text:
National Statistics
Road freight statistics: January to March 2011
Road freight and foreign heavy goods vehicle activity statistics in the UK for January to March 2011.
Quarterly statistics on the domestic and international road freight activity of UK hauliers and of foreign hauliers in UK.
The statistics is based on results from the following 3 continuous surveys administered by the Department for Transport:
- Continuing Survey of Road Goods Transport Great Britain (CSRGT GB)
- Continuing Survey of Road Goods Transport Northern Ireland (CSRGT NI)
- International Road Haulage Survey (IRHS)
Statistics on foreign hauliers in the UK are derived from data supplied to Eurostat by EU-27 countries.
The data is provisional and will be finalised in an annual road freight statistics publication in 2013.
Between January to March 2011:
- goods moved by UK HGVs in the UK increased by 6% to over 37 billion tonne kilometres
- domestic freight activity trends for the UK in recent years broadly mirror those in 3 of the 4 other largest EU economies
- there were 1.3 million tonnes of road freight exported from the UK by UK-registered vehicles. This was an increase of 9% compared to January to March 2010. There was a similar weight of goods imported (1.4 million tonnes)
- there were about 1 billion tonne kilometres of cabotage by foreign hauliers in the UK. Levels of cabotage reported by EU-27 countries in the UK have declined in recent years. The level was 44% lower than in 2005
Technical information:
Information on road freight statistics and the 3 DfT surveys, as well as the pre-release access list, and related technical documentation is available.
Contact us
Road freight statistics
Email email@example.com
Public enquiries 020 7944 3095


text:
If you have ever thought to invest in an ice cream maker, I do recommend it!
Everything tastes better when it's home made, and ice cream and sorbet are no different. I've been playing a bit with my new toy and been sharing the results because frankly, I always make more then I should be eating!
So far I have experimented with gelatos and sorbets.
Because strawberries are delicious this year and I have that whole herb garden at my disposal I made strawberry sorbet my first experiment.
I purchased the type of ice cream maker that has a drum you keep frozen in the freezer. No rock salt or ice required. It doesn't make large quantities, but more then enough for me.
So the sorbet!
4 cups of washed and hulled strawberries, pureed. I just used my magic stick blender
1/2 cup of sugar dissolved in a cup of hot water.
If needed add the liquid to the strawberries to properly puree them
Chill this whole mixture.
When I was ready to make sorbet I added in minced Chocolate Mint leaves (it really is an herb!) and let the whole mixture go.
Things I will change next time. Run the puree through a sieve to remove a bunch of the seeds for a smoother sorbet. Perhaps reduce some of the sugar as strawberries are very naturally sweet this year.
My second attempt was a Cappuccino gelato
I used the best I could find for this one!
Heat 2 cups of half and half
1 cup of 35% cream
Dissolve in 1/2 cup sugar
Add in 2 Tablespoons of good instant espresso powder
1/8 teaspoon of good cinnamon
and 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
Let this mixture cool completely and then make ice cream as in your machine directions.
For Mocha I added a few drops of chocolate extract
Changes for future batches: I'm thinking of steeping a vanilla bean in the liquid instead of using the extract.

subset: commoncrawl


text: Earth's Energy Imbalance Kevin E Trenberth NCAR Energy on Earth The main external influence on planet Earth is from radiation. Incoming solar shortwave radiation is unevenly distributed owing to the geometry of the Earthsun system, and the rotation of the Earth. Outgoing longwave radiation is more uniform. Global warming: Under no climate change, the net flow of energy in from the sun is balanced by the net radiation out to space. ASR=OLR With global warming there is a net energy imbalance as heat trapping gases lower OLR: Net = ASR -OLR Trenberth et al (2009) Global temperature and carbon dioxide: anomalies through 2012 Base period 1900-99; data from NOAA A few cooler years do not mean global warming is not happening! 2010 2005 1998 2003 2002 2006 2009 2007 2004 2012 2004 2001 2011 13 1998 was especially warm from the major El Nino, but by cherry picking points one can infer the wrong trend (red) vs the correct one (black dashed). Has it happened before? NOAA/NCDC data Thru 2012 Earth's Energy Imbalance: How do we measure it? 1. 2. 3. 4. Direct measurements from space of ASR, OLR, Net Take inventory of where all the energy has gone Use climate models with specified forcings Use atmospheric reanalyses 1. Not accurate enough, but good for relative changes 2. Best, but is there some energy missing? Likely not consistent over time. 3. Depends on how good the model and the forcings are. 4. Useless, do not conserve energy, do not have accurate forcings Global warming means more heat: Where does the heat go? >90% 1. Warms land and atmosphere 2. Heat storage in the ocean (raises sea level) 3. Melts land ice (raises sea level) 4. Melts sea ice and warms melted water 5. Evaporates moisture rain storms, cloud possibly reflection to space TOA energy imbalance from CCSM4 Specified radiative forcings from • increased GHGs, • solar, • volcanoes, • aerosols Rel to ens. mean Mo s.d. 0.62 12-mo s.d. 0.25 W m-2 0.9 W m-2 El Chichón aerosol Prescribed profile in CCSM4 Recent volcanic eruptions: Optical depth of aerosols Adapted from Santer et al 2013 Radiative forcing (W m-2) from changes in Total Solar Irradiance from the Total Irradiance Monitor (TIM) instrument relative to a base value of TSI of 1361.14 W m-2 as 27-day running averages. The arrow at right shows the range of 0.15 W m-2. Ocean Heat Content Balmaseda, Trenberth and Källén 2013 GRL Ocean Obs Catia Domingues Argo Temperature Obs per 1 deg square State of the Climate 2012 ECMWF Ocean Reanalysis v4: ORAS4 • • • • • • • • Balmaseda et al. Quart J R Met Soc 2013 5 member ensemble; perturbed initial states 52-year reconstruction for 1958 through 2009 NEMO ocean model 1° 42 level 3Dvar Bias corrected using Argo era Sfc fluxes from ERA, relaxed to obs SST (2-3 days) Corrected XBTs, altimetry 10 day cycle Amount of heat Global Ocean Heat Content Balmaseda, Trenberth and Källén 2013 Ocean Heat Content: ECMWF Reanalysis ORAS4 vs WOA OHC from ORAS4 and rates of change 12-mo running means Diff: 0.21 W m-2 2000s Rates of change of OHC from ORAS4 Full depth 5 member ensemble members of ORAS4 OHC in global W m-2. The ensemble mean and monthly standard deviation of CCSM4 TOA radiation RT. El Niño events are marked by the orange bars, as defined by the ONI index of NOAA. ENSO in ORAS4 TOGA-TAO/Triton array was mainly established 1992-93 These are normalized to be global W m-2. The tropical Pacific Ocean first then the global ocean loses heat over an El Nino event ENSO and volcanic events conflated El Niño events occurred 1) July 1963-January 1964 vs Agung Feb-Mar 1963; 2) May 1982-June 1983 vs El Chichon Mar-Apr 1982; and 3) May 1991-July 1992 vs Pinatubo June 1991. Decadal variability Given the stronger and more frequent La Niña events since 1998 – related to the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) – a major question is what role these variations are playing? Decadal variability: PDO EOF= Empirical Orthogonal Function = Principal Component Analysis = Eigenvector of covariance matrix Based on SST EOF analysis north of 20N in Pacific with global mean removed. Courtesy Adam Phillips -ve -ve +ve +ve +ve Sfc Temperatures: GISS OHC 0-100m 0-700m Full depth Note different color scales SLP and surface winds ERA-I SLP and surface winds ERA-I Polar perspective NH Sea level trend: global mean (3 mm/yr) removed Gary Lagerloef 2013 Linear OHC trends: ocean W m-2 1975-2009 1980s 1990s 2000s Total (ocean) 0.47 ± 0.03 0.58 ± 0.15 -0.26 ±0.13 1.19 ± 0.11 Global 0.33 0.41 -0.18 0.84 0.91 W m-2 when melting ice etc included. NOAA UKMO CERES vs ORAS4 12 month running means CERES, ORAS4 Argo=Roemmich and Gilson WOA = Levitus et al. vSch = von Schuckmann OHC vs CERES • There is not great agreement between OHC changes and CERES • ORAS4 fluctuations are supported by other OHC analyses • At times there are marked significant discrepancies, notably: • 2002 (CERES low vs OHC) • 2007 (CERES high vs OHC) • 2009 (CERES high vs OHC) While the error bars are large, there appears to be either: • missing energy, or • mismatches in CERES vs OHC Key signals in ORAS4 • During the last decade, the ocean has warmed at a higher rate than in the preceding record, even when the impact of Argo is taken into account. • About 30% of the warming occurs in depths below 700m. This involvement of the deep ocean in the heat uptake is unprecedented. • Volcanic eruptions, ENSO and the deep ocean contribute identifiable signals to the character of ocean heat content changes. • The increasing disparity of warming in different layers arises largely from changes in the surface winds, and remains even when the Argo is withdrawn. Missing energy in CCSM4? In CCSM4, sfc T rises in 5 ensemble members. Meehl et al 2011 Missing energy in CCSM4? In CCSM4, during periods with no sfc T rise, the energy imbalance at TOA remains about 1 W m-2 warming. So where does the heat go? Meehl et al 2011 750 to 3000m Is the same as for 750 to bottom. Meehl et al 2011 Missing energy in CCSM4? Taking five ensemble members of RCP4.5 and compositing 10 distinct 10year periods with either zero or slightly negative globally averaged temperature trend shows these time periods are characterized by a negative phase of the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO) or La Niña. Meehl et al 2011 Earth's energy imbalance • Varies from day to day with clouds and weather • Varies from year to year with ENSO • And with sharp drops with volcanic eruptions • Varies with the PDO • The net imbalance of energy in the 2000s went from order 1 W m-2 to 0.7 W m-2 with the quiet sun and minor volcanic activity Missing energy? • Some missing energy appears to be in the deep ocean and unprecedented heating of the deeper ocean is occurring. • It is related to La Niña/ negative PDO • During the positive phase of PDO, more heat is deposited at shallow depths, while in –ve PDO more heat is deposited below 700 m depth. Deep Doo Doo There's a clearer analysis forming Of the increase in powerful storming; But it's not just hot air About which we should care, For the cold ocean depths have been warming. Lynne Page http://limericksbylin.com/ Cover of GRL with Balmaseda et al 2013


text:
|Chocolate cake, buttercream icing and monster eyes!
I hope you all had a great Easter weekend, and are beating the sugar hangover :)
I treated myself to some yarn the other day...I'll have to let you in on that one.
Posts have been sporadic for a bit. My hope is to blog more, now that spring is here, and I've started planting my seeds for my garden. I'll show you some pics when they start to "show". Feels like having a baby :)
Did you start your garden seeds this weekend? It was a great one for getting outside and enjoying the sun. We did that, and cleaned up most of the dog mess....that one's like laundry. The never-ending pile...


text:
73 investors, EIS
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Today, we connect thousands of investors on our online crowdfunding platform with companies seeking funds.


text:
Hepatitis B Virus Vertical Transmission From HIV-HBV Co-infected Women
|The safety and scientific validity of this study is the responsibility of the study sponsor and investigators. Listing a study does not mean it has been evaluated by the U.S. Federal Government. Read our disclaimer for details.
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02044068
Recruitment Status : Completed
First Posted : January 23, 2014
Last Update Posted : April 28, 2017
- Study Details
- Tabular View
- No Results Posted
- Disclaimer
- How to Read a Study Record
|Condition or disease
|Vertical Disease Transmission HBV
|Study Type :
|Actual Enrollment :
|35 participants
|Observational Model:
|Time Perspective:
|Official Title:
|Prevention of Hepatitis B Virus Mother-to-Child Transmission (MTCT) From HIV-HBV Co-infected Pregnant Women by Use of Nucleosides/Nucleotides Analogues With Dual Activity During Pregnancy.
|Study Start Date :
|October 2014
|Actual Primary Completion Date :
|September 2015
|Actual Study Completion Date :
|September 2015
children born from HIV-HBV women
Studying retrospectively their status for HBs Ag and HBc Ab
- Hepatitis B sAg status in children born from HIV-Hepatitis B Virus co-infected women [ Time Frame: up to 10 years (expected average: 5 years) ]
- Antibodies (Ab) against Hepatitis B core antigen in children [ Time Frame: up to 10 years (expected average: 5 years) ]
Choosing to participate in a study is an important personal decision. Talk with your doctor and family members or friends about deciding to join a study. To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the contacts provided below. For general information, Learn About Clinical Studies.
|Ages Eligible for Study:
|9 Months to 15 Years (Child)
|Sexes Eligible for Study:
|Accepts Healthy Volunteers:
|Sampling Method:
|Non-Probability Sample
Inclusion Criteria:
- children born in the Maternity Department from HIV-HBV co-infected women
- whose mother was given a treatment with dual activity (HIV and HBV) during pregnancy
Exclusion Criteria:
To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the contact information provided by the sponsor.
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier (NCT number): NCT02044068
|Hopital Lariboisiere
|Paris, France, 75475
|Principal Investigator:
|Pierre O SELLIER, MD, PhD
|Hopital Lariboisiere, Paris, France
Publications automatically indexed to this study by ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier (NCT Number):
|Responsible Party:
|Célia Lloret-Linares, MD PhD, Professor at Paris VII Denis Diderot University, physician, Hopital Lariboisière
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
|NCT02044068 History of Changes
|Other Study ID Numbers:
|First Posted:
|January 23, 2014 Key Record Dates
|Last Update Posted:
|April 28, 2017
|Last Verified:
|April 2017
|Individual Participant Data (IPD) Sharing Statement:
|Plan to Share IPD:
|Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated Drug Product:
|Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated Device Product:
Additional relevant MeSH terms:
Hepatitis B
Hepadnaviridae Infections
DNA Virus Infections
Virus Diseases
Hepatitis, Viral, Human
Liver Diseases
Digestive System Diseases


text:
Governors gathered in Nebraska for an economic summit say the federal government is hindering state economic growth.
Gov. Dave Heineman, hosting the summit in Omaha as chairman of the National Governors Association, worries about the tax climate in Washington as well as federal regulations and the federal health care law.
"Those three things are creating uncertainty at the federal level and that's why you see more cash on the sidelines than ever before," Heineman says. "I would like to see the federal government provide stability when it comes to taxes, regulation and health care."
The regional summit in Omaha is designed to exchange ideas about how to grow state economies and create jobs. Joining Heineman at the summit are Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad and Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder. All are Republicans who complain that the administration led by President Barack Obama, a Democrat, retards economic growth and has kept the economy from fully emerging from the recession.
Snyder of Michigan added that the politics of Washington gets in the way.
"I believe the dysfunctionality of Washington is holding back our economic recovery in our states," Snyder says. "And, if that could be resolved, we'd move forward faster."
Branstad of Iowa says regulations being pushed by the Obama Administration threaten a big economic advantage enjoyed by the Midwest.
"We have an economic advantage, because we have reliable, low-cost energy," Branstad says. "If that's taken away from us by the EPA, that's going to be a real downer for economic growth."
The summit, part of the initiative promoted by Heineman as NGA chairman called "Growing State Economies", wraps up today.
The three previous regional summits were held in Connecticut, Washington and Tennessee.
AUDIO: Brent Martin reports [:45]
AUDIO: Gov. Heineman, Gov. Branstad and Gov. Snyder discuss federal obstacles to economic growth [5:20]


text:
Charlie called about 8 AM The Intrepid 4 are on the Portage River. It is all downhill from now on. They will go winding thru Little Portage Lake and then bypass Big Portage Lake in a flooding, take a loop to the north where Orchard Creek joins the Portage, then into the channelized part of the Portage River which I call the Portage Ditch, without question the ugliest stretch in the entire Grand River system. It consists of mostly barren, straight channels in a sort of zigzag pattern all the way to the Grand just north of Jackson Prison. If you want to see the original channel the Township line between Henrietta and Leoni Townships of Jackson County follows it.
Back in the late teens and early 1920's flood control projects consisted mostly of channelization where a floating dredge would straighten the river out for many miles. The net result would be to send the flood waters faster down to the lower parts of the river which would of course make their floods worse.
The north trending reach of the Grand River from north of Jackson almost to where the Grand makes its big turn to the west was channelized in 1919. The remains of the original channel are obvious in oxbows on either side of the present river's straight line course.
The next problem the Challengers will face will be numerous log jams and deadfalls blocking the Grand. If the water is high enough they will be able to get around by paddling through the woods. That worked quite well for Charlie and Doug McDougall last year.
Jody Bennet raised the question as to what I mean when I say they "took to their wheels". They have folding bicycle-wheel rigs that they put under their canoes. When on the water the wheels are lashed to the top of the canoe behind the paddler. When they pull out they unfold the wheel rig and strap it to the underside of the canoe. Then they just grab a rope or handle at the bow and pull the canoe down the road like they were walking their dogs. They have lights and reflectors for safety during after-dark travel like last night.
The seven mile portage is on county roads. They pulled out at the Bowdish Road bridge over Portage Creek and zigzagged over to where Moeckle Road crosses the upper end of the Portage River.. It took until about 10:30 last night.
Larry "Coach" Hoff from Superior Wisconsin uses a trailer-like rig and a folding bicycle that all comes apart and is stored inside the hull behind the seat. I told him he looks like a traveling junkyard. He was in Grand Rapids last night and hopes to make Lake Michigan today. He plans to do the 50 miler Saturday.
Jon Holmes' Spotter makes it look like he is about at Eaton Rapids.


text:
Since I've had a few requests for these, I just wanted to share my slidedeck from my September 17, 2010 presentation, "Getting Social in the Classroom: Teaching in a Web 2.0 World" for the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Kentucky.
[slideshare id=5234277&doc=gettingsocialintheclassroom-100919124946-phpapp02]
To answer a couple of questions:
- I use Slideshare to upload and publish my slidedecks. It's free and easy to use, and in keeping with the theme of the presentation, takes a traditional activity (sharing of slides) and makes them more useful by adding a social dimension to it. This deck is posted on a new Slideshare account I've created, but you can view some of my past decks for courses at http://slideshare.net/christopherrice. I'll be moving some of the "greatest hits" from that account to my new account at http://slideshare.net/ricetopher soon.
- Almost all of the photos in the presentation were found on Flickr's Creative Commons pool and attribution is provided on each slide.
Thanks to everyone who came out Friday! And for those who were unable to make it (it was a glorious September Friday afternoon, after all!), I look forward to seeing you at my next presentation (I have an upcoming session on Copyright and DRM as part of this series to be scheduled for later in the Fall).
Originally published on EduFuturist.com


text:
I's an Mule Transport, which is just a fancy name for an APC (that's an Armoured Personnel Carrier for the uninitiated). The model is a laser-cut MDF kit made by Miniature Scenery. It looks the part and was easy to build and, for the cost, is perfect.
I had a pleasant surprise last Sunday morning when this was hand delivered to me by Tim, who runs Miniature Scenery. It seems that he lives not far from me and was dropping his daughter at a friends house near by. Nice chap and he threw in an extra sheet of doodads (sci-fi doors, grates, windows etc). I'll be ordering more of his stuff.
Anyway, here it is:
With some crew (they look a bit large due to perspective)
And here it is with a Laser Cannon.


text:
Call (631) 666-0477 to get this deal
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text: Sorry if this sounds like a silly question, but I've searched the forums and can't find anyone having a problem doing this. I have two WRT54G routers and want to make the second a wireless AP without connecting to the first WRT54G. So I'm trying to create a WDS. Now, the instructions I've read say disable DHCP on the second WRT54G and change the IP to 18.104.22.168. So I do this, I get the confirm screen. I click continue, its trying to get back to 220.127.116.11. So I change the URL to 18.104.22.168. I get back to the router admin screen. After about 3minutes I can't configure anymore of the router settings as the router admin screen won't accept anymore commands, it just times out. So I close IE and try to access the 188.8.131.52 and 126.96.36.199 with no avail. The only way I can access the router admin screen is to hard reset the router. This is really annoying because I can't change the router IP yet everyone seems to have no problem. What am I doing wrong??


text:
One of Stark's most important claims is that the Crusades were not unprovoked. He describes the Muslim aggression during the 7th-11th centuries, showing how the forces of Islam conquered Christian territory from Jerusalem, to Spain, to Italy, all the way up to the walls of Constantinople. For Stark, the Crusades were a response to this Muslim expansionism.
He also makes a point of showing that the Christians in the conquered areas (the majority of whom failed to convert to Islam) were treated very poorly by their Islamic overlords.
A great deal of nonsense has been written about Muslim tolerance--that, in contrast to Christian brutality against Jews and heretics, Islam showed remarkable tolerance for conquered people, treated them with respect, and allowed them to pursue their faiths without interference. This claim probably began with Voltaire, Gibbon, and other eighteenth-century writers who used it to cast the Catholic Church in the worst possible light. The truth about life under Muslim rule is quite different.... --Chapter One: Muslim InvadersRelated to this idea of tolerance, Stark also addresses the issue of Muslim enlightenment and intellectual sophistication. He looks at the technology and scientific advances of the period and concludes that:
The belief that once upon a time Muslim culture was superior to that of Europe is at best an illusion. To the extent that Arab elites acquired a sophisticated culture, they learned it from their subject peoples.... --Chapter Three: Western "Ignorance" versus Eastern "Culture"These subject peoples included Nestorian Christians, Zoroastrians, and Indian Hindus. Stark argues that "Muslim" advances in medicine, literature, mathematics, etc. are entirely due to the ingenuity of the conquered races/religions.
After holding a microscope up against common myths regarding the Muslims, Stark moves to dispel some common vilifications of the Crusaders. Historians have a tendency to ignore Muslim intolerance and to harp upon the Crusaders' behavior toward people of other faiths (particularly the Jews). Stark points out, however, that the Church did not intend for the Crusaders to harm the innocent:
It is worth noting that the pope [Alexander II] was very concerned that the knights setting out to fight the Muslims not attack Jews along the way. Having directed that the Jews be protected, he subsequently wrote that he was glad to learn "that you protect the Jews who live among you, so that they may not be killed by those setting out for Spain against the Saracens...for the situation of the Jews is greatly different from that of the Saracens. One may justly fight against those [Saracens because they] persecute Christians." --Chapter Two: Christendom Strikes BackMy own reading of primary sources definitely corroborates this section of Stark's book. In the early stages of the First Crusade, when mobs of "Crusaders" in the Rhineland tried to exterminate the Jews, it was the bishops of the Church who hid the Jews and protected them. The Church which called the Crusade did not condone all actions that were done in the name of the Crusade.
Another issue Stark addresses is the incompatibility of modern expectations of piety with medieval expectations. In my book Road from the West, some have seen it as odd (or hypocritical) that Tancred--after feeling guilty for killing Christians--sets out to make amends by slaughtering Saracens. To modern sensibilities, true piety means a commitment to non-violence. Is it possible that Crusaders who continue to cleave skulls in two can be truly religious? Stark writes:
Many skeptics have noted that the pilgrimages often failed to improve the subsequent behavior of pilgrims.... The issue seems to be the expectation that an authentic pilgrimage ought to have fundamentally transformed a pilgrim's character and personality--or at least to have changed an individual into a far more peaceful and forgiving sort of person. But that was not a typical outcome. Instead, most of the fighting men who went on a pilgrimage returned as fierce and ready to do battle as before.... That even very pious knights found pacifism incomprehensible may puzzle some having modern sensibilities, but that assumption was fundamental to Pope Urban's call for a Crusade. --Chapter Five: Enlisting CrusadersAlthough some may quibble with aspects of Stark's research, I found this book incredibly refreshing. Instead of merely accepting the dogma of 18th century historians, Stark places the Crusades in their historical context and finds a different way of looking at them. As one of the quotes on the back cover says, Stark's "greatest achievement is to make us see the crusaders on their own terms," an achievement which I hope to emulate in my trilogy The Chronicles of Tancred.


text:
Netflix and Amazon both now support HDR TV, but finding High Dynamic Range content isn't exactly straightforward on either service. Here's how to simplify your super-sharp streaming.
(Update: September 12 2017): The all-new Apple TV 4K has been confirmed for 4K UHD and HDR support.
HDR, or High Dynamic Range, is the next big thing in TV display technology. Put simply, it's the ability of a TV to display a more 'dynamic' range of colours – brighter whites, deeper blacks and so on.
Deal: Amazon Fire TV Stick down to just £25 – save £15
Not only are new HDR-ready TVs flooding on to the market, major streaming services are also starting to get on board. Amazon's Prime Instant Video platform started supporting HDR content in 2015, with Netflix jumping on the bandwagon earlier this year.
The thing is, with HDR video far from the norm – HD and UHD are still the dominant standards – it's not always that easy to find the content. But there's a couple of things you can do.
Let's take a look at each service.
Related: Best Black Friday TV deals
How to find HDR content on Netflix
In the main, Netflix slaps an HDR or Dolby Vision logo on its HDR-ready titles. It's a bit unhelpful that there's not yet a dedicated HDR section in the Netflix app, though this is surely coming.
Until then, you need to know which titles are supported and seek them out individually – we've listed the ones we're aware of below, with Daredevil probably the best known.
- A Series of Unfortunate Events
- Bloodline
- Chef's Table
- Hibana
- Knights of Sidonia
- Marco Polo
- Marvel's Daredevil
- Marvel's Iron Fist
- Marvel's Jessica Jones
- Marvel's Luke Cage
- Marvel's The Defenders
- The Do-Over
- The Ridiculous Six
But you can also cut to the chase just by keying 'HDR' into the search box. That query will bring up a full list of Netflix's HDR-ready content and is the simplest way to browse all the HDR titles on Netflix at the moment.
Related: Best VPNs
How to find HDR content in Amazon Prime Video
Amazon may have beat Netflix to the HDR party, but it's just as tricky to find HDR-ready content in its Prime Video app. Like Netflix, the best it offers is an HDR logo next to selected titles. At present, some of the available titles include:
- Fury
- Men in Black 3
- Smurfs 2
- After Earth
- Pineapple Express
- Chappie
- The Amazing Spiderman 2
- Salt
- Hancock
- Elysium
- Transparent S1 & S2
- Mozart in the Jungle S1 & S2
- Man in the High Castle
- Bosch S1 & S2 (on 3/11)
- Red Oaks
- Mad Dogs
- Casanova
- Highston
- One Mississippi
- Edge
- The Patriot
- Good Girls Revolt
Not having an HDR-capable TV myself, it's unclear whether the same search trick that can be used in Netflix also works in Prime.
Buy Now: Now TV Box for £19.99 down from £39.99
Searching the Prime Video website for 'HDR" does bring up Mozart in the Jungle though, so it's worth a shot.
Check out Amazon Prime Video for yourself for free, no strings attached!
Are you looking to level up to an HDR-ready TV? Let us know below.


text:
I am constructing a packing slip form with simple calculations, Quantity x Unit = SubTotal, but i need the calculation and the currency symbol to change depending on which radio box is chosen, USD or Yen (USD has decimal point where as the Yen does not).
Is there a simple javascript?
I use Acrobat9 pro
Sure. You have to create a document-level JavaScript and add to it a function like the following:
function dollar_yenFormat() {
// Get the value of the radio button
var curr = getField("currency").value;
// Determine the number of decimal places
var nd = curr === "Yen" ? 0 : 2;
// Determine the currency symbol
var cs = curr === "Yen" ? "\u00a5" : "\u0024";
// Set the format options
AFNumber_Format(nd, 0, 0, 0, cs, true);
Replace "currency" with the actual name of the radio button group, and set the export value (Radio Button Choice) to "Yen" for the Yen radio button.
Now you can set the custom Format script for the SubTotal field to the following:
// Custom Format script for SubTotal field
You can do the same for the grand total field or any other that need this.
Hi George,
Thank you so much, the script works perfectly!
[edited by forum host - email signature removed]


text:
Science has good news for women with four or more tattoos
- Posted by
- Sarah Biddlecombe
- Published
Here in the stylist.co.uk office, we've long been admirers of tattoos. From the small and dainty to the bold and beautiful, we've always been fascinated by the way tattoos look.
Now a new study has suggested the benefits of getting inked extend well beyond the superficial, with women who have four or more tattoos reporting an increase in self-esteem.
The study examined 2,395 American college students and found those who had four or more inkings reported a higher level of self-esteem than anyone else in the experiment.
Sociology professor, Jerome Koch, who led the study, theorises that this link might be due to the tattoos empowering their owner. Speaking to Science Daily, he said, "I think women, especially, are more aware of their bodies through, among other things, fat shaming, the cosmetics and plastic surgery industry and hyper-sexualised imagery in media. What we may be seeing is women translating that awareness into empowerment."
Certainly, some of the most confident and empowered women in the world have four or more tattoos. Rihanna has an impressive 21 tattoos, from a delicate music note on her ankle to a stunning replica of the Goddess Isis across her chest, which was inked as a tribute to the singer's late Grandmother.
Rihanna described the Goddess as the "complete woman" and a "model for future generations" on her Instagram page. She also has a traditional tribal tattoo on her hand that she said represented "strength and love", tying in with the idea that a tattoo could boost self-esteem.
Angelina Jolie has over a dozen tattoos, including designs that she has altered or removed over the years, such as numbers representing the geographical locations of where her children entered her life, designed over a former tattoo of her ex-husband Billy Bob Thornton's name.
Lana Del Ray has over six tattoos, including the word paradise inked on her left hand, while Victoria Beckham has a number of tributes to husband David and their four children inked on her body.


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DEDHAM, Mass. – Somebody should explain the meaning of "irony" to the men and women in charge of Massachusetts's Dedham Public Schools, because they apparently don't understand the concept.
Leaders of the Dedham school district – which is "home to America's first tax supported, free public school" – recently announced they've worked with police to identify some 20 students who have been stealing a free public education from the district.
Dedham school leaders didn't reveal how much time and taxpayer money they've spent to ferret out these thieving students, though it must have been quite a bit judging from information shared during a Jan. 8 school board meeting.
At the meeting, Juvenile Officer Ron Pucci explained to members that every year he conducts up to 100 residency verifications of students who are new to the district, a process that requires multiple home visits, reports DailyNewsTranscript.com.
"The 75 to 100 (students) doesn't reflect the amount of visits I need to do, especially the 'red flag' ones are the ones that we find we usually have to go three to four times to those and then they'll generally appeal it," Pucci said, according to the news site. "Then we'll go another three to four times, and then they leave for a month and then come back."
School board member Susan Butler-Walko said community members don't understand "how much effort that this administration with the police department puts in to those residency checks and how much time it actually tales the administration to work on that," according to DailyNewsTranscript.com.
Why are these people working so hard to keep children out of school? And why does it matter if these kids want to attend a school outside their own neighborhood?
Why doesn't the state get rid of school district boundaries altogether, and set up an orderly system that will allow all children to attend the schools of their choice – particularly those kids who are stuck in horrible, failing districts?
We weren't at the school board meeting, but the tone of the DailyNewsTranscript.com story makes it seem as though school and police officials were suggesting that Dedham residents don't adequately appreciate all the hard work they do to keep "the rabble" out of the community's classrooms.
Again, this is coming from the district that brags about having the "first free, taxpayer-funded public school in the United States."
It's easy to see why some families – those whose kids are stuck in some gut-rot school just because they live in the wrong zip code – would try to get into Dedham schools. The district's high school is ranked as one of the Bay State's finest, and the district's student-to-teacher ratio is about 13 to 1.
The Dedham district also has a new state-of-the-art athletic complex, which appears to have been built, in part, with state tax revenue.
We don't mean to single out Dedham schools for ridicule. We understand there are numerous other school districts across the U.S. that also crack down on out-of-area students. It's a national problem.
We also appreciate the fact that local residents feel territorial because they support their schools with their tax dollars. We get that.
However, no U.S. school district is an island. Every district we've ever encountered receives funding from their states as well as the federal government. And since all schools benefit from the taxes paid by all Americans, they shouldn't have the right to reject children who "sneak" across the district's borders in search of a better education.
These are American children, not illegal aliens. If there's room for them, they should be given a desk and invited to take part in the instructional activities.
It's been well-established that every child has the constitutional right to a free and adequate public education. Those rights should trump any and all other considerations. Families should be free to send their children to the school of their choice.


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Tirgul Hazara on the 22nd
adamsh 07 Jun 2010 13:20
On Tuesday, June 22nd, there will be a תירגול חזרה.
Dach Auditorium, 14:00-16:00.
If you have any questions you want us to solve during that recitation, please send them to Adam and Yedael.
Unfold Tirgul Hazara on the 22nd by adamsh, 07 Jun 2010 13:20


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In Young Chop's recollection of the making of "Don't Like," Durk opted out, Reese opted in.
Lil Durk's career has turned out pretty swimmingly, but it's possible that he could be an even bigger star at the moment, if he opted to rap a verse on Chief Keef's seminal 2012 drill anthem "Don't Like."
In a new interview with HNHH, Young Chop described how "Don't Like" came together. The people in the room at the time were Durk, Chop, and Keef. Keef was writing furiously to the beat Chop had just played him. Lil Reese was on his way to join them.
"Durk, I don't know what happened, he didn't want to get on the song or some shit like that," Chop recalled. "So Reesy walked in the door. [I sald] 'Bro, get on this,' because Reesy, that's my homie, he listen to me on some real shit."
Indeed, "Don't Like" not only sparked Chief Keef and Young Chop's respective careers, but Lil Reese's as well. Given Durk's success, it's all good. Durk and Chop are still homies, hopefully they can still deliver on that joint mixtape they teased earlier this year.


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This year's April Fools' Day surprise for you is that there is no April Fools' Day surprise.
This came about as a result of two problems. The first is that I've been inordinately busy and simply haven't had the time to invest the time and effort required to make a half-decent parody - something worthy of being added to the Fake Whimsy roster. The second is that much of Scotland suffered a power cut yesterday afternoon and, when the electricity finally came back on again, my Internet access had gone kablooey. I'm not sure quite what happened, but it took over twenty-four hours for Virgin Media to restore access. Given that, by its very nature, a parody page requires you to be able to actually access the sites your attempting to mock, you could say I was up Shit Creek without a paddle.
If I get time later on, I might spring a surprise Fake Whimsy page on you, but I thought I should let you know in advance that there won't be any fun and games tomorrow, just in case you were waiting on tenterhooks to see what I'd come up with. (In which case, there may very well be something wrong with you.)
This is a little later in coming than I would have liked, but I've been fighting off the effects of a less than pleasant cold over the last couple of days and have only just got round to catching up on the various matters needing my attention. (A post on the new Four Flies on Grey Velvet DVD from Mya is also in the pipeline.) We watched the BD release of Suspiria on the big screen on Tuesday night, and it proved to be a rather frustrating experience, on two fronts. First of all, because our attempts to synchronise the BD video with the English audio from the Image Entertainment LaserDisc weren't entirely successful. Secondly, because of the aforementioned video unpleasantness.
Looking through the disc again today, I noticed several other problems with the master, seemingly stemming from the digital noise reduction (DNR) that was applied during the extensive restoration. Well, perhaps "extensive" is the wrong word to use, since, while the budget clearly allowed for scanning the negative, performing an automated dirt and scratch removal pass, and goosing the brightness, contrast and colour values something rotten, it evidently didn't stretch to decent quality control. I noticed several instances of the DNR machine screwing up during the thunderstorm at the start of the film, this image showing one of the worst affected frames. Gaffes like these serve to highlight how essential it is that, if making use of automated NR tools, you carefully check the output before signing off on it.
I also came across a strange effect whereby, at the start of each new shot, the first frame is perfectly crisp, retaining all of its inherent grain. Thereafter, the second frame has had more or less all of its grain completely eroded and as a result looks like wax. By the third frame, the grain has returned again. See, for example, this instance: (Frame 1), (Frame 2), (Frame 3). Something similar generally happens at the end of each shot too, with the last two frames seeming unnaturally blurry. This process is repeated without fail throughout the entire film, and I suspect it points to yet further careless misuse of the video restoration system.
Finally, we also have that age-old favourite, the DNR machine attempting to repair a damaged frame by taking material from another frame and making matters worse in the process, usually by selecting the wrong piece of visual information. This shot shows a particularly horrific example, where information from the same or a previous frame somehow ends up on the letterboxing at the bottom of the frame. Was anyone actually checking this stuff at all or did someone just his the "Go" button and head off for a leak?
All this has only soured my attitude towards this restoration of Suspiria even more. It has its strengths, don't get me wrong. Detail is very good indeed, at least until the swimming pool sequence, at which point the film suddenly and inexplicably drops to a lower resolution for the remainder of its duration. Furthermore, barring the almost imperceptible gaffes at the beginning and end of each shot, the grain is well maintained. However, the film has not only been screwed up something rotten by having its values knocked out of whack, it has also clearly been subjected to a botched DNR process. This is, by any stretch of the imagination, a landmark film, but the way it has been treated is utterly indefensible and beggars belief. In my opinion nothing short of a brand new scan of the negative (or access to the initial scan prior to any digital manipulation being performed) and an intensive restoration process supervised by someone who actually knows what they're doing will suffice. 4/10
studio: CDE; country: Italy; region code: B; codec: VC-1;
file size: 27 GB; average bit rate (including audio): 18.8 Mbit/sec
Rebus (DVD, Delta, Region 0, UK)
I was pleasantly surprised to spot this in Fopp today, where I was killing time while waiting before my meeting with my supervisors. The previous DVD release (by Universal) of this series starring John Hannah as the eponymous DI Rebus was missing the fourth and final episode, which would have aired on September 11th 2001 had a nice man called Osama Bin Laden not kicked up a bit of a stink, sending the TV schedules to halfway to hell. That episode ultimately disappeared into the ether and I believe aired a couple of times on one of ITV's cable channels. It's present and correct on this new edition. I can't say I've ever been particularly gripped by Ian Rankin's Rebus novels, but I liked this TV adaptation of them, considerably more so than the dour Ken Stott interpretation that came along later.
Suspiria (Blu-ray, CDE, Region B, Italy)
Oh boy…
This evening, in advance of tomorrow's meeting with my supervisors to discuss the recently completed Chapter 3 of my PhD thesis, I tackled the dreaded Six-Monthly Research Progress Review Report, a self-assessment form (on progress so date as well as what you intend to spend the next few months doing) which all Glasgow University research students carry out every (you guessed it) six months. The last time I did one of these, it was like pulling teeth and had to go through a good few drafts before either myself or my supervisors were satisfied with it. This time, however, it was an altogether more painless activity, which I suspect bodes well for my PhD on the whole, because it suggests that I'm now far clearer about what I want to do and how I intend to do it. Looking back at my previous report, I've actually achieved more in the last six months than I actually set out to, which means another feather in my cap.
Over the last couple of days I've taken the opportunity to turn my attention to matters of a considerably less academic variety, mainly the performing of a veritable blitzkrieg on my bedroom, which had become so untidy that simply walking from one end to the other was, frankly, a safety hazard. I'm not by nature a particularly tidy person, preferring to dump things on the nearest possible surface or, failing that, the middle of the floor. I wish I'd taken a "before picture", but I didn't have the presence of mind at the time. Instead, here's the result of a good couple of days on my hands and knees, inhaling enough dust to last me several lifetimes. It will probably last oh, a week or two before once again resembling a bomb site.
My other achievement this week, a considerably less pleasing one, was getting my first midge bite of 2009. Summer is, alas, definitely on the way. Can I go and hibernate until autumn, please?
I received a call today from the extremely helpful Mark at Dell technical support. (Seriously, this guy has been busting a gut trying to help me, which can't have been easy given that, due to some sort of screw-up, the company has no record of my previous communications regarding my ongoing problems.) The long and short of it is that a third monitor will be delivered to me on Monday and the second one will be uplifted.
In other news, the "pinching" I previously mentioned as occurring in three of the panel's four corners has begun to recede. No, it's not completely gone, and it's still quite noticeable with a black background in a dark room, but it currently looks considerably better than it did as little as five or six hours ago. This is most heartening to me, and suggests that such problems will eventually fade once the screen has been allowed to "settle in". Of course, dead pixels (or stuck pixels that have been given a rigorous work-out with the likes of JScreenFix) can't be fixed, but this does mean that, should Monday's arrival suffer from the same pinching effect, I won't immediately be panicking and calling up tech support. This allows me to concentrate solely on faulty pixels, and I've come to the conclusion that, should monitor #3 suffer from a single dead or stuck pixel in a relatively inconspicuous place, I'll put up with it in return for an end to the hassle.
(Incidentally, it's perhaps worth pointing out that the monitor I was using this time last year, the Sony MFM-HT205, had a single red stuck pixel fairly close to the centre of the panel. It actually took me over a year to become aware of it, and only because my brother, bless his perceptiveness, pointed it out to me.)
Here's hoping the old adage of "third time's a charm" turns out to be true.
PS. I showed my mum The Descent on BD tonight (my first gala screening of the new Australian release from beginning to end). She thought it was great. Then again, I'm not entirely surprised, because according to my dad I inherited my taste for horror movies from her.
Update, February 21st, 2009 at 08:12 PM: I've just noticed that the problem is now once again as bad as it has ever been. It appears to begin to show itself after the monitor has been on for a while and just gets progressively worse. Initially, it looks absolutely fine, but within a short space of time the issues begin to assert themselves.
So my copy of the upcoming Blu-ray release of The Silence of the Lambs was dispatched from MovieTyme today. At the moment, my brother is in the final stages of his work on the upcoming Mondo Vision DVD of Andrzej Zulawksi's L'important c'est d'aimer, so I'm currently used to seeing (and hearing) Klaus Kinski ranting (in either French, German or English) on a more or less daily basis. During one of his fine tirades, we ended up speculating as to what The Silence of the Lambs would have been like had Kinski played the role of Hannibal Lecter. "Very different" is, I suspect, the answer. From there, I naturally began to wonder what the film would have been like had it been directed by one of Kinski's most frequent collaborators, and populated by his regular cast. Here's what I came up with:
The Silence of the Lambs
A film by Jess Franco
Written and produced by Harry Alan Towers
Soledad Miranda as Clarice Starling
Klaus Kinski as Dr. Hannibal Lecter
Herbert Lom as Jack Crawford
Christopher Lee as Dr. Frederick Chilton
Paul Muller as Jame Gumb
Lina Romay as Ardelia Mapp
Romina Power as Catherine Martin
Maria Rohm as Senator Ruth Martin
I'm still struggling to cast the all-important role of Barney. Can any Franco experts out there suggest a suitable actor?
On Friday evening, I placed an order with eBuyer, the contents of which will be detailed in a subsequent post. eBuyer is a supplier I've bought from a couple of times in the past, always with no complaints. However, as I always say, the real measure of a retailer's quality becomes apparent not when everything goes according to plan but when something goes wrong.
On Friday night, something went wrong with a vengeance. I'm talking a "Your credit card has been declined" sort of wrong. At first, I wondered if perhaps the credit card company suspected foul play and, believing the transaction to be fraudulent, had put a stop on my card. (This has happened in the past, often when doing crazy things like buying DVDs from - gasp! - non-UK web sites.) Logging into my account, however, proved that this wasn't the case, and that I was a long, long way from reaching my credit limit. I then, not unreasonably, assumed that I'd simply made a mistake when entering my credit card details, so I logged into my eBuyer account and re-entered them. Ten minutes later, I got another message telling me that my card had been declined again.
By this time, it was 6:30 PM, and eBuyer's next day delivery service has an 8 PM cut-off. Rather than spend ages going round in circles, therefore, and miss the cut-off, I decided to simply go with a different payment method, in this case my debit card. The only problem with that is the eBuyer only allows you to change your payment details once for a single order before locking it. No problem, I thought, I'll just give them a call, explain the situation and get them to change my details. After a commendably brief wait, sullied only by some incredibly annoying music and an irritatingly cheery pre-recorded announcement about all the over-priced gold-plated USB cables I could buy, I was greeted by a snippy and extremely bored-sounding woman, who listened to my problem and then, making it readily apparent via her tone of voice that this was a great inconvenience to her, took the details for my debit card and told me to expect the order to be processed within the next half-hour.
Needless to say, an hour later, nothing had changed. My order was still flagged as having a payment issue, at which point I got on the phone to eBuyer again. I ended up speaking to the same bored woman, explained the problem to her once again, and was treated to more sighs and (I would assume) eye-rolling, as this ray of sunshine then attempted to "push my order through again", or something along those lines. Nope, she drawled, it's been declined. "But this is a different card," I told her, "from a different bank." "Not working," was the reply. At this point, with 8 o'clock rapidly approaching, I decided to call it quits, cancel the order and place it again. "You want me to cancel it or are you going to do it yourself?" she asked me. I decided that, rather than tempt fate, I'd handle this tricky task myself, and rang off. A few moments later, order #1 was cancelled and order #2 was placed, this time using my brother's credit card, just in case, by some bizarre twist of fate, both my credit card and my debit card were up the creek.
Ten minutes later, I decided to log into my eBuyer account to check the status of the order. Sorry, the on-screen message informed me, your account has been suspended. Erm, what? By this stage, I was beginning to wonder if someone had it in for me. Yet another phone call to eBuyer once again connected me to Miss I-don't-give-a-shit, who listened to my predicament without a care in the world, before opining "I don't know why that happened." Growing increasingly exasperated by the minute, I asked if there was anything she could do about it. "Don't know," she replied. The conversation continued like this for a couple of minutes, before she finally clicked some buttons and told me that my account had been re-activated. Just under an hour later, I finally received notification that my order had been dispatched for delivery at some point on Saturday. Hallelujah!
The next morning, I was out at work and my parents were out walking the dogs when ParcelForce tried to deliver the package. For me, the face-palm moment of the year so far. They re-delivered it on Monday. This time, thankfully, I was in.
PS. On Saturday, I successfully withdrew some cash from my bank account. So much for there being a problem with it.
I mentioned in a previous post that, since the start of the year, I've been getting sent on relief to various libraries other than the one I normally work at. The contract I signed when I accepted the job back in the Summer of 2007 stipulates that I must be willing to travel to any Glasgow library. In reality, it tends not to work this way, as broadly speaking people do their best to ensure that you get sent on relief to places you can realistically hope to reach in a timely fashion and without frittering away too much money (so, for example, employees operating on the South Side generally cover other South Side libraries), but I've certainly been seeing more of the city of late than I normally do. It's not too bad, although I'm one of those people who resists change like crazy and would prefer to be going to my "own" library every day.
Still, one of the upsides of my travels is that, a couple of weeks back, when I was doing a shift in Woodside Library, a customer, seeing me writing in my strange and ass-backwards left-handed way (see picture opposite) said to me: "What you need is a Yoropen." "A what?" I said. Said customer explained to me that she too was left-handed and had always had trouble with writing, but that a miraculous implement called the Yoropen had solved all her problems. She strongly recommended that I look into it, so I filed the name away for future reference and, a couple of days later, decided to order myself one of these intriguingly-shaped pens to see if they really were all they were cracked up to be.
Many left-handers have problems with writing, generally coming in the form of "hooking", i.e. twisting your arm at an awkward angle, and often ending up smudging what you've written in the process, not to mention putting an incredible strain on your wrist and making the act of writing for prolonged periods painful. I've suffered from this ever since I learned to write, as well as the added problem of holding my pen in an utterly bizarre four-fingered grip - something which I suspect stems from the fact that, with no other left-handers in my immediate family, I had no idea what was the "proper" way of doing it and therefore invented my own less than ergonomic method. (Or, as an art teacher at school once eloquently told me, "Michael, you draw incredibly well for someone who holds his pen like a spastic." Ah, those were the days.)
I've now been using a Yoropen for a little over a week, and I must admit that, while I was initially sceptical, I'm definitely seeing progress. The idea of the pen, as far as I can tell (that is, ignoring the marketing talk on the company's web site and going by my own experience), is that its shape basically forces you to write at an improved angle, reducing strain and preventing you from smearing what you've just written. It also, for me, has the added benefit of forcing me to hold it using the traditional two-fingered configuration, because it's virtually impossible to write with it using my weird four-fingered clutch. As a form of enforced correction, it seems to work. Holding a pen this way now comes to me more naturally than it used to, and I don't believe my writing is any worse than it was previously (in fact, I'd even go as far as to say that it may have improved slightly). I'm essentially having to train myself to write from scratch, so there's probably some way still to go, but my overriding impression is that the Yoropen does indeed work as advertised. So thank you, anonymous lady.
If there's anything good to have come out of the fact that Zammo has gone into administration, it's that the branches that are still open are flogging their remaining goods at cut rates. Books, clothing and posters are all going for 50% of the advertised prices, and there are some fine deals to be had on DVDs and BDs as well. In the case of the latter, I picked up the UK release of Butterfly on a Wheel on Wednesday - a blind buy that didn't pay off. (I also snagged Donkey Punch and George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead.) This suspense thriller stars Gerard Butler, he of 300 who's good at looking constipated and emitting gutteral roars (in 300, it was "Sparrrrtaaaaaaa!"; in this film, he just bellows "Aaaaabbyyyyy!" a lot), and Pierece Brosnan, who is under the misconception that growing a couple of days' worth of stubble and putting on a horrendously overdone Northern Irish accent makes him seem menacing. Unfortunately, it's nothing more than a bland and improbably plotted piece of glossy, slickly-produced twaddle that should have gone straight to TV… and indeed it did in the US, where it was released under the title of Shattered. After we watched it (on Friday), my brother turned to me and said "This is the worst film I've ever seen on Blu-ray." Had I had the presence of mind, I would have reminded him that we also watched Norbit, but I guess my brain had been turned to mush by preceding 95 minutes of tedium.
Oh well, at least it's got Maria Bello in her pants. Actually, screw it, even that isn't enough to save this train wreck.
For what it's worth, Icon's all-regions disc is actually pretty good, albeit with an irritating audio sync issue which affects both the lossy Dolby Digital and lossless DTS-HD Master Audio tracks. The AVC encode suffers from little if any noticeable compression issues, and detail is, for the most part, quite pleasing. The whole image has been slightly pre-filtered, with ringing visible around high contrast edges, such the letterbox bars and the on-screen credits, but, while this is less than ideal, it doesn't affect the look of the film as negatively as something like Kung Fu Panda. On the other hand, the blacks look quite milky, although it's unclear whether this is a fault in the original photography or a problem specific to the transfer. (I'm leaning towards the former, since the black screen against which the first few credits are overlaid is "proper" black, unlike, say, Silent Hill, where the black level is off from beginning to end.) 8/10
Butterfly on a Wheel
studio: Icon; country: UK; region code: ABC; codec: AVC;
file size: 19.6 GB; average bit rate (including audio): 29.61 Mbit/sec
I'm afraid there won't be a DVD review this week. I've simply been too busy, both with PhD work (I need to turn in a draft of what will eventually become my first analysis chapter before the end of March) and with the day job (since the beginning of the year, I've been getting sent on relief to various libraries around Glasgow, with the travel cutting into my "me" time). Rather than post nothing, though (which would be bad manners after I promised a review every week), I decided to dig up a piece I'd previously started and polish it up to a standard fit to be seen by other eyes. It's a review of the 2-parter Barbara Machin wrote for Casualty during Christmas 2006. As such, it's a bit late coming, and it's a little on the long-winded side, but hey - at least it allows me to avoid breaking one of my New Year resolutions.
Killing Me Softly and Silent Night
Series 21, Episodes 15 and 16
Written by Barbara Machin; Directed by Diarmuid Lawrence
Originally aired December 23rd and 24th, 2006
It's been too long.
A normal Christmas Eve shift in Holby City Hospital's Accident & Emergency department: patients suffering from various ailments, minor and major, are waiting to be treated, and the staff are knuckling down while each having to juggle the demands of the job with their own personal woes. However, unbeknownst to them, two members of the team are about to come face to face with death in a very literal sense as what seems like a bog standard day turns into anything but. Nothing will ever be the same again come the end of the shift…
I've probably watched this two-parter more times than any other episode of Casualty made in the last decade, and with good reason: as far as I'm concerned, these are the best episodes that have been made at least since we entered the twenty-first century, and you have to go back to, oh, say, Series 12 and Love Me Tender to find an episode of comparable quality. That's not to say that there haven't been any great episodes between "Love Me Tender" and this two-parter - there definitely have, but the calibre of these episodes is such that they eclipse everything else made in recent years.
I think that part of what makes these episodes stand out is that they fall bang in the middle of a very rough patch in Casualty's history. Series 21 is, as I've said a few times now, in my opinion the absolute worst series of all time, due to a combination of lazy writing, inconsistent characterisation, unbelievable storylines and a genuine sense that no-one on the writing staff knew or cared what they were doing. It says a lot about how bad things had got that it took an outsider to turn the show on its head and, arguably, show the regulars how it should be done. That someone, of course, is Barbara Machin, who, along with the likes of Bryan Elsley (Skins), Bill Gallagher (Lark Rise to Candleford) and Peter Bowker (Blackpool), was part of a bold, daring team of writers that joined the show when it was in the early stages of becoming Great Television (™) and helped lead it through its golden age period. Machin left Casualty after writing Series 13's excellent episode One From the Heart, and from then went on to do Waking the Dead, of which I'm a massive fan, as you probably know.
[Continue reading "A very bloody Christmas"...]
Apologies for the lack of posts over the last few days. I know I promised a full review of Tomb Raider: Underworld, but the three people in the world who are on tenterhooks for it will have to wait slightly longer. The fact is I've been under the weather lately, having picked up that brute of a cold that's been going round. My head feels considerably clearer today than it did yesterday, but I've still got quite a bit of catching up to do, including read an entire PhD thesis before my next meeting with my supervisors on Tuesday 20th. I've also, as of today, started attention a Junior Honours class in Italian cinema, hosted by one of my supervisors. Much as I'd like to, I won't be attending every single class, because each session is five hours long, which, when you're studying part-time, cuts a pretty big chunk out of your week, but it should provide a good opportunity for me to fill in some of the (fairly substantial) blanks that exist in my knowledge of Italian cinema.
Oh, and I picked up a new monitor for a ridiculously low price. More on it later, hopefully, once it's been properly calibrated and I have a better idea of its strengths and weaknesses.
With another year been and gone, now seems like a good time to sit back and reflect on the past 365 days. I've experienced some highs and lows, the lowest of which would undoubtedly be losing my last two surviving grandparents in the space of a few months. On the upside, I feel that I've begun to make real progress with my PhD, which is finally evolving into something tangible, the process of which will no doubt continue in 2009. Otherwise, I can't say that very much has changed for me. I continued to work part-time in my job at the library, with the various rounds of staff transfers mercifully passing me by and life continuing as before. Is it my dream job? No, I should say not, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't go through periods of finding it (and the Great British public) incredibly frustrating. However, all things considered, I can think of plenty other less desirable jobs I could be doing. At least this one is convenient and, all things considered, reasonably well-paid.
Zeros and Ones
In relation to the battle between rival high definition formats Blu-ray and HD DVD, last year's annual round-up included the statement "With no end to the format war in sight any time soon, 2008 looks set to be another interesting year." Well, it seemed that I'd barely finished writing those words when the HD DVD camp threw in the towel. To be honest, the writing had been on the wall for some time, but several people, myself included, still adopted an "It ain't over 'til it's over" mentality in the early days of 2008. With Warner's abandonment of the format only a few days later, however, the writing was well and truly on the wall. Within days, the game was up and the remaining HD DVD-supporting majors (Universal and Paramount) were pledging allegiance to the Blu flag. In any event, once the stragglers got up and running, it turned out to be a pretty damn good year for HD content, with some truly amazing transfers seeing the light of day, while the arrival of several high profile titles such as The Godfather trilogy and The Dark Knight, plus the certainty afforded by there now only being a single HD format, undoubtedly contributed to more people taking the plunge and lending their support to the platform.
I bought myself a new computer - a full tower system after my brief dalliance with the world of small form factors the previous year. After relying on my more technologically competent relatives in the past, I was quite pleased with myself for managing to build the whole thing from scratch myself - seriously, deciphering some of those poorly translated user manuals practically requires a diploma in itself. I also upgraded my PC's aged Creative audio system with some nice new Logitech speakers and a veritable beast of a subwoofer. I also ultimately succeeded in going region-free for Blu-ray playback, thanks to SlySoft's AnyDVD HD software, allowing me to use my system as a multi-region HD home theatre PC.
At the Pictures
This year, my brother put together a pretty impressive projection system, accompanied by a meaty sound setup, allowing us to enjoy a film-watching environment that more closely approximates the big screen experience. Despite this, however, my overall viewing figures were somewhat reduced in 2008 compared with 2007 (themselves a reduction from 2006). I maintain a log of all the films I watch, and the total tally for 2008 is 128, 67 of which were first time viewings. The increasingly wide array of available Blu-ray titles certainly led to me taking increased risks with titles I hadn't previously seen, but at the same time caused me to be far less likely to tune in to television broadcasts of films. (I watched 56 films on Blu-ray, 44 on DVD and 14 on HD DVD, versus 7 on TV.)
I got the opportunity to see several what might be termed "significant" films, among them the great - 28 Weeks Later, Across the Universe, Atonement, Bonnie and Clyde, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Dark City, Eastern Promises, Enchanted, Fight Club, The Fly (the David Cronenberg version), Juno, The Life Before Her Eyes, The Maltese Falcon, A Matter of Loaf and Death, Mean Girls, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, The Orphanage, Persepolis, The Plague Dogs, Rabid Dogs, The Shining, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Volver, Wall-E - the good - The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, Almost Famous, Blow, The Brave One, Chungking Express, La Femme Publique, Grindhouse, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Kiki's Delivery Service, Memento, My Blueberry Nights, Nikita, Resident Evil: Extinction, School of Rock, Shaun of the Dead, La Vie en Rose - the disappointing - 30 Days of Night, All the Boys Love Mandy Lane, The Dark Knight, Doomsday, Gone Baby Gone, Running Scared, Tekkonkinkreet - and the downright dreadful - Freddy Got Fingered, Omen IV: The Awakening and, last but not least, Seytan.
Best film I saw this year? Definitely Atonement. Worst? Oh, come on, do I even have to answer that? I saw Freddy Got Fingered, for god's sake.
Much to my chagrin, my reading this year was pretty limited. In addition to perusing a number of academic tomes as part of my PhD research, I sat down with The Field of Blood, The Last Breath, Garnethill, Exile and Resolution by Denise Mina, Day After Day by Carlo Lucarelli, An Unsuitable Job for a Woman by P.D. James, Demo by Alison Miller, The Deceiver and The Fourth Protocol by Frederick Forsythe, and Above Suspicion by Lynda La Plante. I also re-read Mercy Alexander by George Tiffin, and tucked into The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins - the latter serving as my sole piece of non-fiction reading that had no direct relation to my PhD. I also started Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by John Le Carré, a celebrated classic that I must admit I'm making very slow progress with indeed.
Song and Dance
I picked up the following CDs: Atonement (Dario Marianelli), Echoes of War: The Music of Blizzard Entertainment (Eminence Symphony Orchestra), Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, The Pink and the Lily (Sandi Thom) and Planet Terror (Robert Rodriguez).
Well, 2008 came and went a lot more quickly than I was expecting. I'll be doing one of my usual annual summaries later, but for now I thought I'd do something completely new and write down some New Year's resolutions. In the past, I've scoffed at such practices, believing that, if you want to change something, the best time to do it is now, not when you hang up the new calendar. However, I'm beginning to come round to the notion that, sometimes, we all need an extra little kick to do the things we know we should do but can't face up to, and the start of a new year seems like as good a time as any to make an actual commitment. So, without further ado, here are my goals for 2009, in no particular order:
Write more reviews. Once upon a time, I was quite prolific as a writer at DVD Times. In 2008, however, my output slowed to a trickle. Some of this can be blamed on my workload: I'm researching a PhD and also holding down a part-time job. That said, I could definitely stand to make better use of my free time, so my first resolution for 2009 is to attempt to write one review per week. These might not all be fully-fledged, in-depth pieces like my Wall-E Blu-ray review, which was a massive undertaking, but I could at least stand to write technical reviews of BDs whose DVD counterparts have already been covered either by myself or other DVD Times reviews.
Pay off my student loan. When I did my undergraduate degree between 2001 and 2005, I took out a student loan. Given that I lived at home and was within easy travelling distance of the university, I qualified for the smallest available loan, something which I am now exceedingly glad of, having heard the figures bandied about by some former students (particularly those in the US - yikes!). In comparison, £2,500 feels quite maneagable, and, in any event, payment will be facilitated somewhat by a generous donation I received from a dead relative on Christmas Day (thanks, Gran).
Lose weight. In Spring of 2005, I lost a considerable amount of weight in a short space of time. Unfortunately, some of that has subsequently piled back on, and while I'm far from as large as I once was, I could stand to be smaller. I can also see myself ending up on the slippery slope to becoming a fatty again, something I don't particularly want to happen. I don't subscribe to any particularly outlandish diets: my weight loss system is basically "Three square meals a day, five portions of fruit and nothing else in between." It worked in 2005, and it can work again in 2009. All it takes is a little willpower in the first couple of weeks, and then I don't even miss the crisps, sweets etc.
Watch more films. I saw a number of "significant" films in 2008, some of which I'll list in my review of 2008 post. In general, though, viewing figures were down: I saw a total of 67 films for the first time, a mere seven of which were released that year. I'm not much of a cinema-goer these days - I tend to think it's just not worth the hassle - but I could have done better. I still can't believe I didn't at least go to see Quantum of Solace. I know some people try to watch a film every single day, but that's just not possible from my point of view: as much as I'd like it to, my entire life doesn't revolve around watching movies. I'm not going to make a pledge to watch X number of movies this year, as I surely wouldn't be able to keep to it, so I'm simply going to say "I'll do better."
Post more. I definitely wrote considerably fewer posts for this site in 2008 than I did in 2007. While I wouldn't say I neglected the site as such, I do think I could have written more. While I'm not a believer in posting something every day simply for the sake of it, on far too many occasions I neglected to post a news item that either myself or others would have found interesting simply because I couldn't be bothered. I'm not sure what the solution to this is, but I know some people have a habit of setting aside a specific time of the day for blogging, so that's one possible answer. In any event, expect to see more activity at Land of Whimsy in 2009.
Zavvi, the UK version of what used to be called Virgin Megastore, has gone into administration. Now, this may have had something to do with its main supplier, Entertainment UK (which also provided the bulk of Woolworths' goods), having recently gone down the crapper, but I'd imagine replacing the memorable Virgin brand with a name as stupid as Zavvi didn't help either. Either way, I decided to make the most of their clearance sale on Saturday and picked up a few Blu-ray titles at reasonable prices: Hannibal Rising (the one Hannibal Lecter film I've yet to see - don't worry, I'm well aware that it's supposedly awful), George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead, and, because there's no shame in watching the odd bit of mindless crap from time to time, Mr. Michael Bay's The Island and Transformers (the latter an upgrade over my brother's HD DVD copy, given the BD's inclusion of lossless audio).
I've already done image galleries for the HD DVD versions of The Island and Transformers, which feature the same video encodes on BD, and will be doing the other two titles before too long. However, as a little sneak preview, I must say I'm very impressed by how good Night of the Living Dead looks. I'm an unrelenting pessimist and wasn't really expecting much, particularly given how bad some of this film's DVD releases have been, so I was pleasantly surprised when I popped the disc in to find a transfer that is, at least based on my initial cursory examination, the equal of Warner's Casablanca.
Well, another Christmas has been and gone. I've decided to put my PhD work to one side until the New Year, but I'm back to work at the library tomorrow, so it doesn't really feel like I've had much in the way of a festive break this year. Alas, I can't really complain, as it's simply the luck of the draw: I work Wednesdays and Saturdays, and, with Christmas falling on a Thursday this year, I've missed out on any additional days off. Next year, with Christmas on a Friday, I'll end up with a more generous stretch of time to put my feet up.
Anyway, presents! In something of a change in tradition, I didn't get any movies this year. (As it happens, I'm still waiting on the US Blu-ray releases of Planet Terror, Death Proof and the Canadian Sin City, but, seasonal postal delays being what they are, I'm not entirely surprised that they didn't show.) Instead, I contented myself with two packets of sour flavour Jelly Bellies, as well as Tomb Raider: Underworld for PC and the 3-disc Legendary Edition of Echoes of War, a symphonic recording of compositions from Blizzard Entertainment's Warcraft, Starcraft and Diablo series of games. Oh, and a copy of the From Dusk to Dawn trilogy on DVD from my work colleagues. My final gift, which I've actually had up and running since the middle of November (hence it not really feeling like a Christmas present as such, although technically it was), is my very nice speaker setup, which remains something of a rarity for me in that it's one of the few pieces of computer equipment I've bought and had not one single complaint about.
In that past, we've generally had the grandparents from both sides of the family over for Christmas dinner, but this year, with all but one of them being six feet under, things were a little different. As a result, myself, my parents and my brother did something we've never done before and actually went out for our evening meal, to the Kama Sutra on Sauchiehall St.
Afterwards, we trooped back home to watch the premiere of the new Wallace & Gromit film, A Matter of Loaf and Death, which aired last night on BBC1. I personally enjoyed it a lot, even if it did feel a bit, well, slight in comparison with the previous shorts. It did feel like something of a return to form after the feature-length The Curse of the Were-rabbit, however, which for all its strengths felt like it was lacking the special something which made the shorts so memorable. In any event, Nick Park's masterpiece remains, for me, The Wrong Trousers, which is just about as perfect as storytelling can get.
Best wishes of the holiday season to all Land of Whimsy visitors. May your days be merry and bright, and may all your Christmases be white! I'm afraid I've been pretty busy this December (I even drew the short straw and ended up working the Christmas Eve shift at the library) and haven't had time to draw one of my crappy pictures this year, so I thought I'd post a picture of our Christmas tree to warm the cockles of your heart. And yes, that is a hulking great CRT television. My dad bought it close to a decade ago, and it was his pride and joy. It's now covered with discolouration splotches and hasn't been turned on in so long that I'll be amazed if it still works at all.
By the way, there has been an interesting development in my quest to get to the bottom of the Profondo Rosso situation. I'm continuing to investigate the issue and hope to be able to report back on it in a couple of days, but let's just say that an absolutely gorgeous high definition master appears to exist…
[Continue reading "And on this day…"...]
Holy potatoes!
Forgive me for linking to the Sun newspaper's web site. It's not something I'd normally do, but I feel we're in need of some light relief as we wait on tenterhooks for Barack Obama to come and restore sanity to the US of A. Lyris linked me to this current affairs piece about a reverend in Sheffield who had to undergo surgery to remove a potato that had become lodged in his anus. How did it get there, you ask? The unfortunate clergyman had a perfectly believable explanation:
The clergyman told stunned casualty nurses he fell backwards on to his kitchen table while hanging curtains.
He happened to be nude at the time of the mishap.
But of course! Why didn't we think of that before? I personally frequently redecorate while in the nude, and I often leave vegetables lying about on the kitchen table when I do it. And who hasn't had the unfortunate experience of falling over and conveniently landing on an item of food? Well, given the other nonsense this fellow no doubt believes in, he probably thought this was a highly convincing yarn.
Attention persons of religion who insist on shoving your "faith" down our throats: this is how sick we are of your shit. Recently, an initiative was launched to place adverts on the sides of buses in London proclaiming "There is probably no god. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life." Of course, such a venture would require money - something to the tune of £11,000, to be precise. A donation page was established at JustGiving, the aim being to secure £5,500 from the general public, with The God Delusion author Richard Dawkins promising to match that out of his own pocket, bringing the total to the £11,000 target.
Within eighteen hours, more than £30,000 had been donated.
I take this as ample evidence that there is a silent but sizeable group of people in Britain that is fed up seeing religion getting an easy ride and of "faith" being seen as something that is automatically deserving of respect in and of itself. I do, of course, have no problem with people believing in whatever they wish - be it Kung-Fu Jesus, Flaming Mo(hammed) or dancing unicorns - but, as I've said in the past, I'm all too aware that there is a sizeable discrepancy between representations of religious and irreligious ideas in the public sphere. When I walk down Buchanan Street on a Saturday during my lunch break, I see ample evidence of the religious movement, be it banners proclaiming Jesus to be the only way (the only way of what?), the church at the corner, or that doddering old man who stands at the traffic lights every week without fail, spewing toxic hatred out of his overpowered amp. Unfortunately, all too often these displays of unpleasant nonsense go unchallenged, the notion being (I suspect) that it's far easier to get on your soapbox and claim that something exists than to claim it doesn't.
As of writing, nearly £90,000 has been raised. Result: the campaign has now been extended to cover the whole of the UK and will now be featured inside buses, on trains, billboards, etc. They say that he who shouts loudest gets the most attention; well, maybe it's time we atheists started doing a bit of hollering of our own.
Donate now! Hey, if we hit £100,000, maybe we'll get a common sense blimp or something.
How geographically knowledgeable are you? Do you know your Tuvalu from your Vanuatu, or are you one of those people for whom the only place called Georgia is one of the 50 United States of America? Sporcle.com has a great little game in which you have 15 minutes to name the 195 countries of the world. Regrettably, I managed a rather pitiful 116, showing that my knowledge of Central America, parts of Africa, and the South Pacific islands is shockingly bad. (I also managed to overlook a bunches of places whose names I know as well as my own, such as Croatia, Thailand, Vietnam and Egypt. There's always at least one that you know you know but can't immediately call to mind.)
Take the quiz and see just how much (or how little) you know about the planet you inhabit!
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Marketing is not nearly as simple as it used to be. Even so, the principles of marketing have not changed all that much. This knowledge makes you wonder why so many marketing experts and owners of small companies tend to forget about the basic marketing strategies. These clear-cut techniques are still the factors which can cause a business to either be profitable or to fail.
Listed below are ten simple, effective marketing strategies which can help you take your business to new heights.
Marketing Strategy 1 – Understand Your Consumers.
Marketing campaigns are successful when the directors understand their consumers. This understanding involves knowing what your customers want and the best way to deliver it to them. Just as importantly, you often have to know how to make consumers aware of their own needs.
Marketing Strategy 2 – Conduct a Dual Test.
You never want to use anything, including a marketing strategy, which does not receive a favorable response. The most commonly used marketing review is called either a split or dual test. Using this format, you can try out two unique versions of your promotional materials to see which one gets the best reception.
Marketing Strategy 3 – Never Stop Testing.
There are many other tests you can conduct to make sure your marketing ideas are being well received by your potential customers. Interests change so it is important you stay current with your marketing strategies. For this reason, never stop testing the effectiveness of your marketing campaign. If your materials are not producing the desired results, you want to stop using them so you can stop throwing away money.
Marketing Strategy 4 – Concentrate on What You Are Offering
The marketing offers you send to your consumers will be one of the main influences driving them to buy your goods or services. As such, you should concentrate on your offer to make sure it is the most attractive offer your potential customers will receive.
Marketing Strategy 5 – Seek Out Additional Help
You are not expected to know everything about marketing so do not be ashamed to admit what you do not know. Your strength will come in your wise decision to seek out help from people who excel in marketing. Working with these individuals will only make you a better marketer.
Marketing Strategy 6 – Focus on Value not Price.
Setting your price too high or too low can easily lead to a pricing war, a decrease in profits, and that eventual closing of the company doors. Instead of emphasizing price, focus on the value offered by your product or service. People are always willing to buy when they feel they are getting value for their money.
Marketing Strategy 7 – Keep Your Messages Consistent.
Think about the messages you are considering sending out as part of your marketing campaign. Are they consistent? Does the tone of the email match the one of your website? Consistency gives people a sense of comfort, and when individuals are comfortable, they tend to stay loyal to a business.
Marketing Strategy 8 – Sales Come and Go, but Relationships Stay Forever.
While you may be happy when a customer buys one product from you, would it not be better if they bought something from you every month? As a marketer, your main focus is to create relationships with customers. If these are healthy connections, not only will the consumers buy from you repeatedly, but they will also encourage their friends to buy from you as well.
Marketing Strategy 9 – Use Many Marketing Tools.
When it comes to marketing your webpage, you have many options so do not settle on just one marketing platform. Emails will get you in the mailboxes of potential customers, but what about the individuals who never read their emails? How will you reach them? Have you given any thought to pay-per-click advertising? Use as many marketing tools as you possibly can. The more marketing you do; the greater results you will get.
Marketing Strategy 10 – Remember Experience is Best.
Sure you can obtain the services of some of the most effective marketing strategists out there, but what you need to do is learn from them so you can practice what they preach. After all, experience is the best teacher, and once you learn the tricks and tools, you can manage your own marketing campaign and save yourself money.
If your goal is to successfully promote your website, then you will find these strategies most helpful. Thriving marketers use the strategies listed above every single day. By following in their footsteps, you can join the ranks of those doing well in internet marketing.
Marketing is not nearly as simple as it used to be. Even so, the principles of marketing have not changed all that much. This knowledge makes you wonder why so many marketing experts and owners of small companies tend to forget about the basic marketing strategies. These clear-cut techniques are still the factors which can cause a business to either be profitable or to fail.


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Remakes of movies, soap operas, and songs are usually no match to the original. Some remakes can be applauded and praised, but the original will always be better. It has already set the standard and remakes just altered it a bit to make the final product more distinct. Like movies, soap operas, and songs, original or stock engine components will always be better than aftermarket auto parts. That's why OEM and OEQ parts have been on the lips of car owners ever since distributors first learned the efficiency of these auto pieces. These components usually restore your engine's condition and match the quality of the stock engine parts, with precision fit and a performance level that is equivalent to the original.
OEQ stands for original equipment quality. It's self-explanatory-meaning, you get the same quality found in the original parts. Most car owners rely on this brand because it allows their vehicles to reach maximum performance and staying power. These parts are failsafe and are guaranteed to perform like the original ones fitted in your vehicle. That's why getting replacements from this brand is much easier because it throws away any worries or apprehensions you might have about purchasing a relatively cheaper substitute to the stock parts you have.
But then again, there's also an even much cheaper alternative to OEQ parts-aftermarket replacements. What's the big difference, anyway? Yes, most distributors carry aftermarket components in their product catalogs, but that doesn't mean it could match the performance and function of original equipment quality parts. For car owners, it's always a question of OEM/OEQ vs. aftermarket. But you have to consider at least three factors before making a decision-cost, warranty, and quality. Original equipment quality parts win when it comes to warranty and quality, but aftermarket takes the cake when it comes to cost. Do you really want to save a few dollars and get substandard auto parts in return? A tip in buying aftermarket parts: always ask the retailer if the part you'll be purchasing meets OEQ specifications. If it does, then you'll be getting almost the same quality at a lower cost. If it doesn't, don't buy it because it's not worth the savings.
Feel free to browse our catalog at Parts Train so you can see all our original equipment quality products. Our tried-and-tested replacement parts won't hurt your budget. Purchase from us and save more.
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my new YA cover!I just got the cover to my new YA that's coming out in February from HarperCollins. What do you think?
Nothing compares to a first kiss...
Naturally, I don't want to attend the semiformal with a pity date, which is why I told my friends I have a boyfriend: this really cute drummer, Rafe. (I wish!) What's the big deal? Well, Rafe already has a girlfriend, plus now he thinks I have a boyfriend. So I have TWO imaginary boyfriends, and still NO date for the dance. What was I even thinking?
Would a guy like Rafe EVER date a nobody like me?


text: A bit of a damp and gloomy weekend and there is still no sign of improvement. I keep hoping for some change to the weather but hoping isn't working. I managed to fill the time quite nicely but not many hours in the field, in fact it was probably just minutes each day! Saturday produced some good views of the Grey Herons as they go about the business of furnishing their nests and bonding - they look good with the neck stretched out.


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Capstone Press Media Literacy Series
Link: Capstone Press Media Literacy Series.
Capstone Press Publishes New Media Literacy Series for Youth Dear educators, I am pleased that Capstone Press has just released a new, 6 book set, about media literacy, designed for students in grades 3-5. Download this two page flyer with additional details and ordering instructions. Description of series: Give young readers the tools they need to evaluate the barrage of media messages that reach them every day. Value assumptions, product placements, and cues to act are embedded in each media message. This fun series embraces media as entertaining and useful but also empowers readers as they learn a systematic way to question pop culture and to recognize how influential media messages are.
media literacy


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Jupiter, FL (PRWEB) July 22, 2012
There are so many wonderful reasons to live in Jupiter, Fla., that Coastal Living Magazine has deemed it one of "America's Happiest Seaside Towns."
In its July issue, the magazine picked the laid-back enclave nestled between the wild-and-scenic Loxahatchee River and the Atlantic Ocean as one of 15 U.S. cities with a coastline and that certain je ne sais quoi.
The magazine raved about the environmental features, picturesque scenery and entertainment options and that make Jupiter a standout community. The editors pointed to the impressive loggerhead-turtle population, which this year is having a wonderfully healthy nesting season. Female turtles swim to shore in the dark of night to dig a nest and lay their eggs, an awe-inspiring act of nature that is uniquely Floridian.
The article, which was discussed on the Today show by Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb, also mentioned Jupiter's network of waterways, inlets and forks that make homes for sale on the Loxahatchee River a hot commodity. The low-key lifestyle, the luxury amenities and the number of things to do add to the town's allure.
For entertainment, the 40,000 year-round residents can travel a few miles to Roger Dean Stadium to watch the Miami Marlins and St. Louis Cardinals during Spring Training. The stadium is part of the gorgeous neighborhood of homes in Abacoa.
Jupiter is in good company the "America's Happiest Seaside Towns" list. Among the other 14 finishers are Kiawah Island, S.C., Naples, Fla., Sausalito, Calif., Lake Bluff, Ill., Tiburon, Calif., Laguna Beach, Calif., Half Moon Bay, Calif., Chatham, Mass., Lahaina, Hawaii, Marblehead, Mass., Stinson Beach, Calif., Cohasset, Mass., Duxbury, Mass., and Solomons Island, Md.
Waterfront Properties and Club Communities, which is based in Jupiter, specializes in home and land sales in the area and has been in business for more than 30 years. Its local sales force knows a lot about the town and provides helpful information to clients looking to live there.
For information, call Rob Thomson at 561-746-7272.