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Cocktail-in-a-Flask & Slow-Cooked Ragu: Menu for a Midwinter Sledding Party
Here are the reasons that you, a grown adult of sound mind and body, should go sledding: it's good clean fun that doesn't cost a dime, there's no one to stop you from going on the steep path, and you get to bring a flask. Also, that dinner that you slow-cooked earlier in the day is going to taste amazing when you and your buds tromp in from the snow. Yup, sledding party: it needs to happen.
The Menu
Sledding noshes:
• The Gold Rush in a flask
• Homemade Cracker Jack
• Pomegranate Olive Relish
• Various cheeses
• Rich and Meaty Lamb Ragu over pasta
• Shaved Fennel, Roasted Tomato, and Pistachio Salad
• Baguette for the table
• A bottle or two of Trader Joe's wine
After dinner:
• Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Peppermint Coffee Toddies
The Scene
You, your gang of best friends, and a snowy hillside near your house. Sledding and snacks come first, followed by a lazy dinner while coats and boots dry out next to the radiator.
Make It Happen
I am a fan of bringing a flask to a sledding party, but fast speeds and straight-up spirits is maybe not the best idea. Try taking the middle path with a pre-made cocktail in a flask. Still boozy and fun, but slightly tempered. Try the Gold Rush with maple syrup instead of honey for a wintry spin, and make a batch of cracker jacks to munch while you wait your turn with the sled.
Back at home, we want to keep up the momentum and get dinner on the table as soon as possible. Make the ragu ahead (even the day or two ahead) and put it on the stove to warm as soon as you get in the door. While that warms and you cook the pasta, everyone can dig into a simple cheese board and an easy relish. I love a simple fennel salad with this dinner, which can also be made ahead and refrigerated until you need it.
For dessert, let's go old school with some chocolate chip cookies. Yum. A hot toddy also seems appropriate for the occasion, but I was torn between serving it first thing or with dessert. Maybe both?!
What else would you want for your sledding party?
(Images: see linked posts)


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Super Rugby
Stormers tame Lions with 14 men
April 19, 2014
Nizaam Carr finished off after slick handling by the Stormers
© Getty Images
The Stormers scored two tries with 14 men to defeat the Lions 18-3 at Newlands stadium in Cape Town Saturday and end a five-match Super 15 losing streak.
Right-wing Damian de Allende and flanker Nizaam Carr crossed the try-line for the Cape Town-based franchise during the first half while hooker Deon Fourie was in the sin bin.
Showing a greater appetite for keeping the ball in hand than in previous games, the Stormers built an 18-point first-half lead and restricted the Lions to just three points after the break. The Stormers had a clear edge at the line-outs, with Lions hookers Robbie Coetzee and replacement Malcolm Marx guilty of numerous poor throws, especially to the tail.
Success lifted the Stormers off the foot of the southern hemisphere inter-provincial championship table as they climbed to 10 points - one more than compatriots Central Cheetahs. The Lions, whose No. 8 and captain Warren Whiteley was a last-minute injury withdrawal, suffered three consecutive losses for the first time this season and remain in mid-table.
Fly-half Demetri Catrakilis put the Stormers ahead after three minutes with a penalty, but had to retire with a suspected broken nose soon after.
Superb handling by the home side led to another penalty against the Lions and Peter Grant, who moved from full-back to replace Catrakilis, made no mistake. An off-the-ball charge on Lions prop Schalk van der Merwe led to Fourie being sin binned midway through the half. But the hosts shrugged off the numerical disadvantage to score 12 unanswered points and establish an 18-point advantage.
De Allende was first to cross the try-line after a quick tap penalty by captain and centre Jean de Villiers caught the visitors napping. Carr struck five minutes later, diving over following slick handling after the Stormers won a ruck close to the 22-metre line.
Grant, whose second penalty attempt rebounded off the post, converted the second try and Stormers ran to the changerooms satisfied with a dominant first-half show. They would have been particularly pleased at keeping the Lions scoreless for 40 minutes after intense late first-half pressure from the Johannesburg outfit.
Leading Super Rugby points scorer and Lions fly-half Marnitz Boshoff atoned for an opening-half miss by slotting a penalty on 44 minutes. But Boshoff, who scored 29 points in a 34-10 home win over the Stormers two months ago, had to settle for just three points as he was replaced before the hour. Elton Jantjies took over as playmaker and there was also a change at scrum-half, with Faf de Klerk coming on for Ross Cronje.
The Lions pressed hard as the game entered the final quarter, but traditional solid Stormers defending kept them out.
The Stormers' Michael Rhodes was issued an off-field yellow card for a lifting tackle in the 17th minute.
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subset: commoncrawl


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Opinion: Can Republicans Win in Pennsylvania?
Editorial board member Matt Kaminski on the presidential and Senate races in Pennsylvania. Photo: tomsmithforsenate.com
This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.
... I ... welcome back to Opinion Journal I'd mind joined now by your ... editorial board member Matt Kaminski ... it meant you have just visited the genuinely lovely state of Pennsylvania ... and aam Pennsylvania has been getting too much attention in the campaign it was pre much assume that was going to go for Barack Obama ... of what you've got the impression of it maybe its employee and if its employee that's a big deal because that state has twenty electoral votes ... here it is the swing state as she swung since nineteen eighty eight election when George ... H W Bush wanted and to spend every Republican has come and been very disappointed ... but Pennsylvania ... I think this kind of its scope stealth ... play in this campaign ... Mitt Romney it's not campaign there is not on the air that ... if the statewide polls has narrowed now within under five points in in in in some of them are Jews ... I think what's really happening that people forgot the Pennsylvania ... as the Republican governor ... has open Senator Pat Toomey two one two years ago ... similarly as Romney does kind of Morse or moderate sounding ... Republican and has majority congressional districts are Republican ... to the are focused on hold in question is Can wrong nice queen especially the suburbs around Philadelphia ... that's a screen part of a painting it and let's talk about the outlook that these are the so-called Philadelphia collar counties sets of ... box Delaware Chester and Montgomery ... four years ago those commies gave Brock Obama between fifty five and sixty percent are both now ... and they're very heavily populated counties a lot of people living on the right and that's ... the area that you went into what that would bring that he had been going to bucks County since the week campaign was there and in twenty ten in no way ... you can find a John McCain campaign office much less a John McCain ... you know lawn sign ... aam and in twenty ten it's one very much the other way to health care ... you still feels more like twenty ten that to me ... in the bucks County ... and the main difference he see that and ... that probably isn't much better ground game ... than John McCain did note that theirs is cooling not keen on ... B of exceeded all other ... targets for the doors to knock on ... the phone centers that they're they're packed ... I think that the key moment there was the Denver debate ... the morning after in Books County the local Republican office ran out of ... someone signs within ... a few hours ... because that with the energized me ... there are innocent constituency their ... same time Democrats are not in use this time around ... in you and ... only cost to run to score in Philadelphia especially ... to get over the goal line ... paler color commies or pearly upscale are then you've got the euro brawny people of their being on doors and so forth what message are they agreeing to these more affluent voters is an unknown suspect it has a lot to do ... economic condition to say it's not abortion is not social policy it is just purely on the widget ... widget driven them in the past he's actually I think the reason why Romney may ... begin to think that this is still ... out with cute could more than a long shot but certainly a surprise ... that the member that made Romney is the first Republican candidate since ... George H W Bush ... was a morbid neocon guy he resembles a lot of them are ... Republicans there ... aam who are this the conservative party socially a bit more liberal ... and you know that the viewing relate as well to George W Bush and the costs of the Republicans ... let's talk briefly about the Republican race there are virtually nobody named Tom Smith Republican is ... challenging the incumbent Bob basal body ... well he is now within one point of Mr Casey what the heck is going on there it's incredible I think what ... Tom Tom Smith is a retired executive basically a farmer who owned a bunch of coal mines and sold two years ago ... and he is Khona like Ron Johnson in Wisconsin ... decided last year that someone has to step up and and and really trying to fix things the Senate ... aam and is the self under so he went on his ... Brzeski zeroed name recognition ... and over the summer heat pump that has on its radar state the state ... Bob Casey had very has very soft support ... has the family brand name his father was a very pop and Gov before ... but Kate but that's because when one very strong with that AC hasn't done


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Rocker, NRA member Ted Nugent to attend Obama's State of Union address
Rock guitarist and gun-rights advocate Ted Nugent will attend the State of the Union address as the guest of Texas Republican Rep. Steve Stockman.
"I am excited to have a patriot like Ted Nugent joining me in the House chamber to hear from President Obama," Stockman said in a release. "After the address, I'm sure Ted will have plenty to say."
The president, who in the wake of recent mass shootings has made tighter gun control a second-term priority, is expected to talk about the issue in his Tuesday night speech.
Nugent, a National Rifle Association board member, has already had plenty to say about the president and his agenda.
His speech last year at an NRA meeting resulted in a talk with Secret Service agents.
Stockman last week threatened to start impeachment proceedings on Obama should he use executive action to enact tighter guns laws.
Many Democrats, meanwhile, are extending their State of the Union invitations to victims of gun violence.
Former Arizona Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, severely injured in a 2011 mass shooting, and husband Mark Kelly will be special guests of Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain and Democratic Rep. Ron Barber, who also was injured in the 2011 shooting and won Giffords' seat in November.


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When Wayne Heckathorn was a teenager in the late 1950s, an uncle would try to entice him to walk a soybean field oozing with waterhemp.
"I'd say to him, 'No way!'" recalls Heckathorn, who today farms with his son Chad near Elk Point, SD. "But if we didn't do it, the waterhemp would be so tall that it would dwarf a 105 John Deere combine at harvest."
Fortunately, herbicides such as Amiben and Sencor/Lexone pummeled this pigweed family member in the early 1970s. "From then on, it wasn't a problem," Heckathorn says.
Just another herbicide success story? Read on.
In the late 1980s, many Midwestern soybean farmers started to rely solely upon herbicides, including Pursuit and Scepter, that kill weeds by disrupting the acetolactate synthase (ALS) enzymes. "In some areas, farmers used ALS inhibitors on 80% of soybean fields," says Reid Smeda, a University of Missouri weed scientist.
Despite giving phenomenal weed control at the time, these herbicides wilted against waterhemp. Although waterhemp had not infested fields for years, its seeds had lingered in the soil and waited for an emergence opportunity. The sole use of ALS herbicides triggered waterhemp's resurgence.
Although not economically damaging in all cases, waterhemp now infests 90% of Iowa fields, says Bob Hartzler, Iowa State University extension agronomist. Waterhemp's spread is hastened by its prolific seed production that often averages 550,000 seeds/plant. This weed, which also infests corn, may clip yields 3% if just six plants per 100 ft. of soybean row are present.
Due to overuse of Pursuit and Scepter, ALS-resistant waterhemp also exists. "It's a numbers game," explains Zach Fore, a University of Minnesota cropping systems specialist. "As you increase selection pressure, you'll select out the resistant types of weeds."
What about Roundup?
Waterhemp's resurrection holds a powerful lesson as you plan your 2002 herbicide buys. Reliance upon only one control measure can quickly render that tool useless.
"The reason that you see so much waterhemp is that biological organisms adapt and adjust," Fore says. "We have become predictable in the crops that we plant and the herbicides that we use."
This even applies to biotechnology's golden boy, Roundup Ready soybeans.
"I keep thinking of that scene in the movie Jurassic Park, where the actors are hiding in a car as the dinosaur plows through a restrictive fence," says Kevin Branick, a Pioneer Hi-Bred International agronomist based in Sioux Falls, SD. "One character says, 'You can't contain life.'
"When we talk about weed species and variations in a population, we try to contain and squelch it, and Roundup is about as close as we can get to doing it," Branick continues. "Yet in some way, shape or form, it may flip around and become resistant."
Thus far, glyphosate (Roundup's generic name) resistance is rare. Resistant ryegrass surfaced in Australia in 1996, followed by resistant goosegrass in Malaysia in 1997. In 2000, researchers detected resistant horseweed in Delaware.
"We've been using Roundup for 28 years, and we are only dealing with three confirmed cases of resistance globally," points out David Heering, Roundup technical manager for Monsanto.
But agronomists and weed scientists are equally concerned about "tolerant" weeds that farmers may initially label as resistant.
Resistance in a weed population is selected by repeated control measures, Hartzler says. He says in several fields where waterhemp infested Roundup Ready soybeans, Roundup did not control waterhemp the first time it was used.
"To me, that doesn't fit that definition of resistance," he says.
Yet, Hartzler adds that there are some biotypes within a weed species that may tolerate higher herbicide rates than others. That's especially true with waterhemp. Because this weed has male and female plants, each plant contains unique genetic traits. This diversity has resulted in some plants with the ability to survive the typical Roundup use rate of 1 qt./acre.
In 1999, University of Missouri researchers detected tolerant waterhemp that withstood recommended Roundup rates even after the field had been planted to corn the preceding three years.
"We're still seeing good control of weeds with the 1-qt./acre rate," Smeda says. "But we do see cracks in the armor."
Shifty weeds
Farmers also face weed shifts from Roundup Ready technology similar to shifts keyed by ALS herbicides more than a decade ago.
"A weed shift will be a greater issue with Roundup than resistance," says Jay Zielske, a Pioneer agronomist based in Mankato, MN. "You'll likely see more late-emerging weeds. Roundup works great on early-emerging grasses. But it has no residual for later-emerging weeds like waterhemp."
This sets the stage for infestations of waterhemp, which may germinate from April into August. Other late-emerging weeds include buckwheat, smartweed, velvetleaf and black nightshade. If farmers follow the same pattern of use with Roundup as they did with ALS herbicides, this shift will occur rapidly, Zielske says.
"In some respects, people aren't really thinking about weed shifts caused by Roundup," he adds. "They're using the same reasoning they did with Pursuit by saying, 'We'll deal with it when it's a problem. Maybe there will be another product that will control it.' Then again, there may not be a product that can deal with the proliferation of waterhemp and other late-emerging weeds."
Good news, bad news
Roundup's effectiveness and popularity are its greatest weaknesses, says Chuck Benbrook, president of Benbrook Consulting Services, Sandpoint, ID. Excessive reliance upon Roundup Ready technology, which U.S. farmers used to plant two-thirds of soybean acres in 2001, concerns Benbrook.
"That is a burnout pace for any technology," he says. "It's like that line that Jim Carrey uses in a movie, 'Somebody stop me!' There is not a single system that you can use on that much cropland and not have problems emerge.
"Some farmers may say, 'So what?'" Benbrook continues. "'We have resistance to triazine, imidazolinone, sulfonylurea herbicides and now Roundup. Fine, we'll move on.' But that is a shortsighted attitude on their part. I consider Roundup to be an extremely valuable herbicide. It doesn't leach, it's not toxic, and it doesn't injure the soybean plant or the environment. A good farmer will want to preserve its efficacy for 100 years rather than 10 years, and they can if they use it wisely."
Tap your toolbox
To ease these weed worries, farmers have several options. Not all methods include herbicides, Fore says.
"When we get new tools, we forget about old tools," he points out. "The interesting thing is that successful organic growers have the equivalent of a toolbox with just a Crescent wrench and Vice Grips. They take what they have and use it. The harrow and rotary hoe are tools. So is changing the planting date. Maybe they plant later and do a tillage trip later on instead of applying a certain herbicide."
Conventional farmers may apply some of these techniques to their own farms, Fore says. To ensure an optimum stand, farmers should first buy seed free of weeds and disease and use equipment in good working condition.
"If you have a good stand, you can get things started off on the right foot," Fore says. "If you have a good herbicide program and a poor crop, you can still have weed problems."
Diversified crop rotations may also throw weeds off-balance. "In southern Minnesota, we have corn and soybeans," Fore says. "In northwestern Minnesota, we plant wheat and soybeans. The tight rotations we have now really select for weeds that grow well under those conditions. We used to have perennial and fall-seeded crops. If we had more of a crop mix in our system, we would have less weeds."
Mix it up
Farmers locked into two-crop rotations may buy herbicides with different modes of action to confuse weed populations.
Heckathorn tries to mix herbicide families on fields every two to three years. A mainstay treatment of the farm is LibertyLink corn and Roundup Ready soybeans.
"But we'll never use just two chemicals across the farm," he says. He mixes in Dual II Magnum, acetachlor and Balance Pro on corn. Herbicides used on soybeans include Treflan, Pursuit, Flexstar, Cobra, Prowl, Raptor and Ultra Balzer. Selection hinges upon present weed species, crop safety and planting flexibility.
"It's just like a baseball game," Branick says. "When a pitcher throws fastballs all the time, hitters get used to them. But when he throws a curveball, fastball and slider, it's tough for a batter to overcome."
Buying other chemicals as a setup for Roundup is another way to ease weed worries, Zielske says. Soil-applied herbicides such as Axiom, Boundary and Authority all are good setup products to knock out weeds that Roundup may miss, such as waterhemp.
This strategy may help prevent the mistakes made with ALS herbicides. "Pursuit spoiled us," Zielske says. "When we stuck with the traditional soil-applied DNA [dinitroaniline] herbicides with Pursuit, waterhemp control was good. But trouble started when we didn't include the DNA herbicides."
Tillage is another option. "When I first came here 20 years ago, 95% of all corn and soybeans had a lay-by cultivation," Hartzler says. "You'd eliminate 99% of waterhemp that way."
Heckathorn cultivates when the crop is about 12 in. high on corn and conventional soybeans. "We cultivate strictly because of waterhemp," Heckathorn says. "There's no resistance to the cultivator."
Learn from history
The overuse of ALS herbicides years ago may have a silver lining, Heckathorn says.
"As farmers, we all did the same thing by overusing those herbicides," he adds. "We had a real mess. Now everyone is taking a more serious approach to seed management."
The effort is justified, Smeda says. "Nature always bats last," he reminds. "Every pesticide selects for its own failure."


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Ultimate Adventure 2010: Bringing It All TogetherPosted in Ultimate Adventure: 2010 on December 1, 2010
Without a good man at the helm of the Ultimate Adventure it wouldn't be the greatest four-wheeling event in America. Rick Péwé, our editor-in-chief, does a phenomenal job of assembling a platoon of some of the best four-wheelers and loyal readers in the country. The ragtag bunch of hooligans participates in the UA not for glory, fame, or money, but for the love of four-wheel adventure.
But one man can only do so much. The UA wouldn't be possible without the help of a few 4WD clubs and individuals from across the U.S. These folks put their lives on hold to help make the UA dream a reality. If you can imagine just one guy traveling half the country while looking for great off-road adventure and making hundreds of phone calls, securing permits, and running the magazine, then you realize just how valuable help really is. The entire staff and everyone who participates in the UA fully appreciate all their efforts.
If you want to see us in your part of the country and think that your club or family members can help us with Ultimate Adventure 2011, don't hesitate to email us at firstname.lastname@example.com. We don't need much more than a good patch of dirt to throw out our bedroll and a great place to wheel.
Special Thanks
We owe a debt of gratitude to the film crew of Mike Harrington, Andrew Black, Scott Fusselman, and Jeff Hamor, and to our publisher, Steve VonSeggern, for their help and support. At times the staff and UA crew can be a handful. Thanks for putting up with our antics.


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Have it in the south. The north is dreadful. Matt
All I know is that yesterday in NYC it was freezing. Of course down in NC, it's not much better, but at least we have Bojangles and no toll roads. :disco:Matt
I like DC. Sometime in early August would be good. Yes, I know that is around the time of the apostle's fast. Maybe then right before like the last weekend in July. The reason is I am going to NC in August and I could just go to DC first. I really want to be able to go to the get together since I am one of the admins! anastasios
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Every purchase supports National Museums Liverpool
Drawing on rare archive footage we feature amongst others, the Accrington Pals, the Lancashire Fusiliers and the Cheshire Regiment as they prepare for active service on the Western Front.
We discover the early days of aviation and German Prisoners of War being marched through the streets of Lancashire. From troop inspections in Preston and Blackpool, to the subsequent victory parades in Whalley and Haslingden and the unveiling of war memorials from Egremont to Altrincham.
Presenting evocative footage filmed across the North West a century ago - don't miss the special opportunity to experience how we lived our lives during one of the darkest periods in our history.
From industrial toil in the years leading up to the outbreak of war, to key events during the hostilities - join BAFTA nominated actor Maxine Peake as she narrates this fascinating journey into the past.
Launguage: English
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Run Time: 65 minutes
PAL: All regions
Exempt from classification
Brand: North West Film Archive, Manchester Metropolitan University
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But luckily for me and for all of you out there, she once again surrendered! But on the condition that I would never ask her to pose again, and she said this would be her absolute last ever nude performance as a model.
So knowing this I put together one of the toughest schedules I have ever made. With only a 7h transit in Barcelona before we were heading off to Gran Canaria I booked a duplex suite at the new Hesperia Tower Hotel near the airport. Yanna arrived according to my strict instructions: skirt and no panties or bra, so as she dropped her clothes her body was free of any marks from tight clothing and ready to pose.
After 2 intense hours of shooting I had arranged for an Argentinean massage guru to release Yanna from any tension from her trip and to help re-charge her batteries for the following 2 days... and I got it all on film! I don't know what happened, but that was one hot massage! Not one spot was missed. As I said I have it all on film! See some sneak previews below.
Must run. We have a plane to catch.
Come back for more tomorrow.


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On Nov. 29 a federal bankruptcy judge liquidated Hostess Brands, longtime enemy of the nation's waistline. The purveyor of the Twinkie was a victim of the country's changing tastes. Americans, Hostess said, are more health conscious than they used to be.
By sheer coincidence Hostess Brands shut down its operations 34 years to the week after the disgruntled San Francisco supervisor Dan White assassinated Mayor George Moscone and a fellow city supervisor, Harvey Milk, the latter the first openly gay man elected to public office in the United States. At his trial, Mr. White's lawyers devised what has come to be known as the "Twinkie defense." The defendant, the jury was told, was not in his right mind at the time of the killings; the recent influx of homosexuals and hippies into his previously decorous, respectable, middle-class city, his lawyers argued, had left Mr. White severely depressed. A dramatic upsurge in White's Twinkie consumption, they said, both indicated and accelerated his slide into temporary insanity. The jury was sympathetic; they chose to convict White on two counts of manslaughter rather than the more serious charge of premeditated murder.
The Twinkie defense had worked. Or had it? Many people believe that a better explanation for the verdict is that the jury just didn't want to believe that White, an "all-American boy"—a good Catholic, family man, veteran and former firefighter who had once rescued a mom and her baby from a burning building—could be the same man who had executed two of their neighbors with malice aforethought. He must have just snapped, they reasoned. The jury's willing disbelief seems like the better explanation.
This is related to what Hannah Arendt called "the banality of evil:" We'd rather not believe that an ordinary someone, someone we know, could do something so extraordinarily evil. Yet that is almost always the way it happens. Just a few days ago, Jovan Belcher, a linebacker for the Kansas City Chiefs, shot and killed his girlfriend and then himself. Ruben Marshall, a family friend, remarked: "I didn't want to believe it. He was a good man. A good, loving father, a family man." One of Belcher's teammates said, "There was nothing about him that seemed abnormal.... What could have caused him to do that?"
Good question. Why? Why do the Egyptian Salafists kill the Coptic Christians, as David Pinault reports in this week's issue? Why did Cain kill Abel? Ultimately, of course, we don't know the answers. Such questions belong to the inaptly named "problem" of evil. Evil is not a problem; it's a mystery. Perhaps that is what is most unsettling about it. If evil were a problem, it would be something "out there," something we could analyze and possibly solve. As a mystery, however, evil is not so easily objectified. Indeed, as mystery, evil is a drama in which we are the subjects, the actors rather than the spectators. And yet there is something terrifyingly predictable, even boring about this drama. The characters know the difference between good and bad, and yet they do the bad things anyway, over and over. Much like those Twinkies, I suppose—we all knew they were bad for us; we ate them anyway.
The Good News, with a capital G and a capital N, however, is that Christians know that evil will not endure forever, that our world, to answer the question posed by Richard Clifford, S.J., in this issue (p. 17), is not "fated to end in terror and panic." Christ has already won the victory over evil. Today, as always, we simply pray for the faith and the courage to live in the painful yet beautiful moment between his first and second comings. As of last week, we'll have to do that without Ho Hos, Twinkies and Ding Dongs. No need to worry though. We've been through worse together.
This column has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: December 7, 2012
An earlier version of this column misidentified the nature of the relationship between Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher and the person he shot. Kasandra Perkins was his girlfriend, not his wife.


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The Reliance Group, founded by Dhirubhai H. Ambani , is India's largest private
sector enterprise, with businesses in the energy and materials value chain. The
flagship company, Reliance Industries Limited, is a Fortune Global 500 company and
is the largest private sector company in India.
Dhirubhai Ambani founded Reliance as a textile company and led its evolution as
a global leader in the materials and energy value chain businesses. It was in 1957
when he returned to India after a stint with A.Besse& Co., Aden he started yarn
trading business from a small 500 sq.ft. office in Masjid Bunder, Mumbai.he set
up his brand new mill in Naroda, Gujarat. In 1996 Reliance went on to become the
biggest textile brand 'Only Vimal'. In 1977 the Reliance Textile Industries came
with an IPO which was oversubscribed seven times.
Bigshare Services Pvt Ltd Bharat Tin Works Building,1st floor, Opp. Vasant Oasis,Andheri (E),Mumbai
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Analyst Corner: Retain 'buy'on Federal Bank, profitability to improve
DLF Rating Buy: Company's fortunes on path of revival
Metals and mining Q3 preview: Lower prices, costs to hurt steel players
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Decentralise policy implementation, says Bimal Jalan
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Soon, no e-way bill if GST returns not filed for 6 months
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Slippery slope: Passenger vehicles exports continue to be on slow lane
India can be $5 trillion economy in 7-8 years: Suresh Prabhu
Piyush Goyal calls for better and accurate data on jobs, skilling
Davos in 2019: Millennials take charge of this year's forum
Budget 2019 for women: Here's the budget allocation for women in the last budget
Budget 2019 Expectations: Rural economy in focus? This is what agri sector may get from Arun Jaitley this year
World economy wobbles on eve of Davos with politics to blame


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Friday, July 9. 2010
Judge Rules DOMA Unconstitutional
Wednesday, November 4. 2009
Maine Voters Speak Out
Wednesday, October 28. 2009
Campus Pride's Top 25 for 2009
Tuesday, October 20. 2009
New Big Queer Facebook Page
Monday, September 14. 2009
Theatre is Alive in New York - Thunder Above, Deeps Below
Monday, August 31. 2009
Going West
Tuesday, August 18. 2009
HRC: Homosexual Men Tortured and Killed in Iraq
Tuesday, August 11. 2009
We made the list - Best 100 LGBT Blogs
Wednesday, July 15. 2009
Transgender-sensitive health care providers in NYC
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Living with result of Arab Spring
The recent editorial about the assumption of dictatorial power by Mohamed Morsi in Egypt was right on.
This is the Arab Spring in full bloom. Now that Egypt is the lead player in peacemaking again, it does not bode well for the region. Certainly religious minorities should be very concerned.
Those who wish for a lasting peace between Israel and her neighbors must be troubled as the more rational and pragmatic Egyptians are being squeezed out. Those who greeted the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak with enthusiasm should be careful of what they wish for.
Gil Stein
Arrogant politicians get it wrong again
Mary Nichols, the head of the California Air Resources Board, has declared California's first cap and trade auction a success.
Nichols is delusional to call the auction a success, when under California law energy companies were forced to purchase the emission allowances at the minimum price set by Nichols and the politicians. It did successfully show that our state politicians have found a way to disguise new taxes as an auction, without voter consent.
As the politicians continually jack up the price of these allowances, they can collect billions to squander on their pet projects, including Gov. Jerry Brown's idiotic bullet train.
These taxes will be passed through to consumers via higher energy prices, and in a few years we'll see skyrocketing prices of gasoline and electricity, causing more businesses and jobs to leave the state.
Contrary to the politicians' claim that California is leading the world, the sad truth is that California is the poster child for getting it wrong, the result of arrogant politicians who don't need to care about the consequences of their actions.
Dick Patterson
El Cerrito
Getting facts straight about Middle East
The author of a Nov. 23 letter requires correction of his anti-Israel opinions:
Israel withdrew from Gaza, and the Palestinians have been firing rockets into Israel from Gaza ever since. Recently, an Arab with ties to Hamas set off a bomb that blew up a bus in Tel Aviv.
Israel controls the West Bank since the armistice of 1968 because there has been no peace agreement.
Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has invited Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to have direct negotiations without preconditions, and he has refused.
Israel has checkpoints and a fence on the border of Israel to deter Palestinian terrorism. Israel has a boycott of Gaza only for armaments, and Gaza also has a southern border with Egypt. The Palestinians in the West Bank have a better life and more rights than the people living in the many Muslim and Arab countries of the Middle East.
Norman Licht
San Carlos
Israel has every right to defense
A Nov. 22 letter is a fictional revision of events that Hamas is circulating all over the Internet and media, yet nothing is further from the tragic truth.
Hamas, a radical Islamist group, seized Gaza in a bloody coup after Israel evacuated the strip and handed over the control to the Palestinian Authority.
From its inception, Hamas declared its intention to destroy the Jewish state and acted accordingly by launching more than 8,000 rockets on Israel citizens in the last seven years. The status between these sides is an undeclared war.
Israel government is within its right to defend its citizens from a hostile enemy, and the U.N.'s Palmer report reaffirmed its right to blockade Gaza, and prevent Hamas from arming themselves. Yet, Israel provides free of charge 70 percent of Gaza's electricity, fuel and life necessities, which most media outlets elect to omit.
I wonder how the letter writer would have reacted if her neighbor kept throwing rocks on her family and house continuously, while the police ignored it and stood idle.
Sam Liron
Foster City


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Your home's walls are what surround you and they are the canvas that reflects the rest of the room.
How can you be sure not to corner yourself into ending up with a paint color that you don't really enjoy? Your home's walls are what surround you and they are the canvas that reflects the rest of the room. So how can you be sure you will love a color you are considering? Let's take a look.
An abundance of delightful hues exists in nature, fashion and design. In my years as a designer, I've definitely found that color gets the first—and usually the strongest—reaction. Long before color choices even need to be considered for a project, clients will ask, "What color do you see this room done in?" My typical answer is this: "I have no idea!" While I firmly believe that color can and does take a powerful directive in a home's design, lots of work needs to be done before identifying a color language for a room.
While selecting paint colors, keep in mind that design is departing from the trend of having a different wall color in each room. This is a good thing because stocking 20 cans of paint, in every color of the rainbow, is not only costly but makes storage and minor touch-ups a hassle. Today's more streamlined thinking favors a less-is-more approach. I firmly believe in using one well thought-out generic wall color for most of your public areas and allowing yourself the fun and creativity in your private areas, such as bedrooms. As I have said before, a home is nothing more than a collection of boxes, and what you paint the walls of your boxes is literally the backdrop for all the wonderful items that make your house a home. Ask yourself this, "Is the paint on the walls going to be the focal point?"
My primary goal with this article is to help you make wise, logical, lasting choices in paint colors for your home. If you are making a large leap into a new color palette for your home, meaning all the public wall areas are going to see a fresh coat of paint, here are some considerations for you.
Step 1: List Your Don'ts
When working with clients, the first thing I always ask for is a list of colors they absolutely cannot tolerate living around. This way, I know right up front what colors not to even consider. Ask yourself the same question. If the very thought of a particular hue makes you almost ill, don't waste another second thinking about it. Regardless of who suggested it, it is not for you. Move on!
Step 2: Study Your Home
Before you head into the paint store with a decorative pillow and ask them to match the color of a particular flower, stop! I have often overheard similar requests and it makes me cringe! You may love that color in the pillow, but painting hundreds of square feet of that color without other considerations is likely to produce very undesirable result. Instead, stop and study the aspects of your décor that are not likely to change soon—for example, favorite artworks, upholstery pieces and floors. Then, consider the millwork and ceilings (whether you plan to change them or keep them the same) as well as the lighting in the room. Put all these considerations together, add your personal preferences, and you will be successful with locating the perfect hue for your home!
Floors: If the floors aren't changing soon, consider the color of the carpet, wood, or tile. For example, if wood flooring has a very strong gold tone to it, you can't ignore its intensity when making paint choices.
Millwork: The doorway frames, doors, baseboards, crown molding, trim around windows and, yes, cabinetry all need to play into your paint selection process. If the millwork in your home is stained, take note of what undertones the wood might harbor, such as a touch of gray or red. These details matter!
Ceilings: While choosing wall paints, consider the current color of the ceilings. If you want to take this opportunity to change the ceiling color, choose the wall and ceiling colors together. The safe, typical white ceiling always seem a bit harsh to me. I think the contrast between a rich, strong wall color and a bright, white ceiling is too dramatic. Consider choosing a white for the ceilings that is tinted with the same color as the walls. For example, if the walls are a wonderful warm gold, select a white with strong gold undertone to it. Another option is to use the same color on the walls and ceiling—a technique that lends a wonderful coziness to small areas such as powder rooms, entryways and halls.
Light: Finally, take a look at the location of the room and the natural as well as artificial lighting that occurs there. What does the sun do to your rooms during the day? How about sunrise and sunset? What does lamplight do to the wall color in the evening? Think about what hours of the day you are really in your home. A good share of us spend more time in our homes in the evening, when walls are bathed in lamplight rather than the brilliance of the sunshine. This is a true consideration.
Step 3: Sample, Sample, Sample
I believe the best way to really study wall colors—and how they look throughout our home—is to sample it. Find a paint store, such as Benjamin Moore, that has "wet samples," which will cover a 4'x 4' painted area. If you are considering 2 or 3 choices, use poster boards for your samples and paint each board a different color. Then position each board behind window treatments, furniture pieces and behind art and study what happens with the changing lighting conditions. (Applying paint samples directly on walls can cause confusion and make the selection process more difficult. If putting the paint on the wall is really what you would rather do, paint a corner so you don't have as much of the existing wall color around the sample. This allows you to hone in on the new color better.)
Step 4: Choose a Paint Finish
Your final paint-related decision is the finish. Personally, I am a huge fan of eggshell. In fact, my beloved mentor Ardon said, "Each home should have an internal glow." I believe eggshell paint finish offers that glow through its slight shimmer, luster and light reflective qualities. There's also a practical reason for an eggshell finish: It resists stains a bit better than flat paint. Take a damp cloth to eggshell paint and you likely will remove the stain, leaving no evidence behind. But with flat paint, the finish can absorb the water and possibly leave spots on the wall. Then it is back to the garage or basement to retrieve the paint for a repair.
Flat finish has its place, though. Flat-finish paint is less expensive and produces an even and uniform finish when walls are not prepped to their finest (making this a good choice for drywall). Flat finish is also a better choice for ceilings because of the lack of reflective qualities prevents haloing from lighting fixtures.
Storing and Marking Paint Cans
Once you're finished painting, get out your Sharpie and label every leftover paint can. List the paint color and sheen and then all the rooms and surfaces where it was used. When it's time for touch-ups, you won't have to pry open every can—or end up using flat white to touch up the gloss in the bathroom.
Take the time and effort to arrive at the perfect color or colors, and you will be rewarded with the background that works with all of the attributes of your home and showcases your gorgeous furnishings. Well done, my friends! And is there anything more pleasing than the smell of a freshly painted home?
A few words from the great designer Albert Hadley: "Ceilings must always be considered. They are the most neglected surface in a room!"
Have a wonderful week, and I will visit with you next Saturday!


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Between a small roster and a season full of road games, the Toll Gate volleyball team doesn't have things easy. On Friday against Cranston West, one of the best teams the Titans have played so far, it didn't get easier.
The Falcons cruised to a sweep with 25-10, 25-6 and 25-7 victories, dropping the Titans to 0-4.
"It's a work in progress," said Toll Gate head coach Claire Baggesen. "I have a young team and a small team. We're going to deal with what we've got."
Contending is proving difficult for the Titans, especially against front-running teams like Cranston West and Central. With such a small roster – and only three players carrying any experience – struggles were to be expected.
The Titans are handling it as best they can – working to improve and remaining enthusiastic in the process.
"These kids are to be given a lot of credit for sticking with it – for enjoying every game and playing hard every game," Baggesen said. "To keep up and to continue their desire to play, I don't want to diminish that."
The Titans started Friday's game with an ace from Jose Javier but the 1-0 advantage turned out to be their only lead of the night. The Falcons, who were coming off an impressive win over East Greenwich, won the next seven points in game one. After an error stopped the run, West started another, winning seven in a row again.
This time, it was West's offense that flexed its muscle. Standout middle blocker Mike Rainone landed three kills in a four-point stretch, and Nareg Mkrtschjan added a big kill.
"The last few years, we really lived on defense," said West head coach Roger Tow. "This year, our defense is getting better, but we're not quite as experienced. We've got to change our mindset and be more of an offensive team."
The Titans found their footing for a brief stretch midway through game one. A hitting error made it 14-3, and George Greenhalgh followed with an ace. After a West point, a service error and a push to an open spot by Greenhalgh made it 15-6.
But the Titans couldn't get closer. Two errors put West back in control, and Mike Igoe delivered three straight aces. The Falcons went on to a 25-10 victory.
In game two, the Titans fell into a big hole. Tyler Fann started at the serving line and didn't leave until it was 13-0. Along the way, he landed three aces. The Falcons also got their offense into its highest gear yet, with Rainone posting five kills and three blocks.
"We try to run everything through Rainone," Tow said. "He's our top option."
After the 13-0 start, the Titans won five of the next 10 points thanks in part to blocks by Greenhalgh and Lenny Weisensee. Later, Matt Davis delivered a kill, but that was the only point for the Titans over the final eight. West won game two 25-6.
Game three was more of the same, with West racing to a 12-1 lead. Davis and Greenhalgh had kills late in the game, but the Falcons coasted to the 25-7 win.
The Titans were scheduled to be back in action Monday against Classical, with results unavailable at press time. They'll visit East Greenwich on Wednesday at 6:30 p.m.
Baggesen is hoping for continued improvement – and for the enthusiasm to remain.
"That cannot be diminished," Baggesen said. "It needs to be enhanced upon. They're a great group of guys who really do enjoy the game. Their moment will come."


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Photograph by Gary Copeland
OK, introduce yourselves.
S: Steve Brooks. I sing and play guitar.
R: Rick Smith. I play drums.
A: Andrew Elstner. I play guitar and sing back ups. Jon is out eating.
You've been signed to Mogwai's Rock Action label in Europe. How did that compare to a US label? How did you get hooked up with them?
R: In 2005 - or 2006 - we toured with Mogwai in the States, and on that tour we became friends with them. I don't even remember how it came about, but we somehow got an offer from them to do the European version of our first full-length record. And we said "Hell Yeah." It was awesome. I've been a Mogwai fan for a long while now, so when they asked us if they could do the record we were excited about it. As far as the experience goes, working with the label goes, we just let them run with it and do their own thing with it.
Did you record it with them, at their studio?
R: No, we did it in the States and a different record label, Robotic Empire, actually released it in the States first. Then Mogwai released it in Europe after. So it was already a recorded record. Both records they did for us we already had recorded for another label already, they were just doing the European licensed version.
Are you going to do more with them?
R: Umm, at the moment the labels we work with have European distribution pretty heavily, so there's almost no need to, I guess, in some ways. But it was a cool experience. They're awesome dudes, and the label is very cool too.
Is there a discernible difference between working with a conventional label, run by musicians, and working with a label like Volcom, which has kind of come to be through their dealings in skateboarding and whatnot? Obviously they've been putting out some killer stuff recently...
R: Oh yeah.
S: Yep.
A: I think it's fuckin' awesome, the Volcom thing. Obviously I have no experience - as the new dude in the band - as to how Rock Action was as an experience, apart from total respect. With Volcom - to be blunt - the reach is a little more broad and the pockets are a little more deep. And it's a label that's part of a 'lifestyle' company, you know? They've been selling clothing to skateboarders, snowboarders and surfers since like, the eighties?
S: The nineties I think.
Yeah, the early nineties.
A: Yeah, so they've been fuckin' amazing. There's been no hassle. There's been nothing but positive support from those guys.
S: Especially now, when it's hard to get the support that a lot of bands used to get from labels. They're able to market us in different ways, because of the different aspects of their company.
You're being interviewed for a skateboard magazine right now.
S: Yeah.
A: But they have money coming in from different things other than just records, so there's a little less pressure... In a positive way! It's not like it makes us lazy.
S: They gave us a good deal. And it's the same with all the other labels we've been on, we really know the people we're working with. We're friends with them and we trust them. They're pretty much of the same mentality that everyone else has been.
I know the Melvins got a load of socks and suits from Volcom when they did their record. Did you get anything cool? Did you go for a trolley dash around the warehouse?
A: That's exactly what we did!
S: They cut me off! They cut me off because I took too much stuff.
A: When we first signed on with them it was like "OK, cool, we better do some business-y stuff", but then - they have a factory store in Costa Mesa - they just went "OK, take what you want, go crazy".
S: We had to ship stuff home. We were on tour at the time, and there was just so much stuff.
A: We grabbed fuck-ton of stuff. Jeans, socks, shirts, bags, luggage, hats, headphones, underwear, belts, sunglasses, towels...
S: We were broke, and most of the clothes I was wearing were so old, that I just got me this huge bag, like this tall. Like $300 worth. The bag itself, I mean. The bag was about $300, and I filled it. It was like a shopping spree. You put a bunch of broke motherfuckers in there and tell them to go crazy?
A: By the time we were done they were like "Uh, OK. I think we should go now". We had these three huge boxes.
S: We had a pile, about the size of this room.
Photograph by Gary Copeland
What do you think of the UK?R: I love it. People seem really excited that we make the trip to come out, so as long as people are excited, we're more than psyched to be here. It's been two years since the last time we were out here, so I feel that with these shows, the reaction from the crowd has been awesome. everybody's super cool. I like the vibe. Especially after touring the States so many times in the last couple of years - it's refreshing.
A: During the day is cool too, you get to walk around and see some shit you'd never normally see. Like Nottingham Castle.
It's been four years since your last album. What have you been doing?
S: Every year we've put out something. We did the Songs For Singles EP, we did the Boris split, we did the Part Chimp split last year. Basically we spent last year writing this record. And recording it. And then it took six months or something to get it out. And we tour a lot. In order for us to make a living we have to stay on the road. This time we took a lot of time off in order to write the record, and between recording the record and having the record released we were just sitting at home, and working regular jobs.
Is the band your day jobs now?
A: I want it to be. I'm not good at working in retail. I mean I can do it, I just don't care. I care about this, I don't care about that.
I see you've got some XXXL shirts. Where do you sell those?
A: (Immediately) In the US.
R: It's an American thing because there's a lot of fat-ass people in America. Occasionally you'll get a ghetto-fabulous dude who wants to rock a XXXL t-shirt, you know? Out to the nightclub or whatever. So you gotta have that too.
S: Or some little tiny girl what wants it as a nightshirt. Any time we don't have them, there's always a bunch of people like "You don't have XXXL? What the hell?!"
A: Only when you don't have them, there'll be some massive dude who's 6'8" and 350lbs, going "Aw, dude..."
R: They're fat here too though...
But people are ugly here! And drunk. I'd rather have fat people than ugly, drunk people everywhere.
R: Hahaha! Oh, man...
You make a point of declaring that you're not a metal band. Can you explain this? In what way are you not a metal band?
S: We're a band that's influenced by metal as well as punk, and rock and Middle-Eastern music. We don't think like metalheads.
A: We're just a hard rock band.
R: A very open-minded hard rock band. I think bands like Bauhaus and Swans are some of the heaviest shit ever, and they're not metal bands.
S: I love stuff that's influenced by Hüsker Dü, but I love eighties metal and thrash - stuff I grew up on. I grew up listening to Sabbath and Priest and Maiden and all that, then in the mid-eighties I got into thrash. A lot of the San Fransisco Bay Area thrash bands, then the whole rise of the underground and Florida death metal. Then in about '88 I started venturing off and listening to different things. After Clandestine by Entombed I was like "Everything great has been done". In metal. For me. There are bands now, like High On Fire, and that's the kind of metal I like. Really raw, powerful metal.
A: The new High On Fire record is, to me, a fuckin' masterpiece. Dude it's so good, it's just so right. It's super powerful, and it's kind of meathead-ish without being stupid.
S: The drums sound unbelievable. They sound like a fucking locomotive. Or if you're riding a wooden rollercoaster. It's like DOOF DOOF DOOF DOOF.
R: It's cool when you hear a recording of them, and they're playing metal, but it doesn't sound like they went to the same studio that every other metal band went to, and had the same drum preset triggered in on their drum kit, and the same guitar tone... It's unique. It sounds like them. It has room to breathe, it's not prog-y for the sake of being technical, you know?
S: That's what killed metal for me.
R: It's a pissing contest. It's "Look how complicated we can be" but that shit's just not brutal anymore. You don't want to hear this brutal song then all of a sudden this guitar solo comes in and it's this beautiful thing, with all these sweeps, and all that shit.
Who else is doing metal right just now? You did that split with Boris, do you consider them to be a metal band?
R: No way. I think they're a total rock band. They're an interesting band too, they're kinda like the Melvins, they're a band that can do anything they want to do. It's never the same thing. You can tell someone to check out Boris and they'll pick up one of the drone records, and they'll be "What the hell is this?!"
A: I think we're all of a similar mentality. We're all influenced by the Melvins. I saw the Melvins in like '91, and they had the power of a punk band, and they were just heavier than any band I'd ever heard - part from Swans of Godflesh or something like that - as far as a rock band, they were so fuckin' heavy. They changed everything for me. You can be heavy without having this strict black and white. There's this huge grey area in what they do. And with what we do. A lot of our newer stuff is kind of Krautrock-y
S: Very driving, very repetitive, very psychedelic. It's all over the board, but still sounds like us.
Is this change a reflection of the things you've been listening to more recently?
S: Just trying different things, and just progressing as a band.
A: It's about keeping yourself excited as well. There are certain bands who can do formulaic stuff really well, like AC/DC are still just crushing faces all around the world. It's the obvious example, but when you're writing songs and playing live you do it to please yourself.
R: We haven't changed that much as a band. The production's changed, and maybe the songwriting slightly, but we haven't changed as much as people make out. People are like "Oh, you guys have turned into a total pop band now" but we were kind of a total pop band before.
A: When people say that, I'm like "You didn't hear that from the beginning?!' It's always been there.
S: You're damned if you do and damned if you don't. People want you to write the same record over and over again, but then when you do, they're like "Aw, it's the same thing!" But we've been pretty lucky to have such a dedicated fan base. Everyone has a different favourite record, which is cool. We don't want to be one of these bands that writes the same record over and over.
Like Mogwai...
A: It's a similar vibe. I don't know what their MO is, but maybe they're still trying to perfect a certain ideal, and they want to try it again, and try it again. Some of the reviews for our new record were all "It's cool, but it's just the same" and some were "It's cool, but shit's totally changed".
S: Vice magazine said we'd changed too much, then Pitchfork said we hadn't changed enough.
What's the best band you've played live with?
S: Harvey Milk is one.
A: Big Business.
R: Part Chimp. Boris. We've been lucky, we've toured with a load of great bands.
A: We toured with Jesu.
Volcom had a 'Name a Metal Band' competition on the Sidewalk forum. What do you think of some of these? (I show the band the list)
R: 'Necropaedophilia'? Is that fucking dead children? Jesus, God...
A: 'Haha! 'Endoscope Periscope'!
S: I like 'Rectal Suffocation'... 'Dangerwankk Mumfukk'! 'Pout at the Devil'! Hahahaha! Oh, God... 'Frozen Mammoth', 'Stillborn Grandma', 'Chainmail Sexbeast'? Haha... 'inFANTASYde', that's clever. 'Cradle of Milf'! Haha!
A: 'Prison Jism Power Shower'! Dude... That can be Steve's side project. Those are fucking amazing. This is so good.
(A member of venue staff comes in, and immediately leaves)
A: He was offended.
What did you listen to in the van today?
R: The Chameleons today. Trans Am.
S: Rectal Suffocation...
A: Amps For Christ, Psychic TV...
R: Godflesh. It's all over the place. Japanese noise punk - Attack SS
S: Cock Sparrer, Black Flag, Deicide...
Do any of you skate?
R: Absolutely. I don't skate so much now, what with all the touring and stuff... I'm just scared of hurting myself now actually. I kinda had to stop when I broke my finger. I broke my finger and I realised I couldn't play. There were a couple of dudes down in Florida when I was growing up that used to skate for Element, so they'd always have product in the trunk. That was how I used to get a lot of my stuff. It's hard for me to not get on a skateboard and mess around when somebody has one, but I just can't right now. If I hurt myself I'm out of work.
What two musicians would you like to see fight each other?
R: I want to see Dale Bozzio kick the shit out of Lady Gaga.
They're both men, anyway...
S: Haha!
A: Aw, dude! Dale's awesome. Lady Gaga sucks.
S: I think just Madonna and Lady Gaga would be satisfactory. I just want to see Lady Gaga get the shit beat out of her. I feel I want to see a lot of musicians get the shit kicked out of them, by anyone. I want to see a bunch a metalcore bands fight each other and kill each other off. I hate those flat-ironed haircuts.
What's the best non-musical thing you've bought on eBay?
S: I don't think I've ever bought anything on eBay that wasn't music related.
R: 'The Orkly Kid', with Crispin Glover in it, on VHS.
A: I collect - when I have money - old tobacco pipes. It's the most Spinal Tap shit ever. You can buy them all crusty and beat up, and I'm pretty good at fixing them up, and making them look new-ish. Then you sell them and make money. I had fifty or so before I moved from Atlanta to St. Louis. Made a bit of loot...
Torche are recording a new album for Volcom this Winter, for a late 2013 release, and are touring Europe again in June.


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This is an online lesson associated with activities during Solar Week, a twice-yearly event in March and October during which classrooms are able to interact with scientists studying the Sun. Outside of Solar Week, information, activities, and... (View More) resources are archived and available online at any time. This is an activity about measurements of solar activity. Learners will observe an image of the Sun and sketch major features, plot data to begin to recognize patterns of solar activity, look for long-term patterns in graphed data, compare X-ray and visible light images of the Sun to find solar features common to both sets of images, and make a prediction of what the Sun will look like in a visible light image after observing an X-ray image taken on the same day. This activity is scheduled to occur during Monday of Solar Week. (View Less)
This is an activity about the period of the Sun's rotation. Learners will use image of the Sun from the SOHO spacecraft and a transparent latitude/ longitude grid called a Stonyhurst Disk to track the motion of sunspots in terms of degrees of... (View More) longitude. Using this angular motion measurement, learners will then calculate the sunspot's angular velocity in order to determine the rotation period of the Sun. This activity requires access to the internet to obtain images from the SOHO image archive. This is Activity 4 of the Space Weather Forecast curriculum. (View Less)
Materials Cost: Free
This is an activity about how the Sun can affect the Earth's atmosphere, specifically the ionosphere. Learners will use real data from a Sudden Ionosphere Disturbance Monitor, or SID Monitor, to identify the signatures in the graphed data that can... (View More) be used to determine the times of sunrise and sunset. Although the SID monitors are designed to detect SIDs caused by solar flares, they also detect the normal influence of solar X-rays and UV light during the day as well as cosmic rays at nighttime. There is a distinct shape to a 24-hour SID data graph, with unique shapes, or signatures, of the graph appearing at sunrise and sunset.This activity is part of the Research with Space Weather Monitor Data educators guide. Use of and access to a Stanford Solar Center SID monitor and the internet is encouraged but not required. Locations without a SID monitor can use sample data provided in the educators guide. (View Less)
This is an activity about the declining strength of Earth's magnetic field. Learners will review a graph of magnetic field intensity and calculate the amount by which the field has changed its intensity in the last century, the rate of change of its... (View More) intensity, and when the field should decrease to zero strength at the current rate of change. Learners will also use evidence from relevant sources to create a conjecture on the effects on Earth of a vanished magnetic field. Access to information sources about Earth's magnetic field strength is needed for this activity. This is Activity 7 in the Exploring Magnetism on Earth teachers guide. (View Less)
Materials Cost: Free
This is an activity about the magnetic deflection. Learners will observe and measure the deflection that an iron mass causes in a soda bottle magnetometer and plot the data. The data should show the inverse-square cube law of change in the magnetic... (View More) field. This is the twelfth activity in the guide and requires prior use and construction of a soda bottle magnetometer, as well as a six to ten pound container of iron nails (or an equivalent iron mass). (View Less)
This is an activity about seasonal variations in day length. Learners will graph the number of daylight hours in each month in cities around the world and compare results. They will also gain an understanding of the meaning of the term equinox... (View More) through review of the graphed data. This is Activity 6 in the Great Explorations in Math and Science (GEMS) guide titled Real Reasons for Seasons: Sun-Earth Connections. The resource guide is available for purchase from the Lawrence Hall of Science. This activity requires use of an overhead projector and colored transparency pens. (View Less)
Materials Cost: Free per student
This is an activity about the solar activity cycle. Learners will construct a graph to identify a pattern of the number of observed sunspots and the number of coronal mass ejections emitted by the Sun over a fifteen year time span. A graphing... (View More) calculator is recommended, but not required, for this activity. This is the second activity in the Solar Storms and You: Exploring the Wind from the Sun educator guide. (View Less)


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ORLANDO, Fla.—The woman who was riding with Justin Bieber in a Lamborghini when he was arrested in South Florida has sued the New York Daily News, accusing the newspaper of libel.
Attorney Andew Parker Felix filed the lawsuit Tuesday in Orange County Circuit Court on behalf of Chantel Jeffries. She is described in court papers as a student, model and entrepreneur.
The lawsuit claims Daily News stories posted on its website after the Jan. 23 incident falsely reported she had a criminal record and that she instigated a drag race between Bieber and R&B singer Khalil Amir Sharieff, who was driving a Ferrari. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages and an order preventing future false stories about Jeffries.
The Daily News legal department and a spokesman for the newspaper didn't immediately respond to requests for comment Tuesday.


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Career Ladder Brings New Path to Certification
November 26, 2012 by RVBusiness · Comments Off on Career Ladder Brings New Path to Certification
The RV industry's RV Technician "Career Ladder" offers a pathway to success for RV dealers and their service technicians by adapting to the demands of a fast-paced business environment and streamlining the process to make certification more convenient and accessible for RV dealerships, according to a news release.
Unveiled last year by the Recreation Vehicle Dealers Association (RVDA) and the Recreation Vehicle Industry Association (RVIA), the RV Technician Career Ladder allows technicians to choose from two career paths after completing the candidate and registered technician tests. Path 1 is the current certification testing option in which the registered technician becomes a Certified or Master technician (Generalist).
Path 2 is the Certified Specialty option in which candidates can pass one or more of the offered specialties — body, chassis, electrical systems, appliances or plumbing — to become a Certified Specialist. Technicians who achieve and maintain certification in all five specialties and have five years' experience attain the Master Certified designation.
This new approach improves certification opportunities for technicians, particularly for the growing number who specialize only in a few areas. It also is scalable to the size of an RV dealer's service operation, providing more flexibility to management teams when making decisions about certification.
The enhanced program also makes it easier to engage technicians in the certification process. Testing now takes place online, eliminating the need for travel, time away from the dealership and travel expenses.
Making the process more convenient and accessible for RV dealers to certify their service technicians also provides the potential to boost their bottom line.
A survey by the Boone Group of 600 RV dealers found that 80% of dealers confirmed certified technicians make them more money than their non-certified counterparts; 75% reported certified technicians perform better quality work than non-certified techs; and 72% felt that certified technicians create more satisfied customers.
"As an RV dealer who sees the benefits certification brings to my dealership and the service technicians I employ every day, I recommend my dealer colleagues learn more about the Certification program and the improvements that have been made," said Rick Horsey, owner of Parkview of RV Center and co-chairman of the RV Service Training Council. "This new program will make it easier than ever to certify your technicians, which will lead to better service capabilities, more satisfied customers, and a bigger bottom line."
For more information about the RV Technician Certification Program and the Career Ladder, visit www.rvtechnician.com.


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Tim Shirt In Olive Small Multi-Gingham
Tim Shirt In Olive Small Multi-Gingham
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Meet The Designer
OUR STORY. The year was 2015 anno domini. A secretive fellowship of talented designers gathered at moonlight,
under the shadows of the ramparts of harlech castle, and swore an oath to create a brand of such beauty never seen before in this fair land. And thus the lords of harlech brand was born. In 2017 a.d. Paul Mainwaring was given the throne to lead the lords and their followers. To share the lords of harlech's creations....things of beauty, across the world. He has had an illustrious career building brands in Europe and the USA for the past 25 years and is honored to continue the traditions of the lords.


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Light As A Feather: Ways To Wear Fall's Must-Have Embellishment
Not sure how to wear feathers? Click to see how ladies like Blair Eadie of Atlantic-Pacific and Anna Dello Russo have been wearing the trend, as well as our picks to shop it. Get ready to take flight.
Never a wallflower, Anna Dello Russo made the plucky choice of pairing colorful crystal and feather embellished separates from Dries Van Noten with a structured, crocodile Bulgari bag.
Feather Hem Sweatshirt Dress ($275) in Pearl Heather
A statement sweatshirt and a fancy skirt all in one, this pearl-embellished party dress kills two birds with one stone.
Feather Cuff ($795) in Cream
A blush-hued feather-trim cuff will add sophisticated edge to a tuxedo-inspired outfit.
Paris Fashion Week is the perfect time to practice peacocking. Here, a Dries Van Noten skirt is styled with a grey mohair sweater and an architectural crocodile clutch.
Sabine Chiffon Feather Skirt ($98)
Fake the feather trend with a frothy pale pink skirt made of chiffon fringe.
Margaret Marabou Feather Jacket ($398) in Black
Maribou isn't just for bedroom slippers. A voluminous cropped jacket pairs beautifully with an organza midi skirt and kitten heels.
Photo:Atlantic Pacific
Blair Eadie of Atlantic-Pacific
Blogger Blair Eadie keeps a Kate Spade feather mini skirt from being too precious by styling it with an oversized A.L.C. turtleneck and a sleek Anya Hindmarch bag.
Floral Feather-Appliqué Cashmere Sweater ($4,295) in Charcoal
Practically couture, this cashmere pullover is next-level party sweater material, just begging to be worn with a body-skimming pencil skirt and sleek slingbacks.
Black Feather Chainmail Cape ($120)
A modern take on the feather boa, this feather-trim cape adds a shot of tough chic to a silk cami and fluid trousers.
On the streets at the Paris shows, a fashion insider sports a feather-embellished top from Dries Van Noten, worn with menswear-style trousers.
Ceduna Floral Embellished Silk Top ($1,282) in Navy
Behold, the definition of a girl's-night-out top. Wear it untucked with a skinny black jean and a pointed toe pump.
Feather Front Shift Dress ($1500) in Ivory
The ultimate party dress, this fitted feather shift will surely keep you from flying under the radar at all your upcoming holiday festivities.
Beaton Feather Turban ($465) in Black
No need to look into your crystal ball. This silk peacock-trim turban will ensure you are on top of your accessories game.


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Manchester United — a soccer team, we think — and Nike unveiled new jerseys sporting a $560 million Chevy bow tie in front. If you'll remember, this was the same sponsorship deal that helped get global marketing chief Joel Ewanick let go two years after joining the Chevrolet team.
The logo will adorn the jerseys for seven years starting next season. Chevy follows Sharp, Vodafone, AIG and Aon as title sponsors.
The uniforms were revealed in a video showing fans throughout history singing the team's fight song.
Man U MANU, -1.64% will wear the uniforms for the first time here in the U.S., when they play the LA Galaxy (also a soccer team?) in a preseason game July 23.
The story "Man U unveils Chevy-sponsored jerseys" originally appeared on Autoweek.com.
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Living-Learning Communities
Welcome to Missouri State University and thank you for considering your involvement with the Living-Learning Communities (LLCs). The LLCs are part of your on-campus residential experience. Our program is only offered in the residence halls and provides students with the opportunity to live with others to whom they have something in common. We are very excited about our LLC options and I am confident if you are a new student to Missouri State or a returning student, you will find a LLC of interest to you.
If you are unsure or uncertain about the LLC for you, please call our office. We are happy to visit with you and find the right community for you. Please keep in mind, we do have limited spaces in each community, we do keep waiting lists, but for many communities, we do not cycle through those lists before we start school in August (so, get your preferences in early). I look forward to meeting you at SOAR or visiting with you over the phone. Here is our contact information: 417-836-3234 or email@example.com . I look forward to visiting with you!
Take care,
Alisa Garbisch
Assistant Director – Student Success Initiatives
Residence Life, Housing and Dining Services


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Addons are custom features that you can add to your Vanilla forum. Addons are created by our community of developers and people like you!
These addons are for people who downloaded and set up their own Vanilla forum. Compare your downloaded version with the version requirements on the right.
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Q. On a 3-phase, 4-wire, 277V multi-wire lighting circuit, which is protected at 20A, there is debate as to the proper application of 210.4(B) and 240.15(B). The question is whether or not three single-pole circuit breakers with an identified handle tie are permitted to serve as both the disconnecting means and the overcurrent protective device for this circuit, or whether a multi-pole circuit breaker is required. What is the correct answer?
- Circuit breakers installed with identified handle ties are permitted to serve as both the disconnecting means and overcurrent protection as stated in this example.
- Circuit breakers may be installed with or without identified handle ties to serve as the overcurrent protective device only (not as the disconnecting means).
- A multi-pole circuit breaker may serve as both the disconnecting means and overcurrent protective device.
- All the above are correct answers.
Answer: D
As per 210.4(B), "Each multi-wire branch circuit shall be provided with a means that will simultaneously disconnect all ungrounded conductors at the point where the branch circuit originates." This clearly states that simultaneous disconnection is required. 240.15(B) focuses on overcurrent protection and gives you the choice of using single-pole circuit breakers with or without identified handle ties or multi-pole circuit breakers.
Owen is the owner and president of National Code Seminars and the holder of master electrician certifications in 46 states. He can be reached at [email protected].


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Formulated and developed using the foundation of the most dynamic and revolutionary health and wellness product in the last 20 years – Derma Fusion Technology (DFT), DFT Ultra is the next breakthrough in Le-Vel's prized Derma Fusion Technology delivery system. With an 82% larger Fusion surface, DFT Ultra provides Nutritional Support and a Formula, Fusion, and Technology even greater than original DFT. DFT Ultra truly is a Premium Product on a Premium Level. Consider adding DFT Ultra to your Thrive 8 Week Experience. For Ultra Weight Management results, add DFT Ultra + Thrive Balance to your Thrive 8 Week Experience.


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Facebook — the hot spot for hate-reading incoherent political debates hoted on your 8th grade science partner's Timeline and getting stuck in a k-hole of wedding photo albums, AGAIN — both disgusts and entrances us. A new survey from Rebtel asked Americans aged 18 and older to name the sites that have "the most negative effect on your mood"; Facebook trumped them all, followed by Twitter and LinkedIn. The vast majority of survey-takers also said Facebook stressed them out the most, followed again by Twitter and LinkedIn.
But when Rebtel asked users about social networks' positive effects on mood, Facebook blew the other sites out of the oversharey water. Huh?
Facebook: can't live with it, can't live without it. (…Because you've been using it for so long at this point that how else would you see tagged pics of yourself and get party invites and be haunted by photos of you from freshman year?)
Image via Brian A Jackson/Shutterstock.


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As we bask in the ascension of President Obama to his second-term, it's easy to feel positive and giddy about the future of this country and black people's possibilities in it.
Especially since a Mitt Romney victory would have meant a Tea Party takeover and four years of backlash for us even daring to use our vote to elect a president who shattered their notions of superiority.
But now, it's time to get back to reality. And right now, the reality for black people in this country, when it comes to economic prosperity, is bleak.
Black unemployment is at 13.8 percent – nearly double that of whites. According to The Washington Post, a group of scholars who convened at Howard University recently basically said that the recovery is passing black people by; the black-white wealth disparity is 20 to 1 and fewer blacks own homes.
Some of the scholars said that targeted, large scale efforts, like public jobs programs, are needed to combat persistent black unemployment. Others said that institutional racism remains a problem for most black people when it comes to getting jobs.
Me, I think the problem is a lot more complicated than that. And unless we grasp what much of the real problem is – job-killing technological advances – then it's bound to worsen in a big way.
The Associated Press just completed an investigation that was enlightening as much as it was depressing. What it found was that millions of middle-class jobs – think store sales clerks, meter readers and assembly line workers – are being replaced by technology.
Customers no longer have to deal with rude, sour-faced cashiers at supermarkets, because many stores now have kiosks where customers can scan their own items.
Trains can now run without conductors, and whole employment categories, like secretaries and receptionists, are disappearing.
If you order clothes and goods over the Internet, well, there goes a sales person's job.
So what that means is that we're now in a world in which it won't be enough to be able-bodied, because computers are taking those jobs. And computers don't need lunch breaks or union concessions.
They also don't need to be told everything to do because they've been programmed to know what to do.
Even the scientists who are developing the technology are cringing at the thought that it is developing too fast for workers to keep up with, and that it could continue to lead to persistent, high unemployment.
A Bleak Future For the Unprepared was originally published on blackamericaweb.com


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Colonial New Jersey
This article originally appeared in "Colonial English Research" by Robert Charles Anderson, MA, FASG in The Source: A Guidebook to American Genealogy
Jurisdictional History
Prior to the conquest of New Amsterdam by the English in 1664, the area that was to become New Jersey was a sparsely populated extension of New Amsterdam. Soon after the conquest, the Duke of York granted New Jersey to John Lord Berkeley and Sir John Carteret. In 1676 this region was divided into two proprieties, which were named East Jersey and West Jersey. The proprietors in each of these jurisdictions controlled both the government and the granting of land until 1702, when New Jersey became a royal province. The governor of New York was also the governor of New Jersey, but the proprietors retained control of the land. In 1738, New Jersey became completely independent of New York and, for the remainder of the colonial period, had its own royally appointed governor.
In 1683, East Jersey was divided into four counties: Bergen, Essex, Middlesex, and Monmouth. In the early 1690s, four counties were established in West Jersey: Burlington, Cape May, Gloucester, and Salem. These eight counties were the predecessors of all the remaining New Jersey counties.
Like New York, New Jersey was a region of transition from the town-based proprietary system to the colony-based system. This section focuses on East Jersey to see how this system worked.
Prior to the English takeover in 1664, most of the European population in what would become East Jersey was in the settlement of Bergen, just across the Hudson River from Manhattan. Almost immediately after the grant from the Duke of York to Berkeley and Carteret, township grants were made to settlers who came from various parts of New England. In 1664 the patent for Elizabethtown was issued, and in 1666 this tract of land was subdivided into three parts, thus giving rise to the new towns of Woodbridge and Piscataway. In 1665 the Monmouth Patent was issued, and, within a few years, this area evolved into the towns of Middletown and Shrewsbury. Finally, in 1666 the patent for Newark was granted. Thus, by 1670 most of the settlers in the northeastern part of New Jersey could be found in one of these seven towns, one (Bergen) dating from the period of Dutch settlement, and the other six being formed within five years after the English conquest by men from New England.
These New England-style towns were issued charters by the proprietors. For example, Woodbridge received its charter on 1 June 1669. Among the rights granted was that the 'Freeholders or the major part of them are equally to divide the aforesaid tract of upland and meadows among themselves,' very much in the way that the proprietors of New England towns operated.<ref>Joseph W. Dally, Woodbridge and Vicinity: The Story of a New Jersey Township (New Brunswick, N.J., 1873; Lambertville, New Jersey, 1989), 298'302.</ref> However, the patent goes on to require that these town grants made by the freeholders were 'to be entered upon record by the Secretary or Recorder General of the province' and 'to hold his land by patent from the Lords Proprietors and to pay them . . . rent yearly,' which were actions not required in New England. For much land in this part of New Jersey, then, there may well be two distinct records of the original grant: an entry in the town book and a patent issued at the colony level.
The earliest records of the granting of land at the colony level are contained in a series of books that also include a wide variety of other records, including probate matters, Indian deeds, court proceedings, and so on. These volumes were begun before the division of New Jersey into East and West Jersey in 1683. The years 1664 through 1703 have been abstracted into Volume 21 of the New Jersey Archives series.<ref>William Nelson, ed., Documents Relating to the Colonial History of the State of New Jersey, vol. 21, Calendar of Records in the Office of the Secretary of State. 1664'1703 (Paterson, N.J., 1899; Baltimore, 1976).</ref> This series of records also contains straightforward warranty deeds from person to person, of land earlier granted by the town or colony.
After the division of the region into East and West Jersey in 1683, the focus for landgranting was in the two capitals of Burlington (West Jersey) and Perth Amboy (East Jersey). Although counties were formed very soon after this, the recording of deeds was retained in these two capitals until 1785 (although the recording of mortgages at the county level began in 1766). Thus, for most of the first century of the existence of New Jersey, the researcher must look both in province and town records for information about land transfers. For those generations living in the middle of the eighteenth century, the researcher may need to look in all three jurisdictions: province, county, and town.
Case Studies
Francis James Dallett, 'The Inter-Colonial Grimstone Boude and His Family,' Genealogist 2 (1981): 74'114. This article might have been brought forth as a model for research in several of the colonies. Several members of the family lived at various times in New Jersey, and Dallett has made good use of the published New Jersey Archives, especially the wills and the West Jersey Records.
Phyllis J. Miller, 'Abraham Garrison of Cumberland County, New Jersey, and Some of His Descendants,' American Genealogist 74 (1999): 58'71. Miller consults many of the standard court records of Salem and Cumberland counties but also examines Presbyterian church records and New Jersey tax and militia lists in tracing the life of Abraham Garrison and his children.


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by Grant Moser
The Philadelphia Museum of Art is currently hosting a highly acclaimed exhibition entitled "Van Gogh Up Close" through May 6. It focuses on the last four, years of Van Gogh's career, a period that saw his paintings change dramatically from the first six years of his career. He had just arrived in Paris to be with his brother, Theo, and saw Impressionist paintings and Japanese prints for the first time. This experience had a huge effect on Vincent, explained Chestnut Hill resident and tour guide for the museum, Margaret McGreal.
"He was very much influenced by the light palette and the bright colors and the real lively brushstrokes," said McGreal. "The prints had very high horizons, and they also cut things off at the edges. Instead of painting a panoramic landscape, Van Gogh is painting the ground beneath his feet, exactly what he was seeing, with no horizon; you are forced to look at the spot he's looking at. No entrance into the painting, no exit from it; you are there to look at what he's presenting in that spot. It's a beautiful exhibit."
Though the exhibit started in February, preparation for it began well before Christmas. The 30 guides, including McGreal, took a 12-week training program to be ready to take visitors through the exhibit. The guides educate themselves, with lots of help from the curators.
Two guides coordinate the study sessions and arrange for speakers to deliver lectures about the art. All the guides are assigned a painting to research and present to the rest of the group. It's important to know about all the paintings, but rarely will a guide talk about each painting on a tour.
"When you work up your tour, which takes about an hour, you can't present every painting. There are 45 paintings in this exhibit, and if you can get through 25 of them on a tour, you're doing well. Often times you group paintings together and talk about them as a group," said the Chestnut Hiller.
McGreal, who declined to state her age, has all this down pat; she's been a tour guide at the museum for 32 years. Before that she volunteered for four years doing outreach with school children. Her work is a very important and enjoyable part of her life. "It's a wonderful way to spend time, looking at beauty and talking about beauty. While it is a big commitment, both the training and the work as a guide, we feel we are making a real contribution to the cultural life of the city. There's also a great camaraderie within the guides, so that's a plus."
A big commitment might be an understatement. People interested in becoming guides apply for the museum's training course, which consists of a spring and fall session. The applicants are interviewed by current guides, who run the training course. Only 25 people are chosen for the course. Once the training course has been completed, guides are expected to work at least 100 hours a year in the museum. And apart from the specialized training for exhibits, there is also a continuing education segment, where classes are given throughout the year on a chosen theme.
It's all worth it to McGreal. "We are really the face of the museum, so it's important that we're well educated. I did the school tours for a long time and found them very enjoyable because kids say whatever's on their mind. It was really amazing some of the insights you got into a painting or sculpture."
She's had the opportunity to see many exhibits over her years at the museum, but two really stick in her mind. "I loved the [Ferdinand-Victor-Eugene] Delacroix exhibit in 1999. His color was very vibrant, and he was a master of color. Also, the [Edgar] Degas exhibit and his dancers. There were a lot of stories to the paintings, and people love that. It gives them a way to remember the paintings rather than just talking about color and line and brushstroke. They see the artist come alive and as a human being."
McGreal might have an impressive volunteer history at the museum, but she's hardly the longest-serving. There are several who have been volunteering for 40 years, and one woman who has been there "at least 45 years." Even with her long service at the museum, McGreal still isn't allowed to take any of the paintings home. "Wouldn't that be nice?" she laughed. "We'd have an awful lot more applicants if that were true."
Her experience with exhibits has taught her two valuable pieces of advice for people. "When people see an exhibit is coming, they ought to get there, because toward the end it tends to get very crowded. And a good time to come is in the afternoon. Everyone always thinks they'll go in the morning before it gets crowded, but at 11 a.m. people are standing in line to get in. About 2 or 3 p.m. it's dying down, and that's the time to come."
McGreal will be taking the summer off after the Van Gogh exhibit finishes, but her dedication and learning do not stop. "Oftentimes when I'm on break, I'm studying for whatever is coming in the fall, reading about the artists."
Ed. Note: We were unable to obtain a photo of Margaret McGreal. For information on upcoming exhibits at the museum and how to volunteer, visit http://www.philamuseum.org/.