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Two set photos from the upcoming "Star Trek" sequel feature Bennedict Cumberbatch in what appears to be a losing battle with both Uhura and Spock.
This week's issue of "Entertainment Weekly" reveals new photos from Ridley Scott's upcoming sci-fi thriller "Prometheus." Though these pictures do reveal a little bit about the film, it is still unknown whether it is a prequel to "Alien." I guess we'll have to wait until June 2012 to find out.


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AMG's Marcus Manchild - Red & Yellow (Over Wiz Khalifa's "Black & Yellow") [Label Submitted]
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The Akron Summit County Main Library in partnership with the Akron Public Schools and the Ohio STEM Learning Network is part of a grant from the EXL Center to place STEM materials in classrooms.
|Item Type
|Item Limit
|Loan Period
|Fines (per day)
|Stem Kit
|14 days
|$10 and record blocked
These kits are available to teachers and home school parents only. Proof of this status will be required each time a kit is borrowed. For teachers, a school ID and photo ID or Akron Summit County Public Library card are required. For home school parents proof of home school affiliation and photo ID or Akron Summit County Public Library card are required. For University of Akron students who are student teaching a school ID with the designated sticker given to you at the beginning of your student teaching program.
Customers may reserve individual Kits by contacting the Science and Technology desk in person or by telephone. A customer may have a maximum of 3 holds on STEM kits at any one time. STEM kits can be checked out for 2 weeks. Reservation of these kits is done only by the Science and Technology Division so that we can schedule sets in advance. Sets are in high demand so please plan ahead. Please call 330-643-9075 to place a hold or to inquire about STEM kits. A list of STEM Kits can be found in the Science and Technology Division at Main Library or search STEM Kits in the library catalog to see a list of resources.
Due to the anticipated demand and the limited number of items, the STEM Kits cannot be renewed.
Borrowing privileges will be suspended when the amount of unpaid fines reaches $10.00. Late return of STEM kits will result in the patron's record becoming blocked, which will include requesting and renewing of materials as well as use of a library computer. Please call Science and Technology if you are unable to return items on time, 330-643-9075.


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sanity necesitaba un nuevo diseño de banner publicitario y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 75 diseños de 15 diseñadores freelance.
We are a group looking to attract those opposed to the United States Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, sometimes called "Obamacare", to our website which will help them channel their political opposition in a useful way.
We realize that some people may disagree with the political opinion expressed in this brief and on our website, but our goal is to help people express their opinion in a peaceful and constructive way. We hope that any difference of political opinion will not prevent designers from thinking creatively about how to address our target audience.
Our audience is US citizens that are concerned about the new healthcare bill passed in March 2010. They are likely to be older males, who vote for the Republican party, watch Fox News, and are fans of personalities like Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin. Our audience are likely to be sympathetic to the "tea party" movement, which has become a powerful political force in US politics over the past 18 months.
We require ads of size 300x250 pixels, and 728x90 pixels.
They should be no more than 50 kilobytes when exported in png, gif, or jpeg format (it needs only to be less than 50k in one of these formats). THIS IS A STRICT REQUIREMENT, THE ADS ARE USELESS TO US IF THEY ARE LARGER THAN 50K. The ad should be provocative, but not offensive.
We also require the original files used to make the ads so that we can easily make minor modifications, for example, the original illustrator files if this is the tool used.
You are welcome to propose your own copy, but examples of appropriate text would be:
"Say No to Obamacare!"
"Say No to Socialism!"
"Click here to fight Obamacare"
"Say no to government control of healthcare"
Remember, our goal is to get people to click on the ad, so it should definitely have some kind of call to action to click.
You can get a feel for how we have approached this from a design perspective by looking at our website http://fightobamacare.org/, but please don't be constrained by this.


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Grab your cameras! It's time to start shooting!
We are pleased to announce a Photo Contest for the customers & fans of KEH Camera!
You've always relied on KEH as a trusted source for your photographic equipment, and now we want to give you the opportunity to show off your craft. Here at KEH, we stay so busy selling, purchasing and repairing camera gear that we don't always get to see the wonderful images you create. Therefore, we decided to host a photo contest!
With the holidays right around the corner, the theme for the photo contest is family. Relatives, friends, pets and everything in between. Whatever you define as family. Show us the meaningful moments of the ones you love. This is your chance to be creative!
The winner of the Photo Contest will receive a $200 KEH Camera gift certificate.
Contest Rules:
* One entry per person.
* Photo must be taken approximately within the last 1-2 years.
* Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.
* Photo must be appropriate for posting on a public website.
* Entries must be submitted by the original photographer & sole owner of the copyright.
* Photographer retains the copyright to their image, but grants KEH Camera permission to post winning photograph (with credit) on one or more of the following: KEH Camera Blog, Newsletter, Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, and Flickr accounts. Nature of post(s) will only be to announce winner & winning photograph.
* Photographers, when appropriate, please make sure you obtain permission from persons depicted in photograph prior to submitting an entry.
* Contest is open to both our US and international customers. KEH Camera employees & immediate family members are excluded.
* Photo contest rules are subject to change and may be updated as needed.
* Be creative and have fun!
Photo Guidelines:
* Photo size guidelines: 150 DPI, JPG format & no larger than 900 pixels in either height or width (we amended this so it wouldn't be too strict and possibly exclude other photography formats).
* Slight computer enhancements such as cropping or red eye reduction are permitted. Please, no images that have been significantly digitally modified.
* Watermarks are optional, but permitted, as long as watermark is not in the middle of the image.
* With submission, please include your name, photo title, plus anything about the photo you would like to share. For example, where the photo was taken, when the photo was taken, story/idea behind photo, or format used (digital or film, 35 mm, medium format, etc.). Information will be posted with winning photo.
Submission Details:
* Entries must be submitted via email with the subject line "Photo Contest" to [email protected] by midnight on Monday, November 26, 2012 Eastern time. No other email address or social media submission will be accepted.
* Entries will be judged by KEH Camera staff on the basis of creativity and photographic quality.
* Winner will be notified by email (we will reply to email used to submit photo entry).
* Winning photograph will be announced/posted on the KEH Camera Blog & social media sites on Friday, November 30, 2012.
* Winner must provide mailing address & phone number to receive prize. Contact information will not be publicly shared or used for any other advertising purposes.
Good luck! We can't wait to see your entries!


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Newfoundland: Chesapeake Bay Retriever Breeders
Below is a sample search of our Chesapeake Bay Retriever breeders with puppies for sale. The search tool above returns a list of breeders located nearest to the zip or postal code you enter. From there you can see photos of their pups, find detailed information on their web page and contact them by email, phone or even get driving directions.
(Detailed contact information has been omitted. Enter your zip or postal code above to access our up-to-date directory).
This is a FREE search tool! Use the form at the top to get complete listings for breeders in your area!
Dut-Chesse Chesapeakes
Services: Puppies
One girl still available as of 10/30/19.Callie/Brody pups are here - born 9/29/19. 5 girls and 3 boys. 2 still available - we expect beauty and drive in this litter.
Camptown Chesapeakes
Services: Puppies
Quality Chesapeake pups bred for temperament,conformation and extreme drive in the field. Both parents are OFA,CERF. Pups clean for DM,PRA,EIC. Written guarantee.Check website for availability.
Camptown Chesapeakes
Services: Puppies,Adult Dogs,Stud Service
Quality Chesapeake pups expected June 2019. Bred for temperament, conformation and drive in the field. Parents have hips and eyes checked. Pups come with full health guarantees. All colors expected.
North Flow Chesapeakes
Services: Puppies
Our Mission: First and foremost, we believe that dogs must be able to live with you as a pet. In addition, we strive to breed and show both conformation and performance quality Chesapeakes.
Rebecca I Kowalski
Services: Puppies,Adult Dogs,Stud Service,Rescue
RKK Kennels Located in Mayville MI. Breeders of Chesapeakes for 23 years. We breed for dogs of sound mind and body. From Health tested parents with beauty and brains.
Chaparal Chesapeakes
Services: Puppies,Adult Dogs,Stud Service
Bred for Trainability,temperment,and versatlity for companion,field,hunting,show and performance events Health clearances,OFA,CERF,PRA,DM,EIC, guarantee Parents clearpups due Apr 7 2018
Shiloh Hill Chesapeakes
Services: Puppies,Adult Dogs,Stud Service
Check out our website for current pictures and information
Services: Puppies,Adult Dogs,Stud Service,Rescue
EAGLE HAVEN CHESAPEAKES has been specializing in the Chesapeake breed for over twenty years and we breed our Chessies to carry the distinct characteristics of the breed, being the large square head, broad chest and the curly coated hair. All of our Chessie pups are raised in a family environment, where they receive a lot of attention, handling and tender loving care, which that helps them to develope their great personality and temperaments that they each will show. Each of our Chessie pups has the great potential of becoming a Master Hunter, Show Winner, SAR team member, best friend or a family companion and they will be willing to give you that 110% and more in everything that you ask of them. They will be AKC registrable, UTD on all...
Great Expectations
Services: Puppies,Adult Dogs,Stud Service,Rescue
Where quality and experience meet. More than 25 years of experience to provide you with the best adults, puppies and service available in Texas. Accomplished chessies in both the show ring and field.
Trident Security Group, Inc.
Services: Puppies,Stud Service
Born on 12/12 just in time for last minute x-mas gift. All pups are raised in the home for socialization. Check us out on AKC site. Any Questions call us at(425) 246-4569. Merry Christmas!
Important: breeders.NET has not screened the listed breeders and accepts no responsibility for their reputation or quality. It is your responsibility to investigate. See How to Find a Dog.


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Summer Road Trip! Next Stop: North Country
As the dog days of summer give way to autumn, there's no better place to visit than North Country. This installment of our road trips takes us around the Great Lakes region, particularly its western corridor.
A good place to begin is at the Dossin Great Lakes Museum, located in Belle Isle Park, in Detroit, Michigan, along the Detroit River. Maritime history plays a major role in the story of the Great Lakes area, and the Dossin Museum, administered by the Detroit Historical Society, houses more than 50,000 objects and archival records dedicated to this subject, including photographs, films, manuscripts periodicals, books, and artifacts. Among the latter is one of the world's largest collections of Great Lakes ship models, as well as the bow anchor from the legendary freighter S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald, which sank in Lake Superior amid the "gales of November" in 1975. A 2001 Preservation Assistance Grant (PAG) to the Detroit Historical Society enabled the purchase of equipment to monitor temperature and relative humidity levels in the storage and exhibit areas of the Dossin Museum and other facilities operated by the society, including the Detroit Historical Museum, a major resource on the history and culture of the city and region.
Just outside of Detroit as you head west, stop at the Arab American National Museum in Dearborn and put to rest any stereotypes you may have entertained about the upper Midwest being culturally and ethnically homogenous. Among all states, Michigan claims the third largest Arab American population, with Dearborn at its center. The museum is an important resource for the multifaceted history of migration from the Middle East to the United States as well as on the contributions of the Arab World to science, medicine, architecture, and other fields. The collections include manuscripts, photographs, sound recordings, artworks, and artifacts, some dating as far back as 3000 BCE. A PAG award in 2010 supported the purchase by the museum of environmental monitoring equipment to assist in protecting these materials, with highlights ranging from ancient Mesopotamian cuneiform cylinder seals to creative works and objects from prominent 20th-century Arab American artists and writers, such as Khalil Gibran and Edward Said.
As you continue westward along the Indiana Turnpike, pay a visit to Elkhart, Indiana, particularly if you're driving a recreational vehicle and want to see where it quite likely was manufactured. The Elkhart County Historical Society holds material that documents the history of the RV industry and much more. If you played a musical instrument in high school, you may be aware that Elkhart is also known as the "Band Instrument Capital of the World," home to the Selmer, Conn, and Martin manufacturing companies. The historical society maintains business records and artifacts telling this story as well as other aspects of the area's economic, social, and cultural history, dating from the 1830s--all of which will be more effectively preserved as a result of a 2010 PAG award for the purchase of environmental monitoring equipment and storage cabinets and for the services of a preservation consultant to ensure proper use of these items.
Chicago has so much for the cultural tourist to choose from, but for this trip, we're steering you a bit off the beaten path. This year is the tenth anniversary of the Chicago Film Archives, an organization that began with an effort to preserve a large collection of commercial and noncommercial motion pictures that could no longer be cared for by another area institution. With the help of a series of PAG awards, beginning in 2007, to support a preservation assessment and the purchase of storage furniture, and preservation supplies, this organization has established a solid infrastructure for preserving its collection of over 10,000 films. Much of this documentation, on a variety of film formats, is unique and depicts the city and the region through a grassroots perspective. Dating from 1903, the films include amateur, industrial, documentary, and educational productions, among which is footage of civil rights marches, political demonstrations, cultural celebrations, musical performances, and folk traditions captured through home movies. Many of the films have now been digitized and are available online, but when you're in town, you might enjoy taking part in one of the Archives' regular public screening opportunities.
From Chicago, our next stop is Eau Claire, Wisconsin, home of the Chippewa Valley Museum, located in scenic Carson Park. Here, you'll find a local history museum with an exceptionally vibrant repertoire of public and educational programming, which has garnered awards from NEH's Division of Public Programs and Office of Challenge Grants. It also maintains a substantial collection of archival materials and artifacts of broad research and public interest, the care of which has been aided by several grants from the Division of Preservation and Access. Most recently, a 2011 PAG award supported the purchase of storage equipment and preservation supplies for the museum's oversized and fragile photographs, prints, and documents. Included are 1,870 visual resources and archival records pertaining to agriculture and farm life, German immigration, the Native American community, and the area's largest employer, the Gillette/Uniroyal Tire and Rubber Company.
A short drive further west is the Minneapolis -St. Paul area, another mecca for arts and cultural heritage enthusiasts. Not to be overlooked among the many attractions is the Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum at the University of Minnesota, situated on the east bank of the Mississippi River. With some 20,000 items, the museum's collections range from 11th-century pottery from the American Southwest to 20th-century Korean furniture to contemporary artists in the 21st century. A large percentage of this material consists of works on paper, including prints, drawings, and photographs from such notable artists as Honoré Daumier, John James Audubon, Marc Chagall, Jacob Lawrence, and Alfred Stieglitz. A 2010 PAG award supported the purchase of equipment to monitor light in the museum's galleries and archival storage supplies for its works of art on paper. But in addition to the collections on display, a prime attraction is the building itself. Designed by architect Frank Gehry, the museum's s multi-angular façade coated with stainless steel has made it a signature structure for the campus and the city of Minneapolis, best viewed from across the river before sunset.
Lastly, it's time to go "up north," as the locals say, to the twin ports of Duluth, Minnesota, and Superior, Wisconsin, the westernmost point of the Great Lakes. In Superior, look for the Richard I. Bong Veterans Historical Center, located near the lakefront. The institution is named after America's all-time top military ace, who flew more than 200 missions over the Southwest Pacific in World War II. Bong was raised in nearby Poplar, Wisconsin, where for many years one could see (as did this author) a Lockheed P-38 Lightning airplane, like those Bong piloted, resting on pylons outside the local school as part of a memorial to him. In 2002, the plane and numerous other archival materials, audiotapes, and historic artifacts--including uniforms, weapons, and memorabilia--associated with World War II were moved to the newly dedicated center in Superior. A 2010 PAG grant supported an assessment of the building's storage space and the purchase of preservation supplies and environmental monitoring equipment. Recently, the museum's mission has expanded to encompass the history of veterans of military conflicts beyond World War II. By the time you're done here, fall colors may well be emerging. Whichever way you choose to return home, you'll surely have a picturesque ride!


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Photo: Martin Streicher via Wikimedia
In an interview with Linux creator Linus Torvalds, TechCrunch's Scott Merrill asks about Torvalds's taste in computer hardware.Here's what Torvalds had to say:
"I have to admit being a bit baffled by how nobody else seems to have done what Apple did with the Macbook Air – even several years after the first release, the other notebook vendors continue to push those ugly and *clunky* things. Yes, there are vendors that have tried to emulate it, but usually pretty badly. I don't think I'm unusual in preferring my laptop to be thin and light.
"…I think one of the things that made Apple able to do this was how focused they've been able to stay. They really have rather few SKU's compared to most big computer manufacturers, and I think that is what has allowed them to focus on those particular SKU's and make them be better than the average machine out there.
"Sure, they have *some* variation (different amounts of memory etc), but compare the Apple offerings to the wild and crazy world of HP or Lenovo or Toshiba. Other hardware manufacturers tend to not put all their eggs in a single (or a few) baskets, and even then they tend to hedge their bets and go for fairly safe and boring on most offerings (and then they sometimes make the mistake of going way crazy for the "designer" models to overcompensate for their boring bread-and-butter).
"So that kind of focus takes guts. I'm not an apple fan, because I think they've done some really bad things too, but I have to give them credit for not just having good designers, but the guts to go with it. Jobs clearly had a lot to do with that."
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My Age Of Anxiety
Fear, Hope, Dread, And The Search For Peace Of Mind
Hardcover, 400 pages, Random House Inc, List Price: $27.95 |purchase
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NPR Summary
The author recounts his lifelong battle with anxiety and provides a history of efforts to understand it.
Awards and Recognition
2 weeks on NPR Paperback Nonfiction Bestseller List
5 weeks on NPR Hardcover Nonfiction Bestseller List
NPR stories about My Age Of Anxiety
Fear Of Fainting, Flight And Cheese: One Man's 'Age Of Anxiety'
Note: Book excerpts are provided by the publisher and may contain language some find offensive.
Excerpt: My Age Of Anxiety
Some eighty years ago, Freud proposed that anxiety was "a riddle whose solution would be bound to throw a flood of light on our whole mental existence." Unlocking the mysteries of anxiety, he believed, would go far in helping us to unravel the mysteries of the mind: consciousness, the self, identity, intellect, imagination, creativity — not to mention pain, suffering, hope, and regret. To grapple with and understand anxiety is, in some sense, to grapple with and understand the human condition.
The differences in how various cultures and eras have perceived and understood anxiety can tell us a lot about those cultures and eras. Why did the ancient Greeks of the Hippocratic school see anxiety mainly as a medical condition, while Enlightenment philosophers saw it as an intellectual problem? Why did the early existentialists see anxiety as a spiritual condition, while Gilded Age doctors saw it as a specifically Anglo-Saxon stress response — a response that they believed spared Catholic societies — to the Industrial Revolution? Why did the early Freudians see anxiety as a psychological condition emanating from sexual inhibition, whereas our own age tends to see it, once again, as a medical and neurochemical condition, a problem of malfunctioning biomechanics?
Do these shifting interpretations represent the forward march of progress and science? Or simply the changing, and often cyclical, ways in which cultures work? What does it say about the societies in question that Americans showing up in emergency rooms with panic attacks tend to believe they're having heart attacks, whereas Japanese tend to be afraid they're going to faint? Are the Iranians who complain of what they call "heart distress" suffering what Western psychiatrists would call panic attacks? Are the ataques de nervios experienced by South Americans simply panic attacks with a Latino inflection — or are they, as modern researchers now believe, a distinct cultural and medical syndrome? Why do drug treatments for anxiety that work so well on Americans and the French seem not to work effectively on the Chinese?
As fascinating and multifarious as these cultural idiosyncrasies are, the underlying consistency of experience across time and cultures speaks to the universality of anxiety as a human trait. Even filtered through the distinctive cultural practices and beliefs of the Greenland Inuit a hundred years ago, the syndrome the Inuit called "kayak angst" (those afflicted by it were afraid to go out seal hunting alone) appears to be little different from what we today call agoraphobia. In Hippocrates's ancient writings can be found clinical descriptions of pathological anxiety that sound quite modern. One of his patients was terrified of cats (simple phobia, which today would be coded 300.29 for insurance purposes, according to the classifications of the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, the DSM-V) and another of nightfall; a third, Hippocrates reported, was "beset by terror" whenever he heard a flute; a fourth could not walk alongside "even the shallowest ditch," though he had no problem walking inside the ditch — evidence of what we would today call acrophobia, the fear of heights. Hippocrates also describes a patient suffering what would likely be called, in modern diagnostic terminology, panic disorder with agoraphobia (DSM-V code 300.22): the condition, as Hippocrates described it, "usually attacks abroad, if a person is travelling a lonely road somewhere, and fear seizes him." The syndromes described by Hippocrates are recognizably the same clinical phenomena described in the latest issues of the Archives of General Psychiatry and Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic.
Their similarities bridge the yawning gap of millennia and circumstances that separate them, providing a sense of how, for all the differences in culture and setting, the physiologically anxious aspects of human experience may be universal.
In this book, I have set out to explore the "riddle" of anxiety. I am not a doctor, a psychologist, a sociologist, or a historian of science — any one of whom would bring more scholarly authority to a treatise on anxiety than I do. This is a work of synthesis and reportage, yoking together explorations of the idea of anxiety from history, literature, philosophy, religion, popular culture, and the latest scientific research — all of that woven through something about which I can, alas, claim extensive expertise: my own experience with anxiety. Examining the depths of my own neuroses may seem the height of narcissism (and studies do show that self-preoccupation tends to be tied to anxiety), but it's an exercise with worthy antecedents. In 1621, the Oxford scholar Robert Burton published his canonical The Anatomy of Melancholy, a staggering thirteen-hundred-page work of synthesis, whose torrents of scholarly exegesis only partially obscure what it really is: a massive litany of anxious, depressive complaint. In 1733, George Cheyne, a prominent London physician and one of the most influential psychological thinkers of the eighteenth century, published The English Malady, which includes the forty-page chapter "The Case of the Author" (dedicated to "my fellow sufferers"), in which he reports in minute detail on his neuroses (including "Fright, Anxiety, Dread, and Terror" and "a melancholy Fright and Panick, where my Reason was of no Use to me") and physical symptoms (including "a sudden violent Head-ach," "extream Sickness in my Stomach," and "a constant Colick, and an ill Taste and Savour in my Mouth") over the years. More recently, the intellectual odysseys of Charles Darwin, Sigmund Freud, and William James were powerfully driven by their curiosity about, and the desire to find relief from, their own anxious suffering. Freud used his acute train phobia and his hypochondria, among other things, to construct his theory of psychoanalysis; Darwin was effectively housebound by stress-related illnesses after the voyage of the Beagle — he spent years in pursuit of relief from his anxiety, visiting spas and, on the advice of one doctor, encasing himself in ice. James tried to keep his phobias hidden from the public but was often quietly terrified. "I awoke morning after morning with a horrible dread in the pit of my stomach and with a sense of insecurity of life that I never knew before," he wrote in 1902 of the onset of his anxiety. "For months, I was unable to go out in the dark alone."
Unlike Darwin, Freud, and James, I'm not out to adumbrate a whole new theory of mind or of human nature. Rather, this book is motivated by a quest to understand, and to find relief from or redemption in, anxious suffering. This quest has taken me both backward, into history, and forward, to the frontiers of modern scientific research. I have spent much of the past eight years reading through hundreds of thousands of the pages that have been written about anxiety over the last three thousand years.
My life has, thankfully, lacked great tragedy or melodrama. I haven't served any jail time. I haven't been to rehab. I haven't assaulted anyone or carried out a suicide attempt. I haven't woken up naked in the middle of a field, sojourned in a crack house, or been fired from a job for erratic behavior. As psychopathologies go, mine has been — so far, most of the time, to outward appearances — quiet. Robert Downey Jr. will not be starring in the movie of my life. I am, as they say in the clinical literature, "high functioning" for someone with an anxiety disorder or a mental illness; I'm usually quite good at hiding it. More than a few people, some of whom think they know me quite well, have remarked that they are struck that I, who can seem so even-keeled and imperturbable, would choose to write a book about anxiety. I smile gently while churning inside and thinking about what I've learned is a signature characteristic of the phobic personality: "the need and ability" — as described in the self-help book Your Phobia — "to present a relatively placid, untroubled appearance to others, while suffering extreme distress on the inside." *
To some people, I may seem calm. But if you could peer beneath the surface, you would see that I'm like a duck — paddling, paddling, paddling.
* "For many, many people who have anxiety disorders — particularly agoraphobia and panic disorder — people would be surprised to find out that they have problems with anxiety because they seem so'together' and in control," says Paul Foxman, a psychologist who heads the Center for Anxiety Disorders in Burlington, Vermont. "They seem to be comfortable, but there's a disconnection between the public self and the private self."
Excerpted from My Age of Anxiety by Scott Stossel Copyright 2013 by Scott Stossel. Excerpted by permission of Knopf, a division of Random House LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.


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Why I'm Rooting For 'Real' Love: Supporting The Couples Of "Real Housewives of Atlanta"
From Essence
The last two episodes of The Real Housewives of Atlanta have featured the ladies on a couples vacation to Anguilla. If you're remotely a fan of reality TV, or even if you've traveled with friends, you know that you see the best and worst of folks when you get them out of their usual environment. Couples are no different.
The best of the couples was Peter and Cynthia. After the drama that occurred on their wedding day, it was no surprise that Peter wanted a do-over. Last night, he surprised Cynthia with a second wedding to renew their vows. Without Cynthia's sister around to stir up some drama, the ceremony went off without a hitch. It was a great Black love moment, something I wish we could get more of on this show specifically, and on TV in general.
Kandi and her new boo Todd made the most of their vacay by getting frisky in the public Jacuzzi. Like Phaedra, who said "Since I'm in love with my own vagina, I protect it dearly," I was turned off by the idea, but I'm guessing — hoping, really — the hot water will remove any germs, from them or the couple beforehand. Todd and Kandi seemed chipper in their post-coitus home video update, so I guess no harm, no foul.
Nene and Gregg have been surprisingly tame over the last few episodes. And I'm taking that to mean that whatever they are trying to rekindle is going well. To let Nene tell it, Gregg, who has made it clear he wants to be her husband again, was encouraged when she caught the bouquet at Cynthia's wedding. Gregg was cheering like the Falcons had just won the Super Bowl. (Nene hilariously described him as "acting like the Klumps," an allusion to the charming and chubby family from The Nutty Professor.) It gave me hope that perhaps Peter and Cynthia's wedding won't be the only one we see this season.
Read more at Essence


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If you're looking for engineered wood flooring for the dining room, you're in the right place. We have a huge stock of engineered wood flooring in pretty much every species, colour, grade and finish you can imagine. So no matter whether you're looking for a broad board, monochrome look or a narrow board with an aged and distressed finish, you need look no further.
Engineered wood flooring for the dining room is really popular these days. With more and more people having under floor heating in their dining rooms, they are seeking out this natural looking and highly practical flooring option.
When you choose engineered wood flooring for the dining room, you can either decide to match it closely with your furnishings or contrast it completely to make a real statement; it's entirely up to you. One thing is sure, you'll finish up with a flooring solution that looks great and is easy to maintain.


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Moberly Motor Co necesitaba un nuevo diseño de logotipo y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 341 diseños de 55 diseñadores freelance.
Moberly Motor Company - Ford, Lincoln, Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep and Ram
Hey - Let's split a 6 pack!! We are a Ford, Lincoln, Chrysler, Dodge ,Jeep and Ram Dealer in need of a FROSTY new image.
Our targeted audience is a wide range, 25-60 years old. We are a 3rd generation family owned business that started in 1943. Our local area would be considered rural, a town of 12,000 people with an agricultural tradition. Our market is North Central Missouri that ranges 60 miles to the West, North and East with primarily no competitors. However our major competitors are 30 south in the town Columbia, Mo. Internet, Newspaper, Radio and Direct mail are our primary ways of marketing. Ford has been our primary anchor franchise. We pride ourselves in doing business in an honest, friendly, no pressure atmosphere.
The logo will be used for letterhead, invoices, business cards, newspaper print, internet, website, banner ads, billboards, and large signage. The logo must come across as appealing in black and white as it would in color, do to our usage in newspaper. Color – Really no color requirements, however we feel we would be partial to Ford Blue with in the logo. We would request that there would be 4 or fewer colors involved in the color version of the logo. Because of its various usages, proportional sizes will be important. The logo will have to display well in combination with these franchise logos, Ford, Lincoln, Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep and Ram. We request that the logo be submitted in at least two different formats, logo shown by its self and in combination with the franchise logos listed above. Other considerations are that this logo is clean and crisp to the eye. No cartoons please! Type face should be clear, simple and bold but something that stands out. We currently do not have a dealership theme like some dealers do, such as the "Minivan Store" and "Truck Wholesalers". With all said above, we are open to all designs. We are open to questions and suggestions to make this project successful to all. Files will need to be in the following format JPG, EPS and AI. We are open to using "Moberly Motors", Moberly Motor Company" and "Moberly Motor Co."
Descubre cómo funciona un concurso de diseño u obtén más información sobre nuestros servicios de diseño de logo.


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Available Sizes: M ⇨ Z+3
◉ FINISH: Brushed and matt with rose gold plating
◉ INLAY: Black and rose gold plating (all plating does wear down over time)
◉ THICKNESS: 2.3-2.5mm
◉ WIDTH: 8mm
Together with our reliable courier service, we will deliver your ring to your doorstep within 1 – 2 working days, anywhere in South Africa.
Delivery to farm address carry an extra cost which needs to be worked out once we have the address of the farm. This also applies to outside of SA, and some remote outlying areas
*Should you order the incorrect size of this product, please email us on email@example.com, we will gladly assist you with our quick & simple exchange process.
A tough metal for a tough guy!


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As well as the huge number of Ultrabooks here at CES 2012, there have also been a fair few tablets too.
But what about this prototype?
It's an Intel Core i-series-based Ultrabook but one where the screen detaches to become a 13.3-inch tablet.
It's made by Compal, a Taiwanese firm more used to manufacturing hardware for other people.
The device currently runs Windows 7, but our representative said that the device is fully touch compatible with Windows 8.
As you can see, the tablet itself is razor-thin.
It's also extremely light - under 800g apparently. You get full notebook-like ports though - there's USB 3.0 and microHDMI as well as an SD card slot.
There are rear-facing and front-facing cameras too.
Unfortunately, as the device is Core rather than Atom-based, the unit does get a little hot.
The keyboard dock also includes more battery capacity.
It's certainly an interesting device and, while we really think it has the wrong Intel processor inside, it's an interesting fusion that would really come alive with Windows 8.


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Colorado's third-grade reading results in the final year of the Transitional Colorado Assessment Program dipped slightly from last year, but students scoring proficient or advanced continued to hover in the low 70 percent range.
3rd Grade Reading Results: Colorado 2014 TCAP
The 2014 numbers showed 71.5 percent of the state's third-graders essentially passing the test. That's down from 73 percent in 2013, although each year's scores represent a different group of students.
Statewide data show similar drops among black and Latino students, who passed at about a 56 percent rate. Growth data that chart students' year-to-year progress won't be out until August.
Still, the general dip in scores as Colorado begins implementation of the READ Act — the 2012 legislation that directs schools to identify and help struggling early readers — has caught the attention of district administrators.
"There's no easy answer to why we're all down," said Judy Skupa, assistant superintendent of performance improvement for Cherry Creek Schools, which saw a dip of 3 percentage points. "The answer is going to be complex and require some deep conversations with all the folks involved."
Scores in Denver Public Schools, Boulder Valley, Littleton and Adams 12 all lagged about 1 percentage point over last year, while Douglas County lost 2.5 percentage points.
DPS Superintendent Tom Boasberg called the statewide numbers "very concerning." Although DPS has significantly closed its gap compared with Colorado averages, he said the continuing deficit demands attention on early literacy even as the legislature wrestles with future funding for the READ Act.
"We need to focus very closely on reading for all our kids, particularly young students," said Boasberg, noting that the district will institute three initiatives this summer aimed at improving early literacy.
Districts across the state began implementing the READ Act this school year, which meant that struggling students probably received only a few months of interventions before TCAP testing began in February.
Because the interventions target students starting in kindergarten, it could be another three years before the legislation's impact can be measured fully.
"What I'm excited about with the READ Act is that it's helping us identify students and pinpoint the right intervention for each child," said Heather Beck, chief academic officer for Jefferson County Public Schools. "That is critical and why there's hope for future student scores."
Westminster 50, a traditionally low-performing district, was the only large metro-area district to show improvement over last year in terms of third-graders who scored proficient or advanced on TCAP.
That continues a four-year trend that the district ascribes largely to its competency-based system of not advancing students until they have mastered grade-level material. Slightly less than half of its third-graders passed the test last year, but 56.3 percent scored proficient or advanced this year.
It has seen a nearly 10 percentage-point rise since 2012.
"We still have a lot of work ahead of us, but four consecutive years of growth show that our requirement that every child fully understand a learning target before moving to the next level was the right decision for our children," said Westminster 50 Superintendent Pam Swanson.
Kevin Simpson: 303-954-1739, firstname.lastname@example.com or twitter.com/ksimpsondp


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Off-Campus Study
Kauke Hall
400 E. University St.
Wooster, OH 44691
Phone: 330-263-2463
Fax: 330-263-2614
We strongly encourage all of our students to pursue a semester or a year of off-campus study. Off-campus study gives students the opportunity to see a wider world for themselves and observe the ways in which the past shapes the present while exploring a new culture. In the past, History students have attended programs in Rio de Janeiro, Prague, Nairobi, Tokyo, Barcelona, Galway, and beyond.
If you are planning to study off-campus, please consult with your adviser and the Office of Off-Campus Study. Together, they can help you identify programs and courses that match your interests and needs. You will need to plan ahead. Applications for off-campus study are due early in the spring semester of the year before you study off-campus. For more information, see the Off-Campus Study website.
The History Department has played a very active role in off-campus study. Prof. Hettinger has led students to Siena, Italy for her Wooster-in-Tuscany summer program. Prof. Friedman took a group of students to Israel and Palestine for two weeks over spring break in 2012 as part of her History 228: Israel/Palestine: Histories in Conflict. In the summer of 2012, Prof. Pozefsky led a group to Shillong, India, in the foothills of the Himalayas, for his Wooster-in-India program.


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Camo Glasses
These protective glasses feature a modern design with a camo-pattern frame.
A combination of safety and style, Camo Glasses from STIHL provide 99% UV protection in a sleek, camo-pattern frame. The single lens, wrap-around design offers great protection and an overall modern look. The lenses are made from an optical-grade polycarbonate. Soft rubber temple tips and nosepiece are designed to help maintain fit while reducing slippage.
Meets ANSI Z87+ standard
Available lens colors: Bronze Smoke, Yellow
|Camo Glasses Specifications
|Bronze Smoke
|Green Camo
Important Information
Note: Goggles or protective glasses meeting ANSI Standard Z87.1 must be worn under face screen and shield for primary eye protection.
WARNING! Improper use of any power tool may cause serious
or fatal injury. Read, understand and follow carefully the operating
and safety instructions in your instruction manual before using such products.
STIHL products sold through U.S. STIHL Dealers are for distribution in the United States only.
STIHL Limited Warranty
Contact Us


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Veterans Education Services – MIA/POW
- National Guard National Guard
Grant (NG)
- Montgomery "G.I.
Bill" Education Benefits
- Illinois Veterans Grants
- MIA/POW (Ch35)
- Vocational Rehabilitation
Program (Ch31)
MIA/POW (Ch 35)
How to apply:
There are two programs in this category for which you can apply with the State of Illinois. One is the State of Illinois MIA/POW Grant offered to anyone who meets the eligibility standards under this program. There is also the Dependents Educational Assistance program (Chapter 35 of title 38, U.S. Code) which was enacted by Congress to provide education and training opportunities to eligible dependents and survivors of certain veterans. The first program is a state program and the second is a federal program. You can obtain most of the information you will need at www.gibill.va.gov.
Are you eligible?
Each program provides financial aid for the education of a dependent or surviving son, daughter or spouse of a veteran who dies of, or is permanently and totally disabled as the result of, service-connected disability. The disability must be the result of active service in the Armed Forces. There are more eligibility requirements, and they can be found on the above web site.
How long are you eligible?
To receive benefits under the Ch 35 federal program for attending school or job training under the program, you must be between the ages of 18 and 26. In certain instances, it is possible to begin before age 18 and to continue after age 26. Marriage of a child does not bar him/her from receiving this benefit; however, an eligible child may not receive benefits while on active duty in the Armed Forces. To pursue training after military service, your discharge must be under honorable conditions. The VA can extend your period of eligibility by the number of months and days equal to the time spent on active duty. This extension cannot go beyond your 31st birthday. To receive benefits under the State MIA/POW program you can be a spouse, natural child, legally adopted child, or any step child of a veteran or service person who has been declared by the U.S. Department of Defense or the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to have been a prisoner of war, missing-in-action, or to be 100% disabled and who, at the time of entering the service was an Illinois resident or was an Illinois resident 6 months prior to entering the service. Further information can be found by contacting Department of Veterans, 833 S. Spring Street, Springfield, Il 62794, Ph: 217-782-6645.
How are recipients selected?
The Department of Veteran's Affairs, State of Illinois will determine your qualification for state MIA/POW benefits, but the federal program will be determined by the Regional Office in St. Louis.
How and when are funds paid out?
State MIA/POW recipients do not receive a cash award. Your tuition, activity fee, and athletic fee will be paid by the State of Illinois. Upon verification of eligibility, the applicant will be issued an I.D. Card. The I.D. card shall be used to substantiate the dependent's eligibility. The Ch 35 program will determine the amount of payment according to the number of credit hours you are taking. The Veterans Office in St. Louis will issue a C-Number that will be used when registering for benefits. It is beneficial that you file prior to the start of the semester. Also, you must complete and submit a Request for Benefits Form [PDF] to the Office of Financial Assistance located in UHB 1015 for the semester you are enrolling for.
Additional Information:
The state MIA/POW award can be used in unison with your federal Ch.35 benefits.


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We invite you to apply by mail or online
Read about the Communication graduate admissions requirements
The UMass Amherst Graduate School Bulletin includes a Communication program overview that lists application requirements.
Apply through the Graduate School Admissions Office
The UMass Amherst Graduate School Admissions Office has a standardized application form. For more application information and forms, including an online application, please visit the Admissions section of the UMass Amherst Graduate School website.
The application deadline for fall admission is January 2nd. Spring admissions are not considered.
About the admission decision
Although the graduate school retains applicants' official records, decisions to accept applicants to the Communication program (and to recommend admittance to the university) are made by the department's own Graduate Admissions Committee. The committee is highly selective. Admission decisions are based on all available information, not on any single criterion. Primary considerations include a statement of interest in areas in which the department has expertise, letters of recommendation, grade-point averages, and Graduate Record Exam scores.
Financial assistance
Students in the program have a variety of options for financial assistance. Decisions about assistance are made subsequent to and independent of acceptance into the program. However, academic performance is the primary consideration in both decisions. See Funding, at left.
PhD requirements
PhD admission
The Department of Communication does not require grad school applicants to have an undergraduate major or MA in communication. Acceptance into the program is based primarily on general academic ability and interest in the areas of study within the department. Students with no background in the discipline are usually required to complete supplemental courses in addition to the minimum requirements for the PhD. PhD candidates must have a master's degree (or equivalent) from an accredited college or university.


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David Kramer Adapts Happy New Year For SA Premiere At The Fugard Theatre
The South African theatre legend has brought another international exciting show to Cape Town
The South African theatre legend has brought another international exciting show to Cape Town
Discover the mysterious Lavender Lady, an unsinkable coffin, butchering barbers, exhumed skeletons, a baby killer and meander through the historic burial ground
Catch B Charles Experience, Chasing Time and DJs performing RnB, pop, jazz, funk, Motown and more at Jackson Hall
Four top comedians hit the stage at a Night of Headliners
Artist Natasja de Wet brings her recycled goods art exhibition to a pathology learning centre.
Over the years, more than 55 000 trees have been planted during the festival. Come dig in!
Kick back and start your weekend with a Friday afternoon sundowner session at Avondale Wines in Paarl – food platters by Faber, music and more
What an awesome vibe: Top Franschhoek chefs' lunch favourite is now open till late (one night of the week only) for live music Fridays under the oaks
Experience the best wines the Western Cape has to offer, all while having fun with Wine Flies
Bring the kids along to experience the Duck Parade
Pay a special rate for entrance into SA's first 3D space-themed glow-in-the-dark mini-golf adventure
Live reggae music every Saturday at Strolla: sprawl out on the Corona Sunset Deck as the sun dips over Sea Point
World-renowned DJ Dino Moran takes over city's most vibey steak joint
Rain or shine: Now more farm-fresh food stalls and seating, plus: local music and great wine at the Boschendal Friday Night Market
Forget the traffic: watch the sun set to cool SA house vibes with after-work sundowners at the rooftop at Harald's Bar & Terrace
And now they have added couture alcoholic cocktails to the menu at this all-day cafe
Make your kids' birthday party extra special with outdoor laser tag with Battlefield Live SA
New to the surfing game? You're in good hands at African Soul Surfer
This week-long surf and yoga camp includes breakfast, accommodation and all your equipment – it's the ideal beachside getaway
Finally, there's a place in Cape Town where you can get exceptional home, camping, tactical and survival gifts for men and women – and it's open till 7pm. Head for Just Like Papa on Harrington Street
Enjoy a delicious wood-fired pizza while taking a tour of the crocodile pond or the snake exhibit at a 20% discount on a Friday
Live DJ, killer cocktails, 38 gourmet milkshakes and the chance to meet exciting new people (not to mention the free CBD parking) – here's why weekend parties at Protea Hotel Fire & Ice by Marriott is one of our fave Tamboerskloof discoveries


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- Prayer and Worship
- Beliefs and Teachings
- Issues and Action
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- Bible
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- About USCCB
Letter to Ambassador Schwab on Trade Relationship Between the United States and Vietnam
Bishop Thomas G. Wenski, August 24, 2006
Letter to Vietnamese Ambassador
Bishop John Ricard, April 28, 2004
Greetings on Behalf of the Episcopal Conference of Vietnam
Bishop Paul Nguyen Van Hoa, November 10, 2003
Testimony on Religious Persecution in Vietnam
Thomas E. Quigley, May 16, 2001
Statement on Peace, Reconciliation and Religious Freedom in Vietnam
Bishop Joseph A. Fiorenza, November 24, 1999
Statement on U.S. Normalization of Relations with Vietnam
Bishop Daniel P. Reilly, July 11, 1995
Statement on Vietnam
Bishop Daniel P. Reilly, September 15, 1994
By accepting this message, you will be leaving the website of the
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High Performance JS heatmaps - Codeflow: "You might have encountered heatmaps for data visualization before. There is a fabulous library, heatmap.js, which brings that capability to draw them to javascript. There is only one problem, it is not exactly fast. Sometimes that doesn't matter. But if you have hundreds of thousands of data points to plot, or need realtime performance, it gets tricky. To solve that I've written a little engine using WebGL for drawing heatmaps."
'via Blog this'


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Dan Deacon's new album is titled "America" (Domino). Nothing like aiming high: It's a song cycle on what it means to be a citizen of a troubled democracy, and you can dance to it. The classically trained Deacon works with an orchestra, merges it with his own array of hand-me-down keyboards and electronics, and then tops it off with some of the most ambitious lyrics of a career primarily focused on instrumental music.
"America" addresses an era pulled apart by radical extremes: the Tea Party and Occupy movements. But this album is as much of a personal reckoning as a political one. Deacon says that several years ago his apathy was overwhelming; he was convinced that he could do nothing to change the status quo. So, with no future around the corner and thoughts of Apocalypse dancing in his head, he was content to drop out and party, as Prince once said, like it's 1999.
He felt powerless in "a so-called democracy that is waging wars in the name of protecting me and my country and my way of life." But in the last few years, he says, he's snapped out of it.
"I've never had faith in government, but like it or not I'm in this system, and if I don't actively try to do something about it, I'm part of the problem," he says. "The United States has a crazy nonunified history. North, South -- each region has a completely different history. The expansion from East to West, you get a different viewpoint from each angle. You could say America took this country or America made this country, and both ideas could be true. It goes constantly back and forth."
So in contrast to the rave-like celebration of "Bromst," his 2009 album, Deacon went deeper on "America." The music encompasses classical themes and avant-garde textures – not unexpected for a Baltimore-based composer and musician who is regarded as a rising star on the contemporary classical scene and has scored a film for Francis Ford Coppola ("Twixt" in 2011). But there's also a greater emphasis on narrative; the bleak viewpoints on ecological and political carnage shared on the first half of the album turn to hope, even awe, about the natural beauty of the land on the second.
"People can't argue abut that: The land of the U.S. is beautiful and inspiring," Deacon says. "It's something to be proud of. And the other side is how is this going to exist? I wanted to frame these ideas in an inspirational mind set. Not just false hope or blind optimism. When depressed, I write music that makes me feel uplifted or empowered or gives me reason to celebrate. I think my music has had that trait for the last three albums. With the lyrics, I wanted to ground those issues, to make people think. There is a song from the Baltimore club scene, 'Dance My Pain Away,' about a person who is broken and despairing and yet people are dancing to it. John Lennon created a dialogue with his music. What does he mean, 'War is over if you want it?' It was overt, but it almost bypassed the issue and brought it back to the person interacting with his work."
And that's where this journey through "America" ends, with Deacon's final wish on the album: "Hope I get it right tomorrow."
"What I hope this album will do is spur questions," he says. "Because that is what is happening in my life right now -- questioning my realities. It's hard for me view the future in a utopian sense. What can I do to change that? What can I do to change me that isn't going to make it worse for anyone else? How can I change my reality so that I am not contributing to the destruction of the earth?"
In concert, the weight of those questions is distributed among artist and audience and turned into something of a celebration, a we-can-do-this-together vibe. At a Deacon show, the fans are as much a part of the experience as the guy leading the band.
"The first time I ever did any audience interaction, I had to," he says. "I was playing in a basement club in New York, around 2004, and it was one of the first shows I was doing that was packed, about 50 people, which for me at the time was a lot. Everyone was dancing like crazy and then the power blew, except for one ceiling light. I realized that if I don't keep the audience in that moment, I was going to lose the show. Everyone was in a circle, and I created a dance contest. I came up with all these convoluted rules. It worked, it kept everyone in the room until the power went back on.
"The whole context of the performance had shifted, and it shifted something in my mind. I started thinking the audience took over the performance, and the whole room changed. There was no front row or back row because everyone was facing the center of the room when I did this contest. So it got me thinking about more ways to create these audience-interaction situations. I started thinking of the audience as another compositional element. How important is the crowd to a performance? Ultimately, the crowd is the performance. If the band is great and the audience sucks, the show sucks. There is not one without the other. An audience is just a mob and a performer is just a roaming narcissist without the other."
Dan Deacon: 2:45 p.m. Saturday at the North Coast Music Festival in Union Park, 1501 W. Randolph St., $120 for three-day pass; northcoastfestival.com.


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England | Scotland | Wales | Northern Ireland | Ireland
Get the latest NHS information and advice about coronavirus (COVID-19), a new illness that affects your lungs and airways.
Check if you have coronavirus symptoms
Find out about the main symptoms of coronavirus and where to get medical advice if you think you have them.
What to do if you or someone you live with has symptoms of coronavirus
Advice about not leaving your home (self-isolation) and looking after yourself if you or someone you live with has symptoms.
Testing for coronavirus
Information about testing to check if you have coronavirus.
People at higher risk from coronavirus
Advice for people at higher risk from coronavirus, including older people, people with health conditions and pregnant women.
Coronavirus in children
Advice about symptoms of coronavirus in children, including when to get medical help if your child seems unwell.
Social distancing advice and changes to everyday life because of coronavirus
Advice about avoiding close contact with other people (social distancing), looking after your wellbeing and using the NHS and other services.
Links to more information about coronavirus
Links to government advice, information for health professionals and advice for other parts of the UK.
Hunters WayKimbolton Cambs, PE28 0JFTel: 01480 860 205
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The username and password will be sent to your registered address.


text:
Produced in cooperation with
For more information about ETFs, mutual funds and the broad array of services from Standard & Poor's, please visit MarketScopeAdvisor.com or call 877-219-1247 for a free trial.
One of the most perplexing questions facing investors these days is what to make of gold. With the cracks in the global financial system seemingly growing wider, and gold prices in the midst of a decade-long rally, more investors are wondering, do I buy? Sell? Wait until later?
With the listing of the SPDR Gold Shares, then called the StreetTRACKS Gold Trust, exchange traded fund (GLD) in November 2004, questions about gold have become more pressing. Prior to the fund's launch, there really was no convenient way to invest in gold, and so few investors owned it. Those who wanted to speculate traded futures, and the true believers stashed coins in their attic.
Now, there is $2.1 billion in Gold Shares traded every day and it is the second largest U.S. ETF by assets — $68 billion as of October 31. Several copycat ETFs – including the iShares Gold Trust (IAU), the ETFS Physical Shares Gold Trust (SGOL), and the ETFS Physical Asian Gold Shares (AGOL) – have sprung up to tap into the demand for gold, proving the old adage that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
These new offerings, together with the dramatic rise in gold prices since 2005, the financial crisis of 2008 and 2009, and the massive budget deficit spending programs underway in the U.S. and Europe, have served to make gold a central topic of investor interest.
There is no shortage of opinion about where gold prices will head in the future, but nobody really knows for sure. Standard & Poor's Equity Analyst Leo Larkin, who follows gold mining companies, believes that gold prices will reach $1,900 per ounce by the end of 2012. While that may seem attractive, it's only a 6% gain from gold price levels that prevailed in early November 2011.
Diehard gold fans probably own gold already, so for those still asking whether or not to own gold, a better question might be whether gold would help or hurt their portfolio's overall, risk-adjusted return.
While the merits of gold as a long-term store of value or a hedge against inflation can be argued ad infinitum, it seems intuitively clear that gold belongs to an asset class that is distinct from the equity and fixed income categories that dominate most portfolios.
That intuitive sense is backed up by the numbers as well, according to a recent report from the World Gold Council, a trade group for the world's largest gold miners.
For the period of January, 1987 to June, 2011, the monthly returns delivered by gold had a negative correlation to most domestic equity asset classes, and less than a 0.5 correlation to all 16 asset classes studied. (Interestingly, the study found that gold has been less volatile than seven of those 16 categories, including U.S. large-cap equities, developed world equities, and real estate.)
Using these and other statistics, the report concludes that gold can improve risk-adjusted returns for portfolios made up of equity, fixed income and commodity assets, as well as those holding private equity, hedge fund, and real estate assets.
The study found that for professionally managed portfolios with 55% in equities, 25% fixed income, 5% cash and the remainder in alternative asset classes, as well as more conservative portfolios (35% equity, 50% fixed income, 10% cash and the remainder in alternative categories), gold allocations of 3.6% to 4.4% can improve risk-adjusted performance.
Whether that will prove true in the future, however, is another matter. The period surveyed included a long period of time, 1987-2004, when gold prices varied by little more than $200 an ounce, as well as a 260% rally that occurred over the last six years. Of course, that rally may be repeated in the years ahead, but then again, it may not.
Also, while that period included many unusual and unforeseen events, the central attraction to gold for many is that it holds its value during periods of inflation, and inflation was notably absent – at least from a historical perspective – during that period.
While it may be the case that an added dose of inflation would have made gold perform even better, it may also be the case that if interest rates rose in response to stronger inflation, the cost of owning gold would have risen as well, and its attraction might have waned as a result.
Yet another issue to consider is that many admirers of the yellow metal formed their opinions when there were less sophisticated hedging instruments available to individual investors. With the growth of the ETF industry, investors now have access to funds that deliver the inverse performance of a wide range of equity, fixed income, and currency-based assets.
These instruments can be targeted at specific risks, such as inflation or currency devaluation, while the same cannot be said for gold. Some, such as Treasury Inflation Protected Securities, offer a modest return even when markets move against them.
In conclusion, gold has many attributes that investors want, and since 2005 it has been one of the few assets that have delivered positive returns year after year.
For those who firmly believe that will be the case in the future as well, owning gold can make sense, especially if it is an allocation of 3% to 4%. For those primarily interested in total return, however, gold is only one of many ways to diversify and improve risk-adjusted returns.
S&P Capital IQ Senior Editorial Manager Vaughan Scully can be reached at email@example.com. Send him your ideas for ETF and mutual fund stories.


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[Geetham Lists]
Seven Wonders of Tamil Nadu
:p :p
Okie, dear people..
We have had plenty of discussions about the new seven wonders, or 7-W version 1.01 etc. Good or bad, agree or disagree, one good thing is to list some places that are important centers of culture and interests of tourism.
What would be your list of 7 important places to see in Tamil Nadu?
Let us confine this list to only man-made wonders - architectural and other such interests (that are not-worship places). We can create few more lists for Temples (and other worship places), for natural habitats, and for beachers.
Nominate them now.. we will vote for them after a week.. Each nomination should have atleast two votes/selections for inclusion in the poll..
Top seven will form the
Geetham's List of 7WofTN
Would be nice if you can add some photos as well. May be next time when we visit India, we could check out some of these places..


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Back in the day, say a decade ago or so, when e-prescribing itself was a new and big deal, the feds – especially the DEA – didn't think much of the e-prescribing of controlled drugs like opiates. But a few years later the agency eventually came around. In June of 2010, it released a rule which allowed providers to issue such prescriptions nd pharmacies to receive, dispense and archive these scripts electronically nationwide.
Since then, electronic prescribing of controlled substances (EPCS) has taken off, according to a story in Search HealthIT. In fact, EPCS has been growing rapidly, particularly during 2015, according to national pharmacy IT network Surescripts.
Specifically, the number of ECPS transactions shot up 600% last year, from 1.67 million to 12.8 million scripts issued, according to Surescripts' 2015 National Progress Report. Part of the reason for this surge is that providers are getting on board at a brisk pace. The number of providers enabled to use EPCS grew 359% last year.
Among the interesting stats to be culled from the Surescripts report is that 32% of drugs prescribed were opioids. This statistic should draw a lot of interest from public officials and enforcement agencies trying to stem the tide of opioid overdoses which killed more than 28,000 Americans in 2014. That's four times as many who died of this cause in 2010, according to Surescripts' sources.
A Drop in the Bucket
It's worth noting that the number of EPCS transactions still pales in contrast to the number of transactions hosted on the Surescripts network that year. The network handled 9.7 billion transactions in 2015, up 40% from the previous year, the company reported. That means the EPCS is still a drop in the bucket overall.
Also, levels of EPCS-enabled pharmacies and physicians vary across the U.S. For example, 91% of pharmacies are EPCS-enabled in New York, the top state for such pharmacies. (A New York State rule requiring every practitioner in the state to e-prescribe all medications went into effect in March.) Other top-ranked states for pharmacy penetration included Massachusetts, California and Texas. On the other hand, only 73% of pharmacies were EPCS-enabled in Georgia and Florida.
Still, with adoption levels seemingly evening out between states – and the gap small enough to close over the next few years – it seems like EPCS is becoming an established practice. Surescripts contends that this is for the best, and argues that EPCS reduces fraud and improper prescribing by making it easier to track such medications. And with states like New York mandating e-prescribing for all providers, the growth in EPCS is likely to stay healthy.
However, for every action there's a reaction, and the other shoe may not have dropped where EPCS risks are concerned. It may take a few years to find out whether the confidence some have in this approach was merited.


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Although there is nothing wrong with some banter between posters during the Ashes, insulting or harassing other members is completely inappropriate. As is trolling to provoke a response from other members. The match threads are for discussion of the match, and not for sledging that has been going on over the past few days - the 'under the lid' thread is specifically provided for this.
If posters carry on breaking forum rules, we will review what is posted and take action if we think it is required.


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Quote:Surgery might be in my near future as two vertibra are crushed and a nerve is pinched that is affecting my right hand and arm.
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- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
- 1/4 cup finely diced pancetta
- 1 medium onion, peeled and thinly sliced
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 3 whole garlic cloves, peeled
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 jalapeno, seeded and diced
- 2 green Anaheim chiles, seeded and diced
- 1 green pasilla chile, seeded and diced
- 1 3/4 pounds firm, green tomatoes, cored and cut into eighths
- 3 cups chicken stock
- 1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 2 teaspoons hot sauce
- Cilantro Oil, for garnish
- Cilantro Oil:
- 1 cup packed fresh cilantro, tough stems removed
- 1/2 cup canola or vegetable oil
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- Heat the oil in a large saucepan, over medium heat. Add the pancetta and cook until crispy and golden, 8 to 10 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, remove the pancetta from the pan, place on a paper towel-lined plate, and reserve.
- Increase the heat to medium-high and add the onions to the hot oil. Saute until soft, about 3 to 4 minutes. Season the onions with salt and pepper. Add the garlic, bay leaves and chiles, and cook for 5 minutes. Add the tomatoes and stock. Adjust the seasonings with salt and pepper. Bring the liquid to a boil and reduce to a simmer. Cook for 10 to 15 minutes or until the tomatoes soften.
- Remove the bay leaves, and using a handheld blender, puree the soup until smooth. Alternatively, you can omit blending and leave the soup chunky. Stir in the lemon juice and hot sauce. Adjust seasonings with salt and pepper.
- To serve, ladle the soup into individual bowls and garnish with a drizzle of Cilantro Oil and the reserved pancetta.
- Cilantro Oil: Bring a medium pot of water to a boil. Add the cilantro and blanch for 10 seconds. Remove and shock in an ice bath. Pat dry well on paper towels, squeezing to remove any excess water. Roughly chop and transfer to a blender. With the machine running, add the oil and salt and process until smooth. Transfer to a squirt bottle and refrigerate until needed, for up to 1 week. (Bring to room temperature before using.)
- Yield: about 1/2 cup
Recipe Details
- Source: Emeril Live EM0229 [4]
- Dish Type: Soups [5]


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Princeton Radiology necesitaba un nuevo diseño de otro y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 102 diseños de 26 diseñadores freelance.
The Chesterfield - Princeton, NJ
We are creating casino quality high end custom poker chips for a home poker game. The chips will be manufactured by the same company that makes poker chips for the casinos. See in req. below.
Our target audience is the guys in the poker game. This includes stockbrokers, businessmen, dentists, and doctors.
Need a great design for custom poker chips. Two designs are needed. One for each side of the chip.
We do NOT want the denomination (NO $amt) in the design, but the chips will be needed in the following standard colors: red ($5), green ($25), black ($100), purple ($500), and grey ($5,000). Multiple colors may be used in the design, but the chips should be easily recognizable, even at a distance, by their dominant color.
The words: "The Chesterfield" and "Princeton, NJ" should be incorporated into the design. One side should incorporate the "Tree" image attached. The other side should be an orignal design. I would suggest something related to the target audience, poker, or Princeton, NJ. For extra points you can submit a different design for each denomination/color.
Please add the initials "LEV" in all caps in the outer border of the design.
Please do not submit a design that is just the tree on one side & the words on the other side. I can do that myself. This type of submission will be eliminated.
Prefer image file in a vector based file format such as .psd or .ai.
The chips will be Chipco Pro-Tech chips. These are a solid 10 grams and 39 mm in size. Examples of final quality can be seen here:
I uploaded two images of other example chips: foxwoods.jpg and venetian.jpg


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02 Mar, 2012
Following the publication this week of an article in Science Insider the Director-General of the ITER Organization, Osamu Motojima, has issued a letter to the author of the article to provide more detailed and accurate background information related to the ITER central solenoid conductor tests carried out recently at the SULTAN Test Facility in Switzerland.
A shortened version of the letter has also been posted on the Science Insider website.
1st March 2012
Dear Mr. Clery,
Science Insider
I had a chance to read your article dated 27 February 2012 ("ITER Dodges Trouble With Superconducting Cables"). I appreciate your positive evaluation that the ITER Project is dodging trouble with its central solenoid coil conductor. However, I got the impression — and I'm not the only one — that this article does not really reflect the real situation of ITER's conductor development, achievements and history up to now. I believe that Neil Mitchell tried to do his best explaining the present situation to you, however your recap does not give the full picture.
Therefore, I am writing this letter in order to ask you for the possibility of a "correction" or a "follow-up" to your most recent article. The article implies that the Japanese Domestic Agency (JA-DA) and its industrial suppliers have failed to deliver a central solenoid conductor sample that works. This is not correct, since there is neither technical mistake nor fault and the JA-DA and its supplier did their best to develop a central solenoid conductor sample as defined by the ITER baseline requirements.
The recent test conductor design reflects one episode of a long story that began with the successful testing of a central solenoid model coil in NAKA, Japan, which was implemented during the ITER Engineering Design Activity (EDA) phase that finished in 2001. A major change of the central solenoid conductor design was then decided in 2003-2004 done by the ITER team before the official establishment of the ITER Organization. After that, the tests performed at SULTAN were reviewed in 2006, which led to significant improvements in SULTAN sample preparation and instrumentation.
Waiting for the official foundation of the ITER Organization in 2007, the Organization started to take responsibility to perform the SULTAN tests with Domestic Agencies under the authority of the Science and Technology Advisory Committee (STAC), the Management Advisory Committee (MAC) and the ITER Council.
This above-described history was a common effort endorsed by all ITER partners and the JA-DA implemented the recommended changes. The responsibility is thus not within the Japanese Domestic Agency nor its industrial suppliers. Japanese industrial suppliers have world-class capability which has been demonstrated by many superconducting projects up to now.
Therefore, the statements in your article: "The cables that failed last year ...." and: "Last year's sample, manufactured in Japan ..." do not reflect the situation. It is the failure of all of us not only Japan. However, as Neil Mitchell mentioned, "This demonstrates clearly that there is a solution that works."
With ITER, we are breaking new ground in many ways, especially with the design and manufacturing of its large and powerful superconducting coils. As it is difficult to extrapolate the performance of a new conductor design from the performance of its individual strands, all ITER Domestic Agencies and their suppliers are required to produce full-size conductor samples that are tested at the SULTAN test facility. At SULTAN, the samples have to undergo a comprehensive quality control program, which, for the central solenoid conductor, involves load cycling and warm up/cool down cycles. The recently performed tests are part of the performance qualification program of the central solenoid conductor.
However, we have to bear in mind that at SULTAN only short samples can be tested in conditions that are not fully representative of the in-situ configuration in a real coil. Therefore, the SULTAN test results have to be carefully analyzed in order to draw conclusions that are relevant for in-coil performance.
As you correctly mentioned at the end of your article, we are now looking into options that could enable our Japanese colleagues to move forward and implement the results of the top-performing sample, CSIO1. In particular, the ITER Organization has already procured and prepared a conductor sample made from existing Japanese strands that adopt the cabling pattern of the best leg of CSIO1, where the inner triplet is made of (3 x superconducting strands) with a Cu-to-non-Cu-ratio 1.5:1. Also, based on the results of CSIO1, Japanese industry is presently developing a new generation of 1.5:1 strand that could potentially surpass the results of CSIO1 (given the lead time, this new conductor sample is expected to be tested by the end of the year).
ITER is a challenging international collaboration, a kind of United Nations of Research, and all ITER partners are striving to achieve excellence and to demonstrate that developed nations regrouping more than half of the world's population are able to work together and address the main problems of the planet. Our Japanese colleagues are as eager as any of the other ITER Members to get the project to succeed and we expect that faced with unprecedented challenges (no other superconducting magnet coils in the world has ever been subjected to as many cycles as what is foreseen for the ITER central solenoid coil) the dedicated team of the Japanese Domestic Agency and the proactive Japanese suppliers will come up with a solution that meets the project requirements.
To conclude, if your article provides the very wrong impression that Japan had failed in demonstrating the performance because of the Japanese conductor design, you are sending a wrong message to the public. At present nothing is decided. The SULTAN tests will be continued using the Japanese sample and we will make the final decision based on more data and technical understanding. I would be very happy to ask you to continue to watch our action.
Best regards,
Osamu Motojima
Director-General, ITER Organization
An important milestone was achieved in February for the Korean Domestic Agency. Following the selection of Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) in January 2010 as manufacturer for the Korean section of the ITER vacuum vessel and ports, and the completion of manufacturing design late 2011, cutting has begun on the ITER-grade stainless steel plate for the vacuum vessel.
On 13 February, in the presence of quality assurance experts and engineers from the Korean Domestic Agency, the first cutting operation for vacuum vessel sector #6 was performed by HHI subcontractor Busan Waterjet.
The Director-General of the Korean Domestic Agency, Kijung Jung, stated: "I feel very great satisfaction that the Korean Domestic Agency has initiated the fabrication of this vacuum vessel sector, which is a key procurement item for the ITER project. We will do our best so that all Korean procurement items are consistently within schedule."
The accomplishment of this milestone is the result of extensive pre-fabrication works including practical experience on three full-scale mockups. Issues related to regulator and safety requirements remain to be resolved before vacuum vessel fabrication activity can accelerate.
Following agreement from the ITER Organization, HHI is working with an expert from the Agreed Notified Body (ANB)—a private company authorized by the French Nuclear Regulator to assess conformity of components in the category of Nuclear Pressure Equipment. The expert will work with HHI for five months.
High-voltage current from the French grid will be delivered to ITER's door by the tall pylons that descend, arms outstretched, from the hills of the CEA Cadarache research facility.
ITER's coil power supply system will convert the 400 kV grid voltage from these lines into controlled direct current in ITER's 22 magnet coils. The high voltage must be transformed down to a much lower voltage so it can be rectified and delivered at very high current through a huge busbar system to the magnet feeders.
A joint workshop was held at ITER from 27-28 February to discuss the instrumentation and control (I&C) for the coil power supply system; it was the first multilateral face-to-face meeting on this topic with all procurement stakeholders present: the Domestic Agencies from China, Korea and Russia and their suppliers, and ITER experts from the CODAC and Electrical Engineering Divisions—more than 40 participants in all.
The I&C system's role will be to configure the plant and allow it to be driven by the plasma control system to produce and maintain a plasma discharge. The system will also monitor and protect the plant and interconnect to the central interlock system, as well as protect personnel and the toroidal field coils from safety hazards by interconnection with the central safety system. The coil power supply system has many other interfaces, for example the pulsed power electrical network and cooling water systems.
The coordinator of this week's workshop, Jeremy Goff, likens the coil power supply system to the heart of ITER, pumping "lifeblood" through the ITER coils. "If the current does not flow there can be no plasma. The coil power supply system will be a huge installation and it must be very reliable. Some plant components will run continuously for weeks at a time ..."
Although the procurement for the system is shared, providing the coordinating "top layer" of the I&C system—the master control system—is the responsibility of Korean Domestic Agency.
The workshop met most of its aims: it brought together all those involved around one table, design proposals were shared, and further work identified to bring all the systems together into one. The participation of CODAC experts was highly beneficial and the next steps towards a common final design can now be taken.
Srikumar Banerjee, the chairman of the Indian Atomic Energy Commission, together with Sandip Kumar Mazumder, scientific advisor at the Indian Embassy in Paris, came to visit ITER this Friday. After a tour around the construction site and an intensive discussion with ITER Director-General Osamu Motojima, the representatives of the Indian state met two dozen Indian staff members working for the ITER project in France.
"ITER is a challenging project," Srikumar Banerjee said, "no doubt about that. There are big challenges all around. The exposure to such a task is something you do not get every day."
A ceremony was held in Padua, Italy on Monday 27 February for the launching of the PRIMA Neutral Beam Test Facility (NBTF).
In order to heat fuel to the 200-300 million °C temperature range required for fusion, ITER will be equipped with three powerful heating systems: 33 MW of neutral beams; 20 MW of electron cyclotron; and 20 MW of ion cyclotron. These are the systems that will "light the fusion fire."
The neutral beam system represents such an advance in all its parameters over present-day systems that it was decided some years ago to build the Neutral Beam Test Facility at Padua. This facility comprises two test-stands: SPIDER, which will test full-sized ion sources, and MITICA, which is a full-scale test of the ITER heating system.
Whilst the design and some early procurement were being made, negotiations were under way for bilateral agreements between the ITER Organization and the European Domestic Energy Fusion for Energy, and between Fusion for Energy/Consorzio-RFX, Padua. These agreements were signed in December 2011 and were followed shortly by the signature of Procurement Arrangements with Japan for the high voltage power supplies and the high voltage bushing for MITICA. The Indian Domestic Agency will also be supplying components for SPIDER.
Monday's ceremony was held in the experimental hall of the Consorzio-RFX fusion experiment in the presence of ITER Director-General Motojima and Fusion for Energy Director Frank Briscoe. Guests to the event included the current and former presidents of Consorzio RFX; representatives from the EU Commission; and members of regional and town governments, and university. The region is particularly proud and pleased to host the NBTF facility, which puts Padua firmly on the scientific and technical map and provides economic opportunities.
The firm in charge of building construction—Cooperativa Ravennate Interventi sul Territorio - Società ITER—will begin work on the NBTF facility in April. The "ITER" in this company's name is completely coincidental, which can only be a good omen!
While the earth has not yet moved at Padua, a fire has been lit that will contribute greatly to the success of ITER.
Click here for further reading.
From the behaviour of the Sun's neutrinos to the benefits of the ITER project for the local economy ... conversation between Director-General Motojima and president of the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence département Jean-Louis Bianco, on Thursday 1 March, covered a broad scope of issues and prospects.
A member of the French Parliament and département president since 1998, Mr Bianco was also Secretary General of the Presidency for nearly ten years (1982-1991) under President Mitterrand and, in that role, his closest advisor.
His interest in ITER, which he expressed very strongly during his half-day visit here, stems from both a global and a local perspective. As a respected policy-maker, he is convinced of the importance of developing fusion energy for the benefit of future generations.
As head of a vast but sparsely populated départment—largely dependent on tourism (40 percent of GDP)—he was particularly interested in the latest figures on the local economic impact of ITER that were presented by Agence Iter France director Jérôme Paméla.
The Alpes-de-Haute-Provence département contributes EUR 10 million of the EUR 467 million that local governments allocate to the ITER project. As of 31 December 2011, EUR 29 million in industrial contracts from the ITER Organization, Agence Iter France and Fusion For Energy have already been awarded to companies based in Mr Bianco's département.
For Mr Bianco, this story was as captivating as the one about the Sun's neutrinos.
Wildlife is thriving in the forests of Cadarache. Wild boars, mouflon goats and deer freely roam the vast CEA enclosure (900 hectares) and the smaller National Forestry Commission reserve (200 hectares) located opposite the future ITER Headquarters.
Boars have always been at home in Cadarache. In 1964, archaeologists digging a Bronze Age necropolis within CEA premises came up with a most exceptional find: a tomb containing the remains of a large wild boar, two copper rings and a serpentine ritual axe-head. Wild boars were considered as sacred then and, although they are not anymore, CEA-Cadarache has adopted them as its totem.
The history of the mouflon goats is more recent—and tragic. The present herd of 150 (plus 80 in the Commission reserve) descends from two males and one female that were intended as a gift for poor King Alexander I of Yugoslavia, who was unfortunately assassinated upon his arrival in Marseille on the occasion of his state visit to France in 1934.
A lesser-known story of Cadarache wildlife is that of the sika deer that gracefully roam the land—one hundred heads in the CEA enclosure and 20 in the National Forestry Commission reserve. Four of these timid and elegant animals were offered to French president Sadi Carnot (1837-1894) by the 122nd Emperor of Japan Mutsuhito, the "Meiji Emperor" (1852-1912) considered as the founder of modern Japan.
In the 1860s, Japan and France had established diplomatic, economic and even military relations. At the 1867 Paris World Fair (Exposition Universelle) the works exhibited at the Japan Pavilion caused a sensation, triggering an artistic movement called japonisme that was to have a major influence on French impressionist painting.
In 1890, in order to strengthen the relationship between the two heads of state, the Meiji Emperor decided to offer his French republican counterpart a personal gift in the form of four deer of the "sika" species (cervus nippon), one male and three females. The animals were no ordinary deer: they came from the park in Nara, once the capital of Japan, and were considered as sacred messengers of the gods.
Upon their arrival in the spring of 1890, the four sika deer were released in the Presidential Hunting Reserve in Marly (near Paris) to grow and multiply and ... be hunted on special occasions. Eight years later, when the original four had grown into a small herd of seven stags and eleven does, they were moved to a larger enclosure in Rambouillet, also part of the Presidential Domain.
The deer numbered 42 in 1919 (an equal number had been hunted during the war to provide meat to the local hospitals) and 76 in 1924, the year Gaston Doumergue was elected to the presidency. President Doumergue took a fancy to the beautiful creatures and forbid any further hunting. In order to regulate their population, he ordered instead that the animals be divided among various national parks and wildlife reservations, among them Cadarache.
The first pair of sika deer arrived here in February 1928, followed shortly by another pair. In 1939, a National Forestry Commission Inspector noted that the herd, now numbering 25 head, could be found "close to the Durance and Verdon riverbeds where, even during the hottest summer months, they could benefit from a cool environment, and find water and food."
More than eighty years have passed. The Emperor's deer are still here. They can be spotted grazing in the early morning hours, both inside the National Forestry Commission's reserve and within the CEA-Cadarache enclosure. If disturbed, they will look at you for a short moment, a tinge of reproach in their eyes.
Then they will turn and walk away slowly and gravely, as befits a messenger of the gods.