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• March 4, 2005 |
7:50 p.m. ET
Dance of the moons: Humans have watched lunar eclipses for millennia, and last year we caught our first glimpse of a solar eclipse from Mars . But how often do you get to see one Saturnian moon eclipse another?
Last month, the Cassini spacecraft snapped pictures as one of Saturn's moons, Rhea, slipped behind another moon named Dione. Rhea is much bigger than Dione (949 miles vs. 695 miles across), but in these snapshots, Dione is much closer (900,000 miles vs. 1.4 million miles). The result: The two shadowed disks look almost like twins passing in the night.
The 32-frame sequence was taken over a 17-minute period on Feb. 20, but were not highlighted until Thursday's image release — which led NASA Watch's Keith Cowing to wonder why the Jet Propulsion Laboratory took so long.
Cowing's Cassini-themed Web site, Saturn Today, had a still image from the Dione-Rhea encounter back on Feb. 22, and today the site highlights dreamy edge-on views of Saturn's rings and moons. You can also find an up-to-date collection of Saturnian imagery by checking out the Cassini-Huygens Web site's raw-image repository.
• March 4, 2005 |
7:50 p.m. ET
Behind bars, in the stars: The last time I heard from Walt Anderson, the multimillionaire entrepreneur who is now being jailed on tax-evasion charges , it was via voicemail. I was trying to get some details about a Swedish zero-gravity venture — and although Anderson acknowledged he was working on the project, he was only too happy to refer me to someone else. "I've already had my 15 minutes of fame," he said.
Unfortunately, Anderson is now getting the kind of fame he'd rather not have, including long articles on his legal situation in The Washington Post and The New York Times (registration required). His initial bail request was denied on Thursday, clearly because the judge in the case was worried about adding to the list of fugitive financiers.
Among space buffs, Anderson is better-known for how he spent his money rather than how he made and managed it. He was the major investor in the unsuccessful Rotary Rocket venture, and he made international news for his efforts to extend Mir's life back in 2000, through a U.S.-Dutch-Russian venture called MirCorp. Even after Mir was scuttled in 2001, he had hopes of working with the Russians to launch a free-flying "Mini-Station" into space.
He soon soured on the Mini-Station idea, saying that he was "done being an angel investor for crackpot space enthusiasts." But he saw last year's success of SpaceShipOne as something of a vindication for private-sector space enterprises, and in his interview with the Post this week, he sounded as if he hadn't given up on the long-term vision: "I want to build my own space station since we lost the Mir," he said. "I want to have a moon base."
In 2002, he started up a somewhat less ambitious venture, aimed at using "space tugs" to extend the operating life of aging telecommunications satellites. The London-based, privately held venture is now known as Orbital Recovery Ltd., and although Anderson himself is out of circulation, Orbital Recovery is just getting revved up.
The first space tug, known as the CX-OLEV, is about to go into production, with the first commercial launch scheduled 36 months later, said spokesman Jeff Lenorovitz.
"Walt Anderson contributed to the early stages of the structure of Orbital Recovery. He has not been involved in the operations of the company for some time," Lenorovitz told me. "The recent events are a personal matter for Mr. Anderson and have no relevance to the company."
As for the Swedish zero-gravity venture that captured Anderson's interest: At last report, Xero was gearing up for operations in association with the Icehotel in Kiruna and other tourism services.
The business plan called for providing zero-G rides in a rented Russian IL-76 jet, the kind used for cosmonaut training. And that's where Anderson's connections came into play: MirCorp assisted in putting together the deal with the Russians. So even though Anderson is currently in deep trouble, some of the efforts he put in motion are still percolating along. You could even argue that the MirCorp model for private space investment served as a precedent for efforts such as Mojave Aerospace Ventures, Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin .
• March 4, 2005 |
7:50 p.m. ET
Weekend field trips on the World Wide Web:
• The Economist: 'Star Wars' into plowshares
• Popular Mechanics: Debunking the 9/11 myths
• Discover Magazine: Our preferred poison
• 'Nova' on PBS: Watch a preview of 'E=mc2'
• March 3, 2005 |
8 p.m. ET
A galaxy's last gasp: Cosmic destruction rarely looked so good. A snapshot captured by the Hubble Space Telescope shows a purple haze of hot young stars as the irregular galaxy NGC 1427A crashes into "a large gang of galaxies" called the Fornax cluster at 1.4 million mph. The rough arrowhead shape points in the direction of the galaxy's motion.
"NGC 1427A will not survive long as an identifiable galaxy passing through the cluster," they report. "Within the next billion years, it will be completely disrupted, spilling its stars and remaining gas into intergalactic space within the Fornax cluster."
The yellowish spiral to the upper left of NGC 1427A is a background galaxy that's 25 times farther away. Its color tells scientists that the star-formation process is far less furious.
The picture was taken by Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys two years ago, and astronomers are studying it to verify predictions about the ages of the stars, based on their positions within the galaxy.
NGC 1427A's creative destruction also provides a window to processes more common in the early universe, the Hubble scientists say: "Such events are believed to have been very common during the early evolution of the universe, but the rate of galaxy destruction is tapering off at the present time."
For more cosmic glories, check out our Space Gallery and particularly our first edition of " The Month in Space Pictures."
• March 3, 2005 |
8 p.m. ET
Virtual round-the-world flights: Now that millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett has finished his round-the-world odyssey in the Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer, play the game at home: Aeroplane Heaven has downloadable virtual models of the GlobalFlyer that can be used with Microsoft Flight Simulator 2002 or 2004, while X-Plane.org offers a GlobalFlyer add-on for the X-Plane simulator program.
Chris Parker, a longtime FOCL (Friend of Cosmic Log), pointed out the software on Aeroplane Heaven, and noted also that the software has required some tinkering. It sounds as if the first version of the model didn't include quite enough virtual jet fuel, based on this disclaimer on the download page:
"This is a revised aircraft config file which will correct the fuel loadout. ... Load her up and you'll have the correct fuel load for takeoff with 18,000 pounds of fuel aboard. Sorry for the inconvenience, and to anyone currently swimming about in the Pacific Ocean."
• March 3, 2005 |
8 p.m. ET
More sounds of science: It turns out that my list of downloadable (and streamable) science audio and video only scratches the surface. For another round of cosmic listening pleasure, check out Clark Lindsey's roundup of SpaceCasts.
• March 3, 2005 |
8 p.m. ET
Science made simple on the Web:
• Relativity explained in words of four letters or less
• Listen to the very-low-frequency songs of Earth
• Kuro5hin: Sci-fi eye for the geek guy(via GeekPress)
• The Guardian: Why adolescence is hell
• March 2, 2005 |
8:15 p.m. ET
Download the sound of science: The World Wide Web is serving as a laboratory for new strains of scientific experimentation ... in communication, that is.
For example, check out "Slacker Astronomy," a weekly series of podcast programs initiated last month by three astronomer/writers. Among the downloadable MP3 audio clips are discussions of dark matter ("the other white meat"), coronal mass ejections (which aren't as risque as they sound) and gamma-ray bursts.
It's fascinating to hear how the podcasts become slicker and hipper in a matter of mere weeks. By Week 3, co-host Pamela Gay is noting how one huge gamma-ray burst originated from a source 50,000 light-years away. "This means it happened about 50,000 years ago," she observed, "about the time the first humans entered Europe and North America, and when Dick Clark was born."
Aaron Price, who teams up with Gay and Travis Searle to put together the roughly five-minute podcasts, says in an e-mail that they're trying to take "the latest in astronomical news and make it bright and interesting."
"Right now we have about 1,000 subscribers and another 700 who listen via the Web site," he said. Not bad for the first month of programming.
"Slacker Astronomy" has plenty of precedents, including two long-running audio shows that trace their roots to radio:
- The Space Show, hosted by David Livingston, is heard in the Seattle area over KKNW-AM, but you can also use the Web to listen to the real-time show or graze through downloadable archived shows going back to 2001. Livingston covers the whole cosmos, focusing particularly on space commercialization and tourism.
- Earth & Sky covers a wide range of scientific subjects, from astronomy to zoology, in daily programs that are broadcast over commercial and public radio stations as well as satellite networks. You can also download five years' worth of archived shows.
Science @ NASA also makes its Web features available as downloadable MP3 files. The StarDate astronomy program archives its audio segments as RealAudio files, and "Star Gazer," the weekly sky guide hosted by the ever-ebullient Jack Horkheimer, offers scripts as well as the archived five-minute RealVideo segments.
Do you have your own sources for downloadable sight-and-sound science? Let me know and I'll pass along the appropriate links.
• March 2, 2005 |
8:15 p.m. ET
The last word? Why do performers who go last have a better chance of getting a high score in the judging? That may not turn out to be the case for this week's "American Idol" sing-off, but researcher Wändi Bruine de Bruin found that the rule generally held true over the long term in professionally judged competitions.
In response to Tuesday's item about the "serial position effect," a few Cosmic Log readers proposed explanations for the phenomenon. Here's a sampling of the feedback:
Lois Smith: "Having been on the judging end of several (local and regional) talent-oriented competitions, I'd like to comment on the 'last shall be first' phenomenon from a different viewpoint. Your commentary does not address this judging factor at all: When a judge views or hears the first competitor, he/she has nothing to compare their performance to. If scoring is done immediately, the tendency is to score 'harder' — or lower — for the first few contestants until a median is found. The concept is to allow room for a later, better performance score than the first competitor might deliver: 'If I give this performer a perfect score in this category, how do I score another performer who might do better?' The answer is to score the first performers — relatively — in the middle ranges, in anticipation of better performances yet to come. Thus, the later performances have the benefit of being compared against an established norm — and good performances that happen later in the competition are rated higher."
Gavin: "While the effect is evident, I question whether or not simple order has everything to do with judging results. The reason I usually want to be last is not out of any statistical anomaly of psychology, but because I perform better. When you have to beat an A, it's a lot easier to muster the performance to achieve A+. I believe this is also evident in many competitions, whether it be the American hockey Olympic victory or a timed race. Much of this statistical effect could be removed if you compared empirical contests such as racing, in which racers raced individually in a distinct order, with judged contests. The first racer has no bar against which to compare himself. The last racer is able to know that if he is just a quarter-second faster than he ran last time, the gold is his."
Jeff Cox: "I think it can also be said that a judge will more favorably treat someone or something if they identify with it. Examples: I was inclined to vote on "Idol" for a girl from Oklahoma because I'm from Oklahoma. In judging cars at a car show, most owners of Chevys who judge all cars will find their favorite to be a Chevy; the most owners of Mustangs who judge all cars will find their favorite to be a Mustang. Serial position may have an impact, but only if the bias factors are nil."
• March 2, 2005 |
8:15 p.m. ET
Wonder and whimsy on the World Wide Web:
• Discovery.com: Michelangelo's David is, um, 'totally normal'
• Wired.com: Look for planets on your PC
• The Guardian: Ancient sky map ... or modern fake?
• The Onion: Bush's new science policies
• March 1, 2005 |
8:30 p.m. ET
The last shall be first: Statistics from four decades' worth of contests confirm what talent-show competitors like the singers on "American Idol" have probably known for at least that long: It's good to go last.
The fact that judges tend to favor the latter performers in a contest, a phenomenon known as the serial position effect, is documented in a study published in the March issue of the journal Acta Psychologica. Carnegie Mellon University's Wändi Bruine de Bruin analyzed the results of Eurovision song contests conducted between 1957 and 1997, as well as world and European figure-skating competitions.
What she found could have implications not only for singers and skaters, but for test-takers and job applicants as well.
"A friend of mine asked to go last in a series of job interviews, after hearing about my research," Bruine de Bruin said in a news release. "She got the job. I like to think that she got the job because she has great skills, but order effects may have tipped the balance for her."
In the Eurovision contests — a conceptual grandparent to "American Idol" — the performance order was determined by random lottery, and the judges picked the winner after everyone sang. Statistics showed that the first performer won 6 percent of the time, while the last performer won 13 percent of the time.
That tendency to favor the performance that's fresher in your mind has been documented before, in competitions ranging from classical music festivals to synchronized swimming. Producers angling for an Academy Award take advantage of the serial position effect by scheduling the opening of potentially prizeworthy films toward the end of the year.
Bruine de Bruin's study goes further by looking at skating competitions, where the judges render their verdict after each performance rather than waiting until the end. You might think that's a fairer way to do it, but her analysis indicates that going with a step-by-step procedure has little effect. The first skater in the first round of competition won the top prize only 3 percent of the time, while the last skater in the first round won 8 percent of the time.
In fact, Bruine de Bruin thinks the procedure for a skating contest amplifies the unfairness, because the higher you score in the first round, the later you perform in the second and decisive round.
So what's the remedy? For multiple-round contests, Bruine de Bruin suggests shuffling the performance order so that the first go last — or at least conduct another lottery.
"The lottery doesn't get rid of the effect," she told me today. "It just gives you a better chance of scoring better in the serial position."
Another, more radical remedy would be to weight the judging scores to favor earlier performers and cancel out the statistical serial position effect. "I would really strongly suggest that judges do not try to compensate for it themselves," Bruine de Bruin said. "If they try to correct for it, then people have a tendency to overcorrect."
Does the serial position effect rear its ugly head in the "American Idol" race? Bruine de Bruin doesn't know enough about the procedures for performance order and voting to handicap that competition. She stresses that her research focused on the behavior of professional judges rather than call-in voters. But she guesses that the dynamics are far more complex in a contest where millions of judges are encouraged to vote late and often.
"You can't control what they watch," Bruine de Bruin said, "so they may tune in later and then only vote for the people they have seen."
Are there twists in the "American Idol" procedures that tend to favor some singers over others? Let me know what you think, and I'll pass along a sampling of the feedback.
• March 1, 2005 |
8:30 p.m. ET
More greatest hits: Last week's list of top sources for cosmic imagery is missing at least one must-see astronomy Web site, as I was reminded by Georgia Sutton of Laramie, Wyo.: "I'm surprised that you did not mention the Astronomy Picture of the Day! Why not? It has a different image every day and an archive that goes back years!"
Please forgive my sin of omission — and while we're at it, let's not forget about the aurora galleries that show up every so often at SpaceWeather.com. Here's a collection of January's cosmic fireworks.
• March 1, 2005 |
8:30 p.m. ET
Your daily dose of science on the Web:
• N.Y. Times (reg. req.): Looking for the next Einstein
• News.com.au: Tasmanian tiger riddle grows
• Discovery.com: Paste for teeth repairs cavities
• New Scientist: Genesis capsule reveals solar wind secrets
• Feb. 28, 2005 |
Updated 6 p.m. ET
Personal ads for aliens: One of the world's biggest online communities has put in the high bid for an out-of-this-world radio transmission — and plans to open up the line for its millions of members to transmit messages to outer space.
It's not clear how far the signals will carry, but the broadcast should at least open up a new marketing frontier for Craigslist and its founder, Craig Newmark.
"We wanted to be the first to offer free job postings, apartment listings, personals and other classifieds to the extraterrestrial community," Newmark joked in today's news release. "We believe there could be an infinite market opportunity."
Craigslist's 8 million users will be able to click a checkbox on any of their messages to earmark it for inclusion in a data transmission engineered by Florida-based Deep Space Communications Network. The outfit, which has access to TV production and uplink facilities, put the opportunity up for auction last week.
The recorded high bid was $1,225, but Deep Space's managing director, Jim Lewis, told me that Craigslist might want to transmit more data than his venture was originally offering, requiring a renegotiation of the price.
"We have just about agreed to a price, but we have been asked not to disclose their rate at this time," Lewis said in an e-mail. "Additionally, while Craigslist will be the first, we already have several other transmissions for other clients in the works. We plan on setting some standard pricing soon, so people can easily purchase this service."
Jim Buckmaster, Craiglist's chief executive officer, agreed that the final price would be "significantly higher" than the auction bid. "We'll arrive at something that both sides think is fair," he told me.
Craigslist said the digital postings would be gathered up, along with a video message from Newmark and a clip from the documentary "24 Hours on Craigslist," then transmitted just after the launch of the space shuttle Discovery — which is currently set for May 15.
The hook for the transmission is that aliens far from Earth just might be able to intercept and decode the signals someday. Seth Shostak, an astronomer at the SETI Institute who is heavily engaged in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, is doubtful about that claim. His studies indicate that regular TV transmissions could conceivably be picked up from planets around nearby stars, but even then, they probably could not be deciphered. Also, it's highly unlikely that a relatively brief transmission like the one Deep Space is offering would stand out amid Earth's continuous broadcast babble.
But the folks at Craigslist aren't going to let all that sad-sack science spoil their fun.
"We know that SETI is working on securing a good list of contacts, but we didn't feel right about waiting any longer," Buckmaster said in the news release. "Why not just put the service out there, doesn't have to be perfect at first, and let folks respond with feedback on how we can make it better?"
Buckmaster told me there was an "above-zero probability" that E.T. would get the message from Craigslist, but acknowledged the probability wasn't much above zero.
"Hope springs eternal," he said, "and our users are used to long shots."
• Feb. 28, 2005 |
6 p.m. ET
Your daily dose of science on the Web:
• Science News: Bushmeat on the menu
• Scientific American: The Big Bang misunderstood
• BBC: Manuscripts treated as fossils
• USN&WR: NASA hits back at AP (via NASA Watch)
The fine print: Looking for older items? Check the Cosmic Log archive. Share your perspective on cosmic subjects with Alan Boyle. If you link to this page, you can use http://cosmiclog.msnbc.com or http://www.cosmiclog.com as the address. MSNBC is not responsible for the content of Internet links.


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Apotheosis is recruiting!
In the past few weeks we've lost a few people. Some to real life, some to burn out, and some are just scared at the prospect of seeing Rag's legs.
In a strange twist of fate,* almost* all the classes we are in need of are on the protector token. (What's wrong, Protectors? Don't like fire?)
We are specifically seeking:
- 1-2 hunters
- 1 elemental shaman
- 1 enhancement shaman
- 1 warrior (Tank or DPS)
- 1 retribution paladin (Not a Protector, but I'm convinced these don't exist anyway)
Apotheosis is a 25-man Alliance raiding guild on Eldre'thalas. We raid 9 hours a week – Tuesday, Thursday, Sunday, from 9pm ET until midnight. We are currently 6/7 heroic in Firelands and are about to start working on Glory of the Firelands Raider and take a crack at heroic Ragnaros. If you are awesome and want to work on these things with us (or even want to join us for 4.3) come put in an app. We're a friendly bunch, we don't bite. Well… I do sometimes.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
On Saturday, a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri shot and killed 18-year-old Michael Brown, an unarmed black man. In the days that followed, the community has seen massive protests, and the police have responded with an overwhelming "show of force": Heavily-armed SWAT officers wearing military-style uniforms and riding in large armored trucks have tried to keep protesters at bay.
Many have been disturbed by the images coming out of Ferguson, which show some officers pointing rifles at unarmed civilians.
The book "Rise of the Warrior Cop," by journalist Radley Balko, helps explain how these types of police forces have been used more frequently, and departments across America have become more militarized in the post-9/11 era.
This is an excerpt from the book:
On November 2, 2002, a large group of police officers in tactical gear descended on a rave party in Racine, Wisconsin. The cops kicked in doors, dragged young people from bathroom stalls, threw others to the floor, and held dozens more at gunpoint.
The police issued more than 450 citations of $968 each to partygoers merely for attending an event where some attendees were breaking the state's drug laws. Only three people were arrested on actual drug charges. With help from the ACLU, the city of Racine eventually dismissed the charges against all attendees who hadn't yet pleaded guilty.
The trendy new drug throwing the media and politicians into hysterics was Ecstasy. Raves were the new, weird, and different dance parties where teenagers were allegedly taking this crazy sex drug. Cue the moral panic, political grandstanding, and ensuing aggressive crackdown. Prior to the raid in Racine, Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware seemed particularly obsessed with rave parties. Politicians seemed to think that any party with techno music, pulsing lights, and neon inevitably degenerated into underage kids getting high on Ecstasy and engaging in mass orgies.
In the summer of 2002, Biden was pushing his RAVE Act, an absurdly broad law that would have made venue and club owners liable for running a drug operation if they merely sold the "paraphernalia" common to parties where people took Ecstasy — accessories like bottled water and glow sticks. After attempting to sneak the bill through Congress with various parliamentary maneuvers, Biden was finally able to get a slightly modified version folded into the bill that created the Amber Alert for missing children.
Once again a politician had demagogued worries over a mostly harmless drug into a climate of fear. And once again that fear led to aggressive, wholly disproportionate crackdowns across the country.
A few years later, a rave raid was captured on video. In August 2005, more than 90 police officers from several state and local SWAT teams raided 1,500 people at a peaceful, outdoor dance party in Spanish Fork Canyon, Utah. The police were armed with assault weapons, full SWAT attire, police dogs, and tear gas. Many in attendance say that police beat, abused, and swore at partygoers.
Police denied the allegations, though amateur video/audio clearly showed the police barking out orders punctuated with profanity. In truth, the party appeared to have been pretty well run. Private security guards had been stationed outside the event, and confiscated any illegal drugs they found on attendees. The raiding SWAT cops then arrested the private security guards for the drugs they had confiscated, and charged them with possession.
The other new concept at work in Racine and Spanish Fork was the willingness to subject large groups of people to commando tactics in hopes of catching even a few offenders. By the late 2000s, SWAT teams were increasingly called out to raid entire bars and nightclubs for drug activity. A search warrant for a bar's owner or a description of the place as a drug market could allow police to go in and give the SWAT treatment to everyone inside.
And it wasn't just bars and nightclubs that were treated this way. In November 2003, police in Goose Creek, South Carolina, raided an entire high school, conducting a blanket commando-style raid on Stratford High School. Students were ordered at gunpoint to lie face-down on the floor while police searched their lockers and persons for drugs. Some were handcuffed, while K-9 units deployed dogs to search their lockers, backpacks, and bodies. Oddly, media reports indicated that the school had a stellar academic reputation.
Le'Quan Simpson, a fourteen-year-old, was forced to kneel at gunpoint. His father had once served on a SWAT team. "They hit that school like it was a crack house," he said. "Like they knew that there were crack dealers in there armed with guns." The raid was based on a tip from the school's principal that a single student might have been selling pot. The raid turned up no illicit drugs, and the police made no arrests.
Still, though these raids of schools and parties were somewhat new, drug cops had been conducting massive drug sweeps of entire neighborhoods for years, subjecting innocent people to violent tactics simply because of where they happened to live. There were more of those police actions too.
In February 2002, for example, one hundred Durham police officers, two National Guard helicopters, and ten North Carolina Bureau of Investigation agents seized an entire neighborhood on Cheek Road, then engaged in a series of forced-entry drug raids. They called the whole episode Operation TAPS, short for The Aggressive Police Strategy. The police arrested thirty-five people and confiscated an "undisclosed" amount of drugs, plus two pistols. Superior Court judge Orlando Hudson later threw out all the arrests and evidence, ruling that the entire operation was unconstitutional and "partially illegal" and that some of the officers' behavior amounted to "criminal conduct."
One particularly aggressive action peppered with war rhetoric occurred in April 2006, when police in Buffalo, New York, staged a series of drug raids throughout the city under the moniker Operation Shock and Awe. They borrowed the phrase from the US military, which had used it to describe its strategy in the early days of the Iraq War. Shock and Awe in Buffalo meant thirty-eight SWAT raids over three days. The cops even invited along a couple of reporters from the Buffalo News to cover the invasion.
A month later, the Buffalo News ran a follow-up report. The original six pounds of marijuana police claimed to have found was actually four pounds, thirteen ounces. Three and a half pounds of that came by way of an unrelated traffic stop on the same day that had nothing to do with the raids. They found all of five guns. Not surprisingly, the revised haul wasn't enough contraband to keep the seventy-eight people in jail. Sixteen were immediately released with no criminal charges. Another thirty-two were out of jail within twenty-four hours due to insufficient evidence.
City leaders were furious, not because city police had just terrorized innocent people with fruitless SWAT raids, but because so many petty offenders were let off. City officials demanded tougher drug laws, and discussed the possibility of sending drug cops and SWAT teams out with housing code inspectors to clean up suspected crack houses without those pesky Fourth Amendment warrant requirements.
Buffalo's chief of detectives, Dennis Richards, told the newspaper that Operation Shock and Awe was "just the beginning." "There will certainly be more raids in the future," he said. "You can count on that. . . . We're looking at small-scale, large-scale, street-level. . . . We're looking at top to bottom."
From RISE OF THE WARRIOR COP: The Militarization of America's Police Forces by Radley Balko. Reprinted with permission from PublicAffairs Books.


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Wes "Tiny Tim" Welker hobbled out to midfield with the captains for the coin toss.
Matt Slater stopped Jalen Parmele in his tracks at the Ravens' 17 yard line on the opening kickoff.
Those two moments, both occurring prior to about 1:05 PM Eastern Time, would be the last semblance of good feelings for every chowdah-swilling Masshole in attendance at Gillette Stadium on this day.
On the Ravens' first play from scrimmage, Ray Rice took the handoff on the "slow to, fast through" play, and raced 83 yards to the end zone. The longest play of Mighty Mouse's young career, and the second longest rush in NFL postseason history, served to set the tone for what was to be a glorious day for the Ravens and B'More. Three plays into the ensuing New England possession, it was Week 4 all over again for Terrell Suggs and Tom Brady, as Sizzle AGAIN stripped the three-time Super Bowl Champion quarterback, this time falling on the ball himself at the Pats' 17 yard line.
Five plays later, it was Le'Ron "Pain Train" McClain getting into the end zone, and the route was on. Less than five minutes into the game, with the Foxborough crowd still getting situated in their seats, the purple and black led 14-0.
For the swarming Ravens' defense though, who would have their best game of the season, the turnover party was just getting started. After each squad went 3-and-out (New England's highlighted by a ferocious Ray Lewis sack, the first of his career in the postseason), the Pats would reach only their own 25 yard line before turning it over once again, this time on a ridiculous "who in the world was he throwing that to?" ball by Tom Brady that was snatched up by Chris Carr.
The Ravens' methodical ground game would come through once again, turning this Patriots mistake into seven points as well.
Twelve minutes into the game, with Joe Flacco having completed just one pass for 13 yards to that point, the Ravens already found themselves ahead 21-0. Ravens fans buckled down for what looked to likely be a long, LONG, 48 remaining minutes, as we were sure that Brady & Co. would not go quietly, and would muster a valiant comeback.
Such a situation did not even come close to materializing.
When all was said and done, the Ravens had intercepted Tom "Terrific," who was Tom "Terrible" on this day, three times, and stripped him once. As mentioned, the Ravens' defense came to play, having easily their most impressive performance of 2009. Brady was sacked three times, New England's running plays fooled nobody, and the Pats' go-to wide receiver screen game was completely ineffective thanks to outstanding tacking from the B'More secondary, especially Dominique Foxworth and Chris Carr. Foxworth had his best day as a Raven, leading the team with 8 tackles, most of which were near the line of scrimmage, and holding Randy Moss to just five catches for 48 yards. Carr made several stops in the backfield, and seemingly continues to improve each week since being inserted as a starting cornerback. His only mistakes of the day really weren't his fault – Tom Zbikowski got in the way of the punt that he muffed, and he simply lost his footing on Pats' WR Julian Edelman's second touchdown catch of the day.
Ed Reed and Dawan Landry both had interceptions, and each broke up another pass. It was so bad even FRANK FREAKING WALKER was making plays. No, really. Walker had a direct hand in Landry's pick, blowing up Ben Watson just as the ball arrived causing it to pop up in the air, and made several strong tackles (of course, he dropped what should have been another interception, just to remind us that he's still Frank Walker – but overall a very good day by #41.)
All told, New England managed just 196 total yards, went 3/12 on 3rd downs, and scored their fewest points since Week 2 against the Jets.
The Patriots' defense, which we had been told all week was well equipped to hold down the Ravens' running attack with defensive tackles Ty Warren and Vince Wilfork returning to the lineup, got pushed around handily by the purple and black offensive heavies. Ravens running backs totaled 46 carries, 229 yards (a 4.98 average), and four touchdowns. Even Joe Flacco got into the act on the ground, scrambling for a key first down in the fourth quarter that set up the Ravens' final points of the day.
Flacco's day passing was non-existent, but it didn't need to be otherwise. His 4/10, 34 yard, 1 Int performance tied Bob Griese of the 1973 Miami Dolphins for fewest passing yards in a Playoff win in the Super Bowl era. The haters will be quick to jump on Joe for these numbers, but pay them no mind. Aaron Rodgers of the Green Bay Packers may have thrown for 422 yards and 4 touchdowns in the late game Sunday, but all those pretty stats got him nothing more than a one-way ticket to the offseason. If Flacco does his best Trent Dilfer impersonation all the way to a Lombardi Trophy, not a soul in Charm City will complain, I promise you that.
At the end of the day, the Patriots' dynasty of the 2000s was left in shambles. Tom Brady and Bill Belichick, who had never lost a Playoff game at home together, were embarrassed by John Harbaugh and Joe Flacco (ok, moreso Ray Rice, but you get the idea). Much to the chagrin of all the talking heads (none of whom were giving the Ravens a snowball's chance in hell, all but booking the New York Jets' tickets to Indianapolis) there will be no Brady-Manning rematch in the AFC Championship and no dimpled chin darling to fawn over in future rounds of the 2009 postseason. Nope, it's unibrow time, baby!
- It was the first time an NFL Playoff game had been lost by the Patriots in New England since 1978 (The CBS broadcast decided to break this stat down into days, for some asinine reason – 11,000 or something like that).
- There is now nary an active quarterback in the NFL with more road Playoff victories than Baltimore's own number Five. The Ravens also tied the 1970s Dallas Cowboys for most road Playoff wins in one decade (6).
- The Ravens' committed only three penalties for a paltry 15 yards, both lows for this flag-filled season (big ups to referee Gene Steratore and his crew, by the way, for actually letting the players decide the game! Is there any way we can reserve him for all Ravens games from now on?)
Next up for our purple heroes is a rematch of the 2006 AFC Divisional Playoff with the Indianapolis Colts. Hopefully the road team will emerge victorious this time around as well.


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Advancement for First Year Campers
From MeritBadgeDotOrg
Summer Camps are now required to offer real first year camper programs. See Summer Camp for details.
Below is a letter I wrote based on a request from a friend. I hope you find it helpful.
Dear Catherine,
Don De Young told me you wanted to find out what merit badges a first year camper should take. I'll be glad to attempt to answer your question. Please keep in mind that all of the below is my personal opinion and others may disagree.
Scouts enjoying their first year at summer camp should focus on advancement not merit badges. Most summer camps have first year programs that focus on advancement. Nearly all first year Scouts under twelve years old should participate in this type of program. Scouts who have already earned Second Class and above shouldn't participate because they would probably be bored - they've already had the experiences they would be exposed to in the program. Scouts twelve and older probably won't like having to hang out all week with younger Scouts.
The first year camper programs usually leave some time for a couple of merit badges. It is VERY important that first year campers successfully complete whatever they work on. Good Scouts are built on positive experiences. They will have plenty of time to stretch beyond their levels later on after they are vested in Scouting.
The merit badge that all Scouts should earn first is First Aid. For a long time, you couldn't earn the First Class rank until you earned this one merit badge. It is relatively easy, it is Eagle required, and it is a subject all Scouts should be familiar with.
If the Scout can pass the swim test, encourage him to earn Swimming merit badge. The water is an important part of the Scouting experience and Swimming merit badge is the foundation of this experience. If you have Scouts that can't swim, encourage them to take lessons before summer camp so they'll be ready to take part in this program.
Beyond these, I suggest easy merit badges such as basketry, leatherwork, and fishing. For a list of the recommendations made by our summer camp, see the list below.
Most important of all, whatever your Scouts decide to take, support them and encourage them to complete the badges while at camp. If they can't be completed at camp, jump right on them immediately after getting back from camp. Make sure they remember their first summer camp as a positive experience where they accomplished their goals, even if they didn't know they had them.
The Optimist
|List of Merit Badges Recommended for Younger Campers
The letter above originally linked to a web page which no longer exists. I'll post the list as soon as I can dig it up.
It should be noted that this letter was written in the mid-90s. Since that time, it has become commonplace for summer camps to have very specific programs for first year campers that take up their entire day and leave little or no time for other choices. As such, the above letter may not apply to your troop's camping experience.


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"Alpine Mirror"
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Tapco G2 Trigger Group Double AK47, AK74
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Governor Scott Meets With Residents In Franklin County
Stresses Importance of Meeting Short-term and Long-term Needs of the Community
Today, Governor Rick Scott met with distressed Franklin County residents and local officials who have been impacted due to the decline of oysters and other fisheries in the Apalachicola Bay. The Governor met with local officials and got a firsthand account of the impact the oyster and fishery industry has experienced.
"Florida is working with the Army Corps for a long-term plan to address the needs of Franklin County, while also helping to address short-term needs through worker training and food banks. When one community in our state hurts, we all come together to help," said Governor Rick Scott. "The Apalachicola Bay is critical to the State of Florida. It is home to the world's best oysters and fisheries, and the hardworking residents here rely on the Bay to provide for their families. State agencies and community organizations are coming together to ensure families in this area can get back on their feet quickly."
During his visit, Governor Scott got a tour of the Department of Economic Opportunity's (DEO) Mobile One-Stop Unit which is providing a full range of employment, reemployment and Reemployment Assistance Program services to local residents. DEO is coordinating a food drive with state agencies to help the impacted residents, and the first batch of food was delivered to Franklin County today, with additional deliveries scheduled for Friday.
A previously held resource fair weeks earlier assisted more than 500 residents in the area. The Governor announced another upcoming resource fair scheduled for October 12 and a National Emergency Grant will provide more than $250,000 to hire dislocated fishermen as workers to help the County with traditional recovery efforts.
"Under Governor Scott's direction, DEO, the Department of Children and Families and other state partners in the Rural Economic Development Initiative are working collaboratively with local agencies to develop long-term strategies to assist in supporting the region," said DEO Executive Director Hunting F. Deutsch. "We want to ensure we access any and all available resources to assist the residents of Franklin County with providing for their families."
The Department of Children and Families (DCF) is working with the community to recruit and provide training to 15 volunteers to assist with the emergency needs of Franklin County residents. One temporary employee hired by DCF will assist people at the Apalachicola location of Franklin's Promise Coalition, a community coalition with a mission to improve the quality of life for Franklin County residents.
"Our agency will continue to partner with the Franklin County community to create innovative and effective ways to best serve everyone affected by the fishery resource crisis," said DCF Secretary David Wilkins. "We are committed to helping the people of the Apalachicola Bay area get the assistance they need."
Anyone interested in contributing canned or non-perishable foods for residents impacted residents in Franklin County can drop off their items at the DEO visitor entrance located at 107 East Madison Street, Tallahassee. Please visit Franklin County's Disaster Relief Fund at http://www.bayaidfranklin.com/.


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Winning the $550 million Powerball jackpot sounds like the dream of a lifetime.
Winning the $550 million Powerball jackpot sounds like the dream of a lifetime.
Think of the cars, the vacation homes, the yachts that winning could mean — even though the odds, 1 in 175,223,510, mean that you most likely won't win.
But winning a big-bucks jackpot isn't always the stuff dreams are made of.
Past winners and financial planners caution that big winners need to stick to budgets and invest wisely. They also should be prepared to lose family and friends as they navigate the emotional roller-coaster a sudden infusion of money can bring to a life.
Still, losing anything was the last thing on Susan Cesareo's mind when she bought a Powerball ticket Wednesday afternoon at the New Paltz Kwik Mart on Route 32. Her plan was to hit several stores and gas stations in the area.
She didn't know if her strategy would work.
"I'm kind of just getting started," she said.
She wasn't putting all her eggs in the Powerball basket; she bought $18 worth of other games at the same time she bought a Powerball ticket.
Elsewhere in New Paltz, the big-money jackpot was the talk of the Subway shop on Main Street. Assistant manager Les Velders said he was willing to risk winning when the Powerball numbers were drawn Wednesday night.
"And hopefully I win, and then I could take a day off working every week."
Someone who did win, Sandra Hayes of Missouri, split a $224 million Powerball jackpot with a dozen co-workers in 2006. She collected more than $6 million after taxes. Her experience constitutes a cautionary tale for anyone who thinks they'll be on Easy Street when they win.
"I had to endure the greed and the need that people have, trying to get you to release your money to them. That caused a lot of emotional pain. These are people who you've loved deep down, and they're turning into vampires trying to suck the life out of me."
The single mother kept her job and used her winnings to pay off student loans and a mortgage. Six years later, she still shops at discount stores and lives on a fixed income.
"If you're not disciplined, you will go broke. I don't care how much money you have," she said.
But stories like those didn't stop folks from playing the lottery Wednesday — even if they didn't play Powerball.
In Kingston, brothers Fred and Jack Bechtold cast skeptical eyes on Powerball madness. They both bought tickets for other games at the Convenient Food Mart of Kingston on Lucas Avenue.
"You get lots better odds with these," Fred said while inspecting a scratch-off card.
His brother Jack felt the same way. He'd already won $10 Wednesday afternoon.
He pointed to four of his $100 winning ticket stubs that had been posted above the shop's cash register.
"It's all a waste of money," he said with a grin and a shrug of his shoulders. "But hey, like they say in the ads, you never know."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.


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Friday, 20 July 2012 11:56 AM
The California family of the suspect in a mass shooting at a Colorado movie theater says their hearts go out to those involved.
Police in San Diego read a statement Friday morning from family members of 24-year-old James Holmes, who graduated from high school in the San Diego area.
The family asked the media to respect their privacy. They say they're cooperating with authorities in San Diego and Aurora, Colo., and are trying to process everything.
San Diego police spokeswoman Andra Brown says there's nothing to suggest the family had any involvement.
A spokeswoman for the University of Colorado School of Medicine in Denver says Holmes was a student there until last month but didn't know why he withdrew.
© Copyright 2019 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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The question seemed innocuous enough.
A reporter approached Mike Pettine Jr. during his high school coaching days and wanted to know how it felt to have reached 40 career wins faster than his father, legendary Pennsylvania preps coach Mike Pettine Sr.
That seemingly good news left the younger Pettine evaluating just what it was he wanted in life.
"That was one of the reasons that I think I yearned for more," Pettine Jr. said. "I just did not want those comparisons, because I knew they would always be there."
So the son charted his own course. It's one that began in the lowest levels of professional football, and has steadily advanced to Buffalo, as the defensive coordinator of the Bills.
The pursuit of Pettine to lead the team's defense was one of coach Doug Marrone's first priorities upon taking over in January. In fact, Marrone couldn't wait for his introductory news conference to end, so that he could get on a plane and fly to New York – where Pettine had been defensive coordinator under Rex Ryan with the Jets the last four seasons — to persuade him to move upstate.
This, despite the fact Marrone did not have a prior relationship with Pettine.
"But I've always been an admirer," Marrone said. "You're always looking to attack defenses. What I had in my mind was a system, schematically, that we wanted to run. When I was looking for the people that were taking that system and growing with that system, it just led to one person."
In four years with the Jets, Pettine's defenses finished in the top eight in yards allowed every season. He has been praised for his creativity, especially when it comes to rushing the quarterback.
"It's smart, tough, and it gives you a lot of problems," Marrone said of Pettine's scheme.
Those same adjectives, it turns out, perfectly encapsulates the relationship between Pettine Jr. and Sr.
Tough love
In 33 years as the coach at Central Bucks High School West in Doylestown, Pa., Mike Pettine Sr. amassed an incredible 327-42-4 record. He won four state class AAAA championships and retired after the 1999 season as the winningest coach in Pennsylvania high school history. He did it all with an approach best described as old school.
"Yeah, I'd say that," the 73-year-old Pettine Sr. says with a laugh. "No nonsense."
No player knew that better than his son.
"He wanted to make sure that everybody knew that there was no favoritism there, so he went out of his way to be extra hard on me," Pettine Jr. said.
After a particularly poor scrimmage during Pettine Jr.'s sophomore year, the team was lined up doing grass drills – running in place, diving on the ground and then popping back up.
"He just kept doing it until guys were done," Pettine Jr. said. "It was pushing 100 of them that we did. Of the 70-some players on the team, there were two or three guys left standing, and I was one of them.
"It got to the point where I couldn't get up any more or was slow getting up from one. I just barely saw the size 12 coming at me from the side. The phrase 'momma's boy' and maybe a couple other words were used. That's the way it was back then. He wanted to make sure people knew that any playing time I earned, it was deserved. Players respected that."
Pettine Jr. proved he should be on the field. He threw for more than 1,500 yards and 15 touchdowns as a senior, setting school single-season records in both categories and making the all-state team. He also finished with 21 career interceptions playing defensive back, including a single-season record 10 as a junior.
But when things went wrong, he heard about it. When the arguing between father and son at the dinner table got to be too much, Joyce Pettine had a message for her husband and son: drop it when you come through the door.
So the father improvised. He would pull over the car after practice and hash out whatever faults he found before they got home.
All these years later, he has his regrets.
"I was harder on him than I needed to be," he said. "I don't express it enough, I'm sure, but I'm very proud of him."
Pettine Jr. went from C.B. West to play for coach George Welsh at the University of Virginia, one of the few schools to give him a chance to play quarterback. He did that for his first two collegiate seasons with the Cavaliers before moving to defensive back.
"I've always thought of myself as an offensive guy," Pettine Jr. said. "When I was a high school coach, I had a defensive coordinator and I oversaw the offense."
Pettine started coaching as an assistant with his father at C.B. West. He went on to work as a graduate assistant with the Pitt football team under coach Johnny Majors.
He did that for two seasons before moving back to the Philadelphia area to take his first head coaching job, at William Tennett High School in the 1995 season.
From there, he moved to nearby North Penn High School, like C.B. West a Class AAAA school.
'Father knows best'
Pettine worked days as the audio-visual coordinator at North Penn, counting down the hours until he could get out on the practice field. He devised hundreds of formations and in short order turned North Penn into a legitimate threat to C.B. West's supremacy.
The matchup of father vs. son fascinated the community. So much so, in fact, that a pair of documentaries were produced about the teams. "The Season" followed North Penn throughout the 1999 season and aired on ESPN. "The Last Game" followed C.B. West as it pursued a third straight state title. Pettine Sr. and his squad ultimately got it, defeating North Penn twice along the way.
"The headline 'Father knows best' was getting really old," said Pettine Jr., who went 0-5 against his dad.
The '99 season would ultimately be the last for Pettine Sr., who retired after a three-year run in which his team went 45-0.
"The whole foundation of my coaching, has really all come from him," Pettine Jr. said. "As a high school coach, our systems were deeply rooted in what he did at C.B. West. But even when I got into the NFL, not so much the X's and O's, but more the logical, common sense, no-stone-unturned approach comes directly from my dad. To me, I always fall back on that."
Pettine Jr. went 45-15 in five seasons at North Penn, but he knew the comparisons to his father would never stop. He also knew that leading the AV department was not his true calling.
"I was at the point in my life where I wanted football to be full time," he said.
Big break
To do that, he would have to give up the security of a job in the school system, and start in the most entry-level of positions — as a video coordinator for the Baltimore Ravens in 2002. One of his main jobs was filming special teams practices.
"He's certainly more of a risk taker than his old man," Pettine Sr. said. "He had a family. I said to him, 'Are you making the same money? What about security?' He said, 'Oh, I'm getting the same.' Actually, he took a pay cut."
Pettine cashed in his 401(k) to make it work.
"It was a risk he took, but it paid off," Pettine Sr. said.
The big break came when there was an opening for a defensive line assistant under Rex Ryan.
"Brian Billick said, 'Hey, Rex doesn't have an assistant, why don't you work with him?' " Pettine Jr. said. "I don't want to say it was by accident, but it was almost dumb luck."
When Ryan took the Jets' head coaching job, he brought Pettine Jr. with him as his defensive coordinator. In their first two seasons in New York, the Jets made it to back-to-back AFC Championship games. Their attacking defensive style gave plenty of opponents fits.
"We all spend a lot of time studying people and trying to figure out what can get 'em. There are blitzes where you think nine people are coming and only three are," said Ravens defensive line coach Clarence Thomas, who worked with Pettine and Ryan. "The timing has a lot to do with it. You have to change things up. You can't do the same thing all the time.
"It's about making it appear that there's more people coming than they can handle. Any time you can do that defensively it's to your advantage both ways, whether we bring 'em or we don't."
Despite Pettine calling the plays for most of his tenure in New York, the Jets were undoubtedly looked at as Ryan's defense. When it was reported late last season that Pettine had turned down a contract extension with New York, the popular sentiment was that he wanted to break away from Ryan.
It was one shared by dad.
"He owes a lot to Rex, but in looking at the progression of his career in New York, no matter what, it was always Rex's defense. His mother would get upset watching games. They would be mentioning other coordinators, and hardly ever mentioning her son," he said. "He'll tell you it's all about winning. But as far as moving on — I think he has aspirations of being a head coach one of these days — he had to get out of Rex's shadow.
Pettine Jr., however, said that's not the reason for his move.
"I think that's a little overblown. I talk to Rex probably once a week," Pettine said. "People wanted to write about a falling out, and that's just not the case. I wanted to go ahead and let it run out and just see what my options were. I had the opportunity to go back to the Jets if I wanted to.
"It wasn't a situation where I was being forced out or had definitely burned that bridge. Ultimately, you have to make a decision on what's best for you career-wise. When this opportunity presented itself, it was just more attractive to me than New York."
Cupboard's not bare
Pettine is taking over a defense that gave up 435 points last season, second most in franchise history. But the past is the past, Pettine says. He's been upbeat about the situation here since taking over.
"When you look at some of the guys up front, whether it's Mario Williams, it's Kyle Williams, it's Marcell Dareus – or you look on the back end – Stephon Gilmore we had rated real high on our draft board in New York.
"Just that whole accumulation made it very attractive. I was certainly going to a place where the cupboard wasn't bare."
The new scheme has been a hit with players right from the start. Mario Williams has mentioned, in a good way, that he's not even sure what position he's playing sometimes.
That versatility is what Pettine strives for. He believes by having players cross-trained at multiple positions, it allows him to always have his best 11 on the field.
"It creates some indecision or some confusion on the offensive side when you're constantly changing who's who and you have different groupings on the field," he said. "You know one play this guy's playing inside linebacker, then next play he's playing outside linebacker, the next play he's playing defensive end. From an identification standpoint, I think you can cause some problems for teams. If an offense knows what's your plan pre-snap, you're in trouble."
Majors had a phrase for it: "Don't let them read your mail."
"If they're going to figure out what we're doing, let them do it post-snap," Pettine said. "That's the business we want to be in. Having guys that can play multiple positions I think helps us do that."
A helping hand
With his shaved head and goatee, the 46-year-old Pettine carries a stoic look on the practice field. But he beams when talking about his three children.
His oldest daughter, Megan, is an 18-year-old who will be a freshman at Stony Brook, where she'll play lacrosse. His son, Ryan, is 15, and his youngest daughter is Katie, 11. They reside outside Baltimore, with Pettine's ex-wife.
"It's so hard for me schedule-wise during the fall that I try to spend more time down there or have them up here in the spring and the summer," he said.
As of now, don't expect another Pettine in the family business.
"He's more into academic pursuits. He's a good soccer goalie and a golfer," dad said of Ryan. "He tried football and didn't like it. And I'm OK with that."
Pettine's bond with his father is also strong now, much more so than it was when he played or coached for him. Whatever wounds there were from those battles long ago have healed.
"It's much better now. We're more peers," Pettine Jr. said. "We talk almost every day."
The Bills had Pettine Sr. in for spring practices, and he'll spend a week at training camp. He also has a copy of the team's playbook and will watch practice tape to see if he can offer any advice.
He's not shy about that.
"He doesn't have to ask me. I'm always throwing stuff against the wall," Pettine Sr. said. "No two coaches think alike. I think we have a lot in common, but if I see something in practice or I'm watching film, I'll offer my opinion."
It gives dad his coaching fix, and son a valuable second opinion.
"He just knows football. He doesn't know about contracts and agendas and some of the other stuff that comes along with the NFL," Pettine Jr. said. "He knows from my perspective: He's going to tell me and I can take it or leave. Most of the time he's right."
email: email@example.com


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Bom dia, and welcome to the InterNations Community dedicated to making your move to Lisbon as easy as possible, ensuring you get the most out of your expat adventure in Portugal's capital. When relocating to a new country, it's reassuring to know that you are part of our community; we have experienced expats ready to help and answer any questions you might have, such as "how do I obtain a work visa?", "when can I apply for healthcare?", or simply "what exactly is Ginja?". We also have a wealth of information and resources in our dedicated guide articles that go into detail about all areas of your new life. We'll do our best to make your adventure in Lisbon as exciting and enjoyable as the city itself.
With InterNations, you never stand alone. Whether you move to another city or go on a business trip somewhere — our communities are there to make you feel at home wherever you are in the world. Feel free to also check out our other vibrant InterNations Communities like the ones in Amsterdam or Khobar (Eastern Prov.).
Attend our monthly events and activities for Lisbon expatriates to get to know like-minded expatriates in real life.
Get trustworthy advice and local insights from fellow members in our Lisbon expat forums.
As the bustling capital of Portugal, Lisbon has a rich international business district, a variety of international schools, and, of course, a thriving tourist industry. To work in tourism you'll need to speak English, Portuguese and Spanish to communicate with Lisbon's visitors. This is the richest and most economically robust region of Portugal, so you should be able to find work here with little trouble. Read our guide on working in Portugal for more detailed information, and don't forget to join the InterNations Lisbon Professional Networking Group for new business contacts. Around the city, you'll find excellent dining, great transport links and endless cultural opportunities, including the impressive Museum of Ancient Art, the Maritime Museum and the ever changing MUDE; Museum of Design. For lively nights out, head to Bairro Alto or enjoy well priced and delicious meals in Restauradores, where the numerous restaurants spill out onto the pavements and buskers entertain diners. Traveling around Lisbon couldn't be easier than taking the well-maintained Metro, the underground train network. Despite the numbers of tourists and locals using the service, you'll find it much less busy in comparison to other capital cities' metro services and small enough to navigate easily. Above ground, you can travel around using the tram and bus network and take regular over-ground trains to other cities. Throughout the year, you can further enjoy numerous festivals, such as the Feast of Saint Anthony and Our Lady of Nazaré Festival, where folk dancers take to the stage in the center of Lisbon.
InterNations is the largest global network for expatriates, with communities in 420 cities across the globe. Get to know fellow internationals in your city, before you're moving, or when traveling somewhere and never feel like a stranger. InterNations makes it easy for you to stay in touch with your expat friends, both online and offline, so you can grow your network of friends and contacts from all over the world. Whether they live in Singapore or Riyadh, InterNations allows you to be close to them even if they are miles away.
InterNations will provide you with a wealth of practical information, but don't forget that it also enables you to meet new people and link up with social clubs and events in real life. Wine, cinema, hiking, and dancing are just some of the huge range of InterNations Groups in Lisbon that you can join. Enjoy your hobby or discover a new interest while building a community of friends and expats from all over the world with InterNations. We also organize larger InterNations Official Events, so you know that whatever your new life holds you can easily get in touch with expats in the city, just like you.


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The Tidy Table Tray plus Flexi-Diner looks like a giant clipboard, except the clip is on the bottom instead of the top, and it holds food instead of papers.
The Tidy Table is a highchair tray, minus the highchair. The large pressure clip on its underside grabs firmly onto pretty much any tabletop.
A removable insert fits over the tray, lifting out for a quick washing without having to remove the whole tray. The insert has an extended lip that helps keep spills off your child's lap and compartments in the insert hold a cup and slidable things such as peas and snacks.
The Tidy Tray plus Flexi-Diner is particularly great for road trips, so you're not at the mercy of whatever passes for a highchair/child tray on the road. Tidy Table Tray plus Flexi-Diner costs $29.99.
Info: Bambinoschild.com.
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d3 Wyatt Cheng Addresses Changes to % Bonus Damage Affix in Diablo's Patch 2.4
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By Starym
We're getting two new sets in patch 2.6.7 aka Season 19, with the Crusader and Monk getting upgrades, but it seems we're not getting their associated set dungeons. We may be seeing new ones in the future, but it seems they won't coincide with the introduction of each new set (as we're getting 2 new sets each season from this one forward).
Set Dungeons (source)
I don't believe we have plans to add new Set Dungeons for the new Class sets (at least, not for 2.6.7). I'll talk to the team about this and see if there are any future facing plans beyond that. While it is a shame the new sets aren't coming with their own dungeons, the patch still has plenty of new content, and if we are getting new ones in later patches that will be some solid content to go over each new season.
By Starym
It seems the fact that only Crusaders and Monks are getting new sets is bothering a fair amount of people and Nevalistis has replied to a forum thread titled "2 out of 7 classes are getting love!?", which is a pretty ironic title considering Barbarians are getting quite some affection this season as well (I suppose it's only love if there's sets involved... typical materialists!!1).
The explanation goes into why this way of releasing updates to the classes was chosen and what other ways were planned and then scrapped (although the reason behind the initial limitation is clearly because there aren't that many devs working on D3, as is to be expected - and hopefully the rest are all on D4):
Season 19 New Additions (source)
This is pretty good summary as to why. We really had two approaches we could have taken to bringing new stuff to the game:
Release smaller patches that have something for everyone Release larger, more focused (and ideally better balanced) patches for 1-2 classes at a time We've opted for the latter because we think it makes a lot more sense on a lot of levels; we can focus on a particular art style, gameplay is more consolidated, and we're at less risk of breaking more things at a time while we work. We knew this approach could be divisive, which is why we called it out in the blog from August. We didn't want it to be a surprise.
Class Sets in Diablo III greatly impact skills and gameplay style. Each needs room to breathe (and be thoroughly tested) as they're implemented. And if we need to make changes to the ones we're adding after your feedback, we need time to do that, too.
Trying to juggle seven all at once was just outside scope, especially as supplemental Legendary powers need attention too. I won't pretend we're going to get it all right, but pacing ourselves accordingly makes that at least a little more likely.
Header image source.
By Starym
Update: we're also getting a new pet and portrait frame in addition to the reurning rewards from Season 7!
The next season's PTR will be up this Thursday and we have all the patch notes already! The big news is the new seasonal power, and it's a pretty solid one. The Pandemonuim effect will not only buff your speed and power (up to 50% speed and 100% damage) based on killstreak, but also has a combo effect depending on when you choose to end your killstreak (from massive frost novas, angels descending to help and more). All the effects are listed below and will scale based on the GR level as well, making them (hopefully) relevant in higher GRs as well.
We're also getting new sets! Crusaders and Monks will be getting them this season, with the other class ones arriving in later seasons, and there will be new and returning legendary powers that will synergize with the sets.
Barbarians also get a lot of tweaks to their legendary items, hopefully addressing the issues players have had with the class.
New Pet (source)
I totally forgot to put this in the patch notes, but just in the interest of visibility:
Added a pet and portrait frame reward for completing the full Season Journey for Season 19
This is similar to the Galactic Wings that were available during Season 17 and in addition to the returning Season rewards from Season 7 for completing Chapter IV
PTR Patch 2.6.7 (source)
The one-week PTR testing period for 2.6.7 begins October 17 and we need your help to make Season 19 better than ever!
We've begun introducing brand new class sets to Diablo III as outlined in our Ongoing Support blog, heavily revised several Barbarian Legendaries at the direct request of the community and continued to iterate on our approach to Seasonal buffs and how they can change up the overall gameplay experience. Take a look at the preliminary patch notes below and start theorycrafting; Patch 2.6.7 will be arriving before the end of the year!
Table of Contents:
General Seasons Items Monsters Bug Fixes Note: All changes apply to all versions of Diablo III, including PS4, Xbox One, Switch, and PC unless otherwise indicated. Please note that PTR is only available for PC and Mac users.
Greater Rift Keystones are now subject to vacuum pick-up A note regarding the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) has been added, clearly stating we do not sell account information. For more information regarding the CCPA, please see here. (Console Only) Return to Top
Developer Note: One of the biggest pieces of feedback from Season 18's buff was that the Triune bonus didn't stick with your character while you adventured. With Season 19, we've altered course as well as upped the ante by experimenting with new mechanics to add an element of both chaos and power to the battlefield. It should feel a bit like Pandemonium, and it may be a consideration whether or not you want to reset your total kill streak for a particular killstreak bonus versus continuously maintain the overall effect (especially as the highest level killstreak rewards will be harder to leverage in situations like Greater Rifts). Killstreaks with higher kill count requirements are more powerful, and we're looking forward to seeing what players think of and do with them! The buff for Season 19, the Season of Eternal Conflict, has been added Pandemonium For the duration of the Season, all players will have a stacking buff that that persists as long as you have hit or killed a monster within the last 5 seconds Each stack gives 0.05% movement speed and 0.1% bonus damage. This bonus caps at 50% movement and 100% damage (1000 stacks) In addition, after reaching a certain number of kills in a row, a power is unleashed, dealing an amount of scaling damage based on player level and difficulty or Greater Rift level: 15 Kills: Five massive energy twisters are unleashed 30 Kills: Dark Geysers form beneath enemies 50 Kills: Exploding Chickens seek and destroy 100 Kills: Corpses rain from the sky 150 Kills: A wide Frost Nova freezes enemies 200 Kills: Treasure chests fall from the sky 300 Kills: A ring of fire engulfs everything 400 Kills: Meteors hail from above 500 Kills: Angels descend upon the battlefield to fight for your cause 1000 Kills: ??? Powers are tracked at a group level; this means only one power can be active in play at a time, regardless of the number of players in a group Return to Top
Developer Note: With Patch 2.6.7, we are beginning to roll out new class sets for every class in Diablo III. For the Season of Eternal Conflict, we're focusing on the two classes that embody the Light and wield some form of Holy elemental damage: Crusader and Monk. You'll also find a handful of retuned or newly added Legendary powers intended to synergize with the new class sets. We did a lot of community research into which skills were most requested by players as well as most underrepresented in current builds, and we hope you're as excited as we are for these new gameplay options. The other class sets will be coming in later patches, so if your class isn't represented this time around, fret not—they're coming in a future patch! You'll also notice a significant number of Barbarian item changes in this patch. While the Barbarian class set will be coming at a later date, we have very much heard the War Cry from our dedicated Barbarian community and implemented a number of changes heavily inspired by extremely thorough feedback. While not every suggestion has been taken at a 1:1 parity, the thoughtful analysis helped guide us to changes we could implement in this patch. Thanks very much to the community members who expressed their concerns in a respectful, constructive manner. It's very helpful, and we greatly appreciate the thought and effort that went into making your voices heard! New Crusader Set: Aegis of Valor 2-Piece Bonus: The charged bolts from Fist of the Heavens has a chance to cast another Fist of the Heavens 4-Piece Bonus: Hitting with Fist of the Heavens reduces damage taken by 1% for 5 seconds. Stacks up to 50 times 6-Piece Bonus: Increase the damage of Fist of the Heavens by 10,000% New Monk Set: Patterns of Justice 2-Piece Bonus: Sweeping Wind gains the effect of every rune 4-Piece Bonus: Each enemy within Sweeping Wind increases your movement speed by 5%. Stacks up to 10 times. 6-Piece Bonus: Attacking with Tempest Rush while Sweeping Wind is active will temporarily increase the size of Sweeping Wind after hitting over 30 times within a short period. Sweeping Wind damage is increased by 10,000% Darklight Fist of the Heavens has a [45-60%] 100% chance to be cast twice. Additional Legendary Power: Increases the damage of Fist of the Heavens by [200-250%]. The Eye of the Storm New Legendary Power: When Sweeping Wind hits exactly 1 enemy, its damage is increased by 100%. Vengeful Wind Increases the maximum stack count of Sweeping Wind by [6-7] 10 Additional Legendary Power: Increases the damage of Sweeping Wind by [250-300%] Chantodo's Resolve The scaled attack speed damage bonus to Wave of Destruction has been reduced Developer Note: This is a reactive adjustment from an earlier change to how Wave of Destruction receives a bonus from Attack Speed. The buff that resulted from that change was more than we expected, so we're reigning it in. Wrath of the Wastes 6-Piece Bonus: The damage bonus now also applies to Rend Lamentation Additional Legendary Power: Increases the damage of Rend by [150-200%] Ambo's Pride New Legendary Power: Attacking with Whirlwind also applies Rend and the total damage of Rend is dealt over 1 second Remorseless Hammer of the Ancients has a [25-30%] chance to summon an Ancient for 20 seconds New Legendary Power: While both Wrath of the Berserker and Call of the Ancients are active, Hammer of the Ancients deals [200-250%] more damage. Fjord Cutter You are surrounded by a Chilling Aura when attacking. New Legendary Power: Seismic Slam attacks 50% faster and also deals 100-150% increased damage against Slowed or Chilled enemies Bracers of Destruction Seismic Slam deals [400-500%] increased damage to the first 5 10 enemies it hits. Fury of the Ancients Call of the Ancients gains the effect of the Ancients' Fury rune and your Ancients attack 100% faster Bone Ringer Now has a cap of 60 stacks. Developer Note: We never intended for this item to be used in a way where you farm stacks for an egregious amount of time (5+ minutes) and then watch all their health disappear in less than a second. It's not an engaging style of gameplay, and we don't want that experience to be the best way to play the Necromancer. Legacy of Dreams This gem is now more likely to drop from a Greater Rift Guardian Return to Top
Blighter Blighter's Poison Tentacles' Area of Effect now hits less frequently, but at higher damage, when attacking players Return to Top
Bug Fixes
Spite Fixed an issue where casting Restless Giant would cause the 200% physical bonus damage to fail to apply when the Gargantuan enraged Squirt's Necklace Fixed an issue where some ground effects were causing the Squirt's Necklace buff to fall off despite being shielded Return to Top
How to Participate
To participate in the public test, you must have a Diablo III game license attached to a Battle.net account in good standing (i.e. one that hasn't been suspended or banned). In addition, you will also need to download and install the Blizzard Battle.net desktop app if you have not already done so.
Step 1: Restart the Battle.net desktop app.
Step 2: Navigate to the Diablo III tab on the left-hand menu.
Step 3: On the Diablo III screen, there is a drop-down menu right above the "Play" button (note that this may say "Install" if you do not have Diablo III currently installed). Select "PTR: Diablo III" from this drop-down menu before proceeding.
Step 4: Click Install to begin the installation process.
Your PTR account will be created automatically if you do not already have one. The PTR is available in all supported languages, and accounts from all regions are eligible to participate. For additional assistance with installing and launching the PTR, click here.
Return to Top
PTR Character Copy
The option to copy your existing Diablo III characters from your live account to the PTR will be available and can be done directly through the PTR client. However, only one region per account can be copied at a time. So, if you choose to copy characters from your account in a different region, any previously copied PTR characters will be lost.
Step 1: Log into the live game and then log out.
Step 2: Log into PTR client and create a level 1 character. After you're done, return to the main character screen.
Step 3: Click on the "PTR Copy" button located in the upper right-hand corner. (The PTR Copy button will not appear in-game until you have created a new level 1 character.)
Step 4: Select your region.
Step 5: Click "Copy." This will copy all characters on your account from the selected region.
Step 6: You will be disconnected from the PTR client.
Step 7: Log back in. Your copied characters will be available for play.
Please note that you can only copy characters from one gameplay region at a time. If you choose to copy characters from a different region, any previously copied PTR characters will be lost. In addition, you can only copy characters over to your PTR account once every 24 hours. Attempting to copy characters before this cooldown is up will result in an error.
Return to Top
As this is a test server, please anticipate uneven game performance, and note that restarts and downtime may occur without warning. Thank you, and we look forward to your feedback!
A killstreak-based seasonal power, new Crusader and Monk sets, Barbarian reworks and more!
By Stan
This week's Challenge Rift 120 revolves around Demon Hunters.
Challenge Rift 120 EU
Visage of Gunes Rakoff's Glass of Life + Gogok of Swiftness (Rank 57) Strongarm Bracers Elusive Ring + Legacy of Dreams (Rank 53) Pandemonium Loop + Pain Enhancer (Rank 61) Karlei's Point + Holy Point Shot Kanai's Cube Powers
Dawn Aquila Cuirass Elusive Ring Skills
VengeanceSeethe ImpaleRicochet PreparationInvigoration Shadow PowerGloom VaultRattling Roll CompanionBat Companion
Sharpshooter Tactical Advantage Custom Engineering Awareness Impale is your main damage-dealing ability. You won't have any problems with toughness this week. You can Vault through Elites to proc your Strongarm Bracers and deal increased damage. Vengeance is going to have permanent uptime thanks to Gogok of Swiftness. For more information on layout, check out Mnemonic's video guide linked below.
Challenge Rift 120 US
Andariel's Visage Dovu Energy Trap Mantle of Channeling Aquila Cuirass Frostburn Sanguinary Vambraces Hellcat Waistguard Depth Diggers Irontoe Mudsputters Convention of Elements + Bane of the Trapped (Rank 76) Unity + Legacy of Dreams (Rank 76) Leonine Bow of Hashir + Sin Seekers Kanai's Cube Powers
Echoing Fury Cindercoat Squirt's Necklace Skills
VengeanceSeethe GrenadeCluster Grenades Rapid FireWithering Fire Rain of VengeanceShade CompanionBat Companion Shadow PowerBlood Moon Passives
Sharpshooter Ambush Grenadier Single Out Spam Vengeance, Companion, and Shadow Power every time they're up. Grenades will do your most damage, so throw them as you walk to kill trash. Use Rapid Fire for high single-target damage output on Elites or the Guardian. Cast Rain of Vengeance on Elites. Here's Raxx with his clear of the rift.
By Stan
The drop chance of Legacy of Dreams from Greater Rift Guardians will be increased in Season 19. A suggestion has been passed on to the dev team to include the gem, which replicates the Legacy of Nightmares buff, in the Haedrig's Gift cache.
The increased drop chance means the gem will have a higher priority to drop from the Greater Rift Guardians as outlined in the blue post below.
Blizzard (Source)
Hello everyone,
In this post I just want to discuss my views on two different approaches for starting a season, and why adding a reworked Legacy of Dreams gem to the 3rd Haedrig reward makes sense.
As noted, I feel there are two sorts of progressive players in D3. First, you have players that want to take sets, whatever is the most powerful, and just go for it out of the gate. Next, you have a group of players who prefer the slow grind of gathering different pieces of loot for a more player driven build.
Right now, the first option is the only relevant option if you want to compete out of the gate.
By allowing Legacy of Dreams to drop with Haedrigs gift, and re-balancing as a level 50 max gem rather than level 99, you fully open up the option for players to hit the ground running with Legacy of Dreams.
I see absolutely no negative to these two changes, but wanted to see what the community thought?
Thank you!
That's certainly a thought. I'll pass the feedback on to the development team.
I will note, however, in the next patch, we are going to increase the drop rate for Legacy of Dreams from Greater Rift Guardians. It's a little low currently and hopefully that will help with the feeling that this gem is too scarce. We'll give that a go first and see if we need to re-evaluate after.
Is this to be interpreted as making it drop sooner when you first start collecting the gems?
Correct. While you'll get it eventually even with bad RNG by process of elimination, this change should make it more likely to drop sooner rather than later.
Again, not guaranteed; random is still random and bad luck still happens. But it should be better after the update.


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"A Trip of Goats" — A Win.
"A Trip of Goats," the novel by our fellow blogger and real-life buddy, Kim Crawford (a/k/a "Velociman"), is a trip that should be taken by anyone who enjoys a compelling story, full of local color and very colorful characters.
The journey of twelve-year old Jubal Lee Jackson ("They call me 'Jule'") takes us through rural Georgia in the sixties and includes places that I doubt are pitched by the state travel bureau. While the geography and raw culture of those places and of that time may be unfamiliar to many, the questions for which young Jule sought answers are not.
I was most taken with the cast of memorable characters that, in most cases, defy a good-guy, bad-guy dichotomy. They range from Jule's father, the "Senator," who is a perfect mixture of Darth Vader, W.C. Fields and a pinch of Algonquin J. Calhoun (in whiteface) to the Futch Brothers, who are at once hilarious, profoundly stupid and rotten to the core.
I eagerly turned the pages to see what calamities would next befall young Jule and those who are hot on his trail.
Thank you, Mr. Crawford, for a great read.