text:
So we are in the fourth day of this year's USA Volleyball High Performance Coaches' Clinic and CAP I,II, III sessions here at the Olympic Training Center. Hugh McCutcheon, Tom Hogan and Peter Vint headline a group of our sport's most passionate people in presenting ideas to teach the sport to the athletes and coaches who make up the High Performance indoor pipeline.
I hope some of you get a chance to interact with those coaches who have come here. That which you teach, you learn, so get them to teach you what they thought they picked up, so they can learn it better. Hugh brought a coach into the gym often, who was not here physically - but through what he has taught so many of us - Carl McGown. I was fortunate to first meet and learn from Carl's teachings in the 1970s, and because of him, made motor skill learning part of the first IMPACT manual back in 1988, sharing his research and knowledge to touch first year coaches in this very important area of the science of sport.
So it was a pleasure to see and hear how Hugh continued this sharing, as he too has been powerfully impacted by Dr. McGown's teaching. Hugh brought Nicole Davis, libero for our 2008 Silver medal women's Olympic team, out on the court in front of all the participants to show his ideas on the skill of passing. Working with Nicole, core ideas were stressed, that are important to the future for all USA players of any age or skill level - Repeatability, Variance, and Risk...
Repeatability - at the highest level, every player is a stud - it is the player can perform the skill successfully more often, no matter what the level of competition.
Variance - in order to increase the chance of repeatability, you need to minimize the variance in your movements. Simpler is better, consistency comes with such economy of movement. Don't know until you go - or else you are wasting time and adding movement.
Risk Management - in order to increase your chance for success, we need to get better at risk management options. Traditionally, for example, the setters wait at the net, which makes for half of the errors that are only a meter off of perfect, going into/over the net, vs. the same distance of error from perfect being "safe" and off the net a meter. By positioning the setter target 5-6 feet off the net, you can error by 2 yards, and still have the ball playable in all directions. Tom Hogan noted that vs. Cuba, the toughest serving team in the world with two players ranking in the top servers in the world consistently, their "Error Off" option was used, putting the target eight feet off the net.
Lots of other topics were covered, which will be available from the USA Volleyball office later in 2009, by DVD. While the new men's team coach will likely not be announced until the end of this month, Hugh clearly has a vision for what he will like to see happen in the next quad for the women's program. He spoke often of principles and the science of the game, which does not change between women and men. He noted how "we are salesmen first, and change agents second."
"We want to have a system that is based on principles, not based on who the coaches are. There is nothing I am telling you here, you would not be getting it from CAP or IMPACT which are based in science. Embrace it because it makes sense to you, and so you can do it more often- the result. You should do it based on principles, as we know what good passers look like and what they do ALL the time, it is not a coincidence, it is that model that I am coming from."
When asked about the differences between the men's and women's game, Hugh replied "What is the difference? Don't we live on planet Earth and the laws of physics apply? I am approaching it as volleyball, whether you are a woman or a man. The idea of 'women's vs. men's' volleyball is doing nothing but stereotyping. Guys have issues too. We are going to do everything we can to be great, based on science and principles."
Later on Hugh and Peter Vint did a myth buster segment. There was some lively discussion on these, among others, which Peter used the science from the Biomechanics lab studies to dispel these...
Myth: The wrist snap is important in attacking
Myth: An athlete's ability to read the game/make correct decisions is unalterable
Myth: Toed-in base positions are best for passers and defenders (and/or blockers)
Myth: Starting a move on the balls of the feet results in faster movement times than starting flat footed
Myth: Peaking at the instant of ball contact is a good thing to do
and a bunch more....
The closing session Hugh spoke about the need for "generalized specialists" who are good in all areas of the game but really good in 1-2 skill sets. He noted how we are specializing too early in volleyball. There is not rocket science, the way you get good at passing is by passing, and the way you get good at the game is by playing the game. Trying to teach the game from a generalized basis, you will be better at working together as a team, and win more of the little things that are being lost. "When you start teaching the game, the most important thing is to make it fun...for if at the end of the day if the game is not fun, it will be really hard to keep them around." Our opponents in other volleyball nations can
- Execute all of the fundamentals at a very high level
- Have correct technique and are biomechanically efficient
- Make all the little plays - they cover, can set out of system, can dig, etc.
- Make all the right choices about where to stand, who to set, where to block etc.
If I am going to ask my kids to work hard, I need to work hard too. We should connect as best we can to our kids...they should not be berated to get good, we are service providers to facilitate the hours of each players live to something they enjoy, so when we do what we do, we need to ask if this is right by the team and the individuals. Coaching is a valued career in our nation amazingly, but it is something you earn, not something you require. We have to be into best practices from ourselves, making it a good and positive experience (not all rainbows and ponies), and not beating up on the kids, for ultimately we want to grow the game...positive reinforcement has longer effect on players than negative, so I want to catch them doing it right a lot, right Kess? ...
After this philosophical discussion, the first question was...what is your favorite drill? - Hugh's response - "Subtle variations on familiar themes" - and then he continued on how gamelike/over the net they warm up and train.


text:
Originally published at LewRockwell.com on December 31, 2004
The most significant socio-political shift in our time has gone almost completely unremarked, and even unnoticed. It is the dramatic shift of the red-state bourgeoisie from leave-us-alone libertarianism, manifested in the Congressional elections of 1994, to almost totalitarian statist nationalism. Whereas the conservative middle class once cheered the circumscribing of the federal government, it now celebrates power and adores the central state, particularly its military wing.
This huge shift has not been noticed among mainstream punditry, and hence there have been few attempts to explain it – much less have libertarians thought much about what it implies. My own take is this: the Republican takeover of the presidency combined with an unrelenting state of war, has supplied all the levers necessary to convert a burgeoning libertarian movement into a statist one.
The remaining ideological justification was left to, and accomplished by, Washington's kept think tanks, who have approved the turn at every crucial step. What this implies for libertarians is a crying need to draw a clear separation between what we believe and what conservatives believe. It also requires that we face the reality of the current threat forthrightly by extending more rhetorical tolerance leftward and less rightward.
Let us start from 1994 and work forward. In a stunningly prescient memo, Murray N. Rothbard described the 1994 revolution against the Democrats as follows:
a massive and unprecedented public repudiation of President Clinton, his person, his personnel, his ideologies and programs, and all of his works; plus a repudiation of Clinton's Democrat Party; and, most fundamentally, a rejection of the designs, current and proposed, of the Leviathan he heads…. what is being rejected is big government in general (its taxing, mandating, regulating, gun grabbing, and even its spending) and, in particular, its arrogant ambition to control the entire society from the political center. Voters and taxpayers are no longer persuaded of a supposed rationale for American-style central planning…. On the positive side, the public is vigorously and fervently affirming its desire to re-limit and de-centralize government; to increase individual and community liberty; to reduce taxes, mandates, and government intrusion; to return to the cultural and social mores of pre-1960s America, and perhaps much earlier than that.
This memo also cautioned against unrelieved optimism, because, Rothbard said, two errors rear their head in most every revolution. First, the reformers do not move fast enough; instead they often experience a crisis of faith and become overwhelmed by demands that they govern "responsibly" rather than tear down the established order. Second, the reformers leave too much in place that can be used by their successors to rebuild the state they worked so hard to dismantle. This permits gains to be reversed as soon as another party takes control.
Rothbard urged dramatic cuts in spending, taxing, and regulation, and not just in the domestic area but also in the military and in foreign policy. He saw that this was crucial to any small-government program. He also urged a dismantling of the federal judiciary on grounds that it represents a clear and present danger to American liberty. He urged the young radicals who were just elected to reject gimmicks like the balanced-budget amendment and the line-item veto, in favor of genuine change. None of this happened of course. In fact, the Republican leadership and pundit class began to warn against "kamikaze missions" and speak not of bringing liberty, but rather of governing better than others.
Foreshadowing what was to come, Rothbard pointed out: "Unfortunately, the conservative public is all too often taken in by mere rhetoric and fails to weigh the actual deeds of their political icons. So the danger is that Gingrich will succeed not only in betraying, but in conning the revolutionary public into thinking that they have already won and can shut up shop and go home." The only way to prevent this, he wrote, was to educate the public, businessmen, students, academics, journalists, and politicians about the true nature of what is going on, and about the vicious nature of the bi-partisan ruling elites.
The 1994 revolution failed of course, in part because the anti-government opposition was intimidated into silence by the Oklahoma City bombing of April 1995. The establishment somehow managed to pin the violent act of an ex-military man on the right-wing libertarianism of the American bourgeoisie. It was said by every important public official at that time that to be anti-government was to give aid and support to militias, secessionists, and other domestic terrorists. It was a classic intimidation campaign but, combined with a GOP leadership that never had any intention to change DC, it worked to shut down the opposition.
In the last years of the 1990s, the GOP-voting middle class refocused its anger away from government and leviathan and toward the person of Bill Clinton. It was said that he represented some kind of unique moral evil despoiling the White House. That ridiculous Monica scandal culminated in a pathetic and pretentious campaign to impeach Clinton. Impeaching presidents is a great idea, but impeaching them for fibbing about personal peccadilloes is probably the least justifiable ground. It's almost as if that entire campaign was designed to discredit the great institution of impeachment.
In any case, this event crystallized the partisanship of the bourgeoisie, driving home the message that the real problem was Clinton and not government; the immorality of the chief executive, not his power; the libertinism of the left-liberals and not their views toward government. The much heralded "leave us alone" coalition had been thoroughly transformed in a pure anti-Clinton movement. The right in this country began to define itself not as pro-freedom, as it had in 1994, but simply as anti-leftist, as it does today.
There are many good reasons to be anti-leftist, but let us revisit what Mises said in 1956 concerning the anti-socialists of his day. He pointed out that many of these people had a purely negative agenda, to crush the leftists and their bohemian ways and their intellectual pretension. He warned that this is not a program for freedom. It was a program of hatred that can only degenerate into statism.
The moral corruption, the licentiousness and the intellectual sterility of a class of lewd would-be authors and artists is the ransom mankind must pay lest the creative pioneers be prevented from accomplishing their work. Freedom must be granted to all, even to base people, lest the few who can use it for the benefit of mankind be hindered. The license which the shabby characters of the quartier Latin enjoyed was one of the conditions that made possible the ascendance of a few great writers, painters and sculptors. The first thing a genius needs is to breathe free air.
He goes on to urge that anti-leftists work to educate themselves about economics, so that they can have a positive agenda to displace their purely negative one. A positive agenda of liberty is the only way we might have been spared the blizzard of government controls that were fastened on this country after Bush used the events of 9-11 to increase central planning, invade Afghanistan and Iraq, and otherwise bring a form of statism to America that makes Clinton look laissez-faire by comparison. The Bush administration has not only faced no resistance from the bourgeoisie. it has received cheers. And they are not only cheering Bush's reelection; they have embraced tyrannical control of society as a means toward accomplishing their anti-leftist ends.
After September 11, even those whose ostensible purpose in life is to advocate less government changed their minds. Even after it was clear that 9-11 would be used as the biggest pretense for the expansion of government since the stock market crash of 1929, the Cato Institute said that libertarianism had to change its entire focus: "Libertarians usually enter public debates to call for restrictions on government activity. In the wake of September 11, we have all been reminded of the real purpose of government: to protect our life, liberty, and property from violence. This would be a good time for the federal government to do its job with vigor and determination."
The vigor and determination of the Bush administration has brought about a profound cultural change, so that the very people who once proclaimed hatred of government now advocate its use against dissidents of all sorts, especially against those who would dare call for curbs in the totalitarian bureaucracy of the military, or suggest that Bush is something less than infallible in his foreign-policy decisions. The lesson here is that it is always a mistake to advocate government action, for there is no way you can fully anticipate how government will be used. Nor can you ever count on a slice of the population to be moral in its advocacy of the uses of the police power.
Editor & Publisher, for example, posted a small note the other day about a column written by Al Neuharth, the founder of USA Today, in which he mildly suggested that the troops be brought home from Iraq "sooner rather than later." The editor of E&P was just blown away by the letters that poured in, filled with venom and hate and calling for Neuharth to be tried and locked away as a traitor. The letters compared him with pro-Hitler journalists, and suggested that he was objectively pro-terrorist, choosing to support the Muslim jihad over the US military. Other letters called for Neuharth to get the death penalty for daring to take issue with the Christian leaders of this great Christian nation.
I'm actually not surprised at this. It has been building for some time. If you follow hate-filled sites such as Free Republic, you know that the populist right in this country has been advocating nuclear holocaust and mass bloodshed for more than a year now. The militarism and nationalism dwarfs anything I saw at any point during the Cold War. It celebrates the shedding of blood, and exhibits a maniacal love of the state. The new ideology of the red-state bourgeoisie seems to actually believe that the US is God marching on earth – not just godlike, but really serving as a proxy for God himself.
Along with this goes a kind of worship of the presidency, and a celebration of all things public sector, including egregious law like the Patriot Act, egregious bureaucracies like the Department of Homeland Security, and egregious centrally imposed regimentation like the No Child Left Behind Act. It longs for the state to throw its weight behind institutions like the two-parent heterosexual family, the Christian charity, the homogeneous community of native-born patriots.
In 1994, the central state was seen by the bourgeoisie as the main threat to the family; in 2004 it is seen as the main tool for keeping the family together and ensuring its ascendancy. In 1994, the state was seen as the enemy of education; today, the same people view the state as the means of raising standards and purging education of its left-wing influences. In 1994, Christians widely saw that Leviathan was the main enemy of the faith; today, they see Leviathan as the tool by which they will guarantee that their faith will have an impact on the country and the world.
Paul Craig Roberts is right: "In the ranks of the new conservatives, however, I see and experience much hate. It comes to me in violently worded, ignorant and irrational emails from self-professed conservatives who literally worship George Bush. Even Christians have fallen into idolatry. There appears to be a large number of Americans who are prepared to kill anyone for George Bush." Again: "Like Brownshirts, the new conservatives take personally any criticism of their leader and his policies. To be a critic is to be an enemy."
In short, what we have alive in the US is an updated and Americanized fascism. Why fascist? Because it is not leftist in the sense of egalitarian or redistributionist. It has no real beef with business. It doesn't sympathize with the downtrodden, labor, or the poor. It is for all the core institutions of bourgeois life in America: family, faith, and flag. But it sees the state as the central organizing principle of society, views public institutions as the most essential means by which all these institutions are protected and advanced, and adores the head of state as a godlike figure who knows better than anyone else what the country and world needs, and has a special connection to the Creator that permits him to discern the best means to bring it about.
The American right today has managed to be solidly anti-leftist while adopting an ideology – even without knowing it or being entirely conscious of the change – that is also frighteningly anti-liberty. This reality turns out to be very difficult for libertarians to understand or accept. For a long time, we've tended to see the primary threat to liberty as coming from the left, from the socialists who sought to control the economy from the center. But we must also remember that the sweep of history shows that there are two main dangers to liberty, one that comes from the left and the other that comes from the right. Europe and Latin America have long faced the latter threat, but its reality is only now hitting us fully.
What is the most pressing and urgent threat to freedom that we face in our time? It is not from the left. If anything, the left has been solid on civil liberties and has been crucial in drawing attention to the lies and abuses of the Bush administration. No, today, the clear and present danger to freedom comes from the right side of the ideological spectrum, those people who are pleased to preserve most of free enterprise but favor top-down management of society, culture, family, and school, and seek to use a messianic and belligerent nationalism to impose their vision of politics on the world.
There is no need to advance the view that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. However, it is time to recognize that the left today does represent a counterweight to the right, just as it did in the 1950s when the right began to adopt anti-communist militarism as its credo. In a time when the term patriotism means supporting the nation's wars and statism, a libertarian patriotism has more in common with that advanced by The Nation magazine:
The other company of patriots does not march to military time. It prefers the gentle strains of 'America the Beautiful' to the strident cadences of 'Hail to the Chief' and 'The Stars and Stripes Forever.' This patriotism is rooted in the love of one's own land and people, love too of the best ideals of one's own culture and tradition. This company of patriots finds no glory in puffing their country up by pulling others' down. This patriotism is profoundly municipal, even domestic. Its pleasures are quiet, its services steady and unpretentious. This patriotism too has deep roots and long continuity in our history.
Ten years ago, these were "right wing" sentiments; today the right regards them as treasonous. What should this teach us? It shows that those who saw the interests of liberty as being well served by the politicized proxies of free enterprise alone, family alone, Christianity alone, law and order alone, were profoundly mistaken. There is no proxy for liberty, no cause that serves as a viable substitute, and no movement by any name whose success can yield freedom in our time other than the movement of freedom itself. We need to embrace liberty and liberty only, and not be fooled by groups or parties or movements that only desire a temporary liberty to advance their pet interests.
As Rothbard said in 1965:
The doctrine of liberty contains elements corresponding with both contemporary left and right. This means in no sense that we are middle-of-the-roaders, eclectically trying to combine, or step between, both poles; but rather that a consistent view of liberty includes concepts that have also become part of the rhetoric or program of right and of left. Hence a creative approach to liberty must transcend the confines of contemporary political shibboleths.
There has never in my lifetime been a more urgent need for the party of liberty to completely secede from conventional thought and established institutions, especially those associated with all aspects of government, and undertake radical intellectual action on behalf of a third way that rejects the socialism of the left and the fascism of the right.
Indeed, the current times can be seen as a training period for all true friends of liberty. We need to learn to recognize the many different guises in which tyranny appears. Power is protean because it must suppress that impulse toward liberty that exists in the hearts of all people. The impulse is there, tacitly waiting for the consciousness to dawn. When it does, power doesn't stand a chance.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Were Coptic Christians Better Off Under Hosni Mubarak?
As violent clashes take place in Egypt, some in the media are wondering whether Coptic Christians in the country were better off under the rule of former President Hosni Mubarak.
Since the Arab Spring began, Coptic Christians have experienced frequent attacks against them.
On Jan. 1, 2011, a car bomb set off at a Coptic church in Egypt killed 21 people and injured 79 more.
Last month, a riot broke out when Coptic Christians and liberal Muslims were protesting the burning of a Coptic Orthodox Church in which over 24 people were killed by Muslim fundamentalists. It was the worst case of sectarian violence in Egypt in 60 years.
In a separate incident in October, a Christian student was told to remove a cross around his neck. The student refused and was beaten to death by his teacher as well as his classmates.
Andre Aciman of The New York Times lived in Egypt and says he was targeted for his Jewish faith.
"The problem with Egypt is that there is no public trust. There is no trust, period. False rumor, which is the opiate of the Egyptian masses and the bread and butter of political discourse in the Arab world, trumps clarity, reason and the will to tolerate a different opinion, let alone a different religion or the spirit of open discourse," he testified recently according to a New York Times article.
"I grew up in an Egypt that was inventing hidden hands wherever you looked. Because of my family's increasingly precarious status as Jews living in Nasser's Egypt, my parents forbade me to flash my flashlight several times at night or to write invisible messages with lemon ink in middle school. These were a spymaster's tricks, and Jews were forever regarded as spies after the 1954 'Lavon Affair,' in which Israeli intelligence recruited Egyptian Jews to bomb targets in Egypt," he added.
Barbara Kay of the National post believes Christians had better protection under Mubarak.
"For all the talk of the Arab Spring, many Egyptian Copts must be nostalgic for the days of Hosni Mubarak. Whatever else could be said for him, he at least knew how to deal with Islamists and other hotheads intent on staging pogroms," she wrote.
Mubarak stepped down on Feb. 11, 2011. Recently, protests have risen again as Egyptians are unsatisfied with the interim military government. Thirty-eight people have died in the November protests.


text:
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Welcome to the "Summer of Amena," and Her Triple Chocolate Chip Cookies!
If I've said it once, I've said it a hundred times… democracy doesn't work. Hey, I'm only kidding! Sure, cookies may not be the first thing you think of when you think summer recipes, but that's what a lovely young woman named Amena (pictured here) wanted to see, and enough YouTubers were persuaded by her very creative video to make that happen.
While this was done to fulfill a pledge, I've wanted to do a video like this for a while to prove something once and for all; you do not need an electric mixer to make cookies. This entire recipe takes about 20 minutes to make, and only about five of those are spent doing anything physical.
As I mention in the video, this recipe is very adaptable as far as what and how much you add to the basic dough. I used a "normal" amount of chips, but this amount can be doubled without issue. You can also toss in dried fruit and nuts fearlessly.
So, join me in congratulating Amena, and I hope you all celebrate her triumph by giving this super-easy chocolate chip cookie recipe a try. Enjoy!
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, very soft
1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup white granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 large egg
1/3 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/3 cup white chocolate chips
1/3 cup milk chocolate chips
Note: the amounts of chocolate chips can be doubled for extra decadent cookies! aka "Amena style"
70 comments:
- Nefertiti said...
Woot! You pronounced it right! I'm going to try this recipe right now and its 3:00am lol... I think Im going to enjoy this summer, thanks Chef John :-P
- June 16, 2010 at 3:36 AM
- blogagog said...
While I'm generally enjoying the Summer of Amena, it's getting ridiculously hot. Can someone ask Amena to turn on the air conditioner?
Thanks in advance. - June 16, 2010 at 5:44 AM
- Carolyn™ said...
Nothing really beats homemade chocolate cookies using butter :) The season doesnt really matter as my season is the opposite to yours anyway and it doesnt stop me enjoying the recipes.
- June 16, 2010 at 7:21 AM
Chef, how do I replace baking soda with baking powder? Would it be the same taste wise?
- June 16, 2010 at 8:12 AM
hey! in the picture i see the cookie has a "chip" that looks orange, what is that?
- June 16, 2010 at 9:46 AM
This past week we've had quite a few clouds although the temperatures are rising steadily in Northern Europe...Here's for hoping that this coming summer of Amena will be scorching hot with loads of sun over here in Brussels!
- June 16, 2010 at 5:08 PM
can i replace the white sugar with brown sugar, or must I use white sugar? I'm not a big fan of white sugar, so I was just wondering...
Thank you! - June 16, 2010 at 6:39 PM
Can I ask you a question?
What vegetable goes with fish'n'chips? - June 16, 2010 at 10:35 PM
- Chef John said...
You can use any sugar you want, no prob
- June 16, 2010 at 11:22 PM
- Chef John said...
anon, no answer to that question. if you like a vegetable, it goes. try coleslaw.
- June 16, 2010 at 11:24 PM
- parker394 said...
Where can we see Amena's video?
- June 17, 2010 at 9:42 AM
- Adrian Chen said...
Love it~! But its too hot over here in the UK at the moment to make cookies, really hoping for a recipe on making ice Lollies... i am melting...
- June 17, 2010 at 11:45 AM
- shristy said...
great recipe...cant wait to try it...thanks chef John...but most importantly thanks to Amena...its Summer of Amena alright...
- June 18, 2010 at 12:28 AM
- H. Kids said...
The food wishes consists of welcome to the "Summer of Amena," and her Triple Chocolate Chip Cookies. I like it.
- June 18, 2010 at 2:40 PM
hi chef john great recipe i've already tried it my all familly loved it.
Can the brown sugar be replaced by something else ?( i'm alergic to it) - June 19, 2010 at 8:21 AM
- Chef John said...
yes, white sugar, thanks!
- June 19, 2010 at 9:08 AM
- Anonymous said...
great blog!
- June 19, 2010 at 11:52 AM
- Matt SF said...
Big congrats to Amena for the winning recipe.
Gave these a try last night, with 2 cups of chocolate chips, and they were far superior to any off the shelf, store bought cookie dough. Absolutely delicious. - June 20, 2010 at 10:50 AM
- david said...
Hi Chef
I feel a bit ashamed to say it, but my first attempt ended quite miserably. Once put into oven, the batter melted and I ended up having one nice tray-size cookie. Nevertheless, it was delicious! Not sure whether the problem was converting amounts into metric system, too/not enough heated oven or something else, so I'll be giving it another try tomorrow. Do you have an idea what could the problem be? Except me of course, I'm still trying to get the hang of cooking :)
Thanks. - June 21, 2010 at 2:16 PM
- Chef John said...
try again! all part of the fun
- June 21, 2010 at 2:50 PM
Hi Chef John,
Your videos and website are awesome! I'm a big fan!
Just made the cookies tonight but I'm sorry to report that, like David above, I ended up with one, giant paper-thin cookie. That wouldn't have been the end of the world but it was burnt quite a bit(yeah, I should've been checking on it more closely!). Not complaining, just wanted to report my experimental results.
Like David, I also converted the recipe to the metric system.
Dunno if David has a similar problem but one thing for sure is that my oven here(Europe) is a lot smaller and problematic than my former American oven which makes temperature/timing tricky. Just wanna throw that out there.
Anyway, you win some, you lose some. Keep the recipes coming! - June 26, 2010 at 8:03 PM
- brian said...
yummy i love good home made cookies!
- July 13, 2010 at 8:00 PM
- Merdicchio said...
Hi John,
I have a question about this recipe. I never use baking soda because the only one I can find here(Italy) is very salty and it usually spoils the flavor. I gave up using it after I had to throw away a whole batch of muffins...the taste was absolutely disgusting so I quit using it.
After some research, I found out the one you can find in the US is different so that is why the one I have is not fine.
This being said, can I replace it with something else? In case I can't, what would be the difference between using it or not? Is it about the flavor or the dough consistency?
Thanks! - September 14, 2010 at 8:48 PM
- Chef John said...
I wish I could help, but i have no idea. Not sure of a sub. All I can say is make a batch and see. I know they make cookies in Italy, so I would ask local bakers what they use.
- September 14, 2010 at 9:16 PM
Chef John, how can I alter this to make snicker doodles? Or is it preferable to use another recipe altogether? Thank you!
- September 23, 2010 at 1:29 AM
Is it possible to make these as big as the huge ones they sell in coffee shops? Will I just have to alter the baking time? Thank you!
- September 23, 2010 at 1:31 AM
- Chef John said...
Um, yes, I would find a snicker doodles recipe for snicker doodles.
You can make them bigger, but not sure of the time. - September 23, 2010 at 2:32 AM
Making theses tonight! First time making cookies we shall see how it goes :)
- September 24, 2010 at 1:54 PM
Hi, I really wanna thank you BOTH! It's been ages that I've tried making cookies and they were way too hard like stones!
Amena your recipe rocks and I add myself some nuts!
Chef John your recipes are amazing! Your give an other face to the American cuisine (I won't criticize, I won't do my French girl lol)
Un grand merci à vous! - October 25, 2010 at 3:14 PM
- livlove said...
Those look amazing
- October 26, 2010 at 7:09 PM
Hi chef, i only have salted butter at the moment. Can i use it and skip the salt so the cookie doesnt come out too salty? Will skipping the salt alter the texture of the cookie? Thanks!
- October 27, 2010 at 11:58 AM
- Chef John said...
Sure, that will work.
- October 27, 2010 at 1:25 PM
You know when what you're baking will be good when 1/8 of the dough somehow doesn't make it into the oven...
I love this technique. Wisking in the egg and vanilla early makes such a huge difference. - November 7, 2010 at 2:17 PM
I did 10 minutes @ 375 and the bottom was too brown.
So I did 8 minutes @ 375 and the inside did not cook.
Finally I did 15 minutes @ 300 and they were delicious. - November 20, 2010 at 2:13 PM
- Unknown said...
um ive never been able to make a normal batch of cookies any idea of what im doing wrong? or any tips to get better?
- November 22, 2010 at 5:55 PM
- Chef John said...
so, u followed this exactly, and it didnt work?
- November 22, 2010 at 6:02 PM
chef and amena, I love you!
one question: can i substitute the chocochips with cooking chocolate cut into pieces? thanks! - December 2, 2010 at 7:07 AM
Vraiment de très bons biscuits ! Un gros merci pour les recettes ! Really Good thanks
- January 8, 2011 at 4:50 PM
- disaster999 said...
Chef John, I tried this recipe last night and it tasted good, but the texture is a little disappointing. It isnt crunchy nor is it soft and chewy. It's more like cake/bread like. I did follow your recipe exactly cept held back on the chocolates.
Any idea what might be wrong and how i should improve it? - March 2, 2011 at 11:16 PM
- Chef John said...
Sounds like too much flour and/or over mixing. Good luck!
- March 3, 2011 at 10:30 AM
- Chef John said...
Sounds like too much flour and/or over mixing. Good luck!
- March 3, 2011 at 10:30 AM
Dear Chef! I am new to cooking, so, this might sound stupid. But, when I bake the cookies, am I using the convection option or the microwave option in my oven?
My oven has 3 options, microwave, grill and convection. thats why m asking.. - March 22, 2011 at 2:37 AM
- Chef John said...
It would be convection, but convection oven usually cook faster than standard oven, so it may take less time (you'll have to google for more details)
- March 22, 2011 at 12:51 PM
- May 6, 2011 at 3:54 PM
How many chips will this make?
- May 15, 2011 at 1:53 AM
Hi Chef John, I tried the cookies today. I was wondering what should be the texture of the cookies. Mine are crispy at the edges but softer on the inside. Shouldn't it be evenly baked?
- June 5, 2011 at 6:42 AM
Also, mine have unintergrated sugar on top. So I can literally bite on the sugar.. What should I do?
- June 5, 2011 at 6:46 AM
- Chef John said...
Sorry , im not sure what you did! They shouldnt be like that. A little crisper outside is normal.
- June 5, 2011 at 8:55 AM
- K.T. said...
i made these today and daaaayumn they're just heavenlyy
my mum strictly speaking is particularly not so keen when it comes to sweets cos shes asian but she loves these!!
thanks for sharing the recipe :DD - June 15, 2011 at 3:20 AM
- Heidi Starks said...
While I've never had a bad recipe from you, this one didn't turn out so good. I think it was too much flour. Especially with baking, could you give weights (i.e. in grams)? I'm betting my 1 cup of flour is not the same as your 1 cup of flour.
- July 1, 2011 at 12:24 AM
greetings chef!
tried the recipe all went perfect except the bottom part was soggy and it wasnt as crunchy as the top.
any suggestion?
terima kasih.... - July 24, 2011 at 9:50 AM
- Chef John said...
Sorry, not sure!!
- July 24, 2011 at 10:57 AM
- Flavia said...
Just finished a batch! I must confess I only used your recipe (which is awesome!) as a base for my Christmas Spicy Cookies so I added some nutmeg, cinnamon and powder cloves to the recipe. Instead of regular chocolate chips, I cut a whole swiss chocolate bar into tiny squares. HMMM! YUMMY!
- November 9, 2011 at 3:04 PM
Yummy,yummy. I didn`t make it yet,but it looks SO delicious. But,it`s kind of hard to find and buy all those different types of chocolate chips,isn`t it? Where can I find all of these ingredients?
P.S.I`m Canadian. - November 28, 2011 at 7:46 PM
I love this cookie recipe. I've made it successfully many times.
BUT,the last few times I've made them, the cookies come out completely flat and the fat seems to separate and spread. I am doing everything the same. Don't think I'm over mixing. I thought my oven might not be hot enough but I tried again and had the same results. Any idea what is going wrong? - January 3, 2012 at 11:53 AM
hi i've used this recipe but the last couple of times my cookies have been having the texture of cake any reason why? i followed the measurements exactly
- February 18, 2012 at 12:51 AM
- June-Isabelle Chan said...
Hi, I made these yesterday and they taste great! however, they didn't spread out in the oven into a cookie shape, they stayed pretty much in a ball shape. Explanation?
- April 23, 2012 at 6:31 PM
Third attempt: Nailed it.
By far the best recipe I have ever used! Thanks chef!
Btw for those who are getting "flat cookies" try adding more a little more flour! - June 4, 2012 at 4:18 PM
- Karajeca said...
I've been following you for a while there through Allrecepies, and I have to admit that they are simple, kitchen friendly, and I finally understood why I need to sift the flour. Good thing is I have a 5 year old who loves doing it, so I get her amused and get my cookies fluffier than I thought. I loved the pencake recipe too.
I will try this one, not move from the stove and keep the fingers crossed. If I get everything right, they will not have the time to cool. Unfortunately, I don't have the chocolate chips here in Serbia, so I will chop the chocolates with knife.
Great work, chef John, you have such a nice traditional non eclectic approach that finally makes sense in cooking.
I do enjoy your blog.
Bye from sunny Belgrade.
Karajeca - November 9, 2012 at 8:28 AM
- Unknown said...
I think Amena might actually be Chili from TLC...
- December 14, 2012 at 8:41 PM
- nioc said...
Hi chef john!
Ive been using this cookie recipe since you've posted it...however recently my cookies seem to blow up rather than melt down in the oven.. Ive been getting cookie-balls and I cant figure out where I got it wrong...? Please help me :( - January 11, 2013 at 12:45 PM
- nioc said...
Hi chef john
Ive been using this cookie recipe since you've posted it.. However recently my cookies have been blowing up rather than melting down in the oven... i cant figure out where I got it wrong...please help me :( - January 11, 2013 at 12:47 PM
- Chef John said...
are u using baking powder instead of baking soda? Otherwise, no idea!
- January 11, 2013 at 1:56 PM
- Unknown said...
Hi Chef John
Can I ask what baking tray you are using? And I dont know why every time I bake Amena cookies, the cookies do not become thick as you show in the video, but instead I think it got some moisture and make the cookies soft. And which mode did you use when baking, oven or fan? - February 2, 2013 at 4:14 AM
- Cagliarigirl said...
Chef, I am new to your blog and I have just tried Amena's recipe for her triple chocolate cookies. I live in Italy and unfortunately all their cookies are "no good", at least for me, I miss the butter consistency and the moist batter in every bite. So THANK YOU!! I have decided to eliminate disappointment from my life and bake my own cookies from now on! Oh, and thank you for letting me see I don't need an electric device to make cookies easily. xoxoxoxo.
- April 17, 2013 at 3:04 AM
- Kenkenmakken said...
Chef John, I'm a new fan! It's close to midnight here in the Philippines and I can't sleep, so I'm making these. Right after I get off the computer! Thank you Chef! So excited to try these out :)
- October 11, 2013 at 11:47 AM
- Eric B. said...
Ive made so many of your recipes for dinner and ALL have been great so I decided to try a dessert and of course you came through again. It was the best cookie ive ever made. THANKS!
- October 14, 2013 at 4:43 PM
- Chicafelix said...
I made these today using only milk chocolate chips (a cup and a half) and adding the zest of a large orange... Now eating them with a shot of Grand Marnier and I am in heaven... Thank you Amena, thank you Chef John.
- December 7, 2014 at 11:51 PM
- dgdoubleu said...
I would like to replace the milk or semisweet chips with peanut butter chips. What do you recommend?
- December 6, 2015 at 3:55 AM
- Unknown said...
I have been a long time lurker, just want to say this is my go to choc chip cookie recipe. Thanks you Amena and Chef John!
- April 4, 2016 at 7:19 AM


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31 May 2001 Truth is First Casualty in the Environmental Movement's War Against Bush
Contents Truth is First Casualty in the Environmental Movement's War Against Bush |
Bulletin Board: Newsbreaking new releases and statements from conservatives in Washington.
Truth is First Casualty in the Environmental Movement's War Against Bush
In "Myth of the Martyred Mapmaker" the Washington Post tells an amusing, if cautionary tale: That of website mapmaker Ian Thomas, who was fired after he posted a map on a U.S. Geological Survey website showing caribou migration patterns in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Environmental groups and some elected officials took up his cause, claiming the Bush Administration fired Thomas for taking a position different than theirs on ANWR oil drilling.
In fact, says the Post, Thomas was fired by liberal Democrats and not by Bush, and for reasons unrelated to oil drilling.
All this placed a substantial amount of figurative egg on the faces of officials at the Sierra Club, Endangered Species Coalition, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and other groups, all of which championed Thomas as a victim of Bush without first researching his case. But two days after the Post expose', a Sierra Club website was still making this claim: "Ian Thomas was fired from his job as a cartographer for the US Geological Survey. His offense? He posted a scientific map, the result of months of project reasearch, on the USGS website. The map showed the primary calving areas of the porcupine caribou within Ian's area of research. The problem? The area in question is a part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, long a target for oil company exploitation and drilling. Our new president and his big oil advisors don't plan to tolerate being balked on this issue, not even by science. Ian Thomas is one of the first casualties of the War on the Environment sponsored by the new Bush administration."
Senators John Kerry and Representatives Henry Waxman (D-CA) and John Tierney (D-MA) were among the public officials taken in by environmentalist propaganda on this one. They wrote to Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton expressing concern that "this severe and sudden action may have a chillinbg effect on scientists in the Department who may fear that their job is in jeopardy if they publish findings that are counter to the Administration's positions."
The cautionary part of this tale: Sometimes environmentalists don't stick to the facts. Even when, as in the case of this May 21 Post article, the truth is pointed out to them. Policymakers would do well to remember this the next time they hear from environmentalists on ANWR.
Mushrooming Regulations Cause 66 Percent of Doctors to Consider Early Retirement
Proof that too many regulations can be harmful to your health: A new study by the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons finds that a whopping 66.2 percent of doctors say they will "retire from active patient care at a younger age than they would have considered five years ago" because of increased government interference in the practice of medicine.
64 percent also cited "decreased control" over medical practices and the cumbersome Medicare bureaucracy — themselves regulatory matters — as additional reasons for early retirement.
61 percent said an increased fear of unwarranted government investigation into their compliance with laws and regulations was a factor inclining them toward retirement.
56 percent said decreased fees were a factor in their consideration of early retirement.
For more information, see "Physicians Burn Out on Regulations" by Jon Dougherty on the AAPS website at http://www.aapsonline.org/aaps/press/burnout.htm (Editor's Note: link did not function as of 11/6/01).
Kyoto Coverup: TV News Gives One Side On Global Warming
If you want the straight dope about the seriousness of the alleged global warming problem, beware of television news.
So concludes a Media Research Center study finding that TV news routinely ignores the many prestigious scientists questioning the global warming theory while giving generous coverage to theory proponents.
The study, "Clamoring for Kyoto: The Networks' One-sided Coverage of Global Warming," examined 51 global warming stories that aired on ABC's "World News Tonight," the "CBS Evening News," CNN's "Inside Politics," the Fox News Channel's "Special Report with Brit Hume" and the "NBC Nightly News."
With the exception of Fox, the networks were overwhelmingly supportive of environmentalist claims that human-induced global warming is underway and will threaten the planet if steps aren't taken to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. Among the MRC's key findings:
1) Views that man-made global warming will cause catastrophic climate change received six times as much media attention as the views of scientists who doubt this.
2) Networks gave Kyoto supporters more than twice as much airtime as was given to supporters of Bush's decision to reject Kyoto.
3) There were only seven references to the fact that some scientists are skeptical that human actions are causing global warming.
While gloom-and-doom coverage makes for dramatic headlines, it grossly misrepresents the level of scientific skepticism about global warming.
For instance, TV news rarely mentions that over 17,000 scientists signed a petition stating: "There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of… greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere."
What TV news also doesn't tell the public is that alarmist global warming reports frequently cited by the media as scientific support for the dangers of warming do not reflect a consensus of scientists.
Dr. Richard Lindzen, a climate scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a participant in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the UN panel whose conclusions are most often given as support for the global warming theory, accuses the UN entity of issuing dramatic statements that he and other IPCC participating scientists do not support.
For example, the IPCC recently announced that "most of the observed warming over the last 50 years is likely to have been due to the increase in greenhouse gas concentrations." But Lindzen says that statement is scientifically indefensible – there may not have been any significant warming over the last 60 years and such warming that did occur was "inconsistent with greenhouse warming."
For more information, see National Policy Analysis #337: "Kyoto Coverup: TV News Gives One-Sided View On Global Warming" by John Carlisle at https://nationalcenter.org/NPA337.html or visit the Media Research Center at http://www.mrc.org.*


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Andy's Automotive Machine Where Performance is our Passion Phone: (860) 793-2455 |
Navigation |
Welcome to the online home of Andy's Automotive Machine. In Business since the late 80's, we are a full service machine shop that offers both stock and performance parts. We work on anything from small lawn mower engines, to stock car and truck engines, to high performance street or race engines, to nostalgia engines, or even diesel engines. If you need engine work to be done, we are your place to go. Please feel free to check out our site and look at the many different services we can perform in the Machine Shop Services section or even check out the Parts Vendor section to see just a few of the many parts we offer. NEWS: Right now we are in the process of getting the web site up and running. Please check back often as we will be adding pictures and more information soon. |
© 2006 Andy's Automotive Machine. All Rights Reserved |


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If doing the right thing is its own reward, Glen James appears on the verge of a big-time bonus.
The homeless Boston man who turned in a backpack holding $42,000 in cash and travelers checks is attracting donations from across the nation. By early Thursday, an online fund set up by a Virginia man who has never been to Boston had collected almost $100,000.
And Ethan Whittington said he planned to keep the fund open for as long as people wanted to give.
"I just felt that this was somebody who needed to be rewarded for his good deeds," said the 27-year-old Whittington, a marketing accounts manager from Midlothian, Va. "It's just inspiring to see somebody do an honorable thing like that. If everybody could have the humanity that he did that day, and be together and warm, it'd be a special thing."
Whittington thinks $250,000 — and a home — is now a reasonable goal for James, a soft-spoken man in his mid-50s who has been walking the streets for five years.
The fund had tallied donations ranging from $1 to $500 from more than 3,400 people by Wednesday evening, according to Whittington, who also has received offers of lifetime dental care, computers, furniture, clothes, and jobs for James.
"I think he's more shocked than anything," said Whittington, who has had one phone conversation with James. "You know, $250,000 can change his life for the rest of his life."
James burst into the public eye this week after he flagged down police at the South Bay shopping center in Dorchester, where he noticed a backpack that had been left near an overturned shopping carriage.
The backpack, containing $2,400 in cash, nearly $40,000 in travelers checks, and a passport, had been left behind by a visiting student from China. The student and his money were quickly reunited, and James received a citation of appreciation Monday from Police Commissioner Edward F. Davis, who commended James for an "extraordinary show of character and honesty."
The end to a nice story? Hardly.
Whittington read a news report about James and went to work. He set an initial goal of $50,000 for the online fund but was startled by the response.
"I want to keep it going," Whittington said. "Anywhere in America, you're inundated with negative news on a daily basis. We're constantly hearing about how Democrats and Republicans can't get along, or three people were shot downtown, or George Zimmerman and the Trayvon Martin case.
"You know, we have to come together and make this nation better."
One contributor to the website, Mark Attebery of Texas, wrote, "Please thank Mr. James. I would be proud to call a MAN like that a friend.
James could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
Whittington's work has generated questions along with tens of thousands of dollars. On the donation website, skeptics ask how donors can be sure the money will make its way to James, who spends nights in a homeless shelter and uses food stamps and spare change to get by.
Whittington pledged to bring the check to James personally. Before Whittington delivers that windfall, the fund automatically deducts a 5 percent fee from each donation, plus an additional processing charge of nearly 3 percent, according to information posted on the gofundme website.
"I'm not keeping a penny of it," Whittington said.
Lin Whittington, his mother, said she cried when she first heard about Ethan's involvement. "Your children surprise you all the time," she said in a phone interview.
The project spiraled to a scale Ethan never imagined, said his father, Kim.
"He thought it would be a quick little thing, and he could send some money to the fellow," Kim Whittington said. "He has really been one that cares about other people more than he cares about himself."
Ethan's mother vouched for him on the donation website.
"His heart has been touched by Mr. James's story," her posting said. "I assure you, as his Mom, I will hold him accountable."
Ethan, who was raised in Pike Road, Ala., chuckled at the posting. "That sounds like her," he said.
"My parents taught me everything — to be compassionate and to have love for this world," Whittington said.
In the coming days, Whittington said, he will speak with James to determine whether he even wants a house, where the money should go, and how to proceed in his best interests.
"I want to find out what his past life is like, and if there's anybody around the Boston area that he's close to," Whittington said.
"I think he understands the implications of getting this amount of money. I don't want to hear that this becomes a negative story a couple of weeks from now, that somebody robbed him or whatever," Whittington added. "I want to be responsible to him. I just don't want to take a lot of cash up to him and say, here you go."
Brian MacQuarrie can be reached at firstname.lastname@example.com.


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Flights to Tel Aviv
British Airways operates direct flights to Tel Aviv from London Heathrow, so you can be in the White City by the sea in less than 5 hours. There are frequent flights to Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion International Airport, which is about a 30-minute drive from the city's centre.
Tel Aviv's location on the eastern edge of the Med makes it a perfect year-round destination for anyone seeking a beach holiday with world-renowned architecture, a bewildering range of restaurants, and one of the world's top places to party. If it all gets too much (or too hot), Jerusalem is just one hour away by car.


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Hundreds of students in North Carolina have been suspended from attending school because they failed to get vaccinated.
At least 200 students in three counties had not turned in their certificate of immunization form as of Friday to prove they had received a Tdap shot. The shot is a combination of three vaccines that provide protection against diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis (whooping cough).
Under a 2008 North Carolina law, all incoming sixth graders must get a Tdap booster shot within 30 days of the new school year.
Wednesday was the cutoff.
According to school officials, sixth graders in the state, who had not been vaccinated and who did not have an approved exemption, can no longer attend public school until they provide the proper vaccination certification.
The U.S. Center for Disease Control announced on Sept. 11 there would be a nationwide shortage of the Tdap vaccine until mid-October as a result of a delayed vaccine lot.
The shortage lead the Illinois State Board of Education to send a memo this week to school officials saying the Tdap vaccine shortage would be considered when deciding if a school is in compliance with the required vaccination protocols.
Officials from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, said, however, that there had been no shortage of the vaccine provided to the federal vaccine for children program. Various health departments in different counties have been hosting free clinics so students could easily receive free vaccinations earlier this week.
CDC Says More Kids Protected From the Flu
In Guilford County, approximately 66 students had still not turned in their proof of immunization by Wednesday afternoon. Health clinics were open to students on Wednesday for free shots and on Thursday students could make appointments for free shots.
In the Winston-Salem County and Forsythe County School district, which is adjacent to the Guilford school district, another 177 students had not turned in their proof of immunization as of Wednesday.
The number was significantly diminished from the 1,400 kids who had been at risk of being suspended at the beginning of the week.
Both school districts have been alerting parents by mail and phone of the deadline since April.
Theo Helm, spokesman for the Winston-Salem school district, said while students in other grades, such as kindergarten, were also required to have specific vaccinations before the school year, only the sixth graders consistently fell behind.
"It's like this every year. It's like trying to get them to turn in their homework," said Helm. "I don't know why it balloons like this in the sixth grade."


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Answering a call from UNIT, the Doctor arrives in London to find the streets deserted, apart from looters in possession of a valuable commodity – water.
Britain is suffering an extreme and bizarre drought. The cause is suspected to be extra-terrestrial.
The discovery of a signal being transmitted into space, and of a spacecraft whose crew are desiccated corpses, provides a possible answer. But the true enemy is an old foe of the Doctor's.
The Cybermen have been patient, setting their plans in place over a number of years. As the final stage is implemented, in the darkest hour, the Doctor must identify who among his allies he can trust.


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In 2014, a plume of ocean-borne radiation, originating from the Fukushima meltdown, will hit the west coast of the U.S. Initial sources warned that this could be an extremely dangerous concentration of radionuclides, but recent research and new sources have since said there is nothing to fear.
One of the researchers trying to set the record straight is Henrieta Dulaiova, an assistant professor at the University of Hawaii's department of geology and geophysics. Dulaiova holds a Ph.D. in Chemical Oceanography and a Master of Sciences in Nuclear Chemistry and has been studying the ocean-borne radiation from Fukushima since the disaster began in 2011.
We spoke with Dulaiova over the phone about her research, being accused of working for the government, how much Americans should worry, and background radiation levels.
We asked a person on the bus what he would want to know about a plume of ocean-borne radiation hitting the West Coast. He said, "How long do I have to live?" Can you answer that question?
Honestly [laughs], there aren't negative health effects that he can expect. The radiation will not get on the land. The questions I get most often in Hawaii are whether swimming or surfing in the ocean will be safe, which they are. He should be fine, which is why we wanted to dispute the initial claims that said otherwise.
Continue reading "Q&A: Could a Radioactive Plume Impact the U.S.?" »


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The Sustainable Development Cluster of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Ghana is supporting the Government of Ghana to implement disaster risk reduction programmes, putting in place long term strategies to make Ghana a climate resilient country.
The UN system in Ghana has a long track record of effective coordination of humanitarian operations in response to natural disasters and other emergencies such as cholera outbreak or influx of refugees. The UNDP with support from the Government of Japan, and its national partners endeavor to establish appropriate adaptation and mitigation options to work effectively towards sustainable development. Key partners in these efforts include the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Ghana Meteorological Agency (GMet). It is essential that these institutions, and society as a whole, grasp the issue of long-term planning to mitigate the impacts of climate change and prevent the occurrence of disasters.
- In 2007, floods affected more than 300,000 people in Ghana and required more than $25 million for emergency response, and more than $130 million worth of direct damage.
- UNDP with support from the Government of Japan seeks to establish appropriate adaptation and mitigation options to work effectively towards sustainable development.
- Key partners of the programme include the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Ghana Meteorological Agency (GMet).
In 2007, floods affected more than 300,000 people in the country and required more than $25 million for emergency response, and more than $130 million worth of direct damage. The devastation suggested that Ghana was not prepared for such a catastrophe. To make Ghana a climate resilient nation, UNDP supported state agencies through long term strategies to deal with climate change under the Africa Adaptation Programme (AAP). The Africa Adaptation Programme was implemented from 2010 to 2013, across 20 countries in Africa to help with the continent's response to climate change and natural disasters, by building capacities at the government level for long-term planning for climate change, as well as implementing simple, effective interventions to explore and demonstrate what climate change adaptation means on the ground.
A case in point is the Aowin Suaman District Assembly in the Western Region of Ghana, which received training to mainstream climate change and disaster risk reduction into their District Development Plans. The district was also supported to implement practical climate change adaptation projects such as the construction of a new light industrial market to relocate business owners that were working in flood-prone areas. Through the participation of local stakeholders, the AAP has also supported the construction of foot bridges at key crossing points in the Keta District so that children can cross over flooded lands during the rainy season to attend school, as well as women and men to commute to work or to the market.
The AAP pilot activities in Aowin Suaman and Keta are excellent examples of how simple, and relatively low cost, measures can help communities attain short-term and long-term benefits through mainstreaming the issues of climate change and disaster risk reduction into development planning. Through these programmes, the UNDP strives to build a culture of disaster resilience enhancing the knowledge and understanding of the hazards types, tackling various vulnerabilities of the communities and generating innovative and indigenous solutions through capacity building and education.
The following are some of the successes the AAP has chalked in Ghana. With respect to mainstreaming Climate Change, the programme has supported the development of the National Climate Change Policy (NCCP) which was approved by Cabinet in May 2013. Moreover, all 170 administrative districts have been trained on mainstreaming Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) and Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR). The initiative has also supported the integration of climate change (CC) into the Functional Organisation Assessment Tool which is a prerequisite for budgetary allocations to District Assemblies development projects and programmes. The AAP's effort to mainstream CCA and DRR at the district levels led to 64 out of 149 districts (43%) that submitted their 2012 Composite Budget to have CCA activities mainstreamed and budgeted within their budgets. As a result, in 2012, districts in Ghana allocated over Gh¢ 27 million to implement CCA activities in their districts. The African Adaptation programme also championed the incorporation of CCA and DRR into the Ghana Building Code.
The AAP was successful in building capacity of high level leaders in Ghana. For instance, Members of Parliament, Council of State, the Government's Economic Management Team, Regional Ministers, Regional Coordinating Directors, District Chief Executives, Chief Directors and Directors of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs), Religious leaders, and Commissioners of the National Development Planning Commission were engaged through High Level Interactive Workshops to create awareness on climate change and deliberate on how they could support mainstreaming of CCA and DRR in their various areas of authority. In all, more than 160 high level leaders in Ghana were engaged and commitments made to facilitate the mainstreaming process at various levels.
The AAP tested approaches to enhance CCA capacity in 5 pilot districts through in-depth planning and implementaiton of CCA measures such as construction of a foot bridge (Keta District), relocation of markets and light industrial sites to a higher ground (Aowin-Suaman District) and providing pumps for dry-season farming (Sissala East and West Mamprusi Districts).
The Africa Adaption Programme has also supported the Ghana Meteorological Agency (GMet) to improve its frequency, volume, and quality of weather data by installing 8 Automated Weather Stations (AWS) and 1 High Speed Computer and provided training on early warning signs to build the capacity of GMet Staff to gather, monitor, and utilize weather data for improved weather forecasting, early warning, and future climate projections.
Flood and drought vulnerability maps have been created for communities in all 5 AAP pilot districts using GPS and GIS. Safe havens have also been identified and mapped and evacuation plans prepared for the flood-prone areas. A Climate Change Community of Practice (CoP) was established, comprising experienced and young professionals and researchers who collect and analyze local climate data and use models for making future climate projections. They have been working in collaboration with the University of Cape Town Climate Systems Analysis Group (CSAG). This aside, the Government of Ghana and UNDP developed a project that seeks to continue AAP's efforts in Early warning Systems establishment for the next 3 years called the Community Resilience through Early Warning (CREW).
The AAP has also supported 2 international workshops on climate change economics and finance for 58 Ghanaians and 53 International participants drawn from relevant institutions. These training workshops explored, in great detail, various climate change finance options (including modalities) as well as the economic analysis of various adaptation options. An initial design document for establishing a Functional Institutional Finance Mechanism for climate change in Ghana was developed based on recommendations and good practices from other countries gathered through the workshop.
UNDP continues to support the Government of Ghana to become "climate-finance ready" through facilitation provided through the establishment and access of various international climate finance such as the Green Climate Fund and the Adaptation
Fund, where Ghana's proposal for the Adaptation Fund was technically approved in 2013. AAP supported the development of a Guide for Mainstreaming Climate Change and Disaster Risk into national development policies and planning. The guides were disseminated and utilized by District Budget Officers to incorporate CCA into their district plans and budgets. Moreover, the AAP published an Indigenous Knowledge Atlas that compiles local knowledge related to climate and weather through research conducted in the 5 pilot districts.
Drought and Flood Hazard Maps have been developed for 5 AAP pilot districts. Various audio-visual materials have also been developed, such as: A documentary on CCA in Ghana, local adaptation in Northern Ghana and Burkina Faso. These documentaries were utilized as materials for the high level awareness raising events. Finally, local theater groups were trained to perform informational skits on CCA performed at the various awareness raising events.


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Columns Retired Columns & Blogs |
What is it like with oversampling off? Does it have a perfect response like a NOS DAC? If so this has the best of both worlds, inaudible distortion and good impulse.
All of these functions, and the BDA-1's output level, are accessible from Bryston's BR-2 remote control (a $350 option). The BR-2 also can control Bryston's BCD-1 CD player, BP26 preamplifier, and B100 SST integrated amplifier. The remote automatically lights up when you pick it up in a dimly lit room.
On the rear panel, starting from the left, are: balanced and single-ended pairs of analog audio outputs; a single S/PDIF output; a single USB input; an AES/EBU XLR input; four S/PDIF inputs; two optical TosLink optical inputs; a two-pin trigger input to facilitate remote hardwired on/off control; an RS-232 port for uploading firmware; and an IEC 320-C14 power inlet to mate with an IEC-320-C13 AC mains cord.
Internal Details
Just behind the rear panel is the full-width, multilayered printed circuit board that carries the D/A and analog stages. I wasn't able to get inside the chassis because I didn't have a driver that matched its Torx #8 screws; however, the BDA-1's brochure includes a clearly labeled view of the BDA-1's innards. Most of the interior is empty space, with a single ribbon cable joining the circuit board to another behind the front panel.
Starting at the left of the main board are separate toroidal power transformers for the analog and digital power supplies. Nearby are multistage voltage regulation and filtering components, including electrolytic capacitors and a row of heatsunk voltage regulators. Each stage (input receiver, sample-rate converter, DAC) is independently regulated to prevent interaction and to minimize jitter. Careful trace routing is used to reduce the risk of capacitive coupling to achieve greater reduction of noise and distortion, especially for the low-voltage analog signal leaving the DAC. In the center is a Burr-Brown SRC4392 sample rate-converter chip, to the right of which is a pair of DAC chips, these 128x-oversampling 24-bit delta-sigma Cirrus CS4398s, the same as used in the BCD-1, though only one chip is used in the CD player. Finally, on the far right are four rows of components that comprise the discrete analog amplifier's output stages.
Bryston describes the PCB as being constructed of double-sided epoxy glass with clearly printed component markings. All the components are surface-mount types, and high-quality, 0.1%-tolerance metal-film resistors and polystyrene capacitors are used. Soldered and other gas-tight mechanical connections are used for the signal circuits. Bryston's warranty is five years for the digital circuits, including parts and labor, and 20 years for the analog circuits.
Design Considerations
One of Bryston's primary goals for the BDA-1 was to reduce clock jitter, ie, mistimings of the digital datastream presented to the DAC. Unlike the company's BCD-1 CD player, a one-box transport and DAC, the standalone BDA-1 must reclock all signals fed to its data inputs. To maintain timing accuracy, the Bryston engineers used three different methods of maintaining accuracy and keeping jitter to a minimum: impedance-matching transformers to provide the best interface possible, reclocking the signal, and synchronously upsampling the signal.
The BDA-1's Burr-Brown SRC4392 sample-rate converter provides synchronous upsampling: 32, 48, and 96kHz data are upsampled to 192kHz, while 44.1 and 88.2kHz data are upsampled to 176.4kHz. The Compact Disc's 16-bit depth can be increased to 24 bits, the additional 8 bits filled with placeholder information. While this adds no new information, the conversions of the sample rate and bit depth transform the digital signal into a format that can be optimally converted into an analog signal by the DAC, says Bryston. The D/A conversion is done by a pair of Crystal CS4398 integrated-circuit chips, which feed discrete-component, class-A output amplifiers.
Knowing that the BDA-1's USB 1.1 input is limited to sample rates of 48kHz or lower, I used a Bel Canto USB Link 24/96 adapter (see John Atkinson's review in the May 2009 Stereophile, Vol.32 No.5) to connect my Lenovo X61 laptop's USB feed to one of the Bryston's S/PDIF inputs with audio data up to 96kHz sample rates. The BDA-1 is small enough that I could place it atop my BCD-1 CD player. I connected the BCD-1's S/PDIF output to the BDA-1's S/PDIF input via a single Wireworld Starlight coaxial cable. I ran both single-ended and balanced Bryston XLR interconnect cables from the BDA-1's output jacks to my Bryston BP26 preamplifier. I left in place the single-ended interconnects that ran from the BCD-1's analog output to the Bryston BP26, whose front-panel input switch could then switch between the BCD-1's analog output, the BDA-1's analog output via single-ended interconnects, and the BDA-1's analog output over balanced XLR interconnect, all sourced from the BCD-1's CD transport.
The BDA-1 functioned flawlessly while I had it in my system. Digital signals were decoded instantly when an input was selected. As on Bryston's BCD-1 CD player, the BDA-1's status light goes dark when the unit is turned on; in standby mode, it glows red.
The first hi-rez digital music tracks I played on my laptop was a 24-bit/88.2kHz WAV file from a Naim recording of the Chamber Soloists of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra playing Mozart's Eine kleine Nachtmusik (from Naim Classical HD126). I also downloaded two files from HDtracks.com: a 24/88.2 file of Beethoven's Symphony 3, "Eroica," performed by Andrew Manze and the Helsingborg Symphony (from Harmonia Mundi HMU 807470); and all eleven 24/96 tracks of Chesky's Ultimate Demonstration Disc, Volume 2 (originally on SACD, Chesky SACD343). The BDA-1 processing these hi-rez tracks sounded light-years ahead of CD-sourced music I've heard in my listening room. The BDA-1 reproduced the music's warmth and fullness with none of the irritating edginess I've heard from earlier standalone DACs.
What is it like with oversampling off? Does it have a perfect response like a NOS DAC? If so this has the best of both worlds, inaudible distortion and good impulse.


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Greg Cosell of NFL Films and the "NFL Matchup" show is one of our favorite analysts. That's why his assessment of the San Francisco 49ers' run defense was so eye-opening.
Harrison: Week 11 predictions
Whole lotta intrigue in Week 11, including the latest installment of Ravens vs. Steelers. Elliot Harrison provides his picks. **More ...**
"We can start by throwing out a few numbers," Cosell told KNBR-AM on Thursday, via The Press Democrat. "If you subtract the Arizona game -- Arizona's not a very good offense -- they played in the other three games (against) New York (Giants), Seattle and St. Louis. In those three games, they've given up an average of 148 yards rushing per game, and they've given up 12 runs of 10-plus yards in those three games. That's not the 49ers defense we've come to expect."
It's hard to argue with the numbers. The 49ers are one of the best teams in the NFL, but it has been alarming to see them give up so many long drives, like they did in the loss at Minnesota. Steven Jackson was effective against them last week. The front seven remains the strength of the 49ers, but they haven't been quite as good as they were a year ago.
"It might be blasphemous, but I think (Patrick) Willis and (NaVorro) Bowman have not played as well of late in the run game," Cossell continued. "I think they're playing a little too laterally as opposed to playing downhill with the aggression that we've come to expect."
Knowing Jim Harbaugh, these quotes probably will be relayed to his team for motivation when he returns from his recent procedure.
Follow Gregg Rosenthal on Twitter @greggrosenthal.


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List of Distributors:
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[Back to main support page] | [Runboard.com support forums]
All user accounts have the following features:
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- Can be composed of any alphanumeric characters (a to z and the digits, plus the space mark).
- Can contain zero or one spaces. "Mickey" is fine, "Mickey Mouse" is fine, "Mickey Mouse 2000" is not.
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It's new release time. The latest in our venerable 2.0 series, which now counts over 1.2 million downloads, is available for download immediately, and we suggest everyone upgrade as this includes security fixes. We're breaking the tradition of naming releases after jazz musicians to congratulate Ryan Boren on his new son (and first WP baby) Ronan.
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Like every release this was the result of a lot of people in the WordPress community, and I'd like to thank all our contributors and testers including Mustlive, Peter Westwood, and Robert Deaton. This is also the first release handled by our new 2.0 maintainer, Mark Jaquith. He joins myself and Ryan with commit access and is "committed" to keeping the 2.0 base stable as we head into the exciting new 2.1 world. Congrats to Mark


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With Microtonic, Synplant, Bitspeek and Reason's Malström synth, Swede Magnus Lidström has made his mark as one of the most consistently innovative plug-in developers in the industry. His latest, Permut8, an imagined digital effects processor from the '80s in software form, aims to further that reputation.
At the heart of Permut8 is a stereo delay that can be synced to the host DAW's clock (straight, triplet or dotted note divisions) or freely set anywhere between 0 and 352kHz. Being a 12-bit digital delay, it has a distinctly gritty sound, and directly affects the pitch and quality of the input signal, lowering and muddying it at low frequencies and brightening it up at higher speeds. The action of the delay buffer is visualised in the Memory display.
Audio Example 1: Bell chords
Permut8's processing power lies in the manipulation of the read positions. Two 'Instructions' are applied to them in series, each one offering a separate selection of four 'operators', each operator being defined by a pair of 8-bit 'operands'.
Each of the eight operators has a very specific function - changing the speed of the read position in relation to the write position, jumping it around within the memory buffer or randomly modulating it, for example. Operands are simply the adjustable parameters of each operator. The eight bits of each operand are activated using the four banks of switches, and the specifics of what they do depends on the host operator.
Shaping the sound further, a feedback circuit enables as much or little of the output to be fed back into the input as you like, while the Reverse switch reverses the write and read positions, and Write Protect loops the contents of the memory infinitely until deactivated.
Audio Example 2: Drums
Canned heat
Adding some extra warmth to all that digital delay action, Permut8 also has a very smooth analogue filter onboard, that can be placed at the input, the output or the feedback circuit, and comprises but a single knob, sweeping from high-pass to low-pass. There's also a limiter on the input, soft clipping applied at both the input and output, and a dry/wet mix control.
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The effects it generates are many and varied, there's plenty of controllable digital aliasing and noise on tap, too, and three modes of MIDI control make the whole thing highly 'playable'.
Permut8 might look esoteric and oddball, but it really is a plug-in for everyone, harking back to a golden age but sounding wholly relevant and contemporary. Putting something this unusual on the market is a bold move, even for Lidström, but it's absolutely paid off - Permut8 is a triumph.


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Run amok
What's the meaning of the phrase 'Run amok'?
To 'run amok', which is sometimes spelled 'run amuck', is to behave in a wild or unruly manner.
What's the origin of the phrase 'Run amok'?
The expression 'run amok' is now synonymous with 'go crazy', but originally had a specific meaning.
The term originated in Southeast Asia, where 'amok' (variously spelled amuk, amuck, amuco) meant 'a murderous frenzy or rage'. This derived from the state of mind of the Amuco - a class of 'death or glory' warriors who were employed in local power struggles in Java and Malaysia. Their belief was that fallen warriors became favourites of the gods, whereas failed missions were punished by dishonour and death. Unsurprisingly, the Amuco warriors had little to lose and their attacks were maniacal and frenzied. This is first alluded to in the 1516 text Barbosa, which was translated by Stanley, in 1866:
"There are some of them [the Javanese] who go out into the streets, and kill as many persons as they meet. These are called Amuco."
Captain James Cook, in his account of his travels in that part of the world - Voyages, 1772, gives an explicit definition of 'run amok':
"To run amock is to get drunk with opium... to sally forth from the house, kill the person or persons supposed to have injured the Amock, and any other person that attempts to impede his passage."
See also - go berserk and go postal.
See also - read the riot act.


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Monday, March 29, 2010
Taking joy in living is a woman's best cosmetic. -Rosalind Russell
Granny Square update: All 150 granny squares are done! Yay! Right now, I'm just weaving in the ends and then they'll be all set to join. Hehe ya, this is me in my generally impatient state - I should have woven the ends in at the end of each square, but I wanted to get them all made so much and now I have to go through this tedious exercise 150 times in a row (and each block has 6 ends that need to be woven)!
Yesterday morning, before heading off to my Toronto Modern Quilt Guild meeting, I decided to hit up the St. Lawrence Antiques Market which happens here in Toronto every Sunday. It was great! I've been many times before, but I just love browsing through all the vintage knickknacks, books, clothing, and just plain awesome stuff. I didn't get much yesterday, but I did pick up a couple of spools of vintage ribbon and lace. And actually, when I was buying these, the man selling them informed me that the whole box of ribbon and lace he was selling had been collected by a group of people with disabilities and that whatever money he got for selling the stuff would be given back to them. I thought that was really nice!
I have made (and am still making) a few things recently, but unfortunately I can't really show any of them right now. A couple of pieces are on their way to friends, so after they receive them I'll be sure to show pictures (wouldn't want to spoil the surprise, now would we?).
So, in my last post I mentioned some news about Jennifer and I going to a certain place in May that rhymes with pinneapolis. Only one person (Bonnie) took a stab at guessing where it was we're going - she guessed Indianapolis for Indy 500, which frankly is a pretty good guess considering the information that I gave, but it wasn't the right one! We're heading to (Spring) International Quilt Market in Minneapolis!
For those of you who may not know, International Quilt Market is a giant (and I mean giant) trade show that is held twice a year - the Fall one is always in Houston and the Spring one moves around. Fabric companies and designers all converge to show off their new collections and designs for the upcoming season, oftentimes these items won't be released to the public for another six months. Fabric shops (online, and brick and mortar shops) attend Market to decide what fabrics, patterns, notions, etc they want to purchase for their shops in person; often designers attend Market to show their fabric and pattern designs to reps in the hopes of either being picked up by a company or as a means of getting their name out there.
Market is going to be awesome all by it self, and I'll finally get to meet in real life a lot of people that I originally met online such as Jennifer, Cara, Monica, and Lissa. There are also a few other people who've said they'd like to meet like Kate Spain. I also have serious plans to do a little stalking...by stalking I mean continuously walking past their booths taking covert photos...maybe I'll work up the nerve to approach a couple of them...Amy Butler, Heather Bailey, Camille Roskelley, Anna Maria Horner anyone? Teehee!
But, one of the big reasons that I am heading to Market is to show my quilt pattern designs to some reps and other people! It's just so cool! Above you can see a sneak peak of one of my most recent patterns made using fabrics from Kate Spain's Verna Line. This is part of the reason why I haven't been able to show much of what I've been working on lately - gotta keep the patterns under wraps until after Market ( and hopefully a little longer too)! We'll see what happens.
Jennifer is the only person who has seen some of the new designs and we had a pretty funny moment talking over BlackBerry messenger last night when I mentioned to her that I was looking for a 1/4" foot for my sewing machine. Jennifer asked me what had happened to my old one, and I said that I had never had one, her response was "what?? how do you piece?". I explained that I just did it by eye. This may not seem funny to anyone who hasn't quilted and had to worry about seams lining up exactly, but I found it pretty entertaining.
Okay, I'm off to do some schoolwork now and the I have to leave for class in an hour and half.. Less than two weeks and I'll be done this semester (thank goodness). I'll be back tomorrow with the giveaway winner and the "infamous apricot scone recipe".
10 comments:
Oh my goodness, I can't believe you don't have a 1/4" foot! I only made one quilt without one, and luckily my mom had an extra one she was willing to give me. It has made my life so much easier - you will love it!!!
That's so awesome that you're going to quilt market. Best of luck with your quilt patterns - I love the sneak peak! (And do I understand you've never been to Target before?!?! You're in for some fun!)I love going to Quilt Market. It is a ball and it is tough to get to sleep at night. You don't have to worry about stalking anyone....just walk right up and say hi....these are the nicest people you will ever meet, honestly. I have not run into one cold person there. Have fun and wear comfy shoes :) Maybe I'll see you there....I'm a very tall red head...lol.
ps....I'm hosting 30 days of giveaways...stop over to my blog and put your name in.