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Each day that I walk home from Aliya's bus stop I chat with one of my neighbors who also has a child that rides the bus with her. We basically share our thoughts on general things like life, kids and whatever we can think of for our five minute catch up as we walk home.
I work from home and I didn't have the previous day scheduled to work so me being my Martha Stewart self (I like to think so) kept myself busy. I told her how I organized Ayanna's entire closet before she came home…Continue
I'm your newest twitter follower!! Pls follow my new fb page at http://www.facebook.com/tracilynnjewelry7225 THNX!
Im erum,, I have a site for every girl out there. Its about taking care of urself. pls follow me at http://www.caringwhispers.com I will soon visit your blog & follow you.
thanks -Erum
Hello my name is Sara. I volunteer to crochet for Erlanger's Never Forgotten fort babies that pass and also for a nearby pregnancy center. I have my blog at http://heavenlycocoon.blogspot.com/. Please let me know what you think. Also if you have an HTML button or graphic that you would like added to my blog and website feel free to email it to me at email@example.com. Have a great day! Sara
Hello, welcome to Mom Bloggers. This is a wonderful community where you can meet other interesting moms.
I am Nekky from Reflexions, a fun loving mom of two who like to meet people, make friends and share opinions. I have some weekly blog hops: GET CONNECTED TUESDAY BLOG HOP and WELCOME TO WEEKEND BLOG HOP. Always feel free to link up every week as this will enable you gain some new followers. Come and also make new blogger friends from around the world.
Hope you enjoy your stay here. Happy Connections.
Kindly stop by at Giveaway Junkies on facebook and become a member..
Hope to see you there :-))
Welcome to MBC! We are glad to have you here. We look forward connecting more with you here. I'm a Super Mama who has a family friendly blog. I also have a weekday blog hop called Exposure 99%.Come find out for yourself! This weekday blog hop helps you get more dedicated readers and blog followers. Hope you link up weekly. If you have any questions about how to link up do not hesitate to let me know.
Visit me @ One moment in time, I'll sure return the love :-)
Hi there and welcome from The Girlz Korner in upstate New York where you'll find light, witty and rather entertaining articles on every topic imaginable from beauty, health, fashion, parenting, sex and everything else in between. So if you get a chance to kick back and exhale, if only for a brief moment, we'd love to have you. Hope you enjoy your stay :) http://www.thegirlzkorner.com


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You made your reservations months ago.
This was a vacation you've been planning for… well, it seems like forever. One of those once-in-a-lifetime trips is what you've always dreamed about, and you've bought all new clothes and even a new suitcase for it.
So why would you take just any old book on your vacation this summer? Instead, why not look for something new by an author you love?
Summertime reading bolts out the door like a teenager off curfew with new novels by Mary Alice Monroe, Dorothea Benton Frank, and Jeff Shaara; cookbooks; a business book by William Poundstone and one on commodities; a book about Sally Ride by Lynn Sherr; and Hillary Rodham Clinton's much-anticipated biography. And that was just the first week…
Later in June, look for new novels by Diana Gabaldon, Jennifer Weiner, Janet Evanovich, Linda Fairstein, Ridley Pearson, James Patterson, Jude Deveraux, and Dean Koontz. You'll find a book about a dog that flew during World War II (and why). Learn how to do math in a fun way. Read about Justice Antonin Scalia. Pick up some new Will Shortz puzzle books in June. And learn how to use your manners when you have to swear.
For the kids, look for a new "Dork Diaries" installation; an encyclopedia of animated characters; a few new mysteries for middle-grade readers; a new book about "Charlie the Ranch Dog"; and a book about farting fish.
Just because summer's half over doesn't mean your reading list is! Before the fireworks even begin, look for new novels by Jojo Moyes, Susan Wiggs, J.A. Jance, Jacqueline Winspear, and Amy Sohn. There's a new book coming out about Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio; a new book that debunks myths about sex; a new book by Ja Rule; a skinny book about crossword puzzles and why we love them; a self-help book on "wallowing" the right way; and a cool true-crime book about how amateurs have been solving cold cases and bringing killers to justice.
Later in July, you'll find more favorites: novels by Brad Thor, Iris & Roy Johansen, Anne Rivers Siddons, Terry Brooks, Catherine Coulter, Brad Taylor, Conn Igguldon, Stuart Woods, James Lee Burke, Ace Atkins, and Julie Garwood; a new memoir by singer Rick James; a biography on Michelangelo; a new book about families and race; a tell-all about the Clinton's political life; and a memoir of faith and football.
The kidlets will love finding new "Guardians of the Galaxy" books; new joke books to while away the summer; the latest "Fancy Nancy" installment; and a new graphic novel by Neil Gaiman.
You're not done yet. There's still plenty of summer – and plenty of time to read – left!
The first part of August will see a new book by Andrew Cuomo; a new novel by Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child; a new W.E.B. Griffin tome; a new book about crime-scene profilers; and a book about the woman behind the Mona Lisa.
Also in August, look for a book about college football conferences; a business book about getting organized and one on prosperity; new cookbooks for backyard and for fall; and new novels by Carl Weber, William Kent Krueger, Debbie Macomber, Kelly Armstrong, Elaine Hussey, Randy Wayne White, Tami Hoag, Paul Coelho and Kathy Reichs.
Get the kids in back-to-school mode with a new children's book by Malala Yousafzai; a new Cupcake Diaries installment; ghost stories; and a kid's book about paying it forward.
Yes, some of these books can be shifted, moved, or cancelled altogether. Titles can change; so can subject matter. If you've got a question about your favorite author, nicely ask your librarian or bookseller – this is why they get paid the big bucks. Seriously, they're experts at this stuff.
Have a great summer and Happy Reading!

subset: commoncrawl


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Rona Inc., the home-improvement retailer with the lowest market valuation in North America, would give potential suitors the chance to profit as Canada's economy adds new homes and jobs at the fastest pace in more than three years.
Rona, Canada's biggest home-improvement chain, is valued at a 26 percent discount to its net assets, making it the only North American home-products retailer with a market capitalization over $500 million to trade lower than book value, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. After increasing competition sent the Boucherville, Quebec-based company's shares down 57 percent in the last five years, Rona is also the least expensive of its rivals relative to earnings, the data show.
Lowe's Cos. could be interested in acquiring Rona to expand in the country and better compete with Home Depot Inc., said ABC Funds, after Canadians started work last month on the most housing units since 2008 and the economy added the most jobs in 42 months. The chain would also be attractive to private-equity buyers, said Aston Hill Financial Inc. While the C$1.3 billion ($1.3 billion) company says it isn't for sale, Rona would fetch C$15 a share in a takeover, or a 42 percent premium, ABC said.
"Rona is definitely cheap," Richard Fortin, Calgary-based co-manager of the Bissett Small Cap Fund at Bissett Investment Management, which oversees C$13.7 billion including shares of Rona, said in a telephone interview. "If Lowe's were to acquire Rona, it'd gain a significant presence in Canada overnight. The merger math works quite well at current prices."
Lowe's Chief Financial Officer Robert Hull told Reuters last week that his company is open to "all options" if Rona were to put itself up for sale and called it "a very interesting company."
"Lowe's has stated its intention to expand in Canada to as many as 100 stores," Julie Yenichek, a spokeswoman for Mooresville, North Carolina-based Lowe's, said in an e-mail yesterday. "We cannot speculate about how we may choose to grow our business in Canada."
"We are not looking to sell," Michelle Laberge, a spokeswoman for Rona, said in a phone interview. "We haven't been approached at this time," by potential suitors, she said.
The company is focused on executing its 2012 business plan and will soon be updating investors on its progress, according to Laberge. Rona said on Feb. 23 that it will be introducing a new website and decreasing the size of the sales area in some of its "big-box stores" as part of its 2012 business plan.
Rona, which sells everything from paint to power tools and flower pots at almost 800 stores across Canada, has been trying to fend off increased competition from Home Depot and Lowe's.
Atlanta-based Home Depot, the world's largest home- improvement retailer, has opened 180 stores in Canada since entering the market in 1994, according to its web site. Lowe's opened its first Canadian stores in 2007 in the Toronto area and had 31 locations in the country as of this February, a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission showed.
Rona reported a net loss of C$78 million in 2011 as its results deteriorated after four straight declines in annual profit. In the last five years, Rona's shares slid 57 percent to C$10.60, the biggest drop among consumer discretionary stocks in the Standard & Poor's/TSX Composite Index, the benchmark gauge for Canadian equity. That compares with Home Depot's 33 percent advance and a 0.7 percent gain for Lowe's over the same period, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
The slump has left Rona trading at 0.74 times the value of its assets minus liabilities, compared with an average price-to- book ratio of 3.5 for home product store owners in North America with market values higher than $500 million, the data show.
With its equity and net debt valued at 5.3 times earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, Rona is also the cheapest among its competitors and valued at half the industry average, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
"As Home Depot and Lowe's expand their presence in Canada, they're taking share away from Rona," Brian Huen, a Toronto- based managing partner at Red Sky Capital Management Ltd., said. An acquirer could get Rona "at a reasonable price," he said.
Rona has grown cheaper even as Canada's recovery from the worst global financial crisis since the 1930s strengthened.
Data this week from Ottawa-based Canada Mortgage & Housing Corp. showed the annual pace of housing starts rose 5 percent to 215,600 in March, the highest level since October 2008. The country also added 82,300 jobs last month, Statistics Canada said last week. That's the most since September 2008, the month that New York-based Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. collapsed.
Canadian executives are more positive on sales growth than at any time in two years, the Bank of Canada's quarterly survey showed this week.
U.S. retailers facing saturation in their own country will increasingly search for ways to expand in Canada because of its proximity to the U.S. and the similarities in consumer behavior, according to Irwin Michael, a Toronto-based money manager at ABC Funds, which oversees about C$1 billion and owns more than 3 million shares of Rona.
"The borders are breaking down," Michael said. "We're seeing more and more U.S. companies come here to Canada. We basically watch the same TV, eat the same food. We're familiar with all your stores."
Lowe's is looking to gain scale in Canada, Robert Niblock, the company's chief executive officer, said Dec. 6 at its annual meeting with analysts and investors.
Buying Rona would help Lowe's accomplish that by giving it a "fairly dominant position" in Quebec, and the combined company could lower costs and boost profitability, ABC Funds' Michael said. Rona has more than 200 stores in Quebec, according to its website.
"While management has indicated the company is not for sale, the reality is that control is in the marketplace," Michael said. "That statement by the Lowe's CFO, whether they're interested or not, it certainly was a catalyst to get people to say 'Hey, this stock is cheap.'"
Rona would fetch at least C$15 a share if it were acquired, or "just slightly above" its C$14.33 in book value per share, ABC Funds estimates. That would be a 42 percent premium to yesterday's close, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
While Lowe's management may need to stay focused on competing with Home Depot in the U.S. right now, Rona would make sense as a target for a private-equity firm that could try to run the company better and improve margins, or break it apart and sell off pieces, said Jeff Burchell, a Toronto-based money manager at Aston Hill, which oversees about C$5.5 billion.
Rona, the only North American home products retailer with a market value of more than $500 million that was unprofitable in the last 12 months, earned less than 4 cents in operating income per dollar of its C$4.8 billion in sales in the past year, data compiled by Bloomberg show. That's less than half the median 8.3 percent operating margin for the group, the data show.
A private-equity firm would also be getting a company that trades at 10 times its cash from operations after deducting capital expenses, the cheapest free cash flow multiple among its peers, the data show.
"Lowe's is really focused on the internal business in the U.S.," Burchell said. "For Lowe's to take on the whole Rona and do a hostile takeover for it, that sucks up a lot of management time. Private equity, that would be pretty interesting. That's where you could probably make sense of the whole thing."
Concern that the Canadian housing market will weaken could deter potential buyers, said David Cockfield, a Toronto-based managing director at Northland Wealth Management, which oversees about C$200 million.
Policy makers, including Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, have said parts of Canada's housing market have become overvalued as households add to record debt levels. Household spending in Canada is increasingly driven by "stimulative financing conditions" and higher home values, Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney said in an April 2 speech. Such trends are "unsustainable over the medium term," he said.
"The housing market is running at probably what we would consider an unsustainable high," Northland Wealth's Cockfield said in a telephone interview.
While Cockfield also said it could be difficult to convince Rona to sell, the company may not have a choice if the stock continues to drop and increased competition further erodes margins, according to Sachin Shah, a special situations and merger arbitrage strategist for Tullett Prebon Plc in Jersey City, New Jersey.
Rona "saying 'our standalone strategy is going to deliver more value than doing a deal' is only going to work if they're actually able to do that," Shah said in a phone interview. "Shareholders have been waiting two years and they're not happy. It's just been a downward trajectory and so Lowe's sees the intrinsic value here. We're going to have to wait and see, but that wait and see has a limitation."


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Where am I now?
I tweet @vangosse, if you want to see material from the Postcapitalist Project, www.postcapitalistproject.org and other cool stuff, re Israel/Palestine, El Salvador, US politics. I blog in HuffPo.
I came to Franklin & Marshall in 2001, after a varied career in academia and the nonprofit sector, including teaching at Wellesley College and Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, and working for national organizations like Peace Action. My teaching and scholarship focuses on several overlapping areas: American political development and the special role that the African American struggle for citizenship has played in our history; American culture and society in the Cold War era and since. I also have a special interest in cultural history, looking at popular music and Hollywood movies.
Originally, my scholarship covered the social movements of the United States after World War II, the so-called New Left. I authored or edited several books on this subject, with a particular focus on the movements "in solidarity" with social change in Latin America, from the Cuban Revolution in the 1950s through the Central American wars of the 1980s. This led me to an interest in the long-term political evolution of American democracy and the question of Black Power--whether or not African Americans would ever be, or could ever be, "first-class citizens." To my surprise, I have found that this question was debated as far back as the 1790s, and that black Americans were always part of that debate. I am now deep into a book project called We Are Americans: The Origins of Black Politics, 1790-1860 (for a detailed academic CV go to http://www.fandm.edu/van-gosse).
I worked in United for Peace and Justice, the main grassroots antiwar coalition, from its founding in fall 2002 through 2008, serving on its elected Steering Committee as the representative of Historians Against the War, a network I helped found at the annual meeting of the American Historical Association in January 2003.
From 2004 through the present, I have helped direct our on-campus "F&M Votes" campaign, a joint student/staff/faculty effort which seeks to both register and turn-out our entire student body on Election Day.


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Westbrook leads Thunder past Pistons 92-90
AUBURN HILLS, Mich. (AP) - Russell Westbrook scored a season-high 33 points and keyed a fourth-quarter comeback as the Oklahoma City Thunder rallied to beat the winless Detroit Pistons 92-90 on Monday night.
The loss left the Pistons with an 0-8 record, the worst start in franchise history. It was the fourth game in five nights for the Thunder, who improved to 6-2.
Westbrook, who also had 10 rebounds and four assists, contributed six points - all on free throws - to a 13-0 Thunder run to open the fourth quarter that turned a 73-62 deficit into a 75-73 lead with 8:11 left.
Kevin Durant, who hit a tough runner with 47.8 seconds remaining that gave Oklahoma City an 88-85 advantage, added 26 points and nine rebounds.
(Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)


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Remake pays subtle homage to the past
Starring: Kenny Wormald, Julianne Hough
Director: Craig Brewer
Rated: PG-13
Forget the leg warmers and mall bangs — the '80s have left the building and taken Kevin Bacon with them. The creators of this refreshed hit would probably admit there was no need to remake "Footloose," but then is there ever a solid justification for remaking a movie, except to cash in with a new audience?
There is every expectation that will happen here, especially with the drawing power of "Dancing with the Stars" dance pro Julianne Hough in the female lead as Ariel, the proverbial preacher's daughter gone bad. Her co-star, Kenny Wormald in the role Bacon owned until this past weekend, is less known except to maybe Justin Timberlake fans. At one time, Wormald was one of his back up dancers.
Almost a scene-for-scene adaptation from the original movie, there is a nod to the present day with artists like Blake Shelton and Cee Lo Green on the bill. Also, a hip-hop vibe has replaced the Harlem Shuffle with some poppin' and lockin'.
If you remember the story — and admit it, you saw the 1984 version — city boy Ren MacCormack (Wormald) comes to the little southern Georgia town of Bomont from Boston after his mother dies (one of the few changes in this update) to live with relatives played by Ray McKinnon and Kim Dickens (familiar to audiences from "The Blind Side"). He arrives to find community leaders have outlawed basically everything that teenagers find fun to do in an effort to protect them from themselves.
The motivation behind this police state is the death of five teenagers several years before Ren's arrival in a fiery car crash coming home late one night from a dance. So now a curfew is strictly enforced, as are bans on loud music and public dancing.
The leader of this no-fun zone is the righteous Rev. Shaw Moore (Dennis Quaid), who has personal reasons behind his actions. He also believes the arrogant Ren is a corrupting influence on his daughter, but she's doing a good enough job of that on her own by dating an older boy and acting out in regrettable ways to get attention.For a movie that revolves around dancing, my biggest complaint is director Craig Brewer's camera moves. If the kids are dancing their toes off, I don't really want to see extreme close ups. Brewer's inexplicable choices in no way favor a movie built around dancing, and neither does the slam editing that cuts away too quickly from the dancers.
Wormald, a better dancer than actor, must deal with a pretty bad "Bah-ston" accent but acquits himself with mad dance moves. And the verdict is still out on whether Hough, as a dancer, can convert her talent and popularity into an acting career. For a start, neither could have done better than a movie that requires them to dance more than they talk, but both have a likeability that should propel them into future film roles.
While the adults, including Quaid and Andie McDowall (stuck in the do-nothing role of the reverend's wife), are relegated to the "I know what's best for you" routine, the teenagers get to have all the fun. One of the late Chris Penn's best roles was as Willard, the bumpkin who befriends Ren on his first day at school. Miles Turner inherits this part and almost steals the movie as the sweet-natured kid with a smart mouth and two left feet.
The title song, a Kenny Loggins classic, cleverly finds its way into this movie, too, and it's a nice homage to a simpler time when kids could take over the drive-in theater for an impromptu dance-off like these teens do. Wait. What? I don't remember ever doing that. Oh well, shall we dance?


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"I Hope For Rain": One Homeless Reader's Story
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Topic: "I Hope For Rain": One Homeless Reader's Story (Read 1095 times)
Reginald Hudlin
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"I Hope For Rain": One Homeless Reader's Story
October 09, 2013, 11:51:12 am »
"I Hope For Rain": One Homeless Reader's Story
Last week, a reader who recently became homeless sent us an (undeserved) note of gratitude after several Gawker commenters helped him out in a tough time. At our request, he wrote an essay about how he ended up living in his car, what his life is like, and how random strangers online came to his aid, however briefly. Read it below.
[Photo via AP. The writer's name is a pseudonym]
Original post by JEFFREYECK on JEFFREYECK
This Is My Wake Up Call
I have a strong dislike for anyone that exercises before the sun rises. Because of this, the worst part of my day is between 5:00 a.m. and 6:30 a.m. Probably not a good thing to start your day off in the tank, but it is what it is. It's the time when suburban housewives and financial consultants enjoy waking up ass-early and taking their golden retriever out for a walk. Debbie calls Janet, and the two of them go for their 5k. Which is such a f*cking joke of a run by the way, that you should just say, "Let's go for a run," and not refer to it as a 5K.
I live in a city where young couples inundate the roads with Range Rover Sports, young retirees with matching C classes. You know the annoying people who just have hashtags in their Twitter bios, like #loveroflife or #foodie, or even worse, #humanbeing? Ya, these are the people that I'm talking about. I have to hide from these people in the morning, because where I live is in my car. See, I don't like it when people run by with their rescue dog and look into my car and see me sleeping. Or worse, find me looking directly at them, which would be super creepy.
On the weekends it's a little more difficult to hide from these people. The town is touristy. So on the weekends, people are everywhere. All I'm trying to do is sleep, really. In the beginning, I reclined the front seat and just laid back. No pillow, no blanket. I just laid there like a breathing corpse. But I'm a tall guy, so when I'd move around, my foot would hit the brake pedal, and flashing brake lights at 3am is never really a good thing if you're trying to be invisible. So I switched to the back seat after a week or so. It's better, but not by much because I can only sleep in a fetal position. After a couple of hours your legs will start to fall asleep from the position and then you have to move. I can feel my legs getting shorter by the day.
I hope for rain every night. Rain, both keeps people indoors and shields you from being seen. The humidity caused by your body heat fogs the windows so you can't be seen. But it hasn't rained all that often. Soon the rain will turn to snow and act as sort of an igloo, which might actually keep things a bit warmer. I think I made an igloo when I was a child. I must have. Of course if we're talking about igloos, that would imply the weather is cold.
It wasn't always like this, of course, and one never thinks they will end up in this position. I certainly never did. Now that I am here, however, the reasons that brought me here are clear. Like wet footsteps on dry concrete. I'm able to look back and realize where I went wrong.
I was a poor student in high school, but not because of ability. My SAT score was in the high 1300s, but I just didn't care about my grades. I was too busy trying to be liked and just get through sh*t. I had newly found a love of music and for the majority of my junior and senior year in high school, I kept myself hidden from everybody else. I just planted myself in my room to practice, and practice, and then practice again. It paid off. Just two years after picking up an instrument, I was accepted (after being rejected) to the most prestigious contemporary music conservatory in the world. I was rejected because my grades were so dreadful. I was accepted because of my musical ability. After receiving the rejection letter, I did what anyone who wants something bad enough would do; I called the admissions office and pleaded to speak with someone. The man who helped me was Dana Acker. Dana and I spoke on the phone for close to 30 minutes. The phone call ended with his saying he would write a letter of recommendation for me. Two weeks later, the acceptance letter came. He saved my life and he still, to this day, doesn't even know it.
I was on my way. I was at a place that promoted and encouraged what I spent every waking hour doing. I loved every second of my time there. But sadly, things would quickly end. I was a fish not just out of water, but on the beach, buried in sand. Sometime during my fourth semester I filed a non-continuing form. It was the official form you filed to stop your studies. I had officially dropped out of college. I remember the walk to the registrars office like it was yesterday. I received little to no guidance on the ramifications of leaving college. Nobody had attended college in my family. Everything about it was foreign. I was naive and dumb. No, not dumb, I just didn't know. Had I know that twelve months later I would be diagnosed with stage 2A Hodgkin's Disease, the disease just beginning to enter my lungs before treatment, I probably would never have left. I was 21, a college dropout, and now had cancer.
Thanks to modern medicine and not the holistic sh*t that was pushed on me from some woman in the office (I don't really know why she was there), my treatment was a success. Not only am I in remission, but I'm cured. I don't think about this day to day. Maybe I should. I've won few things in life. I think I won a Pinewood Derby in Boy Scouts when I was 10 or 11, but that might be it. I've come in second a lot.
I could have returned to school and picked up my studies at any time after my health recovered. But I didn't. Years of procrastination, taking the eye off of the ball, a bad break-up here, a meaningless job or two (or three) there, I now sit in a car at close to midnight, next to a library so that I can use their wi-fi to do meaningless f*cking things like check email and Twitter. But nobody emails me anymore because I've alienated all of my friends. Employers rarely get back to me about a job that I've inquired about. It's difficult to get anything really, even to be a trash man.
After years and years of being too poor to do things, too poor to go on trips with friends, to go out to eat, to pay for wedding gifts, my friends, people I've known for two decades, have moved on without me. And I can't and don't blame them. They all took the more conventional path in life. Business degrees, working in cubicles. Conventional seems to work right about now. They've all married and had children. Now they get together with their kids and have dumb parties, which are just excuses to have a bunch of kids hang out and sh*t their pants in unison. I am here counting the number of cars that drive by me.
The only reason why I am still breathing is because I am a huge coward. I am a neurotic (but not Dr. Phil neurotic), pessimistic, cynical guy, who has lied to everyone he knows because he never has anything positive to tell them. It's an awful life to live.
The other reason why I hang on is because somewhere down inside of me, there is talent that is screaming to get out. I am quite certain of that. If it weren't true, I'd not be bothering with writing this. I've no delusions. I am a realist and have no ego. If I had nothing to offer the world, I'd embarrassingly announce it.
But I am still a coward because I am not giving my true name to this story. I am writing this anonymously. Not everyone knows my situation. Most don't, in fact. And it would embarrass and ruin whatever I have left in life, should I be found out.
This story is entirely the result of Gawker's story that ran last week on the Least Privileged Group in America. I had seen the story run throughout the week, but I only caught the final post. Of course the result was that the homeless population was the least privileged group in America. I certainly don't disagree. But as I started reading the comments, there was one that particularly stood out.
It was from a woman who had shared a lovely story about how she, once, was homeless. Below is her comment.
After a while of living outside Cleveland, I caught a ride with someone to Grand Rapids. There was a huge snowstorm, so he stopped in Kalamazoo. I ended up stranded near the Greyhound. I thought maybe I could find someone to get me on a bus, but the only bus that was coming was going to Detroit so I thought, "Fine, I'll go to Detroit. It's a huge city."
It was the middle of the night, the bus station's doors were locked, and it was -17 degrees and I was in very little clothing. The only thing that was open nearby was a McDonalds, and it was shining like a beacon. It was beautiful. Everything smelled like french fries and I don't think I had eaten in more than a week at that point. I trudged through the snow to the McDonalds and asked people for change. I tried to go inside but the owner yelled at me and kicked me out. A man, going inside asked me why I wasn't inside. I told him that I'm homeless and the manager doesn't want bums in his McDonalds. His name was Karl. He took me in with him, bought me a bunch of food and told me he would drive me to Detroit. I drove with him to Detroit, and he said he wanted to go to the MGM casino before he would get me on a bus. I went with him while he gambled. He ended up winning A LOT of money. He got us a hotel room, ate a steak dinner, drank champaign. It was amazing. I took a hot shower. I cried tears of joy from taking a shower. It was like I was taking a shower for the first time. He ended up giving me money, and bought me a plane ticket back to San Francisco, and that's how I got back. Things were not easy after that even though my parents were happy that I was alive, I still had a lot to work on with them and I was in and out of hospitals from depression and manic episodes, but I thank god every day that I met Karl. Thursday 1:23pm
I replied to that comment. Something I rarely do. So rarely that I created a burner account just to comment. Below, is my reply.
I've been homeless for about a month now. Luckily, I have a vehicle to sleep, laptop to do work, and food banks near me to eat.
You're right though. Having absolutely nothing, makes the littlest things worth while. I've found that when I do come up with $2.00, I can treat myself to actually buying a coffee, sitting in a cafe, opening the laptop and pretending to reply to all of the companies that responded to my emails. I get excited on those days.
I'm still new to being homeless and I have things like laundry detergent in my trunk so I don't scream, I'm homeless. I hope that day never really comes.
I've seen the same people every day at the food banks and church dinners (I'm not religious, go figure). I judge them and think, "Well, I can see why you're homeless. Oh. I'd love some pasta, thank you."
I think only people who have been homeless can say this with some level of certainty; that maybe everyone at one point in their lives should be homeless. Even for three days, a week. You start to really appreciate the small things, like you said. Thursday 2:30pm
She replied back to me. And her reply was thoughtful and needed. She felt sorry for me. I felt sorry for myself. She wished me well. She understood what I was going through. She also did something that went beyond the call of duty for a complete stranger. Something that I didn't expect. She sent me $20.00 to a Paypal account. And then someone read our conversation and replied, and that person sent me $25.00. And then someone read that comment and that person sent me $100.00. It was more money than I had had in the previous six months combined, and for the next three days, I stopped going to the shelter in the mornings for three day old bagels. I was able to buy proper food. I used the money to put gas in my car so that I could move about freely. To be human at least for a day. To roll down the window and smell the pavement after it rains; that fresh, city smell that I love. To put the radio on and sit in traffic. Everyone has somewhere to go, but me. Well, I sat in traffic JUST TO SIT IN TRAFFIC. To give the illusion that I had somewhere to go even though I didn't. But I felt good. I put on my only clean and still nice pair of pants and a shirt, topped it with my wrinkled fedora hat from the trunk, and I walked around the city with an empty coffee cup (because I didn't want to waste the money I was just given). A few woman smiled at me as I walked past them. If they knew that I was enabled, insufficient and irresponsible, they'd have cringed.
I didn't think this was an interesting story at all. As I mentioned to the staff, there are homeless people that have it worse than I do. They are hungrier, colder, dirtier, older, sicker, and stronger. But I realize that my life is f*cked up because I f*cked it up. Potential is, really, just a noun (or adjective depending on how you use it).
Perhaps the three people that replied to me are my version of Karl. I don't care if they sent me $20.00 or $200.00, why anyone would do such a thing is something that I have yet to be able to answer. But it helped. If even for a week, it helped. I told them I would repay them as soon as I was able to. They told me that repayment would be to help someone else in need. I promised I would.
I was raised better than this. A lot better. And even though I'm anonymous, if makes me feel just a little better to say that I am sorry. I know I have been a disappointment, a let down, a waste of this overflow of talent. I don't know if someone can exist and not really exist at all. If it's possible, then I am that someone.
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Teacher resources and professional development across the curriculum
Teacher professional development and classroom resources across the curriculum
Psychopathology is the twenty-first program in the DISCOVERING PSYCHOLOGY series. Through glimpses of the original theories of Philippe Pinel, this program explores the biological and psychological components of mental illness, as well as the role of genetics and cultural factors. It also takes a closer look at a few of the major mental illnesses like depression, neurosis, manic-depressive disorders, and schizophrenia.
Experiment: The Genetics of Schizophrenia
Psychopathology is defined as the study of any significant behavioral or psychological syndrome that impairs an individual's daily functioning in society. The current dialogue among doctors and researchers treating mental disorders explores the intersection of genetics and environment in major mental illnesses.
In their study of schizophrenia, a psychotic breakdown of integrated personality functioning, Drs. Irving Gottesman and E. Fuller Torrey conducted an ongoing study of 60 sets of identical twins. In 30 sets, one twin had schizophrenia, and the other did not. In 20 sets, both twins had schizophrenia. The remaining 10 sets of twins served as a control group for normal brain functioning; neither had schizophrenia.
Drs. Gottesman and Torrey conducted in-depth interviews with all the twins and their parents. Then the twins underwent a series of tests in an effort to determine the causes of schizophrenia. In one test, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and SPECT analysis were used to measure the flow of blood to specific parts of the brain during a variety of problem-solving activities.
The results revealed differences betweeb the brains of twins with schizophrenia and those without schizophrenia. In the brains of twins with schizophrenia, the ventricles carrying fluids in the brain were bigger, indicating a loss of brain tissue and an altering of the brain structure.
This research provided evidence of the biological component of schizophrenia. Other factors that may contribute to schizophrenia are more environmental, including concussions, drug use, or severe viruses. Psychosocial stresses may be implicated as well. This interactionist perspective in Drs. Gottesman and Torrey's study expands the traditional methods of identifying and treating mental illness.
Dr. Gottesman has an extensive Web site at the University of Virginia with articles and book excerpts.
Discovering Psychology: Home | Series Info | Series Glossary | Pioneers | Site Map | Credits
Program Pages: Text Links to Programs 1-26
Explorations: History | Research | Brain | Development | Approaches
©2001 WGBH Educational Foundation All Rights Reserved
© Annenberg Foundation 2017. All rights reserved. Legal Policy


text: All Season Nails introduces its Rapido Soak Off UV Gel Master Kit. The soak-off gels are self-leveling and make for a smooth and easy application with no lifting and a super glossy finish without the need for a top coat. The gel is softer than a traditional gel: It flexes with the nail, giving less chance of chipping and cracking while filling in any nail imperfections. The gel can be broken down and removed with conditioning Rapido Soak Off Solution. The master kit contains 22 hot colors as well as pink, white and clear; 8-oz. soak-off solution; 4-oz. finishing wipe; and a set of four gel brushes.


text:
Ice … and more ice … made driving a bit tricky Friday morning, but most Oak Ridge area residents heeded warnings and stayed home.
Ice … and more ice … made driving a bit tricky Friday morning, but
most Oak Ridge area residents heeded warnings and stayed home.
Many counties and cities — including the city of Oak Ridge — closed
their offices early Friday or never opened at all because of the nasty
Police Lt. Robin Smith said Oak Ridge Animal Shelter employees were
sent home after the animals were fed Friday.
"It's been very quiet," the lieutenant said.
Smith said only one vehicle crash was reported before noon Friday, and
no one was injured. A vehicle slid off the road and into a ditch.
Oak Ridge Public Works and Electric Department officials, who began
diligently preparing for the bad weather earlier in the week, also
said no serious problems had occurred as of midday Friday.
"Roads are in good shape," Public Works Director Gary Cinder said
Friday. "The brine worked as advertised, and I'm very pleased with its
Cinder said crews would continue to put salt on the roads throughout the day.
An Electric Department employee said one resident reported a power
outage before noon Friday, but power came back on on its own.
An Anderson County Sheriff's Department dispatcher said the city of
Clinton had more ice than other areas of the county but added that
the main roads were "OK." He said the backroads were icy and four
wrecks had been reported Friday morning, but no injuries were
The Anderson County dispatcher said one tree was reported down on
Dutch Valley Road near Marlow Road, while a Lake City dispatcher said
many of that city's roads were also in good shape as of midday Friday.
She, too, said city crews salted the roads Thursday and would continue
to put salt on the roads throughout Friday.
The Lake City dispatcher did report two wrecks in the same place on
the Interstate 75 off-ramp Friday morning, but no injuries were
"We're doing well," said Clinton Police Chief Rick Scarbrough. "We're
fortunate that everyone heeded all the (advanced) warnings."
The chief said the state Department of Transportation had "been real
busy" keeping roads clear — as did the city of Clinton's Public Works
Beverly Majors can be contacted at (865) 220-5514.


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Former NJ Nets star Jayson Williams was sentenced Tuesday morning to five years behind bars for his role in the 2002 shooting of his limo driver Costas "Gus" Christofi. He must serve a minimum of 18 months before he can be eligible for parole.
Judge Edward Coleman accepted the plea deal Williams agreed to last month. In return for pleading guilty, the state changed the charge against him to aggravated assault instead of reckless manslaughter.
A remorseful Williams cried as he apologized to his family and begged for forgiveness.
"Forgive me for the pain I have caused," said a tearful Williams in the New Jersey court. "You deserve a better father, brother, son than I have been."
Williams was acquitted of aggravated manslaughter in 2004 but convicted on four counts of covering up the shooting. His sentence for those convictions will run concurrent to the assault sentence.
Prosecutors say it's about time Williams face the consequences of his behavior.
"Mr. Williams has a dark side," said Steven Farman of the State Attorney General's office. " With wealth and fame comes responsibility. It is time, after eight long years, for Mr. Christofi's voice to be heard."
Farman added that in Williams' bedroom was "an arsenal of weapons to arm a small militia -- There's a reason why we call it a deadly weapon."
Williams apologized profusely to the Christofi family, saying he's visited the dead man's grave more times than he has his own father's.
"From my heart there's not a day I don't wake up and feel sorry for what I did to Mr. Christofi," Williams said. "I'm not a bad man, but I acted badly."
Free on bail since pleading guilty last month, Williams, who turned 42 on Monday, has been wearing an alcohol monitoring bracelet as ordered by a judge.
This after being charged with drunk driving for crashing his SUV in Manhattan.
Judge Coleman told Williams in court that he blames alcohol "for you being here today."
Williams will reportedly be transported to a facility in Trenton. After spending time there, authorities will decide the location where he'll serve his sentence.


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The Gladstone Hotel presents Come Up To My Room 11
January 23-26, 2014
Thurs. 6-8pm | Fri. 11am- 8pm | Sat. 11am-10pm | Sun. 11am- 5pm
CUTMR 11 marks the start of a new decade for Toronto's biggest alternative design event. In a one-weekend spectacle, 60 artists and designers are given full reign over Toronto's iconic heritage hotel, creating 25 provocative installations.
Staying true to its distinguishing off-the-cuff curatorial process rooted in urgency, risk, discovery and trust, CUTMR 11 encourages exhibitors to bend their disciplinary boundaries. Above all, CUTMR 11 celebrates the surprise of what's revealed in the final moments–the 11th hour–of the creative process.
CUTMR 2014 will include special programming tied to the exhibition. On Saturday, January 25th, the annual Love Design party will attract revelers from across the city to the Gladstone's ballroom, which will feature a one-night-only design installation created specifically for this event by Justin Broadbent. New this year, a comedic affair hosted by Stephen Eyes brings out the lighter side of design and hosts interviews in a playful musical evening event.
CUTMR 11 Participants
A Zero (A0) / Ana Jofre / Andrew Foerster / Bettie Cott + Megan Blake / Bruno Billio + Department of Unusual Certainties / Christine Kim + Vanathy Ganesharajah/ Claire Scherzinger / Collage Collective / currentform / Evelyne Au-Navioz, Rob Giusti, Raymundo Pavan + Nikki Shih / Hilary Hayes + Tim Richards / Jennifer Rong Designs / Justin Broadbent / Kathleen Wicks / KRDW / Natasha Basacchi + Aliya Tejani / Rollout / Jordan Evans, Ryla Jakelski + Evan Jerry with Lois Weinthal (RSID) / Sarah Keenlyside + Nathan Whitford / Shannon Scanlan / Sheridan College Furniture / Sisley Leung / SPAM / Torontonians & Mammalian Diving Reflex / Victoria Taylor & Linda Dervisha / Wayne Muma
CUTMR 11 Curators
Jaclyn Blumas, Robert Cram, Elise Hodson, Britt Welter-Nolan.
Come see what the new generation of CUTMR has created. All will be revealed at the 11th Hour. And, stay tuned for more information about individual artists and their projects.


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Their political fates now entwined, President Barack Obama implored with voters Wednesday to elect Hillary Clinton, appealing to the women, minorities and young people who powered his rise and are now crucial to hers.
Obama told delegates at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia there has never been a man or a woman — "not me, not Bill" — who's more qualified than his former secretary of state to be president of the United States and endorsed her as the woman to finish the job he started eight years ago.
"Nothing truly prepares you for the demands of the Oval Office. Until you've sat at that desk, you don't know what it's like to manage a global crisis, or send young people to war," Obama said. "But Hillary's been in the room and knows what's at stake."
Exactly 12 years to the day after the obscure Senator from Illinois delivered a rousing speech to the Democratic convention, Obama defended his White House legacy and argued that the former secretary of state would be the best choice to bequeath those policies.
Obama cast Clinton as a candidate who believes in the optimism that fuels the nation's democracy and warned against the "deeply pessimistic" vision of Republican Donald Trump.
"America is already great. America is already strong," he declared to cheering delegates Wednesday night at the Democratic convention. "And I promise you, our strength, our greatness, does not depend on Donald Trump."
In addition to party loyalty, a big motivation for Obama's robust support is deep concern that the Republican nominee can win in November and unravel the president's eight years in office.
Obama acknowledged the economic and security anxieties that have helped fuel Trump's rise, but he argued they don't define the country.
"Through every victory and every setback, I've insisted that change is never easy, and never quick; that we wouldn't meet all of our challenges in one term, or one presidency, or even in one lifetime," Obama said, adding that he's "more optimistic of the future of America then ever before."
Wednesday night's Democratic lineup was aimed at emphasizing Clinton's own national security credentials, a shift from two nights focused more on re-introducing her to voters as a champion for women's issues, children and families. Among those were former Pentagon and CIA chief Leon Panetta, who served alongside Clinton in Obama's Cabinet.
Panetta, citing his experience working alongside nine U.S. presidents, said he believes, in this election, Hillary Clinton "is the only candidate that has the experience, judgment and temperament to be Commander in Chief."
Obama, too, was vouching for Clinton's national security experience, recalling their work together during trying times and saying she won't relent until ISIL is destroyed.
"And she'll do it without resorting to torture, or banning entire religions from entering our country," Obama said.
Touting Clinton's experience and judgment, Obama's speech was a direct rebuttal to Trump's attacks on Clinton at last week's Republican convention in Cleveland, when he claimed her tenure as secretary of state was marked by "death, destruction and weakness."
In a statement, Trump's campaign called the Democratic Party "disconnected from what's happening in our world," and said Democrats described a vision of America that "doesn't exist for most Americans."
"They resorted to the politics of fear, trying to convince Americans not to vote for change — they spoke on behalf of the big banks and the big elites, not on behalf of suffering Americans," Trump's campaign said.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.


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Roger Ebert writes that, "Hitchcock deliberately wanted Psycho to look like a cheap exploitation film. He shot it not with his usual expensive feature crew (which had just finished North by Northwest) but with the crew he used for his television show." Subsequently, Psycho feels like the best episode of The Twilight Zone ever, and seeing it projected like I did last night effectively cranks the thrill-o-meter up to 11. It's a creepy, entertaining movie that isn't nearly as much fun on TV as it is in a theatre.
Things that make it work — #1: The performance from Anthony Perkins as a shy, seemingly-harmless but kind of odd motel manager. I've met people like this and Perkins plays it convincingly. #2: The famous shower scene where Janet Leigh is murdered. Everyone in the theatre knew it was coming and it still made everyone jump. It's unexpected. #3: The sudden, deafening soundtrack that cues each murder scene. From Wikipedia: "The soundtrack of screeching violins, violas, and cellos was an original all-strings piece by composer Bernard Herrmann entitled 'The Murder.' Hitchcock originally wanted the sequence (and all motel scenes) to play without music, but Herrmann begged him to try it with the cue he had composed. Afterwards, Hitchcock agreed that it vastly intensified the scene, and he nearly doubled Herrmann's salary." My only complaint is the basement scene near the end of the movie that should have been the big, shocking reveal but turns into a laugh-out-loud joke because somebody is wearing a dress and it just looks silly. Psycho does have its dated qualities (especially in that basement scene), but it's one of Hitchcock's most exciting movies. It definitely stands out from the rest of his work.


text:
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text:
Home : Heather Grey Infant Full Zip Hooded Sweatshirt
Personalized Infant Full Zip Hooded Sweatshirt. 7.5 oz., 60/40 cotton/polyester. Jersey-lined double-needle stitched hood. Coverstitched shoulders, armholes, rib waistband and cuffs. Pouch pockets
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text:
After listening to recovery workers at ground zero and downtown residents emotionally describe how they had been ignored and insulted as they sought help for health problems after the Sept. 11 attack, members of a congressional subcommittee on Friday roundly criticized the federal response and called for sharply increased medical spending.
Subcommittee members, joined by Democrat senators Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer, accused the Bush administration of ignoring the health problems that arose among workers who toiled at ground zero and the claims of downtown residents who say they were also sickened by the dust.
The subcommittee hearing, the fourth to be held since the attack, came amid rising concern about the long-term health effects on about 40,000 workers and volunteers who were exposed to toxic smoke and dust. The subcommittee is examining the way the limited federal funding has been used to address the health problems and is to look for ways to better coordinate those efforts.
Republican Representative Vito Fossella criticized the government for not having done even basic work to record how many people participated in the cleanup and recovery operations.
Schumer said that the US$55 million in federal funds set aside for medical treatment of rescue and recovery workers was inadequate.
Steven Centore, 49, was a team leader at ground zero for the Department of Energy's radiological assistance program. He said he is now suffering from respiratory, circulatory and gastrointestinal problems. His liver is failing and he now walks with a cane.
Centore says he struggled with the federal workers' compensation system and has received no financial help from it.
"I feel like it's a contest to see if they're going to give in first or I'm going to die first," he said.
The federal government -- especially the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and its former administrator, Christine Todd Whitman -- have been accused of falsely stating, in the first days after the attack, that the air downtown had been safe to breathe.
At an appearance on Friday in Harlem, Clinton said she felt that Whitman and her agency had "deliberately misled people" into thinking it was safe to return to Lower Manhattan.
A report by the Inspector General's office in 2003 found that the EPA went beyond what it knew in making general statements about the safety of the air downtown after the attack. It also found that the White House had at least indirectly influenced the wording of some statements by removing cautionary language.
Whitman had defended herself shortly after the release of that report, saying that her statements reflected what was known at the time and applied to areas outside ground zero.
The health of downtown residents has not been as well studied as that of ground zero workers, but limited medical surveys indicate that many residents developed respiratory problems after the attacks.
More than 100 residents gathered Thursday night at St. Paul's Chapel to demand screening and medical treatment.
A bill was introduced at Friday's hearing that would make any rescue and recovery workers -- as well as downtown residents and sickened schoolchildren -- eligible for treatment under the Medicare program.
Democratic Representative Carolyn Maloney from New York introduced a bill that would reopen the Sept. 11 Victim Compensation Fund to make assistance available to those who are ill.


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Team Fortress 2 is getting some updates for Halloween: Objects, items, hats, you know the deal. It's also, though, got something a little more exciting: a new Team Fortress 2 comic.
One that tells the tale of how the Demo lost his eye. And how cute a Saxton Hale costume looks on a little fat kid. And how a kid can dress up as France and somehow get away with it.
You can read the comic below. For more info on the items being released for Halloween, head here.
Scream Fortress [Team Fortress 2]
You can contact Luke Plunkett, the author of this post, at firstname.lastname@example.com. You can also find him on Twitter, Facebook, and lurking around our #tips page.


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Controversy over the price of Gilead's hepatitis C (HCV) drug Sovaldi (sofosbuvir) continues. On Aug. 13, ACT UP New York (ACT UP NY) sent a letter to the U.S. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-OR), demanding a 90% reduction in the price of Sovaldi and outlining two ways in which the government could "break Gilead's monopoly" on the potent treatment.
The letter follows the Finance Committee's own letter to Gilead CEO John C. Martin questioning the ethics of the pricing and informing Martin of an investigation into the matter. ACT UP NY applauded the committee for launching the Senate investigation, and also commended House member Henry Waxman (D-CA) for initiating a similar probe.
ACT UP, founded in 1987 when the death toll from AIDS was devastating in the U.S., has brought new meaning to the word "activism" throughout its history, staging protests such as shutting down the New York Stock Exchange and placing an inflatable condom on conservative Senator Jesse Helms' house.
The high rate of HIV and HCV coinfection raises ACT UP NY's interest in fighting the cost of Sovaldi, which it believes will benefit all people living with HCV, estimated at three to four million in the U.S.
According to ACT UP NY member Luis Santiago, "The fact that Gilead Sciences Inc. now controls the main drugs for treating both HIV and HCV, made it clear to us that it was within our goals to address the issue of Sovaldi's price and any additional barrier for people with or without HIV to access this breakthrough treatment."
ACT UP NY activist Timothy Lunceford says that ACT UP NY will be reaching out to American Liver Foundation and the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases to work together on advocacy efforts.
The Ethics of Pricing
The ACT UP NY letter cites a study presented at the recent International AIDS Conference in Melbourne, Australia, which found that "the predicted minimum production cost is estimated at approximately $102" for a 12-week course of Sovaldi, which currently costs $84,000. For some -- especially those coinfected with HIV -- 24 weeks of treatment is necessary, doubling a price that is already, the group asserts, "simply unacceptable."
As the first HCV cure that doesn't require interferon, sofosbuvir was granted "breakthrough therapy" status by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and approved on an expedited basis. Thousands die from HCV every year, and many advocates and clinicians believe that if Sovaldi were priced low enough to be taken by more people, it could be the best chance for ending the epidemic. The letter notes, "In order to end the hepatitis C epidemic as soon as possible, we need a significant drop in the price of Sovaldi, to make it available to all Americans who need it. What good is a cure that costs $102 to produce if it takes decades to implement nationwide due to high prices?"
Two Paths to Access
Laid out clearly in ACT UP NY's letter are two ways the federal government could step in and help: a patent buyout and a patent waiver.
With a patent buyout, the government would negotiate from the standpoint that the patent for sofosbuvir would be "more valuable to society if the product were available at a reasonable price." All stakeholders, including Gilead, would negotiate a reasonable price for the buyout.
If a patent buyout turned out to be impossible to negotiate, the government could then waive the patent and have the drug made and sold at a lower price. The letter cites a precedent for such a patent waiver: in 2001, when anthrax attacks brought about a threat to seek a waiver of the patent for the antibiotic Cipro (ciprofloxacin). In that case, Bayer, Cipro's manufacturer, agreed to lower the price and a waiver wasn't pursued.
Sue Saltmarsh has worked in the HIV/AIDS field for over 20 years, the first 10 as an herbalist and energy therapist at Project Vida, the last six as a writer and copy editor for Positively Aware magazine. She is now a freelance writer and editor and is also able to devote more time to her passion as founder and director of the Drive for Universal Healthcare (DUH).


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BSB, derived from the structure of Congo Red, is shown to bind to a wide range of amyloid inclusions in situ. More importantly it is also used to label brain amyloids in live animals. BSB recognizes amyloid lesions, and has distinctive properties which allow the quantitative monitoring of the formation of amyloid fibrils assembled from the Ab peptide, a-synuclein and tau. It is a cell-permeable fluorescent probe that specifically binds to and labels intracellular b-amyloid aggregates both in vitro (Ki = 400 nM) and in vivo. It is also used as an antemortem diagnostic tool for animal models of Alzheimers disease.
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text:
Aging Is an Attitude:
Positive Ways to Look at Getting Older
(Rate Now)
Format: Trade Paperback
Pub. Date: Mar. 15, 2005
Positive Ways to Look at Getting Older
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Format: Trade Paperback
Pub. Date: Mar. 15, 2005
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Aging Is an Attitude explores the purpose of aging. What does God have for us in allowing us to get older? Surely, there is more to look forward to than death. Those of us who survive into the older years no longer focus on productivity or making more money. We're now free to discover that God has distinctive lessons for us to learn and to share with the younger generation.
Aging Is an Attitude is an inspirational book designed to strengthen and encourage those who face their own aging, especially baby boomers as they creep into their 60s. In a society that tends to deny aging and find ways to retard the process, Cecil hopes that this book will help the aging realize they are still useful and have wisdom to offer those who are younger.
Aging Is an Attitude is also a book about Cecil Murphey's personal journey as he has struggled with his fears, anxieties, and questions of aging, and learns to joyfully embrace the last third of life as an adventure. Cecil interviewed more than 100 people who were at least 45 years old. "What do you see as the most positive thing about aging?" he asked.
Aging Is an Attitude is an informative book that offers practical advice and encouragement to allay their fears as one becomes labeled "senior citizens." The more readily they can accept themselves, the more helpful they can be to teach and encourage others.
Although he had expected little positive response, every person he asked spoke optimistically about life in the present. He quotes many of them in the book.
Meet the Authors
Cecil ("Cec") Murphey served as a missionary in Kenya, East Africa, for six years, and was a pastor in the Atlanta area for fourteen years. He taught part time in a Bible College for 18 years.
Cec has written, co-written, or ghostwritten more than 90 books. Perhaps his best-known work of co-authorship is 90 Minutes in Heaven: A True Story of Death and Life with Don Piper. His Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story, written for Dr. Ben Carson (Zondervan, Review and Herald, HarperCollins) has sold nearly two million copies. Rebel with a Cause, Murphey's ghosted autobiography of Franklin Graham won a Gold Medallion Award. His other title with AMG Publishers, Committed, but Flawed deals with spiritual growth. He is a panelist for TheWritersView.com and writes a weekly on-line column for the ChristianWritersGroup.org.
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from The Age (Australia) / Stephanie Bunbury
In an extraordinary turn as France's "little sparrow", Marion Cotillard's Edith Piaf is almost better than the original, writes Stephanie Bunbury.
All the time she was shooting La Vie en Rose, says Marion Cotillard, she barely slept at night. Edith Piaf, the peerless French chanteuse whose life was being brought to the screen, had always slept badly. Now she did the same. "One hour, two – three was huge!" she recalls in her careful, glamorously accented English. "And, after two weeks, I started to be afraid because that never happens to me before. I can sleep 10 hours without waking up. Really!"
So: no sleep. That was the deal. Cotillard, at 31 one of life's instinctual hard workers, was not about to betray the role by succumbing to the lure of sleeping pills.
"So I just decided to be focused on everything I was doing, especially when I was cutting things to prepare the dinner or climbing the stairs. My nerves were telling me I was not tired, but you have to be tired when you don't sleep. So all I could do was be careful. It was my reality."
It continued to be her reality, she says, for four and a half months.
Cotillard's performance as Piaf has been lauded as the best on screen this year – one of the best, perhaps, in any year – even by critics who didn't like the film itself. Olivier Dahan, the director, clearly wanted to avoid the leaden plod of the average biopic. Instead, he jumps about Piaf's life like the little sparrow that was her namesake, alighting alternately on her appallingly deprived childhood, her early youth singing and drinking on the streets of Paris, her feted career, her mid-life degeneration and her premature old age. Nothing, complain the naysayers, gets a chance to develop. Piaf's daughter, for example, flashes past as a deathbed recollection; she is born and dies within just a few moments.
Cotillard, however, manages to give even the tiniest moment in La Vie en Rose a sense of depth. Piaf was, she says, a very powerful personality; she, in turn, is such a powerful presence on screen that she temporarily eclipses the original.
"The first and only thing Olivier told me," she says, "was that he wanted to see me in there. Because we all knew I couldn't disappear."
Not long after seeing La Vie En Rose, I went into a Parisian music shop with, inevitably, shelves full of Piaf recordings. The cover pictures seemed to show an impostor: someone who looked very like Piaf, but not quite.
Of course, this resemblance was meticulously constructed. Cotillard is beautiful, fresh, radiant: in short, nothing like Piaf. They shaved her hair back to create Piaf's high forehead. Her eyebrows also were shaved off and redrawn as fake lines, a la Piaf. Make-up for the older Piaf – she died at 47, but was so ravaged by successive addictions that she looked at least 30 years older – took between three and six hours.
Cotillard actually enjoyed those sessions, she says, because her perpetual exhaustion meant she always slept while the make-up artists pleated in the wrinkles. Although, she adds, the fumes from the latex and glue on her face did give her some extraordinary nightmares.
The film's great trick, however, was to make Cotillard look about a foot shorter. Piaf was tiny – only four foot eight – while Cotillard is tall and gangling; as we talk, she periodically rearranges her long limbs along the couch. So she worked in bare feet while everyone else wore stacked shoes; and they built oversized tables and chairs designed to dwarf her. Her short-waisted dresses gave her the proportions of a much smaller woman.
"And I contracted my body somehow," she shrugs, "to make small."
When it came to evoking Piaf as a person, however, she didn't want to use any tricks at all. When Dahan approached her, all Cotillard knew about the life and times of Piaf were a couple of signature tunes, the fact that she wore black on stage "and had a body language very specific". She proceeded to watch all the available footage, both of performances and interviews, and to read biographies. But she didn't do anything towards mastering that specific body language. She didn't practise Piaf's speaking voice. As for the songs, she didn't even consider singing them. The last thing she wanted to do, she says, was try to imitate the real Piaf.
"Because there is no life in imitation," she says. "You become a mimic and the emotions are gone; to imitate someone, I don't think you have to understand the inside of the person and I really wanted to do that. Because it is a role also. You have to consider it as a role because it is."
So she just read, watched, absorbed and had faith that when she started filming – Dahan did not want even to rehearse – a character called Edith Piaf would emerge from within.
"I felt that the combination of all the images in the footage I watched for three months and my journey inside, I would say, would create something on the set. And some really little things during my preparation revealed to me that this was possible."
One day, for example, a friend came to have lunch with her while she was working with her acting coach. "I was eating and he said, 'Do you see how you behave?' And I realised this was not my behaviour. I was not eating my way."
Later on, momentarily afraid that her approach would not work, she simply read one of Piaf's songs to herself. "Just to hear if something was happening. And it was." What was? "I didn't hear my voice in my head; I started hearing something that was close to what I wanted to do."
Anyway, she laughs, if you did try to imitate Piaf, she would surely come after you. "She would say, 'What are you doing?'."
As the film shows, Piaf was not an easy character: demanding, duplicitous and often drunk, racked by the pain of arthritis and then by addiction to the morphine that relieved it, she was a brilliant tyrant. Cotillard lived with that presence around the clock.
"During the shooting I was never alone. Really! But you just have to be aware that someone is with you. I knew that when I was home, I was not totally me. I knew my humour was not mine. I knew the way I was walking was not mine. But because I knew it, it was not dangerous."
And if Piaf could behave abominably, Cotillard felt she understood why. Her mother left her with her own mother, a decrepit old woman living in filth, while she walked the streets. Her father, returning from the front after World War I, snatched her away only to dump her with an aunt who ran a brothel while he rejoined his circus.
"When you are abandoned by two parents as a baby – wow, that is something to live with. I think the origin of that tyrannical side of her was her huge fear of being alone. She was so afraid of that. I know because people who knew her told me. And because she was very smart, because she had that power she had, sometimes she used it to keep people around her."
Cotillard also began performing when was very young; her parents are both actors and she first appeared on stage as a child in one of her father's plays. She never seriously considered any other career.
Her first big break came when she was cast in Luc Besson's Taxi series. A star in France, she has worked three times in English – in Tim Burton's Big Fish, Abel Ferrara's Mary and opposite Russell Crowe in Ridley Scott's A Good Year (2006).
"He was absolutely not difficult!" she assures me. "He was the nicest guy. Really! Sometimes he was like a big kid, trying to make everybody happy."
What she has in common with Piaf, however, is her passion for work.
"The passion of sharing emotions and telling stories about two people. More than a passion, a necessity. But, if I'm not able to go on stage because I have a car accident, I won't be taking morphine."
That, she feels, was a symptom of Piaf's fear of failure. Not as a performer: she was quite prepared to go on stage and collapse after one or two songs.
"But she did the show. That was important for her. She was so afraid of something she had to hide by being on stage. That is my point of view about her. But my failure, I want to face it, even if I am afraid."
There is not much that could frighten her, at least professionally, after La Vie En Rose.
"I discovered many things about my capacities by doing this role," she says. "When I started work on the project, I thought no one person could do all this. But I knew one thing about myself: that I can work hard. I was afraid but I knew that, with work, I could do something. And I discovered a way to abandon myself that I didn't know. I discovered that work is not enough. You have to find the place where you abandon everything of yourself. Then you can let something else happen."


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The Communication Department provides courses of instruction in the areas of Broadcast Journalism, Foreign Language, Photojournalism, Public Relations, Speech Communication, and Radio, Television and Film. The objectives and primary purposes of the department include:
1.) providing students who plan to major in one of the communication study areas a current curriculum that is transferable to a four-year university for completion of a baccalaureate degree;
2.) providing students majoring in other disciplines an opportunity to satisfy the communication course requirements for their degrees; and
3.) providing interested persons knowledge and application of various communication skills.
The Communication Department is committed to standards of excellence in instruction and fostering a learning environment conducive to the student's pursuit of individual educational interest.
Departmental chairperson is Charlie Ehrenfeld, Assistant Professor of Journalism.
READ the November 25 edition of the Plainsman Press.
Speech Communication
SPCH 1311 - Introduction to Speech Communication
This course is a beginning course in speech communication which clarifies general principles of communication common to all settings. The course applies communication concepts and skills improvements to interpersonal and public speaking settings. Semester Hours: 3 Lecture Hours: 3 Lab Hours (Theory based)
Course Content: The Nature of Communication, Perception, Self-Awareness and Self-Concept, Interpersonal Relationships, Developing Relationships, Group & Team Communication, Topic Selection and Audience Analysis, Communication Apprehension and Speaker Credibility, Organization, Visual Aids, and Delivery of a Presentation
Assignments will include 2 Major Presentations, Exams and Written Assignments exploring Intrapersonal and Interpersonal Communication and Public Speaking.
SPCH 1315 - Public Speaking
Research, composition, organization, and delivery of speeches for various purposes and occasions with emphasis on listener analysis and informative and persuasive techniques. Semester Hours: 3 Lecture Hours: 3 Lab Hours (Performance based)
Course Content: Communication Process/Elements, Levels of Communication, Formats of Public Speaking(manuscript,memorized,extemporaneous,impromptu), Audience/Occasion Analysis, Topic Selection, Research/Source Citing, Sensory Aids, Delivery – Verbal,Vocal and Nonverbal Improvement, Listening, Communication Apprehension, Informative Presentations, Persuasive Presentations, Special Occasion Presentations, Small Group Communication/Team Presentations
Assignments will include 5 Major Presentations, Outlines, Peer and Self Critiques and Exams.
SPCH 1321 - Business and Professional Speech
This course includes the basic principles of speech applied to communications in business and professional settings. The course emphasizes practice in the construction and delivery of various types of speaking situations and the application of interpersonal skills that occur in a business, organizational, or professional setting. Semester Hours: 3 Lecture Hours: 3 Lab Hours: (Writing based) This course is a junior level course on the University level, but it will transfer only as freshman or sophomore level credit.
Course Content: Communication Process, Communication Systems and Cultures, Verbal/Non Verbal Communication, Listening, Interviewing Process, Small Group Communication, Public Speaking
Assignments will include a Communication Analysis Project, Career Focused, Information Gathering Interview, Cover Letter & Resume, Individual Presentations, Group Presentation, and exams.
Foreign Language
For the first time, South Plains College offers online Spanish courses beginning in January 2019. For more information on Foreign Language Program, please click here.


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God constructed the lotus with the most advanced nanotechnology imaginable.
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Answers in Genesis is an apologetics ministry, dedicated to helping Christians defend their faith and proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ.


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The nation paused Tuesday for the 11th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, marking the occasion with services that were more modest than years past, a reflection of time's passing and the continued need to reflect and heal.
New York's ceremony was held at the National September 11 Memorial, in the shadow of One World Trade Center, which will open in 2014 at 104 stories tall. The somber ritual remained largely the same, with victims' families reading the names of the nearly 3,000 victims. They stopped for moments of silence at the times when airliners struck the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and crashed into a field in western Pennsylvania, and when the towers collapsed.
The one big change was the exclusion of speeches from elected officials in a politically charged year.
U.S. & World
In Washington, President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama gathered on the White House lawn for a moment of silence. Later, at the Pentagon Memorial, the president said America remains stronger because of the attacks.
"As painful as this day is and always will be, it leaves us with a lesson, that no single event can ever destroy who we are, no act of terrorism can change what we stand for," Obama said.
He added, "that's the commitment that we reaffirm today. That's why, when the history books are rewritten, the legacy of 9/11 will be not hate or division but a safe world, and people united more than ever before."
He mentioned the killing of Osama bin Laden and other al Qaida leaders, as well as the end of the war in Iraq and the ongoing withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan.
He also acknowledged the abiding grief of victims' families.
"No matter how many years pass, no matter how many times we come together on this hallowed ground, know this: that you will never be alone, that your loved ones will never be forgotten."
Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Scaled-down services at the Washington National Memorial replaced the larger commemorations of prior anniversaries. Around downtown Washington, meanwhile, hundreds of volunteers took part in a "day of service and remembrance."
Following his remarks at the Pentagon, President Obama headed to Arlington National Cemetery, where he and the First Lady walked among graves marking recent war dead, the Associated Press reported. They stopped at a headstone that honors 10 members of the military and Drug Enforcement Administration who were killed in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan in 2009, according to NBC News.
The president planned to visit Walter Reed National Military Medical Center to visit wounded service members.
Both Obama and his Republican opponent, Mitt Romney, lifted their negative advertising on Tuesday and refrained from any overt political statements.
Romney marked the anniversary with a speech to the National Guard Association Conference in Nevada, in which he praised service members who have fought in the two wars sparked by 9/11, and those who killed Osama bin Laden.
He called for renewed investment in the military, and better care and support for returning veterans.
"We will not forget why they are fighting or who they are fighting for," Romney said.
In Shanksville, Pa., Vice President Joe Biden and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar visited the Flight 93 National Memorial, where the last hijacked plan crashed after the terrorists were overrun by passengers. The service included a moment of silence and the reading of the victims' names.
Biden described the passengers' actions as the embodiment of heroism: "individual acts of heroism by ordinary people in moments that could have been contemplated."
He went on: "Like all the families, we wish we weren't here. We wish we didn't have to be here. It's a bittersweet moment for the entire nation, particularly for those family members gathered here today."
The 11th anniversary brought renewed focus on the delayed development of memorials in New York and Shanksville.
Construction of a $1 billion museum at the World Trade Center site stalled for months as public officials fought over how to finance it. Late on Monday, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that he, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey had reached an agreement to restart work.
In Shanksville, officials said they needed another $5 million to complete a learning center, visitors center and a Tower of Voices to honor the 40 victims who died there.
Salazar vowed that the project would be completed.
"We are getting close, we will get it done," he said.
The 11th anniversary arrived amid lingering concerns about the health of emergency workers who breathed toxic fumes and dust at the attack sites.
Some estimates put the number of illness-related deaths at over 1,000. Tens of thousands more are being treated for various ailments. New York City firefighters are among those suffering the worst; the Fire Department continues to add names to its roster of 9/11 dead. Police officers and other workers have died of cancer in recent weeks.
The debate over how to distribute $2.7 billion in federal victim compensation funds continues as well. The list of cancers covered in the funding law keeps gets longer; 14 new types were added on Monday.


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|Land Matters Discussion Area Discussion Relating to Your Land/Legislative Issues
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But do they cough up $$$ for projects we would like to accomplish? I am thinking BFG might be the closest to this...with their efforts to recognize great trails in the US. Naches Trail, the Crushers in TSF...pretty sure some money was donated to help preserve these. How much did PNW4WDA get towards the Naches? How much did Raven Offroad Club get to maintain the Crushers?
I am not upset...just having a conversation with ya Jim
Bryan Peterson | WOHVA | PNWJeep | Eldorado Dust Devils
www.orba.biz Look at who is and isn't (Warn) part of this group.
Dave Walters
Tri-Cities Peak Putters
Land Use Coordinator
WOHVA Board member
It's a Scout thing
ARB is currently not under such a contract.
The auto (jeep) dealerships are also not under any such contract.
I do know all of the auto suppliers mentioned are in a bigtime hurt. Currently it is very difficult to get donations of any kind from them.
BFG donated $3500 to the PNW4WDA for continueing work towards the betterment of the Naches Pass Trail. This years work on that trail will be reimbursed (by PNW4WDA)for money spent.
All of these company's budget for their promo's/events in either late Oct. or early Nov. After then they do have some ability to react to some additions and donations. All of the company's mentioned have event/donation planners and as such there is a method to address them. Generally speaking you need to meet their criteria to get donations. What will their benifit be? Size does matter.
Bryan Peterson | WOHVA | PNWJeep | Eldorado Dust Devils
Warn, ARB, Roberts Motors, Auto Nation, to name a few all helped with those endeavors. So to speak some of that found it's way into the trail system. We(the Jamboree) have also educated a lot of wheelers with the continued efforts of our sponsors.
Although not money directly on the ground the effort by them has an effect.
Please note that I have not accounted for the money raised going back into the PNW4WDA. For instance 30% of our profit goes into the scholarship fund. Other monies are utilized for money on the ground.
Last edited by Merrick Graves; 07-17-2009 at 02:12 PM.
I also think that if you look at vendors such as Yukon, SkyJacker, the tire complanies etc....very few really have grant programs. Maybe it is something that can be suggested to them in writing.
I can tell you that a lot of the 4x4 companies that were listed in the SEMA book in 2007 are no longer in business. Money is fairly tight and not being spent on rigs at the moment and those companies have felt the pinch.
I do know from my letter writing campaigns for Creek and Trail as well as Winter Convention that donations are down significantly since 2005. I used to get anywhere up to 120-150 good raffle prizes since then it has been T shirts, hats and frisbees.
The BOD is also looking at ways to promote sponsorship that would entail selling advertising in TriPower, the website and the Trailer as well as donations to PNW that can be used for Trail Jam and Winter Convention. Hopefully we can get this solidified at the Sept meeting.
Beth Ayer
Wolf Pack 4x4
The ox is slow but the earth is patient
It is important to remember that we can get a dollar from a hundred people easier than we can get a hundred dollars from one. We must also remember that a dollar saved is a dollar earned. Because advertising dollars are short these days, companies are often more willing to provide in-kind services in exchange for free advertising.
Let me give you a few examples of what our club does to get in-kind services in exchange for advertising:
R&P Parts pays for our website each year in exchange for a link to their website and an ad in our newsletter. Our website has been key to the growth of our club and our events. Money saved.
Truck Toys has paid for the printing of our newsletter in exchange for a large monthly ad in the newsletter. They have also included our name and events in their commercials. They have provided the PA system and cones with their logo for our Groundhog Competition. This provides us with free services and supplies while providing them with advertising. Money saved.
Warn Industries have provided us with key advice. We don't ask them for product, but turn to them for feedback and ideas. In exchange, we hand out their stickers and hats.
Of course we also have 4x4 companies who provide us with product for prizes, such as 4 Wheel Drive Hardware and Tom Woods Drive Shafts in exchange for links on our website and advertisements on our posters.
High Desert 4x4 often provides printing expenses for our club.
All of these 4x4 companies provide us with exposure and saved expenses, allowing us to grow our club, grow our community exposure and use our club money for trail expenses.
But we must think beyond the 4x4 box in order to save money. The more money we can save on expenses, the more money we will have to spend on trails. Here are a few examples:
Alpine Glass and Bend Engraving provide the trophies for Groundhog each year in exchange for advertising. JP & Sons Construction often provides signs for our events and provides kiosk construction at trailheads. ArmorDillo Powder Coating provided gift certificates for prizes. Our local TV and radio stations provide PSA announcements for our community events. Hardy's Hot Wings and Pilot Butte Drive Inn host show 'n' shines each year in their parking lots. They put up our name in their restaurants giving us free exposure.
A few years ago, our Trails Development Committee prepared a 100-page report on the lack of trails in our area. This report was sent to the local forest service and the Governor of Oregon and about 250 people in between. A local printing company, Lazerquik, provided the printing at cost.
Rainbow Threads is a local embroidery company who gives us a good deal on embroidered hats and coats. We include an ad for them on our newsletter. Bend Communications is a CB repair shop that gives club members a good deal. We also include an ad for them in the newsletter.
United Rentals often provides us with equipment at significantly reduced rates. We include their logo on our posters.
None of these companies are directly affiliated with the sport of 4-wheeling, but each provide us with important in-kind services so that we can use our money elsewhere.
The best way to grow our money for trails is to grow our club and grow our community influence. Deschutes County 4-Wheelers host a huge annual forest clean up each spring that has become well know in Central Oregon. When we approach a business for services or donations, we often hear, "Oh, you are the ones who clean up the forest every year." They know us and therefore trust us.
We also participate in as many Forest Service community events as we can such as the annual Sportsman Show and the Education Fair. We get free booth space to advertise our club and sport and get free access to members of the community who we ordinarily would not see.
Our club has grown tenfold in the last couple of years. More members mean more money. We have become a know entity in Central Oregon and have much more influence with the Forest Service and BLM. This influence with the governing agencies and community has allowed us to develop more trails than we could have ever imagined.
So we must think outside the 4x4 box and find ways to save money, promote our clubs, and bring more awareness to our sport. This will allow us to use the money that we do have to put towards trails.
If anyone has any more ideas on how we can stretch our trail dollars by getting services instead of direct money donations, please post up. We can always use more ideas.
Patti Pyland
Deschutes County 4-Wheelers
Oregon Executive Director Staff
PNW Forum Leader Team Member
Region 6 Delegate
Bend, Oregon
patti, may I borrow your post and put it over on our site? Lots of good stuff in there!
Dave Walters
Tri-Cities Peak Putters
Land Use Coordinator
WOHVA Board member
It's a Scout thing
You bet!! And we welcome your ideas also.
Patti Pyland
Deschutes County 4-Wheelers
Oregon Executive Director Staff
PNW Forum Leader Team Member
Region 6 Delegate
Bend, Oregon
Thanks, Patti! You're welcome to come to our site to look around any time!!
Dave Walters
Tri-Cities Peak Putters
Land Use Coordinator
WOHVA Board member
It's a Scout thing
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The committee is constituted of Ministers of various departments namely Water Resources, Agriculture, Water supply and Sanitation, Finance, Industry and chaired by the Water Resources Minister of Maharashtra. During the 8 years of its operation, the committee diverted large quantities of water from irrigation purposes to the proposed thermal power plants, depriving farmland from irrigation. As the minutes of all meetings were not accessible, the list may not be exhaustive. The minutes are sorted out as those which had decisions regarding Vidarbha and those which had decisions about the rest of Maharashtra for convenience.
High powered committee meeting Minutes - Rest of Maharashtra diversions
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