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FORTUNE — The NPD Group's Stephen Baker chose Tuesday 9/11 — the day before the expected launch of Apple's (AAPL) new iPhone — to pour cold water on what he calls the "growing expectation that this release will achieve the equivalent blowout sales success that the iPhone 4s enjoyed."
Equivalent? As we reported Monday, conventional wisdom on Wall Street has it that the iPhone 5 will outsell the iPhone 4S by a wide margin.
Among the handful of analysts who were willing to venture a guess, estimates for iPhone 5 sales this quarter (i.e. in the eight days from 9/21 and 9/29) ranged from 6 to 12 million. It took Apple three days to sell 4 million iPhone 4S units last year. Topeka's Brian White estimates by day 3, the company will have sold 5 to 5.5 million iPhone 5s.
Stephen Baker begs to differ.
Baker may be right. But it's also true that the NPD group measures only U.S. retail sales, while Apple sells all over the world. In fact, of the 37 million iPhones it sold in the December quarter last year — the first that included the iPhone 4S — nearly half (17 million) were purchased outside the U.S.
All this suggests that the number to watch for at Apple's special event tomorrow is how many countries will be getting the new phone on Day 1. Last year, the iPhone 4S launched initially in the U.S., Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan and the U.K..


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Welcome to Fails Safe Construction
Fails Safe Construction is dedicated to the repair and replacement of foundations of buildings that were built pre-concrete in the Raleigh, North Carolina, region. After years of aging, mortar will revert back to its original state, sand. Older homes were built on foundations primarily, or solely, made of mortar. This endangers the integrity of the building itself as it ages.
Fails Safe Construction replaces existing mortar foundations with concrete ones. By using concrete, the foundation walls and floor will be stronger after the installation of our concrete alternative. Concrete, unlike mortar, actually gains strength as the years go by. In fact, it takes 100 years until concrete fully cures and achieves its total potential integrity. Thus, you can add to the integrity of your existing home or church and protect it in the years to come.
We Replace:
- Perimeter Walls
- Interior Piers
- Girders
- Floor Joists
Ideal for Older:
- Homes
- Churches
- Stores
- Buildings
Serving Raleigh, North Carolina, and the Surrounding Area
Phone: 919-851-3327

subset: commoncrawl


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Local boys Good Charlotte and Army of Me will be playing a MySpace-sponsored secret show tonight at 7:30 PM at the Black Cat. While this is a free show, hopeful attendees need to be at the Black Cat this afternoon at 3:00 PM to receive a wristband in order to then have a chance a getting a ticket.
News of this show has caused quite a stir among D.C.-area fans, so I suggest being in the vicinity of the Black Cat well before 3:00 to beat the crowds.
For more information, visit http://www.myspace.com/secretshows and view the message boards.


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No two dads are alike. And to honor the uniqueness of our old men, our friends at Huckberry helped curate this list of Father's Day gifts: for everyone from the outdoorsman to the handyman, the stylish dad to the whiskey connoisseur. Take a look below to find something he's guaranteed to enjoy (and you can stealthily borrow) every day throughout the years.
The Tie-Free Father's Day Gift Guide — 20 Perfect Things For Dad


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This isn't the kind of game I would normally opt for, not having played many card games in my time. However, three things persuaded me to pick this up; Firstly, I've been looking for a couple of smaller games to add to my collection and, after hearing some favourable comments, thought this might fit the bill. Secondly, the fact Death Angel can be played solo and, finally, the fact I got a nice, big discount on the RRP.
Death Angel is essentially a slimmed down version of the board game, Space Hulk, minus the board and miniatures. If you're unfamiliar with Space Hulk, then imagine the film Aliens, but set on a derelict space ship and with much more heavily armed, and armoured, marines - you won't got far wrong. Set in the Warhammer 40K universe, Death Angel pits Space Marine Terminators from the Blood Angels Chapter against swarms of Genestealers.
The games starts with your marines arriving at the void lock (airlock) and seems them progress through various locations in the ship, on the way fighting through larger numbers of Genestealers, in an attempt to meet the victory condition at the final location. During set up, players randomly choose their teams of marines and set up the mission by randomly picking hidden location cards for the squad to travel through. Given the fact there are six marine teams and eighteen locations with four seperate victory conditions to (randomly) choose from, there is a fair amount of replayability. Add in the fact that there are eight terrain cards and thirty event cards to choose from each turn, the chances of playing exactly the same game twice are fairly slim.
Here's Death Angel set up on turn 1 - beer optionalOnce you've familiarised yourself with the rules, Death Angel itself plays out very smoothly indeed. So smoothly, in fact, that it's initially quite difficult to see the tactical choices available to you. Instead, the game relies on you taking time to look at your available options, set up your marines to support each other and take risks by, for instance, forcing you to choose between defending yourself and progressing the mission.
The rules themselves are elegant and surprisingly complex given the simple way combat is handled. The turn has four seperate phases that flow together quickly enough, so that each player isn't left doing nothing for too long. Each team of two marines picks an action to perform that turn, they carry out that action, the genestealers attack and, lastly, an event card is drawn, spawning new or moving current genestealers and resolving a random event.
Tactical choices come into play in a couple of interesting ways. For instance, players can't show each other the action cards they've chosen that turn, all cards are revealled at the same time (you can, however, discuss your situation and options.) Actions are then carried out in a strict order, so that one team completes their actions before another starts theirs. An example of this could be:
Marine 1: I'll go and activate that control panel, if you support me by killing the genestealers behind me.
Marine 2: No problem, go for it.
. . .
Marine 2: Damn, I a haven't been able to kill them all.
Marine 1: Ok, I'll still move up, but just defend myself, not activate the panel.
Marine 2: Lets hope more Genestealers don't arrive then.
Add in the fact that each marine team can't choose the same action for two turns in a row, marines can't defend themselves when attacked from the rear, genestealers can move in their phase and that event cards can both help or hinder the marines, then you're presented with a game with a good level of tactical depth, variety in games and random decisions (for instance, combat is resolved with a die roll.)
It's obligatory for one of the players to say "They're coming out of the God Damn walls!!!" whilst playing this game
So, have I any criticisms of the game? Well only a couple. Firstly, I think it would have been helpful if the author/publisher had acknowledged that Death Angel needs a certain degree of abstraction on the behalf of the player. The cards representing individual marines are arranged in a column called the Formation. However, the Formation has nothing to do with any actual tactical formation you adopt, rather it's simply a device to organise the table. However, in our first game, I had difficulty explaining this abstraction to the other players, especially when the game has other mechanics called "Movement" and "Travelling." This may simply be down to the fact I've little experience with card games, but a quick paragraph setting the player's expectations would have been useful.
Secondly, the rules are presented in a peculiar way that, initially, really put me off playing the game. You're initially shown how set the game up, but are constantly directed to the back of the rulebook during this step. Then you're shown the turn sequence and again directed to other areas of the book. This is really a complaint with the rulebook, not the rules themselves and, of course, once you've learned the rules, it ceases to be an issue.
Death Angel after turn 5 - a random event card just moved all the Genstealers behind the marines.
Two turns later, it's all over.
So there we are; Death Angel, a great little game, ideal for casual gaming over a few beers, for killing some time at the club waiting for other players to finish or even for getting your gaming fix without needing lots of miniatures, terrain and space etc. At an RRP of £20 (and obviously available for less,) Death Angel is an enjoyable game, either solo or with some mates, with lots of replayability and a surprising amount of depth.


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The list of financial health indicators is extensive. Credit scores and savings milestones and investment portfolios all work together to complete a portrait of your financial aptitude. But there's another factor you should consider, too: net worth.
Your net worth represents the relationship between the decisions you make regarding your assets and those that affect your liabilities. As the ways in which you direct your money change, so does this relationship. Knowing your net worth can help keep you on track for a better financial future.
Average net worth
The median net worth for adults under age 35 is $6,900, according to the most recent U.S. Census data. By the time they reach ages 45 to 54, that number jumps to over $100,000. In addition, parents, especially those with young children, tend to have a smaller net worth than adults without children or whose children are older.
In short, net worth fluctuates over a lifetime. It should ebb and flow as you take on a mortgage, build credit and find your priorities changing, which is why it's important to audit regularly.
What is net worth?
Net worth is simply a personal balance sheet; the difference found by subtracting your liabilities from your assets. In other words, what you own minus what you owe.
Each step you make in your own financial journey should aim to, ultimately, increase your assets and decrease your liabilities. Tracking your net worth can assist you in attaining this goal by helping you keep an eye on where your money is going.
"Tracking it gives you a good measure of whether you're headed in the right direction with a growing net worth," says Crystal Rau, CFP, MBA, founder of Beyond Balanced Financial, via email.
How to calculate your net worth
To calculate your assets and liabilities to find your net worth total, you'll have to prepare to do some research. More importantly, you'll have to be honest with yourself about where your money goes.
First, look at your assets. When you figure the sum of your assets, it's important to not only consider obvious items like real estate and savings accounts. Think about your less apparent belongings, too. Many people, according to Rau, often forget to include items like "automobiles, household furnishings, collectibles, (and) the cash value amount for life insurance policies."
You can use online resources such as eBay to determine an estimate for the value of your furniture, jewelry and other household items.
Next, calculate your liabilities. And that means everything. It's important to gather your total debt, from your mortgage to any credit card debt, student loans and personal loans. Don't forget to also account for any accrued interest.
Once you've totaled all of your assets and your liabilities, you can enter them into the Bankrate net worth calculator to easily figure your net worth. The calculator also provides an estimate for what your net worth could look like over the next decade.
How to use your net worth
Use your new knowledge as a tool in your financial arsenal. Whereas credit scores and savings give insight into parts of your overall outlook, your net worth tells the full story of everything you put your money toward.
"A growing net worth is a sign that you are making smart financial decisions," Rau says. "Decisions like saving a portion of your paycheck, growing your investments or paying down debt are all going to improve your net worth. On the flip side, growing credit card debt, depreciating assets and spending more than you earn will drag your net worth down."
If your assets and liabilities don't quite paint the picture you expected, knowing the details can help you determine a plan of action for your spending and budgeting. Use your net worth total as incentive to do better. If you find your total is on track with your goals, maintain your habits or look for ways to further grow your net worth.
Benefits of tracking your net worth
The value in knowing your net worth doesn't end there. Best practices indicate you should track it regularly to maintain financial health.
According to Rau, you should be checking your net worth often. "I would recommend checking your net worth every month around the same time so you get a good idea as to how it fluctuates depending on your cash flow. Once you get the hang of tracking it, it's a good idea to keep tabs on it quarterly or every six months."


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I found TBIPS as I looked on-line for a psychoanalytic community to call home after moving to Jacksonville, FL following my Psy.D. program at Rutgers University in New Jersey. Despite numerous psychoanalytic supervisors, psychoanalytic courses, and personal psychoanalytic psychotherapy while in graduate school, I still felt not quite ripe with my own education and training. I honestly appreciated in myself that nagging feeling of wanting more, intellectually and professionally. The clinicians I've admired most have been the ones with endless amounts of training and they paradoxically combined their experience and expertise with humble disclosures of feeling they didn't know enough and needed to know more.
My clients have also indirectly nudged me toward getting more training, as their efforts to get better and their "faith" and "belief" in my ability to help them were all taken as hints as "Go get more training, girl!" I was drawn to TBIPS, in part, by its offerings of long distance training via Skype and telephone. I am deeply grateful to TBIPS for being my intellectual home, and an answer to this need for professional sustenance and support. I'm a Filipino American woman, and there's a saying in Filipino called "utang na loob." It is translated as "debt of gratitude" and signifies the Filipino cultural trait of "reciprocity" in relationships or the "debt of one's inner self." I feel indebted so, and deeply grateful for TBIPS' psychoanalytic training and for supervision.
Training and supervision at TBIPS have helped me feel more connected to my clients, helped me to express that connection, to be more human with my clients, and to listen in a particular way that makes sense of our clients' most troubling symptoms. Psychoanalytic supervision has sensitized me to the ways that I may unintentionally shame clients in well-meaning attempts to be helpful, and how to normalize intense feelings and emotions reported by clients and mutually felt by myself as therapist. It has brought the world of psychoanalytic literature to my home, suggesting relevant articles by contemporary relational psychoanalysts, which I feel have connected me with a wider psychoanalytic community that has such a rich history of thinking deeply about common, difficult, tricky clinical scenarios. Ultimately I feel stimulated and nurtured, and much less isolated as I do the day-to-day work of inching towards emotional intimacy and understanding of clients. Clients report feeling understood, accepted, seen, recognized, as we attempt to bear witness to their emotional suffering. The results have been longer patient lengths of treatment due to decreased premature terminations, more spontaneous expressions of gratitude by clients, greater retention and return rates of clients, and lower no-show rates.
Rose Zayco, PsyD


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Pandesal Boy
Game Description
Play Pandesal boy and help the jinxed peddler recover the scattered pandesal and deliver it to his patrons. Fulfill each level, and in the end, fight with the evil ghost who caused the destruction.
How to Play: Jump to get the bread using up arrow or W. Use A and D to move. Click on the grasses to rotate. Read instructions on screedn to be guided.


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The Six Step Selling Cycle
How do we do that? First we analyse the steps of the sales cycle:
Step 1: Preparation:
Start of strong with completing training, certification and the right combination of skills and talents. Getting ready to be able to sell in a particular market place or technology. Targeted training events ensure you have the foundation you need to better understand the (advanced) technology solutions you are positioning and selling.
Step 2: Approach:
Starting to understand where your opportunity is and identify those end customers who have a need for the kind of technology you want to sell. Comstor's integrated marketing and focused communications will help you to reach the right audience with a powerful, high-impact message designed to distinguish you from the competition.
Step 3: Discovery:
Does your end customer have budget? Do they have a problem you want to solve and make money with? Will they walk away understanding you are their best business partner to team with?
Market intelligence, industry and product analysis will position you to gain a competitive advantage.
Step 4: Solution Design:
Your core strength. Comstor can help you translate the information gained during the discovery phase into a solution. Take advantage of our pre-sales service and support as you create a comprehensive multi-vendor solution.
Step 5: Presentation:
also known as Negotiation phase, where you go back to your end customer to present the complete project. By offering a well organised and thorough solution that is based on information gleaned in the previous stages, you are sure to present your customer with an offering that directly addresses their needs.
Step 6: Implementation:
You won the order and looking for assistance in your process of implementing the project and collecting money. Comstor has complete implementation and post-sales services that can help ensure your customer is satisfied during and after the installation, and pays you fast. We can also help facilitate regular communications and follow-up services with your customers after the solution is deployed.
Interested and want to learn more? Click here to meet expert!


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Other Thomas Dambo super project that you can find in Costa Rica. A sculpture made of pallets for the art festival "Culebra es Ley" Hector remains on the coast of the island, protecting it from the invaders. Another good example of creativity with pallets that is not available for everyone 😉
Do you wnat to look for more pallet furniture?


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This is a two part piece on working with Interfaces in MVC via the Html.EditorFor helper.
The first part – "Display" just covers one of those things I tried on the off chance, and was rather surprised that it worked right out of the box.
In the second part I'll have a look at the next step of the process – binding these interfaces back to their models.
For reference, I'm working with MVC4, in VS 2012 For Web. I think this will also work in MVC3 at least.
For a slightly messy user interface I'm working on, I wanted to be able to have a Model that holds a list of classes that implement an interface.
There is a possibility that all the classes might not be the same, and I was concerned that I was going to end up with a messy
switch statement in my View that called the right Partial depending on which class I found in the list, and that this switch might need to be maintained on an on-going basis.


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Amber Lee Baker (aka Amber Lee and the Anomalies) is bringing the accordion back across genres from folk music into the realm of singer-songwriter cabaret. Her heartfelt, catchy and sultry original songs range between bawdy tunes, melodious folk ballads, and soulful spirituals. As the Cover Babe for the 2012 Accordion Babe Album and Pin-up Calendar, she is one of the many women who is fueling the accordion's resurgence as a sexy instrument. Often seen as a one-woman show accompanying her angelic voice with her "Main Squeeze," loop pedal and glockenspiel. Baker, a former architect, has been extensively touring since 2009, often as a variety show with Renee de la Prade, the creator of the Accordion Babes Album and Pin-up Calendar.
A recent review of her latest album, "Indelible" by the blog Sepiachord states: "…while Amber Lee wields an accordion she could just as well be rolling out her tunes from behind a piano keyboard. Eccentric choice in an instrument and snazzy costume choices aside, Amber Lee is a talented singer-songwriter. That is what makes her new CD, Indelible a recording that rewards repeated listens."
"… powerful vocals and poignant lyrics…" –Cape Cod Times (June 2011)
"…. a little like a fairytale princess with … a siren-esque voice. Her songs are quirky and hella nerdy" – College Times (Jan 2012)A


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I won again, sort of.
Rodney knows what's on Monkeyboy's phone: (thinking) "Now that I've got Paris Hiltons phone list I've got it made."
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer during a conference at 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona, February 14, 2006. REUTERS/Albert Gea
Thanks to all who contributed this week. Keep up the good work, but don't get too carried away with my earlier caption contest criteria. As for me, I'm tired, still have a few hours work left tonight and I got to catch a plane at 7:00 AM. The SQNCC will take a one week hiatus while I am away. And so I'm off to Palm Springs and San Diego for 7 days. See y'all next week.
Think about what you can accomplish in four years. Now think about what the UN can't:
Sexual abuse charges against U.N. peacekeepers remain unacceptably high due to a persistent "culture of dismissiveness" in field missions, a U.N. diplomat said on Thursday.
It could take three to four more years for a reform program to fully take hold, Jordan's U.N. ambassador, Prince Zeid Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein, said in updating the U.N. Security Council on how the problem was being addressed.
Unbelievable, or should I say UN believable.
I got this from a blog I've never been to before while searching for something else. You type "(My name) needs" into Google and see what results:
Charles needs to be comfortable with his Olympic roster.
Charles needs hernia operation after stretching awkwardly.
Charles needs expert help.
Charles needs an eartuck.
Charles needs lots of money.
Charles needs an army to put down Irish rebellion.
Charles needs assessment.
Charles needs a change of pants.
Charles needs a new home.
Go ahead and give it a Googlewhack.
Don't forget to leave your own Monkeyboy text message below.
Do you ever wonder if Andrew Sullivan wakes up in the middle of the night and thinks to himself, "Wow, maybe Bush has made the best of a terrible situation."
Me, neither.
I have difficulty believing that 1 in 12 American's goes hungry without food from soup kitchens:
To combat hunger, more in US turn to soup kitchens
As the economy has steadily grown over the past four years, so too has the number of Americans going hungry. America's Second Harvest, the nation's largest charitable food distribution network, is now providing help to more than 25 million people, an 8 percent increase over 2001, the last time the organization did a major survey of its more than 200 food banks in all 50 states.
Simple math folks. That's all it takes to spot nonsense these days. But imagine how bad things would be if the economy were as bad as Paul Krugman keeps telling us it is.
Incidentally, these numbers also mean that on average, each America's Second Harvest food bank is feeding 125,000 people. I think it is a great and noble thing the folks at America's Second Harvest are doing to help people out, but please, but wild, unsustainable claims do not help their cause.
The End is Nigh!
South Dakota passes abortion ban
Just in case you were under the impression that "college" infers some sort of wisdom or intelligence:
A Canadian university has limited Wi-Fi networks on campus, not out of information security concerns, but because the long-term safety of the technology is "unproven".
Meanwhile, on planet earth people continue to live ever longer, despite the omnipresent and ever growing risks the state can never do enough to protect us from.
What might the press reaction have been if word had leaked out that, "Bush refuses to allow sale of British assets to UAE"? Wouldn't George Bush have been criticized for discriminating against Arabs and Muslims, being a hypocrite on free markets, and trying to instill paranoia and fear, or has Bush Derangement Syndrome become a thing of the past?
Especially when they are for free spech, except, of course, when they aren't. Or when they are for free markets, except, of course, when they aren't. Or when they want to fight the GWOT, except, of course, when they don't.
Though, admittedly, I use the word art very loosely here:
More than £25m in cash has been stolen from a depot in Kent after its security manager and his family were kidnapped by armed robbers...
Too bad this guy isn't as tough as Harrison Ford.
Kid Rock Sues to Stop Sale of Sex Video
There is so much ignorance in this "news" story as to beggar belief:
An international team of scientists says the absence of sharks from abyssal regions of the world's oceans may mean some species are in danger of extinction.
The findings mean the world's oceans are about 70 percent shark-free, researchers said.
The oceans' abyssal zone remains in perpetual darkness at depths below 6,560 feet, with immense pressures of nearly five tons per square inch at its deepest.
It had been hoped that, as man explored deeper into the abyss, new shark species would be discovered. Scientists do not know why sharks are absent from the deep, but suggest one possible reason might be a lack of food.
They warn their finding has environmental implications. Professor Monty Priede, director of Oceanlab at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland said: "Sharks are already threatened worldwide by the intensity of fishing activity, but our finding suggests they may be more vulnerable to over-exploitation than was previously thought."
I leave it as an exercise to the reader to find at least three major holes in this "theory."
Oh Lord, must be Ahmadinejad:
Iran's foreign minister denied on Monday that Tehran wanted to see Israel "wiped off the map," saying President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had been misunderstood.
This doesn't sound any more credible coming from diplomats than it does coming from spoiled athletes.
"Nobody can remove a country from the map."
I'm surprised Marc hasn't posted this one yet:
Not one, but two WSLS (Channel 10) meteorologists -- Marc Lamarre and Jamey Singleton -- have struggled with a heroin addiction in recent months, according to an interview with Singleton that aired on WSLS's late-night newscast Friday.
What's the text message on Steve Ballmer's phone that has him smiling?
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer during a conference at 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona, February 14, 2006. REUTERS/Albert Gea
In honor of the Winter Olympics, I have selected Gold, Silver and Bronze winners winners this week.
Field Marshall Earl
Kitchener Hussein says:
Gold -- Kevin Murphy (and Sgt. Fluffy): "You want the truth? You want the truth? You can't handle the truth!"
Silver -- Lynxx Pherrett: "Our destination is the planet Sha Ka Ree, which lies beyond the Great Barrier at the center of the galaxy."
Bronze -- Rodney: "I pay a dollah for that!"
I'd like to thank everyone that entered and especially those that mention this humble contest in their vastly more frequently visited blogs. Note to Rodney: generally speaking, brevity remains the soul of wit, but sometimes a great notion requires a few more words. In my undocumented, unpublished, unaccountable, and yet, highly variable scoring system, wit offers the highest degree of difficulty and therefore scores the most points, but pop culture references (the more obscure the better, but not so obscure that I don't get them), double entendres, triple entendres, show tunes, criticism of the NCAA, and flattering remarks give you the best chance to stand on the podium. And since the scoring results are multiplied rather than added to come up with a final score, the more tricks you can pack into your twizzle without falling down, the better. Oh, and cash bribes work well too.
Bin Laden Vows Never to Be Captured Alive
I must say that's rather petulant and selfish of you though, depriving Ramsey Clark of one last opportunity to play the old fool one more time in his dotage.
DOWNDATE: Gratuitious Steely Dan lyric abuse:
Got a case of dynamite, I could hold out here all night.
Well I crossed George Bush back in Afghanistan, don't take me alive.
West may have to live with low-level Iranian atom work
You know, it isn't living with it that has us troubled.
That is, Mark Steyn is on fire.
Bush's Chat With Novelist Alarms Environmentalists
Well, sure, but let's be honest, the sun's rising alarms environmentalists. But who is it that has the permanently frightened's panites all in a bunch?
In his new book about Mr. Bush, "Rebel in Chief: Inside the Bold and Controversial Presidency of George W. Bush," Fred Barnes recalls a visit to the White House last year by Michael Crichton, whose 2004 best-selling novel, "State of Fear," suggests that global warming is an unproven theory and an overstated threat.
Ah, Michael Crichton. I suppose it's a character fault, but I do find it amusing to taunt those who's barely adequate psychic defenses cannot withstand the expression of any contradictory opinions. It does show you just how much faith they have in their ability to convince you of the correctness of their opinion, doesn't it?
Jimmy Roberts seems like a nice enough fellow, but wouldn't every second of his air time fit better on the Oxygen channel, or on panel with Dr. Phil? I like Bob Costas and think he is a first rate choice to host for NBC, but even his interminable attempts to generate controvery are becoming tiresome. Is it just me or does there seem to be more commercial time than actual comeptition time during prime time? When they have to brag about so many minutes of uninterrupted sports coming up, you realize that even they know it is excessive. NBC's coverage, as with all previous Olympic broadcasts is still a little too jingistic for me. Finally, the use of "Torino" instead of "Turin" is just precious, Presumably, NBC will now refer to the Shroud of Torino from this point forward should that stained cloth enter the news once again. Other that that, NBC seems to be doing a good job.
Short track speed skating seems ideal for NBC's desire to generate controversy. You never know who wins until the judges have reviewed the tape after the race. Meanwhile, you can be the unquestioned best in the world at a given distance but still be knocked out through no fault of your own. Or you can be advanced for being fouled, even if you wouldn't have been able to qualify. Finally, as Ohno notes, illegal team skating is rampant but virtually impossible to police. I have doubts that this event can ever be conducted in a fair manner.
Shani Davis is being unfairly maligned. Why should he sacrifice his chance at a medal to support Chad Hendrick's extreme longshot for five medals? Chad seems like a nice enough guy as well, but his attitude towards Shani do him a disservice.
Johny Weir and Bode Miller are incredible athletes. They are also first rate jerks and they are suddenly finding out finding that their popularity is based upon nothing other than pre-games hype and people's desire to attach themselves to a winner. Now that they haven't won, they are being treated more like the antisocial, disrespectful toads they seem to be.
Any bets that Jacobellis' hotdogging will be a standard element of the USOC training film for all athletes moving forward?
As in the summer olympics, I still believe sport should be about attributes like faster, stronger, higher, and farther; primarily because the winners can usually be identified objectively and unambiguously. Events like ice dancing are almost 100% subjective and hence ripe for abuse and nonsense. Mind you, I'm not saying that the cometitors in ice dancing aren't good athletes or that they haven't worked very hard, but hey, why not include "Drawing Binky" as an olympic event?
Is there a total absence of ice and snow in South America? What else would explain the apparent total absence of all the nations of South America in the the winter olympics?
Lest I leave you with the wrong impression, I am greatly enjoying watching the winter olympics in HDTV.
I still cannot fathom the lunacy that followed Vice President Dick Cheney's accidental shooting of his friend, Harry Whittington. Whether it is the conspiratorial nonsense of Alec Baldwin and friends or the foot-stomping childishness of the White House media, what exactly was the great threat to democracy caused by the media (not the public) not being informed for 24 hours? Watching the media's reaction, is it any wonder that the Vice President didn't immediately alert the media?
Most of the "humor" resulting from this is a little disturbing as well. Some of it has been funny, but I'm not sure making fun of somebody being shot is in good taste, unless, apparently, he is a rich white Republican.
FWIW, since Cheney pulled the trigger, I believe he is ultimately responsible no matter what Mr. Whittington did. You have to know what your shot (note to some members of the media, it was shot -- not bullets) is going to hit at all times. It should still be considered an accident, but I consider any attempt to blame Mr. Whiitington for being shot as ridiculous -- even if it Mr. Whittington blaming himself.
In commenting upon Hamas' shenanigans, Glenn Reynolds writes:
It really is like dealing with teenagers. Except, you know, for the murder part.
But, um, doesn't Dr. Helen specialize in teenage murderers?
Only eleven more hits to 100,00. Will you be my valentine?
DOWNDATE: I passed 100,000 just before midnight. Unfortunately, I cannot tell who the great soul was that put me over the mark, but thanks to everyone who drops by to read, laugh, bitch, compliment, agree, contradict, supplement, correct, or just gaze in shock and awe.
SQNCC #3 is over:
Some good entries this week, but I'm going with the shortest entry because it made me laugh the most:
Matt: "Take my wife.., PLEASE!!!"
Thanks to everyone who entered. Now go and make Lord Kitchener proud.
Field Marshall Earl
Kitchener Hussein says:
Caption contest results next Monday. You still have a few hours to get in a caption of Bill and Hillary Clinton (and George and Laura Bush) yukking it up at Coretta Scott King's funeral.
This contest is closed.
I don't think this is treasonous:
Former Vice President Al Gore told a mainly Saudi audience on Sunday that the U.S. government committed "terrible abuses" against Arabs after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and that most Americans did not support such treatment. Gore said Arabs had been "indiscriminately rounded up" and held in "unforgivable" conditions. The former vice president said the Bush administration was playing into al-Qaida's hands by routinely blocking Saudi visa applications.
But it is utterly disgraceful. Whatever else I think of Jimmy Carter, and it isn't much, in my mind he's always been the second worst living American who previously held a high office in this country. Ramsey Clark grabbed the top spot long ago and held it firmly with his incessant anti-American antics. Now I think Jimmy's risen to third and Ramsey's been elevated up one spot from the bottom of the hole. Al Gore has taken a jackhammer to deepen of the pit of anti-Americanism that so many Democrats are gleefully leaping into these days. Wouldn't you like to see a repeat of the 2000 plebiscite between Al Gore and George Bush now?
Every time someone like the President says that it is only a small minority of Islamists that are the problem, I recall that there are an estimated 1,100,000,000 Muslims in the world. I believe that the President is correct when he says this but if this small minority is only 1% of all Muslims, that still leaves 11,000,000 nuts running around whose sole mission in life (and death) is to enlarge the Ummah and subjugate or kill the infidel by any means necesssary.
And some people want to deal with this as a criminal matter, that is, when they aren't also complaining about overcrowding in our jails.
DOWNDATE: Same math, different path: Google performs about 1,100,000,000 searches every four days. Google's founders assure us that less than 10% of these searches are for porn. If we assume a nominal number of searches, say, 5%, are for porn that equates to around 12,500,000 searches for porn each day -- on Google alone. But is porn really that difficult to find or is fetishism driving ever increasing specialization? Please, do not answer that question.
This is painfully funny. The Orient continues to miscomprehend the Occident. When will they learn that the best way to get more of something from today's hip, post-ironic, pop culture is to condemn it and declare it beyond the bounds of decency. Speaking as the parent of a teenager, let me also assure them that the best way to make something go away is to say, "Hey, I like that too."
Link via Tim Blair.
One more day to join in the fun!
It seems to me that the Angry Progressive Left concept that anyone who disagrees with them is evil strikes entirely the wrong note when applied to the Boy Scouts:
A state senator wants the Boy Scouts kept out of the governor's mansion because of what he calls the anti-gay positions of the national scouting organization. State Senator Thomas Duane of Manhattan was invited by the Twin Rivers Council of the Boy Scouts to join them at the Albany mansion. The group is planning a reception Thursday on character-building programs.
If the session is about building character, I have to wonder why Mr. Duane got invited to begin with.
My understanding was that we could no longer wait for a threat to become imminent:
Iran is prepared to launch attacks using long-range missiles, secret commando units, and terrorist allies planted around the globe in retaliation for any strike on the country's nuclear facilities, according to new US intelligence assessments and military specialists.
Let me make sure I understand this, we either allow Iran to get a nuclear weapon their president has shown a giddy desire to use to create havoc and kill many, many people, or they will create havoc and kill many, many people.
''When the Americans or Israelis are thinking about [military force], I hope they will sit down and think about everything the ayatollahs could do to make our lives miserable and what we will do to discourage them," said John Pike, director of the think tank GlobalSecurity.org, referring to Iran's religious leaders. ''There could be a cycle of escalation."
I gather a cycle of subjugation is preferrable then. Apparently, the old "you've got a nice country there, I'd hate to see anything bad happen to it" gambit still works.
Spot the problem here:
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid saddled up next to rancher-turned-politician Ken Salazar recently to discuss steps that could boost Democratic appeal in states like Colorado or his own Nevada. Democrats don't have to change their message, he said, they just need to don a good pair of boots and wade into the wheat fields of rural America to sell it.
I hope it hurts:
Saddam Hussein and the seven co-defendants in his trial are to start a hunger strike on Monday, the former Iraqi president's defense team said on Sunday, citing sources inside the detention center where they are being held.
Frankly, I still wonder about the long term viability of a civilization that requires what is best characterized as an alternate universe show trial for Saddam Hussein. Stalin's show trial victims where innocent but the verdict was never in doubt in his propaganda driven spectacles, whereas, in this case, Saddam's guilt is not seriously debatable, but sincere doubt as to whether he can be convicted is developing as we continue into what appears to be a multi-year procedural kabuki dance where the outcome becomes ever less clear, and Saddam and his supporters and enablers get the propaganda victory. The UN and Slobodan Milosevic have shown us the way.
Really, wouldn't it have been better if someone had just dropped a grenade down the spider hole? As when Caesar finally defeated Pompey at Pharsalus, the fact that Caesar had won wasn't enough. As long as Pompey was alive he would be a standard around which all of Caesar's enemies could rally. Had Saddam died in his spider hole, his shame would have been complete and eternal, perhaps the insurgency would not have been what it was having been robbed of its rallying point, and we would have been spared the embarrassing absurdity of this bearded Spock universe show trial.
Mark Steyn takes homonymic punnery to the next level while making some first rate points. So what else is new? Here's the first paragraph:
From Europe's biggest-selling newspaper, the Sun: ''Furious Muslims have blasted adult shop [i.e., sex shop] Ann Summers for selling a blowup male doll called Mustafa Shag."
Guess which part of this didn't cause offense. Hint: Michelangelo Antonioni could not be reached for comment.
Who else could get something like this published by the Associated Press:
"I'd be very pleased if Hillary Clinton would become the next American president," Schroeder said to applause from a largely Saudi audience at the Jeddah Economic Forum, which opened here Saturday.
Even former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder knew this was a mistake as soon as he said it.
"But don't quote me too loud. I hope I'm not harming her by saying that."
With friends like this, Senator Clinton is doomed to become nothing more than the matriarch of the Senate.
I don't spend as much time reading blogs as I used to, but I still marvel at the restraint that has kept anyone from using the phrase "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark" in any blog post I have read on the reaction of those whose worldview is threatened by twelve cartoons. Is it coincidence that the number of cartoons is twelve? Are Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his merry band of Twelver's facilitating this choas in an attempt to usher in the twelfth Mahdi? Hey, I'm just asking. After all, no less an authority than Condi Rice has indicated that Iran and Syria are violently exploiting the situation.
Sorry, but John Lennon beat you to the punch on this a long time ago:
Cocky rap star KANYE WEST is calling for a revised edition of THE BIBLE, because he thinks he should be a character in it. The JESUS WALKS hitmaker, who picked up three Grammy Awards last night, feels sure he'd be "a griot" (West African storyteller) in a modern Bible.
He says, "I bring up historical subjects in a way that makes kids want to learn about them. I'm an inspirational speaker. I changed the sound of music more than one time... For all those reasons, I'd be a part of the Bible. I'm definitely in the history books already."
Mr. West used the word "I" five times in those forty-eight quoted words. Someone must have stripped all the parts about humility from his version of the Bible.
DOWNDATE: Anyone think this brave poseur would have the courage to call for a new version of the Koran, because, natch, he thinks he should be a character in it? After all, his lyrics fit a 14th century view of women quite well. I'd quote them here but this is nominally a PG blog.
Monday marks four years of blogging and I'm 401 hits shy of 100,000. Will I make it? If I do, would this mean I am 1/2,165th the blogger Glenn Reynolds is? Shouldn't I be happy about that?
I just wanted to document this further for posterity:
President Bush defended his federal budget blueprint Wednesday, countering critics from both sides of the aisle who have greeted with skepticism and even outright hostility his proposals to trim spending on Medicare and other programs.
Bush's $2.77 trillion budget plan for fiscal 2007, the most austere since the Reagan era, asks Congress to trim Medicare spending by $35.9 billion over five years. Under that scenario, spending on the government health program for the elderly and disabled would grow at a rate of 7.7 percent instead of 8.1 percent, as currently projected.
All that was said about this on NPR's Morning Edition this morning was that Bush is cutting Medicare and they interviewed an advocate who lamented that this attempt to destroy Medicare will hurt the poor. Don't advocates for the poor realize how much credibility they lose when they say stupid things like this? Of course, anyone who thinks a growth rate of even 7.7 percent can be sustained indefinitely on a program this massive is a freaking dolt. It's not just a matter of all of us having to work for the government, it's that we will all soon enough be working for the governemnt just to provide Medicare. Jumping bejesus, where in Hell are the adults in Congress and in the media who will act like adults on this instead of conspiring to further a meme that, in Donald Luskin's words, keeps you poor and stupid.
But I'm curious about one thing for those who choose to call this a cut -- if you received a raise of 8.1 percent for each of the last four years but this year only got a raise of 7.7 percent, would you be standing at the water cooler complaining about how your boss just cut your salary this year?
The Paris Marriott could not be reached for comment:
Paris Hilton ordered to stay away from L.A. man
There's gotta be a Jim Morrison line in here somewhere.
Perhaps they know:
On Saturday in Vienna, Cuba, Venezuela and Syria voted against a resolution of the International Atomic Energy Agency to refer Iran to the UN Security Council over a nuclear program the West suspects is weapons-oriented.
I suspect Fidel, Hugo and Bashir will be damn disappointed if they can't find WMDs in Iran a few months from now as well.
The world has seven years to take vital decisions and implement measures to curb greenhouse gas emissions or it could be too late, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said on Tuesday.
But, hey, why sweat it? Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will bring about the return of the Twelfth Imam at the End of Days long before then. But the really weird thing is that our rough and toothless leaders won't do anything to stop this tough and ruthless nutjob.
This reminds me a lot of George Carlin's riff on comedy and death-related language:
Irans biggest-selling newspaper has waded into the Muhammad controversy by launching a competition to find the 12 "best" cartoons about the Holocaust.
But it gets better:
Farid Mortazavi, graphics editor for Tehran's Hamshahri newspaper, said that the deliberately inflammatory contest would test out how committed Europeans were to the concept freedom of expression.
And once this has been determined, what do you think he'll do with the information? Farid definitely does not have a better idea.
Rolling Stones say Super Bowl censors "ridiculous"
We all know funerals are for laughing and scoring partisan points:
Former Pres. Bill Clinton addresses those gathered at the Coretta Scott King funeral ceremony at the New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia, Ga. Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2006. With Clinton, is his wife, US Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY. At rear is Pres. Bush and First Lady Laura Bush. (AP Photo/Ric Feld, Pool)
So do your worst. Winner announced next Monday.
Rest in peace, Mrs. King. The hope that you can be reunited with Dr. King is enough to make me wish there really is a heaven.
DOWNDATE: If only I'd seen the Saddam Shark sooner.
In response to a Brad Delong post calling Jonah Goldberg the stupidest man alive for saying something silly about buffalos (buffaloes, Mr. Quayle?) and Indians, I posted a comment there that went something like this:
So saying something that may be silly makes you the stupidest man in the world? Jeez, imagine how much damage you've just done to Howard Dean's self-esteem.
I cannot be certain of the exact wording because the comment disappeared. I thought, hey, maybe I screwed up and only previewed it, so I went back and posted a reasonable facsimile again, making sure I previewed and saved it this time. But once again, my post is no longer there.
Weird? Or is it?
Is that this warning comes from the ambassador of a nation that has fought three wars for its very survival since World War II:
Israel's Ambassador to the United States Danny Ayalon said on Tuesday morning that Iran is the biggest problem facing the world since World War II.
The loss of any one of the wars Israel fought in 1948-1949, 1967, or 1973 would have resulted in the total destruction of Israel and the death of most Israelis. I assume Iran starts the cheat and retreat game within three weeks, though in this case Iran will cheat and Western Civilization will retreat. I'd rather write that the Iranian government has three weeks to capitulate or face utter destruction, but I am a realist:
Ayalon, in an interview to Reuters, stated that he believed Iran's nuclear program would be blocked by diplomatic, not military means.
Because, I guess, history is chock full of situations where bullies are cowed by sternly-worded communiques.
I think the Eagles already addressed what comes next:
An astonishing mist-shrouded "lost world" of previously unknown and rare animals and plants high in the mountain rainforests of New Guinea has been uncovered by an international team of scientists.
Among the new species of birds, frogs, butterflies and palms discovered in the expedition through this pristine environment, untouched by man, was the spectacular Berlepsch's six-wired bird of paradise. The scientists are the first outsiders to see it. They could only reach the remote mountainous area by helicopter, which they described it as akin to finding a "Garden of Eden".
How long before there's a heloport or an airstrip nearby to allow the bona gentes of the "right" people, say, Leonardo DiCaprio, to experience the magnificence of this paradise and broadcast the importance of the hoi polloi staying far, far away.
We have another winner!
Rodney Dill: Rumor has it that Saddam's defense attorney's have been coaching their key witnesses.
Of course, having only one entry made it an easy decision this week. I didn't think this would be that hard (Ed. Why do you assume people are reading?). Look up for a new contest.
When life gives you lemons make lemonade. By getting two entries this week I will increase the participation by 100%. Always, always aim high! Hmm..., I wonder what picking a cartoon might do for my sitemeter... ?


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Call Bournemouth Borough Council on their general enquiries telephone number 01202 451 451 for queries regarding council tax payments. For instance, you can get in touch to check a property's council tax band, to pay your tax over the phone or to set up a direct debit from your bank account. However, it should be noted that you may be eligible for a council tax reduction if you live alone, or an exemption if you are part of a household where everyone is in full-time education. Moreover, the Bournemouth Borough Council contact number is useful if you'd like to check the date of your next bin and recycling collection or to report a case of fly-tipping over the phone. Alternatively, you may have enquiries about a planning permission application and should call the council as listed to check its progress or the date when it is discussed by the relevant authorities. In addition, callers can call Bournemouth Borough Council to discuss the availability of public housing in either a flat or household. If you are currently a council housing tenant, you may have a query about a change to your tenancy, would like to report a neighbourhood issue or wish to discuss the right to buy scheme. You may also be interested in applying to the Mayor's Charity Appeal Fund if you represent a local charity in Bournemouth.
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[you can view my concept board/post here]
The LED strips on both sides of the TV wall are perfect at night. It gives just the right amount of light for when I'm working on my computer and it's such a calming glow! Perfect for movie nights and it also sets the mood when pregraming or even when I'm having chill movie nights.
Condo Living magazine featured my wardrobe for a before and after some time ago. View it here. Surprise, surprise! Most of my guy friends have more clothes than I do. :)
At the end of the counter there's a door to the utility cabinet which has my washer/dryer, a fan, 2 clotheslines and my cleaning supplies.
Some before photos just to give you an idea of how the place looked after turnover
Notice that they used bathroom tiles for the flooring. LOL.


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Jeff S
I attended UW-Marathon County from 1980-1982. I found the experience tremendous. Coming out of high school it provided me with the foundation I needed to be ready for my future career. The class sizes were small, there was great support from the professors and my advisor had a handle on what classes I needed for my major. The courses were challenging, which helped me prepare for the future, including graduate school. Having the ability to live at home and attend UWMC helped me save money and I had the support of my family. I also met my future wife at UWMC. She transferred to UW-Oshkosh and I transferred to UW-Madison. I look back fondly of my UWMC days!


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PRESERVATION INSANITY has moved!
Please visit its new location at (and reset your bookmarks to):
I don't know who the "she" is in the film's title, nor what it is that "she" needs to get over. At least as of this writing, I've have not seen this film. And yet I'm in the process of restoring it. This has happened more than once (see my post on Gary Beydler and Venice Pier). In my experience of working on the restoration of experimental films, this isn't the norm, but it's not totally unusual. And in the case of Mike Henderson's films, it's quite common. Will She Get Over It? is a ca.1971 film made by Mike with students in the class he was teaching at UC Davis at the time.
Before I get to this film in particular, I thought I'd say a little bit about restoring something I haven't seen.
First of all, the main reason for this to even occur is that there is no extant print of a given film. For example, there may only be the original picture and sound masters, or an internegative. So there's no way to very easily watch the film before working on it. In some cases, I've had a print, but only a print, i.e. the film only survives as a single print, and although I trust the Pageant 250S 16mm projector I generally use here for quick viewings, I usually feel it's just not worth risking it. This was the case with A.K. Dewdney's film Wildwood Flower (1971), which only survived as a single distribution print, and which I did not screen before using that print as the source for the film's preservation.
Of course, preserving/restoring something that you haven't seen involves a bit of curatorial chance-taking, but if the filmmaker is a known quantity (artistically/historically speaking), and/or I have it on good authority that the film is significant in some way, I don't consider it all that risky, especially if it really doesn't cost that much to do the work (as with Wildwood Flower). I discuss this a bit in the aforementioned post on Gary Beydler, but with Dewdney's film, the same held true. Dewdney had made a few films that I had seen, and felt were fairly remarkable (especially his masterpiece The Maltese Cross Movement (1967)), so I trusted him as a filmmaker. Additionally, the print of Wildwood Flower had shown at Light Industry right before I got it, and a trusted friend who had been at the screening had spoken of how much he'd liked it. That was enough.
Mike Henderson may not be a name familiar to many in the experimental film world, even among the very experienced and prolific viewers among us. This is partly because Mike is known much more as a painter and blues musician. (If you search him out online, you might find a different artist named Mike Henderson and a different blues musician named Mike Henderson. The way you'll know if you have the wrong guys is that those guys are white.)
Here's a short piece about Mike from KQED, if you're curious to learn a bit about him.
Like so many other things, I got turned onto Mike's work because of Robert Nelson. I was teaching a class at Cal Arts in Fall 2006, and one of the sessions was themed on humor. Bob had suggested I look at Mike's film Dufus (1970/73). I already knew about Mike through Bob, and the two film collaborations they had done (King David (1970) and Worldly Woman (1973)). I had also seen Mike perform (with William Wiley on harmonica) at a reception for Bob at San Francisco Art Institute in 2002. But I had no idea he'd made other films.
Turned out the Film-makers' Cooperative had two of his films - Dufus and The Last Supper (1968-70). I rented Dufus, showed it in the class, and we were all pretty knocked out by it. Immediately after that class, I called Mike and asked him about his films. Soon after, I was visiting the Bay Area anyway, and we made plans for me to drop by his place to talk more about it. We met up, had a good long talk, and I was thrilled to discover that Mike had not just made those two films, but also a few others. He gave me a reel of four prints to check out back in LA - the aforementioned two, plus The Shape of Things (ca.1981) and Down Hear (1972). Two other films - Too Late To Stop Down Now (1982) and Ducks Are No Dinners (1983) - were listed as being on the reel too, but were absent, so I could only be tantalized by those fantastic titles. (Mike has a talent for titling, and many of his film and painting titles are packed with wonderfully implicit narrative suggestion. Two of my favorite painting titles of his -- both abstracts -- are All You Do and She Worked For Years.)
|Dufus (1970/73, 16mm, b/w, sound, 7min.)
To cut to the archival chase: Although a number of Mike's films survived as originals plus prints, many survived only one way or the other - as ONLY an original or ONLY a print. Of the films mentioned in the last paragraph, both the originals and a print of Down Hear survived, Harvey Hog and Will She Get Over It? survive only as originals (no prints), and Just Another Notion and How To Beat A Dead Horse survive only as prints (no originals). This is a fairly representative sample that you could extend across his whole filmography.
Part of Mike's sensibility - to just get in there and MAKE things, don't worry about your hangups, don't be afraid of failure - led him to try all kinds of ideas in filmmaking. And thankfully, he had no formal filmmaking training. Bob Nelson just told him to get a camera and get someone to show him how to load it and how to make a correct exposure. Aside from maybe a few other pointers from people about how to splice and where to get your films printed, that was it. He learned the bare minimum he needed to know to actually make films, and then proceeded to create a singular body of independent film work that intertwines complexly with his painting and music, having perhaps more in common with those two disciplines than with other films.
From a technical/production standpoint, all of Mike's films (except one) were constructed in the same very basic way. They were shot on reversal film (he used both black and white and color), spliced with tape on a guillotine splicer as A-rolls only, and the sound finished on 16mm fullcoat magnetic film. Mike's mag soundtracks were often created not on regular dubbers with a mixing console of any kind, but on a 16mm projector with recording capabilities that his friend Michael Rudnick owned. These two elements would then go to (usually) Monaco Lab in San Francisco, and an electroprinted reversal print would be made. (Electroprinting allowed filmmakers to get an optical track on their print directly from the mag, bypassing the creation of an optical track negative. For filmmakers who were only planning to make a couple of prints, this was cheaper, although the sound quality was often not as good.)
Sometimes, the splicing tape Mike used was cheap and shitty. Sometimes he didn't even use proper splicing tape, but cellophane tape. It didn't matter - whatever stuck the two pieces of film together and got it through the printer would work fine. He shot cheap and outdated stock sometimes too. And the prints were barely timed, usually just a one-light, but that was OK because Mike had learned how to make a good exposure.
In the case of Will She Get Over It?, a few of the things I've mentioned above are at work.
No print survives, or at least we didn't turn it up at Mike's place when we looked. I only have the original tape-spliced b/w reversal A-roll, and the 16mm mag. I know how they sync up because they have hole punches in their leaders, but that's it.
The tape splices have problems, as with a lot of his originals. There are two different kinds of splice problems that Mike's originals tend to have:
1. The film ends have separated somewhat under the tape splices, like this:
|original picture roll for Will She Get Over It?
This is not a huge problem, but it still needs to be dealt with. Not only would printing this original as-is mean that you'd see a distracting, clear splice-line at every cut, but the improper pitch of the perforations at the stretched splice would create instability in the printer, leading to the creation of little jumps at each cut, possibly with brief focus issues in the few frames immediately before and after the splice.
2. Tape splices have dried up and crystallized on the film (emulsion and base), and tarnished the silver of the black and white image, like this:
|original picture roll for Will She Get Over It?
As you can see from the above pictures, Will She Get Over It? has both of these problems.
So basically, I had to take apart, clean, and redo every single splice in the film.
The splices that were merely stretched were easy to fix. Just pull off the tape splices, hand clean the adhesive residue with film cleaner, and resplice them with new tape so they join better.
The splices have also usually left adhesive residue elsewhere too, where they rested against the preceding and subsequent winds of film. This had to be hand-cleaned as well.
As I mentioned above, Mike's technical aesthetic was in some ways rough, though it's very much the roughness of someone who knows what he wants to express in a direct way, and doing what he needs to do to express it, without worrying about procedure, rules, or standards. It's actually kind of punk, in the way that raw country blues is also punk.
As I also mentioned, Mike spliced these films in a very simple way using tape on a guillotine splicer. Traditionally, in production and preservation, a splice (especially a tape one) is meant to be as invisible as possible. Mike's splices are not invisible. They're also not self-consciously visible either. They're just there, and they don't care. So I decided the best way to resplice all of these cuts was to do the same thing, on a guillotine splicer, not worrying about making it perfect. I'm not deliberately trying to make them imperfect either. I'm just doing it.
I've dealt with the badly dried up splices in a similar way, but they need a bit more help.
|original picture roll for Will She Get Over It?
The adhesive wouldn't come off in a hand-cleaning, so in a moment of mild frustration, I just stuck the end of the film right into the film cleaner bottle, like so:
let it sit for a few minutes, pulled it out, and was glad to discover the dried up adhesive had weakened enough that a hand-cleaning would work. I then respliced them.
Of course, this didn't help the problem of the tarnishing. Here's a top-down view of the above splice so you can see a more extreme example:
|original picture roll for Will She Get Over It?
One last thing about preserving Will She Get Over It? that came up is something that's suggested by my hasty post-it note on the film can as seen above. The original has yellow lightstruck leader at its head, which cuts directly to the first image of the film. This suggests to me that the film, in its printed form, originally began with a fade-in, but I have no way of knowing for sure - there's no print to compare to, no lab paperwork, and Mike doesn't remember. We talked about it, and he said sure, start it with a short fade-in. So that's what I'm doing. It's up to Mike, and it sounds good to me. And it's not the kind of decision -- when dealing with films as beautifully unanxious and liberating as Mike's -- that I'm going to let keep me up at night.


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How we did it:
For any feedback, any questions, any notes or just for chat - feel free to follow us on social networks
Paul Litwin, Ken Getz, Mike Gunderloy
DESIGN, BUILD, AND REFINE ACCESS APPLICATIONS THAT MEET YOUR ORGANIZATION'S SPECIAL NEEDS The latest from internationally recognized Access authorities Litwin, Getz, and Gunderloy, Access 2002 Desktop Developer's Handbook offers complete coverage of every aspect of building Access applications for single users and small workgroups. Inside, you'll find scores of practical examples, carefully devised by the authors to illustrate effective, elegant solutions to real-world challenges. Coverage includes * Understanding the Access event model * Using VBA class modules * Applying sound database design principles * Using Access SQL * Controlling controls * Using ActiveX Data Objects (ADO) * Designing effective forms and reports * Taking advantage of shared Office programmability * Controlling your printer * Using Access as an automation client and server * Debugging and handling errors * Optimizing your application * Accessing DLLs and the Windows API * Adding professional features offered by Access Wizards * Building COM add-ins and MDA files * Using Reddick VBA naming conventions
Jonathan S. Harbour
Game Programming All in One, Third Edition gives aspiring game programmers the skills that are needed to create professional-quality games. If you have a working knowledge of C or C++ and are ready to expand your skills into the field of game programming, then get ready to begin your journey with this latest edition! You won't cover the topic of programming in general, but rather the specifics of programming for games. Using the cross-platform Allegro game library, you'll learn how to write complete games that will run on almost any operating system. Both Windows® and Linux® screenshots are displayed throughout. Using the techniques taught within this book and the tools included on the CD-ROM, you'll be able to write standard Windows and DirectX® programs without the cost of an expensive compiler.
Paul Litwin, Ken Getz, Mike Gunderloy
Microsoft Access is a home and small office database, and is used as a front end to Microsoft's SQL Server database. This text covers forms, reports, database design, building add-ins, and working with the Windows API.


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For those of you who missed the ModDB update, here.
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Oneness Awakening & Day of Love in Northern Kentucky Aug. 14, 15 & 16, 2012
Oneness Awakening
Tuesday, August 14, 2012 at 9:30 AM - Thursday, August 16, 2012 at 7:30 PM (EDT)
Event Details
Oneness Awakening Course
at Unity of Northern Kentucky
3 Day Course Initiation
including the
Oneness "Day of Love"
August 14th, 15th, & 16th , 2012
10:00 AM - 7:00 PM Tuesday
9:30 AM Registration
Introduction to Oneness
Life is Relationship
10:00 AM-7:00 PM Wednesday
Blessing Giver Initiation
Sacred Mukti Deeksha
Day of Love Celebration
10:00 AM – 7:00 PM Thursday
Oneness Meditation
64 Deeksha
Course Conclusion
Prepare to be taken on a beautiful journey, unique to your own nature, where you will come into direct contact and personal relationship with your higher power - a Divine presence, which is alive, conscious, and full of intelligence and love.
It is a weekend of processes, rituals, music, and meditations to help you leap beyond the human mind and ego, including blessings to set right relationships, heal past hurts and bring you into contact with the true nature of your own greatness.
Participants new to Oneness will also be initiated as Oneness Blessing Givers enabling you to share the Oneness Blessing with others. Experienced Blessing Givers will be taken to even deeper states of consciousness.
Oneness is not a religion or set of beliefs, but is a phenomenon in consciousness which has been revealed to humanity at this critical time in our evolution. The essence of the Oneness phenomenon is that it is the birthright of each and every one of us to live in total and unconditional freedom, in a state where a person perceives reality as it is, thereby experiencing the causeless joy, love, and happiness which is the natural condition of the human being. This realization of Oneness, previously reserved for only the awakened saints and sages, is now available to everyone who has a genuine passion for it.
The Oneness Blessing is a transfer of Divine energies as a benediction of grace. It awakens thereceiver's innate Divine energy (Kundalini) bringing about changes in the brain resulting in:
- Awakened Divine Intelligence and Invocation of auspicious energies (Awakened States of Consciousness)
- Enhanced memory retention and increased learning ability
- Creation of better brain hemispheric synchronization -Awakening present moment joy, peace, & compassion
- Bringing unconditional healing, love, compassion, and affection to relationships
- Appreciation and healing of the body creating more vitality and metabolic activity
- Embracement of a true prosperity consciousness by removing mental blocks and conditioned patterns
Oneness Awakening Course Cost and Registration
Advance registration and/or notification is absolutely required.
$125 General Registration (ends Aug. 12th 2012)
$150 Late Registration (ends August 13th 2012)
$175 Registration at the Door (ends August 14th 2012 @ 10:00 am)
Oneness Blessing Giver Discount = $25 off
use discount code DeekshaGiver
Youth Discount = 50% use discount code OnenessYouth
(up to age 25 with proper ID, parental consent required under age 18)
Please reserve early ~ space is limited!
The life changing course will be conducted by Certified Oneness Trainers Ryan Michael Luken, Keithan Lance Boyd and Mason Graham McClay. Specially selected Oneness Blessing Givers will be in attendance to help facilitate the process and journey into Awakening and Divine-Realization!
Location: Unity of Northern Kentucky
St. Paul United Church of Christ
1 Churchill Drive,
Ft. Thomas, KY 41075
Contact Info / Questions:
call / text
Ryan Luken (513)-288-5529
Keith Boyd (606)-375-9739
Mason McClay (513)-658-2188
"You suffer because of alienation from God. Without God in your life, you are an orphan."
- Sri Bhagavan
"All existence is bliss when you are one with the Divine."
-Sri Bhagavan
Join us for this life-changing event!
Register in Advance:
Due to space requirements, advance registration is absolutely required.
** This course is expected to sell out early; registration is first come/first serve.
To register, visit:
When & Where
Unity of Northern Kentucky @ St. Paul United Church of Christ
1 Churchill Dr
Fort Thomas,
Tuesday, August 14, 2012 at 9:30 AM - Thursday, August 16, 2012 at 7:30 PM (EDT)
Add to my calendar
Oneness Awakening
Certified Oneness Trainers


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- Creative
- Animation
- Film Production
- Fine Art
- Graphic Design
- Illustration
- Music Production
- Photography
- UI/UX Design
- Writing
So this is my first lesson and first attempt ever at calligraphy. I used the Gillott 303 nib, and found that it kept catching on the paper during the upward strokes... maybe I'm using too much pressure/trying to get ink on the paper? I've always admired other people's handwriting, calligraphy, and typography, so I can't wait to strengthen my abilities and continue learning something new. Any and all advice is very much appreciated!!
Thank you!
Update 10.4.13
The above photo is my second attempt, but this time using the Gillott 404 nib, and I found that this worked A LOT better! So much smoother and no more catching on the upstroke. I also messed around a little with my name... I can't wait to start on the next lesson!!
So I attempted to trace the provided a-m alphabet, and I got a little frustrated just because I was trying to follow it verbatim, and I was not successful in connecting the letters. So I broke off and practiced each individual letter multiple times. I feel like that worked out better for me because it was really repetitive and I was able to really concentrate on that letter; the curves and strokes of each individual one. I think as a person starting out completely green in calligraphy, this really really helped me.
After I practiced that for a while, I tried doing some just fun writing stuff.
Let me know what you think!! Thank you :)


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Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Space X lifts off!
(CNN) -- The SpaceX commercial rocket lifted off at 10:43 a.m. ET.
The first commercial spacecraft slated to orbit Earth and re-enter successfully was originally scheduled to lift off shortly after 9 a.m. but was delayed.
SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon capsule had a 9 a.m. to 12:22 p.m. ET launch window.
A successful launch and re-entry would be the latest steps toward commercial space ventures that could eventually ferry astronauts and cargo to the international space station.
In July, a test launch of the Falcon 9 rocket was "essentially a bullseye," SpaceX officials said after the rocket successfully pushed past the earth's atmosphere and deposited a mock-up of its Dragon space capsule in orbit.
NASA has been flying shuttles in low Earth orbit and going to and from the space station for 30 years. The administration would like to see whether private companies can do it cheaper and more efficiently, as the shuttle program is about to fly into retirement.
NASA has selected SpaceX and another company, Orbital Sciences, to each develop an orbital vehicle because the United States will not have its own way to get to the space station. The United States will be renting space from the Russians aboard their Soyuz spacecraft.
But the competition is rabid. SpaceX is the first company to reach the launchpad. By this summer, it had spent almost $400 million to get there.
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, co-founder of PayPal, said in July that if all goes well after a series of test flights, SpaceX will be ready to begin flying cargo to the space station next year.
Musk says they can begin ferrying astronauts to the space station within three years.
Posted by Steve Douglass at 8:14 AM
No comments:
Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)


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Reward Director / Reward Partner - leading multinational consulting firm
Our client is one of the market leaders in the Reward Consulting sector, covering a huge number of areas and sectors.
Their business has developed further and the practice would like to add another Reward Director / Reward Partner to the team - with a very good six figure salary + exceptional bonus.
This is an amazing chance to develop your career within an international consulting practice, one of the best for sure and part of a very successful large business you can leverage for success.
The sales target is several million pounds, but the support and name they have means it is, should you have the right background, something you can hit.
You will be a Reward Director / Partner in a specific sector with a great deal of ability to deliver sales and growth.
If you are the right person for the job please apply on the button, we look forward to hearing from you.


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MAKING HISTORY: France Córdova Becomes First Female Chief Scientist at NASA
Mar 23, 2013
In honor of Women's History Month, we are celebrating with 31 days of women's history! Every day in March, we will highlight an historic moment, as told through the personal stories of our MAKERS.
Today we highlight the first female Chief Scientist at NASA, France Córdova. Although she surprisingly shied away from science as an undergraduate, Córdova eventually followed her passion to disover and explore, becoming the internationally recognized astrophysicist she is today.
Córdova has contributed an invaluable amount of research to the science community and has become a role model for young women today who are pursuing science and technology.
Accomplishing as much as she has in a male-dominated world, Córdova has learned to deal with naysayers:
"Perhaps growing up as the oldest of 12 children, I learned to tune out noise, and I consider that noise."


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German scientists have observed a massive star moving at more that 1.5 million miles per hour. They observed it with the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope and I can only say, "Wow! For once scientists have named something logically!" Of course the logic ends there as the star of interest is named HE 0437-5439. This discovery is of note as stars are not born with this kind of velocity so it suggests that it might have been ejected by a black hole. How ever it was formed, it could once again serve to tell mankind more about the secrets of the universe and it's amazing history.
animated gifs from Library of Congress photos
Kevin J Wier makes animated gifs using old photographs from the library of congress flickr account. ...


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Friday, March 30, 2012
*ice cream*
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Meeting People in Lima
Moving to another country can be an intimidating adventure, but the opportunity to make friends can make it an enriching experience. How does one go about making friends in a country where you may not know the language? Fortunately, there are many places where expats can meet people and make friends, whether it's with people from your home country, expats from other countries, or nationals of Peru.
One of the biggest meeting spots for expats meeting other expats in Peru is on the various forums for expatriates, including ours. Most forums have 'regulars' who are eager to help out new arrivals with information regarding life in Peru, and often arrange get-togethers. It's a great way to get to know a little about someone, and gives you a convenient place to ask them to meet up for a cup of coffee or a shopping trip.
Religious Services
Churches and temples are a great place to meet friendly, like-minded people. Even if you aren't usually of a religious nature, some churches have programs and get-togethers. There are places of worship that perform services in English, and some that have translations available. A great way to meet other expats and Peruvian nationals, see the Ultimate Peru List of English services in Lima.
Tour Groups
Taking bus, walking or biking tours of the Lima is a good way to meet expats and locals. People looking for a fun-filled evening with the chance to meet and interact with others should consider the Bus Parrandero – a bus trip starting at LarcoMar, that tours the streets of Miraflores, Barranco and Chorillos with a live band, drinks and snacks on board. Also, the Miratour kiosk at Kennedy Park in Miraflores offers day and weekend trips from Lima – an excellent way to spend your time, learning about the area and meeting new people.
Hobbyist Groups and Classes
Meeting people is always fun when you're in a group that has similar interests. Some popular special interest groups include the Lima Hash House Harriers, 'drinkers with a running problem' who get together twice a month for running, walking and fun. The Lima Toastmasters Club helps people become more confident public speakers. Local museums offer classes, as do art supply stores. Kolibri Expeditions offers birding trips. Go down to the beach in Miraflores, and take surfing lessons. Whatever your interest is, there is most likely a group in Lima that gets together and does it! This is probably the best way to meet and make friends with Peruvian nationals.
Get out there and help someone, and meet like-minded people. There are many groups in and around Lima that do good works, from educating poverty stricken children to helping care for neglected or mistreated animals. Check this list of Lima based charity organizations, and see where you can lend a hand and make some friends.
Spanish Classes and Spanish/English Exchanges
If your Spanish is non-existent, or needs some improvement, consider taking Spanish classes. Many expats in Lima take lessons to improve their Spanish, so it's a great place to meet people. Another option is conversation exchange – meeting with a Spanish speaker who's learning English and taking turns practicing the two languages. Conversation.com has listings of Spanish speakers in Peru who are looking for a chance to practice their English, and will help you with your Spanish.
South American Explorers Club
The Lima SAE Club provides many of the above resources – they can help you find volunteer opportunities, provide Spanish language courses and organize fun get-togethers. If you're alone in Lima and looking for something to do and a place to meet people, give them a call.


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This box is extra small as I used a 5" X 5" piece of window sheet.
Follow the directions on the punch board using S for the start line and the diagonal line.
I attached the corners with the handheld stapler and a glue dot on the top.
The sentiment is punched with the Word Window Punch, in Tangelo Twist Ink.
All products listed below.
Here is a video that demonstrates the Gift Box Punch Board
Gift Box Punch Board


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Ridha Qentari (Abu Khanfar), 25 years old, was killed when Iranian forces used live ammunition indiscriminately to disperse Ahwazi Arabs who had gathered for the funeral of another man, who was believed to have been killed the previous day. He was unarmed and posed no danger.
The website of the National Resistance of Al-Ahwaz has named three members of the security and police forces who its says were responsible for the killing:
- Police officer Corporal Mohammed Sanaie, who shot Qentari.
- Corporal Karimi, a police officer based in Falahiya
- Lieutenant Saifullah Fatemi Soukht, known as Farhadi, the chief of the investigation section of the city's security forces.


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Speaking of my goal, I don't know if 30 pounds is realistic. I am going to keep it as something to shoot for, but my WW goals are closer to 15 - 20 pounds, so if I make it there by December I'll be a super happy gal anyway!
Pounds lost so far: 6.6
Pounds left to lose: 23.4


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LAW Writer® Ohio Laws and Rules
The owner, lessee, or agent of any mine shall not order or permit solid shooting in a mine unless the owner, lessee, or agent has obtained written permission to do so from the chief of the division of mineral resources management, who may issue such permit when in the chief's judgment such solid shooting is necessary for the just and reasonably profitable operation of such mine.
No owner, lessee, agent, or operator of a mine shall violate this section.
Effective Date: 06-14-2000.