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Hemp FR8 full range drivers
After a brief search on this site I could not find any info on the the performance of this full range speakers.
anyone has any info even better direct experience with:
1. How does it perform in comparison with Fostex 206/7?
2. Any info on what type of cabinets that suit this speakers best?
Despite there having been quite a bit of buzz over the FR8's, it seems like there are not too many of us that actually own a pair. I know that dmason has raved about his pair of Omega Loudspeakers Hemps both here and on other forums (fora?), but Omega uses a version of the FR8 that is tweaked to their spec's. I don't know how much they differ from the DIY version. I suspect that the difference is significant. Dan has posted his pair for sale after losing a listening room, so apparently despite his enthusiasm they never took over the #1 spot in his home.
Another DIY member, Nodiak, posted about trying to add phase plugs to his pair (the whizzers came off with the dust caps), but hasn't posted on them since.
I have my pair in simple BR cabinets, 82 liters volume, 4" dia x 4" long flared ports, and I sit relatively close to them in a smallish room (11 x 14'). So far, I have found them to sound like the FR graph on Hemps Acoustics' spec sheet - the highs are too hot. This didn't smooth out as much as I had hoped during break in, and toe in is not enough to bring the treble in line. The 'turn-'em-up-and-listen-from-the-next-room' test confirmed that the basic balance is tipped up too much for my taste. I put them into the living room HT system for a while, and while the highs were smoother when listening from a greater distance, the balance was still too tipped up.
To try to tame the highs I'm using a treble shelf network inspired by the Visaton open bafle thread on The Audio Circles board, currently a 0.1 mH coil + 13 Ohm resistor in parallel (no Zobel). A pretty aggressive filter, but 8 Ohms were not enough. There is also a litte wool fluff tucked in between the cone and the whizzer, which makes a small but audlble difference. I've probably lost too much sparkle at the very top end, but the overall balance is much better, voices are more natural, and I don't miss the extreme highs much.
My mono-buttocked network falls short of full baffle step correction. The midrange balance is best with the boxes against the back wall, but this gives a lumpier bass response in my room. I keep moving them around searching for the best compromise location. I'm sure the FR can be improved with a better network, but I don't have good measurement tools and there's not even a published impedance curve for the FR8 so I'm pretty much flying blind for now.
I'm not done working with them yet. At their best the FR8's do a lot of good things. The bass can be strong and well defined, dynamics are good, there's plenty of detail. If phase plugs can be successfully fitted I think they'd help. I wouldn't be surprised if a little cone or whizzer damping (dammar or Mod Podge) would help too, but again I don't really know enough about what I'm doing to want to make drastic irreversable mods to the drivers.
According to the Hemp Acoustics website, a new version of the FR8 with an improved cone is coming. They say, "In the analyses of our full range FR8DIY the peak exhibited in the midband at around 3-4K was significantly reduced as well the lower treble area around 7-10K is now far more linear, not to mention the high frequencies are more perceivable without being shrill or fatiguing." The graph they show of the difference still shows a significant HF rise, but I'd guess the new version would be worth waiting for.
As to the optimum enclosure, both the Metronome and Scottmoose's Bruce double horn ('Spawn of Frugel Horn') look interesting. If I get a better handle on the basic FR balance of the driver I'd have a hard time choosing which to build. My instincts tell me that Bruce might have the edge in dynamic punch, the Metronome maybe a little suaver midrange, but that's just me projecting my biases. AFAIK, neither one has been built yet for the Hemps.
I've never heard the Fostex so I can't help with a comparison. I hope someone else can chime in on this!
No experience with the driver, but are you sure cabinet is optimal
Have you worked with internal dampening/"stuffing"
From what I have heard it should be very good up to around 1500-2000hz, so personally I would give it a small ribbon
Hemp FR8
Mine are in BIB with none of the problems described by Lousymusician. Balance was good almost from right out of the box. I gave the whizzer 2 light coats of dammar. Mid range in particular is sweet. I also have the Fostex 206e in a horn and found with it problems similar to those described by lousymusician (highs too hot)
With long breakin and various tweaks it got to be OK but nowhere near as good as the Hemp 8 in BIB. I think alot of guys are scared off looking at the sims for BIB. DON'T BE actual response is as smooth as you would want. I have battled the rising response of alot of the Fostex drivers and I'm happy NOT to have to with the Hemp. Jim G
Not sure at all that the cabinet is optimized. Too much stuffing killed the bass, so for now I've left a layer of poly batting covering the side wall opposite the port, and the bottom of the enclosure. I have damped the driver basket with Mortite (can't find the sort of ductseal other folks have used around here, the duct sealing products I can find locally are nearly runny, and meant to set up after application). The back wall is partially lined with wavy foam strips (made for installing corrugated fibergalss roofing) to make a diffusive surface. Front and back walls are braced with criss-crossed 1 x 3 battens.
For reference, wiring is Cat 5, 4 pairs of solid wire in parallel. Amps are either a modified ST70 (Curcio driver board and regulated PS) with passive Alps pot, and a 6 watt Tripath amp (TA2020 from Autoconstruire, awaiting modification) with its own on board volume pot.
The problems I hear are above the 1000 Hz range; the published FR shows peaks at 3000 and 9000 that are 10 dB above the 200 - 1000 Hz range. That correlates with what I'm hearing.
Jim G,
Coating the whizzer with dammar has been on my mind. How much effect did that have?
No way I have room for Hemp BIB's in this room, but I have enjoyed my much smaller pair with FR125's. An entirely different sound than the Hemps, the 125's wound up rather bass-heavy and somewhat 'dark' as opposed to the Hemps bright presentation.
Hemp 8
I feel that coating the whizzer made a real difference for the good. I also have open cell foam between the whizzer and cone ( 98 cent tweak) I didn't hesitate to try dammar because the whizzer is paper and not the hemp material that the main cone is. Some people have made negative comments about the whizzer. To my ears it works quite well. I like the tone quality of the hemp cone so much that I'm not tempted to do anything to it. I would like to experiment with the Hemp 8 on open baffle. I've read that an open baffle suitable hemp is in the pipeline.
I never figured that my wife would accept the BIB's ( they are big and a lot of different speakers have been through here) After she heard them she said "I think we will have to keep these"
After removing the whizzers from the Hemp 8's I played them on ob a couple weeks with the Hawthorne Augie for bass, as of course they have basically none on their own (on ob). Very rich full output. Didn't really catch on they lacked highs until compared to FE108ez.
Then rotated CSS125's and FE108ez's each in 10L sealed (cabs were available) to mate with Vifa M22 in 40L vented (ala Dickinson in LCB). The variety has helped me get a better idea what each offers.
Last 2 nights it's Hemp's with M22 bass, they like each other. (GM kindly worked up a mltl for M22, anxious to get that built, should be deeper and a little dryer which sounds good to me).
At this time I don't have a tube amp or even tube pre to go with LM3875 gc integrated, my main amp now. So that isn't fair for the Fostex, barely ok for the Hemp's, but the FR125 seems pretty at home. That's the order I'd put them in for "brightness" and clarity factors vs. "warmth".
But I agree the Hemps have midrange tone and some sweetness. WIthout the whizzers (I guess?) the highest treble is gone and I've been tempted to go with that and work in a tweeter like the BG Neo 3. But i need to learn what replacing the whizzer would do. Been thinking of Dammaring the whizzer first, think I'll take Jim G's lead and do that. The phase plugs are made for the FE167's and are a bit small. Maybe with pp's and without whiz I'm getting a decent midwoofer. Going to get some Redwood whizzers made by a friend (Dude! Hemp and Redwood, oh yah!) Got some honk, even on ob, but I hear stories of up to 300 hours of break in needed. I'll put them in a 40 L cab (what's immed. available) for awhile to hear their fullrange. Jim G, can you recommend bib cab design? I'm game for that.
The 108's are extraordinarily clear and open and I need to get them in bib or metronone or ? to hear some low end from them, to fill things out. And, their designed for tube gear right? I mean they must be, cause with the gc it's too clinical.
FR125's are kinda freaky with so much bass, can't hear the rest as well. Going to xo out the bass and mate with M22 this week so can get a better feel for their mids and highs. At this point they seem the least satisfying -too dark, but I'm sure there's a remedy, open to ideas. The low spl's are a problem for matching to bass drivers. The dipole version must be great tho. BIB's for these huh, have a link?
The new Hemps sound like an improvement, tho these have alot to offer. Just need to try things, bsc sounds like a wise move too. Will try the 98 cent tweak.
BTW, room is ~ 300 ft2, but narrow - 11.5 x 26.5 .
BIB design
Don, I went with design on Godzilla's BIB site ( 200 sq in version) If you haven't waded through the Terry Cains BIB thread all you want to know is there along with links to more than one design for hemp 8. Thanks to GM and Scottmoose designs for hemp 8 most fostex incl. 108 are available . Thanks also to MJK's software. If you have corners available BIB doesn't seem too huge. JimG
Hemp 8 in a BLH
I have recently completed a BLH design for this driver. The project is available on www.e-speakers.com . Scroll a little down to "Vadim Horn Project".
There is a link there to an info package.
In the package you may find all the measurements: impedance, T/S parameters and FR. The FR correction filter is also included.
They do need some break-in. I have measured them brand new and after about 50 hours, and otput above 15 kHz increased by a wopping 5 dB.
My pair does not have hot hights. If anything, they drop down above 14-15 kHz. What is hot is from 1 to 10 kHz.
I do not have the new cones yet, but should get them when they are available.
Re: Hemp FR8
I still owe you some cash for those 2 CDs you got me (and the one i hope you got). Would you like a set of 206e plugs in lei of cash?
I've not even seen a set of hempsters, but i have had good luck with dammar on whizzer cones.
as to phase plugs on the hemp drivers, hemp acoustics has a set of my plugs in hand and are playing.
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In Legacy of Silence, New York Times bestselling author Belva Plain creates an unforgettable story of a remarkable family--and a deception that reaches across continents, oceans, and generations.
Caroline Hartzinger flees wartime Europe with a shattered life and a devastating secret. Pregnant and unwed, she arrives in America in 1939. Joel Hirsch offers marriage and respectability, hoping one day to earn her love, if not the passion she feels for a man whose memory still haunts them both. With Joel, Caroline builds a new life, determined to bury the past--until her daughter Eve brings Caroline's carefully crafted world crashing down again, driven by a rage to learn the truth.
"A family saga with lots of heart."—Detroit Free Press
"Belva Plain writes with authority and integrity."—San Francisco Chronicle
"Surprising, moving."—Publishers Weekly

subset: commoncrawl


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Rep. Paul Tonko had a prime aisle position at the back of the House of Representatives when President Obama entered to deliver his first-ever State of the Union speech.
Tonko, D-N.Y., was the first lawmaker to reach out and shake Obama's hand — after the president first greeted a throng of congressional pages at the back of the chamber. Words were exchanged, but we couldn't make them out from our vantage point.
Lawmakers have been known to stake out perfect real estate for the annual addresses, sometimes spending most the speech days occupying chairs in the chamber. Reps. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., and Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, have made traditions out of the pre-speech seat stakeout; Engel has been doing it for more than 20 years.
Some of the early birds arrive before noon. Tonko, a first-term lawmaker, claimed his spot at 6:30 p.m., in hopes of winning a few seconds and a handshake with the commander-in-chief. After all, it's Tonko's first State of the Union, too.


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THE BROKEN CIRCLE BREAKDOWN: Belgium's foreign language Oscar-nominee is a drama that follows the seven-year love affair of two very different people through their mutual passion for bluegrass music, eventually having a daughter who radically changes their lives. (NR) http://tribecafilm.com/tribecafilm/filmguide/brokencircle
I, FRANKENSTEIN: Aaron Eckhart stars as the mad doctor's creation, caught in an ancient war between gargoyles and demons. What's a monster to do? (PG-13 for sequences of intense fantasy action and violence throughout) http://www.ifrankensteinfilm.com/
THE INVISIBLE WOMAN: Ralph Fiennes directs himself as famed novelist and married father of 10 Charles Dickens as he falls in love with a young actress and embarks on an affair with her until his death. (R for some sexual content) http://www.sonyclassics.com/theinvisiblewoman/
John Belushi could have been Hollywood royalty ... but no!: Had he not died of a drug overdose in March of 1982 and was alive right now, Belushi would become an official senior citizen today; he was born 65 years ago on Jan. 23, 1949. Before we contemplate where his career might be in 2014, let's take a look at his contemporaries, or at least other famous folk who were born in that same year: Meryl Streep; Jessica Lange; Jeff Bridges; Richard Gere; Bruce Springsteen; Sigourney Weaver; Sissy Spacek; Pam Grier; Lawrence Kasdan; Garry Shandling; Billy Joel; and Bill O'Reilly.
Movies look for the union's label: The Producers Guild this past weekend handed out the Darryl F. Zanuck producer of the year award (i.e., best picture) to both "12 Years a Slave" and "Gravity," in its first ever tie. The day before, the Screen Actors Guild gave out the SAG best ensemble award to "American Hustle." This Saturday, it's the Directors Guild's turn to honor one of their own. Will it form a coalition with one of its fellow unions and choose the director of one of those three, or will it go rogue, befitting this schizophrenic awards season?
Love movies? Love talking about them? Love reading about them? Go to Times Union Movies blog, moderated by film fanatic C.J. Lais Jr. and join in the conversation. >http://blog.timesunion.com/movies/>


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Dublin Abbey Court Apartments
Fasiliteter Kart Streetview Vurderinger
29A Bachelors Walk Dublin 1
Merk: Det er ansvaret til hotellkjeden og/eller den enkelte eiendom for å sikre nøyaktigheten av bildene som vises. Travellerspoint er ikke ansvarlig for eventuelle feil i disse bildene.
Bachelors Walk Apartments are located in Dublin City Centre facing the River Liffey. The apartments sleep up to 3 people and contain a bedroom, a bathroom, a kitchen and a living area with television. With access to a beautiful private garden this is an ideal place to just relax and escape from the hustle and bustle of the city just outside your door.
The apartments are just beside Dublin's famous O'Connell and Halfpenny Bridges. Temple Bar is just a two-minute walk away and we are just minutes from all the major places of interest and shopping areas including Dublin Castle, Christchurch Cathedral, Trinity College, the Guinness Storehouse, the Old Jameson Distillery and Grafton Street. We are also within walking distance of all public transport systems including tram, DART and bus services.
All of our guests staying in the apartments are welcome to use the excellent facilities located in the Abbey Court building, www.abbey-court.com . Check out the facilities to see all the free stuff offered to our guests. Breakfast is not provided in the apartments. However, with our compliments, guests can avail of breakfast in our sister property - The Abbey Court Hostel.
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Har du vært her? Skriv en vurdering
Merk: Det er ansvaret til hotellkjeden og/eller den enkelte eiendom for å sikre nøyaktigheten av bildene som vises. Travellerspoint er ikke ansvarlig for eventuelle feil i disse bildene.


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Friday, September 03, 2004
Geico Gets The Go-Ahead To Sue Google And Overture
Geico received the okay from the U.S. District Court to sue Google and Overture for selling advertisements linked to their trademarks, CNET reports.
I can see their point. Although the first reaction is that Google is just selling ads, free speech, yada yada, I realized that trademark law is meant to give trademarks some value. If every trademark can link to competitors on a service that runs an enormous percentage of internet traffic, those trademarks become useless.
And it's more than just that. In the law, as I learnt in a Constitutional Law class some time ago, is all about consistency. Every ruling requires the judge to think about other cases in the future, and how this ruling will affect those. At some point, some search engine will decide to accept money for a trademark in the search results. It will take money to push a trademark further down or off the listings, and the company paying them higher up. If the judge rules in favor of Google, it is possible that the company in my theoretical case would actually be allowed by law to do what it is doing.
Furthermore, Google is selling another company's trademark. Under no circumstances is that okay. That would be like if I decided to sell Pepsi use of the word "Coca-Cola".
For all these reasons and more, I believe Google is going to lose this case.
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Prior to last night's game against the Denver Nuggets, Dwanye Wade addressed the reporters about his new born son.
"I had a time, a part in our break, in our pain and our hurt, a blessing came out of it in my life, having a son that was born healthy," Wade said of his relationship with Union. "So I'm moving on."
"I'm in the public eye, so obviously that's a part of it," Wade said of the private matter becoming public. "It comes with the territory."
Wade said now he's focusing on his family and being a great father. "I, my lady and my family have continued to move forward, and I think that's evident with the ring and the proposal that I gave her, with our lives."
Wade had hinted of an outside issue during a September appearance on The Tonight Show, telling host Jay Leno of a break with Union, saying, "Celebrity relationships [are] very hard. This was a big year for us and our relationship from the standpoint of she was shooting her show Being Mary Jane, going most of the year. I was dealing with my injuries, trying to win a championship, so we kinda took a step back."
Wade said he has spent time with his newborn son.
"Yeah, I've got a chance to see him," he said. "You know me. I'm involved in my kids' lives. When my kids were living at home with me, or wasn't living at home with me, I tried to do everything I could to see them. Obviously I got custody of them for different reasons, but nothing changes with my life.
"Like I've said, this is something that my family knows and my now fiancee worked through when we got back together, and understood that we wanted to continue our lives together and continue supporting our family and we're going to do that. That's what I've always done."


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Dallas/Fort Worth 6th On Orkin's Top 50 Bed Bug Cities ListPest control company Orkin has listed Dallas/Fort Worth as the sixth area in the country having the most bed bugs in the country.
North Texas' Bed Bug Infestation Growing At Alarming RateFor years, North Texas parents have put their children to bed saying "Don't let the bed bugs bite." But that phrase, meant as a joke, has become a strange reality for many across the region.


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My wife and I have an agreement. I won't ask her to go running with me, and she won't ask me to go scrapbooking with her. We have plenty in common, but our hobbies don't intermingle too often. She does not like running at all. I think "despise" is the word she uses. She prefers more casual exercises such as walking, stationary bike, and man-bashing (I heard this is a favorite sport at cropping events.) She especially likes the stationary bike because she can read at the same time. Personally, if I can read, write or whistle while exercising, then I don't think I'm getting much of a workout.
From her perspective, my refusal to do scrapbooking is no different than her not running. My excuse is that scrapbooking takes a combination of creativity and scissor skills. Also, it requires you to sit at a desk for hours at a time and perhaps have idle chatter with a table-mate. This does not appeal to me. (Okay, I confess, my real excuse is that only one out of every zillion men do scrapbooking, and I'm not going to be that one.)
I tried to get her interested in running. I scheduled running "dates." (Being romantic and keeping an 8-minute per mile pace is not easy.) I bought a treadmill for home. (It turned out to be a great place to hang clothes.) I even bought her a nice pair of Mizuno shoes. (They still have 499 miles of tread left on them.) I finally figured out that I was missing the point she doesn't like running and just because I like it doesn't mean she will too.
So, I'll stick to running and she'll stick to scrapbooking. Our common ground will be the passion we each have for our hobby. I'll cheer her on as she completes another album, and she can scream her support as I cross the finish line at my next race. Come to think of it, maybe she can even scrap it.
Scott Peacock


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Submitted by Paul Rice
As a proud Christian, I want the government to stay OUT of people's lives (unless they're gay, poor, sick a woman, a minority, a Democrat, a muslim, a jew or don't think multi-billion dollar corporations should pay no taxes).
Actually, just ignore that. I'm only posting this video so I can post this w00t-ass comment:
And the Gold Medal in Mental Gymnastics goes to...
"Praise God, help me Lord be a voice of righteous and have your wisdom. Yes, Jesus paid taxes but we are not Rome by God's design. God raised up America for such a time as this. America's form of Government is like no other nation. We are the closest thing to the perfect rule of man that God has laid out in His Word in the new Testament. We as Christians are to rule ourselves by our own free will through God within and His Holy Word. This nation was raised up by God to prove that man could rule himself under the power and authority of Christ. When man does he prospers as a nation or as an individual. The ruin of America will be because we America are no longer one nation under God. We are going our own way not seeking God or His Wisdom. We now have laws protecting animals such as the bald eagle where we are fined thousands for the destroying it's eggs or it's young. Yet we protect not our own from abortion. A fetus is a baby Jeremiah says God knew you in your mother's womb. John the Baptist knew Jesus in his mother's womb leaped for joy at Jesus in Mary' womb. The tax system of the Roman Empire some historian say was it's down fall. When they started to tax it's own people more than 50% of their income it started to crumble from within. So is America in danger. We the people of the USA have a voice and a choice unlike Rome. In America God gave us a Government to be a servant of the people not the other way around. We have freedom of speech and we better use it. Thank you Tim for the Video sing on. Watch Glenn Beck he is a Christian and he is one of the few in the media speaking the truth. But don't take his word for it. Question everything do your home work check things out and above all pray."
-Janice Cook
BREAKING NOW: a story so dangerous that there are those within our government that might kill to keep it from getting out.
Ma'am, what if I told you I have the miracle of a lifetime right here in this briefcase?
You can't buy No One Lives Forever, and that is a war crime.
In which an all-out barbarian war is fought over a chair that will probably kill you.
As you may have noticed, the most popular viral videos at any given time are amazingly banal, annoying, and cliched pieces of waste. It almost seems as if the internet naturally gravitates towards the worst possible Youtube and Google video selections. So it stands to reason that if the terrible videos become popular, then the unpopular videos must be awesome! We here at Something Awful present to you AwfulVision™, our own patented service dedicated to showcasing a wide selection of unpopular videos that apparently must be good! Welcome to Web 3.9. Welcome to AwfulVision™!
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Thread: Amaretto Almond Encrusted Lamb
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Amaretto Almond Encrusted Lamb
I know! lamb is pricey, but sometimes you have a special occasion for just the two of you and this is a perfect 'special' meal.
Amaretto Almond Encrusted Lamb
Rind from one whole orange
2 cups water
1/3 cups crushed almonds
2 Tbs Amaretto
1/3 cup bread crumbs
1 small bunch parsley
1/2 cup sugar
16 to 20-ounce rack of lamb (ask butcher to dress rack and trim all fat from ribs)
Butter, at room temperature
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Boil orange rind in small saucepan with water and sugar. Cook for 15 minutes. Drain well. Chop parsley finely. Dry well. Place parsley, almonds, breadcrumbs and amaretto in a food processor and blend well. set aside. Put rack of lamb in a roasting pan on middle rack of oven. Roast 15 minutes for medium rare, 20 minutes for medium, or 28 minutes to well done. Remove from oven and let cool 5 minutes. Separate the lamb ribs. Rub butter around the edges of each. Roll edges in mixture of dry ingredients and amaretto. Set ribs on platter. Garnish with orange rind. 2 servings
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tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11939295497692582512018-03-06T15:13:53.038-08:00Physics of ProsperityA science based approach to understanding prosperity.Ram Palaniappanhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1193929549769258251.post-73131158992228500432012-11-14T17:01:00.003-08:002012-11-15T22:13:18.670-08:00Economics of loans to the poor and how technology will help

"One lends only to the rich."

The usual reason given for high interest rates on loans to the poor is the high default rate. If you need to make 5% to cover your costs, but only half your customers are going to pay you back, then you need to charge 210%, so that the ones who do repay can make up for the ones who don't.

This logic assumes that high default rates are a given, not a variable that can be influenced, or even selected. The default rate has a few key drivers and understanding them can lead to ways to influence the economics of a loan.

1. COLLATERAL
One of the basic protections that lenders seek is collateral - something of value that the borrower puts at risk if he doesn't repay. Wealthier borrowers can pledge larger collateral. Often the value of the collateral is proportional to the size of the loan. This explains why poorer borrowers can borrow less, but it doesn't explain why their interest rates should be higher.

2. INFORMATION
If the borrower has no money after using up the loan, then the lender will not be able recover his loan. So the lender needs to know how likely the borrower is to repay the loan, the nature of his income and his financial situation. The lender may even want to monitor the borrower and periodically recollect some of this information. These efforts have a cost that has to be covered by the interest rate. And this cost doesn't scale down with the size of the loan.

To make it worse, this is a bad spiral. When the interest rate goes up, the borrower has a larger incentive not to repay, which means the lender needs to be more thorough in collecting information and monitoring the borrower - further pushing up the cost and further increasing the incentive not to repay.

3. CONTRACT ENFORCEABILITY
The flip side of information is the enforceability of the contract. If the lender had a way to enforce the contract, then they wouldn't incur the costs of having to collect information. While this seems like a theoretical possibility, examples occur all through the real world. The mafia is reported to be the largest bank in Italy (and most profitable). In India, the legal systems takes years to review litigation. This keeps banks out of lending to the poor and those with more innovative ways to collect have stepped in.

IMPACT OF TECHNOLOGY
Now look at how technology can affect these drivers. Everyone has a cell phone and increasingly people have smart phones. These are essentially mini sensing and computing devices that everyone has become tied to. The widespread adoption of cell phones and the movement of information to the cloud make the ability to collect and monitor information much much easier.

Further, people are taking their social relations online (1 billion of them on facebook!) and are creating digital assets that have value (think of online timesheets, points, miles, twitter accounts, BBM contact lists, blogs etc) that are not directly correlated to their wealth. It's not inconceivable that social networks can be a platform to enforce contracts or that digital assets can be put up as collateral.

Eventually technology will drive down the cost of loans to the poor. For an example of this has already started, take a look at activehours.

A version of this post was originally published at blog.activehours.com.

Ram Palaniappanhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1193929549769258251.post-24852715360325402832012-05-16T00:02:00.000-07:002012-06-10T23:02:35.246-07:00Prosperity creates poverty"Capital is that part of wealth which is devoted to obtaining further wealth"- Alfred Marshall

Continuing from my previous post, where we saw that the same wealth distribution patterns across time and across cultures, you'd wonder what causes this. Is it a result of how we as people are, how we interact and how are economic systems function? Can we create a mathematical model that is based on human behavior as it relates to money and would it give us the same distribution?

People engaging with each other and exchanging something of value is very similar to particles bumping into each other and exchanging energy - a basic thermodynamic system that has been studied in a good amount of detail by physicists. You could run a simulation with a large number of people who all start of with the same amount of money. Then they engage with each other at random, exchanging a random amount of their money at each interaction. At the end of a number of iterations, the wealth distribution will be similar to distribution above - with the poorest 10% having 2% of the wealth and the richest 10% having 24% of the wealth. This is roughly what you'd see if you spread everyone evenly between the poorest and the richest person, that is without a huge amount of inequality.

To make the system behave more like normal people do, let's add another condition - that the richer person will never offer up for exchange more than what he could get from the poorer person. After you take this system through a number of iterations, the results are completely different - there are many poor people, with the wealth concentrated among the few rich.

Remarkably, a basic wealth maximization condition makes this system quite similar to the real world. Now that we have a sandbox that works quite like the real world, we can ask some questions, introduce certain changes and see what the results are.

Is the world really a zero sum game?
Can the poor actually carry out their wealth maximization objective?
Would forcibly removing the wealth maximization objective lead to prosperity?

Ram Palaniappanhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-1193929549769258251.post-14750363774808100592012-05-13T22:53:00.000-07:002012-05-16T00:11:15.947-07:00Is economic inequality inevitable?"The Utopian scheme of leveling [wealth distribution] and a community of goods, are as visionary and impractical as those which vest all property in a crown. These ideas are arbitrary, despotic, and in our government, unconstitutional" - Samuel Adams

Study after study has shown that wealth and income distributions across countries and and cultures follow similar power law functions for the wealthy and log-normal distributions for the rest. In simple English: There are usually a few wealthy people and many poor.

In the US the wealthiest 5% have over 50% of the wealth (the wealthiest 1% have one third of the wealth while the poorest 40% hold just 4% of the wealth). In the UK, the wealthiest 5% have over 40% of the wealth and in India they have 38% of the wealth. This pattern holds even if you look within certain age groups or demographics. And it's been repeating itself through history.

Excavations in the ancient Egyptian city Akhetaten, which was populated for a short period during the 14th century BC, yielded a distribution of the house areas. Assuming that the house area is a measure of the wealth of its inhabitants, we find the same type of wealth distributions existed in the 14th century BC.

A study of the wealth and income distribution at the height of the Roman Empire in the 2nd century had the same type of distribution (and used wheat equivalents as the hypothetical currency).

Another study of the distribution of wealth in the medieval Hungarian aristocratic society around the year 1550 again found the same type of power-law based wealth distribution. The study assumed the wealth of a noble family was based on the amount of land and serf families that they owned.

In 1906, Italian economist, Vilfredo Pareto observed that 80% of the land in Italy was owned by the 20% of the population. He then carried out surveys on a variety of other countries and found to his surprise that a similar distribution applied. This is now known as the Pareto Principle or 80/20 rule. (Pareto supposedly also observed that 20% of the pea-pods in his garden contained 80% of the peas.)

This type of wealth distribution appears repeatedly throughout our history and continuous to occur even today - like an natural law that is invisible, but acting around each one of us right now. While the Egyptian civilizations didn't survive, the Roman Empire fell and the medieval times ended, each left behind evidence that this natural law was active during their time. What makes this natural law work? What are the structural elements and interactions, the physics, behind it?

Can it be influenced or is it inevitable?Ram Palaniappanhttp://email@example.com


text:
FAIRBANKS (AP) -- The University of Alaska Board of Regents has chosen a new chairman.
Fairbanks regent Brian Rogers was elected by his peers Friday.
Rogers said he hopes to revamp the allocation of time in board meetings to allow more time for regent discussion. He also wants to increase communication among regents between meetings.
Rogers was appointed to the board in 1999, and has served as treasurer for the last two years, according to UA spokesman Bob Miller.
He was a member of the state House from 1979 to 1982 and worked for the university, first as director of budget development and then as vice president for finance, from 1984 to 1995.
The board also elected Elsa Demeksa as vice chairwoman, Frances Rose as secretary and Joseph Usibelli Jr. as treasurer.
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text:
Merkel Coalition Has Re-Election Majority, Forsa Poll Shows
Support for Chancellor Angela Merkel's coalition rose to the highest level since January 2010 in a weekly Forsa poll, as her junior partner showed signs of recovery less than six months before German national elections.
Merkel's Christian Democratic bloc rose one percentage point to 41 percent in the poll for Hamburg-based Stern magazine and RTL television released today. Her Free Democratic coalition partner had 6 percent, also up one point and the fourth straight week it has been above the 5 percent threshold needed to win seats in parliament. With a combined 47 percent, Merkel has a clear majority for the first time in more than three years.
The Free Democrats have "a potential vote share of 8 percent to 12 percent," and "as the news surrounding the party gets better, more of these people will return," Jan Techau, director of the Brussels center of the Carnegie Endowment, said by phone. Merkel meanwhile is "strong, she's in control and she has the party behind her. She's not a spent force."
With political maneuvering under way before the Sept. 22 vote, the main opposition Social Democratic Party struggles with an unpopular lead candidate, Peer Steinbrueck, and strong public backing for Merkel's handling of the euro-area crisis. The SPD is preparing for an April 14 convention in Augsburg, Bavaria, at which delegates will vote on the party's election platform.
The SPD, which governed in a so-called grand coalition with Merkel's CDU/CSU in her first term from 2005 to 2009, dropped a point to 23 percent in the poll, the same level as its historic low in the last election in September 2009. Its traditional Green Party ally had 14 percent, also down a point.
'In Good Hands'
"If the SPD had a charismatic chancellor candidate then Merkel would be regarded more critically," Forsa chief Manfred Guellner was quoted by Stern as saying. As it is, with Merkel in charge, "people have the feeling that they're in good hands," he said. "A rerun of the coalition now looks possible, something that was doubtful for a long time."
Even with the anti-capitalist Left Party, which gained a point to 9 percent, the three opposition parties have a combined score of 46 percent, one point short of Merkel's coalition. The SPD and Greens say they won't form a coalition with the Left Party, which is the successor to former East Germany's communists.
Forsa polled 2,002 voters on April 2-5. The results have a margin of error of as much as 2.5 percentage points.
To contact the reporter on this story: Alan Crawford in Berlin at email@example.com
To contact the editor responsible for this story: James Hertling at email@example.com


text:
This video has been out for a couple of months, but just came to my attention recently. It's of Angélica Freitas reading from Rilke Shake, translated from the Portuguese by Hilary Kaplan and published by Phoneme Media. It also won this year's Best Translated Book Award. (Speaking of which, it's about time to start planning and releasing info about next year . . . )
Rilke Shake from David Shook on Vimeo.
This entry in the Why This Book Should Win series, is by Tess Lewis, BTBA judge, writer, translator from the French and German, and an advisory editor of the Hudson Review. We will be running two (or more!) of these posts every business day leading up to the announcement of the finalists.
Rilke Shake by Angélica Freitas, translated from the Portuguese by Hilary Kaplan (Brazil, Phoneme Media)
ma'am, do you have a mallarmé in your house?
do you know how many pessoas die every year
in accidents with mallarmé?
statute of mallarmamento
In Rilke Shake, the Brazilian poet, Angélica Freitas, whips up a powerful tonic for even the most stubborn case of anxiety of influence: one cup Rilke, a pinch Gertrude Stein (farting in the tub), two tablespoons Poundian cadences, a dash of Marianne Moore, and toasted Blake, with five hundred hollygolightlies thrown in for good measure, the whole lot shaken not stirred.
Freitas' antic irreverence and exuberant poetic license are contagious but don't come at the expense of depth. Even as she "smooth[es] the rough edges of farce," life's sharper blades intrude in her poems as heartbreak, poverty, loneliness, depression. In family sells it all, a litany of loss, sacrifice, and shady survival strategies ends as expected. "family sells it all / for next to nothing / . . . you know how it goes." Even the luxury of perfect teeth are no match for market forces: "perfect teeth, listen up: / you're not going to get anywhere." Gathering rosebuds or reading great literature is fine as far as it goes, but an empty stomach will have its way.
ah, yes, shakespeare is very nice, but beets, chicory, and watercress?
and rice and beans, and collard greens?
. . .
life's tough, perfect teeth.
but eat, eat all you can,
and forget this chat,
and dig in.
Tragedy and heartbreak can strike at any time, even lunchtime, say, as in boa constrictor.
the creak crack
of bones breaking
a single tear escaping
it was like love
the lack of air
blood rising to the head
where history begins.
Translator Hilary Kaplan won a PEN/Heim Translation Fund Grant to translate these poems. She has done the grant and Freitas' poems justice, capturing the many shifts in tone in and between the lines, from playful to wry to sardonic to pathetic, even sentimental, to deadpan and back to playful, sometimes within a single poem. For all of Freitas' lyric clowning, it's clear she takes poetry too seriously not to dismantle it and use it to her own purposes.
you need
to live in the ellipses
need to dissect
the frog of poetry—
don't abolish the pond.
leaper, leap in
to the great leap.
Yes, reader, leap in with both feet, leap in often. But don't take just my advice, listen to the statute of dismallarmament—"be a patriot, surrender your mallarmé. olé"—and order a Rilke Shake today.
Yesterday I wrote a long preview of Han Kang's The Vegetarian, the Reading the World Book Club fiction book for March. Today, I'm switching over to our poetry selection—Diorama by Rocío Cerón, translated from the Spanish by Anna Rosenwong (Phoneme Media.)
As always, you can post your thoughts and opinions about all of the RTWBC books in the comments section below, on Twitter using the hashtag #RTWBC, or at the Facebook Group.
Anna Rosenwong's Introduction
Anna's introduction to Diorama might not put all readers at ease, but I think it's worth quoting from here because it does provide a couple suggestions for how to approach the collection:
Translating Rocío Cerón's Diorama was at first baffling. As an experienced translator and as a less than conventional poet myself, I know better than to seek clarity or narrative or concrete structure in experimental poetry. Nonetheless, it is precisely this sort of legibility that readers often demand of translated work, which can result in selection bias; difficult, experimental, or what Cole Swenson calls "immanent" poetry is often left untranslated in favor of the more familiar and legible. Diorama is not plainly legible. It is essentially impressionistic, stubbornly elusive, and at times outright hallucinatory.
To get closer to this book, I found I needed—and I urge the reader—to set aside notions of tractability and surrender to its associative and auditory insights. So much of reading and translating poetry is training your ear to the text's private language, particularly in a text like this, where sound often provides the surest foothold amid the rush of cascading images. This emphasis on sound is demonstrated by Cerón's enveloping, fierce live performances, and perceptive readers may find much to gain by putting the book down and trying the lines aloud for themselves, attentive not only to sound and rhythm but to the play and gripping of words in the mouth. In its repetitions, its incantations, its subtle and unexpected linguistic linkages, this is work that demands to be spoken and heard.
An Example
The book opens with "13 Ways to Inhabit a Corner," which is made up of thirteen short pieces. (Obviously.) Here are two of them:
Ostriches in flight—there are women whose words are ash trees. Shadows stitch together harbors of air. In the midst of the stampede, a hand rests on the arc of a kneecap. Cigar and smoke. Rosy cypress sleep. The scent reaches far beyond the border. From the bureau—power, smile destroyed/ocher temptation, strophic enjambed body. Vestibule.
Jubilation and adoration in parentheses. Above the long hair of that woman, seen in Baden-Baden, a galaxy hangs. No satellite rings. No saintly crown. Aftershock. Pealing bells (no ecclesiastical province) whisper a half-truth. White and cracked. The lips. We need a new password to get back to the world in time. While the word appears, she draws a spiral in the water. Resplendence.
Anna mentioned section "XII" in her intro stating, "To her translator, it appears that Diorama is Cerón's attempt to find or forge that password." Which is intriguing to me.
The Sounds of the Poems
Going back to Anna's suggestion to listen to the poems, to read them aloud, here are two videos that give you a sense of what the poem sounds like.
And, even more interesting, here's Rocío herself reading "Sonata Mandala to the Penumbra Bird" as part of the Maintenant Series at Poetry Parnassus.
The Author
Rocío Cerón is from Mexico City and her work combines poetry with music, performance, and video. In addition to Diorama (or DIORAMA? Sometimes it's in all caps) she's published Basalto, Imperio/Empire, and Tiento. Her poems have been translated into a number of languages, including Finnish, French, Swedish, and German.
Here's an interview with her for Poetry Parnassus:
SJ Fowler: Mexican poetry has long been an immense and formidable tradition, reflecting so much of the passion and invention of Mexican culture itself. Octavio Paz is obviously a world-renowned figure, but I think his anthology of Mexican poetry, in conjunction with Samuel Beckett, really opened many eyes in the English-speaking world to the depth of the poetry historically in Mexico. Is this tradition ever present to contemporary poets?
Rocío Cerón: Mexican poets are children of their own traditions and customs, for better or worse. Young poets disdain their ancestors and they frequently succumb to them. I think this is only natural and I don't think that this happens only in Mexican poetry. My generation does not live under the weight of Octavio Paz anymore. There is a chorus of voices and ways of looking at the world. The global era has played an important role in poetry; for example, by bringing together traditions as far as those of the Slavic world and the indigenous pre-Hispanic poetry. Using Internet these influences can dialogue and share their experience. Translation has become a great tool to re-signify different traditions and their poetic legacies.
SJF: Multi-disciplinary approaches to poetry seem very important to you, fusing the art form with music and art. How central is this to your work?
RC: I was raised in a family headed by my grandfather, who was a scientist, and my grandmother, who was an avid reader and storyteller. Contemporary art has nurtured my poetry. It has become an important influence in my writing and led me to something I call "expanded poetry" (the type of poetry that seeks a dialogue and allows for breaking borders between disciplines). Writing from many angles has been a natural process for me. I am interested in the kind of transversal poetry I call Galaxy Projects, meaning a fusion of language, music, action, video and the body.
It's a really interesting interview—be sure and check out the whole thing! There's also a short conversation with Rocío and Anna that World Literature Today published shortly after Diorama won the Best Translated Book Award.
If all goes according to plan, we'll run a short interview with her some time next week.
The Translator
Anna Rosenwong is a former judge of the Best Translated Book Award, and has a MFA from the University of Iowa and a PhD in Comparative Literature from the University of California, Irvine. She has also translated José Eugenio Sánchez's Suite Prelude a/H1N1 and has published an original collection of poetry, By Way of Explanation.
And from this past ALTA conference, here's a video of Anna and David Shook (publisher of Phoneme Media) talking about this translation and the editing process.
A Review
If you want another entryway to this collection, I'd recommend checking out this review by Anthony Seidman that appeared in Entropy.
Yet for all its experimental or "immanent" and "stubbornly elusive" language as Rosenwong writes in her informative translator's note, Cerón's Diorama skillfully situates itself among longer poems from Latin America which use collage, kaleidoscopic experimentation and an all-observant eye to fly over the history and landscape of a country, people or epoch. Cerón´s new collection commences with the micro, ants foraging for candy in a room, and then opens up to the macro in wider thrusts, addressing a "Pan-Latin American" exploration of "Silenced sun on the Rio Grande or the Amazon," South America and the harrowing legacy of the Guarani and "Columbus on his knees in Hispaniola: the blindness of deer and the cunning need to procure prey: Malinche, the first American Babel."
Hopefully by now you're interested in reading Diorama and participating in this month's RTWBC!
Yesterday I posted a bit of a screed against lists, followed immediately by a list of the six translations everyone's talking about. My hope is to produce a bunch of lists featuring literature in translation from 2015, all organized by various rubrics that can allow you to find a handful of recommendations with a minimum of posturing and "best-ness."
On the first podcast of the year, Tom and I talked about our reading goals for 2015. I can't remember the exact number or percentage, but I vowed to read more books from these sorts of underrepresented countries, since I tend to fall into the habit of reading a ton of writers from France and the Southern Cone, despite knowing full well that there are a lot of great books coming out from other parts of the world.
So, for today, here are four recommendations of titles from countries whose literature tends not to get as much attention as books from Western Europe and South America.
Nowhere to Be Found by Bae Suah, translated from the Korean by Sora Kim-Russell (AmazonCrossing)
One of the best books AmazonCrossing has ever published. (Well, out of the handful I've read, that is . . . ) Despite Dalkey Archive's Library of Korean Literature Series, Korean books still don't get the attention and respect they deserve.
It's too early to really call this, but it looks like Bae Suah is going to be the exception to that. Sure, Kyung-Sook Shin got some good press for Please Look After Mom, but I'm not sure how well that sold, and her ensuing titles didn't get nearly that amount of attention. (Doesn't help that she went from being published by Knopf to being published by Other Press.)
On the other hand, Nowhere to Be Found was just named to the longlist for the PEN Translation Prize and Open Letter will be bringing out a new novel of hers next October. I wrote a longish review about this book, which opens as follows:
In Nowhere to Be Found, her second work translated into English following Highway with Green Apples, Bae Suah does more with character and narrative in 60 pages than most novelists accomplish in 300. With concise, evocative prose, Bae merges the mundane with the strange in a way that leaves the reader fulfilled yet bewildered, pondering how exactly the author managed to pull this all off.
Plot-wise, Nowhere to Be Found is pretty straightforward. Set, for the most part, in 1988, the unnamed narrator is a young temporary worker at a university in Gyeonggi Province as a sort of administrative assistant and works part-time at a nearby restaurant, running herself ragged in order to support her semi-appreciative family. Not much of the narrator's life outside of work is depicted. Although she does have a boyfriend of sorts, it's complicated both by his being away in the military and by the fact that his mother thoroughly dislikes her for being lower class.
This book is great, as is the one we're bringing out. Get on the Bae Suah train now! And if you're looking for other great Korean titles to read, grab a copy of The Vegetarian by Han Kang when it comes out in early 2016.
Home by Leila Chudori, translated from the Indonesian by John McGlynn (Deep Vellum)
I could easily have included one of the two Eka Kurniawan titles that came out this year on this list as an Indonesian representative, but those books have gotten some play, and I wanted to use this chance to draw some attention to John McGlynn.
First, in terms of the book itself, it's a family saga that revolves around Dimas Suryo, a journalist who escapes Indonesia just before Suharto took over. He ends up in Paris with a few of his compatriots, where they open and Indonesia restaurant and dream of returning to their homeland. (Which won't happen.) Thirty years later, as Suharto's regime is crumbling, Dimas's daughter decides to make a documentary on Indonesia for her final project . . .
Written in straight-forward prose, Home is mostly interesting to me for its historical information and the way that it bounces throughout time and point of view to tell this history of exile. It would make a great book club book, and unfortunately was overshadowed, in terms of review coverage, by Eka Kurniawan's Beauty Is a Wound and Man Tiger, which happened to come out at almost the exact same time. (Doesn't help that Beauty covers the same period of history, but in a much different way.)
With one exception (Rainbow Troops by Andrea Hirata), the only other Indonesian titles that have been released in the U.S. are from the Lontar Foundation, a nonprofit in Jakarta dedicated to promoting Indonesian literature, which was co-founded by John McGlynn, the translator Home. From what I know of John, he's the Will Evans of Indonesia. He's translated and edited over 100 works of Indonesian literature, is the Indonesian correspondent for Manoa, and has edited a special Indonesian Lit issue for Words Without Borders. Almost single-handedly, he's been introducing Indonesian literature to the world since 1987!
The Knight and His Shadow by Boubacar Boris Diop, translated from the French (Senegal) by Alan Furness (Michigan State University Press)
A full review of this is forthcoming for Three Percent, so I won't spend too much time on the book itself here. I do want to share the opening of Michael Orthofer's review at the Complete Review, though, especially since it was one of the only outlets to have covered this book. (Proving once again that if you want to know as much about international literature as possible, you have to read Complete Review and the Literary Saloon.):
As befits a novel featuring a knight in its title, The Knight and His Shadow is fundamentally a quest-tale: Lat-Sukabé receives a message from the woman he still loves but who disappeared from his life eight years earlier, Khadidja—a cry for help: "Lat-Sukabé, come before it's too late." He sets out for out-of-the-way Bilenty, where she is apparently to be found, but his account is from his time in the nearby town where he has to arrange the pirogue-trip to Bilenty.
The novel is presented in three acts, covering the three days of his stay there, a holding pattern of sorts. Having embarked on his quest, he must see if he really has the will to see it through—a journey that, he comes to realize, might be something completely different from what he had expected (or talked himself into), Khadidja's siren-call not quite what it seems to be and his quest perhaps a more personal one than it ostensibly seems.
Diop structures the novel cleverly. Having Lat-Sukabé narrate the account might already hint that this is also a story of personal (self-) discovery, but the transitions lead the reader—and the protagonist—there in an unexpected way.
What most impresses me is how MSU Press has decided to publish a series of translations from Africa and the Middle East. They published books from Senegal, Jordan, and Tanganyika in 2015, and have an Algerian book coming out early next year. Although getting attention and readers for these books is an uphill battle for a university press (for anyone really), they can quickly become one of the go-to presses for finding books from these parts of the world—regions that more commercial houses tend not to pay much attention to, but which we readers deserve to know more about.
Bessarabian Stamps by Oleg Woolf, translated from the Russian (Moldova) by Boris Dralyuk (Phoneme Media)
I'm including this here in part because its been compared to Bruno Schulz, in part because it's only the second book from Moldova to come out in the past eight years (The Good Life Elsewhere by Vladimir Lorchenkov, translated by the amazing Ross Ufberg being the other), and in part because Phoneme Media deserves as much attention as possible.
First, here's the first paragraph of the book itself:
One day a freight arrived from Grigoriopol with no head car, but no one noticed. No one even noticed that no one noticed. People often pay no heed, at times, to things they later don't notice. No one, in fact, knows where this head car is—whether it arrived from Grigoriopol, whether it will arrive, whether there's even a railroad in those parts.
(This story also includes a Gypsy, which gets an automatic thumbs up from me.)
In the short time they've been publishing, Phoneme Media has done some incredible things. They published Diorama by Rocio Ceron, which won the 2015 Best Translated Book Award for Poetry. They did Like a New Sun: New Indigenous Mexican Poetry, which may be the only collection of indigenous Mexican poetry I've ever seen. (And which may well make my "Poetry Books I Would Read if I Read More Poetry" list.) The did The Black Flower and Other Zapotec Poems by Natalia Toledo. They brought out Uyghurland by Ahmatjan Osman, which is the only book in the Translation Database translated from the Uyghur. They've published several books by Mario Bellatin. Overall, thanks to David Shook's vision, they've become one of the hippest, most notable presses for finding strange, beautiful books from languages and parts of the world that are underrepresented.
I'm pretty sure that over the next few years—with the launch of Tilted Axis, expansion of MSU and Phoneme and others—it will become easier and easier for readers to find books from parts of the world that have historically been underrepresented. To be honest, looking over the list of books from 2015, I was kind of shocked how hard it was to find books from non-traditional countries. Sure, there are four titles from Georgia and seven from Egypt, but only one from: Angola, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Curacao, India, Pakistan, Mozambique, Senegal, and Tunisia. Added together, these countries accounted for 20 titles published in translation in 2015. By contrast, 94 came out from France along.
The eighth annual Best Translated Book Awards were announced at BookExpo America this afternoon, with Can Xue's The Last Lover, translated from the Chinese by Annelise Finegan Wasmoen, taking home the award for fiction, and Rocío Cerón's Diorama, translated from the Spanish by Anna Rosenwong, winning in poetry.
Thanks again to the support of Amazon.com's giving programs, the winning authors and translators will each receive $5,000.
"I'm so excited," Can Xue said when she was reached for a comment, "I think it's the most beautiful thing that has happened in my whole life. I always think of the BTBA as a very prestigious prize rewarding writers who have the great courage to achieve their literary ambitions."
According to the jury, Can Xue's ("tsan shway") The Last Lover (published by Yale University Press) was the most radical and uncompromising of this year's finalists, pushing the novel form into bold new territory. Journeying through a dreamworld as strange yet disquietingly familiar as Kafka's Amerika, The Last Lover proves radiantly original. If Orientalists describe an East that exists only in the Western imagination, Can Xue describes its shadow, offering a beguiling dream of a Chinese West. Annelise Finegan Wasmoen's translation succeeds in crafting a powerful English voice for a writer of singular imagination and insight.
The judges also named three runners-up in fiction: Harlequin's Millions by Bohumil Hrabal, translated from the Czech by Stacey Knecht and published by Archipelago Books, for the wonderful lyricism of its winding sentences; Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli, translated from the Spanish by Christina MacSweeney and published by Coffee House Press, for the exceptional promise it demonstrates as a debut novel; and Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay by Elena Ferrante, translated from the Italian by Ann Goldstein and published by Europa Editions, for its vibrant characters and sweeping narrative power.
On the poetry side of things, David Shook, the co-founder and editorial director of Phoneme Media "congratulates translator Anna Rosenwong for her masterful translation of Rocío Cerón's Diorama, our first book of poetry and one of the most fascinating and important books to have been published in Mexico this century. Phoneme Media is incredibly grateful for the support of the BTBA's judges and organizers, to Three Percent and its indefatigable director Chad Post, to our fellow shortlisted publishing houses, translators, and authors, and to our readers around the world. Congratulations, Anna and Rocío, on receiving this much deserved award!"
Past winners of the fiction award include: Seiobo There Below and Satantango, both by László Krasznahorkai (recent recipient of the Man Booker International Prize) and translated from the Hungarian by Ottilie Mulzet and George Szirtes respectively; Stone Upon Stone by Wiesław Myśliwski, translated from the Polish by Bill Johnston; and, The True Deceiver by Tove Jansson, translated from the Swedish by Thomas Teal. (Jansson and Teal are the only author and translator on this year's fiction shortlist who have previously won the award.)
In terms of the poetry award, past winners include: The Guest in the Wood by Elisa Biagini, translated from the Italian by Diana Thow, Sarah Stickney, and Eugene Ostashevsky; Wheel with a Single Spoke by Nichita Stănescu, translated from the Romanian by Sean Cotter; and Spectacle & Pigsty by Kiwao Nomura, translated from the Japanese by Kyoko Yoshida and Forrest Gander.
This year's fiction jury is made up of: George Carroll, North-North-West and Shelf Awareness; Monica Carter, Salonica; James Crossley, Island Books; Scott Esposito, Conversational Reading and Center for the Art of Translation; Jeremy Garber, Powell's Books; Katrine Øgaard Jensen, Asymptote; Madeleine LaRue, Music & Literature; Daniel Medin, American University of Paris, Cahiers Series, Quarterly Conversation, and the White Review; and Michael Orthofer, Complete Review.
The poetry jury includes: Biswamit Dwibedy, poet; Bill Martin, translator, critic, organizer of The Bridge; Dawn Lundy Martin, poet; Erica Mena, poet and translator; and Stefan Tobler, And Other Stories and translator.
For more information, visit the official Best Translated Book Award site and the official BTBA Facebook page, and follow the award on Twitter.
The latest addition to our Reviews section is by Christopher Iacono on Shiki Nagaoka: A Nose for Fiction by Mario Bellatin, translated by David Shook, and out from Phoneme Media.
Most people can appreciate high-quality writing with a good (literary) prank, and most people can appreciate a finely cultivated mustache. And when you have both, and it stems from these guys:
you obviously and absolutely cannot go wrong. Not much more needs to be said as an introduction for either Mexican author Mario Bellatin or translator David Shook, other than that both are incredibly accomplished, and another review of Bellatin's work is here and David has the coolest mustache and reviewed for Three Percent before. So, without further ado, here is a bit of Chris's review:
Nagaoka's story begins with his birth, which was difficult because of his nose. The two midwives who assisted his mother thought his large appendage was a "punishment" for his aristocratic family's "excessive enthusiasm that accompanied the arrival of foreign ideas." At an early age, he wrote hundreds of stories (mostly about "affairs related to the nose") and later experimented with writing stories in multiple languages. Besides literature, Nagaoka was also interested in photography. His combined love of literature and photography later resulted in the book Photos and Words, which "heavily influenced" Juan Rulfo, the real-life writer of Pedro Páramo. However, his early investigations into photography resulted in an unsolved murder which, according to a "certain Mexican writer," is mentioned in the untranslatable novel.
Following that incident, Nagaoka joined a Buddhist monastery and lived there for 13 years. During this time, he attempted to write "a large novel" that was originally going to be a "masculine version" of Murasaki Shikibu's The Tale of Genji but somehow ended up being a Japanese version of Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time. At the same time, his nose became so big at one point that he needed someone to hold it up for him during meals. As if his troubles during mealtimes were not bad enough, the other monks, despite the rules of the novitiate, would taunt Nagaoka and play with his nose.
After being expelled from the monastery, Nagaoka set up a kiosk to sell rolls of film and develop them. One of his customers was a famous Japanese writer. Oddly enough, Nagaoka was not interested in this writer's works but rather in his photographs of bathrooms. These photographs inspired Nagaoka to compose "his most solid work," Photos and Words, which was popular enough to be translated into English by LIFE magazine in the 1950s.
For the rest of the review, go here.
"I am honored to have ushered Mario Bellatin's biography of the great Shiki Nagaoka, a writer and artist almost entirely unknown to English-language readers, into English for the first time, and it is my hope that this new translation begins to redress his under-acknowledgement as a major influence on contemporary world literature. Bellatin's highly stylized study is the most important work on the author to appear since Pablo Soler Frost's 1986 monograph, Possible Interpretation of [untranslatable symbol], notable for its pedantry, perhaps best evidenced by the average (mean) tally of semicolons per page: 47."
This is how translator David Shook begins his preface to Shiki Nagaoka: A Nose for Fiction. However, Nagaoka never existed; Shook is just going along with a joke which, according to a New York Times article, originated at a writer's conference years ago. When asked about his favorite writer, Bellatin answered that it was a Japanese author who had an unusually large nose and wrote a highly-influential novel in an untranslatable language. The audience members believed the Mexican writer, so Bellatin decided to write this "biography."
Nagaoka's story begins with his birth, which was difficult because of his nose. The two midwives who assisted his mother thought his large appendage was a "punishment" for his aristocratic family's "excessive enthusiasm that accompanied the arrival of foreign ideas." At an early age, he wrote hundreds of stories (mostly about "affairs related to the nose") and later experimented with writing stories in multiple languages. Besides literature, Nagaoka was also interested in photography. His combined love of literature and photography later resulted in the book Photos and Words, which "heavily influenced" Juan Rulfo, the real-life writer of Pedro Páramo. However, his early investigations into photography resulted in an unsolved murder which, according to a "certain Mexican writer," is mentioned in the untranslatable novel.
Following that incident, Nagaoka joined a Buddhist monastery and lived there for 13 years. During this time, he attempted to write "a large novel" that was originally going to be a "masculine version" of Murasaki Shikibu's The Tale of Genji but somehow ended up being a Japanese version of Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time. At the same time, his nose became so big at one point that he needed someone to hold it up for him during meals. As if his troubles during mealtimes were not bad enough, the other monks, despite the rules of the novitiate, would taunt Nagaoka and play with his nose.
After being expelled from the monastery, Nagaoka set up a kiosk to sell rolls of film and develop them. One of his customers was a famous Japanese writer. Oddly enough, Nagaoka was not interested in this writer's works but rather in his photographs of bathrooms. These photographs inspired Nagaoka to compose "his most solid work," Photos and Words, which was popular enough to be translated into English by LIFE magazine in the 1950s.
Still, despite the book's popularity, Nagaoka lived in a modest house and didn't take his writing career seriously, although he continued to write in notebooks, one of which had a giant nose on the cover. "At the end of his life," the narrator writes, "he embraced the idea that, realistically, the size of his nose had determined his existence." Some of these recorded memories appeared in a posthumous work called Posthumous Diary, which inspired a French cult-like group called the "Nagaokites" to further investigate his work. However, "in his final years, Shiki Nagaoka wrote a book that for many is fundamental. Unfortunately, it doesn't exist in any known language."
Bellatin is obviously having a lot of fun telling this story, and he never tries to hide the fact that it's a prank. He also slyly pokes fun at the audience members who originally bought the story about Nagaoka. In one scene, while in a state of dementia, Nagaoka throws his manuscripts into a bonfire, which nearly destroyed a forest near the monastery. "Only the timely action of the rest of the monks, who were woken by Shiki Nagaoka's anguished screams, reduced its consequences to a circle of singed forest. On that occasion, Shiki Nagaoka lied. He said that the fire originated from the passion he had put into his prayers." Later, the narrator informs us that at the time, the monks didn't question this.
Following the biographical portion of the book are 30 pages of photographs by Ximena Berecochea. While these photos appear in a section titled "Photograph Documentation of Shiki Nagaoka's Life," most of them consist of objects and locations mentioned in the book. Only three of them contain the author, but they were either manipulated to hide his nose or taken from a distance. In fact, the funniest photo is Nagaoka's fifth grade graduation photo: Only a circle on the faded right side of the photo indicates Nagaoka's appearance in it.
While it may appear that Shiki Nagaoka is a joke that has gone on for far too long, it is actually worth reading, thanks to Bellatin's skill as a writer and prankster. Also, the actual text is only 43 pages, so that in one sitting you can also enjoy what the audience of the writer's conference heard (and believed) so many years ago.
I Remember Nightfall by Marosa di Giorgio (trans. From the Spanish by Jeannine Marie Pitas) is a bilingual poetry volume in four parts, consisting of the poems "The History of Violets," "Magnolia," "The War of the Orchards," and "The Native. . .
This review was originally published as a report on the book at New Spanish Books, and has been reprinted here with permission of the reviewer. The book was originally published in the Catalan by Anagrama as Joyce i les. . .
Hello and greetings in the 2017 holiday season!
For those of you still looking for something to gift a friend or family member this winter season, or if you're on the lookout for something to gift in the. . .
Three generations of men—a storyteller, his father and his son—encompass this book's world. . . . it is a world of historical confusion, illusion, and hope of three generations of Belgraders.
The first and last sentences of the first. . .
The Island of Point Nemo is a novel tour by plane, train, automobile, blimp, horse, and submarine through a world that I can only hope is what Jean-Marie Blas de Roblès's psyche looks like, giant squids and all.
What. . .
Mario Benedetti (1920-2009), Uruguay's most beloved writer, was a man who loved to bend the rules. He gave his haikus as many syllables as fit his mood, and wrote a play divided into sections instead of acts. In his country,. . .
Kim Kyung Ju's I Am a Season That Does Not Exist in the World, translated from the Korean by Jake Levine, is a wonderful absurdist poetry collection. It's a mix of verse and prose poems, or even poems in the. . .


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FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — A Florida woman charged with threatening the parent of a boy killed in the 2012 mass shooting at a school in Newtown, Connecticut, was a no-show Wednesday at change-of-plea hearing and now faces a more severe punishment if convicted.
The lawyer for Lucy Richards told U.S. District Judge James Cohn that she contacted his office Wednesday morning and said she was refusing to come to court for her scheduled hearing to plead guilty. Cohn issued an arrest warrant and said Richards will be held without bond once she's in custody.
"Did she give a reason?" Cohn asked.
"No," said Robert Berube, the public defender representing Richards. "I don't think there's any way she's going to make an appearance."
Richards, 57, lives in Brandon, Florida, on the state's west coast about four hours from the Fort Lauderdale federal courthouse. Her whereabouts were unclear Wednesday. In previous court appearances she used a walker and wheelchair to get around and said she was on disability.
She was set to plead guilty to a charge of interstate transmission of a threat to injure for threatening Lenny Pozner, the father of 6-year-old Noah Pozner who died in the shooting at the Sandy Hook school. Prosecutors said she told them she believed the shooting was a hoax.
Others linked to the Sandy Hook massacre have reported harassment by conspiracy theorists who argue it was staged to erode support for Second Amendment gun rights. The case comes amid a growing trend toward fake news stories and baseless conspiracy theories, such as the "Pizzagate" case in which a man fired an assault rifle inside a Washington, D.C., pizzeria restaurant after going there to investigate unfounded claims it harbored a child sex abuse ring.
Authorities say Richards made four voicemail and email threats to Pozner on Jan. 10, 2016, including messages that said "you gonna die, death is coming to you real soon" and "LOOK BEHIND YOU IT IS DEATH." Another threat ended with, "and there's nothing you can do about it."
Each of the four charges carries a potential five-year maximum prison sentence. Under terms of Richards' agreement, she was to plead guilty to one count and would have been sentenced to probation and house arrest with no prison time, Berube said. Now, all bets are off on that arrangement and prosecutors could insist on a prison sentence because of her failure to appear in court.
Richards previously was barred from visiting websites that promote conspiracy theories and ordered to have no contact with anyone connected to the Sandy Hook mass shooting. She had been free on $25,000 bail.
(Copyright (c) 2018 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)


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Real Madrid, Liverpool, Juventus: Three Giants Looking for AnswersJune 7, 2010
Real Madrid, Liverpool, Juventus . Three of European and world football's biggest, most prestigious names. For all three, the 2009/10 season ended in failure and, worse, forced them to watch their rivals garner unprecedented success. Not only were the failures very different, but the way all three have begun facing up to making the necessary changes could not be in more stark contrast.
Spanish giants Madrid had easily the best season of the three fallen giants, but considering the outlay in securing the arrivals of Ronaldo , Kaka , Benzema , et al their fans still expected so much more. They also had to not only watch Barcelona narrowly win La Liga for the second year in a row, but city rivals Atletico Madrid won the Europa League trophy too.
Their seemingly endless wealth has seen them capture Jose Mourinho , fresh from leading Inter to the Champions League title for the first time in over 50 years as part of a treble-winning season. With a few additions and Mourinho's organizational skills, the leap from second to first is well within their grasp.
Watching Inter's unprecedented success was especially painful for heated rivals Juventus , who suffered two humiliating European exits, as they floundered to a lowly seventh place finish in Serie A. Liverpool meanwhile suffered in the Champions League, going out in the Group stage and matching Juventus by coming seventh in the Premier League. Seeing Chelsea win their first league and FA Cup double would have added to the pain.
Juve's rookie coach Ciro Ferrara , a former player, only just made it past the Winter Break. His replacement, Alberto Zaccheroni —brought in for his wealth of experience—actually fared worse and has also gone. In their place the new board, led by Andrea Agnelli , have opted for Luigi Del Ner i, fresh from leading Sampdoria to a Champions League place.
Seeing an Agnelli back in charge of Juventus is a reminder of the financial backing the Turin club enjoys. While the rebuilding of the Stadio Delle Alpi continues apace, and on schedule to be ready for the 2011/12 season, the empty promise of a new stadium for Liverpool is as distant a dream as the league title the club has now gone 20 years without.
With Beppe Marotta —an experienced operator in the transfer market—also brought in, Juventus can look towards to the future with hope and renewed expectation as the club slowly rebuilds in a very different way to Madrid. Fans of Liverpool, however, will be most worried, as their club is falling ever further behind the teams above them in England.
Rafael Benitez has finally left, and the search for a replacement has begun. Given the trouble with the ownership and the level of debt escalating daily, what coach would really want the job right now? And of those, who could actually make more of an impact than the Spaniard?
With the two owners barely on speaking terms, the debt standing around £350 million and an asking price set at a completely unrealistic £650 million a buyer may prove an even tougher challenge than the search for a new coach.
Three very different clubs, in very different positions, and three different futures. Madrid's Galactico's 2.0 project is about to get Mourinho's "Special" touch, Juventus have gone back to their past in Agnelli , and Liverpool need to act quickly. Not only have Tottenham Hotspur moved past them, but Manchester City's vast wealth will surely see them become part of the elite.
Given the search for a coach, perhaps apt to let the last word fall to the great Vince Lombardi: "It's not whether you get knocked down, it's whether you get up."


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Another column I wrote recently:
I love the film "Drive." There's a lot to love about it: The synthesizer-heavy soundtrack, Albert Brooks playing a heavy, Ryan Gosling (ladies), Gosling's satin baseball jacket, the cinematography, etc…
I like all that, but the title says it all. Deep down, I know I love "Drive" because of the cars, the chase scenes, the stunts, the act of driving. It's precisely why I will tolerate, even secretly enjoy, ridiculously over-the-top movies such as "Gone in 60 Seconds" and "Death Race."
I've always enjoyed driving, and I suspect it's due to childhood road trips with my family. In a country whose identity is so tied to Manifest Destiny and rugged individualism, a car, driving, represents independence. It represents potential and opportunity.
There's something unmistakeably American about a road trip. One only has to look at American classics like "Easy Rider" or "On the Road" by Jack Kerouac where the road trip is raised to an almost mythical status.
That sort of reverence is possible because this country has the luxury of space. The great expanse of land we call home allows one to make a several-hour, or several-day, trip without running into the border of another nation. We can travel 3,000 miles, coast to coast, and still call where we end up home.
I made these observations later, not as a kid in the back of my parents' Dodge minivan, by the way.
And I certainly appreciate driving in that context, but for me, more than anything, it represents peace. There are those that become discouraged at the thought of a long drive. They malign gas prices and traffic and tolls and say it will be "boring."
But I see it as an opportunity to do something thinking and clear my head. It's a chance to take in the landscapes of this country that have yet to be encroached upon by urban sprawl. Even if it's just corn fields or soybean fields, you must admit it's better than looking at strip mall. I'm not immune to complaining about traffic or bad drivers, but the feeling of hitting an open stretch of highway with no other cars in sight is a difficult feeling to duplicate.
There's something calming about a breeze coming through the window, while Tom Petty wails from the stereo. It's why a drive around the outskirts of Manhattan is my remedy for distraction. It's what I seek when I'm too distracted by my phone, my TV or my computer. I trade my many digital devices for four wheels and asphalt.
Solitary reflection is great, but the camaraderie that comes from driving with friends cannot be understated. In high school, I worked for a photography company that specialized in team and individual photos for youth athletics with my brother and three friends. Youth leagues all over the Chicagoland area, and one or two from the northwest part of Indiana, hired the company. The drive was always the best part of the day.
Wrangling kids, and sometimes parents, and confirming orders all day was exhausting and often thankless work, but I'll always remember the rides with my brother and friends—talking endlessly about music and video games, trying to make each other laugh, stopping for gas station lunches. When I venture home to visit family, we still tell those stories and will continue to.
And I will continue to add to those stories because, to quote Gosling's mysterious character, "I drive."


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Flamstead badminton player Emily Westwood is determined to overcome her current injury problems and continue her rise through the senior ranks.
The 20-year-old is looking to break into the GB Programme squad from the England seniors, but suffered a setback shortly before Christmas when she hyper-extended her knee while doing weights.
The injury rules Westwood out of this weekend's English National Championships in Milton Keynes, and she faces more than another month on the sidelines still.
But while disappointed at missing out this weekend, she remains optimistic about her recovery.
"It was a bit of a shock but I've dealt with it quite well and everything's going as well as it could so I can't really complain," she said.
"I've tried to take it day by day at the moment because it's easier to see improvements in the gym with rehab.
"Once I get back on court I'll probably get a little bit more frustrated than I am at the moment because I know how to do things but I won't really do them as well as I did before.
"If everything goes right then that should happen and hopefully I'll have a good first tournament back but I can't expect too much from myself at the moment."
Westwood was due to take part in the mixed and women's doubles at this weekend National Championships in Milton Keynes but must now watch her teammates from the sidelines.
The former Roundwood Park student expects to be back fully fit at the start of April and will be looking to carry on her impressive start to life at senior level.
She reached the semi-finals of the Welsh Open in 2012 and followed that up last year by making the same stage of Slovenian and Hungarian Internationals.
Westwood has ambitions of representing her country at the highest level but insisted she must learn to play with different partners in order to realise her goal.
"My dream would be to go to Tokyo 2020, that would be awesome even though it's seven years away. Rio will probably come too soon," she added.
"When you get to a certain level it's about finding the right partner for you so it's still good to play with different people.
"Once you know what game suits you it's about learning each other's game inside out.
"The older guys definitely make it easier, especially if you're out on court training with them.
"If you ask them something they're always happy to answer and even if you don't they'll just give you a bit of advice here and there.
"If it's coming from someone who's there at the moment rather than the coaches it's good."
You can watch live coverage of the finals on Sunday, February 9, from 12pm to 5pm at www.badmintonengland.co.uk/tv and tickets are still available to buy at www.nationalbadmintonchamps.co.uk


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Discussion in 'Waffle' started by nafe1, Jun 7, 2009.
anyone know?
That's weird I was thinking about this the other day. Nah mang I don't think they (well, he) did
He just did the one in 1999
funny you asked about it because liam h. is planning to do one.
Wicked news, I loved Volume 1
yeah ,you know that, its probably one of my favorite prodigy albums to just knick back and listen to.
if they do another one im out to get straight away haha.
Separate names with a comma.


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A woman was very distraught at the fact that she had not had a date, nor any sex in quite sometime. She was afraid she might have something wrong with her, so she decided to employ the medical expertise of a sex therapist. Her Primary Care Physician recommended that she go see Dr. Chang, the well-known sex therapist. So, she made an appointment and took the day off work to see the sex doctor.
Upon entering the examination room, Dr. Chang said, "OK, take off all your cwose." So she did. "Now, get down and crawl weery fass to the other side of woom." So, she stripped, got on all fours, and crawled across the room, displaying herself for the good doctor to investigate.
Dr. Chang then said, "OK now crawl reery fass to me," so she turned around and crawled facefirst to the doc.
Dr. Chang slowly shook his head and said "Your probrem vewy bad, you haf Ed Zachary Disease. Worse case I ever see. That why you not haf sex or dates."
Distraught, the woman asked, "What is Ed Zachary Disease? Is it bad?"
Dr. Chang shook his head and explained, "It when your face wook Ed Zachary wike your ass."
Ed Zachary disease
Started by PHANTASM, Jun 11 2010 11:18 PM
2 replies to this topic
Posted 11 June 2010 - 11:18 PM
Posted 12 June 2010 - 10:33 AM
Bah, I've saying "Ed Zachary" for years with most people wondering WTF I was talking about. The ones that got it always had a good laugh. Now every nab on ET will be using it. Now everyone one will sound sofa king Whree Todd Tedd Choo Ah Sole! lol
Good post Phan.
Good post Phan.
Posted 12 June 2010 - 11:31 AM
LMAO that was so freakin funny niic one!
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49 CFR 107.701 - Purpose and scope.
prev | next
§ 107.701 Purpose and scope.
(a) This subpart prescribes procedures for the issuance, modification and termination of approvals, and the submission of registrations and reports, as required by this chapter.
(b) The procedures of this subpart are in addition to any requirements in subchapter C of this chapter applicable to a specific approval, registration or report. If compliance with both a specific requirement of subchapter C of this chapter and a procedure of this subpart is not possible, the specific requirement applies.
(c) Registration under subpart F or G of this part is not subject to the procedures of this subpart.
[Amdt. 107-38, 61 FR 21100, May 9, 1996; Amdt. 107-38, 61 FR 27948, June 3, 1996]


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Tropers / Nedrae
Also known in the interblag as NSDragon or Nintyel. Mostly lurking since 2008, first learned of the site from Irregular Webcomic! and DM-M's commentary. Geek and Nerd simultaneously, Cloudcuckoolander, The Spock at times, mostly Kuudere, Chaotic Good, Snark Knight, Shrinking Violet among strangers, semi-official Deadpan Snarker in his family and at work, usually a Reluctant Leader when things go south. Has a Disability Superpower in the form of cluster headaches, except without the superpower. Also mildly obsessive-compulsive. Web developer and hacker by trade, Linux user, and aspiring mathematician who didn't finish school but hopes to do so one day. Mexican, but vastly prefers English online. This also means he speaks with an accent. Fan of Metroid, Schlock Mercenary, Star Wars, Back to the Future, World of Warcraft, and otherwise with a general leaning towards hard sci-fi and anything with a consistent or complete setting (but not both!). His exploits are only known in the little universe in his mind, as an Armoured Space Dragon Cat Hunter who was forced to flee his home and is trying to get back and re-join La Résistance.


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Current research has determined that the key to breast cancer survival rests upon its earliest possible detection. If discovered in its earliest stages, 95% cure rates are possible. Our center is dedicated to providing one of the most essential tests in breast cancer risk assessment and early detection.
Wouldn't it be great if there was a test that could offer women true early detection, enough in advance to prevent invasive tumor growth? Breast Thermography has the ability to warn women up to 10 years before any other procedure that a cancer may be forming; thus allowing for prompt and timely treatment.
Are you personally at greater risk for breast cancer?
Women with a family history are definitely at greater risk, but 75% of women who get breast cancer have NO family history of the disease. If discovered, certain thermographic risk markers can warn a woman that she needs to be vigilant in monitoring her breast health.
Is estrogen causing increased activity in your breasts? The greatest single risk factor for breast cancer is lifetime exposure to the breasts of estrogen. Breast thermography plays a significant role in prevention by warning women if they have estrogen dominant activation of their breasts. With the help of the doctor, a woman can use this information to decrease her breast cancer risk by taking an active role in the single most important prevention action known.
Do you know that approximately 1/3 of all breast cancers occur in women under 45?
This is the most common cancer in women in this age group. Breast cancers in younger women are usually more aggressive and have poorer survival rates. Breast thermography offers women under 40 a sensitive non-invasive (no radiation and painless) method by monitoring their breast health beginning with a baseline screening at age 20.
Unlike after-the-fact (a cancerous tumor is already there) detection technologies such as mammography, MRI, CT, ultrasound, or PET scans, breast thermography has the ability to gave a warning signal far in advance of invasive tumor growth. Combined with an unprecedented role in prevention, risk assessment and screening for younger women, breast thermography offers women information that no other testing procedure can provide.


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Weddings are an interesting forum for singles. Guests are enveloped in love and romance (and booze, which may enhance those feelings of love and romance). People have different thoughts on whether meeting someone at a wedding is a good idea, or not.
I'd say it's better than hooking up at a funeral …
No matter your position, DeAnna Lorraine shares her tips for picking up a man at a wedding, and what not to do as a single.
1. Scope out the Scene: While everyone's corralling into the wedding, take that opportunity to scan the guests and start scoping out some of the guys you plan on talking to later. And if you could already get in their line of vision and flash them a smile to get the flirtation process started.
2. Mingle: Get your butt off of your seat and make things happen! You should frequent the bar area where lots of gents are sure to be found, as well as the buffet area if there is one. Make sure your body language is open & approachable, you're smiling and making eye contact, and your flirt is on full force.
3. Make conversation: Ask them how they know the Bride & Groom: Find out what you have in common, then expand on that. You can also Give him a compliment on either his watch, his shirt or his tie, and Tell him you like his style.
4. Make the wedding your first date and then "plant seeds" for date #2: From the wedding to the end of the reception is a long time and there's a lot of ground you can cover during that time. If you start making a connection with a guy, use the rest of the reception as sort of a mini-date suggest doing something fun that will allow you to bond more, like checking out the scrapbook of photos of the Bride & Groom, taking a stroll if there are any scenic surroundings, dancing a few songs, or just trying out new drinks together courtesy of the open bar and making funny observations while you people watch.
5. Don't get sloshed: Take it easy on that open bar. It's not an open excuse to give sloppy toasts to the bride and groom and dance on table tops.


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The folks over at iPhone5mod have created a new accessory that just might prove to be the missing link for iOS gaming. The recently announced EX Hybrid Game Controller, which they are touting as, "the lightest and thinnest keyboard for iPhone," will feature two separate parts, one of which happens to be a sleek-looking gamepad.
The absence of physical gameplay controls and tactile feedback has long been a thorn-in-the-side issue surrounding many action platformers and ported titles in the iOS gaming universe. Whether it was your hands getting in the way or the controls not being responsive enough, there's no shortage of iOS games that could benefit from a good, old-school controller.
There are a few options out there already, such as the iCade, but most of these alternatives aren't exactly portable. That's where the potential of the EX Hybrid really comes into play — it doubles as a case. According to iPhone5mod, the each plate adds only 2mm to the overall thickness of your phone and they both attach magnetically. The key features include:
· interchangeable Keyboard / Joypad Controller
· supports both portrait and landscape mode
· "feather-Like" weight keyboard, lightest in the world
· 2mm thickness, thinnest keyboard in the world
· ultra-portable, All-in-one solution for any type of users
· made of sturdy durable aluminum material
· Bluetooth 3.0
· long lasting usage of 40hrs
· standby time: 160 hours
· charging time: 1 hour only
· water-proof and dust-proof
We have yet to try one out, but from the looks of their slick video, it might not be long before that's taken care of. The product retails for right around $50. If you're as intrigued as we are, pay a visit to the iPhone5mod web store.