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How to Figure Corporate Overhead
Overhead makes up a large portion of the costs of the average corporation. It includes indirect costs that the company incurs in order to stay in continuous operation. When trying to cut expenses overall, the corporate overhead is one of the first places an accountant will look. Determine the corporate overhead rate to see just how much of your expenses can be attributed to indirect operational costs.
Determine the total overhead for the business for a given period of time (usually one year). Add up all of the indirect costs that you need to stay operational. Indirect costs include the monthly lease that keeps a roof over the business, lights to illuminate the business location and general administrative fees. They are sometimes referred to as F&A (Facilities and Administrative) costs.
Determine the total amount of direct costs associated with the operation from that same period. A direct cost is an expense that is specifically associated with the production process that brings in revenue for the company. It includes the labor force and cost of materials used to manufacture a product.
Divide indirect overhead costs by direct costs to figure out the corporate overhead rate. For instance, if the corporation spends $70,000 for overhead and $50,000 for direct costs, the overhead rate is 70,000 divided by 50,000 or 1.4 (140 percent).
Photo Credits
- Medioimages/Photodisc/Photodisc/Getty Images


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WASHINGTON, Nov. 25 (UPI) -- Republican Fred Thompson said Sunday if he is elected U.S. president he would fight attempts to roll back tax cuts and would push for an optional tax plan.
Speaking on "Fox News Sunday," Thompson -- an actor, lobbyist and former Tennessee senator -- said he wants to maintain the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, eliminate the estate tax and reduce the corporate tax rate.
"We have the second-highest corporate tax rate among our competing partners," Thompson said. "It's hurting us competitively. We're probably losing revenue from it."
Thompson said he would like to see passage of a House Republican proposal that would allow taxpayers the option of continuing to file as they do now or try a new system that would only have two rates with no exemptions, other than the personal exemption, and no deductions.
"So give that a try and it would be a major move toward tax reform, which I think is greatly needed," he said.
He rejected contentions his plan would result in a 10 percent drop in total tax revenues.
Thompson also said he wants to see a move toward personal savings accounts and indexing initial Social Security benefits to inflation rather than wages.

subset: commoncrawl


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Preview of the distance races at the World Indoor
Championships in Lisbon
K. Ken Nakamura for IAAF
6 March 2001 - Two of the most intriguing events at the World Championships in Lisbon are set to be the mens and womens 3000m. In both races, several superstars are expected to compete, and the anticipated showdowns are set to capture the imagination of the fans.
Hicham El Guerrouj, who won the 1500m World Indoor titles in 1995 and 1997 is back competing in the championships. In 1997, he completely dominated the event, winning the 1500m by nearly two seconds. The Moroccan, who has been primarily a 1500m runner since finishing third at the 5000m in the 1992 World Junior Championships, has been venturing into longer distances this winter. On February 23 in Ghent, he ran the 2 miles in 8:09.89, the second fastest time. However, his potential at the 3000m is much higher, for in 1998 he ran 7:23.09 for the 3000m, also the second fastest time. However, one superstar in the race is not sufficient to capture the imagination of fans....What makes the 3000m race really intriguing is that El Guerrouj will be facing Ethiopians Million Wolde and Hailu Mekonnen. Mekonnen is the World Indoor record holder at 2 miles, which El Guerrouj narrowly missed breaking earlier this year. Wolde was a close third at the 3000m in Maebashi two years ago, and is the reigning Olympic 5000m Champion. Because Wolde outkicked everyone in a slow Olympic final, El Guerrouj will probably want to avoid a slow tactical race, a mistake Ali Saidi-Sief made in Sydney. El Guerroujs strength lies in his sustained long drive at the end of the race. A fast race is expected.
As good as mens 3000m may be, the womens 3000m race should be even better, where Gabriela Szabo is the strongest favourite. She has won the last three editions of the World Indoor Championships as well as the last two editions of the European Indoor Championships at the distance. Outdoors, she is the reigning Olympic 5000m Champion and twice World Champion at the same distance. On February 18 in Birmingham she added the 3000m World Indoor Record (8:32.88) to the 5000m (14:47.35) and 2000m (5:30.53) records she already owns. The Romanian looks set to take her fourth straight title which would bring her gold medal tally at the World Indoor Championships to five, tying Kostadinova for the most gold medals at this competition.
However, both Sonia OSullivan (IRL)and Leah Malot (KEN) who were responsible for Szabos only defeats since 1998 at the 5000m race are expected to line up for 3000m in Lisbon. During the 1998 European Championships in Budapest, at the 5000m, Sonia OSullivan easily defeated Szabo who led most of the race. In the ISTAF meet in Berlin in 2000, Leah Malot outsprinted Szabo at the 5000m; it was Szabos a first defeat since the 1998 European Championships.
In 1998 when Sonia OSullivan completed an unprecedented short/long course double at the World Cross Country Championships, she ran 8:45.21 on February 21 in Auckland New Zealand. This year, on March 1, OSullivan ran 8:43.51 for the 3000m in Melbourne. She may be in better shape than she was in 1998, which should make OSullivan a formidable foe for Szabo. Although OSullivan defeated Szabo in the 1998 European Championships, Szabo had upper hand in both the 2000 Olympics, and the 1997 World Indoor Championships.
Unfortunately, Ethiopias Gete Wami who ran the second fastest 5000m (14:49.36) indoors is skipping the World Indoor Championships, but two Russian runners, Yegorova and Zadorozhnaya are in supreme shape, having set new stage records in the Yokohama ekiden on February 25. Zadorozhnaya ran 18:24 for 6Km, while Yegorova covered 5Km in 15:04 in Yokohama. Olga Yegorova made dramatic improvement in 2000, having improved her 5000m PR from 15:22.88 in 1999 to 14:42.91 in 2000 and finished 8th in the Olympics. Yelena Zadorozhnaya, primarily a 800m/1500m runner until 2000 has turned in the second fastest time at the indoor 3000m (8:41.44).
An athlete that should not be overlooked because she is running in her home country is Fernanda Ribeiro, third in the 1997 World Indoor Championships in Paris and double European Indoor Champion (1994 and 1996).
Finally, the last runner to watch out for is Regina Jacobs who missed the Olympic Games after pulling off 1500m/5000m double at the US Olympic Trials. The American ran a strong final lap in winning the 3000m at the US Indoor Championships should have more motivation than anybody else.
Other middle distance events namely the mens 1500m and mens and womens 800m could also be classic races. If the 3000m heats are cancelled, we might witness a historic 1500m - a match-up between El Guerrouj and the Olympic Champion Noah Ngeny of Kenya. They seemed to be avoiding each other carefully this winter. In Ghent, Ngeny won the 1000m while El Guerrouj won 2 miles. In Lievin, El Guerrouj won the 1500m, while Ngeny won the 2000m. The question is will they race at the Championships, and will we see the showdown in Lisbon? Without El Guerrouj in the race, Ngeny should be a strong favourite, but dont count out Rui Silva who ran 3:52.18 mile; and he will be running in his home country.
One of the most memorable scenes from the World Indoor Championships took place in 1997 in Paris. In the first round heat of the 800m, Wilson Kipketer (DEN) went off on his own and set a World Indoor record of 1:43.96. After easily qualifying for the final on the next day, in the final, Kipketer again set the World Indoor record of 1:42.67. No such prospect is expected in Lisbon. However, athletics is about competition and in the 800m, great showdowns are expected, and two runners stand out in both the mens and womens 800m.
Last year, the European Indoor Champion Stephanie Graf (AUT) finished second to Maria Mutola at the 800m in Stockholm, Zürich and at the Olympic Games. However, Graf has gained the upper hand during this indoor season, having won in Ghent and Lievin (Graf also crossed the finish line ahead of Mutola in Birmingham, but was disqualified). Mozambican Mutola has three gold and a silver from the World Indoors. Can she win for the fourth time?
Russias Yuriy Borzakovskiy was sensational during last years indoor season, however, he could not quite match his indoor performances outdoors. Back indoors, he is running well again, recording 1:44.15 in Karlsruhe. A co-favourite for the 800m should be Andre Bucher. Although he has never won a major championship title, the Swiss is running well, winning in Dortmund, Stockholm, and Birmingham. Will Bucher be able to hold off a fast closing Borzakovskiy in Lisbon?


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Agency Department of Klaipėda Cruise Terminal was duly registered and licensed for rendering agency services in the port .We started to become agents of NCL / Orient Lines, Fred Olsen Cruise Lines, Classic International Cruises /WCA, Saga Shipping Co.Ltd., Seabourn Cruise Line and TUI Cruises within a period from 2005 till 2014. Being operators of navy & cruise terminal and owners of ship repair yard , SC "Klaipeda ship repairs" and it agency department established solid relationships and won recognition of many shipping companies , owners and operators from US, UK, Germany ,Italy, Portugal, Holland, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Greece, Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Russia. Besides agency services for cruise ships we also did services for other types of vessels including Naval, Tanker, Bulk Carriers, Reefers , RO/RO , Fishing trawlers and sailing yachts . We have been participated at Seatrade Cruise Shipping Conventions in Miami and Hamburg and "Poseidonia" Exhibition in Athens since 2004.
Besides the above Agency Department has the following advantages : Local knowledge and good contacts with all port authorities , border police , port customs departments together with our global business vision , enable us to understand , satisfy and protect principals' interests, ensuring that everything is accomplished with loyalty without a moments of delay and less costly for owners. In a period like today , when many shipping companies and agents have met hard times in all sectors , we are proud that we are stable and our reputation as reliable business partner continuous to grow , and today we can reassure our customers and principals of our ultimate assistance to perform much of their demands.
Agency Department office is located at about 100 mtrs from the berths of Cruise Terminal what allows us to provide services to ships operationally and cost-efficiently.
Agency Department — well trained and skilled specialists speaking English , German, Russian, so it helps us to tailor our agency services to the individual needs of our clients, react and solve all the arising questions qualified and with much more dispatch .
Agency Department Manager and Port Facility Security Officer being employees of the same Cruise Terminal , could duly cooperate to organize ship service and implementation of security measures with great dispatch.
To satisfy the requirements we have ability of various kinds of communication means such as VHF radio, phones, faxes, internet . We use new modern ways of computer communications and data treatment what makes our agency service more efficient.
24-hours daily service at best terms in due time. A flexible choice and arrangements of some agency services are as following:
- customs, port border police formalities, quarantine for arrival & departure
— arrangement of proper berth , pilots, towage and mooring services
- trouble-free and seamless port clearance inbound and outbound organization
- inward & outward documentation preparation
- arrangement of bunkering with gasoil, marine and lube oil
- garbage , sludge ,bilge & sewage waters removal
- fresh water supply
- co-ordination of agency and terminal operation activity
- updating of pier and facilities
- transit & entry visas arrangement
- crew members sign on / sign off & repatriation service
- assistance in passengers embarking / disembarking
- flights booking and hotel accommodation reservation
- crew & passengers transportation service
- information for non-shorex passengers
- arrangement of watches , guards and baggage porters
- cargo and luggage forwarding / handling
- car renting assistance
- doctor service & hospitalization and drugstore medicines arrangement for crew & paxes
- banking and cash delivery service
- tel / fax / internet service
- cruise port and terminal layouts and facilities information
- express mail & postage service arrangement
- laundry service
- health insurance policies assistance
- provision and technical supply, stores & spares custom's clearance and delivery
- arrangement of repairs , storage & warehousing
- assistance in arrangement of vessel's repairs , survey and inspections
- excursions and voyages arrangement including advanced reservation of guides & buses direct or through subsidiary company specializing in cost-competitive shore excursions
- private passenger tours arrangement
- visits & meetings arrangement
- diligent accounting for funds advanced by the principal
- accurate & reliable disbursements and prompt submission of accounts and other documents
- financial transactions with maximum security , efficiency and dispatch.
- reliable bank services
- availability of general liability insurance
- providing for substantial credit lines to long-term clients
- thorough selection of all local subcontractors and vendors
- prompt communication with master and operators
- contacts to other agents
- keeping principal reporting of voyage situation and expenses as well as keep informing and updating of port authority , harbor , border police and customs regulations.
Agency department is an integral part of SC "Klaipeda ship repairs" yard as operators of cruise ship terminal having technical facilities to assist any vessels with some repairs and duly render technical supplies & other services. We are working hand in hand with all the Yards departments and sub-divisions as one command understanding our mutual responsibility, what helps us to make management of agency service operationally and with great professionalism. We as agents could reserve & confirm our terminal berths for your ships beforehand.
Local companies, chandlers & vendors help us to render different extra services for ships.
Having contacts with some agents and cruise terminals in Riga, Tallinn, St. Petersburg ,
Amsterdam, Stockholm, Gdansk trying to establish proactive partnership what could help us to coordinate the service structure as well as to control costs and offer competitive and less costly rates for our clients. The above might identify and resolve key market operational and financial issues and reduce administrative burden.


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We accept
All books are RETURNABLE (with prior notice) for a refund if everything isn't A-OK. If the error is mine (wrong book sent, inaccurate description, etc.), then your refund will include all shipping costs both ways; otherwise, I will refund the cost of the book only. Seems fair to me.


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George Eustice MP, Minister of State for Farming,Food and the Marine Environment and George Freeman MP, Parliamentary UnderSecretary of State for Life Sciences, have officially launched Agrimetrics, theworlds first Big Data Centre of Excellence for the whole food system.
Agrimetrics founding partners, RothamstedResearch, the University of Reading, NIAB and Scotlands Rural College(SRUC), hosted the launch of the first Centre for Agricultural Innovationcreated by the UK government through Innovate UK under the UK Strategy forAgricultural Technologies.
Agrimetrics will support a revolution in the use ofbig data science in the agri-food industry and contribute to a highlyintelligent, productive, efficient, resilient and sustainable system.
Professor John Crawford, interim Chief ExecutiveOfficer (CEO) of Agrimetrics, commented: We are delighted to have been awarded11.8m from UK Government, through Innovate UK and the Agri-tech Strategy, forthe establishment of the Centre, which has been designed in consultation withmore than 50 organisations from industry and academia and now has in excess of190 companies engaged."
The Centre, which will work with all business anduniversities, will engage with partners throughout the food system to enabledetailed and collective understanding of the needs of farmers, foodmanufacturers, food retailers, consumers and the environment through the use ofbig data and analytical tools. This high-value collective information, willallow the identification of opportunities for innovation projects among thepartners.
Life Sciences Minister George Freeman MP said: Weare investing in the use of data in agriculture to transform the way crops andlivestock are grown and bred. Using data we can identify new genetic traits,spray only crops with disease, and use less water and energy for modern lowerinput farming. The expertise were supporting at Agrimetrics will position theUK a world leader in this fast emerging field and improve agriculturalsustainability and productivity.
At the core of Agrimetrics is a big data scienceplatform. The platform will include all of the necessary software tools thatmake possible the integration of data according to users needs. Datasets fromaround the world will be used for this purpose. By working with and up-skillingthe industry on data and data analyses, Agrimetrics will be helping to de-riskthe investment required by the supply-chain.
Farming Minister George Eustice said: "Britishfarmers are increasingly making use of data to help them manage and grow theirbusiness, from predicting weather trends, to assessing soil qualities and usingthe very best feed types. This new technology has contributed to efficiencygains and will help us drive up the value of our food and farming industry,already worth 100 billion to our economy.This new centre, funded as part ofthe government's Agri-Tech Strategy, provides even greater opportunities toutilise this valuable resource. Taking ideas from the laboratory to the farmand improving productivity of farming is all part of our ambitious long-termvision for the future of farming."
Professor Richard Tiffin, Chief Scientific Officerof Agrimetrics, said: The food and farming industries face unprecedentedchallenges. For example, farmers throughout the world have to make decisionsfor effective management of costs, ensuring returns and safeguarding thesustainable use of land. These decisions are taken in an uncertain economicenvironment whilst dealing with inherently difficult to predict conditions e.g.weather due to climate change. Agrimetrics will enable the gathering,processing and availability of big data in a way that will support decisionmaking processes for the realisation of new opportunities and better use ofscarce resources."
Ian Meikle, Head of Agriculture and Food, at InnovateUK, the UKs innovation agency, said: Using Big Data will give theagricultural sector the evidence-based edge. The insights from this can driveproductivity and growth in the sector, benefitting the economy andconsumers."
Modern technology is flooding the food and farmingworld with data. The key challenge is to fairly share and efficiently processit into information farmers can use to improve the quality and quantity oftheir outputs in sustainable ways that benefit both themselves and society.SRUC is delighted to support Agrimetrics in this endeavour, which is in linewith SRUCs reputation as a knowledge exchange organisation, added ProfessorAlistair Stott, Head of Future Farming Systems Group at SRUC and member of theAgrimetrics executive team.
The development of Agrimetrics will supportinnovation in agricultural research and its translation to improve theproductivity, efficiency and sustainability of UK agri-food production systems.The integration of large datasets at this unprecedented scale will bringtogether resources from a diversity of areas including crop and animalbreeding, agronomy and farming systems. This will enable opportunities for theUK food sector to lead in and benefit from the new revolution in agricultureinformatics, said Professor Mario Caccamo, Head of Crop Bioinformatics at NIABand member of the Agrimetrics executive team.


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With 1,400 codes, the Astrophysics Source Code Library (ASCL, ascl.net) is the largest indexed resource for codes used in astronomy research in existence. This free online registry was established in 1999, is indexed by Web of Science and ADS, and is citable, with citations to its entries tracked by ADS. Registering your code with the ASCL is easy with our online submissions system. Making your software available for examination shows confidence in your research and makes your research more transparent, reproducible, and falsifiable. ASCL registration allows your software to be cited on its own merits and provides a citation that is trackable and accepted by all astronomy journals and journals such as Science and Nature. Registration also allows others to find your code more easily. This presentation covers the benefits of registering astronomy research software with the ASCL.
Alice Allen, Astrophysics Source Code Library
Kimberly DuPrie, Space Telescope Science Institute
G. Bruce Berriman, IPAC, Caltech
Jessica D. Mink, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
Robert J. Nemiroff, Michigan Technological University
Thomas Robitaille, Freelance
Judy Schmidt, Astrophysics Source Code Library
Lior Shamir, Lawrence Technological University
Keith Shortridge, Knave and Varlet
Peter J. Teuben, University of Maryland
John F. Wallin, Middle Tennessee State University
Rein Warmels, European Southern Observatory


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Jazz Age Redux:"Iron Metropolitan" as Lens on Emergent Social Media Storytelling
In Iron Man: Iron Metropolitan writer Kieron Gillen finally offers a unique vision of the signature Marvel superhero, leading us into a world where art deco becomes a metaphor for modern-day geopolitical upheaval.
Earlier this week, Iron Man #25 ended the third and penultimate chapter of "The Rings of the Mandarin" on a truly fraught note. Tony Stark, Iron Man, is seen enraged by the ongoing violence and misery the Dark Elves have brought to bear on other worlds throughout time. He's committed to his righteous fury, not so much to bring the Dark Elves and their king Malekith the Accursed to justice, but to end the nature of the threat he presents.
But that's not the inherent, psychologically dark moment that series regular writer Kieron Gillen ends with. Gillen ends with a flash of Tony Stark's return to hubris. Wearing a "cold iron" armor (the actual mythical substance that's the kryptonite for Dark Elves), Tony Stark has infiltrated the Dark Elf homeworld of Svartalfheim to reclaim the stolen rings of the Mandarin. Against overwhelming odds, he's won an improbable victory by clear and effective planning. He's got he rings he came for, he's won the day. The Dark Elves are in disarray and now's probably the best time to escape Svartalfheim and return home.
But that's not how the issue ends.
Instead, floating high above the alien landscape (and you cannot ignore the beautiful visual metaphor artist Luke Ross offers here), high above it all, Tony only sees his own blood rage. Malekith needs to be punished, ended even. And with that Tony launches himself downwards into whatever hells and monsters await him in Malekith's lair. It's the quintessential Tony Stark hubris—thinking that past victories are sufficient currency for future victories. And it's finally a glimmer of sorts, of the kind of Kieron Gillen we loved when he wrote Uncanny X-Men.
It hasn't always been smooth sailing reading Gillen on Iron Man, since he took the reins from Eisner-Award winning writer Matt Fraction some two years back now (two years this fall). But it has been engaging to watch it play out. Engaging to see Gillen's mind at work as he wrestled with Iron Man meant to him and how he would craft a unique vision of the signature Marvel character. Gillen himself mentioned in various interviews (printed on Marvel.com) and Author's Notes (printed as backmatter to the first issue) that his creative process for Iron Man would be entirely different than the one for Uncanny X-Men. That while Uncanny X-Men was plotted out well in advance, Iron Man would impose a kind of "Knight's Quest" structure on Iron Man and on Gillen himself, where both would seek out the kind of story that would develop Tony Stark's place in the world.
"Believe," Gillen's opening storyarc read like a kind of a primer. Tony Stark experimented with a modular armor, and Gillen ostensibly experimented with the same kind of storytelling. In "Believe," Stark faces cultists who master IronTech weaponry in the hopes of ushering in their cyber-messiah, business persons with links to political and criminal underworlds who are intent on harnessing bleeding-edge biotech, and rival visionaries who hope to be the first to "test pilot the future" (to borrow a phrase from fabled erstwhile Iron Man scribe, Warren Ellis) and have no qualms in committing genocide to do so.
Follow-up storyarcs "Godkiller" and "The Secret Origin of Tony Stark" seemed to begin with answering corporate objectives of having Tony Stark become a bigger player on Marvel's cosmic stage, but resulted in Gillen advancing the unique narrative elements of his vision of Tony Stark. A new psychological vision of Tony Stark however, like the one earlier writers like David Michelinie, Bob Layton and more recently Matt Fraction, seemed to continually elude Gillen during these arcs.
"Iron Metropolitan," the most recent storyarc that completed its run just prior to "The Rings of the Mandarin," on the other hand rewards longtime readers. We see clearly Gillen's gift for characterization and thematic weighting make an appearance for the first time in Gillen's "knight's quest" creative process.
Gillen's writing of a story that sees Tony Stark foray into geopolitical minefield by wanting to engineer the City of Tomorrow on the site of his greatest rival's fictive Chinese SAR meshes well with storyarc-artist Joe Bennett's art deco-driven visualizations. Almost at once we're faced Tony Stark's unfettered hubris. Only Stark would attempt to engineer a city on the very site where he was kidnapped and held hostage for nearly a year in Fraction's grand finale Invincible Iron Man: The Future. And the real story of course, is even bigger, even seedier. It is Stark wanting to engineer a city that will eventually neutralize the possibility of human extinction (which Stark has calculated at reaching a crisis point in 30 years).
But in typical Stark fashion—the presence of Iron Man on a build-the-future project has drawn a host of villains out from the shadows. Tony Stark's attempt at rebuilding Mandarin City has seen an unexpected rebirth of the Mandarin. Not the man himself, but the cosmic rings that enslaved his consciousness.
But thematically, what sets "Iron Metropolitan" apart, and what makes it an Iron Man Hall of Fame storyarc, is that highly competent, highly precarious thematic structure. Imagine if you will, the Mandarin's rings live again, springing to life and seeking out hosts of their own, host whose own lust for power rival even the Mandarin's. Imagine the recipient of Ring #7, the sun-fire ring, is ultra leftwing journalist Abigail Burns. Imagine she attacks the Mandarin City rebuild site out of a sense of it being a "corporate-fascist colonialist state for neo-consumerism."
What Gillen achieves with "Iron Metropolitan" is bringing to bear the problems of the Jazz Age—the hubris of building New York skywards, the vast economic discrepancies, the unique cultural visions of movements like art deco and jazz and futurism—on a geopolitical arena that's already seen the breakup of the Soviet Union, the transition of intelligence apparatuses into a new role of criminal enterprise networks (as Misha Glenny explained in McMafia), and the accepted wisdom of the human impact on the globe being an overwhelming driver of our species' and others' mass extinctions.
It's almost the perfect Iron Man story. And in many ways, it takes us back to the Grand Old Style, the style perfected by David Michelinie in the pitch-perfect Iron Man: Demon in a Bottle, which played out over something like 18 months of real world time, and only offered a behind-the-scenes glimpse in the two concluding issues. This long, slow, grand opera style of storytelling is really something that's been missed in comics for the longest time. And here it is now, we can hold it in our hands. And it's infused with all the things that make our generation's world so much more complex than earlier generations'. It's finally the Iron Man by Kieron Gillen we deserve.
Except of course, that that is exactly what makes Iron Man feel so eerily out of place in today's comicbook marketplace.
We saw this model of grand opera style storytelling play out to great effect in the closing decades of the last century and the first decade of this one. Grant Morrison writes New X-Men, and it's 19 storyarcs but one grand tale about biology's next evolutionary leap is its struggle with escaping the planetary biosphere. Brian Michael Bendis writes Daredevil and it's a six-year, 56-issue long saga about Daredevil being hounded by the press after he's exposed to be criminal defense attorney Matthew Murdock.
The model was so completely infectious, so seductive that by the time superstar writers Ed Brubaker and Matt Fraction collaborate on The Immortal Iron Fist, the book has a strange feel about it—as if the opening storyarc "The Last Iron Fist Story" could be the beginning of a decades-long legacy hero where the perpetual fiction baton is passed from one creative team to the next. And that is a truly strange place indeed, the Iron Fist has always been a second stringer character, and never really worth a protracted engagement. The best Iron Fist stories, have always run on a limited engagement, terminable basis. Creators, editors, someone (who can say who?) knew that these series, like Iron Fist, were ultimately terminable. And drew a kind of strength from know that an end must come.
A cursory look at Marvel now (which is to say Marvel right now at this moment, but also the rebranding of Marvel NOW!) sees the kind of storytelling that has turned its back on grand operatic longevity of a single series bound by and needing to conform to continuity, and an almost wholehearted embrace of the terminable storytelling model. Look at such projects as Ales Kot's cartoonish sensibility that informs the reboot of Secret Avengers, or Charles Soule's similarly hyperbolic Thunderbolts or for that matter Kaare Andrews' magnificent kung fu noir thriller that is Iron Fist, the Living Weapon or Warren Ellis' Moon Knight which reads like a preternatural reworking of his lead character from Planetary, Elijah Snow, sans the Planetary organization backing him up. Add into the mix Savage Wolverine and Elektra and Black Widow and The Punisher and you begin to see a fairly convincing argument for terminable series that evolve a grander narrative of a fictional universe (like the grander operatic style that's reserved for Avengers and X-Men books these days) only for a limited engagement.
The model of such terminable series isn't entirely Marvel's "fault," as it were. It's a technique that rival publisher DC's been pioneering since the fall of 2011, with the launch of its New 52 universe. Such books as The Grifter and Blackhawks and O.M.A.C. and Mr. Terrific and G.I. Combat have appeared only to disappear a few months on. But at each key phase, and with each of these titles, the ongoing narrative of the New 52 has been evolved.
There's a "battle" brewing to be sure, between grand operatic storytelling styles and legacy books that hark back as far as two, three generations back, and on the other side, this kind of social media-style storytelling where entire series are more terminable than they ever were, but what endures is the fictive universe. But it's hard to see from its current state how Marvel will be the publisher where such the future of these storytelling styles and their impact on the future of perpetual fictions are decided.
Given DC's release of Batman: Eternal and Futures End, two yearlong weekly titles which are competing head-to-head with each other, the two styles of grand operatic and terminable seem to be thrown openly into experimentation. Which model will succeed? The Jeff Lemire, Brian Azzarello directed opus that sees DC's heroes fight their own future (a future ready to cannibalize even the idea of superheroes) that readily reads as a terminable project? Or the vaster, yearlong canvas for the grand operatic tradition that give lease to Scott Snyder's capacity to produce a generationally relevant Batman story in the same way that Carmine Infantino produced a generationally relevant Flash story or Geoff Johns produced a generationally relevant Green Lantern story.
Whose will be done? I hope both.


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General Contractor: AUSTIN – PRAD
Scope: Metal studs, drywall, acoustical ceilings, light guage metal roof trusses, rough carpentry, metal panel ceilings, FRP truss wraps, hi-impact wall panels, doors, frames, hardware, exterior metal canopies and windscreens.
Description: Worlds largest rental car facility. Includes 137,000 SF customer service center and two four level parking structures totaling 2.8 million square feet.
Completed: 2009


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Job Description
To meet new opportunities head-on, this CBD based professional Services organisation are seeking an astute and experienced Asset Accountant to join their team to focus on their sizable assets portfolios. This genuine career opportunity will allow you to rub shoulders with a broad team of professionals that share strong commercial vision and pride in the brand that they work for.
About the Role
This role will see you working closely alongside a team of 10, with occasional travel interstate to their offices in Sydney and Melbourne. Your responsibilities with this professional team will include but not be limited to:
- Maintenance of fixed asset registers
- Capitalisation of asset purchases
- Recording of asset disposals in compliance with accounting standards
- Monthly depreciation schedules
- Maintain asset clearing accounts and work in progress accounts
- Balance sheet and general ledger reconciliations
- Overseeing finance and customers records
You will be degree qualified and ideally be studying towards your CA/CPA qualifications. This position will suit an individual who has a strong interested in asset accounting ideally from construction or property background or a chartered accounting from either business services or audit with experience in asset registers. You will have outstanding verbal and written communication and advanced Excel skills.
The Benefits
- CBD corporate offices
- Potential for bonuses
- Flexible working conditions
- Growing organisation
- Friendly and professional team
- Opportunity for travel
To apply, click the link and upload your current resume in Microsoft Word format only (.doc or .docx). If you would like to have a confidential discussion, please contact Michael Donnelly on 07 3023 1092, quoting ref no. JO-1907-96802. Want to know more about Davidson? Visit us at www.davidsonwp.com


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GE-Hitachi's proposed PRISM fourth-generation fast reactor moved a step closer to reality today with the conclusion of an independent feasibility study showing that the design is credible for licensing and could provide a cost-effective way of quickly dealing with the UK's 100-tonne plutonium stockpile. In a phone interview for this blog (published in full below), GE's chief engineer Eric Loewen told me that the reactor could be up and running in as little as five years after the conclusion of the licensing process – as long as the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority abandons its current support for the much more expensive and complicated process proposed by the French company Areva for a MOX (mixed-oxide)-type management of plutonium.
Update: Duncan Clark over at the Guardian has written this news piece, similarly titled 'Nuclear waste-burning reactor moves a step closer to reality'
According to Loewen it would then take only another five years after startup to 'disposition' the UK's whole plutonium stockpile, and in the process the PRISM reactor would potentially deliver an ongoing 600MW of clean energy to the UK electricity grid. If government policy eventually changes to encourage reprocessing, the reactor could later move on to consuming spent nuclear fuel and depleted uranium, of which the UK has tens of thousands of tonnes in surface storage awaiting final disposal. A recent article in the Guardian revealed that these stockpiles combined already contain enough energy to run the entire country at current electricity consumption for five centuries – without the need to emit any CO2 or mine any new uranium.
However, the current proposal for PRISM is much more narrowly-focused. The UK government's Nuclear Decommissioning Authority is running a consultation on how best to 'disposition' its plutonium liability – a process for which GE-Hitachi was a late entrant, hence the ongoing preference for MOX. (MOX involves mixing small amounts of plutonium into conventional uranium oxide fuel and burning it in existing light-water reactors such as Sizewell B.) The idea is to 'spike' the plutonium with fission products which would make it highly radioactive and therefore eliminate it as a potential proliferation risk. Current government policy is for the used fuel then to eventually be placed in a deep repository – even though the PRISM technology would allow all the plutonium and uranium stockpiles to be burned, so no burnable fuel ever has to go into geological disposal (indeed the very idea of million-year 'geological disposal' begins to seem outmoded when the radioactive lifetime of the waste is a few hundred years at most).
GE-Hitachi also provided further clarification during my interview on the financial model they are proposing to the NDA. With potential financing from the US Export-Import Bank, the UK taxpayer would not shoulder the risk of building the plant or even operating it, I am told. Instead, the NDA would pay the operator of the PRISM reactor per tonne of plutonium dealt with – a so-called 'pay-for-performance' model. This insulates the taxpayer from the risk that a plant might go over budget, as has been the case at Areva's EPR reactors being built in France and Finland, and its MOX plant under construction at Savannah River in the US. (The latter was proposed at $550 million, whereas costs are reported to now be close to $5 billion – nearly ten times over budget, and the plant is still a long way from completion.)
Today's announcement essentially means that the NDA is now under pressure in future to consider PRISM at least on an equal footing with MOX, and to abandon its long-standing policy bias in favour of Areva's proposals. The PRISM already has prominent supporters both inside and out of government, and with 1000 pages of documentation now being delivered to the NDA's doorstep no-one can claim that GE-Hitachi has not come up with a serious offer. Within as little as two months a further announcement should be forthcoming from the NDA about this – all eyes will be on them to ensure that all potential technologies are allowed to compete on a level playing field.
Below follows an extended interview with Eric Loewen, Chief Consulting Engineer Advanced Plants, GE Nuclear Energy (with occasional inputs where stated from David Powell, head of European new nuclear sales for GE-Hitachi). I have only done minor editing for clarity.
What's new about the announcement today and how have things advanced with PRISM over the last year or so?
The significance of today is that we completed our feasibility study with the UK government's Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. For us this is a significant milestone that we have completed this body of work to provide the answers to many questions that the NDA had, and at this point the NDA is going to decide in the next couple of months whether this technology is credible, and if it is deemed credible by the NDA then we will enter the next process, which is the justification process.
Right, so what have the milestones been over the last year or so since this process began?
Well the first milestone happened about a year ago where we formally put in our response to the public consultation on the management of plutonium. Then we did some outreach with different stakeholders during the summer of last year, and into the fall the NDA at the end of their public consultation agreed that MOX was their preferred option but they are interested in other ones that provide value to the UK taxpayer. From then we entered into a contract with the NDA to do a feasibility study, which concluded on Friday with our deliverable of about 1,000 pages of documentation to the many questions that they had.
Is this actually physical documentation… did you have to deliver boxes, or is it done electronically these days?
Both. So it was done in boxes and also we provided electronic versions.
Can you just explain to the uninitiated what is new about the PRISM technology and what its benefits are from your perspective?
The PRISM uses different fuels for its energy to make electricity, and its efficiency in operations is significantly better than a water-cooled reactor. For example, a water-cooled reactor can use about 1% of the available energy in the uranium that comes out of the ground, whereas this technology can use close to 99% of the available energy from fission.
So what that means in this case for the UK plutonium disposition, this technology allows a very simple process to fabricate the fuel that goes into the reactor, where we take that very abrasive plutonium oxide and put that into a metal form, put that into an alloy that then goes into the reactor, and we can extract as much energy as the policy would dictate, and then the reactor used fuel is planned currently to go into the UK's geological disposal.
OK. So just talk us round the issues here with regard to the UK's plutonium management. The other option on the table which the NDA still prefers, the so-called MOX, mixed oxide fuel, which is mixing plutonium with uranium – what are the issues here?
Well it's not fair for me to talk about other technologies because I'm not familiar with MOX, but I can tell you the advantages of what we have. So the advantages of this technology is that we would take the plutonium oxide that is currently stored by the UK government. As soon as we would receive one of those cans we would mix that with the same amount of uranium oxide, so we would have a 50:50 mixture, and then through chemistry that has been proven since the 1800s we do what is called electro-reduction, where the oxide form goes away with the release of oxygen, and you're left with a reduced metal – in this case it would be 50% plutonium and 50% uranium. That then is remelted, and we get it to the alloy composition that works best with the reactor that's been proven at Experimental Breeder Reactor no.2, and at the Fast Flux Test Facility in the United States, and that's by adding some different constituents such as zirconium.
Then that is easily fabricated into fuel and then put into the reactor. So it's fundamentally very easy to make a metallic fuel than it is an oxide fuel. We as a reactor vendor make oxide fuel in four different countries around the world, so we do it well, but we know that it's a complex, very exacting business whereas making PRISM fuel from a manufacturing ability standpoint is very easy.
And can the PRISM as proposed also be used to recycle waste and spent fuel, which the UK also has a lot of, as well as plutonium?
The PRISM reactor if it was built as what we put into the feasibility study, that kit has the ability to recycle fuel. However the UK government would have to buy a different kit, if you will, to do that recycle. So you would need a different building to do the recycling. That isn't currently part of our offer, however by taking this first step with PRISM it allows the UK government – if policy changes – to use this recycling option. Because right now the UK government's position on reprocessing or recycling is not to do either one. So that's why we as a technology vendor haven't offered that, but your country would be positioned to use the reactor for recycling if you bought the building and the technology to do that recycling.
So the reactor is the same, it's just a matter of the reprocessing stage which needs to be carried out beforehand?
Yes, the reactor is the same. So that is the unique thing about PRISM is that it can run in a mode for this feasibility study, which is just to disposition plutonium, put it into the reactor, generate fission products so that it is radioactive, and then put it in the ground – that same reactor could be used for recycling, as an Integral Fast Reactor, which provides a huge, a bountiful amount of energy for this planet.
It also strikes me that wanting to spike plutonium with fission products and put it in the ground isn't necessarily the most sensible use of potential fuel anyway, but I guess you've been asked to do that, and that's what you've come up with, right?
That's what we've come up with, and you have to realise that the PRISM reactor has an operational lifetime of many, many decades, as does the used fuel that would be stored there on site, so it's not as if the reactor's going to run and then they're immediately going to put it in geological disposal. My vision is that once the technology is operating and people see carbon-free electricity coming out of it – and your question is, why don't we build the recycling portion, and then it'll come. I think it's just too much right now. What your country has, we can solve the UK plutonium problem with PRISM, because our children deserve better than an old MOX plant.
What are the safety concerns though? People often are scared by the idea of having molten sodium used as a coolant because it's reactive with air and water – what are some of the engineering issues on safety?
Sodium is actually very beneficial for the safety of the reactor – it provides greater heat transfer capability and that allows us to be able to cool the reactor with a complete loss of all external or onsite power. Because sodium as you know is a metal it's very conductive of heat, and when we turn off a nuclear power plant it still generates heat. So our fuel generating heat, which is metal, is located in metal cladding, which is in metal coolant, which is in a metal vessel, so it's very easy to pass air outside that metal vessel and remove the heat.
So that's what makes it safe. Now unfortunately we make our high school students take chemistry. Most chemistry teachers like to put metallic sodium into water, and it does come up with an interesting reaction – but it's a chemical reaction, and engineers are very good at containing chemical reactions, like chlorine gas that we use to purify our water, to ammonium used for fertiliser. Those chemicals we know how to control very well. So that's where I think we need to overlook that chemistry experiment that we get to see with sodium. Sodium is a great reactor coolant.
It does presumably when it's in the reactor core get radioactive itself. Does that present any concerns?
Sodium, just like water, becomes radioactive in the neutron flux around a reactor. In the case of water it turns into nitrogen-16, which has a half-life of 7 seconds. So if you turn off the reactor and you wait 70 seconds pretty much the radioactivity's gone. In the case of sodium it produces sodium-24, and sodium-24 has a half-life measured in days – so it's radioactive a little bit longer, but it's not insurmountable. If you look at lead-bismuth cooled reactors, bismuth turns into polonium, and polonium has a lot longer half-life and a more significant release of alpha particles, so from a coolant standpoint it's a little bit longer than water, but it's something that's definitely manageable and taken care of in the design of PRISM.
The green groups who've talked about this in the UK are quite sceptical that it will ever happen. Do you have any response or interaction with environmentalists about the PRISM?
At this point we've been focusing on the technical stakeholders at the NDA, and we realise that we have to overcome the pessimism about this third-generation technology for plutonium disposition rather than the second-generation technology which is called MOX. And we think that with continuing to inform stakeholders to continue to have that sort of dialogue that people will see the advantages of this technology for plutonium disposition for a variety of reasons, and then I think that people can see the vision of how this technology allows the UK to be a leader when it comes to the Integral Fast Reactor concept. That they're the ones that unlocked this key to a different way of generating electricity, and also they've become the leaders on how to manage plutonium.
If you look at the United States and Russia, we're still looking at each other working on the disposition of plutonium, but so far not one tonne has been dispositioned. The UK with this technology has the opportunity to disposition 100 tonnes in 5 years. And imagine the impact in a world discussion having the UK lead those sorts of efforts, and look at the United States and Russia and say 'why can't you do better?'. So I think this puts the UK in a leadership role in a variety of areas, not only in energy generation and how to control waste but also as far as the management of plutonium.
But perhaps one of the reasons why there is some scepticism in the UK is bad memories from our own fast reactor programme at Dounreay. How is the PRISM significantly different from that?
You all have an interesting history – the first reactor was metal-fuelled – good – with a loop – not as good. Then in the second reactor you had oxide fuel – bad – with a pool-type design – good. What PRISM is, is metallic fuel in a pool reactor. And that's the best combination. So that's where it's significantly different. And what I mean by a pool, is that all of the coolant, the sodium, is located in one vessel. We surround that by another vessel, called a guard vessel. And we put that underground in a concrete silo lined with stainless steel. And from a fundamental standpoint that design prevents a loss of coolant accident. And that's fairly significant that we've designed that out – that's like saying that we've designed an airplane so that it cannot crash. So in this case we've designed it so that we don't have a loss of coolant accident, and that has been substantiated by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 1994 where they agreed with us that we've designed that out.
So from a safety standpoint, saying that we've designed out a loss of coolant accident –that's significant. Look at Three Mile Island – they had a loss of coolant accident which led to that core damage.
Can we just talk quickly about the financing issues? Obviously central to a lot of the opposition to nuclear is the perception that it's more expensive than everything else – what's the proposal here? What's the taxpayer liability likely to be for the PRISM proposal?
[David Powell replies:] What we're doing is that we're developing that technology such that we've got a strong private sector element involved in the project, in which we are going to be a service provider in processing the plutonium. So that in exchange for that we get a fee arrangement for the amount of plutonium we process. So this is effectively providing a strong insulation for government, NDA and ultimately the UK taxpayer from a plant construction, operation, ownership and other associated risks that you have with those kinds of projects. So effectively the model shifts from the UK taxpayer to a private funding-type model based on a pay per performance approach via an operator of the plant that we would use to process the plutonium and then sell the electricity that we generate.
So the electricity sold offsets the cost of spiking the plutonium essentially?
[David Powell replies:] To some extent yes. And recognising that it is low-carbon electricity as well, which is all beneficial from a UK perspective.
Do you have any idea what the capital cost of both the reactor and the fuel fabrication facilities might be?
[David Powell replies:] Yes we do but I'm not allowed to tell you actually! Because we're not into any commercial negotiations at this point in time and it's probably not right for us to say what those kinds of figures would be at this point.
But in terms of the incentive to the UK taxpayer to consider this, in what way is this better than some of the competing proposals? – I'm not asking you to discuss them, but the model here is different, right?
[David Powell replies:] Yes, the model's different, and as we've concluded in the study report to the NDA, we've put a lot of information in there about the model and how that would work, and trying to explain the roles that each player would take in that. So for example GE-Hitachi would take a technology-provider role, and the operator would implement that strategy. And what we've been able to say, as Eric mentioned is that the fuel fabrication process is a very straightforward and simple process, and when coupled with PRISM, because we can generate that low-carbon electricity, we can do this at less cost than a new MOX fuel fabrication plant. You know, that [MOX plant] would consume power from the grid, and we're actually generating power. So we're able to say that we can provide better value than MOX.
Okay. And how quickly might this be able to be up and running in the best-case scenario? Is it going to take decades or years or what?
[Eric Loewen:] OK, so best case is – I always try to think in years – the process right now is that the NDA has 2 months to evaluate whether the technology is credible, and if they view that it is credible then we enter into the consultation or the justification process that starts this fall. It is my understanding that this process takes over 2 years to do that. And during that 2-year time, one way to shorten things up is to start the process of licensing with the Office of Nuclear Regulation, that would shorten it up some. If that isn't done, then after that 2-year justification, if that technology was then chosen through the justification, then you'd set up a contract, and then that contract would enable the formal submission of a licence.
We think the licensing of PRISM and the two associated facilities – the fuel fabrication and the fuel storage – would take about 5 years, similar to a water-cooled reactor. And then construction would be about 5 years. So there's your first decade, and then the operation would depend on how fast the disposition of the plutonium would occur. The life of the plant is about 60 years, so it would operate in that mode to disposition plutonium, or as we talked about earlier in this call, you could choose with a policy change that you could start recycling the PRISM fuel to extract more energy, to the point where you put no plutonium into the ground.
So that's clearly a game-changer sort of technology – if you look at MOX, you will put more transuranics into the ground than when you started – it's just a fact of how water-cooled reactors work. With PRISM in the Integral Fast Reactor mode you can essentially put no plutonium back into the ground in a geological repository – all that plutonium would be used for energy input into our planet.
I can't remember what the power of each block is, is it 600 each, or 300 each and you're proposing two?
A block is 600 megawatts, and a block consists of two reactors that each produce 300.
Why is it so small? Why not do a bigger one?
Because sodium-cooled reactors are better small. And the reason for that is that if they're small then the reactor cores are small, and if the reactor core is small that means you get neutron leakage. And if you get neutron leakage you have the ability for the reactor to shut down. And those are the experiments that were done at the Experimental Breeder Reactor no.2 when the control rods were held out. The plant was at 100% power, 100% flow, and then the reactor coolant pump was turned off. And the reactor shut itself down, at a lower power, without inserting any control rods. That same scenario for any water-cooled reactor would be significantly different… and then that test was done that afternoon with losing the heat sink, where you turn off its ability to reject heat. And it's because having that small core that allows you to do that. So from a fundamental standpoint sodium-cooled reactors are good small. From a fundamental standpoint water-cooled reactors are better bigger. And that's where PRISM has found that ideal spot of about 300 MW electric in a reactor vessel that's about 30 feet in diameter, it's about 60 feet tall.
It sounds more expensive to build lots of little things than one big thing, but isn't the proposal for it to be modular?
When we started PRISM in 1981, we started it as a technology company that built things in the factory like jet engines, like gas turbines. The reason why we like building things in a factory is that we can control quality, we can control cost, and we can make sure that we put a product out that is going to work. That's kind of the genesis of how PRISM started in 1981. Then we invited Mike Lineberry from Argonne National Laboratory out to our Sunnyvale site later in 1981, and that's where the PRISM concept kind of got formalised. It wasn't until 1983 that it started getting more insight, and in '84 is when it actually got funded. But when we started in 1981 the concept was 'how do you make something in factories that you can ship down the road?' – so your limiting factor is how big that reactor vessel is. And that's where this limit's coming from, that's where you get the modularity. We know from the other products that we make in the factory that the delivery times get shorter and costs start going down, when we start manufacturing things that are small and modular in a factory.
Thanks to you all very much.
12 Comments
I am hopeful that this proposal will turn out well. The business model is pretty ingenious, initially selling the service of plutonium disposition, with that then demonstrating a supply of hundreds of years' worth of energy if the UK simply decides not to put all the great for fast reactor fuel transuranics in the ground. Beats the snot out of the MOX idea for sure. I wish the American taxpayers could get a refund for all that we've spent n the MOX plant in South Carolina. That would have been almost just the right amount to build a first PRISM/IFR, but if the UK's plutonium "problem" can get the design commercialized, that will still put the world in a better place n terms of emission-free energy supply.↓
I agree totally to your assessment. It would be great if this truely marvellous design would be built in reality. I wishe Eric all the best in promoting it.
You mentioned the MOX plant in SC running over in cost by a factor of around 10. Let's hope that the british decision makers also know about this scandalous mis-assessment and give PRISM a chance.
PRISM offers another capability for Great Britain (hopefully US too) and that is Low CO2 hydrocarbon fuels. If we are to address climate change in a meaningful fashion in a short time scale, reusing existing infrastructure (petrol) more efficiently is the only viable option. Using heat from the reactor coal (or biomass) can be turned into liquid fuels quite readily.
It is not entirely CO2 neutral, but that capability can be added in as policy needs change (price on CO2) to make it CO2 neutral or even negative. Combining nuclear heat and coal feedstock can achieve the necessary CO2 reductions.
I am presenting a paper that shows how PRISM can accomplish this task.↓
While that's technically true, it's unlikely to be even remotely economically attractive, especially the coal route.
The obvious starting point is that there will still remain a need to capture and sequester the carbon content of the coal and/or gas. In fact, all you have done by going down a nuclear process heat route (as compared to a conventional approach, where coal or gas is also used to provide heat) is somewhat reduce the size of the sequestration plant, and substitute a low(ish) cost heating system with a high cost one. Short of coal and gas prices reaching multiples of today's price, that's highly unlikely to be an attractive proposition.
Back in the 1980s, long before there was an international market for LNG, a large gas field was discovered off the coast of New Zealand – Maui B. The field could supply well in excess of NZ's needs (there's little gas distribution infrastructure anyhow) so it was developed to supply two facilities.
The first was the "New Plymouth" gas-fired power station (largely a clone of our own Peterhead facility). The second was a plant that converted gas to methanol, which was then mixed into petrol to reduce NZ's import dependency. I worked on that plant briefly.
The plant worked in two stages; the first reormed the natural gas into hydrogen and CO2 stream (and was a heavy energy user). The second took the H2 and made methanol. That's still pretty much what you'd be proposing to do with nuclear process heat (just with coal you need another energy consuming process at the front end to gasify the coal).
The economics were madness. Even with gas virtually free, and hence the energy cost negligible, the methanol cost about 6 times what the equivalent energy value of petrol would have cost.
Now what you want to do, it seems, is exchange a design where the basic energy input was at the level of a few $/MWh, for one where on any reasonable estimate it'd cost an order of magnitude more. You'd probably take that six fold price, and turn it into nine or ten-fold.
There's also the fairly major issue that, to absorb the heat output of even a single PRISM unit, you need to find a use for a GW or so of heat. The "methanex" plant, from memory, needed 60-80MW (although that could be way off – I'm happy to be corrected). For the economics to make even marginal sense, you'd need to be building huge industrial complexes to absorb heat on that scale.
I'm as strong an advocate of nuclear development as anyone – but what doesn't help the argument is excusrsions into economic fantasy land.
There's more than sufficient challenge getting electricityt production by nuclear means to fulfil it's potential. Concentrate efforts on that.
Developing batteries adequate for EV's might be easier and better.
The progress you report is encouraging. However, it is depressing that the UK's nuclear establishment appears to be considering the PRISM only after it was brought to its attention in a public consultation exercise and that many within it still appear to favour the MOX route. More depressing still is that the technology is only receiving the attention it is because of the perceived proliferation dangers of RGP(reactor grade plutonium). The full IFR (integral fast reactor) has the potential to produce unlimited clean energy. Its economics will determine whether this potential will be achieved and can only be demonstrated with pilot plants. The UK is being offered the chance to develop a first mover advantage without carrying the full extent of typical fist mover risk. However, if the project is judged entirely as a means of irradiating and then burying our plutonium stockpile, it is not necessarily an attractive option.↓
I wonder if you could quantify the benefits of the PRISM project with regards to what would otherwise have been nuclear waste to be buried. What is the reduction in volume, mass, half life of rediation of that waste after it has, in effect, been fed to the PRISM reactor?↓
You can find some discussion of the fuel requirements and waste stream of an IFR (PRISM+recycling) here:
Basically it is a couple of orders of magnitude less fuel and waste than for a conventional LWR. As I understand it, the waste is mainly short lived fission products all of which have a half life of less than 100 years. Several hundred years is the time frame normally quoted for the activity of such waste to decay to levels similar to natural uranium ore.
No recycling is currently on the agenda for the UK PRISM proposal, but the obvious hope is that it may be introduced at a later date.
GE's chief engineer Eric Loewen told me that the reactor could be up and running in as little as five years…
There's nothing like getting an independent view! Didn't Areva say something similar about their new EPR reactor? Now they've exceeded 12 years with no end in sight, and billions over budget.
* Nuclear Decommissioning Authority sees IFR technology as immature and commercially unproven, unlikely to start before 2050.
About the only thing that the nuke industry can consistently deliver on is impressive propaganda.↓
The PRISM – and SFR – is a proven product. The first non-weapon reactor was a sodium cooled reactor, the EBR-I; first to generate electricity in 1951. In 1957 a sodium cooled reactor powered the second nuclear submarine USS SEAWOLF (SSN-575). The U.S. EBR-II (a SFR) and 20 other fast test reactors have been operated around the world for many decades.
SFR metallic fuel is proven by extensive EBR-II operation.
The dry electrometallurgical process for recycling spent nuclear fuel from LWRs, has been used in the commercial metals industries more than a century. And electrometallurgical processing of spent nuclear fuel is a heckuva lot cleaner than the messy, complicated and expensive aqueous MOX process.
Lets deploy PRISMs to fission SNF and weapon grade nuclear materials. Take a big bite out of the proliferation stockpiles while generating electricity to the commercial grids.
Let's deploy PRISM and the electrometallurgical process to fission↓
David Fleming (deceased) in his booklet 'The Lean Guide to Nuclear Energy' (2007) raised many questions about the viability of nuclear power in both the short and long term. It is my belief that these questions have not been adequately considered. The decision by the government to sell off its stake in Eurostar to fund, among other things, the building of a nuclear power station on Anglesey, makes the proper consideration of these questions even more urgent.
The conclusion Fleming reaches from his analysis is that the priority for the nuclear industry, which currently provides only 2-3% of the world's energy, should be to use the electricity it generates to clean up its own pollution and to phase itself out before events force it to close down abruptly.
In promoting nuclear power the government gives the impression that it does not involve carbon emissions. Does this assertion assume that PRISM will be viable?. If not then this assertion is far from the truth as fossil fuels are used for mining ores and transport of uranium, building the plant and for dealing with the wastes. Fleming contends that what lies ahead is the prospect of the remaining ores being of such poor quality that the gas and other fossil fuels used in the nuclear life-cycle would produce less carbon dioxide per kilowatt-hour if they were used as fuels to generate electricity. Will there be enough fossil fuels left for the energy needed by our grandchildren to clean up the wastes we have created?
The promise of limitless power through the development of fast-breeder reactors (which would involve the production of plutonium used for nuclear weapons) and nuclear fusion, remain pipe dreams. Fleming points out that the whole fast-breeder cycle, consisting of three processes none of which has ever worked as intended, has itself never worked. When he wrote there were three fast-breeder reactors in the world; Beloyarsk-3 in Russia, Monju in Japan and Phénix in France. Monju and Phénix had long been out of operation. Beloyarsk was still operating, but had never bred.
The government appears to have abandoned its commitment to renewable energy as a response to the public cry for a reduction in energy prices. It has dismally failed to point out the link between economic growth and its dependence on the availability and use of fossil fuels. We sacrifice the future for today and fail to understand the need for the affluent to live more simply and for the development of a more equitable system of creating and distributing wealth. This is a challenge to the current system based on economic growth, greed and debt.
We also need to appreciate the link between economic growth, crime, increased carbon emissions and climate disasters. Money created by economic growth is increasingly being used to deal with the multitude of problems which economic growth creates. It is time to take stock and direct our intelligence towards the development of a new system, without divisive labels (like 'capitalism', 'communism' and 'socialism') which is based on a consideration of the needs of future generations and the poor and marginalized in our present society. The name I put forward for a new social science that might act as a suitable framework for discussion is PHILONOMICS.↓
NDA, 'Nuclear Decommissioning Authority', have provisionally approved PRISM reactors for burning up 85% – 90% of Britain's plutonium (that proportion which can be economically reprocessed).


text:
"There is a lovely relationship between many classic Danish dishes. When a chicken is boiled to make stock, the meat of the bird is often used for creamy chicken and asparagus tartlets, while the broth is turned into this delicious chicken soup with both pork and dough dumplings. While we used some of the locally available baby vegetables in this soup, it is just as delicious served with the vegetables used to make the stock." Adam Liaw, Destination Flavour Scandinavia
Skill level
- 1.5 kg whole chicken
- 1 celery stick, chopped
- 2 leeks, halved lengthwise, thinly sliced
- 3 carrots, cut into 1 cm cubes
- 1 parsnip, cut into 1 cm cubes
- 1 tsp black peppercorns
- ⅓ cup finely shredded parsley and wild garlic (optional)
- bouquet garnish of thyme, parsley, bay leaf and wild garlic (optional)
- 100 g butter
- 300 g (2 cups) plain flour
- 1 tbsp salt
- 3 eggs
- 300 g pork mince
- 2 slices white bread, crust-less, torn
- 2 tbsp milk
- 1 egg
- 50 g butter
- 1 tsp salt
- ½ tsp grated nutmeg
Cook's notes
Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.
Resting time 20 minutes
For the stock, place the chicken into a large saucepan and add enough water to cover well, ensuring the chicken is completely submerged. Bring to the boil over high heat, then drain and rinse the chicken under running water. Place the chicken into a clean pan, add 4 litres water or enough to cover and bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat. Add the celery, leek, carrots, parsnip, peppercorns and bouquet garni, then reduce the heat low and cook at a bare simmer for 1 hour, skimming any impurities that rise to the surface. Remove the chicken and store for another use. Remove and discard the bouquet garni.
For the dumplings, bring 250ml (1 cup) water to the boil in a small saucepan. Add the butter and stir until melted, then remove from the heat. Stir in flour and salt until smooth, then beat in the eggs one at a time until well combined. Transfer to a bowl and set aside to rest for 20 minutes.
For the meatballs, pulse all of the ingredients in a food processor until just combined.
Shape the meatball and dough mixture into 2 cm balls and keep separate.
Cook the meatballs and dumplings, separately in a saucepan of lightly salted simmering water just until they float to the surface. Remove with a slotted spoon and set aside. Divide the dumplings and meatballs among soup bowls, then ladle in the hot soup and vegetables. Scatter with parsley and wild garlic to serve.
Photography, styling and food preparation by Adam Liaw.
Visit the Destination Flavour Scandinavia program page for recipes, videos and more.
View recipes from past seasons: Destination Flavour Down Under, Destination Flavour Japan, Destination Flavour S1.


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If you cant beat them, join them. The Church of Scientology has enabled video on its Web site in an effort to further disseminate its religious message, a month after a widely publicized online campaign sought to discredit and "dismantle" the controversial religion.
The Scientology Video Channel launched this week to "provide an overview of the basic Scientology beliefs and practices of the religion while answering the question 'What is Scientology?'," according to a statement released by the church.
By making the video channel available online, the Church of Scientology hopes to provide enlightening information to those who have questions about the religion.
The church says it has "always considered the Internet a resource for disseminating accurate information about the religion," and its new video channel follows hot on the heels of a February campaign that sought to damage the reputation of Scientology and its followers.
In mid-February, the "Anonymous" group released three YouTube videos that sought to discredit and "dismantle" the church, not long after they had claimed responsibility for a distributed denial of service attack on the Scientology Web site.
The Church of Scientology says its new Video Channel contains 82 Scientology related videos, as well as information on humanitarian programs it sponsors.


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A choice that I'm often presented with is the choice between cynicism and joy. Growing up and in most of my life I have always had a tendency to be very cynical ('honesty' I used to call it…), negative ('realistic' was my term for that…) and sarcastic ('having a sense of humor' in my words…). Cynicism, negativity, sarcasm, fault-finding are all different words that have to do with judgment. Judgment of God as being incompetent and not living up to my expectations, so I decide that he is a liar with his lofty promises ("abundant life?….yeah right!") and I choose to live a life as a believer where I profess to be a Christian, but spend the vast majority of my energy judging other people for their mistakes and hating God for not giving me what I want. I also judge other people and deem them not worthy of my time and energy. Soft, good-hearted, forgiving people are seen as weak and pathetic, and it becomes very hard for me to relate to a God of compassion, grace and relentless love.
I am a cynic in healing. Some Christians I have met say that "it's just natural for me to be more negative and cynical than other people". That's simply not true. It's a lie. There is simply no way that it's 'natural' for a born again child of God with the Holy Spirit living inside of him or her to be cynical, harsh, negative and judgmental. It's flesh. It's ugly. It needs to be recognized, confessed and exposed and put in its right place under Jesus' leadership.
I am a cynic in healing. I have spent much time in my life finding faults. I have often found myself belonging to the large group of Christians who just never seem to find a church that fits them. There is always something that they don't like. The other people never live up to their expectations. They think they are spiritually mature and have the gift of discernment because they can see that no churches are perfect. The problem is that we all know that no churches are perfect. It's truly stating the obvious! But the tragedy is that these people, these cynical Christians, either just sit miserable in their bitterness and self-righteousness in the seats of whatever church or they conclude that church is a waste of time altogether and find themselves church-less, and often after a short while life-less as well. It's a slow fade, but I've seen it happen for too many people I hold dear, and I thank God that he stopped me in my tracks when I was going down that well-worn path. And I thank him that he is healing me for the cynicism and negativity that used to control my life all the time.
It doesn't mean that I'm not able to find faults anymore. Trust me, I'm great at that. I can find faults anywhere. But I don't have to entertain that thought, invite it in for dinner and invite other people to share that discovery with me. I can say to God that I don't want to live in darkness, and he will gradually show me more and more what it looks like to live as a child of the light.
Grace-healed eyes
I was very challenged by the following sections from The Return Of The Prodigal Son. It speaks volumes to me and challenges me to continue down the path of healing with Christ where he changes me from a son of cynicism to a child of joy, just the same way he changed the Apostle John from a son of thunder who wanted to call fire down on unrepentant people (Luke 9:51-55) to the apostle of love who couldn't stop celebrating Christ's love for him and named himself 'the disciple Jesus loved' (John 20:2) when he wrote his gospel.
"The father of the prodigal son gives himself totally to the joy that his returning son brings him. I have to learn from that. I have to learn to 'steal' all the real joy there is to steal and lift it up for others to see. Yes, I know that not everybody has been converted yet, that there is not yet peace everywhere, that all pain has not yet been taken away, but still, I see people turning and returning home; I hear voices that pray; I notice moments of forgiveness, and I witness many signs of hope. I don't have to wait until all is well, but I can celebrate every little hint the Kingdom that is at hand.
This is a real discipline. It requires choosing for the light even when there is much darkness to frighten me, choosing for life even when the forces of death are so visible, and choosing for the truth even when I am surrounded with lies. I am tempted to be so impressed by the obvious sadness of the human condition that I no longer claim the joy manifesting itself in many small but very real ways. The reward of choosing joy is joy itself. There is so much rejection, pain, and woundedness among us, but once you choose to claim the joy hidden in the midst of all suffering, life becomes celebration,. Joy never denies the sadness, but transforms it to fertile soil for more joy.
Surely I will be called naive, unrealistic, and sentimental, and I will be accused of ignoring the 'real' problems, the structural evils that underlie much of human misery. But God rejoices when one repentant sinner returns. Statistically that is not very interesting. But for God, numbers never seem to matter. Who knows whether the world is kept from destruction because of one, two or three people who have continued to pray when the rest of humanity has lost hope and dissipated itself?" (The Return Of The Prodigal Son, pages 115-116).
A few years ago I would have been in the large group calling Nouwen and people like him 'naive, unrealistic, sentimental and ignorant', but they are not. The more I get, what Philip Yancey in his masterpiece What's So Amazing About Grace, called grace-healed eyes, the more I see that I am called to be like Nouwen and the other naive dreamers. I am also called as a child of the light to point to the light in the world when it's visible. I'm not called to be ignorant about the real problems that are in this world. And I doubt that will ever be a temptation for me to not be aware of the real problems that are going on. But being aware of the problems and talking a lot about them, doesn't do much to solve them. I have spent a lot of useless time dwelling of the problems in the world, and the problems in the church, instead of being a part of the minority that is always active in loving people and bringing forth life and light where darkness, bitterness and mediocrity rule.
Darkness/light, cynicism/joy
I will give the scene to Henri Nouwen again in these two segments where he contrasts people of cynicism with people of joy. I recognize myself very well in the cynical people, but thank God (!!) I'm beginning to see more and more of the simple joy in my life. And joy, not cynicism, is after all, one of the fruits of the Spirit living his life in and through me.
"For me it is amazing to experience daily the radical difference between cynicism and joy. Cynics seek darkness wherever they go. They point always to approaching dangers, impure motives, and hidden schemes. They call trust naive, care romantic, and forgiveness sentimental. They sneer at enthusiasm, ridicule spiritual fervor, and despise charismatic behavior. They consider themselves realists who see reality for what it truly is and who are not deceived by 'escapist emotions'. But in belittling God's joy, their darkness calls forth more darkness.
People who have come to know the joy of God do not deny the darkness, but they choose not to live in it. They claim that the light that shines in the darkness can be trusted more than the darkness itself and that a little bit of light can dispel a lot of darkness. They point each other to flashes of light here and there, and remind each other that they reveal the hidden but real presence of God. They discover that there are people who heal others' wounds, forgive each others' offenses, share their possessions, foster the spirit of community, celebrate the gifts they have received, and live in constant anticipation of the full manifestation of God's glory" (The Return Of The Prodigal Son, page 117)
These are powerful words indeed. They expose the darkness that's still inside of me. They expose how often I'm tempted to look at the dark instead of the bright colors of life. They expose that I often find it easier, more comfortable and even more spiritual (!) to criticize instead of encourage.
Paul urged the Ephesian church to: "speak the truth in love" (Ephesians 4:15). Real truth is always filled with love. And real love is always filled with truth. This is not a call to blindness, stupidity, a childish outlook on life or anything like that. We are called to be aware. Be aware of both the good, the bad and the ugly. But in this day and age where most people are focusing on everything that doesn't work in and outside of the church or in their own lives, the calling to celebrate the light is even stronger than ever before. I rarely have any problems speaking what I believe is the truth. But if it's not spoken in love, it's worth nothing (1. Corinthians 13), and I always have to ask myself a key question: "will what I am about to say build up relationships or break down relationships?'. If it will break down relationships, it is probably better to stay quiet, but if it will build up relationships, I am free to speak what's on my heart and trust that God put it there.
Here is the song A Place Called Grace. The place that we can all run to no matter how caught up in cynicism and resentment we may be. It's a place where God starts to melt the iceberg that is around our true selves and we get to experience that God's forgiveness and mercy changes us slowly from within
Blessings, Torben – who is glad that it's God doing the changing of focus! It's not about me tricking myself into seeing more of the light in this world. I simply see it the more I see Christ – who is the light of the world – in my life!


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Adventure Rider Print Magazine! We're doing a print magazine this November - 128 pages of high quality adventure riding stories, photography and interviews! Click here to purchase a copy for $9. Limited copies still available.Dismiss Notice
Soccer/Fussball/Football/Calcio/Futbol 2019-20
Discussion in 'Sports' started by Yossarian™, May 12, 2019.
Page 49 of 49
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Are you a Billiard player ? Do you have the guts to compete to be the billiard bar POOL KING of Trafalgar?
Everybody is welcome to spend his/her happy hours at Trafalgar , or better yet give it a shot on our challenge tables, only the winner gets to stay. Projector and large screen TVs are also ready for those who wants to watch live sports of the day. It's also a great way to meet new people and see the talent of the other billiard bar players in town. Every billiard player loves a challenge, and a well run tournament may even the odds for beginners.
Come Eat, Drink, Play at Trafalgar Sports Bar. Show off your billiard playing skills for a chance to win some cold, hard cash as much as $2000 hkd ! We will be using the Official Game Mechanic for 8-Ball. Participants must register with the cashier at the bar . Entry fee would be $100 hkd per person. Sign up for this great event. For more info, visit us at Trafalgar or call us at 2110 1535


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By: Kendal Monroe
The amazing benefits of rosemary far surpass our modern chemical drugs. Rosemary, an aromatic, ancient herb that desperately needs medicinal resurrecting, is being touted this month. An herb so beneficial, you may want to grow it indoors and outdoors, depending on your "zone".
Our goal is to be as natural as possible; meaning no DDT. You've heard the facts about people being sprayed and the effects, imagine the non-natural ingredients in that which you ingest, digest and rub all over your hair and body.
Rosemary is an herb which can be cooked, rubbed or inhaled.
As a medicinal daily herb, it is an anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant; beneficial for blood pressure, heart health, digestive aide, memory, Alzheimer's, boosts immunity, and increases circulation.
Potassium, calcium, magnesium are wonderfully present, along with carotenoids, vitamin A, and folate so you know it is healthful for optimum organ functions.
This herb is also said to help fight fatigue and depression and muscle aches.
You cannot possibly go wrong with adding it to any and each dish, vegetable, meat, fish or eggs. Cooked or fresh, its flavor will not to be forgotten and knowing that it is so healthful, makes the seeming decadent aromatic pine-esque herb more necessary to one's daily intake.
"There's rosemary, that's for remembrance…" Hamlet. They knew even then the benefits…
With an herb so beneficial for organs, blood and brain stimulation, one can't deny the amazing benefits of rosemary.
So cook with your rosemary like a spice or steep like a tea, each makes for a great modern, ancient healing remedy.
As a tea, have a couple of cups a day and double that if you have a cold! It's great for your immune system
The amazing benefits of rosemary include pulverizing and rubbing them onto your skin; rubbing onto your head to increase and stimulate hair follicles, right, like baldness and thinning; and pulverizing them with other ingredients as facial wash. Also, steep like a tea and use the cold tea as an antiseptic!
As an aromatheraputic fragrance, it's pine-esque stimulating fragrance is stimulating and transporting.
You may be able to eat a dandelion stem to stern, but rosemary can be eaten, steeped or soaked in! There is no denying the amazing benefits of rosemary.


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There has been a big spike in the number of farmers seeking counselling amid worsening dry conditions in Tasmania, a rural depression support group has said.
Rural Alive and Well (RAW) chief executive officer Danial Rochford said dwindling feed, a sharp rise in hay prices and a lack of agriculture jobs have put those on the land under immense strain.
He said RAW counsellors were seeing 50 per cent more farmers than they were 12 months ago.
Key points:
- Nearly half of Tasmania experiencing "serious" or "severe" rainfall deficiencies
- Government announced $2.2m package to help farmers in November
- Minister this week to meet graziers discuss possible further assistance
"That's certainly an alarming trend and one we are very concerned about," he said.
"A lot of social concern — distress — I think would be the better word to use as a result of dry conditions, fodder prices."
The State Government in November announced a $2.2 million package to help farmers deal with the dry conditions but has been reluctant to use the term "drought".
Tasmanian Farmers and Graziers Association president Wayne Johnston believed it was a discussion that needed to be had.
"It's been a prolonged period of dryness," he said.
"It looks like we're not going to get any rain in the next week or so that's anything of significance.
"(Farmers are) starting to use the 'd' word."
"I had somebody say to me... that it was 1982, 1983 (since it was this dry). I'm sure there were years since then that have been bad in areas, but across the state I really don't know."
'Everything just fizzles up'
Richard Bowden, who runs a mixed farming operation in Bothwell, said the conditions were the driest in 30 years.
"The conditions at the moment are extremely difficult," he said.
"The sub-soil moisture was completely depleted so as soon as we get some hot, dry winds everything just fizzles up - there's nothing to retain vegetation.
"We are lucky we've got irrigation ... people without irrigation are doing it very tough. They're either hand feeding or selling stock."
Bothwell farmer Di Fowler said those signing up for new irrigation schemes across the state would be in a particularly difficult position.
"The irrigation schemes haven't had time to actually do much," she said.
"People who are doing new developments it means that they're financially more vulnerable.
"They've got loans and that sort of thing to cover themselves and to have dry seasons in that sort of situation makes things a lot more difficult for them."
The Bureau of Meteorology's drought report for May to December 2015 indicated nearly half of Tasmania was experiencing either "serious" or "severe" rainfall deficiencies.
The TFGA will this week meet with Primary Industries Minister Jeremy Rockliff to discuss the situation.
"I don't know what the protocols are for declaration of a drought period," Mr Johnston said.
"This week and into next week, we'll hopefully sit down with the Minister and have a bit of a discussion about that.
"Whether it be... a freight subsidy coming into the state for grain and pellets, cattle pellets, sheep pellets, that'd be one form.
"We just need to sit down and have a plan for this going forward."
'Not yet at the point of drought'
But the Minister is confident the state it not in drought.
"While conditions are very dry as a result of below average rainfall, we are not yet at the point of drought," he said.
"We keep a very close eye on all factors affecting farmers.
"We will continue to monitor the social and economic impact and work with all industry stakeholders to respond to the dry conditions and consider further actions and support as necessary."
Mr Rockliff said the Government was committed to supporting farming families through the dry conditions.
"I empathise with their frustrations," he said.
"This season has been extremely challenging.
"Before summer, we announced $2.27 million worth of initiatives to help farmers and the industry to ensure they were best placed to respond to short- and long-term challenges."
"This included $2.2 million to extend the subsidy for new irrigation electricity connections, $44,000 for a Feed and Fodder Register and an additional $30,000 to extend Rural Alive and Well outreach services on King Island.
"We have also modernised our water management framework by providing additional water for irrigation from our water catchments."
Mr Rockliff said he was in regular contact with the Federal Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce.
The State Opposition wants the Government to establish a taskforce, to provide support for struggling farmers.
Opposition spokeswoman Madeleine Ogilvie did not think enough was being done.
"Let's see some action, let's see (the Government) talking to the farmers and accepting that there's a problem," she said.
"Unless that dialogue commences immediately, we're going to run into trouble.


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{ASOS denim midi dress // Stuart Weitzman sandals, my current favorite pair – sold out, but similar here, here + here}
FriYAY, amiright??? I am so excited for this weekend. Two of our favorite people are getting married tomorrow, and they have billed their nuptials "the wedding to end all marriages" – all you need to know is that it has a Bar Mitzvah carnival theme and they have insisted I wear my wedding gown. I CAN'T WAIT. (Follow me on Instagram for pics!) Tonight, Tony's new Groundlings show starts previews and will be running Fridays and Saturdays until Thanksgiving; everything he's shown me so far is beautifully, hilariously insane and I'm stoked to see it live, with wigs and all. And Sunday, we'll be hanging and catching up with the School of Rock gang. (Somewhere in there, I need to finally tackle our wedding Thank You notes.) Even though it's the end of September, it still feels like an oven outside here in L.A., so I'm still dressing like I'm on summer break. This is one of my favorite buys I grabbed during a Memorial Day sale and have been wearing non-stop since.


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You can explore the forest on foot. You can also do it while soaring through the canopy of the forest. Travelers visit places like Costa Rica, the reported birthplace of the canopy tour/zip line, to do just that. But they don't often visit southeastern Ohio for the activity. But they should.
On a recent trip to Hocking Hills State Park in Ohio, not very far from where I grew up, I explored the forests in more depth than I ever had on weekend trips as a child. And by that I mean, I went zip lining (sidenote: I also rode in a hot air balloon for the first time and as cheesy as that might seem to you, believe me, it is fan-freaking-tabulous. You should do it.). It was my first time going zip lining and I was excited. Hocking Hills Canopy Tours took me out for the adventure and as I ascended higher and higher toward the perfectly blue April sky, I had this "man, everyone should try this" feeling.The guides were sassy and simultaneously thoroughly helpful. The landscape was breathtaking. The lines were long and I sped quickly from tree to tree. The three hour tour felt more like 30 minutes. I can't wait to do it again.
If you're one of those people who thinks Ohio is all flat; think again. Southeastern Ohio is, in fact, Appalachia. And it is filled with gorgeous rolling hills. The kind you should eye from above.
By: Elizabeth Seward, Photos By: Ben Britz


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