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For the third time in less than two months, the Baltimore Police Department is looking for a new director of training - but they say the current search was always part of their plan.
After a shooting at an unauthorized training drill in February that seriously injured a recruit, the department suspended and removed the commander of the unit, Maj. Eric Russell. His replacement, Maj. Joe Smith, surprised the top brass by informing them that he was retiring just days later. Quickly, the agency announced it had moved Lt. Col. Ross Buzzuro into the position.
There's now a job posting for the position, uploaded today, on the website of website of the International Chiefs of Police. But Judy Pal, chief of staff for Police Commissioner Anthony W. Batts, said it was always the plan that Buzzuro would hold the position for a few months while they looked for a long-term solution. She said Buzzuro is not leaving the agency, and would move back into operations.
Why the six week wait to post the job if the department always intended to find another commander? Pal said the agency needed approval to get approval for the position in the budget.
At the time of his appointment, Buzzuro gave no indication that he was merely keeping the seat warm.
Here's what I wrote after speaking to him that Friday:
Police moved swiftly to find a replacement, appointing Lt. Col. Ross Buzzuro, 27-year veteran, to the post. He is the fourth person to be named to the position in the past year.
"We shouldn't miss a beat," Buzzuro said in a brief interview.
Buzzuro said his only experience at the academy was when he went through as a recruit. But he is a respected commander with experience running the Northern District. Until Friday, he was overseeing the special operations section, which includes the SWAT team. He also has served as ethics commander of the department's internal investigations section.
What the agency did say was that Smith would help Buzzuro with a transition.
At the beginning of 2012, the agency made what was then a rare move of reaching outside and hiring John King, a veteran Montgomery County police commander, to lead training efforts. But he resigned in June. Russell was abruptly placed in the position amid a spate in shootings in the Southwest District, where he was the major.
Last month, Baltimore County authorities indicted training instructor William Scott Kern on charges of second-degree assault and reckless endangerment in the shooting at the former Rosewood hospital site.


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I'm embarrassed to admit that I somehow missed Ethics in Journalism Week, which, according to the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ), ended last Saturday. Now I have to wait a whole year before I get another chance to be ethical.
I'm embarrassed to admit that I somehow missed Ethics in Journalism Week, which, according to the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ), ended last Saturday. Now I have to wait a whole year before I get another chance to be ethical.
That's too bad, because you'd be surprised how complicated being an ethical journalist can get these days. Sure, the SPJ reminds us that a primary tenet to its Code of Ethics is to "minimize harm," but let's face it — I try to do that every time I get behind the wheel of a car or answer a question one of my kids has about human anatomy.
So with that in mind, I thought I'd offer up the following list of eight ways we journalists can get ready to celebrate next year's Ethics in Journalism Week. (I had 10, but it turned out the last two were actually from a book by George Carlin.) Though it may be easy to lose sight of these things, taking a moment to consider them may help us remember why we got into the journalism business in the first place: the flexible hours.
So here goes:
1) Every so often — be it because of a looming deadline or the pressure of competition — even the most established and respected of journalists is going to be tempted to make something up, such as an anonymous source or, say, eight years of his life. But if you find yourself feeling the temptation to fabricate, please: Make sure it sounds realistic. (Nothing about space aliens.)
2) When we publish pictures we've taken of partially naked celebrities — be it on private beaches, when they're getting out of limos sans underwear, or through windows that they've left inappropriately open — we should always make sure to superimpose black bars of a sufficient width to obscure their private areas. It's the right thing to do.
3) Before referring to people as "nappy-headed hos," we should make sure we have at least three on-the-record sources who confirm that's actually what they are.
4) Speaking of sources, when seeking contacts on controversial issues, we should only approach people we know to be reliable and who have no personal agendas. You know, people like vice presidential aides, or someone from a group with a name like "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth." You know you can trust an organization like that, because they have "truth" right there in their name. Write that down.
5) Remember, if we get an arrest wrong it can affect somebody's reputation for the rest of his or her life. So whenever you think of it, throw in an extra "alleged." I think there's a class on that at Columbia now.
6) We should absolutely, positively never plagiarize, unless it's from something we're relatively certain no one has read before. Say, the work of a particularly precocious high school student who we can later claim is emotionally unstable if she accuses us of copying.
7) Let's make a pledge to limit the number of profanity-laced celebrity cell phone messages we release to the general public. I'm thinking one a week, tops. Larry King can handle only so much.
8) Though it may sometimes feel otherwise, not every story has to include nudity or violence. For instance, some stories can include both — maybe something on a horrible bus crash at a nudist colony. But only if we can get a photographer there.
So there you have it. Of course, while it's a good idea to practice these guidelines during Ethics in Journalism Week, technically we have a responsibility to be ethical every single time we set about to ply our craft, as exhausting as that may sound. And by God, we can do it — or I'm not a member of the Society of Professional Journalists!
OK, I'm not a member; I just made that up. But you'll notice I didn't mention space aliens.
Peter Chianca is a CNC managing editor and a regular contributor to the "The Shorelines Blog" (blogs.townonline.com/shorelines). To receive At Large by e-mail, write to firstname.lastname@example.com, with the subject line "SUBSCRIBE."

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Activities for Age Three
Activities for Age Three
These activities will enrich children's language development and enhance emergent math and literacy skills.Building Reading Skills
The Father Who Had Ten Children
Gilberto and the Wind
Golden Bear
Peace at Last
The Tale of Peter Rabbit
Pigs Aplenty, Pigs Galore!
Rabbits and Raindrops
Fire Engines
The Wolf's Chicken Stew
What Is a Book?
Show and Tell: A Favorite Book
How Are Books Made?
Understanding Books Read Aloud
Understanding Characters
Predicting Events in a Book
Alphabet Awareness
Pictures and Words: Which Is Which?
Naming Objects
Story Play
Story Drawings
Pictures About Books
Decorate a Card
Making a Message
Writing Name Tags
Itsy-Bitsy Spider: Listening and Repeating
Talking About Cars and Trucks
Talking About Eating Out
Simon Says, "Follow Directions"
Clapping and Tapping
Pretending to Be Animals
Hearing Sounds in Song
Hearing and Creating Rhymes
Beginning Sounds
Talking About a Favorite Toy
Who Am I? - Describing a Make-Believe
Describing Parts of the Body
Describing the Clothes We Wear
Talking About Nature
Beginning MathHow Many Pennies Do You Hear?
How Many Bears on the Bed?
How Many Children Are Wearing Something
Red Today?
How Many Eggs Are in the Nests?
Marching and Counting 1,2,3,4
How Many Do I See?
See, Say, and Touch Spheres and Circles
See, Say, and Touch Cubes (Boxes) and
Squares and Triangles Game
On or Above: A New Hat
Next To: Who Is Next to the Fire Fighter?
In or On the Cup: Where Is the Square?
Sorting Cars
Vegetable Sorting
Sorting by Color
Comparing Size: Bigger or Smaller
Comparing Height: Shorter or Taller
Comparing Weight: Lighter or Heavier
Measuring Weight
Measuring Length in Steps
Measuring Height with Shoes


text:
Casablanca is a collection of timeless pattern using a revolutionary space-dyed nylon/polypropylene blend for a silky feel with a depth of color and exceptional durability. Styles range from traditional Persian looks to modern pieces utilizing ikat and medallion motifs. The palette highlights modern pastels like dove grey, warm copper and cool sage while using a sophisticated base of soft neutrals such as ivory and warm cocoa.
The Casablanca 5' 3" X 7' 6" Rug by Oriental Weavers at Miskelly Furniture in the Jackson, Pearl, Madison, Ridgeland, Flowood, and Hattiesburg Mississippi area. Product availability may vary. Contact us for the most current availability on this product.
Browse other items in the Casablanca collection from Miskelly Furniture in the Jackson, Pearl, Madison, Ridgeland, Flowood, and Hattiesburg Mississippi area.
This item has been tagged as: Rugs, Area Rugs, Home Decorations, Accessories, Home Design Accessories, Throw Rugs, Bathroom Rugs, Large Rugs, Small Rugs, Floor Rugs, Unique Area Rugs, Rug, Indoor Rugs, Bed Rug, Living Room Rug, Family Room Rug, Kitchen Rugs, Hallway Rug, Accent Rug, Nursery Rug, Room Rugs, Carpet, Decorative Rugs, Floor Mat, Floor Covering, Coverlet, Mat, Matting, Runner, Carpet Runners, Tapestry, Tapestries, Table Rug
Nothing on this page may be copied or reproduced without explicit permission.


text:
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Living in Virginia as I do, I?m never surprised to see a good ?ole boy in a pick-up truck in front of me in traffic. It comes with the territory, right?
But this one had a bumper sticker with a picture of one of my favorite Democrats, Hillary Rodham Clinton, on it. About to break into a smile at the thought of the person I support for president, I then had to read the accompanying text.
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Click the question mark below to see where your account ID appears on your mailing label.
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Senior writer Brendan J. Lyons reports:
ALBANY — As Aaron Dare described it, the plan came together about nine years ago. It was a real estate scheme that would ultimately contribute to the blight plaguing New York's capital city, leave dozens of people financially destroyed and cripple the reputation of two men who had once been pillars in their community.
Dare and his partner, Kenneth Wilcox, a respected Albany detective who died in April 2006, were best friends since childhood who mapped out their strategy on paper.
"When Ken and I sat down we knew that for what we were going to do, it would involve an element of fraud," Dare said Tuesday as he testified at the criminal trial of his former fiancee, Ana Monteiro.
"Trust," Dare said, when asked by Monteiro's attorney, Cheryl Coleman, was what Wilcox brought to the table. "He was a respected name in the community. He dealt with the recruitment of clients … and the fact he had a badge served to further endear that development of trust. … We each played a specific role. He knew what his was."
The testimony marked the first time that Dare, 41, who is serving lengthy, back-to-back federal and state prison sentences, spoke publicly about his years-long crime spree across the Capital Region. The story of Dare and Wilcox, which was first disclosed by the Times Union in 2007, had never been told in such excruciating detail.
In his trademark deep voice and polished speaking abilities, and with the jury at Monteiro's trial riveted, Dare candidly described the origin of a business relationship with Wilcox that began around 2001. He looked gaunt but calm as he spoke. He shuffled into court in handcuffs and wearing a prison jumpsuit, briefly explaining his ongoing battle with heart disease and saying doctors have told him he has the heart of a 73-year-old man.
From the start, Dare said, it was a fraud. The plan that he and Wilcox devised was to "flip" properties using fake appraisals and a stream of forged loan documents. Their victims were banks, friends, acquaintances and people who were either cooperating and being paid, or too naive to know any better as their credit histories were being destroyed.
"Stealing from Peter to pay Paul?" is how a prosecutor put it to Dare Tuesday. He agreed. When it was going well, Dare said, they would take in as much as $90,000 a month. They lived like rock stars, traveling to exotic locations and staying in first-class hotels while driving expensive cars and drinking liquor that cost as much as $150 a glass or more.
"We made a decision not to take a property unless we could make at least $15,000," Dare said.
"How does something like that start?" Coleman asked him.
"You have a need," he said, explaining how it would unfold when they would get a bank check for a mortgage closing. "Kenny and I sat around a table. … We looked at the funds that were in his account and we said we need to take care of some other obligations instead of paying the bank and that's how it began. You tell that first lie for what you're doing and it just continues to explode from there."
Together, Dare said, he and Wilcox created a maze of similarly named companies to do their real estate closings. Dare's credit was in ruins when they started, in part due to Dare's bankruptcy stemming from his failed leadership of the former Urban League of Northeastern New York, which he drove into financial collapse.
Bank accounts were set up in the names of companies created by Monteiro and Wilcox. Over time, millions of dollars flowed through those accounts, disgorged through teller's checks and ATM withdrawals. They hired a small network of pawn employees, enlisted confederates from the mortgage fraud "industry" and set about bilking banks and sometimes the unsuspecting out of possibly millions of dollars.
"There was no mystery to what we were doing," Dare said. "It was real easy to detect by looking at public records that we were flipping properties."
Still, despite their lavish lifestyles, and Wilcox's notoriety, city police who worked alongside the veteran detective apparently never questioned his meteoric wealth in the mortgage industry. Federal authorities, for their part, also were slow to get to the pair. In August 2004, their Tivoli Street office was raided by the FBI, but Wilcox remained on duty and their mortgage-related crimes continued unchecked.
Even when Dare pleaded guilty in November 2006, his crime spree continued while he was out on bail. Some of those crimes are the subject of the 59-count indictment against Monteiro, who met Dare in 2002 when he and Wilcox were visiting a nightclub in Providence, R.I., where she grew up.
The scheme deepened a few years in, Dare said, because they were involved with an underground network of people who were engaged in similar crimes. Wilcox, with his law enforcement background, grew nervous. There were two participants who were adept at what they were doing but Wilcox didn't like them. Still, Dare said, "he recognized we needed them in order to really learn the industry."
"Because of his side in law enforcement he heard they were attracting a lot of attention," Dare said, referring to the others with whom he and Wilcox had dealings. "Ken's big concern was that because of the number of people doing the same things (that) we were it would attract unnecessary attention."
To minimize the problem Dare said he and Wilcox established their own property title and settlement companies. Dare said that made it easier to elude detection because now when they did real estate closings they controlled everything, and they could more easily forge documents, and dupe banks, buyers and sellers.
One of their trademarks, according to interviews with people who were victimized, is that Dare and Wilcox would perform real estate closings at their offices and insist that no attorneys be involved. Dare testified Tuesday that it would be hectic because they always kept sellers and buyers separated so that they would not catch on to what was unfolding.
Typically, he said, they would buy a house for $30,000, have it falsely appraised for triple that value and then sell it to some unsuspecting victim. In some instances, they would forge signatures, change sale amounts on publicly filed mortgage documents and fail to pay off the sellers' banks.
"I was the polish," Dare said. "I would go out and meet with the groups, introduce Ken and Ken would take it from that point. Ken would be the one who would sit with them to talk about how it would happen. … They would not hear from him again. The checks would just start coming across."
As he testified for the defense Tuesday, Dare sought to distance Monteiro, his ex-fiancee, from the fraud. He claimed he had fooled her and that, despite her deep involvement in the real estate dealings, including her the use of her bank accounts and credit, that she didn't know what was going on. Monteiro faces up to 12 years in prison if convicted.
Assistant District Attorney Christopher Baynes, chief of the financial crimes unit, pressed Dare on that assertion. He read portions of transcripts from Dare's federal plea hearing and sentencing from more than two years ago. Banes noted Monteiro was in the federal courtroom in November 2006 when a federal prosecutor read off a charge against Dare that included 31 instances of mortgage fraud involving an unidentified conspirator — later identified by the Times Union as Wilcox.
Wilcox's role in the crimes was never revealed publicly by federal authorities. Dare pleaded guilty to federal charges seven months after Wilcox's death and, in an apparent effort to protect Wilcox's standing in the law enforcement community, federal prosecutors refused to identify the properties related to Dare's residential mortgage fraud crimes. Those properties would have pointed to Wilcox, whose name was attached to many of the deals.
Dare said it was the FBI who kept Wilcox's name out of the public court records. The agency, through a spokesman, previously said they did so only at Dare's urging during delicate plea negotiations.
"I didn't push for it not to include his name," Dare said. "The agents at the time said that since he was dead there was no need to drag his name through it."
Upon Wilcox's death there were still hundreds of thousands of dollars in his bank accounts. Testimony at Monteiro's trial showed the money was turned over to Wilcox's family, and not to any alleged victims of his uncharged crimes.
Closing arguments in Monteiro's trial are scheduled to begin this morning.
Brendan J. Lyons can be reached at 454-5547 or by e-mail at email@example.com.


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So Nintendo is here to help.
Perhaps wanting to get out in front of holiday season returns, when Little Johnny furiously explains he wanted a 3DS and not a DS (or your grandmother buys you a game that won't work in your system), Nintendo has—hastily, judging by the sound quality—put together this instructional video outlining the differences between the three handheld systems it currently has on the market.
Now all they need is to make one for the Wii U and they'll be set.


text:
Oversized Collar Silk Twill Shirt
£750 £750
All orders will be fulfilled by Burberry Limited and shipped from the UK. When you place your order, you accept Burberry's Terms and Conditions and confirm that you have read our Privacy Policy.
Size Guide
Use the Size Guide to choose the best fit for your measurements.
In this window, you can find out the shipping and returns options for the selected item.
In this window, you can contact customer service for further assistance.
- A Vintage check silk shirt with bishop sleeves and an oversized point collar to style flat or tie in a knot. This collaboration supports the rainforest charity Cool Earth.
- Female model wears size IT 40
- Male model wears size IT 44
- 100% silk
- Double cuffs
- Curved, stepped hem
- Dry clean
- Made in Italy
Item 80107821
Recommended Products


text:
V&A Illustration Awards 2012
V&A Illustration Awards 2012
Supported by the Enid Linder Foundation
Entry into the Awards is free
The V&A Illustration Awards celebrate the best illustration published over the last year. Original artwork from the best illustrated book, book cover, editorial illustration and student illustrator of the year are recognised. On these pages you can see all of the entries for 2012.
Congratulations to the five winners of the 2012 V&A Illustration Awards who were presented with their prizes at the awards ceremony on 11 June.
The judges of this year's Published category were designer Orla Kiely, broadcaster and cultural commentator Emma Freud OBE and V&A Director of Design Moira Gemmill.
Click on the tabs above to see the winners of each category.


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By Hoa Nguyen
Publication Date: September 4, 2012
ISBN#9781933517612 (5.5X8.25 88pp, paperback and limited edition hardcover)
It's not a time to run
I wear soft shoes
and it took a long time
to walk here
Grounded in the present tense—in the dailiness of politics and domesticity, citizenship and femaleness—Nguyen's loose, everyday language performs a hook and snare on the ungraspable reality of 21st-century America. In the nearly egoless space of these chiseled yet spacious poems, an extraordinarily clear-eyed poet claims her stakes.
The poems in Nguyen's third book of poetry are spare and often short, but present an openness that allows the reader to luxuriate in the sensory details of the everyday.
American Poets
Nguyen is a master of the poetic line, a distinction considerably rarer in these times than it ought to be. As Long As Trees Last insists on the materiality and weight of each word, not merely as a function of Nguyen's evidently dextrous enjambment but also her impressionistic lexicon—one that communicates emotion through the atmospherics of grammar as well as the dialectics of performative speech...Nguyen makes poetry that sticks in the heart and the craw.
Seth Abramson, Huffington Post
This is a Book of Apocalypse both personal and collective, a collection of fractured lyrics that hear "the half-animal / half-unreal song in the leaves / of your gaze," equally adept at channeling Dickinson for anachronistic commentary on Agent Orange ("The Zeroes—taught us—Phosphorous") as at invoking the Mayan Lady Xoc to join us in the here and now.
Timothy Liu, Coldfront
Mekong Delta–born Hoa Nguyen's As Long As Trees Last gives an up-to-the-minute, street-smart take on being alive in the 21st century.
Barbara Hoffert, Library Journal
The title of Hoa Nguyen's third full-length collection, As Long As Trees Last, neatly condenses one of her finest skills as a poet—a knack for rendering our certainties uncertain. What our lives permit us to perceive as givens, Nguyen reveals as mere conditions, inextricably tied to and guided by greater forces—from the economy to the environment, from the Mayan predictions to the menstrual cycle, from the weight of history to the burden of the future.
Michael Brodeur, The Boston Globe
Nguyen remains one of the most powerful, vivid, and even visceral contemporary poets working today. Readers hoping for a thought-provoking and and strikingly familiar exploration of life in 21st century America will find As Long As Trees Last to be a compelling and often moving collection.
Dan Shewan, The Rumpus
...As Long as Trees Last is Nguyen's tremendous symphony. Living with it these months since its release by Wave Books has been a constant pleasure, one that encourages itself as well as the life of the reader to be one of effulgence and grace.
Christopher Kondrich, Jacket2
Hoa Nguyen, similar to Louis Zukofsky—another poet whose work indelibly again and again proves the apt suitability of the term when intended as sincere compliment and appropriately applied—deserves the title of A Poet's Poet...Her work exists in a timeless flow of language and song...
Patrick James Dunagan, New Pages
Hoa Nguyen puts her ear to the ordinary and hears strange and disconcerting overtones. Unpunctuated, pieced together from fragments yet self-contained, they seem cut from the same cloth. Nguyen wants to touch a nerve but not always by way of explicit meaning.
Barry Schwabsky, Hyperallergic
Easy to spot, but not to pin down, these lithe poems make its chinaberry trees, children, birds, magic words, appropriated language, wind, and drought cover wide territory. Nguyen's poems may be small, the longest of which spans across two pages, but they span from Valentine's Day 2010 to the Maya Queen consort Lady Xoc; immense pressure from such short lines. It could be called an echo-poetics—for its heavy repetition—and an eco-poetics.
Thom Sullivan, Flying Object
Born in the Mekong Delta and raised in the Washington, D.C. area, Hoa Nguyen studied Poetics at New College of California in San Francisco where she earned an MFA. She is the author of four full-length collections of poetry including Violet Energy Ingots (Wave Books, 2016) As Long As Trees Last, Hecate Lochia (Hot Whiskey Press, 2009) and Your Ancient See Through (Subpress, 2002). Red Juice: Poems 1998-2008 was published by Wave Books in the fall of 2014. Her poetry has been collected in eight anthologies including Days I Moved Through Ordinary Sound: The Teachers of WritersCorps in Poetry and Prose (City Lights, 2009), The Best of Fence (Fence Books, 2009), For the Time Being: A Bootstrap Anthology (Bootstrap Books, 2008), Black Dog, Black Night: Contemporary Vietnamese Poetry (Milkweed Editions, 2008), and Not for Mothers Only (Fence Books, 2007). With the poet Dale Smith, Nguyen founded Skanky Possum, a small press journal of poetry and poetics. From Austin, Texas, their home of fourteen years, they published contemporary poets such as Amiri Baraka, Alice Notley, Linh Dinh, Kenward Elmslie, and Eileen Myles. In 2002, as editor of Best American Poetry, Robert Creeley selected poems by four poets that were published in issue 6 of Skanky Possum. Nguyen has been invited to perform her work, act as poet in residence, and lecture on poetry for universities, conferences and literary organizations, including, most recently, Sarah Lawrence College, Emory University, Brown University, the University of Texas at Austin, Washington State University, the Charles Olson Centenary Conference in Vancouver, Buffalo State, the Association for Asian American Studies Conference, Naropa University, and Associated Writers and Writing Programs Conferences. She currently lives in Toronto, Ontario where she curates a reading series and teaches poetics privately and at Ryerson University.
By Hoa Nguyen Publication Date: September 2, 2014 ISBN# 9781933517926 (5.25X8 272pp, paperback) ISBN# 9781933517933 (5.25X8...
By Hoa NguyenPublication Date: September 6, 2016ISBN# 9781940696348 (5.5x9 104pp, paperback)ISBN# 9781940696355 (5.5x9 104pp, limited...
By Lisa Fishman Publication Date: April 7, 2015 ISBN# 9781940696102 (6x7.75 96pp, paperback) ISBN# 9781940696096 (6x7.75 96pp,...
By Caroline Knox Publication Date: May 1, 2002 ISBN# 9780970367273 (5.5x8.5 126pp, paperback) Description Reviews Bio "This...


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With new funds from the Inter-American Development Bank and The Coca-Cola Foundation, Water For People and its partners will expand SWASH+ (School Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Education Plus Community Impact) program.
More than 15,000 students at 150 schools in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua will soon benefit from safe drinking water, restroom facilities, and improved hygiene education.
Water For People will continue to spearhead the SWASH+ program under the Millennium Water Alliance in partnership with CARE and Catholic Relief Services. To date, the program has benefited 17,331 students in 152 schools.
"We are excited to continue to lead SWASH+ efforts in Central America by supporting 65 additional schools and communities in Guatemala," said Ned Breslin, chief executive officer of Water For People. "This initiative helps our program in Guatemala drive toward full water and sanitation coverage in the municipalities we support."
In each school supported by the program, the groups train the Parent-Teacher Association and school director to build a water supply system. Training on water treatment is also provided. The community helps to build or renovate school restrooms.
"We continue to require co-financing from local governments and communities as a key part of this initiative," continued Breslin. "This unique partnering approach is a key to creating local ownership and strengthening the culture of payment necessary for sustainable water and sanitation services."
Parents and students also participate in hygiene training that emphasizes the importance of handwashing to prevent disease. "The simple act of handwashing has been proven to be the most cost-effective health intervention possible," said Mark Duey, SWASH+ Program coordinator. "Our partners are working with local teachers to ensure that students adopt this practice, and that they take it home with them every day. We're planting the seeds for a hygiene revolution in Central America."
UNICEF, ITT and the Global Water Challenge have also been key supporters of the SWASH+ program.


text:
TAIPEI--Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. TSM, +1.66% said Monday it posted higher monthly revenue in November on both unconsolidated and consolidated terms, with analysts saying sales were likely driven by demand for high-performance chips from smartphone and tablet makers.
TSMC, the world's largest contract chip maker by revenue, said in a teleconference that unconsolidated revenue in November rose 24% to 43.64 billion New Taiwan dollars (US$1.50 billion) from NT$35.22 billion in the same month last year.
Consolidated revenue was NT$44.25 billion, up 23% from NT$35.86 billion a year earlier.
The company didn't give a breakdown for the figures.
Subscribe to WSJ: http://online.wsj.com?mod=djnwires


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text:
From NinWiki
The Fragility tours spanned 1999-2000 in support of The Fragile.
Fragility v1.0
1999/11/14 – 2000/02/06; Europe, Japan, Australasia (Big Day Out with shorter sets than below)
Typical setlist
Intro: The New Flesh + Pinion
Even Deeper was occasionally played in between The Day the World Went Away and Starfuckers, Inc.
Fragility v2.0
2000/04/12 – 2000/07/09; North America, European festivals
And All That Could Have Been is the release documenting this tour.
Typical setlist
Intro: The New Flesh + Pinion
Sometimes, Somewhat Damaged was slotted in front of Terrible Lie. The Fragile was rarely played during the encore; it followed the song in the second slot. On some dates, the "second encore slot" was not included, leaving a common three song encore. Also, The Big Come Down and Get Down Make Love fit in there sometimes, also Reptile was played instead of Piggy occasionally.


text:
made to store gems, watch movements and jeweller's findings, these glass-topped
aluminum containers are ideal for organizing seeds, beads, bugs, buttons,
or anything else small. Everybody in the family could use them.
Container sizes range from 1-1/4" (33mm) to 2-3/4" (70mm) diameter.
Available in sets, the containers come packaged in either pasteboard or
hinged aluminum boxes. The set of ten 33mm containers comes in a 2-3/4"
x 6-1/2" aluminum box a perfect size for fitting into toolboxes,
tackle boxes or sewing kits.
These are all excellent containers at superb prices.
The set of 56 Watchmaker's Cases includes items B, D, E & F.


text:
House GOP meets same old Obama
After years of pining for more face time with the president, House Republicans found out Wednesday that Barack Obama looks and sounds the same behind closed doors as he does on TV.
That's not to say they didn't appreciate the personal touches — gentle banter, praise for some of their ideas and handshakes all around afterward — but the president's rare meeting with House Republicans in the basement of the Capitol yielded little in the way of movement on either side of the partisan divide. It's the first time the president has met with the House GOP since 2011.
Story Continued Below
Obama still won't take any big risks on entitlement reform unless Republicans agree to raise taxes again, he declined to say whether he would approve the Keystone XL pipeline, and he still won't slash discretionary spending. Within a couple of hours of leaving the Capitol, Obama issued a threat to veto a job-training bill championed by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.).
So much for the bipartisan note Obama struck in his closing remarks. Or, as some House Republicans concluded as they shuffled out of the meeting room: Meet the new president, same as the old president.
( Also on POLITICO: Tense meeting between Obama, House GOP)
"I heard what the president had to say. I've heard it before," said Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), who has had his share of failed negotiations with the White House. "I thought it was good for all of our members to hear it, so they have an understanding of where he's coming from. We've got big problems in our country — they need to be addressed, we're willing to get them addressed. I hope the president continues his outreach."
Of course, the same could also be said of Republicans. At the moment, they are refusing to raise additional revenue as part of a grand deficit bargain. They think they have given enough by agreeing to raise $600 billion in new taxes when Washington solved the fiscal cliff deal Jan. 1.
Obama's overture to the GOP is part of an unusual series of meetings this week with lawmakers: He started Tuesday with Senate Democrats and will continue Thursday with sessions with Senate Republicans and House Democrats. But it's unclear whether the meetings will move the mark.
A White House official called the meeting a "good, substantive exchange" and said Obama "enjoyed the conversation." The aide said that the two parties didn't need to agree on everything to compromise on some things.
( Also on POLITICO: Behind the Curtain: Obama's tax problem)
"The president handled a variety of questions on a range of topics from the members and reinforced his strong desire, especially now that the election is over, to find bipartisan common ground on a range of legislative priorities," the aide said.
Behind the scenes, Republican leaders made sure that the rank and file were on their best behavior Wednesday. They orchestrated the meeting by handpicking lawmakers to ask questions, vetting their scripts and allowing only a few aides from the White House and the GOP ranks in the room.
The questioners were hardly rabble-rousers. Two committee chairs — Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp and Administration Chair Candice Miller — both of Michigan. Two were members of leadership: Oklahoma Rep. James Lankford and Illinois Rep. Peter Roskam. Rep. Jackie Walorski, a freshman from Indiana, is a favorite of leadership. Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisiana, who chairs the Republican Study Committee, was a conservative representative. The malcontents were relegated to talking to reporters after the meeting or taking to Twitter — Rep. Dana Rohrabacher of California tweeted that Obama was "blowing smoke" in Republicans' faces.


text:
Spiritualist Wants To Avert NYC Doom
He sees the city as one that needs to make changes in order to avoid disaster. In his book, he outlines the evidence regarding the similarities between the Big Apple and Babylon.
New York City symbolizes many things. It's so intriguing that many have written songs and made movies about it. Others see it as one of the oldest and most well-known landmarks of America. For those reasons and more, one person warns that the city is akin to the fall of Babylon.
For YiChen BuddhaChrist, the author/revelator of the "New Millennium Testament: The Eternal Gospel for Peace and Wisdom" (New Era Publishing, 2007) and the "Second Boy" prophesied in the Bible (http://peaceunity.org), he sees the city as one that needs to make changes in order to avoid disaster. In his book, he outlines the evidence regarding the similarities between the Big Apple and Babylon.
"The attack on September 11th was just a sign of things to come for New York City," explains YiChen BuddhaChrist. "If America wants to save the city, they need to look at the similarities between New York City and the prophecy of Babylon in the Bible, and make changes in order to avoid disaster. The great question is where the 'city of Babylon' was. I believe it to be New York City, and it's not too late to prevent its fall."
The similarities drawn in the book include the Bible's statement that the 'great city of Babylon' is a city of economic power, political power, a port city by the sea, and one of ethnic diversification, among other examples. One major connection that he draws is that the Bible implies that Babylon is a city that is symbolized by a woman.
"The Statue of Liberty is a female symbol of the city, known throughout the world," he adds. "We must heed the shape of the Statue and its pedestal, because it fulfills the prophecy of 'a woman on the beast with seven heads and ten horns.' It's imperative that it be reconstructed to get rid of the spiritual influence of the beast."
"The recent Steam Explosion in New York City could be another sign for a major disaster for New York City that can dwarf the '9-11'," says BuddhaChrist, "This New Revelation (http://Bible3.org) is the key to stopping this disaster and saving the city."
To comment or to subscribe to or advertise in New York's leading Pan African weekly investigative newspaper, or to send us a news tip, please call (212) 481-7745 or send a note to email@example.com
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|View Poll Results: Ore no Imouto - Episode 8 Rating
|Perfect 10
|9 out of 10 : Excellent
|8 out of 10 : Very Good
|7 out of 10 : Good
|6 out of 10 : Average
|5 out of 10 : Below Average
|4 out of 10 : Poor
|3 out of 10 : Bad
|2 out of 10 : Very Bad
|1 out of 10 : Painful
|Voters: 106. You may not vote on this poll
|Thread Tools
|2010-11-22, 16:15
|Link #101
Senior Member
Join Date: Nov 2009
For the moment though Anime watchers are pretty much left out, while the staff is toying with LN readers. I felt bad for the anime watchers and picked some important scenes up, for those to read who felt this episode was just too static and/or boring.
After the first shock (wrote last post shortly after watching the episode) I can take the joke personally easy now as LN readers have all important information. It's quite the same feeling I had after watching the second season of the Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
Spoiler for Haruhi 2nd Season:
I hope the Anime staff will put the progress elements they missed now back in at a later point. Things like this might effect the number of people being attracted to the Light Novel, which helps to keep the Novel going untill it ends(nothing is more annoying than a printed media ending unfinished). Buying DVD and it's fan articles leading into buying the original material is not so uncommon. And who wants to buy a product which make you feel like there is missing something or adds annoying traits to the characters?
Last edited by Hoodspirit; 2010-11-22 at 17:46.
|2010-11-22, 16:40
|Link #102
Senior Member
And anime-original viewers are obviously being left out on the joke, unless they run across some information like what Undertaker provided. As far as most anime-original viewers are concerned, these major changes are simply ruining certain major characters for them.
|2010-11-22, 16:56
|Link #103
Meh, I've been enjoying this show, but I felt this episode was terrible and I don't even read the novels. My suspension of disbelief was gone by minute 2 and it was weird to see all the characters behave like brats.
Now that I know it deviated from the source material, it does seem like it was a trolling attempt. But despite this I don't really find it funny. To begin with I don't think trolling your audience is particularly hilarious, but maybe if the episode had done it in an entertaining way at least.
Something being unfunny does not mean people treat it like "serious business". It just means...it's an unfunny joke. Like a bad comedian. :P
|2010-11-22, 17:01
|Link #104
Pretentious moe scholar
Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: Vancouver, Canada
Age: 32
I actually don't mind when an adaptation deviates from the source material since I figure it keeps things interesting for fans, but it only really works well when the writers can capture what made the original great in the first place.
|2010-11-22, 17:15
|Link #106
Senior Member
But what we're seeing here in Ore no Imouto is such a huge character-derailing change that even I think it's horrible.
|2010-11-22, 17:26
|Link #107
Chicken or Beef?
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Seattle
Age: 37
Seriously since when was naivety confused with being a brat? Kirino was gone for about half the episode and people still bitch. She was excited that her book was being made into an anime, any teen, hell even if it was me, would lose their head over something like this. The point of the meeting was to get input from the author.
Anyway, enough about that... I don't think I need to even mention it, as I think it's more than obvious and people just choose to ignore it to through stones without any remorse. Also Kuroneko is overrated, every time I hear someone talk about hating the world and all people I just want to save them some time and slit their wrists for them.
|2010-11-22, 17:29
|Link #108
|2010-11-22, 17:37
|Link #109
Senior Member
Join Date: Jul 2007
Just because Kuroneko says that she hates world, doesn't mean that she actually does. If she did, she would not be engaged in it and would not help others.
Kirino is just annoying, not because of this episode. She is always rambling about dumb things like if she is 5 and looks down on others. It is rare when she does something decent.
This episode was kind of meh... seeing how Kirino's brother is always losing face before others is starting to get old espcially since he almost never gets any reward for it.
|2010-11-22, 18:33
|Link #111
Senior Member
Join Date: Jun 2008
Age: 35
Initially I voted 8 primarily for Kuroneko's scenes of awesomeness.
Then I read Undertaker's post on what was *supposed* to be going on, and wished I could change it to a 4.
Then with help from relentlessflame and others it became obvious that it had to be a troll/joke. Where both the LN and anime are readily available, this could result in successful cross-promotion. It's unfair to anime-only viewers but those vested heavily enough in the story might go and by the LN.
That said, my ultimate rating would fall on 6. Yes it was going for something different but, if the LN was Gouda, this was cheez whiz.
|2010-11-22, 18:34
|Link #112
Join Date: Dec 2003
Age: 37
What is the purpose of this episode? What is the central message? How it did develop the characters in the story to support the message? How does this message contribute to the overall plot of the show as shown so far? What does it to suggest to us about where the story is headed? These are the important questions. But very few people in this thread are asking those sorts of questions. They're focused on words and actions but not on the meaning beneath those words and actions. And this episode is all about providing context and meaning to Kyousuke and Kirino's behaviour, which is the very thing that people keep complaining about ad nauseum from week to week. This episode on its own tells you everything you need to know about Kyousuke and Kirino to understand everything that's happened in the plot so far. And yet people are continuing to bitch and complain about the same things they always have, in addition to complaining now about the lack of faithfulness (despite that being an obvious pun intended). That's why I called it a troll to the light novel readers. For everyone else, I would have thought this episode would have filled in a lot of gaps (gaps that probably didn't need filling for the novel readers in the first place), but few are seeing it because they're focused more on the "what" than the "why" of the plot.
This episode may not have been the greatest on its own, but I would argue that it was actually the turning point of this season of this show.
|2010-11-22, 18:41
|Link #113
Senior Member
Join Date: Jan 2009
To be honest this episode was extremely weird for me. Truth be told the characters were very different from what they were so far (except for Kirino who acted like usual being called and oblivious to the rest of the world). And I haven't even read the LN.
Kyousuke's statement that he "hated" his sister for me was completely out of the blue. Being annoyed with her or envious - I'd agree but hate? After all he's doing and the way he's acting he could simply say he hates her? How does that make any sense really? And a minute after that he's on his knees begging for her sake. I mean the logic - "I hate her but she's my sister so I'm ready to beg if that would somehow help her" is way off.
And after reading what people have posted about the LN content I completely agree the way they changed the order of events (seemingly small yet important for character development) and the contents in general was a really bad choice. I liked this anime mostly because the characters had a lot of room to develop and grow. Now it looks rather random and illogical at times. Any major development from this point on will be pretty much forced (due to lack of time).
And as it was said, Kirino might be working really hard to get where she is, but she's also extremely lucky in general. Both of these fact were clearly shown in this episode. However, fact remains she acts like she's something more and is completely oblivious to how much effort others put in these thing and don't even get even close to where she is. While I'd agree if you're talking about people in general a 14 wouldn't really care about the others. Kuroneko however, is one of those unfortunate people that work really hard and can't achieve their goal and Kirino as her friend should consider her feelings and not practically rub it all in her face.
Oh and Kirino basically gets shielded from one of most difficult situations she has ever faced in her life thus saying she is "being spoiled" isn't that far-fetched.
As far as character development go for Kyousuke and Kirino, the only major thing was that now Kyousuke has to ponder why exactly is he doing what he's doing. I said it in the beginning of my post but the logic he's using to justify what he's doing is kind of ridiculous.
|2010-11-22, 18:42
|Link #114
I disagree with you all.
Join Date: Dec 2005
I got into Bakuman recently, and it's probably influenced me, but... Seriously? Kirino writes something that sounds like really bad fanfiction, and it gets made into anime? It made it pretty hard for me to sympathize with anyone involved.
|2010-11-22, 18:46
|Link #115
Senior Member
Many people here, including myself, have argued that this anime episode is showing Kyousuke going way too far for his sister. That he's spoiling or babying or coddling her by doing what he does for her in this episode.
It's making Kirino even more unlikable for many of us, and it's making Kyousuke look like a pitiable fool for going as far as he is for her.
How exactly is that not putting them in a more negative light, relentlessflame?
|2010-11-22, 19:01
|Link #117
Chicken or Beef?
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Seattle
Age: 37
For those that don't know, the point of this episode is to bring into question why Kyousuke does what he does for Kirino. He himself don't even know why, only hesitantly say "Because I'm her brother." as a scapegoat answer.
|2010-11-22, 19:26
|Link #118
.: A bad doggy :.
Join Date: Jun 2007
As for this episode, I don't understand what I'm supposed to be getting out of this.
If the brother actually hates Kirno but is dead set on the 'but I'm her brother' angle then it sounds like an act out of obligation, not out of love, belief, or what have you. That's pandering to appearances and horribly superficial. Hell, it demoralizes everything he's apparently done on her behalf up to now. Whatever, I'll tell myself he's lying out of his ass, I don't really care anymore. Kirino is still a giant bitch and I just want a bit more development out of her relationship with her brother (or for her to get run over by an 18 wheeler).
I watch anime because I tend to fall in love with characters, and that in turn makes me happy to tag along to see what happens them, regardless of how shitty or amazing the journey may be. I've loved characters in the past that were the epitome of bitch (Flay from Gundam Seed) but Kirno actually manages to rub me the wrong way entirely. I'd greet her with the business end of a shotgun at this point, she deserves a blow to the head regardless of her age, naivety, whatever.
|2010-11-22, 19:40
|Link #119
Senior Member
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Virgo Supercluster, Milky Way, Orion Arm, Sol, Earth, Taiwan
Age: 33
|2010-11-22, 20:38
|Link #120
Join Date: Dec 2003
Age: 37
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In urging a reluctant Mitt Romney to finally release his tax returns, Newt Gingrich produced his own last night during the debate. His 2010 returns reveal an adjusted gross income of $3.1 million with an effective tax rate of almost 32 percent. That's more than twice the rate that Romney said he pays — unless, of course, Gingrich gets his way.
Seeking to overhaul the U.S. tax code, Gingrich announced his plan last month to introduce a new, parallel tax system with what he calls a "flat" 15 percent rate. But as the Tax Policy Center notes, that plan would mean that millionaires would actually pay much lower tax rates than those below them on the income scale — millionaires like Newt Gingrich.
According to calculations by Center for American Progress Action Fund's Seth Hanlon, Gingrich's own tax plan would slash his effective tax rate from 31.6 percent down to 14.6 percent, right around where Romney sits comfortably under the existing code. That amounts to a $536,000 tax cut that Gingrich is proposing to give himself.
It is important to note that while Gingrich released his individual return as well as the one for his charitable foundation, he chose not to disclose the returns from his multiple business entities like Gingrich Holdings, which constitutes the primary source of his wealth. Together, they brought in $2.6 million for the Gingriches. Because his proposal includes business tax cuts as well, it is possible that his tax break would be even larger.
Meanwhile, middle-class families would pay significantly higher federal taxes than one-percenters like Gingrich and Romney. In fact, because Romney essentially admits he accrues nearly all of his wealth from investments, which are tax-free under Gingrich's plan, Gingrich's plan would allow Romney to pay almost no taxes at all.
And while Gingrich tries to sell his plan as a one that will "allow Americans the freedom to choose to file their taxes on a postcard," middle-class families will have to do their taxes under the regular system and Gingrich's system to see which actually affords them a better return.
Incidentally, that $500,000 windfall from his tax plan also happens to be the amount of credit Gingrich and his wife had at Tiffany and Co., the jewelry store. Whether to feed a high-end habit or provide a tax "choice" to American families, Gingrich definitely walks away from his tax plan a much richer man.


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Recently it has become very difficult to add a batch of photos to a photo album on the website. Partly because our internet browsers block certainly things and there is no update for the forum to re-enable multiple uploads, so we cant upload 200 photos or so to the gallery. Is there other options, well yes.
Google photos gallery is one way to share photos with people. There are others like uploading to FTP or other galleries also.
What we want to achieve is to be able
World renowned vehicle lifts
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Well we have moved offices at work, and needing to removed this old 20ft container. It was used for environmental testing of electronics displayed we produced. It was like a faraday cage keeping all radio/mobile signals out, so we could test emissions of the displays. Also had an area at the back that was a heat chamber to cook the displays to see what temperature they fail at.This box has been there well over 20 years as its been there all the time I have.
The new MAN trucks, presented at the IAA Commercial Vehicles 2016 at the end of September, stuck in the visitors' memory with quite impressive solutions in both the exterior and interior, together with an updated driveline to achieve better economy.
New flagship
As its new flagship model in the TGX series, MAN unveiled a special limited PerformanceLine Edition. The lineup numbers 100 vehicles with exclusive interior and exterior design in a
Well this is going to be a fairly long term project. My plan is to build a shed on a concrete base, the mud from the base of the shed will make a raised flower bed. The brick outhouse at the end of the garden, (shown just below the Trans-Am in the photo) has a few garden tools in it, so need a shed to house these items and the BBQ. So then this outhouse can be knocked down to widen the driveway, once the drive way is widened, then widen the garage.
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Head Back to School with the very latest devices & then grab an exclusive Funko Pop Game of Thrones Night King!
Head Back to School with the very latest devices & then grab an exclusive Funko Pop Game of Thrones Night King!
Hello all,
I have been a customer with AT&T for over 10 years now and was pretty disappointed with the conversation I just had with one of their customer service representatives. Since I first purchased an iPhone I have had the unlimited data plan for $30 that was required for purchase at the time. I recognize that since they've done away with unlimited data as an option, I have not gone over the 2GB $25 plan, but I still have opted to pay the extra for unlimited usage in case the day should come that I needed it.
Today I called the customer service line to inquire about why I was not able to set up a personal hotspot (when I try, my phone tells me to contact AT&T). I was told that I would need to "upgrade" (don't get stuck on the terms) to a 2GB ($25) or 5GB ($50) monthly option in order to use this feature. Something about this seems off to me since I have been carrying forward a plan that AT&T required me to have in the first place, but now it disqualifies me from a feature of the phone - not due to capabilities, mind you.
Does anyone know if there is the ability to combine these two features? Really frustrated with AT&T for making it (seem hopefully) an impossibility.
Solved by: Go to Solution.
They have made it impossible to be a loyal customer and be treated like one. I have been with ATT since they were ATT, then Cingular, then ATT asgain, and they will not grandfather us in to use this feature. I dont get it. I feel like being grandfathered in for unlimited data was great, but now with technology, we all need to link to our home computers and each others phones (as a family I do this a lot) and I am the odd man out being the only person with ATT in the family. I have found that Sprint offers something more like this. I have to live out my contract with ATT so I can take my phone number of over 10 years with me. After the contract is up, I am vavavoom outa here. I deserve to feel like I am not losing somehting to gain a little. How dare ATT ask us to take a plan that is obviously inferior to what we originally PAY FOR in order to obtain equal opportunity to their other customers. Very disheartening. I was forced to take this data plan at the time, now they tell me I have to take a limited plan so they can charge me more money, God forbid I use some extra internet, and then present it as a service of some kind to us. Newsflash ATT, nobody feels they are getting anything other than "serviced" by you with this plan. I already pay you an arm and a leg, the loyalyty is unappreciated. I have two cell phone plans in my name, one has unlimited and the other goes over their data three times a month and he DOESNT tether, so stop telling me that nobody usually goes over 3GB.... Ugh, I could go on for days with my dissatisfaction and ideas to stop sticking it to me. I pay over 200 a month for two phones, I feel like for that money, I should be able to use that same internet on my dam tablet, without an additional fee!
My siblings have Sprint and love it, they also offer unlimited everything for cheaper than ATT, plus an insurance plan for 7 bux a month that offers water damage coverage!! Once I can afford to pay the cancellation or my contract is finally up, ATT will not get another dime out of me, my ten year loyalty apparently is not enough, I have to fight to get some recognition for this loyalty, so its time to move on. I am with you on that. I am so insulted to have paid for two phones for 10 years and I cant share my unlimited data with my dam tablet (which they want me to pay 25-50 dollars just to give it internet access as another phone line so that will also need the 9.99 for the added line too I presume) Its sick and disapppointing. Is there anything ATT offers that doesnt require the customer to be inconvenienced and work twice as hard to get what they need (or THINK they already pay for - as misrepresentation is another special here)? I even had u-verse, and let it be known there was NEVER a month that the bill was the same, there were always charged that needed to be disputed and it was always getting more and more expensive and not a single Rep could explain it to me where it made sense. ATT get your stuff in line. With you not offering unlimited anymore and being one of the more expensive plans I think your loyal customers should be more of a priority, as the new ones will be gone as fast as they come when someone else offers a cheaper plan. We have stuck with you paying $80+ a month for a single line in some cases even when $50- unlimited everything plans are out there, and thats not enough for you to make a few exceptions? I would pay another 10/mo to tether my UNLIMITED plan, but like heck I am going to a limited data plan just to tether so you can try and make more money off me, I PAY YOU ENOUGH!
You know, its not like we dont pay for our data, its like they think they gave us something by letting us keep the unlimited data we PAY for, and have paid for, for as long as we have had this option, and frankly, even if it was 5 or 10 a month more to be able to use this plan with hot spot, I would be willing to pay as I know the capability of over-use is there, but to tell us we have to downgrade (or "upgrade " as they present this sack of poo) in order to tether/share internet access with my other devices is nuts. Very scorned by a selfish company. I pay over 200/month for two phones, and why should I be forced to find another provider in order to have features I want? Not good business in my opinion. Isnt every business goal based on KEEPING customers?, retention my friends, its possible if you start thinking about the customer and not dollar signs at every junction in the technology......
Yea what Amber said. Amber - did you really just register and post all that beautiful prose, or are you some web bot that goes from AT&T bashing site to site?
@Amber_Leigh_ChichWow wrote:
Check this site out, Verizon was fined and can no longer disallow tethering, I would look into this further, and ATT, the thought is right, we pay for it, you are by your contract stating that we are entitled to s certain service, why cant we take full advantage of it and share what we pay for with our own items?? We should have THE RIGHT TO TETHER....
Did you read the link you posted completely? What Verizon was blocking was users ability to download apps that tether, not the ability to tether. Verizon customers still must have a data plan that supports tethering and just like AT&T, their grandfathered unlimited data plan does not support tethering either. According the the article you referenced:
Current customers with grandfathered unlimited data plans still have to pay. Unfortunately, if you want to tether with your unlimited plan, you have to either upgrade your plan to one of the new, Share Everything plans (which include tethering), or pony up $20/mo for Verizon's "Mobile Broadband Connect" service. You can still tether off the books and hope you don't get caught, but if they catch you, Verizon will either sign you up for Mobile Broadband Connect, put you on a Share Everything plan, or terminate your contract. Sorry.
- edited 09-08-2014 1:16 PM
- edited 09-08-2014 1:16 PM
Hi there everyone. Thanks for your posts! Though tethering is not available on grandfathered unlimited plans, and some other grandfathered plans, it is available with all Mobile Share plans on capable devices. When visiting this site, click on See Plan Details for complete details.
Hope this helps!
It is also against the contractual agreement that you have with the carrier.
I totally agree with you, we are forced to carry a data plan so I carried 4GB and never use hardly any of them, and time for my upgrade and the phone I finally decided to go with after searching all of them and comparing them, my Sister -in-law who has never been with AT&T can go in and get a package the same price as I am paying now for 4GB and hers is 10GB which no way I would ever need that, but she gets phones free up to 10 and then$100.00 rebate for each phone she adds, but here is the catch, $40.00 per phone to have it add to your service per month. paying $160.00 for the service already why so much to add a phone the plan doesn't do you a bit of good with out your phone. Well I added it up and if we all got on that plan under her and we got 3 smart phones and a rugby flip phone and my tablet added on, it would run $305.00 per month. That is more than my car payment. I refuse to pay that kind of price. I have had service wtih AT&T for over 10 years as well, plus my home phone has always been with AT&T, my wireless Internet is with them as well and it doesn't work half the time. So I have decided I am just going back to a flip phone and just get me a simple plan and it won't be with AT&T as much as I like there service on cell phones. I don't like it that much.... This phone stuff is getting way out of hand and I am done unless there is a very special offer for me and I am sure that isn't going to happen.....
very disappointed with them. and also they offered me to go to the AT&T Next plan and then I get to pay $40.00 for each phone and then for the phone I want I have to pay $30.00 a month to have it.... so add that on times 3 and and probalby a another $15-20.00 a month for the flip phone my brother wanted....outrageous it what it is....
- edited 02-24-2014 9:08 AM
- edited 02-24-2014 9:08 AM
With the original $30/unlimited data plan Wi-Fi hotspot "just worked" with Google Nexus One and Nokia N9. No aditional charges/features were required.
Now with Moto X it doesn't work anymore (sends you to AT&T for extra charges).
Visit these related resourcesView Data Plan Help! View Data Usage Help! View AT&T PREPAID Help!


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Information from the ADA addresses common misconceptions
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The recent conference of the Sports, Cardiovascular and Wellness Nutritionists (SCAN), a dietetic practice group of the American Dietetic Association (ADA), included a discussion about the top 5 nutritional superstitions. Chris Rosenbloom, chair of the department of nutrition at Georgia State University and ADA spokesperson, addressed the following myths and their fallacies — all of which are worth sharing with your members.
Never consume sugars before training and competition. While eating carbohydrates does cause the body to release insulin, relatively few athletes have hypoglycemia, in which the low blood sugar levels would limit energy available to muscles. Proven research shows that consuming carbohydrates one hour before exercise will help athletes reach optimum performance levels by providing them with the energy needed for endurance and strength.
Sports drinks are unnecessary if an athlete exercises for under one hour. Recent research simulating stop-and-go sports like basketball or soccer proves this myth's fallacy. Athletes competing in shorter-term sports have fewer "mental errors" late in competition if they consume a well-formulated sports drink vs. water. Additionally, athletes tend to drink more when consuming a sports drink as opposed to water, thus staying better hydrated.
Protein is all an athlete needs. Contrary to what many muscle magazines tell them, athletes who rely on protein as the mainstay of their diet risk energy deficits late in competition. Carbohydrates are the main fuel source for working muscles.
Vitamin and mineral supplements provide energy. Only calories from food provide energy to the body. Vitamins and minerals play a role in energy metabolism, but they, in of themselves, do not provide energy. Athletes who rely heavily on supplements for increased energy do so at the risk of not having enough body resources to win the game.
Body image distortion is a "woman's issue." Men can suffer from "reverse anorexia." As a result, they may consume high amounts of protein (at the expense of other nutrients, including the all-important carbohydrates) to increase muscle size.


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Case Studies
Cognician: Barry and Patrick Kayton
Creating a market from scratch is incredibly difficult. But if the solution is right, it's not impossible.
When brothers Barry and Patrick Kayton launched their business, they wanted to revolutionise the way education unlocked thinking. Barry hosted a popular seminar on critical and creative thinking for new product development, and they recognised the business opportunity in sharing these skills with a wider audience. Selling time is inefficient though, so they wanted the business to be based on software that did the same thing: help people realise their own potential.
They were aware of the constraints of e-learning, specifically that managers do not want to answer multiple choice questions in an e-course. They think it's beneath them. "They need to be involved in meaningful, interactive discussions instead," explains Patrick. And then something special happened. While developing the interface needed to create discussions and ask insightful questions, the brothers realised they had created a brand new interactive medium, which they now call a 'cog' (short for conversational guide).
"Creating a new medium doesn't happen every day. It's incredibly exciting, but it brings with it its own challenges," says Barry. These 'cogs' became an idea that the brothers began pitching to the market, but they soon realised that introducing new ideas is not an easy sell.
"We tried to raise finance for the idea, but we struggled to explain to people what we had in mind, as we couldn't demo anything," explains Barry.
Realising they were not great at marketing themselves, the brothers considered hiring a web designer to improve their website. They then realised that they could spend that money on developing a prototype of Cognician instead. "It changed our business. We hired a genius developer who has been able to bring our vision to life, and it gave us a 'real, live' product that people could interact with," says Barry.
"Today, corporates are recognising areas where our solution would be invaluable to them. They are educating us on what they need. We have been approached by leading US companies to discuss various applications with them."
Through listening to their clients, visiting corporates and finding out what their greatest challenges are, Cognician has developed and changed. "When you are new in a market — especially if you
are offering something that is so different it can't be related to other products, you need to invest money in the product itself. Selling an idea is one thing, giving clients something they can
touch and feel is another."
Case Studies
Starbucks Coffee Is All About Culture… For A Reason
CEO Howard Schultz reveals how Starbucks does it.
Vital Stats
- Player: Howard Schultz
- Company: Starbucks
- Market cap: $85 bn
- Established: 1971 (Schultz purchased the brand in 1987)
- Website: starbucks.com
When Howard Schultz was raising money for his first coffee shop called Il Giornale (later to be renamed Starbucks) he was finding it hard to land investors. The reason was simple: Schultz was trying to create a coffee culture where none existed.
The idea that the man on the street would pay a premium price for a cup of Italian coffee with a name he couldn't pronounce seemed nothing short of preposterous. But that wasn't the only reason people weren't willing to buy into his idea. Schultz, you see, refused to talk like a proper capitalist. He kept emphasising the fact that he wanted 'to do good'.
Related: How tashas Built A Recession Proof Business
Schultz recounted the trouble he had finding investors during a recent visit to South Africa for the local launch of Starbucks. He spoke at a Q&A session hosted by the Wits Business School.
"My wife was eight months pregnant at the time," says Schultz. "Her father actually sat me down and said: 'My daughter is pregnant, and she's working. You have a hobby. You need to get a job."'
But, as is so typical of entrepreneurs, Schultz persevered and eventually got the funding he needed.
"The first time someone gave me $100 000, I couldn't believe it," he recalls.
Since those early days (the shop opened in the mid-1980s), Starbucks has grown rather prodigiously. Consider the following: By the late 1980s there were 11 Starbucks stores that employed about 100 people. A few years later, in 1992, the company went public with a market cap of $270 million. Today, it has around 24 000 stores in more than 70 countries. And its market cap? A cool $85 billion.
While growth is good, it has a tendency to birth a ravenous monster that is impossible to satiate.
"We have to add $2,5 billion in revenue every year for the next five years just to maintain our current growth rate and satisfy Wall Street," says Schultz. "And to do this, we will need to add 80 000 employees over the next 12 months. Essentially, we're launching a new massive company every year."
Yet, despite this, Starbucks manages to maintain its unique culture. Just as when Starbucks was a far smaller operation, it is known for stores manned by high-energy individuals who have a clear love for the brand. How has the brand managed this? Schultz attributes it to the following seven core principles.
1. Partners not employees
Howard Schultz's father worked as a truck driver, delivering and picking up cloth diapers in the days before Pampers. When he slipped and seriously injured himself, he was summarily retrenched. Schultz wanted to create a very different company.
One of the reasons he didn't adopt a franchise model was that he wanted to be able to offer each employee at least some stake in Starbucks.
When the company went public, each employee became entitled to a portion of their annual salary in the form of stock options. That is still the case today, which is why Starbucks employees are called 'partners'.
"Success is best when it's shared," says Schultz. "At Starbucks, we always ask: What's in it for our people? Starbucks is accused of being great at marketing, but it spends very little on marketing. It's all about the experience we offer in the stores.
Managers and leaders must do everything to exceed the expectations of our people so that they can exceed the expectations of our customers.
Related: Howard Blake Stays Hungry With His Innovation Strategy
2. Regular interaction
The management of Starbucks does everything in its power to engage with employees regularly.
"We travel extensively, and the amount of face-time management has with employees across the globe is really unusual for a company of Starbucks's size," says Schultz.
Schultz himself, for instance, sat down with each and every new Starbucks employee in South Africa during his recent visit.
Starbucks also has what it calls 'Town Hall Meetings' all over the world, during which management interacts with employees in an open and informal manner.
"We tell employees that they are free to speak up during these meetings without fear of retribution. We want honest opinions," says Schultz.
3. Respecting (and cherishing) employees
Howard Schultz is a humanist at heart, and this is reflected in the culture of the company that he created.
"The universal language of Starbucks is a deep sense of humanity," says Schultz. "Building a company is a lot like raising children. You are imprinting a company with a culture and a set of values. Now, if a child falls, what do you do? You pick it up and comfort it. You don't scold it. You need to take the same approach in business."
4. Protecting the culture
Being tolerant of failure, however, does not mean the same thing as indulging bad behaviour. In fact, Starbucks is fiercely protective of its culture, and it doesn't tolerate bad behaviour.
"We teach employees that they have a voice, and that they should speak up when they see someone doing something wrong. You can't enable bad behaviour because it will erode a company's culture."
Related: Don't Let Expansion Ruin A Great Company Culture
5. Spending money on employees
According to Schultz, the management teams of most large companies would be horrified to discover the amount of time and money spent on Starbucks employees.
"We have been very innovative with technology, and we have created a massive digital eco-system. Interestingly, though, we spent as much time and money focusing on the things that were employee-facing as the ones that were customer-facing."
6. Rewarding the right things
Schultz famously stepped away from the role of Starbucks CEO for around five years, and during that time the culture of the company quickly deteriorated.
"The company lost its way. The people who were managing the company — who were all good people — were measuring and rewarding the wrong things. Things such as profit and stock price became the focus. In any business, you need to continuously ask: What is our core purpose for being? Otherwise you lose your way."
Schultz believes that his big mistake was not selecting a successor from within the culture. When he eventually retires, he intends to choose someone from within the operation who is in touch with the culture of the brand.
7. Being human
The film Fight Club famously depicted Starbucks as the epitome of the faceless corporation taking over the globe, but the company is actually quite unique in its willingness to speak out and engage with people on a social (and even political) level.
"We are very outspoken as a company. We feel that we live in a time where the rules of engagement have changed. What I mean by this is that we need to do more for the communities that we serve. The question we ask ourselves is: What is the role of a for-profit public company? Looking at this question has resulted in us taking on social issues such as same-sex marriage, gay rights, gun control and racism."
For example, Starbucks recently unveiled its first store in Ferguson, Missouri (which has been plagued by racial unrest) as part of a plan to support efforts to rebuild and revitalise communities.
Read next: 5 Inexpensive Ways to Create a Company Culture Like Google's
Case Studies
How Merchant Capital And Retroviral Were Built To Sell
Entrepreneur chats to Dov Girnun of Merchant Capital and Mike Sharman of Retroviral. We explore why their companies attracted funders, and how the relationship can be used to grow their businesses.
The Tech Based Business
Know your business's numbers inside out, and don't try to bluff your way through any questions that relate to numbers.
Vital Stats
- Player: Dov Girnun
- Company: Merchant Capital
- What they do: Lending solutions for SMEs
- Est: 2013
- Investor: Rand Merchant Investment Holdings
- Shareholding: 25%
- Visit: merchantcapital.co.za
Less than two years into his business, Dov Girnun attracted the attention of Rand Merchant Investment Holdings (RMIH), a financial services investment company that includes the founders of FirstRand, Laurie Diepenaar, Paul Harris and GT Ferreira. These are no small industry players. On an investment level, they're the funders who backed Adrian Gore when he launched Discovery and Willem Roos when he started OUTsurance.
How had Girnun found himself in the position to pitch to investors at this level? Months earlier, RMIH had launched a fintech incubator called Alpha Code. The idea was to find pre-revenue start-ups that would be the next game-changers. Their research brought them to Merchant Capital.
"We didn't exactly fit their mandate because we were already operational and profitable," says Girnun, "but they still really loved the business. They'd been researching the fintech space, and had recognised the potential in SME lending, which is our focus. They really wanted to invest, but at the time I was unsure if I wanted to dilute my shares further."
Girnun already had an investor, the Capricorn Group, whose investments include Hollard, Nandos and Clientèle, and until this point he'd been careful to maintain his shareholding. His relationship with Capricorn was excellent, as the investment team added huge strategic value to the business over and above capital, and so he hadn't been actively seeking additional funding.
And then a new opportunity presented itself. "We realised we have golden data on the SME space. How could we cross-sell to our base and monetise that data? We started chatting to RMIH, who were aligned to our thinking.
"Once I realised the value RMIH could add to our business, my whole perspective shifted. Here was an investor that could potentially help me to build a billion dollar business. I'd be diluting shares, but building a much bigger pie."
Related: Funding Growth with Dov Girnun
The price of equity
Girnun is referring to the investment lesson that equity is cheap early on, and very expensive later, when a funder holds more shares of your business than you do. If you look for funding later, your valuation is higher, you've got a proven track record, and the same amount of money secures fewer shares. Sell too early, and the exact opposite happens.
This had always been Girnun's view, but an understanding of how far the business could potentially go with RMIH's backing was changing his mind.
There was just one challenge. While RMIH's investment team loved Merchant Capital's business model, investments need to be signed off by the board, which meant Girnun and his co-founder Daniel Moritz, needed to pitch to them in person, so that they could see their energy, passion and vision for Merchant Capital.
Serious, seasoned investors don't make this easy. They need to see your passion, and how well you understand your business. They're not there to make the experience easy.
"Even though I knew they were interested in my business, I still found the experience extremely daunting. There were very few introductions, handshakes or jokes. I was expected to launch into my pitch, and I knew that even though I had been given 20 minutes, the first two minutes would be the deciding factor. If I didn't grab their attention in that time frame, they wouldn't be investing in me and my business."
Tapping into investor concerns
"I had just returned from the Endeavour international selection panel in San Francisco, and I think this played a major role in the success of my pitch," says Girnun.
"One of my judges, a hugely successful venture capitalist from Sillicon Valley, really explained the significance of the elevator pitch to me. Imagine you've gotten into an elevator with the CEO of Goldman Sachs, he said. If you're lucky, you've got seven floors to get them interested enough in your business to want your card, and maybe even a meeting. They can't possibly learn everything about your business there and then — they just need enough for their interest to be piqued.
"Because you don't know how much time you have, or who you'll be talking to and what their area of expertise is, you can't just learn a pitch off by heart, and you certainly shouldn't have a power point deck that you rely on. Both are very bad ideas. Instead, you need to know your business so well, inside and out, that you can tailor your pitch to the person you're talking to, based on what they care about.
"Because of this piece of advice, I was able to tailor the first two minutes of my pitch to the RMIH board and what they care about. If I grabbed their attention, I'd be able to hold it for the next 20 minutes, which actually ended up being close on two hours. If I hadn't, we would have politely shaken hands after 20 minutes (if not earlier), and been on our way."
It's a simple, but incredibly important lesson: Know your business's numbers inside out, and don't try to bluff your way through any questions that relate to numbers.
"You have to know your unit economics — are you able to distill the essence of your business economics on the back of a napkin? You need to know the high level stuff and the minute details, and they all have to be at your fingertips. If they aren't, you have no business trying to sell your company or attract investors."
Case Studies
How AutoTrader Anticipated Change
AutoTrader South Africa is an online behemoth, boasting more than three million visitors each month. Not that long ago, though, the brand faced the very real possibility of extinction.
Vital Stats
- Player: George Mienie
- Company: AutoTrader South Africa
- Established: 1992
- Visit: www.autotrader.co.za
Key learnings
- Trends are out there to be identified. Being caught unprepared is unacceptable.
- Change needs to be tracked through the use of a measurable KPI.
- Don't be afraid to act pre-emptively.
- Do research. Know your customer.
- Create an unprecedented user experience.
By the mid-2000s, it was becoming clear that the world was changing. The internet was going mainstream, placing massive pressure on industries that only a few years earlier had seemed untouchable.
The print industry in particular was coming under threat, with readers moving to the internet for information. Things didn't change overnight, though. The general decline in readership was steady but quite slow.
Like a frog sitting in a slowly-heated pot of water, it was all too easy to ignore the evidence. AutoTrader South Africa, however, was not willing to accept death by attrition.
Related: Fake It 'Til You Make It: How These 10 Entrepreneurs Did Just That
Measuring change
"When it comes to the digital realm, you can never complain that some development impacted you unexpectedly. The writing is always on the wall, provided you're taking notice," says AutoTrader CEO George Mienie.
Long before the global shift to digital mediums started to affect AutoTrader in a real way, the company began to prepare for the inevitable.
"We knew it was coming. The shift to digital was already starting in places such as the US and Europe," says Mienie.
"We also knew that we needed to measure this shift in a reliable way. When it comes to managing difficult change, you need a KPI that you can reliably measure."
Comparing unique users of a website to the circulation of the magazine wasn't reliable enough, since it was impossible to truly know how many people had used any given copy as a reference when shopping for a vehicle. Some other KPI was needed.
"We settled on leads to dealers. We wanted to track how many people had actually contacted vehicle dealers thanks to the magazine, versus how many had contacted a dealer because of the website," says Mienie.
Finding a KPI
Tracking website leads and comparing them to magazine leads sounds like a simple idea, until you actually start to think about it. If it's hard to know how many people used a single copy of AutoTrader as a reference, how do you figure out how many leads the mag has generated? It was a conundrum.
Tracking leads on the website would be easier, provided you were willing to harm the user-friendliness of the site. AutoTrader wasn't willing to do this.
"We could track website leads by forcing every user to fill in some kind of form before gaining access to a dealer's details, but we weren't willing to do this," says Mienie.
"Today, the average user spends a phenomenal amount of time on our site. A typical visit lasts 12 minutes, and we believe this is because our site is easy to use. While KPIs are important, they shouldn't come at the expense of the user. Everything should be done to make the experience for the client or user as pleasant as possible.
"With this in mind, we give our software engineers a lot of freedom. They don't need to seek permission to improve the site. If they've been working on something that they think will improve the website, they can run with it. You never want bureaucracy to stand in the way of improvement."
Related: 11 SA Entrepreneurs on What They've Learnt About Managing Staff
An innovative solution
In order to effectively measure leads from both AutoTrader magazine and the website, the company came up with a very elegant solution called Call Tracker.
The solution was so elegant and transparent that even regular consumers of AutoTrader probably wouldn't have noticed its existence.
How does it work? The number that you find for any given dealer in the AutoTrader magazine or on the website was not the same as the regular number of that dealer, although, the number was dedicated to a dealer.
Instead, it is a technology that redirected the call through the company to the dealer. Thus, giving AutoTrader the ability to measure leads via phone to the dealer, which was the most-used way in which consumers got in touch with dealers in those years.
Importantly, the company regularly placed a different number for specific dealers on the website and in the magazine, meaning AutoTrader could track exactly which platform a lead was generated from, and give the dealers useful insights into his/her dealership's response.
AutoTrader had in essence created a reliable but simple KPI, using sophisticated technology at the time, that could be used to track consumers' migration from print to digital.
The watershed
As mentioned, the migration of users was fairly slow. AutoTrader had started monitoring the trend in 2007, but it wasn't until 2013 that the website took over from the magazine as the core focus of the business.
In the mid-2000s, the company had printed around 230 000 magazines each month, and managed to sell 55% of those on a regular basis.
Today, it sells about 30 000 magazines a month. However, as magazine sales have declined, the number of visitors to the website has skyrocketed, with more than three million visitors to the website every month, opening more than 40 million pages.
Related: 5 Wrongheaded Attitudes Stunting Your Growth As An Entrepreneur
New competition
The migration of AutoTrader magazine advertisers (sellers) and consumers (buyers) to the website wasn't guaranteed. Getting buyers and sellers of the magazine to embrace the AutoTrader website required hard work.
"As a magazine, we had a big advantage: Potential competitors were faced with very high barriers to entry. We had the capability to compile a 600-page magazine, print it and distribute it weekly. Any new competitor would have found it hard to match us," says Mienie. "The internet, however, obliterated those barriers. Suddenly it was much easier to compete with AutoTrader."
AutoTrader wasn't afraid to pre-empt the digital shift. "You need to be willing to eat yourself. One of the things we did was to place the website prominently in the magazine, knowing that it would eat into sales. We had to take a short-term hit, but we knew that we would benefit from it in the long term." The company also placed a huge emphasis on the user experience.
"You need to be the best," says Mienie. "You need to lead the charge and be first to market with every new development. You also need to know and respect your consumer and dealer. We believe in creating a site that is easy to use and offers more content than you'll find anywhere else. We also make it a priority to know the consumer's car-buying journey and car sellers' needs.
"But, the game is changing again, fewer and fewer consumers are using the phone, and to an even lesser degree email, to get in touch with dealers. Our research over the last year shows that more than 52% of car-buying consumers don't phone or email a car dealer, but simply take the address and visit the dealer directly.
"When it comes to managing great change within a company, research is incredibly important. But just doing research isn't enough you need to use it effectively. The temptation exists to hog research because you don't want competitors to get hold of it. That doesn't work. We know exactly how much time the average consumer spends studying vehicles before buying a new car. We also know how much of that time is spent online (15 hours), and how much is spent in the physical world visiting dealers (14 hours), and this trend is shifting rapidly toward less time in the physical world and more time searching online, which means the consumer has pretty much made his choice before he leaves his screen. We give that info to our salespeople, who in turn give it to our clients (car sellers). Information needs to be disseminated."


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Dear OncoLink "Ask The Experts,"
The oncologist said that you should not have sex within 72 hours before a PSA test, as this would spike the results. Can you please explain how this occurs? And also how sex affects PSA in general. How could it be that sex spikes the PSA reading for the test, but in general it is not harmful for a prostate cancer patient.
Alan J. Wein, MD, Professor and Chair of the Division of Urology at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, responds:
Studies examining the effect of ejaculation on serum PSA have shown varying effects. For instance, in men aged 30-40 years or younger, both no change and a significant decrease have been reported. However, in the age group in which PSA testing is primarily used for early detection of prostate cancer (50 years and older), ejaculation can lead to an increase in PSA level but could result in a false positive elevation. After 48 hours, the PSA would be expected to return to baseline in most men. A history of sexual activity and a repeat PSA after 48 hours of sexual abstinence may be helpful in the interpretation of serum PSA levels that are minimally elevated. Thus, even though I believe that in most men, ejaculation will not significantly affect the PSA level, I instruct patients to abstain from ejaculation for 2 days prior to PSA testing. However, you must understand that even if sex increases the PSA reading, sex does not have an adverse effect on prostate cancer.


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Every girl is crazy about 'em. Well, every girl ought to be, in my book.
This ZZtop video is actually really awful. This is the first time I've seen it but I wanted you, dear reader, to listen to the song whilst reading this post. This has long been my favorite ZZTop song (well, next to La Grange, of course) simply because of the lyrics. It's like this song was written for me. I've always been enamoured with men's accessories, and any guy who opts to incorporate these little extras into his daily ensemble earns high marks with me. I used to buy gaudy, bejeweled vintage cufflinks at flea markets knowing that someday I'd meet a man to give them to.
To some it may appear a little fey, but I think it speaks volumes when a man takes time getting dressed, thinks about the way his clothes fit his form, and is thoughtful about embellishments, etc. It makes me sick to see how the vast majority of the opposite sex has given up on fashion, wearing a uniform of cargo shorts, flip flops and baseball caps. Men: do you take no pleasure in the art of "getting ready"? Whatever happened to putting your best face forward? Take one look outside my house and I should consider myself lucky guys are able to get their jeans up to the bottom of their asses nowadays. It really turns my stomach, especially when I see these offensive creatures walking around with women who clearly invested some serious time in their appearance/ensemble.
Ladies! Put your stilleto-clad foot down! Send your beau back inside to change and don't let yourself be seen with him until he is dressed to match your caliber. Do not lower your worth by letting yourself be paraded around by a slob!
Men! Stop letting yourselves go! Some of you complain about not having as many options as women in the shopping/clothing arena but really, you can personalize your look with any or all of the following:
cufflinks (easy)
ties (duh)
bow ties (not for the faint of heart)
belts (very easy)
tie tacks (easy/moderate)
a monocle (difficult, not for amateurs)
watches (easy)
rings (takes panache)
pockets squares (fun and endless ways to fold!)
stick pins. So easy, so elegant, and speaking of:
I apologise for the poor quality photos; my in-house photographer was not available at the moment and I clearly am not skilled with a camera.
This is a custom lapel pin I just dropped off for a dear friend and fellow sharp-dressing enthusiast, Adrian Hardy. He is also a talented purveyor of music, I believe the term is DeeJay although I cringe when I hear myself say that because for some reason (perhaps due to my complete lack of a night life) I feel like an out-of-touch poseur when I use that word. Irregardless, Mr. Hardy and one of his partners-in-crime over at LOTis Media had a fairly significant event last night in Philadelphia to tend to and Adrian requested I whip up something fancy for him. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I love doing custom work. Pieces are so much more special to me when I've got a specific client in mind. That said, it also makes for a much more harrowing experience as I hand it over, wringing my hands and praying they like it. I'm pretty sure this one went over well; I'll have to troll for pictures online to see.
The parameters given to me for this lapel-pin were Arian's personality and what I know of it, and the fact that this particular event was a "white party". I used a bed of Polish Hen plumage and added feathers of pheasant, peacock, and mourning dove. I also embellished it with some rabbit fur and a dazzling vintage charm. All of this atop a 24K gold-plated stick-pin!
And there's more where that came from, folks! Just check out my Etsy shop!
Say it with me, ladies and gentlemen: men's return to fashion starts RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW, with ME and team Diamond Tooth.
Beth Beverly
***update: Here is a photo of Senor Hardy last night Courtesy of Philly Chit Chat: Not too shabby, eh?