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The Derbyshire Hotel was until recently called The Renaissance, it was sold by Marriott to a chain called Principal Hayley Group.
It is just off Junction 28 of the M1, it has conference facilities so is usually used by business people or companies needing a meeting room. Across the road is a touchbase (a building to hire meeting rooms), a premier inn and the attached Brewers Fayre. So cheaper competition close by (check my hotel reviews to see my thoughts on the premier inn).
When staying you can use the heated indoor pool & a small gym for free. I've never used these so can't comment but it's good to have the facilities available.
I've stayed a few times both before and after the switch of ownership. The very first time I stayed I did feel it was a little tired looking, a little old fashioned and in need of a refurb.
Having said that it was clean and comfortable, the staff were pretty good and the food was good (if not the most exiting).
So when I checked in under the new name I was keen to see if the new owners were going to spruce it up some what. Nothing seemed to change apart from the bed covers went from Marriott red to black.
However I've stayed several times now and I've been surprised to see the general standard slip in a few areas. The restaurant is less busy than in the past, and it's easy to see why. While the food is sometimes very good it is not consistent, depending on the night you stay and the dish you order the quality of food can vary a fair bit.
Other little things that you would only notice if you had stayed before and after are:
The rooms have generally gone down hill, furniture a little more battered and worn. Things don't seem to get fixed as they did before.
Breakfasts are not a good, less choice and poorer quality (bacon getting greasier). They have stopped offering those little fruity yogurt drinks at breakfast (I liked those)
And the classic sign of cost cutting the toilet paper is thinner and less soft.
Although nothing to do with the change of ownership when I was last there a car was broken into, by having the side window smashed. The staff were good and help the owner, let him park it right outside the entrance until the police and repair people came along. PARK NEAR THE HOTEL, not in a dark corner.
While on the subject of cars, you can hear the M1 if you have the window open but the rooms are nice and quiet when shut.
Despite all of this the hotel is comfortable, the beds are very comfortable, the bathrooms are clean and you should sleep well, eat reasonably well and have a nice drink in the bar.
The Derbyshire Hotel,
Carter Lane East,
South Normanton,
Derby, DE55 2EH,
Tel: 01773 812000
Fax: 01773 580032
Standard twin / double £89 a night
Breakfast £14.95
(for the most part also on ciao)
This hotel is located just off the M1 at J28. It is physically joined to a Brewers Fayre and in the same business park as a Touchbase (office / meeting room to hire facility). On the opposite side of the road is a more expensive Hotel called the Derbyshire; formally called The Renaissance under the previous owners Marriott (I'll hopefully give a review of that shortly as I've just suggested it to Dooyoo).
You may (or may not) have noticed from my hotel reviews that I seem to stay in this area of the UK a fair amount. While the Premier Inn at Carter Lane East is the cheapest hotel I have stayed in it is far from being the worst.
In my experience the best Premier Inns are the brand new builds. This is probably just because they have new fixtures and fittings so are cleaner and everything works. This Premier Inn is not a new build but once in the rooms you have the familiar look and feel of "cheap but new and clean furniture". I Like this about Premier Inns, I'd rather have a cheap bed that is replaced every 12 months than an expensive one that stays in the hotel for decades (this criteria only holds good for cheap and cheerful hotels).
Small but functional, the staff were friendly and helpful. Check in and out was quick and easy.
General condition
It's a cheap hotel and this is reflected in the decoration but it is clean. The rooms are better than the dowdy corridors.
The classic purple Premier Inn look. Everything is clean and works the bed is comfortable and the duvet thick and warm. You wouldn't want to spend a few nights just in the room but it's what you need to sleep comfortably.
Again clean and functional, fittings looked new and everything worked well. A good, hot and powerful shower was appreciated in the morning.
The only food available on site is from the Brewers Fayre next door, which you can charge to your room. I didn't have an evening meal but It's a Brewers Fayre, so don't expect too much. Cheap pub grub! However I did have breakfast and I was very surprised to find it better than many more expensive hotel breakfasts.
Full breakfast £7.50
Continental breakfast £5.25.
Cheap, functional and next to a pub, what more could you ask for?
Carter Lane East
South Normanton
08701 977 180
Monday - Thursday
From £57 per room
per night
Friday - Sunday
From £49 per room
per night
Worth noting
Free Parking but no disabled facilities
This hotel is just off the M1 at junction 27 and it's about 12 miles from Nottingham. It's in Sherwood Business Park, which has various new office buildings scattered around it. The hotel itself is very modern looking, a black tower structure probably around 10 storeys high (don't quote me on that it might be much shorter or taller).
The initial impression is that's it's very new, clean, comfortable and well designed. This impression continues when you enter the reception. There is a really modern "trendy" feel about the place, expensive looking sofas and a modern open fire. To the right of reception is the bar and restaurant.
The staff on reception are well presented, efficient and polite.
Everything about this place conveys a professional and well designed feeling. They have obviously put a lot of effort into making the hotel a step above the competition priced at around the same level.
Usually I find that as you progress though a hotel its appearance goes down hill, the reception is the plushes part, then the lifts and corridors start to do look a bit scruffier and finally the room looks like it is from a different hotel than the reception you've just walked though. However I was delighted to see the Dakota was different, the lifts and corridors are sparkling clean and the rooms are great.
While the room I stayed in was not massive it was by far the best at this price range that I've ever been in, at home or abroad. The bed was very comfortable the sheets looked brand new, the carpet was thick and clean, I had a big desk, comfortable chairs and a 30" flat screen TV, even the air conditioning worked well and quietly (I always seem to get rooms with broken air con. or heating, until the Dakota that was). The one tiny criticism I would level at my room and the hotel in general was that it was a tiny bit too dark. Most of the fixtures are dark wood and there is subtle lighting everywhere. While this generally looks great, I was staying for 2 weeks so by the end of that time I wanted some magnolia!
By the way if you do ever stay here and can't find where to hang your stuff, instead of a wardrobe you get hanging space hidden behind the bed (that should save you 10 minutes looking).
The bathroom was great as well. Mine was fully tiled from floor to ceiling in black and white tiles making a checkered effect. It was spotless and unlike most hotel bathrooms it had better fittings than most homes, posh looking taps, toilet and basin. Even the built in mirrors were heated so they didn't steam up. The towels were like something you would buy from John Lewis, thick and fluffy. The toiletries were very nice too.
The final important parts of any hotel for me are the restaurant, menu, bar and breakfast. While the bar and food is relatively expensive compared to other hotels offering the same room rate the quality is much better. The variety of food was good and the standard of cooking and presentation could not be faulted. I particularly remember the fish options and steak to be very good. The breakfasts are cooked to order too, so no cold eggs and bacon swimming around in a greasy hotplate. The smoked salmon and scrambled eggs were a favorite of mine while there.
I've mentioned the value in comparison to similar priced hotels but not said the room rates yet. When I stayed the rooms were available from £89 a night, which is cheaper than I've paid for some truly awful places, and this is the weekday business rate (Hotels seem to stick the price up if they know the company are paying) At weekends I'm sure you can get a better price.
I know by the way that I've been banging on about this place it sounds like I own shares in it! That is not the case, it's that it's such a delight to find a hotel this much better than the usual competition, I can't but help tell you all about it.
The key feature of this video camera is that it records onto flash memory. Because it uses these SD and SDHC flash memory cards you get some useful benefits;
1) The battery last longer than HDD, DVD or tape cameras. The standard filming time is 3 hours.
2) Transferring video and photos to a PC is incredibly simple, you just stick the SD card into your PC card reader (I haven't seen a PC sold without a built in reader for years) and drag the files over to your PC.
3) The video camera is small and light, not much bigger than a digital camera. So it can fit into your bag without it being a pain to carry around. It's also pretty good looking which is a nice bonus and really well designed to fit in your hand comfortably.
Its worth mentioning that if you forget to put a SD card in you can still record directly onto the internal memory. Also as SD and SDHC cards get bigger and bigger in capacity you have a camera that will never be limited by a shortage of memory space.
So this is a well designed, good looking, easy to use camcorder and it's well priced. However the price reflects the fact we will be getting standard definition not high def. footage. Online prices I've seen are between £200 and £250. You also get a good optical zoom of x37 which is great for distance shots, the digital zoom of x2000 is something you probably won't use.
I think this is a perfect camera for anyone wanting to point and shoot and be able to quickly transfer and share their films. It's Ideal for holidays and active filming, the small design and lack of moving parts makes it a study choice for any knock about film making. If you want to get serious with high def. you will have to pay more and you may still loose some of the advantages of this camcorder.
Record To Memory Card
Definition - Standard Definition
Video Recording Format SD Memory Card, SDHC Memory Card,
USB Connection
Optical Zoom Factor 37x (45x with Advanced Zoom)
Digital Zoom Factor 2000x
Image Stabiliser
Colour Viewfinder
LCD Screen 2.7" widescreen colour
Media Card SDHC Card, SD Card,
Sound Stereo
Manual Focus
Backlight Compensation
Built-in Light
Top Shutter Speed 1/2000th sec.
Minimum Light (Lux) Approx. 1.7 lux (Night Mode)
Remote Control
Dimensions (WxHxD) mm 58 x 60 x 124mm
Weight 260g
(also on Ciao)
I've had this phone for a month now so wanted to let others know what I think of it.
Now, your criteria may well be different from mine but the features I wanted from a new music phone were:
Good music features (obviously)
Easy to use
Good memory
Decent camera
While the 5610 ticks all of these boxes it has let me down in an area that I hadn't even considered before I started using it in every day life. First however I'll cover off the 5 criteria I had thought of:
Music features
As you would expect from a music phone the music features are spot on. The sound quality is excellent from the built in speaker, the headphones and via my bluetooth stereo headset. All the various music formats I have tried work just fine. The FM radio works well with good reception. My playlists and album art all transfered to the phone with no problems at all.
Easy of Use
I find using the phone very easy, if you're used to a Nokia you'll be familiar with the navigation straight away but if not it is still very intuitive so won't cause you any problems. A nice feature is music slider key that lets you quickly and easily switch between music, radio and phone. The navigation pad and keypad work well and feel nice to use. All the features you'd expect are available and easy to use, set your own ringtone music, send & record audio messages, email, play online games and surf super fast with 3G (the web browser is Opera).
Decent camera
The camera is 3.2megapixel and to be honest the photos look just as good as the ones I take on my 5MP N958GB. Good auto focus and video messaging looks as good as any phone I've used.
Good memory
Being used to 8GB with my old N95 I have been spoiled but this phone comes with 20MB built in and up to 4GB easily added with a microSD card. To get all the music i needed loaded I had to use the extra memory but this was easy to do.
I really like to looks of the phone, the screen is really really colorful and clear as well as being a good size 2.2inches (apparently). The slider looks and feels nice to use. While not very slim the phone fit nicely in a small pocket and is a joy to carry around in comparison to an N95.
So what let me down?
It was the build quality. The music slider key I found so nice and easy to use broke after a couple of weeks. While I got a free replacement from my network it doesn't bode well. Even the replacement seems to be a little shaky with a few rattles. A few buttons seem looser than I would like. I think after my 12 months contract is up I will be in need of the new model. Having said all that i've never kept a phone for more than 18 months, so will it really be a problem?
(Also on Ciao)
More than any other spirit (perhaps with the exception of whiskey) gin seems to be the one that a lot of people just don't like. I was one of these people until around 2 years ago. However once I tried some well made gin and tonics and gin cocktails I started to appreciate the favor of gin. It also opened up my eyes to the fact that there is a wide variety of flavors and qualities in the different gins available, not all gins are the same! So if you've only ever tried a home made Gordon's and tonic and are indifferent to gin take the plunge and try the best, made properly, with a good tonic. It just might be a revelation.
So the best in my humble opinion is Martin Miller's. This gin is a beautiful thing when mixed correctly. I'll give you a bit of background but if you want all this first hand why not check out their website, (just google the name) as they obviously do a great job of writing up the history, and do you really just want me to rewrite details from their website? I hope not.
This gin is made in batches (which is apparently the best method) in a 100 year old still called Angela. This spirit will be over 96% alcohol by volume and this is what they call a neutral spirit alcohol, basically it is a tasteless base on from which the gin we know is made from. Next the Botanicals are added, which ones, how much and how they are added varies between brands and these details will be a closely guarded secret. However in Martin Miller's gin some of the hundreds of botanicals used are:
Juniper - This is always the main ingredient in gin
Orange peel
Lemon peel
Orris root
To get the gin to the correct strength water needs to be added, in Martin Miller's case they take great pride in the fact that they use water up to ten time purer than those well known bottles waters . The water used in this gin is glacial water from Iceland.
If you are trying Martin Miller's for the first time I recommend making a gin and tonic by adding the gin (straight from the freezer) to a glass full of ice. Then adding Fever Tree tonic (this stuff is great), then finally a slice of lime, not lemon. This will be a truly great gin and tonic.
Martin Miller's has a crisp clean taste, you can smell various botanicals but mainly citrus and juniper. It's very hard to describe a taste so I'll leave you with this;
If you like gin already but have never tried Martin Miller's you will love it! If you don't like gin the gin and tonic described above just might change your mind forever!
Usually £18.99, although I noticed that Oddbins have it at £16.99 at the moment.
I've been resisting a new TV for years now but my hand was forced when the old one gave up the ghost. After a bit if research I plumped for a Sony KDL 40D3500.
The first thing to say it that I think this TV looks great, that was probably why I ended up with it in my house. It 's a classy number, understated and very well built.
The 40D3500 is full high def. 1920 x 1080 resolution, which makes Sky digital look great and sky and BBC HD look amazing. I don't have a PS3 but a mate brought his round to see the picture quality. This TV makes the most of the top end 1080p output by the PS3 and it shows the PS3 output as it is meant to be seen.
I've also checked out some blu-ray DVDs and those looked fantastic as well. It may be partly due to some fancy stuff the TV can do; '24p True Cinema' allows a film to be seen in the original 24 frames per second format (the fps they are filmed at) and 'Theatre Mode' that automatically adjusts the colour, contrast and brightness to the idea settings for a particular film.
Switching back from Blu-ray or BBC HD to standard definition is a disappointment, this is not because the SD display is poor but just because the HD is so good.
The sound equaled the picture in my opinion. Both with surround turned on and in standard mode. The TV offers "S Force Front Surround" Sony's version of virtual surround sound, this works great for me as I don't have speakers dotted around the front room.
The D3500 is as easy to set up and use as any LCD TV, it took about 15 minutes to plug in all the HD and scart sockets and the auto tuning with the built in freeview tuner took about 2 minutes.
The TV has two scart and two HDMI sockets.
This LCD TV is available online for as little as £600 in some places and I think it is amazing the picture and build quality you can get for that amount of money!
If your looking to spend around that much on a TV, check out the D3500 from Sony before you make your decision!
We took my six year old daughter to legoland for a weekend treat. It was a last minute thing so we didn't have time to invite any of her friends. However not being with other kids didn't stop her having a really great time, she really didn't want to leave.
The thing I've always noticed about legoland was that it's pretty expensive but you can always get at least half price tickets from various places. We had the option of some tesco vouchers, a voucher from school or some other one we picked up somewhere. I worked out which one got us in the cheapest and used that.
We had seen the adverts for Viking land so we went straight there. 1st up was a rapids type ride, were your round boat spins around, bounces off the sides and generally gets everyone involved very wet. The getting wet part is helped even more because people watching at the sides can grab a water gun and squirt you as you spin past them. This ride was enjoyable, loved by a 6 year old and took about 25 minute to que up for.
Actually most rides involved 30 minutes or so waiting, which as it was a Saturday and sunny I though was fine.
The other memorable rides were:
The log flume (had to go on this twice as it was my daughters fav.)
The larger roller coaster (Sorry I can't remember the correct name). This is tame by some standards but just scary enough for a thrill seeking tom boy.
The driving school was another fav. with a photo license costing a few quid at the end being a big hit. The kids can drive around a mock road system with the usual round-a-bouts, junctions, turns and even a petrol station where the little cars were charged up.
The one thing that I didn't like was the food available, as with most places like this it was a little too expensive and a little to "turkey twisler". If I went again I would take a picnic as near the main eatery there is plenty of grassy space to stretch out and have a nice break.
All in all I was pleased with the day and so was my daughter.
My review may be tainted by the fact I received this juicer as a present from my wife, only a few days after I told her I prefer to buy smoothies rather then make my own juice.
After all I wanted liquefied fruit as a way to get some more of those 5 a days into my life. And juice is just juice with less bits of the 5 a day I wanted.
I thought it only fair to put my comments in context.
So the juicer does what it is supposed to!
The juice is a little foamy but a plastic separator in the collection jug helps to remove that and the juice is as lovely as you would expect from a freshly made wait for it ....
All of the pith, seeds, skin, pulp and fibre gets spun out into a second jug to be thrown away. This is my biggest problem with this juicer, I don't want all of that thrown away, ok I don't particularly want seeds, apple cores and pith in my drink, but I do want as much of the fibre as I can get. If you could somehow keep some of this goodness in the liquid it would be ideal.
Next comes the cleaning. While it is pretty easy to take apart and rinse off, with a little wiping it does come up clean quickly. Apart from the metal bowl that actually does the juicing. This has a metal bottom surface like a very fine cheese grater and getting the fruity bits out of that took a lot of soaking time and nearly wore out my washing up brush! The juicer then takes up all of my drainage board and half of the kitchen surfaces in it's detached state.
My final comment is on the cost of the fruit vs smoothies. My wife assures me she did the maths and it is more economical to juice your own, but to me it seemed I had to juice about half a tonne of fruit to get a glass of juice. Add in the time preparing, cleaning and the 700 watts of electricity I'd rather let a smoothie specialist do all the hard work in a "economies of scale" kind of a way.
Having said all of the above (which probably applies to all juices not just this one), this one does do it's job very well. You want a juicer that juices? Well this one does that!
I stayed over at the Gateway for a meeting in Nottingham during June 2008.
My stay was easily one of the worst I have ever had when staying in a hotel for work.
While first impressions were ok; lots of trees, a nice "moat" (well watery ponds in front of the building), things started to go down hill quickly when I arrived inside.
The lobby area looks cheap and old fashioned, more like an old service station than a comfortable modern hotel.
The staff were fine and check in quick, but then the walk to the room.
The carpet in the corridors looks like it was host to a 16 year olds birthday party, with stains all over it. The corridors smelled of smoke.
When I arrived at my "non smoking" room I was truly disgusted. The room had must have been lived in by a heavy smoker as it reeked of stale smoke, the window was open obviously to try and help but it really didn't.
The bathroom had been cleaned but you can't really clean off moldy floors, corners and the joint around the bath.
I didn't even want to sit on the bed let alone strip off and get in it.
To add insult to injury the room phone was broken so I couldn't request a different room without going back down to reception.
They did give me a cleaner, better and less smelly room for which I was eternally grateful. However I met 5 colleges in the bar and each of them had similar problems to me. One was moved from a room smelling of sick to one smelling of smoke (probably my first room).
If this hotel was the only one available for my next overnigher I would rather stay at home and get up at 04.30 than stay here again.


text:
TAMPA — By the time the Lightning opens training camp today at the St. Pete Times Forum, coach Guy Boucher figures he will have had extensive meetings, some as long as three hours, with about two-thirds of his players.
There was plenty of get-to-know-you talk, but also talk about the system Boucher wants to play and has only four days to install — three, if you consider the team won't be on the ice until Saturday — before the preseason opener Tuesday at Dallas.
Think about that.
Tampa Bay's new coach has all of 72 hours, give or take, to execute a crash course on what some of his players say is a system radically different from anything they have played and that might do for offensive strategy what the neutral-zone trap did for defense.
No wonder Boucher, 39, the league's youngest bench boss, provided the summer primer.
"I don't like to waste time," he said. "We can't kid ourselves into thinking everything is going to start great. The reality is we're the team that has made the most changes with the staff, on all levels, and the number of players who are new on the team. We're the ones who have to work real hard on the chemistry part of what we're trying to do."
• • •
Boucher is tight-lipped about his system, saying he is wary of giving away plans to coaches who scan newspapers and websites for information.
"One thing is for sure. Whatever we're going to do, we're going to be aggressive," he said. "That's how I am as a person. I'm a real intense individual, as the players will find out quick. I'm going to demand that intensity. I'm ferociously persistent in what I want. My systems are based on that."
Players, too, were wary of speaking about it. As right wing Marty St. Louis said, "It's hard to comment on it because I haven't played it."
But there are generalizations:
• The coach wants the puck on the sticks of his top six forwards. That means immediately moving the puck forward and eschewing, for the most part, the passes between defensemen that so many teams use to start clearing the defensive zone.
• The defense will pick its spots to join the rush but will not hang back, either, coming forward enough toward the opposing blue line to oppose counter-attacks while being in position to jump into the offense.
• Defensive zone coverages will include a somewhat unique technique in which two defensemen converge on opponents in corners to force turnovers. If the defensemen get beat, forwards are expected to play stout defense.
• • •
Much has been made of Tampa Bay's lack of a true puck-rushing defenseman. Given how Boucher wants to move the puck, he said it is not necessary:
"What we've got with our forwards is speed, and we're smart. So basically what we tried to do over the summer — and (general manager Steve Yzerman) did an outstanding job of it — was find guys who can move the puck. If we can move the puck to our forwards quick enough, they can do their magic."
"We have to play that way," defenseman Pavel Kubina said. "This team has so much offensive talent, why would you go D-to-D pass? Our job as defensemen is to give them the puck and join the rush if we can."
Sounds good to St. Louis:
"I'm a go-go type player. I don't like (passing) D to D 15 times. Then I have to slow down. Get the puck up. Let everybody get in the chase and come up with us."
Taken individually, Boucher's plans are interesting. As a whole, left wing Simon Gagne said, they might finally nudge the league away from the trap as a default system.
"We always played the trap," he said of his 10 seasons with the Flyers. "This is totally different. It's going to be exciting to play that system. I don't know what we're going to call it, but he can bring a new start in hockey."
Said St. Louis, "Some of us — a lot of us; probably most of us — will have to change the way we played before. It's going to take some time to get used to."
At least 72 hours.
. fast facts
Lightning training camp
When: Today through Tuesday
Where: Today at the St. Pete Times Forum, Tampa; Saturday-Tuesday at the Ice Sports Forum, Brandon
Schedule: Today — players report and off-ice testing; Saturday, Sunday — practices/scrimmages, 10 a.m.; Monday — practice, 10 a.m.; Tuesday — practice, 11 a.m.
Note: Practices and scrimmages at the Ice Sports Forum are free and open to the public.
On the Web: Follow coverage of the Lightning at lightning.tampabay.com

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Selena Gomez Covers Teen Vogue
Call your niece! Giampaolo Sgura shot Selena Gomez for the December/January cover of Teen Vogue, where the 21-year-old reveals she really is the girl next door. "I'm always going to be the girl you want to take home to your parents, not for the night," she explains. Bieber's ex also tells the mag how she's growing as a woman. "The older I've gotten, the more I've learned that I have to open myself up to all opportunities. Maybe I'll get burned and not meet the right people, but I won't know until I do it." Ah, youth.


text:
My courtship of Bunny Yeager began last summer when I punched her number into my phone and felt like a nerdy kid asking Gaga out on a date.
I had rehearsed what I was going to say: "Miss Yeager, we grew up in the same neighborhood. I remember the glory days of Miami and have always appreciated your contributions to Florida culture. I wonder, Miss Yeager, how you might feel about the possibility of me visiting you at home and writing a story." But when she answered I felt 13 again.
I heard myself braying into the phone like it was a Dixie cup connected to Bunny's house by a waxed string. "Uh, am I talking to Bunny Yeager? REALLY? COOL! CAN I CALL YOU BUNNY?"
Silence on her end of the line.
"Who is this?" Bunny asked. I took a deep breath and told her.
"Honey, who do you work for?" she asked.
In the middle of the 20th century, when I was a boy and a teen, Bunny Yeager was the queen of glamorous Miami, winning beauty contests and posing in sexy swimsuits for panting photographers who dispatched the glorious images all over the globe.
Bunny eventually picked up a camera herself and became famous for her photos of gorgeous women. It was as if Mona Lisa had decided to add painting to her resume. Bunny's name was always in the gossip columns. She dated Joe DiMaggio, sold her work to Playboy and had a part in a Sinatra movie. She once got me in hot water at Park Shore Pharmacy when Howard the druggist caught me peeking at one of Bunny's photos of a naked redhead in Cavalier magazine. "I'm going to tell your mother," Howard said, as my repressed Catholic boy bowels turned to water.
"Are you a freelancer?" Bunny asked, snapping me back into the present. Definitely not, I told her, sounding as if I had consumed a 12-pack of Red Bulls. I've worked at the same paper for 35 years, Bunny, a really big paper now, we actually went to the same high school, Bunny!
"Honey," Bunny finally said. "I just don't have time right now. I have so much to do. I'm just kind of overwhelmed. Maybe some other time. Have a nice day."
• • •
She was born in 1930 or so — Bunny was always much more secretive about her age than her measurements — in a little town near Pittsburgh. Christened Linnea Eleanor Yeager, she took the name Bunny after watching a smoking-hot Lana Turner in a film. After moving to Miami, she was voted by Edison High classmates as "the girl with the sweetest smile." She was 5 feet 10 and a curvy 36-25-37, according to vulgarians who care about crass numbers.
She took modeling courses, posed on the beach for "Come on down" Chamber of Commerce photos, and was crowned Queen of Miami, Miss Trailer Coach of Dade County, Miss Personality of Miami Beach and the Cheesecake Queen. Her image graced postcards, magazines and newspapers. Mechanics hung her photos in their work bays; teenage boys — let's not even talk about it.
Models earned less money than photographers, so Bunny bought a Kodak Reflex, mastered the camera and beat the good old boys at their game. Her breakthrough was a photo of a friend posed in a leopard-skin bikini at an animal park. Eye magazine paid $100.
Bunny continued to pose for other photographers, but eventually figured out how to make self-portraits, sometimes using a string that ran from camera to big toe. U.S. Camera magazine called Bunny "The World's Prettiest Photographer."
She thought the two-piece bathing suits sold at Burdines were a bore; using her sewing skills she created her own bikinis, frilly and revealing and tastefully risque. She sold her most polished work to Esquire, Cosmopolitan and Life. The grittier stuff went to girlie mags like Swank.
She didn't do dirty. She didn't do porn. Even her nudes had a girl-next-door quality.
In her own photos, Bunny posed as a brunet and a redhead, but she was most fetching as a Marilyn Monroe bombshell posing in one of those postage-stamp bikinis, or cavorting in a dark living room in a black nightie, or lounging in a tub behind a few suds.
In 1954, Bettie Page visited Miami. Famous for her fearlessness in front of cameras, Bettie never appeared in the pages of Life or in Redbook, probably because she sometimes posed with a leather whip while wearing a black garter.
Yet Bunny somehow made even a naked Bettie look wholesome, posing her at the zoo and draped across a bumper car at the local amusement park. For her most famous photograph, Bunny sat Bettie next to a Christmas tree in the only piece of clothing she apparently needed, a Santa cap. A new magazine, Playboy, bought the centerfold photo for a hundred bucks. Years later, Bunny's good friend Hugh Hefner bought her photos for $15,000 a pop and even published a pictorial of "The Queen of the Playboy Centerfolds" — Bunny Yeager.
• • •
A couple of months had passed since my incompetent telephone call. I worked up my nerve and tried once more. It was November now.
"Who are you again, honey?"
I reminded her. Reminded her I had mailed copies of my stories and even one of my books.
"Oh, that was from you," she said. "Thanks. Hey, do you know Carl Hiaasen?"
Her question about the bestselling Florida novelist caught me by surprise. Sure, I know him, Bunny. Carl's name didn't open her door.
"You know, with the holidays coming, I just am so busy," she said, sounding distressed. "It's kind of overwhelming around here right now. Call me in January."
I felt like an eighth-grader at St. Rose of Lima School again, the kid with a passion for fishing and snakes who was a nincompoop when it came to girls. I loved them, but they didn't love me back.
Of course, a lot of Americans were in love with Bunny way back when. In Miami, where celebrities were as common as orange blossoms, she was on a first-name basis with Arthur Godfrey and Jackie Gleason. She was a guest on the TV game show What's My Line? and exchanged snappy patter on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.
There were Bunny sightings in Miami Shores, where I lived, usually by the hateful older boys who spotted her drinking a cherry coke at Whalen's, skulking in the aspirin aisle at Hinst Pharmacy or sitting in the back of the Shores Theater at the opening of Dr. No. Bunny had taken the iconic movie-poster photograph of Ursula Andress emerging from the surf.
We clueless younger boys got our Bunny Yeager thrills wherever we could. Eddie, the buck-toothed geek with the giant Adam's apple, let us look at his dad's collection of girlie mags until we began fighting over them with our greasy hands. One desperate pal stole a Playboy that we studied daily in the croton bushes until it fell apart.
• • •
In January, I left a voice mail for Bunny but she didn't call back. In March, I tried another gambit, leaving a message announcing that I was going to see her at the end of the week. I had her address. I'd knock on her door.
I had questions I wanted to ask Bunny in person. She had been married twice, divorced, widowed, raised two daughters on her own and excelled in a man's world. How had she managed? I wanted to know her thoughts about the sexual revolution, Internet porn, Lady Gaga. How did a beauty queen cope with aging?
But Bunny Yeager, who in the exercise of her craft had persuaded countless young women to unsnap their bras, valued her privacy.
"Don't come,'' she said, returning my call almost immediately. "I NEVER let anyone come to my house. I don't even like people to come to my office. And I'm so busy right now, I'm overwhelmed, in fact, so please don't come. I've got so much work to do getting ready for this show.''
A show? My ears perked up. I'd have guessed those days were behind her.
"I'm putting together photographs for an art exhibit."
She told me where and when.
"See you there," I said.
"Okay," said Bunny Yeager.
• • •
In May I drove across the Everglades, past alligators and great blue herons, and into Miami, until I got to the Harold Golen Gallery in a blighted neighborhood where shadowy figures leaned in doorways. It was a Saturday afternoon. I went in to talk to Harold, who seemed even more nervous than I was about that night's event.
"My phone has been ringing off the hook," he said. "Everybody wants to know if Bunny's coming to the opening of her own show. I know she can't handle stress or a lot of attention anymore, but she told me she was going to try and come tonight. TRY AND COME. God, I hope she does."
I returned at dusk. The streets had now been taken over by Miami's most colorful art denizens, tattooed bosomy women and gold-chained Latino men, straights, gays and folks of indeterminate gender, a woman in go-go boots, a woman in a fur hat, a man wearing a homburg and a jacket draped across his shoulders like a cape. I saw Harold in the corner of his cozy studio.
"Bunny isn't coming," he was telling visitors. "I'm sorry. She said she was going to try and come but she won't be here."
Bunny's not coming?
"She had every intention of being here," her manager, Ed Christin, explained from a sofa. "Bunny is not an extrovert, but she really wanted to come to this tonight. What happened was she had a procedure done on an eye earlier this week and the eye is bloodshot and uncomfortable. Bunny has a sore eye.''
The 14 photos on the wall captured Bunny in her glory days — as a Marilyn Monroe blond and a Jane Russell brunet, in a negligee, in a bathing suit, in a leotard, hands on her hips, standing on tippy toes, at the beach, looking young and happy to be alive.
"Things are happening for Bunny now," her agent continued. "For years, Bunny sold her photographs on eBay at prices that were terribly undervalued. But we're changing that. How much is her collection worth? I would say it's worth millions of dollars, but the exact number I can't say. I've never been to her house, but I went to her office, and she showed me boxes of photographs that have NEVER been seen. Amazing, erotic photographs, beautifully composed and shot. She's an artist."
A party broke out inside the gallery despite Bunny's absence. I saw Tara "Queen of the Night" Solomon, raven-haired society gal dressed in leopard pattern dress, a la Bettie Page. I saw celebrity contemporary artist Carlos Betancourt, whose lush Caribbean-flavored mixed-media works are in the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery in Washington and the Metropolitan Art Museum in New York. "Bunny captures a time and a place in her work," he said. "That's exactly what every artist dreams of doing."
I saw Joann Biondi, glamorous author of Miami Beach Memories: A Nostalgic Chronicle of Days Gone By, a coffee table collection of photos and text with a picture of a fresh-faced Bunny on the cover.
"It took about a year of trying before she was willing to see me," Biondi said. In 2007 Bunny attended Joann's book party and even posed for a picture. It reveals a striking woman with long blond hair worn in a thick braid draped over a shoulder. It's one of the last-known photographs of Bunny Yeager in public.
Later in the evening came a disturbance near the door. A tiny brown-eyed woman shouted, "Bunny isn't here, Ferdie!" and her white-haired husband announced, "That's too bad. I really wanted to see her."
Ferdie Pacheco — garrulous author, painter, retired physician and former fight doctor to Muhammad Ali — was born in Ybor City but spent most of his adult life in Miami. After entering the gallery like a Roman emperor, he sat and talked — held court, actually — and did his best to make up for the MIA main event.
I asked if he knew her.
"Oh, yes. When I was a young physician, and I was single and a very eligible bachelor, she was the most eligible single woman in Miami," he said.
I wanted to know more.
"I yearned to call her and ask if she would do me the honor of spending an evening with me."
That's not an exact quote. Ferdie actually explained in a more direct manner what he had hoped to do to enliven their evening together. Alas, Bunny said no.
• • •
I got up early the next morning, packed, had breakfast and got ready to drive home. But I didn't. I found a quiet corner in the hotel lobby and waited until 10 o'clock. I punched in a telephone number.
The phone rang and rang.
Jeff Klinkenberg can be reached at firstname.lastname@example.com or (727) 893-8727. Times researcher Carolyn Edds contributed to this report.


text: On vanilla android, there is an option to "make an album available offline". My only assumption that this is for linking to some cloud-storage but what is it talking about? Google Photos? Can you use that with DropBox? Is there a way to use Google Photos without having it sharing with Google+ and what not?


text:
'); var yuipath = 'clientscript/yui'; var yuicombopath = ''; var remoteyui = false; } else // Load Rest of YUI remotely (where possible) { var yuipath = 'http://yui.yahooapis.com/2.9.0/build'; var yuicombopath = 'http://yui.yahooapis.com/combo'; var remoteyui = true; if (!yuicombopath) { document.write('
Why do the things that we treasure most, slip away in time
Till to the music we grow deaf, to God's beauty blind
Why do the things that connect us slowly pull us apart?
Till we fall away in our own darkness, a stranger to our own hearts
And life itself, rushing over me
Life itself, the wind in black elms,
Life itself in your heart and in your eyes, I can't make it without you
A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
Or throw in a first-round pick and flip it for a max-level point guard...
That's not true, at least by attendance. The NFL makes most of the money on TV. It's more successful because of the nature of the sport, the culture of the sport (including fantasy football and gambling), and how well it plays on TV. Football is NOT more successful in other countries, for example, no matter how many games there are.Shortening the season would make each game more of an event, and more of a money-drawer. That is why football is more successful, less games.
The Colts couldn't even sell out every game (by TV cutoff) of 2003 - the heart of Peyton/Harrison/Edge/Wayne/Freney era. And right now plenty of NFL teams have gaping holes in the stands just like Indy did only 10 or so years ago. 1993 vs the Jets, you think that RCA crowd was packed in?
Exactly. To me this is just like MLB interleague. When it's the Yanks, Phillies, Sox and Mets coming to town it's great. When it's the Indians and Pirates is it really helping ticket sales?I doubt people will be ponying up $40-$50 per seat to sit up in the upper balcony for 20 games a season.
The Cavs and Lakers game was packed. But for the Bucks game there had to be 10 empty seats on the FRONT row.
I do know that some teams have started working with a tiered pricing system where some games cost more than others, and I think the Cubs are going to a system where for a premium you can buy into games ahead of other fans. Basically the team undermining the scalpers and bringing those premium ticket profits back in house.
On top of all of this, we have some idea of league revenue because the freaking CBA sets the cap against it. Last time I checked teams weren't asking players to pay to play.
If teams are really losing 20-30m a year, think about the amount of player salary cuts that would require. Also you'd have to question how they fixed that salary % so poorly against total revenue that they are losing money.
I mean salary is a percent of what they bring in, so no matter how much or little that is the teams agreed to run the REST of the operation on the remaining PCT, not some fixed amount. So now 43% is nowhere near enough to cover all the other expenses? The cap has only now started to go down, so how were they making less money in 2003 than 1998 when the cap says that revenue continued to increase?
Last edited by Naptown_Seth; 03-08-2010 at 04:25 PM.
The Cubs have been charging extra for 'premium' games for years now, I think this system could definitely work in the NBA too.
I'd like to see the amount of regular season games go down, but while this may increase attendance per game I don't think it will increase overall revenue because as others have said, people aren't going to be willing to pay that much more for tickets. In my opinion the quickest solution to this problem would be to lower the players' salaries in the new CBA.
Maybe I am. I took it to mean the average price of tickets sold, but it might mean the average price of all seats available. The source (linked in the OP) doesn't say clearly what it is.
But I don't think it would make all that much difference. It is not like all the cheap seats tgo empty while devout fans are clamoring to pay premiums for courtside. The "sea of green" isn't all at the top, not all at the bottom, is it? I observe empty seats at all levels, but guys who go to most games can correct me if I'm wrong.
And I won't be here to see the day
It all dries up and blows away
I'd hang around just to see
But they never had much use for me
In Levelland. (James McMurtry)
Average ticket price, I believe, is based on the inventory of seats available to the games.
(There are X number of $yyy seats, Y number of $zz seats, etc.)
But total revenue/ quantity of seats sold probably won't equal the average from the calculation above. If it does, it is probably coincidence that the seats were sold in the same proportion as the inventory of seats. And I'm 99.9% certain this is in the portion of financial data that is never even going to be disclosed to minority owners of the teams, let alone the general public.
We do the same thing with the airline business. With all the different pricing schemes and the way prices increase as the date of the flight gets closer, the average price per seat actually flown and the average price of available seats are not the same metric.
Why do the things that we treasure most, slip away in time
Till to the music we grow deaf, to God's beauty blind
Why do the things that connect us slowly pull us apart?
Till we fall away in our own darkness, a stranger to our own hearts
And life itself, rushing over me
Life itself, the wind in black elms,
Life itself in your heart and in your eyes, I can't make it without you
Whether my initial assumption is correct or not depends on the meaning of the source. In any case, the value given can't be weighted unless we know how many of each price seats are sold and, as Jay says, they don't tell us that. For lack of perfect information, I'll argue that ticket sales revenue is approximated by the estimate I gave.
The point stands under any realistic estimate. The gap between ticket sales and payroll is huge. If the Pacers sold out every seat for every game, that would be 18,345 x 41 = 752,145 seats.
To raise $66.7 million to pay the payroll, those tickets would have to average $88.67 per ticket. Do they? Not by a mile. and every empty seat widen the deficiency further.
Clearly, ticket sales doesn't come close to paying the payroll, and Bills says as much. The next big source of revenue is TV, and Uncle Buck says that is about $40m today. (For the Pacers? Or all NBA teams?)
The other streams of revenue are concessions, and those have to be pretty small. Count55 tells us that a lot of the advertising in the arena are trade-outs and common sense suggests PS&E can't sell a sign that's going to be seen by 12,000 fans on 41 nights for as much as what a billboard that will be seen by 200,000 motorists five days a week can cost.
So that leaves the source Duke mentions: corporate sponsorships. If WellPoint and Lilly and RollsRoyce and Allison and SallieMae and others are making up most of the apparent deficiency, PS&E may be just about the biggest charity recipient in Indianapolis.
Here's the point:
As basketball, the NBA is unparalleled.
As entertainment, the NBA is an attractive but flawed product.
But as a business, the NBA is a disaster.
Last edited by Putnam; 03-08-2010 at 06:41 PM.
And I won't be here to see the day
It all dries up and blows away
I'd hang around just to see
But they never had much use for me
In Levelland. (James McMurtry)
Actually, the Pacers already have a tier system for "premium games" for this current season. If you look at the folding schedule, you'll notice that certain home games have an asterisk that indicates that game is a "premium game" and it leads to another price chart.
Fortunately, Season ticket holders were not subject to this pricing.
...Still "flying casual"
I think the owners may be short-sighted following that strategy.
I remember the Blazers instituting variable pricing at the start of last season and that causing a big uproar among their fans. I was very surprised, maybe because here tiered prices are the default situation. It seems like a no-brainer to me.
And the TV revenues for the league are above $900 millions per year. You're also forgetting stuff like merchandising, parking, naming rights (how much per season do the Pacers get from the arena naming rights?) , revenue sharing (it was increased to $50 millions awhile ago, the Pacers certainly get a fair part of that money - probably +$6 millions per season),
What's the NBA current credit rating? IIRC, it used to be pretty strong, a BBB+ or something, even after the financial crisis.
In any case, the current CBA and the way it regulates the players salary - with a mechanism that maintains personnel costs at a targeted percentage of the revenues - is extremely favourable for the NBA from a business perspective. So favourable that I suspect many individual teams don't have much incentive to cut wasteful spending - if I were Derek Fisher I'd be very interest in finding out the evolution of the GMs/FO staff salaries in the last 5 years (the fact that for many owners economic and financial efficiency isn't a priority is another contributing factor).
Last edited by cordobes; 03-08-2010 at 08:34 PM.
Jay and Putty, my post was about exactly your discussion. And my point to Duke is that if anything your math might be showing more revenue rather than less.
But ultimately my engineering sense says that your math is basically a solid estimation start. I think the weighted average per ticket sale is significantly lower than the average ticket price, due to promotions, STH discounts, and where the empty seats are.
One thing on the tiered pricing, looking back I really couldn't have cared less about going to the Cavs game. I've seen Lebron upclose before, ditto Shaq. But I could have sold those seats for enough to offset some of my cost. Say I do the same for the Magic game too and I could have cut my cost back by 15% or so, just by giving up 2 games.
The Pacers could benefit from that by having me pass on those tickets, thus allowing them to sell them to the high demand market. I get my cheaper "HST" package without those premiere games and the Pacers still get the full income from the higher price point.
Actually I did this last year when I took them up on the "11 games for 8" mini which basically featured mostly poor opponents on weeknight games. I'm going for the Pacers so I was happy to pay less to see the Pacers just as much. Meanwhile the people that wanted the FRI/SAT night games and the stars paid more.
Basically that's a simple tier system.
oh, RG already followed up on this...
Last edited by Naptown_Seth; 03-08-2010 at 11:42 PM.
we are geeks
My further participation in this thread is risky.
You're way off on the allocation of league TV money, and other league allocated revenue (licensing, international, etc.)
As for the other sources of revenue -- local radio/ tv, in-arena advertising, concessions, naming rights, etc, that's a wild guess.
However, I don't recall the terms of this agreement but its not unusual to find that the arena operating company has the first claim on priority seating revenue (e.g., club level)/ suite rental revenue as that is generally the revenue that backs the bonds for the new arena.
I'm done. With that I've now said way too much on this topic.
Putty, your general premise is right. Its hard for the blue-and-gold to break even when everything is going well. Years ago it was published that the extra revenue from the second round of the playoffs was the difference between break even and a profit. Attendance is down in quantity, and yield (ticket price) is down, too. Local tv (and presumably local radio) ratings and revenue are down. And there's no playoff revenue. Its gotta be ugly!
Why do the things that we treasure most, slip away in time
Till to the music we grow deaf, to God's beauty blind
Why do the things that connect us slowly pull us apart?
Till we fall away in our own darkness, a stranger to our own hearts
And life itself, rushing over me
Life itself, the wind in black elms,
Life itself in your heart and in your eyes, I can't make it without you
One thing to remember is 6.7 M of Pacers salaries (roughly 10% of a players salary) goes into a fund to make sure the team (players) only receive 57% of income. Not sure if coaches, Bird and other front office personnel have to abide by this but I doubt it because they are not in the players union.
"He wanted to get to that money time. Time when the hardware was on the table. That's when Roger was going to show up. So all we needed to do was stay close"
Darnell Hillman (Speaking of former teammate Roger Brown)
Thanks to everybody who's voiced a thought here. Most of us don't know very precisely what we are saying, while Jay knows pretty exactly and cannot disclose it.
Cordobes mentions naming rights as another asset. But isn't that another form of sponsorship? Of charity? The city paid for the building and FA Wilhelm built it. Conseco generated real profit brokering insurance so it could afford to pay for the sponsorship. But the Pacers get to keep the money. To me, that puts the Pacers in the same category as a cub scout troop or any other beneficiary of charity.
So, admitting variation, we can all agree that the actual product of the NBA (ticket sales, TV deals, and memorabilia) doesn't come close to paying the costs of operations. The league stays viable because of public and corporate largesse.
And I won't be here to see the day
It all dries up and blows away
I'd hang around just to see
But they never had much use for me
In Levelland. (James McMurtry)
By the way, the city did NOT pay 100% for the Fieldhouse. At the time, the evil greedy self-serving Simon brothers paid more toward the new arena than had been done by any franchise in recent times. And that was without a payment from the city backing it up.
A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
Or throw in a first-round pick and flip it for a max-level point guard...
I remember reading that back in the first couple of years at Conseco the pacers would gross almost $1M per home game. That of course doesn't account for game expenses. But that is ticket sales, parking, concessions,......I would guess that is cut in half now from lower ticket prices, lack of ticket sales......
Advertising and sponsoring creates value. Sports sponsorships create a very specific and particular kind of value - it's often more about image enhancement and brand awareness than direct impact on sales; it's more about long-term impact than short-term impact. There's plenty of peer-reviewed literature about this issue (there's even a publication dedicated to it: http://www.imrpublications.com/journ...x?volno=L&no=L )
Obviously, sponsors can make mistakes assessing the benefits and gains of sponsorships, but such lapses are generally called decision-making errors, not charity.
The transfers of money by politicians is a more complex issue. If government handouts for private industries didn't exist, the taxation on players would be much smaller - so the labour cost would diminish quite a bit. Basketball consumers would possibly have more money to spend in ball games as well. This kind of economic calculation is just too complex to be made.
In any case, I'm not convinced that even a franchise facing very difficult circumstances like the Pacers doesn't generate enough revenue to "come close to paying the costs of operations", unless I'm misunderstanding what you mean by "costs of operations". Forbes Mag. pointed to a -$15M deficit in operating income, but after reading the link provided by graphic-er I have some doubts about this number.
Still, even though the Pacers are surely haemorrhaging a few millions per year, I still don't understand why Putman equates the Pacers to the NBA and extrapolates from the current situation of the Pacers to the viability of the NBA business model. 1) In times of slow economic growth+low consumer expectations the entertainment business (or parts of it, including pro sports), tend to suffer disproportionately. 2) the Pacers aren't the prototypical NBA franchise.
An analogy would be using the Lakers economics in the moment of a bullish economy + a title run with a team filled with future HoFers and call the NBA one of the most profitable businesses in the history of the Western Civilization.
Last edited by cordobes; 03-09-2010 at 07:25 PM.
Bill Simmons:
As to the argument that this is just a bad year, a viable business ought to be able to trim its costs in bad times. The NBA can't. It is inflexible, like General Motors was before it went bankrupt. That, again, shows me that the NBA business model is flawed.
If he were here now, looking at the way things are, I imagine Red Auerbach would agree, don't you?
And I won't be here to see the day
It all dries up and blows away
I'd hang around just to see
But they never had much use for me
In Levelland. (James McMurtry)
Billboard: $2000.00 / month
Radio Spots: $500 - $10,000.00+ per month (Bob and Tom are the most expensive spots in this market) .
Newspaper Ads: You pay per square inch. Depends on circulation. A small ad can cost less than $100.00 and a full page would be in the $4K - $7K range.
TV: I was surprised when I learned how inexpensive commercials costs. Cable costs less and you can target geographic areas around the city. A cable ad can run $500 - $1000 per month. I've not heard a quote for the network stations but I think they can be quite a bit higher, even when it's just local.
Pacer's Advertising Guesses
Billboards around Conseco: I can't see an advertiser spend more than $250.00 - $500.00 per day (looking at it with 365 days in mind since people will see the ads during other events). My guess is $100,000 on average for the year.
Suites: I assume the cost of the suites are based on the seats they include. $2000.00 - $4000.00 per game plus costs to keep it stocked.
Krieg Devault Level: I drove by their building this afternoon and wondered what they pay for the naming rights to the club level (I don't know if they even still sponsor it this season). The back page of the Yellow Pages cost around $200K and I heard that large law firms don't mind paying that much because it only takes one client to win a huge lawsuit. They could spend $200K - $400K for the year to sponsor the club level.
There's also score table / scoreboard ads, Mountain Dew/ Pepsi Section, ads in the programs, ads on the free items they give out (great clips jerseys), discounts at stores for winning, companies paying to be the one who gets to donate money to charities for hitting 3's, etc. Companies pay to sponsor all these things.
Hope this helps.
I've often wondered how the Pacers could ever make a profit given the small market in which they operate. There is charity involved here and that is the charity that allows this franchise to play in Indy subsidized by the Simons.
This thread has been most interesting and I thank all (including geeks) for their astute insights.
Every year the Forbes Magazine elaborates a study about the economic/financial situation of the NBA. I'll wait for the next one. What records tell us is that years where the league revenue decreases are an extremely rare occurrence.
More importantly, one year (or 2, or 3) of losses doesn't mean a business isn't viable. If that was true, entrepreneurship and investment would be long buried concepts. The idea that a business is only successful if it presents a profit every year is amusing.
The major component of the cost structure of the NBA is the players salary.As to the argument that this is just a bad year, a viable business ought to be able to trim its costs in bad times. The NBA can't. It is inflexible, like General Motors was before it went bankrupt. That, again, shows me that the NBA business model is flawed.
The players salary has a cap - it can't surpass about half of the revenue generated.
How exactly is this inflexible to you? As I missing something here? I wish my business had this kind of flexibility.
Can you provide an example of a non-failing business? I'm really curious.
Certainly not.If he were here now, looking at the way things are, I imagine Red Auerbach would agree, don't you?
If I were a farmer, I would plan to break even on my crops and livestock, without counting on the money from a "Chew Mail Pouch" sign to pay the bills. But even if I did that, I surely wouldn't ask my neighbor to build a barn for me to paint "Chew Mail Pouch" on.
I don't know the details of the Pacers deal with the city for Conseco Fieldhouse. I hope the Pacers will get a good deal in the renegotiation, but it is a pity that the team and the city have to wrangle over the deal at this time.
By the way, I strongly approve of the Simons. I hope you didn't call them "evil, greedy, self-serving" in parody of me.
Finally, I don't know why we're arguing about this. David Stern says costs are out of whack and the league needs an overhaul.
And I won't be here to see the day
It all dries up and blows away
I'd hang around just to see
But they never had much use for me
In Levelland. (James McMurtry)
I respect the heck out of your understanding, but in this case I'm going to remain skeptical.
And I won't be here to see the day
It all dries up and blows away
I'd hang around just to see
But they never had much use for me
In Levelland. (James McMurtry)


text:
Tom Berg to speak in Clitherall
Tom Berg, author of "Minnesota's Miracle – Lessons from the Government that Worked," will be the keynote speaker at a DFL Senate District 8 event at The Peak Supper Club in Clitherall on Thursday, April 25.
Berg served in the Minnesota House of Representatives from 1971-78. His book serves as a civics lesson and legislative primer – a living history account that offers suggestions and hope as well as hard truth and cold facts.
Written with input from four Democrat and four Republican colleagues from that era, "Minnesota's Miracle" discusses a time when state legislators in the House and Senate, with the Governor, compromised and worked together to solve issues for the good of the people of Minnesota.
Recognizing their success, TIME magazine pictured Gov. Wendell Anderson on its cover, and coined the phrase "Minnesota's Miracle."
The event will include a social hour at 6 p.m. with dinner starting at 7 p.m. Tickets are $35 and include a choice of chicken or ribs.
For more information, contact Beth Jansen at 320-763-7831.


text:
A quick post to mention that I've just put a new demo page up introducing a new audio codec named CELT. It's Xiph's first next-generation audio codec now emerging from the development pipeline, intended for high fidelity use at ultra-low latency.
Follow the above link to a ton more about it. As usual, the demo's got plenty of... well... demo, in addition to eye candy and hard information.
Buried in that larger announcement (about a much larger project) is a mention in passing of Squishyball, a cute little app I wrote last month to do fast/easy/convenient comparison between groups of similar samples. It also performs more rigorous A/B, A/B/X and X/X/Y double-blind testing. We'd all been limping along with harder to use apps that caused us to avoid or put off careful listening tests as part of day-to-day codec development. Hopefully Squishyball fixes that.


text:
A Letter from Nancy Reynolds, Campus Health Educator
Hello parents! My name is Nancy Reynolds, and I serve as our campus health educator. My specialty area is substance abuse prevention, a field I've worked in for the past 30 years at five different campuses.
At Ithaca College, I am the chair of our Alcohol and Other Drug (AOD) Prevention Team. The AOD team meets monthly to plan and implement best-practice strategies for our campus. If you'd like to learn more about the membership, mission, and activities of the team, you can find this information on the Center for Health Promotion website.
If you attended orientation with your son or daughter this past summer, you heard about the college's new Judicial Protocol for Alcohol and Other Drugs. The protocol revision process was one of the first tasks undertaken by the AOD team. Research has demonstrated that clear, fair, consistently enforced, and well-publicized alcohol policies are associated with reductions in high-risk drinking. The new IC protocol represents the result of a two-year collaborative process.
The e-mail featured below was sent to our incoming and returning students in August, and provides important information about the new protocol. Please take a few minutes to familiarize yourself with this information.
You may also visit the Office of Judicial Affairs website or call us at (607) 274-3375.
Dear Ithaca College Student:
As you return this fall we wanted to make you aware of some significant changes in the protocol regarding the college's judicial response to alcohol and marijuana violations. Specifically, the changes serve to equalize the judicial sanctions and interventions for both alcohol and marijuana. This new protocol represents the outcome of a collaborative process involving staff, faculty, students, and administrators. The original Equalization Proposal was presented in 2011 by the student organization, Students for a Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP), and endorsed by the Student Government Association (SGA). SSDP is also the organization that proposed the Medical Amnesty Policy (MAP) that was successfully implemented on our campus over the last two years. Please be aware that the alcohol and drug policies that are part of the Student Conduct Code have not changed; this protocol relates only to the judicial sanctions and educational interventions for such violations.
Students representing SSDP and SGA worked along with members of the Alcohol and Other Drug Prevention Team to develop an understandable and consistently enforced protocol with clear outcomes regarding violations of the Student Conduct Code and residential life rules and regulations. It is our hope that this new protocol will reduce the harm from substance abuse and improve the health and success of our students. The judicial protocol places an emphasis on educational interventions which are intended to help students make safer and healthier choices in the future. Please note that there are program fees associated with each sanction. The fees will be used to directly support alcohol and other drug education and intervention programs for IC students.
Please go to the Judicial Affairs website to familiarize yourself with the current Alcohol and Other Drug Policy and the new judicial protocol. It is your responsibility as an Ithaca College student to be aware of the policies.
Mike Leary, Assistant Director of Judicial Affairs
On Behalf of the Alcohol and Other Drug Prevention Team


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It was thoughtful of Electronic Arts and BioWare to time the release of Mass Effect 3 just before a Victorian long weekend. Pity the rest of Australia has to work today instead of battling towards the big finale of Commander Shepard's engrossing trilogy.
I'll reserve my thoughts on the game until next week, but what is obvious from Mass Effect 2 and my time with its successor is that BioWare's clever system of being able to integrate your save files from the previous Mass Effect games ensures that it feels even more like your own personal story.
Your choices certainly have lasting consequences. It's amazing that choices you might have made five years ago have an impact on this new adventure, both in very subtle and dramatic ways.
Screen Play remembers thinking the system was certainly one of the most fascinating features of Mass Effect 2 when revealed at the Electronic Entertainment Expo back in 2009, but it is not something (at least as yet) that has been widely emulated by others.
It's obviously perfect for story-driven role playing games, but I wonder whether similar systems could be used for other genres.
Sequels or even original games could analyse your saves for a lot more information than just story-based choices.
Your save games tell a lot about your personality and gaming skills, valuable information that could be used to create a unique, personal experience. Everything from the length of your typical gaming session to your accuracy with weapons to how many times you actually save or finish games completely tells something about you.
When Psycho Mantis read your mind in Metal Gear Solid it was indeed a mind-blowing experience. I'm sure more games in future could provide a fascinating and personalised experience from reading the huge amounts of data that our hard drives contain.
What have you been playing lately?
Screen Play is on Twitter: @screenplayblog


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An incident at the Alaska-Canada border went from bad to worse when a U.S. border agent allegedly pointed a gun at the head of a detained Boy Scout, the Washington Post reported.
The leader of an Iowa Boy Scout troop told TV station KCCI in Des Moines that a scout had photographed the officer, after which border agents detained the group -- including scouts, troop leaders and volunteers -- for hours.
Troop leader Jim Fox said he was told snapping the photo was a federal offense. The picture was later deleted.
"The agent immediately confiscated his camera, informed him he would be arrested, fined possibly $10,000, and (receive) 10 years in prison," Fox told the TV station.
Officers then began searching the group's luggage, and one of the troop members attempted to help by removing luggage from the top of a van. Fox said the scout heard the snap of a holster and turned around to an agent with both hands on a loaded pistol pointed at the scout's head.
After about four hours, the troop was allowed to continue into Alaska.
The troop was on a three-week trip through Alaska and Canada.
The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency denied the officer unholstered his firearm, according to The Washington Post.
The agency said in a written statement provided to the newspaper that it had reviewed the group's inspection, including video, and found "nothing out of the ordinary."
Des Moines criminal defense attorney Angela Campbell told KCCI the threats of a fine and decade-long prison sentence were not accurate. She said photographing border patrol is an evolving area of the law.
The American Civil Liberties Union argues that policies banning the photography of federal agents is unconstitutional. The San Diego ACLU sued the border agency for two incidents at the U.S.-Mexico border.


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Congratulations All Winners and Participants of the Little Neck-Douglaston Memorial Parade Organization Art and Essay Contest
I would like to extend my congratulations to all the participants and winners of the annual Little Neck-Douglaston Parade Ogranization's Art and Essay Contest. Many of the winners were on hand to recieve their awards during a cermony on Friday May 15th at Fort Totten. The themes this year ranged from "Our Country" in the art portion to "Preserving Our Nation" in the essay portion of the contest.
The Little Neck-Douglaston Memorial Day Parade is the larget Memorial Day parade in the United State with tens of thousands of spectators from New York City and the surrounding areas lining the parade route. The contest is a part of the yearly celebration in the run up to Memorial Day.
I would also like to organization Chairman, James J. Rodgers, Barbara Quigley-Barba Co-Chair, Catherine Glover, Co-Chair for all their hard work and dedication in putting together this event for our area school children.
Winners of the Art Contest
Grand Prize- Jae Eun Kim, MS 67, 6th Grade
First Place- Jillian Kiernan, Parkville
Second Place- Raymond Rico, St. Anastasia
Third Place- Kajetan Ozadowicz, PS 205
First Grade
First Place- Alice La, PS 186
Second Place- Samuel Ahn, PS 94
Third Place- Mark Huber, St. Anastasia
Second Grade
First Place- Carnarr Campbell, St. Anastasia
Second Place- Michael Bonici, St, Anastasia
Third Place- Janeen P. Rico, St. Anastasia
Third Grade
First Place- Matthew Ventura, St. Anastasia
Second Place- Caitlyn Chen, PS 221
Third Place- Caitlyn Gillen, St. Anastasia
Fourth Grade
First Place- Joseph DeEgitio, PS 94
Second Place- Meaghan Sullivan, OLBS
Third Place- Rebecca Zanolla, OLBS
Fifth Grade
First Place- Audrey Lee, PS 94
Second Place- Ester Ahn, PS 94
Third Place- Daniel Kiernan, Lakeville
Sixth Grade
First Place- Justin Ting, MS 67
Second Place- Tiffany Franklyn, PS/IS 208
Third Place- Erin Pellegrino, St. Anastasia
Seventh Grade
First Place- Jazmyn Fuller, PS/IS 208
Second Place- Yuji Choi, St. Anastasia
Third Place- Ashley Hechler, St. Anastasia
Eighth Grade
First Place- Stefanie Wolf, St. Anastasia
Second Place- Amy Yang, St. Anastasia
Third Place- Ashley Hechler, St. Anastasia
Winners of the Essay/Poetry Contest
Grand Prize- Anastasia Gaspar, St. Anastasia, 8th Grade
Fourth Grade
First Place- Siena Clarke, St. Anastasia
Second Place- Rebecca Zanolla, OLBS
Third Place- Gabriella Zaki, St. Anastasia
Fifth Grade
First Place- Erica Cooper, St. Anastasia
Second Place- Danielle Colletti, St. Anastasia
Third Place- Carla Valenti, St. Anastasia
Sixth Grade
First Place- Tanina Dileo, St. Anastasia
Second Place- Robert Spitz, St. Anastasia
Third Place- Jon Caballero, St. Anastasia
Seventh Grade
First Place- Noor Javif, MS 67
Second Place- Danielle Morelli, St. Anastasia
Third Place- David Rodriguez, St. Anastasia
Eight Place
First Place- Kiwook Kim, MS 67


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On Song update
Every Thursday morning I'll ask the followers of the Blog on the Tracks Facebook page for a potential topic for Friday's post - I do this because I'm interested in what you want to read about (relating to music) and I have no reserve of blog-topics. I stare at the blank page for a bit each day, then push something into place. Once there was a list of potential topics. At one stage there was even a spare blog-post or two, written early, "in the bank". But five years on and nearly 1500 posts I need your help some days...and I'm always grateful for the suggestions.
So the other week someone asked for a bit of an update regarding my book, On Song. There was a request for me to share my feelings on the other side of the writing/PR-treadmill, book written, released, reviewed, I've been interviewed - and now it's all over, post-Christmas. You can still buy the book, or borrow it from a library - but my job is done. It's time for me to move on to the next project.
So, the question from the Facebook reader, from what I could tell, was how did I find it all; how do I think I went? And how has the book been received?
I wrote about On Song the day the book was released - so I'll do my best to not repeat the stories and information in that post.
On Song was my selection of 30 favourite Kiwi songs; 30 pop songs. I wasn't interested in covering material from earlier than the 1960s because I don't think we were writing great songs back then - not ones that have lasted, not ones with stories. And in the rare cases where there was a great song pre-1960 it's been covered already in several other histories - crucial books about New Zealand music to own include John Dix's Stranded in Paradise, the recently published Blue Smoke by Chris Bourke (which looks at New Zealand's earliest musical recordings - and music up to the beginning of the pop music era) and I would also mention Ready to Fly: The Story of New Zealand Music by David Eggleton. I unfairly dismissed this book before reading it - I had skimmed it and figured it drew too heavily on Dix's book. In warming up for and researching On Song I read Eggleton's book and found it to be a great update and beautifully written.
But I needed to avoid copying the style - and content - of those three great books.
I wanted to tell the stories of the songs using the anecdotes from the performers, songwriters and producers, people still alive - and in most cases still working. And I would include some of my story too; any writer brings something of themselves to the work they produce. I'm showing my age with the book, with the selections and in the thinking back to offer my memories of when I was first aware of the songs.
The day the book was released - back when I wrote this post - was like any other day. I'd already seen the book, and beyond fielding a couple of emails from friends looking for copies I didn't really think much about the book. It was a normal day. I got up and went to work.
A couple of days later we officially launched On Song at Slow Boat Records - and that was a hoot. In fact it was close to overwhelming. The shop was packed, so many people turned out for it. And no one was carrying a gun, or knife, or grudge.
I was paid for the book. I was given an advance - some of the money was paid before the book was written, as the term "advance" hints. The second half of the advance arrived after the book was published. From there I will earn some more money from royalties. It will not make me a rich man. I will not retire on it. I still have my job. And my freelance writing. And that will continue. But one of the reasons I wrote the book was to earn some money. I'd be lying if I said otherwise. Writing isn't offered measured out to show off an amazing hourly rate but I've always believed that some money is better than no money. Right? And as a parent, working part-time, working from home part-time, sharing childcare days, any extra money that comes in is a bonus. And always welcome. So we'll welcome the "On Song bonus" if/when it arrives.
But I didn't write On Song just to earn a paycheque.
I wrote the book to learn about the songs, and myself. To extend myself, to go beyond hacking out reviews and blog-posts.
The interview/review/publicity process was fine. No issues there. Again, it was almost overwhelming the interest in the book - I did over a dozen radio interviews, as well as chatting to print media, answering email interviews and being interviewed on two TV shows (Choice TV, Good Morning).
This was all slotted in and around work and life. I flew to Auckland to be interviewed for Good Morning and while there I recorded a series of conversations for National Radio's Summer Noelle show. I sat in the studio with Noelle McCarthy - a brilliant interviewer, passionate and knowledgeable, nurturing and encouraging - for three hours. We talked about every song in the book. These chats were then cut up to fit the format and trotted out each day over summer as part of her show.
The rest of the interviews were done over the phone early in the morning or at lunchtime, weekends, nights...I did a couple in the Wellington studios, including meeting Kim Hill and "playing favourites" on her show the weekend the book was released.
I had a brilliant publicist. She set everything up, I just turned up, or answered the phone. I did my best to share stories from the book, to engage. It was a blast. I didn't dread a single interview. And I think they all went well. And all were different. I repeated a few lines, you definitely get your stories down, but I tried to bring up something new each time.
A lot of people told me they were interested to see how I would handle being reviewed - it was fine. I saw a few of the reviews for the book; maybe I saw all of them even? I was sent a clippings file so I saw most of the print ones - and I assume most of the online ones also. And I thought the reviews were - generally - positive; certainly constructive. There were one or two I read that had just rewritten my publicist's press release. Lazy stuff. But you couldn't say they were negative. I was grateful for (and of) the coverage I received.
I don't know that it was ever weird seeing my book in a store - but there have been a few cool moments and highlights.
Being phoned up and asked to pop into Unity Books to sign their copies of the book was the first real indication to me that I had - on some level - become an author. It was never a moment I thought about beforehand, not something you imagine when you're up at night, late, writing. And more often trying to think of something to write. But it's certainly something I'll think of after. It's a moment that sticks.
Same with seeing the book in a store in Sydney on a recent holiday. It was definitely cool to see the book in a shop overseas.
Facebook friends and blog readers sent me photos of the book - its cover always doing its job, selling the book. I received photos of the book as part of a front-window display, as part of the Auckland Art Gallery's Who Shot Rock exhibition merchandise, in someone's house, as a recent purchase; I received emails from people who had ordered it or had it sent to them as a gift from as far afield as England and America.
The one thing I instantly related to - from hearing a version of this story so many times when interviewing musicians - was the idea that from the very moment of release the book was no longer mine.
It was mine while it lived in my house - and in my head. And on my computer. It was still mine when the first copy arrived - about a month before it hit the shelves. But from the day of the Slow Boat launch it became anyone else's book - everyone else's book (he says, optimistically). Not mine.
My job was done. And I had a new job to do - promote the book.
Now that promotion is done. There might be one or two other things happen - a late event here or there. But the interviews and appearances are over. And the window-displays are down. In book-publishing terms On Song is old news. People have read it and told me they liked it - but generally people will always tell you to your face that they liked something; they won't tell you otherwise.
I have a handful of really special thoughts relating to the book and its reception that I'll share with you.
The first one was when a school kid wrote to me to tell me, with great enthusiasm, that my book was one of the awards at his school prizegiving. He added that he had not won and was deeply disappointed. He was going to reserve a copy of my book from the library.
I really liked that story. Both parts.
My not-quite-two-year-old-nephew spied the book in a shop and trotted over to his mother with a copy. We couldn't decide whether this was because he'd remembered seeing it from when I had shown them an early copy or because a bright orange cover had taken his eye. Either way, it's a good story; once again it's the book cover doing its job.
A woman on the bus, a stranger, congratulated me on the publication of my book.
A friend bought a copy of the book for her brother-in-law. He had worked with Jordan Luck in England, or lived with him. Or both. Or something along those lines...there was a story there anyway. So she posted the book to me to sign for him and I posted it on to Jordan to sign also. Jordan happily obliged and posted the book back. I liked being involved in that. I know I've told you all already that Jordan was very hospitable to me when I interviewed him for the book.
A week after the woman on the bus congratulated me the driver offered his congratulations.
A person at the Wishbone near my work congratulated me on the book.
There was an amazing poster campaign from Phantom Billstickers.
Colin Morris interviewed me at Unity Books and I shared some of the background of the book.
I had several people send me copies of my book to sign - from around the country, or I bought copies for people and signed them and posted them.
It was always amazing to me that people wanted this.
And so now we're out the other end. All done with all of this.
Life hasn't changed. At all. But, as my brother told me, I can now say I've written a book. It is something different from filing newspaper copy and blogging. (My brother telling me that, in his way, in his own time, was also one of the special moments).
Sales have been pretty good - from what I know. I haven't really asked for updates because I didn't write it to be constantly updated, to be a clock-watcher or banker. I wrote it because I wanted to write it; the subject was a challenge and interesting to me. And I had reason to attempt it. I wanted to share the stories behind some of our cultural history. I felt there were stories that should be told.
I'm at the stage - now - where the backhanded compliments are arriving. Someone told me the other day to not take this as an insult, but it (the book) was more crafted than they had expected, "I'm not used to that with your writing," he added.
Several people have commented only on the wonderful photographs. In some cases I've assumed that's meant as a dig - since I had almost nothing to do with the photographs (beyond recommending one or two of the photographers). But perhaps it's meant as a sincere tribute to the quality and range of photos - and that is certainly something worth celebrating.
We have one copy of the book in the house now. We had a couple of dozen at one point. We were a production line - Katy was wrapping them for people or organising postage, I was scribbling something not even feasibly close to decipherable as my name inside the front covers...and there was always a copy on the coffee table or by the stereo or on my desk or somewhere. And it was always, for a while anyway, a talking point when there were visitors.
But now there's one copy of the book. I wrote an inscription in it about two weeks ago. I have dedicated it to Oscar, our first born child. He's nearly 16 months old. I told him in the inscription that by the time he can read the book it might mean nothing to him, might be of no interest but hopefully he has a go at the book and takes in that it was written by the guy that he calls dad. And he might find out something about me from a time before he and I met. Something like that. The one copy of On Song in our house now sits in Oscar's room. On the shelf. In between Oh, The Places You'll Go! and The Red Tree.
Oh, and just the other week a very definite reminder arrived that in some senses the life-cycle of the book was complete, an emailed photo of that orange cover beaming out - doing its job, er...for the second time.
Postscript: The On Song radio series from Summer Noelle is available here at the Radio NZ archive. Also I made a list of all the songs, compiling the YouTube clips for them all, a video playlist if you like. And for Spotify people, I believe someone made a Spotify playlist for On Song.
You can also check out Off the Tracks for The Vinyl Countdown, reviews and other posts.


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Like all of the high performance Titanium series memory from OCZ Technology, our modules came equipped with titanium-mirrored heatspreaders. Unlike many of the heatspreaders we often find on cheaper RAM, these were built of pure quality. They were noticeably thicker than other stock and aftermarket heatspreaders we have seen previously. Furthermore, the heatspreaders came in complete contact with all of the memory chips. Not only is the construction good, but the appearance is quite astonishing. However, if you wish to maintain the attractive appearance, be forewarned that these OCZ heatspreaders easily keep impressions of fingerprints and dirt. On both sides of the modules is an OCZ Technology logo in the center of the heatspreaders, while on one side is also the product sticker. The sticker contains the PN (OCZ4001024ELDCTE-K), speed (PC 3200), memory timings (2-3-2-5), and memory title (512MB EL Dual CH Titanium Edition).
Underneath the heatspreaders are Infineon memory chips. The specific model of these Infineon memory chips are HYB25D256800CE-5. OCZ Technology has this RAM timed at 2-3-2-5 (CAS-TRCD-TRP-TRAS) while running 400MHz DDR. Also featured with this RAM is Enhanced Latency (EL) Technology and Ultra Low Noise (UL2) technology. The EL technology allows the memory modules to run at lower latencies than normally possible on most standard memory modules, according to OCZ, and the UL2 reduces the amount of electrical noise by using various PCB manufacturing techniques. The PCB used on the Titanium PC3200 modules is from BrainPower.


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Showing 1 - 24 of 92 Raglan T-Shirt


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News Details
Crime-fighting Coder
June 3, 2011
Ahmad Mujahid Mohd Razip developed an app for iPhone and iPad that displays local crime and traffic information. Using the GPS feature in the devices, a user can see what crimes have occurred in the area, by type and location, as well as trends for specific types of crime. Ahmad says the app could be used by police officers, attorneys, real estate agents, reporters or anyone interested in local crime...Read Full Story


text: Just seeing if anyone has ever had the mesh replace on the rear drop gate of their trailer. My Scag is definitely too much weight for the gate to handle and over time the welds have come undone and the other day as i was backing down the gate my tires actually fell through. Im gonna try and just throw some plywood over the gate for now as a simple fix but really want to get some new mesh put on. Any idea on price??? As thinking about having a couple supports welded in between the space to add extra support.


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Magculture has the heads up on new Brooklyn-based type magazine, Gratuitous Type. We could prattle on, but here's what Magculture had to say on the matter.
"The 32-page small format magazine desrcibes itself as 'a pamphlet of typographic smut' and relishes its obsession as it shares varied thoughts on typography. Content ranges from a look at how a small studio revisited rejected work"
While we've not got our mitts on it, It looks like a handsome magazine, reminding us why we like print so much. Take a leap to see some spreads from the magazine.


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Building Plastics NV
Herlegemstraat 14
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Phone: +32(0)56.604811
Fax: +32(0)56.610657
Building Plastics was established in 1973 by Jean-Pierre Suys. Together with several foreign subsidiaries, the company has grown into one of the most important manufacturers in the world of roller shutter systems.
Today, the management is lead by Thibaut Suys. The company is specialized in the extrusion and the roll forming of aluminium. We produce a unique range of roller shutter profiles that can be processed into all different kinds of roller shutters, roller doors and swimming pool covers. Building Plastics also offers a range of screens, an elegant and modern solution filtering the sun light into your living room or office. Due to the importance of quality and service, we do dispose different CE & NF standards.
With an extensive sales network and a dynamic support team, we are constantly striving to grow in the international market, together with our customers.


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TAMPA — The quarterback smacked his hand on the helmet of a pass rusher, and you figured it was the head coach who winced.
The quarterback stood on the sideline gingerly holding the thumb on his throwing hand, and you assumed it was the general manager who was holding back tears.
The quarterback walked away from the game, and you wondered if the guy in charge of selling Buccaneers tickets in 2010 was looking for an exit of his own.
So this is what it means to employ a franchise quarterback?
Josh Freeman fractures the tip of his thumb in the first quarter of a preseason game Saturday night, and the Bucs immediately go on life support. Hope is bruised, and the only shred of optimism is completely wrapped in tape.
The official word is that Freeman will be ready for the season opener three weeks from today, and I suppose that is a best-case scenario. He probably won't play in any more preseason games and may not practice again until early September.
So tell me this: If a quarterback is lost during a television blackout, does the season make a sound?
Sure, it could have been worse. It could have been a cast Freeman was wearing late Saturday instead of a splint wrapped tightly in tape. It could have involved ligament damage, and it could have required surgery.
Even Freeman, when he first heard the word fracture, feared that his season was slipping away.
"They saw me freaking out. I was acting like, 'Oh my God,' and they immediately said, 'Whoa, whoa, whoa, it's not too bad. Don't worry, it could be worse,' " Freeman said. "They told me that it happened above the ligament, so I've still got the range of motion in my thumb. From everything they said, this should be pretty minor."
Considering Brett Favre once broke his thumb in the middle of October and returned after a bye week to take the Packers to the playoffs without missing a single game, it's certainly conceivable that Freeman will be back in the lineup come Sept. 12.
But the sight of him returning to the sideline in a T-shirt and gauze during the first few minutes of the third quarter Saturday was the most obvious sign yet of how much this 22-year-old quarterback means to Tampa Bay.
If Freeman is not under center, does anyone have faith in this season?
Does anyone have expectations for the offense? Does anyone have happy thoughts about the young receivers?
Um, does anyone have Jeff Garcia's phone number?
To be fair, backup Josh Johnson looked as good as we have ever seen him after taking over for Freeman against the Chiefs. He still has happy feet in the pocket, and he threw a couple of dangerous passes, but he finished with a 132.5 passer rating, and that's encouraging. Third-string quarterback Rudy Carpenter had a touchdown pass and even had a rating of 122.9.
But the Bucs got a glimpse of how scary the huddle looks without No. 5, and it should probably convince them that a veteran quarterback can be a reassuring thing.
I understand the concept of grooming Johnson. I even agree with it. But the season is too long to reasonably expect Freeman to start all 16 games, which means the Bucs will need a dependable third quarterback at some point.
Garcia is 40 and has not thrown a pass in the NFL since his final appearance with the Bucs in 2008, but he is familiar with the philosophies of offensive coordinator Greg Olson and he would never be a threat to a healthy Freeman.
And considering Garcia just signed with the Omaha Nighthawks of the United Football League, you would have to guess he might be willing to come back to the NFL at the minimum veteran's salary.
Coach Raheem Morris acknowledged signing a veteran is a possibility.
"I'm going to sit down with (general manager) Mark Dominik and see if that is what we want to do. See how we're going to attack it," Morris said. "We'll talk about that (today) in our meetings."
It's not that losing Freeman would cause panic in Las Vegas. The Bucs are already something like 150-to-1 to win the Super Bowl, so it would just mean a long shot got even longer.
The problem is losing Freeman would take away much of your reason for caring. Oh, there are other reasons to watch. (Even on tape delay.) There is Gerald McCoy, who is already drawing double teams. There is Mike Williams, who is already looking like the steal of the draft. There is Geno Hayes, Quincy Black, Aqib Talib and Tanard Jackson, who have the makings of a pretty fine defensive core.
But this franchise revolves around Freeman. The Bucs made that obvious when they drafted him, and your gut confirmed it when you discovered he was in pain Saturday.
The chance he could lead Tampa Bay to the playoffs this season is pretty slim, but that was never the expectation. The beauty of this season is seeing Freeman grow. Watching a big, strong-armed kid mature into something special.
When you finally identify your future quarterback, you want the future to begin immediately.


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