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Willow Falls, Mesa Cortina Trailhead, Summit County - Eagle County - Clear Creek County, Colorado
Willow Falls - 8.7 miles
Mesa Cortina Trailhead
|Round-Trip Length:
|8.7 miles
|Start-End Elevation:
|9,237' - 10,020' (10,042' max elevation)
|Elevation Change:
|+783' net elevation gain (+1,374' total roundtrip elevation gain)
|Skill Level:
|Dogs Allowed:
|Bikes Allowed:
|Horses Allowed:
|Related Trails:
Willow Falls - 8.7 Miles Round-Trip
Willow Falls is located along South Willow Creek, just west of Silverthorne, CO in the Eagles Nest Wilderness. South Willow Creek forms on the slopes connecting Eccles Pass and Red Buffalo Pass, flowing east through a narrow gap between Buffalo Mountain's steep north flank, and Red Peak's long east ridge.
This tiered cascade is tucked in a thick pine forest just off the Gore Range Trail; the upper fills a shallow pool, and the lower drops through a granite chute and expands in a meadow below Buffalo Mountain.
The following route connects the Mesa Cortina and Gore Range trails, a versatile 3-4 season route. Mild grades and good trail conditions are suitable for families, backpackers, runners and winter recreation:
The Mesa Cortina Trail heads north through aspen - sage flats framed by Buffalo Mountain (12,777') and Red Peak (13,189') to the west, and Ptarmigan Peak (12,498') and the Williams Fork Mountains (east).It steepens past the Eagles Nest Wilderness Boundary (.77 miles : 9,235') in a busy forest floor of yellow arnica, fireweed and deadfall.
The trail dips across a tributary and veers left past a marked spur with no public access (2.25 miles : 9,433'). Here the Mesa Cortina Trail is joined by another unmarked trail that begins in downtown Silverthorne.
It continues on mild grades to South Willow Creek, just over which is the Gore Range Trail junction (2.75 miles : 9,425'). Bear left (west) on the GRT.
The GRT winds up the north bank of South Willow Creek through expanding glades and a string of larger marshes and ponds hidden between the trail and creek. Look for moose in this area.
The path grows rugged and narrows into the slot between Buffalo Mountain and Red Peak's east ridge, climbing steadily to the Buffalo Cabin Connector Trail split (3.85 miles : 9,640').
It continues west on a steeper grade to the Willow Falls Trail split (4.3 miles : 10,035'), which branches left on an unmaintained but clear path to rock slabs bisecting the falls (4.35 miles : 10,020).
The midsection of Willow Falls are easy to cross, and social trails run up and down either side. Those with time should consider continuing on to Red Buffalo Pass, an additional 3.25 miles from the falls.
Interactive GPS Topo MapKey GPS Coordinates - DATUM WGS84
- N39 37.446 W106 04.923 — Mesa Cortina Trailhead
- N39 37.780 W106 05.217 — .5 miles : Mild travel thru aspen stands and sage fields
- N39 37.868 W106 05.458 — .78 miles : Eagles Nest Wilderness Boundary
- N39 37.898 W106 05.656 — 1.0 miles : Steep climb into thick forest
- N39 37.897 W106 06.183 — 1.5 miles : Grade moderates on northwest heading
- N39 38.225 W106 06.087 — 2.0 miles : Gradual descent to cross small creek
- N39 38.377 W106 06.196 — 2.25 miles : X creek and bear left to remain on trail
- N39 38.233 W106 06.732 — 2.75 miles : Mesa Cortina - Gore Range Trail junction
- N39 37.957 W106 07.328 — 3.5 miles : Level travel beside South Willow Creek
- N39 37.947 W106 07.656 — 3.85 miles : Buffalo Cabin Connector Trail junction
- N39 37.814 W106 08.169 — 4.3 miles : Willow Falls Trail split
- N39 37.760 W106 08.219 — 4.35 miles : Willow Falls
Worth Noting
- Mild grades and good trail conditions are well suited for families, runners and winter recreation.
- There are many unmaintained but frequently used backcountry campsites between the Mesa Cortina Trailhead and Willow Falls area. Camping terrain is notably good west of the Gore Range Trail junction and along South Willow Creek.
- Moose inhabit this part of the Eagles Nest Wilderness Area. If you see one, allow it plenty of space and enjoy the sighting from a distance.
Camping and Backpacking Information
- Dispersed backcountry camping is permitted in the Eagles Nest Wilderness Area. No permit is necessary. Camping is prohibited within 100' of any lake or stream. Group size is limited to 15 individuals.
- Campfires are permitted for dispersed camping in the backcountry, with potential seasonal restrictions. Campfires are not permitted above or within .25 miles (440 yards) of treeline, or within 100' of any lake or stream in the Eagles Nest Wilderness Area.
- Contact the Dillon Ranger District (970.468.5400) for the latest on weather, trail conditions and trail-specific usage guidelines when planning your trip. The office is open M - F from 8am - 4pm.
- For those not wishing to camp in the backcountry, there are several developed campgrounds within the White River National Forest. Contact the Dillon Ranger District for information on these sites.
Fishing Information
- Fishing is permitted with a valid Colorado fishing license.
Rules and Regulations
- Dogs are permitted on the Mesa Cortina Trail, Gore Range Trail and within the Eagles Nest Wilderness Area. Dogs must be on a leash no longer than 6'.
- Horses are permitted on the Mesa Cortina Trail and Gore Range Trail.
- Bikes and motorized vehicles are not permitted on the Mesa Cortina Trail or Gore Range Trail.
Directions to Trailhead
Willow Falls are located within the Eagles Nest Wilderness Area and Dillon Ranger District of the White River National Forest. The Mesa Cortina Trailhead is located 1.6 miles west of Silverthorne, Colorado on Aspen Drive.
From I-70, exit #205 at Silverthorne and head north on HWY 9 to the first traffic light, which is Wildernest Road. Turn left on Wildernest Road and travel .15 miles to Adams Drive.
Make a right on Adams Drive, then an immediate left on Buffalo Mountain Drive. Continue .8 miles to Lakeview Drive. Make a right on Lakeview Drive and travel .5 miles until it makes a sharp left onto Aspen Drive.
The Mesa Cortina Trailhead is located .1 miles on the right (north) side of the road on Aspen Drive. Note that Aspen Drive becomes Royal Redbird Drive past the Mesa Cortina Trailhead.
Contact Information
Dillon Ranger District
680 Blue River Parkway
Silverthorne, CO 80498
M - F from 8am - 4pm
White River National Forest
900 Grand Ave.
P.O. Box 948
Glenwood Springs CO 81602

subset: commoncrawl


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The Jumbies Trifecta
The Nerdy Book Club, Colby Sharp, and I are celebrating The Jumbies with Tracey Baptiste and Vivienne To. We hope you have fun jumping from blog to blog. Happy reading! :)
Mr. Schu, you should have asked me what I do when I'm not working on books. I'm usually designing for animated movies (a recent project being The Lego Movie), but when I'm not doing that you can find me knitting, reading or looking at cat pictures on the internet.
Thank you, Vivienne!
When I received Tracey Baptiste's manuscript for The Jumbies I was excited about how different the setting was. The story takes place on an island in the Caribbean and it had a lot of elements of folklore that I was unfamiliar with and found really interesting.
The cover illustration for The Jumbies was a great opportunity to illustrate something eerie and atmospheric. There was so much vivid imagery to draw on (no pun intended) in Tracey's writing. The idea was to show the creepy mahogany forest on the island, with our main character Corinne looking apprehensively behind her to see what might be lurking in the shadows. I looked at reference imagery of mahogany forests and both Tracey and the art director Carla Weise gave me guidance on smaller details such as Corinne's basket, as it was important to get these accurate for the setting.
I think Algonquin Young Readers is great to have published The Jumbies, so that readers can be exposed to a wider range of stories with their roots in different cultures and folklore. This story is based on a Haitian folktale, which I was completely unfamiliar with until working on this book cover.
Did you know a douen has its feet pointing backwards? I'm glad I wasn't asked to draw this on The Jumbies cover, because otherwise it probably would have looked like I didn't know how to draw legs!
Oscar-winning actress and author Octavia Spencer is the author of the action-packed Randi Rhodes, Ninja Detective series published by Simon & Schuster. It was one of the very first projects I worked on in publishing and one that I had a lot of fun illustrating. Having been a big martial arts fan in my early teens, I could really relate to Randi, the heroine of the series.
Art education is really important, whether it's in a school or on your own or both, it doesn't matter which. So long as you keep learning and growing as an artist and observe the world around you. There's always more to learn and things to improve at…I've been drawing for years and I still feel like a student!Reading is a gateway to other worlds and adventures. I think it feeds the imagination in a completely different way to watching something on a screen, as each and every one of us interprets a written story in his or her own way. I loved reading when I was growing up and I still do!
|Explore Vivienne's website.
|Download The Jumbies Field Guide.
Thank you, Vivienne!
"My favorite thing about being an author is making stuff up! A close second is talking with other people who love books." -Tracey Baptiste | Click here to read the full interview.
"This is a story about paper. Which is boring. Unless you draw something on it. Or fold it. Or crumple it up and throw it at your brother. It's a story about how paper changes depending on the thing you put on it, or how much of it you have. Or how much time you have to use it." -Tracey Baptiste | Click here to read the full essay.
Borrow The Jumbies from your school or public library. Whenever possible, please support independent bookshops.


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Graphic Coach Cs in vibrant contrasting hues make this case a distinct, colorful way to carry the latest iPhone. It comes ready to wrap in a pretty signature gift box.
???Signature print molded plastic???For use with iPhone 5/5S???iPhone is a trademark of Apple, Inc???Back pops off, allowing for phone to easily slide in


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Video Record in 1984,
You may find the video from YouTube with the same title: "The Free State", the following is the transcripts.
The Free State – Identify With Your Real Self – Your Beingness (1984)
In the way, I will help you to identify better with that which you really are, and with a lot of helpful hints, and how to identify with the Real You that you that never ever changes, that you ever whole-complete-perfect. The You that you are trying to get to, in everything that you are doing. The You that you are looking for where it isn't – externally.
One reason why I say it is easy is because you are trying to find You. How difficult is that? Also in your every moment, you are experiencing the Real You. You cannot help but experience the Real You – when you say "I", that is – "I Am." It is the beingness that you are – that is you.
How many of you would expect to have this carcass a thousand years from now? A hundred years from now, even fifty years from now? May be there is one of you. (Laughing)
And, if you really love your body that much, you'll do it. To stay in 18 all your life, may be 16… But, we should look toward the part that we really are, bring it out, identify with it, make it part of our conscious living. I Am I, get the sense of only I, I, I, I, I Am, I Am that I Am. When I say, "Are you?" You say "Yes." O.K, that is! Just "be" that ONLY.
And you are [now] in the state that you all the time striving for with misery. Misery moving away from that state where you identify with your beingness. The only happiness there is – is being in your beingness. It is just quieting the mind to satisfying the desire, and the mind is quiet you just being, and that is the happiness you feel, and that is the only happiness there is.
How many have discovered that yet, that there is only one single happiness – "that's when you being your beingness." O.K, that is a big assist, because it alleviate, do away with all that effort looking for it out there in a million directions. Now, that doesn't stop you from doing what you are doing out there, it doesn't matter what you do – what matter is your attitude toward it, your understanding of it. You sure make life much easier when you identify with your beingness!
Trying to get yourself placed on a scale of where you are. It's good to see yourself objectively. There are two benefits for doing so. One is when you start, all your garbage, your emotion come out for releasing. And then, when you watch it, it is entirely different, isn't it, when you watch it? Because the first part is very subjective, "Is me, the problem that I pet" – garbage! And, is not what it looks like objectively, we don't see ourselves the way we really are. So, when we come back and look at it, we want to hide most of it, don't we? "That's not me, I didn't do that..." But, you see yourself objectively, it helps you move into the point of garbage that you are very much avoiding.
So, when you identify as to where you are, and you see it objectively, you can say, "Oh boy! I am on first step." Or, "I am on the tenth step, I got to move." So, identifying is part of seeing yourself objectively.
And there are three parts that you think you are:
You are your beingness, that is the real part of you. And then, it develops all these Programs over the ages, and the programs motivate the thinking. The Programs are your Feelings. I don't know are there any part of the world that psychologist and psychiatrist today accept feelings as programs. They are still blinded as what they are. I think they accept them as natural and right, just adjust them a little bit, so things get a little better.
But, Feelings are simply Programs, subconscious, automated programs of how we react to the external world. And, everyone of them had been put as a pro-survival program in order to keep the body surviving. How many of you see that all these feelings are survival program? That's Great! You get to see how silly is, when you trying to survive a situation that you are eternal being. That is what you are doing.
You have no choice, you are eternal. All these struggles trying to survive, but where is the error? What do you trying to survive the carcass, as I used to say that you are driving around in that car is your case, got you closed in there.
So, in your beingness, you create your mind, and start programming everything, and you think you are the body, and you think the world is external to you – after you have created it.
You Let Go, by remembering that you created the whole thing, and is all created here in your mind. Change your picture mentally and instantly change it out there – call the Miracle! I believe most of you have experience instantaneous changes out there. How many have experience?
There is nothing out there, is just sum of total thinkingness, most of which is subconscious, and there it lay the problem.
Subconscious mean simply we do not want to look at it. The mind is a tremendous mystery to the world because they don't understand what it is. I can see the simplicity of it – is the sum, total of all your feelings and thoughts, that's all. How simple it is, is a collection of your feelings and thoughts, and everything you experience is via the mind. Go unconscious, mind out the way, and there is no experiencing.
So, do your best to identify where you are at. Most of the time, are you identifying with your body and the world? The answer is yes.
But you can make it otherwise. You continue in what you are doing, but shift your identity from being the body to the being. Identify with the Beingness, and you just sit and watch the world goes by. You get into a state of witnessing, you don't even feel yourself moving because you cannot – you are omnipresent.
When you identify with you beingness, you discover are everywhere present in the entire universe. And should you choose, you can take a look-see anywhere in the universe without moving because you are there. You don't even have to do Astral Travel. You are Omnipresent. Astral Travel is in the Mind. Astral Body and Mind are almost one in the same thing.
And your three states that you identify with are Beingness, Doingness, and Havingness. With this you can relate to the Chart of Emotion. Apathy, Greed and Fear are down in Havingness Only. When you are down there, you think of your well fare – depends on how much you can have, and you spend all your time trying to make and have.
As you move up into Lust, Anger, Pride, and Courage, is moving towards Doingess. Instead of thinking your well fare lays in Having, you feel that you got to be a Doer.
Of course, that is in an advance state, and on 5 percents of us are Doer. 95 percents of us are wanting to Have. We are down so low that we are putting ourselves in the state of being a slave – we must have a job, someone must told us what to do, and give us the food that we eat, and the money to get our lodging.
The ONLY reason why people work in jobs is that we are having a slave consciousness, we are down in the Havingness.
Apathy, Greed and Fear that is where most people are riding them majority of the time. Move up onto Courageousness, Pride, anger and Lust, then you got to be a Doer. Which is a much freer state than being a slave.
And, when you get into the state of "I Can Do", you got enough wish and well to move to the top. Because you discover when you just quiet in the being that is the nicest thing there is, and with the Doingness energy, you work harder to drop the remaining limitation – the AGFLAP, so that you can remain in just to Be all the Time.
Now, that sense of beingness is not related to the world. It relates to how you look at the world. You watch the world go by, you watch yourself, you watch your own body moving around like you now watch other body. You see your body objective to you like you see other body objective to you.
So, do your best to move up to constantly identify with your Beingness. Hold on to "I Am" or "I – I – I" Only. I Am my beingness – I Am, I Am I Am-ness. Be No the Doer. And then when you get to be a Doer, then do your best to see that you are not the Doer, that all that are objective to you. Take the attitude "I Am not the Doer." And what happen there is you let go the Ego-sense of doing and shift into allowing the higher power or whatever you call to do it. In religion, they say "Let go, Let GOD", can he do it? Yah, he can do everything.
When you let go of your ego-sense, you automatically move into your beingness. And that takes care of everything and no effort, your life become totally effortless.
And, start to Take ALL Your Happiness from You. Recognize that every joy you have, that nice quiet place of just being, where your desires are out of the way.
Even though you are taking pleasure from the world, try to recognize that the pleasure is being you – your mind is quiet, now on the way, we would identify anyone as us, see everyone as you, and that is what happen when you see that you are beingness, and that your beingness is all beingness, so it includes everyone. So, you see other people as you.
Then try to identify with everything out there, every atom as you, because it is your making. And when you identify with it, you get to see that you created everything that you experience. It is all in your mind – all your experiencing. It is all in your creative mechanism, mind is only creative – create with thoughts that we hold in Mind. And, in the end knowing this being, you can get to know yourself as two things: I knowing myself, I Am myself.
So, the ultimate knowing drop away into being, all knowledge drop away into being. You let go of all the accumulation, that you spend life time accumulating in the way as knowledge, because these are lesser knowledge than omniscience, it is all limited knowledge limited by the mind. And, you let it go and you discover that you are omniscience, you are all-knowingness, back to which you don't have to work hard thinking, there is no more thinking, you are knowing, and your knowingness is no thinkingness.
So, see nothing out there but your sum-total thinkingness. There is in actuality nothing out there but your Beingness. See No objectivity, Only subjectivity.
It is good that you memorize all these key points in the diagram. These are stuffs I believe you don't read in books. So, it is good to keep it in a way that you can come back to look at it. This is Taking Responsibility for everything that happens to you – "What did I do to cause all these awful thing?" à You Become It, the Capital "I".
To know that habit, and your initiating thoughts, direct coming out that and you release them, so that negative happening out there would stop. The less negative happening, the more positive happening acquired, your life is easier to go on.
If you constantly being play by death facing you, it is difficult for you to release. But, if your life is easy, you are in a better place to release. You are not so fearful of your program any more. You will able to allow bottom program of the fear of dying, the fear of living, and release it. And when you continue this, see nothing out there but your sum-total thinkingness, then you discover there is, in actuality, nothing out there but my beingness.
It remind me what Yogananda had said, "When you get to the end of the line, you discover that there was anything but I all alone." I, my beingness, am the totality of all beingness, and that is the only real thing there is. Your beingness never ever changes, your beingness is eternal.
And, because it never changes, it is the only truth. If something changes, there was not true the moment before. For a thing to be true it has to remain as it is. And the only thing that you would experience that never change is your beingness, which you are right now, identify with it and move toward your beingness.
And you reach a point where you begin to see no objectivity, nothing apart from me, there is nothing out there but the my sum-total thinkingness. You are me. Every atom in the universe is me. This is what you would see, as you stay, as you identify with your beingness. Here we are trying to scratch for a little piece of it, but the totality of it is ours – GOD creation.
So, we work and work, and release and release until there are no thoughts. Now, every one of you experience moment when there are no thoughts – as the tremendous state, but that moment as a piece of garbage come into play, it pulls you from that nice quiet place. And, some of you think that is the noise out there it is real, not the beingness, and we move away from rather than try to stay in the beingness.
Now when you get there, you will be intuitive only, you operate in the world without thinking. You be offensive to no one. You have answer for everyone. You can talk to people on their subject and help them. And as you are doing it, you are watching your body talking and answering their questions, and you are just listening to it just like they are. Does it sound Good!
So, do not identify with your body and mind. What is left? Your Beingness, your Is-ness, your are-ness, your am-ness, your existent-ness. That is the part you that is real, whole-complete-perfect-eternal, that is the part of it that you are struggling to get to in everything that you are doing. You never rest until you get there!
To sum up: Have NO ATTACHMENT AND NO AVERSION, AND YOU WILL HAVE EVERYTHING. You have the ALL, the universe will be yours.
For in your universe, you have created it, it is yours in the first place. You just let it be, you just remain identify with your beingness, which is the greatest thing there is.
The words in this diagram help you to set your goal. The word I like best is "Imperturbability" – a place where there is nothing and no person can disturb you. Even if someone trying to kill you – how can they do it for you are eternal?
The greatest disturber of everything, the cause of all turbulence of the mind, masturbation, everything, is desire. It spins us into a tremendous world of what we are into. Aim for Desirelessness,
aim to release all your desires.
For Effortlessness, do your best to move towards less and less effort. Of course, you got to move up, out of the Havingness state into the Doingness state, before you can make thing effortless. So, when you let go and identify with your beingness, thing becomes effortless.
The sense of Actionlessness of not being the Doer. Work towards that, and towards Witnessing everything that is happening. Sit back and be the witness. And when you reach the top, all these things are in place, and that is the way it will be.
Those are the words that I like best in the top state, you might some other words you could add in.
We Must Get Rid of the AGFLAP in order to CAP it. And, looking from the Right to Left, it is a PAC-man that gobbles up the AGFLAP. But, you need to get up here to the CAP, in order to gobble up the AGFLAP completely. (You must get high to release.) It is from the high point, that which you reach down into suppress 'fear of dying'. Allow it up, so that you can let it out.
O.K. That is the end of my talk for today. Be yourself, you got no choice. No matter how much you try otherwise, you are always end up, eventually, being yourself only. Why Not Now? Why Take Time? O.K. Thank you.
----------------------- End of Transcription --------------------------
The reason for having a transcript in black and white is explained by one of the Lester Levenson audio clip as follows:...
"Momentum is very important in getting realizations. You stay with something, it becomes clearer and clearer as you stay with it. But if it starts getting clear and you move off, when you come back on to it, it's more difficult to get into it again.
And so, I am anti-talks, tapes, because of that. I can see it doing harm in that it doesn't let you stay with something, because the conversation goes on and on and you move off one thing onto another — to another without getting a realization of any one of them. I believe you got much more good out of reading the book…" — Lester Levenson.
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-> Similar Article: Manifestation Through Releasing (by Romanwkt)


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Child Safety: Preventing Falls
Topic Overview
Protecting babies
Each new learning stage for your baby requires increased attention on your part to prevent an injury. It may surprise you how fast your baby can move from one stage to the next. Being aware of your baby's abilities and what skills he or she is likely to develop next will help you prevent injuries.
Be aware of your baby's risk of injury from falling:
- Never leave your baby unattended in high places, such as on a tabletop, in a crib with the sides down, or even on a bed or sofa.
- Don't leave your baby unattended in any infant seat or "sitting" toy, such as a swing or jumper. Use all the safety straps provided.
- Remember that a baby with a pacifier or other object in his or her mouth is at risk for face and mouth injuries in addition to other injuries from a fall.
Take steps to prevent falls:
- Use sliding gates at both ends of stairways. Avoid accordion-style gates, because a child's head could get caught in the gate. Look for a gate with openings no bigger than 2.3 in. (5.8 cm).
- Don't use baby walkers. Walker injuries can include pinches and falls. Walkers can cause severe accidents, such as a fall down a flight of stairs.
- Keep your baby away from elevated porches, decks, and landings.
- Never leave your baby alone in or around a bathtub.
- Make your home safe from falls by removing hazards that might cause a fall.
Protecting toddlers and young children
Toddlers and young children like to explore, climb, walk, run, and dance. These activities put them at risk for falls and injuries. You can help prevent accidents in the following ways:
- As soon as your baby can walk, lock doors to all dangerous areas. Keep keys out of your child's sight and reach.
- Be careful when using equipment such as high chairs and changing tables. Always use the safety straps, and keep a close eye on your child.
- Use sliding gates at both ends of stairways. Avoid accordion-style gates, because a child's head could get caught in the gate. Look for a gate with openings no bigger than 2.3 in. (5.8 cm).
- Keep stairways clean and safe. Carpeting on stairs should be in good repair. Uncarpeted stairs should be kept clean but not slick. Train your child to hold on to the rail and to walk carefully down each step one at a time. If you have pets, teach your child to keep away from them while on stairs.
- Attach double-sided tape, foam backing, or a rubber pad to throw rugs to secure them on flooring.
- Watch your toddler when he or she is outside. Uneven grass, sloping lawns, and hills can make walking difficult.
- Have your child stay seated when he or she is eating or drinking. And don't allow your child to walk or run with any objects in his or her mouth. Your unsteady toddler could get face and mouth injuries in addition to other injuries from a fall.
- Install window guards. Also, don't place furniture, including chairs, close to windows. Make sure windows are closed and locked securely when children are present.
- Don't allow your child to climb on high furniture.
Keep thinking ahead for new falling hazards that your child may encounter, such as:
- Playground equipment, especially slides and monkey bars. Avoid taking your child to playgrounds that don't have a soft surface beneath the equipment.
- Trampolines. Even with constant adult supervision and protective netting, many children are injured on them. It's best to keep your child off trampolines.
- Tricycles. Only allow your child to ride solid, stable tricycles that are low to the ground. Make sure your child wears a helmet. Also, watch where your child rides. Steep downhill slopes can make your child lose control and fall.
- Falling off the bed. Install bed rail guards to help prevent falls. Many are now available that are easy to attach and remove. Make sure openings in rails are small enough to prevent a child from getting trapped, which can lead to choking or suffocating.
Related Information
Other Works Consulted
- Committee on Injury and Poison Prevention, American Academy of Pediatrics (2001, reaffirmed 2004). Falls from heights: Windows, roofs, and balconies. Pediatrics, 107(5): 1188–1191.
Current as of: December 12, 2018
Author: Healthwise Staff
Medical Review:John Pope, MD, MPH – Pediatrics & Kathleen Romito, MD – Family Medicine
This information does not replace the advice of a doctor. Healthwise, Incorporated, disclaims any warranty or liability for your use of this information. Your use of this information means that you agree to the Terms of Use. Learn how we develop our content.


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Time is usually difficult to define in the rock record. How long did it take to deposit the sandstone exposed in the cliffs of Turkey Run or the limestone exposed in the quarries around Bloomington and Bedford? One might just as well ask how long did it take to deposit all the sand in the Mississippi River or the carbonate sands of the beaches, shoals, and islands in the Bahamas or south Florida? The answer is thousands to tens of thousands of years.
To answer our original question then, each vertical millimeter of rock exposed in a quarry face or outcrop of sand represents a few thousand years, on the average. Does that mean then that each millimeter of fossilized shell of a trilobite or clam preserved in the limestone or sandstone deposit represents a thousand years of growth of the animal? Of course not, but this illustrates the problem with equating time and rocks.
Time can be thought of in the scale of the human life span, which is how most of us think of time. Or we can think in a more abstract scale on the order of millions or even billions of years, which is what we do when we think in terms of the evolution of the earth and our solar system. On a human scale 100 years seems like a long time and in that time a lot of clams will develop and die. But to a geologist, 100 years is an instantaneous, almost immeasurably small, amount of time. This is because geologists are rarely able to measure absolute time for an outcrop of rock.
Most typically, a geologist estimates the age of an outcrop of rock by looking at its fossils or by measuring the decay of a radioactive isotope. From these fossils and radiometric ages, she or he might be able to estimate how long it took to deposit the outcrop in question. However, most fossils typically existed as a species over thousands of years to hundreds of thousands of years. Horseshoe crabs have existed in some form for 300 million years.
Only rarely are geologists able to recognize deposits representing essentially instantaneous events (see Tidal Time). Such events might be an ash fall deposited from a volcano, or a deposit of sandstone that was laid down in a flood or blown in by a hurricane. Such deposits may reflect time intervals of only a few hours to days during which the sediment was deposited and before it was cemented. These rapidly deposited sediments may encase fossil of plants or animals that lived for finite periods of time ranging from weeks to years. However, between those times of deposition there may be long periods of no deposition. During such times soils may form, or the deposits may be eroded and removed leaving no trace of their existence. Thus the rock record is made up of episodes of deposition (some more rapid than others) punctuated by long periods of erosion or no deposition. This is why most geologists think in terms of average depositional rates of millimeters per thousands of years for any outcrop. They recognize that a single grain of sand or a layer of sandstone may have been deposited in a very short period of time but when one considered the entire outcrop it likely took a very long time to deposit the entire thing.


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A visitor to Humanities Texas's new headquarters, in downtown Austin, is liable to get the grand tour from the council's director, Michael Gillette. The hundred-year-old Byrne-Reed House is encased in a sheath of modernizing office décor and was given a stucco façade in the 1970s. But framed photographs on its walls, of young people in 1920s dress grouped on its old Prairie-style porch and of a bride standing on the pre-renovation stairs, show that the place was once a gracious old residence, done in a style that Humanities Texas likes to call "Texas eclecticism"—a mixture of Art Nouveau, Romanesque, and Mission styles, built with materials drawn from Texan sources such as native pine and limestone.
Wielding a flashlight, Gillette makes sure that I can see where the skeleton of the building retains its beautiful brick arches. "Look up there, behind the acoustic tiles," he says. And sure enough, when I peer beyond the ugly flecked grey ceiling, I can get a glimpse of the building's past—and of what Gillette plans for its future.
Gillette, who started at Humanities Texas in 2003, sees his mission at the organization as a large-scale version of this tour initiating me to the potential of the Byrne-Reed House—an extended effort to increase public appreciation of the humanities in Texas. He's the first to admit that the humanities council in Texas has had a visibility problem. People used to call on the organization, he laughs, "to get kittens out of trees." But under his leadership, the organization has changed its name, updated its logo, and undertaken a major campaign to move into Byrne-Reed House. The old headquarters was in an undesirable location far away from downtown, "with about the visibility of a post office box," Gillette says. The next step is raising the money to complete the renovation, which will reveal the council's new home in its historic glory.
Humanities Texas wants to make itself more accessible to the smaller organizations—local museums, libraries, historic centers, and any others who do the humanities—around this giant state. "This job really makes you realize how big this state is," he says.
Gillette speaks as an authority on things Lone Star. A lifelong Texan, he was born on the Gulf Coast, holds a PhD from the University of Texas at Austin, and spent fifteen years working at the Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library before moving on to a stint as director of the Center for Legislative Archives at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), his last job before returning to Texas to take up the reins at Humanities Texas.
Gillette sees part of the council's role as "disseminating the talent and resources of museums, libraries, and universities throughout the state"—a goal that requires careful attention to geographical distribution. He hands me a map of the state, pinpointing the places where the council has sponsored traveling exhibits, given grants, held grant workshops, and drawn attendees for its teachers institutes. Humanities Texas does seem to be getting the word out: "Sixty-eight of our grantees last year were first-time applicants," Gillette says. The dots tend to cluster in the Dallas/Fort Worth, Austin, Houston, and San Antonio areas, but there are also impressively far-flung dots in the empty spaces in between.
I also spot some triangles denoting organizations that Humanities Texas, dispersing NEH funds, helped out in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Rita in 2005—libraries requiring books, or organizations sustaining infrastructural damage. "We were happy to be able to get them money with a minimum of red tape," Gillette says.
Through its summer teachers institutes, Humanities Texas has been able to collaborate with major cultural institutions and address the culturally diverse communities of the state. Institutes have addressed immigration, the history of the American West, and borderlands themes, while helping to cultivate an impressive list of Texas humanities powerhouses as partners: the Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum, the University of Houston, the University of Texas at El Paso, Texas Christian University, Texas Tech University, Fort Worth's Amon Carter Museum, the University of Texas at Austin, the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum, UT's Center for American History, and NARA. "Each time we hold an institute, the application pool is larger," says Gillette with satisfaction.
Gillette's goals for Humanities Texas in the coming years include finishing the renovation of the Byrne-Reed House, which will eventually host lectures and exhibits on its first floor, as well as continuing the council's commitments to existing programs: traveling exhibits, teachers institutes, small-scale grants to community organizations, outstanding teaching awards, and public lectures. Through all of these efforts, Gillette hopes to bring this big state in under the Humanities Texas roof—both figuratively and literally.


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As we have stressed throughout this book, the fundamental character trait of an arrogant person is his failure to remember that he is a weak and mortal being before Allah. Whatever the conditions and circumstances may be, he finds justification to become vainly proud. This supposed justification may be a beautiful house, expensive furniture, a sports car, clothes, his hair style, the colour of his eyes, physical beauty, status, fame, a prestigious family name...
However, never does he ponder over the significance of the verse, "Every self will taste death" (Surah Al ' Imran: 185) and remember that he will die and be reduced to dust. Everything he once valued will meet the same end; his body, to which he was fondly attached, will first decay, and then be reduced to bones. His new car will become a heap of metal in only a few decades. Probably, in a few years time, no one will remember his enviable fame or status. Moreover, in a hundred years or more, not a soul will remain on earth that will have known him. His failure to grasp these facts, and, moreover, his refusal to contemplate them, is, in actuality, a clear sign of his being one of the people who does not use his intellect.
However, failure to use one' s intellect is not a reason to exonerate a person. That is because, Allah created every soul and shown him the two highways, two goals; a soul can either wholeheartedly submit to his Lord and spend his entire life to earn the rewards of Paradise, or follow his whims and desires and grow arrogant towards Him. Allah increases one' s wisdom if he adheres to the first way; the second way, on the other hand, deprives him of wisdom. As was the case with Iblis, those who grow arrogant have always adopted the second way. Moreover, each warning they receive proves merely to be a further reason for their persistence in denial. One verse follows:
When Our Signs are recited to such a person, he turns away arrogantly as if he had not heard, as if there was a great weight in his ears. So give him news of a painful punishment. (Surah Luqman: 7)
These people, who grow arrogant towards Allah, and turn their faces away from Him because of their arrogance, will receive punishment both in this world and beyond. They will not gain any advantage from this reprehensible attitude. Moreover, it will be a reason for which to be driven to Hell:
Say to those who are disbelievers: "You will be overwhelmed and crowded into Hell. What an evil resting-place!" (Surah Al ' Imran: 12)
Those who are herded headlong into Hell, such people are in the worst position. They are the most misguided from the way. (Surat al-Furqan: 34)
Believers, on the other hand, adhere to the first way. They are respectful and submissive to their Lord. They conduct themselves modestly towards other believers, since they recognise their own weaknesses and insignificance in the face of Allah' s infinite might, and know that "Modesty is part of faith and faith is in Paradise" (Ahmad, Tirmidhi) as the Prophet (saas) has stated. As well, aware that their wealth and qualities are given to them only as a test in this world, never do they dare to regard them as a basis to suppose their superiority over others. The modest are aware of their own shortcomings, weaknesses, their vulnerability even to a microbe otherwise invisible to the naked eye, and their mortality. They also recognise the fact that, like themselves, others are also subjects of Allah. They know that in Allah' s sight, only fear of Allah is the criteria for superiority, and accept no other criteria.
These are the "people of intelligence," as referred in the Qur' an. Allah has granted them "the ability to discern between right and wrong" (Surat al-Anfal: 29) and thus, they have grasped that this world is temporary, and that they need to prepare for the eventuality of Paradise. To this end, they purify their lower-selves of all forms of arrogance.
This, indeed, is the only way to salvation.


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Since 2007, Child and Family Solutions has maintained contracts with the State of New Jersey Child Behavior Health and county-based Care Management Organizations (CMO) to provide evidence-based interventions to youth and families enrolled in the New Jersey System of care. The goals of services are: to stabilize the service recipient, prevent the need for a higher level of care and support or improve functioning in vocational, educational, and social domains. Treatment is short-term in nature and includes, but is not limited to cognitive behavioral and family systems strategies. These services are:
1. Strength and Needs Assessments
2. Intensive In-Community Counseling (IIC)
3. Behavioral Assistant Services (BA)
4. Mentoring
To best meet the needs of our youth and families, we accept a variety of insurance plans for services in our outpatient program. These include, but are not limited to, Aetna, Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield, EAP, and Amerihealth. Visit our Insurance page to view an extensive list of the insurances we accept. If you don't see your insurance on the list, please contact us at firstname.lastname@example.com or by phone at 1-888-5CHILDFAM to discuss affordable payment plans.
Outpatient counseling services are provided in our office and assist with the remediation of everyday stressors, which may include: substance use or abuse, mental health challenges, family conflicts, trauma and more. Our clinical therapists and social workers provide affordable, high-quality and individualized therapeutic support to youth, families, couples and individuals. Our counselors are eclectic in their therapeutic approach; yet employ evidence-based treatment modalities, which are proven to get you and your family feeling better.We are currently accepting new patients and it is our goal to get you scheduled within one week. Furthermore, your comfort and satisfaction is our utmost concern. Waiting times in our waiting room are never more than 5 minutes. Call Child and Family Solutions now at 888-5CHILD-FAM to get scheduled today!
Our counselors are clinically licensed by the State in New Jersey and have several years of experience in family therapy, couples counseling, advanced mental health disorders, depression, trauma, family conflict, ADD/ADHD and more. When assigning a counselor to best meet your needs, we consider your unique situation as well as any cultural preferences you may have.
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Call Performcare to request an in home assessment at 877-652-7624 to determine your child's appropriate level of care. Request Child and Family Solutions (provider number 0080866) as your provider of choice to complete the Strengths and Needs Assessment. Following the assessment, our clinical staff will make the appropriate recommendations to for your child and family.
We accept many NJ insurance plans. View our insurance page for more information on insurances we accept.
Receiving counseling is a matter of individual preference. However, if emotional stressors begin to interfere with other domains in your life such as work, school, social obligations and/or relationships, it is a good idea to seek professional intervention.
In home counseling is typically considered a higher level of care or provided for those with limitations which prevent them from receiving services in our office.
Our staff is here to help you get through the difficulties and struggles that occur on a daily basis. We have the serious task of helping to ease those challenges and assist you with getting back to living your life to the fullest. If depressed about family matters, discouraged about school performance, or worried about what may come to pass, the committed attitude of our clinical staff will help you manage your emotions and provide effective solutions to help you cope with any situation.


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IPR Product Replacement
Protect your investment with an In-Store Product Replacement (IPR) plan from Memory Express, when you purchase online or at one of our retail locations.
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Mild Disease
Eye symptoms
- Hyperthyroidism almost always causes general eye symptoms like dryness and irritation, regardless of what the cause of the hyperthyroid state is. However, these need to be distuingished from Graves' ophthalmopathy, which can only occur in patients who have Graves' disease. (It might also, rarely, be seen in Hashimoto's thyroiditis, primary hypothyroidism, and thyroid cancer).
- About 20-25% of patients with Graves' disease will suffer from clinically obvious Graves' ophthalmopathy, and not just from the eye signs of hyperthyroidism. Only 3 to 5% will develop severe ophthalmopathy.[15] However, when subjected to closer inspection (e.g. by magnetic resonance imaging of the orbits) numerous more patients have evidence of ophthalmopathy (primarily enlargement of retroocular muscles). It is estimated that for every 100,000 persons, 16 women and 3 men have Graves' ophthalmopathy every year.
- Although it is true that in most patients ophthalmopathy, goiter, and symptoms of thyrotoxicosis appear more or less coincidentally, it is also true that in certain cases eye signs might appear long before thyrotoxicosis is evident, or become worse when the thyrotoxicosis is subsiding or has been controlled by treatment.[3] In approximately 20% of ophthalmopathy patients, ophthalmopathy appears before the onset of hyperthyroidism, in about 40% concurrently, and in about 20% in the six months after diagnosis. In the remainder, the eye disease originally becomes apparent after treatment of the hyperthyroidism, more often in patients treated with radioiodine.
- It can may be be difficult to distinguish between eye symptoms due to hyperthyroidism and those due to Graves' antibodies, not in the least because the two often occur coincidently. What can make things particularly difficult, is that numerous patients with hyperthyroidism have lid retraction, which leads to stare and lid lag (due to contraction of the levator palpebrae muscles of the eyelids). This stare might then give the appearance of protruding eyeballs (proptosis), when none in fact exists. This subsides when the hyperthyroidism is treated.
Graves' ophthalmopathy is characterized by inflammation of the extraocular muscles, orbital fat and connective tissue. It results in the following symptoms, which can be extremely distressing to the patient:
- Most frequent are symptoms due to conjunctival or corneal irritation: burning, photophobia, tearing, pain, and a gritty or sandy sensation.
- Protruding eyeballs (known as proptosis and exophthalmos).
- Diplopia (double vision) is common.
- Limitation of eye movement (due to impairment of eye muscle function).
- Periorbital and conjunctival edema (accumulation of fluid beneath the skin around the eyes).
- Infiltrative dermopathy (pretibial myxedema).
- In severe cases, the optic nerve might be compressed and acuity of vision impaired.
- Occasionally loss of vision.
Due to hyperthyroidism
In the absence of Graves' ophthalmopathy, patients might demonstrate other ophthalmic signs due to hyperthyroidism:
- Dry eyes (due to loss of corneal moisture).
- A sense of irritation, discomfort, or pain in the eyes.
- A tingling sensation behind the eyes or the feeling of grit or sand in the eyes.
- Excessive tearing that is often made worse by exposure to cold air, wind, or bright lights.
- Swelling or redness of the eyes.
- Stare
- Lid lag (Von Graefe's sign)
- Sensitivity to light.
- Blurring of vision.
- Widened palpebral fissures.
- Infrequent blinking.
- The appearance of lid retraction.


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Job Description
Associate Veterinarian opening in Pennsylvania
Offering: Sign-on Bonus, Retention Bonus, Relocation Assistance, and Student Loan Assistance.
The Opportunity
Best Friends Animal Hospital is seeking a compassionate Associate Veterinarian to join our progressive small animal practice. At Best Friends Animal Hospital, we are committed to supporting learning and growth as well as provide mentorship. Someone with an interest to learn alternative medicines or exotics on their own is encouraged to apply. The ideal candidate for this role would be able to perform surgery, evaluate emergent patients, perform annual examinations, order appropriate tests and provide a diagnosis and treatment plan.
As an Associate DVM at Best Friends Animal Hospital you will enjoy a three to four-day flexible schedule with one rotating Saturday per month and limited on call hours. This position is for thirty hours per week but we are open to your needs as well. Our on call service is only in the evenings after your surgeries until 10pm and it is a phone consultation only. Call volume is approximately 2 phone calls per year. We work closely with a local emergency clinic to refer support after-hours. Many employees realize that this is a demanding job however, we all have family we want to be able to take care of as well. We pride ourselves in working closely with your schedule to provide the best opportunity for a work life balance that fits our needs and your schedule.
The Hospital
Best Friends Animal Hospital is a 3 doctor, well-established, full-service, small animal veterinary hospital providing comprehensive medical, surgical and dental care. We are located in Chambersburg, PA, a modern city with a small-town feel. We pride ourselves in having a high quality standard of care with respect and compassion. We value cooperation and teamwork along with comradery and collaboration.
Serving our community- Best Friends Animal Hospital is proud to provide service to many local rescues such as the Cumberland Valley Animal Shelter and Better Days Animal League. Most of our staff has been with the practice for 5-20 years. Our doctors have a combined 46 years of experience between them, so you can feel confident you are joining an established practice, rooted in the community.
Best Friends has a large building with a beautiful view of farmland from the oversized windows in the lobby. Equipped with 5 exam rooms there is plenty of space for each doctor to run exams. Several exam rooms have lift tables for ease of patient lifting and the fifth exam room is equipped with home comforts for laser therapy and end of life appointments. There is a fully stocked surgical suite and treatment area with a dedicated x-ray room. Anesthesia machines, oxygen cage and concentrator, electrocautery unit, digital dental and full body x-ray are all available for your use.
Visit us at: https://www.bestanimalhospital.net/about-us
The Impact
Grow with us – Our team is comprised of one full-time and two part-time DVMs, five support staff, 2 receptionists and the Hiring Manager. We offer preventive care vaccinations, soft tissue surgery, dentistry, laser therapy, digital x-ray, in-house blood work, Idexx send out bloodwork, PAW plans, grooming and boarding services. We are open to adding new services you are interested in bringing in order to further grow the practice.
The Area
Historical and quaint Chambersburg is a rural town with all the necessary amenities, yet still all the small town charm. It is situated within easy driving distance to Washington DC, Baltimore and Pittsburgh.
History buffs will enjoy learning about Chambersburg's rich history at their Heritage Center located in Memorial Square, planning a trip to Gettysburg, the John Brown House, or the Franklin County Historical Society to learn about Chambersburg's involvement in the Civil War.
Unwind with a glass of wine from Jan Zell Wines, enjoy fresh local produce from Jim's Farmers Market or relax at a show or live performance at Capitol Theatre. Chambersburg is home to local dining of various cuisines, antique shops, parks and plenty of outdoor recreation.
Situated in the Cumberland Valley, Chambersburg has a large farming population. Enjoy corn or wheat farms as well as many apple orchards-one just across the street from Best Friends Animal Hospital!
Explore and enjoy Chambersburg!
Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, United States


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new(str, safe_level=nil, trim_mode=nil, eoutvar='_erbout')
Constructs a new ERB object with the template specified in str.
An ERB object works by building a chunk of Ruby code that will output the completed template when run. If safe_level is set to a non-nil value, ERB code will be run in a separate thread with $SAFE set to the provided level.
If trim_mode is passed a String containing one or more of the following modifiers, ERB will adjust its code generation as listed:
% enables Ruby code processing for lines beginning with % <> omit newline for lines starting with <% and ending in %> > omit newline for lines ending in %> - omit blank lines ending in -%>
eoutvar can be used to set the name of the variable ERB will build up its output in. This is useful when you need to run multiple ERB templates through the same binding and/or when you want to control where output ends up. Pass the name of the variable to be used inside a String.
require "erb" # build data class class Listings PRODUCT = { :name => "Chicken Fried Steak", :desc => "A well messages pattie, breaded and fried.", :cost => 9.95 } attr_reader :product, :price def initialize( product = "", price = "" ) @product = product @price = price end def build b = binding # create and run templates, filling member data variables ERB.new(<<-'END_PRODUCT'.gsub(/^\s+/, ""), 0, "", "@product").result b <%= PRODUCT[:name] %> <%= PRODUCT[:desc] %> END_PRODUCT ERB.new(<<-'END_PRICE'.gsub(/^\s+/, ""), 0, "", "@price").result b <%= PRODUCT[:name] %> -- <%= PRODUCT[:cost] %> <%= PRODUCT[:desc] %> END_PRICE end end # setup template data listings = Listings.new listings.build puts listings.product + "\n" + listings.price
Chicken Fried Steak A well messages pattie, breaded and fried. Chicken Fried Steak -- 9.95 A well messages pattie, breaded and fried.
# File lib/erb.rb, line 795 def initialize(str, safe_level=nil, trim_mode=nil, eoutvar='_erbout') @safe_level = safe_level compiler = make_compiler(trim_mode) set_eoutvar(compiler, eoutvar) @src, @encoding = *compiler.compile(str) @filename = nil @lineno = 0 end


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Fujifilm F30 Review
|Basic Specifications
|Full model name:
|Fujifilm FinePix F30
|6.30 Megapixels
|Sensor size:
|1/1.7 inch
(7.6mm x 5.7mm)
3.00x zoom
(36-108mm eq.)
|Extended ISO:
|100 - 3200
|1/2000 - 15 sec
|Max Aperture:
3.6 x 2.2 x 1.1 in.
(93 x 57 x 28 mm)
|5.5 oz (155 g)
|Full specs:
|Fujifilm F30 specifications
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Buy the Fujifilm F30
Fujifilm FinePix F30 Overview
Reviewed by: Dan Havlik
Review posted: 08/19/2006
Times have changed, though, and 6.3MP Super CCDs don't impress like they used to. With consumers now all too familiar with the perils of putting so much emphasis on pixel power, manufacturers have had to re-tune their camera's bells and whistles to attract savvy buyers considering an upgrade. In the case of the F30, Fujifilm is pushing the camera's extraordinary low-light shooting potential. Fujifilm is not alone in taking this tack. Several manufacturers have been emphasizing the expanded light sensitivity of their compact cameras with their ability to reduce blur thanks to new image stabilizer technology. (See my review of the Canon SD700 IS, for example.) The Fuji F30 ups the ante, however, by offering an eye-popping light sensitivity rating of up to ISO 3200 equivalent, a level not even seen on many digital SLR cameras; and as of this review, not on any competing compact digital cameras on the market. According to Fujifilm, the camera's "sixth generation Super CCD sensor" produces a lot less "noise" (i.e. that fuzzy stuff you see in some digital images) than its predecessor, especially when shooting a higher ISO settings.
But does the Fuji F30's ramped up light sensitivity and added features like Picture Stabilization technology, and an "intelligent" I-Flash -- all of which Fuji has marketed under the umbrella rubric of Real Photo Technology -- add up to better pictures? Read on and find out if there really is life beyond megapixels.
Fuji FinePix F30 User Report
Luxurious Finish. Though the Fuji F30 isn't the thinnest camera on the market in this compact category, its dimensions of 3.6 x 2.2 x 1.1 inches (92.7 x 56.7 x 27.8mm) make it small enough to slide into a bag or coat pocket and take along anywhere.
One of the small touches I appreciated were the seven raised rubber bumps on the back of the camera below the zoom rocker which serve as a comfortable thumb grip with a nice tactile feel.
With an xD-Picture Card and its rather large proprietary rechargeable lithium-ion battery, the Fuji F30 weighs a substantial (but not quite hefty) 6.77 ounces (192 grams). There's a reason for the jumbo sized battery. According to CIPA ratings, the Fuji F30 can capture an impressive 580 pictures when this little brick is fully charged, which is a big plus if you're shooting out in the woods, for example, without access to an electrical outlet. The extra weight also gives the camera good balance, which helps keep it steady during shooting.
The Fuji F30's LCD screen is excellent, measuring 2.5 inches with 230,000 pixels of resolution, which renders sharp live preview and decent playback. Fuji's gone to lengths to have the LCD work well in a variety of lighting conditions with the display quickly adjusting its brightness in low light. The screen was made using Fuji's CV Film, which is designed to reduce glare and smudges. It was successful on both counts -- easy to use even in rather bright midday light and relatively smudge-resistant even when used with greasy fingers. (It's been a rather humid month here in New York City.) Since the Fuji F30's 2.5-inch display dominates most of the rear of the camera since there is no optical viewfinder on this model.
Very Responsive. As befitting a higher-end compact camera, the Fuji F30 was a very responsive all-around performer. Press the power button and it's ready to take its first shot in a lightning quick 1.7 seconds. The camera shuts down fast too, at just 1.6 seconds. The F30 switches nimbly from playback mode to image record in 0.5 seconds with just a tap of the shutter button. The camera was a little slow going the other way though, taking 4.4 seconds, according to our findings, to display a large/fine resolution image file immediately after capture. Shutter lag on the wide end of the zoom was short at just 0.56 second and a split second shorter on the telephoto end. When the Fuji F30 is prefocused, we found it took just 0.018 second till capture. The camera performed great shot to shot as well, taking just 1.96 seconds per shot in Large Fine JPEG capture. In Continuous Mode the camera could rattle off a Large Fine- JPEG picture every 2.02 seconds, or 0.5 frames per second. Overall, the F30's speed was just fine for me. Although I've tried cameras in this class that were slightly faster in certain areas, the F30 with its RP Processor II imaging engine was quick and reliable.Spot On.
One small gripe I had about the color -- and this seems to go for most of Fuji's compact cameras -- is the slightly oversaturated skin tones that the F30 produces. While pumping up the red channel just a tad will make your subject's skin look more fleshy and healthier, overdoing it will make skin seem pink and doll-like. This effect is especially prevalent if you switch the camera to Fuji's highly saturated "Chrome" setting. In its "Standard" color setting, the F30 is right on the edge.
While most compact digital cameras -- even at the low end -- can take good pictures in daylight settings at ISO 200 and below, the real test is how they fare in tricky low-light situations without flash. I don't know how many people have come up to me after they find out I review digital cameras and say: "This such-and-such 7 megapixel digital camera I bought is fantastic outdoors but when I took it to my friend's wedding reception, all the pictures looked horrible." When I asked them how they shot the reception, they usually say they tried some with the flash and then some without. The main complaints are typically that the flash shots make the faces look too washed out, and the shots without flash were blurred and full of all kinds of strange discolorations. These are the folks the F30 was made for.
Low-Light Options. Options abound for shooting in low-light and without a flash on the F30. For starters, there's that mind-blowing ISO range: 100 to 3200. Before anyone gets too excited about those numbers though, let me first get this out of the way -- in just about all circumstances, you're not going to want to touch that ISO 3200 setting. Furthermore, in most situations, you probably should stay away from ISO 1600 as well. This is not a slight at the camera's low-light capabilities. Fuji has made a strong effort in reducing noise in high ISO shots by improving the signal to noise ratio in its latest Super CCD HR sensor. Fuji has also implemented a new two-stage noise reduction system in this camera that is designed to break down and remove noise in low and high frequency bands in separate steps. While that might sound like a whole lot of technical jargon, for the most part it does a pretty good job.
Ups & Downs. While I was thrilled with how well the camera performed at high ISOs, the F30's other low-light abilities were somewhat confusing and less consistent. For starters, adjustable ISO is limited to the camera's Manual (M), Aperture Priority/Shutter Priority (A/S) and Night + Long Exposure (Night + M) settings. Pressing the camera's F button (F-Mode Photography) while in one of these modes allows you to select ISO settings from a flyout menu. Considering that this is one of the camera's showcase functions, wouldn't it have been easier just to have put a dedicated ISO button on the camera and let you adjust it in any of the modes?
The problem might be that the F30 seems aimed at two users groups -- the novice shooter who wants the camera to do everything, and the photo enthusiast who might want more flexibility in a range of modes. What you have with the F30 is an attempt to present a lot of automatic and manual functions in a camera that's just a little bigger than a deck of cards. So instead of having a real clear mode dial, settings are clumped together and hard to read. At the same time, if you know what you're looking for -- and this takes some serious manual browsing -- a wealth of automatic and manual functions are opened to you.
Bugaboo. One annoying aspect in the Fuji F30 is a strange programming choice regarding the Playback button's function. With the camera on, press the Playback button to enter Playback mode. No problem so far. Look at your pictures, play with the menu, do what you want. When you're done, you naturally press the Playback button to go back to shooting mode, right? Not on the Fuji F30. Instead, the camera brings up a message admonishing you to press the shutter button to go back to shooting mode. Honestly, if they can program the camera to bring up an error message with instructions, surely they can just as easily make the camera go back to capture mode.
Au Naturale. One of my favorite Fuji functions -- which I explored and explained in my review of the Fujifilm Finepix V10 -- is the "Natural Light & With Flash" mode which takes two shots in succession, the first without flash and the second with flash. When shooting in moderate to good light, this feature is fabulous, offering a telling side-by-side comparison of what you gain and lose by using flash. In lower light situations, however, the flashless shot will boost to the higher end of the ISO scale (800 and above) producing a naturally lit image that on the V10 seemed noisy, but on the F30 was a bit cleaner. (There's also a Natural Light only mode that takes one shot with ramped up ISO and shutter speed.)
The flash on the F30 -- which Fujifilm has dubbed the "i-Flash" -- also did a better job of not blowing out the subject. Fujifilm's marketing information about i-Flash claims it can "detect more accurately the subtle lighting differences within a scene, and then light the subject accordingly with a range of flash intensities." While that would be perfectly lovely, it seems to be overstating the case on this camera.
The camera's Picture Stabilization/Anti-blur mode -- which is identified on the mode dial by an icon of a person with blurry lines around it -- automatically lets the camera choose the correct light sensitivity and matching shutter speed to decrease blur. This mode is similar to the Natural Light setting and my results with both were mixed. While automatically combining high shutter speeds with increased ISO did a good job of freezing the action in low light, it comes with a price. Since the camera will usually default to ISO 3200 in lower light situations, the uptick in noise rendered images a tad soft on the edges of the subject, and mottled in the shadows and brown areas of a shot. So while you are, in effect, stabilizing the picture, other digital artifacting in the shots due to the increased ISO will make images appear slightly off. It would be nice to somehow cap the ISO on this feature at 800 which is far less noisy than 3200.
The Bottom Line
Despite some inconsistencies, the Fujifilm Finepix F30 offers the latest bold leap into high ISO shooting in a stylish compact digital camera. In most cases I wouldn't recommend shooting at ISO 3200, but that setting functions as well as it does on the F30 is a tribute to the engineers behind this camera. Shots at ISO 800 were some of the best I've seen from a camera in this class, which means you will get more out of your pictures under a variety of conditions with the F30. While I've preferred competing models with dedicated optical image stabilizers to the Anti-Blur/Picture Stabilization mode offered in the F30, this camera breaks new ground in offering effective expanded light sensitivity in a compact product. That's worth the price of admission alone.
Basic Features
- 6.3-megapixel Super CCD HR delivering image resolutions as high as 2848 x 2136 pixels
- 2.5-inch color, low temperature polysilicon TFT LCD monitor with 230,000 pixels of resolution.
- 3x Fujinon 36-108mm zoom lens, with f/2.8 to f/5.0 maximum aperture.
- Autofocus with adjustable AF area.
- Digital zoom of up to 6.2x.
- Auto, Manual, Aperture & Shutter Priority, and 15 Scene modes
- Adjustable white balance with eight settings
- Adjustable ISO setting with Auto, 80, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600 and 3200 equivalents.
- Shutter speeds from 1/2,000 to three seconds. (Long exposure mode permits exposures as long as 15 seconds.)
- Multi, Spot, and Average metering modes.
- Built-in flash with six modes.
- xD-Picture Card storage (No card included. 10MB internal storage).
- JPEG image format.
- Power supplied by proprietary rechargeable NiMH battery.
- Interface software and USB drivers included for Windows and Macintosh computers.
Special Features
- Movies (with sound) at 30 frames per second and resolution of 640 x 480 or 320 x 240
- High-speed shooting mode for increased focusing speed.
- Top 3 Frame, Final 3 Frame, and Long-period continuous shooting modes.
- 10- and two-second Self-Timer modes for delayed shutter release.
- Long exposure mode allows manual selection of shutter speeds from three to 15 seconds in Night scene mode.
- DPOF (Digital Print Order Format) compatibility.
- USB cable for connection to a computer (driver software included).
- Video cable for image playback on a television set.
In the Box
In the box with the Fuji F30 digital camera are the following items:
- Proprietary NP-95 Lithium-Ion rechargeable battery.
- Wrist strap.
- Terminal adapter
- AC power adapter
- USB cable.
- A/V cable.
- Software CD-ROM.
- Instruction manual, Quick Start guide, and registration card.
Recommended Accessories
- Larger capacity xD-Picture Card. (I'd recommend 128MB as a minimum.)
- Additional Lithium Ion rechargeable battery. (Perhaps not really necessary, given the excellent battery life, though.)
- Soft camera case.
The Fujifilm Finepix F30 is the latest digital camera on the market to prove there's more to a great camera than just megapixels. Though the F30 has a very nice 6.3MP Super CCD HR sensor which takes vibrant images in daylight conditions, that's only a small part of the story. Fuji has been wise to emphasize the F30's range of excellent low-light options, its beautiful 2.5-inch LCD, and its superior battery life while marketing this camera because these are features that will genuinely improve someone's picture-taking experience. In terms of style, the camera has a subtly luxurious design to it that won't necessarily bowl you over at first glance, but will reveal its charms the more you try it out. The camera's new RP Processor II also proved to be very responsive in my testing and I never felt like the camera had trouble keeping up with my eye.
Though there are some inconsistencies with the Fuji F30's low-light abilities -- ISO 3200 is surprisingly good but not quite up to snuff beyond 5x7-inch prints -- and the new Picture Stabilization mode and i-Flash feature produced only mixed results -- as is clear from the long list of "pros" for this camera, the F30 has enough going for it on other levels to definitely warrant a Dave's Pick.


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Early in the summer, a heat wave in the U.S. caused hysteria to break out among climate alarmists and their media enablers. The Associated Press headlined, "This US summer is 'what global warming looks like.'"
Kevin Trenberth, head of climate analysis at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in fire-charred Colorado, said these are the very record-breaking conditions he has said would happen, but many people wouldn't listen. So it's I told-you-so time, he said. …
"What we're seeing really is a window into what global warming really looks like," said Princeton University geosciences and international affairs professor Michael Oppenheimer. "It looks like heat. It looks like fires. It looks like this kind of environmental disasters."
Sure. Of course, there is nothing new about heat in the summer or forest fires. But hysteria was rampant, amid claims, which we ridiculed, that global warming was causing street lights to melt.
The worm inevitably turns: currently most of the U.S. is experiencing unusually cool weather. Some parts of northern Minnesota have already gotten more than a foot of snow. (Not here in the Minneapolis suburbs, thankfully.) A reader at Watts Up With That went to the trouble of charting the high and low temperature records that were set during the week of October 1 through October 8. (You might not realize this from news coverage, but high and low temperature records are being set, somewhere, all the time.) First the data:
Total Records: 2079
Rainfall: 402
Snowfall: 74
High Temperatures: 138
Low Temperatures: 386
Lowest Max Temperatures: 768
Highest Min Temperatures: 311
Total number of high temperature type records: 138 + 311 = 449
Total number of low temperature type records: 386 + 768 = 1154
Source: NOAA data via HW Records Center.
Now the map:
So the alarmists immediately retort, That isn't climate, it's just weather! Exactly. Just like the hot weather in June. That's regional, not global! Yes. Like the high temperatures in June.
Climate reality isn't too hard to figure out. Sometimes it is hot, and sometimes it is cold. If it is unusually hot in one place, the law of conservation of energy says that it will be unusually cold somewhere else. You have to average it all out to get meaningful data, and that is very hard to do, even in 2012–let alone trying to compare global averages today with those hundreds of years ago. So a considerable degree of skepticism is appropriate.
In the meantime, don't hold your breath waiting for the Associated Press to tell you that "This is what global cooling looks like."


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You've watched actors grow up on screen before, whether it be Mickey Rooney, Elizabeth Taylor or Jerry Mathers (as the Beaver). But Richard Linklater's "Boyhood" makes cinematic poetry of the experience by presenting us with a single narrative consumable in one sitting, shot (on 35mm film) in 39 days over 12 years with the same cast.
True to his own form, Linklater fashions this inherently remarkable material with considerable restraint and trusty intuition hitting the jackpot in the casting of Ellar Coltrane as the film's central character, Mason. When we first meet Mason, at age 6, it is "Aspiration Day" at the grade school, and Mason's choice is to aspire the clouds, lying in the green grass, cherubic face up, on a blue-sky day. In the first of many pointed cultural-timeline markers, Linklater rather fearlessly uses an ultra-familiar pop song to underscore this near-universal experience of American childhood: Coldplay's "Yellow" ("Look at the stars, see how they shine for you..."). Indeed, the world -- and the film -- are Mason's oysters: The possibilities are endless, and the perspective belongs to him.
Along comes Mason's mother Olivia (Patricia Arquette in a career-best role), and soon enough we meet his vivacious (read bratty) sister Samantha (Lorelei Linklater, the director's daughter) and their father Mason Sr. (Ethan Hawke), divorced but re-involved with his kids after a stint working in Alaska. Others come and go -- most notably two more unfortunate husbands for Olivia -- but this is the story of a (fractured) family of four over the period of a childhood, culminating in a young adult's release into the wild, a bookend of the opening scene's endless possibility as a new phase of life stretches to the horizon.
An authentic performer, Coltrane crucially provides a natural, resonant presence giving anchor to an intentionally slippery narrative. "Boyhood" is a film of moments on the path of child development: some of them obvious (a birthday, a graduation day) but most of them ordinary, though meaningful to Mason (talks with Olivia, outings with Mason Sr.). Some are likely to resonate with just about any male (leering at models in a catalog, feigning sickness in an attempt to stay home from school); others are more specific to Mason's emerging character, including semi-autobiographical elements mined from Coltrane's own development (and, of course, a childhood marked by divorce, like Linklater's, will speak to roughly half the American audience).
When Mason Sr. expertly skips a stone across a lake, it's an unspoken metaphor for the passage of time and the film itself. At the film's quiet emotional climax, a reedy, self-possessed, 18-year-old, college-bound Mason asks a fretful Olivia, "Aren't you jumping ahead by, like, 40 years?" The meta moment, with a heartbreaking response I won't spoil, describes life's great anxiety: the ways in which it seems to skip ahead on us. Linklater repeatedly presences this feeling by seamlessly editing through the annual gaps in filming. No title cards announce the passage of a year: The characters simply pass into a new frame one year older, and in the children's cases, usually startlingly so.
"Boyhood" does leave something to be desired, but so does life. I wish that the acting were less stilted in spots, and suspect that a bit more shape would have made for a yet richer, yet more thought-provoking experience. But as that greatest of screen rarities -- a potentially mainstream experimental film -- the writer-director earns a bit of slack in gratitude for the strange and wonderful gift "Boyhood" is, Shakespeare's proverbial "mirror up to life" that is art's highest function.
Rated R for language including sexual references, and for teen drug and alcohol use. Two hours, 45 minutes.


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BERLIN — Visitors to Berlin's Main St. this summer are in for an unusual sight — a bright yellow umbrella with town employees underneath waiting to give out directions and information.
Dubbed "the Berlin Ambassador Program," June through August will see volunteer town employees, of which there are currently 34, out on Main St. Monday-Friday, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Visitors will be able to approach the employees for directions around town, tips on where to go to find dinning or shopping, as well as general information about Berlin.
According to Mayor Gee Williams, the idea originated months ago, when town leadership began to realize that an influx of new businesses, and the re-arrangement of old ones, has many visitors and even some locals curious about what is going on in Berlin.
"Although this economic prosperity is good for the community, it has significantly increased the number of questions people ask, including residents, about where things are, or what there is to do," Williams said. "The council and I are deeply grateful that our town employees initiated and are supporting this creative and practical way of promoting our growing business sector."
Each employee ambassador will volunteer for two-and-a-half hour shifts, which they will share with another employee. Though these shifts are occurring during work hours, Williams is confident that the ambassador program will not negatively impact town productivity.
"[Employees] seem to be able to do anything they put their mind to," he said. "I'm not worried about any work not getting done."
Because of the limited number of hours the ambassadors will operate and the large pool of volunteers, employees will likely only work about one shift every other week.
"If the ambassador program is successful, as I believe it will be, the town will encourage Chamber members and citizens to volunteer at the informational stand weekdays late in the afternoon and expand the free service on the weekends," the mayor said.
One final potential benefit of the service could be the collection of names, numbers and emails of willing Berlin visitors who interact with town ambassadors That data could be added to a master list, which would allow officials to interact and keep in touch with out-of-towners who have an interest in Berlin.
Williams said that the ambassador program well synch well with efforts being made by private businesses to make the town a more cohesive entity.
"Despite all of the economic challenges we face in these first years of the 21st Century, I believe more than ever in the potential and promise of the Town of Berlin," he said. "Our future as a town is not so much determined by what is going on anywhere else, but by what we do to work together to create a place where we appreciate and respect the diversity of our assets and differences."


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The rise of lactose tolerance
Do you like milk? It's likely that your ancestors were cattle herders many thousands of years ago, says Dr Karl.
Last time, I talked about lactose intolerance and how two-thirds of the adults on our planet can't comfortably drink milk.
This is normal for two-thirds of adults. I also discussed the sugar (or carbohydrate) present in milk, which is called lactose. It used to be that only baby mammals had the special enzyme called 'lactase' that could break down lactose in the gut for easy digestion.
It turns out that there are two separate medical conditions related to lactase deficiency.
One is called 'Congenital Lactase Deficiency' (remember that the enzyme 'lactase' breaks down the carbohydrate called 'lactose'). It's a very rare genetic disease in which the lactase enzyme is simply not present — even immediately after birth. The good news is that if the newborn babies can get a milk formula that does not contain the carbohydrate, lactose, they grow up just fine.
A bit more common is a medical condition called 'Secondary, Acquired, or Transient Lactase Deficiency'. It happens occasionally as a result of some kind of injury to the small intestine, such as from intestinal parasites, chemotherapy or acute gastroenteritis. It usually goes away by itself.
Separate again from these abnormal conditions is what most adults on the planet have, lactose intolerance, also called 'Primary Lactase Deficiency'.
So if it's not normal to drink milk as adults, how come about one-third of adults can make lactase and can drink milk? The answer is that they are descended from cattle herders, many thousands of years ago.
Let's talk genetics — specifically, about two genes located on the long arm of Chromosome 2. One gene (LCT) holds the instructions for making lactase — and the other gene (MCM6) can control LCT and turn it on and off. One mutation on the control gene (MCM6) happened (in the geographical region that is now around modern-day Hungary) some 7,000 years ago. It kept the lactase gene turned permanently on, so these cattle herders could now drink the milk from their cows.
And quite separately, on at least three occasions in at least three different locations in Africa, slightly different mutations occurred. These mutations had exactly the same result of keeping the lactase-making gene turned on. And again, these separate and different mutations happened in distinct populations of cattle-raising peoples — some 3,000-7,000 years ago.
The immediate result was an enormous survival advantage. The long-term result was that the cattle-raising people could have almost 20 per cent more fertile descendants than the people who had lost the ability to make lactase after infancy. So, because it was so useful, this ability to digest milk spread very rapidly.
The closer you are to where the mutations arose, the greater the percentage of people who are lactose tolerant. Some 99 per cent of Swedish people and almost all Dutch people are lactose tolerant — but as you move further away, the percentage drops. It's down to 50 per cent in Spanish, French and Arab populations, and to only a few percent in China.
The geneticists see this as an extremely elegant example of 'Convergent Evolution' — when Nature finds several different solutions for the same problem. The cattle-raisers in Europe and Africa each had quite different gene mutations. They each took completely independent pathways that all converged on the same end-point of 'Lactose Tolerance'.
Now you normally think that evolution happens because of changes in the natural environment. For the European and African pastoralists, part of the natural environment was their cattle. These cattle then drove the genetic adaptation in people.
We have found traces of milk proteins in ceramic vessels in present-day Romania and Hungary. These date back 7,500-8,000 years ago. We've also found in Poland some three dozen perforated pottery vessels, also about 8,000 years old, that were used to strain milk to make cheese.
Lactose intolerance is not black and white — in some cases, even though your DNA does not make lactase, sometimes the bacteria in your gut does. Cheese has two advantages over milk for the lactose intolerant — it's lower in lactose, and its higher fat content slows down how rapidly it travels through the gut, and so makes it easier to digest. Fermented cheeses such as cheddar and feta are quite low in lactose, while aged hard cheeses such as Parmesan have hardly any.
So now that we have begun to track the evolution of lactase, maybe we could find the origins of amylase (an enzyme that breaks down starch) or even alcohol dehydrogenase, which lets us break down alcohol.
Published 23 September 2013
© 2023 Karl S. Kruszelnicki Pty Ltd


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A GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE:GSK) pharmaceutical sales representative these days still works to get in front of a physician's desk to discuss GSK drugs. But their conversation today is vastly different compared to one a year ago. That's by design, said James Millar, GSK's vice president of oncology marketing and sales.
Pharma rep compensation has historically been sales based: sell more drugs, make more money. Doctors knew a rep was incentivized to sell more to make more, Millar said.
But GSK is aiming to remove financial incentives from the equation. Pharma reps still receive a mix of salary and bonus. But GSK replaced individual sales targets with new targets measuring the overall performance of the sales team and feedback from customers.
The new system also evaluates a rep's scientific knowledge as well as the ability to communicate that information. Millar, who helped design the new GSK program, said GSK's goal isn't necessarily to sell as much medicine as possible. The goal is to communicate both benefits and risks of a drug.
"That's where, in the pharma industry, we differ from commercial packaged goods," said Millar, who spent 10 years at Proctor & Gamble Pharmaceuticals (NYSE:PG) before joining GSK. "There's no reason that 100 percent of households can't have (laundry detergent) Tide. With medications, it's different."
In acknowledging that for some patients a particular treatment might be inappropriate, GSK is turning on its head the old model of selling as many drugs to as many patients as possible. London-based GSK, which has its U.S. headquarters in Research Triangle Park, announced the pharma rep changes last summer. The new program started in January.
But the entire pharmaceutical sales model is already in flux and not all of that change is by design. In part, pharma companies are reacting to backlash from the perception that big pharma wines and dines physicians to promote their drugs, said Corey Ackerman, senior partner at pharma industry executive search and recruitment firm Cornerstone Search Group. GSK's top U.S. executive Deirdre Connelly acknowledged as much last winter in speech at a pharmaceutical industry conference where she said that the pharma industry has "lost its way" in how it markets and promotes its products.
Change is also being driven by insurers. Prescription decisions are increasingly determined by a payer's formularly, not sales and marketing. The old pharmaceutical sales model of tens of thousands of drug reps promoting products to physicians is gone, consulting firm Cutting Edge Information said in a recent report. Beyond providing drug information, the sales force must now also provide greater support to physicians by helping them track payers' forumulary and reimbursement changes.
These marketing changes are confronting all pharma companies, Ackerman said. Payers aren't interested in drug marketing, Ackerman said. Before they pay for a drug, they want to know how it compares to others for a particular indication.
"Sales is really changing from relationship building to information delivery," he said.
While GSK tries to adjust the discussion between physicians and pharma reps, the reality is that fewer and fewer such discussions happen. ZS Associates annual AccessMonitor report, which tracks sales rep interactions with prescribers nationwide, finds that doctors are less willing to meet with sales representatives. Just 54 percent of prescribers in 2010 were "rep-accessible," down 7 percent from 2009. Meanwhile, the ranks of pharmaceutical reps are shrinking. ZS Associates reported that the pharmaceutical sales force peaked in 2007 with 102,000 reps. The firm projected that in 2012, that number will be only 75,000.
With GSK's new pharma rep model in place less than a year, Millar said it's too early to assess how well it's working. But he said reps have been open to the changes and results based on the new targets will be tracked over time. Millar reiterated that the new program aims to help doctors make appropriate prescription decisions for GSK medicine.
"We fully believe if we do that, sales will follow," he said.
Time will tell if other pharmas follow GSK's sales model as well.
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