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Saturday, July 16, 2011
Parisbreakfast in Vogue
91 comments:
Well how cool and frustrating at the same time. I would let them know you should have some credit for it at least. I am heading off to get my own copy now. :))ReplyDelete
Are you saying you were not asked if they could use it? Egads! Not making light of that fact, I have to say all of the watercolors in this post are just gorgeous, including the original one that Vogue used portions of. I don't buy Vogue, but I'm tempted to just to see your work in the magazine.ReplyDelete
Good stay + good artwork + good clams in Maine Carol!ReplyDelete
It's a shame the "non-credit" of your work in Vogue, really! I don't like this way of being and we may tell them what is missing in their article...
Woo -hoo! But how dare they not attribute?????ReplyDelete
I think every PB reader should write to Vogue and ask for the artist's name...I will! And I will mention that it looks like the work of that fabulous artist, Carol Gillot.ReplyDelete
- Waterpainter1:41 PM
I love your watercolors and read your blog faithfully, and got several of your recommended books for my daughter before her year abroad in Paris as an architecture student. In short - a fan! As a fellow illustrator, I'm truly appalled that Vogue would steal from you in this way. They know better!ReplyDelete
Would you like for us, your faithful readers, to write them emails of protest?
??????Seriously?? no credit to you for the painting images? That's horrible, Carol! I think they should do another whole spread with more of your things to compensate, then. How the hell did they get away with that?? These look beautiful. You deserve to be in Vogue, but what were they thinking!? jeeeeeezReplyDelete
I think Vogue needs to hear from each of us! This is really sad and wrong for a company such as Vogue to do this to a hard working artist!ReplyDelete
Let's stick by Carol and write them! I will not purchase Vogue until they make this right (and it clearly could be an honest oversight).
I am sorry, Carol!
I just saw this this morning and immediately thought it was your art and looked for your name! Since I couldn't find it I actually thought someone had copied you! Glad to know it was yours..it looks fabulous and you so deserve the credit! Vogue should hire you as an ongoing illustrator for their magazine! They would be lucky to have you!ReplyDelete
It's an honor..but dishonor for them! I really can't believe it..ReplyDelete
They should have asked:(
I love sharing..i would say go for it..I do w/ photos.. but your watercolors..? I hope Vogue sees this..or someone contacts them..i don't get the magazine..
I agree Vogue should hire you..
But I hope thy come through with a kind gesture ..I do..
A lovely reportage on the artist..?:)
At least.. a lifetime subscription..and a trip to Paris?:)Now that would be sweet.
PS I now covet that issue too:)ReplyDelete
for yr supposrt PBers!
I'm honored to have such terrific PB fans.
If only I did my Twitter we could do something - reason to start in peut-etre?
There is a credit on the page but to someone at LADUREE?!
I'm stumped
Any complaining emails to Vogue will be rewarded in some way or other (by an improved macaron or a watercolor scrap?
What do you think?
Go figure?
Someone definitely dropped the ball at Vogue, Carol. There is always someone whose job it is to find credits of any art or photos they use. Also it's odd they wouldn't contact you. But perhaps they didn't have your name. It's up to you to let them know. Immediatement. (If not sooner.)ReplyDelete
Still, it's nice to be in Vogue.
Wow, talk about a publishing faux-pas! It is frustrating that we artists often get ripped off by people who don't credit us OR worse still, blatant copy-cats, BUT I think it's also a testament to the beauty and quality of your work, Carol. By hook or by crook, you're in there and add your own bit of beauty to their publication....add a tag to your sidebar saying "featured in Vogue"! You were and no one can contest that - ha! Have a great time in Maine and eat a lobstah roll for me. xxReplyDelete
What a surprise! I would still contact them and speak to someone about the lack of credit....ReplyDelete
Thanks for reminding me about tweeting. I sent an email earlier, but will also do the tweet! That makes even more sense...tell them in a more public way.ReplyDelete
In the email, I mentioned this blog and said I knew Carol and her readers would be wanting to hear from Vogue and how they would right this oversight.
I get very annoyed with this kind of thing.
- Anonymous2:57 PM
C'est ridicule! Vogue will sit up and take notice once when they hear from you, the true artist. I really don't think that they can legally use that image without your permission. I always check out the name of illustrators in say, "Saveur" and "Real Simple." The illustator name is ALWAYS listed either alongside the pic. or by the inner crease of the page. I'll say as much in my email to "Vogue." Actually, it's good that this has happened! Your fans will bring you to their attention! (-: Bonne chance!ReplyDelete
Jill H.
- Anonymous3:41 PM
Yep, that's BAD form! SHAME on Vogue. Love the art.ReplyDelete
Now--the word isn't "allude" which means means refer to, but elude "which means "escape" and incipient isn't the right word either. Pet peeve about if you write on line, you need to clean up your grammar knowledge and look up the words you use. LOVE your images, but if you're on line, it's also about the WORDS. Just my tiny nag; I love your blog.
Well! All I can think is Bravo ParisBreakfasts and shame on Vogue....but what a fab watercolor, they just HAD to use it, and on the issue with SJP on the cover. I love the watercolor of the Laduree boxes on on the silver tray...the silver sheen just comes through your wonderful shadings.ReplyDelete
Shamefull an unbelievable!!ReplyDelete
I shall look for Vogue address too and write something to them
Even though the drawing might be taken from Google images they can easily find your name as well.
Your work is unmistakable and they will have to recognized it. And hei mistake!
Have a nice day/night, Rosanna
I am appalled that VOGUE would steal an artist's work, just like that!ReplyDelete
Could it be an unfortunate failure of communication between Laduree and Vogue? Did they think that Laduree owned the artwork?
Have fun in Maine and I can;t wait till my Vogue arrives! So sorry they did not credit you! I wish they would open soon.ReplyDelete
Hi Carol!ReplyDelete
"Mixte" feelings here words "elude" me......Congratulations! for having your work in Vogue..... Shame on them for taking license......Your talent speaks volumes, and I, for one, love your spelling...Sorry Miss "grammarface" felt the need to correct you when clearly you were justifiably miffed at having not been given credit.... All in good time my dear ... Keep up the good work....xo Maryanne
THANKS Maryanne/BeadboardReplyDelete
My spelling has always been rotten and isn't about to change nohow, noway.
There is always a puce/flea in the ointment non?
I just emailed Vogue and asked them to credit you in their next issue. I was nice. Didn't want to come off as a lunatic.ReplyDelete
Still, it's wonderful to be in Vogue!!
Let's hope something wonderful comes of this, PB!
WOW WOW WOW !ReplyDelete
I just noticed that they ADULTERATED the artwork...Hmmmm
They move the box on the left to the right to get ANOTHER MACARON into the vignette!
! ! ! !
THIS is NOT right :(
@voguemagazine you went too far this time!
What to do?
I have been adulterated :(
i know that if this was MY artwork, i would personally contact them and let them know my feelings......and even if they do not compensate you for it, you have the satisfaction of telling them that the next time they decide to use YOUR work, you expect payment, and the courtesy of acknowledgement....thank you very much!!!!!!ReplyDelete
It is of course fantastic that Vogue think so much of your work to use it, but very, very bad form that they don't ask permission or pay to use it, and don't credit your work. I just did a google search for Laduree New York and your pre-adulterated image is the third one that comes up. I suppose Vogue found it just as easy.ReplyDelete
I saw that and thought it looked so familiar! wow...kind of sad to think a huge magazine like Vogue would do that....hope it turns out for the positive for you!!ReplyDelete
I agree with everyone: congratulations for getting in there, shame on Vogue for not crediting you, and you should definitely contact them. The mainstream mags think they can walk over everyone.ReplyDelete
Carol, I can see that my art history recognition skills have not evaporated.ReplyDelete
I absolutely agree that all PB fans should contact Vogue in whatever manner they might choose.
I am currently reading Blow by Blow, the story of Isabella Blow, by her husband Detmar Blow, and am sure that Vogue magazine has a history of not always recognizing certain talents.
I'd also think it might be good to contact Laduree, because that company certainly provided the picture. Gosh, Carol, wouldn't want to mess with your Laduree connection if such communication to L were made.
Meanwhile...enjoy the cool, fresh air of Maine. xo
Oh Carol! Firstly, congratulations! That's so exciting and a real credit to your talent...but that's the thing...they didn't actually credit you! You simply have to contact them. That's so unfair. I will do so as well. How unjust!ReplyDelete
Hello again Carol!ReplyDelete
I contacted Vogue by email and hopefully it will get to the right people. Don't worry, I made sure I was still nice as I do think it's great publicity even though they haven't credited you..
What to do?ReplyDelete
Monday you call Vogue and speak to the art director.
You tell that person that you are sending them a bill for $1000 for stealing your artwork
- without your permission - changing your artwork
- without your permission - publishing it without credit to you
- and there you go.
Case closed.
Dear r,ReplyDelete
I'm sure it was a last minute oversight on Vogue's part but certainly one click on the GOOGLE IMAGE would have let them know who and where the artwork came from.
An apology of some sort would be much appreciated.
One does feel some what delighted that out of all 228,000 images available on GOOGLE for Laduree they picked mine even though it was No.#3..ReplyDelete
Expediency may have been an issue in the rush to pub..
If you do get to the art director, have them look at your work.
They must like it enough to have used it.
Tell him/her that you would have been happy to give them permission to use it.
For a fee of course and name credit.
Tell them you'd forget about it if they gave you another job, with a credit.
Who knows?
- Kay/stjulienlepauvre6:48 AM
Carol, For what it's worth, I just sent a tweet (to my 3 followers!) saying:ReplyDelete
Heard rumor that Carol Gillott's (parisbreakfasts) lovely artwork was used in current Vogue, without acknowledgment, permission or payment! Not nice!
My twitter name is 'stjulienlepauvr' (without the 'e' as it's too long).
Maybe they do a search on twitter for any mention of 'Vogue'
BIG MERCI to Kay of St Julian!!!ReplyDelete
I hope they get our messages.. Actually I think..it just came to me..you should be a regular feature in Vogue.. :) I do..it would add charm!ReplyDelete
They might actually print a correction in the next issue if you point it out to them...ReplyDelete
Not unless Laduree is using your watercolors without your authorization?
And no, Conde Nast wouldn't sue you... they would just send a letter from their lawyers instructing you to take down the post.
They clearly moved your yellow macaron from its place atop the larger box and placed it on the other two. The old "cut & paste."ReplyDelete
And they spelled it "macaroOns!!" Sigh. Vogue dropped the ball all OVER the field in this one.Replies
I just read all the comments here hoping that SOMEONE would have noticed that not only did Vogue steal your watercolor, they misspelled macaron as macaroon! Yikes!Delete
Obviously whoever wrote the copy has NOT eaten a macaron.
One would think that everything in Vogue is edited by someone and the mistake would have been caught.
I can't believe they forgot to credit you!! That's such a bummer to a wonderful event like this. Congratulations none the less!ReplyDelete
Be pleasant but businesslike. Ask for the art director, and leave a voice mail to return your call and give a brief sentence outlining the reason for the call.ReplyDelete
Introduce yourself as the artist of the Laduree article. Ask them if the inclusion in their issue was the result of artwork provided by Laduree or done by the magazine.
A fee would not get you worldwide exposure.
A correction is not as good as another use WITH credit .. people don't read corrections, or at least as many as notice the artwork.
I would also tell the art director that you are speaking to them first, and hoping that Vogue and you can reach an agreement.
If you get a future use with credit, tell them you will be confirming the discussion with a memo; request the name and address of the person to whom you spoke.
Please keep us posted. This was a big mistake on their part. Also allow that they could have been given the artwork by Laduree.
Bon chance ...
When I first started painting I was told that if the artwork was changed or altered at least 10% it made it legal to copy. I have since learned that this is false, of course. This is the kind of ignorance we are dealing with. I hope you get the credit and compensation that you deserve for you beautiful artwork.ReplyDelete
Wow - I am shocked Vogue would use your artwork and not credit you! That being said what an honor to appear on there hallowed pages! You should contact them and maybe they can include a "correction" in an upcoming issue noting the source of the fabulous artwork. Very excited about Laduree opening in New York - YUM!ReplyDelete
Congrats Carol..and I'm shocked too that Vogue didn't credit you! They should, I hope they will apologize to you!ReplyDelete
Excellent and most sensible advice Karen in CTReplyDelete
Most kind.
- Anonymous9:44 AM
Yes, Carol, plain and simple, your artwork was not only stolen, but altered. Not permitted - not legal. And, shame on Vogue - some lazy person just went to the internet, found your lovely artwork, and lifted it, thinking it would not be discovered.ReplyDelete
Do what you have to do to make it right. You deserve whatever you can get, and reject their first offer. They don't want you to sue. And, you do have grounds!
Infringement of copyright!
Success to you.
I agree with GiGi above. I hope you're contacting their legal department toute de suite! I would think they would acknowledge what they did was wrong, pay your requested fee, apologize, and give you credit.ReplyDelete
If they don't, let us all know and we'll leverage our collective social media powers on your behalf. Then back to their legal department you go.
From what I see on your flickr stream, there is no creative commons license for commercial use. You made it clear that you kept all rights reserved.
This is really outrageous behavior by Vogue.
Congratulations - kind of. The painting is gorgeous and it's SO MADDENING they didn't credit you! I hpoe you get it figured out with the Vogue folks. I just got my copy today and will definitely show it to Harry. If he can tear his eyes away from the gorgeous painting you sent him...ReplyDelete
Alas, I don't read Vogue, being more inclined to mags about France, but I am shocked by this story.ReplyDelete
I recently thought to post about macarons, in a bout if homesickness, and found a lovely painting on the internet so wrote to the artist to ask her permission to use it along with a credit and link to her website. She replied to say yes. I never wrote the post but maybe now I will with a link to your blog where people may find superbe pictures.
Shame on the professionals but I do foresee a whole Vogue article based on your work with proper credits and a nice fee for you
Hi CarolReplyDelete
A blogger told me about your ordeal with Vogue. Shame on Vogue for using a beautiful piece of your artwork without your permission, Shame on Vogue for changing your artwork without permission, Shame on Vogue for not contacting you for information status on your artwork! You deserve full credit for your beautiful artwork.
Contact them about their mishap.
Again your artwork is beautiful, and Vogue overstepped, and Laduree should take note of how many of PBers admire and stand up for you!
Carol, hi!!There is a long time since I was visiting the blogs I love...and I really miss it. .. I've beem working so hard (as you know I am a lawyer...).ReplyDelete
This post is amazing!! Your paintings are stuning, they really are!! Congratulations!!
I love the Maine's lobsters too!!
Kisses and hugs!!
Bitter sweet for sure! I think it is illegal what they have done. You should have been asked and should have been credited. Good luck!ReplyDelete
I noticed your comment about being in VOGUE and not being mentioned. You should absolutely in the nicest way send a letter to the Managing Editor and cc: the Publisher, or any bs. people to get their attention. Your work is copyrighted I imagine? It would deserve an honorable mention and correction in a forthcoming issue, if not in letters to the editor. It might work to your advantage.ReplyDelete
Carol, I will be so disappointed!!! for an Artist is a privilege to be on a magazine as Vogue, but remember the things always happen for a reason, and I believe that a better thing is about to come, for your art work, I am sure, you are so talented!!!!ReplyDelete
i think you should get onto Anna Wintour or Grace Coddington and sort something out!!! tout sweet...ReplyDelete
CONGRATULATIONS! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ReplyDelete
And...for heaven's sake Vogue should spell the word correctly! It's macaron, NOT macaroon.ReplyDelete
They are not the same thing.
Your artwork is so lovely. It's unconsciencable that Vogue editors would "borrow it" without paying and crediting you. Shame on them, contact your lawyer…they owe you money and they know it!ReplyDeleteReplies
Oh of course Vogue paid me.Delete
It was PAUL BOULANGERIE/LADUREE that refused to pay and threatened to sue me.
Go figure.


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An officer's virtue: Tell Michael Briggs' storyEDITORIAL
November 09. 2013 12:40AM
At about 2:45 a.m. on Oct 16, 2006, with just 15 minutes left on their shift, Manchester Police Officers Michael Briggs and John Breckinridge spotted two suspects, wanted for a recent crime spree, in an alley. Briggs knew one of the suspects, Michael Addison, having treated him for a gunshot wound on a different Manchester street three years before.
Officer Briggs yelled, "Stop! Police!" twice, but Addison only slowed his pace. When Briggs was within arm's length, he yelled his command a third time. Addison spun around, raised a handgun to Briggs' head, and fired.
Officer Briggs died the next day. Michael Addison was convicted of capital murder in a trial in Manchester. Last week, the state Supreme Court upheld his capital murder conviction, rejecting all of his claims, including this interesting one: The trial was inherently unfair because it was held in Manchester, where Officer Briggs was known as a great public servant.
Addison's attorneys argued that there was a "prejudice inherent in holding a capital murder trial before jurors drawn from the community that suffered the loss of Officer Briggs." They claimed that "the bond between the community and the highly decorated police officer who protected it" made a fair trial in Manchester impossible. They even admitted to the court that their client was not nearly the man his victim had been. The trial presented the "rare case in which the victim is so beloved by the community, the defendant so reviled...."
Addison had spent the previous week boasting about wanting to "pop a cop." It was clear from his statements that he had spent a long time mentally dehumanizing anyone with a badge. In court, his attorneys presented a different view.
They acknowledged that their client had removed from this earth a good and beloved man of surpassing value to the community he served (not to mention to his family).
There is no telling how much of this Michael Addison believed. But his attorneys would have discussed with him this line of argument. The idea would have entered his mind and floated around there awhile. After all, it was a point on which his life might depend.
If he is capable of reflection, Addison must have spent some time in the last seven years mulling the contrast between himself and the better man he took away. Though we can never know how he processed those thoughts, if he did at all, it is clear that Michael Briggs' short life of public service created a powerful bond with the city he served and that the city's reaction to Briggs' loss made an impression upon Addison.
Briggs never got through to Addison while Briggs lived. But if his death made Addison see, even for a fleeting moment, the value of a virtuous life, imagine how many thousands of young men and women in the city are inspired by Briggs' story every time it is retold.
The story of Michael Briggs' service to this city can be retold every time a kid asks for whom the police station was named, or who wore the number 83, Briggs' badge number, which hangs on the outfield wall of the Fisher Cats' stadium - or every time his killer gets his name in the news. Maybe if we continue telling Briggs' story, we can inspire more kids to live by his example and help fight the cancerous dehumanization of police officers that still lingers in some dark corners of the city.

subset: commoncrawl


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Pennsylvania once had 50 county homes across the state. Currently, there are fewer than 30.
The trend has been to close or lease county homes because of lost revenue for various reasons, including loss of Medicare and Medicaid funds, mismanagement, and regulatory costs.
I know Butler County officials have in the past studied the possible sale or lease of Sunnyview Nursing and Rehabilitation Center. If we are to keep it, we must look at it as a business. It should be self-sustaining.
We should hold the county commissioners accountable to ensure that.
I have been a small-business owner in this county for more than 30 years. Everything has increased in cost over the years, and we have had to make tough decisions to stay profitable and remain in business.
I have not received federal, state or county funds to ensure my continuance in business.
We as taxpayers are overtaxed now; raising taxes to cover bad business decisions does not sit well with me.
Sunnyview is a business, run by the county, that has needed to be bailed out in the past.
It is time to make it profitable — or get rid of it.


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September 18. 2013 11:08PM
Shutdown showdown: The GOP's suicide squad
At the end of Monty Python's "The Life of Brian," the crucified hero appears on the verge of being rescued by members of the underground Judean People's Front, who rush in and chase off his tormenters. Proclaiming his team to be the Front's "Crack Suicide Squad," the leader shouts, "Attack!" At that point they all ritually kill themselves. As he crumples to the ground, the leader utters his final words, "That showed 'em, huh?"
Some Republicans in Washington are eagerly preparing to play out this scene as they charge forward with plans to shut down the government if Democrats — who control two of the federal government's three elected institutions — do not agree to defund Obamacare, their party's signature accomplishment of the Post-Clinton era.
The federal government will run out of money in a few weeks if Congress does not pass another continuing resolution to authorize ongoing spending. Sens. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Mike Lee, R-Utah, are trying to persuade House Republicans to pass a resolution that contains no money for Obamacare. They believe that, somehow, this will force Democrats into a terrible political choice: defund Obamacare or shut down the government.
This is magical thinking. As Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., told The Weekly Standard, "Obamacare is falling of its own weight." The Cruz plan "will distract attention from Obamacare" and focus it on the government's inability to do things Americans want it to do. It also would fail to defund Obamacare.
After five years under His Pomposity's disastrous rule, Americans are hungry for leaders who can demonstrate a capacity for doing what Obama cannot: ably govern. If Republicans force a shutdown in a fit over Obamacare, they undo all of the political advantages Obama's ineptitude has fortuitously conferred upon them. Their political fortunes will fade as they mutter, "That showed 'em, huh?"


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Ernest Brandvold, 72, of Redding, Calif., died Monday, December 10, 2012, at Mercy Medical Center in Redding.
Ernest Brandvold, 72, of Redding, Calif., died Monday, December 10, 2012, at Mercy Medical Center in Redding. Ernest was born October 13, 1940 in Maddock, N.D. to Theodore and Pearl (Georgeson) Brandvold. Ernest grew up in Maddock where he enjoyed playing basketball and hunting. He also worked for the area farmers. Ernest married Barbara Anderson on June 18, 1960 and they had four children. They lived in Devils Lake, Minot, N.D., and California during their marriage. Ernest continued to live in California and later married Nancy Harrison and they had one son. Ernest owned and operated two restaurants for many years. Ernest later married Nancy VanCromphaut with whom he spent the remainder of his life with. Before Ernest retired he owned Ernie's Economy Auto Glass in Redding. After retirement, Ernest traveled back to North Dakota to visit family and friends. Ernest enjoyed spending time watching the ducks swim in the pond that he and Nancy had in their back yard. Ernest is survived by wife, Nancy of Redding; children, Kay (Scott) Bachmeier, Devils Lake; Cheryl (Tim) Miller, Hillsboro, N.D.; Renae (Kevin) Yali, Crary, N.D.; Duane (Heather) Brandvold, Devils Lake; JR (Jackie) Brandvold, Redding; step-children, Christine Howard and Carl Anberg, Redding; eight grandchildren; four step-grandchildren; four great-grandchildren. Ernest was preceded in death by his parents; brothers, Emil, Allen and Glenn; sisters, Bernice and LaVon.


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Long-time trapper filmed by Ionia H. S. grad
The love of trapping has kept a former Ionia man at his hobby for 50 years, and drew another former Ionian to document it. A segment on Richard (Elmer) Gregory will run at 8 p.m. Thursday on the PBS television show "Michigan Out-of-Doors," produced by Jordan Browne.
Gregory, 62, now of Stanton, began trapping muskrats and mink as a 12-year-old at Coon School. He said his half-century of continuous trapping has never been about the money; it's about the sport.
"Water trapping is very challenging, hard work. It's a lot of the fun out on the creek bank," said Gregory, while standing in the water trapping. "It's the love of putting my boots on and getting in the creek, finding signs, like a kid on Christmas opening up a present. I hurry to get to the creek to see if there's a rat in the trap."
If he has a good day, the hard work starts when he gets home, Gregory said. That's when he works with the pelts: combs them out, skins them and puts them up on drying frames.
"It's a lot of manual labor, but I've always enjoyed doing it," he said. "Thank goodness I can still do it."
Browne, an associate producer for "Michigan Out-of-Doors," approached Gregory for the segment because the show features trapping a couple of times a year. Now of Grand Ledge, Browne is a 2006 Ionia High School graduate and a 2010 graduate of Michigan State University.
"It's a dying sport, and it's not as easy to get good trapping stories," said Browne. "He's trapped the same area for so long, and I was intrigued by the longevity. Going with a guy who's done it for so long, everything he says teaches you something. The things he considers basic knowledge is great information for the novice trapper."
Browne shot the video with Gregory at the spot where Gregory said he "cut his teeth" on trapping.
"The particular ditch we trapped was the ditch he's been trapping for 50 years. He trapped there on his way to school with his brother," said Browne. "A lot of times, ditches like that don't even last that many years in a row."
Nowadays, there aren't many young people who want to trap, said Gregory.
"A lot of that is the work involved," he said. "I never looked at it as work."
Still standing in the creek, Gregory noted he just watched a couple of deer walk the bank.
" I do it for the love of the sport and being out in the wild, part of Mother Nature," he said.
To learn more, visit www.michiganoutofdoorstv.com/shows.cfm.


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JANESVILLE, Wis.—You can hear the good humor in his voice as mail carrier Brant Yantorni leaves the Janesville Post Office to set out on his delivery route.
"It's time to make the magic happen," he said.
The 35-year-postal service veteran embraces a daily mantra: Keep the people happy.
With the holiday rush in full swing, Yantorni is especially loaded down with packages as he makes deliveries to hundreds of homes on the city's northeast side.
Maybe you've seen him, bent slightly forward as he walks so he doesn't crash on the ice.
"I crave fish because I walk like a penguin," he said, laughing at his own joke.
Thanks to technology, Yantorni spends less time in the post office sorting mail and more time on the street delivering it.
"When I started in this job, we had to sort everything," Yantorni told The Janesville Gazette ( http://bit.ly/1jP8tjv). "It wasn't unusual to spend more than two hours easily in the office every morning. Now, the mail all goes to Madison for sorting. It seems we are getting more and more things done by machine."
Yantorni is right.
With the approach of the year's busiest mailing day —Monday, Dec. 16 —new and improved technology keeps the seasonal avalanche of cards and packages moving at a fast clip.
Much of the work is done at Madison's processing and distribution center on Milwaukee Street.
Letters, cards and packages mailed in the Madison service area, which includes all of Rock County, end up at the almost 100,000-square-foot building.
Manager Gary Kaiser reigns over the bustling operation, where the package business is booming because of online commerce.
In fact, Kaiser said, the volume of packages shot up 17 percent in 2012 during the holiday.
Nationally, the financially troubled postal service predicts a 12 percent jump. The federal agency even started working with Amazon last month to begin making Sunday deliveries in New York and Los Angeles. It plans to expand that service to other cities next year.
Closer to home, the Madison center processes about 25,000 packages daily for delivery in the service area, which roughly stretches west to the Mississippi River, north to Friendship and Fond du Lac, east to the Walworth County line and south to the Illinois border.
The number of packages will bounce up to 35,000 and even 40,000 on some days during the holiday season.
In addition to packages, the center processes about 1.5 million first-class letters daily for delivery in the Madison service area. The number may swell to 3 million during the holiday peak, Kaiser said.
But unlike packages, the volume of letters continues to drop and is expected to be down about 7 percent this year.
Still, in an era when the federal postal service is losing money overall, the Madison processing center earns its keep.
"We generate a lot of revenue," Kaiser said. "We usually stand out from the rest of the country in the volume of mail received here."
Company catalogs and magazines from places such as the commercial printing company Quad/Graphics are the reason.
The postal center gets two or three semitrailers of catalogs and magazines a day, with up to 10 on other days.
"In a couple of hours, you won't be able to stand here," Kaiser said, walking alongside one of 15 loading stalls, where trucks bring in mail from all post offices in the service area and from around the country.
Once workers move letters and packages off the trucks, technology does much of the extensive sorting with little help from human hands.
Machines scan and sort the mail in a complicated process. They read the addresses on letters, translate them into bar codes and ink jet the codes onto the fronts of the envelopes. Other machines read the bar codes and sort letters according to their places of delivery.
Cards and packages for delivery outside the Madison service area are sorted and moved on to an even bigger processing center in Milwaukee. From there, they are sorted and sent to addresses in Wisconsin, the United States and the world.
Other machines scan and sort area packages and bundles of magazines according to zip codes. Later, the packages and magazines go to local post offices for more sorting by clerks and letter carriers. Packages are scanned at every stop along their journeys, which allows customers to track their progress online.
"Technology has allowed us to process more mail faster and more accurately," Kaiser said. "The changes are humongous in our ability to process letters."
In addition, improved technology saves time for the carriers in the post office each day. They still sort mail, but the amount is much smaller than it was in the past.
Kaiser is amazed at how much mail is processed every day, especially during the holiday.
"A lot of people entrust the mail to us and don't realize all the things it goes through to get to where it is going," Kaiser said. "They just want to know that it gets delivered. Machines are great tools, but we will always need employees to process and move the mail on the last leg of its journey."
Among those workers is Yantorni, who goes the final mile in December with extra cards and packages.
"A lot of people are excited to see what I'm bringing them," he said. "I have close to 600 stops, but for each house I go up to, it is a special encounter. I have to make sure I treat the people that way."
This time of year, residents show their appreciation to Yantorni with small gifts of cookies, fudge and even homemade cards.
At 62, he could have retired a few years ago. But he chose against it.
"I will work until I can't because I enjoy it," he said. "I make the magic happen every day."
Information from: The Janesville Gazette, http://www.gazetteextra.com


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Louise M.. (Barkdoll) Kline, 87, of Smithsburg, Md., passed away on Jan. 9, 2013, at Meritus Medical Center.
Louise M.. (Barkdoll) Kline, 87, of Smithsburg, Md., passed away on Jan. 9, 2013, at Meritus Medical Center. She was the wife of the late Kenneth O. Kline Sr., who died Nov. 14, 1996. Louise was born Feb. 6, 1925, at Edgemont, Md. She was the fifth of 13 children born to Lois (Stouffer) Barkdoll and Delbert S. Barkdoll. She was a member of St. Paul's Evangelical Lutheran Church, Greensburg, Md. Louise had a kind and loving heart and especially enjoyed spending time with her family and friends. She was a devoted mother, grandmother, great-grandmother and will truly be missed by all. She loved working crossword puzzles, gardening and reading, especially her Bible and Amish novels. She is survived by her loving children Dorene Young and husband David, and Sue Recher of Waynesboro, Kenneth Kline Jr. and wife Barbara of Williamsport, Kerry Kline and William Gregorek of Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; grandchildren, Kenneth Kline III and Kristyn Socknat and husband John of Arlington, Va., Leslie Connor of Waynesboro and Andrew Recher and Rachel Rogge of Champaign, Ill.; great-grandchildren Trevor and Kelsie Connor, and Alexandra and Nicholas Socknat. She is also survived by her brothers Richard Barkdoll of Waldorf, Md., Edward and Samuel Barkdoll of Smithsburg, and sisters Elsie Naile, Mary Regina Woodring, Julia O'Neal and Helen Black, all of Waynesboro, as well as many nieces and nephews. Sisters Isabelle Kendall, Lois Miller, and brothers Delbert, Walter Dale and Arthur Barkdoll preceded her in death. Services will be held at 11 a.m. on Monday, Jan. 14, at St. Paul's Evangelical Lutheran Church, Greensburg, Md. Pastor Julie Brigham will officiate. Burial will be in Mountain View Cemetery, Ringgold, Md. The family will receive friends on Sunday, Jan. 13, from 2 to 4 and 6 to 8 p.m. at J. L. Davis Funeral Home in Smithsburg. In lieu of flowers, the family requests memorial donations to St. Paul's Evangelical Lutheran Church, 13156 Edgemont Road, Smithsburg, Md. 21783. Arrangements were made by J.L. Davis Funeral Home, Smithsburg, Md.


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Nicad Battery Recycling
If you are looking for a recycling facility, check out our complete listings of centers. Having one of these centers reprocess your waste is good for the environment. Some recycling centers may even pay you for your unwanted items. Use the recycling center directory to find the closest recycling center from your location. Removal, pick-up and hauling is also available. If you do not have the means of getting your items to the closest recycling drop-off site, fill out our contact form and we can get you in contact with a company that will come remove and haul away your unwanted items.


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Personal use of city-owned phones by Manchester police gets scrutinyBy BILL SMITH
New Hampshire Union Leader
July 16. 2013 1:32PM
MANCHESTER — Police officers have reimbursed the city treasury more than $4,000 over the past three years for personal use of department-issued cellular telephones, an aldermanic committee was told.
But information about all calls made by city employees on city-owned phones is not always a public record, according to an opinion from the city's law department.
The Administration and Information Systems Committee of the Board of Mayor and Alderman will consider the reports from Police Chief David Mara and assistant city solicitor Thomas Arnold III at a meeting this afternoon.
The issue of private use of publicly-paid phones arose during the trial of a Manchester police officer who was acquitted of charges that he assaulted his estranged wife. During his trial, the officer admitted communicating with other women on his city cell phone but said it was not against departmental rules.
That led to Alderman-at-Large Joe Kelley Levasseur asking for information about private use of cell phones by city officers.
Levasseur said Monday he doesn't like the idea of city workers having city-paid cellular telephone service and wanted evidence that the city is being reimbursed for private use.
"I just wanted to make sure there was an accounting for it," Levasseur said "We wanted them to get rid of them having cell phones altogether. I don't want to see any employees have cell phones paid for by the government whatsoever.
The report provided by police said that officers repaid $1,629.93 for personal cell phone use during the 2011 fiscal year; $1,293.43 in 2012 and $627.43 during the first part of 2013. Final bills had not been calculated for 2013 at the time the report was prepared.
City Solicitor Thomas Arnold III advised aldermen in a memo last week that cell phone bills are public records, but not everything appearing in the bills can be released.
Arnold said billing records of detectives can't be released "if disclosure would impair the investigation or prosecution of a criminal case."
"A billing record of a telephone call by a detective in the course of an investigation may be exempt from disclosure if disclosure would impair the investigation or prosecution,"Arnold said. "A call by a health department employee ... may be exempt as an invasion of privacy."
Arnold advised aldermen that whether records of any particular call must be released depends on the facts surrounding the call.
But he said instances in which call details are not public records "should be fairly limited."
The administration committee will also consider complaints from a city resident that Manchester's dog fouling ordinance is virtually unenforceable because it effectively requires that a dog must be caught in the act .
Steven Stefanik of South Hall Street spoke during a public participation session earlier this month and distributed photographs of fouled streets and lawns.
He pointed to the language of the city ordinance as being a big part of the issue.
The ordinance says a person in control of a dog in public must carry an "article or means" to clean up after a dog, or to "remove and dispose" of dog feces.
But the ordinance says it can be no enforcement unless a violation "occurs in the presence of a law enforcement officer," which limits the ability of police or animal control officers to issue tickets after the deed is done.


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Last thing I would expect on a Seahawks Fanpage Section
Notice what Stadium/Game that picture takes place in? (Hint: Not Seattle!)
Great Article man, Just what we wanted to hear.
Really want to give this writer more hits? http://www.footballnation.com/team/seattle-seahawks/
I realize that the guy is an independent writer, but I will not stand for this. Mostly because it is too funny.


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A woman named Donna recently called Fargo, N.D., radio station Y94 to air a problem so bizarre, the station's hosts were almost speechless. Her complaint? Deer-crossing signs placed along busy highways were "irresponsible" because they simply encouraged the animals to cross there, and that was why she'd smacked her car into deer not once, not twice, but three times. "You'd think they'd put deer-crossing signs at school crossings where it would be safer," she said indignantly. "Why place the signs on busy interstates?" When told the signs were warnings to motorists to drive carefully, Donna just couldn't accept it. The government could move signs wherever it wanted, she insisted, and it should stop erecting signs at dangerous places on roads where they "attracted" deer. It took several minutes before Donna - reluctantly - saw the light, though she never admitted that she believed deer could read.
Forget denouncing wind turbines as bird Cuisinarts; lovable pussycats rank as the true killing machines. Housecats wipe out some 4 billion animals every year, including at least 500 million birds, reports Wyoming Wildlife. The magazine cites a novel new study by two groups, the National Geographic Society and the University of Georgia, that determined just how fierce cats' hunting instincts are by employing the animals themselves as reporters. The cats were outfitted with "crittercams" - special video cameras around their necks. When the animals went outdoors to prowl, the camera recorded each gory encounter. The cats averaged about 2.1 kills per week, but they brought home less than one of every four of their victims for their owners to see and/or throw out. Cats preyed on just about anything close to the ground that moved, including lizards, voles, chipmunks, birds, frogs and small snakes.
The crittercam study did not include feral cats, which have their own support systems these days - advocates who persuade their communities that trapping, sterilizing and then releasing the cats is a good idea. In theory, writes Kiera Butler in Mother Jones, it sounds like a terrific way to reduce the population of starving stray cats. In practice, it costs roughly $100 per kitty and "to put a dent in the total number of cats, at least 71 percent of them must be fixed, and they are notoriously hard to catch." Butler thinks a better strategy is for owners to keep their pets indoors and that soft-hearted animal-lovers need to just "quit feeding the ferals." Yet at least 10 major cities, including San Francisco, have adopted the approach, even though the effort is not only arduous but might also turn out to be never-ending - unless owners start neutering their own cats, or somebody invents a cat food laced with a failsafe contraceptive.
How embarrassing for rural Delta County in western Colorado: A file containing the names of a couple of dozen "sovereign citizens" - residents declaring themselves free of pesky taxes, laws or regulations by governmental authorities - was labeled "Wingnuts" by one staffer. That title became public when a reporter for the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel wrote a front-page story about the annoying anti-government folks, headlined "Watchdogs or Wingnuts?" A week later, red-faced county commissioners apologized.
The Rev. Rick Page, pastor of the First Christian Church in Lewistown, Mont., is convinced he's found a sure-fire way to lure men to Thursday night services during hunting season: Offer churchgoers the chance to enter a raffle to win a rifle or a crossbow. "I don't think there's too many places around the country where you could do something like this," he told the Missoulian. But it works, he says, pointing to Libby, Mont., which attracted 800 people last year with a similar emphasis on hunting. To help hunters feel at home in his church, Page says the auditorium and fellowship hall will be festooned with mounts, including deer heads, a full-sized bear, two mountain lions, bull elk, moose and some pheasants. Page also intends to hit a hunting theme hard in his sermons. He started with the Apostle Paul, he says, because "before his conversion, he hunted down Christians until God hunted him down."
Betsy Marston is the editor of Writers on the Range, a service of High Country News (hcn.org). Tips of Western oddities are always appreciated at email@example.com.


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Londonderry first-grader hurt in dog attackBy APRIL GUILMET
Union Leader Correspondent
April 01. 2013 9:07PM
LONDONDERRY - A 6-year-old Londonderry girl is recovering from severe facial injuries after being bitten by a neighbor's dog on Easter night.
Local police and fire officials were called to the Winterwood Drive condominium development just after 9 p.m., where a resident reported his daughter had been bitten by a pit bull mix earlier that evening.
According to police, the little girl was playing outside when she fell on top of the dog. The first-grader, who suffered severe bite wounds on her face, was taken to Elliot Hospital in Manchester.
Londonderry Police Lt. Tim Jones said the dog, owned by John and Lisa Palmieri, was immediately taken into quarantine. No charges have been filed against the owners.
The quarantine was a necessary precaution when the owners were unable to immediately produce vaccination records, police said. Jones said the animal's owners are being cooperative.
"They're trying to locate the paperwork right now," he said.
No one answered the door at the Palmieri residence Monday; attempts to reach the couple by phone were unsuccessful.
Police did not release the young victim's name, but South Elementary School Principal Linda Boyd confirmed the girl is a student at her school.
Boyd said she'd been in touch with the girl's parents and was told the first-grader has been released from the hospital and is home recovering from her injuries.
According to Jones, the dog growled at police officers when they arrived Sunday night. But he said the dog wasn't acting aggressively when he was fed at the police kennels Monday morning.
A Winterwood Drive resident who did not want his name used said neighbors are familiar with the Palmieri pet.
"I don't think this comes as any surprise to anyone in this neighborhood," he said.
It's unclear whether the condo association has rules concerning the keeping of pets considered aggressive or of a certain size or breed. A call made to Evergreen Property Management, the Bedford firm that manages the Londonderry condo development, was not returned.


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Bus crashes into Boston overpass, 33 people hurtStaff and wire reports
February 02. 2013 10:59PM
A bus carrying 42 passengers traveling from Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass., to Pennsylvania crashed into a Boston overpass on Saturday night, injuring 33 people, according to emergency officials.
The crash happened about 7:30 p.m. on Soldiers Field Road in Boston, according to Boston Emergency Medical Services spokeswoman Jennifer Mehigan.
Medical workers took 33 people to four area hospitals - 28 with minor injuries and five with serious injuries, Mehigan said. Some people had to be removed through the bus roof and strapped onto backboards, according to the Boston Fire Department's Twitter feed.
"A number of patients were trapped at some point during the incident," said Mehigan.
All of the victims had been removed from the bus by about 9:30 p.m. She said the fire department had to remove part of the roof of the private Calvary Coach charter bus to perform the rescues.
The bus was carrying high school students and adult chaperones from the Philadelphia area, according to Massachusetts State Police. The students had been in the Boston area to visit Harvard.
Authorities are investigating whether charges are warranted in crash. The bus driver was believed to have missed a sign prohibiting the bus from that road, according to state police.


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|Episode Description
|Sunday, Jan 27, 2013 - 10:00 AM
"The Abolitionists, Part Three"
During his raid on Harpers Ferry, John Brown is captured, then executed, becoming a martyr for the cause. Abraham Lincoln is elected president in 1860; war breaks out in 1861. On New Year's Day 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation is announced; African-American men may now enlist in the Union forces, and two of Frederick Douglass' sons go to war. In December 1865, the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is ratified, banning slavery in all states. Part 3 of 3 G
|More on WORLD (PT)
|No upcoming shows in database


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WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama's choice of John Brennan to be the next CIA director hit a snag Tuesday as a Republican senator threatened to delay the nomination until the Obama administration provides answers on the deadly assault in Libya that killed the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, whose opposition helped scuttle U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice's hopes of becoming secretary of state, said the Senate should not confirm any Obama nominee for the nation's top spy post until the administration elaborates on the attack on the diplomatic mission in Benghazi.
"My support for a delay in confirmation is not directed at Mr. Brennan, but is an unfortunate, yet necessary, action to get information from this administration," the South Carolina senator said in a statement. "I have tried — repeatedly — to get information on Benghazi, but my requests have been repeatedly ignored."
He added that the administration's "stonewalling on Benghazi" must end.
Kevin Bishop, a spokesman for Graham, said late Tuesday that it's possible the senator would put a "hold" on Brennan's nomination, but the lawmaker hopes he doesn't have to take that step. In his statement, Graham signaled that he would try to slow the nomination.
The White House dismissed the politicization of the issue and pressed for the Senate to act quickly and deliberately on Brennan's nomination.
"It would be unfortunate, I think, if in pursuit of this issue, which was highly politicized, the Senate would hold up the nomination of John Brennan to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency," White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters.
An independent review board released an exhaustive report last month that found "systematic failures and leadership and management deficiencies at senior levels" of the State Department that led to inadequate security at the mission in Benghazi.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is likely to deliver her long-awaited testimony on Libya before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee the week of Jan. 21. The State Department said the date hasn't been finalized.
Illness and a concussion delayed her congressional appearance in December, one of her last acts as secretary of state. Obama has nominated Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., to replace Clinton after Rice withdrew her name from consideration.
In the weeks after the Sept. 11, 2012, attack that killed U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens, Republicans criticized the administration for blaming spontaneous protests over an American-made, anti-Muslim video. They suggested the administration was trying to play down an act of terrorism leading up to the November election, even though Obama used that description in the days after the raid.
Graham and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., directed much of their ire at Rice, who said in a series of Sunday talk show interviews on Sept. 16 that the attack may have been a protest that got out of hand. Rice's widely debunked explanation was based on talking points from the intelligence community.
Graham said he wants answers on who changed Rice's talking points and deleted references to al-Qaida. He said lawmakers were told that the director of national intelligence deleted the references, then were told it was the FBI. Hours after a meeting with Rice in late November, Congress was informed that the CIA had changed the talking points.
"This ever-changing story should be resolved," Graham said. "It is imperative we understand who changed the talking points just weeks before a presidential election and why."
Graham, who is up for re-election next year, has been an outspoken critic of the administration on Libya.
Carney pointed out that Obama pressed for swift confirmation of his national security nominees when he announced the selections Monday, and the administration hopes there are no unnecessary delays. He noted that the FBI is continuing its investigation of the attack, the independent review board issued a scathing report and Obama wants to bring the perpetrators of the attack to justice.
"The president is focused on those issues, not what seems to be the continued political fascination with appearances on Sunday shows," Carney said.
Brennan was expected to have an easier time on the path to Senate confirmation than Chuck Hagel, Obama's choice to run the Pentagon. A handful of Republicans have announced opposition to their former GOP colleague, and several skeptical Democrats reserved judgment until Hagel explains his views on Israel and Iran.
The concerns about Hagel complicate his path to Senate confirmation but are not necessarily calamitous as the White House pushes for the first Vietnam War veteran and enlisted Army man to oversee a military emerging from two wars and staring at deep budget cuts.
Brennan, a 25-year CIA veteran, is expected to be hit with questions about torture and administration leaks of secret information at his hearing, but is widely expected to win Senate confirmation. Graham's demands on the Libya raid could stall the nomination.
Hagel has upset some Israel backers with his comment about the "Jewish lobby," his votes against unilateral sanctions against Iran while backing international penalties on the regime in Tehran and his criticism of talk of a military strike by either the U.S. or Israel against Iran.
He also upset gay rights groups over past comments, including his opposition in 1998 to President Bill Clinton's choice of James Hormel as ambassador to Luxembourg. He referred to Hormel as "openly, aggressively gay." Hagel recently apologized, saying his comments were "insensitive."
Those remarks and actions have created fierce opposition from some pro-Israel groups, criticism from some Republicans and unease among some congressional Democrats.
In an interview with the Lincoln (Neb.) Journal Star, Hagel said his statements have been distorted and there is "not one shred of evidence that I'm anti-Israeli, not one (Senate) vote that matters that hurt Israel."
During a trip to the Mideast, Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., sought to reassure Israelis concerned about Hagel's nomination. Nelson, a member of the Armed Services Committee, said Hagel has a record of support for Israel.
Nelson said he discussed Hagel's nomination with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He said the prime minister did not voice objections to Hagel.
Former Sen. Max Cleland, D-Ga., himself a wounded Vietnam veteran, said he thinks Hagel "has to clarify" his positions on issues like Iran and Israel.
But Cleland also said in an interview on "CBS This Morning" Tuesday that Hagel is battle-tested and ready for the challenges of a confirmation process, accusing the Nebraskan's critics of "swatting at nothing, shadow-boxing."
Associated Press writers Julie Pace, Darlene Superville, Lolita C. Baldor, Lara Jakes and Connie Cass contributed to this report.


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- Home
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Gas Guzzlers: Combat Carnage Beta Client
Gamepire's fast-paced addictive combat racing game for the PC is currently in beta. Give the game and one of its deadly cars a test drive by giving it a try.
Mass Effect 3 'Take Earth Back' Trailer
Not everyone will survive. The Reapers have finally arrived and taken over Earth, its now up to Shepard and all of galactic civilization to take Earth back.
Unstoppable Gorg Demo
Get ready for a revolution in tower defense. Defend the solar system by sending satellites into orbit around planets, moons and space stations.
Starfarer Demo
Starfarer is a sandbox style space role-playing game. Fly around with your customizable fleet, explore, build, blow stuff up and advance your character.
Skyrim Modifications
Everybody keeps asking us "Where are your Skyrim Mods?" Just click on that this link above, and you'll fast travel to their location. 50 gold please.
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Cloning Clyde Demo
Ever wonder what it would be like to be half chicken? Half monkey? Half frog? Well, wonder no more when you play Cloning Clyde.
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Cell: Emergence Demo
Get a taste of the "massively reactive" gameplay in indie game Cell: emergence, a journey inside the human body based on "dynamic voxels."
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Jagged Alliance: Back In Action Demo
Return to the beloved turn-based mercenary strategy game with this demo for Jagged Alliance: Back In Action consisting of two missions to play.
Free to Play GamesSee All Free Games
Meet a playful, vibrant game with a lot of heart and bounce. Wroom combines colorful, silky smooth visuals with an acrobatic, parkour type of gameplay.
Treasure Adventure Game
A fun and free platform adventure game in a huge pixelated open world. Grab your favorite red head-perching parrot and a magic boat for some fun!
Lineage 2: Goddess of Destruction
Lineage 2 has been revitalized with a revamp of existing content, new high level content and the introduction of the Truly Free business model.
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Anno 2070 Patch v1.02
This patch will update Anno 2070 to 1.02 and includes first ornamental buildings for Ecos and Tycoons, game stability improved and more.
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Pro Evolution Soccer 2012 Patch v1.03
This patch will update the DVD retail version of Pro Evolution Soccer to version 1.03 enhancing the overall gaming experience.


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photo 1 of 428
Carlos Condit
TRAINING: Sparring/grappling at 9:30am Mon-Fri. Strength and conditioning at 1:00 Mon-Wed-Fri. Pads and technique at 5:30.
When and why did you start training for fighting? I've always been interested in combat sports, and when I was 15 I decided to look for a place to train. I found the school I'm with now, and I just fell in love with the sport.
What ranks and titles have you held? Former nterim UFC welterweight champion, WEC Welterweight Champion
Do you have any heroes? Tyler Sanchez and Tim Mullens
What is your favorite technique? Knees to the jaw
What does it mean for you to fight in the UFC? Fighting in the UFC is a chance to make my mark, to compete with the best in the world, and hopefully write my name in MMA history.
Did you go to college and if so what degree did you earn? No college
What was your job before you started fighting? I worked as a bouncer for a while and I was a lifeguard for a couple years. Now I teach at the gym.
Getty Images reserves the right to pursue unauthorized users of this image or clip. If you violate our intellectual property you may be liable for: actual damages, loss of income, and profits you derive from the use of this image or clip, and, where appropriate, the costs of collection and/or statutory damages up to $150,000 (USD).


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Copyright 5/8/2013 Publishers Weekly. Week ending 6/29/14, powered by Nielsen Bookscan 5/8/2013 The Nielsen Company.
1. "Invisible" by Patterson/Ellis (Little, Brown)
2. "Top Secret Twenty-One" by Janet Evanovich (Bantam)
3. "Silkworm" by Robert Galbraith (LB/Mulholland)
4. "Mr. Mercedes" by Stephen King (Scribner)
5. "Written in My Own Heart's Blood" by Diana Gabaldon (Delacorte Press)
6. "All Fall Down" by Jennifer Weiner (Atria)
7. "The Goldfinch" Donna Tartt (Little,Brown)
8. "The Matchmaker" by Elin Hilderbrand (Little, Brown)
9. "The One & Only" by Emily Giffin (Ballantine)
10."Unlucky 13" by Patterson/Paetro (Little, Brown)
11."Cop Town" by Karin Slaughter (Delacorte)
12."All the Light We Cannot See" By Anthony Doerr (Scribner)
13."The Hurricane Sisters" by Dorothea Benton Frank (William Morrow)
14."The Target" by David Baldacci (Grand Central Publishing)
15."Ghost Ship" by Cussler/Brown (Putnam)
1. "Hard Choices" by Hillary Rodham Clinton (Simon & Schuster)
2. "Blood Feud" by Edward Klein (Regnery)
3. "One Nation" by Ben Carson (Penguin/Sentinel)
4. "Good Call" by Jase Robertson (Howard Books)
5. "Instinct" by T.D. Jakes (FaithWords)
6. "Capital in the Twenty-First Century" by Thomas Piketty (Harvard/Belknap)
7. "Think Like a Freak" by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner (William Morrow)
8. "Everything I Need to Know I Learned From a Little Golden Book" by Diane Muldrow (Golden Books)
9. "America" by Dinesh D'Souza (Regnery)
10."Grain Brain" by David Perlmutter (Little, Brown)
11."The Closer" by Mariano Rivera (Little, Brown)
12."I Am Malala" by Malala Yousafzai (Little, Brown)
13."Finding Me" by Michelle Knight (Weinstein)
14."Girlboss" by Sophia Amoruso (Penguin/Portfolio)
15."Special Heart" by Bret Baier (Hachette/Center Street)
1. "Takedown Twenty" by Janet Evanovich (Bantam)
2. "The Promise" by Robyn Carr (Mira)
3. "Until we Touch" by Susan Mallery (Harlequin)
4. "Bombshell" by Catherine Coulter (Jove)
5. "Second Honeymoon" by Patterson/Roughan (Vision)
6. "Kiss and Tell" by Fern Michaels (Kensington/Zebra)
7. "Inferno" by Dan Brown (Anchor)
8. "The 9th Girl" by Tami Hoag (Signet)
9. "When Day Breaks" by Maya Banks (Berkley)
10."Zero Hour" by Cussler/Brown (Berkley)
11."Bones of the Lost" by Kathy Reichs (Pocket Books)
12."The Last Boyfriend" by Nora Roberts (Jove)
13."The Marriage Pact" by Linda Lael Miller (Harlequin)
14."To Marry a Scottish Laird" by Lynsay Sands (Avon)
15."On a Clear Day" by Debbie Macomber (Mira)
1. "Gone Girl" by Gillian Flynn (Broadway Books)
2. "And the Mountains Echoed" by Khaled Hosseini (Riverhead)
3. "The Longest Ride" by Nicholas Sparks (Grand Central Publishing)
4. "The Boys in the Boat" by Daniel James Brown (Penguin)
5. "Doctor Sleep" by Stephen King (S&S/Gallery)
6. "Heaven Is for Real (movie tie-in)" by Todd Burpo (Thomas Nelson)
7. "The Silver Star" by Jeannette Walls (Scribner)
8. "The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert (Penguin)
9. "10-Day Green Smoothie Cleanse" by J.J. Smith (Adiva)
10."The Cuckoo's Calling" by Robert Galbraith (LB/Mulholland)
11."The Ocean at the End of the Lane" by Neil Gaiman (William Morrow)
12."How to Read Literature Like a Professor" by Thomas C. Foster (Harper Perennial)
13."Sweet Salt Air" by Barbara Delinsky (St. Martin's)
14."Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls" by David Sedaris (Back Bay)
15. "Inferno" by Dan Brown (Anchor)


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Lodi Unified School District
location on Google Maps.
in new tab.
on social media.
Lodi Unified School District encompasses 350 square miles and serves the cities of Lodi, North Stockton, and the communities of Acampo, Clements, Lockeford, Victor, and Woodbridge in the Central Valley of Northern California
Lodi Unified School District was created in 1967, when voters approved the merger of 18 elementary districts and the union high school district. The boundary, established in 1922, followed that of the old Lodi Union High School District. Over the last 30 years principally uninhabited territory was ceded to adjoining districts south of the Stockton Deep Water Channel north of Jahant Road (at Highway 99) and south of Hammer Lane. The district is a major contributor to the economy of the area, employing over 3,000 people. In addition, over the last 12 years the district has obtained over $100,000,000 in state bond funds for the construction and renovation of school facilities throughout the district.
Student enrollment is 29,800 in Kindergarten through grade twelve. There are 49 school sites, 33 elementary, 7 middle, 4 comprehensive high schools, and two continuation high schools. In addition, the district offers two elementary community day schools, and one middle community day school, a Middle College High School, an adult school, an Independence School, a Career Center, Children's Center, a Developmental Center for disabled students, and several pre-school programs. The top five primary languages other than English are Spanish, Hmong, Urdu, Cambodian and Vietnamese.


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By MailChimp
Listed On
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CATEGORIESMass Emails
More than 16 million people use MailChimp to design, send, and track email marketing campaigns. Keep your MailChimp and Salesforce.com data in sync with this free integration. View campaign reports, manage subscribers, create custom queries, and more.
Contents of managed packages don't count against your org's app, tab, and object limits. Contents of unmanaged packages count against these limits, so check your org before installing. Package Contents
Lightning components are building blocks for Salesforce apps. Use global components to build custom apps with tools like Lightning App Builder and Community Builder. Lightning Components
Many people use MailChimp for their email lists. If you'd like to give your visitors a way to subscribe to your list on your blog, you can either use the subscriber popup form, or a regular signup form.
You can create a regular signup form, by embedding a
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or Wet Look Stirrup Legging Black Miss Selfridge yaVMWq
form withMailChimp integration, directly into your site. Here are specific instructions for eachservice:
However, a subscriber popup form can be more engaging, as it appears on top of your site, the first time a user opens it. Here's how you can set one up:
First, either create a MailChimp account or log in to your current one .
Next, create an email list for your website's followers.
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on how to create a list in your MailChimp account. Once it's created, navigateto your list, and click Signup forms .
From there select the Subscriber popup option.Subscriber popup
Design and configure your form however you'd like.
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Make sure to Publish your form and then click View Code (both buttons are in the lower right).Publish View Code
You'll get a popup with some code. Copy that code, making sure not to change anything.
Back on WordPress.com, head over to Customize and select the site you'd like to run the popup. Select Widgets …Widgets
And then select the widget area (you may only see one depending on your theme). Next, click the button to Add a Widget .Add a Widget
Either scroll down the list of widgets or search to find the MailChimp Subscriber Popup .MailChimp Subscriber Popup
The widget's settings will come up.
Now you need that snippet of code you copied from MailChimp's site. Paste your code into the textbox. You can limit where the popup will appear to your visitors by configuring the widget's Visibility settings . When you're done making changes click the Save Publish button up at the top.Save Publish
The first time a visitor comes to your page, they'll get a popup with your subscribe form. MailChimp stores a cookie in the visitor's browser so they don't get the popup more than once. Here is an example:
While product managers may not build the actual product, they do produce something very tangible for a team: .
These decisions can be about anything: small ones like a line of copy in the docs, to big ones like what the MVP of a new feature should be.
The decisions PMs make are the ones that unblock their team so they can continue to build. They don't need to make decision, but they are responsible for ensuring a decision gets made — whether by them, their team, or their stakeholders.
Product managers are the hedge against indecision, and it's uniquely our job because we tend to have the most context in a company. Typically, the most important decisions that a PM makes are, in order:
Since we've
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these decisions before, and observed a really bad one , in this post we're going to focus on something more general: What does it mean for a PM to be a good decision maker?
Intuitively, matters At the same time, and in contrast, there are often factors outside of our control that determine outcomes.
Maybe you're building an iOS app and then Apple changes their terms of service so your app is in breach. Maybe a law passes that makes your on-demand services illegal in your biggest markets.
These situations all happen in a flash, are hard to predict, and can negate any good decision you otherwise made. In such an environment, how can one objectively analyze their decisions?
I propose that being a good decision maker means doing two things:
Deciding how important a decision is, is the most important decision you can make. For people that make decisions for a living, understanding when one is really important vs. not-that-important is most critical skill.
In Amazon's 2016 shareholder letter , Jeff Bezos touches on this concept with what he calls type 1 and type 2 decisions.
What Bezos drives at in the letter is that the impact of a decision guides how much effort you need to put into making it. You can be right 99% of the time, but if you're wrong the 1% of times when ityou're not an effective decision maker. The takeaway is that when the stakes are high, you should work a lot harder at making the right decision.
Although I don't see Type I and II decisions as binary, I do see them as representing the spectrum for a framework for determining "decision importance":
This framework breaks down decision importance into three dimensions:
The idea here is to plot a decision along these spectrums in order to determine an overall importance. Let's take a look at three examples.
First, .
This is clearly a low importance decision. If you're wrong, it's very easy to undo. The impact of being wrong is limited only to the number of users affected during the period of change. The impact of being right is only incremental.
Note, this doesn't mean it's not worth doing, it means the decision to do it or not isn't that important, and as we'll see later that should affect the speed at which we make the decision.
Another example:
This is a medium to high importance decision. It might not take a lot of resources to execute, but the impact (both positive and negative) to the company's brand and customer base is huge. Remember when Uber changed their logo and no one could find the app? Or when AirBnB did and no one could stop seeing genitals ?
One more:
This particular decision is medium to low importance. It's important in that it will consume material resources, but also not important in that failure has no lasting downside.
This is a common decision type for tech companies that have reached scale and are looking for new ways to grow. The high investment + low impact of failure + high impact of success creates a risk/reward ratio that is very attractive to companies that can afford to spend the resources, so much so that they often create dedicated teams to repeatably experiment with these types of projects. Think Facebook's
laceup sneakers Black Marni tn53N
, or Google's .
This framework, or any variation of it, will create common ground for you to compare decisions and articulate the importance of them to everyone you work with. Tweak it based on your company's context, and recognize that defining decision importance informs everything else about how you should approach making the decision. So do it first.
I have a proposition for you, which is that good decision makers are also the ones who make most of their decisions . To get to that conclusion, we're going to unbundle the following statements:
Let's go through each of them.
1. The less important a decision, the less information you should try to seek to make it.
Products, especially those used by many people, are complex systems where predicting all the ramifications of a decision are practically impossible, even when you have 100% of the available informationSince we cannot perfectly predict outcomes,this effectively means that all decisions are we are making.
We choose to make these bets based our in a positive outcome, and that confidence is based on the amount of information we have. The more information we have as a percentage of all available information about a decision, the higher our confidence level should be.
"Information" in this context can be anything relevant to the decision. Using our previous sign-up button example, we could research button patterns from other sites as information to support a positive outcome.
Here's the key question, though: should one be gathering before they make a decision?
Whether consciously or not, few people gather anywhere near 100% of available information before making a decision. What ends up happening is that at some point, every decision maker subconsciously thinks to themselves "I'm ~70% sure adding this green button will increase conversion." and then they simply make it.
It's that line of thought that reveals two things about how decisions actually get made by an individual: first, they assess their confidence level (70%), and secondly, they define a confidence threshold required to make that decision.
You may be willing to add the sign-up button with 60% confidence that it will create a positive outcome, but you wouldn't change the company's logo with only 60% confidence. The latter is a more important decision, and therefore the bar for confidence should be higher.
To summarize:
We can visualize these points in the model below:
This reveals something counterintuitive about decision making: your goal shouldn't be to always make the right decision, it should be to invest the right amount of time in a making a decision relative to its importance.
The ramifications of subscribing to this are two-fold. The downside is that you will end up making more decisions, but when you do, they're likely not important. The upside is that you will end up making decisions, which as a PM means you're creating more .
How much more? That's what the next section is about.
2. Information gathering effort follows the Pareto principle
What's the difference in effort required for gathering 35% of information versus 70%? It's not 2x — most of the time you will already have a significant amount of the relevant information close by: data about past user behaviour, previous research studies, previous attempts by the company, etc.
The Pareto principle applies here in that you can usually get ~80% of the information you need with little investment, whereas getting 100% will take a lot of effort.
Say you're a PM at Facebook and you're deciding whether or not to get into the peer to peer buying/selling space. As evidenced by Craiglist, Letgo, and others, you know the opportunity is big so you start exploring the need for such a feature on Facebook.
You assess the importance, and come up with "medium important" because of the resource investment and the potential legal risks of facilitating transactions and commerce on Facebook.
What information would you gather to make this decision?
Well, probably the first place you'd look is the existing user behaviour within Facebook Groups. Are communities of people already doing this without having specific features for it? You can probably analyze the names of groups and the content being posted to them in order to identify how many users are already buying/selling.
By looking at the posts made in the groups, you can also probably figure out what is being sold, the composition of pictures being used, and how a transaction is happening even though there's no payment features. To address the legal risk, you can also work with your legal team to research the implications to the company. All this information is readily available.
What you probably won't be able to figure out so easily is: are people choosing to use Facebook for this instead of the established marketplaces? To find that out you'll likely need to do more qualitative research directly with users, which is going to take a lot of time.
Do you need to? Is it worth the extra time?
Probably not. The readily available information provides ~80% of the context for figuring out if people want the feature and if the company can stomach the legal impact. Although knowing why they're using Facebook for buying/selling will be important knowledge for designing the feature, it's not really needed to decide whether or not to do it in the first place.
Generalizing this into a model, we can say that the time (effort) to gather information for decisions follows the Pareto principle:
Notice this curve is exactly the same as we showed in the previous section when we showed that the amount of information you need is based on the importance of the decision.
Merging these two curves together, we can actually model the appropriate speed of making a decision as a function of the importance.
The combination of these models reveal something important. The speed of your decision making not linearly correlated to how important you think a decision is, it's correlated. Incorrectly assessing a low importance decision as high means you waste a significant amount of time gathering excess information.
3. Most decisions are not important
The model below shows that decision importance follows an inverse power law, where the vast majority of decisions are not important.
To save your time, I'm just going to assert that this model is directionally, intuitively, true.
We make decisions all day working at product companies — they are not all be of equal importance, and frankly most are trivial. Should we use the oxford comma, or not? Should we roll out to 5% of users, or 10%? Lunch meeting, or eat fast and meet up in 15?
Let's review our three statements and the conclusion they form:
Overlaying the last two models we covered illustrates this clearly.
decision makers, are decision makers.
Applying these principles and frameworks are incredibly tough in practice. No one likes to be wrong, and as a PM being wrong is very public and can feel career damaging.
Understanding that decisions are your output as a PM can help you suppress your fears and focus on impact. If you packed boxes for a living, you wouldn't think packing 3/hr flawlessly is better than 100/hour with a 2% failure rate. So why think that way about your output?
If you manage PMs, recognize that PMs that are uber careful and always right usually aren't the ones who are driving the most impact. Impact is driven by those who are driving lots of decisions quickly, and are right when it's really important to be.
The sign up button decision should be made fast, almost real time.
The Facebook buy/sell marketplace decision needs some time to think through, but it's not the end of the world if you're wrong.
You should take your time with the logo decision.
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The Center for Children Families (CCF), part of the Health Policy Institute at the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown University, is an independent, nonpartisan policy and research center with a mission to expand and improve high-quality, affordable health coverage. Founded in 2005, CCF is devoted to improving the health of America's children and families, particularly those with low and moderate incomes. Contact Us


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Jeffrey Nickerson
January 17. 2014 11:50AM
ALTON - A man featured as this week's Fugitive of the Week was arrested about midnight in Alton after members of the U.S. Marshals Fugitive Task Force found him hiding in a Main Street apartment.
Jeffrey Nickerson, 29, was wanted by Pittsfield, Barnstead and Laconia police on charges of failing to register as a sex offender, burglary, theft of a vehicle and escape.
Nickerson is required by law to register as a sex offender based on 1994 convictions in Middlesex County, Mass. on three counts of sexual assault.
Previously, Nickerson contacted investigators and indicated several times he was going to surrender to the task force on the outstanding warrants. When he didn't, the task force intensified its search for him.
Information developed by investigators and two tips led the task force to an apartment on Main Street in Alton. Authorities said Nickerson was found hiding in a corner next to a bureau and a rear door in the apartment.
Nickerson quickly realized he could not flee because an Alton police dog was just outside the door, according to a news release issued by the U.S. Marshals Office. Nickerson was arrested without further incident.
He was turned over to the Pittsfield and Epson police, and taken to the Merrimack County jail where he is being held pending arraignment.


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Wednesday's city council meeting agenda shows the council will address more ceremonial items than discussion items.
The one consent calendar item of note is a request that the council pass a resolution approving the City's Successor Agency Recognized Obligation Payment schedule (ROPS) for the period between July 1 and Dec. 31, 2012.
According to the staff report, the document "reflects the obligations of the Successor Agency for the period of July 1, 2013 through December 31, 2013 and has been prepared per the Stateof California Department of Finance regulations."
The ROPS report itself notes that of the Successor Agency's total $72.2 million outstanding debt or obligations, $8.9 million is due for FY 2013-14.
The staff report, to be presented by Economic Development Manager Gary Parsons, notes the major additions to the payment request are "are a $1.182 million payment to the Sierra Sands School District, the Funding of a Property Management Plan to facilitate the sale of the Agency property assets of $21,500 and the addition of $50,000 dollars for anticipated legal costs."
The $1.182 million payment to SSUSD popped up during a discussion during a December RDA Successor Agency's Oversight Board, in which board member Gary Rice indicated he would like to see it on the next ROPS.
It is a case in which the Kern County Auditor-Controller's office continued flowing funds into an RDA account as a means of paying back a loan floated to the school district for a construction project at Gateway Elementary School.
As a way to pay back the loan, the district opted to divert a percentage of its tax revenue over a number of years. Due to an accounting oversight, the county auditor-controller continued diverting money to the account.
The council will be asked to review the report before sending it up to the Oversight Board for final approval and kicking it over to California's Department of Finance.
Appointments and ordinances changes
Council will also need to fill three vacancies in its remaining boards and commissions. A vacancy remains in the Personnel Commission, Handicap Access Appeals Board, and Construction Appeals Board.
During the Jan. 23 special council meeting, Vice Mayor Chip Holloway appointed former police chief and city manager Michael Avery to Construction Appeals, while Councilman Jim Sanders appointed Ryan Hunter to Handicap Access Appeals.
Mayor Dan Clark appointed former mayor Ron Carter to the personnel commission on Feb. 6.
An amendment updating the city municipal code is expected to pass through without much debate. The changes clean up the municipal code's language by replacing "City Administrator" with "City Manager" and deleting the section pertaining to the city's now defunct RDA.
The only major change is to the section governing the personnel commission. Under the revisions, all personnel decisions made by the commission are final, instead of only making recommendations to the council.
Ceremonial items include presenting City Engineer Loren Culp with the city's employee of the month award and a proclamation declaring May as "Motorcycle Awareness Month."
The council's regular session meeting begins at 6 p.m. at City Hall on Wednesday, Feb. 20.


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Events for August 14, 2013
June 25, 2011 - December 7, 2014
Special Exhibit
Picturing Science
This exhibition features more than 20 sets of large-format images that showcase the wide range of research being conducted at the Museum as well as how various optical tools are used in scientific studies.
Through January 5, 2014
Special Exhibit
Whales: Giants of the Deep
Whales: Giants of the Deep brings visitors closer than ever to some of the mightiest, most massive, and mysterious mammals on Earth.
© Brandon Cole, Romeo/V&W, SeaPics.com


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One thing that you notice with poison ivy is that they have a unique leaf pattern. This helps you tell them apart from other plants in case you are not so sure. The leafs will occur alternatively along the stem. They can be glossy green or dull, but they are smooth and toothed along the edge. It is a perennial plant produced by woody rhizomes and seeds. It can grow either as a self-supporting woody shrub, a trailing and thin vine along your surfaces, or it can also grow on trees, fences, power poles and shrubs as an aerial rooted vine. Whichever of these you have in your home, you need an expert at Clarence poison ivy removal to help you keep your home safe from these plants.
The health risks associated with poison ivy have been well-documented over the years. This is one of the reasons why it is wise to leave poison ivy removal in Clarence to professionals. There are different factors that come into play when you are thinking of the cost of removing poison ivy from your home. The level of development/spread will definitely determine how much you spend on this project. The cost of labor is another factor that you cannot take for granted. The cost of materials used in poison ivy removal can be anywhere between $80 and $200. You, however, need to consult a professional to inspect your home and advise you on how to go about poison ivy removal.
Most of the companies will charge you $150 for poison ivy removal in Clarence. Apart from that, you will also be charged around $0.75 per mile round trip, including the cost of tolls. Most contractors prefer that you pay the travel costs and estimate fees in advance before they get to your job site. Once they are through, they will also offer disposal of the treated poison ivy. This is charged at around $25 for a 10-pound bag, though each contractor might have different cost considerations.
For reference it may be helpful to compare the costs from surrounding towns as well:
You might be surprised, but millions of people are affected by poison ivy each year. One of the common effects is a skin rash. A lot of people have reacted badly to urushiol, the allergic agent contained in poison ivy. It can be transported either through smoke or through the wind, and in some cases through direct contact. For this reason, you should not take risks. Get a professional for poison ivy removal in Clarence as soon as possible.
It is actually a good idea to do so. Most of the chemical products that might be used for Clarence poison ivy removal might have a detrimental effect on the life and health of the rest of the plant life in your compound. Organic products, on the other hand, will not have the same effect. There are no harmful chemicals used. You also do not need to wait for weeks to see the results.
No, they will not. After poison ivy removal in Clarence, all the poison ivy, sumac or oak plant parts will die. Therefore, you will not need to worry about the risk of exposure again. However, if that is not the case, you can consult your contractors for an agreeable reprieve. This is why you are also advised to work with professionals. They usually have a performance guarantee and in case you do not see immediate results, they can recommend further treatment, often without you having to spend more in the process.
Last updated: Sep 18, 2018


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Linked by Thom Holwerda on Tue 10th May 2011 08:19 UTC, submitted by porcel
So, the biggest acquisition in Microsoft's history. The Wall Street Journal reports - and it has been confirmed - that Microsoft and Skype will announce today that Redmond will buy Skype for $8.5 billion. That's a lot of money for a company that hasn't ever actually made any profits. Update: and it's official: yay on Skype on the Xbox360 and Windows Phone, and this: "Microsoft will continue to invest in and support Skype clients on non-Microsoft platforms." Let's hope this includes Linux.
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To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
RE: A new bubble
by ramond on Tue 10th May 2011 21:30 UTC in reply to "A new bubble"
Exactly my point before. Shareholders should be angry.
http://sxsy.co/microsoft-buys-skype"%20rel= http://sxsy.co/microsoft-buys-skype" >


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Business owners frustrated by sidewalk restoration plansBy MARK HAYWARD
New Hampshire Union Leader
September 19. 2013 9:10PM
MANCHESTER — Some downtown retailers expressed frustration this week to find out that their sidewalks — which they said were uneven and unsafe — will not be part of a sidewalk restoration effort slated for the core downtown area.
The city plans to spend $380,000 this fall to reconstruct some brick sidewalks downtown. The work is slated for the east side of Elm Street — the Citizens Bank side — from Merrimack to Bridge streets, a six-block stretch of downtown.
A smaller, one-block portion of the west side of Elm Street will be paved — the sidewalk between Stark and Mechanic streets.
But areas north of Bridge, or south of Merrimack Street, won't see any work.
"I think this block deserves a good sidewalk," said Mike Grady, owner of Collector's Heaven, a baseball card and sports apparel store between Central and Lake Avenue. He said his store and George's Apparel are two of the biggest downtown retailers, and pedestrians on his block are usually headed toward the Verizon Wireless Arena, he said.
Yet, his sidewalk won't be touched.
"Our block has a tremendous amount of traffic," Grady said. "We want to make sure (pedestrians) are all right when they're walking here."
City officials put out a memo this week announcing that Lyman Construction will start work on the sidewalks next week.
City Engineering Manager Todd Connors said the money is going to restore sidewalks that are in the worst shape. Connors said there have been some preliminary discussions about future restorations, but the money is not now available.
The city used debt to fund the project.
The center of downtown features several blocks that are totally bricked, while blocks farther from the core have brick accents located along curbs and between concrete slabs. They were installed in the 1970s, said City Design Engineer Bruce Thomas.
While stylish, the brick walks require maintenance, and that hasn't taken place for at least the last five years, Thomas said. Mortar gets loose and pops out. Then the brick loosens. Eventually, it gets lost. The city then fills in the holes with asphalt, but lost mortar joints generally remain open.
"It's fun late night watching the girls walk by in heels," said Steve Matluk, a manager at The Gyro Spot, which will have its sidewalk replaced.
Thomas said the new design calls for bricks to be much closer together — about a half-inch — and to be filled with sand. That will require less maintenance, he said.
"We think it's lower maintenance and fewer trip hazards," Thomas said.
Connors said if any money is left over, mortar on the west sidewalk from Merrimack to Stark streets will be replaced.
Meanwhile, others will have to wait. Krysten Apostoles, owner of K-Fab Boutique, wouldn't get a new sidewalk. She is on the west side of Elm Street, near Dow Street. Her sidewalk is asphalt, filled with cracks and uneven.
"Mine is probably one of the absolute worst on Elm Street," said Apostoles, who recently opened at the location and fears that winter will be treacherous for her customers, some of whom visit wearing high heels. She said she complains to the mayor about her sidewalk, but nothing has happened.
Connors said her block would not be eligible for the project because it does not include brick. However, if her sidewalk needs work he will see what can be done.


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