text:
Three years ago, when I signed up to my five-year fixed rate mortgage with First Direct, I checked that if we wanted to move house during the fixed rate period, we could transfer our mortgage to the new property.
I was told that the mortgage was fully portable and, reassured, thought no more about it, until we decided to move house this summer.
As soon as our home went under offer and we found a property to move to, I contacted First Direct to arrange the mortgage transfer.
Perhaps naively, and since we weren't changing the mortgage amount or the term, I assumed it would simply be a question of us arranging a mortgage valuation on the new property, checking a few of our details, and assigning the mortgage to the new address.
Not so straightforward...
I was surprised therefore, to be told that we effectively had to re-apply for the mortgage before we could transport it over. This involved a lengthy application interview over the telephone, following which my husband and I were asked to send in our last three months' bank statements, three years of my accounts as I am self-employed and proof of our identity.
Once this information was sent off, we were extensively questioned about activity on our bank account and were told that if we had had any unpaid items or had exceeded our authorised overdraft limit just once over the past three months, the application would have been refused.
There were also issues over my accounts. Since the start of the credit crunch, lenders have become much stricter about the amount you can borrow. Given the fact I have had two children in the past two years, my income has fallen, although not substantially, and, even though we have never missed a mortgage payment, we were then asked for a letter from my accountant confirming that my income will be higher this year.
Having crossed these hurdles, we thought we would be accepted without any further issues, only to receive a call from First Direct asking for evidence that my accountant was a member of a professional accountancy body, such as the Association of Certified Chartered Accountants or the Institute of Tax Consultants.
After much chasing we managed to provide this proof of his membership but were amazed at the lengths we had to go to to move our mortgage across, especially as we had provided all this information when we initially took out the mortgage.
Stricter lending criteria
David Hollingworth, of London & Country Mortgages, says we are far from being alone. Anyone wishing to move their current mortgage to a new property is likely to find that they are assessed against much stricter criteria than before the credit crunch.
He said: "You will be asked far more questions than you might have been previously and there will be a lot more paper-chasing involved before you will be able to move your mortgage.
"What people have to remember is that, when it comes to transporting your current deal to a new property, you always have to meet the lender's criteria at that particular point in time. So, while your circumstances might not have changed, their lending criteria might have got much stricter, which means you may no longer be eligible to move your mortgage across.
"When times are tough, as they are now, you could find that especially if you are upsizing and wanting to borrow more, your lender may not allow it."
According to Mr Hollingworth, Northern Rock customers who took out mortgage deals they thought were portable are among those hardest hit.
Since the bank re-structured into two separate companies, the majority of mortgage accounts now fall under its Asset Management arm.
This means that while borrowers can still transfer their mortgages if they don't need to borrow any additional money, they can't if they require further funds to make the move.
What if your lender won't let you move your mortgage over?
If you find you can't transport your mortgage to a new property, your only option is to stump up any early redemption penalties and to move lenders, or to stay put in your current property.
Mr Hollingworth said; "There is no way to side-step the fact that there are now much more rigorous under-writing procedures in place when it comes to getting a mortgage. If you are about to lock into a five-year fix, then you should really think long and hard about whether you might want to move during this term.
"Even if the deal you are considering is portable, you may be better off going for a two or three-year fix so that when you do move you can shop around and have a choice of deals so you aren't restricted to the same lender."
While, thankfully, we have finally had our mortgage approved, I will be following Mr Hollingworth's advice and will give a lot more thought as to when our next move might be before we lock into another mortgage deal – even if it is 'portable'.
Did you enjoy that? Why not share this article
Energy Monitor
Never overpay again
Energy saving guides
Find more help
All the information you need
Our driving hub
Everything you need to run a car


text:
|Structure » Logistics
Logistics does not serve for all but enables all.
Logistics Command - an element of the Armed Forces of Lithuania currently manned by servicemen of professional and obligatory military service and civilian personnel.
Insignia - armorial shield with a centered sword surrounded by stylized gold-colored eagle's wings on both sides.
Logistics Command is responsible for planning and execution of provision of units of Lithuanian Armed Forces deployed in the territory of Lithuania and abroad, for accumulation of resources and development of capabilities, and for maintenance of the Host Country's Support system in Lithuania and its provision according to valid bilateral or multilateral agreements in case of necessity.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Quick update
If I had a time machine, I'd jump back to the second half of 2012 and switch my enrolment over to part time.
Okay, so I'd probably do a few other things as well – trying to circumvent the world wars, that sort of thing. Trying to keep up a full-time writing load while working full time was far too optimistic though, even before Ariadne was born. That has made for some administrative complications this year, which have taken up some of my time recently.
This week, I'm writing about technology adoption: specifically, the features of social media technologies that help them spread so rapidly, and the characteristics of small business managers that can help or hinder their adoption of new technology. It's one of the major chapters for my thesis, and has me geeking out over Diffusion of Innovations all over again.
It's been a while since I last wrote about qualitative analysis software, though I have wanted to revisit that topic in some more detail. In the meantime, others have picked up where I left off. Jen's post over at Investigating the Imponderable has some updated information tools like Dedoose, Atlas, Ethnograph or HyperResearch – if you visit this blog for data analysis news, check it out!
It's also worth noting that NVivo 10 will have a native Mac version available later in 2013. If you've been struggling along with virtual machines or dual operating systems until now, that's great news! I'm looking forward to trying it out in a future project, but it will arrive a few years too late for me to use in my current research.
Collecting qualitative data from online communities
There seems to be a tendency among new online researchers to assume that you need a way of capturing all the things in order get an understanding of what's happening in an online community. This is a post looking at some reasons why that might not be the case.
Imagine that you're setting out to produce an ethnography of the head office of a multinational firm. You select your target company, negotiate access, and go in for your first day on site. When you arrive, you're shown into a room that is utterly overflowing with paperwork: huge piles of interview transcripts, reports and meeting minutes tower over the small desk. As you look through them, realisation (and a growing horror) dawns on you: you now have a 'perfect' image of everything you had intended to study. Every word of every conversation has been recorded, every document and email ever produced has been dragged out of archives, and all you need to do is make sense of it all. Easy, right? Well, no. Of course not.
A more typical approach would be to find ways of immersing yourself in the day-to-day operations of the company, spending some long stretches embedded in the organisation, finding and reading through relevant documents, and interviewing people of interest. You'd try to make sure that you saw a variety of activity: don't only visit on casual-clothes Fridays, or you'll draw some odd conclusions about the place. Visit in the quiet periods, but also spend time there during deadline season: the end of the financial year, that sort of thing. Your job is to see enough to understand how and why things work the way they do, filter that through the set of experience and biases that make you into the researcher you are, and communicate what you saw to those who read your work.
Some of those traditions are born out of convenience (or physical limitations). You have a finite amount of time that you can spend in the company. You can't be in three different meetings at once. You won't hear every conversation at the water coolers. So, you pick your opportunities as they arise, based on your (emerging) understanding of what's important to the story that you are going to tell. This meeting is important, as it will help you see who opposes X. That conversation is not important, because you've already heard enough about Y.
And while you do it, you write notes. Copious amounts of lovely, lovely field notes. Writing them helps shape your understanding of what you're observing, and aids recall later on.
So, should online communities be handled differently? You often won't be bound by the same limitations: you can access every aspect of communications that you weren't online to witness at the time they were posted. You can pull an archive of hundreds of simultaneous conversations. In our hypothetical scenario, you really can walk into that room and get buried alive under a pile of archive documents.
Last year, I spoke with another grad student who was looking at a group of online forum communities. She had written some software that automated the search-and-archive part of her work, and was using it to gather vast amounts of qualitative data: in the order of several hundred thousand conversations, and millions of words. The software was working fine, and the disk space was filling up. Her biggest question was "what happens now?" Ultimately, you need to analyse whatever you collect, and finish your dissertation before you die of old age…
I don't think that "I can do X" should mean "I must do X." Many of the same research decisions that are made regarding face-to-face ethnography are still just as valid when the interactions you're observing take place online. Qualitative data still needs to get filtered through one or more humans, with their skills, training, biases and limitations. Magnifying the volume of data going in won't solve your problem, unless your problem requires that volume – and if it does, there is a good chance that you should re-think your choice of methodology.
More data does not always mean that you'll produce better answers to your research questions. Going overboard on data collection is easy: once started it's fairly simple to replicate, and feels very productive! You're not a data collecting machine though: you're here to analyse and interpret that data, and then do something with the results. Making decisions about what to cut (and why) can be hard, but it gives you a project that can actually be finished.
I'm back!
I'm back! It's been a very, very long time since I updated this blog, but in my defence things have been more than a little busy over here. I've been reading (and responding to, where I can) the many comments that still come in on my two posts on choosing qualitative research software for Mac users, and those have prompted me to get back into the habit of writing in here.
Last April I began working for Symphony3 – a consulting firm based in the Melbourne Docklands, where I've worked on social media projects for local, state and federal government clients, private industry and non-profit organisations. It's been a hell of a ride: I've learned a great deal, and been able to directly apply many of the things I've explored in my PhD research. As part of that job, I've been maintaining blogs, twitter and other social media accounts for many different clients, which hasn't left me with any energy to keep my own site up to date. However, in 2013 I will be looking for work elsewhere, in an attempt to get better at juggling my work-life balance to accommodate the newest development in my life…
Last October, my wife and I had our first child. Since Ariadne arrived, there have been some huge changes in my life: my priorities have been completely rearranged, and I've had to think about what kind of a parent I intend to be. That's been a big shift: previously, I've been a huge advocate of doing what you love, in whatever form that takes (which inevitably seems to lead to a live to work attitude…). Looking at my own childhood, though, one thing that I can't avoid is noticing how often my father (working 70-80 hour weeks) wasn't around outside of family holidays. If I hadn't spent a few years working with him after I moved out of home, I probably never would have got to know him very well at all.
I'm not prepared to squeeze my time with my daughter into short bursts of 'quality time' late in the evening and on a big holiday each year: that's a great approach for those who want it, but it's not how I want to spend the next stage of my life. I'm not sure exactly what I'll be doing to pay the bills over the next little while, but I'm hoping to find something that lets me fit work in around my family, instead of the opposite.
Along the way, balancing consulting work and a new baby in the house left very little time for finishing off a thesis. My PhD has been stuck in an "all but dissertation" holding pattern for the past few months: I've jumped through the various hurdles regarding completion seminars and all that, and just need to finish writing the document so I can submit it. I've been on leave throughout January to achieve just exactly that, and have been writing like a mad thing since December 24th.
I'll no doubt write a lot more about that over the next few months, in addition to going back and adding to the series of articles on qualitative research tools. If there's a topic you'd like to read about later in the year, please let me know! I'm looking for suggestions about what to cover in this blog. In the meantime: thanks to all those who've left comments on earlier posts in this blog! It's good to be back again.
What's in a name?
I've come back to my methodology chapter, after burying my head in papers on social capital and social network theory for the last month. I never did end up getting any feedback on what I wrote in the last draft, but the break has given me some more perspective on my own writing. In short: not entirely terrible, but there's a hell of a long way to go before it's decent.
One of the sections that I've struggled to write about is the "ethnographic" research methods that I've used. I'm wary about using the term, as it carries a lot of baggage – I don't want to be jumped on by old-school anthropologists insisting that a real ethnographer needs to spend six years in a Kenyan village, and that online observations are fundamentally different…
I found a copy of Robert Kozinets' Netnography: Doing Ethnographic Research Online by random happenstance while in the library last week. The books I went there to find are more traditional resources on ethnography, but it's been fascinating comparing them with the newer book.
In many ways, ethnography seems a good label for what I have been doing: I've spent the past two years embedded in the online communities that each business manager has joined, trying to understand how those communities work from the perspectives of the participants. In some of these I'm more of a traditional observer, in others I definitely participate to a larger extent. Particularly in Twitter, I'm using it myself (to keep in touch with people, contacting people before/after conferences or meetups, finding out news) while following all the different ways that each business manager is using the service. Access into some communities implies participation – profiles are public, and anything that you subscribe to/like/follow/etc gives those you're watching an opportunity to watch you right back, or start up a conversation.
Kozinets argues that there's a need for the newer label, as some areas are significantly different between "offline" and online ethnographic research. That blurry area around what constitutes participation and observation is one. Most of your data is natively digital: transcription errors aren't a problem when you have every word used by the participants. It also affects the volume of data that can be used: depending on the source of the data, you could well pull the entire history of interactions between your study participants. That quickly turns data collection into much less of a problem than data management: it's easy to get absolutely buried under reams of data that may or may not actually help you answer your research questions.
There are a few different names floating around. RMIT is starting its own centre for "Digital Ethnography." Ethnographic online research, netnography, webnography and network ethnography have all been used as well. They may all be intended to mean similar things, but it's difficult to tell exactly what any given author mean without reading their entire study.
Much like the quip about a language being "a dialect with an army and a navy," successful methodologies are often jargon with a marketing department. In the case of netnography, the originator is a Professor of Marketing, backed up by many MBA students… since first mentioning the term on Twitter last week, people have started contacting me out of the blue, with links to Prof. Kozinets' presentations and course material, and the term has already got a lot of traction. Being able to concisely express a set of shared understandings (approach, methods, standards) is what good labels are all about. So I'll most likely adopt it to describe what I've been doing so far: observing and learning about communities that operate largely online, by embedding myself in them over a period of months or years.
The "monastic phase"
Supriya mentioned in today's meeting that I'm entering the "monastic phase" of my project, now: the final six months, where it's pretty much expected that every waking moment will be filled by working on or thinking about my thesis. I think it's an apt description – though other aspects of life will keep grinding relentlessly onwards, as I don't have the luxury of taking six months off from the world.
I'm spending today working on my data analysis, using Dedoose (which I wrote a bit about over here). Over the past few months, Louise has been using it extensively for her Masters thesis, and now it's my turn to get to know what it can do. So far, it's been very easy to use: it works on my Mac, allows simple tagging/coding of text excerpts from interview transcripts, and has some nice visualisation tools for exploring the data. It's quite laggy on my computer, though (running in Firefox 9.01 & OS X 10.5.8, on a fast university network). I also find that I need to use a separate mouse, as the left/right click commands sometimes don't respond to the touchpad. Still, it's far simpler than running a virtual Windows environment, with two different operating systems slowing everything down.
Despite needing to spend most of my time hiding under a rock, I'm going to a public talk that danah is giving at RMIT tomorrow evening – it's called "Privacy in networked places," and there's a bit of info about it here. I almost missed hearing about it, as the university departments can be terrible at publicising their events. Fortunately, I've now discovered that we have a Digital Ethnography research centre over in Media & Communications, and will try to go to all their events in future. Hopefully I'll be able to meet some of the ARC Creative Industries and Youth & Wellbeing CRC people while I'm at the seminar, too.
Smart Services: 2011 annual conference
Longs days and little sleep make it likely that I'll forget important details from the 2012 CRC conference, so I thought I'd write a few quick thoughts while they are still in my head…
I flew up to Sydney early on Tuesday morning, for a day of student training workshops with the other research students. Student numbers seemed down a bit on previous years due to a few scheduling clashes (ANZMAC in Perth, OZCHI in Canberra) but we still had 34 PhD students in attendance.
The major theme behind this year's workshops was "creative leadership", with sessions run by Ralph Kerle from the Creative Leadership Forum. We also heard from Paul Boustead about his journey from CRC researcher to director of the Interactive Voice group at Dolby, a keynote from Stuart Anderson (Sydney Capital Partners), and some advice from Natalie Chapman (Gemaker/Smart Services CRC) on idea evaluation, protection and commercialisation.
I enjoyed Ralph's session on the FourSight thinking profiles (built on Gerard Puccio's work at Buffalo State University). Despite having a very biased group (almost all PhD students, engaged in some kind of technology research) we were relatively close to the global norms: slightly more Ideators, and a good mix of Clarifiers, Developers and Implementers. The FourSight archetypes are an interesting tool for looking objectively at team composition, and examining the strengths and weaknesses of groups and individuals.
Natalie's session seemed more relevant to the CRC researchers than the IP workshop we saw a few years back: covering some of the same ground, but in a more accessible fashion. People asked questions about their own work or that of their colleagues, and saw the range of options available when trying to take an idea to market. It's not always about patents or copyright! There are lots of tools available, and situations where each might be the most appropriate.
Late in the day, we tried a group exercise where teams of eight students proposed a series of business ideas, picked one, and worked through a series of stages: identifying what IP would be involved, ways of protecting it, a pathway to commercialisation, and a description of the product and business model. My team had plenty of ideas, but struggled a bit on the details of how to mange the interim stages – possibly because we'd ended up with a team almost entirely filled with ideators, and lacked the developers or implementors who would work on those areas. I love team challenges – another reason why I need to finish my damn PhD already, as the endless solo work is wearing me down…
Wednesday involved the formal start of the conference, with research presentations, a great keynote by David Harrison from Freelance.com, and the student poster sessions. The room layout did no favours to the students: poster sessions were held during meal breaks, with the food in a different room. Few people made it to the far end of the main room where I was based, so the opportunity for conversation was pretty limited. I think the 2009 conference was the closest to a format that really worked in that regard – while those sessions were far too long, at least we spent all day talking instead of hoping that someone might come over for a chat. Still, the few conversations I had this year were all valuable.
An oft-mentioned research strength in the CRC has been our combination of technology and user research: understanding user motivations and behaviour, in order to design better products and services. While that's broadly true, I think that we still have a ways to go on that front: the CRC contains sharply contrasting research groups, and "social" research is obviously not a priority for some. For me, that was probably the only sour note in the conference: talking to people with bold, world-changing ideas that risk going nowhere at all, because their products require widespread adoption from a group of poorly understood potential customers. I firmly believe that the users of a technology should be placed right in the middle of the design process: understand what they want, how they will use the technology, and why they might not use it in the way you had imagined.
Ignore the users and you risk them ignoring your technology: regardless of how great its potential benefits might be. Having seen a glimpse of what those futures might hold, it would be a shame to see them never realised.
Where do we go from here?
My CRC has been good to me, over the years. Apart from providing the scholarship that makes my research possible, they also incorporate student training workshops into each year's conference. I think it's important to develop a broad range of skills, to avoid graduating and forever being the brunt of jokes about "experts," who know more and more about less and less, until they know everything about nothing at all…
Previous workshops have covered research commercialisation, media and presentation skills, 'pitching' business ideas, and managing intellectual property. This year, one of the workshops leads into a speed-dating style networking event when the industry partners arrive on Day 2. Warren sent an email to all the students yesterday, with a few pointers:
Give thought to where you want to be in 5 years, what you need to do to get there and what type of people/skills can help you along the way. Your 5 year vision may or may not have anything to do with your current areas of research: you may desire a total sea change or you may see yourself running a company or climbing the ranks of the academic world. Whatever you choose you will need to gather people around you with the right contacts and skills to help you get there. Your pitch should articulate your vision and also what you need to get there so that other people excited by your vision can see where they might assist, and if you are lucky offer to help you achieve your goals.
It's a question that I've been asked a lot, during the past few months: "What comes next?" It's not something that I find easy to answer: there are many things I'd like to do, and even more uncertainty over which ones will be available to me.
My goals are quite generic, and don't require any particular industry or specialisation: I want to use the skills and knowledge that I've built over the years, but one of those skills is the ability to learn new things as needed. I want to be challenged. I also need a job where I can balance work and life: I've worked around the clock for years, and no longer enjoy it. I'll work damn hard on a project that drives me, but outside of work I need time to spend with my family.
I woke at 5am today, with the tiniest beginnings of a business concept in my head. Since then I've been scribbling down notes and thinking through the questions that will eventually shape a business plan. I enjoy the planning process, and have something that I think will make it through the many hurdles between idea and reality. Importantly, it taps into skills that many of my closest friends share and take for granted, but aren't actually all that common. Taking skills that people have a passion for and finding ways to apply them in other areas fascinates me. It also helps to find a niche. An important piece of advice that has stuck with me is that a small business doesn't need to be all things to all people: it should find a niche, and own it. When developing a hobby into a business, it's important to know where to draw boundaries: My business does X. I also do Y and Z as a hobby, but those are not the focus of my work.
If the concept has legs, it will help me reach those generic goals: more than anything, I love the range of challenges that a small business throws at you. If not, then preparing a rigorous business plan should help identify problems before it's too late to change direction. Either way, it has an important (if counter-intuitive) secondary function: helping me to get my thesis finished. Starting a new project adds to the workload, but you always work faster when you're preparing to move into what comes next…


text:
The most memorable impressions are the big eyes and genuine smiles of the kids. Some are cute but some look more mature than their age. One can easily see child labor and beggars on the street.
This kid gives me the lasting impression because of his natural poses. Despite working in harsh and dirty environment, he can give me such a brilliant smile that brighten my entire trip.
Many children have to help the family to earn a living at tender age. On my way to Jaipur in the middle of the congested traffic, I saw this poor boy using his skinny body as a "human brake" to stop the heavy cart from running down the slope. It is high noon, and the street is filled with dust and exhausts from vehicles. Many of us may not know how lucky are we.
Some kids have to start their day before the sunrise, so by 9am, this kid already care less and take a nap wherever possible.
Luckily for some children, they are well taken care of and being loved, or having fun.
This happy kid is having a joy ride on Honda Hero at the bazaar at Jodhpur.
Some are luckily to have easier access to the material world, and have a natural talent to strike a Bollywood pose.
Many just know how to have fun with friends.
Some are happy the school is over.
For me, I am happy for those who have the luxury to receive good education. Best wishes all the kids and people I met in this trip.


text:
Mother's Day, what a day. You share with your children all the memories of days passed and dream of new adventures with your family. Chatter is all about, the smell of flowers everywhere; rain or shine, the sun shines upon us this day.
Little voices, grown up voices fill the air. You hear the sound of a car pulling in the driveway and you know another visitor, more smiles and laughs, hugs and kisses. On Mother's Day your heart cannot get enough of it, your heart fills up and overflows, cascading down into your life like a river swollen from spring rains. How could life be any better?
This year, like any other year, the cars drive in, I hear the pitter patter of feet, the whole of the world is a stir as children arrive, grand daughter too. The biggest smiles from my grand daughter as she presents her card, all designed and drawn by her; it is one the most beautiful I have gotten, it is because in each stroke was her love, and her pride exudes itself in the whole design. I remember back when her mom would bring me fresh flowers and a handmade card, they exist in my heart, never forgotten, in a special box to thumb through and reminisce on days I want to relive the moment.
The fresh flowers arrive, the potted flowers line up; there will be digging to do, when the rain stops; planning on where to plant, I want them near, where my enjoyment of them is close at hand. My garden never seems to be crowded, it evolves, spreads and mother nature gives me a hand on doing some trimming back during winter and spring storms. Still I plant, and plan for more space, for another line up of Mother's Day plants.
All this day goes by and within all the chatter there is silence; that sound of the world spinning around you and you are left in the middle of a cavern, deep, without escape. What is this silence? It is the absence of something, the absence of the sound of life. With all the chatter about me, I was missing, my heart was missing, my child, my daughter; spending Mother's Day in heaven for the first time. She was a big part of my Mother's Day, spending it always with me, helping me to plant, cooking dinner and sharing every minute of the day. Now there is no sharing, no one to help me plant or make dinner for me; I am lost in this cavern of longing for what I cannot have, her presence. I dream, I let my mind wander but it finds nothing, only longing.
I love each of them, each filling a special part of me; my heart divided into eleven rooms. One room is silent, filled with memories and joys of passed Mother's Day but in this room today a vase remains empty, no chatter, no music, only the sound of silence; over powering the chatter and laughter. Mother's Day silence, it brings me to reality, to where I discover she is gone; that motherhood is hard sometimes, and the hardest thing was to give her back and tell God, thank you for sending her so I could know the joy of loving her on earth and learn to love her forever in heaven. And now I understand, silence is not the absence of sound but the absence of not hearing the sounds from heaven; listening with my heart and not my ears I hear the joyful sound of silence.
Mother's Day should mean your children are here and mothers are there to receive those awesome handmade Mother's Day gifts.


text:
Herbert Strutt School was built 1907–09, commissioned by George Herbert Strutt - a direct descendent of Jedediah Strutt,
the famous industrialist who developed the cotton industry in Belper.
Herbert Strutt was given the go-ahead to provide a school for the town in March 1907 and the site he chose for the new school was opposite the town's workhouse, Babington House.
By the spring of 1909 the work was complete, and the school, named after its creator, was officially opened on May 7th. The Duke of Devonshire carried out the opening ceremony.
On completion the building was a presented by George Herbert Strutt to the County Council for use as a Higher Grade Elementary School and Pupil Teacher Centre.
Later the school became a Grammar School and then a Middle School in 1973. In 1986, following the shake-up in education brought
in by the Government in 1971, Herbert Strutt School became a primary school.
It remained as such until its closure in February 2007, when children moved to a new school building, taking the Herbert Strutt name with them.


text:
C40 2016 Awards announced
December 16, 2016
On December 1st, C40 announced the winners of the 2016 Cities Awards:
- Climate Action Plans & Inventories: Portland, United States
- Adaptation Plans & Assessments: Paris
- Building Energy Efficiency: Melbourne & Sydney
- Clean Energy: Yokohama
- Finance & Economic Development: Shenzhen
- Solid Waste: Kolkata
- Adaptation in Action: Copenhagen
- Transportation: Addis Ababa
- Sustainable Communities: Curitiba
- Social Equity & Climate Change: Seoul
The Award Ceremony coincided with the C40 Mayors Summit taking place from 30 November to 2 December in Mexico City.
1. Climate Action Plans and Inventories: Portland, United States
The 2015 Climate Action Plan (CAP) is Portland's plan focuses on equity as a key outcome of climate action and adds a consumption-based inventory to recognise the full capability of the city to achieve carbon reductions even beyond the city's boundaries. This allows Portland to focus on high impact goods and services, and provides an analytical basis for expansion of sharing-economy business models.
2. Adaptation Plans & Assessments: Paris, France
The Paris Adaptation Strategy aims to adapt Paris to the challenges posed by climate change and future resource scarcity. The programme contains 30 objectives and 35 actions with four main objectives:
1. Protecting Parisians from extreme climate events;
2. Ensuring water, food and energy supply;
3. Living with climate change: more sustainable city planning;
4. Fostering new lifestyles and boosting solidarity.
3. Building Energy Efficiency: Melbourne & Sydney, Australia
Sponsored by an association of cities, the CitySwitch Green Office program has fostered collaboration and leadership among a growing network of business leaders across Australia who are committed to environmental excellence. The program offers support for office-based businesses to improve their day-to-day energy and sustainability performance by providing innovative information resources and tools, online and in-person support and training, and a strong network to support signatory businesses in achieving environmentally beneficial results.
4. Clean Energy: Yokohama, Japan
In 2010, the city of Yokohama began the Yokohama Smart City Project (YSCP), a five-year pilot project. The project partners with leading Japanese companies to introduce building, community and home energy management systems (EMS), applying smart grids for the energy management of households, office buildings and local communities, and introducing large-scale renewable energy and optimizing the energy supply and demand balance. . The project has reduced household energy consumption by up to 15.2% and office building consumption by up to 22.8% through demand response (DR) testing during peak times of electricity usage.
5. Finance & Economic Development: Shenzhen, PRC
The City of Shenzhen was the first of seven Chinese pilot cities to launch an emissions trading scheme (ETS), allowing companies to trade carbon emissions. The allowances in Shenzhen's ETS are based on carbon intensity, an average rate based on the amount of carbon produced per unit of activity. The city caps the total allowances based on the results of the best performing organisations, creating healthy competition. 636 key companies and 197 large public infrastructure projects participate in the scheme, and together are responsible for 40% of the city's carbon emissions, creating a substantial impact from the scheme.
6. Solid Waste: Kolkata, India
The Kolkata Solid Waste Management Project (KSWMIP) is a trans-municipal project for environmental development through scientific waste management and stakeholder participation. Kolkata aims to minimise waste generated by segregating recyclable wastes, composting organic waste, burying inert waste and treating septic sludge, benefiting more than a million people in 145 wards of six municipalities, on the western bank of the River Ganga.
7. Adaptation in Action: Copenhagen, Denmark
In 2015, the Copenhagen City Council officially approved the city Cloudburst Management Plan, which, over the next 20 years, aims to invest, develop and implement 300 projects that increase the level of flood protection across the entire city, while taking urban planning, maintenance and resilience into account. For the city, climate adaptation is an opportunity to create green growth, to increase the number of recreational areas across the city, and to improve the quality of life and increase health.
8. Transportation: Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
In September 2015 the Light Rail Transit (LRT) in Addis Ababa, the first LRT in Sub-Saharan Africa, launched. This new LRT is changing the face of public transport in a city where almost 60% of the population walks to their destination. Featuring 35km of track, covering four lines, the system now operates at full capacity with up to 15,000 passengers per hour, per line (60,000 in total). Designed to be affordable for the average Ethiopian, this new transit technology provides comfort, ease of access, enhanced security and less pollution than alternative means of transport available to Addis' citizens.
9. Sustainable Communities: Curitiba, Brazil
Curitiba's Urban Agriculture Programme, started in 1986, is an evolving and ongoing project that utilises urban voids (e.g. backyards and empty lots) to promote food production, social inclusion and income generation. Run by the Curitiba Food Supply Department and its partners, it provides all necessary practical training and conditions for garden and crop production. This has resulted in numerous community gardens, school gardens, small space vegetable gardens, gardens in apartments, and many more sites of creative urban agriculture.
10. Social Equity & Climate Change: Seoul , Korea
The city of Seoul's Energy Welfare PPP Programme is designed to ease energy poverty exacerbated by climate change and promote energy saving and sharing culture between businesses, civic groups and citizens. The multifaceted programme includes free installation of home energy improvements for poor households, a Virtual Power Plant (VPP) energy credit donation project, and training unemployed citizens to become energy consultants.
Learn More about the Projects and the semi-finalists here.


text:
This month is Maritime Month! Come to the museum and take part in all of our fun, special activities!
Here is a schedule for the events taking place:
Thursday, August 7th: National Lighthouse day
Saturday, August 9th: Shipwreck Day
Wednesday, August 13th: Maritime Museum Open House – Free to everyone in Marquette County!
Saturday, August 16th: Lighthouse Day
Saturday, August 16th: Ghost Stories at Marquette Harbor Lighthouse – Call ahead and reserve your spot
Thursday, August 21st: Evening Lighthouse Tour – Call ahead and reserve your spot
Saturday, August 23rd: Kids Day
Thursday, August 28th: Evening Lighthouse Tour – call ahead and reserve your spot
Saturday, August 30th: WWII Submarine Day
For more information visit our website at http://www.mqtmaritimemuseum.com or call us at (906) 226-2006.
We hope to see you this month at one of these fun events!!


text:
Today is the day after elections... I vote for more love, how about you?
There were several propositions - I voted YES on more laughter, YES on more fun and more spirituality. YES on health, YES on communication, YES on more sex and celebrating sexuality.
I voted NO on repeating old patterns, NO on being stuck in a rut, NO on depression and boredom.
I also voted:
Annie Sprinkle for President
and Starhawk for Vice President
and Megan McElroy for Senator
and Melissa Ferrick for Representative
Laurie Anderson for Governor
and Amber Rose for Mayor...
I vote for more love, and the tide will turn....


text: What a gladsome thing a peony is! Peonies are the 'over-the-tops' of late spring and early summer from the buxom 'officinalis' beauties so often seen in cottage gardens to the glamorous 'suffruticosa' tree peonies with their sumptuous blooms. About 12 years ago, I fell for one of these in a garden-centre; it's called Handaijin (very dully translated as 'Minister of Flowers' – hang on, that's quite a good idea for the next time we have a Cabinet Reshuffle"…) , it is now six feet tall, with the most beautiful grey/pink leaves preceding lots of frankly unbelievable dinner-plate sized flowers of bright reddish-purple. (I...Continue reading


text:
Sony Mobile Communications
On 13-14 June, thousands of Xperia fans around the world captured their adventures and experiences over 48 amazing hours for our latest competition. See some of their incredible Instagram shots in this video:
Congratulations to merihariantisasi from Jakarta; our overall winner who impressed our panel of judges, including guest judge Melanie Philippe from the World Photography Organisation, with this illuminating shot of a gorgeous Indonesian sunset. As well as an Xperia Z3 smartphone, Meri has won a trip to Niagara Falls – lucky the Z3 is waterproof!
47 other Xperia fans also bagged themselves a shiny new Xperia smartphone thanks to their stunning shots – well done to our winners, below, and thank you to everyone who took part: we had a wonderful 48 hours, and hope you did too.
Congratulations to our 48 competition winners:
Aldionez, Jakarta
Danni_Lym, Bogota
annie_tikhomirova, St Petersburg
aziz.alyahya, Riyadh
betterbrunet, Berlin
bong.fallurin, Manilla
chrsgrgry7, Manchester
cramosmartinez, Santiago
csikosdavid, Budapest
debdeb57690, Montreal
dertuncay, Athens
ene_mene_bene, Munich
frankelwerff, Amsterdam
fruquo, Istanbul
hol_lywood, Kiev
jefcanton, Madrid
joshua941216, Kuala Lumpur
juan_castillo95, London
kemring, Oslo
komar_gda, Gdansk
kristupha, Toronto
lucoctober, Warsaw
marciorizzon, Sao Paulo
megzagem, Sydney
mobigrafie, Paris
mrdax79, Edinburgh
myinstagramni, Dublin
nandroid89, Buenos Aires
negeduisend, Moscow
nettyaco, Dubai
sajinvincent, New Delhi
samson0910, Hong Kong
sebanex, Zurich
serenalefox, Copenhagen
shankarvincent, Bangalore
shyyea, Taipei
silencis_mf, Barcelona
slonska, Vienna
snufkinz, Singapore
sunny.bala, Mumbai
svensken84, Stockholm
tiagozz3, Lisbon
vancouver_living, Vancouver
vanessahartikainen, Helsinki
veliksnonethingman, New York
vickie.su, Mexico City
zaasurtie, Cape Town


text: We don't have any such optimization. Firstly, the pointer has to not make it into any function call at all, since any function might in turn call free(). Then we need to do escape analysis as you pointed out, but that's not difficult. We do similar analysis to determine pointer capture already. Matt Giuca wrote: > I have a compiler which generates a lot of malloc instructions for > basically all data. I was rather hoping that these mallocs would be > converted to allocas if the pointers didn't escape. This would require > an escape analysis, and I'm not sure if LLVM has such a thing. > > For instance, consider this code (typical of the output of my compiler): > > define i32 @dontescape(i32 %x) { > entry: > %t = tail call i8* @malloc(i32 4) > %t1 = bitcast i8* %t to i32* > store i32 %x, i32* %t1 > %t2 = load i32* %t1 > ret i32 %t2 > } When do you free it? Why not just use an alloca? > Running with opt --std-compile-opts, LLVM is smart enough to figure > out that the result is actually %x. So it generates: > > define i32 @dontescape(i32 %x) nounwind { > entry: > %t = tail call i8* @malloc(i32 4) ;<i8*> [#uses=1] > %t1 = bitcast i8* %t to i32* ;<i32*> [#uses=1] > store i32 %x, i32* %t1 > ret i32 %x > } > > This saves a load, but I was rather hoping to eliminate the malloc and > store altogether. I was hoping it would realise that %t doesn't > escape, and generate this code: > > define i32 @dontescape(i32 %x) nounwind { > entry: > %t1 = alloca i32, i32 1 ;<i32*> [#uses=1] > store i32 %x, i32* %t1 > ret i32 %x > } LLVM doesn't realize that @malloc has no other side-effects. It's treating it like a function that might perform I/O. > which would then get optimised to: > > define i32 @dontescape(i32 %x) nounwind readnone { > entry: > ret i32 %x > } > > and in general the allocas would go on to become registers due to > mem2reg, which would be wonderfully efficient. > > So firstly, is there anything I'm doing wrong which is preventing this > from working? For example, I tried declaring malloc as "readnone" (is > this safe?). No. If it's readnone then two calls with the same argument can be folded to one. That would partly fix the problem (if you allocate memory > but don't return it, it can optimise away the malloc), except that it > isn't clever enough to realise the "store" instruction is redundant. > Again, I think this would require an escape analysis to fix. Maybe > there's an optimisation pass I'm missing here. > > Secondly, if there is currently no way to magically make this work, > has this proposal been discussed before? Are there any known gotchas > which prevented it from being implemented? Doing this in general requires either that the free can't be found or that it really is right before the function exit, or else there might be a good reason the memory is on the heap. Then we have to make sure that we don't transform malloc calls inside loops (unless we also prove they're independent and Just Leaked). How large a block of memory are you willing to move from heap to stack? What if it's a variable, how hard should we work to try to determine its upper bound (we probably can't with any reasonable amount of effort). And what type is the alloca? We could take the 4 from malloc(i32 4) and create an alloca i8, 4 and let instcombine try to sort it out. Where should we look for malloc calls? Note that we only do stack to register transformation on alloca's in the first basic block if they're stacked together in a row as the very first instructions in the function. > I've found this file. I'm not sure if it's part of the LLVM > distribution, or a branch: > https://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/llvm/tags/Apple/llvmCore-2092/lib/Analysis/EscapeAnalysis.cpp > It contains a comment: "Returns allow the return value to escape. > This is mostly important for malloc to alloca promotion." That does exist in head, but strangely enough I can't find any implementation of it? It looks like it was removed when we straightened out value tracking + capture tracking.


text: I want to run a 5K! Posted on April 29, 2015 by Dwayne L. Craft This past weekend, I had the opportunity to attend the NSBE STEMulate Your Body 5K run in King George, VA. Check it out on Facebook by clicking HERE! This event was absolutely wonderful, and although ... Read More


text:
Lawcopy is the Central Coast's Premiere Litigation Support Company. Now boasting 15 years experience helping you meet the demands of the legal system and the clients you represent. We are confident that we can help your practice thrive by providing fast, reliable, quality service allowing you to focus on what matters most; achieving the best possible outcome for your client.
For more information about our copying, scanning, process serving, court filing, eDiscovery, shredding, document retrieval, Deposition officer, and courier services please visit the services section.


text:
Contact Us
Contact Information
Contact Form
Spring Hill Office
5438 Spring Hill Drive
Spring Hill, Florida 34606
Tel: 352.683.1963
Fax: 352.683.3847
Email: email@example.com
Trinity Office
8221 State Road 54
Port Richey, Florida 34655
Tel: 727-835-5048
Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
Google +
Get our Newsletter
Legal Disclaimer
PLEASE NOTE: the hiring of an attorney is an important decision which should not be based on advertisements alone, ask us to send you a written statement of our qualifications and experience. Also, this web site is designed for general information only, and the information contained herein may not apply to your circumstances and is based upon Florida law only. Finally, please be aware that the presentation of the information at this web site does not and should not be construed to be formal legal advice and it does not create or form an attorney/client relationship. No attorney client relationship is created until you have signed an Authorization for Legal Services.
Created By:
COPYRIGHT © 2014. Naturecoast Law / Hengesbach & Hengesbach


text:
Settled inside the stunning Erg Chebbi Dunes, Bivouac Café du Sud offers a wide variety of desert activities. We offer desert Berber camps in the Sahara worthy of the Thousand Nights and a Night story, where we promise to take you to live the life of a prince.
Bivouac Café du Sud offers its guests a vast selection of activities and services which involve the exploration of the sands in the Sahara Desert in the Dunes of Erg Chebbi and in this region in southern Morocco.
We provide three types of desert camps: Royal, Lux, and Standard.
■ Royal Bivouac
Ultra-Luxury camp for those who want the best. Overcome your expectations.
■ Lux Bivouac
Luxury desert camp to make you fully enjoy the Sahara.
◉ If you wish to book a tent or a desert excursion with Café du Sud, please use the booking page. For special groups/agency prices or common questions please use the contact page. Our office will get back to you within 24 hours. Thank you.
◉ Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Google+.


text:
100 NE First StreetGainesville, FL 32601Phone: (352) firstname.lastname@example.com here for directions
This class is an in-depth study of Holy Scriptures and is open to all. No preparation is necessary as each class is self-contained. Those interested in a stimulating reading of the Bible meet every Wednesday at 11 a.m. in the parish library (September—May). Come and bring a friend. Contact the parish office, 352-372-4721 or email@example.com


text:
math, science, and technology drive learning that is grounded in core academics. Our Biotechnology curriculum focuses on vital subject areas using integrated course units such as Technological Innovations, Biofuels, Environmental and Medical Biotechnology, Global Food Chain, and Sustainable Systems.
Your children will gain the education they will need for high school, college, and beyond.
Join the PTA, be an at large board member, or volunteer to be a school aid.
Get Involved >
Call anytime to get a tour of our facility and learn more about the curriculum.
Request Tour >
Download and fill out an application for your children to attend our school.
Apply Today >
View our student videos and other media that we have created.
View Galleries >


text:
We are committed to supporting the scholastic future of all eligible students. We encourage students to honor Dr. Kulis' legacy by considering pursuing a career in the field of science or medicine and our scholarship committee is particularly interested in rewarding students with exemplary community or church service records. We offer a variety of different types of scholarships. We invite you to learn more about which scholarship might be the right for you and to apply if you meet the eligibility requirements.
Students may only apply for one (1) of the following scholarship programs each year.
(click to expand each title)
Application deadline April 1st of each year
Application deadline April 1st of each year
Application deadline April 1st of each year
If you would like to be added to our distribution list for announcements regarding any of these scholarship opportunities, please send an email to email@example.com with your name and preferred email address.


text:
Vermont Luxury Homes
From Waterfront to Mountainside: Vermont Luxury Homes
With its picturesque views of Lake Champlain and mountain ranges, the Greater Burlington area has proved to be a popular setting for luxury homes for almost two centuries.
Starting in the early 1800s, successful local merchants and business owners built fine homes in Burlington's Hill Section, ranging from sprawling Victorian mansions to stately residences with classical and Gothic Revival elements. Bucolic towns throughout northwest Vermont, meanwhile, have appealed to both summer vacationers and all-season sports enthusiasts, with wealthy families such as the Vanderbilts and Webbs choosing Shelburne for their country residences.
"Vermont abounds in desirable sites for summer homes," pointed out the author of a 1915 guidebook called "The Green Mountain Tour." Indeed, the author continued, towns ranging from Burlington to Bennington have drawn "men and women of nationwide distinction."
In today's real estate market, that translates into an abundance of historic luxury homes, as well as a robust inventory of more modern high-end properties.
Burlington Luxury Living
"Most of the luxury market in Burlington is on the lakefront," notes Brian Boardman, owner, and REALTOR of Coldwell Banker Hickok & Boardman Realty. The Hill Section offers luxury homes with views of the lake, while people who want land and privacy often turn to Charlotte or Shelburne to find the perfect property, he notes.
In the exclusive South Cove neighborhood in the South End of Burlington, where properties frequently sell in the $1 million range, residents enjoy a private beach on Lake Champlain and easy access to the city's famed bike path.
South Cove's developments began in the mid-1900's and were once the site of the estate of Dr. William Seward Webb and his wife Lila Vanderbilt Webb, who later built Shelburne Farms. Because of this, the neighborhood offers a wider range of architectural styles than is found in many other Burlington neighborhoods, from Contemporary homes to Adirondack-style residences.
The Hill Section ranks high among Burlington luxury-home buyers. With its leafy, quiet streets boasting lake and mountain views, the neighborhood tends to offer an older housing stock than South Cove, including grand Victorian houses and brick Colonials.
Brian, who specializes in Hill Section homes as well as new construction, waterfront, and other high-end properties, notes that the challenges -– and charms -- in buying or selling luxury homes in the Burlington area often are due to their properties' historic natures. While many buyers are attracted to antique homes, they also need to be aware of issues such as the need for specialists to repair slate roofs, for example. With agents such as Brian steeped in the issues and know-how of luxury homes, Coldwell Banker Hickok & Boardman Realty has helped scores of high-end buyers and sellers through successful transactions.
Bucolic Shelburne and Charlotte
Newer and historic homes, country estates and waterfront properties are the hallmarks of Shelburne and Charlotte, towns located to the south of Burlington and which also boast lakefront homes. Generally, Shelburne and Charlotte register the highest average sale price in Chittenden County. Our quarterly Vermont Market Report will provide current information.
Shelburne Point is known for its high-end real estate properties. A spit of land that juts into Lake Champlain and creates Shelburne Bay, Shelburne Point offers waterfront property on both its eastern and western shores. Home to the Lake Champlain Yacht Club and Shelburne Shipyard, the Point draws many homeowners who enjoy boating as well as a quiet seclusion that is just minutes from Shelburne's bustling village life. The famed Shelburne Museum called a "tribute to collecting and its transformative powers" by the New York Times and the historic Shelburne Farms are just minutes away.
Charlotte, like Shelburne, also attracts high-end buyers with its miles of lake frontage, although the town tends toward a more rural character. With working farms, pick-your-own berry stands and Mt. Philo State Park within its boundaries, the town offers many of the pastoral pleasures Vermont is known for and maintains its character with the help of a requirement that houses have at least five acres of land.
Waterfront – Burlington and Beyond
Sometimes called the country's sixth Great Lake, Lake Champlain offers miles of waterfront property to the north and south of Burlington, including the bucolic Lake Champlain islands. While some properties are traditional Vermont "camps" – summer vacation cottages positioned by the water – newer developments also offer luxury choices.
The islands, which are 30 miles long and eight miles wide, consist of five towns including North Hero and South Hero, believed to be named after prominent early Vermonters Ethan and Ira Allen.
"It's a peaceful, quiet type of atmosphere," notes Carol Audette, a Realtor with Coldwell Banker Hickok & Boardman Realty who represents many buyers and sellers looking for island property.
Luxury properties on the island have recently sold to buyers as far away as California, although waterfront property also appeals to Vermonters and Canadians, who are attracted by the islands' proximity to the border.
Waterfront property located nearer to Burlington may appeal to luxury buyers who want to be minutes away from nightlife and amenities such as Church Street's boutiques and cafes.
Outer Bay at Marble Island in Colchester, a high-end new development set on a spit of land straddling Malletts Bay, provides three beaches, tennis courts, a marina and other luxury amenities. Represented exclusively by Coldwell Banker Hickok & Boardman Realtor Doug Boardman, the community offers a waterfront lifestyle with close proximity to Burlington and Canada.
One advantage of Lake Champlain is the diversity of the waterfront, from limestone ledges that plunge into its clear waters to shallow water bays with dark shale beaches, notes Chris von Trapp, a Realtor who specializes in waterfront property.
"There are deep-water bays where you can pull your boat right up to your beachfront, to shallow bays that draw just one-and-a-half feet of water, so I always ask what kind of boating do you do: Are you a kayaker or a fly fisherman, do you sit on lawn and like to look at the water," notes von Trapp.
Luxury in the Mountains
With all-season recreation attracting many high-end buyers to the state, towns closer to and in the Green Mountains also offer a range of luxury homes, from ski chalets to country estates. Warren, Waitsfield, and Stowe are among the mountain towns that attract luxury buyers, with estates ranging from multi-million dollar properties to high-end condominium developments.
Indeed, the attractions of Stowe prompted cable network HGTV to build its 2011 Dream Home in the town. Gristmill Builders, of Stowe, built the 3,400 sq. ft. home using locally sourced materials and craftsman and the best sustainable building techniques.
Farm to Table Communities
Gristmill, along with two other premier builders, Sheppard Custom Homes and Sterling Construction are among the preferred builders at South Village, a new development in South Burlington adjacent to a 4 acre working organic farm. South Village, represented by Coldwell Banker Hickok & Boardman Realty, offers single-family, townhomes, and opportunities to build a custom build home. The neighborhood, surrounded by 150 acres of common land, provide open space for walking, nearby paths for cycling and community gardens. "South Village provides housing opportunities for people at any stage in their life," says Kelly Fiske, a REALTOR with Coldwell Banker Hickok & Boardman Realty.
Whether it's a luxury home in Burlington's Hill Section or a waterfront estate in Shelburne, Coldwell Banker Hickok & Boardman Realty provides the expertise to ensure a smooth transaction.
Speak with an Agent Today
Call: (802) 863-1500


text:
We have arranged for a special rate for you at our very pilot friendly Air-Tel Plaza Hotel and Convention Center, conveniently situated right on the airport with a front row seat to the famous "16 Right" at Van Nuys.
When booking just mention you are training at ROTOR F/X to get the discount. It couldn't be easier – if you arrive at LAX, collect your bags and step onto the concourse where a luxury coach comes by every 30-45 minutes. For $8.00 it will take you to Van Nuys Fly-Away terminal where you will be picked up by shuttle for the three block trip to the hotel. If you do want a car rental it is available at the hotel and can be arranged at booking time or on your arrival. You'll be picked up and returned to the hotel for each lesson.
Enjoy your stay at the busiest GA airport on the planet and feel free to take in all the Los Angeles area has to offer. Airport and tower tours are available at the airport as well.


text:
Family Achievement Center announces Social Skill Groups
Sign up now for summer classes!
CLICK HERE for Social Skills Flyer descriptions, costs and schedule.
CLICK HERE Registration Information
(print and return to FAC)
CLICK HERE for Agreement LetterFamily Achievement Center Group Participation Criteria For Children Ages 6 and under:
• Children must be able to separate from their caregivers for approximately one hour.
• Children must be able to comprehend and attend to basic instructions (i.e. sitting down for circle time, keeping hands to self, etc.).
• Children cannot be aggressive toward other children or adults.
• Children should not be a "flight risk".
For Children Ages 7 and Older:
• Children should be able to participate in structure activities for more than one hour and also. have an attention span of, at least, 10 to 15 minutes for individual activities.
• Children should be able to initiate communication with other children and adults.
• Children should have a desire and/or motivation to interact socially with others.
• Children should be able to communicate his/her needs and wants.
• Children should be intelligible to others most of the time.
• Children's language should be spontaneous with little or no echolalia.
• Children should be able to tolerate a small group setting with other peers with appropriate adult supervision.
• Children must not demonstrate physical aggression towards other children or adults.
• Children should not be a "flight risk".
• Candidates new to FAC will be required to pass a free observational screening prior to class enrollment.
Other Programs
• Transitional Skills For Teens
• Therapeautic Listening
Please discuss any concerns regarding your child's behavior with the group contact before enrollment.
FAC reserves the right to change eligibility criteria depending on group needs.


text:
How to Make It
Step 1
Cook first 4 ingredients in a saucepan over medium heat, stirring until smooth. Stir in macaroni, and spoon into a lightly greased 11- x 7-inch baking dish.
Step 2
Toss together cracker crumbs and butter. Sprinkle mixture over macaroni.
Step 3
Bake at 350° for 25 minutes or until lightly browned.
Step 4
Note: For testing purposes only, we used Velveeta cheese product.


text:
Terry McDermott wins science journalism award
A memo from Editor Russ Stanton: Congratulations to Terry McDermott, winner of the Wistar Institute Science Journalism Award for "Chasing Memory," a four-part series on the quest to understand how memory works and why it breaks down.
The series, published Aug. 19-22 and available at latimes.com/memory, chronicled the efforts of UC Irvine neuroscientist Gary Lynch to understand the basic biological processes that enable us to remember things. The Wistar judges said the stories "brought the scientific process to life."
Wistar is a nonprofit biomedical research institute on the University of Pennsylvania campus in Philadelphia. Its science journalism award, which comes with a $5,000 cash prize, recognizes "the most insightful and enterprising reporting on the basic biomedical sciences."


text:
I've been unwell the last week or so but feel better today and didn't really feel the cold (which is usual for me) so i took some photos along the canal to show just how cold it is. The canal is frozen over as you can see!
Monday, November 29, 2010
Warmer Gower
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Snow and ice
So Winter has come early, the Tame Valley seemed a bit iced up earlier in the week though Gas Street seems fine today... snow on the towpath though!
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Pubs (1) : Lock Dock & Barrel, Leamington Spa
A new occasional series of canal side pubs. This one is in a lovely spot alongside the Grand Union at Leamington Spa.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Boats along the canal (30)
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
A badling of ducks
Badling is the collective noun for a group of ducks incase you wondered.
Monday, November 15, 2010
The city centre
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Junctions (8) : Albion Junction
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Friday, November 5, 2010
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Water a bit low
Monday, November 1, 2010
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)


text:
Home | Parish Council | Community | Leisure | Visitor Information | A-Z Index | About Us
Dymchurch is well known for its glorious beach which attracts many thousands of visitors every year. The sandy beach is quite flat and stretches from north to south for over three miles, and is frequently 'washed' by the tide of the English Channel.
The beach is very close to all the facilities of Dymchurch village, including cafes, restaurants, pubs and amusements. During the summer months there is a beach manager on hand with help and advice.
NB Users of the beach should observe the notices at every access point to the beach, that the revetment sea defence can be slippery. Designated steps with handrails should be used to access the beach.
The main public toilets are adjacent to the central car park in the High Street. [see map right] They are open throughout the year during daylight hours and closed at night. There also toilets just off the beach - see map right.
Dogs are banned on the beach each year 1 May to 30 September, from Sycamore Gardens in the north, to the Martello car park to the south. When on the beach, this is the area from groyne number 15 in the north to groyne number 26 in the south. The groyne numbers are marked on the sea side of the sea wall. see map right
The Environment Agency monitors and assesses bathing water quality at each designated bathing water in England & Wales annually between May and September. The monitoring results and annual compliance are all published on the Environment Agency website.
Dymchurch offers one of the best beaches from which to launch along the entire South Coast and is an ideal location from which to go sea fishing. The Dymchurch and District Sea Angling Club has its premises on the sea wall.
Personal Water Craft, commonly known as jet-skis are not permitted to launch from the central slipway at Dymchurch.
Notice: Personal watercraft users please read the notice here about the use of slipways.


text:
About ALEC
The American Legislative Exchange Council is America's largest nonpartisan, voluntary membership organization of state legislators dedicated to the principles of limited government, free markets and federalism.
ALEC's activities, while legal,[14] received public scrutiny after being reported by liberal groups in 2011 and after news reports from outlets such as The New York Times and Bloomberg Businessweek described ALEC as an organization that gave corporate interests outsized influence.[8][9] Resulting public pressure led to a number of legislators and corporations withdrawing from the organization.
ALEC is not a lobby; it is not a front group. It is much more powerful than that. Through the secretive meetings of the American Legislative Exchange Council, corporate lobbyists and state legislators vote as equals on 'model bills' to change our rights that often benefit the corporations' bottom line at public expense. ALEC is a pay-to-play operation where corporations buy a seat and a vote on 'task forces' to advance their legislative wish lists and can get a tax break for donations, effectively passing these lobbying costs on to taxpayers.
Along with legislators, corporations have membership in ALEC. Corporations sit on ALEC task forces and vote with legislators to approve "model" bills. They have their own corporate governing board which meets jointly with the legislative board. (ALEC says that corporations do not vote on the board.) Corporations fund almost all of ALEC's operations.
Participating legislators, overwhelmingly conservative Republicans, then bring those proposals home and introduce them in statehouses across the land as their own brilliant ideas and important public policy innovations—without disclosing that corporations crafted and voted on the bills.
ALEC boasts that it has over 1,000 of these bills introduced by legislative members every year, with one in every five of them enacted into law. ALEC describes itself as a "unique," "unparalleled" and "unmatched" organization. We agree. It is as if a state legislature had been reconstituted, yet corporations had pushed the people out the door.
ALEC is a corporate bill mill. It is not just a lobby or a front group; it is much more powerful than that. Through ALEC, corporations hand state legislators their wishlists to benefit their bottom line. Corporations fund almost all of ALEC's operations. They pay for a seat on ALEC task forces where corporate lobbyists and special interest reps vote with elected officials to approve "model" bills. Learn more at the Center for Media and Democracy's ALECexposed.org, and check out breaking news on our PRWatch.org site.
Corporate Board
For a more complete list of current and former ALEC formerly "Private Enterprise" Advisory Council (formerly "Private Enterprise" Board of Directors) members, see the "Private Enterprise" Board of Directors list. Advisory council corporations have included (members as of June 2014 in bold):[1][2][3]
- SAP America, Steve Seale – National Chair – Resigned from ALEC on November 6, 2014 (due to ALEC policies on climate change, renewable energy, guns and voting rights.)[4]
- American Bail Coalition, William Carmichael – Vice Chair
- American Water, was a "Trustee's" level funder of ALEC's 2016 Annual Conference.[5]
- Altria Group, Daniel Smith, "Vice Chair" level sponsor of ALEC's 2016 Annual Conference ($25,000).[6]
- AT&T, William Leahy, "Vice Chair" level sponsor of ALEC's 2016 Annual Conference ($25,000).[6]
- Coca-Cola Refreshments, Gene Rackley (Coke announced on April 4, 2012, that it had "elected to discontinue its membership with" ALEC.[7]) See Corporations that Have Cut Ties to ALEC for more.
- Diageo, Kenneth Lane
- Energy Future Holdings, Sano Blocker
- ExxonMobil Corporation, Cynthia Bergman, was a "Chair" level sponsor of ALEC's 2016 Annual Conference ($50,000).[6]
- GlaxoSmithKline, John Del Giorno (GlaxoSmithKline CEO Sir Andrew Witty said in a response to a shareholder's question at the company's annual meeting in May 2013 that the company had decided to sever its relationship with ALEC[8]) See Corporations that Have Cut Ties to ALEC for more.
- Intuit, Inc., Bernie McKay. Member of ALEC's Communications and Technology Task Force [9] (Intuit told the CMD April 5, 2012 that it had declined to renew ALEC membership[10]) See Corporations Which Have Cut Ties to ALEC for more.
- Johnson & Johnson, Don Bohn (J&J announced it would "suspend" its ALEC membership June 12, 2012[11])
- Koch Companies Public Sector, Mike Morgan
- Kraft Foods, Inc., Derek Crawford (Kraft announced it would leave ALEC April 5, 2012[12]) See Corporations Which Have Cut Ties to ALEC for more.
- NetChoice, Steve DelBianco
- Peabody Energy, Kelly Mader
- Pfizer Inc., Michael Hubert
- PhRMA, Jeff Bond
- Reed Elsevier, Inc., Teresa Jennings (Reed Elsevier announced on April 12, 2012, that it had resigned its board seat and dropped its ALEC membership "after considering the broad range of criticism being leveled at ALEC"[13]) See Corporations Which Have Cut Ties to ALEC for more.
- State Budget Solutions, Bob Williams
- State Farm Insurance Co., Roland Spies
- United Parcel Service (UPS)[14][15], Richard McArdle
- Wal-Mart Stores, Maggie Sans (Wal-Mart announced on May 30, 2012, that it is suspending its ALEC membership.[16] See Corporations Which Have Cut Ties to ALEC for more.
Reference Links:


text:
Paintbrush Skirt Crochet Pattern Download
This product will be accessible from My Downloadable Products located in My Account after purchase.
Crochet the colors of a beautiful self-striping yarn that unfurls throughout this lacy skirt. Discover how the colors pool in the wide fan border, contrasting with the stripes of the rich diamond filet crochet stitch pattern in the body of the skirt.
Finished Size: 25 (27, 29, 31, 34)" waist circumference; 35 (38.25, 42, 45.5, 49)" hip circumference; 29" long. Sample shown in size 29", modeled with 2" ease.
Yarn: Schoppel Wolle Lace Ball (distributed by Skacel) (75% virgin wool, 25% nylon; 874 yd [800 m]/3½ oz [100 g]): #1564 frische fische, 2 (2, 3, 3, 3) balls.
Yarn Weight: #0 - Lace
Needles: Size 1 (2.75 mm) steel hook. Adjust hook size if necessary to obtain correct gauge.
Notions: Yarn needle.
Gauge: 25 sts and 14 rows (one filet diamond) = 3½" x 5½".
Originally Published: Crochetscene 2014
|Product Type
|Pattern Download
|File Type
|Natasha Robarge
|Difficulty Level
Shipping Options
For United States customers:
Ground: $4.95 flat rate. Free shipping on orders over $50
Estimated total shipping time (not including order processing time) is 2-8 business days. Includes tracking information.
2nd Day Air: $19.95
Estimated total shipping time (not including order processing time) is 2 business days; no P.O. boxes. 2nd Day shipping includes tracking information.
Next Day Air: $49.95
Estimated total shipping time (not including order processing time) is 1 business day; no P.O. boxes. Next Day shipping includes tracking information.
For International customers:
- Shipping Method —All orders are sent via Airmail. Please allow 4-6 weeks for your order to arrive.
- Tracking information is not available for International orders at this time.
International Air Printed Matter: $6.95
Estimated total shipping time (not including order processing time) is dependent on final destination. For Canada, the estimated shipping time is 2-4 weeks. For other International Countries please allow for an estimated shipping time of 4-6 weeks.
Digital Product Download
When you purchase a downloadable item from our store, you have unlimited access to your purchase and can download it as many times and as often as needed.
- Go to https://www.interweave.com
- Click on "Sign Up/Sign In" at the top right corner.
- Sign in with your email and password
- Click on Welcome, (your name)! in the top right corner
- On the left side of the screen is a list of options. Click on MY DOWNLOADABLE PRODUCTS.
- Underneath the Product Title will be the download link. Click the link to view the PDF or Video.
- To save your purchases to your computer please do the following:
*PC Users: Right click on the download link, select "Save Link As" (Firefox, Chrome) or "Save Target As" (Internet Explorer)
*MAC Users: Hold the Ctrl button while clicking on the download link and select the option "Download Linked File As" (Safari)
- Save the download(s) to your "Desktop," "My documents" or other favorite folder. Click Save.
If you are having trouble opening your download, we recommend using the latest version of Adobe Reader for eBooks, digital magazine issues and patterns/projects. Get it here for free: https://get.adobe.com/reader/
For videos, we recommend using VLC Player. Here is the link to access VLC download for free: http://www.videolan.org/
Please let us know if we can be of further assistance.
Online Workshops and Streaming Video
If you have purchased an on-demand courses or video you can access your product immediately by following the directions below. If you have purchased course with a start date you can still access it by following the directions below but may be limited to what you can access until the course starts at the date that was described in the details section of the product you purchased.
- Go to https://www.interweave.com
- Click on Sign Up/Sign In at the top right corner.
- Sign in with your email and password.
- Click on Welcome, (your name)! At the top right corner
- On the left side of the screen click on MY Workshops.
- Click Go to Course link to the far right of the course title. If nothing happens, verify that your pop-up blocker is off.
- If you are directed to a screen asking for your name and email address, fill in the information.
- You will be taken to your Dashboard, where you will see your course listed.
- Click on the teal button to the far right of the course title. It should either say Start Watching or Continue.
- Click the Play button to start viewing the course.
*If there are course materials available, they will be found under the Menu tab at the top of the viewing window.
To Access Online Workshop Materials:
- Click on the Menu tab.
- Click on Resources.
- You will see the number of Files available for the course.
- Click Files.
- Click View/Download to the right of the file title to access it.
If you do not see this notification, you simply have to navigate to your web browser's "settings" and disable your popup blocker there, or choose to allow popups on our site.
For instructions on Chrome go to https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/95472?hl=en&co=GENIE.Platform=Desktop
For courses on Apple mobile devices, such as iPad and iPhone, go into iPhone settings -> safari -> block popups and turn it off.
Then when you click on "go to course" from your device's internet browser app, you will be asked to allow popups for this site. Choose yes, and you should be good to go.


text:
- home
- news
- blogs
- calendar
- enewsletters
Tiara Yachts Stays Home For $14M Expansion Project
S2 Yachts Inc. CEO David Slikkers is continuing to build on the company his father, Leon Slikkers, started in 1974 with a $14 million expansion at the Tiara Yachts Holland facility.
The Michigan Economic Development Corp. has awarded the company a single business tax credit valued at more than $4.7 million over 13 years and an Economic Development Job Training grant worth up to $200,000 for training new employees to help with the expansion.
Construction is waiting on final approval on an additional $2.1 million in tax abatements over 12 years from the city of
"Once that's done and complete, we're hoping to break ground by the end of the month," he said. "Hopefully, we will just forge right straight forward as quickly as possible."
This is not the first large-scale change the company has been through. S2 Yachts started out as a sailboat company, eventually adding outboard powerboats, and then narrowed it's focus to Tiara inboard yachts and Pursuit Boats, a company based in Florida.
"It's an evolutionary process of growing and understanding the business and the marketplace," Slikkers said. "When you can successfully navigate those changes over a period of three-plus decades, I would say that's a good thing."
The nearly 80-acre Holland campus will be rearranged, Slikkers said.
"We have plenty of real estate to do the expansion right here on this campus," he said.
The 300,000-square-foot expansion will connect the two large buildings that are on the campus and will include a new lamination and tech center and an additional assembly line.
The newly connected building will be 800,000 square feet when finished.
"We'll be adding jobs already this fall," he said. "That will be almost a continuous acceleration and ramp-up."
There will be 100 to 125 new jobs in the beginning and the remaining 275 to 300 jobs will be added as new products are developed. The company has three to four years to add a total of 400 jobs to the area.
"These will be all of our normal manufacturing jobs," he said. "It's basically an expansion of all the jobs that we have today; it's just that we're going to need lots more of them."
Slikkers said that he has received community support for the decision.
"We've seen a lot more jobs exiting than coming to West Michigan. I think the community, as well as people in general, have been extremely positive," he said. "As we ramp up, I think it will just make our company a more desirable place to work in West Michigan, because they know our plans are to stay here in West Michigan and expand in West Michigan."
Slikkers said though Michigan is a costly state to do business in, the local and state governments are recognizing the need to be competitive and have helped the company with incentive packages
"We have an opportunity to take our manufacturing to a new level," he said. "It was a difficult decision to make, but I believe in the long term we'll be able to leverage the fact that we're here in West Michigan with the quality workers that we have available to us. We know these workers are capable of doing great things."
Randy Thelen, president of the regional economic development group Lakeshore Advantage, said the expansion may help inspire others.
"I'm a firm believer that when you see construction of that size, when you see the help-wanted ads go in the newspaper, that helps the mindset of the community," he said. "You start to see the steel going up everywhere and you start to realize we may have turned the corner."
Thelen said Lakeshore Advantage helped the company with the incentive package it received from the city and the state.
"The Slikkers family has been a strong employer for years, and this is going to take their company to even greater heights," he said. "Here in West Michigan, we talk about our zest for entrepreneurship and how we've got great examples across the region of just amazing entrepreneurs, and I think people always think of entrepreneurs in terms of start-up businesses. But here the Slikkers family has remained entrepreneurial throughout their business. They've never lost that entrepreneurial spirit and that entrepreneur drive to always grow their business and look for new opportunities."
Slikkers said there are multiple reasons the company has been successful.
"Certainly I think that the leadership that Leon provided early on, the core values that were instilled in us as boys and remaining true to those operating principles" are part of that success, he said.
Holland Area Chamber of Commerce President Jane Clark said the expansion was wonderful news to hear.
"The expansion is just another indicator of what a great place Holland is," she said. "The chamber was just so happy to see that the company was able to make decisions that would have such a strong economic effect on the community."
Clark said there are many talented workers who will be able to stay in the area because of the expansion.
"It's wonderful to see the economic opportunities that are being created for some of the folks that may have lost their jobs elsewhere," she said.
Despite setbacks, Clark said the area has a strong industrial base that is growing.
"I think Holland really has a climate of success, and workers and companies that want to make a difference. Although we've faced our share of tough times in the manufacturing sector, we're still good at making things," she said. "Slowly but surely — five employees here, 10 employees there — we're seeing expansions."


text:
Handcrafted Designer Jewelry to Nourish Your Soul
Regular price
Handcrafted in 14-karat,this pair of simple yet edgy geometric triangle studs are an easy way to complement your everyday. Wear yours stacked with other studs from the collection.
Length: 8.68 mm
Material: Gold
Diamond CTW: 0.025
Purity: 14k
Sold as a pair
Post Backing


text:
Dusk Overalls | Musk
Our original Dusk Overalls in this season's subtle tone, Musk. A light and easy piece for warm days or perfect layered with a sweater in cool weather. Featuring adjustable button on straps and pockets for treasures this piece will become an instant favourite.
100% Cotton
Sizing Notes
This piece runs true to size and features adjustable button on straps. Due to the nature of this fabric some shrinking is expected after the first wash. Please keep this in mind when you first try on the piece.
Garment Care
To keep the piece looking it's best we recommend only washing in cold water and never tumble drying. This is a delicate open weave gauze and pulls very easily. Please be gentle.
Shipping & Taxes


text:
ave you started your year with funding problems and do not know how to solve them? You may have gone to a bank and after informing you about personal payday loans and presenting all the documentation, you have only received a refusal. Well, if you are in Bank Lending and have a payroll, we have the loan designed for you.
From the moment you are registered in a list of defaulters, regardless of whether you have payroll, you will have many problems to access credits in traditional banking. But the unforeseen and needs do not wait, that's why Small Credit Lender has created for you the loans without payroll or endorsement, only DNI and with Bank Lending.
What are personal payday loans with Bank Lending and payroll?
These are online loans specially designed for those who are enrolled in one of the lists of defaults with the Bank Lending or the RAI. The reasons can be very diverse: from an unpaid bill to a mortgage that could not be assumed. In Small Credit Lender we know the real problems of consumers and we are here to help.
In these loans with Bank Lending, the requirements and the feasibility study are very different from those of the usual loans. They have been created for those who, despite having a payroll, being on this list of defaulters prevents them from accessing the purchase of a car, a more than deserved trip or private lessons for their children.
Requirements for personal payday loans with Bank Lending and payroll
The requirements to complete the mini-credit application with Bank Lending are very simple, we detail them below:
- Being over 18 years
- Provide a valid DNI to confirm your identity
- Be the holder of a bank account in Spain, to be able to receive the money from your quick credits with Bank Lending
- In some cases, it is necessary to justify that there is a recurring income, depending on the lender
- Not having incurred debts with credit institutions. This legal requirement is essential before applying for any type of credit, whether it is loans without payroll or payroll
From the process of applying for personal payday loans with Bank Lending and fixed payroll to receiving the money in your account, everything is designed to reduce the waiting time and procedures. Forget the long queues in your bank and the incomprehensible small print: Small Credit Lender is trust, clarity and facilities.
Step by step of the application for personal payday loans with Bank Lending and payroll
Below we present you step by step the process you must follow to apply for your personal payday loans with Bank Lending in Small Credit Lender. You only need an internet connection and 15 minutes of your time. We take care of the rest so that you can enjoy your money in the shortest possible time and that you can face the expense that torments you.
First, you must visit the main page of Small Credit Lender. You will find a quick personal payday loan tool where you can select the amount and time of return. Then, you must fill out an application form and that's it! In a few minutes you will receive your answer and in about 24 hours, the money in your bank account.
Advantages of applying for loans with Bank Lending
At the time of requesting microcredits with Bank Lending with Small Credit Lender, the advantages can be appreciated from the first minute:
- Faster and easier: credits instantly without waiting, without complications or small print.
- Security: in a secure web environment with online assistance.
- Complete comfort: personal payday loans with Bank Lending and only payroll from your home, just with an internet connection.
- Flexibility and adaptation: discover all our offer of quick credits without payroll.
Decided to apply for your loan?
The loans with Bank Lending and without endorsement of Small Credit Lender can be summarized in a few words:
- Speed and assistance throughout the process.
- Flexibility to choose the amount and the options that you want for your credit.
- Security, because the whole procedure is protected.
- Transparency, since you will be informed in real time of the evolution of your request. You will have no doubt about the status of your loan. And if you have any questions, our agents will be happy to guide you and resolve any question that may arise before, during or after the request.


text:
RJD leader flouts PM's order, refuses to remove red beacon
| Updated: Aug 23, 2017 11:20 IST
Patna (Bihar) [India], May 2 (ANI): While most of the ministers across the nation have already removed the red beacon atop their vehicles following the Centre's ruling, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Bhai Birendra yesterday said that he will not remove the beacon from his car as the order is not by the Bihar government. "Which cabinet decided this? Why Bihar will follow any decision by the Delhi Cabinet. If our Bihar state government will pass this order then only we will follow the rule. I won't remove the red beacon from my car," RJD leader Bhai Birendra told ANI. The government banned the use of red beacon on vehicles attached to dignitaries, including the central and state ministers and other VVIPs from May 1. It is reported that five categories would be allowed to use the red beacon- President, Vice President, Prime Minister, Chief Justice of India and the Lok Sabha Speaker. The ban applies to union ministers, chief ministers, state cabinet ministers, bureaucrats and judges of the High Court and Supreme Court. On last Sunday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that new India is not about VIP but about EPI- Every Person is Important. Speaking in the 31st edition of his monthly radio programme, he further said that people have developed a negative mindset for the VIP culture in the nation. "In our country people don't like the VIP culture. I recently came to know that how intense it is. So the government banned the use of red beacon atop the vehicle of ministers no matter how prominent leaders they are," the Prime Minister said. Backing the ban on red beacon, Prime Minister Modi earlier said that every Indian is special and a VIP. (ANI)


text: We are pleased to be able to report that our clients, the Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board and other California state agencies, finalized a settlement regarding the Leviathan Mine Superfund site near Lake Tahoe. The settlement resolves a lawsuit brought by the Atlantic Richfield Company (ARCO), successor to the former mine owner and operator. ARCO sought to hold the defendants liable for all cleanup costs, based upon a settlement agreement from 1983. The parties reached an agreement in principal on the third day of an anticipated six week trial, but it took some time to finalize the settlement due to its complex nature and the anticipation that the site will require active remediation for hundreds of years or more. ARCO is currently conducting an investigation with the goal that a final remedy will be selected in the next few years. The settlement provides for, among other things, ARCO to complete the investigation and the Water Board to construct and operate the remedy, with the majority of funding (75% for construction and 70% for operation and maintenance) being paid by ARCO. A copy of the Water Board press release can be viewed here and a copy of the settlement is available here.


text:
"A kind overflow of kindness: there are no faces
truer than those that are so washed. How much
better is it to weep at joy than to joy at weeping!"
On Tuesday, March 14, Blessed Trinity students traveled into Atlanta to visit Shakespeare's Tavern for a live performance of "Much Ado About Nothing."
The trip was a part of the curriculum of the elective class, Shakespeare's Comedies. All students had already read the work and had the chance to see professional actors bring the play to life.
AP Art History Students were also learning outside of the classroom this week.
Students visited an art gallery and saw several pieces from Africa that they have been studying, including masks made by the Mende peoples from Sierra Leone.


text:
BAGHDAD: The Saudi-owned newspaper Asharq al-Awsat said on Monday it fired its Baghdad correspondent, a day after printing controversial accusations wrongly attributed to a UN spokesman.
The report drew condemnation from Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi and several other leading Shiite figures and bodies demanding an apology.
The sacking of the journalist, who was not named, came after the paper ran an article Sunday accusing Iranian pilgrims taking part in the Shiite Muslim commemoration of Arbaeen of sexually harassing women.
The article quoted a World Health Organisation spokesman as saying that after last year's pilgrimage more than 169 Iraqi women became pregnant out of wedlock.
The UN's health agency said the "claim that this information was released by a WHO headquarters communications officer is completely erroneous."
The London-based daily paper published the WHO statement on Monday in what it said was evidence of "its commitment towards the truth... and to correct the erroneous information contained in (Sunday's) report."
"We also announce that we have stopped cooperating with the newspaper's correspondent in Baghdad responsible for the report because he did not respect professional and ethical norms," it said.
A correspondent for Asharq al-Awsat in Iraq, Hamza Mustafa, meanwhile said he was resigning from the paper, although he stressed he did not write the article.
"I announce my resignation... after having asked them to identify the correspondent responsible for the false report," Mustafa said on his Facebook page.
Another journalist working for the newspaper in Baghdad, Maad Fayyad, in a statement obtained by AFP, said he had nothing to do with the controversial article.
"I am innocent... and those who know me... know it would be impossible for me to resort to such things," said Fayyad.
Arbaeen, one of world's largest religious events, commemorates the death in 680 of Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Mohammed.
Millions of Shiites from around the world take part each year in the massive processions to the shrine city of Karbala.
This year's edition culminated on Monday, with officials expecting the number of visitors to total 17 to 20 million, including around three million Iranians.--AFP


text:
Love this necklace? Well watch for it in a giveaway post next week! WOO!
When Lightning Strikes
Love this necklace? Well watch for it in a giveaway post next week! WOO!
8 comments:
That necklace is cute and perfect for stormy weather :)ReplyDelete
Heyyyy I recognize that dress ;) it looks adorable on you, and the pairing with the lightning necklace is so clever (very Ben Franklin of you). My dog has always been terrified of thunderstorms, and there've been so many lately here, too.ReplyDelete
xox Sammi
I love that you paired the kite dress with the lightning necklace. How scientific! Also, the necklace reminds me of HP. :DReplyDelete
I have a cute perspex lightening bolt necklace too! They are simple and sweet!ReplyDelete
Enter the Two Hearts One Roof August Giveaway
i love the kite print dress :) and the dogs look happy :)ReplyDelete
Ah yes. Florida and the popup storms! I love that lightning necklace you're wearing. Such a cool piece and your kite dress is adorable too. Cute and summery!ReplyDelete
Jamie | PetitePanoply.com
That necklace is awesome!ReplyDelete
Your hair is so pretty here.Also, I like the cleverness of kites and lightening bolts. Ben Franklin turned high fashion :)ReplyDelete
Thank you for visiting and reading this post! We're excited to read your comment - and even if we aren't always able to get back to you, we read these together. Definitely feel free to hit us up on Twitter also - @kmuchadoo or @jamcadoo


text:
The NGO, Society to Create Awareness Towards Life & Environment, has lit up more than 3,000 homes till date. In future, the group plans more initiatives to promote clean energy. In an event on Sunday, attended by the Indo-Tibetan Border Police in Haldwani, 300 solar lanterns along with seven mobile charging stations and 10 solar home lights were distributed.
Anand Singh, commandant of the 36 battalion ITBP, said, "A combined effort like this helps in making lives of thousands better. The solar equipment will be distributed in 40 villages in Dharchula block of Pithorgarh district."
Designed by experts from India and abroad, the solar lanterns cost around Rs 1,100 to 2,100 whereas the home lights cost around Rs 3,200 to 6,000 and are manufactured in the hill state.