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Robert O Connor in Profile archive
Friday 26 August 2011
Tegan Foley speaks to Irish turner Robert O'Connor who turns a range of functional items and hollow forms alongside his full-time profession as a kitchen designer
It was a pleasure to profile another Irish turner, but I have to admit that I wasn't as familiar with Robert's work as I am with Billy Henry's, the last Irish turner I profiled. However, after some research and trawling the internet, I came across many examples of his work and started to build up a picture of what type of turner Robert is. I learnt that this turner is a member of the Crafts Council of Ireland, and his work is available from various Irish galleries. So I set about asking Robert a few questions to try and get a feel for his work and what makes him tick.
BackgroundRobert begins by explaining that he was introduced to woodwork at an early age by his Father, and in his early teens, decided to study the subject in Second Level School where woodwork was an examination subject as part of the curriculum: "At age 14, I made and fitted my first kitchen, a business, which I was later to concentrate on, and which I continue to this day."
Now that I had established Robert's background and found out that he works as a kitchen designer, I was interested to delve further and find out how he came to discover turning through his career. He explains that in the early years of kitchen design, galley rails were all the rage and the requirement to make small spindles was ongoing. "As well as these, I also made stair spindles and newel posts to order. That essentially was my introduction to woodturning and I was self-taught," he tells me. Robert goes on to explain that as trends changed, the woodturning requirement disappeared and, for a number of years, he didn't do any turning - he even decided to sell his lathe as he couldn't conceive that he would ever find another use for it. I must admit that I was quite surprised when Robert told me this, as usually, people go on to discover turning and fall in love with it, or so have the turners I've profiled! It is interesting to speak to a turner who breaks these rules and does things differently. So, I was even more eager to hear how Robert re-discovered turning after his spindle and newel post making days. He explains that some years later, a chance meeting with William Stedmond, a co-founder of The Irish Woodturners' Guild, was to rekindle his interest in woodturning: "Soon after this meeting, I joined The Irish Woodturners' Guild and have, since then, taken a very keen interest in the craft of woodturning, which now works to complement my business," he finishes.
Types of workI understand by looking at the Crafts Council of Ireland website that Robert produces a number of forms including bowls, hollow forms as well as wall hangings. I asked him to describe his repertoire further, and, according to Robert, he produces two types of work: "The first type is functional pieces which cater for the household/domestic market. These pieces range from the classic fruit bowl/salad bowl, lamps, clocks, etc. down to the humble bottle stoppers and foot massagers." Robert says that these production turnings help to pay for the woodturning overhead costs he incurs. Then there are the artistic pieces, which unfortunately, Robert explains there is little demand for at present: "These are largely hollow forms and significantly, it was for these items that I won several Open National Competitions." I was eager to find out more about these competitions and other accolades Robert has won, but first I wanted to learn more about his inspiration behind the artistic pieces he creates.
Inspirational sourcesUnlike a lot of turners I have profiled, Robert tells me that he doesn't get any particular inspiration from a direct source. However, he explains that he likes to experiment with design, form and finish: "Possibly there is a segment of my brain that is always working on shapes and form, and I can often be found sketching on small bits of paper, or even on a beer mat while I sip the occasional drink." Inspiration can come from all around us, so it is interesting to see how people - especially turners - channel these creative ideas into new shapes, forms and finishes, all the while working with the timber and taking its natural characteristics into account. At this stage, to me, Robert's work seemed simple and uncomplicated but I had a feeling there was more to this turner than meets the eye.
He goes on to tell me about the change he felt with his turning. He explains that when he first started out on this path, it was all spindle turning: "Now, however, spindle work is but a very small part of my work. It has been replaced by bowl turning, largely to satisfy demand, and the turning of hollow forms for which I am best known," he says. I understand that Robert also likes to incorporate different materials with the wood, which helps to bring out the individuality of the natural elements. "I like to mix the traditional and contemporary. At present, I am veering very much towards the latter in the form of artistic pieces where experimentation is the predominant aspect or feature."
InfluencesRobert explains how getting involved with a collaborative group really changed his style and thinking: "When I returned to woodturning after a break of some years, Willie Stedmond introduced me to bowl turning and at the time I remember being influenced by the master Irish bowl turner, Ciarán Forbes. His technique and flawless tool control on the inside of bowls was a definite influence."Robert also says that he very much admires Bert Marsh for his thin-walled forms.
Further inspiration came from the Irish Woodturners' Guild when they formed their Collaborative Chapter. Robert tells me that he went on to join this group and consequently found himself collaborating with people from different craft disciplines: "This was a great benefit as it opened my mind to new concepts, and spurred me on to trying new ideas and designs with my turning," he finishes.
This was later followed by The Craft Council Of Ireland when Robert embarked on a similar collaborative exercise. Robert explains that while challenging, this was a great experience and has definitely been a lasting influence on his work.
These two exercises helped Robert open his mind to different concepts and introduced different materials into his turnings.
WorkshopI was intrigued to find out more about Robert's workshop, and I wondered if this was turning dominated or if the workshop was mostly dedicated to his kitchen design business. Robert explains that his is pretty much a custom-built workshop measuring 20 x 14ft. and has been described as minimalist: "It is devoid of clutter and houses the usual turning gear including a Vicmarc 300 lathe, a smaller Vicmarc 100 VL, bandsaw, grinder - on which Robert sharpens all tools freehand - a compressor, extraction system, bench press, drills, and much more. "Most of my other requirements are housed in fitted kitchen units and cupboards. I do have an adjacent building where all of my turning blanks are placed on shelves to air dry, usually for up to two years," he explains.
So what is Robert's work ethos and how does he go about creating his fine pieces? Robert says that he pays great attention to detail and never, ever, leaves any turned object out of his workshop that he cannot fully stand over:
"The customer is entitled to demand a quality product for their cash and I have to be 100 percent happy with each item in terms of design, shape, form and finish before it leaves my workshop."
In terms of where he sees his career heading, Robert says that this is always a process of redevelopment and experimentation: "I see myself experimenting with a range of materials to enhance my turnings. Things like stone, copper, silver, glass and even horn - but not using any endangered animal species - all of these are definite possibilities."
I wanted to find out more about the special tools which Robert uses
to complete his turnings so I asked him to name the three he could not do without. Robert explains that these would have to be the 10mm (3/8in) bowl gouge sharpened with a fingernail grind, a 25mm (1in) square scraper and the 25mm (1in) round scraper. These are used on a variety of forms from his platters and bowls to the classic hollow forms. And when I enquired as to how long, typically, it took Robert to complete one of his signature pieces, he informs me that this will vary depending on the complexity of the item: "A typical salad bowl might take two hours while a special hollow form could take days, or even weeks. That would not include time taken to cut out the blanks from the log, shape them with the bandsaw, or the roughing out stage of the whole process. Normally I would leave a wall thickness of 50mm (2in) at the roughing out stage and leave the blank to air dry for two years"
Career highs & lows
So what is the best thing about turning according to Robert? He tells me that the highlight of his career to date has got to be being able to impart his knowledge and skill to his children and seeing his 10-year-old son appear on television demonstrating woodturning. Robert says that he tends not to look for lows, but if he were to find one, it would be having a piece, on which he had spent something like 40 hours working, explode with the very last cut: "Now that was a real shocker!"
He goes on to tell me how he loves the challenge of producing classical, turned forms from windfallen local timbers and being able to extract the hidden beauty of the timber: "I find this particularly satisfying. I am always happy when I have brought out the special nature of the timber and have shown it to its best advantage in the completed piece," he explains.
In terms of promoting his work, Robert exhibits his turnings at various venues in Ireland including the Guinness Storehouse, Kilkenny Design Centre, the John F. Kennedy Arboretum, New Ross, Selskar Design, Wexford, and the historic Wicklow Gaol. Robert says that he is also fortunate to have a shop window fronting onto the Street in Gorey, from which he sells his turnings.
I took the opportunity at this stage to ask Robert more about the Open National Competition in which he took part. He explains that at the National Seminar, there exists four different category prizes as well as an overall winner. According to Robert, the different categories are beginners, spindle turning, open section and artistic: "In 2007, I won the Overall Prize, and in 2009 I won the artistic category, as well as being judged the Overall winner."
The futureSo what does Robert hope the future will hold? He replies that he wants to be the best he can be at what he does. In my opinion, Robert is already pretty much there but it's always good to have goals to aim for so we continue to push ourselves and realise our full potential. He further goes on to explain that he would also love to adopt a teaching role where he could pass on all that he has learned about the craft of woodturning: "I have just started giving classes and hopefully they will gain in popularity."
I hope that the future is successful for Robert and I have a very strong feeling that it will be. He seems to have a desire to achieve and I look forward to hearing how the teaching element pans out.


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You don't want your hotel stay to leave you feeling fleeced. Any type of bad hotel experience leaves you feeling disappointed and unhappy. Instead of running into these types of problems, pay attention the following advice so that you can enjoy your next hotel stay.
Make sure you check out online review websites prior to making a reservation for a hotel. In this way, you can get real information from real people regarding their experiences at a variety of hotels. These reviews can help you decide which hotel you should select.
Use your hotel room's safe to keep your valuables secure. You should put any expensive items in the hotel safe.
Take a look into organizations you are part of. Sometimes you can get discounted hotel prices through these organizations. You may save ten percent or more. For extended stays, this can really add up. A stay of 5 days or more could add up to one free hotel night stay!
When booking a hotel, you need to establish what you need and what you would ideally like from your stay. Of course price is a big deal, but a hotel close to where you are head is a big consideration. What about free breakfast, local calls, wifi or swimming pool? Try locating a tip that checks off as much of your wish list as is realistic.
Use hotel search tools online. These websites can help you quickly find great deals. They can also provide you with the average rate for a room at a particular hotel, so you can see if your offer is really a good deal. They can also give you information on nearby attractions, too.
Don't book a hotel room without looking for online deals. You might not learn from the person on the phone that you can actually get great discounts over the Internet, instead. For this reason, making a proactive search is advisable. Websites like TripAdvisor, Expedia, and Jetsetter always have promising bargains for certain hotels that you won't find anywhere else for a better price.
Check your room when you arrive. Is the room clean and devoid of issues like mildew and mold? Do the sink, shower and toilet work properly? Do you have all the towels and linens you need? If there are any obvious problems, report them to the front desk immediately so that they can be taken care of or you can be moved to a different room.
By following this smart advice, you can avoid negative experiences when staying in hotels. Now you know exactly what to look out for. Your hotel stay should be relaxing to you, not an unhappy experience.

subset: commoncrawl


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1681 Jaillot Map of Westphalia, GermanyDucheDeWestphalie-jaillot-1681
1681 Jaillot Map of Westphalia, GermanyDucheDeWestphalie-jaillot-1681
1681 (dated) 17.5 x 23 in (44.45 x 58.42 cm) 1 : 200000
Westphalia was part of one of the 'imperial circles' created by the Holy Roman Empire in the 1500s. Groupings of regional territories were designed for defensive, tax, and administrative purposes within the empire. Westphalia, in 1648, became famous when the 'Peace of Westphalia' was signed in Munster and Osnabruck, ending the Thirty Years' War.
A beautifully engraved title cartouche adorns the lower left quadrant of this map, along with a compass rose, scale and legend. This map was created by Alexis-Hubert Jaillot and Guillaume Sanson in 1681.
The De L'Isle family (fl. c. 1700 - c. 1760) (also written Delisle) were, in composite, a mapmaking tour de force who redefined early 18th century European cartography. Claude De L'Isle (1644 -1720), the family patriarch, was Paris based a historian and geographer under Nicholas Sanson. De L'Isle and his sons were proponents of the school of "positive geography" and were definitive figures, defining the heights of the Golden Age of French Cartography. Of his twelve sons, four, Guillaume (1675- 1726), Simon Claude (1675 - 1726), Joseph Nicholas (1688 - 1768) and Louis (1720 - 1745), made a significant contributions to cartography. Without a doubt Guillaume was the most remarkable member of the family. It is said that Guillaume's skill as a cartographer was so prodigious that he drew his first map at just nine years of age. He was tutored by J. D. Cassini in astronomy, science, mathematics and cartography. By applying these diverse disciplines to the vast stores of information provided by 18th century navigators, Guillaume created the technique that came to be known as "scientific cartography", essentially an extension of Sanson's "positive geography". This revolutionary approach transformed the field of cartography and created a more accurate picture of the world. Among Guillaume's many firsts are the first naming of Texas, the first correct map of the Mississippi, the final rejection of the insular California fallacy, and the first identification of the correct longitudes of America. Stylistically De L'Isle also initiated important changes to the medium, eschewing the flamboyant Dutch style of the previous century in favor of a highly detailed yet still decorative approach that yielded map both beautiful and informative. Guillaume was elected to the French Academie Royale des Sciences at 27. Later, in 1718, he was also appointed "Premier Geographe du Roi", an office created especially for him. De L'Isle personally financed the publication of most of his maps, hoping to make heavy royalties on their sales. Unfortunately he met an untimely death in 1728, leaving considerable debt and an impoverished child and widow. De L'Isle's publishing firm was taken over by his assistant, Phillipe Buache who became, posthumously, his son in law. The other De L'Isle brothers, Joseph Nicholas and Louis De L'Isle, were employed in the Service of Peter the Great of Russia as astronomers and surveyors. They are responsible for cataloguing and compiling the data obtained from Russian expeditions in the Pacific and along the northwest coast of America, including the seminal explorations of Vitus Bering and Aleksei Chirikov. The De L'Isles, like their rivals the Vaugondys , must be considered speculative geographers. Speculative geography was a genre of mapmaking that evolved in Europe, particularly Paris, in the middle to late 18th century. Cartographers in this genre would fill in unknown areas on their maps with speculations based upon their vast knowledge of cartography, personal geographical theories, and often dubious primary source material gathered by explorers and navigators. This approach, which attempted to use the known to validate the unknown, naturally engendered many rivalries. The era of speculatively cartography effectively ended with the late 18th century explorations of Captain Cook, Jean Francois de Galaup de La Perouse, and George Vancouver.
Nicolas Sanson (1600 - 1667) and his descendants were the most influential French cartographers of the 17th century and laid the groundwork for the Golden Age of French Cartography. Sanson started his career as a historian where, it is said, he turned to cartography as a way to illustrate his historical studies. In the course of his research some of his fine maps came to the attention of King Louis XIII who, admiring the quality of his work, appointed Sanson Geographe Ordinaire du Roi. Sanson's duties in this coveted position included advising the king on matters of geography and compiling the royal cartographic archive. In 1644 he partnered with Pierre Mariette, an established print dealer and engraver, whose business savvy and ready capital enabled Sanson to publish an enormous quantity of maps. Sanson's corpus of some three hundred maps initiated the golden age of French mapmaking and he is considered the 'Father of French Cartography.' His work is distinguished as being the first of the 'Positivist Cartographers,' a primarily French school of cartography that valued scientific observation over historical cartographic conventions. The practice result of the is less embellishment of geographical imagery, as was common in the Dutch Golden Age maps of the 16th century, in favor of conventionalized cartographic representational modes. Sanson is most admired for his construction of the magnificent atlas Cartes Generales de Toutes les Parties du Monde. Sanson's maps of North America, Amerique Septentrionale (1650), Le Nouveau Mexique et La Floride (1656), and La Canada ou Nouvelle France (1656) are exceptionally notable for their important contributions to the cartographic perceptions of the New World. Both maps utilize the discoveries of important French missionaries and are among the first published maps to show the Great Lakes in recognizable form. Sanson was also an active proponent of the insular California theory, wherein it was speculated that California was an island rather than a peninsula. After his death, Sanson's maps were frequently republished, without updates, by his sons, Guillaume (1633 - 1703) and Adrien Sanson (? - 1708). Even so, Sanson's true cartographic legacy as a 'positivist geographer' was carried on by others, including Alexis-Hubert Jaillot, Guillaume De L'Isle, Gilles Robert de Vaugondy, and Pierre Duval.


text: Sarah and Hagar's shared experience is one of taking matters into one's own hands, pursuing God's blessings by selfish and earthly means, ignoring God's promises and ways, but scrambling to make life work. This is the life of works-righteousness, and is contrary to the Promise. We must "cast-out" the works approach and embrace the Promise. Paul affirms the incompatibility of legalism and liberty, commanding that we let go of the legalism.


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The bill changes the organ donation program so that a person is presumed to have consented to organ and tissue donation at the time the person applies for or renews a driver's license or identification card unless the person initials a statement that states that the person does not want to be considered as a possible organ and tissue donor.
Lends a whole new meaning to "trafficking in human organs." The bill is being proposed in Colorado, and the above paragraph is from its introductory comments. You can read the whole thing here.


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yep, I am still ALIVE!
sorry, for the lack of updates, my dearies. Work kept me busy (as usual, bleh) and been trying to sleep early so i've tried to keep myself from going online...but still didn't work. I've been, and still is, sleep-deprived.
we had a long weekend because of the Philippine Independence Day last week, so i went home to be with my family. Nothing beats the feeling of being home...and it sucks to be back for work later.
anyways, here's another neutral look requested for Jane...she asked for an eotd using some basic colors from MAC. For this one, i used Femme-Fi (you can also use Ricepaper) and Espresso. looks like a lot of my readers are more into neutrals...maybe because we spend much of our time in the office wearing business casuals and we're stuck with neutrals, eh? =)
ugh...i am still regretting not being able to enroll at MUFE's Advanced Bridal Makeup lessons. :( i really wanted to, but i don't think that i'd be able to make it considering the adjustment i'd have to do with my work schedule and my not being able to sleep early. the lessons would be M-F at 1-5pm so that would mean being in the office at 9am, leave at 1 for the lessons and go back to the office after and stay until 10-11pm. just thinking about it makes me tired already. :( geesh, i wish they would have a weekend schedule.


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The zebra mussel station is now open during daylight hours, and the main boat ramps are open. You need to stop by for a brief inspection of your boat before launch. When it's busy, particularly on weekends, you'll want to stop on the way out to get tags for the next entry.
If you hear about plans for Horsetooth or other area lakes, please post a comment here.
The club is open to all, but club events take place during the week and we meet at Chilson Senior Center in Loveland, CO. Our basic purpose is to fish, but we're easily distracted by the chance to work with youngsters or improve northern Colorado outdoor resources.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
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The producers of a new documentary about straight edge titled Edge: Perspectives on Drug Free Culture, have posted two clips featuring influential figures from the movement. The first clip features Ian MacKaye who coined the phrase while he was in Minor Threat but also went on to former a number of notable acts including Embrace, Fugazi and The Evens. The second clip includes Ray Cappo of Youth of Today and Shelter and who also founded both Revelation Records and Equal Vision Records.
Ian talks about the issue of militance in straight edge as well as the role of caffeine. Cappo discusses his experiences as a teenager and his first brush with alcohol. The documents aims to trace the development of the edge movement from its roots in the 80s to current day. It highlights an MacKaye, Ray Cappo and Karl Buechner (of Earth Crisis) as the initiators of three separate waves of straight edge and also promises comments on the history, philosopy and criticisms of the subculture. Other figures appearing in the film include Russ Rankin of Good Riddance, Kent McClard, Bull Gervasi, Priyesh Patel, Peter Young and Eva Hall.
The documentary was written and directed by Marc Pierschel and Michael Kirchner. It will be relased on DVD by Compassion Media on May 15, 2010.
Ian MacKaye
Ray Cappo


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If you want to make the most out of Thailand, skip Bangkok and Phuket. I visited Chiang Mai at the end of last year, and I had a much better experience than I've ever had anywhere else in the country. Thailand is beautiful, and that's exactly why so many tourists turn up there. You won't have to fight past them to experience it if you go somewhere they're less likely to go. This is why I compiled for you this list of the best things to do in Chiang Mai Thailand.
Table of Contents (skip directly to the info you're looking for)
In Chiang Mai, you'll get to know the real Thailand
Must See in Chiang Mai – The Animals
Chiang Mai is a very family friendly face. Whether or not you have kids, you're going to want to see the animals while you're there. Chiang Mai has one of the biggest zoos I've ever seen.
There are more than 400 different animals to view – even pandas. The Chiang Mai Night safari might be even better. You can actually hand feed tiger cubs, and that's not something most people get to do every day.
If you find elephants to be amazing, you absolutely need to see the elephant camps. These elephants can paint pictures! It's incredible.
Recommended: The most luxurious train in India, The Deccan Odyssey
Best things to do in Chiang Mai
Camp Near the Chiang Dao Mountains
I backpacked through Thailand, and the Chiang Dao Mountains were the best spot by far. The area is great to hike. The large mountain is covered in green grass, and you can see everything from the top.
It's nestled right into a wooded area with plenty of spots for hammock camping. It was such a peaceful place to sleep. If you want the get a full experience of Chiang Dao's nature, you can't pass this one up.
Meet the People Who Live There
(My picture. Please feel free to use)
One of the best things about visiting a new place is meeting the people who live in it. Just past the caves is a large Karen tribe – where the women wear lengthening rings on their necks. You can tour their village, but you don't have to tour it like a tourist.
Most people just walk around and take pictures, which is exactly why the people in the village are happy to actually have conversations about their lives and their culture.
I didn't take many pictures because I was so focused on learning from these people. They're extremely friendly, and they'll teach you everything about who they are and where they came from.
Get Some Work Done
Chiang Mai is a digital nomad hotspot. People from all over the world visit to work while they travel, and I did a lot of that while I was there.
The internet is ridiculously fast – much faster than the internet I was used to at home. Coworking groups pop up all over the place, and it's easy to find a seat at a table.
It's really cheap to stay in Chiang Mai. Everything costs less, from food to rent. With the nomad culture and networking opportunities all over the place, it's simple and very inexpensive to stay in Chiang Mai long term.
There's always another remote worker to talk to, so it's not surprising to find a lead on a new job while you're hanging out and eating lunch.
Explore the Temples
There are over 300 religious temples in Chiang Mai. You need to at least visit some of the bigger ones, even if you only look at them from the outside. Most of these temples are old, from an era where people painstakingly built things all by hand.
Wat Phra That Doi Suthep is the most popular temple. It's usually swarming with tourists, but it might be worth waiting for the crowds to thin out to get a look.
Wat Sri Suphan is painted solid silver. Go at night. When it's dark outside, they turn on a bunch of neon spotlights than make the temple light up in a giant rainbow of colors. The whole thing shines – it's so bright, you could probably find it without even looking for it.
Wat Lok Molee is a little quieter. If you want to have more of a personal experience, go there. It was built in the fourteenth century, and it really shows its age. The front of the temple has been completely restored, but when you walk around the back, the rest of the temple is still the original architecture.
It's off of the main roads, so most of the tourists don't even see it. It's a quiet place to sit and think.
Browse the Street Markets
You can find anything you'll ever need in the Ploen Ruedee Night Market. It's more like a nightly street fair than it is like an open air mall. Bands perform all the time, there's plenty of beer, and way too much to eat. There's more than just typical street food. You can get a whole real meal for almost no money, and it's just as good as it would be if you got it at a normal restaurant.
There are also some interesting things you might not get to try anywhere else. Some of the food stalls serve bugs, like worms, crickets, and grasshoppers. If you're really feeling bold, go for it. They're not as terrible as you might think they are.
Visit the Art Museums
I didn't know how important art was in Chiang Mai until I got there. Their art museums are kid friendly, but as an adult, I definitely don't have any regrets about visiting. The 3D Art Museum is the coolest thing. All of the exhibitions are in three dimensions. Paintings wrap around walls, and some of them have props with them.
A lot of the exhibits are designed for people to interact with. If you like to take a lot of pictures, you're not going to run out of opportunities to do it.
The best part of this museum is that you can touch almost everything. There aren't glass cases between you and the art, so you can really get involved with it. Look up close. Feel the textures. Put yourself in the picture.
I would rather go to Chiang Mai than anywhere else in Thailand.
I feel like I know the country better than I did visiting the larger cities, and it was far from boring there.
Chiang Mai is the perfect blend of busy and calm. Whether you're a solo traveler or going on a family trip, you're going to love it as much as I did.
This is a guest post by Karlis Kikuts of Independent Wolf blog.


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The ARDEX Group
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- ARDEX is a system solution provider of high-performance specialty building materials.
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- ARDEX believes that all employees and partners should operate within a spirit of fairness, transparency and responsible business practices at all times.
- Employees are the foundation on which we build our business.
- Sustainable, long-term growth objectives underpin all of our various activities.


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It's that time of year again!
You've probably already had them casing your neighborhood - knocking on doors and smiling while they wreak havoc on your new year's resolutions with their tasty temptations.
Yes folks, I'm afraid so . . . It's GIRL SCOUT COOKIE TIME!!
Last year, my very first year selling cookies as a girl scout MOM, I was terrified of the goals being laid before me. And there were plenty of phone calls and much wringing of hands while I tried to figure out if all this focus on funds was something I wanted my daughter (or myself) involved in. After all, isn't the purpose of selling cookies to teach our girls lessons about manners, financial responsibility, leadership, and blah,blah, blah . . . you get the idea. And I was worried!
Weeeeell, it is - but it's also about the money!
One year later and I now find myself in the position of co-leader for this fledgling troop and let me just say, "Helping Girls Grow Strong ain't necessarily cheap!" So this year I vowed to get off my soapbox, ignore my moral high road and take the road MOST travelled instead.
Luckily, Sheep is one year older (and wiser) and has caught the cookie bug this year, so she's willing to help! Last year she set her sights on a journal that required selling 200 boxes of girl scout cookies. And she did it!!!! And when I say she did it - I mean SHE did it! I was not working (outside the home) last year and Speed was working from home, so mom and dad did not have offices. No break rooms tables to simply throw the form out on and wait for the orders to come rolling in over lunch. Instead, she had to go door-to-door and person-to-person. She made lots of phone calls as well. Speed is a salesman by day, so he helped her with her pitch and she got quite good at it if I do say so myself!
I guess I have my mom (a former girl scout leader herveryownself) for my insistence that she sell them herself. My mom always made us call up to her office to sell cookies or other school things rather than taking the forms to work. At the time I thought it was torture. Now I see it as a stroke of genius!! It is sooo much harder to say no to that tiny voice and that earnest little look!
This year, she has set her sites on the LARGE stuffed penguin plush toy that requires selling 650 boxes (what the . . .?)!! Can she do it? Probably not. Don't tell anyone, but girl scout leader/mom doesn't really want to deliver 650 boxes of girl scout cookies either. But I am LOVIN' the effort I am seeing from this girl!! And even though we've 'officially' gone cookie crazy this year with a troop goal of 2200 boxes, I am secretly smiling to see her using her math, HER MANNERS and making change like a pro! I'm also impressed with her practicality (which I have never been accused of having - ha!), because she has assessed her initial goal and revised it now that she's been pounding the pavement this week. So we'll see . . .
Either way, thanks to girl scouts she's already growing into ONE TOUGH COOKIE!!
P.S. If you need a connection, Sheep can hook you up!!
P.S.S. In additon to everything else, I also
fight with own an embroidery machine. I put this design together using the varsity feltie font from Planet Applique and a donut design (I don't know about you, but that looks like a Samoa to me!) from Stitch on Time. Check these ladies out - they both have great ideas and products! This was my first try at a 'raggy' alphabet. Not too shabby - ha! Sometimes, I crack myself up!


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Read Write Inc
Beech Grove Primary School
Read Write Inc.
Read Write Inc is taught from Reception onwards Read Write Inc is delivered through group sessions.
Pure Sounds to help parents to read the sounds of words
while reading with their children
Learn how to pronounce pure sounds
from Set 1 Sounds through to Set 3 with 5 year-old Sylvie.
Click on the Read Write Inc logo
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The channel shall be on Freeview's Channel 15, the channel allocated to Ten for datacasting. REPLACE Try ch 159 and 176 for the purchasing channels…my mom with her primary channel package deal can receive these now as an alternative of 24 and 25. She thinks the picture quality is better; so she is happier, apart from missing EWTN , which is marketed for all channel packages but only comes up on ch 460 (testing on my TELEVISION, not hers to verify).
Along with the tv channel, TSC additionally has several businesses and products associated with and integrated with the television channel. And those that shop via each the tv channel and the Site, he stated, spend 25 p.c greater than those that store at just one.
The channel was exempted from licensing by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Fee (CRTC), however for a number of years this was on the condition the channel not use reside movement video to exhibit its products. This would be the second channel in the genre, the first being HomeShop18, which was launched a 12 months ago.
For the file, CJ Residence Procuring is a subsidiary of the CJ Group, which has stakes in food and food service, bio and pharma, leisure and media, and home purchasing and logistics. Mr. Bozek, of Dwelling Buying Network, mentioned he expected the gross sales from the Website online and the television channel to stay robust regardless of the financial slowdown.
Kijiji Alerts are an electronic mail notification service the place Kijiji customers can have the latest Ads despatched to your e-mail address. The Canadian Home Purchasing Network was renamed to The Procuring Channel (TSC) in 2000. As with most house purchasing channels, the products are mainly aimed at a female viewers.


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Fan Fiction set after Captain America – Civil War and After Peggy Restored
"You kissed my niece?"
Peggy stood with her arms crossed over her chest, and though she stood far shorter than Steve she seemed to dwarf him in her anger.
"I…I panicked. I didn't know what else to do." Steve was a fairly pale man but all colour fled from his face as he stood before Peggy. He wasn't sure he had ever seen her more furious. Not even that time she had shot at him and his shield.
"So you decided the best thing to do was to kiss my niece?"
"I didn't want to blow my cover. Your cover. It was a dumb choice, I didn't mean to make you jealous, Peg."
"Jealous? Jealous! Steven Grant Rogers, this is not about me not liking you kissing another woman. This has everything to do with you giving hope to a girl who has been half in love with the concept of you since she was four years old."
Steve opened his mouth and closed it again. It was clear he hadn't thought of that. Peggy moved her hands to her hips and was about to open her mouth again but there was a movement in the doorway that drew her attention.
"That. That…you're…but…what…"
"Hello, James." Peggy's ire melted away as she moved to embrace her old friend.
Bucky's confusion was heightened because this was not the first time he had seen her this year. He had snuck in to see her when his memory was returning, and he had been so distraught to find hers failing.
"Peggy. But…" He shook his head. "I shouldn't be surprised but…
"But you are surprised. It seems we three are very hard to kill. In my case, Tony and Vision would not accept my passing. But given the method, well, it has been a very well-guarded secret what happened."
"Tony?" Bucky shot Steve a look that spoke volumes.
"He won't betray her. Neither will Vision."
"Are you sure?"
Peggy nodded, "They will not betray me. Tony is doing what he must for more than the obvious reasons, though I cannot excuse what happened on your last encounter, or a number of other things that have transpired."
"I'll reach out, Peg. See if I can't make peace. For your sake as much as anything," Steve offered and watched as Peggy's attitude towards him softened.
"Thank you, Steve." Peggy moved back to Steve and he took her into his arms.
Bucky getting a goofy grin as Peggy pulled Steve down to kiss her.
The three moved to the couch to talk. They discussed how the rescue mission had gone, Peggy had been at the lead of it, as much as Steve had tried to argue against it. Then Steve explained about Bucky's plan in Wakanda with the aid of T'Challa.
"I might have an idea that could help, James." Peggy never called him Bucky like the rest, or rarely, and Bucky never seemed to mind. "I think it might help, a twofer as they say."
Peggy got a smile on her face that both men still recognised.
"Let me talk to her first, just in case the answer is no but given how it might help both sides, I have faith. I wouldn't want to get your hopes up, though."
Bucky nodded and smiled. He had no idea what she was talking about.
It seemed strange to have the three of them together again after so many years. To look at them you would think only a few years had passed but by their eyes, you could see the truth of all that had happened since the last time they had been together.
It had been two nights before the tragic train fight. They had been working alongside the resistance and had spent the afternoon getting a dozen children to a waiting plane that had winged them to freedom. The three friends had withdrawn from the rest of the commandos to enjoy a bottle of bourbon. Steve and Bucky could barely get tipsy any longer but there was comfort in taking the drink, Peggy had barely touched the bottle. She had not really liked the taste then.
Still, they were happy to drink together in the blacked-out room, taking a breather from the intensity of war. Steve and Peggy were known to be sweethearts and Bucky had spent much of the evening teasing. Steve had looked downright murderous when Bucky had asked Peggy to dance. Peggy had smacked Bucky up the back of his head and then kissed Steve. There had been so much laughter that night. The next time Peggy had been alone with Steve there had been no laughter, no teasing. Bucky's death had changed Steve, but it did bring him and Peggy even closer together.
Now they all had second chances. With complications. They were outlaws. A modern day Robin Hood with his Marion and his Merry Men. Bucky had his complications from his time as the Winter Soldier. And Peggy had her own complications from the Infinity Stones that had restored her.
But they were together and on the same side once more.
"You two should spend the night and leave for Wakanda in the morning. I should be able to follow within a day." Peggy leant her head against Steve's shoulder.
"Peg, I have to ask. Will you tell Sharon the truth?"
"Not yet. It puts her in too much danger. When this fall out from the accords has come to a resolution and order has been restored, then I will tell her. Though it pains me to keep it from her."
"And what about Tony?" Bucky asked. He was sitting sideways on his chair letting his arm drape down the side, out of sight. "Are you sure Tony can be trusted to keep your secret safe?"
"Though neither of you were around to see Tony and I, there is a strong bond that is very different from what I had with Howard. I was Tony's Godmother and he can be trusted with this. Even if he is lost in hatred and grief. He can be trusted."
Peggy was worried about Tony. His PTDS seemed to have worsened and she worried how bad it would become now he knew about his parents. She would have to hope he could forgive her for her part in the deception, they simply believed it was better that he did not know. It was above his clearance and could do him no good. She could only hope that he would keep her faith but she was concerned, no matter what she said to Steve and Bucky.
Of Vision, she had no concerns. He was where he had to be. And the part of him that was Edwin would never betray her.
The two men were appeased by her assurances and soon all were ready to retire for the night. Bucky hugged Peggy, his one good arm around her so tight it felt as strong as his other arm. He saluted Steve and then wandered off to find a guest room to claim as his own.
Steve followed Peggy to her bedroom. Though there was still plenty to talk about, neither were keen to talk. They chose instead to be in each other's arms with nothing of the world to distract them from each other.
They both knew all too well how precious these moments were.


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Boxed Chocolate Assortments
Our boxed assortments of small-batch chocolates offer enough variety and flavor to show you why we feel it's so very important to make them fresh & without preservatives. All of our truffles (containing cream) should be consumed within 10 days to 2 weeks of purchase to ensure freshness. (Most people claim they barely make it home with them before they're all gone!)
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Dollars & Sense
by Jason Biro
Dr. Charles spent years building his practice, but one expense after another kept him from saving enough for retirement. To make up for this gap, he pre-loaded his retirement and investment accounts using a program that pulls your business real estate equity. He's now contributes to his retirement plans yearly, without sacrificing the growth of his practice.
Sleep & infection: no snooze, you lose?
There a large body of evidence that links sleep and the immune system through extensive and complex pathways. Studies indicate, in both animals and humans, that a variety of viral and bacterial infections lead to increased sleep.
Over the past few decades, the average number of hours that individuals sleep has decreased, and there is some evidence linking sleep deprivation and increased infection susceptibility ( mediated via effects on immune cells and cytokines). "Shift workers" who have less than 7 hours sleep (on average) are 3 times more likely to develop a "cold";" partial sleep deprivation " may negatively affect inflammatory bowel disease and cancer.
Sleep deprivation does not appear to be a benign phenomenon as it diminishes immunocompetence thereby altering the body's responses to a variety of inflammatory challenges.
Pediatric Infectious Disease Journal
Redo Nissan fundoplications.
A large (823 patients) retrospective study reviewed the incidence and factors associated with redo Nissan fundoplications. 12.2% of patients require 1 or more redos over a median 2.9 years. Incriminating factors include: male gender, young age, hiatal dissection and retching.
Journal of Pediatric Surgery
Underwriting Opportunities
With a circulation of over 4,900, Updates in Pediatrics offers an excellent opportunity to promote your brand at affordable rates.
Functional impairment & Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD): Effects of exercise.
The functional impairment and adverse developmental outcomes from ADHD are most likely a result of the interaction between genes and environment.
A comprehensive electronic database search for animal and human studies evaluating the effect of exercise on animal behavior, symptoms of ADHD and developmental outcomes in humans, reveals that exercise, particularly early on in life (perhaps mediated by brain-derived neurotropic factor and catecholamines) appears to provide a beneficial effect against ADHD symptom outcomes.
Use of "Conventional" & "Novel" smokeless tobacco products.
Smokeless tobacco is a blanket term that refers to a variety of products used: ( a) "Conventional "uses - including sniffing, chewing, placing tobacco between lip and gum and application to the skin, and ( b) "Novel" usage - "snus" (a moist tobacco product placed under the upper lip for an extended period of time) and "dissolvable tobacco" (a smokeless tobacco that dissolves in the mouth).
Data from the 2011 National Youth Tobacco Survey indicates:
Youth who use smokeless tobacco believe that these products are less harmful to health. As all forms of tobacco use are potentially harmful, pediatricians need to focus on prevention and cessation interventions.
Inhaled nitric oxide (iNO) for respiratory failure in premature infants-neurodevelopmental outcomes.
While it appears that there is a place for iNO therapy for the premature infant with pulmonary hypertension, its use to manage a variety of pulmonary diseases and/or to treat/prevent bronchopulmonary dysplasia remains controversial.
A multicenter, randomized, double-blind study of preterm infants born at < 29 weeks gestation with moderate respiratory failure and given iNO 5 ppm started early (<24 hours after birth) or placebo for 7-21 days and assessed (Bayley Scales) at 1 and 2 years (corrected for prematurity) indicates that the treatment appears to have no deleterious effect on neurodevelopmental or other health outcomes.
RGS5 gene & therapeutic response to bronchodilators in asthmatic children.
A large number of genes have been implicated in the genetics of asthma and patient's responses to bronchodilator therapy. The regulator protein G signaling 5 (RGS5 ) pathway appears to mediate the contractile effects of β2 agonists on smooth muscle cells. Variances of the RGS5 gene on chromosome 1 exist.
A study of 137 asthmatic children's responses to short acting β2 agonists examined the effects of a newly discovered variant of RGS5 on bronchodilator responses in childhood asthmatic patients. ( It appears to have an enhancing bronchodilator effect with a PDE4D gene variance -a phosphodiesterase modulator).
Pediatric Pulmonology
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On Saturday, October 11, 2003, at 4 p.m., eyewitness B.H. reported, "My daughter had just stepped out the back door" of their home in Prescott Valley, Arizona (population 23,535) "and came running back in, yelling at me to come quick. As I stepped out, she was pointing almost directly overhead."
"I looked up to see a perfectly round dark cloud spinning very slowly like a pinwheel. As it turned, it was drawing in tiny puffy white clouds. The rest of the sky was basically clear. There was no sound nor wind of any kind."
"It was approximately a quarter-mile (0.4 kilometers) in diameter. We sat on our patio and watched it for approximately 10 minutes. Then the cloud broke up all of a sudden, going every which way."
"Approximately 7 to 8 minutes later, two jet fighters came out of the east and turned just before coming over town and went north."
"At approximately 11 a.m. the next morning (Sunday, October 12, 2003), we saw four black helicopters flying low across town."
"The next day (Monday, October 13, 2003) there was a huge camouflaged helicopter flying over town." Later "the same day, as we were getting gas at Albertson's, we pulled up to see a big white van with black tinted windows with the words Area 51 on the front (license) plate. There were dishes, antennas and other strange contraptions all over the top of it. Your Web address was on the window in black letters."
(Editor's Note: There it is again--the elusive UFO Roundup van! For five years now, this strange-looking white van has been seen all around the USA, several times in Arizona. However, it is neither owned nor operated by Joseph Trainor and John Hayes of UFO Roundup.)
"I spoke with the tall, gray-haired and bearded gentleman and told him about our sighting. He said, 'That wasn't a cloud, was it?' with a grin. He said he was usually up north but had been here for a while, and that Prescott Valley had had quite a few sightings. And that he was going back north but would be down here again shortly."
(Editor's Note: This time, the driver seems to be about 20 to 25 years older than the male driver of the van's previous appearances.)
"When I mentioned the black helicopters, he said, 'Don't they always show up a day late and a dollar short?'"
"He was dressed eccentrically, but I had the feeling he was here in an official capacity. I asked a lot of questions, but he was very careful not to directly answer any of them."
On Wednesday, October 8, 2003, at 6 a.m., Curtis Fields was at his home in Paulden, Arizona, a town on Highway 89 about 20 miles (32 kilometers) north-northwest of Prescott Valley, when he "saw a UFO go from south to north. It was a bright object with lights shining in the back. It would travel for a few seconds and then stop. It would reverse direction and come to a stop. And then it made square moves. It was brighter than a star and it was pulsating. It seemed to return to the same spot. It did not depart. It was getting too bright to see the object at around 7 a.m."
Prescott Valley, Ariz. is on Highway 89 about 90 miles (144 kilometers) north of Phoenix. (Email Form Reports)
Last week's report of multiple UFOs in formation over the McDonough Elementary School in Manchester, New Hampshire (population 107,006) has been confirmed by a teacher who was in the schoolyard at the time.
The incident took place on Friday, October 3, 2003 at 1 p.m. The teacher reported, "I am a very logical person and have never witnessed anything like what I witnessed on October 3 while doing recess duty. That Friday evening, I found myself repeating tasks around the house that I'd already done--pouring water, watering plants, feeding the dog (he didn't mind.), loading the dishwasher, etc. All I could do was think about what I saw and how dumb I was not to find a camera or something to record what my brain couldn't believe it was registering."
At 1 p.m., the teacher "was standing on a playground looking up at the 12 objects with blue lights, and they seemed as high as a kite that was half way to its destination, but my mind was having a hard time making a correct distance and measurement judgement because I couldn't understand why there was a mist around them that shielded their exact shapes. The sky everywhere else was blue and totally cloudless. They (the UFOs) were the size of a hula hoop when I looked at them in their floating position and the size of a quarter (USA 25-cent coin-- J.T.) when they were in their silver-white swirling formation mode."
"After 20 minutes, the floating blue-lighted objects disappeared without a sound. Then I saw the silver-white round objects racing through the sky in tight formation... perfect alignment in swirling patterns, but it looked as though I was missing a visual frame as they moved. Kind of like if you were to view cartoon animation stills and every fifth picture was missing. That's how they looked as they were moving high in the sky."
"I had to bring the 150 Fourth Grade students back into the building because the recess bell rang. The objects were still whirling around when I went inside," the teacher added, "The other two adult witnesses, the principal and my assistant, are choosing to believe it must have been weather balloons and a lost flock of birds that they saw that day. However, I'm choosing to continue to question what I saw and that it was out of the world I'm familiar with." (Many thanks to Canadian ufologist Brian Vike for this report. For more on the Manchester, N.H. encounter, see UFO Roundup, volume 8, number 39 for October 15, 2003, "UFO hovers over a New Hampshire school," page 6.)
On Tuesday, October 14, 2003, at 12:20 a.m., Sarah Fenwick and a woman friend spotted a red UFO in West Cumbria, UK.
"When I first saw the object, it appeared to be a continuous red light," Sarah reported, "It was unusual because it was stationary, and it wasn't on the usual flight path. As we approached the object over a distance of about a mile (1.6 kilometers) it didn't seem to move at all. When we got close to where it was, it came down quite low to the ground."
"My friend got my binoculars out and was going to look through them to see if she could make anything out. As she did this, she leant onto the switch that opens the windows on my car. At this time, the object came much lower. I would say about 300 to 400 feet (90 to 120 meters) off the ground, and the red light grew much stronger and brighter."
"All of a sudden, a greenish-blue light shone out of the left-hand side (of the UFO--J.T.) So there was red shining from one side and green from the other. In the middle, there seemed to be a disk, but it could just have been shadows from the lights. Then it shot off in a northwesterly direction at a tremendous speed. The car window had been open all this time, and we didn't hear a sound. So what was it?" (Email Form Report)
On Sunday night, October 12, 2003, David K. and his wife were outdoors, looking at Mount Panorama near Bathurst, New South Wales, Australia, when they spotted an orange UFO.
"Hovering very high above the mountain we saw what appeared to be a very large and bright glowing orange flare," David reported, "Then an orange glowing oval- shaped light with glowing leg-like projections from the rear and base of the object."
The UFO "accelerated to faster than jet speed towards the west, if not slightly south of west until no longer visible. We expected to see flashing (navigation) lights as per helicopter or aeroplane. None visible. We expected some sort of sound, but nothing."
"Before the sighting, my wife and I went to view the mountain because we noticed radio silence and an electrical blackout on the mountain. As soon as we had a proper view, we looked up and watched the 'orange flare.'"
"This is the second time since childhood I've seen an unexplainable object. As a child, I saw a massive light explosion and a sudden direction change and acceleration. Tonight was not similar. It was more like the movement of a Harrier jump-jet. My wife and I were quite moved by the experience. It felt strange to watch. It was like nothing we've ever seen before."
Bathurst, N.S.W. is about 250 kilometers (150 miles) west of Sydney. (Email Form Report)
Eyewitness Roy Whitehead reported, "I saw an unexplained light at 12 a.m. on the night of (Thursday) October 16 (2003) in the night sky of Wellington, New Zealand. It was so far up in the sky and stationary, directly above me."
"It was flashing red, yellow and silver-white flashes randomly. It didn't get closer or move away."
"I went inside to get a second opinion from my mate. He came out and had a look. We concluded it wasn't a helicopter. It was too high. And it wasn't a plane as it didn't move away. We watched for a further two minutes or so. Then it disappeared." (Email Form Report)
"People from around the country have reported seeing an Unidentified Flying Object in the skies of Bahrain, emitting strange lights for about a minute around 11 p.m. on Friday," October 10, 2003.
"Mohammed Jaffer al-Hajer was sitting with six of his friends outside his home in Qurrayah village, near Budaiya, when they noticed the UFO in the distant skies. Al-Hajer 'caught' the strange object on his digital video camera as the lights appeared twice--once when the UFO emitted a bright yellow light and the second time when it split into two before disappearing."
"'We first noticed the strange light appear to the left of the Batelco tower in our village,' he said, 'We saw it again just above the tower when I reached for my camera and began to videotape it.'"
"Al-Hajer videotaped the object for about 40 seconds before it disappeared."
"People in Manama also reported seeing the UFO at the same time and placed it between Manama and Muharraq, in the same vicinity as Al-Hajer claimed."
"However, sources at Bahrain International Airport told the Tribune that the radars there did not register any abnormal activity during that time." (See the Bahrain Tribune for October 15, 2003, "UFO seen in Bahrain skies." Many thanks to Jim Hickman and Ayesha al-Khatabi for this newspaper article.)
"Frank Speare has managed to take the latest footage of what could be an ABC (alien big cat, also known as phantom panther here in the USA--J.T.) near Horncastle," Lincolnshire, UK, where "the Wolds have recently had sightings of big cats."
"A large black cat was seen recently in Edlington, described by Muriel Brooks as about four feet (1.3 meters) long and around 2 feet (0.6 meters) tall--but this latest one appears to be white."
"Frank was eating his breakfast" at his home in Minting "when he saw the creature, which he first assumed to be a calf until he noted the way it moved--unlike a calf and more like a cat."
"Grabbing his video camera. Frank rushed outside and managed to get a few seconds' video footage before the creature disappeared into the trees."
"Frank describes the cat as quite slender but far bigger than a domestic feline, as the ground slopes down towards the trees, and a domestic cat would have been impossible to see. He reckons it was easily the size of an Alsatian dog."
"Also near the trees he found an area where it looked like a huge animal had been lying and several mauled birds."
"Speare said, 'I have been told by a lady in the village that another sighting in the same field was reported 18 months ago and experts were called in, including the police, who confirmed large cat-like prints in the snow. I was told that the person who made the sighting was very frightened.'"
Elsewhere in UK, "a large cat, described by one witness as a black panther, was spotted in Telscombe Cliffs this week."
"A woman called police Wednesday lunchtime (October 15, 2003) when she saw a panther-like beast about 100 yards (90 meters) away in a field north of Telscombe Cliffs Way."
"Police searched the area and found no traces. However, officers called on Trevor Weeks, of East Sussex Wildlife Research Ambulance Service, for his expert advice."
"While on the trail of the cat, a shocked Mr. Weeks also spotted a creature as he approached Telscombe Village. He said: 'I saw something across a field which appeared to be larger than a fox or badger. It was jet black in colour and disappeared into shrubs. I am completely baffled as to what it was.'"
"Peter Harwood, a resident of Telscombe Village, was able to shed more light on the mystery. He told the Express a puma-like creature had been seen during the past couple of years and had gone in front of his car."
"He said: 'I would describe it as a puma (cougar or mountain lion in the USA--J.T.). It was a massive blacky- brown coloured cat, about the same size as a large collie (dog).'"
"His mother had also spotted the cat in the village while dog-walking." (See Lewes Today for September 19, 2003. Also BBC News for October 13, 2003. Many thanks to Robert Fischer, UFO Roundup's phantom panther expert, for these news reports.)
Eyewitness K.C. reported, "I was drivng west on U.S. 20 approximately 10 miles east of" West Yellowstone, Montana (population 1,177), "the western entrance to Yellowstone National Park. My wife was in the front passenger seat. The time was 8:35 p.m. on Friday, September 29, 2003. The sun had already set, so it was quite dark. This is a wilderness area that we were in, no lights whatsoever for miles. No other vehicles were in the area. The sky was clear. One could practically reach up and touch the stars."
(Editor's Note: The couple was very close to a volcanic feature known as Fountain Paint Pots, pools of silty water heated by volcanic vents close to the surface.)
"We were traveling about 30 miles per hour with the windows rolled down so we could hear the elk bugling in the not-so-far distance. Suddenly, and without warning, approximately 3 feet (0.9 meters) off the ground and 30 feet (9 meters) in front of me, a red sphere darted across the road from left to right (south to north--K.C.) The color was that of a lit (automobile) tail light lens, but not bright as if the brakes were being applied. The completely circular object, about 6 inches (15 centimeters) in diameter, flew straight for the short duration that we saw it. Sighting was lost as it entered the trees."
"Nothing was said to each other until I stopped at a pull-off a couple of miles down the road. We then looked at each other, and I asked my wife, 'Did you see that back there?'"
"Her reply was, 'I wasn't going to say anything until you did. What was that red ball?'"
"We compared notes. We indeed did see a 6-inch red ball flying from left to right about 3 feet off the ground. No sound was noted."
Yellowstone National Park is located in the northwestern corner of the USA's state of Wyoming. (Many thanks to Jim Hickman for forwarding this report.)
(Editor's Comment: The red sphere sounds more like a rare display of ball lightning than a UFO. Its proximity to the volcanically-active Fountain Paint Pots is extremely interesting. It's possible that the glowing sphere could be a piezoelectric display related to geological processes nearby.)
From the UFO Files...
Anybody who's seen the movie Moulin Rouge is familiar with Nicole Kidman's character Satine. But did you know there was a woman like that in the entourage of Madame Blavatsky? Today she's sort of considered the black sheep of Theosophy, and there's a reason for that...as we shall see.
Her name was Yuliana Dmitrievna Glinka, and she was
born in 1844. Her family was very prominent in Orel,
located 160 kilometers (100 miles) south of Moscow.
Following the abortive December revolution of 1825, the Tsar appointed a Commission of Enquiry, under Prince N.A. Galitzine, to investigate Russia's Masonic lodges to see what role they played, if any, in the uprising. The commission soon zeroed in on Colonel Feodor Nikolaevich Glinka (1786-1880) as the leader of "a secret society of mystics." During his testimony before the commission, Feodor Tolstoy admitted Col. Glinka's mystic ties but swore that he was "a loyal officer of the Empire."
The Decembrist revolt didn't wreck Col. Glinka's career. Nor that of his nephew, Mihail Ivanovich Glinka (1803-1857), a famous composer. Nor that of his son, Dmitri Feodorovich, who became a general and joined Russia's diplomatic service.
As an ambassador's daughter, Yuliana spent a lot of time globetrotting. Her father was Russia's ambassador to both Portugal and Brazil. And it was most likely in Brazil that Yuliana first became interested in spiritualism.
Yuliana lived in Rio de Janeiro (then capital of Brazil--J.T.) and at Petropolis, in the Serra da Orgao, home of Emperor Pedro II. She, her sisters and her father also traveled with Dom Pedro to the state of Minas Gerais, visiting Ouro Preto and Diamantina, both very old cities with a mystical past.
(Editor's Notes: Brazil was an empire from 1822 until Dom Pedro was overthrown by Marshal Fonseca in 1889. Diamantina was the home of the sorceress Xica da Silva in the Eighteenth Century. Ouro Preto, too, has an occult past. It was the site of the Inconfidencia Mineira, the first Illuminati uprising in the Americas. And just outside of town is Itacolomi (Tupi-Guarani for Rock and Papoose--J.T.), a weirdly shaped mountain alleged to have ties to the lost continent of Atlantis.)
It was in Brazil, perhaps during one of Dom Pedro's tours of Bahia, that Yuliana first became acquainted with Candomble, a Brazilian version of Caribbean Santeria. She also read about the Fox sisters and their encounters with "the Spirit World" in the USA's northern New York state.
In 1857, the family returned to Russia, and Yuliana's older sister married Vsevolod Soloviev, the brother of Russian philosopher Vladimir Soloviev. But the honeymoon didn't last. In no time at all, the wannabe-writer Soloviev succeeded in seducing Yuliana, the 13-year-old sister of his bride.
Family connections got Yuliana a gig as lady-in- waiting to Tsaritza (Empress) Maria Alexandrovna. But Yuliana rarely showed her face at Tsarskoe Selo, home of the Romanovs. She spent most of her time in Paris, living among the "jet set" of Napoleon II's Second Empire.
Like Catherine Theot 70 years earlier, Yuliana became a star of the Parisian occult underground, attending seances and consorting with the disciples of occult leader Eliphas Levi (birth name: Alphonse Constant--J.T.).
In the 1870s, through the influence of her grandfather's friend, General Orzheyevsky, Yuliana became a secret agent of the Okhrana (Tsarist secret police-- J.T.) According to Soloviev, "she was continually surrounded by 'phenomena' and miracles of all sorts; her marvelous stories of what happened to her at every step were enough to make one's head swim. She did not live in Russia and had lodgings in Paris; but she was continually vanishing, no one knew where, and was absorbed in some complicated and intricate affairs of her own."
"In Paris in 1881-2 she tried her hand at the game which (Okhrana spymaster Pyotr) Rachkovsky was to play so brilliantly shortly afterwards--watching and denouncing the Russian terrorists in exile. General Orzheyevsky, who was a prominent figure in the (Russian) secret police and ended as Assistant Minister for Internal Affairs, had befriended her ever since her childhood. But she was not really gifted for the (spy) work, feuded constantly with the Russian ambassador and ended by being unmasked in the (French) left-wing newspaper Le Radical.
Soloviev was a frequent visitor to Paris, where he and Yuliana lived as common-law spouses. Yuliana often used the alias of "Justine."
(Editor's Comment: I wonder if Madame de Soloviev had any idea that her husband's French mistress, Justine, was actually her own kid sister.)
In April 1884, Yuliana heard through the grapevine that "the First Lady of Occultism" was coming to Paris. None other than Elena Petrovna von Hahn Blavatsky, author of Isis Unveiled. The Duchesse de Pomar put up Madame Blavatsky in an opulent apartment at No. 46 Rue Notre- Dame-des-Champs, and Yuliana was one of the first to wangle an invitation.
"During the month of May, Helena (Blavatsky) saw a good deal of Soloviev and his woman friend, Justine Glinka. Aside from intelligence-gathering, Justine Glinka's chief interest was occultism, and when the occasion presented itself, she liked to combine the two. As a member of the Theosophical Society and a sincere admirer of the foundress, she had been greatly distressed to hear another (Russian) maid of honor, Olga Smirnoff, casually remark that the Tiflis Police Court (in Transcaucasia) had convicted Madame Blavatsky of 'theft, cheating and deceit.'"
Olga, who apparently had the dirt on every noble family in Russia, told Yuliana that "for more than 30 years, she (HPB) has not dared to show herself in the Caucasus, knowing that she would be immediately arrested, put into prison and deported to Siberia."
Madame Blavatsky responded by calling Olga "a withered old maid subject to hysteria and hallucinations" and "an old hag spitting venom." But it was Yuliana who saved the day, and earned HPB's undying friendship, by using her own considerable fortune to finance a media blitz in defense of Madame Blavatsky.
Now part of the Theosophical inner circle, Yuliana followed Madame Blavatsky to Germany, where she witnessed the unveiling of her guru's most precious possessions, "two great draped portraits of (HPB's) Mahatmas Morya and Koot Hoomi, painted in oils by Schmiechen."
Madame Blavatsky claimed that her Mahatmas (Hindi for Great Souls--J.T.) were "Hidden Masters" from the Himalayas, directing the evolution of the human race. Bored with spirit trumpets, disembodied voices and apports falling from the ceiling, Yuliana longed to meet one of HPB's Masters.
In June 1884, she got her wish.
Shortly after midnight, Yuliana was asleep in her room at Rugmer's Hotel in Wurzburg, Germany, when the rustling of the drapery woke her up. Blinking sleepy eyes, she tottered out of bed and came face-to-face with a dark-skinned man with a bristling full beard, who was wearing Indian robes and a white puggaree (turban).
With an approving glance at Yuliana's corset-style negligee and movie-star figure, the stranger introduced himself in fluent Russian as "the Master Morya" and said, "We have need of a 'little beetle' like you."
(Editor's Comment: I'm also wondering how and where Morya learned that 'little beetle' was General Glinka's babyhood nickname for his daughter.)
Like Madame Blavatsky, Yuliana had become a chela (Hindi for disciple) of the Hidden Masters.
Her boyfriend Soloviev did not welcome this news. He "described the encounter as an hallucination induced by staring too long at the portraits." Later, he turned against Madame Blavatsky and in 1892 wrote an expose of her entitled A Modern Priestess of Isis.
To her delight, Yuliana received a personal note from Morya on his trademark blue paper, which read, "Certainly I was there; but who can open the eyes of him who will not see?"
After Madame Blavatsky's death in 1891, other disciples came to the fore in Theosophy--Annie W. Besant and Katherine Tingley, to name two. Yuliana dropped out of sight.
Two years later, she surfaced again, now in possession of a curious document entitled Tayna Yevreystva (Translated: The Secret of the Jews--J.T.) When the Russian nobles she approached heard that this document had been "dictated by the dead," they wanted nothing to do with it.
Three years passed. Yuliana tried again in 1895. No mention of the dearly departed this time. She claimed that it had come from "the secret capital of the Jews in Nice (!!!)." It was sort of Secret 2.0.
This time, however, she had some takers--Alexei Sukhotin, a family friend from Orel; Filip Stepanov; and Sergei Nilus, a Russian mystic she had met at Biarritz in France. The public was suddenly a little more receptive. What made the difference? Answer: L'affaire Dreyfus, the 1894 court case involving French Army captain Alfred Dreyfus. This case put "the Jewish Question" on front pages throughout Europe. It also influenced Austrian journalist Theodore Herzl to found the Zionist movement.
In 1902, Yuliana tried to market it yet again. Now it was called The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion. (Think Secret 3.0--J.T.) Russian journalist M. Menshikov "reported how a lady of fashion (Yuliana) had invited him to her house to see a document of vast importance. Seated in an elegant apartment and speaking perfect French, the lady informed him that she was in direct contact with the world beyond the grave and proceeded to induct him into the mysteries of Theosophy... Finally, she initiated him into the mysteries of the Protocols."
A year later, in August 1903, the newspaper Znamya (Russian for The Banner) published Yuliana's strange little document, thereby launching The Protocols on its worldwide odyssey.
As for Yuliana, she died in Paris in 1918 at the age of 74, having lived through most of the apocalyptic war her master Morya had predicted thirty years earlier. On her deathbed, she must have thought the Apocalypse had surely come. Paris was under siege, regularly getting hit by the Germans' big rail guns and Zeppelin air raids. The French Army had mutinied. Her Tsar had been overthrown, and Russia was engulfed in revolution. The world had become a terrifying place for "the little beetle."
In 1919, the Times of London revealed uncanny similarities between The Protocols and an 1864 satire by a French lawyer named Maurice Joly. It's possible that Yuliana read the original Joly pamphlet as a young woman during her first trip to Paris and later used it to concoct her "revelation."
Having read The Protocols many times, your editor believes that the document has the same didactic, repetitive prose and otherworldly "feel" of Newbrough's Oahspe and other "spirit scriptures" of the Nineteenth Century. If I had to guess, I'd say The Protocols is about 30 percent Joly, 60 percent "Spirit World" and maybe 10 percent Morya.
And thereby hangs the tale. Did Yuliana Glinka make up The Protocols herself, marketing them with fanatic determination? Or did she promote them with such ardor because they were "a revelation" from her Himalayan masters? Clearly, more research into The Protocols' murky origins needs to be done. (See the books HPB: The Extraordinary Life of Helena Blavatsky, Founder of the Modern Theosophical Movement by Sylvia Cranston, G.P. Putnam's Sons, New York, N.Y., 1993, pages 288 through 292 , Madame Blavatsky: The Woman Behind the Myth by Marion Meade, G.P. Putnam's Sons, New York, N.Y., 1980, pages 296, 297, 298, 299, 300, 314, 354, 355 and 367; Warrant for Genocide by Norman Cohn, Harper and Row Publishers, New York, N.Y., 1967, pages 100, 101, 102 and 106; and The Tolstoys by Nikolai Tolstoy, William Morrow and Co., New York, N.Y., 1983, page 161.)
That's it for this week. Join us next time for more UFO, Fortean and paranormal news from around the planet Earth, brought to you by "the paper that goes home--UFO Roundup." See you in seven days.
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In "Macbeth," Shakespeare wrote "Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak knits up the overwrought heart and bids it break."
In four-time Tony Award winning playwright Terrence McNally's brand new play, "Mothers and Sons," ending its two-week run at New Hope's Bucks County Playhouse this weekend, two people who suffered the same loss decades earlier give words to their sorrow as they had never been willing or able to do before.
Tony and Emmy Award winner Tyne Daly, who, at age 17, appeared with her entire family at the playhouse a half-century ago in a play called "Jenny Kissed Me" and more recently starred there in "Love Letters" with James Earl Jones, plays Katharine, a woman who has lost her son to AIDS.
Manoel Felciano plays that young man's lover at the time. Mother and lover share a common loss, but they have never discussed nor shared their feelings.
While son Andre was alive, mother and lover Cal had little contact, but Katharine wants to give Cal the diary her son had kept during their relationship. She arrives unannounced at his present home in New York City to deliver it. Cal is now married to Will (played by Bobby Steggert), and they are raising their own son (Grayson Taylor).
The story involves issues like AIDS, gay rights and gay marriage, which are often the subjects of McNally's works, but Daly doesn't consider this a "problem play."
"It's a character play more than a problem play," Daly says. "It's about people who seem very real to me and how those people deal with what life throws at them. They find ways to cope by using warmth and humor too.
"It's also about how changes in values and attitudes let people look at things differently than they did before," Daly adds. "Katharine and Cal are not the people they were. The loss they shared was in the past, but they deal with it in the present after changes have taken place not only in themselves and who they are now but in the world around them."
Daly recently drew raves for her performance as Maria Callas in a revival of McNally's Tony Award-winning 1996 play "Master Class" in both New York and London. McNally supposedly wrote the role of Katharine with Daly in mind last spring.
"Her conscious motivation is the return of the diary, but there may be other issues underneath," Daly says. "Finding out more about that could be what we're all doing here in a collaborative effort in a very short time.
"Writer, director Sheryl Kaller, actors, all of us are at work on the play together here. A friend of mine said that you get about 40 percent of a play in rehearsals, and then you get the other 60 percent working on it in front of audiences. They're very important contributors to the development process."
Daly has fond memories of her 16 seasons on TV in the series "Cagney and Lacy," "Judging Amy" and "Christy," which won her six Emmy Awards.
"TV changes all the time," she says, "and that can be disconcerting. Nothing is constant there, but the theater is more reliable, more consistent. What an actor can do gives you an immediate return, a more intimate connection."
For Felciano, the role of Cal demonstrates how society's perceptions about gay people and issues have changed and developed in recent decades. Cal's relationship with Andre was not a legal marriage as his present relationship with Will is, and this is an important psychological and legal factor for the people involved.
"It's so much about who families are now and the parent-child relationships within families," Felciano says. "Katharine had lost a son, and Cal lost a lover. That's a difference in viewpoint. Cal's a father now, and his relationship with his son is something he didn't have and couldn't have had with anybody when he was Andre's lover.
"The scope of his world now is bigger in that way," Felciano adds. "He has a legal partner and the responsibilities of raising a child. He may be able to understand Katharine's loss better or at least from a different angle now that he too is a parent, and a parent losing a child is a different kind of loss and pain than his had been losing a lover."
Felciano's previous work with playwright McNally included "Ragtime," the musical version of E. L. Doctorow's novel, for which McNally wrote the book.
Will this New Hope production be the beginning step for a play that could go elsewhere? Daly and Felciano both hope so, but both know that many internal as well as external factors, including the economy, that are beyond their control are involved.
Last year, Daly starred in a well-reviewed musical called "It Shoulda Been You" by Brian Hargrove and Barbara Anselmi directed by David Hyde Pierce at New Brunswick's George Street Playhouse, and she says that's still a Broadway possibility.
Daly admits to keeping her fingers crossed.
"From the inside, that show looked really good to me. So does this one. We live in hope, and that expectation and uncertainty can be so exciting."
: 8 p.m. today and tomorrow, 4 p.m. tomorrow and 2 p.m. Sunday
: Bucks County Playhouse, 70 S. Main St., New Hope, Pa.
: $29-$57.50; (215) 862–2121 or


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Since F3 the images are saved/packed in a new file: GameDataFolder.assets
Overwrite if dds file newer
In GaDaBaMa 2.x for FSD2 there was an option to overwrite the file (image) if dds file was newer. That was useful when doing a full sync and became - from my point of view - obsolete when SyncQueue was introduced. This function used filedate to determine wether to overwrite or not.
As .assets files only contains the image data without creation dates it is not possible to check which file would be newer. So this option will be gone.
Save dds files locally
In GaDaBaMa 2.x for FSD2 there was an option to save the converted JPG files as DDS locally. F3 still uses DDS format but does not save them as individual files. It would make more sense to give an option to save the .assets file locally but then again all dds files within that .assets file would need to be extracted to rebuild a new file with the changes. Changes done in STEP3 automatically deleted the old converted DDS file. Saving .assets files locally is also not an option.
My favourite way of syncing. But in F3 you can't replace individual images. And to avoid blowing up the .assets file a rebuild of that file makes perfect sense.
F3 Sync
Because of that I'm thinking of using only one option to sync: SyncQueue + rebuild .assets file. To achieve a fast & practical sync I thought of this:
All images (JPG/PNG) in the SyncQueue are converted to DDS and saved locally (GaDaBaMa\DDS\GameId_Folder\*.dds). All files in that folder will be overwritten.
The.assets file header of the current game will be read and analyzed. Images that are not present in GaDaBaMa\DDS\GameId_Folder\*.dds will be extracted from the .assets file and saved locally.
All DDS files in the current game folder (GaDaBaMa\DDS\GameId_Folder\*.dds) will be packed in a new .assets file and saved (overwrite existing file) under F3\Data\GameData\GameId_Folder\GameId_folder.assets
- Those having used GaDaBaMa since the beginning and saved all DDS files locally will certainly appreciate the fact that all previous work done was not in vain.
- If you migrated to F3 through 2.2.1 you'll see that each cover.dds was also saved this way.
- If you haven't used GaDaBaMa before or you did not use the Save DDS locally option but you migrated to F3 through 2.2.1 you can copy FSD2\Data\GameData\*.* to GaDaBaMa\DDS\*.*. This way you'll already have all images in DDS which have been used during migration to build .assets files. So next time you sync a game with new content there is no need for GaDaBaMa to extract those files from the .assets file.
STEP1/2/3 are already done. Build .assets file was already coded in the migration function. Extract images from .assets file is done as well. Only STEP4 is left. Comment if there is something I missed, otherwise I'll proceed with STEP4 with the above logic.


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CountyLine Submersible Thermoplastic Utility Pump with 2340 GPH is made of thermoplastic construction for rugged durability. Perfect for removing water from sinks, rooftops, troughs and more. Draws water down to 5/8 in. and comes with a garden hose adapter, self-cleaning screen and 8 ft. power cord for easy mobility.
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Advanced Search
Redmondmag.com columnist Brien Posey always has an interesting take, especially with his recent article that focused on the future of the hypervisor, particularly market leading VMware.
Big changes have been happening in data centers. More and more servers are split into a bunch of VMs, and server operating systems are becoming more dedicated with smaller footprints. We've long had Linux appliances. Now Windows Server is increasing focus on Server Roles.
This is the perfect context for hypervisors (which assume the duties of an OS). You see, these slices of server computing are narrowly focused, so they need less OS support.
VMware is the company Posey sees moving in this direction (wouldn't it love to intrude on Microsoft's OS turf?). VMware is already looking to handle storage and to virtual networks -- key pieces that OS's generally touch. And Posey got a sneak peak at some cool stuff in VMware labs that seem to back up his prognostications, especially in the area of configuration.
When you look at things like Linux appliances, a lightweight OS doesn't actually have to do all that much. It's easy to assume that VMware may not be that far away.
One of the questions Posey didn't address is could VMware support Windows servers apps? Would this let IT run these apps without paying the Microsoft server license tax, and would Redmond let it?
What is your expert analysis? Send it forth to [email protected]
Posted by Doug Barney on 09/12/2012 at 1:19 PM
Microsoft is now planning to disable Basic Authentication use with its Exchange Online service sometime in the "second half of 2021," according to a Friday announcement.
Microsoft this week offered advice for organizations using Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager with remote Windows systems that need to get patched, and it also announced Update 2002.
Azure Edge Zones, a new edge computing technology from Microsoft designed to enable new scenarios for developers and partners, emerged as a preview release this week.
Microsoft is shifting its big events this year to be online only, including Ignite 2020.
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Blessed New Year!
What will this New Year bring? Sometimes the future looks hazy. We do not know what will happen next. We cannot know for sure and not knowing can make us anxious. We all want to know how everything turns out but that knowledge belongs only to God. The problem is, since we do not know what is going to happen next, we are inclined to forget that God does know. God sees it all from beginning to end, like a magnificent story from above; he sees it all at once. The future belongs to God, and he determines what happens next. We can trust God with the future, because God is always and forever the same. God's holiness, his mercy, his purposes never change. Even so, that does not make God predictable. God is beyond us, infinitely greater and wiser, and we will never figure out his ways.
We know the Bible says in Romans 8:28, "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose". God is always going to do something good; God is always going to bless us. Still one thing is for sure: God will surprise us every time. He will always do something new. God loves to create and do new things. A friend taught classes in country line dancing. She loved to teach dancing, but she had one major frustration. Whatever single dance she would teach first, that is the dance the class would want to do all night long. Apparently, rather than learn another new dance, people would rather do the same dance they know over and over again. The problem with sticking only with what we have done in the past is that all we know is past; yet we serve a God who is calling us forward into a new future. God says, "Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing!" (Isaiah 43:18-19) Are you ready for God to do something new in your life and in our life together at church? Ready or not, as we join to walk with the Lord this New Year, God only leads us in one direction. FORWARD.
A good theme for 2018 could be LIVE FORWARD. We want to be a people released from the past and ready to receive every new thing God holds out to us in days yet to come. So let us get ready to LIVE FORWARD. In this first month of the year, I am asking you to make a couple of new commitments. First, set aside the seven days between the last two Sundays of the month, January 21 to 28 for a special week of fasting, praying, and renewal. We all need this time of spiritual renewal, and I believe the future of our church depends on it. Second, in order to grow as disciples, we are asking everyone to start a new journey with a small group or Bible study group. If you are not part of a small group or Bible study group, find out what group you can join. What God wants to do next in your life may very well begin with this new commitment to grow in relation to Christ with others. I am asking you to try it. After all, it is a new year, the start of something we have never seen before. What does the future hold for you and me? What does the future hold for our church? New things according to God's purpose So let's join together, and trust God as we LIVE FORWARD in ministry together in this new year.
Shalom, Pastor Lia


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