of Philadelphia for a long time. And it's a popular, but it's a very, like, middle-of-the-road show in its sensibility. Is that fair to say?
SHERMAN: Yeah, "The Mike Douglas Show" was in many ways the antithesis of the late-night talk shows that were programmed out of New York and Los Angeles. It spoke to a middlebrow, middle-American audience. You know, the common saying was that it appealed to the millions of housewives who in those years in the 1960s were often at home watching television.
And, you know, Mike Douglas was a kind of washed-up big band singer. He was nearing the end of his career even though at the time he was in his early 30s, and on a lark he applied for a talk show opening in Cleveland, at KYWTV, and he landed the spot. And that sort of saved his career.
He was almost at the point of bailing out of show business entirely, and he clicked with that middlebrow audience because the seeds of the 1960s tumult were just percolating in the early, early '60s. You know, "The Mike Douglas Show" really took off from '63 to '68, and I think Mike, "The Mike Douglas Show" became a safe haven for the millions of Americans that felt that the culture was moving a bit too fast. And he was a genial, likeable character, and the audience connected with that.
And the other fascinating thing that Roger Ailes learned in his time on "The Mike Douglas Show" was how to create dramatic television and that television is medium that thrives on spontaneity, drama, likeability, surprise. And you see all of those elements on Fox News.
You know, the hosts are - even when they're spouting aggressive rightwing talking points, they do it with a smile. You never quite know where the segments on Fox are going to go. And on "The Mike Douglas Show," the producers talked about every segment needing a payoff. And so they would produce the segments so that the viewer would get a surprise at the end.
And I think that same DNA and that same formula has been, in a large sense, why Ailes has made Fox News the most successful network on cable news. It really is applying all of the best precepts of daytime television to a new medium, which is news.
GROSS: It's through "The Mike Douglas Show" that Roger Ailes meets Richard Nixon and gets involved with politics. Was Nixon a guest on "The Mike Douglas Show"?
SHERMAN: I love this story. This story gets to the heart of the creation myth of Roger Ailes. So in Ailes' telling, the way he met Nixon was that on the day Nixon was set to appear as his 1968 campaign was just getting into gear, "The Mike Douglas Show" had booked a belly dancer named Little Egypt. And as Ailes has told it over and over again, it was his idea to stick Nixon in his office so that he would be spared an awkward encounter with an exotic dancer in the green room, who as Ailes said had a boa constrictor.
He didn't - he called it a dancer with a snake, and it was in that encounter where Ailes talked himself into a job with Richard Nixon by telling Nixon he needed to improve his television skills. And Nixon, you know, was impressed by this young dynamo and said, well, I'm going to hire this kid to teach me TV.
Well, I went back, and I re-reported that episode. It's a wonderful story. It shows Ailes' wit and his charm. But in fact there was no belly dancer on the show that day. I consulted the show logs from "The Mike Douglas Show." I interviewed his producers and colleagues who were on the set that day.
And in reality the way they tell the story is that Roger Ailes was intensely interested in meeting Richard Nixon. He put him in his office specifically because he wanted to have a private conversation to pitch him on being his media advisor. And Roger Ailes was a fan of the propaganda work of Lenny Reifenstal.
He discussed it with a colleague on "The Mike Douglas Show" how impressed he was with Leni Riefenstahl's use of camera angles. And already he was thinking about how to use television to amass political power.
GROSS: She was Hitler's - Riefenstahl made propaganda movies for Hitler. I imagine what he admired was her craft and not her - not the ideology behind it, yeah.
SHERMAN: Yeah, he was enthralled with her technical abilities. He discussed with a colleague about her savvy use of camera angles, and they called it the hero shot, in which if you position the camera lower than the subject's eye level, facing slightly up, it has this tendency to make the person on the screen seem larger and more impressive.
And so it's this - it was the technical craft that Riefenstahl had that deployed in her films that Ailes was captivated by, and he used that in his work for Nixon and at Fox, and the use of camera is one of his - I mean, at his heart Ailes is a producer.
I mean, he's a powerful political strategist, but he thinks like a producer, and he was in awe of Riefenstahl's use of camera angles and editing to make a point.
GROSS: He succeeds in becoming a media advisor for Richard Nixon. What does he do for Nixon?
SHERMAN: Well, the irony is that Richard Nixon didn't make Roger Ailes a star campaign strategist. A liberal named Joe McGuiness did. Joe McGuinness was a columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer. He was friendly with Roger Ailes. And McGuinness had taken it upon himself to write a book, a landmark book, about the 1968 campaign by focusing on the handlers and the TV men who were behind the scenes.
And he had been shut out by the Humphrey campaign, and luckily, fortuitously, the Nixon campaign invited him in, and Joe McGuinness shadowed Roger Ailes throughout the 1968 campaign as part of the research for his book. And Ailes in McGuinness' portrait emerges as the most brilliant, the most savvy, the most colorful of the TV men that had surrounded Nixon.
So although Ailes was just a young Turk, and he was in no way a senior Nixon strategist, he was a television producer who was in charge of setting up camera angles and the staging of these TV town halls, these staged town halls Nixon did to soften the old Nixon and present himself as the new Nixon, Ailes emerged as the secret genius behind that campaign, which again is part of the self-mythology of Roger Ailes.
The greatest image manipulation that took place during the Nixon campaign was in fact the image of Roger Ailes.
GROSS: Did you talk to McGuinness about whether he thinks that the book played up, you know, exaggerated Ailes' importance in that campaign?
SHERMAN: McGuinness and Ailes have stayed in touch throughout their professional careers. And, you know, Joe is a wonderful writer, and he told me in our interview that Ailes was this incredible subject. He said something to the effect of all the other Nixon men were in black and white, and Ailes was in Technicolor.
I mean, he was profane. He was brash. He trash-talks his bosses. There are a couple of incredibly memorable quotes that Ailes delivered where he was making fun of Nixon and Spiro Agnew, and, you know, as a reporter if you're there as a witness you're getting incredible copy. Ailes provided McGuinness with incredible copy. And they both - that book made both of them into star and catapulted them on their careers.
GROSS: If you're just joining us, my guest is Gabriel Sherman. He's the author of the book "The Loudest Voice in the Room," which is a biography of Roger Ailes, the head of Fox News. Let's take a short break here, and then we'll talk some more. This is FRESH AIR.
GROSS: If you're just joining us, my guest is Gabriel Sherman. He's the author of the new book "The Loudest Voice in the Room," which is a biography of Roger Ailes, the head of Fox News. Sherman is a contributing editor at New York Magazine.
So in 1974 and '75, Ailes becomes part of Television News, TVN, which you describe as kind of like a wire service for television stations, but it's not just print they produce. I mean, they produce video packages. So for, you know, local TV news stations, they have, you know, national reports that they can run.
And this is a network that's funded by Joseph Coors, the beer magnate whose politics are very on the right. And you describe TVN as kind of a prototype for Fox News. You say it passed itself off as having no political agenda, the press release announcing its debut, saying it had no philosophical ax to grind. But you say in fact it did. What were the politics, and how were they expressed?
SHERMAN: The secret history of TVN is I think central to understand how television and politics have changed. You know, TVN really created the blueprint of Fox. It was the brainchild of an ABC executive named Robert Pauley, who was disaffected with the mainstream media. He was a Barry Goldwater supporter, a John Birch Society member.
And so he went around, Bob Pauley went around and raised money from Joseph Coors and others to create what he hoped would be a balance on the rest of the media. And you see in these documents, in these internal memos, about how they were going to package the news.
You know, they had a plan to send all of their story lineups to a conservative watchdog group called Accuracy and Media for review. They were consulting with former Nixon officials, Pat Buchanan and others, and so they were basically saying how do we package the news that is going to appeal toa conservative audience.
And there's one just remarkable memo that describes how they would actually produce the news. And I think anyone who watches Fox News now sees the exact same techniques. There's one technique they describe as the hold frame. And then the hold frame is a strategy in which you have an unflattering picture of your subject.
So for Fox it would be, say, Barack Obama or a Democrat, and you hold that image on the frame. Another technique was called, quote, repetition. And it's described in one memo as the oldest and most effective propaganda technique. And so at TVN they were writing about how if they repeated the same story over and over again on their news reports, it would become a national issue.
And I think at Fox you can see that with their relentless coverage of storylines like the fast and furious gunrunning scandal or the terror attack in Benghazi or the ongoing fallout from some green energy projects like Solyndra. So these repetitive storylines are ways to create political issues.
One other technique I think is essential to understanding Fox, they pioneered at TV, according to an internal memo, it's called, quote "whipping posts." And so the conservatives at TVN felt that the CIA and the FBI in the 1970s had become kind of bogeymen for the left. So they would come up with their own, quote, whipping post. And they selected, for example, the HUD agency and some inner-city welfare programs.
So they would come up with their own kind of enemies list, and the right would, you know, go after the EPA and these kinds of - Department of Education would be another one. So whipping posts was essential.
And then the final point, and this is what I was taken with reading these memos that are, you know, more than three decades old, is sex appeal. One TVN consultant writes how this is, quote, one of the most important elements which we should not ignore. And so you see as they're building this fledgling news service to have a political outcome, they're incorporating all these propaganda elements, pretense balancing, whipping posts, but most importantly sex appeal.
And anyone who turns on Fox will see that the anchors are - the female anchors are very attractive. They're often blonde. They have a lot of personality. And that's the way Ailes programs it to appeal to a mostly white, middle-class, male audience. And sex appeal is at the heart of one of the reasons why Fox is such a - successful at transmitting political messages.
GROSS: Can I just add one more thing from this memo that you're describing from TVN that you think becomes kind of like a template for Fox News, it describes something called pretense balancing, showing all sides of a particular story when in fact the balance is tilted.
SHERMAN: Oh, and that's exactly foreshadowing what Ailes would do.
GROSS: And that was a quote. It wasn't me. That was a direct quote.
SHERMAN: It's a quote from an internal memo, strategy memo about how they were putting together their newscast. And that is essential to understanding how Fox appeals to its conservative audience. You know, Ailes for years clung to this notion of fair and balanced, and we give all sides, and while there are liberals on Fox, if you look at the way the network is programmed, the fight is rigged.
You know, the whole notion that liberals have a fair shot on Fox is a complete fiction, and in my book I write I use as a case study for this, I write about the relationship between Alan Colmes and Sean Hannity, who for years hosted the sort of Fox equivalent of "Crossfire." It was a right-left debate show.
And Ailes, you know, used "Hannity and Colmes" as a talking point to say that, well, in primetime we give both sides. But what I show in the book is that the show was never intended to be an equal fight. Sean Hannity, as one producer described it, was the, quote, "executive producer," acted as the, quote, "executive producer of the show."
He would decide the stories that the show would cover every morning. And then there would be a second phone call with Alan Colmes that producers would kind of humor him and make him feel like he was providing input for the story rundown, when in fact the real stuff had already been - real lineup had been decided.
And Sean Hannity would openly kind of tease and berate Colmes on the set, off camera. You know, as his ego grew, he would say Alan, what's it going to be like when you are gone. I mean, so this notion that it was always a fair left-right debate was a fiction that Ailes sold to its audience.
And we see that going back all the way to TVN, that they were already thinking about how do we present ourselves as fair but really have our side win.
GROSS: TVN, this new service that we're talking about, folds pretty quickly. And then Ailes go back to political consulting.
SHERMAN: Yeah, this was really - the failure of TVN marked the moment when Ailes was winding down his efforts to make it in the worlds of entertainment and theater and show business. And the one reliable profit center that he had, the one arena in which he was better than anyone, was Republican politics.
And by the early 1980s, he emerged as the mercenary campaign consultant. His attack ads were known for their crass distortion, their humor, their devastating attack lines. One early employee of his consulting company told me how much Ailes liked 30-second issue ads because on a 30-second issue ad, your candidate had to be for something or against something.
There was no nuance. You had to be on one side or the other, and he knew how to drive wedges that would divide the electorate that would favor his candidate.
GROSS: Gabriel Sherman will be back in the second half of the show. His new book about Roger Ailes is called "The Loudest Voice in the Room." I'm Terry Gross, and this is FRESH AIR.
GROSS: I'm Terry Gross back with Gabriel Sherman author of the new book "The Loudest Voice in the Room, How the Brilliant, Bombastic Roger Ailes Built Fox News and Divided A Country." Ailes is the chairman of Fox News and has headed the network from the start. He was hired by Rupert Murdoch, the head of the global media company, News Corp.
Gabriel Sherman is a contributing editor at "New York Magazine," where he's reported on media, business and politics.
Who were some of the people that Ailes is directly responsible for bringing to Fox News, both on air and off air - people who were key in shaping what Fox News became?
SHERMAN: Well, I like to tell the evolution of Fox through the story of two men. In 1996, when Ailes launched Fox, he brought in two executives to be his deputies. And one of them was a man named Chet Collier, he was an older man. He, in fact, was Roger Ailes' mentor on "The Mike Douglas Show." And Chet is not a political person; he's a talk-show guru, he's a Massachusetts liberal, he's not ideological. And his big influence on the early years of Fox was showmanship and big personalities. Chet famously told colleagues that you could hire someone for television by watching them with the sound off - and which is funny if you actually, you know, really don't care what they're saying. But that was his idea, is that people - you want to hire people who have big personalities that jump through the screen.
The other executive is a man named John Moody. And I really see John Moody as the conscience of Fox News. He's sort of at war with himself. He was a celebrated foreign correspondent for Time magazine in his earlier career. The colleagues at "Time" I interviewed said that he was a first-rate journalist. He was a conservative, but they felt he largely kept his politics secondary to his journalism. And by the mid-90s, Moody was frustrated at Time magazine - he expressed frustration at "Time" magazine and he looked for jobs in television. And Ailes hired him. They bonded over their shared belief that Christians were persecuted. In one conversation, they talked about how at Easter time all of the news media ran negative stories about Jesus Christ and made him into - in one of their telling - a cult figure. So they had sort of a cultural resentment that they shared.
And so Moody comes to Fox and Moody's job is to really try to build a real news organization. And he was at war with Chet Collier whose instincts were all about show business, and pizzazz and programming. And in that tension, you see how Ailes sets these two opposing views to clash. And ultimately, you know, Moody, through the years, you know, only could fight so much and he just, you know, threw in the towel and that sort of the show business and political character of Fox superseded news. And I think it's a story where you see it through these men and their struggles inside the office to get their worldview onto the screen. And as one executive said, you know, you can fight Roger for so long and then he's just going to kill you. You know, Moody did lead a good fight to keep Fox tethered to some journalistic moorings, but it ultimately failed and Chet Collier retired and was replaced by a man named Bill Shine who's Ailes is programming deputy and will do essentially what Ailes wants him to do. So the programming and the political side of Fox won. It's sort of brushed the news side to the corner.
GROSS: You say one of the stories that helped kind of like not only define Fox News but create a big audience for Fox News was the Monica Lewinsky story.
SHERMAN: Mm-hmm.
GROSS: What was it about how Fox handled it that helped create the Fox brand?
SHERMAN: That was the defining moment in transforming Fox from a fledgling cable news startup to a national phenomenon. Ailes seized on the Lewinsky story by adding - instantly adding news programming that would capitalize on it. Because for his audience - for the audience of conservative Americans - it distilled the essence of everything they hated about Bill Clinton. You know, the corruption of power, the sexual appetites, the, kind of, lurid tabloid aspect of the story. And so by giving it wall-to-wall coverage, you know, he, on the day the scandal broke, Ailes created a newscast with Britt Hume - a respected former ABC correspondent, and he called it Special Report. And Ailes wanted Humes' show to be like Ted Koppel's famous "Nightline" broadcast during the Iran hostage crisis. Because for Ailes, the Lewinsky story was every bit as riveting for his audience as, you know, a foreign-policy crisis, like the Iran hostage situation. So he just added programming, he moved Bill O'Reilly, who was struggling at a 6 PM newscast to 8 PM, and that show exploded because O'Reilly's outrage at Clinton resonated. So it was all these forces came together and the ratings during the Lewinsky scandal exploded more than 400 percent. So you saw, instantly, that there was a market for this type of conservative outrage television. And because the news cycle, the very headlines every day, were fitting into what the audience wanted to hear.
GROSS: So you say that Fox News is very rigid when it comes to leaks. It doesn't want its people to leak how Fox News operates, what happens behind the scenes. And you say that Roger Ailes has an assistant who helps police leaks. So what's the system that you're describing?
SHERMAN: Well, one of the most powerful executives inside Fox News is a woman named Judy Laterza. She's Roger Ailes' executive assistant. She has worked with him since the 1980s, and she attends virtually every meeting. And she sits in the meeting and takes notes of the proceedings. And Ailes would say something explosive, something like Mitt Romney is like Chinese food, you know, 20 minutes after you meet him you don't know what you've had. Or Barack Obama hates capitalism. Or global warming is a conspiracy - and these are the kinds of monologues that he delivers in these meetings. Judy Laterza will write down what Roger Ailes said. And as one source told me, you know, she'll roll her eyes, 'cause she's heard it all before, she'll write down what he says and then tellingly, she will write down a list of every single person who is in that room so that Roger Ailes has a written record of his comments in these meetings and an attendance list. So that if it appears in the press, he can consult his notes and then go interrogate every person who possibly could have been a source of that leak. And that kind of surveillance society chills these men who are making hundreds of thousands - in some cases millions of dollars - into silence.
And it was the hardest reporting challenge of my career to crack that code of silence, but I think, you know, it's a window into the secretive world that Ailes has been able to create, that he is able to get his political views directly into, inject it into the news without it being revealed to the wider public.
GROSS: You said that Roger Ailes said, at a meeting with executives, that it's fine that Fox is making a lot of money, but what he wants to do is elect the next president. And then you go on to describe, in a way, how he tried to recruit somebody who he thought would be a valuable candidate. Do you think he was trying to recruit a candidate?
SHERMAN: Oh, I know that he was. You know, the mission of Fox really changed in the Obama years. It became, you know, ultimately they're without a doubt a political organization and Ailes wanted for his legacy to defeat Obama and propel a Republican to the White House. So he set out to recruit Chris Christie, the governor of New Jersey who is going to his own political crisis at the moment, but at the time he was very popular. And Ailes' General David Petraeus, who at the time, was head of the Allied Forces in Afghanistan, and he sent an emissary to Kabul to have a secret meeting to lobby Petraeus to consider running. And what both those men decided to sit out the race and what it showed is the limits of Ailes's power.
In the story of 2012 and Fox News Ailes had created the most profitable cable news network, the most powerful political machine. But what made him power, ultimately, has destroyed his party's ability to win - at least in the last cycle - a national election because the brand of the Republican Party had become so associated with the extreme voices that Ailes had given airtime to on Fox, that moderate candidates - like Christie, like Petraeus - did not want to jump into the race. And then so Ailes was forced to back a candidate, Mitt Romney, who he had very little enthusiasm for. To his face, he told Romney that he needed to lighten up and stop being such a preppy. He said to another Fox personality, you know, no one ever wanted to know more about Mitt Romney. I mean these are kind of indicting words. And the fact that Romney lost and Obama was able to counteract this machine that was set up to attack him is a testament to the fact that, you know, Ailes thrived in a world where, you know, he could keep the old Nixon's silent majority together, but we're now - that audience is aging. Fox's audience is aging, a new audience is rising and Ailes is ultimately, you know, clinging to power. He's presiding over an empire that's built, in a large measure, on a crumbling foundation. So the story of 2012 is a story of failure for him.
GROSS: You made an assumption that when Petraeus and Christie declined to take Ailes' advice and run in the Republican presidential primary, that it was because they didn't want to be associated with Fox News or with the conservative principles that Fox News represented. Do you know for sure that that's the reason why they decided not to run? They probably had lots of reasons, don't you think?
SHERMAN: Oh, of - there were multiple reasons. I think, you know, people who sat out the 2012 race thought maybe in open election, 2016, may be more favorable. But it's undeniable that the brand of the Republican Party going into 2012, had been sullied by the extreme voices on the right that had dominated the debate. And so going into that, the - you know, it would be more favorable to wait instead of running against, you know, a historic president, the first African-American president in American history. And the moderate voices on the right did not see 2012 as a favorable environment for them. And Ailes tried to draft Christie on two occasions. He had a private meeting at his house in upstate New York and he lobbied him, and he had a second follow-up conversation in which he lobbied him aggressively to get into the race, and ultimately was unsuccessful.
GROSS: You're write that after Republicans lost the election - presidential election in 2012 - that Ailes' position at Fox News - at News Corp., the whole Rupert Murdoch empire - seemed to weaken. What evidence do you have of that?
SHERMAN: The reporting is based on conversations with very senior Murdoch executives. And the view inside the company is that while Fox News is a tremendously profitable asset, it's less of a, they don't view it as a growth business. You know, Ailes' audience is aging. The demographics continue to get older. It's a loyal audience, but it's not a growing audience. And so when you're in the board room with Rupert Murdoch and you're looking out at the future about where media is going, they don't see Fox as something that is going to be a rocket ship that's going to be continuing its ascent. It's had a great run, but as I write at the end of my book, every show has its run. And so they are content to allow Ailes to program it as he sees fit. He has ultimate editorial independence. But he no longer is viewed as someone who has unlimited potential to keep growing his business. And his efforts to rebrand Fox in the post-2012 world, you know, have, on the margins, improved ratings slightly, but there's no, there was no silver bullet to appeal to a younger demographic to grow into new markets. It's a very stable, mature business at this point.
GROSS: If you're just joining us, my guest is Gabriel Sherman, author of a new book about Roger Ailes, the head of Fox News. It's called "The Loudest Voice in the Room."
Let's take a short break here, then we'll talk some more. This is FRESH AIR.
GROSS: If you're just joining us, my guest is Gabriel Sherman. He's the author of a new book about Roger Ailes, the head of Fox News. The book is called "The Loudest Voice in the Room." And Sherman is a contributing editor at New York Magazine.
Roger Ailes is not happy with your book. And he said your publisher, Random House, refused to fact check the content with me or with Fox News. That tells you everything you need to know about this book and its agenda. What's your side of that?
SHERMAN: Well, Terry, I reached out to Roger Ailes more than a dozen times in the two and a half years I was doing the researching and writing, both in person and in writing. I traveled to different states to see him at public events to tell him I was eager to sit down and discuss every fact in the book. Ultimately, it was his decision not to participate with the book and to participate in the fact checking.
GROSS: Well, I think he might be implying that if you were doing your job, you would have handed over a manuscript to Ailes or to others at Fox News so that they could fact check it for you and then get back to you.
SHERMAN: No. That's not the way journalism works. I would not turn over a manuscript. I had a team of two fact checkers, spend more than 2,000 hours vetting the manuscript, talking to sources, consulting all of my research material. And I kept Roger Ailes abreast of my reporting and he knew what was going - he knew what was going to be in the book. You know, sources would report back to him what I was working on. He knew it was going to be a probing look at his life and career. And I offered to sit down and go through every single fact in the book and he is the one who declined. So that is reflective of his - it was a battle for control, a control over his story. And while I can appreciate his point of view, I was not going to cede that control. My responsibility is to my readers. And I fact checked the book. It is rigorous, and ultimately, he decided that he did not want to engage with my project.
GROSS: What's it like for you to be kind of in the vortex now of the like the political, cultural wars?
SHERMAN: You know, it's been a crash course in what it must be like to be involved in a political campaign, which, as a reporter, is an odd place to be, because I'm not the story. Roger Ailes is the story. But he has elevated me to a place where I - it's this kind of me-versus him dynamic. Very early on into the reporting, I started to see attacks on me on right-wing media sites.
There's been a concerted campaign from the right through surrogates of Ailes and Fox to demonize me as some left-wing activist who's on the payroll of George Soros, and just a completely distorted picture of me and my journalism. And I think that's, again, tying back into this issue of control. This was an effort to try to malign me in the eyes of the conservative audience that watches Fox, because I - it makes me wonder: What is Roger Ailes scared of? What wouldn't he want people to know about him that's in my book? And why would he try to, through his surrogates and emissaries, color and shade my journalism?
And, you know, there was one anonymous smear on a website that described me as, quote, "Jayson Blair on steroids" - and referring, obviously, to the disgraced former New York Times reporter who had been fired for fabricating stories.
And I found out through my reporting that that comment was made by Ailes' deputy Bill Shine, in a meeting with Ailes, and within 24 hours of Bill Shine repeating that line, it showed up on a right-wing website. So I could see these attacks emanating from within the building, and to me it just - again, it just was more revealing of my subject. It was, you know - maybe in a way that Ailes did not intend it - he was revealing himself to me and confirming my own reporting.
GROSS: So now that you finished the book, how do you think Fox News has changed media in America?
SHERMAN: Well, one of Ailes' lasting legacies will be that, for millions of Americans, news is now no longer viewed as a way to be informed about the world. It's a way of gathering information that advances your side. And we have segmented and siloed ourselves as a culture. You know, the subtitle of my books is, you know, "Roger Ailes Divided a Country." You know, the resentments and the antagonisms that are surfaced on Fox have cleaved our culture.
The right has Fox, MSNBC counter-programmed to Fox. The Internet is now populated with all brand of sites that present news from different ideological positions. And ultimately, you know, we've lost this notion that journalism should be separate from politics, that, you know, reporting the news, gathering fact, is something that's noble. And politicians are supposed to - and people who are politically minded - can look at the facts. But now politics and journalism have been fused. And Roger Ailes has been at the center of that transformation.
GROSS: Do you think that MSNBC, in its left-leaning, has eroded the wall between journalism and politics?
SHERMAN: I think MSNBC has responded to Fox, but they're actually very different. I mean, MSNBC is essentially progressive talk radio with images. They do very little reporting. They actually do very little journalism. They - it's liberal commentary throughout the day, and I don't think MSNBC is telling their audience that they're getting the gospel.
They don't have the fair and balanced slogan. Their slogan is, you know, lean forward. It's just a different - it's a much smaller business. Fox News, for most of its history, told its audience that you do not need to watch anything else but Fox. Don't trust the mainstream media. Fox News is fair and balanced. We report. You decide. It's that relentless hammering of this notion that it's objective journalism that separates Fox from all the other partisan media outlets there.
And it's a testament to Ailes' genius as a storyteller and a mythmaker that he was able to maintain that fiction for so long.
GROSS: Gabriel Sherman, I want to thank you very much for talking with us.
SHERMAN: Thank you for having me.
GROSS: Gabriel Sherman's new book about Roger Ailes is called "The Loudest Voice in the Room." Sherman is a contributing editor at New York Magazine. Coming up: techies, hackers, software Americans? Our linguist Geoff Nunberg has been thinking about what to call the seemingly privileged new neighbors who are changing his San Francisco neighborhood. This is FRESH AIR.
TERRY GROSS, HOST: This is FRESH AIR. From the beats to the hippies, San Francisco has been the site of a number of American subcultures, movements and cultural confrontations. Now an influx of tech workers is leaving its own mark on the city. According to our linguist, Geoff Nunberg, whether you approve or not is reflected by what you call them.
GEOFF NUNBERG, BYLINE: There goes the neighborhood. Every so often that cry goes up in San Francisco, announcing a new chapter in American cultural history as the rest of the country looks on. There were the beats in North Beach, then the hippies in the Haight, then the gays in the Castro. Now it's the turn of the techies, who are pouring into my own Mission neighborhood, among other places. Only this time around, the green stuff that's perfuming the air is money, not weed.
Locals are agitated over soaring rents and the changing urban landscape, as used bookstores yield to cafes full of people punching out business plans on their laptops. But the most heated protests and discussions have focused on the buses that shuttle 18,000 tech workers every day from San Francisco to their jobs at Apple, Google, Facebook and other companies, their oversized Wi-Fi-equipped luxury coaches, usually gleaming white, which scoop up their passengers at transit stops like something out of "Close Encounters of the Third Kind." You couldn't invent a more compelling visual symbol for the privileged and disconnected lives that the tech workers seem to live, cosseted behind smoke-tinted windows.
But the buses aren't really the problem. They may be intrusive, but they also take thousands of cars off the freeways, and their riders are hardly tech millionaires. The resentment here has as much to do with culture as economics. It's been fueled by a series of public remarks from tech figures complaining about everything from the bitchiness of San Francisco women to the transvestites who make it hard to get a late-night taxi.
On Facebook not long ago, the CEO of the startup AngelHack vilified what he called the dropouts, trash and degenerates on the downtown streets, saying that they don't realize it's a privilege to be in a civilized business district in one of the wealthiest cities in America.
That sounds a lot like the things they were saying about the hippies half a century ago. But this is really a post-industrial arrogance from people who've been assured that it was in the natural order of things that their smarts and energy would be rewarded with an eight-figure payout while they were still young enough to be on their parents' health insurance.
And not surprisingly, this has tended to darken the public's attitude toward the techies, not to mention the word itself. I still use techie as an amiable label for the nerdy guy who comes to my office and rolls his eyes when I ask why my computer won't talk to the printer down the hall. But these days a lot of people use the word as a disparagement that implies entitlement and self-absorption.
Techie used to suggest a computer whiz with no social skills. Now it suggests one with no social conscience. Actually, the distinctive feature of tech culture isn't arrogance so much as a chronic obliviousness, which is why some tech people can't even understand the resentment they engender. The San Francisco Chronicle quoted the founder of one online retailer who compared the word techie to the slurs for other immigrant groups, like the Mexicans in the Mission.
That prompted Sam Biddle at the Gawker site Valleywag to refer to the newcomers as Software Americans. There's a sign of that disconnectedness in hackers, which is the name a lot of tech people prefer to go by. That accords with the original meaning of the word as an honorific for an ingenious programmer, and it can be extended to other things. Startups describe their marketing people as growth hackers.
But to the rest of the world, hacker is only a pejorative for people who break into computer systems. Programmers insist that that's a misuse of the word. But once a word goes bad, you can get away with using it positively only within a closed group that's in on the game. Within tech culture, hacker has become a shibboleth that identifies one as a member of the tribe.
It suggests a distinct subculture, and an indifference to what other people think - the private language of the nerds' table in the high-school cafeteria, where the kids cared more about being smart than being popular. That hermetic subculture seemed to find its natural home in Silicon Valley, where it could flourish in industrious seclusion from the rest of the world.
You could go to work, get lunch, get a workout and a massage without leaving the corporate campus, then drive home at 1 in the morning without ever encountering anybody so different from you that they didn't also know that hacker could be a positive term. Yet even so, more and more tech workers prefer to live in San Francisco these days, hence the buses, and the new offices that companies like Twitter and Dropbox have opened downtown with city tax incentives.
This is where the clash of cultures begins in earnest. Right now, the fear is that the city will become another Silicon Valley, only with better restaurants, higher rents and worse parking. There are signs of that already. The Mission is well on its way to becoming a techie theme park. But the city can also subvert cultural borders with its stubborn complexity.
It resists the reduction to algorithms, insists that you take it on its own terms. That's the source of its infuriating allure. As a former student of mine who takes the bus to his job at Google told me: Why would I want to live in the Silicon Valley wasteland when I can live here? I can't disagree with him. I lived in Palo Alto myself for a while. It's a nice place to raise a car.
GROSS: Geoff Nunberg is a linguist who teaches at the University of California Berkeley School of Information.
Transcripts are created on a rush deadline, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of Fresh Air interviews and reviews are the audio recordings of each segment.


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JOHN Zacek admits that he has been a bit short tempered when dealing with staff at the office of Flinders MP Greg Hunt.
But he attributes his anger to the "purely political" responses he received from Mr Hunt's office when expressing frustration at the lack of a testing site for COVID-19 on the Mornington Peninsula.
The closest "respiratory clinic" is at Frankston Hospital, a distance Mr Zacek sees as being too far away for the peninsula's population of more than 167,000, especially the nearly 40,000 aged over 65.
When asked by The News for comment on Mr Zacek's concerns, Mr Hunt's office gave the same response as it had sent to him: there were 188 respiratory clinics around Australia "assisting to assess patients with COVID-19 like symptoms".
Locations were chosen by the health department after advice from state health departments "and hospital districts like Peninsula Health".
Mr Hunt's office also provided Mr Zacek with the coronavirus hotline (1800 675 398), said he could visit www.australia.gov.au and explained how the government was continuing to "invest heavily" to combat the pandemic.
Mr Hunt said social distancing rules still applied to anyone holidaying on the peninsula.
"We must continue to practice social distancing and stay home as much as we can to flatten the curve and reduce the spread of coronavirus," Mr Hunt said.
Mr Zacek was annoyed that Mr Hunt did not specifically respond to his concerns that there was no COVID-19 testing clinic on the peninsula.
His concern arose two weeks ago when he learned that the peninsula had the second highest number of recorded COVID-19 cases of any Victorian municipality.
The fact that the electorate of Mr Hunt – who is also federal health minister – covers the peninsula (and French Island) was not lost on Mr Zacek.
Although the peninsula by last week had dropped to having the fifth highest number of COVID-19 cases, Mr Zacek remained angry that testing was only available at Rosebud Hospital if people were very unwell.
"I am 74 later this year and live by myself on the border of Rye and Blairgowrie. What happens if I come down with the virus and need to be tested?" He stated in a letter to Mr Hunt.
"Frankston hospital is almost an one hour away. I have been diagnosed with expanded lungs and am on a puffer [for treatment of asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease].
"I will need to drive on Peninsula Link or Point Nepean Road or the old highway to get to Frankston. If I have some sort of episode or reaction while driving, lose control of the car and cause an accident and kill somebody, what then? A ringing of hands by the politicians?"
Mr Zacek said he was not alone in his situation.
In the lead up to Easter he had noticed an an increase in people walking along his street, which had many houses that were short term rentals.
"This extra inflow of people will increase the potential of the virus spreading, so why no closer testing centre than Frankston Hospital … or does the federal government consider us "oldies" expendable?"
Mr Zacek is "living in hope" that a testing site would be established on the peninsula.
First published in the Southern Peninsula News – 14 April 2020


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Driving timber design into the new decade, the inaugural Intergrain Timber Vision Awards launches on 19 April 2010, inviting architects, landscapers and designers nationwide to showcase their visionary use of timber in residential and commercial design projects.
From 19 April to 30 June 2010, Australia's architects, landscapers and designers can enter their project in one of four categories in the Intergrain Timber Vision Awards by visiting www.intergrain.com.au/awards.
For more information, terms, and conditions, visit the official website.


text:
Sometimes planning a vacation can be stressful. Many questions may come to mind. Where to go? What to pack? How much money is needed? What will the weather be like? How am I going to get there? All of these questions need to be answered in order to plan your vacation, but always remember to plan some fun. Here are some steps to make the most out of your vacation.
Step 1 Set a Budget
First of all, decide where you can afford to go and set a budget. This is very important because it gives you a chance to set a goal for yourself by having a destination in mind and having something to work for while planning. When having a destination picked out, it is easier to know how much money you will need because not every place is the same. The place you choose will most likely change your budget and how your itinerary looks.
If you have trouble picking a destination, it is always good to look at three main things. First, look at recommendations from social media, friends, and family. If you ask for recommendations, most people suggest asking people that you trust to tell you what they liked about that destination and provide some activities that you can do there. When using social media, you can explore the area by looking at images of all the places that your friends have gone and it can give you an idea of where you would like to go and what you would like to see while you are there. Some of the best vacations are the ones you spend with your friends and family. Most of the people in the world today like to travel to visit family members or friends that they don't see very often.
Step 2 Plan your activities
Begin planning what you want to do, what you want to see, and how you are going to get there. This step is when it is best to make an itinerary because you can keep yourself organized with everything that you want to do. It is also best to stay flexible because even if you're driving or flying, the times can change very quickly and you need to be ready for any type of situation. You also need to be flexible with the dates you want to travel. If you are going to be flying, you could possibly get cheaper tickets if you keep your dates flexible. It is also best to book your flight in advance and not wait until the last minute. Some of the best deals on plane tickets are months in advance of the actual flight.
When thinking about when you would want to go on vacation, you could always think about the weather and holidays. Most people like to take vacations in the summer so they can go to beaches, take a cruise, and enjoy outdoor activities. Another reason people travel in the summer is schools are out which means families will be traveling a lot. When thinking about holidays it is very important because the bigger the holiday the more expensive the trip will be. For example, if you go to New York City on New Year's Eve you definitely should consider the hotels and flights to be more expensive than a regular day.
Step 3 Book Reservations
Book reservations for a place to stay. This step is another part of traveling where you need to be flexible and be able to search many different hotels to make sure it is the one you want. When booking hotels, you will always need to look at the prices and the read reviews so you know if it is a good place to stay. If you don't read the reviews, you could end up a place that is not properly maintained. Even though people mostly go with hotels for their vacations, there are also other places that you can stay. Airbnb has become a popular option, where you can stay in a house or condo and make it feel like you are staying at your own home.
Step 4 Expenses
How much money will you need when you get there? When you think about it, no vacation is complete without enjoying various activities or buying a variety of souvenirs. Make sure you have enough money for everything that you want to do or buy. All of this money can go towards food, admissions, souvenirs, and activities. To plan out everything that you want to do, it would be helpful to make an itinerary of all the activities of interest to you. Making an itinerary can allow you to do mostly everything you want and it can allow you to make any budget adjustments if needed.
Step 5 Last-minute tasks
A week to the day before you leave, start packing, checking tickets, getting money ready, and double check your itinerary. As people get closer to the trip, packing can be very stressful because you have to decide what you want to bring. If you pack too much, it can lead to higher transportation fees especially when you're flying. This can also be a hassle if you are driving with a lot of people in a car because you still need to fit their luggage along with your own luggage. If you end up forgetting something, you can always purchase it once you get to your destination. Remember to check that you have everything the night before because if you try to do it the day of your departure, you will be very stressed out and most likely forget something. Be sure to check your plane tickets to make sure the date is correct and that you know the time that the plane leaves. Missing a flight can cost you a lot of money you did not account for in your budget.
Step 6 Appropriate Timing
Figure out when you should leave if you're driving and if you are flying give yourself plenty of time to get to the airport and through security so you don't miss your flight. Be sure to have a proper ID and a car full of gas. If you are flying, it is important to get to the airport about 3 hours in advance, depending on the size of the airport, because you will need to check your bags, go through security, and still have time to get on the plane. Smaller airports may only require you to arrive 2 hours prior to the flight. If you are driving, it is important to leave at a certain time because you will need to stop for gas, the occasional restroom break, and for meals as well. If you are flying or driving, it is important to have a proper ID because you could need it at any time.
Step 7 Arrival
When you arrive at your destination, check into the hotel. Make sure you check in and that your room has the amenities that the website indicated would be in your room. If you are missing anything, or if you have forgotten something like your toothbrush, you can call the front desk and have them bring it to you. Don't be afraid to ask for extra towels. Find out if the food or drinks in the room are complimentary or if they will cost you money. Also, ask about a complimentary breakfast in the lobby each morning. This can save you some money on your trip. The front desk can also provide information about the area and recommend good places to eat and shop.
Step 8 Time for fun and relaxation
Have fun! Once all of your travel is complete and you have unpacked, it is time to have the vacation of your dreams. Don't worry if you get lost on your trip, or something unexpected happens while you are traveling. This is part of the adventure. Let everything go, relax and make the most of your vacation.
Travel has become more complicated due to the global pandemic currently happening around the world. Some nations and some of the states have shut their borders to tourists. Make sure you know the policies of the destinations you plan to visit. Even though this time in the world is difficult due to Covid-19, it is still good to take a safe vacation with proper precautions to clear your mind and have some fun. Traveling is good for your mental health.
By Allison Rammel, Activist writer


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Phadia Allergy and Autoimmunity Products Commercially Approved in India
By Phadia, PRNESunday, December 19, 2010
UPPSALA, Sweden, December 20, 2010 - Import, sales and distribution of Phadia's allergy, asthma and
autoimmunity diagnostics products, including ImmunoCAP and EliA, have been
commercially approved by the Indian authorities.
www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20101208/425503 )
Following official approval, Phadia will begin marketing a broad
portfolio of diagnostic products to major commercial laboratories, hospitals
and research institutes as well as to individual physicians.
"The Indian market is strategically important to Phadia with high
economic growth and an expanding middle class demanding new and better
healthcare solutions," says Jean Forcione, Chief Operating Officer, PhadiaAB.
With allergy prevalence estimated at over 30 per cent of the Indian
population of 1.2bn people and the laboratory market expected to grow close
to 20 per cent, Phadia sees substantial growth potential.
Phadia opened its own subsidiary in India in April 2010 and already works
closely with several of the major commercial laboratories and major private
hospital chains.
About Phadia
PhadiaAB is a global leader in allergy, asthma and autoimmunity
diagnostics. Phadia develops, manufactures and markets complete blood test
systems to manage and support clinical diagnosis. Phadia has marketing
companies in more than 20 countries and distributors in more than 60
countries. Phadia is owned by the leading European buyout firm Cinven. For
more information please visit www.phadia.com
Media Contact: Ulf Bladin VP Marketing, Corporate Communication, Scientific Affairs Tel. +46-73-800-24-88 firstname.lastname@example.com
Media Contact: Ulf Bladin, VP Marketing, Corporate Communication, Scientific Affairs, Tel. +46-73-800-24-88, ulf.bladin at phadia.com
Tags: December 20, India, Phadia, sweden, Uppsala