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Three skin care executives from beauty industry powerhouses Clarins, Clinique and Elizabeth Arden shared their insights on the fast-growing skin care category at Cosmetic Executive Women's (CEW) Beauty Insider Series event held June 18, 2014, at New York's Harmonie Club. Carlotta Jacobson, president of CEW, remarked on the uniqueness of the event, saying, "Where else would you be able to hear from the top three skin care leaders—and competitors—under one roof?"
Jacobson, who also announced the upcoming launch of CEW's new social media site for members, said the site will be an interactive membership directory that will enable members to form communities within it and better communicate with one another. The social media hub will allow the CEW's 6,000 members across the nation an opportunity to join discussion groups, gain career advice, and enable mentorships through the site.
Trends and Demographics
CEW chairperson Jill Scalamandre moderated the evening's panel, which included Maria Dempsey, executive vice president of regional marketing, Americas, Clarins; Agnes Landau, senior vice president of global marketing, Clinique; and Kara Langan, vice president of global marketing, Elizabeth Arden.
Scalamandre began the discussion with a look at the paradox of the skin care market, noting its global acceleration and local decline, and Dempsey whose successful product launches include Clarins' Vital Light Serum and the rebranding of Total Eye Concentrate, said, "It's a dynamic industry. This is a little bump in the road for skin care. It's a slight slowdown, no need for panic."
Landau, who has been the guiding force behind Clinique's Even Better Clinical Dark Spot Corrector and Repairwear Laser Focus Wrinkle & UV Damage Corrector, also provided some perspective on the changes, saying, "Three to three and a half years ago the whole hyperpigmentation category was created. Now this is leveling off. That might explain some of the slowdown in the U.S. But, we look at opportunities too—for example, online is growing double digits, and we want to understand online growth."
A look at shifting consumer habits prompted Langan's reply. "Looking at different channels is important. Spas, dermatologists and plastic surgeons all have different dynamics, so we need to understand them better," she noted.
Dempsey also addressed the BB cream category, saying it created excitement for the consumer and "shows us that customers want multi-benefit. It's dynamic." And Langan said it was a great way to introduce the younger market to skin care benefits. "This is a great market for us to concentrate on," she said.
Landau also weighed in on this topic. "Industrywide, consumers are looking at benefits. The CC cream consumer wants to feel that she is not wearing anything," she noted, explaining her mother-in-law felt the CC cream she used was so light it hardly qualified as a cosmetic, let alone a foundation. "The insight of simplicity is an important one. Consumers are telling us something about wanting to simplify their routines."
Key trends discussed to get more traction back in skin care centered around both product integrity and tools. Dempsey said, "At-home beauty care is really important, like Clarisonic and other at-home tools. At Clarins, we believe that your hands are your best tools for applying makeup, massaging and more."
And Landau referred to a new cleansing device that will be launched soon for Clinique, saying, "The cleansing category is the heart of this brand. It is its DNA for Clinique. A device is like a great car, like a Ferrari, but you need a great driver. So, designing this with a dermatology/device synergy is key for us at Clinique." Langan expanded the topic, noting, "Customization is also something we're starting to see more of—like 3D printers, customers want to be able to create something for themselves," she said.
Landau also noted that the environment continues to be something to look at. "Global warming is here, allergy season is significant. How we design products to address this changing world is important," she said.
Additionally, ethnicities and diversity continue to impact changing demographics. According to Dempsey, "The Hispanic population is reaching 30–40% in the coming years, the Asian population is growing, and baby boomers are all factors impacting product creation." The Chinese population in particular is interested in products that address specific demands, including minimizing the look of roundness to the face, and is prompting looking at the area of structural cosmetics.
Landau also acknowledged increased travel and global exchanges, while Langan observed the demographic shifts that are taking place, noting that ethnicities are actually merging. "We may need to focus on aging as women will be aging differently as these changes take place," she said.
Skin Care Routines
"Designing routines for skin care is key for Clinique," Landau shared. After six years in development, Clinique has created a new serum that is said to "understand your skin's past in order to determine its future." The serum, Clinique Smart, will address specific skin signals that are transmitting signs of dullness, damage, skin tone or loss of elasticity. "It is formulated for one skin in the world—yours," said Landau. "You will still need your moisturizer and hydration, as the product is positioned as a repair product," she added.
Another topic that brought a range of responses was how to manage the complexity of today's consumers. "We need to provide the tools at [the] counter to meet the needs of the consumer. Developing a deep beauty advisor-customer relationship is key to the core of the Clarins brand," said Dempsey. And Langan shared, "Outside the U.S. there are many different approaches to selling a brand, so finding ways to reach a customer with a complex brand is a challenge."
"Technology can also be important in bridging those gaps. Honestly, I'm not the same consumer every time I go to the counter," Landau noted of her own experiences. "Sometimes I want something specific and sometimes I browse." And Dempsey shared her take on technology, saying, "The innovations in digital have been big. We've partnered with a company that has a turn-to program allowing customers to provide genuine feedback to other customers, which has taken customer service to a new level."
"I think consumers are looking for experiences not at the counter, like the beautiful CBGB John Varvatos store downtown [in New York]. The millennials want to know that your brand has a DNA," said Landau, and Langan agreed, noting, "The experience is important. We've had the opportunity to bring the experience to the customer with the Elizabeth Arden Red Door store in Union Square. Customers can get a mani-pedi and also interact with the products. It brings the experience of the brand to life. Our color in the location also does really well, and the whole idea of being able to get multiple services on your lunch hour to provide a quick pick-me-up is key."
Regarding consumer trends, Landau said, "The one thing I know is we're a flat world. Skin care is exploding in Korea. There is lots of fast innovation and trends moving around the world, and technology has also had an impact. iPhones, iPads—it's expected, and regardless of age, we're seeing that around the world. As far as anti-aging products, particularly in Asia, I'm seeing customers at 25, and they want the products. This varies across the world."
Dempsey commented," Women are feeling differently about age. Fifty years old now feels like thirty. But what scares me is that, with skin care innovation, products don't happen overnight, despite the fact that consumers want results right away."
Managing core products is key, and for Clarins, Dempsey noted, "It's about how you manage innovation. We have to continue to improve our already great products. Talking to the consumers about Double Serum, for example, is important, and introducing our brand to new customers who don't know us is key." Landau said, "Our philosophy is that Clinique believes that we will always do what is best for the skin. The big challenge for our products—for example, Dramatically Different Lotion—is making sure we retained the texture and feel of the product."
"Our iconic Eight Hour Cream is the only product in our line that was actually developed by Elizabeth Arden herself. This is my Windex. My go-to product," said Langan. "It was developed more than 30 years ago. It is part of the magic of the brand. If we spent too much time making new stuff, it would detract from the magic of the brand."
And Dempsey discussed the Clarins presence at Macy's, in Flushing, Queens, where there is a significant Chinese and Asian population. "We brought products that are specific to Asia, [and] we had Mandarin speaking advisors at counter and at-counter literature in Mandarin. It has been hugely successful. We offer products that lift the jawline, refine the face—for example, with the new Shaping Facial Lift by Clarins. It has also been a great learning experience," she shared.
In addition, Dempsey said the product assortment was critical and changing the cleansing protocols was also important, i.e, offering two cleansers, two makeup removers and two eye products.
Eye on the Consumer
Meeting the needs of a changing consumer base remained key for all of the panelists representing their brands. "It's the relationship with the customer. For me, it's training the beauty advisors so they are in line with the consumers," said Dempsey. And Langan shared, "The opportunity to really communicate to women that Arden is running strong is very important. We have the original skin care brand, and we have amazing people to modernize it."
Helping to conclude the event, Landau added, "Anticipating her needs and creating newness and being intuitive in understanding the consumer's every need is very important. From a brand perspective, it's a good season."


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Create a Website Account - Manage notification subscriptions, save form progress and more.
Yes, it can be dangerous for some. It is especially dangerous for children under the age of five and for the elderly or adults with weakened immune systems. The bacteria can cause kidney failure and bleeding and can lead to death.
Show All Answers
E. coli is a common kind of bacteria that lives in the intestines of animals and people. There are many strains of E. coli and most do not cause serious illness. However, there are some strains that produce a toxin that can cause severe illness.
These strains are called "shiga toxin-producing E. coli". E. coli 0157:H7 is the name of one of the most common toxic strains of this type of bacteria. It is found in the intestines of some cattle, deer, goats and sheep.
People with E. coli infection usually have a sudden onset of diarrhea, often with visible blood, and stomach cramps. Most people have no fever or a very low-grade fever. A stool sample tested specifically for E. coli is the best way to determine if someone is infected.
Taking antibiotics or over-the-counter anti-diarrhea medicines can make the infection worse. Call your doctor if you experience sudden diarrhea with blood in it.
E. coli bacteria are spread by eating and drinking contaminated food or water, or by putting contaminated objects or hands into the mouth. E. coli can be spread in the following ways:
Follow these tips to prevent E. coli infection:

subset: commoncrawl


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Good morning, fellow political junkies.
The Affordable Care Act should dominate Wednesday's news cycle thanks to scheduled high-profile appearances by President Obama and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to defend the law.
President Obama plans to be in Faneuil Hall in Boston later Wednesday. His appearance is meant as a blaring reminder that Obamacare's roots were in Massachusetts and Republican. It was in that very hall that Mitt Romney, Obama's 2012 GOP rival for the presidency, as governor signed into law the health-care insurance legislation that became model for the national law.
Meanwhile, Sebelius will testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee where she will be grilled by Republicans about the infamously rocky launch of the federal health exchange website.
Republicans have also begun hammering the Obama administration about the insurance cancellation letters many people are getting from their old insurers forced to end certain policies under the new law.
With that, here are some interesting items of political news or analysis that caught my eye this morning.
- Obamacare's critics are increasingly seizing on a very real problem the president created for himself. Before the law's 2010 passage and after, the president reassured Americans that if they liked their health care plans and doctors, they could keep them. But that's not true in many cases. The Washington Post's Lena H. Sun and Sandhya Somashekhar capture the situation. It's a "read my lips" problem for the president. Like President George H.W. Bush, he made a high-profile promise that is being violated. Meanwhile, WaPo's Sarah Kliff recently explained in detail the reasons for the cancellations.
- School districts and local governments in Pennsylvania, Delaware and New Jersey (and presumably elsewhere) are reducing the hours of part-time workers to avoid having to provide them with health insurance under Obamacare, reports the Philadelphia Inquirer's Kelly April Tyrrell.
- Republicans have portrayed Obamacare as a huge threat to the U.S. economy that will beggar many Americans. But some investors spot a potential goldmine, writes Adam Davidson of NPR'sPlanet Money in The New York Times Magazine.
- As talks begin Wednesday between congressional budget negotiators, there were indications the White House might not insist a deal include new tax revenues in exchange for removing part of the sequester cuts, The Wall Street Journal's Damian Paletta and Janet Hook report.
- National Journal gives ammunition to both sides of the argument about the ultimate meaning of a defeat Republican Ken Cuccinelli next week in Virginia's governor's race. Sarah Mimms writes that if he loses, which some polls suggest is likely, it will be a one-off event due more to his particular failings as a candidate. Josh Kraushaar, on the other hand, writes that Cuccinelli's failure could signal a larger GOP crackup since the Tea Party forces behind his nomination may not draw the right lesson.
- Little about the unraveling of former congressman Jesse Jackson Jr.'s life and career has been predictable. That now includes the way he surrendered himself to federal prison authorities in North Carolina. The Chicago Tribune's Katherine Skiba reports Jackson caused initial confusion that resulted in his being turned away by prison officials by showing up at prison several days too soon but that he's now begun serving his sentence for his federal conviction.
Copyright 2016 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.


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The Netflix Player continues to gain in popularity. Roku has finally released the GPL code for their Netflix Player. Just today Forbes published that Roku would roll out a software update allowing it to stream from other online services. The diminutive device has no internal storage and just enough RAM to buffer the stream. Many have wondered how a Linux box is handling the DRM; this is purely a feature of the NXP PNX8935 processor being used. While waiting for the code, hackers have already popped the box open to see what's inside. We found [hokiokie7]'s photos of the internals on Roku's forum. The only really interesting thing we've seen so far is that the WiFi is on a daughter card that plugs into the USB. That should make it much easier to support other devices, if users ever manage to get into the system.
UPDATE: [mbailey] points out in the comments that he was able to telnet to the device.


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Proposal Template
A proposal template is a LaTeX file that can be used to prepare the scientific justification of an ALMA proposal. It is not mandatory to use LaTeX: other formats, such as Word, Pages, etc can also be used as long as they can be turned into a pdf file and use at least 12pt characters. The pdf format is required to attach the justification to the proposal prepared in the Observing Tool (OT).
Regardless of format, the justification has to adhere to the maximum total number of pages, which is 4 for Regular, DDT, ToO, Phased Array, and mm-VLBI proposals, and 6 for Large Program proposals, as these should contain additional sections on management and data products. Both page limits include figures, tables and references. For more information, please see the ALMA Proposers Guide.
For clarity, we provide two templates, corresponding to each of the page limits:
Download zip file containing the 4-page Template for Regular, DDT, ToO, Phased Array, or mm-VLBI proposals
Download zip file containing the 6-page Template for Large Program proposals only


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Part No.: GMO 2460R
Pipe pullers connect swivel and the PE product pipe to be installed. Pipe-pullers are used for pulling in pipes. TT-pipe pullers adapt automatically to the standard pressure steps of the relevant pipe. For all conventional HDPE/PP pipes from OD 25 mm on, extremely tight and optionally available with rear seal and yoke (upon request) PE reducing adapter available upon request.


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For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
February 23, 2003
Remarks by the President in An Exchange of Toasts at the State Dinner for the Nation's Governors
State Dining Room
THE PRESIDENT: Good evening. Laura and I really look forward to these yearly dinners with our nation's governors, and spouses. And we welcome you all back to the White House.
For those of you who are first-timers here as governors, we welcome you, as well. I'm particularly pleased that Lyle Lovett, from the great state of Texas, is here with us. We look forward to hearing you tonight, Lyle.
I also welcome former governors who serve in my Cabinet -- Tommy Thompson and Christie Todd Whitman, John Ashcroft are here. Tom Ridge is now a member of my Cabinet, he's not here. He'll still be invited to the Cabinet Room. (Laughter.)
Governors are strong leaders with a practical point of view, and I'm really grateful for my former fellow governors for serving their country. There are 25 new governors who are here. I know it's an exciting experience for you, to set an agenda and to put together a great team to solve problems for your state or your territory.
I loved being the governor of Texas. In my six years, I placed great value on the advice of fellow governors, and made many friendships which continue to this day. I've grown especially close to the Governor of Florida. (Laughter.) The man is like a brother to me. (Laughter.)
We each have a shared experience and we have shared responsibilities. We share the responsibility for protecting the homeland. We share the responsibility for encouraging economic growth and jobs. We share the responsibility for making sure every child learns and no child is left behind. We share the responsibility for expanding access to high-quality, affordable health care, and for helping our fellow citizens in need. And we'll meet these responsibilities together.
I'm honored to have you all here. I now ask you to join me in a toast. To the governors of the United States.
(A toast is offered.)
GOVERNOR PATTON: Mr. President, we're honored to be your guests tonight. We recognize, in the wake of the loss of the Columbia and your responsibilities as Commander-in-Chief, your time is especially valuable to the nation. That you and the First Lady have made such a special effort to welcome us this evening is, therefore, even more appreciated.
As your former colleagues and your closest partners in our federal-state partnership, we know that you bear great burdens in serving the nation and our people. As our nation confronts unprecedented challenges at home and abroad, from terrorism, which has, for the first time in our nation's history, reached across the oceans into our heartland, to deep uncertainties in our national and state economies, we know this gathering faces hope and risk of a scale none of could ever have anticipated. That imposes responsibilities of leadership on your shoulders that perhaps no President before you has borne.
So this evening, I want to offer a toast to you and to the First Lady -- and we salute you, Mr. President. If I could have my toast here -- we salute you, Mr. President and Mrs. Bush, for the grace and strength that you've brought to us and to the nation in these past few weeks. For the leadership you have both demonstrated to guide us out of our sorrows and fears. And for binding us together for the task we face tomorrow.
The future of our security and economy, the foundations of our global leadership rest in no small part on your determined commitment to achieve not just a global alliance against terrorism, but also a lifting of our spirits as Americans. Tonight we stand together, shoulder to shoulder, beside you and behind you. Go well in bravery. Our best to you, Mr. President and to Mrs. Bush.
(A toast is offered.)


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I've been thinking recently about distributed content experiences--ways for people to interact with museum content (art, history, science, etc.) as they make their way through the world outside the museum. There are a zillion apps for making your own tours, podcasts, maps, or QR code-infested games... but none of them are great.
Distributed mobile content experiences seem to suffer from two basic problems:
- Underwhelming entry points. It's extremely hard to get people to download a new app. Where and when does an institution ask you to do so? At the museum? At the historic site? While walking down the street? The impulse to download an app is driven by curiosity or an urgent perceived need. While museums may cultivate curiosity, they rarely offer sufficiently clear, urgent use cases to encourage you to go through the drudgery of downloading an app.
- Unlikely reentry points. Once you download an app, are you really going to remember to (re)open it to find an interesting historical fact tagged to your geolocation? Are you going to use it to scan for public art near you? Most of these apps seem so niche, so useless for anything other than accessing semi-interesting content in a clunky interface, that they end up languishing in the Siberian outback of your phone.
In contrast, successful distributed projects seem to have one of two characteristics:
- Compelling and/or versatile mobile experience. What do we use our phones for most? Communicating, playing, exploring. Quality content experiences tend to piggyback on massive social media platforms apps that are already well-used (i.e. facebook) or create very compelling whole worlds unto themselves (i.e. Pokemon Go).
- Prominent real world presence. One of the simplest, effective distributed projects I've seen recently is Walk [Your City]. It's a system for creating signs, zip-tied to existing traffic/lightpoles, that direct people to points of interest, special experiences, and surprising encounters. Some cities use them for straightforward wayfinding, but in many towns, the signs have a whimsical or poetic nature. It's amazing how much impact simple signs can have. I'd choose repeated physical presence over a fancy digital interface any day.
Thinking about these two characteristics, here are some highly speculative ideas and questions:
- What is the most effective way to have lots of physical presence in the built environment? Working with cities and public property involves a lot of regulation (though if you can push through the red tape, a lot of potential impact). It's often easier to make deals with private property owners than to lobby the government for use of public space/sidewalks/streets. Projects like Little Free Library and the Peace Pole Project work this way; individuals choose to build them on their own land. How can we activate movements for people to participate in producing and sharing content on the land they already control?
- What's the cheapest advertising money can buy? I generally assume nonprofits can't afford to compete in the advertising world, but there's so much advertising in our visual landscape, some of it in very odd (and affordable) forms. Could you give out free coasters at bars? Make beautiful bike racks? Provide your local coffee shop with thousands of sleeves for paper cups? Is there a distributed layer to life (in the form of advertising) that is hackable for good?
- How can we creatively hack into mobile apps that lots of people already use? Of course you can create content for podcasts, twitter, instagram, etc. But what about apps where you don't have to build a whole media presence? What about creating geo-fenced Snapchat filters connecting people to art nearby, or making Tindr profiles for historical figures in the area? Are there other ways to piggyback on popular apps for content experiences?
- Who's going to build the killer app for distributed learning experiences? Part of me feels like learning is just so low on people's priority lists that distributed museum experiences will always be niche... but then I think of the huge success of online learning platforms like Khan's Academy. I wonder if we just need one (or a few) powerhouse app to take the lead on facilitating quality distributed learning/augmented reality experiences. I think it's possible an institution could do this... but only if it was more focused on building an industry-wide solution than building something custom for their own museum or historic site.
I know that there are very smart people working on these problems. Who's tackling them? What are some of the most interesting approaches underway?
If you are reading this via email and would like to share a comment or question, you can join the conversation here.
And a note to readers in the Boston area: I'll be participating in a MuseumHive real world / Google hangout on these topics (and others) on October 26. Register today.


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Orexigen Therapeutics Commends the Campaign to End Obesity's Report on Long-term Returns of Obesity Prevention Policies
SAN DIEGO, April 25, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Regarding the report "The Long Term Returns of Obesity Prevention Policies" unveiled this week by the Campaign to End Obesity (CEO), Orexigen Therapeutics, Inc. (Nasdaq: OREX) issued the following statement:
Orexigen commends CEO as well as the author of the report, Alex Brill, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) who funded the report, for this new research illustrating the importance of long-term budget impact analyses on preventive health policies, specifically those aimed at obesity. With obesity contributing over $200 billion annually to healthcare spending, Orexigen agrees that policymakers need thorough budgetary analyses that capture short and long-term impacts of obesity policy. A longer view may enable policymakers to have more information when making legislative decisions. Brill noted that the largest budgetary benefits from reducing the burden of obesity would be federal savings within the Medicare and Medicaid programs that would result from avoiding obesity-related diseases and co-morbidity.
"Today's report supports our belief that, while there are substantial near-term benefits of weight loss for obese patients, an even larger value should accrue to individuals and societies when health improvements are assessed over a longer period of time," said Orexigen CEO, Michael Narachi.
The report's author, Alex Brill, is a Research Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and formerly counsel to the Simpson-Bowles Deficit Reduction Commission and chief economist and policy director to the House Ways and Means Committee. Mr. Brill also served on the President's Council of Economic Advisers under President George W. Bush. Mr. Brill has worked on a variety of economic and legislative policy issues, including dividend taxation, the alternative minimum tax, international tax policy, social security reform, defined benefit pension reform and U.S. trade policy.
The report may be found at the Campaign to End Obesity's website http://obesitycampaign.org/research.asp
About Orexigen Therapeutics
Orexigen Therapeutics, Inc. is a biopharmaceutical company focused on the treatment of obesity. The Company's lead product candidate is Contrave®, which has completed Phase 3 clinical trials and for which a New Drug Application has been submitted and reviewed by the FDA. The Company has also reached agreement with the FDA on a Special Protocol Assessment (SPA) for the Light Study, the Contrave cardiovascular outcomes trial. The Company's other product candidate, Empatic™, has completed Phase 2 clinical trials. Further information about the Company can be found at www.orexigen.com.
Contact: McDavid Stilwell, 858-875-8600
SOURCE Orexigen Therapeutics, Inc.


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Please Read About WINTER/ CANADIAN Shipping
Also known as Banyan Fig and Taiwan Ficus. The Retusa has small dark green leaves that alternate up the stem and which are more oval than the Benjamina. Grey to reddish bark dotted with small horizontal flecks, similar to tiger-like markings. Has a heavy exposed bulbous roots. Among the most tolerant, versatile and trouble-free bonsai trees for indoor use.|n||n|23 years old, 14" - 16" tall.


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good chemistry is complicated, and a little bit messy -LW |
PerlMonks |
New site editorsby vroom (His Eminence) |
on Feb 21, 2001 at 04:32 UTC ( [id://59807] : monkdiscuss . print w/replies, xml ) | Need Help?? |
I've created a new editors group full of individuals I find worthy of the calling. These are people I feel I can trust and will take the responsibility seriously.
They'll have full edit permission to all writeups. Their editing will largely be doing things to make the site look prettier. Most of which will be getting rid of PRE tags, and adding CODE and READMORE tags as necessary. Most of the editors already point out these problems on the nodes to consider page. Now they'll be able to fix them. Other powers will include moving root nodes between sections, and removing items from view on the frontpage or a section page. These powers will probably be arriving in the next few days when I get some time to sit down and code. What about accountability for their actions? The truth is that if I thought I had to worry about the actions of any of the people in the editors group I wouldn't have chosen them. All of the chosen ones have demonstrated a good mix of the following: The editors and I would welcome hearing what you think of the new approach to handling some of the daily drudgery around here. Discuss below.
Back to
Perl Monks Discussion


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"THERE is," says he, [a] "in the county of Gloucester, a forest abounding in boars, stags, and every species of game that England produces. In a grovy lawn of this forest there is a little mount, rising in a point to the height of a man, on which knights and other hunters are used to ascend when fatigued with heat and thirst, to seek some relief for their wants. The nature of the place, and of the business, is, however, such, that whoever ascends the mount must leave his companions, and go quite alone.
"When alone, he was to say, as if speaking to some other person, 'I thirst,' and immediately there would appear a cupbearer in an elegant dress, with a cheerful countenance, bearing in his stretched-out hand a large horn, adorned with gold and gems, as was the custom am~mg the most ancient English. In the cup [b] nectar of an unknown but most delicious flavour was presented, and. when it was drunk, all heat and weariness fled from the glowing body, so that one would be thought ready to undertake toil instead of having toiled. Moreover, when the nectar was taken, the servant presented a towel to the drinker, to wipe his mouth with, and then having performed his office, he waited neither for a recompense for his services, nor for questions and enquiry.
"This frequent and. daily action had for a very long period of old times taken place among the ancient people, till one day a knight of that city, when out hunting, went thither, and having called for a drink and gotten the horn, did not, as was the custom, and as in good manners he should have done, return it to the cup-bearer, but kept it for his own use. But the illustrious Earl of Gloucester, when he learned the truth of the matter, condemned the robber to death, and presented the horn to the most excellent King Henry the Elder, lest he should be thought to have approved of such wickedness, if he had added the rapine of another to the store of his private property."
[a] Otis Imperiaila apud Leibnitz Scriptores rerum Brunsvicarum, vol.i. p. 981.
[b] Vice calicis.


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The Last King of Africa
By Tolu Ogunlesi
There's no escaping Africa, no matter how far from it you are. From England's supermarket shelves bottled water leaps at you, chanting "Buy me and save a continent!"
You blink, once, twice, to be sure you're not hallucinating. You're not. The voices are as real as they are earnest: by buying a bottle of water you can help build a borehole in the remotest jungles of Africa. And so you hearken to the plea; a black person taking on guilt once monopolised by whites.
There's even more fascinating stuff in print. I've been coming across a call-for-donations insert in UK magazines, in which a circular hole sits in the middle of the page, accompanied by the chilling line: "The upper arm of a child who has severe acute malnutrition would fit through this hole."
Talk about shock therapy.
But let it not sound as if I'm complaining, I'm not. Hey world, Africa is indeed grateful for the aid, and even more so for the headlines and media mentions. (Father of 'em all: the May 13–19, 2000 issue of The Economist which paid tribute, on its cover, to "The Hopeless Continent").
Bono and Bob Geldof also have a place in my Hall of Fame; celebrities who could have busied themselves checking in and out of rehab, but have instead chosen to work tirelessly saving Africa and its citizens. Unlike fad-hunters Madonna and Angelina Jolie who simply want to parachute in for a quickie adoption ("Err, jus' gimme the baby and keep the change darling…") — with a photo-shoot to boot — Bono and Bob Gee are commendable long-distance 'activists'.
If like me you are worried about who will take the baton from them, worry no more. We have Britain's Prince William to thank for making plans to order the over-sized shoes of the Irishmen.
Late last year Sky1 aired a documentary titled 'Prince William's Africa.' In it TV presenter Ben Fogle followed the Prince to 'Africa', to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Tusk Trust (a UK charity devoted to the protection and conservation of wildlife in Africa), of which the Prince is Patron Saint.
Prince William's Africa… never mind that Botswana is the only African 'province' they visit.
I recently realised that of my many foolish (random) assumptions, the biggest has been this — thinking that Africa is what the atlas says it is. No, Africa is what Tourists say it is: the jungle and its gorillas/guerrillas (same difference!); the game park and its sunsets, elephants, lions and zebras. Kabisa!
Lagos's concrete jungles are not "Africa", they are "Nigeria". Ibadan's "running splash of rust and gold" is not Africa, it belongs to the "predominantly Christian South" (as opposed to a "largely Muslim North") of "oil-rich Nigeria".
Unless we can convince Prince William that 'observing' our politicians — especially caged in their convoys — will provide as much entertainment as a Southern Africa safari; unless we can convince him that what we lack in real pachyderms we more than make up for in (cashnivorous) 'White Elephant' projects; we should give up any hopes of seeing his Royal Highness' Africa extend in the direction of Nigeria.
The Prince's interest in Africa is clearly not a mere Tweenage fad. He's been into this continent since like forever. His 21st birthday party, held seven years ago at WindsorCastle, was, according to the BBC, "African-themed."
"As the party started, outfits spotted arriving at the castle included a furry lion, Tarzan and a banana. The castle's ancient rooms were transformed into scenes from the African bush, which include a life-sized elephant made out of papier mache," the BBC tells us. "Other outfits seen on arriving guests included a lion suit topped with a gold crown, a full foreign legion uniform, a Biggles-esque pilot, a banana and a top-hatted witch-doctor."
I'm hoping the future King will choose to have his Coronation staged in his beloved Africa. Dignitaries — faces painted of course — will arrive at Africa's International Airport (named after none other than the most famous living citizen of Africa, Nelson Mandela), waving 'iSpears' (trust Steve Jobs to cash in on this) and singing 'God Save The King' in 'African'.
It'll be like the 2010 World Cup all over again! All we'd need to do in terms of security would be to prevent the Swazi king Mswati III from coming near the new King — we don't want anyone extolling the virtues of Royal polygamy to the head of the Church of England do we?
The Africa that the Prince will be 'inheriting' when he becomes King will of course be vastly different from the one his grandmother inherited when she became Queen almost sixty years ago. But who cares? Prince William's Africa — full as it will be of elephants, witch-doctors, Tarzans, vast farms and BBC and SkyTV cameras — will be, for most of Europe and America, a vastly recognisable Africa.
I'm betting The Economist will want to atone for past sins. Atop an image of frenzied crowds lining the streets of Africa to hail the brand new King William V, our beloved newsmagazine will plaster these words (a marked improvement on a decade ago): "Africa: The Hopeless BUT Happy Continent!"
This first appeared in NEXT on Wednesday 27th October, 2010


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Building Adobe WorkflowLab, Part 3: Planning for Development
Quick Review
In part 1 of this series, we determined the high-level vision for our WorkflowLab project (originally codenamed Cascade), ending in a single-sentence goal: "Build a consistent communication vehicle for workflow, disciplines, tasks, users, products, and technologies that constitute a complete workflow for a project type." We built a prototype of the user interface, showed it to management and got approval, and began developing use cases to narrow our huge list of desired features into a practical first release.
Once the business planning was complete, we focused on planning for design. Our designer created a full set of accurate low-fidelity wireframes and user workflows to match the feature set and use cases (discussed in part 2 of this series). As planning for design was executed, the development team began working in parallel on the planning task for development.
The planning phase of development can begin early in the project lifecycle. As the project team fleshed out use cases and features, technical questions began to arise. Such questions must be answered in order to solve specific scenarios that help to define features. As more details are realized, certain types of technologies become apparent.


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Andrew McCutchen, left front row, Garrett Jones, second from right front row, and Tony Sanchez, second from left, back row, watch an NHL hockey game between the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Buffalo Sabres in Pittsburgh on Saturday, Oct. 5, 2013. The Pirates face the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 3 of the NL division series on Sunday in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
by Dan Scifo
Associated Press Writer
PITTSBURGH (AP) — The past two seasons, the Pittsburgh Penguins have topped the NHL in scoring. They've come up short in the playoffs both times, eliminated with a pair of disappointing early exits.
The Penguins are playing better defense so far this season, and embattled goalie Marc-Andre Fleury is leading the way.
Sidney Crosby and Chuck Kobasew each scored his second goal and Fleury was nearly perfect again, making 20 saves to lead Pittsburgh over the Buffalo Sabres 4-1 on Saturday night.
"I like the way our team has played defense," Penguins coach Dan Bylsma said. "When it has been difficult, there have been breakdowns or chances, (Fleury) has been up to the task and has been really solid."
Fleury has sparkled through two games, turning aside 47 of 48 shots. He earned his 250th career victory and 24th shutout in a 3-0 win Thursday against New Jersey, and nearly wound up with consecutive shutouts.
Fleury went 1:15:06 without allowing a goal — the longest shutout streak to begin a season in franchise history — until Thomas Vanek scored at 15:06 of the third period Saturday. It was the seventh straight time Vanek scored against the Penguins.
"As a goalie, it's always something you like to do," Fleury said of getting a shutout. "I don't want to be selfish about it. We got a win and that's all that matters."
Craig Adams also scored his second goal, a late empty-netter, and Chris Kunitz converted a penalty shot to help the Penguins open 2-0 for the third straight season. Pittsburgh defenseman Matt Niskanen added two assists and forward Pascal Dupuis, playing in his 800th game, also had an assist.
"I think we're pretty good as far as our structure defensively," Crosby said. "That's usually something that takes a little more time, but I think we've looked pretty comfortable with the way we need to play defensively."
Fleury has been the catalyst.
He has displayed the confidence and poise unseen last spring when he lost the starting job to Tomas Vokoun after compiling a 3.40 goals-against average during an ugly first-round playoff series against the New York Islanders.
Fleury should receive ample opportunity to build his confidence with Vokoun out three to six months due to blood clots in his hips. The defense will be there to help, too.
The Penguins were disciplined in front of Fleury, blocking pucks and limiting Buffalo to 14 shots through two periods — including five in the second. Fleury did his part during a late second-period power play, denying Tyler Ennis and Vanek's rebound in the slot, keeping the Penguins ahead by a pair after two periods.
"A lot of the shots he was solid, square, and directed the rebound in the right way," Bylsma said. "I felt he was really in control of the net tonight even though it was 21 shots."
The Sabres (0-3) are approaching their worst start since opening 0-5 with two ties during the 1999-2000 season.
Ryan Miller was brilliant Friday, stopping 45 shots during a 1-0 home loss to Ottawa, but he missed Saturday's game with a lower body injury. He is expected to return for the Sabres' home game Tuesday against Tampa Bay.
Backup goalie Jhonas Enroth got the call Saturday, making 31 saves. He didn't get much help from the offensively challenged Sabres, who have two goals in their first three games. Buffalo, also 0 for 13 on the power play, is experiencing growing pains, starting three teenagers and five rookies.
"We didn't generate a lot," coach Ron Rolston said. "We just have to be a lot simpler than we are right now. We pass up opportunities when we do get them."
For the second straight game, Crosby and Kobasew staked the Penguins to a two-goal lead in the first period.
Dupuis sent a spinning backhand pass from the slot to Crosby, who smacked his own rebound past Enroth, extending his point streak to 15 games against the Sabres.
Kobasew struck 10 minutes later, deflecting Brandon Sutter's slap shot from the point under Enroth's glove.
Kunitz put it away midway through the third when he scored on a penalty shot, banking the puck off Enroth's body and into the net.
"I like how our team has played as a group, and we can certainly credit Marc-Andre Fleury with some great saves and great performances," Bylsma said. "We haven't given up a lot and that's been excellent to see out of our team."
NOTES: Penguins All-Star forward James Neal is week-to-week with an upper body injury. … Sabres D Henrik Tallinder, who sustained an upper body injury Friday against Ottawa, will miss about a week. … D Alexander Sulzer, recalled Saturday, was scratched for the Sabres along with John Scott. D Deryk Engelland sat out for the Penguins. … The Penguins conclude a three-game homestand Tuesday against Carolina.


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An American kidnapped in Pakistan reportedly had not been previously threatened and had been legally working in the country, a colleague told AFP Monday on condition of anonymity.
Authorities were still searching Sunday for clues about who kidnapped an American in Pakistan but came up with no leads after questioning the guards at his house when he was abducted, police said.
Gunmen snatched development expert Warren Weinstein before dawn Saturday after tricking his guards and breaking into his house in the eastern city of Lahore, a brazen raid that heightened fears among aid workers, diplomats and other foreigners already worried about Islamic militancy and anti-U.S. sentiment in Pakistan.
Weinstein is the Pakistan country director for J.E. Austin Associates, a development contractor that has received millions of dollars from the aid arm of the U.S. government, according to a profile on LinkedIn, a networking website. He had told his staff that would be wrapping up his latest project and moving out of Pakistan by Monday, just a couple days after he was kidnapped.
"We are unclear why Weinstein was kidnapped. We don't know what the motives are," according to a senior Pakistani employee at J.E. Austin Associates, reported AFP.
"Weinstein never told us that he received any threats. Had he received any threats, I certainly would have known. He was the country head of our organization and had been here for the last seven years."
Police were hoping the guards could shed some light on who targeted Weinstein but came up empty-handed, said Shoaib Khurram, a senior police official in Lahore.
"We do not yet have any concrete information that there was a specific threat," Khurram told The Associated Press.
Kidnappings for ransom are common in Pakistan, with foreigners being occasional targets. Criminal gangs are suspected in most abductions, but Islamic militants, are believed to also use the tactic to raise money.
J.E. Austin Associates stressed Weinstein's commitment to Pakistan's economic development in a written statement and said he has worked with a wide range of Pakistani government agencies, including the Pakistan Furniture Development Company and the Pakistan Dairy Development Company.
"His efforts to help make Pakistani industries more competitive have resulted in many hundreds of well-paying jobs for Pakistani citizens and contributed to raising the standard of living in the communities where these businesses are located," it said.
Shahab Khawaja, a former official at Pakistan's Ministry of Industries and Production, said Weinstein has been working in Pakistan since 2004 and was scheduled to finish his contract with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) on August 15. The two men, who are close friends, met in the capital, Islamabad, in recent days.
"I was shocked and deeply disturbed by his kidnapping," said Khawaja.
Police said Weinstein, believed to be in his 60s, had returned to his home in Lahore on Friday evening from Islamabad.
According to Pakistani police, two of the kidnappers showed up at Weinstein's house Saturday and told the guards inside the gate of the walled compound that they wanted to give them food, an act of sharing common during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
The guards opened the gate, and five other men suddenly appeared. The armed assailants overpowered the guards and stormed into the house. Some gunmen are believed to have entered through the back. They snatched the American from his bedroom but took nothing else.
Hussain Bhatti, who worked with Weinstein in Pakistan, said the American decided to replace the security company guarding his house in recent months because of general threats to U.S. citizens working in Pakistan. But he did not know who would have targeted Weinstein.
Americans in Pakistan are considered especially at risk because militants oppose Islamabad's alliance with Washington and the war in Afghanistan. The unilateral U.S. raid that killed Al Qaeda chief Usama bin Laden on May 2 in northwest Pakistan only added to tensions between the two countries.
The Associated Press and AFP contributed to this report.


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Boardwalk Fresh Burgers and Fries is bringing its famous fresh-cut Boardwalk Fries and fresh, made-to-order burgers to its new location in Gresham, Oregon.
The new Boardwalk Fresh Burgers and Fries is located in The Oregon Trail Shopping Center. The chain is set to open its third location in the Portland, Oregon, area with a grand opening celebration of events from Thursday, March 14, through Sunday, March 17.
Master Development Agent and owner Lucky Patel says, "I am excited about bringing Boardwalk Fresh Burgers and Fries to Gresham, Oregon, after having successful openings in our first two locations in the Portland area with our Beaverton and Tigard restaurants.
"Community involvement is always important to the Boardwalk Fresh Burgers and Fries brand," Patel adds. "I am excited and proud to be bringing new jobs to the Gresham community. I am also looking forward to being a member of the Chamber of Commerce and supporting the local community in any way our restaurant can."
David DiFerdinando, president of Boardwalk Fresh Burgers and Fries, says, "We are very excited to see the continued expansion in Oregon. Oregon is a relatively new market for our concept.
"However, with the energy and commitment of our development agent and franchisee, Lucky Patel, the momentum continues to build as he opens his second location, with many more to come," he continues. "The residents of Oregon will soon be able to experience our food and atmosphere throughout the state. This is a very exciting time. As our concept continues to expand, so does the recognition of our brand in new markets, such as Oregon."


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Rear seat design: A priority for children's safety in cars
A research report released today from The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) provides specific recommendations for optimizing the rear seat of passenger vehicles to better protect its most common occupants—children and adolescents. By bringing technologies already protecting front seat passengers to the rear seat and modifying the geometry of the rear seat to better fit this age group, the US could achieve important reductions in serious injury and death. Motor vehicle crashes remain the leading cause of death for children older than 4 years and resulted in 952 fatalities in 2010 for children age 15 and younger.
"Our review of the current science and data regarding rear seat occupant safety found clear evidence that use of a child restraint system (CRS) is protective for younger children. However, older children who have outgrown child safety seats and booster seats are at greater risk of injury," says Kristy Arbogast, PhD, lead author of the report and director of engineering at the Center for Injury Research and Prevention at CHOP. "Many technologies that protect front seat passengers, such as load limiters and pretensioners, are not commonly found in the rear seat even though sled tests and computer modeling suggest that these seat belt features have the potential to reduce the risk of serious head and chest injury for rear seated occupants."
In addition to front seat restraints, CHOP researchers suggest that cues can be taken from booster seat design to determine how to keep kids who have outgrown boosters properly positioned in vehicle seat belts so the restraint can perform properly. They propose that adjustments to the geometry of the rear seat – including shorter seat cushions, lower seat belt anchorages and contoured seats – could increase comfort, keep the shoulder belt in position and, in side impact crashes, reduce lateral movement.
"For children under age 13, the rear seat is still the safer seating position as compared to the front seat of passenger vehicles," says Dr. Arbogast. "But we can do a better job at protecting children who have outgrown add-on restraints."
The report authors recommend the development of regulatory procedures or vehicle performance assessment programs for consumers that evaluate protection of rear seat occupants. Common vehicle rating systems do not evaluate the safety of rear seat occupants in frontal crashes. In addition to engineering solutions, the report also recommends policies and programs to increase rear seat restraint use, which remains lower than front seat restraint use and is a key risk factor for dying in a crash. Additional research is needed to further inform these priorities.
More information: To download the full report, made possible with support from Global Automakers, and additional materials including a one-page overview of CIRP's recommendations and an infographic, visit injury.research.chop.edu


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Our instructor gave us this lecture about our Case Study in our course Object Oriented Programming. Will you help me find a simple code about this as soon as possible? It will be highly appreciated.
Build a simple help system that displays the syntax for the Java Control Statement. There is a code to display a menu, input users choice check for valid response and display information about the item selected. The program also loops until letter "q" is pressed. If you think about it, it is clear that the menu, the check for valid response and the display of information are integral part to the help system. How user's input are obtained and whether the repeated request should be processed or not. Thus, you will create a class that displays the help information, help menu and the checks for valid selection.
-Add Constructor
-Its method will be called HelpOn(), ShowMenu(), and isValid(), respectively.
Thank you in advance if you will help me create this java program.


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Babylonian amora of the seventh generation; he was a pupil of R. Ashi, to whom he frequently addressed questions (Ket. 95b; Giṭ. 42a), and a colleague of Rabina II. (Yoma 78a). He succeeded R. Gebiha as head of the Academy of Pumbedita, and held that position from 433 until his death in 443 (Sherira, in Neubauer, "M. J. C." i. 34; Abraham ibn Daud, ib. i. 61).
- Halevy, Dorot ha-Rishonim, iii. 85-89.


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August 20, 2008
Figure 1. Baca National Wildlife Refuge (BNWR) Wetlands and Sangre de Cristo Mountains
Figure 2. San Luis Valley and proposed Lexam drill area on BNWR
(red rectangle in upper right).
I have always told people that the San Luis Valley is more than a home to me. It is a spiritual place unlike any other on earth.
We believe the best way to protect our spectacular, unique, and sacred home is to ensure that the San Luis Valley remains a NO-GO (No Gas and Oil) Zone in perpetuity. There is great potential for production of solar, wind, geothermal and other forms of renewable energy in our Valley. Indeed, SunEdison is now constructing an 8 MW solar power plant facility just north of Alamosa. Local production of clean, green energy makes more economic and ecological sense than continued reliance on fossil fuels, which come with unacceptable environmental and social costs. We are convinced that, while people can live without natural gas, we cannot survive without sources of clean water for drinking, for agriculture, for municipal and industrial uses, and for natural ecosystems.
We (WWA) formed in August, 2006, when our Crestone/Baca community learned that a Canadian company, Lexam Explorations, Inc. (www.lexamexplorations.com), had recently applied for permits to drill two 14,000' gas test wells on the newly-formed Baca National Wildlife Refuge (BNWR). Our initial goal was to research the potential impacts of gas mining and suggest "Best Management Practices" recommendations for the BNWR. Many of our recommendations were subsequently written into the drilling permits issued by the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC, www.fws.gov/alamosa/BacaNWR.html). Our next objective was to begin educating others in our community and region about the potential impacts of gas drilling here. We organized two showings of the film, "A Land Out of Time," (www.alandoutoftime.com) that shows the alarming scope and scale of oil and gas drilling which has escalated dramatically throughout the Rocky Mountains since 2001. At these well-attended events, we shared what we had learned with our local community.
Based on the documented impacts of oil and gas drilling and production elsewhere in the Rocky Mountains we are convinced that full-scale gas/oil production in the San Luis Valley would be entirely incompatible with the values and the qualities of our local environment that brought us here and that we hold sacred. And these kinds of activities are completely incompatible with the mission of the newly-formed Baca National Wildlife Refuge. We feel it is our responsibility as citizens and stewards of this unique and sacred place to protect the health and quality of our air and water, our communities, the natural ecosystems, and the profound silence that is so essential for the many spiritual groups and retreat centers that have settled here. Because Lexam's three drilling permits allow production of gas or oil from the permitted wells in the event they discover commercial quantities, a big strike here would inevitably result in a land rush, with attendant pollution, boom-town effects, and loss of property values.
Priceless Aquifer
The primary goal of Water Watch Alliance (WWA) is to protect the quality and quantity of water in the San Luis Valley; many believe that our aquifers could be one of the largest underground reservoirs of clean water in North America, with at least 140 million acre-feet (or 45+ trillion gallons) of recoverable water (Pearl, 1974) worth over $700 billion. This vast reservoir of groundwater forms the headwaters of the Rio Grande River, which is the primary source of water for over 10 million people in the Rio Grande Basin and is allocated to three states (Colorado, New Mexico, and Texas) as well as Mexico under international and interstate agreements. San Luis Valley aquifer water is all the more priceless because it occurs in true desert on the edge of one of the driest regions in the U.S. As human populations continue to grow in the American Southwest, this water will be even more essential for the future survival of human communities and natural ecosystems.
Whereas Lexam and their much larger partner, Conoco-Phillips, aim to extract potentially billions of dollars worth of natural gas beneath our Valley floor, we feel it is our responsibility to protect the exponentially more valuable, priceless aquifer as well as our pristine and sacred natural environment for the benefit of current and future generations, it is our mission to maintain this sacred place in perpetuity as a NO-GO Zone.
We are particularly concerned that since Bush/Cheney took the White House, they have given carte blanche to oil and gas companies to expand into all public lands of the Rocky Mountain West with potential for gas or oil development. Essentially, Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico, Utah, Montana, and North Dakota, with some of the most spectacular scenery in the world, have become "a national sacrifice zone." Tim Westby (High Country News, 9/27/99) noted in an article about coal-bed methane gas extraction in the Powder River Basin of Wyoming: "To get the gas (out of the Powder River Basin, Wyoming), underground aquifers above the coal bed must be de-watered."
There have been two previous attempts to take ground water from the San Luis Valley and sell it at great profit (between $5000 and $12,000/acre-foot) to the Denver area. These attempts were by Canadian Maurice Strong of AWDI (American Water Development, Inc.) in the 1980's and by local rancher Gary Boyce (Stockman's Water, Inc.) in the 1990's. In a recent court case which local water officials have dubbed "AWDI-3," Boyce's challenge to the Colorado State Water Engineers ruling that limits extraction and exportation of our aquifer water was over-ruled. In another recent water court case, the judge awarded all unallocated groundwater beneath the Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve to the federal government.
History and Accomplishments of Water Water Alliance (4/3/08):
1) In the fall of 2006, four of us spent a day with Peggy Utesch of the Grand Valley Citizen's Alliance (www.gvca.org) in the Rifle/Silt area of Colorado. We toured many gas wells, learned of the adverse health impacts of EnCana's gas drilling on local human communities and ecosystems, and began accumulating resources and publications describing impacts of gas drilling impacts throughout the West (My Articles and Reports Related to Proposed Gas Drilling).
2) We toured the Baca National Wildlife Refuge (BNWR) with its Director, Ron Garcia. One of our founding members, Lisa Cyriaks, was the official contact between our community and Ron during the process of formulating "best management practices recommendations" for the refuge.
3) We wrote and submitted "Best Management Practices" recommendations for the BNWR (Best Management Practices Recommendations to BNWR). Most of these were subsequently written into the permits for Wells #5 and 6 granted by the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC) .
4) We organized two community showings of the film, "A Land Out of Time," (www.alandoutoftime.com) in Crestone, our local town. At these events, we educated local citizens on the geological context and potential impacts of gas drilling. For this event, we distributed a list of "Talking Points" which we wrote and also prepared graphics, including geological cross-sections of the Valley (Geology of the San Luis Valley).
5) In cooperation with the San Luis Valley Ecosystem Council (www.slvec.org), we sent out a fund-raising letter in December, 2006, that netted $8700 in local contributions. Of this, $3500 was spent on retaining environmental lawyers, Brad Bartlett and Travis Stills, of the Energy Minerals Law Center in Durango, Colorado. These lawyers subsequently brought suit against the BNWR for failing to initiate a NEPA (National Environmental Policy Act) process, as mandated by federal law (NEPA and The Draft Environmental Assessment).
6) This lawsuit has now forced the BNWR to (belatedly) initiate an Environmental Assessment/Scoping Process as a preliminary step in fulfilling the NEPA process (NEPA and The Draft Environmental Assessment). It is noteworthy that by allowing the well-permitting process to go forward prior to completing a NEPA process and also by actually preparing a 47-page draft document entitled: "Negotiated Operating Plan for Conducting Hydrocarbon Exploration and Development Activities on the Baca National Wildlife Refuge," BNWR was out of compliance with federal law.
7) We have contacted appropriate politicians (Governor Ritter, Senator Salazar, Congressman Salazar, Colorado Rep. Gail Schwartz, etc.), lobbying them on behalf of protecting our community and supporting green, renewable energy development in our region. (Congressman John Salazar and Governor Ritter are apparently now committed to this clean, green energy strategy; and Salazar recently issued a special report on 21st Century New Energy Solutions.)
8) Based on consulting with an environmental expert in the oil and gas industry, we developed a list of Bullet points and Actions/Tasks for our group and community that are designed to protect our area from drilling. (My Articles and Reports Related to Proposed Gas Drilling)
9) We are researching potential impacts of coalbed methane gas (CBM) production (CBM- Coal-Bed Methane Gas) as well as the complex series of water laws and compacts that govern use of water within the Rio Grande Basin (Rio Grande Basin and San Luis Valley Aquifer). To us, it seems criminally negligent, perhaps insane, to allow the deliberate contamination of the upper headwaters of the Rio Grande drainage system, as this water is a primary source of municipal and agricultural water for for some 10 million people in three states (Colorado, New Mexico, and Texas) as well as Mexico, and its use is governed by treaties such as the Rio Grande Compact.
10) We are trying to cooperate with two other local groups, the San Luis Valley Ecosystem Council (SLVEC, www.slvec.org) and the relatively new San Luis Valley Citizen's Alliance (SLVCA www.slvca.org) that are also working on this issue, despite the fact that the groups have not always cooperated. Hopefully, our cause will be advanced by the activities of each of these groups. However, WWA seems to be the only one of the three groups completely committed to a NO-GO (No Gas and Oil Drilling) outcome. Although each group can contribute, WWA has unique strengths, including 1) it has the longest history of involvement with the issue, 2) its membership includes Dr. Eric Karlstrom, with over 30 years of experience as a physical and environmental geographer, c) Dr. Karlstrom has assembled a library of resource materials regarding this issue, d) WWA has access to information and advice from an environmental consultant in the oil and gas business.
11) On January 18, 2008, the BNWR released the Draft Environmental Assessment (EA). The Draft EA was prepared by ENRI, a private consulting group paid by Lexam. Thus, it comes as no surprise to us that the draft EA recommends that Lexam's proposed drilling should go forward. This EA then is what is called a FONSI (Findings of No Significant Impact). To suggest that drilling three 14,000-foot exploratory gas wells through sensitive wetlands and into one of the continents largest and most valuable aquifers is preposterous. In order to come to this conclusion, ENRI (and the BNWR) had to ignore and wish away many, many significant impacts, including potential groundwater contamination, air pollution, noise pollution, light pollution, damage to sensitive riparian ecosystems, damage to archaeological sites and sacred areas of modern Native Americans, and damage to our Crestone/Baca community as well as to the Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve.
Indeed, the draft EA indicates that in 2006 the Colorado National Heritage Program documented the presence of Rio Grande suckeron the BNWR. Because this is considered an endangered species by the state of Colorado, we believe that the presence of this species on the wildlife refuge alone should suffice to prohibit the proposed drilling.
Thus, we at WWA have been involved, along with the other local groups, in efforts to critique this very weak and self-serving draft EA and force the BNWR to follow the law and conduct a full-blown Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), which will require an additional year or two of studies (NEPA and The Draft Environmental Assessment).
12) In February, 2008, this website was posted by Dr. Eric Karlstrom, Professor of Geography, of Water Watch Alliance. This site is revised and updated as needed.
13) Water Watch Alliance has issued a press release ( Water Watch Alliance Press Releases) and an open letter to Governor Bill Ritter (My letters to Officials), requesting that he place a moratorium on gas exploration activities until a full EIS, a GGP (Comprehensive Conservation Plan) can be completed by the BNWR, and detailed water studies are conducted on the San Luis Valley aquifers, are completed.
14) Dr. Karlstrom has given several radio interviews, two at Salida's KHEN , one at KRZA, and one with Peter Boyles (KHOW) in Denver (Audio interview with Dr. Eric Karlstrom at KHEN and KRZA).
15) An article by Eric Karlstrom, "Baca residents fight drilling in wildlife refuge," appeared in April, 2008 issue of Colorado Central Magazine (www.cozine.com) (Newspaper articles).
16) Bound copies of the contents of this website have been presented to Mike Blenden, of the Baca National Wildlife Refuge, Governor Ritter, Senator Salazar, Congressman Salazar, the Saguache County Commissioners, the POA library and the Adams State College Library.
Recommended Actions/Tasks To Stop the Lexam/Conoco-Philips "Drillplay"
During the past year and a half, we at Water Watch Alliance, have learned a lot. However, we are still not sure whether this current "drillplay" is motivated by Lexam's desire to mine: 1) gas and oil, 2) water, or 3) the American taxpayer. Regarding the potential for gas and oil, it should be noted that San Luis Valley is the northern extension of the Rio Grande Rift, one of five major rifts in the world, and that there is no significant production of oil and gas in any of them. Although many exploration wells have been drilled to depths of over two miles in the Rio Grande Rift to the south, there have been no big finds of gas and oil. However, Lexam claims that test wells they drilled in 1995 on what is now the Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve had "oil shows." Also, water quality studies in the Valley show a "methane band" in Valley wells where water samples in deep wells east of Mosca are saturated with methane gas. But is there enough oil and gas to be commercially viable? This is still a big question. But we know that the nearby San Juan, Raton and Picaeance Basins are major producers of gas and oil and therefore, consider the possibility that there could be significant amounts of gas/oil here also. Regarding water, there have been two major attempts to export water from the huge and priceless San Luis Valley aquifers to the Denver area in the 1980's and 1990's. At present, however, a complex set of water laws would make it very difficult to export this water. The third alternative is that Lexam could decide to sell the mineral rights under the BNWR to the surface owner (U.S. government), if there is an attractive offer.
Because gas and oil mining in the rest of the Rocky Mountains is now having tremendously adverse impacts, we must take the threat of gas/oil exploration drilling here very seriously. a knowledgeable environmental consultant with the gas and oil industry has given us the following advice:
1) Oil and gas industry people talk to each other. Based on what our "insider" has heard: Lexam thinks they have hit the jackpot, that this is a massive field, and that this is a great investment. They believe they know exactly what they are going to find and where they are going to find it.
2) Once the three exploratory wells are drilled and they hit gas, this is their proof that is gas here. They will publish their findings and then Conoco-Phillips will come in with lots of money and put in lots more gas wells. The Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC) will then "cookie cutter" permit and approve all future proposed wells. It will be a "land rush."
3) Lexam could really be looking for Coal-Bed Methane (CBM) Gas. They've been talking about this. CBM gas is more valuable and quite a bit messier than natural gas- which is also very messy.
4) At the very least, the BNWR should get a reprimand for not originally following the NEPA (National Environmental Policy Act) process. This has set a very bad precedent. It shows their attitude. We (WWA) and other groups should go after the Department of Interior for this, as they've already broken federal laws by allowing this to go forward without a NEPA process.
5) We need an independent third party to do the environmental assessment. The contractors (archaeologists, ENSR, etc.) paid by Lexam are just doing "damage control," trying to protect Lexam's interests.
6) Our 'insider contacts" advise us that once they get their foot in the door with those first wells there will be no stopping them. Hence, we need to have massive demonstrations, protests, invite famous people who have an interest in our area (like Richard Gere and Shirley MacLean) to help our cause, etc. Get famous musicians like Willie Nelson, Paul Winter, Peter Rowan, etc. to give a benefit concert. Get lots of press. Get lots of people who are ready to protest on the ground. Get Native Americans groups involved as much as possible. Go after the Department of the Interior. Go public. Whine. Delay. Envision 10,000 gas wells on the new Baca Wildlife National Refuge (that's one for every 10 acres). Get coverage by National Geographic, Mother Jones, NRDC.
7). Look at who the owners of the local land are. Look at the land titles maps. Find out what is the evacuation time and what are the evacuation routes if there is an accident and people are poisoned.
8) Get massive petitions to our Senators, Congressmen, etc. Perhaps get these signatures at Boulder/Denver REI stores, etc.) Submit it as a group. Go to Denver, talk to newspapers, radios, have a horseback ride. Get hundreds to camp on the land- with press coverage. This needs to be common knowledge. Get university students and campuses involved.
Contact Information
If you are interested in receiving more information about this issue and/or are interested in contributing funds or ideas to this important cause, please contact:
Water Watch Alliance, P.O. Box 653, Crestone, Colorado, 81131 or Dr. Eric Karlstrom, (firstname.lastname@example.com).
Or please write your concerns in a letter and send multiple copies to:
Governor Bill Ritter: Address: 136 State Capitol, Denver, CO 80203-1729. Phone: 800-283-7215 or 303-866-2471. fax- 303-866-2003. Email: www.Colorado.gov
Senator Ken Salazar: Address: 702 Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20519. Washington, D.C. Phone- 202-224-5852, fax 202-228-5036. Alamosa office: phone: 719-587-0096, fax: 719-587-5137. Denver office: toll free phone 866-455-9866, phone 303-455-7600, fax-303- 455-8851. Email: salazar.senate.gov/contact/email.cfm
Senator Wayne Allard: Address: 525 Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C., 20519. Washington, D.C.: phone- 202-224-5941, fax- 202-224-6471. Denver office: phone- 303-220-7414, fax- 303-220-8126. Email: allard.senate.gov/
U.S. Representative John Salazar: (Washington, D.C.)- 202-225-4761, fax- 202-226-9669.Address: 1531 Longworth House Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20515. Phone Alamosa office: 609 Main Street, Alamosa, CO 81101; phone- 719-587-5105, fax- 719-587-5137. Email: house.gov/salazar/contact.shtml
State Senator Gail Schwartz: Address: 200 E. Colfax, Denver, CO 8023. Capitol phone: 303-866-4871. Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
State Representative Tom Massey (R- Dist. 60) Address: 200 E. Colfax, Denver, CO 80203. Capitol phone: 303-866-2747, 303-866-2346. Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
Saguache County Commissioners: Saguache County, P.O. Box 655, Saguache, CO. Phone: 719-655-2231, fax- 719-655-2365.
1) Linda Joseph: phone- 719-256-5003, Email: email@example.com
2). Sam Pace: 719-256-4660
3) Michael J. Spearman: 719-754-2486
Colorado Department of Wildlife: Wendy Wallis. Phone: 303-291-7208. Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service: Mike Blenden, Baca National Wildlife Refuge, Alamosa/Monte Vista National Wildlife Refuge Complex, 8249 Emperius Road, Alamosa, CO 81101. Phone: 719-589-4021. Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
Colorado Mule Deer Association, 2005, Management Guidelines for Oil and Gas Development.
Council on Environmental Quality, Executive Office of the President, "A Citizen's Guide to the National Environmental Policy Act."
Darin, T.F., and Stills, T., 2002, Preserving Our Public Lands: A Citizen's Guid to Understanding and Participating in Oil and Gas Decision Affecting Our Public Lands, Sponsored by: Land and Water Fund of the Rockies, Oil and Gas Accountability Project, Wyoming Outdoor Council.
ENSR, 2008, Draft Environmental Assessment of Planned Gas and Oil Exploration, Baca National Wildlife Refuge, Saguache County, Colorado
Grand Valley Citizen's Alliance, 2006, The Rifle Silt, New Castle Community Development Plan: A Collaborative Planning Document Between the RSNC Defined Area Residents, Antero Resources Corp. and Galaxy Energy.
National Park Service, U.S. Department of Interior, Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve, 2006, Draft General Management Plan/Wilderness Study/Environmental Impact Statement.
Oil and Gas Accountability Project, 2005, Oil and Gas at Your Door? A Landowner's Guide to Oil and Gas Development, 2nd Edition.
Pearl, R.H., 1974, Geology of Ground Water Resources in Colorado. Denver: Colorado Geological Survey, Department of Natural Resources.
Robinski, B., and Shattil, W., 2005, Valley of the Dunes: Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve, Fulcrum Publishing.
U.S. Department of Interior Bureau of Land Management, 2006, Surface Operating Standards and Guidelines for Oil and Gas Exploration and Development, 4th Edition.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Lexam Explorations (U.S.A.) Inc., 2007, Negotiated Operating Plan for Conducting Hydrocarbon Exploration and Development Activities on the Baca National Wildlife Refuge.
Western Organization of Resource Councils, 2005, Filling the Gaps: How to Improve Oil and Gas Reclamation and Reduce Taxpayer Liability. Prepared by Kuipers and Associates.
Thanks for your interest in this important issue. Please help us by writing letters, contributing, or anything else you can think of. (Dr. Eric Karlstrom, Professor of Geography, webmaster)


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Date(s) - Saturday, August 13, 2022
6:00 pm - 11:00 pm
This is a recurring event. See event description for more details.
Times Square Fort Myers Beach
1021 Estero Blvd.
Fort Myers Beach, FL 33931
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Live music, food, and fun every Friday & Saturday at Time Square on Fort Myers Beach. Sunset Celebration is a pet and kid-friendly event. Sunset Celebrations are sponsored by The Times Square Merchant & Event Association, The Town of Fort Myers Beach, and The Beaches of Fort Myers & Sanibel.
We make every effort to ensure the accuracy of this information. However,
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Thoughts & Articles
SMBs and the Social Equation: Which SocialMedia Sites Work Best for Businesses?
There's little question that small-business owners understand the power of social media and its importance to their bottom line. As of 2013, some 92% of polled SMBs (Small - Medium Businesses) said their social profiles were effective tools for their marketing and brand-building push.
"We use social media as a means to not only attract new people to our website and online community but also as a tool to nurture relationships with customers who choose to friend or follow the company," said Stephanie Ciccarelli, chief marketing officer and co-founder of Voices.com, an online voice-over marketplace.
"Sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn have given our already social brand another outlet to shine and connect regularly and freely with our customers," she continued. "When someone follows you via a social channel, they are also granting you the opportunity to enter their world, as in permission marketing."
But what platforms are out front, which ones are SMBs turning to most often? To help illuminate some answers to that question, Slabmedia conducted an informal survey of 35 small businesses. Let's look at what they had to say.
SMB Survey: Social Media and Brands Like Us
Chances are, you haven't got a multi-million dollar advertising budget. If you own an SMB, and your line item for marketing is still a modest amount, you likely already work with social media to help fill the brand-growth gap.
One national survey of 2,292 small-business owners revealed that 88% of SMBs with social profiles list Facebook as a top social-media channel for business outreach, followed by LinkedIn (39%); Twitter (31%); Google+ (22%); Pinterest (20%); and YouTube (17%).
But how do the national stats square with what Slabmedia found, in its survey? Our results, based on the responses of 35 SMBs to the question "what are your business's top 3 social-media platforms", were as follows.
And so, we see Twitter with lead by a 6% margin over Facebook. LinkedIn comes through in third place, and then Google+ and Instagram round out the top five. The category of "other" — accounting for 11% of the voting — includes Tumblr, YouTube, Foursquare, Vimeo, Yelp, Scoop.it, SlideShare, Quora, and Flickr, all of which garnered 2% or less among the platforms cited by our polled owners.
The Blog: Still a Place for Brands and Customers
Among the respondents, another message came through as well: blogs still matter.
Chris Cooper, co-owner of Active Movement and Performance, a personal training studio, said that his company's emphasis on Facebook and Instagram goes hand in hand with the way the business's blog allows staff to elaborate on services and topics of interest.
It's a key point to make, and it's backed by stats. That is, 95% of small businesses in a recent e-Strategy Trends report said blogging is also part of their effective marketing toolkit."Our blog gives a bigger area to discuss what is going on in the news relating to health, fitness, and nutrition," Cooper said. "Our blog also enables us to educate our clients — and really any readers — on what to do. We also provide weekly motivational posts to kickstart the week."
Blending the blog with the shorter-form environments of social-media platforms is good advice for SMBs. If the overall strategy is outreach, and finding your customers where they go to chat, then bringing them into your sales funnel from those location means drawing them back to a website where calls to action can lead to that one important result — not just the fostering of interest and loyalty, but an actual conversion at the end of the conversation.


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A commenter suggests that Russians are the smartest Whites.
It's not the case. Russians are not at all the smartest Whites. Here are some recent scores. There is a North-South cline, but it's not perfect at all. Italian is a very much a Med state, and it's IQ is very high. France is mostly a Northern state, and it's IQ is not so hot. Spain is a Med state with a high IQ. Ireland is a Northern state with a lower IQ than the rest.
Notice I title this piece White Europeans, because as a Pan-Aryanist, I not only believe that most all Caucasoids of Europe are White, but I also believe that there are Whites outside of Europe who are just as White as those of Europe.
Germany 107 Netherlands 107 Poland 106 Sweden 104 Italy 102 Austria 101 Switzerland 101 UK 100 Norway 100 Belgium 99 Denmark 99 (median) Finland 99 Americans 98 (for comparison purposes) Czech Republic 98 Hungary 98 Spain 98 Ireland 97 Russia 96 Greece 95 France 94 Bulgaria 94 Romania 94 Turkey 90 Serbia 89
I don't have much to say about these scores. If France can produce such a great nation with an IQ of 94, then others with similar scores can do well too. Bulgaria, Romania, Russia, Hungary and the Czech Republic should be able to create some fine modern societies. They are surely smart enough to. These others listed below are certainly intelligent enough to do well for themselves. IQ is certainly not holding them back at any rate.
Mongolia 100 Vietnam 99.5 Estonia 99 Latvia 97.5 Ukraine 96 Belarus 96 UK East Indian 96 Uruguay 96 Moldova 95.5 US Mexican-American (2nd generation) 95 Argentina 94.5 Lithuania 94 US Filipino 94
Even Serbia has created an excellent modern society with an IQ of only 89. If you go to Belgrade, you would think you are in any modern US or European city. Even the countryside is not really backwards. Its health, education and development figures are excellent. There's nothing inferior about the place other than their morals. If we take Serbia as the IQ at which one ought to be able to create a fine, modern, European-type society, things get a lot more interesting, and a lot more countries have the brains to do well.
Armenia 93.5 Georgia 93.5 Kazakhstan 93.5 Malaysia 92 Macedonia 92 Brunei 91.5 Cyprus 91.5 Chile 91.5 Thailand 91 Albania 90 Bermuda 90 Croatia 90 Costa Rica 90 Bosnia and Herzegovina 90 Cambodia 90 Cook Islands 89 Laos 89 Suriname 89
If you think this website is valuable to you, please consider a contribution to support the continuation of the site.


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During the Conservative fight to fool everyone into believing the long gun registry is a bad idea, one of the most frequent and most proximate reasons the CPC and their spambot flaks gave for dismantling and bonfiring the database was that it served as an invasion of privacy that allowed the government too much insight into its citizens' lives by telling them who had guns and where. One of the folks touting this line was Public Safety Minister Vic Toews, who primarily expressed concern that an NDP or Liberal government would get their hands on that info.
He said then, "In order to protect the privacy of law-abiding, long gun owners, those whom that member and his party subjected to gross violations of their privacy, records held by the Canadian firearms program on currently registered long guns will be destroyed."
Fast forward a few months, and Vic Toews has introduced the Tories' newest salvo on freedom in bill C30, the Protecting Children from Internet Predators Act.
What does this bill propose? Well, you see, it allows the government warrantless wiretapping on all internet communications — ISPs have to turn over names, addresses, all communications, anything the government wants. You know, like they can do now, by getting a warrant. This does away with all that pesky check-and-balance nonsense and lets the government get on with the business of spying on everything the people of Canada does. So too does the even easier methods for getting the information in the new laws requiring ISPs to allow real-time data monitoring via a backdoor for law enforcement. Again, no warrants.
The bill says absolutely nothing about child predators, except in the title, evidently. But Vic Toews had already taken a few swings against anyone who would dare protest against this REAL invasion of privacy. Of course, he obviously had something of a pang of regret for using these execrable tactics, and he's trying desperately to backpedal, but this video doesn't lie (thanks sinned34!):
One more time through this. Registering weaponry is a violation of privacy, but letting the government have sweeping powers to get whatever information they want whenever they want from ISPs without first justifying it with a court order is all in the interest of protecting the children.
Twitter responded with a hashtag, #tellviceverything, where they helpfully tweeted the obvious computer luddite Vic Twenty Toews (@toewsVic) with every mundane detail of their lives. I plan on very helpfully sending him a link to this post as well, though I'm sure he's probably going to be well capable of finding dissenters on his own with his broad new powers!


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LAS VEGAS -- Linux network operating system developer Cumulus Networks this week at Interop rolled out a management platform that provides a common interface and operational process for data center racks.
The Cumulus Rack Management Platform is based on the company's Cumulus Linux network operating system code base. Out-of-band management switches running Cumulus RMP may be managed by the same Linux toolsets as both servers and data-plane switches running Cumulus Linux, the company says.
+ MORE ON NETWORK WORLD: Will network disaggregation play in the enterprise? +
Cumulus RMP will be available through providers of open rack management switches. Penguin Computing will deliver the first platform supporting the Cumulus RMP operating system, the Penguin Arctica 4804ip. The 4804ip will include the license for Cumulus RMP, a three-year warranty and three years of customer support.
Penguin Computing currently has five platforms on the Cumulus Linux hardware compatibility list including 1GbE, 10GbE and 40GbE switches. Penguin this week said it will also support Pica8's network operating system.
Cumulus also announced that Supermicro has joined the company's Open Hardware program, and is now supporting Cumulus Linux on Supermicro bare metal switches. Cumulus' hardware compatibility list now includes 25 switches from seven partners, including Dell and HP.
Join the CIO Australia group on LinkedIn. The group is open to CIOs, IT Directors, COOs, CTOs and senior IT managers.


text: [Linuxworks] has posted a writeup on how to build an IR module for the popcorn hour c-200. We weren't familiar with the popcorn hour c-200, so we had to look it up. It seems to be a media center pc sort of thing. We're not reviewing the unit itself, since we've never used one, so we'll just get back to the mod. The device uses an RF remote, which some people didn't like as much. Luckily it has an expansion port which can be utilized to get IR signals into the machine. [Linuxworks] has used a cheap IR sensor and a standard headphone plug. He notes that equipment passing power through these plugs should be turned off before plugging them in or removing them as they short momentarily during insertion.


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The Cotton Club (1984)
Directed by Francis Ford Coppola
Genres - Drama, Music, Crime |
Sub-Genres - Gangster Film, Musical Drama, Period Film |
Release Date - Dec 14, 1984 (USA) |
Run Time - 128 min. |
Countries - United States |
MPAA Rating - R
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Synopsis by Lucia Bozzola
Combining electric song and dance performances with drama (both on and off screen), Francis Ford Coppola's The Cotton Club (1984) looks back to the 1920s-1930s peak of the legendary Harlem nightclub where only blacks performed and only whites could sit in the audience. Mixing historical figures with characters loosely based on actual people, Coppola and co-writers William Kennedy and The Godfather's Mario Puzo create a panorama of love, crime, and entertainment centered on the Club. Among them are cornet player Dixie Dwyer (Richard Gere, playing his own solos), who escapes psycho gangster "benefactor" Dutch Schultz (James Remar) for a George Raft-type Hollywood career as a gangster film star; Schultz's nubile mistress Vera Cicero (Diane Lane), who loves Dixie against her mercenary instincts; Cotton Club Mob owner Owney Madden (Bob Hoskins) and close associate Frenchy Demarge (Fred Gwynne); Vincent (Nicolas Cage), Dixie's no-good Mad Dog Coll-esque brother; Club tap star Sandman Williams (Gregory Hines), who woos ambitious light-skinned Club singer Lila Rose Oliver (Lonette McKee); and cameos by Charles "Honi" Coles and Cab Calloway impersonator Larry Marshall. Complementing the period story, Coppola evokes the style of '30s gangster movies and musicals through an array of old-fashioned devices like montages of headlines, songs and shoot-outs. Conceived by producer Robert Evans as his crowning achievement and directorial debut, Evans had to hand over the troubled production to Coppola, but the budget spiraled out of control as the script was repeatedly re-written throughout the chaotic shoot. By the time it was released, The Cotton Club's epic production story of power struggles, financial bloat, and even a murder overshadowed the "reunion" of The Godfather's creative team. Neither a Heaven's Gate-sized failure nor a wallet-saving hit like Coppola's Apocalypse Now, The Cotton Club got some favorable critical notices (although it drew fire for subordinating the African American stories). It did not, however, find a large enough audience to justify its expense and controversy, becoming another mark against 1970s "auteur" cinema in increasingly blockbuster-driven 1980s Hollywood.
nightclub, race-relations, gangster, musician, love-triangle, Mafia, singer, Hollywood
High Production Values


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Independent Documentary Film "TURN IT UP!" Turns To Guitar Fans for Funding
Los Angeles, CA (November 2, 2012) – Independent film company Loud and Louder has launched a 60-day campaign to raise the finishing funds for "Turn It UP!," a feature-length documentary
Los Angeles, CA (November 2, 2012) – Independent film company Loud and Louder has launched a 60-day campaign to raise the finishing funds for "Turn It UP!," a feature-length documentary celebrating the electric guitar.
Hosted by Kevin Bacon, the film's cast includes B.B. King, Slash, Les Paul, Robby Krieger, Paul Stanley, Nancy Wilson, Steve Lukather, Skunk Baxter, Jerry Cantrell, Albert Lee, Carl Verheyen, Rick Vito and many other extraordinary guitar players.
Directed by Robert Radler and produced by Doug Forbes, the film is finally finished. However, the filmmakers still need to license the archival clips and music to complete the final post-production. Fans can contribute to the final stretch by visiting this IndieGogo.com page.
Once on the site, backers can help fund the film and receive specialized premiums for their support. Perks for donors range from guitar picks to private lessons by Rock Stars, collectible guitars, or even a co-producer credit in the film.
In 2007, veteran filmmakers Robert Radler and Doug Forbes set out to make the definitive documentary about the electric guitar, "Turn It UP!" Five years and 146 hours of footage later, Radler and Forbes have crafted a feature-length documentary that celebrates the electric guitar. The film explores the passionate relationship between artists and their instruments with revealing interviews and performances. While tracing the historical development of the guitar, "Turn It UP!" also touches on the iconic status of the electric guitar in pop culture, from politics to personal salvation. More than one artist in the film states, "the guitar saved my life."
Anchored by host Kevin Bacon, "Turn It UP!" features in-depth, personal conversations and performances by guitar legends as well as passionate amateurs. The film features some of the last interviews with the great Les Paul, who was playing and inspiring musicians well into his 90's, until his death in 2009.
A classic rock legend, Paul Stanley of KISS, gets to the heart of the matter when he says, "Nothing says rock and roll, and sex . . . like a low-strung, low-hung electric guitar." Told with humor and passion, the film also profiles committed amateur players like Gary Kelly, the CEO of Southwest Airlines, and phenomenal young virtuosos like Kristen Capolino and Jared Stamey, both 16 years old at the time of filming.
Facing the chronic budget challenges of making an independent documentary film, Forbes and Radler have turned to the crowd funding website, IndieGoGo.com with a campaign to raise the final funds for licensing the music in the film. "We've spent the better part of two years negotiating the rights for music and archival film clips used in Turn It UP! Now, we finally have agreements lined up and are turning to fans of the film for help,",says Doug Forbes, producer of Turn It UP!
In the brave new world of financing documentary films, crowd funding is the red-hot path for connecting audiences with filmmakers. "It's a completely different financial model now for independent film making," according to Robert Radler, veteran director of action films like the 'Best of the Best' series. "People can connect directly with projects, and become invested in the artistic process. Sites like IndieGoGo.com make that possible." Producer Doug Forbes, a long-time producer of music specials for HBO agrees: "For a small film, with a dedicated audience like "Turn It UP!," it is essential to get fans involved, or the film may never be seen."
The Turn It UP! Campaign is currently anticipating completion of the film in the Spring of 2013.
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I have a great fondness for the Gauge. And when it comes to The Gauge, I am a firmly in the House of Remington and consider the 870 to be where it's at.
I've considered and examined and have fired all the Semi Autos out there. The M4 is certainly the Mercedes Benz of the class. However at it's price… a Thousand Dollars more than most everything else, is it worth it? Man, I don't know. It's cool… but I am not sure its a Grand More of Cool.
You know what gun I keep coming back to? The 1187. Reason? I like the position of the Bolt Release. To unleash that bolt on a Tactical Reload, it's center bottom, easy to get to and faster than a tiny little button that everyone has positioned in the worst possible place. A small button with no geographic reference point on the gun… just alone in the field of the receiver some place where your hand can get struck by the charging handle if you don't get it out of the way. Every semi auto in current production that feeds from a Tube does this and they are all wrong… all save for the Remington 1187.
I believe this to be a key advantage. Because regardless of how many shells your tube gets stuffed with, its going to go dry and you are going to have to do a fast tactical reload. I think this is a winning position. Not only that, but the 1187 can run the same iron sights that you can on the 870, making it scary accurate with slugs.
This is why my pick on the Semi-Auto Shotgun for fighting… the 1187. For impressing other guys, the M4 remains just fine.


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Event details
- Thursday | February 29, 2024
- 11:00 am
- 578 Whitehead Road
Our Reading Room is a practical expression of our love for our community.
In Matthew we read, "When thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to the Father which is in secret, and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly." Our Reading Room provides a peaceful place to fulfill this command. It's a place for quiet study and prayer, and is located in our church building. Bible study materials, and Christian Science literature are available for borrowing or purchase. The Reading Room is open Tuesdays and Thursdays from 11 to 2.


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In the rings of Akhaten Clara and the Doctor spend some time walking around and talking to aliens. There were a couple of scenes where Clara didn't understand what the aliens were saying (and some where she did - the child for example). The Doctor could talk to them (after all he speaks every language) he then translated for Clara.
In previous episodes the Tardis translates spoken language for the companions. Why didn't this happen there?