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Further to my previous post on the Government's housing plans for Auckland and the problem that iwi and hapū rights under the Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau Collective Redress Act 2014 may cause, my attention has been drawn to the following matters.

When the Ngā Mana Whenua o Tāmaki Makaurau Collective Redress Deed was signed back in 2012, it contained a "Property Redress Schedule" (you can see it in PDF here, from p.21 on). And that Schedule contained a specific "Department of Building and Housing Protocol", which is at p.46 of that document.

Under that Protocol, the Crown agreed that:

If the Crown intends to:

7.1.1 develop land it owns that is subject to the [right of first refusal] RFR to achieve, or assist in achieving, the Crown’s social objectives in relation to housing or services related to housing; and

7.1.2 involve a party other than the Crown (including a private buyer or Crown body) in that development,

the Department [of Building and Housing] shall first provide the [iwi and hapū's] limited partnership the opportunity to be the developer, subject to meeting the intended Crown social objectives in relation to housing or services related to housing, and on such terms as might be offered to the private sector.

Which the Department just hasn't done. So, on the face of it, the Government's announced plans are a breach of the agreement it made in its settlement deed with the Tāmaki Makaurau Collective only three years ago.

Having said that, there's a further complicating factor. The Protocol goes on to say:

The Crown will endeavour in good faith to provide the limited partnership with the opportunities set out in this protocol. The Crown reserves the right to trigger the RFR exception or transfer land to a Crown body without first making an offer under this protocol in circumstances where:

7.1.3 achievement of Crown’s social objectives in relation to housing or services related to housing in the opinion of the Department would be frustrated in whole or in part by exercising the protocol; and/or

7.1.4 Crown’s social objectives in relation to housing or services related to housing would be achieved, but applying the protocol would substantially increase cost or reduce efficiency for the Crown.

So it isn't the case that under this Protocol the Crown must in every case give the iwi and hapū's limited partnership the first chance to be the developers of housing on Crown land in Auckland. But, by the same token, can the Government possibly be acting in "good faith" by making a sweeping decision that the iwi and hapū's limited partnership is not to have first dibs on any of the 500 hectares of Crown land that is allegedly being made available for new housing? Without, it should be noted, apparently even informing the iwi and hapū's limited partnership that it is intending embark on this new policy?

For how would allowing the iwi and hapū's limited partnership to be the developer of any of the housing "frustrate" the Government's plans? What evidence does the Department have that allowing the iwi and hapū's limited partnership to be a developer would "substantially increase the cost or reduce efficiency"? Is there a paper trail to show that the Department carefully considered these matters before announcing the policy and had good grounds for reaching such conclusions? How could those conclusions be reached without having talked with the iwi and hapū's limited partnership at all?

Interesting questions. Let's see what answers come of them.

Comments (5)

by Alan Johnstone on June 05, 2015
Alan Johnstone

This is what happens when ignore problems for years and then develop ad hoc policy in response to disappointing focus group results.

Yet again this administration is caught out by the deal making instincts of senior members who short cut process.

by Che Nua on June 06, 2015
Che Nua

Even if by some miracle 500ha do get developed for housing in our lifetimes NZ's population is likely to be well over 5,000,000 by 2020 so Nick Smith's vision of intensive urban sprawl wont realise any social benefit unless the demand side is sorted too - very unlikely under our current political leadership

by Donald Ellis on June 07, 2015
Donald Ellis

Thanks for the analysis, Andrew. It is difficult to imagine how the government could defend not offering the RFR land to the limited partnership. It looks like their only option is to pass this programme off as delivering social housing or achieving social objectives. In the absence of any statutory definition of social housing we would have to fall back on the common use of the phrase, basically rental housing provided by the public sector to those who are unlikely to be adequately housed any other way. And this programme doesn't look anything like that.

 So, at first glance, it looks as though the limited partnership could mount a very strong case in court. And it would be very much worth their while to do so. My rough calculation is that they should be expecting somewhere in the region of $100m-$300m out of this programme. Funds a lot of litigation.

 I assume that the government are quietly holding private negotiations with the limited partnership. It would actually be to everyone's advantage if the two parties signed a single agreement with the partnership accepting an ex gratia payment in return for waiving their rights of first refusal over the land. The problem is that the government is in a weak position and the partnership will lose little by stringing the process along, hoping to achieve more.

Let's not disguise this as anything other than an asset sale. If the government was hoping to flood the market with new houses and drive general property prices down in Auckland it won't happen this way. Even if they get 10,000 dwellings out of this programme (extremely unlikely) that number is not big enough to make a noticeable difference. Besides which, if that was their goal, there are better and easier ways.

 The government is looking for two outcomes: lots of subdivision consents issued by Auckland Council within the next 15 months (30 September 2016), and, of course, a pile of cash to pour into the election year budget in 2017. Despite the upbeat press releases the Auckland Housing Accord is on track to be a failure. It is already over halfway and, although there was initial talk of building 39,000 dwellings during the Accord, the actual number will be closer to 25,000. The targets are pretty soft so the parties can include consents to subdivide and include the consented lots in the targets. At the moment the chances are high that they won't even meet the soft targets.

I haven't seen any detailed explanation of how the partnerships between the government and developers will work and this is where the fun really begins. We know that the government will sell their land to the developers before they are sold to the end buyers. There are four places in the process where that can take place:

1. when the subdivision design is complete but before an application for resource consent to subdivide is lodged

2. after the subdivision consent is granted but before siteworks begin

3. around the time siteworks are complete and the Council issues the Certificate of Completion

4. after titles are granted but before building begins

 The sweet spot for the government is at about the second point. If they are to get 10,000 lots consented before September 2016 they have to force the pace which they can only do if they are still the landowner. Administratively it is a lot easier to off-load the large blocks rather than lots of little titles also it ensures that the money is in the pot in time for Budget 2017.

 The sweet spot for the limited partnership is at stage 4. Whereas the value of the undeveloped land at the start will be roughly $100K per lot (1bn for the whole 500ha) by the time they are developed those sections will be worth somewhere between $300K and $400K (the current median price for a section in Auckland is $475K but let's assume these will all be below median sections). Even after taking out the cost of siteworks, financial and development contributions, legal costs, developers margins etc the raw land value will have increased to $200K-$300K. The fight will be how to divvy all those gains up between the government, the developers and the limited partnership. I would have thought that the limited partnership would be expecting about a 10% cut yielding anywhere between $100m and $300m. I imagine that extra is worth fighting for,

 If my guesses are close then the government has put itself in a delicate position. It actually can afford to give up a fair bit to the limited partnership. Whatever the government make off the land sales is kind of bonus money because it has never been factored into forward projections. But the political reality is that they will suffer some backlash if the amount of taxpayer money they "give away" to Maori is seen as excessive. But if they are to stuff the development pipeline quickly then they can't afford to let the process drag on.

It will fascinating to see how this plays out.

by Donald Ellis on June 14, 2015
Donald Ellis

How wrong could I be? Turns out the government have not bought off the local iwi and hapu. Andrew, your analysis is about to hit the limelights.

by Donald Ellis on June 15, 2015
Donald Ellis

And we are off to court. Yahooo!

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red cobra b

Indie developer Adversary game’s kickstarter campaign for their upcoming game Red Cobra, has an PS4 stretch goal.

Red Cobra is a Shmup/Metrovania hybrid with puzzle and exploration aspects in which you shoot, bomb, explore and solve puzzles in order to put an end to the evil organization G.R.I.P. and their campaign to rule the world.

red cobra 1

The evil organization G.R.I.P (Global Repression and Imprisonment Patrol) has begun occupying countries under the rule of tyranny and slavery. G.R.I.P has recently set their eye on a cluster of small countries to the west. These small countries have banded together and are simply called, the “Allied Nations”.

When the Allied Nations received lintel that G.R.I.P has become frustrated with the AN’s resistance and plans to launch a nuclear bomb, they sprang into preemptive action and launched a nuclear strike of their own. Operation Cobra would send a swell of ground and air forces to protect Goliath, the 300-man flying fortress that would drop the nuclear weapon of mass destruction over G.R.I.P’s nuclear launch facilities with hopes to end the invasion. When Goliath was shot down by G.R.I.P’s overwhelming forces, a small team was sent on a suicide mission to finish what Goliath had failed to do.

Their plan is to stay away from large battles while flying under the radar, in hopes of as little resistance as possible but enemy territory is uncharted and nobody knows what they will face behind the lines.

Due to the severity and urgency of the mission, Operation Cobra has been upgraded to Operation Red Cobra.

red cobra 2

Game mechanics and features:

The core of Red Cobra is shooting 360 degrees in a twin-stick fashion. Sprinkled throughout the game will be “Metroidvania” exploration levels as well as environmental and boss puzzles. Objects can be manipulated by picking them up, dropping them, or shooting them. Red Cobra will be heavy on environmental obstacles as well.

– 360 Degree Shooting
– Explore and Solve Puzzles
– Navigate Obstacles

red cobra 3

Check out the trailer below:

For more info about this beautiful game, follow Adversary Games on twitter or visit their kickstarter page if you want to back their project.

Verocious is our contributor from The Hague and is an avid gamer since the day his father bought his first computer. He grew up playing games like Wolfenstein 3d, Duke Nukem and Tomb Raider. Although he loves all kinds of genres, he’s not really familiar with JRPG and Sports games. His favourite of all time is The Last of Us, and has a big love for Indie games.

Follow me on twitter @Gamethusiast for the laster news on Playstation 4 and PS Vita.

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Sales Letter Creator Review

This is the Sales Letter Creator product report. My critiques have a set format, and this is how it breaks down.

  • Name, cost, web site as well as other important details in a single helpful at a glance box
  • Information on precisely where to purchase
  • The payment processor publishes stats on the product and I review them to assess its quality.
  • A community forum for discussion of the product with other people in the comments part of the review
  • A purchase bonus is one thing that must not be ignored. Find out what it is and exactly how you can get one.
Before diving into the assessment a quick note about “affiliate links”. They are labeled with . Read a little more about our hyperlink guidelines: right here.
Sales Letter Creator

Product Facts

Product Name: Sales Letter Creator
Standard Price: $47
Author: RobertPierson
Review Updated: 28th Sep 2010
Bonus Offered: Yes

Where to Buy

Allow me to start with reminding you that payments for this program are by means of a separate transaction processor called Clickbank. It’s them that make sure the 60 day refund promise is enforced. They host the transaction page, and will email you download details soon after payment. In order to go to the transaction page you must initially visit the Sales Letter Creator site over at It is the sole site that is offering the product. From that site search for the Add to cart link that will redirect you to the transaction page.

Publisher’s Description

A comprehensive software that gives you expert looking, high converting sales letters

  • Ready-made Testimonial & Money Back/Satisfaction Guarantee templates to choose from to build credibility
  • Simple help notes and guidance for each step to make it even faster to complete
  • A range of Pre-Written Introduction sentences to “hook” your reader
  • Pre-Written Proven Powerful Headlines To Choose From
  • Expert Written copy text templates

User Comment and Discussion

When considering investing in a product there’s nothing quite like listening to individuals in an equivalent situation to oneself. This is exactly why we have the user ratings area – to let you hear from folks exactly like you. Therefore if you’ve bought Sales Letter Creator please let us know what you think.

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Product Statistics and Assessment

Great – so there should now be zero uncertainties as to what precisely this program does. The next thought is – is it good or not?

To answer this we use stats. All the products we analyze use the exact same payment processor. They supply stats on all of the items they list. (Check out the about us post for more info on the manner in which we utilize statistics). The data give us two quality indications: buyer frenzy and buyer satisfaction.

The Buyer Satisfaction Rating

The buyer satisfaction rating for Sales Letter Creator comes out as 98.64/100 which is one of the top rankings on this website. These are people that obviously know how to keep their customers happy.

The Buyer Frenzy Rating

Buyer Frenzy Rating is actually a phrase I’ve created to help us rate the amount of interest there exists in a program. The higher the ‘frenzy’, the more customers are battling against each other in a hurry to buy this product. The larger the rush – the greater the quality of the program, or so the idea goes. Sales Letter Creator scores 72.21 which is just about standard – the frenzy amounts have not attained top levels quite yet.

The Bottom Line Well, we’ve gotten to the end of the assessment and it is time for me to add up all the disadvantages and benefits and provide the final verdict. This rating considers the satisfaction score, the frenzy rating, and I intend to update it based on the opinion of visitors here. It also takes into account the confidence I place in the product’s internet site and publisher. So, my final rating is 8.88/10. This is a top ranking – and this means a top-notch program. You ought to add it directly to the top of your list Nonetheless, although a stellar product you might still reap the benefits of looking at the best rated program on the site for its categories. So you may want to look at each category and discover if there’s a product that better satisfies your needs. Make sure you click on the subsequent hyperlinks:: E-business & E-marketing, E-commerce Operations

Sales Letter Creator Bonus

In the event you end up buying this product immediately after visiting their site by means of our link, we get commission from the supplier of the package. In turn, we wish to say thank you. To determine precisely how we do this, please click this link: Sales Letter Creator purchase extra.
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Watch Bunnyman putlocker

IMDB Rating: 2.9/10 from 791 votes
Release: 21 June 2011 (USA) /

Genre: Horror
Director: Carl Lindbergh,
Stars: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Synopsis: A couple of dimwitted teens get chased by a killer dressed in a bunny suit.

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Critic Reviews

The plot for this movie is simple a group of young morons are tormented by a maniac dressed in a bunny costume. The execution however is terrible.

If your one of those people who shout at the screen every time a character in a horror movie makes a bad decision prepare to scream yourself hoarse. This movie has possibly one of the most moronic group of characters I've ever witnessed. Every decision they make is either the wrong one or just plain stupid. Some choice examples. Never once taking the opportunity to overwhelm a single bad guy when they greatly out number them. Always running off and leaving their friends to die. But my favourite is when the Bunnyman has been chasing them in a truck and is trying to run them off the road they pull over and the Bunnyman pulls up behind them. What do they decide to do? Wait him out, both the truck and the car just sit there for what is portrayed as several hours. DUMB.

The Bunnyman is not alone though he has a pet hunchback chained up in his house. There is also a normal looking woman who has a rather mean streak connected to him. In what way we never find out is she the sister, the mother, who cares, I certainly didn't by this point. If your wondering what the Bunnyman looks like under that bunny head I'll tell you, disappointing.

The gore effects are few and far between pretty much everyone has a chainsaw (the Bunnymans' weapon of choice) shoved into their stomach. But you don't see it, you just see some blood spray up their face. All the kills are off screen so it doesn't even have that in it's favour.

The acting is pretty terrible but then so is the dialogue so you can't win. The sound is also annoying I found myself turning up the volume to hear the talking and then the chainsaw would start going or a car horn or some other irritating sound and it would be deafening.

The movie was a massive disappointment for me. I was expecting something like motel hell, but it was nothing like it. I wasted my money on this movie and the only comfort I can take is that the makers of the film probably didn't get their deposit back from the fancy dress shop they got the Bunnyman costume from.

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Watch Unfreedom putlocker

IMDB Rating: 6.9/10 from votes
Release: 29 May 2015 (USA) /

Genre: Uncategorized
Director: Damon J. Taylor,
Stars: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Synopsis: UNFREEDOM is an urgent contemporary thriller about a society torn apart by political, religious, and sexual turmoil. Shifting between New York and New Delhi, the film juxtaposes two powerful and unflinching stories about religious fundamentalism and intolerance, one of which follows a Muslim terrorist attempting to silence a liberal Muslim scholar, while the other is about a young woman who defies her devout father and escapes an arranged marriage because she is secretly embroiled in a taboo lesbian romance. In this searing portrait of the polarized world we live in, all four characters go to their absolute limit-and beyond-in their struggle to defend their deeply-held and conflicting viewpoints on freedom, faith, family and love.

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Critic Reviews

The Movie "Unfreedom" just awesome. All the characters were too good to be praised. really an awesome movie.This movie shows the real meaning of present day society.The movie shows enough of blood shades,and enough of sexuality. Yes! it is not a movie for a kid but it shows the dark side of our SOCIETY.Where we are restricted with limited amount of choices still called as INDEPENDENT. We are free to do anything say independent to do anything but.....with a limited choices..then how can one say that we are free...we are independent...A must watch movie.People must know the ugly truth of the society.The movie should be rated as an adult movie but shouldn't be banned...

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Thursday, December 29, 2011

Something to Truly Disrupt Higher Education

It's as if MIT is using Clayton Christensen's Disrupting Class as a blueprint.

James Marshall Crotty reporting … M.I.T. Game-Changer: Free Online Education For All
For Wall Street Occupiers or other decriers of the “social injustice” of college tuition, here’s a curveball bound to scramble your worldview: a totally free college education regardless of your academic performance or background. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.) will announce on Monday that they intend to launch an online learning initiative called M.I.T.x,which will offer the online teaching of M.I.T. courses free of charge to anyone in the world.

The program will not allow students to earn an M.I.T. degree. Instead, those who are able to exhibit a mastery of the subjects taught on the platform will receive an official certificate of completion. The certificate will obviously not carry the weight of a traditional M.I.T. diploma, but it will provide an incentive to finish the online material. According to the New York Times, in order to prevent confusion, the certificate will be a credential bearing the distinct name of a new not-for-profit body that will be created within M.I.T.

Students using the program will be able to communicate with their peers through student-to-student discussions, allowing them an opportunity to ask questions or simply brainstorm with others, while also being able to access online laboratories and self-assessments. In the future, students and faculty will be able to control which classes will be available on the system based on their interests, creating a personalized education setting.

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Tag Archives: RBSE 12th arts marksheet

Rajasthan Board 12th Arts Merit List 2015 Name Wise Results

Advertisement RBSE 12th Arts Stream Result 2015 Merit List, Rajasthan Board senior secondary Arts Result 2015, Rajasthan Board 12th Arts Mark sheet 2015, Rajasthan Board Amjer 12th name wise Result, RBSE 12th Arts Merit list 2015 Name Wise Search, www.rajresults.nic.in  Rajasthan Bard Of Secondary Education (RBSE) will going to announced 12th Arts Stream Result Today 01 June 2015 at 4 PM. Earlier… Read More »


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QPR Report Twitter Feed

Monday, August 29, 2011

QPR Report Monday Update: Transfer Gossip...(Reminder Transfer Window Closes 11:00 pm Wednesday)

See "On This Day, QPR Games" Including QPR in the Charity Shield against Manchester United!
- Play "Spot The Ball"
- Throughout the day, the QPR Report Messageboard has news updates, comments and perspectives - even links to other board comments of interest re QPR matters (on and off the field) along with football (and ONLY football) topics in general....Also Follow: QPR REPORT ON TWITTER

- Ron Phillips: QPR Club Secretary of the 1960s, 1970s, and early 1980s - and the man who designed the Checkered QPR Programme (and removed the apostrophe from Queen's Park Rangers!) Looks back

- Just to avoid any possible misunderstandings or errors: A reminder that the Transfer Window on Wednesday, August 31st, closes at 11:00 pm (Eleven O'clock) in the evening. NOT Midnight.
- See Premier League: "...The transfer window shuts at 23:00 (BST) on Wednesday 31st August..." Premier League

(As Neil Warnock said on Saturday: “I’m disappointed Luke [Young] wasn’t playing today,” said Warnock. “I worked three days to try and get it done only to find out we don’t know the rules and regulations at the club just yet.)

- Malaysian Players to QPR?

- Video: QPR Fan Interview With Neil Warnock: Subject: npower's What's Your Goal winner - Luke Harris

- Reminder: September 3rd is "Non-League Day"

- Wigan Match Reports and Comments

- Wigan's Goals vs QPR

DAILY MAIL/SAMI MOKBEL -QPR lead chase for Dann after Liverpool and Arsenal pull back from Blues defender
Scott Dann has been offered to QPR after Liverpool and Arsenal declined to follow up their interest.

Liverpool are set to seal an £8million move for Uruguay international Sebastian Coates, while Dann is only viewed as a contingency plan by Wenger should moves for Phil Jagielka, Gary Cahill, Chris Samba and Per Mertesacker fail to materialise.
QPR now have the financial backing of Tony Fernandes while Birmingham are desperate to offload high earner Dann before the transfer window closes. Daily Mail

MIRROR - Warnock hands trial to Burkina Faso striker "QPR boss Neil Warnock is giving a trial to Burkina Faso striker Habib Bamogo" Mirror

Guardian/Alam Kham

QPR need Joey Barton to deliver after Wigan defeat, says Neil Warnock

• QPR hope to sign 'old pal' Shaun Wright-Phillips
• Franco Di Santo hits double for Latics

Many deemed it too much of a risk but Neil Warnock, the Queens Park Rangers manager, had no hesitation in signing Joseph Anthony Barton. Four years ago Warnock planned to spend £4m on the midfield player if Sheffield United had not controversially lost their place in the Premier League.

And despite Barton's "baggage" – past indiscretions that include a six-month jail sentence for assault and affray – Warnock has already noticed him trying to help QPR while yet to kick a ball for them.

Having also signed Luke Young, the Aston Villa full-back, QPR are now trying to land Shaun Wright-Phillips. A fee has been agreed with Manchester City for the winger and Warnock said: "I think the big draw for Shaun is going back to London and we have to try to convince him. I think Joey has spoken to him – they were room-mates when they were at Man City so that might help.

"I want to go everywhere in the Premier League and know that my team has got a chance. To get four or five quality players in an already decent squad – we know we will have [a chance]."

QPR's cause will be helped by Young and Barton, who Warnock is convinced would have been an England regular and at a top-four club but for his off-field problems. He added: "I think when he looks back a lot of what's happened, he will regret. But I've said and done a few things and when I look back, it was a bit silly. You have to learn from that. Joey wouldn't be signing for us if he hadn't got some baggage, but I don't worry about that."

The acquisition of Barton on a free transfer from Newcastle may even prove to be the bargain of the season, according to Paddy Kenny. The QPR goalkeeper said: "People have to give him a chance. You know what you are going to get from Joey, a 110% every week, and that's what we need."

Yet keeping Barton out of trouble may prove to be an equally challenging task for Warnock as keeping QPR in the Premier League; that task highlighted by Saturday's disappointing defeat against the perennial strugglers of Wigan. Two goals from Franco Di Santo settled the outcome but Rangers struck the woodwork three times, twice through Adel Taarabt, before Bruno Perone headed against the crossbar.

Roberto Martínez, the Wigan manager, was relieved, in more ways than one. While Argentinian players have generally flourished at neighbouring clubs, the Spaniard has not been as fortunate.

Mauro Boselli arrived for £6m from Estudiantes and returned to them on loan in the summer with a sole Carling Cup goal to his name for the Latics. And Di Santo has been similarly profligate, but mention of his goalscoring record – now four in three years – irks Martínez.

"I have seen articles that judge him on his scoring records at previous clubs and I think that is unfair. We know the potential Franco has," he said. "He has good decision-making, he knows when to bring players into the game, when to use his strength, when to take people on – his decisions were really mature [against QPR]. Now it's about being consistent." Guardian

TELEGRAPH/Ian Whittell
Franco Di Santo set about correcting his embarrassing career goals return tally although even his two efforts, and three points for Wigan Athletic, could do little to dampen the unbridled enthusiasm currently coursing throughout Queens Park Rangers.

Manager Neil Warnock praised the efforts of his depleted team while simultaneously criticising his club’s administrative department for failing to push through the registration of Aston Villa full-back Luke Young in time for him to make his debut at the DW Stadium.

However, it was the pending arrival of Newcastle midfielder Joey Barton, watching from the stands as his side lost for the second time in three games to date this season, that filled Warnock with most optimism.

“I’m disappointed Luke wasn’t playing today,” said Warnock. “I worked three days to try and get it done only to find out we don’t know the rules and regulations at the club just yet.

“I didn’t think we’d get Joey. I’m amazed one of the bigger clubs hasn’t had a gamble on him. If he concentrates on his football, I don’t think there is much better around in this country. At 1-0 today, you needed somebody to grab people by the throat – in a nice way! – and say, 'Let’s go’.”

Warnock was also swift to point out that Di Santo’s two goals had taken deflections, adding: “If you were Di Santo, you’d fill in a lottery ticket tonight, wouldn’t you?”

He also alluded to the fact that his side hit the woodwork three times. Twice, they hit the post via amazing pieces of skill from Adel Taarabt before a Bruno Perone header was kept out by the bar.

Unfortunately, they also encountered a Di Santo who finally found the route to the goal after scoring just once in a little under a calendar year with the club. In the 40th minute, he exchanged passes with Hugo Rodallega before teeing up the ball to volley into the right-hand corner of the goal.

Then, midway through the second half, as Perone half-cleared Emmerson Boyce’s cross directly to him on the edge of the area, Di Santo was allowed to take his time before curling a perfect finish into the top corner of the goal via a deflection off the unfortunate Perone.

“Sometimes I feel we have been a bit unfair to assess Franco,” said Wigan manager Roberto Martinez. “He came to Wigan at a young age, he is still only 22 and has had very few experiences. The way he works, the way he understands the game, now he has the rewards he deserves. He has a long way to go to fulfil his potential but he has everything. This could be a springboard for him. To see him smiling and celebrating his goals was a worthwhile feeling.” Telegraph

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The WHO patient safety curriculum guide for medical schools

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  • Quality lines
    David P Stevens


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Assessing content validity and user perspectives on the Team Check-up Tool: expert survey and user focus groups
  1. Jill A Marsteller1,2,
  2. Yea-Jen Hsu1,
  3. Kitty S Chan1,
  4. Lisa H Lubomski2
  1. 1Department of Health Policy and Management, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
  2. 2Johns Hopkins Medicine Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
  1. Correspondence to Dr Jill A Marsteller, Health Policy and Management, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, 624 North Broadway, Room 433 Baltimore, MD 21205, USA; jmarste2{at}

Objective This study assesses content validity and user feedback on the Team Check-up Tool (TCT), an instrument used for measuring dynamic context of quality improvement (QI) teams and their implementation of QI activities.

Methods We conducted two focus groups and one larger feedback session with TCT users to assess feasibility, importance of areas of inquiry and barriers to use. A panel of eight QI experts evaluated the item-by-item content (content validity) of TCT by rating the relevance of each item to implementation success. We calculated item-level and scale-level content validity using the content validity index (CVI).

Results Scale-level CVI was 0.872. Highly rated items included implementation of recommended interventions, educational activities, team review of performance data, team sharing of performance data with staff and specific barriers to progress. Four items were rated relatively low: presentation of performance data to the hospital/health system board; manner of provision of feedback of data to staff; to what other units the team attempted to spread and turnover of QI team members. Items identified in user focus groups as important included whether there were events distracting staff from the initiative, number of team meetings and turnover of QI team members. Focus groups also identified barriers to the completion of the tool, including lack of feedback and response fatigue during stable activity periods.

Conclusion The findings support the conclusion that the TCT measures meaningful areas of context and implementation in team-based QI initiatives, particularly intervention activity tracking, review and sharing of performance data and team progress barriers. We offer a modified instrument with a framework for real-time measurement of important elements of implementation and context of QI teams based on the findings.

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8:14 p.m. | Updated MySpace, the long-suffering Web site that the News Corporation bought six years ago for $580 million, was sold Wednesday to the advertising network Specific Media for roughly $35 million.

The News Corporation, which is controlled by Rupert Murdoch, had been trying since last winter to rid itself of the unprofitable unit, which was a casualty of changing tastes and may be a cautionary tale for social companies like Zynga and LinkedIn that are currently enjoying sky-high valuations.

Relief over the sale was palpable on Wednesday, and not just at the News Corporation. Wall Street ''just wanted it done, because it's been a real drag on growth,'' said Michael Nathanson, a media sector analyst for Nomura Securities.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but the News Corporation said that it would retain a minority stake. Specific Media said it had brought on board the artist Justin Timberlake as a part owner and an active player in MySpace's future, but said little else about how the site would change.

The sale closes a complex chapter in the history of the Internet and of the News Corporation, which was widely envied by other media companies when it acquired MySpace in 2005. At that time, MySpace was the world's fastest-growing social network, with 20 million unique visitors each month in the United States. That figure soon soared to 70 million, but the network could not keep pace with Facebook, which overtook MySpace two years ago.

As users fled MySpace, so, too, did advertisers. The market research firm eMarketer estimates that the site will earn about $183 million in worldwide ad revenue this year, down from $605 million at its peak, when the site introduced many Web users and many advertisers to the concept of social networking.

''It's a shame that MySpace's value has diminished so severely since the acquisition; MySpace's pioneering of social networking (now referred to as social media) will always be revered as igniting a new medium,'' Richard Rosenblatt, the chairman of MySpace at the time of the sale to the News Corporation, said in an e-mail.

Instead of envy, the News Corporation's bet on MySpace now provokes punch lines. Tom Freston, who was fired as the chief executive of Viacom in part for failing to buy MySpace, joked in an interview with CNBC earlier this year that ''I'm still waiting for a thank-you note'' from the Viacom chairman, Sumner M. Redstone.

Mr. Freston, who was in Iceland on Wednesday and said he was smiling at the news of an impending MySpace sale, declined to comment.

News Corporation executives declined interview requests on Wednesday.

It is not clear whether MySpace itself was profitable for the company. The division that houses MySpace and other digital properties has turned a profit only once in the last six years. An advertising deal with Google helped the company to recoup what it spent on MySpace in the first place, but the site became a burden on the company's earnings; by last year executives were calling the losses unacceptable. Mr. Nathanson called the site a ''headache.''

What doomed the site? Lee Brenner, the former director of MySpace's Impact section who is now the publisher of HyperVocal, wrote in a blog post Tuesday, ''I'm sure most employees (former or current) will argue that it was poor management, or a need to hit revenue targets once News Corp. took over, or a bottleneck in the technology department, or lack of resources given to their division, or a poor public relations effort, etc., that set the course of MySpace's downfall.

''Any number of these could be true,'' he continued. ''I suppose we'll never know for sure. It is most likely a combination of these factors, along with a 'low attention span' public. It probably didn't help to be doing business, and trying to grow, along with all of these issues, in the midst of a global economic crisis.''

MySpace has tried to reboot itself several times, most recently as a social destination for music, movies and other media. It has not been abandoned altogether: it still has 35 million visitors a month in the United States, according to the measurement company comScore. Facebook has 157 million visitors a month in the United States.

''It's still one of the biggest pockets of traffic on the Internet, for the price,'' said a former MySpace executive who insisted on anonymity to maintain friendships and business relationships with the News Corporation.

Mr. Timberlake said in a statement about the sale that MySpace still had the potential to be the place on the Web where ''fans can go to interact with their favorite entertainers, listen to music, watch videos, share and discover cool stuff and just connect.''

Many of the current and former MySpace users who reacted to Wednesday's sale thought differently. Many compared MySpace to Friendster, a social network that was left for dead years ago.

In preparation for the change in ownership, many of MySpace's roughly 400 employees were dismissed on Wednesday. Mike Jones, the Web site's chief executive, said in an internal memorandum that he would depart in the next two months.

''Today should be a day,'' Sean Percival, a vice president at MySpace, wrote on Twitter Wednesday morning, before the sale announcement.

He followed up later in the day, telling his online followers that Wednesday would be his last day at the company. Seemingly referring to the site's rise and fall, he wrote: ''It was a unique moment in time and an impossible problem to solve. Was proud to be a part of it.''

This is a more complete version of the story than the one that appeared in print.

PHOTO: The News Corporation, controlled by Rupert Murdoch, bought MySpace in 2005. (POOL PHOTO BY BEN GURR) (B8)


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Friday, February 13, 2009

dNYel's Big Day

dNYel's big day has finally come to an end. All the running around the past few weeks and the last spurt of frenzied activity over the past few days have come to quite a satisfactory conclusion, and I can finally look at this weekend with only "dinner" pencilled onto the calendar.

We themed Get Ed! day to focus on the mass media industry. We roped in speakers and guests from the press (broadcast and print), media academics (local and foreign), a local activist blogger, a psych, the Authorities, and a couple of other media interest groups to discuss industry issues in "breakout sessions" with the whole college. A local talk radio station set up a forum in LT3 to chat about "advertising", broadcast 'live' on air; while on our part I was thoroughly impressed with Madam A who ran with my idea for her to host a talk show (I once had a convincing vision of her as a talk show host and I spoke aloud about it) and she went whole hog, interviewing the queen of TV talk shows, Diana S, herself, on the "Terror Blanks Show" which she hosted in LT2.

Me, I got my own shot as Jeopardy! host, sans Sean Connery and his shenanigans, fortunately.

Why am I writing so much detail? 'cos I've been tasked to do a write-up of the event's more innovative aspects for Kevin's committee, and I need to remind myself who to interview for their side of the story.

In what was to become a very long day, we had reps from the three Universities' admissions boards to discuss entry requirements with the kids and their parents in the evening. We are very gratified that the Unis themselves have spoken on the issue that good grades are definitely not enough to guarantee entry. Rather, applicants need qualifying grades but must "stand out from the crowd" through their personalities, their activities outside of the curriculum, and their general and current affairs knowledge in one or more interviews with the Unis they are applying to.

This is good to hear because this is exactly what our GP programme aims to train the kids in. We feel much more validated now.

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Setting up for Jeopardy!

Ladies and gentlemen, this is... Jeopardy! And tomorrow is your's truly's big debut as a game show host for the JC1s. I consider yesterday's run with the JC2s as just a rehearsal.

This afternoon, we set up LT1 with CL's electric buzzer and scoreboard system, so the place really looks like a skeletal version of a TV studio set. Well, perhaps like one in some developing nation with an ambition to explore high technology in its near future, anyway.

Coincidentally, I found the above video clip about how TV's Jeopardy! has changed over the years. LT1 today is a hybrid of ancient marker-pen and current networked technologies. It's a little Frankenstein monster I can proudly call my own -- at least until the real Jeopardy! lawyers come a-callin'. Bwa ha ha!

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Sums up the week

I began an email I sent today as follows:
"One thing I love about my job is the constant practice in juggling conflicting requirements and coming up with desperate, if not creative solutions to keep the show running. And I always thought I was never any good at improv."

That kinda' sums up the week I'm having. And it's only Tuesday.

Sunday, February 08, 2009

The robots are coming!

This is typical cat behaviour. 1st, check to see if the newcomer is at all a) edible, or b) bully-able.

Maui gets a new playmate, and the playmate collects a new toy.

After some getting used to each other, Maui and the Roomba are new best friends.

May picked up a Roomba for us on her travels. With all the fur, fluff and whatnot sloughing off our pets, and forming a daily layer of sediment on the floorboards, we simply cannot spare the time to keep our place neatly vacuumed all the time.

Solution: let a robot from iRobot do it for us while we're out at work so that the house is pristine by the time we come home. Enter the Roomba 560, electronic self-directed dustbuster extraordinaire! Battery-operated, it circles our floor and sucks up all the pets' sheddings. When it gets low on power it automatically docks itself with its charging bay for a nom, and then it's ready to go again, if that's what we want.

May gave it an initial charging while in the US, and on that single charge it performed quite a satisfactory job in our living and dining rooms. But to charge it again, Tong will be helping us to find an adaptor that can tansform our current (240V) to a voltage its American tastes are more accustomed to (110V). Until then, its initial charge expended, it's temporarily dormant while it awaits its next meal.

The Roomba isn't capable of miracles, though. It's a lot faster to do our vacuuming manually, and it misses the occasional spot, but that could be perhaps due to Maui messing with its operations as he tries to play with his new friend. But since we expect it to be working while we're out, it should be able to get most of the floor clean by the time we get back. For us, that's good enough.

Cool! My 1st Robot.


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Saturday, January 25, 2014

That's a good one...

Anyone reading what Ed Balls is promising the UK public on creating a surplus from the current deficit ought to be reminded of a previous Labour saying as let slip by a barrister acting on their behalf. @Manifesto promises are not subject to legitimate expectations.'
Shadow chancellor Ed Balls makes "binding fiscal commitment" if the Labour Party wins next year’s general election
Labour has given a deadline on when it would eliminate Britain’s budget deficit.
Ed Balls will say in a speech on Saturday that the party will clear the £86  billion deficit in current budget spending by 2020 if it wins the next general election.
The shadow chancellor will make a “binding fiscal commitment” that a Labour government will balance the books as soon as possible after 2015 and by May 2020 at the latest.
It is the first time that Mr Balls has given a deadline on eliminating the deficit, which is forecast to be £51.4 billion at next year’s election.
George Osborne, the Chancellor, has committed by 2017-18 to eliminating the current account deficit, the shortfall between government tax revenue and spending on services. Labour is carrying out a “zero-based review of public spending” to root out waste and inefficiency “by examining every pound spent by government from the bottom up”.
Apart from the fact that no politician can possible imagine what's round the corner you do have to laugh at a Labour politician going on about spending as they are very much not their own masters when it comes to budgets. The minute the pinch hits their union masters, the minute the purse strings and borrowing will go through the roof. Ed Balls is a time served follower of the socialist magic money tree philosophy of economics where if money is required, taxes and borrowing go up and keep going up as the various pet projects of the comrades keep getting piled onto the bonfire of vanities. Sure there's a place for looking after those who are struggling, but Labour take it upon themselves to not only gild the lily, but to cover it in an inch of 22 carat gold.
To put it simply, politicians in general and Labour specifically simply don't have the common sense to stick to their word and apply sound financial sense to the countries finances.
So giving us a budget surplus Labour style is probably a figment of Ed Balls imagination and about as likely as five beans growing into a giant beanstalk...

3 annotations:

Kath lissenden said...

Ed Balls lives in la la land where he consorts with Dipsy Tinkywinkey and Po, The man has as much common sense as brick and is as likely to keep a promise as I am to become queen of England.
In short the last Labour government were the most squanderous wasteful and useless bunch of economists ever.
Gordon Brown the self styled "hero of economics" was probably the most delusional and dangerous man in economic history, encouraging people to spend money they did not have and had no hope of ever repaying. Why in god's name would anyone believe this load of old trip being spouted by Ed Balls. I wonder if all labour politicians are taking some delusion inducing substances given the trail of rubbish they have been issuing lately.
It is quite amusing that given their alleged attempts at breaking the bonds of the unions they are still spouting this garbage. Anyone with an iota of common sense can see through this ruse, the trouble is Blurgh and Brown ensured common sense was killed off during their time in office and so we are stuck with a generation of idiots who believe this political gerrymandering.

Mr. Morden said...

He is only going to 'balance' the budget FFS. What about paying off the National Debt and all those PFI schemes that Labour indulged kept off the Books. Scandalous !

I could balance the budget now ! Stop giving other countries our money. Stop paying fake charity taxpayers money. Stop giving money to both Scotland, Ireland and Wales. Leave the EU and stop giving them our money. Stop health tourism.

I could go on. Its not difficult once you start. If you look after the pennies, the pounds tend to look after themselves.

Oh, and one of the words used to 'Prove that I am not a robot' is, Fiscal.

Funny that !

john in cheshire said...

It's a symptom of the ingrained corruption of the labour party that Mr Balls is still playing a prominent role in the shadow cabinet. After what he is associated with, during the 13 disastrous labour years, any normal party would have consigned him to the back benches, if not expelled him from the party.


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Video: V-LOG no.2

My second video blog (VLOG) — a recap of my recent trip to NYC. I'm really loving making these, if only they didn't take FOREVER to edit. Check me out above, and don't forget to subscribe to QFascinatingTV! Sorry it's so long, but it's worth it, I promise.

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Wednesday, 11 May 2011

Adventures in GNOME3 Land

Over the past few weekends I've been trying out GNOME3 via the Fedora 15 Beta. I've already read many a blog post in opposition to various things, so I was not overly surprised when I tried it out. Fortunately, I have a pretty boring setup because I only tested on my desktop, meaning I didn't have to worry about external monitors or suspending.

In fact, with respect to working with the whole thing, it wasn't a terrible experience. Granted, I made a couple tweaks right off the bat since I knew about them. I still like my menus and buttons with icons, and the default hinting is terrible on an LCD. I didn't really care about the min/max buttons though.

Because I've been using Compiz and not Metacity, the transition to Mutter and GNOME Shell was pretty easy. One thing I miss is the "Put" plugin, which allowed moving a non-maximized window to any of 9 positions on the screen using the keypad. And the window switching is a bit boring now.

I even reported a bug or two. These are pretty minor, but everyone's reported the major problems by now, I'm sure. It's the little things that people are going to pick out anyway (like the uncanny valley in robotics/CGI.) Overall, I found the experience pleasant, except for two somewhat annoying problems.

Firstly, the default theme is, well... I was going to say terrible, but on second look, it's not that bad, but still not to my taste. To be honest, I've never been crazy about dark themes. But this theme is some weird conglomerate of dark and light that doesn't mesh well at all. The icons are either black and white (I'm not colour blind!) or sometimes washed out. Take, for example, gedit in the screenshot below. Odd transition from menubar to toolbar, the disabled icons/text are hard to see... It just doesn't look good to me.

Secondly, GNOME3 has koumpounophobia. That's a fear of buttons, for those who don't know (not that I did, and it most likely refers to clothing, really.) I don't live in crazy 1990s Mac land; all my mouse have at least two buttons. My desktop mouse identifies itself as having 12 buttons! (though half are for scrolling, technically) Yet for some unknown reason, right-clicking is totally useless on GNOME Shell. You can't right-click any of the applets on the top panel. It's more likely people will right-click it than hold down Alt as a guess, but that "Shut Down" item is hidden behind the "Suspend" item with an Alt-key. A little lower in the stack, GTK+3 decided to drop scroll-on-notebook-changes-tabs. What's even more annoying is if you have a GTK+2 app, it will scroll nicely, but the "new" apps don't. Unless you try in gnome-terminal, where they implemented it themselves. Inconsistency is never good.

So this Fedora 15 Beta is on a separate external drive. I'm not sure if I'll be upgrading straight away once F15 goes gold. I certainly need to find a real theme first, and I suspect when it's released, there'll be a lot more people with criticism that may nudge things along (as opposed to some knee-jerk reactions by a few early-adopters).

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Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. Volume 1.
Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865.

Resolution Introduced in Illinois Legislature Concerning Teachers' Examinations [1]

[December 2, 1840]

Resolved, that the Committee on Education be instructed to enquire into the expediency of providing by law for the examination,Page  214 as to their qualifications, of persons offering themselves as School-teachers, and that no teacher shall receive any part of the Public School Funds, who shall not have successfully passed such examination; and that they report by Bill or otherwise.

[1]   AD, I-Ar. Several attempts to amend failed, and the resolution was adopted as written. This became Section 81 of the act organizing and maintaining common schools as ultimately passed. (See Laws of Illinois, 1841, pp. 259-87.)


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Compare A Metal Quonset Hut vs A Wood Building – Now that you have you Quonset Hut quote, see what a similar wood garage built by a local contrator will cost. Then compare which one is cheaper and which one is right for your situation. There is no cost and no obligation with getting these price quotes!

The secret with building a garage on your lot is having the right contractor. Building a new attached or detached garage is a big decision and should not me made in without studying the facts. Get as many garage quotes as possible from local garage contractors. Check their references online and make your decision. Consider all the information and have the decisions made prior to starting. Wood Garage Price Quotes


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Best Vehicle Transport Companies Sunol CA

Auto Shipping Calculator

It is advisable that in addition to getting a condition report document from your car mover detailing any pre-existing damage to your car, that you take photographs of the vehicle, date the pictures, and attach them to the condition report provided by the automobile mover for your records. You should have a in-depth description of the condition of your cars and truck prior to shipping. The condition report or other file utilized by the car mover need to consist of present mileage, pre-existing damage of any type consisting of as glass, scratches, paint, damages, and so on. This report is necessary in case any disputes arise.

How to Ship a Vehicle from Sunol CA

Automobile transport business use good rates and great services to get your automobile shipped to your brand-new destination. They are just one option to pick from when your go to move your lorry. There are a number of other transport choices available to you.

Among the automobile transport alternatives are self transport. This is where you lease a trailer to move your lorry all on your own. You will need to have the time readily available to do this. And it could be expensive depending on the range of your destination. If you select in this manner of car transportation ensure you can navigate the trailer alright. This is a good way to transfer your car if you like driving. Train transportation is another alternative for shipping your car. Your automobile can be delivered on a train and after that you can travel with it on the train. The train will accept automobiles such as vehicles, bikes and vans. These are simply a couple alternatives that are available to you.

Vehicle Transportation Rates in CA

Many individuals shop for utilized cars and trucks and trucks online today, particularly when they are looking for a specialized lorry. There are wonderful deals online, plus many websites offer fantastic opportunities to search thousands of cars. Once you find what you are trying to find, how do you arrange to have it provided?

Car shipping is simply the method of carrying your car from point A to point B. As consumers, there are a couple of things that are essential when picking someone who is going to deliver your car. Initially, when considering car shipping, the cost to ship is very important. Is their price competitive and reasonable? Second, you need to know if the business has a good quality and safety record. Will the methods they utilize for delivering my vehicle ensure me that my lorry will arrive safely and in one piece at the destination? Lastly, it is important to consider punctuality when considering a car shipping company. Will my automobile get here when it was guaranteed to get here?

How to ship a vehicle to CA

Most all automobile transport companies will offer estimate to their consumers. People typically get many quotes from different business and then compare them to choose which one will be the least pricey and still provide the service that they will require. The internet is a great place to get estimate for automobile transportation companies. There are lots of business on the internet that you can compare quotes with. When people get price quotes from automobile transportation business these are a few of the concerns that they might stumble upon.

Cheapest Truck Ship Companies

The distance where your car will be delivered plays a big factor in just how much shipping will cost. Sometimes it is cheaper if your automobile is being shipped a longer range then reduce one. The range in which your car will be carried will play a big consider the shipping price.

Another thing that is thought about when figuring out a car transport quote is the kind of cars and truck you have that is being carried. In some cases if you are delivering a classic automobile that may need a unique kind of delivering it will be different then if you are just delivering a vehicle that needs the regular transportation service. A classic, antique or exotic car might cost more to deliver then the typical cars and truck would.

How do I Transport a Vehicle by boat California

Some shipping companies are only domestic. Other carriers handle global nations. When looking for a cars and truck shipping business, you must consider from where you will begin and what your destination will be. What does it cost? experience does the business have in shipping to that destination?

I have learned the hard way about which questions to ask when delivering a cars and truck or other vehicle internationally. My experience taught me that there is a lot to learn before committing to a particular cars and truck shipping business. The costs to deliver your vehicle will be substantially more than shipping locally. Also, when delivering internationally, you need to have clear title to the car in order to get the automobile through custom-mades with both the outbound and inbound countries.

What is an auto transport?

You need to offer details of all these things to your automobile transport company in order to get a correct price quote for delivering your vehicle. Don’t leave out any details that you can believe might be very important for shipping your cars and truck. The more details that you can offer to the vehicle transport business the better and more accurate price quote you will get.

And this likewise lets the vehicle transportation business understand what kind of shipment you require for your car and the services that you have to fit your car shipping needs.

How much does it cost to transport a Vehicle from the UK to the US?

  Keeping in mind that the entire process can take quite a while, particularly on fars away, schedule your auto shipping a minimum of 4 weeks prior to you move, providing adequate time to arrange for a automobile mover carrier to get your vehicle. Generally, the more advance time the much better. If you are not offered, you should set up an alternative authorized party such as next-door neighbor, good friend or relative you can trust to transfer the vehicle to the car mover. A lot of auto shippers provide door-to-door service.


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Eventing / Jumping Simulator

Racewood have launched their

The JUMPING SIMULATOR is the first of a new generation of fully programmable interactive horse simulators.

The JUMPING SIMULATOR can: WALK, TROT, CANTER, GALLOP and JUMP... It can also refuse a jump, and/or fall, if required. (This is a programmable option).

It can perform: CROSS COUNTRY (at different levels) and SHOW JUMPING.

The Simulator has realistic movements in all gaits. The body, neck and head move independently and the different jumping actions are as close as you can get to the real thing.

The Simulator gathers information from the pressure sensors for the:

  • Reins
  • Stirrups
  • Neck
  • Saddle
  • Legs

These are used to control the movement of the horse by steering around the course. Pressure on the reins controls the cantering pace of the horse when approaching the jump. The reins can also slow down or halt the horse at any time. The interactive screen displays ongoing feedback to the rider.

The pressure on the left and right stirrups is measured continually throughout the ride. The on-screen feedback tells the rider if he or she is correctly balanced when jumping.

The display on the screen will show how much the rider uses the neck for balance whilst jumping.

These sensors provide feedback on the rider's weight and balance when seated.

Pressure from the legs is used to make the horse walk, trot and canter. Racewood welcome all potential customers to come and try out the new Racewood Horse Jumping Simulator "the first of its kind in the world".


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01 Aug

Inspiration: Encontro das Águas at the Olympic Sculpture Park

I had a lovely time hanging out in Seattle last week with Boris and friends. It’s been a long time since I’ve been there without a specific event, so for this visit I made a point of getting out for an arts and culture fix every day. One of our adventures was visiting the Olympic Sculpture Park, which I’d last been to years ago with Hendrik.

My favourite piece was a stunning mural hand-drawn by artist Sandra Cinto, and a crew of volunteers. It doesn’t come across in the photos but the whole thing is actually silver. It’s a beautiful, highly intricate drawing that made me want to run off and cut paper to emulate some of the line work of the waves.

Encontro das Águas mural

Encontro das Águas mural

This behind-the-scenes video reveals some of the in-progress drawing of the mural done by Cinto and her volunteers. She also talks in detail about what inspired the piece.

The collaborative aspect of the creation of the mural makes me love the artwork even more. I’m also viewing silver markers in a whole new exciting way.

© Rachael Ashe


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Wednesday, January 21, 2009

A recipe for marshmallow squares

Homemade Marshmallow Squares

1 cup cold water, divided

3 - 1/4 ounce envelopes unflavored gelatin

2 cups sugar

1 cup corn syrup

1/4 teaspoon salt

A dash of vanilla extract, or any other extracts you'd like to try!

Mix 1/2 cup cold water and the gelatin packets in an electric mixer until blended. Let stand while you make the syrup.

Pour 1/2 c cold water, 1 c corn syrup, and 2 cups sugar into a pan. Bring to a boil, but do not stir! Boil the syrup until it reaches 240 degrees on a candy thermometer, or until it is to "medium pull" consistency (when you make a ball out of a little of the syrup in ice water, and it is firm to push, but not stiff).

Turn on your electric mixer with the gelatin. Gradually pour the hot syrup into the bowl. Whip the syrup and the gelatin until it is the consistency of marshmallow creme.

Stir in the flavoring(s) you have chosen. You can also add food coloring if you would like.

Pour into a greased 9X13 pan, or into two square cake pans (8X8). Refrigerate until firm. When you cut them into squares, dip the knife in cold water first so the marshmallows don't stick.

You can roll the marshmallow squares in chocolate sprinkles, chopped nuts, toasted coconut, or any other toppings you can think of. I haven't tried them in S'mores, but I'm sure they'd be delicious!

Monday, January 19, 2009

A trip home!

We spent the weekend in Oregon with my family. It was really nice to see them. The pictures below are of my little sister, Anna. Yesterday, we made homemade marshmallows. Anna is the sugar queen. We ate half the pan yesterday, and we have about 1/4 left today. They sure tasted good!

Anna showing off her sticky hands and face.

Licking the bowl.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Today, we got a dishwasher. We found it on Craigslist used, and it was only $125. And it's full-sized, so I can put anything in it. According to the previous owners, it works great. I was sooooo so excited when I came home and Peter had set it all up. Washing dishes by hand is my very least favorite chore. And Peter never has time, so usually I do them or we have a huge pile next to the sink. Now washing the dishes will be easy! We have yet to try it out, so maybe I won't like it anymore, if it leaks all over the floor or something. But for now, I am THRILLED!

Monday, January 12, 2009

An update

Well everybody I have seen this past week has asked me how Peter's scholarship thing turned out. It just got mostly resolved today. Peter's scholarships came back online, and tuition is taken care of, and he will submit an appeal for the grant. If it doesn't come back, life will go on. At least the scholarships came back.

I don't remember if I posted this or not, but they also took away his grant from last semester and posted on his account that he had to repay it. Thankfully, that was just the result of a computer error and is or will soon no longer say that we owe it back.

We are very blessed!

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

An advertisement

This recently appeared on the side of my facebook:

Info on Your Husband.
Find anyone in the USA. Search billions of records in seconds.
Try it for free. Get info on real age, address, relatives.

Is that not the weirdest advertisement ever? I sure hope that I know my husband's real age, address, and at least some of his relatives. I would especially hope I knew them BEFORE I got married. Crazy. I can't believe they thought that would be an effective headline.

Although, if any of you people are wondering if you've been lied to all these years (or months, as the case may be), I found your website.

Monday, January 5, 2009

First day of school

Today was, unfortunately, our first day back at school. We both could have used another month or so of break, but no such luck. We had lots of fun spending time with family and friends, and wished we could have done more!

Last night, Peter discovered that his scholarship and grant money had all been taken away from his account, and he had a notice saying he no longer qualified, and he had a hold on his registration so he couldn't switch into the classes he wanted to take. Plus, when you are late to pay tuition (as he now was, because when we checked it a week ago the scholarships had paid it all) they report you to the credit agency. It made for a very stressful night and morning.

Turns out Peter can appeal to get his money back. He had taken too many credits, but because he is a double major the chances of a successful appeal are pretty good (we hope!)

My day was fine. My classes today were really easy and I think they will be fun. I had orchestra again for the first time in a year and a half. I have missed playing my viola, so it will be really fun to have a reason to play regularly again.

Hopefully the rest of the semester goes smoothly!


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Friday, October 26, 2012

A photo shoot

My fabulous sister-in-law Elyse took Lydia's pictures just before she turned 1 month, and they came out fantastic! You can find her on facebook as Elyse Alexandria Photography. Here are a few of my favorites.

This first one isn't Lydia, and it wasn't taken by Elyse. But here I am at 1 week old...

And here is Lydia in the same outfit on the same blanket. Except on her, it was more of a shirt than a dress.

Monday, October 22, 2012

Cloth Diapers

I wanted to try cloth diapers for Lydia after hearing several friends rave about how much they like them. The main attraction for me was the statement that cloth diapers don't leak as badly as disposables do. This was after a period of me getting pooped on by several different babies (and before Lydia was born). And then the whole save money, create less waste deal was an added plus. Well. Cloth diapers are fine, but after Lydia outgrows hers I'm not planning to buy more. As far as I'm concerned, their biggest advantage is that they are WAY cuter than disposables. They do seem to leak less, but not enough to really make a difference. My biggest complaint about them is how often Lydia has to be changed when she wears them. I frequently have to change her after 30 minutes if she's in cloth because she gets uncomfortable being wet & cries. I try to change her frequently no matter what kind of diaper she's in, but every 30 minutes is more often than I want to change diapers. I don't know what they do to disposables to help babies feel dry, but whatever it is it's magical. If anyone has a solution to this problem, I'd love to try it. Otherwise, we'll be sticking to disposables in future.

Monday, October 15, 2012

Back again...hopefully

Hi everyone. I have attempted to write several posts since my last one in April, but I always end up agonizing over what I write, saving it with the intent to "come back later" and finish it, and then never doing it. So my new goal is to take 5 minutes, post something, and then just leave it. Here is our daughter Lydia! She is so much fun, and she has grown so much since she was born. These pictures aren't very recent, but I hope you will enjoy them. And maybe if I keep doing my 5 minute posts, you will hear from me more often. :)
Anna holding Lydia
Bennett holding Lydia
Lydia in her blessing dress. She was really grouchy when we took these pictures, but this one came out cute I think.
Lydia after her first bath in the hospital.


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Live streaming Weather station with Cortana Analytics – Part 2

Posted by on Feb 28, 2017 in Analytics, Cortana Analytics, IOT | One Comment

In previous post (, I have explained what is Cortana, What is IoT and how to set up the Raspberry pi3. In this post, I will explain the process of connecting weather station sensor to Raspberry Pi. Also, how to send data to the Event Hub and set it up.

Get Weather Data

For connecting Raspberry PI to weather station sensor, we should write some codes. Two types of code are needed. First a code that read data from sensor and, the second one that send data to cloud.

There is an article that shows the process of connecting weather station to Raspberry PI ( This article provides 4 main .Net projects:
1- Sparkfun weather shield: a Universal windows project for collecting information from Weather sensor

also for collecting the “barometric pressure” information we use mpl3115a2 project and also for measuring humidity htu21d project has been used.

First of all, we should specify the name of Raspberry PI in code. Hence, find the file with name “MainPage.xaml.cs” then in uri put the iot device name.

In  windows universal projects, the code will be run in specific device, that in this scenario is “Raspberry Pi”. hence we have to specify the device name, that we want to run code on it. In page build2015-weather-station we should find the remote machine first.image30

there is an important note that raspberry pi and pc that we run should be in a same internet network.

by running the code, in monitor you will see the below picture, that shows weather station is receiving information about weather such as humidity, temperature and pressure.

In this stage,  Raspberry Pi and weather station sensor have been connected. Now, we should sent the collected data to Cloud (Cortana), but before that, we it should be set it up.

Event Hub

Event hub is a managed event ingestor that able to collect million of events per second from different devices. Event hub is  part of service bus in Cortana. It receives information from Raspberry PI in JASON Format. To create event hub, I login in old Cortana portal: “Manage.windowsazure”. Tto create new event hub we should create “New” component.

By clicking on New bottom, new page will be show up, we should create “APP Service” and then “Service Bus”. following, in service bus, “Event Hub” should be chosen.

This should be accompany with specifying the Event Hub name and Region, which in my case is “Southeast Asia”.

now we can see the process of creating Event hub and related service bus in Cortana (see below picture).

After creating Event Hub, we able to see Event hub configuration by clicking on the configuration component (below picture). By clicking on the name of Service bus, we able to see the configuration in event hub.

In event hub we can see some information about the “Policy Name” and “Primary Key” that can be used for creating connection between Universal Windows code that we have and Cortana analytics.

now we should put the policy code and primary key in our .Net code as below

By running the code, first the project will be deployed in Raspberry PI and the information from weather sensor will be send to Event Hub. Below picture shows the sending message in output.

Now by clicking on the “iotLeila” service bus in Cortana analytics (see below picture), we can see the Related Event Hub.

Then, we can see iot event hub in below picture.image43

We can see all the messages that have been sent to Event Hub in last 24 Hours. This includes all sending message, errors and successful messages.

Till now, we find out how to send data from weather station to Raspberry PI and  then to Event Hub. In the next, post I will show how to sent information to Power BI and Azure ML via stream Analytics.

Leila Etaati
Dr. Leila Etaati is Principal Data Scientist, BI Consultant, and Speaker. She has over 10 years’ experience working with databases and software systems. She was involved in many large-scale projects for big sized companies. Leila has PhD of Information System department, University of Auckland, MS and BS in computer science. Leila is Microsoft Data Platform MVP.

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Monday, October 29, 2007

My Take on the Rockies Ticket Fiasco

Before I mothball all my baseball thoughts until next Spring, I want to state the following completely unsubstantiated assertions and speculative conjectures about the World Series ticket fiasco:
  1. This was a Java application, evidenced by the fact that users were hitting JSPs. Well built Java applications a very scalable, but this one was not.
  2. They experienced a software and not hardware failure. It was a possible to access the site, but making progress was almost impossible.
  3. 8 million hits in 90 minutes is a lot, but can be handled by a well-designed scalable system.
  4. They were probably not the victim of a malicious attack. Hackers usually demand ransoms these days. I did not hear anything about a ransom in the news. Staging a denial of service attack "just for fun" does not ring true and would require substantial resources.
  5. There was no "online queue". When users entered the site, the window claimed that they were given a place in line, and said not to reload, or they'd lose their place in line. I was thinking about how to implement this, and in theory it can be done with session IDs, but would be difficult to implement fairly and correctly. It may not be possible at all, and I know of no online queues like this. Users were better off hitting reload constantly which is what I did in about 20 Safari web browser tabs. I was actually able to make progress but not enough to buy tickets.
  6. Users that were closer to the servers in California with fast Internet had an advantage over users in Colorado. My wife's cousin was able to buy eight tickets without any difficulties from California, and mysteriously also easily surpassed the four ticket limit.
Next time the Rockies make it to the World Series, they ought follow the Red Sox's example and use a lottery system. It is fairer and kinder to fans.

Oh and by the way, congratulations to the Rockies. They didn't win the World Series, but they had a much better year than anyone expected.

Thursday, October 4, 2007

Book Recommendation: Java Generics and Collections

I recently wrote a blog entry about reluctantly accepting Java Generics. If you are planning on genericising your Java code (which is in principle inevitable for all Java programmers as Sun recommends against using raw types, and may not support them in the future), then "Java Generics and Collections" by Maurice Naftalin, and Philip Wadler is the book for you. It is the clearest, most coherent treatise I have read on the subject. Java Generics make a lot more sense after reading this book.

Declarations like

List<? extends XYZ> list = new LinkedList<XYZ>();

and notions like covariance finally make sense. I even find using wildcards useful since they give programmers some indication as to the purpose of the data structure in addition to providing type safety.

The "Get and Put Principle" in section (2.4) is a real gem. To quote Java Generics and Collections:

The Get and Put Principle: use an extends wildcard when you only get values out of a structure, use super wildcard when you only put values into a structure, and don't use a wildcard when you both get and put.

They also give some best practices on dealing with non-generic legacy libraries. This is particularly useful information, as we are probably a long way from seeing Apache project libraries moving to generics.

(I still wonder about the cost benefit ratio adding so much complexity to the language, but let's ignore that for now.)

There are other resources out there for Java Generics, but they tend to be insufficient or a bit rote like Angelika Langer's huge FAQ. I would actually recommend reading Java Generics first, and if you have questions left over, consult the FAQ.

Moreover, there is a section on the Collections Framework interface that reviews the major Java core data structures (Sets, Queues, Lists, and Maps). This type of material is really great to know. Java programmers tend to gravitate 99% to ArrayList and HashMap, but there are a lot of other fine data structures available in the core language that may be more appropriate for your requirements. Java Generics and Collections covers them all.

There are a few obnoxious typos, such as the broken Function Pattern code. This is confirmed in the errata.

Regardless, this is the best programming book I have read since "Java Concurrency in Practice."


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Saturday, 11 June 2016

Simple social skills for the liberal elites

It was when, as a lad, I arrived home after a day out exploring with the dog, both bone-tired, exhausted and panting, that I learnt my dad's first maxim. Gently holding my hand from the breadbox he pointed at the dogs empty waterbowl "Always see to your men and animals first" he said quietly. That, and his second - "Never point a gun at anyone unless you intend to kill them" - have stayed with me for life. And if you only learn two maxims, those two aren't so bad.

An old soldier of few words he was of a generation that had seen the alternatives to the way we did things and didn't like them. The Italian army, for instance, had three scales of rations for officers, NCOs and enlisted men. He mentioned it contemptuously. But he was no 'snowflake' - he knew fellow Brits of all classes, backgrounds and callings sober and drunk, in battle and at rest, scared and beserk, filthy and freezing and slick in parade order and was under no illusion that romanticised and varnished his fellow soldiers. But from Normandy to Korea, Palestine to Cyprus there was no-one in the world he would rather have standing in the line with him than fellow British men.

I just know he would have been disgusted and revolted by the hauteur, disdain and ridicule heaped today on ordinary British people by a new metropolitan left-liberal elite. Laughing at someone's spelling, ridiculing their opinion or disparaging their taste from a position of wealth, power and privilege was something he and his generation had fought a war to eradicate - their prize a social victory at home. Yes, he was a Labour voter until Barbara Castle as Defence Minister criticised his battalion's use of force in Cyprus for political brownie points. After that we were Conservative and took the Daily Express.

There is no comparison, but in my own way I've had a taste of it. Thirty years in construction and about a third of it spent on site have also allowed me the privilege of close contact with all manner of men from many nations. Sites are one of the few environments in which you never have to make your own tea, but if you do make a mug yourself, and one for the labourer who sweeps and housekeeps, and find the time to have a fag and a chat, then those little things pay dividends. You just need to remember the real truth that everyone is interesting, everyone is worthwhile and everyone is worth listening to. As I watch new young construction professionals on site disdaining the manual and craft as anonymous nobodies to be ignored as they bury their heads in their 3G devices I think that teaching those lessons to the new snowflake generation may be the most useful thing we can ever do.

Thursday, 9 June 2016

Hatred of the Left for the working class - Pt II

I was going to pen another piece about the vicious hatred of the middle-class EUphiliac Left for the working class, but found that Kate Hoey MP has already done it, and rather well
It allowed them to take Left-wing politics that used to be about getting higher wages for the less well off, and turn it into a game about middle-class identity.
Central to that is the new middle-class religion of so-called non-racism.
It became “racist” for the working classes to ask why white European cheap labour was allowed to come and drive wages down. It takes a real middle-class invasion of Labour politics to put that trick across.
What do the middle classes really care about the plight of black families living in poverty in our inner cities? These are the low paid or unemployed whose job chances are threatened by EU immigration.
And what do they care about the plight of the migrants once they get here? What do they say about them after they have settled in and want higher wages?
“British workers (and this must include settled immigrants and sons of immigrants) won’t do the jobs… so we have to get immigrants to do it.”
By which they mean new immigrants, cheap immigrants. And the bit they leave out is… for the low wages offered. They won’t do the jobs for the low wages offered. This is the crux of the EU intentions on labour.
Just as the Victorians tried to make trade unionism immoral, so the present middle classes brand any worker who complains of non-union or cheap labour.
It was immoral to protect your wages in Victorian times, it is immoral now. Morality often coincides with middle class economic interests.
The EU supports the low-wage economy, and tries to create it where it didn’t already exist, for example in Sweden where it prosecuted the unions, and sequestrated their funds (as the Tories did to the miners) when they tried to get union rates for migrant workers.
Where should the Left stand in all this? It’s pretty clear where it would stand if it were working class.
I recommend reading the whole thing.

Wednesday, 8 June 2016

Something very nasty is fouling our democracy

Dr Dawkins as we know is a fool - and not one that hides his idiocy under a bushel. His latest fatuous pronouncement is that ordinary people are too stupid to vote in a referendum; he wants to restrict the vote to middle class professionals with a knowledge of economics. I thought he was alone in this lunatic anti-democracy but no; up pops David Mitchell, the husband of Victoria Coren and supposedly a comedian of sorts. He came out supporting Dawkins. Not funny; very scary.

The left have a long history of despising and wanting to disenfranchise the British working class; from GB Shaw and his serious and earnest desire for a 'humane' poison gas to kill the poor, to Virginia Wolff who wanted to euthanize a group of mentally disabled persons. Indeed, in Scandinavian Poly Toynbee La-la land, the government were compulsorily sterilising people regarded as stupid right up to the 1990s, to stop them 'breeding'. The left and eugenics go together like cheese and pickle - and it's always the working class that are the target of their violence and spite.

What has become very apparent in this campaign is that the 'Remain' camp's hatred of the working class has shown itself in all its bigoted, vile, filthy nastiness. Here are a selection of Tweets posted in response to an interview by R4's 'Today' with an ordinary family from Hull. On balance, the family favoured the 'Leave' case. The tweeters responding as below would all, no doubt, support the foolish Dawkins and seek to remove the vote from our fellow citizens from Hull.

Their arrogance is intolerable. We must make it clear we will not stand for it.

Tuesday, 7 June 2016

Somewhat on the basis of monkeys, typewriters and Shakespeare ...

Since the start of the campaign I've been twittering like an obsessive - more twits in the past month than since 2008 - and have used an easily edited and modified graphic to make key points and counter points day by day. Most are a little amateurish and so-so but they generally work a lot better than bare twits. Today's, though, is getting a lot of people exited and is being re-twitted like Billy-oh. I clearly got something right here; probably more on the basis of monkeys and typewriters than anything else.

Why do Fascist dictators always start with Armbands?

I have no doubt that someone in the EU has commissioned at vast public expense a top European clothing designer to produce the EU Army's uniform, much as Hugo Boss was commissioned to do the same for the SS. In the meanwhile, just what are all those Brussels bureaucrats in the Berlaymont who openly wear Hugo Boss suits trying to say?

In the absence of a uniform, and sometimes with a uniform, they always start with armbands; the first picture are the fascist 'Jobbik' thugs from Hungary ...

Then are the EU's new border guards ...

(No, don't adjust your screen; the chap on the right really is wearing his epaulette over his manboob)

Finally, like LDV volunteers still with pitchforks and shotguns, are the EU armed forces;

Monday, 6 June 2016

Fear gives way to Smear as Remainiacs get dirtier

There was something extraordinary about watching John Major being more animated in one brief TV appearance than he had been in the whole of his premiership. Major was incandescent with anger that the British public appeared prepared to disobey their masters and betters; he had told the nation that the EU was good for it, and now they were daring to disagree!

The 'Remain' side's playing of this tedious old relic marks a point in the campaign at which we will see things about to get a lot dirtier. They have busted a gut with Project Fear only to have it fall flat as the British public are either annoyed at the obvious lies or amused at the jejune mendacity. Now they are about to go from Fear to Smear in earnest; Major's 'dead sheep' savaging of Boris (which the blond one shrugged off with a laugh - he's been dissed by pros; this toothless gumming by a passing geriatric was hardly felt) marks the start of Phase II.

So expect the Whips' little black books of blackmail secrets to be used in an escalation of personal attacks against 'Leave' and 'Out' campaigners, and expect there to be retaliation. And when the two sides are left like mental patients covered from head to toe in eachother's shit, the smart money says the public will vote 'change' because this is precisely the behaviour from which we want to escape. So Leave gains, again.

But it's going to be rough.


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Tag: New York Jets

Scouting the Raiders Recent Front Office Changes

When Reggie McKenzie was hired he spoke of the fact that he planned to make changes within the Raiders front office. He brought up his vision of having everyone within the organization from front office employees to players on the

Posted in Front Office Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Raiders’ Open Road

This Sunday the Raiders travel to Minnesota and face the Vikings. This game will feature two of the top five rushing teams in the league. While the Vikings run All Day (Adrian Peterson), their passing game is anemic. While defending

Posted in Regular Season 2011 Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,


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Will Elder:
The Mad Playboy of Art

by Will Elder
(Fantagraphics, 2004)

This comprehensive sampling of the work of zany master cartoonist Will Elder is simply magnificent. It is so because of the size, format and quality of reproduction of this 391-page trade paperback that reprints this artist's groundbreaking and influential work from the early 1930s to the present. A extensive biographical essay and the inclusion of "paintings, portraits, still lifes, caricatures, and sketches," certainly recommend the volume as well. But this retrospective is simply magnificent for one primary reason. There is no cartoonist, living or dead, better than wacky Will Elder.

Whoa, there, Nellie. Gushing a bit?

So, what distinguishes a great cartoonist from a competent one? Including a grasp of artistic technique and visual storytelling, there is:

1) Versatility: Elder mastered any style required by its subject, from "big-foot" cartooning to abstract painting to photographic realism.
2) Unique personal style: His is instantly recognizable.
3) Unique viewpoint: There is no other way to write it: Elder drew crazy funny, and was extremely influential for his "eye-pops" -- little visual and verbal puns peppered everywhere in his work.
4) Mastery of many media, including pencil, ink, wash, watercolor and acrylic or oilpaints.
5) Influence: In comics, television, editorial cartoons and motion pictures -- in a nutshell (his natural habitat), there is only one "Villie" Elder, and the history of comics is much richer because of his great gift.

The Mad Playboy of Art receives the highest recommendation for adult readers (because of nudity) in my 17-year history of reviewing comics.

by Michael Vance
15 July 2006

Buy it from Amazon.com.


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Aubrey L. Haines,
An Elusive Victory:
The Battle of the Big Hole

(Falcon, 1999)

An Elusive Victory is a different kind of book about the Nez Perce Flight for Freedom. Instead of dealing with the entire "war," the author focuses on only one of the battles and puts the incident under a microscope.

This battle occurred on Aug. 9, 1877 when the 7th U.S. Infantry and citizen volunteers attacked the Nez Perce in Big Hole Valley in western Montana Territory. They caught the Nez Perce sleeping and inflicted heavy casualties and losses on the natives, though they suffered equally. The battle lasted two days and ended with no clear victory for either side. It simply reinforced the Nez Perces' determination to find freedom from the pursuing military!

This incident is said to be the "best-documented battle of the Indian Wars." I find it amazing that with all this documentation, three-fourths of the natives shall remain nameless. I wonder if the author bothered to speak with any of the Nez Perce at the Lapwai reservation. I have.

Perhaps I began the book with a pre-conceived notion that this was to be just one more account written from the white man's perspective -- which to date has been one that tries to minimize the egg on the face of our government. I came to this conclusion on the third page of the introduction when I read: "Among a number of compiled works used, the following were found to be the most useful: ... I Will Fight No More Forever, by Merrill D. Beal (1963)." I have a low opinion of that book due to omission of facts and just plain slanted writing. You will also find that there was a controversy following the book's release that resulted in the production of another book, which was not mentioned by Haines. With Haines' extensive credentials, I am certain that this is not an oversight. Obviously, this was a willful omission. That indicates a purposeful slant.

As for the narrative, the author spins a good tale. The action is strong and the writing brisk. You are propelled forward through the pages. The heavy use of quotation makes the characters somehow more "personal" and "alive." It is a well-written book and quite enjoyable.

This book includes a prologue and epilogue written by Jack R. Williams, several maps and illustrations, and a listing of the persons present at the battle broken down into groups of Nez Perce, Army officers, soldiers and civilians. Several photographs accompany this listing. The listing for the Nez Perce states that less than one quarter of those present are known.

My advice is for you to enjoy the war story without placing absolute credence in anything that you read here. Do your own referencing and check the "facts" against several other sources without placing blind faith in this manuscript simply because the author is highly credentialed.

- Rambles
written by Alicia Karen Elkins
published 30 August 2003

Buy it from


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Jack Vettriano,
Lovers & Other Strangers
(Pavilion, 2000)

I first came across Jack Vettriano's work as I suspect many people come across it -- whilst browsing in a card shop. The vibrant colours drew my eye, and I picked up one called "Dance Me to the End of Love." The blurb on the back told me the artist was self-taught, Scottish and an ex-miner. Intrigued, every time I went into the shop after that I'd look to see if there were any new ones. I liked the way they generally told half a story, or a joke, sometimes, and I wanted to learn a little more about the man holding the brush.

Anthony Quinn clearly has a fondness for his subject, and includes some interesting background material here covering Vettriano's life. It's interesting that the boy who grew into manhood in and around the nightclubs of Kircaldy would later find himself painting images that are straight out of 1950s film noir -- some of them a little more risque than the cardshop display would lead you to believe, by the way.

Vettriano has had a mixed press. He has a number of admirers, but others have accused him of producing little more than pornography. He finds this grossly unfair, and I think he has a point. "I choose to paint the moments before and after sex," he says, "not the act itself," and that's true enough. Most of his pictures describe a kind of sexual tension, leaving you to make up the rest of the story for yourself. What happens when the woman meets the chap who's waiting for her at the top of the stairs at Angel tube station, for example? What is the couple in "Bad Boy Blues" talking about? Are they arguing? The woman in "The Party's Over" is wearing a wedding band. Is the man pushing her back against the table her husband? Her husband's best friend? A stranger? We don't know.

The first line of the introduction to the book, from Tim Rice, sums it up beautifully: "Jack Vettriano has the ability to make you feel nostalgic for things you never actually experienced in the first place." Why not dip in and borrow some memories of your own?

- Rambles
written by Jean Lewis
published 6 September 2003

Buy it from Amazon.com.