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It's clear that birds copulate, procreate, and promote their genes with alacrity. But love? Do birds feel love? Can they? To explore this question, it's probably best to first define love. Love includes elements of need, but primarily those of affection. It's an attachment to another being that inspires deep longing and desire to be together. It's easy to observe this attachment behavior in parrots, especially pets. A succession of budgies and one venerable Chestnut-fronted Macaw (Charlie) have sought me out for caresses, allopreening and kisses over the years. Charlie was never more content than when she was perched on my shoulder, her wing pressed against my neck and cheek. But any mention of affection or "love" in parrots must include that other, unwelcome element: jealousy. Psittacine love can be jealous, and parrots demonstrate strong preferences in the partners they choose to shower with affection. When Bill and I first got together, Charlie would tenderly preen my cheek, eyelashes and hair, nibbling at my lips and making loud kissing noises. She'd then climb down my leg, waddle across the room, climb up Bill's jeans, and bite him, once right in the middle of his back. Message sent, she'd waddle back to me, her true love and favorite possession.
Eventually, Bill and Charlie reached an understanding. I know one thing. That macaw loved a sip of beer.
While we're used to declarations that our pet parrots "love" us just as we love them, and they can be quite demonstrative in showing their affection, the evidence is thinner for wild birds. No human can divine what a mated pair of geese or eagles may feel for one another, but stories abound of birds,especially Canada Geese, who spurned all offers from members of the opposite sex for years after a mate was killed. I've seen mourning behavior in a longterm captive Savannah Sparrow whose temporary cagemate, a dark-eyed junco, recovered from its wing injury and was released. The birds had roosted together each night in a single soft clump of feathers. When the junco was released, the Savannah Sparrow called frantically, became greatly agitated, then quit eating and sat, silent and still, on his perch for two days. Did Vanna love his cage partner? He certainly seemed lost without her.
Wild birds I've raised from tiny, featherless orphans demonstrate attachment to me, as would be expected for any young creature with a surrogate mother, even a weird, long-limbed primate mother. Mourning Doves in particular display strong attachment behavior, cuddling under my chin to nap and preening my hair and eyelashes.
Needless to say, this makes them quite pleasant to raise. Young robins act like spoiled brats,demanding food and attention long after they should be on their own. But the most startling demonstration of affection and perhaps love I've experienced came from an unexpected source: Ruby-throated Hummingbirds.
In 2003, I raised three orphaned ruby-throats from the early pinfeather stage to release at around 30 days of age. I made sure they were able to self-feed from flowers and feeders before cranking the aviary window open and removing the screen. They all took off with such speed, disappearing into the surrounding yard, that I was flabbergasted to find one perched on the clothesline as I hung out laundry later that same afternoon. It was Adventure Joe, and he was famished and peeping, seeking me out for food and comfort. The other two sought me out, as well. Perhaps they weren't as ready for the wild as they'd seemed. For the next month and a half, our yard was enchanted, populated by free-living hummingbirds who'd suddenly appear, solicit a little food, then go back to the flower beds and feeders. I chalked it up to the fact that the three had been hand-raised from a young age. It sure was a kick to have them around! I'll never forget the day I looked behind me as I road the roaring riding lawnmower, to see a little phalanx of three hummingbirds following over my head.
The real test of hummingbird bonds came in 2004. My three orphans had left for Central America in September 2003. Would they return? On April 17, 2004, my husband Bill stepped out, coffee mug in hand, to take the morning sun. A male Ruby-throated Hummingbird zipped up, hovered in front of his face, then poked his beak in between each of Bill's fingers. It was as close to a handshake as a hummingbird could manage. Later than day, I looked out to see two male hummingbirds sitting shoulder-to-shoulder on a twig by our front door, one that had been their favorite as youngsters. I rummaged around until I found the small feeder they'd used the summer before, and filled it with the protein-rich solution the three had been raised on. As I reached to hang it from a branch, three adult male rubythroats wove through my arms and around my head, fighting to be the first to feed. Six months and two ocean crossings behind them, my hummingbirds were home, right where they belonged.
Homing instinct isn't necessarily a demonstration of affection, I know that. I wondered about the nature of the bond I forged with the three hummingbird orphans. Would any young hummingbird become attached to its caretaker, or was this dependency an artifact of the birds' having been hand-fed since they were in pinfeathers? I am rarely able to put a whole puzzle together, usually being given only a few pieces at a time. By the next summer, I'd have one more piece. Just a year after the original three orphans came in, I got a call from a woman with a newly fledged hummingbird who'd been found trapped in a greenhouse. Bits of down still adhered to its head feathers. It was weak and debilitated from its long, hot ordeal. I put it in an empty glass aquarium and brought a small feeder filled with hummingbird maintenance diet up to its bill. It quickly accepted this food source, and was self-feeding from then on. By the next morning it was strong enough to fly. I put up a nylon screen tent in the yard and released the hummingbird into it, hanging a feeder in the center of the tent. I kept the foundling for six more days. I never handled it, hand-fed it, or did anything more than speak kindly to it. It was an altogether different upbringing than my three fledglings enjoyed the previous year.
Sylvia Salvia was released at around Day 28, self-feeding like a champ from a special feeder and from flowers all around my gardens.
And the oddest thing happened. Just like the hand-fed orphans, she actively sought me out in the yard. She'd land on a low twig right by my face and peep. When I'd speak to her, she'd ruffle her feathers and preen companionably. I knew that this behavior had little to do with food, because I hand-fed her only once. She'd leave to visit the flower garden or her feeder, then return to perch near my face. As time went on and she gained flight prowess, she'd hover in front of my nose, chipping irritably until I brought my finger up in front of my face. And shed land on it, fluff her feathers, and settle down for a good preen and one-on-one chat. Seemingly satisfied, she'd rocket away on some pressing hummingbird business.
I cannot describe how it felt to have a free-living, essentially wild hummingbird seek me out for companionship. I'm still searching for an answer to this delightful conundrum. I've decided that, lacking a mother, Sylvia simply needed to make contact with someone she knew, someone who cared. And somehow, having a person speak lovingly to her filled that need. Being near me was clearly reassuring to her. Did she love me? I can't say, but I sure loved her. Whatever was going on, I know that I will never be through learning about how birds' minds work, even the tiniest ones.
This blogpost has been adapted in part from my new book, The Bluebird Effect: Uncommon Bonds with Common Birds (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt). Released March 20, 2012, it's in its second printing, which may have something to do with its being selected as Book of the Week on Oprah.com. I know, it's kind of tacky of me to mention it, but when has another nonfiction bird book made that list? You can order an autographed copy from me here.
Good point, Felonious…rubythroats do seem the Least Likely to Form Attachments of all the birds in the class. Maybe that's why I was so surprised to have them seek me out for a little lovin'. I've concluded that most of the "irascible" behavior we see in hummingbirds is probably an artifact of the highly artificial feeding situations we impose upon them. When in nature is a hummingbird presented with a superabundant, never-ending food source in one location? Of course they go a little bonkers trying to protect something like that–it's like the Bottomless Pint of Guinness.
Once I saw a robin get hit by a car I went to see if it was still alive and it was. So I picked it up and took it to my house. I only held it for about ten minuets and then he flew away.Then the next day I seen a robin siting in a tree so I walked up and it let me touch it then he flew away. I knew it was the same one because it flew differend ever since. I would not think they would remember you just after ten minets. But since then he flew to the same tree everyday.
I once raised a sparrow that had fallen from it's nest and was not able to be returned. She was still bald. Of course, she was attached to me as a baby, but as soon as she could feed herself, she became very wild and I released her when she could fly well. That was three years ago. She does not land on me or let me touch her. But she drops in and says "hello" often. Her "cheep" is just different enough that I know it and she respond to the "tic, tic" sounds that I made when I fed her as a baby.
Also we have had a male Rufous Hummingbird winter with us for the past two winters. He is wild and has never been touched, but he always talks to me when I am outside. I will greet him with "Hi Rufie" and he will begin to chitter and cock his head looking at me.
I do believe that they form emotional attachments with humans, and mostly with other birds.
I only have to hear the sorrowful call of a lone Canada Goose circling and flying this way and that searching for a lost mate to be sure of that.
Very intersting. I am not conviced that birds feel love as we do… But this article confirms 100% that you have strong love for your birds.
What a beautiful story! I look forward to reading your book. The two birds I've loved the most were a pair of Scrub Jays who visited our deck where we used to live in Marin County, CA. They liked to eat peanuts, and we would supply them on demand. Each year they would bring their new baby for some peanuts… and to be admired by us. Eventually the babies would be sent off into the world to fend for themselves. One year we were surprised by twin babies!
I always find it galling how readily some science-types will pooh-pooh the observations and empathic/intuitive sense we use to ascribe "emotions" to animals as completely unscientific and ill-founded, while at the same time they routinely employ methodologies that are chockfull of their own subjective elements and unproven assumptions.
I sincerely believe that birds can love each other. After four years together, my 22-year old cockatiel Audrey died leaving the four-year old cockatiel Conner in mourning. Conner used to climb inside Audrey's cage to sing to him almost every day, but after Audrey died Conner was silent for five months. Conner still makes me hold him in front of Audrey's cage and he won't climb inside anymore.
It's such a sad story, Elizabeth…
I really hope that Conner will get better…
And how amazing it is of you to be so attentive to your bird's feelings…
Thank you for sharing your story…
I wish I were you Julie. I so envy the love you have for your little ones and back.
Dear Julie!
You don't know how heartwarming your story is to me… I'm leaving you this comment with tears in my eyes…
I'm raising two sparrows because the bird sanctuary in my area wouldn't take them in… And I'm so amazed by how much I have learnt from these two little beings in the last year and a half… Most people think I'm crazy, so reading your beautiful story and knowing that there are people like you in this world is very precious to me…
Thank you so much for taking the time and share this!
I know what you mean Christina…sparrows that have no worth in this world found a place in our hearts. I wish I could keep mine as a pet but I'm leaving. The first time I picked up that little bird, I just wanted to be kind. But now as I'm preparing to say good-bye, I want to thank him for all the totally unexpected sweet memories. I wish you many more days with the two little beings!
Highly energetic post, I loved that a lot. Will
there be a part 2?
After hearing these wonderful stories about birds loving their owners I wonder what is wrong with me. I've loved birds and cared for them but they've never come back once they've left.
© 2013 10,000 Birds. All words, images, and opinions are the property of their respective authors unless stated otherwise.


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Forms and Resources
Travel Forms
- Loss or Missing Receipts Worksheet (XLS)
- Travel Advance (XLS)
- Travel Prepaid Worksheet (XLS)
- Monthly Local Travel Expense Log (XLS)
- Travel Expense Report Sample (PDF)
- Travel Expense Report Key Checklist (PDF)
Compliance Forms
- A/P W9 Payment Compliance Form/Request for Taxpayer Identification Number and Certification and Vendor Information Request (PDF) (campus username and password required)
- Employee Direct Deposit Form (PDF) (campus username and password required)
Charge Card Payment Slip
Effective May 1, 2015, new credit card acceptance guidelines will be implemented to ensure cardholder identity when accepting credit card payments by phone or in other instances when the credit card is not swiped. A new credit card form has been developed to collect the CVV code from the back of the card and the complete billing address. This CVV code and billing address are verified and used when determining whether the credit card is approved. In addition, cash remittance vouchers with credit card information can no longer be sent through inter-office mail because it violates PCI-DSS guidelines which dictate secure handling of credit card information. Deposits/payments/cash remittance vouchers with credit card information must be deposited into the secure depository drop box in the basement of the Student Union, next to the Wright1 Card window. If your department is located off campus, it is acceptable to fax the credit card information with the cash remittance voucher to the Office of the Bursar, (937) 775-5775.
FOAPAL Forms
- Financial Account, Program, Activity or Location Request Form (PDF)
- Financial Fund Request Form
- Financial Organization Request Form

subset: commoncrawl


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Travel Impressions - Receive Unlimited Access to 9 Parks & Tours!
Receive Unlimited Access to 9 Parks & Tours With Transportation Included and No Hidden Fees at Hotel Xcaret Mexico!
In the heart of the Riviera Maya, a new hotel concept is born: Hotel Xcaret Mexico is a natural haven by the Caribbean Sea and the mystic jungle. Designed with an eco-integrative architecture, with 900 suites using the ALL VIEW SUITES concept, guest will be connected with the environment from any point of the suite and will be able to appreciate the beautiful views of the pools, jungle, rivers and beaches of white sand dedicated to rest and fun.
Living and enjoying the best of Mexico has never been so easy as at Hotel Xcaret Mexico, where you have unlimited access to Xcaret parks and tours. The ALL-FUN INCLUSIVE program, transforms the traditional all-inclusive into a unique experience. Visit Hotel Xcaret today, a new destination inspired by the warmth of the Mexican hospitality, full of tradition and modernity in every detail.
Booking Window: Now - December 22, 2019


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Actor Patrick Wilson has stepped up to defend former "Grey's Anatomy" Katherine Heigl following a report which suggests she behaves badly on the set of her films.
Heigl has been targeted in an expose published in The Hollywood Reporter which accuses the actress of making "movie star demands" during press tours and suffering an overinflated "sense of entitlement," while the article also suggests she is guilty of turning up late to set.
However, Wilson insists Heigl was professional and "gracious" on the set of their new film "North of Hell," and he is convinced the negativity stems from the fact she recently landed an exciting new TV role in a spy series.
He tells The Huffington Post, "Now listen, this article (about Heigl) that came out was because… she sold a show last week to NBC. Well great! So what do people do? 'Hey, let's rip her down a few days later'. We all have reputations, whether they're true or not.
"She was not only not all of those things – 'Oh, she was late and never came out of the trailer.' Nothing. She showed up, worked her tail off, super funny, super gracious, great to the cast, great to the crew, and was a total pro. Someone that's been doing it forever. You walk away and you go, 'Well that's a great actress and a great person to work with'.
"I have to defend her because she couldn't have been a better experience."


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Paul.cole necesitaba un nuevo diseño de logotipo y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 589 diseños de 159 diseñadores freelance.
Williamson Roberts
Established in 1987, WIlliamson Roberts is a Mid-Market Private Equity firm with offices in Sydney, London and New York. We are a respected organisation that prides ourself on the integrity of our business dealings with our partners. We embrace new and emerging technology throughout our organisation and love to align ourselves with others that 'stand out from the crowd'.
We deal with multi-million and multi-billion dollar corporations on a daily basis; however we deal with just as many small to medium enterprises.
We require a new logo that will reflect the level of professionalism and establishment that our organisation prides itself on; yet that we are still a youthful and vibrant business that is embracing the changing times. We would like to see designs with Greys and Silvers, possibly some Greens. It needs to be sharp and contemporary as well as sophisticated and sublime. Ideally we would like some sort of motif (possibly incorporating an asterisk or WR?) to the left of the business name that could be used on its own if needs be. The company name would be to the right of this motif in a suitable font for the above theme, with the two names either separated by a space, or joined together but in different colours. We would like to see the names of the three locations of our offices also incorporated into the logo (ie small font). Winning Designer will also have the opportunity to design new Business Cards, Letterheads, Web, etc for us. Any and all questions welcomed!
Descubre cómo funciona un concurso de diseño u obtén más información sobre nuestros servicios de diseño de logo.


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Smithsonian National Zoo
Zoo officials are unsure how Rusty escaped.
Rusty the red panda's run through the wilds of Washington, D.C., is over.
Officials at the Smithsonian's National Zoo confirmed Monday afternoon their runaway resident is on the way home.
Crews had been looking for the almost year-old red panda since 8 a.m. Monday, said Pamela Baker-Masson, a communications director at the zoo.
Rusty was spotted in the northwest D.C. neighborhood of Adams-Morgan and shortly later, was "recovered, crated & is headed safelty back to the National Zoo!" the zoo tweeted.
Smithsonian National Zoo
Red pandas are closely related to raccoons and skunks but are not part of the bear family.
Baker-Masson said they are still unsure how Rusty escaped.
Rusty, who arrived at the zoo in April from a Nebraska zoo, is one of two red pandas at the zoo. Zoo officials say he is fully vaccinated and should not pose a threat to the public.
"Red pandas are arboreal, territorial animals, so it would be unusual for Rusty to wander far from his home range -- in his case his exhibit," the zoo tweeted.
For more coverage, go to NBC Washington
This story was originally published on Mon Jun 24, 2013 7:50 PM EDT


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Anyone grab multiple Anakin keys?
Those look great Jamie. If I'd been in on the ground floor, I probably would have collected these. Since I missed so many though, it's not something I want to chase down. Cool pic.
Especially since the secondary market is commanding a combined $650+ for all the keys I would need to complete the set.
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Not being familiar with the game (but interested,) I am a little unclear on what is needed. One of my computers easily blows apart the specs posted earlier, and I have 5Mbps uploads. Can I just run the server software on my machine and, what, open up some ports? Voila?
As I said, I have set something up although I'm not sure I have the settings 'right.' If someone wants to test connecting to it at 22.214.171.124 it would be much appreciated.
I recommend "gargamel". Take a walk in it yourself to gain an appreciation for how awesome it is.No Smurfs in it, though.


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ANNAPOLIS, Md. (WJZ) — The annual oyster harvest is underway in the bay and this year, there's a positive twist.
Alex DeMetrick reports it's shaping up to be the best harvest in a decade.
It's been years since Maryland watermen have pulled this many oysters out of the Chesapeake.
"We're having a fantastic oyster season this year, largely based on the spat set we had in 2010," said Mike Naylor, DNR Fisheries.
Spat are the baby oysters that set on other oyster shells and it takes just the right weather for a population explosion. Dry weather that plagues farmers is needed because less freshwater runs into the bay, increasing the salt levers and triggering oyster reproduction. But too much salt triggers the diseases that can wipe out whole bars.
The harvest underway now is the result of the bay balancing in the Goldilock zone: neither too salty nor too fresh.
"These oysters have had very little mortality over the last two years. They're now market size and we're seeing harvests double and maybe triple this year," Naylor said.
Doubling would mean 200,000 bushels this year; tripling would mean 300,000. It's the best harvest since the 1990s.
But oyster abundance has created a bit of a hitch: shucking houses are getting overwhelmed. Since this is where most of Maryland's catch ends up, shuckers are having a hard time keeping up.
Supply is also driving down the price watermen are paid, although after so many poor to mediocre years, few are complaining.
While the oyster harvest is up this year, it is still a fraction of what it once was before overfishing, pollution and disease wiped out most of the bay's oysters.
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New York Teachers Praise 1001 Inventions
Hundreds of New York Teachers Attend 1001 Inventions Event
New York, 3rd February 2011 - More than 400 teachers from the New York tri-state area attended a special "Open House" at New York Hall of Science (NYSCI) today, to enjoy a private viewing of the 1001 Inventions exhibition, which invited them to "Discover The Golden Age of Muslim Civilization".
Educators from New York city and even further afield braved the snow and ice, which has encumbered the US Eastern seaboard for more than a month, to visit the recently-opened blockbuster exhibition at New York's leading interactive science centre. The exhibition's residency at NYSCI marks the US premiere of the 1001 Inventions initiative.
Visitors were introduced to the "Golden Age" of Muslim civilization with a special screening of the award-winning educational film, 1001 Inventions and The Library of Secrets, starring Oscar-winning actor Ben Kingsley. Following which, school teachers were invited to explore the 10,000 square foot exhibition which is divided into seven zones representing different areas of science and invention.
Junaid Bhatti, Director of Marketing for 1001 Inventions, commented: "Both 1001 Inventions and NYSCI are overwhelmed with how many school teachers took time out to attend this private viewing. The feedback we've received has been wholly positive and we look forward to many of the teachers who came tonight visiting us again over the next few months and bringing with them students from their schools for organised field trips."
Prior to its arrival in the United States, the 1001 Inventions exhibition attracted record numbers of visitors during its residencies at the London Science Museum and Istanbul's Sultan Ahmed Square, with a combined audience of more than 1 million people experiencing the blockbuster installation during it's time in Europe.
The 1001 Inventions exhibition at NYSCI runs from December 2010 to the 24th of April 2011. Admission to 1001 Inventions is free with regular NYSCI admission ($11 adults, $8 children and seniors.)
Further details about 1001 Inventions can be found here.


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Dole Recalls Bagged Salad; Listeria Possibly Found
(NEW YORK) -- Dole says it is voluntarily recalling 1,039 cases of bagged salad after a random sample tested positive for the Listeria bacteria.
Dole Fresh Vegetables, a division of Dole Food Company, which is based in Westlake Village, Calif., issued the statement Wednesday evening, saying no illnesses have been reported in association with the recall.
The specific product being recalled is 10 oz. Dole Italian Blend, with a "Use-By" date of Aug. 20, distributed in eight U.S. states: Florida, Alabama, North Carolina, South Carolina, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Mississippi and Virginia.
The company said the recall is in response to an "isolated instance in which a sample of Dole Italian Blend salad yielded a positive result for Listeria monocytogenes in a random sample test conducted by the North Carolina Department of Agriculture."
However, Dan Ragan, director of the food and drug protection division of North Carolina's agriculture department, said the testing did not take place in the state. He said samples were sent to his state's agriculture department as part of a regular practice through the USDA's Microbiological Data Program, a national food-borne pathogen monitoring program implemented in 2001.
Ragan said he does not know where the sample originated or where the testing took place.
A request for comment from Dole was not immediately returned.
Last year, 30 people died after being infected with one of four outbreak-associated strains of the bacteria, Listeria moncytogenes, and one ill pregnant woman had a miscarriage, the Center for Disease Control reported. A total of 146 people from 28 states were reported to the CDC as infected.
Dole said in a statement that it was "coordinating closely" with regulatory officials.
Because the product is two days past its "Use-By" date, Dole said "it is highly unlikely that any product is still available at retail…."
But the company said, "Retailers should check their inventories and store shelves to confirm that none of the product is mistakenly present or available for purchase by consumers or in warehouse inventories."
Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio


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The Transcapitalist swan song: a summary of two years exploring the technology & free markets intersection
After 177 posts spanning nearly two years, Transcapitalist is going into hibernation. I have loved writing here, most of all for the opportunities to meet other people who think like me (and those who didn't and told me why). Highlights of the experience were co-hosting Tap the Collective with Inkling Markets, participating in Ignite DC and Ignite Baltimore with my talk Web Capitalism Doesn't Need a Bailout (a summary of the Transcapitalist philosophy), and having the opportunity to interview people at many of the companies that I most admire.
When I got started, there were three emerging constructs that really excited me: social lending, peer-to-peer e-commerce, and prediction markets. As this was late 2008 at the height of anti-market fervor in DC, what struck me about these platforms was that they were essentially distributed marketplaces, largely self-policing, transparent, efficient, community-driven, and enabled by the internet. At a time when much of the political rhetoric focused on how the market had failed, these seemed to be constructs that offered a purer and non-exploitative example of how market capitalism could and should work. Transcapitalist began with this idea – to explore the intersection of technology and free markets – with the presumption that the former had the potential to transform the latter and for the better.
My viewpoint evolved through the course of writing here and discussions with others, but I still think that web capitalism has a lot to offer our traditional view of market dynamics. I've summarized my thinking on these topics below, linking heavily to previous posts with more detailed coverage.
In the face of tightened financial conditions, new investing and borrowing mechanisms are emerging ranging from the "personal IPO" to crowdfunding. Peer-to-peer lending remains a viable alternative to banks for both borrowing and lending at small scales with better rates for both sides of the transaction.
Largely in response to the credit crunch and the restrictions of the current financial marketplace, interesting financial innovations emerged over the past few years. We were particularly intrigued by the new concept of selling a percentage of your future income in exchange for a cash investment up front, which I referred to alternatively as the Personal IPO, or "taking yourself public" or "selling your personal equity".
Another emerging construct which holds promise is crowdfunding. We came out early with enthusiasm for Kickstarter, a platform to match creators and artists with funding through, and we've been thrilled to see it take off ever since. The first real example at scale was set by Trampoline which sough to crowdsource its Series B funding. We loved the trend for mobile payments like Square for merchants and Venmo for repaying friends. More troubling financial innovation is on display at eToro which aims to create a "Zynga for real men" in the world of foreign exchange trading.
However the most prominent innovation is in p2p lending which experienced great change over the past two years as they sought to create an entirely new financial product and asset class. The original innovators Lending Club and Prosper Marketplace made it successfully through the SEC process (which at the time was far from certain as Prosper alternatively opened and closed), while promising privacy-focused hybrid upstart Pertuity Direct folded. What began as a platform to browse individual profiles prone to adverse selection is now a more scalable steamlined dashboard experience to select target characteristics from vetted borrowers in order to create a custom portfolio. Since opening my Lending Club account, my discussions with their team and continuing healthy returns (~10%) encouraged me to expand my portfolio, and I plan to keep up my investments there for some time to come. The appeal of p2p lending is that it is simple and commonsense: by cutting out the middleman of the bank and lending directly, investors earn better returns and borrowers pay lower rates. Why give that spread to the bank? However, even with high interest rates and the credit crunch, p2p lending has not gone mainstream. Uncrunch America was an effort by a coalition of non-traditional finance platforms to encourage people to look beyond the bank, but it's not clear that the message was heard.
More niche markets also emerged to mixed results. Yadyap ("payday" spelled backwards), which aims to provide an alternative to the payday lending market, has yet to get off the ground. On the other hand, People Capital has secured significant financing and during my interview with them, they impressed me greatly with their concept of a Human Capital Index to replace the FICO as the credit evaluation metric for young people. Unithrive seeks to connect Harvard students with alumni who can provide interest-free loans. Vittana targets helping students in the developing world.
Internationally, internet-enabled market-based practices are introducing new concepts to traditional international development approaches.
Muhammed Yunus, godfather of the microfinance movement, pointed out that Grameen Bank's microfinance investments performed steadily through the financial downturn where other lending arrangements failed and could be a means to "return the economy to health". I keep a small amount of money with MicroPlace, interest-bearing investments in microfinance institutions in Nicaragua and Uzbekistan, which each send me $0.50 or so every month.
In China, p2p lending is a nascent movement, as CreditEase offers a p2p lending platform to institutionalize informal lending practices, and Qifang employs clever cultural pressures for repayment, including posting the pictures of family members to shame defaulting customers.
I greatly admire Acumen Fund's approach to international development, which seeks to invest in targeted local ventures, providing an example of a free market solution providing social good. And one of the top startups of the past couple of years is socially responsible outsourcing nonprofit Samasource which encourages you to "give work" through paying the poor to do online tasks.
New e-commerce platforms have the potential to cut out the middleman to directly connect small-scale sellers and buyers, but many remain in the realm of gimmick.
Etsy remains one of the most amazing and promising sites on the web. A destination for handmade goods which defied the odds to become the fastest growing e-commerce site, I covered it a full 20 times. It's a prime example of an open marketplace, from its open API to the Community Council that brings the buyer and seller community together to talk about the future of Etsy, and it serves the artisan community well. Its blog encouraged me to join the outcry against the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act, and I argued that the community-enforced handmade standards of the Etsy community were an approach to support, not smother with regulation.
I was an early fan of Groupon with absolutely no idea of how huge it would become just a year and half later, but my opinion now is considerably tempered. Also out there with innovative selling platforms are the cleverness of Gilt Groupe and the fast purchase decisions made through online sample sales, the scam-like approach of Swoopo, and gaming travel deals on Off and Away.
Crowdsourcing is opening up problems sets previously thought as being too complex for non-"professionals" resulting in more efficient and open approaches.
Netflix set the model for challenge competitions as it successfully crowdsourced the improvement of its recommendation algorithm, setting off a trend within government to procure technology and approaches through contests, saving taxpayer dollars. Other crowdsourcing projects we enjoyed included:
- Peer-to-Patent, an effort to open the patent examination process to the public, providing transparency to all and improving the process by collaboratively engaging the scientific community in patent right decisions
- The attempt by Freerisk to open up the credit rating process under the principle that own open data and transparent, crowdsourced calculations can provide more accurate risk modeling of the assets that underpin our financial framework
- Crowsourced micro-volunteerism at the Extraordinaries
- Quirky, a fun place for aspiring product designers to participate in a collective creativity platform and bring real products to the market
- Crowdrise, a combination of social networking and fundraising
However, when I was ambivalent about its application in crowdsourced design sites such as 99 Designs, I received an unexpected outpouring of support from the design community and a simultaneous beatingon HackerNews by those who believed that this was simply a more efficient marketplace. I was less sympathetic to the artists' cause when they rallied against the Australian government's decision to seek citizen photos for its website rather than professionals'.
I was generally unimpressed with crowdsourced Q&A sites like Yahoo Answers, Mahalo, and Aardvark; however, Quora seems to be on to something.
Crowdsourcing was also applied in dumb, troubling, or useless ways, including:
- One Book One Twitter, or #1b1t, a crowdsourced book group on Twitter
- "Human Flesh Search Engines" – terrifying, kind of also awesome crowdsourced vigilatism
- Polling for facts regarding terrorism on Sean Hannity's website
And finally, the two posts that didn't fit into any clear bucket, but which were the two most read and commented upon posts on Transcapitalist …
After the first release of classified documents, I came out strongly against Wikileaks with "How Wikileaks threatens transparency", arguing that its actions threatened transparency where it really mattered: between government agencies. All commenters both on my site and on HackerNews disagreed strongly, but I still stand fully behind my original opinion: with the latest release, we see exactly the closing down of information channels that I feared.
"Markets at Burning Man" explored my personal experience of the gift economy on the playa and the contrast of the commercialism that is in the outside world before and after the event. The post started a fascinating thread on HackerNews by fellow Burners and Burning Man novices alike.
Thanks for reading and keep in touch.


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Free shipping continues above € 99
Free shipping continues above € 99
Part of the large family of steel objects with minimalist appeal, for the table service conceived by Jasper Morrison from 2000 onwards.
Born in London in 1959, he studied design at Royal College of Art and at the HdK in Berlin. Editor of the Design Year Book 1999 with a passion for the history of design, Morrison designs for Cappellini, Vitra, Magis, Flos, Rosenthal and Sony.


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If you live in nyc and love french macaroons and like to bake you might have noticed or heard me complaining that the macaroon making classes at dessert truck works fill up almost immediately after announcement. Everyone must be very busy with the approaching holiday because two Sundays ago the husband and I were able to attend a workshop.
French Macaroons are notoriously difficult to make. The class didn't focus so much on the recipe as it did technique. It was a very informative class. (We made another batch over the weekend and I felt like I knew what I was doing.) We talked alot about what to look for in texture and consistency during each stage of the recipe and how to troubleshoot. Here are some of the more important points:
- Don't rush, just be patient.
- Use aged egg whites. Separate them 3-5 days before baking, let them age in the fridge.
- Eggs of happy chickens will need more like 5 days
- make sure your meringue is fully formed (glossy and holds in the whisk when held up)
- Humidity is not your friend. It increased meringue production and drying time.
- fold in dry ingredients, fold as to not deflate batter
- use powder flavor or gel food coloring, can be added anytime
- use a silicone baking mat or parchment paper to line you baking sheet
- pipe & space uniformly for even baking.
- piping: squeeze to form circle, stop squeezing, flick pipe tip away with conviction
- if piped circles look like hershey kisses, pound on the bottom of the tray to flatten
- let them dry before baking. test for readiness by lightly touching one, should feel like an eggshell.
That said, let's get started.
White French Macaroons, from dessert truck works/cathcart & reddy
Makes 25 sandwiched macaroons / 50 discs
125 g blanched almond flour
125 g confectioners sugar
50 g egg whites, aged and at room temperature
50 g egg whites, aged and at room temperature
110 g granutated sugar
Whisk almond flour and confectioners sugar until well mixed and without lumps. Set aside.
In a large metal mixing bowl, over a simmering water bath, vigorously whisk together 50 g egg whites and sugar, adding sugar slowly, for 30 seconds. Stiff peaks will form. If whisking by hand, this could take an hour.
With a rubber spatula, fold in almond flour, sugar and 50 g egg whites until all incorporated into the meringue. Also add any food coloring or flavoring if you haven't done so already. The final mix should be homogenous and have a thick viscosity: imagine the mixture is like cooling lava, gradually inching over a cold surface, and flattening ever so slightly as it comes to rest. If the mixture is too stiff, fold in 1 tablespoon egg white at a time until you reach proper consistency.
Transfer the macaroon mixture into a piping bag fitted with a straight tip, size #805. On a full sized non stick sheet pan, 18"x 13", lined with a silicone baking mat or parchement paper, pipe silver dollar sized discs. Set the sheet pan aside and allow the surface of the macroons to dry, anywhere from 1/2 hour to 2 hours, depending on humidity.
Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Bake macarooms for approximately 15 minutes. turning the pan halfway through. The macaroons are finished when the tops are firm, dry and the foamy base is dry as well. Let cool.
Gently run an offset spatula underneath each macroon to release it from the liner. They are very fragile, try not to crack them. Pair macaroons by sizem lining them up next to each other, with one of the pair sitting with the interior (what was the bottom) facing up. Pipe your desired filling onto that macaroon and sandwich it with the other half of the macaroon pair.
For fillings, consider jams, marmalades, butter creams, peanut butter, ganaches, nutella or even ice cream. We made some this weekend and filled some with a citrus curd and others with a coffee caramel.


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Dow's Black Friday: Up Triple Digits
The Dow posted a triple-digit rise, led by rebounds from a trio of tech stocks, in an abbreviated session following the Thanksgiving holiday. Jonathan Cheng reports on The News Hub. Photo: AP.
This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.
... the the ... what about the new sub at the yes J live it's time to take a quick look like it's that's the big four ... hundred and seventy three points or one point three five percent this ... light trading day was subdued session and as the Nasdaq up one point four percent and the ... SNP up one point three percent Wall Street Journal's Jonathan Cheng birthday boy himself ... is on the sex of the book they sank deeper into what you both to ... do much to do that one in of the Dow ... rallies on my behalf so will hopefully open Richard an eye on you but I am a little bit of cadavers ... look we got a hundred seventy three points is how do they imagine if we had a full day traders and those with wheat in it now but ... one that they would need to spend a lot slower to get to go up ... maybe this is good we got we got some data of the night right this is about manufacturing in China and that you know how to stride Rite Aid and this is just smoothing over some concerns about the slowdown in China in the case of that mean nobody wants to see China ... so too quickly even though I think it's inevitable that that there will be some slowdown we can keep growing at the rate that we've seen over the past ... decade of course so ... I think if you can moderate a little but I think that will take away the feeder ... nom same with yells of elements of us but we're still ... waiting for but really I think the story of the day with technology ... that's a sector that's just been beaten up over the past few weeks ... and this was its first winning week and had so ... you know it was ... good for ... your Hewlett-Packard hse today not this week one day needs of how the US the US company outside the Micra soft Cisco Systems Intel all the new welcome and none of these guys are ... are are the apples are you new ... cloud computing companies or anything like this and the ECB would know what the company is going to everyday life from fridge is in things like that so I mean they they were not done this in a sling and economic oh that's right and to be together with consumer discretionary and retail stocks have been leading the way this resistance registered with the did the best things you don't need to find the you might want to buy REITs his disciples those we have to buy a bright light you know that such ... that the stock ... that's right so as you know when we talk alot about life writing that's that's its best dispose of the stocks that were talkin about so ... those two have really been store this week and down ... that did me down for the stock market in general after the election because things were not looking good after the election ... it seemed a good and now I'm pretty consistent with the action scenes of town right now ... we know this is my dead cat bounce ... which is which is the thing was comes down ... owing anything that the cap bounce this one right as of its own ... right well that this is ... looking like a pretty nice pants because it looks like it was pre flat for a while after its big decline but ... look again at this and the Congress of Santa what happens there because that's what ... people are thinking about and they got ... a nice week because of what ... John Bean are and what sound him into close you know he's the congressional leaders said last Friday ... now we all know that the orifice fight this week so we give them ... to give them the benefit of the doubt ... but come on they wouldn't be looking for some sort of you know concrete advice ... evidence that there's some sort of ... the media ... we want we want them to do it we we don't wanna give this a Senate seat ... good stuff hopefully we get a thank you my much Jonathan Cheng and everybody to see the Fed was semi


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Renewed fight begins for bill to ban texting and driving
It was supposed to be a joyous occasion. Russell Hurd and his wife were waiting for his 26-year-old daughter Heather and her fiancé at Walt Disney World on Jan. 3, 2008, to meet with a wedding planner.
But the young couple never arrived.
Heather, who worked for the theme park, was killed, and her fiancé injured, in a nine-car crash caused by a 61-year-old tractor trailer driver who was distracted by his company's electronic messaging device.
Margay Schee, of Ocala, was 13 when a truck driver talking on his cellphone hit her school bus, which was stopped with its flashers blinking. Margay was pinned under the seat, the bus caught fire, and she was trapped inside.
Steve Augello, of Spring Hill, started worrying when his 17-year-old daughter Allessandra was late getting home from a play rehearsal. Allessandra was hit head-on by a 19-year-old girl who was believed to be texting her boyfriend.
Three scenarios, same lethal outcome: victims killed by drivers distracted by cellphones, a problem outgoing U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood has called a "deadly epidemic."
Thirty-nine states ban text messaging for all drivers. Five states ban teens from texting while driving. Florida, on the other hand, is one of six states without a texting ban for drivers.
Sen. Nancy Detert, R-Venice, and Rep. Doug Holder, R-Sarasota, have been sponsoring texting bans for years without success, but they're pushing hard again this year.
Detert's Senate bill passed its first committee stop and is moving up the legislative chain. Holder's companion bill will be introduced early March. "I think this is the year that the Legislature is willing to move on it," Detert said.
There's strong support for a ban. The Florida sheriffs' and police chiefs' associations, the Florida League of Cities and a host of other groups support legislation to curb texting while driving.
A majority of 800 registered Florida voters — 71 percent — said last year that they supported a texting while driving ban in a Tampa Bay Times/Miami Herald/Bay News 9 poll.
"The stars may be lining up for something bold here," said Sen. Tom Lee, R-Brandon, who voted for Detert's bill but voiced concerns that it needed more teeth.
The proposal by Detert and Holder makes texting while driving a secondary offense, which means a driver caught messaging has to commit another offense, such as speeding or running a stop sign, before an officer can stop the driver.
Once stopped, a driver could receive two tickets, one for the infraction and one for texting. The fine would be $30 for a first-time texting offense, $60 if it occurs again within five years. Amendments would allow texting in hands-off high-tech cars and when a car is stopped at a red light or in a traffic jam.
More than 100,000 crashes a year involve drivers who are texting, according to the National Safety Council. When people text and drive, their eyes are down for an average of 4.6 seconds. At 55 miles per hour, that's like "being blind" while driving the length of a football field, Detert said.
Other bills are also moving through the Legislature.
Sen. Maria Sachs, D-Delray Beach, is sponsoring legislation that would make texting or using a cellphone without a hands-free device a primary offense for drivers.
Rep. Irv Slosberg, D-Boca Raton, has filed two bills. One would make it vehicular homicide if someone using an electronic device caused a fatal crash. The other would prohibit anyone under 18 from using a "wireless communications device or telephone."
A 2012 State Farm survey found that more than 57 percent of teens with a driver's license admitted to texting while driving, though advocates said the problem is hardly limited to teens.
One of the most compelling speakers at a recent House workshop on the matter was North Marion High student body president Wesley Sapp.
Sapp formed a group called Drive for Life after 10 North Marion students or graduates died in accidents in a five-year span. "We didn't feel like we should be attending our friends' funerals," or "having a moment of silence" way too often, Sapp told legislators.
His Drive for Life group began a statewide initiative to educate students on "what was happening — how our decisions behind the wheel are affecting our lives and others."
The loss of his friend, Margay Schee, has also motivated him to speak out against distracted driving. The day she died, "it was a bright and sunny September day and Margay was on her bus coming home from school like any day," he said. "The bus was at a complete stop and the lights were flashing. The bus was struck from the back by a semi driver. … She was just 13 years old."
"Margay's mother will never see her graduate, her mother will never watch her get married or go to college," Sapp said. "It takes a lot to remember what her smile looks like, it takes a lot to remember what her voice sounds like, what that little sparkle in her eye looked like."
Making texting illegal will help change habits, Sapp said. Using a seat belt is "second nature," to his generation and eventually using a cellphone while driving "won't be acceptable."
Asking legislators to pass the texting ban, Sapp told them: "It will save the lives of your loved ones and your children's children."
Contact Rochelle Koff at firstname.lastname@example.com.


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Like many professional riders, Erin Sylvester can tell you that it takes one special horse to launch your career, and she's found just that with No Boundaries. The pair finished 13th at their first four-star at Rolex Kentucky this spring and went on to complete the Land Rover Burghley CCI**** this fall, but it's been a long road for Sylvester, full of trial and error, heartbreak and determination.
Sylvester, 27, grew up in Hingham, Mass., a suburb of Boston. From an early age, she was horse crazy. Her parents put her on a horse at age 2, and by 4 she was in riding lessons. Her family lived just a few miles away from eventer Elizabeth Iorio, and the then-15-year-old agreed to teach Sylvester. "I can't imagine how she did it and how she kept my focus. I must have been like a little bouncing ball," Sylvester said. From there, she joined the North River Pony Club, eventually earning her C-2 rating.
After 11 years of lessons and moving up the levels, Sylvester bought her first serious event horse, Wily Wizard, who had been Iorio's three-star horse. She took him through the intermediate level before he was retired to the lower levels in 2003. "He tried his heart out. He knew the sport so well that if I made a mistake, he'd run out or stop. Otherwise, he was a very honest horse and really allowed me to learn what I needed to do at bigger fences and combinations," she said. While the gelding incurred some injuries over their three years together, he proved to be a valuable partner. "In retrospect, I wish I knew a little bit more when I had him. I was a bit green about dealing with conditioning and soundness. That kind of thing comes with experience I think. Soundness with horses is sort of trial and error," Sylvester said.
Location, Location, Location
When it came time to choose a college her senior year of high school, Sylvester's only criteria was that it was near a top trainer. While she'd never worked with him, Phillip Dutton was first on her list, so she applied and got in early to the University of Delaware, which was within commuting distance to Dutton's True Prospect Farm in West Grove, Pa. While she was positive she wanted to ride throughout college and become a professional, she was a bit shocked when she got to Dutton's and realized her skills were lacking.
"I guess I was taking a chance because I didn't know if I would get on with him as a student, and I think at times I drove him pretty crazy because at that point in his career, and still now, he spends most of his time teaching intermediate and advanced riders that have their own programs," she said. "He sees talent and potential in them to be really great riders, and I was, for lack of a better word, a bit of a hooligan. I didn't have any concept of counting strides in between fences or seeing a distance. I knew how to sit up and kick and hold on and get stuff done. I was lucky to be on catty horses until I got there. It was definitely a work in progress for him when he first started working with me, just having the patience to [teach me] some really basic things that I should have known before I got there and that I'd kind of gotten away with not understanding."
Sylvester brought a new horse with her to Dutton's, Landsear, a Thoroughbred gelding she bought in 2003 after he'd done his first prelim. At the same time, she spent her freshman year of college making friends, traveling to Europe and "living the experience. Once I did that, I was ready to get down to business and work on my riding more," she said. Sylvester majored in international relations and specialized in Latin American studies.
"I'm embarrassed to say I have not used much of my degree at all," she joked, although she admits she's still fluent in Spanish.
Landsear proved to be another good learning horse, taking Sylvester to her first CIC and CCI**'s. They completed one advanced horse trial together in 2007 right after Sylvester graduated, but the gelding was struck by lightning and killed. "It was a very tragic thing, and it was devastating. That's the lowest that I've ever felt, because when you have a horse like that, it's so hard. He was my first top level horse, and he taught me so much. He had a lot of heart," she said.
Along the way, Sylvester had found Armani IV (Darn That Alarm—Chanson de Roland), a "very big, very green, pretty rambunctious" Thoroughbred gelding. She'd also started to work more with Boyd Martin, who had just moved to the area from Australia and was working for Dutton. "They're both trainers and mentors to me, and I'm very lucky to have them in my life. They have an incredible amount of knowledge, and they're very willing to help riders that are coming along," she said.
Armani settled as he matured, and he and Sylvester had a string of successful years together, including a sixth-placed finish at the Bromont CCI** (Quebec) in 2009. "He's a very special jumper. He seemed very bold and game for the cross-country," she said. "He was the first horse that put me on the map as an advanced-level event rider. He was the first horse that I brought on from no experience. A lot of what I did with him was trial and error. He's such a scopey jumper that you can make a mistake here and there, and he's always going to take care of you, though he might buck on the landing to let you know that you shouldn't do that again."
A New Leaf
After graduating from college in 2007, Sylvester came across a teaching position at Fox Brook Farm in Unionville, Pa., where she stayed for four years.
Around the same time, Sylvester was bringing along another project horse, No Boundaries. Originally bought by Christine Price as a dressage prospect but bred to be an eventer, "Bucky" decided that life inside a white rectangle was not for him, so Sylvester took the Thoroughbred on as a resale project. "He seemed to move well enough and jump well enough a fair amount of the time. Honestly, I really didn't believe in him that much until he went to a two-star," Sylvester admitted.
Bucky, whose nickname is just a coincidence even though he did buck a lot as a young horse, proved to be a challenge for his rider. "He was wild as a young horse. He had rails down all the time and would vacillate on cross-country between running really well and just being bonkers," she said.
Sylvester started to see a change in Bucky at the Fair Hill CCI** (Md.) in 2010, where he finished in 10th place. "He was so easy to ride around, it was unreal. It's a taxing course with the terrain, and I just thought, 'I can't imagine that this horse couldn't go advanced,' " she said.
By 2011, he'd matured enough to move up to advanced. "He took a deep breath and settled down. Something clicked in his brain on cross-country, and he figured out how to gallop and how to look for fences and not be wild. It was kind of smooth sailing since then," said Sylvester. "He's a good horse on the flat and wants to try hard, but sometimes his nerves get the best of him. He has all the heart in the world for cross-country."
By the end of 2011, Sylvester felt that a four-star could be a feasible target. She headed down to Aiken, S.C, with the "cautious goal of doing it." A strong season, including an eighth-placed finish at The Fork CIC*** (N.C.), solidified her decision to send in her entry to Rolex Kentucky. "This spring season was the best season that he had. He just went out every course feeling a little bit better and little bit more confident," she said.
Despite working on her dressage with Silva Martin, Sylvester was discouraged with her test at Kentucky. "He always puts in a competitive test, but I think the crowd and the atmosphere got the best of him about halfway through his test," she said.
She was able to put that behind her on cross-country day, even though there was a lot of trouble on course early on. "The two riders that went before me fell off, and I'm hearing this on the announcements right as I'm going into the start box," she said. "When you hear that happening, you kind of have to turn it off and have your plan for how your ride's going to go, and I did just that."
One of seven double-clear cross-country rounds and one rail down put them in 13th place by Sunday afternoon. "If you had told me that No Boundaries was my first Rolex horse when I bought him, I would have told you that you were crazy," she said. "The idea to go to Burghley came the Sunday afternoon of Rolex," she said with a laugh.
A Whirlwind Year
Over the summer, Sylvester and fellow Chester County rider Kate Hicks held fundraisers to help them get to the Land Rover Burghley CCI**** (England). Getting participation was easy; Sylvester has a built-in support crew of students at Ferideh Farm in Cochranville, Pa., where she runs Lilybridge Eventing, plus the active eventing community in Chester County.
Between a jumper derby at Plantation Field (Pa.), a silent auction and two jumper shows at Sylvester's farm, the two were able to raise close to $50,000, which nearly paid for the entire trip. "We put our best effort forward, and it was pretty inspiring to see the amount of effort in the community to help us get there. It wasn't one big check that someone wrote to help us get there, it was participation," said Sylvester.
Sylvester and Bucky ended their weekend at Burghley in 52nd with a run-out on cross-country and four rails down, but the experience was invaluable to the young professional. "My weekend didn't go quite as smoothly as Rolex did, and it was huge learning curve," she said. "Putting [the run-out] aside, I was so happy to be able to complete. I had a really tired horse on Sunday for show jumping, but I was really glad I was able to push through that.
"It's a very humbling experience being over in that world of competition because the quality of riders is really impressive. I just tried to soak in as much as could, watching people ride and watching what they do with their warm-ups," she continued.
Sylvester is surprised and humbled at how far she's come before she's 30. "This has been a whirlwind year, and I can't believe I've completed two four-stars. It's very inspiring and makes me want to do more and makes me push harder with all of my other horses. I didn't expect to be this far along in my career at this age," she said.
"A few years ago, I was a little bit lost, and I didn't have as much going on after Landsear died. I feel very lucky to be where I am now and to have the horses I have now. Everybody knows that it takes the luck of one really good horse to put you on the map. You absolutely have to put the work and the time into getting there, but you have to hope and pray that that horse comes along, and I'm really lucky to have that in Bucky," she said.


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Nugget's early paintings were all full page extravaganzas. He would fill every space on the page with strokes and colour usually showing a nice balance, but never pushing any boundaries.
|Nugget - Aged almost 3
Nowadays, it is all about
Doo-Dah has had a penchant for large swirls and splashes of colour.
|Doo Dah - Aged 3 and a bit
Dew Drop's paintings are all about lines - horizontal and vertical strokes with barely a wave in them. He is all business.
The Minx loves dots. Her works resemble Aboriginal dot paintings at times, where she splashes the brush persistently against the paper to create a shape (it is rarely recognisable as an object however). She loves her work and paints with vigour and a smile.
Like all other areas of development, my children have shown their different personalities. It is such a wonderful gift to be given the opportunity to watch these unique people grow. Who knows if one of them will become an artist of note but I love that they all think they are now!
I wonder when we become conscious of our artistic talents (or lack there of)? When do we stop painting like no-one is judging?
Do you have a Picasso or perhaps a Dali in your family?
PS: Six items or less update - having trouble getting photos sorted of my six items (probably because I am always wearing some of them and my camera is in hiding). Will continue to try and post stat.
PPS: No photos of the twin's paintings available - will add to post once I find that camera!


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Child Protective Services is trying to figure out why eight children in Dallas were left alone in a home and later dropped off at a fire station.
CPS investigators have located and are talking with the mother of the eight children, aged 3 to 12, who were reportedly left alone Sunday morning at a house in Oak Cliff.
Police said two women who described themselves as acquaintances from church had gone over to the family's house to check on the children and did not find their mother at the house.
Around 7 a.m., the women dropped the children off at the fire station at 745 West Illinois in Dallas.
Dallas Fire-Rescue told NBC 5 that the children were at the station for about 40 minutes before police and Child Protective Services responded. Firefighters fed and entertained the children before they were taken into custody.
The children could not tell investigators how long they had been on their own.
All eight siblings are now in foster care and in good health. The children will remain in foster care temporarily while the investigation continues, according to CPS spokesperson Marissa Gonzales.
Investigators would not comment on what, if any, explanation was provided by the mother for leaving the children. CPS did not reveal if the mother would face charges.
NBC 5's Reginald Hardwick, Catherine Ross, and Kendra Lyn contributed to this report.


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Walking the Talk: IRONMAN's All World Athletes
IRONMAN employees share personal tips for balancing a busy career with triathlon training and racing.
by Kara Deschenes
IRONMAN recently announced the winners of the All World Athlete awards, and if the company's enthusiasm for the program wasn't already evident, we've got proof positive. Five of IRONMAN's own employees (including Chief Executive Officer, Andrew Messick) scored top honors for the 2013 season, making award status an office rivalry. Check out their stories and learn about their insider tips for balancing a busy career with training and racing.
Andrew Messick, IRONMAN CEO
AWA award: Bronze (70.3)
2013 races: 70.3 Auckland and 70.3 Philippines.
Season highlights: "Both races I competed in were fabulous in different ways. I loved the urban settings of both, where Auckland's waterfront course offered amazing views and the Philippines provided crowd support like no other race in the world."
Advice for balancing work and training: "Make your workouts a priority and a non-negotiable in your schedule. If you travel a lot, like I do, focus on cycling while you're home and running while on the road. I've also learned to book accommodations based on a hotel's pool. Packing running shoes and a pair of goggles is a simple way to ensure I can train on the road."
Lessons learned from racing: "Racing has helped me redefine what's possible. I wasn't a particularly good swimmer before I started racing, but I learned a new skill—proof you can teach an old dog new tricks!"
Fun fact: "Racing is a luxury for me. It's one of the only times in my crazy, busy life that I am without my phone for an extended block of time and I love it!"
2014 race line-up: "I started an office challenge for IRONMAN 70.3 Florida this year to encourage IRONMAN employees to get out and race. I'll be competing on the bike leg of the race, while I recruited two former college athletes to take the swim and run. To kick the competition up a notch, we've issued a bigger challenge: any TriClub team who beats my team will get a prize. Bragging rights are at stake, so I'm planning to give that race my best!"
Frankie McDermond, Executive Challenge Logistics Manager
AWA award: Bronze (overall) and Silver (70.3)
2013 races: 5150 St. Anthony's, 70.3 St. George, IRONMAN Lanzarote, IRONMAN 70.3 Raleigh, IRONMAN 70.3 Augusta and IRONMAN Cozumel.
Best training advice: "Keep your workouts fun and enjoyable!"
Lessons learned from racing: "I'm stronger than I think I am. You learn a lot about yourself especially when the day takes a turn on you, it's how you finish the day that counts!"
Insider tips: "Race within yourself and finish strong. Stay positive and focused and don't be ashamed if the plan falls apart—the finish line will be just as sweet no matter when you cross it."
2014 race line-up: IRONMAN 70.3 St. Croix, IRONMAN 70.3 Raleigh, IRONMAN Louisville, IRONMAN Chattanooga
Elizabeth Kollar, Athlete Development Director and Special Programs Manager
AWA award: Silver (70.3)
2013 races: IRONMAN 70.3 Florida, IRONMAN 70.3 Syracuse, IRONMAN Lake Placid and IRONMAN World Championship.
Season highlights: "Winning my age group at IRONMAN Florida 70.3 and scoring podium finishes at IRONMAN Syracuse 70.3 and IRONMAN Lake Placid felt pretty amazing, but nothing beats racing at the IRONMAN World Championship in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii alongside my 80-year-old dad."
Advice for balancing work and training: "I get up early (4 am) to ensure my workouts happen. Waiting until the end of the day opens more opportunity to bail on training after a long day."
Lesson learned from racing: "Anything is Possible, of course!"
Pre- and post-race rituals: "Even though my friends think I'm nuts, I always shower before a race while pumping high-energy music. After a race, I like to take a bit of time to relax before heading back to the finish line to cheer on the final finishers—nothing is more inspiring than their determination."
2014 race line-up: IRONMAN 70.3 Florida, IRONMAN Texas, IRONMAN 70.3 Eagleman, IRONMAN 70.3 Timberman and a few little off-road events (just so I can get dirty!).
Jennifer Ward Barber, North American Editor
AWA award: Gold (70.3), Silver (overall), and Bronze, (IRONMAN).
2013 races: IRONMAN Los Cabos, IRONMAN St. George, IRONMAN 70.3 Vineman and IRONMAN 70.3 Austin.
Season highlights: "I raced IRONMAN Los Cabos last March to get my "A-race" over before the busiest part of the season. I clocked the fastest female amateur bike split, which I'll hold forever now that the course has changed!"
Advice for balancing work and training: "There's not a very big of divide between the two. I've assigned articles to writers on bike rides and come up with ideas the middle of long runs. I start my days early, either training or responding to emails from colleagues on East Coast time. I squeeze in extra work hours after dinner if need be and on the weekends while relaxing after a long ride."
Lessons learned from racing: "That I don't have a very good memory for pain. Also, that I need adventure, accomplishment and advancement in my life—and racing does that for me." Insider tip: "Stalk Ironman.com for the latest triathlon training tips and news (shameless plug!) No, really, being knee-keep in the awesome and informative training and nutrition content on Ironman.com helps me. You should try it."
2014 race line-up: IRONMAN South Africa and IRONMAN Whistler. I also hope to do IRONMAN 70.3 in Syracuse, which is where I did my Masters in Journalism.
Meghan Henry, IRONMAN Foundation Intern
AWA award: Bronze (overall)
2013 races: IRONMAN 70.3 Florida, IRONMAN Lake Placid and IRONMAN World Championship.
Season highlights: "After qualifying for Kona at IRONMAN Lake Placid, my IRONMAN World Championship experience was a sacred moment in my life. As the youngest 2013 female competitor, I had no idea how my journey would unfold. The race was pure hell, pushing me into the darkest spot to overcome the pain and misery. In the end, the race experience was the most rewarding finishes because of how much I had to endure to score a personal best.
Advice for balancing work and training: Establish priorities, but know that you will have to make sacrifices.
Insider tip: If you are looking to snag a win, scout out your competition. Know their weaknesses and strengths. Memorize their race numbers. Knowing you're passing your competition helps put extra pep in your step.
2014 race line-up: IRONMAN 70.3 St. George and IRONMAN Whistler.Want to learn more about IRONMAN's All World Athlete program? Find the award levels and categories, here.
Kara Deschenes is a health and fitness freelance writer living in Tampa, FL. For her latest musings in the endurance world, follow her @KaraDeschenes


text:
doesn't matter you've admitted about the DN and anyway where have you done that and to whom? by assignment arrows are the creditor regardless to your acking of that fact or not.
By shamrocker · PostedI wouldn't worry. It's not critical.
Just ignore the letter. Block/bounce their emails or let them come through so you know what they're up to, and keep us posted............. 😎
Thanks DX, I've already admitted that a default notice was served in 2010 by MBNA, so it seems I might be left hoping that they're unable to produce the original CCA. I've never acknowledged Arrrow as the creditor and continue to pay MBNA. Is that in my favour? Cheers, Richard.
For PCN's received through the post [ANPR camera capture] please answer the following questions. 1 Date of the infringement 10/07/2019 2 Date on the NTK [this must have been received within 14 days from the 'offence' date] 12/07/19 3 Date received 13/07/19 4 Does the NTK mention schedule 4 of The Protections of Freedoms Act 2012? [Y/N?/ Yes 5 Is there any photographic evidence of the event? yes 6 Have you appealed? [Y/N?] post up your appeal] yes Have you had a response? [Y/N?] post it up yes 7 Who is the parking company? Civil enforcement 8. Where exactly [carpark name and town] 10B QUEENS ROAD, CONSETT, DH8 0BH For either option, does it say which appeals body they operate under. Yes ………………….. This is what I sent to CE appeal in my own words Reason For Appeal: Firstly I had an appointment at that time with the dentist. My last visit 2 years ago the car park was free and was not aware of the new parking system. The sign at the front is very obscure especially turning right into the car park. Where I did park, the sign opposite was turned 90 degrees making it hard to see. The door at the surgery was wedged open when I entered not realizing there was a sign relating to the new system . I cannot remember if there was any signs inside the surgery but once in I always pick up a magazine to read until the dentist is ready to see me. My statement and evidence to POPLA. in response to CE evidence highlighting main arguments. Par 18 . The image submitted from the Appellant of a sign slightly turned is still readable and is not obscured...….. Me Not from where I was parked. A photo from the bay shows a pole with the sign facing away. Par 18 . Furthermore, it highlights that the Appellant was aware of the signage on the site and failed to comply with the terms and conditions regardless....... Me I treat this paragraph with contempt. There is nothing to "highlight" here as I maintain I did not see any signage; Regardless ? I could have legally parked right outside the Surgery as there were spaces at the time but having "regard" for disabled and elderly, parked further away having to cross a busy road to the Surgery. Par 20....,. Furthermore, the Appellant failed to utilise the operator's helpline phone number,,, (displayed at the bottom of signage) to report the occurrence, or to request advice on what further action could be taken.... Me How could I have done this ? I only realized there were signs there when the PCN arrived. Summary. I stand by statements and maintain that I did not see any signage entering or leaving the car park. The main sign at the entrance is too small and easily missed when you have to turn right though busy traffic and once through carefully avoid pedestrians, some walking their dogs. The main sign is blank at the back. When you leave the car park I would have noticed the private parking rules if the writing was on both sides. Roadworks signs close to the parking sign at the time did not help either. [see photo] CE evidence is flawed, illegal and contemptuous. Photos submitted are from months ago, Today I have driven into the car park and noticed the same signs turned 90 degrees including the one opposite my bay. CE have done nothing to rectify this disregarding my evidence and the maintenance of the car park. Showing number plates is a total disregard to patients privacy and I object to these photos being allowed as evidence on the grounds that they may be illegal. POPLAS assessment and decision....unsuccessful Assessor summary of operator case The operator states that the appellant's vehicle was parked on site without a permit. It has issued a parking charge notice (PCN) for £100 as a result. Assessor summary of your case The appellant states that he parked on site to attend a dental appointment. He states that the terms of the site had changed since the last time he parked two years ago. He states that signage at the entrance to and throughout the site did not make the terms clear. The appellant has provided various photographs taken on and around the site. Assessor supporting rational for decision The appellant accepts that he was the driver of the vehicle on the date in question. I will therefore consider his liability for the charge as the driver. The operator has provided photographs of the appellant's vehicle taken by its automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras. These photographs show the vehicle entering the site at 14:17 and leaving the site at 15:13. It is clear that the vehicle remained on site for a period of 56 minutes. Both the appellant and operator have provided photographs of the signs installed on the site. The operator has also provided a site map showing where on site each sign is located. Having reviewed all of the evidence, I am satisfied that signage at the entrance to the site clearly states: "Permit Holders Only … See car park signs for terms and conditions". Signs within the site itself clearly state: "DENTAL PRACTICE PERMIT HOLDERS ONLY … ALL PATIENTS AND VISITORS MUST REGISTER FOR A PERMIT AT THE PRACTICE RECEPTION ... IF YOU BREACH ANY OF THESE TERMS YOU WILL BE CHARGED £100." The signs make the terms of parking on the site clear, are placed in such a way that a motorist would see the signs when parking and are in line with the British Parking Association (BPA) Code of Practice. The operator has provided evidence to show that a search for the appellant's vehicle has been carried out against the list of vehicles for which a valid permit was held on the date in question. The appellant's vehicle does not appear on this list. The appellant states that he parked on site to attend a dental appointment . I accept that this may have been the case, however I do not accept that this entitled the appellant to park on site outside of the terms. The appellant states that the terms of the site had changed since the last time he parked two years ago. The operator's photographs of the signage on site are dated 27 March 2019. It is clear based on these photographs that the terms had been in place for at least three months by the time the appellant parked, which I am satisfied was a reasonable period for any regular user of the site to adapt to any change to the terms. The appellant states that signage at the entrance to and throughout the site did not make the terms clear. He has provided various photographs taken on and around the site. As detailed above, I am satisfied based on the evidence as a whole that signage made the terms sufficiently clear. I am satisfied from the evidence that the terms of the site were made clear and that the appellant breached the terms by parking without registering for a permit. I am therefore satisfied that the PCN was issued correctly and I must refuse this appeal. docs1.pdf
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A Queen's Guard pointed his rifle at a member of the public outside Buckingham Palace when an argument erupted with a police officer, it has emerged.
The soldier left his post to intervene when the man refused to stop shouting at the officer outside the palace gates on Friday.
A photograph published in The Sun on Sunday shows the guard pointing his bayonet-fixed rifle towards the man's face while stood next to the police officer.
A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: ''Police were made aware of a disturbance at the North-Centre Gate of Buckingham Palace at approximately 5.50pm on Friday, April 4.
''Officers from Royalty Protection spoke to a man and he was given words of advice and there were no arrests.''
The Queen's Guard is not believed to be facing any action over the incident.
An Army spokesman said: ''We are aware of an incident outside Buckingham Palace on Friday and while no one came to any harm and there were no arrests, we are very clear that the Metropolitan Police lead on Royal Security arrangements including outside the Palace itself.''
Buckingham Palace declined to comment.
The North-Centre Gate is now the everyday entrance to the Palace.
The Queen's Guard are a contingents of soldiers charged with guarding the Palace but carry a largely ceremonial role.
Earlier this year a man was jailed for 16 months after staging a stunt in which he jumped a vehicle barrier at the same Buckingham Palace entrance armed with a knife.
He was rugby tackled to the ground by armed police officers.
David Belmar, 44, said the incident in October was part of a protest against his Incapacity Benefit being stopped.


text:
Liberty Media: Near-Term Catalysts and Sirius XM Stake Will Drive Big Upside
Liberty Media's stock has been an under-performer relative to the broader market in 2014. However, the company has a very strong management team with excellent acquisition experience, and that is major plus for the company's fortunes in the near future.
In addition to being captained by a solid management team some interesting events are on the horizon. First, Liberty Media is planning a 3 for 1 stock split later this month, and after that will put all its cable and wireless investment holdings into a separate company spin-off this new entity to be called 'Liberty Broadband'. This string of financially sophisticated transactions will reduce the net asset value (NAV) discount to the company's valuation. In other words, the underlying assets held by Liberty Media are worth far more than what the company's stock price is currently trading for.
Big NAV Discount
So just what does having a NAV discount really mean? Liberty Media is a holding company with a couple of subsidiaries including TruePosition and ANLBC, but mostly its assets are comprised of equity investments in publicly traded firms. Liberty's biggest holding is satellite radio company, Sirius XM, in which it owns a 53% stake.
The share price of Liberty Media is heavily correlated with the stock price of Sirius XM because Liberty's Sirius XM stake makes up roughly two-thirds of Liberty Media's net asset value. Sirius XM is a fundamentally sound company with growth in subscribers and free cash flow that also happens to be buying back a large amount of its shares. Over time that will increase Liberty Media's ownership stake from 53% and drive more value for Liberty Media's stock price.
The second biggest holding of Liberty Media is Charter Communications. The cable company's stock price is at all-time highs as it struck extremely lucrative deals with Comcast to acquire subscribers. Charter's video customer count will grow from 4.4 million to 8.2 million customers, after the deal with Comcast closes and this will make Charter the second largest cable company in the U.S. Liberty Media hiked its stake in Charter in Q1 2014, and has an ownership stake of roughly 26.4%. With Charter quickly growing its customer foot-print it will become a far more valuable company, and as a result, Liberty Media stands to benefit.
The last major holding for Liberty Media is Live Nation which is the world's largest live events company. Live Nation has recently come up with newer ways to monetize its shows by broadening its digital footprint with Yahoo! and generate incremental revenues from Internet video with a highly valued partner. And as a result, Live Nation stands to grow its revenues and cash flows further down the road. Liberty Media owns 27% of Live Nation and will be a beneficiary of Live Nation's future growth.
All these assets and other smaller underlying stakes are worth a lot more than what the current share price of Liberty Media implies. And Liberty Media has $327 million in its share repurchase program, which will only increase the NAV per share due to low valuation of the company.
Morgan Stanley recently upgraded shares of Liberty Media from Hold to Buy with a $158 target price. The firm cited the widening NAV discount and the future corporate actions including the spin-off as reasons for the upgrade. I personally think that the shares of Liberty Media are worth more than $180 because of the strength in Sirius XM's business, and also the actions by management will unlock a lot of value for Liberty Media shareholders.
Split and spin-off
Liberty Media will undergo a stock split by distributing 2 non-voting Class C shares for every Class A share of the company. Once the stock split takes place, the company will conduct a spin-off of its broadband assets including stake in Charter, small equity holding in Time Warner Cable and TruePosition subsidiary. The newly formed company will be called Liberty Broadband and is expected to be publicly traded before the end of 2014.
Current shareholders of Liberty will receive 1 share of Liberty Broadband for every 4 shares of Liberty Media. And the company will also hand-out subscription rights at a 20% discount to the first 20 days of trading of Liberty Broadband. These complicated financial transactions will lead to the NAV discount of the company to reduce substantially. Liberty Media's stock trades at a 16% discount to its net asset value and once the stock split of the company and the spin-off of Liberty Broadband takes place, the NAV discount should get wiped away for both the parts of the company.
Going forward
Liberty Media has multiple catalysts in the near-term that will translate into a much higher stock price. The assets that will be held at Liberty Media--including Sirius XM, Live Nation and smaller equity interests and ANLBC are all fundamentally very strong. In particular, Sirius XM should see big growth in its stock price due to its subscriber additions. And also Liberty Broadband shareholders will get to buy a piece of the company at a discount while simultaneously benefiting from Charter's scale advantages. Liberty Media's shareholders will see healthy upside in the near-future.
Learn more about what Liberty media is doing to win the war for your living room
You know cable's going away. But do you know how to profit? There's $2.2 trillion out there to be had. Currently, cable grabs a big piece of it. That won't last. And when cable falters, three companies are poised to benefit. Click here for their names. Hint: They're not Netflix, Google, and Apple.
The article Liberty Media: Near-Term Catalysts and Sirius XM Stake Will Drive Big Upside originally appeared on Fool.com.Ishfaque Faruk owns shares of Liberty Media and Sirius XM Radio. The Motley Fool owns shares of Liberty Media and Sirius XM Radio. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
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text:
netsrik necesitaba un nuevo diseño de logotipo y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 29 diseños de 8 diseñadores freelance.
knitting nerd
I am 30-something Vancouverite starting a small knitting business (beginnings of a site can be found at http://www.knittingnerd.ca). My focus to start with is private and small group knitting lessons as well as a blog http://www.knitdaily.ca (the shell is up, but I haven't gotten it going yet).
I have been knitting daily for the last year and a half and an extremely enthusiastic about yarn crafts and can't wait to see where this will take me. At this time I am a team of one.
I hope to convey that although I am a knitting nerd (and I know there are many more of us out there) that knitting is fun, a great way to express yourself and meet new people. Not to mention a great stress reliever!
The new wave of knitters in their 20-30s. People who have no experience whatsoever, and also those who maybe learned a little a few years ago and need a refresher.
I am looking for a logo primarly for web materials, but will also use this on business cards down the road. I do have an image of a ball of yarn wearing glasses in my head for some reason, but am definetely open to other ideas.
I prefer simple, clean and modern designs.
Am open to color as well, but am partial to mustard, chartreuse, olive etc.
I like these color palettes at colourlovers.com:
stormy weather
damage ctrl
It is important that design convey approachability and warmth.
Descubre cómo funciona un concurso de diseño u obtén más información sobre nuestros servicios de diseño de logo.


text:
I have installed newest Nvidia drivers (from their site with the
.run file) on my laptop with Nvidia Geroce 420M.
After some time I decided to try out open source drivers there I went to
System Settings -> Software Sources -> Additional drivers and clicked Open source drivers and applied the changes.
After a reboot I have had no Unity panel shown when I logged into the system. So I googled a little and then removed all
nvidia-* packages (except
nvidia-common) and installed
nvidia-current-updates, rebooted and ... boom system won't load.
So I booted now from the livecd and got some logs from it
dmesg.log http://paste.ubuntu.com/1571454/
boot.log http://paste.ubuntu.com/1571456/
syslog http://paste.ubuntu.com/1571474/
Xorg.failsafe.log http://paste.ubuntu.com/1571479/
boot.log there is a line:
initctl: Event failed
And in
Xorg.failsafe.log :
(EE) Failed to load module "nv" (module does not exist, 0)
(EE) Failed to load module "modesetting" (module does not exist, 0)
(EE) open /dev/fb0: No such file or directory
(EE) Screen 0 deleted because of no matching config section.
(EE) NVIDIA(0): Failed to initialize the NVIDIA kernel module. Please see the
(EE) NVIDIA(0): system's kernel log for additional error messages and
(EE) NVIDIA(0): consult the NVIDIA README for details.
(EE) NVIDIA(0): *** Aborting ***
(EE) NVIDIA(0): Failing initialization of X screen 0
When I try to boot from recovery mode to any
repair filesystem, turn on networking etc. mode then I get something like :
Continuing will remount your / fillesystem in read/write mode and mount any
other filesystem defined in /ect/fstab. Do you wish to continue ?
fsck from util-linux 2.20.1 /dev/sda: clean 318818/10117120 files, 24047888/40467456 blocks .
What else can I provide to better illustrate the issue ?
All I can do is go to the root prompt in recovery mode but can't remount my filesystem in read/write mode (also I can't install packages because there is a
If I choose any other option than root shell then i got stuck as described here : safemode how long should it take clean and free up space


text:
In this activity, students calculate electricity use by state and determine, using Google Earth, how much land would be required to replace all sources of electricity with solar panels.
In this exercise learners use statistics (T-test using Excel) to analyze an authentic dataset from Lake Mendota in Madison, WI that spans the last 150 years to explore ice on/ice off dates. In addition, students are asked to investigate the IPCC Likelihood Scale and apply it to their statistical results.
This short video, the sixth in the National Academies Climate Change, Lines of Evidence series, explores the hypothesis that changes in solar energy output may be responsible for observed global surface temperature rise. Several lines of evidence, such as direct satellite observations, are reviewed.
This is a hands-on activity students design, build, and test. They compare the energy-generating capacities of vertical- and horizontal- axis wind turbine prototypes they have built as potential sources for power in a home.
In this short, hands-on activity, students build simple molecular models of 4 atmospheric gases (O2, N2, C02, and methane), compare their resonant frequencies, and make the connection between resonant frequency and the gas's ability to absorb infrared radiation.
This activity engages learners to investigate the impact of Earth's tilt and the angle of solar insolation as the reason for seasons by doing a series of hands-on activities that include scale models. Students plot the path of the Sun's apparent movement across the sky on two days separated by three months of time.
This short video, is the fifth in the National Academies Climate Change, Lines of Evidence series. It focuses on greenhouse gases, climate forcing (natural and human-caused), and global energy balance.
This small-group activity uses engineering concepts to design energy systems for three off-the-grid towns in Mali, Ethiopia, and Namibia.
In this 3-part lab activity, students investigate how carbon moves through the global carbon cycle and study the effects of specific feedback loops on the carbon cycle.
This activity from NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory introduces students to the scientific understanding of the greenhouse effect and the carbon cycle. The activity leads them through several interactive tasks to investigate recent trends in atmospheric carbon dioxide. Students analyze scientific data and use scientific reasoning to determine the causes responsible for these recent trends. By studying carbon cycle science in a visual and interactive manner, students can learn firsthand about the reasons behind our changing climate.