text:
Its History And Its Operations.
(Lecture by the Manager)
Notwithstanding the attractions of a mid-summer night, a large number of the members of the Dunfermline Naturalists' Society attended at the Hall of the Lauder Technical School on Tuesday to hear a lecture by Mr A. Muir of Bowhill Colliery, on "A Visit to a Coal Mine", with illustrations by flashlight slides. Mr Henry Beveridge, F.S.A., of Pitreavie, President, occupied the chair, and briefly introduced Mr Muir.
Mr Muir proceeding at once with his lecture said: - The first
object that takes your attention when you arrive at Cardenden
Station is the pits which are situated on a slight rise, with the
village lying to the east of them. The shafts were started to be
sunk in the year 1895, but coal was only begun to be worked in the
beginning of the year 1898. At that time very few houses were in
the neighbourhood, but now you will see that a large village has
sprung up and this has been rendered necessary by the great number
of men required to develop the colliery.
The village is typical of some of the cities in America and
elsewhere which have sprung up very quickly, in fact, it may be
termed the Mushroom Village. A walk of about three quarters of a
mile brings you to the pits, and the first object that takes your
attention when nearing the pits is the great stack of props piled
up near, and connecting with the pithead by an inclined roadway
which is worked by endless rope haulage for taking the props to the
mouth of the pits, as showing the great expense for timber used in
working the coal, I have only to tell you that it costs about 4d
for every ton of coal raised, and this is by no means an excessive
rate for a deep colliery with such bad roofs as some of our seams
The Winding Engine.
Next we come to the winding engine, and great massive engines they are. One is placed to wind out of No 1 shaft, and the other out of No 2. No 1 shaft is 220 fathoms deep to the five feet seams, and No 2 is 170 fathoms deep to the Lochgelly Splint seam. Each engine winds about 1000 tons of coal per day at the rate of 2½ tons per wind. The work is divided into three shifts in the 24 hours, during two of which the coal is brought up, and the other one, or the night shift, repairing work is done. There are about 1000 men and boys employed underground, and the yearly output of coal is about half a million tons.
Stages of Development from Women, Water.
Steam Power to 400 Horse Power.
To illustrate the great advance in mining machinery during the last 100 years, Mr Adams has been good enough to prepare slides showing the different methods of raising coal during that period, one of which is on the screen and represents the coal being drawn to the surface by a "horse gin", another by "Water Wheel" for raising coal at Govan Colliery, near Glasgow, near the end of the eighteenth century. Then we take you further back when women worked in the pits and carried the coals in creels on their backs, along the underground passages and up a stair in the shaft, and deposited the coals in little bings belonging to each family on the surface.
The Days of Serfdom.
These were the days when men and women were no better than slaves, and were bought and sold with the colliery, as an instance of which, I read you an extract from an advertisement which appeared in the "Caledonian Mercury" of Wednesday, 24th January, 1770, as follows: -
"By adjournment, to be sold within the Parliament or New Session House of Edinburgh on Wednesday 31st day of January inst, betwixt the hours of 3 and 5 in the afternoon, the coals and other subjects after mentioned which belong to Mr Adam Anderson, Feur in Kestock, viz.: - the splint coal with the whole other seams of coal within the lands of Halbeath, lying in the Parish of Dunfermline and Shire of Fife, together with the tenth load thereof, Fire engine erected thereon by the said Adam Anderson, and whole machinery, collier houses, colliers, coal bearers, and "pertinents" thereon as also a tack of certain parts and portions of the lands of Halbeath whereof there is 13 years to run from Martinmas 1769, and sublet to sundry tenants who pay £20 10s 5½d sterling to the tacksman over and above the tack duty the public burdens payable by the tack. The upset price of these subjects is £500 sterling."
Then immediately after that comes an advertisement of the Tack of Over and Nether Dundonald, where though colliers are not sold as fixtures, you draw the inference that it was the rule and not the exception that they were fixtures. It is a fact that in the end of the 18th century the colliers of Scotland were relieved from slavery by Parliament. The last vestige of actual slavery was then extinguished in Britain, but long afterwards it was no uncommon thing to met colliers who had been born slaves. Hugh Miller tells us that he had himself frequently conversed with them, and relates an anecdote of one who, according to his own account, at one period of his career had been niffered for a pony. It was a recognised custom in these days that the women who married a collier became his coalbearer, and bears out the old saying "Who takes the collier by the hand, takes the creel by the band". I may here state as a fact that my own father was working in the pits when only 6 years of age. In the year 1842 the women were prohibited by an Act of Parliament from working in the pits.
Generation of Steam.
From the engines we pass to the boilers. These are twelve of the Lancashire type, and produce steam for all the engines about the works.
Pit Stores and Water Supply
Next we come to the stores where the different kinds of supplies are kept. Adjacent to the stores is the domestic water supply tanks and filter. The water is pumped from a large cistern built in the side of the shaft which collect the water from a spring of fine clear water which comes from the whinstone rock at 55 fathoms from the surface, and is distributed through all the district in pipes in the usual way.
Treatment of Accidents.
Built in connection with the stores is the ambulance room for treating cases of accidents, and the shed for ambulance wagon and litter. The van is fitted with all the appliances that can be thought necessary for the care and comfort of the patient during transport to their homes or hospital. The litter is used for short distances and only for accidents of a less serious nature.
Pithead Workshops.
Next we visit the workshops, comprising the smithy, joiners shop, and engineering shop, where a large staff of the different tradesmen work at repairs and any new work which is required. The shops are fitted with three turning machines, one shaping machine, one screwing machine, one slotting machine, one vertical drilling machine, one large radial drilling machine, one planing machine, three punching and shearing machine, one emery grinder and twist drill grinder, grindstone, and fan for the blast for the smiths' fire.
Pumping Engine.
This view shows the kind of pumping engine which keeps the workings clear of water. It pumps 1300 gallons, or nearly six tons per minute to the surface, and works continuously except when it breaks down and needs repair, but this seldom occurs; water was the great drawback to the development of coal working in the old days, and an engine for pumping water from a mine was amongst one of the first steam engines invented, but before that, water was raised by means of hand pumps and water wheels, and among the first to apply the water wheel was Sir George Bruce of Culross about the year 1500 to the pits on the shore at Torryburn. Another view shows a large underground pumping engine placed at a depth of 115 fathoms from the surface, capable of forcing up 700 gallons per minute, and is used in case of stoppage to the big pump.
Air Compressing Engines.
We just look in to see the large air compressing engine when passing. It compresses the atmospheric air to a pressure of 40 lbs per square inch, and is led down the shaft and along the workings in tubes, and works the haulage engine, small pumps, and coal cutting and boring machines, besides the jib crane and large punching and shearing machine on the surface.
The Load Hutches.
From the air compressor we go up the stair to the pithead, and see the load hutches coming up and the empty ones being sent down the shaft, this puts me in mind of a story I heard about a country man one day standing at a pithead and seeing the empty hutches going down and the load ones coming up, to show that he knew all about it, he went forward to the pitheadman and said " Man, they are not long in dipping them." When the load hutches are taken off the cage, they run by gravity to the creeper which takes them up to the steelyard where they are weighed by a man appointed by the Company and checked by a man appointed by the miners; you see one man taking off the pins or tokens by which each man's hutch in known, and a boy putting a mark on the hutch for the guidance of the men at the different shoots, and also for the "Billy Man", who weighs the amount of dross in the hutches be means of a spring balance. From the steelyard, the hutches gravitate to the "tippers" where they are emptied into the jiggers, They then find their way to the back of the pit and are ready to be sent down the shaft to be filled again.
Sifting, Separating, And Weighing.
When the coal leaves the hutches it falls into a jigger, with large perforations, which divides the large coal from the small, the larger coals passing on to the "picking tables" where any stones that may be amongst it are carefully picked out and laid aside, so that nothing but clean coal goes into the wagons, and is ready to be taken away by the pug engine to the wagon steelyard to be weighed and addressed to its destination. The small coals that pass through the perforations in the coal jigger falls on to a conveyor and is taken to another jigger, where it is again divided into various sizes of nuts, which also pass over picking tables and get the stones taken out before they are loaded into the wagons. There are four kind of nuts, comprising of chirls, trebles, doubles, and singles, then the very finest size of all, called duff, drops into a long conveyor and is carried to the stock hole among the first views.
At the Bottom - Telephone Communication.
We now descend the shaft, arriving at the "bottom" we see the men putting the load hutches on the cage and taking off the empty ones, then we halt a few minutes in the cabin until our eyes get accustomed to the darkness, and here you will probably be surprised to find a telephone, which is in direct communication with the pumping engine house on the surface, also to the pitheadman, the office, and the managers house as well as my own, and is the means of saving a very considerable amount of time in cases of accidents to the workmen, or a breakdown in machinery. In one of the bottoms there is an endless chain for taking the empty hutches out of the pit bottom to the haulage or the pony along the level bit.
At The Coal Face.
We now start for the coal face, and in passing, look in at the stables, there are 32 ponies underground, but are kept in different sections of the workings, and in passing along you will likely encounter a pony and a rake of hutches. Arriving at the face you see the men employed in getting the coal, who look round with a look of enquiry on their face as much to say "I wonder who this is?" It is very seldom that a miner continues working when anyone goes into his place, but we ask him to show us how miners do their work, and he begins again. Pointing to the illustration on the screen, Mr Muir continued - this man you see beginning to hole the coal has not got very far under the coal, but you will notice that he has to take up a very cramped attitude to get properly at his work, you will also observe the sprags and props put up to protect him from the coal, should it be loose and inclined to fall; by and bye he gets further and further under the coal until he lies almost full length under it.
Pointing to another illustration, Mr Muir said: - This view shows you some of the difficulties in getting the coal at the face so as to get it to come down. It is in holing away under the coal like this that lots of accidents occur, more especially when the miner neglects to put up the sprags and supports you see and which he is required to do every 6 feet at least, according to an Act of Parliament. But of late years, machines driven by electricity or compressed air are being largely used for doing this work.
Machine Cutting.
Pictures of the end view of the machine was next shown, and passing to another Mr Muir continued. This view shows a section of the Jubilee Seam which we cut by machine, you will observe that it is admirably adapted for the coal cutter, as it is divided by a soft stone in the centre which the machine entirely cuts out leaving the clean coal and relieving the miners of a considerable amount of the hardest work, besides the coal got is very much rounder than that got by hand holing, and this item alone often represents the entire saving or profit to the coal master. As the working face is by far the most interesting part of the whole workings, I have had a number of slides prepared showing it.
Another view shows a machine cutting in the stone in the Jubilee Seam. This is one of the best Disc machines made and driven by compressed air, but there are numerous other kinds. The driving power is now very often electricity in place of compressed air. It makes a very handy and economical method of driving but is rather more dangerous and, therefore, requires more care to be taken in its use to render it safe for operating at the face.
When the coal is cut it is brought down in as large pieces as possible and filled into the hutches. Here you will see the same two men you saw when you got to the coal face, but by this time they have got a hutch in and are filling it. Observe the pins, the props and the pillars. They bid you good-bye when you leave them.
Government Requirements.
Of late years the Home Secretary has ordered, in view of the large percentage of accidents occurring at the face through falls of roof, that the manager with the approval of the Mines Inspector should specify a certain distance not to be exceeded between supports for the different seams, and the view on the screen shows that rule being carried out; You see the props placed at regular distances apart. Besides this what is called chokes, consisting of square pieces of hard wood is built up sufficiently clear of the face to allow the machine to pass along between them and the face. These yield as the roof gradually comes down, where as the props are likely to break. These chokes are taken out each time the coal is cleared away and brought forward to a fresh position. Observe the pieces of wood on the top of the props. These are put there for the purpose of distributing the bearing surface over a greater area. They also at the same time yield a little, acting as a sort of spring on buffer and save the props from breaking. Sometimes besides these temporary chokes, the roof in places where good building stones cannot be got readily, is supported by pillars built of round trees placed crosswise forming a sort of square cage, the centre of which and the spaces between the trees being filled up with stones and rubbish. From these views you will see the necessity for the large stock of timber on the surface.
Systems of Working.
The coal may be wrought on the stoop and room or long-wall system,
"stoop and room" consists in cutting parallel roads
through the seam in one direction at certain distances apart and
connecting these by other roads at right angles and leaving square
pillars standing to support
the roof. This method is continued from the shaft pillar until the
boundary of the coalfield is reached when the pillars are extracted
by working back towards the shaft. It is only certain seams that
are suitable for stoop and room. One of the reasons for determining
this is the thickness of the seam. I may say this was the system
adopted by the old folks, but they usually left the stoops or
pillars too small and they were generally crushed and
Long Wall.
Here is another view showing the method of extracting the stoops.
Longwall consists in extracting the whole coal in one operation. Main roads are driven in different directions from the pit bottom inclines being driven from them, then short levels at the tops of the inclines from which the roads to the face branch off at right angles. The length of the face, as it is called, is the distance between these roads. It is usually from twelve to fourteen yards. This is occupied by a man and a boy or two men, one an experienced miner who digs the coal and puts up the props, and the other termed a drawer, who fills the coal into the hutches and takes them away to the main incline, when it is run to the main road and taken to the pit bottom by horse or haulage.
The Brushers.
Here you see a little haulage engine driven by compressed air used for drawing the coal up the dook to the pit bottom. After the coal is extracted or filled away there is considerable work to be done to get the place ready for the next cut because the roof has been gradually settling down since the coal was taken out and it is necessary to ripp the roof or the roads to keep them high enough for the hutches. So during the night shift the "brushers" come into the place. They lift the rails and setting a prop in the roadway drill a hole in the brushing and put in a charge of explosives, blast the roof of the roadway down, making it about two feet higher. The stones that are got from the blast are built into the roadside to support the roof. This building is shown in the plan of the Longwall face.
Having now seen nearly all the operations carried on underground, we get to the surface again and back to the station in time to catch the train.
Visit To The Works.
In response to an invitation by Mr Muir a party of nearly forty made an excursion to Bowhill on Wednesday evening to inspect he works. Among those present were Mr Henry Beveridge, President; Mr Sommerville, secretary; Mr Wm Ross, treasurer; Major Shearer; Mr Adams; Mr and Mrs Connell; Mr Culing; Mr Richardson, postmaster; Mr Gifford; Mr Davidson, Touch; Mr Dawson and Miss Dawson; Mr Philp and Miss Philp; Mrs P Donald; Misses Anne Tod, Katie Tod, Garrie Addison, and Johnstone, Messrs Thomas Jackson, Stone Farm: Grandison, Henry Reid; T. A. Buncle; Wm Gow; P. G. Millar; David Henderson; George B. Hunter; Wilson; W. Drysdale, and J. H. Mackie.
As the party walked from the Cardenden Railway Station and saw on the rising ground before them the pit-works and the village of which they had beheld a pictorial representation on the previous evening, they realised the actuality of the transformation which had been effected within a very few years. They noted that the village had already attained the dimensions which some of the ancient royal burghs "east the coast" might envy, and that though considerable extensions were in progress there was no sign of confusion or even of the road-rutting that generally accompany the formation of new streets and the erection of new buildings. The general aspect, of course, could not compare with the appearance of the old established model villages in Durham, belonging to the Peases, or Lord Londonderry; yet although much paving has yet to be done and garden ornamentation for which there has not yet been time was conspicuous by its rarity, the appearance was cleaning and pleasing. The width and the plans of the streets gave evidence of regard paid to modern sanitary ideas; the curtained windows of the neat dwellings told of taste and comfort; the rosy cheeks and the tidy attire of the young people were incontestable evidence of healthy surroundings and of parent care.
Despite the information given the previous evening that the Bowhill Coalfield extends to four square miles, that the Company employ 1400 hands, 1000 underground and 400 about the pithead, and that the output of coal amounts to 2000 tons a day, with the prospect of an early enlargement to 3000, the first surprise of most of the visitors was the impression of the magnitude of the works they received, and of the apparently complicated character of the processes in operation. In their perplexity and bewilderment they gratefully welcomed Mr Muir's cordial reception, and gladly submitted to his gentle though masterful guidance.
Presently, under his guidance, the minds of the beholders became conscious of the evolution of order and of the gradual comprehension of the plan of operations. The extent of the resources for the generation of steam is realised as attention is directed to the twelve Lancashire boilers, 8 feet in diameter and 30 feet long, working at 90 lb. pressure to the square inch. The winding engine with all the equipment shining as brightly as the best cared for machinery of a Dunfermline Linen factory, command universal admiration.
The workshops give evidence of full modern equipment, as they are rapidly passed through; the rock driller is seen in operation; the electric plant which sends light to the remotest parts of the pit and makes the night almost as bright as the day at the pit head, is explained; the screening plant, which sifts and separates the different classes of coal, carrying with them a minimum of manual labour and guidance to the wagons ready to be loaded and despatched to their destination is curiously examined. The longer one gazes and takes note of the constancy of the supply of loaded hutches raised to the mouth of the shafts, directed to the railway that passes in front of the weighman and the checkweighman, fastening themselves in the revolving cages that release them after they have discharged their load, to be again sent down the pit, the more he realises that no waste of time or of material is allowed, and the possibility of error is reduced as nearly as may be to the vanishing point.
For, while the different classes of coal are passed along the courses assigned to them, and are examined by the women pickers who are sharp to detect and to remove stones or other undesirable material, provision is made for the gathering up of the fragments that nothing be lost. The small coal which passes through the screening jiggers is conveyed by a trough conveyor on a pair of small coal jiggers which divides it into the different sizes of nuts and delivers this on to the nut picking hands viz., one bar band for chirls. One ditto for trebles, and one plate band for doubles. The singles are dropped direct into a wagon, and the duff on the trough conveyor which takes it to the boilers.
A considerable number of the party having donned waterproof caps and jackets were first lowered to the bottom of the shaft and made their way nearly a mile and a half distance to the coal face where they saw the wonderful and powerful Diamond Coal Cutter at work in the Jubilee Seam, which has a rib of fireclay and course coal about 5 ins thick in the centre of the seam, which is about 5 feet thick. The machine undercuts 5 feet 6inches and cuts at a rate of 20 yards per hour along the face. The greater portion of the company, including the ladies, made a much shorter journey when they reached the bottom of the shaft, but they saw a great deal which interested and delighted them, the comfortable stables and well cared for ponies receiving their due share of admiration.
Meanwhile, a resurvey of the various apparatus and operation at the pithead deepened the impression of the completeness and the efficiency of the equipment. Traces of the presence of the master-mind directing and controlling the powerful machinery and the labyrinth of complicated processes became more discernible. The visitor in the cage may not know whether they are ascending or descending, but the man who guides the winding engine knows where they are in their journey through the darkness. He regulates the speed of the descent or ascent, and stops the cage at the appointed place with a nicety suggestive of the line which is a twelfth of an inch.
The fan, which raises a storm and windworthy of King Aeolus himself, and gives off 160,000 cubic feet of air for the maintenance of ventilation and of the healthy temperature underneath, is under the control of another engineman, as calm and serene as old Neptune, and much more watchful in the preservation of his sovereignty. And while air is artificially poured into and diffused throughout the workings, water is taken out through the agency of the huge main pump at the rate of 1300 gallons per minute. Each man, too, seems to know his place and do his work without rest and without haste.
Mr Muir has been remarkably successful in surrounding himself with a staff of capable officers and steady workmen. And he deserves all the effective assistance he receives. For, while he is enthusiastic about his pit equipment and the remarkable success which has attended the working of the colliery, he is still more enthusiastic about his men. With every department of the work and of the machinery he is familiar; he is a born leader of men as well as a skilful engineer; and one of the secrets of his success is the completeness of his sympathy. He makes it his aim to raise Bowhill Colliery to a proud pre-eminence for comfort and safety. Yet knowing that perfect immunity from accident cannot be guaranteed, he has a full ambulance equipment always in readiness, and when a casualty of any kind does occur, the workmen all know that no one is more deeply grieved than their highly capable manager.
It may be added that the Company have built 274 new houses for the
use of their workmen, all of which are fitted with the latest
improvements. They also own 700 wagons - 500 to carry ten tons, and
200 to carry twelve tons of coal. There is a brickwork in
connection with the colliery, which produces about eight to nine
thousand common bricks per day. Besides this, the handmade bricks
of fireclay and composition of various shapes and sizes and vents,
chimney cans, etc. are also made in large quantities.
[The above supplied by Jim Campbell, Lochore.]


text:
Serving up all the latest food news, cool foodie products, gossip, and good deals that are fit to print!
Burger King Debuts Rainbow-Wrapped 'Proud' Whopper
Burger King introduced a special Whopper in a new campaign to promote LGBT rights. The burger is identical to the standard Whopper and that's the point.
The "Proud Whopper" was sold at a San Francisco outpost during the city's Pride week. The company's video shows puzzled customers wondering what made the burger so different, only to notice the rainbow wrapper's message: "We are all the same inside."
Burger King, which changed its iconic "Have It Your Way" slogan to "Be Your Way" prior to the start of the campaign, is donating all proceeds from the Proud Whopper to the Burger King McLaore Foundation, which grants scholarships to LGBT high school seniors. That charitable gesture, plus those adorable rainbow Burger King crowns, adds up to one heartwarming ad campaign.
(via Los Angeles Times)
We're folding
up your tweets. What does #BeYourWay mean to you? http://t.co/D69mWgaOml
Burger King (@BurgerKing) July
2, 2014
We are who we
are. And it's awesome. #BeYourWay pic.twitter.com/HABi34JNil
Burger King (@BurgerKing) July
2, 2014
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This product has been discontinued
This is a holy grail eye product for me. It gave me a mini-eye lift (upper lids) that I didn't even know I needed! It took the lids I have, in fact, have had my entire life (I haven't yet started experiencing a lot of aging in this area), and perfected them. It also lightened my under eye area (I have extremely stubborn hereditary circles, exacerbated by allergies) by about 40-50%. This will remain a staple for me. It's so rare we find an HG.
On my second tube, I noticed less improvement, but probably only because it worked so well to begin with. I'm experiencing good maintenance of the original results.
I gave packaging only a 2 because the cap should be flip-top -- much easier to apply, and more sanitary; with twist-off, there's more surface area on which germs can congregate. Also, more air can get to the product. continued >>
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No
Being in the cosmetic industry I have tried many, many eye creams - high and low end. For some reason this is the ONLY ONE that keeps me from waking up with sleep creases below my eye. I sleep on my face, and with every other cream I have a line of demarkation that appears on my orbital bone. But not with this inexpensive gem of a product! I know its a discontinued line so I try to buy it on ebay and whereever I can find a rep with leftover pieces. Love it! HG status.
This product was discontinued at least 2 years ago and
contains AHA so the shlef life is about 2 years. If the poster
below just got it from a rep she should return it and shame on the
rep for even selling something that is an old product.
If it was purchased on ebay I guess your out of luck about
getting a replacement or your money back.
The first time I used the product, I thought there had been an error in processing my order, as the product which emerged from the tube was a thin watery lotion. It is not the consistency of any other product I've used which is marketed as a cream.
Efficacy? Have only used it 2 days now, so too early to determine conclusively, however, after application the eye area does not feel moisturized as it does with a "cream"
I LOVE this stuff, but I'm so torn on it! I basically hate almost all eye creams, and this one is one of the few that doesn't give me millia... I don't know if this cream has any claims to long term effects or not, but I use it for instant gratification.. I LOVE the way it makes my eyes look! Just some of this and mascara and they look great! A translucent lighter version of your skin is the best way I could describe it. However I've had problems applying it to my under eyes at times. When my skin is on the drier side and I apply this under my eyes I get a horrible mess when I try applying concealer! It just doesn't meld together with the dry skin and the makeup. I stick to applying it to my eye lids and outter eye area, but have on good moisture days successfully applied it to my undereyes as well.. I have a few tubes of this stuff around but when its gone I may very well repurchase it since I've tried so many of these lightener/brightener creams in the past without being wowed until now.
This is a great eye cream. Mary Kay came out with a newer firming cream but it is not as good as this cream. Minimizes lines and puffiness. Not greasy so goes under makeup without shine. The new firming cream leaves greasy residue.
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I used this eye cream for 4 months.. and I loved it!!! It gave me good moisture and it was softening some fine lines I was already recieving at a young age. I thought I found my HG eye cream BUT then I noticed it started giving me little comedones on wherever I applied it. UGH!! I tossed it out and have to go see a dermatologist now to have them extracted somehow. continued >>
More reviews by beautyaddict297
This product is okay. I don't really need it, since I'm only 14, but I use it in the mornings when I don't get much sleep at night and it makes me appear much more awake than otherwise. Other than that, it's okay.


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The wet conditions at Interlagos had given his rivals hope of a shot at pole, but Red Bulls Sebastian Vettel was having none of it. Keeping his cool after the lengthy Q3 delay, the world champion calmly out-paced the field by over half a second to start the years final Grand Prix from the best possible position - and even he was shocked at his advantage
Q: Sebastian, it seems that no matter what the conditions, the pole setter is, was and obviously will remain Sebastian Vettel. How is that?
Sebastian Vettel: Feels good, because today it was not so easy to get your game together: car tyres and the right timing. Probably key this afternoon was to switch to the right tyre after sitting for 40 minutes in the pits because Q3 was postponed due to the conditions. So it was all about having the nerves to wait - and then make the right call. I had my mixed experiences on my mind a bit when going out, but it clicked and I did two really good laps - laps good enough for pole position. I never would have guessed that gap to the cats behind me.
Q: Its your ninth pole position of the year. Are you still counting?
SV: It is never about counting - and all about delivering the result that you want to have. So yes, it was a great feeling - and if it is the ninth, thats also welcomed. (laughs) In fact it is a bit funny: there is so much money spent in this sport and then it is sometimes so that we dont have enough tyres to run more. To please the fans I hope that it will again be an Interlagos special and that although the championship is decided, the racing spirit still lives on.
Q: Nico Rosberg had hoped to grab pole position, alas in vain. But do you expect him to be your fiercest opponent tomorrow?
SV: How would I know? It is a long race - and just remember what happened last year. So the grid is one thing, but what will develop in the race is quite another. I think you also should not write off anybody sitting on row four. (laughs) It might be dry tomorrow and none of us has experienced the track in the dry, so it will all depend on how flexible your set-up is for various conditions. But yes, Nico has been pretty fast all weekend long in the wet, so it surprises me a bit that we are as much in front as we are.
Q: You just said it: nobody knows what is going to happen with the conditions. So how do you imagine your meeting with your engineers?
SV: True, you cannot do so much on the set-up, but you can go a bit more into details - like getting it right with the front wing which will have a huge impact on the driveability of the car if the car is getting too nervous or if you face too much understeer. So yes, the front wing will have quite an importance tomorrow because you also dont want to have to pit because your tyres are destroyed. So things like this you talk through with your engineers. And then there are some tricks that I decline to speak about - who knows whos listening? (laughs) A major part will be dedicated to the questions about how long the tyres will last, as we all have not had dry conditions so far as I just said.
Q: In such a meeting, who has the last word?
SV: Depends on the issue, but in general I want to be included on the finding process. It is always different if you get it wrong or somebody else.
Q: Do you need an element of luck to win tomorrow?
SV: Sure. You need to make the right calls at the right time. That will be tricky - as it was last year. Just ignore the fact that I was facing the wrong direction on the first lap. But we came in on one lap to change for drys and then it started to rain and we came in again to change for intermediates - so things like that are always within reach here. But that unpredictability will spice up the race - and that will definitely add to the show.
For tickets and travel to 2013 FORMULA 1 races, click here.
For FORMULA 1 merchandise, click here.


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16 Jan 2013
BDO's STEPHEN HERRING has stayed ahead of Tax Research UK director Richard Murphy as Accountancy Age's tax avoidance debate heads into the final stretch.
With hundreds of votes already cast, and both Murphy and Herring preaparing their final statements for tomorrow, the debate is still very close. Herring is running with 52% of the votes, with Murphy in close attendance.
Further reading
Today Murphy said that judgments on how to deal with tax matters were based on a moral code, "the reality is that those claiming morality should be kept out of tax are simply in denial about the law, objectivity and the nature of decision-making".
Herring said: "Put quite simply, we should never require an individual or a business which has three or four routes to make an investment to be required, or indeed expected, to choose the one which generates the highest tax liabilities; to choose another route is not 'cheating'."
The debate sees Murphy propose that "tax avoidance is an unacceptable exploitation of the tax system". Herring opposes the motion.
The voting and comment systems are still live to join in for the first time. Those who have cast their vote can also switch allegiances if swayed by the latest arguments...
Twitter: #AADebate
Picture (l-r): Richard Murphy and Stephen Herring
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If budgeting is to have any value at all, it needs a radical overhaul. In today's dynamic marketplace, budgeting can no longer serve as a company's only management system; it must integrate with and support dedicated strategy management systems, process improvement systems, and the like. In this paper, Professor Peter Horvath and Dr Ralf Sauter present what's wrong with the current approach to budgeting and how to fix it.
In this white paper CCH provide checklists to help accountants and finance professionals both in practice and in business examine these issues and make plans. Also includes a case study of a large commercial organisation working through the first year of mandatory iXBRL filing.


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Answered by
Sheikh Nâsir al-Mâjid, professor at al-Imâm University in Riyadh
The issue of distinguishing between literal and metaphorical expressions in Arabic has been a topic of much disagreement since early times. The vast majority of scholars, including commentators of the Qur'ân, language specialists, and legal theorists, acknowledge the existence of metaphor. They do not distinguish between the language of the Qur'ân in this matter. Among them are some of the most eminent and erudite scholars who adhere to the creed of the Pious Predecessors and defend it.
Those who denied the existence of metaphor were motivated in doing so because of how certain innovators abused the concept to give misinterpretations that negate the meanings of the texts of the Qur'ân and Sunnah relating to the Unseen and to the attributes of Allah.
In actual fact, the recognition of metaphor in the Arabic language presents no danger. This is because the default assumption for any instance of language is that it must be understood literally unless there is a contextual indicator to show otherwise. This is a matter of unanimous scholarly agreement.
When it comes to texts relating to maters of the Unseen, there cannot conceivably be any contextual indicator to show the need for a metaphorical meaning. Therefore, a person cannot correctly resort to a metaphorical interpretation in order to negate the text's literal meaning.
Those who make such interpretations and negate the attributes actually do so on the basis of their pre-suppositions as to what those texts imply. They come up with these interpretations to dispel the negative implications that they mistakenly discern from the tests.
The texts relating to Allah's attributes do not lend themselves to being understood metaphorically – neither linguistically nor from their context.
This is, in brief, the general position of Ahl al-Sunnah on the matter.
There is no problem with acknowledging metaphor as being a part of the language. The Qur'ân was revealed in the language of the Arabs. It employed their idioms and modes of speech.
It remains to say that metaphor is a necessity of language – any language – indispensable for its vitality and continued survival. No matter how vast a language might be, its words and expressions are limited in number and can never encompass all the meanings and nuances of meaning that people need to have in order to express the thoughts circumstances of their lives.
If we consider these points, they should dispel our reservations about this topic.
And Allah knows best.
Source: Islam Today


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Found the same room at a different price? Tell us, and we'll offer to match it.
Eneide Residence
These places are famous for their beaches and for their wonderful inlets (Pizzolungo, Bonagia, Monte Cofano, San Vito lo Capo). The structure is also located a few kilometers away from the city of Trapani (9 Km).
The residence is made up of 7 very comfortable and fully equipped small villas, and each of them have a wonderful view on Mount Cofano gulf and on Mount Erice.
With a stay in Eneide Residence you will enjoy the beauties of an uncontaminated sea and the history of a place shrouded in legend.


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MEDFORD, Ore. — It has been months since the Rogue Valley has seen any significant rainfall. Farmers in Southern Oregon have had to rely on other ways to water their crops.
"It has indeed been a dry season, but we really haven't had an adverse impact on the crop because we get irrigation water through Talent Irrigation," said Pheasant Fields Farm Owner Ric Reno.
The irrigation canals are set to shut off this month, meaning rainfall will soon be needed. Reno said water is most important in the months leading up to the harvest season, but it's still needed for some crops. Reno said this winter will be very important to see how the reservoirs will recover.
"We'll see how the weather works out this winter. I'm sure that the reservoirs have been tapped as a result of that and so if we get a good water year, then I think things will work out well. If not, then I think it will be a little more challenging," said Reno.


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So I just got my truck back from the alignment shop. Picked up my son and noticed this on the passenger side front suspension.
I did go offroading this past weekend, and yes they are stock bilsteins with a spacer lift
I am a computer guy not a truck guy, so I will ask you thoughts as to what may be spewing stuff all over my front suspension.
Thanks for helping....


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21 Easy Breezy Beach House Decorating Ideas
Whether you live by the beach or just dream about ocean breezes, enhance the natural beauty of your home with crisp white, splashes of bold color, and sea-themed accents.
Shades of Gray
In the kitchen of her summer cottage, interior designer Sarah Richardson chose two different gray-greens by Benjamin Moore for the cabinets: Gray Cashmere up top and November Rain below. The marble tile backsplash incorporates the kitchen's many hues and loosely resembles life buoys—a nod to the home's island location.
Stacey Brandford


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Every January since 2000 I have written a Mormon Literature Year in Review column. I posted the early columns on the AML-List discussion group , but the archives are no longer available, so I am finding a home for them here. Every other Friday this month (when I am not doing the Week in Review column) I will publish one of these early Year in Review columns. I hope you will find the reminders (or new information) about what was significant a decade ago interesting.
2000 Mormon Literature Year in Review
January 2001. What is a cultural genre without a year-in-review? And what is a year-in-review without a largely ignorant reviewer? That's me! So here is my own personal year in review of Mormon Literature, based on what I've read and the reviews and notices that I have seen.
I'll start with the novels. There were three truly great Mormon novels this year, and several very good ones that were both challenging and faithful, probably as many as I've ever seen in a year. Here are my favorites so far:
Louise Plummer's A Dance for Three (Delacorete). Plummer is clearly in the very top ranks of skilled Mormon writers. Some may have hesitated to read her work, because all her novels have had adolescent teenage protagonists, and are marketed as girl's juvenile literature. Well, I'm here to tell you to cut it out. I have read all of her published novels, and very rarely have I ever seen someone so skillfully mix together the readability and flow needed in juvenile literature with literary excellence. And A Dance For Three is the best novel of hers I have read. It tells the story of Hannah, a Salt Lake City teenager who gets pregnant, and is abused and abandoned by the baby's father. Her father died a few years earlier, and her mother had descended into a debilitating depression, leaving Hannah to run the house. Hannah cracks under the pressure, and is put in a psychiatric hospital. Hannah and her mother are able to regain some stability through professional psychiatric help and help from a neighbor, friends, and the local bishop. She then decides to give the baby up through adoption.
One reason I have a strong attachment to this book is because my wife and I adopted our son, and hope to adopt more. Therefore the story of a pregnant teenager who (at the end) must decide whether to give her baby up for adoption means a lot to me. Such a story poorly done would make me mad, but in my guts Plummer's story feels right. She lets her character live, not as an object lesson, but as a full fleshy individual, whose pain I feel as my own. The final scene, in which Hannah mourns for and celebrates her baby, will stick in my head forever. I only met Lachlan's birth mother very briefly, and only know a little about her. So Hannah's actions help me, I think, understand her better, and love her that much more. It isn't often a novel can have that kind of impact.
Margaret Blair Young and Darius Gray's One More River to Cross (Deseret). This is a momentous book, probably the most important book about Mormonism published in the last few years. With a few exceptions, the writing style is typical MBY excellence. The fact that the authors tried to scrupulously maintain historical accuracy, and because the two main characters never meet in the first volume, results in a somewhat choppier flow than one might prefer for a novel. But that is fine, because this is more than a novel, this is a retelling of a vitally important, forgotten part of our history and collective unconscious. In some ways, I had more of a feeling of reading a really fascinating history book than a novel, and there is nothing wrong with that to my way of thinking. It won the 2000 AML Award for Novel.
John Bennion's Falling Toward Heaven (Signature). In terms of literary chops, Bennion is in a different world from most Mormon authors. This, his first novel, is mostly an interior story, the thoughts, not the plot, move it along, which will put off many readers. It tells the story of a missionary who falls into an affair with a non-member woman. They run off together, and eventually marry. Although the former missionary has "fallen", the power of his pioneer and farm family background, and his fear of a vengeful God, continue to influence all his actions. He is forced to renegotiate his relationships with God, his family, and the Church, in some fascinating ways. The novel is particularly interesting in the way it places traditional Mormon gender roles on their heads.
Alan Mitchell's Angel of the Danube (Cedar Fort). What a fun, fun book. It is a great depiction of missionary life's ups and downs in 1970s Vienna Austria. The writing is great, the funny parts funny, the characters interesting, and the use of German folklore gives the story an unexpected dimension. The protagonist's introspection is engrossing and credible, without taking away from the crisply moving plot. I'm afraid that some casual readers will be put off by all the tomfoolery (but not irreverence) that the missionaries get involved in, but I'm going to give my copy to my very straight-laced bishop friend who served in Austria in the early 80s anyway, I think he'll enjoy it. It won the 2000 Marilyn Brown Unpublished Novel award, before it was published.
Eric Samuelsen's Singled Out (Cornerstone). Samuelsen fills his first novel with fascinating characters and great dialogue, as befits a novelization of a play. We get to know characters at the margins of Mormon society, like a divorcee, a new member who retains many of her party-girl mannerisms, and a scared single mother on the run. It is fun to discover the strength that often lies behind the quirkiness and faults of the characters.
Dean Hughes's As Long As I Have You (Deseret). This is the fifth and final installment of the Children of the Promise series, which I have loved from start to finish. In this volume, the surviving members of the Thomas and Stoltz families finally are reunited in Salt Lake City after World War II. But it isn't all a celebration, as the individual family members have to deal with the horror and guilt associated with fighting in the war, unease over war-profiting, racism, and a lot more. This series is in many ways as "important" as One More River to Cross. Both are revisionist historical fiction, reminding us of chapters of our part not often remarked upon. And like Standing on the Promises, racism and intolerance, including among the mainstream Mormon culture, are key elements of the book. Hughes should be applauded for not ending the series on a self-congratulatory, chauvinistic note. In fact I think the series is the most significant anti-war work that Mormonism has ever produced. The characters sometimes seem a little more 1990s than 1940s, and there is so much going on that the very difficult issues, like Alex's gradual recovery from his war traumas, could use some deeper exploration. And if you want symbolism or postmodern irony, this straightforward series isn't for you. But within his genre Hughes is a fantastic writer, with a great sense of his historical period at the family and personal level, tackling some difficult themes with credibility and skill.
Honorable mentions:
Curtis Taylor's The Dinner Club (Forward). This is close behind the first six. It appears to be basically self-published, and could use better editing. Still, it is an engrossing description of a man suddenly beset with a truck-load of troubles, centering on his wife's abandonment of the family, and the spiritual transformation which result.
Orson Scott Card's Sarah (Deseret). Average Card, not great, but not bad. He is always a good read.
Also, there are several works I haven't read yet that I have heard very good reviews of and hope to get to soon. At the top of my list are Marilyn Brown's The Wine-Dark Sea of Grass (Cedar Fort), Benson Parkinson's Into the Field (Aspen), and Linda Adams' Prodigal Journey (Cornerstone).
That's a big heapin' helping of quality Mormon literature, all of which challenge our assumptions and prejudices, while remaining essentially Mormon.
How have the Mormon market publishers done?
Deseret: This is the first full year of the mega-Deseret, after the merger with Bookcraft. So, we have a traditionally conservative publisher, sponsored by our very (in terms of public relations matters) conservative Church, which comes close to dominating the market, at least in sales. Well, surprisingly, Deseret made some bold choices, and put out a good deal of quality material. Clearly it has made a commitment to publishing Mormon-themed fiction, and someone over there is making some good decisions.
What stands out the most, of course, is Young and Gray's One More River to Cross, the first of the Standing on the Promises series about Black members of the Church. It took a lot of guts to publish this series, which deals head-on with the prejudices held in the membership about Blacks and the myths surrounding the Priesthood ban. While Joseph Smith is portrayed very positively, other revered members are depicted as being tinted with a variety of shades of ignorance, condescension, and bigotry. And it cannot help but get tougher in the next volume, which will cover the period in which Brigham Young clearly states the Priesthood ban. I hope Deseret Books knows what is coming, and won't lose their nerve with the series. As I said, it is among the most important things they are doing now.
Also, they managed to get nationally-known Orson Scott Card to write a second work of historical fiction based on the Old Testament for the smaller LDS market, with two more scheduled for the future. Dean Hughes provided the fifth and final installment of the fantastic Children of the Promise series, and Robert Farrell Smith published the third installment of his funny Trust series. With Kathryn Kidd apparently finding the "Guide to . . .:" business more profitable, Smith is our reigning humorous fiction practitioner. Also they published Tom Plummer's third collection of essays, Second Wind: Variations on a Theme of Growing Older. And in juvenile fiction they published the annual Weyland book and C. B. Andersen's The Book of Mormon Sleuth, which is apparently pretty good. Meanwhile Gerald Lund, their main fiction moneymaker, came out with two books, one about the handcart companies which was pretty poorly written, and the first of a new historical fiction trilogy about Christ and His Apostles.
Outside the literature world, they have come out with a wonderful edition of the Book of Mormon for the family, with the basic text supplemented by illustrations, definitions of difficult words and concepts, and other useful stuff. It is a beautiful book, which I hope to buy one of these days.
Which brings me to my last point, the covers. Apparently they've hired some skilled people in the design department, because the covers and other design aspects are way ahead of what was coming out of Deseret and Bookcraft a few years ago. The beautiful cover for One More River to Cross is a good example.
Covenant: Covenant is the biggest independent Mormon publisher, and they sure did put out a lot of fiction titles this year. They appear to have found a formula of providing uplifting and reliable work by a stable of productive authors. In fact two of their most popular authors, Rachael Nunes and Anita Stansfield, each published three novels in one year! Covenant also took a page out of Deseret Book's book by beginning a multi-volume historical fiction series, this one based on the Book of Mormon, by David Wooley. I read the first chapter, and the writing is only fair to poor, but apparently it is selling very well. I haven't read any of the other Covenant titles, as their brand of fiction is not particularly my cup of tea.
Signature: Our main "alternative" press was relatively inactive in the literature front this year. Usually they put out a couple of literary works a year, but this year they only produced John Bennion's novel Falling Toward Heaven, a very challenging and interesting work. Perhaps I should also count William James Adams's Sanpete Tales: Humorous Folktales from Central Utah. Anyway, things should pick up from Signature next year, with three titles scheduled for publication: a collection of essays by Eloise Bell, a collection of short stories by Lewis Horne, and a novel by Margaret Young.
Cornerstone: Richard Hopkins' new publishing house is off to a pretty good start, with Eric Samuelsen's great novel Singled Out, and the first of Linda Adams's new last days series, which has gotten fairly good reviews on the AML-list. Michael Ritchey's speculative novels, Disoriented, however, received poor reviews on the list. Cornerstone also has begun a new Latter Day Girl Collection series of juvenile novels, beginning with works by nationally polished authors Carol Lynch Williams and Laurel Brady. Both had previously published under the similarly titled Latter Day Daughters series from Deseret, so maybe Cornerstone is trying take over this niche. Now that Cornerstone has absorbed Horizon, and I have high hopes that we can see some more good things from them.
Cedar Fort: Cedar Fort has done little to distinguish itself in the past, but they published two excellent novels this year. Apparently their sudden improvement in taste is due to Marilyn Brown's new partnership in the organization, as the first novel is Brown's piece about the Mountain Meadows Massacre, which Richard Cracroft gave a glowing review, and Alan Mitchell's great first novel Angel of the Danube, which won an honorable mention in Marilyn's unpublished novel contest last year. Another interesting looking novel is Winds of Change, by Dory Peters, a semi-autobiographical story of growing up Navajo and LDS.
Granite: Granite has published a couple of novels a year for the last few years, and one was turned into a made-for-TV movie recently. I have never read any of their books, or seen any reviews, so I can't comment on them.
Number of literary works produced by Mormon publishers in 2000.
Covenant: 15, Deseret: 12, Cedar Fort: 12, Cornerstone: 5, Granite: 3, Signature: 1, Aspen: 1, Horizon: 1
Historical fiction. With the big success of Lund's Work and the Glory series, multi-volume, hardback-only historical fiction novels practically dominate the shelves of Mormon fiction. Deseret still rules the roost, with Hughes wrapping up his Children of the Promise series, and Lund and Young/Gray starting up new ones. Covenant also is jumping in with the Wooley's Book of Mormon series, and Marilyn Brown continues to mine the genre for interesting things.
Last days. Again, following the success of the Left Behind series, it only makes sense that we will see more Mormon novels set in the last days. Actually there was only one new one in 2000, Linda Adams's Prodigal Journey, the first in a series. But there are two other recent series with new volumes scheduled soon, Pam Blackwell (Ephraim's Seed) and Kenneth Tarr (The Last Days, CFI).
Missionary novels. It was serendipitous that three novels about the missionary experience (and its aftermath) came out the same year as the popular movie God's Army. Parkinson's Into the Field is the sequel to The MTC: Set Apart, and follows the missionaries we met in the first novel to France. Mitchell's Angel of the Danube is set mostly in Vienna, with the last part covering the protagonist's first months home from the mission. Bennion's Falling Toward Heaven starts off with the protagonist serving in Houston, and then moves into his post-mission life. Young and Gray's One More River to Cross also has a few chapters about Elijah Abel's mission during the Kirtland period.
In the national presses, besides Louise Plummer, Mormon authors (all females) produced six young adult novels. They are Lois Thompson Bartholomew, Vicki Blum, Laurel Stowe Brady, Laura Torres, and Carol Lynch Williams. Also Richard Paul Evans and James Michael Pratt continued to rake it in with their popular weepies.
One more thing, there was no major work of fiction about Mormons by an "outsider" or even an "insider/outsider" (or Jack Mormon, whatever you call them, someone with a Mormon background that has publicly become estranged from the Church to one degree or another, someone like Kirn, Van Wagoner, or Freeman). There was one of those "insidious Mormon mystery novels" that Michael Austin studies, Brigham's Day, by John Gates (Walker and Co.).
Short Stories
It was a pretty thin year for short stories. In fact, if it wasn't for the recent rise of Irreantum as an outlet for short fiction, there would hardly be any at all. This was largely because of the halt in publication in the first part of the year of our two most reliable publishers of Mormon short fiction, Sunstone and Dialogue. Dialogue made a comeback, under its new editors the Chandlers, and published three issues in fairly rapid succession in the second half of the year (all of which are officially dated 1999). The first didn't have any fiction, but the second (32:3) was a special AML-sponsored issue, containing four pieces of fiction. The fact that Neal Chandler himself is a published short story author (and professor of literature at Cleveland State University) certainly bodes well for more good stories in the future. Sunstone finally came out with an issue in the Fall, with one short story. Hopefully these two journals will be back to normal next year. Also Mormon fiction could be found in Inscape, the BYU literary journal, and The New Era.
There were two collections of short stories published that I know of, both by non-Mormon, literary presses. Darrel Spencer taught at BYU for quite a while where he helped train a number of AML-listers out there, I think. Now he is at Ohio University. His collection, Caution: Men in Trees won the Flannery O'Conner award and the AML Award for Short Fiction. This collection of stories is less experimental and more accessible than his two earlier ones, but it still is going to appeal to a very small audience, I think. As I read them, I could see that this was a skilled author, but I kept thinking of excuses of other things to do than finish the collection. It was just kind of dull, I felt. I felt the same way about the 1996 Paul Rawlins collection No Lie Like Love. It isn't that I don't like "literary" authors, I loved Brady Udall's 1998 collection Letting Loose the Hounds and Mary Clyde's 1999 collection Survival Rates. Spencer's stories just seemed to lack enough juice to encourage me to read more.
Anyway, the other collection of stories is Brian Evenson's Contagion and Other Stories. I haven't seen it, and haven't heard word one about it yet except for a newspaper review quoted in Irreantum.
My favorite stories I have read so far are Christopher Bigelow's "Daughters of Hysteria." (Irreantum, 2:2), Paul Rawlins' "Faith of the Fathers" and Todd Robert Petersen's "Long After Dark." (both in Irreantum, 2:3). I also liked the Reed McColm's "There is Always Someplace Else" (Dialogue, Fall 1999), even though the ending (brave little sick boy convinces his mother to get baptized through the force of his pluck) seems a little manipulative, I still fell for it all the way, and the overall writing was great. I also enjoyed Douglas Thayer's fable "Brother Melrose" (Dialogue, Fall 1999), it seemed like quite a switch from his usual stories.
Our speculative fiction regulars continue to plug away, especially the ever-busy M. Shayne Bell. "At Bud Light Old Faithful" (Interzone Feb.), "Homeless, With Aliens" (Science Fiction Age 8, March) and "Balance Due." (Asimov's, Dec.). Actually, there were no SF novels by any of our mainstays in 2000. But really that was an anomaly, Card had novels about Bean and Ender published late in 1999 and early in 2001, and Farland was about the same with Runelords novels in 1999 and 2001.
Unlike the novels and short stories, of which I have read a good number, I saw only one Mormon play the entire year, since I don't live in Utah. Also, what with Sunstone dormant most of the year, there were very few plays appearing in print. The only exceptions were Eric Samuelsen's Bar and Kell, a one-act from his Three Women trilogy, which appeared in the Spring Irreantum, and undergraduate Nicole Christensen's play which appeared in Inscape (the BYU undergrad literary journal). So this review is based almost solely on what has been reported on AML-list, and Eric Snider's reviews in the Provo Herald.
Eric Samuelsen and Tim Slover continue to be the leaders in the field. Slover didn't have any new plays this year, but he will have a new play, Hancock County, about the trial of the assassins of Joseph and Hyrum, produced sometime soon at BYU. Several of Slover's earlier plays were restaged, however. God's Fisherman (co-written with James Arrington) was done somewhere earlier in the year, March Tale, about Shakespeare, was produced by ARTE at the Castle Theatre in Provo (directed by Scott Bronson and featuring Thom Duncan—that was the one play I saw), and Joyful Noise (about Handel) played Off-Broadway in February with the Lamb's Theater, as well as a production by the Pioneer Theatre Company in Salt Lake in December. Slover obviously has a good thing going with plays based on historical figures.
Eric Samuelsen had two plays produced at BYU this year. First, in January, a small production called Three Women, which was made up of three one acts, Bar and Kell, Community Standard, and Judgment. Soon thereafter came a main stage production, A Love Affair With Electrons, about the life of Philo Farnsworth, with scenes done in parody of today's TV shows. It sounded pretty fun. Eric also turned the 1999 play, The Way We're Wired, into the novel Singled Out.
Margaret Blair Young, with the Genesis Group, turned a portion of her Standing on the Promises series into a play, I Am Jane, about the pioneer black sister Jane Manning James, and featuring lots of 19th century spirituals. It was performed at the Genesis Group's meetinghouse, then the Browns' Villa Theatre, and a few other places after that.
BYU also produced a main stage production of undergraduate Nicole Prado's Sy's Girl. Eric Snider gave it a fair to poor review, but Eric Samuelsen came strongly to Prado's defense. I've heard good reviews from a couple of people who saw it. Other productions at BYU included Char Nelson, Denise Cutliff, and Kirsten Haskell's The Blacker the Berry, an adaptation of Wallace Therman's Harlem Renaissance novel. It was a joint production of the College of Humanities, Theater department, and the Utah Humanities Council. The play was also performed a couple of times in Salt Lake City, including at a Baptist church. Also undergraduate Nicole Christensen's Spaces between Us: The Dialogues of Il and Elle, which was produced through the BYU Mask Club (student-run productions), appeared in Inscape. And, as has become tradition, the year ended with James Arrington's Farley Family Christmas.
Arrington is the head of the Theater department at UVSC now, so maybe we'll see more Mormon plays produced there. This year Karla Huntsman and the Deseret Dance Theatre performed her Woman in the Wind: The Drusilla Hendricks Story there. Huntsman is a BYU theater adjunct faculty, and a descendent of Hendricks. Hendricks' husband was shot and paralyzed at the Battle of Crooked River. The performance included dramatic vignettes, music, and choreographed movement. Also UVSC hosted the First Annual 10 Minute Play Festival, which included Scott Bronson's one-act On the Romance of a Dying Child.
Speaking of Bronson, the Provo Theatre Company held a reading of his Stones: Two Plays About Sacrifice. The two one-acts were Alters, about Issac and Abraham, which appeared in Sunstone a couple of years ago, and Tombs, a new play of a conversation between Jesus and Mary as she prepares His tomb. Another reading of note was Paul Cracroft's Sam's Place, about Sam Weller.
Utah Valley is the center of the Mormon theater world, with BYU at the epicenter. But perhaps the theater most active in producing recent Mormon plays was the Little London Dinner Theater in Pleasant Grove, which opened in 1999. Marvin Payne has served as the artistic director since it opened, and he put together a program of plays by himself and other Mormon authors, beginning in 1999 with a musical adaptation of Charlie's Monument by Payne, Susan Evans McCloud, and Newell Daley. Plays by Mormon authors produced there in 2000 included former BYU student Josh Brady's comedy Great Gardens! (which first appeared at BYU in 1998), James Arrington's The Mylaynniul Farley Dinner Party in January (which basically was his Christmas play, with a few changes), Steven Kapp Perry's Polly: A One-Woman Musical (which first appeared in 1992), Perry and Payne's new marriage comedy Wedlocked (which first appeared at BYU in 1999, and also appeared at SCERA in 2000), and Payne's A Little London Christmas, which featured lots of beautiful Christmas songs with a brief dramatic framework. The shows tended to be well-reviewed, and the dinner is supposed to be excellent. Unfortunately Payne's term as artistic director has ended, and the next scheduled work there was yet another production of Joseph and His Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.
Other new plays appearing in Utah Valley theaters included Bill Brown's 50s play Riot at Flo's Café at the Villa, and youngster Erica Glenn's Dancing Shoes, an adaptation of a novel, at the Valley Center Playhouse.
Outside of Happy Valley, in Salt Lake the only Mormon plays of note that I know of were Slover's Joyful Noise at the Pioneer Theater Company, and Julie Jensen's Two-Headed, produced by the Salt Lake Acting Company. The play was set in 19th century rural Utah, and dealt with the themes of polygamy and the Mountain Meadows massacre. It also appeared off-Broadway in May. There was also the Christmas musical pageant at the new Assembly Hall.
Marianne Hales Harding's one-act Hold Me appeared in a New York drama festival, and a new play, Next Rest Stop 78 Miles, was read at the Utah Shakespeare Festival. Harding was the playwright-in-residence at the festival this year.
Finally, Neil LaBute's Bash : Latterday Plays, which appeared Off-Broadway and in London in 1999, was shown on the Showtime cable network in August.
Perhaps for the first time there is a Utah theater critic who consistently reviews plays both in Salt Lake and Utah counties (as well as Tuhancan and Cedar City), including the "Mormon" plays. That is Eric Snider of the Provo Herald. And a really great thing about Eric is that he keeps all of his reviews in an archive on his web site, so one can go back and check past reviews. It made writing this column much easier, thanks Eric. He reviewed thirteen of the productions I mentioned above, or a little more than half of them. Of the plays he reviewed, two Little London Dinner Theater productions received A- grades, Brady's Great Gardens! and Perry's Polly. Close behind (B+), in Eric's estimation, came Samuelsen's A Love Affair with Electrons (BYU), Arrington's Farley Family Xmas (BYU), and Slover's March Tale (Castle Theatre). Next (B) came Jensen's Two Headed (SLAC) and Perry and Payne's Wedlocked (SCERA).
Major films by Mormons in 2000 with Mormon themes: Richard Dutcher's God's Army (AML Award for Film) and Keith Merrill's The Testaments: Of One Fold and One Shepherd.
Films by Mormons without Mormon themes: Neil LaBute's Nurse Betty, screenwriter David Howard's Galaxy Quest, and Don Bluth's Titan A. E.
Also Todd F Cope's 1998 novel The Shift (Granite) was turned into a made-for-television movie called The Last Dance, which appeared on CBS in October, and starred Maureen O'Hara and Eric Stoltz.
Doctrinal books perhaps should fall into this category, but there are a lot of them, and I haven't tried to keep track, so sorry. There were two collections of published essays that I know of, Tom Plummer's Second Wind : Variations on a Theme of Growing Older (Shadow Mountain) and Terry Tempast Williams' Leap (Pantheon). This is the third year in a row Plummer has published a collection of essays, and his 1998 collection won the AML essay prize, so he must be doing something right. I haven't read any of them. I did receive Williams' Leap for Christmas, and it is very sumptuous. Williams uses the 15th Century Flemish painter Hieronymus Bosch's triptych "The Garden of Delights" as a jumping-off point to a number of subjects, including faith, family, and the environment. I liked Refuge, Williams' most well-known work. Well, not liked, I was moved by, or impressed by it, but it was painful to read. The things she has published since then, especially Desert Quartet, haven't done much for me. I am easily put off by new agey writing, and her written voice was too much like that for my taste. That is still there in Leap, but it is either more muted or she has more interesting things to say with it this time, because I fell very easily into her languorous rhythms. Of course a large number of personal essays have appeared in Dialogue, Sunstone, Irreantum, and The Ensign over the course of the year.
Web Magazines
Meridian Magazine (www.meridianmagazine.com)is run by Maureen and Scott Proctor, former editors of This People. Every week there are several new articles posted, and usually there is one worth reading. It has improved significantly in the last few months, but there is still lots of schmaltz and boring material. Mystery writer Anne Perry's monthly snoozer of a column is a good example of that. Meridian does include quite a few short articles on the arts. Richard Cracroft has done several columns on his lists of "essential books" for one's library, along with commentary. These have included a list of essential books on Joseph Smith, a list of other essential Mormon biographies, and lists of the great British and American novels. Richard J. Matthews of the BYU religion department also has a column in which he has been reviewing new LDS inspirational and doctrinal books. Kieth Merrill has written about film, including Mormon films. Most intriguing of all, Marvin Payne has a column called "Backstage Glances". It sounds like it might be about the theater, but so far they have been mostly about the problem of figuring what to write a column about. Payne indulges in the Harlow Clark extended-and-imbedded-parenthetical-comments school of writing, and is pretty funny. I also like Truman Madsen's recent columns on religious topics.
Be aware that Meridian also contains a lot of conservative social commentary. It has a constantly updated news bar, with stories and opinions taken largely from what appear to be fundamentalist and conservative news outlets. Anti-UN commentary is especially frequent, not only from the national news stories, but also stories about or by Richard Wilkins, our own home-grown anti-UN activist who has gotten a lot of institutional support from BYU. I have mixed feelings about Wilkins' positions, but I thought his recent Meridian column was totally whacked out. If the International Criminal Court treaty goes through, the Pope might be in danger of arrest for his support of the institution of marriage. Puh-leeze.
Dallas Robbins' Harvest Magazine had the potential to be a more serious, interesting magazine, but unfortunately it never got off the ground, and by the end of the year Dallas announced he was putting it on indefinite hiatus. A handful of interesting articles appeared there, including an essay by Valerie Holladay on Mormon literature, a fantastically interesting interview of BYU professor Woodworth, and a long defense of humanism by another BYU professor.
BeliefNet is a web magazine with articles about all different kinds of religions, with lots of different commentators. Each religion, including Mormonism, has its own sub-page. BeliefNet started strong early in the year, landing Orson Scott Card as a columnist, and including interesting content by Eugene England and others. In the second half of the year, however, things have pretty much died away. Card contributes a column about every other month, as does historian Jan Shipps, and Linda Hoffman Kimball writes a light essay about every month, and that is about it.


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Media Contacts: Bob Brady For The Salvation Army Ph: 202-289-4001 firstname.lastname@example.com
Emily Robbins Dallas Cowboys972-556-9359
Daughtry To Kick Off Salvation Army Red Kettle Campaign During Dallas Cowboys Thanksgiving Day Game
Annual Fundraiser's 13th Year to Appeal for Donations During Economic Recession
Irving, TX (October 30, 2009) - Grammy-nominated rock band, Daughtry, will perform live at the Dallas Cowboys Thanksgiving Day game against the Oakland Raiders in a nationally televised halftime show that will air on CBS television network on November 26, 2009 at 3:15 pm CST, Cowboys owner and manager Jerry Jones announced today. The performance will officially kick off The Salvation Army's 2009 Red Kettle Christmas campaign, the oldest annual charitable fundraiser of its kind in the United States. Through Christmas Eve, December 24, the campaign will raise money for people in need in communities nationwide, providing toys for kids, coats for the homeless, food for the hungry and countless social service programs year-round.
Daughtry- Chris Daughtry, Josh Steely, Josh "JP" Paul, Joey Barnes and Brian Craddock - will perform a medley of hits from their chart-topping sophomore album, Leave This Town and multi-platinum debut, Daughtry, during the first Thanksgiving Day halftime show at the new state of the art Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, TX. Since forming Daughtry in 2006, the band has sold nearly seven million albums worldwide, and is currently headlining their first arena tour promoting Leave This Town, which debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200.
"Thanksgiving is a time for great traditions, like watching the Cowboys' game, giving thanks for the blessings in your life and remembering those less fortunate," says singer Chris Daughtry. "This year, the band will perform at the game during halftime and encourage people to generously support The Salvation Army's Red Kettle Campaign, a fantastic charity that has a real impact on peoples' lives."
Daughtry's performance will mark the 13th year that the Dallas Cowboys Thanksgiving Day game halftime show officially launches the Red Kettle Christmas Campaign on a nationally televised stage. The event has become an annual holiday tradition for fans in attendance. The Red Kettle campaign has raised more than $1 billion since the partnership began in 1997 and has helped the Army to serve 30 million people each year nationwide. Last year, the campaign raised a record $130 million. Previous halftime performers include Jonas Brothers, Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, Sheryl Crow, Destiny's Child, Toby Keith, LeAnn Rimes, Creed, Jessica Simpson, Billy Gillman, Clint Black, Randy Travis and Reba McEntire.
"We are very pleased that Daughtry will be the centerpiece of the Red Kettle kickoff this year. They have shown that their music connects with the American public like few artists have before," said Jerry Jones, who is also the national honorary Christmas chairperson for The Salvation Army. "If Chris Daughtry and his fellow band members bring the passion and intensity they display in their music to this partnership, the importance of The Salvation Army's work can spread far, reaching American donors of all ages."
As the national honorary Christmas chairperson, Mr. Jones will act as an advocate for the campaign during Christmas by helping to spread the word about The Salvation Army's critical programs year-round. For more than a decade Mr. Jones and his family have been major supporters of The Salvation Army. In 1998, Mr. Jones and his wife, Gene, opened the Gene and Jerry Jones Family Center for Children - a Salvation Army child care center for low-income families in Irving, TX. In 1999, the family received the Evangeline Booth Award, one of the Army's highest national service honors. Mr. Jones is now an Emeritus member of The Salvation Army's National Advisory Board and his daughter, Charlotte Jones Anderson and wife Gene currently serve as active board members.
"Like in years past, the Jones family and the Dallas Cowboys help The Salvation Army express the importance of giving back during the Christmas season. This partnership has evolved into a great holiday tradition, and we are honored that the members of Daughtry will help us continue this tradition at a time when people need help the most," said Major George Hood, National Community Relations and Development Secretary for The Salvation Army. "The state of the economy has forced an increasing amount of people across the country to seek help from The Salvation Army. The continued public support of the Red Kettle campaign is a major reason why we are able to provide families with food, utility assistance, adult rehabilitation from alcohol and drug addiction, disaster relief and other services to more than 5,000 communities nationwide."
From its original beginnings as a fundraiser started by a Salvation Army captain in San Francisco in 1891, the Red Kettle Campaign has grown into one of the most recognizable and important charitable campaigns in the United States. As part of the campaign, more than 25,000 Salvation Army volunteers spread throughout the country to ring bells daily and solicit spare change donations to the iconic red kettles from holiday shoppers. In 2008, the campaign raised more than $130 million nationwide, a new record supported by the public's nickels, dimes, quarters and dollars (and the occasional diamond ring or gold tooth) all collected and used to help people in the communities where they were raised. Last year, the funds helped The Salvation Army provide food, clothing, toys and other assistance to nearly 30 million Americans in need. In addition to physical kettles, donors can also contribute online at www.salvationarmyusa.org or through a virtual red kettle on any number of corporate or individual websites and Facebook pages.
About DaughtryBuilding on the global success of its self-titled debut, Daughtry entered the chart at #1 with its second album, Leave This Town. The album's first single, "No Surprise," is the group's fourth #1 hit, extending an extraordinary run of #1 singles that began with its Grammy-nominated, quintuple-platinum debut. The quintet launched its first-ever arena tour this fall and will perform everywhere from Michigan to Florida and Oklahoma to North Carolina before taking a short break at the end of the year. In addition to recording and touring, Daughtry is also dedicated to using its position to raise awareness about a number of charitable causes. For more information about the band and tour, visit Daughtry's Web site, www.daughtryofficial.com <http://www.daughtryofficial.com> .
About Gene & Jerry Jones Family Charities
In the area of community service, Gene and Jerry Jones Family Charities' mission is built upon an overall philosophy of helping those who don't have the strength, the resources or the means to help themselves. As a sports entity that has enjoyed unprecedented success and recognition for more than four decades, the Dallas Cowboys feel a very strong obligation to transfer that championship tradition and the magic that it creates toward the bigger purpose of making a difference in the community. More information about the Dallas Cowboys is available at www.dallascowboys.com.
About The Salvation Army
The Salvation Army, an evangelical part of the universal Christian church established in 1865, has been supporting those in need in His name without discrimination for 129 years in the United States. Nearly 30 million Americans receive assistance from The Salvation Army each year through the broadest array of social services that range from providing food for the hungry, relief for disaster victims, assistance for the disabled, outreach to the elderly and ill, clothing and shelter to the homeless and opportunities for underprivileged children. About 82 cents of every dollar raised is used to support those services in 5,000 communities nationwide. For more information, go to www.salvationarmyusa.org.


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Best Price for this Product: Amazon.com <--Click here for the best deal
What do you get with it?
With the purchase of this CD Organizer, you get the following:
Power Supply and USB Cable (for once, someone actually included a USB cable):
Quick Connect Guide and the PC CD Organizing Software:
The Actual CD Organizer (be a bitch if it didn't come with it =p )"
Impressions and Product Usage
In all actuality, this is a well made product. I thought for a first attempt at a company making a tower like this that there were going to be some bugs, quality problems or poor workmanship (you ever bought a car in its first model year, BIG mistake!!), but I could not find a thing. This tower is SOLID.
I took the liberty to take off the back cover just to see what made this little bugger tick and I was surprised as to how simple the internal workings of the tower were. The unit is basically belt driven up and down and gear driven trays controlled by a small onboard circuit board. Simple but effective. I myself use the KISS principle (Keep It Simple Stupid).
The premise of this tower is that you can use the functionality whether it is hooked to your computer, or if you have a real good memory of where you placed the CD's and no computer at all. The above buttons will allow you access to all CD slots and allow you to eject them and there are greed LED's indicating which tray is occupied. Some websites that have reviewed this tower have complained about the slow access if you were going to the 75th slot from the first slot, but I found that it is still faster to use this then to fumble around your room like an "Amsterdam crack addict looking for his/her last rock" looking for that damn half-life CD buried within the cornchip bags and Vaseline intensive care bottles. It is just plain simple and for some websites to think that a company is going to make a product that will access those trays that fast will enable enough energy to make it jump off the floor (Would be funny, but only the first time until it hit the ceiling). The unit is quiet and only emits a light humming when accessing different trays and turns off automatically when not in use for a short time. One thing that I would have liked the unit to have is a longer power down time because numerous times, I have extracted a CD from the tower, installed the software on the CD only to come around and have the unit turned off. This in turn forces me to turn the unit on again by hitting the extract button and waiting for the unit to go through it's power on cycle for 30 seconds, it's kind of frustrating sometimes. Another neat function is if left on with a tray open, the unit should close the tray before auto-shutting down. Just a thought =).
The software is simple and easy. It allows you to label what is in the trays and the tray number the media is stored in. Again, nice and simple. The nice part about the software is that you can set a tray as being lent out to a friend and the software will keep track of which one is lent so that you will not forget like sooo many people do with their CD's.
Overall Conclusion
What can I say other than KDS has released a great product onto the market. There is relatively no problems with the tower other than the small quirks I found with the unit. Overall good effort by KDS and their engineering team.
- good workmanship - finally clearing up the jewel case mess on my workstation - unique product on the market
- Need's a slower auto-shutoff time- tray needs to close upon auto-shutoff
Review score: 9/10 (TweakNews Recommended Product)
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Rock Hounding in Sierra County..Adventures by Jack
At the Alpine, Texas rock and gem show, at which I was a dealer, a customer named Paul who lived in Truth or Consequences (TorC) told me about several spots east of the Rio Grande across from TorC. He had found moonstones at one spot, and a fluorite mine at another. He had also found a mountain lion at the fluorite mine, so I had bought a 12 gauge shotgun to take with me just in case. Normally, I would check out the Gem Trails of New Mexico spots near by, and there are several, but time was short and I did not.
Comment: Rockhounding. The moonstone area was a bust. However, the whole area for at least ten miles south along the Rio Grande is volcanic and bears much more exploration than I had time for. There are numerous rough roads to follow to potentially exciting places.
Camping. You can camp anywhere in this area -- on peaks, in washes. The area is desert and beautiful. Flowers in May are blooming everywhere. The area in the hills above the river is all BLM land. I will camp in the "fishing meadow" mentioned below as a base camp the next time I go. The Rio Grande provides water for a bath after a long and dusty day in the desert hills and some evening fishing.
Conditions. In dry weather, a two wheel drive vehicle might make it along the Rio flood plain road, but even for this I recommend 4WD. For any of the forks leading higher, 4WD is totally essential. These are old mining roads that are not maintained. They are very narrow and at any moment could throw you hundreds of feet down into a gorge.
As a good canoeist I will scout unknown rapids, always stop and walk ahead if you cannot see the condition of a road in front of you. It may have washed out leaving you having to back up through extremely rough terrain. Also, tire placement is critical. Some of the volcanic rocks have sharp, jagged edges that could easily blow a tire. Some of the spots you will be in would make it impossible to change a flat.
The Dreamer first. On May 2nd I headed out to explore Paul's tips. After a brief but profitable (for once!!) stop at the Isleta Casino, I headed for my fluorite claim in Bingham. The kids at the Alpine and Lubbock shows had ravaged my dollar boxes, and I needed to restock. I arrived there late in the afternoon and spoke briefly with Allison Nilsen, owner of the Blanchard Rock Shop in Bingham.
Then, off to the claim which is 5 miles into the desert. The wind was howling so hard that I had to put rocks on my sleeping bag to keep it from blowing off the cot, but it calmed down by morning. Up at dawn, I explored an old hole in the claim wall and made some big finds described elsewhere in this site -- see BIG NEW FIND AT THE DREAMER CLAIM.
On the way out at noon, I stopped to show Allison my finds. She was suitably impressed. When I told her that I had found the best specimens in a vug that had also been a den of some sort of rodent, she remineded me of the possibility of Hanta virus which I have since researched. Then, it was off to TorC. Moonstone Site.
First, I checked out the moonstone site. Paul's directions were accurate in every respect except for distance. I did find the place -- a volcanic feature rising some 300 or 400 feet above the desert floor. Basically, it was a highly bubbly pumice-like lava, but none of the abundant small bubbles were filled with anything but air. I scoured the draws where Paul had found moonstones, and found none. There may be some there, but....
That evening, dirty to the point of discomfort, I stayed for $10.00 in the Elephant Butte Park just below the Elephant Butte Lake dam. It was virtually deserted, and I enjoyed their shower, shelter and walking along the Rio Grande which flows fast and clear from the dam above. This area below the dam is a special trout fishing area where you can catch two above 16 inches a day on single hook, barbless artificial lures. Search for the Fluorite Mine.
Refreshed on the 4th, I headed for the fluorite mine. Paul's directions were inadequate for what awaited me. To the East of TorC accompanying the Rio Grande south is a vast range of mountains. Paul had told me to enter a particular road south and "go about nine miles." What he had not told me was that, after about three miles, the road branches and branches and branches so that there was very limited possibility of finding what he had found. HOWEVER, this was a benefit. I generally took the higher of the successive forks that I encountered. By this time, I was not trying to keep any sort of mileage record. I generally was following a spine of hills paralleling the major mountain ridge to the East, and the road was very rough. After a couple of miles I saw in the distance to the East what appeared to be a major but abandoned mine and, closer and straight ahead, another mining structure. Heading for the closer structure, I turned up a steep, rugged road towards where I thought the structure would be. This was a false trail because this road led to the top of a hill and a steep 200 or so foot drop off the other side. But, it was interesting. The terrain was all volcanic. I poked around and found jaspers, rhyolites and lots of small quartz crystals. Pretty, but not keepers.
The mine was on another peak, and I could see the road winding down, up and around to it. It took another 20 minutes of slow going to get there. The mine was a large, narrow cut into the top of the peak. Inside the cut was a deep hole which had obviously traced the vein of whatever they had been mining. Again, the hill was all volcanic. I backed out and circled back up the hill along the cut. I found lots of banded onyx including some nice green pieces, some small plates of small citrine crystals, and green traces of copper minerals.
I circled back to the truck to get some water before exploring the structure built for loading what had been taken from the mine to discover what they had been mining. To my unhappy surprise, 50 or more bees were swarming around the truck and in the back of it. I am allergic to bee stings and carry a syringe of adrenaline in case stung. So, this was an extremely unwelcome development. These were serious bees, not the little stingless sweat bees that swarmed all over us at Mule Creek in March. My thoughts immediately turned to escape. It appeared that the little nasties had been attracted to the leaking water container in the back of my truck which was open.
Moving slowly, I closed the back of the truck, climbed into the truck and rapidly closed the window, killed the two bees that were actually in the cab, and took off down the other side of the hill watching 20 or more angry bees captured in the back of the truck (It's a cap). It took a good 5 minutes for the bees swarming around the truck to depart at which point I stopped and opened up the cap door to let the others out. In about 10 minutes I was out of the hills and onto the Rio Grande plain. I never did figure out what had been mined up on the hill.
I continued south hoping to spot the landmarks that Paul had told me about. I did not but drove up a number of washes and side roads to, as the bear did, see what I could see. One of these side trips
ended where the road ended, but the cause of the road's ending profited me. The road had been washed out, but the wash had exposed a small but thick (6 inches) seam of pure white banded onyx. I took 3 big pieces and left the rest for a future explorer.
Heading south, I arrived at a place where the road paralleled the Rio Grande for a mile or so. At the beginning of this confluence, was a sizable meadow with shade trees. A perfect camping site for my next venture to the area to explore and fish.
In Truth or Consequences, take third street (also Rte 51) east towards Engle. Immediately after you cross the Rio Grande, take the dirt road to the right. You will proceed through an area of rough, reddish conglomerate and a small residential area to a ranch. I didn't get the mileage to the ranch (3 miles??). At the ranch, there is a gate across the road. Proceed through the gate, closing it behind you. Immediately in front of you is a steep hill. At the top of the hill the road commences its branching and branching. To get to the "fishing meadow" described above, keep to the right towards the river. The road goes up and down some small hills, but generally parallels, and for the most part is on, the flood plain of the Rio. In 9.2 miles you will come to the fishing meadow. At any point you want, after the ranch gate, you can start branching off up hill towards the mountains to "see what you can see". I'll update this story after I've planned a longer trip to explore this promising region.
The descriptions of my trips will include directions, comments on the nature of the roads into an area, and the difficulty of accessing collecting sites by foot. These descriptions necessarily are based on my own particular set of observational and physical abilities which may be lesser or greater than yours. They are also based on the time of year of the trip. You can assume that the weather conditions at the time were reasonably good -- neither too hot nor too cold -- I'm not a glutton for punishment.
I urge you to take all reasonable precautions carefully assessing the match between your own abilities and the terrain you are entering either in your vehicle or on foot. Dress appropriately for what you intend to do, and be prepared for rugged conditions in you intend to enter them.
• Always take plenty of water
• Carefully watch the effects of the sun and heat or cold on your body
• Always carry a long, sturdy walking stick as it is a third leg for you on slopes and should be used to precede your body at all times where you do not have perfect vision of the next 5 or so feet ahead of you. This is essential to alert you to the presence of rattlers.
• Have first aid handy
• NEVER put your feet, hands or other part of your body into a hole, crevace or space that you have not totally assured yourself is empty of snakes or scorpions or other dangerous critters.