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L is for…
So, the living room. When we bought the house, it was orange (basically) and full of furniture, with lace curtains and a piano on one wall.
Got rid of the furniture, refinished the floors (after realizing that the tape that had been holding the rug in place would NOT come off the floor), painted and replaced the light fixture.
Eventually we also fixed the windows so that they now open and replaced the ugly lace curtains (sorry, I know some people, my mother included, love lace curtains, but I can't STAND them) with wood blinds.
Now, it's one of our favourite rooms in the house with plenty of room for having lots of people over.
Posted on April 14, 2014, in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink. 5 Comments.
Oh, thank you thank you thank you for getting rid of the curtains (and the furniture, and the orange…). It looks so much better!!!!!!! The blinds look terrific with the lovely glass above. (is this house a money pit? 😉 )
Gorgeous house! Fun to watch the progress. Especially fun to watch and know I don't have tondo all the work! Nice job.


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May 4, 2019
PARIS (Reuters) – Air France-KLM will propose a voluntary redundancy scheme that would affect nearly 400 ground staff at French airports, La Tribune said on Saturday, a day after the airline posted a deeper first-quarter loss.
The Franco-Dutch company, which blamed higher fuel costs and price competition for its operating loss of 303 million euros ($339 million), will present the redundancy plan to a union and management meeting on May 13, La Tribune said on its website.
Another 200 departing staff would not be replaced, it added.
An Air France spokesman confirmed that a voluntary plan to cut short-haul ground staff would be presented on May 13 but declined to give details on the proposals ahead of the meeting.
He also said that a company review had pointed to a need to hire more than 1,000 people across the company's business this year.
Air France-KLM has trailed rivals Lufthansa and British Airways (part of Intercontinental Airlines) on profitability, held back by restrictive French union deals and strikes that last year wiped 335 million euros off earnings and forced out its previous chief executive.
Under CEO Ben Smith, who joined last September from Air Canada, the airline is seeking to boost efficiency in part via better coordination of the Air France and KLM networks, but his task is complicated by the arrival of the Dutch government as a major shareholder keen to preserve KLM's autonomy.
(Reporting by Sybille de La Hamaide; Editing by David Holmes)

subset: commoncrawl


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Darkness to Light Home Page
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Part Two
by R.K. McGregor Wright, Th.M., Ph.D.
This three-part article is continued from:
Pauls Purpose at Athens and the Problem of "Common Ground" - Part One.
Verse 29 - "Therefore, since we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by art and man's devising.
Paul then proceeds to argue that the Greek theory and the Greek practice are also inconsistent with each other. If our nature is derived from God, as his sons and daughters, how can God's nature be like these physical idols the Greeks adore? "You made these things yourselves! How can an infinite and eternal Creator be compared with mere bits of his finite, temporal creation? Idolatry is a crock! There is no great scale of Being in which God and the creation both participate! Mere human meditation will not reach the true God."
Paul is not only arguing that their worship reflects a lower view of God than their theology would warrant, but also implies that the natural human tendency is to make a god in the image of human ideas. Starting with man, we do not reach God, but we arrive at something even less than the worshiper himself. This is an important step in Paul's thought, and exactly reflects the material of Romans chapter 1.
Verses 30-31 "Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead."
Paul moves to a conclusion, reminding them on the way of the admitted ignorance he had started with. It is really no wonder that the Greek worldview and worship were so inconsistent, for they were both based on ignorance. The whole project of arguing from the creation to the nature of the Creator is a failure; "natural theology" does not work, even thought there are revelatory implications in the structure and details of the Creation, sometimes referred to by theologians as "general revelation," and referred to by Paul in Romans 1.
The real solution to knowing God is to hear him identify himself to us in a divine Word from himself, directly given as a historical event. God has announced that this ignorance of God's real nature must come to an end in a specific historical revelation, requiring not more speculation, but repentance before the sovereign Creator himself. This revelation comes as an announced command to all men everywhere to repent, to change their minds about the source of religious truth. The Truth is to be found in a specific historical Messiah, who is not even a Greek! And God has identified him in time and space by the most startling miracle conceivable; by raising him from the dead.
The term 'apangello, translated "commands" in the NKJV, means to make a public announcement, such as the proclamation of the legal decrees of a king or of the governor of a city, or the orders and commands of a general transmitted through a subordinate officer. That is, God's revelation in Christ is an authoritative statement which must be obeyed. Everyone must change his mind about it all, and accept God's own interpretation of reality as the epistemological starting-point. Fear of the Lord is the beginning of Wisdom, of Knowledge, and of Instruction (Prov 1:7, 9:10, 15:33.)
Eschatology is found in all religions, but the Jewish tradition was of a coming Judgement Day foreordained by God himself, at which his Messiah would judge the whole world. Thus Paul's religion was no national or localized superstitio, no merely privatized opinion, but an all-embracing, comprehensive religious world vision, with an universal moral claim on all mankind, both Jew and Gentile (on "all men everywhere"). The unity of the human race is a remarkable theme in this sermon, and embraces not only the material on human origins in Genesis (such as 9:19) but the notations on human unity found in the book of Revelation too ("earth-dwellers" in 3:10, etc.)
Epistemologically, God's verbal revelation is to be made the starting-point for answering the question of how we know reality. Paul seeks to show the Athenians that they have begun in ignorance, and ended by worshiping objects made by their own hands. Then, ontologically, God himself as the Creator is the starting-point for understanding Being. There are only two levels of being, not one; they are the Creator and his creation. Nothing exists outside these two categories.
We are now additionally told that ethically, God's own righteousness is to be the standard for judgement. Contrary to Socrates, the Good is good because God himself is the standard; God does not approve of the Good because it is good independently of himself.
Finally, or teleologically, God has had a purpose in it all. History is not merely a meaningless series of cyclic returns, for all is moving towards an historical climax. History is linear, not cyclic, and so God controls the future too! Time is moving on from the Age of Ignorance to a coming Age of Truth, and you Athenians must move with it. Far from each immortal soul being finally reabsorbed into the One, everyone will be raised an individual with an immortal body.
The reference to a resurrection of the body was the final straw for this sophisticated audience. At last it dawns on the listeners what anastasis really is. Resurrection is not a goddess, but a real event in history! In fact, it is the objective ground for identifying God's Chosen One, a proof offered publicly to all. Against Greek analytical skepticism, Paul asserts that it is possible to recognize an adequate ground of certainty, and this he identifies with the risen Lord Jesus Christ.
The Greeks held that we are part chaotic matter, and part immortal soul. The body tends toward decay, finally to be dropped altogether in death, as the soul glides up the Chain of Being to immortal union with the unknowable divine One. The last thing the soul wants is to be tied to a physical body again. For a true philosopher to point to a physical resurrection as a mark of divine approval was the height of absurdity. The higher reaches of the evolving chain of Being have no need of the material body.
This is an error repeated over and over again on Star Trek (in all four series) in which higher beings without physical bodies, and barely distinguishable from demons, are always assumed to be more "evolved" than we mere humans are, with our awful material bodies. In one episode, Captain Picard is actually addressed by a bodiless entity as an "ugly bag of mostly water!" This quaintly literal description of a human body was intended to emphasize how far above us the entity was on the great scale of evolving Being.
Verse 32-34 - And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked, while others said, "We will hear you again on this matter." So Paul departed from among them. However, some men joined him and believed, among them Dionysius the Areopagite, a woman named Damaris, and others with them.
At this point, Luke reminds us that the preaching of the Gospel is a divisive affair. He leaves us with an important paradigm in his noting the three responses to the preaching. The first is derision; "This babbler is crazy after all." They laughed and walked away. A second group realized that they had just encountered the most earth-shattering, comprehensive intellectual challenge to the Greek Theoria ever heard in Athens, and they could not let it drop. They were captivated, threatened, and puzzled all at once; "We will hear you again about this stuff" they guardedly said. But a small group clung to Paul and believed. One was Dionysius of the Areopagus council itself. Another was probably a visiting foreigner, a woman named Damaris, in town on business or pleasure. There were others, but not many.
Sadly, Paul never had an occasion to write a "Letter to the Athenians." But on that fateful day before the Areopagus, half a dozen among the hundreds of Athenians heard a challenge which gripped them with irresistible power, and opened up to them an entirely different universe of reality. By God's grace they stepped into a new and saving worldview, and that forever. These were the third group, that believed and for them, the adventure of eternity had begun.
No doubt Luke has given us only a summary of the full presentation Paul would have made to the Athenians. Perhaps Luke took notes, or Paul was later asked to give a summary. But we may be confident that the essence is all there, as to both fact and argument.
First, Paul seeks to contrast the Hellenic worldview with that of the Bible, with respect to God's nature (to Thelon, verse 29), the world's created dependence (verses 24-26) and our uniform moral responsibility (verses 30-31). The presuppositional under-structures of these two world visions are incompatible.
Second, Paul sought to make men's ethical divergence from God's character to be at the heart of the problem, not mere ignorance or finitude. The issue is sin and this can only be addressed by changing one's mind about the ultimate ethical reference-point, which is God in Christ as Judge. If sinners will not receive Christ as Judge and Savior now, they will be left with Christ as a Judge only, in the future.
Third, Paul sought to show that the Christian worldview focuses on two equally historical events, the past Incarnation and death of Christ on the one hand, and the future second coming of "this same Jesus" as final Judge. It is the resurrection that links these together. Between these two events and moving towards the second, are all of mankind, whether Jews, Greeks, or Barbarians. History is God's story, not ours. The world's diversity manifests God's plan, and its unity reflects the coherence of his creatorial sovereignty. Its future direction fulfills God's purpose comprehensively.
In the course of moving from God's nature to the status of the creation, and so on to the human dilemma, Paul contradicts at least two dozen popular Hellenistic religious and philosophical opinions. Greek notions are challenged in the areas of existence (ontology), knowledge (epistemology), moral action (ethics), and also with respect to the purpose of it all (teleology). The entire structure of the Greco-Roman worldview is meticulously subverted, and a coherent substitute is offered in its place. There is no way to make these two theoria, or visions of reality compatible. To accept the new one is necessarily to abandon the other. The two systems have incompatible presuppositions and conflicting methodologies, they disagree about what "the facts" are, they lead to different practical lifestyles, and finally to different expressions of worship.
Specifically, the Hellenic worldview is internally inconsistent with itself in both its theory and its practice, and the practice does not even reflect what truth there is in the illogical theory. That is, Paul applies the Coherence Test to Greek thought. Further, it cannot cope with either the facts of history (such as the unique life and death of Jesus), or the acts of God (such as Christ's resurrection). That is, it stands in sad need of a divinely-given reference-point; a place to stand for handling the ancient and vexed problem of how an ultimate unity can relate to an ultimate diversity. Paul therefore also made use of the Correspondence Test.
Paul was not looking for a class of innately spiritual people to autonomously evaluate and accept his Gospel. He spoke openly to all in the marketplace, and offered Christ freely to all. Anybody at all might be a potential convert. After all, even a nasty little fanatical Jewish theological student could be thrown off his horse on the road to Damascus and brought to his senses spiritually! Did not Paul know of such a case?
Pauls methodology in this address is primarily one of describing the confrontation between his own worldview with the non-christian vision of reality as it happens to be expressed at that moment in history as the Hellenistic worldview. He makes the basic religious concepts of salvation and worship depend as personal responsibilities on correct specific concepts of both the divine and human nature, with the divine nature being the origin of the meaning of the human and not vice versa, as Strato of Lampsacus would have had it. Thus Paul also raises the issue of the Location of Ultimacy, which is the test of one's ultimate Presuppositions.
Further, he is anxious to point out the self-contradictory nature of the non-christian worldview as well as its inability to cope with historical facts which tell against it. The non-christian worldview is up against both logic and fact. It cannot bring them together, and it cannot make them intelligible separately.
Again, the non-christian worldview produces absurd results (such as idolatry) despite what degrees of sincerity and the desire for God the heathen can muster. Heathen religion, far from lifting man up to connect with God, debases God to the level first of human intellectual failure, then below man to animals, and below that again to material images. From this, the idolator proceeded to violate his own body (Rom 1:24-26). This is the Test of Ethical Fulfillment.
The cause of this whole debacle is the non-Christian's fallen starting-point. Presuppositions function as one's ultimate reference-point, and they control everything across the board, much like the rules in a game of chess. They predetermine what is "possible" for every move on the board. The dilemma is that while not to have presuppositions is not to begin the interpretational enterprise at all, to begin with unacknowledged axioms is quickly to become a slave to the unknown. One's presuppositions must be knowable, they must actually be known, and they must be self-consistent. And since we all must begin with ignorance, we must either get our axioms from God himself by revelation, or we must set up our own arbitrary absolutes, which then function for us like epistemological gods, and demand an obedience they do not deserve.
For the Apostle Paul, it is much more important that his hearers recognize they have been significantly challenged, than it is to search out a "common ground" to build on. It is absolutely vital for this evangelist that his hearers know they have confronted a significantly different vision of reality when they turn their backs on Christianity, and that they know what they are rejecting when they reject it. For Paul, preaching the Gospel must Involve a real choice between alternatives, and not just a comfortable adjustment along a common spectrum of mere probabilities.
There is an even more fundamental reason why Paul shows no interest in finding a "common ground" within the Athenian religious culture, which we must now explore. Paul does not seek common ground because he already assumes an idea of common ground which is only intelligible from within the Christian's Theoria. This Pauline perspective is made explicit in such passages as Romans 1, and in those parts of the epistles which mention the intellectual results of sin, and the renewal of the image of God in the believer. Although we cannot give a full exposition of these issues now, the following points are crucial;
1) All of us confront God in every fact and moment of awareness. We cannot escape his omnipresence, nor reach up to apprehend the divine being. The movement to save us must come from God to us, and not from us to God. This is a corollary of the doctrine of "grace alone."
2) Salvation is a divine accomplishment, not just the result of a human struggle. It is by grace through faith in a sufficient Savior, not the achievement of a religious or cultural elite. All need God's undeserved grace both to initiate and then to consummate the drama of salvation. As the hymn puts it, "Thou must save, and Thou alone."
3) All start out as rebels who must be subdued and turned around to face their Origin of meaning, who is also their Judge. The sinner must sooner or later confront God personally. If Christ is not received as Savior in this life, he will be met as Judge in the next. These are the only alternatives in the long run, and we are unfaithful to our charge if we do not preach it as part of our apologetic.
4) All know the true God innately by virtue of their consciousness having been created as a finite image of the divine self-awareness; to know self is to know that God is there in the same moment of awareness. This awareness of God's reality is then suppressed in the fallen by the sin of nature, by the sin of choice, and by sins of habit. Sinners approve of the Fall and are thrilled to bits to be sinners. That is, until they encounter the concept of God as Righteous Judge. Then suddenly sin becomes a "problem" of the philosophy of religion, like God himself.
5) All fell wholly in Adam, and so no part of human nature can rise above sin's thralldom by itself. Because created, we are not autonomous, and because we are sinners we are not morally free, but are slaves to our sin. Sinners therefore have their slavery in common. Those of us who are "being sanctified"' (Heb 10:14) remember what it is experientially to be a rebel. We can therefore sympathize with sinners without approving of their sin any more than we approve of our own.
6) All share the need for divine revelation, the sinner to get started, and the saint to continue on the path of life.
7) All have an awareness of, and a capacity for, the Good. The unbeliever's consciousness of God as the ethical standard of righteousness (the ''conscience") may be compared to an ungraduated thermometer. It can tell the difference between hot and cold, but not the exact temperature of either. The believer's conscience however, has been "graduated" by God's revelation of New Covenant law, so that he can not only tell the difference between good and evil in general, but also what specific acts are good or evil. The image of God within us includes also the awareness of God as the origin of ethical meaning, and so of moral standards particularly.
8) Because God is fully sovereign, no human heart is inaccessible to him. At the same time, the rebel is in existential confrontation with the reality of God even as he exists in God's creation. The Jewish existentialist Franz Kafka once said of Christ, "He is an abyss of light. We must close our eyes lest we fall into it." So the prodigal son is afloat in his little boat upon the great Sea of Being at midnight. In the distance he can still see the lighthouse, the visible beacon which his father built near his house by the shore, from which the escape to the far country was planned. In order to be certain that he is going away from the shore and not towards it, he must keep the lighthouse in view even as he pulls away from it with his oars. For it is the only flicker of light in the darkness, a darkness which threatens every moment to engulf him.
Paul assumes then, that all of us have the imago Dei, the image of God, in common, and with it elements of self-consciousness, rationality, and an ethically sensitive conscience. But he cannot assume that we have worldviews in common, for our presuppositions differ from those of the unbeliever, and so facts and logic sustain different relations to each other in the outworking of the two worldviews. As a result, the more consistent the unbeliever is to his fallen assumptions, the further will he remove from the reality of God's world into the nightmare of his own meaninglessness.
When Paul quotes Epimenides and Aratus, it cannot be that he agrees with their intended meaning in context, for neither the polytheism of the one nor the pantheism of the other are possible on Paul's basis. The quotations merely document the fact that the Greeks were well aware of the problems which both Stoics and Epicureans sought to answer, and that the various non-christian answers are actually in conflict with each other. Paul then gives a meaning to the two quotations which brings them together intelligibly. It is clear then, that these quotations mean different things according to which worldview they are placed in. Far from trying to "build a bridge" from heathen "common ground" to the Gospel, Paul redefines the question so that only the Christian worldview allows the possibility of Truth. Did not Jesus do the same thing in his Parables?
This three-part article is concluded at:
Pauls Purpose at Athens and the Problem of "Common Ground" - Part Three.
Pauls Purpose at Athens and the Problem of "Common Ground" © November 1993 R. K. McGregor Wright, Ph.D. for Aquila and Priscilla Study Center. Originally read as a Paper at the Denver Reformed Round Table, August 1988, and revised for publication November 1993.
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The above article was posted on this Web site September 3, 1999.
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Remember that famous quote about money? "Money is the root of evil?" Frankly, I disagree. I think it's more like "Human is capable of evil…" The richer we are, the more we could do, both bad and good. One day when we have RM77 billion, what would we do with it if we have three children? Divide equally among them? How about giving each one of them JUST RM2 billion and donating the rest of it to charities? This is what the famous billionaire investor Warren Buffett plans to do. Here's that report in Washington Post: Why the super-rich aren't leaving much of their fortunes to their kids (Surely it's really going to happen) This was what Buffett told Fortune in 1986 (click to read that article) He wants to leave his kids "'enough money so that they would feel they could do anything, but not so much that they could do nothing." Well, the rest of his wealth will go toward philanthropic causes.
Buffett is a co-founder of the Giving Pledge along with friend and fellow billionaire Bill Gates. Buffett is committed to donating more that 99 percent of his wealth to charity during his lifetime or at the time of his death. Here's another article in cnbc.com about what so many of the world's billionaires will be doing with their wealth. In brief, it's not going to all go to their kids. I think it's time that more are done for the world's poor. This is the latest set of numbers. The world's poor are growing according to United Nation. Article in CBS: UN says number of hungry people worldwide is growing, with climate change partly to blame There are 823 million people in the world facing chronic food deprivation in 2017. This is rising from 2016. South America and Africa showed the worst increase. The report called for policies to target groups most vulnerable to malnutrition, including infants, children, adolescent girls and women.
Education is the key to help poorer communities increase their income. Financial literacy is however the most important skill to have after that because the one with the most salary could still have far higher debts than those with lesser pay but better understanding of how to make their money a root for growing their money. When it comes to investing to ensure people do not fall into poverty, it's important to note that property is an important part. Let's look at a very brief example. A poor family whose father managed to buy a RM200,000 property and paid slowly over the next 30 years will actually own a RM500,000 house when he retires, even if the property price rises by just 2 percent per year. This RM500,000 is actually enough for his kids to further their studies in local private universities. This is the start of a better life for the next generation. Without that property, the father would still have to spend a substantial amount of money for rental and the kids will have to either get scholarships or continue to get low paying jobs. We do not need to even start talking about financial literacy. Money is certainly not the root of evil. However understanding how money works would go a long way for the poorer ones. By the way, only when the poor has extra money that they could buy more things. This is how the economy moves; when everyone has money to spend. Happy understanding.
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written on 12 Sept 2018
Next suggested article: Of low salary, lots of OTs and poverty and well, property


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Picture Collage Maker Christmas Edition esteve disponível como oferta em 24 de dezembro de 2012
Picture Collage Maker é fácil de usar e permite que qualquer pessoa, dos iniciantes aos profissionais de fotografia criem colagens de fotos no Windows. Em apenas alguns cliques, você pode criar colagens, scrapbooks, posters, cartões, convites, calendários e qualquer outro tipo de material que você puder imaginar.
Windows 8/ 7/ Vista/ 2000/ XP; Intel Pentium IV 1.0GHz, AMD Athlon XP (equivalent) or higher recommended; 256 MB RAM (512 MB or higher recommended); 150 MB HD (200 MB or higher recommended); Language: English
CollageIt é um aplicativo automático e fácil de usar que ajuda pessoas a criar colagens estonteantes com total rapidez no Mac ou no Windows. Ele é tão fácil de usar que reduz drasticamente o tempo de trabalho manual.
PearlMountain Image Converter é um conversor de fotos assim como umm conversor de imagens em série que ajuda você a converter imagens para outros formatos, redimensionar, girar, cortar, adicionar marca d'água, aplicar efeitos e inserir bordas a milhares de imagens ao mesmo tempo.
Stunningly unimpressive software: clunky, non-intuitive, hopeless 'help' section and requiring of the user far more effort than the results justify.
I don't normally begin any GAOTD comment of mine with the verdict first but the 'reviews' so far posted here -- including Justin's from dot.tech -- make me wonder if we're talking about the same program.
To begin, then: downloaded and activated OK but the 'read me' text really should make it clear that though you should run setup first, activate afterwards, you should NOT activate if the program is open. Yes, you'll get a GAOTD activate confirm message but that means nothing: if this program is open then it's in 15-day trial mode only. Close it then and activate it again.
Creating your own calendars is one of the most popular features of photo collage software and explains why all such programs include calendar templates. So I figured, I'd quickly (!) make my own calendar with today's offer.
For a start, all templates are for 2012 calendars. They range from the ugly to the reasonably attractive. One might have expected today's developer to be aware of the fact that there's only a week left of 2012, but apparently not: go to the website in search of 2013 templates and you're out of luck.
Reconfiguration of the template ought in theory to be easy because this collage maker operates on the standard principle of adding 'layers' to a project; in a calendar, there can be separate layers for text, photographs, numbers, whatever.
Going to the program's help section is, however, pointless. There's little in the way of detailed guidance. Going to the developer's own website and the tutorials there also seems a bit pointless seeing as they relate to the PRO version, not the Standard version on offer here today.
The website's advice to doube-click on a calendar icon (I never found any such icon, but then, the toolbar icons aren't dependably context sensitive) is meaningless as it's necessary to go to Collage / Add Calendar to open the Calendar Settings panel where the year / month / week can be changed along with font, font style and font color.
There's no indication at all though of how those adjustments will play in. I finished up time after time with ugly slabs of 2013 data layered atop the existing template. Removing the template's layers resulted in, uh, ugly slabs of 2013 data that in most cases didn't even fit the template.
I suppose if I had all day or maybe even all week to figure out what the developer wants me to do here, the outcome might be more satisfactory -- but I hold little hope, seeing as this program has so far managed to lock up half a dozen times in its first hour of usage.
By contrast, I could -- in the time it's taken to try to fathom out just what today's software is supposed to do and if, indeed, it can even do it -- I could've created a dozen or more 2013 photo calendars for different friends and sent 'em off via email, courtesy of:
Pically is free. Pically works. Pically doesn't require its user to have to waste time and effort on what should actually be the simplest of creative projects.
Quite how my road-testing of today's Giveaway squares with the glowing eulogies -- yet curiously omitted details -- of actual 'reviews' in this comment thread, I've no idea.
Thanks, GAOTD, but no thanks: uninstalled.
Pretty decent collage maker with several advanced features such as the ability to add cliparts, text, calendars, shapes, masks and backgrounds to the framed pictures.
Supports almost any kind of image format (BMP, JPG, JPEG, GIF, PNG, TGA, TIF and TIFF).
Overall it's a good but not great app for 30 bucks, but if you are eager to create scrapbooks, collages, calendars and greeting cards just grab it and enjoy!!
BEST FREEWARE ALTERNATIVES (Giovanni's Christmas Edition...LOL!!)
http://www.serif.com/digital-scrapbooking (==> My Personal First Choice)
Or for a more comphensive Photo management solution:
Top (scam) FREE Online Photo collage maker:
My 2 cents for today's giveaway....
*Offers 130+ templates
*Allows you to create collages, scrapbooks, calenders, greeting cards, invitations, posters and more
*Allows you to easily share your creations via email
*Extremely easy to use; very intuitive for new users plus offers a Wizard to walk you though the steps of using the program
*Some of the templates aren't very aesthetically pleasing -- ugly, one could even say
Final Verdict
Click here for final verdict and full review
Make sure you check over on the game giveawayoftheday site. there's extra games for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. todays game is 8-Ball Pool. :)
This is one of thoses tools where it's not realy what in it but what you can add to it type of programs that makes it worthwhile to have.. for examples the masking options any greyscale image will interact as a mask (Black and white even better) as for vectors and cliparts well the internet is full of them and guess what Icons that are 256x256 are just the decent size for this little tool.. Yes like Ashraf mentioned the templates need work but guess what they are editable.. so make the final work your perfect design or let the little ones be creative while your preparing festivities... heck save on the macaronni and glue just download some clipart from google xD
Well have fun folks I'm off to get drunk and to forget 2012... so be safe and happy holidays..


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Opportunities Tab
What is an Opportunities Tab?
Opportunities Tab – Located in the AdWords interface, this is a tool designed to help you get the most out of your PPC campaigns. Common suggestions include budget recommendations, potential keyword additions and more. These are all automated opportunities, so use the Google Ads opportunities tab with caution.
The Google Ads Opportunities tab is a great tool that gives your ideas and options for expanding your current campaign(s) and improving your current performance. You can think of the Google Ads Opportunities tab as an assistant who customizes opportunities for your account. It can help you discover new keywords and improve your bids, your budgets, and more.
All these ideas are created after the system looks at your account's performance history, your campaign settings, and your Google search volume and trends. It automatically generates opportunities that could improve your performance.
Most of these opportunities are valuable, and you should take them into consideration. However, you should never just blindly trust all that you see here. You must be the judge and decide if the opportunities suggested are ones you want to apply and if you want to apply them in the way the system is recommending you do. There are some things that you need to watch out for before accepting them.
Adding new keywords may affect your ad groups
This tool is great for finding new keyword ideas and expanding your campaign to get more traffic and conversions. However, you should be careful when using the keywords that are shown in the Google Ads Opportunities tab. Some of the things that could be wrong with these are:
- Keywords may not fall in the ad group in which AdWords is recommending that you place them, which is very common is you have properly themed ad groups.
- Some keywords are "related" to your product or service but don't provoke the reaction that you want from users.
- Some keywords just don't make any sense and shouldn't even appear as suggestions.
To avoid making any mistakes when adding keywords, I recommend that you always download all the available keywords that appear as opportunities. You will then be able to review them using Excel and add them accordingly to your campaign using AdWords Editor or through the interface. To download the opportunities, you just need to click on the download button.
Opportunities Tab and Raising the budget may not be necessary
As soon as you have a campaign that is shown on a "Limited by Budget" status, you receive an opportunity telling you that you should raise your budget. This is something that you want to take into consideration, but it is not advice that you should blindly follow. Before you raise your budget, you need to consider if your current spending is right and if there's anything you can do to reduce costs that are not producing conversions. Some steps you can take before raising the budget include but are not limited to:
- Pausing keywords that have accrued high costs and haven't resulted in conversions.
- Change your schedule to eliminate those hours of the day that are not resulting in conversions but are accruing significant costs.
- Excluding search partners, if they have a CPA that's too high.
- Lowering bids on keywords that have a great position to balance what you pay for every click without losing your positioning.
- Looking for new keyword opportunities that may allow you to drive relevant traffic at a lower average CPC.
In an ideal world, you should only raise your budget on campaigns that are producing a good amount of conversions for you but that is not getting all possible traffic due to a constraint in your budget.
Is your company in need of help? MV3 Marketing Agency has numerous Marketing experts ready to assist you. Contact MV3 Marketing to jump-start your business.
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|March 11, 2019 10:13 AM
|Senator Patrick M. Browne and Sen. Ryan P. Aument
|All Senate members
|Public Higher Education Funding Commission
|In the near future, we will be introducing legislation to establish the Public Higher Education Funding Commission. This Commission will review and make recommendations related to higher education funding including a higher education funding formula and higher education issues.
Membership of the Commission will include the chairs and minority chairs of the Appropriations and Education Committees in the Senate and House of Representatives. Two legislators shall be appointed by the President Pro Tempore and two legislators by the Speaker of the House. One legislator shall be appointed by the Minority Leader of the Senate and one legislator by the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives. Also, the Secretary of Education shall be a member of the commission.
The Commission shall develop a higher education funding formula and identify factors that may be used to determine the distribution of funding among the public institutions of higher education. Factors identified may include: goals for higher education; the Commonwealth's higher education needs; affordability of higher education; graduation and retention rates; student debt; student financial aid, including programs operated by PHEAA; job placement and wages; appropriate level of state support to maintain operations and appropriate level of formula driven funding to incentivize success.
The Commission will review and make findings and recommendations related to higher education funding; consult with experts; receive input from interested parties; hold hearings across the state; review and consider funding formulas from other states; identify higher education funding factors; review the administration and operation of higher education programs and services and make recommendations; determine if cost savings and efficiencies can be achieved for the Commonwealth and students and make recommendations; develop a proposed higher education funding formula including factors; and draft proposed legislation based on the Commission's findings.
A report will be issued by the Commission of its findings and recommendations one year after the enactment of the legislation. The higher education formula will only be effective if approved by an act of the General Assembly. Every five years, the Commission shall be reconstituted to meet and hold public hearings to review the operation of the recommendations related to the funding formula and issue a report.
Please join us in co-sponsoring this important legislation.
Introduced as SB536


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Delphi Automotive's Revenue Jumps 11% on High-Tech Demand
Auto-industry supplier Delphi Automotive PLC (NYSE: DLPH) reported its fourth-quarter and full-year 2016 earnings on February 2. Here's what investors need to know.
The sensors on Delphi's latest self-driving test vehicles are closely integrated into the vehicle's body. Image source: Delphi Automotive PLC.
Delphi earnings: The raw numbers
|Change vs. Q4 2015
|Full-year 2016
|Change vs. 2015
|Adjusted operating income
|Net income (GAAP)
|Earnings per share
|Cash from operations
Data source: Delphi Automotive PLC.
What happened at Delphi in the fourth quarter of 2016
Delphi's 47% year-over-year gain in net income in the fourth quarter was driven largely by growth in sales of the advanced technologies that are supporting the industry's (and Delphi's) evolution toward fully self-driving vehicles.
The company booked $9 billion in new business in the fourth quarter, a substantial percentage of it in high-tech areas: active safety, infotainment, and vehicle electrification. Delphi is emerging as a leader in active-safety systems, having partnered with machine-vision expert Mobileye with the intent to bring a "Level 4" self-driving system to market by the end of 2019.The partners may be first to market.
Delphi's adjusted operating margin for the quarter was 14.1%, up from 13% a year ago. That was a result of increased earnings from the acquisition of HellermannTyton in late 2015, the impact of cost-cutting efforts, including movement to lower-cost manufacturing locations in Europe, and above-market sales growth in all regions, the company said in a statement.
Delphi's new business bookings totaled $26 billion for the full year.
What Delphi's CEO said about the quarter
CEO Kevin Clark hailed what he called a record quarter during the company's earnings conference call.
Looking ahead: Delphi's guidance for 2017
Here are the company's expectations for key metrics in 2017.
- Revenue between $16.5 billion and $16.9 billion.
- Operating income between $2.185 billion and $2.285 billion.
- Earrings per share between $6.40 and $6.70.
For the first quarter of 2017, Delphi expects:
- Revenue between $4.05 billion and $4.15 billion.
- Operating income between $490 million and $520 million.
- Earnings per share between $1.40 and $1.50.
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John Rosevear has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.


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Alison Tshangana
South Africa
Head of Research and Market Intelligence
- Political Science
Professional Profileshttps://www.linkedin.com/in/alison-hickey-tshangana-96a36116/
Alison Tshangana is the Head of Research and Market Intelligence at the Centre for Affordable Housing Finance in Africa (CAHF). She has ten years of experience in the public sector. She has previously worked at the South African Local Governement Association (SALGA), Western Cape Department of Local Gvernment and Housing, Western Cape Provincial Treasury and IDASA. Her areas of work are in human settlement policies and programmes,and inter-governmental finance and public expenditure analysis.
Alison holds a Bachelor's degree in Political Science (cum laude) and Religious Studies from Brown University and a Master's Degree in Public Policy (2000) from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.
by Alison Tshangana
2022 Housing Finance in Africa Yearbook
Land, Human settlements, Finance, Construction, Built environment
Analysing the Economic Impact of South Africa's Subsidy Housing Instruments: Cost Benchmarking and Impact on the Economy
Human settlements, Finance
Case Study 14 | Financing Micro-Developments of Residential Rental Stock
Human settlements, Finance, Construction, Built environment
Case Study 16 | Construction financing in Africa's affordable housing sectors
Human settlements, Finance, Construction
Comparing Housing Economic Value Chains in Four African Countries
Human settlements, Finance, Construction
Estimated Contribution of Housing Construction and Residential Rental Activities to the South African Economy in 2017
Human settlements, Construction
How Basel III and the Latest Changes in Regulation are Likely to Affect Access to Housing Finance in Africa
Human settlements, Finance
Local Government Position on Municipal Responses to Backyarders and Backyard Dwellings
Human settlements, Construction, Built environment


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A mute swan's song
Not trying to impress,
Only trying to express,
But i digress.
Ingest my ideas
Regress to a state
With no hate
Grate my brain to rid it of pain
I can't explain
O world refrain
From becoming sane.
Common knowledge of sanity
Is a misconstrued inequity
Segregating parts of the mind
Which I find
Binds intellect with creativity
And obscurity with lament
I implore competence
And in the event
That we are heaven sent


text:
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Releases - City of Muscatine - Lightning strike affects UV control system at WRRF (PDF)
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text:
Organ Fest XII
This annual organ concert is sponsored by Classical 89, Utah's classical radio station, and features the six members of the Tabernacle organ staff as well as the organist from the Cathedral of the Madeleine.
October 18, 2019 (Friday) at 8:00 p.m.
The concert will be broadcast on KBYU-FM radio on Sunday, November 24th at 12:30 p.m. and again at 9:00 p.m..
This free concert will take place at the Cathedral of the Madeleine.
For the 2019 Organ Fest concert, the organists will be honoring their coleague Bonnie Goodliffe, who will retire this fall as a Temple Square Organist following many years of devoted and distinguished service. Bonnie's musical and personal gifts will be sorely missed, as she worked with every part of the Choir organization. The selections on the program reflect Bonnie's love of the music of Bach and her appreciation for her colleagues (past and present) on the organ staff.
Each year since 2008, the organists of the Tabernacle on Temple Square have joined with the organist at the Cathedral of the Madeleine to celebrate organ music and to show support for organ music programming on Classical 89. The annual concert alternates between the Tabernacle and the Cathedral of the Madeleine to showcase both famous instruments.
Visit Temple Square event parking for additional event parking information.
Edit text


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A "Wandering Princess" Travels the Santa Fe Trail
Susan Shelby Magoffin, the 18-year-old wife of merchant Samuel Magoffin, traveled the Santa Fe Trail with her husband in the summer of 1846. Her diary published as "Down the Santa Fe Trail and into Mexico: The Diary of Susan Shelby Magoffin, 1846-47" gives great insight into life on the trail. She wrote in her diary on June 15th, "It is the life of a wandering princess, mine."
Pregnant, Susan traveled in a carriage on the bumpy 850-mile ride accompanied by her servant, Jane, and her pet greyhound, Ring. She wrote of swarms of pesky mosquitos and gnats, as well as the "ill-shapen…shaggy" buffalo. Her carriage overturned on the 4th of July; a few weeks later her tent collapsed on her in a storm.
Arriving at Bent's Old Fort ("the outside exactly fills my idea of an ancient castle"), Susan was feeling ill. Her 19th birthday took place at the fort. While there, she sadly suffered a miscarriage. Meanwhile she writes of a Native American woman giving birth in a room below her and taking the baby to the river to bathe within a half hour of giving birth.
the outside [of Bent's Old Fort] exactly fills my idea of an ancient castle
After a stay of 12 days at the fort, Susan's husband's caravan moved on toward Santa Fe. They later traveled further south into Mexico as part of Samuel's business. Returning to the states in 1848, Susan passed away in 1855 and is buried in St. Louis.
Susan's diary in published form is still in print and available from many booksellers.
Images: Susan Shelby Magoffin (partial ambrotype from collection of Mark Lee Gardner) and Susan's recreated room in the upstairs corner of the fort "…we have two windows one looking out on the plain…" (NPS photo)
To explore more stories of the Santa Fe Trail, attend the Bicentennial Santa Fe Trail Symposium in La Junta this September. For more information go to www.2021sfts.com.


text:
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text:
Only when the Dhurzi (Indian tailor) arrived to measure me for shirts, shorts, suits, etc. was I told that I would soon be going to a boarding school in Mandalay. Sheets, pillowcases, towels, handkerchiefs, Eton collars, table napkins, stockings, socks, a boater etc rapidly came together. With all this happening, I must have been very dim because it came as a great shock when I found myself seated in a first class compartment with the Revd. Edmunds, the riverine Chaplain, who was taking me to St. Mary's church of England school for boys at Mandalay, his headquarters. He used to hold monthly services in Monywa and called at our place on those occasions, when the question of my schooling must have been gone into. The arrangements they had decided upon had culminated in my heading for a new school completely and utterly different from the one I had known.
A side-wheel paddle steamer ferried us across the wide Irrawaddy at Sagaing (the great Aka bridge would not be built for many a year) and on the ferry I tucked into a huge lunch. Having left home at 6 in the morning, I needed that feed in spite of coffee and biscuits provided in between by my host.
During that day-long journey the conversation was all on Revd. Edmunds side. I had little to say beyond a 'yes' and a 'no' here and there, some times wondering if I had not misfired. It was not that I was ill at ease at this my first railway journey; in other circumstances I would have enjoyed it enormously. The simple reason I was nervous tongue-tied and ashamed was my lack of English. Had Revd. Edmunds spoken In Burmese I would have been an excellent travelling companion. With father so much away I had spoken nothing but Burmese, learning very little English at school where it was taught as a second language with phrases in textbooks such as:
'A fat hen ran'
With an illustration of a large English hen bearing no resemblance to the scraggy Burmese fowl. The book had apples and pears, foxes and sheep but no mangoes or papayas, leopards or bullocks, The more Revd. Edmunds tried to put me at ease with light conversation, the more frustrated, ashamed and uncomfortable I became. The journey was a nightmare. How he must have rued the day he had gaily volunteered to rearrange his programme of services to accompany me to school. Now and again, my thoughts would leap forward wondering how I would manage at the English school. At the Mandalay Railway station, we got into a gharry (horse drawn carriage) to be driven 2 ½ miles into the heart of Port Dufferin, which housed my school, the central jail, the Government house, many barracks, Officer's messes and the Burmese Royal Palace. I Has taken in by a kindly matron who showed me my dormitory, bed and locker and left me to unpack. I had arrived.
As I sat on my bed quite alone in that dormitory of some 20 beds, the thickly falling unusual rain adding to my intense misery, imminent tears were whisked away as if by magic, at the sound of a voice asking me in Burmese where I had come from. From that moment Dick Mundt was to become a life-long friend. I had so greatly funked the first day, the first week, the first month with little or no English that the relief of having Dick and half a dozen other boys more or less in the same boat as myself was tremendous. The big black cloud hovering over me had vanished. Years later I was to come across an apt passage: "The Lord tempers the wind for the shorn lamb."
I was placed in the lowest form of the school, the third standard. I did badly from the word go, always at or near the bottom of the class for the first three-quarters of the school year. Then quite suddenly and miraculously, impositions, detentions and canings ceased to be my lot. I began to do better. Somehow the damage caused by the fracture must have healed much to my great joy and relief. But I was quite unprepared for what happened at the end-of-the-year concert and prize distribution. When my name was called I hid, thinking I would be given a dunce's cap; but the head prefect soon had me on the stage. There, in the glare of the lights, in full view of the school and masses of other people. I was shaking hands saying Thank you, bowing and walking away, my head in a cloud, my chest sticking out a mile clutching a prize book in my hot hand. Miracles of miracles, it was a form prize I had won for the highest marks scored at the final exam of the year.
Discarding his usual Victorian reserve, my father showed unusual warmth and much excitement when I proudly produced the prize. Mother had tears in her eyes but said nothing. Only then did I realise how greatly he and mother must have worried over me. How many a sleepless night must they have spent over my bad end of term reports when before the accident I had been quite a bright lad. The thought that their son might turn out to be a near idiot must have been constantly in their minds. Now all that was past, relief and joy could take over from anxiety and sorrow. I was overwhelmed with gratitude, my heart overflowed with thankfulness, Mine had been the privilege of bringing home a momentous book: "The Old Curiosity Shop."
In the excitement of my first homecoming, I had not missed granny, that tiny petite bundle of cross-grained, quick tempered, impatient, impetuous, imperious loving femininity. Slim built and all of 4 foot 11 inches in height, she was a great favourite with us as she defied our parents and spoiled us all.
"Where is granny?" I eventually asked.
Father said that perhaps mother should tell me the story. Intrigued, I pricked up my ears,
In the course of trading, granny had come across U Kyaw Mo, a dark skinned gentleman with thick eyebrows and heavy black moustaches. As mother described him, the strongly built virile gentleman came to mind on the occasion of his first visit just before 1 left for Mandalay. He had come on some transaction or the other. As time went on his visits became more frequent much to the amusement of the children Who began teasing granny who in turn had begun to spruce herself up, wearing her finest longyis and taking ages to do her hair and eyebrows whenever he was expected. Mother was not amused. Then one day granny came to mother with a proposition. A friend had pledged some gold bangles for a loan from her of 500 rupees but was unable to repay the loan at the moment, just when granny required 500 rupees to pay for some beans which she had bought. Would mother take over the pledge and let granny have the money. Mother obliged. About three months later mother had a sudden call for cash. As granny was also short, she promptly took the bangles to her usual chettyar as pledge for a loan. 'The bangles were weighed, then re-weighed, a frown deepening on the chettyar's face, He said:
"The bangles feel light. Do you mind if I make a small nick in one?"
Though mystified Mother readily agreed. Of what could the man be thinking?
With a jeweller's file the chettyar made a nick and in it placed a drop of straw coloured liquid. In a moment the colour changed from straw to green. His face distorted with anger he shouted:
"Daw Ngwe Nyun, I never thought you would stoop to this: bringing me as a pledge gold washed copper bracelets."
Mother was so overcome that her incoherent explanation hardly carried conviction. The hot walk back from the market and shopping centre did nothing to damp down the towering burning rage that was consuming her. She, a bogadaw (wife of and Englishman) could have been had up by the chettyar on an attempt at cheating and this all through her mother's doing, a mother she had done everything she could for. There was an unholy row. Granny wept, wailed, nearly had a fit; but mother was adamant, She poked and pestered till she had got the truth, The bangles belonged to U Kyaw Mo who seemed to have disappeared a few weeks before. Give grandmother her due, she had no idea the bangles were spurious. But she was inconsolable, she had been wrongly accused, she, a poor defenceless widow, put upon by everybody, she would end her useless life. If ever she ate a mouthful of rice in her unnatural daughter's house, may she be cursed the seven curses, so on and so on.
No one dared to go near her. Dusk was falling when mother asked one of the children to go and coax granny, only to return saying she was not to be found Night came, with relatives, neighbours and friends enquiring and searching for her everywhere. At first light, the well was inspected in case granny had jumped in, the riverbank and the railway line produced no clues. Then that afternoon a small slight Buddhist nun with red-rimmed eyes walked into the house, More tears all round, but no recriminations. Granny had made straight for a little known nunnery, cut off her long thick hair, had her head shaved and had donned the robes of a nun as a gesture of having given up the world, the flesh and the devil. She divided her time between the nunnery and our house and when I saw her the next day, she, looked far happier than she had since grandfather's death, There was peace and calmness about her that had never been there before. She remarked how tall I was growing, enthused over my prize and made me feel quite important. I was told that she would always be at the nunnery the day before the Sabbath to join other nuns in doing the rounds of houses receiving gifts of raw rice, money, peas, beans etc. towards their subsistence. Though done on the spur of the moment, she was to remain a nun for the rest of her life.
Back to school after Christmas and then on with football, hockey, cricket, swimming, scouting, regular hours of work and study, I enjoyed boarding school life to the full. On Saturdays we had the freedom of the fort. We could fish in the many canals and tanks of the palace grounds, visit the many and varied rooms of the palace, climb the watch tower, view royal garments and other exhibits in the palace museum, watch soldiers and officers at parades, obstacle courses, bayonet practices (the 1914 - 1918 war was still on) and make friends with jolly Gurkha troops whose barracks were not far from our school. Dick Mundt and I had many a feast of puree (wholemeal pancake) and potato curry given us by our Gurkha pals only a few years older than we were.
Then there were the summer holidays of three solid months. Banging an empty kerosene tin did not amuse me anymore. With father now retired, the two of us were about to came together in a companionship that grew stronger and pleasanter as time went on. Gone was the stern unbending Victorian father of the old days when he was home for short periods, demanding instant obedience and servility. We took long walks together early mornings when, after a little chit-chat, stories of his boyhood, adolescence and as a young man would flow readily from father making the long walks appear so much shorter and more enjoyable. He too had fractured his skull. Much to my surprise I learnt that he had been the star gymnast of his year at school. There had been a display by the senior gymnastic team before a distinguished gathering when in the final act on rings, one of the ropes had given way dropping him head first on to the gymnasium floor. He carried his head with the slightest of slants to the right as the result of this mishap. No such story was needed to put me off gymnastics! I already knew I was hopeless, getting completely lost whenever 1 was upended,
Many of these walks had to do with agricultural land. Father and mother had agreed that investing in such land would ensure an additional income to the retirement pension. But as to how it was to be done was heatedly argued and endlessly talked over for months and months. At the start of one of my summer holidays, I came in at the tail end of it all. There had been heated words, a big flare up.
Father's idea was to obtain a grant over 150 acres of wasteland on long lease from Government, clear and drain the particular low-lying area and bring the lot under cultivation with hired labour. A second home would be built there, where he would actively supervise the workmen and where he would keep his draught bullocks, plough cattle, ploughs, harrows and other paraphernalia of agriculture. In fact he would become a farmer, pure and simple.
"What" exclaimed mother, "a Boh (Englishman) to stoop so low beneath his status as to become a humble cultivator! No, never. I couldn't stand being known as a cultivator's wife."
Her own idea was to buy holdings of ten to fifteen acres in various localities which she would let to tenants on previously agreed fraction of the crop as rent. There would be no bother; she would sit back and get her share at the time of harvest, without losing the dignity and status of a Bogadaw.
The quarrels and heated arguments ended in a compromise. Father could apply for the grant of land, demean himself by actively farming, occupying his 'second homestead' which mother called a mat shack she would not move into. She, on the other hand, would commence buying suitable holdings for her own scheme. I was too immature to realise that a house divided could not prosper and thought at the time what a good idea it was for each person to be able to do his own thing.
With a 30 year grant of land from Government on generous terms in his pocket, father bought plough bullocks, draught bullocks, ploughs, harrows etc. and commenced clearing the higher ground on which the buildings for the farm would be put up. They would include a superior mat and thatch hut for father, sheds for cattle and implements, stores etc. and buildings to house the workers. Them came the clearing of the low lying area a much more difficult business, while all, this unusual activity was going on, a topic of much local talk, a group of fishermen chuckled to themselves.
The rains came at the usual time but in this part of the so-called dry zone it did little more than lay the dust. The ground remained stone hard. The Chindwin fed by heavy rains much further north, however, was rising, water crept up small and large ditches, small and large creeks and within a week father's land was a lake,
He was jubilant, "Good" said he, "All that lovely silt will produce marvellous crops of wheat, haricot beans, butter beans, onions and chick peas."
Unfortunately when the level of the Chindwin eventually dropped, father's land still remained submerged except for about 10 acres around the buildings. For years it was the practice of fishermen to construct a dam across the main drainage of a large area of low-lying ground to keep in the breeding and growing fish, this year was no exception. Father filed applications for the removal of the dam before the Township Officer, the Subdivisional Office and the Deputy Commissioner without success. The fishermen had been there from time immemorial and had prior right aver a newcomer - cultivator. The dam remained till the end of the fishery season, too late in the year to plough or to plant. While the Revenue Court proceedings were going on, father had not been idle, Into the patch of ten acres, he put all his frustrations, the hired men, the bullocks, the ploughs and harrows, and produced some sort of crop quite incommensurate with the outlay. Even so he went on for another two years despite the knowledge that to make a success of the scheme he had to cultivate the full 150 acres. He did this so as not to surrender to mother who kept telling him that he ought not to be dabbling in something he knew nothing about.
At the start, mother was more successful. Then gradually difficulties began to mount up. For subsistence before harvest, the tenants relied more and more on loans from mother, At harvest they would be unable to payoff these loans because they had other pressing debts to pay. Also they had to keep back something to live on; but that did not prevent them from coming again and again before harvest for money. Debts mounted. The assessment of the harvest for the share-out between the landlord and tenant turned out to be an unreliable business. Mother had her own personal assessor who received a percentage of the crop as his fee. So had the tenant. When the two assessors came to an agreement after considerable discussion, the size of the crop became established. There was always a feeling that mother's assessor, being a cultivator himself always leant towards the tenant as evidenced by the fact that assessments on mother's holdings, acre for acre was much smaller than those in neighbouring holdings. Then there were droughts, insect pests and low prices for whatever mother had asked to be planted, while what she had not planted fetched very high prices. All in all it was a soul-wearying business and matters dragged on and en as they do in farming till the facing of the truth could no longer be postponed. Buying land in boom years and selling in the slump was a costly business, more costly than father's investment in bullocks, ploughs, harrows, huts and sheds had been. All in all, a lot of money had been lost. The end of it all brought peace, tranquillity and a measure of happiness to the household,
With farming buried good and deep father used the peaceful tranquil time to start on the study of Hinduism and Buddhism, subjects which had intrigued him over the years. As usual he went into it in a big way, obtaining more and more books, going to the extent of learning Sanskrit to enable him to get to the heart of the matter, discussing Hinduism with Indians and Buddhism with Burmese, Indian and Chinese Buddhists. By now he was fluent in Burmese and could carry on long discussions with venerable Sayadaws on the more abstruse aspects of Buddhism. He used to lie in a solid teak and cane longsleever, a large black cheroot in his mouth and a fat book resting on his chest, hour after hour, day after day, for weeks at a time without getting fed up. By the time he had got to the nub of these religions, a new movement had come into the world.
Father's was just the right background for the Theosophical society, which had taken people by storm in India, Britain and Europe and in no time the Monywa branch had been formed with father as one of the founder members, Very quickly he was elevated as President. A motley bunch used to meet at a Chettyar Hindu Hall not far from us, the Indian Post Master, the Indian Head accountant of the Treasury, three chettyars, two Burmese doctors, three Burmese and two Indian lawyers, four Burmese teak traders, a Chinese Mill owner and my father. A close study of the writings of Madame Blavatsky and later of Mrs. Annie Beasant revealed many errors, contradictions, misstatements to father and his co-Theosophists. They were up in arms. They decided on lines of attack and who else but father should be asked to carry out the correspondence. Father loved it. He charged into the fray much enjoying the putting together of closely reasoned arguments backed up by the greater knowledge they had of Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity. The correspondence grew in volume and acrimony as father nailed home cogent argument after cogent argument. The monthly meetings, fully attended, were a source of much interest and enjoyment for the members whetting their brains and pitting them against the founders of the movement. What a dreadful day and what a blow to his enjoyment it was when the final letter arrived to say the correspondence was at an end. Thick dark clouds had blotted out the glorious sun he had basked in for so many months.
Had I been a little older, a little more mature or had more time with him I might have learned a great deal. I did learn, however, that though there were many gods for the mass of Hindus, to the comparative few who had delved deeply, there would be the suggestion of a supreme being, God, who for example could be likened to an immense ocean, droplets from which were our souls or spirits or whatever they could be termed, going through innumerable lives and existences being cleaned of dross, until they were sufficiently purified to be able to return to the ocean. Buddhism I was surprised to learn was not a religion; it was a philosophy, a way of life. Lord Buddha, a strict Hindu, who from childhood had been protected and isolated from every kind of pain, suffering, decay and death, suddenly came face to face with these realities of life, realities which made a deep and lasting impression. The caste system which consigned the lowest and most numerous class to the level of animals or worse, also troubled him greatly. Through deep meditation on the eternal cycle of birth, suffering and death, he received his enlightenment under the Bo tree after forty days of fasting and the end of months of wandering in the forest. A new way of life of service and complete abnegation of self through the control and mastery of the desires of the senses. He also taught the law of Karma which regulates the kind of existence and the manner of the life in a new life. A sizeable balance of merit through the many good deeds done over the demerits in the previous life would mean a happier, more comfortable and more reasonable sort of life, whereas a preponderance of demerits through evil deeds will mean the reverse. By doing more and more good, less and less evil, by study of Buddha's teachings, by meditation and final mastery of the desires of the flesh, through many, many existences, Nirvana is attained. Nirvana being a state of peace, tranquillity and a great calm beyond imagination. Apparently happiness does not come into it because it is something felt, something hankered after, something to pull the spirit back to earth and another existence.
At one period, I had taken all this sustained intensive study to mean that father was seeking a more satisfactory religion; but I was way off mark. It had merely been an intellectual exercise from which he had derived much pleasure. Not only that, but these studies had also greatly strengthened his Christian faith.
My teachers could not understand why I was working so hard in the seventh standard and I would not let on. That summer I had met Arthur Yards, a ship's engineer who had come home to Monywa after a long session at sea. He, the brother of Edward Yards, a class mate of mine, gave the two of us wonderful descriptions of the world he had seen, the adventures he had had as a ships engineer and nothing else would I be. After his middle school examination, he had been apprenticed to the Dallah dockyards, Rangoon, where he had qualified. So I was all agog when a telegram arrived from the Revd. N.K. Anderson, the Chaplain of Mandalay, who was my godfather, to say that not only had 1 been successful in the middle school examination but that I had obtained a scholarship to go on to High School. This made things very awkward. For months now, I had been dwelling on becoming a ship's engineer and had told everyone about it at home. Mother of course was against it. She never fancied me as a filthy greasy engineer like the fitters she had seen at the local saw mills. Besides, she kept harking back to what U Pon Na, the famous Manipuri astrologer of Mandalay, whose father had been the King's astrologer, had seen in my horoscope. According to him, I was marked out to be a high official in the administrative branch of Government service. Anything else was utterly irrelevant. Though he had never said so, father also must have had some reservation, and now that my godfather had suggested what he himself would have desired he went about persuading me rather cannily. There was no laying down of the law; none of the Victorian business, Instead of a rather stubborn irascible son, fit to be bawled at by an irate father, he spoke to me as if I was a great friend of his, treating me as an equal. I gave in, to mother's great joy and to father's obvious relief. This would mean another three years of schooling, the 8th, the 9th and the 10th standards in preparation for the High School Final examination; three years to be endured now that I could not be an apprentice at the Dallah dockyards.
After the first term in the 9th standard, I came home for the summer holidays to find father a shadow of his old self. As his weekly letters full of news had not contained the slightest hint of any illness, it came as a great shock. Mother put the cause of the illness to a change of diet from meat to vegetables as the result of his study of Hinduism; but as father had made the change three years before and as he had told everyone how well he felt all along, that wouldn't wash. But now he was not able to stomach even vegetables without discomfort. He suffered from long bouts of abdominal pains and slept badly. Eventually on doctor Po Mya's insistence father was taken to the General Hospital, where I spent most of each day keeping him company. On his bad days very little would be said; but on good days, and there were quite a few of them, he spoke gaily of the days of his youth, told stories against himself, laughed and cracked jokes. But I could see he was going downhill, Dr. Po Mya still playing hopeful said diagnosis was difficult, while the Civil Surgeon kept up a cheerful appearance when he came on his rounds. Mother and I lived from day to day without questioning. Then one afternoon when I got back to hospital after lunch, I found father blue to the lips and shivering with cold. A large window had been left open by a ward servant and through this, a tropical rainstorm had blown, soaking him and the bedclothes, A complete change of clothes, a bed packed with hot water bottles, then a hot drink, rallied father remarkably quickly. In a couple of hours he was fairly comfortable. Contrary to expectations, father was full of beans the next day. Much to my surprise he said:
"I feel very much better. After yesterday's experience, I am sure we can manage far better at home, Both the doctors have agreed to let me go home. Will you bring me my clothes this afternoon and ask mother to have a bed made up in the upstairs front room. It will be cooler there."
Though I should have read something into the sudden change in the attitude of the doctors, I did not. Instead we were filled with relief and joy. With just a little help from me, father managed to walk from Dr., Po Mya's car to his bed upstairs. The next two days were the happiest we had know for several weeks; the pains had ceased. Mother was asked to cook a beef and pork dish which he had enjoyed years ago - no, the cook wouldn't know how - mother had to be the one to cook it. He enjoyed every mouthful of the reasonable helping he had taken and what was more there were no after effects,
But the next day started badly, Before 7 in the morning, father was in such pain that he insisted I go for the doctor at once. The excruciating pains had now gone down to the legs. He was in agony. I rushed out and rushed back, The doctor was with us within the hour. When the legs were examined I was horrified to see them black and blue. He gave some pills for the pain but the pain would not budge, He then applied belladonna plasters to the legs and gave more pills. The pains went on. Mother called the doctor to the next room and begged him to give father a painkilling injection. There were tears in his eyes as he said:
"I wish I could. It will kill him. Why hurt him any more." He and father had been good friends for over 20 years, Asking me to call him if father got worse he left quietly.
Even then I did not realise how desperate matters were. It was a hot windless day. Mother kept wiping the wet forehead with a large handkerchief squeezed out in Eau de Cologne while I kept giving him sips of water, in between pains for an hour or so. Gradually the plaster and the pills began to work bringing a measure of relief. His breathing became less irregular; soon he was asleep. Mother and the children were at the foot of the bed while I was at the head when at about midday father stirred and in a firm voice said,
"Prop me up, I can't breathe,"
I lifted the wasted body with one hand and arranged the pillows with the other as I had done times out of number before and let him down gently. The eyes which had remained closed suddenly opened wide as if something very important had to be said, the next instant he straightened up a trifle and opened his mouth to its widest extent as a rattle welled up the throat. His mouth closed and his chin dropped to his chest. I couldn't believe it; I could not take in. Automatically 1 rearranged the pillows and placed father back on the bed, then went to mother who was sobbing, sobbing, and sobbing while unending tears coursed down her cheeks, My sisters and my brother began to wail, It was his birthday the 25th May,
A large number of people, many I did not know, came to offer their condolences and to have their last look at father laid out where grandfather had been laid out before. There was so much to do so many things for me to attend to that I was run off my feet, on the day of the funeral as the result of a garbled message to the effect that the coffin could not be ready. I left the home at 7 in the morning and cycled at breakneck speed some three miles only to find that everything was under control. The funeral procession started out on time without a hitch. The Civil surgeon read the funeral service attended by a handful of Christians and a large gathering of Burmese, Indians and Chinese of other faiths and members of the Theosophical Society. Though numbed and dulled with the constant misery which had oppressed me since father died, the solid silent emptiness of the house chilled me to the bone on this hot summer afternoon on the return from the funeral. Had every stick of' furniture been removed while we had been away, the emptiness of the house would have made far less impact. In the days that followed my eyes could not stay away from the solid teak longsleever,


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by, C. Garrett Keidel, Social Media Editor
Does anyone remember how they even began to envision the year 2020 would go for them on New Year's day, the resolutions to go to the gym more or even spend more time with friends? No? Thought so.
The year 2020, in what feels like the longest year of many of our lives, has proven to be one of the most disturbing global events to the ordinary person's way of life.
More than that, 2020 has brought about the phrase "social-distancing" and "quarantine" into the modern lexicon faster than any dystopian movie or novel imaginably could. Who even knew there was the namesake movie, Quarantine in 2008?
Many Manhattan College students have experienced, or are currently experiencing a quarantine. If you are currently in this situation, or possibly preparing to not see another human being for a two week minimum period of time, and are looking for quality content to pass the time instead of the lacking personal interaction through Zoom or FaceTime calls, you have come to the right place.
Below are several recommendations.
"Why Won't You Date Me?", Nicole Byer (Podcast)
For many, quarantining may feel like the most socially isolating span of two weeks they have ever felt. But is that kind of the point of a quarantine? Nonetheless. What better way to cope with the loneliness in quarantine than by listening to the romantic loneliness of comedians?
The podcast hosted by comedian Nicole Byer, follows her quest to understand why she is perpetually single. Accompanied by fellow comedians, previous flings, and other celebrity guests, Byer discusses and dissects relationships of the past. Mold your experiences of perceived loneliness in quarantine and join the conversations of romantic loneliness for a laugh out loud experience that's guaranteed to lift your spirits.
"Explained", Netflix (TV Series)
Intellectual stimulation may not seem very exciting to a campus of college students just starting a new semester, but the Netflix original series "Explained" may just very well be the series that converts you from monotonous youtube binges to mini-documentaries about a wide variety of topics. No two episodes are the same, and every single one is roughly 15 to 20 minutes long. Recommended episodes include the origins of the exclamation mark, astrology, the racial wealth gap, and the even more eerie during a COVID-19 world "The Next Pandemic" (released Nov. 7, 2019).
"Avatar: The Last Airbender", Netflix (TV Show)
The Nickelodeon cartoon of many of our childhoods is streaming on Netflix. Catch up in the nostalgia of the story, and the memories of watching it in your childhood home. With three whole "books" of content available, you are sure to have several days worth of storyline to catch up on, revisit, relaugh, recry, and recover from how you're feeling in quarantine.
"Shots with Jack Daniel", Jack Melanson (IGTV) @shots_with_jackdaniel
This new Instagram original content from Quadrangle alumnus, Jack Melanson, is sure to leave you feeling entertained, positive, and more informed after every episode. Along the lines of Trevor Noah and John Oliver, Shots with Jack Daniel is an instagram infotainment show commenting on current events.
Melanson said in regards to his mission, "I wanted to continue some important conversations. In the first episode I talked about Trump, and his lack of knowledge when it comes to the history of his own political party, and for some reason that issue alone has been one that I have cared about forever…when Trump began piggy-backing on the idea that he and Lincoln are a part of the same political party it really bothered me. No one was talking about how he was wrong there."
The show discusses several topics on contemporary themes that pertain to our everyday lives. A beautiful mixture of comedy and commentary that allows it to reach and connect with an ever so growing digital audience.
"My favorite joke I have written for the show comes from the first episode. I sort of talked about life and what matters to a republican, and I compared it to the American flag. I said 'republicans only care about being red, white and blue,' because after all the only thing that matters is red republican lives, white lives and apparently now blue lives."
If you are seeking fresh infotainment, with a perspective that has a connection to the Manhattan College campus, this is the show for you.
And that's your week of Quality Quarantine Content. If you have any suggestions for future content, contact the Quadrangle (@mcquad on Instagram) or C. Garrett Keidel (@garrettkeidel on Instagram).


text: Progress in extending the life expectancy of cystic fibrosis (CF) patients remains jeopardized by the increasing incidence of fungal respiratory infections. Pseudallescheria boydii (P. boydii), an emerging pathogen of humans, is a filamentous fungus frequently isolated from the respiratory secretions of CF patients. It is commonly believed that infection by ... read more


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COVID-19 Policy & FAQs
Q: Will BaeVibez Skincare stay active?
We remain open 24-7 so you can shop on our website. Our customer service team is ready to help with any and all questions via phone, email and chat.
Q: How long will shipping take?
A: Over the last few weeks, we've adjusted our practices to ensure that we're fulfilling orders in a way that protects the health and safety of our associates — and as a result, orders will experience shipping delays.
Q: Will your return policy change?
A: Our return policy is flexible for anyone who needs additional time. We've extended the policy to 60 days, but if you need longer, you can send us an email and we can assist.
Q: Will the cancelation policy be impacted during this time?
A: You will not be charged. If you would like to place a new order, please our website to place an order that will be shipped to a new address.
Q: I need to make a return or exchange, but I am unable to go to the store. What are my options?
A: Please feel free to email us and give us a call in regards to this matter, please know that during covid times we are very understanding. Visit our help section online to start a return. We are currently not accepting exchange orders.
Q: What steps are you taking to create a safe environment?
A: We want to assure you of the safety measures we're taking for you and our employees. Everyone is required to wear a mask. We have temperature scanning, regular sanitization and deep-cleaning, and social distancing measures in place.


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Free casino slot machines have become popular on the internet games that gamblers can play without an online connection to the computer. These kinds of free slot machines can also be called freerolls. Once downloaded, these kinds of free casino slot games can be played entirely free of charge and without registration or signing up. The totally free slots that are accessible online are not real money games, so all you need to do is play them to your heart's content. Sometimes you might have to create an account and log in to complete your winnings. If you would like to try one of these free casino slot machines for yourself and see how they operate, then read on.
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Words by Jesse Serwer
Our own Eddie STATS first brought us word of Tracks & Records after returning from a weekend in Jamaica last month with stories of a new Usain Bolt theme restaurant/sports bar that had just opened in a Kingston stripmall. Though it just opened in April, already the Jamaican answer to both the Hard Rock Cafe and the ESPN Zone (it's sports- and music-themed, hence the punny name), in which Bolt is a minority investor (the majority owners are Kingston Live, the people behind the adjacent Fiction nightclub), is growing satellites. According to the Jamaica Observer, a second location will open on Royal Caribbean's massive new cruise ship pier in Falmouth, Trelawny, near where Bolt grew up, followed by another in London. The latter, it's hoped, will be ready for business in time for the 2012 Olympics, when Bolt will look to set new records in the 100- and 200-meter sprints and then, presumably, gully creep his way over to his own theme restaurant to celebrate with an escoveitch sandwich. For now, Kingstonians and visiting music journalists are the only ones who can watch Lee "Scratch" Perry videos (every booth comes with a giant screen and interactive table-top LCD) while they sample T&R's renowned jerk chicken, coconut-and-cassava crusted shrimp and scotch bonnet wings. But we hear the company is considering locations in Atlanta and New York so…people, get ready.