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Economic Development
Raid on The Reservation
Casinos linked to Indian tribes bring in billions of dollars. States get only a fraction of that money. Many of them want more.
Like many new governors this year, Mitt Romney of Massachusetts spent much of his early time in office wishing his budget problems would go away. At one point, though, he thought he had an ideal solution. Not only would it raise tens of millions of dollars, it would do so without an increase in taxes. All the money would come from entities located at a safe distance, outside the commonwealth.
It would come from gamblers and Indian tribes. One small Massachusetts tribe, the Wampanoags, on Martha's Vineyard, had been trying for years to open a casino within state borders. Romney let it be known to established casinos elsewhere in New England that he would be willing to block the Wampanoag move--if those enterprises sent the Bay State $75 million in "casino mitigation" fees. As Romney explained it, gambling operations throughout New England could rest easy, knowing that their parking lots would remain full of cars that had been driven down from Boston. Tribes located in Massachusetts would continue to pose no competitive threat. "If they refuse to provide at least $75 million to us," Romney warned, "then we will engage in video lottery terminals of our own."
Romney liked his stratagem so much he included the expected $75 million windfall in his initial budget. Others were not quite as enamored with it. "The plan clearly appears to be like a form of extortion," said Mark Brown, chairman of the Mohegan tribe, which operates a major casino in Connecticut. In the end, Romney retreated from the plan, deciding instead to follow the well-trod path of his brethren in Pennsylvania and Maryland and promote slot machines as a budget fix instead.
But the audacity of Romney's ploy, even if unsuccessful, points to the growing sentiment in many states that casinos on Indian reservations, a bonanza in recent years for a select few tribes and Native American citizens, can be used to relieve the current fiscal crunch.
Under federal law, states can enter into compacts with Indian tribes not only to regulate the casino business but to share in the profits. Where the state already is getting a share of the take, governors are trying to entice tribes back to the table to renegotiate the terms, promising to license expanded operations or simply increase the number of slot machines allowed in casinos.
In California, Governor Gray Davis hopes to boost the state's share of casino profits by $680 million a year. (He originally asked for double that.) In return, he promises casino-owning tribes that he will lift the current cap on the number of slot machines any one tribe can operate. Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle has negotiated new compacts with several tribes that will lead to a quadrupling of casino payments to the state. In Oregon, Portland city officials have asked the Grand Ronde tribe to consider financing a major league baseball stadium in exchange for the right to open a casino in the metropolitan area.
Arizona voters approved a ballot initiative last fall that allows 17 tribes to engage in house-banked blackjack, slot machines and video games. In return, the state will assume more regulatory authority and get up to 8 percent of the profits. The state Department of Gaming projects that tribal casinos will generate $54 million for the state and its schools in the coming fiscal year alone. Michigan is similarly hoping for a sweeter deal with casino-operating tribes. New York is engaged in a long-term battle to force its tribes to collect state sales taxes on non-gambling purchases made on casino premises.
States have not always been quite so hungry for Indian gambling dollars. Some of the earliest compacts with tribes, such as the ones drawn up in Minnesota and South Dakota in the 1980s, did not include any revenue-sharing agreements at all. The tribes were simply allowed to keep whatever they took in. A few other states chose to collect only enough money to pay the cost of regulating the games. A few, such as Connecticut and New York, were tougher negotiators and came away with as much as a quarter of total casino profits.
Now some of the older compacts are expiring, just as states face their most serious budget shortages in decades. It's not surprising that several are looking to strike new deals that will boost their take from Indian casinos by hundreds of millions of dollars. "It looks like we're not going to get any help from the federal government, so we have to explore all options," says Wisconsin state Senator Robert Wirch.
Given the history of U.S. relationships with Indian tribes, the current pressure for more money has generated a bit of cynicism. "Anytime Indians have something worth money--land in 1890, oil paintings and casinos today," writes Scott L. Malcomson in his history, "One Drop of Blood," "white folks will try to take it."
Indians turned to gambling--primarily bingo games--as a means of economic development during the 1980s. By the middle of the decade, they were generating about $100 million annually. Then, in 1987, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states could not prevent tribes from sponsoring gambling on reservations as long as gambling was legal elsewhere in the state. The following year, in response, Congress passed the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, under which states share the right to regulate the casinos, although they cannot tax them. "The federal government has done this consistently for 200 years," says Anthony Gulig, a historian at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. "When Indians win in court, Congress passes a law to modify the victory."
There is no disputing the significance of the casino windfall. Revenues from Indian gaming increased nearly 40-fold in little more than a decade after passage of the 1988 federal law. Nearly 200 of the 562 federally recognized tribes now run some form of gambling, with revenues totaling $12.7 billion in 2001.
Gambling has presented different tribes with wildly different financial situations. In 2000, only eight tribes accounted for 40 percent of all income from Indian gaming. Most other tribal casinos were not nearly so profitable and, of course, the majority of tribes don't run gambling operations at all. Still, given the overall growth of the industry, some of the states that settled for fixed annual payments in their initial compacts began to wake up to the fact that they hadn't made very shrewd deals. "I think that the previous governors, Thompson and McCallum, certainly did not get enough money from the gaming compacts," says Wisconsin Senator Wirch.
Doyle, the Democrat who unseated McCallum last fall, is doing everything he can to change that situation. Under his proposal, several tribes would be able to raise betting limits and expand the hours and the types of games they could offer. Their deals with the state would also become permanent, as opposed to the five- and seven- year compacts they're under now. But in return, Doyle is asking for a percentage of their business, as opposed to the current fixed payments. His budget for the next biennium assumes $206 million in state gaming revenues, a big leap from current payments of $51 million.
Doyle's plan has generated enormous controversy in recent months, both partisan and institutional. Former Governor Tommy Thompson told the state GOP convention in May, "If I would have negotiated that, it would have been in the neighborhood of $1 billion." The Wisconsin legislature wants authority over any deal the governor negotiates, and twice this year has passed bills giving itself that authority.
Doyle vetoed both and simply negotiated new tribal arrangements without consulting the legislature. Frustrated by their inability to override his vetoes, Republican legislators in April filed a lawsuit to block the new compacts, which they call an unconstitutional expansion of gaming.
Doyle was able to talk the tribes into more generous payments to the state by granting them monopoly rights. This is a strategy that several other governors have used successfully. Connecticut, for example, has only two casinos, both enormous and both with monopolies in their markets. Not coincidentally, those tribes turn a higher percentage of casino profit back to the state than their counterparts anywhere in the country.
Other states, however, have a much more competitive environment. In California, with 50 tribes operating 51 casinos and Nevada gambling outlets hugging the state border, profits are modest and tribes spend as much as one-third of their take on marketing and advertising to gain an edge over competitors. Current compacts, signed three years ago, limit each tribe to no more than 2,000 slot machines. Governor Davis is offering to lift that limit in exchange for an increased state share of the till, but except in a handful of cases, the tribes don't do enough business to justify even the 2,000 slots. "There's no incentive for them to renegotiate," says a spokesman for the California Nations Indian Gaming Association.
Tribes in Arizona are adjusting to a deal with the state which followed two years of negotiation and was ratified by voters last November. Much of the gambling money that the tribes will be handing over to the state will be earmarked for particular purposes, rather than just patching holes in the general fund. The tribes even have discretion over the 12 percent of their gambling revenues that they contribute to localities. The Salt River Pima-Maricopa County Indian Community is contributing millions to gene research in Phoenix, satisfying the requirement that it help with local economic development and also responding to the high incidence of diabetes among the local Indian population.
The reason the state didn't simply insist on direct cash payments to fill budget holes, says Christa Severns, of the Arizona Department of Gaming, is that until recently, raising money was a lower priority than ensuring adequate regulation of gambling. "When we went through our negotiation process," she says, "we had the fortunate circumstance that the state didn't have a deficit. Getting tribal contributions was never a way to balance a budget." If they were sitting down at the table today, Severns concedes, the emphasis on money would be a much greater motivating factor.
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text: Since you pay to go to the university, you usually don't have to pay extra for the connection. Some places tack on a small fee to the other charges, but it doesn't amount to much. My school didn't have any limits on downloads, but I do know that some places have implemented restrictions on people who download or upload lots.Originally Posted by PING

subset: commoncrawl


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Hello Oil Country!
I am relatively new to this site as well as having a Subaru. I know there are rallies and runs around here somewhere, i just need to find out where and when. The CRC puts on the rocky mountain rally in November but I'm not about to put a roll cage and a bunch of Race decals on and pay $1300.00 to have a little off road fun(ok, a lot of Fun).
I cant believe i am 1.5 Hrs away from the rockies and i cant find anyone else who has the same passion for nice cars and beautiful back country roads through the mountains.
Anyone in the Calgary, Canmore, Exshaw, Crowsnest, Banff, Jasper, Kananaskis, Etc area know anything about some meets or show and shines?
Please don't tell me i have to go to Montana or B.C. to do some fun drives... i mean damn, this isn't Saskatchewan! jk much love Sask, Go Riders!


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Too Many Jobs: Nice Problem, If You Can Get It
Dan Muzich was living in paradise. Earning $50,000 a year as a civilian engineer for the U.S. Navy, he lived a half block from the beach in Los Angeles. But he gave it all up 18 months ago to move to Detroit and take a contract job at Chrysler Corp., Why? "I was very boxed in out in California because of the abrupt, 90-degree turn the defense business made," says Muzich, 28. "But there's lots of growth potential here."
Michigan, once the embodiment of America's industrial decline, is rubbing the rust off its image. Thanks to an unusually long resurgence in the auto industry and aggressive cuts in state taxes, Michigan now is enjoying record low unemployment of 4.6%--vs. 5.4% for the national average (chart). The state's per-capita income is up 26% since 1991, the most for any state. And the long mass exodus to other states finally reversed itself last year, as 2,800 more people moved into Michigan than left. Now Michigan has a new, albeit pleasant, problem: It can't find enough workers.
"STARVING." Just ask Ralph Miller, who is having trouble filling 750 openings at APX International, a suburban Detroit automotive engineering and design firm. "We are starving for people for very good paying jobs," says Miller, president of APX, which pays engineers and computer draftsmen $50,000 to $100,000 a year. Miller--along with his rivals--is scouring the West Coast and Texas for workers laid off by defense contractors.
Fearing his state could lose a chance to secure its comeback, Governor John Engler in May mailed appeals to more than 6,700 engineering graduates from Michigan universities who live elsewhere. "It's time to let everyone who left Michigan know that it's time to come back home," Engler said in announcing the campaign. The Republican governor also wrote to chief executives at AT&T, McDonnell Douglas, and Boeing, encouraging them to put their laid-off workers in touch with Michigan's state employment agency. Michigan has even set up a "port-of-entry" site on the Internet (http://www.mesc.state.mi.us/techjobs.htm).
And it's not just white-collar jobs that go begging in Michigan. A University of Michigan study this year found that the Big Three auto makers will be hit with record retirements of mostly blue-collar employees during the coming seven years, forcing the auto makers to hire 225,000 workers. At least 100,000 of those jobs will be Michigan-based, says David E. Cole, director of the university's Office for the Study of Automotive Transportation and the author of the study. Hourly jobs in Big Three factories pay about $40,000 a year; overtime can push it above $70,000.
That sounds great to many job-seekers in other states. After news of Cole's study got out this winter, Michigan's state employment agency received 150,000 applications in one month. The problem is finding the skilled, computer-literate workers the auto industry now needs. "We have to upgrade the math, reading, and deductive capabilities of the people coming into our plants," says Ford Motor Co. Chairman Alexander J. Trotman. Meanwhile, demand is rising again: Auto makers increased their U.S. vehicle sales forecast to 15.3 million for 1996, up from 14.7 million last year.
RENEGADE RACE. All the good news makes a distant memory out of the popular bumper sticker of the 1980s that read: "The last one out of Michigan, please turn out the lights." How did it happen? A lot of downsizing improved the business climate. Faced with a budget deficit of $1.8 billion in 1991, Engler cut services, eliminated state welfare for able-bodied people, and slashed 4,300 workers from the state payroll. He also cut taxes 21 times, reducing the state's tax burden by $3.5 billion over the past five years.
Engler, who is on Bob Dole's short list of vice-presidential candidates, doesn't want his work to go unnoticed. In ads running in Indiana newspapers this month, he encourages businesses there to "join the race to Michigan." The ads play off the controversy over the U.S. 500, a renegade auto race to be held in Brooklyn, Mich., on Memorial Day--the same day as the Indianapolis 500. "I'd much rather be the pursuer than the pursued," quips Engler. "This feels good."
Can Michigan's economy keep its glow when the auto industry takes its inevitable turn for the worse next year or in 1998? By then, says Muzich, "I'm hoping I'll be entrenched." The way things are going, many newcomers will have the same hope.


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Never awkwardly stuff your backpack into a front rack again.
In countries where bicycling is routine, people rarely wear helmets. In America, where automobiles dominate, pedalers sport protection.
A new apartment building will offer 1,200 cyclist parking spots, a North American record.
How the Netherlands is treating new residential developments in smaller cities and suburbs.
Adelaide's Tour de Work has gotten at least 1,633 people to cycle to the office.
Cycling in Vancouver just got a little more wild.
And city rankings, based on Bike Score.
A new study highlights the concern women riders have for car traffic.
Hot-air balloons! Squishy, non-circular wheels! A competition to rethink bicycling in Singapore is producing some strange results.
A government tax incentive program has made cycles affordable for thousands.
Hurricane Sandy left behind untold destruction, painful memories and a wicked new environment for bicycling.
A new study takes a real-time approach to see why cyclists choose some routes over others.
Using a variety of electronics hooked up to his body, Brian House turned his daily bike route in New York into music.
If you think all European cities embrace cycling as much as Copenhagen, you must not be familiar with Brussels.
These LED-studded gloves not only look nifty, but could save lives, too.
Research on the topic doesn't offer any clean answers — and two new reports just add to the confusion.
How bike share programs can provide clean helmets for everyone
The city has just a few years to transform its cycling infrastructure before the UCI Road World Championships


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Hi guys! I realize I haven't posted in a long time, and I've gotten a few emails that are concerned that I am ok. Thank you so much for thinking of me! I am just fine, in fact, I'm pregnant! I didn't realize how exhausting pregnancy can be, which is why I haven't posted. Please hang in there, I hope to be back posting soon.
A New Sprout
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You step onto the treadmill and it asks you for your age and weight. After glancing around and covering your fingers (like you're punching the buttons at the ATM) you're off! At the end of the session you get a few numbers: how long you spent on the machine, how far away you'd be if you had actually been outside and how many Calories you've supposedly used up. I say supposedly because there is virtually no way this number is correct. Here's why….
To reliably estimate how many Calories your body expends, the machine needs to know many things about you. Incidentally, your age and weight are amongst the least important. It needs to know about your internal workings: how hard your muscles are working and what chemical cycles are being utilized within your muscles. It needs to know how much heat your body is producing. It needs to know how much carbon-dioxide you are exhaling. It needs to know how much of your weight is made up of muscle, how much is fat and how much is bone tissue. It also needs to know where those muscles are within your body. And it should probably be told which fiber types are predominant in the muscles being utilized.
I can imagine what you are saying right now: "Matt, I don't care if it is really accurate. I just want an idea of how many calories I used up".
So maybe this is one of those situations where accuracy is not that important to you. But what if your treadmill tells you that the hour you spend running used up 1100 Calories, but you'd actually, maybe, used 400-500. Is that close enough? If you were counting calories and I gave you a sandwich and a label that said it contained "between 400 and 1100 Calories" would you be OK with that? You have to ask yourself how important these numbers are to you.
Forget the numbers on those machines. Stop asking your trainer how many Calories you are burning. Don't walk around with one of those things on your arm supposedly recording your Caloric expenditure. Instead, bike to work, take the stairs, swim at your cottage, walk your dog and work hard when you train. Enjoy the time you spend moving. Think about the gradual adaptations to your muscles, heart and lungs I talked about in the past. Allow them to happen by getting adequate rest between workouts. Numbers are for accountants and statisticians.
This is biology. Your body will adapt to the stresses you expose it to as long as the stresses are not so catastrophic that you break in the process. Don't fool yourself, if you're comfortable when you run you need to run faster. If your muscles don't feel taxed after a weight session you could have done more.
Stress and recover, then repeat. And find someone to do it with. Everything else will fall into place. This is part of a healthy lifestyle.
Please leave questions or comments below!
You can read all of Matthew's series on fitness here
Front slider image: Twitter 365 Project – Day 62 by Lu_lu on Flickr


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Last week, the New England Journal of Medicine published a study which, according to the fawning mainstream press, proved "conclusively" that the best diet in the world was the Mediterranean diet, that it protected everyone from heart disease and stroke, and that everyone in the world should be on it.
Except the study showed no such thing.
Now, don't get me wrong. I'm a big fan of the concept of Mediterranean eating, even though I've never seen anyone definitively define what "The Mediterranean Diet" actually is. (Check the definitions: most are squishy and vague with phrases like "higher in vegetables" or "lower in dairy".) We do know that in all styles of Mediterranean eating there is way less sugar. And there's lots of olive oil, nuts and other good stuff.
We also know that Mediterranean folks eat their big meal of the day in the middle of afternoon. And that they take naps. And that the men talk about their feelings. (A lot.) And they get lots of sun. And that all of these things have a great deal of impact, though that's not what gets mentioned when the press talks about "The Mediterranean Diet".
But I digress.
Back to the study. What the researchers actually did was create three groups of people. Group one ate what is generally thought of as a Mediterranean-type diet, but supplemented with lots of extra-virgin olive oil. Group two ate the same diet, but supplemented with lots of nuts. And group three ate the standard, American, low-fat high-carb diet that the diet dictocrats have been pushing on us for decades. The one recommended by such groups as the American Heart Association and the god-awful moribund American Dietetic Association (or whatever it is they're calling themselves these days to try to reinvent themselves as contemporary. Good luck with that.)
Here's what the results showed with laser-sharp clarity: The low-fat diet is a complete and utter failure.
Both "Mediterranean diet" groups did well on measures of cardiovascular health, and there wasn't much difference between the two groups. But the low-fat group did horribly. In fact, they did so badly that in the middle of the study, the researchers intervened, and tried to give the low-fat group more instruction and attention to bring them up to speed. Didn't matter. They bombed anyway.
Side note that was missed in all the media reporting: The researchers clearly state that they believe the excellent results achieved by both "Mediterranean" groups were largely driven by the supplemental nuts and the supplemental extra-virgin olive oil. Not necessarily the "diet" itself.
So what have we learned, class?
We've learned that the American, low-fat diet stinks. And that nuts and olive oil are extremely healthy foods.
As far as the Mediterranean diet being the "best" diet ever, that's still up for grabs. This study certainly didn't show that, as it didn't pit the "Mediterranean diet" against any other diet but the low-fat one; there was no group doing a "paleo" diet, or a "high-protein" diet or a "raw foods" diet.
And we still don't have a good definition of the Mediterranean diet. (As my mentor, the great Robert Crayhon once quipped, "People think the "Mediterranean Diet" means adding a bunch of olive oil to your corn flakes".) And we still don't know which aspects of the so-called Mediterranean lifestyle are the ones that really produce the results. Is it the olive oil? The nuts? The vegetables? The low level of red meat? The fact that they eat slowly and in the middle of the day? Maybe it's all of those things, maybe it's just some of them… this study certainly didn't address that question, so we can't say for sure.
What we can say is this: No diet, ever, in the history of the world, has been higher in sugar and processed carbohydrate junk foods than the one that most people in America consume on a daily basis.
And no diet is better designed to produce the epidemic of obesity, diabetes and heart disease we are currently witnessing.
My own personal opinion is you could design a dozen diet studies showing the superiority of a dozen different diets (from Atkins to Ornish to Zone) as long as you compare each of them to the crap we're eating now.
With a bar that low, almost any diet is going to look like a superstar.
15 Comments
Jonny, you are so irreverant in the most pleasing of ways; always love to hear that sarcasm when it hits completely on target. Yes, we are subject to more idiots in the world of nutrition than can be counted. We are blessed that you are diligent in the pursuit of bringing truth into the foray. I mean, seriously, these idiots that do these studies would not make it into high school biology class without having to make excuses for their lack of practicing 'real' science. Honestly. Thank you for being the rogue that you are!
Well, the early (like 3,000 years ago) Greek diet was a diet high in all kinds of fats (natural of course). Bet they wouldn't like to hear that.
Thank you, JB. Excellent, informative and refreshing. Cannot wait for your next book.
Hi, Jonny… Re: Your comment: "And we still don't have a good definition of the Mediterranean diet." The study was very specific about what the reserachers fed the Med Diet group:
The "Mediterranean diet" was defined very specifically:
• Fruits – 3 servings daily
• Vegetables – 2 servings daily
• Fish – 3 or more servings weekly; preferably fatty fish
• Beans – 3 or more servings weekly
• Sofrito – 2 or more servings weekly
• Poultry (in place of habitual red meat)
• Extra virgin olive oil (EVOO) – 4 tbsp daily or Nuts – 3 servings weekly (walnuts, almonds, and hazelnuts)
• Glass of wine at dinner (optional, and only if previously habitual)
My question is: Why did they need to run this study at all? For one thing, we have the results of the Lyons Heart Disease Study of 1988 which showed the same results. As your body Dr. Stephen Sinatra and I wrote in our book The Healing Kitchen (Bottom Line Books, 2010): "The Lyons Study showed that heart attack survivors who follow the Mediterranean diet with the fat content of 30-40% were 70% less likely to experience a second heart attack or other cardiac problems compared to patients who followed the typical low-fat diet recommended by the American Heart Association. The heart healing effects of the Mediterranean diet could be observed in patients within the first two months. And the study was halted years early to protect the health of the patients in the low-fat diet group."
As you know Jonny, Lyons wasn't the first study to prove the failings of the low fat diet. As I cite in my upcoming book, The 30-Day Blood Pressure Cure (written with Roy Heilbron, MD, co-creator of the South Beach Diet: "… we've repeatedly been told for nearly 50 years that a low-fat diet is good for us. This has become a cultural belief, although there is no credible research to support it. In fact, when researchers finally got around to testing this, the results demonstrated no benefit from a low-fat diet. This should have sent shockwaves through the medical community and changed public health policy. Unfortunately, it didn't.
"Several such clinical studies have been conducted in the last ten years, comparing the low-fat diet still recommended to this day by the AHA and the British Heart Foundation to those high in fat — and especially saturated fat. These trials are considered the best ever done on the effect of eating high-fat, high-saturated-fat diets on risk factors for heart disease and diabetes. In each of these trials, participants were instructed to eat as much fat and protein foods as they wanted — including meat, fish, and poultry — but to restrict carbohydrates to no more than 50 grams. Their results were compared to subjects who ate fewer overall calories and avoided fat and saturated fat. Results were remarkably consistent across all studies.
"Here's what happened to those who ate mostly saturated fat and protein:
1. Their HDL cholesterol went up.
2. Their triglycerides went way down.
3. Their blood pressure went down.
4. Their total cholesterol remained about the same.
5. Their LDL cholesterol went up slightly.
6. They lost about the same amount of weight as the low-fat group
7. Their risk of having a heart attack decreased significantly. "
Hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent trying to stubbornly demonstrate any health benefits for the low-fat diet. All have failed. Indeed, the official low-fat dietary advice from doctors has been responsible for our current epidemics of Type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and obesity. This "fat is bad" advice has frightened consumers into devouring more refined carbohydrates – with devastating consequences. Jim Healthy, http://www.MyHealingKitchen.com
1 Gannon et al. Nutrition & Metabolism 2010, 7:64 http://www.nutritionandmetabolism.com/content/7/1/64
2 Ibid.
As a Registered Dietitian, who has had training in a functional approach to nutrition, I would like to say that not all of us agree with our organization. I am in private practice and hope to see a change in the focus of AND( association of Nutrition and Dietetics). We are nutritionists, most with a graduate degree and we become Registered Dietitians by qualifying to sit for the credentialing exam. We need to maintain education credits , both at state and National level. I am not alone, and we are working on getting rid of some of the relationships with corporations that make unhealthy foods. Trashing all RDs is not fair.
Hi Rukhsana,
I never intended to trash all dietitians. Some of my most respected colleagues– Esther Blum, for example, or Linda Lizotte (president of Designs for Health) are RDs… but i remain convinced that the ORGANIZATION is horrible. They engage in all kinds of behind-the-scenes litigation and lobbying to "protect" their members from competition, they were birthed in the days when nurses gave up their seats to doctors in the hospital cafeteria and they have never waved from this kind of subservience to the medical profession, they refuse to question even the most ridiculous reactionary positions of conventional pharmaceutical medicine, they parrot the "party line" on every issue and have never had an original thought in their collective head. Sorry. Individual dietitians can be wonderful, forward thinking, revolutionary, and all the rest. The ADA? Not so much.
As much as I appreciate the information posted (and I do,I do!), I also have to admit that Jonny's slightly caustic sense of humor as he points out the flaws in the dogma always brings a big giggle to my day!
Jonny, you forgot to say that almost nobody was able to stay on the low fat diet, so it wasn't even a comparison to that diet. It did show that low fat is very difficult to stay with, though.
You're great Jonny – love the candor.
why thank yoU!
From looking at the details of the study, the control was not the standard American diet, rather it was the standard Spanish diet with the addition of a flyer that said to cut back on fat. As table S6 in the original document shows, all 3 diets were very similar in amounts of vegetables, fruits, cereals, refined cereals, pasteries, and dairy products. As Jonny points out, the interpretation of this as a recommendation of "Mediterranean diet" is a real stretch!
I read that it was the Greek coffee that was the 'good guy'.
Well ?
I heard it was the Ouzo
I grew up in the Meditteranean, and it is a myth that people there don't eat a lot of red meat. Goat and lamb are both red meats, and they are regularly consumed very frequently. The thing is that there is a lot of fish and poultry consumed too, so that they all balance out. But those meats are still eaten in fairly even proportions to one another. It's beef that might not be eaten quite as frequently – but that depends on the region, too. They do eat more fruits and veggies than we do in the U.S. But olive oil, as good as it is, does contribute to weight gain, given that it is in the line of being a LCFA. The other thing people miss is that butter and dairy actually are consumed quite regularly in the Mediterranean. It's just milk consumption that isn't as high with all adults. But there is regular consumption of butter, cheese, and yogurt – quite a bit of it, actually. – Especially in the Middle Eastern, Greek, north African, and French parts of the Mediterranean. In Turkey, a special drink call Ayran is a slightly salty, tart yogurt drink that is drunk regularly for the hot summer months. So, maybe people need to pay a little more attention before they start assuming Mediterraneans eat little red meat or dairy.
I really thank you for this post. It's good to hear from someone who actually lived there.. we tend to believe our own mythologies too much!


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October 5, 2015. An urgently needed, state-of-the-art, 10-bed Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Stabilization Unit (CAPSU) dedicated to the treatment of children and adolescents with mental health disorders will open in 2017, providing specialized care close to home for approximately 1,000 young people each year.
The paint and coating industry has changed often through the past decade evolving into only a few foreign, multinational manufacturers who own and control most paint brands sold in Canada. In this global arena and amid the unknowns that change sometimes brings, Cloverdale Paint is proud to have remained a "constant" in the Canadian markets we serve.
Our strength and stability have instilled confidence in our customers and employees alike. Our roots and our brands are "home grown". Our coatings are designed to exceed the performance requirements of Canada's variable climates and provide excellent value to the customer segments we serve.
We are proud to be the largest Canadian owned paint and coatings manufacturer in North America!


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Avoid Contamination of the Product
Patients should be advised not to touch the dropper tip to any surface to avoid contaminating the contents.
Avoid Contact Lens Wear
Patients should be advised not to wear contact lenses if they have signs and symptoms of bacterial conjunctivitis.
Hypersensitivity Reactions
Systemically administered quinolones, including moxifloxacin, have been associated with hypersensitivity reactions, even following a single dose. Patients should be told to discontinue use immediately and contact their physician at the first sign of a rash or allergic reaction.
Last reviewed on RxList: 1/25/2017
This monograph has been modified to include the generic and brand name in many instances.
Moxeza FDA Prescribing Information
Additional Moxeza Information
Report Problems to the Food and Drug Administration
You are encouraged to report negative side effects of prescription drugs to the FDA. Visit the FDA MedWatch website or call 1-800-FDA-1088.
Women's Health
Find out what women really need.


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Compare C510 Silver Deals
The Sony Ericsson C510 in striking silver is a metallic-cased all-rounder for business, entertainment, photography and fashion. A tri-band phone plus 3G, it offers a 3.2 megapixel camera with LED flash, face/smile detection autofocus, 3.2x digital zoom and geo-tagging just for starters! It being Sony, Cybershot features abound.
It offers a 2.2-inch TFT display - 262,144-colour and 240 x 320 pixels resolution – with auto-rotation, which automatically changes from portrait to landscape when you turn the handset. The media player supports all the popular formats and has Sony's array of sound enhancers: MegaBass, PlayNow, album art and TrackID, plus an FM radio with RDS.
Internet connection is fast thanks to HSDPA technology and the C510 offers SMS, MMS and email messaging options as well as GPS (with Google Maps), with the 3G enables video calling via the integral video camera (with its own video light for excellent picture quality).
At 107 x 47 x 12.5 mm and 92g, the C510 is slim, light and stylish, with a host of organiser functions, too, such as speakerphone, timers and alarms. Battery life is rated at 10 hours' talk time (GSM; four hours (3G) and around 350 hours on standby from a full charge.
- 3G or UMTS
- Bluetooth
- Built-in handsfree
- Calculator
- Calendar
- Camera
- Internet
- Java compatible
- Memory expandable via MicroSD card
- Multimedia Service MMS
- Polyphonic ring tone
- SMS - text messages
- Video recorder


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Presentation & Services
With their long experience in localizing software from English to French, our team of experts provide full localization services which will fully integrate your documentation and products to the French market.
For more information or to get an estimate, please contact us.
We provide a full range of translation and localization services from English to French:Translation/localization of your documents, websites, software, training programs...Post-editingScripts and timed scriptsTerminology, translation memory creationTranslation, localization, proofreading and editingQuality assurance, testsDTP
For supported formats, please see the Resources section.


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Clear Channel Media and Entertainment has announced further expansion of iHeartRadio, with integrations in new Jaguar Land Rover, Volvo and Kia vehicles. In addition to these original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), iHeartRadio will also be available via platform solution provider Bosch.
According to an announcement from CCM+E, iHeartRadio's auto integrations "are designed to utilize simple, made-for-driving features that safely communicate only the most essential information for the best possible iHeartRadio experience. The application includes large text and touch targets, intuitive menu functions that incorporate the current habits of car radio users, and an interface designed to reduce distracting light during nighttime driving."
In 2014, Jaguar Land Rover vehicles equipped with Bosch SoftTec's InControl Apps platform, Volvo vehicles equipped with the Sensus Connect infotainment solution and Kia vehicles with UVO will have access to iHeartRadio. Drivers will also be able to access iHeartRadio's newest feature, iHeartRadio Talk, plus a variety of other iHeartRadio features will be accessible in-dash, including thumbs up/thumbs down, station scan and its signature music discovery tuner.
In addition to the new OEM integrations, Clear Channel is furthering its innovation in the automotive space by working with leading platform solution provider Bosch SoftTec; Bosch's specialists in automotive software, connected services and smartphone solutions; to extend iHeartRadio's in-vehicle reach with support for cross-OEM platforms.
"Radio is the original mobile, in-car entertainment feature," said Brian Lakamp, President of Digital for Clear Channel Media and Entertainment. "With the new advancements in automotive infotainment systems, Clear Channel is able to extend the reach of our radio stations to even more listeners. We're extremely pleased to work with Jaguar Land Rover, Volvo and Kia to bring iHeartRadio to their dashboards, as well as be available in Bosch's deeper extension into consumer-facing functionality -- providing even more listeners with the products and services they expect no matter where they are and no matter where they drive."
Nicki Farag, SVP of Promotion, Def Jam Recordings
Copyright © 2017 Friday Morning Quarterback Album Report, Inc. and Mediaspan Online Services - All Rights Reserved
Contact: Mediaspan Online Services
FMQB, 1930 East Marlton Pike, Executive Mews, Suite F-36, Cherry Hill, NJ 08003. (856) 424-9114.


text:
The SearchersMature
Darcy Ward moves to Liverpool from her life in Birkdale, with her Uncle Joe and their dog Rafe. But when she meets George Olsen, her life changes forever.
Chapter One
The Bloody Lightning Bolt
I woke up from a strange dream, wrenching myself from the bed and carelessly flinging the quilt onto the bedroom floor. I paused for a moment as I tried to endure with the antagonising pains of a morning headache. I must have hit my head in the night. After this, I looked up at my curtains that had small sewings of spotted horses and red roses stitched into a background of sea blue. I sighed. There wasn't any reason to draw the curtains; there wasn't actually any reason for me to have windows at all, since my window only looked through into the drably bedroom of our neighbour Mrs Zhang. The estate agent told us that people used it in the Second World War so they wouldn't have to walk outside their house and expose themselves to bombs.
I scanned my brain, trying to recollect the fragments of the dream last night.
Don't you hate it when you try to remember a dream? There must be some reason why dreams that you so desperately want to remember can just disappear and be forgotten forever. And yet, it's the most horrific and traumatic nightmares that linger in our minds and torture us with the fact that it may happen to you in real life. I mean, dreams always mean something, don't they?
Trying to remember, I drew the curtains and found myself looking into the dark bedroom of our next door neighbour. I leaned forward, opening the window as I did, to see if she was around. I couldn't find any form of life, until Mrs Zhang appeared at the corner of the room near the door, with chicken Pot Noodles hanging, like a tentacled alien, from her mouth. The only light emitted from the television screen in front of her, with some trashy TV talk show – probably Jeremy Kyle or Springer – and yet again, another parade of unattractive, teenage mother who cheated on their boyfriends with their best friends.
Zhang – I had to admit – had the appearance of an ancient hag. Thick, black bags hung, like two large weights, from her mysteriously grey eyes, with her face riddled with a network of deep wrinkles and laughter lines from years of happiness and fun times and with a creased forehead from the confused or sad times. All I can say is: you would only need to briefly glance at this old woman to understand that this person had lived life to the full.
The morbid state of the bedroom made me pity the poor pensioner. The room would be barren if it wasn't for the small single bed, a half filled bookshelf, a television (that wasn't working to the full potential the salesman guaranteed) and a beaten up armchair she was sitting in.
The place was dead.
A ghost of its former glory, when her husband had passed away in the night. The funeral was peaceful, with Joe, my uncle, respectfully speaking at the church.
She noticed me spying on her, and waved. With a weak smile, I waved back.
'Darcy?' My uncle's voice called. 'Are you decent?'
I examined the skinny shape that is my body. Like most teenagers, I'm completely insecure about my body: my almost nonexistent breasts, my average looks, spots, everything that could be branded 'adolescence' or 'in the midst of puberty', some of my most hated words in the English Language. I was dressed in my favourite Snoopy pyjamas, with my favourite rainbow socks with the individually coloured toes. Hopefully, in a normal person's eyes, I would pass for decent. Although I assumed that if a film was to be made about my life, I would get some Disney branded Hollywood actress with the perfect everything.
But I'm waffling on.
After assuring my decency, the door creaked open then slammed against the wall, as Rafe – our beautiful Alaskan malamute – charged into the bedroom, followed by Joe. Rafe barked as he scampered over to my bed and leapt onto it. Lovingly, he licked my face, as I wrapped my arms around his fluffy mane.
'Rafe!' Joe shouted, between laughs.
At this, Rafe stopped licking and shedding black and white hairs onto the bed sheets and returned to Joe's side.
He examined me up and down, and then noticed my worrying gaze at the day ahead.
His brow furrowed. 'What's got you so bugged up?'
'Guess I'm just shattered. Do I have to go?'
'Bloody 'ell, Darcy! This may be your first day, but you still need to get up and go like everyone else. Everyone's shattered!' He exclaimed, trying the 'responsible parent' tone which – I thought – didn't suit him at all.
'But Liverpool is so boring. It's just buildings and cranes!'
'Hey, there's…Liverpool One…and…Anfield. See? There's a silver lining.'
Joe sat next to me, and wrapped his arm around my shoulder; his other hand stroking Rafe's fluffy neck.
'It's not that different to Southport, you know…except…maybe less old people probably, but moving to a new place is always different, and I'm not lying when I say I know what you're going through. Come on, you'll make loads of friends and have sleepovers and play…I dunno, hair braiding circles -'
'I'm not five.'
'Hey, once you're eighteen, you can do whatever you want…you know what I mean; I've been through stuff like this when I was your age –'
'Oh, when the dinosaurs roamed?' I pitched in. Joe always did look like a caveman, no matter how hard he tried not to. He always seem to have a very unkempt, outdoorsman look, with the way he kept his Kurt Cobain hairstyle and his unshaven complexion with eyebrows – turning into a potential monobrow – that I desperately wanted to pluck.
'Oy, I'm being serious here. Parents and Guardians need to get close with their kids to help them out with their problems. Lorraine Kelly said so.'
'Depends on your meaning of 'getting close''
I had a foul mind.
'When I was young, I had loads of life changing experiences. It's all part of growing up. This'll be a big change for you. You'll see!'
Rafe barked happily after the words left his mouth.
'See? Even Rafe agrees!' Joe pointed out.
There he goes again about these 'life changing' experiences he never wants to talk about. I've always wondered what he meant about them. He'd always say that his childhood was filled with many 'disappointments' and 'experiences', but he would never go into any further detail, despite always bringing it up in conversations. This was an aspect of Joe that became increasingly annoying in the past few years. Every time, I tried to dig deeper into what he meant, he would always make some sort of pathetic excuse, like something was burning in the oven or Rafe was about to do one in the front yard, or he would go off in a huff and take Rafe for a walk, sometimes for hours.
I didn't want Joe to be angry, for whatever reason it was...
I just wanted to know.
We never usually kept secrets from each other.
The drive, in Joe's old car, still remains one of the most embarrassing experiences of my day, especially when the car you were sitting in was an old Ford Fiesta MK2. I caught glimpse after glimpse of onlookers pointing and laughing at the poorly painted glow-in-the-dark lightning bolt alongside the front car door. Joe assumed that the laughing crowd he always gathered were jealous of his car.
No, Joe, they aren't.
And as usual, Rafe would sit in the front, secured to the seat with a dog harness.
This had been another aspect of Joe I could never truly understand. He treated Rafe like he would a child. And to top all of that, he would even talk to him!
For the love of Christ, Cesar Milan, come to my aid!
Then again, this is probably why he was thrown out of his old job as a filing clerk. His co-workers and his boss would often wonder why most of the files had scribbles of his son's name all over them and why he would be talking to himself about suicide and about the failure of his life in general. Beforehand, he had suffered a nervous breakdown over the death of his son. He still won't tell me what happened to the mother – he didn't even mention if my aunt, his own wife, was still alive.
Joe parked near the college entrance, crowded to the brim with students - dressed in an array of different trends and cultures, who couldn't help but stare and laugh at the bloody lightning bolt, or maybe it's the fact that Joe began a conversation with Rafe about how it was going to work out on my first day back in education, like I was a trembling Year Seven starting high school. Once the mob of students began to push and shove each other into the dull grey building before me that was St George Community College, Joe, to my dismay, stepped out of the car, followed by Rafe.
Like a butler or a chauffeur, Joe opened the door for me, and then extended his hand to help me out of the car.
'Ma'am, and a good day to you,' he said, attempting to sound like Colin Firth.
I scoffed at how his humour still managed to get me.
'Joe, I'm seventeen, not seven.'
Joe ignored this. 'Do you wish for me to walk you into the college?'
I pressed my hand against the chest to push him away towards his car and Max. 'I can manage. Unless…savage pit bulls try to attack me, I'm fine.'
St George Community College didn't exceed my expectations. It was just a dull, grey building, surrounded by a large playing field with two football posts and a basketball court consisting of two badly damaged basketball hoops; one even missing a net. The bordering fences around the college were so high you couldn't even see the chimneys of the houses on the other side, if there were any, and were lined with barbed wire. Where am I? What is this place? A prison for wayward youths?
I approached the college nervously, and then saw the unattractive sight of a smokers' group - two boys and two girls – next to the bike shed, lighting up and shooting vicious glares at whoever shot them a second glance. They must have noticed me watching them because, with a smug expression on his face, the tallest of the boys approached me with worryingly fierce intent.
'Oy! What you looking at?' The boy exclaimed with a heavy Scouse accent, towering over me by almost a foot. He wore a filthy denim jacket over his tatty college uniform which smelled like he had doused in cheap aftershave. Obviously some futile effort to show how much of a 'big man' he is. A tie was wrapped around his head where, above, sat a mat of dirty blonde hair that spiked up like the leaves of a pineapple.
My stomach leapt. Students must have deciphered 'what you looking at' as code for 'let's have a fight' since me and the walking aftershave bottle were now surrounded by an excited bunch of adolescents waiting for a grizzly bloodbath to record on their phones. I felt like a Roman gladiator in front of a crowd of demanding Greeks.
I was speechless.
He wouldn't actually hit me...
Would he?
As if this crowd has shot a new burst of confidence up his arse, the boy pulled off his jacket and raised his fists playfully, as his friends laughed behind him. My brain screamed for me to run away or cower, at least. I could even feel my legs shaking and shouting angrily at my feet to start running back to Birkdale, where my friends are, but I stood my ground and waited for the boy to launch a powerful fist into my chest. I didn't understand why no one stepped forward to stick up for me, then I realised that ninety percent of the crowd were male and the female minority were cheering for my defeat.
But then, he stopped in front of me, until he had become close enough to kiss me.
I grimaced at the choking waves of odourous cigarette smoke and aftershave radiating from his clothes and mouth. I covered my nose at the stench and tried to back away but the crowds, expecting a fight, pushed me back into the ring. A smug smile stretched across his face, revealing an unbelievably white set of teeth. My teeth weren't even that white.
I wasn't expecting that. He must have just started.
But, then again, I wasn't expecting him to blow a thick cloud of smoke into my face either, sending a Mexican wave of degrading laughter and jeers throughout the crowd along with the boy who lavished in his new dominance over me.
'You're dead custy, ye nah!' he suddenly remarked, checking me out admirably. 'Ay yous single, er wa'?'
I felt a cold hand slither along my spine.
'Get stuffed!' I growled, pushing him back towards his group of admirers. His cheeks flushed a deep scarlet, as the tables turned on him and the crowd sniggered at the fact that a girl made him blush. With my new dominance, I joined in.
I stopped sniggering when the boy had become increasing hot under the collar. He took one last drag of his cigarette, threw it away, then stormed over towards me and grabbed my tie.
'Fight! Fight! Fight!' the crowd jeered, the word getting louder and louder as more people joined in.
'Yous picked de wrong kidda ter choss wi','
I didn't understand a word either. The boy clenched his hand into a fist. I closed my eyes and waited for the K.O punch.
'That isn't a good idea, there.'
At the sound of this voice, I felt my tie drop. I opened my eyes and saw a hand gripped tightly around the boy's wrist, with his clenched fist only a few centimetres away from my face. With one twist of his hand, the owner of the voice had the boy on the ground in seconds.
'Jack Brown,' he said, smiling and looking into the distance, as if this was the last thing on his mind. 'I was expecting you to be in the middle of something like this. Nothing unusual, I guess.'
I smiled. Jack managed to struggle out of my rescuer's grip and back away towards his friends, and it became even funnier when his friends began to shrink away from him, as if trying to avoid the embarrassment of hanging around with the loser. The crowd began to disperse, as the fight came to a sudden and disappointing end.
My rescuer looked around the same age as me, but his height may have suggested he could have been as old as 20. He held a tall and sturdy frame with cascades of rippling dark brown hair that sat neatly on his shoulders. His face supported two beautiful blue eyes, resembling two pieces of lapis lazuli, filled with the mystery of a troubled past.
'I'm George. And yourself?'
'Darcy!' I replied, blushing at the hasty response. 'I'm new here.'
'Yeah, I guessed. This is usually what happens to the noobs.'
'Noobs? Look, I don't use slang, but I don't think that describes a new person. It sounds like it, but it doesn't...'
He laughed again, and then shrugged. 'Oh, well, I'm not into slang either. It takes me too much time to understand what Jack is saying. I'm not a local.'
'Should have figured that out myself. You don't have the accent...you sound like you're from the South. You from London?'
'Yeah, Golders Green. You don't have the accent either, unless I'm hearing posh Scouse, or whatever it wants to be called. Where you from?'
'I was born here, but I've lived in Birkdale most of my life after my parents died.'
'Oh, sorry about that.'
'S'okay, you learn to get over it.'
'I guess you just never miss people who you never really got to know, that's what my conscience tells me anyway.'
He scoffed. 'God, you actually believe in all that conscience crap? (He creased his forehead in thought) This, strangely enough is the first thing I don't believe in. I usually believe in everything.'
'What? Like dragons and that?'
'Dragons exist!'
'Do they now?'
'Yeah...komodo dragons.'
'Come on.' George took me by the hand, and pulled me through the dispersing crowd as they marched towards the college entrance. I grew more and more wary as George refrained from talking or looking at me, so much that I had thought he'd forgotten about me. We pushed through the double doors and burst into the main reception area. Slowly, the students drifted off to their first lessons, leaving us alone in the quiet corridor.
'So, where do you-' I turned to George, but there was nothing there but an empty hand. The ear-piercing shrill of the bell echoed through the hall.
I shrugged, and approached the main reception. A beautifully polished silver bell sat at the window, which looked through into the main office, bolted to the corner of the table. What? Where people actually stealing them? I longed to see pens chained to the class desks. I rang the bell and waited for assistance, as the sign, blue tacked to the wall next to it, explained.
Nobody answered. I looked inside to discover the room completely deserted. I sighed, and sat down on a very expensive looking easy chair, admiring the gracious surroundings that immediately made me feel out of place in terms of class. Despite its' dull exterior, I felt as though I had stepped into Eton or Cambridge. The grey, dreary building outside gave me the impression that this school would be the epitome of neglected school-keeping: wallpaper peeling from the walls, old battered chairs outside the Headmaster's office (with holes made in them for a whole variety of reasons) but this place...I needed to take a quick glance outside to make sure I hadn't walked into a different building.
As I did this, I felt something tap me on the shoulder. I froze, and then turned sharply to what seemed to be an elevated stick of a man.
'Hello, there,' the man greeted coldly. 'Can I help you? Why did you ring my bell?'
'Oh...um, I, I'm Darcy Ward.' I replied hastily. 'I'm new...'
This must have been Mr Lovejoy, the Headteacher. Mr Lovejoy held the stature of a thin and gangly looking man, yet he had the enchanting look of an angel with dark brown eyes and short brown hair with long, sharply cut sideburns that met accordingly with his growing beard. To add to his handsome, yet emaciated formation, he wore a brown, neatly ironed pinstripe suit, and glossy black shoes that curved to an uncomfortable point. He pulled out a small piece of paper from his breast pocket, looked at it and then looked back at me, as if realising who I was.
'Ah, yes, Miss Ward. We've been expecting you. Follow me please,' Mr Lovejoy turned away on the balls of his feet and strolled along the corridor with his head held high, like he was strolling in his own little kingdom. 'Yes, my receptionist told me about this a few months ago. You attended Greenbank High School, did you not? Your teachers spoke highly of you in every subject so we were rather happy to get you started. You will enjoy life at St George Community College, so named, of course, aftertheSaint George –'
'- the patron saint of England.' I finished for him.
'Very good, your generation tend to forget that.'
We stopped at a door, bearing the words 'A5', in bold letters engraved into the elegant mahogany.
'Your timetable. Read it, learn it, and obey it.' Lovejoy told me then handed my timetable with the graceful twist of his hand. 'Ancient History, Physics, Physical Education and English, correct?'
'Yeah, that's right.'
'A rather widespread curriculum of lessons, is it not?'
'Oh, I'm very broadminded.'
'Excellent, we could use a few more of you here,' he replied with a slight twang of sarcasm to his tone. He rapped rhythmically against the door.
'Come in!' A musical voice sung from inside.
Lovejoy opened the door, and walked me into the classroom, where a dozen pair of eyes, with some eyes in blissful reminiscence of the 'fight' beforehand, turned their attention to me. Lovejoy and the female teacher exchanged brief glances, as if they were secret lovers having an affair, but then they turned back to their professional selves, with Lovejoy glaring expectantly over his minions.
'Terribly sorry to interrupt you, Mrs Murdoch (Mrs?!), but we've got a new student. This is Darcy Ward, and she has ancient history now with you. Do you mind me putting her into your capable hands?'
Murdoch produced a large smile, baring her shiny white, Hollywood style teeth. 'Not at all, sir. We're happy to have her, aren't we?'
A wave of murmurs ricocheted lazily across the room, but no one seem to greet me with the same level of interest as Murdoch. A reaction both embarrassing and calming since no one would bother to talk to me, and would leave me alone. Not the most social of ideas, but hey! I'm not the socialising type, as you may have picked up.
'I'll see you in the staff room, Mrs Murdoch.'
Lovejoy left without another word, leaving a wooed Murdoch to her giggling class. I caught two friends at the front bickering away about a rumour that Mr Lovejoy and Mrs Murdoch are lovers, and that they were having affairs at the Malmaison, and that they were planning to elope to the Caribbean to get married and have tons and tons of babies together.
Mrs Murdoch was a beautiful and willowy woman, setting the example of the ideal woman that all teenagers spend their pocket money or work job to look like at salons or at supermarkets for buying make up and spot cream. Her long and curly auburn hair draped over her shoulders softly, like two orange silk curtains, with her piercing light purple eyes that shined like amethysts on her lightly freckled face; an odd colour which reflected her bubbly and happy attitude.
She wore a knee length, pink floral dress and red high heels; heels that looked too high for such a tantalizing woman. She was like a delicate porcelain doll.
I walked to the front of the classroom with Murdoch, as a few eyes gazed up to me, and then averted their eyes to something more interesting, but then I saw, to my surprise, that one of the remaining eyes were Georges'.
She beamed. 'Well, if you haven't already heard, Darcy, I'm Mrs Murdoch. It's smashing to meet you! We just need to look for a space to put you...ah! There's a seat free next to Mr Olsen!'
I looked at the empty chair next to the alluring George and immediately began to hate its existence. My stomach, once again, performed a circus act of somersaults.
'Well? Aren't you going to move, or are your feet glued to the ground?' A childish giggle passed her lips after she finished the sentence. 'You've come at a very good time, Darcy! We're in the midst of revising for our May exam (some students shot out a sarcastic 'Ooooh'!) Are you familiar with Ancient Sparta, my dear?'
I nodded, and she replied with a wide smile.
'Hey!' George called out, raising his hand to indicate his position. I took a breath and sat down next to him.
'Right!' Murdoch started her lesson. 'Darcy, I always ask my new pupils to question. Just to see where they're at, okay? Good! What was the name of Gorgo's father?'
'Cleomenes,' I replied.
She beamed once again. 'Well done, you!'
With the air of an all-too-high-on-life spirit, she strolled gracefully over to my table and stuck a smiley face on the lapel of my blazer; along with the top of the brightly coloured sticker were the words: 'Well Done!' What was this? Nursery?
Murdoch must have noticed my disapproval. 'You don't like it?'
'Yeah, it's nice and all that, but don't you think we're a bit...old to be having smiley faces stuck to our clothes?'
She didn't look too insulted, but her eyes narrowed.
'You're never too old to like smiley faces, I mean, what about those hippies?' George suddenly butted. 'They had smiley faces printed all over themselves!'
My cheeks blushed as the class laughed in agreement, including Murdoch, who sneaked in a giggle from behind her hand. I wanted to shove my elbow into George's chest, hopefully succeeding in breaking a few ribs, and maybe smack his head around a bit with my chair and then stick his lips together with Murdoch's hippy stickers, but I brought myself back to the harsh reality dominated by the sound of humiliating laughter. Thanks, George.
'Thank you, Mr Olsen,' Murdoch thanked, looking at him with a wary stare that seem to oppose her once bubbly and happy demeanour. I grew suspicious at the general unfairness at the fact that she wasn't addressing George by his first name.
'You're welcome.'
In those brief seconds, they exchanged intense stares, as if they had some ancient grudge against each other, but I cleared my throat to stop the awkwardness of being in this invisible line of fire, and they broke out of their trances.
After the lesson, the bell rang for first break. I ventured into the courtyard and through the arch to the crowded field, dodging the smoking circles and the stray footballs until I got to the deserted bike rack. No one was there, and it didn't smell like anyone had been there in a while, so I pulled the ancient history homework from my bag and started working, scribbling down the incredibly easy answers on the Spartan Political System.
'Hey noob, working hard already?'
A warm hand planted itself on my shoulder. I shuddered at the unexpected warmth that radiated from his palm. George.
'I'm-I'm not a noob,' I muttered. 'What do you want? Going to make a show of me again?'
'Hey I didn't mean anything by it, you know. I didn't know it was going to offend you, just making some innocent joke. Just making a valid point.'
I stood up. 'A valid point, eh? Why don't you keep your valid points to yourself, and I'm so glad that's not a euphemism – ow!'
Static electricity struck my hand.
'Did you do that on purpose?'
'Do what?'
'You just shocked me! Did you rub your hands on your trousers or something...where's the balloon?'
'Why would I be carrying a balloon? I'm not a clown!'
'You're not funny, you know.'
He shrugged. 'Didn't I say I was. It...it was probably the carpets; I must have dragged my feet before I came out here. I'm sorry, okay?'
I did nothing, but nod. Suddenly, something came over him that made him approach me until he was a hand's length away from me, his potent gaze fixing into mine. He then grabbed my hands and rubbed them against his cheeks; that same comforting warmth that had radiated from his hands. Strange. As if the feeling of my hands were reminding me of something – or someone. I didn't feel the same; in fact, I might as well have had an old man doing the same. It just felt disturbing. I knew he was staring at me, but I didn't think the thought of me occurred to him at all. I wanted to know what was happening in that mysterious head of his.
He gave my arms a gentle jerk and, before I knew it, we stood there, wrapped in each others' arms, my cheek cushioned against his soft chest. I couldn't put my fingers on it but, at that moment, I felt secure and safe wrapped in his arms, like these arms were shields, protecting me from the dangers of the world. At that moment, the world had gone quiet, like me and him were the only people left in the world.
My heart leapt frantically. I didn't know how to react and seem like some of the other girls around college and stroke him senseless, like a new and treasured teddy bear. He brought his face down so that his mouth was level with my ear, and whispered:
'Everything you know is about to change.'
A chill shot through my mind after he uttered the ghostly words.
'You've dropped something, by the way,' he suddenly pointed out. I unwrapped from my warm human blanket to see what had fallen.
I hadn't dropped anything.
'There's nothing.'
He disappeared. I burnt inside with fury at the second time he had gone and done this! In a mood, I stormed from the bike shed to hopefully see him and catch up with him and ask him what he had meant about everything changing or whatever, or maybe so I could just watch him walk dramatically into the distance, like in the Clint Eastwood films (that Joe goes to great lengths to show me because he doesn't want Hollywood to 'contaminate' me with some of the low brow, explosion every minute, trash they produce and label a film).
I turned to the group of boys playing football in the playing fields, but I couldn't see him there either. I shook my head in disbelief and returned to the college, after the lesson bell called everyone into the building. As I walked back, I kept a lookout for George, pushing and shoving people out of my way to catch a glimpse of him, as if I was a devoted stalker of a famous celebrity.
But again, it's as if he had disappeared into thin air.
Giving up, I walked through into the college, where I found everyone pouring into the assembly hall, all in excited discussion. I pulled someone to the side, which I began to regret since he gave me daggers, and it was a dagger I assumed he would pull out, yet I managed to survive with an aggravated glare from this scruffy looking skinhead.
'What's going on?' I asked nervously.
'Emergency assembly, you mong! Weren't you in Tutor this morning?' He shrugged himself from my grasp and rejoined his friends who were loitering suspiciously outside the assembly hall doors.
As I followed the crowd (something I hoped wasn't going to be happening a lot), I listened in on the bantering about this 'emergency' assembly.
'I bet it'll be another boring assembly about smoking, or safe sex, or something,' one girl suggested to her friend.
'It's going to be, like, a big speech about Lovejoy's life in the school,' another suggested. All of these reasons were possible, and I knew a handful of headteachers who lavished on the subject of obliviously reminiscing about pointless events that happened decades ago. I didn't want to sit through a frightening lecture about condoms, safe driving, or Lovejoy a headteacher. Not that they weren't important, it was just awfully embarrassing to stand in front of a bunch of hormone raging teenagers as you learn how to put on a condom using a banana.
The assembly hall stretched out and shaped to the style of a small cinema. There were rows and rows of comfortable, not to mention, expensive looking purple seats that got higher and higher towards the back of the hall, where a small window looked into the projection room. The seats surrounded a huge stage, where the teachers, including Lovejoy, were sitting in a semi circle. I felt like I was in the company of the Gods of Olympus.
I found myself getting a seat in the front row. I dreaded this, like dreading to sit in the front row of a comedy show and worrying whether the comedian was going to cruelly poke fun at you and humiliate you before crowds of people you didn't know. I imagined, in utter horror, at the thought of Lovejoy volunteering me to test a condom on a banana. But, on the bright side, it gave me a good chance to observe the teachers; all of them bearing their own individual image of godly beauty.
I recognised Murdoch immediately, who sat at the end of the semi circle, chattering away to a fellow teacher, and occasionally sending flirtatious signals to Lovejoy every so often, who returned them with a devilishly handsome smile.
I leaned back, waiting for Lovejoy to proceed with this assembly, which gave me another chance to look around. I looked to my right to find a girl with her nose buried in 'Crime and Punishment'.
She had long, auburn hair that stopped at her unnaturally large breasts from what her white shirt was failing to contain, and her eyes were brown, like two chocolate buttons.
'Strange,'I thought. 'Usually it was me who was found with their nose deep in a book.'
I craned my head over her shoulder to see where she was at, but only found a smuggled fashion magazine. I envisioned Raskolnikov, posing for Vogue.
Without thinking, I tapped her on the shoulder, and she responded with a friendly smile.
'Excuse me, I'm sorta new...and that. Can you tell me who the teachers are?' I asked. She folded the top corner of the magazine to save her page, closed the book and shoved it into a large pink Gucci bag.
She started with the man talking to Murdoch.
'That Mr Williams; he teaches Physics,' she explained. 'So fit. Everyone thinks he looks like Johnny Depp. See Murdoch, the redhead? You see, he's married to her, right, but everyone thinks she's having it on with Mr Lovejoy. Haven't you seen the signals? I would never cheat on Mr Williams, or Johnny Depp, either. I mean, look at him! Ooh, I would!'
I laughed at this, agreeing that Mr Williams had the look of a God, and Johnny Depp in Public Enemies. Mr Williams, according to the girl, was branded the baby of the teaching staff, yet he had the brain of a supercomputer. She told me he had completed a master's degree at Physics at Cambridge University,withhonours.
Mr Williams had copper coloured eyes that seem to reflect the sunlight oddly. His silky, wavy fair hair stopped and curled at his ears, and I agreed with the girl's confusion at why such a beautiful man would ever need to worry whether their equally beautiful wife was having an affair.
The next teacher, the girl continued, was Mr Stanford, another good looking man who didn't look a stranger to the gym and heavy weights. He was a P.E teacher and ran the college football squad. I waited in anticipation for the tight fitting sleeves of his Liverpool shirt to burst.
'I'm Charlotte, by the way, but everyone calls me Lottie.'
'I'm Darcy.'
She pulled out her hidden magazine once again, and tore a corner from the top of her current page, then scribbled something with a fluffy pink pen which she produced from an even fluffier pencil case.
'We could go shopping in Liverpool One at the weekend. There are some sales on there. I'll die if I don't get there in time. Here's my number.'
Wow, she works fast.
We went through the male majority of the teaching staff, discussing how amazing and lush – a word I couldn't get used to using – they all were, like girls do! I began to wonder if I was in St George Community College, and I wasn't some character in a Twilight story. New girl, handsome people. I wished this was true, since I always wanted to live in that world, and have George be my Edward Cullen, but, for some reason, my feelings for George were less of an obsession. I wanted to experience of a feeling of attachment to George, but something off-putting – if that's the best word to describe it – made me back off.
My mind had descended into another world, until Lovejoy finally stopped talking with the Deputy Head, and took to centre stage.
'Can we quiet down now, please?'
He looked shaken at whatever this assembly was about. I furrowed my brow at this, and leaned forward to hear me. But the college behind me were still chatting away with her friends. After a few attempts of Lovejoy's pointless efforts to shut everyone up, Mr Stanford rose from his seat, snatched the microphone from Lovejoy's bony hands and pushed the microphone against the speaker system; the speaker then sent a screeching, ear piercing sound that reverberated sharply through the hall, silencing the chattering crowd immediately.
'Thank you, Keith,' Mr Lovejoy thanked. 'Now that I have your full attention, I'd like you all to be vigilant in the next few weeks. Your teachers have recently come under information that, if it gets out of hand, may become a problem in this school and to yourselves.'
The crowd murmured with concern, seconds after the last words left Lovejoy's mouth but a thunderous 'quiet down' from Mr Stanford silenced the crowd once again. A boy in the far back put his hand up.
'Yes, Matthew!'
'Is it terrorists, sir?' A wave of laughter rushed across the crowd.
'No, it's not terrorists, Matthew. And we do not have to evacuate the college, like what had happened with Sam Lennon's bag.'
Another small wave of laughter ran over the crowd; as everyone looked back in joyful reminisce. I scanned all of the joyful faces on both the staff and the students. I thought this was an emergency assembly.
'Now,' Lovejoy continued, 'we want you to keep your eyes peeled, okay? If you notice anything out of the ordinary, please contact one of the staff immediately.'
A hand rose from a girl sitting behind me.
'Yes, Lauren?'
'What's going on, sir?'
'I'm afraid we can't tell you that. The information we have so far is classified.'
The crowd moaned then engaged in angry conversation. What the hell did he mean by 'classified'? I thought we were in a small community college in the middle of Liverpool, not a top secret base in America.
I sighed, and contemplated on why Lovejoy had taken a time out of everyone's day for an emergency assembly and wasn't even going to tell us why we were sitting here anyway. I averted my eyes to the windows, yearning to go back outside and breathe in air that wasn't conditioned.
'What do you think this classified info's about?' Lottie asked, fluttering her fingers dramatically, like a gypsy fortune teller over a crystal ball.
'It might be some maniac planning to shoot everyone in the college.'
Lottie then shot me an apprehensive glance, obviously not picking up on the very off-coloured joke.
'I was messin',' I assured her.
She paused for a few seconds, until she stretched a wide smile across her spotless face, then let out a shrill laugh.
'Oh, right! That's sofunny!'
I opened my mouth to say something else, when I noticed something standing just outside the corridor. I blinked my eyes twice just in case my mind had started to play tricks to ward my attention from this god-awful assembly, but the figure – dark and alluring – still retained its position just outside the door. I couldn't see the face – a shroud of black nothingness masked the figure's face – but I could feel eyes burning into my own and a horrible sting of fear sat at the bottom of my stomach. Maybe there was some maniac hiding out in the college.
'Lottie! Lottie!'
'There's a-' the sight of an empty corridor stopped me in mid-sentence. I blinked and then look around to make sure I wasn't looking through the wrong room, but the figure had disappeared.
'Is this another joke?' Lottie asked, with a slight tone of hope in her voice.
'No, I think there's someone in the corridor.'
I left my seat before Lottie could say anything further, slipping away as the crowd dived into another giant chat as Lovejoy tried pointlessly tried to talk about strangers. Nervously, Lottie slipped the straps of her bag onto her shoulders and followed.
How we managed to get out of the hall without being caught was beyond me but wasn't a major concern now that we were out and able to continue. As I slowly managed to calm down, Lottie started fidgeting and hanging onto my sleeve, as if the ground was going to disappear under her feet at any minute.
'It's probably just some idiot messing about, let's get back!'
'Lottie, if you want to get back, just go alright? I didn't force you to come along with me, you know!'
'Oh good,' and then she zoomed back to the hall without a second glance. I shook my head, damning at the chances that the only friend I managed to make was a clueless bimbo destined to become a footballer wife. I continued along the corridor, with Lovejoy's voice getting further and further away and leaving me in a corridor that became too quiet for me to bear.
Suddenly, my heart stopped at the sight of the figure shooting into the Science Laboratories, followed by a spine-chilling, clown - like laughter you'd hear before the victim is severely mutilated in the films. Stupidly, and suddenly, my feet shot forward after the figure into the laboratory.
I stopped at the doorway and looked around the classroom for the figure, but, again, there was nothing but an empty and slightly smelly laboratory. 'Is-is anybody there?'
There was no reply.
But then, the shuffling of beakers echoed through the classroom from the chemical storage room in the corner of the lab. I whimpered, before taking a deep and courageous breath:
'Look, if you don't come out, I'll –'
'You'll what?' a demonic voice grumbled from the storage room. 'Kill us?'
Another deep and spine-chilling laugh reverberated through the laboratory, followed by the familiar sound of hissing gas and the scraping sound of a match.
I gasped; knowing what would come next, and darted to the door for dear life! I scrambled for the door handle; my hands were shaking, with a mind of their own, as fear and panic took over. Whilst trying to cover my nose and my mouth from the gas, I tried desperately to take a firm hold of the door handle and run home and never return until –
YES! Finally, I managed to hold the handle firmly and then turned the handle to the right, and then pulled the door back as hard as I could, and bolted out of the room. If only I had got out of there faster...


text:
These Nike Women's Lightweight Rival Run Gloves feature thermal fabric to resist heat loss and help keep you warm and insulated. The gloves keep cold air out and warm air in without the extra bulk. Silicone is placed on the inside of the index finger for added grip. The reflective Swoosh logo enhances visibility in low light conditions.
- Thermal fabric to resist heat loss
- Keeps cold air out and warm air in
- Silicone grip
- Enhanced visibility in low light conditions
Product Code: M1314097
About Nike
Revered by some of the worlds top athletes and crafted from their Dri-FIT fabric, a lightweight material that wicks away sweat keeping you cool and dry, Nike Running wear gives you the ultimate in style meets technology. Identified by their iconic swoosh Nike Running shoes gives you uncompromising performance, no matter the distance.
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text:
love it
Verified Purchase
love it
use at a cold, dripping on the pillow at night, all night nose breathing well
love it
Posted by Reviewer27139998 on Aug 20, 2012 | Verified Purchase
use at a cold, dripping on the pillow at night, all night nose breathing well
Works wonders
Posted by Reviewer2779900 on Dec 30, 2011 | Verified Purchase
I've used Olba massage oils for a while now. The formula seems more complex and effective than others I've tried. A few drops in a hot shower is wonderfully spa-like and tension relieving. Highly recommended.
Olbas Therapeutic, Olbas Oil, 0.32 fl oz
Posted by Reviewer3215899 on Feb 15, 2009 | Verified Purchase
We can't live without this stuff. We mostly use it for sinus problems. We have tried just about everything on the market and this far excedes everything hands down.
과연 올바스네요. This product is great.
Posted by 5367011767908600019 on Mar 01, 2013 | Verified Purchase
중국에 한 달정도 머무르게 될 것 같아 호흡기 질환 예방 목적으로 사갔는데, 잘 지내고 온 것 같아요. 코가 간질거리고 목이 따끔할 때, 자기 전에 뚜껑 열어서 맡으니까 다음날에 어느 정도 멀쩡해지더라구요. 아직 많이 남아서 집에서는 휘향해서 사용하고 있습니다. It helped me not to catch a cold. When you smell bad, you can also use it. I recommend you to use this one!
Posted by Reviewer3185841 on Jul 31, 2013 | Verified Purchase
Very effective used on itches!
Posted by Reviewer1670267 on Dec 11, 2013 | Verified Purchase
Very soothing and fragrant scent which clears the breath. I also use this oil on itches due to mosquito bites and allergy. I apply it to small wounds as well, pressing some oil against the wound for a few minutes with cotton wool. Surprisingly, it doesn't sting and facilitates healing. It certainly worked after a number of applications where fungal cream failed on a small spot.
Really refreshing
Posted by 5178637037423812339 on Feb 13, 2014 | Verified Purchase
I love this oil and will repurchase when I'm finished with this vile. I use this every night...a little dap under my nose...which sends me to a really refreshing sleep. Much better than using the famous "salve" that people typically use ;) I just want to emphasize that you can benefit from this each night (or day, when you need a quick refreshing jolt), and not only when you have a cold!
I like the smell, clears my nose and chest
Posted by 4780771279391202816 on Aug 28, 2015 | Verified Purchase
I use this for everything. I find the smell comforting. I use it for insect bite, tummy aches, headaches and blocked nose.
Good and natural
Posted by Reviewer2183338 on Nov 22, 2009 | Verified Purchase
Feels good when it tingles. Relaxing. Don't know if it really helps sore muscles much, but feels good. Also good for clearing out nasal passages if you have a stuffy nose. Very strong, but good, scent.
Love the smell
Posted by Reviewer2666811 on Aug 23, 2012 | Verified Purchase
I use this product by putting a little under my nose to help me breathe when I have a cold. I can't say it has directly gotten rid of a problem but it soothes me.


text:
Feb. 21, 2013
CHICAGO - Ben Averkamp (Germantown, Wis./Germantown), a senior forward on the Loyola men's basketball team, has been named Capital One Second Team Academic All-America it was announced today. Averkamp is just the eighth Loyola individual, and the first-ever member of the men's basketball program, to garner Capital One Academic All-America accolades.
Averkamp was joined on the Capital One Academic All-America Second Team by Matthew Dellavedova (St. Mary's), Nathan Healy (Appalachian State), Peyton Siva (Louisville), and Andrew Smith (Butler). Aaron Craft (Ohio State), Kelly Olynyk (Gonzaga), Mason Plumlee (Duke), Matthew Sullivan (Brown), and Cody Zeller (Indiana) comprised the first team.
Although he has missed the last four games due to injury, Averkamp is one of the top players in the Horizon League and leads the team, while also ranking among the top five in the conference in both scoring (15.3 ppg) and rebounding (6.5 rpg) this season for a Loyola team that has doubled its win total from a year ago (7).
One of only 19 players in Loyola's storied history to have racked up over 1,000 points and 500 rebounds in his career, the team captain enters this weekend's action needing just three blocked shots to become the first player in school history with 1,300 points, 600 rebounds, 150 assists, and 150 blocks.
As a junior in 2011-12, Averkamp collected Second Team All-Horizon League honors to become the first Loyola player since 2007 to be a first or second team all-conference pick after putting up 15.4 ppg and 7.1 rpg, both career-best averages. This season, he has scored in double figures in 18 of his 23 appearances, four times scoring 20 or more points, including a season-best, 27-point performance in a November 18 victory against Maryland-Eastern Shore. Averkamp was at his best when Loyola gave then No. 19 Michigan State all it could handle in a 73-61 loss on December 8, going for 25 points and eight boards.
Equally accomplished off the court, the biology major is a two-time Capital One First Team Academic All-District V selection (2012, 2013), and also has been named to the Horizon League Men's Basketball All-Academic Team (2011, 2012), I-AAA Men's Basketball Scholar-Athlete Team (2012), National Association of Basketball Coaches Honors Court (2012), National Jesuit Men's Basketball All-Academic Team (2012), and Horizon League Academic Honor Roll (2010, 2011, 2012). During his career, the 6-foot-8 forward has been a four-time Horizon League Male Scholar-Athlete of the Month honoree and in addition to being a member of Loyola's Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC), he is also the president of the Horizon League chapter of SAAC.
Loyola's last Academic All-America selection came in 2010, when men's soccer defender Will Martin captured second team honors.


text:
About: MLPlot is a lightweight plotting library written in Java.Changes:
Initial Announcement on mloss.org.
About: The K-tree is a scalable approach to clustering inspired by the B+-tree and k-means algorithms.Changes:
Release of K-tree implementation in Python. This is targeted at a research and rapid prototyping audience.
About: KReator is an integrated development environment (IDE) for relational probabilistic knowledge representation languages. At the moment, KReator supports Bayesian Logic Programs (BLPs), Markov Logic Networks (MLNs), Relational Maximum Entropy (RME), Relational Bayesian Networks (RBN), and Probabilistic Prolog (ProbLog).Changes:
About: This Java software implements Profile Hidden Markov Models (PHMMs) for protein classification for the WEKA workbench. Standard PHMMs and newly introduced binary PHMMs are used. In addition the software allows propositionalisation of PHMMs.Changes:
description changed
About: KeplerWeka represents the integration of all the functionality of the WEKA Machine Learning Workbench into the open-source scientific workflow Kepler. Among them are classification, [...]Changes:
About: The SUMO Toolbox is a Matlab toolbox that automatically builds accurate surrogate models (also known as metamodels or response surface models) of a given data source (e.g., simulation code, data set, script, ...) within the accuracy and time constraints set by the user. The toolbox minimizes the number of data points (which it selects automatically) since they are usually expensive.Changes:
Incremental update, fixing some cosmetic issues, coincides with JMLR publication.
About: jblas is a fast linear algebra library for Java. jblas is based on BLAS and LAPACK, the de-facto industry standard for matrix computations, and uses state-of-the-art implementations like ATLAS for all its computational routines, making jBLAS very fast.Changes:
Changes from 1.0:
About: Implementation of LSTM for biological sequence analysis (classification, regression, motif discovery, remote homology detection). Additionally a LSTM as logistic regression with spectrum kernel is included.Changes:
Spectrum LSTM package included
About: HSSVM is a software for solving multi-class problem using Hyper-sphere Support Vector Machines model, implemented by Java.Changes:
About: dANN is an Artificial Intelligence and Artificial Genetics library targeted at employing conventional techniques as well as acting as a platform for research & development of novel techniques. As new techniques are developed and proven to be effective they will be integrated into the core library. It is currently written in Java, C++, and C#. However only the java version is currently in active development. If you want to obtain a version other than the java version you will need to get it directly from GIT.Changes:
Please get the version in GIT only, the released version is old.
About: LIBSVM is an integrated software for support vector classification, (C-SVC, nu-SVC ), regression (epsilon-SVR, nu-SVR) and distribution estimation (one-class SVM). It supports multi-class [...]Changes:
Initial Announcement on mloss.org.
About: The JINSECT toolkit is a Java-based toolkit and library that supports and demonstrates the use of n-gram graphs within Natural Language Processing applications, ranging from summarization and summary evaluation to text classi?cation and indexing.Changes:
About: JOP is a Java virtual machine implemented in hardware. It is a hard real-time open source multicore processor capable of worst case execution time analysis of Java code.Changes:
Initial Announcement on mloss.org.
About: A Java library to create, process and manage mixtures of exponential families.Changes:
Initial Announcement on mloss.org.
About: RL-Glue allows agents, environments, and experiments written in Java, C/C++, Matlab, Python, and Lisp to inter operate, accelerating research by promoting software re-use in the community.Changes:
RL-Glue paper has been published in JMLR.
About: MALLET is a Java-based package for statistical natural language processing, document classification, clustering, topic modeling, information extraction, and other machine learning applications to [...]Changes:
MALLET 2.0 RC4 Release Notes July 16, 2009
Major updates:
An implementation of generalized expectation criteria training of MaxEnt classifiers and methods for obtaining constraints (c.f. Gregory Druck, Gideon Mann, Andrew McCallum "Learning from Labeled Features using Generalized Expectation Criteria.")
PagedInstanceList has been substantially rewritten by Mike Bond.
Bug fixes to topic model hyperparameter optimization and topic inference.
About: Java-ML is a collection of machine learning and data mining algorithms, which aims to be a readily usable and easily extensible API for both software developers and research scientists.Changes:
new release
About: Model Monitor is a Java toolkit for the systematic evaluation of classifiers under changes in distribution. It provides methods for detecting distribution shifts in data, comparing the performance [...]Changes:
Improved AUROC calculation. Several minor bug fixes.
About: Debellor is a scalable and extensible platform which provides common architecture for data mining and machine learning algorithms of various types.Changes:
About: Piqle (Platform for Implementing Q-Learning Experiments) is a Java framework for fast design, prototyping and test of reinforcement learning experiments (RL). By clearly separating algorithms and problems, it allows users to focus on either part of the RL paradigm:designing new algorithms or implementing new problems. Piqle implements many classical RL algorithms, making their parameters easily tunable. At this time, 13 problems are implemented, several with one or more variants. The user's manual explains in detail how to code a new problem. Written in Java, Piqle is as platform-independent as Java itself. Its components can easily be embedded as part of complex implementations, like robotics or decision making.Changes:
Initial Announcement on mloss.org.


text:
Rocky Hill, Ct, USA < change city >
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MARIELLA CREATIONS < this is my business >
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Stefanie and Michael's Wedding
"I can't say enough about this dress shop. It came highly recommended and they surpassed my expectations. They had a variety of dresses in many price ranges and more than one big dressing room for brides (unlike other places that were very cramped). I bought my dress and had my alterations done there. My bridesmaids were also happy with their purchases."
Julia and Tyler's Wedding
"This salon is a little pricey, but has a huge selection of beautiful gowns. I tried on dresses in at least six other salons before I finally found the perfect one here."
Mariella Creations
2192 Silas Deane Highway
Rocky Hill, CT, United States


text:
Iggy Azalea Hosts a Night Out in Vegas
Ready for a fabulous night out in Sin City, Iggy Azalea hosted a Night at Tao Nightclub at the Venetian Hotel & Casino on Saturday (April 5).
The "Change Your Life" singer looked great in a black dress, animal print jacket, and black heels as she posed for pics on the red carpet before things got crazy inside.
Unfortunately, the 23-year-old songstress wasn't able to carry her luck into the realm of gambling during her stay.
Posting a selfie in the hotel, Iggy wrote, "Vegas why u gotta do me this way. #LostAtTheTables."


text:
Two defendants, one trial in 2010 death of toddler
17-month-old Kamryn Schlitter died of head trauma in 2010
CEDAR RAPIDS — A man and his ex-girlfriend accused in the death of his toddler daughter will be tried together, 6th Judicial District Judge Marsha Beckelman ruled Tuesday in Linn County District Court.
Zyriah Schlitter, 24, of Cedar Rapids, wanted a separate trial from Amy Jo Parmer, 27, of Hiawatha, because he believed statements Parmer made could be used against him or implicate him in the alleged crime. Both are charged with first-degree murder and child endangerment resulting in the death of 17-month-old Kamryn Schlitter. She died of head trauma on March 28, 2010.
The state resisted severing the trials. Prosecutors' theory is that both are guilty in the child's death and it's impossible for one of them to have committed the abuse without the other knowing or being involved.
Beckelman found that there is no confession from Parmer naming Schlitter as a participant in the alleged crime.
A competency hearing for a witness in the case is set for 9 a.m. Friday, and the pair's trial is scheduled for May 29.
|Reynolds to decide this week on appointi ...
|Cedar Rapids police: Woman hit by truck ...
|Roger Moore, former James Bond actor, di ...


text:
Wadmalaw Island, SC, USA < change city >
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Wadmalaw Island Wedding In November
Ceremony at Charleston Tea Plantation
Wadmalaw Island Wedding In November
Ceremony at Charleston Tea Plantation
Allie and Mike's Wedding
Ceremony at Holy Spirit Catholic Church
"The wedding on Kiawah Island was a dream come true. From the ceremony t..."
Alisa and Shane's Wedding
Ceremony at Kiawah's Ocean Course Clubhouse
"Our Wedding week, day and location couldn't have been any more perfect! ..."
Lee Ann and Peter's Wedding
Ceremony at Old Wide Awake Plantation
"The weather on May 30th was hot and sunny! Beautiful wedding."
Alecia and Roger 's Wedding
Jared and Sandrine's Wedding
"Seabrook Island is a gorgeous place to hold a wedding. The new Gold Clubhouse is perfect for entertaining guests for ..."
Michelle and Jeffrey's Wedding
Ceremony at River Course at Kiawah Island Club
Our Wedding
Ceremony at Mingo Point
Reception at The Sandcastle
"Kiawah Island was a beautiful place. We had perfect 85 degree weather on October 31st & our guest loved the gorgeous ..."
Nathan and Kaitlyn 's Wedding
Ceremony at The Sandcastle
Reception at The Sandcastle


text:
IT Monitoring for Networks, Applications, Virtual Servers and the Cloud
IT Monitoring for Networks, Applications, Virtual Servers and the Cloud
GPG error: https://downloads.opsview.com squeeze Release: The following signatures couldn't be verified because the public key is not available: NO_PUBKEY FB4C675977CB2CF6You may also receive the error message shown below. Although you can continue, we recommend that packages are verified prior to their import.
WARNING: The following packages cannot be authenticated! opsview-perl opsview-base libapache2-mod-auth-tkt-prefork-opsview opsview-core opsview-web opsview Install these packages without verification [y/N]?
USA Contact: firstname.lastname@example.com +1 866 662 4160
EMEA Contact: firstname.lastname@example.com +44 1183 242 100