text:
" Bright and chunky musical keyboard with illuminated buttons and illustrated note book. Two modes of play, learning or music mode - learn colours, animals and instruments. / Type: Musical Toy "
* Prices may differ from that shown
We got this when my son was around the 6 month mark. He loved it then and still does now although interacts with it in different ways. I think he'll definitly continue to enjoy it for the next 6 months (taking him up to 2 years).
It has a few different features
-A book with a spiral bind. The pages are quite sturdy and not hugely breakable.
- A chunky keyboards with 5 keys of different notes
- A microphone- You have to get quite close to it for it to amplify your voice. My son at the moment lieks to put it right to his mouth and just go "AHHHH" down it! It crackles quite a bit.
- A drum button which sets of a drum beat.
- 5 musical notes buttons which when pressed play different nursery rhymes.
- A dog. I dont really know his purpose, you just wiggle him around he woofs! This is fine by my son though as dogs are one of his favourite animals and he likes to point at it and say "dog" and imitate the woofing noise.
The keyboard also lights up, this was one of the things that had my son entranced when we first got it. Now i think he prefers the musical activity and the interactivity- he cant get enough of pushing the buttons.
Its a vtech toy, as a brand I love vtech we rarely find a toy by them we dont like although I do think they can be quite pricey! As Ive found with some other vtech toys the two volume options are both particuarly loud!
The toy takes 4xAA batteries which screw in at the back. The battery life for this toy is great, we dont use this toy everyday but my son is now 18 months and we havent yet had to change the batteries. They are in need of replacement though as in the last few days the toy will go a little slow or out of tune but for almost a years worth I think thats great.
You can get these from around £15 at Debenhams, they seem to be a bit pricier elsewhere. I think £15 is a good price but I dont think I'd want to may more but maybe I'm a little stingy!
However I like the variety of features and the chunky keys are great for little fingers. I would definitly reccomend as a Christmas present for your (or someone elses!) baby.
Our daughter loves this little piano. It has several different activities to keep little ones amused.
The piano keys at the bottom play different notes when you press them and the corresponding light above lights up. they are brightly coloured and have little pictures on.
Then there is a little white disk to the left and to be honest i have never really understood what this is, maybe it is meant to be a kind of drum?
The best feature for our daughter is the microphone, she loves singing (more like shouting!) into it and hearing her voice amplified, she finds this fascinating and it makes us laugh watching her!
Then there is a story book this is really just two plastic sheets with pictures one and it allows you to use the piano in activity mode, our daughter is too young for this but she likes turning the pages.
Finally there is the little conductor joystick, he wobbles around when you move him but again it has never been clear exactly what he does? He seems bark and make the lights flash but that's all?
all in all this is a nice little toy but not very simple to operate (even for an adult)
It is nice and colourful and has two sound settings which is always a bonus.
Nice toy but a bit confusing
This is a toy that we inherited from my Auntie as my cousin is about a year and a half older than my youngest daughter so we have had quite a few things passed down from her.
The toy is by Vtech and I do tend to like Vtech toys and so do my children, I trust Vtech toys as I have never found a really bad one. My daughter was given this piano when she was about a year old and it is kept at my parents house and although it isn't a toy she plays with everyday she still often plays with it.
I have had a look for the purposes of this review and you can buy this toy currently at Argos for £22.99 which I would say is about the right price as it has loads of activities on it to keep little ones interested. The toy is aimed at children who are aged 6 months and over which I would say is about right as really it is about the age they begin to sit up.
The toy runs off 4 x AA batteries which came with it when w3e got it but my Auntie may have put them in, the battery pack is on the underneath of the toy and shut with a screw so your child cannot accidentally open it. The toy has two volume controls which I always like as generally in my house both children will decide to play with noisy toys at the same time.
The piano is made of mainly white plastic, there is a book on a spiral bind at the top and the pages are made of thick cardboard with a sort of laminated finish, there are 5 big chunky keys to the keyboard and then there is a microphone and a couple of other buttons and rollers for your child to play with so there is loads to keep their attention. The toy is very brightly coloured as you would expect from a baby toy and once my daughter is playing with it it really does hold her attention for quite long periods of time.
The book plays a big learning part to this toy, it has different things on each page, there is a page of animals, a page of shapes and a page of nursery rhymes. Depending on what page the book is on when a key is pressed on the keyboard is corresponds to the book, the blue key is for the circle and the elephant, the orange key is for the triangle and the monkey, the red key is for the square and the cat, the yellow key is for the heart and the pig and finally the green key is for the star and the bird.
When you press each key it will announce the corresponding shape or animal depending which page you are on which I think is a great way for your little one to learn. I can sit and play with my daughter and point to the things that the keyboard is announcing to help her learn which I think is really good and gives an easy way for parents to help their children learn along with the toy.
The nursery rhymes option plays 5 different well known nursery rhymes which we love to sing along to and for all my daughter barely even speaks yet she makes noises in tune with the rhymes which I think is really cute. The green gives you row, row, row your boat, the yellow frera Jacque, the orange pop goes the weasel which Emily laughs at when we sing pop, the red gives a song of three little kittens and the blue is ring o ring o roses which Sophie likes to do the actions to for Emily.
The microphone on the toy isn't really that could and just really crackles more than anything else. There is a little dog button which when wiggled will say woof woof and a drum button which of course sounds like a drum. All of the buttons are really easy to press so they are great for little hands and they don't need you constantly setting things off for them.
I like this toy for how easy it is to interact with and help your child learn, my daughter enjoys playing with it but doesn't play with it all the time but when she does she plays for ages with it. I would recommend this toy as a really good educational toy will added fun value.
I don't actually remember who got this for my daughter as every birthday and christmas she receives so many gifts I never remember where they have come from! In any case when she was 18 months old she received this as a present and even now that she is 3 she still gets a lot of amusement from it!
It has a book element which on one page has shapes, the next page, animals, and on the final page nursery rhymes. These coincide with the 5 keys - red , orange, yellow, green and blue. Switching the pages is easy to activate the different settings so this is simple to do.
When on this page the Triangle is Orange, the Circle is Blue, Heart is yellow, Square is red and Star is green. So when my little one presses the blue key on the keyboard for example it says "circle" which is good for her learning shapes and colours simultaneously.
Monkey - Orange
Cat - Red
Pig - yellow
Bird - green
Elephant - Blue.
This is good as I can interact with my daughter now and she can learn colours and animals. So If I point to the picture of the elephant I ask her what colour it is (the picture of the elephant is blue) and then on the keyboard, the blue key also has a picture of an elephant so she learns to make association by understanding the elephant is blue, she presses the blue key and it makes a noise of an elephant (aaa-roooo!!! Yes that is my elephant noise!)
This page is the most fun as my daughter absolutely loves nursery rhymes!
Row, row, row your boat - green
Three little kitens - red
Ring-a-ring-a roses - blue
Pop goes the weasel - orange
Frere Jacques - Yellow
By pressing the coluours on the keyboards this allows for different songs to be sung by the keyboard. My daughter loves row, row, row your boat so she repeatedly presses the green button and sings along and does the actions! (Pretending to row a boat of course!) It should be noted the songs don't last very long and so would be good if the songs sang both versions which I normally sing for her!
There are other features which include a basic drum, and a little blue dog which when moved, and makes a music sound and cute little woof woof. There is also a microphone which is extremely short so doesn't move off the holder, so it's annoying my daughter can't really take it off and pretend to have a sing a long on it, she has to lean forward to try and hear herself in it.
The volume has 2 settings, "quiet" and "loud" but to be honest we have had it so long it just stays on loud as the "quiet" setting makes no noise! I am actually surprised at how long it has lasted as we haven't changed the batteries at all in almost 18 months! It requires screwing to put new batteries in which is much safer as no chance of litlte ones opening it up and playing with them, and I believe it takes 4 AA batteries.
Overall I really like this toy as not only is it educational but it's musical and engaging and it is one of my daughter's favourites. She goes from time to time forgetting about it, but always comes back to it. It was an amazing gift, and she has definitely got lots more play with it yet!
My son received the VTech Sing and Discover Piano as a Christmas gift when he was only 3 months old, the toy is reccomended for 6 months + so he was too young to play with it at the time. He first started properly taking an interest in it when he was about 5 months old and I found that the Lights & Music would nearly always grab his attention. As he still couldn't sit unaided, I would place him in his Bumbo chair which has a tray on the front and put the piano on the tray for him to play with in front of him.
This toy has a Brightly coloured Musical Keyboard with chunky keys which suit even the smallest of fingers. The toy doesn't just play music as I expected it would since it is a Piano, it also teaches colours, animals and instruments. There is a Notebooke with pages above the Piano's keyboard which your baby can turn, and each different page will change the mode of the Piano. For example, if it is on the Numbers page it will sing different numbers when the keys are pressed and if it is on the Nursery rhymes page it will sing the different Nursery Rhymes etc.
The Nursery Rhymes that the Piano plays are;
Row Row Row Your Boat
Three Little Kittens
Frere Jacques
Pop Goes The Weasel
Ring-a-Ring a Rosies
Along with other musical tunes!
If the piano isn't being played with, it reminds you it is still being switched on by shouting things like "Come and Play with us!" and "Jam with the Band!". There is also a continuous faint beating noise that sounds even when the toy isn't being played with, this is handy in one way as it reminds you the toy is still switched on so that you can turn it off and not waste the batteries, but at the same time it is also a really annoying noise for the parent!
There is a circular "Drum" button at the side of the Piano which makes a Drum beat noise when pressed, then theres a Blue dog "conductor" at the side which makes noises when jiggled. Finally there is a little microphone which is attached to the piano with a small lead which I noticed has been made the perfect length to be safe for your baby. The toy encourages your baby to sing by saying "Sing into the Microphone!" and the microphone really works too, but not too loud! There are 2 volume options depending on how loud you want it, but to be honest even on the quietest setting it is still quite loud!
Once again I think VTech have made a great little toys hear that it both educational and greatly entertaining for babies. It is easy to clean too and it can just be wiped down, ours it still shiny as it was new. It requires 4 x AA Batteries which are included when you first buy the toy, they seem to be lasting us a while too. I think this is a toy my son will be playing with for a while and it is certainly one that I am happy for him to play with considering the educational value and brain development it encourages.
The VTech sing and Discover Piano is widely available in most Toy stores for £19.99 and it is well worth the price tag.
The Sing and Discover Piano is one of your typical V-tech electronic baby toys; made out of brittle looking (yet actually quite sturdy) brightly coloured plastic, and with various interactive bells and whistles, intended to engage a 12 to 18 month old's attention.
The piano takes the form of a small piano keyboard with attached music stand - all highly stylized. There piano has only five, chunky keys, each a different jolly colour, and with a cartoon, musical-instrument-playing creature drawn on it. Above this are another set of five pressable buttons shaped like musical notes. These are made out of translucent plastic so that lights can shine through them when they are pressed, and each plays a different flowing, electronic tune / song with words whenever it's depressed. The 'music' on the music stand part is a ring-binder containing a four-page, brightly coloured, plastic picture book. The first two pages are 'shapes, ' the next two 'animals' and the last one 'nursery' and the whole thing is set up so that depending on which set of pages you've turned to, the piano makes different noises, appropriate to the content displayed (it says 'circle' and 'square' and so on when you've turned to the 'shapes' pages, etc.).
There's also the familiar V-tech blue 'Puppy' character as a fixed but swivelling toy attached to the right hand side of the keyboard (he's got a conductor's baton and is presumably directing the V-tech orchestra). Puppy swivels around on his base like a computer joystick and when you move him about, he makes a glissando type noise and a barking sound come from the keyboard. On the left, a bright, blue and yellow toy microphone (it clips into a stand there when it's not in use) connected by a short length of plastic-coated wire, and another giant round plastic button to press on. When you speak into the microphone, the sound comes out slightly amplified (sort of) via the slots at the other side of the of the piano keys. Appropriately enough, the sound quality from the mike seems to be best when a baby's got the handset actually in its mouth and is babbling 'ha-HA' or some such into it; it doesn't seem to work so well for adult speech, for example.
There are two volume switches, quieter and louder that you can use to adjust the volume of the piano. The on switch also switches it between 'modes' - one to the right, and one to the left, with the 'off' position in the middle, which I find not very user friendly, though this is a very minor point. As with all V-tech toys, the batteries at the back have a screw-on cover for safety's sake. Happily it comes with the batteries already installed. Though I'm not sure why most of the entire back panel of the toy is covered with black plastic; that looks a bit grim, and as V-tech toys are usually so carefully designed to be bright and jolly looking.
The whole play panel type arrangement is just over a foot long, and about a foot high, so it's not horribly massive (unlike, say the detachable front panel from the V-tech baby walker that we've also got, which is about the size of one half of a broadsheet newspaper). We got the piano from Argos for £20 for the baby's Christmas, and he plays on it several times a day. So we're very happy with it.
The VTech Sing and Discover Piano is definately one of the best toys I've bought for my son and he loves the music and interacting. I love it and if he wasn't playing with it I'd be half tempted to give it a go myself. I managed to pick it up for about £20 which was well worth it in my opinion. He is now 2 years old and I can see him playing it for a while yet.
It has plenty of stuff to play with which is a great thing and keeps kids interested for long periods. There are five brightly coloured piano keys in red, orange, yellow, green and blue, each with different animal pictures on them, and when each one is pressed you can listen to the tunes and see the flashing lights. On the right hand side of the keyboard is a blue puppy dog which acts as a joystick to play with and mine and also my son's favourite part is on the left which is a microphone.
In regards to the microphone my son loves this as he can pick it up and hear his own voice echoed and louder when he speaks into it. He can also sing along to the music at the same time as pressing the piano keys.
There are also music sheets that are very easy to turn and make noises when you turn them. This helps with your child learning how to turn pages like in a book. He learns from the different colours and shapes and also the noises that come from him pressing different keys. Add this to the lights that engage him and keep him occupied and you have a great toy.
I would highly recommend this to anyone as it's not that expensive and will keep your child occupied for hours as he plays with all the different features.
Okay so most battery operated toys these days tend to be loud, flashy and repetitive; however this version has all of the above but with a bit more variety than most. There are two main modes, one based around music and rhyme the other is focussed around learning colours and numbers. There is an illustrated notebook with several pages that prompt several new songs and sounds and work in conjunction with the note shaped buttons underneath in addition to a piano keyboard. The buttons do different things depending on the mode or page that's shown in the book which makes the babies experience it a bit more exciting.
My daughter is just four months but has already having great fun pressing the buttons and wriggling to the musical tunes. I paid a little more for this in Boots, but I've seen it on Amazon for just under £13 which in my opinion is great value for money. I've bought quite a few toys from the vetch range as they are sturdy and seem to last. This particular toy seems to serve its purpose for being educational and it certainly interests my baby with its bright colours and lights.
Finally as a bonus it has two volume settings meaning you can put it on low if the repetition gets too much!
I bought this piano for my daughter's first Christmas in 2007. It cost £20 from Boots and was in the 3 for 2 deal. It's the same price and in the same deal this year, and available from a wide variety of other stockists; Early Learning Centre, Argos and Amazon being some of them. At the time of buying I was wandering around the store with my then five month old daughter who was not in a happy mood. I took her to the toy section to distract her and plonked this piano on her knee, she looked rather startled, but interested, and began to frown and poke at it. The unhappy noise stopped and was replaced by an electronic one which meant I was able to do a bit of shopping in relative peace. At that time anything that could stop my daughter crying for more than thirty seconds seemed miraculous and I decided that this could be a Christmas present for that year, (even though she'd seen it, and sure enough when Christmas Day came it was still a surprise!).
The recommended age for this is from 6 to 30 months. My daughter is now coming up to two and a half and still enjoys playing with it, so it has had plenty of use and, despite being occasionally rather annoying, was a good buy. There is quite a lot to it so unless you're especially interested you might want to skip to the pros and cons paragraph near the end where I sum it up.
When you switch it on a chirpy little voice shouts out 'It's Showtime!', and launches into a song, (to the tune of 'Skip to my Lou'), which implores you to; "come play with your animal friends, the fun and music never ends, play the piano and sing too, there's so much for us to do", then yells "Come and Play with us!" Oh yes, I know it all off by heart. My husband has been known to switch it off in annoyance and put a ban on it, but I can let the noise go over my head. I've noticed that Mums seem to be able to manage this kind of feat much better than Dads, at least that's true of my acquaintance! There is, importantly, a volume button, so it can be on loud or extra loud. Why anyone would choose to have it on the higher setting is beyond me, although now my daughter can switch it to this, she does so. The quieter setting is definitely loud enough. It took a while for my little one to get to grips with the on/off, modes setting and volume buttons as they are small and quite stiff for a young child, (I think it was better when I had full control of them).
The piano has five broad colourful keys and there is a fat blue and white drum pad at the left hand side. The drum pad doesn't seem to vary much as far as I can tell, after saying 'kick to the beat', it plays three different percussion beats on three pressings, but it is the easiest button for very little hands to press. There is,(was), a microphone attached to this side. On the right hand side there is a little round speaker and a blue plastic puppy,(the composer). At six months old this was the bit my daughter favoured. Obviously that puppy looks really juicy to a little teething one, and, if you push it, it barks! Holding and moving the puppy can also make the music speed up or slow down.
Above the keys there are five light up buttons shaped like musical notes, these light up to the music and can be quite manic. Above them is a little book with three scenes entitled - 'shapes', 'animals' and 'nursery'. As you turn a page there is a musical sound and a phrase such as, 'Jam With the Band!', and the button and key responses change. The pages are strong and despite them being a bit bent, I can vouch for the fact that they are made of durable material.
Each piano key and light up button is associated with an animal. There is a cat on the red key, a monkey on the orange, a pig, a bird and an elephant. They each play their own musical instrument and are used help to illustrate various things on the pages, eg on one page the cat is reading a book which, we are told, is shaped like a square.
There are two modes of play; music and learning and there are three sections to each, denoted by which page of the book is open. It's a bit difficult to remember what does what at first, I remember my daughter wanting to hear a particular song one day and it took me aeons to work out how to find it.
Music Mode
When in music mode, it doesn't matter which page of the book you are on, pressing the piano keys on their own will always sound a note enabling the user to make up tunes. If you press a key when a tune is playing it will stop and let you 'pretend play' it yourself, one note at a time, but if you stop, it will return to playing normally. This means the player can give the impression of actually playing the tune themselves, if they/you should find them/yourself so inclined, (Okay I admit I have on the odd occasion been seen pretending to play one of the tunes while my daughter tries to wrestle the piano from my grip).
Pressing the buttons will result in tunes being played, two to each button on some pages, or songs being sung. You can make the animals miaow/grunt/tweet etc to different melodies by pressing the keys or buttons when a tune is underway. One of the things I originally found a bit frustrating was that once a tune was underway it continued to the end, there's no cancel button. However -useful tip - I have discovered that in effect the red button on the microphone stand acts as a cancel button; whenever it's pressed a voice says, 'use the microphone to sing along!', but it can just be pressed to stop a tune and then quickly overridden by another button.
All of the tunes are well known, some very obvious ones such as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and Hickory Dickory Dock, others annoying in that you know the tune but can't put a name to it, (unless you're a musical know-all). There is a melody list in the instruction booklet but I don't think everything is actually covered on it.
Irrelevant aside - There is one well known classical tune that I have tried to find out the name of without success. In fact, as it is on the same button as Hickory Dickory Dock which my daughter likes a lot, I made up some lyrics to it to keep her happy and I wonder if anyone can recognise it by the rhythm? I've tried to make the punctuation do some of the work, imagine it sung to a fast high pitched piano tune; "Now the mouse is running round the house, now the mouse is running round the house, now the mouse is running round the house, little mouse is running round the house. Running round the house. Running round the house. Now the little mouse is running all around the house. Now - the- li-ttle mouse is running all aro-oo-uuund the house". I know it's ever so slightly a long shot, but does anyone have any idea what it is?
Learning Mode
In learning mode the keys will teach colours by saying the colour of the key that is being pressed. Shape names are taught on the shapes page, ("The sail on the boat is shaped like a triangle"), and instrument sounds are also taught - eg the words, 'the bird is playing the violin', followed by a bit of violin playing. Then there are animal noises to be learned too, "miaow like the cat, miaow, miaow", and so on. Various other noises come into play and new words may be learned as the animals undertake simple activities like the cat fishing in the pond. Songs are played in learning mode too, the five songs on the 'Nursery' page are sung in both modes.
The Microphone
There is a microphone which allows your child's, (or your own), voice to come out of the speaker if they sing along. The one on our toy didn't last long. There were a couple of problems with it. The first, which is the same for all of them, was that the lead was a bit short. I appreciate that this is probably for health and safety reasons, no one wants to see their child strangled by a toy, however, it means sitting uncomfortably close to the piano to sing into it as well as encouraging inadvertent rough handling. We soon had a problem with a loose connection, (probably caused by a good yank), which meant that the output was crackly and sometimes just touching the microphone made the whole thing crackle annoyingly. My husband 'fixed' it temporarily by shortening the lead even further, but it soon packed in altogether so we removed it.
Automatic Power Down - If the piano is left untouched but switched on it will continue to try and attract your attention by shouting 'come and play with us' and various other musical entreaties, until after a while, (the booklet says 30 seconds but I'm certain it's a lot lot longer), it says 'bye bye', and shuts up. If you have any other Vtech toys you will recognise the voice as it seems to be the same one on all the Vtech toys I've heard.
It takes 3 AA batteries. For some reason in the instruction booklet Vtech state in big letters that they do not recommend the use of rechargeable batteries. Having only just noticed this all I can say is that I have been using rechargeable batteries in it for the last two years without any noticeable ill effects. They've been changed no more than a handful of times over this period and my daughter does play with it a fair bit. Having said this, bear in mind that she doesn't have lots of toys, because for various reasons, I don't think it's good for children to have too many.
Fun for Fun's Sake
On the Vtech website this is sold as an educational toy and much is made of the 'developmental benefits'. I'm a bit fed up of hearing this sort of thing on children's toys. As a rule I'm not a fan of noisy plastic toys. I think plain old wooden/soft non electrical items are often a lot better, as the child has to use their own imagination instead of having everything done for them. I suspect many/all the claims these kind of toys make are really just so much claptrap. Children learn more from being with their families and interacting with real people than with lumps of plastic, no matter how bright they flash or how many different noises they make. 'Encourages auditory stimulation' is one of the terms used about this toy on the Vtech website. I mean, come on, 'auditory stimulation?' isn't that what happens every time you hear a noise?! Children learn every minute from every thing around them. Just let it be fun.
To sum up the pros and cons:
There are plenty of tunes and songs which little ones like and other fun features like animal noises. The chunky keys are good for little fingers to get to grips with and all those sounds and flashing colours make it a good distraction for crying babies. It could possibly encourage further interest in music. There may be something in the 'developmental benefits' such as language development, certainly there are close links between music and language so who knows, it might well help with speech. It's not too pricey. Apart from the microphone it seems quite hardy, ours has certainly taken a bit of a bashing and survived well. It teaches shapes and colours in learning mode or can be played simply as a piano in music mode. It can seem a bit complicated and difficult to work out. I think it could be over stimulating for a baby, especially in combination with other things going on such as more toys. The noise can be repetitive and irritating. The microphone seems fragile, ours didn't last long.
I've seen my daughter progress from being barely able to press the keys, through bouncing happily to the tunes although not knowing how she's made them happen, to eventually gaining some kind of mastery over it. She now likes to play little tunes of her own composing and understands what will happen with different buttons that she presses. She knows how to get it to play Hickory Dickory Dock and other favourites. She seems to prefer the music mode over the learning mode, although she likes both. Although I wouldn't rush out to buy more of this type of toy, I do think my daughter has had good use from this one and I'm pleased that it still works well enough to be passed on for another child to have fun with.
I've knocked off a couple of stars for the faulty microphone and the irritation factor, but if I could I would actually give this 3.5 out of 5 stars.
We bought this toy for my first baby girl two years ago, and she used it from about six months old, and still likes to have it out to play with now.
The keys are big and easy to play with using tiny hands. They all make musical sounds and make different sounds depending on whether you select a speak function or just music.
The pages turn over at the top, and this can be easliy achieved by a baby who is more than about eight months. They also make sounds when they turn, and help you to select a different function for the light up keys beneath the keys. There is a beat box pad and a microphone attached to this toy, which lead me to my only criticism of the piano. Sadly, the microphone broke after about six months and it seems that the wire is faulty (and this is not the first toy of mine that this has happened to).
Other than that, this toy is a really good buy for christmas or birthdays, as the price can sometimes be quite steep due to its v-tech brand name
This is easily the best toy I own and has been since my son was 3 months - now 8. It is a versitile toy with lots going on - at 3 months my son loved to watch the colours flash and listen to the tunes, then he loved grabbing the puppy and bashing the keys with his hands and now we have pregressed to hitting the keys with the microphone like a hammer. The best thing though is that it will be a toy to grow up with as there is so much learning still to be done once they can understand colours, numbers and shapes - as a musician myself i think the concept of the puppy playing the music faster and slower is great. The pages also make a noise when you turn them and this also helps little fingers learn how to turn pages just like a book. I would recommend this toy to everyone as it has amused my son endlessly and made him smile everyday!


text:
Miss (Christian) America
- By John W. Kennedy Copyright Christianity Today International
- 2003 1 May
Before she began her senior year at the University of Illinois in 2001, Erika Harold experienced a crisis of faith. She not only had lost the Miss Illinois title twice, but she felt that her outspoken views on her chosen platform—sexual abstinence before marriage—had cost her scholarships in competition. Harold wanted to attend law school after graduation, but the lack of funds made her pessimistic about her prospects.
"I felt as though every time I stood up for my faith I not only wasn't being rewarded, I was losing things as a result," she says. "I didn't feel God's presence in my life the way I thought I would."
Harold turned to her dad, who helped address the litany of questions she had about the Bible. Her pastor at the Urbana First Assembly of God also gave her books by Charles Colson and C.S. Lewis to help answer faith questions. Ultimately, God confirmed his existence to Harold when she earnestly sought him in prayer and realized that faith requires being secure in God's omniscience despite times of adversity, confusion, and doubt.
"God told Job he wasn't going to give him all the answers and he didn't have the right to demand them," Harold says. After she became Miss America 2003 last September, Harold, now 23, began to understand God's timing. She says if she had won the Miss America title at 19 when she first entered the Miss Illinois pageant, her shaky faith would not have enabled her to survive the rigors of public scrutiny. But because of perseverance through many difficult circumstances, including sexual and racial harassment as a teenager, Harold (whose father is white and mother is black and American Indian) is no longer easily rattled.
In fact, Harold's perseverance was quickly put to the test just a few weeks after winning the national pageant when, in a widely publicized moment, the Miss America organization attempted to silence her public promotion of teen abstinence. However, pageant officials soon discovered that their newly crowned queen was not about to be muzzled when it came to sharing her beliefs. Harold has something to say, and she was willing to take a stand and live with the fallout of her convictions.
Erika Harold's experience was not a unique one. Every year, the Miss America pageant attracts an inordinate number of born-again Christian women vying for the title. A check of the biographies of the Miss America winners on the organization's website (www.missamerica.org) and links to personal pages shows that a full third of the women from the past three decades have overt Christian references, testimonies, or invitations to accept Christ. And that's just the winners.
Why do evangelical women seek fame through a secular organization in which they must parade onstage in a swimsuit? Many are motivated by the chance to win enough money to finance their education. By winning the crown, Harold received more than $80,000 in scholarship assistance, which she'll use to pay tuition at Harvard Law School. Some also see it as the opportunity to launch a career that would be otherwise unattainable. Harold, for instance, aspires to high political office.
"The Miss America pageant is one of the few platforms available for young Christian women to win significant educational scholarships while gaining incredible exposure to realize their dreams without compromising their beliefs," says 1973 Miss America Terry Meeuwsen, who remains one of the most visible winners because of daily appearances on cable television. For Meeuwsen (and many others), the title served as a springboard for her career, which she originally thought would be singing and acting. Eventually she realized that the yearlong reign and its almost daily speaking engagements around the country prepared her for her current role as co-host of CBN's
Tara Dawn Holland Christensen, Miss America 1997, says the pageant winner is watched not only for a year but for a lifetime. "No other program gives such a voice to a woman," Christensen says. "When I was at the pageant I cared nothing about the crown, the money, the glitz or the glamour. I realized this was my opportunity to make a difference for everything from literacy to abstinence. There is something about the crown that makes people listen to what you have to say."
Debbye Turner, Miss America in 1990, says she competed in order to earn funds for veterinary school. After seven years of seeking to enter the national pageant, she finally qualified in her last year of eligibility at age 24. As she received the national crown, Turner looked toward heaven and thanked the Lord. "It all happened in God's timing," she says. "I wouldn't have been ready if I had won sooner."
Erin Moss, the current Miss Michigan, says she competed to gain speaking opportunities. Moss, the daughter of a Church of God pastor, eventually wants to become a motivational speaker through a parachurch ministry. Traveling around Michigan has enabled her to speak before numerous Christian groups and churches.
—Erika Harold, 2003
College scholarships motivated current Miss Indiana Tangra Riggle, the oldest of 11 children, to appear in beauty pageants. She has received $20,000 to help with college expenses, including $4,000 for winning the talent competition at last September's Miss America contest with her vocal rendition of "God Bless America."
The state title also has helped Riggle secure money for computers for at-risk youth in low-income areas. "The Miss America organization opened doors to do things I care about," Riggle says. "I always had a voice, but now because of the state crown I have a microphone. Miss Indiana is a platform to effectively minister to many."
Nicole Johnson, Miss America 1999, says the scholarships that accompanied her title financed her bachelor's and master's degrees. Johnson, who has Type I diabetes, has used her fame to write books about the disease. "Where else in the world can a 24-year-old woman have her voice heard on such vital matters?" she asks.
The road to the national title is rewarding, but it can be arduous. More than 12,000 women participate in local and state pageants annually, making the competition fierce. By the time she won Miss Illinois last June, Harold had devoted hundreds of hours to preparing for the pageants.
Harold says she experienced incredible peace the night of her final state pageant. "Sometimes we have a tendency to pray 'Thy will be done,' when we really mean 'if it's my will,'" she says. "But that night I prayed I would be able to accept whatever God had planned for my life. If I didn't win the money to pay for school that night, I knew that God would provide it some other way."
Within the first week of her reign, Harold appeared on the
Because she has been a youth advocate speaker since age 18, Harold is accustomed to extensive traveling, early wake-up calls, and late-night appearances. She will travel approximately 20,000 miles each month during her time in office.
However, Harold is not as accustomed to having her every word monitored. Although she won the Miss Illinois title with an abstinence platform, state pageant officials last year required contestants to sign a contract that if they advanced to the national level they would adopt the cause of youth violence prevention. Harold agreed, figuring that her firsthand experience with racial and sexual harassment made such a platform a natural fit. But she also determined that a message of saying no to sex before marriage could be incorporated into youth violence prevention talks.
#8212;Tara Dawn Holland Christensen, 1997
Miss America officials, who five years ago lauded Miss America Kate Shindle for promoting condom distribution in schools and needle exchange programs as her causes, didn't applaud Harold's idea. At an October appearance before the National Press Club, they ordered her not to mention abstinence. Harold objected, saying she wouldn't be true to her beliefs if she neglected to counsel during talks to school groups that waiting for sex until marriage is best. Harold believes her words can save lives by keeping young people from contracting AIDS.
Harold calls the showdown a life-defining moment. "God really laid it upon my heart that he brought me to this point to do something more than to just talk about something everybody agrees with," Harold says. "If I say, 'I don't think we should bully others,' there's not a soul who's going to say, 'I think we should harass people.' But if I say, 'I think people should wait until marriage to have sex,' some people want to challenge that."
The tiff between a biblically conservative beauty queen and the 82-year-old liberal-leaning Atlantic City organization caused a national firestorm. Pro-family organizations and conservative publications rallied to her side, including an editorial in
After two days, the Miss America organization relented, agreeing to allow Harold to include abstinence as a part of an expanded violence platform. But the incident put a strain on Harold's relationship with pageant officials.
Turner says in 1990 Miss America officials placed no restrictions on what she brought up in remarks. She talked about prayer and trusting in the Lord in public school appearances and even sang Christian rap songs in classrooms. Complaints to pageant officials and threats of lawsuits didn't stop her. "I wasn't going to be ashamed of my beliefs," she says. "I told them I lived in a country where I could express my views freely."
Christensen, who now speaks and sings around the country through her non-profit ministry Cross & Crown, says she only encountered one instance where pageant officials tried to censor her. It was after she mentioned on a talk show that she would someday like to marry a Christian. After discussions, Christensen says she realized her appearances should not be used for such means.
—Debbye Turner, 1990
Johnson wove her spiritual commitment naturally into talking about diabetes in all 300 speeches she gave during her reign. "When interviewed on the telecast, I was able to talk about how my initial anger at God over having diabetes was a big mistake," she says.
Miss America pageants haven't always been a forum to evangelize. In fact, in 1965 Vonda Van Dyke Scoates became just the first winner to speak about her faith publicly—34 years after the pageant started. She prayed that the Lord would allow her to testify about her beliefs through the interview portion of the show.
"Back then we all had to sign a contract agreeing that we wouldn't talk about religion or politics," Scoates recalls. An information sheet supplied to judges asked applicants if they had brought a good-luck charm with them to the pageant. Scoates answered that she didn't possess a good-luck charm, but she did bring a Bible. Emcee Bert Parks asked her on the air if her Bible served as a good-luck charm.
"I do not consider my Bible a good-luck charm," Scoates replied. "But I always carry a Bible with me. It is the most important book I own. I would not classify my relationship to Jesus Christ as a religion but rather as a faith. I trust him completely." The audience burst into applause.
Immediately after the telecast, Miss America officials accused Scoates of breaking the contract because she mentioned Christianity. Scoates responded that Parks had raised the subject and therefore voided the agreement. Nevertheless, she consented not to bring up religion during the year unless first asked. Usually her faith became the first question in appearances. Soon churches inundated the organization with requests for Scoates to speak. Seeing that discussing religious views on the air actually created favorable publicity, the Miss America organization eventually dropped its objections.
—Terry Meeuwsen, 1973
"It was so out of the context for the day," says Scoates, the only Miss America also to win the congeniality contest at the event. "No one mixed the secular and religious in conversations back then." Hundreds of people sent Bibles to Scoates in gratitude for her stance. In effect, she opened the door for future Christian contestants to be more outspoken about their beliefs.
Scoates believes the Miss America pageant attracts a large number of Christians because of its format. "Kids raised in churches have many opportunities to perform in front of people," says Scoates, who used ventriloquism as her onstage talent. "What better place is there to tell about your faith than the Miss America pageant?"
The fact that participants now readily proclaim their faith also is an indication of how the lines between sacred and secular in society are more clearly delineated. In 2001, first runner-up Abbie Rabine (a.k.a. Miss Massachusetts) recalls that all five finalists professed to be committed Christians, and she estimates that 30 of the 50 women that year held Christian convictions. Contestants these days quickly determine how public they will be with their faith during the preliminary events before the telecast, which have stretched to 17 days now compared to five days when Terry Meeuwsen participated.
Meeuwsen recalls all contestants gathering for prayer every night before the competition back in 1972. Erin Moss estimates that one-third of last September's contestants professed to be evangelical Christians. Each day, the Christian competitors met for prayer and Bible studies.
Thirty years ago Meeuwsen had an opportunity to evangelize the moment after being crowned. Because the show ran short that year, Bert Parks asked her what being Miss America meant to her. Meeuwsen proceeded to talk about Jesus' parable of the loaves and fishes. During the next year she spoke in churches about twice a month.
Meeuwsen remembers only one request to tone down her rhetoric. One of the organization's sponsors asked her to not mention Jesus but instead talk about God. Meeuwsen refused.
"I had perfect freedom to say whatever I wanted," says Meeuwsen, who began her reign before
—Nicole Johnson, 1999
As Miss America changes with the times, the "swimsuit fitness" portion of the program has become more revealing. In Meeuwsen's day, all the women wore one-piece bathing outfits. Today, women don both one-piece and two-piece swimsuits for the nationally televised pageant.
Tangra Riggle says she struggled with the swimsuit competition but reasoned that it only counted for 10 percent of the score. "It didn't violate my morals and I figured the benefits—scholarship dollars—outweighed the costs," she says.
Moss calls the swimsuit segment the most difficult part of the event for her, especially because of her ministry plans. "I came to the conclusion that the judges are looking for physical fitness and muscle tone," she says.
Harold had no qualms. "Christians swim and they wear swimsuits," she says. "The outfits worn in the competition are far more modest than ones at the beach."
Some Christians are opposed to the entire concept of a beauty pageant, yet Harold draws a parallel to Esther in the Old Testament. While humans picked Esther as queen because of her physical attributes resulting from six months of beauty treatments, God designated her to stand up for virtue in a hostile society. "I am under no illusion that I won because of beauty or talent," Harold says. "God has creative ways of using people to make a difference. We should never limit him to the traditional ways we conceive of ministry."
The Miss America organization has vast control in determining Harold's schedule until she relinquishes her crown, but she strives to attend events that are important to her, especially where young people are present. As she continues her reign, Harold is trying to ignore the criticisms about her beliefs and focus on helping young people.
"Certainly there are going to be people who disagree with me on every issue," the future law-school student reasons. "If I get sidetracked debating and trying to change opinions, then I become less effective. But I won't endorse agendas that run counter to my belief system."
Harold has found her newfound fame to be a tremendous training ground for political life, noting the daily interaction with media and being subjected to public examination. But for the moment, she's enjoying the national spotlight and the opportunity to boldly proclaim her Christian values.
"If you're a Christian it needs to be manifest in every aspect of your life," she says. "If you encounter any adversity in life, God can use it."
Vonda Van Dyke Scoates, 1965
She was the first Miss America to speak about her faith on national television. An accomplished singer and speaker, her first book, That Girl in Your Mirror, sold over 1 million copies. Her late husband, David Tyler Scoates, was a well-known minister in Southern California.
Terry Meeuwsen, 1973
Today this wife and mother of four is best known as co-host of Pat Robertson's
Cheryl Prewitt Salem, 1980
At age 11, Salem's face was scarred and her left leg crushed in a near-fatal car accident. Doctors said she would never walk again, but she was miraculously healed five years later after attending a revival meeting. An inspiration to many, she has written several books, including
Heather Whitestone McCallum, 1995
Profoundly deaf since she was 18 months old, McCallum was the first woman with a disability to be crowned Miss America. Today she says the biggest handicap in the world is negative thinking, as she shares her message of faith and inspiration. Last year, she received a cochlear implant, which she hopes will restore some of her hearing. Her latest book is
Erika Harold's message on sexual abstinence places her in a long-standing Christian traditon. For a quick history of the abstinence message in the church, click here.
Click here for reprint information.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Urbina pitched four innings, recorded a save in each appearance, and did not give up a hit last week. On September 26, he closed out the Marlins' 4-3 win over the Mets and clinched Florida's first playoff appearance since 1997. Urbina, who was traded from the Texas Rangers in July, was 3-0 with a 1.41 ERA in 33 games with the Marlins this season.
Other players nominated included Urbina's teammate Jeff Conine (.381, 3 HR, 8 RBI); Colorado's Ronnie Belliard (.474, 3 HR, 11 RBI) and Larry Walker (.438, 2 HR, 8 RBI); Houston's Morgan Ensberg (.409, 3 HR); Arizona's Alex Cintron (.536, 4 RBI); Chicago's Shawn Estes (1-0, 4-hit shutout); San Francisco's Pedro Feliz (.545, 3 HR, 7 RBI); San Diego's Xavier Nady (.435, 2 HR, 7 RBI); Montreal's Tomo Ohka (1-0, 5-hit shutout); Al Leiter (1-0, 8-hit shutout) of the Mets; and Woody Williams (2-0, 2.08 ERA) of the Cardinals.
Urbina will receive a Tourneau luxury Swiss timepiece as the National League Pepsi Player of the Week.


text:
Teen Sentenced to Year in Prison for Motor Vehicle Homicide Caused by Texting While Driving
A Massachusetts teenager, who fatally wounded a New Hampshire man after crashing into his car while texting, was convicted yesterday of motor vehicle homicide and sentenced to serve one year behind bars.
Aaron Deveau, seventeen at the time of the accident, is the first person to be punished under a new state law criminalizing harm caused through texting while driving, and was given the maximum sentence: Two years in prison.
He was also sentenced to two-and-a-half years for the homicide charge. District Court Judge Stephen Abany made the sentences concurrent and suspended all except for one year of prison time. The judge said he hoped the severity of Deveau's punishment would deter others from texting while driving.
Deveau was arrested last year and charged in connection with the crash that occurred on February 20th.
55-year-old father of three Daniel Bowley Jr. and his 59-year-old girlfriend Luz Roman were driving along River Street in Haverhill when a distracted Deveau crossed the center line and collided with their vehicle. Bowley sustained life-threatening injuries and died 18 days later.
"I made a mistake," Deveau said yesterday. "If I could take it back, I would take it back. I just want to apologize to the family."
He and his lawyer maintained that no texting was involved in the crash, but prosecutors argued that Deveau himself admitted to exchanging some 200 texts the day of the crash, and may have deleted the texts he wrote prior to the accident.
[photo via AP]


text:
Fredi loses challenge on close play at first
By Joe Morgan / MLB.com
ATLANTA -- Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez had nothing to lose when he challenged whether Justin Upton was out on a groundout to Mariners shortstop Brad Miller in the bottom of the ninth in Wednesday afternoon's 2-0 loss at Turner Field.
First-base umpire Will Little's call was confirmed after a review of 40 seconds, clocking in as the second-shortest review on a Braves challenge. Atlanta had a call successfully overturned after a 37-second review against the Cardinals on May 5.
Upton hustled down the line, but Miller's throw thwacked into first baseman Willie Bloomquist's glove a full step before the Atlanta outfielder reached the bag. But in the midst of their 16th straight scoreless inning, the Braves lost nothing with the challenge.
Atlanta has now lost three straight challenges after winning eight of its first nine.
Joe Morgan is an associate reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.


text:
Avant-garde of honour
About an Hour brings together a curious mix of theatrical experiences.
Since its launch in 2006, the Sydney Festival's About an Hour program has functioned as the annual arts bash's affordable entry point and its showcase of the avant-garde.
This year, hosted in the cavernous Carriageworks, the program takes on the quality of a separate mini-festival, with shows programmed to allow punters to take in more than one event in an evening without dashing between venues.
Highlights of the 2013 About an Hour include cabaret-punk duo Die Roten Punkte, performing their new album Kunst Rock (January 11-12 at 10.30pm), and the immersive The Moment I Saw You I Knew I Could Love You from the British company Curious (January 11 at 5pm, 6.30pm, 8pm and 9.30pm; January 12 and 13 at 4pm, 5.30pm, 7pm and 8.30pm).
It's Dark Outside, a new work, explores the effects of dementia (January 11 at 5.30pm; January 12 and 13 at 3.30pm and 6pm; January 14 and 17 at 7pm and 9.30pm; January 15 at 7pm).
''It's going to be so much fun when Otto and I get together and do a rock und roll concert,'' purrs Astrid Rot of Die Roten Punkte in a heavy German accent of questionable authenticity but admirable ripeness. Kunst Rock will unite the worlds of cabaret and rock concert, says Astrid's brother, Otto. ''Some people think it's like cabaret because we tell lots of stories about our lives,'' he says.
''I hear people laughing at what we have to say. I don't care. We are still a serious rock'n'roll band.''
Or at least as serious as a rock band can be with a bio that makes much of the death of their parents (eaten by lions, Otto says) and when the lead singer is wielding a keytar.
British company Curious are also out to challenge barriers separating art forms.
They are on a mission to change the traditional relationship between audience and a performer, too. The Moment I Saw You I Knew I Could Love You starts with ''the audience walking into a huge soundscape that sounds like you've been swallowed by a whale'', says Curious's co-creator of the work, Helen Paris.
''The audience enters into something that's almost like an emergency situation, but then the performers meet them with flashlights and help them into the liferafts as if they need to be rescued.'' Liferafts. ''Real ones,'' Paris says. ''Three of them. You might find yourself in a raft with people you don't know. Very interesting things can happen.''
Perth theatre-makers Tim Watts, Arielle Gray and Chris Isaacs are offering similarly novel experiences in their new show, It's Dark Outside, which follows an old man who, as the sun goes down, becomes lost in a surreal fantasy.
The multimedia piece blends puppetry, video projection and music. ''We've got all sorts of tricks to create a bit of magic,'' Gray says.
The audience enters into something that's almost like an emergency situation, but then the performers meet them with flashlights and help them into the liferafts as if they need to be rescued.
January 11-17, Carriageworks. For information and bookings, sydneyfestival.org.au. All tickets $35.
January 11, 12 and 13
In Atmospheres - famously featured in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey - composer Gyorgy Ligeti organised every instrument in eerie-sounding sonic spectrums. But what would it sound like if this were performed on strings, electric guitar and turntables?
Musical performances January 11, 12 and 13
Composer-artist Jon Rose has transformed the rusted hulk of a car into a multimedia experience. Rose will play the wreck as an instrument, coaxing rattles, creaks and squeaks into a metallic crescendo. Earplugs are recommended. Installation open January 11-17.
January 11-16
Stefan Gregory reimagines Beethoven's Seventh Symphony as a score to a dance work by Sydney company Legs on the Wall.
January 11-14
Franck Edmond Yao and German actor Cornelia Dorr playfully deconstruct the cliches surrounding Shakespeare's Othello and Desdemona.
January 11-15
Sleepwalk Collective blends B-movie excerpts with an ominous soundtrack.
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text:
Acquia Partner Program
The Acquia Partner Program is your resource for locating experienced, professional Drupal service providers to assist with your social publishing initiatives. In this video, you'll learn about our Partner Program, its foundations and development, and how you can get involved! Plus, meet some of our talented and dedicated partners, including BrightLemon, Volacci, Commerce Guys, Blink Reaction, ImageX Media, Lingotek, Mediacurrent, DataFlow, TreeHouse Agency, mogdesign, and i-KOS.
To find out more about Acquia and our Partner Program, please contact us today or visit our partner section.
Partner Program
Publish on date:
Tuesday, November 29, 2011


text:
Sebastian County Circuit Judge James Cox rejected a claim that Fort Smith's former city administrator violated the state Freedom of Information Act by talking privately with members of the board of directors. Instead, Cox called on the Arkansas Legislature to clarify the meaning of a "meeting" under the law so local officials could follow it.
The administrator, Dennis Kelly, had also given the board a memo with a proposal to change city ordinances so he could hire and fire department directors at will. His proposal was eventually tabled.
A local attorney, Joey McCutchen, sued the city in March and asked Cox to declare that the state sunshine law doesn't allow officials to hold a series of individual meetings instead of a regular meeting that's open to the public.
But Cox denied that request and went further, saying the Freedom of Information Act's provision that violators could face a misdemeanor criminal charge — and up to 30 days in jail — violated the U.S. and Arkansas Constitutions. No criminal charges have been filed against any of the officials involved in the lawsuit.
"In particular, the criminal provision provides no guidance or instructions as to when a member of a subject governing body could be found guilty of violating the provisions, provides no direction as to whether criminal intent is required, and ... leaves uncertain as to when and how a violation might occur by a member of a governing body," Cox wrote in a ruling issued Tuesday.
Both McCutchen and city attorney James Canfield told The Associated Press that they would appeal parts of the ruling.
"The citizens deserve the right to see it all and hear it all," McCutchen said.
Canfield said the city takes extra precautions after the Supreme Court ruled against it. Multiple board members will not attend the same meeting unless it is sanctioned under the state Freedom of Information Act, he said.
Arkansas' FOI law was adopted in 1967 and is one of the oldest in the country. In 2004, the Arkansas Supreme Court sided with a retiree, David Harris, who sued Fort Smith after the city administrator secured approval from board members by telephone to buy property at auction to realign a truck route.
The board would approve the purchase in a public meeting. Harris sued after the county prosecutor declined to press criminal charges. The Supreme Court would rule in his favor, but three years later, it refused to order Fort Smith to pay $10,000 for Harris' attorney fees.
After McCutchen sued Fort Smith this year — with Harris as one of the plaintiffs — the city countersued, complaining that the Supreme Court hadn't made it clear whether sending emails, making phone calls or handing out material before a meeting could be considered a violation.
Cox agreed with the city's complaints, saying that the problems were "a matter of public policy for the Arkansas General Assembly."
Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel did not comment directly on Cox's findings.
"The Attorney General's Office just learned of the ruling today and we are reviewing it," spokesman Aaron Sadler said. "We are considering whether to intervene in the matter."


text:
Brain Teasers
U.S. Founding Fathers III
Fun: (2.71) Difficulty: (2.49) Puzzle ID: #28622
Submitted By: paul726
Submitted By: paul726
Cryptography In Cryptography teasers, a phrase or expressions has been encoded in some way (frequently by replacing letters with other letters). You need to figure out the encoding method and then decode the message to find the answer.
"Db gvyycb px xjsqvndkxt bcc gwxvewo vyt bcc cabxy bqvb bqdn yvbdcy mvn acrytxt, ycb po exwdudcydnbn, prb po Gqednbdvyn; ycb cy exwdudcy, prb cy bqx ucnsxw ca Zxnrn Gqednb. Ace bqdn hxeo exvncy, sxcswxn ca cbqxe avdbqn qvhx pxxy vaacetxt vnowrj, secnsxedbo, vyt aexxtcj ca mcenqds qxex."
~Svbedgl Qxyeo
(warning: The hint will reveal the vowels)
~Svbedgl Qxyeo
(warning: The hint will reveal the vowels)
Hintv=a x=e d=i c=o r=u (code=solution)
Answera b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z
v p g t x a u q d z l w j y c s i e n b r h m f o k
"It cannot be emphasized too clearly and too often that this nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religion, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ. For this very reason, peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here."
~Patrick Henry
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text:
I am a subscriber to Identity Guard for over a year. Part of the package is Zone Alarm. This Zone Alarm package is not the newest one available. Right now I am running version ZA Suite 8.0.298.035, true vector sec engine 8.0.298.035, ave 126.96.36.1998 spyware 220.127.116.11.
This is part of my monthly package and it still updates everyday. Problem is twice when I ran a manual scan ZA detected a win32 worm socks on my computer. It did not detect this or prevent it automatically. I had to do a manual scan. this has happened 2x. customer service at identity guard said not to worry. I am concerned my computer is vulnerable to spyware. Plus identity guard still has no idea when or if they will update its subscribers to the new 9 version. Probably we will get updated to version 9 when ZA releases version 12. how can I be sure my computer is safe? I have all of the settings properly set. If checkpoint is reading this, then why don't you have identity guard update us to the better version?


text: Widening income inequality, in the U.S. and in other developed nations, threatens democracy, just as it did in the 1930s, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka says. Trumka issued that warning in early June at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) meeting in Paris. The OECD, which represents the most-developed nations in the world, invited outside experts to discuss the state of the world economy.


text:
Advanced Options
Joe Forward
Aug. 6, 2014 – The dust has settled. The media frenzy is over. With the U.S. Supreme Court's 2013 term in the rear-view mirror, now is a good time to review what happened, and what some national and local legal commentators had to say about it.
First, we turn to SCOTUS Blog's final "Stat Pack for the 2013 Term." It includes a mountain of statistical information about the high court's work this term, which ran from October 2013 through June 2014. In all, the Court heard 73 cases on the merits.
Forty-eight (66 percent) of the merits cases were 9-0 decisions. Ten cases (the second-highest at 14 percent) resulted in a 5-4 decision, but only six of the 5-4 decisions resulted in a straight split between the so-called "liberal" and "conservative" justices.
Justice Anthony Kennedy was the swing vote in those six cases. In four of them, Justice Kennedy sided with the bloc of justices appointed by a Republican President: Chief Justice John Roberts (George W. Bush) and Justices Antonin Scalia (Ronald Reagan), Clarence Thomas (George H.W. Bush), and Samuel Alito (George W. Bush).
In two cases, Justice Kennedy (Ronald Reagan) sided with justices appointed by a Democratic President: Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg (Bill Clinton), Stephen Breyer (Bill Clinton), Sonia Sotomayor (Barack Obama), and Elena Kagan (Barack Obama).
Four cases (5 percent) were on review from the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, which includes Wisconsin. The Court reviewed the most cases (12) from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which includes California and other western states. The Court heard eight cases (11 percent) on review from a state court, but none from Wisconsin.
According to Georgetown Law Professor Neal Katyal, the Court delivered an historic percentage of unanimous 9-0 decisions, the highest percentage since 1940.
Writing for the New York Times, Katyal called the high number of unanimous decisions a "remarkable achievement" and evidence of "cultivated collegiality" among the justices, which can be characterized or perceived (rightly or wrongly) as motivated by ideology.
"The justices' ability to cross partisan divides and find common ground in their bottom-line judgment in roughly two-thirds of their cases … should remind us that even in this hyperpartisan age, there is a difference between law and politics," Katyal wrote.
But Harvard Law Professor Laurence Tribe, writing for Slate, notes that many 9-0 decisions still have concurring opinions with divergent views and unanimity, on the surface, can sometimes "mask deep divisions that emerge a few years later."
org jforward wisbar Joe Forward, Saint Louis Univ. School of Law 2010, is a legal writer for the State Bar of Wisconsin, Madison. He can be reached by org jforward wisbar email or by phone at (608) 250-6161.
University of Chicago Law Professor Eric Posner, also writing for Slate, questioned Katyal's assessment of the court's perceived cohesiveness. "[E]ven when all nine justices agree on the outcome, that outcome can be – and likely is – determined by an ideologically driven compromise that takes place in the justices' chambers."
Posner suggests that a chief justice's ability to "suppress the visible evidence of ideological disagreement" is a "tactical skill, to be sure, but nothing to celebrate."
In any event, some of the higher profile 9-0 decisions this term included Riley v. California, McCullen v. Coakley, and National Labor Relations Board v. Canning.
In Riley v. California, the Court unanimously held that police, without a warrant, may not search digital information on cell phones seized from arrested individuals. Justice Alito filed a concurring opinion. Otherwise, all justices were in agreement in Riley.
"Riley gave the Court an opportunity to address criticisms that it is out of touch with modern technological realities," wrote Marquette Law Professor Michael O'Hear in a blog post on the Marquette University Law School Faculty Blog.
"The Riley Court was able to demonstrate that it can pull its head out of the eighteenth century and adapt its constitutional jurisprudence so as to respond to distinctly twenty-first century concerns," wrote O'Hear, analyzing the Court's Fourth Amendment cases.
In McCullen v. Coakley, the Court unanimously struck down a Massachusetts law that made it a crime to stand on a public street or sidewalk within 35 feet of abortion clinics, which was the practice of some attempting to influence the decisions of patients.
This "buffer zone" violated the First Amendment, the Court ruled in a majority opinion by Chief Justice Roberts. However, Justice Scalia filed a concurring opinion, joined by Justices Kennedy and Thomas. Justice Alito also filed a concurring opinion.
"One potentially wider implication of the ruling is that it may also imperil 'bubble zones' near clinics – invisible no-entry zones that float around individual patients as they approach a clinic," wrote Lyle Denniston for SCOTUS blog.
In National Labor Relations Board v. Canning, the Court ruled that President Obama violated the Recess Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution by appointing three commissioners to the NLRB during an "intra-session" recess of the U.S. Senate. In this case, the four "conservatives" joined together in a concurring opinion by Justice Scalia.
Of the 73 merits cases, only 10 cases were decided by a 5-4 decision. This represents 14 percent of all decisions, the lowest percentage of 5-4 decisions since 2005. In addition, only six cases were decided as a split between so-called "conservatives" and "liberals," grouped under the party affiliation of the president who appointed them.
Historically, 5-4 decisions draw high-profile attention from those who suspect that such splits represent the ideological divide among justices of the U.S. Supreme Court.
Last year, 16 of the Court's 23 total 5-4 splits were decided on "party lines," with Justice Kennedy siding with "conservatives" in 10 cases, and with "liberals" in six. This year, only a total of six cases were decided that way. But one Milwaukee lawyer suggests the conservative-liberal divide is less significant than the reasoning of each opinion.
"The significance of a 5-4 decision can turn on the strength and coherence of the reasoning which decides the close case," says Michael Brennan, an appellate lawyer at Gass Weber Mullins LLC and a former circuit court judge in Milwaukee County.
"A 5-4 decision with splintered reasoning can have multiple justices writing concurring opinions as to why they decided the way they did. A slightly different case with a slightly different argument may yield a different result in the future," Brennan said.
"Contrast that with a 5-4 decision grounded in solid reasoning shared among five justices, reasoning that beats out the alternatives. That produces an authoritative, workable rule for future cases, and is more respected," Brennan continued.
Perhaps the most high-profile case of the 5-4 decisions was Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, in which the "conservative majority" (plus Kennedy) ruled that closely-held companies with religious owners cannot be compelled to offer health care coverage for contraceptives.
Marquette Law Professor Michael Waxman, in a Faculty Blog post, notes that the Hobby Lobby decision raises some unanswered questions about the interaction between the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the Affordable Care Act (ACA).
"Considering the majority's reliance on two terms that go undefined by the Court – 'sincere religious belief' and 'closely held corporation … and the fact that none of the other Hobby Lobby opinions address the meaning of these terms, it is essential that these terms be defined as they fit into the ACA context," Prof. Waxman wrote.
Another high-profile case was McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, in which the 5-4 conservative majority struck down monetary limits on aggregate contributions to federal election candidates, political campaigns, or political action committees.
Mike Wittenwyler, an administrative and regulatory attorney at Godfrey & Kahn S.C., explains McCutcheon and state campaign finance changes in his May InsideTrack article, "McCutcheon and Act 153 Affect Campaign Financing in Wisconsin."
In Town of Greece v. Galloway, the conservative majority ruled that a town's practice of holding prayers before town board meetings did not violate the Establishment Clause.
"Narrowly defining what is not allowed in such prayers, the Court said they may not be used to praise the virtues of one faith and may not cast other faiths or other believers in a sharply negative light," wrote Lyle Denniston for SCOTUS blog.
And in Harris v. Quinn, the conservative majority held that public sector unions cannot collect "agency fees" from nonunion workers who are not full-fledged public employees.
Two law professors, writing for the New York Times, said the decision was narrow, but "saying that, in some cases, unions could not collect fees from one particular class of public employees who did not want to join, its language suggests that this may be the court's first step toward nationalizing the 'right to work' gospel by embedding it in constitutional law," wrote Cynthia Estlund (NYU) and William Forbath (Texas).
The liberal majority (liberals plus Kennedy) took 5-4 decisions in Hall v. Florida and Abramski v. United States. In Hall, the majority said Florida could not execute people who don't have intellectual disabilities, as determined solely by a threshold IQ score.
In Abramski, the liberal majority held that a person violates federal law if purchasing a gun on someone else's behalf but not claiming so on a federal gun purchase form. The dissenting opinion from the conservative justices argued that a federal background check doesn't apply if the purchaser and transferee are legally eligible to buy a gun.
"Statutory cases are not marked by the rigid ideological divides that we see in some areas of constitutional criminal law, such as the Eighth Amendment," O'Hear wrote.
"Only Abramski featured the classic 5-4 ideological breakdown – perhaps a reflection of the especially ideologically charged nature of gun-ownership issues."
In Navarette v. California, Justice Thomas wrote a majority opinion, joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Kennedy, Breyer, and Alito to uphold the marijuana possession convictions of two brothers who were pulled over and searched by police after 911 dispatchers received an anonymous tip about their erratic driving.
The tipster had provided the license plate of the vehicle driven by the defendants and said they had run her off the road. This was enough, the majority ruled, for police to believe that the driver was drunk. Thus, the majority said the traffic stop was legal.
"The 5-4 lineup mirrors that in Maryland v. King, another Fourth Amendment decision from last term that reflects the differing world view of the majority and dissent as to whether (and how) the Fourth Amendment applies to citizen-police encounters," said Marcus Berghahn, a criminal lawyer at Hurley, Burish & Stanton in Madison.
In Paroline v. United States, Justice Kennedy (author) and Justices Breyer, Kagan, Ginsburg, and Alito, ruled that a child pornography defendant, under federal law, must only pay mandatory restitution for losses proximately caused by the defendant.
"The real mystery in Paroline is why the liberals switched sides and supported a more expansive approach to liability in a criminal case, Professor O'Hear wrote in a blog post.


text: Holidays in Santorini are a magical experience where visitors get spectacular landscapes, picturesque villages, breathtaking sunsets, wonderful beaches, delicious food and excellent accommodation. Santorini is a beautiful Island with long history, ancient Greek culture and traditional architecture. Hotels in Santorini are built in traditional Cycladic way, made of stones and well decorated with wooden furniture where the visitors can get nice hospitality, comprehensive facilities and services to have an unforgettable Santorini vacation.


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"I love sleep. My life has the tendency to fall apart when I'm awake, you know?" (Ernest Hemingway)
"If people bring so much courage to this world the world has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills them. The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially. If you are none of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no special hurry." (Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell To Arms)
"It is awfully easy to be hard-boiled about everything in the daytime, but at night it is another thing." (Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises)
"Never go on trips with anyone you do not love." (Ernest Hemingway)
"Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime." (Ernest Hemingway)
"No, that is the great fallacy; the wisdom of old men. They do not grow wise. They grow careful." (Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell To Arms)
"Vice is a wonderful thing." (Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell To Arms)


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Atypical Moles
The skin cells that produce pigment ( melanocytes ) sometimes group together to form moles . Most people have at least 10 moles on their bodies.
Melanocytes can form abnormal moles, also called atypical moles or dysplastic nevi. These moles are not malignant themselves. But their presence is a warning of an inherited tendency to develop melanoma . Some people have only 1 or 2 atypical moles. Some people may have more than 100. The tendency to develop atypical moles can run in families (inherited predisposition).
Early signs of melanoma in atypical moles
The ABCDE rule of detection means watching for:
- Asymmetry . One half doesn't match the other half.
- Border irregularity . The edges are ragged, notched, or blurred.
- Color . The pigmentation is not uniform. Shades of tan, brown, and black are present. Dashes of red, white, and blue add to the mottled appearance. Changes in color distribution, especially the spread of color from the edge of a mole into the surrounding skin, also are an indicator of early melanoma.
- Diameter . The size of the mole is larger than 1/4 inch (6 mm), or about the size of a pencil eraser. Any growth of a mole should be of concern.
- Evolution . There is a change in the size, shape, symptoms (such as itching or tenderness), surface (especially bleeding), or color of a mole.
Atypical moles are seen most commonly on the back but may be anywhere on the body, including below the waist, on the scalp, or on the breasts or buttocks. They may fade into surrounding skin and include a flat portion that is level with the skin surface. They may be smooth, slightly scaly, or have a rough, irregular, "pebbly" appearance.
Atypical moles usually are not present at birth but develop some time later.
Several types of atypical moles are known to develop before melanoma (melanoma precursors). Atypical moles are the most common precursor, but not all atypical moles develop into melanoma. Precursors to melanoma include:
- Giant congenital melanocytic nevus (giant hairy nevus or garment nevus).
- Small to medium-sized congenital melanocytic nevus.
- Some heavily pigmented lesions of the membrane that line the eyelids (conjunctiva).
Current as of: May 3, 2017
Author: Healthwise Staff
Medical Review: Kathleen Romito, MD - Family Medicine & Amy McMichael, MD - Dermatology


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Lorde was a fourth of the four ladies honoring Kurt Cobain by taking his place as frontman at Nirvana's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction last April, a move that inspired a few detractors here and there, especially considering that the other three — Joan Jett, Kim Gordon and St. Vincent — are more closely associated with rock music.
Among those a little less than thrilled with Lorde's inclusion is current Billboard cover star Iggy Azalea.
The rapper, who's also holding down the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 with "Fancy," spoke to the publication for this week's cover story and seemed to diss the Rock Hall's decision to have the New Zealander perform "All Apologies," backed by Nirvana's Pat Smear, Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl.
Related: Interview: KISS' Paul Stanley Slams Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Patti Smith
"Nothing against her, but I think when you're doing a tribute to someone that's dead, generally it should be the person's peer," Azalea told Billboard. "Lorde is not Kurt Cobain's peer. No matter if she killed the performance or not, I just don't think it's appropriate."
She did not comment on the inclusion of Jett, Gordon and St. Vincent, real name Annie Clark, as part of the induction ceremony.


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Media Bites: Why the Hippie Radicals - er, NDP - Lost in BC
The Liberal Party of B.C. is not a brilliant outfit by any means. Much of its agenda is faddish and unscientific, and, if past performance is any indication, simply doesn't work. Yet it's also the party associated with business, capitalism, status, success, and wealth -- and now a four-term majority government to boot. What does make many squeamish, however, is the idea of a party run by hippies and radicals who dogmatically cling to the 20th century's most discredited economic theory simply for reasons of pride or denial. It comes off as a little pathetic.


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All quotes tagged Stacks
(107 quotes found)
"Mr Michener, as timeless as a stack of National Geographics, is the ultimate Summer Writer. Just as one goes back to the cottage in Maine, so one goes back to one's Michener."
"[When the Emmy nominations come out, there's always a tally of how the Big Four networks stacked up compared to the cable networks. HBO, in recent years giving NBC a run for its money with several of its own critically lauded original series, is hoping for nods for the comedy series] Sex in the City, ... The Sopranos."
"Group 2 is stacked. The end of May could be great. It's exactly what we want. The caliber of ball we're capable of playing, we want to play those teams now."
"There was a lot of fuel load, stuff in the garage, stuff stacked on the walls, on the dining room table. There was a lot of personal belongings just all over the place."
"This was a deep-seated fire because there is clothing, furniture and boxes stacked and packed away inside of the units. We had to pull everything out and spray it all off."
"When the odds are stacked against you, the only way to win is to be different. You have to go against the rules that everyone is following, particularly if the rules are dishonest."
"If you stacked regulations up, they would be about 5 feet tall, and there are so many regulations for small-business owners that half the time when they break regulations, they don't know they are doing it."
"While companies have bigger stacks of chips to play with, they still remain hesitant to put many of them into the pot."


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In Philip Rivers, new Chargers quarterbacks coach Frank Reich inherits a 31-year-old whose quarterback rating has dropped each of the last four years.
Rivers set the bar high before his recent slippage. In 2008, his quarerback rating (105.5) led the league.
Consider that his rating of 88.6 last year, which was 11th in the NFL and his lowest in five years, still beat Joe Flacco's 87.7.
For a 28-game stretch that began with the 2011 opener, however, Rivers had the most turnovers (43) in the NFL. Bad decisions by Rivers and blocking leaks played a role, as did the offense's talent drain overall. Ex-QB Steve Young, an ESPN analyst, faulted Rivers' footwork at times.
Reich, 51, is a former NFL quarterback. The same cannot be said for Rivers' previous coaches. Reich went to four consecutive Super Bowls with the Bills as the backup to Jim Kelly, learning a lot.
"Frank understands football," said Ted Tollner, who was a Bills aide for part of Buffalo's AFC dynasty. "The other thing is, he's an excellent coach. He deals with people really well."
To hear Tollner, if Reich assists Rivers to the same degree that he did Kelly, a Hall of Famer, Rivers will improve.
"Jim had a lot of confidence in what Frank saw and what Frank would say to him on the field," Tollner said. "Frank complemented, I thought, very, very well. He helped Jim as a field guy."
Peyton Manning is another passer with Hall of Fame credentials whom Reich knows well, from Reich's time in 2009-10 as the Colts' quarterbacks coach.
As the Colts' receivers coach, he tutored Reggie Wayne in 2011. Last year Reich was the receivers coach for the Cardinals. In San Diego, he is reunited with offensive coordinator Ken Whisenhunt, Arizona's head coach from 2007-12.


text: Special to The Globe and Mail Published November 30, 2011 Updated March 26, 2017 These powerful handsets have brains and beauty Open this photo in gallery: 1 of 9 Apple iPhone 4S Apple's latest must-have handset is identical to its predecessor on the surface, but comes packed with a more powerful processor, improved graphics for gaming, an eight-megapixel camera, and Siri, a highly evolved voice interface system that lets you have a conversation with your phone. It's less creepy – and much more funny – than it sounds. (Starting at $649.99, or $159.99 with contracts through Rogers, Bell, or Telus; www.apple.ca) Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Open this photo in gallery: 2 of 9 Samsung Galaxy Nexus This wafer-thin handset – the first to run Google's new Android 4.0 operating system (better known as Ice Cream Sandwich) – sports brand new features like Face Unlock, a zero-shutter-lag camera and support for Android Beam, which transfers data between phones simply by touching them together. It also has a true HD 1280-by-720 pixel Super AMOLED screen, making it a mobile movie lover's dream. (Starting at $649.95, or $159.95 with a three-year contract through Bell) Handout Open this photo in gallery: 3 of 9 Motorola RAZR The revamped RAZR puts Motorola back on the frontlines of sexy Android phone design. Its downright anorexic 7.1-millimetre body is infused with Kevlar for extra strength, and its 4.3-inch Super AMOLED gorilla glass screen is a dream. Plus, the brand new Motocast app lets you access files on your home PC anywhere you happen to be. ($649.99; $149.99 with a contract through Rogers; www.motorola.ca) Handout Open this photo in gallery: 4 of 9 HTC Raider This new Android Gingerbread mobile from Taiwanese hardware powerhouse HTC sports a 4.5-inch qHD display that makes viewing movies through the cloud-based HTC Watch service a treat. Potent innards, including a dual-core Qualcomm processor, help power HTC Sense, an Android overlay designed to anticipate and simplify common tasks, such as answering calls and sharing pictures. (Holiday launch, pricing to be announced; www.htc.com/ca) Handout Story continues below advertisement Open this photo in gallery: 5 of 9 LG Optimus LTE With lightning quick downloads (it runs on Bell's 4G LTE network) and a 1280-by-720-pixel 4.5-inch display, there are few mobile handsets better equipped to stream high quality video than this cutting edge Android phone. It also packs an eight-megapixel camera that can capture 1080p video and will be upgradeable to Android 4.0 – A.K.A. Ice Cream Sandwich – come 2012. ($629.99, or $149.99 with a contract through Bell; www.lg.com/canada) Open this photo in gallery: 6 of 9 Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray This compact new Android-powered Xperia has a sleek aluminum frame measuring just 9.4-millimetres at its thickest point. Ideal for social networkers, Facebook has been woven into the interface, making it a snap to "like" music, tag people in pictures, and communicate with friends. (Holiday launch, pricing to be announced; www.sonyericsson.ca) Handout Open this photo in gallery: 7 of 9 Blackberry Bold 9900 Blackberry's flagship phone has all the features that fans of the Canadian company crave, including a Liquid Graphics touch screen interface, a physical QWERTY keyboard, BBM, access to exclusive apps, and a lightning fast Web browser. And it's all contained in the slimmest, slickest carapace Blackberry has yet designed. ($599.99; or $169.95 with contracts through Bell, Rogers, Telus, or Virgin; www.blackberry.com) Handout Open this photo in gallery: 8 of 9 Samsung Galaxy S II X Also known as the Hercules, this powerful Android 2.3.5-powered super phone sports Samsung's peerless Super AMOLED Plus display and rocks a 1.5-gigahertz dual-core processor. It runs at 4G speeds on the Telus network, and will likely be upgradeable to the next version of Google's mobile operating system, nicknamed Ice Cream Sandwich. ($599.99, or $99.99 with a contract through Telus; www.samsung.ca) handout Open this photo in gallery: 9 of 9 Nokia X7 Nokia's Windows 7 phones are still a few months away. In the meantime, fans of the Finnish manufacturer's mobile hardware can give this Symbian-powered handset a go. Its distinctive trim-cornered design frames a bright 4-inch AMOLED touch screen perfect for viewing pictures and HD videos captured with its 8.1-megapixel image sensor. ($299.99; $29.99 with a contract through Rogers; www.nokia.ca) (Editor's note, an earlier version of this story incorrectly identified Nokia as a Norwegian company, we regret the error.) Handout Report an error Editorial code of conduct


text: I use a 70oz Camelback filled with ice & water and supplement it with a 1 liter bottle of water at my last stop for gas before setting up camp for the night. The bottle water is used for coffee & cooking. As I travel solo this works fine for me.


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10 More Years
The Recording Academy and CBS officially celebrated inking a new 10-year partnership to air the GRAMMY Awards through 2021 with a star-studded after-party following tonight's CBS special "The GRAMMY Nominations Concert Live!! — Countdown To Music's Biggest Night." The show announced select nominees for the 54th Annual GRAMMY Awards, which will air on Feb. 12, 2012.
CBS has been the television home of the live GRAMMY telecast for nearly 40 years.
"We are so pleased to continue our longstanding partnership with our friends at CBS," said Recording Academy President/CEO Neil Portnow at the time of the signing in June.
Leslie Moonves, president and chief executive officer, CBS Corporation, added, "We are excited to be the home of the GRAMMYs for another decade and to continue our long and mutually beneficial partnership with The Recording Academy."
The deal includes the continuation of the now annual "The GRAMMY Nominations Concert Live!!" special.
To celebrate, performers and presenters from tonight's nominations broadcast such as Grandmaster Flash, LL Cool J and Mike Stoller joined such CBS celebrities as Donielle Artese, Garrett Morris and Glynn Turmanand and other noteworthy attendees to ring in the new deal at a party at Club Nokia L.A. Live in downtown Los Angeles.
Given the cutting-edge artists nominated for the 54th Annual GRAMMY Awards who will be part of the telecast in February, the party drew attention from presenting sponsor Hyundai, which was attracted to the event because musicians' spirit of innovation matches their own aim to innovate in the automotive industry.
Hyundai has already shown an adventurous musical spirit in collaborating with the GRAMMYs for Re:Generation, a documentary highlighting music's creative process.
Re:Generation chronicles the creative journey of leading DJs the Crystal Method, DJ Premier, Pretty Lights, three-time GRAMMY winner Mark Ronson, and 54th GRAMMY nominee Skrillex as they interpret and put a new spin on traditional styles of music. From classical music and jazz to rock and funk, the DJs collaborate with some of music's top artists, including GRAMMY winners Erykah Badu, the Funk Brothers, LeAnn Rimes, and Dr. Ralph Stanley; Recording Academy Lifetime Achievement Award recipients the Doors; the Berklee Contemporary Symphony Orchestra; and the Dap Kings, Joseph "Zigaboo" Modeliste, Nas, Martha Reeves, and Trombone Shorty.


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ACHICA / Timeless Luxury: Silk Bedding
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Bureaucratic blocks blamed for failure to tackle blinding disease
A NATIONAL strategy to eradicate the endemic blinding eye disease trachoma in remote indigenous Australia is failing to achieve its objective because of alleged bureaucratic bungling and indifference.
Australia is the only developed country in the world with the disease, which is regarded by the World Health Organisation as an indicator of indigenous healthcare.
Trachoma, normally only found in the Third World countries of Africa, is easily treated with antibiotics and lessons in personal hygiene.
The Rudd government made $16 million available to wipe out trachoma in 2008 as part of a $58 million package to address indigenous eye care.
Professor John Funder, an eminent medical researcher and former director of the Baker Institute, said New South Wales health bureaucrats had been ''sitting on their hands for three years'' when they should have been embracing the Closing the Gap strategy to wipe out trachoma.
''But progress is glacial,'' he said. ''NSW has not got off its backside.''
He said ''blockages'' to progress had occurred between mid-level Commonwealth and state bureaucrats, who ''meet every three months, fail to resolve their differences and then agree to meet in another three months.
''The duplication, but more importantly the stagnation, is terrible.''
Melbourne University's Indigenous Eye Health Unit estimates there are 20,000 indigenous Australians, including 5000 children, who are at risk of contracting trachoma in remote communities.
Professor Hugh Taylor, who heads the unit, said trachoma could be eliminated in five years with proper funding and co-operation.
Professor Funder said he had come to the conclusion that the ''appalling'' Commonwealth-state relationship was an impediment to forging an effective trachoma strategy even though there had been widespread agreement ''at the very top'' on the need to eliminate the disease.
Inquiries by Fairfax Media reveal significant progress to reduce trachoma rates has been made in the Northern Territory, Western Australia and, more recently, South Australia, but Queensland, home to the nation's second-biggest indigenous population, and NSW, with the biggest, failed to embrace comprehensive screening and preventive measures.
In contrast, NT Health accepted the Rudd offer in 2008 and has since screened 83 per cent of high-risk communities and introduced treatment strategies that have led to a fall in trachoma rates from 20 per cent to 11 per cent.
Health officials report the program has been effective but there remains significant work to be done.
A spokeswoman for NT Health said there was no doubt increased screening and treatment had significantly reduced the amount of trachoma.
In the same period, NSW has haggled with Canberra over the scope and timing of screening programs and only recently reached agreement on how to proceed. Queensland, where trachoma was recently rediscovered in an island community, has been equally slow to act, claiming a limited study of six communities found it was not a significant problem.
Research by Melbourne University's indigenous eye care unit found rates of preventable eye disease remain at alarming levels in most states. Two-thirds of remote communities surveyed have endemic trachoma.
Blinding cataracts are 12 times more common in indigenous adults, 40 per cent of whom have not yet had corrective surgery.
Professor Taylor said it was puzzling trachoma had been found in one Queensland island community but no steps had been undertaken to investigate similar communities.
He said no major investigation had been undertaken recently in western NSW, where trachoma was first discovered to be a significant health issue by the late Fred Hollows in the 1970s. This year it is estimated NSW's indigenous population will reach 176,000.
A spokesman for the NSW Health Department confirmed that discussions had only begun on plans to screen trachoma last year. ''Because the trachoma strategy was a new program, steps were taken to ensure the program was feasible, ethical and undertaken with appropriate community consent and engagement,'' he said.
He claimed the Northern Territory and Western Australia were more advanced because they were extending existing trachoma screening programs.
Trachoma has not been a significant problem in Victoria since the 1890s due a mild climate and a relatively small indigenous population not located in remote communities.
Professor Funder said Kevin Rudd should have stuck to his ''word'' in threatening to take over state health departments. ''It was unfortunate that he got rolled before he could do it.''
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I've ridden an rs for over thirty years and have tried all heights and the stock shield with the edging on it is the best.
In the last few years I have gone to ear plugs and a better quality helmet than the ones I used to buy at walmart in my younger days.
Stock shield, ear plugs and a quality helmet will be the best and look the best; putting a taller shield on an rs just doesn't do it for me.