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VERONA, Miss. — The North Mississippi Research and Extension Center, headquartered at Verona, will hold its annual Row Crops Field Day Aug. 4 at the Lee County AgriCenter on Highway 145 South.
Registration and refreshments begin at 8 a.m. Field tours of the unit's cotton, soybean and corn research will begin at 8:45 a.m.
Cotton stops will highlight research into 15-inch row production; cotton seedling rates; cotton variety blending; the current cotton situation and updates on new technology.
The corn tour will offer growers the opportunity to observe various insect management practices; the production of Roundup Ready corn; soybean/corn production in sod; and the current corn situation.
A highlight of the soybean stop will be the chance to observe the performance of dozens of soybean varieties in Mississippi State University's 2004 soybean variety trial; comparisons of soybean response to foliar fungicides; and soybean variety response to reduced seeding rates.
"In light of the rapid spread of some potentially serious invasive weeds, this year we are devoting a portion of the morning program to identification and management of these weeds, including the much talked about cogongrass. The invasive weed identification and management session will be from 11 a.m. until 11:40 a.m.," says Joe Street, interim head of NMREC.
Charles Bryson, USDA botanist, and John Byrd, MSU Extension weed scientist, will share information on cogongrass and other weeds on the state's invasive weed list. All landowners, particularly producers with pastures for forage and hay, can benefit from this session.
Following the invasive weed session, participants are invited to a sponsored lunch and updates from Street; Reuben Moore, associate director of the Mississippi Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station; and a keynote address by David Waide, president of the Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation.
Commercial exhibits also will be set up for viewing and discussion.
For more information call 662-566-2201 or go to http://msucares.com/nmrec/index.html.


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Wednesday, April 28, 2004
Pendulum swinging back on offshoring?
The NY Times reports on the story of Storability Software, which tried for three years to contract out programming work to India before throwing in the towel and bringing back most of the work to the U.S. where it costs four times as much. It seems that the knowledge that Storability needed was simply stronger among U.S. programmers.
Interesting enough. But, here's the kicker:If it sounds like "Made in the U.S.A." jingoism, consider this: The entrepreneur, Hemant Kurande, is Indian. He was born and raised near Bombay and received his master's degree from the Indian Institute of Technology in that city, now known as Mumbai. Mr. Kurande is not alone in his views on "outsourcing" technology work to India. As more companies in the United States rush to take advantage of India's ample supply of cheap yet highly trained workers, even some of the most motivated American companies — ones set up or run by executives born and trained in India — are concluding that the cost advantage does not always justify the effort.Read the whole article, which points also mentions the case of Dev Ittycheria, Indian born CEO of Bladelogic, who found that although the monthly cost differential was three to one in favor of India, the difference in productivity was six to one in favor of the U.S.
Related posts
Productivity risks in offshore outsourcing
Risks of offshore outsourcing
Outsourcing: the next bubble?
Offshore labor drove firm to brinkby Frank Scavo, 4/28/2004 06:42:00 AM | permalink | e-mail this!
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Saturday, April 24, 2004
IT decisions that are too important to leave to the IT department
I'm preparing for an IT strategy workshop with a client next week, and I came across an interesting article, Six IT Decisions Your IT People Shouldn't Make, by Jeanne Ross and Peter Weill, in the Harvard Business Review, Nov. 2002. Paraphrasing their main points, there are some decisions that are simply too important to leave to the IT folks:
In many companies that I visit, there is a great deal of dissatisfaction with information technology. A recent Computerworld article indicates that the average tenure of a corporate CIO is only 18-36 months, while the CFO averages five years in the position. If Ross and Weill are right, some of the blame lies not with the IT group, but with the fact that senior management abdicates too much of its role in IT decision-making. With information technology now accounting for nearly half of all capital spending, executives cannot afford to continue to manage IT in this way.
- How much should we spend on IT? Too many companies focus on IT spending metrics, without first defining what they expect from IT. Executives must first define the role of IT, then set funding to achieve that objective. If spending decisions are left to the IT group, the company will most likely fail to develop systems that support the business, in spite of high IT spending.
- Which IT initiatives should be funded? No firm can afford to satisfy every user request for new systems. Executives must decide which IT initiatives will and will not be funded. Otherwise, the IT group will try to do too much, or will do too many low-value projects, or won't focus on the really high-payback initiatives.
- Which IT capabilities should be firm-wide? Executives must decide which IT capabilities should be centralized and which should left to business units or departments. If the IT group makes this decision, they may insist on too much standardization, limiting flexibility. Or they may not standardize enough, which increases costs and limits company-wide synergies.
- How good do our IT services need to be? Executives must decide which IT services should be optimized based on costs and benefits. If service level decisions are left to the IT group, the firm may wind up paying for services that aren't worth the cost, or users may suffer from too much downtime, slow response time, or unreliable network connectivity.
- What security and privacy risks will we accept? Security and privacy always involve tradeoffs. Executives must decide how much security and privacy they are willing to pay for, and how much they are willing to sacrifice convenience to get it. If left to the IT group, security and privacy may be overemphasized, inconveniencing employees and trading partners. Or, the IT group may underemphasize security and privacy, exposing the firm to liability and loss.
- Whom do we blame if an IT initiative fails? When a project goes south, it's easy to blame IT. To maximize likelihood of success, executives should assign a business executive to be accountable for each IT project and monitor business metrics before and after implementation. If a business executive is not responsible, the firm will likely not realize the full business value of information systems.
Furthermore, it's not as if senior management should only deal with IT at the level of strategy. Careful examination of the six decisions indicates that, while the first three questions focus on IT strategy, the last three focus on execution. Therefore, senior management must collaborate with IT in setting IT strategy; and they must also learn to deal with IT at the level of execution. Just because a decision involves computers does not mean that the IT group should make it. Bringing senior management into IT decision making at the right points will ensure that the IT choices will be aligned with business strategy. Companies will spend enough on IT but not too much, and the right systems will be implemented.
Related posts
Escaping the ROI Trap
Escaping the ROI Trap, Part 2by Frank Scavo, 4/24/2004 08:42:00 PM | permalink | e-mail this!
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Friday, April 23, 2004
Epicor making a comeback?
Epicor just posted its Q1 results and it is showing year over year revenue growth of 26%, to $43.4M. License revenue, which is traditionally considered a key measure for future health, is up 34%, to $10.5M. Epicor, like many enterprise system vendors in recent years, now obtains the bulk of its revenue from services, not new license sales. Still, the trend in new license sales is encouraging.
Epicor's results do not include performance of its Scala acquisition, which is not expected to close until June.
Locally, I've seen Epicor in one of those new Q1 deals, which it won in a competitive bid on the overall breadth of its functionality. The deal was for Epicor's Vantage product, which Epicor positions when manufacturing functionality is a key requirement. My firm is assisting in business process improvement around the implementation, so we will be getting a first hand look at current capabilities of the latest release of Vantage.
Related posts
Epicor merging with Scala--hope for Epicor's future?
Epicor swallowing ROI Systems
Epicor picks up Clarus e-procurement products for a songby Frank Scavo, 4/23/2004 04:28:00 PM | permalink | e-mail this!
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Tuesday, April 20, 2004
IFS flush with success
Sorry, I couldn't resist. A press release on the IFS web site says that they've just closed a deal with Bemis Manufacturing Co, the "world's largest manufacturer of toilet seats."by Frank Scavo, 4/20/2004 05:17:00 PM | permalink | e-mail this!
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Friday, April 16, 2004
High tech job market perking up
Job losses in the high tech sector appear to be largely behind us. At least that's the conclusion Challenger, Gray & Christmas. The firm's most recent quarterly survey of telecom, electronics, computer, and e-commerce firms shows that Q1 job cuts were 64% lower than the previous quarter, only 29,513--the lowest figure since the outplacement firm started tracking the number in January 2001.
More generally, my own observations indicate a pick up in IT activity. Most of the IT consultants I talk to these days say that the signs are good--phones ringing, software evaluations underway, and postponed projects now being restarted. One associate tells me that he's had more calls in the past two months than he had in the past two years. The only cautious note comes from a business development manager for an IT staffing firm, who says that he has not yet seen a pick up in demand. But, if new projects are just now in the evaluation/planning phase, it would make sense that increased demand for development resources is still a few months away.
If a recovery in the high tech sector has truly started--and I believe it has--it pretty much ensures that the media focus on offshoring of IT jobs will soon move on to other subjects.
On the other hand, I've been predicting a recovery in the IT sector for almost two years now.
Related posts:
Yet more light at the end of the tunnel
More light at the end of the tunnel
Light at the end of the enterprise systems tunnelby Frank Scavo, 4/16/2004 06:37:00 PM | permalink | e-mail this!
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Wednesday, April 14, 2004
Sun should shine on enterprise software
Josh Greenbaum has written an open letter to Sun's chairman, Scott McNealy. Rather than focusing on operating systems, development tools, application servers, and systems management tools, which are becoming commoditized, Josh thinks that Sun ought to focus on software: specifically enterprise applications.The point is that the enterprise software market does a relatively good job of staying ahead of the commodity curve. Enterprise software, when it combines vertical functionality and deep business expertise, is by definition commodity-proof, at least for long enough to make a difference in a vendor's bottom line. And enterprise software does so in part by helping to commoditize other sectors of the software market.I couldn't agree more. As Josh points out, Sun has long had a reputation for providing the most robust, secure, and scalable platform for enterprise applications, although Sun never did a good job of incorporating that as a main theme of its marketing message. Sun ought to push further in the direction of enterprise applications: buy a couple of enterprise software vendors and systems integration firms and offer the whole nine yards, from hardware, operating systems, and development tools to software applications and services. With Sun's newly found cooperation with Microsoft, the difficulties associated with desktop integration ought to be resolved, eliminating one big source of customer frustration in adopting Sun technologies.
Hence the presence of apps servers, portals, integration services, and the like in SAP's software stack. It's no coincidence that much of what SAP includes as a loss-leader for its applications sales are pieces of technology that Sun has been hoping, vainly, would help it become a software powerhouse.
So, Scott, it's time to get real about enterprise software. Which means getting real about moving out of the commodity stack and into the value-added side of the equation.
Read Datamation for Greenbaum's entire letter.by Frank Scavo, 4/14/2004 11:59:00 AM | permalink | e-mail this!
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Wednesday, April 07, 2004
Justice Department pulls rug out from under itself
Talk about a strange turn of events. The U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ), is suing to block Oracle's hostile takeover of PeopleSoft, in part, on the basis that the market for high end financial systems for large commercial and governmental organizations is served by three main vendors: Oracle, PeopleSoft, and SAP.
So, when DoJ itself went shopping for high end financial systems, did it pick: a) Oracle, b) PeopleSoft, c) SAP, or d) none of the above?
The answer, of course, is (d).
That's right. The DoJ picked American Software's Momentum system, in a deal worth up to $24 million. According to Computerworld,That price tag places the deal on the high end of the ERP spectrum -- precisely where the Justice Department has argued that customers' choices are limited. In its legal filings, the department refers to Oracle as "one of only three vendors of high-function enterprise software" and argues that other vendors can't match the product quality, scale and support levels available from the market's three leading ERP developers.A DoJ spokesman was not available for comment.
Related posts:
Quick look at DOJ's complaint against Oracle
What exactly is the market for enterprise systems?by Frank Scavo, 4/07/2004 08:42:00 PM | permalink | e-mail this!
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Saturday, April 03, 2004
Microsoft .NET losing mind-share?
My friend David Harding, who by his own admission is "married to Microsoft," thinks he might be seeing an early indication that Microsoft's .NET technology is losing ground to Linux, Java, and open source developer tools. Recently, he visited his favorite local tech bookstore and was stunned by the shrinking shelf space devoted to Microsoft's .NET technology.As I was walking through the store, I stopped by the .NET aisle and noticed something very odd. Whereas the Microsoft book section used to be three rows and packed with new titles on all of the latest technology tools (e.g. C++, Visual Basic, SQL Server, etc.), it was down to one row with room to spare on the shelves. As I perused the available titles, I noticed something else: the majority of the books were not on .NET languages, but on their previous versions (i.e. version 6). At quick glance, it appeared there were at least three books to one of the older languages as compared to their .NET counterparts. In looking through the .NET books I saw that at least 25% of them were being sold as used!Dave then went to the front desk and asked the attendent to run a search for books on Microsoft technologies C# and ASP.NET:A few keystrokes later and he turned the monitor towards me as page after page of book titles appeared. The problem was that none of them were in stock. Before I could say anything, he told me that most of these books didn't exist! That's right - the books were never published! He told me that the publishers routinely send them electronic catalogs of books that will be printed so that the buyers can get a jump start on what to order. Because of the downturn in book purchases on Microsoft technologies, they had been receiving notices that many of these books, although finished, had been pulled before they ever reached the presses.Dave attributes the decline in interest for Microsoft developer tools to the general decline in tech employment in the U.S., since Microsoft has always viewed developers as its biggest proponents. But that would not explain why demand for books on Linux and Java is increasing.
I asked him why he thought the demand had dropped and his response was: "We aren't selling as many Microsoft programming books these days. I think that the number of programmers out there has dropped off. Anyway, Linux and Java are our big sellers now."
My theory would be that open source tools are reaching a tipping point. All those unemployed and self-employed software developers are trying to improve their skills by downloading the free open source tools, or are trying out the tools offered on the cheap web hosting sites, which strongly tilt toward open source technologies such as Linux, Apache, MySQL, and JBOSS. Don't believe me? Check out the bundled plans offered by any of the web hosting sites and see how many mentions of .NET there are compared to Linux, Apache, and MySQL. Sure, these tools may not yet offer the same high end features or integration as Microsoft's .NET platform, or Oracle's for that matter. But for many development projects, they are good enough. And it's hard to compete with free.
In a subsequent instant message chat with Dave, I pointed out that I suspect the offshore development trend is also fueling the migration from Microsoft to open source tools. In offshore locations, such as India, China, and Eastern Europe, I believe there is a strong bias toward open source tools, which can be deployed for much less cost than proprietary platforms. The lower hourly rates of offshore developers also negate any advantage that the proprietary tools have in terms of developer productivity.
Whether Dave's theory is correct, or mine--either way, it doesn't look good in the long run for Microsoft's ambitions to win the hearts and minds of developers for .NET. As I pointed out over a year ago, Microsoft's main argument regarding the cost of Linux and open source technologies is that Microsoft's technologies are less expensive to implement because of the larger base of skilled professionals trained in Microsoft's technologies. I said then that this was at best a temporary advantage. If the population of developers is now trending toward open source technologies that argument starts to look less and less tenable.
Check out Dave's entire article on his blog, The Tech Cynic.
Related posts:
PeopleSoft CEO compares Microsoft .NET to ... asbestos?
Microsoft-sponsored study on Win2K vs. Linux is NOT all good news for Microsoft
Update, Apr. 6:
My friend Jim Oden offers another reason for the apparent slump in sales of books on Microsoft .NET technology:There's another possible explanation for why developers aren't buying .NET books. Visual Studio.NET, for example, is not that much different from Visual Studio, (nor is C#.NET, or VB.NET, etc.) to motivate a seasoned developer to buy a book in order to learn it. In fact, most developers don't like to read books anyway on these subjects. They'd rather learn by trial and error. And the documentation available with the .NET product and from the Microsoft web sites is actually more current and robust than what is available from printed versions, which quickly go out of date.So, perhaps the jury is still out.
A few months ago, I did purchase several .NET books to get up to speed on the new technology, but this was because I like the structure of following a book, and wanted them for reference.
The company I currently work for, [name withheld], is developing all of their products using the .NET framework. It's hard to know who's really winning the war on development environments, but I can say that so far I'm pretty impressed with .NET ...by Frank Scavo, 4/03/2004 11:24:00 AM | permalink | e-mail this!
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Thursday, April 01, 2004
Barriers to implementing electronic signatures
Software vendors who serve FDA regulated industries like to promote their support for electronic signatures. But I'm starting to think that it will take a lot more than good software to make electronic signatures work. It seems that, even when software supports electronic signatures, many users don't implement them.
Although I've been noticing this problem for some time, it finally became clear to me earlier this week. I gave a presentation on electronic records and signatures at the IFS World conference. After the presentation, I got into a discussion with a user from one company that has implemented IFS Applications in the medical device industry. The company has been quite successful generally with its use of the system. Nevertheless, the firm has still not implemented electronic signatures.
The problem is not IFS functionality. IFS has good support for electronic signatures and is even working on adding an option for biometric signatures to its product offering. The problem, according to this user, is the business processes themselves that involve approvals.
For example, this user pointed to the process of transferring a new product design from engineering to production. This is a key control point in FDA's quality system regulation, which requires formal sign-offs when design changes are transferred to production. This company does have the required approval steps. But, the paperwork flow from approver to approver is not disciplined. One approver may sign off on the design and forward it to the next individual on the sign off list. The second individual may not have reviewed all the paperwork in advance and now finally takes a good look at it and finds some issue. He marks up the design and sends it back to the initiator for re-routing. Multiply this several times for several approvers and you can see the problem. I suppose it is possible to automate such a process with electronic workflow and electronic signatures, but it would likely bog down with all the re-initiation of signatures and re-routing.
A better approach would be to improve the organizational disciplines around the approval process itself. The company should strengthen its practice of design reviews so that all approvers review the design and raise any issues or questions prior to the design transfer process being initiated. Then, when the design transfer is initiated, there should be few if any surprises.
The problem therefore, is not whether the software has electronic signature and workflow routing capabilities. Many of the major vendors now have this functionality. The problem is that the business process to be automated need to be formalized to the extent that they can use the functionality.
Related posts:
A quality systems view of 21 CFR Part 11
Oracle unveils new electronic signature functionality for FDA regulated manufacturers
Data clean up a key prerequisite for e-procurement benefits
Business changes needed to ensure enterprise system success
Large system implementations require organizational discipline.by Frank Scavo, 4/01/2004 10:46:00 AM | permalink | e-mail this!
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subset: commoncrawl


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Kursaal Flyers - Tge Great Artiste (Rock) vinyl record
1 year ago by deal88
In Vintage Collectibles
Vinyl : EX
Sleeve : EX
Item goes to the highest offer at the time I accept the offers.
Once offer is accepted, item will be reserved for collection & will no longer be available for further offers.
🔺 Self collection only @ my convenience at Changi Green Condo (outside near guardhouse), S486850.
Bus no. 2, 5 & 24
Bus stop no. 96061 /96069 (opposite)
Nearest MRT: Upper Changi station 🔺
Collection to be done within a week after offer otherwise reservations will be deemed void.
Advanced payment must be made if reservation for later collection is required.
Cash deal or internet transfer.
No trade/refund/exchange.
You get what you see. Please zoom in on the pics.
Low ballers will be ignored.
MIAs will be blocked.
Thanks for viewing.
**Vinyl Grading:
👉 Mint: Sealed
👉 Near Mint (NM): Opened, never played or played perhaps once or twice.
👉 Excellent (EX): 1 or 2 light scuffs
👉 Very Good (VG): Very light scuffs or hairline scratches, playable.
Vinyl, Records, LP, Vintage, Music, Band, Rock, House, Electronic, Remix, Classical, Jazz, Orchestra, Audio, Chinese, English, 黑胶, 唱片.
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text:
Denver's surprising loss to San Diego took the Broncos out of the driver's seat for the AFC's No. 1 seed. More worrisome, however, was how poorly Peyton Manning and company played at a time when they should be hitting their stride
Seventeen days left in the regular season, and my Seattle-New England Super Bowl pick is looking good, with both controlling conference home field through the playoffs in the wake of San Diego's 27-20 win at Denver on Thursday night. But the story of the day is Denver. Specifically, the holes in Denver's game as the Broncos drive to the playoffs.
The five things about Denver that should worry Bronco fans this morning:
1. The inability of Peyton Manning to challenge San Diego downfield all night
Maybe he was in "take what they give us'' mode. Maybe he never felt comfortable with the pesky and variable Charger rush keeping him off-balance all night. Maybe it's the wear of a long season on his 37-year-old right arm. Whatever, Manning's longest completion was 22 yards, and he had but three incompletions longer than 20 yards out of 41 throws. To see him dink-and-dunk in the final two minutes with no timeouts on the clock and needing two scores was the height of frustration. You don't want to throw into the teeth of umbrella coverage downfield, but you also can't be taking eight yards consistently without being able to stop the clock. Where was Demaryius Thomas (four catches, 49 yards)? The passing game Thursday night was disturbing. I don't think it'll continue, but one bad game could have blown home-field through the playoffs, and could mean Peyton Manning, to get to the Super Bowl, could have to play Tom Brady in New England, where Brady is 7-2 all-time vs. Manning.
2. No Welker
Andre Caldwell (who'd played 32 snaps in the previous three games) stepped in to catch six balls for 59 yards and two touchdowns. Good sub. But what was missing was Wes Welker (out with a concussion) sitting down in the familiar holes with the laser throws he and Manning have perfected. In less than a season, Welker has proven how valuable he is. We all saw it Thursday night. No word if he'll be back for the very winnable final two games (at Houston, at Oakland), but if Denver doesn't sweep those two games, the Broncos risk getting passed in the West by 10-3 Kansas City and having to play a Wild Card game instead of getting the bye a vet like Welker will need.
3. Knowshon the No-show
San Diego has been generous against the run this year despite some stout players (Corey Liuget's legit), but the Broncos were feeble running it, particularly on first down: seven carries, 11 yards. That includes a minus-six for Montee Ball. Starter Knowshon Moreno had eight carries for 19 yards. What killed Manning all night was knowing if he was going to get anything done, he'd have to do it himself. And he couldn't.
4. A sieve of a run defense
San Diego is not the best running team in the league. Not close. But the Chargers ran 44 times for 177 yards, and held the ball for 39 minutes. Did you see the spectators in orange jerseys on Ryan Mathews' 23-yard touchdown sprint down the left sideline? Luckily for the Broncos, Jamaal Charles is the only franchise back playing well who is set to be in the AFC playoffs.
5. No shutdown corners in sight
Denver can't count on Champ Bailey to play much of any valuable role in the playoffs (he's been day-to-day all season with a foot injury), and rookie backup Kayvon Webster was burned three times that I saw, twice by rookie San Diego wideout Keenan Allen (who, by the way, is the leader in the clubhouse for Offensive Rookie of the Year in my book). And Webster is due to have surgery on a thumb he injured Thursday night; he'll miss at least next week's game in Houston. Denver will have to win scoring contests to advance in the playoffs. Until Thursday night, when the front seven contributed just two sacks and two pressures, that worried nobody in Denver.
No need to panic, Bronconians. The first home playoff game, should Denver win out against two bad teams, will be four weeks from Saturday or Sunday, in the divisional playoff round. But in Houston and Oakland, it would be nice to see Manning challenge some safeties downfield, and nice to see Welker back, and nice to see the defense stop somebody. Thursday proved one thing for the Broncos' immediate future: It's no lock they can win a scoring contest every game. And when they struggle on offense, they can be an ugly team.
* * *
Player You Need To Know This Weekend
Kirk Cousins, quarterback, Washington (No. 12). When Cousins, Washington's fourth-round pick in 2012, got a chance to play last season, he was impressive: 69 percent passer, four touchdowns, three picks, 101.6 rating. Now he'll have the last three games of a disastrous season for the team to prove his worth. It's no secret to anyone in Washington (or New Zealand, for that matter) that Washington, missing its first-round pick in 2014 as the last vestige of the Robert Griffin III trade, wants to develop a trade market for Cousins. GM Bruce Allen would love to recoup a low-first-round pick for him, because Griffin, even with his struggles this year, is unquestionably Washington's quarterback of the future. So Cousins gets to face the Falcons, Cowboys and Giants to end the season, with Griffin sitting. It's a good time to go in: Atlanta and Dallas, combined, have allowed 66-percent passing, with 52 touchdown passes and 14 interceptions.
Sound Bite of the Week
"I'm sure everybody knows by now that coach decided to shut me down for the rest of the season. I talked to coach, he talked to me about it. I expressed my desire to play. He explained to me his reasoning. At the end of the day, coach's decision is what we go with."
—Washington quarterback Robert Griffin III, on being made the team's third-string quarterback this week—and likely for the last two weeks of the season as well—by coach Mike Shanahan.
Ten Things I'll Be Watching For This Weekend
1. The latest on Shanahan. Did he clean out his car this week? His garage? You'll hear some news on Mike Shanahan's benching of RG3, certainly, but let's keep these things in mind after analyst after analyst has talked about how damaging a blow this is for a 22-year-old player: Griffin will have a new coach next year, and he'll get to show the world that either this was a fluky year and he never felt right the whole season and he got messed up by the Shanahans … or maybe he isn't the savior he was supposed to be. I do find it interesting that, according to Mike Shanahan, the owner and GM were on board with the move to yank Griffin. The season needs to end, and Griffin needs to take three weeks far, far away, and when he comes back there needs to be a new coach (Jon Gruden? Art Briles?) who coaches him hard and builds back his confidence. If he's scarred for life at 22, then he was over-drafted to begin with.
2. Test for Trestman. Josh McCown's passer rating is 21 points higher than Jay Cutler's, and his TD-to-Interception differential is plus-12, compared to Cutler's plus-five. But Cutler, after four weeks off with a high ankle sprain, got his job back Thursday from Trestman and acted like it was no big deal. (Has anything ever seemed a big deal to Cutler?) But Cutler goes to Cleveland needing to play well for the Bears to keep pace with Detroit. They're tied atop the NFC North at 7-6. Will Trestman waver if Cutler stinks and loses? I would if I were him.
3. The zebras to rebound. Good start for Bill Vinovich's crew Thursday night in Denver; no gaffes. The NFL needs a newsless Sunday from the men who have had a very bad couple weeks.
4. AFC home-field. New England can win out and win it, now that Denver has a third loss. But for New England to cop the top seed, a tough sweep might be necessary (at Miami, at Baltimore, vs. Buffalo).
5. Road sweet road. Saints are 1-3 in their last three roadies, and now take off for St. Louis and Charlotte in back-to-back weeks.
6. Someone's going to get hurt. Ravens (7-6) at Lions (7-6). Bring the smelling salts.
7. Some boring playoff races. Three games left. Only one division tie at the top (Detroit and Chicago, NFC North). The biggest drama might be whether a 7-7 team (San Diego) or a pair of 7-6ers (Miami and Baltimore) end up winning the AFC's sixth seed.
8. Son of Gronk. Zaniest stat line from last weekend was Pats running back Shane Vereen's against Cleveland: 12 catches, 153 yards; three carries, nine yards. Vereen and Josh Boyce will be the combo platter to replace Gronkowski starting Sunday in Miami.
9. This is groovy: All three Florida teams play at home at 1 p.m. Sunday. Second time in the past month it's happened. Miami, Jacksonville and Tampa Bay started the season a combined 4-20. They're 11-4 since. Roll this one around in your head: Jacksonville's got a very good chance to finish second in the AFC South. Tough go this weekend, though … Pats at Dolphins, Niners at Bucs, and, in the latest installment of "Gus Bradley Vies for Coach of the Year," the Jags host Buffalo.
10. Dirty dozen for Houston. The drive for Teddy Bridgewater continues in Indy. A 12th straight loss (I still cannot believe the 2013 Houston Texans have lost 11 straight) would keep at least a one-game lead in the race for the first pick in the draft.


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India's Energy Demand To Outpace China And Russia By 2035
New Delhi: India's energy consumption will rise by 132 percent by 2035, outpacing demand growth in Russia, China and Brazil, BP's Global Energy Outlook said.
"Global energy demand continues to grow but that growth is slowing and mainly driven by emerging economies - led by China and India," according to the BP Energy Outlook 2035.
India's energy production, it said, will rise by 112 per cent (from 344 million tonnes oil equivalent in 2012 to 729.4 million tonnes in 2035) while consumption grows by 132 per cent.
The nation, which will in seven years become the world's third largest energy consumer, will see energy demand rise from 563.5 million tonnes oil equivalent to 786.1 million tonnes by 2020. It will soar to 938.6 million tonnes by 2025 and to 1307.5 million tonnes by 2035, the report said.
"India's demand growth of 132 per cent outpaces each of the BRIC countries as Russia (20 per cent), China (71 per cent), and Brazil (71 per cent) all expand slower. India's growth is almost double the non-OECD aggregate of 69 per cent," it said.
Its share of global demand rises to 7 per cent in 2035, accounting for the second largest share of the BRIC countries after China's 27 per cent. Russia at 5 per cent and Brazil at 3 per cent follow in that order.
BP Energy Outlook said the country's oil imports will rise by 169 per cent and account for over 60 per cent of the net increase in imports, followed by increasing imports of gas (573 per cent) and coal (85 per cent).
"Demand for all fossil fuels expands led by gas (183 per cent), oil (121 per cent) and coal (108 per cent) while renewables in power expand by 539 per cent as does nuclear (366 per cent) and hydro (127 per cent)," it said.
India's energy mix evolves very slowly over the next 20 years with fossil fuels accounting for 87 per cent of demand in 2035, compared to a global average of 81 per cent. This is down from 92 per cent today.
Its energy production as a share of consumption drops from 61 per cent today to just 56 per cent by 2035 as imports rise by 163 per cent.
"Declines in oil production (by 25 per cent) is made up by increases in gas (44 per cent) and coal (116 per cent)," it said.
Coal remains the dominant fuel produced in India with a 66 per cent market share in 2035. Renewables in power overtakes oil as the second largest, increasing from 3 per cent to 10 per cent in 2035 as oil drops from 12 per cent to 4 per cent.
According to BP, India's energy intensity is 32 per cent lower than today's level compared to a BRIC average decline of 46 per cent. Despite slower intensity improvement, per capita demand is 60 per cent below the BRIC average.
Read More: 10 Best Business Ideas With Low Or No Investment
Source: PTI


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Ruby Trautz was the first to die.
On Aug. 27, 2006, the 81-year-old Nebraska woman was rushed to the hospital. She was in so much pain that morphine was administered. Four days later, she succumbed to a food-borne infection later identified as a virulent strain of E. coli.
Two weeks after Trautz's death, on Sept. 14, the Food and Drug Administration took an unprecedented step: It told Americans to stop eating bagged spinach, a staple of healthy diets, until its safety could be assured. A day later, the FDA extended the warning to include all fresh spinach and almost as quickly, it vanished from grocery shelves, salad bars and menus.
By this time, two more people had died.
Before the outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 was over, at least five people were dead after painful, bloody illnesses. More than 205 others in 26 states had endured a sickness that left them vulnerable to future health problems. And the agricultural industry, government regulators and consumers were shaken by the vulnerability of America's system for delivering fresh produce to markets.
Since early this year, USA TODAY has interviewed dozens of key government officials, food producers, survivors who ate contaminated spinach and relatives of those who died. They offer new insight into the behind-the-scenes panic throughout the agricultural industry and government offices as the crisis unfolded nationwide, and of the detective work that led officials to suspect that the E. coli — commonly found in cow manure — came from spinach grown on a 2.8-acre plot in central California.
The FDA would partially lift the spinach advisory on Sept. 22, but it would be six months before federal and state investigators released their report.
The outbreak would ultimately cost the leafy green industry more than $350 million as the nation turned away from its growing appetite for fresh, ready-to-eat spinach. It's an appetite that has not returned: Sales of packaged spinach are still off about 20% from pre-outbreak levels, industry executives say.
The interviews reveal vivid details of the gruesome illnesses caused by the contaminated spinach, and show why such a deadly crisis remains possible today. In the past year, the industry has made strides in keeping produce safe, says Michael Doyle, head of the Center for Food Safety at the University of Georgia and a consultant to Natural Selection Foods, which processed the tainted spinach.
But while companies have imposed higher standards for farmlands and have increased testing of the greens before they get to the consumer, it's still possible for bacteria to get through the safety net.
In the past four weeks there have been two leafy green recalls, one for E. coli in mixed greens and another for salmonella in spinach. No illnesses were reported.
"Raw produce, even if you put it in a bag and seal the bag, is still raw produce. It's a high-risk food, even if the American consumer doesn't realize it is," says Oregon state epidemiologist William Keene.
One year ago, that risk changed families, an industry and consumer attitudes toward fresh spinach.
The victims
In July, the month before Trautz died, a 2.8-acre section of a 51-acre field was planted in spinach by grower Mission Organics at the Paicines Ranch in central California, an 8,000-acre spread largely devoted to cattle grazing.
The 1,002 pounds of spinach from that 2.8-acre section was harvested on Monday, Aug. 14, and processed the next day by Natural Selection Foods, one of the nation's biggest processors of leafy greens. The spinach went mostly into bags of Dole Baby Spinach, each tagged with the production code P227A. It was shipped nationwide.
FDA and California investigators would later say that spinach from this small section of the Paicines Ranch most likely carried the deadly E. coli strain into the homes of unsuspecting consumers.
They were consumers such as Polly Costello, who on Monday, Aug. 21, bought a package of Dole Baby Spinach at No Frills Supermarket in Bellevue, Neb. She, her husband and her mother, Ruby Trautz, would eat spinach from the bag over the next few days.
By that Saturday, Trautz was sick with nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramps and diarrhea. On Sunday she began passing blood, and her daughter and son-in-law rushed her to Creighton University Medical Center in Omaha.
When a nurse examined her on Sunday, Aug. 27, Trautz was light-headed and in extreme pain. On Thursday, after five days of increasing weakness, Trautz began to hallucinate and have seizures. She died at 6:15 a.m. that day.
Her doctors had no idea what had killed her. It wasn't until Sept. 25 that tests on the spinach from her daughter's refrigerator showed she had been infected with E. coli O157:H7.
The second death came Sept. 7, a week after Trautz's, when 77-year-old Marion Graff of Manitowoc, Wis., succumbed to kidney disease. Graff had always been a healthful eater. "My mother would cover her plate in salad," says her daughter, Leah Duckworth.
A woman who'd blossomed with age, Graff was with friends on a bus trip to Minneapolis for a weekend of museums and theater when she lost consciousness.
Graff deteriorated so quickly that Duckworth, on vacation in Canada, couldn't get home in time. Her sister, Annie Banks, held the phone to their mother's ear and Graff said, "I love you, my little mommy. Now it's time." Their mother died about 90 minutes later.
Next was June Dunning who, even at 86, was "a very proper British lady" who made a point of leading a healthy life, says her son-in-law, Chuck Swartz. Dunning lived with Swartz and her daughter Corinne in Hagerstown, Md. She got sick Friday night, Sept. 1, several days after eating lightly steamed spinach from a Dole bag. True to her stiff-upper-lip nature, Dunning didn't bother her family about the pain.
The next morning Corinne went into Dunning's room "and found this huge bloody mess all over," Swartz says. Corinne took her mother straight to the hospital.
It wasn't until Wednesday, Sept. 6, that tests showed she had E. coli O157:H7. "I said, 'What's that? That sounds like something from Mars,' " her son-in-law says. "The infectious-disease doctor said it came from hamburger. We said, 'She doesn't eat hamburger; she loves vegetables.' " Dunning lasted for another week.
The fourth fatality was the youngest, 2-year-old Kyle Allgood of Chubbuck, Idaho. Kyle had been born at home before his mom and dad could make it to the hospital. "He was in a hurry coming into this world, and he was in a hurry to leave it," says his mother, Robyn Allgood.
Kyle came down with flu-like symptoms on Friday, Sept. 15. His mom had worked hard to make sure her kids got good nutrition. A favorite trick was the veggie smoothie. "If you put enough berries and juice and yogurt in them, you can put spinach in, so I did," she says.
But it soon became clear that Kyle had something much more serious than the flu. The whole family got sick, but his mom, dad and his older sister fought it off. Kyle couldn't. He was rushed to the local hospital, then to Primary Children's Medical Center in Salt Lake City.
There, Kyle developed hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS). His kidneys shut down. On Wednesday, Sept. 20, he had a heart attack and died, his parents at his bedside.
The last death occurred on Jan. 26, 2007, when Betty Howard of Richland, Wash., succumbed to heart failure after a long battle with HUS. Howard, 83, got sick after eating a turkey sandwich garnished with spinach. She went into the hospital on Sept. 7 and from there to a convalescent facility, never returning home.
Howard and Dunning were not counted in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's final list of victims. Seattle-based Bill Marler, considered the nation's pre-eminent E. coli lawyer, who represents Howard's and Dunning's families, says the bacteria that felled both matched the spinach outbreak strain. Their medical bills were paid by Natural Selection's insurer, Marler and Dole say. Natural Selection declined to comment.
Dozens of others would become dangerously ill. Of the 200 confirmed cases of sick people, 102 were hospitalized and about 15% would suffer kidney failure — a condition that could affect them for the rest of their lives.
In Milwaukee, two of Ana Maria Zientek's children, David, then 6, and Caroline, then 3, were sickened by the spinach salad they'd eaten at dinner on Aug. 28, suffering severe cramps and diarrhea.
Blood "literally poured" out of Caroline as her mom bundled her up in a sheet and raced to the hospital. David was hospitalized for six days, his sister for 13.
For Jillian Kohl of Milwaukee, the nightmare began on Wednesday, Aug. 30, with a spinach salad. Being a thrifty grad student, she ate a lot of it, because the expiration date on the bag was that day.
Over the next few days the 25-year-old marathon runner started to feel tired and worn out. By the weekend she was feverish and nauseated. She called her mother, who told her to rest and take aspirin. But on Monday, the bleeding started, putting her in a hospital's intensive care unit for eight days.
At one point, as her body began to shut down, she thought, "I give up. I had a good 24 years in life, and I hate that my family is going to have to see me die like this."
The regulators
In the early days of the outbreak, Wisconsin and Oregon, both known for their strong public health departments, took the lead in trying to figure out what was making people sick.
Wisconsin, which has an aggressive E. coli monitoring network, was the first state to realize that something was wrong.
When the week of Sept. 4 began, chief state epidemiologist Jeffrey Davis knew that he had a cluster of five E. coli O157:H7 cases. But most of the victims had gone to the Manitowoc county fair — a common place for E. coli to spread, because cows and other animals excrete the bacteria in feces.
And small clusters aren't uncommon; in any year Wisconsin may have around 200 cases. Davis adopted a wait-and-see approach.
But there was one confusing twist. Graff, who would become the second fatality, hadn't gone to the fair.
By midweek, there was an outbreak in another county, and a pattern was emerging. On Thursday, Sept. 7, the day Graff died, the director of the BloodCenter of Wisconsin told Davis he'd gotten requests for plasma for five people at five hospitals, all of whom had HUS. "That was very, very unusual," Davis says.
Wisconsin confirmed that all the hospitalized people had the same strain of E. coli O157:H7 and posted three of the test results Friday to PulseNet — a national database launched in 1998 that allows public health officials nationwide to track food-borne illnesses.
Davis then called Chris Braden, chief of the Outbreak Response and Surveillance Team at the CDC, to alert the federal agency.
By themselves, the Wisconsin cases didn't mean much. "There's always a certain number of background cases," says Robert Tauxe, chief of the food-borne and diarrheal diseases branch at CDC. In August, for example, PulseNet had had nine different E. coli strains from nine states.
The Wisconsin cases were different from the usual, unrelated cases but no one knew that yet. But they were now out there, waiting to see if anyone, anywhere else in country, was also infected with the identical E. coli strain.
By Tuesday, two other states had posted matches, PulseNet records show.
On Wednesday, Sept. 13, Robert Brackett, head of the FDA's Center for Food Safety, got an e-mail from Wisconsin asking if there was contamination reported in lettuce.
As lettuce had been the major source of more than a dozen O157:H7 outbreaks, it was a good question. But the FDA wasn't tracking anything in lettuce, so the answer was "no."
Oregon had a little E. coli cluster going, as well. But it wasn't initially viewed as a big deal — until Sept. 13. Melissa Plantenga, an investigator, told senior epidemiologist William Keene that of the six people who were sick, five said they'd eaten bagged spinach, although they named four different brands.
Keene wasn't surprised: Fresh spinach was a very plausible vehicle for E. coli O157:H7 because there is no guaranteed "kill step" in readying it for consumption. Bagged salads are washed and re-washed in processing plants, making them safe to eat straight from the bag, companies say. But the wash doesn't eradicate all bacteria.
Keene might have reacted more forcefully if he'd been able to check PulseNet and see that other states were reporting E. coli cases, too.
But he couldn't do that because the state had been bounced off PulseNet. A CDC-issued device that generates the security codes that allow states to log into the computer network had expired and the new one hadn't yet arrived in the mail.
Keene called officials in California, where most of the nation's leafy greens are grown, and learned that it isn't unusual for multiple brands of packaged bags to come from the same plant.
It was all falling into place. Keene pounded out a somewhat cryptic e-mail to the CDC: Oregon had a cluster of O157:H7 cases, and he wondered if anyone else was seeing anything similar. Ten minutes later, the CDC e-mailed him back, saying yes, there were a lot of other cases out there.
So Keene also called Braden, the CDC's top food-borne illness epidemiologist. Wisconsin's Davis was patched in, and the three men began comparing what they knew. "At that point, Phase One of the investigation was over," Keene says. Wisconsin and Oregon had shown the outbreak was O157:H7 from spinach. Within 24 hours, the rest of the nation would know as well.
That day, June Dunning died in Maryland.
That night the CDC asked all 50 state public health departments if anyone else was seeing E. coli cases. The next morning, Sept. 14, the CDC had heard from eight states reporting 50 cases. It was looking like a nationwide problem.
By noon, CDC and FDA officials were having their own conference call with their state counterparts. The CDC asked each of the eight states to list the number of cases, the number of hospitalizations, how many kids, how many with HUS and how many dead. The FDA's chief medical officer, David Acheson, took notes.
"I'm writing this all down, and I get to page three and I'm thinking, 'Oh dear,' " he says. For every reported case, he knew there would be many more that hadn't yet been reported or noticed by state health officials.
Some states had sick consumers reporting eating lettuce; some said strawberries. But more said spinach, even bagged spinach with household-brand names on it, including Dole.
Indeed, 80% of the consumer cases at that time recalled eating spinach, an incredibly high number to be coincidental as only about 17% of the U.S. population routinely eats spinach.
The call lasted at least two hours. At the end of it, "We were looking at each other saying, 'This was big,' " Acheson says.
The FDA team met in what would become their war room, a slightly worn conference room on the 12th floor of the Office of Emergency Operations at the agency's Rockville, Md., offices.
In the next two hours, the 10 or so people in that room would decide to tell the American people to stop eating a single product. Not a brand. Not a lot number. Not a production day. An entire product — bagged spinach.
The FDA, concerned that consumers may not know if bagged spinach was dumped out of bags and into loose-leaf bins at grocery stores, expanded the advisory the next day, Sept. 15, to cover all fresh spinach.
The pronouncement was so big that FDA lawyers questioned the agency's press officer, Julie Zawisza. She remembers them asking: "Do you realize that you're saying, 'Don't eat any raw spinach from any source, anywhere, anytime?' "
The FDA did, Zawisza responded, and the media onslaught began.
Acheson was driving home when he got a call: CNN wanted to do a phone interview. When would he be home? He finally dropped off to sleep shortly before midnight. One of his lingering thoughts: "Could this have been deliberate?"
The industry
The news hit the processors and growers of America's $3.5 billion packaged-salad market hard. In California's Salinas Valley, nicknamed "America's salad bowl," producers of leafy greens gaped at CNN as they listened to the FDA's warning that an E. coli outbreak was likely underway.
Executives — scattered on Sept. 14 — quickly got back to their offices. Dole Fresh Vegetables President Eric Schwartz was on the East Coast for a business trip. Natural Selection President Charles Sweat was in San Diego visiting customers. Both immediately caught flights home.
Tanios Viviani, president of Fresh Express, the biggest maker of packaged salads in the USA, turned on CNN and learned that a big part of his industry had been shut down. "It was like an earthquake," he says. "I was thinking to myself: 'Why am I learning about this from CNN?' "
Barbara Cassens, district director of the FDA's San Francisco office, got on the phone with executives from companies that made or sold spinach that sick consumers reported eating: Dole, River Ranch and Natural Selection.
For Sweat, one tidbit from that conversation would plunge his company into the biggest crisis of its 22-year history: About 6 out of 10 consumers who reported illnesses thought they'd eaten Dole spinach. Natural Selection made that product.
California officials suggested a recall, Sweat says. The next day, Natural Selection recalled products made at its plant in August and September for 28 brands, including Dole. None other than the Dole Baby Spinach processed by Natural Selection would ever test positive for the E. coli outbreak strain.
In fact, the contaminated produce appears to have been concentrated in 42,000 bags of Dole Baby Spinach processed during a single shift in one plant.
The recall was much bigger because, at the time, no one was sure how many products or processors were involved. Within seven days of Natural Selection's recall, five more companies would recall produce. All had products made for them by Natural Selection.
As soon as the outbreak was confirmed, investigators began hunting for production records that could lead back to the point of contamination, something that had never been accomplished in 19 previous E. coli leafy-green investigations since 1995.
Everyone in the Salinas Valley produce community was fearful, says Bradley Sullivan, a lawyer for grower Mission Organics, which would later be identified as the most likely grower of the tainted spinach.
Sullivan says growers and processors were on the phone constantly, sharing rumors and details. "In those first days, everybody was nervous. All the processors. All the growers," he says. "They were asking, 'If it is me, could I go to jail?' "
Otto Kramm, managing partner of Mission Organics, which is 85% owned by the same investors who own two-thirds of Natural Selection, was feeling pretty safe, Sullivan says. He thought his spinach had been harvested too late to make it into bags that were beginning to sicken people on Aug. 23. "We thought it would still be sitting in a cooler somewhere," Sullivan says.
That would turn out to be a wrong assumption. Of the 850 soil, water and feces samples collected by California and FDA investigators, only those from the Paicines Ranch, where Mission Organics farmed, would match the outbreak strain.
None of that was known on Sunday, Sept. 17, when executives from Natural Selection, River Ranch and Fresh Express, which by now had also been named by sick consumers, met at the Residence Inn in Salinas with regulators.
The dozen participants, in casual dress, rearranged the tables in the hotel's meeting room into a horseshoe shape so they could see each others' faces. Some executives had boxes of production records before them, says Jim Lugg, food safety chief at Fresh Express, which had prepared a one-page document explaining how it would gather electronic records. The doors were shut, and then there was silence.
No one knew how to get started as "we were all equals," Lugg says. By the time the one-hour meeting ended, the companies had told the officials how they would gather production records for the past three months. Lugg suspects the officials had expected to get them that day.
That, too, would turn out to be a wrong assumption.
The investigation
With at least three processors to check out, it would take almost two weeks for investigators to narrow their search from 12 fields to the final four. Investigators even pulled empty spinach bags out of consumer garbage cans to get clues. "It was like a big treasure hunt," says the FDA's Cassens.
Indeed, tracing the contaminated produce that people ate back to the greens processed by Natural Selection and the field they came from involved thousands of pages of documents, some handwritten.
Even with a record in hand, Kevin Reilly, then an investigator for the California Department of Health Services, says investigators must verify that what is on the record jibes with what plant managers and workers say happened. "It is a CSI-like investigation," he says, referring to the popular CBS show.
A big break came on Sept. 20, when researchers in New Mexico proved that the strain of O157:H7 from the P227A Dole bags of spinach was identical to the strain that was infecting people. The code indicated the product was made at Natural Selection's south plant (P) on the 227th day of the year, (Aug. 15) on the first of two shifts (A). "It was the first time we had a code, a bag of product and an E. coli match," says the FDA's Cassens.
That was also the day on which 2-year-old Kyle Allgood died.
Even with the confirmed P227A code, Cassens says it would take investigators seven days of poring through records to narrow the investigation to what turned out to be the four ranches that supplied the P227A product.
On Sept. 22, the FDA felt confident enough to tell consumers that it was safe to eat spinach grown outside three California counties: Monterey, San Benito and Santa Clara. The contaminated product, it was later discovered, most likely came from San Benito and the 2.8-acre slice of the 51-acre field on Paicines Ranch.
That entire field now sits fallow along a lonesome stretch of highway that cuts through a narrow valley between hillsides covered in brush and grass. Natural Selection says an extensive risk assessment will be done before it will be considered for leafy greens again.
The grower, Mission Organics, didn't have an outside company check the field's food-safety risks before last year's outbreak, investigators said. Sweat of Natural Selection says the company requires such third-party audits for every ranch that supplies it, and now checks to make sure its growers comply.
FDA and California investigators issued their report on March 23, almost two months after the death of Betty Howard. They didn't pinpoint how the spinach was tainted, saying the culprits that carried the O157:H7 might have been wild pigs that lived near the field or irrigation water from wells not grouted to prevent seepage from groundwater exposed to feces.
The investigators also said there was no evidence that the contamination started at the Natural Selections plant. But they said conditions inside the plant may have allowed pathogens to spread.
There were no indications that the contamination was the product of a deliberate act.
This outbreak was home-grown, unlike the most recent spate of food-safety scares involving products from China, which have re-ignited concerns about the nations' food-safety defenses. State and federal health officials say they will respond more forcefully because of the lessons learned in the E. coli outbreak.
Since last fall, companies have taken thousands of acres out of leafy-green production because they've been deemed too close to pastures, wildlife or other risk factors — and they've added miles of fencing, including on the Paicines Ranch.
Processors in California, where the bulk of the nation's leafy greens are grown, have also agreed not to buy from growers who don't meet a defined set of safety standards — an industry first.
Some companies are improving their ability to track a bag of produce back to where it was grown. That will aid investigators and help limit the size of recalls. Dole is implementing a high-tech system that it says will enable it within minutes to track a contaminated bag back to within 30 feet of where the product was grown in the field.
Companies are also doing more testing for E. coli and salmonella in raw, leafy greens and, for the first time, in the finished product, too.
While some companies say such testing may provide a false sense of security because such a small percentage of the product is actually tested, just such a system late last month may have prevented another illness outbreak caused by contaminated spinach.
California's Metz Fresh retrieved more than 90% of 8,118 cases of potentially salmonella-contaminated bagged spinach before they got to consumers. Metz had tested the bagged produce as it came off the processing line and detected salmonella, leading to a recall.
In the past, the salmonella may never have been detected until someone got sick. No illnesses were reported, the company says.
Parts of the industry — and some lawmakers — have advocated that the FDA, which already regulates processing plants, start to oversee growers. The FDA's Brackett says the establishment of mandatory federal rules for growers has been discussed as one of several options related to produce safety.
For some, this will never be over.
Milwaukee's Jillian Kohl has resumed her graduate studies in art therapy, which were interrupted in their first week by her hospitalization. Her kidney function is normal now, but her doctors say there is a 30% chance that in the next 10 to 20 years they could fail again
"By the time I am 40 to 45 years old, I could be laying in a bed hooked up to dialysis machines again. I know death is inevitable, but sometimes it feels like quite a load to carry, knowing a rough timeline has potentially been put on my life," she says.
Kyle Allgood's family decided not to sue Dole. "We really trust in God," his mom, Robyn, says. "We felt that if he'd meant for Kyle to stay, he would have helped him fight it."
Natural Selection's Sweat says he learned of Kyle's death on the eve of his 45th birthday. "That was the one that took me to my knees," he says. "I was on my knees, in my home."
After Kyle died, the Allgoods' neighbors held a bake sale to buy benches in Kyle's name for a park in which he and his little sister played. Robyn wasn't sure she could walk past that park with her oldest daughter when school started this year. It was just too painful. But two weeks ago she did and was buoyed by what the benches represented.
"It's all the love there. I just don't think people understand what that meant to us."
For Zientek, grocery shopping is a different experience today. "We were somewhere, and my children naturally reached for some lettuce that was there and I had to stop myself from saying, 'No, put that down,' as if it was something really bad." She sighs. "I don't want them to grow up like that."
While the kids are healthy today, they, too, carry a greater risk for kidney disease and will need to be tested for the rest of their lives.
"People think life goes on," Zientek says. "But you're never really the same."
Do you worry about eating "pre-washed" spinach right out of the bag?


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Christmas Gift Ideas for Your Husband
Your husband is your lifelong companion and best friend, so get him a special Christmas gift that lets him know you care. Whatever your husband's hobbies and passions are, this guide can help you get inspiration for his ideal gift. Keep reading to find a unique and thoughtful Christmas gift for your husband.


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TV Review: Can Jimmy Fallon Become The King Of Late Night?
02.19.2014 | By Mariana Dussan | No Comments">No Comments
I am not a late-night television kind of gal. I occasionally watch reruns of "Friends," but last night Facebook persuaded me to do otherwise, so I tuned in to Jimmy Fallon's debut on "The Tonight Show." Read More


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Latest analysis provided by AMEGA experts. Forex forecasts, charts, recommendations. Everything that you need in one place.
Technical analysis by AMEGA - Opinion
Medium-termtrend: Bearish
The bear market is continuing. The price has already reached the target zone №1 1.33507-1.33400 and it has been fixed below the zone. The probability of reaching the target zone №2 1.32481-1.32289 is about 70%. The best prices to try to have a short position are the control resistance zone 1.33796-1.33689. In case of the price is fixed upper the control resistance zone the medium-term trend will be changed to the bull market and all short positions should be closed.
Trading recommendation:
It's recommended to try to have a short position near thecontrol resistance zone 1.33796-1.33689 (111 points from current minimum) with using the pattern «Head&Shoulders» at least on timeframe M15.
The control resistance zone is constructed from the current minimum. If this minimum changes by n points the zone should also be shifted n points down. The risk/reward ratio for every order should be at least 1/3.
All zones are constructed on the basis of data from the CME futures market.
Target zone:
Internal border – Maintenance margin size in points
External border – Initial margin in points
Control resistance zone – the half from the target zone
Resistance zone – the quarter of the target zone
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It's recommended to try to have a short position near the control resistance zone 1.13742-1.13650 (100 points from current minimum) with using the pattern «Head&Shoulders» at least on timeframe M15.


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Get more creative by skipping the path of least resistance
The modern business environment values creativity. The success of many firms is rooted in their ability to innovate. That said, creative behavior flies in the face of our daily reality. Most of our lives consist of habits in which we try to do what we did last time in the same situation. In meetings, we sit in the same seat in a conference room. At restaurants, we order the same dish. On our drive home from work, we take the same route.
How LinkedIn Makes Money; Behind the IPO Numbers
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Power? Thanks, but I'd Rather Have Influence
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How to Change the World - Hindsights
I've been blogging for a whole ten days now, and all my topics have been business stuff: venture capital, entrepreneurship, intrapreneurship, evangelism, etc. Now I want to throw you a total curve ball.
Read more: http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2006/01/hinds...
How Entrepreneurs Can Conquer Fear of Selling
It may be the hidden epidemic that's driving high business failure rates: Owners who hate selling.
Academic-Nonprofit Partnerships Can Pick Up Where Student Innovators Leave Off
When I was an undergraduate at MIT, I was involved with the small-but-growing community of students and faculty who were interested in international development. My classmates spent Friday nights hammering away on solar cookers, weekends in the kitchen trying to concoct simple hand warmers, and afternoons meeting mentors around campus to discuss their new ideas.
The Idiot's Guide to Launching Successful Innovation Task Forces
During the past 25 years I've seen a lot of innovation task forces come and go. Some of them looked good at the beginning and died a slow death. Some of them looked bad at the beginning and died a quick death. And some of them actually succeeded.
It's Not About You
Over the past few weeks, America's colleges have sent another class of graduates off into the world. These graduates possess something of inestimable value. Nearly every sensible middle-aged person would give away all their money to be able to go back to age 22 and begin adulthood anew.
What if the Secret to Success Is Failure?
Dominic Randolph can seem a little out of place at Riverdale Country School — which is odd, because he's the headmaster. Riverdale is one of New York City's most prestigious private schools, with a 104-year-old campus that looks down grandly on Van Cortlandt Park from the top of a steep hill in the richest part of the Bronx. On the discussion boards of UrbanBaby.com, worked-up moms from the Upper East Side argue over whether Riverdale sends enough seniors to Harvard, Yale and Princeton to be considered truly "TT" (top-tier, in UrbanBabyese), or whether it is more accurately labeled "2T" (second-tier), but it is, certainly, part of the city's private-school elite, a place members of the establishment send their kids to learn to be members of the establishment. Tuition starts at $38,500 a year, and that's for prekindergarten.
Read more: http://goo.gl/gW3bE
21 Books Every Entrepreneur Should Read
Summer is here, and even dire workaholics should take a few hours to relax. Read one of the following books and you'll become a better entrepreneur while you're at it.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/books-every-entrepreneur-should-read-2011-5?op=1#ixzz1QUkQjLVU
The journey toward values-based cultures — are you on the way?
Culture, values and leadership are critical priorities for business leaders. No matter how many resources your company deploys, how many experts you retain and no matter how many programs you run, little matters if you're not reaching your global workforce at heart, mind and gut level.


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CHARLOTTE, N.C. – The common denominator among all NASCAR drivers is that they all want more grip from their tires.
It has been difficult for manufacturer Goodyear to meet the demand at a track like Atlanta Motor Speedway without sacrificing reliability. But Goodyear has taken steps to address both issues with a new "zone tread" technology, which will be used for the first time at this weekend's race in Atlanta.
"Historically, Atlanta is one of the more difficult race tracks on tires and equipment, and this tire gives us the ability to improve performance," NASCAR vice president of competition Robin Pemberton said. "Combining the high speeds we always see at Atlanta with the high loads in the corners and the abrasive surface that brings tire wear into play, this is the ideal track to debut this technology."
The tires, most recently tested Aug. 6 at Atlanta by 13 teams, combine two different compounds to create a rubber capable of withstanding race conditions while also providing the grip drivers desire. The inside of the right-side tires uses the same compound Goodyear used at Michigan this year, and the outside uses the compound from previous Atlanta races.
Goodyear found that the inside of the right-side tires suffers the most abuse during a race at Atlanta because of stress loads, and has gone back and forth in tire development. Hard tire compounds lack grip and don't wear out very fast, while softer compounds have the grip that drivers want but aren't reliable.
"Atlanta is one of our biggest challenges from a tire perspective. The abrasive surface causes extremely high wear, while the length and layout promote very high speeds," said Stu Grant, Goodyear's general manager of worldwide racing. "What we've done here is take a specific rubber compound and limit the application to the inside shoulder, and then have a more tractive compound across the rest of the tread."
Jamie McMurray crew chief Kevin Manion said the tire held up well at the Atlanta test over long runs.
"It could handle the harshness of the Atlanta track," Manion said. "The applications may not be quite endless, but on tracks that have been repaved or where cars lack grip, Goodyear can potentially beef up the inside edge of the tread to help control heat, and then use a different compound on the outside of the tread to give more grip on entry and exit, which would be a good advance."
Pemberton, who noted NASCAR's new Gen-6 car has already broken 13 speed records this season, believes the technology will lead to better racing long-term. Immediately, at Atlanta, the increased downforce levels of NASCAR's new car should lead to a better show than last year, but the new tires will contribute, too.
"Goodyear always has to build a tire for the most stressful conditions possible," Pemberton said. "This multi-zone tire means they can not only build safer tires, but also tires that will allow for enhanced competition for both our competitors and our fans."
"Zone Tread" technology
• Combines 2 different rubber compounds
• Inside of the right-side tires uses a harder compound, which has less grip but doesn't wear out as fast
• Outside of the roght-side tires and the left-side tires use a softer compound, which has better grip but is less reliable


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While brandishing his trademark rhetorical flourish, Gov. Jerry Brown appeared before the state Legislature on Thursday to paint them a bright, and even rosy, picture of California's future.
It is the first time in a good while that any governor has had the nerve to do that.
Brown laid out a vision of a state that, against all odds, is beginning to recover from a terrible fiscal plight that has lasted about half a decade.
The governor repeatedly praised the Legislature and the voters for contributing mightily to the turnaround. But he did not spend much time specifically discussing the state's massive debt.
As one might expect, Brown expressed particular gratitude for the voters' approval of Proposition 30, which temporarily raised the state's sales and income taxes. Passage of the proposition should raise about $6 billion a year and avoided the state having to make massive cuts to funding of public schools.
He said that passage of Proposition 30, coupled with the anticipated turnaround in the economy, will put an end to huge deficits that have been the skunk at the party in Sacramento for nearly as long as U.S. troops have been in Afghanistan.
The State of the State speech was pure Jerry Brown as he wove in references as diverse as Spanish explorers, biblical parables and none other than "The Little Engine That Could." On policy issues, the speech broke little, if any, new ground, but it did allow Brown to be upbeat, optimistic and even exuberant about the direction of the state.
So much so that one almost expected to hear the strains "The Impossible Dream" from "Man of La Mancha" playing softly over the PA system as he spoke.
We have had our differences with the governor, but we fervently hope that his vision of the state's future is correct. Like everyone else in the state, we have grown weary of hurting.
While the governor touted his bold plans for high-speed rail, massive water tunnel projects and revamping school funding, those were not the most important words we heard.
We heard Brown acknowledge in very real terms that California is not merely a victim of circumstance and that many of its fiscal wounds are self-inflicted. It is a message that must be repeated often so as to avoid repeating financial disasters.
Brown made sure to explain that his plan for the future did not include a return to the ways of bygone days once the money starts rolling in.
"Fiscal discipline is not the enemy of our good intentions, but the basis for realizing them," Brown said. "It is cruel to lead people on by expanding good programs, only to cut them back when the funding disappears. That is not progress; it is not even progressive. It is illusion. That stop-and-go boom-and-bust serves no one. We are not going back there."
Hear! Hear!
We only hope that the governor really means that. In our view, such an attitude is absolutely necessary, if California is to return to greatness.


text: Guest-Tek Furnishes Lifesize® High Definition Video Communications Systems to Hospitality Industry Hyatt Regency in Irvine, CA Implements Lifesize® Room™ to Offer Hotel Clients Exemplary Technology and Services when Hosting Corporate Meetings and Events Austin, Texas — Jan 8, 2007 Lifesize, the high definition video communications company, today announced that Guest-Tek, the world's largest provider of IP based technology solutions for the hospitality industry, is furnishing Lifesize® Room™ systems to hotels for enhancing meeting facilities and services provided to hotel clients. As the first Guest-Tek customer to implement Lifesize Room, the Hyatt Regency in Irvine, CA can now offer its clients a significantly improved conferencing experience when holding on-property meetings and events. Lifesize Room is a high definition video communications product that allows geographically distributed participants in multiple locations to experience more effective, true-to-life interactions. "The ability to guarantee a successful high quality videoconference to our customers is of critical importance to us at our hotel," said Jay Patel, manager of information systems at Hyatt Regency Irvine. "With Lifesize high definition video communications and Guest-Tek's exemplary service and support, we are able to do just that." In the past, some hotels would supply videoconferencing over ISDN to clients needing these services for connecting remote participants to events being held on-site. However the expense of provisioning ISDN bandwidth, along with the poor quality of low resolution systems, would often result in dissatisfied clients and minimal to no usage. Guest-Tek was interested in finding a videoconferencing solution that gave its hospitality customers an opportunity to leverage the IP services it was already providing them for Internet access in meeting rooms. They sought a solution that would deliver superior quality at a cost-effective price and allow hotels to offer state-of-the-art technology. "It became clear to us that many of the hotels we serve had found videoconferencing to be a challenging service to deliver reliably," said David Denhardt, Guest-Tek's director of event services. "We set out to acquire the skills and tools necessary to help them, and it was in this quest that we discovered Lifesize Room represented the best value in the industry for both quality and reliability." Lifesize channel partner Canadian Communication Products* is supplying Guest-Tek with the Lifesize Room systems. Guest-Tek has added Lifesize Room to the wide range of Internet based products and services that it offers to Hyatt Regency Irvine and other hotels. This includes reliable High-Speed Internet, Video on Demand, IP Telephony and industry leading support for these services in guest rooms and meeting spaces. "Hotels and their clientele can definitely realize substantial business benefits by utilizing the high definition video communications products Lifesize pioneered and perfected," said Craig Malloy, CEO of Lifesize. "In the hospitality industry where offering outstanding service makes all the difference, it is great to see providers like Guest-Tek taking the initiative to ensure this is always the case." Lifesize Room, with its patent-pending industrial design and high definition technology, offers the very best price-to-performance value available on the market. By delivering better video quality at any bandwidth, Lifesize Room enables all types of businesses around the world to realize a greatly enhanced user experience. About Guest-Tek Guest-Tek is the world's largest provider of IP based technology solutions for the hospitality industry. Guest-Tek's OneView platform provides hotels with converged data, video and telephony services. Guest-Tek is a preferred vendor to major hotel brands, providing services including network design, procurement, implementation, and post sales customer support to 3,400 properties and over 505,000 rooms. Guest-Tek's common shares are trade on the Toronto Stock Exchange under the trading symbol "GTK". The company's head offices are in Calgary, Alberta, and it has major support facilities in Irvine, California, and Warsaw, Poland as well as Sales offices located throughout North America and Europe. For more information about Guest-Tek, go to www.guest-tek.com. About Canadian Communication Products Inc.* Canadian Communication Products Inc. (CCP) specializes in the distribution of audio and video peripheral products for the telecommunication and computer industries. CCP Customer Care Program offers a complete line of pre and post sales support and maintenance services. For over 20 years CCP has provided sales and technical support to customers across Canada from offices located in Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Halifax. Visit www.ccpin.com *Updated August 2011: CCP is now SENSUS About Lifesize Headquartered in Austin, TX, Lifesize combines best-in-class, cloud-based video conferencing services with integrated equipment to help you present your business in the best light. Recognized as Frost & Sullivan's Cloud Video Conferencing Vendor of the Year, Lifesize leads the industry in customer satisfaction with the world's first 4K video conferencing solution and 4K service architecture. Together with a full suite of integrations and offerings designed for businesses of any size, Lifesize sets a new standard for workplace communication and productivity on a global scale. To see why companies like Yelp, Netflix and Major League Baseball rely on Lifesize for their mission-critical team communication, visit www.lifesize.com or follow the company @Lifesize. Lifesize and the Lifesize logo are trademarks of Lifesize, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. ### Request a Demo


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By Barbara Kollmeyer
And now, back to our regularly scheduled risk-off Friday program. Let's see, a largely lousy week of trade, led by techs and momos again, check, and potential stress from Ukraine/Russia this weekend, check. Good luck with volume today.
One wants to be positive, but even Europe is starting to get a little painful. Over at Valutrades, Joao Monteiro says the day's icky German trade data means U.S. traders will be ready to hit their own sell buttons on any signs the ECB has put off additional stimulus for too long. There's been plenty of talk, again, about how much Europe pain can affect the U.S., so it's a space that needs watching.
But not all the gloom can be blamed on Europe. After all, there was Thursday's disappointing session with its big letdown from the Dow industrials /quotes/zigman/627449/realtime DJIA , says IG's Chris Beauchamp. In the short term, the DJIA's failure to hold above 16,600 could be a "worrying short-term sign for the bulls and may well signal a swift retest of 16,400." The Dow is about the only index that's barely in the black this week. The market still lacks a catalyst to drive it higher, he says. He adds:
"The search continues, but when dovish central bankers and a reasonably benign earnings season are insufficient, investors will be asking what is really going to drive this market higher. If the answer is 'nothing,' then the outlook seems more than a little negative for stocks."
Then there's that Russell 2000 /quotes/zigman/2759624/realtime RUT worry. Head & shoulders warnings are flying:
Could a big deal from Apple be that catalyst? Maybe that's a shot in the arm for techs, however briefly, if talk of a $3.2 billion buy of Dr Dre's high-end headphones isn't just hot air and that video that briefly made the rounds has any grounding.
Key market gauges: Losses are picking up for stock futures, as Wall Street looks to be headed for another one of those risk-off Fridays. Futures for the Dow /quotes/zigman/17899764/realtime YMM4 and S&P /quotes/zigman/20258906/realtime ESM4 averages are in the red, along with techs. Asian markets /quotes/zigman/6959860/realtime XX:ADOW perked up a bit, but nothing to write home about. European stocks /quotes/zigman/2380150/realtime XX:SXXP are down from a six-year high on gloomy earnings and weak German data. Those Europe losses are viewed as one culprit for red ink seen at the open for Wall Street.
The euro /quotes/zigman/4867933/realtime/sampled EURUSD , meanwhile, has dropped below $1.38 for the first time since early April as dovey Draghi comments continue to reverberate.
The economy: The calendar is barely a whisper today, with job openings and wholesale inventories for March at 10 a.m. Eastern. Dallas Fed's Richard Fisher, who is a voting member, will talk on limitations of U.S. monetary policy at noon Eastern and Minneapolis Fed President Narayana Kocherlakota will speak on diversity after the market closes.
Earnings: Only one company reported and the news wasn't good. Shares of Ralph Lauren /quotes/zigman/6233187/delayed /quotes/nls/rl RL fell more than 5% after the luxury clothing company got cautious on 2015 margins.
Gap /quotes/zigman/227242/delayed /quotes/nls/gps GPS is up 8% after topping expectations for April same-store sales and forecasting first-quarter earnings above consensus. Rocket Fuel /quotes/zigman/21382860/delayed /quotes/nls/fuel FUEL is down another 30% after a late-session tumble after the digital advertising company missed Wall Street forecasts and Jazz Pharmaceuticals /quotes/zigman/8123438/delayed /quotes/nls/jazz JAZZ is also getting clobbered in the wake of earnings, down 30%.
Also watch for News Corp /quotes/zigman/18008449/delayed /quotes/nls/nwsa NWSA /quotes/zigman/18008448/delayed /quotes/nls/nws NWS , the parent company of MarketWatch, which beat forecasts and could gain after a late-Thursday lift. GrubHub /quotes/zigman/30071449/delayed /quotes/nls/grub GRUB also may follow on late-session gains after results.
The buzz: All eyes on Apple /quotes/zigman/68270/delayed /quotes/nls/aapl AAPL shares this morning, especially if that Beats deal goes through, which would be its biggest in awhile. My colleague recalled watching a QVC infomercial for Beats headphones a few months ago and how those $300 headphones sold out in minutes. Meanwhile, Reuters is saying Apple will unveil its iPhone6 in August, a month earlier than expected, citing Taiwanese media, which in turn was citing unidentified supply-chain sources. Surely rock-solid information! As for possible Beat deal, here is just some of the carping going on over at Twitter:
Another bust-up between Tesla /quotes/zigman/118681/delayed /quotes/nls/tsla TSLA and individual states over sales of its electronic vehicles. This time, Tesla is taking on the Missouri auto-dealers lobby, who the electronic-car maker claims has pressured legislators to prevent Tesla from selling its cars directly to would-buy buyers in the state. "This extraordinary maneuver amounts to a sneak attack to thwart due process and hurt consumer freedom in Missouri," says a charged-up Tesla in a blog post on its website.
Merck /quotes/zigman/574389/delayed /quotes/nls/mrk MRK shares are a bit lower in premarket. News the FDA gave the go-ahead to a new drug Thursday to be used to inhibit blood clots isn't providing much of a lift.
Tough times these days for U.S.-French tie-ups. Omnicom /quotes/zigman/237213/delayed /quotes/nls/omc OMC and French-based Publicis /quotes/zigman/135224/realtime FR:PUB have finally called off their planned $35 billion merger. It seems they couldn't get past tax issues, regulatory approvals and who would get to claim the role of acquirer. Good luck, GE /quotes/zigman/227468/delayed /quotes/nls/ge GE .
Call of the day: The buy case for Apple, says ISI's Brian Marshall, has wobbled a hair. Citing that $75, or roughly 15%, move since early April, Marshall cut its Apple rating to buy from strong buy. The fundamental view on Apple — dominant smartphone and mobile computing software, services — and the iPhone 6 upgrade cycle remain unchanged, but the upside potential has been "somewhat reduced" now that the stock is trading around $600, he says. With that, ISI also lifts its price target to $675 to reflect "solid fundamentals and upside potential from the 'mother lode of all Apple upgrade cycles'" in the second half of this year. Can Apple make it back to 2012 all-time highs of $700-plus a share? It will need to break out of that developed-market upgrade-cycle story, he says and until the "bill of materials" comes in on that new iPhone 6, ISI says it's prudent to shift to a mere buy. Apple saved $42 putting a plastic body on its Apple 5S.
More from the analyst patch: Canaccord reportedly lifted its price target on Apple by $50 to $660, with analyst Mike Walkley pointing to indications the iPhone 5S was the top-selling phone at all major U.S. carriers as well as global channels in April. Also, plenty of interest in the early upgrade programs for smartphones, which he thinks are giving a lift to high-end smartphone sales.
Chart of the day: Is the tortoise catching up to the hare? Just maybe. From Bespoke Investments comes this chart showing the S&P 500 (tortoise) stacking up against the Nasdaq Internet Group (hare) since the start of 2013. In February, the Internet group was up 80% from where it started in 2013, though the fun ended when March came and nearly half of that chunky gain has since been erased.
Random reads: Where America's hungriest kids live, compliments of Feeding America, complete with an incredible interactive map.
The dodgy sign-language interpreter at Mandela's funeral is back.
Ham, cheese and cocaine? Arrested over a sandwich in Spain.
Can't wait for the mini-series of "Rosemary's Baby", now that my baby days are done.
A video to send you off on your weekend. Burberry-clad Beat headphone? Surely Angela Ahrendts and Dr Dre will come up with something fun if this deal goes through.
Need to Know starts early and is updated as needed until the opening bell, but sign up here to get it delivered once to your e-mail box. Be sure to check the Need to Know item. The e-mailed version will be sent out at approximately 8:45 a.m. Eastern. Follow @bkollmeyer on Twitter.


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What do you follow a splash park with at the Children's Museum of Memphis?
Children play in the recently completed H2Oh! Splash spray park at the Children's Museum of Memphis. The park has over 7,700 square feet and more than 40 sprayers.
(Daily News/Lance Murphey)
A robotic cow, of course.
As children out of school for the summer enjoy the newly opened "H2Oh! Splash" water park at Hollywood Street and Central Avenue, museum public relations and marketing director Carrie Roberts says plans are being made for the robotic cow and a barn on the other side of the museum property including an outdoor classroom.
"It's a cow that can be milked," she said. "It is used as a teaching tool to learn about animals and their environment."
The exhibit on farm life will include the giant milk bottle donated to the museum from the South Memphis Alliance that was once atop the old dairy building on Bellevue Boulevard near Walker Avenue.
The dairy building was demolished to make way for the alliance's planned center for social services that will also serve as a gateway to the Soulsville neighborhood west of Bellevue.
The water park, which is technically "spray pads," is already proving to be popular with the worst of the summer heat still to come.
It complements the traditional pool at the Salvation Army Kroc Center that opened last year on the northwest corner of the Mid-South Fairgrounds property.
A gift from Katherine and John Dobbs and their family foundation helped fund H2Oh.
They have committed to helping fund one new exhibit at the museum a year for the next 10 years. It is the largest gift in the history of the museum, which opened in 1990.
"They picked the splash park as the one they wanted to start with," Roberts said. "We wanted it to still be educational since we are a children's museum. We chose a growing theme. So it's all about plant life and bugs that you find in the garden."
Chloe Jones, 6, beats the heat in the H2Oh! Splash spray park. The park has a variety of sprayers, including flowers, leaves, jet streams, magic mist, turtles and crabs.
It features different sized waterfalls and spray areas as well as metal flower sculptures, real grass areas with real flowers and four large granite turtles.
The museum worked with Memphis Pool Supply Co. on the spray pads, the design and engineering of what is the largest water facility of its kind in the Mid-South at 7,700 square feet, according to Mark Reed, CEO of Memphis Pool.
"It's well beyond anything that's been installed around here," Reed added. "We had a lot of drainage issues. I don't know that the sight was as difficult as it was just working around the utilities that were already there and having to take parking lot and curb up and maintain the budget we had given them."
Memphis Pool "kicked in some as well" on the cost of the splash park.
"They are getting more popular because they require a lot less maintenance and they are less expensive to install," he added. "Over the years pools have graduated from the big diving pools and diving wells and have started to shallow up and be more play areas to float around rather than the diving thing."
H2Oh is a zero-entry area with no standing water to be held within any kind of barriers.
"Water doesn't pool on the grounds so the toddlers just learning to walk can have a good time," Roberts said. "We want to be able to reach as many children as possible. A lot of people that come because they see the splash park – they are also going in and playing at the museum as well."
The splash parks are about 5 percent of Memphis Pool's business, Reed estimated. They are becoming popular with hotels and other public places that have to meet access standards of the federal Americans with Disabilities Act.
"Just inertia led us there," Reed said. "They had some pretty onerous requirement for bringing baby pools up to code. It was cheaper to fill in a baby pool and just forget you had it. But what we realized is we can convert these baby pools into some kind of a little small splash pad spray park kind of thing and avoid all of the ADA stuff."
The corner of Hollywood and Central, where the splash park is, has also changed over the years. It had a front nose cockpit section of a FedEx jet for several years and when the CMOM building was still a National Guard armory, the corner was the first post-World War II home for the Memphis Belle B-17 bomber.
The splash park is open daily to all children through Labor Day from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. with a separate admission fee from the museum. It could remain open past Labor Day depending on how long the summer heat lasts.
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