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September 11, 2011
I haven't posted in a long time. I feel awful and rusty, so this post may wander a bit because many things have happened since my last post. I hopped on the Trans-Siberian train and rode from Moscow to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. I flew up in a hot air balloon in Cappadocia in Turkey. I left my post as Regional Director for Heartland Alliance in Burundi. And throughout that whole time, I have been producing a radio program called Imagine Burundi (Learn more about the show at www.imagineburundi.com)
It's kind of an unbelievable statement to say I have a radio show in Burundi. Let's take this by stages to see how Imagine Burundi happened.
Something like this usually starts out with a tepid declaration over a few drinks:
"I love radio?" (Questioning glance around the table.)
Then, in response, another's expression of outrageous disbelief:
"No way! Me, too!"
Followed by emboldened stupidity:
"Really?! Let's get a radio show!"
And that's pretty much it. If that transcript of a conversation between my friend Seth Chase and me is not verbatim, it's essentially accurate. This was back in September 2010.
But there were a few problems. Neither of us knew what to do to produce a show. I had done some broadcasting and journalism work and we both had dabbled in college radio, but if anything, that last one should have counted against me and served as a template of things to avoid. I was feeling quite bold because I had just bought a new MacBook and had the tools for the project. I figured I could just learn as I go. Probably not since discovering girls in junior high have we mixed so much ignorance with such unwarranted enthusiasm.
I was able to cling to one segment idea. For one show. But it was the kind of idea that fit so neatly for so many reasons that it just had to happen. The ideas for that one show laid out the ideal foundation for many of the episodes that followed. The idea was I would interview a taxi driver whom I had met randomly one day on the streets of Bujubura when I got in his cab. During the ride, the driver, Ilunga, seemed completely baffled when I tried to communicate with him in French. This gap was reasonable and somewhat common – some drivers lacked formal education and spoke mostly Kirundi or Swahili. But it was also frustrating given that I needed to point out my destination. So I sort of threw up my hands and sat in the passenger seat quietly. All of a sudden, Ilunga breaks out in English – really really solid English – and asks me where I'm going. So it's my turn to be baffled. We end up talking the whole ride about how long he has studied English (20 years), if he studied it at school (no) and what he's been doing since. That meeting happened in 2009 but I never forgot Ilunga so when I finally got approval for my show, there was no doubt I needed to speak to him first.
There were a host of reasons why Ilunga personified the show's objectives. He was a self-taught English speaker. He was fearless. He had great stories and ideas. He was a taxi driver, meaning he was amongst the most informed, most connected people in the city – in other words, someone anyone might run into. And all of these qualities matched up with Imagine Burundi's aims. We wanted to highlight motivated people, strong speakers of English, people who were interesting just by going about their lives (which is a lot of people) and someone you might call "working class" in a different context.
I am tired of the notion that most Burundians are poor suffering folks, victims. Yes, around 80 percent of the population is hovering at the poverty line and really struggling to make it under an ineffective government, but portraying the majority of Burundians as small/powerless victims hardly empowers them; in fact, it's very debilitating. Because Burundians, even the farmers and laborers, are working people, people who are trying to make it, people running households, hosting parties, living lives – they're trying to build something and framing them as victims seems like a defeat already. The ubiquitous imagery of suffering that we often see hardly expresses the everyday richness of Burundian life. (In my more cynical moments, it even feels like those portrayals are marketing tools for the aid industry.)
Take a young doctor, for example. He or she might have talent, might hold up in any city hospital in the world, but he or she would not be a priority for donors from a development framework that prioritizes victims and certain health issues. Yet, we are talking about a young doctor in Burundi, and that makes a huge difference. That means he or she may end up working at a under-supplied under-funded government clinic, making 300-400 USD a month. He or she might wonder why funding for HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment keeps getting precedence over basic medicines and supplies and trainings when the national HIV infection rate hovered around 4%. While he or she could end up relatively well off, these salaries would not be sufficient to send kids abroad for an education. So this show is for people like that as well – people with the talent and creativity and motivation but maybe not the outlet for that energy. Potential elites, maybe, but elite because of merit. This show is for the men and women and boys and girls making an effort, trying to change things, workers and intellectuals and civil servants and athletes and artists. This show is about recognizing achievement and highlighting inspired individuals. I think after three years of focusing on Burundi's past, it has been an important evolution for me to view development as Burundians want to view it, as a movement toward a different more dynamic Burundi.
So Imagine Burundi tries to introduce listeners to Burundians, to their thoughts and dreams and ideas rather than their misery and tales of woe. I realized I'm not here to save anyone; I would rather inspire or motivate people. We may want to hear that story of suffering because it makes us feel compassion, even confirms our antiquated notions of "Africa" but it can be a self-serving and incomplete story. Imagine Burundi's decision to broadcast entirely in English is also a statement about the country's future direction: Burundi is now working hard to integrate into the regional community its Anglophone neighbors have constructed to increase its economic and political influence. Burundians have responded to this shift by learning English in droves. I am hoping the show will help in some small way to raising that standard as well.
Learning radio from scratch has been so rewarding and maintaining the discipline of a weekly broadcast may be one of the most refreshing parts. The show remains forever in a precarious balance of catering to different levels of English, raising intellectual standards, increasing participation and accommodating diverse audiences. Sometimes, to ensure a segment is communicated effectively, we simplify the diction or we script material or we re-use those scripts so that listeners have a chance to really absorb the message. It started as a side-project while all of us were either working full-time jobs or larger projects. So in the beginning, we gave it what time we could, streamlined production, recorded at ridiculous hours and worked right up to our broadcast time.
In some of the segments from the first few months, you can actually hear our tiredness. Our voices sound deflated, our sentences barely adhere to the subject-verb-object structure, our logic sometimes not fulfilling the requirement of being comprehensible. But we never missed a broadcast. Each and every week, we put out an hour-long show– 60 minutes of ideas and advice and stories and restaurant commentary, each of which took 20-30 hours to assemble and refine. We've loved every second of it.
Sometimes people ask me why Imagine Burundi sounds like This American Life (TAL). About the only time I am not asked that question is when my interlocutor has never heard of TAL. One main reason is TAL impresses us with the genius of its clarity and directness. It's light on music and effects; it frames speakers' voices in just the right mood with minimal fuss. But maybe the most salient (read: honest) reason is we just don't know how to do anything else. TAL works because it's simple. We sound like TAL because we're simpletons. We're still learning the basics of production elements like managing audio quality, using the right microphones, editing tape. If we've achieved even a tiny measure of comparison to TAL, then we're already immensely proud. And relieved. Because even after overcoming all the challenges of getting a timeslot in the station's schedule, there was the small matter of putting out a product people would actually listen to. It's starting to feel like we're on our way.


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Laurie Curtis, M.A., CPRP, is a senior program manager at Advocates for Human Potential (AHP) providing consultation to behavioral authorities on evidence-based practices and recovery-oriented services. Focusing on adults experiencing serious mental health challenges and co-occurring disorders, Ms. Curtis has accrued expertise in policy and organizational development; clinical, peer, and recovery support services; workforce development; training design and delivery; and multimedia product development and technical writing. Recent work for the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) includes her roles as project director for Recovery to Practice (RTP), deputy project director and AHP lead for Bringing Recovery Supports to Scale Technical Assistance Center Strategy (BRSS TACS), project director for SAMHSA's shared decision-making project, team leader for the consumer-operated service programs (COSP) evidence-based practices (EBP) KIT, and task lead for developing video products for SAMHSA's EBP toolkit on supported housing. She trained under Dr. Mary Ellen Copeland to facilitate training on the Wellness Recovery Action Plan (WRAP) and has worked with both Dr. Copeland and AHP to develop and update WRAP educational materials.
Before joining AHP in 2007, Ms. Curtis worked as an independent consultant focusing on recovery support services and systems. Her projects included preparing planning documents for state and local behavioral health authorities; developing manuals on statewide mental health consumer networks, models of self-determined care, alternative dispute resolution, and ethics/boundaries; and creating curricula for team-based training on behavioral health workplace safety. Her professional work is grounded in her lived experience as a person in recovery. A certified psychiatric rehabilitation practitioner (CPRP), Ms. Curtis received her M.A. in education, counseling, and psychological services from Northern Michigan University.
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The Sad and Rapid Decline of the Ball Cap
On getting older and how to cover your head
Blame my father. He was a ball cap guy. He had, and still has, an entire filing cabinet and three storage bins full of hats. The mesh feedlot and seed supplier caps that a farmer can't help but accumulate. He kept them all.
And when he bought me my first ball cap—a cruel joke of a hat for any Cubs fan that reads "1984 Champions"—that collector gene kicked in. Over the next 13 years, I amassed a large collection of my own, which was fun, but as an adult you're expected to eventually deal with these things.
So, while home over the 4th of July weekend, I did what I tend to do when I'm not sure what I want to do. Just archive everything.
I decided to photograph all of the 67 hats that survived my teenage years so I would have a personal record of 1990s athletic apparel design.
And what a terrible era it was.
When North Carolina center Brad Daugherty was selected with the first overall pick by the Cleveland Cavaliers in the 1986 NBA Draft, he received something no previous draft pick had received before—a hat. A pretty sharp hat, actually. Orange wool with 'CLEVELAND' in blue block lettering over 'Cavaliers' in script. This became the hat of the NBA Draft, used through 1995, and it was, ostensibly, a fashion hat.
Prior to that point, there wasn't much variety out there for ball cap wearers. It was a functional part of a baseball uniform—wool, six- or eight-panels, a team logo or letter front and center—that few saw fit to alter. That made the first draft hats something unique. There was no logo. Just a name and a fancy font. It seems restrained now, but at the time this was a significant step.
And, of course, it wasn't enough. Run through the old NBA Draft clips on YouTube and you'll see the same idea I noticed while documenting my own collection: "What if we expand the canvas?" When Derrick Coleman was selected with the first overall pick by the New Jersey Nets in 1990, his hat featured an NBA logo on the right side. Nothing major. It didn't really detract from the hat, but it was a first step in the ugly and uncontrolled logo migration that was to come.
Two years later, Major League Baseball added its logo to the back of its on-field caps. By 1995, Glenn Robinson got his draft hat after being selected by the Milwaukee Bucks and it was still the same basic design as in 1986 but this one featured the NBA logo on the right and the team logo on the left. Limits? There were no limits any more.
This was the hat-collecting era I grew up in. That famous script? It eventually got relegated to the damn bill of a hat to make room for even more elements.The designs got bigger and uglier.Pinstripes, patchwork,piping, anything was possible and this terrible design strategy worked on me. It worked so well.
I have an off-and-on relationship with professional football. College is more my game, but a few years ago I decided to reconnect with my once beloved Chicago Bears. I planned to celebrate this rekindled relationship with a new Bears hat. Something simple. Navy blue with that famous wishbone-C.
The NFL was deep in a licensing deal with Reebok at the time. I went to the official online shop of the National Football League and scanned through probably 80 different hats. I didn't want to wear any of them. My teenage self would've probably purchased most of them, but I'd grown up since then. Classic was in and edgy was out, which really meant that I was out.
Despite my long history with hats, I'm no longer the target demographic. We all come to that realization at some point, and for me it happened on NFL.com. I didn't get a hat and this somehow actually curbed my interest in the Bears for a few more years.
But things could be changing. While creating this personal archive of the poor taste and buying decisions of my youth, I found a Bears hat I actually like. It's black wool (because everything was black around 1992) and has 'CHICAGO' in orange block letters above 'Bears' in blue and orange script. It's at least part of the reason that I can't go to the local sporting goods store and pick up a ball cap anymore.
In that sense, it is the perfect hat.


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Whether it's housing, currency or bath soap products…there is always a delicate bubble and it is always imminently going to burst. Many people run around, chanting of doom and considering whether it is worth living through the impending Armageddon or whether they should run away to a forest to live off a diet of woodlice and moss (I've heard this is going to be the next weight loss fad). The same can be said for the 'influencer marketing bubble'.
Log into LinkedIn and follow a handful of influencer marketing professionals, thought leaders or writers and you will quickly realise the theme of 'fuck influencer marketing is about to implode and kill us all' is running strong. You are also likely to see a few contrasting opinions arguments around this – primarily due to so much contrasting data and opinions being available on the subject.
In answer to this I have decided to recline in my chair and ask the burning question – so fucking what?
Will the influencer marketing bubble really burst? And if it does, is it really an issue? Are we really all going to lose our jobs, cars and homes and have to start busking on the streets?
It's doubtful and here is why.
Define the death of an immaterial thing…
My first major issue with this impending doom is that I am yet to meet any two people who have the same definition of influencer marketing. Even a quick web search throws all this up:
"Influencer marketing is a type of marketing that focuses on using key leaders to drive your brand's message to the larger market. Rather than marketing directly to a large group of consumers, you instead inspire / hire / pay influencers to get out the word for you"
"Influencer marketing (also influence marketing) is a form of marketing in which focus is placed on influential people rather than the target market as a whole. It identifies the individuals that have influence over potential buyers, and orients marketing activities around these influencers"
"Influencer marketing is the process of identifying, researching, engaging and supporting the people who create high-impact conversations with customers about your brand, products or services"
"Influencer Marketing is the name we give to the process of developing relationships with influential people that can lead to their assisting you in creating visibility for your product or service. This type of marketing depends on your having something great to offer your potential customers, and the audience of the influencer, and it also depends on your building a great relationship with the influencer as well"
Don't get me wrong, they all have a similar theme based around identifying and leveraging influential individuals within a business's particular niche…but my point is, influencer marketing is an immaterial thing, it is a concept and as such can shift and adjust over time to become a new thing that stays true to its principals.
A wise man once said…
"Influencer Marketing is using influence to market"
But can anyone actually tell me that this will ever not ring true? Will there ever be people who are not leaders and influential in particular niche areas? And will those people stop being beneficial to businesses, whether that is through paid endorsements or building strong and lasting relationships – or a combination of them both?
"Influencer Marketing (of the genuine kind) will likely never burst — I don't see it as a bubble. There will always be more influencers, and forever more brands looking to collaborate in an increasingly saturated marketplace (filled with potential customers who are rapidly tiring of ads and pushy marketing). People trust people. It's been researched countless times in many studies. Add targeted, influencer status to the mix (somebody who is not only influential, but highly-engaged with their audience) and this effect is intensely amplified. To sum up: Human connection is what matters today. The right, authentic partnerships blow any bubbles far away!
Sure, the tactics around influencer marketing may get tired, outdated and flat. But the fundamentals will always ring true as a powerful way to interact with and engage potential customers.
"90% of consumers are influenced to buy as a result of positive reviews." Now Escape
"30% of consumers are more likely to purchase a product endorsed by a non-celebrity blogger, than a celebrity." Collective Bias "
Do you think the tactics and approach to content marketing are the same as when the phrase was coined? Hell no – they have had to change and adapt rapidly in order to keep up with the times – websites, blogs, social media etc etc. Same with sales…even in my relatively short career in sales the techniques and tactics changed rapidly in order to keep up with the times and keep leads engaged.
WTF is influencer marketing?
Ok, ok…I am probably going to get some shit for this. But influencer marketing is actually pretty new. At least the term in the way we use it now…I am well aware that the fundamentals have existed for centuries (and in my opinion, will continue to – see above).
But just because those of us who have been leveraging influencer marketing in our professional lives may have been doing it for a fair few years now…the world outside our window is only really just hearing about it.
Just because you have read 7 million articles entitled 'what is influencer marketing', doesn't mean the rest of the world has.
"A LOT of people don't know what influencer marketing is. Example: someone got in touch with me recently and said she'd never heard of influencer marketing. Didn't know what it is. There are more of those people out there than we know – in spite of all the content we all publish!"
Tom Augenthaler (theinfluencemarketer.com)
New things always get some bad media….and yeah of course there are some atrocious examples of influencer marketing taking place in the market. Just like there are some atrocious examples of content marketing and atrocious example of sales…people are always trying to make a quick buck out of these things, especially when they are hot news.
I don't know about everyone else. But I am getting more clients asking me what on earth influencer marketing is than telling me they don't want to use it because it has a bad rep.
Instead of submitting to the massacre of IM, we should be educating the world about it and its real benefits – if we want to keep it alive. This is our duty.
Focus on what works, not what's 'hot'
Let's line up for another semi-controversial one…because those that know me, know I am a huge advocate of micro-influencers as a way to get a genuine message across to an engaged audience.
However, as a marketer, you need to focus on what works, not what is fashionable among marketers or what has the most media buzz at the time…your job is to market and market well…so use the right tools.
What I mean by this is; if I were Nike and I had the budget…I would work with Tiger Woods as a 'celebrity influencer'. This is because he has influence over my target audience – specifically those that play golf. My mate use to buy the shoes that Tiger Wood wore because Tiger Woods wore them…if he played in Calloway's he would buy their brand instead.
People really need to understand that celebrity endorsements work, mid-tier influencers work, micro-influencers work, me telling my mate that 'Piddle in the hole' is a good beer will convince him to buy a pint (true story, beers in the UK have weird names). The end of it is that influencer marketing, whether that influencer is mega famous, or my mate Dave works…and it always will.
Of course, there are always trade-offs in getting better value for money. Working with 50 micro-influencers may be more beneficial than working with one 'celebrity'. But then depending on the product, the budget, the audience and the industry the opposite may be true.
There is so much data out there telling us contrasting things. Most of it is collected by those within the industry – yes it is useful and indicative, but usually biased – whether intentionally or not.
Focusing on what works is about using your own judgment, only the data that you personally trust and probably a fair amount of gut feel.
But what if the influencer marketing bubble actually bursts?
Adapt damn it!
We don't work in the past, the likelihood is our 'jobs' are never going to stay the same for very long, things change and only those that adapt will survive in the long run.
"I'd love to see the ''bubble'' burst – but let's get this straight, this bubble is only applicable to those within the influencer advertising space, where people are heavily relying on internet celebrities & eyeballs. You won't hear those focusing on strategic, long-term influencer marketing programmes talk about bubbles. But once it's happened – perhaps we can all start focusing on what real influencer marketing is."
Philip Brown (influencermarketingacademy.co.uk)
Take a step back. To reiterate a point – focus on what works, not what is hot. If you are 100% convinced that influencer marketing is about to blow up in spectacular fashion, then why are you paying it any mind? You should be spending all of your time looking for the next thing to sink your teeth into.
In conclusion, the likelihood of influencer marketing disappearing off the face of the Earth is pretty much nill. Undoubtedly, the tool and those that use it will have to adapt as consumer perceptions change, platforms alter algorithms and policies and as people & organisations continue to change the way in which they interact and grow their influence over their audiences.
As always, every 'disaster' or 'predicted disaster' will present a number of opportunities. Just like a large part of the power influencer marketing was born from consumers getting fed up with direct ads, so too will any changes in perception of influencer marketing present new ways to connect with customers…so go find them.


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On Mon, Nov 14, 2011 at 7:04 PM, Ojan Vafai <firstname.lastname@example.com> wrote: > With a browser-provided html quasi-literal, this could be: > var table = html'

'; > for (var i = 0; i < labels.length; i++) { > table.childNodes[0].append(html'
 > ${labels[i]}	 >  >  > ${values[i]} > 	 >
'); > } > element.append(table); This seems like it's clearly the best solution proposed so far. It's hard to come up with a syntax for DOMs that's more concise or familiar than HTML. It's worth pointing out that if this returns a DocumentFragment, it's actually impossible for authors to use string concatenation -- the *only* way for them to embed variable quantities is by the ${} syntax, which will auto-escape. So this would really be superb for preventing XSS. It's also worth pointing out that sadly, running an HTML parser on
 with no context node will simply make the
 disappear, so this particular case would completely fail. If the html quasi-function uses the existing HTML parser without adjustment, you'll append a bunch of spans and text nodes directly to the
, with no
 or . There's discussion in another thread (I can't remember which list) about how best to handle this for DocumentFragment.innerHTML, which is relevant here. It's not so simple to add a new magic insertion mode that picks the right insertion context automatically, particularly when you mix in SVG. But I think this syntax is far more concise and readable than anything else proposed so far, and it's also likely to be the most efficient (only one function call). This is the only kind of syntax that will actually displace innerHTML and all its XSS problems. (There is one aspect in which innerHTML might be better: if you're adding hundreds of thousands of rows, it's going to be much faster to run the HTML parser once instead of hundreds of thousands of times. Is the idea that it's also possible to call the html quasi-function on an arbitrary string you build, so you can resort to string concatenation if you really need to?)Received on Tuesday, 15 November 2011 19:07:28 UTC
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0 : Friday, 17 January 2020 22:36:59 UTC


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HolidaysView All Events
Labor Day Weekend
August 30, 2019 - September 02, 2019
Agendas and More InformationAgenda
Event DescriptionAs Summer growth gives way to Fall harvest, we'll send off the warmest of seasons the best way we know how: by making the most of our most popular family holiday on the Farm, Labor Day. Savor the last of Summer with a fun-filled weekend of fresh air, family activities and relaxation. Guests will enjoy lawn games, crafts and a big, Southern cookout, Blackberry style. If you must wish Summer farewell, we think a few days in the Great Smoky Mountains is the best way to do it.
Highlights & Features
- Complimentary activities such as yoga, guided hike
- Annual Country Fair Lunch at the Yallarhammer Pavilion
- Special Labor Day Performance


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Overly Enthusiastic
Ok, I get a big overly enthusiastic when it comes to tv shows (and movies) I'm a big fan of. Two shows I am always trying to get people to watch is Misfits and Breaking Bad. I know not everyone is going to like every show but I really do believe that the majority of people would really love both of these shows.
I've yet to get anyone to watch Misfits who hasn't liked it but that's a fun show, it's nothing that is going to keep you up nights or stress you out, well not normal people. Breaking Bad will piss you off on a regular basis and bring on a discussion after almost every episode. So many times Manly Man and I have gone to bed discussing what had happened in the episode we just saw. Sometimes I take an Ativan just to calm down enough so I can sleep.
But I wonder, for the people who don't like the show, if they wonder how they are missing what everyone else seems to be so enthralled with? Like the show Lost, I've never had any interest in watching the show since it seems a bit to fantasy for me but I've always wondered if I'm missing out on something. I also wonder if they think the show is like Mad Men and that people don't actually really like it, they just think they have to like it because everyone else does.
What is the need by some people, like myself, who have this need to convince people to watch stuff that you know is going to blow them away but they just don't feel it? Is it a matter of feeling you know better than they do? "Eat this, you don't know what you like." Is it a need to pull as many people into your Misfits world because your group is just too damn small? Is it just a pathalogical desire to have everyone like the shows you think are amazing?
This would all be a lot easier if people just did what I told them to do and liked what I told them to like. Sigh.
4 Comments
AnonymousJanuary 17, 2012 at 6:34 pm
I tried for a long time with breaking bad, but I just hated Walt SO MUCH that I couldn't continue on. He's mean and horrible to everyone. Plus it's kind of boring to me, I like action or comedy or romance in my shows and this one really doesn't have that for me.
RobinJanuary 17, 2012 at 6:35 pm
I understand, anyway you watch like every single other show I watch so it's like…oh well.
AvitableJanuary 18, 2012 at 6:53 am
I tried twice with Breaking Bad and just couldn't find a single character to identify with, so I couldn't do it.
Did you see the Sherlock season 2 finale? FANTASTIC!
RobinJanuary 18, 2012 at 1:02 pm
Yeah I didn't either but I just thought it was so refreshing and well-written, I think I just needed that at that time and then the show just got fucking amazing. I haven't yet, we were going to watch it last night but Manly Man had a migraine.


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Skate America 2004 in Pittsburgh was very exciting for me because it was my first chance to see international skaters in a competition setting. I was especially excited to see Brian Joubert, and when I spotted him in the stands, I raced around the arena to get a photo with him!
Jennifer Don and Jonathan Hunt were one of the America pairs competing, and I'd been a big fan of theirs since 2003 Nationals. I thought they had a bright future... one of many failed American pairs I've had to experience disappointment with over the years! The clear favorites in the pairs event were the Russians Tatiana Totmianina and Maxim Marinin, but disaster struck during their free skate when Maxim lost his footing during a lift and Tatiana fell head-first onto the ice. Many minutes passed as medical personnel attended to her on the ice and then carted her off. It was the scariest thing I've ever witnessed at a competition. None of us knew how badly Tatiana had been hurt. We were all so glad to see her interviewed on TV the next day.
I don't remember a lot about the arena or the hotel except they were located within a short walking distance of each other. And there was pretty foliage in the area. We don't see much foliage down here in the Gulf South! That year was the first time I attended a Friends of Figure Skating reception, and I got to talk to Ryan Jahnke and Tanith and Ben. That was a fun afternoon!
After my experience in Pittsburgh, it was no surprise that I was hooked and wanted to attend Skate America again. Atlantic City in 2005 seemed difficult to get to, so I passed on it. That turned out to be a good decision since Hurricane Katrina hit in August 2005, and I was still exiled from home when Skate America rolled around. But I returned to SA in 2006 in Hartford, and there was some unforgettable drama. Read all about the early morning fire alarm and more in the next installment!


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As a Business Improvement District member all you need to do is make one call and help is on its way.


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Being pregnant is the first step towards getting your motherhood mojo and, if you pay close attention, you'll see it's God's way of telling you that life as you've known it is soon going to be over. As I write this as a mother of a three-year old, I realize I don't remember much about my pregnancy. This loss of memory is common, and probably evolutionary — it allows women to attempt a second or even a third child.
I may not remember all the details of my pregnancy and my experience with childbirth, but I can confidently say that the whole process is one where you rapidly lose control of your faculties, dignity, self-respect, sovereignty over your body and eventually life in general....
Pregnancy is the first time you realize that you may be as brilliant, well read, educated and professionally accomplished as the next man (and better than many), but you're not a man. For many of us brought up 'like a son' by our parents, this can be quite a shock. If you're pregnant, your body is on a mission to make sure you confront the differences and learn to really, really live with them.
Pregnancy brain or 'momnesia' is a real thing too. I am sure there are complex, scientific reasons at play here but, to put it simply, you feel and act rather dim. They say you'll go back to your old self a few months post-partum, but you don't — my son is now three and I continue to function on less-than-full mental capacity. Quite recently, as I readied the boy for school, I chased him around the house for about seven minutes just so he'd let me zip his pants. Then I went all the way to drop him to school, with my own jeans unzipped. As someone has wisely remarked, women trade perfectly functioning brain cells for children.
As your belly grows, so do your problems. In the rare event your tummy or back or swollen feet allow you to sleep through the night, your bladder will wake you up. In the third trimester, the baby begins to treat your bladder like a stress ball and the effects of that never quite go away – my ability to hold it in on long train journeys was legendary but now I can barely make it through a half day in office.
The good thing though is that all of this is for your own good. The poor sleep now prepares you for the months that lie ahead and the constant peeing is to make up for all the times you won't be able to once the baby comes along. Post-childbirth it's nearly impossible to sneeze without peeing just a tiny bit and given how little time new mothers have to themselves, that's how most of us empty our bladders in the first few months of motherhood any way.
As if it isn't scary enough that you'll have to somehow push a human out of you, you also need to worry about not having any marks to show for it. Stretch mark creams must be religiously applied and while I don't know anyone whose stretch marks were helped by them, they do help with the crazy itching. The backaches and exhaustion get worse over time as you become even bigger and your centre of gravity shifts. You are now routinely accosted by strangers who 'just know' that your baby is a girl or boy and want to touch your belly.
Pregnancy brain or 'momnesia' is a real thing too.
All this while your husband – the one who is also having the baby apparently – goes about his business, completely unaffected. Pregnancy is the one time the aches and pains are all your own and even the most supportive spouse can only be an annoyance.
Of course there are some upsides. You can use your growing belly to scare people away — crowds in a busy shopping mall will often part like the sea for Noah when they spot a baby bump. Many people recoil in fear as if you'd pop the baby right in their face, any second. A pregnancy is also a great excuse for things you don't want to do or want to do but never had good enough reason to. You probably shouldn't but you really can eat for two now and then fart freely. You can also stay on the couch all day with your feet up, avoid boring parties, family events and irrelevant work meetings, never answer the door or your mother-in-law's phone call. No wonder they call it a magical time.
All this magic, of course, must build up to a magnificent grand finale, and that is the 'miracle' of childbirth. And a miracle it is — a miracle that I have lived to tell the tale.
As someone has astutely observed, labour pains are so bad that you can almost imagine what your husband goes through every time he has a headache.
Edited excerpts from Stop Licking My Arm by Amee Misra, exclusively available on the Juggernaut app.
Also on HuffPost:


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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Hundreds of thousands of female immigrant farm workers in the United States are at risk of sexual violence and harassment, the organization Human Rights Watch said in a report on Wednesday.
Women who have experienced diverse forms of violence are more likely to take sexual risks, according to a new study.
There is no clear evidence that having more immigrants equates to more crimes, according to a new study.
Animated characters were created to contribute to reducing urban youth violence based on community-based participatory research.
In a new study, baseball fans exhibit a high moral tolerance for a form of revenge not otherwise practiced in most of contemporary society:
Tragic tales of domestic worker abuse in Lebanon are common, but a film showing an Ethiopian maid dragged along a street in Beirut just days before she was found hanged from her bed sheets has rattled Lebanon's conscience.
What effect does a TV advert have on a viewer? How does it bring about a change in their knowledge, emotions or intentions? These questions have existed alongside advertising ever since it began. Through a psycho-physiological study developed jointly by El Bureau de la Comunicación, the Tecnalia Centre for Applied Research, and the UPV/EHU, it has been possible to measure the emotional response of a person to a series of television adverts.
Do Violent Computer Games Make People Aggressive? Reaserchers are questioning the link.
Mothers with postpartum depression are more likely to be in a violent relationship than moms without depression, and new mothers in abusive relationships are more likely to suffer postpartum depression, according to a new survey of women with infants.
Seventh-grade students have experienced alarming rates of physical violence at the hands of a romantic partner, including being shoved, grabbed, hit or kicked, a survey of middle schoolers showed on Thursday.
A black veteran U.S. police officer said "racism is alive and well" in the United States and is evident in the case of Trayvon Martin, the unarmed African American teenager gunned down by a neighborhood watch volunteer in central Florida last month.
Male high school athletes' ability to recognize and intervene to stop dating violence is improved ...
"Now I live as far away from Florida in America as you can freaking get," he said, explaining his recent move to Hawaii was aimed at leaving a lot of bad memories behind in what he now calls the "Gunshine State," a play on Florida's nickname, "the Sunshine State."
A new study shows that in states where conjugal visits are permitted, there are significantly fewer instances of rape and other sexual offenses between inmates.
Nearly 4,000 counselors, counselor educators, and counseling students from across the U.S. and 30 countries are attending the American Counseling Association (ACA) 2012 Conference & Expo in San Francisco, March 21-25.
For all intents and purposes, the "War on Drugs" ended when nearly every state passed a law for recreational or medical marijuana use. The truth is, however, that law enforcement officers everywhere still actively pursue drug arrests. If you've been arrested for illicit drug use, you need to take the charges seriously. While there may be a valid defense or a program that can get you out of trouble for a first offense, the stigma can haunt you for a lifetime.


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Introduction: Concrete Clown Vs. Friendly Kitty
This project began with a simple question:
"What if I made a mask that was, itself, wearing a mask?"
There was nothing more to it. I did not ask myself about clown masks or cat masks or any particular type of mask at all. I just started pondering the concept of a mask that wore a mask.
I imagined that if I built a mask of a particular shape, I might be able to make a second mask that sort of clipped onto it, and wouldn't move too much. Or perhaps a sufficiently snug exterior mask could maintain its position based on nothing more than friction. Both of these notions, while potentially successful, would be rather restrictive in terms of design, but they might be worth pursuing.
And they still might! But I didn't use them. Instead I went with the much simpler and more effective idea that rather embarrassingly did not occur to me right away: magnets!
The idea was this: I would make a mask, and at key points (the points of greatest protrusion, and significant perimeter points) I would embed magnets. Once the mask was finished, I would wrap it in plastic and build a second mask base on top of it, and embed another series of magnets in that one.
Of course, before I could really get down to business, I would need to decide where to begin. What kind of mask would be worthy of this experiment?
Now, a word about the clown. I don't like clowns. In fact, I kind of hate them. But they are fun to draw and they're creepy, and somewhere in the back of my mind I had sorta been wanting to make a clown mask. Here's the thing, though: clown masks are boring. A clown is passe, cliche, obvious. Even if the process is interesting, at the end of the day, what am I going to be left with? Nothing but a clown mask. So I probably wasn't going to make one.
Until this idea came along. This was a way that I could step up the game and make a clown mask more interesting. In fact, the first notion I had was to make two clown masks. Imagine that! You see somebody with a clown mask and you say "No, gross, take it off!" And he takes off the clown mask and underneath there is an even worse clown mask! That would be pretty awful, right?
But I thought better of that. One clown mask at a time. If only one of them would be a clown mask, though, it seemed much weirder to me for the clown mask to be on the bottom, so I decided to start there.
Step 1: Let's Clown Around!
I started, as I often do, by making a mold of my face in plaster gauze. Then I prepared a batch of Paper Mache Clay, but I made a slight alteration. I wanted the surface of the clown's face to be craggy and stone-like, so I made the clay with the full amount of paper but only half the liquid ingredients. As I had hoped, the result was a clay that could still be sculpted, but had a rough surface that would crack without additional moisture.
Using the clay, I built a creepy clown face and embedded a set of ribbon ties next to the eye openings.
At the hobby shop, I purchased a set of powerful, small, disc-shaped magnets. Once I had made the face, I placed a magnet on each eyebrow, one in the center of the forehead, one at the tip of the nose, one on each side of the jaw, and one on the chin. I buried these beneath the thin layer of clay and let it dry until it was good and hard.
Step 2: Wrapped in Plastic
For the second cast, I put the completed clown sculpture onto one of my display heads and then wrapped it in plastic kitchen wrap. I sprayed it with coconut oil to facilitate later removal, and then I began to construct another mask base, being careful not to create any shapes that would prevent my from pulling off the outer layer once it dried. This process worked just as I had hoped, and the second mask came off easily.
The Big Mistake:
What I did, at this point, was place the second mask onto the first mask. I took new magnets and allowed them to find their own favorite distribution, then glued them in place and covered them with paper mache clay. The problem with this is that the second mask I made was too perfect a fit. It was snug.
What I should have done was to retain that second cast as an intermediate form, a base upon which I could build any number of masks for the clown to wear. A mask built on that base would be a step removed from the clown mask, still shaped closely enough for the magnets to work, but not as tight.
Oh well, live and learn.
When it came to the second mask, I had more trouble deciding on the subject. First there had been the two-clowns idea, which I had already rejected in principle but it still held a certain appeal. After that, I kicked around several other ideas. The cat had originally occurred to me as an extension of the cliche nature of a clown mask: the clown mask was not something that I would be likely to make on its own, but I had decided to do it because of the heightened reality of the dual mask project. Perhaps the second mask should also be something that I would never make on its own, like a cat mask. Too mundane to make solo, but worth doing under the right circumstances.
Still, it was too hard to nail down, until I realized something that should have been obvious from the outset: I don't have to make only one mask for the clown to wear, I just have to make one first. After that, I can take another cast and use more magnets to make any number of additional masks. Once I understood that this mask didn't need to be the only one, it was easier to accept the notion of making a cat just to test the mechanics of my dual-mask system.
The main consideration was the elongated nose of the clown mask. The outer mask would need to be built over that nose, lending itself naturally to an animal with a muzzle (or a beak! Maybe the next one will have a beak.) I thought about making a grinning sort of Cheshire cat, something naturally menacing, but as usual I began to overthink everything. If you're an evil clown, and you choose to wear a mask, then your purpose is probably to seem less evil so that people will approach you, and it will be easier to perpetrate your evil clown stuff on them. So the mask ought to be... not exactly friendly, but it should be something that an evil clown believes you will think is friendly. Evil clowns don't think quite the same way that you and I do, though, so their notion of friendly might be a little different.
So I started to make a cat. A cat that I planned all along to be pink. I did not plan for it to look quite so creepy. Maybe I really am an evil clown.
I made the cat using old-fashioned newspaper and flour-paste techniques. I built the muzzle shape out of poster-board strips and once it dried, I cut out the excess plaster gauze from the back. Twisted newspaper and masking tape framed out the temples and built the upper eye shapes, and made the ears. I used clay to make the lower eyelids and smooth out a couple of rough spots. I used wire at the tops of the ears and wrapped them in newspaper.
Step 3: Clown Makeup
The first pass was a black base coat, which was applied thickly and thoroughly, getting down into every nook and cranny. That way, when I went with the white coat over the top, the effect look stony, like concrete.
When it came to designing the makeup, I wanted to keep things as simple and classical as possible. I wanted it to look cool and creepy up close, but it needed to be easily read as 'clown' at a distance too. Enhanced smile, big red nose, blue arched eyebrows.
Achieving that simplicity was a lot of work. There are hundreds of little highlights and lowlights, using the natural contours of the surface. I used two cheap reds (labeled Fire Red and Bright Red), white and black, and two shades of blue as well. I finished the clown mask with a matte varnish that really emphasized the concrete effect.
Step 4: One Way to Skin a Cat
For the cat mask, I put a black base coat around the edges and in all the deep grooves, and then a white base over the rest of it. Then I started in on the pink.
I mixed a light cadmium red with a day-glo pink color, then brightened it up with some white. It was a back-and-forth process of blending the pink into the black, then adding layers of highlights to make the large sculpted areas really pop.
I painted black inside the eye openings, then used a color called "interference green" to create cat-eye shapes. The green is iridescent, changing intensity depending on the angle of the light.
I painted spirals up the "antler" areas at the tops of the ears, which I liked, but I was a little disturbed by how the whole thing had ended up looking so much like one of those hairless cats. I wanted to break up the pink surface, so I added a series of spiral designs over the skin. I painted them in using the original pink mixture darkened with mars black, then highlighted the edges to make them look a bit like they had been carved into the surface.
The cat mask was finished with a gloss varnish. I wanted a high contrast between the two sculptures, and the gloss makes it seem more artificial. More like a mask.
Overall, I am pretty happy with this project. My motivation was to test the mechanics of the magnetic mask-on-mask construction, and that was successful. I think the masks are kinda cool, but I wasn't driven to make them. Not these masks, specifically. I guess I would say that they are less inspired than my other mask work, but they hold their own. And I am definitely not done mining this idea!
Participated in the
Halloween Contest 2017


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About Wedding Photography
For the client and photographer, a wedding is one of the most important events to photograph and we only get one chance to do it right.
The last thing you need on your special day is to be worried about a photographer who is late or doesn't show up at all, and you can't reach them... because sadly, it happens all the time.
You want a professional that that is trust-worthy, dependable, accessible, and most of all - really cares about doing the best job possible.
We Care.
We're going to know where the best angles are to get good shots, because we research the locations ahead of time and evaluate the lighting and layout.
We will be at every location on time or ahead of time to ensure your plans are not delayed or interrupted.
Not only that, but we also work with a member of your wedding party to ensure we get every photograph on your list.
Does that sound like the type of photographer you want to deal with?
Yes, of course it does!
Please contact us to arrange a consultation.


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Therapy has a new face, these days.
My therapist is going off of sensorimotor psychotherapy, by Pat Ogden. She'll let me talk briefly what's going on in life and then we get into it. it's motion based. Today it was simple movement of her going back and forth towards me, what felt safe and what was not, as I tried to ward off attack. Boundaries.
It was terrible, readers. And I had to notice what I was doing, and what was going on with me as I did it, on top of all that, to tell her those things, and I couldn't believe what was coming out of my mouth. Used to be that it was more of a tea party, where I'd just chat about my woes.
I felt sick. i still feel sick.
I know I want to talk to someone, to hear a voice to just drone on, but I also know that the only option, and I mean the only option, is my mother.
And that's a phenomenally horrible idea.
Talk about boundaries. That was the point of the session today, really, was that I had no boundaries and why. I mean, I know enough when I'm being attacked, or even just a gentle version of people just talking to me (my ears still roar at that point) but not enough to know that I'm allowed to say my piece, either to be present or to repel them entirely. My mother violates these senses at every turn. I don't know if I can say that I can call these senses boundaries though. I can't. I have no defenses. Everything, even people being friendly, is just too much. Like, if they are being friendly, it's as if they are saying I exist, I deserve it. It just narrows down to a car's headlights for me and I just wait to get hit as they pass me by.
I don't have many people left, that are wholly within my heart and I am wholly within theirs, with which I can be a whole and unguarded being, chosen family. My two young cousins up the road, my cat. The rest of everybody I regard with some darkness in my heart, for one reason or another. My mother, for instance, suffocates my soul, wants to know it all. She broke my trust badly over time. Now she pries constantly. Even physically, when she's in my space, at my apartment, she'll arrange it just so. I reluctantly give her pieces, which she gobbles up, wanting more, and I am left feeling robbed. She only hears what she wants to too. Neither her or my dad wants to hear anything whatsoever about manliness or transliness (I still don't know what men wear for shoes, is a light example. I have old somewhat unisex girl shoes for the most part, and this makes me self conscious. But that is another story). This is not healthy listening, but she's the only one in my entire existence who will listen at all.


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Santa Barbara is often called "The American Riviera," because of its uncanny resemblance to the beautiful and breathtaking Mediterranean coasts of France and Italy. Homes that are located on this hilltop command premium value due to the unparalleled views of the entire Santa Barbara city, the harbor, the ocean and the nearby Islands. The curved road, Alameda Padre Serra, also known as APS, is the main street of the Riviera neighborhood, dividing the area into the lower and upper Riviera. The lower part being closer to downtown areas and the upper being next door to the Mission, Upper East and Mission Ridge areas. This neighborhood is not very walkable but is still conveniently located to all that Santa Barbara has to offer. The Riviera Theatre, the beautiful and historic Franceschi Park, and the stunning El Encanto hotel all call The Riviera home and all enjoy the sweeping, stunning and unmatched views
The Riviera neighborhood is part of the Santa Barbara Unified School District. For more information, please click here.
For private school information in Santa Barbara County, please look here.


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Casa Ortega was founded on October 2nd, 2002 with just a small amount of funds, but with big dreams! Jesus Ortega and Lourdes Ortega started working on the restaurant ensuring every dish was made original and full of flavor. Making everything from scratch, that is the Casa Ortega difference. We also wanted to make a unique environment for everyone to enjoy along with their dinner. Our ultimate goal was to bring a little piece of Mexico, and over the years we are proud to have accomplished that.
Thank you for letting us be a part of your family over these past wonderful years!
Special thanks to Maria and Ed Cupido.


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Charade; Thriller comedy, USA, 1963; D: Stanley Donen, S: Audrey Hepburn, Cary Grant, Walter Matthau, James Coburn, George Kennedy
American Regina Lambert, who works as a translator, arrives in Paris to file for divorce from her husband, but he gets killed in a train. In US embassy, Mr. Bartholomew explains that he husband stole 250.000 $ during the World War II and hid them somewhere, but his "friends" Tex, Gideon and Scobie are after the cash. Regina's friend is the mysterious Peter, but she discovers his name is actually Doyle and that he works with Tex in order to get the money. When Tex, Gideon and Scobie get murdered and Regina discovers the money was transformed into stamps, she figures Bartholomew is actually the killer and that his name is actually Doyle. He gets killed by "Peter" who explains her he works for the embassy.
"Charade" is a real thriller that took Hitchcock as the ideal, at the same time suspenseful and comical, with a complicated story where every third represents the negation of the previous - which is why the viewer is left uncertain on to who is actually Cary Grant's character since he at one moment turns out good, then bad (the associate of the bad guy) and then good again (just pretends to be the associate) - but that ideal wasn't so perfectly re-enacted as a whole. Director Stanley Donen has an inspiring sense for how and where to place all the camera angles whereas the most famous sequence is the one on the funeral of Regina's husband - she and her friend are the only people present in the church, besides a police officer who is "just there because the deceased one was murdered", but then the three bad guys enter the stage and "subtly" stab the corpse with a needle and place a mirror in front of his face to see if he is really dead. Some inconsistencies and discrepancies in the story are bothersome, since it didn't manage to become as stylish to forgive it everything despite a few fun ideas (a bad guy with an iron hand) and has a few plot twists too much, yet the two main actors have great chemistry, especially Audrey Hepburn who was nominated for a Golden Globe and actually won a BAFTA as best actress.


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Jesse James to Janine Lindemulder: Lay Off Sandra Bullock!by Free Britney at .
Jesse James has a message for his ex-wife, and that is to leave his current wife the heck out of their custody dispute, which was gotten increasingly bitter of late.
The Monster Garage star's ex, porn star Janine Lindemulder, suggested this week that his current spouse, Sandra Bullock, is trying to "take away my daughter."
She called out the actress to talk with her directly.
James' attorney Marilyn Slifman calls Lindemulder's remarks "wholly inaccurate and unfortunate," noting that "Sandra Bullock is in no way a party to this litigation."
"Mr. James' sole concern is for the safety, welfare and best interests of his daughter," he added. "The proper forum to resolve this case is in the courtroom."
Bullock has been helping raise 5-year-old Sunny since January, when Lindemulder, who has appeared in over 100 adult movies, was jailed for tax evasion.
Janine Lindemulder says Sandra Bullock is trying to steal her child. Hasn't she seen one of Sandra's 46 romantic comedies? No way is she capable of such a thing!
She and James wrote to the court questioning her fitness as a parent and voicing concerns about Sunny's safety due to Lindemulder's alleged drug problem.
"I myself have stopped working like I used to in order to be here with Jesse and the kids because we are on constant high alert," Bullock wrote. "Never knowing what condition Janine will be in, and the condition [the girl] will be in."
"I know the term 'stepmother' carries many connotations, one being 'glorified babysitter. My commitment and responsibility to [the girl] ... goes beyond that."
Lindemulder has since been released from prison and is tangling with James over visitation, insisting that she's a changed woman and "the best mother I can be."
"Yes, I have absolutely made horrific choices in the past. I've had my share of drugs," she said on Good Morning America. "But then there's a huge portion of my life, a 10-year span, where there's nothing - I didn't need it."


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David Levin, Joan Neri and Monica Novak published an article in Bloomberg BNA's Health Law Reporter titled, "Recovering Third-Party Payments After Montanile." The article explores the implications of the Montanile decision and the steps a plan sponsor and plan fiduciaries can take to increase the plan's likelihood of recovery.
The attorneys suggest plan fiduciaries and plan sponsors review their plan administrative procedures related to subrogation and reimbursement to ensure that the plan:
(1) Requires participants and beneficiaries to notify the plan when a third party may be liable for the injury or illness for which the plan has paid benefits;
(2) Has procedures in place to investigate and track recoverable claims; and
(3) Follows procedures for claiming reimbursement from participants and beneficiaries in a timely manner (i.e., before a participant or beneficiary has the opportunity to dissipate settlement funds).
If the plan's procedures are less than adequate on this issue, the plan sponsor should consider revising the procedures.
Read "Recovering Third-Party Payments After Montanile," here.


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This evening on the B Side Mikey Show I will be joined by Walter Morgan as he brings his plethora of knowledge to the mic. SCORPIONS is the band going down LIVE in Studio 2B from 8-10 PM (PST). As they just ripped a show with Megadeath during the middle of the week, it was the right time to pay tribute to these long lasting musicians. A month or so back I featured the old school Scorpions with ULI ROTH. "Zetro" Tommy T, Chuck, & myself pulled that show off quite well. Tonight the MATTHIAS JABS years will drop in your ear holes. If your out and about all of you "Blues Lovin, Rock N Rollin, Stoner Rock, Metal Heads" Listen on your phone. USE THE TUNE IN APP & BAM, you're in! THANK YOU ALL FOR THE LIKES (Facebook) B Side Mikey Show. FRIEND ME Michael S Sojda & remember I appreciate you all so, DON'T DRINK & DRIVE! \m/ #scorpions #matthiasjabs
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (105.1MB)
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About Us
What We Believe
Business etiquette and authenticity are partners, not rivals. Etiquette can change how you are perceived, but not who you are. Your true self, your character, will support or undermine the perceptions you create. Business etiquette is simply the foundation that supports your message. In other words, business etiquette helps you do you!
Our Approach
We take business etiquette seriously, but we like to have fun! First and foremost is our commitment to establishing a safe and supportive learning environment. We use real life examples, storytelling, research and current thought leadership to make our seminars and one-on-one sessions informative, relevant and fun. We take feedback from our clients seriously, so your input in our after seminar surveys is important to us.
Our Mission
We want to help you to use business etiquette skills to achieve career success on your terms. We think you are pretty great just as you are, but we know that mastering business etiquette skills can give you confidence and an edge over the competition. Your success is our passion!


text: Alpha Women's Center of Lowell hosted their annual Friendship Banquet at The Grand Volute. It was a beautiful event filled with testimonies, amazing food, great speakers, and more. Alpha seeks to not only to be a help to any woman who finds herself with an unplanned pregnancy; but also they offer parenting, first aid, and financial classes. I am so thankful to be a part of the Alpha team. Would you consider volunteering? Head on over to their website for more information.


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Daddy's Girl
The past few months I have watched Little Bean's relationship with her Daddy blossom and grow. She has always spread herself pretty evenly between the two of us but since I am a stay-at-home Mum we obviously spend lots of quality time together doing lots of fun things. She's a funny girl because the person who she gravitates towards each day is the person who she first sees when she wakes in the morning. On a normal week day she will be a Mummy's girl but more often than not at a weekend she will wake up to Daddy's face and will only want him for the rest of the day.
Now as you're probably aware we have been moving house since last Wednesday and so Daddy has been off work and getting up early to make the most of each day. Since he has been the first person she has seen each day she hasn't wanted to know me in the slightest!
I love to see her face light up when Daddy enters the room and scoops her into his arms for a "big Daddy squidge", it melts my heart. Yesterday morning she woke at 6.30am! On a Sunday morning!!!! So I plucked her out of her bed and tried to encourage her to cuddle up to me and Daddy in our bed in the hope that she might drift off again – no chance! But what she did do will remain etched in my memory forever, she shuffled herself as close to Daddy as she could and laid down next to him with her face laying on Daddy's cheek and she looked so content and happy. If I could have got out of my bed fast enough to get a camera without disturbing her I would have done because it would have made a gorgeous picture but I knew I couldn't so I had to settle for a mental picture instead.
Whilst all of this is lovely and heart-warming to a certain extent I feel bruised and a little "unloved" because my little girl doesn't want me. In my heart I know that she loves me and Daddy can never be Mummy but I do sometimes feel like a poor substitute. Last night when we got in from a day out I sat on the sofa and gave her a cuddle, she seemed really happy and content. But then Daddy came in and sat down so both Little Bean and Curly went over and cuddled up with Daddy leaving me all alone like an outcast. I'm guessing its just my hormones, they are my babies and nothing will ever stop me loving them but I definitely felt rejected. Maybe when my little boy is here I'll have someone on my sofa??
Do you ever feel like this? How do you tell yourself to snap out of it???


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Serve with your favorite Corelle dish or bowl. I don't know about you, but I can't have enough of the Corelle dishwares. They are light and appropriate for any occasion.
I won't go into the full recipe, but will list all the ingredients I used in this noodle soup. If you have questions, leave them in the comment, I will get back to you as soon as I can. My posts will be brief most probably until the end of April as I have hot stuff cooking right now and need to give them my full attention.
1/2 pound of shrimp peeled and de-vein. Ground by the chopping method or in the food processor.
1 16 oz chicken broth.
1 table spoon shrimp paste
1 bag of Udon noodles
1 Yellow onion chopped into little 1/2 squares, seasoned, and browned
1 hand full sliced thin cabbage , or bean sprouts
1 bunch of cilantro
1 sesame rice paper cracker
Thanks for stopping by today.


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Emaar Square will be a pedestrian-friendly, mixed-use development that represents a truly modern community. Emaar Square will be the ultimate integrated destination, providing a variety of shopping, entertainment, dining, living, hospitality and office spaces.
The urban design approach features a complement of city streets, from grand boulevards and avenues to intimate streets, lanes and courtyards. The extensive retail plan is woven throughout these streets, an integral part of the urban fabric. A wide range of residential offerings will allow people to live according to their own style, from high-end modern towers to more classic courtyard dwellings. The public spaces also range from grand to cosy, with the main Celebration Place as the grand gathering plaza, intended to knit the community together in celebration of Cairo, the old and the new.


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Although many have assumed that the Packers will keep DeShone Kizer on their final roster — after all, Kizer is just one year removed from being a second-round draft pick, and Green Bay liked him enough to trade for him this offseason — Eric Baranczyk and Pete Dougherty of PackersNews.com believe the Packers should keep Brett Hundley and cut Kizer if it comes to that. Baranczyk and Dougherty say the game has slowed more for Hundley than it has for Kizer, and the fact that Green Bay recently traded for Kizer should not be a factor in the team's decision (after all, the Packers were likely to cut Damarious Randall anyway if Cleveland hadn't been willing to deal Kizer for him). Ideally, the Packers would be able to swing a trade for one of Hundley or Kizer, but failing that, the Packers News scribes think GM Brian Gutekunst should stick with Hundley, who did not play very well in relief of the injured Aaron Rodgers last year.
Now let's take a look at a few more notes from the league's North divisions:
- Wide receivers Kevin White and Javon Wims both improved their chances of making the Bears' 53-man roster during Chicago's preseason victory over Kansas City last night, as Adam L. Jahns of the Chicago Sun-Times writes. White, of course, was the No. 7 overall pick of the 2015 draft — and GM Ryan Pace's first-ever draft choice — but injuries have almost completely wiped out the first three years of his NFL career. Wims was a seventh-round selection in this year's draft, and Jahns believes the Bears should keep both players and six receivers overall, including Josh Bellamy.
- Although Mackensie Alexander is battling an ankle injury, he is expected to start as the Vikings' slot corner — and "quarterback of the defense" in head coach Mike Zimmer's scheme — if he is healthy, as Andrew Krammer of the Star Tribune reports. However, first-round rookie Mike Hughes — who is also battling an undisclosed injury — has been pushing for first-team reps, which is fairly remarkable when considering that he did not play in the slot in college. Hughes could overtake Alexander down the line, but in any case, Minnesota appears to be well-set at the position in the long-term. Alexander, a 2016 second-rounder, has made tremendous strides in his third summer with the club.
- Though they had been enjoying an injury- and drama-free offseason, the Ravens have been hit hard with unwelcome news over the past few days. They lost rookie TE Hayden Hurst for three-to-four weeks, they saw star CB Jimmy Smith suspended for four games — though they at least knew that was coming — and now Jeff Zrebiec of The Athletic has more bad news to report. Zrebiec tweets that emerging third-year defensive tackle Willie Henry will miss several weeks with a hernia, while promising rookie safety DeShon Elliott may be out for the season with a forearm injury. Zrebiec adds that the recent spate of bad luck will impact Baltimore's initial roster construction, because while the team will likely carry Hurst and Henry on the 53-man roster until they are ready to return, the Ravens may need to keep an extra tight end and defensive lineman until that happens (Twitter link). Elliott, meanwhile, is an IR candidate. Jamison Hensley of ESPN.com reports that Henry had surgery for his hernia and Hurst has had surgery for the stress fracture in his foot (Twitter links).
- Browns head coach Hue Jackson wants to keep six wide receivers on the team's regular-season roster, as Steve Doerschuk of the Akron Beacon Journal writes. Josh Gordon, Jarvis Landry, Antonio Callaway, and Rashard Higgins make up four of those six wideouts, while sixth-round rookie Damion Ratley also stands a good chance. That means veteran Jeff Janis and relative unknowns Derrick Willies, Da'Mari Scott, and C.J. Board could be fighting it out for the last spot.


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(REVISED) NEWS: Blow to OC Startup Ecosystem: Details Surrounding Arbitration Case That Stuart Frost Lost Are Likely to Have Repercussions. Frost Created an Incubator and Affiliated Funds. Both Sides Could Have Made Better Decisions, According to a Local Tech Expert….
Stuart Frost, the founder of tech incubator Frost Data Capital and three funds affiliated with it, lost an arbitration case and has been ordered to pay approximately $12 million to investors, as well as millions in attorney fees, according to court
NEWS: Startup Launches Program to Help with Airbag Recalls
The recall of Takata airbags, classified as "the largest and most complex safety recall in U.S. history" by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration," continues to affect vehicles built by 19 different automakers, with a projected 70 million airbags expected
*UPDATE: Innovative Artisan Marketplace in OC Expands
Imagine walking into a Paris specialty shop with chocolates from Maxims and olive oils from all over the world. Now imagine this shop is tucked into a mundane office park in Lake Forest. That's precisely what myPanier has achieved - European
NEWS: Cove Fund II's Recent Investment – Startup That Delivers VR/AR Experience in 3D Fashion
Traditional entertainment venues are struggling to compete in an increasingly crowded market. At the same time, high quality at-home entertainment, like movies and video-games, are abundant and more accessible than ever via streaming and smart TVs. Musical acts, theme parks
*Q&A: BioLargo's Finances. Q&A with CEO Dennis Calvert…
OC Startups Now will periodically run Q&A's with interesting entrepreneurs, investors and other key players in the OC startup/innovation ecosystem, in their own words. This Q&A is with Dennis Calvert, CEO of BioLargo, a chemical company developing and marketing innovative products
UPDATE: Cannabis Company For Women Starts Taking Orders
A cannabis-based startup specifically for women is taking orders on its website and plans to start delivering those orders in January. Last week, MyJane, with HQ in Fullerton, held an intimate meet-and-greet at a cafe in Ladera Ranch to let OC
*NEWS: Innovative MedTech Company Gets Investment
An innovative med-tech company announced today it's secured over $1 million in equity and finalized its acquisition of a "breakthrough" stem cell therapy technology. Clyra Medical Technologies said today in a press release that it's acquired the "SkinDisc" stem cell therapy
*NEWS: Software Startup Focusing on School Lunches Raises $5.2 Million in Series A Round
A software company that helps K-12 school districts streamline their school lunch programs has raised $5.2 million in a Series A round, according to a press release issued today. Titan School Solutions said it will use the new capital for software development,
*NEWS: Nutraceutical Company Makes Inroads in Canada
An innovative nutraceutical company is now selling its products in the Great White North. ChromaDex, is selling its flagship Tru Niagen, product in Canada, now that it's obtained regulatory approval from Health Canada. Tru Niagen is a supplement clinically proven to
*NEWS: Startup That Insures Concert Tickets Raises $8 Million in Series A Round
Every year, consumers lose money after buying more than 1 billion tickets to concerts, festivals, sports and other live events they can't attend. A Newport Beach startup set out to change that. TicketGuardian created a way for attendees to insure their


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Recombinant Mouse AARS cell lysate
Welcome! For price inquiries, please feel free to contact us through the form below. We will get back to you as soon as possible.
|Cat.No. :
|Product Overview :
|Mouse AARS / alanyl-tRNA synthetase derived in Baculovirus-Insect cells. The whole cell lysate is provided in 1X Sample Buffer.Browse all transfected cell lysate positive controls
|Source :
|Baculovirus-Insect Cells
|Species :
|Preparation method :
|Transfected cells were cultured for 48hrs before collection. The cells were lysed in modified RIPA buffer with cocktail of protease inhibitors. Cell debris was removed by centrifugation and then centrifuged to clarify the lysate. The cell lysate was boiled for 5 minutes in 1 x SDS sample buffer (50 mM Tris-HCl pH 6.8, 12.5% glycerol, 1% sodium dodecylsulfate, 0.01% bromophenol blue) containing 5% b-mercaptoethanol, and lyophilized.
|Lysis buffer :
|Modified RIPA Lysis Buffer: 50 mM Tris-HCl pH 7.4, 150 mM NaCl, 1mM EDTA, 1% Triton X-100, 0.1% SDS, 1% Sodium deoxycholate, 1mM PMSF
|Quality control Testing :
|12.5% SDS-PAGE Stained with Coomassie Blue
|Recommended Usage :
|1. Centrifuge the tube for a few seconds and ensure the pellet at the bottom of the tube.2. Re-dissolve the pellet using 200μL pure water and boiled for 2-5 min.3. Store it at -80°C. Recommend to aliquot the cell lysate into smaller quantities for optimal storage. Avoid repeated freeze-thaw cycles.Notes:The lysate is ready to load on SDS-PAGE for Western blot application. If dissociating conditions are required, add reducing agent prior to heating.
|Stability :
|Samples are stable for up to twelve months from date of receipt at -80°C
|Storage Buffer :
|50 mM Tris-HCl pH 7.4, 150 mM NaCl, 1mM EDTA, 1% Triton X-100, 0.1% SDS, 1% Sodium deoxycholate, 1mM PMSF
|Storage Instruction :
|Lysate samples are stable for 12 months from date of receipt when stored at -80°C. Avoid repeated freeze-thaw cycles. Prior to SDS-PAGE fractionation, boil the lysate for 5 minutes.
|Gene Name :
|Aars alanyl-tRNA synthetase [ Mus musculus ]
|Official Symbol :
|Synonyms :
|AARS; alanyl-tRNA synthetase; alanine--tRNA ligase, cytoplasmic; alaRS; alanyl-tRNA synthetase, cytoplasmic; sti; C76919; AI316495;
|Gene ID :
|mRNA Refseq :
|Protein Refseq :
|Pathway :
|Aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis, organism-specific biosystem; Aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis, conserved biosystem; Aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis, eukaryotes, organism-specific biosystem; Aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis, eukaryotes, conserved biosystem; Cytosolic tRNA aminoacylation, organism-specific biosystem; Gene Expression, organism-specific biosystem; tRNA Aminoacylation, organism-specific biosystem;
|Function :
|ATP binding; RNA binding; alanine-tRNA ligase activity; amino acid binding; aminoacyl-tRNA editing activity; aminoacyl-tRNA ligase activity; ligase activity; ligase activity, forming aminoacyl-tRNA and related compounds; metal ion binding; nucleic acid binding; nucleotide binding; tRNA binding;
◆ Recombinant Protein
|Recombinant Human AARS Protein (Met1-Asn968), His-tagged
|Recombinant Human AARS Protein, MYC/DDK-tagged
|Recombinant Human AARS, GST-tagged
|Recombinant Zebrafish AARS
|Recombinant Mouse Aars, His tagged
See All AARS Recombinant Protein
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The Great British Bake Off owners Love Productions take £2MILLION hit to profits
Love Productions signed a £75million deal to move Bake Off from BBC1 to Channel 4
THE maker of The Great British Bake Off saw profits slip two thirds last year.
Love Productions netted £1million after costs and tax, compared to £3million a year earlier.
Public documents just filed reveal the production company — also behind shows such as Benefits Street — turned over £19.5million, compared to £22.9million the year before.
Takings from UK series, including TV's most popular show Bake Off, fell more than £6million.
But cash from shows abroad, where Love sells rights to its formats, rose nearly £3million.
Despite the profits dip, the documents say the firm consolidated its position as "one of the UK's leading independent production companies".
The figures cover the year to June 2016, before Love signed a £75million deal to move Bake Off from BBC1 to Channel 4.
Paul Hollywood will stay, but Sandi Toksvig, Noel Fielding and Prue Leith replace Mel Giedroyc, Sue Perkins and Mary Berry.


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Video from ECR 2018: Thomas Beyer on hybrid imaging
March 3, 2018
VIENNA - The successful clinical implementation of hybrid imaging in Europe still appears to be a long way off. Major challenges remain, particularly in terms of training and education and also the availability of equipment. Thomas Beyer, PhD, MBA, professor of physics of medical imaging at the Medical University of Vienna, speaks about an extensive new survey that sheds light on the issues to be resolved.
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Thomas Beyer, PhD, MBA, from Vienna.
Video produced by Christof. G. Pelz I GRAFIFANT Creation. Grafik. Photo I
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PET/MRI and champagne have a lot in common. On the face of it, both are expensive and even exclusive, befitting the "rich and famous." Read more about...
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As part of the Foodbuzz Tastemaker Program, I have the opportunity to pitch ideas to different food manufacturers for the opportunity to create blog posts featuring their products. When Hormel asked for ideas for a "party" using their products, I originally pitched them the idea of a "Brinner" (breakfast for dinner) party. I was sent coupons for products and later offered a monetary stipend for party planning (which I have asked them not to send as I was not able to create a full-fledged party within the time constraints). However, even taking the above into account, I was able to come up with two recipes which were INCREDIBLY tasty and showcased both Hormel bacon pieces and Hormel Natural Choice Ham lunch meat.
I offer you Hormel Bacon-Cheese mini-muffins and Hormel Ham and Cheese Quiches:
Both recipes were based around store-bought refrigerated biscuit dough (the kind in the cardboard tubes that you whack on the counter).
The recipe?
Egg filling for both quiches and muffins:
4 eggs, beaten, diced Hormel bacon bits or Natural Choice Ham, and feta cheese.
For the "muffins," tear each piece of biscuit dough in half and roll into a ball; put one in each cup of a 24-cup mini-muffin pan. Make a thumbprint in each dough ball and fill with a spoonful of the egg mixture.
For the quiches, use 8 silicone muffin tins, flatten a biscuit and shape it into the tin to make a "crust" and fill with the egg mixture.
Bake as according to the package directions for the biscuits.
These were a total hit! My girls ate them all and begged for the recipe!


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My partner and co-rat owner, who is also a cancer research scientist, has written this piece. We think people ought to know about this.
tl;dr: although red bush contains flavenoids which are good at reducing mammary tumours, there doesn't seem to be any evidence that drinking them in red bush helps. More scary is that red bush also contains estrogen, which can cause an increased risk of mammary tumours if it gets into your blood. It could be bad for your rats.
"So, three of our rats spontaneously developed mammary tumours *on the same day* yesterday. In two cases, the rats are over two years old and we might have put it down to age, but one is much younger and so we looked for a recent change that might be involved in this sudden change in their health. As descriptions are generally positive, we had recently given them a bottle of diluted red bush tea in addition to two bottles of water, which they had been drinking for a couple of weeks.
Suspicious, we looked into the tea further, and discovered that it contains analogues of estrogen, which can drive the growth and development of certain kinds of mammary tumour.
Lots of studies describe the efficacy of red bush tea as a health supplement, good for cardiovascular health and preventative against a range of cancers. For mammary cancers specifically, this is always phrased as "rooibos is rich in flavenoids, which are shown to help prevent breast cancer". When looking for studies that specifically treated rats with red bush and found a reduction in breast cancer, we were unable to find any. There were specific studies that showed it was good for preventing other forms of cancer, but none on this, one of the most common forms of cancer. I am somewhat concerned that this is a publication bias wherein positive and expected results are more likely to be submitted to journals for publication. The upshot of this is that if scientists found that red bush made mammary tumours more likely in rats, they'd be a lot less likely to publish the results.
Though our observations here are by no means a proper scientific survey, we thought it was striking enough to be worth giving a quick warning to the fancy rat community."
Advising against giving red bush (rooibos) tea to female rat
All topics on health, physique, vets, and medication
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I Got A New Telescope, How Do I Find Galaxies?
August 17, 2010 by fuadramsey
Filed under Articles, Featured, How To's, Starting Out
"I am using the stock eyepiece of this scope. I haven't been able to observe galaxies, nebula and star clusters like I would love to. Perhaps I am doing something wrong?"
This is a comment somebody posted under my YouTube video "Omni XLT 150 Setup"
It seems this is a common theme with many people that purchase a new telescope. The problem here is that if these people don't find help fast that shiny new telescope will be doomed to the garage and dust for many years before somebody else gives it a shot. That budding astronomer will loose interest and move on to a new hobby. They will miss out on all the joy astronomy brings. We should all know our tiny place in the universe.
In this article I will cover how to get started with a brand new telescope. If you are just getting started in astronomy and need help with the basics make sure you read my article "How to Get Started In Astronomy."
Well I admit I was one of those put-my-telescope-in-the-garage people, but luckily my persistence paid off. My excuse why I could not find anything was usually related to my location. I live in the city and was always disappointed because I could never find any galaxies. I then pointed the blame to my location for the reason why I was not finding anything. All I could really do was point my telescope at a star "yup another tiny bright dot." I paid no attention to the fact that I did not know the major stars and constellations. I also had no clue about Messier objects let alone how to find them.
I think my early impressions were that you get a telescope and point it anywhere and you'd be able to see more than just stars. Now that I think about it, that's pretty ridiculous, but that is how a lot of us start out. I did however manage to find Jupiter and Saturn somehow, and even a comet once!
Okay so now you have a new telescope and you are ready to try it out! Okay, if you really have the need to see something quick and fast look at the moon. It's funny because the moon is the brightest thing to see in the night sky. You can see tons of detail and it's the closest thing in the sky to us. But once you are a few months into astronomy chances are you'll hardly ever really be caught in the dark with a telescope when a bright moon is out. Why? Because the bright light impedes our view of faint objects.
So what else can you look at? Try to find the planets. Just look along the ecliptic (the path the sun follows in the sky) and look at the brightest things in that path. Chances are if there's something that's brighter than most stars, it could be a planet. Chances are that anytime during the year either Venus, Jupiter, Saturn or Mars will be visible in the night sky.
So now that you got too see a few things quick, it's time to move on and this may take some time. Perhaps the fastest way to get into the swing of things is to join your local astronomy club. There will be many members there that will be glad to show you what they can see and will even help you get started on your telescope.
But if you are a do it yourself-er like me, or are not so outgoing, you need to learn things on your own. There are several different kinds of telescope mounts and you need to know about and also what you have so you can learn how to set it up to find cool things.
The mount is the part the telescope tube (OTA optical tube assembly) sits on to move around and point to objects. There are basically two main mounts that you need to know.
The simplest is called an altazimuth or alt-azimuth more commonly an alt-az. With this type of mount you simply setup your tripod and move your telescope in just about any direction. Your telescope moves up and down and from side to side. The big giant tubes that look like they sit of the floor fall in this category (dobsonians). Alt-az mounts are easy to setup. You pretty much plop them down and start viewing the skies.
The other type of mount is an equatorial mount also know as an EQ mount. This type of mount needs to be setup up a certain way. You need to have the telescope aligned parallel to the Earth's axis, more commonly know as polar aligned. Yes it sounds crazy and scientific but it's not really that hard to do. Since this is a beginners guide I wont get too detailed here. First point your telescope North (if you live in the northern hemisphere). If you don't know where North is get a compass, or just note where the sun set. That will be West for the most part. From there you can find north. There you are now done. Okay, since you are getting into astronomy you probably want more performance and precision than that. Most EQ telescopes will have a polar alignment guide hole in the center of the mount. This is to attach a polar finder scope. To get your scope aligned well enough to do visual astronomy you can simply find Polaris and center it in this hole. If you don't have a polar finder scope or hole for one simply move our mount and align it by site. Now it's important to remember here that you are not moving the part of the mount where the telescope attaches to and swings from. You are moving just the base of the mount. This position remains fixed once you put your telescope on here and does not move the rest of the night.
The main differences between the two mounts is that with an alt-az mount you can be setup in minutes and need no power. But with an EQ mount, it takes more time and patience to get going, but you can track objects better and if you have a motor on your mount, the objects will stay centered in the eyepiece without having to move the telescope around.
Now that you have your mount setup and ready to go, you are now ready to start finding galaxies right? Almost, it depends on where you are viewing.
There are several things to consider when trying to find DSOs (Deep Space Objects):
1) Location- where are you viewing, in the city or outside of town. The brighter it is outside the harder it is to find stuff. Although it is possible to see galaxies in the city, most are pretty faint. Try finding M31 Andromedia first as it's the biggest and brightest galaxy (except our own). A decent sky to view is when you can see the Milk Way. If it's that dark then you can find most bright messiers (messier objects are a group of 110 deep space objects that were cataloged by Charles Messier- they are probaby the easiest and funnest items to start hunting out).
2) have an idea of what it might look like. Most galaxies are hard to see regardless of what equipment you use. You need to train your eye and get used to seeing faint fuzzies. When we do outreaches with our telescope clubs a lot of the people don't see the galaxy I have the eyepiece centered on. No it's not going to be in color and you are not going to see tons of details. But with practice you will start to see more detail (averted vision). They are called faint fuzzies for a reason.
3) Know where to look. You have to know the major constellations and brightest stars before so you can navigate the Messiers and galaxies. I suggest getting a Telrad finder and find or make some Telrad maps. A Telrad is basically a 1X finder that projects a bull's eye in the sky. You use these marks to jump from place to place. I can easily navigate with my Telrad and maps, better yet with my iPhone app. This to me is the most important purchase you can make for this and just about any scope!
Okay so now that you have a better understanding of what you can see, it's time to dust off that scope and get it going once and for all. Yes you may not see colorful galaxies with tons of detail, but you did find it. And that's something to be proud of. And if that does not impress you, just remember that the light from that galaxy that you are looking at is millions of years old!


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Buffalo Grove, IL – Father's Day gift shopping can be stressful. What do you get the man who already has everything? When you get him something personalized from The Stationery Studio, you are showing him you went the extra mile.
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Gourmet Dad: He loves to cook and grill.
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Sports Dad: He lives and breathes sports.
Tech Dad: He loves his gadgets.
Sophisticated Dad: He loves the finer things.
The Stationery Studio, LLC is the industry's leader in premier online personalized stationery and carries over 17,000 unique products. The Buffalo Grove, IL based company has created announcements, wedding invitations, personalized gifts and party supplies for some of Hollywood's biggest event planners and A-list celebrities. They have won numerous distinguished honors, including the 2012 Trendy Online Stationer of the Year Award.
For hi-res images, products for editorial consideration or additional information, please contact Jennifer Raaths at 312-401-8460 or [email protected].
For the latest product information, please ask to be added to our product release email list.


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ARCHSTONE SOLICITORS - Family Property & Litigation Special, Bankruptcy, Commercial Property, Commercial Property Law, Company Law, Conveyancing Solicitor, Divorce Law, Employment Law, Family Law, Immigration, Landlord And Tenant, Legal Aid, Litigation, Personal Injury, Planning Law, Probate, Probate Solicitor, Residential Conveyancing, Wills
Archstone Solicitors provide comprehensive legal services to both individuals and businesses throughout London and Essex. We pride ourself in providing expert legal advice, expediently. * Competitive Fixed Fees or Low Hourly
Bank Chambers, Green Lane, Sutton, Surrey, SM1 1DS


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Formula 5 has announced an extensive Winter Tour to kick off 2017. The tour will accompany the release of the band's third studio effort All Points North in April. Blanketing the Northeast throughout February, the band will return to the Midwest and Colorado in March, with debut performances in Kansas City and Chicago, wrapping up their tour back East at Rock n Roll Resort and a headlining show at Nectar's in Burlington, VT on April 1. Fellow Upstate New Yorkers Mister F will join the band for 8 shows throughout New York and New England.
Poised for a breakout year, Formula 5 has their eyes focused on building off the success of 2016, which found the band performing with the likes of Twiddle, TAUK, Assembly of Dust, Kung Fu, Particle and Ghost Note.
Formula 5 has also released a recording of their Nov. 18th performance at Buffalo Iron Works on their Soundcloud, highlighted by a 24 minute performance of the jam vehicle "Sad Bed." Additional soundboard releases of full shows can be found on the band's site.
Formula 5 is a four-piece improvisational rock band out of Albany, NY, featuring Joe Davis (guitar/vocals), Greg Marek (drums), James Woods (bass), and Matt Richards (keys/vocals). With a diverse catalog of distinctive originals and familiar covers, Formula 5 will keep your feet moving and your mind engaged. The band's influences include Steely Dan, Jeff Beck, Aquarium Rescue Unit, D'Angelo, Ween and Phish. Their high-energy blend of rock with tasteful grooves and an emphasis on collective, goal-driven improvisation provides for a unique show each performance.
Watch Formula 5 cover The Rolling Stones "Dead Flowers," and originals "It Goes…" and "Come Along" on Dec. 8th at Putnam Den in Saratoga Springs.
Formula 5 Winter Tour 2017:
Feb. 1 – Electric Haze – Worcester, MA
Feb. 2 – The Fete Lounge – Providence, RI*
Feb. 3 – Arch Street Tavern – Hartford, CT*
Feb. 4 – The Hollow Bar and Kitchen – Albany, NY^
Feb. 7 – Brooklyn Bowl – Brooklyn, NY&
Feb. 10 – B.R.Y.A.C. – Bridgeport, CT
Feb. 11 – Winner's Circle – Hanover, PA
Feb. 17 – Chameleon Lounge – Lancaster, PA
Feb. 18 – Hudson Music Hall -Hudson Falls, NY
Feb. 23 – 3 Heads Brewing – Rochester, NY*
Feb. 24 – Nietzsche's – Buffalo, NY*
Feb. 25 – Smoke Signals – Lake Placid, NY*
March 8 – Mike Kelly's West Sider – Kansas City, MO
March 10 – Be On Key Psychedelic Ripple – Denver, CO
March 11 – Old Town Pub – Steamboat Springs, CO
March 12 – Stage Stop – Nederland, CO
March 15 – Owsley's Golden Road – Boulder, CO
March 17 – The Eldo – Crested Butte, CO
March 19 – Tonic Room – Chicago, IL
March 22 – Woodlands Tavern – Columbus, OH
March 23 – Woodlands Tavern – Columbus, OH%
March 24 – King's Rook – Erie, PA
March 25 – Stratton Mountain Resort – Stratton, VT
March 31 – Rock n Roll Resort – Kerhonkson, NY
April 1 – Nectar's – Burlington, VT*
*with Mister F
^ with Ampevene
& with Mister F and Goose
% with Jaden Carlson Band