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social marketing
Posted by Dale Buss on May 16, 2012 12:20 PM
General Motors' CMO Joel Ewanick made waves this week with the news that he's refusing to buy ads on Facebook until he can be convinced there's any ROI for doing so. The automaker is still committed to engaging on Facebook, as a statement on GM's Facebook page this morning notes:
"Just wanted to let our millions of Facebook fans know, we're still here, and we 'like' you back! We may not be advertising on Facebook at the moment but we'll still be talking with you all daily. If anything, we will be providing more content across our many GM Facebook pages - including Chevrolet, Buick, GMC and Cadillac - to keep the dialogue going."
He's got some sympathies from brand executives of other automakers who are scratching their heads about the value of actually paying for space on the ubiquitous social site. But most car brands (including Kia and Subaru, as the Wall Street Journal noted) are sticking with Facebook ads as well as in beefing up the content and engagement available that doesn't cost them anything (other than staffers' time or agency fees) on their brands' Facebook pages.
Ford strikes the highest-profile dissension with its cross-town rival in assessing the value of paid ads on Facebook. "We are doing more advertising on Facebook," Matt VanDyke, Ford's director of marketing communications, told brandchannel, "and it is a growing and critical part of our media mix."Continue reading...
More about: General Motors, GM, Social Marketing, Facebook, Twitter, Advertising, Digital, Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, Cadillac, Ford, Kia, Subaru, Mustang, Nissan, Scion, Pathfinder, Explorer, Joel Ewanick
Posted by Dale Buss on March 27, 2012 04:01 PM
Is it the brand or the products that sell automobiles? Nissan isn't taking any chances.
The Japanese automaker plans to introduce five new models to replace the mainstays of its vehicle lineup over the next 15 months, so Nissan has got the product angle covered. But Nissan USA also is about to launch a new marketing campaign that brings renewed attention to the brand over the vehicles, at least for now.
The new campaign, breaking April 5th (but teased on the Nissan USA YouTube channel) to align with the New York Auto Show, reinforces Nissan's long-time "Innovation" brand persona while at the same time teasing the 2013 Nissan Altima, Pathfinder, Sentra, Versa, and Rogue ahead of their Big Apple premieres.
Ads will use the imagery, common to auto-product introductions, of a sheet covering the new models. While the new Altima, which goes on sale this summer, is revealed, the other vehicles stay under wraps. In that way, Nissan both reminds consumers about its important new launches as well as allows a continuing focus on its brand.Continue reading...
More about: Automotive, Nissan, Altima, Juke, Leaf, New York Auto Show, NV200, Pathfinder, Rogue, Sentra, Taxi of Tomorrow, Versa, Advertising, Social Marketing, Digital
sports in the spotlight
Posted by Dale Buss on January 11, 2012 05:44 PM
Nissan and Buick marketers recognize the advertising juggernaut that the NFL has become. And their brands, like their rivals, are advertising during this month's NFL Playoffs, and many brand are gearing up for record auto-industry spending to advertise during Super Bowl XLVI on February 5.
But Nissan, its Infiniti luxury brand, and GM's Buick brand also have been making a departure from the football-chasing pack by investing more heavily than the rest in special marketing relationships with college sports, both basketball and football. Infiniti and Buick are the car sponsors of NCAA's March Madness basketball tournament.
And in the meantime, Nissan has been ramping up its ties with college football and the Heisman Trophy, signing a new five-year agreement as a "premier partner" with the award that goes to the game's best player each year. "It's a big strategic opportunity for us," Bill Peffer, Nissan's director of marketing communications, told brandchannel. Nissan wil be able to feature the Heisman Trophy in ads, for instance, and bring the hallowed piece of metal with it now on College Football Experience tours that it brings to football-crazy campuses.Continue reading...
More about: NAIAS, Detroit Auto Show, Nissan, Buick, NFL, NCAA, Super Bowl, Infiniti, GM, Pathfinder, Encore, Cadillac, Sports, March Madness, Heisman Trophy, Campus Marketing, Event Marketing, Co-Branding, Social Marketing, Advertising
Posted by Dale Buss on January 6, 2012 04:34 PM
The U.S. economic climes are growing about as balmy as the unseasonably warm weather expected next week when global automotive media and industry executives descend on the North American International Auto Show in Detroit. And car brands from Acura to Volvo are poised more than they have been in a few years to try to take advantage of the platform to launch new models, brag about technological innovations, tease with concept vehicles and spin their stories to several thousand curious journalists, bloggers, TV producers and hangers-on.
Overall, NAIAS will feel more like the golden days of yore than a Detroit show has in years. For example, Nissan is making a return to the exhibit after a couple years' absence during the Great Recession. Fuel economy and electrification will continue to be strong themes as they have been for the past few years, but with a slow but steady multi-year recovery in the U.S. market underway, auto brands will be emphasizing "happier" themes such as exterior-design departures and interior connectivity technologies.
Audi plans to use the show to unwrap a concept "Vail" version of its compact Q3 just for the U.S. market, where the company plans to introduce several more models in the years ahead as it tries to supplant BMW as the world's largest luxury-car maker by 2015. Audi sells only about half as many vehicles in the American market as BMW and Mercedes-Benz at this point, but the Volkswagen-owned brand has been growing by leaps and bounds in teh U.S. already. Audi executives have said they're also looking at the idea of making SUVs in the United States as its two German rivals do already.Continue reading...
More about: Automotive, Detroit Auto Show, NAIAS, Acura, Audi, Cadillac, Ford, Honda, Infiniti, Leaf, Lexus, Lincoln, Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, Nissan Leaf, Pathfinder, Scion, Toyota, Volvo, Facebook
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Comedian Mike Epps and rapper Ludacris headlined the event, while former Auburn basketball star Charles Barkley and former head coach Sonny Smith made appearances as celebrity dunk contest judges.
"I have been blessed and lucky to go all over the world," Barkley said. "Ain't no place I'd rather be than in Auburn, Alabama."
Prior to the dunk contest, Barkley assured the Auburn Arena crowd that embattled head coach Tony Barbee has the program moving in the right direction.
"I know most of y'all came here for football, but Coach Barbee is going to turn this program around and let's turn out tonight," Barkley said.
Sophomore forward Jordon Granger showed off his leaping ability during his Jungle Jam dunk contest victory. His 85 final round points edged him ahead of senior center Asauhn Dixon-Tatum in the final.
Virginia transfer KT Harrell and freshman guard Dion Wade poured it in from range in the three-point shooting contest, but Harrell's 19 final round points assured victory in the contest.
A scrimmage between White and Blue squads saw impressive shooting from white squad members Harrell and Wade, while senior guard Chris Denson displayed his renowned quickness for the blue squad.
The White squad defeated the Blue squad 18-11.
Epps' comedic commentary kept the energetic crowd laughing throughout the events, and his energy even coaxed Barkley and Coach Barbee into busting a few moves of their own.
"The reason why I got Mike Epps and Luda was for the students. You guys have been there every game for us," Barbee said. "You are as important to me as my team and I need you there every single night."
Barbee took to the floor after the scrimmage and called the Auburn student section the very best in the nation.
"This team has been working their tails off," Barbee said. "They're getting after it on the defensive end of the floor and the students are going to make the difference for us this year. Our student section is the best in the country. "
Though Epps and Ludacris have not been the biggest names in entertainment in recent years, Auburn students were impressed by the performance and said that it gave credibility to the basketball program.
"I know these kind of events help to bring out a good crowd and I know that the crowd ultimately feeds the team," said Josh Poole, a graduate student in geology. "They do little pep rallies before each athletic season starts, but a big event like this makes you think that they mean business and it gets the fans directly involved."
All in all, the event seemed to create optimism amongst students and a hopefulness that some of the night's energy might transfer into the regular season.
"An event like this can bring energy back to a program and like Coach Barbee said he brought these guys to hype everybody up," said Reed Burchette, a junior in mechanical engineering.

subset: commoncrawl


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This wicked piece of headgear was designed by Filippo Cazzaniga for Yamaha. Called the Lizard Helmet, it features a lizard-like mohawk on the top of the helmet that seems extremely slimy.
The Lizard Helmet would definitely be distracting for other drivers, but would certainly add some style and spunk to a bikers gear this summer.


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Top: Aritzia (old, great alternative here), Jeans: AG via Anthropologie, Shoes: Tibi, Bag: Forever 21 (old, similar here), Sunnies: Forever 21 (similar option here for $5!)
Just a quick post today ~ it was rainy and cold ALL WEEKEND and is supposed to rain straight through until Saturday. It was hard to find a break in the rain to snap a picture, but I took this before going to dinner at a friend's house on Saturday night.
I am definitely someone whose mood is easily influenced by the weather and therefore I am feeling a little cranky. I hope mother nature comes through in time for Memorial Day Weekend!


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Description and Goals:
In this four-week clinical elective, you will be a member of a trauma team at the R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center. The Center is the clinical hub of the State of Maryland's system of emergency care, the Maryland Institute for Emergency Medical Services Systems. Each year, approximately 8,000 injured patients are admitted to the Center. Approximately 80% are admitted directly from the scene of injury via State Police Medevac Helicopter or ambulance and approximately 15% are transferred to the Center from other hospitals.
The Center is staffed and equipped to deliver state-of-the-art care to the critically injured. In addition, patients with conditions requiring hyperbaric medicine are treated. Care at the Center is multidisciplinary. The trauma teams are responsible for the resuscitation, diagnosis, and emergency trauma surgery management of all patients from admission to discharge. In addition, they are responsible for coordination of care with other specialties, including: orthopaedic surgery, neurosurgery, plastic surgery, oral surgery, anesthesiology and critical care medicine. The student is expected to gain a basic knowledge of the priorities of trauma resuscitation, diagnosis, and acute care, and an understanding of post-acute care. Student activities are closely supervised by their team attending surgeons and fellows.
In addition to clinical activities, educational activities include daily lectures, bi-weekly M & M conferences and Grand Rounds lectures.
Students are assigned to 1 of 3 trauma teams and are expected to follow the same time-table as the fellows and residents on these teams. This means that one out of every 3 days the student is expected to stay in the hospital all night.
Visiting students interested in pursuing electives at the University of Maryland School of Medicine must apply through the Office of Student Affairs (OSA). All students must be in good academic standing and must be fourth-year medical students before starting their electives. Please contact Barbara Lindsay in the Office of Student Affairs at 410-706-7476 for information for applying for an elective or view the General Guidelines for Elective Application for Visiting Students.
For more information, please contact the Office of Physician Education at 410-328-3156.
Obtaining emergent consultation or transferring patients to the R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center takes only OneCall, day or night, to 1-800-373-4111 or 410-328-1234
This page was last updated: October 2, 2013


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The Brady Campaign Has Gone Full Derp.
A friend of mine enlightened me on a recent posting on the Brady Campaign's facebook page. Please see exhibit "A"
That is the picture that was posted and see exhibit "B" on the screen capture of their facebook page.
So it seems the Brady Campaign is saying that rape only lasts 30 and all is over? Women that have been sexually assaulted have a difficult time carrying on normal lives and the emotional scars run deep. There have been rape victims that committed suicide because of the emotional torment.
Are we to believe that their soultion is to become a victim and night fight back because of some sheep mentally?
Please feel free to chime in.
Well Written Article on Gun Control from a Gun Loving Leftist.
Here is a well written article. Read it and enjoy.
Brady misses the bulls eye….. again.
The Brady campaign just doesn't get it..... again. They are calling the "National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act of 2011" by the made up name of ""Packing Heat On Your Street" bill. They say on their website:
H.R. 822 is so extreme it would allow dangerous, violent, and untrained people from out-of-state to carry loaded guns in your community, and your state would be powerless to stop them.
Apparently giving it a "big bad name" makes is worse than it really is like "barrel shroud" or "shoulder thingie that goes up".
I can't get over how much this is an oversight. They are saying the people that go through all the legal channels and get themselves proper training are the problem... WHY do they feel that the people that care enough to want to protect their families are the problem, not the ones that we are protecting their families from.
Because if a CRIMINAL knows that there is a LAW that stops them from crossing state lines while they have a gun in their wast band they will stop, turn in their firearm to the nearest police officer and stop their life of crime, and join a local non-profit that's whole mission in life is not to help people but to strip them of their rights because they believe that an inanimate object is what causes people to commit crimes not the person themselves.
I was asked "What was the weirdest thing to ever happen to me while carrying concealed?"
So I thought I would share this little story with y'all.
When I first got my CCW I was using a non-retention holster, I was adjusting my clothing after using the restroom at Olive Garden when I noticed the door opening I immediately went to move my cover garment over my firearm, in that motion with a loose belt and a non-retention holster the firearm shifted its weight and slid right out and made a clatter on the floor that sounded like the entire contents of a kitchen cabinet (or at least it seemed that way at that moment) onto the floor (no round in the chamber), and as this happened as I was watching the police officer walk through the door.
He looked at me, Looked at my firearm laying on the floor and locked eyes with me. I didn't move. He calmly asked if I had a permit, I answered "yes" he asked me to take several steps back. He then retrieved my firearm checking to see if I had one in the chamber and asked me for my permit. After I showed it to him, he asked what happened, I told him that "CCW is new to me and I'm still trying out holsters and that's why there isn't one in the chamber, and it fell out". He then asked if I had taken any classes yet, I told him that I had my first one scheduled next week, he then gave me a canned speech about responsible gun ownership.
He then smiled handed me my firearm back and told me about several holsters he recommended. I have seen this officer several times around town since then he would always smile and nod to me, recently he asked if I had everything figured out when he saw me eating lunch at Subway one day he sat down and talked for about an hour.
Now we call each other whenever we go to the range. He has become a good friend.
Did you hold your candlelight vigil with the Brady campaign?
These people did.
When will they have a vigil for all poor sea kittens murdered every year eaten my the horrible people in tofurky, TX?
H/T Weer'd
Cool feature or defect?
Sig Sauer manufactures some of the best weapons on the market in my opinion. I'm still loving my P238 .380, it packs a hell of a punch for it's compact size. During my testing of this weapon I noticed something that absolutely blew my mind.
As you know, when firing most semi-automatic handguns the slide will lock once the magazine has been emptied. Standard procedure at that point is to eject the empty mag, drive a new mag home and grab the back of the slide, pulling it back, in order to chamber a round from the fresh mag. This process takes only a second, maybe two, if you've trained for it. Well, ladies and gentlemen, have I got something interesting for you. There I was, testing out my new P238, having a ball when I emptied the mag. So, I eject the spent mag, take my freshly loaded mag, drive it home and.....the freakin slide lock released and chambered a round!!! Holy Hell!!! Do you have any idea how cool that is? Needless to say my husband and I were in awe. I've never seen a handgun do that before. After the initial shock wore off we decided to do some tests. Was this caused somehow by the FMJ rounds I was using. The answer is no. We found this to be a constant result not affected by the type of round in the mag. Even tried it with an empty mag...yep, got the same results.
Now, like I said. This is by far one of the coolest things I've ever seen on a handgun. Even my husband, who has trained rigorously on reloading, admitted that such a feature could save a few precious seconds (or more depending on your skill and comfort level) and possibly save a life.
I needed a bit more info so I called Sig Sauer customer service. When I explained to the gent why I was calling he gave a knowing chuckle and said that it's actually not an intentional function. I could tell this was not the first time this guy had heard of this. So I asked him if they had had a large amount of complaints on this. He said that they had some calls, but no complaints. Everyone that has had the chance to use this weapon and experience this little quirk loves it! Now, there haven't been any reported instances of slide locking failures so Sig's going with the flow at this point.
When we look back at history we see that so many of greatest triumphs have happened unintentionally. Could Sig have stumbled onto something accidentally that may change the future of handgun production? Could this be the next big breakthrough that gives our law enforcement and military personnel a few precious seconds that may save their life or the life of someone else? Only time will tell.
For now, Sig's the only weapon I will have on my side.
A Warning From a Brazilian About the US 2nd Amendment
I could not help but to become infuriated over what the gentleman stated in this article. In Brazil, the citizens are targeted by local law enforcement over owning guns or anything that looks like guns. He also offers up a warning to American citizens to stand up and fight for our constitutional right to keep and bear arms.
I always take it to heart when someone from another county speaks out about our 2nd amendment rights, especially from countries that have headed down the same path that it appears that we are taking.
I strongly urge you to support a pro 2nd amendment organization such as the ones listed below.
Open Carry Day.
Went to eat... nothing happened.
Went to the book store... nothing happened.
Went to the "organic" market... nothing happened. (though I was avoided)
Went to the local gun shop... Duh..
Went to a woman's clothing store with the wife... Nothing happened.
Went to the video game store... Nothing happened.
Went to Steak House for dinner... Nothing happened.
Went to Liquor store for night cap... Nothing happened.
Went home... Had a good day!
Valuable lessons…
I was having trouble deciding where to start. After a weekend like none I've had before, where I had the opportunity to do things most people in my position could only dream of. From firing the Barrett .50 cal and the M16 the same weapons use by our brave men and women overseas. To classic open bolts like the Grease gun, shooting preferred gangster gun the Tommy gun, to even taking a Rangemaster Pistol class. These were experiences, that before this weekend, were doomed to only be dreams.
Secondly the people were amazing everyone had a warm smile and a hearty handshake. It was truly good company and coming away many new friends is only secondary to the knowledge that there are many other people that value our freedoms as much as I do.
As I sat at my desk back at work on Tuesday, Fat and happy from a good Memorial day, I pondered what was the best part of the whole experience. There were just too many things battling for this spot in my mind to put my finger directly on one.
Only after the smoke had cleared and the last brass had gone cold did it finally occur to me what was the most memorable experience of the whole thing. Needless to say it came as a bit of a shock to realize that be best experience of the Luckygunner blogger shoot wasn't that of my own.
It had been nagging me non-stop since Sunday, this little voice in the in the background describing every firearm, describing every target in minute detail, speaking about every shooter with crisp detail. The thing is the voice wasn't my own.
Every time I would look at a video of this weekend, view photos or read a blog post about it there was a comforting pressure at my back reminding that there was something more that I was missing that was more important then shooting all the firearms, meeting all the people, or the training I received from RangeMaster.
The most important thing about this weekend was the impression that it left on my son. He had been talking about it non-stop since Sunday, he spoke lovingly about the "cool holster" that was worn by Jennifer and made by Michael. He has been carrying around my copy of Arcturus signed my MJM and pretending he is reading it. He has been wearing the safety glasses that Tam Gave him on Sunday, I even had to take them off of him when he fell asleep in bed on Sunday. He has been begging me to watch the RangeMaster DVD we got after the training.
I truly didn't realize how much fun he had and how much of a truly positive experience this had left on him until Tuesday night when I found these drawings in his notebook. As you can see he has drawn the luckygunner shirts we were wearing, the range, and him shooting the Kel-tec .22.
Above all the magnificent firearms I got to shoot this weekend, it was the humble 10/22 and Olegs Kel-tec PF-9 with the Twisted Industries .22 conversion that made the lasting impressions that will last a lifetime. It's weekends like this that will make him a lifetime firearm enthusiast and shooter. Though him and my wife only showed up because we had checked out of the hotel on Sunday and they were just hanging out till we were ready to leave that little bit of time it all it took to make a truly lasting mark on a young mind.
The people at Luckygunner, Magtech, Sellier & Bellot and Rangemaster, have done in one weekend what I could never do in my back yard. It truly brings a tear to my eye knowing that even though I had the experience of a lifetime my son had a better time then me.
I truly must thank Luckygunner, Magtech, Sellier & Bellot and Rangemaster for helping me as a father show my son the joy of shooting, better than I ever could at home. You have earned the loyalty of my family for helping me be the best father I can, you are the reason my son will be a shooter for life.
Sore Thumbs
It hurts so good. Shooting everything from a 10/22 to a Barrett .50cal. Here at the luckygunner blogger shoot this has got to be one of the funnest times have photos and video to come later.


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2004 Pontiac Aztek from North America
Love it
Right rear hub and rear-end had to be replaced at 17,000 miles (under warranty). No problems since then.
General Comments:
This is the best vehicle we have owned. I wish they still made them, and we would be first in line to buy a new one. It is equipped with OnStar (which I would not like to be without again, as I have had to use it in emergency situations). I love the looks both inside and out. I don't know why some think it's ugly; it was just before its time.
Would you buy another car from this manufacturer? Yes
Review Date: 22nd June, 2010


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Costly Cloning Isn't a Cure-All
Of the small number of Americans who have any idea what therapeutic cloning is, the majority likely believes it essential for stem-cell therapies to succeed. That is not necessarily true.
Therapeutic cloning, also known as somatic cell nuclear transfer, will not be the route to successful stem-cell therapies, many scientists say. In fact, if therapeutic cloning were vital, it would make stem-cell therapies prohibitively expensive.
That doesn't mean therapeutic cloning is altogether useless. Researchers believe they can learn a great deal about disease and perhaps find cures by studying stem cells derived from the clones of patients with diabetes, cancer, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and other ailments. But those cells will likely be a conduit to therapies, not therapies themselves, at least not until scientists develop much more efficient therapeutic cloning methods.
"The value of nuclear transfer is not for cell therapy, it's to do molecular research to figure out how genetic disease is manifest," said Tom Okarma, CEO of Geron, a biotech company in Menlo Park, California, that has studied stem cells since 1995. "When you inject nuclear transfer, (stem-cell therapy) becomes a dead end."
That's especially worrisome from the standpoint of a company trying to please its stockholders. Back when Geron began stem-cell research, scientists theorized that patients' immune systems would reject stem-cell therapies, just like an organ transplant. The solution, in theory, would be to create clones of patients from which researchers could extract genetically identical stem cells that would be accepted as the patients' own cells.
But that would mean a custom-made clone for every patient. Not only would that be exorbitant for already cash-strapped hospitals (especially when you consider treatments would likely cost up to $200,000), but it could also create a big demand for donor eggs. That prospect led to
But now, most stem-cell researchers have given up on the idea of custom-made clones.
"Not only would it be expensive, but logistically it could be impossible because you will have to have every single hospital in the world set up to do therapeutic cloning and prepared to do the different protocols," said Jose Cibelli, a cloning researcher at Michigan State University in East Lansing.
While immune rejection is a big hurdle for stem-cell therapies, excluding therapeutic cloning as the solution is a bit of a weight off researchers' shoulders. It means therapeutic cloning bans, which have been in the works in the


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The front panel controls should allow you to perform all the basic functions necessary to set up and use the receiver. You can expect the volume control to be the largest dial, but different manufacturers will design other controls in different ways.
Cheaper models may have no on-screen menu function, so the display on the front of the device is the only way of knowing what it's doing. This front panel display is very important for all AV receivers because it's your primary source of information on the receiver's settings.
On-screen menus (sometimes called a graphic user interface or GUI) appear on your TV. These make it easier to do more complicated setting up because you can see all the options at once, rather than having to cycle through them on the front panel display. However, most of these settings are unlikely to be used often, so a GUI is handy but not essential.
The remote control is very important. Its design has to allow you to control all the receiver's functions. Some come with a basic remote that can control the receiver and some other devices, such as a DVD or video player.
The more expensive models allow you to use the remote to control other brands' devices as well, but none would be as versatile as the best of the universal remote controls we tested in CHOICE July 2008.
Some also come with a second remote control which is smaller and easier to use than the main one. However, these usually can only perform basic functions.
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The Issues
That story may have been fantasy, but it demonstrates very well the concept that quality does add real value to a home. For hundreds of homes in Pueblo County, that basic understanding appears to have been abandoned by the office of the Pueblo County Assessor.
The County Assessor's office currently utilizes a mass appraisal method known as "market adjusted cost" to value your homes. They break residential properties down into one of five quality classifications from "low" to "well above average", and then assign "market adjusted" costs to each quality class. The errors produced by this outdated method are very apparent. Consider the current "market adjusted" square foot costs in use by the County Assessor's office for homes in Pueblo County:
Notice anything unusual in the above table? Why are the "market adjusted costs" for low quality homes up to 13% more than those for similarly sized homes in the next higher quality class? The County Assessor's office is Constitutionally mandated to value homes based on the local Real Estate market; given that information, these "market adjusted" costs appear to indicate that there are instances where low quality homes are selling for more than similar homes of higher quality. Is that really the "market" for such properties in this area? Consider the implications of these "market adjusted" costs; if two homes are constructed right next to each other, one using low quality materials and design considerations, and the other using higher quality materials and architectural designs, the lower quality home would be valued for tax purposes up to 13% more than the higher quality home. The property tax liability for the lower quality home would similarly be up to 13% higher than that of the home built using superior materials and designs. Consider the actual taxable values involved; if your financial situation were tight, and you were to build a small, 500 square foot home to "below average" construction standards for you and your family, that home would currently be valued for tax purposes at $42,825 (refer to the above table; $85.65 per square foot X 500 square feet). If your new home were then to suffer significant damage which you could not afford to repair to the same level of quality, your home could well be re-classified into the "low quality" property classification. The cost structure above would consider that damage and subsequent inferior repair work to be an asset to your home; the taxable value of your property would increase by more than 13% to $48,490 ($96.98 per square foot X 500). Your property taxes would similarly go up by 13%. Does this make sense? Now consider the "real world" effects of these over-valuations on low quality homes in Pueblo County. On Pueblo's lower East Side, for example, the vast majority of the owners of low quality homes saw a slight increase in their taxable values. When you consider that residential properties countywide (as a consequence of the battered Real Estate market) went down by around 6%, there is absolutely no justification to support such value increases on low quality homes. This issue is not isolated to homes on the lower East Side; these inflated costs are effecting hundreds of low quality homes across Pueblo County. The unfortunate owners of these homes are now paying the real consequences of these over-valuations in their current property tax bills, and they will continue to do so in 2015. Unfortunately, this is not the first time this has occurred; consider the following square foot costs that were used to value homes for taxes that were collected in 2010 and 2011:
In this case, it was the square foot costs of "below average quality" homes that exceeded the costs of similar "average quality" properties. Since the taxable values on your homes are required by the State Constitution to be based on recent sales, could it have been possible that substantially renovating such homes during those years yielded a lower value in the local Real Estate market? Did neglecting your home, or repairing your severely damaging home using low quality materials result in an increased market value at that time? These types of errors resulted in very questionable valuations and associated tax liabilities on thousands of homes in Pueblo County from 2008 through 2011. Now that unfortunate history is being repeated under the current values as established by the office of the County Assessor. The valuation errors and associated tax penalties have now simply been shifted from "below average quality" homes to "low quality" homes. Why are disproportionate values and associated tax burdens being imposed on the owners of lower quality homes? Why are homeowners in the most economically distressed areas of Pueblo County being marginalized? These types of valuation errors are becoming more and more commonplace in Pueblo County, but they are no less troubling. Lower quality homes are not the only properties being effected by such errors; they are simply the most obvious. Higher quality properties are also effected by other valuation anomolies. All such issues are attributable to the continued use of an outdated method of mass appraisal. Given the number of variables involved in the process of mass appraisal, the real question might well be how many such errors have never been discovered, and how have these errors effected your tax bills? There is a better way. The simple solution to this problem is to follow the lead of other large front range counties, and implement modern methods of mass appraisal such as Multiple Regression Analysis (MRA) to value properties in Pueblo County. Methods of mass appraisal such as MRA utilize the power of modern computer systems to generate mathematical models that minimize the error in your taxable values. An easy way to demonstrate the superiority of these methods is to consider a simple measurement of the error in taxable home values known as the "Coefficient of Dispersion" (COD). This simple statistic has long been accepted as one of the prime indicators of the quality of any mass appraisal system. It is rather simple; the larger the COD, the greater the error in your taxable values. As one of the 11 largest counties in the state, Pueblo County is classified as a "Category 1" county; consider the most recent error statistics for all Category 1 counties in Colorado as reported by the State Auditor:
Pueblo County is dead last, with by far the most error in their taxable home values; i.e., YOUR taxable home values. Where the average COD for the other 10 Category 1 counties is 7.6, Pueblo stands alone at 11.5. What do the top 5 counties with the least amount of error in their taxable values have in common? They all use Multiple Regression Analysis to value their residential properties. The office of the Pueblo County Assessor would argue that they did pass the state audit for 2013; but when you consider that the current audit standards were established around 30 years ago to accomodate the error prone mass appraisal systems in use at the time, this is a statement of minimal competency at best. As demonstrated in the table above, modern methods of mass appraisal such as MRA consistently produce values with much less error than those derived from out-dated methods such as those in use by the office of the Pueblo County Assessor. The fact that the Pueblo County Assessor's office was actually able to pass their audit using the problematic cost structures outlined here is a strong indicator regarding the minimal standards of that audit. We need to demand that our property values be as accurate as possible; to do otherwise simply perpetuates the very tired expression "close enough for government work", and demeans those who do strive for excellence in government. Over the past decade, MRA models have been demonstrated to the County Assessor's office on numerous occassions, and these methods have ALWAYS provided superior valuations when compared to their current, outdated methods of mass appraisal. Multiple Regression Analysis could be implemented within a matter of months using existing computer technologies already available to the County Assessor's office; there would be no additional costs related to such a conversion. Pueblo County taxpayers have already supplied that office with modern computer hardware and software systems; it is time to put that very expensive technology to work. Please take a moment to vist the following link regarding The Solutions, which include the qualifications of David Bratina; the candidate who, if elected, will reduce the error in your property values and associated property taxes by immediately implementing Multiple Regression Analysis in the valuation of your homes. For those who find it hard to believe that this could be a recurring issue in Pueblo County and would like a more detailed look at these and other valuation irregularities, such detail is available by clicking on this link: show me more of the problems. |
Why are low quality homes being repeatedly over-valued for taxation in Pueblo County? |


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McClelland's life has improved significantly since the days she thought about overdosing on painkillers. She still has excruciating headaches, and riding in a car can bring on severe anxiety. But she has been seizure-free for several years now, and she has a fiancé; friends say he "acts as her frontal lobes," taking charge of organizing household chores, the checkbook and their combined families. McClelland jokes that her plan for her life is "to buy as many pairs of pajamas as I can." She has quite a collection, a souvenir of her many hours in bed since the accident.
Seriously, she adds, "I want to get my kids through school and find something I can do. Even volunteering somewhere is hard. You have to go through training and be scheduled, and I never know when I'm going to have a headache. But I want to feel I'm giving something back instead of sitting around my house."
She sighs, a long exhale of relief. "Emotionally, I feel so much better and lighter," she says, "now that the trial is over."


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Deepings Leisure Centre -
the home of Deepings Swimming Club
Our home pool for galas and training is -
Deepings Leisure Centre, Park Road, Deeping St James, Lincolnshire, PE6 8NF
It has a 6 lane, 25 metre pool, with electronic timing.
Their website is:
Last Updated 07 August 2012
Home page for Deepings Swimming Club
Results for Open Meets that are not DSC ones
Fenland League Galas results
Results now available
Can you help Saturday night?
Sunday 27 July
Can you help Saturday night?
Sunday 27 July
Latest update
Changes to training this weekend
Entry packs now available for our Level 3 Open Meet
Change to time of County Age Group training session on a Sunady


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Two-up Metal Platesetters -- The CTP Periphery
January 2003Even though these devices are successfully meeting the needs of printers at the low end of the market, Lamparter says he still hasn't seen any significant change in the industry's opinion of polyester plates. "Polyester could go a lot further, but it's under-marketed," he points out. "One thing the technology has going for it: you can show that CTPoly is cheaper."
The prices for scaled down two-page metal CTP systems may be significantly less than those of their big brothers (four- and eight-page models), but the investment still is more than what owners of two-up shops are likely to want to make, according to Lamparter. Getting financing can also be an issue. "Any time these printers have a buck to spare they'd rather buy a press or a color copier, since they can sell the output," the consultant adds.
Total cost of ownership is a phrase that gets tossed around a lot in discussions about CTP adoption. Performance on-press is a key factor in the equation. Whether there are actual differences in the performance of polyester and metal plates or not, the attitude of the press operator can be its own cost. As Lamparter noted earlier, press operators on the whole still love metal.
In a sense, almost every metal platesetter is a two-page machine since the minimum plate size supported typically falls into this range. Small press shops have been known to opt for a larger model to support future growth plans, but the addition of a larger press has to come in the near term for the economics to make sense. Some manufacturers do offer a field upgrade from the two- to four-page format.
Metal platesetters with a dedicated two-page format are a relatively recent evolution of CTP technology. If they can get past the "sticker shock," small printers will find some compelling reasons to make the move.
Faster turnaround is a primary reason for adopting CTP, be it in a two-, four- or eight-page format, says Mark Tonkovich, product manager for CTP at Heidelberg USA in Kennesaw, GA. However, he notes that there isn't a universal need for automation to meet that demand. "The base version of the Heidelberg Prosetter 52 (two-page platesetter) is a semi-automatic recorder to provide an attractive price point," the product manager explains.
The platesetter is offered in an automatic version, with the option of a field upgrade, Tonkovich says. "The smaller format market has more of a tendency for shorter run lengths, which can boost plate volumes," he notes. "Automation does add to the cost of a unit, but it can be justified with large volume plate requirements. Whether or not it's needed really depends on individual production demands."
The Prosetter 52 features violet imaging technology (405nm, 5mW) in an internal-drum design to lower the purchase price. It handles a maximum plate format of 20.66x26.37˝, outputting up to 20 plates/hour at 2,540 dpi (depending on plate type) in yellow safelight operating conditions. The unit's maximum resolution is 3,386 dpi, and it can be configured with up to two integrated punching systems. Field upgrade to a four-up Prosetter 74 configuration is also possible.
Budget and space constraints have a higher degree of importance in the CTP buying decision for the small printer market segment, reports John O'Rourke, director of digital media at Presstek Inc. in Hudson, NH. These concerns, he says, normally outweigh the potential gains from automation and automated handling capabilities.
"In general, prospective buyers of two-page metal CTP systems have a higher percentage of jobs with less than four colors, meaning fewer plates per job," O'Rourke adds. "However, shorter runs, quick turnaround cycles and having multiple small presses in the shop can increase plate usage." These factors will generally cancel each other out in terms of the impact on plate demands, he contends.
O'Rourke believes the advantages of thermal, process-free CTP are especially applicable to the two-page market. The per-unit cost of plate developing chemistries (or yield) is impacted by processing volumes, he points out. "While two-page shops can have reasonable plate volumes, the small size of the plates still works against their plate/chemistry cost ratio."
The Presstek Dimension200 thermal platesetter handles a maximum plate size of 20x21˝ in daylight-safe operating conditions. The system images most thermal plates (830nm), including Presstek's own Anthem and PEARLdry materials. The platesetter is offered in versions with imaging resolutions of 1,200/2,400 dpi or 1,270/2,540 dpi and can expose its maximum plate size in 3.1 minutes at 2,540 dpi. It supports screen rulings up to 200 lpi.
Print Imaging Services (Pisces), in Nashua, NH, has taken a different technology approach in going head-to-head with CTPoly systems. Its JetPlate desktop systems use standard ink-jet printer engines and a proprietary "liquid light" imaging solution to expose certain conventional UV-sensitive aluminum plates.
Hank Clifford, vice president of sales and marketing, naturally agrees with the assessment that printers prefer to run metal plates. "The registration on metal is better and the plates don't stretch on-press," he explains. "Operators can start and stop presses without impacting the plates on the cylinders. Older presses, in particular, tolerate metal plates better than polyester.
"Running four-color work on a four-color press just requires one setup, but four-color printing on a two-color press requires two passes. Registration becomes more critical for quality and to facilitate setups," Clifford points out.
Small-format printers had been largely relegated to adopting CTPoly systems because of the cost, he asserts. "They can't afford to make mistakes and be pioneers. They also can't afford the expensive systems adopted by eight-up users."
Small printers are being impacted by the broader CTP adoption trends, however. "The eight-up users have been able to trim costs out of their processes with CTP, which is enabling them to go down market and compete for more of the work that was traditionally done by small printers," Clifford reveals.
The Pisces JetPlate system is designed to offer printers a low-cost (under $20,000) computer-to-metal-plate solution. The company's 3000 plus series uses a slightly modified Epson Stylus Color 3000 ink-jet print engine to output a maximum plate size of 18.06x25˝ at 133 lpi with 0.002˝ repeatability. It can produce approximately one A3-sized plate every eight minutes and operates in yellow safelight conditions. The system includes a separate JetPlate Processor 64 (including post-baking) or CBU-18 curing and baking unit to enable hand developing.
ECRM is also a player in the two-page metal CTP market with two lines of platesetters. Its Mako 2 system uses violet imaging (405nm, 5mW) to expose a maximum plates size of 22x22˝ at seven resolutions from 1,200 to 3,556 dpi.
The TigerCat 2 supports a maximum format of 24x24˝, with a field upgrade option to a four-page format. It can be configured with violet (405nm), green FD YAG (532nm) or red HeNe (633nm) laser imaging systems for exposing silver or photopolymer metal plates. It offers a choice of eight resolutions from 1,200 to 3556 dpi with a 200 lpi maximum screen ruling.
Distributed in the U.S. by GraphLine Inc., the HighWater Platinum 2218 is a flatbed platesetter offered in violet (400nm) or green (532nm) laser versions. It handles a maximum plate size of 18.1x22˝ with a manual loading/unloading operation guided by pins. The unit images metal plates at a resolution of 1,270 or 2,540 dpi and exposes its full image area in less than four minutes at 2,540 dpi. It is driven by a Harlequin-based RIP that also enables proofing from the same file and supports features such as Ink-Monitor for capturing ink usage data and Q2 Workflow Manager for automating the prepress workflow.
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For Small to mid-sized producers or distributors of food products, beverages, or other FDA-regulated products IT requirements can be greater than in almost any other industry. This is especially true when a portion of the product is ultimately distributed through retail; either high-end regional or national specialty retailers or even the mass retail market including grocery chains like Kroger and Safeway, or Target, WalMart, etc.
In addition to classic IT requirements like accounting, order entry, and purchasing, there are at least three additional factors that contribute to a stronger need for technology; meeting the Bio Terrorism Act and other regulatory requirements, complex Inventory Management challenges, and Customer Compliance requirements when distributing through retailers other than your own retail stores (which adds an additional layer of complexity).
Here are a few real-life stories of how SVA has helped other distributors and supply chain management companies:
A large manufacturer of food products produces their own branded product as well as many private-label products for other brands. They sell primarily through all the major grocery retail outlets. All raw material and finished product must be lot controlled. This entire process was tracked manually. Because inventory moved so fast, it was difficult to keep track of where the inventory resided in the warehouse and product often expired. The process of labeling shipments with compliance labels was also manual and slow. Finally, because all finished goods looked alike, it was easy to mis-ship product.
Using a tightly-integrated solution of Microsoft Dynamics and Accellos One Warehouse, all raw materials are bar-coded and scanned on receipt, including the lot numbers and expiration dates. As materials are consumed and finished goods are produced, the consumption and production are scanned and tracked as well. About 40 different trading partners communicate electronically via EDI. All UCC-128 labels are printed during the picking process and that information is scanned and sent to the customers via an Advanced Ship Notice.
A medium-sized producer and distributor of branded snack food distributes their product through thousands of convenience stores and specialty retail outlets. They process a large volume of orders with a variety of customers, each with various price contracts. Because their products are regulated by the FDA, lot traceability is critical.
Microsoft Dynamics is used to keep track of all of their different price contracts and applies the proper price at the time orders are entered. Finished products are tracked in a perpetual inventory system by the production Lot Numbers. Each customer invoice contains the lot numbers of the products shipped, giving them complete traceability from the source to the destination.
Are you facing similar challenges in your company? Learn about the applications our professionals used to solve these problems.
Let us help you discover the right solution for your organization.


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found a new home!
Plenty of my friends are looking
for one too. Find a pet to adopt.
Find a pet to adopt |
My name is Flamenco!
Facts about Flamenco
- Breed: American Staffordshire Terrier Mix
- Color: Black
- Age: Young
- Size: Med. 26-60 lbs (12-27 kg)
- Sex: Female
Flamenco's Info...
** Available May 3 ** Hi! I'm Flamenco and I'm a 2 year old American Staffie! I'm a totally adorable girl that is friendly and playful and loves to give kisses! I love to get out of my kennel and run and run and run. Once I'm finished running, I like to take a break and smother you with love and cuddles! We would have a blast together, so come meet me soon!
Animal #: 409199
Name: Flamenco
Sex: Female
Age:Approx 2 Years
Breed: American Staffordshire Terrier
THIS PAGE IS CREATED BY VOLUNTEERS AND IS NOT DIRECTLY ASSOCIATED WITH SHELTER OR STAFF. For additional information on rescue or adopting contact the shelter directly. You need the ID NUMBER AND NOT NAME WHEN INQUIRING ON THE ANIMAL
Act quickly to adopt Flamenco. Pets at this Shelter may be held for only a short time.
Other Pets at Collin County Animal Services
Why Adoption is a Great Option
Flamenco, a McKinney American Staffordshire Terrier dog was adopted! Here's how you can benefit by looking at adoption as an option to buying a American Staffordshire Terrier for sale in McKinney, or seeking a American Staffordshire Terrier dog from a breeder in McKinney.
- Rescues and shelter volunteers in McKinney already know the personality and tendencies of their pets. This means they can match you with the right pet. That will makes it much easier transition to owning a pet for yourself and your new pet.
- On average adoption fees are much less than you'd pay a McKinney breeder, or pet store. Plus most often rescue pets have already been to the veterinarian for a check-up, had a round of vaccinations, and are spayed or neutered. That is a lot of savings!
- You will become a hero, and give a needy dog or cat a loving home. In fact, there are even American Staffordshire Terrier breeders who help with American Staffordshire Terrier rescue. One puppy or kitten adopted in McKinney paves the way for another one to be saved.


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Bible Verses About Attraction
Bible verses related to Attraction from the King James Version (KJV) by Relevance
1 Corinthians 13:1-13 - Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become [as] sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. (Read More...)
1 Corinthians 6:9-10 - Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, (Read More...)
2 Peter 3:9 - The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
Hebrews 13:4 - Marriage [is] honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.
1 Corinthians 6:18 - Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body.
Hebrews 9:27 - And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:
1 Thessalonians 4:3-5 - For this is the will of God, [even] your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: (Read More...)
Colossians 3:16 - Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.
John 10:10 - The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have [it] more abundantly.
John 3:16-17 - For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (Read More...)
Leviticus 20:13 - If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood [shall be] upon them.
Leviticus 18:22 - Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it [is] abomination.
Genesis 2:24 - Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
Romans 10:9 - That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
Romans 1:26-27 - For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: (Read More...)
John 5:39 - Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
John 3:16 - For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
John 3:1-36 - There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: (Read More...)
Matthew 19:12 - For there are some eunuchs, which were so born from [their] mother's womb: and there are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive [it], let him receive [it].
Matthew 4:1-10 - Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. (Read More...)
Jeremiah 15:16 - Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart: for I am called by thy name, O LORD God of hosts.
Isaiah 1:1-31 - The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, [and] Hezekiah, kings of Judah. (Read More...)
Psalms 119:11 - Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.
Genesis 19:1-38 - And there came two angels to Sodom at even; and Lot sat in the gate of Sodom: and Lot seeing [them] rose up to meet them; and he bowed himself with his face toward the ground; (Read More...)
Genesis 1:28 - And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
Genesis 1:1-31 - In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. (Read More...)
Some scripture references/categories courtesy of Open Bible .info under CC BY 3.0
Related Bible Dictionary Terms:
Search the King James Version (KJV) for more references about Attraction...


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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - View original article
Malcolm Scott Carpenter | |
NASA Astronaut | |
Nationality | American |
Status | Deceased |
Born | Boulder, Colorado, U.S. | May 1, 1925
Died | October 10, 2013 Denver, Colorado, U.S. | (aged 88)
Other occupation | Test pilot, aquanaut (SEALAB II) |
Rank | Commander (USN, Ret.)[1] |
Time in space | 4 hours, 56 minutes |
Selection | Group 1 (1959) |
Missions | Mercury-Atlas 7 |
Mission insignia | |
Awards |
Malcolm Scott Carpenter | |
NASA Astronaut | |
Nationality | American |
Status | Deceased |
Born | Boulder, Colorado, U.S. | May 1, 1925
Died | October 10, 2013 Denver, Colorado, U.S. | (aged 88)
Other occupation | Test pilot, aquanaut (SEALAB II) |
Rank | Commander (USN, Ret.)[1] |
Time in space | 4 hours, 56 minutes |
Selection | Group 1 (1959) |
Missions | Mercury-Atlas 7 |
Mission insignia | |
Awards |
Malcolm Scott Carpenter (May 1, 1925 – October 10, 2013) was an American test pilot, astronaut, and aquanaut. He was one of the original seven astronauts selected for NASA's Project Mercury in April 1959. Carpenter was the second American (after John Glenn) to orbit the Earth and the fourth American in space, following Alan Shepard, Gus Grissom, and John Glenn.
Born in Boulder, Colorado, Carpenter moved to New York City with his parents Marion Scott Carpenter and Florence [née Noxon] Carpenter for the first two years of his life. His father had been awarded a postdoctoral research post at Columbia University. In the summer of 1927, Scott returned to Boulder with his mother, then ill with tuberculosis. He was raised by his maternal grandparents in the family home at the corner of Aurora Avenue and Seventh Street, until his graduation from Boulder High School in 1943.[2] (It was claimed that his reason for choosing the name 'Aurora 7' for his spacecraft was for the fact that he was raised at this house on the corner of Aurora and Seventh, but Carpenter denied this.)[3]
Upon graduation, he was accepted into the V-12 Navy College Training Program as an aviation cadet (V-12a), where he trained until the end of World War II. The war ended before he was able to finish training and receive an overseas assignment, so the Navy released him from active duty. He returned to Boulder in November 1945 to study aeronautical engineering at the University of Colorado at Boulder. While at Colorado he joined Delta Tau Delta International Fraternity.[4] At the end of his senior year, he missed the final examination in heat transfer, leaving him one requirement short of a degree. After his Mercury flight, the university granted him a B.S. degree on grounds that, "His subsequent training as an Astronaut has more than made up for the deficiency in the subject of heat transfer."[2][5]
On the eve of the Korean War, Carpenter was recruited by the United States Navy's Direct Procurement Program (DPP), and reported to Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida in the fall of 1949 for pre-flight and primary flight training. He earned his aviator wings on April 19, 1951, in Corpus Christi, Texas. During his first tour of duty, on his first deployment, Carpenter flew Lockheed P2V Neptunes for Patrol Squadron Six (VP-6) on reconnaissance and anti-submarine warfare (ASW) missions during the Korean War. Forward-based in Adak, Alaska, Carpenter then flew surveillance missions along the Soviet and Chinese coasts during his second deployment; designated as PPC (patrol plane commander) for his third deployment, LTJG Carpenter was based with his squadron in Guam.[2]
Carpenter was then appointed to the United States Naval Test Pilot School, class 13, at NAS Patuxent River, Maryland in 1954. He continued at Patuxent until 1957, working as a test pilot in the Electronics Test Division; his next tour of duty was spent in Monterey, California, at the Navy Line School. In 1958, Carpenter was named Air Intelligence Officer for the USS Hornet.[2]
After being chosen for Project Mercury in 1959, Carpenter served as backup pilot for John Glenn, who flew the first U.S. orbital mission aboard Friendship 7 in February 1962. When Deke Slayton was withdrawn on medical grounds from Project Mercury's second manned orbital flight (to be titled Delta 7), Carpenter was assigned to replace him. He flew into space on May 24, 1962, atop the Mercury-Atlas 7 rocket for a three-orbit science mission that lasted nearly five hours. His Aurora 7 spacecraft attained a maximum altitude of 164 miles (264 km) and an orbital velocity of 17,532 miles per hour (28,215 km/h).[2]
Working through five onboard experiments dictated by the flight plan, Carpenter helped, among other things, to identify the mysterious 'fireflies' (which he renamed 'frostflies', as they were in reality particles of frozen liquid around the craft), first observed by Glenn during MA-6. Carpenter was the first American astronaut to eat solid food in space.[2]
Carpenter's performance in space was the subject of criticism and controversy. While one source has Christopher C. Kraft (Chris Kraft), directing the flight from Cape Canaveral, considering Carpenter's "mission the most successful to date; everything had gone perfectly except for some overexpenditure of fuel."[6] The New York Times reported in its obituary for Carpenter that Kraft was angry because Carpenter was not paying attention to his instruments and ignoring instructions from Mission Control. Kraft opposed Carpenter's assignment to future space missions.[7]
Unnoticed by ground control or pilot, however, this "overexpenditure of fuel" was caused by an intermittently malfunctioning pitch horizon scanner (PHS) that later malfunctioned at reentry. Still, NASA later reported that Carpenter had:
"exercised his manual controls with ease in a number of [required] spacecraft maneuvers and had made numerous and valuable observations in the interest of space science. ... By the time he drifted near Hawaii on the third pass, Carpenter had successfully maintained more than 40 percent of his fuel in both the automatic and the manual tanks. According to mission rules, this ought to be quite enough hydrogen peroxide, reckoned Kraft, to thrust the capsule into the retrofire attitude, hold it, and then to reenter the atmosphere using either the automatic or the manual control system."[6]
At the retrofire event, the pitch horizon scanner malfunctioned once more, forcing Carpenter to manually control his reentry, which caused him to overshoot the planned splashdown point by 250 mi (400 km). ("The malfunction of the pitch horizon scanner circuit [a component of the automatic control system] dictated that the pilot manually control the spacecraft attitudes during this event."[8]) The PHS malfunction jerked the spacecraft off in yaw by 25 degrees to the right, accounting for 170 miles (270 km) of the overshoot; the delay caused by the automatic sequencer required Carpenter to fire the retrorockets manually. This effort took two pushes of the override button and accounted for another 15 to 20 miles (30 km) of the overshoot. The loss of thrust in the ripple pattern of the retros added another 60 miles (100 km), producing a 250-mile (400 km) overshoot.[2]
During reentry, there was a great deal of concern over whether Carpenter had actually survived, since he splashed down 250 miles off course. Forty minutes after splashdown, Carpenter was located in his life raft, safe and in good health by Maj. Fred Brown under the command of the Puerto Rico Air National Guard,[9] and recovered three hours later by the USS Intrepid.[2]
Postflight analysis described the PHS malfunction as "mission critical" but noted that the pilot "adequately compensated" for "this anomaly ... in subsequent inflight procedures",[10] confirming that backup systems—human pilots—could succeed when automatic systems fail.[11]
Some memoirs[12][13] have revived the simmering controversy over who or what, exactly, was to blame for the overshoot, suggesting, for example, that Carpenter was distracted by the science and engineering experiments dictated by the flight plan and by the well-reported fireflies phenomenon. Yet fuel consumption and other aspects of the vehicle operation were, during Project Mercury, as much, if not more, the responsibility of the ground controllers. Moreover, hardware malfunctions went unidentified, while organizational tensions between the astronaut office and the flight controller office—tensions that NASA did not resolve until the later Gemini and Apollo programs—may account for much of the latter-day criticism of Carpenter's performance during his flight.[2]
Carpenter never flew another mission in space. After taking a leave of absence from the astronaut corps in the fall of 1963 to train for and participate in the Navy's SEALAB program, Carpenter sustained a medically grounding injury to his left arm in a motorbike accident. After failing to regain mobility in his arm after two surgical interventions (in 1964 and 1967), Carpenter was ruled ineligible for spaceflight. He resigned from NASA in August 1967.[2] He spent the last part of his NASA career developing underwater training to help astronauts with future spacewalks.
In July 1964 in Bermuda, Carpenter sustained a grounding injury from a motorbike accident while on leave from NASA to train for the Navy's SEALAB project.[2] In 1965, for SEALAB II, he spent 28 days living on the ocean floor off the coast of California.[14][15] During the SEALAB II mission, Carpenter's right index finger was wounded by the toxic spines of a scorpion fish.[16][17] He returned to work at NASA as Executive Assistant to the Director of the Manned Spacecraft Center, then returned to the Navy's Deep Submergence Systems Project in 1967, based in Bethesda, Maryland, as a Director of Aquanaut Operations for SEALAB III.[14][15] In the aftermath of aquanaut Berry L. Cannon's death while attempting to repair a leak in SEALAB III, Carpenter volunteered to dive down to SEALAB and help return it to the surface, although SEALAB was ultimately salvaged in a less hazardous way.[18] Carpenter retired from the Navy in 1969, after which he founded Sea Sciences, Inc., a corporation for developing programs for utilizing ocean resources and improving environmental health.[2]
Carpenter was married four times and divorced three. He married Rene Louise Price in 1948. In 1972, he married Maria Roach, daughter of film producer Hal Roach. He married Barbara Curtin in 1988 and divorced several years later. He married Patty Barrett in 1999.[19] He had four children from his first marriage: Marc Scott, Kristen Elaine, Candace Noxon, and Robyn Jay. He also had two children from his second marriage: Matthew Scott and filmmaker Nicholas Andre, and one child from his third marriage, Zachary Scott.[20][21] Carpenter had a stroke and entered The Denver Hospice Inpatient Care Center at Lowry where he died on October 10, 2013.[22] He was 88 and was survived by his wife, Patty; four sons, Jay, Matthew, Nicholas, and Zachary; two daughters, Kristen Stoever and Candace Carpenter; a granddaughter; and five step-grandchildren. One son, Marc, predeceased him.[23][24]
Carpenter received:
In 1962, Boulder community leaders dedicated Scott Carpenter Park and Pool in honor of native son turned Mercury astronaut. The Aurora 7 Elementary School, also in Boulder, was named for Carpenter's spacecraft.[2][25]
Scott Carpenter Middle School in Westminster, Colorado, was named in his honor,[26] as was M. Scott Carpenter Elementary School in Old Bridge, New Jersey.[2][27]
The Scott Carpenter Space Analog Station was placed on the ocean floor in 1997 and 1998. It was named in honor of his SEALAB work in the 1960s.[28]
Speaking from the blockhouse at the launch of Friendship 7, Carpenter, John Glenn's backup pilot, said "Godspeed, John Glenn," as Glenn rose off the launch pad to begin his first U.S. orbital mission on February 20, 1962.[2]
This quote was included in the voiceovers of the teaser trailer for the 2009 Star Trek film.[29] The audio phrase is used in Kenny G's "Auld Lang Syne" (The Millennium Mix).[30] It is also used as a part of an audio introduction for the Ian Brown song "My Star".[31]
Less officially, Carpenter has been reported to add, sarcastically, "Remember, John, this was built by the low bidder".[32] This quote is sometimes improperly attributed to John Glenn.[33]
In the 1983 film, The Right Stuff, Carpenter was played by Charles Frank. Although his appearance was relatively minor, the film played up Carpenter's friendship with John Glenn, as played by Ed Harris. This film is based on the book of the same name by Tom Wolfe.[34]
The character of Scott Tracy in the Thunderbirds television series was named after him.[35]
His recovery is referred to in the Peanuts comic strip of June 28, 1962, after Linus' security blanket is rescued under similar circumstances.[36][37]
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Scott Carpenter. |


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April 22, 2013
When a memo from the Justice Department surfaced in February of this year, it cast a new light on one of the biggest modern military secrets—and not a flattering one.
The 16-page government document detailed previously unheard of details on the United States' drone policy, perhaps most alarming among them, the legality of executing drone or Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) strikes against U.S. citizens.
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Final Thoughts
From a regular gamer's perspective, NVIDIA's GeForce GT 220 GPU probably isn't really a video card you would buy. The chances are this is the kind of video card that's sitting inside your work PC, assuming it doesn't use onboard video. Does this make it a bad model, though? No, it's just aimed at a different segment. If you're looking for something that's going to pack a bit more punch than an onboard video solution, this is what you would buy - it's going to be perfect for those older games at those lower resolutions.
Galaxy's take on the new GPU is pretty standard - the cooler while being a little on the loud side does a good job of keeping the card cool. We also did see that World in Conflict was able to achieve a 30 FPS minimum, which means other games like Company of Heroes based off the same engine are going to be able run at the same numbers, which we consider playable.
Warhead was also able to break 30 FPS at 1680 x 1050 with the settings at low, so it's possible to get a bit of performance there, but nothing is going to look too pretty.
These are the sacrifices you make with a cheap video card though. While I wouldn't ever personally use one myself, it doesn't mean that there isn't a market for them. If you're making $10 a week pocket money and you're looking for something that is going to replace that onboard graphics solution, so you can play those old Age of Empires games with improved quality, this is a good option.
The other market would be for those people who simply don't want to spend any serious money on a new video card, but want to just get away from that onboard solution for exactly the same reason above and gain some of the well known NVIDIA features.
There's a bit of hidden performance behind the cooler and we've got native HDMI port and a single slot solution. It wouldn't do too bad in a home theater system (HTPC) and as we said, if you're looking for something to play those old games at lower resolutions, it could be the right card for you.


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Lincoln Park – Theater, Food and Shopping!
Lincoln Park is one of Chicago's best neighborhoods with wonderful restaurants, great shopping and home to some of the best theater in the city.
Armitage Avenue is a great place to start. Here you will find:
Butcher and The Burger: Located at 1021 W. Armitage, this is a good casual, local's spot for burgers including turkey, salmon and elk. Stop in after you walk the nearby stores.
Lori's Shoes: At 824 W. Armitage, this is a great discount shoe store, which my friends rave about.
Tarantino's: Located at 1112 W. Armitage, this is a great neighborhood Italian restaurant with great indoor as well as outdoor seating in the summer. The smoked chicken pasta dish is really good.
Tabula Tua: A great store for table top and home accessories. It is at 1015 W. Armitage.
Sai Café at 2010 N Sheffield: A favorite sushi restaurant of many locals with great fresh items.
Further south along Halsted is:
Alinea: If you can get in, make sure to try Alinea. Grant Achatz is an El Bulli trained chef and his restaurant is considered to be one of the best in the US. It is located at 1723 N. Halsted.
Trattoria Gianni: A small neighborhood trattoria near the Steppenwolf, at 1711 N. Halsted, that is always good. The new outdoor seating to the north is perfect during the Summer.
Vinci Restaurant: A long-time locals favorite for Italian, if Alinea is not in your budget. 1732 N. Halsted.
Steppenwolf Theater: Try to see a performance of this Tony Award winning regional theater at 1650 N. Halsted. Recently it sent August: Osage County to New York which won the Tony for best play. Superior Donuts was another recent success that went to NYC.
North of the Steppenwolf is the Roger Brown Study Collection. Roger Brown was a well-known Chicago artist and graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. After his death he gave his collection and home to the school. The Roger Brown Study Collection (RBSC) is a house museum, study collection, and archive, located off campus, an 1888 storefront building. The RBSC is an intimate collection with an very large range of objects, including works by Chicago Imagists and other contemporary artists, self-taught artists, folk and tribal art from many cultures, objects from material and popular culture, costumes, textiles, furniture, travel souvenirs, and other things Brown surrounded himself with for artistic inspiration. The RBSC offers an in-depth contemplation of objects and collections, and serves as a laboratory for art historical, curatorial, and preservation studies. You can schedule a tour at 773-929-2452. 1926 N. Halsted.
Twin Anchors: Located at 1655 N. Sedgwick, since 1932, it is known for its great burgers and ribs. A favorite spot of Frank Sinatra's, his music is still available on the juke box. A great place to go on a cold Chicago night. Scotch and Frank Sinatra is the best.
North of Armitage is Webster Avenue. After covering Armitage Avenue walk two blocks north to Webster. Here you will find John's Place at 1200 W. Webster, which is a local's favorite for breakfast (the smoked salmon scramble and the pumpkin pancakes are wonderful), lunch and dinner.
At 1119 W. Webster is Range, the newly opened restaurant featured locally-sourced farm-raised American fare. It has an attractive, comfortable decor without TVs as many of the neighborhood spots now have.
For an afternoon snack don't miss Sweet Mandy B's Old Fashioned Desserts at 1208 W Webster or Café Floriole at 1220 W. Webster. The latter is great for lunch or a latte and a pastry!
Rickshaw Republic: At 2312 N. Lincoln, just north of Belden, is one of the first Indonesian and Malaysian restaurants in Chicago. The décor is stunning and the food awesome. The combination plates are the best.
2 Sparrows: A restaurant that's great for breakfast or lunch at 533 W. Diversey Parkway.
TimeLine Theatre: Located on Wellington and Broadway, this is a theater company that continually gets great reviews for its productions. I have seen four plays in the last two years and the quality is really outstanding! Near the theater, is Bar Pastoral, the cheese and wine bistro.
Café 5411 Gourmet Empanadas: A fun, casual spot serving some great Argentinian empanadas. At 2850 N. Clark.
North Pond Cafe: Chef Bruce Sherman received the James Beard Award for Best Chef Great Lakes 2012. This is a wonderful restaurant in a perfect setting, overlooking the lagoon in Lincoln Park, in an Arts and Crafts style building. The menu reflects and supports local farmers. Great in the evening but perfect for Sunday brunch when you can see the great views of the Chicago skyline. 2610 N. Cannon Drive.
A short walk from North Pond is the traditional French Bistro, Mon Ami Gabi at 2300 N. Lincoln Park West. It is a neighborhood favorite. The outdoor dining area in the summer is a highlight.
The Hotel Lincoln: Recently opened, this is a good alternative to Loop, Michigan Avenue and Gold Coast Hotels. It is directly across from the Lincoln Park Zoo, near the Chicago History Museum and with a good restaurant, Perennial Virant, that is perfect for brunch, and a local coffee bar on the first floor. The rooftop bar, is one of the most popular in the city. You can also easily walk to restaurants, shopping and nightlife.
Green City Market: Located in Lincoln Park on Wednesdays and Saturdays during the summer months. This is a fun spot to buy local produce, have a bite from a local cart, listen to music or attend a cooking demonstration. In the winter it moves to the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum.
The Peasantry: Billed as offering "elevated street food", this is a casual Lincoln Park restaurant at 2723 N. Clark. They offer a good selection of starts, soups and salads, flatbreads, burgers, gyros, sausages and pasta. The lamb burger is really good!!
Ricardo Trattoria at 2119 N. Clark Street, is a favorite for authentic Italian specialties. It has been featured in the Chicago Michelin Guide as a Bib Gourmand since 2011. According to Michelin, "chef/owner Riccardo Michi's family is best known for its swanky Bice restaurants. When Michi opened his own spot he brought the family know-how, but put his name on the door. The result is a casual, Italian-style trattoria, perfect for either date night or a group dinner".
Across the street at 2116 N. Clark is his new, casual Ricardo Enoteca, or wine bar, that offers great wines, pastas, pizzas, salads and other meat and seafood items. The warm, contemporary atmosphere is a perfect addition to the neighborhood.


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Products used:
- Face: BellaPierre Mineral Foundation in Cinnamon;
- Eyes: Essence eyeshadow base, Meow Cosmetics Ideal Eyes e/s in Cats in the Cradle on the inner half of the lid and as a highlighter, The She Space e/s in Naughty Neighbour on the outter half of the lid, in the crease and on the lower lash line, Essence Multi-action Mascara.
- Cheeks: Alverde Powder Rouge in Magic Terra (Zauberwald LE).
- Lips: Essence Lip Gloss in Flowerkissed (Blossoms etc. TE).
So, what are you doing these days?
Song of the day: Iggy Pop - Realy Wild Child (Wild One)


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This weeks rankings are on the main page at mitca.org!
Power ranking is completed using Athletic.net. Each team wishing to be ranked must enter three athletes per event, being careful to not enter an athlete in more than four total events. All times entered must be ACTUAL MEET PERFORMANCES during the 2014 MHSAA season, including indoor performances IF they are at the same distance during the season and while competing on the school team. If you have a relay time with an athlete who will not run that relay (or has already been entered in four events) then you may deduct the split(s) of the athlete(s) not running the relay from a relay time and substitute a different person in their place using an open mark or relay split. This is meant to allow for the fact that your relay may have run with an athlete entered in four other events for the power ranking.
There are four different meets on athletic.net — you join the proper one and then enter your athletes the same as you would in any other meet — you do NOT ENTER MEET RESULTS in these meets — you enter the athletes in the meet as ENTRIES using seed times that are appropriate.
The four meets may be found here:
MITCA D1 Power Ranking
DO NOT ENTER RESULTS AS RESULTS, rather enter your athletes in the meet using their best time as their seed time AS AN ENTRY. If you enter results it will affect performance lists, etc., and it will NOT be used for rankings.
The power ranking meets are scored based on THIRTY team scoring (90 individuals and 30 teams).
Entries will be due as follows at 10:00 p.m. each week in 2014:
April 15th – top two teams will receive automatic invites
April 22nd – invite any top three team without an invite already
April 29th – invite any top four team without an invite already
May 6th – invite any top five team without an invite already
May 13th – invite top 20 D1 teams and top 12 D2, D3 and D4 teams to attend
May 20th – invite regional champions
May 22th at NOON – ALL ENTRIES DUE FOR SATURDAY MEET. Only limited drop adds will be permitted after this time.
Meets in 2014 will be held at the following locations:
Division 1 Wyandotte Roosevelt High School
Division 2 Linden High School
Division 3 Kent City High School
Division 4 Saugutuck High School
Here is a list of who is invited and who is coming: Link to 2014 MITCA Attending Teams Spreadsheet


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Thank You!
Thanks to all who sent kind wishes after the passing of Tiny. The days have flown by so quickly and I want to make sure I acknowledge your kindness.
It is as I always suspected – I have the best blog followers in the world.
Glad you're feeling better.
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