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Narrow Results:
Title: Pizza Problems: An Angle Investigation
This investigative lesson allows students to identify angle measurements as part of a larger angle. Students will deconstruct 180 degree angles into equal parts.
This is a College- and Career-Ready Standards showcase lesson plan.
Standard(s): [MA2015] (4) 25: Recognize angle measure as additive. When an angle is decomposed into nonoverlapping parts, the angle measure of the whole is the sum of the angle measures of the parts. Solve addition and subtraction problems to find unknown angles on a diagram in real-world or mathematical problems, e.g., by using an equation with a symbol for the unknown angle measure. [4-MD7]
Title: Angles
This is a student-narrated PowerPoint about angles. The student defines different types of angles such as right, acute, obtuse, straight, vertical, interior, and exterior. She also describes angle measurement and application of angle measurement. Standard(s):
[MA2015] (7) 12: Draw (freehand, with ruler and protractor, and with technology) geometric shapes with given conditions. Focus on constructing triangles from three measures of angles or sides, noticing when the conditions determine a unique triangle, more than one triangle, or no triangle. [7-G2]
Title: Number and Operations Web Links
This collection of Web links, reviewed and presented by Illuminations, offers teachers and students information about and practice in concepts related to arithmetic. Users can read the Illuminations Editorial Board's review of each Web site, or choose to link directly to the sites.
Standard(s): [MA2015] (5) 26: Classify two-dimensional figures in a hierarchy based on properties. [5-G4]
Title: Communicating about Mathematics Using Games: Playing Fraction Tracks
Mathematical games can foster mathematical communication as students explain and justify their moves to one another. In addition, games can motivate students and engage them in thinking about and applying concepts and skills. This e-example from Illuminations contains an interactive version of a game that can be used in the grades 3-5 classroom to support students' learning about fractions. e-Math Investigations are selected e-examples from the electronic version of the Principles and Standards of School Mathematics (PSSM). The e-examples are part of the electronic version of the PSSM document. Given their interactive nature and focused discussion tied to the PSSM document, the e-examples are natural companions to the i-Math investigations.
Standard(s): [MA2015] (5) 26: Classify two-dimensional figures in a hierarchy based on properties. [5-G4]


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Answers Home
» Health & Wellness
I have a 7 week old Great Dane puppy with a weird lump on the top part of his penis (one side only) it's reddish pink.
Should I take him to the vet ASAP or would it be fine to wait until Monday as that's when my usual dr is open. I noticed it last night and have looked up stuff online but can't seem to find anything. What should I do to fix it and what is it called? Thank you! I have photos but I'm not sure how to post them on here. I can email a photo.
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on Nov 9th 2013
in Health & Wellness
- Cast your vote for which answer you think is best!
Romeo answered on 12/7/13. Helpful? / 1

subset: commoncrawl


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|Home > Entertainment > Article
Water's role in art is as crucial as its role in life. Think of Arthur Boyd's paintings of the Shoalhaven River (flowing water), Neil Murray's galvanising ballad My Island Home (comforting water), or Andres Serrano's maligned installation Piss Christ (passing water).
Further afield, few bodies of water have inspired as much art as the Mississippi, the river that divides the United States into east and west, left and right (or, these days, into right and far right). And very few bodies of water have inspired as many nicknames, which include Ol' Man River, the Mighty Muddy and - my favourite - Mr Sippi's wife. Perhaps that's because Mississippi is nearly as hard to spell as Woolomolloo. Sorry, Woolloomooloo.
Spilling into the Gulf of Mexico at New Orleans, the world's third-largest river has its source in Minnesota, the northern state where Swedish migrants have had a devastating impact on the local dialect. Apparently, the phrase "Yah, you betcha" is unavoidable. More notably, this is the home state of the world's second-best filmmakers: the Coen Brothers, whose films include Blood Simple, Raising Arizona and The Big Lebowski. (The world's best filmmaker, of course, is an Aussie - Peter Weir.)
The Coens' films always have a strong sense of place, and Fargo, their most successful film, was set mainly in Minnesota. The more recent O Brother, Where Art Thou? - a comedy about three convicts whose adventure recalls Homer's Ulysses - was set further downriver, in the state of Mississippi. For the climax, a river floods. Presumably, it is the Mighty Muddy or one of its tributaries, which washes away homes, animals and people - everything but George Clooney's precious hairdo.
This scene has been viewed by some as an oblique reference to William Faulkner's brilliant 1930 novel, As I Lay Dying. Like the Coens, Faulkner spent much of his life within cooee of the Mississippi and, in As I Lay Dying, the Bundren family must survive a flash flood. A tough ask, particularly without Clooney's help.
The work of Faulkner, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1949, was rooted in the Mississippi region. As he said: "I discovered that my own little postage stamp of native soil was worth writing about and that I would never live long enough to exhaust it."
That didn't stop him leaving Mississippi for Hollywood, however, where he adapted Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep (1946) for director Howard Hawks. Previously, the pair had collaborated on To Have and Have Not (1944), but only after Hemingway had rejected the offer to adapt his own book. "I'll get Faulkner to do it," Hawks reputedly told Hemingway. "He can write better than you can, anyway."
For his part, Hemingway once wrote: "All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain, called Huckleberry Finn." In The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, published in 1884, Twain wrote of an orphan growing up on the banks of the Mississippi, the same river where he had worked as a river-boat pilot. The author, by the way, was born Samuel Clemens; he took the name "Mark Twain" from a riverboat term meaning "by the mark of two fathoms".
Muddy Waters wasn't born Muddy Waters, either. The seminal bluesman was born McKinley Morganfield in 1915 in a backwater called Rolling Fork, Mississippi. After World War II, Waters nurtured a style of playing the blues that, in turn, sparked performers such as Elvis and the Rolling Stones. In other words, it's fair to say Waters single-handedly invented modern music.
OK, maybe not, but it is fair to say the influence of Delta Blues - that is, blues from the Mississippi Delta - on modern music has been profound. And what is the Delta Blues? In the words of one writer, it is "a music shot through with all the agonised tension, bitterness, stark power and raw passion of life lived at or near the brink of despair [that is] profoundly, inexorably, moving".
That's certainly a fair description of Ol' Man River, the 1928 hit from the musical Showboat. The original lyrics - rewritten later by Paul Robeson - were potent: "Niggers all work on the Mississippi/ Niggers all work while the white folks play/ I gits weary and sick of tryin'/ I'm tired of livin' and scared of dyin'/ And ol' man river, he just keeps rollin' along."
Melancholy stuff, as was the death of Jeff Buckley in 1997. On a May evening, the prodigiously gifted singer/songwriter and a friend were playing acoustic guitar on the banks of the Mississippi in Memphis, Tennessee. Fully clothed, Buckley decided to go swimming. A week later, his body was found floating near the same spot.
At 30, having recorded only one album - the sublime Grace - Buckley was dead. Sadly, the Mississippi doesn't just inspire artists, it can take them away, too.
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The best TVs you can buy right now
Find reviews of the latest Panasonic LCD TVs Up to 30in.
21 September 2010
Does this 32in LCD TV include top picture quality alongside its Freeview and Freesat tuners?
07 September 2010
Want a purple-coloured television with an iPod dock? Well here's a 19in LED LCD TV that offers just that.
26 May 2010
This 26in LCD television is one of the cheapest Panasonic has to offer.
16 September 2009
If you're on the lookout for a second room LCD TV, the 19in Panasonic Viera TX-L19X10 is a worthy candidate.
23 March 2009
The Panasonic Viera TX-L26X10 is relatively expensive but its premium performance makes up for that.
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Call for global privacy standards
September 14th, 2007 | Published in Google Public Policy
As I've noted before, everyone has a right to privacy online -- and governments have an obligation to keep their citizens safe. Yet despite the international scope of even the most ordinary Internet activity, the majority of the world's countries offer virtually no privacy standards to their citizens and businesses. And even if every country in the world did have its own privacy standards, this alone would not be sufficient to protect user privacy, given the web's global nature. Data may move across six or seven countries, even for very routine Internet transactions. It is not hard to see why privacy standards need to be harmonized and updated to reflect this reality.
The problem of international data flow and privacy is not new. Potential problems were identified as early as the 1980s. At that time, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) established the first "fair information principles." Twenty years after they were first established, OECD guidelines are now but one voice in a large chorus of local privacy standards.
There are a number of factors that contribute to the need for global privacy standards today more than ever before. First, globalization. Today, all business is potentially international business, and this scale calls for organizations and those within them to operate in multiple countries. As data crosses geographic boundaries, the policies controlling it change.
Second, the growing recognition of privacy rights creates a need for global standards. Experts are not the only ones talking about privacy anymore; now ordinary citizens have entered into the debate. Increased attention to privacy among the general public has resulted in more national and local privacy laws which, in turn, have increased the fragmentation of global privacy policy.
Third, technological development also contributes to the need for global privacy standards. As technology develops, more and more information travels around the world faster and faster each day. Development of this kind increases the productivity of business and consumer transactions, but can potentially endanger privacy protections.
In addition to these factors, new threats to individual privacy emerge everyday and, without global standards, solutions to these problems will continue to be fragmented and ineffectual. All of these factors contribute in making the status quo of localized policies no longer acceptable. Countries cannot and will not be able to write effective privacy legislation without global cooperation. And as long as there are no global standards for privacy protection, individuals and businesses will remain at risk as they operate online.
In light of this, Google is calling for a discussion about international privacy standards which work to protect everyone's privacy on the Internet. These standards must be clear and strong, mindful of commercial realities, and in line with oftentimes divergent political needs. Moreover, global privacy standards need to reflect technological realities, taking into account how quickly these realities can change.
Although this seems a tall task, we are luckily not without guidance in the creation of global privacy standards. To my mind, the APEC Framework is the most promising foundation on which to build. The APEC framework already carefully balances information privacy with business needs and commercial interests, and unlike the OECD guidelines and the European Directive, it was developed in the Internet age. Moreover, APEC involves countries with very divergent privacy traditions: from Peru to the Philippines, from New Zealand to Vietnam. Surely, if privacy principles can be agreed upon within the 21 APEC member economies, a similar set of principles could be applied on a global scale.
Whatever route we choose to pursue in solving the problem of global privacy standards, there is no question that the problem must be solved. It is time that data -- the most globalized and transportable commodity in the world today -- become treated in a similar way as other subjects of international trade. It is time that privacy policy, like the data its meant to protect, become global.


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Shauna Sotelo Photograp Photographer
Carolina VegaModel Female Rupert, Idaho, US
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About MeName: Carolina Vega
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I will travel if traveling expenses are covered.
I love being in front of the camera so if you want to work with me send me a message.
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Steering pump pulley damaged
VERY DISSAPOINTED MY WK2 LIMITED HEMI IS SPENDING THE NIGHT AT THE DEALER TO BE "RE-INSPECTED" AND "EVALUATED" ON CONDITION NOTED WHEN COMPARED OPERATION OF HIDRAULIC STEERING PUMP ON MY JEEP THE DAMN PULLEY OSCILATES LIKE CRAZY ... GUYS PLEASE CHECK OPERATION OF YOURS??? I compared to another hemi they had in the service area the other one did not moved as much as mine??? Warranty chick does not want to order new pump-pulley assembly because it has not failed ... I told them that was unnaceptable!!! :mad::mad::mad:
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Future Jug/Carafe - Aquamarine
In 2000, Peter Svarrer came up with his answer to the water glass of the future. That glass was Future. A uniquely designed drinking glass with a shape and color choice that are perfectly in tune with today's mode of expression - a whole decade later. This same concept was extended to his creation of the Future Jug. Future is also a reflection of Peter Svarrer's way of thinking that utility items should brighten up everyday life. Mouthblown glass.
- Design Country: Denmark
- Material: Mouth blown glass
- Volume: 34oz
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Mar 28, 2014 - By Kelli Ameling, Staff WriterLander Mayor Mike Wolf posed a telling question this month while speaking about Fremont County's air service.
"How can we discuss something that doesn't exist?" he asked during a March 13 meeting of the Fremont County Association of Governments.
His issue is not only with Great Lakes Airlines. Wolfe said he also is frustrated with Fremont County commissioners, none of whom were present at this month's FCAG meeting.
Great Lakes has canceled dozens of flights so far this year as the impact of a federal ruling on co-pilot experience hit the regional carrier.
Wolfe said the air service situation is more than just a municipal problem.
"It's a county problem. It's a state problem," he said. "And I see no one here from the county."
The feeling seemed to be shared by others at the FCAG meeting, who noted that the Fremont County Commission is part of the FCAG board and receives agenda items ahead of time.
"I feel they have let us down," Wolfe said. "Come elections, I think we should reflect."
Later in the meeting, Dubois Mayor Twila Blakeman also noted her frustration with the commissioners. She said her town is working on a $150,000 project at the Dubois Municipal Airport.
"There is no help from the county, although (the airport) services the northwestern part of the county," Blakeman said, also noting that medical personnel utilize the facility for life flight emergencies.
'Spiral out of control'
Lander's community resource coordinator Gary Michaud spoke about air service in Fremont County as well, specifically noting the trouble with flights out of Riverton Regional Airport.
"As you know, air service has not been very good," Michaud said. "Last month, 60 percent of the flights were canceled --that's six out of 10 flights."
Those figures differed from data reported at a March 21 public meeting in Riverton, but cancellations have been significant all year.
If similar statistics become the norm, he predicts problems with air service in Fremont County will "spiral out of control."
Currently, Michaud's data shows a 50 percent "leakage" rate, meaning that half of area residents are utilizing airports in other counties.
Michaud thinks the number is actually higher than 50 percent.
"(That statistic) sounds low to me," he said.
A meeting was held March 12 to begin developing a plan to fix the problems with air service in Fremont County. Michaud said the group in attendance included state legislators as well as members of the Lander and Riverton city councils and both cities' economic development teams.
"This is a great time for the community to come together," Michaud said.
The state is offering funding to improve the situation, he continued, but local governments would have to raise matching money. According to Michaud, any funding from the state has to be matched at a 28 percent rate.
Riverton Mayor Ron Warpness, who also attended the month's FCAG meeting, was in favor of moving forward with the state funding.
"It may be Riverton's airport, but it serves all of us," Warpness said. "It's very important."
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Reghan's American Girl Birthday Card
My niece and lil' love of my life! Little Reghan stole my heart the second she was born and I celebrate every moment of her young life. She is now head over heels for American Girl and her sweet KIT doll! (yep, I spoil her every time she comes to NYC-shopping at the American Girl store) This is the sweet card that I made for her 6th birthday back in August. I was so excited to find these Kit stickers at Michael's and scooped up a bunch to share with Reghan and to put on her future cards and scrapbook pages.
Tags: American Girl birthday cards Heidi Bound Kit New York City


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Aetna stopping individual insurance in Colo.
Months after pulling out of the small group market, Aetna has also indicated it will no longer offer individual insurance in Colorado. The company sent a letter in December to the Division of Insurance, indicating it would no longer offer insurance for individuals in the state. Aetna pulled out of the small group market in …
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Naval Officer Hat Cake
I made this hat for the graduating Naval ROTC at my university. The cake is chocolate with buttercream filling. I made a mold of an officer crest and button from an actual hat. This was the first time I had ever made a mold of something, and it turned out alright. The gold, silver, and black were all hand painted on
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.38 Specials, leaving aside the old lead roundnose or the FMJ practice rounds, are not known for over-penetration, so I think you can set that concern aside.
The "FBI" or "Chicago" round - 158 grain, semi-wadcutter hollowpoint in +P flavor - has a fine track record of stopping fights. But the more modern JHPs are well-designed and apparently effective as well. I carry both... the lead SWC-HP in the gun and JHPs as spare ammo.
I think in a self-defense shooting the rounds that don't hit the intended target are a far greater risk than rounds that penetrate the BG. Just use good defensive ammo (such as you are) and practice lots.


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Publisher: Taschen
Language: English | Number of Pages: 443 | Format: Hardcover
Isbn-10: 3822838098 | Isbn-13: 9783822838099 | Publish date: 13/04/2007 | Edition Taschen 25th Anniversary Ed
Category: Home & Gardening , Reference , Textbook
Do you like The Book of Plants ?
Join aNobii to see if your friends read it, and discover similar books!
A magnificent pictorial document of the flowers grown in the greatest German garden of its time, the Book of Plants is in a class of its own when it comes to the variety and range of flowers engraved.
Working under Basilius Besler, a team of at least ten engravers worked on this massive project, translating in situ and specimen drawings faithfully to copper plates. Nearly four hundred years old, the book has survived though the gardens did not; they were destroyed by invading Swedish troops in 1634. However, in 1998 a reconstruction of the original garden opened to the public in Eichstätt.
This facsimile's reproductions - structured by seasons - are taken from a hand-painted edition, one of only a few still extant. In auction, the asking price for a first edition copy is half a million dollars. You can now enjoy its unique qualities for somewhat less.


text: ORLANDO, Fla., Oct. 30, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Honeywell (NYSE: HON) and Inmarsat PLC have agreed to make Honeywell the exclusive wireless airtime reseller for Inmarsat Global Xpress Ka-band aircraft connectivity services and hardware for business aviation jet customers. The five-year agreement will give airplane operators, pilots and passengers access to a higher-speed, in-flight wireless broadband network worldwide. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20080425/LAF040LOGO) In addition, Honeywell has signed distribution partner agreements with ARINC Direct and OnAir that will provide the GX Aviation Service directly to business aviation airplane operators. This relationship enables these and other companies to develop innovative applications and services ranging from entertainment and software updates and upgrades to technical aircraft maintenance and customer support. Cabin Connectivity: Bringing the Home or Office to the Sky By 2016 it is estimated there will be 10 billion mobile devices in the world, and demand for data traffic is expected to grow by a factor of 50 for smartphones and a factor of 62 for tablets. Honeywell is uniquely poised to meet this demand with in-flight broadband coverage by 2015. Passengers will have access to streaming data ranging from music and movies to social apps and business tools. Business users will be able to access cloud applications, just as on the ground. Flight Deck Connectivity Inmarsat Global Xpress Ka-band is a wireless microwave frequency used to deliver broadband services via satellite. It offers higher broadband communication speeds than today's existing satellite networks. This will enable business jet operators, owners and passengers to work, entertain and access the Internet faster than with today's technologies, and do so over bodies of water and around the world versus being restricted to local, land-based access only. By providing aircraft operators with the hardware and service to access this high-speed GX Aviation connection, Honeywell will give pilots and crew the ability to stream flight preparation and non-flight-critical information in real time. This will revolutionize how pilots communicate with each other and with the broader ground and air traffic community.


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What Is Moodle?
Moodle is a Learning Management System sometimes referred to as an LMS. It is a web application that allows instructors to post course materials (like documents, discussion boards, assignments, video and audio) online making them convenient and available to their students around the clock. In addition, instructors can make use of discussion boards, announcements and other social media, expanding the conversion beyond the confines of a traditional classroom.
FYI for geeks: The acronym "Moodle" stands for Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment.
Moodle is an Open Source Course Management System (CMS), also known as a Learning Management System (LMS) or a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). It has become very popular among educators around the world as a tool for creating online dynamic web sites for their students. To work, it needs to be installed on a web server somewhere, either on one of your own computers or one at a web hosting company.
The focus of the Moodle project is always on giving educators the best tools to manage and promote learning, but there are many ways to use Moodle:
- Moodle has features that allow it to scale to very large deployments and hundreds of thousands of students, yet it can also be used for a primary school or an education hobbyist.
- Many institutions use it as their platform to conduct fully online courses, while some use it simply to augment face-to-face courses (known as blended learning).
- Many of our users love to use the activity modules (such as forums, databases and wikis) to build richly collaborative communities of learning around their subject matter (in the social constructionist tradition), while others prefer to use Moodle as a way to deliver content to students (such as standard SCORM packages) and assess learning using assignments or quizzes.
How many schools are using it?
There is a very large movement in Higher Education toward the adoption of Open Source course management systems. Currently, the two major contenders are Moodle and Sakai. Moodle has been adopted more widely, and especially among our peer institutions in the Consortium of Liberal Arts Colleges. Here's a sampling of schools that have adopted Moodle:
Idaho State
Iowa State*
Louisiana State
Notre Dame
*Known dual LMS


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Behind the wheel of a police car, at the controls of a helicopter, underwater in scuba gear, or handling explosives and firearms with an expert's touch, an Indiana State Trooper's career is one of action. From its humble beginning in 1933 with sixteen officers, to today's department with over 1,300 enforcement personnel, the Indiana State Police is one of the premier state police agencies in the country. Follow the links below to learn more about the Indiana State Police and how you might become a part of its future as an Indiana State Trooper.
ISP currently is not accepting applications for the Indiana State Police Recruit Academy. When applications for the Academy are being accepted, ISP will announce the new class on this page.


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Climate Models' "Basic Physics" Falls Short of Real ScienceSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Sun, 03/08/2015 - 15:23
Recently, a PR offensive has been mounted by the minions of climate alarmism, attempting to rehabilitate the soiled reputation of climate models. Most everyone by now has heard of the 18+ year pause in global temperature increase, dubbed the "pause" by climate change advocates. This hiatus in global temperature increase, happening in the face of ever rising atmospheric CO2 levels, has caused even the most die hard climate alarmists to doubt the veracity of climate science's digital oracles. The latest phrase being test marketed in the green stooge press is the claim that climate models are just "Basic Physics", implying that they are in some way scientifically accurate. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
If At First You're Not Believed, Lie, Lie AgainSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Mon, 02/16/2015 - 13:26
Proving the old adage, if your first lie isn't believed lie again and make it a whopper, NASA GISS announced another study proclaiming imminent climate catastrophe. This time it's the US Southwest and the scourge is not just drought, it's Megadrought! The report predicts that decades-long droughts are likely to ravage the US Southwest and Great Plains within the next century. "This drying could be worse than any other in the past 1,000 years, including a 'megadrought' seven centuries ago that helped drive an ancient civilization to collapse," wails Nature online. But just how did the researchers come to this conclusion and what evidence do they base their predictions on? As it turns out the whole thing is a house of cards.
2014 - Annus Horribilus For Climate AlarmistsSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Fri, 01/09/2015 - 12:47
As the new year begins the forces of climate alarmism find themselves in disarray. The world refuses to warm, despite contorted data manipulation aimed at squeezing out a claimed "hottest year ever" record by NOAA. One hundredth of a degree does not a warming trend create. Northern hemisphere temperatures are depressed for the second year in a row—also not a climate trend in itself but a psychological blow to the warmists trying to sell the idea that temperatures are at a record high. Moreover, there are indications that the climatologists' bane, CO2, is not ravaging tropical forests and is not being produced where the "blame the developed world first" crowd expected. In all, a good start to the new year because it is a bad start for the alarmists.
Celestial Collisions, Climate Change and ConsensusSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Mon, 12/08/2014 - 15:07
Despite efforts to correct and educate many ersatz climate experts, many persist in using consensus as an argument in favor of the failed theory of global warming caused by human CO2 emissions. From froth at the mouth fanboys on Twitter to empty headed politicians on network television, the cry comes: "what about the 97% consensus among scientists?" On occasion old, and evidently lazy, scientists revert to using "consensus" as an argument. Once again I will try to set the record straight when it comes to polls among scientists and scientific proof.
Review: Disasters & Climate Change by Roger Pielke, Jr.Submitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Thu, 11/06/2014 - 11:02
The Rightful Place of Science: Disasters & Climate Change is the latest book by Roger Pielke, Jr., noted political scientist and professor in the Environmental Studies Program and a Fellow of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES). In it he addresses the controversial subject of whether natural disasters are becoming more frequent and more fearsome due to manmade climate change. This short volume is an excellent summary of his work in this area and a reference that anyone serious about climate change should have on their shelf. After receiving an advance copy of the work, here is my review.
The Ignorance of Climate AlarmismSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Wed, 08/06/2014 - 13:31
One of the sad side effects of the global warming climate scam is the way otherwise fairly intelligent people have been snookered into believing the dumbest things. An example in point: in a world where millions die each year due to malnutrition, US Secretary John Kerry lectured African leaders attending a summit in Washington that creating more farms in Africa causes too much carbon pollution. Can you imagine the response of any national leader, being told he must let his people starve because a bunch of rich nation, ivory tower science boffins have this unproven, wild idea that CO2 might cause the world to warm by a degree or two a hundred years from now? This is the type of imbecility that comes from following a pernicious untruth down a rabbit hole of false assumptions. Yet around the globe people seem defenseless against the infectious ignorance that is climate alarmism.
Ghosts of Orion, Doug Hoffman's Latest SF Novel ReleasedSubmitted by Resilient Earth... on Fri, 08/01/2014 - 11:25
Resilient Earth Press is pleased to announce that Ghosts of Orion, Doug Hoffman's fourth novel and the first in a new science fiction series, the T'aafhal Legacy, is now available for purchase online. The book follows the further adventures of the captain and crew of the starship Peggy Sue, as they set out to explore the galaxy beyond Earth's local neighborhood. Led by Captain Billy Ray Vincent, the crew is part of a new, commercial enterprise, the Orion Arm Trading Company, whose mission is exploration and colonization of new worlds in the Orion Arm. Along the way they encounter scientific mysteries and strange aliens, and are reminded that the galaxy is a very dangerous place.
Models & Statistics: A Toxic CombinationSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Mon, 07/07/2014 - 14:31
In 2013 a group of climate researchers published a study using statistics and the output of the latest crop of climate models. Their purpose was to show when surface temperatures could be expected to permanently depart from previous historical ranges. Such an event is called an expulsion. Camilo Mora et al. presented precise projections for when these unprecedented regional climates would emerge. Now a second group of researchers argue that their methodology produces artificially early dates at which specific regions will permanently experience unprecedented climates and artificially low uncertainty in those dates everywhere. This is an example of what happens when untrustworthy model outputs are combined with specious statistical methods. The resulting predictions are scary enough to be published in a major journal, but so false that even other climate scientists are moved to protest.
Ghost of Orion Book Give-A-Way!Submitted by Resilient Earth... on Wed, 07/02/2014 - 14:28
It's a month before the planned publishing date for Doug L. Hoffman's latest science fiction adventure book and Resilient Earth Press is pleased to announced that there is a give-a-way contest being held on Goodreads. We were so pleased by the results of the M'tak Ka'fek give-a-way we decided to do it again. Ten lucky entrants will get a free copy of the trade paperback version of Ghosts of Orion shipped right to their homes. Read on for more about the novel and how to enter.
Swapping Climate Models for a Roll of the DiceSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Thu, 06/19/2014 - 14:10
One of the greatest failures of climate science has been the dismal performance of general circulation models (GCM) to accurately predict Earth's future climate. For more than three decades huge predictive models, run on the biggest supercomputers available, have labored mighty and turned out garbage. Their most obvious failure was missing the now almost eighteen year "hiatus," the pause in temperature rise that has confounded climate alarmists and serious scientists alike. So poor has been the models' performance that some climate scientists are calling for them to be torn down and built anew, this time using different principles. They want to adopt stochastic methods—so called Monte Carlo simulations based on probabilities and randomness—in place of today's physics based models.
Unsettled ScienceSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Wed, 05/07/2014 - 14:53
The science is settled, the President of the United States assures us. His pet scientists have produced yet another frightening climate report to prove it. Given this President's tenuous relationship with the truth on other matters, a citizen might pause to ask if the claim of settled science is, in fact, true. In the recent past scientific papers have discovered some "unexpected" phenomena that help to regulate climate. In fact, one of the climate change faithful proposed a mechanism affecting the jet stream that could be responsible for this winter's unexpected weather in the northern hemisphere. Only problem, a number of climate alarmist luminaries have dissented from her idea. Remember the consensus that was supposed to shut down all opposing opinions? Never mind. Another study shows statistically that there is no way to establish a human caused warming trend without another 100 years of observation. Of course, if you believe the climate catastrophists the world as we know it will have vanished by then. So is climate science really settled? Here are just some of the most recent indications that it is not.
The Other Climate ReportSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Mon, 04/14/2014 - 13:21
On March 31, 2014 the fifth in a series of scholarly reports produced by the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), Climate Change Reconsidered II: Biological Impacts, was released to the public. While little reported in the main stream media, this new publication represents an independent, comprehensive, and authoritative report on the current state of climate science. It is an answer to the propaganda put out by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and its lackeys and a direct refutation that no real climate scientists dispute the conclusions of the climate change alarmists. For those who do not accept the claims of consensus science or the fatuous assurances that global warming is an imminent threat by vacuous politicians, this report sheds light on the real science behind global warming and its possible effects.
The Hollow Earth, Global Warming And The Truth About ScienceSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Wed, 02/19/2014 - 16:32
The past week has witnessed the advent of a new climate change offensive by know nothing progressives, led by the triumphantly ignorant U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry. Kerry and his boss, the equally scientifically naive Barrack Obama, have publicly stated that climate change "is a scientific fact" and that the argument is over. This stunning display of politically motivated, willful belief over scientific rigor demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of scientists and the scientific method. Contrary to popular belief, science is seldom sure of anything and scientists often spend years debating ideas that just don't prove to be true in the end. An illustrative example is the Hollow Earth theory, which suggests that within the bowels of our planet are other, habitable worlds awaiting discovery.
California Dreamin' Of Wetter TimesSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Wed, 02/05/2014 - 15:03
California, the state that raises 30% of US fresh produce, is in the grip of a severe drought. Billed as the driest period in the state's recorded rainfall history, climate change alarmists have hastened to blame the parched conditions on anthropogenic global warming (AGW). Paleoclimate history tells a different story, however, and highlights the amazingly short attention span of AGW advocates. Going beyond the 163-year historical period, science shows that there have been other, longer lasting and more severe droughts than the current dry spell. Today's drought is minor when compared with ancient Megadroughts, which occurred between 850 to 1090 and 1140 to 1320. In fact, the worst droughts suffered by the American Southwest all happened so long ago that human memory fails us.
Procrastinating About The PauseSubmitted by Doug L. Hoffman on Tue, 01/21/2014 - 13:27
The world is entering the 16th year of the greatest climate science embarrassment in modern history—the pause in global warming. Despite rising IPCC confidence levels and hundreds of computer model predictions, that darned old climate is just not behaving like the boffins say it should. After all, CO2 keeps rising, and we all know that CO2 drives Earth's climate like the thermostat in a house... or not. No longer able to sweep the lack of warming under the observational rug, the climate change community had started flailing about for answers: the heat must be hiding deep in the ocean, it must be soot from China, some have even begun to wonder whether there is something wrong with their models. Most are still convinced that the missing heat is hidden somewhere because they will not accept the simplest explanation—the theory of Anthropogenic Global Warming is fundamentally incorrect.


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On Adoption as a First Choice6
December 11, 2007 by multiracialsky
I always knew I would adopt children. I was less committed to giving birth to children, however pregnancy and homebirth have been parts of my mothering experience as well. I don't remember the moment I decided I wanted to be a parent–it was in me from the very beginning. I also don't remember deciding my future family would include both adopted and biological children, I just always knew it would. Maybe it was because my first friend was adopted. I don't remember life before him; he is just three days younger than me.
As a young child, I took care of my many dolls and dressed up (for several years in a row) as a 'mother' for Halloween. I spent a good portion of my early pre-parenting life taking care of other people's children. I have a brother who is ten years younger than me. I babysat a lot. I ran a summer 'day camp' for neighborhood kids. I nannied for children with cerebral palsy and autism, as well as their siblings. I worked with toddlers in a daycare center. I was a substitute teacher.
In my later professional life, I worked with adults with schizophrenia, OCD, and bipolar disorder. I worked with social workers and police investigating child sexual abuse and serious physical abuse. I've known many children, and I've known many struggling adults who are still dealing with their difficult childhoods.
I have always felt a real responsibility to be of use (as Homer Larch says), to constantly assess my life and myself to see if I am doing all I can. My thoughts and purpose have directed me to be of use to people in need: real, basic need. I completely believe that we are all one world, one people, but I also believe I must first address what is right here in my own back yard: the needs and inequities in my own country.
When we went through our first adoption process, I was not thinking about the ethics of adoption or about the policies (and the 'values' behind them) that financially reward women for placing their children with adoptive families–but don't provide these same women the opportunity to parent their children. I was just thinking about children who needed a family. We knew what we were comfortable with, and we had a fabulous agency, and we ended up with a fully open adoption. Our second adoption was (serendipitously) with a different agency, and again was a completely ethical placement. (Although sometimes it seems like luck that both our adoptions worked out that way. In hindsight, I see so many potential pitfalls that just didn't materialize.)
Our coming to adoption by choice instead of by way of infertility has caused a lot of confusion for others–for family members, for the general public, and for other adoptive parents. It is an unusual choice, especially with our combining adoption with biological children in such close concert. (Hard-core preferential adopters do not have any biological children, and many adoptive-bio mixed families have a few older bio kids and then a few younger adopted kids–almost like two separate families.)
So, why adopt when we are able to have (and not philosophically opposed to bearing) biological children?
For me, the answer lies deep inside me: every child is my responsibility. As with all things, If not me, then who? This is true in the abstract and in the very concrete (as in, we have the resources and the space, we should be open to another child in our family if a child needs us). The way this deeply held belief has played out in my adult life is a bit more complicated.
I have a life partner and best friend I have been with for almost 14 years. His ideas and plans are not necessarily the same as mine. I now have four children who (through some amazing blessing) are all multiply-gifted. They are healthy, they are beautiful, they are (mostly) well-behaved. They are intellectual and athletic super-stars (yes, I know, this is their mother bragging here). Thus, the thought of adding extremely needy children–I'm talking older child adoption here–to our family at this point in time (our kids range in age from 6 down to 2) gives me pause for the first time in my life. What would that mean for the children we have now? What would our family feel like for a child who has not had most of the advantages our kids have?
I am not traditionally religious at this point in my life, but I do love the writings of the Sufi master Jelaluddin Rumi. In a piece entitled The Real Work, Rumi says:
There is one thing in this world that you must never forget to do. If you forget everything else and not this, there's nothing to worry about, but if you remember everything else and forget this, then you will have done nothing in your life.
Parts of me want to be a writer, a painter, a small-time homesteading farmer, an antiracist activist and organizer, an educator about multiracial families and individuals, an adoption reformer, an open adoption advocate. But when I dig deep down to my core, my internal compass always points the same way. My true purpose and drive is to provide a family and a home for children who need one.
One place this gets tricky with adoption is in turning down a specific situation because it is unethical: because the child's parents are not being treated fairly, because you are being asked to do something–or pay for something–that is (at best) a very grey area. If you (as a potential adoptive parent) stick to your ethical values and say no to the situation, it feels like what you are really doing is saying no to the child: No, I'm sorry, you or your mother are involved with an unethical social worker (or facilitator or agency) and so you can't become a member of our family. But I could not live with myself with even the hint of having 'bought' a child, or parenting a child whose first family truly intended to keep and parent them.
I carry all those children–and their mothers– around with me still, the children who joined other families, the children who are still waiting. I carry the sibling group of three Black brothers waiting in foster care, children who require more care (and fewer siblings) than our family can provide. I carry every face from every photolisting, every mistreated pregnant or parenting mother, every statistic about children living in poverty or parents dying of AIDS, alongside the pain in the faces of the mothers on T.V. during hurricane Katrina, the stories of children from Guatemala and Ethiopia stolen away to families overseas. Every mother hurting because of her child's pain or the loss of her child; every child hurting because they have no parents–I carry them all inside me. I always have.
I constantly ask myself, would I be more effective working on policy issues instead of parenting a house full of stair-step children? But to me that feels like I'd be saying, I'm willing to donate money to the cause because that abnegates me from going to the people and being a part of the work myself. Donating money is important, don't get me wrong, but it is also neater, less personal, in many ways–easier. Who is responsible for doing the actual hands-on work?
Along a similar line, and one that is with me almost as often: The financial privilege of the world's middle and upper class has translated into ridiculous–yet seemingly mundane–expenses. Even when we have the money, I struggle to buy myself anything because the thought of what that $40 (the cost of a new striped turtleneck) would buy for a mother struggling to feed her children . . . you know, I'm pretty content in my thrift-store finds and my mother-in-law's hand-me-downs.
We're not wealthy, but we do more than get by. My partner and I have been blessed with good health, able bodies, the opportunity to complete college degrees, steady jobs, health insurance, and some very supportive family members. To most people who know us IRL (and probably the rest who don't), our consideration of adopting another child–or two–into our hopping and popping family, well, they think we're a little crazy. "Your life's so perfect," one relative always says, "Why risk wrecking it? Who knows what another child will do to your family balance?"
To that relative, and to everyone else, I say only this: There are children who need families. I think we have a pretty great family, with a lot to offer another son or daughter, brother or sister. And I love being a mother.
6 thoughts on "On Adoption as a First Choice"
I can't tell you how refreshing it is to read your perspective . . . maybe I'm not nosy enough, or something, but it just never occurred to me to wonder why you had both bio and adopted kids 😛 My family has been formed with a mix of both, so maybe it just doesn't occur to me to question families where there are both. My grandmother, who is adopted herself, has one adopted and two bio children; I have cousins who were adopted out of our family as well as into our family. I joke that I have a "family history" of adoption, and so there is no way I would not consider both adopted and biological children for my own family; it just feels right.
I guess what I keep forgetting is that not every family will necessarily welcome an adopted child as an addition that will be as loved, anticipated and delighted in as they would a biological child, particularly if infertility doesn't lie behind the decision to adopt. I've never been exposed to that perspective- I guess I'm sheltered that way, and I think reading your post on the topic was necessary, since I hadn't yet considered that some people outside my family might be more willing to question why somebody who isn't infertile would happily adopt as well as give bith.
I do so much thank you for sharing your perspective, and a bit of your experience. It is very much appreciated 🙂
I saw many correlations between your life experience and mine here. Wanting to care for a child whose mother couldn't is among my earliest memories. I worked in sex abuse investigation, and left the work of helping other people with their children in the belief that by raising my children well I would be making the greatest contribution to society. I'm a first choice adopter with a bio child hot on the heals of my adopted son. And we're about to get a new homestudy so that we can pursue adopting another child soon. Three under four? Okay!
I think if I weren't so conflicted and haunted by the complexities of ethics in adoption, we would have a very large family. And perhaps we shall still. Right now our plan is to adopt older children/sibling groups or do foster care when these children are older, and more able to manage children that may need a lot of care and energy. When I'm not in knots about adoption ethics, I'm happily dreaming of our big, rowdy family.
I found myself just saying, "Yes, yes!" over and over again as I read this post. Thank you for giving voice to so much of what I am feeling right now! My husband and I have two biological children and a deep yearning to adopt as well. Within myself, I know the money will work out. The family dynamics will work out. The intensity of family life will work out. Yet, I let the questions and commentary of others convince me that I must be crazy to think it will all work out. Sometimes, it is difficult to choose a less traveled, less "conventional" path. Others may not understand our decisions. But I am with you, "If not me, then who?"
[…] come to adoption as a first choice (this is a post I like a lot on this topic). I think there's a lot to think about in that, but […]


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Defendant's statement to police: 'I couldn't stop' stabbing victim
By Jonathan Weaver, Salisbury Post
Margaret Leighann Martin was a golden-haired beauty with a room-brightening smile and a good helping of warm Southern hospitality.
Wesley Tobe Smith was a manic-depressive, drug-using painter friend of Martin's fianc/ whom Martin said gave her the creeps.
District Attorney Bill Kenerly launched Smith's trial Thursday detailing what he believed happened the last day the two saw each other.
On Sept. 12, 2001, Smith arrived at the eastern Rowan County home shared by Martin and her fianc/, Jason Scott Wagner. Wagner wasn't there.
Martin invited Smith in, then said she didn't want him around Wagner anymore.
Martin went into the kitchen and Smith went into a rage.
"Something came over me," Kenerly said, reading from a confession Smith gave detectives.
She was bent loading the dishwasher when he began stabbing her, Kenerly said. She dropped to the ground. He got on his hands and knees and continued the attack. Martin wrestled away and ran toward the bathroom, all the while begging him to stop. She got to the bathroom and swung a curling iron at him.
But, "I couldn't stop," Kenerly read from Smith's statement. When she finally stopped fighting, "I turned her over and cut her throat."
The estimated 53 stab wounds punctured all her vital organs except her heart. She died from loss of blood 15 minutes after the attack began.
In the first statement he gave detectives, Smith said he thought Martin had a thing for him.
Smith, 27, is on trial for his life in Rowan County Superior Court. He is charged with first-degree murder.
As they began investigating, detectives considered Wagner a suspect, Kenerly said during his opening statement. Wagner had found Martin's body the day of her killing.
But after questioning Smith, they cleared Wagner. Detectives noticed a bandage covering three of Smith's fingers. They also found shoes with tread similar to footprints left on the linoleum floor at the crime scene.
Rowan County Sheriff's Department crime scene technician Tommy Swing ended Thursday's testimony about the blood he found in the kitchen and through the house. Swing told the court he found several distinct sole depressions made in blood on the linoleum in the mobile home.
Smith's defense attorneys did not deny their client committed the murder. Instead they pointed out that before his arrest, Smith had no evidence of a violent past. Doctors had diagnosed him as a manic depressive and prescribed him several medications. He also suffered a head injury a few months before the killing, defense attorney Marshall Bickett told the jury.
Kenerly first called Jason Wagner to the stand. Immediately, Kenerly showed him a portrait of Martin and asked Wagner if he could identify her.
"That's Leighann," Wagner said in a hushed voice as he dropped his head.
Wagner said he knew Martin for about 11 years. The two had dated for a little less than two years.
Kenerly asked Wagner about previous convictions. Wagner said he had done time for breaking and entering, larceny and possession of stolen goods.Wagner said he was "an on and off (marijuana) user," and that he grew plants at his home in an indoor growing system.
Wagner met Smith through construction work. Smith was a painting subcontractor who worked with his father. And the two shared drugs. On at least one occasion, Wagner said, he gave Smith an ounce of marijuana.
Wagner said he came home for lunch on Sept. 11 -- the day of the terrorist attacks on New York City and Washington -- to see how Martin was doing.
"I was concerned for her," he told the court. "I know how she is about violence."
When he pulled up to the mobile home, he saw Smith's burgundy van sitting in the driveway. "It kind of bothered me," he said. "I wasn't too happy about it, but I wasn't going to show it."
Smith was sitting on the couch with Martin. The two were watching the day's events unfold on television. Smith asked Wagner if he had any jobs available. Wagner said he was working a siding job, and asked if Smith had any siding experience. Smith said no, then left.
Wagner said he left home the next morning for the siding job on Dunn's Mountain Road. Wagner left work about 4 p.m. and stopped and bought two beers. He went to his cousin's home and the two went hunting for arrowheads along High Rock Lake. About an hour later, Wagner said he headed home.
"When I entered the driveway ... the front door was open ... it caught me off guard," Wagner said.
Normally, Martin worked in the yard or sat on the couch waiting for Wagner, he said. This day he couldn't find her. He called her name several times, but got no response.
Then he walked into the kitchen. "Blood was everywhere," he said.
He found her in the doorway of the bathroom. "I approached her and saw she had something around her neck," Wagner said. "I shook her and said her name ... I freaked out."
The curling iron cord had been wrapped around Martin's neck. The phone was near her on the floor -- dead. The couple's pistol rested about a foot from Martin's body, Wagner said.
Wagner said he drove his motorcycle to his mother's home to call 911. His mother followed him back to the mobile home.
"We really couldn't tell what happened," he said. "Her hands were crossed across her chest."
On cross-examination, Bickett focused on Wagner's lengthy criminal history. He noted convictions for escaping from jail and assaulting a government official along with the breaking and entering conviction and an assault on a female charge for an incident involving a former girlfriend.
Bickett also questioned Wagner about his involvement in drugs.
"Were you growing marijuana?"
"Yes sir," Wagner replied.
But Wagner said he didn't smoke it often.
"So you're saying you grew the marijuana as an experiment and to give to friends?" Bickett asked.
"You're right. Correct," Wagner said.
Martin's mother, Tonia Helms, testified about two incidents in which Martin told her Smith frightened her.
During the summer of 2001, "she had told me she didn't like going to job sites because Tobe was there," Helms said. Martin said Tobe Smith gave her the creeps, Helms said.
And on the Saturday before Martin's killing, she said Smith "had been coming down there when Jason wasn't there," Helms said. Martin told her mother she was going to tell him to stop coming around and to stop hanging out with Jason Wagner, Helms said.
"I told her to get Jason to do it," Helms said. "She said 'I'm not scared, I can tell him.' "
Kenerly also called two men who shared a Morgan Road mobile home with Smith, his wife and three kids.
Michael Page said Smith slept during days and took a lot of pills. "There toward the end, it was pretty bad."
He said he saw Smith the day of the murder with injured fingers. He asked what happened, and Smith said he was attacked at a convenience store phone booth. Page also identified slip-on sneakers Smith often wore around the mobile home. He testified that he found a blood-covered T-shirt in a trash pile at the mobile home.
Anthony Hummel, who owned the Morgan Road home, said Smith used "any type of drug he could" and stayed in his room a lot. Smith also had a crack cocaine problem -- the reason doctors admitted to Charter Pines Hospital, Hummel said.
Testimony continues today.
Contact Jonathan Weaver at 704-797-4266 or jweaver@ salisburypost.com.


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Monday July 23rd, 2012 4:30pm
As part of an ongoing series, Inside Lacrosse is scouring its archives to bring you years worth of instructional tips that you may have missed. Below are two articles capturing two players perspectives on battling back from ACL tears. The First, Kate Kaiser talks about her experience and explains that it's not easy, but you can get back on the field after an ACL tear. In the second article IL's John Jiloty tells the trials of former UMBC standout Andy Gallagher and how delt with tearing both ACLs—almost a year apart. Both articles first appeared in the November 2005 Issue and were related to "Every Athlete's Worst Nightmare" an article claiming that tearing your ACL can be one of the most dreaded injury in sports.
Duke's Kate Kaiser entered the 2002 season as the consensus favorite for Player of the Year honors. Then she tore her ACL in the first practice of the season. She missed the '01 season rehabbing from the injury but returned in 2003 to pick up first-team All-American honors with 44 points from the Blue Devil midfield. A two-time Tewaaraton finalist, Kaiser put up nine points and 11 groundballs with Team USA at last summer's World Cup in Annapolis, Md.
As an athlete, the three words you never want to hear are "anterior cruciate ligament." It seems like every spring we hear about ACL injuries ending seasons, and sometimes even careers. I fell victim to a season-ending ACL injury in the opening 30 minutes of the first preseason practice of my senior year at Duke.It was supposed to be "my year". But after half an hour, it looked as if I would be watching from the sidelines. Our team was doing a standard shooting drill from various spots in and around the 12-meter arc. I came around the left side of the crease, reached for a pass and as I planted my right leg, I hyper-extended my right knee.
I tried to walk it off, not thinking much of it. I wasn't in much pain and even entered the next drill, which involved lateral shuffling. But as I shuffled to the right, my leg buckled. That's when I got nervous. I left the drill and went over to see the trainer, who did the standard stability test and said it might be my ACL.
I kept thinking, 'That's not possible; this can't happen to me.' I underwent further tests, X-rays and an MRI that night and the next day, which confirmed my worst fear: I had torn my ACL.
Like anyone else who has blown out his or her knee, I couldn't believe that it was actually happening to me. I was shocked, angry, in disbelief. The biggest injury I had suffered in the 15 years I had been playing sports was a black and blue fingernail. But this was reality, and I had a choice to make—I could let my injury control me, or I could control my injury.
I chose the latter. I wanted to return to win a national championship and I was going to do everything in my power to get back for a fifth year and a second chance at my senior season. Each day that I went to rehab, even if I had to force it upon myself, I had the attitude that I was going to get a little better and get one step closer to my goal. I never let myself come in with a negative attitude.
After undergoing surgery about a week after the injury, I spent many, many hours in rehab. The first few weeks after surgery, my mobility was very limited and I was moving around on crutches, which is a very humbling experience. I couldn't drive or carry anything and had to depend on my friends for a lot. That portion of my rehab definitely taught me a lot about myself and made me stronger mentally and more determined to conquer the injury.
Rehab was a gradual process, as I slowly increased my range of motion and strength. Some days were boring, some were painful, some were frustrating. And that's just the physical part. Some days I felt great and was ready to return to action, and others I was sore and felt like I had aged 50 years overnight.
Emotionally, the road to recovery is also draining. Just like the physical process, some days I was on top of the world, while others made me feel like the world was crashing down around me. It's hard to go from being a top Division I athlete to learning how to run again. It was also a struggle for me to go from starting every game of my career to watching from the sidelines, knowing I couldn't contribute anything but encouragement from the bench.
I worked out on the treadmill and in the pool. I did a variety of exercises on a trampoline and a lot of leg lifts. Part of the recovery process is putting in additional work outside of the hours you spend in rehab. While watching practice, I did additional leg lifts or worked on my balance and stick skills, anything I could do to speed up the recovery process and stay involved in the sport I love. I also became a student of the game while watching many hours of practice; watching the game provides a much different perspective than playing it.
With all of the exercises my physical therapist put me through, the hardest thing was working out by myself. It's easy to measure your status and compete when you have teammates around you, but when you're all alone in a pool, it's hard to push yourself to the maximum level day in and day out. But the thing that kept pushing me was the vision of celebrating a national championship at the end of the season.
So to anyone that is going through this, my advice is to take control of your injury and your attitude immediately. You may be sidelined, but you need to have the attitude that you're bigger than your injury and you will return to be better, stronger and faster. Set a goal for yourself, and each day in rehab push yourself to work hard to reach it. You will run the gamut of emotions, but continue to push yourself physically and maintain a positive, hard-working attitude, even through the hardest days.
You can beat this injury; it's all up to you.
Forgive UMBC's Andy Gallagher if he's a bit edgy in mid-March.
That week-and-a-half stretch cost the former high school All-America both of his ACLs—in consecutive years.
Gallagher led the team in scoring through his first three and a half college games in 2003, but tore his left ACL in the third quarter against Dartmouth on March 19. Almost exactly a year later, he was in a very similar spot.
He led the Retrievers in scoring again in the first two games of 2004, but went down with a torn right ACL in the Monday practice after the Retrievers beat Ohio State in double overtime on March 6.
Surrounding these injuries, the former big-time recruit out of DeMatha (Md.) has flashed plenty of potential when playing at 100%. In his first two collegiate games, he ripped eight goals and two assists; in his most recent two, once he shed the brace on his right knee that limited him through the first 11 games of the 2005 season, he put up six goals and an assist.
In between? Well, that's a pretty crazy story.
The whole debacle started with a simple spin move against Dartmouth in that early-March Tuesday back in 2003. He thought he broke his leg until he got up and was able to walk—with assistance—off the field.
Then he went into the trainer's room and got the news: a torn ACL. "That was kinda shocking," says the laid-back middie.
On crutches for a couple of days and in a straight-leg cast for a month, Gallagher waited two months to have surgery, choosing his own doctor, Dr. Kevin McMahon, in his hometown of Olney, Md.
After the early-summer procedure, it was two more months on crutches. The doctor initially tried to save Gallagher's torn meniscus by stitching it up rather than taking it out. That lasted until December, when Gallagher tore through the stitches while running on a treadmill, resulting in another surgery.
He says the most painful part of rehab was the first couple of days after the initial surgery when the trainers started bending his leg back. After that, it's one step at a time. "It's a lot of waiting and patience," he says. "When you first start out it's definitely frustrating because you don't think you'll be able to do anything. You can't move onto the next exercise until the first one is done. It's a very long process."
Seven full months of rehab later, Gallagher finally got back on the field in 2004 for a preseason scrimmage against Villanova. He says he was hesitant on his first dodge, but after that it was out of his head.
It didn't last long, though. A few weeks later he was in practice dodging from up top when he planted his right knee wrong and heard that awful "pop." "They didn't even have to tell me what I did," he says. "I just knew."
This time he had surgery a couple of weeks later and he rehabbed at UMBC. Surprisingly, there wasn't much anger accompanying this second disaster.
"I was pissed off in a way, but I wasn't going to let it keep me down," he says. "I knew that I had done it before and could get back out there."
He was out all summer again, but he did do some non-contact drills during fallball. He says he learned a lot from watching his teammates play, but that didn't curb his anxiety to get back on the field when the 2005 season started.
Again his first game action was a preseason scrimmage with Villanova, and again he says he felt good. After that, getting through the first part of March was tough. "I just wanted to get past that one week," he says. "Once I got by that, I was pretty good."
Playing mostly midfield last year, the former attackman says he struggled with the brace: "I wanted to take it off so badly, but they wouldn't let me."
But the strong finish to the spring and his first active summer season since 2002 helped buoy his confidence this fall. "I feel about the same [as before the injury]," he says. "The only difference is after I play I have pain in my knees. My knee is probably stronger now actually. There's no difference on the field."
Now it's just a matter of getting through another March.
January 24, 2011 - Rehabbing an ACL Tear: Warrior, Outlaw, Mammoth defender Ken Clausen


text:
17.01.2014 •
Events NEWS
Director: Kevin McElvaney
Location: Agbogbloshie, Ghana
Hier zeigen wir Euch eine freie und auf schreckliche Weise spannende Strecke samt Text von Fotograf Kevin McElvaney. Seine letzte Reise führte ihn nach Agbogbloshie, der größten Elektroschrott-Mülldeponie Ghanas. Die hier gezeigte Giftmüllhalde gehört zu den am stärksten verseuchten Orten der Welt. Durch die Zusammenarbeit mit lokalen Umweltaktivisten und Hilfsorganisationen hatte Kevin die Möglichkeit das Leben der Jugendlichen vor Ort für vier Tage kennenzulernen und dieses zu portraitieren. Sein Erfahrungsbericht, sein Film und nicht zuletzt die traurig-schönen Motive findet Ihr auf GoSee. GoSee.us/derkevin
Hier sein Text auf GoSee :
"Ghana is a favourite destination for illegal exportation and dumping of electronic-waste worldwide. It started about 10 years ago. Almost every electronic devise (and especially older ones) contains toxic chemicals, which makes it expensive to recycle them or they are even not-recylable. By law it is not allowed to dump this electronic-waste in Europe and America (≈1st world countries), so they end up in (for example) Ghana as second-hand and fake-labeled donations. So sometimes even a fully loaded container of TVs, Hifi-Systems, Refrigerators and so on is disguised as development aid, even if the content is obviously not working anymore.
In the end 500 shipping-container loads end up in Tema (= Harbour in Ghana) every month! And +/- 2 month around christmas it even rises up to 800/ month. Besides the waste from Individuals, you will also find devices from ministries, high profile government institutions, universities and banks - again, most times from Europe & the US. Its quite easy to identify it, because institutions like that have stickers and labels on their devices.
For sure they don´t expect it to end up in a place like Agbogbloshie. In th first place they paid (a lot) for a proper disposal, but do not control what really happens… A friend of mine is collecting devices like this to have a proof and is e-mailing the institutions to let them know and many of them are really surprised.
On top the Basel Convention makes it illegal to export stuff like that (The Basel Convention, a treaty meant to control the movement of hazardous waste between nations, particularly the transfer from developed to less-developed countries. The treaty was opened for signatures in 1989 and put into force in 1992. As of 2013, 179 countries and the European Union are parties to the convention.).
Approximately 80% of the containers from Tema end up in Agbogbloshie and some smaller dumpsites (= Tema itself, Kumasi, Takoradi, Koforidua - but these are really small ones). So the importeurs just check the containers quickly and buy the stuff that looks good and some devices without testing them, but again, 80% goes to the dumpsites.
On the dumpsites they do everything to get the metals: small boys smash the TVs with stones or simple tools and without gloves. Copper has a great value and can be found in wires, small electro engines and capacitors.
The fastes way to get this copper is to burn these materials. So the boys touch and inhale high toxics every-day (cadmium for example) and get seriously ill because of that. With the money they earn they have to buy food, medicines and if possible they send some money to their parents. Many boys and Girls come from the northern parts and upper west regions of Ghana and because people are very poor there, they try to find jobs in cities like Accra, but actually these jobs don´t exist. Many of them have been farmers, but the climate change makes it almost impossible to grow plants there and many import-vegetables like tomatoes are cheaper, than the local ones.
Working in a place like Agbogbloshie means, that most of them won´t reach the age of 30years. Injuries like sears, untreated wounds, lung problems, eye and back damages go side by side with chronic nausea, anorexia, heavy headaches, respiratory problems and almost everyone is suffering from insomnia. Its a place of no-man, because everyone can just come there and start to burn. I also met boys from close by countries, who flew because of civil-war struggles, so many desperate souls can be found here. Many boys work communally but they never work for someone else, than themselves, everyone is a brother/ boss. The ≈ 40.00 settlers themselves call this place "Sodom and Gomorrah".
So there are a few middle-man in this system, after the copper and metals are separated, but beforehand the kids just follow the trucks which come to Agbogbloshie and pick up as much as they can and burn it. The bared metals will find their way back to any country, which needs them.
Who makes the money: The boys in Agbogbloshie just live on a subsistence level (approx. 2,50$/ day and they work from sunrise to sunset), but investigations have shown, that the exporters really make the money by receiving money and proclaiming "we will recycle".
Maybe there are some bribes in the exporting harbours (Europe, America, Nigeria, China, Holland), but its difficult to show that. Many checkers report, that they are just overwhelmed by the quantities, and because of that, its not possible "to check every container" - in doubt they let it go. The controls of the shifted containers are bad and maybe even impossible. Sometimes you will see a container, where the first few devices in front are ok, but behind there its just scrap. But the problem starts here: exporting countries should check the containers and prevent illegal exportations.
The solution: All countries should stop these e-waste shifting and respect the basel convention. Manufacturers and consumers have to play their role and should know the consequences. New design and way of recycling could change that. I met a few organisations who work from another way: They try to teach the boys how they can disassemble the scrap properly, "safe" and more efficient, but in the end they will still get infected. Agbgobloshie is a social-economic and environmental disaster. And we should´t except it as some kind of "income for an african country"/ way of life.
In my opinion there should´nt be some kind of economy based on this, especially not in this way. For example Agbogbloshie was a recreation area before and the odaw-river, which surrounds the burning fields once had many fish swimming around. Today it is black, slightly bubbling and TVs, PCs and Refrigerators swimming on top of it. The first day i was there, i wash´t even able to identify it as a river, because it was covered with all that, but the next day it was all flushed away and found its way into the Atlantic Ocean. Nowadays the cows still walk around on their old grazing grounds and eat the waste and poisoned grass. I saw a cow with open wounds (cancer?) with a local activist for the first time there.
Before Agbogbloshie existed they sold oranges, water and other stuff at the close by market, called "Agbogbloshie Market" - so there are alternatives. Working in these fields keeps the kids away from school, because they play and work there instead of going to school and even can´t afford it as expected sometimes. In the long run its a vicious circle and they are not able to leave this place.
About - Agbogbloshie is a suburb of Accra, Ghana known as a destination for legal and illegal exportation and environmental dumping of electronic waste (e-waste) from industrialized nations. Often referred to as a "digital dumping ground", millions of tons of e-waste are processed each year in Agbogbloshie. The town covers approximately four acres and is situated on the banks of the Korle Lagoon, northwest of Accra's Central Business District. 40,000 Ghanaians inhabit the area, most of whom are migrants from rural areas. Due to its harsh living conditions and rampant crime, the area is nicknamed "Sodom and Gomorrah".


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Google's aptitude test equation
Hi everybody, I have a little question about Mathematica (version 5.1).
Please note that I just began to use this program, so sorry if I'm missing
some trivial points.
As an exercise I've tried to resolve the Google's equation that appeared on
the web some time ago, using this page as a reference:
The text of the exercise is:
1. Solve this cryptic equation, realizing of course that values for M and E
could be interchanged. No leading zeros are allowed.
I've implemented the solution in Mathematica in this way:
- Setup the problem:
prob = "wwwdot" - "google" == "dotcom"
- Setup the equation associated with the problem:
eqn = prob /. s_String :> FromDigits[ToExpression[Characters[s]], 10]
- Extract the variables of the equation:
vars = Union[Cases[eqn, _Symbol, Infinity]]
- Setup the constraints:
ineqs = And @@ (0 <= # <= 9 & /@ vars)
- Resolve the equation:
(sol = Reduce[eqn && ineqs, vars, Integers]) // Timing
This operation gives 449 solutions, calculated in roughly 13 seconds.
Only two of these solutions are correct, since I have to remove the
solutions which yield more than one variable to have the same value.
Obviously this task is pretty easy, so I should expect it to take just a
short time to compute.
And that is actually the case if use a code like this:
Select[sol, Unequal @@ (Part[#, 2] & /@ Cases[#, _Equal, 1]) &] // Timing
The two solutions are extracted in a fraction of a second.
On the contrary if I try to do that in the following way, Mathematica starts
a long session of evaluation and eventually crashes after some minutes:
Reduce[sol && Unequal @@ vars] // Timing
I understand that Reduce might be too general to perform this operation in
an efficient way, but I haven't been able to find a more suitable function.
Also I've noticed that if I change the constraints on the single variables
for the first Reduce in order to explicity consider that no leading zeros
are allowed (so just replacing the 0<=x<=9 with 0<x<=9 for the variables w,
g and d), the evaluation time jumps from 13 seconds to 40 seconds.
That's odd, as in this case the new solutions are obviously just an easily
computable subset of the previous ones.
So I don't really know if Reduce is actually the best function even in the
first usage.
Can you help me out?
Lorenzo Castelli
E-Mail: gcastelli at racine.ra.it


text:
iPod adapter kit extended cable
I had my CD Changer replaced with a iPod adapter kit. Does anybody know what/where I can find a cable that will reach the center consul?
Ive looked in eBay and none look long enough.
I had my iPod adapter kit installed by the dealer. I'm not sure what the connector type is on the kit end for the iPod but I need a cable that will reach from the glove box to the center consul.
Haven't seen any cables that look long enough regardless....
Any help?
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Cadillac News, Concepts, Future Models, Rumors and more Discussion, Cadillac News: Video: Cadillac CTS-V drifts its wheels off at Monticello in Current Cadillac Vehicle Discussion; Filed under: Motorsports , Coupe , Performance , Etc. , Videos , Cadillac , Chevrolet , Mercedes-Benz , Porsche , ...
Cadillac News: Video: Cadillac CTS-V drifts its wheels off at Monticello
Filed under: Motorsports, Coupe, Performance, Etc., Videos, Cadillac, Chevrolet, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, Ferrari, Luxury
Cadillac CTS-V is the new smoke monster - Click above to watch video after the jump
The 2011 Cadillac CTS-V Coupe is a lot of things. It's a luxury two-door that's also a muscle car. It's a supercharged beast with a fire-breathing LSA mounted under the hood. And it's also a smoke machine. Monticello Motor Club invited a slew of vehicles out for its first annual Drift with the Supercars event, and while a few dedicated drift cars showed up, a handful of other lust-worthy rides arrived to ruin their rubber. The CTS-V Coupe was on hand, sharing the track with a Ferrari 575 Maranello, C6 Corvette, 2011 Porsche 911 GT3 RS and a Mercedes-Benz CLK63 AMG Black Series.
The Cadillac fared exceptionally well against the rest of the competition and took home the title of Best Drift in New Car. Check out the tire-shredding, sideways action in the beautifully shot video after the jump.
Gallery: First Drive: 2011 Cadillac CTS-V Coupe
Photos Copyright (C)2010 Steven J. Ewing and Chris Shunk / AOL
[Source: ]Continue reading Video: Cadillac CTS-V drifts its wheels off at Monticello
Video: Cadillac CTS-V drifts its wheels off at Monticello originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 21 Oct 2010 12:59:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Special Treat
Made from sustainably sourced softwood, Accoya is processed to increase its acetyl molecules, making it more durable and dimensionally stable than untreated wood, the company says. The UV-resistant boards repel mold and insects and can be used in both structural and non-structural applications. Titan Wood. 972.233.6565. www.accoya.com
Custom Home Product Showcase
Titan Wood's Accoya
Special Treat


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2001 zx3 wont start
Hi guys, ive searched and searched this forum and im still at a stand still. Car wont start. Things ive done to track down the cause....
1. Checked spark. Removed a plug, attached it the wire out of the cylinder and it sparks.
2. Disconnected fuel line after fuel filter. When i turn the key on it spits gas, so i know the pump is working. I disconnected the line at the fuel rail and had the same results.
3. I checked the fuel injector pulse on all 4 injectors and the ecu is sending the signal to each injector.
4. I checked the inertia switch. I bypassed it to try to start it and it did not start.
5. I checked compression. 120-120-120-118, cold.
6. I plugged in a scan tool and im only getting 7 psi fuel pressure when i turn the key to on. Is that normal for these cars?
Im stuck. Anyone have any other suggestions? Thanks.
45psi is the spec IIRC
39 actually, but 7 is definitely under spec.
There's no easy way to do it but I'd almost put a mech. gauge on it and double check that pressure.
Did fuel spray out or did it stream out? Meaning, did it seem like there was good pressure.
Could be the Fuel Rail Pressure Sensor is bad. If it sees low pressure it will send more voltage to the pump and actual pressure might be so high that the car floods almost instantly.
Like iminhell said, 39 psi is spec and yes, the pressure should be there when you turn the key to start.
Ok, checked fuel pressure manually and its only getting 7 psi. I changed the fuel pressure sensor and still no luck. Any other ideas?
Only 7 would sound fuel pump, not the FRPS. The sensor read 7 and you manually got 7, so it's working.
Pull the line before the Fuel Filter and see if that makes a difference. Hell, just replace the Fuel Filter being you're right there.
If there's no change you're going to be replacing the pump. How you want to go about that is up to you; cut an access hole or drop the tank.
Just make sure the pump you buy has the spring top (update pump).
Ok....replaced the fuel pump with a spring top fuel pump, had to cut the old bracket inside the tank....what a pain! It now gets 40psi but i got a code P1237. So i guess i have a short somewhere. Any suggestions on where to start?
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text:
Devil Doom was Black Doom's final form in Shadow the Hedgehog. He was a powerful being that could use almost all of Shadow the Hedgehog's powers. He was soon defeated by Super Shadow.
Black Doom took this form after the truth behind Shadow's creation was revealed. As the Black Comet was invading Earth, Shadow used the Chaos Emeralds to transform into Super Shadow and fought Devil Doom. Once hit with enough Chaos Spears, Devil Doom fell to his death, expressing shock at how a supreme being and immortal life form could be defeated.
Devil Doom is the final boss of the game. He attacks by breathing fire, raising rubble and sometimes throwing it at Shadow, and strange rocks which shoot lasers, either revolving around him and shooting vertically, or circled around him and shooting outward.
To defeat him, Super Shadow must use Chaos Spear on his eye. The best way to do this is to charge Chaos Spear until Shadow says "Chaos", then get near Devil Doom's eye and fire. Whenever it is hit, Doom's Eye will move from one of Devil Doom's two heads to the other. Shadow must find which head has the eye on it and attack it. If any rubble or orbs are between Shadow and Devil Doom, Shadow is likely to attack them instead of him.
Sometimes Devil Doom will teleport using Chaos Control, which he always does if Shadow gets close enough to dash into him. When he reappears, he will often raise rubble. Among this rubble are balloons, which contain rings to help Shadow maintain his Super form. Dashing into him to make him teleport and then raise the rubble with balloons is a good way to obtain more rings if Shadow is running low.
If the fight goes on for long enough, the gas from the Black Comet will enter Earth's atmosphere and paralyze everyone below (though this does not affect the battle, and there does not seem to be a time limit). Just over eight minutes in, Eggman will confess that Shadow is not an android (as he would claim in some paths Shadow can take in the game), but the same Shadow from Sonic Adventure 2, and that he had one of his robots rescue him from the fall. Near ten minutes, Devil Doom will do an evil laugh at Earth being taken over by the Black Comet, although the battle will still go on.


text:
Framed Art Print
Arctic & European Oilby Doodle Dojo
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Choose from a variety of frame styles, colors and sizes to complement your favorite Society6 gallery, or fine art print - made ready to hang. Fine-crafted from solid woods, premium shatterproof acrylic protects the face of the art print, while an acid free dust cover on the back provides a custom finish. All framed art prints include wall hanging hardware.
Arctic & European Oil were one of the first to get in on the Triffid business. Bill Masen was one of their top men, until the day the comet came and made almost everyone blind.
Inspired by The Day of The Triffids by John Wyndham.


text:
Essentials of Tuscan Cooking
The simple yet refined flavors of Tuscan cooking are world-famous, and with good reason. Whether the product of one of Florence's great restaurants or the simple dishes from a country kitchen, the integrity of Tuscan cooking has won applause for centuries. Learn some of the secrets of this venerable cuisine as you make and enjoy: Bellinis (sparkling wine and peach juice cocktails); Risotto with Porcini Mushrooms; Pear and Fennel Salad; Crostini with Roasted Eggplant; Tuscan Chicken with White Beans; Pork Chops with Olives and Fennel Seeds; Florentine Porterhouse Steak; Cipollini Agrodolce; Oranges in Marsala Glaze; and Almond and Anise Biscotti with Vin Santo.


text:
"That's great," said his dad. "Someday you'll get a real job."
Richard Sr., a physician, was right on both counts. Rick Davis had a great career as a pro soccer player and eventually got a "real job."
Davis, 50, is National Executive Director of the American Youth Soccer Organization. AYSO, which today has nearly 600,000 players, was founded in 1964 and was in its second year when it gave 6-year-old Davis his start in the game.
"My parents signed me up and I fell in love with it right from the very beginning," says Davis.
He grew up playing every sport he could — baseball, football, basketball, tennis, golf, soccer. But when he was just 8, he noticed something special about soccer, because he got a taste of the World Cup. One of his father's patients had given him a pair of tickets to watch the 1966 World Cup final in a closed-circuit broadcast at the Los Angeles Forum.
"I thought it was amazing," he says, "because we got tickets to basically watch a TV. A giant TV as it was, but I remember thinking, 'Why couldn't I watch it on my TV in the family room?'"
Davis watched England's spectacular 4-2 win at Wembley over West Germany, whose star in midfield was a 21-year-old named Franz Beckenbauer.
Davis continued to star in various sports but his Damien High School coach, Al Mistri, believed he could go far in soccer and offered special training focusing on skill and technique.
"He's the one who created a vision and even a path of how I might get there," says Davis.
By 1977, Beckenbauer was playing in the North American Soccer League, which was stocked with the foreign players and some of the world's biggest stars. What was missing during these glory days of the NASL were American stars. In came Davis, whom the New York Cosmos signed at age 19 and lined up with superstars such as Beckenbauer, Carlos Alberto and Giorgio Chinaglia.
Davis played with the Cosmos until the league folded in 1984 and won three league titles. He played Major Indoor Soccer League ball through 1990.
Davis was U.S. captain for many of the 36 games he played for the national team and played in the 1984 and 1988 Olympics. Upon retiring, he worked as a TV commentator, which he had done while still playing. He served as general manager of the APSL's Los Angeles Salsa for more than two years.
"I'm more intrigued by the organization of soccer than the actual coaching," he says.
Davis left the sport entirely when he worked as a healthcare consultant. But he returned to soccer when he started coaching his children and became club director of the Yorba Linda Junior United Soccer Association. As he saw the approach toward youth sports change dramatically, he was drawn back to AYSO.
"Society as a whole has changed," he says. "When I started playing sports it was nothing more than just wanting to have fun. And it was always very affordable. Youth soccer has gone the route of being highly professionalized."
AYSO remains volunteer-driven — 200,000 adults donate their time — and affordable. Davis joined AYSO as Director of Programs in 2004 and became Executive Director in 2006.
"Rick brings the same discipline, work ethic and soccer savvy to AYSO that I saw in him as a player," said Lynn Berling-Manuel, chief marketing officer of AYSO. "He's passionate about AYSO, the kids who play in it and the volunteers who make it possible."
(This article originally appeared in the July 2009 issue of Soccer America magazine.)