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The Best Radar Detector
Some new detectors have been introduced since we wrote this guide, including a new Escort model called the Max 360 that has a rear-facing sensor and multi-arrow display similar to our top pick, the Valentine…
Some new detectors have been introduced since we wrote this guide, including a new Escort model called the Max 360 that has a rear-facing sensor and multi-arrow display similar to our top pick, the Valentine One. We will update this guide after we've been able to do a thorough evaluation of the major new models. But until then, we feel that you still can't go wrong with our top pick, the Valentine One.
When driving, I avoid speeding tickets thanks to help from the $400 Valentine One (V1) radar detector. Yes, that's a lot of cash, but cheaper detectors simply aren't worth buying when points on your license and higher insurance rates are at stake. The guys who hold the record times for driving cross-country sans police escort swear by it because its arrow system provides the information they need to separate the false alarms from actual cops. Coupled with the app Waze, it's your best defense against ticket-writing police.
The research
- Why spend this much?
- How we picked
- Reviewers who also sell
- How we tested
- Our pick
- Who else likes it
- Flaws but not dealbreakers
- Accessories
- A runner-up with GPS
- Sounds great; why is this not the main pick?
- Smartphone supplementation
- Long-term test notes
- Budget detectors (or: why there's no step down)
- The rest
- What to look forward to
- How radar works
- Hard-wiring
- Wrapping it up
- Sources
Why spend this much?
Before we start, we want to spell out that we don't condone unsafe driving. While dangerous driving doesn't directly translate to driving above the speed limit in every case, doing so can easily become part of a larger 'unsafe driving' incident. Please always use your best judgment when getting behind the wheel of a car, and be respectful of your fellow drivers on the road. A radar detector is good for helping you avoid tickets in the event that you do find yourself going faster, but it's not a 'get out of jail free' card.
For a radar detector to be worth using, it must see the radar before the radar gun sees you, help you determine a false alarm, and alert you to different types of speed readers (like lasers). The ability to meet these criteria separates the useless gray boxes from the detectors that'll pay for themselves with avoided tickets. Expect to spend around $500 for a quality detector. Go cheaper and you will likely wear out your brakes with all the false alarms caused by unsophisticated software or gain confidence beyond the detector's range.
Furthermore, unlike your GPS, an app will never replace a dedicated radar detector. Detectors use a special microwave sensor to read the special signal spectrum that cops use, and that sensor will never fit in an iPhone. What you buy today won't be obsolete tomorrow (the Valentine One's design hasn't changed in over a decade) so it's worth an investment. If used correctly, a detector will quickly pay for itself in avoided fines. If time spent seeking a good deal is worth saving a couple hundred bucks, you can always run an eBay search for used models.
How we picked
Published reviews are always helpful, so we read everything written recently about radar detectors. Car and Driver, in particular, conducted a scrupulous formal test with a road circuit and traps set by a laser jammer manufacturer. Their findings helped inform our pick between the finalists. Besides Car and Driver, we looked at reviews from CNET and the other smattering of professional detector writeups.
In this case, though, expert testimony sealed the deal for our pick. Controlled testing on a closed course is one thing, but breaking the speed-record for crossing the United States is another. Both the former and current record-holders told us about their personal preferences.
Ed Bolian is the current record-holder for the cross-country drive, which he completed in 28 hours and 50 minutes in his 2004 Mercedes-Benz CL55 AMG. (That's an average of 98 mph throughout the United States highway system without any help from law enforcement.) His trip was made possible by smartly using radar detectors and apps to spot cops before they could stop his record attempt. During the working week, he's a sales director at Motorcars of Georgia, a dealership for Aston Martin, Lamborghini, Lotus, and McLaren, so he's accustomed to responsibly piloting speed-limit-breaking vehicles.
I also spoke to Alex Roy, former holder of the speed record for a cross-country drive and a regular star in the Gumball 3000. He drove his 2000 BMW M5 from New York to the Santa Monica Pier in 31 hours and 4 minutes. That's a still-astounding average of 89 mph. He explains his exploits in full in his book The Driver. Roy has tried every setup out there for going fast while keeping a sparkly clean driving record.
Reviewers who also sell
In addition to the experts above, I also spoke to the experts behind two websites focused on radar detectors. I consider them to be subject-matter experts with scads of knowledge to share, but in the interest of disclosure to our audience, both their sites also sell radar detectors.
First, I spoke to "Radar" Roy Reyer, a retired sheriff's lieutenant, traffic radar instructor, and radar detector reviewer. His site is a comprehensive resource for radar detector information, but he also sells radar detectors at radarbusters.com.
RadarTest.com works similarly---they post reviews and also sell through their site. Both say they sell only what they like and know to work.
Neither site sells the Valentine One, the model that usually takes top honors or second place for most independent editorial reviews and tests. They both consistently find an Escort brand radar to be the winner for best detector—which also happens to be brand they sell the most.
Radar Roy's site has no formal review of the Valentine, a fact that his forum members have mentioned. Radartest.com doesn't sell the V1, but reviewed it and found it inferior to the models they do sell. Knowing this, we took their recommendations with an appropriate grain of salt.
How we tested
Once we found detectors that multiple sources confirmed to be great, we called them in and tested them with hours of city and highway driving around the Bay Area and around New York City. The city driving in particular tested how susceptible each detector was to false alerts and how well they responded to our preferences, like filtering out X-bands or spotting traffic cameras at intersections.
We weighed our findings with our research to find the detector that we would purchase and use daily.
Our pick
Valentine One
The Best Radar Detector
The Valentine One has the industry-best range for detection, a rear-facing sensor, laser detection, and an arrow-based display that points to the source of the signal.
Buying Options
*At the time of publishing, the price was $400.
The technology and basic user interface is decades old, but the Valentine One remains the best overall option for all drivers looking to drive faster while avoiding costly tickets. By multiple accounts, it has the industry-best range for detecting speed radars, a rear-facing sensor, laser detection, and an arrow display system that orients drivers to the source of the radar signal. That last part is what makes this simple device the best at what it does.The Valentine's three arrows light up to tell you whether the signal is coming from the front, side, or the rear. No one else has a directional display like this, and the information it provides is vital—if a signal is coming from ahead, and it's a Ka-band, you're likely approaching a speed trap. If it's coming from the side, you're all clear because no radar can get an accurate speed reading from the side of a car or motorcycle. Once it registers as coming from behind, then you know you're in the clear. And if it starts out from behind, you probably don't need to worry, but you can choose to keep your wits about you because it may be a trailing patrol car looking to match your speed for a reading.
Whatever bearing the alarm is coming from, you can keep your eyes peeled in that direction until you feel safe. It'll also track multiple radar sources, indicating how many sources are hitting at once with a numeric read out. The result is a comprehensive presentation of the potential threats in your immediate driving environment. Every detail matters in that situation, and no other detector can match the V1's combination of intelligence-gathering and lucid presentation.
While other detectors use GPS and their own algorithms to determine what's a false alarm and what's a potential threat, that means putting full faith in the detector to predict the human behavior of police. A signal location that the detector automatically determines as a false alert may one day turn out to be a real speed trap. By being a bit more sensitive and telling you the direction the signals are coming from, the V1 gives you the information you need to make an informed decision.
Current trans-American speed record holder Ed Bolian is a big advocate of this approach. He told me in a phone interview that "the most effective tool is a passenger paying attention." An example he gave me was that when the sun is at your back, you can infer that there won't likely be a cop ahead who's willing to subject himself to staring into the sun to issue a few tickets. Keeping these kinds of ideas in mind while using a detector is the most effective way to outwit the cops.
Testers consistently name the Valentine as the champion of range when it comes to consumer-grade detectors, as well. In fact, as this RadarTest comparison shows, it can even keep pace with trucker-oriented models, which are designed to maximize range. Their testing, which took place on "an almost perfectly level two-lane highway that runs die-straight for 14.27 miles," shows that depending on the band it's detecting, you'll get a preliminary alert from as far as 13.52 miles in ideal conditions. Basically, if there's a cop with a speed gun along your path, it'll tip you off.
The Valentine also gets praise for its laser-detecting abilities. As mentioned, laser detection is typically shot from far away, making it inaccurate, so detecting laser presence can indicate that police are in the area. Radar detector blogger (and maker of a car coating that blocks lasers) Veil Guy says, "Laser detection performance remains the platinum standard and no other radar/laser detector has yet to obtain a such a performance level."
Since that endorsement isn't from a what we'd call an authoritative source, we checked elsewhere. Car and Driver confirmed the Valentine's laser proficiency, as well: "The V1 also reported POP radar and laser alerts more consistently than the Passport Max."
The V1 also gets points for its simple and effective user interface that's actually designed for someone to use while they're driving—always a good thing for something meant to be used while driving. David Cardinal at ExtremeTech does a good job of highlighting its advantages in comparison to other models: "As a V1 owner for many years, I never thought much about the design of the controls until I started testing it against the [$550 Escort] Max... The main knob turns it on and off, and sets the volume — while pushing it mutes the current threat. A second and fairly easy to turn adjustment controls the muted volume. That's it. The controls are helpfully turned outward slightly towards the (left-side) driver. By contrast the Max has half a dozen different controls on the top of the detector. With a slanted windshield it is almost impossible to see which control is which by reading the labels when the detector is mounted. You need to memorize their location."
A final reason to recommend the V1 is, surprisingly, its cost. At $400, it's about $100 cheaper than most other premium detectors, which, when you add Bluetooth receivers and app membership, can add hundreds to a $500+ price tag.
Who else likes it
Alex Roy has tried every possible setup to help him go fast while maintaining a clean driving record. The V1, with an iPad or iPhone running an app like Waze (or Trapster in previous years), is his setup of choice, and he told me why. "You can't decide whether to slow down if the detector is just going off or staying quiet," he said. "You need to know the direction the signal is coming from. The idea is if you get a signal from behind, you're likely clear to keep going the, ahem, posted speed limit. If you're forward arrow lights up, downshift and slow yourself."
He's not alone in relying on the Valentine. When I interviewed Ed Bolian recently, following the recent cross-country trip that broke Alex Roy's record, he immediately told me that he has used a Valentine One for about 12 years: "I love them — the sensitivity is the best."
Besides the industry-best hardware, Bolian says that the arrows were invaluable during his record drive, something no other detector has: "It was the biggest help in Arizona and Eastern California. In those areas the cops were running radar on constantly so you could detect them from about 2 miles out. They do that more at night because detection is easier for the cops using always on radar. It is great because you see the arrows and you watch the signal build and then you get confirmation as the signal reverses to the arrow behind you."
For his drive, Bolian's setup was the same as Roy's: "The best solution is Waze and a Valentine combined," Bolian says. This configuration supplements the V1's directional intelligence with user-generated tip-offs to speed trap locations and police presence. Buy the V1, use the free Waze app, and you're using the same tools as cross-country speed record holders Alex Roy and Ed Bolian. If it works for them, it'll work for you.
Besides acclaim from the world's most accomplished road drivers, the Valentine One is the perennial favorite of magazines like Car and Driver and Motor Trend. In a recent and exhaustively comprehensive test, Car and Driver found that the V1 still had the industry-best setup: "In each of our range trials, the V1 provided generous warning, and its second, rear-facing antenna—an exclusive in this test—gives it a leg up in rearward detection."
Extreme Tech (a Ziff-Davis publication) tested the V1 against the Escort Max (more on that below), and found that the Valentine was better overall: "If you simply want a 'fire and forget' unit you can put on your windshield to be reminded of the possibility of active radar or laser nearby, the Valentine One still has the best detection and ergonomics."
Even RadarTest, despite not selling the V1, had nice things to say about it when they pitted it head to head against the Escort Redline, (which, as previously stated, is designed for professional truck drivers who need maximum range): "Regardless of some hiccups, for both detectors all of these numbers are superb. Testing two overachievers like these is like evaluating F1 drivers." They went on to conclude that "The Valentine One is a classic design that still delivers commendable performance against most types of radar."
Flaws but not dealbreakers
The most common complaint against the V1 is that it errs on the side of caution by alerting to every bandwidth of radar it detects, which can sometimes mean alerts to non-police sources. These are called "false positives," and it's a source of annoyance for some, but for skilled drivers, it's not an issue.
It's also worth noting that you can disable notifications for X and K bands if the only time you detect them are near automatic doors (thank you, Chris Kozso for reminding us of that). As mentioned, police favor Ka band for catching speeders, but we've heard of rural cops using K on occasion, so disable at your own discretion.
"I have never been one to be hugely bothered by false positives," Ed Bolian says. "I would rather have an overactive radar detector than one that doesn't see to do much."
We agree. We think it's better for you to make the call yourself using the information at hand (which the V1 gives you more of) rather than to rely on an imperfect algorithm that could potentially land you a costly ticket and only serves to protect you from a fairly minor annoyance.
For what it's worth, Radar Roy told me that the Valentine One was often called the "chicken little of radar detectors," but as this forum discussion points out, he hasn't formally reviewed the V1 on his site, so we're skeptical of that dismissal.
You can, however, install the SAVVY, which plugs into a car's on-board diagnostic port (something you'll find on any car made after the mid-1990s). It automatically mutes the detector if you're traveling below a set speed. For example, if you're going under 30 mph in Manhattan, you won't need to worry about speed traps. You can also, as with any radar detector, just hit the mute button to quiet it down.
Overall, while occasionally annoying, the V1's false positives are an inevitable by-product of a finely-tuned radar that won't slip up when it counts.
There's also no GPS, which can be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on your level of risk aversion. GPS-equipped models have the ability to automatically mute alarms that it previously determined to be false positives—either through a connected, paid subscription service or by detecting the same signal in the same spot multiple times in a row. Valentine claims that this is a speeding ticket waiting to happen, others will claim that it's super convenient and key to avoiding unnecessary false alarms. We think it's better to be safe than sorry when it comes to facing an expensive speeding ticket, but if you'd rather have fewer false positives, you might consider our runner-up instead.
Valentine sells a Bluetooth adapter that connects the V1 to an iPhone or Android using the Valentine App (Mac Rumors has a basic background on its features). But, in our opinion, there's not much to be gained from using the app.
Using a personal profile within the app, you can darken the display of the V1 for night driving, or tweak the bandwidths that trigger the detector if you're using it outside the United States. If you pass a lot of shopping malls you can block out X-band alerts, too. Mostly, though, the app is just a big display of the Valentine's built-in arrows, which is the default display on one of the app's three screen options.
When you come to a speed trap with the display set to the "Threat Picture Screen," it will, as we found, display a list of the signals it's detecting: at the top will be a flashing arrow forward next to the letters Ka, and a hertz reading for that signal. If you're going past a shopping mall with automatic doors, another arrow will display the direction of the benign K or X band. The third screen option gives you the hertz measurements of the signal it's detecting. None of this is particularly useful, and the in-app disclaimer screens border on inconvenient. Even running the app in the background is unnecessary.
Understand, though, that the app only feels underwhelming because the V1's hard displays are so informative and lucid. We'll keep checking on its updates, but for now, you don't need the Bluetooth dongle. Invest in a hard-wiring setup, run Waze, and you're set.
A runner-up with GPS
Also great
Escort Passport Max
A detector with GPS
The Passport Max will remember false positives and smartly ignore them thanks to its GPS chip, but it's a lot more expensive, requires a subscription, and doesn't indicate which direction radar signals are coming from.
Buying Options
*At the time of publishing, the price was $544.
Discussions about the best radar detector typically focus on two brands: Valentine and Escort. For this guide we tested Escort's $550 Passport Max model, which comes with a heap of modern features that make it extremely customizable. It's the better option for people who want to block out false alerts as effectively as possible. Since then Escort has released two other flagship models, the $600 Passport Max2 and the $650 Max 360. The Max2 is essentially a mild upgrade of the Passport Max that adds Bluetooth capability to the detector, letting it wirelessly communicate with the Escort Live smartphone app without needing Escort's $100 SmartCord. Except for that difference, the following info on the Passport Max also applies to the Max2. The Max 360, which was introduced in September, builds on the Max2 by adding a rear-facing radar antenna and a display that uses directional arrows, similarly to the Valentine One. Because it's so new, we haven't had a chance to thoroughly test those added features, but after we do we'll update this guide with that info.
If you have a regular commute where automatic doors can trip a detector often enough to annoy you, read on. For most drivers, though, the warning system on the Max will feel obtuse compared to the Valentine's. On top of that, the Max starts at $550. And if you want the detector to work with the Escort Live app and service, you need to add $100 for Escort's SmartCord Live. The SmartCord comes with one free year of the Escort Live service, but after that you'll need to pay $50 for it annually. (As mentioned, the Passport Max2 links to the app through Bluetooth, eliminating the cord. It also gives you one year of the Escort Live service for free.)Before getting to the accessories, the Max has received most of its attention for its basic hardware. Escort touts this model for having "military"-grade "Digital Signal Processing," which, Escort told me, makes it 50 times faster at processing threats than older models like the Escort 9500ix, all at twice the range.
As CNET explains, Escort says that its chips will tune out radio interference so that only potential police radar will come through—Car and Driver describes it as Bose noise-cancelling headphones for the detector. On top of that technology, the Max is pre-loaded with what they call Traffic Sensor Rejection" software, which means if it detects radar emitting from the wireless traffic sensors you'll see on some highways, it'll block them out.
It also has a GPS chipset, which lets it do a few other things the Valentine can't, like automatically logging and silencing false alarms along your normal routes. For example, if the Max detects a signal consistently occurring at the same location, like an automatic door's X-band that you pass on your daily commute, it will still detect the signal, but after the third or fourth time you pass it, the AutoLearn software in the detector will mute the alert. Escort says, though, that it will never block out "true police signals." The GPS also lets the Max know your speed, so if you want it to be totally silent if you're going under 30 mph, it can do that.
The Max's noticeably comprehensive color display will read your speed and hit you with an alert if you're speeding---if you only want notifications when you're many mph over the limit, that can be adjusted to your liking. The GPS function also lets the Max draw from Escort's network of traffic camera locations.
The Max flexes all its muscles when connected to Escort Live, the subscription app that collects drivers' findings (cop car spotted, false alerts, etc.) and keeps the detector updated with new intel on red-light cameras and speed traps.
Popular Mechanics explains why it is one of their 2011 SEMA Editor's Picks: "These days the locations of speed traps and red-light cameras can live on the cloud, thanks to Escort Live. The system takes advantage of more than a million Escort radar detectors, storing the data they collect in the cloud and making that data accessible to all Escort customers."
All the user data, when connected, constantly updates the Max. If several other Escort Live drivers hit the button on their detectors to say that the K-band on a particular intersection is a traffic monitor and not a threat, the Max will keep quiet when you hit that same bend.
Another benefit of the Max and Escort Live is being able to tweak the Max's settings on your phone, which is much easier than working on the Max's small screen. It also lets you adjust something called Smart Muting, which tells the detector to beep once, then silence right after.
The result is a detector that's much quieter than the Valentine, especially through urban areas where you're surrounded by automatic doors and traffic means you're not breaking the speed limit.
Sounds great; why is this not the main pick?
In short: Passport Max has no rear-facing radar sensor, the Live app is still too young to come close to Waze's usefulness, it's an expensive package with subscription costs, Car and Driver found that the Max generally matches or falls short of the Valentine's range, and, most importantly, it doesn't have the arrows. At $550, the Max also costs a lot more than the $400 Valentine One.
Let's start with that last deficit, the lack of arrows. "Escorts rely on the strength of the signal to know when the signal has passed," Ed Bolian says. "You just have to see [the signal strength] going down to know that it has passed."With the Valentine's information, you know which way to look when a signal hits, then make an informed decision about how to adjust your speed. The Max can't give any directional information. The Max's only orientation is the signal strength. If Ka is coming at you from the side, where it's not a threat, the Max will pipe up, but you'll be looking in every direction while you should be watching traffic.
The Max's laser detection is also not nearly as reliable. In Car and Driver's testing, a $100 detector was more effective at picking up laser and POP readings than the Max.
Radar detector reviewer Veil Guy says in one of his videos that, among his many issues with the detector, he actually finds the Max's ornate display distracting and can't figure out how to turn it off. More bluntly, in his conclusion, he says, "As it stands now, I cannot recommend the purchase of this radar detector [Escort Passport Max]." Of the Valentine, he says, "I'm what you might call a true believer."
Besides that, the Max's ability to keep quiet can mess with your confidence in the device. "My thing about the Passport is that it's so quiet so much of the time that I struggle to believe it's always working," Bolian says. "Relative to the Passport, I massively prefer the Valentine."
Smartphone supplementation
Escort was the first, but now almost all of the few detector manufacturers have come out with apps to use alongside their devices, and Escort's Escort Live app is most established option so far.
Your Escort detector uses a $100 special cord to link via Bluetooth to your smartphone, and it learns if a signal is coming from the same location multiple times, allowing you to block out known false alerts — for example, if you pass by an automatic door to a pharmacy on your way to work everyday, but the detector beeps, you can tell it that the signal isn't a threat, and the detector will keep mum when you pass it next. Live also collects user data, similar to Waze.
When a driver spots a cop, they can hit a button and report the sighting so other Live users can look out for it. The app is only a few years old and, though we couldn't get exact figures, we suspect that it can't come close to the user base of Waze.
Valentine has another (less compelling) approach. Basically, it turns your phone into an extension of the Valentine detector's display with info like the specific frequency of the signal.Fortunately, using an app with either detector is absolutely not necessary, which is good because all of these supplementary apps will kill most batteries, and it's a pain to mount your phone for every single car trip. If you plan to use the detector for driving the same route often, something like Escort Live is worth using to fine-tune your experience. On their own, though, these detectors have enough of a display to function autonomously. If it reads an X-band, you're probably ok, but when it shows Ka, it's time to slow down. That's enough for most drivers.
Non-detector-specific apps are, as I've learned from sources, a boon to drivers. Alex Roy, the previous record holder for a cross-country drive, told Ed Bolian, the current record holder, that apps like Waze, coupled with expanded 4G and LTE coverage, were the only major technological game-changers to legally driving fast since Roy made his record trip years back. As Bolian told me, no one uses Trapster anymore, but Waze's user base is always expanding, which means more user-generated intelligence on the locations of speed traps or lanes closed to construction.
For now, radar-specific apps like Escort Live haven't hit the user base they need to be truly great, but if you need navigation, running Waze on your smartphone next to a dedicated detector will help you spot police threats even more effectively than relying on a detector alone.
Long-term test notes
After years of driving with the Valentine One (a 2012 model that, Valentine confirms, is still up-to-date), I've used its early warnings and arrows to save me from dozens of tickets. On a particular drive down the Garden State Parkway well after dark on a Monday night near the end of August, I was the only car for several hundred feet ahead or behind. Approaching a stretch with a slight right bend and a wooded median where cops frequently post up, the Ka-band ringer went off with a flashing forward arrow. The dots for the intensity counter climbed, and I slowed down to 65 mph, even though no police were showing on Waze. The beeping got faster, and I looked left when it was at its peak to see the outline of an NJ highway patrol vehicle with the modern low-profile top lights. The V1's side-pointing arrows lit up, then the rear-facing arrows as I passed.
The V1 has given warning early enough to, in one instance, slow down through inertia, rather than aggressively braking. On another trip, the Ka alert went off, and I counted eight seconds between the first beep, and passing the police car, which was sitting behind another car it had pulled over. Eight seconds sounds like a short time, but at 85 mph-plus, that's serious distance and ample time to slow down.
I've learned to quickly notice and dismiss the K- and X-band signals (which can be muted through the app, or with the separate volume knob), especially when going through an E-Z Pass or Fastrak automated toll system, or passing a shopping mall with automated doors.
We've also been driving off-and-on with a 2012 Passport Escort 9500ix (after asking multiple times, Escort never provided us with a Max test unit), from our original review. With the occasional software update, the radar itself has been adept at picking up Ka-band signals early enough to warn and slow down, though next to the V1's arrows, relying on the signal strength and frequency of the beep to determine the signal's location feels imprecise. The major detriment, however, is that even in testing over the summer of 2014, the Escort Live app yielded frequent false alarms — specifically, a user-generated tip-off about a police speed trap was almost always a false alert.
For now, and we expect for the future, Escort's app just doesn't have the user base to even compete with Google's Waze. Escort's radars are reliable at detecting Ka-band signals, which helped us avoid highway speed traps multiple times in one drive, but next to the V1's arrows, you feel under-informed. The app's muting ability (to block out an automatic door you pass every day on your commute) is also, in practice, not a huge benefit. When you're in a suburban environment with lots of false alerts, we've found you're seldom going fast enough to make use of a detector's warning — it's easier to just ignore the X- and K-band signals when you're going slow then to block out every signal that you might frequently pass.
We'll keep driving with both, updating both models as needed, to see if any hidden benefits appear or if Escort Live proves to be unexpectedly great.
Budget detectors (or: why there's no step down)
There are dozens of options for sub-$400 detectors, but with speeding tickets costing around $250 a pop, we wouldn't skimp, especially when points on your license can mean an increase in insurance premiums. When you're playing with legal consequences and the hundreds or potentially thousands of dollars at stake, we would spend the extra cash to get the best product possible. The difference between a $200 or $300 detector and a $500 detector is vast; no serious reviews pay attention to anything less than $400.As Car and Driver found in its testing, a budget detector's range (a Cobra SPX 5400) was several hundred feet shorter than that of the Valentine or Escort. In their testing, they said, "In two of five around-the-bend tests, though, the SPX 5400 didn't warn us until we were within sight of the police car—a guaranteed ticket."
Radar Roy told me, "If you spend anything less then $300 you'll have a detector that is always chirping because of false alerts and low range." You'll pay the difference in speeding tickets and anxiety.
At worst, having a cheap detector versus no detector can mean a false confidence that might result in a ticket, especially if you buy an especially crappy model.
The rest
Escort recently released a new detector called the Max 360. It's based on the Passport Max2, but it includes dual front and rear antennas and a directional arrow display that's similar to the Valentine One. That's not a coincidence, as Valentine's patent expired recently, leaving the door open for other companies to adapt a similar design. Escort's twist is that the arrows are color coded to represent the frequency of the source: Blue for the X Band, yellow for K Band, and red for Ka Band.
Like the Passport Max and Max2, the Max 360 uses GPS and Escort's AutoLearn technology to mute regularly detected false alerts. And, like the Max2, it has built-in Bluetooth, so it can communicate with the Escort Live smartphone app (described above) without needing a cord. After we test one, we'll do another update to this guide and let you know how it stacks up against our top pick. But even if it's as good as, or even better than, the Valentine One, the Max 360 still costs $650, compared to the Valentine's $400 price tag. And while the Max 360 comes with a one-year free subscription to the Escort Live service, after that you'll have to pay $50 per year. We still feel you can't go wrong with the Valentine One, especially when you use it alongside the Waze app.
Besides the Valentine One and the above Escort models, the only other manufacturer of $500 detectors is Beltronics. Beltronics is a subsidiary of Escort Inc., and the technology is the same. Both of them even use Escort Live. Between the two companies, the Escort "Max" models remain the flagships.
That said, Beltronics recently released a new flagship for its line, called the GT-7 ($500). Like the Escort Max models, it uses GPS, digital signal processing, and speed-based sensitivity. It also links to Escort's Defender Database ($20 per year), which gives you info on the location of red-light and speed cameras, as well as the Escort Live service ($50 per year), which provides real-time user-generated alerts (think Waze).
There are other sub-$400 options like the Cobra iRadar, which relies on supplementing the detector with an app. These work, but they rely on crowdsourcing to work effectively. Wired tried it and its 10,000-pinpoint database of speed-traps and camera-enforced red lights and liked it. Despite the favorable review, the testing and stats aren't comprehensive enough for us to consider these kinds of detectors an option.
In August Cobra updated their iRadar model with the smaller iRAD 900 (iRadar Atom). It has the same issues as its predecessor like a small user base and less-sensitive hardware and adds crash-prevention that CNET found annoying. Stick to a dedicated, high-performance detector and Waze.
Beltronics does offer cheap options like the $250 V995, but there are no published reviews of anything made by the company, save for a five-year-old CNET write-up, so we hesitate to offer any conclusive claims about the company until we can test their lineup.
As for others:
Escort SmartRadar - at $550, we'd get a Valentine and not rely on Escort Live or pay its subscription fees. CNET's 4 out of 5 star rating doesn't take that into account.
Cobra iRadar - another detector that compensates for cheap hardware with crowdsourced intelligence. CNET gave it 3.5 out of 5 stars.
Beltronics Pro 200 - cheap, but as Radar Roy says, it has half the range of the higher-end Escort models.
Escort 8500 x50 - this is a solid entry-level option, particularly if you use it with Escort Live, but at around $300, not including the Escort Live cable, you'll be paying as much as you would for a Valentine.
Escort Redline - with 11-plus miles of range, these are made for truckers, which sounds good, but it has no GPS, so it can't learn false alerts like the Max. At $500, it's too expensive and niche to recommend.
Beltronics STi - this is Beltronics' equivalent of the Redline, with enormous range and high sensitivity. Like the Redline, though, it has no GPS and no option to block out non-threat signals.
Escort 9500ix - I've been driving on and off with this model for over a year now, and even with Escort Live fired up, it feels like you're flying blind compared to the Valentine. At $450, not including the Smart Cord or a subscription, there's no reason to not just get a Valentine, or a Max if you're committed to customization.
What to look forward to
In addition to Beltronics, Escort also now owns the Cobra brand. And a rep told us that the company plans to use their technology across all three brands in a good/better/best marketing strategy (that's Cobra/Beltronics/Escort, respectively). So, we expect to see more updates and new models from those brands. Meanwhile, the Valentine One remains mostly unchanged, save for the availability of add-on accessories and apps.
How radar works
Radar, the way a majority of police catch speeders, is a microwave signal that tracks a moving car's Doppler Shift with a rebounded signal. Think of it as very rapid sonar. When you see a cop sitting on the traffic median with a big handheld device pointed at cars, this is what's happening.
When radar detectors pick up a signal ("Ka" is the bandwidth that police most commonly use), the dash-mounted boxes beep and light up, indicating that you should to tap the brakes and get back down to the posted speed limit. If you want to get into the technical details, here's a full explanation that will answer everything. For most of us, just understand that these devices pick up on nearby radar, and if it's a frequency police use, you'd be wise to slow down.
Laser, also called LIDAR, works similarly, but is more effective since, as we learned from our sources, it provides an instant reading. It's highly concentrated---for about 1,000 feet of distance, the beam is only four feet wide. The cop shoots the laser gun at a small reflective surface, usually your license plate, shiny grill, or headlight, and, using the known speed of light, it finds the distance from the gun to the car. It does this 500 times a second, but since it's so narrow, the gun can only read a single vehicle, and only if the line of sight between the gun and the car is completely unobstructed. Radar, by comparison, can get the fastest speed reading from a pack of cars, so if you're knocking on 95 mph in the slow lane, he'll know to pull out and snag you.Good radar detectors typically come with laser detectors. If you've been targeted, it's usually too late, but sensing that laser is in the air means you'll know to keep your wits about you.
There are such things as laser jammers, which intercept the signal. They're illegal in a lot of states, but, as a reader pointed out, the manufacturers get away with it by calling the setup a "parking proximity sensor," which it is, but with a signal so powerful that it can blind a laser gun. We asked Ed Bolian about them. "There's people that swear by the laser jammers, and it's good to have," he said. "But I think it saved us once, maybe."
Jammers can get into the $800 range if you have a big car that needs extensive coverage, and using one means you're also the recipient of constant radiation emission from the jammer. Laser hasn't reached the ubiquity of radar, so for most of us, it's not worth the money, but Blinder is a brand liked by Alex Roy and Radar Roy.
Most detectors also have sensors for something called POP, which is a trademark radar mode for a radar made by MPH Industries. These guns emit K- or Ka-band bursts that last less than a tenth of a second. Police, though, aren't supposed to write tickets using POP as the only evidence, but having a detector that picks up on that signal will inform you that cops are nearby.
As our sources confirmed, a majority of road cops continue to rely on radar to read a vehicle's speed and create hard data to prove the driver's transgression. If you can know that you're approaching a radar source and scrub off speed, you'll be able to evade tickets across the United States and most of the world.
More generally, radar detectors are light years from predicting human behavior as well as something like Google Now. You cannot rely on a device like the Max to do all the work for you; a radar gun is a human cop with a tool, which is not predictable by any algorithm we've yet seen in any radar detector. At least for now, it's better to provide yourself with as much intelligence as you can about your surroundings, and make decisions with your own judgment.
As with dash cams, if you have a car commute or just drive enough to use a radar detector regularly, it's worth considering getting the detector hard-wired in your car. Less than $40 and an hour or so at an auto shop or Best Buy will set it up. The result is an always-ready detector that doesn't require a vision-obscuring cord that, if you do get pulled over, will indicate to the cop that you like to drive quickly. The setup also frees up your cigarette lighter so you can charge devices.
Wrapping it up
The Valentine One, unlike the other more automated competitors, has indispensable arrow orientation that provides immediately relevant information for spotting cops before they can catch you. If you want to surpass the speed limit without incurring the legal and financial consequences, it's the best gadget you can buy.
ERICTINGWALL, Escort Passport Max vs. Valentine One, Car and Driver
Doug DeMuro, Meet The Guy Who Drove Across The U.S. In A Record 28 Hours 50 Minutes, Jalopnik, October 30, 2013
Alex Roy, Former holder of the speed record for a cross-country drive, Interview
"Radar" Roy Reyer, Retired sheriff's lieutenant, traffic radar instructor, radar detector reviewer, Interview


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The Ravens held the Texans to 200 passing yards in the October meeting, but it's hard to take much away from that considering that Houston's top quarterback, Matt Schaub, played in that game and his top target, wide receiver Andre Johnson, didn't. Johnson is back, and slowing him — a task that most likely will be assigned to Ravens top cornerback Lardarius Webb — is the team's No. 2 priority behind containing Foster. Rookie T.J. Yates, a fifth-round pick last April, will start at quarterback for Houston after Schaub and Matt Leinart sustained season-ending injuries. Yates threw for 949 yards, three touchdowns and three interceptions in six regular-season games, then completed 11 of 20 passes for 159 yards and a touchdown in the Texans' playoff-opening win. With wide receivers Johnson, Kevin Walter and Jacoby Jones and tight ends Owen Daniels and Joel Dreessen, Yates has plenty of weapons at his disposal. But the Ravens are hoping to rattle the rookie with a pass rush that accounted for 48 sacks during the regular season, 14 of them by AFC leader Terrell Suggs (above). The Ravens are also hoping that the crowd noise affects Yates and prevents him from calling out blitzes and communicating with his offense. EDGE: RAVENS
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Looks like Victoria's Secret is finally straightening its halo. Following a Greenpeace investigation that revealed the presence of hormone-disrupting chemicals in the popular underwear, the lingerie retailer has pledged to eliminate all releases of hazardous chemicals throughout its supply chain and products by 2020. Limited Brands, its parent company, is now the 14th global corporation to make a "credible 'Detox' commitment, as well as the first to provie an "explicit process" that will ensure the total elimination of phthalates, a group of endocrine-disrupting substances linked to birth defects, genital and reproductive abnormalities, and—somewhat ironically—early breast development in girls.Sorry, there are no polls available at the moment.
Victoria's Secret is an old hand at fielding accusations over its use of toxic chemicals. In 2003, the brand was strongarmed into removing carcinogenic substances from its beauty products. Five years later, it faced a slew of lawsuits from women who claimed they developed severe rashes and scarring after wearing bras contaminated with formaldehyde. After Greenpeace published its findings, however, rumors abounded that leading Victoria's Secret "Angel" Miranda Kerr, who considers herself an "eco-warrior," was reconsidering her relationship with the lingerie company, a move that might have spurred other high-profile models to hang up their wings, as well.
Rumors abounded that leading Victoria's Secret "Angel" Miranda Kerr was considering retiring her wings.
Rumors abounded that leading Victoria's Secret "Angel" Miranda Kerr was considering retiring her wings.
Limited Brands, which also owns La Senza, a Canadian intimate-apparel line, will kick off its commitment by disclosing discharge data from 80 percent of its worldwide supply chain by the end of 2013, according to the environmental nonprofit. The corporation has also committed to a complete ban of perfluorinated chemicals, a class of industrial chemicals used primarily to repel water and oil in outerwear, by July 2015.
"Limited Brands has the chance to move from toxic villain to 'Detox angel' with its commitment to completely eliminate all hazardous chemicals from its supply chains and products," says Marietta Harjono, Detox campaigner at Greenpeace International. "The onus is now on the company to follow up on its ambitious statement and quickly turn words into action."
Other companies that have answered Greenpeace's call are Adidas, C&A, Esprit, H&M, Levi Strauss, Li-Ning, Mango, Nike, Puma, Marks & Spencer, Uniqlo, Zara, and most recently, Benetton.
Companies that still need to enter the game, Greenpeace says, include Calvin Klein, Gap, and G-Star Raw.


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Peter Pan is from the most memorable Disney movies. It's hard to believe this moviewas from 1953. There is something about peter pan that inspires everyone when he is a kid. Its a great movie but its not one of disney's best classics. Enjoy Movie and Thanks for visiting my blog.
How to Watch Peter Pan (1953) Disney Movie For Free Without Download?
1- Click on the play icon in the middle of the screen
2- Wait 5-10 min for stream to load
To play Peter Pan full movie at full-screen size, click the arrow button located at the far bottom-right corner of the stream (video). Please let us know via comments if the stream is working or not.


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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. regulators have opened a probe into whether a Lockheed-Boeing joint venture that launches U.S. government satellites into space has flouted antitrust laws.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is investigating whether United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture of Lockheed Martin Corp and Boeing Co, violated federal antitrust laws by "monopolizing" or restraining competition through an exclusivity agreement with the maker of the engines used in its rockets, according to a FTC document obtained by Reuters on Wednesday.
RD Amross, a joint venture of Russia's NPO Energomash and Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, a unit of United Technologies Corp, provides RD-180 engines for ULA rockets.
Industry sources say ULA is preventing RD Amross from selling the engines to other rocket makers, including Orbital Sciences Corp, which is trying to break into the lucrative market for government rocket launches.
Jessica Rye, spokeswoman for ULA, confirmed the investigation and said the company was cooperating with antitrust regulators.
"ULA's contracts to purchase the RD-180 engine are lawful, pro-competitive and designed to provide the most reliable launch vehicle possible for critical U.S. government missions," Rye said. "Because this is ongoing investigation, it would be inappropriate for us to comment on specifics."
Pratt & Whitney spokesman Jay DeFrank said his company is aware of the investigation and cooperating with U.S. regulators.
The FTC declined comment.
Barry Beneski, a spokesman for Orbital Sciences, said the company had been contacted by the FTC about the probe.
"We have been contacted by the FTC about their investigation. However we can't be more specific than that," Beneski said. "In general, the company supports efforts to ensure there is an open and fair competitive environment in the market for launch services."
Lockheed and Boeing formed the joint venture in 2006 after years of competing for contracts under the Air Force's Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) program, which provides launch services for large military, intelligence and NASA satellites.
The companies won U.S. government's approval for the venture by arguing that there was not enough demand for heavy lift rocket launch services to support two competitors since the commercial demand they had expected had failed to materialize for such large rockets.
The U.S. Air Force, frustrated about the high cost of EELV rocket launches, has in recent years tried to infuse more competition into the launch service market.
Industry sources said the FTC investigation follows repeated unsuccessful efforts by Orbital to buy the RD-180 engines for its new medium-lift Antares rocket, which was developed in partnership with NASA to haul cargo to the International Space Station. The first Antares rocket was launched from a new commercial spaceport in Virginia in April.
Orbital ultimately used the AJ-26 engine, a refurbished Russian engine that is supplied by Aerojet, a unit of GenCorp Inc, to power the rocket. But that engine is no longer in production and there are only limited supplies available.
To be a viable competitor in the future, industry sources say Orbital needs access to the RD-180 engine, the only liquid propulsion engine in production that is commercially available and can be used for Orbital's Antares rocket.
Orbital developed the Antares rocket together with Aerojet and Alliant Techsystems as a replacement for the Delta II rocket built by Boeing that has been retired.
Orbital has enough AJ-26 engines to support its resupply missions for the space station but needs more engines to be a viable competitor for launches of medium-sized satellites that do not need larger and more expensive boosters.
Orbital is not seeking to compete directly with ULA for heavy lift rocket launches, but says it could save the government money by using the Antares rocket, which costs under $100 million, to lift smaller payloads into space.
Additional reporting by Diane Bartz; Editing by Ryan Woo


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Established in 1988, NIDCD is mandated to conduct and support biomedical and behavioral research and research training in the normal and disordered processes of hearing, balance, smell, taste, voice, speech, and language. The Institute also conducts and supports research and research training related to disease prevention and health promotion; addresses special biomedical and behavioral problems associated with people who have communication impairments or disorders; and supports efforts to create devices which substitute for lost and impaired sensory and communication function. NIDCD has focused national attention on disorders of human communication and has contributed to advances in biomedical and behavioral research that will improve the lives of millions of individuals with communication disorders.
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|Chicken Fried
|Toes [Greatest Hits Version]
|Knee Deep (feat. Jimmy Buffett)
|Colder Weather
|Whatever It Is
Nov 2018 • 1 song
Nov 2018 • 1 song
Aug 2017 • 1 song
Zac Brown is a country singer, songwriter, and bandleader, one of the brightest stars in a generation of performers set on changing the paradigm of the country music business. He's also a record producer, record label head, and philanthropist set on making the world a better place for as many people as possible. With his winning combination of country, bluegrass, reggae, and Caribbean music, he appeals to country fans and jam band hippies, and could well cross over to lovers of ... Read more


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Roger Moore
A better-than-average, gravity-defying ninja duel leads to an epic chase � by leaps, swings and ziplines � through the Himalayas in the big set piece sequence of G.I. Joe: Retaliation. Masked villains in red ninja suits chase Snake Eyes and Jinx as they attempt to spirit a ninja villain out of a mountaintop lair. They scamper, by rope, across impossible slopes, swinging their swords.
And when a line is cut, the victim yowls into the void. It may be the most dazzling bit of business of its kind from the age of digital stunts.
The rest of the movie? Seriously, it�s a live-action version of an �80s cartoon that was designed to sell toys. This is Transformers without the Bumblebee Camaro, a lot of action, a few one-liners, and a lot of gunplay. And it was entrusted to the director of the Justin Bieber concert documentary. How good can it be?
It�s got the biggest body count since, well, Olympus Has Fallen � stabbings, shootings, blowings to bits. And barely a drop of blood.
But it has Dwayne Johnson, an action hero who knows his way around a raised eyebrow and a catch-phrase. His character, the G.I. Joe-force sergeant known as �Roadblock,� quotes Jay-Z for motivational speeches. He�s a father of two who tells his boss (Channing Tatum) that their little �extraction� from Pakistan (a country described as �a riot with a zip code�) is so easy that they�ll be �home in time for Top Chef.� Only they aren�t.
COBRA may have been down for the count in the first Joe movie, but they have an impostor (Jonathan Pryce, playing the real prez and the fake one) in the White House and all manner of evil henchmen and ingenious gadgets (firefly-shaped bomb drones) to wipe out the G.I. Joes. And that�s not even mentioning the ninjas.
It�s up to team members Roadblock, Lady Jaye (Adrianne Palicki) and Flint (D.J. Cotrona) � with maybe an assist from masked marvel Snake Eyes (Ray Park) and the fetching fury Jinx (Elodie Yung) to foil evil � the masked COBRA commander and his sidekick, Firefly (Ray Stevenson).
Maybe the Joes can enlist Bruce Willis, who needs to be reminded that John Wayne never played fifth banana in other people�s action pictures, even in his dotage.
Acting? We�ll have none of that. Just D. Johnson manfully wielding an Arnold-sized heavy machine gun, masked stunt artists dodging pointy slo-mo 3-D ninja stars, and Pryce, hamming it up as both a serious, imprisoned president and a snarky super villain disguised as that president.
Things go boom and bodies go down, and the one hour and 50 minutes zip by like oh, two hours and 10. There�s a �nuclear weapons are good for us� message that also seems positively �80s.
But at least there are no jive talking, joking and pontificating robots.
Just ninjas. �Damn ninjas.�


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Plan your permissions strategy
An effective permissions strategy will enhance the manageability and performance of your site, ensure compliance with your organization's data governance policies, and minimize the cost of maintenance for you and your organization.
Why strategize?
Most websites are created speedily, with the aim of solving a particular problem or getting a specific set of information to people who need it quickly.
That's good, but the structure of the site that you start with often becomes the default structure as your site collection grows and is required to meet other kinds of needs. This growth can result in permissions-settings chaos, where everyone in the organization has full control over subsites or every individual requires new permissions for every new site they need to use.
A good permissions strategy can catch these problems before they get started.
An effective permissions strategy gains you control in three main areas:
Manageability and performance. The permissions settings you choose have long-term consequences for how much work it takes to manage your sites, and how speedily your sites respond to user commands.
Data governance. A planned permissions strategy can help you ensure compliance with your organization's data governance policies, which may be unique to your company or an essential part of complying with financial and accounting disclosure and retention legislation, such as Sarbanes-Oxley.
Cost of maintenance. A strategy that takes advantage of built-in efficiency tools, such as security groups, permission levels, and permissions inheritance will enhance ease of use for your site users, and minimize the requests for individual access that permissions managers have to respond to during the life of the site.
Tips for an effective permissions strategy
Keep these tips in mind to help create a simple, easy-to-maintain permissions strategy.
The principle of least privilege
Give people the lowest permission levels they need to perform their assigned tasks.
Work with security groups
When you give people access, add them to standard, default security groups (such as Members, Visitors, and Owners).
Make most people members of the Members or Visitors groups.
People in the Members group can add or remove items or documents, but they cannot change the site structure, site settings, or site appearance.
People in the Visitors group have read-only access to the site, which means that they can see pages and items, and open items and documents, but cannot add, edit, or remove pages, items, or documents.
Limit the number of people in the Owners group.
Only people you trust to change the structure, settings, or appearance of the site should be in the Owners group.
Work with permissions inheritance
Use permissions inheritance to create a clean, easy-to-visualize hierarchy.
Managing permissions becomes more difficult and time-consuming when some lists within a site have fine-grained permissions, and when some sites have subsites with unique permissions and others with inherited permissions.
If you break permissions inheritance to use fine-grained permissions extensively, users may experience slower performance when they try to access site content.
It is much easier to manage and explain permissions when there is a clear hierarchy of permissions and inherited permissions.
Organize your content to take advantage of permissions inheritance.
Consider segmenting your content by security level. Create a site or a library specifically for sensitive documents, rather than having them scattered in a larger library and protected by unique permissions.
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text: Director Gore Verbinski (Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, Rango) has teamed up once again with cinematographer Bojan Bazelli (Rock of Ages, Pete's Dragon) for a new thriller titled A Cure for Wellness. The story follows a young business executive who is sent to retrieve his company's CEO from a mysterious wellness center isolated in the Swiss Alps and comes to suspect that the center, although renowned for its miraculous (if not unconventional) treatments, is not all it's made out to be. Leading the cast are actors Dane DeHaan (Lawless, Kill Your Darlings), Jason Issacs (The Patriot, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix), Mia Goth (Nymphomaniac: Volume II, Everest), Ivo Nandi (Sons of Anarchy, Boardwalk Empire), Adrian Schiller (Bright Star, The Danish Girl), Celia Imrie (Nanny McPhee, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel), and Harry Groener (Patch Adams, Road to Perdition). Continue reading


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Sunday, August 26, 2007
I'll need some more time to digest the whole experience but in a nutshell it was great - everything I hoped. I'll write some more thoughts later.
But of course, I'll leave you with some photos of what we all really want to see - the craft loot!
initial crafty puchases - fabric, trim, stamps, paper, purse handles and kit, minature pegs + spools, 'handmade zakka' book
further crafty puchases - cutesy japanese fabric, crafty books, cram cream tape, Shinzi Katoh cafe mug, cute little 'vault' storage stack
12 comments:
- Di said...
Looking forward to hearing all about your travels! If the craft loot is anything to go by it looks like you had a fabulous time!!
- 6:21 am
- alison stedman said...
So jealous of your trip to japan. Hope you had a great trip.
- 6:23 am
- Corrie said...
wow so I guess you loved it! I love my tapes but they're harder to find than I expected!!!! hope my shopping tips put you in the right direction....where did you get those gorgeous alphabet stamps...I love them and the little vault storage case! how did i miss those!!! oh and being back home seems so quiet...like when I cross the street and there aren't 50 people around me waiting to cross with me too!
- 7:39 am
- Belinda said...
Welcome back, so glad you enjoyed it! I'm counting down the weeks now, Can't wait!
I hope you will share some shopping tips, nice loot.
- 7:43 am
- Victoria E said...
Welcome back :) I had no doubt that you would have an amazingly fun experience. Looks like you got some fantastic fabrics - swoon. Our interview will be going up on my site tomorrow (Monday); I'll make sure to send you a link when it's up :)
- 7:51 am
- Hollabee said...
Great to hear you're back and I can't wait to read all your stories. I absolutely love the book & fabrics you bought! Looks like you had a fantastic time.
- 10:03 am
- Anna said...
Welcome back! I'm sure that you had a fantastic trip (am quietly envious)
- 2:12 pm
welcome back! glad you have a great time!
you have done well with the crafty loot hehe..
- 7:16 pm
- tiel said...
wow..if there is one thing on my to do list before I die..it is to go to Japan! I'd like to spend at least a month. Guess I better start saving.
- 8:07 pm
- Bejeweled said...
Fantastic craft loot!
- 11:46 am
- Heather Moore said...
I'm just back from a week away, so have enjoyed catching up with you. Wow, your trip to Japan must have been incredible. I was just reading about a fabrics-themed Japan trip in Selvedge mag this morning, feeling pangs of envy. And your new fabric! Gorgeous. Website too. Yay!
- 4:39 pm
- Evie said...
I've been searching around blogs for crafty Japanese info and I've got to ask. WHERE did you get that vault box? I must have one! By the way, I am in love with your teal birch tree fabric!
- 8:36 am


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Lancaster & Lebanon Campuses Computer Boot Camp
Date: Wednesday August 31, 2016
Time: 9:00 AM - 2:00 PM
Location: HACC Library
Contact Name: Kristina Wagner
Contact Phone: 717-358-2986
Contact Email: email@example.com
A drop-in event that allows students to meet one-on-one with someone who will guide them through a number of HACC related computer programs necessary for student success at HACC. Areas that are covered include MyHACC, Brightspace (D2L), Google Docs and Microsoft Word. There is no sign-up for students. Simply come into the library on Aug. 29 - Sept. 9 from 9am-2pm.
Sponsored by: HACC Library
For more information:


text: Makeup legend Trish McEvoy's namesake line offers an innovative range of cosmetics, beauty products and brushes. The Trish McEvoy collection features moisturizers, serums, cleansers and, treatment solutions. The soothing and illuminating effects of her serums, cleansers, and moisturizers combine with formulated concentrate treatments to repair the skin, leaving it feeling protected and nourished all-round. Also included in the collection is an excellent assortment of perfumes in floral, vanilla, and fruity scents bearing the distinct Trish McEvoy charm to boost your confidence and lift your mood. Explore the vast selection of Trish McEvoy's beauty line at Neiman Marcus, including Trish McEvoy fragrances, cosmetics, makeup brushes, and more.


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Pieter Hugo's "Kin" is the photographer's closer look into his motherland and a personal approach to the incredible human diversity surrounding him. Hugo's photo series from South Africa depicts the issues of race, social status, economical despair, sexuality and his own place in such "fractured, schizophrenic, wounded, and problematic place".
Despite being complicated in content, Hugo's photographs carry a distinctly serene, calming style and the sense of connection between the photographer, camera and the subject. Regardless of who's in frame, an unknown homeless drifter, domestic servant, or his pregnant wife, Hugo captures their essence and tension in a simple static shot.
"[Kin] is an engagement with the failure of the South African colonial experiment and my sense of being 'colonial driftwood. [South Africa] is a very violent society and the scars of colonialism and apartheid still run very deep. Issues of race and cultural custodianship permeate every aspect of society, and the legacy of forced racial segregation casts a long shadow."
Based on his photographic approach, Pieter Hugo raises questions to himself and searches for answers through his work. How should one live in this diverse society? Should one accept the historical aftermath for granted or try to change it? How to raise a family in these circumstances?


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- Publish date:
- Updated on
- Year
- 1822
Victor Hugo marries Adele Foucher
On this day in 1822, Victor Hugo married Adele Foucher, his childhood sweetheart. The pair will have numerous children, and the marriage will survive notorious infidelities on both sides. The marriage got off to an ominous start, however, when Hugo's brother suffered a nervous breakdown at the wedding breakfast.
Hugo, who had decided to be a writer during his early teens, published his first collection of poetry the same year as his marriage. It won him a pension from Louis XVIII. The following year, Hugo published his first novel, Han d'Islande. About this time, he began meeting regularly with a group of Romantics. His 1827 play, Cromwell, embraced the tenets of Romanticism, which he laid out in the play's preface. The following year, despite a contract to begin work on a novel called Notre Dame de Paris, he set to work on two plays. The first, Marion de Lorme (1829), was censored for its candid portrayal of a courtesan purified by love. The second, Hernani, became the touchstone for a bitter and protracted debate between French Classicists and Romantics. In 1831, he finally finished Notre Dame de Paris, which pleaded for an aesthetic that would tolerate the imperfect, the grotesque. The book also had a simpler agenda: to increase appreciation of old Gothic structures, which had become the object of vandalism and neglect
In the 1830s, Hugo wrote numerous plays, many of which were written as vehicles for the actress Juliette Drouet, with whom Hugo was romantically connected starting in 1833. In 1841, Hugo was elected to the prestigious Acadamie Francaise, but two years later he lost his beloved daughter and her husband when they were drowned in an accident. His expressed his profound grief in a poetry collection called Les Contemplations (1856).
Hugo was forced to flee France when Napoleon III came to power; he did not return for 20 years. While still in exile, he completed Les Miserables (1862), which became a hit in France and abroad. He returned to Paris during the Franco-Prussian War and was hailed a national hero. Hugo's writing spanned more than six decades, and he was given a national funeral and buried in the Pantheon after his death in 1885.


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WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 (UPI) -- More than $175 million during the next five years would help manufacturers develop more advanced and fuel-efficient vehicles, the U.S. Energy Department said.
U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced that about 40 efforts across 15 states would target projects ranging from better fuels to lighter materials and longer-lasting batteries.
"Investments in the next generation of autos will strengthen our economy and lead to a more fuel-efficient, clean energy future," Chu said in a statement.
The announcement follows a series of new automotive and truck standards for future model years.
U.S. President Barack Obama announced that standards for trucks and buses built in 2014 through 2018 will reduce oil consumption by a projected 530 million barrels and greenhouse gas pollution by approximately 270 million metric tons.
Obama unveiled new fuel efficiency standards for cars and light trucks in July. Over a series of incremental increases, the standards would impose restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions and push fuel efficiency standards to the equivalent of more than 50 miles per gallon by 2025.
Members of the Republican-controlled House of Representatives said the measures are too strict. They are lower than those in place in China and the European Union, however.


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Vermont report finds no radiation danger from using smart meters
Associated Press
MONTPELIER -- A report commissioned by the Vermont Legislature on the potential threat to human health posed by smart meters, the devices used by electric utilities to measure power consumption and ultimately save energy, found the devices emit only a small fraction of the maximum exposure levels set by the Federal Communications Commission, said the report.
The maximum peak radiofrequency level measured one foot from a meter was 3.9 percent of the FCC's top exposure limit, said the Department of Public Service, which hired the Washington state company that prepared the report.
The smart meter exposure compared to a limit of 1 percent of the radiofrequency exposure level for a cordless phone, 6.5 percent for a microwave oven and 10.5 percent for a cellphone.
"It is concluded that any potential exposure to the investigated smart meters will comply with the FCC exposure rules by a wide margin," said the report, which was released Wednesday.
The conclusions of the report were based on results of lab testing and field measurements from smart meters being used by Green Mountain Power and the Burlington Electric Department.
GMP spokeswoman Dorothy Schnure said the new smart meters, and other technological improvements, would improve reliability and help the utility offer more cost-effective service to its customers.
"The results of this study confirmed what we already believed: smart meters are safe for our customers," she said.
A number of Vermont utilities are installing smart meters in place of traditional meters that had to be regularly read by someone to determine a customer's power consumption. Smart meters allow two-way communications between the customer and the utility, in many cases by two-way radio.
The meters could make it possible to allow electricity prices to vary at different times of the day, which could encourage consumers to use power-hungry appliances such as dishwashers and clothes dryers at night when demand, and the price, is low.
But some fear the meters could have unintended health effects because of human exposure to radiofrequency levels from the meters.
The group Vermonters for a Clean Environment has been skeptical of smart meter technology. No one from the organization responded Wednesday to a request for comment about the new report.
A number of states allow customers to opt out of having smart meters installed on their home of businesses, but they are charged a fee. Last year Vermont passed a law requiring the utilities to pay the cost when customers choose not to use smart meters.
If you'd like to leave a comment (or a tip or a question) about this story with the editors, please email us. We also welcome letters to the editor for publication; you can do that by filling out our letters form and submitting it to the newsroom.


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Women of cloth; that is what we used to call them. Often they were and still are misunderstood. People ask; why would a healthy woman choose to live a life of total celibacy in the name of serving God. Others think these women are living a lie, purporting to live a saintly life, married to Jesus yet they are not half as good as they seem to be.
When I was young, I was also of this mindset. I expected nuns to be perfect in their ways. My ideal nun was a gentle person, calm in temperament, never the one to get angry even when wronged, never one to shout even when exasperated and never one to punish mischievous children (and if punished we perceived it as cruelty). But now I realise that expectation was very unfair and unwarranted. After all nuns are human beings just like me and surely they are entitled to a little anger from time to time. Looking back at my expectations I realise they were outlandish, childish and very selfish.
Sr Theresa Camillo (Click here to see her image dressed in grey) is a catholic nun in the (SJI) Sisters of the Child Jesus Sect. She was the headmistress of Regina Mundi High school in Gweru, Midlands province of Zimbabwe where I spent 6 years of my secondary and high school. She recorded amazing pass rates for many years in her all girls' high school. We did better than all the boys' schools in the region such as Shungu and Fletcher academically yet she also nurtured in us the sportswomen, the basket-ballers, the hockey players, the soccer players (like I was), the great debaters, public speakers, musicians and dancers that we became.
Our motto mens sana in corpore sano'a healthy mind in a healthy body' was her preoccupation and she always wanted us to be fit in both mind and body. She taught us to eat all our meals hence meals were compulsory (and then we hated it). She also demanded that we walk briskly and purposefully from one point to the other, something I have made into a habit in my adulthood, after all loitering is a sign of complacence and laziness.
Sr Theresa was a loving woman, maybe even more loving than some of the mothers people left behind in their homes. She was a also a very liberal woman, accommodating of our very many misdemeanors, little temper tantrums and mood swings. We spent 9 out of the 12 months of the year at school and she was the grounding force when we were developing from adolescence into adulthood at that boarding school. Imagine being mother to 700 teenage girls all aged between 12 and 19 years. Surely you would be pulling your hairs out each day until you had none left. But she did it. Each year she let out 100 students and took in another 100.
The fruits of the kind of women she nurtured are self evident. One only needs to look at the women who emerged out of the girls she received many years ago. She raised doctors, models, television presenters, beauty therapists, chartered accountants, human rights activists, occupational health practitioners, dentists, biomedical laboratory researchers, veterinary surgeons, engineers, pharmacists, medical surgical nurses, movie directors, lawyers, writers, lecturers, among other and some of them are wonderful mothers and wives too. Indeed she can boast of rearing numerous generations of capable women who are doing wonderful things for the development of Zimbabwean society.
The continuation of generations of women that are still being raised by that school is also the fruit of her work. In 2008 at 14 years of age, Makhosazana Moyo groomed at Regina Mundi was picked as the overall winner of the 2008 cover to cover short story writing competition. In the 2014 class of the US students achievers, three of the girls profiled for their amazing achievements, Senzeni Mpofu studying at Yale university, Rudo Esther Mudzi studying at Mt Holyoke university and Rumbidzai Vushe studying at Smith college were all from Regina Mundi. Thabiso Machingura in 2011 won awards in the American Black History Month write ups for her short story.
When we were still students guided by her, we began a youth HIV/AIDS awareness group called 'Worth the Wait' which advocated abstinence among young girls to refrain from sex. Today that club has been transformed into the 'Youth Against Aids club.' and it gives these young girls life lessons on how to protect themselves from HIV/AIDS.
As 'Worth the Wait' members we made this vow:
I make a commitment to God, myself, my family, my future husband and my future children to stay sexually from this day forward until the day I enter a covenant marriage relationship.
I made this vow in 1999 and I have done my damnedest to keep it, at a cost of course. I have been dumped unceremoniously in relationships for holding on to this commitment which many will argue is very old-fashioned but I will always be grateful to Sr Theresa for that value she inculcated in me. I have lost friends who I went to school with, to AIDS and I believe I am still here because of this vow which she taught me.
To date I carry two things that she always emphasised:
1. Greet visitors with a smile
2. Throw away all your litter in a bin
She has never been celebrated but I feel she deserves that history should remember her with pride, admiration and reverence for all she has done to uplift and empower the girl-child in Zimbabwe and beyond.


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You have a unique medical history. Therefore, it is essential to talk with your doctor about your personal risk factors and/or experience with lipid disorders. By talking openly and regularly with your doctor, you can take an active role in your care.
Here are some tips that will make it easier for you to talk to your doctor:
- Bring someone else with you. It helps to have another person hear what is said and think of questions to ask.
- Write your questions ahead of time, so you don't forget them.
- Write down the answers you get, and make sure you understand what you are hearing. Ask for clarification, if necessary.
- Don't be afraid to ask your questions or ask where you can find more information about what you are discussing. You have a right to know.
- What is my total cholesterol?
- What are my LDL (bad cholesterol), HDL (good cholesterol), and triglyceride levels?
- What is my ratio of HDL cholesterol to total cholesterol? What does this mean?
- What should my lipid levels be?
- How will my lipid levels affect my risk for heart disease?
- How does my medical history, lifestyle, and family background affect my risk of having a lipid disorder?
- Can I stop a lipid disorder from developing?
Will I have to take medication?
- What are the benefits/side effects of these medications?
- Will these medications interact with other medications, over-the-counter products, or dietary or herbal supplements I am already taking for other conditions?
- What should I do if I forget to take a dose?
- Will I need to take these medications indefinitely?
- Can I take fish oil supplements and/or niacin?
Should I engage in exercise?
- What type of exercise is best?
- How much should I be exercising?
- How do I get started with an exercise program?
Should I change my diet?
- Should I meet with a dietitian?
- Should I stop drinking alcohol?
- How can I find help to quit smoking?
- Do I need to lose weight? If so, how much? Any suggestions on going about it?
- If I change my lifestyle habits, will I still need to take medication?
- How will I know if the medication is working?
- How will I know if my cholesterol and triglycerides are staying within healthy limits?
- How often will you monitor my lipid levels?
- If reduce my cholesterol numbers, can I stop taking medication?
Revision Information
- Reviewer: Marcin Chwistek, MD
- Review Date: 03/2017 -
- Update Date: 03/15/2015 -


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Attorney for Chris Rainey says woman was never hit; attempting to have case dismissed
January 12, 2013 | Pittsburgh Steelers | No Comments|
*** Discuss this article and more at our Pittsburgh Steelers forum ***
Developments came out on Friday night in the Chris Rainey scandal, as now it appears the woman in question who was allegedly slapped by Rainey says she was never hit. According to Gainesville attorney Huntley Johnson, they are requesting that the case be dismissed. According to Johnson via Steelers reporter Joe Starkey: Johnson said the woman had…
Source: Yardbarker: Pittsburgh Steelers