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- Amanda
As you may have noticed, we've been getting a lot of our recent cooking inspiration from you. In the same autumn salad contest that prompted Merrill's post on Persimmon Chiffon Pie, there were a couple of dressing recipes that incorporated caramelized fruit. I like citrus-based vinaigrettes but sometimes the flavor is too thin, too faint and ephemeral. So I decided to try caramelizing some citrus before squeezing the juice for the dressing.
I sliced a tangerine across its belly, dipped one half in raw sugar, then pressed it into a very hot pan. It sizzled and bounced like a soft-shell crab in butter, and when a rim of caramel formed around the edge, it was done. For the vinaigrette, I whisked in a dab of Dijon, a splash of white balsamic vinegar and a shot of olive oil. Turns out: eureka! The pale sweetness of the tangerine was enriched by the caramelization, giving the dressing both body and depth.
This new trick also worked with pink grapefruit, although I altered the dressing proportions slightly. There was no need for another acid like vinegar and I did add a pinch of sugar to the dressing to offset the grapefruit's bitterness. Not everyone will notice the difference in a salad dressed with one of these vinaigrettes, but you will.
Caramelized Tangerine Vinaigrette
Makes about 1/2 cup
1. Set a small sauté pan over medium high heat. Do not use cast iron. Dip the cut side of each tangerine half in the raw sugar – you want a light but thorough coating. When the pan is hot, press the sugared side of the tangerine onto the surface of the pan. Let bubble and sizzle until caramelized; keep a close eye, you don't want them to blacken. Remove the tangerine halves to a plate.
2. When the tangerine halves are cool, squeeze their juice into a bowl. Measure out 1/4 cup and pour this into a small bowl.
3. Whisk in a pinch of salt, followed by the mustard and vinegar. Slowly whisk in the olive oil until the dressing is emulsified. Taste and adjust seasoning -- if you want more acidity, add a little fresh lemon juice or more white balsamic.
Caramelized Grapefruit Vinaigrette
1. Set a small sauté pan over medium high heat. Do not use cast iron. Spread the sugar on a plate and press the cut side of 1 grapefruit half in the raw sugar – it should fully coat the surface; eat the other half. When the pan is hot, lay the sugared side of the grapefruit in the pan. As the sugar melts and browns, the juices will bubble around the edge; don't let it blacken. Remove the grapefruit half to a plate and let cool.
2. Squeeze the juice from the grapefruit over a strainer and into a bowl. Measure out 1/4 cup and pour this into a small bowl.
3. Whisk in pinches of salt and sugar, then the mustard and vinegar. Gradually whisk in the olive oil until the dressing is smooth and thickened. Taste and adjust seasoning.
A New Way to Dinner, co-authored by Food52's founders Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs, is an indispensable playbook for stress-free meal-planning (hint: cook foundational dishes on the weekend and mix and match 'em through the week).
See what other Food52 readers are saying.


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For 17 years, I was a serial hamster killer. It wasn't an intentional thing; I think it's entirely possible I was cursed by my crazy grandmother who had a penchant for channeling George Washington and/or The Prince of Darkness. No, not Ozzy, you stoner. The other one. No matter the why: if you were a hamster and you ended up in my house it was not a question of if, but rather when, you'd end up getting stuck in the wall for a few weeks/getting dropped one too many times/being thrown across the room when you crawled across my neck in the middle of the night/sliding down the heating duct and roasting like Chirstmas dinner/chewing your own leg off to escape us. I could go on. Dozens of hamsters died on my watch.
When I grew older and they wouldn't sell me rodents anymore, I moved on to Cookie Carnage. I can bake the most insanely complicated holiday Yule Logs and the most delicate thank-god-you're-lactose-tolerant cheesecakes, but when it comes to cookies, I may as well have had a machete and a hockey mask. The cookies I baked for birthday parties were rock hard and the ones I baked for Santa disintegrated on the cookie sheet - and those are just the drop cookies. Rolled cookies? HAHAHAHAHAHA. Grown men have wept at my cookies. Children have run, crying for their mothers.
Then I got a cell phone. CHALLENGE ACCEPTED. The very first day I got my very first cell phone, I dropped it in a toilet in Aurora, Colorado. Since then, I have gruesomely murdered at least two dozen cell phones. I left my first pink Motorola X on the hood of my car in Denver, CO, trying to put groceries in the trunk. I dropped my second one in False Creek, Vancouver, BC, trying to take pictures of my now sister-in-law's dragon boats. The trail of broken phones, dropped and shattered while getting into cars and getting out of cars, walking down the street, or just standing there doing nothing at all, spans much of the southwest of the USA, and several scenic locations along the West Coast.
For a brief time in Arizona, I tried my hand at Handbag Homicide, but the sight of the one and only Gucci bag I will ever own flattened by a 30 minute onslaught of oncoming traffic was enough to scare me straight.
I've never been much of a watch person. When I was younger, I had a calculator watch. I loved that watch. I wanted to shave my fingertips down to sharp, pointy stubs so that my watch and I would have the most symbiotic relationship possible. The cool kids who threw really good punches in grade 4 didn't love my watch as much as I did, however, so I retired it and instead imagined myself entirely too cool to be tethered to the constraints of something as arbitrary as, like, time. Unfortunately, the constraints of time directly correlate to the constraints of payday, so I probably couldn't have afforded a watch anyway.
When I was older, I didn't ever wear a watch because watches only do one thing, and I was a young mother of two small boys. You had to serve at least two simultaneous functions in my life for me to even acknowledge you existed.
AT&T (@ATT) sent Jim and me Pebble watches to try out and we spent the first few weeks texting each other ridiculously love notes to and from our wrists, as we do. It was lovely and is still - as far as I am concerned - the single best thing about having a smartwatch. No matter what meeting he is in, or how stuck in airport security he is, I know he will get the 8,502th sappy romantic emoticon I've sent him this week. These things matter.
But second-best to more-efficiently harassing some cute guy I met online is the fact that this watch is actually saving me from Mobile Murder. I was walked though San Francisco a few weeks ago, on my way to a client meeting and waiting for another client to call me before my next meeting. I was in high heels on cobblestone, chugging a coffee, rushing from one meeting to the next, hanging on to my phone so I'd feel it ring and not miss the call I was waiting for. My laptop bag was throwing me off-balance, and what it wasn't doing, the cobblestone was. I almost dropped my phone three times before I remembered that my watch would vibrate when the call came in. I didn't have to flail about Union Square, scaring the tourists, tempting fate. I could tuck my phone safely in my bag and not miss a thing. So many helpless phones could have been spared, had the Pebble only been invented 10 years previous.
The ability to reach someone via their wrist is completely underrated. I can't tell you how many times I have called and called and called and called my 14 year old but have gotten no answer because he left his phone in bed or by the toilet or outside in the driveway for me to run over when I get home. I pay $50 a month to a phone provider for the privilege of never getting through to this kid.
So his dad and I bought him a Pebble, too.
Jim wrote about a bunch of other Pebble features that we both really love, like being able to check a text at the movies and not worried about getting shot, or being able to screen phone calls discreetly, or convincing the kids their dear old great grandmother has possessed their television set. It also has a great fitness/running app in it that works with your phone to notify you of your progress during a run and then shows the map of your path after, and it even pings you later with encouragement to do better the next time. I know this because I've used it exactly once. If you want, I can tell you how long it takes before it gives up on you.
I was switching out the watchfaces every week or so, but I've landed on a steady rotation of Calculus and Fuzzy. They're everything I've ever wanted from a watch - something to show my geek streak, and something to let me keep pretending like I am too cool to care what time it is.
Of course I tried to kill this thing, because we are who we are, after all. I took it in the shower, but it turns out, you can totally shower with it on or bath your kid with it on or wash the dishes with it on or sit in the hot tub with it on.
So I don't know what I'm going to kill next. I've gone from living creatures to baked goods to personal technology. Maybe there is no next; maybe I'm a changed person. I can bake a decent cookie now, I have a watch I really love wearing, and I haven't broken a phone in months. Maybe it's time to start gardening or something.

subset: commoncrawl


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Photographer's Note
The ancient temple of Hathor and Nefertari (a.k.a. Small Temple) was built in Abu Simbel next to the temple of pharaoh Ramesses II and was dedicated to the goddess Hathor and Nefertari-Ramesses II's wife. This was the second time in egyptian history that a temple was dedicated to a queen.
Because of security reasons, it is possible for foreign travellers to reach Abu Simbel only in a police convoy.
There is usually one daily convoy. And so, all busses arrive at the same time early in the morning and leave the place 2 hours later.
Critiques | Translate
psamaddar (1089) 2013-08-01 8:54
Hi Maria..good use of wide angle. Good view of the place with tourists around.
serp2000 (47063) 2013-08-01 9:45
Czesc, Maria,
Outstanding colors! I always like a combination blue and yellow colors. Some strange to see the people in the winter clothes in Egypt. I was here on February of 2005 and I remember that we had a police convoy too, it was in so calm peaceful Egypt. It is old (1990th) low for the foreign tourists after some tragedy in desert.
Best wishes,
Photo Information
- Copyright: Maria Wyszomirska (mariposa) (916)
- Genre: Places
- Medium: Color
- Date Taken: 2013-02-01
- Categories: Architecture, Ruins
- Camera: Nikon D 70s, Nikkor 18-70 DX, Skylight 1B
- Exposure: f/20.0, 1/125 seconds
- More Photo Info: view
- Photo Version: Original Version
- Date Submitted: 2013-08-01 6:58


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Retesting the Radeon HD 4830: Too Few SIMDs Enabledby Derek Wilson on October 25, 2008 12:00 AM EST
- Posted in
- GPUs
UPDATE: As certain as it seemed AMD was that no 560 SP 4830 boards had made it into the retail channel, it appears that they were, in fact, wrong. Fewer than 400 HIS Radeon HD 4830 boards made it into the channel. Here is the statement we recieved from AMD's Jay Marsden today:
AMD has identified that, in addition to reference samples of the ATI Radeon™ HD 4830 boards sent to media with a pre-production BIOS potentially impacting the card's performance, a very limited number of ATI Radeon™ HD 4830 boards were released to market with the same pre-production BIOS. This is in no way hardware related, and an updated BIOS fully resolves the performance limitation.
Through consultations with AMD board partners, it has been determined with a high degree of certainty that fewer than 400 ATI Radeon™ HD 4830 boards from one AMD board partner, HIS, have reached the market with the pre-production BIOS incorrectly provided by AMD. As only a small number of HIS-branded ATI Radeon™ HD 4830 cards are impacted, we ask any customers that purchased an HIS-branded ATI Radeon™ HD 4830 to test the board using the GPU-Z utility (available at http://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz). If the GPU-Z utility reports fewer than 640 shaders, please visit the HIS website for information on how to update the card BIOS via a downloadable install utility.
We had thought that retail parts would be fused to a certain number of active SIMDs to avoid soft mods and that review samples were probably based on test/engineering hardware AMD was using when developing the final specs for the Radeon HD 4830. It seems that theory is out the window, but we will continue to provide updates as we learn more.
Thursday, AMD launched their newest RV7xx variant completing their line up in time for the holiday season. As is usual with a new graphics card launch, we published a review. The hardware looked good and offers gamers that really want to play games with good quality but don't need high resolution performance a solid money saving option.
But a number of curious things happened throughout the course of the day yesterday. We first noticed an interesting article from the makers of GPU-z. Techpowerup.com posted a story on the fact that their reference sample from AMD only enabled 560 SPs rather than the full 640 we were all promised.
We were certainly intrigued by this, so we picked up the updated GPU-z and it told us we also only had 560 SPs. Now, this isn't a common occurrence at all, and multiple other issues could have been at work. We wanted to hold off on commenting until we could learn what was really goning on and bring you the whole story. It took us a while to sort everything out, and with this issue out there it's understandable why AMD needed some time to track down the causes and potential effects of this problem.
All the details we have point to the missing SP problem being limited to review samples only. AMD's partners should not have this issue pop up in the wild. This is good news for consumers, and good news for AMD as well. We saw that the 4830 wasn't a bad part, but because our tests were run with 87.5% of the full compliment of SIMDs our numbers don't reflect the full performance potential the hardware has.
AMD got us an updated BIOS for the card and we have new numbers showing the performance improvement. We have updated our tests from the other day to better reflect the relative performance end users can expect.
It is also worth noting that AMD has supplied all their partners with an updated BIOS as well to cover the just-in-case scenario. They believe they know why this happened and so believe that there is no cause for concern over retail parts exhibiting this problem. But giving their partners a new BIOS is a good idea anyway as it covers all the bases.
24 Comments
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CEO Ballmer - Sunday, October 26, 2008 - linkYou people need to give Vista a second chance too!
JonnyDough - Sunday, October 26, 2008 - linka button. My guess is that AMD did this intentionally to get more people talking about their card. Reply
Griswold - Sunday, October 26, 2008 - linkOh yea, I'm sure the somewhat unfavorable comparisons to the 9800GT in a number of reviews because of this mishap will magically turn into an advantage too.
Glad you're not responsible for any marketing at AMD - you'd proof that it *can* get worse. :P Reply
MrSpadge - Sunday, October 26, 2008 - linkfrom what you're writing it's clear that the x-axis indicates "performance improvement in %", but it's not written there. Professional graphs need proper axis. Reply
RagingDragon - Saturday, October 25, 2008 - linkSo will be seeing a 4810 with 480 or 560 SP's? That'd fit nicely in between the 4670 and 4830...
Also, are there any idications whether all 4830 will be made from partially disabled/defective dies? Or will AMD be fabbing smaller 4830 specific RV770's? Reply
Goty - Saturday, October 25, 2008 - linkI highly doubt AMD would try to produce an entirely new chip for the 4830. The more SKUs you have, the more waste you get. The 4830 is a cost recuperating measure for the dice that don't make the bin for the 4850 or 4870. Reply
DerekWilson - Saturday, October 25, 2008 - linkif the 4830 overtakes the 4850 and 4870 combined in volume and amd runs out of parts binned for the lower performance part, they may need to make 4830s out of some GPUs that could handle higher performance.
but there's a lot of ifs and such in that one. it's not impossible that some GPUs could be capable of running with all SIMDs enabled. but it might also be impossible to make the card tell the GPU to turn them all on (depending on how AMD has built the thing).
PrinceGaz - Saturday, October 25, 2008 - linkHehehe, "dice". The last time I used them was in a tabletop D&D session. The last time I used real physical ones you could hold, anyway.
The plural of "die" is "dies" for a manufactured physical component like a processor, or anything else for that matter. Pretty much any reliable online (and especially paper) dictionary will agree.
Talking about CPU dice is good for a light-hearted comment, but not for anything else. Reply
Griswold - Sunday, October 26, 2008 - linkNo, smartpants. Both works just fine. Open your eyes to the real world and you'll see. Reply
Goty - Saturday, October 25, 2008 - linkMost industry documents would disagree. Reply


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Kris Jenner continues her promotional frenzy for her upcoming talk show. This week the pimpmomager is dishing on her (almost) sons Scott Disick and Kanye West, Kourtney's aversion to marriage, Bruce fleeing to their beach house, how much longer Keeping Up with the Kardashians will roll on and more.
Kris opened up about Kim and Kanye's courtship: "There was just a really nice friendship and a bond there for sure. He's amazing, he's a really cool guy. He's a softie."
Kris has nothing but love for Kanye. She shares, "He's just a big teddy bear. We get along really good, but we always have. I've known him for a really long time. He's been a really close friend of the family, 10 years maybe. I met him through the kids. I would talk to him on the phone, lots over the years." This must be the "other" Kanye. The one who isn't making angry faces at every photographer and ranting to the public…
Kris confesses that her ringtone created an awkward moment with him, "My ringtone is 'Gold Digger.' That's my secret of the day! The other day the phone rang and he was standing there, and it was like, 'a Gold Digger!' I'm just like, 'This is so embarrassing!' It was funny." Biting.My.Tongue.
On those rumors that Kim will introduce her daughter, North, on the talk show: "I don't think we've made any kind of decision right this second. She's just over a week old, there's no plan. Right now it's about they're happy and happy and home and doing fine and resting."
Kris clears up reports (sort of) about hospital staff being required to sign nondisclosure forms. "No, I don't think so. We were just out of the way. Totally out of the way."
Kris admits that Bruce does hide out at their beach house to get some space, but claims he sleeps at home. "We got a place out at the beach for him to get away a little bit because it does get a little congested in my house. [After] 23 years, it's amazing to have a little bit of space. So it's kind of fun. He sleeps at home."
On her feelings about Scott Disick & Lamar Odom: "[Scott] is amazing. We were like oil and water in the beginning. I did not like him. I just didn't understand him and now he's grown up and the minute he had kids, [he became] this amazing dad and he just turned into one of my favorite people. We hang out, just to go hang out. We have like little dates. I think Scott would love to get married. I don't want to speak for them, but I will, I don't think Kourtney is as into it as I thought she would be. She's just sort of a free spirit. And Lamar, oh my God, Lamar Odom, he's delish!"
On how long Keeping Up with the Kardashians will keep going: "When it doesn't become fun anymore or when we're not happy, then you're like, 'Maybe it's time.' But, we're having such a good time, all of us. And when we're not doing it, we miss it.
Photo Credit: Daniel Tanner/Wenn.com


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Massachusetts medical marijuana law scrutinized
The medical marijuana referendum was overwhelmingly passed by voters on Nov. 4, but city and state officials will have the final say on how the marijuana is dispensed in communities across the state.
State Rep. William "Smitty" Pignatelli, who represents the 4th Berkshire District, said the Leg islature will likely "tighten" language in the law to ensure that proper safeguards are attached to the state initiative.
Many say the medical marijuana referendum, as written, leaves the door open to exploitation of pot.
"I think it's poorly written, but that is the will of the voters," Pignatelli said.
Lawmakers "now have the obligation and the responsibility to implement restrictions for law enforcement and the medical field and make sure [marijuana] does not go to people who will put the drugs in the wrong hands," he said.
The Pittsfield Police Department is awaiting important details from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, the agency charged with addressing registration and administrative fees associated with opening medical marijuana treatment centers. These dispensaries would be allowed to grow, process and provide marijuana to patients or their caregivers.
These details include how much marijuana a patient could be provided for a 60-day medical supply; the administrative process and fees for registering a treatment center; and the regulatory framework for which patients with a verified financial hardship -- or other permissable reason -- will be allowed to grow a 60-day supply of medical marijuana on their property.
In Pittsfield, Mayor Daniel L. Bianchi and City Council President Kevin Sherman said that there will be discussion with the city solicitor on whether the zoning ordinance regulates where a medical marijuana treatment center can be placed.
Bianchi -- who said the city has been approached with inquiries about a center within city limits -- said that it was too early to know if it would be an agenda item on a council meeting, but he said that the health and zoning committees are likely to discuss the new law.
"We're in the natural process of researching the effects on the city," Sherman said. "It doesn't mean anything bad or good. There are a lot of experts coming to collaborate on this. It's on our radar."
There are 35 licenses for nonprofit dispensaries allowed statewide under the law. There are also punishments against those who violate medical use requirements, which include up to six months in jail or a fine of up to $500. Fraudulent use of a registration for the sale, distribution or trafficking could be punished by up to five years in state prison.
Still, Pignatelli said the Legislature -- likely sometime after the law's implementation on Jan. 1 -- will "tighten" up the "very loose and open-ended" language in the policy.
Pignatelli pointed out that an age restriction with parental consent should be included.
He also said more detailed language -- beyond the list of diseases listed -- is needed to ensure that medical marijuana is limited to a handful of conditions and not widely distributed.
The Department of Public Health is supposed to regulate the treatment centers, but Pignatelli said that with upcoming holidays and internal issues surrounding a chemist who allegedly mishandled drug evidence the department will not have a lot of time.
Allen St. Pierre, executive director of the National Org anization to Reform Marijuana Laws, or NORML, of Wash ington, D.C., said that he has heard from "dozens and dozens and dozens" of people inquiring about starting treatment centers in Amherst, Cambridge, Northampton and other Massachusetts cities.
St. Pierre, who was raised in Massachusetts and attended Amherst College, said that the Massachusetts medical marijuana initiative incorporates best-practice concepts, which should allow for a successful implementation.
St. Pierre specifically stated that important elements include specifically stating what illnesses would be allowed for medical marijuana use, incorporating state government in regulating the industry, and specifying a certain number of business licenses.
According to St. Pierre, Massachusetts is the 18th state to legalize medical marijuana. Two states have legalized marijuana for recreational use.
In 2008, Massachusetts de criminalized possession of marijuana in amounts under 1 ounce.
But that medical marijuana will be legal in Massachusetts won't guarantee that a medical treatment center will thrive, St. Pierre said.
St. Pierre said that local community support would play a strong role in whether a business is able to survive over the long haul.
If you'd like to leave a comment (or a tip or a question) about this story with the editors, please email us. We also welcome letters to the editor for publication; you can do that by filling out our letters form and submitting it to the newsroom.


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Tuesday, 17 April 2007
The Best Sushi in Town?
Back to the sushi. The freshness is unbeatable, the service is exceptional and it's excellent value for money. There is not a pre-made handroll in sight! A sushi and sashimi box will set you back $11.50 and a sashimi platter for two is $18.00. You'll be hard pressed to find a better value meal in South Yarra. Worth a try if you're not too ashamed to admit you like them are the California Rolls at $11.25 for 8 of the biggest pieces you'll ever see.
31 Chambers Street
South Yarra
Ph: 9804 7396
Tue-Wed 10am-6pm
Thur-Sat 10am-7pm
7 comments:
- Ellie said...
I never actually venture down into South Yarra, but might venture down to check out the treats this store has to offer...especially the green tea ice cream :P
- 17 April 2007 at 3:38 am
- Jack said...
This sounds very interesting. I work near by and am very appreciative to hear about good lunch food locally. Will check it out in the next few days and let you know how I go...
Thanks for the tip.
- 17 April 2007 at 7:20 am
- Truffle said...
Hope you like it Ellie. The Camberwell one has a much larger variety of Japanese goodies and sweet treats.
Let me know how it goes Jack. It's not show stopping but a good deal better than the usual $2 handroll joints.
- 17 April 2007 at 9:45 pm
- Jack said...
I made it there on Thursday and I have to say it was pretty good. Yes, much better then the $2 handrolls (and much pricier)but it had love. I had the sushi and sashimi platter and got some nigiri unagi (eel sushi)extra. See my site in the next few days for further comments.
Thanks for the tip off!
- 21 April 2007 at 7:45 am
- Truffle said...
Thanks for the review Jack. Will look out for the full one on your blog.
I agree it's a bit pricey but I'm always so full afterwards that I can't help but consider it good value. If you turn into a regular the staff seem to become warmer and more helpful.
- 21 April 2007 at 8:00 am
Have you tried Jamon Sushi before?
It is on 3 Murphy St, South Yarra, very close to South Yarra train station.
This is the kind of place that will satisfy those demanding nothing less than perfection!
Bizarrely, the chef is Australian yet the food is unbeatably good!
- 26 April 2007 at 10:50 am
- Truffle said...
Thanks for the suggestion. Sounds brilliant. Will try it soon!
- 26 April 2007 at 2:37 pm


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The Tesla Dilemma: To Sell or Not to Sell?
"Our favorite holding period is forever," Warren Buffett has famously said. But even the Oracle of Omaha sells stocks at times. He has even expressed regret in not selling his belovedCoca-Cola stock when it became wildly overvalued in the late '90s. In reference to its wild run-up, Buffett confessed his mistake in the 2004 Berkshire Hathaway letter to shareholders:
Berkshire's results would have been far better if I had caught this swing of the pendulum ... I can properly be criticized for merely clucking about nose-bleed valuations during the Bubble rather than acting on my views. Though I said at the time that certain of the stocks we held were priced ahead of themselves, I underestimated just how severe the overvaluation was. I talked when I should have walked.
So what is the best practice? Should you let your winners run? Or should you cash out when your stocks become overvalued?
For investors in Tesla Motors , these are serious questions and merit thoughtful exploration. Up more than 500% in less than 12 months, Tesla's valuation is getting ahead of itself. But what should shareholders do?
Selling strategies
There is no black and white answer on when an investor should sell a stock. There are, though, the two extremes:
- Sell stocks when they become overvalued.
- Let your winners run as long as your investment thesis remains intact.
However, as is the typical problem with extremes, they may be too extreme. Let's examine both approaches.
Letting your winners run is helpful in minimizing capital gains taxes. Even more, it reduces portfolio turnover and means your portfolio may not require as much attention. And probably the best of all, it enables your best stocks and their underlying businesses to outperform your expectations. Why pick the flowers in your garden when you should be watering them and pulling the weeds instead? Finally, it could even be argued that having such an extreme mindset could evoke superior analysis and wiser investment decisions since you could be holding the stock for a very long time.
The biggest problem with Selling overvalued stocks, of course, is that you may find yourself frequently selling your best-performing businesses much too early, missing out on nice gains. But the problem with this strategy goes deeper than that.
To assert that a stock is overvalued, you're going to need an estimate of the company's intrinsic value -- and this isn't easy. Selling overvalued stocks, therefore, introduces a greater need to keep tabs on a company's intrinsic value. To make matters more difficult, that value changes over time.
Before Tesla's first quarter, for instance, the company's ability to significantly ramp up production on its new Model S was nothing but a hope for investors. After it reported first-quarter earnings, however, the story totally changed. And soon after, intrinsic value looked better again as the company paid off a massive government loan and raised about $1 billion in new capital. Clearly, keeping tabs on intrinsic value is hard work.
But there are benefits to selling stocks when they appear to be overvalued. Mainly, it allows you to free up cash invested in overvalued assets, reallocate that money into undervalued stocks, and thus boost the total intrinsic value of the assets in your portfolio. Easier said than done, of course.
A middle ground
Why not find a middle ground between both approaches? Why not hold your slightly overvalued, excellent businesses, but sell your grossly overvalued stocks?
Value investing guru and blogger Greg Speicher explored this same dilemma and eloquently highlighted a compelling middle ground:
I am a strong proponent of patient business-like investing for the long-term. This is a proven way to create wealth. However, at a sufficiently high price, all assets -- no matter what their level of quality -- should be sold.
He goes on to suggest that investors should put "a premium on hard work, exceptional research, and following a rational investing process with great discipline," and cash out on their grossly overvalued stocks.
But what is grossly overvalued? When the company's price "exceeds all reasonable estimates" of its intrinsic value, he says. This answer still leaves a lot of gray area. What is the highest reasonable estimate for Tesla's intrinsic value? For me, it's below $190 -- and that's why I've recently sold the stock. I laid out what I believe to be a reasonable best-case scenario for Tesla's business -- 500,000 cars per year in five years and a 30% gross profit margin -- and I found even this bullish scenario is already priced into the stock. But thanks to so much gray area between different selling philosophies and estimates for Tesla's intrinsic value, you'll be better off making the final decision based on your personal research and opinion, not mine.
Whatever you decide about Tesla stock, the scenario serves as an interesting case study. After examining both approaches and being forced to make a decision with my real-money portfolio, I believe the best approach is found in the middle: Invest with the intention of holding for decades and let your winners run -- but not too far.
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The article The Tesla Dilemma: To Sell or Not to Sell? originally appeared on Fool.com.Fool contributor Daniel Sparks has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends Coca-Cola and Tesla Motors. The Motley Fool owns shares of Tesla Motors. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
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Thursday, September 23, 2010
My Second Blogiversary Dedicated to my Son
On this second anniversary of my blog, I'm dedicating my post to my son Matt for two reasons: (1) He's the greatest blessing of my life and I adore him, and (2) I'm currently researching his ancestry.
I adopted Matt as an infant. We were each blessed last year when Matt was able to locate and meet his birth mother, Karen. Upon their first personal meeting, Matt requested of Karen that she complete a 4 generation pedigree chart, as far as she was able. I think I've trained him well! As soon as he received the pedigree chart in his mail, he called me and gave me all the names she'd given him. I got right to work on the research and found that it gave me a totally different feeling than I've experienced while researching anyone else's ancestry. As I learned names and saw faces in the photos I discovered in a tree on Ancestry.com, I felt so grateful to these wonderful people, for it's their blood that runs through my son's body. They are HIS people. There's a very special place in my heart for every individual I've met in his ancestry.
At the time I met Karen, she loaned me several pictures of herself as a child, as well as pictures of her parents and siblings. My fellow genealogists will understand and appreciate what a treasure those are to me, and what a wonderful gesture that was for her to make. And in my online hunting I've discovered a cousin of hers who has uploaded over 7,000 photos to her Ancestry tree, many of which relate to Matt's ancestors!
My research has rewarded us with enough pictures that I can share with you a line of 7 generations in my son's family:
Matt's great, great, great grandmother Martha Susan Tanner (1834-1905)
(His great, great grandmother Emeline Charlotte Crotchett (1863-1931)
Matt's great grandfather was "Emma's" son, Frank Jefferson Bell (1888-1951)
The son of Frank Bell was Robert Bell, Matt's grandfather, pictured below at far left, with his family:
In this photo covering 2 generations, are Matt, with his birth mother Karen at right and me, his Mom (adoptive mother) at left:
And here's our little jewel, Alyssa, Matt's daughter, when she was 2 years old:
How blessed we all are to have pictures of SEVEN generations of family and even more blessed to know them and love them! I'm so happy to dedicate this anniversary post to my wonderful son, his family and his ancestors. They truly manifest God's Grace and Glory in my life.
19 comments:
- Janice said...
Becky, this is a beautiful post with such special meaning to so many people. Happy Blogoversary and thank you for sharing the photos and the story of your son's birth family with us.
- September 23, 2010 at 1:35 PM
- Terri said...
Oh Becky, such a wonderful blog post to celebrate your blogversary. Honestly I don't know why it brought a tear to my eye, it just tugged at my heartstrings I guess. You are such a kind giving person how wonderful that you could do this for your son and his birth family.
- September 23, 2010 at 4:32 PM
- Debbie Blanton McCoy said...
Becky, you are such a sweet person to do this for your son. Happy blogiversary!!
- September 23, 2010 at 5:20 PM
- Greta Koehl said...
Happy Blogoversary - you have made such a wise choice in dedicating it to your son - and wishing success to you and Matt in researching his ancestors!
- September 23, 2010 at 8:21 PM
- Nora said...
This also brought a tear to my eyes... thank you for sharing such a wonderful and heartfelt post x x
- September 23, 2010 at 9:25 PM
- Nancy said...
What a wonderful post for your son about his ancestors. How amazing that his birth mother knew so much family history and had photographs! Happy anniversary to your blog - and you.
- September 23, 2010 at 10:46 PM
- Deb said...
Becky, what a lovely way to celebrate your blogiversary. Thank you for sharing such a moving story. What an amazing gift you have given your son.
- September 24, 2010 at 1:51 AM
- Debra said...
Becky! This is fabulous! How wonderful and heartwarming to find so many more people to love. I can see Matt in so many of his ancestors. The photo of you, Matt and Karen is a beautiful testament to the love that two women share for their son. I love this. Thank you for sharing with the rest of us. Gives me hope in my research! Love you.
- September 24, 2010 at 9:02 AM
- GrannyPam said...
This is a wonderful post. It says so much about you and your loving attitude toward your family.
- September 24, 2010 at 10:17 AM
- Professor Dru said...
Becky, this is such a beautiful and happy story. Thanks for sharing.
- September 24, 2010 at 10:22 AM
- Sheri said...
I am so glad that we got to meet and chat a little bit while at NGS last April. I have read your blog from the very first post - it truly is a work of Grace and Glory.
And now I shall sing:
- September 24, 2010 at 2:55 PM
- Mary said...
This is AWESOME! Not all the time that stories like yours have such happy endings! Happy Blogoversary
- September 24, 2010 at 11:22 PM
- LindaRe said...
Happy Blogoversary and may there be many more. You have a beautiful family.
- September 25, 2010 at 8:39 AM
- Martin said...
I would like to hear more about how your son feels about genealogy. Does he claim both heritages? I should think he would. My niece is adopted and I often wonder what I should save for her since she is the only grandchild from that side and only great-grandchild on her maternal grandfather's side.
- September 26, 2010 at 3:22 PM
Happy Blogiversary! This post was beautiful.
- September 26, 2010 at 5:25 PM
- Mary said...
You did a marvelous job on your Blogiversary Post! This is a marvelous story of love and family history all tie up as one. Congratulations on your blog being 2 years old. Yours was one of the first Genealogy Blogs I started to follow. Thanks for keeping up such an uplifting and informative blog.
- September 26, 2010 at 5:26 PM
- Miriam said...
Beautiful! We have numerous adoptions in our family, and I have researched bloodlines, adoptive family lines, and step-family lines. What a marvelous legacy you have created here, Becky...and Happy Blogiversary!
- September 26, 2010 at 6:32 PM
- Kristin said...
I would love to be able to do this for my adopted son. maybe one day...
- September 26, 2010 at 9:55 PM
- Amy Coffin, MLIS said...
I'm a little late to the party, but HAPPY BLOGIVERSARY!
This is such a wonderful tribute. It's you're party, but you've given this wonderful gift and a very touching post to everyone. Thank you!
- September 27, 2010 at 1:34 PM


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Lamar prez recognized for musical chops
Red, White and Wow! … Lamar University President James Simmons earned another elite honor with induction into the Phi Beta Mu Texas Bandmasters Hall of Fame at the latest Texas Bandmasters Association annual convention in San Antonio. In selecting Simmons to become part of the Hall of Fame 2012 class, the international bandmasters fraternity continues its tradition of honoring outstanding Texas band directors. Simmons was thrilled to observe that the honor puts him in the record books with his mentors and up for recognition by his peers. Val Rose, a friend and colleague for more than 50 years, nominated Simmons for this honor. Way to go, Mr. President!
Fraternizing fun … Rao's Bakery was the venue when Lamar University alumni gathered for a fun filled Jazz Night. Linda LeBlanc, director of Alumni Affairs at LU, did an outstanding job organizing and promoting this ener-jazzing evening with a huge turnout of Lamar grads. Enjoying the jazz performance by LU students and playing conversation catch-up with their fellow alums were bakery owners Mary and Jake Tortorice,Leila and Rickey Melancon,Jean Ornelas, Johnnie and Vernon Durden,Cherrie and Alan Hefty,Phelicia and Veryl Williams with son Miles, Jennifer and Ken Parker with son Sam, Nancy and Larry Beaulieu, Alica and Tom Sigee, Sally and Kent Palculict, Micki and Ronnie Platt, Betty and Ross White, Rusty Chimeno, Dean Terrebonne, Beverly and Fred Escamilla, Antoine LeBlanc, Camille Mouton, Kaycee Doyle,Harold Wilkinson, Antoinette Mays, as well as Patti and Floyd McSpadden. Can't wait until the next LU alumni gathering!
Ever loyal … Hats off to Barbara Tipton Young, Craig Fecel and Gene McFaddin for their skills in gathering the Beaumont High School Class of 1962 grads to celebrate their 50th reunion. Coming from all parts of the country to reminisce with lifelong friends, enjoy dinner and dance to the sounds of The Innovators, this group partied all weekend. Several groups gathered at The Grill and Carrabba's on Friday evening, with the guys enjoying a round of golf at the Beaumont Country Club. Saturday, starting at 6 p.m. at the MCM Eleganté, libations were served and guests were welcomed and entertained with hulahooping by Suzan Szafir Golman and magic tricks by Ralph Felder. Kit Ohmstede managed to find beautiful purple flowers to fashion floating arrangements in large glass cylinders on each table. Dinner was served around 8 p.m. and dancing started at 9 p.m., lasting until midnight. Having a blast were Sherri and Paul Horwitz, Beverly and Jim Price, Karleen Humphrey Watson, Kathy McQuiston Tacl, Marilyn Maness Mehaffy (the first reunion she was able to attend), Tifton Simmons, Andi Anderson Barnett, Ed Childress, Celia Crittenden, Tommy Currie, Julie Terry Hise, Sue Wallace Dailey, Dude Turney, Betty Bando, John Bissell, Jane Bevil Honovich, Bill Miller, Carol Ann Webber Paddock, Robert Murphy, Jane Landrum Hendricks, John Beck, Kay Fowler, Bill Shepherd, Jane Wheat Parks, Karen Bill Marlow, Karen Hudler Gafford, Horace Bonner, Cissie Carey, Kay Henslee Neild, Frank Fuller, Judy Foreman Scardino, Vivian Hodges Wright, Dickie Cordray and too many more to mention. What fun!
Candles and cakes … Belated best to Macon Ware, Susan Sampson and Dykie O'Shell. Birthday greetings to Elizabeth Winslow, J. Shane Howard, Jenna Miller, Alex Stelly, Erik De La Rosa, Chuck Barbee, Ramey Rose Saba, Jay Tortorice, Keith Henke, Hannah Jenkins, Ford Phelan, Gracelyn Miller, Susan Berndt, Dean Terrebonne, Ruthie Williams, Dette Toups, Carol Smith, Patricia Adams, Frances Bethea, Dana Bundy and one of my dearest gal pals, Carol Snowden.
Until the next RSVP!


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|Geocaching at Gopsall Temple
We parked the car nearby and had a short walk across fields to the woodland which was beautiful. The Rhododendrons were in flower and the whole woodland had a beautiful untouched feel about it. Not surprising really because it was off the beaten track and people would need to make that little bit of extra effort to visit it.
|Gopsall Temple Woodland
We continued our walk towards GZ and as we approached I couldn't believe what I saw. Bearing in mind this place was not sign posted and not really marked on the map. Gopsall Temple is a Grade II listed building and it is said that George Frederick Handel closeted himself within the temple for 3 weeks during August/September 1741 to write his masterpiece "The Messiah".
|Gopsall Temple
Gopsall Temple is a place of historical importance, set within a beautiful woodland and a place that we probably would not have visited if it wasn't for Geocaching.


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Beau Biden, the Delaware attorney general and the son of Vice President Joe Biden, is undergoing medical testing in Texas after being hospitalized last week for weakness and disorientation, his office said Monday night.
The younger Biden, who suffered a mild stroke in 2010, began experiencing the new symptoms last Wednesday night after driving to Indiana for a family vacation, said Jason Miller, a spokesman for the Delaware Department of Justice.
Biden, 44, was admitted to Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago and traveled the next morning to Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia to consult with his doctor.
He was discharged and spent the weekend at home in Wilmington. Miller said Biden currently is undergoing testing in Houston to determine the cause of his symptoms.
The White House says the vice president, who had been at his home in Delaware for the past several days, accompanied his son to Houston. There was no word on how long Vice President Biden would remain in Texas.
Miller said Beau Biden spoke by telephone with Chief Deputy Attorney General Ian McConnel over the weekend, and had been in touch with his office Monday evening.
Officials with Biden's office said they had no comment beyond the prepared statement Monday, but that further information would be forthcoming.
Biden's Twitter account on Sunday posted a photo of him and his father sitting on a porch and smiling while sending a message of encouragement to a Delaware team that was in the Little League World Series.
This isn't the first health scare for the younger Biden, who became Delaware's attorney general in 2007. After suffering a mild stroke in May 2010, he spent a week in the Jefferson University hospital and more than a month recuperating at home.
``I was just a little off,'' Biden later explained to The Associated Press when asked about his stroke. ``My arm didn't feel right. I was able to move it, but I just wasn't myself.''
``Stroke was the farthest thing from my mind when I went in,'' Biden added then, saying he didn't know enough to be scared, or to reflect on the brain aneurysm that nearly killed his father in 1987 at age 45.
Beau Biden is the eldest son of Vice President Biden. After the 1972 accident that killed his wife and daughter and critically injured brothers Beau and Hunter Biden, the vice president devoted himself to caring for his two sons as a single father.
Beau Biden served a yearlong deployment to Iraq with his Army National Guard unit, returning stateside in 2009.


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CORTLAND, N.Y. – Senior quarterback Chris Rose (Victor) completed 32-of-53 passes for 320 yards and three touchdowns, including the game-winning 33-yard pass to freshman DJ Spencer (Buffalo/Cleveland Hill) with one minute, 26 seconds remaining, as Cortland defeated nationally 17th-ranked Rowan, 24-21.
Cortland improves to 6-1 overall and remains unbeaten in New Jersey Athletic Conference (NJAC) play with a 6-0 record. Rowan suffered its first loss to a Div. III team this season and is now 5-2 overall and 4-1 in the NJAC. Cortland can clinch the NJAC title if it wins next Saturday at Kean University, which is also undefeated in league play with a 5-0 mark.
Rowan had taken a 21-17 lead with 1:52 remaining when Dan Reed (Westmont, NJ/Haddon Twp.) turned a short slant pass into a 76-yard touchdown reception as he raced untouched up the middle of the field. Cortland, however, started the ensuing drive on its own 37-yard line after a short kickoff. Rose completed an 8-yard pass to senior tight end Rob Von Bargen (Massapequa) and a 22-yard pass to sophomore Kordel McInnis (Sewell, NJ/Washington Township), then hit Spencer on a long pass into the front left corner of the end zone for the go-ahead score.
The Profs had a final chance to tie or win. On 1st-and-10 at its own 47-yard line, Rowan completed a pass that moved the ball to the Cortland 3-yard line, but the play was negated by an ineligible player downfield penalty. The Profs were still able to move the ball to the Cortland 37-yard line two plays later on a 22-yard pass from Louie Bianchini (West Long Branch, NJ/Red Bank Catholic) to Anthony Barone (Hammonton, NJ), but on the next play Bianchini overthrew a deep pass and Cortland freshman Andre Green (Philadelphia/Indian River) intercepted the ball at the Red Dragon 7-yard line with 21 seconds left.
Rowan led 7-0 in the first quarter on a 62-yard pass from Bianchini to sophomore Ed Eisenhart (Mullica Hill, NJ/Clearview Reg.). The Red Dragons answered with a 20-yard TD pass from Rose to McInnis 13 seconds into the second quarter to tie the game at 7-7.
Rowan regained the lead on a Keith Corcoran (Atlantic City, NJ/St. Joseph (Hammonton)) 24-yard TD run up the middle with 12:33 left in the second quarter and led 14-7 at halftime. The Red Dragons tied the game after catching a break on a third-quarter punt that was touched by a Rowan player and was recovered by Green at the Profs' 34-yard line. Five plays later, Rose and McInnis connected for their second TD – this one from 14 yards out – to tie the game at 14-14.
The Red Dragons had 1st-and-goal at the Rowan 2-yard line late in the third quarter, but ended up settling for a Mike DeBole (Webster/Webster Schroeder) 28-yard field goal to take their first lead of the day at 17-14 with 3:02 left. Neither team scored again until the fireworks in the final two minutes of the contest.
Cortland senior tailback Dorian Myles (Lackawanna/Hamburg) rushed for 56 yards and caught nine passes for 55 yards. Senior Mike Humphrey (Le Roy) made seven catches, McInnis finished with six receptions and Spencer had four receptions – his first four catches of the season.
Senior linebacker Chris Bright (East Meadow) led the defense with nine tackles, eight solo, with two for losses. Green and sophomore cornerback Andrew Tolosi (Monroe/Monroe-Woodbury) each had interceptions and Green also made seven tackles.DeBole averaged 46.3 yards per punt on six kicks.
For Rowan, Bianchini completed 15-of-27 passes for 306 yards and two touchdowns. Warren Oliver (Beverly, NJ/Palmyra) had seven catches for 94 yards and Matt Dortch (Wayne, NJ/Wayne Valley) ran for 62 yards.
On the defensive side, senior Casey Dillon (Northfield, NJ/Mainland Reg.) led the Profs with 10 tackles, seven solo. Freshman Darren Dungee (Morristown, NJ) had nine tackles, eight solo, and senior Frank Rubino (Belle Mead, NJ/Montgomery) intercepted a pass.
Cortland held a slight 410-409 advantage in total offense. The Red Dragons have gained at least 400 yards in seven straight games, a new school record. Last year's Cortland squad had a streak of six straight 400-yard games.


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Let US take a Look
Comprehensive Dental Exam
The exam is performed at your initial dental visit and at following check-up exams that your dentist or hygienist will perform. Do not let the name General Dental Exam fool you, this is a comprehensive dental exam that will include all of the following main points.
Digital X-Rays:
Our offices are equipped with the highest quality equipment available. By examining the digital x-rays your dental team can detect decay, bone loss, tumors, cavities, cysts, and numerous other dental situations, while helping the team map tooth and root positions. Another important feature of this type of x-ray is that it allows interaction between you, our patient and your doctor. Instead of your dental team telling you the situation, they can show you on digital computer screens exactly what they are talking about and from many different views.
Oral cancer screening:
Your team will check for signs of oral cancer in your mouth, neck, lips, tongue, throat, tissues, and gums. This is a painless and quick process.
Gum disease screening:
Your hygienists will check your gums and bone around your teeth for signs of periodontal diseases. This is tested by using a periodontal probe, a tiny measuring stick, to measure the pocket depth. Typically a healthy condition depth measures from 1 to 3 millimeters, anything over 4 millimeters in not healthy. Bigger numbers usually indicate pockets of infection that need treatment.
Examination for tooth decay:
This is where the surface of each tooth is checked for decay.
Examination of previous work done (existing restorations):
Your team will check all your fillings, crowns, bridges, and any other existing dental work.


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MANTECA - Ho! Ho! Oh! No!
MANTECA - Ho! Ho! Oh! No!
After eight years in Manteca, Los Angeles transplant Jennifer Munoz and her family have established the tradition of going downtown every Christmastime to see Santa Claus.
"It reminds me of my own childhood. It's not that way anymore," said Munoz, 42, the mother of four, including a 4-year-old who absolutely loves visiting with Santa.
This year, though, when the family went for its annual visit, Munoz took stock of the poor condition of the hut the Downtown Merchants Association provides for Santa's layover in the heart of the south San Joaquin County city at Main Street and Yosemite Avenue.
The deterioration was so disturbing to Munoz that as soon as she got home, she went to work establishing an online fundraising effort - known as crowdfunding - seeking $3,000 or more to help build a new house for Santa. That site can be found at GiveForward.com,, then search for "Giving Back to Santa."
"It's the cutest little hut, but it's just old," Munoz said.
The current hut - expertly constructed when it was donated for the cause about 50 years ago by the late Manteca developer and philanthropist Antone Raymus - now suffers from dry rot, mold, numerous cracks, sagging, missing shingles and a roof that's beginning to separate.
The hut got a new coat of white paint with appropriate green and red trim about 10 years ago, but that hasn't kept the inevitable decay from creeping in. It also needs a new heating system to allow a photo printer to operate properly.
And Santa has made a special request: He wants his new downtown Manteca house to have a wheelchair ramp so all children can sit with him inside and make their wishes known.
Manteca's Santa is Ben Jetton, 65, a retired school bus driver - only the third man in that role during the past five decades - who said he does it because he loves kids.
"It's beyond repair," Jetton said of the hut, which he has worked on over the years along with dedicated volunteer Dennis Bedford. Jetton said he would like to see Santa's new house - measuring about 27 feet long by 8 feet wide - set up permanently on a trailer, instead of jacked up on brick piers.
Jetton said when Santa visits the downtown Manteca corner - from 1 to 6 p.m. every day now through Christmas Eve - he makes a point of not hurrying the children.
The children can take their time talking to Santa and get their photo taken with him for $5. If the cost is a problem, parents are allowed to use their own cameras to take photos. And Santa - worried about traumatizing younger children who might be scared of the bearded man in red - has a special way of appearing in every photo.
"We call it stealth mode. We guarantee a picture with the child not crying," Jetton said. "Just like me, I'm afraid of the 6-foot Easter Bunny."
Should Munoz be successful with her fundraiser, Jetton said "$3,000 would be a gift from heaven. That would get us well on our way. We're mainly looking for manpower now."
Speaking for the merchants group that provides the hut and hosts Santa's visits, Tipton's Stationery owner Bea Bowlsby was originally unaware of Munoz's effort to raise money. She said her group was "well aware of the problems" with Santa's hut but just didn't get around to fixing it up in time for this season.
"We'll do our own thing. We're not asking for donations. Whatever she wants to do with the money, there are plenty of worthy causes here in town. That would be nice, pass it on to the Boys & Girls Club or Haven of Peace, anybody who can use a little help," Bowlsby said, seeking to downplay the need for additional funding.
Whatever the outcome of her fundraising efforts - by Wednesday afternoon, the website had recorded 17 donations totaling $530 - Munoz expressed gratitude and amazement at the outpouring of support she's received.
"A licensed contractor showed up yesterday and said, 'Whenever you are ready.' I can't even speak on the donations - it is a blessing to be from a small community. This would not happen in L.A. There are so many religions and people from so many backgrounds, but this is the one thing that everybody is pulling together for, putting our differences behind us," Munoz said.
Jetton, who hopes to continue his role for many years to come, said his takeaway from helping Santa out is "the love from the children, especially the ones with special needs, the autistic children, the homeless children, the ones living in cars. I try to put a little cheer in everyone's life."
Contact reporter Joe Goldeen at (209) 546-8278 or firstname.lastname@example.com. Follow him at recordnet.com/goldeenblog and on Twitter @JoeGoldeen.


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My Beauty Diary is a Taiwanese brand that primarily makes in sheet masks but have recently expanded into skincare products. I purchased their Rose and White Peony Sleep Concentrate (read about sleeping packs here) to try because the packaging is so cute!
The gel works like an invisible mask that locks in moisture on the skin. It can be used as a regular moisturiser or as a sleeping pack when applied more thickly at night. You are supposed to wash the pack off in the morning but I've need seen any harm in leaving it on!
The sleeping pack has a medium thick jelly gel type texture. It is the soft of gel that seems to sit on the surface for a little while, then sinks in. To tell you the truth, I used this on Mr C twice as he has very dry skin that flakes a lot, and then I didn't see it again as Mr C has nicked it!
He has found it super hydrating and that it almost locks in a layer of moisture – even in the morning he can feel some moisturiser left on his skin (in a good way IF you have very dry skin. Obviously you can wash this off if you don't like it).
This stuff is very economical with the texture it has, it goes pretty far.
I used this product a few times myself and I like it; skin feels really soft the next day but then I've liked all the sleeping packs I tried before.
I don't like the scent though; Mr C doesn't mind it but to me it's quite a pungent rose with an almost slightly alcoholic type scent?! Sounds crazy but that's what it reminds me of and I dislike any heavily scented skincare.
Otherwise this is a nice sleeping pack, nicer than most night creams.
*I purchased this from eBay


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The Economist is no friend of Israel, in my estimation. However, its take on the Labor Party's departure from the national unity government is quite similar to those of the Jerusalem Post and DebkaFile that appear below. The Economist notes that Labor Party leader Ben-Eliezer had been looking for a pretext to leave the govenment for some time, in order to bolster his sagging popularity within his party. It reports that Sharon has said he may replace Ben-Eliezer as Defense Minister with retired General Shaull Mofaz, who has advocated deporting Arafat (I'm not holding my breath on that one). The Economist predicts that the next election will produce a new coalition government.
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"Proclaim Liberty throughout All the land unto All the Inhabitants Thereof." Inscription on the Liberty Bell


text:
LIVERMORE, Calif., Sept. 18, 2014 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Board of Directors of McGrath RentCorp (Nasdaq:MGRC), a diversified business to business rental company declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.245 per common share for the quarter ended September 30, 2014. The dividend will be payable on October 31, 2014 to all shareholders of record on October 17, 2014. The year 2014 marks the 23rd consecutive year that McGrath RentCorp has raised its dividend to shareholders. ABOUT MCGRATH RENTCORP Founded in 1979, McGrath RentCorp is a diversified business-to-business rental company. The Company's Mobile Modular division rents and sells modular buildings to fulfill customers' temporary and permanent classroom and office space needs in California, Texas, Florida, and the Mid-Atlantic from Washington D.C. to Georgia. The Company's TRS-RenTelco division rents and sells electronic test equipment and is one of the leading rental providers of general purpose and communications test equipment in the Americas. The Company's New Jersey based Adler Tank Rentals subsidiary rents and sells containment solutions for hazardous and nonhazardous liquids and solids with operations today serving key markets throughout the United States. In 2008, the Company entered the portable storage container rental business in California under the trade name Mobile Modular Portable Storage, and in 2009 expanded this business into Texas and Florida. For more information on McGrath RentCorp and its operating units, please visit our websites: Corporate – www.mgrc.com Tanks and Boxes – www.AdlerTankRentals.com Modular Buildings – www.MobileModularRents.com Portable Storage – www.MobileModularRents-PortableStorage.com Electronic Test Equipment – www.TRS-RenTelco.com School Facilities Manufacturing – www.Enviroplex.com
CONTACT: Keith Pratt Chief Financial Officer 925 606 9200


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The Sigatoka Sand Dunes National Park is Fiji's first National Park and was established in 1987 to protect a unqiue natural and cutural heritage site.The Park is open daily from 8:00am to 5:00pm. Its Visitor Information Centre is manned by local rangers, who provide an informative introduction to the Park's status and how to traverse its walking tracks.
The Sigatoka Sand Dunes National Park is managed by the National Trust of Fiji.
The Sigatoka Sand Dunes National Park is managed by the National Trust of Fiji.
Visitors can take the 1 hour walk or the 2 hour walk to explore this unique ecosytem or seek a guided tour from the local rangers onsite.
Both walks provide visitors an opportunity to experience first hand the key attributes that make the Sigatoka Sand Dunes, a well known national heritage. We recommend the 2 hr walk for a full on 'Dunal experience'.
Two popular Park activities include a visit to the old archaeological sites to see ancient lapita artefacts and bird watcing in the Park's pockets of Native Dry Forests.
The Park also runs a Going Native program which sees visitors helping local rangers and local community volunteers replant native trees.
The Park is a popular destination for many international student groups wanting to experience Fijian culture, history and wilderness.
Specially designed programs are available for visitors wanting to make their visit to the Park more experiential and memorable. For details on the Park's special programs, please contact the Park.
ContactThe Sigatoka Sand Dunes National Park lies along the main Queen's Highway, in the Coral Coast region. It's a 10 minutes drive from Sigatoka Town, right after Volivoli village, on your way to Nadi. Keep a lookout for the Park's billboard.
P.O. Box 522 Sigatoka Nadroga


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A marathon runner who placed third in a British race had a secret weapon: bus fare.
Rob Sloan completed the Kielder Marathon in a time of two hours, 51 minutes, but fellow runners immediately voiced suspicion, having not seen him toward the end of the race on Sunday, according to the Telegraph.
Sloan, 31, denied cheating at first, but then admitted hopping a bus at the 20-mile mark because he was feeling tired. He then re-emerged from a wooded area of the course and collected the bronze medal.
Witnesses reported seeing him crouched behind a tree until the first and second placed runners went past, then falling in behind them. He now faces dismissal from his club, Sunderland Harriers, and could be banned from future marathons.
There were other signs something wasn't right, according to Steve Cram, the former world record holder and organizer of the race, in Kielder Water, Northumberland.
"He was the only runner in the whole of the race who ran the second half quicker than the first half," noted Cram.
Sloan was indignant when first accused of cheating.
"I'm upset and angry that someone wants to cast these aspersions," he said.
After Sloan's admission, race organizers issued a statement voiding his time.
"The athlete who was disqualified on Sunday after initially placing third has admitted that he failed to complete the whole course of 26.2 miles.," the statement said.
The case was reminiscent of the 1980 Boston Marathon, in which Rosie Ruiz initially won the women's division, but was later stripped of her victory when it was revealed that she didn't run the entire race.


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Nation & World
Egyptian forces storm protest camps; hundreds killed or injured
Egypt's security forces stormed camps of protesters loyal to ousted President Mohammed Morsi on Wednesday in a wave of gunfire and tear gas that set off fighting throughout the country. At least 278 people were dead and more than 2,200 injured on the deadliest day since the 2011 uprising.
By evening, bulldozers had move into the camps. The main site, a virtual city that had housed thousands in the Rabaa section of Cairo, was set afire. Much of the country was under a curfew and a state of emergency.
"Rabaa is ashes," said Jihad Khalid, 20, a protester who'd lost friends and was at the Rabaa field hospital when police arrived. "The police were letting women leave and arresting men. And then a police officer told me, 'Leave,' and I said, 'I am not leaving.' He said, 'You know I can kill you right now.' "
The clashes threw the country once again into a state of upheaval.
Nobel laureate and liberal Mohamed ElBaradei, who'd served as the vice president of foreign affairs, resigned from the military-named government, saying he opposed the crackdown on Morsi supporters.
"I cannot be responsible for one drop of blood," ElBaradei said in a statement, adding that he thought the government had other means to clear the sites, where Morsi supporters had conducted sit-ins for six weeks.
The government defended its actions, claiming that its forces had been attacked and that they'd used only tear gas and not live ammunition. Mohammed Ibrahim, the minister of interior, said the "least amount of force" had been used. He banned future sit-ins.
"This state of mayhem and insecurity has come to an end," said Prime Minister Hazem el Beblawi, who praised police for what he called their restraint.
Health Ministry officials said 235 people had been killed, plus at least 43 police officers, and more than 2,200 people had been injured.
The moves were widely criticized in the Middle East, Europe and the United States.
"The United States strongly condemns the use of violence against protesters in Egypt," Principal Deputy White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said Wednesday from Martha's Vineyard, where President Barack Obama was vacationing.
"We extend our condolences to the families of those who have been killed, and to the injured. We have repeatedly called on the Egyptian military and security forces to show restraint, and for the government to respect the universal rights of its citizens, just as we have urged protesters to demonstrate peacefully."
The government effort to clear the sites, which pitted armed forces against citizens often armed only with rocks, produced widespread carnage. Near the site of the larger sit-in, in Rabaa, it was impossible to walk a few feet without seeing an injured man, hearing the wails of a grieving woman or smelling the punctuating stench of tear gas.
There were conflicting reports that the daughter of Muslim Brotherhood supreme leader Khairat el Shater and her husband had been killed in Rabaa.
The leader of the Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party, Mohamed El Beltagy, confirmed that his daughter Asmaa, 17, was among those killed. Egyptian state television later reported that Beltagy was one of eight Muslim Brotherhood leaders who'd been arrested Wednesday, though Interior Minister Ibrahim denied that. The government already had arrested Shater.
Among those killed at Rabaa were at least two journalists, including Sky News cameraman Mick Deane, 61, a 15-year veteran of the British station. Several other journalists were arrested or threatened when they tried to cover the events.
In Rabaa, protesters had positioned cars as barricades. About 6 a.m., witnesses said, military and police vehicles began surrounding the site, which comprised several blocks of numbered tents, bathrooms and kitchens for the thousands living there. Around 7 a.m., the forces threw tear gas into the crowds, said Mohammed el Nagger, 64, a carpenter who's been at the site since June 28. Residents started to run out of the tents, el Nagger said.
"Once the people went out into the open, they started shooting," said el Nagger, who was struck in the ankle.
His son, Kamel, 35, described a horrific scene of people trying to help one another, his bandaged hand shaking as he recalled the incident.
"In front of my eyes I saw someone shot. Another man went to help him and he was shot, too. They were lying on top of each other," he said. "We cannot even move the dead outside."
Ambulance workers told McClatchy they didn't have permission to enter Rabaa, the far larger of the two protest sites. They had to enter by foot, limiting their rescue work. McClatchy reporters saw roughly 30 bodies piled up in a makeshift morgue at Rabaa field hospital, near one of the sit-ins, with only a fan overhead to keep them cool. Hospital officials said they had 10 more bodies in another room. Reporters saw others outside the site.
As the clashes erupted, the Ministry of Interior urged protesters to use one exit point. But local residents were waiting for them there, vowing to beat up those who left. Later, more avenues were created for protesters to leave.
At least 10 people were killed at the second, much smaller sit-in at Nahda, near Cairo University.
Bursts of tear gas and gunfire continued throughout the day. McClatchy reporters who were caught in the middle of fighting between protesters and police pleaded with an apartment doorman to let them inside the gate. Once there, they could hear the sound of gunfire nearby, the screams of those who were hit and the sound of others breaking up bricks at a nearby construction site to use as rocks.
The violence spread throughout the nation. At least 21 churches were set ablaze, along with police stations.
With many Cairo roads blocked in what appeared to be an effort by the government to stop protesters from coming to the sit-in sites, supporters launched protests in their neighborhoods. In Faiyom, an impoverished governorate south of Cairo that was fiercely loyal to Morsi, at least 17 people died. Clashes also erupted in Ismailia in the Nile Delta, killing at least 15, and the restive Sinai.
Morsi supporters said that at least one child was killed.
In other parts of Cairo, protesters overturned police vehicles and even sent one over a bridge, according to a widely distributed video of the incident.
The government declared a monthlong state of emergency in 14 of the nation's 27 provinces, effectively allowing security forces to clear the streets without public oversight. From 4 p.m., when it announced the state of emergency, till 7 p.m., when the curfew started, the forces allowed some protesters to leave sit-in sites but arrested nearly 600 others.
It was the third move against the camp at Rabaa. The scale of violence sparked a debate about the government response to the Muslim Brotherhood, the secret organization through which Morsi had ascended to the presidency a year ago, and his Islamists supporters. Last month, Gen. Abdel-Fattah el Sissi, the minister of defense, who announced Morsi's ouster July 3, asked the public to take to the streets and give him the backing to address the sit-in.
While some decried that fellow Egyptians could treat one another with such brutality, others welcomed the clearing of the sit-in, saying the carnage was necessary for Egypt to move forward.
"Your hearts are cold. These people are peaceful. We have to defend them," one woman yelled to fellow passengers on the subway early in the morning.
"Stop watching the news!" another replied.
Efforts at negotiations – by Egyptians and the international community – failed in the past month. Neither side could agree on who'd represent it, let alone the major divisive issues of the day.
Ahmed el Tayeb, the sheikh of Al Azhar, a revered institution of Sunni thought, condemned the violence and said he was unaware that the security forces planned to clear the area.
Indeed, he was scheduled to lead negotiations between the Muslim Brotherhood and the government Wednesday, though he'd shared the stage with el Sissi during the July 3 announcement.
At the field hospital, so many bodies came in so quickly, it was clear there wasn't room for them. "Sha-heed!" – or "Martyr!" – protesters would yell as another dead man came by.
Those who were lucky enough to escape the site sought treatment at a nearby mosque turned hospital. Some tried to take off their shoes at the doors, in accordance with religious customs.
"This is no time to take off shoes!" the imam yelled as blood soiled the mosque carpets.
Every few minutes a man would be carried in, the women would scream and there were quiet murmurs of what the day's events meant for Egypt's future.
"We can no longer be peaceful," a Morsi supporter said as he carried an injured friend.


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WASHINGTON -- The U.S.-led military command in Afghanistan will no longer count and publish the number of Taliban attacks, a statistical measure that it once touted as a gauge of U.S. and allied success but now dismisses as flawed.
The move comes one week after the coalition, known as the International Security Assistance Force, acknowledged in response to inquiries by The Associated Press that it had incorrectly reported a 7 percent drop in Taliban attacks in 2012 compared to 2011. In fact, there was no decline at all, ISAF officials now say.
The mistake, attributed by ISAF officials to a clerical error, called into question the validity of repeated statements by allied officials that the Taliban was in steep decline.
Anthony Cordesman, a close observer of the war as an analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said it had been clear for months that ISAF's figures were flawed.
"The truth is they should not have published them in the first place," he said. "A great many people realized from the start that it was a meaningless measurement" because it implies that in order to succeed the Taliban has to keep attacking rather than gaining ground by influencing ordinary Afghans. It's that influence which needs to be overcome in order to ensure the viability of the Afghan government.
"Over the last year it has become clearer and clearer that not only was the measurement meaningless, but it became embarrassing because there weren't any (ISAF and Afghan) gains," he added, noting that Taliban attacks last year were more numerous than in 2009, before President Barack Obama sent an extra 30,000 U.S. "surge" troops.
"Basically speaking, we've ended up -- after the surge and three more years of fighting -- with absolutely nothing that we can tell ourselves that shows the level of progress we did or did not achieve," Cordesman said.
The U.S. and its ISAF allies have pledged to end their combat mission by the end of next year, and while they are likely to leave at least several thousand troops to help train Afghan troops, the Afghans are to assume the lead role for security across the entire country this spring, when the Taliban typically step up their attacks.
There are now about 66,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
Statistical measures of battlefield progress have long been a point of dispute, not only in Afghanistan but also in Iraq. The disputes typically are a combination of doubt about the numbers themselves and about what they mean.
Jamie Graybeal, a spokesman for ISAF's headquarters in Kabul, said Tuesday that the coalition has lost confidence in the reporting system that produced its figures on "enemy-initiated" attacks. That is mainly because more combat operations are being performed by Afghan forces, out of view of American and allied troops. That means ISAF has diminishing control over the mechanics of collecting the data.
"We have determined that our databases will become increasingly inaccurate in reflecting the entirety of enemy initiated attacks," Graybeal said in a written statement.
"Additionally, we have come to realize that a simple tally of (attacks) is not the most complete measure of the campaign's progress," he said. "At a time when more than 80 percent of the (attacks) are happening in areas where less than 20 percent of Afghans live, this single facet of the campaign is not particularly accurate in describing the complete effect of the insurgency's violence on the people of Afghanistan."
Taliban insurgents have been pushed out of many population centers and have failed to regain territory they held before the surge of U.S. troops in 2010. But they are expected to test Afghan forces as U.S. and allied troops withdraw.
Coalition officials, including Obama administration officials, had previously cited the reported 2012 drop in Taliban attacks as a sign that the insurgency was in decline and that the Afghans could take on more of the fighting burden.
Last Tuesday, on his final day as defense secretary, Leon Panetta indicated that he was disappointed in the mix-up. The Pentagon on Tuesday said it was leaving it to ISAF to explain the decision to stop reporting attack figures.
Graybeal said ISAF will continue to track Taliban attacks that are observed and recorded by ISAF troops. But it will not track and report on the totality of attacks -- including those directed at Afghan forces.
The erroneous ISAF report of a decline in 2012 attacks came to light after ISAF removed from its website a set of statistics that included its tally of "enemy initiated attacks," which it had said declined by 7 percent. When the AP inquired about the missing figures, ISAF said they had been removed because they contained errors.
Initially, ISAF said it would correct and republish the statistics, but on Tuesday Graybeal said the corrected 2012 figures will not be put back on its web site.
That raises questions about the Pentagon's most recent report to Congress on progress toward stabilizing Afghanistan, which used the coalition's figures on enemy attacks as its main measure of insurgent violence. The report also cautioned in a footnote, however, that the attack figures have "a number of limitations" and should not be used by themselves as a reliable indication of violence levels in Afghanistan.
A Pentagon spokesman, Navy Cmdr. William Speaks, said the issue of counting Taliban attacks will be addressed in the next report to Congress, due by April 30, "and the errors in these figures will be explained." That report will cover developments in Afghanistan from October 2012 through March 2013.
The previous report to Congress, covering the period from April 2012 through September 2012, said ISAF and Afghan forces had continued to "degrade the cohesion and capability" of the insurgency, while acknowledging that the militants were still capable of carrying out high-profile attacks like a stunning assault on Camp Bastion on Sept. 14 in which 15 Taliban fighters breached the security perimeter, killed two U.S. Marines and destroyed six U.S. Marine aircraft.


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neutral color living rooms awesome cat tree rustic cat eicee.org This image is provided only for personal use. If you found any images copyrighted to yours, please contact us and we will remove it. We dont intend to display any copyright protected images.
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How to get answers faster and more easily than with a telephone call.
Why is EasyHelp better than calling? Because all the answers are there!
It really is easy! EasyHelp answers are available by going here. If you need to ask a question or review your support history, log in to your account and select the "EasyHelp" logo in the header.
The EasyHelp system offers four tabs for you to use.
How to use each section of EasyHelp


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11 Child Prodigies Who Had Done Amazing Things by Age 11
Enjoy being humbled (humiliated?) by these 11 amazing child prodigies – some from history and some doing their prodigy thing in the here and now.
Image credit: JuditPolgar.com
1. Hungarian chess grandmaster Judit Polgar (1976-) began playing in tournaments at the age of six and, by the age of eleven, she had defeated her first grandmaster, Vladimir Kovacivic. She became the best female chess player in history. No other female has ever won a game against a men's chess world champion; she has beaten nine of them.
2. American professional billiards player Willie Mosconi (1913-1993), at the age of six and standing on a box, played an exhibition match against the reigning world billiards champion in front of a packed house. He lost that match, but it earned him some major attention. By the age of eleven, Mosconi was the juvenile champion and regularly held popular trick shot exhibitions. He picked up the awesome nickname "Mr. Pocket Billiards" and won more World Straight Pool Championships (15) than anyone. He was also Paul Newman's pool mentor as he prepared for his role in the 1961 movie, The Hustler.
3. French mathematician, physicist and philosopher Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) wrote a treatise on vibrating bodies at the age of nine and scrawled his first proof on a wall with a piece of coal when he was eleven. He is probably best remembered for Pascal's theorem (something about hexagons or whatever), which he threw out there at age 16. Oh, and he also invented the mechanical calculator.
4. German composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) is the child prodigy poster child. He began playing the harpsichord at age three and learned to play his first piece of music three days before his fifth birthday. He was composing his own music at five and, at six, embarked on a three-and-a-half year European tour with his father and older sister who was not too shabby of a musician herself.
5. Korean mega-genius Kim Ung-Yong (1962-) could have conversations at six months, could read in Japanese, Korean, German and English by the age of four and could perform complex calculus by the time he was five. From the ages of three to six, he sat in on University physics courses. The Guinness Book of World Records recognizes Kim as having the world's highest IQ which is estimated to be over 210. Yowza.
6. Spanish artist Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) showed his talents for art at a very early age. His mother claims (as mothers often do) that his first words word "piz, piz" – short for "lapis" (Spanish for "pencil"). There is non-mom-derived evidence of his prodigious talent: Picasso drew "Picador" when he was just eight years old.
7. American actress Anna Paquin (1982-) won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her debut acting performance in The Piano when she was just eleven years old. Why do I choose to showcase Ms. Paquin here instead of the youngest Oscar winner in Tatum O'Neal who won at age ten? Well, Anna now plays Sookie Stackhouse on HBO's True Blood, which only serves to exacerbate her general awesomeness.
8. Canadian hockey star Wayne Gretzky (1961-) was playing against ten-year-olds when he was only six. The uniforms intended for the ten-year-olds were far too large for the undersized Gretzky who tucked his sweater into the right side of his pants: a tradition he continued throughout his hockey career. When he was ten, he scored an incredible 378 goals and added 139 assists in just one season. Athlete prodigies need love too, you know.
9. British philosopher John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) learned Greek at age three and had read all of Herodotus's Histories and was quite familiar with Plato's Dialogues by the age of eight. He was also more than competent in Latin and Greek and had read through most of the major Latin and Greek works, in their original languages, by the age of ten.
10. American smart kid Gregory Smith (1990-) could memorize and recite books by the time he was 14 months old and could add by 18 months. He went from second to eighth grade in one year and began high school at the age of seven, graduating with honors two years later. He entered Randolph-Macon college at ten and, there, majored in mathematics with minors in both history and biology before pursuing his masters at the University of Virginia. OK, so he's an academic stud – fine. But wait, there's more! The activist work he began as a pre-teen for children's rights throughout the world has made a serious impact. He has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize three times.
11. Indian mental calculator Somani Priyanshi (1998-) took home the overall title at the most recent Mental Calculation World Cup in 2010 when she was just eleven years old. Her specialty? Square roots from six-digit numbers up to eight significant digits (Somani placed first). A couple other events at the MCWC: addition of ten numbers of ten digits each (Somani placed second) and multiplication of two numbers of eight digits (Somani placed second). Yes, her competitors were grown folks.
For 11-11-11, we'll be posting twenty-four '11 lists' throughout the day. Check back 11 minutes after every hour for the latest installment, or see them all here.


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Fifteen year old Australian Felicks Zemdegs can solve a Rubik's Cube puzzle in 6.7 seconds, which is less time than it takes you to drunkenly sext your high school boyfriend during a moment of intense loneliness.
This video, which was shot on November 13th at Melbourne, Australia's "Cube Day," shows the feat in its entirety. It's pretty impressive.
Congratulations, young squire!
New Rubik's Cube Record [Buzzfeed]


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Even if you work with stamped drawings, you'll eventually need to do commercial load calculations in the field or on a licensing exam. The NEC covers commercial calculations in Art. 220, but other articles also apply. For example, you must know the definitions in Art. 100, be familiar with what Art. 210 says about continuous loads, and understand the overcurrent protection requirements set forth in Art. 240.
Two items associated with this type of calculation repeatedly need clarification:
The voltage to use for your calculations depends on the system design voltage. Thus when you calculate branch-circuit, feeder, and service loads, you must use a nominal system voltage of 120V, 120/240V, 208Y/120V, 240V, 347V, 480Y/277V, 480V, 600Y/347V, or 600V unless otherwise specified (220.2) (Fig. 1 below).
Refer to 200.2(B) to end the rounding mystery. When the ampere calculation exceeds a whole number by 0.5 or more, round up to the next whole number. If the extra is 0.49 or less, round down to the next whole number. For, example, round 29.5A up to 30A, but round 29.45A down to 29A.
Specific loads. Art. 220 doesn't cover all specific loads. For example, you'll find motors in Art. 430 and air conditioners in Art. 440. To know if you should look in another Article, use the NEC index.
Art. 220 has specific requirements for most loads, including the following:
Dryers. Size the branch-circuit conductors and overcurrent protection device for commercial dryers to the appliance nameplate rating. Calculate the feeder demand load for dryers at 100% of the appliance rating. If the dryers run continuously, you must size the conductor and protection device at 125% of the load [210.19(A), 215.3, and 230.42]. Table 220.18 demand factors don't apply to commercial dryers.
Let's apply what we've just learned. What size branch-circuit conductor and overcurrent protection does the NEC require for a 7kW dryer rated 240V when the dryer is in a multi-family dwelling laundry room (Fig. 2)?
The ampacity of the conductor and overcurrent device must be at least 29A (240.4). Per Table 310.16, a 10 AWG conductor at 60°C is rated 30A. Therefore, you must use a 30A breaker with a 10 AWG conductor.
Electric heat [424.3(B)]. Size branch-circuit conductors and the overcurrent protection device for electric heating to not less than 125% of the total heating load, including blower motors. Calculate the feeder/service demand load for electric heating equipment at 100% of the total heating load.
Kitchen equipment. Size branch-circuit conductors and overcurrent protection for commercial kitchen equipment per the appliance nameplate rating.
To determine the service demand load for commercial kitchen equipment that has thermostatic control or intermittent use, apply the demand factors from Table 220.20 to the total connected kitchen equipment load. The feeder or service demand load can't be less than the sum of the two largest appliance loads. The demand factors of Table 220.20 don't apply to space-heating, ventilating, or air-conditioning equipment.
Laundry equipment. Size these circuits to the appliance nameplate rating. You can assume a laundry circuit isn't a continuous load and that commercial laundry circuits are rated 1,500VA — unless noted otherwise in the project drawings or exam question.
Lighting. The NEC requires a minimum load per square foot for general lighting, depending on the type of occupancy [Table 220.3(A)]. For the guestrooms of hotels, motels, hospitals, and storage warehouses, you can apply the general lighting demand factors of Table 220.11 to the general lighting load.
Assume the general lighting load for commercial occupancies other than guestrooms of motels, hotels, hospitals, and storage warehouses is continuous. Calculate it at 125% of the general lighting load listed in Table 220.3(A).
Receptacles. You don't do all receptacle load calculations the same way. The NEC has separate requirements, depending on the application.
Multi-outlet receptacle assembly. For service calculations, consider every 5 feet (or less) of multi-outlet receptacle assembly to be 180VA. When you can reasonably expect a multi-outlet receptacle assembly to power several appliances simultaneously, consider each foot (or less) as 180VA for service calculations. Normally, a multi-outlet receptacle assembly isn't a continuous load [220.3(B)(8)].
Receptacle VA load. The minimum load for each commercial or industrial general-use receptacle outlet is 180VA per strap [220.3(B)(9)]. Normally, receptacles aren't continuous loads.
Number of receptacles permitted on a circuit. The maximum number of receptacle outlets permitted on a commercial or industrial circuit depends on the circuit ampacity. To calculate that number, divide the VA rating of the circuit by 180VA for each receptacle strap.
Let's work a sample problem. How many receptacle outlets are permitted on a 15A, 120V circuit (Fig. 3)?
Total circuit VA load for a 15A circuit:
Number of receptacles per circuit:
1,800VA÷180VA=10 receptacles
Receptacle sizing. The NEC permits 15A circuits in commercial and industrial occupancies, but some local codes require a minimum 20A rating (310.5).
Receptacle service demand load. In other than dwelling units, you can add — to the lighting loads — receptacle loads computed at not more than 180VA per outlet per 220.3(B)(9). You can also add fixed multi-outlet assemblies computed per 220.3(B)(8). Both of these must adhere to the demand factors given in Table 220.11 or in Table 220.13.
Bank and office general lighting and receptacles. Calculate the receptacle demand load at 180VA for each receptacle strap [220.3(B)(9)] if the number of receptacles is known, or 1VA for each square foot if the number of receptacles is unknown [Table 220.3(A) Note b].
Signs. The NEC requires each commercial occupancy that's accessible to pedestrians to have at least one 20A branch circuit for a sign [600.5(A)]. The load for the required exterior signs or outline lighting must be at least 1,200VA [220.3(B)(6)]. A sign outlet is a continuous load. You must size the feeder load at 125% of the continuous load [215.2(A)(1) and 230.42].
The following question will allow you to practice what we've just covered. What's the demand load for one electric sign?
Neutral calculations. The neutral load is the maximum unbalanced demand load between the grounded (neutral) conductor and any one ungrounded (hot) conductor — as determined by the calculations in Art. 220, Part B. This means you don't consider line-to-line loads when sizing the grounded (neutral) conductor. What about load reduction? That depends on certain factors, which we'll look at next.
Reduction over 200A. You can reduce the feeder/service net computed load for 3-wire, single-phase or 4-wire, 3-phase systems that supply linear loads for that portion of the unbalanced load over 200A, by a multiplier of 70%.
To see how this would work for an actual installation, determine the neutral demand load for a balanced 400A, 3-wire, 120/240V feeder.
Total neutral load for 400A service:
First 200A at 100%: 200A×1.00=200A
Remainder at 70%: 200A×0.70=140A
Total demand load: 200A×140A=340A
Reduction not permitted. You can't reduce the neutral demand load for 3-wire, single-phase, 208Y/120V or 480Y/277V circuits that consist of two line wires and the common conductor (neutral) of a 4-wire, 3-phase wye system. This is because the common (neutral) conductor of a 3-wire circuit connected to a 4-wire, 3-phase wye system carries about the same current as the phase conductors [310.15(B)(4)(b)].
As proof of this theory, see the example in Fig. 4.
In addition, you can't reduce the neutral demand load for nonlinear loads supplied from a 3-phase, 4-wire, wye-connected system, because they produce triplen harmonic currents that add on the neutral conductor. This situation can require the neutral conductor to be larger than the ungrounded conductor load (220.22 FPN 2).
Knowing the correct way to do commercial load calculations makes you more valuable because you can play a key role in the field design, inspection, and implementation process. It's one more skill that helps you do the job right the first time.