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A new springtime

Dear meerkat-fans out there, I am sorry for not posting here for such a long time, but these last two years found me very busy...

Maybe I should give you a short update on the things that happened since the last post in September 2010.

The mob is still without a dominant couple but Möfzi, former DF is still alive, even though you would not say "kicking". Today one of the keepers told some people that she is 13 years now, which makes her a real meerkat Methuselah.

Möfzi went through a couple of crises these last months, the meanest thing was a huge abscess on her right hind leg which left her limping badly. The abscess was opened and cleaned and she was kept in a separate enclosure inside, but with sniffing contact to the other group members.

A friend and I were let into this enclosure by one of the keepers, and we had the chance to see her being fed and taken care of. We could see that the keeper was very touched by how tough and strong this old female still is. He told us that she was on the brink of death for about two days, struggling with the huge wound. On day three though, she got up and started eating again.

She is very weak, which is particularly due to not being able to chew properly. Once in a while they will keep her separate and feed her some additional stuff, she will also receive vitamin shots etc. As you will see in the pictures I´ll post further down, she looks shrunken.

Her right front paw, which was broken in winter 09 is giving her trouble, too. It is bent and looked slightly swollen. Möfzi is very slow now, but she will not miss any occasion snatching additional treats.

Unfortunately I did not bring egg or sth. just some dandelion, which is currently in full bloom and the which the kats really love.

One of the highlights I witnessed in the last months was the kats being given a whole dead rabbit to eat and play with. Unfortunately I did not bring my camera on this day. At first I wondered, why all the kats had so much blood on them, but looking into the inside enclosure I saw them going at the rabbit. On such occasions you can see that they are really mean predators, they love the blood and gore!

A lot has changed for the kats since their exhibt was started in 2000.

These last weeks the enclosure had a total makeover, with all the lookout hills being re-modelled, and two dead trees being put into the enclosure for the kats to climb onto. One of the real highlights though is that one of these newly made hills features a heated den! The kats will love this on windy and cold days!

In the beginning, in 2000 their enclosure was rather bleak and got bleaker within the next years, with the kats digging through every inch of ground, no new stuff being put into the enclosure etc. From 2000 until 2007/08 nothing much was done to brighten their lives.

With meerkats being very curious animals which get bored easily, this was a dreary situation. And of course they did not want to breed under these conditions. Möfzi had a couple of pregnancies which sadly resulted in misscarriages. One successful birth must have been around summer 2004, but the pups were attacked by the mob or she might even have killed them herself.

2004 was a bad year anyway, Stubby Tail had an abscess which was in need of treatment. He could not eat properly for several weeks, losing weight. It took ages until he was treated correctly. Since then he has been suffering from swellings on the right side of his nose, which will never go away completely. Today he had a swelling oozing pus from his right eye.

These nasal swellings can be found in most members of the group, the keepers think that they results from clogged sinuses and are not sure what the cause might be.

Today found all members well and relaxed even though there had been an event in the afternoon with thousands of people visiting in this fine and warm spring weather.

I will post a couple of pictures I made today.

The three youngsters Caruso, Sayuri and Snoutie.

Left: Orlok and Möfzi taking a nap
Middle: Snoutie and Möfzi
Right: Snoutie, Möfzi and Orlok

Close-ups of Möfzi, now aged 13.
In the right pic you can see her twisted right front paw.
You will also notice the long claws, as she will no longer use this paw for digging.

Left: Orlok sitting on one of the dead trees in the enclosure.
Middle: Snoutie on the newly made lookout featuring a heated den.
Right: Re-modelled hills, the large one on the right features the heated den.

1 comment:

http://www.bestdissertations.com said...

Thanks for sharing such a wonderful post as usual. I like your photography. They are looking so cute and healthy. No issues for late responding on the blog. It happens sometime.


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Photo © The Israel Museum, Jerusalem

Kore male society initiation mask
Late 19th – early 20th century
Bamana or Marka people, Mali
Wood and vegetal fiber
H: 51; W: 22; D: 10 cm
Gift of Faith-dorian and Martin Wright, New York, to American Friends of the Israel Museum, in memory of Abraham Janoff
Accession number: B84.0898

Newton, Douglas, African and Oceanic Art in Jerusalem, Israel Museum, Jerusalem, 2001, English

Many Faces: Masks from Many Times and Many Places, Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Ruth Youth Wing, 08/04/2009 - 30/11/2009

Digital presentation of this object was made possible by: The Ridgefield Foundation, New York, in memory of Henry J. and Erna D. Leir

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Photo © Israel Museum, Jerusalem, by Elie Posner
Wedding ring
Izmir, Turkey
Gold, cast and engraved
Diam: 2.1 cm
Gift of Jacques Hemsi, Izmir, in memory of his mother Sultana Cohen Hemsi
Accession number: B83.0621

Digital presentation of this object was made possible by: The Ridgefield Foundation, New York, in memory of Henry J. and Erna D. Leir


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Brian Wilson’s ‘Pet Sounds’ anniversary tour coming to ACL Live

Brian Wilson and opening act Rodriguez performs at Bass Concert Hall on June 23, 2015. Erika Rich for American-Statesman

Brian Wilson will perform “Pet Sounds” in full at ACL Live on May 13, 2017. Erika Rich for American-Statesman 2015

[Update, Oct. 14, 4:10 p.m.: The May 13, 2017, show sold out quickly, but a second show has been added, on May 14, 2017.]

By the time Brian Wilson’s “Pet Sounds 50th Anniversary Tour” reaches Austin next spring, it’ll actually be the 51st anniversary of the monumentally influential Beach Boys album. Still, given that last year’s Levitation Fest washout nixed Wilson’s scheduled appearance here in the early phase of the tour, word of any make-up show is good news.

The new date — May 13, 2017, at ACL Live — is just three days shy of 51 years since the album was released on May 16, 1966. Tickets, $55-$133, go on sale Friday, Oct. 14, at 10 a.m. via the venue’s website.

The show is officially being billed as “Brian Wilson Presents Pet Sounds: The Final Performances,” though that appears to apply to the playing of “Pet Sounds” in its entirety, not a suggestion that Wilson is calling it quits after the tour. As was the case for the canceled Levitation show, this one will feature Wilson’s longtime Beach Boys collaborators Al Jardine and Blondie Chaplin.

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Southern Paiute

The Paiutes likely reached the Colorado Plateau between 1100 and 1200 A.D. They speak a dialect of the Numic language family, and are related to the Ute people. Paiute means “true Ute” or “water Ute.” Historically the Southern Paiute were a hunting and gathering people, and some bands also practiced limited irrigation agriculture and grew corn, beans, squash, sunflower, melons, and gourds.

Beginning in the middle of the 19th century, more Europeans began moving into Southern Paiute territory and claiming it for themselves, culminating in the Paiute or Pyramid Lake War. The Utes were eventually defeated by the United States army, and the US began moving all Native Americans into reservations. The Southern Paiute refused to be moved into a reservation, and eventually settled in southern Utah.

1n 1954, as an assimilation effort, the US government stopped recognizing the Southern Paiute as a group, but they regained federal recognition in 1980. Today there are Southern Paiute communities scattered throughout the Southwest.


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, | 2016 | 115 minutes | | , , ,
Directed by Anne Fontaine

Friday September 09, 2016

$12 General Admission, $9 Member,
$7 child age 14 or younger
Doors Open for admissions 30 min. prior to screening
Buy tickets at Film Center or online now BUY TICKETS

Directed by Anne Fontaine

The hauntingly beautiful film from Poland, THE INNOCENTS directed by Anne Fontaine is set in 1945 Poland where a young French Red Cross doctor is sent to assist survivors of a concentration camp and discovers several nuns in advanced states of pregnancy at a nearby convent.

Warsaw, December 1945: the second World War is finally over and Mathilde is treating the last of the French survivors of the German camps. When a panicked Benedictine nun appears at the clinic one night begging Mathilde to follow her back to the convent, what she finds there is shocking: a holy sister about to give birth and several more in advanced stages of pregnancy. A non-believer, Mathilde enters the sisters’ fiercely private world, dictated by the rituals of their order and the strict Rev. Mother (Agata Kulesza, Ida). Fearing the shame of exposure, the hostility of the new anti-Catholic Communist government, and facing an unprecedented crisis of faith, the nuns increasingly turn to Mathilde as their belief and traditions clash with harsh realities.

Balancing the many heartbreaks of ‘The Innocents’ with ease, Director Anne Fontaine is able to weave together some loaded themes – the influence of religion on the devoted, the unique ways in which women bond with each other and the importance of remembering history and the horrors of war.

The Innocents copy

"It gives us war as seen by the women it rolls over and it quietly exults as they help each other back to their feet." - Ty Burr, The Boston Globe

"In such a dark time and place, hope does emerge." - Bruce Demara - Toronto Star

"Fontaine's greatest achievement is her assured voice which is never too comforting nor too cynical." - Gary Shannon, The Young Folks

Winner Best Narrative Feature - Provincetown International Film Festival 2016

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I had some coherent final thoughts on this album, but these aren’t them. Even so, it might explain a few things. —Keir

I hope everyone enjoyed our revisiting of this album and everything in its orbit. I know we (or at least I) have never truly stopped talking/writing/posting/whatever about all my band stuff, so I appreciate everyone who read this for humoring me yet again. I’d like to say it’ll be the last time, but we all know better than that, don’t we?

Why? Well, when I started this series I had a plan to wrap it up with some grand unifying theory of nostalgia, but I already did that in book form a few years ago, and that thing’s not due for an anniversary til 2018, so it can go on hold for a while. Seriously though, this “How Far is the Fall” business was, for me, less a trip down memory lane than a necessary exorcism. To explain that, I think I’d better squeeze out one last drop of self-indulgence and expand a bit on what i said at the end of the previous post:

“This project was the beginning of the end of my obsession with ‘being in a band’ and getting too wrapped up in that as an identity. The time spent making this album was also the time that I finally landed a real job in the design business, so I kind of feel like it’s the bridge between two chapters in my life. That’s a lot to put on ten songs and eight grand, but when we finished it, we only played six more shows over the next twelve months, and then life exerted its gravity on Honey White as we moved on to other things. I also hear what every recording is: a document of specific songs made with four other creative people, in a particular location and time.”

I think what this thing really represented was the last time I’d really commit to making music with a group—or indeed undertaking any major creative project with a group, outside a professional context anyway. I didn’t know if I’d write any more lyrics after “Hold Still,” the “How Far is the Fall” outtake that was easily the nastiest, jerkiest thing I’d ever made. I was wrong—my subsequent “Weapon of Young Gods” fiction novel/instrumental soundtrack project ate up several years in its own right, but still inspired me to write lyrics again. And yes, we reunited Honey White (and even the Mojo Wire…sort of) in 2010 and released much fun stuff (some of which I’m pretty proud of), but that still seemed like a lark. We all have grown-up lives and responsibilities and there’s nothing wrong with that, but it does curtail the selfish impulses that so often fuel creativity. Or at least MY creativity.

And yet even that seems to be failing—or at least stalling—for me at the moment. Getting wrapped up in AIGA and other professional design commitments put a major dent in my home-recording/music-making time. It wasn’t a total loss, because I have spit out at least 5 new lyrics since 2013—but it’s taking forever to record the simple tunes I’ve composed for them and the project they’re attached to is still stuck in neutral. The funny thing is, I don’t mind. I don’t feel compelled to express myself with lyrics and music the way I did when I was 19 or 25 or 28 or 34 or whatever. It’s still there, and it’ll never go away, but it’s not so urgent anymore.

So by any measure, “How Far is the Fall” really was the last project of its kind for me and maybe for the other guys as well. Brian’s making great music with his wife Rebekah, and Bryn and Adam still get together and play, but it’s all obviously different and that’s not a bad thing. I read something about this years ago that really clicked with me: Derek Sivers of CD Baby (our distributor) once said this about indie musicians: that for so many of them out there, the finished album is the endpoint. Not the promotion/gigs/touring—simply the act of creating, recording and getting the music out of your own head, and I think that’s true. It’s a good yardstick these days when there’s little point in attempting a music career unless you really bust your ass to do it. But then that’s always been true, so who the hell knows.

Anyway, what IS probably true is that this Honey White album was the best expression of our overall aesthetic and how we created music together, and yet it also stands as the end of Honey White proper—or at least the beginning of the end, like I said above. I still count it as one of my best creative experiences even though it was at the beginning of my professional creative career. It seems like a contradiction, but contradiction is balance, right?

I dunno. Thanks for hanging in there with this stuff. I (and the others in the band) sure do appreciate it. If I ever do anything else for this site above and beyond the “parade of milestone anniversaries with only a few updates if Bryn or Brian have new projects or gigs to report on,” I’ll flog it to death the way I always do. Until then, enjoy all the other gloriously unprofessional music we made. This album was as close we got to being real pros, and it’s special.


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My Dribble – Daily Articles About Nothing Specific

France might extend state of emergency after ‘known wolf’ rams police van with explosives-filled car

, , , , , , ,

Frances interior minister said he will present a bill to extend the country’s state of emergency until Nov. 1 following an attack on police in Paris Monday. #BREAKING: Suspected attacker has crashed a vehicle into police van on #Champslyses — FRANCE 24 English (@France24_en) June 19, 2017 // Fortunately, no one was hurt but […]


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Edmonds-area fire calls for Nov 3-9

Snohomish County Fire District 1 responded to 367 calls the week of Nov. 3-9:  282 emergency medical aid calls, 28 motor vehicle collisions, 25 fires, 16 service calls, 3 gas leaks, 1 hazardous materials call, 1 technical rescue and 11 automatic fire alarms. The following calls were in or near Edmonds:

Nov. 4
HOUSE FIRE:  At 10:50 p.m., a house fire was reported in the 23100 block of Brier Road in Brier.  A smoke alarm alerted the residents to smoke in the living room and they safely exited the home.  The fireplace had been in use earlier in the day and it appeared the fire was started by an overheated wood frame adjacent to the fireplace, then spread to the attic. Damage to the structure and contents is estimated at $100,000.

Nov. 5
COLLISION:  At 1:13 p.m., a two-car collision was reported in the 22100 block of Highway 99 in Edmonds.  Firefighters transported one patient to Swedish/Edmonds Hospital.

Nov. 6
COLLISION:  At 1:18 a.m., firefighters responded to a collision at the intersection of Highway 99 and Lincoln Way north of Lynnwood.  Firefighters used rescue tools to free one patient trapped in the wreckage. Firefighters transported three seriously injured patients to Providence Regional Medical Center Everett.
November 7
COLLISION:  At 7:12 a.m., a seven-car collision was reported in the carpool lane on southbound I-5 north of 196th Street SW in Lynnwood.  Several occupants had to be extricated from their cars. Firefighters transported two patients to Harborview Medical Center and one patient to Swedish/Edmonds Hospital. They also treated five other patients at the scene.
VEHICLE FIRE:  At 7:39 p.m., firefighters extinguished a vehicle fire in the 12500 block of 28th Place W south of Everett.
November 9
COLLISION:  At 2:41 p.m., a two-car collision occurred in the intersection of 226th Street SW and 82nd Avenue W in Edmonds.  Firefighters transported one driver to Swedish/Edmonds Hospital.

COLLISION:  At 8:24 p.m., a two-car accident was reported on northbound I-5 on the ramp to southbound I-405.  Firefighters transported one patient to Evergreen Hospital.

Fire District 1 is the largest provider of fire and emergency medical services in Snohomish County, serving more than 225,000 residents in the unincorporated communities of Silver Firs, Eastmont, Mariner, Lake Serene, Picnic Point, Martha Lake, Mariner, Lake Stickney, Norma Beach, Hilltop, Hilton Lake and Pioneer Trails; the Cities of Brier, Edmonds and Mountlake Terrace; and the Town of Woodway.

  1. Teresa, one incident happened to be left out. A one car collision occurred at approximately 10:30 AM on November 8th at 512 5th Ave S in Edmonds when a car ran into the building occupied by Salon 512. No one was injured, only a few shattered nerves and the only damage to the building was a broken window. We all felt very fortunate that the driver was ok and no one was hurt.

    • Thanks for the update, Gail. These reports come directly from Fire District 1 and obviously don’t include all incidents.

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Get ready for real interactive football action with your very own FOOTBALL 21 Pro game table. Your Pro model is perfect for your home, tailgating, barbecues or just about anywhere. Travel is made easy when you  bring the fun on the road since it easily folds into 2x2 ft. with a carrying handle and only weighs 11 pounds.

So what's included ?

1 FOOTBALL 21  8 ft Folding Game Table

2 Goalposts (1 for each end, just pop em in ! )

3 FOOTBALL  21 Mini Foam Footballs

1 Set of 12 Sided Dice

10 Passer Chips

1 Pack of Extra Football Receiver Decals

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What purpose are your thoughts serving you? 5 ways to check in and change them

Almost every time that I attend a yoga class, I’m asked to check in with myself on this very question. And almost every time, I am able to think about some of the daily thoughts that go through my head and nix out certain ones that aren’t serving me a healthy purpose!

Whether you want to admit it or not, there is always room for improvement when it comes to daily living and thinking.

Our thoughts have a direct impact on our actions. If you are crippled with anxiety then the results will be manifested in your daily choices. Maybe you decide not to go out to lunch with your friend because you’re worried about navigating through traffic to arrive there. Maybe you aren’t able to start on that work or school assignment because you’re experiencing paralysis by analysis.

Thoughts are very important. Examining your inner self-talk is the first way to understand what purpose those pesky negative thoughts are serving you.

1. When you wake up in the morning, check in with yourself each day.

Take a mental inventory of what is going through your mind. Are you berating yourself for eating that extra piece of pie last night? Are you worried about the lunch meeting? Identify what is going through your mind to cause the discomfort.

2. Ask yourself—what benefit am I getting from having that anxiety/negative thought about A, B, and or C?

How will that positively serve me throughout the day. Let’s think back to the person who is upset with themselves about eating the extra piece of pie. Instead of giving up on healthy eating for the day, use that feeling of angst to propel you to make healthier eating choices throughout the day. Skip out on the bread at lunch and go with a salad. Do you see what I mean? Use those negative thoughts to make positive choices.

3. Examine the self-talk.

What you tell yourself in your own mind will manifest itself daily. We all have self-talk. We all have preconceived notions about what is going to happen throughout the day—some people have the notion that ‘no one will like me’ while others may have the notion that ‘I can’t wait to see who I will be working with today, maybe I’ll meet a new friend’. If you are experiencing negative self-talk, identify what those messages are and work proactively to counteract against them. Examine where those messages have come from and consider the source.

For example, I work with many women who have come out of an abusive relationship. Some have stayed for 6 months, others for 5 years or longer. These lovely ladies have received all kinds of messages from their abusive partner that have negatively impacted their self-talk. Much of our work is identifying the negative messages that their partner has implanted in their minds and listing reasons why they are untrue, and replacing them with positive messages that are true.

Telling yourself that ‘no one will ever love me’ is essentially a self-fulfilling prophecy. Instead of constantly allowing that message to pass by in your brain, replace it with ‘I love myself’ or ‘I choose to love myself’.

4. Be kind to yourself.

Some people believe that they are undeserving of receiving kindness from others, being in a healthy relationship, etc. Instead of focusing on being on the receiving ends of external kindness, start with being kind to yourself! Work from there. People are fallible. They will have good days and bad days—sometimes another person will go out of their way to be nice to you, sometimes they won’t even speak to you. The common denominator in the equation is you. If you can learn that kindness starts from within, then you will save yourself a lot of heartache that can come from depending on others to provide kindness for/to you.

5. Seek out a therapist to assist you in identifying your self-talk and where it comes from.

Therapy is what I do, so of course I believe that a skilled therapist can help a person with their self-growth exponentially. If you are still struggling with changing your self-talk and thoughts, then seek out a trusted mental health professional to help you with this process. Change can be very difficult, especially if the things that you need to change are deeply engrained in who you are as a person. The very act of talking about what ails you is healing. That release, or cathartic experience, is freeing in itself. You don’t have to do everything on your own, seek out assistance if you have noticed that your self-talk and thoughts are negatively impacting your ability to carry out activities of daily living.

Tying it all together…

I have said it before, but definition is clarity. Experiencing the aha! moments about why you are thinking and acting the way that you are is beneficial to your mental health and daily living.

Thoughts only have as much power as you allow them to.

Understanding what purpose your thoughts and self-talk are serving is the beginning of understanding what must change in order for you to be the best version of yourself that you can be.

Wishing your freedom to understand and thrive today and every day,

Rachel Ann


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Monday, December 5, 2011

Meet Me on Monday - 60th Edition

1. Monday's are _always exhausting_?
2. What is your favorite kind of milkshake? Vanilla
3. What monthly bill do you most dislike paying? The cellphone bill
4. How many email addresses do you use on a regular basis? I have at least three - work, home, and personal
5. What color lights are on your Christmas Tree? multi-colored

  1. If I ever get a tree up, I will use multi-colored lights. It is so cheerful.

  2. I agree - multi colored lights just look more like Christmas!

I would love to have you leave me your thoughts. Thanks for stopping by.

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Wednesday, February 11, 2015

Chickpea Avocado Salad - Forks Over Knives

The sun was shining yesterday and I felt the hope of spring. I feel encouraged and ready to open windows, walk outside and eat lighter meals. Here's the perfect salad to wake up the spring in you. It's amazingly simple and incredibly delicious. Find the original recipe here posted at Forks Over Knives on their Super Bowl 2015 menu. (Looking back at the recipe just now, I realize I did not include the jalapeno pepper and I can't decide if this salad needs the heat or is perfect as is.)
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Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Here but not

Yesterday, Courtney and I were suppose to go to the Music School but that did not happen, for two reasons: one the school is planning something special for us, and two I do not think I could have made it. Yesterday my stomach decided to hate me. I do not know why, but it did. I spent most of the day in my room. On top of my stomach's mutiny against my body my head began to have a lovely ache to it. Thank you Jesus for allowing me to experiencing this joy. Anyways today at 8:30 my time and 10:30 Eastern time I have my Peace Corps interview. I am so ready for this thing....not really. I know if God wants me to be in the Peace Corps than he will allow my to be. And if not, I will not. We shall see. Well i am going to prepare for my interview, ie pray. And I will let you know how it goes after.

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Learn to Love Yourself

At Myoka Spas, we spared no luxuries when it comes to establishing a soothing home away from home, for your Body, Mind and Soul. Where ancient rejuvenating techniques blend seamlessly with modern amenities, we deliver a health-renewing experience with lasting effects.

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Monday, January 21, 2013

Beach House to do list

2013 Beach House to do list

  • finish the hallway and decorate
  • repaint the hallway entry dresser (need to decide on a grey color)
  • paint front door (color?)
  • Front entry overhaul (new mailbox, gardening)
  • Paint Bunk room (that is a big maybe)
  • Garden
  • Get new Lounge Chairs
  • Re-sand and oil outside table/ benches
  • get new grill

Beach House Hallway (the first)

I am sure you are interested to also see the first part of the hallway makeover. The hallway itself is very narrow and has no natural light. It also had brown panelling which was depressing and didn't say beach house at all.

 Yes lots and lots of brown paneling. I spent a good time sanding it with my electric sander (I love it), then primed the corners and little in between areas before rolling the whole thing. needless to stay it took forever but the end results are so worth it.

I painted every single surface in the hallway except the ceiling (which will get done since it is now driving me crazy). It is a slight off white color now that everything else is really white again. The last time the ceilings were painted must have been 20 years ago. You get the idea....but I am dreaming about recess lighting first and then I will paint.

Yes I sanded all the doors and trim but it was worth it in the end. I love that we invested in new door handles.

For ease of reference a before and after

Thanks for reading.

Beach House Hallway- the second

Ok, here I am journaling our home improvements for all you readers out there. There is a lot of work to be done here and I am usually better doing the work rather than writing about it but let's see how this goes. I have to apologize for the bad quality pictures but you'll get the idea.

The past 2 weekends I've been working on the second half of the Beach House Hallway. It's been bugging me for quite some time now but we are finally getting there. The whole hallway was a yellowish wallpaper. The wallpaper does not bother me but the color did. We removed wallpaper in the back bedroom once and I have no desire to do it again so we painted over it again.

First step was priming with an oil based primer to make sure that the wallpaper stays on the wall. We did this successfully in the Master Bedroom and I decided to keep going with this method. Only downside is the fumes in oil based paint/ primer and I highly recommend a mask and working with all the windows/ doors open. Yep, not so much fun for your lungs but the mask really helps me.

So first I primed (yes I am the designated painter/ decorator and dreamer upper of new projects, while Brian is the builder/ fixer/ installer/electrician and overall handy man.

So I primed first and then painted the walls BM Moonshine to match the rest of the hallway. The trim was sanded and painted with Olympic Semi- Gloss White Paint (off the shelf). Next step will be sanding, priming and painting the doors.

Next weekend we will install the new light, new light switches and outlets....

Eventually we (I) are hoping that we will install wooden floors through the hallway and living rooms (it is a beach house after all) along with recess lighting. I am a firm believer that you always need more light (and they are just so pretty).

I can't wait to start decorating and painting the entry dresser..... Oh and how I love the white trim.


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World Domination Summit 2012

World Domination Summit 2012 ended last Sunday. It was my 2nd time to attend this conference (I wrote about the first one here). This year, it was twice the size from last year, and it was amazing to see this beautiful theater filled with 1000 attendees. What’s more, apparently some 5000 more people wanted to come.

The most memorable speaker for me was Brené Brown. I wasn’t familiar with her work before I heard her speak, but I am now a fan. She talked about vulnerability.  The topic happened to coincide with an area I’ve been  working on these past few years. Most of us are so afraid of being or feeling vulnerable. She then talked about the value of keeping our heart open even when we want to shut down, withdraw or hide, because that is what keeps us connected with people, and with the world. It’s what makes us feel. She said that “the capacity to be wholehearted can’t be greater than your willingness to be heartbroken”.

After seeing her speak, and sharing the experience of singing the song “Don’t stop believing”, a popular song by Journey, with everyone in the theater full of people, I remember thinking “this alone was worth coming here”. You can read a back story of this occurring in a blog post by Brandon Sutton, who took over the microphone from Chris (in picture) after a while. Reading Brandon’s post reminded me that nothing is quite how it seems on surface, as he looked calm and confident as if he was practicing for this performance…

Then there was Cal Newport, author of “How to be a high school superstar”. He talked about how thefamiliar advice of “Follow your passion” is a bad career advice, based on his research and discovery. He said that nothing is quite as simple as the phrase suggests. He talked about the value of craftsmanship, spending 10,000 hours or more to be truly great at something, how we all should want to strive for mastery – and how the most satisfied and happy people at their jobs share common “patterns” in their career paths. When you come to this kind of conference and hear the speakers talk, you might think that the people up on the stage make everything so easy, and “anyone can do what they can do”. Or just the opposite, they might make you think that they possess something　special  that you don’t, and you can’t do what they do. The truth, of course, may lie somewhere in between. Anything worth doing, and more importantly, anything that creates a lasting impact will take time to master, and one needs to put in some serious effort. Those who are the happiest at their job have spent time doing the work and got really good at a rare and valuable skill, to the point that they can leverage those “career capital” to gain general traits(characteristics of the life you want), so their life can be filled with the value of their choice. Cal concluded his speech with this remark “Do what Steve Jobs did, NOT what he said”, meaning that when you closely look at his career, creating a computer was not his #1 passion to begin with. According to Cal, if Steve Jobs had followed his passion back then, he probably would have become Zen instructor. Overall, I enjoyed Cal’s speech a lot. It reminded me that in the world of instant gratification, sticking to one thing and pursue until it becomes your passion, has lots of value. It can also be a good relationship/marriage advice. Rather than try to find what you love, learn to love what you already have….

Then there was Chris Guillebeau. At the end of these mind-turning, heart-opening, inspiration-loaded 2 days, he managed to shock us once again. He shared that unlike last year where they lost about $30,000, this year they came out ahead and made a small profit.  Then he talked about an anonymous donation that came after the last year’s summit. He announced that he would invest that money in us, the 1000 attendees of this conference. He told us that we were all going to receive a $100 each when we walk out of the venue, so we could do something good and meaningful with it. When he said that, I felt like I could hear what people are saying in their heads while quietly gasping in shock and disbelief. The picture above was taken when he just announced. In the end, we walked away with an envelop which contained $100 bill and a small card that said “Thanks for making #WDS2012 a fantastic experience. We’d love to see how you can put these funds to good use. Start a project, surprise someone, or do something entirely different – it’s up to you”.

How will my life be different because of this experience? How can I make someone’s life different, or make a positive change in this world? These are the big questions I still need to answer. But first thing first, my birthday is coming up in exactly 3 days! Since I pledged to give up my next birthday at the end of the presentation by Scott Harrison for his charity: water,  I created this page and started a campaign to raise money so we can give more people access to clean water all over the world. Please join me to make it happen!

Thank you Chris, the action team and the ambassadors, all of the speakers, and all those who attended and became part of this experience!

*Photos by Armosa  Studios

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Saturday, September 6, 2008

Exploding Stars

I don't usually name my quilts but this one just named itself. Yes, I finished the BOM paper pieced quit top only.

I had asked for help from all of you and got many good suggestions. The shooting stars outside border fabric I found at Thousand Bolts and love it. Just the thing for all these great blocks designed by Carol Doaks for the group.

If I had thought a little ahead and used all the same fabrics in these blocks they might have gone together better but except for the blue and yellow in the corner I think I have arranged them to be pleasing to the eye.

I took this close-up to show better the fabrics in the borders. That red check with the hearts came out of my DD's stash that I have in the basement. It had a date on the border of 1986. Back about the time when she was making dolls to sell. I liked the check. Then the yellow was suggested in one comment and it was a good one so went looking for a yellow with enough length. Found this. I remember buying it but not what for. It is rain drops.

Thought I would put it on hubby's bed to see how it covered it and did good. But you really can't get the gist of all the blocks. I had thought that this would be a good one to try something like a feather pattern in those large 12 inch quarter square triangles but I don't think that type of design goes with these stars. Guess something will show itself by the time I get around to quilting it.

Now on to finish the plaid quilt top. I got two plaids for the inner and outer borders and backing. Now that the board is empty, almost, I can put those blocks up and decide how to put them together. Why is it so much fun to just make blocks and put them together but not to get around to the long job of quilting each and everyone? Didn't used to be like that. I used to completely finish a quilt before starting another one. It's just all this new fangled stuff that is in our face wanting to be started. Guess they will be finished someday. Maybe one of the granddaughters will find a box of tops and think it's just the best thing to finish up Mamaw's quilts.

On another subject, since many of you might have been watching the weather the last week or so with the hurricanes moving across the islands and into the gulf and then Hanna just moved up the East coast. Yep, we got some of that rain. Over 3 inches last night and today. I had to go to the grocery store in it this afternoon. Course it sort of disrupted the "Boonsbough Days" which was to be today and tomorrow. I'm sure it will go on tomorrow as planned. They come from near and far for a day in the park to watch the historical things that go on and look at all the vendors and buy and buy, especially food. The Fire Company always has country ham sandwiches.

The yard sales started on Thursday in town and all along the pike from Hagerstown. I was really surprised at how many of the older homes on West Main Street yesterday morning were set up on the front lawns. Guess it was a good thing they started early since no one was out today. Normally I wouldn't have tried to go down though town on Sat. That crowd is just not my thing. It's been years since I went down and then it was Sunday afternoon when things were winding down. Usually a good time is had by all.

Just another little tidbit about my little town.

Amanda said...

That is such a stunning quilt - from the picture no one block looks as if it doesn't fit. The borders are such a good match too. It'll look great once it's finished and in use. I'm a start-and-finish person too, I hate to have unfinished projects around. The hurricanes you're all having in your neck of the woods must be disrupting so many things, as well as causing dreadful destruction.

Sara said...

Those stars are great! They just jump right out at you! It looks great and I love the borders. The colors are great and I even like the blue and yellow one.
Hope the rain isn't putting to much of a damper on the festivities!

Eileen said...

This turned out really beautiful. I would never think of that one block being out of place, you've made it fit right in.
What kind of dolls did your daughter make?

Beth said...

What a beautiful quilt! Great solution for having some dark and some light backgrounds in the blocks! I will have to remember that! You did a lovely job...

matilde said...

!Es muy bonita! felicidades por tener ese umor y esas manos maravillosas un saludo desde España

Kathy Wagner said...

Great job on putting together all these blocks!


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Here’s our guide to surviving Senior Week:

1. Be smart when you’re packing – especially your food and drinks.

Be sure to pack plenty of nutritious snacks, meals and beverages in addition to your celebratory drinks and cheap breakfast pastries. Pauline Wallin, a licensed psychologist in Camp Hill, said grads should aim to eat at least one balanced meal a day.

An easy way to do this is to make your meals beforehand and freeze them when you get to the beach. Love your mom’s veggie lasagna? Ask her to donate a pan to the cause. Then all you have to do while you’re vacationing is heat it up.

If everyone brings a covered dish, then you don’t have to go out to eat so much, and you’ll save a lot of money, said Hilary Radic, 21, of Swatara Township.

And a note on nutrition: You’re inevitably going to get the late-night munchies and sprint to the nearest pizza joint. That’s OK, sometimes. But pack these healthy snacks, too, to satisfy those cravings, according to

  •  Protein or granola bars
  •  Fresh fruits
  •  A cup of yogurt
  •  Crackers and cheese
  •  A bowl of cereal with skim milk
  •  A nutritious sandwich

2. Call your parents before they call you.

Then they’ll leave you alone.

“Parents nag because they worry, but if you keep them informed of where you are, when you get back, your parents won’t worry as much, and they’ll ask fewer questions,” Wallin said.

Listen up. Your parents are going to call you. It’s just going to happen. Set aside a time once a day when you can take a few moments and call them (not text them) to reassure mom and dad that you’re OK. Send them snapshots of you and your friends having fun in a safe way, like when you’re playing mini-golf or building a fort in the sand.

3. If you’re under 21, don’t drink.

Senior Week is a time to celebrate your accomplishments over four years of high school – don’t ruin it by doing something stupid with alcohol.

“If you’re under 21, you’re not legally allowed to drink. At 18, it can go on your record and affect getting a job later,” Wallin said.

4. When you don’t listen to No. 3, just be responsible.

Police in popular beach destinations crack down during Senior Week on underage drinking, according to Chief Keith Banks of the Rehoboth Beach Police Department. Think the cops turn a blind eye to this stuff? Think again.

"We do take it very seriously and because of that, they could lose their driver's license," Banks said. "It's a criminal offense and goes on their record."

If a person is cited for underage drinking, they'll likely have to pay a fine, come back to the area for court, or worse – Banks said many students have had scholarships to college revoked because of one citation during Senior Week.

On a given night, grads can be seen falling on the ground, too intoxicated to stand. They’ll be drunk in public, vomiting on the boardwalk, the list goes on and on. Be careful when you’re drinking and be safe about it. If you’re intoxicated, stay inside. And whatever you do, don’t get behind the wheel.

"We don't want them to get behind the wheel or cause an accident," Banks said, "Or kill someone."

If you're headed to Ocean City, Md., sign up for the Play It Safe program. There's access to free concerts, laser tag and other activities. The best part? You'll get a free wristband which lets you use the bus system for a week, at no charge to you. So park your car and avoid a DUI.

And one last trick of the trade: Disorderly conduct is a real thing that police are searching for. Don't do things like standing on your porch at 3 a.m. and yelling "YOOOO WE IN OCEAN CITY" because officers are patrolling and you'll probably get a disorderly conduct citation. And maybe busted for underage drinking.

5. Don’t post anything you wouldn’t want a future employer to see on Facebook.

Think you look great in that shot of you owning your arch enemy at beer pong, or maybe that super cute photo of you and your bff winning a case race? Leave it on your iPhone.

“Don’t post pictures or let yourself get tagged in anyone else’s photo of you. Employers are looking at Facebook now,” Wallin said.

She’s not kidding. According to a 2012 study commissioned by CareerBuilder, 37 percent of employers are using Facebook to prescreen job applicants. We’re guessing they won’t love your pong pics.

6. Get enough sleep.

Whether that begins at 10 p.m. or 2 a.m., you know the drill. Shoot for eight hours of sleep a night so you can revitalize your body and recharge for the next day.

“You can’t run on no sleep. At some point, take a nap," Wallin said. "Sleep deprivation can affect your judgment and can make you prone to accidents."

7. Never go off by yourself and have a support system with you.

Christina O’Donnell, 21, of Lower Paxton Township, went to Senior Week after her graduation in 2010 and said one her biggest tips is to always stay with someone you know. Remember the buddy system from elementary school? In a town flooded with thousands of visitors – many of which may be drinking or using drugs – it’s important you have someone to be with.

According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, youth who drink are more likely to carry out or be the victim of physical or sexual assault. Drunken fights are common, and Banks said those who in engage in that type of behavior will be arrested for it.

8. Stay hydrated.

With average temperatures reaching the scorching level in June, dehydration is a force to be reckoned with. Adding alcohol – a diuretic that causes more frequent urination – to the mix can be add to the problem.

Drink plenty of water to stay healthy and happy. Take a break from beer pong and play a round of water pong. Or, have a funnel with you for, er, sand? Clean out the sand (beer) and fill the funnel with water and drink up. See? Rehydration is fun.

9. Be careful with tattoos and piercings.

Just when you start to think it’s a great idea to tat your new girl or guy’s name on your backside, take a step away from the tattoo parlor.

According to WebMD’s skin division, there’s a litter of questions you should ask before you get a tattoo or piercing to be sure the studio you’re going to is clean and safe. Are sterile needles being used? What training does the artist have? What type of sterilization processes are used in the facility? Keep these questions and more in mind before you get that jewel on your bellybutton. Or elsewhere.

10. Have fun, and don’t let your week be ruined by bad decision-making.

Senior Week can be the time of your life if you act responsibly, take care of yourself and look out for your friends. Don’t come home to central Pennsylvania with a citation – or worse.

A version of this was found on Penn Live


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Saturday, May 28, 2016

A new way to look at small project building.

When I got the 37 sensor kit a few years ago I figured out what was wrong with how normal arduinos are used to built circuits. Using these little sensors and devices mounted on tiny break out boards with connectors already in place, it was easy to connect them back to a breadboard for power and ground and wire up the data line to an Arduino data pin.

The normal pinouts on an Arduino are difficult. You can't even mount a normal Arduino board on a breadboard (and visa versa), because one set of the pins are wrong.  Every model is lacking all the 5v and ground connections a normal project needs. The normal board is too big and the small boards have strange pinouts as well.

What we need is a board that will have rows of dozens of connections that accept a clip in connector.  And then have sensors be on tiny boards that accept the other end of that connector. I can see a 5 pin connector being used. ground, +5v, +3v, digital, and analog on the first 7 connections, or however many the built in chip supports . After that just have 4 pin connectors without the analog.   If an Arduino Mega was used for this kit you could have 16 analogs inputs. A Raspberry pi with an 8 or 16 port analog to digital converter could work too.

Have various length cables with the clip in connectors on both ends for building various projects.  This is similar to the tinker kit connectors, but with every option in every connector so you literally cannot hook it up wrong.

Come with a few simple devices already wired to the boards, just like the 37 sensor kit did, but make these connectors ones that clip in and are all wired identically, ready to go.  Have extra blank protoboards in the kit to let people build their own devices and connect the same way that the standard pins connected. Release the eagle files to let people build their own protoboards and designs as well.

I would have the device and boards sit in a plastic carrier that is compatible with Lego, letting you build your projects on the Lego base plates.  As you get more advanced with your projects you could still wire up all the individual digital and analog pins up to a breadboard (also in Lego compatible bases.) Additional kits could be sold beyond the base kit to explore different technologies.  You could even have spi connectors with boards that let you daisy chain the boards together, but that used the same connectors and pins, but were wired a little differently.

As for the software, I am picturing an extra program that you just say what you have connected up, and which connector you have it attached to, and then you push a button, it creates an Arduino project with the right libraries installed and names attached to the correct pins, and everything already initialized for you, and starts Arduino software loading that package to let you go from there.

Think of this project as "Arduino For Everyone."

Planning on building a new home server.

All my computer hardware is ancient at this point.  The old server that I got second hand blew up on me, so I am looking at getting back up to the trailing edge of technology again.

Start with an 8 core AMD processor with 16GB  of RAM, an over-sized power supply, a small 128GB SSD for the OS, and a 4 or 5 TB hard drive stuck in a tower case. Over time I want to double the RAM and add 5 more hard drives of similar size. If needed I can add a PCI hard drive controller with 4 more connections. Later I could copy the OS to a bigger SSD and put the smaller drive in a laptop whose hard drive just died.

The plan right now is to install Debian Linux and use LVM to mange the drives. This way as I add more drives in the future I can add new partitions and expand/move existing ones. I plan on creating partitions to store data the same size as the external usb drives I am currently using to store my files. This way I can always easily back up the data to the external drives as needed.  I can store the back up drives at other people's houses in case my own location suffers some sort of badness.  And everything should be encrypted on disk.

Use SMB to share files on my local network. Setup a media server on the box to share media files to my portable devices. Connect the OSMC raspberry pi box to the main server to see all its files.  This gets rid of a bunch of usb hard drives that sit behind my TV right now.

Use KVM to create virtual machines so I can run a dozen other operating systems at the same time.  Setting up development environments for different versions of windows and Linux.  Things like eclipse and rails have enough dependencies that conflict with other packages that they really need to be in their own bubbles of existence. I can't tell you how often doing some upgrade or install of one thing hosed another package on my desktop machine.  Not to mention just how bloated things get after a few years of constantly adding package after package to the same desktop.

Xen might be better.

And if I run a service like file sharing, that should be in it's own virtual machine.  In fact, I am actually leaning toward doing almost nothing directly in hardware and installing just a minimal operating system at the hardware level and actually running my own desktop as a virtual machine.  Open stack might be interesting to try out for these services.

And finally I want to use thin clients to access this server and the operating systems running on it.  A raspberry pi, even the $5 one, should have more than enough power to run a desktop as an X-terminal server.  And the $30 one now has wifi built in and bluetooth for a keyboard.  I would love to have a half dozen terminals scattered around my place, able to log into my desktop and access the virtual machines. There are actually some distros that give thin client access to many different systems.

The beauty of thin clients is that you save so much time by not having to configure and manage multiple laptops and desktops. If the terminal server dies, you can just switch to another screen and keep working.   Everything is done directly from the main server, so you only have one system to manage and backup.  And if you have multiple users on that same box and each user runs similar programs, the binaries only have to be loaded once, so that once one person runs a Chromium browser, that is in memory so for the next person their browser starts almost instantly.

Saturday, May 7, 2016

Getting Pico/SVOX text to speech converter working under Debian 8

Pico TTS is in non free, and by default you do not have access to these repositories when you first install Debian.  In /etc/apt/sources.list  add
contrib nonfree
after main on all the jessie deb lines.

Now you have to install the TTS library and some audio video tools.  Run the following command:
sudo apt-get install libttspico0 libttspico-utils libttspico-data libav-tools
Now find the command line utility to allow you to create sound files from text, or just play them to the sound card. it is here:

Download these files, make them executable, and put them in a bin folder in your path.
After you do that then run the different commands and they will tell you what their options are.  You can also just read the python script to see what the scripts can do for you.

And downloaded those two files, made them executable, and then used the following script to convert text to an mp3 file.

./  --rate=80% --pitch=110%  --audible "false" --output "$1.wav" "$1"
rm -rf "$1.mp3"
avconv -i "$1.wav" -b 96k "$1.mp3"
rm -rf "$1.wav"

The Results

The output was far superior to espeak, and is very lifelike. When I was growing up I had a commodore 64 and we had an 8kb voice synthesizer called SAM.  So to see the progress in just a couple of decades is amazing to me.

Future Projects

This would be awesome if I can get it to run on Raspberry Pi computers.


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Friday, January 24, 2014

Robert's Picks

With The Lightnings by David Drake

Starship: Mutiny by Mike Resnick

Captain Vorpatril's Alliance by Lois McMaster Bujold (very good)

Tarnsman of Gor by John Norman (good)

Outlaw of Gor by John Norman (good)

Kushiel's Justice by Jaqueline Carey (excellent)

Kushiel's Mercy by Jacqueline Carey (,excellent)

Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters (good)

Oblivion (very good)

Thursday, January 23, 2014

Happy John Moses Browning Day!

The inventor of the 1911 and .45 ACP cartridge was born on this day in 1855.

Other notable Browning inventions are the BAR (Browning Automatic Rifle), the Browning Hi Power pistol, and the M2 .50 BMG which is still in use by US Armed Forces to this day.

Monday, January 20, 2014

Defensive Gun Use Survey.

I am looking to collect some data regarding Defensive Gun Use for an article I want to write.  I have a series of questions that I would like to ask as many people who have had a DGU as possible.  The focus is going to be the aftermath of the DGU and to keep things relevant I'm looking for incidents that have occurred in the last ten years.

If you would be interested in taking part in the survey please email me at and I will send the questions. I want to keep the respondents anonymous so I'm not looking for any identifying information except which state the incident took place in.

Thank you for any help.


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Saturday, March 22, 2008

History Channel Blood Diamonds

Diamonds are symbols of wealth, elegance and love around the world. But in several African nations, they have been a means to power, a reason to terrorize millions of innocent civilians, and may have even helped finance some of the world's most brutal terrorists. The human cost of the illicit global diamond trade is examined in the provocative documentary.

Because they are portable, easily concealed, and untraceable, diamonds lend themselves to smuggling and corruption. In several underdeveloped African nations, warlords have used diamonds to help finance wars, while the rest of the world has turned a blind eye. Rebel armies have forced tens of thousands of people to mine diamonds in brutal, dangerous conditions under the threat of death, their pay as paltry as a cup of rice per day. In Sierra Leone, rebels chopped off people's hands, arms, feet, lips, and ears indiscriminately for years during a civil war financed in part by the trade of illicit diamonds.

BLOOD DIAMONDS looks to some of the world's foremost experts for the facts of the history of the diamond trade, and goes to the heart of the matter, interviewing both the victims and perpetrators of diamond-fueled atrocities in countries like Sierra Leone. One such victim is Usman Conteh. Captured by rebels in Sierra Leone's Kono district, Usman was forced to mine diamonds for rebels - diamonds the rebels then sold or traded for arms. After months in captivity, Usman escaped only to find rebels had murdered his family.

The documentary explores the factors that led to the violence, tells the vivid details of the suffering, and speaks with the organizations that eventually exposed the link between diamonds and several brutal African conflicts. BLOOD DIAMONDS also looks at the steps eventually taken by advocacy organizations and the diamond industry to combat the problem.

Anonymous said...

Please, the password!

Anonymous said...

hey guys whats the password???

eXTReMe Tracker


text:
What Is Xbox's Mystery New Exclusive E3 Game?

Microsoft says they should have a new, exclusive IP at E3. Let the speculation begin.

The story is too old to be commented.
XboxDD1001d ago

Please be something good.
New Gears are a given, I wonder if MS could secure some multiplatforms.
Or better yet, return Conker.

Transistor1001d ago

I just heard that a Xbox One version of Gears is playable so expect it at E3. Don't know if it's a remaster of Gears 4 though.

XboxDD1001d ago

Maybe they'll go with both of them. I don't expect GeoW 4 to launch until winter 2016/spring 2017.

Naga1001d ago (Edited 1001d ago )

Maybe we can narrow this down through the process of elimination. Consider the game-types they already have a stake in:

FPS - Halo
3PS - Gears of War
Racing - Forza
Sandbox - Crackdown
Creative - Minecraft
RPG - ???
Stealth/Action - ???
Flying - ???
Survival/Horror - ???
Vehicular Combat - ???

Personally, I'd be down with a vehicular combat game a la Twisted Metal.

nicksetzer11001d ago

Survival/horror has state of decay.

Agree though, hoping it is either a well executed platformer or an RPG.

gamertk4211001d ago

JasonKCK1001d ago

Survival/Horror - Alan Wake

Kal0psia1001d ago

No doubt new State of Decay, they just released a remaster so it only makes sense they'll be showcasing what State of Decay is suppose to be, given the last one was a huge successful beta.

+ Show (3) more repliesLast reply 1001d ago
AngelicIceDiamond1001d ago

Well it could be anything. A new Ip from a brand new studio or from an existing studio. If its anything to go by Phil said hes not interested in another FPS or racer.

I could see a third person action games. platformer from Rare. Perhaps that spy game from Black Tusk's.

Just throwing this out there but that third person action game could be MS answer to Uncharted.

Imo if it is, please let it be its own game. Don't let it be a blatant rip off from Uncharted, don't let it be forced. If it is 3rd person let it be the Perfect Dark reboot. That game would be beautiful in 3rd person.

But sadly Phil said Perfect Dark game isn't in development.

micx1001d ago

Don't they already have Rise of the Tomb Raider as sort of a counter to Uncharted? I know it's not a true exclusive, but it's something.

What they don't have is a platformer a la Ratchet & Clank, so my bet is on Rare to pull it off.

shloobmm31001d ago

I just want lost odyssey 2

crazed_shadow271001d ago

I hope they don't secure a multiplatform. That is a cheap tactic. I don't mind if a former exclusive goes multiplatform, but not the other way around. Securing a multiplatform only limits gamers. Rather than do that, come up with an original idea on their own rather than taking what already exists.

IRetrouk1001d ago

I hate 3rd party exclusive games from series that were multi, as it limits who gets to play, exclusive new ips from 3rd party studios are ok though as although it limits who gets to play it, its not a continuation of an existing ip.

crazed_shadow271000d ago

I didn't mind what Insomniac did with Sunset Overdrive since it was a new IP, but not with something that used to be available for everyone like Tomb Raider.

I get Square Enix were scared to compete against Uncharted. I figured the PS4 version would be out within 6 months of the X1 release. But now due to the Uncharted delay, it feel like Square Enix are kicking themselves in the ass. I doubt that the Tomb Raider exclusivity will last up to a year, people will have moved on and forgotten about it by then.

Farmassy1000d ago

It is rumored that the studio behind State of Decay is making an MMO which is financed by microsoft. I personally would love to see what that company can create given the proper financial backing

Necr0philiac1000d ago

Games I would like it to be-
Turok Dinosaur Hunter
Dino Crises 4
Ninja Gaiden
Crimson Skies
This one is kind of far stretched-
I want 2k sports to make the Mutant League Sports series that EA used to make.

+ Show (3) more repliesLast reply 1000d ago
christocolus1001d ago (Edited 1001d ago )

At this point it could be anything and i doubt we will be seeing just one new ip from MS at E3. MS has so many ips laying dormant and with their new focus on 1st party ip they could decide to start up some brand new franchises with some of their new studios or even in partnership with 2nd or 3rd party devs. The options are limitless and i hope they wow us at E3.Can't wait to see what they have planned. Still hoping for a sequel to Kameo though.

hello121001d ago (Edited 1001d ago )

Its has to be Rare game or game from another studio? One game only is bad to me but Phil seemed to be hinting at that in his tweet. I think Microsoft need least another two games to get people excited because we know scalebound, crackdown and gears 4 are coming already you need to excite people.

micx1001d ago

Probably Rare, there were some teases about their project before.

christocolus1001d ago (Edited 1001d ago )

There's definitely going to be more than one new ip but they may decide to spread the announcements across E3, Gamescom andTtGS. We know many MS studios have unannounced games in development(some have multiple titles in the works i.e rare).Lift, Soho, Rare, Decisive games , Lionhead, Mohjang, Pressplay,Twisted pixel, Lxp and even 343i etc have unannounced games in development and then there's rumored parnerships with 2nd and 3rd party devs. I think MS may announce a game in partnership with either capcom, mistwalker or square at e3. They also have the rumored joe montana game with 2k studios and i wouldn't be surprised to see something from epic or insomniacs SO team and who knows what playground is working on next? It might be a brand new game or even pgr or forza rally and lastly Phil did say he would make up for the sf5 ps4 exclusive there's that too. :)

vega2751001d ago

I'm not sure be I think Phil Harrison merged lift and soho together before he left the company. But either way I'm very excited to hear what MS has up their sleeves.

Mikefizzled1000d ago

Phil Harrison is leaving Microsoft but he said working with Rare on their new game is a career highlight. Whatever they are cooking up in Twycross its going to be good.

Manic20141001d ago

Maybe Eden Falls? It was trademarked some time ago. Hopefully we'll finally know what the game is.

guyman1000d ago

o yes i forgot about that trademark. The name sounds very interesting and mysterious. I hope it is Eden Falls.

jhoward5851001d ago (Edited 1001d ago )

I think MS secret game is going to be something apocalyptic like The last of us(or maybe with aliens invading our planet instead of zombies.

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text:
GameBoyz: Skate It Review

GameBoyz writes: "Growing up I always had a secret desire to be a skater boy. Afraid that I would fall flat on my face and embarrass myself by just standing on a skateboard, I shied away from that dream and moved on to other things, one of which happened to include video games. This actually provided me an opportunity to live out my dream in a small way by playing skateboarding games. When I heard about EA's Skate It, and how it is compatible with the Wii balance board, I got excited at the prospect of attempting to skateboard on a board that probably wouldn't lead to my face being shred across some asphalt".

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Flagship co-founder establishes Gravity Bear

Flagship Studios co-founder Phil Shenk has established a new studio titled Gravity Bear, Shenk confirmed to Shacknews. The former Blizzard developer will serve as CEO of the company.

Best known to gamers as his Diablo 2 doppelganger Shenk the Overseer, Shenk held the position of art director on Hellgate London, and worked as a lead artist on Diablo 2 and its expansion Lord of Destruction.

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text:
7 Achievement Rules That All Games Should Follow

Go Gaming Giant looks at achievements in video games and tells you 7 things that need to be included in all games to ensure the achievements are fun and well balanced.

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astrobrights3047d ago

They certainly aren't very balanced the way things are now :)

RaymondM3047d ago

Yeah man, achievements should be less ridiculous. I get so mad to see 5 points for an achievement. Although I shouldn't be too mad, they are just fake achievements. Good article btw, had some good points.

Go Gaming Giant3047d ago

I used to be heavily into achievements but I realized it's just not worth it anymore. There just points

astrobrights3047d ago

I agree. Achievements and trophies are easy to get hooked into, but they are just points.

nomoregameblogs3046d ago

i used to be a trophy whore. then i found a 12 step program! :)

Ziriux3047d ago

Those are decent rules.

A lot of developers three years ago took easy routes when it came to achievements, especially sports games, with their get five blocks, 10 assists, 5 steels and so on. Than you had some games that gave you 100 points for beating each level. I found it not so much of a challenge and felt like the dev. did it just to get a sale on the game. I'm glad to see some harder achievements these days to give the gamer a true challenge.

Go Gaming Giant3047d ago

ye but some games take it to far, although some of those sports games were a joke, especially the 06 class

gooneygugu3047d ago

One of my favorite achievements was not really an achievement at all. After finishing the first mission in inFamous for PS3, by way of an on screen prompt the game explained that due to my skill level the difficulty would be switched to hard.

While there were no points awarded and no audible chime, this virtual pat on the back was a boost to my ego and incredibly rewarding. If more games were able to integrate awards in similar ways, perhaps Achievements would become less important.

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10 Sega classics that should be reborn on iPhone

With rumours circulating that Sonic 4 is iPhone-bound, our eager, vigorous minds are working overtime as we recall countless hours wasted in front of our beloved Sega consoles back in the mists of time.

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text:
Natal Experience - Things We’re Hearing ’Round the Net (Live Blog)

The Natal Event is about to kick off in LA, and since no recording devices and the like are allowed, VG24/7 is going to describe the goings on that they’re hearing around the net best they can. So, keep checking this for constant updates.

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zetsuei12777d ago

read n4g to know that if Natal is indeed priced at any higher than 100 dollars, its going to be a huge fail.

BRG90002777d ago

Right, because N4G represents a perfect slice of the target demographic of Natal.

ShepardVasNormandy2777d ago

I think you mean XBOX KINECT.

pain777pas2777d ago

I don't want to say it but this smells of fail. I want Kameo though one of the most underated games on the 360 and nothing else really like it on the system so lets try and hope that this thing works cause I'm a gamer and want to give everything a try and a fair shot at peaking my interest.

deadreckoning6662777d ago

Raven-Symone, Michael Cera..WTF??

absolutecarnage2777d ago

wow no offense dude but i think that n4g doesn't even come close to 1% of gamers in the world, I so sure that there like oh sh1t we never read n4g we are dooomed

SOAD2777d ago

It doesn't even come close to 0.0001 percent.

PRHB HYBRiiD2777d ago

n4g is my new facebook lol

Rainstorm812777d ago

i agree, i use facebook as well and i rather the trolls, the gamers, and the fanboys compared to status updates about someone hating work or stuck in traffic.

BTW heres the N4G Fb page everyone

Inside_out2777d ago

I hope somebody cams this thing...I don't want to wait till Tuesday to watch should start streaming in soon....More pS3 kids than 360 kids on the Kinect want to know too....good for them...the more the merrier...

NoFanboyZone2777d ago

The amount of fanboys on this site is quite pathetic. The only reason people bash MS & Sony is because they are jealous about something, and if you think I am wrong it only means you are one of them.

Rainstorm812777d ago

i dont even thik it comes down to jealousy, I think its that some people feel the need to back what they purchase, and bash anything other wise.

It cant be as simple as being jealous because just as easy as you can buy a 360 you can buy a PS3, it all comes down to preference. Some people show thier preference different ways than others

SnuggleBandit2777d ago

"interactive poncho"

looks like natal might have trouble detecting you if you aren't wearing this interactive casuals are gonna look even more ridiculous playing with this crap

BRG90002777d ago (Edited 2777d ago )

That's related to the Cirque du Soleil show. The press isn't actually PLAYING Natal/Kinect tonight if I understand correctly.

@below: Tweets say all their ponchos are now green. They change colors as part of the show.

Moonboots2777d ago (Edited 2777d ago )

I'm wondering about that as well.. Why are suddenly everyone having to dress in monocolors? You can call it an interactive poncho but I am kinda suspicious here. And all the Cirque people are Blue? Hrmm.

EDIT: Nice.. I'd rather be wrong about that. We can put that one to rest.

NoFanboyZone2777d ago

Wow, I could have never seen an unthoughtout comment from a fanboy coming.

BRG90002777d ago

He clearly hasn't left as he's still tweeting about it. Thanks for linking him however, as I'm now following him as he tweets about the show every couple minutes. I don't think they're supposed to do this, so I hope he can keep it up.

Parapraxis2777d ago

..I didn't say he did LOL.

The GiantBomb guys did though.

Sounds like it's getting pretty crazy now, so they may have left prematurely

NoFanboyZone2777d ago

Lol, you should have kept reading his tweets, now he thinks it's awesome.

logikil2777d ago

If you didn't say he did, why did you link to his tweets?

They got me at Kameo 2. I thought the first game was way underrated. Have no idea how you would play Kameo 2 using something like Natal aside from making gestures to change her form.

+ Show (2) more repliesLast reply 2777d ago
SIX2777d ago

Gives new meaning to pulling the wool over your eyes. It's obvious that this E3 is about the casual market for MS. As a 360 gamer I would be embarrased and offended. I hope I'm wrong and MS does show some games to get excited for.

HolyOrangeCows2777d ago

That's it, eh? I stayed up just to relearn about the games that USA Today outlined hours ago?

Ehh.....I gotta hit the hay. Same time tomorrow afternoon, gents?

+ Show (5) more repliesLast reply 2777d ago
HolyOrangeCows2777d ago (Edited 2777d ago )

They have to wear ponchos?

fantasygamer2777d ago (Edited 2777d ago )

wow im wondering if you have to wear em to play o.o..

Blaze9292777d ago

looks like a damn religious cult.

SnuggleBandit2777d ago

dont drink the M$ kool-aid!!!

Christopher2777d ago (Edited 2777d ago )

I'm thinking they might be doing live capture of the Cirque persons with Kinect-like cameras when they move and the ponchos will help create a back-drop that will help to distinguish Cirque performer from audience member.

Otherwise... I prefer cherry Kool-Aid...

BRG90002777d ago

Interesting, I'd say that's a pretty good guess. So it might be more accurate to call them NON-interactive ponchos.

Christopher2777d ago

Unfortunately I was completely wrong. It was so they could change the colors of the audience so when they tape it and re-air it the audience becomes part of the acts being performed.

mookins2777d ago (Edited 2777d ago )

Looks like some KKK rally if you ask me. Hilarious.

+ Show (2) more repliesLast reply 2777d ago
KionicWarlord2222777d ago

Hmm...looks like the kkk arrived .

Obama2777d ago

That's also the first thing that came to my mind haha.

NewYork2142777d ago

better watch out then obama. this comment feels wrong to post

niceguywii602777d ago

Arrived? N4G is a Ku Klux Klan compound with a Tea Party event forming as we speak.

crapgamer2777d ago (Edited 2777d ago )

If It's $149 it will still do well, since one is all you need. Unlike Move or the Wii, you need to purchase extra controllers to have more then one person play at a time.
I think it look's like one heck of a show honestly. Well done and interactive, thus proving that EVERYONE can play it. Nice mixture of people as well. I have a feeling Kojima has a game to announce for it tomorrow. Exclusive game at that. I cant wait, as if the excitement wasn't already through the roof!!!

*Edit* So you think Move will work at $99 and an additional $99 or $69 per controller? Get real. If one fails they both will, though with the install base so much greater in the USA for Xbox 360 I suspect we'll see Natal or Kinect do just fine.
I should expect such noob logic from POS3 GG. Wont catch MS now kiddos. Last place looks good on Sony though. :)

Britney Spears2777d ago

at 150 it wont do well,this gimmick is being hidden by wearing those suits.M$ should focus on making a working console.

Unicron2777d ago

I dont think either will work well at these price points actually. You don't attract the casuals with such pricing.

Personally, I care not for motion controls, so I wouldn't care if both tank.

Though Natal's functionality in other aspects besides gaming intrigues me.

Adva2777d ago

All you do is troll on N4G 24/7.

PS360PCROCKS2777d ago

"So you think Move will work at $99 and an additional $99 or $69 per controller?"

As the xbox 360 posterboy on this site you would think that you would know that YOU ARE THE CONTROLLER! Did you really just say that?

fear882777d ago

Might be as dumb and obnoxious as 360 fanboys... oh wait.

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 2777d ago
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text:
Naughty Bear Review ( "Although nowhere near enough people ever played it, Artificial Mind And Movement’s previous game – the Grindhouse-themed PS3 and Xbox 360 shooter Wet – is more fully deserving of a critical reappraisal than any videogame since Free Radical’s ignored (and influential) Second Sight from back in 2004. It could be argued that..."

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Destructoid - Escape Plan Preview

Destructoid - The first time I saw a video for Escape Plan, I was sold. I knew it was something I had to have because of the arresting art direction that utilized gorgeous saturation and stark, black and white contrast. Of course, all style and no substance would’ve proven a huge disappointment, so I was excited to hear that the development team is comprised of people that worked on the well-received Fat Princess.

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PSX Extreme: Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception Review

"When I created PSX Extreme alongside my brother 12 years ago, the last thing I imagined was that I'd have something called a Blu-ray disc spinning inside a PlayStation 3, displaying an image that would absolutely surpass the CG sequences I was used to from the likes of Final Fantasy VIII, Final Fantasy IX, Chrono Cross, Legend of Dragoon, and so forth. What action-adventure shooters like Uncharted and Gears of War are for the industry today, is what the above RPGs were for a generation of gamers yesterday. And while many of us have vilified this genre for dumbing gaming down, and with good reason, games like Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception is a core example of what being the very finest exception to a rule is all about."

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stonecold32279d ago

great score got my copy paid off the other day goty 2011 ? thanks naughty dog and sony

Dante1122279d ago

Sweet score. I'm gonna to buy my UC3 copy day 1.

dark-hollow2279d ago (Edited 2279d ago )

I was hping it will be as great as uncharted 2 (which is by itself a big achievement) but it looks like it have surpassed uncharted 2!!!
Good job naughty dog.

zu4G2279d ago

another 10!!
#1 Game of the CURRENT Generation

josephps32279d ago

You know a game is good when just reading the reviews of a great game is entertaining on its own. Plus its well written so some credit should go to the reviewer lol

Relientk772279d ago

Ok I lost count of all the perfect scores Uncharted 3 has gotten

ASTAROTH2279d ago

A lot of perfect 10 but strangely only a few are reflected in the Metacritic 93% score... very strange

gaden_malak2279d ago

Probably needs time to update.

Boody-Bandit2279d ago (Edited 2279d ago )

Last I checked 22 reviews were posted on N4G with a 10 rating for UC3 and only 12 are posted on Metacritic. All the more reason to ignore them as a source for information. They hand pick which sites to allow and they are inconsistant when doing so.

I felt UC2 was a masterpiece an it appears that UC3 is equally as good, if not better. You can't ask for more than that.

Laxman2279d ago

Metacritic isnt an average of review scores. More credible websites and publications scores get more leverage to the overall metascore of the game, and the less credible and popular ones dont get counted as much towards the meta verdict.

RufustheKing2279d ago

don't bother mate. i never trust game scores. I play the game and i get my opinion from that. still think that UC:DF was better than UC2:AT. The story for UC1 was great, UC2 has lots of set pieces and action tho so not far behide. :)

don't know if this or Skyrim will be GOTY but UC will give me 15 hours at least of brillance while skyrim will give me a whole new life.

ASTAROTH2279d ago

Me neither... I play the games thats why I have the amazing Folklore... If it was for the reviews I would never have played it..

As for GOTY I dont forget to mention Zelda... I think that will be GOTY..

RufustheKing2279d ago

i hope to get it on the 1st nov. com'on gamestop delieve one day early for me. :)

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text:
rawDLC: Renegade Ops video review

The two stick shooter has had a massive resurgence lately. Such titles seem to shine ever so brightly when you team up with a buddy or two to bring the pain. Leaving their secret underground base at Studio 33 by land, sea and air, the three rambunctious rapscallions Nathan, Josh and Dave look to decimate a diabolical madman and thwart his evil plans.

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C.A.R.S. - New Screenshots From Slightly Mad Studios' racing sim

DSOGaming writes: "Slightly Mad Studios released a new build for their racing sim, C.A.R.S, and here are some brand new screenshots from that build. As always, the detail on the cars is simply amazing. C.A.R.S looks great and could be a great rival to SimBin’s racing games. C.A.R.S is based on a new development model, so it will be interesting to see whether or not this ‘community-based’ development is worth the effort."

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killerhog2253d ago

I wish this and canyon came to the ps3. I would like another sim other then GT, and another create, play, share, with cars instead of modnation. I like real cars, modnation was fun but I'm old enough to prefer real cars.


text:
Over 50 Reasons to buy a Playstation Vita! run through over 50 'reasons' to purchase a Playstation Vita!

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moparful992193d ago

Every passing day my excitement ratchets up more and more... CANNOT WAIT!!

NovusTerminus2193d ago

Shinobido 2 + Gravity Rush + Dynasty Warriors NEXT = Purchase

Play2Win2193d ago

Im Pc Gamer but I will buy Vita this or next year to play Uncharted. Gaming device = only Sony

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text:
Miyamoto: We are trying our best to make the Zelda timeline consistent

Shigeru Miyamoto has said that Nintendo are trying their best to ensure that the Zelda stories are consistent throughout the timeline.

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Titanz2168d ago

No matter what, the timeline won't make sense!

Though I don't really care, cause the LOZ franchise is still top notch to me.

Instigator2165d ago

I'd like to see them tie together the three timelines at some point.


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Elite Tan 10%

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Failure investigation of multiplicator of an aeroengine

Sujata, M and Madan, M and Bhaumik, SK (2008) Failure investigation of multiplicator of an aeroengine. Project Report. National Aerospace Laboratories, Bangalore, India.

Full text not available from this repository. (Request a copy)

Fractographic study confirmed that the driving gear of the multiplicator had failed by fatigue. There was multiple fatigue crack initiation and in all the cases, the fatigue crack had initiated at the tooth root. In two cases, the teeth got fractured and lost by tooth bending fatigue. In another case, after initiation, the fatigue crack had propagated into the hub of the gear and continued propagation further along the hub fillet. After propagation to a critical length, this fatigue crack had resulted in fracturing of a segment of the gear. Following this fracture, the impact with the input gear of the gear cluster had resulted in second fracture and chewing off of remaining teeth in the driving gear. Subsequently, the gear assembly had seized leading to torsional overload failure of the quill shaft transmitting power from the AGB to the multiplicator. The fatigue failure in the driving gear appears to be stress related. Evidences suggest that probably, the load on the gear assembly was more than the usual. The power transmission system down the multiplicator needs to be examined as a whole for establishing the cause(s) for excessive load on the gear assembly.

Item Type: Monograph (Project Report)
Uncontrolled Keywords: Aeroengine;Multiplicator;Gear;Quill shaft;Fatigue failure; Torsional failure
Subjects: AERONAUTICS > Aeronautics (General)
CHEMISTRY AND MATERIALS > Chemistry and Materials (General)
Depositing User: Users 11 not found.
Date Deposited: 20 Jul 2011 04:29
Last Modified: 20 Jul 2011 04:29

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Will China reveal its secret about the gold reserve?

Will China reveal its secret about the gold reserve?

Chinese gold does not let gold market participants sleep soundly and sparks rumours here and there. Some analysts believe Chinese gold reserves may exceed 3500 tons turning the Asian Giant into a more powerful country than already was.

Latest official data were published far back in 2009, and now one can only make guesses about the Chinese impact on the world gold market. At that moment Chinese gold reserves were 1050 tons. Is it possible for this number to have tripled during the last 6 years?

On the basis of gold production data and information provided by gold associations, the Bloomberg agency has estimated the approximate amount of gold reserves in 3510 tons. That would situate China in the 2nd place in the world top gold reserves rank after U.S. One of the theories why the Asian nation is concealing this information is precisely to become a competitor of USA in the market.

The reason why China could soon update this information comes from the expansion of the yuan worldwide. The country aims to introduce its currency in the International Monetary Fund basket to boost its presence in the general market.

The willingness of China to open its market has put it between a rock and a hard place and it could mean the revelation of the data thanks to which every country could play a fair game in the gold market.

Gold is gaining ground in the market and wakening the interest of more and more investors. The clients of the Emgoldex online store know the value of this precious metal as they earn with gold buying it under the most profitable conditions.

To learn how the role of gold is gaining importance in the world economy as well as in every individual’s financial situation, follow the news and changes in gold prices published daily on the official Emgoldex website.

Share the gold news in your social networks and you will be sharing the best opportunity to buy gold!

Category: Gold news      Publication date: 2015-05-05 08:43

Gold Fixing  |  Price History


text:
torsdag 18. september 2014

My second GDT card for Copic Markers Norway:O)

This is the second card I made as GDT over at Copic Marker Norway.
(Link to the post)
It is a Christmas card, folded inspired of a card Wenche made.

To make this card:
Blue and white bazzill
DP from Vibeke Spigseth and Melissa Frances
Digital image from Karen's Doodles
Stamps from Sugar Shoppe and Stamin' Up
Buttons from Kort og Godt
Distress Ink "Broken China", "Spun Sugar" and "Walnut Stain"
Ribbons from my scrap
MS Punch "Embossed Zigzag" and "2008 collection snowflake"
Tag punch from Ushida

Copics used:
The girl snowman: C0, C1, C3
Scarf: E31, E33, E55, E57
Clouths: V91, V93, V95, E30, E31, E33
Carrot: YR01, YR02, YR04
Arms: E42, E55, E57
Snowman with top-hat: C0, C1, C3
Hat: W5, W7, W10
Vest and bow: BV20, BV23, BV25, BV29
Carrot: YR01, YR02, YR04
Arms: E42, E55, E57

Snowman with scarf: C0, C1, C3
Vest: B91, B93, B95
Scarf and hat: B91, B93, B95, BV20, BV23, BV25
Carrot: YR01, YR02, YR04
Arms: E42, E55, E57

"Buttons": W5, W7, W10
Song sheets: E30
Sky: BG0000, BG000

The back of my card.

Hope you liked this card, it was fun making it.

Don't forget our Autumn challenge and blog hop that is going on over at Copic Marker Norge. Nice prizes to win;O)

Have a great day.

Hugs and smiles from

I have entered this card here:
Kort o Mania #115: Anything goes
The Paper Shelter #174: Ribbon, twine and/or floss
Papertake Weekly: Punch it Out
Incy Winky Designs: Shaped Cards
C.R.A.F.T. Challenge #277: Colour Combo (Brown, Aqua and Pink)
The ABC Challenge: T is for TIC TAC TOE (Ribbon, Sentiment, Pearls/Gem)

11 kommentarer:

Kari sa...

For et herlig julekort!Stilig brett,denne må jeg nok prøve en gang!
Lekkert farget som alltid og virkelig julete dette!
Ha en flott helg!
Klemmer :)

Gail sa...

Ooooh, I love this card. Snowmen are my favorite image and this one is fabulous! love the colors and papers you used on this, too! Thanks for joining us at The Paper Shelter this week! Hugs, Gail

Colette sa...

Hi Nancy,

Adorable card. The snowmen are sooo cute! Thanks for playing along with the Incy Wincy Designs Challenge this week ;o)

☥ Kaia sa...

Fantastisk flott julekort.
Herlig motiv, og hele kortet var så "lekent" og flott. Flotte detaljer, og blå julekort er bare sååååå fine..
Ha ei super helg

Klem fra Kaia

Jenny sa...

Vilket härligt detaljrikt kort!

Gail sa...

Oh how wonderful! This is just gorgeous. Your art work is all so fantastic. I love this card. This is awesome! Thanks for joining us at The Paper Shelter this week and hope to see you at our next challenge on Wednesday! Hugs, Gail

Marie sa...

Super sweet!Thanks for playing with us over at The Paper Shelter this week.
Love n hugs

carol sa...

ooh fab use of our colour combo, super cute image too, thanks for playing along with us at CRAFT x carol

Nikki sa...

Love the ribbon you used..... fits right along with our challenge... thanks for joining us at The Paper Shelter... xo Nikki

Helen sa...

Great card - lovely to see a Christmas card in such different colours.

Thanks for joining us at the CRAFT Challenge.

Helen x

Anita-Lise sa...

Søtt julekort du har laget. Morsomt og humørfyllt! :) Takk for at du deltar på utfordringen Lag På Lag hos NSHK!
DT Anita


text:
Tuesday, September 6, 2016

County seeks more staff to address growing social service caseloads

Washington County officials are requesting more staff next year to address increased caseloads for social service programs.

The Washington County Board of Commissioners conducted their second 2017 budget workshop after their Aug. 23 meeting. The board heard budget requests from Community Services, Public Health and Environment, and the Library System.

Dan Papin, community services director, submitted a budget request of $43,890,700. His department’s workload is growing, he said, and state dollars are not keeping pace.

“The feds continue to hold up their end of the bargain but it's frustrating since the vast majority of the mandates that we provide — and they’re not all all bad mandates, don’t get me wrong — but they are imposed by the state. Everything we do as a department is to comply with those mandates.”

Papin cited two main areas of concern:

-- an increase in applications to MnSure, the state run health care exchange for which the county pays 50 percent of the cost to administer;

-- a jump in assessments for MnCHOICES, an independent living support program for the elderly and disabled.

While the MnCHOICES program is paid for by state and federal tax dollars, Papin said they need to hire an administrative worker to deal with a bigger caseload.

“We don’t mind paying our share,” he said. “They continually have reduced the state share, added more county share, yet the mandates haven’t changed. So it falls on the backs of the county commissioners to balance the budget.”

The property tax increase requested is 1.9 percent in Community Services.

“We do shift dollars where we can to minimize the impact on taxpayers,” Papin said. “Not everything translates to a levy increase.”

The youngest and oldest citizens in the county continue to be exploited, Papin said. He is asking the Washington County Board to hire a full-time adult protection social worker to help respond to a 54 percent increase in adult elderly exploitation reports over a two-year period.

He also cited increased caseloads in child protection investigations and family assessments, which are on pace to exceed last year’s.

Full Article & Source:
County seeks more staff to address growing social service caseloads

1 comment:

Betty said...

This is a problem in every state.


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