text:
There are many ways to contact us
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We aim to respond to your enquiry as soon as possible, however we may take up to 28 days to respond if further investigation is required. If this is the case a member of staff will be in touch to advise this.
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Diversity and inclusion have long been priorities at Carnival Corporation & plc with our over 120,000 passionate employees representing more than 100 countries. As CEO since July 2013, Arnold Donald has been a strong champion of engineering "diversity of thinking" across the group, fostering innovation through all forms of diversity, including gender, ethnicity, background, upbringing, education, geographic origin and experience. During his five year tenure, numerous dynamic leaders from diverse backgrounds have been appointed to leadership roles as presidents of the group's cruise line brands and in key roles within global port and destination development, human resources, marketing, sales, operations and procurement, while continuing to promote diversity and inclusion.
We believe such diversity must be led from the top and 4 of the Group's 10 brands are now led by women. However, we recognise that this is only a beginning and we aspire to deepening this commitment to fostering a diverse workplace.
Taking diversity more broadly, the group has been recognized for its LGBT employment practices, scoring a perfect 100 on the Human Right Campaigns' (a leading global non-profit organization working to advance diversity, inclusion and gender equality at work) corporate equality index.
"We are very proud of the diversity of our workforce and we believe strongly that diversity of thinking helps drive innovation," Donald said. "We have seen time and time again that leveraging the knowledge and creativity of our collective backgrounds, experiences and perspectives produces smarter and more innovative solutions to our overall business and especially to our top priority of consistently exceeding our guests' expectations."
"We commend Arnold Donald along with the other Catalyst Champion CEOs who represent a passionate group of change agents," said Deborah Gillis, former President and CEO, Catalyst. "They are already leaders and champions of gender equality and inclusion. Now they are taking bold action, holding themselves publicly accountable for doing the right thing and inspiring all of us to do more."
Together with Catalyst and other global companies, Carnival Corporation has pledged to accelerate progress in the representation of women, including women from different ethnic backgrounds, in executive/senior level positions and on the company's board of directors (or equivalent).
Within the UK we are required to report our Gender Pay Gap. Please click here to view the report for Carnival UK (shore based) and click here for FMSI (fleet based).
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Potter, Fredric James
Fredric James Potter
Rank: Private
Regiment: 1/5th Battalion, Royal Sussex Regiment
Wife: Mrs Jane Louise Potter
Address: Woodman's Corner, Whatlington
Other Info: He served 22 years and 249 days in the Rifle Brigade (Prince Consort's Own), and went through the South African War. On the outbreak of the present War he volunteered for service again, and joined up on 11th August 1914, in the 5th Royal Sussex. He went to the Front on 18th February 1915 and was dangerously wounded on 17th October the same year. He is now on duty with the Regiment at home.
According to CWGC, Fredric died aged 50 on 4th April 1918 whilst serving with the 695th Agricultural Company, Labour Corps He is remembered at Whatlington (St Mary Magdalene) Churchyard, in the north part.
Published: August 1916
Please use the comments box below if you can provide more information about this person.

subset: commoncrawl


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After getting a taste of the "tour life" this past summer with Weezy on his âAmericaâs Most Wantedâ Tour, world famous boxer, Adrien Broner, aka AB, is back today to take another stab at rappin'. For his newest release, AB calls on the MMG bawse Rick Ross for â40â, a track that is presumably off ABâs upcoming debut mixtape About Billions. Expect that project to impact in the coming months. Â
Is this another L for Adrien? Or does he deliver on this one? Mastermind in stores now!
Quotable Lyrics:
Hit the club at 12:40 with like forty on me
Strapped at the 40/40 with two forty's on me
If I get forty bricks, I let two go for four
That's forty gone, now I need forty more


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Content Services & Collaboration Track
Benjamin Niaulin
(Microsoft MVP)
Benjamin works for Sharegate, a SharePoint & Office 365 Migration & Management tool, based in Montreal.
Shafina Hassam
(Adoption & Change Management Expert)
Shafina is a dynamic Office 365 and SharePoint Online adoption consultant.
Susan Hanley
(Microsoft MVP)
Susan Hanley is a consultant specializing in the "people side" of intranet and collaboration solutions.
Business Process Management Track
Filip Karadzic (Microsoft)
Filip is Senior Program Manager on the PowerApps product team, with oversight of PowerApps controls.
John P White
(Microsoft MVP)
Melissa Hubbard
(Microsoft MVP)
Melissa is a Business Applications Microsoft MVP and a Digital Workplace Expert that specializes in collaboration and business process automation.
Intro to Azure Track
Daryl Novak
Forward thinking technology and innovation leader, with broad expertise across infosec, cryptotechnology, IoT and cloud infrastructure.
Frank Boucher (Microsoft)
With many years of experience in the IT industry, François (Frank) Boucher is a trusted Microsoft Azure professional whose expertise and bilingual service are relied upon in large Canadian markets (Ottawa and Montreal) as well as internationally (Minsk).
Sharon Bennett
Sharon Bennett is an IT staff instructor for Lynda.com at LinkedIn.
Special Lunch Track
Colin Smith
(Microsoft MVP)
Colin Smith has worked for some the world's largest and smallest technology companies. He has had an interest in systems management and desktop delivery solutions since the 1980s and has been involved in virtual desktop architectures since the mid 1990s.


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Natural Nigerian Moisturizing Deep Conditioner ReviewHello my people,
Today I'm reviewing the Natural Nigerian Moisturizing Deep Conditioning Treatment with Shea Butter and Herbs.
When Natural Nigerian launched her new products, I couldn't wait to try them.
Because deep conditioners are my favourite thing, this had to be first.
This product is made in Nigeria. (Yay #BuyNaija)
Quick note about Natural Nigerian: she is VERY particular about living a very natural life- all the way from food to self care to cleaning products. No gimmicks. It is a life I am committed to (still on this journey) so I trust the quality of her products even before I buy.
Whether or not her product will work for my particular need, I can afford to skip reading the label and know that I'm not using anything that could potentially harm me. Of course if you have specific allergies, read labels and avoid your triggers, natural or not.
Packaging: White jar, green label on the cover and the body. Clean and simple. I like.
Price: N3800 (about 10 USD now)
Smell: The only thing I can compare it to is plastacine. I loved playing with it as a child. I googled and found that plastacine gets its smell from flaxseed (aka linseed) oil but this product doesn't contain that so I guess something similar? Dunno. There's also a slight herbiness to the smell. On the whole it's mild enough and doesn't linger.
Colour and Consistency: Beige. Not too thick: it'll flow nicely if you tip the jar.
Product Description:
"A medley of herbs, juices and vitamins make Natural Nigerian™ Moisturizing Deep Conditioning Treatment a super nourishing, moisturizing, strengthening treat for hair. It contains ingredients that repair damage as well as prevent damage. It also sixteen amino acids (building blocks of hair) and contains an ingredient that is scientifically proven to improve hair combability and increase hair shine."
Aqueous extracts of Chondrus Crispus (Irish Moss), Arctium Lappa (Burdock root), Ulmus Fulva Bark (Slippery Elm) and Yucca Schidigera (Yucca Root), Aloe Barbadensis (Aloe Vera) Leaf Juice, Butyrospermum parkii (Shea Butter), Cocos nucifera (Coconut Oil), Behentrimonium Methosulfate (and) Cetearyl Alcohol, Polyquaternium-11, Hydrolyzed Quinoa, Hydrolyzed Adansonia digitata (Baobab) Seed Protein, Benzyl Alcohol (and) Salicylic acid (and) Glycerin (and) Sorbic acid, Neem Oil, d-alpha tocopherol (Vitamin E), Panthenol (Pro-Vitamin B5), Guar Hydroxypropyltrimonium Chloride.
Guaranteed no added: Artificial colours, fillers, preservatives, Additives, Synthetic fragrances
Great ingredients. Now let's get to the tea.
How I used it I used this product like I would any other deep conditioner. I put it on my damp hair after cleansing with shampoo or clay, covered with a plastic bag +/- a towel so there's some heat; then rinsed after 45 mins to an hour. Sometimes a lot longer.
My Assessment
When I applied it, it didn't sink in immediately but as I continued to work it into my hair it did easily.
It has a fair amount of slip but this probably won't dethrone your favourite detangling conditioner. It didn't immediately soften my hair like some other deep conditioners I've used but I was willing to wait.
One thing, it's not greasy at all. You may feel like you want to pile it on, but don't. You'll waste it.
When I rinse off a deep conditioner that is moisturising, I expect my hair to feel very soft, lush, hydrated.
If it's strengthening, it should feel strong. Not hard and and difficult to work with, but strong so that it feels like it can handle some manipulation without breakage. I get this after a protein or an ayurvedic hair treatment.
If it's a balancing conditioner (strength + moisture), it should feel soft and hydrated, as well as strong. It's something you'll understand when you feel it.
NN Moisturising Deep Conditioner definitely fell into the strengthening category for me. When I rinsed and touched my hair, I went back to read the description and ingredients. It could be the 16 amino acids, the quinoa and baobab protein; it could be the yucca or any of the other plant extracts; or it's a combination of everything... but it was for sure a strengthening treatment for my own hair.
I also noticed more shine. Even when my hair was wet it seemed shinier that usual so I know this product did some work of filling in gaps and patching up my strands.
I got the nourishing and strengthening parts of the product description, but I didn't get the moisturizing part with that 'Hair like Buttah' feel.
I was a bit let down the first time because I was expecting fluffy cloud hair and I wasn't due for a protein treatment. But looking back I should have read the ingredients before using and since I know my hair, I would have known when to use it.
I have type 4 hair, normal to high porosity, not protein sensitive but will readily be strengthened when I apply protein.
If your hair is like mine, I'll say treat this product like a protein treatment. Save it for when your hair needs one and follow with a moisturising deep conditioner.
Orrrr just mix the two together for a balancing deep conditioner. I used it up before I got this idea but it's a thought. I might have to buy again to try this.
If you have fine hair, this product might be balancing enough for you on its own (I should get my sister to try it). Also, even if your hair looks like mine it could respond entirely differently from mine.
I haven't seen any reviews yet on this product, but NN shared a video of this product on her daughter's hair and it really looked like it deeply moisturised her hair.
Verdict: Quality ingredients, great for strengthening and shine. Not as moisturising as I've come to expect.
Will I repurchase? Maybe. If I'm looking for a strengthening conditioner. If you read my blog often you'll know I use eggs for strengthening but I'm getting more interested in veganism so I might pick this up again.
You can get it online at naturalnigerian.com/ahia, I bought mine at Yellow Sisi salon in Lekki. Some stores in Lagos and Abuja also carry her products but I couldn't find a list. She posts them on her Instagram though.
Thoughts? Talk to me in the comments.


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Holt, Dr Georgina; Grey, Mr Peter; Nielsen, Mr Robert and Tranter, Mr Richard (2003) A multi-country case study of the process of conversion to organic farming in the EU. Working paper, Centre for Agricultural Strategy, The University of Reading . [Unpublished]
- English
This paper reports on a series of case studies of the process of conversion to organic farming in five EU countries. The objectives of the case studies were: to identify factors affecting the decisions of conventional farmers considering conversion to organic farming; to identify problems that farmers thought they would face; and to consider and detail the financial impact of conversion on a range of farm businesses. National comparisons of the practice of conversion to organic farming reveals a wide diversity of support systems. Although these are in part necessitated by the diversity of enterprises suitable to different geographical locations, variation also results from different political agendas. Variation is also seen in farmer attitudes to organic farming. However, there are clearly concerns across countries in the financial benefits of, inputs changes for, and technical barriers to organic farming. Thus, in order to understand movements in, and out of, organic farming more fully, it is necessary to take a closer look at each of the countries here compared and to understand conversion within the national context.
|EPrint Type:
|Working paper
|Organic conversion, organic policy, case studies
|"Organics" in general
Farming Systems > Social aspects
Farming Systems > Farm economics
|Research affiliation:
| European Union > Conversion
UK > Univ. of Reading
|Deposited By:
|Jones, Mr Philip
|ID Code:
|Deposited On:
|20 Dec 2006
|Last Modified:
|16 Jan 2012 10:03
|Document Language:
|Not peer-reviewed
Repository Staff Only: item control page


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« What Does DeVos Running the Ed. Department Mean for Her Critics? | Main | Betsy DeVos to Give First Speech at Education Department »
Trump Will Repeal Common Core, Says Kellyanne Conway (He Can't)
What will Betsy DeVos' confirmation as education secretary mean? Among other things, according to President Donald Trump's counselor Kellyanne Conway, it means the president can move ahead with his campaign promise to repeal the Common Core State Standards. But that's a problematic assertion.
Conway made the claim during a Tuesday interview with CNN's Jake Tapper. Her remarks about the common core begin at around the 50-second mark:
"He wants to repeal common core. He doesn't think that federal standards are better than local and parental control, for example," Conway told Tapper.
As we've reported previously, states adopt content standards like the common core—the federal government doesn't get to choose for them. Washington also didn't write the common core. There was intense debate during President Barack Obama's administration about whether Washington improperly coerced states into adopting the common core through programs like Race to the Top grants. But regardless of that debate, the president by himself doesn't have the authority to scrap the standards with the stroke of a pen.
What about Congress? The Every Student Succeeds Act explicitly bars the education secretary from influencing states' decisions about standards. So right now, neither Trump nor DeVos can bar states from using the common core. Absent a change to federal education law that bans the common core outright or in some way relaxes those prohibitions on the secretary (neither of those possibilities appears at all likely right now), their hands are tied.
DeVos promised to abide by those prohibitions on standards in ESSA in responses to question from Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., before DeVos was confirmed Tuesday. But DeVos' reply to Murray didn't sit particularly well with Joy Pullmann, a managing editor at the Federalist website and a critic of the common core—Pullmann told us in an email that DeVos' response was focused on compliance and wasn't particularly creative.
"I do think there are a number of things a motivated education secretary and her team could do to address the intellectual monopoly ... her department helps create that helped fuel common core," Pullman told us. Such new approaches could include promoting new accountability systems and teacher training methods, for example, Pullman said.
None of this is to say Trump and DeVos can't use the bully pulpit to speak out against the common core. After all, political pressure has played a role in some states' decisions to review and at least nominally replace the common core. Right now, we calculate that at least 37 states and the District of Columbia officially use the common core, although that's a number open to reasonable debate.
Conway also indicated to Tapper that the Trump administration would be looking to expand school choice, charter schools, and home schooling. Trump pitched a $20 billion voucher plan on the campaign trail.
"Children should not be restricted in their educational opportunities just by their ZIP code," Conway said.
Don't miss another Politics K-12 post. Sign up here to get news alerts in your email inbox.
Follow us on Twitter at @PoliticsK12.


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IF YOUR broadband speed is at a crawl or occasionally drops out completely don't yell at the National Broadband Network. Not automatically, anyway.
NBN chief executive Bill Morrow believes his company too often is blamed for failures which have been the fault of retain service providers (RSPs) who onsell his product.
One retailer can get top marks from customers while another, using the same NBN service, can be marked down by their clients because they aren't as good at running their end of the network.
Mr Morrow has told a Senate committee the finger-pointing often is in the wrong direction, although occasionally both are responsible.
But the creation of the broadband network was so swift and vast that the NBN was being blamed for almost everything, he told the committee last night.
"Many end-users are confused as to who does what and the industry — including us — must do a better job in providing that clarity," Mr Morrow said.
"In going through some of the customer complaints, it's clear there is too much finger pointing and sometimes it is us and sometimes it is the retailer.
"But more often than not, the end-user feels like they get the run around.
"Again, this is an industry-wide issue that cannot be fixed by NBN alone. Some retailers are taking strong action already and it shows in the end-user satisfaction scores.
"For example, we have one retailer with very high scores and another at the other end of the scale, both using the same portion of the NBN network and the same NBN processes to activate a user."
The NBN reach often is far less than that of an RSP, he said, "only a small fraction of the end-to-end network that connects an end-user to their internet content or the other end of the telephone".
"For example, in some cases NBN is just the last 10-15 kilometres, but the retailers have a far greater stretch of network that must be invested in and maintained to support the user experience," he told the committee.
"Failure to do so results in a reduction of speed, packet drop outs, or a call not going through. Adding to the confusion is the fact that the process of having the service turned on, or the speed observed, or even the reliability of the end-to-end network is both the work of a chosen retailer and of NBN."
Official base figures from the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman show NBN complaints had increased by 120 per cent. However, Mr Morrow said, as a proportion of end users the figure had dropped by 12 per cent.
Mr Morrow said more than 4.2 million premises across the country can now order a service, which was more than a third of the country. NBN was on track to pass the half way point in the
middle of this year and will extend that to three-quarters a year from then.
"We are beginning to punch above 70,000 new homes in just a single week and we expect
this will continue to climb," he said.
"Four out of five of all homes and business in the country are now either in design, construction, or can already order a service. This accelerating pace is important but equally so is keeping
the cost per premises in line with expectation and once again, we are either on or better
than budget."


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Improving Indian Health Service hospitals
Agency strives to ensure safety, coordinate quality initiatives.
The Indian Health Service (IHS) is tasked with delivering comprehensive health care to about 2.2 million Native Americans, but recent evidence has suggested that some of its hospitals have fallen dangerously short of this goal.
In Rapid City, S.D., for example, the emergency department of Sioux San Hospital was closed in 2016 for deficiencies so severe that they constituted "an immediate and serious threat to the health and safety of any individual who comes to your hospital to receive emergency services," CMS wrote in a letter to the hospital.
Also in 2016, CMS warned the Pine Ridge IHS hospital that it was in "immediate jeopardy" of closing after CMS inspectors found that staff had failed to appropriately assess patients, had not adequately factored patient history into diagnoses, had made patients wait for care they needed immediately, and had been inadequately trained in intubation and respirator use. The emergency department of a third IHS Great Plains hospital, Rosebud, was shuttered for seven months after CMS found similar deficiencies.
These cases reveal systemic problems with safety, access, and quality of care at IHS that extend beyond the Great Plains Area. In Window Rock, Ariz., for example, Crownpoint Medical Center closed its emergency department, inpatient services, and obstetrics care units in 2015 due to staffing shortages, according to a press release from the Navajo Nation.
Today, however, some dedicated clinicians and government initiatives are working to correct these deficiencies and provide Native Americans with high-quality inpatient care.
IHS hospitals and their clinicians face multiple hurdles, said Lee Lawrence, MD, chief medical officer of the IHS Great Plains Area. "The remote, rural, and distant locations, limited funding, outdated or missing equipment, and chronic staffing vacancies make medical care in the IHS system particularly challenging," he said.
For example, some facilities lack CT scanners, so patients must be flown long distances to better-equipped IHS medical centers, Dr. Lawrence said. Pregnant patients also must endure long-distance transfers if their local IHS hospital cannot retain appropriate obstetric staff. "Particularly challenging to the hospitalists is the lack of ICUs in many of our facilities, requiring them to make the difficult decision of admitting or transferring the more critical patients," Dr. Lawrence added.
Dorothy Sanderson, MD, FACP, agreed. The aging of IHS facilities, infrastructure, and equipment, combined with geographic isolation and budget shortages, force hospitalists and their clinical colleagues "to be as creative as possible in finding ways to provide the culturally sensitive and excellent medical care our patients deserve," she said.
IHS hospitals also are uniquely complex, explained Dr. Sanderson, who is a hospitalist and chief of internal medicine at Phoenix Indian Medical Center in Phoenix. Some are federal facilities, while others fall under tribal authority. Some have a very limited scope of practice, while others offer certain specialty and diagnostic services.
But despite—or perhaps because of—these tiered intricacies, IHS headquarters has for years delegated the oversight of care to its nine geographic areas, according to a January 2017 report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO). As a result, IHS lacked agency-wide standards for quality of care, and oversight of quality issues was "limited and inconsistent," the report asserted. For example, authorities in some IHS areas did not meet regularly and failed to make quality a standing agenda item at their meetings. Reporting of data on quality and adverse events also was sporadic and incomplete, the GAO found.
Systemic change
Such revelations spurred IHS in 2016 to craft a quality framework that aspires to ensure patient safety, boost organizational capacity, and meet and maintain accreditation standards, the agency stated in a recent press release. IHS also has pledged to expand existing safety reporting systems and promote a culture of transparency and patient safety in which hospital staff feel comfortable reporting medical errors.
As part of these efforts, CMS has added IHS to its national Hospital Improvement Innovation Networks program, which aims to cut overall patient harm by 20% and to reduce 30-day readmissions by 12% between 2014 and 2019. Premier, Inc., a private health care improvement company, will serve as the Hospital Improvement Innovation Network organization for IHS. CMS also has tapped HealthInsight, a nonprofit, community-based organization, to help coordinate quality improvement efforts at the 25 IHS hospitals that are Medicare-certified.
In the Great Plains Area, a newly hired manager is implementing quality assurance and performance improvement programs at each of the IHS hospitals, Dr. Lawrence said. The Great Plains Area also has set new minimum standards for medical equipment and has contracted with The Joint Commission to provide accreditation, training, and education on quality assurance and patient safety.
In order to continue receiving CMS reimbursements, the Pine Ridge and Rosebud hospitals also have agreed to shift executive hospital leadership to expert contractors who will thoroughly train local administrators and then shift to mentoring and coaching roles.
The Great Plains Area also has allocated $8.6 million to provide telemedicine services at all 19 of its service units, which together serve about 130,000 patients. "The telemedicine initiative is an important step in expanding access to care for patients, who will receive specialized care nearer to home instead of traveling long distances to see a specialist," Dr. Sanderson said.
Local progress
Clinicians at Phoenix Indian Medical Center in Arizona did not await external or top-down pressure to make positive changes. To support complex patients in the face of limited resources, surgeons and their colleagues designed a Perioperative Surgical Home (POSH), a model which the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) promotes as an innovation for providing safe, patient-centered care.
Perioperative care has become highly fragmented, according to the ASA. The perioperative surgical home model overcomes this tendency by teaming up hospitalists, surgeons, anesthesiologists, nurses, pharmacists, respiratory therapists, and nutritionists so they can comprehensively evaluate medical and psychosocial needs before and after surgery and create detailed pre- and postoperative needs assessments and treatment plans, Dr. Sanderson said.
Implementing a POSH enabled Phoenix Indian Medical Center to expand its scope of surgical services—a vital step for a hospital that serves more than 140,000 patients from 40 tribes. In addition, evaluations during the early stages of the project revealed opportunities for improvement, such as a perioperative antibiotic prophylaxis program, a recovery pathway for colorectal surgery patients, and a ventral hernia program, which clinicians can tailor based on patient needs, Dr. Sanderson said.
To encourage early mobility after surgery, staff also designed a WeMove! program that provided detailed instructions for patients, a walking circuit in the medical-surgery ward, and 55 new chairs. Early results showed patients were out of bed 40% more often after the program started, Dr. Sanderson said.
Recognizing the need for ongoing staff education, clinicians also designed a web-based curriculum on the essentials of surgery and began organizing regular lectures at the hospital for CME credit. To help reinforce the program, they also updated their electronic health record system to include POSH notes and nursing documentation.
The model is generalizable, Dr. Sanderson emphasized. "Any facility [with] complex patients requiring multiple encounters in the perioperative setting can benefit from evaluating the process through which patients prepare for surgical procedures."


text:
So after the dust has settled a bit on a customer, let me tell you about their problems, relating to improper installation of a regenerative power supply and a third party repair of a motor. Get a call a few months ago for a regenerative style power supply. Talk to the customer a bit and they had a raft of F860 faults before the power supply finally gave up. F860 is a short, either in the drive, the motor power cable or the motor. They were worried about just putting in a power supply, and I was too, but they meggered out the motor and cable and everything looked ok. Power supply in and they started running just fine. For a month. Then the drive blows. At this point I hear the story of the third party repair of the motor, but they will not hear of sending the motor out to have it checked as it was done by a local shop that "they have good luck with". So, we send them a drive. It will not start as it is getting a F860 constantly. We send them new cables, and tell them they should get the motor checked again. New cables are installed, they run about a day and then blow out the drive and power supply. So we send everything in for repair and eval, including the motor. For the motor, freshly "Repaired" we get…
– Physical condition: Fair condition, Output shaft has light grooved damage.
– Pre-repair assessment: Thermo check is within Bosch Rexroth specification, HiPot test passed,
Winding test passed, EMK test passed, brake test failed.
– Operational Test: Failed, Encoder give out 89 fault and 22 fault.
– Disassembled the motor for visual inspection and found that Front beairng is severely worn out,
Bearing cup race is worn, Encoder is severely worn out and contaminated with dust. Rear bearing
and brake are worn out. Brake is overheated. Brake resistor is missing. The cooling fan has been
modified, Instead of cooling fan blowing the cool air to the motor, it instead it is pulling the air out.
So the "repaired" motor needed – Replaced: Front and Rear bearings, Brake, Front flange, End shield, Encoder, Supporting disc, Shim, Rotary shaft lip, Shim ring, O-Rings, Brake pins, Brake
connector and resistor, Cooling fan.
The interesting thing is that this didn't even fix the problem. We had one more iteration to go before noticing that this motor was of a date code that had extended windings which required a different end plate. That was listed per serial number and was only something the manufacturer of the motor would have had (along with the special extended plate).
End result, customer down 4 weeks because of a badly repaired motor. The money they saved on the first repair was pointless, as it had to come back in for repair.


text:
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text:
The Samsung Galaxy Note7 exchange programme started here yesterday, with thousands of customers swopping their old devices for new ones.
Users had to book an appointment online before heading down to Suntec Singapore Convention and Exhibition centre, where 90 counters were set up for them to make the exchange.
Phone-maker Samsung issued a global recall of the phone two weeks ago, following reports of the phone's battery exploding while charging.
When the doors to the waiting area opened at 1pm yesterday, a queue of about 50 people formed. But the queue moved quickly.
Most consumers whom The Straits Times spoke to said the exchange was fuss-free and smooth. Most took 45 minutes to two hours to complete the exchange. It took longer for those who opted to transfer data from their old to the new phones, for instance.
"I expected a long line, but there's not much of a queue at all," said customer service executive Nur Serena Tay, 44. She had backed up her phone at home, but waited 10 more minutes for an assistant to transfer data between the two devices, "just in case".
But insurance agent Danny Chay, 34, said the process could have been more efficient. He turned up at about noon to queue, an hour before the doors opened.
"For example, when we were waiting outside, they could have used an SMS queue system to tell us when it was our turn instead of having us stand in line," he said.
Consumers who did not have an appointment or who had booked a different time slot were turned away at the entrance.
Those who exchanged their Note7 phones received a goodie bag with food and water, as well as a letter of apology from Samsung, a $30 CapitaLand Mall voucher and a screen protector.
They can keep the accessories from the old device such as the charger and stylus.
Sales consultant Evelyn Ong, 23, said: "Samsung is making an effort to make it up to its customers and I do appreciate it. We shouldn't be too picky as the recall is also a huge task for them."
So far, more than 50 per cent of the thousands of Galaxy Note7 users in Singapore have registered for the exchange programme.
The programme will run from 11am to 9pm on weekdays and 9am to 11pm on weekends, from now until Oct 2.
- For more information, go to www.samsung.com/sg/note7exchange


text: with most all the cooking shows ive seen they ALWAYS pan sear the protein and then finish it off in the oven. it doesnt matter if its beef, pork, chicken, fish, lamb or anything - they always use this method. ive never tried it myself, ive always either baked it all the way or pan fried it all the way. just wondering if the pan then oven method really makes a difference and what would i notice/gain from it. i am a miser at heart and it just doesnt make sense to use the stove and then fire up the oven to finish off a meal, but i am a food conosuer so i would indeed do it if gains were large.


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There is a new bottling in the Douglas Laing Old Particular range, apparently exclusive to Tel Aviv Airport Duty Free. It is called "Aultmore XO" and sells for $113. When this was mentioned yesterday in the Malt Maniacs & Friends Facebook group by Israeli Blogger Michael Bendavid it sparked quite a discussion, and I think it is worthwhile to give it a closer look.
Obviously this is a NAS bottling because it does not have a classic age statement. But for anyone mildly familiar with cognac, the term XO rings a bell. In cognac, XO stands for Extra Old. This means a minumum age of 6 years according to the official regulations. Because cognac is usually blended from many vintages, there may be significantly older spirits in the botte as well.
Now how old might the Aultmore XO possibly be? And why has Douglas Laing decided not to use a proper age statement?
If the whisky was old, there would be no reason whatsoever to hide its age. Douglas Laing have been using age statements for the other bottles in the Old Particular range as well. I think it is fair to assume the Aultmore to be on the young side. Coincidentially, there have been a number of very young and rather good Aultmores around, recently. For example there was a 5 yo from Master of Malt that managed to win a bronze medal at the 2012 Malt Manaics Awards, and there also was a 5 yo from Douglas Laing in their Provenance range.
The Scotch Whisky Regulations forbid misleading age statements, so I would be very surprised if the Aultmore XO was not 6 years old. But even if it was older, it is evident that Douglas Laing figured naming it XO could improve the sales of this whisky. XO certainly would be a very nice way of making a young whisky look more exclusive, especially in a duty free shop sitting next to the expensive cognac bottles. But for someone who is only used to cognac, the XO might really be misleading, because of the fact mentioned above that XO cognac usually also contains older spirits.
NAS whisky has usually been defended with the argument that indeed older does not automatically mean better. Which is perfectly true. But one thing which for me is a key issue in NAS whisky has been neglected a bit so far: the pricing. The Aultmore XO highlights this particular problem of NAS whisky because it is not affected by blending issues like cask selection or pressure on stock because of high global demand.
In a recent Spirits Business article, whisky industry insiders are discussing the NAS phenomenon and the problems of convincing the buyers that the decades-old "older is better" mantra was actually wrong.
Older whisky may not be automatically better than young whisky. But higher age has always reflected in a higher price. This is only logical because for example you can sell twice as much 10 year old whisky in 20 years time than you can sell a 20 year old. Obviously the 20 year old whisky must be more expensive than the 10 year old whisky.
But of course this logic also works in the other direction. You can sell twice as much 5 year old whisky in 10 years than you can sell a 10 year old. So it would be only logical that younger whisky is significantly cheaper. Now the Aultmore XO sells for $113 which equals £67. This indeed would be quite a lot for a 6 year old single malt.
All in all the current marketing of NAS whisky appears to be less about true consumer education than about trying to hide the correlation of the price of a whisky with its age, about finding arguments why young whisky should be as expensive as it is. It's about convincing the buyers that a whisky is worth its money more than about increasing their whisky knowledge. Plenty of fancy stories are being told which usually boil down to "we think it is worth it because it is very good and rare". If properly educated consumers knew the actual age, higher prices would without a doubt be questioned much more.


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Oregon State University's veterinary teaching hospital says that a horse from eastern Oregon has been diagnosed with equine flu.
The four-year-old quarter horse mare, which recently arrived in Oregon from Texas, has been placed in isolation at the hospital and is being treated, according to a university press release.
OSU veterinary clinicians say the flu is highly contagious among horses, but is not transferable to humans or other animal species.
While typically not fatal, the virus can be dangerous to foals, elderly and pregnant horses, said Keith Poulsen, an internal medicine specialist at the Lois Bate Acheson Veterinary Hospital in OSU's College of Veterinary Medicine.
The virus can be spread by direct contact with nasal discharge or from coughing, Poulsen said.
The Large Animal Internal Medicine and Surgery Services program at OSU's College of Veterinary Medicine is working with the state veterinarian's office to inform veterinarians and horse owners about the disease, according to a university commincations officer.
Poulsen said the first clinical sign in horses is typically a fever, followed by coughing, nasal discharge and lethargy. Horses with a fever of greater than 102.5 degrees should be seen by a veterinarian, he said. Horse owners also should consult their veterinarians about vaccinations, he said.
Infected horses can transmit the virus for up to 10 days after incubation. Horses that show signs of the disease should be isolated from other horses for 10 days after clinical signs first appear, the university said.
"The good news is that many disinfectants can easily kill the equine influenza virus, and thoroughly cleaning stalls and equipment can help prevent the virus from spreading," Poulsen said.
The Morrow County horse was purchased at a sale in Hermiston last weekend, the university said. Several horses that were in close contact with it also have developed signs of illness, although they have not been diagnosed with equine influenza virus, officials say.
The infected horse will remain at OSU in isolation until it fully recovers, the university said.
As an added precaution, the OSU hospital is only accepting equine patients requiring emergency treatment until Feb. 27. Horses being referred for elective surgery, lameness or non-emergency conditions will be delayed until after Wednesday.
--Mitch Lies


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Emini Trading Charts for Monday 12 July 2010 (6:50)
Friday and Monday were two low volume up days and our little rally might be running out of steam. So I'm looking for a pull back tomorrow and then another push to re-test the highs. Still a couple of days away from turns on Better Sine Wave and Better TRIN.
If you're reading this article via email or RSS reader, then follow this link to view the Emini trading charts video on the website.
Good luck with your Emini trading.


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You don't just want to leave your prospects with an impression of your brand, you want to tattoo it on their minds There's one thing we can learn from the brands who understand their audience like Apple, and Old Spice, and that's interesting, fun, and a little bit of weirdness make the perfect recipe for a memorable brand.
3 steps in creating the brand they'll never forget!
Have a BG story
Share the unique background story of your company. Talk about ideation process of your company. Bring your prospects right into that moment of eureka, and let them relive the experience through your eyes.
Define Your Brand Culture
What is your brand for and against? Define how your prospects will know when they're clearly on your side, and when they're not. Your product or service might not be the most economic alternative to your prospects needs, but if they can connect with you through your brand culture, you'll be first in mind when it comes time to making purchases.
Be a Leader
Don't wait for trends to come, build them. Don't cross your fingers and hope things go your way, plan them. When you're a major contributor to your industry people can't help but remember your name, as it begins to pop up everywhere the conversations are relevant.
Truth: Creating a memorable brand takes time, authenticity, and the courage to be different. Only a few companies will ever reach memorable status, but if you follow the 3 steps above, you'll be well on your way.
Comments are closed.


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- Home
- The Project MODUM
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- Documents
- Contact
- Press information
Transport congestion problems contribute about 70% of pollutants to urban environments. The transport sector by itself consumes up to 30% of the total energy in the EU. These figures suggest that if Europe is to reduce its CO2 emissions by making an efficient use of energy while improving the quality of life in European cities, novel approaches for the optimal management of urban transport complexity must be developed and adopted in the transport sector.
The MODUM project addressed the environmental footprint in the transport sector by developing a new approach for pro-active demand-responsive management of traffic. On the one hand the MODUM system supports the traffic management departments of cities in their efforts to minimise the environmental impact of traffic and improve the quality of life in urban environments, and on the other hand the MODUM system also helps citizens to tackle the dynamic variations and unexpected disturbances in urban traffic by adopting energy-efficient multi-modal transport choices.
MODUM focused on the comparison and the synthesis of two modelling approaches: 1) a traffic flow self-organising mechanism based on ant-like agent technology and 2) a "reverse" route planning based on software agent technology; using real-time data and declared destinations. Both mechanisms have proven successful in other application domains and have the potential of utilising vehicles' computational power and networking capabilities for achieving their active participation in the demand-response management of urban traffic.
In the MODUM project the metrics for the comparison of the two models were extracted from real needs of traffic control centres and from transport users in selected cities. A series of simulation experiments of realistic complexity was constructed using real-time data feeds available from transport sensing infrastructure. Results from these simulation experiments profiled the two approaches against certain scenarios of traffic disturbances causing rapid changes in conditions. Based on these results a "Synthesis Model for Low-Carbon Traffic Management" was developed by the academic partners within the MODUM project.
Software implementation of this synthesised approach focused on the telecommunication challenges of two realistic demonstrators: the city of Nottingham (UK) and the city of Sofia (BG). The developed prototype was validated by staging real-life experiments in Nottingham and in Sofia, which the relevant traffic management structures within the traffic control centres of these cities evaluated. These experiments included historical data and simulations in combination with real-time data feeds from existing infrastructure and vehicles going through a section of the cities in a number of congestion profiles. Analogous experiments included people moving in the cities by different means of transport.
The prototype of the MODUM system provides an implementation of an optimisation approach to traffic management, which is capable of dynamically adapting the overall flows of traffic to unexpected disturbances in order to minimise carbon emissions within an urban complex environment. To ensure practical efficiency an implementation strategy was devised including the likely reactions of commuters to the suggestions of the system. Widespread implementation of the MODUM system provides the potential for a consequent reduction in both pollution levels and energy consumption in the transport sector.
As a research project, MODUM pushed the state-of-the-art in the scientific domain of pro-active traffic control and delivered new knowledge in the area in terms of models and requirements (demand and supply side).
However, MODUM was not only a research project, but developed a prototype system that can be implemented in cities all over Europe. The "package" that MODUM offers to city councils basically comprises of two parts: the MODUM Integrated Simulation Model, and the MODUM applications for mobile phones and in-car devices.
The MODUM Integrated Simulation Model, a bundle of software that models the current and near-future traffic situation on the city's whole road network based on sensor data and/or floating car information and calculates routing information based on this modelled traffic situation, is at the core of the MODUM system. It helps traffic operators to monitor the actual traffic situation in the city, and to plan appropriate interventions for improving the situation.
Visualisation Web Client for Traffic Operators
MODUM applications for mobile phones and for mobile (in-car) devices enable citizens to use the MODUM multimodal routing information for their trips.
MODUM addresses the environmental footprint in the transport sector by developing a new approach for pro-active demand-responsive management of traffic. This approach enables energy-efficient multi-modal transport choices accommodating dynamic variations, minimising the environmental impact and improving the quality of life in urban environments.


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JACKSONVILLE, Ala. (AP) Brian Williams paced four Jacksonville State players in double figures with 18 points as the Gamecocks rolled over Tennessee Tech 83-62 in each team's Ohio Valley Conference opener Saturday night.
Williams was 7 of 10 from the field, including 3 of 4 from 3-point range as Jacksonville State (9-3, 1-0) shot 43.8 percent (7 of 16) from beyond the arc. Darion Rackley scored 16 points, Tarvin Gaines had 15 points and eight rebounds and Ronnie Boggs netted 14. Nick Cook added seven rebounds, five blocks and four assists off the bench.
Offensively, the Golden Eagles (6-7, 0-1) struggled, with Jud Dillard netting 12 points - the senior entered averaging 18.9. Jeremiah Samarrippas scored 11 points on 5-of-11 shooting as Tennessee Tech shot just 37.1 percent (23 of 62).
The win is Jacksonville State's sixth in its past seven games, with the lone loss coming at Nebraska 59-55 on Dec. 18.


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My Sleep Deprivation Experience & Why Sleep is Important
My sleep deprivation experience and why sleep is important
3 weeks ago in the midst of a major heat wave here in New York City, after a "normal" day at the clinic, I attempted to walk my way to urgent care. Except, I did not make it.
I was only two block away when I decided to call the ambulance to take me to the Emergency Room.
What happened? I'm suppose to be Dr. Health.
I was feeling run down 3 days prior and developed a low grade fever. That was not alarming as I was glad a fever developed. An occasional fever is a good thing as it can stimulate the immune system, force us to slow down , drink more fluids and get more rest.
I developed a sharp pain on my left side of my chest with shortness of breath on any exertion. The faster I walked the less I could breath. At this point, the thoughts that went through my head were" Left chest pain, Shortness of breath and fever – ER."
All is good and back to normal now. I was diagnosed with a small infection in my lung that was treated with antibiotics.
This is the first time I have taken any medication, prescription or over-the-counter, in 14 years. Sure I felt like a loser. This all happened on a Thursday, rescheduled my Friday patients and rested Friday and Saturday. Sunday, I was out on the court playing basketball.
Thinking back, 4 hours of sleep a night for about 7 days in a row was probably the culprit. I typically need 6 to 7 hours of sleep a night.
"I love sleep. My life has the tendency to fall apart when I'm awake, you know?"
– Ernest Hemingway
The Importance of Sleep
I find it ridiculous when people brag about how little sleep they need; " Oh I only need 3 or 4 hours a night and I am good." There's nothing good about that. That is a recipe for disaster.
This recent article in the New York TImes points out that sleep deprivation leads to eating more and gaining weight.
Sleep is essential for a healthy immune system. More people get sick when they are sleep deprived – proven from my personal experience. Chronic sleep deprivation leads to chronic disease.
In Prostate Cancer , Sleep and deprivation and shift work significantly increases the risk of the disease. (Sigurdardottir et al. 2012)
With pelvic pain, Painful Bladder Syndrome / Interstitial Cystitis and Erectile dysfunction and cardiovascular health sleep deprivation and sleep apnea worsens the symptoms.
Doggy Bag message and What to do
1. If you are a good sleeper, don' t take it for granted. There are many people who are not. Be greatful for the comfy king size mattress you get to sleep on each night.
2. We all can tolerate a few days of little sleep. There are times when we have to work a little longer or tend to babies. Chronic sleep deprivation though, is a problem.
3. Go to a sleep clinic if you have sleep problems. They will evaluate you and provide the proper therapy if needed.
4. If the problem is a racing mind (rumination), write your thoughts down on paper. Or better yet, type them on your smartphone – that' s how we do it in the 21st century 🙂 Most of the times you don't want to forget your "to do list" for the next day.
5. Practice transition time. Transition time is a method where you ease your way from morning time (yang) to nighttime (yin). Shut down the computer. Take a warm bath. Drink chamomile tea. Spray some lavender oil around your bed. Read a relaxing book.
6. Try acupuncture. Although sleep problems is not my specialty per se, I have helped many people improve their sleep patterns with acupuncture.
7. Try melatonin, especially when traveling to a different time zone or if you work night-shift hours. Melatonin can balance out circadian rhythms.
8. Avoid caffeine, nicotine and alcohol 5 hours of bedtime. These may interfere with your ability to get deep sleep.
9. Exercise in the morning helps with sleep at night – especially if done outdoors. Avoid strenuous exercise 5 hours before bedtime
10. Make your last meal the lightest and have it 2 to 3 hours before bedtime. Big meals at night interfere with quality sleep.
If you diligently follow these tips – you will once again train your body to sleep like a baby.
I hope this helps. Let us know how you do.
Lara G. Sigurdardottir, Unnur A. Valdimarsdottir, Katja Fall, Jennifer R. Rider, Steven W. Lockley, Eva S. Schernhammer, Lorelei A. Mucci;Circadian Disruption, Sleep Loss and Prostate Cancer Risk: A Systematic Review of Epidemiological Studies; Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev. 2012 July; 21(7): 1002–1011.


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QJumpers and NBR Talent join forces
QJumpers and NBR Talent join forces to tackle tough recruitment market
In some of the hardest recruitment conditions of the past 10 years, QJumpers has joined forces with NBR Talent to help streamline the way New Zealand companies seek fresh talent.
QJumpers provides a unique blend of innovative applicant tracking software and recruitment services for a range of companies throughout New Zealand. The QJumpers technology enables employers to post their jobs to multiple jobsites and then manage all applicants from the one place.
And, by joining forces with NBR Talent – which provides a single platform for companies to access a wide variety of specialist recruitment agencies – QJumpers is now able to give its clients an even broader range of quality applicants.
QJumpers General Manager Simon Oldham said a global shortage of skills in industries such as IT and engineering meant Kiwi companies had to think outside the box to attract quality employees.
"We are pretty much in an identical cycle to 2007 – the last time there was a global skills shortage. And that means that overseas companies, complete with their big bucks, open up global searches for talent," Simon Oldham said.
"These companies start pinching our best IT people, our best scientists and our best engineers for their global operations and New Zealand companies traditionally can't compete with the amount of money they're offering."
Oldham also said the talent pool was also growing smaller because rapid advance in technology meant skills' life-cycles were decreasing.
"You can learn to build an app and become a top app builder – but in five years building apps may not be a skill anyone wants any more. That means that when a company is searching for particular skills there are fewer and fewer people around who have them," Simon Oldham said.
"International companies are now paying big bucks to attract this talent so New Zealand companies have to go away and try to find innovative solutions to keep them here."
NBR Talent's Business Development Manager Richard Webb said companies using QJumpers would now gain access to some of the eight-out-of-10 workers in New Zealand who aren't actively looking for a new job.
"There's a lot of research which suggests that only 20% of the labour market is active at any time – but through this synergy, companies who are using the QJumpers system will also be able to use our platform to target passive candidates who wouldn't otherwise be looking for jobs on the likes of Trade Me or Seek.
"The source of those candidates may be on our recruiters' databases or our network or maybe the recruitment agency will use innovative techniques – even shoulder-tapping."
The partnership between QJumpers and NBR Talent ensures companies' recruitment strategies can be streamlined by using only one login for access to both systems; by being able to add NBR Talent to a job posting at no extra cost (a charge is made only after a successful applicant is found); and by the time and cost savings involved in having recruitment agencies screening all potential applicants before putting only the likeliest candidates forward.
"This really is a win-win situation for everyone involved," Simon Oldham said. "We will bring more jobs to NBR Talent giving their recruitment agencies more to choose from, and our clients will get access to new top quality candidates from top quality recruitment agencies while still enjoying the benefits of our applicant tracking system."


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Australia is likely to have military assets in the South China Sea to gather vital intelligence on a joint drill between Chinese and Russian forces next month, Fairfax Media understands.
The exercise between Chinese and Russian ships and planes is intended to send a signal of defiance to the West but defence sources and experts say it will also provide a gold mine of intelligence on how the major powers' militaries work together.
A Defence source told Fairfax Media that assets were expected to be used to collect information, though the source declined to say what kind.
"It would be foolish for Defence to miss an opportunity like this," the source said.
The deployment of a Collins Class submarine would be one option. The simplest way to observe the drills would be with the RAAF's P-3 Orion surveillance planes, which routinely fly over the South China Sea as part of Operation Gateway.
Surface warships could also observe from over the horizon though this is less likely because they are committed elsewhere. This overt observation is more likely to be undertaken by the US Navy, Fairfax Media has been told.
The Australian Defence Force has in the past adjusted the timing of Operation Gateway patrols to match events of particular interest.
Defence has previously said it varies the path of such patrols depending on what is worth observing, including whether to devote more effort for example to the South China Sea rather than the Indian Ocean.
Peter Jennings, executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, said it would be "routine business for Australia to want to observe such an exercise with its P-3 maritime surveillance aircraft".
"I imagine there would be a great deal of interest from us and the Americans in how effectively the Chinese and Russians are able to operate together," he said.
Mr Jennings, a former senior Defence Department official, said the joint exercise was "more about political show than genuine military co-operation".
"Increasingly [Russian President Vladimir] Putin and [Chinese President] Xi [Jinping] identify each other as like-minded countries that are prepared to push against the established international system," he said. "It's a marriage of strategic convenience which is designed to create maximum discomfort for the US and its allies."
Retired Royal Australian Navy rear admiral James Goldrick said it would "certainly be worthwhile" to observe the drills. Planes or ships would not need to get too close, but rather could observe from over the horizon and pick up signals and radar signatures.
"It wouldn't be a matter of having to fly 500 metres overhead," he said.
Mr Goldrick said even if they weren't natural allies in the long term, China's and Russia's interests currently were aligned around opposing "the world order that they see effectively as having been set up by the US".
Mr Putin had calculated that China rather than the US was a preferable relationship to "restore Russia to where it thinks it ought to be", he said.
David Wroe is defence and national security correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.


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Nicaragua is one of my favourite Central American countries. As a nature obsessed human, I was drawn to Nicaragua for its diversity in terrain and landscape. I loved the beaches, volcanoes and lakes. Isla de Ometepe was a place we were going to visit for a few days, however once we arrived, we knew we wanted to settle and enjoy the area for a few weeks.
Isla de Ometepe is an impressive island, formed by two volcanoes. It is situated on Lake Nicaragua and is the largest freshwater volcanic island in the world (a fact I didn't know when I was visiting). A visit to Isla de Ometepe is part of the typical backpacker route through Central America and it's also becoming increasingly popular with the ecotourism travellers, due to the island's biodiversity in wildlife and nature along with the outdoor activities available.
When planning your visit to Isla de Ometepe, be sure to add my favourite ways to explore the island to your itinerary:
Horse riding
I try and plan horse riding into all of my getaways. We did a half day of horse riding, which we booked through our accommodation. Our guide took us riding to San Ramon waterfall. It was a beautiful experience. Our guide was fantastic and the horses were in great condition. It was quite a steep ride and the horses handled it extremely well. There is a restaurant I'd recommend stopping at on the way back, which is at the base of where the trail starts up to the waterfall. One thing I learned about horses (from our local taxi driver) is Nicaraguans don't name their horses. I'm not sure if this is the same for all animals, including pets, however when it came to their horses, they didn't give them a name. This was confirmed when we went horse riding and I asked our guide what the names of our horses were and he said they didn't have names.
Volcano climbing
There are plenty of places to hike on Isla de Ometepe. For the best views and a great workout, take the challenge and climb up either Volcano Concepcion or Volcano Maderas. We chose to climb Volcano Maderas, as it was the closest to where we were staying and slightly easier. But be warned! Both volcano climbs are extremely arduous, steep and expose you to the elements. The climb up Maderas was extremely slippery and very windy. We were blessed with beautiful views out to Volcano Concepcion, but when we reached the summit, it was completely cloud covered, which is common. There is a lake at the top, which in warmer conditions, you can swim in (but it will still be cold!). Allow at least 8 hours to complete the return climb and I recommend booking in an experience guide, who knows the climb, as it can be hard to find the trail in some parts. And if you are not an experienced hiker or climber, you will definitely need support and guidance trekking up this volcano.
Water sports
Being on an island surrounded by water, you can do a variety of water activities. We hired canoes from our accommodation and spend many days exploring the area. Canoeing is a great way to get up close to birds, who live in the trees overhanging the water's edge. One of the visitors at our accommodation was settling in for 3 months and brought their Stand Up Paddle Board with them. If you are able to travel with your board, this is a fantastic way to explore. They were out every day at sunset and I got some beautiful shots of them paddling in front of Volcano Concepcion. Then of course there is swimming, which is a great way to relax and enjoy the surrounds.
Mountain Biking
Whilst we didn't do any mountain biking during our stay, you can rent bikes from accommodation operators around the island. There are plenty or roads to explore and get amongst nature and the outdoors. The roads are quite bumpy and are dirt, so expect a sore backside if you are heading out for a big ride and pack a flat tye repair kit as there's a high chance you may get a flat tyre along the ride.
For the yoga enthusiasts (myself included), I'm sure there are yoga classes somewhere on the island. If you cannot find one, find a sweet patch of grass overlooking one of the many stunning views and do some downward dog on your own. The sunsets are to die for and there's nothing more magical than yoga at sunset and taking in the day.


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Missing Person
Gerard Conway
Gerard we are here for you whenever you are ready; we can listen, talk you through what help you need, pass a message for you and help you to be safe. Call. Text. Anytime. Free. Confidential. 116000
- Age at disappearance: 32
- Missing Since: 25-Jan-2007
- Missing from: Cookstown, Co. Tyrone
- Reference No: 07-006407
- Download: a poster of Gerard Conway


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One of the topics this blog will focus on quite frequently, not because it affects me per se, but because of the intolerance from those that oppose it all in the name of their religion, is same sex marriage. With that in mind, I was doing some research for a topic concerning the neo-con's contention that allowing gay to marry would somehow affect their marriage when I came across an article that defines marriage in the biblical sense, all 8 types!
1. The standard nuclear family: Genesis 2:24 describes how a man leaves his family of origin, joins with a woman, consummates the marriage and lives as a couple. There were quite a few differences between the customs and laws of contemporary North Americans and of ancient Israelites. In ancient Israel:
* Inter-faith marriages were theoretically forbidden. However, they were sometimes formed.
* Children of inter-faith marriages were considered illegitimate.
* Marriages were generally arranged by family or friends; they did not result from a gradually evolving, loving relationship that developed during a period of courtship.
* A bride who had been presented as a virgin and who could not be proven to be one was stoned to death by the men of her village. (Deuteronomy 22:13-21) There appears to have been no similar penalty for men who engaged in consensual pre-marital sexual activity.
2. Polygynous marriage: A man would leave his family of origin and join with his first wife. Then, as finances allowed, he would marry as many additional women as he desired. The new wives would join the man and his other wives in an already established household. Polygyny was practiced by members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Mormons, until the practice was suspended, a least temporarily, in the late 19th century. It is still practiced by separated fundamentalist Mormon groups which have left and been excommunicated from the main church.
There are many references to polygynous marriages in the Bible:
* Lamech, in Genesis 4:19, became the first known polygynist. He had two wives.
* Subsequent men in polygynous relationships included:
o Esau with 3 wives;
o Jacob: 2;
o Ashur: 2;
o Gideon: many;
o Elkanah: 2;
o David: many;
o Solomon had 700 wives of royal birth;
o Rehaboam: 3;
o Abijah: 14.
o Jehoram, Joash, Ahab, Jeholachin and Belshazzar also had multiple wives.
* From the historical record, it is known that Herod the Great (73 to 4 BCE) had nine wives.
We have been unable to find references to polyandrous marriages in the Bible — unions involving one woman and more than one man. It is unlikely that many existed because of the distinctly inferior status given to women; they were often treated as property in the Hebrew Scriptures.
3. Levirate Marriage: The name of this type of marriage is derived from the Latin word "levir," which means "brother-in-law." This involved a woman who was widowed without having borne a son. She would be required to leave her home, marry her brother-in-law, live with him, and engage in sexual relations. If there were feelings of attraction and love between the woman and her new husband, this arrangement could be quite agreeable to both. Otherwise, the woman would have to endure what was essentially serial rapes with her former brother-in-law as perpetrator. Their first-born son was considered to be sired by the deceased husband. In Genesis 38:6-10, Tamar's husband Er was killed by God for unspecified sinful behavior. Er's brother, Onan, was then required by custom to marry Tamar. Not wanting to have a child who would not be considered his, he engaged in an elementary (and quite unreliable) method of birth control: coitus interruptus. God appears to have given a very high priority to the levirate marriage obligation. Being very displeased with Onan's behavior, God killed him as well. Ruth 4 reveals that a man would be required to enter into a levirate marriage not only with his late brother's widow, but with a widow to whom he was the closest living relative.
4. A man, a woman and her property — a female slave: As described in Genesis 16, Sarah and Abram were infertile. Sarah owned Hagar, a female slave who apparently had been purchased earlier in Egypt. Because Hagar was Sarah's property, she could dispose of her as she wished. Sarah gave Hagar to Abram as a type of wife, so that Abram would have an heir. Presumably, the arrangement to marry and engage in sexual activity was done without the consent of Hagar, who had such a low status in the society of the day that she was required to submit to what she probably felt were serial rapes by Abram. Hagar conceived and bore a son, Ishmael. This type of marriage had some points of similarity to polygamous marriage, as described above. However, Hagar's status as a human slave in a plural marriage with two free individuals makes it sufficiently different to warrant separate treatment here.
5. A man, one or more wives, and some concubines: A man could keep numerous concubines, in addition to one or more wives. These women held an even lower status than a wife. As implied in Genesis 21:10, a concubine could be dismissed when no longer wanted. According to Smith's Bible Dictionary, "A concubine would generally be either (1) a Hebrew girl bought…[from] her father; (2) a Gentile captive taken in war; (3) a foreign slave bought; or (4) a Canaanitish woman, bond or free." 1 They would probably be brought into an already-established household. Abraham had two concubines; Gideon: at least 1; Nahor: 1; Jacob: 1; Eliphaz: 1; Gideon: 1; Caleb: 2; Manassah: 1; Saul: 1; David: at least 10; Rehoboam: 60; Solomon: 300!; an unidentified Levite: 1; Belshazzar: more than 1.
6. A male soldier and a female prisoner of war: Numbers 31:1-18 describes how the army of the ancient Israelites killed every adult Midianite male in battle. Moses then ordered the slaughter in cold blood of most of the captives, including all of the male children who numbered about 32,000. Only the lives of 32,000 women – all virgins — were spared. Some of the latter were given to the priests as slaves. Most were taken by the Israeli soldiers as captives of war. Deuteronomy 21:11-14 describes how each captive woman would shave her head, pare her nails, be left alone to mourn the loss of her families, friends, and freedom. After a full month had passed, they would be required to submit to their owners sexually, as a wife. It is conceivable that in a few cases, a love bond might have formed between the soldier and his captive(s). However, in most cases we can assume that the woman had to submit sexually against her will; that is, she was raped.
7. A male rapist and his victim: Deuteronomy 22:28-29 requires that a female virgin who is not engaged to be married and who has been raped must marry her attacker, no matter what her feelings were towards the rapist. A man could become married by simply sexually attacking a woman that appealed to him, and paying his father-in-law 50 shekels of silver. There is one disadvantage of this approach: he was not allowed to subsequently divorce her.
8. A male and female slave: Exodus 21:4 indicates that a slave owner could assign one of his female slaves to one of his male slaves as a wife. There is no indication that women were consulted during this type of transaction. The arrangement would probably involve rape in most cases. In the times of the Hebrew Scriptures, Israelite women who were sold into slavery by their fathers were slaves forever. Men, and women who became slaves by another route, were limited to serving as slaves for seven years. When a male slave left his owner, the marriage would normally be terminated; his wife would stay behind, with any children that she had. He could elect to stay a slave if he wished.
So when they complain that gay marriage would somehow affect the sanctity of marriage, which marriage are they referring to exactly?


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I've been hiccupping for days. Please help!
Most people have hiccups occasionally, and sometimes they can last for days. What are they, and what can you do to stop them?
At the bottom of your lungs, separating your chest from your abdomen, lies a flat, blanket-like muscle called the diaphragm. It moves down when you take a breath in, creating suction in your chest that helps pull air into your lungs. It moves up when you breathe out, helping push air out of your lungs.
A hiccup is caused by a sudden contraction or spasm of the diaphragm. It makes you inhale quickly and involuntarily. Then the space in your throat near your vocal cords snaps shut, producing the typical hiccup sound. Try making a hiccup sound: You'll discover that you need to take in a quick breath, and you'll feel something move in your throat.
Of the many purported ways to get rid of hiccups, here are a few that have some merit:
- Stimulate the uppermost region of your throat: Pull on your tongue; put a teaspoon of granulated sugar on the back of your tongue; gargle with water or sip ice water; drink from the far side of a glass; or bite on a lemon. (I've tried all of these, particularly the sugar trick, and they work for me.)
- Tap or rub the back of your neck.
- Gently poke the back of your throat with a long cotton swab.
- Stimulate the cone-like tissue that hangs from the very back of the top of your mouth (the uvula) by touching it with a cotton swab.
- Change your breathing pattern in various ways: Hold your breath; breathe into a paper bag; gasp in fright; or pull your knees up to your chest and lean forward.
- Distract yourself from the fact that you're hiccupping.
Occasionally, hiccups just won't go away. But even long-lasting hiccups don't usually signal a medical problem.
In a small number of cases, though, persistent hiccups may be a sign of disease. The underlying issue is usually something that causes irritation of one of the nerves in the chest that send signals to the diaphragm telling it to move. Hiccups can also be triggered by excess alcohol use, kidney failure and infections, especially ear infections.
If you have long-lasting hiccups, see your doctor. He or she will look for problems that may be causing them and then try to fix that problem. Your doctor may also prescribe a medication that can help stop your hiccups. The ones most often used are chlorpromazine, haloperidol and metoclopramide. Or your doctor may tell you to stop taking a particular drug that may be causing your hiccups. Examples include midazolam, some types of chemotherapy and digoxin.
Surgery for persistent hiccups is another option, though it's rarely used. One type of surgery is a "nerve block" that stops a signal telling the diaphragm to contract. Another option is implanting a pacemaker that makes the diaphragm contract more rhythmically.
Fortunately, the simple solutions I described earlier almost always solve the problem.


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U.S. reality TV star PORSHA WILLIAMS turned herself in to police in Georgia on Wednesday (16Apr14) after a warrant was issued for her arrest.
The Real Housewives of Atlanta regular and her co-star Kenya Moore were allegedly involved in an on-set altercation last month (Mar14), leading Moore to file a police report.
On Wednesday, lawmakers issued a warrant for Williams' arrest in connection to the complaint, and hours later, she appeared at the Atlanta Police Department and was charged with misdemeanour battery.
Williams posted the $2,000 (?1,188) bail bond and was released.
The alleged altercation occurred during the taping of The Real Housewives of Atlanta reunion show, which is set to air in America on Sunday (20Apr14).


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today I released Flowly.
It is an App for daily Android News and more.
You will get instantly notificated when there are new news and you have a lot of options and settings to personalize your Android News Experience.
The app uses public RSS Feeds of the best Android Blogs (Including XDA Developers) to get the content displayed.
The goal is to keep making this app better and better so please send me your suggestions and wishes.
And of course, don't forget to give this app a rating.
I will try to add a new update every 1-2 days to produce a little 'Nightly feeling' and keep Android Hub up-to-date.
The .apk file is attached in this post aswell.
Version 1.5.1 Build 92
- Left menu action bar drawer is now matching to the Theme color
- fixed Bug: some articles won't load
- fixed Bug: Pull to refresh causing problems in Web Views
- Flowly is now deleting unread articles older than 3 days automatically in order to save storage
- Changed Top Bar Icon color and font from white to grey
- Removed link to Flowly Community Beta
- Pull down to refresh now displayed white in Top Bar
- Updated Support libraries
- API Update
- Increased performance on high end devices
- Removed shoutbox
Have a great Day!


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NEW YORK (Forex News Now) – Manufacturing activity in the Philadelphia region unexpectedly cooled in July, official data showed on Thursday, in one of the day's spotlight FX news events.
The Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia said that its general economic index fell to 5.1 in July, the lowest level since August 2009, from 8 in June.
Analysts had expected a reading of 10.2 for the key gauge of U.S. manufacturing, two global forex news outlets reported.


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NEW DELHI -- The death toll of Indians at the Haj stampede has gone up to 101, external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj said on Friday morning. Meanwhile, 32 others are still missing.
"Saudi authorities have identified more pilgrims who died in Haj stampede," she tweeted on Friday. The Indian consulate in Jeddah has put up a list of Indians who have died, as well as the names of the 32 missing.
The tragic stampede outside the holy city of Mecca last month has killed at least 1,364 people according to an Associated Press report, which is 600 more than the official government death toll. This is the worst disaster to strike the Haj in a quarter century.
Makkah Helpline Numbers
MEA's 24X7 Mission helpline numbers:
Toll-free number for pilgrims in Kingdom: 8002477786
Nearly 1.5 lakh Indians had gone on the Haj pilgrimage to Mecca this year. The stampede occurred on 24 September when Haj pilgrims jostled their way to perform symbolic stoning of the devil in Mina at the holy Mecca, marking the culmination of the annual pilgrimage.
The tragic incident occurred outside the five-storey Jamarat Bridge, which was erected in the last decade at a cost of more than $1 billion and intended to improve safety.
(with agency inputs)
Contact HuffPost India


text:
This Scene Rocks!
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He looks like he's carrying a baked potato.
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"Don't Retreat, Retweet": The Story of Ai Wei Wei, China's Leading Netizen
BY Micah L. Sifry | Monday, October 29 2012
There are really two stars of the new documentary "Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry"--the artist himself, and the Internet. The two are inseparable in the film, which both documents the life story of the man who has become one of China's most creative and courageous dissidents, and shows how he has maneuvered through the cracks in China's vast system of social control by using social media to reach a global and local audience.
Weiwei himself is an amazing story. His father was the poet Ai Qing, a Chinese revolutionary and romantic who was punished during Mao's Cultural Revolution and sent with his wife to a rural labor camp in 1958. Weiwei spent his first 16 years there, and then went to the Beijing Film Academy where he began his path into his life as an artist. For twelve years, he lived in the U.S., mostly in New York City, but then returned in 1993 to be with his ailing father. The film pulls together archival footage of the Maoist period, with revolutionary cadres ritually denouncing ideological renegades, and then blends in never-before-seen clips of Weiwei on the streets of New York, documenting his days Avedon-like, and showing his growing political engagement as the pro-democracy movement in China crested with the Tianamen Square protests and massacre in 1989.
But the bulk of the documentary is about a more recent period in Weiwei's life, from the Sichuan earthquake of 2008 to just after he was released from prison in June 2011, as captured by Alison Klayman, a young American filmmaker who had the good fortune to meet and befriend him during this time. (Fittingly, part of the financing for her film came via Kickstarter.) Weiwei's artistic and political activism during this period was truly extraordinary. Working with other artists and activists, he crowdsourced a list of more than 5,000 names of children killed during the earthquake, a project that was both an act of commemoration and protest at the shoddy construction practices that caused many of their deaths. Then, using Twitter and the net, he and his team made a moving audio tribute online, involving hundreds of Chinese who each read names of the dead.
"Never Sorry" shows Weiwei being beaten by police after he tried to testify on behalf of a fellow investigator of the earthquake construction scandal, and then takes the viewer on a journey with him as he has emergency brain surgery in Germany to relieve internal bleeding caused by the beating. This is followed by Weiwei's efforts to lodge a legal complaint against the policemen who beat him, and his subsequent efforts to serve Chinese authorities with a lawsuit pursuing his case. The film takes a detour to show him with his young son, born to a mistress that Weiwei doesn't quite explain or apologize for (his wife is also shown in the movie), and also highlights major exhibitions of his in Germany and London. And it culminates with the chilling 81-day period when he was imprisoned by China on trumped-up charges of tax evasion and then released on bail under stringent restrictions on his movements and speech.
Throughout the film, Weiwei is seen documenting his life and his encounters with the authorities using his camera, cell phone and Twitter account (Sina Weibo apparently is a more recent development). Several times, we see the network in action, as when some of his followers show up spontaneously to eat dinner with him at an open-air restaurant in Shanghai, and then stunningly, when hundreds come to "celebrate" the demolition of his studio in that city while he is under house arrest. Again and again Klayman punctuates an episode with a tweet from Weiwei either showing a photo he took of the event that just unfolded, or typing out his wry and rebellious comments on what just transpired. The juxtaposition of film footage and Twitter snapshots is uncanny, and I found myself wondering if it was possible that somehow the filmmaker had reversed engineered still shots from her footage into "tweets" from @aiww as more of a dramatic device than an actual reconstruction of tweets that Weiwei sent.
It probably doesn't matter either way because the ultimate effect is more important to the story than whether Weiwei took those exact photos or sent those exact tweets. That's because the technique Klayman uses solves a difficult problem many filmmakers have when it comes to illustrating the importance of the Internet to a story. Watching someone type on a screen just isn't interesting, nor is watching someone else reading what they wrote. But this method has the benefit of explaining to the less savvy viewer why the net is so important to Weiwei's life and work. Without it, he'd be sentenced to obscurity. With it, his every gesture and saying is amplified.
"Never Sorry" is in theaters now. If you are a fan of dissent, freedom, art and/or the Internet, go see it while you can, because it shows how these forces are all inextricably linked in the networked age. Whatever your political persuasion, you will be inspired by the courage of Weiwei and many other less well-known Chinese pro-democracy activists.
Update: Alison Klayman clarifies regarding the tweets shown in the film: "Almost all the tweets are real and from that exact day/moment when they are depicted. Sometimes if a tweet did not have an accompanying image, we provided a screen grab from the scene. For the section you mentioned, that final trip to Chengdu as he is going around to file his complaint at various offices (right before the fight breaks out), those were all real Twitter images he posted. The second trip to Chengdu when he testifies successfully in the police station, those tweets were also real from that moment (about how he "made a little progress today").I spent a lot of time back-searching his tweets and posted images on Twitter in order to make it as accurate as possible. I felt the authenticity of the tweets was important."
[Bonus link: See also this talk by artist An Xiao Mina, a collaborator of Weiwei's, at PDF2012, on "Internet Street Art and Social Change in China."]


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What was Tennyson's Celebrity Circle?
It is difficult from our twenty-first-century perspective to imagine a writer, not to mention a poet, enjoying the kind of adulation Alfred Tennyson (1809-92) experienced in the Victorian period. But whereas our modern celebrities tend to be actors, actresses, models & musicians, Victorian 'lions' were artists, writers & poets. The most famous poet of the Victorian period, Alfred Tennyson, attempted to extricate himself from his own celebrity by moving with his family, in 1853, to Freshwater on the Isle of Wight.
His decision transformed Freshwater into a Victorian tourist attraction & enticed some of the most admired figures of the nineteenth century there. It also created one of the most renowned celebrity circles of the age – a circle that included the most famous female photographer of the day, Julia Margaret Cameron; the most famous artist & sculptor, G. F. Watts; & two writers, Edward Lear & Lewis Carroll, who, although less well known at the time, later came to achieve a literary celebrity that is indisputable.
If you would like to discover more about Tennyson & his celebrity neighbours in Freshwater, you may like to read the Tennyson's Celebrity Circle booklet.


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In my search for those literary gems at the higher reading levels for our advanced readers, I stumbled across The 10 Greatest . . . series. These are non-fiction books, but there's one for just about any interest your kids may have, AND they have fairly challenging reading levels. Short bursts of interesting subject matter, at reading levels that will challenge their vocabularies . . .Just right for the Christmas Shopping list from the bookstore. However, you may have to order these online (or check your school or public library), so plan ahead . . .
The 10 Greatest Spies RL: 7.3
The 10 Greatest 21st Century Innovations RL: 7.7
The 10 Greatest Sports Dynasties RL: 7.2
The 10 Most Daring Escapes RL: 7.1
The 10 Most Amazing Animal Helpers
The 10 Most Fascinating Phenomena RL: 7.1
There are many more of these "10 Most" or "10 Greatest" books – I've just listed a few here, notably avoiding the "10 Most Extreme Fighting Styles" and "10 Most Heinous Acts of Mankind" – ok, I made that last one up! But, my point is, that most of these non-fiction books look fantastic, just keep an eye out for the ones that have potentially mature topics.
I read The 10 Greatest Spies book. The layout is appealing and the nuggets of information are intriguing. Did you know that 2 of the top 10 Greatest Spies are Canadian? Canadian?? I'm going to have to keep a closer eye on our neighbors to the north!
These international men (and women) of mystery will intrigue and challenge readers ages 8+.


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Depicting cell phones and digital cameras small enough to be worn like overgrown pendants have long been a marketing ploy by technology vendors even though consumers rarely carry them that way. Perhaps they have all striven to escape the "pocket prison" — that valuable real estate that can accommodate only one or two mobile devices. As exercise accessories, we've certainly seen many armbands that can accommodate bantam devices like the lightweight iPod Shuffle or iPod nano (or even their less bantam CD and portable tape playing forebears), but again it is pretty rare to see people wearing these devices outside of a gym or running track.
However, two new technology advances showcased this week show that we are indeed on the precipice of infiltrating technology into the everday. The Nike+Apple Sport Kit is an inexpensive accessory for athletic shoes that sell for as little as $85 while the Abacus 2006 watch appears to be the first one with Microsoft's SPOT technology that isn't conspicuously thick. MSN Direct has other obstacles, such as competing with increasingly savvy cell phones and building a subscription business, but both products represent fresh approaches to data-enabling formerly dumb devices.


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A few weeks ago, I was fortunate enough to travel to the pacific island of New Caledonia for four days. A tropical haven only a few hours away, it's as picturesque as you would imagine.
For the duration of my getaway, I stayed at the recently opened $250 million Sheraton New Caledonia Déva Spa & Golf Resort. Whilst I was there for the First Women's Pro-Am International Golf Tournament, I spent much of my time soaking up all that the hotel had to offer. I thought I would share my experience staying at the Sheraton and tell you what I got up to.
New Caledonia is a French territory located in the South Pacific, consisting of a collective of islands. Only 2-3 hours from Sydney, Aircalin offers flights that fly directly to the international airport just outside the capital, Noumea.
After flying in on Tuesday afternoon, I made my way directly to the Sheraton, in the region of Domaine de Déva. A leisurely 2 hour transit from the airport, this part of New Caledonia is sparsely populated but the seclusion affords the authentic experience of an island holiday. The Sheraton sits directly on the coastline and this proximity to the beach is a big drawing point – my room was less than 50 metres from the ocean. All the buildings throughout the grounds are styled in wood and intricate carvings, with bungalows and suites set amongst lush greenery. My bungalow was very paradise-esque: think timber furnishings and a four post plush bed…an escape from reality no doubt. They have a range of rooms available, suitable for individuals, couples and families.
In the short four days I was there, I managed to fill my time with activities. On my first day, I drove a golf buggy to the driving range and spent a couple of hours practicing my swing. I didn't get to play the whole 18-holes because of the pro-am tournament but it's a must-do if you stay there. Whilst the Sheraton Deva evidently place a significant focus upon their course and golf facilities, they have much more to offer if you aren't golf inclined.
I spent part of my second day living the high life, lounging on the secluded beach and sitting poolside with a passion mojito. The highlight of my day was having lunch at the resort's Sand Beach Grill, barefoot and looking out at the ocean. I ordered the goat cheese salad which was divine but way too heavy to finish. Being a foodie, I have to mention the range of food the resort offers, a cuisine of both French and Melanesian influence.
The Deep Nature Spa was a lovely way to spend an afternoon and I thoroughly enjoyed my hour long massage. I wish I would have had more time to try the other treatments they offer. They also had an impressive fitness centre with cardio equipment, weights and daily exercise classes. If you want to fit in a work out whilst on holiday, you've got everything you need there.
One unexpected feature about the resort that I loved was that they had bikes available for guests, making it easy to explore the expanse of the resort. The only problem was trying to find one that wasn't being used! I loved riding around the resort for some morning exercise and again under the afternoon sun on my way to the beach.
With my knowledge of the French language being limited to "bonjour" (hello), "merci" (thank you) and "au revouir"(goodbye), there was a moment or two of miscommunication during my stay as many of the hotel staff spoke only French. Fortunately, there was always someone around to interpret and I even picked up a few new phrases, like "Oui, s'il vous plait" (yes, please).
I wasn't too sure what to expect when travelling to New Caledonia but with beautiful scenery and friendly locals, it was an extremely enjoyable experience. My stay at the Sheraton Deva Resort & Spa was ultimately luxurious and exactly like a holiday should be – an idyllic escape from reality.
You can take a look at some of the photos from my stay at the Sheraton Deva in New Caledonia below.
Sheraton New Caledonia Deva Spa and Golf Resort
Lot 33 Domaine de Déva, Route de Poé B.P. 50, Bourail, 98870, New Caledonia
Ph: (+687) 265000
Sheraton Deva @sheratondeva
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text: Animals Wildlife Watch Baby Hummingbirds Hatch, Grow on Live Webcam By Laura Moss Writer University of South Carolina Laura Moss is a journalist with more than 15 years of experience writing about science, nature, culture, and the environment. our editorial process Laura Moss Updated June 05, 2017 This photo of Bella incubating her eggs was taken in 2014. (Photo: explore.org). Share Twitter Pinterest Email Animals Wildlife Pets Animal Rights Endangered Species Meet Bella, an Allen's hummingbird that has been nesting in the branches of the same ficus tree for years. The homeowner, who wants to remain anonymous, first noticed the tiny bird around her California home in 2005, and she dubbed her Bella and watched the hummingbird build a nest over a two-week period. Soon, Bella laid two eggs about the size of jellybeans, and after about 16 days of incubation, the eggs started to hatch. "I watched her feed these little babies continuously throughout the day," the homeowner said. "It seemed like such hard work, but she kept at it." The bird fed her young a mixture of insects and nectar, a concoction the homeowner refers to as "Buggy Stew," and soon, the babies started to test their wings and explore the world around them. A few weeks later, they fledged from the nest. "I really missed my little hummingbirds that I had grown to love and adore after so many weeks of watching them. I didn't dare hope it would happen again." But to her surprise, the bird returned the next year, and the tiny hummingbird has continued to do so, building new nests and raising her young. After years of enjoying the avian family, the homeowner decided to share the "little life miracle" with the world, and she set up a webcam. Now, thanks to explore.org, anyone with an Internet connection can watch Bella as she incubates her eggs and raises her young. (The cam link is embedded below.) One chick has already hatched, and the second could hatch any day now. About 21 to 25 days after hatching, the baby birds will fledge. The webcam is explore.org's latest addition to its Pearls of the Planet initiative, a collection of live video feeds from around the world.


text: "Bart's cookies are DANGEROUSLY DECADENT! I personally love them because they are small, but the taste is HUGE and HEAVENLY! I highly recommend them if you are having a bad day, because surely they will turn your frown upside down. Not only are they reasonably priced, but the taste is phenomenal. They aren't like your typical cookies. With rich chips in every bite, the texture as well is so unique and tasty. They are incomparable! Don't miss out on life … Eat Bart's cookies! They're fast becoming a household name!" ~ Sweta P., San Diego, CA