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Unsure if you are a candidate for Bariatric Surgery? This surgery, also called weight loss surgery, offers many people a successful journey towards a healthy lifestyle when other methods have failed. Only you and your Crittenton physician can determine if Bariatric Surgery is for you. Read our frequently asked questions below about Weight Loss Surgery to get a better understanding of the lifestyle changes, surgery procedures, and generable information. Do you have specific questions? Ask Crittenton directly, by contacting us today.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Bariatric Surgery
Bariatric surgery includes a variety of procedures performed on people who are obese. Weight loss is achieved by reducing the size of the stomach with a gastric band, by removing a portion of the stomach or by re-routing the small intestines to a small stomach pouch.
Why should someone consider Bariatric Surgery?
For some, no amount of dieting, exercise or lifestyle modification can help significantly impact severe obesity. It's a reality that can lead to frustration, depression, and in many cases, serious health issues. Bariatric Surgery is an alternative option that can provide a whole new life. Determining whether you may be a candidate for Bariatric Surgery is a process that requires serious discussion with your doctor and your family.
How do I know if I am a good candidate for Bariatric surgery?
You are a candidate if you have a Body Mass Index (BMI) above 40. Generally, this translates to 100lbs or more overweight for men, or 80lbs or more for women. Bariatric procedures may also be an option for people with a BMI between 35 and 40 who suffer from life threatening cardiopulmonary problems or diabetes.
Who takes care of me if I undergo Bariatric Surgery?
The multidisciplinary team assembled at Crittenton Hospital includes Bariatric Surgeons, nutritionists, psychologists, pulmonologists, cardiologists, nurse educators, case managers, and other medical specialists trained in Bariatric care. At Crittenton, our team treats your family like our family and all medical staff focus on holistic and caring approaches to patient care.
What can I expect before surgery?
Patients should anticipate losing a small amount of weight through diet and exercise prior to surgery to ensure the liver is at an optimal weight. The liver is a large organ that sits right in front of the stomach and by losing weight, it is easier for the surgeon to gain access to the stomach.
- For the two weeks immediately prior to your surgery, you should consume only between 800 -1000 calories per day.
- Limit caffeinated beverages, as they will make it more difficult to stay hydrated.
- Stop all blood thinners or platelet medication two weeks before surgery. Be sure your prescribing doctor is aware and comfortable with this decision.
- Stop all herbs and supplements other than the prescribed vitamins, as many of these supplements cause bleeding problems and interfere with anesthesia.
- Take other medications as usual.
- Take heart medications (no aspirin) 4-6 hours before leaving for the hospital, also discuss with anesthesia doctor.
What happens right after surgery?
After surgery, you will be taken to the Recovery Room. The anesthesia team will carefully follow your progress as the anesthetic wears off. General anesthesia is used for all types of weight loss surgery. A breathing tube is inserted in your mouth while you are sleeping. While most patients have the breathing tube removed as they wake up in the operating room, it may be safer in some cases to leave the tube in and remove it in the Recovery Room. Your anesthesiologist will make the decision as to when it is safe to remove the tube.
Most patients remain in the PACU for several hours, but some remain overnight. Once you have fully recovered from the effects of the general anesthesia, the PACU team will transfer you to your hospital room. If they feel that more intensive monitoring is required, you may be transferred to the Surgical Intensive Care Unit (SICU) or the Step-down Unit instead.
Most patients can start the "Stage I" diet on the first day after surgery. Stage I includes low-calorie, noncarbonated clear liquids and jello. Your nurse will encourage you to do two things on this day:
- Incentive Spirometer: You will be given a breathing exercise tool, known officially as an incentive spirometer. This is a small clear plastic device with an indicator inside to let you know how deeply you are breathing. By exercising your lungs, you can reduce your chances of fevers or pneumonia after surgery.
- Walking: It is very important to get out of bed and walk, even right after surgery. This will reduce the risk of a blood clot and will help you to take deep breaths. It is important to spend as much time out of bed walking as possible, and to diligently use your incentive spirometer. When you are tolerating your diet well, your surgeon will remove your intravenous line (IV) and switch you over to oral pain medication. Most patients are ready to go home by the middle of the 1st day after their surgery.
What kind of pain medicine is given?
In the Recovery Room, your anesthesia team will help assess what type of postoperative pain control will be best for you. If they feel that you will benefit from a PCA device (patient-controlled analgesia) they will set this up while you are here.


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Updated at 11:25 a.m. Monday, Aug. 22, with start time moved up to 4:45 p.m.
Kayleigh Goldsworthy says she's going to pack her PT Cruiser with as many friends as possible and point it north from Manhattan.
Destination: Syracuse.
Reason: The Scarlet Ending plays Chevy Court for opening day of the New York State, Fair at 4:45 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 25.
How's that for a triumphant homecoming?
"Being from Baldwinsville, it's a yearly thing I look forward to," she says. "Regardless, I'd probably drive up for the fair, anyway."
To join twin sister Kaleena and the rest of their band The Scarlet Ending — Jon Tedd, Jess Hafner, Aaron Garritillo and Nick Streeter — on the big stage at the fair will be sweet indeed.
"Mom found out we were playing Chevy Court before we did," says Kaleena during a three-way conference call interview. "We have our parents to thank, and (WSYR radio host) Jim Reith and (fair director) Dan O'Hara. This is a culmination of something we've been trying to have done the last few years."
"We've been playing 10 years in the area," says Kayleight. "I feel like playing Chevy Court is a direct effect of the support we've had these 10 years."
The last year's been a big one for the Goldsworthys.
Patrick Confrey of Sunshine Sachs discovered The Scarlet Ending in October on the Kickstarter.com site, where the Goldsworthys were trying to raise money to film a video in in Vancouver. Confrey sought them out, and they signed shortly thereafter with the company, which has offices in Manhattan and Los Angeles, and numbers Bon Jovi, Usher, Leonardo DiCaprio and Ben Affleck among its clients.
"I moved in February. After we signed a management contract, I kind of knew from there that things would be progressing a lot faster, so I figured it was time," Kayleigh says.
"When I first heard the band, I was completely blown away by their dark and beautiful harmonies," says Confrey, now their manager. "Once I talked to them and realized they not only had the talent and the drive, but were also really great people, I knew that I had to work with them."
Kaleena, though, stayed in Baldwinsville, where she kept her day job as front end manager at Hafner's Garden Center while continuing working on the band with Kayleigh through many emails.
"It's the first time in our 25 years we have been separated," Kaleena says. "It's actually a breath of fresh air, almost. Yes, we're twin sisters. We've been sharing a bathroom forever, so you kind of become roommates. Then, when all of a sudden you don't have that everyday thing, you develop a great relationship."
"It's opening a whole new world," Kaleena says.
"We went to a Rolling Stone party. VIP. Red carpet. We have a company that knows what they're doing in promotion and management," Kayleigh says. "They'll be the seventh band member now."
The twins are working on material for the album that will follow up No. 2, "Ghost," which they recorded at The Hollow, the studio owned by their dad, Jim Goldsworthy, and released in April 2010.
"We started finding our way with 'Ghost.' Now it's a lockdown," Kayleigh says. "We're really excited about it. We're focusing on our voices. It has a heavy feel, like 'Ghost.' But we leave space to settle out. It's really exciting."
"We'll push ourselves further than 'Ghost.' Some is Fiona Apple-ie. It sounds like us, but we're pushing genres," says Kaleena.
They agree that anything can happen with the band.
Neither has been able to give up other work. In Manhattan, Kayleigh works as a cocktail waitress at music club Prohibition as well as doing freelance graphic work. Kaleena says she's been working at Hafner's so long that she really does feel like part of the family.
"We can go upward," Kayleigh says. "We've put our entire lives into this band. Next year, I'll be in this band for more than half my life. I feel like we're getting to that point where we see the light at the end of the tunnel. We don't know if it can be our only job, but we do know that we're putting out the best work we can and getting noticed, by fans and industry people. We're looking forward to this album."
Here's a clip of The Scarlet Ending playing "Cities by the Ocean," from "Ghosts," at The Lost Horizon.
And here's the video for their song "Exactly What You Want."
» New York State Fair: Latest news, schedules, concert line ups and more (Aug. 25 - Sept. 5, 2011)


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Type of Account for a Minor
- Traditional IRA
- Roth IRA
The Uniform Gifts to Minors Act (UGMA) and Uniform Transfers to Minors Act (UTMA) allow an adult to give a gift, such as shares of a mutual fund, to a minor. There is one custodian and one minor allowed for each UTMA/UTMA account, and the custodian directs transactions for the minor.
Accounts are registered to the minor's Social Security number for tax reporting purposes and offer some tax advantages.
UGMA/UTMA provisions vary by state. The custodian should consult a legal advisor regarding obligations.Account Details
A traditional IRA offers the opportunity to make tax-deductible contributions if you meet certain income guidelines as indicated by the IRS. Contributions and earnings grow tax-deferred until eligible for qualified withdrawals, usually when you reach age 59 1/2. Mandatory withdrawals must begin after you turn 70 1/2, and you cannot contribute after age 70 1/2.
To understand a Traditional IRA, you will need to read, understand and agree to the terms and conditions in the Traditional IRA.
Disclosure Statement and Custodial Agreement
Account Details
A Roth IRA offers the opportunity to contribute on an after-tax basis. Earnings on contributions grow tax-free until eligible for qualified distributions, usually when you reach 59½. You may contribute at any age, provided you meet the income requirements. There are no mandatory withdrawal requirements.
To understand a Roth IRA, you will need to read, understand and agree to the terms and conditions in the Roth IRA.
Disclosure Statement and Custodial Agreement
Account Details


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4000 Point Card
The card had 4000 points on it just like the description said it would. I redeemed my points and spend them from time to time. The XBOX360 is an effective way to waste a lot of time and these points certainly help!
Was this review helpful to you?YESNO


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Elizabeth Houston's Articles
Digital and Social
Creating Meaningful Events with Social Media
The ins and outs of how to use social media effectively for on- and offline events can be overwhelming. What technologiesRead More
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Using Social Media to Create 'The Event'
As final preparations are underway for the July 31st (9am PT) Let's Chat! #Ciscosmt Training Series USTREAM broadcast, let's getRead More
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How do you turn social media on its head and make it unique for your initiatives? I'm always fascinated toRead More
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Did you happen to catch the Let's Chat! #ciscosmt Social Media Training Series executive panel USTREAM broadcast on Wednesday AprilRead More
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Since launching our internal executive social media mentoring program, it's been really eye-opening to get a close up view ofRead More
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How Do You Get Executives Involved in Social Media?
"How do you get executives involved in using social media themselves? How do I make it relevant for them andRead More


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It's one night a year when it's hard not to look into the sky.
Last night, people across Michigan gathered together and watched fireworks displays for the Fourth of July. There were a spectrum of colors and sizzlers, horse trails and sliders. It's a great time, unless you're a dog.
Here is a compilation video and photo gallery from fireworks displays from across Michigan. The video includes fireworks from Muskegon, South Haven and Lansing. Below is a photo gallery of more fireworks, including links to stories.
Bay City: July 4 fireworks display kicks off three-day festival
Grand Rapids: A July 4th display of fireworks
Jackson: Fireworks show at Cascades Falls Park brings thousands
South Haven: Fireworks "Light up the Lake" and dazzle thousands of spectators
Fritz Klug is a news buzz reporter for MLive. Contact him at firstname.lastname@example.com or 269-370-0584. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ or App.net.


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Which, come to think of it, they must have seemed at the time, too! Because surely by mid-18th century in France, you didn't need a weatherman to see which way the wind was blowing. Even Madame de Pompadour herself was starting to get the message: It's cold outside.
But enough of this "fountain of awful metaphors" (as Tony Kushner calls his in "The Illusion," which is getting a smart and funny production from the Public Playhouse these days, about which, more later). I'm really here to talk about Adam Gopnik, the long-time New Yorker writer/critic, and his talk at the museum on Friday night.
Gopnik was that rare combination of informal and informed. He knows his 18th century French painting and his 18th century French philosophy, and he had a sharp point he wanted to make. Specifically, he wanted to argue that what you and I today might see as soft-core porn for enfeebled noblemen in the museum's "La volupte du Gout: French Painting in the Age of Madame de Pompadour" was in fact the "radical Rococo" -- part of a culture that married sensual pleasure and philosophy, thanks in part to the good graces of Madame de Pompadour. Operating without notes, but with lots of slides and asides, he didn't argue this pedantically. He argued it narratively.
The woman at the center of his story, however, was NOT Madame de Pompadour. She held the parties, staged and acted in the plays, paid the musicians, supported the writers, and encouraged the rest of the court to do the same. But though she was apparently a delightful actress (we can see her in action in a painting at the art museum), she wasn't in and of herself the perfect marriage of philosophy and sensuality. The Marquise du Chatelet, however, was, and the story of her affair with Voltaire, the greatest public intellectual of the day, was the synecdoche that Gopnik was looking for.
Gopnik tracked the fantasy of erotic love mating with pure reason back to Fontenelle, whom he called the first great popularizer of science in France. Fontenelle's "Conversations on the Pluralities of Worlds" (which helped to spread Copernicus' idea that the Earth and other planets revolved around the sun) was set up as a series of dialogues between a philosopher and a beautiful young Marquise, hungry for learning. This image animated Voltaire. "Voltaire has the dream that he will make this fantasy of of sharing the universe with a beautiful, gifted woman come true."
When Voltaire meets Emilie du Chatelet, he meets his fantasy. She's already among the most gifted intellectuals of the time, and Voltaire proposes to her that they run off to study Newton together, "which is a hell of a line to give a girl," Gopnik noted. Though in this case it worked. "She runs away with Voltaire, and they begin a great intellectual adventure." Which is about bringing the findings of Newton and the other English scientists to France, which also had the effect of pushing Descartes to the side of the rode as a scientist (but that's another story). To Gopnik, Emilie stands for "feminism, adultery and Newtonian science."
And here he made a turn: the paintings of a court life that was based on "licentious, hedonistic, pleasure-seeking was inseparable from the the scientific investigations." In short, the learning that was at the heart of the Enlightnment was done by "voluptuous philosophes," like Voltaire and Emilie du Chatelet. And the painting in the exhibition at the art museum, which seems so frivolous, is part and parcel of the whole thing.
When we look at the pictures, there is a lot of confirmation. Women and the intimate life are at the center of things, not men doing battle. Madame de Pompadour is painted with sheaves of music in her hands, surrounded by books, paintings, a glove and manuscripts. Apollo "reveals his divinity" to a Shepherdess (who is Madame de Pompadour!), Psyche pleads with Cupid (who is represented a LOT in this show), gardens filled with statuary are represented, Europa is abducted, Aeneas is deified by Venus. Everywhere you look you see books and music, muses and intimate conversations between men and women.
So, according to Gopnik, the new learning takes place in a feminine space, not a masculine one. He goes back to Voltaire and Emilie. He stumbles over Newton and moves on to human rights, fighting against torture and penal servitude and for the right of habeas corpus. She takes a younger lover, creates the translation of Newton's "Principia" that is still read in France to this day, has a child and then dies. "Because Voltaire takes pleasure in the beauties of life, he feels bound to protect it for everyone so he can protect it for himself," Gopnik said.
And now the final turn of Gopnik's talk: In the salons of the 18th century, we see a model for how society changes swiftly, driven by conversation and not force of arms. More than that, we see a precondition of a democratic society. Gopnik brought in the political philosopher Jurgen Habermas to help make the case, and Alexis de Tocqueville, the great French observer of 19th century America. Habermas has argued that the creation of an active civil society, which meets in coffeehouses and salons, is crucial to the development of democracy. The smaller voluntary groups we form are an important part of that. So is the creation of domestic life that encourages conversation between men and women, as depicted in the paintings. The democratic America that de Tocqueville discovered was awash in this cafe society, these voluntary organizations, this talk around the kitchen table. Ultimately, it's where ideas emerge, are tested, improved and then become important to the culture as a whole.
Gopnik contrasted the "frivolous" Boucher paintings with the Neo-Classicism that replaced it, showing us that great picture of David, "The Oath of the Horatii," with its women huddling in the background while three brothers accept a sheaf of swords from their father, as they prepare to do battle for their city. And that same French militarism leads. Gopnik said, to Goya's "Third of May 1808," and its depiction of the massacre of Spanish captives by French soldiers.
How great are these stretches, from Boucher's lolling nudes to democracy on the American frontier, from Neo-Classicism to the butchery of war? Gopnik argued for them convincingly. But he also suggested, in the Q&A period during a question about the Marquis de Sade, just how complex and contradictory individual psychology, let alone history, can be. A shepherdess on a canvas can mean many things, in other words.
Ultimately, Gopnik said, Madame de Pompadour realized that she might have fed the fire that became the French Revolution and began to back away from her support of the philosophers, who in any case were developing aesthetic theories that attacked her favorite painters. (Diderot, for example, became a big supporter of the simple still lifes of Chardin -- a beautiful one is in the Portland Art Museum show.) But then that's the way conversation works -- it activates thinking and action. And soon the luxurious marriage of sensuality and learning was replaced by the Committee on Public Safety and guillotine. Oops.
We have sped swiftly through Gopnik's talk here -- without doing it too much damage, I hope. When I swirled around the museum's exhibition itself with the "radical Rococo" in mind, it did make the trip more enjoyable. Less "let them eat cake" and more "something important is going on here." I may have to go back for another look. It's cold outside!


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Michigan teenager Denzel Washington said he spotted what he believed to be a UFO hovering over a movie theater during the weekend. The 19-year-old Flint resident said his close encounter was no act and he and his brother were as close as 200 feet from the mysterious black craft they saw. The UFO was described as about five car-lengths long with a bluish-white exhaust coming from it. The brothers' attention had been attracted by bright lights
they thought might be coming from a stadium; however they got a good look at something definitely unfamiliar that moved silently away as they got closer and then disappeared in the blink of an eye. The Journal said police confirmed getting an excited 911 call from Washington but no other authorities had any records of aircraft in the area at the time.
A British burglar set his smart-phone to the "stupid" setting – by using it as a flashlight during a robbery and forgetting that he had the video camera turned on the whole time, capturing his crime spree in its entirety. Emmanuel Jerome was busted at another attempted break-in, and when cops cuffed him and took inventory of his possessions, they found the phone, with footage of a lucrative heist from earlier in the month. Despite the videos, Jerome's lawyer said his client was innocent, although he offered no explanation as to how the clips of the crime scene got on the phone.
A judge's offer to allow an Ohio drug defendant the chance to stay out of prison if he'd give up marijuana might have just gone up in smoke. Hamilton County Common Pleas Judge Melba Marsh says she was astonished by the response from 19-year-old Damaine Mitchell. The Cincinnati Enquirer reported Mitchell told the judge he likes smoking weed and staying off it so he could stay out of prison would be "a challenge." He told the judge he could try to quit but made a request: Could he "at least get one more joint in?" Not surprisingly the judge said no. She wants Mitchell back in court next week before she decides what to do with his trafficking case.


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Rosie Huntington-Whiteley Designs Underwear Now
How convenient!
Model-slash-actress Rosie Huntington-Whiteley has teamed up British high street brand Marks & Spencer to design her own lingerie collection, which she'll also be the face of (naturally). She already models for the retailer's Autograph line, so — to use the parlance beloved by publicists everywhere — her new "design" role is "just a natural extension" of their relationship. Her collection, called Rosie for Autograph, will have a pink rose motif (get it?) and consist of 33 pieces, including bras, panties, camisoles, and kimonos. According to the Telegraph, it'll drop in stores and online in September.


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TAMPA, Fla. -- After illness bumped his scheduled session back by a day, CC Sabathia appeared comfortable while throwing 40 pitches of batting practice to live hitters on Sunday afternoon.
Sabathia's focus remains on sharpening his breaking pitches and working on his cutter, which he says always comes along last. He induced a couple of silly looking swings, though Sabathia said it's way too early to get excited about such things.
"These guys are still kind of behind us," he said of the hitters he's faced.


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Posted by merri on July 29, 2003 at 07:05:40:
In Reply to: Re: Red Hot Pokers Not Blooming!! posted by Jen on July 28, 2003 at 14:24:04:
: I had a red hot poker last year and it did not make the winter. I purchased it when it was in bloom. This year I've started again this time purchasing a plant with no blooms and like you I do not have one bud. I take good care of it, proper lighting, fertilizer and regular watering but still nothing. If things don't work out this year I'm not going to try this plant again. (I am also in Zone 5)


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The Buncher Company is a leader in service-oriented businesses and real estate development. Our sustained success and growth is based on our ability to adapt to the constantly changing business environment. By combining our years of experience with new and innovative approaches to business, our clients are assured the best products and services.
Over the years, The Buncher Company has expanded its business lines from its early involvement in metals recycling and trading to public warehousing, commodity transferring, railroad car leasing and repair, construction and leasing of commercial real estate, residential and hotel development.


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Ellie Krieger, the home cooking expert and patron saint of overworked moms, will be at the Mall at Short Hills Sunday signing copies of her latest cookbook, "Weeknight Wonders: Delicious, Healthy Dinners in 30 Minutes or Less" (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $29.99).
Krieger, a registered dietician and Food Network chef, will be at the Williams-Sonoma at 1 p.m. and will offer a cooking demo of her shrimp dish with spinach, garlic and smoked paprika.
CHATHAM Maple sugaring, opportunity to help identify and tap maple trees, collect sap and watch syrup made over a wood-fired evaporator, 2-3 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. $3. Great Swamp Outdoor Education Center, 247 Southern Blvd. (973) 635-6629.
MORRISTOWN Winter Farmers Market, in collaboration with Foodshed Alliance Farmers Access Network and local farmers, 10 a.m.-
2 p.m. Sunday. Fosterfields Living Historical Farm, 73 Kahdena Road. (973) 326-7645.
PHILLIPSBURG Pork and Kraut Dinner, family style serving with potatoes, vegetables and pies and cakes, 4:30 p.m. Saturday. $10, ages 5-12 $5. Wesley United Methodist Church, Miller Street at Potts Avenue. (908) 859-5725.
PLAINSBORO Slow Food Winter Farmers Market, locally grown and produced foods, 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Saturday. $2 suggested donation. Tre Piani, 120 Rockingham Row. (609) 933-4452.
WESTFIELD "A Spot of Tea," history, customs, display and descriptions of various tea varieties, with tours of museum, 2-4 p.m. Sunday. $3 ages 3-12 $2, ages 2 and younger free. Miller-Cory House Museum, 614 Mountain Ave.
(908) 232-1776.
BELVIDERE "Eat More, Weigh Less," workshop on healthy eating with holistic health practitioner Linda Smith, 6:30 p.m. Jan. 13. Warren County Library Headquarters, 2 Shotwell Drive. (908) 475-6322.
FLEMINGTON Briteside Winter Dinner, three-course dinner to benefit Briteside Adult Day Center, 5 p.m. Jan. 13. $75. Matt's Red Rooster Grill, 22 Bloomfield Ave. (908) 782-8642.
HAMBURG "We Can," program led by dietitian Cathy Olmstead on how to introduce new foods to children and make healthier eating choices, 6 p.m. Jan. 13 through Feb. 17. $90 family. Registration required. Sussex County YMCA, 15 Wits End Road. (973) 383-8116.
MONROE "Create It With Theresa — Vegan Cooking," information discussion and demonstration, 1:30 p.m. Jan. 13. Registration required. Monroe Township Public Library, 4 Municipal Plaza. (732) 521-5000.
WEST ORANGE "Mindful Eating: Be Your Own Nutrition Guide," Saint Barnabas Wellness Institute yoga and nutrition interactive workshop, 11 a.m. Jan. 14. Registration required. Leon and Toby Cooperman JCC, 760 Northfield Ave. West. (973) 736-3200.
The Food Calendar is an edited list of the week's community food events. Submit events online at nj.com/myevent or sign in to starledger.com/events. Find more culinary events at nj.com/dining


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By Tom Philpott
Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., and Defense Department officials have negotiated a proposed increase in military death benefits that would boost total payments to survivors of service members killed in Iraq and Afghanistan by $238,000.
The higher payments would be made retroactive to the start of the war in Afghanistan, in the fall of 2001, to help service families who have lost loved ones in combat as well as those who will in the future.
The proposal has two main features: Designated beneficiaries or next of kin of service members killed in war would receive an additional payment of $150,000 under the Servicemembers' Group Life Insurance, whether or not they had SGLI coverage.
Also, the lump-sum military death gratuity, now $12,420, would be raised to $100,000 but only for deaths resulting from combat.
"The American people want to know that a soldier who gives his life for his country is generously taken care of. It's important … as a statement of our support for those who go into harm's way," Sessions said.
The nation, he added, seeks "a bond" with its warriors and part of that bond are assurances "that their families will be well taken care of if something happens to them. We're not there yet. This bill would make a big step in that direction."
A Sessions aide said the bill would raise military death benefits nearer to amounts typically paid to families of law enforcement personnel and firemen killed in the line of duty.
Another consideration, he said, was the stark disparity in compensation paid to families of service members who die fighting terrorists and an average award of $1.7 million that the government has provided to families who lost loved ones in the terrorist attacks of 9/11.
Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., will join Sessions in sponsoring the Honoring Every Requirement of Exemplary Service (HEROES) Act. They will introduce it when the 109th Congress convenes later this month. Sessions said he expects it will attract broad support and predicted swift passage.
The senator said he negotiated the details over the last couple of months with David Chu, undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness. Sessions said he expects the Bush administration to request the necessary funding — $460 million the first year — in the fiscal 2006 defense budget that Bush will send to Capitol Hill by early February.
A Defense Department spokeswoman said Jan. 12 that the department could "not speak for the White House" on the issue or confirm, at this time, that the defense budget request will cover higher death benefits.
But Sessions sounded confident.
Chu has "been in my office and I've been in his office in the last number of months. The reason I think we may be in a position to see this occur rapidly is because the Defense Department will put it in their budget," Sessions said.
"Otherwise we will have to find some offsetting financing, which become more complicated."
Aides said the first-year costs are high because of the retroactive payments of bigger death gratuities and added SGLI payouts to the families of 1500 service members who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Maximum SGLI coverage would be raised to $400,000 from $250,000 for all service members willing to pay higher premiums. At current rates, monthly premiums for the added $150,000 in coverage would be $9.75. The $400,000 maximum coverage would cost $26 a month.
SGLI also would be modified to include a "no surprises" feature, like one used with the military's Survivor Benefit Plan. Members who opt out of maximum coverage would need to show that their spouse or other beneficiary knew about the decision.
While members serve in a combat area, premiums on the first $150,000 of SGLI coverage would be paid by the government. So a member who elected $400,000 maximum coverage would see premiums drop to $16.25. For the 2 percent of members who decline SGLI, $150,000 in coverage would take effect automatically while they served in a combat area. The government would pick up the cost.
The idea is to protect the well-being of families even if members themselves aren't prudent about insurance.
Tom Philpott can be contacted at Military Update, P.O. Box 231111, Centreville, Va. 20120-1111, or by e-mail at:


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Before you start
This tutorial is for any developer interested in working with energy data on the Web, with a particular focus on electricity data. You will use a number of technologies, including XML, Ruby, HTTP, Atom, Rails, Google Charts, and a little bit of Ajax thrown in for good measure.
About this tutorial
Electricity is invisible. You use it all the time, but you rarely know how much you use. To understand your energy use (and hopefully reduce it), you need to re-engage with energy in a way which is currently impossible. Smart metering and real-time monitoring can help, by making it easy to see just how much energy you use. Forthcoming systems such as Google Powermeter and Microsoft® Hohm offer to make your energy usage available over the Web, but, in this tutorial, I will show you how to build a similar system from scratch using readily-accessible tools.
To effectively reduce energy usage, you need to understand how much you use, and yearly or monthly figures just aren't good enough. For proper understanding, you need instant feedback. With the AMEE API, you will build a system in this tutorial that lets you visualise your energy usage from minute to minute and see changes instantly, connecting you with your energy use like never before.
A number of devices on the market allow you to monitor your home energy usage. In this tutorial, you learn to hook up those devices to AMEE, a neutral energy management API, and then create a simple Ruby on Rails Web site to visualize the results, so you can see your carbon emissions from electricity in real time over the Web.
If you are unfamiliar with AMEE, I suggest you read my introductory article, "Introduction to AMEE," before you start this tutorial. See the link to this article in Resources.
The following tools are needed to follow along with this tutorial:
- A Linux™ PC; I assume you are working in a Linux environment, though most things should be easily adaptable to other platforms.
- Ruby 1.8.6 or greater. Most modern UNIX®-based operating systems will have this installed already. Windows® users can download a simple installer. See Resources for a link to the download site.
- Rubygems 1.3.1 or greater. Rubygems is a package management system for Ruby code (or "gems"). Once you have Rubygems installed, you will need to add GitHub to your sources list as shown in Listing 1.
You will also need the rb232 gem for accessing serial ports from Ruby. Note that this is
currently only available on Linux platforms—Mac and Windows versions are in the pipeline, however. For the display side of things, you will also need the rails gem installed. See Resources for a link to the download site for Rubygems.
Listing 1. Installing required Ruby gems
sudo gem sources -a http://gems.github.com sudo gem install Floppy-rb232 rails
In this tutorial, you will build an energy monitor from scratch using a Current Cost meter and the AMEE API. Take a look at both of these items, before you get into the creation of the energy monitor.
The Current Cost meter
The Current Cost meter is a real-time display unit for electricity monitoring. You connect it to your electricity supply, and it tells you how much power you use at any one time, as well as other stats like how much the energy costs you. The great thing about the Current Cost meter, however, is that it has a serial data output on it, so you can hook it up to your PC and get all the same data in your own code.
AMEE, which is an acronym for Avoiding Mass Extinctions Engine, is a Web-based API that allows you to store and retrieve energy and consumption data, while also applying carbon calculations to work out emissions related to that consumption. By storing your energy information in an AMEE profile, you can build up a history of energy use and calculate a carbon footprint for it.
The finished app
This tutorial will step through the entire process of measuring your energy usage, sending it to AMEE over the Web, and then show the results. You will build a simplified version of the AMEE real-time energy monitoring demo in Figure 1, which graphs the last hour of energy usage for a Current Cost meter connected to it through AMEE. The version you will create will have most of the same functionality, but you just won't deal with the graphic design—you can do that part yourself!
Figure 1. AMEE's realtime energy monitoring demonstration
Measuring energy use with a Current Cost device
Before you can produce and analyze the energy data, you must first gather this data with an energy monitor. As mentioned, you will use the Current Cost meter, which can connect to a PC, uses a public data format, and produces data in XML, which is, of course, easy to parse and make use of in your application.
Real-time energy monitors
Many people use electricity, but they seldom know how much. Real-time energy monitors aim to solve that problem by displaying your current usage at all times. You attach a special clamp around your incoming electricity supply, which is connected to a transmitter. This clamp measures the flow of energy through the wire, and transmits it to a display unit inside your home, so that you can get a live view of how much energy your home is using. These sort of systems are not 100% accurate—and can often a discrepancy of up to 10%—but they are good enough to get a rough idea of what is going on.
Of the many different makes and models on the market, the CC128 Envi made by Current Cost (see Figure 2) is particular interest to you. This is one of the few that can connect to a PC (using a special USB cable), and the only one with a public data format. This makes it a very attractive device if you like to play around with data, especially your own energy data.
Figure 2. The Current Cost CC128 "Envi" energy monitor
Data output
Data is produced from the Current Cost meter in a simple XML format, which is sent as text over the serial output. If you hook up a PC to the meter using the correct cable and settings (57600 baud, 8 data bits, 1 stop bit, no parity) you can read this XML and do interesting things with it. Listing 2 shows the format.
Listing 2. Current Cost XML output
<msg> <src>CC128-v0.11</src> <dsb>00175</dsb> <time>20:57:01</time> <tmpr>24.9</tmpr> <sensor>0</sensor> <id>00077</id> <type>1</type> <ch1> <watts>00280</watts> </ch1> </msg>
The meter sends an XML data packet every six seconds. The fields in the XML represent
different bits of data.
src identifies the type of meter
and software version.
dsb is "days since birth", that is,
since the meter was first turned on.
time is
self-explanatory, and
tmpr gives the current temperature as
measured by the sensor in the meter.
sensor and
id identify which sensor is connected and how, and
type tells you what type of sensor it is (1 is electricity). The most useful information is in the
ch* tags. Each input channel on the meter (that is, each sensor) will have one of these, containing a watts tag that shows the current power usage measured by that sensor. You can get the total power by adding up all of the
ch* sections.
The meter also stores and sends historical data. While you won't use it for this project, it's very useful data. It is also sent in XML packets, but is only sent every two hours in a stream of smaller packets, rather than one large packet. If you are interested, see Resources for a link to the XML format for this data.
Parsing the XML
Once you know you can get useful data from the meter, you need to get it into your code. The first step is to grab the data from the serial port that the meter connects to. To do that, you will build a Ruby script that reads data from the port, separates it into individual packets, and converts the XML into something you can use.
First, look at grabbing data from the serial port (see Listing 3).
Listing 3. A Ruby class to represent a Current Cost meter
require 'rb232' require 'rb232/text_protocol' require 'currentcost/reading' require 'observer' module CurrentCost class Meter include Observable def initialize(port = '/dev/ttyS0') @port = RB232::Port.new(port, :baud_rate => 57600, :data_bits => 8, :stop_bits => 1, :parity => false) @protocol = RB232::TextProtocol.new(@port, "\n") @protocol.add_observer(self) @protocol.start end def update(message) unless message.nil? # Parse reading from message @latest_reading = Reading.from_xml(message) # Inform observers changed notify_observers(@latest_reading) end end def latest_reading @latest_reading end def close @protocol.stop end end end
Listing 3 shows a Ruby class that represents the Current Cost meter. Let's step through what's going on, function by function.
initialize function takes an argument, which tells the
object which serial port to connect to. The Current Cost meter has a fixed set of
connection parameters, so these are hardcoded in the line that creates the serial port object using the RB232 gem installed earlier. The next few lines deal with higher level handling of the protocol. The XML messages are just text, and are separated by newlines, so you can make use of a handy utility class in RB232 called
TextProtocol. This class wraps the serial port up, and only passes on complete messages. It hides all of the details of having to read individual bytes and detect packet separators, making your life easier.
To set up the text protocol, create a new instance of the class, giving it the pre-initialized serial port as an argument. Also specify the separator character for the protocol, in this case a newline. But how do you get the messages when they arrive? Well,
TextProtocol implements the Observer pattern, an implementation of which is included in Ruby's standard library. Basically, any object interested in receiving messages from a
TextProtocol instance can do so by registering itself with that instance. The class which is observing must have an update function, which receives the updated data as an argument.
So, when the meter is created, register it with
TextProtocol to receive the messages when they arrive. You then tell the protocol object to start monitoring the port.
To get the data, you need an update function; when a message is received,
Meter::update is called, with an argument that is the text of the
received message. In this case, the function needs to just do one thing: Take that
message and convert it into something of use. Since the message is an XML
representation of a reading, you will define a class called
Reading, which can be created directly from an XML string. You can
then pass on the reading to someone else who will decide what to do with it. To do
this, make the
Meter object itself implement the Observer
pattern. By putting
include Observer in the class definition, you pull in the required functionality.
Then, when you want to say that something has changed, just call
changed, followed by
with the data you want to send. In this case, you want to send on the
Reading object that you just created. Don't worry about where it
goes for now; I will come back to that later on!
Let's deal with the actual XML parsing now. See Listing 4 for the implementation of the
Reading class.
Listing 4. A Ruby class for parsing Current Cost XML data
require 'rexml/document' module CurrentCost class Reading def self.from_xml(xml) # Parse XML doc = REXML::Document.new(xml) # Create reading object r = Reading.new # Extract basic data r.software_version = REXML::XPath.first(doc, "/msg/src").text r.days_since_birth = REXML::XPath.first(doc, "/msg/dsb").text.to_i r.hour, r.minute, r.second = REXML::XPath.first(doc, "/msg/time"). text.split(':').map{|x| x.to_i} r.id = REXML::XPath.first(doc, "/msg/id").text rescue nil r.type = REXML::XPath.first(doc, "/msg/type").text rescue nil r.temperature = REXML::XPath.first(doc, "/msg/tmpr").text.to_f rescue nil r.sensor = REXML::XPath.first(doc, "/msg/sensor").text rescue nil # Channels r.channels = [] REXML::XPath.each(doc, "/msg/*/watts") do |node| r.channels << { :watts => node.text.to_i } end # Done return r end attr_accessor :days_since_birth attr_accessor :hour attr_accessor :minute attr_accessor :second attr_accessor :id attr_accessor :type attr_accessor :software_version attr_accessor :temperature attr_accessor :sensor # An array of channels. channels[x][:watts] contains the current power for # that channel in watts. # The figure shown on the meter is the sum of the wattage for all channels. attr_accessor :channels # The sum of the current wattage for all channels, as shown on the meter def total_watts watts = 0 channels.each { |c| watts += c[:watts] } return watts rescue 0 end end end
Reading class is very straightforward. It has a number
of attributes that can be accessed that store various parts of the message from the meter, and it has a factory method to create an instance from an XML string. Look inside that.
You will parse the XML using Ruby's built-in REXML library (see Resources for information on using this parser). REXML is a nice
easy-to-use parser, with full support for advanced features like XPath (which you will
get to in a moment). The first step is to create a document object from the XML
string. As the message is short, I use REXML's tree mode, where it parses the entire
document into memory, after which point you can access any part of it. Once you parse
the document fully, proceed to extract the information that you want. Use XPath
queries to grab the parts of the document to put into each attribute of the
Reading object. This might be overkill for the simple data at the
start of the function, but it's useful at the end where you have to parse an unknown
number of channels into an array. Because the code looks for any tag containing a
watts tag, you can grab all the data without knowing how many are there. These readings are stored into an array of channels.
The value shown on the meter is the combined total of all channels, so you also write a helper function to give that total by simply adding up all of the channel data.
The Current Cost gem
At this point, you have a nice set of classes that can read Current Cost readings from a serial port, parse them into a simple Ruby structure, and notify arbitrary observers that something has changed.
All the functionality above has actually been wrapped up as a gem, so that you don't have to manually add it to every application where you want to use a Current Cost meter. The full source code is on GitHub (see Resources), and you can get it by installing the Floppy-currentcost gem. Simply create a
CurrentCost::Meter object, make sure you have a class that conforms to
Observer's requirements, register one with the other, and sit back and watch the readings drop neatly into your application. You can also get all of the source code used in this tutorial in Download.
Next, look at what you can do with these readings now that you have them.
Processing energy data with AMEE
The next step for this data is to store it somewhere so you can access it later on. You will also do some carbon calculations on the stored information, so you can see live emissions from the energy monitor. You will store the energy data in AMEE and let it work out carbon emissions. This section of the tutorial will show you how to take the readings from the meter and store them in the AMEE platform. Before moving on, you will need to sign up for an AMEE API key.
Creating a profile
First, create a profile, which is an area in which to store energy information for an individual (or a company, or anything that can be thought of as a single unit). You can create profiles using API calls, or manually through the AMEE Web interface, details of which are in the signup mail you will get from AMEE. For this project, as you want to use the same profile every time, you will create one manually and pass the profile identifier as a parameter.
Within a profile, AMEE arranges data into categories, each of which contain items. To
store a piece of data, simply create the right sort of item inside the right
category. By looking at the AMEE documentation (see Resources), you can see that the right place to store electricity
information is in the /home/energy/quantity category, using the electricity data item.
This will, by default, use United Kingdom (UK) electricity emission factors, but you can change the country code in the
/metadata category.
Publishing meter data to AMEE
You will need to create some sort of publisher class to do the job of taking readings and putting them in AMEE. This publisher will have to receive a reading, decide whether or not to store it, and create an AMEE request that will store that data if appropriate. Listing 5 shows the code for such a class.
Listing 5. Storing Current Cost readings in AMEE
require 'net/http' class AMEEPublisher def initialize(config) @profile_uid = config['amee']['profile_uid'] @last_minute = Time.now.min - 1 # Store AMEE connection details @server = config['amee']['server'] @username = config['amee']['username'] @password = config['amee']['password'] # Get electricity UID for later req = Net::HTTP::Get.new("/data/home/energy/quantity/drill?type=electricity") req.basic_auth @username, @password req['Accept'] = "application/xml" http = Net::HTTP.new(@server) http.start do response = http.request(req) raise response.body if (response.code != "200") @uid = response.body.match("<Choices><Name>uid</Name>< Choices><Choice><Name>.*?</Name><Value>(.*?)< /Value></Choice></Choices></Choices>")[1] end end def update(reading) # Let's put data into AMEE every minute. if Time.now.min != @last_minute @last_minute = Time.now.min # Create POST options options = { :dataItemUid => @uid, :startDate => Time.now.xmlschema, :endDate => (Time.now + 60).xmlschema, :energyConsumption => (reading.total_watts / 1000.0), :energyConsumptionUnit => "kWh", :energyConsumptionPerUnit => "h", :name => "currentcost" } # Post data to AMEE req = Net::HTTP::Post.new("/profiles/#{@profile_uid}/home/energy/quantity") req.basic_auth @username, @password req['Accept'] = "application/xml" req.set_form_data(options) http = Net::HTTP.new(@server) http.start do response = http.request(req) raise response.body if response.code != "201" end end end end
In Listing 5, first look at the
function. As you must realize by now, this function is intended to be part of an
Observer pattern. Having this function means that you can just register an instance of this class with a
Meter object and everything will flow nicely.
Inside the
update function, you have a few jobs to do. First
of all, do you want to store this reading? The Current Cost meter will produce a
reading every six seconds, but AMEE can only store data with a maximum time resolution
of one minute. So, you ignore any data if it comes within a minute of the last time
you stored anything. Save the current time when you send, and
check it when you get a reading. A more intelligent approach might be to take an average of the readings received over a minute for a more accurate result, but that is left as an exercise for the reader!
As discussed above, storing data in AMEE involves creating profile items. To do this,
send an HTTP
POST request to the category where you want to
store the data. The body of the
POST should contain the
item values that you want to store, along with any other required parameters. Start by building that parameter list.
The options hash in Listing 5 contains the parameter list. First,
set the
dataItemUid parameter. This is a 12-digit hex
string (UID) that tells AMEE which type of profile item you want to create. I'll come
back to how to get that UID in a moment. For now, just assume you already have it. The
next two parameters are the
startDate and
endDate. These parameters define the time period that your item will be valid for. Use the current time as the start, and the end is set to be in 60 seconds. AMEE will round the times down to the minute automatically.
The next few options are the actual data you want to store. For this data item, the
value that you want to store is called
energyConsumption. As
this is an energy (not power) figure, you will send it in kilowatt-hours (kWh). You
have watts, so divide by 1000 to get a figure in kilowatts. AMEE actually wants a rate
of energy—it has a time dimension to it as well as just "energy used". If you
send energy into AMEE in kilowatt-hours per hour, you can just use the kilowatt figure
without any further conversion. The
energyConsumptionPerUnit specify the energy and time
units that you want to use respectively. You also set a name for this item. This isn't required, but it is necessary if you ever want to store more than one data series of the same type in the same category, so add it now.
Once you create the parameter list, storing it in AMEE is simple. Use Ruby's built-in
Net::HTTP library to create a
POST request. The path for the
includes the profile UID and the category path. Provide the AMEE login credentials
using the standard HTTP Basic authentication method, and set the Accept header in the
request to application/xml. This will make sure that any responses you get are in the
right format. JSON is also available. You then send the request, and expect to get a
201 response, which means that AMEE has created the item you asked it to.
The other function in Listing 5 is the
initialize function. This is run when the object is created, so you
can do any one-time setup here. Earlier on, I assumed you knew the UID of the data
item you wanted to store. This is the place to actually fetch it. Make a
GET request to a drilldown resource. This takes a human-readable name
like "electricity" and converts it into an AMEE UID for later use. The path for the
drill is the data category corresponding to the profile category you are using, and
the UID is easily obtained from the XML response by using a regular expression. You do it this way because UIDs are not stable across different AMEE platforms—if you hardcoded the right UID for the development (stage) platform, it wouldn't work when it was time to transfer over to the live (production) platform.
Hooking it all together
As mentioned, the code above is designed to hook directly into a
CurrentCost::Meter object and receive readings directly. You need something around it to initialize that connection, and then to run on our system continuously processing the data and publishing it to the right places. Listing 6 shows a simplified version of such a script.
Listing 6. System daemon wrapper
require 'rubygems' require 'daemons' require 'currentcost/meter' require 'yaml' require 'amee_publisher' # Load config config = YAML.load_file('currentcostd.yml') Daemons.run_proc('currentcostd', :dir_mode => :system) do # Create meter object meter = CurrentCost::Meter.new config['currentcost']['port'], :cc128 => true meter.add_observer(AMEEPublisher.new(config)) # Just let it run while (true) sleep(30) end end
This script uses the daemons ruby gem to run as a background process. Simply load the
configuration from a YAML file, create the
Meter object,
hook it up to an AMEE publisher, then just let it run indefinitely—the daemons
gem can take care of stopping it if you want to.
The Currentcost-daemon project on GitHub includes the AMEE publisher, along with a few similar publishers for different systems. You can set it up to run in the background and publish Current Cost readings to many different targets (including Twitter!). See Resources for details.
Displaying the data with Rails
Now that you have regular readings of your electricity usage and have stored them in AMEE, it's time to do some visualization of this data. While you might do that many ways, I will go for the obvious choice and build something that can display the carbon emissions of energy use over time as a graph. For this, you will build a Web site that can take the data from AMEE and present it in a useful way.
Getting carbon data out of AMEE
The first step is to get the data back out of AMEE. Also, you don't just want one reading but a series of them—let's say the last hour's worth. Fortunately, AMEE provides access to this information in a standard way, by providing an Atom feed for every category in a profile. This feed has an entry for every item stored, starting with the most recent and going back in order. You could put this straight into a feed reader if you wanted to, or run it through feed processors like Yahoo! Pipes, but you will make your own site to consume it and produce some results.
Fetching the feed for a category is as simple as sending an authenticated
GET request to the profile category, with an Accept header of
"application/atom+xml". I'll show you the code to do that in a while, but first look at the feed itself, in Listing 7.
Listing 7. A typical Atom feed for an AMEE profile category
<feed xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:amee="http://schemas.amee.cc/2.0" xml:lang="en-US" xml:base= "http://stage.amee.com/profiles/A2C16CB5BE98/home/energy/quantity"> <title type="text">Profile A2C16CB5BE98, Category Quantity</title> <id>urn:dataCategory:A92693A99BAD</id> <generator version="2.0" uri="http://www.amee.cc">AMEE</generator> <link href="" type="application/atom+xml" rel="edit" /> <link href="" type="application/json" rel="alternate" /> <link href="" type="application/xml" rel="alternate" /> <author> <name>A2C16CB5BE98</name> </author> <amee:name>Quantity</amee:name> <amee:categories /> <updated>2009-08-11T20:49:04.000Z</updated> <entry> <title type="text">currentcost</title> <subtitle type="text">Tue, 11 Aug 2009 21:49:00 BST - Tue, 11 Aug 2009 21:50:00 BST</subtitle> <link href="02D07ECC41CB" type="application/atom+xml" rel="edit" /> <link href="02D07ECC41CB" type="application/json" rel="alternate" /> <link href="02D07ECC41CB" type="application/xml" rel="alternate" /> <id>urn:item:02D07ECC41CB</id> <published>2009-08-11T20:49:00.000Z</published> <updated>2009-08-11T20:49:00.000Z</updated> <amee:dataItem uid="CDC2A0BA8DF3" /> <amee:startDate>2009-08-11T21:49:00+01:00</amee:startDate> <amee:endDate>2009-08-11T21:50:00+01:00</amee:endDate> <amee:amount unit="kg/year">2686.900900</amee:amount> <amee:itemValue> <amee:name>Energy Consumption</amee:name> <amee:value>0.21</amee:value> <link href="02D07ECC41CB/currentReading" rel="http://schemas. amee.cc/2.0#itemValue" /> <amee:unit>kWh</amee:unit> <amee:perUnit>hour<amee:perUnit> </amee:itemValue> <amee:name>currentcost</amee:name> <content type="html"><div class="vevent"><div class="summary">2686.900900 kg/year</div><abbr class="dtstart" title="2009-08-11T21:49:00+01:00"> Tue, 11 Aug 2009 21:49:00 BST</abbr> - <abbr class="dtend" title="2009-08-11T21:50:00+01:00"> Tue, 11 Aug 2009 21:50:00 BST</abbr></div></content> <category scheme="http://schemas.amee.cc/2.0#item" term="CDC2A0BA8DF3" label="Energy Quantity" /> </entry> </feed>
The feed in Listing 7 is just standard Atom with a few custom
extensions for AMEE-specific data. Each item in the category is an entry, though I
only show one in Listing 7 for brevity. Different parts of this
feed will be useful to you depending on your interests, but the useful parts for this
tutorial are the
amee:amount and
amee:itemValue tags. The
amount tag in
each entry shows the carbon footprint of that item, in kg/year by default (you can
change this with parameters to the
GET). This is the value
you want to plot. Also included in the feed are the individual item values, such as
Energy Consumption, which you set earlier. Listing 7 only shows one, again for brevity, but will a series of them
in a real feed. If you want to plot the actual energy used over time, you can use the
amee:value tag for the
Energy Consumption value to get the value for each entry.
Creating the display application
The feed is useful, but you need to display it, so let's built a Web site that can do exactly that. You will use the Ruby on Rails framework for this tutorial, though you can just as easily build the same thing in PHP, Django, Java™, or any other Web technologies.
The first step is to create the Rails application and do some basic setup, as in Listing 8.
Listing 8. Creating and configuring your Rails app
rails realtime_display cd realtime_display script/generate controller Main config/routes.rb map.root :controller => "main" config/initializers/load_config.rb $AMEE_CONFIG = YAML.load_file("#{RAILS_ROOT}/config/config.yml") config/config.yml username: your_amee_username password: your_amee_password server: stage.amee.com profile: your_amee_profile_uid app/views/layouts/application.html.erb <html> <head><%= javascript_include_tag :defaults %></head> <body><%= yield %></body> </html>
The first few commands create the application and a controller for the application
MainController. Rails is an MVC-oriented framework. Requests are handled by controllers, which manipulate data from models, and render views to create the actual HTML output that is sent back to the browser.
The subsequent lines in Listing 8 are some basics to get the
application set up. You set the
MainController to handle
the root URL of the site. You load a YAML configuration file, which will contain AMEE
connection and profile details, and you set up a basic application layout template that includes a set of standard JavaScript libraries, including Prototype and script.aculo.us.
Before writing code, you should decide how the page will be structured. Since the Atom feed can take a short while to retrieve from AMEE, you will load it through a bit of Ajax. The main index page will do very little except set up a container for the results and then call the Ajax action once the page is loaded. To get a live view of energy use, you will also make it load the latest data once a minute. Listing 9 shows the code for this index page.
Listing 9. app/views/main/index.html.erb: Main view, calls Ajax action to get data
<div class="data" id="data"> <%= image_tag "ajax-loader.gif" %> </div> <% javascript_tag do -%> new Ajax.Request("<%= url_for :controller => 'main', :action => 'update_data' %>", { method:'get'}); <% end -%> <%= periodically_call_remote(:url => {:controller => 'main', :action => 'update_data'}, :frequency => '60', :method => :get) %>
Note that the only displayed content here is an image with an Ajax-style loading icon
on it. The rest of the page is JavaScript. The first part does an immediate Ajax
GET request to an action in our
MainController called
update_data. The result of that action will be inserted into the page later on. You also use Rails'
periodically_call_remote helper function to set up the same call to happen once a minute after the page is loaded. You need both, unfortunately, as
periodically_call_remote will not do its first call until a minute after the page is loaded.
Now you can start to write the controller code. This will do all the heavy lifting to fetch the feed from AMEE, parse it, and convert it into a chart image (see Listing 10).
Listing 10. app/controllers/main_controller.rb: parses AMEE Atom feed and converts to Google Chart
require 'net/http' class MainController < ApplicationController def update_data # Grab AMEE feed http = Net::HTTP.new($AMEE_CONFIG['server']) http.read_timeout = 20 http.start items = [] req = Net::HTTP::Get.new("/profiles/#{$AMEE_CONFIG['profile']} /home/energy/quantity?itemsPerPage=60") req.basic_auth $AMEE_CONFIG['username'], $AMEE_CONFIG['password'] req['Accept'] = "application/atom+xml" feed = http.request(req) # Parse data and find max value while we're at it max = 0 doc = REXML::Document.new(feed.body) REXML::XPath.each(doc, '/feed/entry') do |entry| item = entry.elements['amee:amount'].text.to_f max = item if item > max items << item end items.reverse! # Get current value @current = items.last.to_i # Create image URL params = [] params << "cht=lc" params << "chs=600x200" params << "chd=t:#{items.join(',')}" params << "chds=0,#{max}" params << "chxt=x,y" params <<"chxl=0:|#{(Time.now-items.count.minutes).strftime("%H:%M")}|# {(Time.now-(items.count/2).minutes).strftime("%H:%M")}|#{Time.now.strftime("%H:%M")}" params << "chxr=1,0,#{max.to_i}" @image = "http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?#{params.join('&')}" respond_to do |format| format.js { render :update do |page| page.replace_html 'data', :partial => 'data' end } end end end
Note that there is only one function in this controller:
update_data. Because the index action is very simple (it's pure HTML
and JavaScript), you can let the Rails framework render it automatically using the file in Listing 9.
When the
update_data action is called, you need to do a
series of things. First, grab the Atom feed from AMEE. Again, use the
Net::HTTP library to do the request. Set up a simple
GET to the same URL as you POSTed to earlier, with an Accept header
"application/atom+xml". By default, you will only get
the latest 10 items in the feed, so use the
parameter on the end of the
GET URL to force AMEE to give
you 60, enough for the last hour of energy use. Note that this request is still authenticated with HTTP Basic.
Once you have the Atom feed, you need to turn it into something we can put in a chart.
All you need is an array of carbon values, so simply parse the Atom feed into a REXML
document and use XPath to loop through each entry fetching the contents of the
amee:amount tag. Add each amount to the array, keeping track of the
highest value as you go for use later on. Once you've done this, reverse the array so
that the oldest values are at the start rather than the end, which makes more sense
when graphing. You also store the latest value as
@current to display later on.
Now you need to create an image from the data. The Google Charts API is perfect for
this; by simply creating the right URL, you can graph any data without having to deal
with actually creating image files. The charts API consists of creating a URL with a
series of query parameters on the end. The first parameter you add is
cht, which specified the chart type; in this case, a line chart (
Next is
chs, the size in pixels. Now you come to the actual
data, in the
chd parameter. This is a simple
comma-delimited list of values, so creating it is as simple as using
Array#join on the data. You also need to tell Google Charts what the
highest value is so that it can scale the graph appropriately. Use the
chds parameter, setting the highest and lowest values. That's all you
really need to make a chart; the remaining parameters just add axis labels. For more
details on these, see the Google Charts documentation link in Resources. Now, you only need to paste that URL into
an image tag in your page and we will have a graph.
The final stage in the
update_data action is to actually render the data. In this case, since it is an Ajax action, use Rails' helpers once again to render some JavaScript, which replaces the content of the
element in the index page (the
surrounding the Ajax loader image) with content rendered by a Rails partial view called, once again,
Listing 11 shows the partial code (see Downloads for the full source code).
Listing 11. app/views/main/_data.html.erb: Data view partial, renders results
<div id="date"> <%= Date.today.strftime("%A, %d %B %Y") %> </div> <% if @current %> <div id="total"> Live CO2 emitted: <span class="current-power"><%= number_with_ delimiter @current %></span> kg/year (equiv.) </div> <% end %> <div id="graph"> <%= image_tag @image, :width => 600, :height => 200 %> </div>
This is just generating simple HTML. Add the date, some text for the current carbon
value, and then just create an image tag that uses the URL you created in the
update_data action. Once the Ajax call is complete, your page looks something like Figure 3, with a date, a current total, and a history graph.
Figure 3. Your energy usage displayed in your browser
Because of the periodical Ajax load, this graph will update once a minute to show the latest data from your Current Cost meter! Note that at no point does the Web site talk to the meter directly. By using AMEE in the middle, you have decoupled the collection and display of the data completely, allowing you to change either one without affecting the other.
In this tutorial, you created a complete Web-based, real-time energy monitoring solution. This shows every stage of using AMEE for data aggregation and storage, including history and Atom feed output. The display you created here is very simple, but you now have all the knowledge necessary to create something that can connect people to their energy use in new and innovative ways!
|Energy monitor source code
- Introduction to AMEE (James Smith, developerWorks, August 2009): See what is going on under the hood in terms of AMEE API access.
- Monitoring carbon emissions from ICT systems (James Smith, developerWorks, September 2009): For a more detailed view of how to track energy data in AMEE, investigate some of the approaches to calculating ICT emissions that are possible using the AMEE platform, and examine sample Ruby scripts that enable the automatic monitoring of such systems.
- Current Cost Web site: Find details on their hardware devices and how to monitor and reduce your energy bills.
- XML Matters: The REXML library (David Mertz, developerWorks, March 2002): Get details on how to use Ruby's REXML parser.
- Introduction to Ruby on Rails (David Mertz, developerWorks, June 2005): Check out this article if you've not used the framework before.
- Podcast: James Smith on embedding environmental intelligence in your apps (05:03) - 18 Aug 2009: Listen as the author talks about AMEE (Avoiding Mass Extinction Engine) and how to add its environmental intelligence to your apps.
- AMEE home page: Visit and learn more about the AMEE platform and how to measure the carbon footprint of anything.
- Free AMEE access key: Take the first step towards using the AMEE platform and sign up for your access key.
- The AMEE Developer Centre: Learn about all aspects of using the AMEE API.
- AMEE data wiki: Explore the data sources, methodologies (such as the Greenhouse Gas Protocol) and assumptions used in the AMEE service.
- Realtimecarbon.org: Visit this site that uses AMEE to calculate the real-time carbon intensity of the UK power generation system.
- IBM Smarter Planet home page: Connect the systems that run our world to make the planet smarter: with less traffic, healthier food, cleaner water, safer cities.
- Smart Grid: Learn how IBM helps utilities add a layer of digital intelligence to their power grids.
- City of Amsterdam Smarter Energy Project: See how IBM and Cisco collaborate so consumers can make more informed decisions about energy consumption.
- ISO-8601 on Wikipedia: Read about this international standard for date and time representations.
- HTTP on Wikipedia: Get some background on this application-level protocol.
- The GReen IT Report: Find resources for green computing and build your green skills.
- IBM XML certification: Find out how you can become an IBM-Certified Developer in XML and related technologies.
- XML technical library: See the developerWorks XML Zone for a wide range of technical articles and tips, tutorials, standards, and IBM Redbooks.
- developerWorks technical events and webcasts: Stay current with technology in these sessions.
- developerWorks podcasts: Listen to interesting interviews and discussions for software developers.
Get products and technologies
- Source code for the Rails application: Obtain Rails from AMEE's subversion repository.
- Ruby: Download version 1.8.6 or greater.
- Rubygems: Download version 1.3.1 or greater of this package management system for Ruby code (or "gems").
- Current Cost Ruby gem on GitHub: Download this code (and source) for getting data and the Current Cost system daemon.
- CC128 XML data format: Get the full details online from Current Cost.
- The Google Charts API: Try this very useful for simple graphing of data.
- IBM product evaluation versions: Download or explore the online trials in the IBM SOA Sandbox and get your hands on application development tools and middleware products from DB2®, Lotus®, Rational®, Tivoli®, and WebSphere®.
- It's all about Green! group on My developerWorks: Join and connect with other developers about energy-efficient computing.
- XML zone discussion forums: Participate in any of several XML-related discussions.
- developerWorks blogs: Check out these blogs and get involved in the developerWorks community.
Dig deeper into XML on developerWorks
- Overview
- New to XML
- Technical library (tutorials and more)
- Forums
- Downloads and products
- Open source projects
- Standards
- Events
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MOBILE, Alabama -- There will be no LoDa Artwalk in February due to the Mardi Gras parades scheduled for Friday, Feb. 14.
To make up for the lack of Artwalk, Cathedral Square Gallery is stepping in to provide an Artwalk-like experience on Sunday, Feb. 9 from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
"Sweetheart Sunday" will feature food, drink, Valentine's Day shopping opportunities, and a chance to watch Cathedral Square Gallery artists at work.
Brownies a la mode from Wintzell's, wine spritzers and more tasty treats are on the menu!
Cathedral Square Gallery is located at 612 Dauphin St. in downtown Mobile. For more information, call 251-694-0278.


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For the New York Knicks, the first half of the season has been surprising, erratic and ultimately disheartening as a follow-up to their 54-win campaign just a year ago.
Matching their success from last season is all but mathematically impossible at this point, which let's you know just how bad the first half has gone in New York.
All hope is not lost to save the season—at least in terms of making the playoffs—but the Knicks will have to act quickly and learn from their mistakes if anything positive is to come from the second half.
Let's take a look at the six biggest takeaways from the Knicks' first-half schedule.


text:
The past 'week in words' saw some very powerful ones as a community came together to show their love for a 6-year-old gunned down in Saginaw.
Check out some of the other quotes from top stories.
"If we don't step forward, this will continue. Y'all have to get your kids off the streets, or the streets are going to get your kids."
— Walter Carpenter, a speaker at the funeral of 6-year-old Lay'la Jones
"I think police are just glad legislators are finally addressing the fact that super drunks may be the more dangerous of the drunks. If you get behind one of them, it's obvious — they're all over the road, hitting the curb, have inconsistent speed. They'll be driving 20 (mph), then 40, then back to 20."
— Bay City Police Lt. Joe Lanava on the "Super Drunk' law.
"Clearly, the university cares more about football than the safety of its students," Rooney said.
— Farmington Hills attorney Scott Rooney, who represents the victim and his family in an alleged hazing incident at SVSU that saw four football players suspended.
"The cucumbers were beautiful and the potatoes were amazing. You should have seen the cucumbers, you couldn't see through (the plants) they were so thick."
— Elizabeth Mueller St. Mary's radiologist and Kawkawlin resident, who started a garden behind St. Mary's of Michigan in Bangor Township. The produce grown is donated to charity.
More money out of the paychecks of teachers is not going to fix the system. Shifting the cost from the government onto the teachers does not solve problems with the pension system."
— Bay City Education Association President Rick Meeth on school pension reforms.
"From a police standpoint, I was shocked. Other things could have been done. Even if he wasn't my cousin, I would have been upset,"
— Former Buena Vista police Chief Brian Booker on the police shooting that killed his cousin Milton Hall
"Open your wallet. Our money says, 'In God we trust.' "
— Saginaw County Commissioner Dennis Krafft supporting Frankenmuth's decision to fight to keep a cross on public land.
"The land is sick and its gonna take a higher power than me and you to get the job done. They took prayer out of school but you can pray at home. We need to go back to the old time way to ask God to lead and guide us."
— Patricia Lamar of New Alternatives Youth Center during a town hall meeting on violence in Saginaw.


text:
SAN FRANCISCO — Hakeem Nicks came out of the Giants' locker room, jogged a few laps around the field, went through an extended stretching period with strength coach Jerry Palmieri, said a prayer in the end zone with Palmieri and then started running routes and catching passes from Eli Manning.
Now, he's ready to play against the San Francisco 49ers. And so is Mario Manningham.
The Giants' starting wide receivers were both listed as questionable — Nicks with a nagging hamstring injury, Manningham with a knee issue that was revealed on Saturday — but are active for today's game here at Candlestick Park. The Giants have announced no changes to their starting lineup, so both should be on the field to start the game.
Also active and starting is center David Baas, who was questionable after practicing in a limited capacity last week. Baas, the former 49er whose tough adjustment to life as a Giant was featured in Sunday's editions of The Star-Ledger, missed last week's game against the New England Patriots.
As expected, rookie cornerback Prince Amukamara (foot) will miss his ninth game. Amukamara said Friday Tom Coughlin sees him limping from time to time.
Fullback Henry Hynoski is inactive, though that's likely more a coaches' decision than a neck issue. He was listed as probable.
Offensive tackle/extra tight end Stacy Andrews (back), who was listed as questionable, is active.
For the 49ers, DE Ray McDonald (hamstring) is active. He was listed as questionable.
Here are the inactives for both teams:
WR Jerrel Jernigan (hip)
CB Prince Amukamara (foot)
RB Ahmad Bradshaw (foot)
FB Henry Hynoski
OL Mitch Petrus
DT Dwayne Hendricks
OT James Brewer
QB Scott Tolzien
WR Brett Swain
CB Shawntae Spencer
FB Moran Norris (fibula)
OG Daniel Kilgore
OG Mike Person
NT Ian Williams
For more Giants coverage, follow Mike Garafolo on Twitter at twitter.com/MikeGarafolo
Mike Garafolo: email@example.com


text:
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. - James V. Episcopia, 95, of Castleton Corners, a World War II veteran and retired businessman remembered as "the life of the party," died Thursday at home.
Born in Manhattan, Mr. Episcopia was brought to New Brighton as a child. He also lived in Westerleigh before settling in Castleton Corners in 1960.
After graduating from Curtis High School, he entered the University of Alabama to study pre-med. Accepted into the school of dentistry at New York University, he dropped out to join the U.S. Army Signal Corps during World War II. He was stationed in Europe.
Mr. Episcopia went into his family's Manhattan-based paperstock business after his discharge. In the late 1950s, he founded Eppy Carting, a private sanitation company. He retired in 1978.
Mr. Episcopia belonged to Granito-Smith Post, American Legion. He liked saltwater fishing from party boats.
He was a parishioner of St. Teresa's R.C. Church in Castleton Corners for 50 years.
Mr. Episcopia was an attentive host and "the life of the party," according to his family. "He was a good organizer," said his son, James. "He was the one who made sure everyone got up to dance."
Mr. Episcopia's first wife, Marie DiPietro Episcopia, died in 1974. His second wife, the former Janet Carstang, died in 2010. He was also predeceased by his daughter, Rosemary Cusimano.
In addition to his son, James and daughter-in-law Patricia, he is survived by a stepdaughter, Pamela Ross; three grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren.
The funeral will be Monday from the Casey Funeral Home, Castleton Corners, with a mass at 9:30 a.m. in St. Teresa's Church. Burial will follow in Moravian Cemetery, New Dorp.


text:
What do Superman, Wolverine, Archangel, Daredevil, Supergirl, Sonar and Loki have in common (besides the fact that they're all super heroes)? They all possess some manner of super hearing. According to Wired, a lab out of Princeton University is working on bionic nanomaterials that could make super hearing and other powers a reality.
The research team is led by Michael McAlpine, a chemistry Ph.D. who, as he told Wired, "was corrupted to being more of an engineer than a scientist." The latest creation to come out of McAlpine's lab is a prototype of an artificial ear with electronics embedded inside it. One end of the synthetic ear is designed to be connected directly to the cochlea, the spiralled chamber in the inner ear which conducts sound. Indeed, it functions a lot like a cochlear implant, which allows some previously deaf people to hear for the first time — although McAlpine is interested in not only mitigating hearing loss but also pushing beyond normal human abilities.
"The ear was a great proof of concept for combining biological and electrical," McAlpine told Wired. "What I'm most excited about is using these 3D printers, interwoven with advances in material science, and adding biology to them—not just taking the ear to the next level."
The synthetic ear could be tuned to pick up frequencies beyond the normal human range of 20–20,000 Hz, and responds to radio frequencies as well.
Another invention out of McAlpine's lab: smart teeth. By "tatooing" graphene, a crystalline form of carbon, onto tooth emamel, McAlpine created a nanosensor capable of detecting bacteria cells. His team is also working on nano-scale power generators that could harvest energy from the motion of internal organs to power implanted devices.
"It will just be considered normal that you have electronics embedded in your body," he told Wired. "You won't think it's weird that a door will just open up as you walk towards it. We will become cyborgs and it will be seen as just a normal thing."
Via Wired


text:
In a post last week, I was on the verge of bitching about the state of modern poetry. That's not the blog I want to have, so for the most part I'll keep it to myself. Then yesterday on "The Writer's Almanac" I heard and read "The Death of Santa Claus" by Charles Harper Web and it prompted me instead to offer some praise for a really well-written piece.
First off, this is clearly a bit of demotic poetry, as most on Writer's Almanac tend to be. I don't use that term pejoratively either. Indeed my preference is toward narrative poetry: tell me a story while you paint you pictures. This poem certainly delivers that with a very droll concept deftly delivered with a twist at the end. But what really caught my eye with this piece was the unexpected use of line breaks.
Now, if you get any group of poets together and the subject comes to line breaks in free verse poetry, the discussion will almost invariably end in fisticuffs. To me, line breaks are like periods. The represent the end of a thought, and each should stand alone even as they are connected to each other. Recently I've been doing a lot of long-line pieces, because to my ear it gives the work a Ginsberg-esque flow. Many poets, however, create line breaks to generate a certain visual impact on the page. Done well it adds a nice dimension to a piece, but all too often I find it somewhat gimmicky.
No matter what though, each line in a poem should have impact: you should be able to extract each line individually and see the poetry in it. This is true of both strict forms and free verse, and while I seldom achieve this myself, it is what I strive for. (It is also what makes me cringe in so much poetry I see these days, where poets cuts lines randomly, so you end up with meaningless cruft like that turns or of a great, both of which I've seen in actual published pieces.)
But Web's poem has a couple of really well-done breaks. One example, from the last line of the second stanza and the first line of the third:
hospital gowns always flap
open, waiting rooms upset
Hearing this aloud, (which you can at that link, by the way, Billy Collins will read it to you), you get hospital gowns always flap open, waiting rooms upset. But reading it, hospital gowns always flap, I can already see the image. [O]pen, waiting rooms upset you subconsciously have open modifying waiting rooms, which gives you a very different picture of the waiting room in question. Then, toward the end, there's this:
wailing, and the elves wring
their little hands, and Rudolph's
nose blinks like a sad ambulance
light, and in a tract house
in Houston, Texas, I'm 8,
So again, what you read and what you hear are two different things. Reading it though, you are left with the image of the sad ambulance, and again light is subconsciously modifying tract house, juxtaposing Santa's darkness against the place where this kid lives.
Now, I'm not saying that this is the best poem I've ever read, nor that every line is brilliant. I will however take away from it a lesson in technique, a different way of looking at these breaks. Perhaps I can even try it in some of my own work someday.


text:
Off-Campus Work-Study
Off-campus work-study is an opportunity to gain experience in the public sector at nonprofit agencies, often in the student's area of study. Because it is also a form of community service, off-campus work-study is an excellent addition to a student's résumé.
Please Note
Students may inquire about specific non-profit agencies they'd like to work with to see if they are current Smith affiliates or to have the agency apply to become an affliliate.
Only returning students with "Federal Work-Study" in their award notification can hold off-campus work-study positions. No exceptions are made, even after campus based jobs are opened up to non-Work-Study.
Pay Rate
$10.50 per hour increasing to $11.50 per hour January 1, 2017.
How to Apply
To apply for an off-campus work-study position, you must follow these steps:
- Apply for the position on JobX
- Once hired, you must complete the Off-Campus Work-Study Contract (PDF) with your supervisor and submit it to the student employment office immediately. You cannot work until you have submitted the contract and receive an email verifying your hire.
Your Responsibilities
You are still subject to the same policies you would be if you were working on campus.
Commitment to the Program
Only consider off-campus work-study if you can truly commit yourself to the agency and its work. Treat your off-campus work as seriously as you do your academic work. Not only will you be getting valuable experience, but also future employers will consider the importance of the work you do off campus.


text:
Kamen Rider Dragon Knight (Wii) - Onyx : Arcade (Normal)
What do you think about this video?
master monkey: How do you get him?
Carlos Calderon: that game use the engine and music from original japanese game, super climax heroes
GMmaster99: Axe- Beat Arcade with Torque Onyx - Beat Arcade as Wrath without losing a round Spear- Beat Arcade with Camo Sting -Beat Arcade with Dragon Knight Strike - Beat Arcade with Siren Survive Mode Dragon Knight - Beat Mirror World with Dragon Knight Survive Mode Wing Knight - Beat Mirror World with Wing Knight Thrust - Beat Arcade with Wing Knight Wrath - After all the characters have been unlock (Except Onyx), beat Arcade with any character without losing a round
Tyriek York: how do you unlock people
GMmaster99: no, Onyx had the same final vent as Dragon Knight because Onyx is a copy of Dragon Knight
Glide: Didn't Onyx had a different Final Vent? This one is different from the one on the TV show.
spear401: @GMmaster99 hehe, yep. no problem
GMmaster99: @spear401 oh okay, I think I get it now, thanks for letting me know
spear401: @GMmaster99 its just a dirty thought about what Onyx said. thats all
GMmaster99: @spear401 I'm sorry, What r u talking about?
spear401: alright, come..? sorry, but please dont say that, Kit!
GMmaster99: @YaBoyLilJJ u unlock sting by Beating Arcade with Dragon Knight on any difficulty. for Survive Modes Wing Knight and Dragon Knight by beating Mirror World with the respective character to unlock their Survive Mode Forms
Josh Green: how do u unlock sting, survive mode dragon knight, survive mode wing knight, and how do u do a backflip?
GMmaster99: @YaBoyLilJJ Beat Arcade with Camo on any difficulty.
Josh Green: how do u unlock spear, sting both of the survive modes, and how do u do a backflip? sorry 4 all the questions.
GMmaster99: @YaBoyLilJJ u unlock Wrath by beating Arcade Mode with all the other characters and to do a final vent, u switch to your character's final vent card, build up your gauge with attacks and advent guards until the card glows, face your opponent and then shake the Wii Remote to do the final vent
Josh Green: @GMmaster99 how do u get wrath, and how do u do a final vent
GMmaster99: @YaBoyLilJJ Beat Arcade Mode with Wrath
Josh Green: how do u unlock onyx
Josh Green: how do u do a advent attack (like at 1:06)
Kamen Rider Dragon Knight (Wii) - Onyx : Arcade (Normal) 5 out of 5


text:
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Coupeville covered play area due soon
Students at Coupeville Elementary School will soon have some protection from the wind and rain that sweeps through Central Whidbey Island during the winter.
School officials hope a covered play area will be finished and ready for use at the elementary school by the time students return from Christmas break in January.
The school board approved a $318,000 contract with Bellingham-based Myers General during a special board meeting Monday evening. The project includes construction of a covered play area and improvements to the office area at the elementary school. Four companies submitted bids ranging from $318,000 to $413,000.
Superintendent Patty Page said that having the covered play area ready by January will offer students protection for most of the winter.
"We're fast tracking it," Page said. Construction will begin soon, in late September or early October.
The elementary school covered play area was one of the construction projects listed in the bond voters approved in 2004.
Other work at the elementary school is designed to improve building security. Plans call for expanding the administrative area to allow employees in the front office to be able to see who is entering and exiting the building. During the construction period, school administration will work out of the conference room. Page said this will be inconvenient but it will allow the construction work to get done faster.
She described the building work as a "minimal remodel" and school staff will continue using the existing furniture. She said the project was needed to add a safety element to Coupeville Elementary School.
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text:
Through art and music, two young women from Minneapolis will offer a day of creativity of spirit at Bethany House in Fort Dodge.
Barbara Meyer and Beth Joselyn will lead an "Awaken Your Inner Creative Spirit" workshop from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Feb. 20 at Bethany House, 1024 Sixth Ave. N.
"Imagine the joy of simple techniques that will awaken your spirit of creativity," wrote Bethany Director Carol Joselyn. "Combining elements of breath, dance and meditation, you will learn how your inner creative spirit can transform your everyday active life."
The day will include "a lot of playing," Joselyn said, along with "making books, laughing, sharing and grooving."
People attending the workshop may bring a journal if they want, but everything else will be provided.
A goodwill offering will be accepted for the day.
Lunch is included. Space is limited, so reservations must be made by calling 570-3736 or Bethany co-director Jan Coleman at 576-0058.
Bethany House is a nonprofit ministry.
Contact Sandy Mickelson at (515) 573-2141 or firstname.lastname@example.com


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Drip irrigation in turf
Discussion in 'Irrigation' started by JoeinJasper, Jan 2, 2008.
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Page 1 of 3


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yes i would prolly have to say i would
here you go here it is a video for ghost squad and wii zapper do you like them what are your opinions.
some questions i want to ask you are
will you buy resident evil UC bundled with the zapper ?
if so will you still buy it seperate with the crossbow game
and if ghost squad comes bundled with it will u get that to?
will u even get one?
PSN daviduk2000
Gamertag daviduk2000
yes i would prolly have to say i would
it was you >_>
kudos to Gikoku
~Join the Zelda Fan Club~
Spoiler Alert!guess they let anybody be mods now a days >.>
Ein Staat, ein Volk, ein Führer
whoops wrong thread
Lolzo yeah wron ghtread
PSN daviduk2000
Gamertag daviduk2000
is it out 25th Oct in Japan?
What is the int release date?
That looks great man. Yes, I am planning on purchasing both the Wii Zapper and the game. Thanks for sharing.
The key to immortality is first living a life
worth remembering. - Bruce Lee
PSN ID: Byuakuya


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Volunteer Events and Tours
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Join Big Reuse and New York Cares as we tackle the latest donations at our Reuse Centers. Events are scheduled at our Astoria warehouse on the first Sunday of every month and in Gowanus every other Thursday. Please wear workboots or closed toe shoes and clothes that you don't mind getting a bit dirty. Projects range from sorting and measuring salvaged doors, to de-nailing reclaimed lumber, to sorting paint donations. RSVP via NYC Cares
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Learn how to keep trees happy and healthy with the NYC Compost Project hosted by Big Reuse! Help prepare local tree beds during the fall and winter. We'll weed, cultivate, and amend tree beds with locally made compost and mulch to help them thrive in our urban environment. We'll provide gloves, tools, snacks and tree care know-how! All ages welcome at tree care events. Youth under 18 must be accompanied by an adult to sign safety waiver. Please wear clothes suitable for gardening work and closed-toed shoes. For more information or to RSVP, please email email@example.com
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The NYC Compost Project hosted by Big Reuse turns residential food scraps and NYC Parks leaves and wood chip into compost to rebuild our urban soils! We would love to give your group a tour of our site in Queensbridge Baby Park (Queens Plaza South at 10th Street, Long Island City, NY). To book a tour, contact us at email@example.com. Check out nyc.gov/zerowaste for more information about the NYC Compost Project.