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There is a box hedge in the garden where I grew up which reaches up to just above my knees. If I crouch down beside the hedge so that my hand is level with the top, close my eyes, and run my fingers along the feathery surface, the sensation returns me at once to my seven-year-old self. There are other parts of the garden that have the power to efface time: a tiny sunken courtyard filled with giant lilies into which we would vanish as soon as lunch was ready, infuriating the adults, and a narrow brick path that winds along the side of an old wooden hut where gardening tools are still kept. As you press down the latch of the hut door, leaving the smell of honeysuckle to suffuse the air outside, and adjust your eyes to the darkness, the shapes of rusted iron spades gradually strengthen into focus, their smooth wooden handles hanging on nails tacked into the beams. Beside them are dangerous-looking, sharp-pronged forks; and, propped against the wall, an ingenious wooden seat with chipped green metal handle bars, ideal for sitting on to weed or, when turned upside down, for standing on to prune out-of-reach roses. If I stand now for a moment on that seat and grip the roughly painted handles in my palms, I can take myself back half a century.
Truly valuable memories, the kind that deliver an instant punch of return to a single moment long ago, are not always prompted by photograph albums or brought back by some elusive mental struggle to remember the detail of the past. Cleaner, more rounded recollections come rushing at you from embedded sensations: a taste, touch, smell, sight or sound that perhaps seemed insignificant at the time, but can be ignited unexpectedly decades later by the simplest of experiences. It is Proust, of course, who best describes how memories are most effectively triggered by the senses rather than the intellect. "The smell and taste of things remain poised a long time, like souls," he writes in Swann's Way, the first book of À la recherche du temps perdu, "ready to remind us, waiting and hoping for their moment, amid the ruins of all the rest." The hippocampus – the area of the brain where all sensory information is gathered and processed – ensures, for example, that if the taste-trigger is activated, then some or all of the other neighbouring senses will respond and deliver a visualised and amplified memory. It is as if the entire body of some formidable sea creature lying somnolent beneath a muddy surface can be stirred into action by the simple tweak of his tail.
During childhood and adolescence one's mind is at its most energetic, gathering and storing away these sense-sensitive experiences like bees in a hive, ready for the adult to return to discover the nectar, sometimes deliberately, sometimes involuntarily. These memories that are created during youth become those that are most intensely precious at the end, when life begins to ebb away. Memories, whether those of an individual or celebrated collectively by a group, can become a source of consolation in moments of despair or doubt, providing validation that one has lived a rich and varied life. The retrieval of the past is a process to be relished, wherein the unexpected recollection of long-neglected experiences resembles the discovery of old home movies abandoned in the attic. I am interested not only in the way memory plays its part during life but in the inestimably valuable payout during the last phase of all.
Smells associated with early childhood are powerful time capsules. The medicinal scent of a bar of golden, transparent Pears soap evokes, for me, a grandfather who allowed his grandchildren to be present during his morning shave and whose conversation was funnier than that of any other adult we knew. My memory-prompts of school a few years later relate more to foods and tastes that are not always enjoyable to revisit. Grey hunks of liver with unswallowable whitish pipes threaded through the centre and puddings made with cereals have ensured that offal and tapioca are never now part of our menu at home. Eggs too, especially the fried kind with their metallic-tasting, overcooked, frilly edges, have joined my private list of bile-inducing foods. I can never forget or forgive the way the sticky yellow seepage of the yolk onto the crispy fried bread contaminated the only palatable ingredient of the horrid, compulsory, pre-communion Sunday school breakfast. Simultaneous in timescale, but an antidote to the lifelong egg and tapioca prejudice, is the unfailingly delicious flavour of avocado and its attendant creamy, sugary dressing, served as an exotic welcome-home treat by my mother at the beginning of the holidays. By contrast, roast chicken, associated with the ritualistic last lunch before returning to boarding school, fails even now to deliver much pleasure. In order to live, one must eat. Like the act of procreation itself, this biological necessity can involve all five of the senses. Perhaps that is why food and sex remain so important in reveries of former times. It is no coincidence that people whose own reproductive capability is long gone find a particular pleasure in the sensory delights integral to growing flowers, fruit and vegetables.
For my grown-up children, the sound of popcorn popping beneath the lid of a deep pan means movies, just as it did when they were small. For me the carefree contentment of distant English summers is contained within the sweet smell of mint in a boiling pan of new potatoes; the sight of a perfectly poached, velvety-pink salmon; the sensation of the first slim, slippery stems of asparagus in my hand; the taste of a mouthful of just-picked, home-grown, still-dewy raspberries.
Revisiting places one has worked in, lived in or briefly visited can be fundamental to the recollection of an entire period of one's life. One of the most evocative smells of my teenage years still exists in the Times Room in the basement of the London Library in St James's Square. More than half a lifetime ago I would descend the wooden stairs to spend university holidays in my part-time research role, checking off my father's lists of footnote queries for the latest volume of diaries or letters that he was in the process of editing. Turning the old broadsheet pages, taking care not to tear the fragile edges, I would check for dates of births, marriages and deaths, noting down illuminating obituaries, details of violent weather, spellings of obscure names. Even now, when heaving the huge red leather-bound volumes off the shelves and releasing the mustiness of centuries, I can revive my undergraduate excitement at discovering forgotten minutiae of history. I have long since found that walking myself visually up the stairs, along the corridors and even into the cupboards of houses I once lived in is a more efficient way of inducing sleep than meandering round a field of indistinguishable sheep. Sometimes the detail of those rooms comes back to me. A new book in which the pages have not yet been cut, a pot of emerald nail polish, a frayed velvet cushion in a stranger's hallway or an overeager electric hotplate in an overheated dining room can all resurrect the mood of a past life. But just as Proust cautions that the memory-jogging taste of a madeleine dipped in tea must be rationed if it is to retain its full power, I limit my nocturnal house travel to my most insomniac nights.
Smells and sights and sounds in places are capable of bringing back distant centuries. Visits to the battlefield of Hastings in the school holidays were accompanied by a parental suggestion that we close our eyes while standing among indifferent cows and listen to an agonised scream: our father's attempt to convince us how loudly poor King Harold must have yelled when the arrow hit his eye. About a mile from where I live in Sussex is a meadow that in midsummer is bright with scattered buttercups. To reach this place one must climb high up onto the ridge of the South Downs past men flying kites, their shorts held up with Swallows and Amazons snake-clasp belts, before dipping steeply down through the cowslips and wild orchids flowering in the folds of the hills. Timelessness is in the very quality of the silence here. Shakespeare, Keats, Hardy, Lawrence and Kipling all saw, heard, smelled and touched a place like this.
The pleasure of experiencing and reading about identical sensations undergone by the greatest dramatists, poets, novelists, diarists and essayists of the past can bring tranquillity to a nation's fast-moving, anxiety-ridden soul. In Britain, at times of national mourning as well as celebration, those rousing patriotic favourites – the words and music of William Blake's and Hubert Parry's Jerusalem, Cecil Spring Rice's I Vow to thee, My Country and, of course, the national anthem itself – sustained a nation through two world wars. They are the sounds that continue to unite us in song even if we do not agree with a single word of the sentiments. Familiar words, be they verses of hymns learnt long ago and never forgotten, or passages from literature with which one has a lifelong acquaintance, have the power to transport one in time as powerfully as any photographic record. "The great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River" beats out the alliterative drumroll of a childhood bedtime. Not long ago, at her memorial service, the recorded voice of my first inspiring English teacher jolted me back to the first time I heard Dickens read aloud. When my father became ill and took to his bed for the last time, he sometimes turned to his favourite books, finding their silent companionship preferable to human chatter. As an undergraduate he had bought at Blackwell's bookshop a leather-bound copy of Wuthering Heights, which he had kept all his life. On the back page in pencil he would make a careful annotation of each date on which he reread the book. There was a neat entry every five years. The final date was written just a few weeks before he died.
While researching three books, set variously just outside and just within living memory, one of my greatest pleasures has been to coax recollections from people who are unaware that what seem to be dreary quotidian activities, tucked into the pleats of a long life, become sparklers for a social historian. The process made me conscious of one of the few benefits of getting older. Again and again I came across those who had difficulty remembering events of a week ago but to whom, with a little prompting, the far distant past returned in ever-sharper focus. An adored aunt was at first sceptical that the shopping trips to a department store she used to make with her mother in the Twenties could have any relevance to my book about the aftermath of the war. But when I explained my interest in the "nearly new" top floor and lit up at her description of travelling for the first time in a lift, she opened up a little more. "When I was 20 I had a Blackshirt for a boyfriend, you know," she once said casually as she poured me a cup of tea. "Not for long, mind you," she assured me, stirring in the milk before looking up at me to check that I had got the point. Last year on a hot English summer day, I was speaking in a muggy canvas tent to a group of people who were assembled there to hear tales of life a hundred years ago. Afterwards a woman came up to me. While I had been talking about the record-breaking, sweltering summer of 1911, when the wells had dried up and overdressed Edwardians had gone half-crazy with heat, I had mentioned that one Essex man had been arrested for insanity after stripping stark naked as he walked the Braintree streets to work. The woman had suddenly remembered a previously forgotten incident. Perhaps it was the warmth of the tent, or the flowered print of my summer dress, or simply my spoken-out-loud description of that long-ago August day: she could not be sure. But something had jogged into her consciousness a long-submerged childhood conversation, when her grandmother had recounted an anecdote from her wedding day. Her cotton wedding dress was covered in a pattern of lilac-coloured pansies. After the reception in the bride's family's garden, the moment came for the newly-weds to leave for their honeymoon, and although she had not changed out of her wedding dress, guests remarked on the elegant simplicity of the bride's going-away clothes. The intense strength of the sun, during that prelapsarian summer before the First World War, had bleached the pansies clean away. Only now, 100 years after the event, did her granddaughter remember and trust the veracity of her grandmother's story. There were tears in her eyes as she thanked me for the verbal madeleine.
The collapsing of time through anecdotal recollection is an exhilarating game. When my grandfather was a child he went on holiday to France and was introduced to a very old man with a long white beard who, as a child himself, had been the personal standard-bearer for Napoleon Bonaparte, stepping out at the front of the emperor's procession as it made its way towards the battlefield at Waterloo. On another occasion the same grandfather had been holidaying in the Alps, walking through the summer mountain flowers with a couple of undergraduate friends. Taking shelter in a log cabin from a sudden cold wind, the young men fell to discussing the author of the novel they were all reading. Had Charlotte Brontë really loved Mr Nicholls, they wondered, or had her father pressed his bachelor curate on an unwilling daughter? An old man who had been sitting unobtrusively in the corner by the fire suddenly stirred. "I can assure you all that Charlotte certainly married Mr Nicholls out of feelings of true love," he told them sternly. "And I should know the truth, because I am Mr Nicholls."
Sometimes I ask myself, if I were to arrive in heaven now, which days of my life would be the most enjoyable to look back on, and to give the game more edge, which the least? The Christmas day when I was given my first bicycle? The day I wore my first mini skirt with its silver buttons? The day I first fell in love? The days on which my children were born? The day I failed my driving test? The day I passed my driving test? The day my father died? The day I knew why I wanted to marry again? The shape of this mental exercise, the often delicious immersion in nostalgia, is both familiar as well as constantly evolving. But when facing death itself, be it one's own or that of someone close, one becomes even more conscious of the simultaneous joy and sadness that comes with remembering. "Men live by forgetting," TS Eliot wrote, "women live on memories." For men who have lived through war this generalisation seems to hold true. Even the redoubtable Henry Allingham waited until his centenary year before he could bear to speak of the hellish trenches of the Great War. In 1920 the poppy that had threaded its way through the corn and wheat fields of the Western Front was adopted as the symbol of remembrance for those who died within sight of the scarlet flower. Blood-red poppies had been the last living thing so many of their friends ever saw. Now that even Henry Allingham is no longer here, there are no known living survivors of the Great War, but for some of those who lived on for 90 years after the guns stopped firing, the annual sight of those commemorative poppies brought back nothing but pain. The opening lines of "The Waste Land", Eliot's great postwar poem, addresses memory's power to torment. In order to find a way of coping with its monumental tragedy, Britain had tried for the course of the war years to protect itself from too much suffering by denying the scale of the tragedy. "Human kind/ Cannot bear very much reality", Eliot wrote later in "Burnt Norton", the first of his Four Quartets. And so the dark, wintry years of the 1914–18 conflict were at times kept paradoxically warm and optimistic, "covering/ Earth in forgetful snow". For as long as the fighting continued there was always the hope that it might end soon, that those who were missing abroad might return, and even, in the absence of the repatriation of bodies, that loved ones might only be dead for the duration of the war. The springtime of Eliot's "The Waste Land" is a paradoxically cruel season as it brings with it a reawakening of consciousness after a long, collective submerging of painful truth. With the aftermath of winter comes the unavoidable light of April, "the cruellest month", from which it is impossible to hide. As a consequence it is necessary to face up to this new, arid landscape, "mixing/ Memory and desire, stirring/ Dull roots with spring rain".
Other than the death of a child, the loss of a parent can be the most unsettling of adult experiences, sometimes robbing one of the illusion that there is more of one's life left to be lived than has gone before. As long as a parent provides the ceiling above one's fragile emotional structure, one is protected from exposure to the winds that buffet those who must accept responsibility for themselves. Some of my most personal memories are rooted in the unique experience of living through and beyond the death of a parent. In just a few months I will be exactly the same age as my mother was when she died. Her own mother had succumbed to the same fatal disease at the same age: the track record for longevity on the maternal side of my family is unimpressive. I have been approaching this generational hurdle with a mixture of sadness and finger-crossing triumph. I feel sad knowing that my mother did not live to share the splendid adulthood of her grandchildren; that she missed visiting the lovely garden her son-in-law has made; and that, as a cheerleader for the monarchy, she will never witness the renaissance of a Royal family who seemed down on their uppers in the late Eighties when she died. Yet I feel miraculously lucky that I am poised to outlive the age span of both a parent and a grandmother. Although my mother had been ill for a while, the end came suddenly in a hospital bed, her fall into unconsciousness depriving me of the chance to say goodbye.
My father's death was an altogether different matter. During his last few months his existence narrowed to a distillation as well as a reflection of the way he had responded to life. Throughout their marriage my parents had occupied separate bedrooms; my mother slept alone in a double bed, and my father in a single. When my mother left to marry another man, my father continued to sleep in his monastic room. It was to this place that he climbed the stairs one final time after being diagnosed with an illness from which we all knew he would never recover. He lived for another eight months and he never again went downstairs or out into the garden that lay just below his window. Possibly the physical weakness that prevented him from walking there on his own was too distressing to acknowledge. Maybe he chose to save himself from the pain of saying goodbye to a place he had known and loved almost all his life. Or perhaps he could not bear the irony of dying in a place so vitally alive. Yet until the last day the room was a focus for all the things he had loved best. I now realise that his passions and dislikes could somehow be sifted according to his sensory habits. A lifetime's indifference to classical music was emphasised by his equally long-standing passion for popular songs from musicals like Oklahoma!, South Pacific and My Fair Lady. When a few years earlier he had been invited as a castaway on Desert Island Discs, he had taken as much trouble as anyone over his list of eight records, and was surprised and a little hurt at his friends' amusement following the broadcast programme. No one disputed the excellent choice of the haunting Lily Marlene, sung during the Second World War across no-man's-land by the enemy and returned in answering chorus by the British troops. It was a song that never failed to move my father to tears, no matter how often he heard it. The sentimental selections I Could Have Danced All Night and A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square were followed by a chart-topping pop record of the Sixties, sung by a girl who had a thing about not wearing shoes, which reminded him of the time when he was in unrequited love with a young American research assistant. Ravel's Boléro was included because it had accompanied Torvill and Dean's balletic performance on the ice and was the only piece of classical music my father could identify. The recording of Patricia Hodge reading from Pride and Prejudice, musical in cadence alone, certainly caused the odd raised eyebrow.
During those dying months, as the days grew warmer and the daylight hours stretched far into the evening, various adjustments were made. An abstract painting by a granddaughter, a red-and-blue block of colour, was propped bedside his bed, as was a framed print of his favourite portrait, Gainsborough's Mr and Mrs Andrews. The television set was brought from downstairs and took up its position on the chest of drawers. This was 2004, the year of the Summer Olympics in Athens. The combination of athletic beauty and a backdrop of his favourite city on Earth provided him with something wonderful to watch, although a visit from his dearest friends or the sight of one of his own grandchildren's heads peering round the door to check he was not asleep satisfied his visual sense more than anything else. As this gradual closing-down of time persisted, I began to believe it would never end. And even though we failed to persuade him to go outside into the garden, he welcomed the arrival in his room of a bunch of miniature narcissi, or two or three grape hyacinths in a sherry glass. The scent of these spring flowers brought the promise of new life, and with it, hope. Beside his bed sat a series of tiny vases, the sort that my grandmother used to keep on her writing desk when she wanted to study the single stem of a flower for its shape or its perfume. My father's favourites were aquilegia, with their jester caps of every colour, and sweet-smelling 'Madame Alfred Carrière', the first rose planted in the garden he had loved since the age of 12. As the end approached, three raspberries popped in the mouth seemed, at least for a day or two, to contain a life-giving elixir. With this concentration of pleasure came expressions of regret, about memories he knew he would now never have of places he had never visited. Allied with the regrets came a new honesty. Sex troubled him. Like Betjeman, he felt he had not had enough of it, or ever succeeded in being very good at the whole enigmatic process. He felt he had loved too often but never too well. Sex, that most encompassing of all sensory experiences, when the hippocampus is aroused into complete response, remained for my father unsatisfyingly mysterious, even somehow shameful. Confined to his single, starchy sheeted bed, my father continued to be as physically self-conscious and reserved as ever, flinching apologetically if someone crossed the line and stroked his hand, yet occasionally ruffling my hair as he used to do when I was a child as I bent to kiss him on the cheek. "You must have three great loves in your life," he told me once casually over the washing up. "You need not marry all or, indeed, any of them, but while you are involved in these relationships they must be all-consuming." At the end of his own life, however, he confided that he had been unable to consummate, as it were, his own advice. This failure assumed huge importance for him during those final months; and as he spoke with unprecedented openness, he wept for what might have been, for what should have been, lamenting the lack of chances to start all over again.
I pitied him, remembering the urgency of a meeting with the man I loved at a railway station in a tiny town in the south of France, a moonlit swim in the warm waters of the Mediterranean, and, at the culmination of a love affair, a garland of pale-pink roses threaded through an arch in a country churchyard. I felt blessed knowing that I would not share my father's regrets. Not that there was any doubt he had lived a rich and full life: several hundred people came to his memorial service – and listened to the Grenadier Guards band playing Lily Marlene.
The urge to transcend time becomes varyingly acute at different moments in one's life. Each year, almost as soon as the summer light begins to fade, grown-ups start saying to each other, "I can't believe it's nearly Christmas again. Doesn't time fly? Seems like only the other day I was sewing up that turkey." Children roll their eyes, innocent of their parents' and grandparents' implicit lament. Linear time is hard to deny when one is faced with the evidence of a life well laughed indelibly marked around a mouth, or tired legs beginning to slow in their stride. Memory can, of course, involve self-deception, and the temptation to exaggerate or sentimentalise the past is what gives nostalgia its bad name. Phrases such as "in the olden days" and "in my day" often herald unreliable comparisons with the present. The famously golden Edwardian summers that preceded the dark years of the First World War were in fact a product of elegiac myth. Apart from two sunny seasons in 1906 and 1911, the first 13 summers of the 20th century were notably damp and soggy; but it suited millions who craved the return of life before the conflict and tragedy to allow themselves a dab or two of the ointment of retrospective delusion. In two more lines from "Burnt Norton", however, Eliot emphasises that with the very act of remembering comes an awareness of the now, and that honesty depends on living in the moment: "What might have been and what has been Point to one end, which is always present."
When someone much loved returns from a long absence abroad, words can wait. In the enclosing of one hand within another, a greater eloquence lies. On the last day of his life my father allowed me to take his hand in mine for the first time. Self-consciousness dissolved as trust and love were condensed and recognised in simple human contact. On that day, in that moment, memory had no valid part to play.
This is an edited extract from 'Memory and Desire', published by The Cuckoo Press for John Sandoe (Books) Ltd
Juliet Nicolson is the author of 'The Great Silence: 1918-1920 Living in the Shadow of the Great War' (John Murray), and, most recently, 'Abdication' (Bloomsbury)


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Comfort from pre-planning
My dear friend and work colleague of many years was, unfortunately, diagnosed with a terminal brain illness. While she still had all her mental faculties we sat on her verandah one warm afternoon and together with her husband, we created her funeral ceremony. About a year later Margaret passed away peacefully, and in due course I conducted the service which we had written. Whilst the events were tragically sad for all concerned, the funeral was somehow uplifting and satisfying because all present knew that Margaret had contributed greatly to its format. I often wonder if there is a sensitive way to convey this story to a wider audience, so that more people might benefit from the comforts that flow from this process.
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subset: commoncrawl


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Stoke City goalkeeper Asmir Begovic says their warm weather training camp has worked wonders.
Stoke have been getting some sun on their backs in Dubai as they prepare for this weekend's match at title-chasing Manchester City.
Begovic said: "We are working on a few little things ready for how we want to finish the season.
"We have to make the most of the break and recharge the batteries ready for the last few games."


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The CBCIA Outstanding Seedstock and Commercial Producer of the Year Awards recognize progressive beef cattle breeders who use practical, scientifically accepted selection and management methods and integrate them into successful ranching operations. Examples include, but are not limited to, genetic and breeding strategies for traits of economic importance, feed development and utilization, nutritional management and marketing based on objective measurement of performance. Awardees will be honored at appropriate CCA and CBCIA sponsored events and are eligible to be nominated (by CBCIA) for the national Beef Improvement Federation (BIF) awards
Bentley Ranch
*donotes international BIF winners


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Robert Sandler
MD, MPH, School of Medicine, UNC-Chapel Hill, Cancer Epidemiology, Gastrointestinal Oncology Program
Robert Sandler
School of Medicine
UNC-Chapel Hill
Cancer Epidemiology
Gastrointestinal Oncology Program
Area of interest
Dr. Robert Sandler is an internist/gastroenterologist with research interests in colon cancer etiology, screening and prevention, and intermediate markers of colon cancer risk. He is the principal investigator of the North Carolina Colon Cancer Study, a population-based, case-control study exploring environmental, lifestyle and medical factors that might explain diverging black-white incidence and mortality trends for colorectal cancer. He is principal investigator for an NCI-funded investigation to study rectal mucosal proliferation and recently served as study chair of a multicenter chemoprevention clinical trial testing whether aspirin can prevent colorectal adenomas in patients who have undergone curative resection for e colorectal cancer. He is the principal investigator for the North Carolina Colorectal Cancer Care Outcomes Research and Surveillance (CanCORS) study, an NCI initiative to investigate the impact of processes of cancer care on outcomes. He is also an investigator for multicenter cooperative trials of calcium and aspirin/folate prevention of neoplastic polyps. He directs an NIH-funded training grant in digestive disease epidemiology and the NIH-funded UNC Center for Gastrointestinal Biology and Disease. He is the president of the American Gastroenterological Association and was a member of the National Commission on Digestive Diseases.
Awards and Honors
Named visiting professor at: University of Washington, Northwestern University, Harvard Medical School, Yale University School of Medicine. University of Chicago, Massachusetts General Hospital, Vanderbilt
President, American Gastroenterological Association Institute, 2008-9.
Masters Award for Sustained Achievement in Digestive Disease, May 2006
Best Doctors: 2005-2009
National Commission on Digestive Diseases 2008


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Test Anxiety: It's a Real Thing. Do You Need Therapy?
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Name: Georgia Adams Langerfeld
Day Job: Copy Editor at the Pensacola News Journal
Pensacola Resident Since: Born here in 1983, moved to Milton, Fla. when I was 15, and moved back to Pensacola two years ago
Good Eats: I'm a huge fan of sushi from Horizen Sushi Restaurant. I lived in Japan for a year when I was in college, so I'm pretty picky about my sushi, but Horizen always hits the spot. Skipping continents, I love our taco nights at work, when we mosey over to Nacho Daddies on Palafox for an order of house nachos, or, my favorite, a veggie quesadilla add chicken. They use an awesome blend of vegetables that really makes their veggie items stand out. And getting away from downtown, I also have to give a huge shout-out to Goat Lips Deli. They've got great food and free Wi-Fi, so it's a great studying hangout.
Retail Therapy: I'm a bargain hunter, so I love hitting up Ross, TJ Maxx and Beall's Outlet stores when I'm looking for clothes. And even though we rent, I love working in the yard, so I spend a fair amount of my dinero at Home Depot. And honestly, when I really feel the need to shop but I don't want to blow my budget, I hit up any Dollar Tree. I can walk out with all kinds of weird stuff for less than 10 bucks.
Watering Holes: I really love the atmosphere and attitude at The Magnolia, and I also adore The Elbow Room. I'm not much of a partier, so the laid-back atmosphere at both these places is great. Plus, I'm (tragically!) allergic to beer, so the selection of ciders and wines at these places is great.
Nightlife: Honestly, most of the time I'm just as happy at home watching Netflix, but when I do go out I like to be somewhere I can hear my friends talk, like sipping glasses of wine at The Wine Bar. For the times I do feel like dancing, I haven't found anywhere that could beat Emerald City for a stress-free dance party.
Outdoors: Palafox Pier is really awesome, and I love that it's so easy to get to. I also really love canoeing, though I don't get to do it too often. If you're looking for a real adventure, hit up the zip line at Adventures Unlimited in Milton, Fla.
Arts & Culture: I like to try to catch productions at the University of West Florida whenever I can. I work nights and weekends, so I don't get to see many of the things the town has to offer. There have been a ton of classical concerts at the Saenger Theatre that I've wanted to see. Someday. I do like strolling Gallery Nights on my dinner breaks from work, as there are always cool performers playing on Palafox, like my friend Tanya Gallagher.
Never Miss Events/Festivals: I've been to every Festival on the Green for the past three or four years. I love the mix of art, history and culture it provides. For everything else, my work schedule dictates whether I can make it, but I love to get out when I can. The Seafood Festival and the Greater Gulf Coast Arts Festival are both stellar.


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Control Issues
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The Gifting Key
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Home > Understanding Kidney Disease > Kidney Diseases > Kidney Failure > Kidney Failure Diet >
Kidney failure means end stage of kidney disease, and kidneys have been damaged severely for patients. Gout is one of the most common seen symptoms, which is mainly caused by high uric acid level in blood. For patients with gout, they shoul...Read More
Bread is a popular food around all over the world, while for patients with kidney failure, they should pay more attention to the breads types and nutrients ingredients because they have many dietary restrictions due to severe kidney damage....Read More
A balanced diet plan contributes to reducing kidneys burden and protecting residual renal function, so kidney failure patients have to pay highly attention to their daily diet. Well then, can renal failure patients eat quinoa? Quinoa is cal...Read More
Recently, all people are celebrating for the coming of the new year and they enjoy delicious food and beverages freely. However, for patients with Kidney Failure, they should pay much more attention to their dietary habits. In order to help...Read More
Stage 4 Kidney Failure is one of advanced kidney disease stages, which usually patients are recommended to do dialysis in the near future. Due to severe kidney damage, patients are required to have balanced and healthy eating plan. Here we...Read More
Kidney Disease patients are more likely to suffer from various symptoms due to persistent decrease of renal function. Therefore, returning kidney function also become the most one of urgent things for patients. Actually, a good diet plan is ...Read More
Kidney Failure is a condition that can not only affect your normal life but also can shorten life time. Facing the threatening disease, aside from taking necessary treatments, it is also necessary to have a balanced and healthy diet plan. D...Read More
Kidney disease patients need to limit the amount of certain nutrients you eat and drink, so as to protect kidney from the further damage. Usually, friendly-kidney diet is recommended to patients. Well then, can I eat beets and asparagus on...Read More


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Djokovic looks to maintain edge over rival Nadal
MONACO (AP) — Novak Djokovic looks to continue his recent dominance over archrival Rafael Nadal at the Monte Carlo Masters, where he beat the Spaniard in the final last year, and boost his confidence as he bids to win his only missing major at the French Open.
Monte Carlo is the first of three Masters tournaments played on clay and is followed by Madrid and Rome in May, leading up to the French Open, which starts May 25.
The six-time Grand Slam champion Djokovic narrowly lost to Nadal in a dramatic semifinal last year at Roland Garros, where a clumsy error at the net late in the fifth set curtailed the Serbian player's comeback, and then Nadal beat him in their next two meetings.
"Winning this title last year in the final against Nadal was definitely one of the highlights of my career. I really love playing in this tournament," Djokovic, who lives in Monaco part of the year, said Sunday. "My family comes in big numbers during this week so it makes me feel very comfortable, and at home."
The top-ranked Nadal's last win against No. 2-ranked Djokovic was in the U.S. Open final, but since then Nadal has lost three consecutive matches in straight sets. Nadal leads him 22-18 in head-to-head matches and has 62 career titles compared to 43 for Djokovic.
"We're more or less the same generation. We're still 27 and 26 so we still have lots of time in front of us," said Djokovic, who is the younger player. "It's a huge challenge, there's no question about it ... I do not exclude any other players, but the rivalry I had with him is the biggest one so far."
The three straight defeats hurt even more because Nadal was unable to force a tiebreaker in any of them.
"Sure it always affects (you) but I hope to (be) ready to be back and compete on clay," Nadal said. "In Miami I didn't play my best level in the final. I didn't compete well enough. I wasn't ready yet to play that match and he played great, but I didn't push him."
Last year's Monte Carlo final was dominated by Djokovic too, as he won 6-2, 7-6 (1) to end Nadal's eight-year winning run.
"I'm not going to win 14 (titles in a row). There's a start for everybody and there's an end," Nadal said. "I know that I'm not going to keep winning all the tournaments on clay forever and (there is) going to arrive a day when I'm not going to win one more ... hopefully not yet."
The win here last year gave Djokovic the belief he could beat Nadal at Roland Garros. He almost did, losing 9-7 in an intensely-fought fifth set. Looking back, Djokovic thinks he put himself under too much pressure .
"Yeah, last year, I put a lot of energy, mental, physical, emotional, into winning that title. I have a different kind of approach this year," he said. "Last year it was more in my mind. It was more in my thoughts, constantly ... Of course, I want to put all my effort into winning Roland Garros, but when the time comes."
Federer, meanwhile, returns to the Monte Carlo Country Club for the first time since 2011, when he lost to Jurgen Melzer in the quarterfinals.
Federer, who lost three straight finals to Nadal from 2006-08, has 78 career titles but has never won here.
Top-seeded Nadal is in the same half of the draw as third-seeded Stanislas Wawrinka and fourth-seeded Federer, and the Spaniard could meet No. 6 David Ferrer or Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov in the quarterfinals. Second-seeded Djokovic may face the fifth-seeded Berdych in the quarters.
Nadal faces either Frenchman Gilles Simon or qualifier Teymuraz Gabashvili of Russia in the second round on Wednesday. Djokovic plays qualifier Albert Montanes of Spain or Frenchman Benoit Paire.
Some first-round matches got underway on Sunday, with 17th-seeded Alexandr Dolgopolov breaking Latvia player Ernests Gulbis' serve twice in each set in a 6-2, 6-4 win, and Jeremy Chardy of France rallying to beat Igor Sijsling of the Netherlands 1-6, 6-2, 7-6 (5).
Also, Russian Dmitry Tursunov won 6-1, 5-7, 6-3 against Dutchman Robin Hasse and Frenchman Nicolas Mahut downed wild card Dominic Thiem of Austria 4-6, 6-3, 6-2.


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Whois Details
inetnum: 188.8.131.52/20 aut-num: AS262313 abuse-c: AJRAM2 owner: Internet Pinheirense Ltda - ME ownerid: 03.460.347/0001-05 responsible: Adair Jose Rodrigues Amoim owner-c: AJRAM2 tech-c: AJRAM2 inetrev: 188.8.131.52/21 nserver: ns1.ggosolucoes.com.br [lame - not published] nsstat: 20170823 TIMEOUT nslastaa: 20161111 nserver: ns2.ggosolucoes.com.br [lame - not published] nsstat: 20170823 TIMEOUT nslastaa: 20161111 inetrev: 22.214.171.124/24 nserver: ns01.noroestenet.com.br nsstat: 20170823 AA nslastaa: 20170823 nserver: ns02.noroestenet.com.br nsstat: 20170823 AA nslastaa: 20170823 created: 20111214 changed: 20111214 nic-hdl-br: AJRAM2 person: adair jose rodrigues amoim created: 20111018 changed: 20161111
IP Addresses in this range
IP address ranges, or netblocks, are groups of related IP addresses. They are usually represented as a base IP address, followed by a slash, and then a netmask which represents how many IP addresses are contained within the netblock. This format is known as CIDR. You'll also sometimes see netblocks given as a start ip address, and an end ip address, or an ip address range.
Traffic works its way around the internet based on the routing table, which contains a list of networks and their associated netblocks.


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* Your list is public by default.
Alternative Titles
Synonyms: Mo er zhuang yuan bing shi ji
Japanese: 摩爾莊園冰世紀
Type: Movie
Episodes: 1
Status: Finished Airing
Aired: Aug 11, 2011
Producers: None found, add some
Licensors: None found, add some
Studios: None found, add some
Source: Unknown
Duration: 1 hr. 38 min.
Rating: PG - Children
Score: 6.271 (scored by 11 users)
1 This score is not weighted. Please note that 'Not yet aired' titles are excluded.
Ranked: #114432
2 based on the top anime page. Please note that 'Not yet aired' and 'R18+' titles are excluded.
Popularity: #13856
Members: 82
Favorites: 0


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Computer Science Major Elected to Phi Beta Kappa
George Albert (Bert) Cortina has been elected to Phi Beta Kappa, the highest academic honor awarded to liberal arts students in the United States. Membership selection is based on intellectual honesty and curiosity, careful scholarship, creativity, good character, and a commitment on the life of the mind. While members of the election committee do consider a candidate's GPA during their deliberations, they give great weight to faculty recommendations to determine the depth and breadth of candidate's academic endeavors.
Bert's election was undoubtedly based in part on his interdisciplinary interests in computer science, biology, chemistry, and medicine. Bert's research at William & Mary has been with Professor Mark Forsyth in the Department of Biology, where Bert's study of the human pathogenic bacterium, Helicobacter pylori, involves examining the ability of this gastric ulcer and gastric cancer-causing bacterium to invade stomach epithelial cells in the lab. Bert is using mutant strains of the pathogen to determine if their ability to survive inside human cells is affected by mutations in various bacterial sensory-response pathways. Bert is in the process of applying to medical school where he hopes to conduct bench research, but also to study medical informatics and design models of the systems he is studying.


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From microscopic image to results in seconds, all in the palm of your hand.
From microscopic image to results in seconds, all in the palm of your hand.
We are an award winning company.
We believe in simplifying microscopy for everyone.
Our automated image recognition software and mobile microscope enable you to take a microscopic image and get results within seconds, wherever you are.
We are an award winning startup. We want to simplify microscopy and make it accessible and easy for everyone to use. Our automated image recognition software and mobile microscope enable you to take a microscopic image and get results within seconds, wherever you are.
Our smartphone microscope consists of a removable optical module (~400X), a smartphone, an application and a connection to the server hosting the image recognition software. The optical module is attached onto a smartphone and the magnified picture is visible through the app on the screen. The device then sends the image using WI-FI or mobile data connection to the server that analyses the picture and returns the result within seconds.
Image Recognition
Our image recognition software performs automatic analysis for you in one measurement. No specialized expertise required!
Smartphone Microscope
The Oculyze Microscope has a magnification of up to ~400X. You can view objects in the 2-50µm range.
Cloud Processing
Everything is stored and processed in the cloud. This gives you access to your images and results anywhere, anytime.
Data Analysis
Meta-analysis on all your measurements allows quick recognition of trends. React early!
Better Brewing
automated yeast counting for brewers
Our first application Better Brewing is a quick and easy analysis of yeast, allowing you to take control of your fermentation process. We automatically determine the concentration, viability and budding count of yeast cells in a matter of minutes. A contamination alert for unwanted microorganisms is currently in development.
Find out more!
Future Applications
animal health, agriculture, industrial monitoring, human health & more!
The Oculyze Microscope can be used for any microscopic analysis up to 400X. Our image recognition software capabilities allows the system to be used across many industries. Applications in various stages of development range from industrial monitoring to a point of care diagnostic tool for blood analysis. We also offer customized image recognition services for biological and microscopic images.
Stay updated
We are
Dr. Ulrich M. Tillich
Kilian L. Moser
Dr. Katja Schulze
Prof. Dr. Marcus Frohme
Cenk Uyan
Gordon Andrade
Hanna Säynäjäkangas
Berner Panti
Florian Steininger
Benjamin Girke
Juliane Pfeil
Sebastian Funk
Stay up-to-date with general Oculyze news!
By subscribing to our newsletter you also agree to comply with our new privacy policy.
You can read about this in full detail here.


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Exceptional clinicians, advanced technology and knowledgeable staff are all critical components of a successful healthcare organization. Equally important to the healing process is the attention paid to the emotional and spiritual needs of our patients.
At Shore Medical Center, we recognize the importance of meeting patients' individual needs. It is not just about providing an extra blanket or a few kind words. It's about individualized attention to details and creating exceptional patient and family experiences. All of this plays an essential part in helping patients recover faster and prepare for their transition back home.
Shore Medical Center is an affiliate member of The Planetree Organization, a global, non-profit organization that promotes patient-centered care in healing environments. As part of our journey to becoming a designated Planetree Hospital, Shore is passionate about enhancing patient care in multiple areas. That includes our dedicated community resource library within Shore's Surgical Pavilion, creation of the Experience Department and a number of other programs dedicated to humanizing and demystifying healthcare.
Integrative Therapy
There are multiple avenues for promoting healing. Shore's utilization of integrative therapies works in tandem with traditional healthcare services for acute pain, symptom management and stress management.
Shore's Patient Comfort Menu includes back and hand massages in addition to reflexology and Reiki treatments. The Spirit of Shore team members, many of whom hold certifications in integrative therapies, provide complimentary chair massage, Reiki, reflexology, hand massage and aromatherapy sessions for members of the community, physicians and hospital staff.
Patient and Family Advisory Council
Shore's Patient Family Advisory Council was formed in July of 2010 as a way to involve patients and the community in shaping the healthcare experience at Shore. The council, made up of former Shore patients and family members, community members and volunteers, meets bi-monthly to share stories, provide valuable feedback on its members' hospital experiences and assist our leadership in decision making by incorporating their perspectives into our organization's philosophy and operation. Through these meetings, Shore staff members educate the council about the medical center and healthcare issues in general.
No One Dies Alone
No One Dies Alone is a volunteer program that provides companions for patients near death who do not have any family or close friends to be with them in their final hours. Volunteers sit with the patients and offer solace through meditation, music, poems or the simple gesture of a touch.


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A cute little number that can be worn from picnic to party. With contrast trim on straps, sash and a pencil skirt with a back vent. Here in a beautiful wave print
Please select your size. Refer to our size chart for guidance or contact us for advice.
You can select this print in any other dress style.Please choose from the menu below
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A petticoat can be worn with this dress style. Petticoats are made to match the size and colour of the dress
Please contact us for more details.
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This is our website. Would you prefer to shop on our website?
This is our website. You previously shopped on our website. Would you like to go to our website now?
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Upgrade your style with this Hamilton satchel bag by MICHAEL Michael Kors. Crafted in a grained leather, this structured piece features a zip closure, a dual carry handle, a spacious main interior and a detachable chain leather shoulder strap. Boasting branded gold toned detailing, this bag is finished with a padlock detail attached to the front.
Product code: 704807
Exchanges & Returns We will happily offer an exchange or refund within 14 days of delivery. For full details please read our returns policy
Using the standard service, your order should be with you within 3 - 5 working days (excludes Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays).
International delivery is available for this product. The cost and delivery time depend on the country.
We use cookies to give you the best customer experience possible. If you continue to use our website, we will assume you are happy to receive cookies from us and our partners.
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text: Dear All, I am interested in finding someone who may have interest in identifying and possibly describing a very large aquatic oligochaete that I repeatedly collect from mountain streams on Maui, Hawaii. I am positive that they are fully aquatic. A couple of days ago I collected close to 20 (many > 12 cm in length) in about a 225cm2 area of sand covered with detritus. They were buried, and when disturbed actively began to burrow back into the sand. They had full guts and were turgid to the touch. When lifted and left in the water column they actively flail about in a trashing manner until they settle on the substrate and then begin to burrow again. no sign of osmotic stress at all. I have collected them in abundance several times before. The interesting thing is that they have a clittelum (or what appears to be one), which I have been told, is not found in any fully aquatic oligochaeta, but more indicative of earthworms (I think the Lumbriculidae or something like that, I am not a expert in annelid taxonomy, obviously) which are all terrestrial. If anyone has any information or is willing to take a look at these creatures please contact me at benbowme1 at aol.com. I can collect as many as is needed. Thanks in advance. Eric Benbow Dept. of Biology University of Dayton Dayton, OH 45469-2320 Address in Hawaii: 2747 S. Kihei Rd. F102 Kihei, HI 96753 808-874-3902 -- ANNELIDA LIST Discuss = <annelida at net.bio.net> = talk to all members Server = <biosci-server at net.bio.net> = un/subscribes Archives = http://www.bio.net:80/hypermail/ANNELIDA/ Resources = http://biodiversity.uno.edu/~worms/annelid.html --


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New Bidi APIs
In Eclipse 3.2, new APIs were added to provide proper rendering of strings containing bidirectional text that have implicit left to right semantic meaning. The method org.eclipse.osgi.util.TextProcessor.process(String str, String delimiter) provides this function.
- str
- the string to process
- delimiter
- a string of characters used to segment the string.
The text of each segment has directional markers inserted at the beginning and end of it to ensure the entire string is rendered left-to-right and also has the Unicode Bidirectional algorithm applied to it in order to render the mixed text of the segment in the proper orientation.
As an example, a file path such as
(where capital letters indicate RTL-oriented text) should render as
when using the Unicode Bidi algorithm and segmenting the string according to a specified delimiter set. However, since the OS does not understand that the string should be segmented according to each segment of the file path, it uses the Bidirectional algorithm to renders the string as follows:
Types of strings to which this API should be applied are:
- File paths (e.g. d:\myFolder\abc\DEF)
- URLs (e.g. http://abc/DEF )
- File names with extensions (e.g. ABC.java)
- File associations (e.g. *.java, *.ABC)
In Eclispe 3.3, there is a bug that suggests providing APIs for the most common usages so that users won't have to figure out for themselves the instances in which this API should be used (see bug 146220).


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Sale > Mandala Canteen Crossbody - Poppy
Mandala Canteen Crossbody
Sale: $68.00
Reg: $98.00
- Add To Wish List
- Leave a Review
- No Reviews
Our Poppy tone adds brilliant color to this mixed-texture Mandala Canteen from The Sak Collective. Hand-crocheted with distinct texture and trimmed with soft leather, this fun silhouette is furnished with a hidden zip pocket and removable leather crossbody strap for hands-free versatility. Comes with mirror mandala.
- Origin: Imported
- Exterior: Hand crafted polypropylene and leather
- Interior: Polyester
- Gold tone hardware
- 8.5in L x 1.75in W x 8.5in H; Drop up to 24 inches
- Hidden zipper pocket on leather trim handle
- Strap is both adjustable and detachable can be worn as a clutch
- Mirror mandala
- Wipe clean with barely damp cloth and air dry
- 107714
Related Products
Sale: $102.40 Original: $102.40
The Sak Collective The 120 Crochet Small Hobo
The Sak Collective Crochet Tomboy Convertible Crossbody
The Sak Collective Crochet Tomboy Convertible Crossbody
Seaside Stripe


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A new invention using a classic Greek cheese
Sensual and a little dramatic. The perfect cake
Tangy and creamy with the added sweetness of honey
Bringing back a classic
The best vegan cake ever
Adding a new twist on a Greek favourite
Your taste buds are about to go on an exciting journey!
Where history and food collide
This is the real deal folks!
Summer fruits make the best cake...
A Sicilian Classic


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Parents always want the best for their children. One of the ways of ensuring that your baby has the best care is through choosing the best baby products. One such product is the baby beanbag seat. This seat gives your baby comfort as he or she sleeps or during feeding time for the products that allow for the same. However, you might be conflicted on the type of beanbag to buy for your precious baby. As expected, the market is flooded with different products to choose from, which can be confusing. This article will provide you with the details that you should be keen on when choosing a baby bag.
We all want to purchase a product that lasts for long. It can be very frustrating to always keep on going to the stores even before your baby has used the seat for six months. Ideally, a baby seat should last long enough for the baby to outgrow it. The kind of material and connectivity used highly determines the durability quality. You can easily check if the material used is of good quality. Also, double stitches always ensure durability compared to single stitches.
While ensuring that you offer the best for your child, you should also make sure that you don't end up overspending. However, affordability is a highly personal issue. You will often find yourself spending a lot, especially on a new baby. Always ensure that the products that you buy are worth.
Every parent wants their baby to look the best. You are most likely to get a good feeling when you spend on a seat that appears nice and elegant. The type of material used as the cover lining also contributes to the appearance. Also, such materials should be easy to clean.
The baby should enjoy spending time in the beanbag seat. One important factor that highly contributes to comfort is the amount of cushion used. Also, the filling used is another important factor. Although this might mean adding some dollars on top, always ensure that the baby's comfort is ensured.


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Feb 07, 2017 04:54 PM EST
Win Complimentary Passes For Two To An Advance Screening of Universal Pictures, The Great Wall
The Great Wall of China was built to keep the enemies out and keep the people safe. What if it was really built to keep the monsters at bay? Universal Pictures and Legendary Pictures explore this idea in their new film THE GREAT WALL.
FlickDirect, in conjunction with Universal Pictures and Legendary Pictures, wants to give some lucky winners the chance to see it before it opens nationwide.
Simply enter by downloading the Movie Hype App and "following" THE GREAT WALL. Be sure to tell us why you want to see this movie using the hashtags #flickdirect and #thegreatwall. We will choose entries at random to win a complimentary admit-two pass to the Advance Screening of THE GREAT WALL on Wednesday, February 15, 2017, at 7:30 pm at Cinemark Boynton Beach 14.
Starring global superstar Matt Damon and directed by one of the most breathtaking visual stylists of our time, Zhang Yimou (Hero, House of Flying Daggers), Legendary's THE GREAT WALL tells the story of an elite force making a valiant stand for humanity on the world's most iconic structure. The first English-language production for Yimou is the largest film ever shot entirely in China. The Great Wall also stars Jing Tian, Pedro Pascal, Willem Dafoe and Andy Lau.
The film will be released in 3D by Universal Pictures.
Contest ends February 11, 2017. For more information please visit THE GREAT WALL movie page on FlickDirect.com or the official website at http://www.thegreatwallmovie.com .
Rated: PG-13 for sequences of fantasy action violence.
NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Limit one (1) admit-two pass per person. This film is rated PG-13. Must be 13 years of age or older to win passes. Employees of all promotional partners and their agencies are not eligible. Void where prohibited. Entries must be received by 11:59pm on February 11, 2017 to be eligible to receive pass. Winners will be contacted via e-mail to receive their pass. Sponsors not responsible for incomplete, lost, late or misdirected entries or for failure to receive entries due to transmission or technical failures of any kind. SEATING IS LIMITED, SO ARRIVE EARLY. PASS DOES NOT GUARANTEE A SEAT AT THE SCREENING. Refer to screening pass for further restrictions. ONE ENTRY PER PERSON
Filed Under: flickdirect florida, contest, giveaway, the great wall
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I have been getting a lot of questions regarding Kroger's new coupon policy. You can see a copy of the new Kroger coupon policy here.
This new policy if for the Dayton/Cincinnati region stores and is no doubt in reaction to the extreme couponing craze.
The only real changes I see are:
- A limit of no more than five paper manufacturer coupons for the same product. This seems to be an effort to keep products on the shelves and prevent "extreme" buys. I think I like this change and some manufacturers (like P&G) are already placing limits on the number of like coupons you can use.
- A limit to two internet coupons per manufacturer per customer per day will be accepted. This is interesting, in our area (Knoxville) it is a limit of two of the same internet printable coupons (which is logical because the print limit is usually 2 per computer) This however is per manufacturer. I am sure this is an effort to stop fraudulent use/copying of IP's.
If you are in the Knoxville/Atlanta region your can read all the details of our Kroger Coupon Policy here.
I have a few more though but I really want to hear what you think of the new policy!


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Test machines
Test ancillaries
Analogue Digital and Digital Analogue Converter Interface Card
The Si-Plan Analogue Digital and Digital Analogue Converter Interface Card enables a RISC OS computer to be connected to external equipment such as pressure transducers, load cells and thermocouples. Information from these devices can be displayed on the computer and used to generate output signals to further equipment. For example, information about temperature and humidity can be used to control air conditioning installations.
The ADC DAC Interface Card is available on a single width eurocard, designed to fit into the Acorn Risc PC range of computers. (The card only functions with RISC OS operating system computers. It is not compatible with other formats.) Connection to the outside world is via a 50-way box connector.
The standard card has 16 analogue input channels, 2 analogue output channels and 16 digital channels, which can be designated individually by software as input or output. Add-on cards, using 8 of the digital channels, can increase the capacity to up to 64 digital input/ output channels. Three versions of the add-on card are available:
The cards are optically isolated, giving an added level of protection to the computer.
The analogue to digital converter is a 12 bit device with a maximum conversion time of 2.7 microseconds, achieving a throughput of around 333KHz on a single input channel. The 6522 VIA chip fitted to the board can be fully used; all signals are taken to the connector. The PB7 line can be used to trigger the AD conversions, giving the accurately-timed samples essential for some applications.
The 16 inputs pass through a bank of analogue switches to an instrumentation amplifier, normally giving an input sensitivity of plus or minus 10 volts. (Alternatives are available.)
The signal return for the amplifier is usually via the 'Return' pin but can be programmed under software so that the inputs are paired to give fully differential inputs.
Interrupts can be generated either by the VIA, or when an AD conversion is complete. The two are independent of each other and can be software programmed for interrupt requests (IRQs) or fast interrupt requests (FIRQs).
The two bit DACs are of the four quadrant multiplying type. For non- multiplying applications, the 'Ref In' pins can be connected to the 'Ref Out' pin giving an output voltage range of plus or minus 10 volts.
The card's on-board driver modules cater for reading and writing the digital and analogue levels over multiple boards, setting up interrupts for different events and interrupt-based data logging and generating waveforms.
The card comes complete with example BASIC programs showing how to use the various driver calls. Also included is a software package of powerful desktop applications running in the RISC OS environment, featuring:
Price: £450.00 plus VAT.Also available:
Updated 20 April 2005
The Si-Plan logo is a reistered trademark of Si-Plan Electronics Research Ltd. All other trademarks are acknowledged. © 2000-2009 Si-Plan Electronics Research Ltd. All rights reserved.


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Events showcase emergency services
On Friday, Cassville High School students had the opportunity to see some of Barry County's emergency workers in action. Cox EMS, the Cassville Fire Department, the Cassville Police Department, the Missouri State Highway Patrol, the Barry County Sheriff's Department, Barry County E-911, the Barry County Coroner's office and CHS nurse Elaine Boles displayed their skills at a mock crash scene that occurred on the grassy lawn south of the high school.
This was the third docudrama event I have had the opportunity to attend as a journalist. Although I find these events gut wrenching to watch, and I usually shed several tears during the assemblies that followed the mock crashes, I am always honored to be in attendance. Watching our local emergency workers in action reminds me how valuable these volunteers and professionals are to our community. Local law enforcement officers, 911 dispatchers and emergency medical technicians commit their lives to responding to tragedies and giving their all to help those in need of assistance. Numerous others in our community volunteer their time as firefighters and first responders to help save lives.
This week, the Barry County E-911 Operations Center also celebrated National Telecommunicator Week, which is designed to show appreciation for 911 dispatchers. Often 911 dispatchers are the last to be thanked by communities. Even though these individuals do not respond to crash scenes and fires, they offer the first level of assistance in emergencies. Barry County E-911 dispatchers receive special training that allows them to provide callers with directions to keep those who are injured or sick stable until emergency responders arrive at the scene. Dispatchers also provide detailed instructions that help officers, firefighters and medical technicians find the location of those who are sick or injured.
Once a year, the Cassville Democrat utilizes newspaper space to recognize the emergency workers who serve area residents. During that time, we encourage Barry Countians to take time to thank the volunteers and professionals who serve as law enforcement officers and emergency workers. I know these unsung heroes appreciate hearing "thank you" from time to time, but none of them serve in hopes of being recognized. Each of these men and women give their time and energy because they care about their neighbors and friends.
This week, the Cassville Democrat is honored to have another opportunity to showcase the emergency services offered by local professionals and volunteers. We appreciate all of those who choose to serve in these fields. It is nice to know that these men and women are available and ready to help when they are needed.
Lindsay Reed


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Sweet potatoes have been a typical ingredient in a portion of the best tasting dinners and treats – and for reasons unknown they are really solid. They are normally sweet, not containing abundance sugar, and have a calorie check. Sweet potatoes are solid, reasonable, and could assist avert visual deficiency and help with your weight reduction.
How Sweet Potatoes Can Help Prevent Blindness
How can such a tasty food help prevent blindness? As it turns out, vitamin A deficiency is actually the primary cause of preventable blindness.
According to the WHO (World Health Organization), vitamin A deficiency can also result in an increased risk of death from various infections and about 250 million young children, across the entire world, have a vitamin A deficiency.
Sweet potatoes have been a typical fixing in a portion of the best tasting dinners and treats – and for reasons unknown they are really solid. They are normally sweet, not containing abundance sugar, and have a calorie check. Sweet potatoes are solid, reasonable, and could assist avert visual deficiency and help with your weight reduction objective.
The bio-fortification of sweet potatoes is previously underway in South Africa, where sweet potatoes are a main of the region. This healthy vegetable has a large amount of beta-carotene, which is then converted to vitamin A by our bodies.
Giving less demanding access to new sweet potatoes as opposed to having the imported has helped individuals in specific areas get the sustenance they require. Also, the bio-stronghold procedure has permitted individuals in South Africa to have their sweet potatoes the path they like them, high in dry substance and with a firm surface.
How Sweet Potatoes Can Help You Lose Weight
As amazing as it is that sweet potatoes can help prevent blindness, the excitement over this vegetable does not stop there. Sweet potatoes can also help you lose weight. They help regulate blood sugar and do not contain a high level of refined sugars.
The sweet potatoes have a compound that can increase the level of adiponectin in our body. This hormone helps to regulate blood sugar levels. Their low glycemic record ratings can likewise utmost glucose spikes. If you want to get out the most possible of your sweet potatoes, consider boiling or steaming them, instead of roasting. Roasting sweet potatoes can cause them to lose some of their nutrients and vitamins – which is true for most fruits and vegetables.
Sweet potatoes are likewise a decent wellspring of fiber. Fiber will normally help you stay fuller for a more drawn out span of time. Eating one medium-sized sweet potato will give you 4 grams of fiber.
As specified, sweet potatoes contain a lot of vitamin A. Notwithstanding serving to avert visual impairment, vitamin A can help your invulnerable framework and advance better wellbeing for your eyes and bones. Eating sweet potatoes can even help you clear your skin break out issues.
Foods that have a low glycemic index, such as sweet potatoes, may also remain in your digestive system longer, which can keep you feeling fuller longer – allowing you to control your appetite.
Recipe Roundup
All in all, you need to incorporate more sweet potatoes in your eating regimen, however you don't know what to make? Utilize the accompanying formulas to find some extraordinary strategies for get ready sweet potatoes.
Sweet Potato and Carrot Soup
A basic, velvety soup that you can get ready in minutes – sweet potato and carrot soup is an extraordinary noontime supper. Utilize your sustenance processor to throw together the potatoes and carrots. In the event that you are a veggie lover, substitute vegetable stock for chicken soup.
Heated Sweet Potato Latkes
Yummy sweet potato latkes are made by grinding sweet potatoes and after that blending with flour, eggs, cinnamon, and nutmeg. This is a simple formula to take after and makes 12 latkes – enough for the entire crew.
Sweet Potato Wedges
Potato wedges produced using sweet potatoes offer a much fuller flavor than standard potatoes and contain less fat. Serve as a side dish with ham or pork. With an aggregate prepare and cook time of 45 minutes, you may need to arrange ahead before making sweet potato wedges.
Apple and Sweet Potato Hash Browns.
Apples and sweet potatoes combine well together. Blend cleaved apples and hacked sweet potatoes to make a healthier serving of hash tans. There are numerous approaches to get ready apple and sweet potato hash tans, yet stay away from formulas that utilization margarine or other undesirable fixings.
Sweet potatoes are stuffed brimming with beta-carotene and other sound supplements. Begin adding them to your eating regimen and find different sweet potato formulas to set them up in distinctive ways. Having the capacity to help Prevent visual deficiency and shed pounds, alongside better skin, eye, and bone wellbeing, makes sweet potatoes the superfood of the season.
Source: thescienceofeating.com


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Top video - great flight - love your set up - want mine in the air - soooooo jealous!
Please keep feeding your stuff to us and I promise to reciprocate...
WildWill wrote:This is the rough start that I was talking about.
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How does a white person who aspires to be an ally against racism talk to their friends and family who are in denial about racism against people of color?
The White Ally Toolkit Workbook gives people concrete guidance about how to respond a wide variety of statements that racism-denying white folks make everyday.
The Holiday Survive and Thrive Guide is a webinar series will give you a practical guidance about how to turn a situation with a great potential for conflict into one that has positive and connecting dialogue between people who see current events very differently. It is only available to subscribers for a one-time fee of $10.
Why Racism Skeptics Should Be Empathetically Listened to,
and This Should Be the Work of White Allies
There is increasing scientific evidence that shows that empathy-based dialogues are the way to go if you want to have a chance to change adults' minds. According to this research, the best way to foster "debiasing" is to first listen empathetically to skeptics so they feel heard, and after that, raise experiences and facts that invite them to a broader and more nuanced perspective.
As one journalist titled his review of this research: "Research says there are ways to reduce racial bias. Calling people racist is not one of them."
But you don't have to simply take this on faith. Ask yourself these questions:
Have you ever observed situations where someone's views were hardened after they experienced a private lecture from someone who thought they knew "the truth"?
Have you ever observed situations where someone's views were authentically changed for the better after they experienced a private lecture from someone who thought they knew "the truth"?
Have ever been times when you someone listened to you empathetically (not necessarily about race) and this experience helped expand your view of a situation?
Have been times when you listened to someone closely and empathetically (not necessarily about race) and this experience helped someone else expand their view of a situation?
If anti-racism allies are going to change any minds, empathetic listening will likely be important.
But, the anti-racism movement should not expect POCs to empathetically listen to white racism skeptics.
White people are in a much better position to execute listening-based strategy with people who are skeptical about whether racism is real.
On a daily basis, POCs must endure the indirect expression of white skepticism that racism really matters, and they must do so as they are they are experiencing overt and subtle racism in many parts of their lives. Some people of color might want to choose to have conversations where white people's racial skepticism is consciously expressed. But it would not be fair to expect people of color to endure this.
Engaging white folks who are skeptical of racism so they can examine and potentially revisit their views should be the a primary task of white allies and not a key task for people of color. But the allies must be smart about how to do this.


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Today is the official release of 12 news prints I've been working on for the fine folks over at Hero Complex Gallery. Titled Visions of a Past, Present and Future, this set of giclee prints celebrates some of the best science fiction films in cinematic history. From Star Wars to La Jetee, each print is sized at 12" x 36" and limited to 75 per print.
A big thank you to io9, who featured and revealed the work on their site. If you'd like to buy one of these lovely, super wide landscape prints, then head over to HCG and BUY HERE!
The full list of prints is as follows: 2001 : A Space Odyssey, Akira, Alien, Blade Runner, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, La Jetee, Metropolis, Moon, Star Wars Ep IV, V and VI, The Fly. Here are just a selection of images.
Once again, a huge thanks to everyone who helped make this possible. Especially all those at Hero Complex Gallery.
To purchase a print, visit HCG's website here!


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Future Cars Menu
BYD Gets Chinese Government Approval to Produce Electric E6
In brief: The Chinese government has given approval to BYD to begin production on the electric vehicle crossover dubbed the E6.
Vehicle in the news
Make/Model: E6
Manufacturer: BYD
The word
The e6 crossover electric was first introduced in Shanghai last year. Since then, it has toured the world, hitting several auto shows, but not showroom floors.
Until now. The Chinese government has finally given BYD approval to begin production on the electric vehicle, which is slated to begin hitting showrooms in China later this year. BYD has promised it will come to North America soon as well, though that may be delayed from their earlier "late 2010" plans due to this red tape (no pun intended).
The car is priced at about $40,000USD with a 60kWh battery pack that moves it for up to 205 miles per charge. The e6 is highway-ready and capable.
And so ...
Most may recall that Warren Buffet made a news splash last year when one of his investment subsidiaries went heavily into the Chinese battery-cum-automaker. He may see a return on his investment sooner than anticipated if this vehicle takes off.
Photo credits: ABG
This site follows the emergence, application and development of transportation innovation. Reference to manufacturers, makes and models, and other automotive-related businesses are provided for informational purposes only and do not constitute an endorsement by FutureCars.com.


text: Lionel Messi was born on 24 June 1987. He is a specialized Argentine footballer who plays like a forward for Spanish Association FC Barcelona, and he is also the captain of Argentina team. When he was at 21, Messi had got the FIFA World Player of the Year recommendation. In the past year 2009, he also won his first FIFA World Player of the Year award. He Keep Reading


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Top players to sign on FIFA 17
Here are some top players to sign on FIFA 17 courtesy of @FootyTen Quincy Promes – Promes currently plays for SpartakRead more
All the tips and advice you can need in mastering your Football Manager 2016 team and maybe take Burton Albion to the Champions League Final in two years?
Here are some top players to sign on FIFA 17 courtesy of @FootyTen Quincy Promes – Promes currently plays for SpartakRead more
After a somewhat disappointing end to last season, I'm determined to get the Elland Road sleeping giants back amongst theRead more
We enter the January transfer window with some work to do here at Elland Road. First out the door areRead more
I turn up at Elland Road for my interview with my boyhood club Leeds United. Gone are the days ofRead more
Well we survived, just! Now on to the important business of the off- season. With Alan Halilovic already on hisRead more
Review of last season and going forward Unbelieveable. Somehow we finished top of the Championship last season after being predictedRead more
Arriving in England When I arrive in England things are looking up. I've already been approached by Wigan and SwanseaRead more
We went up, against the odds, we actually went up. I have no time to rest on my laurels though,Read more
When I last caught you up, we were in November and sitting in the very respectable position of eighth inRead more
As we head into October, things have taken a turn. Results have been up and down, though we are progressingRead more


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The Anterolateral Abdominal Wall
The abdominal wall encloses the abdominal cavity, and can be divided into anterolateral and posterior sections. Its key functions include:
- Forms a firm, flexible wall which keeps the abdominal viscera in the abdominal cavity.
- Protects the abdominal viscera from injury.
- Maintains the anatomical position of abdominal viscera against gravity.
- Assists in forceful expiration by pushing the abdominal viscera upwards.
- Involved in any action (coughing, vomiting) that increases intra-abdominal pressure.
The anterolateral abdominal wall consists of four main layers (external to internal); skin, superficial fascia, muscles and associated fascia, and parietal peritoneum. In this article, we shall look at the anatomy of the anterolateral abdominal wall – its musculature, surface anatomy and clinical correlations.
Superficial Fascia
The superficial fascia consists of fatty connective tissue. The composition of this layer depends on its location:
- Above the umbilicus – a single sheet of connective tissue. It is continuous with the superficial fascia in other regions of the body.
- Below the umbilicus – divided into two layers; the fatty superficial layer (Camper's fascia) and the membranous deep layer (Scarpa's fascia).
- The superficial vessels and nerves run between these two layers of fascia.
Muscles of the Abdominal Wall
The muscles of the anterolateral abdominal wall can be divided into two main groups:
- Flat muscles – three flat muscles, situated laterally on either side of the abdomen.
- Vertical muscles – two vertical muscles, situated near the mid-line of the body.
Flat Muscles
There are three flat muscles located laterally in the abdominal wall, stacked upon one another. Their fibres run in differing directions and cross each other – strengthening the wall, and decreasing the risk of herniation.
In the anteromedial aspect of the abdominal wall, each flat muscle forms an aponeurosis (a broad, flat tendon), which covers the vertical rectus abdominis muscle. The aponeuroses of all the flat muscles become entwined in the midline, forming the linea alba (a fibrous structure that extends from the xiphoid process of the sternum to the pubic symphysis).
External Oblique
The external oblique is the largest and most superficial flat muscle in the abdominal wall. Its fibres run inferomedially.
- Attachments: Originates from ribs 5-12, and inserts into the iliac crest and pubic tubercle.
- Functions: Contralateral rotation of the torso.
- Innervation: Thoracoabdominal nerves (T7-T11) and subcostal nerve (T12).
Internal Oblique
The internal oblique lies deep to the external oblique. It is smaller and thinner in structure, with its fibres running superomedially (perpendicular to the fibres of the external oblique).
- Attachments: Originates from the inguinal ligament, iliac crest and lumbodorsal fascia, and inserts into ribs 10-12.
- Functions: Bilateral contraction compresses the abdomen, while unilateral contraction ipsilaterally rotates the torso.
- Innervation: Thoracoabdominal nerves (T7-T11), subcostal nerve (T12) and branches of the lumbar plexus.
Transversus Abdominis
The transversus abdominis is the deepest of the flat muscles, with transversely running fibres. Deep to this muscle is a well-formed layer of fascia, known as the transversalis fascia.
- Attachments: Originates from the inguinal ligament, costal cartilages 7-12, the iliac crest and thoracolumbar fascia. Inserts into the conjoint tendon, xiphoid process, linea alba and the pubic crest.
- Functions: Compression of abdominal contents.
- Innervation: Thoracoabdominal nerves (T7-T11), subcostal nerve (T12) and branches of the lumbar plexus.
Vertical Muscles
There are two vertical muscles located in the midline of the anterolateral abdominal wall – the rectus abdominis and pyramidalis.
Rectus Abdominis
The rectus abdominis is long, paired muscle, found either side of the midline in the abdominal wall. It is split into two by the linea alba. The lateral border of the two muscles create a surface marking, known as the linea semilunaris.
At several places, the muscle is intersected by fibrous strips, known as tendinous intersections. The tendinous intersections and the linea alba give rise to the 'six pack' seen in individuals with a well-developed rectus abdominis.
- Attachments: Originates from the crest of the pubis, before inserting into the xiphoid process of the sternum and the costal cartilage of ribs 5-7.
- Functions: As well as assisting the flat muscles in compressing the abdominal viscera, the rectus abdominis also stabilises the pelvis during walking, and depresses the ribs.
- Innervation: Thoracoabdominal nerves (T7-T11).
This is a small triangular muscle, found superficially to the rectus abdominis. It is located inferiorly, with its base on the pubis bone, and the apex of the triangle attached to the linea alba.
- Attachments: Originates from the pubic crest and pubic symphysis before inserting into the linea alba.
- Functions: It acts to tense the linea alba.
- Innervation: Subcostal nerve (T12).
Rectus Sheath
The rectus sheath is formed by the aponeuroses of the three flat muscles, and encloses the rectus abdominis and pyramidalis muscles. It has an anterior and posterior wall for most of its length:
- The anterior wall is formed by the aponeuroses of the external oblique, and of half of the internal oblique.
- The posterior wall is formed by the aponeuroses of half the internal oblique and of the transversus abdominis.
Approximately midway between the umbilicus and the pubic symphysis, all of the aponeuroses move to the anterior wall of the rectus sheath. At this point, there is no posterior wall to the sheath; the rectus abdominis is in direct contact with the transversalis fascia.
The area of transition between having a posterior wall, and no posterior wall is known as the arcuate line.
Surface Anatomy
The abdominal cavity contains numerous organs – many of which can be palpated through the abdominal wall, or their position can be visualised by surface markings.
The umbilicus is the most visible structure of the abdominal wall, and is the scar of the site of attachment of the umbilical cord. It is usually located midway between the xiphoid process and the pubis symphysis.
The rectus abdominis muscle gives rise to abdominal markings. The lateral border of this muscle is indicated by the linea semilunaris, a curved line running from the 9th rib to the pubic tubercle. The linea alba is a fibrous line that splits the rectus abdominis into two. It is visible as a vertical groove extending inferiorly from the xiphoid process.
The abdomen is a large area, and so it split into nine regions – these are useful clinically for describing the location of pain, location of viscera and describing surgical procedures. The nine regions are formed by two horizontal and two vertical planes:
- Horizontal planes:
- Transpyloric plane – Horizontal line halfway between the xiphoid process and the umbilicus, passing through the pylorus of the stomach.
- Intertubercular plane – Horizontal line that joins the iliac crests.
- Vertical planes – run from the middle of the clavicle to the mid-inguinal point (halfway between the anterior superior iliac spine of the pelvis and the pubic symphysis). These planes are the mid-clavicular lines.
Clinical Relevance: Surgical Incisions in Abdominal Wall
Vertical Incisions
An incision that is made through the linea alba. It can be extended the whole length of the abdomen, by curving around the umbilicus. The linea alba is poorly vascularised, so blood loss is minimal, and major nerves are avoided. All can be used in any procedure that requires access to the abdominal cavity.
Similar to the median incision, but is performed laterally to the linea alba, providing access to more lateral structures (kidney, spleen and adrenals). This method ligates the blood and nerve supply to muscles medial to the incision, resulting in their atrophy.
Transverse Incisions
This incision is made just inferior and laterally to the umbilicus. This is a commonly used procedure, as it causes least damage to the nerve supply to the abdominal muscles, and heals well. The incised rectus abdominis heals producing a new tendinous intersection. It is used in operations on the colon, duodenum and pancreas.
Suprapubic (Pfannenstiel)
Suprapubic incisions are made 5cm superior to the pubis symphysis. They are used when access to the pelvic organs is needed. When performing this incision, care must be taken not the perforate the bladder (especially if it is not catheterised), as the fascia thins around the bladder area.
This incision starts inferior to the xiphoid process, and extends inferior parallel to the costal margin. It is mainly used on the right side to operate on the gall bladder, and on the left to operate on the spleen.
This is a 'grid iron' incision, because it consists of two perpendicular lines, splitting the fibres of the muscles without cutting them – this allows for excellent healing. McBurney incision is performed at McBurney's point (1/3 of the distance between the ASIS and the umbilicus). It is mostly used in appendectomies.


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Leave the gourds on the vine until a light frost or the stems turn brown. If you need to pick a gourd before the frost, the gourd should be very firm to the touch. Cut the gourd with an inch or more of stem. Wash the gourds in soapy water. Dilute household bleach may be added to the water if desired, and may help delay mold formation. A light coat of non-glossy floor wax gives the gourds a natural glow.
Dry the gourd fruits naturally by placing in an area with good air circulation. Bringing the gourds indoors may help them dry faster, but gourds can be dried outdoors even in cold areas, however repeated freezing and thawing will affect the viability of seeds. When the seeds rattle, the gourd is dry and ready for crafting. How long it takes a gourd to dry depends on the drying environment -- the warmer and the better the circulation, the faster the water will evaporate from the gourd. Most moderate-sized hardshell gourds will be dry by Christmas. Larger or particularly thick-shelled gourds may not dry for several more months. Light may help to retard formation of mold, but the mold on the outside of gourds is a natural part of the drying process; as long as the gourd remain firm to the touch, do not discard it. Turning the gourds and wiping off the mold on a weekly basis may help the gourds dry sooner.
While the natural method of drying in time-consuming, it is still the best recommendation for drying gourds. There are a few other tricks which work for some growers but do not give consistent results for everyone. Some growers have luck using an ice pick to pierce the gourd to help it dry sooner. This may work depending on the environment; for most gardeners, however, this only serves to introduce mold and bacteria into the gourd which causes the fruit to rot. Another technique which works for some growers is to "bake" the hardshell gourd by putting it in a conventional oven (not a microwave!) at a very low heat with the door open to let the moisture escape; if the gourd is too "green" when this is tried, it may cause a lot of undesirable wrinkling of the skin.
"Greenscraping" of gourds may help gourds dry a little faster and may prevent some of the darker patterns of mold. It seems to work best if the gourd has a chance to dry out slightly first. Using the back (dull) side of a knife, scrape off the outer skin, revealing the lighter surface below. Place the greenscraped gourds in a warm, lighted, well-ventilated area; turn and wipe them off every few days. If the gourds dry too quickly, they may tend to wrinkle. The disadvantage to this method is the amount of time put into scraping if the gourd does not "cure".
Once the gourd is completely dry it is ready to be cleaned. Rattling of seed is a good indication of dryness; however sometimes the seeds adhere to the inside of the gourd and in this case the gourd will be very light and sound hollow when tapped. Submerge the gourd in a bucket of warm soapy water and scrape off the outer skin with the dull side of a table knife or a plastic mesh kitchen scrubby. Bleach may be added to the water, but it is not a necessity.
Using sandpaper or steel wool to clean dry gourds is OK if the gourd is going to be painted -- but there will be fine scratches from these abrasive materials which will show up if the gourd is stained with wood stains or a light coat of leather dye. Small holes or cracks can be filled with wood putty. Cut edges of gourds and the interiors can be sanded smooth.


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So Microsoft have release a CTP of their next iteration of Visual Studio which is currently name version 14 (as always with Microsoft skipping version 13).
If you have a Azure account you can create a new VM image containing the latest version of the VS 14 CTP directly from the gallery.
There are some great resources to help you get up to speed with the new features of the IDE and I have linked to them below.
First check out the This week on Channel 9 show http://channel9.msdn.com/Shows/This+Week+On+Channel+9/TWC9-Visual-Studio-14-CTP-Episode
Then head over to Soma Somasegar's blog post covering some nice new features with C# refactoring and ASP.Net vNext that will be included in the next version. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/somasegar/archive/2014/06/03/first-preview-of-visual-studio-quot-14-quot-available-now.aspx
Finally you can read through the official release notes here http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2967191.
One final note, I provisioned a VS 14 CTP image in my Azure account and was trying out some of the new C# refactoring features from Soma's blog post but I wasn't able to completely recreate what was shown.
On Soma's post he showed an "Introduce local for.." feature on the refactorings list when highlighting a local variable, as shown below.
However when I tried to emulate this I only got the following refactoring options
So I'm not sure what I am doing wrong or there is a discrepancy with the version I am running but if you are interested in seeing what's coming in the next version of Visual Studio then do go and check out the resources above.
Found what I was doing wrong with the refactoring, you need to select both the variable and the string to see the "Introduce local" feature. Makes sense really.