text: Tutorial: Painting (Fake Wood) Kitchen Cabinets November 1, 2010 DIY 52 Comments Let me preface this by saying that while I'd rank this about a 4 on a scale of 1-10 for difficulty, this project is not for the faint of heart. What it requires is a time investment (think 1 week, minimum) as well as a great deal of patience and attention to detail. However, if you are tired of your ho hum builder grade cabinets…this is the perfect way to customize them for an upscale look. You may remember that I had already repainted and tiled the backsplash, so this was the final step in the transformation! Here's what you'll need: Paint and primer (more on this to come) Nice brushes Sandpaper (both fine and medium grit) Degreaser or TSP Painter's Tape Like any good home improvement project, it starts with agonizing over choices. In our case, I knew I wanted to paint the cabinets white, but who knew there were about 100 million shades of white? After taking a few samples home, I decided on Benjamin Moore's White Dove (not to be confused with Dove White). Now normally I'd take my swatch down to Home Depot or Lowes and get a color match, but this is not a job for ordinary paint. Think about the banging, food slinging, moisture, and heat that your cabinets are subjected to. As a highly visible and frequently abused kitchen element, you definitely want these babies to come out smooth and durable. After much research and speaking with several paint experts, I decided to go with a new product by Benjamin Moore, "Advance" in a satin finish. I did come across stories of good results with BM's Satin Impervo (both oil and waterborne) as well as Aura. There are also several specialty paints made for cabinets, but they are not always easy to find. After a recommendation from their staff, I decided to give this oil/water hybrid product from BM a shot. I purchased some nice brushes, a gallon of their Fresh Start All Purpose Primer and was on my way. Once you gather all your supplies, the next step is to take down all your cabinet doors and drawer fronts and remove all hardware/hinges. If your kitchen has a complicated layout, you may want to label what came from where to make the re-install less of a headache. Otherwise, get out your cleaning and sanding supplies. You might be tempted to rush into painting, but let me warn you that your finished product depends entirely on this prep work. Clean your cabinet boxes and doors thoroughly and give them a good roughing up with some medium grit sandpaper/block. My cabinets had a glossy veneer which I didn't sand completely through-I just sanded enough to take the sheen off and give the surface some grip. Be sure to wipe away the dust with a tack cloth or damp lint free cloth. Once your cabs are clean and stripped (hehe), give them a coat of primer. For the best adhesion, let the primer cure for a full 24 hours. Patience is a virtue, my friends. The following day prime the back side of the cabinets. To save some time, I actually painted a first finish coat on my boxes the same day. Are you starting to see the pattern here? It's a whole lot of painting and a whole lot of waiting. Once the back side primer is dry, turn the doors over and give them a light sand with some fine grit sandpaper. If this is all getting a bit confusing, let me lay out the order like this. Day 1- Clean, sand, prime boxes and front of doors Day 2- Lightly sand boxes and put on a first finish coat, prime back of doors Day 3- Lightly sand front of doors and put on a first finish coat. Lightly sand first coat on boxes and paint a second (and final) finish coat. Day 4- Lightly sand back of doors and put on a first finish coat. Day 5- Lightly sand first coat on front of doors and put on a second coat. Day 8 or 9 or if you have a ton of time Day 10- Reattach hardware and re-hang doors! Before you get started, let me detail the painting technique I was shown at Benjamin Moore specifically for the Advance paint. It's designed to flow like oil, so you don't want to overwork it. Put a good amount on your brush and use long strokes to spread it as evenly as possible. Let it settle itself, try not to go back and brush it too much because it will start to set up in a few minutes. The good news is that you effectively have one practice coat to see how the paint feels and flows. By the second coat, you should be a pro! Despite all the work, the result is totally worth it. First, let's look at those boring they-fell-off-the-contractor's-truck boxes. After a brief stint as a disaster area… The kitchen came together beautifully (if I do say so myself). I also added some beadboard paneling in certain areas, which I'll show you how to do in another post this week. So, what's the verdict? You likey? Anyone else thinking about attempting this? *******Shared On The Following Blogs******** 52 Responses Tra J. November 1, 2010 Wow, looks awesome! You did a great job. Thanks for the tutorial. Reply Amy with Good Day! November 1, 2010 WOW! The kitchen looks AMAZING! You have mad DIY skills lay—nice work! Reply Jennifer@piecesofme November 1, 2010 Love love love this! I have the exact ugly cheap builder cabinets! So sad that they would even use these ugly things! Now I have found inspiration to paint mine! I would love them In white, would u come over paint mine? Lol I need to post a pic of my kitchen to get some advice on colors. Love yours!!!! Reply Rachael November 1, 2010 Thank you! I hope the tutorial helps others to tackle this (seemingly) overwhelming job! Reply katie November 1, 2010 Wow those look great!!! I would love to paint my cabinets but I'm not sure if I have the time or the patience. Reply Amanda November 2, 2010 VERY nice, they look wonderful. You are SO right about the prep work. I am in the middle of the same exact project! Today is the day I prime the back of the cabinet doors. The hardware was old brassy grossness with 50 years (literally) of gunk on them. After a good soaking and scrubbing I lightly primed then used Rustoleum's Hammered Black. They look awesome! Can't wait for it to all come together I have a backsplash I have to paint too, going to look and see if you have a post you did on that. Reply Rachael November 2, 2010 Wow tackling the hardware is an extra bonus, good for you! I bet it will look awesome! Thanks for stopping by! Reply Cindy November 2, 2010 Hi! Your kitchen looks marvelous, just beautiful! You did an amazing job on it, good for you and if you like it then it is perfect! Hugs, Cindy Reply Rachael November 2, 2010 Thank you Cindy! Reply brandi November 3, 2010 Your cabinets turned out great! I love the color you chose. I've been wanting to repaint my kitchen cabinets as wall and your tutorial makes me think I can do it myself! thanks for the inspiration. You did a beautiful job!!!!! Reply Rebecca November 3, 2010 Great tutorial-love the fresh look! Reply Janet November 3, 2010 You're cabinets look so nice! I just finished painting mine to. It's a lot of work! Reply Rachael November 5, 2010 Wow thank you so much Maryann!! I really appreciate the spotlight!!!!!! Reply June November 3, 2010 Absolutely amazing makeover Rachel!!! Love This! Reply Rachael November 7, 2010 Good for you for trying to tackle this yourself Jen! It's definitely worth the money savings to do it yourself. It probably cost me about $200 between paint, primer, brushes, and other supplies-but it would have been A LOT more for a pro to do it. Reply laurie@heavenswalk November 3, 2010 Rachael – I am SO jealous of your beautiful cabinets! I would give anything to paint my cabinets….but still working on talking hubby into it. You know guys and their wood……ugh! The transformation is just amazing and really brought your kitchen up to date and very inviting! Great work! Happy WW! xoxo laurie Reply Rachael November 7, 2010 How neat Lisa, we'll be cabinet twins! Can't wait to see your kitchen. I think you'll love the Advance. The guys at BM may suggest the Aura, but it dries very quickly so I heard even pros have a hard time not overbrushing it. The Advance gives you a bit more time before setting.Good luck! Reply cindy geilmann November 3, 2010 Wow, that is a great transformation. They should have been white all along. I'm not kidding, beautiful and beautiful back splash. I'd like to paint my cabnets white, but their a solad oak and I don't dare. come visit cindy-stitches-n-stuff.blogspot.com Reply Jan November 4, 2010 Your kitchen transformation is perfect. You did a marvelous job and made it all seem so effortless. I know you must be thrilled with the outcome. Thank you for sharing this transformation on the Boardwalk Bragfest, and I hope to see you again next Tuesday! Reply Rachael November 4, 2010 Thank you June! I'll pop over to your blog here in a minute! Reply Lisa RoombyRoom November 4, 2010 Nice job! Oh yes. I have done this before and it's on the schedule to do again. Reply sharon November 4, 2010 Bravo Rachel! I saw your project at the PoPP, and I had to tell you how spectacular your cabinets look. You're right about being patient – this is a time consuming project that requires lots of preparation before the paint can is ever opened. But WOW! What great results you achieved!……you must be thrilled. Now I'm going to enjoy the rest of your site… Reply Meg November 4, 2010 Great job! My sister wants to re-do her cabinets, so I forwarded this to her for a tutorial! Thanks so much! I'd love for you to link up to my link party going on now! alittleknickknack.blogspot.com Reply Maryann @ Domestically-Speaking November 5, 2010 GORGEOUS! I LOVE a cream'ified kitchen!!! You guys did an amazing job. I'm putting your kitchen in the SPOTLIGHT at the PoPP this weekend. Reply Jen November 6, 2010 Absolutely gorgeous! I was just telling my husband that we really need to repaint the kitchen cabinets. Since we had it done for us last time, I had no idea where to start. Thanks to this, now I do! Thanks so much! Reply Lisa November 6, 2010 What a beautiful job! Thank you so much for detailing your steps. We are about to paint our cabinets with the same color – White Dove. We've already painted all the natural trim in our house this color, along with several built-ins. The kitchen is the last big project. I haven't tried this Ben Moore product and can't wait to give it a go. I absolutely despise oil-based paint but with kitchen cabinetry it's important to be durable. I'm excited to start this project now that I've seen your transformation! Great job – thank you for sharing it! Reply Missy November 6, 2010 Thank you for your post! It looks amazing! Our kitchen has a very similar layout, except I have a small island rather than the bar. My cabinets are off the contractor's truck I believe, but in Walnut. Along with the fake brick I have on my large wall, its very 70′s-ish. Your project is quite inspiring! Maybe next spring I will tackle this beast! I'm bookmarking you so I can come back to this info! Thanks again! Reply Teri November 7, 2010 Looks gorgeous! Reply Eileen November 8, 2010 It looks fabulous. I once did this to the hardest of cabinets. They were some kind of formica or something and it took a lot of de-glosser and then primer and paint. But they went from ugly make- believe wood to gorgeous white and it opened up the whole area. Your kitchen looks awesome. The white makes the backsplash stand out more! Reply Kari December 16, 2010 Hi, I just wanted to know how you feel about the paint you used on your cabinets now that you've had them for a little bit now. I used regular satin paint, and my nail polish makes marks all the time. Thanks! Reply Lovely Crafty Home December 16, 2010 Kari- it has been really durable, it's a really hard finish and I can wipe them down without worrying about chipping the paint. I think the only way to get a really durable finish is to use a paint that has a bit of oil in it. The hybrid was easy to use and easy to clean up (pretty low odor also). BM makes a completely water based paint called Aura which some people have used for cabinets, but I saw some mixed reviews. Overall I'm really pleased with how the Advance turned out- little to no brush marks! I'd definitely recommend it. Reply Sarah @ The Ugly Duckling House February 15, 2011 This looks fab! Thanks for stopping by The Ugly Duckling House today. This is a great tutorial, one I will reference when I tackle the kitchen cabinets this summer. Question for you: Are you happy with the white you chose? I'm stumped with all the white options out there and am considering a possible pale gray instead. Not sure though. Hope to see you stop by again soon! Reply Lovely Crafty Home February 15, 2011 Thanks Sarah! Yes I LOVE the white, and I probably spent 2 weeks comparing different shades. I looked up the most popular (BM Linen White, Decorator's White…) and they really looked different in my space. I'm glad I opted to get samples rather than just picking a color that was really popular. I did consider other colors for a two toned look like a slate gray or a gray-green color on the bottoms and white on the top, but I decided that I change my mind too much to put a color other than white on them. Good luck with whatever you choose! Reply Olivia @ Swan White Curtain March 6, 2011 First, you did a fantastic job! Second, THANK YOU so much for putting that little daily task list up. I have dreaming of a kitchen makeover and that's how I've been planning it out, day by day. Brilliant! Reply Jenny March 21, 2011 I just came across this great tutorial. I am actually using the Advance line now to repaint my doors. I love the hard finish and its sheen (satin). I am curious as to what kind of brush you used? Also, did anyone there try to sell you on using cabinet coat? (That is what my paint guy suggested for kitchen cabinets. But, then on another day suggested Advance for my doors/trim). Reply Lovely Crafty Home March 21, 2011 I used BM brushes also, a 2″ one for most of it. The first time I went in, one guy suggested Aura-but I was just getting color samples. Then the next time I was there, someone else suggested the Advance and made a good case. I'm glad I went with it. I haven't heard of the Cabinet Coat…is that a BM product? Reply Jenny March 21, 2011 I don't know a whole lot about it, yet. I was at an independent paint store that carries BM. Here's I quote about someone else using it: "Apparently Benjamin Moore manufactures it but it is available under the brand name insl-x in other paint stores as well…It is a water base enamel paint…Contains ethlene Glycol. Can recoat is 6 hours….I would dry them flat because they say it levels out like Aura …. Too much applied on vertical surfaces will run….It is a much harder finish than Aura…It feels just like oil." I did see a sample of it that was done 6 years ago and it was a very nice, smooth finish. And non-yellowing. I need to get more paint so I'll ask him the difference next time. Kristy August 26, 2011 I love the way they turned out. I have been considering a whole house painting of the fake "oak" woodwork in my house. The problem I am having is wondering how it would look if I leave the fake "oak" doors looking like oak and having all white woodwork. What are your room doors and woodwork like? Are they white? Are they oak? I love the look of white woodwork especially the way it looks against painted walls. I know I could paint the doors too but just the thought of painting all the woodwork is daunting enough! Reply Lovely Crafty Home August 26, 2011 We have mostly cheapo white interior doors, but I gel stained our front door to look like a dark wood door and it looks great against the white trim. In general, I think white trim goes with most anything and I wouldn't worry about the doors! Reply Beaded Board = Instant Charm October 14, 2011 [...] November 8, 2010 2 Comments Auto Adsense WPNow that we've learned to tile a backsplash and paint cabinets, I'd like to share with you one more trick to help you customize your kitchen: [...] Reply Brenda November 4, 2011 Thanks so much for this tutorial, I was wondering if its possible to Lacquer your cabinets? if so do you have an idea on how to do this? My cabinets don't have knobs build on them, any tips on how to put knobs on the cabinets? Reply rachaelevans November 5, 2011 Brenda- You can lacquer cabinets, but I have never done it. I just prefer the look of a more satin finish. But, if you use a high quality high gloss paint, you should be able to get the same effect with having to lacquer (and it will be less work). You can buy cabinet knobs at most hardware stores and they come with screws, all you have to do is drill a hole where you want to put the knobs. It's super easy and makes a huge difference in how the kitchen looks! Reply Guest Post - Make Drop Cloth Elf Stockings!! November 15, 2012 [...] {Table Redo} I also loved her Cabinet Transformation – so beautiful! {Cabinet Painting Tutorial} Rachael also sews like you have seen and cooks. {Pickling Tutorial} You will adore [...] Reply Marie January 1, 2013 HAPPY JANUARY 1st,. 2013!!! It's been just my dog and I up all night trying to make something out of nothing in this horrible handiman special. Your website ended a horrible 2012 and brought in 2013 in much better light. THANK YOU Reply marsha April 16, 2013 Hello, I was wondering if you could tell me how your cabinets are holding up after painting them? I am getting ready to paint mine and researching colors, brands, etc. Also you said your cabinets are "fake wood" – what do you mean by that? Mine are fake wood as well – the doors aren't but I live in a manufactured home and the boxes are paper covered junk. Thanks so much! Reply Rachael November 1, 2010 Amy- You totally have skills too, thanks for your help! Reply Rachael November 1, 2010 Jennifer- UGH I know! They are totally devoid of any character, right?! My next step is to add crown to the top and some trim around the bottom as well (on the uppers). You could totally paint yours, I'd be happy to swing by, assuming you live within 20 minutes of me Reply Rachael November 4, 2010 Thank you so much Jan! I am so happy with the results and happy to share the how-to! Reply Rachael November 4, 2010 Thank you for stopping by Cindy! If you have solid wood, it's easier AND you can go back Not that I'm pressuring you or anything hehe. Great blog! Reply Rachael November 4, 2010 Laurie-If you have real wood, I say go for it My husband pretty much lets me have free reign upstairs (he has a man cave…), but if you think you'll encounter resistance, show him some of your inspiration photos. The nice thing about real wood is that it can always be returned to its original glory Thanks for stopping by! Reply Rachael November 4, 2010 Lisa, I can't believe you're doing it again!! I can't even stand the thought! Reply Rachael November 7, 2010 Thank you for stopping by Missy, good luck with your 70s makeover :)!! Reply Leave a Reply to Rachael Cancel Reply Your email address will not be published. Name* Email* Website Comment


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BILLINGS – A Texas company has bought oil and gas leases on almost 75,000 acres in northeast Montana's McCone County in a move that could portend a significant westward expansion of the Bakken oil patch, government officials and a company representative said Wednesday.
San Antonio-based Donco Inc. paid more than $13.5 million for the leases in a competitive auction held Tuesday by the federal Bureau of Land Management. It marks one of the largest federal lease acquisitions by a single company in Montana in recent years, BLM spokesman Kristen Lenhardt said.
Donco is the parent company of Shale Exploration LLC.
Shale Exploration President Sam Tallis said Wednesday that the company aims to amass leases on roughly 200,000 acres in McCone and neighboring Garfield counties. He said drilling could begin next year.
The Bakken region of western North Dakota and eastern Montana has emerged in recent years as one of the most productive oil patches in the U.S. The area being targeted by Shale Exploration has seen only limited drilling to date, said Tom Richmond with the Montana Board of Oil and Gas.
"It's new interest in the area," Richmond said.
Tallis said his company is confident the McCone-Garfield area has other oil-bearing geological formations in addition to the Bakken, located at different depths beneath the surface.
"This is a step away from where most people believe the conventional Bakken is," Tallis said. "A lot of people call it the end of the road because it's the last possible place for the Bakken, to go that far. But we tend to like it because there are other formations."
The leases bought by Donco accounted for 153 out of 244 oil and gas parcels sold at Tuesday's BLM auction, Lenhardt said. Total proceeds from the sale topped $16 million. That included 7 parcels sold in South Dakota, with the remainder in Montana.
Shale Exploration previously has been active in other parts of Montana, including Daniels County, where it partnered with the much-larger Apache Corp. to drill on leases it amassed there.
Richmond said it's too early to say if the intensive drilling activity seen in Montana counties closer to the North Dakota border is repeated in McCone County.
For now, he said, it remains a "lease play," meaning companies such as Shale Exploration are scrambling to snap up leases on public and private land in anticipation of future development.
"Lots of time leasing plays get a life of their own," he said. "The leasing starts first, and at some point in time the assumption is that somebody's going to drill a well someplace, and prove or disprove the play."
Tallis, who works out of Billings, referred to Montana as "the best kept secret in oil and gas" and said he and majority owner Sid Greehey are in it for the long haul.
In April, Shale Exploration donated $130,000 to the Scobey Public Schools in Daniels County to purchase iPads — tablet computers made by Apple Inc. — for all the district's students. A month later, the company donated $20,000 to the Montana Rescue Mission Women's and Family Shelter in Billings.
Tallis said he hopes to establish a similar close relationship with residents of Garfield and McCone counties.
"Whether it's iPads or something else, we want to partner with the community," he said.
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subset: commoncrawl


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The Pennsylvania Judiciary has provided detailed updates regarding county-by-county court operations and proceedings.General information is also provided on our FAQ page.
We continue to monitor developments regarding the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) and its impact on court operations.
By order of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, the general statewide judicial emergency declared and maintained in previous Court Orders of March 16, March 18, March 24, April 1 and April 28 ceased as of June 1, 2020. Any previous Orders in this line shall expire according to their own terms.
We communicate regularly with the Governor's Office and the state Department of Health for guidance on measures to continue protecting the health and safety of court users and court employees.
Contact your local county court for more information or visit their website.You can also learn more about mitigating the spread of the virus at Health.pa.gov.
In recognition of National Women's History Month, the Pennsylvania Courts today released an infographic looking at the history of women in the Pennsylvania judiciary, as well as those women currently serving.
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Times Credits Adbusters Mag With Launching OWS, Ignores Anti-Jewish Articles
New York Times reporter J. David Goodman interviewed an Occupy Wall Street attendee with a shameful past for the Tuesday metro section - 'A Regular at the Protests With an Unspoken Past: Wall St. Made Him Rich.'
Robert Halper is a retired Wall Street trader and the top single donor to the Canadian 'anticorporate' magazine Adbusters, credited with launching the leftist sit-in. But Goodman didn't mention the magazine's incendiary anti-Israel past, like the paper's notorious 2004 attack on neo-conservatives, 'Why Won't Anyone Say They Are Jewish?'
Mr. Halper said he first heard about the plan for protests in June when he visited Kalle Lasn, the editor in chief of Adbusters, a Canadian anticorporate magazine, in Vancouver. Over a steak dinner, the two longtime friends discussed Mr. Lasn's project, a plan to fill Wall Street with protesters as a way to galvanize anger on the political left into a revolutionary movement resembling the Arab Spring.
'I rolled my eyes,' he said. 'I was more interested in talking about health care.'
But Mr. Halper, who lives on the Upper West Side, had long been a supporter of the magazine, donating by his estimate $50,000 to $75,000 over the last 20 years since he was first attracted by the magazine's spoofs on corporate logos and advertisements. So he wrote a check for $20,000 and returned to his life in New York.
A month later, the magazine sent an e-mail blitz to 90,000 readers and advocates calling for the occupation of Wall Street and setting the date for the first protesters to camp in downtown Manhattan.
There's a stark double standard here. Last year the Times sent a reporter to Idaho to produce a 4,500 word front-page hit piece on the Tea Party, inaccurately linking it to unsavory anti-government radicals like Randy Weaver, even though most trace the origins of the Tea Party revolt to Seattle blogger Keli Carender and CNBC analyst Rick Santelli.Yet the paper is not at all curious about the unsavory anti-Jewish background of the magazine that instigated the leftist OWS sit-in. The Weekly Standard summed up Adbusters' offensiveness in its October 24 issue (subscription required):
...Anti-Semitic signs were obvious at Occupy Wall Street protests, especially when compared with the thin gruel reporters cited in accusing the Tea Party movement of racism.
Now we don't think Occupy Wall Street is necessarily defined by anti-Semitism. There are enough protesters to encompass a large and diverse assortment of unpleasant ideologies. But the fact that the protests were in large part inspired by the left-wing Canadian magazine Adbusters ought to give people pause.
The magazine's editor, Kalle Lasn, has repeatedly been criticized for publishing such quality articles as the 2004 cri de coeur 'Why Won't Anyone Say They Are Jewish?'– which consisted of a list of prominent Jewish intellectuals accompanied by some barely coherent commentary about how Jews were responsible for the war in Iraq, or something. Adbusters later ran afoul of the Holocaust Museum by repurposing the museum's images of the Warsaw Ghetto as part of an inarticulate gripe about Gaza. David Duke himself has felt moved to defend the magazine publicly. Can you imagine if the Tea Party were largely the creation of such an unsavory character?


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A prison break, heist, political thriller, and superhero drama all rolled into one, "The Hunt" is the kind of episode that makes Young Justice's cancellation all the more heartbreaking. The writers of this series have thrown so many balls in the air this season, and as the show races to its finale, it's beginning to look like everything is going to be juggled smoothly. Like I hoped for at the end of last week's recap, this week's episode follows Nightwing and M'Gann as they work to free their captive teammates. While they don't team up with Lex Luthor's metateens, the superpowered runaways play a large part in the episode, partnering up with an incredibly badass Arsenal. Luthor also wants the young heroes freed, but as is usually the case, he has a sinister ulterior motive.
I firmly believe that Young Justice: Invasion will go down as one of the strongest seasons ever of a superhero cartoon, largely due to it's roller coaster pacing. A considerable amount happens off-screen, giving each new episode a boost of momentum as characters are pushed into new positions before the story begins. We don't see Nightwing tell M'Gann about Jaime's betrayal or Lex Luthor training his new teen heroes because there just isn't time for that, and having those moments off-screen keeps the story moving at a brisk pace. The writers have crafted an epic narrative for these characters, but as the plot expands, it remains focused on real human emotions. That's not an easy thing to do, and the balance of character and story is this series' best attribute. While the size of this show's cast has expanded considerably, key emotional moments still tend to be centralized on the season 1 cast; the rest of the heroes are basically fan-pleasing set dressing, except for Blue Beetle.
The Reach had a good thing going until Mongul showed up with his giant war planet, and after revealing the fleet of ships it had hidden under the sea, the alien menace is forced to account for their deception on G. Gordon Godfrey's television show. It's nice to see that this show's resident pundit doesn't discriminate when it comes to maliciously attacking anyone who lies to him and the rest of the planet. Godfrey has been a welcome addition to this show, giving radical voice to the public's opinions on superheroes, aliens, and every other fantastic thing that shows up on Earth. Godfrey represents the human element, which is ironic considering he's one of Jack Kirby's New Gods in the comics. With only three episodes left, I doubt we'll be seeing Darkseid and Orion enter the fray, but it would have made sense for this show's third season to move in that direction.
There's a time for guilt and there's a time for action, and Nightwing and M'Gann have the two confused right now. M'Gann blames herself for not scanning Green Beetle's mind thoroughly and allowing the Scarab to feed her false information, but Nightwing argues that if he hadn't kept Kaldur's undercover mission a secret from M'Gann, she wouldn't have been afraid to use her powers. They're both right, but there are more pressing issues at hand. M'Gann has been one of the lead characters of this season, dealing with the increasing ferocity of her powers and the subsequent guilt that comes from going to far, so it's fitting that she would be the one to realize that this shame spiral is crippling them both. They've both made mistakes, but it's time to get over themselves and start thinking about the team.
The storyline of Lex Luthor and his teen heroes has moved so quickly that it's almost rushed, but by the end of the episode, the pacing makes sense. After a night of smoothly coordinated destruction of Reach billboards and supply trucks, the four are given a Father Box by Luthor and asked to rescue the captured heroes of Young Justice, a mission that Virgil sees as repaying the team for initially saving them from the Reach. Everyone agrees and they teleport right into the center of the action, fighting off the Reach's guards while Arsenal watches in the distance. Arsenal and his awesome bionic arm steal the show this episode, sneaking through War World, taking down Reach soldiers, and ultimately teaming up with the metateens to accomplish his mission.
With the Justice League guarding the control room where the Reach can use their newly acquired Crystal Key, the aliens send their big muscle Black Beetle to clear the way. He never makes it to the Justice League, instead running into Luthor's group, who he quickly takes down before Arsenal shows up to even the playing field. After rescuing Eduardo by shooting Black Beetle's jet pack, Arsenal tells the team that their best hope is to confuse their opponent until they have a better option. Arsenal makes a risky choice when he releases Mongul from his containment pod, but it's a smart decision that gives them enough time to free the rest of the team while Mongul and Black Beetle duke it out.
With War World in chaos, Lex Luthor takes the opportunity to retrieve the Crystal Key while Reach forces are fighting the heroes, sending in Deathstroke to take care of any remaining guards. This episode is packed, but an appearance from Deathstroke is always welcome. After rescuing the team, Arsenal runs off to retrieve the key, but he's already too late. Things only get worse for Arsenal when Karen confronts him about opening the airlock to save himself from Blue Beetle at the expense of his teammate's lives. After saying thank you for saving his friends, Nightwing kicks Arsenal off the team, but Luthor's group quickly snaps him up.
When they boom tube back to their base and Arsenal sees that Luthor is behind their actions, he tells his new partners about how their boss was responsible for putting him on ice for eight years and that he played them to get the Crystal Key. Lex doesn't have a suitable response and Asami blows up their laptop and Father Box, cutting off ties from their old employer. The reason this storyline has moved so fast is because these characters are always on the run. They ran away from home, they ran away from the Reach, they ran away from S.T.A.R. Labs, and now they're running from the Light. With the team saved and the Reach exposed, the board has been set for this show's grand finale, and it's going to be a bittersweet goodbye if the last three episodes are as good as "The Hunt."
Stray observations:
- This week's DC Nation: It's an animal-based double-header with an "Animal Man" rerun and the return of the hilarious DC Nation Farm League. It's an all-Batmongoose adventure featuring the Croaker, Moo-Face, and the brilliant Cat Cat, with lots of silly narration and jabs at the Dark Knight's attitude. Quotes: "Alright, I'm a little afraid of hawks." "I am Bat Mongoose! Cue lightning!" "I looked it up! Wombats eat roots!"
- The Young Justice comic ended this week with a sweet story about the start of Dick Grayson and Barbara Gordon's relationship. I wish there was more time for this show to explore that.
- Poor Reach Ambassador doesn't get a name.
- Seeing Eduardo teleport around makes me want to see an X-Men series done by this creative team using the line-up from Giant Size X-Men.
- "Now you're just being petty."
- "Hello!"
- "Now you gone done woke up the big man!"
- "So this is our guilt-off?"
- "That's just what we do."
- "Deathstroke's more of a bishop, really."


text: Finn's Irish Pub's 10th Birthday Party 22. Jan 2013 Park Town Hotel Finn's Irish Pub Finn's Irish Pub, located in the Park Town Hotel, will be celebrating its 10th birthday on March 9th, 2013. Finn's Irish Pub started in March 2003 as the Clurichaun (meaning Irish Fairy), but no one could spell the name so we changed it to Finn's Irish Pub. This March 9th we are going to throw ourselves a birthday to celebrate all things Finn's and all things Irish. We will have a special menu all day including drink specials, cup cakes, special shooters, a live band and some really awesome door prizes! We will also have tons of Finn's Swag to give out at the door. There is no cover, but you've got to be 19 and over! Hope to see you all there! Check out our Facebook page for more details. This party is going to rock and we can't wait to celebrate our birthday with you!


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Clawing Back of Excess Rent Paid After Unlawful Increases Charged by LandlordPage last modified: May 21 2021
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If My Landlord Unlawfully Increased My Rent And I Paid the Increase Can I Get The Extra Amount Back?
When a Landlord Collects Money Unlawfully, Such as Accepting Sums That Are An Unlawful Rent Increase, The Tenant Has One Year to Claw Back the Unlawful Portion.
Understanding What Can Be Done When Rent Is Overpaid to a Landlord
Uninformed landlords and tenants may from time to time enter into agreements, such as a lease, containing unlawful terms such agreements regarding a rent increase. This may happen at the outset of a lease, such as a multiple year lease containing clauses that automatically increase the rent annually and do so in an amount beyond the lawful guideline amount. When this happens, the tenant may at some point in time become aware of the unlawful monies paid to the landlord and seek to recoup, meaning claw back, any unlawful sums paid. When this happens, or other unlawful monies were paid to the landlord, the tenant may claw back the unlawful portion paid for up to one year prior to filing an Application with the Landlord Tenant Board.
Actual Case Review
Factual Summary
In the case of MM (Tenant) v. AP and MP (Landlord), CET-72689-18 (Re), 2018 CanLII 42806, the Tenant moved into the rental unit in 2004. In 2004, the agreement for rent was $550 per month. Subsequently, with some change in hands of ownership (an issue disregarded or unapplicable and ignored here), on the first of January each year, starting in 2015, a $25 per month rent increase was charged. Accordingly, from 2004 through the end of 2014, the $550 per month rent was charged. In 2015, rent of $575 per month was charged. In 2016, rent of $600 per month was charged. In 2017, rent of $625 per month was charged. In 2018, the Tenant paid only $625 per month and sought relief from the Landlord Tenant Board for excess previous rent paid.
Applied Law Findings
The Landlord Tenant Board, by application of the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, S.O. 2006, Chapter 17, deemed that the rent increases were unlawful charges by stating:
9. The rent increases imposed by the Landlords in 2015, 2016 and 2017 are void because they were not made in accordance with of ss. 116 (1) and (4) of the RTA which state:
116(1) A landlord shall not increase the rent charged to a tenant for a rental unit without first giving the tenant at least 90 days written notice of the landlord's intention to do so.
(4) An increase in rent is void if the landlord has not given the notice required by this section, and the landlord must give a new notice before the landlord can take the increase.
The Landlord Tenant Board then went on to say that while the landlord failed to provide proper notice of a rent increase, contrary to section 116 of the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, that despite the failing, any increase in rent was saved by section 136 of the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006 which imposes a one year period within which a matter may be brought for the purpose of deeming the unlawfulness of a rent increase:
10. Section 136(1) of the RTA provides that in certain circumstances an illegal rent increase may be deemed lawful. These provisions read as follows:
Rent deemed lawful
136(1) Rent charged one or more years earlier shall be deemed to be lawful rent unless an application has been made within one year after the date that amount was first charged and the lawfulness of the rent charged is in issue in the application.
Increase deemed lawful
(2) An increase in rent shall be deemed to be lawful unless an application has been made within one year after the date the increase was first charged and the lawfulness of the rent increase is in issue in the application.
However, and appearing almost contrary to interpretation of the section 136 statutory provisions within the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, the Landlord Tenant Board went even further and added that despite the original unlawfulness per section 116, which was then saved by the section 136, a nullity is incapable of being saved as where a nullity is nothing, there is nothing therefore to save:
11. However, in Price v. Turnbull's Grove Inc. the Ontario Court of Appeal concluded that a rent increase imposed by a landlord without any written notice cannot be saved by what are now subsections 136(1) and (2) of the RTA because a void rent increase is a nullity which leaves nothing to be saved.
12. Thus, the lawful rent remains at $550 per month because this was the rent charged at the beginning of the tenancy. All of the subsequent rent increases imposed by the Landlord were illegal because they were not made in accordance with of sections 116 (1) and (4) of the RTA, and they cannot be saved by the deeming provisions in section 136 of the RTA.
There then remained the actual ultimate issue in the matter as to whether the excess monies collected, as were deemed unlawful per section 116 of the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, then saved from unlawfulness per section 136 of the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006 due to the passing of more than one year, then deemed without saving whereas a nullity is without saving per Price, should be returned to the tenant. In reviewing this ultimate question at issue, the result was that despite the excess rent being paid, and therefore collected by the landlord illegally, section 135 of the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006 stands as a one-year bar to seeking return of excess monies previously paid despite any illegality of those monies; and accordingly, the tenant was awarded the remedy of return of excess monies as were paid only in the one year preceeding the Application to the Landlord Tenant Board:
13. However, this does not mean that the Board can order the Landlord to return all of the rent that the Tenant paid that is in excess of the lawful monthly rent of $550. Subsection 135(1) and (4) states that a tenant's claim for a rebate for an unlawful rent increase must be made not more than one year after the landlord collected or retained money in contravention of the RTA. Those subsections read:
Money collected illegally
135(1) A tenant or former tenant of a rental unit may apply to the Board for an order that the landlord, superintendent or agent of the landlord pay to the tenant any money the person collected or retained in contravention of this Act or the Tenant Protection Act, 1997.
Time limitation
(4) No order shall be made under this section with respect to an application filed more than one year after the person collected or retained money in contravention of this Act or the Tenant Protection Act, 1997.
14. The Tenant's application for a rebate challenging the lawfulness of each void rent increase since January 1, 2015, was made on January 10, 2018. In accordance with section 135 of the RTA, the Tenant can seek any illegal rent that was collected by the Landlord on or after January 10, 2017.
Closing Summary
This case shows just how many twists and turns can apply within the law and appear to produce a giveth and then taketh away result. The almost confusing back and forth application of various sections of the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006 as well as the Price decision provide excellent examples as to why deep research and understanding of the relevant law is necessary - and why well qualified legal representation in such matters is always a wise choice.


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Watch: Julianna Barwick Performs 'Crystal Lake' At Judson Church In New York
Sometimes music and setting combine for something more than the sum of its parts. Julanna Barwick found the perfect complement for her ethereal music in the Judson Memorial Church in New York City. Barwick's method of recording, sampling and layering her own voice was influenced by her upbringing in church choirs, so this Greenwich Village landmark was a natural fit.
This song is "Crystal Lake," and features guests Sharon Van Etten and Taraka and Nimai Larson of Prince Rama. The original version can be found on her latest album, Nepenthe, which came out this summer on . Barwick wraps up a national tour with Sigur Rós next week.
Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.


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Cloud access security brokers deliver must-have protection for your SaaS apps
Cloud Access Security Brokers are products that can be described as firewall plus identity management plus anti-malware plus DLP plus encryption control/implementation plus threat management.
CASB products have becoming increasingly important as enterprises look to extend their on-premises security policies to their cloud-based assets. We looked at three products -- CipherCloud, Bitglass, and Netskope. Each one takes a different, yet ingenious, approach to the task of stopping unauthorized, inappropriate, or uncontrolled cloud asset access and manipulation.
+ MORE ON CASB: What is a cloud access security broker (CASB) and why do I need one? +
Security brokers require varying degrees of work, we found in our review, but they pay off in important ways. While it's impossible for us to test all use cases and to scale as high as vendor claims, we were able to get a good feel for both the features of these products and for potential scalability.
- If you're part of a huge organization, a multinational, with many users in difficult locales, we'd choose CipherCloud for its sheer depth and the power of its encryption techniques.
- Bitglass also has interesting features and a lot of control to back up specific popular SaaS apps. Also, Bitglass can watermark files in such a way as to trace exfiltration forensically.
- Netskope scored the highest in our review, just edging out CipherCloud and Bitglass. It has a complex setup, but widely and deeply covers sanctioned brand-name SaaS sources, using gradients of multi-faceted, bolt-things-down methodology.
Another thing to keep in mind: CASB is a critical security resource, so it requires administration, monitoring, and help desk personnel, along with astute installation. Adopting one is important, but non-trivial.
Here are the individual reviews:
Net results
|Netskope GoScope Platform
|CipherCloud Trust Platform
|Starts at $8 per user per month for Discovery, $15 per month for the Active Platform. Options such as DLP, Encryption, and Malware Protection are priced separately.
|Starts at $2/month to $30/user month + maintenance costs/help desk costs + those that use a gateway with on-premises can be $30-150K depending on complexity.
|Breach Discovery + Log analysis, $2/user/mo. Add Mobile-only protection, $5/user/mo. Standard edition (mobile+web+DLP) $10/user/month, Enterprise (includes encryption and specific app control) $30/user/month).
|Detailed platform with very good analytics and administrative tracking; flexible and deep cloud app intelligence, high potential programmability
|Extreme encryption flexibility and with it, DLP control for large organizations needing international regulatory compliance
|Detailed and broad canned application control, graduated services
|Docs could use work; a la carte pricing and configuration potentially inconvenient
|Requires platform dedicated work costs; potential additive cloud app coverage costs
|Comparatively less programmability, cloud-based forward proxy only.
CipherCloud Trust Platform
CipherCloud provides a hypervised gateway appliance priced per user. Inside the appliance are three functional components, administrative, security, and connectors specific to managed CASB resources. Pricing, like the other products in this review, is based in gradients of services provided.
CipherCloud is a construction set with many pre-fab pieces, and it requires significant planning to deploy in order to gain full effectiveness. It's in use by some of the largest financial institutions in the world.
+ ALSO ON NETWORK WORLD 5 cloud security companies to watch +
The strong upside is its ability to establish strong flexible encryption to the record/field level, and with it, strong DLP controls for its list of covered applications. A hidden cost is integration and adaptation of specific cloud app platforms, like Salesforce. With some work, it can be come annealed to a target application like no other, because of its data protection schemes.
We installed the gateway as an Amazon Web Services VM. Multiple instances of the gateway appliance VM can be used in redundant instances as a reverse proxy gateway between users and cloud resources. Once set, and platforms are encrypted, so it renders AES-256 gibberish of any access that doesn't use the gateway and its decryption resources. Once accessed through the controls set in CipherCloud's trust platform, it's possible to set encryption that allows searches and field-level data loss prevention (DLP) flagging and control.
We like CipherCloud for its certificate key control, staggering varieties of stateful/stateless encryption, tokenization possibilities and breadth of popular SaaS app coverage. (CipherCloud doesn't cover every app found in the cloud.)
We also like it for its strong flexibility for varying deployment designs for larger organizations. BitDefender services are available as an additional intermediary for streams flowing through, although streaming data examination isn't totally perfect.
Architecturally, the VM is a reverse proxy gateway appliance that's licensed by user count, so multiple instances can be generated and deployed without additional cost. The gateway, which requires healthy server-allocation resources, serves as a deep-inspector, even with many pre-set encrypted data flows filtering through it, using AES-256 encryption.


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No. 43; Updated March 2017
Children do not always do what parents want. When a child misbehaves, the parent must decide how to respond. All children need rules and expectations to help them learn appropriate behavior. How does a parent teach a child the rules and, when those rules are broken, what should parents do?
Parents should begin by talking to each other about how they want to handle discipline and establish the rules. It is important to view discipline as teaching not punishment. Learning to follow rules keeps a child safe and helps him or her learn the difference between right and wrong.
Once rules have been established, parents should explain to the child that broken rules carry consequences. For example, Here are the rules. When you follow the rules, this will happen and if you break a rule, this is what will happen. Parents and the child should decide together what the rewards and consequences will be. Parents should always acknowledge and offer positive reinforcement and support when their child follows the rules. Parents must also follow through with an appropriate consequence when the child breaks a rule. Consistency and predictability are the cornerstones of discipline and praise is the most powerful reinforcer of learning.
Children learn from experience. Having logical consequences for misbehavior helps them learn that they are accountable for their actions, without damaging their self-esteem. For example, if children are fighting over the television, computer or a video game, turn it off. If a child spills milk at the dinner table while fooling around, have the child clean it up. Some behaviors have natural consequences. For example, a teenager who stays up too late may suffer the natural consequences of being tired the next day. Another type of consequence that can be effective is the suspension or delay of a privilege. For example, if a child breaks the rule about where they can go on their bike, take away the bike for a few days. When a child does not do chores, he or she cannot do something special like spend the night with a friend or rent a movie.
There are different styles and approaches to parenting. Research shows that effective parents raise well-adjusted children who are more self-reliant, self-controlled, and positively curious than children raised by parents who are punitive, overly strict (authoritarian), or permissive. Effective parents operate on the belief that both the child and the parent have certain rights and that the needs of both are important. Effective parents don't need to use physical force to discipline the child, but are more likely to set clear rules and explain why these rules are important. Effective parents reason with their children and consider the youngsters' points of views even though they may not agree with them.
The following are tips for effective discipline:
Parenting classes and coaching can be helpful in learning to be an effective parent. If parents have serious concerns about continuing problems with their child's behavior, consultation with a child and adolescent psychiatrist or other qualified mental health professional may be helpful.
If you find Facts for Families© helpful and would like to make good mental health a reality, consider donating to the Campaign for America's Kids. Your support will help us continue to produce and distribute Facts for Families, as well as other vital mental health information, free of charge.
You may also mail in your contribution. Please make checks payable to the AACAP and send to Campaign for America's Kids, P.O. Box 96106, Washington, DC 20090.
The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP) represents over 10,000 child and adolescent psychiatrists who are physicians with at least five years of additional training beyond medical school in general (adult) and child and adolescent psychiatry.
Facts for Families© information sheets are developed, owned and distributed by AACAP. Hard copies of Facts sheets may be reproduced for personal or educational use without written permission, but cannot be included in material presented for sale or profit. All Facts can be viewed and printed from the AACAP website (www.aacap.org). Facts sheets may not be reproduced, duplicated or posted on any other website without written consent from AACAP. Organizations are permitted to create links to AACAP's website and specific Facts sheets. For all questions please contact the AACAP Communications Manager, ext. 154.
If you need immediate assistance, please dial 911.
Copyright © 2023 by the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.


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OCZ halts value Memory module line
It has been quiet surrounding OCZ memory for the past year alright and initial hints now confirm that OCZ will be retreating from the value memory module market. Read carefully, value. See, OCZ's biggest market are now SSD drives, it took them over by surprize as 50% of their sales now is in some way SSD related.
XBitlabs reports that OCZ Technology Group, of the leading suppliers of premium memory modules, said Wednesday that it would drop its memory business partly so that to concentrate on SSD products that now target various market segments, including high-margin enterprise-oriented solutions. The company, however, will continue to sell advanced memory modules for enthusiasts.
"The Value DRAM segments basically were not providing any profit to the company. Given our SSD growth trajectory - SSDs are more than 50% of our business on a go forward basis - and that fact that we dominate all segments of the SSD market in terms of performance, it just did not make sense to keep selling Value memory at 3% margins," said Ryan Petersen, chief executive officer of OCZ Technology.
OCZ has four major dynamic random access memory (DRAM) product lines: Enthusiasts, Gamers, Special Edition and Value. The latter product line accounted for over two thirds of OCZ's sales in 2009. As a result, with 50% of revenue already commanded by SSDs, it makes more sense for the manufacturer to assign more resources onto further development of solid-state drives as well as advanced memory modules.
"We have not specified exactly which exact lines are going away, but the emphasis will be on not just maintaining, but growing the high-end memory offering. This is the area we are traditionally strong in and customers can expect to see new premium memory products launching as we scale back our lower end lines. The distinct lines of what will be cut is an ongoing process as we optimize the product offering moving forward," said Alex Mei, chief marketing officer of OCZ.
via xbitlabs


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(CNN) - The tweets are a-flyin' in the last great frontier. Again.
Alaska GOP Senate nominee Joe Miller's campaign has deleted at least four tweets published on its official Twitter account Wednesday night that imply Miller feels his election is all but certain.
"Think I'll do some house hunting while I'm in DC," one of them read.
And then: "Guess I should pick out some office furniture, as well …"
(CNN) - Republican Kelly Ayotte may be even closer to fending off her Democratic opponent in New Hampshire's Senate race, according to a new poll.
A WMUR Granite State Poll released Thursday found that 50 percent of likely voters support Ayotte, while 35 percent support Democratic Rep. Paul Hodes. Twelve percent remain undecided.
The survey shows that likely voters who are "very interested" in the election support Ayotte by a 56 to 36 percent margin.
(CNN) - Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Georgia, said Thursday he has removed a staff member confirmed as the author of an anti-gay comment on a gay and lesbian blog.
"The office of the Senate Sergeant at Arms has concluded its investigation, and I responded to that report immediately with the removal of a member of my staff," Chambliss said in a statement released by his office Thursday.
Earlier: Chambliss office source of anti-gay comment
The Chambliss staffer allegedly responded to a blog posting about a Senate vote on a defense bill that included a repeal of the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy by writing "ALL F–GOTS MUST DIE" in the blog's comments section.
(CNN) - Democratic congressional leaders used a White House strategy session Thursday to push President Barack Obama to be more aggressive in helping them campaign in the final weeks before November's elections, multiple senior Democratic sources familiar with the meeting tell CNN.
According to the sources, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told the president that congressional Democrats want to see more of the kind of campaign rally and rhetoric he displayed this week in Wisconsin. They said they especially want him to continue to make the case - and the contrast with Republicans - on jobs and the economy.
The president said he would, and signaled that there are other campaign events in the works beyond the handful that have already been announced, according to the sources.
(CNN) - President Barack Obama will help his party raise money Thursday night.
The president is the main attraction at a small fundraising dinner at a private residence in the nation's capitol. A Democratic Party source tells CNN that the event is expected to bring in around $1 million for the Democratic National Committee.
(CNN) - The Service Employees International Union is out with a new television ad in California hitting GOP gubernatorial nominee Meg Whitman for paying an undocumented immigrant to be her housekeeper.
"Whitman attacks undocumented workers to win votes, but an undocumented woman worked in her home for nine years," the narrator of the ad says in Spanish.
The ad comes one day after the housekeeper held a press conference during which she alleged that she had been "exploited, disrespected, humiliated and emotionally and financially abused" by the former eBay CEO.
"Whitman says one thing in Spanish - and something different in English," the ad concludes. "The real Meg Whitman has no shame. She's a two-faced woman."
(CNN) - Vice President Biden will be making his fourth trip to Ohio in the past six weeks, as the White House tries to bolster the re-election bid of Gov. Ted Strickland.
Strickland campaign communications director Lis Smith confirmed Biden will hit the Youngstown area on Monday for two stops and a fundraiser.
(CNN) - The first poll of New Yorkers conducted nearly entirely since Republican Rick Lazio dropped his bid for governor indicates that state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, the Democrat's nominee, leads GOP nominee Carl Paladino 53 to 38 percent among likely voters, with eight percent undecided.
According to a Marist College Institute for Public Opinion survey released Thursday, Cuomo is capturing nearly eighty percent of the Democratic vote, just over a quarter of the Republican vote, with Independents divided between the two candidates.
LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) - Meg Whitman, California's Republican nominee for governor, denied Thursday ever seeing a letter from the federal government questioning her former housekeeper's Social Security number.
Whitman said she would be willing to take a polygraph test, to prove that she was "really stunned" to learn just last year that Nicky Diaz Santillan was an undocumented worker.
"If it comes to that, I would be delighted to do that," Whitman said at a news conference.
(CNN) - House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, laid out a sweeping reform agenda for Congress Thursday, promising to make spending increases much tougher if he becomes speaker in January.
Sticking to the GOP focus on skyrocketing federal deficits, Boehner said that too many congressmen currently "go out and promise their constituents the moon," which ultimately leads to "passing more bills, micromanaging more bureaucracies, and raiding the federal treasury."
Addressing the conservative American Enterprise Institute, he promised to help usher in a new era of bipartisan cooperation, but also pledged to change House rules in a way that would strongly favor the agenda being pushed by fiscal conservatives in the Tea Party movement and elsewhere.


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A trail guide in Costa Rica might stop to flick the thorns on an acacia shrub. The thorns are wide and hollow and grow in pairs, like a demonic two-fingered peace sign. And when the guide agitates them, ants scurry out. This particular ant, Pseudomyrmex ferruginea, is a hard-biting acacia defender. It protects the plant from other insects, bigger animals and well-meaning trail guides. In return, the acacia feeds the ants a protein from its leaflets and nectar from its stalk. The acacia and its ant army are a textbook example of mutualism between species. And they represent the principle behind a new concept for urban farming: bug-like greenhouses perched on the roofs of skyscrapers.
They are rooftop farms, and they could represent a future segment of agriculture. Like their biological analogs, the greenhouses tap into the buildings below them, giving and taking in a kind of mechanical symbiosis. By recycling air and water, the two drink together, breathe together and regulate each other's temperature.
About 15 percent of the world's food is grown in cities, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. And that could grow, as cities strive for efficiency and reduce fuel consumption. Urban farms solve the prime source of waste—in fuel, pollutants and time—in the food industry: transportation. The average piece of food may travel 1300 to 1500 miles from farm to plate, according to studies cited by the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture. So far, however, no urban farm design has gone mainstream. This is because they are costly to develop and maintain (since they are in high-rent areas) and the product—food—is already made cheaply elsewhere.
More From Popular Mechanics
Natalie Jeremijenko, an aerospace engineer and environmental health professor at New York University, came up with a rooftop design to solve these common problems for urban farming. Her fixtures may be more economical than other urban farm concepts because they take up real estate that otherwise goes unused, and unlike other urban farm designs, they can pack in the plants, because everything, from the integrated systems to their bubble shape, is a slave to efficiency.
The Engineering Challenge
Not all roofs can support the hundreds or thousands of pounds of soil and water that a farm needs. That was a major obstacle in Viraj Puri's hunt for a rooftop to cultivate. Puri runs Gotham Greens, a startup that's trying to become New York City's first commercial rooftop farming operation. Finding the appropriate site is the first thing he mentions when listing the challenges. "You have to look at the structural composition of the building and line that up with what your operations are going to be," he says.
Jeremijenko's design sidesteps this issue with legs. The steel stilts splayed out underneath distribute the structure's weight to the building's load-bearing walls. And the farms weigh less because they grow in hydroponic, soil-free trays.
The curved shape of the farms optimizes sun exposure and doesn't require moving parts or grow lights, unlike many greenhouse designs. "The building doesn't have to rotate to follow the sun," says Jeremy Edmiston, principal at SYSTEMarchitects in Manhattan and co-designer of the Urban Space Station, as Jeremijenko calls the design. "There's enough change within the shape of the building to allow for variations."
The streamlined form also fares well on windy rooftops. A series of computer models show that decreasing wind resistance helps keep the farm intact. "The wind wants to blow the thing off the roof," Edmiston says. "So, much of the structure is about holding it down rather than holding it up." To get a streamlined shape, Jeremijenko's design incorporates a skin of Ethylene tetrafluoroethylene (ETFE) stretched over curved ribs of steel. ETFE is a supertough, translucent polymer used to cover stadiums and other big spaces.
Beneath its skin, the greenhouse is linked to the building below, sharing energy, air and water. Imagine homes and offices where garden-fresh breezes waft through the vents. The breezes may do more than improve the scent. Plants cull carbon dioxide and increase the oxygen content in air, and some species can filter other harmful gases, such as formaldehyde, as well.
Besides the air, the farms would also recycle and purify gray water, which is wastewater from sinks, bathtubs and drinking fountains. Jeremijenko is experimenting with retrofits of a building's upper two stories. They would circulate water and air through the farm and back again for people to use.
Vertical Farms, the Other Urban Farm
The Urban Space Station has so far taken a back seat to another urban farming concept: the vertical farm. In this approach, an entire skyscraper is dedicated to agriculture, and it doubles as a water-treatment and waste-recycling facility.
Vertical farms are designed to produce a higher volume of food than rooftop farms, but it's not clear if they would do it cheaply. The premium on the building space, Jeremijenko says, is why vertical farms do not have a viable business model. "It takes a stock market to build a high-rise," she says. In other words, it may be tough to recoup the rent through crop sales, especially since high-rise crops would compete on the shelf with food that grows on cheap, building-free flatland farms.
Jeremijenko has nothing against farming upward—in fact, she has designed a vertical farm herself. But hers is built around a fire escape on an otherwise occupied building (it's still code-compliant, she says).
Dickson Despommier, a Columbia University professor who has championed the vertical farm design, has a different economic argument. He has said that costs could change as priorities change. Populations are rising, and so might both food prices and the cost of farmland. And future generations may prefer to pay more for vertically grown crops if they free up land for wildlife, he says.
Despommier likes most aspects of Jeremijenko's rooftop design. "It's a greenhouse that can be built on the roof; that's a great idea," he says. He points out that they can trap heat in the winter, and, he says, the retrofits required for water recycling would not have to be very sophisticated.
To Jeremijenko, a key difference between her concepts and others is that the farm is integrated: It can make life more pleasant for the people who live below it. The principles of mutualism is rare in modern architecture, but it can tackle unsexy problems like efficiency and cost. In other words, the extraordinary curves in this rooftop design are not paying homage to Frank Gehry. Likes ants living in acacias, they serve a purpose.
Rob writes about technology, medicine and solutions for global development. He lives in Colorado among a herd of his own children, and he sometimes tries to play the ukulele. Besides Popular Mechanics, you can also find his work at Reuters and a non-profit called Engineering for Change.


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I probably shouldn't have tried to write a DOTS post a couple hours after coming home from a crazy weekend of racing, but I did... and totally spaced on the Truck Monday tradition. Not that the Datsun 1200 isn't a great car, but we're supposed to have a truck here to start our week, dammit! To make up for that screwup, I'm going with a truck I've been saving for a special occasion: a rusty, crusty survivor straight from the Alaskan bush!
You don't see a lot of Alaskan plates in Alameda (Hawaiian ones used to be fairly common, with the huge Navy base on the island and many sailors bringing cars from the islands); this truck seems to have become a permanent resident, so we'll probably see boring ol' California plates on it one of these days. I like to imagine this thing grinding down some icy dirt road with a bunch of tools rattling in the back. I'm not sure whether "Scout II Traveler," "Scout Traveler," or just "Traveler" is the preferred nomenclature; you Scout guys can weigh in on this issue.
Explorer 2-Person Inflatable Kayak
Comfortable for anyone
Nnjoy the water but don't want to deal with the hassle of traditional kayaks? This is portable, lightweight, and easy to store when not in use.
It's even a diesel (or at least has diesel emblems). The diesel engine for '77 was a six-cylinder, 92-horse Nissan unit.
Looks like the oxidation brigade has been at work here; the Alameda climate will slow the rot to a crawl. I think Jack London himself would have driven this truck, had he lived long enough (102 years) to buy one. In fact, London probably used IHC farm machinery at his Beauty Ranch in Sonoma County.


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Thank You!
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We work to defend marriage and the faith communities that sustain it at the local, state, and national levels. We do this by working with legislators, by informing voters when they head to the ballot box, and by giving marriage a voice in courts of law as well as in the court of public opinion.
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NKorean diplomat heads to Finland for talks with US, SKorea
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — A senior North Korean diplomat who handles North American affairs was heading to Finland on Sunday for talks with the United States and South Korea.
Choe Kang Il's trip comes ahead of a possible meeting between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
South Korea's Yonhap news agency said Choe was seen at a Beijing airport on Sunday before boarding a flight to Finland. The report cited unnamed "diplomatic sources" in Seoul as saying Choe would take part in a meeting with former U.S. diplomats, including former U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Kathleen Stephens, and South Korean security experts.
South Korea's Foreign Ministry said the gathering would be similar to the so-called "Track 2" dialogue that has involved North Korean officials and former U.S. officials and experts. It gave no further details.
Choe was in the delegation North Korea sent to last month's Winter Olympics in South Korea.
On Saturday, Sweden's foreign minister concluded three days of talks in Stockholm with her North Korean counterpart, saying they discussed the "opportunities and challenges for continued diplomatic efforts to reach a peaceful solution" to the Koreas' security dispute.
Sweden has been rumored as a possible site for a U.S.-North Korea summit, though a truce village on the South Korean side of the Demilitarized Zone between the Koreas is seen as more likely.
Trump has agreed to meet Kim by May. So far, North Korea has yet to comment publicly on what it hopes to gain from the talks.
Senior South Korean officials who traveled to the North Korean capital of Pyongyang this month and met with Kim say he is willing to discuss the North's nuclear weapons program.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in is due to meet with Kim in April.


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Roy Andersen was with EY from 1966 to 1993, starting his career as a trainee accountant and becoming a member firm partner at age 26. "EY has been a golden thread all the way through my career," says Roy who is now a non-executive director in three listed companies in South Africa, including Sasfin Bank.
His advice to young partners? "Don't lose your connections with EY. Use that as your background information. Also use that as your backbone when it comes to ethics."
"When I was headhunted to head up the [Johannesburg] stock exchange, it was because I was the senior partner of EY [and] because I stood for something. When I was headhunted to become the CEO of Liberty Life, one of the biggest insurance companies, it was because I had succeeded at the stock exchange, but also [because] I was a partner at EY."
An active alumnus, Roy is still in touch with his former EY colleagues and also reaches out to EY people for professional advice. "You don't want to wake up one morning and find [that] your bank is irrelevant. So, we use EY as a source of intelligence to say: 'These are the trends in the banking sector. Are you keeping ahead of them? Can your systems cater for them?'"
The untapped market for banks in South Africa is huge. "Fifty-eight percent of South Africans do not have a bank account," he says "But most South Africans have a cell phone. So you can just see the opportunity: to suddenly bank those unbanked. That gives a tremendous opportunity."
However, banks looking to make headway into the untapped market will also have to deal with disruptive technologies and business models. "There are three banks opening in South Africa this year. And one has no bricks and mortar at all. It is purely electronic. That's going to change the rules."
The easiest way to deal with disruption is to embrace it. For example, "use artificial intelligence to calculate what your clients want from you. If you look at the transactions that they are actually doing at the moment, you must be able to predict what they want. Communicate that with them. But, more importantly, make it easy for them to access that particular service."
Roy is very optimistic about the country's future in spite of its rough recent past. The entrepreneurial spirit is on the rise and investment trends are turning to the country's favor. Things are looking up.
With new business models and disruptive technologies, the banks in South Africa are looking toward tremendous growth.
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Dear Kathy,
Weve always seen Buddy so clearly through your loving eyes, and that will never change. On mornings like this, our tears blur the images for a time. But the love is unwavering and the clarity always returns. Sadly, so does the pain and the loss and the missing him. I wish I could make that part better, but I know I cannot. But we join you in remembrance and honor and celebration of Buddys sweet spirit, today and every day.
My heart is with you as this anniversary arrives, Kathy. I will always remain so deeply sorry for your loss. No matter how many years pass by, that will never change.
Hugs, hugs and more hugs.


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A rather clever guy on twitter named @newbiedm tweeted the following after 5e was announced:
I wonder if Elminster will wake up next to Bob Newhart and realize it was all a dream.
Funny, right? Yeah, he's pretty clever. But while he was probably trying to be cute, the question about what the heck to do with the post-Spellplague Forgotten Realms as D&D moves into a new era is a valid one. I'll admit up front that I am not a big Realms lore guy. I'm not up to speed on the history of Faerun, don't know all the NPC's, don't read the novels, and can't answer too many basic geography questions. However, I can tell you that I am a fan of the Realms in a rather casual way, and have always loved the flavor, maps, and fluffy articles through the years. My favorite D&D product is a Realms boxed set after all…
So what do we know about the Realms regarding the 5th Edition of D&D? Well, we know it's going to be supported at the game's launch, and that WOTC's hired a video game company from China to detail the Realms. Bizarre, right? A video game company from China? Well, I did some digging around and Cryptic Studios, the developer of the Neverwinter MMO was recently purchased by a video game company from China named Perfect Worlds. Coincidence? I'd bet on the answer being no.
Here are the quotes from ENWorld when the question on the Realms came up at the now famous December gathering at Wizards of the Coast:
The Forgotten Realms will be supported from the start, and a video game art studio from China has been hired to fully detail the Realms. We asked if going forward support would be continued for the current time after the Spellplague and the Neverwinter Campaign. A WotC spokesperson answered, "The Forgotten Realms has a rich history and we will support all of it. It is for the gamers to decide which time they would enjoy playing in." That would allow Wizards to take advantage of a massive back catalog of products.
Okay, so lets look at this bit by bit.
- A video game company is "fully detailing" the Realms. My prediction: Expect a Forgotten Realms MMO to launch along with D&D 5e at launch. Obviously using its ruleset. Art from both the MMO and the pen and paper game would then be used back and forth between the products, and in a way the video game company is indeed detailing the world. Remember WOTC getting the digital rights back from Atari? Bingo.
- "The Forgotten Realms has a rich history and we will support all of it. It is for the gamers to decide which time they would enjoy playing in." That's a heavy statement. I'm not getting a sense of an advancement in the timeline, but rather a chance to play anywhere you want within the current timeline. I can see articles in Dungeon and Dragon taking chunks of the timeline and updating the npc's to the game's stats, and releasing adventures that fall under "The Time of Troubles" or "Spellplague". You are given options to play in different eras, and guys like me can use their good old boxed set by pulling out the converted npc stats from the Avatar Crisis and play a game in old Faerun using shiny new rules. That could be cool.
So these are some of my thoughts regarding the Forgotten Realms and the newly announced D&D Edition. An MMO, releases updating NPC's of different eras to the new system stats, and adventures and fluff detailing different eras of the realms rather than concentrating on a specific campaign year.
This is all going to be so interesting to watch unfold… Oh hey, here's a thought… What if the Realms were actually 5e's assumed setting? That would be interesting! I think I like that idea…
If you would like to support NewbieDM.com, perhaps you'd consider visiting Amazon.com for your next rpg related purchase. Check out the following products:
World of Greyhawk AD&D Boxed Set
Conquest of Nerath: A D&D Boardgame


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July 29, 2012
For the first time in over 30 years, the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture opens a major exhibition of North American Indian baskets on Sunday, November 20, 2011. The exhibition runs through February 23, 2014.
All objects tell a story, if you know the right questions to ask. At the time the baskets in this exhibition were collected little to no information was recorded; the weaver's names are largely unknown. Nonetheless, each basket has an identity, a woven identity. The identity of each basket—where it was made; when it was made; who made it; who it was made for; why it was made—by "reading" its individual characteristics.
To read a basket five principal traits must be taken into account: material, construction, form and design, and utility. Woven Identities is divided into five sections representing these essential and diagnostic Native American basketry traits. If you ever wanted to learn the language of baskets, begin your journey with this exhibition.
On exhibit are baskets woven by artists representing 60 cultural groups, today referred to as tribes, bands, or pueblos. The weavers' ancestral lands are in six culture areas of Western North America: The Southwest, Great Basin, Plateau, California, the Northwest Coast, and the Arctic.
Baskets can be functional. Burden baskets were for carrying. The improbable task of cooking was done in baskets—heated stones were added to food and liquid contents in meal preparation. Water was carried and clams collected in others. Baskets also served as hats (especially, but not exclusively, to the tourist trade).
Yet, function does not trump beauty. Basket making techniques are inherently attractive. Among the baskets on view are examples of false embroidery, cross weave, plaiting, and coiling. Materials like wrapped twine, corn husk, roots, rhizomes, stems, branches, leaves, grass, and cedar bark add their own good looks.
Of the 241 baskets in the exhibition, only 45 have been attributed to individual artists. Woven Identities honors those weavers and the many others whose names we do not yet know.
High resolution exhibition images may be downloaded from the Museum of New Mexico Media Center.Media Contact:
Valerie Verzuh, Curator
Steve Cantrell, PR Manager
Located on Museum Hill™, the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture shares the beautiful Milner Plaza with the Museum of International Folk Art. Here, Now and Always, a major permanent exhibition at the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture, combines the voices of living Native Americans with ancient and contemporary artifacts and interactive multimedia to tell the complex stories of the Southwest. The Buchsbaum Gallery displays ceramics from the region's pueblos. Five changing galleries present exhibits on subjects ranging from archaeological excavations to contemporary art. In addition, an outdoor sculpture garden offers rotating exhibits of works by Native American sculptors.
The Museum of Indian Arts and Culture is a division of the Department of Cultural Affairs.
Information for the Public
Location: The Museum of Indian Arts and Culture is located on Museum Hill™, Camino Lejo off Old Santa Fe Trail.
Information: 505-476-1269 or visit www.indianartsandculture.org
Days/Times: Tuesday through Sunday, 10:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. Between Memorial Day and Labor Day the Museum is also open on Monday.
Admission: Adult single-museum admission is $6 for New Mexico residents, $9 for nonresidents; OR $15 for one-day pass to two museums of your choice (Museum of Indian Arts & Culture, Museum of International Folk Art, New Mexico Museum of Art, and Palace of the Governors/New Mexico History Museum) OR $20 four-day pass to the four museums listed above. Youth 16 and under, Foundation Members, and New Mexico Veterans with 50% or more disability always free
Sundays: New Mexico residents with ID are admitted FREE, Students with ID receive a $1 discount. Wednesdays: New Mexico resident seniors (60+) with ID are free. Field Trips: There is no charge for educational groups attending the museum with their instructor and/or adult chaperones. Contact the Tours office by phone at (505) 476-1140 or (505) 476-1211 to arrange class/group visits to the Museum.


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A New Crop of Holy Joe's
Ronald K. Wells
"I Wonder"
1969, Crescendo Music
Ah, the Christian musical… a reaction to the "new thinking" of the 1960′s and revisionist hippie musicals like Jesus Christ Superstar. This one has some pretty great narration along with the tunes. I think I'm going to raid the "Christan hippies" section of my record library to find a few more of these!


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A Zimbabwean villager fistfights crocodile to save child, says local media
Published December 27, 2013
Associated Press
HARARE, ZIMBABWE – State media in Zimbabwe says a villager fought a crocodile with his bare hands to free his son from its jaws in northeastern rural Mutoko. The Herald newspaper reported Tafadzwa Kachere and his 11-year-old son Tapiwa were trying to cross a river on Christmas eve when the crocodile attacked the boy. It reported that Kachere jumped onto the crocodile's back and tried to force open its jaws, beating at its head with his fists and poking at its eyes with reeds. The crocodile released the child and turned on Kachere who wrestled free of its grasp. The newspaper says the child lost a leg and his father's arm was severely gored. Both survived. Crocodile attacks are common in rural Zimbabwe during the rainy season but many go unreported.


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what we do
Since 1981, Prestige has partnered with homeowners and design professionals to produce residential work of the highest quality. Our portfolio represents a mix of architect-designed homes, historic home renovations, and remodeling projects of both modest and expansive scale. Most of all, we like to make friends—and keep them.
how we work
At Prestige, we're all about doing it right. Our precision craftsmanship philosophy translates to everything from client communications to budgeting, staffing, on-site organization, and—of course—to the eventual construction outcome. What else are we dedicated to? Strategic sustainability.
home repair + care
It's one thing to embark on a big project, quite another to repair (and care for) your home on a regular basis. We assist busy homeowners looking for an exceptional level of finish for their smaller projects. Our dedicated team is consistently sensitive to the need for cleanliness in occupied homes.


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In case you missed it, the New York Knicks signed Rasheed Wallace. Thirteen year old Jesse would be ecstatic with this move. Truth be told, I wore number "30″ for 'Sheed when I played basketball in middle school. The big question, despite my teenage joy, is what does this mean? Despite the fact that Wallace is out of shape and currently boxing to get ready for the NBA season (anyone familiar with Rasheed's past finds that sentence hilarious), the Knicks are still counting on him. They keep saying that they'll need him for the playoffs, but I'm not too sure. Let's take a look at this and try to answer the question: "Why did the Knicks sign Rasheed Wallace?"
Option 1) They thought he'd be fun to have around.
This is fair. I'm sure Rasheed will be fun to have in the locker room and could keep the players happy. He's a generally gregarious guy who, despite his many indiscretions early in his career, is a pretty well-liked player. Maybe that's why the Knicks gave him a contract?
Option 2) He has good numbers in the playoffs.
His main playoff years, with Detroit (he played a strong majority of his playoff games with the Pistons), were not terribly great. This is mostly because of the Pistons team strategy back then (
gauge the other team's eyes out, er, keep the games low scoring) and less of a problem with him. He does have experience, though, having played 177 postseason games in his career. That experience can't hurt, I guess.
Option 3) He is buddies with Mike Woodson.
This is the one that's actually right. The two are close and, with Rasheed being closer to Woodson's age than most players (Wallace is 38), it's possible Woodson just wanted to hook up a friend.
The fact that the nepotism that plagues the Knicks carried over to Coach Woodson is an absolute shame, but hopefully it doesn't come back to bite the Knicks in the ass. I would've rather had Scotty Machado to challenge at the point or another aging Euroleague star, but I guess he'll do.
Written by Jesse Schneiderman. You can see more of his work at The Cult Jar and you can follow him on twitter at @thecultjar and @JesseOneT