text:
You are here: Manchester Confidential › Food & Drink.
THE StreetSmart campaign has launched in Manchester and will see city restaurants, including some of its newest and most acclaimed dining establishments, pulling together to help raise funds for the homeless over the Christmas period.
This year a high profile roll call of some the best restaurants in the region are representing StreetSmart in Manchester and hoping to beat last year's fundraising total.
StreetSmart works by participating restaurants adding £1 to all customers' bills throughout November and December. This a voluntary contribution and the amount is the same no matter how big the party.
With hundreds of restaurants doing this nationally this small gift adds up to a serious impact on the lives of the UK's homeless population with the 2012 campaign raising £805,000 nationally, and Manchester restaurants generating £25,000.
A major point of difference for the StreetSmart campaign is that, thanks to the campaign's sponsor Deutsche Bank, 100% of the funds raised by each participating city are directed straight back into local homeless projects and charities.
These organisations are designed to help individuals who have found themselves homeless to break the cycle, regain their dignity and rebuild their lives via positive action. Therefore the aim of the StreetSmart campaign in Manchester is to 'prevent' homelessness rather than just 'treat' it.
This year a high profile roll call of some the best restaurants in the region are representing StreetSmart in Manchester and hoping to beat last year's fundraising total.
Participating restaurants in StreetSmart Manchester:
Aumbry, Prestwich, Bury.
Artisan, Spinningfields, City Centre.
Choice Bar and Restaurant, Castlefield, City Centre.
Damson, Heaton Moor, Stockport.
Damson, MediaCityUK, Salford.
Grenache, Walkden, Salford.
The Grill on the Edge, Alderley Edge.
The Grill on the Alley, City Centre.
Hearth of the Ram, Ramsbottom, Bury.
Kro Piccadilly, City Centre.
Michael Caines Restaurant, City Centre.
Michael Caines Bar & Grill @ABode Manchester, City Centre.
Mr Cooper's House and Garden by Simon Rogan, Midland Hotel, City Centre.
Northern Quarter Restaurant, City Centre.
The Parlour, Chorlton.
The Red Lion, High Lane, Stockport.
Rosy Lee Tea Rooms, City Centre.
Second Floor Restaurant, Harvey Nichols, City Centre.
Vermilion, East Manchester.
Partner hotels to SleepSmart to date include:
The Lowry Hotel, Salford.
The Works Aparthotel, City Centre.
Restaurants can still sign up to the StreetSmart campaign. They simply need to visit http://www.streetsmart.org.uk/sign-up.php or contact Siobhan Hanley as below. For more information and images please contact Siobhan Hanley: email@example.com
Like what you see? Enter your email to sign up for our newsletters which are chock-a-block with more great reviews, news, deals and savings.
I wish someone would feed the Big Issue seller outside Philpotts on Brazennose Street, because when he's high and incomprehensible he looks ever so thin.
Aumbry in Prestwich looks like Auntie Lydia's front parlour. Creepy
I am sharing a great website with where instahacker.xyz… you can learn how to hack an Instagram…Read more
If you did not receive any such welcome e-mail you have to call 1300 692 653 for help Those who…Read more
Pita Pit are a weird one. Tasty but a bit pricey and I wish they'd just get on and provide you with…Read more
Pita Pit never again expect a PITAfully tiny amount of meat and loads of salad,overpriced and and…Read more
© Mark Garner t/a Confidential Direct 2020
Privacy | Careers | Website by: Planet Code | SEO by The eWord


text:
Tigipko acquires Russian Sberbank's Ukrainian subsidiary
12:00, 13 December 2017Economy
227 0
Sberbank Europe AG (a subsidiary of Russian Sberbank) has completed a deal to sell a controlling stake (99.9230%) in Russian Sberbank's Ukrainian subsidiary VS Bank, based in Lviv, to the TAS group owned by Ukrainian businessman Sergiy Tigipko, according to the press service of the Russian bank.
Please Subscribe For Full Access
UNIAN Web subscription
Get a complete information picture of the day by subscribing to UNIAN's news feeds.
For more information, please call:
+38 (044) 354-28-06
If you see a spelling error on our site, select it and press Ctrl+Enter

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Sen. Paul Honors 50th Anniversary of Civil Rights Act
July 1, 2014 in Politics & Elections
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Sen. Rand Paul today offered the following statement honoring the 50th Anniversary of the Civil Rights Act:
'Tomorrow, July 2nd, we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It is simply unimaginable to think what modern America would be like if not for the brave men and women who stood up for the rights of all Americans. This legislation changed the future of our nation by enforcing the belief that all men and women are created equal. We must continue to build an America that our children-of every race, creed and color-deserve,' Sen. Paul said.
### …read more
Source: RAND PAUL


text:
Tara Cassidy
Tara Cassidy, 45, a Wantagh resident since 2008, is currently running for one of the two open seats in the Wantagh School District Board of Education.
"As a parent and a taxpayer, as well as a CPA, I believe I can be an asset to the Wantagh community because I can understand the fiscal responsibility as well as the importance of our education for these children," she said.
Cassidy has two children in the Wantagh School District — senior Randy Reif and seventh-grader Abigail Reif.
Cassidy is a certified public accountant and works at the Tin Box Company of America Inc. in Farmingdale. She is also a current member of the Wantagh 6-12 Association and former member of the Wantagh Elementary School PTA. She is also a coordinator for the Wantagh Arrows Youth Cheerleading League.
If elected, Cassidy hopes to combine her passion for providing an excellent education to students with actions that are fiscally responsible for district taxpayers — both those who have children in the school system and those who
do not.
"I'm passionate about providing an excellent education for our students, but also balancing that with being fiscally responsible to the taxpayers," she said.
p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; line-height: 12.0px; font: 11.0px 'ITC Franklin Gothic'} span.s1 {letter-spacing: 0.3px} span.Apple-tab-span {white-space:pre}
Cassidy said she wants to work to maintain the tax cap without taking away from our children. She said a trustee is supposed to represent the whole community, taking into account the needs of everybody.
Kera McLoughlin
Kera McLoughlin, 41, of Wantagh, is seeking re-election for her position as a trustee on the Wantagh School District Board of Education for the next three-year term, which starts this Fall.
McLoughlin has served on the board for the past six years. She, and her husband Brian, have three children: eighth-grader Jack, sixth-grader Maggie and second-grader Nate — one child in each level of the Wantagh school district — elementary, middle and high school.
McLoughlin is a former teaching assistant at Massapequa High School. "I was always passionate about education [and] providing great educational experiences for children," she said.
McLoughlin has also been involved in the nonprofit organization Autism Speaks, joining the organization's Long Island Walk planning committee in 2009 and becoming a member of the executive committee as the team mentorship chairperson in 2010.
She also served as the copresident of Wantagh SEPTA (Special Education PTA) during the 2012-13 school year and has been an active member of the Wantagh Elementary PTA since 2010.
McLoughlin said the biggest educational area she is passionate about involves addressing the needs of the whole child. "That's been my focus on the board," she said. "I'm very passionate about social and emotional learning [and] addressing the mental health needs of children."
p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; line-height: 12.0px; font: 11.0px 'ITC Franklin Gothic'} span.Apple-tab-span {white-space:pre}
McLoughlin said she is proud of the work the board has accomplished over the past six years. "I feel that we're made a lot of progress and put the district on a very good track," she said.
Peter Mountanos
Peter Mountanos, 24, of Wantagh, is seeking re-election for his seat as a trustee on the Wantagh School District Board of Education.
Mountanos was elected to the board six years ago, while still a freshman at New York University. "Over those past six years I feel like we've made some really great programs in the district," he said. "I think, while given all that great progress, there's still more work to be done, and I'd like to see some of that work through."
Mountanos, a software engineer for Google, wrote in a bio, on Facebook, that he has spent his whole life as a Wantagh resident and 13 years in Wantagh's primary and secondary education. Mountanos and one of his close friends launched Wantagh TechDay, where they have taught many Wantagh students how to code in the past five years. Computer science classes were then created and offered district-wide, as a result of this annual day.
While working on TechDay, he discovered what makes up the inner workings of the administration. "I began to get this idea that my recent experience as a student in Wantagh could actually provide some value to our district on the Board of Education," he wrote, in the post.
p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; line-height: 12.0px; font: 11.0px 'ITC Franklin Gothic'} span.Apple-tab-span {white-space:pre}
Mountanos mentioned, in a phone call, a few of the big points the board hopes to accomplish over the next term, including adopting budgets that minimize tax increases while maximizing student programs and improving instructional technology support for the district's teachers and staff.
Laura Reich
First-time candidate Laura Reich, 48, of Wantagh, is seeking one of the two open seats on the Wantagh School District Board of Education.
Reich has four children — two, 20-year-old Jaimie and 18-year-old Matthew, who have gone through the Wantagh School District primary and secondary education; Wantagh High School sophomore Dylan; and Wantagh Middle School sixth-grader Sadie. "I have been very, very involved in the district since 2004, when my oldest started kindergarten," she said.
Reich spent nine years on the Wantagh Elementary School PTA executive board. She has been the Wantagh 6-12 Association treasurer for the past three years. She has also volunteered with the Wantagh sports' booster club and has been the treasurer of the Wantagh High School Bandwagon organization. She is currently an accounting assistant at A N S Consulting Services in Wantagh.
Reich said she has seen the curriculum change in the years she has been involved in the district's schools and is interested in how the changes will help develop the students.
"I'm heavily involved in the entire school community and I just feel like it's time to step it up now and go to the next level of that commitment," she said.
p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; line-height: 12.0px; font: 11.0px 'ITC Franklin Gothic'} span.Apple-tab-span {white-space:pre}
The trustee election and annual budget vote will take place on May 21 between 7 a.m. and 9 p.m. at Wantagh Elementary, Forest Lake Elementary and Mandalay Elementary.


text:
One might not easily believe that Juliet Ibrahim is Ghanaian simply because she is as popular in Nollywood as she is in Ghallywood.
The multi award winning actress who only recently praised men who stay faithful to only one partner has dropped another one of the 'beautiful ladies'.
She while taking to her Instagram page shared that beautiful ladies are mostly single because nobody believes they are actually single.


text: 1 hasan007 Forum posts: 3 Forum posts: 3 Mar 9, 2013, 9:14:25 AM via Website Mar 9, 2013 9:14:25 AM via Website Just Bought an new sony ericsson xperia ray. Its Android OS, v2.3, but the says i an upgrade it to latest version. Any one can help me that hoe can I do it Please? Thanks — modified on Mar 9, 2013, 9:24:39 AM Thanks0 Reply More Link to post


text:
• Free quotes
• Competitive prices
• Excellent workmanship
• All work guaranteed
• Fully insured
• Knowledgeable and friendly team
• Personal service tailored to your needs
• Qualified horticulturalists
• Bradstone Assured Installer
• Nottingham
• Arnold
• West Bridgford
• Mansfield
• Wollaton
• And their surrounding areas
We are dedicated to providing a high quality service at the right price, with over 20 years of experience within the garden design and landscape industry.
At Gardens of Inspiration Ltd we want you to get the most out of your garden, and we will do everything we can to meet and exceed your expectations.
At Gardens of Inspiration Ltd, we have been providing Nottingham and Nottinghamshire with quality landscaping and garden design services for over 10 years.
If you're looking for a garden to be proud of, then look no further than us.
Please click the links below to view our services in detail:
• Design
• Planting


text:
Earn points toward FREE PIZZA with Piece of the Pie Rewards
More About Your Newcomerstown Domino's
Order Fresh Handcrafted Pizza in 43832
When your stomach grumbles for a slice of meaty, veggie-loaded, cheesy goodness, we know you're not craving any old pizza in 43832. You're looking for a flavorful pizza with a freshly made tomato sauce, generous heaps of mozzarella, expertly diced pepperoni, and a hand-tossed crust that's both chewy and crispy. You want only the best pizza. You want Domino's.
At Domino's in 43832, we make it quick and simple to get the fast, fresh pizza your hunger craves. Order your pizza over the phone or online, or visit a Domino's near you to place a carryout order.
First, start by selecting from one of our handmade crusts, like our hand-tossed crust that's packed with buttery flavor, a pan crust featuring two huge layers of cheese, a crispy thin crust, or a gluten-free pizza crust! Then, choose a sauce and pile on as many or as few toppings as you want. Whether you're all about the veggies like green peppers, spinach, and onions, or you prefer the sweet and savory combination of ham and pineapple, you can count on your local Domino's to deliver.
With more than 34 million different ways to handcraft a Domino's pizza, you can be sure we've got a slice for whatever your tastebuds are craving. Build your own pizza from bottom to top or choose one of our many crowd-pleasing specialty pizzas, like the popular Wisconsin 6 Cheese, Pacific Veggie, or ExtravaganZZa™, and have it delivered to your doorstep, super fast!
Demand the Best 43832 Pizza Delivery: Demand Domino's!
Order from your 43832 Domino's and you'll see—we're pretty serious folks when it comes to pizza delivery. We guarantee that your pizza will arrive at your doorstep hot and fresh, straight from our oven. Can't wait for your pie to arrive? Use our patented Pizza TrackerⓇ system and follow your pizza order as it's prepped, baked, and headed out the door for delivery... and try to keep your drool from falling onto your keyboard or phone in the meantime.
Get More Than Just Pizza Takeout in 43832
Sure, we deliver pizza, but we're also experts when it comes to fast pizza takeout in 43832. When you visit, feel free to order from our pizza menu or order something entirely new! Give everyone exactly what they want with one of our oven-baked sandwiches or pastas, platters of specialty chicken wings, crisp and colorful salads, and even mouth-watering desserts like chewy cookies and chocolatey brownies.
With more than 12,000 stores in 80 plus countries, we know quality and customer service. It's our mission to be the best pizza delivery company not only in Newcomerstown, but in the world, and everything we do reflects this commitment. You'll see it in our courteous delivery drivers and money-saving pizza coupons, and taste it in every bite of pizza you eat. Order online, call your nearest Domino's restaurant in 43832, or use our free smartphone app for hot, fast, and delicious pizza carryout and delivery today! Trust us, we're different than other 43832 pizza restaurants. We're your go-to, hands down, favorite pizza place in 43832!


text:
If you're under 30 and you're reading this, you're probably going to wonder what on earth I'm banging on about, but just heed this warning: you'll find out one day, and it ain't gonna be pretty.
To you, having a hangover probably just means lethargy, a slight headache, and a hankering for a fried breakfast and Lucozade. Just you wait, mi'laddo.
I was the same as you once. I didn't get hangovers. Drinking too much just meant an extra long lie in the next day. Hell, I used to get drunk and get up at 7 for work – at least three times a week. Sometimes, for good measure, I'd get a helping of the giggles at some point during the day.
All that changes when you get into your mid thirties. Hangovers last two to three days, but after the first day they're imperceptible, and you only realise you were hungover on the fourth day, when you feel normal again. My hangovers these days affect my whole outlook, perception of reality and conception of the future. And like it or not I'm wide awake at 7am, feeling like shit.
The first sign that your hangovers are increasing in severity is getting the anxiety. The anxiety is bad. Something isn't quite sitting right. You're not sure what it is, in fact, as far as you know everything is fine. You didn't embarrass yourself or upset anyone, but for some reason you feel anxious, and the feeling won't go away. It's even worse if you did embarrass yourself or upset someone. Sure, at least then you know there's a reason for feeling that way, but the import of the situation just gets blown way out of proportion until it seems like you've committed the most heinous crime imaginable, someone's going to find out, and the whole world is going to come crashing down on you.
The final stage – or at least, the final stage I'm aware of so far (I hope it doesn't get worse than this) – is the extended hangover. Usually it's brought on by heavy drinking on two consecutive days.
The first hangover day will be more or less fine. You might be thirsty and anxious, though you could also have a headache and feel nauseous. The second day, you're feeling physically better, but you're just… so… tired. And because you're tired, you feel heavily depressed, but that's ok; it's just because you're tired.
The third day is the killer. By this time you're not expecting to be hungover any longer and the drinking session(s) took place long enough ago that you've actually forgotten it/they took place. You have no physical symptoms whatsoever, but emotionally, you're a wreck. Paranoid, forlorn, hopeless. Everything is crap, you don't want to talk to anyone, you can't get any pleasure out of anything. What is pleasure anyway? What's the point in it? Why do you feel this way?
As I say, the day after that, it's like you've been reborn. The world is normal again, there is a future after all. This is when you realise that it was all just a symptom of alcohol poisoning. You will resolve never to have two heavy sessions in a row again – some people might even vow never to drink again, but you'll forget, and it will happen again. The only question is how many times will it take before you say enough is enough and mean it.
Because alcohol is poison, it's just that alcohol poisoning's early symptoms include a heightened sense of fun, increased confidence and the ability to be witty and charming. Then, when you enter the later stages, you have to experience not just the absence of these qualities, but a negative effect that isn't just opposite, but disproportionate also.
I haven't reached the quitting stage yet, and I'd better not or this blog is really going to suffer. Sometimes two days' heavy drinking turns out to be necessary. Luckily, if you've gotten to this stage, there are things you can do to protect yourself. Here's some knowledge for you.
First, you can moderate your drinking. I know, that sounds boring, but one day you'll realise not only that you need to moderate your drinking, but also that you can – and I'm not talking moderate in line with what the government tells you, just more moderate than nuts out, kamikaze style drinking.
When you're young it's easy to spend the whole night chaining one drink after the next, but you'll see it is possible to not have a drink in your hand sometimes, and it isn't going to mean you have less fun. It's just that sipping a drink is a good way to fill awkward gaps in conversation (should you be prone to these), and having to go and get another drink is a good way to get out of awkward conversations altogether.
Second, you can try to avoid consecutive heavy drinking sessions. As I say, sometimes it turns out to be necessary, but you can just try a little harder. When you've got a big Saturday night planned, and friends coming over in advance on Friday night, it's very easy to make Friday night a big night, too. Just get your friends to come over on Saturday instead, or just have a couple of drinks on Friday. If you're going on a three day (or more) stag do, or it's the Christmas period where you've got so many friends and colleagues and so little time, just forget it. You're going to have to prepare yourself for the worst.
Third, drink a big glass of water for every two or three alcoholic drinks you have. I know, this sounds a bit soft, but it will keep you going longer, and ensure your hydration levels are sufficient – and you'll still have just as much fun, possibly even more. And you'll be able to remember more of it.
If you fail to drink water periodically, the final thing you can do is make sure you drink at least two pints of water before you go to bed. Your body is going to be dehydrated the next day, and the only way to prevent that is to rehydrate before you go to bed. If you don't, the next day you can drink as much water as you like, but it isn't going to make you feel any better. The drawback with this one is that drinking two pints of water is difficult, and on top of that, it's easy to say, I'll be fine, I didn't drink that much, or just black out and wake up the next day when it's already too late. If you can remember though, you'll be surprised at how effective this is.
There isn't really anything you can do when the hangover has already kicked in. Some will tell you a greasy breakfast will sort you right out, but that always makes me feel worse. Having a beer might help, but you're going to have to continue drinking after that, and it could make you feel nauseous and tired. Nor is it going to prevent days two and three of the hangover. Lucozade might help, but again, only for the first day. As for hard liquor, that just doesn't taste very nice until you've recovered – so you'd be wasting it, and that's worse still – and probably a fast-track to alcoholism, which isn't the same as alco-thusiasm.
The all-consuming hangover is something you're going to have to get used to if you're going to stay committed to drinking, but you can take it. And if you can't, you know what to do.
|photo by Mrs Cake
This week's post is particularly relevant for me, since last weekend I attended my first three day music festival for quite a few years; Bearded Theory. At festivals you pretty much have to forget about considerations like moderation and drinking water, and just drink alcohol from the moment you wake to the moment you pass out face-down on your inflatable mattress – as far as I'm aware, it's the only way to keep your energy levels up when you wake up on that first morning, at 7am, in a tent that's so hot it makes your upper lip burn… and you need to go to the toilet so bad that you actually can't move without feeling you're going to burst. Oh, and your head weighs a ton.
Mrs Cake tried the practice of drinking water before bedtime (she's become a real convert recently) and asked an official whether the water taps contained drinking water. He said he was 95% sure it was safe to drink, but that wasn't enough for me.
So drink from morning till night was pretty much what I did last weekend, and boy did I pay for it earlier this week. Other circumstances didn't help – such as the fact that we had to get up and leave the campsite at 6.30 on the Monday morning because we needed to be back home for 9 in case the guy from Parcelforce came to collect the piece of furniture we were returning to the supplier that early.
It's a good job I wasn't driving; I could barely keep my head up. On top of that, we'd been drinking Thornbridge Breweries' Jaipur IPA (5.9% ABV), which is fricking awesome, and it had turned both our insides to foul smelling mush.
On Tuesday morning when I returned to work, I thought I was ok, but I did that thing where you read an urgent e-mail… and panic. I just felt overwhelmed and couldn't cope with all the e-mails that had come in on the two days I'd taken as leave. Then I had a high-powered finance meeting, and couldn't remember the most basic thing from the week before that I definitely knew about.
'I wouldn't know about that £400,000 underspend', I said. Oh shit, yes I would…. Too late.
You can't say, 15 minutes later, "can I just interrupt? You know that thing we were talking about before? Yeh, I'm on it." I mean, you can, but not when you're the least senior person in the room.
For the rest of the morning I was chasing my tail around rabidly, overreacting to things, forgetting things, sweating like an 80s childrens' tv presenter - until I had lunch, and equilibrium started to reassert itself. I remembered things aren't so important, work's not so hard, I work at a university. Aaaand relax.
By Thursday afternoon, it turned out that I hadn't overreacted to one of the urgent e-mails, and I was actually in trouble, which wasn't nice. For once, something I had worried about actually came to pass, but as on this occasion I had decided it was the hangover early on, I hadn't wasted two days worrying about it – so that was good. I'm such a worrier normally.
I think the hangover kicked back in once I got in trouble and got back home. I decided to watch the Oh My Dayum Burger Song on Youtube, to cheer me up, and ended up crying tears of joy. I love that video.
Then I finished watching a documentary called Project Nim, where they put these chimps that had learned sign language into a medical testing facility. One of the scientists said that they noticed the chimps were signing, and wrote down what they were saying… and one of the things was "hug"… I started booing and laughing at myself at the same time.
"You're such a sensitive soul," said Mrs Cake.
Sure, you could go to a festival and drink sensibly, or not at all, but how are you supposed to have fun standing in a field all day? The real question here is was it worth it? And yes, it was. Mrs Cake and I had a terrific time. We drank a lot, watched some good bands (shout outs to Ned's Atomic Dustbin and Asian Dub Foundation) and had a laugh rapping and singing our way back to our tents and hanging out with some very good friends.
Let me leave the subject of hangovers and Bearded Theory then with a few sights and moments that I found particularly memorable:
- A man in a motability scooter who had the biggest hip flask in the world… but couldn't get the cap loose. I had to tell him his flask was awesome.
- A mother of 5 dancing to New Model Army, whose kids seemed to be asking each other, "what's wrong with mummy?"
- Emerging from the portaloo to announce to Mrs Cake in song, "here I am/ the biggest douche in the universe!"
- Serenading our friend Victoria for a long time with, "V to the I to the C to the T! O to the R to the I to the A! Victo-o-o-o-ria! Vic-to-o-o-o-ria!" and later, beatboxing my way through the campsite.
- Asian Dub Foundation reminding me why I liked them so much in the 90s.
- A girl floating around in a pool in one of those orb things, wearing a pair or red lacy knickers, and everyone watching in disbelief – the men thinking, is she old enough for this to be ok? And the women, I am shocked and appalled. At one point it looked like even the girl was thinking, why is everyone looking at me?
- Finally, all the nice, happy people who made the whole thing so much fun.
|another pic by Mrs Cake
I strongly suspect we'll be attending Bearded Theory again in the future. I might even get over my middle aged aversion to festivals and go to some others. To be fair though, Bearded Theory was a nice size and well organised – many others are branded, strict on alcohol rules, and have nasty toilets. So we'll see.
In other news, it's another bank holiday weekend. I'm thinking of pitting two cheap supermarket brands of white rum against each other tonight, and can't wait to get some more whiskies inside me. It could be time to open that Suntory Hakushu 12. I've got golf on Saturday morning, a Jeffrey Lewis show on Saturday night and a housewarming party on Sunday, so it looks like it's going to be good. I'm going to try to enjoy my extended weekend, I hope you enjoy yours. Check back next week for another post.


text:
Duke's secondary took a significant hit from this weekend's game against North Carolina. Junior safety Dylan Singleton will miss Dukes' final two games and likely bowl game due to an ankle injury that occurred during the first half of the game on Saturday.
Singleton reportedly underwent surgery on Sunday to take care of a fractured left ankle, according to a medical update from Duke on Sunday.
The loss of Singleton is the third defensive starter lost by Duke for the remainder of the season. Cornerback Mark Gilbert and defensive tackle Edgar Cerenord had already been lost to injuries as the depth on the Duke defense continues to get more shallow. Duke was without linebacker Joe Giles-Harris on Saturday too due to an MCL injury from the previous week.
There is rarely a good time to have so many injuries on defense, but Duke's timing could not be more unforgiving. Duke visits Clemson this week.


text:
By Matt Leon
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – The La Salle Explorers play their third straight home game to open the season on Saturday as they welcome Siena to Gola Arena.
La Salle split its first two games. A double-overtime loss to Manhattan was followed by a 73-67 win on Tuesday in a rare 9:00am tip-off against Quinnipiac.
"We really didn't have many surprises," La Salle head coach Dr. John Giannini tells KYW Newsradio. "We knew Manhattan was poised for a special year. They are extremely veteran, very deep, very talented. They were tremendous. We're disappointed with some of the things we did. But we bounced back nicely against Quinnipiac. They were number #1 or #2 in every rebounding statistic you could dream of last year. So they presented a challenge and we responded nicely."


text:
"When we pray, the voice of the heart must be heard more than that proceeding from the mouth. "- Saint Bonaventure
I seem to have spent my whole life trying to make sense of the balance between heart and mind, soul and intellect.
There doesn't have to be a dichotomy of course, yet I have tried to seek a balance, to see where the distinction is between the two.
It has been the writing of Saint Bonaventure that has helped me see the importance of heart, of love, whereas my natural tendency has been to rely solely on intellect and reason.
To take the safe route.
Yet in unschooling I chose what may seem to be seen as the unsafe route, a way of educating without school methods, a way of melding life and learning.
And as the youngest Unschooler begins study at university, I ponder what unschooling and St Bonaventure have taught me.
To allow for love, for passions, in our lives. Yes, even in the daily life of lists and chores and work. And most especially in the big picture, of goals and dreams.
In talking with our Unschoolers about life and goals, I have learned that it is the questions that are important. Like Socrates, we can ask questions and leave the thought for pondering.
And in doing so, we can help our Unschoolers use their reason and listen to their hearts.
What is your passion?
What do you love?
If everything else in your life was not a consideration, if you didn't need to be practical, what would you do? Where would you live? How?
What book or movie makes you sigh with love and longing?
What saint and saint's writing most appeals to you? Why?
Deep inside, what do you want? And if you don't know forever, what about now? What is fun? What is intellectually stimulating?
And what does God want? Have you prayed? Have you asked? Have you given this to Our Lady, and asked for her intercession?
The last is a clincher for me.
These are not your typical career counselling questions. But then unschooling is not your typical means of education or, indeed, of life.
And in asking these questions I, too, have sought answers. For me.
That's how unschooling works, isn't it?


text:
This is a general guide to IB that explains how IB works, describing everything from the assessments at the end of senior year to the way sophomores usually choose their IB-level classes. It also explains most of the acronyms used in IB, such as EE, HL, or IOP. This guide was adapted from meeting notes from a Coffee Talk on 2/28/14 and updated in Summer of 2016.
An EA (External Assessment) is a written paper or exam (called Paper 1, 2, or 3) administered at St. Patrick's Church during the month of May of senior year. Two or three EAs are administered in each subject: English, Sciences, Math, History, Psychology, Foreign Language, and Economics. Visual Arts seniors will submit studio work and participate in an art show display in spring of their senior year, but will not sit for an EA in May.
IAs (Internal Assessments) are also in every subject, starting with the English IOP (Internal Oral Presentation) fall of junior year, and others going through March of senior year. IAs can be 1200-1500 word essays, projects, or labs. IAs are completed in and outside of class time (after school or during Saturday School). Students may correct IAs and resubmit, if they are turned in on time. If turned in at the last moment, they won't have that opportunity. Some IAs are only graded once. Many IAs are due around the same time before winter break, but were assigned months in advance.
IA papers and projects are graded by teachers. Initially, only scores are submitted to IB in Wales. IB will request a few specific names of students for RHS to send actual work samples of the high, medium and low scorers. IB will assess whether the IA scores are accurate. The difference a teacher is off, the entire class's scores are moved higher or lower. There is a temptation for a teacher to grade too high, if that is the case, the whole class could be moved down. We monitor trends and takes appropriate action. Although IA scores go toward IB diploma points, some IA's also go toward report card grades. Students will not see official IA grades until July 5th when they receive all their scores after graduation.
Core Components – CAS, EE, and TOK Essay
Also required to graduate are Core Components: completion and submission of CAS experiences and reflection (150 CAS hours: 25 Creativity, 25 Activity, 75 Service) completed in junior and senior year, the EE (Extended Essay-4000 word independent research paper-thesis), and the TOK Essay (Theory of Knowledge 1200-1500 word essay).
CAS is an acronym for Creativity, Activity, and Service. This is the term used in IB. On the first day of junior year, the 50 hour Integrated CAS Project ("Junior CAS Project") may be started. These hours are included in the 150 total for junior and senior year. It is an activity that involves team work, planning and initiative, integrates two or more types of CAS activity (creativity, activity, service), and addresses an issue of global concern. A project proposal, display at the CAS Fair in the spring of junior year, 3 documented meetings with CAS Advisor (homeroom teacher), and written evidence and reflections of 8 Learning Outcomes are also required. CAS requirements must be completed and finalized in April of senior year.
Theory of Knowledge (TOK)
TOK is a class that starts 2nd semester of junior year, and continues through 1st semester of senior year. Here students get direction on how to do their Extended Essay (EE). They choose a Subject (English, History, Visual Arts, Other), an EE Advisor (IB teacher), a Topic, and a Research Question. The Topic may fall under a core subject, for example an Aerospace "Topic" may fall under a Physics or History "Subject". Choose a topic you are passionate about so that it is fun and interesting, rather than just more work! The "Final Rough Draft" of the EE is due at the end of junior year, before summer. During the school year, advisors are available to meet with students regularly. Through the researching and writing process, TOK students should stay on top of deadlines and attend all scheduled meetings with their advisor, as they receive a report card grade for many of these assigned due dates (lower grade if not completed on time). The EE final draft has a due date that is assigned by the TOK teacher and the IB office. TOK Essay is due at end of first semester of senior year (approximate due date around middle of January).
Predicted Grades
Predicted grades are made up of 70-80% EAs and 20-30% IAs. During second semester, senior year teachers are asked to give predicted grades, as if the IB exams would be taken that day. Predicted grades are shared with students. The goal is to motivate the students, to see how close they are to earning an IB diploma. IB asks for official predicted grades in March. At this point, a new round of numbers will be entered, including all IAs.
Diploma Points
In order to obtain an IB diploma, the basic requirements are: a minimum of 24 points, complete all Core Requirements and earn at least 12 points in HL courses. A student will receive a score of 1-7 in each of their 6 IB courses. A score is comprised of both IA (20-30%) and EA (70-80%) scores. A student can earn 7 points for each of their 6 classes, plus 1-3 points may be added (but not to HL) for A, B, and C averages on EE and TOK essays, making a total of 45 possible points.
SL/HL Selection (Standard Level/ Higher Level)
In January of sophomore year, students make their DP (Diploma Program-junior and senior years) class selections in the 6 subject areas: English, Foreign Language, History, Math, Science, and an Elective (Visual Arts, Economics, Psychology, or a 2nd SL level Science). HL English and SL Foreign Language are required, so that leaves 2 HL and 2 SL choices to make. When choosing HL and SL classes, students and famlies should take into account factors such as student interest, the course curriculum, and the instructor teaching the class.
Colleges look for a combination of grades in challenging classes, scores on SAT/ACT, and students' involvement in activities outside of school. Coaches and teachers are generally sensitive to the competing demands on the students involved in sports and other demanding activities. We are aware that it is important to have well-rounded students. We recognizes that participation in these extracurricular activities helps create a healthier and more motivated student.
Robinson offers incoming freshman immersion classes in French and Spanish. We also provide a summer "IB Success Camp" with focus on introducing curriculum, study skills and successful time management for incoming 9th graders. In addition to doing summer assignments, summer is a great time to get CAS hours completed, do college essays, apply for scholarships, and go on college visits. Note: you may request an Excused Absence to visit colleges during school hours, so that class work can be turned in late without reduction in grade. Also, many colleges send admissions representatives to conduct presentations at Robinson. Sign-up for these presentations is on the bulletin board in the Guidance office. There are no scheduled trips to tour college campuses.
Going Beyond 4 Years
Due to their many IB and AP credits, many IB students enter college with 30 credit hours. If they pass 6 exams (4 or above on IB, 3 or above on AP), that may be 6 classes that they do not have to take in college. Some students enter public universities with sophomore status. They can use the extra year of Bright Futures (have 4 years total) to fund graduate work. Students will already be accepted to college by the time IB diploma grades are posted July 5th, but most kids are still motivated to do well on IB exams to try to get their diploma. An IB diploma looks great on graduate school applications, and to future employers.


text:
French and Beninese presidents welcome progress on fighting Boko Haram
Benin – Bilateral relations and fight against terrorism – Meeting between M. François Hollande, President of the Republic, and Mr Patrice Talon, his Beninese counterpart – Communiqué issued by the Presidency of the Republic
Paris, 12 December 2016
The French President had a meeting with Mr Patrice Talon, his Beninese counterpart.
François Hollande confirmed France's technical and financial support for Benin in the areas of renewable energy production, access to electricity and water, transport and the social sectors.
The two heads of state confirmed their wish to develop economic and human exchanges between the two countries and agreed to put the major issues of innovation, support for young people and job creation at the heart of the conclusions of the forthcoming Africa-France summit in Bamako.
As regards the fight against the terrorist sect Boko Haram, they welcomed the military progress observed and signalled their willingness to continue ongoing efforts, particularly to secure and reinvigorate the liberated areas. François Hollande confirmed his desire for France and the European Union to maintain their support in 2017 for the mixed multinational force, which is combating Boko Haram./.


text:
Want to learn computer security and don't know where to start? Want to learn some of the latest hacking and pentesting techniques using Kali Linux? Know security pretty well, but want to brush up on your skills and see what the new Kali Linux has to offer?
And all at a very affordable price?
Then look no further than "Kali Linux – Backtrack Evolved: Assuring Security by Penetration Testing".
The teacher, Justin Hutchens is a bright young rising infosec star. I had the absolute honor to work on Justin's training class as a technical reviewer, and can honestly tell you that you are going to be engaged, and you are going to learn some great material from a very impressive, easy to follow and capable teacher.
The course covers almost 3 hours of hands on learning that will teach you how to:
- Prepare a fully-functional and low-budget security lab, where you can practice and develop your penetration testing skills without fear of legal consequence
- Gather information about a target with advanced reconnaissance techniques
- Identify target systems on a network using host discovery tools
- Identify services running on target systems by scanning and enumeration
- Discover vulnerabilities to determine potential attack vectors
- Launch automated exploits and payloads using the Metasploit Framework
- Learn a variety of hands-on techniques to exploit target systems
- Establish backdoors to ensure continued access
- Escalate privileges to acquire maximum control over compromised systems
For pricing and more information see the PacktPub Website.
Check it out!


text:
The health and wellbeing of our pupils, parents and teachers is extremely important to us. For an update on our response to the Coronavirus outbreak, please click here.
Welcome to Ipswich High School
Welcome to our unique and inspirational school. We put the happiness of our pupils at the heart of everything we do and strive to provide an exceptional education for every individual.
Adventure Awaits at Ipswich High School
Founded in 1878, Ipswich High School has a longstanding reputation for offering an exceptional education and experience to pupils as a leading private school in Suffolk. While tradition remains important to us, we are proud to be a forward-thinking school and take an innovative and personalised approach to our curriculum and enrichment offer.
The Diamond Model
We welcome boys and girls from age Reception – 18. We offer the Diamond Model of education – an approach which allows us to teach some subjects in single-sex classes whilst maintaining the benefits of a coeducational environment. Please see Diamond Model for more on this unique approach.
Our Curriculum and Pastoral Care
A bespoke curriculum for every child and an unrivalled Enrichment Programme embedded within the school day means that our pupils are encouraged to pursue their passions and become the very best version of themselves.
We support each and every individual with incredible Pastoral Support which makes our school community stand out as a truly warm and inspirational community.
The Woolverstone Campus
Our beautiful 87-acre campus is located in Woolverstone, just outside of Ipswich. The spacious site has superb facilities, including a theatre, ICT suites, a 25m competition swimming pool, Sixth Form suite, cookery rooms, dedicated music rooms and floodlit AstroTurf pitches. Explore our campus and facilities in our Virtual Tour. We capitalise on our outstanding natural surroundings via our stimulating Forest and Beach School in the Prep School, offering a unique, proactive learning experience in an ever-changing environment.
Our first boarding house, The Dairy opened in September 2019 enabling us to educate pupils from further afield. This brand new boarding house in a Grade II listed property is an outstanding addition to our school, with additional, brand new boarding facilities taking shape for 2021.
Start your Adventure
I am delighted to say that our parents and pupils are hugely positive about the school, and while these endorsements are extremely pleasing to me, I always urge those interested in joining the school to visit us, either at one of our Open Mornings or for a Private Tour.


text:
You are currently browsing the monthly archive for August 2012.
Today I watched a little girl discover.
Her name was Gabby. She was maybe 2 years old. I was at my science museum job, watching tumbleweeds roll through the hallways (school is back in this week). There was Gabby, approaching an exhibit called the vortex. She saw the colorful balls under the table, grabbed one, and let it go. Her eyes lit up with wonder and delight, and she watched, transfixed by the motion of the ball around and around the table.
When the ball disappeared down one of the table's two holes, Gabby reached under the table and grabbed another. This one she threw a little differently, and it bounced around before falling down a hole. Another ball, and this time Gabby tried to get closer, closer, by inching up on the table. That's how I learned her name, as the adults with her told her, "Gabby, no."
Undaunted, she tried approach after approach with the balls. One bounced off the table and away. "Uh oh," Gabby said, then joyously chased down the bounce-bounce-bouncing ball. Again, Gabby tried to get closer, only to be rebuffed by her adults. I wanted to scream, "Let her explore!" but I held back.
Finally, the inevitable happened. The adults got bored. "Come on, Gabby, let's go." Gabby didn't want to go. She was exploring, discovering amazing new things with each ball she rolled. What more could one want from a visit to the science museum? But the adults were insistent. "Gabby, now," and Gabby, reluctantly, moved on. Later I saw her trying to crawl under the barrier to the Foucault Pendulum, then discovering, with that same joy, the model pendulum alongside it, swinging the ball around and around and around.
It was painfully beautiful to watch, and it reminded me of how the simplest things, if they're real, if they're true, are anything but boring when looked at the right way. And it reminded me to try, and try, and try so hard to remember what it was like to see the world through Gabby's eyes.
I think I was Gabby's starfish.
Now for something more interesting. A while back I wrote twelve pieces on the surprising ways helium has impacted our view of the universe. I thought I was finished, but recently, as I was researching a possible article on an astronomer named Henrietta Leavitt, I stumbled upon helium tale number thirteen.
Let's start with something completely unrelated to helium, but which, I promise, will get us back to this amazing idea.
Imagine a pot of water boiling on a stove. Were you to insert a thermometer into that pot of water, you would discover something odd. The temperature of the water is (more or less) 100 degrees C (or 212 degrees F, if you prefer such things). Even though the stove is pumping lots of heat into this boiling water, the temperature does not change. It stays right at the boiling point of water until all the water is converted to vapor.
Now consider just the opposite. I'll use the liquid-to-solid transition because it's easier to deal with, but the vapor-to-liquid transition works, too. Imagine a pot of water in a freezer. Again, there's a thermometer in the water. The temperature drops, drops, and drops until the thermometer reads 0 degrees C (32 degrees F). And then the thermometer stays there until every bit of the water is converted to ice. Even though the freezer is pulling heat away from the water, the temperature of the water does not change.
OK, familiar enough. This phenomenon (known as latent heat) is what drives thunderstorms and hurricanes, protects water-covered fruit during rare Floridian freezes, and makes steam burns so dangerous. It's caused, by the way, by hydrogen bonds, amazing and important in the own right for many, many reasons. Maybe a future blog subject.
The important point for now is that the phase change provides a sort of reservoir for energy at a particular temperature. If you look at a graph of temperature change versus heat added for water, you get these plateaus where the phase change is occurring.
Notice that the water-vapor phase change plateau is enormous! It takes much, much more heat to boil a gallon of hot water into steam than it does to heat that same gallon from the freezing point to the boiling point. Hydrogen bonds are tough little boogers, and it's hard work to get water molecules apart.
OK, enough with water. What about stars?
Stars are balancing acts, kinda like this:
Gravity is forever trying to squash the star down. Pressure, provided by the nuclear reactions in the star's core, is trying to blow it apart. The balance between these two forces is the star we see. What if, for whatever reason, the star were a little too squashed? Were that ever to happen, increased pressure would drive the temperature up. Then the star would swell (and cool) until it was the right size (and right temperature) again. What if the star were too swollen? In that case, reduced pressure would cause the temperature to drop, and the star would contract back to where it belonged, all the while heating back up to its appropriate temperature. In fact, all stars go through these cycles a little bit all the time. Because most never go much beyond their equilibrium point, we never notice.
However, some stars, called Cepheid variables, get caught in large, days-long cycles that keep oscillating for many years. What causes this oscillation? Here it comes: helium!
Henrietta Leavitt was an astronomer in the early 1900s. She became an expert in recognizing and measuring Cepheid variables. Noticing that the Cepheids in the small magellanic cloud had a regular period-to-brightness relationship, Leavitt was able to build a crucial early piece of what would become our cosmic yardstick. Her story is both triumphant and tragic, and I'll save it for my article if I ever write it. For now I'll tell just the helium part of the story.
It turns out that the reason Cepheid variables are, well, variable, is that helium near the surface of these stars is undergoing a phase change. No, not from liquid to gas. Stars are much too hot for anything like liquid helium to exist. Instead, the phase change is from one type of ionized helium to another.
OK, so what is ionized helium?
Helium may be number one in our hearts, but on the periodic table it's always number two. Every helium atom has two protons in its nucleus – otherwise it isn't helium. Normally, helium also has two electrons buzzing about outside the nucleus. Normally.
But stars aren't normal. As Laura Dern once said, they're "hotter'n Georgia asphalt."
Inside a hot star (stop it, this is a family blog!), there's lots of energy. Deep in the interior, no atoms have electrons. As you move out toward the edge of the star, however, atoms start to recapture some or all of their lost electrons.
A Cepheid variable is a star nearing the end of its short life. For most of its life cycle, the star is no more variable than our own Sun is. But Cepheids are bigger than the Sun, and so they burn through their hydrogen fuel much more quickly than the Sun does, in just millions instead of billions of years. At some point, the mixture of chemicals in the star is just right to cause the star to start blinking brighter and dimmer. By the time such a star starts to blink, it has burned its hydrogen fuel and has started in on its helium. In the core, helium fuses into carbon, oxygen, and heavier elements. Away from the core, helium isn't fusing, but it is hot enough to have lost one, but not both, of its electrons. We say that the helium is singly ionized. This ionized helium near the star's surface is the key to its blinking behavior. How? Read on!
The funny thing about ions is that they interact strongly with light. This makes sense if you think about it; light is nothing more (and nothing less!) than waves of electromagnetism. Ions have an electric charge. When electromagnetic waves reach ions, they interact. This means the ions are somewhat opaque – they absorb the energy of the light and heat up.
When singly ionized helium ions heat up, they tend to lose their one remaining electron. This makes them – you guessed it – doubly ionized. Doubly ionized helium is even more opaque than singly ionized helium, so heating the helium results in the outer layer absorbing even more energy.
Now comes the key point. Think back to the water on the stove. Remember how it stayed at the boiling point as it boiled, not getting any hotter until all the liquid was changed to gas. A very similar thing happens to helium in a Cepheid variable star. Instead of driving the temperature up, much of that extra absorbed light drives the helium from its singly ionized state to its doubly ionized state. The temperature doesn't go up (much) until essentially all the singly ionized helium has changed into doubly ionized helium. The star has found a helium plateau! In effect, the star is storing energy in this altered helium. So what happens next?
Once the helium is doubly ionized, there's nothing to stop the star's temperature from going up. The increasing temperature causes the star to swell, and this swelling causes the temperature to drop. But wait! Now there's all this doubly ionized helium. As the temperature drops, we hit the helium plateau again, this time moving the other direction. The doubly ionized helium gains an electron and becomes singly ionized, releasing energy in the process and stopping the temperature drop, in the same way that steam turning to water or water turning to ice prevents temperature drops.
Why helium? With electrons in the very bottom shell, completely unshielded by the positive charge of the nucleus, and with two units of positive charge instead of just the single unit of hydrogen, helium is (like water's hydrogen bonds, only on a much higher-energy scale) a tough booger. It takes a lot of energy to ionize helium, and this makes it perfect for a phase-change plateau inside stars. Once again, the deceptive simplicity of the helium atom makes the world a much more interesting place.
All this heating, cooling, ionizing, and deionizing causes the Cepheid to, again and again, overshoot its equilibrium. Each heating and swelling causes a cooling and collapse, and each collapse causes the next round of heating and swelling. That helium plateau stuck in the middle keeps the star from ever settling down (that is, until in its evolution it leaves the Cepheid variable stage). The star gets brighter, then dimmer, then brighter, then dimmer again, in a very regular and predictable pattern. And it gives us exactly the tool we need to discover just where we are in this vast and surprising universe. Once again, helium is the key.
I shouldn't write about this. It has nothing to do with science and wonder. I'm doing it anyway.
Some fool in the House of Representatives who doesn't know the difference between global warming and changing seasons (and yet, amazingly, is on the Science Committee!) said something stupid about rape.
I don't care about that.
What I care about is that smarmy right wing politicians trying to attract supposed moderate voters ran away from his statement in droves. Consider . . .
If a woman is raped and becomes pregnant, the new enlightened view of the kinder, gentler right wing says she should be allowed an abortion. On the other hand, if a woman is careless, or unlucky, and becomes pregnant, that woman must carry her baby to term. Why?
If you believe that God is there at conception, then you believe that God allows and even uses the rape to create life. That's disgusting.
If you don't believe that God is there at conception, then the collection of microscopic cells has no soul, and so destroying it shouldn't bother you.
So is God around when the condom breaks, but not when a rape is committed?
Which is it? Is an embryo a soul, or isn't it?
We all know what's really going on here. The anti-abortion movement isn't about saving souls. The rape exception proves that. It's about controlling behavior. The right wing doesn't want women having sex. If they do have sex, the right wing wants to punish them. How? By making them have a baby! Brilliant!
If you're raped, according to these new right-wingers, you don't deserve punishment. If the condom breaks, you do. That's the mentality of those who want to run the country.
OK, I'm done with politics now.
Near my home is a small pioneer cemetery called Clover Cemetery. It contains the graves of Civil War and even War of 1812 veterans, as well as pioneer farmers and their families from the 1800s. It's a peaceful, picturesque place with tall trees and wrought iron fence.
Just to the south of Clover Cemetery is a small, u-shaped pond that was recently dug out by the city of Columbus, presumably to help with drainage in this perpetually-wet area. I don't know much about this little bit of water, but I've named it Cloverfield Pond, after the cemetery, after the ubiquitous clover growing all around it, and after the giant alien sea monster from the recent movie.
Anyway, each day that I can I ride my bike through my neighborhood, always finishing with a stop at Cloverfield Pond to visit the local residents. Generally there's a Great Blue Heron wading the shallow water who always flies away upon my approach. "You again?"
I park my bike on the gravel path that runs behind the cemetery and walk through the matted clover to the edge of the pond. Turtles have already slid off rocks and into the water by the time I bumble my way to the water, but frogs always seem surprised and go hopping away with terrified peeps, sometimes skipping like stones over the surface. Strangely, the ticks in the tall vegetation never seem alarmed by my approach, and I often have to flick one off.
The carp in Cloverfield Pond also seem to look forward to my approach, as soon after I make my way to water's edge they begin swirling up mud and poking mouths and fins above the surface. I suspect that the heron keeps the carp from enjoying their morning, but my beak, being much less sharp, doesn't worry them nearly as much.
Occasionally I'll see a turtle pop her snout above the surface, only to disappear again as the turtle recognizes me on the shore. Once an enormous snapping turtle swam my way. At first the turtle looked like an abandoned tire, until I realized that the "tire" was swimming toward me, its ancient head and tiny eyes half in, half out of the water.
The real stars of the show, though, are the family of muskrats that live in the drainage pipe connecting Cloverfield Pond with nearby Clover Groff Run. One of these furry creatures is by far the braver. Also the larger of the pair that I see regularly, I suppose him to be the male of the pair. This morning he actually swam right up to my feet, beneath the vegetation at the pond's edge, and gave me the eye before swimming away.
It's almost as much fun to watch the muskrats swim underwater as on the surface. I can follow their progress through the bubbles that come streaming off their coats, as well as the wake they create in the water. They remind me of the diagrams of jets creating sonic booms as they travel through the air.
The other muskrat is far more timid, and also smaller. She'll swim out of the pipe, see me standing there ("are you STILL here?") then flip her tail in contempt and swim back in. A few minutes later, she'll poke her nose out again and replay the scene once more. Occasionally I'll catch her further out, and when she spots me she'll take off, swimming underwater, making a beeline straight for home. Maybe someday she'll trust me enough to hang around a little.
A few days ago I spotted what I think was a mink. It was an exciting site, but it also made me worry a bit for my little muskrat family. I didn't see any muskrats that day – I hope they were hiding well.
After watching the action for a few minutes, I jump on my bicycle and pedal back up the path to home. "Finally," I can almost here the muskrats say, "I thought he'd never leave."


text:
Media… it's the engine that drives political agendas, unfortunately.
You can't win though. In yesterday's Independent I was described as a 'true professional' and a 'rebel'. Today on the daily Politics Show I was described as a loyal Cameron MP!
On PM tonight I am commenting on the fact that PCTs (Primary Care Trusts) are making women wait to have terminations. Apparently PCTs have quotas for such things and if this month's quota has been used up and someone is waiting for a termination they will have to wait until the next month.
Any woman who becomes pregnant and decides to terminate that pregnancy has rights
A right to help, counselling, and advice --- and a period of time to reflect upon her decision, a period of informed consent.
However, the NHS has an obligation that once a thoughtful decision has been made to terminate then the termination should be carried out as quickly and as humanely as possible.
It is completely unacceptable for PCTs to set a quota on the number of terminations to be carried out each month without clinical consideration.
Bureaucrats are not medically qualified.
They don't know the effect that pushing a woman into the third trimester for a termination would have on the woman or the foetus
Very few women take the decision to terminate lightly. They do feel acute anxiety and distress, and that anxiety and distress is with them every minute of every day until the termination takes place
PCT bureaucrats are exacerbating that distress - they are making the whole process of termination that much more inhumane.
Research very clearly shows us that many women suffer with mental health problems later in life as a result of termination. This was documented in detail in the Fergusson Report.
I would rather that far fewer women went through the process of termination. But I am a realist and know that to achieve this will take time, patience and hard work.
What the government are trying to achieve by condoning the process of making pregnant women who know they are going to terminate wait in the wings without support or help simply defeats me.


text:
Hello Everyone,This article is Part II of my series covering Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the robotic future that's headed our way. As I mentioned in my prior article, by no means do I assert to be an expert in the field. I'm just someone who took interest in the subject many years ago. I've read most articles written by high-profile originators, such as the Brookings Institute, McKinsey Global Institute, World Economic Forum, along with many other t..
Hello Everyone,We finally did it … we've converted Silicon Valley Local Magazine to Silicon Valley Talk. We're going to have a lot of interviews and commentary coming your way … I'll also be sharing my personal experiences on some of the following topics in the near future.Retirement:How much do you really need to retire? I say a couple should have a minimum of $5 Million by age 55 … I'll share with you how to get there. Are you fortunate enough to work (o..
Recently my wife and I had the opportunity to see Jason Alexander, better known as George Costanza of the hit TV series Seinfeld … followed by Arsenio Hall the next night.
Alexander portrayed the much-loved character George Costanza from the hit show Seinfeld, universally and ironically referred to as "the show about nothing," a series that continues to entertain audiences every day.
Alexander has starred on Broadway, in hit films like Pretty Woman and S..
Hello Everyone,
Just recently over the Thanksgiving Holiday weekend my wife and I visited friends in Minneapolis Minnesota. The good news it didn't snow … the bad news, it was downright cold. However, it was very warm inside the largest mall in the country, the Mall of America located in Bloomington, Minnesota just 10 miles from downtown Minneapolis.
It's always been on our list to spend the busiest shopping day of the year inside the biggest mall in the..
Order, Eat & Go!
I recently returned from a business trip … while at the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport I thought I'd grab a bite to eat since I had a few hours. After making my way to the restaurants in Concourse G I noticed that you can order food and drink from tablets. How cool is that? Every seat and every bar space you can check the news online, check your email, play games, get flight updates and you can also place your food and drink order on tabl..
Let's go back in time a bit when I first started writing this article.
About a year ago, I was in line at Starbucks and struck up a great conversation with a first-year college student. He was attending San Jose City College taking general courses. He shared with me some of the pain his family went through during the Great Recession. He told me he didn't want to be in the same position as his parents when future recessions come around, struggling at an ..
To the 50,000 fans who filled Levi's Stadium to capacity on May 17, this was not merely another concert.U2 started the concert on the smaller stage closer to the audience in a more intimate setting. They started out by performing songs prior to the Joshua Tree Album release. During the song "Pride in the Name of Love" which is a song about Dr. Martin Luther King jr's assassination a large screen displayed the words to his "I Have a Dream" speech.
When th..
Hello Everyone,
I want to invite you to read our exclusive interview with Oakland Raiders Star Quarterback Derek Carr and Bay Area Nonprofits. Our interview focused on Derek's relationship with Valley Children's Healthcare.
Valley Children's Healthcare is committed to providing high-quality healthcare services to children, regardless of their ability to pay, and to continuously improve the health and wellbeing of children.
To read the interview in full pl..
My long wait was over, one of my favorite bands of all time rocked their way into the Oracle Arena recently. The Red Hot Chili Peppers with their lead man and bassist Flea (Michael Balzary), vocalist Anthony Kiedis, drummer Chad Smith and guitarist Josh Klinghoffer.
The Arena was nearly filled to capacity on a Sunday night … Flea opened the show with a few words to the audience "Thank you for having us the last 35 (expletive) years," Flea said. "We didn't..
Actor and comedian Billy Crystal brought his show "Spend the Night With Billy Crystal," to San Jose's Center For Preforming Arts Theater recently.
It was a nice blend of standup and storytelling along with film clips you may not have seen before. Crystal was joined by comedian/actress Bonnie Hunt who facilitated the interview portion of the show.
You can tell a lot of what they did was simply improvised on the spot which gave him freedom to tell a lot of ..
My wife and I recently went to Thunder Valley Resort Casino to see one of favorite comedians. Best known for his role on the Emmy award-winning sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond, Brad Garrett performed at Thunder Valley's Pano Concert Hall.
With a 2,000-seat concert capacity, Pano Hall is the perfect venue for mainline entertainment with a more intimate setting. Located inside the casino, seating is comfortable, aisles are spacious, and with a raised platfor..
The wait was finally over. I've been looking forward to seeing Maroon 5 perform for some time now. The setting was a jam-packed Oracle Arena in Oakland.It's hard to believe that these guys started out as an alternative-rock band with the name of "Kara's Flowers in the mid-nineties, when front man Adam Levine and the guys were in high-school. Soon after the turn of the century, Maroon 5 was formed, releasing their album "Songs About Jane."
When these guy..
On Saturday September 10, Carrie Underwood brought her Storyteller Tour to the SAP Center in San Jose. We made the decision to go the day before. At the end of the concert, my wife and I both agreed that Carrie Underwood is one heck of a singer and one heck of a superstar.
Underwood opened her show with her hit, "Renegade Runaway", then moving into "Last Name" and Something' Bad" followed by "Undo
It." "Good Girl" then her latest hit "Church Bells." ..
Hello Everyone,If you missed Boy George and his Culture Club band at the Mountain Winery this year, then I can honestly, say you missed one heck of a show.
Drummer Jon Moss took to the stage to get the evening started at the Mountain Winery. Sitting behind a plexiglass wall on drums he got the crowd on their feet with the Club's trademark beat of "Church of the Poison Mind" … I don't think anyone in the venue sat down the entire evening. As the beat got ..
A few years ago, my wife and I took a half day off to make the drive to Thunder Valley Resort Casino to see Grand Funk Railroad and Foreigner in concert. We had dinner reservations at their "High Steaks" restaurant. However, traffic was so bad; it took us over 5 hours to make the drive. Of course we had to cancel our dinner reservation and showed up 10 minutes prior to the concert. I said I'd never do that on a Friday again.
As they say, never say neve..
Since their early days in the 1990s, BNL has been pretty much known for their hilarious humor and fun songs. Even though their founding member Steven Page is no longer with them, you would never know the difference. Co-Founder and singer Ed Robertson is one heck of a front man. BNL really knows how to have fun on stage as the Mountain Winery audience was amazed.
Even before BNL took the stage at the Mountain Winery in Saratoga this warm summer evening, t..


text:
Feel the magnetic pull down Cathedral Arcade towards Kuwaii's timeless, elegant, and incredibly beautiful womenswear. The local label's flagship store fits like a perfectly crafted glove in the stunning Cathedral Arcade, the vaulted ceiling and leadlighting complementing Kuwaii's signature pastel colours and flashes of gold. Spoil yourself with a Kuwaii piece that's sure to last for seasons to come.Content: Visit Victoria
Social media:
Shop 7–8, Cathedral Arcade, 37 Swanston Street , Melbourne, Victoria, 3000
Map pins are available via the tab key in a list after the map.
You can pan the map with the keyboard arrows.
-37.81667 144.96699


text:
Vintage tin jewelry is made from, literally old tins and lead free, jewlery grade solder!
No two are ever the same. They are super light weight and oh so cute. The beads are either glass, vintage or brass.
Brass earwires
Measure about 2 inches each
Comes in gift box, with a polishing cloth!
Vintage Tin Earrings, short - pink bead


text:
The to-do list surrounding Malt is pretty dramatic and as vast as the Grand Canyon. Things we have to cover and want to achieve with all the best intentions. However, that old chestnut of father time keeps us at arms length. This is, after all, not a full-time gig, more a labour of love that we somehow give the illusion of all-encompassing.
One of my personal aims in 2019 is to explore mezcal, or for Malt write about mezcal, as we've mentioned our fondness for the Mexican spirit but never actually gone so far as to review it. Therefore, I've put that right with this debut piece and hopefully as I source more throughout the year, we can do this a couple more times if there's interest.
In the UK, Mezcal isn't widely available so you tend to have limited pickings. The premium end of the market is the domain of single estate, handcrafted, bespoke releases with traditional methods and less commercial strains of agave utilised. More commercial and intensive mezcals occupy the cheaper end of the market that has stepped towards a more efficient and industrial approach to production. Does this remind you of another spirit closer to home?
In the UK, I believe we have a love for all things Mexican. Friends seem to visit the country to spend their weeks in a compound, which isn't my idea of a vacation. I'd rather explore and experience the true culture, flavours and spirits of whatever country I find myself in. To be locked away seems a towering shame. Although my American relatives tell me that their days of visiting Mexico are sadly at an end for various reasons.
Recently, I reviewed an inventive approach to tequila from a Scottish company called UWA. In this piece, I tapped into the existing image of bad tequila and knocking back the spirit in the search of escape. Or that's how it seemed at the time from the company I kept. Point being, tequila had a poor image that it is trying to overcome. Whilst it is related to mezcal, thankfully this spirit doesn't have the same stigma. I'd recommend for further reading the excellent read from Emma Janzen with a gloriously long title i.e. Mezcal: The History, Craft & Cocktails of the World's Ultimate Artisanal Spirit. This gives you a sense of the origins and future that awaits mezcal. Such things we'll leave for another article.
For this starter piece, I wanted to compare a more premium release against a trio of potentially affordable and widely available mezcals. It should, in theory, throw up some interesting angles including if the price is a barometer of quality or inefficiency? The different types of agave and production methods used? Hopefully, you'll join me in future mezcal forays as we delve further into this intoxicating Mexican tradition.
For reviewing purposes we'll drop the colour criteria as it seems pointless.
Del Maguey Mezcal Vida – review
A single village mezcal this is twice distilled using the Espadin agave and bottled at 42% strength and will set you back around £44.95 a bottle from Amazon, or it's available from the Whisky Exchange for the same price.
On the nose: Smoky pine cones, basil and fennel with milk chocolate. Lemon thyme and a fresh finish nature. An earthy foundation and a mineral quality, liquorice root and water best is avoided.
In the mouth: ashy and smoky with chilli flakes. Oddly, lavender on the finish which is really weird. It is lacking body and development. Fennel and celery follow, with water things are sanded down with less definition.
Score: 5/10
Los Siete Misterios Coyote 2015 – review
Made using the rare Coyote variety of agave this is bottled at 46.3% and will set you back circa £80.56 a bottle from Amazon although this is the 2017 edition, and the Whisky Exchange has a different vintage for £63.95.
On the nose: More spirit based and a touch of meths oddly. Leafy and autumnal vegetation, oily with hints of menthol. Minty, with aniseed, kindling, red lettuce followed by lime juice and coffee beans.
In the mouth: Much smoother than the rest and subtle. Olives and green mango, an unripe pineapple with an oily texture but not much more.
Score: 5/10
Montelobos Joven Mezcal – review
Made from the espadin agave this will set you back around £45.20 a bottle from Amazon, or a similar price from the Whisky Exchange.
On the nose: light with spent smoke and pebbledash. Chalky with limes and wood splinters. Some seashells and crushed grapes. There are some apples mixed in with mint leaf but little more.
In the mouth: Sweet with a big dollop of aniseed. It lacks power and has a limited palate. Very woody, a very neutral and inoffensive mezcal. Hard to recommend.
Score: 3/10
Pensador Mezcal – review
A combination of espadin and madre-cuishe agave is used in the process from harvest to bottle, which lasts 2 months. Bottled at 48% strength, this will set you back £37.25 from Amazon, or £39.95 from the Whisky Exchange but see our conclusions about the bottle size.
On the nose: very oily and dense. A cool aqua vibe followed by fennel, chickory and a little smoke. A minty freshness and a touch of ash. Some paraffin? A musty aspect to this mezcal with cooking apples, liquorice and a block of dry crumbly wood.
In the mouth: sweeter than expect before the earthiness and a clay-like aspect. Quite savoury in parts, olives, smokey and grapefruit. Aniseed on the finish with some blueberries and dry wood again.
Score: 6/10
A very mixed selection of mezcal. When putting this assortment together I wanted to pitch the more affordable offerings against a more luxurious or premium example. Generally, the lesser priced mezcals held their own fairly well. There were some evident limitations as you can see, but overall the winner of this grouping would be the Pensador mezcal that you can pick up for £37.25 for 50cl from Amazon. Remember that's a reduced size and our in normal day jobs of whisky/whiskey reviewing, we do the maths. Meaning the Pensador is the equivalent of £52.15 for a standard 70cl bottle. This is still good value for the experience, especially when compared to other mezcals in the market.
The biggest disappointment arguably is Montelobas Joven in terms of scoring, but I'd highlight the Los Siete Misterios Coyote, which for its premium price tag is more of a curio than a worthwhile purchase. I really was expecting more layers and a sense of something fine. As an initial foray into mezcal I'm enthused to try more and see what delights await.
Images from the Whisky Exchange and there are commission links within this article – these never influence our opinion.


text:
Alexandra Holmes, CCNA, CCDA, Ph.D., is a technical writer for the Cisco Networking Academy Program and has been a professional writer for five years. She is the co-author of the Fundamentals of Web Design course. Alex is currently pursuing her CCNP certification.
© 2020 Pearson Education, Pearson IT Certification. All rights reserved.
221 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030


text:
Happy Holidays!
Seems like the current batch of "writers" only knows about 3 villains:Doctor Doom,Taskmaster and Arcade.What is this opsession with Arcade?
It could have been...Javier Pulido?Or any of the ton of people with that webcomic/tumblr artstyle Marvel likes so much these days.
and comes from the same era as Michael Allred


text:
Vinu Sundaresan
Founder and Chief Executive Officer, vMobo Inc.
Vinu has over 25 years of experience in the Telecommunications and Enterprise software industry. Most recently he founded an IT Data center Software company and was the visionary behind Collation. Collation was acquired by IBM end of 2005. Prior to founding Collation, Vinu was Vice President of software engineering at Covad Communications and the company's first software engineering employee. Recruiting a world-class software engineering team, Vinu led the development of the company's Business Operations Support Systems. Under his leadership, the team deployed one of the largest application suites into production enabling a zero-touch service provisioning system.
Prior to Covad, Vinu was Program Director for Development at TCSI where he led the development of distributed management software products for telecom service providers worldwide. Vinu has been quoted and has written many articles on management systems and holds 4 patents in this area.
Prior to TCSI, Vinu held senior positions at Ascom Nexion, Timeplex and NJIT. Vinu holds a MSEE from New Jersey Institute of Technology and a BSEE from REC Warangal, India.
Vinu lives in Bangalore, India and Fremont, CA, with his wife and two children and is an amateur golfer and private pilot in his spare time.
Yan Or
Chief Technology Officer
Yan has over 16 years of experience in the software and systems development area. Most recently he was Co-founder and Architect of Collation, and led the development of the core Configuration Management Database technology instrumental in the acquisition of Collation by IBM. Prior to Collation, Yan was Director of Engineering at Covad Communications where he was responsible for the company's service fulfillment systems. Prior to Covad, Yan was Development Manager at Tandem Computers where he led the launch of the first Windows NT product based on Tandem Non-Stop technologies. Previously, Yan held various engineering and management positions at Allied Telesis, 3Com, and Compex.
Yan is the inventor on 6 US patents in the areas of computer networks, process automation, and system management. Yan graduated from UC Berkeley in Electrical Engineering and Computer System with high honor.
Anand Sankaran
Chief Architect
Anand Sankaran loves software and has been a hacker for the past 16 years. He loves to start new projects and experiment with new ideas and projects. As an avid Asterix fan, he goes by the handle of Obelix on the internet and one of his proudest achievements is showing up in the first five results for "Obelix" on a google search. It has been suggested that he fell into a vat of code when he was a baby.
Anand is also a serious amateur photographer whose definition of a holiday includes 4 am starts to catch sunlight at below freezing temperatures. He loves travel and hopes to visit every National Park in the world. You can catch his photographic exploits at http://www.anands.net
Sapna Nanjappa
Vice President, Sales Operations
Sapna Nanjappa is the epitome of the modern working woman. Armed with 20 + years in the luxury retail business, her personal network of individuals is almost as impressive as her business savvy. She started her career working with Ravissant Mumbai and went on to work with mega houses such as Paul Smith, Ferragamo, Ritu Kumar, Abu Jani and Sandeep Khosla just to name a few. Her interest in Fashion has fueled her drive to understand the industry second to none. So much so, she makes sure her colleagues dress for the job they want, even if it's not the job they have.
Her keen eye for style gives you the 360 experience when you have the privilege of her company. She is strong willed and a people's person, creating the perfect balance for her title as VP India Sales Operations & Business Development. Her passion for this company knows no bounds. She is an avid traveller and knows the vast and varied schools of thought regarding luxury.


text:
"Pass It Off" Remix Competition
After having released the smash video to their song "Pass It Off", The Immortals Project have opened up a remix competition to all beatmakers, DJs, and producers out there for the grand prize of having their remix appear on the next Immortals Project album. Using the official acapella track for the song, producers are encouraged to create brand new music for the song. As long as it's impactful and in line with what the guys are all about, any genre remix is fair game.
Read below for some of the requirements:
1. The Immortals Project are looking for original remixes to be created using the acapella from the original song "Pass It Off" .
2. You must download the acapella from this site in order to compete for the Grand Prize.
3. When sending your final submission, please do not include any material that you do not have the legal right to exploit (uncleared samples).
4. Remixes can be single/multi/cross-genre ie. Hip-hop, Drum & Bass, dubstep, Hip-hop/dubstep, Drum & Bass + Jazz — it just needs to be DOPE!!!
5. Winning remix will be on Immortals Project's upcoming album which is currently in production
6. Final decision for Grand Prize winner and runner-up will be determined by The Immortals Project.
For a full brief of competition requirements and rules, click here: Pass It Off Remix Brief
So if you're up to it then, download the acapella here or the music player below and get to it!


text:
First of all, I have to own up and admit that my hunch that Sir Alex Ferguson would step down as United manager at the end of this season looks to have been unfounded. Thanks to a Wayne Rooney penalty, United secured a record 19th Championship today following a twitchy and unconvincing draw at Blackburn and though all the talk will be of # 19 and knocking the Dippers off their perch or maybe of Ryan Giggs' 12th Premier League Winners' Medal, there are other aspects of this victory that are just as significant. For example, today saw the first serious silverware going to the Da Silvas, to the excellent Chris Smalling, to Tony Valencia and, of course to Javier Hernandez. There is already the basis of a new, younger United coming through and with Welbeck and Cleverley returning from loan spells, with Pogba, Tunnicliffe, Will Keane and (hopefully) the troubled Ravel Morrison emerging from the Academy, the future prospects are bright indeed.
Rooney keeps his nerve at Blackburn…
In his post-match interview, Fergie talked of signing 'maybe three' new players this summer and – assuming one will be a goalkeeper to replace Edwin van der Sar – you would have to hope that the other two are midfielders – with (ideally) Wesley Snejder as one of them. There's been much talk of how this year's champion crop have been devoid of the kind of stardust we got used to when Ronny was terrorising defences a couple of years back and what must be acknowledged is that United have won the title this year with a makeshift central midfield whose composition has shifted from game to game. Within those shifting line-ups, there have been many significant contributions , but probably the only truly consistent component has been Ryan Giggs; Scholes began the season brilliantly but then faded, whilst Carrick started the season slowly and poorly, then improved (to an extent). Fletcher, Anderson and Park missed chunks of the season due to international commitments and injuries whilst Gibson was always a pretty inadequate makeweight. Can't help but feel that Fergie got away with it a bit this year.
That he did so was due to tremendous team spirit in the United dressing-room, but also due to the inadequacies of the competition. Arsenal played dazzling football but had no cutting edge, City had spent a sheikh's ransom but often played like strangers – something that is likely to change after their F.A. Cup win over Stoke today – and Chelsea never recovered from a disastrous dip in form before Christmas.
Next week sees the first leg of United's FA Youth Cup Final against Sheffield United and also the glitzy, end of season, internal Awards bash at The Vatican where I would imagine that Javier Hernandez will pick up the Player of the Year award, though I would give it to Vidic for his consistently top-drawer displays. In-house, United and MUTV in particular are doggedly persisting in calling Hernandez 'Chicharito', whilst the rest of the world and most United fans seem to have settled on Hernandez as being a less gaudy and more appropriate alternative. I rather admire their persistence with this rather silly nickname, but it will be interesting to see whether he re-appears with it on the back of his shirt again next year. Hernandez has certainly had a terrific season, scoring some important goals at Stoke and in Valencia, but most importantly in last weekend's critical victory over Chelsea. A bargain to set in Fergie's 'Credit' column alongside some of his less successful punts in the 'Debit' column – Kleberson, Djemba-Djemba, Bebé, Bellion, Bosnich – to name but a few.
My Player of the Year – Nemanja Vidic.
There remains the FA Youth Cup Final over two legs and the small matter of a Champions League Final at Wembley against the mesmerising Barcelona, who are quite clearly the world's most gifted club side right now. I'll be blogging about all three of those games but my chief hopes are for the youngsters; they are such an outstanding bunch that they deserve this trophy as a monument to their undoubted quality. As for the Barcelona game, I have only limited amounts of optimism about our ability to beat them. Reading between the lines, Fergie's strategy looks as though it will be to use Fletcher and Park to disrupt Barca's midfield passing 'carousel', but Fletcher has been out for a long time with a virus and looks a long way from being in peak condition. I really hope that Fergie doesn't deploy Rooney in a lone striker's role as it will rob us of his considerable talents as an attacking midfielder – talents that have seen him emerge this season as Paul Scholes' natural successor. Using Hernandez to buzz around the somewhat ponderous heart of Barca's defence with Rooney dropping off to link play, allied to harassment from Park and Fletcher in midfield may well represent our best hope of upsetting the form book.
The important task – regaining the Premiership title – has been achieved and though Fergie will hope to outwit Guardiola, it may be difficult with this limited, transitional squad. I think most United fans will just want us to at least do ourselves justice this time around (unlike Rome in 2009) and give them a decent game. To be honest, anything over and above that would be a bonus.