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Okay, just checking because the wood didn't look like it had been scrubbed. When I scrub it, all the BBA is gone except maybe just a tiny trace. You forgot to turn your filters off when doing the physical removal, as well. That keeps them from being clogged.
Dead algae is often easier to remove than living algae so you may want to do another physical removal this weekend since you left so much in the tank, especially the wood. Literally scrub the wood until it's all gone. Use a scrub brush and scrub every bit of the wood. That's how you'll get rid of the BBA when it's gotten so bad in the tank. Also, don't forget to turn your filter off first this time. You don't want the filters sucking up that muck.
If one water change still leaves a lot of dead algae floating in the water column, then do another water change before turning your filters back on. I find it's helpful to let the water settle a bit so the loose algae falls to the bottom, then you can vacuum it up when you do the water change. All you should end up with is cloudy water when you refill with fresh water, and then your filters should be able to clear that up quickly.
The goal is to remove 95%-99% of the algae from the wood and any hardscape that you can truly scrub. You can't scrub plants so they'll have to be chemically cleaned. That's why it's important to physically remove what you can. Otherwise, not only will you be left with too much dead algae in the tank for the bacteria to handle (creating a mini-cycle), but you can end up with too much living algae left in the tank to kill all at once with H2O2. Then what happens is you end up chasing your tail with killing it from one area while it grows back in another area. The only way to get it ALL is to reduce the total amount in the tank to begin with. Then you have a shot at hitting ALL that's left with the H2O2.
Not only watch out for a mini-cycle, but I'm concerned for your plants given the amount of H2O2 you used. Did you measure a total maximum ml amount of H2O2 to use when you sprayed it on the wood when the water was low (when you said it made the wood "smoke"). If not, then all that H2O2 ended up in the tank when you refilled it with water which could have caused an overdose of H2O2. You won't see the plants die right away. They'll die slowly. Check for stems that have turned to mush as a result of an overdose.
If you ever spray any part of the tank like that again, you have to either do it outside of the tank where you can wash off the H2O2 before putting it back in or you have to use a measured amount of H2O2 and no more. You can dose however much H2O2 you want on hardscape that's not in the tank, but you need to keep proper doses in mind any time the H2O2 will come in contact with the plants.
I hope all is going well. Please update with pics when you get a chance!
|eek. Well, I haven't noticed any ill effects, yet. I actually did both complexity. I physically removed as much as possible by hand, then scraped as many surfaces as possible without ruining my layout, then used the H2O2, then filled the tank. The filter was pretty clogged with BBA and gunk. The flow in the tank is much better now. I will watch for any mini cycle. I have been adding 1ml per gallon daily since, just hitting the spots I couldn't manage to clean very well by hand.....
Did you do the physical removal or just use H2O2?
Watch your cycle after using so much H2O2 to kill the algae and cleaning your filter at the same time The more algae you left in the tank to kill chemically, the more likely you'll have a mini-cycle if for no other reason than the dead algae will throw a ton of ammonia into the tank. Cleaning the filter at the same time may compound the problem. This is why I stressed doing a thorough physical cleaning before using H2O2 on a tank with so much algae.
|Oh, and it's a pressurized co2 system, 2 bps. Injected by inline diffuser from GLA. The drop checker is light green, slightly a little more towards yellow than the reference solution. The only thing I really worry about is the fact that I bought this really nice light fixture from Catalina and its a 3 bulb fixture. It has 2 switches for the bulbs. 1 switch controls the 2 outer bulbs, and 1 switch controls the middle bulb. I have been running the fixture with just 2 bulbs because I have been told using all 3 would be too much light, but I really want to use it because it looks like my rotala is staying green, even at the top of the tank, and my new grass I bought, even though it's growing, some of the tips are yellowing.....I am not sure they are getting enough light.....My photoperiod is 7 hours, should I just keep using the 2 bulbs and lengthen the photoperiod? I was thinking around 10 hours, is that too long? I always thought as long as your supplying the proper fertilizers and co2, the lights could be on as long as the plants could grow?
|Ok, so tonight, I did a lot of work on the tank. I turned off everything and siphoned out about 90 percent of the water. When the water level was down, I used 3ml per gallon of hydrogen peroxide by pipette on the wood. The wood actually smoked a little, it was weird. Anyway, after squirting every inch of the wood and letting it sit there for about 10 minutes, I filled the tank, added prime......then took out my Rena XP3 and cleaned it really good. After all was cleaned, I hooked all equipment back up, and took pictures. The water is pretty cloudy because I rearranged the Rotala to the left side of the tank and that stirred up the water, but it should clear up soon. Oh, and I also added my fertilizers which I do twice a week....this consists of 1/4tsp Pot. Nitrate, 1/8tsp of the CSM+B, 1/8tsp Pot. Phosphate, and 3/4tsp Pot. Sulfate. I only add the potassium sulfate once a week though.....that's what I was told to do. I think of this tank as medium light planted or so. I am hoping the rotala grows in thick. I took out the P. Erectus......I just didn't like it in the tank
Yeah, I can't take my wood out either for the same reasons. That's why I mentioned cleaning the wood while it's still in the tank. It's great you don't have any fish in the tank. That always worries me a bit when having to do a massive clean up while the fish are in the tank even though I've never had any problems with it harming the fish. It still bothers me.
If you do a good job of physically removing the BBA, you may not need to use higher amounts of H2O2. Keep in mind that the more H2O2 you use, the riskier it is—not just to fish, but also to plants. It is better to do more physical removal and less H2O2 than the other way around. The good news is that if you work very hard at the physical removal, it is possible to have a complete turn around in the tank with just the one cleaning (and a few followup light H2O2 treatments).
Also be aware that Vals, hornwort, and anacharis are all sensitive to H2O2 and should not be treated with it.
Be sure to take lots of before and after pics. If you do a good job with the physical removal of the BBA, I think you'll be very pleasantly surprised with the end result. It's worth capturing it in pictures.
|The full tank shot was from a couple months ago when the water was really cloudy. I think it was that way because of all the ammonia the substrate was putting out initially. ADA soil. Anyway, the water is clear now and the plants have started to grow a lot better. I have also cut out one light from the fixture. Now I only have 2 24" bulbs running (T5HO). I will manually try and get off as much BBA as I can tomorrow then treat with peroxide again at higher levels. I don't have any fish in there anyway. I will post another full tank shot when I get home tomorrow. Thanks Complexity. I would love to take out the wood and soak it, but lol it's not going to happen. My wood is so far under all the soil and all the plants are grown around it.....and it took me forever to get it stable the way I have it, I am sure I couldn't get it back the way I have it if I took it out. I will try and remove as much as I can with it in the tank, then peroxide the hell out of it. I will post pictures as I go to show progress.
Having gone over how to clean the BBA out of the tank, I think it's also very important to consider how the BBA got this bad in the first place. Ultimately, you have to figure out what caused the BBA in order to correct the problem so it won't keep coming back.
While BBA is generally attributed to low or fluctuating CO2, I don't think it's quite that simple. One thing I noticed in your pictures is your water is rather murky. That brings up two concerns:
How long has this tank been running?
What filter(s) are you using?
I see that you have a drop checker so I gather you're adding CO2. Are you doing DIY or a pressurized system? What color does your drop checker usually show? Blue? Green? Yellowish-green? Greenish-yellow?
What lighting do you have? What is the photoperiod?
Are you dosing any ferts? If so, which ferts, how often, and how much?
I'd also like a FTS (full tank shot) to get an idea of what the overall tank looks like. This is very helpful in seeing which plants you have and the density of the plant mass.
Oh, my, you do have a problem! But not all is lost. You can fix this. I once had wood develop algae almost as bad and was able to clear it up surprisingly quickly.
While H2O2 (hydrogen peroxide) will kill BBA, I would not rely on it as your sole source of attack when the BBA has gotten this bad. The best way to approach this would be to first clean it up manually. It's a pain, but it's the best way to go.
Anything that has BBA on it that you can take out of the tank, remove from the tank and scrub off as much BBA as you can physically remove. Scrub every inch of it. Leave as little BBA as you possibly can.
Then soak anything non-porous (such as rocks, intake pipes, spray bars) in bleach water for a couple of hours. A 1:20 bleach:water ratio should work fine. I generally just fill up my sink with water and pour bleach in without measuring.
Anything porous (such as wood) spray with H2O2 and then soak in H2O2 water. Leave it there for 30 minutes.
After the items have soaked, scrub them again. Often, dead algae will scrub off easier than living algae so you should be able to remove the last remnants of algae that wouldn't come off before. Use any stiff bristle scrub brush you can find that's not full of soap. I've also used magic erasers to clean intakes and spray bars to perfection. Once everything is clean, soak anything that was bleached in water with a high concentration of dechlorinator to remove any trace of chlorine that may remain.
For stuff that you cannot remove from the tank you will have to scrub off the BBA while it's still in the tank. I've done this with wood in tanks before. Yes, it makes a huge mess, but you'll clean that up. You can remove your fish if you'd like, but I never have, and I've never had any problems with my fish, inverts, or snails having done it (however, I wouldn't suggest this for sensitive inverts, such as CRS).
First, turn off your filters unless you're willing to clean your filters when you're done. Otherwise, the filters will get clogged very quickly. Then take anything you can find to scrub off the BBA from the wood. I've used scouring pads, scrub brushes, and toothbrushes. It's a time consuming process, but you have to do this. Scrub every inch of the wood. Get all the BBA off of it. ALL of it. It usually takes me a few hours to do this, but it's well worth the effort. The results are amazing.
Once you've cleaned off all the BBA from the wood, do a water change, doing your best to get all the BBA out of the tank. If you have to do more than one water change, then so be it. You can start out by using a small net to grab as much of the large pieces of BBA floating around which will reduce the need for multiple water changes. I've also used a large plastic spoon to "swoosh" the water around plants and the substrate to kick up debris into the water column so it can be netted. When you think you have netted all you can get, then go on and do your water change(s).
After you've finished your water change(s), turn your filter(s) back on. They should finish cleaning the water. The next day, change out your filter floss as it should be clogged.
NOW it is time to start treating with H2O2. This will kill out the small amount of BBA you could not get off the wood and decor. Use 1ml of H2o2 per gallon for your tank (so 40ml for a 40g tank). Turn off your filters. Use a syringe to squirt the H2O2 directly onto the BBA. Once you've used up the full 40ml, turn off your lights. Wait 15 minutes. Then turn on your filters. Wait another 15 minutes. Now turn on your lights. You can do a water change if you want, but it's optional.
I have used higher concentrations of H2O2 (as much as 4ml per gallon); however, the higher you go, the riskier it becomes. If you have done a good job of scrubbing off the BBA, you should not need to take the risks of using higher H2O2 doses. You can repeat the H2O2 treatments as often as twice a day, but space them far enough apart to be certain that the first treatment has completely broken down (H2O2 breaks down into water (H2O) and oxygen (O)). I generally wait 9-12 hours between treatments.
The more algae you kill with H2O2, the more you will need to keep up with water changes to remove the dead algae from the tank; otherwise, the dead algae will decompose and turn into ammonia which can cause your tank to mini-cycle (another reason why physical removal is preferred over using H2O2 with a bad outbreak of BBA like this). So it's always a good idea to test your water for ammonia, nitrites, and nitrates while you're doing all this to be sure your cycle remains in good shape. If you do get a mini-cycle, perform water changes as needed to clean out the dead algae and to keep the water parameters in check. Dose with Prime every 24 hours to protect the fish from any harmful effects of the mini-cycle.
It is always best to catch an algae problem before it gets this bad, but it's not impossible to fix it once it's taken over like this. While my suggestion may include a lot of hard work and may make the tank look disastrous while you're working on it, the results are excellent. The two times I've done this, it has completely resolved the algae problems after just one round of cleaning. So the work is well worth the effort and much preferred over spending months and months of fighting the algae. I've even won the battle over a combination of BBA and Clado using this technique.
|I took these pictures about ten minutes ago. I did a large (80%) water change and while the water level was down, I used about 1ml per gallon of aquarium volume of Hydrogen Peroxide on the branches of the driftwood to see if it would kill the BBA.
Believe it or not this is quite a bit better than it was o_O And hey, at least my water is clear. It was really cloudy:
Since this picture, I have turned off one of the 24" T5HO bulbs, so now I am only running 2 out of the 3 bulbs in the fixture, and I have taken out the glosso which was not growing well obviously, and put in micro sword instead, which is putting out new runners already and has been in there for about a week and a half. The pictures color are a little off since I was contending with natural sunlight coming into the room. My wife has ordered new blinds and the old curtains came down.
The BBA is retreating, just slower than I thought, but at least it's going away. It was definitely the fluctuation in the co2. I am now a believer in keeping the co2 on all the time and just keeping adequate surface agitation in the tank. Also, you mentioned "Wood Snot" which actually describes it perfectly. For me, when I look very closely, the structure of the "Slime" looks a little like a sponge in a saltwater tank, like microscopic branches. It looks really gross when I do a water change and the stuff is exposed to air, it just hangs on the wood, exactly like wood snot. I will have to google it lol and see if that's it. If it is wood snot, what gets rid of it I wonder, maybe google will have an answer?
P.S. I wish I had the time to take pictures. I bought a nice Nikon D90 a couple Christmas' ago and don't even have the time to take pictures. I hate working constantly, but gotta pay the bills right? Private school for the kid, mortgage, etc. Who said life would be easy I guess.
FTS = full tank shot.
Gray branched out algae sounds like staghorn algae, but I have never heard of it described as slimy. You may just have regular "wood snot" which is ugly, but normal and resolves itself in time. However, "wood snot" isn't branchy, so again, that doesn't fit.
That's why I'd really need a picture to be able to have any idea what you have. Without a picture, it's really hard to say what it might be.
Since you mentioned that the driftwood also has BBA on it, you might be best off just pulling the driftwood out of the tank, scrubbing it down, and then soaking it in water with H2O2 (hydrogen peroxide) for 15-30 minutes. If nothing else, that should kill the BBA. However, this will not prevent it from coming back. To prevent algae from coming back, it would be important to find out what's out of balance in your tank and correct it. Otherwise, the algae will just keep returning.
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Town Square
Fiscally conservative, socially liberal?
Original post made by Natalie O'Neill, Danville Weekly reporter, on May 4, 2007
School board trustee Joan Buchanan said a couple months ago "I'm fiscally conservative and morally more liberal." Is that the way you see yourself, too?
And what about Alamo folk? Are you different than Danville?
a resident of another community
on May 4, 2007 at 1:29 pm
Hey Natalie!
Thanks so much for posting that poll about the traffic situation down in Oakland!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yeah, I kind of see myself as fiscally conservative , onless it's important for to shell out money on certain things... don;t know if i would klasify myself as socially liberal. i'd say people should be free to make their own choices and learn and respect others who have made other choices... i think diversity is important in seeing a spektrum of things.
a resident of Alamo
on May 7, 2007 at 12:33 pm
Dear Natalie,
In my support of API researchers, focus group interviews throughout USAmerica are showing a shift away from the self-interests of USAmericans during the last 5-6 years and a return to a social conscientiousness. Mostly, according to such focus group research, USAmericans have become concerned for our global reputation and the disparity in quality of life by residents in our own country. As a result, focus of interests for more than 2/3rds of USAmericans is on education, healthcare, jobs programs, aid programs and global responsibility.
USAmericans' focus on money issues have been accelerated by costs of war, Katrina, and more. Unlike true conservatives, USAmericans want money spent effectively, with accountability, to better serve our global role and our nation. With growing deficits and lack of spending controls of the past 5-6 years, USAmericans want fiscal and social accountability for uses of OUR money.
Hal Bailey
CDSI Research Fellowship
a resident of Danville
on Oct 10, 2012 at 8:30 am
Joan Buchanan (school board trustee) actually leans towards fiscally liberal. She also leans to the extreme left regarding moral issues. It is close to impossible to separate these two points when politicians such as Joan, are spending our tax and school bond money towards often social issues within the education environment. These issues are all connected and the bottom line with Joan; she sees political decisions through the prism of the union causes (CTA, etc.); her number one political financial supporters.


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Happy Halloweeeeeen, everybody! 😀
We have a very special epsiode for you this week. This week, to celebrate the Horror Genre, our resident self-proclaimed "Big Horror Guy" Chris Tanski took to the streets and canvassed the vaunted "Horror Community", trying to ascertain what people's favorite Horror Movies of all time were! He obtained contributions from 13 different horror afficianados, including bloggers, fans, and horror magazine contributors in order to compile a listing of their 50 favorite Horror films!
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To help present the Top 50, we invite back Ben Scrivens of Fright-Rags.com, and first time visitor Jesse Bartel of Liberaldead.com. Together, the four of us list out 50-11, and then break down the top 10 in depth! What makes the cut? Which ones do Tank and I like unreasonably in comparison to others? How did your favorite horror movies fare?
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You can download it directly, here, or as always, look for us on Stitcher Radio and iTunes by searching for (title pending) or Tank and Fogs!
Happy Halloweeeeeen, TPMP Listeners!


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S&P as Sole U.S. Target Has Wall Street Asking About Moody'sMatthew Leising
The Justice Department decision to sue Standard & Poor's has investors asking why Moody's Investors Service and Fitch Ratings weren't targeted for awarding the same top grades to troubled mortgage bonds and other debt securities.
"What purpose does it serve for the U.S. government to bring an action against S&P at this point in time? On the surface, is this a bid for some sort of retribution" for the company's 2011 downgrade of the U.S., Bonnie Baha, head of global developed credit at Los Angeles based DoubleLine Capital LP, which oversees about $53 billion, said in a telephone interview yesterday. "Moody's and Fitch assigned the same ratings to these transactions. Why aren't they named as well?"
The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission and a Senate panel laid the blame on S&P, Moody's and Fitch for inflated ratings on mortgage-backed securities and collateralized debt obligations that helped cause the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Together, they provided 96 percent of all ratings for governments and companies in the $42 trillion debt market in
The U.S., in a lawsuit filed Feb. 4 in federal court in Los Angeles, is alleging that the unit of New York-based McGraw-Hill Cos. defrauded investors by failing to adjust its analytical models or taking necessary steps to accurately reflect the risks of the securities because it was afraid of losing business.
U.S. Downgrade
S&P lowered the U.S. government's credit rating one step to AA+ from the top AAA rank on Aug. 5, 2011, after months of wrangling between President Barack Obama and Congressional Republicans over whether to raise the federal debt limit. Bond investors repudiated the downgrade and U.S. borrowing costs fell to record lows as Treasuries gained the most since 2008.
Debt markets have judged ratings company rankings to be unimportant, Baha said. "My question is, why are U.S. taxpayers wasting money to prove a fact that's already widely accepted in the market?" she said.
The Justice Department's case "looks rather suspicious" because Moody's isn't involved, said Peter Wallison, co-director of the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute's program on financial policy and a member of the inquiry commission.
"It's very hard to see how Moody's was doing anything differently than S&P," he said yesterday in a telephone interview.
'Everyone Else'
S&P has used this as a defense. Floyd Abrams, the Cahill Gordon & Reindel LLP lawyer representing the company, said in a Feb. 5 appearance on Bloomberg Television that investors required two ratings on CDOs before they would buy.
"And yet we find ourselves now being accused of acting in bad faith, while everyone else acted in good faith, presumably," he said on the "Lunch Money" program with Sara Eisen. He said on CNBC the same day that the Justice Department's investigation intensified after the S&P downgrade, though he didn't know if there was a direct link. "No one in the government has come to me and said, 'That's why we did it,'" Abrams said.
Ed Sweeney, an S&P spokesman, declined to elaborate on Abrams's comments.
Attorney General Eric Holder said Feb. 5 in Washington that the complaint against S&P was unrelated to the downgrade.
"There's no connection between the two," he said. "They did what they did, assessing what the creditworthiness was of this nation. We looked at the facts, the law and the investigation" and "made a determination that the filing of these lawsuits was appropriate."
Shares Tumble
McGraw-Hill has dropped 24.9 percent in New York trading this week, set for the biggest weekly decline in data going back to August 1980. The stock lost 23.8 percent in the week ended Oct. 10, 2008, during the height of the global financial crisis. Moody's has decreased 15.1 percent in the same period, poised for the biggest retreat since the week ended Sept. 25, 2009.
Yields on McGraw-Hill's $400 million of bonds due November 2037 have increased 34 basis points this week to 5.78 percent, the highest level since March, according to Trace, the bond-price reporting system of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority. Yields on Moody's $500 million of securities due September 2022 advanced 8 basis points to 4.095 in the period.
$2.8 Trillion
S&P rated more than $2.8 trillion of residential mortgage-backed securities and about $1.2 trillion of CDOs from September 2004 through October 2007, according to the complaint. Many were rated AAA. S&P downplayed the risks on portions of the securities to gain more business from the investment banks that issued them, the U.S. said.
The collapse in value of securities that packaged home loans from the riskiest borrowers led to a credit seizure starting in 2007 that sent the world's largest economy into its deepest recession since 1933, from which it has yet to recover
3.23 million of the 8.74 million jobs lost. It also left financial institutions, including those with federal insurance, nursing billions of dollars of losses.
Wallison said the largest shareholder in Moody's is Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Buffett is an Obama supporter and his name is associated with a proposal to raises taxes on the wealthiest Americans promoted by the administration.
'Peculiar Things'
"There are peculiar things about this particular lawsuit," Wallison said. He said there's no way to know for sure why S&P is alone in facing the U.S. lawsuit.
Buffett didn't respond to a request for comment left with an assistant.
There is still the chance that Moody's will be named by the government, Peter Tchir, founder of New York-based TF Market Advisors, said yesterday in a telephone interview. "It has to come at some point. It would be hard to say one guy was rating a AAA completely fraudulently but the other guy was fine."
The Justice Department may sue Moody's after the S&P case is tested in the courts, Reuters reported late yesterday, citing people familiar with the matter it didn't name.
In September, Moody's said it may join S&P in downgrading the U.S.'s credit rating unless Congress this year reduces the percentage of debt-to-gross-domestic-product during budget negotiations.
Holder and Associate Attorney General Tony West declined to comment on whether Moody's is being investigated. White House spokeswoman Amy Brundage referred questions to the Justice Department.
'Far From Clear'
Michael Adler, a spokesman for Moody's in New York, declined to comment.
Fitch Ratings said Feb. 5 it has "no reason to believe" it faces a lawsuit from the U.S. Dan Noonan, a spokesman in New York for Fitch, said the company stands by that statement.
U.S. success in the lawsuit in federal court in Los Angeles is "far from clear," said Jeffrey Manns, an associate professor at George Washington University Law School. S&P's defense may include evidence that the agency believed in its ratings and proof that U.S. fraud allegations are unfounded. Company lawyers are also weighing whether to argue that the 1989 statute underpinning the case doesn't apply to S&P.
"We start with proposition that we deny there was any fraud," Abrams said yesterday in telephone interview. Fraud claims have "a high burden of proof."
Moody's, S&P and Fitch are being investigated by the New York Attorney General over whether the companies breached a 2008 settlement with the state, a person familiar with the matter said yesterday.
Cuomo Deal
The companies reached an agreement with then-Attorney General Andrew Cuomo that required them to adopt changes to their operations. Eric Schneiderman, the current attorney general, is probing whether they complied with the agreement, said the person, who wasn't authorized to speak publicly about the probe and asked not to be identified.
Moody's Adler and Fitch's Noonan didn't immediately respond to e-mails yesterday after regular business hours seeking comment about the New York probe.
Catherine Mathis, an S&P spokeswoman, declined to comment on the probe.
The Justice Department's investigation started long before the downgrade, said Janet Tavakoli, founder of Chicago-based consulting firm Tavakoli Structured Finance Inc.
"That's just their spin," she said, referring to S&P. "There's been ample evidence that they've been incompetent in their jobs."
Increasing Transparency
Enough evidence exists for the Securities and Exchange Commission to strip S&P of its designation as a Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organization, or NRSRO, which allows the firm to sell rankings, she said.
"All these ratings firms have not been held accountable by the SEC," said Tavakoli, who wrote a 2011 research note titled "Tavakoli Structured Finance Revokes the Credit Rating Agencies' NRSRO Designation."
John Nester, an SEC spokesman in Washington, declined to comment on "vague criticisms," saying in an e-mailed statement that the agency has "taken numerous significant actions to increase transparency, reduce conflicts and promote ratings with integrity, and we will continue to do so."
Tavakoli also faulted the legal merits of the case, which relies in part on internal e-mails.
"We rate every deal," one S&P analyst said in an e-mail cited in the complaint. "It could be structured by cows, and we would rate it."
The complaint includes at least 58 examples of S&P executives ignoring internal warnings from analysts and others, dismissing relevant data, taking steps to appease issuers or acknowledging how pressure from banks could lessen the quality of its grades or delay downgrades.
"If all it takes for people to incriminate themselves is e-mails, it would be very easy to be a lawyer," Tavakoli said.


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12 dead, 58 injured in shooting at Aurora movie theater
Suspect in Custody
AURORA, Colo. - Police spent Saturday inside the apartment of a suspected gunman that killed 12 people and injured at least 58 others during a midnight opening of the latest Batman movie "The Dark Knight Rises." 11 people are listed in critical condition at area hospitals.
Inside James Holmes' apartment authorities found several booby traps and incendiary devices. Authorities won't go into great detail about what types of liquids they discovered but the Chief of Police in Aurora indicated it was meant to seriously hurt or kill who ever walked in.
Police arrested the 24-year-old, while he was still wearing a gas mask, next to a white car in the parking lot behind the theater. Holmes, a PhD candidate who was in the process of withdrawing from CU-Denver's graduate program in neurosciences.
"He did not resist. He did not put up a fight," said Frank Fania, an Aurora police spokesman.
The gunman was dressed in black and was wearing full tactical gear including a ballistics helmet, a ballistics vest, a groin protector, throat protector, tactical gloves and other gear, police said. He was well armed with an AR-15 rifle, a Remington 12 gauge shotgun and a 40-caliber Glock handgun, police said. Another 40-caliber Glock handgun was found in the suspect's white Hyundai behind the theater.
ABC News reported that Holmes identified himself as the Joker when he was arrested, and that his hair had been dyed to resemble the villain played by Heath Ledger in "The Dark Knight." Police declined to comment on that detail.
According to our sister station, KMGH, Holmes legally bought the firearms at a Bass Pro Shop and Gander Mountain Guns within the last several months. The first gun was bought in May.
Investigators said they have no idea how many rounds were fired, but that it was many.
At a press conference on Friday night, the Aurora Police Chief, Dan Oates, said the first responders did a tremendous job and also added that the Aurora cops "went through a lot."
Authorities say the gunman bought a ticket to the Batman movie, sat down for about 15 minutes, and then propped open the back door to the theater when it was dark. The gunman then went back to his car and parked it in the back of the theater, grabbed the guns and went in through the open back door.
Police said the man set off two devices with some type of irritant or smoke, then started shooting.
Moviegoers said they didn't know what was happening when they heard a hissing sound and smelled smoke. Some thought the attack was part of the movie, since it occurred during a battle scene about 20 minutes into the movie. Then they saw a silhouette of a person in the smoke at the front of the theater near the screen, pointing a gun at the crowd.
He fired first with the shotgun, emptied it and then calmly picked up the rifle and fired at the back of the movie theater.
Police confirmed that Holmes used an assault rifle, a shotgun and a 40-caliber handgun inside.
"There were bullet (casings) just falling on my head. They were burning my forehead," Jennifer Seeger said, adding that the gunman fired steadily except when he stopped to reload.
Seeger said she was in the second row, about 4 feet from the gunman, when he pointed a gun at her face. At first, "I was just a deer in headlights. I didn't know what to do," she said. Then she ducked to the ground as the gunman shot people seated behind her.
She said she began crawling toward an exit when she saw a girl about 14 years old "lying lifeless on the stairs." She saw a man with a bullet wound in his back and tried to check his pulse, but "I had to go. I was going to get shot."
Many of those injured or killed were young adults, teens or kids. The victims range in age from 3 months to 45 years old. The 3 month old has been discharged and is doing well, a hospital spokeswoman said.
Police said 911 calls started coming in 12:39 a.m. Police said officers were on scene with 60 to 90 seconds and immediately arrested the suspect.
Victims were rushed to hospitals in police cars by responding officers because there were not enough ambulances.
Ten people died in the theater, two more died at the hospital, Aurora police said.
Witnesses told 7NEWS that the gunman opened fire in Theater 9, but bullets also pierced the adjacent Theater 8 injuring moviegoers.
Witness Shayla Roeder said she saw a young teenage girl on the ground bleeding outside the theater.
"She just had this horrible look in her eyes .... We made eye contact and I could tell she was not all right," Roeder said.
The Aurora police response was swift, since police headquarters is less than a mile away from the theaters. More than 250 police officers from across the metro area -- from Brighton to Jefferson County -- were also called out to respond to the mass shooting.
The entire parking lot around the Century 16 Movie Theaters has been blocked off.
Aurora Police Chief Dan Oates said there was no evidence of additional shooters.
FBI spokesman Jason Pack said there's no indication in the investigation so far of any connection to terror groups. There was no immediate word of any motive.
Just after the shooting occurred, a bulletin was issued to other police agencies throughout the metro area warning them of the possibility of similar incidences in theaters in their cities.
In Colorado Springs, various movie theaters have requested off-duty officers to monitor the theater. Colorado Springs Police is making arrangement to assist them. Police say they will also pay special attention to shopping centers and other places where people tend to socialize.


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VoIP Abuse Project
I will eventually clean it up, add to it, etc.
If you can't find it here or at our sister site, CSP Online Mag, guess it would go here.
sil wrote:@dynamik my WIP: RWSP @ TechnoForensics End of this month
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text:
A bank robber once known as "the potbelly bandit" has been sentenced to more than 15 years behind bars for a Sept. 11 holdup in Pleasanton. Royland Rice, 62, was sentenced yesterday to 15-1/2 years in prison for bank robbery
Read the full story here Web Link posted Thursday, August 1, 2013, 3:41 PM
Town Square
'Potbelly bandit' sentenced in Bank of America holdup
Original post made on Aug 2, 2013
Like this commentPosted by Joe
a resident of San Ramon
on Aug 2, 2013 at 10:01 am
He is 62 and taking an early retirement with food, housing and medical covered. On our dime.
Like this commentPosted by Derek
a resident of Danville
on Aug 5, 2013 at 10:19 am
Maybe that was the plan. He certainly seems a bit long-in-the-tooth for a career in robbery.
Like this commentPosted by cardinal
a resident of Diablo
on Aug 5, 2013 at 5:27 pm
He looks like he's about to give birth to "Woody."


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Last month, while at the London International Wine Fair, we had brought a few bottles from Spain to share with our hosts. We always like to bring wines from our cellar, wherever we travel, knowing that we'll magically find the need to open them among friends. This trip we opted for a California treat, S.Anderson's 1999 Cabernet Sauvignon, a wine that I had bought many years ago on the advice of a nice Parker review. Having never tried it, we could only hope that a 10 year old Cali Cab would be a fun warm up to whatever wines were in store for us at the LIWF.
During dinner of our first night in London, we popped open the bottle, and despite its age, and rough ride in the belly of our British Airways flight, the wine showed beautifully. Paired with a roasted lambshank simply tied up with fresh rosemary, alongside roasted potatoes, the subtle delicate Cabernet flavors aged perfectly with a touch of oxidation on the nose and palate. It was a wine that gave each swallow a tinge of sweet regret as you longed for the flavors to linger on.
As the bottle slowly disappeared, the final drops savored, I felt sad thinking about the amount of people who drink wine immediately without holding onto it. We have no temperature controlled cellar here in Terrassa, but we do our best to keep the wine out of the sun, and as cool as we can. That said, many people would draw a rigid line and say that you should never store a wine in such conditions, and as a result, they never do. Sadly this means that many people miss out on the joys of a well aged wine. (Fickr phot by jenny downing)
Tonight, we're grilling Paella on the grill and due to a head cold all of our wines will be aging a day or two longer. No need wasting some good juice on a congested head! 🙂
Have a good week and enjoy the start of summer!
Ryan Opaz
Eager to taste a wide range of spectacular Port wine with a Knight of the Port Wine Brotherhood? Are you...Learn More
Meet the passionate people crafting old-school Portuguese food deep inside Lisbon's traditional neighborhoods. Visit the traditional hole-in-the-wall bakeries famed for their...Learn More
On this four hour Barcelona Cooking Class and Market Tour, you'll have the rare opportunity to ease your way into...Learn More


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Israel pushes deeper in Gaza after soldier seized
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) — Backed by tank fire and airstrikes, Israeli forces pushed deep into southern Gaza on Friday, searching for an Israeli army officer believed to be captured by Hamas fighters during deadly clashes that shattered an internationally brokered cease-fire.
The apparent capture of the soldier and the collapse of the truce set the stage for a possible expansion of Israel's 25-day-old military operation against Hamas.
President Barack Obama and U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon called for the immediate release of the soldier but also appealed for restraint. In Israel, senior Cabinet ministers convened late Friday in a rare emergency meeting after the start of the Jewish Sabbath.
The search for the missing soldier centered on the outskirts of the town of Rafah, on the Egypt-Gaza border.
At least 140 Palestinians were killed Friday in Gaza, with at least 70 killed in the Rafah area along with two Israeli soldiers.
Earlier Friday, Israel and Hamas accused each other of breaking the truce, which had been announced by the U.S. and the U.N., and took effect at 8 a.m.
The breakdown meant there would be no reprieve for the 1.7 million residents of Gaza, where large parts have been devastated by airstrikes and shelling, and at least 1,600 people — mostly civilians — have been killed and more than 8,000 wounded. Israel has lost 63 soldiers and three civilians.
The fighting in the Rafah area continued into the night, with residents reporting airstrikes along the Egypt-Gaza frontier as well as heavy tank and artillery shelling. The Israeli military said it was searching for the missing soldier and had sent automated calls or text messages to Rafah residents to stay indoors.
"We are under fire, every minute or so tanks fire shells at us," said Rafah resident Ayman Al-Arja. "I have been thinking of leaving since 2 p.m., but tank fire can reach anywhere, and I was scared they will hit my pickup truck. Now we are sitting in the stairwell, 11 members of my family, my brother, his nine children and wife. We just have water to drink and the radio to hear the news."
The 45-year-old Al-Arja added: "We are just staying put waiting for God's mercy."
The heavy shelling in Rafah was part of operational and intelligence activity to locate the missing officer, 2nd Lt. Hadar Goldin, the Israeli military said.
An hour after the cease-fire began, gunmen emerged from one or more Gaza tunnels and opened fire at Israeli soldiers, with at least one of the militants detonating an explosives vest, said Israeli army spokesman Lt. Col. Peter Lerner.
Goldin, a 23-year-old from the central Israeli town of Kfar Saba, was apparently captured in the ensuing mayhem, while another two Israeli soldiers were killed.
"We suspect that he has been kidnapped," Lerner said.
Obama called for Goldin's unconditional and immediate release and said it would be difficult to put the cease-fire back together. However, he said the U.S. will continue working toward a cease-fire.
He said Israel committed to the truce, but at the same time called the situation in Gaza "heartbreaking" and repeated calls for Israel to do more to prevent Palestinian civilian casualties.
"Innocent civilians caught in the crossfire have to weigh on our conscience, and we have to do more," Obama said. He added that Israel must be able to defend itself, but that irresponsible actions by Hamas have put civilians in danger.
Israel has gone to great lengths in the past to get back its captured soldiers. In 2011, it traded hundreds of Palestinian prisoners for an Israeli soldier who had been captured by Hamas-allied militants in 2006. The capture of two soldiers in a cross-border operation by Lebanon's Hezbollah guerrillas in 2006 sparked a 34-day war between the Iranian-backed Shiite group and Israel.
A Hamas spokesman, Fawzi Barhoum, would neither confirm nor deny the capture, saying the event was being used — along with the killing of two Israeli soldiers in the Rafah area — as a cover for what he called a "massacre" in Rafah.
The violence killed at least 70 Palestinians and wounded 440 in the Rafah area, according to Gaza Health Ministry official Ashraf al-Kidra. The dead included paramedic Assef al-Zamily, killed when an Israeli tank shell hit an ambulance in which he was riding, al-Kidra said.
Another 70 Palestinians were killed elsewhere in Gaza on Friday, according to al-Kidra.
Ban blamed Hamas for violating the cease-fire and demanded the immediate and unconditional release of Goldin.
The U.N. chief also urged both sides "to show maximum restraint and return to the agreed 72-hour humanitarian cease-fire that tragically lasted such a brief period of time," U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry by phone that Palestinian militants had "unilaterally and grossly" violated the cease-fire and attacked Israeli soldiers after 9 a.m.
"Israel will take all necessary steps against those who call for our destruction and perpetrate terrorism against our citizens," Netanyahu told Kerry, according to a statement from the prime minister's office.
Moussa Abu Marzouk, Hamas' deputy leader, denied that Hamas violated the truce. He told Al-Arabiya news channel from Cairo that the movement's military wing carried out no military operations after 8 a.m.


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red this time?
testing 1 2 3
When was the old site closed? I have'nt been her in a couple months. All my links on pc and phone were dead. Man I got a little nervous
this thing hangs up constantly for me I have checked my pc for viruses with up to date Norton's and it comes clean ....I also get logged out randomly ....didn't have these problems with the old board.....I,m at a loss for what might be wrong.....windows 7..... ms explorer 9 any help would be appreciated perhaps Norton antivirus is causing the problem...
I just tryed to post and got a message are you sure you want to leave this page instead of posting and had to rewrite this message
I got the same thing Byron , I clicked to leave and it posted .I figured that's the way it was lol
Ok that time it didn't ask me.
Last edited by byron; 08-01-2012 at 09:16 PM.


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Downtown Campus cardio (top) and weights (bottom) facilities
Campus Recreation opens Downtown Campus facilities
By Emily Schlumbrecht
Fitness Program Coordinator, Campus Recreation
(July 19, 2005)--UTSA Campus Recreation will open new Downtown Campus fitness facilities Aug. 1 in Durango Building Rooms 3.202 and 3.302 for use by UTSA community members.
The weight and cardio room is equipped with the latest fitness machines, including cardio equipment with LCD TVs connected to cable. The weight room includes the newest machine weights, a multi-lift rack with bench, three benches and a full line of dumbbells ranging in weight from 5 to 50 pounds.
Today's headlines
- La Prensa Foundation is newest member of UTSA Lone Star Society
- UTSA alumna Jordan Kaufmann wins $50K for new stent-graft start-up
- UTSA begins new way-finding sign installation this summer at Main Campus
- USA Today: UTSA long jumper Tyler Williamson rescues three-year-old boy
Article tools
Along with the weight and cardio room, Campus Recreation will offer group exercise sessions, massage therapy, a demo kitchen and Nutrition 101 classes.
Current UTSA students can use the facilities at no cost by presenting their UTSACard. Read more about memberships for UTSA faculty, staff, alumni and retirees.
For more information, visit the Campus Recreation Web site or contact Emily Schlumbrecht at (210) 458-2734.
Downtown Campus exercise facility hours (Aug. 1-23):
6-8:30 a.m.
11 a.m.-2 p.m.
4-7 p.m.
10 a.m.-2 p.m.
Downtown Campus exercise facility expanded hours (Beginning Aug. 24):
6-8:30 a.m.
11 a.m.-2 p.m.
4-10 p.m.
6-8:30 a.m.
11 a.m.-2 p.m.
4-7 p.m.
10 a.m.-2 p.m.


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How much difference can one person make? Sinclair Hitchings hopes it's a substantial one when it comes to his "Art in Boston" project, which he began in 2006.
This is a town in which our major museums, universities, and Pulitzer Prize-winning critics give short shrift to art made here. An example: the Institute of Contemporary Art has almost completely ignored Boston art since its last Foster Prize exhibit for talented locals in 2010 — and the next edition of the "biennial" show is scheduled to arrive nearly a year late. Instead of fostering a creative community, our leaders often stunt how far most locals can go here.
"Art in Boston" is part collection of Boston art, part research library. The goal: study, exhibit, publish, and promote local artists. Hitchings dreams of it evolving into its own "teaching museum." The fledgling collection is having its public debut at Maud Morgan Arts.
"There is a lot of good work being made in Boston," Hitchings insists. Building a collection is a way to make his point. "People are really only going to be able to get my message by seeing the art."
Hitchings began "Art in Boston" the year following his retirement from leading the Boston Public Library's print department for four decades, building its collection and a $10 million endowment. "The most ambitious of the projects was working with contemporary Boston artists," Hitchings says. "Eventually I built up a collection of more than 1000 Boston artists featuring more than 10,000 works on paper. . . . There is really no collection like it."
"I myself don't think of Boston as a provincial town," he says. "I think it is an academic town. And it's a funny town, because there's a lot of wealth here. . . . The money is here, but the imprimatur isn't here, the patronage isn't here."
Hitchings says, "There needs to be additional energy and some additional money in this town devoted to Boston artists."
So he's buying Boston art for the Cate and Sinclair Hitchings Collection, so far spending "out of my pocket." Plus, he has landed some gifts. The Maud Morgan show features works by Ken Beck, David Akiba, Andy Zimmermann, Rob Moore, Lois Tarlow, Jane Akiba, Maud Morgan Arts director Catherine Kernan, and others.
It's a modest beginning. But it used to be that when the art world felt vital work was being ignored, new museums got founded. Maybe Hitchings's idea arrives at a propitious time.
"ART IN BOSTON" :: Maud Morgan Arts, 20 Sacramento St, Cambridge :: January 14–March 1 :: Reception January 27 from 3 pm to 5 pm :: 617.547.1647 or maudmorgan.com/gallery
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The Wines of Alto Adige
I was invited to go to Alto Adige by the Italian Trade Commission in May. The wines there can be wonderful. I arrived there aware only of Tiefenbrunner, Hofstätter, and Lagader wines here in the US. I was surprised: even the wines from the co-ops show finesse and quality (typical of Italy for that matter; coops are generally very well-respected). Pinot Bianco, Sauvignon Blanc, Gewürztraminer (the town of Traminer lies in Alto Adige), Lagrein, Schiava and a bit of Pinot noir all show great appeal. And a whopping 98 percent of all the wines are DOC. Most wines are exported to the US.
But these wines come from a region with a mixed identity. Are they Italian wines? Or Austrian wines?
Alto Adige has had a confused history. Right now it is the most northern winegrowing region in Italy. Its identity is mostly Austrian, as historically this region was a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and identified as Austrian. The primary language is still a German dialect, and they also claim to be the oldest German-speaking wine region with over 3,000 years of wine history.
The History
Even before the end of the Second World War and immediately afterwards, South Tyrolese representatives and the provisional government of Austria began working to see that at the coming peace negotiations South Tyrol would be returned to Austria. The Allies already rejected such claims in the autumn of 1945 and, despite further massive attempts by the South Tyrolese and Austria, a final negative decision was made in April 1946. The only way left open was for Austria and Italy to negotiate directly so that South Tyrol should obtain some form of self-government.
The "Paris Agreement" on 5 September 1946 was signed by the Italian Prime Minister and the Austrian Foreign Minister, and annexed to the peace treaty with Italy, so that the South Tyrol "question" was thereby given international standing.
This agreement provided, amongst other things, for Italy to give the Province of South Tyrol an autonomous legislative and executive power. After much protest and upheaval, little by little a whole package of measures to put the self-government into effect was agreed, and this was approved by a narrow majority of the South Tyrolese People's Party at its Congress in 1969 and thereafter by the Italian and Austrian governments.
South Tyrol received addition special provisions regarding the use of the mother tongue, schools, culture, bilingualism, and ethnic proportions in employment, etc.
The Provincial Government of South Tyrol has been given a "dynamic autonomy".
In 2001, a final series of important reforms on the constitutional level went into effect. The two provinces (of South Tyrol and Trentino) were given the power of electoral legislation and free choice of the government form (for example the direct election of the president of the regional government).
The Mixed Identity
This mixed identity comes through in the wine marketing as well. While being represented by the Italian Trade Board, the primary language is German, and the food more Austrian: no pasta, lots of lovely dumplings and sauerkraut. Menus are in German. Winery signs are in German. Wine labels are usually in German in situ. But exports to the US have English (and Italian) labels. The people typically speak German dialect as a first language, learn Italian in school and then add another language later.
All of this makes Alto Adige a fascinating place. It doesn't really feel Italian, nor really look Italian. The region lies within a ring of mountains, creating a dramatic bowl-like effect. Flying into Bolzano is gorgeous, with the Dolomites showing off their majesty.
But being in Alto Adige seems like being in Austria. And that's just what they want you to think.
The Best Wines
Laimburg Research Center wines
Pinot Bianco Classico Estate 2009
A steely wine with notes of pineapple, apple and minerals. Good depth of flavor, strong acidity, and nicely balanced with some length.
Pinot Bianco "Rayèt" 2007
Muted apple nose; palate shows high acidity balanced with broad apple and mineral flavors in a slightly broad, oxidative style. Good length.
Riesling 2008
Classic Riesling nose filled with floral notes, schist, and peach. Lots of acidity, apricot and peach flavors showing good depth, and nice length.
A restrained nose of earth, a bit of oak and cherry; a focused palate of cherries, bright acidity and length. A complex, very attractive wine.
Col de Rey 2005
A blend of Tannat, Lagrein and Petit Verdot that shows an earthy, black fruited nose; black fruits supported by acidity, with fine tannins and very long length.
Erste & Neue coop
Puntay Lagrein Riserva 2007
A pretty, earthy and cherries nose; palate shows a depth of cherry flavor, a strong backbone of acidity, and very good integration.
Mueller-Thurgau 2009
Aromas of mineral, lemon and white peach; high acid supports a good depth of creamy lemon and peach, nice minerality, and a very long finish.
Lagrein 2008
Minerals and black fruit on the nose; lots of black fruit supported by bright acidity; chocolate; sweet fine tannins and lots of length.
Lagrein Riserva "Linticlarus" 2007
A big wine! Loads of concentrated black fruit and supporting acidity; focused, complex wine. Also present are fine dense tannins, integrated oak and amazing long length.
St. Michael-Eppen (also known as St. Michele-Appiano) coop
Pinot Bianco Selection 2009
This single vineyards wine showed a creamy apple and mineral nose with a creamy palate of apple and minerals, with good length.
St. Valentin 2009 Sauvignon Blanc
The nose offered a mineral-based expression with a bit of pyrazine, with a palate that showed a good depth of grassy flavors backed by acid, some complexity and long length.
J. Hofstätter
Pinot Nero Barthenau 1993
A complex, slightly evolved nose of red fruit, with some earthiness and leafiness; bright acidity, a good depth of evolved red fruit, silky texture and long length.
Pinot Nero Barthenau 2007
The nose was a bit muted, but offered earthy red fruit; firm acid supported a good concentration of tightly wound, earthy red fruit ; silky texture; long length. Very serious wine.
Gewürztraminer Kolbenhof 1993
A honeyed gold color showing aromas of honey, honeysuckle, and lots of complexity; moderate acid supported a very floral and mineral palate with a slight butterscotch flavor, apricots, and long length.
Gewürztraminer Kolbenhof 2008
Very floral nose; a floral palate that is very round, a broad palate that offers complex peach and mineral flavors. Long length. Lovely!
Moscato Giallo 2009
An orange blossom, nutmeg and mineral nose; a fresh, bright palate offering nutmeg, floral notes, and a lovely long finish tinged with mineral.
Mason Pinot Nero 2008
A light expression of the grape, with a muted nose; the palate offered bright cherry fruit supported by moderate acid; fine dense tannins; some complexity and long length.
Lagrein Rubatsch 2008
The nose offered muted earthy black fruit; the palate showed firm acidity supporting a good depth of blackberry and licorice flavors, and very long length. The wine was slightly green but that did not detract from its charm.
Castel Campan 2005
A blend of merlot, cabernet franc, and petit verdot; this wine was a lovely expression of red and black fruit, spice and leather notes; firm tannins. Red fruit and supporting acid were well integrated on the palate. The wine showed a long length, if slightly marred by high alcohol on the finish.
Le Petit 2008
A Petit Mensang dessert wine that showed apricot and mango character, high acid balanced by a rich broad palate with apricot and mango flavors, and long length. The wine shows a lot of elegance.
Terlano Coop
Chardonnay 1994
This wine saw 10 year on its lies; 1 in botti and in stainless for 9 years. The gold color smelled a bit of oak. The palate was round and very creamy, with a moderate depth of flavor, and a bit of length. It was very interesting wine.


text:
What is a pink round pill with zc02 on it?
kgb answers » Health & Body » Health & Fitness » What is a pink round pill with zc02 on it?
Thursday, February 02 2012Source: http://www.pharmer.org/forum/pill-identification/found-small-pink-or-peach-pill
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text:
Town Square
Good News for Gunn's Counseling Services
Original post made by Gunn student, Gunn High School, on Apr 1, 2013
Over 1200 students in the freshmen, sophomore and junior classes took the survey. While we know there is much work to do, we are happy to see in our small survey that we have taken strides in improving our services.
Here are a couple of key highlights we feel very proud to see improvement in relation to how freshmen feel about our services. On each of them we are showing the percentage of students who answered either "strongly agree" or "agree."
I consider my counselor to be a valuable resource.
2012 2013
39% 74%
I feel comfortable going to an adult about personal issues that I might be struggling with.
2012 2013
36% 56%
My counselor can help with supporting me if I'm feeling generally stressed.
2012 2013
55% 75%
All of the results of our survey are available on the link below.
Web Link
Comments (6)
a resident of Gunn High School
on Apr 2, 2013 at 8:26 am
Where's WCDBPA? Kind of silent. Takes the wind out of their sail.
a resident of Gunn High School
on Apr 2, 2013 at 4:25 pm
I think it's safe to say they're "doing better."
a resident of Barron Park
on Apr 2, 2013 at 9:58 pm
I am just wondering if this PR is what we got for our $150K .... I don't doubt the test results published but I do suspect that there is possibly more to the story.
a resident of another community
on Apr 3, 2013 at 2:08 am
@Gunn student - It is pleasantly surprising to see a student starting this thread during Spring Break.
@Barron Park Parent - I do not know if 150k PR was hired. In any case, check this: Web Link
a resident of Adobe-Meadow
on Apr 5, 2013 at 12:36 am
I see that the job description lists degree fields including "marketing" and one of the job's core objectives is "promote a community climate of support for the district."
So we are paying for the wool and paying for it to be pulled over our own eyes.
This is a new low for public school governance.
a resident of another community
on Apr 5, 2013 at 8:52 am
@Don Draper - Thank you for checking the link I listed. Sometimes, details are the eye opener. You mentioned a sample from this link.
Here - just another reinforcement, added to many many, many prior. Systemic issues, the excellent editorial mentioned.
Transparency? Accountability?
Sadly, seems that the gift - info of the OCR investigation, given to the community by the family coming forward to the weekly, left no real impact. Seems that an objective investigation/audit is not about to happen, systemic issues not really identified, addressed.
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text:
looks like you missed the theme for this week by a couple days.
Re: The road to antisocial disorder
The Rejectionator must be taking a day off or something.
Re: Escape
Very awesome work, it's easily one of the few greats of this derby. I absolutely hope it prints, I'd buy it in an instant!
Re: This is a Space Ermine
I definitely want one...
Re: If it Bleeds you Should Hug it RESUB
I wasn't sure if the pink and the gore was off-putting, so I decided to resub without it. Hope you like!
yellowflower wrote:I love this so much! I thought I was over the Star Wars shirts, but I would totally buy this.
How could anyone ever be over Star Wars shirts?! =]
Re: Jammy Dodger
As an US Whovian it took me a few years to get my hand on Jammie Dodgers locally, but this shirt would keep them near my belly forever!
endangeredomega wrote:I'm in the same sort of camp, especially when it comes to Woot shirts. I never really vote for or buy the reference designs, save for the occasional gift for others. Paying people to rip off of others' intellectual property / creativity, rather than rewarding those who take a chance to create something new and original, tends to leave a bad taste in my mouth as a general rule.
It's not ripping anything off; it's re-imagining. That takes just as much creative integrity as creating something original.
Also: Cute shirt, do want.
AutoTechInSTL wrote:Wow you're wheat grass. Aside from a couple of minor imperfections of the saber (which IMO make it look more 'realistic') the saber and the text are perfectly perpendicular.
And I shall prove it with this perfectly level box I drew between the bottom of the saber and the top of the text.
Now do that with the handle part...
srbaritono wrote:Kawaii = cute. Cookie Monster is cute by itself, hehe.
Um, don't really think so. Especially when you didn't render CM any different than he would normally look, except for the fact that he's in Indiana's outfit.
Heck, I'll give you sci fi because of monsters and a giant, living cookie, but this just seems way off as far as kawaii is concerned.
Re: Young Darth
But young Vader is Anakin and not in the suit...and I'll even discount you that the Death Star nor anything like it existed...ho-hum.
D3lusional wrote:Even if this was on a shirt template, there is no way this is printable and besides I'm pretty sure that background is a photo.
THIS. As much as I may like it.
AzatiPrime wrote:Very cool design but I unfortunately don't think it's quite for me. Too bad the derby had to be cute stuff. Would have loved this without the cutesy robot.
If it wasn't for the derby, I think the cityscape could actually be printed better elsewhere where there aren't restrictions on printable area, but that's neither here nor there really.
Fantastic design. I hope this places because it is well deserved. It is on theme, it is wearable, and it is without a doubt easily within the bounds of what I think most of the most vocal commenters on the derbies would consider to be art.
I definitely need this shirt in my life, please.
Re: Like a Lumbering Leaf on the Wind
Love it!!!!!!!!!
Re: You have been warned...
I am cold, Heartless, and cruel. You have been warned.
After fighting with Illustrator to save my files correctly, this is especially accurate, I'm afraid. I usually use Serif for my entries, trying something new. Wish me luck!
Re: How to make an electric mouse
Love it!
Re: Spoilers - s5 Doctor Who spoilers!- Wedding Tardis
Poor Amy! Almost put a fez on the top and a crack behind the tardis, but I figured less cluttered was better!
Re: I Hate When This Happens...
I so love this! Two of my very favorite things.
manikx66 wrote:wow thats well very rude i am the creator of this design so good luck getting my permission to use it because theres not a chance in hell that you do. woot please remove this entry and ban this person from your site.
Relax manik, you originally stole the idea from odysseyroc's chicken taco anyways.
Just remove the submission and issue a warning. That is enough.
Love the concept. Would like The design better with a little more contrast, hard to read the type.
Re: Lessons Learned - Doctor who
The Text reads:
Everything I ever needed to know, I learned from the Doctor
Fixed points can't be stopped.
- But they can be tricked.
You are not alone.
- But you might wish you were.
Going away is good.
- Not coming back is better.
When you are still cooking, you need food.
- I recommend fish fingers and custard.
I now look at a screwdriver and think "this could be more sonic."
- Tapping it against something to make noise does not count.
All important things are blue
- Especially the stabilizers.
Never go to London on Christmas
- No, seriously, I mean it.
- Just run.
When you are given just one chance, take it.
- Would you rather have THE Library to yourself, or be the family of the Blood?
Bow ties are cool.
- As are Stetsons and Fezzes.
Brilliant things come to those who wait.
- We're talking years, here.
- Geronimo!
Don't Blink.
- The Angels Have The Phone box.
If you think that you are forgetting something, you probably are.
- Kill it on sight.
Count the Shadows.
- Or be saved.
Always bring a Banana to a party.
- Though an apple can prove your point, and vegetables are lapel garnish.
Almost every species has an irrational fear of the dark.
- Vashta Nerada, Weeping Angels - They're wrong. Because it's not irrational.
Trock On.
- Chameleon Circuit rocks!
There are certain constants in the universe.
- The Daleks, The Doctor, The Master, The Cybermen.
There are a few more I wanted to add, so they might get their own entries. ENJOY!
SkyAlokar wrote:I would be much more likely to get this if it were the design AS the shirt, instead of on it.
I totally agree! I was disappointed when I saw the entire layout.
Re: Existential Whale
This is on Navy, right? Or am I tripping?
Re: Inevitable Betrayal
I would absolutely get this shirt in a minute if I if Wash's head weren't SOUTH PARK STYLE - UGHHHHHHHHHHHH SO HIDEOUS! Also, the colours..sigh.
This makes me so sad! (And I really do like this artist's work generally, so I'm not sure what happened here....)
Re: They are Mine
For the record, I actually dislike Jack, but a number of people might have strung me up if I left him off...
Re: Seyonra Gringy
eeee...this is a design by Harzack! this user should be banned for stealing!
Re: Free Return Firefly
Design is WIN, brown coloured shirt is FAIL FAIL FAIL.
Re: I can't! It's so adorable
this is so awesome!!!:D
I agree, a spray red cheeker would have sealed it- and although I'm normally not a fan of the ramyb animal designs (think they're a bit TOO cute), I know my kids (who are still into Pokemon hardcore) will freak out with this... good job, ramyb.
chiinkz86 wrote:Relax manik, you originally stole the idea from odysseyroc's chicken taco anyways.
Just remove the submission and issue a warning. That is enough.
so tired of people saying i stole the box trap idea from odysseyroc. i was still new to this site when i put up this design orginally and didnt even know of that design. besides that the box trap is not original to anyone it has been around for a long time its a general concept not something you can steal. this person took my design and slapped another title on it without even changing something on the design thats stealing. if that had taken the idea and drawn something completly different heck even in the same pose i wouldnt care.
HA! Perfect!!
The Last Starfighter! Right on! Love that movie!
Re: Welcome to Rylos
Re: Nice Buns...
Re: TWILIGHT TOWN SEA SALT ICE CREAM
The text reads:
Try Twilight Town Sea Salt Ice Cream.
The preferred snack of nobodies.
hlynnbigham wrote:It's not ripping anything off; it's re-imagining. That takes just as much creative integrity as creating something original.
Also: Cute shirt, do want.
Perhaps not "ripping off" so much as riding the coat-tails of something that is already tried, tested, + popular.
I say this as something of an 'artist' myself; I write and self-publish indie comic books. While I could easily make a lot more money + gain a larger fanbase by slapping a "re-imagined" character that closely resembles Batman or Spider-Man into my work + calling it a day, I opt to go the more challenging route of creating something new. Perhaps its simply personal bias, but I have more respect for artists willing to take the risk and carve out their own niche, than those who opt to play it safe by sticking to what's come (and sold well) before.
Imagine a world in which the creators of some of the beloved universes we enjoy so much had opted to just write piles of fanfiction instead. :/
HeartlineTwist wrote:But young Vader is Anakin and not in the suit...and I'll even discount you that the Death Star nor anything like it existed...ho-hum.
I guess I should have known the risks of a Star Wars shirt was fact checkers ;) I'll leave the factually accurate remake version to you. Hope you voted for this one anyway, cuz facts aren't funny
Re: The Attack
Sorry for being uninformed, but what does the NT stand for?
sunaness wrote:Well in this case I'm pretty sure without the reference it wouldn't count as Sci-fi and would be rejected.
How is a space whale not sci-fi?
View All →


text:
Niseko is synonymous with the Japan ski scene and incredible powder snow. Powderlife is your Niseko Travel Guide – online, and when you arrive.
Between Powderlife.com online and Powderlife Niseko magazine on the ground, we've got all the information you need to find the perfect accommodation, experience a great variety of restaurants and make the most of your holiday in Niseko.
Powder Capital of Japan
Niseko is in the southwest of Hokkaido – Japan's rural, northernmost island and its largest prefecture. It's about two or three hours by bus, car or train, southwest of Sapporo, the capital.
Hirafu? Kutchan? Annupuri? Niseko Village?
So you know you're going to Niseko… but you're wondering why your hotel is in Hirafu, when the postal address is Kutchan?
Niseko is the name given to the four independently owned ski resorts on the southeast face of Mt Annupuri, collectively known as the Niseko United. The most well known and visited of these resorts is Grand Hirafu, commonly known as Hirafu. The resort itself is great, but unless you know your secret spots, the powder quickly disappears from the traffic it experiences during the day.
That's the beauty of Niseko – there are four resorts you can ski between with ease, with slopes and terrain to suit all levels of experience.
If you're looking up at the mountain from Hirafu, the off-piste powder haven of Hanazono is over a few hills and gullies to your right. To the left, across a massive avalanche-prone bowl, is the up market and slower-paced Niseko Village, formerly known as Higashiyama. And to it's left, bookending the Niseko United is Annupuri, famous for it's back bowls and tendency to hide secret stashes of some of the best powder Niseko has to offer.


text:
Silvan S. Schweber
ORDINARY GENIUSES: Max Delbrück, George Gamow, and the Origins of Genomics and Big Bang Cosmology. Gino Segrè. xxii + 330 pp. Viking, 2011. $27.95.
George Gamow, in the epigraph to the preface of his 1947 book One Two Three . . . Infinity, quotes the walrus in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass and declares that for him, too, the time has come to talk of many things: "of atoms, stars, and nebulae, of entropy and genes." Gino Segrè, who, like Gamow, is a distinguished theoretical physicist and a fine writer (as evidenced by his Faust in Copenhagen), has emulated him by writing about many things in Ordinary Geniuses. The book is a stimulating, authoritative, highly relevant and very accessible account of the origins of Big Bang cosmology and of genomics. It is told through the parallel lives of Max Delbrück (1906–1981) and George Gamow (1904–1968), whose lifelong friendship began in the early 1930s when both were postdoctoral fellows at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen.
Delbrück, by virtue of his pioneering and seminal studies of the replication of bacterial viruses in their host cells, his charismatic leadership, and the enormous influence he had on those who worked with him, is considered the founder of molecular biology. For his contributions to this field, he and his colleagues Salvador Luria and Alfred Hershey were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1969.
Gamow, by virtue of his pioneering and seminal contributions to nuclear theory after the introduction of wave mechanics in the 1920s, his early advocacy of the Big Bang theory in cosmology, his generative efforts in deciphering the genetic code, and the deep influence of his popular scientific writings, is remembered as an unconventional, highly original and creative scientist.
In parallel chapters, Segrè sensitively and insightfully narrates chronologically Delbrück's and Gamow's personal and professional lives. While doing so, he presents and explains their scientific contributions, the prior works on which they were based, and their present-day importance and relevance.
Delbrück was the youngest of seven children in a very distinguished academic family. His father was a professor of history at Berlin University. He grew up in the Grunewald suburb of Berlin with the families of Max Planck, theologian Adolf von Harnack, and psychiatrist/neurologist Karl Bonhoeffer as close neighbors. While he attended Göttingen University from 1926 to 1929, Delbrück's early interest in astronomy and mathematics became transformed into a commitment to theoretical physics. He there wrote a doctoral thesis under Walter Heitler on the binding energy of the Li2 molecule and thereafter spent some time in Bristol working with John Lennard-Jones on quantum chemistry.
The award of a Rockefeller fellowship in 1931 became a transformative experience for Delbrück. In February 1931 he went to Copenhagen, where he spent six months working under the influence of Niels Bohr. While there, he roomed with Gamow, and the two of them collaborated on a nuclear physics project. Delbrück then went to Zurich, where he spent the final six months of his fellowship working with Wolfgang Pauli. Bohr and Pauli profoundly influenced him. He incorporated Pauli's deep sense of integrity, his unflagging dedication to the highest standards of scientific investigation, his intolerance of intellectual pretense and his unsettling frankness. Pauli's "Not even wrong" became translated into Delbrück's "I don't believe a word of it"—his frequent response when told of some new experimental result or theoretical model. Bohr's complementarity principle and his attempts to extend its applicability beyond the atomic domain—in particular, to biology and consciousness—led Delbrück to study the relation of atomic physics and biology. His interaction with Bohr, and his lack of creativity in comparison with Hans Bethe, Felix Bloch, Gamow, Lev Landau, Rudolf Peierls, Victor Weisskopf and other off-the-scale theorists of his generation, eventually made him decide to become a biologist.
In 1933, rather than becoming Pauli's assistant, Delbrück accepted the position of house theoretician in Lise Meitner's nuclear physics group at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in Berlin, because the job would allow him to devote ample time to studying biology. While in Berlin, he organized a study group in biology and collaborated with Nikolai W. Timoféeff-Ressovsky and Karl G. Zimmer in writing an important paper on the nature of gene mutation and gene structure. In it, Delbrück used his knowledge of the quantum-mechanical description of molecular structure as the basis for a model of the gene that was to account both for its remarkable stability in its cellular environment and for the mutational consequences of its exposure to x-rays. It was reading this paper that led Erwin Schrödinger to write his influential 1945 book What Is Life?: The Physical Aspect of the Living Cell.
In 1937, because of the political situation in Nazi Germany, Delbrück's employment in Berlin came to an end, and he accepted a research position in Thomas Hunt Morgan's fly room at Caltech. It was there that he first learned of bacterial viruses from Emory L. Ellis and collaborated with him on an influential article, "The Growth of Bacteriophage," published in 1939. Summer visits to Cold Spring Harbor further integrated Delbrück into the American genetics community. In 1940 he went to Vanderbilt University as an instructor in physics but continued doing research on phages. Working with Luria and Hershey on various aspects of mutations in bacteriophages, Delbrück formulated and carried out the mathematization of the initial phase of molecular biology. In 1947 he accepted George Beadle's invitation to return to Caltech as a professor of biology.
The distinguished geneticist William Hayes, in his National Academy of Sciences biographical memoir of Delbrück, succinctly characterized him as follows:
A man of rare intellectual ability, and clarity of thought and perception, he excelled in theoretical physics, biology, and philosophy, and possessed a deep knowledge and appreciation of the arts. . . .
Above all, Max was a born leader whose Socratic influence on those who worked with him was enormous, whose rare praise was something to be coveted and remembered, and whose criticism was welcomed with respect. . . . On a personal level he engendered in the minds of his friends and colleagues a deep respect and affection.
Segrè has convincingly corroborated this assessment by detailing Delbrück's scientific life.
Similarly, Segrè has insightfully and lovingly narrated the life of George Gamow: his growing up in Odessa; the hard years of the Russian Revolution; his membership in the "Jazz Band," a remarkable quartet (the other members were Dmitri Ivanenko, Lev Landau and Matvei Bronstein) of young men in Leningrad in the mid-1920s who were passionately studying the development of quantum mechanics; his stays in Europe, first in Copenhagen with Bohr and then in Cambridge with Ernest Rutherford; his attempts to escape the Soviet Union after returning there; his acceptance in 1934 of a professorship at George Washington University; his role in establishing the annual Washington Conferences on Theoretical Physics; and his eventual acceptance in 1956 of a professorship at the University of Colorado at Boulder. And in the process of narrating Gamow's personal and professional life, Segrè also tells us about Gamow's seminal contribution to the theory of alpha-particle decay, his influential "liquid drop" model of the nucleus, his attempts to explain nucleogenesis in a Big Theory of cosmogenesis, his important post–World War II work with Ralph Alpher and Robert Herman on the consequences of including radiation in a Big Bang model (predictions eventually corroborated by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson, and by Robert Dicke and his collaborators, with the discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation), and his generative contributions to the decipherment of the genetic code.
The focus of Segrè's book is on scientific matters and concrete results and accomplishments. I would have liked to learn a little more about Delbrück's and Gamow's political views and their respective mathematical abilities, and more about their character traits and the metaphysical assumptions that guided them—I'm curious about what allowed Gamow to be so open to the world and what constrained Delbrück to cling throughout his life to the dialectical aspect of Bohr's complementarity principle, loosely interpreted, as applied to biology. But this in no way detracts from Segrè's truly impressive accomplishment in informing the wider public of the great and important scientific advances achieved by these men.
Delbrück, Schrödinger and Gamow's contributions to, and influence on, molecular biology derived in part from their having been trained as physicists. Schrödinger's What is Life? and Delbrück's annual phage lectures at Cold Spring Harbor from 1945 on were responsible for attracting a large number of young physicists to molecular biology. Today, once again advances in biology, and the funding available in the field, are attracting a large number of young physicists to genomics and to molecular and evolutionary biology. I hope that Segrè will be challenged to write an equally lucid and enlightening book about this development.
Silvan S. Schweber is professor of physics and Richard Koret Professor in the History of Ideas, emeritus, at Brandeis University. He is the author of, among other books, QED and the Men Who Made It (1994) and In the Shadow of the Bomb: Bethe, Oppenheimer, and the Moral Responsibility of the Scientist (2000), both from Princeton University Press, and Einstein and Oppenheimer: The Meaning of Genius (Harvard University Press, 2008).
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The communist chinese government has set the table for them.
welcome to the world of commu-capitolist-eliteism --just like the mainland china--
communism protects the elite capitolist robber-barons at the very top and everybody else is a communist surf-- living to serve the system.
i think people confuse various things --but their not the same as a free-market economy.
the free market was what we had --long --long ago.
thats gone with government regulation and protectionism of the big guys.
Let's start with this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...013! - YouTube


text:
Uptown is the New Downtown in Houston
Hotel Derek • Houston, TX
Escape Kit
- A One-Night Stay for Two in an Upgraded City View Room
- Breakfast Buffet for Two
- Valet Parking
- Combine Vouchers to Stay Up to Two Nights
In recent years, Houston's Uptown District has become the city's de facto downtown. Never mind that once upon a time the area was beyond city limits; today it's a hub for Houston's premier commercial enterprises, with high-fashion retail, top-notch restaurants, and four-star hotels drawing more than 20 million visitors to the district each year.
Less than a mile from The Galleria—Houston's premier upmarket retail center and the largest mall in Texas—the Hotel Derek injects its own brand of style and sophistication into the bustling Uptown District. This 314-room boutique hotel is, first and foremost, dedicated to design: Sleek black floors lend the lobby a posh-penthouse vibe, while rich leather couches, cowhide rugs, wood accents, and framed artwork create a homier atmosphere reminiscent of a hip Manhattan apartment. And it doesn't just look nice; it feels nice too. Rooms are appointed with plush beds draped in satiny linens, a large glass work table satisfies business travelers' needs, and cozy bathrobes lie in wait in each room.
Mornings at the Hotel Derek begin with breakfast at the Valentino Vin Bar Houston. A sumptuous American buffet by morning and an elegant Italian restaurant and wine bar by night, this outpost of the original Valentino in Santa Monica dishes out time-honored recipes made with fresh, seasonal produce and top-quality meats, plus cocktails, beer, and wine.
After a light workout in the hotel's fitness room, or a refreshing dip in the outdoor pool, head to the centerpiece of Uptown: The Galleria, a three-million-square-foot homage to consumerism fit with 375 stores—many of them high-end—two hotels, a sprawling office complex, and a private health club.
"The greeting is pleasant, rooms are comfortable, and the overall vibe from the staff is great. My preferred hotel in The Galleria district. Even the valet personnel make you feel at home. Best bet."-- TripAdvisor
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