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We offer one of the most luxurious and exclusive homes in Retiro. It is located in one of the most representative and stately buildings of Madrid where you can enjoy spectacular views of the Retiro Park through its balconies on the facade.
Since we entered the building, we can see his spectacular portal, and once got into the house, we can perceive the feelings of luxury and exclusivity.
This exclusive property has 319 square meters of construction with high ceiling of 3.20 meters which provides even more the feeling of spaciousness and has many possibilities of distribution according to the needs of each client.
Noted for its focus on 2 major highways providing orientations East and West.
Once we enter the House, this shows elegance and spaciousness. The construction materials used in his latest refurbishment are of high quality. From the entrance Hall we can see the spectacular living room of 90 meters currently distributed in several rooms. Notable for their columns with equal composition that fireplace in Onyx marble, its two balconies and views to the Park. Next to the living room, we have a large bathroom and a separate dining room between the living room and the kitchen. The dealer Hall is quite large, and since we access a larder - storeroom, fully equipped kitchen with island and office, 2 bathrooms and 4 bedrooms.
This magnificent house ultimately is unique, with a very special value for its location and views.
Retiro district. Area of Ibiza. Extraordinary location in the center of Madrid thanks to the proximity to the Retiro Park and Ibiza Boulevard. The area has many restaurants, cafes and shops, which makes the area one of the most lively in the capital. It has all kinds of services, mainly a large number of kindergartens and schools, both public and private education, and hospitals such as the Gregorio Marañón, Niño Jesús and Maternidad de Odonnell. This area of Madrid is really well communicated with several metro stations including Ibiza, Retiro and Sainz de Baranda and is very close to the M30. In general terms it's a district full of contrasts, vibrant and prosperous.
Availability to be agreed. The exposed information is offered by third parties, merely for information and it is supposed to be correct. Our company does not guarantee its veracity. The offer is submitted to errors, price changes, omission and/or withdrawn of the market without previous notice. The expenses of Contract and Fees of the Agency run at the expense of the tenant, other particular conditions as duration, deposit, guarantees, consumptions or community expenses if present, they will be specified in separate document.


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FEMA says no to Virginia storm victims
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) - The Federal Emergency Management Agency has denied the state's request for individual assistance to help northern Virginia property owners affected by Tropical Storm Lee.
Gov. Bob McDonnell's office requested that FEMA make low-interest loans, grants and other forms of assistance available to homeowners, renters and businesses in Fairfax and Prince William counties that suffered damage during heavy rains and flooding Sept. 8 and 9.
McDonnell's office said Friday that the Department of Emergency Management will recommend whether to appeal the denial or to apply for Small Business Administration loans.
If the SBA assistance is approved, federal loans would be available to repair or replace real estate and property.

subset: commoncrawl


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Complete recovery from osteoporosis possible?
- Question from Nikole: Has there ever been a case in history where someone was diagnosed with osteoporosis and then had a complete recovery to where the disease was completely gone?
- Answers - Charles Shapiro I would think not. The disease can be improved with lifestyle and medication changes, but I would say return to the normal bone density when you've had osteoporosis, severe bone loss, would be unusual.
The Ask-the-Expert Online Conference called Keeping Your Bones Strong featured Charles L. Shapiro, M.D. and Marisa Weiss, M.D. answering your questions about how to measure the strength of your bones, how to find out your risk for osteoporosis, and what you can do to lower that risk.
Editor's Note: This conference took place in August 2002.
The materials presented in these conferences do not necessarily reflect the views of Breastcancer.org. A qualified healthcare professional should be consulted before using any therapeutic product or regimen discussed. All readers should verify all information and data before employing any therapies described here.
A production of LiveWorld, Inc.
Copyright 2010. All rights reserved.


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Just wondering if anyone out there has had any success with a coal chute with a right angle or 60 deg angle anyway. something close to that.
I am installing an EFM stoker and have been readying the basement. There was an old coal bin but they put an oil tank in it. I got that out and cleaned out some of the old Bit coal that was in there leftover. Rebuilt the door and now i'm going to be refilling it. Got 6 tons of Summit Rice coal last weekend outside waiting on me to get it in there!
basically The chute door on my bin is at one end of the coal bin on the long side.... If you can envision that. On the short side I could give it a good pitch and be fine but on the long side I want to get the coal to the rear of the bin. I thought if I built a chute in there and put an angle on it sort of like and L. I could at least get some back in there without having to go in and out of the bin as often to shovel the coal back into that back corner....
Hopefully you all understand what I mean here. My question is has anyone built one like this with any success or am I wasting time? Coalberner gave me the idea to use like aluminum on the chute so it slides.
Any other thoughts or help is appreciated.
PS I made up a diagram. In red is roughly what I want to build to chute the coal into the back corner if I can. the chute is what goes outside that i'll be shoveling into. about 1.5' deep or so. 2' wide. the doorway is where I will have the slats to keep the coal in and remove as needed.


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The captain has left town.
Who's next?
With Jarome Iginla's departure from the Calgary Flames via the late Wednesday trade to the Pittsburgh Penguins, the biggest issues of interest surrounding the team are regarding how many others will be jettisoned before the April 3 trade deadline, and who will they be.
There are no shortage of candidates for the veteran-laden club which appears destined to miss the playoffs for a fourth consecutive season.
The player with the biggest target upon his face, and the biggest salary cap hit, is defenceman Jay Bouwmeester, who — in a moment of honesty — admitted Thursday the possibility has been broached in some manner.
"I've had conversations, but it's not anybody else's business," Bouwmeester said after practising at the dome.
With one more season on his contract — with a US$6.68-million salary cap hit and a no-trade clause — Bouwmeester can't be targeted by every team.
However, there must be a handful of clubs who could dearly use the 29-year-old blueliner who has collected six goals and 15 points this season.
His name has been bandied about for more than a year, especially with Bouwmeester finally showing the offensive touch fans have expected of him since he arrived prior to the 2009-10 season.
"I understand it," Bouwmeester said. "It's the situation we're in. It's been the same for the last two, three weeks. Until it's brought to you and you have to make some decisions or they make decisions, you can't worry about it.
"I've been in this situation where there's been stuff flying around and something potentially could have happened, but you have to separate yourself from it and go about your daily business.
"You think about things, but it's not something that's been brought forward. You're not going to preoccupy yourself."
Bouwmeester is hardly alone when it comes to potential former-Flames.
Fellow blueliner Mark Giordano, who has a no-movement clause and is signed through the 2015-16 campaign, has been the subject of trade rumours.
Goaltender Miikka Kiprusoff, who no longer has a no-trade clause and still has one more year on his contract, has reportedly said he'll not report if traded away — citing family reasons, the birth of his son just over a week ago — but it's possible that's just a way of him having some say in where he goes.
As for the forwards, there is no way any of the current team members should be considered untouchable, and rest assured the likes of Lee Stempniak and Curtis Glencross — who has a no-movement clause — would generate interest from clubs looking for players with some scoring touch and cap-friendly deals.
Who knows? There could be interest in the likes of Mike Cammalleri and Alex Tanguay, who have both had playoff success in their careers and probably wouldn't mind avoiding being part of a rebuild.
Rest assured, we could be seeing the beginning of an exodus that could rival what the Edmonton Oilers went through in the couple of seasons after their 2006 run to the Stanley Cup final.
Having seen Iginla moved to a team with Stanley Cup championship expectations must fuel the desires to see if there is greener grass elsewhere.
In Bouwmeester's case, Friday's clash against the Columbus Blue Jackets will be the 750th of his NHL career, all without having once been part of a playoff game, and that does wear on his mind.
"No less than any other year," he said. "Obviously, I'd like to be there. I'm yet to play in the playoffs and I'd like to do that.
"That's No. 1 for me."
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Home Search Gallery How-To Books Links Workshops About Contact
about Film and Printing
You can order as I do (cheap!) here and here. Poke around for the various sizes and types.
NEWS: July 2004: Fuji's secret new Fortia 50 film info here.
INTRODUCTION return to top
Film is a very personal artistic choice. No one else can tell you what look you want, and no charts or graphs can help you either.
Your choice of film is far more important than your choice of camera or lens.
All films look very different. You can't learn much from a scientific data sheet. You have to go out and try them personally. What's important is how they interpret the light. When you find what you like, use it. It's that simple. There is NO absolute scale of what makes a film good for you or not.
It's up to you as an artist to choose what gives you the look you want. I want wild, vivid colors so I prefer Fuji's professional Velvia 50 slide film for almost all of my color work. (The new Velvia 100F is not as good, more here on that, and the up and coming Velvia 100 is likely better.)
There is no "best" film for all purposes, or even one purpose. You may prefer something different, for instance, Velvia is poor for photos of people because it makes them look way too red. As you have seen, I don't post my people photos which I do on my digital camera now.
You probably won't find Velvia 50 at smaller camera stores and definitely not at the grocery store, Target or Wal-Mart, but you can just order it here as I do. I use Velvia in 4x5, 120, 220 and 35mm sizes. It comes in 8x10 and bulk, too! To see all the different package options do a search at Adorama starting at FILM, then COLOR SLIDE FILM, then select the check boxes for FUJI, the sizes you want, ISO up to 99 and DAYLIGHT. I usually order in multi packs, for instance, the box of 20 rolls of 35mm, the box of 5 rolls of 220 or 5 rolls 120 and 50 sheet boxes of 4x5.
There is a new Velvia 100F that costs more than Velvia 50 and to my taste looks worse than Velvia 50. See my comments on Velvia 100F here. You can push Velvia 50 one stop to 100, and you can push the Velvia 100 a stop or two to 200 or 400 quite well, although only Velvia 50 has the wildest colors I love.
If you want 400 speed, try the expensive and good Fuji Provia 400F. No, the colors are not the same as Velvia 50, and yes, this is the best way to get ISO400 slides.
MAKING GREAT PRINTS (click)
HOW TO GET THE WILD COLORS I DO return to top
AT WHAT SPEED SHOULD YOU SHOOT VELVIA 50? return to top
50. Who is buried in Grant's Tomb?
I shoot it at ASA/ISO 50 in every one of my cameras. Like what you see here? Then there's your answer. All the people I know who produce killer images also shoot it at 50.
If your slides are consistently too light or dark then, and only then, adjust either the ISO film speed setting or the exposure compensation.
Compensation possibly is a better way to do this, since you will not still have the camera locked out of automatic DX code reading and into some totally irrelevant ISO. If you use compensation instead of a deliberate manual ISO setting you'll still have the same compensation as applied to a new film, which is probably the thing to do on your camera anyway. This could save rolls of film if you put in ISO 400 film and forget to change the ISO setting manually.
There are folk tales about Velvia only being ISO 40. Some reasons behind this old wives' tale are:
1.) Conspiracy theories, like "Fuji is ripping us off, it's really only ISO 40" always excite impressionable minds, mine included.
2.) People's cameras don't even match to within +-1/3 stop anyway, so people categorically stating that the film needs to be shot at 40 are splitting hairs that don't exist. See Ansel Adams "The Negative" on the zone system. Most of my Nikons need to be set to 50, my L35AF needs to be set to 64 and my Minolta X-700 gets set at 80. Go try for yourself. Many meters read differently.
I agree that you have to figure out what film speed works for you on your camera because they are all different. Electronic cameras are super accurate for exposure today. What varies more is the mechanical calibration of the diaphragms on Nikon SLR lenses.
That's right, good old fashioned mechanical tolerances control how accurately your aperture stops down and therefore how accurate your exposure is compared to what the meter intended to do. Because of this one lens may give a half stop different exposure than another. I've seen this myself and have even had to get out the jewelers' screwdrivers to calibrate one Nikon AF lens the hard way.
Think I'm kidding? Go shoot the same subject like a blank wall so you can get the same image at different focal lengths for consistency with all your lenses. You'll probably see some slides made with one lens consistently brighter or darker (slightly) than slides made with other lenses.
3.) Here's the real reason: Velvia has the deepest, darkest, most vivid and delicious DMax of any color film ever.
Because of this you get deeper, more VELvety blacks than any other slide film.
You are supposed to make the slide look just a tad darker overall. This way you also get more sparkle in the highlights because they can get even brighter from the overall darker gray level. This is part of what gives Velvia its vividness: colors pop out from the jet-black background.
Velvia has a DMax of around 3.8D, regular Kodak VS film a weak 3.4D.
Let me make up the following numbers; I have not measured these.
If regular slide film is shot to put neutral gray around 0.7D (I'm guessing here at that value) then you can get highlights up to +0.7D above gray and blacks to -2.7D below gray.
If we do that with Velvia we get the same highlights, and blacks that get way down to -3.0D below gray.
If instead we aim to put our gray at 0.85D on Velvia then we can get highlights that hit +0.85D above gray, far more sparkly than with the old Kodak VS, and we still can get deeper blacks down to -2.85D below that gray.
Now when people just hold their transparencies up to the light in the ceiling or throw a bunch of them on a light table without masks their eyes close down and hide all the vivid deep velvety blacks. In these conditions one is blind to detail in the blacks. In these conditions one may be tempted to shoot for a slightly lighter transparency to match what one gets from lightweight films like Kodak VS.
On the other hand, this changes radically looking at projected slides or masked transparencies on a light box in a dark room. Now the shadows will start to glow on Velvia. If it was shot at 40 one will have duller highlights than if it was shot at 50.
Again this is all art. Do what looks good for you, but in all cases don't start off on a tangent like shooting Velvia at ISO 40. One always ought to experiment, but when experimenting it helps to start out where the manufacturer suggests.
In the old days of Kodachrome 20-40 years ago one got a little less bad colors by underexposing it. Today some people try to apply this to E6 films where it doesn't apply.
Velvia gets brown and dull with underexposure. I find Velvia always looks marvelous for me shot right at 50 on all my cameras. Shooting it at 40 would wash out what I shoot. 1/3 stop is a subtle issue anyway. Go shoot a bunch of things at a bunch of things and see what you like.
When scanning for digital I find I love the results from bringing up the levels on an underexposed Velvia slide even better sometimes than from a properly exposed one. Cranking up the levels command in Photoshop (moving the right-hand slider to the left) also increases color saturation.
SLIDES OR PRINT FILM? return to top
For what I happen to shoot I prefer the vivid colors I get from slides. Avoid print film, which is what 95% of amateurs shoot, unless you make your own prints or have an intimate relationship with one person who makes your prints. Here's why:
Slides are the actual film that was in your camera. The colors and exposure are whatever you did, period. Each film is a little different from other films, but overall what you saw is what you get.
Prints are printed from the negative that was in your camera. When printed, the printer again has to control the exposure AND the color of the print when making the print. This is because there is NO standard for how to print color negatives. Every brand and every different film requires different settings of the printer. Therefore many printers attempt to correct colors automatically, and therefore usually they screw up your colors.
There is talk of film makers attempting to adopt the same color printing characteristics for all negative films, in which case a new day will dawn for print film. That day has not yet happened. Stick with slides if you are picky about color.
Your colors are going to be different every time you get your print film printed and they are always going to be too light or too dark. I got sick of this.
If you print your own negatives, fine, because you know what you want. It doesn't matter if you send your film to either Costco or a pro lab, they all have automated printers that tend to eliminate all the careful effort you put in to get the right exposure or color.
If you shoot slides you can get better prints because you can point to the slide and tell the guy at a custom lab "make it look like the slide," although contrast tends to build up.
Everything you see on my site is from slide film. I can't get these colors from print film.
Ever seen magazines called "National Geographic" or "Arizona Highways?" All their photos come from slides, like almost everything you see in print. How? Scanned on a $50,000 drum scanner by a guy with a lot of experience.
Slides are also better than negs for scanning because all slides scan with the same settings. All negs need to be scanned with different settings, and therefore the colors are always off, just like your Wal-Mart prints. In other words, a slide looks like it should. Every brand and type of neg film needs to be scanned or printed a little differently to get the right colors. There is NO STANDARD for colors on the negs themselves, although film makers are considering this. Unless you go get some fancy scanning software like Vuescan or Silverfast that already has all the color terms in it you are just gambling with color when scanning negs. Even with those programs you still have 100 options to select to try to get the right colors. When I mentioned "settings" I am referring to the very complex color sync profiles you have to get someplace, not anything you can set yourself.
Today I'd also recommend Chrome in San Diego for any print film developing and printing. I just drop my stuff personally and you can ship your film to them. Tell them I sent you.
WHAT ABOUT REFRIGERATION? return to top
Don't worry about it. You can carry professional film like Velvia around for a year at room temperature with no problems.
I've been shooting Velvia since the late 80s when it came out.
I've never had any problems with anything, unlike with Kodak.
I'm constantly putting Velvia in and out of the fridge or freezer. Fuji Rep Phil Abel told us around 1995 that Fuji told him that it's best not to freeze the film, but I've never had a problem.
Also, don't worry about not having a fridge, either. I've had 4x5" Velvia loaded in holders out of the fridge for a year and unless you are trying to match colors for fashion work there's no problem.
Film is nowhere near as perishable as milk or cheese.
I keep loads of it in my fridge, but I also don't worry if I go away for a few weeks and have no fridge.
EXPIRATION DATES return to top
Don't worry about them.
If you keep it in the freezer it keeps forever. I have shot Velvia with expiration dates more then ten years out of date, and it was fine. This film therefore was probably made over twelve years ago. Sorry, I have not tried Velvia left at room temperature for a decade.
If you are a cheapskate and know film was refrigerated by all means pick up the give-aways from less courageous photographers cleaning out their fridges. Test a roll first if you have to shoot something important, of course.
Personally I don't worry about film I bought new and goes out of date a year or two. I save the ten-year old rolls friends give me for testing broken cameras.
WHERE TO GET SLIDE FILM DEVELOPED return to top
Slide films are developed with a process called "E-6." Look in your yellow pages under something like photographic processing, and look for labs that do E6.
You can drop film off most places like grocery and discount stores to go to a lab that does this, but the results can be bad. I use Chrome in San Diego where I just drop my stuff personally. You can ship your film to them, although if I were you I'd just go find a local lab. Professional E6 labs are in every city and many towns.
MOUNTING AND PROJECTING SLIDES return to top
35mm film usually comes back mounted in 2 x 2" (preferably glassless plastic) mounts so you can throw them right in your projector. Some pros save a dollar a roll and get them unmounted as just a continuous strip of film in a clear protective plastic sleeve. They then just mount the ones they actually use. Unmounted film is much better for printing and scanning, since you don't have to unmount them again! Personally I always have mine mounted. If you shoot something weird like half-frame (72 shots per roll) or panoramic like the Hasselblad/Fuji/Mamiya then of course you need them unmounted.
Some people used to fuss with glass mounts. You have to be very careful about cleaning the glass, since any impurities and dirt will be forever sandwiched in with your film.
There used to be an odd format called "Super Slides" that were about 38 x 38mm images also called 4 x 4 cm. They were shot on medium format cameras, either regular 120 format 2 - 1/4 cameras with masked backs, or odd little twin lens reflexes that took long discontinued 127 film, a miniature 120 film variant. You could then mount these images in 2 x 2" mounts and project them in many 35mm projectors. This big film area looked far better than 35mm slides, and also the square format has the strong benefit of always filling the entire square screen, unlike piddly 35mm that always has black on the top and bottom or left and right. Instead of the subject being in the middle of the smaller rectangular frame, the subject on a well done super slide gets huge and fills the whole square screen. Of course today it's even better to shoot real medium format below, and of course there's no reason you can't shoot and mount super slides today. More here.
Medium format film usually comes back in a protective clear plastic sleeve. If I want to project them (always jaw-dropping) then I mount them by hand. In the 1950s and 1960s when medium format was popular with amateurs you could have them all mounted automatically by the lab if you asked. I know of no labs today that mount automatically, but I'm sure some are still around. 6 x 6 cm and 645 film goes into 7 x7 cm square mounts I get here and 6 x 7 cm film goes into these mounts here which are 85mm on a side. Tip: I shoot 6 x 6 and when I have an image better suited to a vertical or horizontal crop I just mount it in a 645 mount and move the film a little to get the crop I want. This always looks great when projected, and of course you just take your film out of the mount undamaged when done the show. The 645 and 6 x 6 mounts all go in the same projectors and trays.
You don't mount 4 x 5" and larger transparencies. You can tape them into cockamamie cardboard frames or whatnot, but in any case you still have to shuffle them in and out of any projector by hand.
35mm projectors are easy to get today, since businesses have been carting them out to the dumpster for the past 5 years since businessmen now use electronic projectors for their presentations. Likewise, many amateurs will be dumping them in favor of electronic projectors in the near future. Thus you ought to be able to get one for free. This also is why Kodak has announced they will stop making them in about 2005. Who cares; there are already too many of them out there and Kodak made the worst I knew of anyway today.
Personally I use an inexpensive made-in-Germany Leica P150 projector I got here for $250 brand new. I threw away the included 85mm f/2.8 Hektor lens which is as crummy as the ones all the Kodak projectors have and bought a Leica 90mm f/2.5 Colorplan-P2 lens like the one here for $130. Thus for less than you'd pay for a new Kodak Carousel I have a Leica projector and lens that really lets me see what's on my slides. The P150 is intended for light duty; if you really want to beat on it then you're looking at a $1,000 projector from Leica. I love my P150 because the optics are unbeaten at any price and I don't use it often enough to warrant a tougher model. The Leicas use a much better slide tray system than the Carousel system that used to be popular in the USA. The LKM style trays used by Leica and other European projectors cost less, work more reliably and don't waste all the space that the Carousels did.
Watch it: it's always tough getting the whole slide in focus. The lens above is flat-field and best with glass-mounted slides. A curved-field lens is better for cardboard or plastic mounted slides. With plastic mounts either one will work. This gets iffy with no glass; as the slides pop and then heat up they wiggle around and thus CF and FF lenses are better depending on brand of mount and humidity. I use a curved field lens for my plastic mounted slides.
Medium Format (645, 6 x 6, 6 x 7, 6 x 9 cm)
Medium format projectors come in two or three flavors.
The cheapest flavor is to go find a 1950s or 1960s amateur projector which you can find at garage sales or your grandfather's garage. They used 500W tungsten lamps and work OK, although dim due to the inefficient bulbs and optics.
The best flavor, if you are as frugal as I am, is to buy a basic modern 250W halogen projector like this Kindermann here for $700 new complete with an OK lens. This is what I use. It has the same lamp, design and brightness as the next flavor,
A fancy professional projector like the Hasselblad or Rollei here which costs $1,600 and also needs a separate lens like this one here for $500.
Of course the two flavors above only show the 7 x 7 cm mounts for up to 6 x 6 cm originals. If you shoot 6 x 7cm then you're in trouble. You can either find an antique, buy the Mamiya Cabin totally manual (you have to feed each and every slide in by hand) projector here for $1,200, or if you want even the basics of a tray advance or autofocus you have to spend many thousands of dollars for der König der Diaprojektoren, das Göetschmann.
To project 6 x 9 cm slides you have to look at a 4 x 5" projector below or go look for antique projectors. Good luck. 645 and 6 x 6 cm is pretty easy to project and manage. At 6 x 7 cm and bigger you have hit the fringes of practicality today.
4 x 5" and Bigger
For 4 x 5" borrow an ordinary and fast becoming obsolete (and therefore free if you keep your eyes peeled as I do) overhead projector. I just make a cardboard mask and project away. Most of these projectors had bad lenses; keep your eyes peeled for one of the better ones with a good lens and you'll do great. Here's one if you can't borrow one. Of course the overhead projector works perfectly for 5 x 7" and 8 x 10" and anything you can stick in it. Just remember as the format gets smaller you have to get further away from the screen to fill it.
If you prefer, Noblex makes a dedicated $3,000 4 x 5" projector here.
Black-and-White Film return to top
For B/W there really is no visible difference between films except to experts who develop and print their own work. It's all in how and where you have the film developed. So few people expose B/W film properly that most people who think they are seeing differences between films are really chasing their own exposure issues. In any case one can elicit the looks due to subtly different curves in Photoshop today anyway.
B/W is very different from color. Every film is usually a stop or more different in speed, unlike color which is usually dead-on its rated speed. Thus you have to perform zone-system tests when you start using a new film, otherwise you get poor results most people do at first. Get Ansel's book "The Negative" where he explains how to go all this, or the next paragraph where I explain it a little more simply.
If you want no grain then shoot Kodak T-Max 100. If you want faster film try T-Max 400, and if you want grain try Kodak Tri-X, or for really grainy try Kodak T-Max 3200 or Kodak Recording Film 2475. You'll have to get special and potentially expensive B/W developing for this, or do it yourself. B/W is easy to develop and print yourself, and very difficult to find a lab that will do it well.
Others prefer Ilford Delta 400 and the list goes on. Whichever you choose, stick to it unless you shoot 12 rolls a week. Back to the lover analogy, you need to become intimately familiar with how your film responds under different conditions. If you try to mess with many films you'll never know anything about any of them because you'll be so confused with the very, very subtle differences among them. Don't listen to the guy at the camera store who claims that there is such a big difference between films.
Personally I shoot Velvia color slide film, scan it, and convert it to B/W for my modern B/W work anyway. Yes, I've won awards and had these prints exhibited in museums over other people's prints made with traditional B/W methods and film.
A huge advantage of having a color film source is that you can control the effective filtration after you shoot the film. In other words, by playing with the channel mixer in Photoshop you can get the same look as having used various color filters over the lens with B/W film. By using the channel mixer with color film you have complete and continuous control after the exposure, and the real reason to do it is you can effectively use different effective filtration for different regions of the image. That makes this method superior to traditional B/W film.
Black-and-White Film Speed Testing return to top
Everyone makes this so difficult. It's easy, it's very important, and you should only need to do it once.
1.) First you have to have a lab picked out that you know is developing the film properly. (Personally my life is too short to do my own developing. If you develop your own film this gets a lot tougher since you also need to calibrate your development at the same time. For this I refer you to Ansel's book "The Negative" again.)
2.) Shoot a gray card at many different film speed settings depending on how lucky you feel. Read all the way through and at the bottom for suggestions on how to shoot the card. You don't want to miss the correct value in the interest of saving film and wind up having to do this all again! Feel free to shoot a whole roll at 1/3 stops, or just bracket in 1/3 stops from the rated speed from two stops slower to one stop faster. In other words, for an ISO 100 film try it at at least ISO 25, 32, 40, 50, 64, 80, 100, 125, 160 and 200. Make sure to put a little index card next to the gray card with the speed written on it so you know which neg is which. This is much easier than taking notes and trying to correlate later. Leave the lens focused at your typical shooting distance; if you focus close on the card you may actually bias your measurements to overexpose by 1/3 of a stop since some lenses that extend as you focus close can lose as much as 1/3 stop of light. Try to fill the frame with the card to make the measurements below easier.
3.) Go find a densitometer. A densitometer is a scientific instrument that gives a numerical reading of a negative's darkness, or density. Your lab ought to have one. If they don't have one you may want to worry, since that means they are not keeping tabs on their processing. If your lab are smart alecks they may ask you if you want visual density or R, G or B. Whatever, ask for visual, if not just look at green or blue. Just use the same type of reading for everything. If worse comes to worse you can take your B/W negatives over to a color lab who also ought to have a densitometer. Now:
3a.) Measure a clear (unexposed part) part of the negative. It will probably read something like 0.07, and the exact value will vary with your choice of film anywhere from 0.01 to 0.10 or so. It's not important. Ansel called this value "base plus fog." Depending on your camera, you may just want to leave one frame blank to make making this measurement easy. The densitometer typically needs a spot about 1/4" to make the measurement.
3b.) Measure the different frames of film. They will probably read between 0.50 and 1.00 or so.
3c.) Subtract the clear value ("base plus fog" or b+f ) from the values of each frame. These values are the film density above the b+f, which is what counts.
4.) See which frame of film gave you a reading closest to 0.70 above base plus fog. (Probably the card that measured about 0.80, minus 0.10 b+f = 0.70 above b+f.) The ISO used to shoot that frame is the ISO you should use. Hopefully you remembered to include a little card in the side of the image so you can just see what ISO you used. If two frames are just as close to 0.70 as each other then use the ISO for the card that read a little higher than 0.70 (0.75 for instance) when you subtracted the b+f value.
Note that I never said what meter to use or what filters. If you are loony you can do this for every meter, every filter and every light condition and use those ISO values in each case. Personally, I suggest using whichever meter and filter you usually use and stopping there. Each lens will test a little different, too. Don't worry too much about all this.
You also should try this with each filter (Yellow, Red, etc.)
Here's what I do:
Meter: Pentax Digital Spot meter, no filter over the meter.
Film: Shoot in daylight with a yellow filter (my standard) over the lens.
Personally I also shoot these tests for all my different filters, but I'll just tell you the results to save you the trouble.
I get a speed for my film from the above process. I set it on the meter (no filter) and use a yellow filter on the camera and shoot away.
If I want to use a different filter, like green, on the camera, I meter through the filter, setting the film speed a little differently, and then put the filter back on the camera and shoot. The slightly different film speed settings are because the meter responds a little differently to colors than the film does. I use these values:
If you do this correctly you can shoot a gray (or green or purple or white or black) card under any light with any camera filter and all your exposures will print as the same gray. This is important. Now that you see how difficult it is just to get gray to print gray you may understand why so many people's negatives are often incorrectly exposed. Getting the correct exposure in B/W is difficult because you always compensate for exposure in printing, so often you won't know if you got the right exposure unless you calibrate like this.
If you do calibrate like this you will get loads of great images that are easy to print!
Black-and-White Processing return to top
Unlike color, you can do this well yourself, or send it to a real B/W lab. Many pro labs claim to do B/W film, however most of them just process all B/W films the same and if you dislike the results blame it on you.
Sadly, all B/W film has to be developed differently in different developers. Unlike color film, there is no standard time or developer, thus every roll brought in has to be developed differently in a real B/W lab, and this is why even the expensive pro labs usually just process everything B/W the same way. Thus many films are over or underdeveloped, and the lab blames it on you. Ensure to ask a prospective lab indirectly if they develop all films the same, and if they do, don't use them.
There are a couple of good B/W labs I've used. The lab I used in San Diego evaporated in 2005. When I worked in Hollywood I used Photo Impact. They developed my film exactly as it should have, even when I got sneaky and sent them test wedges I read on a densitometer. They were dead on, so if you don't like your results you need to get better calibrated. Their development was far more accurate and precise than my ability to expose film!
As of 2006 in San Diego I'm going to try North Coast Photographic Services, (760) 931-6809, 5451 Avenida Encinas, Suite D, Carlsbad, CA 92008.
Black-and-White Printing return to top
See my separate page on black-and-white printing.
DOES ANYONE STILL USE KODAK COLOR FILM? return to top
Not that I know of. Funny that I refer to films like Kodak VS and E100G as "old." Velvia came out in 1989 and Kodak ever since has been trying to equal it. They keep trying, and every 2 years come out with some other weak attempt to duplicate Velvia. Remember Lumèire and E100VS? It's unfortunate for Kodak. Even if they invented a film that gave the vivid colors and deep velvety blacks of Velvia I would avoid it because it would take me some time to learn how it interprets color, and then Kodak would discontinue it.
Grain and film speed have nothing to do with colors and how good a photo looks.
Longevity is also important to me. The only even partially valid data out there to guess at how long our color film will last is Henry Wilhelm's. His tests show that the Fuji films ought to last longer than Kodak's E-6 films. Kodak poo poos this, which proves the fact that Kodak agrees that Fuji is superior.
I don't know about you, but I want my images to look great in 30 or 40 years. Much of what you see on this site was shot about 10 years ago on Velvia. My 10 year old Velvias still look far better than 10 year old Kodachromes.
Kodachrome lasts forever, but looks crummy to begin with. According to Wilhelm, Ektachrome will be faded before the Fuji films.
Of course if you like what you see on Kodachrome, by all means use it. This is art, and no one can tell you what you like and which is best. Kodachrome looks great for skin.
It is important to have films that stay available from year to year. Kodak changes film types every year or so in the interest of some clueless scientist's quest for less grain and more accurate duplication of bogus color charts and continual failed attempts to imitate Velvia. By doing this artists can never tune their process around Kodak film by the time it goes out of production. My experience with Velvia across three decades (80's, 90's and 00's) allows me to tune my images even before they are exposed.
I use Kodak B/W film, but don't see any point in their color films.
For instance, Kodak was silly enough to discontinue Tri-X B/W film, introduced in the 1950s, when their scientists invented T-Max because the aesthetically ignorant scientists thought that just because their new invention had less grain and more resolution that no one would want Tri-X anymore. What those folks in dreary Rochester misunderstood is how important an artists' experience with certain tools and media is to that artist's ability to create. Artists invest considerable time in learning how a material reacts and sees the world. Once we know this we can use that material to produce consistent results. It takes a long time to get familiar with new materials.
There was enough outcry that Kodak continues to make Tri-X, although Kodak has no idea why people buy it.
WHY DON'T I LIKE KODACHROME? return to top
Kodachrome always looks greenish, especially in the highlights. Everything looks as if were shot through a car window. When Kodak introduced Kodachrome Professional in the 1980s this problem was supposed to go away. It didn't.
On the other hand, it makes people's skin look great. As I said, I usually photograph things as opposed to people.
Technically, if you look at the curves I told you to ignore above you can see how the green curve moves away from the red and blue curves at the highlights, which proves that Kodachrome goes green just before it goes clear. This makes white clouds look awful. Forget the curves, just look at the pictures. You cannot tune this out with color printing filters or gels over the taking lens, although you can tweak it out in Photoshop if you are advanced.
I shot Kodachrome for decades. I didn't know any better until I tried Velvia in 1989 and saw the light.
Real pros whose work was printed in magazines, catalogs, posters and books used to shoot Kodachrome because the color separators who made the color printing plates for the printing presses knew how to get the colors from Kodachrome to look great because they'd worked at it for years. Because Kodachrome was similar from year to year the separators got very, very good at getting great color from Kodachrome, so they didn't bother learning how to get great color from all the other films that came and went every year. Thus all the pros shot Kodachrome up till 1990. The color looked great coming off the press, even if it looked awful on the slide.
This was great if you were shooting for reproduction, but awful if you were shooting for projection or photo prints.
Because all the pros shooting for repro shot Kodachrome before the 1990s many amateurs though that they should shoot it, too. Today the only people who shoot Kodachrome are amateurs, and usually Leica camera collectors at that.
What is great about Kodachrome is that it does not fade when stored. It should retain the same green tinge for decades. My 1973 and 1989 Kodachromes look exactly as they did when they came from the lab, but then again so do my 1989 Velvias, and boy oh boy do the Velvias look so much better!
RELUCTANT COLOR PRINT FILM SUGGESTIONS return to top
If you insist on using print film, I prefer Fuji Reala 100 print film if I'm photographing people. If you want a more general purpose film for use also in dim light without flash I used to use Fuji 400 or Fuji 800 film before I got my D1H for these things.
Today I'd use Chrome in San Diego for any print film developing and printing. I just drop my stuff personally and you can ship your film to them. Tell them I sent you.
Don't worry about print films. Worry a lot about where you have them developed. Any print film will look fantastic when printed well, and the best film shot by an expert will look awful when developed or printed in most places.
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Make your claim now for Packers RB Jackson
Adam Rank | Tags: Brandon Jackson, Green Bay Packers, John Kuhn, Ryan Grant
Forgive me for stating the obvious, but immediately put in a waiver claim for Packers RB Brandon Jackson. Like right now.
Jackson will be a hot name on the waiver wire with Ryan Grant reportedly out for the season.
Jackson will be a solid No. 2 fantasy back going forward, and he there is a chance he can be more involved in the passing game than Grant was. Make your claim for him now because there are not a lot of opportunities to grab a top running back on waivers.
Although one caveat, as pointed out by one of our news editor Chris Bayee, that John Kuhn could take goal-line carries. Which, to me, would just be rude.
Grant suffered an ankle injury in the season opener against the Philadelphia Eagles, and is expected to have a surgical procedure in which at least one screw will be inserted to help the injury heal.
— Adam Rank
Tweet your fantasy questions to @nflfantasy.


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Since we use Skype as our phone service (instead of having a landline), we (by which I mean "I") decided we ("I") should invest in a headset/microphone combination. I figured that the coolest PC accessories are made by Logitech, so their Premium USB Headset 350 was a clear winner. Added bonus – they make me look like a commander from Star Trek!
After some shopping around, I found the best price was a Buy.com – coming in at only $32.98, they were about $17 cheaper than RRP. And, since I've already bought a heap of stuff from them, they send me vouchers all the time – so there's another 10% off. And then today when I got them, I found a voucher for about $5 worth of credit on Skype! So the overall cost was only about $24.
Of course I had to try them as soon as possible, so Sista Suz was lucky enough to receive the first call. Reports from Australia are that the microphone is "very clear". The cushy earpads are also very comfy on the ears, and they have a handy volume/mute switch on the cord. At $24 I reckon these are a top buy – gerrod.com rating: 9.5/10. Logitech gear rocks – I think I'm going to buy some shares in that company (if they're listed)!


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- Americana® Decor™ Chalky Paint: Refreshing Light Green Chalk Paint
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Color: Green
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4 ounces of chalk paint per package.


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How 'bout that, two Greenwood/Phinney eateries opening sister locations in West Seattle! Just a couple hours ago we saw on the West Seattle Blog that Prost! was opening a second pub in West Seattle in about a month. Now the West Seattle Blog tells us that OK Corral at N. 87th St. and Greenwood Ave. N. is also opening a second location in West Seattle. Check out all the comments on West Seattle Blog giving props to the Corral's tasty barbecue.
Entries from September 2008
Greenwood's OK Corral opening 2nd location in West Seattle
September 30th, 2008 by Doree
→ No CommentsTags: restaurant
Register to vote at Greenwood Market
September 30th, 2008 by Dale
With the voter registration deadline looming for the Nov. 4 general election, organizers are holding a voter registration drive outside of the Greenwood Market, 8500 3rd Ave. NW today from 5:30 – 8:30 p.m.
They'll also help you if you've had a recent change of address. The last day to register by mail is Oct. 4. After that, the last day to register in person at the elections office is Oct. 20. Here's more deadline info.
→ No CommentsTags: election
Prost! expands to West Seattle
September 30th, 2008 by Doree
The West Seattle Blog reports that Prost! on Greenwood Avenue is opening a sister pub, Prost! West Seattle, in the next month or so. The main difference between the two is that Prost! West Seattle will welcome the under-21 crowd as well. There's quite a thread of comments on the West Seattle Blog debating the merits of allowing children in a bar, but the owner, Chris, says the new pub won't exactly cater to kids (no booster seats, crayons or kids' menu), but he wants it to be family-friendly in true European style.
→ No CommentsTags: pub, restaurant
Support a Phabulous cause at Phinney Pig Out
September 30th, 2008 by Dale
Eat out at any of 18 local restaurants, breakfast hangouts, coffee shops and pubs this Thursday, Oct. 2 during the 6th Annual Phabulous Phinney Pig Out and a portion of the proceeds will go toward supporting the Phinney Neighborhood Association soup kitchens.
Participating businesses include:
74th St. Ale House, 7401 Greenwood Ave. N. (Reviews)
Bleacher's Pub, 8118 Greenwood Ave. N.
Carmelita, 7314 Greenwood Ave. N. (Reviews)
Fresh Flours, 6015 Phinney Ave. N.
Gaspare Ristorante, 6705 Greenwood Ave. N. (Reviews)
Gorgeous George's, 7719 Greenwood Ave. N.
Kouzina, 8403 Greenwood Ave. N.
Mae's Phinney Ridge Cafe, 6412 Phinney Ave. N. (Reviews)
Oliver's Twist, 6820 Greenwood Ave. N. (Reviews)
Park Pub, 6114 Phinney Ave. N
Pete's Egg Nest, 7717 Greenwood Ave. N. (Reviews)
Pig 'N' Whistle, 8412 Greenwood Ave. N.
Red Mill Burgers, 312 N. 67th St. (Reviews)
Santa Fe Cafe, 5910 Phinney Ave. N. (Reviews)
Stumbling Goat Bistro, 6722 Greenwood Ave. N (Reviews)
Wingdome, 7818 Greenwood Ave. N. (Reviews)
Yanni's Greek Restaurant, 7419 Greenwood Ave. N. (Reviews)
The event runs from breakfast through dinner and dessert. So eat well and feel good about it at the same time.
→ No CommentsTags: Food & Drink
Naked City Brewing a few weeks from opening
September 29th, 2008 by Dale
The folks at Naked City Brewing hope to open in mid-October. Here's what it looked like inside Monday evening:
That's one of the owners, Don Webb, behind the bar. Take a look at our previous post to get an idea of how far they've come since Sept. 1.
Donald Averill (another owner), said they're still working on getting a conditional use permit that will allow them to brew beer on the premises at 8564 Greenwood Ave N. He's hoping they'll get it by the end of the year. People won't go thirsty waiting, however. In the meantime, there will be 24 guest taps right behind where Don is standing. Mmmmm, beer.
→ No CommentsTags: Food & Drink
Help plan Day of the Dead
September 29th, 2008 by Dale
Every year, the PNA holds a traditional Mexican parade and festival celebrating life and death called Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead).
There's a 7 p.m. planning meeting tonight (9/29/08) at the Phinney Neighborhood Center, so anyone who is interested in being involved, has ideas, or wants to find out what will be happening, is invited to stop in.
For those who just want to participate, the festivities happen this year on Friday, Nov. 7, starting with a candlelight procession that begins at 6:30 p.m. at 75th and Phinney and end up at the Phinney Neighborhood Center, 6532 Phinney Ave N. where you can participate in the community altar and enjoy live music, hot chocolate, craft activities, and more. Call (206) 783-2244 for more information.
→ No CommentsTags: PNA
Bike lanes going in on Fremont Ave.
September 29th, 2008 by Dale
Spray-painted markers denoting where permanent bike lanes and "sharrows" will be placed are marking up Fremont Avenue from the south end of Woodland Park Zoo to North 42nd Street.
According to an employee at the Seattle Department of Transportation, the permanent markers could go in later this year if the weather holds. If not, they'll go in sometime next year when the weather again improves.
The completion of the bike lanes and shared roadway markers is part of Seattle's Bicycle Master Plan.
→ No CommentsTags: bicycling
Missing dog roaming through area
September 28th, 2008 by Dale
UPDATE: Rosa's owner, Oscar, reports that Rosa has come home. See the Comments section for his thanks to everyone who looked for her.
Rosa, a 10-year-old, 30 pound Jindo, went missing Friday afternoon from 5th Avenue NW between 42nd and 43rd. Someone saw her at 85th and Aurora on Saturday, so she could be in the area.
Her most distinctive feature is that she's missing part of her right ear. She is very aloof with people but loves other dogs. Anyone having information about her can phone Oscar at (206) 419-1102.
→ No CommentsTags: missing, pets
Why aren't you visiting the Friday Farmers Market?
September 26th, 2008 by Dale
Year two of the Phinney Farmers Market is a week away from coming to a close and by all accounts, attendance is down. Here's the scene Friday a little after 6 p.m.
Granted, many people probably went home to watch the Presidential debate, as one vendor pointed out. In a few conversations with the organizers over the course of the summer, they've said it's not uncommon for year two of most farmers markets to take an attendance dip. Just the same, they've said the market in the lower parking lot at the Phinney Neighborhood Center was performing to expectations.
Several farmers asked about it today felt it was less about the poor economy than about how aggressively the market is being promoted compared to last year. Given the growing interest in eating locally and organically, it's been surprising to us and some of our readers how few people are showing up for great local produce, honey, fresh breads, pizza, bakery items, cheeses, apple cider, chocolates, ice cream and so on.
There's even live entertainment most afternoons until 6 p.m. Today, Tiger Zane played a beautifully emotional set that captivated our young son.
OK Phinneywood readers, here's your opportunity – why are/aren't you attending? What would you like to see change for next year that would get you to attend? In any case, 3-7 p.m., Friday, Oct. 3 is your last chance to stop by this year.


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We are a family owned and operated business since 1956. Today, our family members are Wendy Olney, Danny Knapp and Steve Perry.
Please click on this History tab or to the left of the screen to view the history of Knapp and Schlappi.
We have a large inventory within our stores and lumber yard, though if you can not find what you are looking for you can shop at Do It Best online.
We have two store locations: our main store is in Penn Yan and our smaller store is in Dundee; click on the store location links above to get the addresses to each of our stores.
In the links above are many of our Product Websites for you to view.


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Denisse Salazar, one of our regular Latin pop contributors, was on hand for Señor J.Lo's sharp set. She'll be back Sunday with a review of Jaguares at the Mouse House …
Salsa sensation Marc Anthony wowed his fans Friday night in Anaheim, delivering a series of favorites that had everyone dancing at the Theatre at Honda Center.
Anthony was fashionably late at about 9:30 p.m., but once he took the stage, his cheering admirers weren't disappointed with his high-energy, passionate rendition of crowd-pleasers such as "Valio la Pena," "Y Hubo Alguien" and "Te Conozco Bien."
In a form-fitting dark suit and a white dress shirt, Anthony electrified the stage with his powerful voice and explosive dance moves that had the mostly female audience screaming and shaking during his 90-minute performance.
The 41-year-old native New Yorker was accompanied by a full instrumental ensemble, including timbales, trumpets and congas, along with three backing vocalists. During solos, Anthony charismatically simulated to the band that it was his turn to sing –- while also encouraging the audience to finish lyrics for him.
At the end of "Hasta Ayer," he paused, crossed his arms and gazed out at his fans, embracing the moment as the squeals, cheers and applause intensified. "Wow," he said. "You guys can dance, too!"
That dancing continued on the stage, which jutted out halfway across the floor –- which Anthony kissed midway through his show, vowing to show his appreciation to the near-capacity crowd.
Midway through his performance, Anthony kissed the floor and vowed to the audience to show his appreciation, inviting them (in Spanish) to keep singing along.
The most impressive moment of the night was when Anthony transformed Juan Gabriel's well-known ballad "Hasta Que Te Conoci" into a lively salsa jam. "This song changed my life forever," he said. His piercing voice shined throughout the tune, gaining even more strength as he added knockout dance moves.
He told his fans "Mi Gente" was his last song but, of course, came back when cheers and applause grew louder, offering a powerful rendition of "Te Conozco Bien," during which he blew kisses to fans.
The audience gave him a standing ovation. He soaked in the love, put his face in his hands, then looked back at the crowd to deliver one more hit, "Tu Amor Me Hace Bien."
Photos by Kelly A. Swift, for the Orange County Register.
More concert reviews:
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LOWELL, Mich. (WZZM) - A teen who phoned in a false report about six armed gunman storming a Lowell home has been ordered to pay more than $1,300 in restitution to police agencies responding to the March 2013 hoax.
The teen, who lives in Mount Airy, N.C., was charged with making a false report to police, which under North Carolina law is punishable by up to six months in jail.
It's called "swatting,'' making a hoax call to 911 to draw a response from law enforcement, usually a Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team.
The North Carolina boy was placed on probation and ordered to pay the city of Lowell $1,237 and the Kent County Sheriff's Department $134.
"It was an expensive lesson,'' said Lowell Police Detective Gordy Lauren, who has kept tabs on the case. "There were a total of nine officers dispatched on his prank call.''
It is the second reported "swatting'' incident in West Michigan. Police from Holland, Zeeland and the Ottawa County Sheriff's Department responded in April to a call about two armed men entering a home in Zeeland with shots fired.
A sergeant with the Ottawa County Sheriff' Department was involved in a crash at Lakewood Boulevard and 120th Avenue while responding to the hoax.
No arrests have been made, but the case remains under investigation, Zeeland Police Chief Bill Olney said.
"I don't understand people's thinking; the resources wasted and the potential for harm when you have resources yanked somewhere on a false report,'' Olney said. "Until officers arrive on scene, you don't really know what you've got so other calls are neglected for a period of time.''
In the 2013 Lowell case, AT&T received a text at 11:20 p.m. March 1 advising that six men armed with assault rifles broke into a house on South Pleasant Street. Responding officers were told a teenage girl had been stabbed and her parents were being held hostage.
Arriving officers were greeted by the homeowner – a Lowell youth pastor, who was watching TV when his house was surrounded by police tactical units.
The intended 'target' was a Lowell Middle School student who met the "swatter'' on Skype, an online peer-to-peer connection system.
They met in a group chat room "and apparently he didn't like what she was saying, so he decides to 'SWAT' her, sending up a SWAT team or police agency to her house to cause a problem,'' Kent County Sheriff's detective Scot Vansolkema wrote in a police report.
The detective accessed the North Carolina boy's Twitter feed and "he had mentioned swatting another person,'' he wrote.
The girl told police she learned her lesson and was no longer going to talk to random stangers online.
Police obtained several search warrants for online accounts, which led them to Mount Airy, better known as the birthplace of Andy Griffith. The boy – who used an online name of ''swatted101'' is also believed responsible for swatting incidents in Illinois and Massachusetts.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation says 'swatting' first surfaced in 2008 and there are about 400 cases reported a year. "Spoofing" technology—which enables callers to mask their own numbers while making the victims' numbers appear – has made it difficult for emergency operators to verify the legitimacy of the call.
Hollywood celebrities are favorite targets of the new trend; recent victims include Justin Timberlake, Justin Bieber, Tom Cruise and Ashton Kutcher.
In April, more than 60 heavily armed officers went to a home in Long Beach, N.Y. when a caller reported someone had killed his mother and brother there.
Police said the caller may have been upset while playing "Call of Duty,'' on online video game, and made the call against his 17-year-old opponent.


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Kicked off range for not having NFA paperwork...
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December 1, 2009, 10:23 AM
Frank Ettin
Join Date: November 23, 2005
Location: California - San Francisco
Posts: 8,702
Originally Posted by
...It is the attitude that has been expressed time after time that it is just fine to arrest someone....
What you don't seem to get it that I, at least, really don't care what you do. I have no problem with the lawful possession of NFA weapons, I fully understand that private citizens can legally own them. What I have described in numerous posts here is simply the way the law in fact works.
If you are openly and obviously in possession of an NFA weapon and can not show an LEO that you are in lawful possession of that item, he will have probable cause to arrest you. And if you were to complain to a judge, the judge will support the LEO. That is just reality.
I make no judgment about whether that is good or bad. It's the way it is.
I don't care what you do with that information. You might conclude that it would be in your best interest to carry a copy of you NFA paperwork with the weapon. In that way, if you are contacted by an LEO about the weapon you can quickly and easily establish your lawful ownership and go on about your business. But if your idea of a good time is to spend the day getting handcuffed, stuffed into the backseat of a police car and driven "downtown" where you can continue to hassle with the cops, that's fine too. It's your choice. My only interest is that it be an informed choice.
I've never said there is any statute that requires you to carry your paperwork with you when you have the gun in your possession. I've never said that there's any statute that requires you to display your paperwork to anyone other than an ATF agent.
What I have done is explain how probable cause works, how the presumption of innocence works, and what an affirmative defense is and how it works. This is all basic law of general application that I first learned over 30 years ago in my Criminal Procedure class in law school.
It's the way it is. Do what you please with the information.
If you don't like what the law is, write your Congressman.
Originally Posted by
...It is crystal clear that most are willing to play along with the new set of made up rules..... But that is not the law no matter how many people *think* it is the law....
What new rules?
Probable cause, the presumption of innocence, and affirmative defenses are as I've described. These aren't new rules. Things have been done that way, and the law has been thus, for a long time. It works that way for everything -- not just Title II weapons.
I don't know where or how you've learned what you think is the law. I've learned what I know of the law in law school and by being a member of the bar and practicing law for over 30 years. As a shooter and firearms instructor, I have a special interest in gun law and use of force law.
Originally Posted by
...You are fine with legal citizens exercising 2nd Amendment rights being arrested based on nothing more than suspicion....
An LEO in general has the power to arrest someone when he has probable cause to believe that person has violated the law. "Probable cause" is "sufficient reason based upon known facts to believe a crime has been committed or that certain property is connected with a crime...."
Yes, I'm okay with that. It's been that way for a very long time and makes good sense.
Originally Posted by
...Our worst enemy is not the Brady group... It is the gun owner that thinks assault weapons should be banned, and that MG's are illegal. And saying it is fine to arrest someone just because they have a title II item and not following some made up "law" is perpetuating that stereotypical thought process....
And this is of course utter nonsense. It's clear that you haven't really been paying attention. You want things to be a certain way. They aren't the way you want them to be. Sorry, but that's life.
Frank Ettin
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Noted: J.M. Coetzee
From Coetzee's memoir, Youth:
He pages through it. It is printed in the same fullbodied serif type as Pound's Selected Poems, a type that evokes for him intimacy, solidity. He buys the book and takes it back to Major Arkwright's. From the first page he knows he has hit on something. Propped up in bed with light pouring through the window, he reads and reads.
Watt is quite unlike Beckett's plays. There is no clash, no conflict, just the flow of a voice telling a story, a flow continually checked by doubts and scruples, its pace fitted exactly to the pace of his own mind. Watt is also funny, so funny that he rolls about laughing. When he comes to the end he starts again at the beginning.
Why did people not tell him Beckett wrote novels? How could he have imagined he wanted to write in the manner of [Ford Madox] Ford when Beckett was around all the time? In Ford there has always been the element of the stuffed shirt that he has disliked but has been hesitant to acknowledge, something to do with the value Ford placed on knowing where in the West End to buy the best motoring gloves or how to tell a Médoc from a Beaune; whereas Beckett is classless, or outside class, as he himself would prefer to be.
Labels: Ford Madox Ford, J.M. Coetzee, Noted, Samuel Beckett


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Alvaro Herrera wrote: > Bill Moran wrote: > > >> What I suspect is that the typical tuning advice applies here. I don't >> see any information about your configuration or your hardware setup. >> * What are shared_buffers set at? >> * What do the checkpoint configs look like? >> * In general, what does your postgresql.conf look like, how much tuning >> have you done? >> * What is your hardware setup? You're not running RAID 5 are you? >> > > Also, how many indexes does this table have? > > Two, but the column I'm updating isn't included in either one of them.
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Here's something you don't see everyday! Following the news that Disney have an open casting call for the new Star Wars movie in Bristol today, BBC news readers Alex Lovell and David Garmston dressed as two of the best known Star Wars characters to deliver the news report surprising viewers in the BBC Points West region.
The casting call opened up by Disney for J.J Abrams' Star Wars Episode VII was reported to be asking for the role of an orphaned girl was "street smart and strong" and in her late teens and a "smart capable" man in his late teens or early 20s. Auditions for the roles will be taking place in London, Manchester, Dublin and Glasgow over the course the next month.
Below is the casting call from a @UKopenCall sent to Digital Spy yesterday. The image above comes from BBC Points West Facebook page and thanks to Yahoo for the heads up.
@digitalspy Open Auditions for major Disney Movie starting in Bristol this weekend! Please help spread the word. pic.twitter.com/Z6rVaZxYP5
— Claire Curry (@UKopencall) November 5, 2013
More as we get it!


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back to The Store
Eiffel Tower Luggage Tag
This magnifique luggage tag would love to accompany your suitcase to Paris - and it will never get jet lag!
Luggage tags are 2.5″ × 4″. Made out of plastic with a black loop. Back of tag has room to write personal information.
Luggage Tags


text: Dear all, I am dealing with a project "automation of web application of testing tool **puffin**". I am using Python and zope. So, may I know what will be the best way to store xml tags for system and testaction configuration entered by tester in form.And generate xml file using python. ------------------------ Basalingamma, Volunteer, Mahiti Infotech Private Limited 314/1, Vijay Kiran, II Floor, 7th Cross, Domlur Layout, Domlur, Bangalore - 560 071


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Living in this fully renovated 1920's immaculate family bungalow will enhance your lifestyle returning peace and tranquility that only special properties can do.
Made over to exacting standards (2012) the native timber flooring, ornate period detailing bay windows and modern kitchen create a very cool vibe.
Open plan living connecting to shelted north facing lovely verandahs overlooking lovley landscaped grounds this 'easy care' lock and leave property needs to be viewed immediately.
Price By Negotiation
Call Danneil Keit 021 261 8685
Logan Glbert 021-2427241


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Last month, the Dallas Arboretum launched a new culinary event: Chefs in Nature, where local chefs share recipes, prepare some bites and pair their dishes with a few cocktails. There are three more events scheduled each month. Tomorrow, Aug. 17, will feature community favorite Janice Provost of Parigi, pictured, conjuring up a light menu with two summer cocktails and tips on making her French-Italian fusion food. On Sept. 21, Nikky Phinyawatana of Asian Mint will create the meal. It will all culminate on Oct. 16 with a Harvest Feast featuring six chefs, each preparing a course.
The August and September events run from 6–7:30 p.m. The price is $70 ($63 for members). Learn more here.


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|Thread Tools
I've been ready for DD to wean on her own whenever she was ready. It's not really a huge deal that she's still nursing and I don't mind most days. But other days, it's just one more thing to do. She has been on the pure CLW path all along and has cut herself to nursing just once before bed. My husband can put her to bed if needed, but she prefers me. Even if she wasn't nursing, she would prefer me. I'm not ready to wean her quite yet, since I'm still holding out hope she'll do it on her own. Any one been there done that with words of hope? She'll be 6 years old in two months so we're at the point where it's really hard to find others in the same situation.
I did not do CLW with my oldest. I did what I called child-respected weaning. I weaned him right before 5 years old because I was ttc and tandeming and have rough pregnancies. So, DD has nursed longer than he did, but I'm done having kids so there was no reason to wean her. I'm also nursing my youngest who will be 3 years old next month and nurses 6+ times a day - though I think it was 6 times alone during the night last night. (Which isn't common for him. 8 times during the day is common but he's usually wakes 0-1 times at night to nurse).
*Edited to add: Some of it may have to do with how long I've nursed. I've nursed at least 5 times a day for 8+ years now straight. In May, I'll hit 9 years in a row of nursing. As of now, I've spent 5 years of that tandeming.
I remember seeing my friends (who were LLL Leaders & child-led weaners) have their kids wean between 2-4 and sometimes feeling so *done* and so jealous even. It was so frustrating that it seemed like I had to try so hard when their kids just naturally were down to nursing only a few times a day by 2.5 and tapered off so easily. I remember finding the LLL toddler group when DD was a toddler and feeling so good being around the women nursing older children--- and then years later having the oldest nursling by far. It is hard because it starts to feel so different.
With DS we did as close as I could get to child-led weaning and he was 5.75 years old. And it was *totally* worth it. I felt really good about letting him go at his own pace and he felt really good about deciding on his own.
Have you talked to DD about weaning? I didn't encourage DS to wean, but I let him know that it was something he would want to do, and that was great when he decided and that we could have a celebration because it was a big deal (he didn't want a public celebration so I got him a DS game, lol).
Good luck.
I have asked her when she would like to wean. It was "when I turn 5," then "when I turn 6." Now that 6 is less than two months away, it's "whenever you make me." I know it won't be tramatic if I wean her. She likely will get upset, but she'll get over it. (Plus, she's very dramatic. She cried yesterday because she wished she had a big head). However, I would love for her to be able to do pure child-led weaning. I just want her to hurry up with it!
With ODS, I did do a weaning cake to mark the end. But I weaned him, doing what I call child-respected weaning. He was almost 5 years old and it was very gradual. I did the weaning cake since we needed to mark the end with something concrete- or he would have been asking to nurse afterwards for a while. I don't want to bribe DD with something to get her to wean, but will be fine with something concrete to mark the end so she's less likely to ask more after. I figure I'll use that tactic once she starts skipping days in a row.
LOL, she should have given herself more space! I think DS was up to 9-10 at one point (when he thought he would wean).
When a child is 5 or 6 CLW is just one way of weaning. If you are talking about a toddler CLW may be best but with an older child other ways may work just as well. With one of my sons we had a set weaning day and had a weaning party. I think it was the best weaning of my 3 sons, the other 2 were CLW. The youngest was before I was ready and a surprise since he was less than 3. I spent 10 years breastfeeding, 3 tandem so I know what you mean by it seeming like having been nursing forever and or pregnant forever. I've never met anyone in real life that breastfed longer than me.
: Grandmother , 3 Adult Sons
Maybe the first thing to do is to sort through your own ambivalence. I seem to recall reading that it's easier when you have made a decision one way or the other. Have you done any journaling on your feelings about this?
Are there certain situations where you feel especially annoyed by her nursing? Maybe you can negotiate with her, and set limits that work for you. It is a two-way relationship, so I think you have the right to cut back if you are feeling the need.
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Latest Activity: Played Realm of the Mad God (Sep 3, 2017 7:30pm)
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Err… I guess this is where I write my epic life autobiography. Don't have much to write actually, but my life is pretty simple. Play video games until you can't blink. You'll know the exact point when you get there. FAKE FRIENDS: Borrow food.
REAL FRIENDS: Are the reasons you have no food.
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Sportsnet's Hugh Burrill is at Das Gasthaus on the Danforth where fans of Germany celebrated the team's World Cup victory.
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I did it again this morning – walked into my office with the intent of returning a call, picked up the phone and drew a blank. Who did I need to call again? Then I had that moment of panic. "I'm losing it!" I tend to blame hormones, but turns out, the doorway may be the culprit. (Because, of course, motivational speakers encourage personal responsibility!)
University of Notre Dame researchers have found that doorways mark "event boundaries." Our brains associate locations with certain memories of events. So when we get up from our desk and go to the supply room, as soon as we leave our office, we're taxing our brain's ability to recall our decision. Makes sense. Who hasn't then walked back into the original room and recalled their intended task? The upside? The extra calories burned with all that walking back and forth.
So cut yourself a little slack next time you walk into a room and have no idea what you're doing there. It's those darn doorways.


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The need for the Royal Proclamation of 1763 could have been avoided if the colonist had not..... I have to write an essay, and I want to say it could have been avoided if the colonists were not...
The need for the Royal Proclamation of 1763 could have been avoided if the colonist had not.....
I have to write an essay, and I want to say it could have been avoided if the colonists were not racist towards Inidans, showed fairness over land, and got support of British on the frontiers, but I need ideas to go in some of these categories, especally racism.
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You're taking a tricky position on the proclamation if you say it could have been avoided. Your argument boils down to the idea that if people weren't such jerks, things would have been better. That's true, but it is in the nature of people to be jerks so it goes without saying.
The proclamation was a method used to try to reduce potential problems with the natives. You might want to change your thesis to discuss why the proclamation was necessary, despite the fact it was unpopular in the colonies. I think that you'd have an easier time arguing some of it should have been adopted by the new American government as well.
I'm in a "numbered bullet" mood, so there's going to be lots of them in my answer:
The Proclamation of 1763 came about for several reasons.
- England had acquired a lot of North American land, previously owned by France, through what we know as the "French and Indian War," and the British weren't sure how to administer it yet.
- The land won was populated by natives, many of whom had been on the side of France and were not partial to the British.
- The colonists had a habit of moving West into this land, which caused tension with the natives.
- The tension was sometimes violent and the British were afraid of expensive and bloody "Indian Wars" on this frontier.
The Proclamation of 1763 did the following:
- Organized governments for places like Quebec and Florida.
- Put a temporary "boundary line" at the watershed of the Appalachian mountains, across which no colonists were supposed to settle.
- Made it illegal for individuals to make land deals with the Natives across that line.
The proclamation of 1763 had the following result:
- Many people got angry.
Why did they get angry? Lots of reasons:
- The war had just won the land, so colonists felt they had a right to enjoy what they'd help win.
- There were a fair number of settlers already living in that land who would now be displaced.
- Settlers argued that the "line" was not far enough west.
Getting back to your original question, though, you're right about your points but there is a lot of history working against your argument:
- Most colonists were racist about Indians. The problem with this is that the colonists were racist about everybody. In general, Europeans would have found all the other races of the world inferior and so it would have been odd if they'd thought differently of Native Americans. They also disliked each-other to a large extent.
- Racism was only part of it. The British just fought a war with the French and won the land, and they were Europeans as well. The overriding factor wasn't race but greed. If they hadn't thought the natives an inferior race, they still would have wanted to take the land through conquest.
- At this point, I think the colonists did feel they were being fair about buying the land, or felt they didn't buy it because the natives didn't technically own it.
- Forts and soldiers on the frontier wouldn't have helped. Without the proclamation they would only have been there to fight Indians on behalf of colonists, which wouldn't have reduced tensions.
I respect what you're trying to do, but I think you'd have an easier time if you modify your angle. Let me know if you'd like more help!


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Jonathan Agee Pleads No Contest to Shooting State Trooper
Christiansburg, VA - Former Franklin County deputy Jonathan Agee pleaded no contest to four charges in a Montgomery County court Tuesday afternoon.
A fifth charge against Agee was dropped. These charges stem from the shooting of a Virginia State Trooper after a chase on I-81 in May of 2011. Agee already pleaded no contest earlier this month to the 1st degree killing of his ex-wife, Jennifer, in Roanoke.
Agee will be sentenced in a Roanoke courtroom, for both the Montgomery County and Roanoke cases, on May 7.
He faces life in prison.


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Discovered someone who looks appealing? Send a letter to them or just a wink and await their reply. With a little luck you'll be on your way to a lifetime of happiness.
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Why are lakes in China disappearing?
About half of the lakes in a northern region of China have vanished over the last few decades, scientists report. And with climate change, even more lakes could dry out, threatening endangered species such as red-crowned cranes.
The study isn't the first report of shrinking lakes. In Africa, Lake Chad shriveled up to about 5 percent of its former size between 1963 and 2001. In Turkey, Lake Aksehir — which covered nearly 350 square kilometers in 1975 — disappeared a few years ago. Researchers blame drier climates for the change, as well as sloppy management of water for irrigation.
The study authors examined lakes in a 1.2-million-square-kilometer region of China, mainly on the Inner Mongolian Plateau. Waterfowl depend on wetlands in this area; scientists have catalogued 119 bird species, including six crane species. The region is also home to about 30 million people, many of whom tend crops or raise livestock.
The researchers gathered temperature and precipitation data and studied satellite images of 241 lakes taken from the 1970s to late 2000s. Then they calculated the change in lake area and looked for links to climate or human activities.
From 1975 to 2009, 121 of the lakes became "fully desiccated," the team writes in Environmental Science & Technology. The lakes appeared to shrink mainly when temperatures rose and precipitation dropped. Conditions have become drier at all 241 sites, the researchers say. Since some of the disappearing lakes were in an area with extensive farming, people's water use might have contributed to the problem.
The team also discovered that salty marshes have expanded, and freshwater marshes have dwindled. The shift could hurt cranes that rely on freshwater habitat. And saltier conditions could end up damaging fisheries as well. — Roberta Kwok | 22 October 2013
Source: Liu, H. et al. 2013. Disappearing lakes in semiarid northern China: Drivers and environmental impact. Environmental Science & Technology doi: 10.1021/es305298q.
Image © liu jian | Shutterstock
A caffeine fix for heavy metal cleanupOctober 14th, 2016
What's smothering coal? Not the EPAOctober 13th, 2016
The unappreciated brilliance of ratsOctober 12th, 2016
Dam greenhouse gas emissions really add upOctober 11th, 2016
Foreign investors' land deals in Africa could heighten water conflictOctober 7th, 2016


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I called and got an appointment the same day for HCG. Marilyn explained the process to me and told me everything to expect. Everyone was extremely polite and professional. On the 2nd appointment I arrived very early there was a little bit of wait. I had my pics and measurements taken. Very quick and easy. I am looking forward to seeing my results
36yr Mother of 3 - Pembroke Pines, FL
I called and got an appointment the same day for...
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The squirrels, by the way, were pretty wary of it, but eventually succumbed to the seeds' allure!
Dog of the Day
Cat of the Day
Pet of the Day
The squirrels, by the way, were pretty wary of it, but eventually succumbed to the seeds' allure!
I've Been Frosted
I saw this project and the pictures of it they looked so pretty and almost sparkling. Of course I can't try it living here in California.
I still think yours looks pretty neat anyway!
Our goal in life should be - to be as good a person as our dog thinks we are.
Thank you for the siggy, Michelle!
Cindy (Human) - Taz (RB Tabby) - Zoee (RB Australian Shepherd) - Paizly (Dilute Tortie) - Taggart (Aussie Mix) - Jax (Brown & White Tabby), - Zeplyn (Cattle Dog Mix)
Probably if you took time to polish the orb, it would sparkle, but the surface of a balloon is NOT perfect/
Just ordered some stuff for next year's Christmas science experiment.
The one eyed man in the kingdom of the blind wasn't king, he was stoned for seeing light.
It was shinier when first taken out of the balloon, granted.
But I did expect the color to be more evenly distributed! The flat spot it is resting on is where the gas bubble formed on the top of the balloon as it was laying in the snowbank as the ice froze.
I've Been Frosted
Not bad Karen, it looks pretty nice to me. I give you lots of credit for trying, well done
"Happy is the home with at least one cat" - Italian Proverb
Every life should have nine cats. Anonymous
"I've been frosted."
That's quite the orb Sounds like a real pot of trouble but I have balloons here and if this crazy weather doesn't give I just might give that a try.... maybe one green and one red...to put near the bird feeder to scare the squirrels away, they can empty 3 large tubes in less than a week , the bluejays are quite the scavengers also.
I've been frosted--- thank you Cassie'smom
I've been Boo'd----
Interesting potential variations on the experiment would be figuring out if different colors or kinds of food coloring take longer or shorter to freeze ... or if adding in things like glitter would help or hurt the freeze time ... although Paul swears any purveyor of glitter has my picture taped behind the counter as warning not to sell me any ... so someone else may have to try that one! Still have no idea why that one slice has so much less color than the rest of it ...
I've Been Frosted
I just came back hoping to see photos and there they are! I think this is a great first try, Karen, a big red almost football shape! And the pic of the 2 squirrels trying to sort out this new thing is just what I love! He hee, they sure are curious, aren't they? And tempted by the seed.
Great work, Karen! It is larger than I expected, especially after you wrote about it not freezing and such. Very interesting experiment!
LOL! At least your experiment brought us all joy!!! Maybe if you tied a string onto it after it was filled and tied shut and hung it from a tree branch it might freeze better???? Have no clue, just wondered. Thanks for sharing. At least you enchanted some squirrels with it.
No matter what anyone does, someone some where will be offended some how!!!!
Grandma (RB), Chester, Angel, Chip
Leonardo (RB), Luke (RB), Winnie, Chuck,
Hmm, add that to the list of experiments to try if we get another extended cold stretch! It is warm and raining today, and now what's left of it is sitting in grass instead of snow, and it is almost half the size - we've had a lot of rain.
I've Been Frosted
By late afternoon, it was down to less than a third of its size, and I am betting when the sun comes up tomorrow, there will be no trace of it after all the rain and warm temperatures we had today. The rain washed away all the snow underneath it as well, so I have no record of how the coloring spread as it melted!
I've Been Frosted
That was one reason I haven't been able to try this experiment out----our below igloo weather turned suddenly and we've had rain and wet snow for the last 2 days and the week is supposed to be no colder than -6C so nothing will freeze. If I get antsy enough I might try it and tie a string to it and suspend it in the freezer somehow, the chest freezer not the stand up. A litlte afraid the whole thing lets go in there, would hate to be trying to get the inside white again...
I've been frosted--- thank you Cassie'smom
I've been Boo'd----
Yeah, there is no trace of it now, one think we can always depend on is the weather will change!
I've Been Frosted
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DEBT will make Christmas a time of misery for millions — but Jeffrey Weiss
won't be one of them.
As families struggle to pay for gifts and food by taking out payday loans with
eye-watering interest rates, Weiss will be rubbing his hands in festive
For his phenomenal multi-million pound fortune, luxury homes and fleet of
expensive cars are all built on profits from the controversial short-term
The 69-year-old American, who pocketed £7million in wages and bonuses last
year, is the mastermind behind one of the biggest payday lending firms in
the UK — targeting borrowers with interest rates as high as 2,670
per cent.
Former investment banker Weiss heads DFC Global, owner of more than 500
outlets of The Money Shop.
The outfit is also behind a clutch of pawnbrokers and internet lenders Payday
UK and Payday Express.
Almost HALF of DFC's entire worldwide revenues come from the United
Kingdom and Ireland.
The company boasts that it offers "alternative retail financial services" and
that it can process a loan application in just two minutes.
But the cost is high, with a £500 loan taken out for one month adding up to
a repayment of £649.75p.
By contrast the same amount on a credit card charging 19.9 per cent would cost
a similar amount but be spread over three years.
What DFC does is legal — but payday loans have been heavily criticised by
anti-debt campaigners.
An estimated four million people — equivalent to almost one for every six
households in the country — have taken out such loans to cover the cost of
Christmas. And while increases in the cost of living strike fear into the
hearts of hard-pressed families, Weiss REJOICES at the idea that
prices are going up.
In the year to last June, his salary was $1m (£620,000) as well as a bonus of
$4.23m (£2.62m). He was also given shares, a further lump sum under an
"incentive plan" and other benefits which together totalled $11.55m — a
staggering £7.16m.
He also has a deal written into his contract that means he gets a
$300,000-a-year (£184,000) retirement benefit when he leaves, free life
insurance, medical care and thousands towards the cost of belonging to a
swanky US country club.
And a bizarre clause in his contract says that if he retires, Weiss gets to
keep "all photographs and artwork" bought to decorate his office in DFC's
Pennsylvania HQ.
He and his wife Felecia, 57, have several properties, with the most impressive
a Mediterranean-style waterfront mansion in the wealthy Boca Raton area of Florida.
It is worth $2.3m (£1.41m) and boasts five bathrooms, a pool, spa and parking
for five cars.
Property tax records show the couple also have a New York pad valued at
$4million (£2.45m) on Manhattan's Upper East Side and rent a $650,000
(£400,000) two-bed apartment in a leafy Philadelphia suburb.
Last year they sold a five-bedroom, five-bathroom 1910 colonial mansion with a
pool and perfectly manicured 3.5-acre gardens they had owned for 18 years in Pennsylvania
for $1.7m (£1.05m).
And should the couple want to pop out to spend any of their wealth, they are
not short of cars.
Their fleet includes a Porsche Carrera worth $97,700 (£60,000), a BMW
760Li worth $117,895 (£72,000), a vintage BMW Series 326 worth
$38,500 (£24,000) and a BMW sports car worth $45,295 (£28,000).
Weiss recently got rid of his 2011 Maserati, worth $136,300
(£84,000). And even if he does need to borrow money, high interest rates
aren't a worry to him.
Company records show that some years ago, he borrowed an unspecified amount of
money from DFC. When it came to settling the debt, DFC wrote off the
interest of $2.3m (£1.4m).
Things are not the same for ordinary borrowers. If they miss a payment
interest adds up, though the firm says this is capped.
Payday UK levies a £15 charge if a borrower defaults on a loan.
And people who are worried about how to repay what they owe are encouraged to
phone Payday UK — but the number they have to call is a high-tariff number
costing 10p a minute.
Payday Express charges even higher interest rates than Payday UK. The APR on
its loans is 2,670 per cent, though it plays down the significance of the
In a presentation to investors, DFC gleefully predicted how business was going
to boom more as economic woes worsened. It noted how population growth would
push up demand for food and oil, increasing prices generally. In addition,
it expected "decreasing average salaries".
Bosses concluded these two factors meant people have less spare cash "driving
increasing demand for short-term credit".
DFC reckons there is huge potential for expanding its high-cost lending
business. It wants to open new Money Shop outlets and take over small
pawnbroking businesses.
And lending over the internet — where it faces intense competition from Wonga
in the UK — is fast-growing business. Worldwide, DFC's revenues from
internet lending TRIPLED in the year to last June.
In the UK, moves are under way to clamp down on the activities of legal
There are calls to limit maximum interest rates, as happens in many states in
the US. And the Office of Fair Trading has signalled that it will limit
companies' ability to take money straight out of borrowers' bank accounts to
repay debts.
But DFC thinks it can continue to increase its earnings by expanding its
operations. That should "help insulate our business from unfavourable
regulatory activities," it said in its most recent financial report.
A DFC spokesman said: "For over 20 years, Jeff Weiss has constructed a
business allowing people access to credit at a time when increasing numbers
are excluded.
"The company's products are in demand and DFC is successful and well run,
employing more than 3,100 people in this country alone.
"Mr Weiss has invested much in the firm and his remuneration is commensurate
with these factors.
"His salary and benefits are reviewed against peers by an independent
consultant and approved by DFC's independent Board of Directors. The details
are publicly available, transparent and conform to all requirements." The
firm also said that for payday loans it offers, interest is stopped after
day 40 past the due date — in other words, the month of the loan plus 40
So for the £500 loan DFC says it would be capped at £861.68.
However debt charity Step Change said the figures show how those who are hard
up represent a "goldmine" for payday lenders.
Spokeswoman Una Farrell said: "This really helps understanding of how much
money is being made from the payday loan industry.
"We have seen a dramatic rise in people seeking our help with payday loans
over the past few years."
"Hearing that huge salaries are being generated from such misery leaves a
bad taste in my mouth.
"These profits are being made through charging people who are often on low
incomes very high costs for credit."