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7:45 AM - Weimar: I've just dropped Soeren off at school and am on my way to work. I turn up the radio as my favorite band, Coldplay rock to the sounds of "Viva La Vida". My usual trip to work always cheers me up. It's the same everyday but everyday I discover something new. At this hour the streets of Weimar are already alive and wide awake.
This is a bicycle town and regardless of the weather there are always a multitude of bicycles criss-crossing their way through their separate bicycle paths. I love watching the different characters pedaling away to their destinations.
A small group of school boys with their stylish BMX bikes race down the paths, laughing and joking, there is that business man, with his fine suit and tie fluttering in the crisp air, here comes that guy who probably chain smokes all day with his trusted cigarette tucked between the corner of his mouth and behind me I see that pimped up chick who probably has been teleported from the 80's! Finally my favorite of the day a mother with her four kids cross the street in front of me. She pedals her bike, with one of the younger ones sitting in the seat behind her, pulling a trailer with a further two toddlers, next to her, her eldest proudly perched on his own bike. It reminds me of a family of ducks crossing the street.
Weimar is in full swing already. I wonder how they all start their day. Are they the types to jump into the shower and rush out or do they prefer a nice long breakfast?
I am the type who enjoys the start of the day with a good power breakfast and some time with my family before we head off to our days. Before Soeren came along I was not like that though. Tom and I would enjoy a breakfast but it was a quick yogurt or a dry piece of toast with coffee. By mid-morning though our stomachs would be grumbling with us and while at work we grabbed the next nearest filling food - cookies, sweet buns etc.
With Soeren came also a whole new look into our nutrition and eating habits. If we were going to preach good eating habits we had to live by them too. Today we sit down together and enjoy a healthy and filling breakfast. A breakfast that will not have us craving food within an hour, instead keep us filled till lunch time and give us enough energy to tackle our hectic school or work schedule.
I do not have to go into the fact that breakfast is the most important meal of the day - we all know that. There is a great proverb here in Germany, which touches the right note on how one should set their meals throughout the day:
"Eat like a king in the morning, a prince in the afternoon and like a beggar in the evenings."
With this is mind we orient ourselves to a good big breakfast in the mornings, a light healthy lunch and a small dinner. It works!
My favorite breakfast is a mixture of organic wholegrain - rye, barley, spelt and oat flakes, cooked in milk until soft then sweetened with maple syrup and spiced with a touch of cinnamon. If using dried fruit I normally add them in the milk while cooking the flakes, which causes them to plump up and become juicy. Finally add a handful of nuts and some additional milk. All you now need is a spoon!
What's For Lunch, Honey? is celebrating it's 3rd anniversary. I started this humble blog in February 2006, with this first post. Since then there was no stopping me! In three years I learned how to fight my way through HTML and CSS jungle, learned what DoF and Bouquet meant in photography, dared to become a baker, experimented with unorthodox tastes and played around with flavor combinations. It's been a great fun-filled path.
Almost 500 posts, 1.4 million visitors and a few exciting mentions and awards later I am here today to say thank you to you! Without you motivating me through each post I am sure this space would not be so full of life as it is today. These three years have given me not only so much knowledge and insight into the Foodie world but also has bestowed upon me great friendships too. Thank you for making What's For Lunch, Honey? a place full of pizzazz, fun and life!
Many celebrate with cake but I would like you to join me for a power breakfast of a different type. After featuring Goji Berries as the latest in my Food Guide, I thought I would show you one of my favorite ways to enjoy these power foods. I normally prepare the basic porridge the night before so the flakes soak up the milk and flavors overnight. In the morning I add a splash of warm milk, cashews and if desired fresh fruit.
Recipe: Wholegrain Porridge with Goji Berries and Cashews
Printable version of recipe here.Makes enough for 3-4 servings
1 cup organic mixed wholegrain flakes, I used a mixture of rye, barley, oats and spelt
2 cups + 2 cups low-fat milk
1 tablespoon organic maple syrup
Good shake of cinnamon
1/2 cup dried Goji Berries
1/4 cup cashews, chopped
- In a small saucepan add the mixed wholegrain flakes, 2 cups milk, cinnamon and maple syrup. On medium heat bring the mixture to a gentle boil.
- Reduce heat, then add the goji berries. Simmer for 8-10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Turn off the heat and cover the pan. Leave to soak overnight.
- Next morning heat up 2 cups of milk. Divide the wholegrain porridge into three bowls and pour warm milk over the porridge. Sprinkle with cashews.
Serving tips:
- You can add some toasted sugar-free granola for a nice crunch.
- Bittersweet chocolate chips make a great chocolaty treat.
- Dried cranberries, cherries, apricots, figs or dates all offer a fantastic variety for a different flavor.
- Use pecans, pistachios or macadamia nuts for more nutty variety.
- Throw in a handful of toasted seeds like flax, sunflower or pumpkin.
You can add any type of dried or fresh fruits and nuts that takes up your fancy. We love our goji berries and cashews in this porridge as the flavors just fit together so perfectly. Only sweetened with a dash of maple syrup this makes it a perfect alternative to other pre-packaged and sweetened cereals. The multi-grain porridge keeps us satisfied and our energy at a balanced level throughout the morning. I normally round up my breakfast with half a grapefruit and a cup of coffee. Ready to face the day with such a fantastic start!
Join me this whole week as I celebrate 3 years What's For Lunch, Honey? with cake and ice-cream and more cake! You are all invited - so make sure you'll be there!
You might like these breakfast treats from WFLH:
Nutty Amaranth Granola with Fresh Berries | Sweet Spiced Risotto with Cherry Compote | Apricot Olive Oil Tea Cakes |
Breakfast ideas from around the blogs:
- Eggs Benedict - The Knead For Bread
- Double Blueberry Crisp Bars - Breakfast at Banjo's
- Breakfast Quinoa with Clementines, Sour Cherries and Pecans - Mostly Eating
Daily Tiffin Reading Tip:
- Waste: The Demon of Despair written by Deeba
All photographs and written content on What's For Lunch, Honey? © 2006-2009 Meeta Khurana unless otherwise indicated. | All rights reserved | Please Ask First


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An extremely rare convergence this year of Thanksgiving and the start of Hanukkah has created a frenzy of Talmudic proportions.
There's the number crunching: The last time it happened was 1888, or at least the last time since Thanksgiving was declared a federal holiday by President Lincoln, and the next time may have Jews lighting their candles from spaceships 79,043 years from now, by one calculation.
There's the commerce: A nine-year-old New York boy invented the "Menurkey" and raised more than $48,000 on Kickstarter for his already trademarked, Turkey-shaped menorah. Woodstock-inspired T-shirts have a turkey perched on the neck of a guitar and implore "8 Days of Light, Liberty & Latkes." The creators nabbed the trademark to "Thanksgivukkah."
Songs have popped up with lyrics like these from "The Ballad of Thanksgivukkah": "Imagine Judah Maccabee, sitting down to roast turkey and passing the potatoes to Squanto ..." Rabbi David Paskin, the song's co-writer and co-head of the Kehillah Schechter Academy in Norwood, Mass., proudly declares his the Jewish day school nearest Plymouth Rock.
Card celebrating Thanksgiving and Hanukkah (Photo: AP)
Let's not forget the food mash-ups commemorating the staying power of the Pilgrims and the fighting prowess of the Jews, along with the miracle of one night's oil lasting eight days. Pumpkin latkes, apple-cranberry sauce and deep-fried turkey, anyone?
"It's pretty amazing to me that in this country we can have rich secular and rich religious celebrations and that those of us who live in both worlds can find moments when they meet and can really celebrate that convergence. There are a lot of places in the world where we would not be able to do that," Paskin said.
The lunisolar nature of the Jewish calendar makes Hanukkah and other religious observances appear to drift slightly from year to year when compared to the US, or Gregorian, calendar. But much of the intrigue over Hanukkah this year is buried deep in the history of Thanksgiving itself, which hasn't always been fixed in the same spot. That caused some initial confusion over Thanksgivukkah, aka Turkukkah.
In 1863, Lincoln declared Thanksgiving as the last Thursday in November (the month sometimes has five of those) and the holiday remained there until President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed a joint resolution of Congress fixing it as the fourth Thursday, starting in 1942.
Celebrating Jewish American experience
Jewish practice calls for the first candle of eight-day Hanukkah to be lit the night before Thanksgiving Day this year, so technically Thanksgivukkah falls on the "second candle" night.
And then there's Texas. Before 1863, each state decided on its own date for Thanksgiving. As late as 1956, Texans were still chowing down on turkey and stuffing a week later than everyone else, according to a history put together by Chabad.org of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement of Hasidic Jews. That means Jews in that state might have also been lighting their first Hanukkah candle in 1945 and 1956.
There's more early Thanksgiving lore and 2,000 years of calendar tinkering involving the Jewish calendar, but we'll spare you.
Jonathan Mizrahi, a quantum physicist at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, N.M., puzzled on the convergence last January, in a blog post with buzzed-about line graphs picked up by others online. More than 100,000 people have visited the blog since then, he said, including some who questioned his calculations and prompted him to post a couple of clarifications.
He hadn't made it clear that he was referring to the "second candle" night of Hanukkah, and he hadn't realized Thanksgiving had shifted from the last to the fourth Thursday of November.
The interest, Mizrahi said, "has truly blown me away. I've just been totally flabbergasted at the number of responses."
While the whole thing is lots of fun, is there anything truly cosmic happening here?
Well, there's Comet ISON, which is scheduled to pass close by the sun on Thanksgiving this year and may provide a nice show -- possibly even during daylight. Or not, since comets can't always be counted on.
Mom-of-two Dana Gitell, who lives outside Boston, partnered with an artist and the Jewish gift site Moderntribe to create and sell souvenir T-shirts, cards and a poster. She sees a happy and meaningful coincidence and 10% of proceeds will go to Mazon, a Jewish hunger relief organization.
"Cosmic? It's just a day when Jews and the rest of America are celebrating on the same day," she said. "It's an opportunity for us to really celebrate the Jewish American experience, and to give thanks in America for the religious freedom we enjoy here, and for making the Jewish American experience possible."

subset: commoncrawl


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Book News: Anonymous Tip Led To Outing Of J.K. Rowling's Alter Ego
Ben Pruchnie/Getty Images
The daily lowdown on books, publishing, and the occasional author behaving badly.
- The debut detective novel The Cuckoo's Calling, seemingly written by a former Royal Military Police member named Robert Galbraith, was actually written by Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, The Sunday Times revealed this weekend. Rowling's publisher confirmed the news. Richard Brooks, the Sunday Times' arts editor, told NPR in a phone interview that "it was frankly too good for a book by an unknown first-time author." The novel, supposedly based on Galbraith's "own experiences and those of his military friends," follows the private investigator and military veteran Cormoran Strike as he delves into the suspicious death of a supermodel. Brooks said one of the paper's columnists, India Knight, received an anonymous tip on Twitter saying the novel was by Rowling. The source's account was immediately deleted. Knight brought the tip to Brooks, who was initially skeptical. But after uncovering telling similarities between the detective novel and Rowling's other work — including heavy use of Latin and themes such as drug use and, as Brooks put it, "disdain for the privileged middle classes," he brought the novel to two linguistic analysts who, though they couldn't say definitely, identified strong similarities between The Cuckoo's Calling and Rowling's other work. Brooks also noted that Rowling and Galbraith shared an agent, a publisher and an editor. To his surprise, when he confronted Rowling's representatives, they confirmed the story. Rowling told the Times, "I hoped to keep this secret a little longer because being Robert Galbraith has been such a liberating experience. It has been wonderful to publish without hype or expectation, and pure pleasure to get feedback from publishers and readers under a different name."
- Update at 12:45 p.m.: Asked about rumors that Rowling's publisher might have pulled a stunt and strategically leaked the story, Brooks replied, "Absolutely not." He continued: "They would not talk to me despite various requests. I had to do all the detective work." And Tamsin Kitson, publicity director for Little, Brown UK, declared in an email to NPR, "Any info The Sunday Times received was not leaked by us or planned in any way." Rowling publicist Nicky Stonehill likewise denied leaking the author's real name.
- After threats of a boycott against the upcoming film version of Ender's Game because of author Orson Scott Card's anti-gay marriage views, the movie studio Lionsgate has released a statement clarifying its position on the controversy. In a statement quoted in The New York Times, Lionsgate said, "[W]e obviously do not agree with the personal views of Orson Scott Card and those of the National Organization for Marriage. However, they are completely irrelevant to a discussion of 'Ender's Game.' The simple fact is that neither the underlying book nor the film itself reflect these views in any way, shape or form."
- Charles Simic writes an ode to summertime in The New York Review of Books: "There's something familial, deeply comforting in the sound of a pig oinking in the peace and slumber of a summer afternoon."
The Best Books Coming Out This Week:
- Love, Dishonor, Marry, Die, Cherish, Perish is the final book by David Rakoff, the author and "This American Life" contributor who died of cancer last year. The book is an inventive rhyming prose poem, with lines such as, "Susan had never donned quite so bourgeois/ A garment as Thursday night's Christian Lacroix. / In college — just five years gone — she'd have abhorred it / But now, being honest, she [expletive] adored it." NPR's Alan Cheuse called it "cleverly rendered and entertaining."
- Mark Leibovich's This Town: Two Parties and a Funeral — plus plenty of valet parking! — in America's Gilded Capital is an account of the inner workings of Washington's political and media machines. He spoke to NPR's Rachel Martin this weekend: "It is a profile of a city that I think is widely misunderstood. ... I think what people don't have a full appreciation of is just the full carnival that Washington has become. The way in which the city has been completely revolutionized by money, by new media, by the celebrity madness that's sort of engulfed the rest of the culture."


text: How to Start a Chapter - 2015The basic requirements for a new TU chapter include a chapter name, a list of chapter officers and directors, bylaws, and zip codes. However there are a number of other items you'll need to understand prior to starting a new chapter. Follow these seven simple steps to start a TU chapter in your area. New Chapter Development Concept - 2012A new concept for early chapter development. The new chapter groups and their parent chapters and councils must comply with the following procedures to assure that their operations are within the structure of the parent chapter or council. Alternative Engagement Group Operating Procedures - 2018This document will help you understand how to set up an alternative engagement group under a parent chapter or council in order to be compliant with insurance and IRS regulations. Alternative engagement groups can be great ways to organize non-traditional groups within the TU community but outside the typical chapter meeting model. TU Staff Organizational Chart - Feb 2018An organizational chart of all departments and staff within TU and the reporting structure. To contact staff, all TU staff email addresses are first initial last name at tu.org (Example: John Doe would be email@example.com.) You can also search for staff contact and phone numbers, as well as view individual staff profiles in the online staff directory. Volunteer Code of Ethics - 2018At TU we are committed to honest and ethical behavior and to accomplishing our mission with integrity. This Code of Ethics applies to each and every one of TU's volunteers on the chapter and council level. TU's History and Organizational Structure - 2012This brief overview of TU's 53 year history provides background on where we have been and how we are structured to accomplish our mission and vision. TU's Strategic Planning ResourcesThis is a brief overview of TU's strategic plan that places the national organization, councils and chapters on a trajectory to achieve the TU vision. It also includes resources such as strategic planning templates and guidance documents. Chapter Focus - 2012This five-page document examines how to help chapters evaluate and then increase chapter effectiveness in the four areas of: conservation, youth education, service to members and business practices. Also included in this document are chapter officer checklists that outline responsibilities for new chapter leaders. Council Focus - 2012This five-page document examines how to help council evaluate and then increase their own effectiveness and show value to their chapter. Also included in this document are council officer checklists that outline responsibilities for new council leaders. Keeping the Peace - 2012Effectively avoid or manage conflict in your TU chapter or council Chapter and Council Fundraising - 2012Fundraising is one of the core functions of both chapters and councils. This document outlines some of the key ways chapters and councils can raise funds. Sample Chapter Budget Template - 2012This sample template can help many chapters easily and simply allocate and manage funds. Attract New Members and Volunteer Leaders - 2012Attract and activate new members, volunteers and leaders to build stronger and more sustainable chapters and councils. Leadership Mountain Presentation - 2012Former Council Chair, Chapter President and Grassroots Trustee, Sharon Lance, guides us on a one-hour training on how to effectively move members into volunteer positions and volunteers into leadership positions.


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Bicknell, IN - Funeral Home
Wampler Shaw Chapel
118 North Washington Street
Bicknell, IN, 47512
In Bicknell, IN if you are in immediate need of a funeral home or cremation service to care for a family member or friend whose death has just occurred place your trust & confidence in the compassionate professionals of Wampler Shaw Chapel. They understand that what matters most when losing a loved one is guidance and understanding. Whether you choose from their personalized signature cremation options or a traditional funeral followed by burial or entombment they are committed to honoring the dignity of those entrusted their care while respecting the wishes of every family they serve.
So, if you are in immediate need of a funeral home or cremation service in Bicknell, IN, please accept our sincere condolences. Rest assured that the funeral professionals & cremation experts at Wampler Shaw Chapel are standing by 24\7\365 to take your call, answer your questions and expedite transport of your loved one.
Making a Pre-Need Funeral Arrangement will pay off both emotionally and financially for you and your family. We spend a lifetime planning for the precious moments in our lives: the birth of our children, birthday parties, weddings, and of course, our retirement. But there is one event that we tend not to plan for, yet it's guaranteed to happen...our funeral.
Making a Pre-Need Funeral Arrangement saves you & your family money while protecting against inflation & price increases. Planning Ahead organizes data so your family does not worry about locating vital information when it's needed most. Preparing for tomorrow today by pre-funding your funeral arrangements serves as an extension of your estate planning.
Making a Pre-Need Funeral Arrangement allows you to consider alternatives & make decisions on your own terms. Planning Ahead provides peace of mind in knowing that your affairs are in order & your wishes will be fulfilled. It allows you to select & document your final wishes while eliminating the uncertainty & financial burden from the shoulders of your family.


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Kalonji in my glass spice bottles, jet black, like the hair I always wanted before the era of streaks and highlights.
Kalonji in my hand, tiny, coarse to the touch, crowding and jostling, waiting to flavor my food.
Kalonji in hot oil, tempering, dancing around merrily, haunting me with the aromatic flavor, I cannot put a word to. I see it described as acrid, smoky....but I am not sure.
Kalonji... Kalo Jeera... Nigella Seeds...a part of my cuisine
Nigella seeds are small, matte-black grains with a rough surface and an oily white interior. They are seeds of a plant Nigella Sativa, of the buttercup family and are often confused with Onion seeds. Nigella probably originated in western Asia but today is cultivated from Egypt to India.
Cultivation of these black seeds has been traced back more than 3,000 years to the kingdom of the Assyrians and ancient Egyptians. A bottle of black cumin oil was found in the tomb of King Tutankhamun, perhaps to protect the ruler in the afterlife.
Known as Kalonji in Hindi and Kalo jeera in Bengali, Nigella is used in India and the Middle East as a spice and condiment and occasionally in Europe as both a pepper substitute and a spice. It is widely used in Indian cuisines for its smoky, pungent aroma.
In Bengali cuisine it is almost as popular as Paanch Phoron and used for tempering, vegetable dishes, Dals, fish curries and some chutneys. It is one of the five ingredients of Paanch Phoron. It is also added to the dough while making Nimki a savoury fried dough. The flavor within the seed is enhances after it is baked, toasted or fried in a small amount of oil or juices of foods.
The seeds are always used whole, never as a powder and very rarely as a part of a paste
Nigella is used in Indian medicine as a carminative and stimulant and is used against indigestion and bowel complaints. In India it is used to induce post-natal uterine contraction and promote lactation. The seed yields a volatile oil containing melanthin, nigilline, damascene and tannin. Melanthin is toxic in large dosages and Niugelline is paralytic, so this spice must be used in moderation.( Source: here)
In Islam, it is regarded as one of the greatest forms of healing medicine available. Muhammad once stated that the black seed can heal every disease – except death.
Black cumin and its oil have also been used to purge parasites and worms, detoxify.
A very simple recipe with Nigella seeds is the Alu-Charchari, a quick stir fry of potatoes.
Some of the recipes I have blogged where Kalonji is used for tempering are:
Shorshe Dharosh or Okra in Mustard Sauce
Check out other spices in this series in the left hand column
Trivia: The many uses of nigella has earned for this ancient herb the Arabic approbation 'Habbatul barakah' meaning the seed of blessing.


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Last night Gov. Walker delivered his 4th State of the State address, the final one of his first term. He used the opportunity to highlight his view of an ever improving economic situation in Wisconsin pointing to a number of statistics that show job creation, an increase in personal wealth, decreasing unemployment, more homes being built, and the newly announced $1 billion surplus.
The Governor detailed his plans for the surplus which included a $400 million property tax cut, an income tax cut, a state tax withholding freeze, and $35 million for workforce training.
Today, Gov. Walker will call for a special session to move his plan forward, but the path to passage is far from clear as Sen. Majority Leader Fitzgerald has already remarked that his caucus cannot pass the governor's plan due to structural deficit concerns.
The speech was delivered under a spotlight that now includes a growing prospect at a run for president, as well as in what could be a competitive election year with a well-financed Mary Burke having entered the race for Governor. Reactions to the speech are still coming in, but Gov. Walker's message was clear: Wisconsin has prospered under his policies, and will only continue to improve.
Below are Governor Walker's remarks as prepared for delivery:
First, before I acknowledge anyone else, I would like to recognize my good friend and fellow Harley rider, Congressional Medal of Honor recipient Gary Wetzel.
Speaker Vos, Speaker Pro Tem August, President Ellis, Majority Leader Fitzgerald, Minority Leader Larson, Minority Leader Barca, members of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, Constitutional Officers, tribal leaders, members of the Cabinet, distinguished guests, members of the Legislature, most importantly, fellow citizens of the great state of Wisconsin, it is an honor to appear before you tonight.
Before we get started, I would like to introduce the First Lady of Wisconsin, my wife, Tonette. Also in the gallery are our sons, Matt and Alex, and my family; my parents, Llew and Pat, my brother, David, my sister-in-law, Maria, and my nieces, Isabella and Eva.
Next to my wife is Major General Don Dunbar, our Adjutant General. I want to thank him and the more than 10,000 members of the Wisconsin National Guard. Thank you for being here.
The state of our state is strong and improving every day. The economy is dramatically better and our finances are in great shape. Still, there is more work to be done.
Thankfully, the days of double-digit tax increases, billion-dollar deficits, and major job loss are gone. We replaced them with massive tax cuts, growing budget surpluses, and significant job growth. Wisconsin is going back to work.
Tonight, we have some really great news about the economy and our fiscal situation. The non-partisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau recently verified that the state will have $911 million more than previously projected. These new revenues are not a one-time windfall, or budget gimmick, but come from a strong
economic recovery, where more people are working, more employers are hiring, and personal income is going up. They also come from good stewardship of the taxpayers' money.What do you do with a surplus? Give it back to the people who earned it. It's your money.
I propose that we deposit a portion of these new revenues in the state's rainy day fund and use the remainder to provide much needed tax relief to you — the hardworking taxpayers of Wisconsin.
Tonight, I will propose a Blueprint for Prosperity, which will continue to improve our economy, while preserving our strong fiscal standing.
So how did we get these positive results? A true commitment to real structural reforms for state and local government budgets led to our long-term fiscal stability. Meaningful tax cuts that keep more money in your pocket rather than requiring you to send it to Madison, changes to laws and regulations that make sense if you're trying to start a business or find a job, and bipartisan investments in worker training are some of the driving forces behind the strong economic recovery.
So, how do we measure the impact of the recovery? Well, the unemployment rate in Wisconsin is the lowest it has been since 2008. Initial unemployment insurance claims are at a 12-year low.
Private sector job creation between April and November was the best since 1994. The seasonally adjusted private sector job growth from November 2012 to November 2013 ranked Wisconsin higher than Minnesota, Iowa, and Illinois.
According to the latest national report, personal income grew 4.4% over the year; faster than the U.S. In fact, Wisconsin ranked as the 4th best state in the country for personal income growth from the second quarter to the third quarter in 2013. After years of a stagnant market, a key component of the American Dream, home sales are up by nearly 11% and housing permits are up 12.9%. And according to quarterly and monthly job reports, more than 100,000 jobs have been created over the past three years.
Let me introduce you some of the people hired since I took office: Joann Stephens from Appleton is employed as a Quality Engineer at Surface Mount Technology. Heyward Gualandi from Madison is employed as a Sales Supervisor at Beechwood Sales and Services. Ben Lang from Brookfield is employed as a Design Engineer at Metcast Service Tech Resources. Dominic Petri from Cedarburg is employed as a Design Engineer at TLX Technologies. Lucas Klemann from Appleton is employed as a CNC Operator at M& M Tool and Mold. Bob Stoffel from Hartford is employed as a Brake Operator at Steel Craft Corporation. Patti Sharer from New Berlin is employed as an Accounting Specialist at Hastings Air Energy Control. Scott Grinder from Reedsburg is employed as a Maintenance Technician at Milwaukee Valve. Rick Banach from Oak Creek is employed as a Supervisor at Rexnord. Angela Hayward from Madison is employed as a Nursing Assistant at UW Hospital and Clinics. David Sohl from Madison is employed as an Organ Procurement Organization Surgical Recovery Coordinator at UW Hospital and Clinics. And Chris Barber of Two Rivers, is employed as a welder at Ariens Company.
As a candidate for Governor, I announced an aggressive jobs goal because I wanted people, like Joann and Heyward and Patti and Rick, to be able to find work. Every time we help someone find a job, it makes for a stronger home, a stronger community, and a stronger state.
Each of these people were looking for a job, or a better opportunity, over the past three years. They represent the people and the families behind the numbers. These are the faces of an improving economy in our state. Wisconsin is going back to work.
When I spoke about our jobs goal more than four years ago, I also made a pledge to help the people of Wisconsin create 10,000 new businesses by 2015.
Tonight, I am proud to announce we exceeded that goal with nearly 13,000 new businesses created so far.This is a great sign for the future as thousands of new employers bring the potential of even more jobs. Think about it, if each of these new ventures grew by 15 employees or more by next year, we would more than exceed our 250,000 jobs goal.
New businesses, like 5-Point Fabrication in Ashwaubenon and SOLOMO Technology in Madison, will help us reach our goal.
Others are helping, too. During the past week, I visited Hartford Finishing in Hartford to announce 94 new jobs. EmbedTek in Hartland committed to creating up to 72 more jobs on Friday.
A & B Process Systems in Stratford hired 50 more people over the past year and Greenheck in Schofield added 209 jobs since 2011. These are just the employers I visited in the past few days.
Throughout the past year, we helped Amazon.com expand and create up to 1,250 jobs here in Wisconsin. EMCO Chemical Distributors moved up from Illinois with about 187 jobs. Hanna Cylinders announced the same thing and brought 105 jobs to our state. All three of these companies moved into Kenosha County. These are just a small sample of the many good news stories showing Wisconsin is going back to work.
This is a stark contrast to the negative job outlook of the past. During my predecessor's last term, Wisconsin lost more than 133,000 jobs and lost more than 27,000 businesses. In 2009, the unemployment rate peaked at 9.2%.
During that same year, Wisconsin's ranking in Chief Executive Magazine's best and worst states for business was 43rd. In 2009, a survey of employers by the chamber of commerce showed just 4% thought our state was heading in the right direction. Now, our ranking is up to 17th—one of the fastest jumps of any state in the country. As of last month, 95% of the employers surveyed said Wisconsin is headed in the right direction. That's right, ninety-five percent.
Another reason for our positive revenue numbers is our prudent fiscal management. Three years ago, we inherited a state government with a $3.6 billion budget deficit. The state had past due bills to Minnesota, owed more than $200 million to the patient compensation fund, and raided $1 billion from the segregated transportation fund. At the same time, they only had $1.7 million in the rainy day fund.
Sure, we had to make some tough decisions, but they paid off. We ended our fiscal year in 2013 with a $759 million surplus; we paid back Minnesota, filled the fund to help injured patients of medical malpractice, and restored funding for transportation. And the rainy day fund, well, it's now 165 times bigger than it was when we took office.
We are turning things around. We are heading in the right direction. We are moving Wisconsin forward.
A year ago, I laid out the priorities my administration would focus on to get our state working again. Let me tell you a bit more about the positive things we are doing to continue to improve our economy, while maintaining a balanced budget:
Manufacturing and agriculture are two of our core industries in Wisconsin. Thankfully, both are playing a big role in our economic recovery. In 2013, CNBC ranked us as one of the top states for new manufacturing jobs. From November 2012 to November 2013, we rank 7th highest in the country in manufacturing job growth.
Milk production went up at double the national rate over the past year. And agricultural exports grew by 6% through the first three quarters of 2013, while dairy exports grew by 34%.
To keep these positive trends going, we put in place the manufacturing and agriculture production tax credit last year. Now, if you are an employer in one of these key industries, you should look at growing in Wisconsin as this credit will eventually wipe out almost all of your taxable liability. That is a really big deal because it gives you the opportunity to invest the capital necessary to help create more jobs. This program is a game changer for employers in manufacturing and agriculture.
Argon Industries in Milwaukee and Gro Alliance in Cuba City told us the credit was a factor in their decision to grow in Wisconsin. Others, like Kenall Manufacturing, decided to move up to Kenosha from Illinois, and the manufacturing tax credit was a big part of their choice to relocate in Wisconsin.
In addition to the credit, we made major investments in agriculture this year. At the University of Wisconsin, we are expanding the Dairy Resource Center at Babcock Hall and building a new Meat Science and Muscle Biology Laboratory. Thank you to our industry partners for matching our investment. We have a similar partnership with Dane County on improvements for the World Dairy Expo.
We are proud to be America's Dairyland, but we are also one of the top states for corn, soybeans, potatoes, cherries, and other foods. Many may be surprised to know we are the number one producer of cranberries in the United States. And 95% of the ginseng exported to China comes from our state. Last April, we signed a ten-year agreement while on my trade mission in China worth between $150 and $200 million, and Tom Hack and Butch Weege from the Ginseng Board of Wisconsin are with me here tonight.
Not only is Asia a major market for our ginseng, many people now come to north central Wisconsin to tour our ginseng operations. Food-and beverage-related tourism continues to grow. From tours of breweries, wineries, cheese factories, cranberry fests, and even spice operations, Wisconsin is a great destination.
Overall, tourism continues to improve across our fine state. I was just at the World Championship Snowmobile Derby in Eagle River this weekend. The crowd was great and the snow was perfect. During the past summer, we made a strategic investment, which will boost Wisconsin's $2.3 billion sport fishing industry; and in less than a year, we have already increased stocking more than four times over, putting 440,000 walleyes into our lakes. In the coming years, resorts, guides, bait dealers, marinas, and all of the other local businesses that depend on good fishing will benefit as Wisconsin becomes the premiere destination for walleye fishing in the Midwest. Yet another reminder that Wisconsin is fun in all four seasons.
Since I took office, the economic impact of the tourism industry has grown by $2 billion to $16.8 billion. We have many great partners, including our 11 tribal governments across the state. After years of cuts to the tourism budget, we put more resources in for marketing in 2011 and, again, in 2013. It is paying off as people see the value for their money in Wisconsin—as well as the incredible hospitality and, most importantly, the FUN at tourism sites all across our great state.
Thankfully, people will have more money to spend at those attractions because of our tax relief. Since 2011, we have reduced the burden on the hard-working taxpayers in Wisconsin by $1.5 billion.
In the budget, we dropped the number of tax brackets and cut tax rates for everyone who pays income taxes in our state. On top of that, we passed $100 million worth of property tax relief this past fall. For the third year in a row, property taxes actually went down on a median-valued home in Wisconsin. In fact, with the tax controls we already put in place, property taxes on a typical home in December of 2014 will actually be lower than they were in December of 2010. What a difference a few years make.
During the ten years before I took office, property taxes went up by 27%. If property taxes had continued to grow at the pace they did during Governor Doyle's final term in office, the typical homeowner would have paid $680 more by the end of this term.
It seems like a long time ago, but taxes went up $1.7 billion in Governor Doyle's last budget in 2009. Four years later, our budget lowered the tax burden by nearly $1 billion.
In addition to putting plenty of money back into the hands of consumers and employers in this state, we are doing more to get people the skills they need to work. As of last Friday, JobsCenterofWisconsin.com, had nearly 50,000 jobs listed on it. However, a significant number of the people looking for work today don't have the skills required for the jobs available. This is why we invested $100 million into worker training. We want to ensure everyone who wants a job can find a job.
Specifically, we just kicked off Wisconsin Fast Forward. This is a program to provide customized worker training in key areas, like manufacturing, construction, and customer service. And we increased support for our technical colleges, so they can expand courses in areas like health care, information technology, and advanced manufacturing.
Together with the University of Wisconsin System, we created the new UW Flexible Option, so adults can reduce the amount of time and money needed to get a UW degree in important areas, like engineering and health care. And we funded new positions at the UW School of Medicine and Public Health and at the Medical College of Wisconsin to increase the number of primary care doctors in rural and underserved areas of the state.
We are also doing more to get skilled tradesmen and women into the workforce. Through November, the number of apprentices is up 34% from the previous year.
Filling all the positions available in the state, now and in the future, also requires us to think and act in new ways. Tonight, I want to share with you the stories of some incredible people. A few might say these individuals have disabilities, but I want to talk about their unique abilities in the workplace.
Patrick Young works at Tailored Label Products in Menomonee Falls. About a year ago, he gave me a tour of where he works. Patrick is here tonight with the COO of that company, Jeff Kerlin. Jeff told me that Patrick adds tremendous value to his company-not only in morale but in productivity.
Like Patrick, Brady Dockendorf and Joe Nueman love their jobs. Both of them are employed at Features Sports Bar and Grille in Holmen. They showed me where they work and their supervisor said they are both key players on their team.
Steven Pils and I first met at the Piggly Wiggly in Lake Geneva. His boss, Mark Stinebrink, is here with him tonight and he says that people go out of their way to go through Steven's checkout lane, just to talk to him.
These are just a few of the many people all across the state who are sometimes defined as having a disability. Thankfully, their employers took a closer look and saw their true abilities.
Similarly, Project SEARCH is a year-long program for high school students with disabilities. One young woman I met has acute autism. Through Project SEARCH, she found a position sterilizing surgical equipment. This was a way to use her unique abilities to do a job that few others could do as well as she does. They identified her ability instead of getting hung up on her disability.
Tonight, I am pleased to announce the start of a year-long initiative called A Better Bottom Line—it's about employment opportunities for people with disabilities. It's an idea borrowed from a friend of mine-Delaware Governor Jack Markell-who used it as his agenda during his recent term as the chair of the National Governors Association.
Make no mistake, A Better Bottom Line is not about charity. A Better Bottom Line means helping both the individual and the company do well. We are looking for ways to help employers hire people who will add value to their organizations.
All throughout 2014, I will highlight employers, who find the unique abilities and hire people with disabilities, as well as organizations, which help people with disabilities grow their skills and find meaningful work.
We will focus on companies, like Walgreens. At one of their distribution centers, where more than 50% of the employees have disabilities, they experienced a 120% productivity increase. Now, they are expanding that successful model to retail locations across the state and the country.
As part of the Blueprint for Prosperity, which I will announ ce tonight, we will use the Wisconsin Fast Forward program to expand Project SEARCH. Currently, there are seven businesses in the program in Wisconsin. We will fund an expansion of 20 more over the next three years.
In addition, the state Division of Vocational Rehabilitation currently serves more than 17,000 people. The recent law I signed at Independent Living Resources in La Crosse will help us serve an additional 6,000 individuals with disabilities. We will use the Wisconsin Fast Forward program to provide training to people with disabilities to fill needs in key industries.
All in all, we understand that for an economic recovery to be real, we cannot leave anyone behind.
We are looking for new ways to help connect people looking for work to the skills they need to fill available jobs across the state. In addition to our tech colleges and our worker training programs, this means investing more in our K-12 schools.
We support Dual Enrollment Academies, like the new one at WCTC, that allows high school seniors from eight school districts to take courses in Information Technology, Tool & Die, and Welding/Fabrication for both high school and technical college credits.
Tonight, I want to introduce some of the students in the program, Thomas Putnam, Justin Cerny, Jacob Rosenthal, Dale Medved, Alexander Hoelke, Samuel Fex, Tyler Polaski, Collin Hodson, John Davis, Zachary Rademan, Micah Kordik, and Scott Thom.
We also enrolled more than 1,200 high school students in the Wisconsin Youth Apprenticeship Program. In December, I signed legislation at Nicolet Technical College to add at least 500 more high school students to the program.
We created a $1,000 per pupil incentive for high schools to provide career and technical education programs. We created a scholarship for high school students, who excel in technical education. To find out more about these and other programs, please visit prosperity.wi.gov.
Employers tell us they have tremendous needs for IT professionals, yet most states do not allow computer science courses to complete math or science requirements for high school graduation. Working with State School Superintendent Dr. Tony Evers, we changed the law with the hope that more young people will pursue careers in computer science-related fields.
Students in other countries have great success identifying skills and interests early in school, so they can take right courses for a career path.
In the state budget, we funded Academic and Career Plans for our schools to help kids as early as sixth grade start preparing for their career.
So many employers tell us they would take on more work and create more jobs, if they could only fill the positions they have open today, particularly in manufacturing. We need to remind our young people about the valuable careers available in our skilled trades. Many students, as well as parents, and even high school guidance counselors, don't know that manufacturing jobs pay 25% more than the average job in Wisconsin, and are more likely to have benefits.
We need to recognize the manufacturing advantage we have here in Wisconsin. It means valuing our sons and daughters, who are high skilled welders and machinists and tool and die operators, as much those who are doctors and lawyers.
Overall, our reforms help improve the quality of education for all of our students in Wisconsin. A recent report by the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance showed the reforms we put into place in 2011 gave schools the tools to more than make up for the budget adjustments. Plus, schools can hire and fire based on merit, they can pay based on performance, which means we can put the best and brightest in our classrooms and pay to keep them there.
Every child, regardless of where they live or what their parents do for a living deserves a chance to have a great education at the public school, charter school, choice school, virtual school, or home school environment right for them. With this in mind, we increased funding for our traditional public schools by $387 million and expanded the choice program for other families across the state.
We are proud of our positive reforms in education. ACT scores continue to be higher than the national average, graduation rates are better than when I took office, and also, third grade reading scores are up.
We are also working to make college more affordable for students and their families. As the father of two sons who are in college, I can relate. After years of 5.5% average tuition increases, we now have a two-year tuition freeze, for the first time in the history of the UW System.
Last year, I met Anastasia McCain at UW-Green Bay. She is pretty impressive. She goes to school full-time and works three jobs to cover the costs of her textbooks, supplies, and housing. She told me that our tuition freeze is taking weight off her parents, as they work to send three kids to college, and allowing her to save money toward her goal: law school.
Along with her tonight are Hannah Bresson and Stephanie Johnson from UW-La Crosse. I met Hannah and Stephanie at their school when I announced our tuition freeze. And they, like students at campuses across the state, appreciate the break on their tuition. Thanks for being here.
In addition to improving education, reforming government also helps create jobs. Many of the employers moving from Illinois to Wisconsin mention our stable fiscal situation, as well as our improving economic climate, as reasons for their move north.
Unlike Illinois, our pension fund is the only one in the country that is fully funded. Wisconsin's per capita pension and debt level is one of the lowest in the country. Stability at both the state and local level is good for employers, who want to grow, and for those who want to come to Wisconsin.
Our unemployment insurance reforms save employers tens of millions of dollars, while protecting the unemployed as they seek work. We are trying to make it easier to create jobs.
Most importantly, we are helping people transition from government dependence to true independence. We are helping people live the American Dream, which comes, not from the heavy hand of the government, but from the dignity that comes from work. Our reforms offer people more freedom, more opportunity, and, ultimately, more prosperity.
Our reforms are based on common sense. We ask those receiving unemployment checks to seek work four or more times a week instead of two. We ask adults without children seeking food stamps to enroll in employment training. We're not making it harder to get government assistance; we're making it easier to get a job.
We are putting in place similar reforms for Medicaid, too. Years ago, under Governor Doyle, eligibility for BadgerCare Plus went up, but not enough funds were budgeted, so many people living in poverty were put on a waiting list. This year, for the first time in Wisconsin history, everyone living in poverty will be able to access health care under Medicaid.
For those living above poverty, we transition them into the marketplace. I believe Medicaid is for those living in poverty, and our goal should be to help lift more and more people out of the depths of economic despair.
Our Wisconsin Plan is unique as we are able to cover everyone living in poverty, reduce the number of uninsured, and still not expose Wisconsin taxpayers to the uncertain potential cost of the federal Medicaid expansion.
Helping more people transition from government dependence to true independence is not only good for the taxpayers, it is good for employers, too, as more and more jobs are created in our growing economy and employers need more skilled workers to fill those positions. Most importantly, it is good for the people, who can now control their own lives and their own destinies.
Yet another way to improve the economy is to put people to work building and maintaining our infrastructure. After my predecessor raided more than $1 billion from the state transportation fund, we reversed that trend.
In our current budget, we invest $6.4 billion into the state transportation system.
This is welcome news for all those who work so hard to build and maintain our roads and bridges. People like the crew with me tonight, who helped open the Leo Frigo Memorial Bridge in Green Bay ahead of schedule and on budget. With us are Dean Schmitz, Matthew Gehrman, Brian Firari and Travis Schreiner from Zenith Tech, and Scott Nachreiner and Joseph Quist from Lunda. We are also joined by some of our hard-working folks from Department of Transportation; Will Dorsey, Robert Arndorfer, Dale Weber, Randy Asman, Tom Buchholz, and Brian Roper. Thank you all for your hard work and thank you to Secretary Mark Gottlieb for your leadership in completing this project so quickly.
Good roads and bridges and freight rail and ports and transit and airports are important to more than just construction workers, they are vital to a thriving economy. All sorts of industries rely on a strong transportation system: manufacturers, farmers, miners, loggers, retailers, and many others.
Overall, this is just a summary of all of the good work we are doing to improve the economy and to strengthen our fiscal standing. Tonight, I thank our partners in the private sector, as well as my staff, our Cabinet, and our state employees for their hard work over the past few years to meet these objectives.
I also thank you, the members of the state Legislature, for your partnership. Our work together to enact meaningful reforms is a sharp contrast to the dysfunction often on display in our nation's capital. Since taking office, more than 97% of the bills I have signed into law have had bipartisan support. We do more than talk, we get positive things done for the people of our state and I want to thank you for working with me to do just that.
We've made tremendous progress on the priorities I outlined a year ago, and now, we're seeing positive results. Looking ahead, we have the opportunity to do even more good work for the people of Wisconsin. Again, I ask for your help and support.
Tonight, I propose a Blueprint for Prosperity to help provide more opportunities for the citizens of Wisconsin.
Specifically, I ask you to work with me over the next few weeks to return the vast majority of the new surplus directly to the hard-working taxpayers of Wisconsin and to add more than $100 million to the state's rainy day fund. As it has over the past few years, lowering the tax burden will contribute to a stronger economy and a better fiscal situation in the future.
Our Blueprint for Prosperity will put more than $800 million back into the hands of the hard-working taxpayers all across the state through tax cuts and withholding changes. Once passed, the total tax relief provided since I took office will be roughly $2 billion.
First, we will reduce property taxes by $406 million. This is more than four times larger than the property tax relief we passed last year, and it is vitally important to protect working families, senior citizens, farmers, and small businesses. The typical homeowner will see an actual reduction of $101 dollars on their next property tax bill.
Second, we will reduce income taxes by $98.6 million. To ensure we don't leave anyone behind in our economic recovery, we will target this tax relief to the lowest income tax bracket. If you're a family of four making $40,000, your savings will be $58. No one will get a bigger savings than that.
Third, earlier today, I directed Revenue Secretary Rick Chandler to adjust withholding for state income taxes by $322.6 million, so you can keep more of your hard-earned paycheck. This will put more money in the hands of consumers and will continue to stimulate the economy. Starting in April, a typical working family of four will see $57.90 more in their paychecks each month. By the end of this year, that's more than $520 dollars.
For everyone watching from home, go to Prosperity.WI.gov to see how much you will save under our plan, and then contact your legislator to offer your support.
In addition, our Blueprint for Prosperity will increase the Wisconsin Fast Forward program by $35 million to focus on three new areas:
First, investment in our technical colleges to eliminate waiting list in high demand fields, like manufacturing, agriculture and Information Technology;
Second, help high school students get training in high demand jobs through dual enrollment programs between our high schools and technical colleges;
And third, support programs helping people with disabilities enter the workforce, as I outlined in our Year of A Better Bottom Line initiative.
I ask that the funds already set aside in the Joint Finance Committee from the surplus at the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation be used for the expansion of Wisconsin Fast Forward.
Tonight, I'm calling on you, the members of the Legislature to pass this Blueprint For Prosperity and return this money to the people of the state. Tomorrow, I will call for a special session to move forward with legislation to return this surplus to the taxpayers and to invest in our technical colleges, train workers for high-demand jobs, and support employment opportunities for people with disabilities.
When I ran for governor, Wisconsin faced big economic and fiscal crises. As I travelled the state then, I saw the impact that job losses had on so many individuals and families. I saw the stress on the faces of people all across the state as so many worried about making the mortgage each month or paying to put food on the table. It was then and there that I set a big goal to make up for the jobs lost in the past and to aim high for a recovery that did not leave anyone behind.
To take on the economic and fiscal crises of the past, we came in and made some pretty bold moves. Now, three years later, we see a dramatic turnaround in our state. These are historic times. The $911 million budget surplus shows that the economy is coming back strong as more people are working, more employers are hiring and personal income is up.
Our reforms are helping the people of Wisconsin create more jobs and more opportunity and these reforms are helping restore fiscal sanity to state and local governments. Tonight, I call on the members of the Legislature to continue to build on these positive reforms by passing our Blueprint for Prosperity.
Some might say that we should keep more of this surplus in Madison. I disagree.
When I travel the state, people don't tell me that they want to keep sending more money to Madison. They don't tell me that taxes are too low or even that taxes are just right. Overwhelmingly, people across the state tell me that one of the best ways to fuel the economic recovery is to reduce their tax burden.
The best way to prepare for the future is by continuing to grow our economy, not by keeping more money in Madison. With a rainy day fund seven times larger than we had ever had before I took office, now is the time to send your money back to you, the hard working taxpayers of Wisconsin.
Now is the time to add to the many faces of the economic recovery that you saw earlier.
Now is the time to ensure that budget surpluses, like the one we celebrate here tonight – continue in the future.
Now is the time, once again, to put the power back in to the hands of the people.
Now is the time to pass our Blueprint for Prosperity, and help move Wisconsin forward.
Thank you, God bless you, and may God bless the great State of Wisconsin.


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text: Good morning. I'm Renee Montagne. Rent is notoriously high in London and especially so during the Olympic Games. That's why David Weeks stuffed his cab with a mattress, radio, mini-fridge and teddy bear. The cabbie is parking it outside his flat to rent out to tourists for about 80 bucks a night, much cheaper than most hotels, but there's still rules - no smoking and no pets. The vacancy sign is still on, but he's calling it the Hail-a-Hotel. It's MORNING EDITION. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.


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We stayed in Carmel, CA, at the Cypress Inn, one of the many cute Carmel hotels that cater to dogs and people alike. In fact, one could argue that owners play second fiddle in this dog-obsessed town where it's hard to find a restaurant that doesn't take pets. Rocky even got his own menu at The Forge, where the chef is happy to prepare a dog-sized portion of entrees such as oven-roasted chicken and filet mignon. Sheesh, who's birthday is this anyway?!? I don't think Rocky's doughnut-shaped tail stopped wagging all weekend.
The family wisely slept in as I crept out at 3am Sunday morning to catch the bus to the start. Nervous first-timers were bright-eyed and ready, eager to get any advice from the more experienced runners that were trying to sleep. It was an international event for sure - I sat with folks from France, Canada, Kansas, and China, all of whom were coming back for their 3rd-5th time. The bus rocked back and forth slowly as we made our way through the dark.
We stepped off the bus to the sound of bagpipes, and found some places to stay warm for the hour before the race. The buses were unloading thousands of runners, walkers, and relay runners. I'm not sure why I had the impression this was a small race - it's huge! The race management was handling it well, and before we knew it we were taking our places in the start corral around 6:30am. The fog was still thick, but it had warmed to 50 degrees. Not bad for running!
Since it was my birthday, I was hoping to have a mellow run down the coast with lots of pictures, a few new friends, and be coherent enough at the end to drink beer (and thus become incoherent...well, it made sense at the time). I figured I would shoot for a 3:30 finish time, which was easy enough to smile, but fast enough that I would still have to climb hard at Hurricane Point, the big climb at mile 11. I taped up my feet, finished up my coconut water, slipped on my Injinji's, and decided that a hat and gloves would suffice to stay warm and dry. When I heard the call for "3:30 runners", I made my way to the start.
The race was delayed a few minutes to get us in line, but at 6:55am I heard the collective "bleep" of everyone setting their watches and we all headed up the coast. The first couple of miles were a nice, easy downhill. It was hard to go any faster than the crowd, so I just did my best to relax even as I heard the mile splits of "8:30/mile" that made the devil in me swear I would never line up in the back of a race again. ;-) Relax, devil! No need to go fast on the birthday.
The redwoods were beautiful, towering up on either side of us beyond the fog ceiling. At mile 3, we passed one of many bands that came out to support us in the wee hours of the morning (thanks, guys!) and the sun began to peek through in places. The ocean came into full view at one point, and none of us could take our eyes off the waves lit up by the morning sun. This is truly God's country.
Then a 30 mph gust brought the fog bank right into our chests. God's country, indeed! And he/she has one helluva pitching arm. The gusts didn't last long, and calmed to a 5-8 mph headwind that kept the fog in our faces like a cooling fan. Much like the Boston Marathon two weeks ago, the cool weather allowed everyone to pick up the pace.
Now that the runners were spread out, my legs wanted to go-go-go. Please! It's our birthday too! I picked up the pace to a 7:20 min/mile, racing along with the hawks hunting in the nearby fields. We approached the first relay handoff with great fanfare, and within 100 yards, the ranks were flush with fresh legs that could keep the 7:20 min/mile pace.
I caught up to a group of New York Harriers who were already looking forward to their "mile 27 aid station at the pub". They were smiling ear-to-ear and having a great time. As we ran together, we came upon Dean Karnazes, who was doing a double (start at 2am and run Big Sur backwards, then run the marathon with us normal people). I didn't recognize Dean at first since he's sportin' thick locks of hair these days and is looking very lean, but sure enough, it was him. I chatted with Dean a bit, and as we were talking, one of the Harriers asked me, "oh my God, you aren't Dean are you? We love that guy." I said "no, but HE is Dean." She recognized him and started jumping up and down, asking if anyone had a camera. Dean said, "that's why you need to meet Scott too - he definitely has a camera." With one quick pic, we captured the energy of the moment, and I raced forward with a smile. I love it when that happens!
Nargus Harounzadeh join Dean Karnazes for a few miles)
At mile 8, we began rolling up a slight hill into the cloud of fog above us. This seemed to be a telling moment for many runners as some eased up to save their energy while others seemed to go even harder, confident they have trained for the hills. I began thinking that the cloud cover was helpful for psychological purposes - if you can't see the top, you don't know to be worried!
I ran with a gentleman from France who was training for the Tour de Mont Blanc, and asked him how this course was helping. He said, "because it's fun?". Gotta love the ultrarunners. ;-)
At mile 10, the relay runners swapped for fresh legs, and we began the 500' vertical climb up Hurricane Point. This climb doesn't ever get outrageously steep, but the headwind got stronger as we got higher, making it all the more difficult. At the top, it was blowing a solid 15-20 mph. This was a good test of will for all the first-time marathoners, and I was impressed that hardly anyone was slowing to a walk. I leaned forward and threw my arms as much as possible to keep my pace.
As we all exchanged high-fives at the top, I felt a surge of energy and really cranked it up for the downhill. The mile marker folks said "3:23 pace" at mile 12, so I was definitely making up some time. But best of all, it just felt good to run fast! How lucky am I that I can spend my 38th birthday doing this? Thinking about it just made me want to run even faster. The theme from Chariots of Fire was running through my head, and then I realized it wasn't in my head - it was coming from the grand piano on the bluff! Such an odd sight to see Michael Martinez in his tux cranking away on a full-sized grand piano in the middle of nowhere. I just had to get a pic!
Ocean waves crashing, jagged mountain-scapes, and live music created a Zen state of inspiration that made me want to sprout wings and fly. Isn't running as fast as we can how runners bear witness to the beauty of a new course? Must...go...faster. I pushed my strides a few inches farther, and let my pace creep up to 6:20 min/mile. Aaahhh, me like it!
As if I needed one last boost to go fast, my camera died with a whimper at mile 20. That's it, birthday boy, nothing to focus on but running. I did the math in my head - I could do 3:10 if I held 6 min/miles for the remainder of the race. My legs and head agreed - a Boston qualifying time is something to be proud of on this course, and a worthy birthday present. I picked up a beat from a Native American drum circle and channeled it through my feet.
I found a lane on the far right, and went hard. I ran past fellow ultra runner Kevin Swisher, who was fresh off his 8:20 finish at the American River 50 and looking good for a sub-3:15 finish here. I was leaning forward, kicking hard, throwing my arms, and taking the aid stations at full speed (quite unsuccessfully, I might add). The predicted finish splits were getting closer..."3:14" at mile 23, "3:13" at 24, wait...oh, crap. That's not fast enough. At mile 25, I did the math to the seconds - I needed a 5:55 min final mile to get 3:10:59.
I don't know about you guys, but I don't run 5:55 min/miles very often, and certainly not at the end of a marathon. But here I was, needing one, and having a slight downhill grade to give me a boost. Who said I can't get faster at age 38?!? Damn it, I was running against Father Time and if it was up to me, he was about to get chumped. So I just closed my eyes and ran, trying to keep my form as much as possible. The cheers of the crowd brought me in, and I looked up at the finish - 3:10:58 - made it by one second! And I felt surprisingly good. Once again, it appears our limits are largely self-imposed.
The family was waiting for me at the finish (to you family supporters, this means A LOT!), where the sun was beginning to finally burn down the fog. It was such a glorious day, and it was only 10:30am! We still had time to go to the beach, hit the Monterey Aquarium (definitely Sophie's favorite stop), and enjoy dinner at Casanova's. I sure hope the Big Sur Marathon lands on my birthday again next year, for I will certainly be back. My thanks to the great race directors, volunteers, musicians, and fellow runners who helped make this such a great day.


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Hollywood Latest Trend
Growing Crowd of Celebrity Wines Take the Spotlight
Fancy having Brangelina, Drew Barrymore and Dan Aykroyd over for dinner? No problem, they'll even bring the wine.
OK, maybe the stars themselves won't show up, but their wines will appear with just a wave of a credit card. You might start with an aperitif of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt's new Miraval rose, move on to a light pasta dish served with Barrymore Wine's pinot grigio, then perhaps finish up with a glass of Aykroyd's cabernet franc ice wine for dessert.
It's hard to put a number on celebrity wines, a category that includes singers, sports stars, chefs and more. But Danny Brager, vice president for alcoholic beverages at market research firm Nielsen, says there's close to 100 on the market at the moment. "It keeps growing all the time," he said.
With thousands and thousands of wines out there, having a recognizable name on the label can help. "Just breaking through the clutter can be hugely difficult and I think that's where a recognized name just in and of itself can help break through that clutter," said Brager.
Interestingly, the average price for all 750-milliliter bottles of wine in the Nielsen database is $9. Average price for celebrity wines: $20. That could be due to a number of factors, including the type of wine the celebrity is selling — some are drawn to high-end efforts. Still, "it's a significant gap," Brager points out.
Jasper Russo, the fine wine buyer for Sigel's wine and spirits store in Dallas, recently held a tasting of celebrity wines, including Miraval, a partnership between Jolie and Pitt and the Perrin French winemaking family. "When you have someone with that kind of serious winemaking background, that's going to tell you something," said Russo. There's a flip side, too. "It tells me volumes when I can't find out from your website who's making the wine."
True wine aficionados are "going to judge the wine based on what the wine tastes like in the glass. But you have lots of customers who are not that picky about the wine. For them, wine is just a hedonistic experience. They don't want to analyze the wine; they just want to enjoy it," he said. "If you're a Brangelina fan, it's cool to have that on the table."
Miraval is made from grapes grown at Chateau Miraval, Pitt and Jolie's place in the south of France. "I was prepared for it to be not quite as good and I'd still be able to sell it, but I was happy with the quality," Russo said. "It had a wonderful strawberry, raspberry, mineral character to it and a great finish." And here at Wine n' About, we're proud to say that Brangelina's Miraval is our exclusive in Thailand! Contact us for more info!
Levels of celebrity involvement vary from not much at all to sitting in on blending sessions to taking an active role in the winery.
And then there's renowned tenor Andrea Bocelli of Bocelli Family Wines, who put a new twist on the celebrity wine connection. Born into an Italian winemaking family, Bocelli pursued a singing career and has since returned to his roots helping promote the family wines.
In an email interview, Bocelli said he spent hours in the vineyards as a boy and also worked with his father and brother in the cellar. "It was always a sort of miracle to smell the fermentation and taste the wine afterward," said Bocelli, who is blind.
Bocelli's singing career, which is ongoing, had a direct effect on the winery, said Joshua Hanson, director of Seattle-based August Wine Group, importer for Bocelli Family Wines since 2005 and co-owner of the brand. When the tenor began traveling the world with his career he learned more about wine, bringing back some of the world's best bottles as well as information on the latest in cellar techniques to share with his late father, Alessandro, and brother Alberto, the chief winemaker and estate manager.
The family brought in professionals to help elevate their wines and now make small quantities of high-end wines exclusively from their own grapes. They also have partnered with local growers to make a sangiovese, Bocelli Rosso Toscana, and Bocelli Prosecco sparkling wine, which have a suggested retail price of $20 each.
While Andrea Bocelli is involved in promoting the wines — and has been known to burst into a little impromptu song at tasting events — the labels don't carry anything but the family name.
"Our whole strategy from day one has been to ground it continually in their generational history," said Hanson. "They've been making very good wine for 130 years and they're very serious about it. It's not a new, kind of, 'I'll give wine a try because it's sexy.'"
Dan Aykroyd wine: http://www.danaykroydwines.com
Drew Barrymore wine: http://www.barrymorewines.com
Jolie-Pitt wine: http://www.miraval-provence.com
Bocelli wine: http://www.bocellifamilywines.com


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Here is your open thread for the week of February 23rd, 2015. You may post random links and off-topic discussions here. Also, if you have an idea or a topic you'd like to see covered in an article, please make it known.
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a legal fight with a twist. The state will argue that the sect's children are at risk at the compound, but not because every one of them has been physically or sexually abused.
Instead, they will say that the culture of the church, which encouraged girls to marry and bear children in their early teens, was a danger to any child immersed in it.
"There was a pervasive belief that children having children was what they were supposed to do," said Patrick Crimmins, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services.
To those who study polygamist cultures, the crackdown seems like something out of the distant past. Something that, in the past, had reliably backfired.
That's been my take from the get go: Officials were initially worried the raid would turn into "another Waco," but they had the wrong analogy. They should have been worried it would become "another Short Creek," the 1953 raid in southern Utah that ripped women and children from their homes for 2-3 years before finally returning them all.
To help me think about our core discomfort with this culture's version of a girl's role, choices, and self-determination, this morning I went searching for biblical dicta on marriage, and the following passage jumped out at me:
"in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing doctrines and spirits, and doctrines of devils; speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with hot iron; forbidding to marry and commanding to abstain from meats which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth.
"For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer."
Of course, St. Paul's point of reference wasn't polygamous marriage, but marriage between Jews and gentiles, a point over which he disputed with Christ's disciples in Jerusalem throughout his various missionary journeys. (I've often wished we could have read St. Peter's rebuttal.)
The Apostle Paul can be blamed for a lot of the attitudes about marriage and child bearing that the state of Texas now aims to prosecute, starting with his admonition, "wives, submit to your husbands." Paul went on to say in 1 Timoth 5:14: "I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, [and] give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully." (All quotes from the KJV.) That sounds a lot to me like the values CPS criticized among FLDS women that made them such a threat. (For that matter, as mentioned earlier on Grits, a case for polygamy, too, may be firmly established in the biblical canon.)
Most of Christendom doesn't consider the heretical religion founded by Joseph Smith in America to fall under the Christian umbrella, but Mormons accept the Christian Bible as canonical and a lot of criticisms about an oppressive ideology that too narrowly defines a woman's role (e.g., that her "highest purpose" is raising children, as the CPS investigators testified of FLDS women) can be applied equally to extremist versions of both faiths.
In mainstream culture, we've come to think of this debate playing out between feminists and Christian women, with the latter complaining the former want to "liberate" them against their will from a life raising children and running the household, as Paul advised to Saint Timothy.
The content of the complaint is similar to the backlash from conservative women when Hillary Clinton became First Lady and made derisive comments about "baking cookies." Partially for these reasons, Mormons overall have been drawn largely by the cultural conservatism of the religious right into the Republican party in recent years.
It's precisely this thread of belief, common to Christianity and Mormonism, that animates much of the culture war debate between feminism and religious folk. Quarkstomper over at Street Prophets recently lamented this common ideological thread:
My wife left the church long ago because she felt alienated by the attitudes towards women ... As far as she's concerned, all religions have the same attitudes as this group in Texas. I try to tell her different. I try to tell her that Jesus isn't about enslaving women; that God isn't about enslaving women; that the Gospel isn't about enslaving women. But people like James Dobson and Jerry Falwell and this Warren Jeffs guy tell her I'm wrong.Most Americans today, whether religious or not, take it as gospel that a young women should have a range of options and the ability to choose among them. At the same time, everyone think some options are better than others.
Although the state didn't find many young pregnant teens at the YFZ Ranch, the outcry over FLDS practices has been widespread. The revulsion of 21st century sensibilities to what are essentially 19th century values, attitudes, and practices was painstakingly expressed recently in three posts on Orcinus: Secret Lives of Saints, Are FLDS Women Brainwashed?, and What We're Not Talking About, Part I: Other Issues With the FLDS.
That baseline, essentially "feminist" position, though, errs when it fails to understand that liberation may come in many different forms, and that a life of service to family and faith may be as liberating, for some, as breaking glass ceilings and workplace barriers are for others. None of us possess any sure-fire recipe for happiness in this short life, and in the absence of such a formula, many still turn to God for advice on topic, as they understand Him, or whatever texts they believe represent God's views.
How odd it is, then, to see this attempt to forcibly liberate religious women from family and faith led by Governor Perry, Gregg Abbott, Rep. Harvey Hildebran (who changed Texas' marriage age to target FLDS), the Texas Rangers, and hundreds of armed police backed by helicopters and an armored personnel carrier.
The question in Eldorado, as in all feminism vs. religion debates, is whether women's call to marriage and child bearing is chosen or coerced. (We know their removal by the state was coerced.) But some who've left FLDS say the kids there are free to reject marriages or leave the community, and I've little reason to believe polygamous marriages disempower women any more than monogamous ones. Columnist Robert Kirby of the Salt Lake Tribune describes himself as "a Mormon descended on both sides from staunch the-federal-government-can-go-to-hell polygamists,"and tells this story about his own polygamist ancestors:
My great-great-grandfather Nathaniel married three women. Wife No. 1 was OK. However, I have a copy of the letter Wife No. 2 wrote to Brigham Young begging him to let her divorce Nathaniel because Wife No. 1 was so mean. See?Kirby's great-great grandmother doesn't sound too disempowered to me.
Wife No. 3 - my great-great-grandmother and one of Salt Lake's first female doctors - didn't bother with the letter. She threw Nathaniel out and became Wife No. 6 to some other guy a few blocks away.
Even so, society's views toward a woman's role have changed a lot since Kirby's great-great grandma's time, much less since St. Paul wrote St. Timothy nearly 2,000 years ago. When feminism's ideological victory finally came, I never expected it would result in self-styled conservative pols using the brute force of the state to seize children from marriages "received in thanksgiving of those who believe." That odd role reversal is one of the things that make this debate so compelling.
A SELF-INDULGENT ASIDE: I couldn't help but think of the FLDS kids riding away from their parents in buses after spending part of yesterday evening entertaining the grandbaby. She's just beginning to talk, and with a little prompting picked up on the phrase "Yippie Ki Yay" from an old country & western song, with her and I repeating it back and forth to one another gleefully for several minutes. (You haven't seen cute until you've witnessed an 18-month old dancing and shouting "Yippie Ki Yay," flinging her arms into the air with a big grin.)
When she left, I wrote this and nearly added it to yesterday's post, then re-read it and found it a little hoakie. As the missus occasionally reminds me, I'm no poet. But on this blog what gets written ultimately tends to get posted sooner or later, so with that caveat and background, here you go:
I'll never forget that sad April day
When the Baptists brought buses and
Cops hauled us away
From our home on the ranch
Where the kids used to play
And sing "Ki Yi Yippe Ki Yay"
I'll never forget how all we knelt and prayed
While men with machine guns
Filed in like a parade
By the hundreds, an army
Swarmed God's holy place
Singing "Ki Yi Yippe Ki Yay"
I'll never forget hearing Judge Walther say
That my parents' beliefs were
Abusive per se
And I needed protection
From them and their faith
She sang "Ki Yi Yippe Ki Yay"
So they brought in more buses and swept me away
Into foster care, now the Judge
Says I am safe
But I don't feel that way
All alone and afraid
Singing "Ki Yi Yippe Ki Yay Ki Yay"
Singing "Ki Yi Yippe Ki Yay"


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Special Feature
Former interim UFC heavyweight champion Shane Carwin retires...
If you want to talk about the legacy of Shane Carwin, the former interim UFC heavyweight champion who retired Tuesday at the age of 38, the most telling aspect of his relatively short, yet explosive, UFC career was that you can never say he was in a boring fight.
A lot of that had to do with the fact that with one swing of his fists, a fight could end suddenly, but it's also a testament to the fact that for someone with such obvious physical gifts when it came to size, power, and athleticism, he was still just a fighter at heart. Carwin was a fierce competitor who would take one to give one, and sometimes – as in his 2009 fight with Gabriel Gonzaga – it worked, as he rebounded from a broken nose to knock his opponent out seconds later. Other times, as in what would end up to be his final bout against Junior dos Santos in 2011, it didn't, but even after taking a steady thrashing from the future heavyweight champion, the idea of quitting never entered his mind.
So when Carwin tweeted "Officially retired 2day:-) thank you to my family, friends and fans! #dreambig GOD BLESS!!!" Tuesday evening, you had to assume that it wasn't from a series of losses or a realization that he couldn't compete with the best in the world anymore, but that his body finally overruled his heart and mind and made the decision that it was time for him to walk away.
That would come as little surprise to fight game insiders, who saw Carwin battle with serious back and neck injuries for years, some dating back to his college football days, when the two-time Division II All-American linebacker for Western State College saw his back ailments keep him from pursuing a career in the NFL. Of course, the gridiron's loss was mixed martial arts' gain, as Carwin – who was also a Division II National wrestling champion – soon turned to fighting, making his debut in October of 2005 with a first round win over Carlton Jones.
Going home early became a habit for Carwin, who didn't see the second round until his 2010 title fight with Brock Lesnar. That was his 13th pro bout. In the previous 12, Carwin was a force of destruction, tearing through all opposition, and ending five of those bouts in less than a minute.
In 2008, he made his UFC debut with a 44 second knockout of Christian Wellisch, and after similarly impressive finishes of Neil Wain and Gonzaga, he was matched up with Frank Mir on March 27, 2010 for the interim UFC heavyweight title. Three minutes and 48 seconds after the opening bell, Carwin had his 12th victory and a championship belt.
Four months later, it was a clash of the titans between Carwin and Lesnar for the unified title, and after rocking Lesnar early, Carwin was on the verge of a stoppage win as he pounded his foe across the Octagon and back. As he told me after the fight, "The type of fighter that I am, I'm not going out there to score points, I'm going out there to try to wreck that guy."
And maybe with a referee with a quicker hook in there, Carwin might have walked away with the title. But Josh Rosenthal gave Lesnar every opportunity to defend himself and get back in the fight, and that's just what the champion did.
"The thing is that I had been there previously in all my fights, and I just go for the kill," said Carwin. "And that's what I did. Rosenthal said on multiple times, 'Brock, you've got to show me something or I'm gonna stop the fight.' When you hear that as the top guy, you try to pick up the pace to make the ref jump in and stop it, and it was a relentless pace there for a while. I just didn't get the stoppage."
Then the bell intervened, and when the second round began, Carwin said "there was nothing there." 2:19 into round two, Lesnar submitted Carwin with an arm triangle choke.
It was one of the most epic heavyweight fights ever, but Carwin was unable to jump right back into the mix and fight for a rematch, as his next bout would be with a surgeon's knife. When he did return, he lost the three rounder to dos Santos, and then it was back into surgery. It would be his last fight.
Yet unlike some fighters in the combat sports world, who find themselves unable to cope with life beyond the final bell, Carwin is a pretty safe bet to break that mold. A family man with two degrees and a full-time gig as an engineer in his native Colorado, the 38-year-old prepared for life after fighting before it became a reality. And now that he is walking off into the sunset with a final record of 12-2, he can not only be secure that his family is taken care of, but that he put together a fighting career that he can be proud of.
But oh, how we'll miss those knockouts.
Power Slap