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I wanted to write about technology... how we live in a world immersed in that very thing. Thing? Or is it a space, a dimension, a sphere?
I'm a media production student and at the start of the week, I was encouraged to discuss my 'media map' in a seminar. What media do I engage with on a daily basis and how do those media interlink? Sounds simple right? Well just fifteen years ago, it was. It's a very different story now.
How many of you sit down and watch a television programme without engaging with it in any other way? By that I mean don't tweet about it or visit its website to watch behind-the-scenes clips or read spoilers online or in a magazine or newspaper? Not many, I would bet. How many of you watch Big Brother or Eastenders or Britain's Got Talent whilst simultaneously adding to the collection of #CBB, #WhoKilledLucy and #BritainsGotNoTalent hashtags popping up every millisecond on Twitter? Most of you, I assume. How many of you actually watch a TV programme on a TV?! Or do you watch it on your smart phone or tablet or laptop, on iPlayer or ITVPlayer or 4OD? Do you watch it on NetFlix or your Sky recordings or a dodgy free streaming website?
Now let me ask you this... how many of you use social media? Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Vine, YouTube, Pinterest, Blogger, Tumblr, Snapchat... you know the ones. You use at least two of those, I can guarantee. And they interlink don't they? You post your Snapchats on Instagram, you post your Instagram photos on Facebook, you share a link to your YouTube video on Twitter and tweet your Vines too. You pin your blog post on Pinterest and screenshot your friends tweet to upload to Instagram. Am I right or am I right?
And you multitask too, don't you? You read your kindle on the bus, listen to music whilst scrolling through your Twitter feed, you snapchat while you're drunk dancing, you upload a photo to Instagram whilst you're in the middle of that moment that you took the photo of and therefore not living wholly in the moment.
What happened to watching a programme at the time of broadcast on the television set? What happened to discussing it with your family who are sat next to you, instead of discussing it with other @ usernames on Twitter? What happened to enjoying the moment so much and soaking up the company of the people you're with that you forget to check your messages, you forget to send a snapchat, you forget to absent-mindedly scroll through your Twitter feed whilst half-listening to them tell you about things they're finding difficult at the moment?
I say all this, but I do it too. Of course I do. And I'm not saying it's bad or shameful or annoying. It's just different to what it was. 15 years ago, none of this existed.
We are a world immersed in technology. We play games on a screen, not games in a garden. We talk to people as text, not as voice. If alone, we don't observe the world around us, we observe the latest happenings of Twitter, e.g apparently someone just ate a grape or beat their high score on Candy Crush.
Do you ever look around you, when you're in an airport or at a café or on a train or sat at the dinner table, and see 99% of the other human beings around you staring at a screen? I notice it so often, and it looks lonely.
But, of course, they're not lonely because they're texting 10 other people in a WhatsApp group, sending rabbit emoji's to each other just 'for the bants'. They're not lonely.
Thanks to technology we can now watch other peoples lives on YouTube, have a direct conversation with a celebrity without being anywhere near them and share our innermost feelings with Facebook 'friends' we've met once, or not at all.
Let this blog that you've just read give you food for thought. Challenge it, explore it, consider it. With technology with us and all around us, do we become a world immersed in the digital, in pixels, in cyber space? Are we truly making the most out of living, out of being a human being, or just out of having a smart phone in our hand?
Decide for yourself.
P.S. My blog has now had well over 5,000 pageviews - thank you so much to each
and every one of you who takes the time to read my ramblings! x
one of you


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Action Comics Weekly #626 (Secret Six)
"Capitol Offenses"
Writer - Martin Pasko
Pencils - Frank Springer
Inks - Frank McLaughlin
Colors - Carl Gafford
Letters - Albert DeGuzman
Editor - Robert Greenberger
"int" is usually how I begin laying out my patented comics-reviewing format. I fill in the credits... hit enter twice... type "int"... hit enter twice... type "--"... hit enter twice... type "syn"... hit enter twice... type "--"... hit enter twice... type "rev".
Now you know all of my Secrets. Were there Six of 'em? I lost count...
We open with Sixers, Vic, LaDonna, and Maria attempting to evade a helicopter in the skies above Arlington, Virginia. Meanwhile, on the opposite coast, Tony and Mitch play dress-up with some Imagik prosthetics. They kinda playfully bicker back and forth, which feels like it comes out of nowhere. Back in VA, Vic leans out of the VTOL and blasts the chopper to bits... it falls, and crashes into what's gotta be an Olympic-sized swimming pool in some random backyard.
While those Sixers set down and try and figure out their next move, we shift scenes to that Hunter S. Thompson-looking guy. He's chatting up another Agency member about how Fenedy has called a morning meeting. Then... he deduces that there might just be a new Secret Six! What's this... nine chapters in a row where he has this revelation? Dude, get over it... you were right the first time! Take the win and move on!
Next, we check in with Luke... who had been taken captive at the end of last chapter. Some Agency goons approach his prone body, with a sizable hypodermic in tow. Luke manages to get the upper hand and fight off the pair of geeks.
Back at the VTOL, Tony (disguised apparently as the wizard Shazam) arrives to fill in his teammates on everything he'd learned during his West Coast excursion. He believes it was this "Agency" that downed the original Six, and not Mockingbird. We get some awkward (which is to say, wrong) word-balloon placement here, which kinda muddies things, but I feel like we're smart enough to know who really said what.
More than that, Mockingbird also knows who said what... ya see, he's got the entire operation "bugged". He's tickled pink that his new Sixers are blaming Fenedy and the gang for all of their troubles.
But not everything is going quite as well for ol' Mista Byrd. Ya see, his current captive is taking his sweet time "coming around". That captive is, of course... wait for it... Rafael! Wow, we haven't seen that guy in ages! He's looking far less Bert Convy-like here... and more like Namor the Sub-Mariner when the Fantastic Four first found him. We join him as he's sitting on a floor playing with a train set. Seems as though he thinks he's a little boy... or something.
Well, no, not really. As one of Mockingbird's goons enter with his evening meal, Rafe overpowers him... with a toy train, then makes a run for it. He is found, almost immediately, by Mockingbird who mocks him for being unable to escape... after all, his father was an escape artist!
It feels like we might finally be getting somewhere with this one! Though, we gotta keep in mind that there are still four chapters left to go...
Let's break this one down. Four of the Six have been reunited... and have shared intel. That intel may not be the most accurate, but we'll burn that bridge when we get to it. We finally get to see Mockingbird "in the flesh", as in, not just as a talking head on a monitor. While it's pretty hilarious that he wears his full cloak even when cloistered away in his headquarters, it was still cool to "see" him.
I remember way back in the long ago, when I was reading ElfQuest. There had been ongoing in-story rumblings about the half-Elf/half-Troll character, "Two-Edge". I never thought we'd get to see him... then, we did! The Mockingbird appearance was... well, a lot less cool than that... but, still... forward momentum!
Rafe being "brainwashed" into being a child? Okay, it's interesting... but, doesn't get enough "build". It also... kinda tips the creator's hand a bit, doesn't it? We got Mockingbird talking about "genetics"... he's got Rafe acting like a little boy... we know Mockingbird is one of the original Six... and Rafe is the son of one of the original Six. Ya see where I'm goin' with this?
I'd be remiss not to mention how Hunter Thompson deduced that there might just be a new Secret Six... again! Would somebody please just pat this guy on his bald head and tell him he's right?! This reminds me of making the mistake of laughing at a joke a little kid tells... they try and "recreate" that moment for the rest of the day, and that just ain't fun. So, Hunter-looking guy... from me to you: You're right, buddy! Good job!
Overall, I'm pleased that this feature is moving forward. Lord knows it's been mostly stagnant since its return! I will admit though, I am kinda looking forward to referring to this one in the past tense. The art, which I don't mention nearly enough, is still strong as ever!
Tomorrow: Off-Roading!
Your Moment of Vartox:
|From Power Girl (vol.2) #7 (February, 2010)
Jimmy Palmiotti & Justin Gray (w) / Amanda Conner (a)

subset: commoncrawl


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- This event has passed.
July 8, 2016 @ 8:00 am - 5:00 pm
Services available beginning 9:30 a.m.
The Academic Calendar reflects major dates and events in the college community. Deadlines for all student record transactions are specified for regular 16-week semester courses. Deadlines for alternative calendar courses (late-starting, online, self-paced and short-term courses) are posted in the schedule of credit classes and available in the Registrar's Office.
Registration and payment is available online at all times including after hours, weekends and holidays.
Failure to arrange payment by the deadline could result in losing your place in class.
This institutional academic calendar does not reflect transaction deadlines for alternate scheduled course offerings. Online registration is available at https://www.sfcc.edu/


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This invitation features a custom monogram design printed on white shimmer cardstock, mounted onto gold shimmer cardstock then layered onto a rich black pocket. The invitation is completed with a gold shimmer band with custom printed monogram. The gold shimmer envelopes compliment this set beautifully.
This invitation is part of our Alexandra Collection which includes:
- custom design (endless revisions)
- 5x7 invitation card
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Classic Invitation with Layer and Pocket
Save youself some time and have us print all of your addresses for you! This option is avaliable when you visit our add ons page located under the Invitation Collection tab.
Our Full Set Address Printing includes:
- Guests full name and address
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All printed in the fonts and color of you choice.


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Cheltenham ice rink is open!
Come skate in Cheltenham Park! What a great way to get your kids off the couch and screen… and to feel the wind in your hair and get some exercise…
Even better – brag to your friends that you helped out at the rink. We need volunteers! Please send an email to firstname.lastname@example.com if you would like to help maintain the rink. Most importantly, at this time of the year, we need people to help shovel and flood.
Please come and enjoy a great Canadian tradition - outdoor ice skating. Teenagers play hockey, little kids learn to skate, age groups are mixed and a great place to gather to enjoy a great Canadian winter!
A special thanks to Doug Jones, the Parks Supervisor who has worked on behalf of the City to provide us with flood lights, hoses and access to the water necessary to flood the rink.
The Cheltenham rink is an all volunteer community project. The LPRA provides support for this important community initiative.


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Since 2002 Perimeter Institute has been recording seminars, conference talks, public outreach events such as talks from top scientists using video cameras installed in our lecture theatres. Perimeter now has 7 formal presentation spaces for its many scientific conferences, seminars, workshops and educational outreach activities, all with advanced audio-visual technical capabilities.
Recordings of events in these areas are all available and On-Demand from this Video Library and on Perimeter Institute Recorded Seminar Archive (PIRSA). PIRSA is a permanent, free, searchable, and citable archive of recorded seminars from relevant bodies in physics. This resource has been partially modelled after Cornell University's arXiv.org.
Accessibly by anyone with internet, Perimeter aims to share the power and wonder of science with this free library.
Quantum-reduced loop gravity is a model of loop quantum gravity, whose characteristic feature is the considerable simplicity of its kinematical structure in comparison with that of full loop quantum gravity. The model therefore provides an accessible testing ground for probing the physical implications of loop quantum gravity. In my talk I will give a brief introduction to quantum-reduced loop gravity, and examine the relation between the quantum-reduced model and full loop quantum gravity.
A standard approach to quantifying resources is to determine which operations on the resources are freely available and to deduce the ordering relation among the resources that these operations induce. If the resource of interest is the nonclassicality of the correlations embodied in a quantum state, that is, entanglement, then it is typically presumed that the appropriate choice of free operations is local operations and classical communication (LOCC).
We comment on the recently introduced Gauss-Bonnet gravity in four dimensions. We argue that it does not make sense to consider this theory to be defined by a set of D->4 solutions of the higher-dimensional Gauss-Bonnet gravity. We show that a well-defined D->4 limit of Gauss-Bonnet Gravity is obtained generalizing a method employed by Mann and Ross to obtain a limit of the Einstein gravity in D=2 dimensions. This is a scalar-tensor theory of the Horndeski type obtained by dimensional reduction methods.
Light dark photons are subject to various plasma effects, such as Debye screening and resonant oscillations, which can lead to a more complex cosmological evolution than is experienced by conventional cold dark matter candidates. Maintaining a consistent history of dark photon dark matter requires ensuring that the super-thermal abundance present in the early Universe (i) does not deviate significantly after the formation of the CMB, and (ii) does not excessively leak into the Standard Model plasma after BBN.
The information paradox can be realized in two-dimensional models of gravity. In this setting, we show that the large discrepancy between the von Neumann entropy as calculated by Hawking and the requirement of unitarity is fixed by including new saddles in the gravitational path integral. These saddles arise in the replica method as wormholes connecting different copies of the black hole. We will discuss their appearance both in asymptotically AdS and asymptotically flat theories of gravity.
In this talk I will discuss ongoing efforts at UChicago to explore matter made of light. I will begin with a broad introduction to the challenges associated with making matter from photons, focusing specifically on (1) how to trap photons and imbue them with synthetic mass and charge; (2) how to induce photons to collide with one another; and (3) how to drive photons to order, by cooling or otherwise.
When Alice shares thermofield double with Bob, her time evolution can make the wormhole grow. We identify different kinds of operations Alice can do as being responsible for the growth of different parts of spacetime and see how it fits together with subregion duality. With this, we give a quantum circuit interpretation of evaporating black hole geometry. We make an analogy between the appearance of island for evaporating black hole and the transition from two-sided to one-sided black hole in the familiar example of perturbed thermofield double.


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Croatia will, once again, host best European Men's Youth teams from 9 until 19 of August in Koprivnica and Varazdin exactly two years after the Men's 18 EHF EURO 2016 was held in in sport halls in Zagreb and Koprivnica. Handball fans in Croatia will have a chance to enjoy great youth handball once again.
Total 16 teams will be competing for the gold medal at the Championship:
- Croatia
- France
- Germany
- Slovenia
- Serbia
- Denmark
- Spain
- Iceland
- Portugal
- Norway
- Russia
- Sweden
- Israel
- Romania
- Hungary
- Poland
We kindly invite you to visit our website, where we are going to present all news connected with Tournament.
We are looking forward to seeing you in Varazdin and Koprivnica.
Preparing a healthy and student friendly environment conducive to learning is a pre-requisite for any effective instruction to take https://domyhomework.guru place


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A new school year beckons. Whether it's your first day of school or your student days are long behind you, the signs are everywhere. Celebrate the coming fall with a new backpack or bag. Find your perfect companion with these five picks, and make a fresh start this academic season.
1 Let's Do Lunch.
Nestle your meal du jour inside this insulated backpack. Insert your favorite beverage in the bottle carrier and place some snacks in the smaller pockets. Extra pouches are ideal for stowing your wallet and keys. On weekends, this bag is the perfect partner for a hike or park outing. Head out on your next adventure with this in tow. Picnic Time Backpack, $59, Evelyn & Harriette's, 1232 Oysterdale Rd., Oley, 610.987.6055.
2 Vivid Imagination.
Head off to preschool in style. These comfy, quilted backpacks look like a page out of a favorite storybook. Choose from a variety of bright colors and whimsical designs to express your child's personality. Each comes with a matching stainless steel water bottle, perfect for snack time for your little one. Stephen Joseph Quilted Backpack, $32, Petite Milan, 484.258.3580. petitemilan.com
3 Business Class.
Make a statement at your next meeting or presentation. Pack up your office and work anywhere with this stylish messenger bag. Tuck your laptop into the padded interior for safekeeping. Secure other tools of the trade in adjacent pockets. This durable canvas bag is hardworking inside and out. Black Canvas Executive Messenger Bag, $49.95, Barnes & Noble, Broadcasting Square Shopping Center, 2751 Paper Mill Rd., Wyomissing, 610.236.0100. barnesandnoble.com
4 Athletic Aptitude.
Bounce through the halls with this sporty backpack. Padded shoulder straps help you carry academic and extracurricular gear in comfort. Plenty of pockets make it easy to stay organized and ready for class. Wet/dry compartments are a game-changer for separating homework papers and after-practice clothes. Nike Hoops Elite Max Air Team 2.0 Backpack, $85, Dick's Sporting Goods, Broadcasting Square Shopping Center, 2767 Paper Mill Rd., Wyomissing, 610.373.7366. dickssportinggoods.com
5 Gather and Go.
No matter where your daily adventure takes you, this tote has you covered. Stock its roomy interior with an eclectic mix of small and large items. Bold stripes and a monogram add classy sophistication. Reverse the soft fabric and change your look to match your mood (and your outfit). Reversible Tote, $49.95, Anni B Monogramming, 1424 Monroe Avenue, Wyomissing, 610.780.7368. facebook.com/AnniBMonogramming


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If you're preparing for an MMI, you may be wondering how you can prepare for stations on calculations and data analysis. This blog will give you some examples of the kinds of questions that may feature at these stations, as well as our top tips on how to prepare for drug dosage conversions and graph interpretation.
Preparing for your MMI? Try our MMI Circuit!Book an MMI Circuit
Many medical schools now include a Calculation station at their MMIs.
Wondering if the medical schools you've applied to will feature calculation stations? Find out which stations have featured previously at all medical school MMIs on our MMI page!
At these stations, you will be asked simple calculations relating to a clinical scenario – for example, you may need to calculate the correct drug dose to give to a patient, or convert metrics. These questions can take a variety of forms:
At some medical schools, you won't be given a calculator during this station, so a good way to prepare for these is to practice your mental maths beforehand.
You may be given a sheet of paper for your calculations, so practice working out basic sums by hand and completing practice questions, like the ones above. Our blog, How to do Drug Calculations, guides you through the answers to the above questions, as well as detailing some key tips on how to convert units.
Be mindful of the units in drug calculations, and practice your conversions between metrics – for example, converting from micrograms to grams and between decimals and percentages. It may be a good idea to memorise some of these basic conversions to assist you (and then get a friend to test you!) such as 1g equals 1000 mg, and so on.
You could also practice some of these conversions, for example:
Answers at the end of the blog!
At a station on Data Interpretation, you may be given data to discuss – this could be on anything from study findings on blood glucose to heart monitors. This doesn't involve calculation but assesses your ability to analyse data – and this may take a number of forms:
These stations draw on basic Biology and Maths knowledge – for example, with the second question above, this would require maths knowledge of graphs/gradients, and also biological knowledge of antibiotics and how they work – topics you will already have an understanding of through GCSE or A-Level. Your interviewers won't expect you to notice everything about a chart or graph, but they want to see that you can use this data to spot trends and draw some conclusions.
With these stations, the key is to vocalise your ideas and don't be afraid to state the obvious. Spend some time establishing what the graph is showing. What does the x or y axis show? What are the variables? Is there a sudden rise or decline and what does that suggest?
Remember to vocalise these things aloud, using the numbers from the graph. Then remember to focus on what the interviewer has asked you – for example, with the insulin graph, look for the specific patient and describe any trends you see in their insulin levels. You can visit an answer guide to this in our MMI Question Bank (Question 9).
Another way to prepare for this kind of question is to keep on top of the content covered in A-Level Biology. Take a look at some of the graphs from past AS papers and the kinds of questions that were asked to familiarise yourself with interpreting graphs.
Two key terms that often appear in these papers are 'describe' and 'explain' – you could take a similar approach to the MMI data analysis. What do you see, and what does that signify?
These questions may draw on basic Biology knowledge you will have covered at school – for example, insulin levels or antibiotics – so these past papers will also be useful to get used to these kinds of graphs as well as refreshing your knowledge.
If you're struggling, you could also ask your Biology or Chemistry teacher for some help – and they may be able to provide you with example questions of data interpretation graphs.
Calculations answers:
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Stranmillis Teaching College
Coral Environmental have been employed by Stranmillis College to provide and carry out a full legionella management programme within all of their buildings. Coral will assess and monitor the domestic water systems each month and provide detailed analysis and guidance to Stranmillis in order to allow them to fully comply with their statutory requirements.
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text: 5-10+ FREE Samples From SampleSource (Survey Required) [Verified Received By Mail] Sample Source always has hundreds of thousands of free samples from brands you know and love. Sign up now and fill out your profile if you haven't. Once you complete your profile and any surveys ... John 'Samples' Clark Mar 31, 2020 Read More Advertisement


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Chesser Resources Ltd (ASX:CHZ) directors have completed the acquisition of ordinary shares in the company pursuant to a subscription agreement entered into on the same terms as the placement completed in January 2019.
Director share subscription details
The company had raised $790,000 via its placement at 3.8 cents per share to sophisticated investors in January 2019.
Chesser has a strategic land package of over 400 square kilometres in the Eastern Senegal gold province in West Africa.
The region contains numerous large-scale gold deposits, covering the highly prospective and underexplored Birimian greenstone belt.
This includes Barrick Gold Corp's (NYSE:GOLD) Loulo and Gounkoto mines with a combined resource of more than 18 million ounces of gold.
Chesser has already Identified a significant 4 kilometres x 4.5 kilometres ring-like geochemical gold anomaly at its flagship Diamba Sud Project, with deep auger intersections of up to 21.1 g/t gold.
The company has multiple high-grade priority drill targets at Diamba Sud.
Chesser's maiden drill program commenced in January 2019. The phase 1 program will include 5,000 metres of reverse circulation drilling (RC) at Diamba Sud.
Next steps and news flow
• Complete phase 1 drilling
• Assay results
• Interpretation of results
• Commence phase 2 RC drilling (5,000m) at Diamba Sud
• Assay results
• Review and interpretation of all project results
• Assess strategic acquisitions and prioritise portfolio activity


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OKTAL-SE publications
By topic- Electro-Optic (infrared)
- Radio-Frequency (radar)
- Active-Imagery (laser)
- Satellites Navigation (GNSS)
- Company
By year2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 | 2001 | 2000 | 1999 | 1998 | 0000 |
A presentation of ATR processing chain validation procedure of IR terminal guidance version of the AASM modular air-to-ground weaponSPIE 2009
Developed by Sagem (SAFRAN Group), the AASM is a modular Air-To-Ground "Fire and Forget" weapon designed to be able to neutralise a large range of targets under all conditions. The AASM is composed of guidance and range enhancement kits that give bombs, already in service, new operational capabilities. AASM Guidance kit exists in two different versions. The IMU/GPS guidance version is able to achieve "ten-meter class" accuracy on target in all weather conditions. The IMU/GPS/IR guidance version is able to achieve "meter class" accuracy on target with poor precision geographic designation or in GPS-denied flight context, thanks to a IR sensor and a complex image processing chain.
Aircraft infrared signature, taken into account body, engine and plume contributionsITBMS 2009
The IR signature of an aircraft is the result of several major contributions, namely: - Hot engine parts of the tail pipe and/or the air intakes - Combustion hot gases (and in some cases hot carbon particles) in the plume - Skin of the airframe, due to the thermal emission resulting from aerodynamic heating and internal heat sources and the reflected ambient radiation from the sun, the sky and the ground. The aim of this paper is to explain how the combination of CFD++, CFD computational code, RadTherm-IR, 3D thermal computational code and SE-Workbench-EO from OKTAL-SE is an adequate solution for computing the IR signature of a jet aircraft taking all this major into account.
Simulation of Active EO Imaging System based on SE-Workbench and OSMoS software toolsITBMS 2009
Active EO imaging systems are more and more considered as an outstanding solution for detection/recognition or guidance purposes in severe atmospheric conditions such as heavy fogs or in the presence of smoke due to flares in smoke-producing devices. In particular, flash laser systems that have range gating capabilities enable the elimination of photons that are backscattered by the particles in the atmosphere and hence improve the systems detection performances. Range gated systems also offer recognition/identification capabilities based on the target shape identification. Thus it is of great interest to be able to assess the performances of such systems in different operational conditions and simulation is a good means to do this. The SE-Workbench workshop, also called CHORALE (French acceptation for "simulated Optronic Acoustic Radar battlefield") is used by the French DGA to perform multi-sensors simulations. CHORALE enables the user to create virtual and realistic multi spectral 3D scenes, and then generates the physical signal received by a sensor, typically an IR sensor.
The coupling of MATISSE and the SE-WORKBENCH: a new solution for simulating efficiently the atmospheric radiative transfer and the sea surface radiationSPIE 2009
The SE-WORKBENCH workshop, also called CHORALE (French acceptation for "simulated Optronic Acoustic Radar battlefield") is used by the French DGA (MoD) and several other Defense organizations and companies all around the World to perform multi-sensors simulations. CHORALE enables the user to create virtual and realistic multi spectral 3D scenes that may contain several types of target, and then generate the physical signal received by a sensor, typically an IR sensor. MATISSE [4,5] is a background scene generator developed for the computation of natural background spectral radiance images and useful atmospheric radiative quantities (radiance and transmission along a line of sight, local illumination, solar irradiance...). Backgrounds include atmosphere, low and high altitude clouds, sea and land. A particular characteristic of the code is its ability to take into account atmospheric spatial variability (temperatures, mixing ratio, etc) along each line of sight. An Application Programming Interface (API) is included to facilitate its use in conjunction with external codes. The paper will demonstrate the advantages for the SE WORKEBENCH of using MATISSE as a new atmospheric code, but also for computing the radiative properties of the sea surface.


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One of the things mentioned in that piece was the general unhappiness Cal has felt about academia in its current form. Perhaps not totally unrelated is a rant published by Christian Smith about the BS in academia.
It seems a crisis of faith in the efficacy and viability of academia is not exactly "mainstream" but it's not exactly not normal at the moment. We looked at Justin Stover's piece about how there was no real defense for the liberal arts aka the humanities.
Stover's case was that the crisis regarding the funding and legitimacy of the humanities is ultimately not about the humanities themselves but about the legitimacy of the class that is expected to both learn and teach the humanities as they have been understood. There's more to the case than "just" that, to be sure, and there's more to be said about the matter , but it has been congruent with an idea I've been mulling over here in the last year or so, that one of the challenges academicians have struggled to face down is the possibility, or even the reality, that despite what they think about the top one percent the academic world nevertheless constitutes its own form of ruling class and caste of power-wielders. The possibility that, should some kind of revolution take placein the United States toward a more populist or redistributivist goal be undertaken, that academics in America could or even would be regarded as "class enemies" is not something academics tend to think about, to go by the way academics have written about the formally less educated types of people who stereotypically voted for that one guy.
Enrollments have gone down and prices are still high. While white collar labor has seen some results from unionization blue collar labor hasn't had the same kinds of success. Even a person dedicated, in principle, to the value of lifelong education can start to get the impression that academia has become such a prestige racket that it's not worth getting kids in debt up to their eyeballs earning a degree that may net them no jobs. STEM is not necessarily an answer in itself because gluts are gluts. For a while business and econ majors were oversaturating the job market, law schools are not necessarily the hot ticket now, either (maybe? rusty on this one). So with those various thoughts in mind ... Smith's piece.
Some might see the larger crisis as being a crisis in the nature of liberalism itself. There are folks who see that as being the nature of the crisis. Others seem to feel, if I'm understanding them, that the delicate balance of Western liberalism and humanism can be salvaged if we just get back to Enlightenment values (John Borstlap's take, as best I can tell); or if we just reinject an appropriate dose of Christendom back into Western liberalism, perhaps, things can be stabilized (which may or may not be a rough way to describe the tack taken by the red and blue partisans in the United States).
There's been some mumurings and rumblings to the effect that education has become a bubble, not unlike real estate was a decade ago. Rod Dreher recently posted about a proposed law in New Mexico, asking if this might be proof of the existence of the bubble.
by way of Rod Dreher's blog.
If there's no constraint on what school the kid applies to then a whole bunch of kids could apply to colleges that aren't even in New Mexico. Let's pretend for sake of imagining things that New Mexico passes a bill and in compliance with the bill 80% of the students apply to some college in California, or Texas, or Washington, or Arizona or ... basically anywhere but New Mexico. Unless there's a specific provision that high school students in New Mexico schools have to apply to at least one college in New Mexico there's no reason the enrollments would stop dropping, is there?
That's even "if" the thing passes. If exceptions are made for apprenticing that gets back to the question of what the options are for that. Ever since people decided to enforce child labor laws in the wake of the Depression there are a lot of things adolescents can't legally do because of child labor laws. Merely imposing one legal requirement without accounting for its impact on all other associated enforceable policies and norms is just not the shrewdest way to play. If a kid aims to apprentice then they'd best apprentice fast, I guess. Whether or not this passes, it might open up some questions as to the extent to which adolescents have been restricted from fully joining the labor force on account of stuff like child labor laws. Would a teenager who seeks to apprentice be allowed some legal clemency so that he/she and the prospective mentor don't run afoul of child labor laws? It's certainly possible for people who advocate for this law, which seems like a bad idea since it compels rather than provides and because the goal of raising enrollments seems dubious, because "if" the goal is to go for a better educated workforce so as to lead companies into New Mexico perhaps there's more than one way to tackle that problem than by insisting that every high schooler apply for at least one college.
And here is, roughly speaking, how this ties to what Cal described as the Seminary Industrial Complex, modeling a would be renaissance in Christian academics on the academic paradigms of the Anglo-American culture seems like it might be a ... not-so-great idea if the crises reported within academia and the liberal arts education in the US and UK have been what they've been.
If Christian higher education wants to keep up the way things have been going in academia more generally it doesn't look like the present "norm" is all that inspiring.
And apropos of tlak about Christian learning ... I dunno, it has me thinking about how places like The Gospel Coalition talk about Christian learning ... and yet even among the self-identify Calvinists and Reformed types there hasn't been an English language translation of very much by Bullinger, has there? There's a market for marriage book s and a need for manliness but a more extensive English language translation of Bullinger? Eh ... .
I could throw out the idea that maybe If someone in musicology wanted to do something fun they could translate all six of volumes of Anton Reicha's treatise on advanced composition into English. If a music scholar with mastery of French were to do that I'd want a copy of that set. Yet, as Kyle Gann has lamented, the musicology ladder has a prestige system and you get more points for doing the hundredth book on the big name composer than for doing pioneering scholarship on someone who isn't as high up on the prestige racket's list. But as a matter of personal curiosity and interest Boehmian composers are one of my pet interests. So Reicha's woodwind quintets are all fantastic and I have admired Matiegka's guitar sonatas since I first heard them five or six years ago or so.
Whether or not the problems that beset academia are entirely due to neoliberalism or neo-Marxists thought seems doubtful ... it might well be that American educational culture has benefited from the worst tendencies of both sets of views.
Thursday, February 01, 2018
a postscript to some thoughts on "Against the Seminary Industrial Complex", Christian Smith's rant on BS in academia and a bill proposed in New Mexico that would require high schoolers to apply to at least one college
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Thursday, November 26, 2009
Survival Run
This one is actually a pretty complex shot, so I thought I'd upload a set of "progress steps" which should make it easier to visualize the recipe:
Obviously you start with your figure. (Incidentally, click on the filmstrip at left ... it's actually about 500 pixels wide, so you can easily see what's going on there. Also, the finished pic was uploaded at 1000 wide...) You start with a bare stage. Bring in your model, add whatever hair and clothes (or not!) that you want. Change the color of his eyes maybe, and pose him however you want him posed. By this time you ought to know what the background should be. Forest? City street? Docking bay? Okay...
You can pay a fee and download a digital model (which is the best way to go), or you can paint something yourself (also great, but takes a long time), or you can use a digital; photo (also cool, but do some digital effects on it, or it ends up looking "raw" and "fake"), or you can swipe something off the Internet ... in which case, for goodness' sake do SOMETHING with the image to make it different from the work you swiped!! You can flip it left to right; you can swap the colors; you can leech our or super-saturate the colors; you can blur it way down with a median filter. You can take out objects and paint in (or paste in) other objects. You still end up with a "derivative" image, and the original artist could either object or applaud! But at least you did did something rather than just stealing a picture.
Anyway, however you get the background, now the challenge is to set up the lights on the model (in DAZ) to make it look like the character is part of, and belongs in, the background. So you set up some distant lights and point lights of whatever color is right, and render one. Tweak it all till it looks perfect (middle one in the filmstrip). Then open the render in your paintshop program ... I like and recommend Micrographx. And go to town your your filters -- Light Studio and Lens Flare studio.
Keep going till you get exactly what you want, and ... save it. That's another one done!
Jade, November 27
Labels: backgrounds, digital painting, filters, lighting, Micrographx


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Axalta to Acquire Plascoat Systems Limited
Founded in 1952, Plascoat was a pioneer in the science behind the formulation, manufacturing, and application of thermoplastic polyolefin coatings.
At the signing, left to right, Keith Bilham (Group Finance Director, IPT Ltd), Jeremy Stoke (Chairman, ITP Ltd), Matthias Schoenberg, Axalta Vice President and President Europe, Middle East and Africa Region. (Photo: Axalta)
Axalta Coating Systems has acquired Plascoat Systems Limited, a leading supplier of thermoplastic powder coatings. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
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After working as a Sommelier with Chicago's most talented Chefs, Jennifer joined the Texas Hill Country wine community. She is the Marketing Director, Sommelier and Educator for a boutique winery, Kuhlman Cellars, in Stonewall Texas. Additionally she sits on the Board of Directors for the San Antonio Chefs Cooperative which works to promote local farms, produce, wine, spirits and beer while giving back to the agricultural community.
She writes a bi-monthly wine column for Edible San Antonio and is Certified Sommelier and Certified Specialist of Wine as well as being a member of Les Dames d' Escoffier.


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U Mobile and WeChat partner up to entice visitors from China
U Mobile and WeChat partner up to entice visitors from China
U Mobile is not only catering to the needs of locals and our heavy data consumption habits, but also that of visitors from China. The telco has just recently announced the launch of the U Mobile WeChat Go SIM, in partnership with the Tencent-owned social media app and platfrom WeChat.
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The U Mobile WeChat Go SIM pack will be available starting December 6, 2017, and will be priced at RM38.00. Since it's aimed at Chinese tourists, it will naturally be available across various international airports in the country. Beyond that, it will still be available at any of the 138 U Mobile outlets across the country.
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Two point-and-click titles from Tim Schafer's studio Double Fine Productions will be coming to the Nintendo Switch. The first, Grim Fandango Remastered, is a revised version of the classic title for modern platforms that came out in 2015, while the two-part Broken Age marked Schafer's triumphant return to adventure games. Double Fine didn't announce when either would come to the Switch.
'Grim Fandango Remastered' and 'Broken Age' are headed to Switch
Two Tim Schafer classics are coming to Nintendo's console.
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We are excited to say that we're working on bringing Grim Fandango Remastered and Broken Age to Nintendo Switch! #e32018 pic.twitter.com/R26Whl58bh— Double Fine (@DoubleFine) June 13, 2018
The announcement came alongside a night of performances commemorating Grim Fandango's 20th anniversary. The original voice cast assembled for a live reading of a slice of the game's script backed by music from the title's soundtrack composer Peter McConnell and Clint Bajakian. The night had another guest: Jack Black, who had lent voices to Double Fine games Brutal Legend and Broken Age, showed up to add to the cast. Watch the full event below:
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|"He would have lived, if there had been enough prey for him to eat. Now I'm just waiting to join him."
|— Misty Water to Silver Frost about Broken Feather in The Sun Trail, page 2
Broken Feather is a tom.[2]
In the Dawn of the Clans arc
The Sun Trail
- When Silver Frost offers Misty Water an eagle carcass, she declines the offer, and states that ever since Broken Feather died, she had no appetite. She notes that he would have lived if there was enough prey to eat, and adds that she would be waiting to join him.
- When Snow Hare tells Gray Wing that Misty Water was too old and nearly blind to go find Jagged Peak, Gray Wing notes that Broken Feather told him many times that Misty Water was the best scent tracker he had ever known.
- The Sun Trail (First appearance; mentioned only)
Notes and references
- ↑ Revealed in The Sun Trail, allegiances
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Revealed in The Sun Trail, page 2
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Gaining by losing
Books | Creature comforts and coolness are nothing compared to our new life in Christ
by Brett McCracken
Posted 3/31/18, 08:50 am
Brett McCracken begins Uncomfortable with a hilarious send-up of many millennials' dream church: architecturally contemporary and environmentally sustainable, organic garden, concert venue, fully equipped fitness center with CrossFit and personal training, and so forth. There's nothing evil about any of these things—I'd like treadmills at the back of sanctuaries for those who listen better while walking rather than sitting—but they sometimes contribute to the consumerist notion that we should live in a bubble and avoid what's uncomfortable: cross, holiness, truth, the discomfort of recognizing we are dependent on God.
In the following excerpt, courtesy of Crossway, McCracken emphasizes our need to lose our pride, coolness, cultural respectability, and sometimes our health, property, family, and everything that gives us a sense of personal empowerment. He then shows us how much we gain.
Uncomfortable was on the short list for WORLD's 2017 Book of the Year in the Accessible Theology category, and WORLD Radio's Warren Smith interviewed McCracken last fall on Listening In. —Marvin Olasky
The loss of consumer religion
Christianity is not about "your best life now." It's not about self-promotion or ambitions of greatness. It's about following Christ's example, who "came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many" (Mark 10:45). Christianity is about sacrifice rather than personal gain and service rather than power. This has been a bitter pill to swallow for disciples of Christ since the earliest days, when James and John were ambitious for status and power ("Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory," they asked Jesus in Mark 10:37). The Zebedee sons were doubtless crushed to learn that the ethos of Christ's kingdom was not glory and prestige, but washing one another's feet (John 13:14). For "whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all" (Mark 10:43–44).
These words are countercultural and desperately needed in today's church, where many approach Christianity with a "what can I get out of it" consumer posture. Maybe it's the family-friendly community a church offers for the parents of small children. Maybe it's the single twentysomething seeking an eligible churchgoing spouse, the aspiring musician seeking audience applause, or a pastor seeking fame and fortune in the Christian book market and conference circuit. A willingness to give up these wish-list items for the sake of Christ is part of the cost of discipleship. This means dropping our dream-church demands and simply committing to a congregational family, even if it doesn't suit us perfectly.
The perfect-fit-for-me impulse of consumerism almost always fails us. When we marry someone on the basis of how well they match up with our list of desired qualities, what happens when they (or we) inevitably change? There is neither a perfect-for-me person nor a perfect-for-me church. In relationships and in faith, it's about commitment rather than consumerism; finding ways to serve rather than desiring to be served; filling a need rather than finding a niche. This is an uncomfortable but crucial cost of following Christ.
The loss of pride
One of the most offensive things about the cross of Christ has always been its leveling aspect, giving "insider" access to prostitutes, tax collectors, and the pariahs of society just as much as to religious and cultural elites; to Gentiles just as much as to Jews. The wretched thief on the cross didn't and couldn't do anything "good" to save himself, but Jesus still welcomed him into his kingdom.
This is offensive. There's a gut-wrenching scene in the Korean film Secret Sunshine that captures the scandal of grace better than any film I've ever seen. The scene takes place in a prison, as protagonist Shin-ae (Jeon Do-yeon) goes to visit her son's murderer in prison. Shin-ae, a new convert to Christianity, wants to forgive him. Her friends tell her she doesn't have to see him face-to-face in order to forgive him. But she insists. She wants to see him in person and (truth be told) wants to witness the look on his face when she offers him the gift of forgiveness.
And yet when she sits down to confront the prisoner on the other side of the glass, Shin-ae finds him unexpectedly happy, peaceful, even joyful. "You look better than I expected," she tells him before explaining that the peace, love, and "new life" she'd found in God had prompted her to forgive him. She's "so happy to feel God's love and grace" that she wanted to spread his love by coming to visit her son's murderer. But then the shocker: the prisoner, the killer of her son, has also come to faith in Christ.
"Since I came here, I have accepted God in my heart. The Lord has reached out to this sinner," he says.
"Is that so?" replies Shin-ae, crestfallen and shaken. "It's good you have found God," she says, very tentatively.
The convicted murderer continues: "Yes, I am so grateful. God reached out to a sinner like me. He made me kneel to repent my sins. And God has absolved me of them."
And this is where Shin-ae begins to wilt.
"God … has forgiven your sins?" she mutters in disbelief.
"Yes," he replies. "And I have found inner peace. … My repentance and absolution have brought me peace. Now I start and end each day with prayer. I always pray for you, Ms. Lee. I'll pray for you until I die."
This hits Shin-ae hard. When she leaves the prison, she collapses, overcome by the horror of an idea she had not considered: that God could beat her to the punch in forgiving her son's killer, offering this criminal the only real absolution he needed. Unfortunately, Shin-ae can't accept this seeming injustice. How can a law-abiding, good citizen like her and a convicted child-killer be on the same level in terms of God's grace? She can't take that, and abandons God because of it.
The sufficiency and availability of God's grace to all people is scandalous, and for many, a pill too hard to swallow. We're prideful creatures. We want to believe that "right" living warrants us better standing in God's eyes than, say, terrorists and rapists and pedophiles. We want God to reward us for being good and punish others for being bad. Our pride makes it hard for us to stomach the notion that earning or deserving are not words that exist in God's vocabulary of grace.
The Jewish religious establishment in Jesus's day was utterly offended by this idea, as are many today who trip on the "grace alone" gospel because they want to believe their efforts at righteousness count for their salvation. This is why Paul describes the cross as a "stumbling block" (1 Cor. 1:23) and an "offense" (Gal. 5:11). No rule keeping, no good deeds, no circumcision or baptism or any other -ism can save us. Only Christ can.
The loss of power, coolness, and cultural respectability
Closely related to the loss of pride but deserving of its own mention is the loss of power, coolness, and cultural respectability that comes with true discipleship of Christ. For all the reasons already mentioned in this chapter, and for many more to come in this book, Christianity calls people to ways of living that are decidedly uncool, politically incorrect, and just plain weird. Unfortunately many pastors and Christian leaders find this hard to accept; they want to be culturally respectable and perfectly at home in the hallways of power and celebrity. They will compromise convictions in order to keep those White House invitations coming. They want to be relevant players in the Zeitgeist, widely admired and well-liked, front row at fashion week right next to Kanye and Kim. Don't we all!
But faithfulness to the true gospel calls us to value weakness over power and reverence over relevance. "Cool" and "Christianity" are diametrically opposed on all sorts of fronts.[1] Cool is about self-promotion and narcissism while Christianity is about selflessness and altruism. Cool is transient and obsessed with the "now"; Christianity is transcendent, mindful of eternity. Cool is elitist while Christianity is humble. Cool is cynical while Christianity is hopeful. Cool is about being the first to discover a new trend; Christianity says the last shall be first (Matt. 20:16).
Whether we like it or not, Christianity is very strange and, in the eyes of polite society, only getting stranger. As Russell Moore has pointed out, the growing marginalization of true Christianity will likely force the church to more clearly grasp and articulate the otherness of the gospel: "The church has an opportunity now to reclaim our witness, as those who confess that we are 'strangers and exiles on earth' (Heb. 11:13). That strangeness starts in what is the most important thing that differentiates us from the rest of the world: the gospel."[2]
Indeed, the most important and ultimately most offensive aspect of Christianity will continue to be the gospel of the old rugged cross. As long as it is front and center in pulpits, Christians will always be uncool. John Stott puts it bluntly in The Cross of Christ:
Either we preach that human beings are rebels against God, under his just judgment and (if left to themselves) lost, and that Christ crucified who bore their sin and curse is the only available Savior. Or we emphasize human potential and human ability, with Christ brought in only to boost them, and with no necessity for the cross except to exhibit God's love and so inspire us to greater endeavor. The former is the way to be faithful, the latter the way to be popular. It is not possible to be faithful and popular simultaneously.[3]
The loss of health, wealth, and comfort
In addition to being a blow to our autonomy, individualism, pride, and cultural respectability, following after Jesus Christ often pulls us into material discomfort.
The cost of following Jesus requires an open-handedness with money and earthly possessions, for example (Matt. 6:19–21; Luke 12:33–34), a point that proves especially challenging to the wealthy (Mark 10:17–31). Discipleship might also pull us away from any sense of home or comfortable places to lay our heads at night (Luke 9:57–58). Jesus also makes it clear to his disciples that they may have to put him above family. Indeed, some of the things Jesus says about family are quite uncomfortable (e.g., Matt. 10:34–39; Luke 8:19–21; 11:27–28), especially for cultures like ancient Judaism where family is everything. N. T. Wright observes:
Family and property, then, were not for the ancient Jew simply what they are to the modern western world. Both carried religious and cultural significance far beyond personal, let alone "individual," identity and security. Both functioned symbolically within the total Jewish worldview. To both, Jesus leveled a direct challenge: those who followed him, who were loyal to his kingdom-agenda, would have to be prepared to renounce them, god-given though they were.[4]
As if the loss of wealth, property, and family are not enough, the loss of health and life itself are also possible costs of discipleship. Physical suffering, persecution, and martyrdom have been and continue to be fixtures of the Christian experience. From Paul's flogging in Philippi (among many other sufferings: 2 Cor. 11:16–33) to Stephen's stoning, Polycarp's burning at the stake to Jim Elliot's death by spear in Ecuador, the crucified Christians in Syria and the beheaded believers in Libya, the list of Christian martyrs is long and bloody. As one contemporary writer has put it:
There is no getting around the fact that a Christian community is one that suffers. The pioneer of our faith suffered, the main symbol of our tradition is one of agony and death, and it's no use trying to remove the cruciform marks from the hands and feet of the church. The mark of the gospel is not health and wealth, but nails and blood.[5]
But the crazy thing about Christianity is that suffering and persecution are framed not in terms of fear but flourishing. For in suffering "we directly experience the gospel, because the gospel is about suffering giving way to death and beyond death to the victory of resurrection."[6] Suffering is perhaps the most literally "uncomfortable" thing about following Jesus that nevertheless grows us, strengthening our bonds as people that suffer together, deepening our devotion to and identification with Christ. The suffering of Jesus on the cross is something we can understand, something we can return to in our own moments of pain and hopelessness. For poet Christian Wiman, the suffering of the cross is a key to his faith:
I am a Christian because of that moment on the cross when Jesus, drinking the very dregs of human bitterness, cries out, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? … The point is that he felt human destitution to its absolute degree; the point is that God is with us, not beyond us, in suffering.[7]
To be a Christian is to count the cost and accept all loss in exchange for the gain of new life in Christ. As Paul wrote from prison in his letter to the Philippians:
But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him. (Phil. 3:7–9)
The gain
Every taking-up-our-cross loss that we endure is worth it. For Christ and for us in him, weakness, suffering, and loss are not the end of the story. They lead to victory, resurrection, and eternal gain. The beautiful hymn of Philippians 2:5–11 captures it well. The first half is a descent: Christ leaves his heavenly home, forgoing his "equality with God," emptying himself and reducing himself to the form of a servant by becoming human. Then further down: he is obedient to the point of death. And further down still: "even death on a cross" (v. 8). At this lowest point the passage pivots to ascent: God exalts Christ and gives him the name above all names. Then further up: every knee worships him in heaven and earth. Further up still: "every tongue confess[es] that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father" (v. 11).
This is the trajectory of the Christian life. Like Christ, we descend to ascend. We humble ourselves, shunning our status, accepting the depths of our depravity. And then we are exalted with Christ. After suffering, glory. After the cross, resurrection. Every loss is worth the gain of Christ. As C. S. Lewis famously writes at the conclusion of Mere Christianity:
Give up yourself, and you will find your real self. Lose your life and you will save it. … Look for yourself, and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. But look for Christ and you will find Him, and with Him everything else thrown in.[8]
Far from a symbol of shame, the cross is a symbol of victory for those who believe. We are victorious in Jesus (1 Cor. 15:57), more than conquerors (Rom. 8:37), led by Christ in triumphal procession (2 Cor. 2:14). The cross is victory over sin and deliverance from darkness (Col. 1:13); it destroys "the one who has the power of death" (Heb. 2:14); it triumphs over and shames the rulers and authorities of this world (Col. 2:15); it sets men free from the law of sin and death (Rom. 8:2).
On the cross Jesus said, "It is finished," and it was. Uncomfortable, ugly, bloody, rugged, and shameful the cross may be. But it is sufficient. It is everything.
Content taken from Uncomfortable: The Awkward and Essential Challenge of Christian Community by Brett McCracken, ©2017. Used by permission of Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers, Wheaton, Il 60187, www.crossway.org.
[1] For more on this topic, see Brett McCracken, Hipster Christianity: When Church and Cool Collide (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2010). Much of what follows is taken from the "Cool vs. Christianity" chart in Hipster Christianity, 199.
[2] Russell Moore, Onward: Engaging the Culture without Losing the Gospel (Nashville: B&H, 2015), 7.
[3] John R. W. Stott, The Cross of Christ, 20th Anniversary Edition (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006), 338.
[4] N. T. Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996), 405.
[5] Adam S. McHugh, The Listening Life: Embracing Attentiveness in a World of Distraction (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2015), 162.
[6] Scot McKnight, A Fellowship of Differents: Showing the World God's Design for Life Together (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2015), 228.
[7] Christian Wiman, My Bright Abyss: Meditation of a Modern Believer (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2013), 155.
[8] C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2001), 226–27.
Brett McCracken
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TxAgEngrPosted: Sat, 03/31/2018 09:19 pm
Thank you for sharing words of truth.
neverthelessPosted: Mon, 04/02/2018 07:53 am
Co-dependency is also an idol to be avoided. What I mean is, we must be careful to carry the burdens that are ours alone, and to carry the burdens of others that God intends for us to carry. What we require, in a word, is wisdom. Separation from the world's idols will set us on a path to carry only the burdens and enduring the suffering that our Lord intends for us. It's not formulaic, but entirely based on who we are as individuals and God's infinite-personal nature and his calling for us.


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New Veecans earrings celebrate cosmic jewelry trend
For thousands of years, civilizations around the world have looked to the night sky to find truth and inspiration. The fascination with all things cosmic endures and is a major jewelry trend for 2019. The distinctive star motif tops the list of celestial favorites and the Swarovski trend experts predict a resurgence of star-studded designs in the coming seasons. Getting the trend just right is Veecans from China.
The Swarovski Ingredient Branding partner has started 2019 with the launch of the Star earring, a delicate star-shaped ear adornment made of silver and set with Zirconia from Swarovski. The jewelry is available online at the Veecans Tmall shop and at Veecans retail locations across mainland China and Hong Kong and will make its wearer shine bright like a star.


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Biblical Meaning: The name Jesaiah is a Biblical baby name. In Biblical the meaning of the name Jesaiah is: Health; or salvation; of the Lord.
Jesaiah is baby boy name mainly popular in Christian religion and its main origin is . Jesaiah name meanings is Yahweh is salvation. Other similar sounding names can be Isaiah.


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Responsible for all clerical /secretarial duties during scheduled shift in the department. Performs the receptionist and secretarial duties on the patient care unit while functioning as the focal communication source in the nursing station. Reports to the RN in charge. Excellent communication and interpersonal skills.
� High school graduate or equivalency � Minimum of six months to one year of related work experience.
� Basic clerical skills. Basic computer skills. � Medical terminology preferred � Additional languages preferred.
� Ability to maintain global view and work on many tasks at a time.
� Current BLS certification - American Heart Association
Employment practices will not be influenced or affected by an applicant�s or employee�s race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, age, disability, genetic information, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, veteran status or any other legally protected status. Tenet will make reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities unless doing so would result in an undue hardship.


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Do you have friends that you can go months (or maybe even years) without seeing and pick up right where you left off? I'm lucky enough to say that I have many – scattered all over the country. Life pulls us all in different directions, but if we're very lucky, we'll cross paths again and be there for each other through life's major events. This past weekend I got to see a group of some of my very best friends from college at a wedding for a member of our crazy crew. Miss Emily there next to me has been one of my biggest supporters from afar (since we met but especially over the last two months), as sadly we're geographically separated now. She's been there every step of the way cheering me on and telling people about our blogging ventures to the point where we have a teenie audience all the way down in Florida!
One of my many motivators for starting this paleo challenge back in January was that I wanted to be a better version of myself for this big reunion. No, the wedding wasn't about me – it's about this gorgeous bride Leigh and my buddy for life Eric – but I wanted to feel my best and confident going to an event that was so special for all of us to be invited to attend. Low-self esteem should never be invited to the party.
Speaking of great friends: Jeanie and I have a special type of telepathy. Her post on April 3rd I swear was written for me going into this past weekend. I had set a goal for myself to lose 20 pounds by April, and I was 5 pounds shy of that goal. I've always had issues with body image, and not reaching my goal was taking a toll on my brain. I wasn't focusing on everything I had accomplished thus far – all I saw as I tried on my outfits for the trip were my shortcomings:
I could have lost more … my waist should be smaller … I'm going to look huge in this dress.
Reading Jeanie's post snapped me back to reality. How unhealthy is all this self-hating talk? And how sad is it that so many women do this to themselves? I looked back through some of my other posts and reminded myself of the major changes I've made in my life and the success I've achieved thus far; it gave me that boost of confidence I needed to push my shoulders back and get ready to party with some of favorite people – after all, that's what it's all about, right?
So in my acceptance of self (ha), here are the pictures from the wedding, including a full length I swore I wasn't putting on the internet due to standing next to my tiny tot of a friend and feeling like the Jolly Blue Giant (I say this with love, Emily!):
The party might be over but the process of improvement is not! Back to Zumba, back to Body Pump, back to fueling myself properly, and back to NOT trying keep up with the boys' alcohol intake in high altitude. Back to paleo … in super comfy pumps!
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Babies Room – ages 0-2 years
Before the age of 15 months, there are several milestones for each child.
Babies will begin to crawl, walk, use their hands to pick up items, start discovering their voice to say words and sounds, explore their surroundings, bond with other children, build relationships of trust between educators and so much more.
As the carers for your baby we understand how important it is for us to be prepared to nurture and care for your baby during this time of their life. Management and staff work hard to provide babies with the security, stability and support they require.
The baby room is setup with age appropriate toys, books, puzzles, musical instruments, art and craft activities, rockers and play equipment to stimulate the learning experience for babies. The baby outdoor play area is setup with a sand pit, vegetable garden, outdoor equipment and play mats to allow for a more versatile learning experience.
On a monthly basis, we keep record of observations, noting the various actions and abilities of children, their strengths and challenges. The activities are thereafter planned to further their skills and abilities, addressing any weaknesses and challenges. Observations are also available at the front or in each play room for you to look through when at the centre.