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Rolling Big Power 66RF-2614-85-101BG RBP HK-5 Forged Gloss Black Wheels with Machined Spokes
Brand: Rolling Big Power
Manufacturer's Part Number: 66RF-2614-85-101BG
Part Type: Wheels
Product Line: RBP HK-5 Forged Gloss Black Wheels with Machined Spokes
Wheel Diameter: 26 in.
Wheel Width (in): 14.000 in.
Wheel Bolt Pattern (app):
5 x 139.70mm
5 x 5 1/2 in.
Wheel Material: Aluminum
TPMS Sensor Compatible: Yes
TPMS Sensor Mounting Style: Valve stem mount
Primary Wheel Color: Black
Wheel Finish: Gloss
Manufacturers Wheel Series: Rolling Big Power HK-5 Forged Series
Backspacing (in): 4.500 in.
Offset: -76.00mm
Wheel Construction: 1-piece
Beadlock Included: No
Beadlock Functional: No
Lug Nut Seat Style: Conical seat - 60 degree
Hub Centric Ring Compatible: No
Center Bore Diameter (in): 3.071 in.
Center Bore Diameter (mm): 78.00mm
Center Cap Included: Yes
Load Rating (lbs): 3,200 lbs.
Lug Nuts Included: No
Valve Stems Included: No
Quantity: Sold individually.
Notes: Designed for 1984-2017 Dodge and Ram 1500 pickups with 8 inches of lift or more.Rolling Big Power HK-5 Forged Gloss Black Wheels with Machined Spokes have earned the RBP big red star! These robust aluminum wheels are offered in a variety of sizes to outfit any truck with lightweight strength. And of course, RBP performance is only matched with their unique style and assortment of stand-out finishes that will add a distinctive attitude to your vehicle.
|Featured Product
|Part Type


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Christmas Gift for Mom Double Circle Necklace
Buy Any 2 Items, Get 10% Off + Free Shipping w/ code AVA10
Sometimes it's hard to express thanks to those you are grateful for, but even the small gestures of generosity can deepen friendships. This holiday season, remind your mom how much you love and appreciate her with this jewelry gift set.
- 1 Tranquil Lavender Soy Wax Candle
- 1 Peppermint-Shea Lip Balm
- 1 Lavender Natural Castile Soap
- 1 Relaxing Rose Petal Bath Bomb
- 1 Uplifting Orange Bath Bomb
- 1 Heartfelt Greeting Card (as shown in the 1st image)
- 1 Engraved Wood Heart with an Inspirational Message
- OPTIONAL ADD-ON: Gold Double Circle Necklace (see details below)
Our crafted goods are packed inside a 5x5x2" gift box with a decorative lavender-colored bow.
Shipping & Returns
Delivery by Christmas is not Guaranteed
Free Shipping on all orders $50+ in the USA
Orders are currently processed within 2-3 business days after being placed. Transit times and costs are below:
|Transit Time :: Cost
|1-4 business days :: $3.99 (Free on Orders $50+)
|Priority (USA)
|1-3 business days :: Calculated at checkout
|Priority Express (USA)
|1-2 business days :: Calculated at checkout
|14-28 business days :: $7.99+
In total, it generally takes 4 - 7 business days (PROCESSING + SHIPPING) after the order date to receive your order.
We offer a 30-day money back guarantee on all orders. If you don't love it, just contact us and we'll happily take care of you.
Please note that some countries may charge an import duty fee when your package arrives in your country.
Card Quote
What's Included
We handcraft our bath products with love in the USA. Made with the highest quality natural ingredients we can source, our products smell and feel better than most you'd find at stores.
🧼 Lavender Natural Castile Soap
This luscious bar of castile lavender soap is hand-made from a moisturizing blend of olive oil, coconut oil, and lavender essential oil.
Ingredients: Olive Oil, Coconut Oil, Sustainable Palm Oil, Castor Oil, Sodium Hydroxide, Fragrance, Essential Oils
💄 Peppermint-Shea Lip Balm
This lip balm uses natural ingredients for supreme moisture and protection for your lips. Shea butter, cocoa butter, aloe vera, and peppermint essential oil blend together for a subtly sweet scent and work together to soothe your lips from cracks and dryness.
Ingredients: Lip Balm: Soybean Oil, Sunflower Oil, Beeswax, Cocoa Butter, Shea Butter, Vitamin E, Aloe Vera, Peppermint Essential Oil
🕯Tranquil Lavender Soy Wax Candle
We use 100% high-grade soy wax to create this hand-poured candle in a 4oz dish with a windowed clear top (to cover the candle while not in use). The candle is rated at a generous 20-hour burn time. It will fill the room with a relaxing aura, the perfect pairing with a warm bath.
🌹 Relaxing Rose Petal Bath Bomb
This soothing bath bomb made with epsom salt will relax even the most tense muscles after a long day. Crafted with real rose petals, this lusciously-scented bath fizzer will transform your home bath into a true spa experience.
Ingredients: Sodium Bicarbonate, Citric Acid, Epsom Salt, Olive Oil, Essential Oil, Aqua, Rose Petals, Polysorbate 80
🍊 Uplifting Orange Bath Bomb
Awaken the sense with this invigorating citrus-scented bath bomb. Take a deep breath as the bath bomb fizzes away in your tub and eases away stress and mental fatigue.
Ingredients: Sodium Bicarbonate, Citric Acid, Epsom Salt, Olive Oil, Essential Oil, Aqua, Polysorbate 80, FD&C Colorant.
Gifts that Create Memories
We believe that sharing the right piece of writing that represents our emotions can be an invaluable way to express our feelings and deepen our bonds.
That's why we use the highest quality natural & sustainable ingredients we can source. Our products smell and feel better than most you'd find at stores.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
AWS services or capabilities described in AWS Documentation may vary by region/location. Click Getting Started with Amazon AWS to see specific differences applicable to the China (Beijing) Region.
Constructs a new LimitExceededException with the specified error message.
Namespace: Amazon.KeyManagementService.Model
Assembly: AWSSDK.KeyManagementService.dll
Version: 3.x.y.z
public LimitExceededException(
String message
Describes the error encountered.
.NET Core App:
Supported in: 3.1
.NET Standard:
Supported in: 2.0
.NET Framework:
Supported in: 4.5, 4.0, 3.5


text:
SAG Awards: Who Do You Want to Win?
TV Guide
It's actors' biggest night: the 19th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards! Who will get the most love from their peers? Can Alec Baldwin win Lucky No. 7 - in a row? Will Homeland make it a clean sweep? Is Modern Family going to three-peat? Will Argo earn its second guild win in as many days after snagging the Producers Guild Award?
Sound off with your predictions below!
View original SAG Awards: Who Do You Want to Win? at TVGuide.com
Related Articles on TVGuide.com
Other Links From TVGuide.com


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GRAMMYs® Add Bruno Mars, Sting and Rihanna Collaboration
Billed as a special performance, the Recording Academy announced today, Monday, February 4, that previously announced performer Rihanna will join Bruno Mars and Sting for a special performance on the 55th Annual GRAMMY Awards. No additional details were made available at press time, but it is the first time these three legendary performers will take the stage together.
Additionally, the GRAMMYs announced the addition of Kelly Clarkson to the evening's performers. Clarkson celebrated her 10th year in the industry this year with the release of Greatest Hits - Chapter One. She is nominated for Record Of The Year and Best Pop Solo Performance for "Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You)," and Best Pop Vocal Album for Stronger.
Finally, the GRAMMYs also announce the addition of new presenters, including last's night's Superbowl Halftime performer Beyonce, Jennifer Lopez, Hunter Hayes and Prince.
Play Radio.com's Awards Show Challenge -- fill out your ballot and correctly predict who will take home the awards on GRAMMY night to win prizes.
The GRAMMYS air on February 10th on CBS.
-Courtney E. Smith, Radio.com
for more features.


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Pentagon: Budget crisis could hurt war effort
WASHINGTON - The Afghan war effort eventually would be harmed by across-the-board budget cuts, even as the Obama administration intends to shield the military's combat mission from the reductions, the Pentagon's No. 2 official said Friday.
"There will be second-order effects on the war," Ashton Carter, the deputy defense secretary, said in an interview in his office with a small group of reporters. Deferred maintenance on weapons and other equipment, for example, will eventually erode the combat fitness of military units deploying to Afghanistan, he said.
The U.S. has about 66,000 troops in Afghanistan, with an undetermined number of withdrawals expected this year and in 2014.
The administration holds out hope that Congress will come up with a deficit-cutting mechanism to replace the across-the-board spending cuts due to take effect March 1, but Carter suggested that hopes are not high.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have repeatedly warned that the threatened defense cuts, amounting to about $50 billion this budget year, would hurt national security. Carter said he feared that the message has not been heard widely enough in Congress and across the country.
If the cuts take effect in March, hundreds of thousands of Pentagon civilian employees will face furloughs and reduced paychecks by April, Carter said. They would lose one day of work per week for the remainder of the budget year, which ends in September, he said.
"This is painful to us," Carter said.
The Pentagon has about 800,000 civilian employees; they have not yet been officially notified of furloughs. Carter said the furloughs would be expected to save $5 billion. No military positions will be cut, he said.
Carter said the Pentagon already is eliminating all 46,000 of its temporary civilian workers in anticipation of budget cuts.
Carter also disclosed that he will remain on the job as deputy defense secretary in President Barack Obama's second term. He said Obama had called him after nominating Chuck Hagel to be his next defense secretary, asking Carter to remain.
"I agreed to do that, and I'm enthusiastic about doing that," he said, adding that he believes Hagel will be a good Pentagon chief.
Carter had been mentioned as a possible Obama choice for energy secretary.


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If you bought a flash memory item from gedjus2011 – Ireland or any other eBay seller you are advised to test item(s) immediately for advertised capacity. You may have purchased a fake flash memory product. H2testw is the software to test true capacity for flash memory. It is used to test memory cards, mp players and usb flash drives. It is free to use and download. A linux alternative to H2testw also exists. To understand what H2testw does and download read: H2testw 1.4 – Gold Standard In Detecting USB Counterfeit Drives
If your memory item fails testing report immediately to SOSFakeFlash . If your eBay seller is deregistered from eBay, it is urgent you report in to SOSFakeFlash. If you do not, they will not be able to investigate and to record in their database to publish an offical alert listing all items sold. eBay is suspending fake flash memory sellers to avoid buyers leaving feedback or recording the truth.
Never use any flash memory item without testing for capacity. If you purchased a fake you could lose your files and data. Read: Why Is Fake Flash Memory So Dangerous?
Please see Validation Memory links for brand names and flash nand memory chip decoding. Reminder, Gb is Gigabits, not Gigabytes. 8 bits is 1 byte. You must divide by 8, if manufacturer lists size as Gb. Exercise care in disassembly of your item to decode.
If you need help and information on eBay read:
Fake Flash Memory – Hacked! Top Articles SOSFakeFlash. Consumer, Reseller Education. Beware. Be Wise. Learn. Avoid Fake Flash Memory. Learn To Test For Real Flash Memory Capacity.
PayPal Refunds – Counterfeit Items Policy Change Nov 01 2010. What Does This Mean For Fake Flash Memory? MP Players, USB Flash Drives, Memory Cards? Hacked Memory Awareness Growing.
Changing Trends In The Sale Of Fake Memory On eBay For USB Flash Drives, Memory Cards And MP Players. SOSFakeFlash Advises Do Not Buy From eBay Sellers With Low FeedBack Scores. Avoid Sellers with Scores Under 300+ To Protect Yourself From Potential Fraud. Learn Why.
Check your eBay Sellers feedback, type in the id: http://toolhaus.org/cgi-bin/negs
If your item failed capacity testing with H2testw, make sure to leave SOSFakeFlash in your feedback.
SOSFakeFlash has asked us to remind you on the importance of sending SOSFakeFlash all addressing information on an eBay seller who sold fake capacity flash memory. This information is critical to detecting and tracking fake flash memory sellers.
New Information On Flash Memory Prices!
Survey Flash Memory Prices Retail Stores. SOSFakeFlash Requests Your Participation. Please Assist. 2012 Global Price Drop For Flash Memory? Is It Cheap? New Trends. What Is The Real Story On Lower Flash Memory Prices?
Technology change is driving lower prices for legacy flash memory, see this comment.
Warning to buyers of legacy flash memory! Do not expect discount prices on old flash memory products… Issue is original cost price, sellers will never offer them at prices less than the original wholesale cost. If they did, they would loose money. Discount for sellers is only available if they purchase from an authorized brand name reseller or direct from the brand name. If sellers purchase from internet wholesaling sites in Asia they are at EXTREME risk.
gedjus2011 – Ireland
Danger! Do Not Buy USB Leather Pen Thumb Memory Flash Stick Drives On eBay! Fake Capacity Sold 16GB 32GB 64GB 128GB 256GB.
eBay. Why Do People Bid And Buy 256GB USB Leather Pen Thumb Memory Flash Stick Drives With Free Shipping? The Scam For 16 32 64 128 256 GB Fake Capacity.
Genuine Verses Fake Counterfeit USB Flash Drives – A Guide – USB Flash Chips Used In USB Flash Drives – Grades A B C D
Global Report – eBay Fake Memory 2008 – 2009
Crises on Ebay For Fake Flash Memory Products Sold In 32GB 64GB 128GB 256GB – SOSFakeFlash Reports


text:
Mentor Mothers: A Sustainable Family Intervention in South African Townships
|The safety and scientific validity of this study is the responsibility of the study sponsor and investigators. Listing a study does not mean it has been evaluated by the U.S. Federal Government. Read our disclaimer for details.
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT00972699
Recruitment Status : Completed
First Posted : September 7, 2009
Last Update Posted : May 3, 2013
- Study Details
- Tabular View
- No Results Posted
- Disclaimer
- How to Read a Study Record
|Condition or disease
|Human Immunodeficiency Virus Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome Tuberculosis
|Behavioral: Peer support and mentoring
|Phase 2
South Africa's HIV/AIDS epidemic, one of the worst in the world, has shown little evidence of decline and is indicative of the urgent need to focus on both preventative and treatment intervention efforts (UNAIDS, 2006). In South Africa, close to one in three women who attend public antenatal clinics are living with HIV (UNAIDS, 2006). In KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) - one of the worst affected provinces - as many as 40% to 60% of pregnant women attending antenatal services are living with HIV (Rochat et al., 2006; Kharsany et al., 2004).
HIV infection in pregnant women raises a number of issues that are not faced by HIV-infected men or non pregnant women (Ojikutu & Stone, 2005) and has particular implications for the successful prevention of mother-to-child transmission (Raisler & Cohn, 2005). Most women learn their HIV status for the first time during antenatal testing, which can be distressing and may introduce or further compound psychological, social and health risks in the antenatal and post natal period (Firn & Norman, 1995; Patel V, Rahman A, Jacob KS, & Hughes M, 2004; Patel, DeSouza, & Rodrigues, 2003; Rochat et al., 2006; Shisana et al., 2005; Stein et al., 2005). Research on the uptake of treatment for HIV indicates that poor mental health and a lack of social support are associated with lowered uptake of HAART (Cook et al., 2006), lowered adherence to anti-retroviral medication (Ammassari, Trotta, Murri, & et al., 2002; DiMatteo, Lepper, & Croghan, 2000; Ickovics et al., 2001; Starace et al., 2002)and increased disease progression (Ickovics et al., 2001).
Fortunately, HIV testing and access to antiretroviral drugs (ARV) to prevent mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) from HIV positive pregnant women to their babies are currently being scaled up in South Africa (Civil Society HIV and AIDS Congress, 2005; Department of Health, 2005). While the potential exists to cut transmission to babies from mothers living with HIV(MLH), maternal HIV disease has been demonstrated to have negative consequences on maternal mental health and social support and children's emotional, social and developmental outcomes and adjustment - both as a result of chronic HIV illness and as a result of the psychological and social burden of HIV on care giving (Stein et al., 2005; Krebs, Stein, & Rochat, 2005; Stein et al., 2005; Sherr, 2005; Dunn, 2005; Hough, Brumitt, Templin, Saltz, & Mood, 2003).
While PMTCT programs provide the opportunity for women to prevent transmission through medical and feeding interventions, the needs of mothers living with HIV extend well beyond this. The psychosocial challenges facing mothers living with HIV are substantial and, if children are to have positive outcomes, it is necessary to provide mothers living with HIV with the support, skills and knowledge to protect and promote their own health and well-being, that of their babies, and, hopefully, their partners (Rochat et al., 2006; Stein et al., 2005; 2006).
The goal of this randomized trial then is to test an intervention to improve the health and well-being of HIV positive mothers and their babies during pregnancy and the early postpartum period through the implementation of a clinic-based mentor mothers' peer support program(also referred to as Project Masihambisane) and dissemination of health information.
|Study Type :
|Interventional (Clinical Trial)
|Actual Enrollment :
|1200 participants
|Intervention Model:
|Parallel Assignment
|None (Open Label)
|Primary Purpose:
|Health Services Research
|Official Title:
|Mentor Mothers: A Sustainable Family Intervention in South African Townships
|Study Start Date :
|July 2008
|Actual Primary Completion Date :
|December 2011
|Actual Study Completion Date :
|December 2011
Experimental: Mentor Mothers Intervention
In the intervention arm, participants will receive the Department of Health-delivered Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission (PMTCT) program plus the Project Masihambisane mentor mothers support program. HIV positive mentor mothers, who have been through the PMTCT program, will be recruited and trained to deliver the intervention to pregnant mothers living with HIV.
Behavioral: Peer support and mentoring
The intervention will be delivered in 4 non consecutive visits during pregnancy and 4 visits post-partum. The sessions will be delivered to mothers living with HIV on the days of their health care appointments either individually or in groups that can accommodate up to 30 mothers living with HIV. The intervention will focus on enhancing the mother-baby relationship through increasing the health of the mother and baby, maintaining the mother's mental health, and reducing HIV transmission.
Other Name: Masihambisane
No Intervention: Control
Mothers living with HIV in the standard of care control clinics will receive the Department of Health-delivered PMTCT program.
- Baby's health status [ Time Frame: 6 days after birth; 6 months after birth; 12 months after birth ]
- Maternal adherence: baby's and mother's health. [ Time Frame: 6 days after birth; 6 months after birth; 12 months after birth ]
Choosing to participate in a study is an important personal decision. Talk with your doctor and family members or friends about deciding to join a study. To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the contacts provided below. For general information, Learn About Clinical Studies.
|Ages Eligible for Study:
|18 Years and older (Adult, Older Adult)
|Sexes Eligible for Study:
|Accepts Healthy Volunteers:
Inclusion Criteria:
- 18 years or older, pregnant, and HIV+
- Enrolled in the PMTCT program at the study site clinic
- Receiving medical care from study site clinic
- Residing in study area for duration of study
- No psychosis, neurological damage, or IQ less than 70, as judged by an interviewer in consultation with a clinical supervisor
- Ability to give informed consent as judged by an interviewer
Exclusion Criteria:
- Less than 18 years, or not pregnant, or not HIV+
- Not enrolled in the PMTCT program at the study site clinic
- Not receiving medical care from study site clinic
- Not residing in study area for duration of study
- Psychosis, neurological damage, or IQ less than 70, as judged by an interviewer in consultation with a clinical supervisor
- Clinical provider (nurse or physician) believes it is not in the best interest of the MLH
- Unable to give informed consent
To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the contact information provided by the sponsor.
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier (NCT number): NCT00972699
|South Africa
|HSRC Sweetwaters Site
|Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, 3201
|Principal Investigator:
|Mary Jane Rotheram-Borus, Ph.D.
|UCLA Semel Institute, Center for Community Health
|Responsible Party:
|Mary Jane Rotheram-Borus, Principal Investigator, University of California, Los Angeles
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
|Other Study ID Numbers:
R01MH077553 ( U.S. NIH Grant/Contract )
R01MH077553 ( U.S. NIH Grant/Contract )
|First Posted:
|September 7, 2009 Key Record Dates
|Last Update Posted:
|May 3, 2013
|Last Verified:
|May 2013
Human Immunodeficiency Virus
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome
Vertical Transmission of Human Immunodeficiency Virus
South Africa
Low Birth Weight
Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome
HIV Infections
Immunologic Deficiency Syndromes
Mycobacterium Infections
Actinomycetales Infections
Gram-Positive Bacterial Infections
Bacterial Infections
Bacterial Infections and Mycoses
Immune System Diseases
Blood-Borne Infections
Communicable Diseases
Sexually Transmitted Diseases, Viral
Sexually Transmitted Diseases
Lentivirus Infections
Retroviridae Infections
RNA Virus Infections
Virus Diseases
Slow Virus Diseases
Genital Diseases
Urogenital Diseases


text:
Help us get to over 4,000 biographies in 2018.
If you know of a past magician not listed in MagicPedia, start a New Biography for them or Email us your suggestion.
Category:Books published in 2001
From Magicpedia, the free online encyclopedia for magicians by magicians.
Pages in category "Books published in 2001"
The following 20 pages are in this category, out of 20 total.


text:
Please remember to put the edition number in thread titles guys - this has so many versions!
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I drove toward the moon, a full and brilliant orange globe suspended above the horizon in a March sky. Pockets of fog clung to the pavement of Route 50 as Sacramento faded in the rearview mirror. Ahead, in the darkness, lay the mountains that define Tahoe, where I planned to hopscotch through five ski resorts around the 191-square-mile lake. The serenity of the moment, the guiding light of the pumpkin-colored moon and the promise of the days to come almost made me forget the very real fact that, while I had successfully made the trip from Washington, my luggage – including all my ski gear – had not. As any skier or snowboarder will tell you, a successful winter-sport outing largely depends on the whim of always fickle Mother Nature. One year, she can deliver record-breaking snowfall, like the time in 2011 when 16 feet fell across Lake Tahoe in nine days – so much snow that it buried the ski lifts. But she can just as easily force you to trade the snow-covered slopes for the hotel pool, staring in disbelief at the bare mountain. In short, it's a gamble. You can, however, stack the decks in your favor. That bounty of snow that swallowed the Tahoe ski lifts fell in March, rescuing an otherwise dismal season. Last year, when I set out for Tahoe, intermittent storms all through the winter had built up a decent base of snow, and the area typically gets mid-spring dumps. Another record-breaking storm was a long shot, but the odds were good. Even if feet of snow fell the night after I arrived in South Lake Tahoe, though, I still wouldn't be able to ski. Not unless I wanted to brave the slopes wearing just the light sweater, jeans and thin socks that I'd worn on the plane. Half a day later, I was riding the gondola up Heavenly Resort, the first of five resorts on my ambitious itinerary. The mountain base had been covered by a leaden overcast, but as the lift climbed the mountain, we broke through the dense blanket of gray to a vibrant bluebird sky bathed in sunlight. The snow gleamed an almost fluorescent white, and the sparkling expanse of Lake Tahoe, visible beyond the gray shroud covering the town of South Lake Tahoe, felt close enough to touch. 'This is where God and science grab hands and say, 'Ha! This rocks!' ' exclaimed Mike Fry, a longtime Tahoe resident with a slight gray beard and inviting blue eyes. My luggage was currently in Sacramento, Reno or San Francisco, following a convoluted path that would eventually end at my hotel sometime that night. But Mike had come through. He'd met me early that morning to show me around Heavenly, a massive 4,800-acre resort boasting 97 runs. And when I'd explained why I was still wearing street clothes, his solution was simple: I'd explore South Lake Tahoe, a sleepy burg on the border of Nevada and California, and he'd go home and find something for me to wear. Most skiers have a vast collection of old gear, well used, respectfully retired and impossible to part with because of its years of loyal service. And that's how I ended up in a pair of tight-fitting ski pants adorned with a two-inch stripe of Hawaiian flower-print fabric running the length of the outer seams, the graphic flaring out like a pair of bell-bottoms at the cuffs. The jacket lacked some of the pants' flair, but those two pieces of well-worn apparel – as well as Mike's backup base layers, socks and gloves – had me on the slopes. That's one of the things that define lovers of snow. Mother Nature may be fitfully magnanimous, but the people who gravitate to skiing and snowboarding are typically generous to a fault. From Mike and his loaner gear to the hotel clerk at Squaw Valley four days later who pulled out a trail map to show me the best runs on the mountain before I'd even checked in, snow-lovers are deeply enthusiastic about the sport of skiing. It's not a competition. It's a shared experience, one that even overcomes the vagaries of the weather. The only real differences among skiers lie in the type of experience a given individual desires. And the Tahoe region offers the perfect solution for all comers, from first-timers getting their West Coast powder legs to hard-charging skiers yearning for steep-and-deep terrain to couples looking to marry a few days on the slopes with vineyard tours. In total, Lake Tahoe boasts seven world-class ski resorts, along with a handful of local mountains. I visited five; three on the southern side near South Lake Tahoe and two in North Tahoe. And from the beginning, it was clear that this visit wasn't going to be long enough. Instead of an extensive tour, it became a Tahoe primer. Heavenly is the big boy on the block, with the most acreage and longest vertical drop. It also offers lake views that make you feel as if you could launch off a jump and splash into its glittering surface. At the only resort to straddle the California/Nevada border, you find a heady mix of both gob-smacking natural beauty and a Vegas-on-the-slopes vibe best typified by the Unbuckled happy hour at mid-mountain, complete with go-go dancers wearing strategically placed fur. The resort's proximity to South Lake Tahoe also makes it one of the easiest to reach from a variety of accommodations, whether they're casino resorts or private lakeside vacation rentals or old motor motels converted into hip boutique hotels. More than 30 miles south of Heavenly, Kirkwood trades lake views for a more iconic alpine landscape. The mountains stare down at you from the parking lot, issuing a quiet dare that's reinforced when you see a handful of lifts marked with skull-and-crossbones signs that indicate that all you'll find are expert-only runs at the top. About half the resort is rated for intermediate skiers and riders, but locals anxious to test their skills and torture their legs gravitate to Kirkwood, hiking across the expansive ridgelines of the 2,300-acre resort before winding down with a can of beer on the expansive village patio. Sierra-at-Tahoe also caters to the locals, with prime tree skiing when the snow is deep enough. It wasn't on the day I visited, but the main runs had received a several-inch dusting and proved a riotous blast. Sierra also has a defined cred among freeskiers and snowboarders, a rep that's likely to continue thanks to the Burton Star Wars Experience. This full-day program uses characters from the iconic movie to help budding Shaun Whites, ages 3 to 12, learn how to ride in a kids-only camp. The smallest of the three South Tahoe resorts I visited at 2,000 acres, Sierra eschews the more grandiose resort elements for a relaxed mom-and-pop vibe. 'The typical development news here isn't the construction of new hot tubs,' said Steve Hemphill, the resort's communications manager. 'It's getting more local beers on tap.' Head west out of South Lake Tahoe and drive north for an hour on scenic Route 89 along the western coast of the lake, and you reach North Tahoe's Squaw Valley. Host of the 1960 Winter Olympics, this epic resort boasts a rep as an extreme- skiers' playground. Hardly any of the terrain in this 3,600-acre resort is off-limits; if you can see it, you can try to ski it, as some of the best skiers in the world have demonstrated. Like Kirkwood, the six-peak resort almost smacks you in the face with its sheer, steep topography. The exposed ridgeline also means that if the winds pick up, the lifts may close. Surprisingly, only 30 percent of the resort is rated for experts, with almost half the 170-plus runs ideal for intermediates. Come spring, it's best to start late and let the sun warm the hard pack and ski until the snow softens into the infamous Sierra cement, a sticky composition that's more sludge than snow. Then retire to Squaw's High Camp pool and hot tub near the mountain's summit – just wear your bathing suit under your ski gear. Afterward, make like a local and ski back down to the base in your board shorts or bikini. If Squaw feels wonderfully carnival-like, Northstar, just to the northeast, embraces the more refined, family-friendly skier's experience. It's geographically sheltered from the prevailing winds that can cause the Squaw lifts to close and boasts robust snowmaking coverage – the ace in the hole against a dismal ski season. The gentler pitches on the resort's 3,170-acre mountains make for easygoing runs, though adventurous skiers can find tight, exhilarating lines through the trees when the snow is plentiful. Such was not the case on my one day there, but the groomers were wide and steady, the sun bright and strong enough to burn my pale face a bright red below my goggles. Six days after losing my luggage and wearing those glorious Hawaiian-print pants, after skiing a half-day at Heavenly with Mike the gear savior and watching the U.S. Freestyle Championships at Heavenly two days later, after squinting through an intermittent spring storm at Squaw and braving overcast conditions at Kirkwood, after driving 275 miles and taking slightly more vertical feet than my legs could handle, I ended my final day in the dizzying five-resort tour the way I had every other: exhausted and exhilarated and wishing for one more day. Northstar had delivered textbook spring skiing: few crowds, dazzling sunlight and forgiving snow on the marked slopes that got softer as the sun crawled across the sky. The trees could have used more coverage – but resorts can always use more snow. I sat on the resort's back deck bathing in the warm sun. Soon, I'd have to make the drive to Sacramento and crash near the airport before my early flight back to Dulles. The less exciting necessities of travel. But at that moment, with the late-March sun warming my skin as I watched a few skiers getting in a few last turns on the mountain, it was clear that my gamble – spring skiing in Tahoe – had paid off big. Except that I didn't get to keep those awesome ski pants.
Hopscotching among Lake Tahoe's plentiful slopes
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We offer Disinfecting Cleaning Services Throughout the Bensalem Area
The COVID-19 situation has had a significant impact on the way so many of us work, and especially for those of us that work in the cleaning industry it has changed the ways in which we work. There are a variety of ways in which we have had to adapt, and one of these impacts is that we have now had to look at the types of products that we use for disinfecting different surfaces. With our Bensalem disinfecting cleaning services, we have always looked to use surface cleaners to ensure that desks, furniture, chairs and other items in a commercial space were clean, but we are now having to pay particular attention in this area.
We at Bactronix SEPA have been closely following the medical advice when it comes to the surface cleaners that we use, and we have looked at the cleaners that have been shown to have the greatest effect at killing COVID-19. All of the cleaners that we use either use a combined detergent and disinfectant solution, or use a separate detergent and disinfectant, where the disinfectant element has the higher parts per million concentration that has the greatest effect on the virus. There are some surfaces where these solutions cannot be used, such as couches or other soft surfaces, and for these we use the recommended steam cleaning where needed.
Our Bensalem disinfecting cleaning services operatives are also very aware about the risks of cross contamination, especially when they are working in more than one site during the day. The surface cleaners that we use help to keep high touch areas such as door handles and elevator buttons clean and safe, but we also take care to ensure that the disease doesn't transmit from site to site. All of our cleaners are currently using disposable cleaning cloths and mop heads, or are ensuring that only one set is used per site, with the non-disposable items being efficiently laundered every evening.


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RADIOLAB on the Situation of Badness
Posted by The Situationist Staff on January 19, 2012
From RADIOLAB:
Cruelty, violence, badness… This episode of Radiolab, we wrestle with the dark side of human nature, and ask whether it's something we can ever really understand, or fully escape.
We begin with a chilling statistic: 91% of men, and 84% of women, have fantasized about killing someone. We take a look at one particular fantasy lurking behind these numbers, and wonder what this shadow world might tell us about ourselves and our neighbors. Then, we reconsider what Stanley Milgrim's famous experiment really revealed about human nature (it's both better and worse than we thought). Next, we meet a man who scrambles our notions of good and evil: chemist Fritz Haber, who won a Nobel Prize in 1918…around the same time officials in the US were calling him a war criminal. And we end with the story of a man who chased one of the most prolific serial killers in US history, then got a chance to ask him the question that had haunted him for years: why?
Go to the RADIOLAB website to listen to the podcast.
Related Situationist posts:
- Assistance and Obedience
- The obedience experiments at 50
- The Milgram Experiment Yet Again (Again!)
- Milgram Experiment at 50 Years
- Shocking for Money
- The Power of the Situation
- Video on the Original Milgram Experiment,
- Milgram-Inspired Movie
- The Situation of Stanley Milgram's Obedience Experiments,
- Milgram Replicated on French TV – 'The Game of Death',
- A Shocking Situation,
- Zimbardo on Milgram and Obedience – Part I,
- The Case for Obedience,
- Replicating Milgram's Obedience Experiment – Yet Again,
- Jonestown (The Situation of Evil) Revisited,
- Milgram Remake, and
- The Milgram Experiment Today?
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This entry was posted on January 19, 2012 at 12:01 am and is filed under Classic Experiments, Conflict, History, Morality, Podcasts, Social Psychology. Tagged: Evil, migram, Morality, Social Psychology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.


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Index Rebuild vs. Coalesce vs. Shrink Space (Pigs – 3 Different Ones) February 8, 2008Posted by Richard Foote in Index Coalesce, Index Rebuild, Index Shrink, Oracle General, Oracle Indexes, Performance Tuning.
Previously, I discussed how an ALTER INDEX … COALESCE is going to be less expensive in terms of using resources than an equivalent ALTER INDEX … SHRINK SPACE COMPACT (or ALTER INDEX … SHRINK SPACE) as the Coalesce doesn't have to concern itself with ensuring all leaf blocks at the physical end of the index segment have all been moved to allow for the storage to be de-allocated from the index segment. If you just want to de-fragment an index and not necessarily reduce the overall space allocated to the segment, use Coalesce rather than the Shrink options as it's cheaper.
But what about an ALTER INDEX … REBUILD, when, if ever, should it be used ?
Well the answer is as with most things Oracle, it depends.
Scenario One.
We have a table and the application deletes historical data but in a manner in which leaf blocks are not being entirely emptied. Basically, older stuff is removed, but it's only removed in a random manner, from approximately the "earlier" 10% of the table. The index is sequenced which means only those leaf blocks in the "left-most" 10% of the index structure are impacted but all this deleted space is "deadwood" as new index entries are only being inserted into the "right-most" part of the index.
Note that basically 90% of the index is fine and very well utilised, it's only 10% of the index that's problematic. Of the problem 10% of leaf blocks, there's plenty of free or deleted space, with many leaf blocks almost but not quite empty.
Coalesce (and indeed Shrink) will basically run through these 10% of fragmented leaf blocks and will merge the index row entries into as few leaf blocks as possible. With the 90% of blocks that are fine, Coalesce will basically read and then ignore them from any processing as there's nothing that can be done for them.
Rebuild on the other hand will take an entirely different approach. It will (generally) read the entire existing index structure and will build a brand new, bright and shining index segment. As part of this process, it will rebuild the entire index, it has no choice (assuming the index isn't partitioned, but that's another story) and will rebuild the 90% of the index that was actually perfect to begin with. Rebuilding 90% of something that doesn't need rebuilding doesn't sound particularly efficient and indeed it isn't. As a result, the index rebuild will use substantially more resources and generate substantially more redo than an equivalent Coalesce (or Shrink Space).
Scenario Two.
We have an application that deletes data and it deletes data throughout the entire index structure. The deletes are significant with a substantial proportion of the overall rows having been deleted. Additionally, the table is not going to be repopulated with anything like the same volume of data or it won't be repopulated for a substantial period of time. As such, all this deleted index space is "deadwood" as it's not going to be used any time soon, if at all.
Now typically in this sort of scenario, it's of course the table as much as the associated indexes that needs to be rebuilt. That's a key point. However, maybe Full Table Scans are not an issue for this table so the wasted space in the table is not of urgent concern. Maybe the table in not in an ASSM tablespace or in a database that supports a Table Shrink command and maybe moving the table is not an immediate option due to availability concerns. For whatever reason (or lack of reason), the index needs to be de-fragmented.
Note it's the entire index that's problematic here and there could be portions of the index that have very few remaining index entries.
Now poor Coalesce (and indeed Shrink) has a bit of an issue here. They both merge index entries from two blocks into the one block where it can. However, if leaf blocks are really empty, these merged index entries may in turn be merged and moved again with index entries from yet another leaf block. And maybe yet again with another leaf block. And again and again … So a specific index entry may actually be moved into several different leaf blocks during the entire process. Each of these moves requires resources and generates redo and takes time.
Now the rebuild has an entirely different approach. As mentioned, it will basically (generally) read the entire exisiting index structure and will build a brand new one, but importantly as it does so will only have to locate a specific index entry once and once only. Also, as it's the entire index structure that's problematic, there's no issue with fixing the entire index, as it's all "broken".
As a result of only having to deal with an existing index entry the once vs. the Coalesce which may relocate a specific index entry many times, the index rebuild is going to be substantially more efficient and potentially use significantly less resources and generate less redo.
This demo of the Differences between a Coalesce, Shrink Space and Rebuild shows when one out performs the other.
Basically, Coalesce is particularly efficient and uses less resources when the percentage of the overall index structure that's problematic and fragmented is relatively small (less than approximately 20-25% of leaf blocks). Rebuild is particularly efficient when the percentage of the overall index structure that's problematic and fragmented is relatively large and the average degree of fragmentation within an index leaf block is relatively high. Note Pre 10g, an index needed to have at least 50% free space less pctfree in neighbouring leaf blocks for a Coalesce to be effective.
Now Rebuild (and Rebuild Online) potentially have locking implications that need to be considered although as we'll see later, 11g has addressed some of these issues …
- 1. Robert - February 8, 2008
Once again, interesting stuff! I'll put this on the whishlist for Oracle 19: augment statistics gathering with additional logic that will detect which of rebuild / coalesce / shrink will be most efficient given the current (say last few days) usage pattern on the index. Add another package that is able to automatically do the optimal reorganization (or none at all) based on the info gathered.
I would have guessed that the rebuild uses the table – but when you think about it a moment the index will likely be smaller than the table so less IO will have to be done this way.
Thanks again!
- 3. Robert - February 8, 2008
I deliberately picked a higher version number to give you a chance to reach retirement age before the release. 🙂
Also, I don't think you run out of topics to write about: until then Oracle will introduce so many new features (new index types?) that there will be a constant stream of new issues to investigate and educate people about. 🙂 But generally I have the impression that Oracle has decided to improve manageability, at least that's where I think 10g makes a major leap.
Have a nice weekend – and Listen to the Music
- 4. Jack - February 8, 2008
We hit a significant bug on 10.2.0.3 with ALTER INDEX REBUILD. See Bug 6455161 "Higher CPU / Higher "cache buffer chains" latch gets / Higher "consistent gets" after truncate/Rebuild"
Note: 6455161.8 (21-DEC-2007).
Apparently it affects 10.1.0.2 through 10.2.0.3.
The issue is that the index root block is pinned and unpinned for each key lookup during a Nested Loop on Indexes that have OBJECT_ID DATA_OBJECT_ID (as viewed in DBA_OBJECTS).
Each pin/unpin operation obtains the "cache buffer chains" latch, uses extra cpu and increases the "CONSISTENT GETS" statistic.
At the individual statement level queries doing Nested Loops with
Indexes lookups may do more "cache buffer chains" latch gets and have a larger than expected "CONSISTENT GETS" statistic ("query" column on tkprof).
At the instance level it is possible to get some contention on the
"cache buffer chains" latch and some increase in the CPU utilization.
The DATA_OBJECT_ID for an index changes if an ALTER INDEX REBUILD or TRUNCATE TABLE operation has been performed on the index.
To find a list of affected objects:
select owner||'.'||Object_name||'.'||subobject_name
from dba_objects
where object_iddata_object_id
and object_type like 'INDEX%'
order by owner,object_name,subobject_name;
*** that this only affects use of such indexes in a NESTED LOOPS operation. ***
Drop and Recreate all indexes which OBJECT_ID DATA_OBJECT_ID. This synchronizes the two values.
(Note that it is not sufficient to REBUILD the index, it must
be explicitly dropped then recreated)
The bug was quite nasty in our case. The work-around to Drop and Recreate indexes worked like a charm, but wasn't how I originally planned to spend that Saturaday. After just going through a major tuning exercise with ALTER INDEX REBUILD, which was actually an un-tuning exercise.
- 5. Index Rebuild 10g « Oracle Scratchpad - February 9, 2008
[…] 9,2008 I've written a few notes about the pros and cons of index rebuilds in the past. A comment on Richard Foote's blog describes a bug in 10g (reminiscent of an old index root block bug in early versions of 8i) […]
- 6. Virag Sharma - February 9, 2008
How to identified indexes, which need rebuild or Coalesce ?
It will be really great , if you can outline some criteria
- 9. Virag Sharma - February 15, 2008
Thanks Richard, we will come to your Index Seminars , if it held in India.
Recently Craig A. Shallahamer had some Seminars in India, hope soon you will also have some Seminars in India.
- 11. Pedro lopes - March 15, 2008
Hi Richard
Do you know if Coalescing the index locks the table in exclusive mode?
We have some massive AQ applications and the AQ indexes gets so fragmentated (before coalescing 2000 buffer gets, after 3 for a query) and seems that is caused by the facts explained in
Note:267137.1 QMON does not perform space management operations on the dequeue IOT in Locally Managed Tablespaces using ASSM or when using FREELIST GROUPs
So seems we need to coalesce the indexes quite often and I cant find anywhere which says this acquires a exclusive lock or not…
- 13. pedro - March 16, 2008
thanks Richard
I dont understand why AQ index get so fragmentated anyways, usually when you create an AQ table implictly it creates a composite index of 6 fields and when query it only uses the first two field which is queue name and state. There are only two states, processed and pending, as you can see not very selective fieleds.
As I said after coaleces buffer gets reduces from thousands to 3 to 10. But after several hours or so it rises to hundreds again because enqueue (in serts) and dequeue (deletes) are being run constantly. Do you know why such situation can fragmentate the index so much…?
- 15. Nitin Joshi - October 29, 2008
Hi Richard,
In one of your topics you've mentioned that Deleted entries are automatically reused by oracle wheather it may be same or different value.
Here,initially you says some 10% of Sequence values are being deleted so "mostly" they are going to be of same values ,so why can't they reuse deleted space in the index?
May be i'm missing something?
- 17. Alon Principal - December 25, 2008
I'm trying to understand what exactly SHRINK does to index.
When I create a new index and right after the CREATE I run shrink on it – it still reduce index's blocks and size.
Isn't CREATE should build a new & efficient tree? How come it can be shrunk?
- 19. Alon Principal - January 4, 2009
Hi Richard.
Thanks for the reply.
There's the information you have asked for:
It's Oracle installation on Red Hat.
select * from v$version;
— Oracle Database 10g Enterprise Edition Release 10.2.0.3.0 – Prod
— …
create table SHRINK_INDEX (i number);
n number;
for n in 1..1000000 loop
insert into SHRINK_INDEX values (n);
end loop;
create index SHRINK_INDEX_IDX on SHRINK_INDEX(I);
select BYTES, BLOCKS, EXTENTS from USER_SEGMENTS where SEGMENT_NAME='SHRINK_INDEX_IDX';
alter index SHRINK_INDEX_IDX shrink space;
select BYTES, BLOCKS, EXTENTS from USER_SEGMENTS where SEGMENT_NAME='SHRINK_INDEX_IDX';
- 21. Mark - September 2, 2009
Interesting read, thanks for the post.
What do you think about using the automatic segment advisor findings to determine when to do a shrink/coalesce/rebuild?
select * from table ( DBMS_SPACE.ASA_RECOMMENDATIONS )
where segment_type like '%INDEX%'
- 23. Steve Howard - January 28, 2010
Hi Richard,
Am I correct in thinking that the essence of the pro's for a rebuild in this case is the time/resources it requires to do so? In other words, after either a shrink or a rebuild is complete, are there any other differences?
- 24. Michael Kreuz - December 17, 2010
Very nice. I have not found that much information on index block splitting, and this was great information and the explanations very insightful.
Thank you very much.
- 25. fabio - October 19, 2011
This post is very usefule.
- 26. Stalin Subbiah - July 28, 2013
Hi Richard,
Is there anyway I could monitor the effectiveness of empty blocks being reused from freelist of an index resulting from purge process that we are planning to start soon? We are simply purging data older 6 months so no partial deletes.
I wanted something less intrusive since this will be performed on an active production system, so validate index is out of the door. Does block dump next to header block has this info?
We aren't doing fast full scans or in any space pressure, so don't plan on rebuilding it anytime soon but curious to see how are they being reused.
Appreciate your response.
- Stalin - August 2, 2013
Thanks Richard as always. Glad you pointed out dbms_space.space_usage, as i ended up using that after doing some research. In comparing the stats from yesterday vs. today, FS2 blocks seems to have gone up from 1.46Million to 1.88M. Full blocks have gone down from 7.52M to 7.10M. The unformated blocks of 1.3M remains the same from both days snapshot. FS1,3, and 4 are zero blocks.
Interesting to see these stats, as i was expecting FS4 blocks to be a high number and not FS2 from the nature of deletes we do. The index is on Id, name col where Id being FK based on sequence.
Also since unformated blocks haven't be used, i assume free blocks from free lists are being reused ? it doesn't make sense from these numbers though. Am i way off from my interpretation?
- 27. My Possible Pasts » Blog Archive » Index Health Check - May 13, 2014
[…] a good candidate for being rebuilt (or coalesced or shrunk.. for info on which to choose, check out this post by Richard Foote). Jonathan being his normal generous self, shared this script in the presentation. This is a huge […]
- 28. Oracle Database 19c Automatic Indexing: Predicted Back In 2008 (A Better Future) | Richard Foote's Oracle Blog - March 19, 2019
[…] I've recently received a number of correspondences regarding one of my most popular blog posts, dating back to February 2008: Index Rebuild vs. Coalesce vs. Shrink Space (Pigs – 3 Different Ones). […]
- 29. Same time even after deleting the row - December 4, 2022
[…] shrinking the table or its indexes would reduce the number of blocks that need visiting and therefore speed up the query. At the […]


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Lear Birds of Europe Pl. 250, Black Grouse
Original Antique Print
21 3/8" x 14 3/8" (approximate)
Hand-colored lithograph
Birds of Europe
John Gould (1804—1881) was the most prolific publisher of ornithological subjects of all time. In 19th-century Europe, his name was as well known as John James Audubon's was in North America. John Gould's love of natural history was fostered in the gardens of King George III where his father was chief gardener at Windsor Castle. Although trained as a gardener, John Gould's interests soon evolved. He moved to London where he worked as a taxidermist, and at the age of 27, he was appointed taxidermist to the Zoological Society of London. After three years, he progressed to the position of curator of birds and chief taxidermist. In 1830, newly married, John Gould and his artist wife, Elizabeth, began their publishing career.
Unlike John James Audubon, whose life's work focused on one region, John Gould traveled widely and employed other artists to help create his lavish, hand-colored lithographic folios. Among John Gould's renowned works is the monumental Birds of Europe, originally published in 22 parts from 1832 to 1837 and A Monograph of the Trochilidae or Family of Humming-Birds (1849-87), considered Gould's masterpiece in both breath and beauty.
Every antique work of art that you purchase at our gallery or on our website is guaranteed to be authentic and of the finest quality. All of our prints include any conservation work required to assure that your acquisition is archivally stable and will last for generations when cared for properly.


text:
Today's Music: Dead South – In Hell I'll Be In Good Company
As she put it…
It was a typical Thursday, at the end of December. Guap was back from another round of saving the world. This time that involved terrorists, twerking, that orange powder they use to coat Cheetos, and chocolate pudding.
He was taking a much needed day off (I can't tell you how badly Cheetos dust and pudding react to each other) and decided to go skiing to celebrate the end of the year, and the approach of spring in a few months.
He made it to the top of the lift and was considering which trail to take while adjusting the bindings on his 192cm solid titanium rocket skis (a gift from the King of Montenegro) when he heard the first scream.
There was a woman – a pregnant woman, holding a baby, at the top of one of the trails – wearing rentals!
Guap ski'd over as fast as he could to see if he could help. As he got closer, he could see her expression was one of unmitigated terror! She turned at his calls, then turned again – facing straight down the mountain. She pushed off, the newborn squealing in her arms as the edges of her cheap rentals grabbed the snow and gravity propelled her down.
He raced to catch up, focusing only on helping the beleaguered damsel. He rocketed past the copse of trees where she had been, not seeing what had caused her overwhelming fear until it was too late.
A Yeti rocketed from the evergreens, it's horde of miniature reindeer accompanying it with a fierce whuffling noise to drive fear into the hearts of men.
But Guap was made of stronger stuff. Using the snow bumps to his advantage, he skied circles around the mythical horde, raising a cloud of ice and snow to blind even the hardiest of winter nightmares. Knowing it had been beaten and that the prize of the pregnant woman and her spawn had escaped, the Yeti unleashed a mighty bellow of rage!
The bellow unsettled the precarious sheets of snow and ice resting loosely on the mountain face and they began to slide toward the base. Guap knew what he had to do.
Casting caution to the wind, he raced down the mountain, calling on all his skill and all his luck. He caught up to the pregnant woman just ahead of the cascading avalanche. He hurled himself to the surface just above her, and used his body as a snowblock to protect her from the tons of ice and snow.
She was saved.
But Guap…poor Guap. A ski glove that had been lost the previous season, spending the year being slowly encased in solid ice, was the last thing down the hill in the avalanche. It was aimed directly at the poor woman's head. Ignoring the pain, Guap tore his leg from the snow and held it between her and the projectile.
He saved her. At the low, low cost of shattering his lower leg in three places.
And he'd do it again.
As he put it…
I was turning to stop at the top of the first run of the season, to see what the terrain looked like. One ski bit beautifully, arcing through the hardpack snow. The other didn't.
And down I went.
The truth, I expect, lies somewhere in between…
And how is your year going?


text:
Fashionable Color Line, Easy and Exciting to Shop
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text: Search Sort by: DateRelevance Don't be taken for a ride this Melbourne Cup Punters are being warned to watch out for betting and sports investment scams which falsely promise high odds and big returns on Cup Day. 6 Nov 2017 Don't get scammed by a fake online store The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is warning online shoppers to be wary of scammers masquerading as legitimate online retailers, often selling well-known brands at too-good-to-be-true prices. 20 Mar 2017 Scam category Attempts to gain your personal information 2 Hacking 1 Phishing 1 Buying or selling 1 Online shopping scams 1 Dating & romance 1 Investments 1 Betting & sports investment scams 1 Threats & extortion 2 Ransomware & malware 2 Date 2017 2 November 2017 1 March 2017 1 News type Features 2 Media releases 2 Radar alerts 1 Subscribe


text:
The fireworks king: How one Chinese businessman became the largest supplier of pyrotechnics in the United States
An Online Journal
~creating community for clergywomen~
Ria Loader explores words, writing process, and magic in scifi and urban fantasy. Wyrdplay is a play on words and wyrd is a kind of magic.
Building Disability Community and Justice in the Outdoors
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This WordPress.com site is the bee's knees
Bereavement single parent dad
life through one female Asperger's lens
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- Satire, Commentary, Satirical Commentary -
politics, engineering, parenting, relevant things over coffee.
Blogging about Culture, Equity, and the Arts since 2013
Music, tour stories and good chocolate
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books for kids about families, friendship, feelings and funny stuff


text:
A Cal Maritime education is the sum of many well-honed parts with each element serving an important purpose. Each of our seven bachelor's degrees (majors) focuses on a different aspect of the little-known but dynamic maritime industry and related careers on land or at sea.
Our 14:1 student-faculty ratio and classes averaging 20 students ensure access to
our knowledgeable, supportive faculty. Cutting edge labs and simulators quickly take
concepts from the textbook to hands-on application while building confidence in one's
abilities. During the summer, our Training Ship Golden Bear exposes students both to the responsibility of running a 500' vessel and to the exotic
cultures of international ports of call, before returning during the main school year
as the pride of our campus.
Required internships in shore-side companies, with government agencies or aboard commercial ships complete the critical connection between classroom instruction and real-world practices as well as connecting future graduates with possible employers.
Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs
Lori Schroeder


text:
One of the best memoirs of 2006, Alexander Masters's Stuart: A Life Backwards (Delta, $12), has arrived in paperback, not long after becoming a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award. If you don't think anybody could tell a charming story of the life an "ex-homeless, ex-junkie psychopath," this book could change your mind. This link will take you to a review that has a reading group guide posted just below it: www.oneminutebookreviews.wordpress.com/2007/03/22/. The readers' guide is also saved with the March posts and in the "Totally Unauthorized Reading Group Guides" category.
(c) 2007 Janice Harayda. All rights reserved.


text:
The Open Thread is a general discussion forum, where you can talk about whatever you like — there is nothing 'off topic' here — within reason. So get up on your soap box! The standard commenting rules of courtesy apply, and at the very least your chat should relate to the general content of this blog.
The sort of things that belong on this thread include general enquiries, soapbox philosophy, meandering trains of argument that move dynamically from one point of contention to another, and so on — as long as the comments adhere to the broad BNC themes of sustainable energy, climate change mitigation and policy, energy security, climate impacts, etc.
You can also find this thread by clicking on the Open Thread category on the cascading menu under the "Home" tab.
Note 1: For reference, the last general open thread (from 7 June 2011) was here. Why another one so soon, I hear you ask? Well, blame yourselves, you worked the last one over too quickly (almost 600 comments accumulated), and this payload slows down the thread loading too much. Hence, a fresh canvas for you.
Note 2: I have now added the BNC animated video as a permanent widget, located at the top right hand column of the blog — so it will always be easy to find (and, I hope, will act as an introduction to the site for those who are visiting for the first time).
Note 3: Some interesting reading… Joe Shuster (a member of SCGI and author of 'Beyond Fossil Fools') has written a 24-page pamphlet called "Energy Independence Day: July 4th 2040" (PDF download). This US-focused plan includes 15% wind, 15% solar, 5% hydro, 6% biomass, geothermal, tides and waves, 5% plasma remediation (waste), 12% natural gas, and 42% nuclear (an initial build out of advanced LWR and a transition to predominantly IFRs). Click the link to read the document, which is well argued (even if you disagree with some details), colourfully illustrated, and thought provoking. Tom Blees said the following:
Joe Shuster has distilled the confusing energy picture and presented in this brief report a rational, logical, and quantified solution to some of the most intractable problems of our day. Unlike most visions of humanity's future, Joe foresees an energy-rich world that would enable a dramatic improvement in the lives of everyone on the planet. This is not just about energy. It's about social justice on a planetary scale.
—Tom Blees, President of the Science Council for Global Initiatives—


text:
Merritt Baer is a Harvard Law School student living in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This semester, she wrote the following brief essay for a seminar on situationism. We are delighted to publish it on The Situationist (the essay and some worthwhile comments also can be found on GlobalComment).
* * *
In her concession speech, Hillary Clinton dedicated her gratitude "to the moms and dads who came to our events, who lifted their little girls and little boys on their shoulders and whispered in their ears, 'See, you can be anything you want to be.'"
Yet given the scrutiny dedicated to her pantsuits, Hillary's vision of possibility seems limited. Indeed, a new study by researchers led by Northwestern University's Joan Y. Chiao and just published on October 31 found that while men need only seem competent in order to be electable, women need both competence and attractiveness.
Palin was selected in the aftermath and with the awareness of how Hillary was characterized as not attractive or even female enough. In a sense this draws new justifiability for Sarah Palin's reportedly lofty budget for aesthetics, from hair stylists to department store budgets. It seems that if she had not spent time and money on her appearance, she could have suffered yet more critique.
Even CNN's Campbell Brown, who was far from a Palin supporter, said "There has been plenty of talk and plenty written about Sarah Palin's jackets, her hair, her looks . . . .When I wear a bad outfit, I get viewer email complaining about it. A lot of email. Seriously." She continued dryly, "When Wolf Blitzer wears a not-so-great tie, how much email do you think he gets?" She makes a good point.
Meanwhile, in the midst of the pressure to look good, there is the catch-22 at work: Bill Maher calling Palin a stewardess, movies of her in a swimsuit for a beauty pageant becoming the hot new YouTube video to circulate, and widespread sexualization of Palin becoming a favorite American pastime.
It seems clear that attractiveness in general plays a part in the reception a politician gets. However, Barack Obama's handsomeness contributed to his campaign strongly in positive ways – even becoming part of his branding, as his profile was featured on t-shirts and buttons. For Sarah Palin's naughty librarian beauty, there is a cost to the attractiveness factor: Palin was not merely attractive, she was sexy.
And while Chiao's study suggests that female politicians need to be perceived as both attractive and competent, a sexy woman just does not go with competence. (When does attractiveness intersect with or become sexiness? I am not entirely sure–perhaps it is merely being very attractive that veers into the category of sexy, although it seems also to encompass those who for some reason capture the public imagination, like Palin's rough-and-tumble hobbies.)
On the contrary, female sexiness triggers that animalistic side of our brains that seems opposed to intelligent thought (while male sexiness seems often to derive from and contribute to their aura of powerfulness). Thus audiences were primed to find Palin incompetent, and eager to hear the latest evidence. Not knowing Africa was a continent was perfect news.
Yet of course Obama – and all of the other candidates – had his share of campaign gaffes. When Obama stated on camera that he had visited 57 states, no one rushed to the conclusion that he actually didn't know the 50 states–instead, people looked for explanations: well, maybe he was including US territories. Never mind that the New York Times now reports that Palin's Africa gaffe was leaked by a fake blogger under the auspices of a fake think tank – the story had already taken a life of its own. We looked for reinforcements of Palin's incompetence, and we found them.
In some ways, this catch-22 lends a new dimension to the "halo effect" – the idea that an attractive person is advantaged because of their attractiveness. The attractiveness halo effect was first documented by social psychologist Solomon Asch, but we may know it anecdotally to be true that attractive people tend to have more success both professionally and in the dating arena. It's one of the reasons we have celebrity endorsements–attractiveness influences our overall perception of the person such that we assume their preferences for a product are as desirable as their looks.
Yet the disturbing implication is that while the halo effect works in purely positive ways for men, for women attractiveness is both even more necessary (see Chiao's study) and often simultaneously crippling (see Palin's representations).
After the final presidential debate between Obama and Mccain, newsanchor Katie Couric asked Hillary Clinton, "Why do you think Sarah Palin has an action figure and you have a nutcracker?" Clinton replied that she didn't know. But Hillary Clinton knows better than anyone that capturing the American audience as a woman is a balancing act.
The constant criticism dedicated to Hillary's pantsuits culminated in the marketing of a "Hillary Clinton nutcracker," in which her thighs serve as the nutcrackers (perish the thought of imagining what a comparable doll would look like for Obama…?) Meanwhile, Sarah Palin, who took a cue and opted for the skirtsuit and heels, became the subject of sexualized mockery. Interesting too that often, the originators of derogatory material directed at both Clinton and Palin were from the ideological left, a position we associate with progressive and tolerant views,
Unfortunately, we may be bypassing qualified or even brilliant individuals because they do not navigate the femininity/competence minefield – and who can? Perhaps Clinton was wrong to urge children to believe that they can be anything they want to be. Beautiful or not, our daughters will encounter the attractiveness and competence quotients– asked to be both while the catch-22 prevents it. And the minute their delicate juggling act topples, we will be quick to caricature them as a nutcracker doll or an Africa joke.
* * *
To read some related Situationist posts, see "The Color of Sex Appeal," "The Situation of Body Image," "The Situation of Hair Color," "The Magnetism of Beautiful People," "Survival of the Cutest," "Spas and Girls," "Fitting in and Sizing Up," and "Shades of Fairness and the Marketing of Prejudice."


text:
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Guess who's joined the craziness!
We do, however, have a new addition to the household - meet Dora!
We got a call about this sweet girl late Friday night - she was owner surrendered to a kill shelter over in Raleigh, NC. A friend who works for a foster organization north of us let us know of her situation and we drove up an hour Saturday morning to see her - after walking in and seeing her happy self, we knew instantly she was going to be coming back home with us! Sadly, we don't have any other information on her, other than she's about 2 or 3 years old. Our vet saw her Monday morning and said she looked great, but suggested we do around of blood work just to make sure there wasn't an underlying issue as to why she was given up.
She did come with silvery painted toe nails, so we assume she was possibly in a home with children that no longer could take care of her (either not enough money or time) or she has some medical condition. We've found her temperament pretty spot on with Gus's - laid back, not a barker, pretty playful and such a sweetheart! She hasn't shown any aggression towards other people, the random dog during our walks or even with her food. Now, of course, the question is, what does this dude think of her?
He has taken quite an interest in her! Playing around with friendly chasing parties and we've even seen an occasional snuggle on the couch or outside in the grass. We didn't know how he would react since he's been by himself for some time now, but apparently we had nothing to worry about! Although, I think he is trying to make up for lost time with the ladies, if you know what I mean... and yes, both of them are fixed.
Since it has been a few years since we've had two dogs in the house, it's taking a bit of time to get into that routine again. Life sure is hopping around here now! For whatever reason she was given up, Jeff and I are happy that we found her and can give her a safe, loving home to spend the rest of her life in. Welcome to your forever home, Dora!
43 comments:
- Anonymous3/24/2011 06:00:00 PM
Congratulations. Dora is beautiful and very lucky to have found such a wonderful, loving home.ReplyDelete
- Joanie B3/24/2011 06:54:00 PM
Awww, look at that last glamour shot! She's gorgeous, and Mr. Gus looks quite smitten & happy. Bless you both for opening up your home and your hearts to another critter. Now can you help me with 3 stray kitties, please, Joe? I'll bring them to Charlotte!!! Glad to hear your big news wasn't another move and that you'll be in NC a bit longer!ReplyDelete
Oh my goodness! Your beautiful dogs take my breath away! I am the owner of a 3 year old male black and tan long hair dapple dachshund! He hurt his back last week, and was diagnosed with intravertebral disc disease. He is luckily recovering with conservative therapy of steroids, pain meds, and crate confinement (for the next 6-8 weeks!). That may kill me.ReplyDelete
Congrats! Your doggies are adorable and from a rescuer, THANK YOU for adopting Dora. :)ReplyDelete
You are just the greatest guys.It makes me so happy to see what happend in your life last weekend.I am not surprised that Dora loves it in your home and gets along with Gus. The new dog can feel the warmth and love in your house and she fits right in with her mild temperament. Congratulations,my friends and a happy, long life tall of you. RitaReplyDelete
P.S. I am sure Dora can smell all the wonderful food that you prepare on a daily basis, Joe, she knows she's going have a great life.
She's beautiful. Does she know that there might be homemade treats in her future?ReplyDelete
What a nice story. It made my day. I think it is happy days ahead for the whole family.ReplyDelete
- Anonymous3/24/2011 09:32:00 PM
She's adorable! Love the two-dog-snuggle photo.ReplyDelete
Best wishes with the new lady of the house.
So georgeous! Gus and Dora make such a beautiful pair. Thank you so much for taking Dora in! Echoing what Christina said - does she know about the homemade treats yet? I bet Gus has told her... :)ReplyDelete
Best wishes to all!
You guys are killing me with these pictures. This is just what I dream of - two babies like you have! I would love all the craziness!! Good Luck.ReplyDelete
What a beautiful girl. Looks like Dora and Gus have become soul mates.ReplyDelete
At some point you and Jeff will be rewarded for your good deed.
omg just beautiful...they make a wonderful couple.....shes very lucky to have found such a great home....i love rescue dogs..ReplyDelete
I love the pictures!!! And from one animal lover(I'm currently fostering a French Bulldog and her 5 puppies, along with my own three animals)to another....thank you so much for offering Dora a forever home. :o) That is what animal companionship is all about.ReplyDelete
- Anonymous3/25/2011 07:15:00 AM
So sweet. I myself have two dachshunds, Bama and Bandit. Love them so much.ReplyDelete
Congratulations! And thank you for giving a wonderful pet a happy home!ReplyDelete
- Anonymous3/25/2011 10:01:00 AM
outward kindness always finds its way back, and miss dora you are beautiful and lucky. just found your blog, the recipes are great. i was a professional baker for 20 yrs,and your goods look wonderful,.made the banana bars, they were delicious.i have a delicious and moist yellow cake batter if anyones interested, their hard to make. enjoy your blog alot. t.sReplyDelete
Awwww, Dora is beautiful and she is so lucky to have you!ReplyDelete
I love making home made treats for my sweety boxer, Clare!
- Jeremy3/25/2011 11:35:00 AM
Congratulations on your new pup! They make a cute pair. Is Max still with you?ReplyDelete
Welcome, Little Dora!!! She is a beauty and I'm sure she will be so happy with you all, I'm so happy she found her forever home. Congratulations on the new addition!!ReplyDelete
OMG Joe and Jeff! You had me there for a minute with "news to share!" Dora is BEAUTIFUL - you really should be a professional photographer!ReplyDelete
I'm so happy for you guys - your happy household is growing, and I can't think of better dog lovers for Dora to have discovered. Yay YOU!
This is a very happy post.
As a dog lover, I'm so happy that Dora found you after whatever she had passed in her short life.
Wishing you all a long, healthy and joyful life together.
I do not know how anybody can give up their animals. I could never! Glad Dora found a good home with you!ReplyDelete
Looks like a match made in doggie heaven to me!
- Barbara3/26/2011 12:22:00 PM
Dora is one lucky girl, she found the perfect forever home! Happy to know you got her as a rescue, I wish everyone would adopt their pets at shelters.ReplyDelete
Aw, sweet! Congrats. She looks like a perfect addition to your family. ;)ReplyDelete
- Victoria3/26/2011 05:04:00 PM
Reading your story about Dora joining your family just made my day.ReplyDelete
Cogratulations on rescuing Dora. I know she will be very appreciative of living in a good loving home. They make such a cute couple.ReplyDelete
You two guys are the nicest people to give that sweet little Dora a loving home. Bless you.ReplyDelete
So cute! Congratulations!ReplyDelete
Dora is settling in so well! Neither of us can believe how smooth this has been - it must have been fate!ReplyDelete
Here's the story on the white American Esike, Max, that we had. Several years ago, back when we lived in MN, Max went to live at my Mom's farm.
His dad and sister are there - he seemed much happier there, rather than cooped up at our house with such a small yard. We miss him lots, but definitely feel he is living a much happier, free life there with plenty of room to roam!
Awwww! Too cute! I'm so happy that you are able to give a home to Dora! Though it's hard to pass up on a doxie, there is something about them that makes them simply irresistable!ReplyDelete
- Sobaka3/29/2011 07:28:00 AM
Oh, what a sweetie! She's a lucky girl to be rescued by you. She'll have a wonderful life now. Glad Gus likes her. She's beautiful, too.ReplyDelete
- Anonymous3/30/2011 11:01:00 PM
Dora is just as lucky to have you as you are to have her. Thank you for saving a dog.ReplyDelete
God bless you and Jeff for rescuing Dora! She is a beauty and it's plain to see that Gus agrees!ReplyDelete
Bless U Joe, SPAY NEUTER ADOPT is the way to go. Story made me cry. The pretty girl will now LIVEReplyDelete
How fabulous! She is adorable. Hope it's all working outReplyDelete
Things here are still grooving along here and we are flowing into a nice routine! Thanks for the comments!ReplyDelete
- Anne - Edinburgh4/04/2011 06:05:00 AM
Told you Joe - one you have one daschund, you will always want another! And these two look made for each other. She is absolutely beautiful and she will have you all round her little paw in no time - sorry, that's already happened! We don't have kill shelters here in the UK and I have to say that it made me shudder!ReplyDelete
doxies are like potato chips, you cant have just one!!ReplyDelete
Congrats on Dora. I had a lowrider for many years. His name was Max. He was also a rescue dog.He would burrow under the covers. I almost sat on him twice. I have some homemade dog treats on my site. http://www.mycatholickitchen.comReplyDelete
If you are interested.
I just saw this, Joe! Wonderful news! (I don't comment often but I read almost everyday.)ReplyDelete
Aww, hello Dora! and look at her pretty self on the banner!ReplyDelete
You guys are wonderful...we rescued one of our 2 dashes several years ago and have never regretted our decision xoxoReplyDelete


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NCAA Tournament: Louisville, Kansas among top seeds in Dance
Louisville earned the top overall seed in the NCAA tournament Sunday, while Kansas, Indiana and Gonzaga also received No. 1s after a topsy-turvy regular season and another round of weekend upsets.
The selection committee had its work cut out after five teams swapped the top ranking in The Associated Press poll, capped by the West Coast Conference champion Zags (30-2) moving to the lead spot for the first time in school history.
But it's No. 4-ranked Louisville (29-5) that leads the 68-team field after sharing the Big East regular-season title, then pulling off a stunning turnaround to beat Syracuse in the final of the conference tournament for their 10th straight victory. The Cardinals came back from a 16-point deficit early in the second half for a 78-61 rout.
No. 7 Kansas (29-5) moved up to take the second overall seed after an impressive run through the Big 12 tournament, capped by a 70-54 victory over rival Kansas State in the title game.
No. 3 Indiana (28-6) is third overall in the tournament despite falling to Wisconsin in the Big Ten semifinals.
The Zags claimed the last of the coveted No. 1 seeds, edging out Atlantic Coast Conference champion Miami.
The Hurricanes, who became the first ACC team to be denied a top seed after winning both the regular season and the conference tournament, were among the No. 2 seeds with ACC rival Duke, Georgetown and Big Ten tournament champion Ohio State.
The tournament begins Tuesday with a pair of games in Dayton. Everyone is trying to get to Atlanta for the Final Four, which begins April 6 at the Georgia Dome.
Kentucky won't get a chance to defend its national title. The Wildcats were left out of the field after a quarterfinal loss in the Southeastern Conference tournament. It didn't help that their best player, Nerlens Noel, went out with a season-ending knee injury.


text:
A young writer faces a test of her faith when she cares for a dying man
What Happened to Sophie Wilder: A Novel. By Christopher R. Beha. Tin House, 256 pp., $15.95, paper.
By Janice Harayda
American novelists appear to be losing faith in faith as a source of literary inspiration. Nearly all of the leading fiction writers who have dealt seriously with religion are over 60, especially those who have explored Catholic themes. No obvious heir to the tradition of Flannery O'Connor and J.F. Powers exists among the generation of novelists that is coming into maturity, the children of baby boomers. Into the void have rushed authors of ecclesiastical thrillers inspired by The Da Vinci Code, books that don't engage Catholic beliefs so much as distort and exploit them.
These realities may reflect a broader cultural trend: Young Americans are less likely than their parents to affiliate with a church, a reality documented in a report earlier this month from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. But the dearth of novels about Catholicism remains odd and disappointing given the deep impact on the faithful of the upheavals caused by issues such as abortion, sexual abuse by the clergy and the exclusion of women from the priesthood. You could hardly ask for more dramatic literary material.
So it's heartening that in his first novel Chris Beha tells an intelligent, if not fully successful, story of a young female convert to Catholicism. In college Sophie Wilder fell in love with a student in her writing program, Charlie Blakeman, whose surname aptly embeds that of that skeptic of orthodox religion, William Blake. Sophie drops back into her ex-lover's life when they are in their late 20s and finds him keeping company with self-consciously literary New Yorkers who think and speak in phrases like, "Alfred Kazin once said of Saul Bellow …" Since college, Sophie has converted to Catholicism while Charlie and his friends have made a religion their pretenses or, as they might say, "stories." In this novel a man who asks, "What's her story?" means: What narrative has she constructed about herself? Sophie, it seems, has reconnected with Charlie to tell him the story of her recent, troubling experience of caring for a dying man whose wishes tested her faith.
This novel represents Charlie's attempt to make sense of Sophie's tale. Antiphonal chapters tell the story from alternating points of view: Charlie's first-person account in each case precedes a third-person narrative about Sophie that perhaps reflects his effort to see things from her perspective. Both versions of the tale have weak spots. Writing in the first person, Charlie often asserts instead of dramatizing facts about Sophie or offers awkward explanations for her actions. ("Perhaps because of her family situation …") He says that male students were "enthralled" with Sophie and found her "unlike other girls," but it's never clear why this was so when she was rude, sarcastic and lacking the conventional beauty that might have offset those traits. Charlie also implies that Sophie had that blend of talent and drive that enables a writer to get a book published and become "briefly famous" soon after college, but he offers no evidence of her talent and little of her drive. The chapters not told in the first person have traditional third-person limited-omniscient narration when free-indirect speech might have better revealed Sophie's character. All of this leaves a hole at the center of the story: You see Sophie from two perspectives that don't coalesce into a whole. She never comes into her own.
What Happened to Sophie Wilder is ultimately Charlie's story rather than Sophie's, and as such, it deals sensitively with worthy questions: Why do we need stories, whether religious or literary? What do we gain or lose from them? At what point does an investment in story become irreversible? The great virtue of this novel is that it treats belief seriously. If the book shows the cost of Sophie's faith, it never ridicules it, and it also reveals the cost of others' misplaced devotions. Charlie and his cousin rent rooms in Greenwich Village from a man who has Victorian aquarium full of fish, "the most important thing in his life," and who asks only that they care for it when he's away. Consumed by their own interests, the young men are incapable of this simple task. Charlie realizes it too late, and in a rueful observation on their failure, suggests a theme of the novel. "We had been given something beautiful, asked only to watch over it," he reflects. "We'd been careless, and now it was all in ruin."
Best line: "Henry's the Ted Hughes of management consultants."
Worst line: "Tom … pursed his lips with a look of concern."
A Totally Unauthorized Reading Group Guide and discussion questions for What Happened to Sophie Wilder appeared on this site on Oct. 14. The guide to this book explores, among other things, some of the religious issues raised by the novel: for example, that Sophie converted after reading Thomas Merton's The Seven Storey Mountain and each of the main sections of the book has seven chapters.
Published: May 2012
Furthermore: The New York Times summarized the the report from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life cited above. You may also want to read Sam Sacks' review of What Happened to Sophie Wilder and One-Minute Book Reviews' review of the nonfiction book Mr. Tibbits's Catholic School.
Read an excerpt from What Happened to Sophie Wilder.
You can follow Jan (@janiceharayda) on Twitter by clicking on the "Follow" button in the sidebar on this page.
© 2012 Janice Harayda. All rights reserved.


text:
Justin Bieber claimed foot fracture in Florida, police say
Justin Bieber claimed after a shaky sobriety test in Florida that he was suffering from a hairline fracture in his right foot and made condescending comments to officers, according to a Miami Beach police document released Tuesday.
The police summary of Bieber's performance on various sobriety tests following his Jan. 23 arrest shows that the pop singer told officers he had injured his foot skateboarding three months earlier. The officer had noted that Bieber appeared to sway and have leg tremors during one of the tests, and also winced as if in pain.
"He appeared to have great difficulty," the report noted, adding that the injury never was mentioned or noticed after that test.
Bieber, who has pleaded not guilty to driving under the influence and other charges, also told officers he was not drag racing in a rented Lamborghini along with R&B singer Khalil Amir Sharieff, who was driving a Ferrari when both were stopped. Bieber, who turned 20 March 1, questioned why he was arrested in the first place.
The report describes Bieber as initially "agitated and condescending" and using frequent profanity when brought to the police station.
"He then got upset and said, 'I'm 19 years old. I'm just out having a good time,'" the report quoted him as saying. "What were you doing when you were 19?"
The officer replied that he was not driving around in a Lamborghini at that age.
"Yeah, well, I bet you didn't have millions of dollars in your bank account either," Bieber was quoted in reply.
The singer told officers that black Cadillac Escalade SUVs following the two sports cars were carrying security personnel and that the group was trying to avoid celebrity photographers who were tailing them.
The officer mentioned to another officer that it appeared Bieber and Sharieff were having difficulty driving the high-end cars.
Bieber was quoted as saying, "What? I've been driving Lamborghinis since I was 15."
Other topics of discussion, the report noted, included Bieber's numerous tattoos and fishing for pike in his native Canada with his grandfather. He also mentioned taking an anti-anxiety medication whenever he feels "closed in," according to the report.
Police drug tests found the presence of the active ingredient in marijuana and Xanax, an anti-anxiety drug. Traces of alcohol were also detected with a breath test, but the level was below the 0.02 threshold considered intoxicated for drivers under age 21.
Bieber faces a May 5 trial date.