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Nintendo Sells 3 Million Wii Us, Lowers Sales Forecasts Again

by Ron Duwell | January 30, 2013

The Wii U continues to take a pounding on sales following Nintendo’s Q3 report which puts the numbers way lower than what Nintendo had predicted. To date, Nintendo has sold three million Wii U consoles worldwide and 11.69 pieces of software for the fledgling system.

With the latest figures, Nintendo has once again been forced to lower its sales forecast of the system, much like they did before, and they are expecting to bring in a drop of 17 percent in revenue.

As bad as these launch figures might seem, don’t count Nintendo down and out just yet. The first wave of software might have failed to deliver a knock-out marquis title, but 2013 is already looking to be a much brighter year with more fun Nintendo games for long time fans to choose from. Nintendo recently took time during a Nintendo Direct presentation to announce a new 3D Mario, a new Mario Kart, a new Yoshi title, progress on Smash Bros. and two separate Zelda games.

I know I’m personally waiting for adjustments, a start-up patch and a few more solid games before I jump aboard, so count me as a second generation Nintendo Wii U owner once I finally come around.

In other news, the Wii is nearing 100 million units sold worldwide, making it the second home console to ever reach that mark, the other being the PlayStation 2. The Nintendo 3DS is also performing admirably with 30 million sales in sight.

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Ron Duwell

Ron has been living it up in Japan for the last decade, and he has no intention of leaving this technical wonderland any time soon. When he's not...


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Rewriting Life

Device Finds Stray Cancer Cells in Patients’ Blood

A microfluidic device that captures circulating tumor cells could give doctors a noninvasive way to diagnose and track cancers.

Cancers are now often diagnosed with invasive biopsies. A blood test would be quicker and cheaper.

Doctors typically diagnose cancer via a biopsy, which can be invasive and expensive. A better way would be to detect telltale tumor cells floating in the bloodstream, but such a test has proved difficult to develop because stray cancer cells are rare, and it’s difficult to separate them from the mélange of cells in circulation.

a microfluidic chip
Good catch: This microfluidic chip captures circulating tumor cells.

Now researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School say they’ve built a microfluidic device that can quickly grab nearly any type of tumor cell, an advance that may one day lead to simple blood tests for detecting or tracking cancer.

Similar, existing devices—including earlier versions developed by the authors of the current study, which appears in Wednesday’s online issue of Science Translational Medicine—depend on tumor-specific biomarkers on the surface of the cells to pull them out of a blood sample, meaning that a given device won’t work for all cancer types. What’s more, the process of separating the tumor cells  from other cell types is generally inefficient and time-consuming. In a given blood sample, circulating tumor cells are rare—there may be only one tumor cell for every billion cells.

The new device is a “substantial step forward from previous microfluidic devices,” says Peter Kuhn, who studies circulating tumor cells at the Scripps Research Institute but was not involved in the study. The device combines existing microfluidic techniques of cell sorting into a single device, he says. The result is that the tumor cells can be pulled out of a blood sample quicker, and without prior knowledge of their molecular characteristics.

Mehmet Toner, director of the BioMicroElectroMechanical Systems Resource Center at MGH, and colleagues report that their latest chip can isolate circulating tumor cells in the blood and that it could help detect all types of cancer. “For our earlier chip, you needed to know something on the surface of the tumor cells,” says Toner. In those devices, a small sample of blood would flow through microfluidic chambers, some of which contained an antibody that grabbed tumor cells. That system also took four to five hours to process a single blood sample. “But for early detection and to make this useful for virtually all cancers, we needed to increase the throughput and to make it [tumor-type] independent,” he says.

Identifying these wandering tumor cells could also help researchers study a cancer’s progression and help doctors track treatments or screen for new cases. By studying the surface proteins or genetic profiles of the cancer cells, doctors and researchers could learn which mutations are present in the cancer and perhaps tailor molecularly targeted treatments accordingly. The authors show that 15 tumor cells were recovered from a blood sample from a prostate cancer patient. The gene expression levels of each cell were studied individually and a mix of mutations was found.

The device developed by Toner’s group combines magnetic labeling of cells and microfluidic sorting to process a sample of blood in about an hour or two. To capture tumor cells regardless of their cancer type, the system first tags white blood cells with magnetic beads that are covered with antibodies that recognize proteins on the surface of the immune cells. The sample is then passed into microfluidic chambers that clear out red blood cells, plasma, and unused free magnetic beads based on their size. Then the device discards the tagged white blood cells using a magnetic field. “In the past, we were focused on tumor cells that we know very little about,” says Toner. “Here, we throw away the cells we know everything about, the blood cells,” he says.

The advantage of the new cell-sorting device over previous attempts is that it successfully brings together multiple technologies already used in the field, such as size separation and magnetic-tag separation, says Gajus Worthington, president and CEO of Fluidigm, a California company that produces microfluidic devices for biomedical research. “The key thing here is the integration, which is crucial to anything related to single-cell work,” he says. All the steps in Toner’s device take place in similar volumes. “If you have to go from one microstep back to macrostep back to microstep, there are losses and complexity, which leads to noise,” says Worthington.

Toner notes that the ultimate goal of identifying circulating tumor cells would be to diagnose patients early. “About 10 percent of cancer patients survive if they are diagnosed late, but almost 90 percent survive if they are diagnosed early,” he says. But whether or not these circulating tumor cells can be found in early-stage patients is not yet clear, says Luis Diaz, an oncologist at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, who was not involved in the study. “Early-stage cancers might release very few cells into circulation,” he says. “That’s historically the problem with circulating tumor cells; you can only find them in advanced cancers.”

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Home Blogging 10 Free & Best Blog Sites to Create a Blog In 2016

10 Free & Best Blog Sites to Create a Blog In 2016

There are tons of free and best blog sites / blogging platforms available in the market to create a blogs., but not at all are good to choose. In this article, I share a top 10 free and best blog sites to create a free blogs and starting your blogging career today. Blogging is a technique in which you can create , make, design posts or articles on any topics according to your own interest and passion, and publish it on the world wide web for your presence all around the world.

You can tell the world what is in your minds on your own personal blog. You can create and articles or posts on any topics, and just hit publish .

At in 2016, blogging is also makes a very powerful profession. Because many pro-bloggers can make living with only blogging.

Many pro-bloggers earn online money through her blogs. Even they earn thousands of dollars monthly with a single blog. Here are a list of some best blogs/blogging sites where you can make your own blogs.

image: 10 Free & Best Blog Sites to Create a Blog
Best Blog Sites to start a Blog

Blogging is a world top class and best ways to inspire others, deliver your knowledge to others, motivate yourself as well as others, and also main thing is that express yourself.

You don’t have any professional experience of starting a blog or any professional writing skills for writing, because you just write about yourself or success stories or related topics in your own words.

Basically, blog is type of website, where you can make posts or articles and publish it on daily basis. But in the websites, you don’t update regularly, you just make a website and then user can maintain its traffic and contents.

You can create blogs on any topics , but according to your own passion. If you have passionate about any things, you can create a blog and start writing. We have point out some main topics which are very famous today to start a blog and make huge income from it.

  • Technology Niche
  • Health Tips
  • Online Income
  • Health and Fitness
  • Sports ( Cricket, football, Tennis etc)
  • Blogging Tutorials
  • Android Phones
  • Programming

This list not completed because there are dozens of other topics also available. There are a huge knowledge in it, because with blogging you can get a large amount of knowledge. When you write a new post on daily basis, you can search, and that’s why due to more search more knowledge you can get.

So here we are tell you about the some famous platforms and some best blog sites where you can create your free blogs and start blogging. But before starting blogging, first of all you must know about “What is a Blog or Weblog?

#1 – Blogger
#2 – WordPress
#3 – Tumblr
#4 – TypePad
#5 – Weebly
#6 – Webs
#7 – Contentful
#8 – Penzu
#9 – Live Journal
#10 – Blog.Com

These all are very famous and powerful CMS ( Content Management System ) platforms where you can simply start a blog and write a posts and publish it. List given below as follow:

1 – Blogger

Image: 10 Free & Best Blog Sites to Create a Blog

Blogger is a CMS based blogging platform, developed by the Google. This is the word famous and best CMS blogging platform where you can create your free blog according to your own interest. You can get free sub-domain which is like that ( yourname.blogspot.com ).

There are millions to billions blogs are already created through blogger platform and everyday a huge number of blogs created. I personally recommend you, if you want to start blogging for learning and sharing your thoughts with the world then choose Blogger platform.

2 – WordPress

wordpress best blog site To Create Free Blogs

WordPress is a world largest CMS ( Content Management System ) blogging platform. It is like blogger, but the main difference is that WordPress has many professional themes and plugins as compared to blogger, and you can use it easily.

You can create two types of blogs on WordPress. Free or paid. But for start up you can create free blogs with free sub-domain. The world most famous and almost all professional blogs are created with this platform.

3 – Tumblr

Image: Tumblr best Blogging Platforms To Create Free Blogs

Tumblr is a world third largest blogging platforms for make a free blogs. Also you can here create your free blogs and write posts and publish it on a single click. It is the best alternative of blogger and WordPress as well.

Tumblr is most powerful than any other platform, so if you don’t like blogger or WordPress, you choice is only Tumblr.

4 – TypePad

image: typepad best blog site to create a free blog

Typepad is also much like same as blogger and tumblr, and here you can also start your blogging career with free subdomain which is likely is that ( youname.typepad.com). It is a very popular blog site to create a blog. People frequently used TypePad for starting blogging.

5 – Weebly

Image: Weebly best blog site to create a free blog

Weebly is also a very famous blogging platform. Weebly basically used for websites development in CMS system, but it introduces the blogging platform as well. So if you like you can start your blogging career on weebly.com as well.

6 – Webs

image: Webs best blog site to create free blog or website

Webs is most like that of weebly.com. Like weebly webs also a websites building platforms but they allow users to create a free blogs with her free domain name, which are totally free of cost. It is also very known blogging platform.

7 – Contentful

image : Contentful best blog site to create a free blog

No one knows about how to published their articles just a few years back, but now there are dozens of free CMS (Content Management System) are available that provide you facility to published your articles within clicks, “Contentful” is one of them. Contentful provides a way create your optimized contents and share with the world.

8 – Penzu.Com

image: Penzu best blog site to create a free blogs
Penzu is a very awesome platform for creating free diaries and journals. It loved by everyone in the world due to it’s verstility. Easily create your first free online journal within minutes. Penzu provides you three types of journals. 1) Daily Diary 2) Expressive Journal 3) Travel Journal. So start today which you loves according to your interest.

9 – Live Journal

image: LiveJournal best blog site to create a free blogs
LiveJournel generally combines two types blogging and social networking. Generally it started like a CMS system (Like Blogger) in 1999, but with the passage of time there are different changes takes place and it converts into combinations of blogging and social networking. You can create your free blog here and also starting discussion with others.

10 – Blog.Com

Image: Blog.com best blog site to create a free blogs

Like Blogger and WordPress, Blog.com also provides the facility to make a free blog where you can write anything related to your interest and passion. Write unique contents can get high ranking in search engine as well .

So these are all the best and very powerful & very famous blog sites where you can start your free blogs with free sub-domains. I hope you may like this list.  These are all totally free of cost , so hopefully you like that all blogging platforms. Simply share this post with others just for love. If you know about any other best blog sites then share in the comments section below. If you’ve any question in your mind then also use below comment section.


text:
Kim Gorgens:
Protecting the brain against concussion

TEDxDU 2010 · 9:21 · Filmed May 2010
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Neuropsychologist Kim Gorgens makes the case for better protecting our brains against the risk of concussion — with a compelling pitch for putting helmets on kids.

Kim Gorgens studies the brain's response to injury — and advocates that we mind our (gray) matter. Full bio
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Achieve New Levels of Automation with Cisco UCS & Tegile

Manually performing actions like creating VMs, provisioning, cloning is time-consuming—especially when you’re operating at “Cloud” scale. So data center automation is a vital step to maximize operational efficiency.

To that end, we’ve worked closely with Cisco to integrate Tegile flash storage arrays with UCS Director 6.0, so you can consolidate management and provisioning. This adds on to our existing IntelliStack converged-infrastructure solution.

Building a Better Stack

IntelliStack combines Cisco UCS servers, Cisco Nexus switches, and Tegile flash storage into a single architecture. All of the components are pre-validated and optimized to work together seamlessly, creating a complete solution stack that includes everything you need to quickly, easily and affordably deploy a flash-based IT infrastructure.

Organizations like the Minnesota Wild NHL team and MiraCosta College have deployed the Cisco/Tegile reference architecture. It’s helped end users simplify deployment and streamline operations. They can also scale their storage independently from computing, requiring storage to support mission critical dedicated database backends.

Integration with Cisco UCS Director 6.0

Tegile integration with UCS Director 6.0 now lets administrators manage storage, network, and compute via a single pane of glass. Orchestration, monitoring, and manipulation of physical and virtualized resources is now possible. You can also easily automate tasks, such as creating VLANs and LUNs, as well as copying OS images.

In this series of short videos, you can see how easy it is to add an account, run reports, and orchestrate tasks from the UCS Director interface:

A Match Made in IT Heaven

As many of us get ready to head to Miami for Cisco’s Partner Exchange, I just want to end this note saying that we really appreciate our partnership with Cisco. It’s really been a pleasure to work with them on the development side as well as in the field.

I’d also like to thank our mutual partners Securedatatech, CDW, Groupware, and vZure for representing Cisco and Tegile at #CiscoPartnerConnection.

We have several more exciting things on the roadmap focusing on software and automation! Stay tuned! In the meantime, feel free to download this IntelliStack configuration guide to get a deeper understanding of our joint solution and how it can be used for various application-centric use cases:

Cisco UCS and Tegile Flash Storage Arrays Configuration Guide

Cisco UCS and Tegile Flash Storage Arrays Configuration Guide

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Interactive Map: Census Poverty Estimates by County

Using U.S. Census American Community Survey data, this interactive shows which Texas counties have the lowest and highest rates of poverty, broken down by race.

Poverty levels are calculated by the U.S. Census based on a predetermined set of income thresholds that vary depending on the individual and/or family being surveyed. If a family's income is less than its assigned threshold, that family and everyone in it is considered to be impoverished. To learn more about how the Census Bureau calculates this measure, click here.

To use the interactive, select a race/ethnicity from the drop-down menu. Hover or tap on the map to learn more about the poverty breakdown of a particular county.

Want to play with the data yourself? Download it here.

Select Race/Ethnicity
Estimated Percentage of Population Under Poverty Level
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Texas Tribune donors or members may be quoted or mentioned in our stories, or may be the subject of them. For a complete list of contributors, click here.

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The Texas Tribune is pleased to provide the opportunity for you to share your observations about this story. We encourage lively debate on the issues of the day, but we ask that you refrain from using profanity or other offensive speech, engaging in personal attacks or name-calling, posting advertising, or wandering away from the topic at hand. To comment, you must be a registered user of the Tribune, and your real name will be displayed. Thanks for taking time to offer your thoughts.

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text: On Friday 24th October we are holding a Readathon all day; it is taking place from 8.45am – 3.30pm in the Jubilee Centre. Students have already signed up for the event. We held an assembly giving details of the day and where they collected a sponsorship form. All the money raised will go to the students house charity.   During lunchtime on the Readathon day, there will be an inter house event taking place. Students need to come to the old gym and pay just 10p to enter (again, all money goes to the house charity). All students have to do is read a very short story and fill in the missing blanks. The winning house will be the one who raises the most money and prizes will be given to those students who create the best story.       Readathon Assembly 17-10-14  Readathon Sponsorship Form


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Atlantic Monthly Sidebar

Thomas Powers
Contributor Profile

powersm picture Born in 1940 in New York City and educated at Yale University, Thomas Powers worked as a newspaper journalist until 1970, when he quit to become a freelance writer. Powers claims not to have had a job since, but he has certainly kept himself busy: he won a Pulitzer Prize in 1971 for National Reporting at the United Press, and has been a contributor to The Atlantic since 1972. A member of the Council on Foreign Relations, he has also received the National Intelligence Study Center annual book award (in 1980) and the Olive Branch Award for "outstanding coverage of the nuclear-arms issue" (in 1984). Powers is a founding editor of the two-year-old Steerforth Press, of South Royalton, Vermont.

Powers has written numerous book reviews and feature stories for The Atlantic, most of which have focused on nuclear weapons and military policy. In addition to reporting for The Atlantic, he has written extensively for The New York Review of Books, Harper's, The New York Times Book Review, Life, and The Nation. He is the author of six books, the most recent of which, Heisenberg's War: The Secret History of the German Bomb, was published in 1993.

Copyright © 1996 by The Atlantic Monthly Company. All rights reserved.
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Buried deep in Twitter's archives, the first users of "Obamacare" symbolize a fundamental divide in the Twitter universe: @WSJopinion, the Wall Street Journal's opinion team, and @victoria_29, a lover of NASCAR from "God's Country-Texas."

Do the @victoria_29s of the world have the power to affect national policies on topics like health care via Twitter? If the "Obamacare" case is an indicator of broader trends, the answer is no, probably not. In particular, this summer's campaign to "defund Obamacare" proves that even grassroots political movements on Twitter might be AstroTurf: Fake public outrage manufactured by traditional players in Washington like special-interest groups, think-tanks, and a handful of elected officials.

Efforts to gut funding for the Affordable Care Act are underway on Capitol Hill and computer screens across the country. Conservative groups like Heritage Action, Tea Party Patriots, and ForAmerica are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on ads and multi-state advocacy tours. At the same time, the Twitterverse has seen a gradual swell of conversation about health care -- 1.93 million tweets over the past two months. This summer has seen more tweets than the summer when the Supreme Court ruled on the health-care legislation (1.6 million tweets), the spring when Rush Limbaugh called Sandra Fluke a "slut" (338,000 tweets), or the winter when the Obama Administration struggled to compromise with religious communities on the birth-control mandate (562,000 tweets).

So why now? Why is the Twitterverse fixated on a political issue that seems to be in its twilight? Theoretically, there could be many reasons -- for example, starting in October, people can enroll in government-approved health insurance plans -- but data from Topsy, an analytics company that partners with Twitter, suggests that the bump in activity might be part of last-ditch efforts to rally opposition to Obamacare.

The graph below shows the "sentiment rating" for tweets that mentioned or used a hashtag involving "Obamacare." This rating is a way of assessing the tone of people's tweets -- whether they love Obamacare, hate it, or anything in between. After each tweet is evaluated, it's assigned a "sentiment" score. The green line represents the number of positive tweets, and the red line represents the number of negative tweets.

Since March, for basically the first time in two years, negative tweets have outstripped positive tweets.

Via Topsy

What makes this significant is who's driving the change.

"Most of that conversation we've seen is being driven by organizations and groups [that are] either promoting or opposing Obamacare leading up to enrollment beginning," said Jamie De Guerre, Topsy's senior vice president of product. "They're the larger make-up of that sentiment shift and the overall conversation around Obamacare that's happening ... on Twitter right now, as opposed to the general populace."

It's possible to track this by looking at how influential the people talking about health care are. The graph below shows the "potential impressions" of people tweeting about Obamacare -- basically, that's the number of followers who could have possibly seen a particular tweet. The uptick in "potential impressions" in recent months indicates that accounts that have large followings and broad audiences have been driving the traffic on the topic -- not everyday Twitter users with just a few hundred or thousand followers.

With the exception of a sharp spike last summer, right around the Supreme Court's ruling on the ACA's constitutionality, that hasn't ever happened in the last two years. Today's talk about Obamacare is trickling down from special interest groups with a policy agenda.

Via Topsy

One of the ways these groups shape conversations in the Twitterverse is by mimicking the language "regular" people use to talk about the issue.

"A lot of the politicians advocating for this legislation would use #AffordableCareAct," De Guerre said. "It was more of the broad populace using the phrase #Obamacare, and you got a better representation of what the actual populace was saying. That started to shift -- what we've seen in recent weeks is a lot of smear campaigns against Obamacare being very active using the phrase #Obamacare, trying to push a negative message that is anti-Obamacare through Twitter."

In other words, the groups pushing to defund the ACA are conducting the Twitter equivalent of guerrilla warfare, pushing specific messages out through influential allies and crafting language to make it seem like their views are shared by the broader population. But will their efforts actually matter? Almost uniformly, political analysts and elected officials say no

If highly orchestrated, well-funded efforts to drive policy changes via social media don't work, is it likely that truly grassroots ideas can prompt change? On the one hand, there is some evidence that Twitter conversations can have a tangible effect on the real world. For instance, a 2013 Nielsen poll showed that Twitter chatter can increase a television show's ratings -- if someone's friends are talking about something on TV, chances are they will tune in, too.

Twitter chatter hasn't always been driven by special-interest groups. Over the past two years, the users who had the most "influence" on Obamacare conversations, meaning that their tweets reached the largest audiences, ranged from Barack Obama and the RNC to users like @rocky1542, who lives in North Dakota, and @csteven, a small-business owner in Chicago.

Via Topsy

But when it comes to actually changing policies, it's harder to tell whether Twitter makes a difference.

"There is a bit of a pendulum effect where people are talking about the day's news, that conversation influences the news, and then vice versa," said Adam Sharp, Twitter's head of government and non-profits in D.C. "You do have a bit of a chicken-and-egg situation."

Perhaps Twitter chatter is the 21st century equivalent of "call your congressman" -- another way for people to give feedback to elected officials, Sharp said. But, he added, "I don't think Twitter replaces the constituent town hall. It doesn't replace traditional polling, the same way as satellites and radar didn't replace the thermometer and barometer."

There's ample evidence that Twitter is an effective way to draw attention to an issue, and everyday users can end up reaching fairly large audiences with their thoughts on policy. But as this case illustrates, with enough data analysis and effort, groups can mold the public sphere of Twitter around their agenda, which makes this a problematic way for congressmen to gather constituent feedback. Since Twitter is a platform anyone can use, it might seem more representative of the views of regular Americans than the form letters organizations encourage people to send to their congressmen. But it's not -- Twitter can be co-opted to amplify the appearance of popularity for a certain position just like any other lobbying tool in Washington.

More importantly, there's a big difference between creating Congressional buzz and making Congress act. No matter who's talking on Twitter, it's unclear that policy makers are actually listening and doing something about what they hear in the Twitterverse.


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Elena Donovan Mauer

Gear To Make Potty Training Easier

You’ve got the potty and the underwear. But what else should you stock up on when you start potty training — and, most important, what will make the process less painful?
Monkey Potty Chart

When it comes to using the potty, most kids really respond to rewards. Give your big kid a sticker whenever he gets the right stuff in the right place, and then add it to this cute chart. (Here’s hoping it fills up fast!) $20,

Faucet Extender

There’s a lot of hand washing in your near future. And it'll be less of a hassle if you don’t have to hoist your kid up to the sink every time. This contraption rigs things up so your child’s hands can better reach the water flow. $14,

Potty Protectors

When you go into a bathroom stall with a touchy-feely child, you become even more aware of just how disgusting public toilets can be. These towel-like covers have sticky stuff on them, so they adhere to toilet seats and keep little bums and hands from coming into contact with the seats. They’re washable and reusable too. $7 for 10,

Flushable Wipes

One big adjustment to ditching the diapers will be letting go of something you’ve relied on for quite some time: baby wipes. Believe us, you do _not _want to flush the ones you’ve been using (unless you really like plunging your toilet). Instead, get your kid's bum clean with the kind of wipe made to be flushed. $8 for 2 packs of 50,

Potty-Training Doll

Some kids learn better through pretend play, which is why a potty-training doll might really help you out. We love Paul because, well, he’s one of the few boy dolls out there (the same brand has a girl doll too). He drinks and pees and can even go in the bath. $65,

Tinkle Targets

Your son doesn’t have the best aim? Give him a target. $10 for 30,

Step Stool

What potty-training kid doesn’t have a step stool to help him reach the sink? We love this one because of its bright, bold colors and because it’s sturdy and wobble-free. $19,

Plus, more from The Bump:
Photo: The Bump


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Regional Claims

Free Consultation · No Attorneys’ Fees Unless You Recover Monetary Damages

The Callahan Law Firm in Houston, Texas, is recognized as a leading personal injury trial law firm representing injured oil and gas field workers. Our litigation team offers the professional and financial resources and knowledge to represent injured workers in the most complex cases following an oil or gas field accident.

If you were injured in an industrial accident related to the exploration, drilling or production of oil and gas, you may be eligible to seek additional damages beyond workers’ compensation benefits. Often, liability for compensation can be sought from the company that owns the wells, contractors or manufacturers of defective equipment.

We Represent Clients From Across the Country

There has been a recent boom in drilling and exploration for oil and natural gas in a number of shale fields around the nation. Contact us if you have been injured in any type of accident involving oil or natural gas exploration in any national shale such as the Barnett Shale, the Eagle Ford Shale or the Marcellus Shale. We are based in Houston, Texas, the energy capital of the world, and we have the capacity to represent victims of oil and gas exploration accidents nationwide.

  • Texas: From our Houston law offices, we represent people injured on shale exploration sites such as the Eagle Ford Shale, Barnett Shale and Haynesville Shale.
  • Louisiana: The Haynesville shale region, also known as Shreveport Shale, stretches between Texas and Louisiana. It is widely thought to be one of the most abundant shale sources of natural gas.
  • Colorado: Energy companies are spending hundreds of millions of dollars tapping into the shale oil deposits in the Niobrara, Lewis and Pierre shale exploration sites in Colorado.
  • New Mexico: The Lewis and Pierre shale fields stretch into New Mexico as well, along with the Leonard, Barnett and Woodford shale sites.
  • Wyoming: The DJ basin, which includes the Niobrara shale, is an active oil and gas exploration region that extends into Wyoming.
  • Pennsylvania: The Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania is the subject of heavy exploration due to high concentrations of natural gas.
  • North Dakota: The Bakken Shale also known as the North Dakota Shale, located in the Williston Basin, stretches down from Canada into North Dakota and Montana.

Complex Cases Require Maximum Financial Resources

Injury and wrongful death claims resulting from oil and gas exploration accidents can often take more than a year to resolve successfully. From your initial consultation through the final settlement or jury award, our firm has the knowledge, skill and resources to aggressively handle your case. We handle all personal injury cases on a contingency-fee basis. You pay attorneys’ fees only as a percentage of what you recover in a settlement or jury award. During your initial consultation, we will explain our fee structure and contingency policies.

Call 888-224-7020 or send us an e-mail to schedule a free initial consultation with an experienced Texas oil field accident lawyer.


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Texas Gianvi Idiopathic Intracranial Hypertension Lawyer

No Longer Accepting Cases

Birth control pills such as Gianvi may increase the risk of Idiopathic Intracranial Hypertension, a serious medical condition that causes high pressure inside the skull, migraine headaches, and blindness.

What is Gianvi?

Gianvi is an oral contraceptive that contains 3-mg of drospirenone (progestin) and 0.02-mg of ethinyl estradiol (estrogen). These active ingredients are identical to Yaz, but Gianvi is a generic drug made by a different manufacturer. It was approved in 2010.

Idiopathic Intracranial Hypertension (IIH)

Idiopathic Intracranial Hypertension (IIH) is medical jargon that means “high pressure inside the skull due to unknown causes.” The condition occurs when there is too much cerebrospinal fluid inside the skull, which puts pressure on the brain. It can also damage optic nerves and cause vision problems, including papilledema (swelling of the optic disc) and blindness.

What is the problem?

Birth control pills are one of many possible risk-factors for IIH, according to the National Institute of Health.

The first studies linking birth control and IIH were published in the 1990s, including 56 cases of IIH linked to a progestin-only contraceptive implant (Norplant) reported by the New England Journal of Medicine.

Other types of birth control have also been linked to IIH, including Depo-Provera (progestin-only injections) and exogenous estrogen. However, experts still do not know what causes IIH, which is why it is “idiopathic.”

Gianvi Blood Clots and IIH

The popularity of Gianvi plummeted after studies linked the ingredient drospirenone to a 3-fold increased risk of blood clots compared to progestins like levonorgestrel.

If a blood clot travels to the brain, it could physically obstruct the flow of cerebrospinal fluid and cause secondary intracranial hypertension. The Intracranial Hypertension Research Foundation warns:

“Cerebral blood clots (also known as cerebral venous thrombosis) are a cause of secondary intracranial hypertension. A clot can be the result of an injury, head trauma, a blood-clotting disorder, or even the use of certain medications, including oral contraceptives containing estrogen.”

Symptoms of Intracranial Hypertension

  • Chronic headache and/or migraines
  • Vision problems
  • Double-vision (diplopia)
  • Temporary blurry vision or loss of visual field
  • Ringing in the ears or abnormal sounds in the skull (tinnitus)
  • Blind spot enlargement
  • Loss of vision
  • Blindness

Free Case Review

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To contact us for a free review of your potential case, please fill out the form below or call us toll free 24 hrs/day by dialing: (866) 879-3040.


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Under the Skin - donkeys at risk

Right now, millions of donkeys from Asia, Africa and South America are at risk of being stolen and slaughtered for their skins – the gelatin in the hide being a key ingredient in the prized traditional Chinese medicine called ejiao (e-gee-yow).

A new report by The Donkey Sanctuary reveals the shocking scale of this global demand for donkey skins – a demand that is unsustainable, whilst simultaneously causing mass-scale suffering to donkeys and risking the livelihoods of millions of people who depend on them.

Read here about the serious issues being faced and act now to add your voice to our campaign and help us curb this trade.


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Solid Wood Keepsake Box with Fused Dichroic Glass Heart Inset

Looking for the perfect gift or simply a delightful addition to your home decor? This striking, solid wood, walnut stained, alderwood box may be just what you're looking for. The top is adorned with kiln formed glass with a dichroic glass heart in the center. This box can be used for storage of jewelry, keys and other small items. It has protective felt pads on the bottom corners.

Measures: 5 1/4" square by 2 1/4"H

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Go to the Globe and Mail homepage

Jump to main navigationJump to main content

2010 Kia Forte Koup (KIA)
2010 Kia Forte Koup (KIA)

Rob's Garage

Ever considered a Kia? How about a Hyundai? Add to ...

In February you talked about car-buying options that included a Mazda3. We're pretty much done with Toyota until it gets its act together plus we're not fond of its bland design philosophy.

We are looking for a small car like the Mazda. First on our collective list is reliability followed closely by safety. I've never owned European so maybe we should look across the right-hand pond.

I know this isn't much to go on but anything you can add to our car search tool kit would be a help.

Otto and Irene

Well Otto and Irene, your timing is perfect. You do have options and they're not Japanese or European - consider the very capable offerings from South Korea.

Before everyone starts in with me about the Hyundai Pony, let me say two things:

All the Pony stories have become old. And (sorry Ford) have you driven a Kia or a Hyundai lately?

Smooth and responsive, this budget runabout is similar to the Honda Civic in terms of drivability.

These two auto makers, especially Hyundai, have been pumping out a decent product the last few years, and people are finally starting to take notice, (since Kia was folded into the Hyundai family in 1998, it has made huge gains also). The sales numbers speak for themselves never mind the cool products out there like the Hyundai Genesis, the new Sonata (which I think will stand the mid-sized market segment on its ear) and the Kia Forte Koup and the very funky Soul.

Kia's sales jumped of 11.3 per cent in March as the company set an internal sales record with its best first quarter in North America. Combine this with steadily climbing resale values, J.D. Power and Associate numbers that rival BMW and Acura, and the Kia Forte being named the Top Safety Pick by the (American) Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, you've got to figure that it's doing something right. Kia is also keeping pace in the politically correct hybrid race - in 2009, it unveiled a Forte Hybrid at the Seoul Motor Show.

Otto and Irene, the next time you drive by a Hyundai or a Kia dealership, stop to take a look. Not only do you still have options over the left-hand pond, you have options within the "new" automotive companies from South Korea.

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Any IL cops here...

Discussion in 'General Gun Discussions' started by Autolycus, Aug 15, 2006.

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  1. Autolycus

    Autolycus Member

    Feb 13, 2006
    In the land of make believe.
    Hello all,

    I am thinking of applying to the Cook County Department of Corrections. I was curious as to what the testing for a CO consists of. I was told that it is not a POWER test but something different. Can anyone tell me further about the testing procedure?

    And are they allowed to CCW off duty? I was told they are but Illinois Dept. of Corrections is not allowed. Is that true?

    Thanks once again for your service and responses.
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2131 West Touhy Avenue, West RidgeChicago-West Ridge, IL 60645MLS Number 09562412

  • Price: $216,300
  • Est. Mortgage of $/month
  • 74 Days on Market
$/month over payments
Federal 30-year interest rate: 4.03% last updated on Apr 27, 2017
* All Figures are estimates. Check with your bank or proposed mortgage company for actual interest rates.
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  • 3Bedrooms
  • 0.09Acreage
  • 2Bathroom
  • 1914Year Built

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Great opportunity to own this 3 bed and 1.5 bth single family home in the heart of Rogers Park. This two story home features good size living room. separate dining room, 3 bedrooms, 1.5 bathrooms, hardwood floors on main level, fireplace, kitchen with original built in cabinetry, unfinished basement, nice size back yard, carport for 1 car. enclosed front and back porch. Addendums to follow after an offer is accepted. Seller does not provide survey/disclosures. Pre-approval/POF must accompany all offers. Tax prorated at 100%. House sold in "as-is" condition.

Listed by Andy Kordic of RE/MAX Premier Properties

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  • Address2131 West Touhy Avenue
  • NeighborhoodWest Ridge
  • TownChicago-West Ridge
  • CountyCook
  • Zip60645
  • StateIL
  • TownshipRogers Park
  • StreetWest Touhy Avenue
  • Building Number2131

  • A/CNone

Water Body

  • Has WaterfrontN
  • Water ViewN

  • List Date03/11/2017
  • Date Listed03/11/2017
  • Original Listing Price$216,300
  • OwnershipFee Simple
  • Annual Tax$5,315
  • Tax Year05/23/2017

  • Approximate Age103
  • Year Built1914

  • Bedrooms3
  • Bathroom2
  • Total Full Baths1
  • Family Room LevelN
  • Half Baths1
  • Square Feet1,945
  • Partial Baths1
  • Dining Room Length15
  • Dining Room LevelM
  • Dining Room Width14
  • Master Bedroom Width11
  • Master Bedroom Length14
  • Kitchen Length14
  • Kitchen LevelM
  • Total Rooms6
  • Kitchen Width11
  • Living Room Width13
  • Living Room LevelM
  • Living Room Length19
  • Fireplaces1
  • Basement DescriptionFull
  • Bedroom 4 LevelN
  • Bedroom 3 Width10
  • Bedroom 2 Level2
  • Bedroom 2 Length17
  • Bedroom 2 Width10
  • Bedroom 3 Level2
  • Bedroom 3 Length13
  • RoomsSun/Florida Room

  • List Price$216,300
  • MLS Number09562412
  • Property TypeDetached Single
  • Parking Spaces0
  • ExteriorFrame, Stucco
  • Lot Dimension4350 SQ. FT.
  • Parking DescriptionNone,
  • Acreage0.09

  • Heat SourceGas, Radiators
  • SewerSewer-Public
  • WaterLake Michigan
The Jelinek Group
Office: 773-537-0600
3101 N Greenview
Chicago, IL 60657

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My Hollywood Engagement Story (The W{h}iney Bride)

by Tea Time With Tess

I figured there is no better way to start my blogging journey than by telling my favorite story in the world: How I got engaged.

On Saturday, June sixth my fiance Joel left our Los Angeles apartment to run errands. Not thinking much of it, I yelled for him to remember his dry cleaning ticket and said goodbye. No more than ten minutes later I had a knock on our front door from our friend Juli. She told me she was instructed to take me to The W Hotel for an overnight “staycation".

When she dropped me off in front of the hotel, I had a feeling this was it. It had to be it. My heart started to beat out of my chest and as I made the elevator ride to room 1518. I expierenced ever feeling in that elevator ride possible, but mainly, I just thought I was going to throw up.

I walked slowly into the room, expecting to be over taken with a scene of candles and rose petals, maybe a harpist and lots of cold champagne…but what I found was Joel lounging on the couch watching soccer – in sweats no less.

It took me a full two minutes to come to terms with the reality of the situation. An engagement clearly was not going down here so I gave him a look and started buzzing with questions.

a. ) What are we doing here?

b.) Why did you reserve such a gigantic suite

c.) What are we doing here?

d.) What are we doing here?

e.) What are we doing here

He told me his company had upgraded us at the hotel and that we were going to have a special date night of just the two of us. He wanted to treat me.

He's a keeper, right?

It was the sweetest gesture, and I was excited, so I fully of gave up on the idea that this was going to be the day that I was getting engaged. And there was no way I was going to let him think, that I was thinking that this was “the" day.

He had booked a manicure for me at the spa and then told me to meet him by the pool and before a fun dinner in West Hollywood.

Again, I can deal with this.

I marched my happy self down to the spa, put my headphones in and zoned out to Keeping Up With The Kardashians.

When I headed back up to room 1518 to change into my swimsuit things started to fall into place.

Joel had changed into a suit coat, grabbed my hand, and led me into a room where he had flowers, two flutes of champagne, and a ring box.

He grabbed my hand, got down on one knee, and proposed.

Such a happy day

We spent the rest of the day sipping champagne in a cabana at the pool and then finished the day off with a gluttonous meal at The Everleigh in West Hollywood followed by drinks at the hotel bar.

I loved that I had some sense of surprise in my engagement, and even after 6 years of dating him, nothing could have prepared me for how special that day was. A day I will never forgot. The day I became a bride to be.

The Bling

Up Next
Emerald cut engagement ring and gold wedding band
Points for Your Wedding Ring Appraisal
Yes, you'll feel great when you've finally found the perfect ring and bands, but don't celebrate just yet -- you've got two very important things to do before you can let that alluring little sparkler loose on the streets: Get it appraised and insured.
by Jessica Zaleski


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Trebles all round

Get your glad rags on and prepare to celebrate. The biggest night in the legal calendar is here: It’s The Lawyer Awards 2014, now in its twentieth year. Find out more about our finalists.

Excellence breeds diversity in 20 years of The Lawyer Awards

Change: the great balancing act

Corporate crunch time: who will triumph at The Lawyer Awards 2014?

Evolution: our Law Firm of the Year winners reflect the changing times

ABS of the Year Roundtable: Variety adds spice


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212 Dunton CIRHampden, ME 04444Price: $52,900

  • Price: $52,900
  • Est. Mortgage of $/month
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  • 1250659MLS Number
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Beautiful building site for your dream home! Welcome to Hawthorne Ridge Subdivision. This neighborhood is quiet, safe, and the lots have already been soil tested and surveyed. Only 6 miles to schools & shopping, this lot provides both convenience and privacy in a tranquil environment. Don't miss this opportunity to live in Hampden's most highly acclaimed neighborhood. Hawthorne Ridge Subdivision is a smart choice to protect your home's value in the future.

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Home Clothing Knitwear Sweater Striped cotton sweater

MSGM Striped cotton sweater

$200 (Approx. CAD $271)
Was $500 60% off
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Color: Off-white

Select a size (you can view our size guide here)

large x large
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Details & Fit

  • Multicolored cotton
  • Slips on
  • 100% cotton
  • Hand wash
  • Made in Italy

  • Fits true to size, take your normal size
  • Designed for a slightly loose fit
  • Mid-weight knit
  • Model is 177cm/ 5'10" and is wearing a size XSmall

Product code: 648850

Product Measurements

We measured this product for you. View our measuring guide.

Size Length Shoulder Waist Bust Sleeve
large 58 40 96 98 48
x large 59 41 100 102 48
Size Length Shoulder Waist Bust Sleeve
large 23 15.5 38 38.5 19
x large 23 16 39.5 40 19

Designer Information

Yves Saint Laurent, Coco Chanel and contemporary art and music are just a few of the diverse subjects that inspire Massimo Giorgetti. His Italian brand MSGM is all about fresh colors and modern prints in easy-to-wear silhouettes.

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Home Clothing Skirts Mini Wrap-effect printed cotton-terry mini skirt

Moschino Wrap-effect printed cotton-terry mini skirt

Was £495 50% off

Color: Multi

Select a size (you can view our size guide here)

IT 38 IT 42 IT 44
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Details & Fit

  • Moschino multicolored skirt
  • Printed cotton-terry
  • Wrap-effect front
  • Concealed snap and zip fastening at front
  • 100% cotton
  • Hand wash or dry clean
  • Made in Italy

  • Fits true to size, take your normal size
  • Mini-length, sits at the waist
  • Mid-weight, non-stretchy fabric
  • Model is 175cm/ 5'9" and is wearing an IT 40

Product code: 851769

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IT 38 45 64 84
IT 42 45 72 88
IT 44
Size Length Waist Hip
IT 38 17.5 25 33
IT 42 17.5 28.5 34.5
IT 44

Designer Information

When Franco Moschino launched his namesake label in 1983, the fashion crowd instantly took notice of his whimsical, ground-breaking designs. Today, the Italian label is loved the world over for its fun and feminine style. Add the iconic brand's playful panache to your wardrobe with statement-making dresses, quirky jackets and fabulous accessories.

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Don't give into gimmicks for oral health

By - Bad Breath Expert

SUMMARY:  A major oral healthcare company recently applied for a patent for an energy?-enhancing and appetite suppressing toothbrush, but don't give into the gimmicks.

Posted: May 24, 2013

oral health toothbrushes gimmicks

Whether you're searching the web, flipping through a magazine or channel surfing, chances are you're going to run into gimmicky advertisements that feature empty promises. Everything from keeping you alert throughout the day to helping you shed that unwanted belly fat without changing a lick of your daily lifestyle can trick consumers into spending their money wastefully. Companies reel in consumers without any research to back up their claims. According to the Huffington Post, some manufacturers of oral health products are coming up with new items that give users a boost of caffeine or help suppress hunger. However, it is much more important to focus on the cleanliness of your mouth while brushing to fight against gum disease and bad breath instead of getting a dose of energy.

A hectic work schedule coupled with daily errands and family life can lead many people to look for alternative ways to get energy. Colgate-Palmolive filed a patent application for a toothbrush with the capabilities of releasing chemicals from its tip in slow doses as an individual uses the brush that would give him or her energy. Other chemicals that could be released from the toothbrush include an appetite suppressant or pain meds.

Recently, Wrigley took its caffeine-infused gum, Alert, off of retailers' shelves after the FDA began researching how caffeinated foods affected people, particularly children and teens.

Too much caffeine?
According to the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, the number of people who had to seek emergency care from too much caffeine rose to nearly 20,000 in 2011, and more than 90 percent of adults are estimated to consume some source of caffeine each day. While buzz-inducing beverages can pose risks to your overall oral health, getting your fix from your toothbrush could potentially cause other harm.

Go natural
Instead of trying to find a way around eating healthy to lose weight, you can increase the amount of fruits and vegetables that you consume, which will also help with your oral health. Consuming fresh produce on a regular basis can help get rid of dental plaque, balance out anaerobic bacteria in the mouth and promote healthy gums.

If you are one of the 90 percent of American adults that need a dose of caffeine to get through the day, you can rest assured that it's not necessary to receive that from your toothbrush in order to have a clean mouth. While coffee can stain teeth, there are several precautions you can take to stay healthy. You'll want to make sure that you are brushing before drinking coffee to protect your teeth and using the best gum for bad breath to get rid of smelly coffee breath.

It's important to understand that gimmicky products like these will not help to protect against tooth decay, bad breath, gum disease and other oral health issues. Instead, oxygenating and additive-free toothpaste and mouthwash can help to battle anaerobic bacteria and keep the mouth clean and fresh. Include the use of natural gum for bad breath and you won't have to worry about having an unpleasant mouth.

Focus on what's important
It's not necessary to multi-task while you're brushing your teeth, even if that means getting an appetite suppressant or caffeine to get you through the day. Keeping up with good brushing and flossing habits will help keep bacteria at bay and could decrease your chances of suffering from other health issues like heart disease. Diabetes and oral health are also synonymous with one another, making it extra important to keep a clean mouth.

* These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Please Note: The material on this site is provided for informational purposes only.  Always consult your health care professional before beginning any new therapy.

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Reg comments40

Netflix splits DVD, streaming offers in 60% price hike

Think of it as a discount on a thing you never use!

Netflix has announced that they're no longer offering a streaming-plus-DVD service. Instead, you can have either streaming or DVD, but if you want both, you'll have to pay for both.

The old monthly plan was $9.99 per month, which allowed unlimited streaming of movies plus the ability to rent any one DVD at a time. Such DVDs were supplied through the mail system and returned that way once watched.

The streaming-plus-DVD plan has now been scotched entirely, and there are two separate plans available: unlimited streaming for $7.99 a month or the ability to get DVDs through the mail (still one at at a time) for $7.99 a month. Customers can purchase both of course, but there is no discount associated with doing so.

This applies only in the US: the company's Canadian and newly announced Latin American offerings are streaming only.

The announcement included the usual corporatespeak of more choice and the intention to satisfy those who only wanted DVDs.

Interesting commentary from Felix Salmon at Reuters, who points out that this undermines the company's famous "long tail" strategy. At least, for anyone purchasing the streaming-only service.

For while streaming might be just the bees' knees, it does suffer from the number of offerings being so much lower. In the long run, everything will be available purely online, but it just ain't at present, and a significant percentage of Netflix's business is in that long tail of movies which are only available on DVD.

There have been quick and dirty attempts to ask people if they'll leave as a result of a 60 per cent price rise and some such – including a straw poll on Business Insider – indicate that one-third will. Which sounds like a very large number given the more usual consumer lethargy about things that they're signed up to.

New subscribers will have to pay the new prices immediately. Netflix's current customers will have to start coughing up in September.

Anecdotal evidence (otherwise known as reading comments sections) show that perhaps the largest effect immediately is to make people dig out and check what they have actually signed up for. Some of these users are changing providers as a result. This is always one of the problems that come with changing an offering that people have signed up to.

If you keep quiet, and just leave everyone believing they are still on the offering they originally took out, then you can keep on collecting the money without most noticing. As soon as you start changing this, making everyone look at what they're getting for what they're paying, there is inevitably a reconsideration of whether to continue to pay. Which might be why the 60 per cent price rise: smaller than that might not be worth it for Netflix, given the potentially lost subscribers. ®

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Reg comments3

Brocade brags about EASILY bedding campus LAN biz

Simplified networks package anticipates smartphone data deluge

Brocade is baking new campus LAN products with its HyperEdge technology providing mix-'n'-match edge switch stacking and single point management.

The HyperEdge technology is said to facilitate simplified and automated access layer networks that will be able to accommodate the expected flood of data traffic to/from smartphones and tablets and be able to scale as traffic grows.

Brocade claims that "single-point management ... enables users to manage their entire access-switching layer as if it were a single device, from initial deployment to ongoing configuration, software upgrades and monitoring." Several switches on different floors of a building can be managed as if they constituted a single logical device.

Brocade claims that entry-level and more expensive edge switches can be stacked so that "entry-level switches inherit all of the feature richness of the premium switches in the stack," and says this is cheaper than building stacks from costlier switches – which means future switches can be added to the stack instead.

There are two new ICX 6430 and 6450 self-stacking switches with layer 2 and layer 3 functionality are able to support Energy-efficient Ethernet (EEE) and MACsec encryption for link-level data protection. There are 24-access port and 48-access port 1GbitE models and optional 1/10GbitE uplink/stacking ports. Up to 384 ports can be stacked in total. The 6430 has 4 X 1GbitE SFP uplinks and the 6450 4 X 10Gbit SFP+ uplinks.

They join the existing FCX and ICX 6610 access switches which are ready for HyperEdge technology as well. They all connect to aggregation and core switches such as the 6610, which is a cross-over switch, the Fastiron SX and the MLX products.

Brocade is marketing all of this as the "effortless" network, which is nice marketing.

The HyperEdge technology will be available on Brocade's stackable access switch portfolio through a software upgrade which will be made available next year. This aspect of Brocade's announcement is somewhat vapour-like as it involves a nine-to-15-month wait. But customers are assured that the access switches they buy between now and then will be upgradable to the HyperEdge technology.

The ICX 6430 and 6450 switches are available today directly from Brocade and its channel partners at a starting list price of $1,295. HyperEdge technology is planned to be available for purchase in the first half of 2013. ®

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My most important lesson Posted over 5 years ago

Photo: Jeanfrancois Beausejour, Monaco

People ask me what is the most important lesson I have learned as a coach. After a World Cup win, 143 test matches and 37 consecutive years in charge of a team, you would hope that I have an answer by now. I do.

It doesn’t matter if it’s the under-14 third team or the All Blacks, you have to be able to handle the hard times. I’ve had 103 games in charge of New Zealand, but it’s the 15 we lost, those are the ones I remember. I hate them with a passion.

But the losses are the games that make you stronger and give you clarity. You have to be able to handle defeat. You have to be able to focus when it seems like there is chaos all around. It’s about the ability to control your environment. I could not handle the losses if I did not feel totally prepared for the next match and good in my own skin. If I’m not exercising enough or eating too much or have a hangover, I would be hopeless. Get to know yourself.

Most of us coaches need to stay fit and healthy to do our best work. There is an All Blacks management group that goes to the gym pretty regularly. Mike Cron, the New Zealand scrum coach, is in charge. We call him coach. When I am at home I walk the 7km to Mission bay and back with Raewyn. If I didn’t exercise, I couldn’t do the job. You need to be fit as a coach because you need total clarity. The team needs clarity.

I may have come up with a menu as long as this table when planning for a game, but you need to cut it down. Otherwise the players can’t handle it. Rugby is about making good decisions under extreme pressure. The players can’t do their job if they have too many things running around in their heads.

Our job as coaches is to keep it as simple as possible. We have a couple of sessions with the All Blacks every week when we work on clarity. At the World Cup we have done indoor gym sessions where the team is just walking through a few things.

The players have to take ownership of the team. I’m just a resource. That’s the thing I’m most proud about with this All Black World Cup winning team. The players are in charge of their own environment.

It’s their team, led by Richie.

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Sir Graham Henry (Ted) is a New Zealand rugby union coach, and former head coach of the country's national team, the All Blacks. Ted is one of the most successful coaches to have ever coached the All Blacks.

Topic Leadership & Management
Applicable to Coaches

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Woman's killer awaits sentence, after elaborate police sting yields a confession

Andrew Keene enjoyed four years of freedom after killing and dismembering Alexandra Flanagan, until he was caught by a “Mr. Big” scheme.

Alexandra Flanagan was murdered in 2007.
Alexandra Flanagan was murdered in 2007.

For four years, police kept an eye on the man they believed had murdered and dismembered a petite, vivacious Barrie hairdresser.

For four years, Andrew Keene enjoyed liberty, going about his married life, his job, his amusements, presumably confident he’d got away with a brutal homicide.

He’s now finally been found guilty and, theoretically at least, could end up — time served factored in — with a remaining prison sentence shorter than the length of time it took to lay charges and bring the case to trial.

Eight years between murder and conviction.

On the one hand, this tale could be viewed as vigilant policing, never giving up on justice for 33-year-old Alexandra Flanagan, as investigators spun an elaborate, patient undercover sting around their suspect, luring him into a confession. On the other, their frustrations — not enough evidence to support a prosecution — meant that someone who’d already killed once remained free for nearly five years.

Article Continued Below

Indeed, it was Keene in 2011 who ultimately led detectives — he didn’t know they were cops — to the spot where he’d disposed of Flanagan’s torso, the only body part that had remained unrecovered. It was beneath a bush across from the Barrie OPP detachment, almost literally under law enforcement’s nose and mere blocks from Keene’s basement apartment in Innisfil.

Why had he hidden the torso so close to his home? Keene had been asked by the undercover officer pretending to be a gangster with a fictitious criminal organization, assessing him for a position in the outfit. “It was heavy,” Keene said on the police wire recording played in court. “I have a bad back.”

Other remains had, years earlier, been found in three separate locations around Barrie. Keene, as court would hear, had stuffed Flanagan’s mutilated body — apparently dissected with a knife, though he also had replica swords — into a hockey bag and spent about five hours trudging around the city, disposing of parts hither and yon.

On Tuesday, a jury convicted Keene of second-degree murder and indignity to a body. Second-degree carries a mandatory life sentence, but parole eligibility ranges from 10 years to 25 years, depending on what the trial judge decrees. The majority of this jury has recommended no parole for 25 years.

Alexandra Flanagan, a popular woman with a wide group of friends — they would organize a Facebook page, Friends of Alex Take Action, dedicated to sharing information at first about Flanagan and later for other unsolved murders in Barrie — vanished on July 8, 2007. She was last seen in a city park, waving goodbye to a pal who’d walked her halfway home after a night out.

It was Flanagan’s worried mother and sister who reported the woman missing two days later, upon learning she hadn’t reported for work. They went to Flanagan’s apartment, finding a pot of congealed stew on the stove and her two beloved cats, Mystic and Oliver, meowing pitifully for food and water.

Police would soon discover that Flanagan had received seven text messages from Keene, then 29, on the evening of her disappearance, but they went unanswered until about 10 p.m. Keene was confronted about those texts a couple of weeks later and denied seeing her that night. Detectives interviewed him on multiple occasions subsequently and spent several days searching his apartment, where undisclosed evidence was seized.

At trial, forensic analyst Dave Sibley recounted how he sprayed Keene’s apartment with a chemical that glows when it interacts with iron in the blood — stains invisible to the naked eye — yet found nothing. Keene had used dish soap and bleach to scour the apartment clean.

Police did retrieve the hockey bag and sent it to the Centre of Forensic Sciences. Unbeknown to Keene — kept on the QT as “hold-back evidence” — forensic experts found traces of blood inside that yielded a DNA match to Flanagan. While sufficient to lay charges against Keene, it wasn’t enough to secure a conviction, police concluded.

They knew it, couldn’t prove it.

Three years later, always keeping Keene under surveillance, police devised a plot to befriend and hopefully nail their suspect. They invented a criminal organization — a tactic known in the police world as a “Mr. Big” sting. An undercover officer was assigned to establish a relationship with Keene.

The jury heard that Detective A (whose identity was protected by a publication ban), dressed in faded jeans with long shaggy hair, loosened the lug nuts on his pickup truck so that the wheel came off right at Keene’s driveway. The cop pretended he needed Keene’s help and pulled out a cooler of beer when the job was done. Thus a friendship was established.

For an entire year, the undercover cop drank and partied with Keene. Detective A pretended to be part of a criminal organization and initially drew Keene into a DVD bootleg operation. At one point, Keene became suspicious of his new buddy when the cop initially declined to smoke pot. “So I had a couple of puffs,” Detective A testified. “It was for my own safety.”

Scheming to seduce Keene into talking about Flanagan’s murder, the cop turned up at Keene’s home one day, all sweaty and dirty, pretending that he had killed a woman for his “boss” and dug a hole to get rid of the body.

In a further ruse, a confrontation was staged as Keene and Detective A left a Barrie Colts game. The duo, as had been planned, ran across a Barrie police sergeant who told Keene: “We know you killed (Alexandra).”

Keene was then introduced to the phony crime boss of the gang, Detective S, who claimed to have inside info, arising from the blood stain on the hockey bag, that Keene was Flanagan’s murderer. “See, I like you,” the detective says on the police wiretap. “But we got a problem… I know you did it… See, I got tentacles everywhere, I got people.”

The “boss” convinces Keene he can make the whole thing go away by having someone else, already doing long time, take the rap.

“If you can make this problem go away, I’ll give you my life,” Keene says.

Boss: “Yeah, you got a monkey on your back.’’

Keene: “It’s not a monkey — it’s an elephant.”

But first, the “boss’’ insists, Keene must provide details. “So how’d ya do her? Ya shoot her?”

Keene discloses that he wrapped something, maybe a T-shirt, around Flanagan’s neck, struck her on the head and then strangled her. Afterwards he cut the woman up, scrubbed down the apartment (his wife was out of town that night), then dumped the body parts. As for the tools he used to dismember the victim, “they’re in the lake.”

Keene never told his new criminal pals why he’d killed Flanagan, mentioning only that he’d been “sort of” in love with her.

And he led them to Flanagan’s torso.

On that day, Oct. 20, 2011, Keene was arrested and charged with first-degree murder, later reduced to second-degree. First-degree requires premeditation and planning. At trial, he admitted to the dismemberment but pleaded not guilty to murder.

He will be sentenced Thursday.

Rosie DiManno usually appears Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.


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Future’s not Stone Rosy

STONE ROSES fans could be in for a shock this summer – Dodgy drummer Mathew
Priest reckons Reni might not be playing the gigs.

Mat The Hat has heard rumours that the legendary Roses drummer could be too
sick to perform on the reunion tour.

He said on my XFM show yesterday: “I bought tickets because The Roses were one
of my favourite bands and Reni was playing. But I’ve heard rumours that Reni
might not be playing – he’s not well apparently and they’re rehearsing with
another drummer. They’ve sold a lot of the 250,000 tickets because of Reni –
I’d want to see them with Reni.”

But a spokesman for the band said: “The Stone Roses are currently rehearsing
for their forthcoming dates. All four members can’t wait to play the shows.”

To hear the full interview download the Smart On Sunday Xfm podcast from


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Most Addictive Nintendo DS Games

A list of addictive games for the popular, amazing, fun, and awesome handheld from Nintendo, the DS, these are the games you can't stop playing

The Top Ten

1 Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations

I might be slightly biased because this is my favorite video game series of all time and would play Ace Attorney until the end of time, but the writing is brilliant, the music is fabulous, the characters are memorable and you feel like you actually know them since you watch them grow from square one as they evolve. While it isn't anything like real-life court as it would be an incredibly boring game otherwise, it's worth playing/reading for the story and characters themselves.

Nothing Beats Phoenix wright..
The best I've ever played..
The twist in the story never misses to leave me thrilled. Goosebumps Guaranteed..

Want to be a lawyer or attorney.. here's your practice... OBEJECTION!

V 1 Comment
2 Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars

People thought the ds wasn't a good system for a Grand Theft Auto game. They thought wrong this game is awesome! It has a good story. It uses the touch screen very well. Limitless fun!

V 1 Comment
3 Animal Crossing: Wild World

I haven't actually played wild world but new leaf was very addictive so I'm assuming wild world was too

The sequel to the one of the bestselling gamecube games. It's Animal Crossing: Wild World... have fun :)!

4 Super Scribblenauts

This game is so much fun! Even though it's meant for kids who are learning their spelling its really a great quest

Create many things.. a good buy for anybody. Buy the way: polka dotted flying winged shark!

5 Mario Kart DS

The only game on here I've heard of. Its awesome. - randomuser2525

One of the best ds games... OF ALL TIME!

If you enjoy a good thing, this is your only option

V 1 Comment
6 Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies

It's Dragon Quest... awesome rpg!

V 1 Comment
7 Electroplankton

This is one of the coolest games you will ever play! - adamgogle

8 Transformers: The Game Autobots and Decepticons
9 The World Ends With You

Looking for a different type of rpg made by the people from Square Enix.. this is it my friends!

10 Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes

One of the last Lego games to be on ds... this provides all the fun you need if you love Legos and batman. Good graphics for a ds game.

The Contenders

11 Pokemon Platinum
12 Brain Age 2: More Training in Minutes a Day!
13 Drawn to Life: SpongeBob SquarePants Edition
14 Pokemon X V 1 Comment
15 Naruto Shippuden: Shinobi Rumble

A good fighting game love the arcade stylized graphics... So much you will have with this Naruto game

16 Super Mario 64 DS
17 Ultimate Mortal Kombat
18 Tetris DS
19 Ghostbusters: The Video Game
20 Prince of Persia: The Fallen King
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text:
Welsh Assembly

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 1:09 pm on 25th July 1997.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Mr Allan Rogers Mr Allan Rogers Labour, Rhondda 1:09 pm, 25th July 1997

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Clwyd (Mr. Ruane) on his maiden speech. I am sure that he will represent his constituency with great force.

Bearing in mind what has gone on over the past couple of months, there seems to be a Welsh national newspaper that is a broadsheet for the Welsh Office. Those of us who happen to have a different view about the Welsh Assembly from other colleagues in the Labour party might well be in favour of devolution. I am strongly in favour of it, but I am not in favour of the Labour party's proposals as encapsulated in the White Paper. A fundamental reason for not believing in them is that I do not want subsidiarity. At the same time, I do not want devolution to stop at an all-Wales level.

I happen to be a strong proponent and supporter of local government. It is an institution that we take for granted all the time. Selfless people spend their lives—many of them prejudicing their careers—to serve others at a local level. They undertake fairly awesome responsibilities. When I was involved in local government I participated more in the democratic process than I feel that I have ever done in England, where the Executive runs the state and where Parliament has little say.

Local government is the largest employer in Wales, and it spends more money than any other organisation in Wales. For the life of me, I cannot understand why, if they wanted to abolish quangos, the Government did not first restore to local government the powers of those quangos. It was the Tories who took the powers of local government and handed them to the quangos that they set up.

That is what happened over the past 18 years. The Tories could not govern Wales. Indeed, they could not govern England. They never won local elections. We know that they were hammered at that level. So what did they do? In London, in other parts of England and in Wales, they took powers from local authorities and gave them to unelected quangos, where they could put their placemen. That has been the pattern of politics in Wales.

We should not fall for the false nationalistic answer to the problems of democracy and accountability. Surely we should first undo what the Tories have done. It was the Tory party that created bad government in Wales. That is why I, and some of my hon. Friends who hold a different view from others in the Labour party, resent the imputation that there is a move to get into bed with the Tories.

I happen to come from what many people in the valleys of south Wales refer to as the heartland of British socialism. The very thought of collaborating with the Tories would get me kicked out of the House by my constituents and by my family, right through to those who would rise from their graves at the very thought of it.

I and my hon. Friends the Members for Islwyn (Mr. Touhig), for Ogmore (Sir R. Powell), for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Mr. Rowlands) and for Cynon Valley (Ann Clwyd) are prepared to fight against the Tories all the time. We also fight against the nationalists because we think that they present a false road for the Welsh people to travel down.

Our patriotism and our love of Wales is not based on resentment of the English. We are not fighting for a Wales in Europe. We do not trust the French, the Germans and those from Luxembourg any more or any less than we trust the English. If we have to be part of a pattern of government, I would rather be within the pattern of government of a British state, of Great Britain, rather than following Plaid Cymru's policy of a Wales in Europe. I will not go down that road, because it does not serve my constituents. Let it be understood that we are all here to serve our constituents.

I see my colleagues in the Chamber, and I see no one who is an absolutely dogmatic politician. We must all realise that politics is often the art of the possible. Our surgeries are not full of people who fly to the stars on great political philosophies. They are full of people who are concerned about their rents and their welfare payments, because the ravages of the Tory Government decimated our communities and collapsed our industries. The Tories did that purely out of selfish spite against coal miners. We fight for those people every day.

I am not hung up on any particular structure of governance in Wales, but I want good government for my constituents, and quite frankly I am not convinced by this White Paper. My right hon. and hon. Friends have already made some of the points that I was going to make, but I want to raise one issue in particular. It has been suggested that, if we had had a Welsh Assembly, we would not have had the ravages of Thatcherism, and that somehow Toryism and Thatcherism would have stopped at the Severn bridge or at the border by the A5, near the constituency of that English nationalist, the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Mr. Paterson).

There is a railway bridge in Nelson that the Secretary of State and I know very well, from when we were both campaigning for a no vote in 1979. I have seen written on that bridge, "We voted Labour and we got Thatcher." That is true—we had Thatcher and she hammered our constituencies—but an Assembly will not save the people of my constituency from poverty, it will not cure the sick, and it will not put the unemployed back to work.

A previous Labour Government felt that the best way to regenerate the Welsh economy was to establish a Welsh Development Agency, for the reasons that my hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney gave. It was decided that we needed something outside the normal organs of government that could energetically pursue investment in Wales. By and large, the WDA has worked.

The issue of accountability has been raised. When the Welsh Development Agency did not work and performed badly, it was made accountable. Tribute was rightly paid to my right hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, West (Mr. Williams) for his work on the Public Accounts Select Committee. I can go back a little further. When I was a member of the Public Accounts Select Committee, we considered the Parrot Corporation and its relationship with the WDA. I feel that such accountability will be missing under this proposal.

I have been elected to make such bodies accountable, and if they are not, it is my failure and the failure of every hon. Member. We have the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs, the Welsh Grand Committee, the Public Accounts Select Committee and the Chamber, and, if democracy has gone from Wales, it is our fault. We may not have been diligent enough. We fought the Tories, but they had a majority and were able to railroad proposals through. That is greatly to their shame.

It is the fault of Conservative Members that we are in this mess. If there is a break-up of the United Kingdom, as is quite possible as a result of this slope that we are sliding down, people should not blame my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Government Front Bench.

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text:
What Do Caterpillars Eat?

Host Plants for Moth and Butterfly Caterpillars

Caterpillar feeding on a leaf.
Collect foliage from the plant where you found a caterpillar—that's probably its preferred food. Getty Images/Matt Meadows

Caterpillars, the larvae of butterflies and moths, feed almost exclusively on plants. You will find most caterpillars munching happily on leaves, though some will feed on other plant parts, like seeds or flowers.

Generalist Feeders vs. Specialist Feeders

Herbivorous caterpillars fall into one of two categories: generalist feeders, or specialist feeders. Generalist caterpillars feed on a variety of plants.

Mourning cloak caterpillars, for example, will feed on willow, elm, aspen, paper birch, cottonwood, and hackberry. Black swallowtail caterpillars will feed on any member of the parsley family: parsley, fennel, carrot, dill, or even Queen Anne's lace. Specialist caterpillars restrict their feeding to smaller, related groups of plants. The monarch caterpillar feeds only on the foliage of milkweed plants.

A small number of caterpillars are carnivorous, usually feeding on small, soft-bodied insects like aphids. One rather unusual moth caterpillar (Ceratophaga vicinella) found in the southeastern U.S., feeds exclusively on the shells of dead gopher tortoises. Tortoise shells are made of keratin, which is tough for most scavengers to digest.

Determining What to Feed Your Caterpillar

Whether a caterpillar specializes on a specific type of plant, or feeds on a variety of host plants, you will need to identify its food preferences if you're going to raise it in captivity.

You can't put a caterpillar in a container with grass and expect it to adapt to eating something different than its usual diet.

So how do you know what to feed it, if you don't know what kind of caterpillar it is? Look around the area where you found it. Was it on a plant? Collect some foliage from that plant and try feeding it that.

Otherwise, gather samples of whatever plants were nearby, and watch to see if it chooses a certain one.

Also, keep in mind that we often find caterpillars when they're wandering away from their host plants, looking for a place to pupate. So if the caterpillar you collected was crossing a sidewalk or trudging across your lawn when you picked it up, it might not be interested in food at all.

Oak Leaves: The (Nearly) Universal Caterpillar Food

If your caterpillar won't eat anything you've offered it, try collecting some oak leaves. An incredible number of moth and butterfly species—well over 500—will feed on oak leaves, so the odds are in your favor if you try Quercus leaves. Other foods that are preferred by many caterpillars are cherry, willow, or apple leaves. When all else fails, try leaves from one of the powerhouse perennials for caterpillars.

Host Plants for Caterpillars in Your Garden

If you want to plant a true butterfly garden, you need more than nectar plants. Caterpillars need food, too! Include caterpillar host plants, and you'll attract a lot more butterflies as they visit your plants to lay eggs.

When you plan your butterfly garden, include some caterpillar host plants from this list.

A well-designed butterfly garden supports not only this year's butterflies, but generations of butterflies to come!

Common Garden Butterflies and Their Host Plants

ButterflyCaterpillar Host Plants
American painted ladypearly everlasting
American snouthackberry
black swallowtaildill, fennel, carrot, parsley
cabbage whitesmustards
checkered whitesmustards
common buckeyesnapdragons, monkey flowers
eastern commaelm, willow, hackberry
giant swallowtaillime, lemon, hoptree, prickly ash
grass skipperslittle bluestem, panic grass
greater fritillariesviolets
gulf fritillarypassion vines
heliconianspassion vines
monarch butterflymilkweeds
mourning cloakwillow, birch
painted ladythistles
palamedes swallowtailred bay
pearl crescentasters
pipevine swallowtailpipevines
question markelm, willow, hackberry
red admiralnettles
red spotted purplecherry, poplar, birch
silver-spotted skipperblack locust, indigo
spicebush swallowtailspicebush, sassafras
sulphursclovers, alfalfa
tiger swallowtailblack cherry, tulip tree, sweet bay, aspen, ash
zebra swallowtailpawpaws