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HighTower said Monday that it recruited a former UBS (UBS) team to open an office for the independent firm in San Diego. On Tuesday, Baird said it recruited five advisors from Merrill Lynch (BAC), Morgan Stanley (MS), JPMorgan (JPM) and Spectrum to join its operations in California, Oregon and Texas.
Chicago-based HighTower is owned by its 65 advisors, who operate in a fee-based independent model, while Milwaukee-based Baird is owned by many of its 700-plus employee advisors, along with management and other staff.
Joining HighTower in San Diego are David Molnar and Drew Nordlicht, who have a total of 40 years of experience in the financial services industry, specialize in the venture capital sector and have about $330 million in assets under management. With the addition of the Molnar/Nordlicht Group, HighTower has added six teams in 2012, and new-team assets have surpassed those of 2011.
"The Molnar/Nordlicht Group joined HighTower because they understand that it's the best option for their clients," said Mike Papedis (left), HighTower's executive vice president of business development, in a press release. "Our unique platform harnesses the competitive power of Wall Street for our clients' benefit. We simply have more choices and better prices."
Molnar and Nordlicht, who most recently worked as advisors for UBS, were also advisors at Smith Barney earlier in their careers.
"Over the last few years, we've studied the changing landscape of our industry. We came to the conclusion that HighTower is the only firm that is positioned to meet our needs and our clients' needs—both now and in the future," Molnar said in a statement. "We are pleased to join this dynamic partnership."
Baird's New Recruits
Baird's most recent recruits include ex-Morgan Stanley Smith Barney advisor Patty Estopinal in Roseville, Calif. Estopinal has about $1 million in annual production, $175 million in assets under management and operates in the greater Sacramento area.
The Fields Nichols Group of Portland, Ore., joined Baird last week from Merrill Lynch with about $1.1 million in yearly fees and commissions and $170 million in assets. The team is led by Matthew Fields and Tonya Nichols.
Jayson Bales moved to Baird in Dallas from Spectrum Financial Group, where he managed about $65 million in assets and had some $635,000 in yearly production.
In nearby Fort Worth, Steve Phillips joined Baird from JPMorgan Chase & Co. with roughly $50 million in assets and $50,000 in yearly fees and commissions.


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'Women and money': Prosecutors suggest motives in Abshire pretrial hearing
If Eric Abshire were a grieving widower, he had a strange way of showing it. According to information presented by prosecutors Thursday, between the death and burial of his wife, the Orange County man had sex with one woman, and he flashed a topless photo of another woman mere hours after the mangled body of Justine Abshire was found on a dark road near Barboursville.
The lurid details emerged during an October 6 pre-trial hearing in Orange Circuit Court, where the 36-year-old widower will stand for trial next week on a first-degree murder charge.
Top motives when a husband murders his wife are "women and money," declared Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Rick Moore. "We have those in this case."
Moore told the court that while dating and married to Justine, Eric Abshire had been involved with as many as eight other women. But it's what Abshire allegedly did in the days surrounding his wife's demise that sent shudders throught the courtroom and brought protests from the defense.
On the day of Justine's death, prosecutor Moore said, Abshire allegedly showed at least one person a "topless or nude photo" of a female acquaintance. Upon flashing the photo, which he carried in his wallet, Moore said, Abshire mentioned Justine's parents, Steve and Heidi Swartz, then traveling to Virginia from their home in Tennessee after getting word of their daughter's death.
"They probably aren't going to want to see this," Abshire allegedly said.
Abshire told authorities he found the body of his wife on Taylorsville Road on November 3, 2006. The blonde 27-year-old, a kindergarden teacher, was the apparent victim of a hit and run; but authorities now say that Eric Abshire brutally killed her and then staged a phony accident scene.
"Would his love for his wife prevent him from killing her?" asked Moore. "The affection wasn't there because the affection was spread all over."
In open court, Moore reeled off the names of three of Eric Abshire's alleged extra-marital sexual partners and noted that the allegedly sexually prolific dump truck driver had intercourse with one of the women in the days between his wife's death and funeral.
In deference to requests from both the defense and prosecution, both expressing concern that such details could hinder jury selection in the rural community, the Hook has agreed to withhold the identities for now.
The prosecution also noted the amount of insurance money Abshire stood to receive if his wife died in a hit-and-run.
"He could have collected $1.5 million," said Moore, listing five policies for which Abshire was the beneficiary, and asking the court to allow evidence of a financial motive for murder. Moore revealed that Abshire was no stranger to insurance claims, having filed 12 of them in automotive and other cases between 2000 and 2009.
"Here is someone," said Moore, "who is very familiar with filing insurance claims."
Charles Weber, Abshire's court-appointed attorney, offered five motions on behalf of his client including a request to shield "prior acts" from the jury. Citing "so many incidents," Weber suggested that Abshire's history, replete with protective orders and assault arrests, wouldn't relate to the events surrounding his wife's death.
In an earlier hearing, the Orange County Commonwealth's Attorney asserted that Abshire has a history of manual strangulation, citing an allegedly painful but not permanently injurious act against the mother of his two children. Judge Daniel Bouton declined to rule, explaining that the court will consider evidence of Abshire's history on a "case by case" basis.
During the three-hour hearing, Abshire sat expressionless in the orange jumpsuit issued by the Central Virginia Regional Jail. Shackled and handcuffed, he spoke only when the judge asked him to reenter his "not guilty" plea, one of several procedural issues to take place since a grand jury issued a fresh indictment last month to replace one issued late last year.
One defense motion asked the court to exclude testimony about Justine's "habits"– for instance, whether she would have been likely to leave her home around midnight on a chilly evening. As previously reported, Abshire claims the couple had an argument on that fateful night five years ago. According to Abshire, Justine drove off in her 2002 Ford Mustang before quickly calling to report car trouble. Abshire claims when he went to render aid, he discovered his dead or dying wife before rushing to a nearby house to call 911.
As the investigation progressed, prosecutors and police revealed a litany of details suggesting that the scene was no accident. Besides finding no evidence of mechanical problems with the woman's car, they said Justine's body showed 113 separate injuries. Conspicuously absent, they added, was much blood at the scene– or any "strike marks," injuries typical when a vehicle hits a standing pedestrian.
Throughout the investigation, Abshire has insisted his story is valid and maintained his innocence.
Justine's parents, Steve and Heidi Swartz, who have long suspected their former son-in-law, sat stoically as the motions were presented. While previously outspoken, they declined comment following the hearing, citing proximity of the trial.
The trial is slated to begin October 12.Read more on: eric abshireJustine Swartz Abshire
7 comments
This will be an interesting trial. May justice be served for Justine.
Deleted by moderator
He had better stuff at home than he was running around chasing. Dump truck drivers are not the sharpest crayons in the box to begin with. Shoot him and forget about it.
dEm beady eyes scurr me mane
This is proof that the kindest best looking women always go for the biggest losers they can find. It is truly amazing.
As somebody who is extremely close to the family and to the case, the topless photo remarks in here are false. The topless photo was of his ex girlfriend from the 1990's....he was not flashing it, nor did he keep it in his wallet...An ex-friend of Eric is the one who pointed out to searchers in the home of the photo and it's location. It is not relevant to the case at all, besides the fact that Eric is a giant sleezebag. This woman did not have any physical relationship with Eric after 1997 and more importantly while Eric was married to Justine or during his entire on and off again relationship with the mother of his two children. So please make sure you have all of the facts, before anything is published (like that will work).
As somebody who is extremely close to the family and to the case, the topless photo remarks in here are false. The topless photo was of his ex girlfriend from the 1990's....he was not flashing it, nor did he keep it in his wallet...An ex-friend of Eric is the one who pointed out to searchers in the home of the photo and it's location. It is not relevant to the case at all, besides the fact that Eric is a giant you know what.... This woman did not have any physical relationship with Eric after 1997 and more importantly while Eric was married to Justine or during his entire on and off again relationship with the mother of his two children. So please make sure you have all of the facts, before anything is published (like that will work).

subset: commoncrawl


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Ark. senators split on discrimination bill
Arkansas' U.S. senators split on a measure now headed to the House that outlaws workplace discrimination against gay, bisexual and transgender Americans.
Democratic Sen. Mark Pryor voted for the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, while Republican Sen. John Boozman opposed the measure. The proposal passed that chamber on a 64-32 vote.
The bill would prohibit employers with 15 or more workers from using a person's sexual orientation or gender identity as the basis for making employment decisions, including hiring, firing, compensation or promotion. It would exempt religious institutions and the military.
The measure heads to the House, where it faces heavy opposition.
Pryor is a two-term senator who is running for re-election against Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Cotton next year. Boozman was elected to the Senate in 2010.


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BalticClimate videos and photos
The 6th Baltic Climate project Newsleter has been issued
BalticClimate report on climate change perceptions includes detailed results of the surveys implemented in 2009 and 2011 in seven BalticClimate Target Areas as well as two questionnaires usable for any interested person!
The BalticClimate Conference, held in
The project team has just launched the registration for the BalticClimate Conference, which will be held on Nov 7th – 8th,
Within the past months BalticClimate project Target Areas with their unique approach to climate change adaptation and mitigation have been represented on the weekly TV program "Vides Fakti" ("Environmental Facts") on Latvia TV.
BalticClimate Final Conference will take place on November 8th and 9th 2011 in Riga


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Can you explain to me Eastern Orthodox Church's Theology? Do they still represent true Christianity?
As I am sure you can appreciate, this is a huge question. Let me recommend a recent book from a Reformed writer on the subject. Orthodox Presbyterian minister and professor Robert Letham has written a fine book entitled Through Western Eyes - Eastern Orthodoxy: A Reformed Perspective (ISBN-10: 1845502477; ISBN-13: 9781845502478). This book is published by Christian Focus, an English publisher (Dr. Letham is currently teaching in Wales).
The Eastern Orthodox Church is often referred to as the Church of the Seven Councils because it has not materially advanced theologically beyond those councils. Whereas the Western church developed from Augustine's insights on grace and justification (albeit differently among its various branches), with a forensic or legal bent, the Eastern church tended to develop in terms of a more mystical approach, not emphasizing justification but theosis (or deification). The Eastern Orthodox church tends to regard the Western Church, in both its Roman and Protestant branches, as too rationalistic because of its particular theological development (think Anselm on the atonement or Westminster on the covenant) as opposed to the apophatic approach of the East, in which theology is done largely by via negative, God being defined by what he is not, being best known mystically. If all this seems a bit chewy to you, that's all the more reason to consult Letham's book or a good article on Eastern Orthodoxy.
In terms, then, of Eastern Orthodoxy representing true Christianity, it is Trinitarian, affirming the first two councils. It properly affirms the Incarnation, as do the 3rd and 4th councils. But the Eastern Orthodox Church does not have our doctrines of depravity, atonement, justification, etc. I am sure that you have many more questions but I trust that this is of some value to you.
"Questions and Answers" is a weekly feature of the OPC website. The answers come from individual ministers in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church expressing their own convictions and do not necessarily represent an "official" position of the Church, especially in areas where the Standards of the Church (the Scriptures and the Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms) are silent.
The questions come from individuals like yourself. If you have questions about biblical and theological matters, you are invited to send them by e-mail by using the "Pose a Question" link on the OPC home page or by clicking here.
At least one new question is posted each week, so there should always be something new here for you to read. (For those people who would like to look at previous questions and answers, they will continue to be available as well.)
The purpose of the OPC website's "Questions and Answers" is to respond to biblical and theological questions. Matters of church discipline, disputes, or debates go beyond the scope of our work. We recommend that you present your concerns in these areas to the appropriate judicatory. In most cases this will be to a local pastor, elder, or session. We do not want the website to replace personal involvement in, or commitment to, the local, visible church.
While we will respond to every serious questioner, we are not bound to give a substantive answer to every question, should we deem the question to be beyond the scope of our purpose or our own ability to answer.
You will receive an answer by e-mail. Please be patient as many of our respondents are busy pastors. The response to your question may take up to two (2) weeks. Some of the questions submitted will be chosen to be posted here, along with the corresponding answers.
Note that the "Questions and Answers" posted on the site have been editedall personal references are removed, Scripture references or from some source may be added, and sometimes portions are expandedto make the questions and answers more useful to a larger audience.
|© 2020 The Orthodox Presbyterian Church
Chaplains and Military Personnel


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Minecraft Towny Servers, page 6
Servers: 1326
Towny is a versatile, player-controlled land management plugin for use with Bukkit/Tekkit/Spigot/Libigot. Towny offers solutions for pvp, griefing, chat, inflated economies and monsters to minecraft server admins. Towny allows players to work together and against each other as they see fit. Find here the best Minecraft Towny servers.


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I <3 HUCKABEES Principal Photography Has Begun
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Super Genius
Joined: 27 Jul 1999
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Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2003 3:18 pm
Post subject: I <3 HUCKABEES Principal Photography Has Begun
HOLLYWOOD, Calif., June 30 /PRNewswire/ -- Principal photography has begun in Los Angeles on the existential comedy I HEART HUCKABEES (pronounced I HEART HUCKABEES) featuring an ensemble cast that includes two-time Academy Award(R)- winner Dustin Hoffman (RAIN MAN, KRAMER VS. KRAMER), Isabelle Huppert (LA DENTELLIERE, 8 FEMMES), Oscar(R) nominee Jude Law (THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY, ROAD TO PERDITION), Jason Schwartzman (RUSHMORE, SPUN), Oscar nominee Lily Tomlin (NASHVILLE, SHORT CUTS), Mark Wahlberg (THE ITALIAN JOB, THREE KINGS) and Naomi Watts (THE RING, MULHOLLAND DRIVE).
I HEART HUCKABEES is directed and co-written by David O. Russell.
Russell's first film, SPANKING THE MONKEY, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Sundance Audience Award in 1994. It also was named Best First Feature and Best First Screenplay at the Independent Spirit Awards. His second film was the acclaimed comedy, FLIRTING WITH DISASTER. THREE KINGS came out in 1999 and appeared in over 100 critic's top ten lists and won the Boston Film Critic's Association's Best Film of the Year. The film marks co-writer Jeff Baena's first feature film screenplay put into production.
Producers on the film are Oscar-nominated Scott Rudin (THE HOURS, THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS), Gregory Goodman (8 MILE, THREE KINGS) and David O. Russell, with Michael Kuhn (BEING JOHN MALKOVICH, WILD AT HEART) as executive producer. The director of photography is Peter Deming (MULHOLLAND DRIVE, FROM **** ) and the production designer is KK Barrett (LOST IN THE TRANSLATION, BEING JOHN MALKOVICH). The entire shoot will take place in Los Angeles and is set to wrap in early September.
In I HEART HUCKABEES, a husband-and-wife team (Dustin Hoffman, Lily
Tomlin) play detective, but not in the traditional sense. Instead, the happy duo helps others solve their existential issues, the kind that keep you up at night, wondering what it all means...
The film is being produced and financed by N1 European Film Produktions-GmbH & Co. KG with production advisory services supplied by Qwerty Films Limited. The project was brought to Fox Searchlight Pictures by Claudia Lewis, Executive Vice President of Production.
Fox Searchlight's rights are limited to North America, Latin America, UK, German and Italian territories (other territories being sold by Icon Entertainment International). Fox Searchlight is a filmmaker-oriented company that focuses on distinctive films helmed by world-class auteurs and exciting newcomers. It has its own marketing, distribution and publicity operations, and its films are distributed internationally by Twentieth Century Fox. Fox Searchlight Pictures is a unit of Fox Filmed Entertainment, a unit of Fox Entertainment Group.
SOURCE Fox Searchlight Pictures
[This message has been edited by Mark Shields (edited June 30, 2003).]
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Joined: 16 Jul 2001
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Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2003 6:10 pm
Post subject:
Thanks for the great news.
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Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2003 5:27 pm
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Thank you very much Mark
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Posted: Thu Jul 03, 2003 3:39 pm
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Thanks for the update Mark
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Site Admin
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Location: San Francisco, CA
Posted: Wed Aug 06, 2003 11:54 pm
Post subject:
Posted it last week on my website, the first pic - taken by director David O. Russell from the set (minus Mark, Naomi & Jude) was posted by
Fox Searchlight
. They promise more updates and looks good on updates if its anything like what they're doing for Bend it Like Beckham (which is a great movie if you haven't seen it yet) and Le Divorce.
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Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2003 6:11 pm
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Thank you for the update Lianne
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Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2003 9:56 pm
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Thanks for the info Lianne.
The Z Review has pics from the filming of Huckabee's.
[This message has been edited by Kazuko (edited August 26, 2003).]
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Nathalie Cage
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Posted: Wed Aug 27, 2003 4:00 pm
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Thanks Mark S. and Lianne
Love and Kisses Nathalie
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Posted: Sat Aug 30, 2003 6:52 pm
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Thanks Kazuko.
People magazine, Sept 8th issue has a pic of Mark on his bike with Jason and one of Dustin & Lily. My scanner doesn't work, but I'm sure someone will scan it and post it.
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The secret stairs bookcase was clever and beautiful. This climbing library is clever and beautiful and comfy. Like the stair bookcase, you can't go up and down, but you can also use it to lay down and read comfortably.
See that red cube sticking out of the wall? That's the library.
It's part of a an extension to another house, created by Dialect Design in Charlotte, North Carolina. [Apartment Therapy]


text:
Introducing Interventor™: Hydrasun's unique load-bearing hose solution for surface to seabed fluid delivery.
Applications include Well Intervention, Pipeline Commissioning and Emergency Response.
Hydrasun is a recognised market leader in the provision of integrated fluid transfer, power and control solutions to the oil and gas, renewable energy, OEM, marine and defence industries worldwide.


text:
I was going to talk about a cool recent paper that described the evolution of novelties by way of modifying modular gene networks, but I started scribbling it up and realized that I was constantly backtracking to explain some fundamental concepts, so I stopped. I was concerned because one of the most common sources of confusion I've found in my students in the past was difficulty in distinguishing phenotypes from the complexities of the underlying genotype, and I have to be slow and thorough in setting up those differences early on until it sinks in, a habit I'm continuing here. It's so easy for students to reify a trait, like eye color, into a single discrete property that must be somewhere on a chromosome. It's not. It's so much messier than that.
Let's talk about eye color in flies. Drosophila eyes have a characteristic brick red color, and the most famous mutation in flies is white, which produces distinctly white-eyed flies. Eye color is too complex to be described as the product of a single locus and only two alleles, though: there's actually a whole battery of genes that work together to produce eye color.
For example, the specific color of the eye is the product of mixing two pigments, drosopterin and xanthommatin, in appropriate proportions in the pigment cells of the eye. So we've actually got at least two genes, brown or bw for short, that is part of the pathway that makes drosopterin, a bright red pigment from guanine, and scarlet or st, that's part of the pathway to make xanthommatin, the brown pigment. Each of these pigments is produced in a more complex way than is illustrated here — xanthommatin is produced from the amino acid tryptophan by a series of enzymes, tryptophan pyrrolase, formamidase, kynurenine-3-hydroxylase, and phenoxazinone synthetase — but this story is already complicated enough, so in this diagram we reduce all that to just a couple of arrows.
So there are two parallel pathways to produce the eye color. There is a brown pathway that produces a red pigment, and a scarlet pathway that produces a brown pigment. The names might be a bit confusing (they always are for my students), but it's part of a standard genetics convention: the genes are named for their effect in mutants, not wild type forms. If you knock out the brown gene with a mutation, the fly will be unable to make the red pigment, but it will still make the brown pigment, so the eye will look brown. See? Makes perfect sense.
Conversely, if you knock out the scarlet gene with a mutation, the fly will not be able to make the brown pigment, but it will continue to produce the red pigment, so the eye will look bright red.
All you have to do is think about genetics for a few years, and don't worry, this inversion of names will someday begin to seem perfectly natural. It's just another peculiarity of the genetical mind that makes geneticists weirdos on campus.
Now for the test: if you knock out both the brown and the scarlet genes, what do you get? They don't make the brown pigment, and they also don't make the red pigment, so the eye color would be…?
If you realized it would be unpigmented or white, give yourself a kewpie doll. Eye color is primarily the product of two gene products, a red and brown pigment, which are produced by multi-step enzymatic reactions that offer multiple points for possible disruption. This one trait is the outcome of a whole series of genes.
I mentioned at the beginning that the white-eyed fly was the most famous Drosophila mutant. Have we just explained how that mutant was created? No we have not. As it turns out, the white mutation was in a single gene, but again, not a gene that directly makes a pigment. White is a mutation that makes a defective a transporter protein — the mutant blocks the transport of the precursors tryptophan and guanine into the cell, so it has no raw materials to make the pigments. In the wild-type fly, there is a complex sequence of events that results in the ultimate production of two pigments in the eye.
Defects in white, scarlet, and brown disrupt different events in the sequence, with white upstream, or epistatic, to the other two. White affects both branches of the pathway, while scarlet and brown each affect one.
Whoa, so this is already getting complicated, and we haven't even dug into the details of each pathway. The proportions of the two pigments that end up in each eye are dependent on the relative rates of each of the two branches, so subtle mutations can change the hue of the eye; variations in intermediate steps can produce aberrant byproducts with odd colors; and of course, this whole collection of genes has to be regulated to be expressed in the right place. The whole fly isn't brick red, just the eyes, so this process has to be switched on in only a subset of cells.
At this point, you could just give up, if you were a creationist. It's too complex, there are too many bits and pieces, and everything is interlinked — even if you could get it too evolve, the interdependencies must lock the whole grand network into one rigid pattern where you can't break one thing without the whole thing collapsing like a house of cards. But you'd be completely wrong.
It's counter-intuitive, but it turns out that this complexity actually enables the evolution of interesting novelties. I'll get to that either tomorrow or the day after…be patient.
Diagrams are from Klug, Cummings, Spencer, and Palladino, Concepts of Genetics, 9th edition.
(Also on Sb)


text:
There are no Upcoming Shows listed for this comedian.
Rick Kunkler
Rick Kunkler has been performing in theaters and musical shows since childhood. At the age of 20, after placing as a finalist in the Seattle Laugh Off as well as the Rocky Mountain Comedy competition, Rick moved to Los Angeles to expand his professional career. Within 2 months of arriving in L.A., he landed his first audition, appearing on the sitcom "Becker." Since then, Rick Kunkler has surfaced on every major television network, filming numerous pilots including NBC's "Fantasy Island." After performing in the Montreal Comedy Festival, Kunkler hosted his own show, MTV's "Suspect." Rick has also been featured on "Last Comic Standing," shot 2 films including the award winning short film "Closing Time" which premiered at Mann's Chinese theater in Hollywood. Other appearances of note include "That 80's Show," a featured sketch on "Jimmy Kimmel Live", and as a comedy guest on "Funny Money GSN." Rick's name has emerged in the Sunday New York Times and the Hollywood Reporter as an "up and comer." Currently, Rick hosts "The Search For The Perfect Girlfriend" on The Playboy Network, still finding time to perform at clubs and colleges all over the country with rave reviews, and recently returned from the Middle East performing comedy for the U.S. troops. As a musician, Rick plays a variety of instruments which include, but not limited to, the piano, banjo, ukulele, guitar, and harmonica. Rick Kunkler is a consummate entertainer, and although he doesn't like to admit it, he has also trained in ballet, tapdance, singing, and even dabbled in Shakespeare, reprising the role of Hamlet, with great success.
Rick Kunkler's Upcoming Shows
Rick Kunkler is Known For


text:
The original Datsun 240Z is considered one of the most iconic and important sports cars ever made. The two-seat coupe offered great performance, exotic looks, a reasonable price tag — and it didn't leak oil on the showroom floor, unlike some of its European competition. The car hammered its British and Italian rivals and helped to truly put the Japanese auto industry on the map.
But over the years, like all cars, the Z has grown bigger, heavier, and more expensive. No one will dispute the outstanding performance offered by the current 370Z, but it's kind of a far cry from the original. Some of the earlier Z cars were guilty of the same, like the twin turbo 300ZX of the 1990s.
So what should the next Z be? A light, affordable coupe with moderate power and an even more moderate price tag, like a Scion FR-S/Subaru BRZ, or a more expensive performance machine?
Noted car hoarder and occasionally funny comedian Jay Leno took a trip to Japan recently to find out the answer to that very question. Watch as he visits Nissan's design studio and examines some concept drawings for the next Z, some of which appear to be pretty radical.
While the video doesn't give us any firm details about the next car, it does appear that its exterior design will mirror the original 240Z a lot more closely than we've seen lately. Take a look and let us know what you think in the comments.
So what should the next Z be? Smaller and lighter or bigger and more expensive? Or is the current generation just right?
H/T Speedhunters!


text: At this year's Macworld | iWorld event, iOS apps took center stage -- which wasn't hard for a trade show of ever-diminishing relevance. Apple no longer supports the show with the grand spectacle of an iDevice product reveal, and the event isn't even called "Expo" anymore. The show's tagline is now "The Ultimate iFanEvent," and last week's gathering felt more like a fantasy con than a buzzing hive of product announcements and demos. But at least the 2012 show, which closed Saturday, had the Mobile Apps Showcase pavilion, which featured about 75 mobile app developers demonstrating their wares. We checked out the action, and here are our picks for the apps you need to know about most. They're not necessarily the best apps, but they point to interesting new directions for mobile content. Some have been available for a few months, others just launched, and others should debut in the coming months.Totally Amp'd Aimed at tweens, Totally Amp'd takes a 10-episode season of a Nickelodeon-style musical sitcom, and invites its young users to embellish the content with a suite of interactive features. The interactive elements look gimmicky on the surface, but demonstrate how traditionally passive video content can be, well, amped up. The "show," as it were, is about a group of teens who form a pop group after being rejected by a music label executive. After you watch each segment -- the developer calls them "appisodes" -- you can interact with various elements of the show through in-app music, movie and design studios. The design studio lets users create their own attire (e.g., dresses, jeans, sneakers), and all these items can be saved and shared with friends. The movie studio puts you in the role of video editor. You can recut a scene -- changing views and mashing up video clips -- to create a new version of what you saw. The music studio lets you record your own vocals and remix songs. For example, you can amp up the guitar to give a song a harder rocking feel, or turn up the strings for something more mellow. "The teenagers that have been here are very interested," XMG Studio representative Lydia Schaele said at the Macworld booth. "They especially love the music studio, and that they can record their own voice." Parents have also shown a lot of interest in the app, Schaele said, as it encourages kids to be creative. The app is free to try out with the first episode. But if the content reels you in, you'll have to make a one-time $5 in-app purchase to get the rest of the season's segments and complementary interactive activities.iStopMotion Hardcore computer users will argue that tablets like the iPad can't really be used for content creation -- that tablets don't have the processing power or precision control for content production. This new app shows critics they're wrong, leveraging the unique hardware package that only a tablet provides. Whether you're a budding filmmaker or just a bored iPad owner, you can have tons of fun messing around with the new iStopMotion iPad app. The $5 app makes it exceedingly easy to produce entertaining stop-motion videos. The basic stop-motion technique, also called stop-animation, is perhaps most famously used in clay animation content, like the "California Raisins" commercial produced by LAIKA, but has also been employed in much more polished content. For example, the monstrous walking AT-ATs in The Empire Strikes Back were animated via stop-motion. With iStopMotion, you capture your animation frame by frame, using your iPad's camera. As you shoot away, the app places an overlay of your previous photo over each new photo, granting better control over how choppy or smooth your resulting video will look. The app also has traditional time-lapse features, so you can set the iPad in a stationary position and let it snap away, rather than meticulously controlling each onscreen movement. In either case, an instant playback feature lets you monitor exactly how your film is looking, and a shot-by-shot timeline helps remind you how each shot fits in with your story's big picture. If you'd rather shoot with your iPhone camera instead of the sorely inferior iPad camera, there's a companion Remote Camera app you can use for the smartphone. Unfortunately, you don't get the convenient overlay feature on the iPhone app. iStopMotion was released in the App Store Dec. 21, and was given a "Macworld Best of Show" award.Sky Gnomes Foursaken Media is an app team of four brothers based out of Raleigh, North Carolina. They just launched a game in the App Store -- Mad Chef, a wild restaurant-management sim -- but it's their beta product, Sky Gnomes, that really caught our fancy. Sky Gnomes is a racing game. You fall from the sky toward the Earth on your "snow engine," a joystick-operated snowmobile-like contraption. Your snow engine is powered by snow, so as you race, you have to pick up snow flurries that are also falling through the air for fuel. You can customize your ride with magnets and other trinkets that give you extra power, abilities and swag. Now here's the real innovation: Although you don't compete against other players in real time, you still compete against "real" players. The app saves every player's race on a centralized server, and automatically loads other players' races as your Sky Gnome competitors. "It gives you a real sense of other players' ability," Foursaken developer Jamie Jackson Jackson said, but doesn't suffer network latency like in true real-time gameplay.Tour Wrist TourWrist isn't new to the App Store, but it's about to get a killer new feature in its next update. TourWrist lets you view 360-degree, panoramic views of rooms, landmarks and foreign locations so you feel like you're actually experiencing them in person. Currently, the content on TourWrist is professionally sourced, and includes everything from urban cityscapes and building tours to tropical resorts and lush forests. The experience is impressive: It uses your iDevice's gyroscope so that as you turn your iPhone or iPad (up, down or around you in a circle), you see every inch of a scene. You can also switch to a mode that lets you control your view of the panorama with touch, but the gyroscope-powered mode is infinitely cooler. It feels like you're inside an invisible sphere of another world. The app is best viewed on an iPad for its larger, more immersive display. Soon, you won't be limited to only viewing these stunning virtual scenes in-app -- you'll be able to photograph them as well. It takes about a minute to shoot a 360-degree scene, which is compiled from 10 different images. The app recognizes where photos overlap, and seamlessly stitches them together. Once that's done, you can name, save, and upload your panorama to Tour Wrist so others can share your experience. You can also share it on social media sites, or grab an embed code to put it on your website -- particularly useful for realtors hoping to attract future tenants, or businesses that want to show off their swanky digs. Other apps offer similar 360-degree panorama features, but TourWrist feels incredibly polished by comparison, both in panorama execution and in its user interface. TourWrist also has an API available to developers so that other apps can use and publish to its platform.Runmeter, Cyclemeter, Walkmeter Abvio is a veteran in the exercise-tracking app space. The company has iterated its three sister products, Runmeter, Cyclemeter and Walkmeter, for version 7.0, making the collection one of the most obsessively complete app suites for monitoring and analyzing workouts. All three apps are built on the same platform so they offer the same features, but are tailored to running, cycling, and walking, respectively. The apps tap into the GPS function of your iPhone, and help you track your activities on a map, in a calendar, and in graphs. Abvio's apps are completely iOS-based -- there are no accompanying web apps, and all information about your exercise is stored in the apps themselves. The software trio features social media integration and text-to-speech technology. So, for example, if you tweet that you're about to break a distance record, and your friends tweet back to urge you on, the app will read those tweets to you aloud. Version 7.0 includes an updated stopwatch feature that lets you track and display more information than pretty much any other exercise app around. It can display more than 150 different data statistics, broken down into time or distance-based "splits," like each mile of a bike ride. You can set up and personalize pages of information to get the statistics and visuals that interest you most, and the apps now have a history feature that saves all of your past workout info directly to your iPhone. You can go back and look at your past milestones by year, month, week or day, or by specific workout. Runmeter, Cyclemeter and Walkmeter are $5 from the App Store.MacPractice Clipboard This isn't an app for everyone -- it's designed for doctors, dentists, optometrists, and other medical professionals. But it's an iPad app I hope to start seeing in offices across the country after it lands in the App Store in the very near future. MacPractice Clipboard takes the pain and redundancy out of office visits. You know how you normally have to fill out form upon form, writing in the same personal information over and over again, even though the office already knows some of your data? This app streamlines that process, pairing with the MacPractice Mac app that's already available to physicians. In short, it takes all the patient data already available in the Mac app, and delivers it to the iPad. All you, the patient, need to do is verify the information on the virtual forms, tap in anything that's missing, and then sign your name on a digital release form using your finger. If an office has a few iPads floating around instead of pen and paper clipboards, MacPractice Clipboard could streamline dentist and doctor visits for every patient. And by keeping all of this information digital, it should make the lives of office staff much easier, too. Besides saving typing time, offices could eliminate scanning, printing and filing paper forms as well. For an eco-conscious office, this translates into fewer slain trees. All of MacPractice's software (mobile and desktop) is ONC-ATCB 2011-2012 Certified. This means that offices and practitioners that take advantage of this app are eligible for some of the $19 billion in funding that's been set aside by the government for individuals who are trying to reduce medical costs and improve patient care by going digital. Using MacPractice, or a similar app, is like a win-win-win. The only obvious losers are the paper and printer companies (sorry Dunder Mifflin!).Splashtop If you need to emulate your Mac or Windows desktop on your iPad, or you're dead set on showing some Flash video or animation, the Splashtop app (and accompanying desktop software) is one of the easiest ways to do it. The utility of Splashtop shows we haven't transitioned to a completely mobile world just yet, but that new era is certainly within reach. Splashtop is a Macworld veteran, debuting at last year's conference. The cloud-based service lets you connect to a remote desktop or notebook over Wi-Fi, logging in from a web browser, and then accessing everything on your PC or Mac from your mobile device. This means all of your desktop files and programs will appear on your iOS device, all without syncing. You can even watch video from your desktop on your iPad, but only at 30 fps maximum. Using the app is straightforward enough, although using one's finger as a mouse pointer can be a bit of a challenge -- and something Steve Jobs would certainly have cringed at. Splashtop would probably come in most handy when you need to share information with coworkers or clients at a meeting, and you don't have access to a projector, or when you need to share interactive data from your desktop that can't be accessed using other iPad apps. Splashtop is $3, and its companion Mac and PC streaming software is free.TurboViewer Computer-assisted design on an iPad? Yes! CAD functionality isn't solely limited to high-performance, desktop computers. There is a number of CAD iPad apps available already, but TurboViewer is the first with a native DWG file viewer for iOS. You can pan, zoom or 3-D orbit through DWG and DXF files, plus tap into another two dozen file formats the app supports. "The iPad is reinventing CAD with its portability, sensors, GPS, built-in camera and battery life," CEO Royal Farros said at the TurboViewer booth. Dragging my finger from one view to another, looking at every angle of a 3-D model, was flawlessly smooth. And if you get lost in your 3-D diagram (an entirely reasonable possibility if it's even mildly complex), you can pull down specific views from the upper right corner. Eventually, Farros said, you'll be able to use TurboViewer like an x-ray machine thanks to augmented reality. You'll be able to point your iPad at walls and see right through the walls to where pipes, beams, and electrical conduits are positioned thanks to blueprints in the app. The TurboViewer booth also demoed "AngryCAD," an app that lets you take whatever project you're working on and explode it on screen. No, not explode it as in creating an "exploded view." Rather, the app virtually destroys the content using an open-source physics engine so that your castle, automotive design, or other structure bursts into pieces with maximum realism. Shouldn't every profession should have a cathartic tool like this? TurboViewer is free and available now, and a Pro version packed with dozens more features (like the ability to convert file types in the cloud) is $20. AngryCAD should be available as a standalone app in the next few months. Photos: Ariel Zambelich/Wired


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Thousands of practitioners use "electrodiagnostic" devices to help select their recommended treatment. Many claim to determine the cause of any disease by detecting the "energy imbalance" causing the problem. Some also claim that the devices can detect whether someone is allergic or sensitive to foods, deficient in vitamins, or has defective teeth. Some claim they can tell whether a disease, such as cancer or AIDS, is not present. One Mexican clinic even claimed that such a device could be used to cure cancer [1]. The diagnostic procedure is most commonly referred to as Electroacupuncture according to Voll (EAV) or electrodermal screening (EDS), but some practitioners call it bioelectric functions diagnosis (BFD), bio resonance therapy (BRT), bio-energy regulatory technique (BER), biocybernetic medicine (BM), computerized electrodermal screening (CEDS), computerized electrodermal stress analysis (CDCSA), electrodermal testng (EDT), limbic stress assessment (LSA), meridian energy analysis (MEA), or point testing. EAV devices are marketed by several companies, most of which also sponsor seminars.
EAV History
The first EAV devices were developed by Reinhold Voll, a West German physician who had been engaged in acupuncture practice in the 1950s [2]. In 1958, he combined Chinese acupuncture theory with galvanic skin differentials to produce his EAV system. His first transistorized model was the Dermatron. A few years later, one of his students (another German physician named Helmut Schimmel) simplified the diagnostic system from approximately 850 points to 60 points, made small modifications to the equipment, and went on to help create the first model of the Vegatest. Subsequent variants include the AcuGraph, Accupath 1000, Asyra, Avatar, BICOM, Bio-Tron, Biomeridian, BioScan, BioTracker, Computron, CSA 2001, DBE204, Diacom, DiagnoMètre, Eclosion, e-Lybra 8, ELAST, Interactive Query System (IQS), Interro, I-Tronic, Kindling, LISTEN System, Matrix Physique System, Meridian Energy Analysis Device (MEAD), MORA, MSAS, Oberon, Omega Acubase, Omega Vision, Orion System, Phazx, Prognos, Prophyle, Punctos III, Quest4, Sensitiv Imago, SpectraVision, Syncrometer, Vantage, Vitel 618, and ZYTO.
|Vegatest II
Proponents claim that these devices measure disturbances in the body's flow of "electro-magnetic energy" along "acupuncture meridians." [3] Some are claimed to measure "vibrations," "resonance," or "stresses" associated with body tissues and/or organs. Actually, most devices are little more than fancy galvanometers that measure electrical resistance of the patient's skin when touched by a probe. The device emits a tiny direct electric current that flows through a wire from the device to a brass cylinder covered by moist gauze, which the patient holds in one hand. A second wire is connected from the device to a probe, which the operator touches to "acupuncture points" on the patient's other hand or a foot. This completes a low-voltage circuit and the device registers the flow of current. The information is then relayed to a gauge or computer screen that provides a numerical readout on a scale of 0 to 100. According to Voll's theory: readings from 45 to 55 are normal ("balanced"); readings above 55 indicate inflammation of the organ "associated" with the "meridian" being tested; and readings below 45 suggest "organ stagnation and degeneration." However, if the moisture of the skin remains constant—as it usually does—the only thing that influences the size of the number is how hard the probe is pressed against the patient's skin. Some devices have all of their wires connected to the patient or generate their responses randomly so that the practitioner does not influence the results. The chart below is one version of Voll's scale.
In the earlier devices, the number was indicated by a needle that moved over a dial gauge. Later versions, such as the Interro pictured below, make sounds and provide the readout on a computer screen. The treatment selected depends on the scope of the practitioner's practice and may include acupuncture, dietary change, and/or vitamin supplements as well as homeopathic remedies.
Interro device. One probe is held in the patient's hand. As the other probe is touched to the patient's other hand or foot, a bar rises on the right side of the computer screen, accompanied by a noise.
The reading supposedly determines the status of various organs of the body. In 1986, while investigating the homeopathic marketplace for Consumer Reports magazine, I underwent testing with this device The Nevada Clinic in Las Vegas, Nevada. When the doctor left the examining room, I played with the device and I found that the movement of the bar and the loudness of the noise were determined only by how hard the probe was pressed to my skin [4]. After the alleged problems are "diagnosed," glass ampules containing homeopathic solutions may be placed in the metal honeycomb in the foreground and the tests are repeated to determine whether they are suitable for correcting the alleged "imbalances."
Fanciful Claims
Some EAV sellers make direct medical claims, some couch their claims in terms of correcting "imbalances," and some pretend that the device is used for "stress testing." In addition:
- Some devices are claimed to help the practitioner make as well as select the recommended remedies. The e-Lybra 8, for example, is said to provide "over 285,000 remedies at your fingertips" and to "make single or multiple remedies easily and quickly in any potency." [5]
- Some devices are claimed to restore health by rendering signals that correct "imbalances." A 1997 patent application for the LISTEN device, for example, states: "By determining the electrical resistance at different points on a patient, it is possible to determine which organs are affected by a disease. In addition, a patient can be treated by providing a radiofrequency electrical signal which restores electrical conductance at specific points to normal levels." [6]
- Some practitioners claim to use their device as aid to diagnosis rather than the sole basis for diagnosis. However, I believe they say this to make it harder for licensing boards to discipline them for nonstandard practice.
Capital University of Integrated Medicine, a nonaccredited postgraduate school that closed in 2005, offered a three-day course in "Electro Dermal Resistance Analysis." The course was said to provide "assessment of health and the treatment of imbalances of the immune system through the resistance characteristics of specific acupuncture meridians on the body" and how to "locate the systemic roots of immune system weakness and to provide stimulation to strengthen the weakness."
Phazx Systems, which ceased operations after receiving an FDA warning letter, told prospective device purchasers: "You will be able to create a new profit center, because patients will be willingly paying for the services, as well as purchasing vitamins and supplements directly from you. Often the biofeedback testing can be billed and reimbursed through insurance companies or health plans, using biofeedback CPT codes."
Scientific Reports
The Australian College of Allergy has concluded that "Vega testing is a technique of diagnosis without scientific basis." [7] In 1997, a biomedical engineer found that placing ampules in the honeycomb of a Vegatest I device did not affect the device's readings [8]. This is not surprising, because glass is not an electrical conductor.
In a double-blind study, British researchers compared its results with a Vegatest device to those of conventional skin-prick testing in 30 volunteers, half of whom had previously reacted positively for allergy to cat dander or house dust mite. Each participant was tested with 6 items by each of 3 operators in 3 separate sessions, a total of 54 tests per participant. The researchers concluded that Vegatesting does not correlate with skin prick testing and so should not be used to diagnose these allergies. The authors estimated that more than 500 EDS devices were being used in the United Kingdom to assess sensitivity to potential allergens [9].
In 1997, Swiss researchers reported the results of a study of 32 children, ages 1.5 to 16.8 years, who received 4 to 6 weeks of hospital care for atopic dermatitis (eczema). The children were randomized according to sex, age, and severity of the skin disease to receive conventional inpatient therapy plus either"active" treatment or a sham (placebo) treatment with a bioresonance device. All of the children quickly improved. The bioresonance device had no measurable effect on the outcome variables measured in this study, which refuted the claim that it could considerably influence or even cure atopic dermatitis. The researchers concluded: "Considering the high costs and false promises caused by the promoters of this kind of therapy, it is concluded that BIT has no place in the treatment of children with atopic dermatitis." [10]
In 2002, Italian researchers reported the outcome of a double-blind study that examined whether offending allergens can cause measurable variations of electromagnetic activity at specific acupuncture points. The study involved 72 individuals with asthma or hay fever and 28 healthy volunteers who were tested twice with randomly generated sequences of homeopathic dilutions of histamine, immunoglobulins, allergens, and saline (salt water) in sealed vials. The device was a DBE204. The researchers found no relation between skin conductivity changes and the type of substance contained in the vial and found wide variations in the same individual between the first and second tests of most individuals. These findings indicated that the device did not reliably determine who was allergic and who was not [11].
Government Regulation
The FDA classifies "devices that use resistance measurements to diagnose and treat various diseases" as Class III devices, which require FDA approval prior to marketing. In 1986, an FDA official informed me that the FDA Center for Devices and Radiological Health had determined that the Dermatron and Accupath 1000 were diagnostic devices that posed a "significant risk." [11] No such device can be legally marketed in the United States for diagnostic or treatment purposes. A few companies have obtained 510(k) clearance (not approval) by telling the FDA that their devices will be used for biofeedback or to measure skin resistance, but this does not entitle them to market the devices for other purposes.
EAV devices are not biofeedback devices. Biofeedback is a relaxation technique that uses an electronic device that continuously signals pulse rate, muscle tension, or other body function by tone or visual signal. In biofeedback, the signal originates and is influenced by the patient. In EAV, the signal is influenced by how hard the operator presses the probe against the patient's skin. (Pressure makes the electric current flow more easily between the device to the patient's skin.) The now-defunct International Academy of Bioenergetic Practitioners encouraged device purchasers to bill insurance companies using biofeedback codes [12]. I believe, however, that doing this could result in prosecution for insurance fraud.
The FDA has banned importation of EAV devices into the United States and warned or prosecuted a few marketers [13.] Foreign and state regulatory agencies have also taken a few actions [13]. However, no systematic effort has been made to drive them from the marketplace, and the FDA's inattention to this area is disgraceful. As a result, these bogus devices are being used by many chiropractors, naturopaths, acupuncturists, dentists, "holistic" physicians, veterinarians, self-styled "nutritionists," and various unlicensed individuals . The most common use is for prescribing homeopathic products. They are also used to determine "allergies," detect "nutrient deficiencies," diagnose "parasites" and organ "weaknesses," and locate alleged problems in teeth that contain amalgam ("silver") fillings.
Significant Risks
EAV devices pose several serious risks. The transmittal of false or misleading health information can cause emotional harm, a false sense of security, or a false set of beliefs that can lead to unwise decisions. During the past ten years, more than 200 people have told me about their experiences with EAV practitioners. In most cases, they or someone they knew wasted hundreds (or even thousands) of dollars for the test and recommended treatment. In some cases, the person tested became very frightened and wound up undergoing expensive medical tests that showed that the diagnosed conditions were not present.
Unnecessary follow-up procedures can also be a serious problem. I know of several patients who had healthy teeth extracted after being misdiagnosed with an EAV device. In another case, a man who consulted a physician about rectal bleeding and abdominal cramps was examined only with a Dermatron and told that his colon was fine. Unfortunately, the man had colon cancer—which was not diagnosed until at least seven months later when he consulted another doctor. Two others I know about had advanced cancers were erroneously told they were cancer-free. One of them was sold 33 products to get rid of "parasites" and other nonexistent problems. One victim who tried to get a refund was told that the products had been electrically specifically modified for her and could not be used for anyone else.
The strangest report I have received came from a parent who, after reading an earlier version of this article, telephoned to described how his five-year-old daughter had been tested by an unlicensed practitioner. When the child became restless, the test was continued by probing the parent's hand while the parent held the child. The parent also noted that the practitioner appeared to manipulate the results (seeking a "50" reading on the device) by moistening or drying the child's finger while testing to select the appropriate remedy.
Other Device Variations
Many other "bioenergetic" devices have been claimed useful for diagnosing and/or treating health problems. I am uncertain whether or not they should be considered EAV devices or classified in some other way. The common denominator is that they rely on detection and/or manipulation of either "vibrations" and/or a body "energy" system that have no scientific recognition. The devices include the Quantum Medical Consciousness Interface (QMCI) System (also called the EPFX or SCIO), the Orion Bioscan, the Electro Interestitial Scanner (EIS), ZYTO scanners, and various Rife frequency generators.
The Bottom Line
The devices described in this article are used to diagnose nonexistent health problems, select inappropriate treatment, and defraud insurance companies. I believe that EAV devices should be confiscated and that practitioners who use them are either delusional, dishonest, or both. If you encounter any such device, please report it to the practitioner's state licensing board, the state attorney general, the FDA, the Federal Trade Commission, the FBI, the National Fraud Information Center, and any insurance company to which the practitioner submits claims that involve use of the device. Please send copies of your complaints to me by email or by mail at 287 Fearrington Post, Pittsboro, NC 27312. You are also welcome to phone me at (919) 533-6009.
For Additional Details
- Barrett S. BioResonance tumor therapy. Quackwatch, Nov 6, 2004.
- The EAV history and roots (original method). Institute for ElectroAcupuncture & ElectroDiagnostics Web site, March 8, 1999.
- American Association of Acupuncture and Bio-Energetic Medicine. Basic explanation of the electrodermal screening test and the concepts of bio-energetic medicine. AAABEM Web site, archived Jan 28, 1999,
- Barrett S. My visit to the Nevada Clinic. Nutrition Forum 4:6-8, 1987.
- Brewitt B. Methods for treating disorders by administering radio frequency signals corresponding to growth factors. U.S. Patent Number 5,626,617, May 13, 1997. Patent Number 5,629,286 contains additional information. To access the full text of these documents, a special plug-in must be used to download them as images (click "Images" at the top or bottom of the page), a process that can take up to an hour.
- Information for e-Lybra 8. World Development Systems Web site, accessed September 4, 2007.
- Katalaris CH and others. Vega testing in the diagnosis of allergic conditions. Medical Journal of Australia 155:113-114, 1991.
- Mosenkis R. Examination of a Vegatest device. Quackwatch, Sept 4, 2001.
- Lewis GT and others. Is electrodermal testing as effective as skin prick tests for diagnosing allergies? A double blind, randomized block design study. British Journal of Medicine 322:131-134, 2001.
- Semizzi M and others. A double-blind, placebo-controlled study on the diagnostic accuracy of an electrodermal test in allergic subjects. Clinical and Experimental Allergy 32:928-932, 2002.
- Shoni MH and others. Efficacy trial of bioresonance in children with atopic dermatitis. International Archives of Allergy and Immunology 112:238-246, 1997.
- Rollings JN. Letter to Stephen Barrett, M.D., November 28, 1986.
- Bioenergetics – Space age technology available today. IABP Web site, archived Nov 8, 1999.
- Barrett S. Regulatory Actions Related to EAV Devices. Quackwatch, June 3, 2016.
This article was revised on February 14, 2018.


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Tonight was a big night out with the boys in Shibuya.
There was a great turnout, including a friend I know from Brisbane who's only been in Tokyo for three weeks.
After first getting a drink from a combini, we started off in Tasu Ichi (aka. "Love Connection").
It's a small bar slightly erring to the side of more foreigners than Japanese, but it has a nice vibe and cheap 300 yen beers. Some J guys said they liked my shirt. It felt like an English lesson so I didn't talk to them very long. If it's a J girl I don't mind it at all. Hmm..
Once we had enough of there, we moved on to Club Atom.
It's strange that tonight, after almost a year of being here, I hadn't been to any nightclubs at all.
I'm glad I hung around and didn't catch the last train. I had a great time.
Club Atom is situated on the left side of Shibuya, walking past Shibuya 109 to the area commonly referred to as "Love Hotel Hill", where there are quite a few clubs.. and love hotels.
I paid a 2500 yen entry which is a bit much for me. I was a little perturbed that the security staff rifled through my wallet. I think that's quite a bit too invasive of my privacy. What are they looking for anyway?
There are three floors to the club.
The fifth floor is the largest main dance floor playing dance music. This was probably the least interesting room to me. I just felt kind of bored here.
I spent most of the time here on the sixth floor Hip Hop room. (There weren't the tables there that you see in the picture) This style of music is probably the most recognisable music you hear these days, so I knew almost all the songs the DJ played. The DJ was "spinning" tunes on a Macbook Pro!
I danced with two quite attractive Korean girls, that were on holiday in Japan for a few days. Their English was great, and I had a fun time dancing with them. One of the Japanese girls that tagged along with our group came up to me to dance and scared the Koreans away. Shame that. Probably a good idea anyway.
Finally I discovered the fourth floor psychedelic room. One of the other guys told me it was there. I thought it was the exit!
This was the room you come to get blissed out on heavy Trance/Techno tunes. Here, I was doing my most strange dancing, poking my hands through the smoke-machined air and laser lights. Big box, little box. Trippy!
It was a LONG night. Around 4:30am I stumbled out on the street with some of the others towards Shibuya station to catch one of the first trains of the morning.
On the train I sat next to an old man. At first I thought he was irritated that a foreigner had chosen to sit next to him, but he blurted out, "Nice to meet you too". Ok..
He continued with, "Are you American?", "Australia, nice people" and lastly, "Beautiful Japanese girls".
Yes they are.
Saturday, 24 May 2008
I Love The Nightlife, I Love To Boogie
Tonight was a big night out with the boys in Shibuya.
2 comments:
- Giovanni said...
They were looking for drugs in your wallet. They check cigarette packets too.
If you have any 'gear'...just put it in your socks.
- 27 May 2008 at 09:59
- Jimmy In Japan said...
That's what I thought it might be. Shame they had to do that. Still a fun club though.
I think I'll be going there again sometime.
- 28 May 2008 at 01:56


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aging, albums, Aquarius, articles, Audacity computer program, audience, audio-technica LP120 turntable, Ball University, Barbara Walters, Blackberry smartphone, blogging, Burt Lancaster, cassette tapes, catharsis, cinema, Clair de Lune, crazy love, crime, dancing, Facebook, fictions, film noir, gratitudes, happiness, Humphrey Bogart, I Watched You Sleep, Ida Lupino, information seekers, John Donne, Johnny Mathis, Johnny Rotten, Lauren Bacall, logic, Love Is Blue, Mantovani, Mass, Moon River, music, No man is an island, oxygen machine, Paul Mauriat, PiL, poetry, scripture, sleep disorders, spirit, Stranger On The Third Floor, Theme From Summer Of '42, to shine, Tracy Morgan, Turner Classic Movies (TCM), voice, While The City Sleeps, Woman On The Run, words, writings
Today, on turning sixty-one, I'm playing with the logic that "everyone wants to dance."
In 1624, Londoner John Donne wrote: "No man is an island, / Entire of itself, / Every man is a piece of the continent, / A part of the main. / If a clod be washed away by the sea, / Europe is the less."
Late last year, Tracy Morgan, a comedian by trade, who survived a tragic car crash that claimed the life of his friend, recently said to journalist Barbara Walters that happiness is having someone or something to look forward to.
If the above wisened words are true, and if the dance is intertwined with happiness, then "everyone wants to dance!" The logic is absent, of course, but sentiment abounds, along with the music and words, the spirit and audience, the desire to "shine" and the catharsis of "crazy love."
So, what's on my mind these days? What have I been up to at this still point in life?
For one, I've been using my audio-technica LP120 turntable and Audacity computer program to digitize songs from my collection of albums and cassette tapes. Mostly, I've been recording "easy listening" performances by artists such as Johnny Mathis, Mantovani, Paul Mauriat and others. Then, I transfer the songs to my Blackberry smartphone for shuffle-play.
I recently moshed to the punk-forerunner Johnny Rotten in concert with his band PiL. My friend Travis asked me how one gets from Johnny Mathis to Johnny Rotten. I experience joy from differing music for different moods. Lately and mostly, I've enjoyed the soothing sounds of original recordings from the forties, fifties and sixties, songs like "Love is Blue," "Theme from "Summer of '42," "Aquarius," "Claire de Lune" and "Moon River," to name a handful.
Often, at night, I place headphones on and listen to the mellow sounds as I drift off into sleep. I have to breathe from an oxygen machine each evening due to sleep disorders, and I look quite the sight with my mask blowing air up my nose and my headphones providing a soft soundtrack as my body shuts down in the darkness.
On Facebook, I'm a contributor in a closed group of poets from America, England, Scotland and Wales, as well as other countries. Friends such as Lani, Stuart and Meirion and many others share their poems, as I do, and we support each other's efforts. In my most recent poem, I wrote these words:
I watched you sleep / While other galaxies circled the sky, / The taste of your goodnight kiss / Fresh on my breath, still.
A feathery, warm wind / Gently lifted the locks / Of your shadowed hair, / Then let them fall.
Your sealed eyes fluttered, / I thought, like monarch butterflies / Over a summery earth, / Then lay still, again.
I didn't dare speak, / Let alone believe, / That fateful word / Of capture and demise.
Best to let you and I / Fly as free as / Just good friends have— / Yes, that's it.
Of course, I received glowing reviews from my Facebook friends. 🙂
Last month, I began reading scripture aloud from the lectern at Mass. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." Words are as powerful to the spirit as music is. Parishioners in the audience tell me that my voice projects clear and smooth, and that I have a gift for drawing out the sounds appropriately so that the message is more understandable. In any case, I enjoy reading words, even aloud, as much as composing them into humble attempts at poetry.
Blogging remains a major love of mine, in which I strive to "shine,"—to dance before and with the public, if you will. I have this blogsite where I collect my own writings, articles by other writers that seem relevant to me and other items that I feel are newsworthy. I currently have just over 45, 500 views over a four-year period of time. The site receives about 25-30 hits/day, sometimes more, sometimes less. I've had views from information seekers all over the earth. Many friends and family visit there to see photos and to read what I'm up to.
No one wants to "dance alone" with no one or nothing to look forward to or to be grateful for. I'm grateful for all of those who frequent my blogsite.
Last summer, I completed an online class in film noir. Turner Classic Movies (TCM) sponsored the adventure along with Ball University in Indiana, and they screened a large selection of the film noirs that are currently available to view. My wife, Jean, and I watch these films regularly now, movies like "Stranger On The Third Floor" (1940), "Woman On The Run" (1950) and "While the City Sleeps" (1956).
They feature stars like Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Burt Lancaster and Ida Lupino. Noirs are dark films, black and whites from the forties and fifties that delve into themes of crime that always pays and love between characters that can't see the consequences of their actions until too late—or, they just don't care. Their "crazy love" is too magnetic.
There's blood and death, revolvers and booze, cigarettes, smoky rooms and lots of shadows—much like a still-large segment of real life today. With cinema, as in fictions, there's a catharsis—a purging of emotions that takes place. One enters the drama, feels the punches, tastes the liquor and fears the killers, but in the end, the criminal gets justice, and upon exiting the film, all is balanced again with the world.
Hey, it's not a perfect world–but there's always time to dance.


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Designed for ambitious and experienced managers, the Graduate Certificate in Management will bring you one step closer to an MBA. If you are ready to carve out your niche as a business leader, or would like to sure-up your future with some formal management qualifications, the Graduate Certificate in Management from AIM Business School is the perfect place to start.
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Designed with the senior manager in mind, the Graduate Diploma is an ideal mid-level postgraduate qualification. The Graduate Diploma in Management provides a solid grounding and depth of understanding of a broad range of theory, practical business strategies and applications.
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Factors associated with isolated right heart failure in women: a pilot study from western Kenya.
(Glob Heart, 2014-06)
BACKGROUND: Small observational studies have found that isolated right heart failure (IRHF) is prevalent among women of sub-Saharan Africa. Further, several risk factors for the development of IRHF have been identified. ...


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Features and Contracts in Windows Store Apps
While the goal of these quickstarts is to discuss the issues and solutions involved in porting our Windows Phone 7 app to a Windows Store app, there are some features and requirements in Windows 8 we wanted to address: snapping and appcontracts.
Windows 8 Contracts provide OS level functionality and can significantly extend the power of your app when implemented properly. In this video, we will look at two contracts we implemented, the Search Contract and the Share Contract. But first, let us look at how snapping is handled in a Windows Store app.
Handling Window Snapping
As we discussed in the last Quickstart, snapping can have a significant impact on how you choose to present your app interface. In a typical template project page, we will find a GridView and ListView element both positioned in Grid.Row="1" under the navigation and page header row of our root grid.
It is the VisualStateManager that controls the visibility of these elements. Since PageHub.xaml inherits from Common\LayoutAwarePage.cs, we already have the orientation and positioning handlers taken care of. When the app is "snapped" to the screen and has its visual footprint significantly reduced, the VisualStateManager will toggle the visibility of the main GridView to Collapsed while making the thinner ListView based interface visible as shown below:
One other thing to note in this discussion is that while the ListView and GridView are both showing the same data, they would most likely need to reference different data templates and styles.
In the Khan Academy app, the ListView control that handles the snapped layout shares the same CollectionViewSource as the larger GridView control, but points to its own ItemTemplateSelector so that it will pull in the snapped styles accordingly.
The Search Contract
The Search Contract allows your app to register with the operating system as being searchable from the Windows 8 Search charm.
To set this up, we need to add some code to the LaunchApp() method in App.xaml.cs as shown below:
public async void LaunchApp( ApplicationExecutionState previousExecutionState) { DataSource = new KhanDataSource(); await DataSource.LoadAllData(); SearchPane searchPane = SearchPane.GetForCurrentView(); searchPane.PlaceholderText = "Search Khan Academy"; searchPane.QuerySubmitted += (sender, queryArgs) => { KhanAcademy.SearchResultsPage.Activate( queryArgs.QueryText, previousExecutionState); }; […]
First, we get the SearchPane object for the current app. Once we have a handle to the instance of the pane, we can set some properties to make the search experience a bit more tailored to our app. Namely, we set the PlaceholderText property to the string "Search Khan Academy". Finally, we hook the QuerySubmitted event off the SearchPane object, which will be called once the user presses the Enter key or clicks/taps the magnifying glass icon to the right of the search box. In the event handler, the SearchResultsPage is activated and displayed with the user's query text passed to the page.
The Search pane can also handle real-time suggestions based on the query the user is typing. To do this, we just need to handle the SuggestionsRequested and ResultSuggestionChosen events as shown:
searchPane.SuggestionsRequested += (sender, suggestionArgs) => { var videos = App.DataSource.TopicGroups.SelectMany(g => g.Playlists.SelectMany(p => p.Videos.Where(v => Regex.IsMatch(v.Name ?? "", suggestionArgs.QueryText, RegexOptions.IgnoreCase) || Regex.IsMatch(v.Description ?? "", suggestionArgs.QueryText, RegexOptions.IgnoreCase)))) .Distinct(VideoItem.CreateComparer()) .Take(3); foreach(VideoItem vi in videos) suggestionArgs.Request.SearchSuggestionCollection.AppendQuerySuggestion(vi.Title); var recommended = App.DataSource.TopicGroups.SelectMany(g => g.Playlists.SelectMany(p => p.Videos.Where(v => Regex.IsMatch(v.Name ?? "", suggestionArgs.QueryText, RegexOptions.IgnoreCase)))).FirstOrDefault(); if(recommended != null) { suggestionArgs.Request.SearchSuggestionCollection.AppendSearchSeparator("Recommended"); IRandomAccessStreamReference imgStream = RandomAccessStreamReference.CreateFromUri(recommended.ImagePath); suggestionArgs.Request.SearchSuggestionCollection.AppendResultSuggestion(recommended.Title, recommended.Description, recommended.VideoPath.ToString(), imgStream, recommended.Title); } }; searchPane.ResultSuggestionChosen += (sender, resultArgs) => { var recommended = App.DataSource.TopicGroups.SelectMany(g => g.Playlists.SelectMany(p => p.Videos.Where(v => Regex.IsMatch(v.VideoPath.ToString() ?? "", resultArgs.Tag, RegexOptions.IgnoreCase)))).FirstOrDefault(); Frame f = Window.Current.Content as Frame; f.Navigate(typeof(VideoPage), JsonSerializer.Serialize(recommended)); };
In the SuggestionRequested event handler, we use a LINQ query to find the first 3 results that match what the user is typing and add them to the suggestions list using the AppendQuerySuggestion method off the SearchSuggestionCollection object. In addition, we also use LINQ to find the closest match to what the user is typing to display and display that after a line separator.
The line gets added with the AppendSearchSeparator method, and the single result gets added with the AppendResultSuggestion method. The specific result suggestion can include an icon, and we get the stream for that icon using the CreateFromUri method off the RandomAccessStreamReference object, passing in the path to the image we want to use as the icon. This returns the IRandomAccessStreamReference required by the AppendResultSuggestion method.
In the ResultSuggestionChosen method, we determine which suggestion the user selected and then navigate to the VideoPage to show the video to the user.
The Share and Devices Contracts
The Share Contract allows the user to share a piece of data from the current app to another app which knows how to receive the data. For our app, we wanted to allow the user to share a link to the video they are watching to other apps. This works great with the Windows 8 mail app.
To accomplish this, we override the DataRequested method on the VideoPage class as shown:
public sealed partial class VideoPage : KhanAcademy.Common.LayoutAwarePage { private PlayToManager _playToManager = null; private CoreDispatcher _dispatcher = null; private DisplayRequest _displayRequest = null; public VideoPage() { this.InitializeComponent(); } protected override void DataRequested( DataTransferManager sender, DataRequestedEventArgs args) { VideoItem vi = (this.DataContext as VideoItem); args.Request.Data.Properties.Title = vi.Name; args.Request.Data.Properties.Description = vi.Description; args.Request.Data.SetUri(vi.KhanPath); }
In this method, we get the VideoItem that is currently being played, and use its properties to fill out the Data object property of the Request object. The SetUri method is used to pass the actual Uri to the Khan Academy website.
Finally, we wanted to enable PlayTo functionality so the user can quickly and easily send the video output to a TV or other media device on the network. The user can choose to do this while watching the video by selecting the Devices charm. Any PlayTo-enabled devices on the network will show up in this device list.
In code, we handle this scenario in the OnNavigatedTo and OnNavigatedFrom overridden methods.
protected override void OnNavigatedTo(NavigationEventArgs e) { _dispatcher = Window.Current.CoreWindow.Dispatcher; _playToManager = PlayToManager.GetForCurrentView(); _playToManager.SourceRequested += playToManager_SourceRequested; if(_displayRequest == null) _displayRequest = new DisplayRequest(); _displayRequest.RequestActive(); base.OnNavigatedTo(e); } protected override void OnNavigatedFrom(NavigationEventArgs e) { _playToManager.SourceRequested -= playToManager_SourceRequested; if(_displayRequest != null) _displayRequest.RequestRelease(); base.OnNavigatedFrom(e); } void playToManager_SourceRequested(PlayToManager sender, PlayToSourceRequestedEventArgs args) { var deferral = args.SourceRequest.GetDeferral(); var handler = _dispatcher.RunAsync(CoreDispatcherPriority.Normal, () => { args.SourceRequest.SetSource(videoElement.PlayToSource); deferral.Complete(); }); }
In the OnNavigatedTo method, we get an instance of the PlayToManager and hook the SourceRequested event. We also grab an instance of the current Dispatcher. In the SourceRequested event handler, we request a deferral. This tells the PlayTo manager to wait until we give it the PlayTo source so the request doesn't time out. We then, using the dispatcher, set the source of the PlayTo request to the video player's PlayToSource property, and then complete the deferral. At this point, the PlayTo request is sent and the media player talks to the OS to make the magic happen. Note that in the OnNavigatedFrom method we unhook the SourceRequested event handler since it is no longer needed once the user navigates away from this page.
So at this point, we have come up with a migration strategy for porting our Windows Phone 8 to Windows 8, handled changes to how we handle asynchronous data requests and have a well styled, data bound interface that leverages the newest features of Windows 8. From here, the next step would be submitting to the store for distribution.
Hopefully, this set of quickstarts has covered some key areas of interest in getting your app up and running on Windows 8.
I would like to extend a tremendous amount of gratitude for Joel Martinez and all his tireless work as well as opening up the Viewer for Khan Academy app to serve as a Coding4Fun Community project here on Channel 9.
The source code for the Windows 8 Khan Academy app is available for download:
If you have any questions, comments, or feedback feel free to join in the discussion.
Twitter: @rickbarraza, @joelmartinez
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Congress Turns to FY12 Funding: Urge Their Support for the Arts! - (April 18, 2011)
FY11 Budget Closes; FY12 Discussions Begin. Urge Congress to Protect the Arts!
Washington, D.C. - On Friday, April 15 President Obama signed the FY11 spending agreement passed by the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate earlier in the week. The final budget for FY11 allocated $155 million for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and $25.5 million for the Arts in Education program at the U.S. Department of Education, bringing to a close several months of whirlwind budget negotiations. Thank you for contacting Congress in support of these programs! Every letter and phone call makes an impact, and orchestras turned up the volume when it was most needed!
However, this is no time to rest. Congress has already begun taking up the FY12 budget process and both chambers will be expected to seek deep cuts. Your continued communication with Congress is essential! Elected officials will be listening very closely to the priorities of their constituents, and only you can tell them of the specific ways in which federal arts support serves your community. Please, continue to contact your Senators and Representative and urge them to support the vital services your orchestra provides to your community. With Members of Congress at home from April 18 through 29, now is an opportune time to meet with your Members in their home offices, invite them to attend your orchestra's concerts, and see community programs in action. As always, be sure to review the Guide to Congressional Gift Rules.
Contact your elected officials today in updated campaigns for the NEA and Arts in Education in the FY12 budget process:
The League is a member of the Performing Arts Alliance, a coalition of national performing arts service organizations dedicated to advocating for national policies that recognize, enhance, and foster the contributions the performing arts make to America


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Politicians often call elections era-defining events.
Usually, the issues don't loom as large as such hyperbole from campaigners would suggest. But at other times, such as B.C.'s May 14 provincial election, they do.
This election is more than just a decision about which political party is best-equipped to run the province for the next four years. The next government will be setting a course for B.C.'s economic development for at least 20 years.
A large number of complex, expensive, long-term agenda-setting decisions await the next government, and will resonate in people's lives and their wallets.
BC Hydro, the province's largest Crown corporation, needs a decision on whether to proceed with the proposed $7.9-billion Site C power project on the Peace River.
The government and Hydro must decide how to reconcile customers' ability to pay against a debt ($18 billion by 2015) that is growing while Hydro renews its aging "heritage" network of dams, power stations and transmission wires for the first time in a generation.
In the Lower Mainland, regional transit authority TransLink is warning that without a multibillion-dollar infusion of government funding it will be forced to choose between two equally worthy rapid transit projects — light rail to shape growth in booming Surrey and SkyTrain along Vancouver's over-capacity Broadway corridor to the University of B.C. If there's only one winner, the loser likely won't see any traffic relief until 2029.
That's just the start.
National Energy Board reviews for the Northern Gateway and Kinder Morgan oil pipelines will likely wrap up after the next government takes office, and decisions will be required on whether to support them and the billions of dollars in additional revenue they would generate for the Canadian economy.
At least two world-class copper mines could open up in northwest B.C. — and at least a dozen are far enough into development that they may all qualify for mining permits by 2017 if they were to be judged to satisfy environmental requirements.
There is urgency around B.C.'s skilled labour shortage, around a film and television industry that insists it won't thrive without big subsidies, and especially around measures to aid the long-term recovery of a forest industry that has lost 40 per cent of its Interior wood supply to the pine beetle.
The reversion to provincial sales tax (PST) means the province's industries and businesses are returned to a complex tax regime that makes B.C. a less attractive place to invest. Reforms may be imperative.
A decision is needed on whether to continue the carbon tax, and whether to increase it if it remains. If the tax goes up, the government must decide whether to make a commensurate cut to personal and corporate income taxes — as the Campbell government did when the tax was introduced in 2008 — or to channel the extra money into general revenue or perhaps debt reduction.
Taxpayer-supported debt is projected to grow from $38 billion in the 2012-13 fiscal year to $46 billion in three years — and consume a growing portion of the province's gross domestic product in the process.
On top of all this, a decision is required on the extent to which the province will support the emergence in Kitimat and Prince Rupert of a world-class liquefied natural gas (LNG) export industry.
B.C. could gain significant royalty revenue from gas exports, but LNG processors need more energy than BC Hydro is in a position to supply in the near term. If B.C. wants LNG processors to rush into the Asian market, it will have to allow them to power up using natural gas rather than greener electricity such as hydro. However, that would cause a spike in B.C.'s industrial greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to 130 per cent of annual GHG emissions from all 68 of B.C.'s major industrial emitters, according to data from Environment Canada and the Pembina Institute.
It's not immediately clear how B.C. can reconcile its CO2 reduction goals with its need to use natural gas to drive economic growth and generate revenue.
"Provincewide, we've got to get some alignment between our energy extraction vision and our environmental vision," said Nancy Olewiler, the director of Simon Fraser University's school of public policy.
"Good luck to the next government. It's a big agenda, but I also think it's a tremendous opportunity to engage British Columbians in what they want to see their environment and economy be, and get some thoughtful and long-serving policy directions."
Olewiler believes it would be prudent for the next government to take "a more comprehensive … look at how we use our natural resources instead of trying to get the darn stuff out of the ground as fast as we can (and) incur all of these trade-offs in terms of environment."
That includes deliberating on a wide range of options that might encourage economic growth, she added.
That could include building new gas-fired generation stations in the northeast, home of the province's gas exploration industry, and exporting electricity to the U.S. rather than piping raw gas across the province and selling it offshore, she said.
Considering the carbon tax as a possible mechanism for funding other government priorities is another option.
Beyond the energy sector, Olewiler said the province should also look at tax "barriers" that penalize small companies as they grow into larger ones — such as an effective tripling of the provincial tax rate when they advance from the small business to the corporate tax rate.
Greg D'Avignon, president and CEO of the Business Council of B.C., sees a "myriad of public policy issues facing the government, some of which really beg for a vision of the province for the next 20 years that will shape that opportunity and shape the province economically."
He cites "generational change" as one of the challenges. Demographers predict B.C.'s workforce – people 16 to 64 – will peak in 2015 at 70 per cent of the population and then decline to 55 per cent of the population by 2036 as the baby boomers retire.
"If we don't get it right, we are going to have some significant problems around education training, government revenues, and also we will have lost opportunity," D'Avignon said.
A shift in economic power from Western nations to Asia continues, and lingering uncertainty in the global economy means that "the province has limited resources to be able to do some of the traditional things, whether they are NDP or Liberal, that they would do heading into an election, let alone coming out of it."
B.C. has advantages that favour its economy, including world-class post-secondary education and mining expertise, a strong record for research and development, and a trade economy that is equally diversified into Asia and the United States.
Where we lag behind is competing for outside investment "given the complexity of doing business in British Columbia" such as the province's tax and regulatory regimes.
"I think we need to start asking the question of British Columbians, 'How do we do things' as opposed to 'Why should we do them?' " D'Avignon said.
"One of the keys that the government needs to focus on is starting to change the culture and debate in British Columbia on how we inform ourselves and how we make decisions. We need to do a better job of understanding the common fact base in B.C. because we tend to have rhetorical debates that never really get to an informed decision point."


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Stop Talking Live Wallpapers - Funny dides will crash your phone once you will tap, they are nervous because of talking
- Animation on click.
- Play sound on tap.
- Run setup on double pressing.
- Multilingual.
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Download and Install => Run the application icon
Download and Install => Desktop => Press Menu => Set screen saver => Animated Screensavers => Select "Stop Talking"
The application works on the AndEngine framework with shared license LGPL.
Graphic elements used in these wallpaper, are freely available on the Internet and is supposed to be public
domain. If you own the copyright on some of these items, please contact us and we'll remove them immediately.
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stop, talk, dudes, angry, funny, crash, tap, nervous, phone, live, wallpapers, free, android


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Is career training the right direction for you? Find out! Take Our FREE Career Analysis
Lansdale School of Business is committed to a policy of nondiscrimination in compliance with all applicable Federal and State statutes. Education programs, activities, and employment at the school are provided to individuals without regard to marital status, race, color, national origin, sex, age, or religion. In addition, the school endeavors to remove any barriers and to provide opportunity for education and employment of handicapped persons.
If you wish to take one of the certification tests, you must notify Donna Romano three weeks before the payment deadline.
Students should visit www.nahpusa.com
Read more for further details.
The November Term 2020 classes begin
November 16th, 2020
Enroll today for your tomorrow!
Our massage students went on a field trip last week to an Aura Imaging Photography studio.
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April 19, 2017, 6:00 p.m.
Lansdale School of Business
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Playa Flamenco
A brilliant white crescent of coral sand, lapped by glittering waters of turquoise and azure blue, Playa Flamenco (24hr; free) is fringed with the same low-lying scrub and palm trees that Columbus would have seen five hundred years ago. Staggeringly beautiful, it's worth a day of swimming, lounging and simply soaking in the idyllic scenery. The beach can get busy at the weekends, but it's wide enough to handle the crowds and at other times is remarkably tranquil. Check out the rusting Pershing tank half-buried in the sand at the northwestern end of the beach. Once used as target practice, it's decorated with murals (there's another tank just inland). At the far eastern end of the beach is the "Muellecito", where an old pier has formed a sheltered pool popular with families.
Flamenco lies about 2.5km north of Dewey at the end of PR-251, with the large car park behind the sands home to a series of tempting kioscos selling drinks, snacks and more substantial meals from around 7am to 6–7pm every day; the best is number 6, Meson de Goyita (t787/642-1101), selling fresh fish, shark nuggets and garlic shrimp ($4–11). For information about camping here. To access beach hotels, turn right along the signposted dirt track just before the car park.
Vieques and Culebra
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