text:
OA Affiliate Programme
DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS
Spatially coherent statistical simulation of widespread flooding events under climate change
Adam Griffin;
Adam Griffin *
aUK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Benson Lane, Wallingford OX10 8BB, UK
*Corresponding author. E-mail: adagri@ceh.ac.uk
Alison Kay;
Alison Kay
Elizabeth Stewart;
Elizabeth Stewart
Paul Sayers
bSayers and Partners Consultancy, Watlington OX49 5PY, UK
Hydrology Research (2022) 53 (11): 1428–1440.
https://doi.org/10.2166/nh.2022.069
Adam Griffin, Alison Kay, Elizabeth Stewart, Paul Sayers; Spatially coherent statistical simulation of widespread flooding events under climate change. Hydrology Research 1 November 2022; 53 (11): 1428–1440. doi: https://doi.org/10.2166/nh.2022.069
Simulating rare widespread hydrological events can be difficult even with the use of modelled data such as the UKCP18 12 km regional climate projections. To generate larger event sets for application in catastrophe modelling, two statistical approaches are highlighted and applied to widespread GB-generated flooding events using a grid-based hydrological model and UKCP18 regional projections. An Empirical Copula method was applied on a national scale, generating over 600,000 events across two time-slices (1980–2010 and 2050–2080). This was compared to model-generated events and showed good matching across time-slices and ensemble members, although lacked some ability to describe the least-rare events. The Empirical Copula was also compared to an implementation of a conditional exceedance model. This model was much more computationally intensive so was restricted to Northwest England but offered the ability to be tuned more finely through choices of marginal distributions. Analysing over 11,000 events, it also matched well with the Empirical Copula and model-generated events but under-represented the smallest events. Both approaches require a broad dataset to draw from but showed reasonable efficacy. For simple statistics, the Empirical Copula shows the potential to be a powerful tool in exploring spatial structure over large regions or at a fine spatial resolution.
The Empirical Copula and the Heffernan–Tawn model both can be used effectively to generate national-scale extreme flooding event sets for risk analysis.
The Empirical Copula proved more stable over larger areas due to much lower computational costs.
The methods were used to investigate and highlight the differences in the spatial structure of widespread flooding events between 2010 and 2080.
climate change, flood hydrology, statistics
Quantifying risk due to extreme high flow events on a regional or national scale requires knowledge of the correlation of floods occurring in many places at once. One common approach, often applied in catastrophe modelling, is to refer to a suite of observed or derived scenarios, and measure the frequency of key features, including the loss associated to an event, to understand the return period or likelihood of an event generating a similar amount of loss occurring. Sayers et al. (2002) discuss the benefits having a risk-centred approach to flood hazard management. However, naively using sets of observed events, or events modelled on current or previous climatic, meteorological or hydrological conditions may neglect the possibilities of changes over time. Climate change, and its impact on global hydrology, is a clear driver of this, and much work, such as the Third Climate Change Risk Assessment (Slingo 2021) makes use of long time series and ensembles of model runs to perform analysis of future scenarios.
Flood risk assessments sometimes suffer from a lack of modelling of spatial dependence, due to comprising a collection of local-scale risk assessments, rather than a harmonious national-scale one. Keef et al. (2009, 2011) and Villarini et al. (2011) showed that in the UK and United States that there is positive dependence between locations for the most extreme events, and so there has been a drive to perform risk analysis (via catastrophe modelling via event sets, or otherwise) on a national scale through the use of hydrological modelling to describe the impacts of flooding.
As discussed in Zanardo & Salinas (2022), a large event set is essential in catastrophe modelling to be able to determine the relative frequency of events with different levels of risk or loss, as there is no well-known natural approach to theoretically model the frequency of any specific class of event. There are several approaches to generating a large event set for risk analysis. A perturbed parameter ensemble (PPE) can be used (Kelder et al. 2020; Kay et al. 2021) to cover a wide set of possible outcomes, especially if only one hydrological model is used. Alternatively, stochastic weather generators can use random processes and Monte Carlo approaches to generate a large number of possible rainfall events to feed into a hydrological model (Wright et al. 2020; Matte et al. 2021). Instead of directly using high-dimensional or high-resolution observed or modelled events and time series, various methods apply interpolation (Towe et al. 2016) or kriging (Laaha et al. 2014) to estimate likely values of flow between observed locations, preserving hydrological coherence.
Climate models, however, are often focussed on short time windows (<100 years) and therefore each model run is likely to have a very small number of the most extreme events, which can often vary greatly in their characteristics (duration, area, peakedness), and so fail to capture the full range of possible extreme events. To this end, this paper proposes two statistical approaches (as opposed to hydrological process-based models) to specifically generate a much wider range of extreme events for use in risk analysis. In this paper, the focus is on method comparison rather than examining changes in spatial coherence over time. Two methods, the Heffernan–Tawn (HT) model and the Empirical Copula approach, will be defined and applied on a national and regional scale across Great Britain, and a comparative analysis was undertaken, using a grid-based hydrological model to produce a reference dataset to seed the two statistical methods, and form a reference dataset with which to compare the two approaches.
UKCP18 climate data
UK Climate Projections 2018 (UKCP18) provides information on potential changes in a range of climate variables over the 21st century, via a number of different products (Murphy et al. 2018; Lowe et al. 2018). These data have previously been used to analyse multiple hazards in the UK and how they are expected to differ in the future due to climate change (Kay 2021; Kay et al. 2021; Arnell et al. 2021).
The UKCP18 Regional projections (Met Office Hadley Centre 2018) comprise a 12-member PPE of the Hadley Centre Regional Climate Model (RCM), nested in an equivalent PPE of the respective Global Climate Model (GCM). This work uses ensemble members 01–15, excluding 02, 03, and 14. GCM ensemble members 02, 03, and 14 do not have an RCM nested within, so have no regional projections. Ensemble member 01 uses the standard parameterisation. The ensemble covers the period December 1980 to November 2080 under an RCP8.5 emissions scenario (Representative Concentration Pathway) (Riahi et al. 2011). The rainfall, temperature, and potential evapotranspiration (PE) used in the present work is on a 12-km spatial resolution and a daily timestep covering England, Scotland, and Wales for a synthetic 360-day year (30 days per month). The data were available re-projected from the native climate model grid to a 12 km grid aligned with the GB national grid, with the exception of the PE data, which was computed from other UKCP18 variables using a modified Penman–Monteith approach (Hough et al. 1997). To allow easy comparability between time-slices, observed flow time series were not used in this paper since these are not available for the 2051–2080 time-slice.
The work in this paper is part of a greater pipeline to generate event sets for catastrophe modelling as mentioned in Figure 1. Driving precipitation, temperature and potential evaporation data are used in the Grid-to-Grid model (explained in Section 3.1) to generate reference time series of daily river flow. These data are used to fit pointwise Generalised Pareto (GPa) distributions, including the calculation of thresholds that are exceeded, on average, twice a year. These thresholds are used to identify events with widespread flooding to generate a reference event set (Section 3.2). In the present paper, two methods, Empirical Copula and HT, are used to generate much broader event sets for risk quantification (Section 3.3). Key summary statistics are computed (area, maximum return period, duration, etc.) for each event in both the reference and simulated event sets.
Pipeline of work. Bold outlines indicate the present work; grey boxes indicate work covered in Griffin et al. (2022b).
Hydrological regions of the UK; NWE was used as a case study for the HT model (subdivisions are UK hydrological areas). Please refer to the online version of this paper to see this figure in colour: http://dx.doi.org/10.2166/nh.2022.069.
Grid-to-Grid model
The Grid-to-Grid hydrological model (Bell et al. 2009) is a grid-based runoff-production and flow-routing model, where flow is routed from grid-cell to grid-cell. It models the river flow across Great Britain based on data such as meteorological, topographical, soil type, and land-cover data. It requires input time series of gridded precipitation, daily maximum and minimum temperature, and PE. In total, 19,914 grid-cells were identified on the river network with at least 50 upstream grid-cells (equating to a theoretical catchment area of 50 km2). Daily flow time series for baseline (1981–2010) and future (2051–2080) time-slices for these 19,914 grid-cells.
The next step of the pipeline took these daily outputs of flow and extracted 'widespread, extreme events'.
Reference event extraction
Full details are provided in the companion paper (Griffin et al. 2022b), with a brief summary provided here. At each grid-cell, a threshold (POT2) was chosen such that daily flow exceeded it on 2 days per year on average during the baseline time-slice. This corresponds to a daily probability of exceedance (PoE) of approximately 0.56%. The same threshold was used for both time-slices for comparability. Events were defined as periods of consecutive days where more than 0.1% of the 19,914 river grid-cells across GB exceeded the threshold at the same time. PoEs were initially calculated using daily data. To convert from daily to annual return periods, a Poisson approximation was used based on a 360-day year: .
The events were then summarised by taking the maximum flow at each grid-cell over the duration of the event. Events were restricted to 2 weeks (14 days) to mitigate the possibility of two consecutive but independent events being counted as a single event. From this, annual PoEs and return periods were computed. In order to simulate national events, the Empirical Copula and the HT model need marginal distributions for each grid-cell that cover the entire flow regime. Since no clear probability distribution can accurately cover the full regime of flow while giving the appropriate heavy tails at the upper end, a mixed distribution was selected, as in Towe et al. (2019). This is a mixed distribution combining an empirical distribution describing each time series for values of flow below threshold, and a GPa distribution on those values above the threshold. In the rest of this paper, event extent is only defined by exceedances, so the choice of an empirical sub-threshold distribution does not affect the analysis of area or peak return period.
As an alternative to a mixed distribution, one could consider a fully empirical distribution (transformed to Gumbel marginals in Keef et al. (2009)), or a distribution that covers the whole period of flow such as Lognormal or Tweedie as discussed in Svensson et al. (2017) for summaries of the daily mean flow. However, we feel that the fit in the upper tail for these distributions is not sufficient for the present work. This mixed distribution gives the full expression for the cumulative distribution function of flow, x:
where Fi,EMP is the empirical cumulative distribution function at grid-point i, Fi,GPa is the cdf for the GPa distribution, ui is the flow threshold at that grid-point, and , since this investigation uses the POT2 threshold defined previously. The return period T is given by 1/F, as this paper assumes stationarity during each of the two time-slices, since both event methods outlined below lack the capability to incorporate non-stationarity into the event generation. This assumption of stationarity is a strong one and not necessarily realistic (Milly et al. 2008). There are several approaches to describing the 'return period' of an event under the assumption of non-stationarity based on the expected time to arrival, expected number of events per period, or a design life level which is based on a probability of failure over a pre-defined period (see Salas et al. (2018) and the references therein).
To ensure a good fit of the GPa distribution for the most extreme events, the 60 largest independent peaks at each grid-point were found using the peak-extraction algorithm as used by the NRFA (https://nrfa.ceh.ac.uk/), which stipulates two requirements for events to be independent at a specific location:
Two peaks are separated by at least three times the time-to-peak (geometric mean of times from the start of rainfall to maximum flow) at that location. As an approximation, this was simplified in this analysis to have a time-to-peak of 7/3 days, so peaks were separated by at least 7 days.
The river flow between two peaks must drop below two-thirds the height of the lower peak.
Events were selected starting from the largest and excluding any dependent peaks before selecting the next largest remaining peak. For a specific event, the flood extent area is the maximum number of 1 km2 grid-cells simultaneously above their threshold during a selected event.
For regional events, the reference event set was divided by hydrometric area (Figure 2). In each region, only events which saw threshold exceedances in the specified region were kept, leading to a slightly smaller event set. Since events without exceedances do not contribute to either of the statistical models below, this reduced reference event set did not reduce performance.
Statistical event generation
In both of the following methods, the events were derived by choosing a 'seed' event from the reference set, which was used to simulate a new event more specifically. Since these simulated events were not based on a full-time series and so not technically at any specific time (other than baseline or future), we assigned the season and duration of the simulated events to be the season and duration of the 'seed' event.
Empirical Beta Copula
The first approach that was implemented to generate new events on a national scale was the Empirical Beta Copula (EC) method (Rüschendorf 2009; Segers et al. 2017). This approach, which has not been used in hydrological modelling before, is a fast method to generate widespread flooding events which scales well to these very large datasets. Events in the 'reference' (G2G) dataset (of N events) are ranked at each grid-point i, so each grid-point has one rank (1 to N) for each event n. Additionally, a mixed distribution with cdf Gi as above was fitted to the event set at each grid-point (not the whole time series). A set of N uniform random numbers ui,n in [0,1] are generated for each grid-point and ordered according to the ranks of the reference set. To simulate a new event, an event n is drawn uniformly at random, and the values are the simulated values of flow for that event. Estimated PoEs are based on the mixed distributions Fi based on the whole time series. This procedure generated 600,000 events: two sets of 25,000 events for each ensemble member, based on baseline and future time-slices.
HT model
The HT model (Heffernan & Tawn 2004) is a conditional exceedance model, designed to describe the probability of one site experiencing a threshold exceedance, given an exceedance is being experienced at another specific site. It was implemented using a modified version of the texmex package (Southworth et al. 2020), modified to accommodate the larger number of points being investigated; the number of parameters being fitted increases quadratically compared to the number of grid points, and so computational complexity increases similarly. In the present study, there were limitations on computation power, which restricted the work to just the NorthWest (NW) region, as in Figure 2.
For threshold exceedances at each location, the HT model was fitted with two parameters for the marginal distribution, a two-parameter GPa distribution. Tawn et al. (2018) used and developed this model using a multivariate Normal distribution, but for the extremes of interest, the GPa is more appropriate. The marginal was then transformed to a one-parameter Laplace distribution, and the spatial dependence structure was fitted using two parameters for each location-pair (i,j), and an estimate of residual distribution. The set of marginal (at-site) distributions along with the spatial dependence structure was used to generate new events as follows. Suppose location 1 is assumed to have the most extreme flow (in terms of PoE) and that flow is above the threshold. A residual z is generated from a high-dimensional normal distribution and an observed flow is simulated. Then, observations at all other locations are generated on the same basis which are then scaled to Laplace observations according to:
where ai and bi are parameters estimated for each site i. Simulated events for which y1 is largest are kept, otherwise, they are discarded. This procedure was repeated for each desired event: the designated 'most extreme' flow was drawn for each event based on the distribution of most extreme flows in the observed event set.
Using the HT method, 400 extra widespread events were simulated for the NW region, for each ensemble member for baseline and future time-slices (12 × 2 × 400 = 9,600 events). Neal et al. (2013) undertook a similar exercise with a bootstrapping approach, rather than the use of an RCM ensemble.
National events were simulated only using the Empirical Copula method. Figure 3 shows some differences in the distribution of area and return period. Figure 3(a) shows the distribution of event area, split by season and method combined across both time-slices. For the Empirical Copula method, the seed event from the reference set strongly informs the area of the simulated event. This means that we see a very similar distribution in the reference and EC-simulated events. We see a slightly different picture for return periods. In the baseline time-slice (top row of Figure 3(b)), we see that the EC gives a more rounded distribution, with fewer of the more frequent events (return period less than 2 years). This is linked to the law of large numbers and the fact that there are no 'below-threshold' events, meaning that the probability of getting a return period very close to 0.5 years is slightly decreased. Thus, using just the EC method may lead to an overestimate in national-scale return periods or event extents. In application, if the events of most interest are of low return period or extent, then the method as currently described may be inappropriate. If this is the case, then reducing the minimum extent or reducing the minimum at-site return period should improve performance.
(a, left): Histograms of maximum event area summed across ensemble member and split by season and events set (reference and EC-generated). (b, right): Density plots of maximum return period of event summed across ensemble member, split by events set (reference and EC-generated) and time-slice.
Figure 4(a) shows how the EC method matches the overall distribution of peak return period and area of widespread events. The broad patterns match in both time-slices, but we can see that the EC method appears to 'fill in the gaps' not observed in the reference event set. Specifically, the EC event set provides a much richer set of rare-but-small events of return period above 100 years, but the extent of less than 1,000 km2. This is a key advantage to using simulation methods to generate larger sets of extreme events for risk analysis: supplying events that have different combinations of extent and severity not necessarily observed over short time-slices. Additionally, the computational cost (in time) per event was notably lower for the Empirical Copula method than being directly generated from a hydrological model. In practice, there is a trade-off to be made between the number of events required for risk analysis, and the hydrological plausibility, which increases with the number of reference events. Figure 4(b) shows the difference between baseline and future events for the two methods. Both show similar overall patterns, but the EC method seems to show a greater increase in future rare events compared to the reference events. The reference event set also shows a strong decrease in the number of small-extent, low-return period events.
Heatmaps of (a) return period and area and (b) difference in probability density between baseline and future time-slices comparing reference and EC-generated events sets on national scale, summed across RCM ensemble members, split time-slice. Positive values (blue) indicate more events of this type in the future. Please refer to the online version of this paper to see this figure in colour: http://dx.doi.org/10.2166/nh.2022.069.
Regional case study
To compare the two statistical methods and the reference event set, events restricted to the NW region are examined. Figure 5 shows similar patterns in terms of the number of events. In particular, the results suggest that there will be fewer events in the summer (MAM, JJA) and more in winter (DJF, SON). This is reassuring as the season of events is drawn from the reference event set, and so the EC and HT season distribution should be identical to that of the reference event set (note what is seen is only one realisation from this distribution).
Proportion of events split by season for each event set (reference EC-generated and HT-generated). Please refer to the online version of this paper to see this figure in colour: http://dx.doi.org/10.2166/nh.2022.069.
Split by ensemble member, there is still some variation in event area and maximum return period (Figure 6), but the overall patterns are the same across all ensemble members and there is no sizable difference between the members in the median area or return period. The total modelled area of the NW region was 1,437 river grid-cells, hence the upper bound on the area distributions. For return periods, although there are many outliers for the EC method, this is due to the highly skewed nature of the return periods (even with the outlier criteria computed on log-transformed return periods), and the much larger EC event set. These outliers still contribute less than 10% of the events in the EC event set. Figure 6(a) suggests that the distribution of return periods is quite different between the three methods, with the EC giving a greater proportion of high return periods, and HT a lesser proportion.
Boxplots showing variability within and between RCM ensemble members in terms of event (a) maximum return period and (b) area, split by time-slice and event set (reference EC-generated and HT-generated). Please refer to the online version of this paper to see this figure in colour: http://dx.doi.org/10.2166/nh.2022.069.
To investigate this further, more detailed histograms, not split by ensemble member or season, are shown in Figure 7. Figure 7(a) shows that the HT model was leaning towards larger extent events, but Figure 7(b) shows that there were fewer return periods beyond 100 years in the HT-simulated events, although the overall pattern in return periods was similar. This is even more apparent in the future time-slice. The greater appearance of the smallest return periods may be because, for the regional study, a 0.1% coverage only needed to cover two grid-squares, and so some very spatially small events were kept for this study. Figure 8 shows that as before, EC does a good job in 'filling in the gaps', while the HT approach matches the reference event set closely in distribution. Within the NW region, it appears that there is a lack of possible events which have both a small extent and a very high return period (lower right of both panels of Figure 8). Between the present and future, the three methods show reasonably similar changes in the heatmaps in terms of probability density (Figure 7(b)). It is interesting to note the marked difference between the changes over time nationally and restricted to the NW (Figure 7(b),cf.Figure 3(b)); future work in drawing out regional differences would be valuable.
(a) Histograms of maximum area of NW regional events and (b) histograms of maximum return period of NW regional events, summed across ensemble members and split by time-slice and event set (reference EC-generated and HT-generated).
Heatmaps of (a) area against return period (in years) and (b) difference in probability density between baseline and future time-slices of events in the NW region summed across ensemble members and split by time-slice and event set (reference EC-generated and HT-generated). Blue indicates a greater proportion of future events, red with more baseline events for a given area-return period combination. Please refer to the online version of this paper to see this figure in colour: http://dx.doi.org/10.2166/nh.2022.069.
The EC method also appears to match well in terms of area and return period, although both methods struggle to simulate the 'smallest' extreme events, due to the conditioning on at least one location exceeding its at-site threshold. The HT method seems to match the reference event set in terms of spread of area-return period combinations (Figure 8) but on each individual margin, there are noticeable differences.
Generating widespread extreme events for risk calculation analysis is an exercise in optimisation: the trade-off between getting enough events to give the full breadth of possibilities and having the time and processing power to achieve it. At one end of the scale is the UNSEEN programme (Kelder et al. 2020), which has made excellent use of the available processing power, and at the other is risk analysts just making use of observed events, but with immediate results. This paper presents two options which offer a half-way house, generating a wide set of events using a fraction of the processing power and time. In context, each 30-year hydrological model simulation takes on the order of a day, whereas the EC method can generate many more extreme events in a matter of minutes given the same computational resources.
Using the UKCP18 Regional projection data under an RCP8.5 scenario, the Grid-to-Grid hydrological model was run for the 12-member RCM ensemble for two periods: 1980–2010 and 2050–2080. To generate a greater number of possible widespread events, the Empirical Copula and HT model were used on a national and regional scale, respectively.
The analysis shows that there are some differences between the two statistical approaches and how well they match the G2G-derived reference event set (as close as one can get to a 'truth'). The HT approach (with a more parametric model characterising the inter-site extremal dependence) has the possibility to work extremely well, if the best model can be identified (type of marginal, etc.). The standard R package for undertaking this modelling (texmex; Southworth et al. 2020) has limitations, but the model itself (as shown here and in Neal et al. 2013) has the potential to be effective The EC approach (which directly uses an empirical view of the rank dependence structure) shows the ability to better explore the state space of possible widespread extreme events. However, since choices still have to be made (marginals and thresholds) the use of the EC approach to extrapolate greatly beyond the extremes of the reference event set is not recommended.
A fuller analysis of the differences between baseline and future behaviour of widespread extreme events is covered in Griffin et al. (2022b), but a few key points can be observed here. First, there is a slight trend towards widespread events having a greater area but a similar maximum pointwise return period. On a national scale there is also an increased occurrence of the most extreme events (with a return period exceeding 100 years, based on thresholds derived from the baseline period). However, in a closer inspection for the NW region, the most extreme events in terms of return period do not change in distribution between baseline and future, suggesting most of the change in events is in spatial spread or in the structure of the more frequent events. It may also suggest that the big changes in widespread flooding dynamics are occurring outside the NW region.
The Empirical Copula approach shows the ability to simulate a wide range of statistically possible widespread events (under various choices and assumptions), but it would be interesting, and prudent, to test the plausibility of such simulated events by using them as initial/boundary conditions for hydraulic models on a smaller scale; or whether such events could be replicated directly from a hydrological or hydraulic model. There is already a natural extension of the HT model to multi-day events (Keef et al. 2009), so it would be of interest to see how well the Empirical Copula approach could be extended to such events. Applications to other types of hazards, such as widespread drought or direct analysis of extreme precipitation, could be fruitful. It would be enlightening to investigate methods of incorporating non-stationarity into both the Empirical Copula and HT methods through the use of non-stationary marginals or copulas (Xu et al. 2019). This could also more easily allow the use of design life levels for a better description of return period under non-stationarity.
Future work could investigate whether the Empirical Copula and HT methods work as well on true observed data, however for comparability between time-slices this is not investigated here. Since the principles of the methods are independent of the hydrology, one would expect similar performance, but it would be enlightening to check this. Additionally, it should be noted that all the present work is based on modelled data, and so the application of EC and HT to observed data would be interesting, whether the loss of variance in events would be detrimental to capturing the spatial dependence. Adjusting this for future scenarios is also a highly non-trivial extension.
Funding for the project was provided through the UK Climate Resilience Programme supported by UK Research and Innovation, the UK Met Office, and from the Natural Environment Research Council.
E.S. and P.S. managed the project, A.K. ran the hydrological modelling, A.G. ran the event extraction and summary, and performed the statistical analysis. All authors assisted in writing and editing the manuscript.
All relevant data are available from an online repository or repositories. All relevant data are available from the Environmental Data Centre (Griffin et al. 2022a).
Arnell
N. W.
Changing climate risk in the UK: a multi-sectoral analysis using policy relevant indicators
doi:10.1016/j.crm.2020.100265
V. A.
R. J.
N. S.
Use of soil data in a grid-based hydrological model to estimate spatial variation in changing flood risk across the UK
Journal of Hydrology
doi:10.1016/j.jhydrol.2009.08.031
E. J.
Sayer
Peak Flow and Probability of Exceedance Data for Grid-to-Grid Modelled Widespread Flooding Events Across Mainland GB From 1980–2010 and 2050–2080
NERC EDS Environmental Information Data Centre
doi:10.5285/26ce15dd-f994-40e0-8a09-5f257cc1f2ab
Sayers
Widespread flooding dynamics changing under climate change: characterising floods using UKCP18
Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions
[preprint]. https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2022-243. in review
Heffernan
Tawn
A conditional approach for multivariate extreme values (with discussion)
Journal of the Royal Statistical Society: Series B (Statistical Methodology)
Hough
The Meteorological Office Rainfall and Evaporation Calculation System: MORECS Version 2.0 (1995), An Update to Hydrological Memorandum 45
The Met Office
Simulation of river flow in Britain under climate change: Baseline performance and future seasonal changes
doi:10.1002/hyp.14137.
Climate change impacts on peak river flows: combining national-scale hydrological modelling and probabilistic projections
Spatial dependence in extreme river flows and precipitation for Great Britain
Batstone
The Risk of Widespread Flooding – Capturing Spatial Patterns in Flood Risk From Rivers and Coasts: Spatial Coherence of Flood Risk – Results from a National Case Study
Defra/Environment Agency Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management and Development Programme, Technical report SC060088/R3
Marjoribanks
T. I.
Wilby
Prudhomme
Bohlinger
Nipen
Using UNSEEN trends to detect decadal changes in 100-year precipitation extremes
Npj Climate and Atmospheric Science
Laaha
Skøien
Blöschl
Spatial prediction on river networks: comparison of top-kriging with regional regression
doi:10.1002/hyp.9578
Bricheno
Fosser
Fung
UKCP18 Science Overview Report
Met Office Hadley Centre
Ozturk
Spatial extent of precipitation events: when big is getting bigger
Met Office Hadley Centre 2018 UKCP18 Regional Climate Model Projections for the NW Europe Region. Centre for Environmental Data Analysis. http://catalogue.ceda.ac.uk/uuid/45b332cd72c14fb3beddb4bf05077c97
. (Accessed 1 August 2022).
P. C. D.
Betancourt
Falkenmark
Kundzewicz
Z. W.
Lettenmaier
Stouffer
Stationarity is dead: Whither water management?
doi:10.1126/science.1151915.
G. R.
D. M. H.
Kendon
P. E.
S. J.
R. T.
R. E.
McInnes
C. F.
J. F. B.
Rostron
H. E.
UKCP18 Land Projections: Science Report. Met Office, Exeter.
Leedal
Probabilistic flood risk mapping including spatial dependence
Riahi
Krey
Chirkov
Nakicenovic
Rafaj
RCP 8.5. A scenario of comparatively high greenhouse gas emissions
. Climatic Change
doi:10.1007/s10584-011-0149-y.
Rüschendorf
On the distributional transform, Sklar's theorem, and the empirical copula process
Journal of Statistical Planning and Inference
doi:10.1016/j.jspi.2009.05.030
Obeysekera
Techniques for assessing water infrastructure for nonstationary extreme events: A review
Hydrological Sciences Journal
doi:10.1080/02626667.2018.1426858.
Meadowcroft
I. C.
Towards risk-based flood hazard management in the UK
. In:
Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers-Civil Engineering
doi:10.1680/cien.2002.150.5.36
Segers
Sibuya
Tsukahara
The empirical beta copula
Journal of Multivariate Analysis
doi:10.1016/j.jmva.2016.11.010
Latest scientific evidence for observed and projected climate change
The Third UK Climate Change Risk Assessment Technical Report
Haward
K. V.
, eds).
Prepared for the Climate Change Committee
P. D.
texmex: Statistical Modelling of Extreme Values. R Package Version 2.4.8
Prosdocimi
Statistical distributions for monthly aggregations of precipitation and streamflow in drought indicator applications
Water Resour. Res.
doi:10.1002/2016WR019276.
Towe
Modelling spatial extreme events with environmental applications
Spatial Statistics
doi:10.1016/j.spasta.2018.04.007
Improving statistical models for flood risk assessment
doi:10.1051/e3sconf/20160701011
R. P.
C. G.
Model-based inference of conditional extreme value distributions with hydrological applications
Environmetrics
doi:10.1002/env.2575
Villarini
Baeck
Marchok
Characterization of rainfall distribution and flooding associated with U.S. landfalling tropical cyclones: analyses of hurricanes Frances, Ivan, and Jeanne (2004)
Journal of Geophysical Research
doi:10.1029/2011JD016175
Six decades of rainfall and flood frequency analysis using stochastic storm transposition: review, progress, and prospects
doi:10.1016/j.jhydrol.2020.124816
Time-varying copula and design life level-based nonstationary risk analysis of extreme rainfall events
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss. (preprint) doi:10.5194/hess-2019-358
Zanardo
J. L.
An introduction to flood modeling for catastrophe risk management
Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Water
doi:10.1002/wat2.1568


Lezyne quality construction and CNC-machined I-Beam body design make this multi-tool lightweight and extremely rigid.
2, 2.5, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 8mm.
L Allen 2, 2.5, and 3mm.
Extra long bits are nickel plated for durability.
Wrapped design for a compact profile.


Add all ingredients except sugar substitute to a microwaveable bowl. Stir well. Microwave on high 3 to 4 minutes or until mixture thickens. Stir 2 to 3 times during cooking. Cool and add sugar substitute to taste (equivalent to 1 teaspoon sugar). Glaze should be tart. Use as a topping for chicken, turkey, or pork. It may also be used as a spread over breads. This recipe yields 3 servings. Nutritional Analysis Per Serving: Calories 52; Fat (grams) 0; Percent calories from fat 0; Percent polyunsaturated 0; Percent saturated 0; Percent monounsaturated 0; Cholesterol (milligrams) 0; Sodium (milligrams) 1; Protein (grams) 0; Carbohydrate (grams) 13; Fiber (grams) 1.


text:
LIETUVOS SPAUDOS FOTOGRAFŲ KLUBAS
Festivalis
LT / En
DOCUMENTARY 'CRIMEA SICH'!
2016-09-20 /
Followers, Maxim Dondyuk present his first documentary CRIMEA SICH, which was filmed shortly before the Maidan and the annexation of the Crimea, and which tells the background of these events. In summer 2013, together with his brotherНиколай Дондюк (Nikolay Dondyuk), he went to the Crimea to document the military training camp for children, later it turned out that we took the very last year of its existence.
For the last year, together with the team, Maxim are working hard to create the film, They have already completed the script and started the editing. Up to this point I've covered all expenses out of own pockets. But now Maxim Dondyuk asking for your help and support in order to complete the film and tell this story to the world.
More information about the film you'll find on this page https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dondyuk/crimea-sich. And remember, even if you are not able to support maxim by pledging, you can do it by sharing his Kickstarter campaign among your friends and relatives. The more people know, the closer they are to the goal! Thank you in advance!
Rėmėjas:
© Lietuvos spaudos fotografų klubas.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


A luscious, elegant gentle feminine fragrance that is designed in the best tradition of the designer's house and is a symbol of panache and pure luxury. Ferre 20 Perfume is a floral woody scent that was launched in 1998 by the 'Architect of Fashion' Gianfranco Ferre. The fragrance features notes of mandarin orange, jasmine, vanilla, sandalwood, musk, velvet, silk and fir.


text:
Q: Loop through excel-spreadsheet-rows until empty using VBA-macro in powerpoint. For each row read values and write to 2-dim-array. No .select I wanna do a simple search and replace in powerpoint.
I am trying to loop through an excel spreadsheet using a VBA-macro in powerpoint.
The spreadsheet has two columns and ~100 rows. I want the macro to loop through the rows until it reaches an empty cell.
For each row it shell read the values of column 1 and column 2 and write those to an 2-dimensional-array.
I had it running using various .select-statements but I didn't like it that way (is select buggy? Search and replace worked a few times, but after changing the spreadsheet too often the macro always crashed).
I am trying to use a more robust way with better performance.
Dim excelDataArray(120, 2) As String

Dim slidedeck As Presentation
Set slidedeck = ActivePresentation

Dim singleslide As Slide

Dim excelFile As Excel.Workbook
Set excelFile = Excel.Application.Workbooks.Open(spreadsheetFolder)
Dim excelSheet As Excel.Worksheet
Set excelSheet = excelFile.Worksheets("Sheet1")

'Loop through each row in Column A until empty row
Dim N As Integer
N = excelSheet.Cells(excelSheet.Rows.Count, "A").End(xlUp).Row
For i = 1 To N
    excelDataArray(i, 0) = excelSheet.Cells(i, "A").Value
    excelDataArray(i, 1) = excelSheet.Cells(i, "B").Value
Next

A: You can dump it directly to a variant array without loops.
I have tidied your variables for completeness.
Pls change the path to your xl file here, "C:\temp\test.xlsx"
Sub likethis()

Dim slidedeck As Presentation

Dim singleslide As Slide
Dim XLS As Excel.Application
Dim excelFile As Excel.Workbook
Dim excelSheet As Excel.Worksheet

Dim lngROw As Long
Dim X

Set slidedeck = ActivePresentation
Set XLS = New Excel.Application
Set excelFile = XLS.Workbooks.Open("C:\temp\test.xlsx")
Set excelSheet = excelFile.Worksheets("Sheet1")

lngROw = excelSheet.Cells(excelSheet.Rows.Count, "A").End(xlUp).Row
ReDim X(1 To lngROw, 1 To 2)
X = excelSheet.Range("A1:B" & lngROw)
End Sub

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Who says you have to go out to enjoy mouthwatering ribs? Featured on The Expresso Morning Show!
Marinade: Mix all ingredients together and pour over warm short ribs. Mix well and leave to marinate for at least 30 minutes.
Bean Mash: Put the butternut and Sweet Potato in a pot and cover with chicken stock. Bring to the boil and cook until soft. Drain excess liquid off.
Add the butter, butterbeans, sugar beans, fresh coriander and fresh basil. Stir to combine and heat. Using a potato masher, roughly mash the beans and veg together. Should be rustic and not smooth. Adjust the seasoning with salt, lemon and lots of black pepper.
Serve sticky ribs on top of mash and enjoy.
Use this marinade on any types of meat or poultry and great used to baste meat on the braai.


text:
Q: Overlaying a 'dot' on to an image on click I am trying to write a simple program that lets me overlay a dot on top of an image when the image is clicked.  I can save the X and Y data back to my database but then I will want to be able to call that information back at a later date and overlay the dots again via code unlike the first time when the user had to click the image.
I got as far as capturing the X and Y of the click no problem but I am having trouble finding examples specifically for what I am trying to do.  All of the examples online seem to be for saving the image with the added graphic but I do not need to do that as it will be the same image every time.
Once I can do this, I also need to work out a way that I can detect what area of the image has been clicked.  The areas I need to mark out vary in shape and size so I need to try and work out a way to 'map' these areas and then cross reference with the co-ordinates of the users click (I assume that I may need to do some clever geometry stuff for that?)
If anyone has any suggestions of what subjects/classes/methods etc. to research for either of my queries, I would very grateful.
Thanks in advance

A: You can use the System.Drawing namespace to achieve this.
Create a control and override OnPaint and OnPaintBackground. Store your clicks in a List

*

*In OnPaintBackground, draw the image using DrawImageUnscaled using the graphics object which is passed to you as a parameter.

*In OnPaint, loop through your points array and call graphics.FillElipse or similar to draw a little dot.
Because this isnt a retained mode graphics system, you need to keep drawing these items so this may not suit a large number of dots. In that case, you can create an in memory bitmap and get a graphics drawing object using graphics.FromImage.


text:
Gassed up: Standoffs, Strikes, and Tension in West Virginia
By Leila Hooshyar on March 7, 2018
A couple weeks ago, Lissa Lucas, a Democratic political candidate for the West Virginia House of Delegates, was physically dragged off the House Chambers floor during a Judiciary Committee hearing. Prior to this, Lucas had taken to the podium at the hearing and listed donations that Congresspeople, primarily Republicans, had received from the oil and gas industry. Around a week later, West Virginia teachers began a strike over low teacher pay and benefits that Governor Jim Justice didn't think would last more than a day, but which ended up lasting over a week, becoming the state 's longest teacher's strike in 20 years.What do these two instances of defiance have in common? They both manifest the same frustration felt by residents who face increased cuts to education, healthcare, and public goods by the state government while oil, gas, and mining industries simultaneously get tax cuts disguised as "business incentives."
Before 2016, West Virginia was known to some as the western part of Virginia, as many people continue to conflate the two states even though West Virginia gained its independence over 150 years ago, and unknown altogether by others. Most national discussion of the state gravitates toward the opioid epidemic. Opioid overdoses are common in most economically depressed areas of the country, but especially so in Appalachia. Indeed, the rate per 100,000 people for drug overdoses in West Virginia is 2.5 times higher than the national average. Its reputation for being a state of "diseases of despair" is coupled with its reputation for being uneducated and economically destitute. All of these factors played into the negligence of West Virginia by the rest of the country, until the fateful day of November 8, 2016, when voters in West Virginia turned out in droves to vote Donald Trump into office as the 45th President of the United States. The revulsion of metropolitan centers of the country at the outcome of the election led pundits to spend countless hours interviewing its residents, finally recognizing the issues plaguing the state after lending an ear to the "silent majority."
Although media imagery of West Virginia is anything but rosy, such as this distasteful photo essay put out by Vice, the state once played an integral role in the nation's economy. Bituminous coal mined primarily in West Virginia was the energy source of choice by the United States from the Industrial Revolution to the late 1960s. Coal mined from the Appalachian mountains was what powered the first light bulbs and fueled the steamships used by industrialized nations in both World Wars. West Virginia played an absolutely indispensable role in the progression of this nation to its current position as the reigning superpower of the world, but many people wouldn't be able to recognize this fact by taking a glance at the state's current economy, which ranked as the "worst state for business in 2017" by CNBC.
Despite the plunge in coal mining that has taken place since the 1980s, coal continues to be integral to the lives of many West Virginians, providing 94% of the state's net electricity generation and being its largest export. Outside of the numbers, the coal industry remains important to many West Virginian families, not only for the income it brings them but also for the cultural heritage it carries with it. It was through coal mining that West Virginia enjoyed its most prosperous years. As a result, many West Virginians have come to identify with coal and other natural resource extraction industries, like oil drilling and the more unpopular practice of fracking. This history partially explains the bold reaction of legislators to Lucas' exclamations during the House Judiciary Committee hearing. The oil and gas industry in West Virginia is not used to dealing with opposition since many public officials receive a wealth of donations from them. For instance, Lucas' incumbent opponent in the upcoming midterm election receives almost 40% of his own campaign financing from these industries. Meanwhile, the state's two Senators, Joe Manchin III (D) and Shelley Capito (R), play crucial roles in assisting the success of the state's energy companies: the past and present on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.The issue that Lucas was calling into attention, however, has the potential to garner support across party lines.
The hearing Lucas interrupted was arranged to vote on a bill that would allow companies to drill on mineral owner's land regardless of their consent, so long as at least ¾ of landowners approved the extraction. For Lucas, this was personal: her grandfather left her land that happened to have a gas well. In an interview with the Washington Post, Lucas claimed that "no one is listening to us in the rural areas," and added, "Those pipelines will go through your land whether you're a Republican or Democrat or Libertarian." Moreover, Republican lawmakers' resistance to her outrage seems hypocritical given their own partisan stance on eminent domain –– most Republicans have expressly stated that they are against government seizure of private property for public use. The caveat in Lucas' case is that private companies are the ones doing the seizing. As a result, protests against the bill have been framed as detrimental to business and jobs, two issues that are extremely salient in West Virginia politics.
Currently, about 87% of West Virginia's state and federal congressional offices are up for election. The most contentious one is Democratic Senator Joe Manchin III seat, challenged by 5 Republicans, one of whom is notorious coal baron, Don Blankenship. Blankenship's negligence as CEO of Massey Energy coal company led to a disastrous mining explosion in 2010, killing 29 miners. In a state where more than ⅔ of the population voted for Trump, and where Democrats make up less than ⅓ of state and federal congressional offices, 2018 could be a year when West Virginia turns fully red. Historically, however, the state wasn't always so Republican. West Virginia's government was predominantly blue following the New Deal Era, and even through the 1980s amidst the rise of Evangelicalism elsewhere in the country. In fact, its longest-serving Senator, Robert C. Byrd, was a Democrat, albeit with a conservative past.
Likewise, the state's current political activity, the statewide teachers strike, in particular, reflects a potential for Democratic mobilization. It's no matter of opinion that Republicans are less likely to secure teacher's votes across the board, since 1990, the National Education Association has contributed over $2,000,000 to the Democratic Party. Furthermore, many focal points of the strike: a pay increase and better benefits, are the bread and butter requests of organized labor across the decades. As if this wasn't already ripe enough of an opportunity for the Democrats to swoop in, during negotiations with the state legislature, Republican Congresspeople tried to walk back on their deal to raise teacher's pay to 5%. Since then, however, the teacher's demands were met, and the strike has ended. Regardless of party representation, one thing is certain; it is high time that West Virginians act as the teachers do and Lucas did: openly defying their governments until they begin working for the people, rather than for industry. To my fellow West Virginians, be valiant and remember, "Montani Semper Liberi; Mountaineers are always free."
Featured image source: Education Week
Published in The Review
organized
Leila Hooshyar
More from The ReviewMore posts in The Review »
Israeli Election: Netanyahu's Comeback Attempt, Plus Far-Right Revival
Russia's Invasion of Ukraine and The Present Global Food Crisis
Standardized Testing Isn't What's Wrong with College Admissions
Where Does "Where the Crawdads Sing" Come From?


Perhaps you've heard of it. Perhaps you've heard of it long, long before other people started talking about it, and people accused others of being victims of Shiny Object Syndrome. Perhaps you've been using it for a few years before everyone else, and just sit back and watch all the fuss.
For instance, did you know that Facebook is the next Microsoft? Or that it's the next Google? I didn't. All this time, I thought I was using Facebook because I liked it because it was Facebook. But who knew?
What if we just let it be what it is, and we just wait and see what happens? No?
Facebook is not the next Microsoft. Facebook is about people and relationships. Microsoft is about software.
Facebook is not the next Google. Google is about seeking out information that is new to you. Facebook is about staying connected with people and things you already know, or know by association.
~ by Brad Levinson on July 20, 2007.
Facebook is growing organically, plain and simple.


Staff and news services Feb. 4, 2019 Updated: Feb. 4, 2019 10:13 p.m.
McMahon had scored just three points before he made three free throws with 11:53 to play. He then added three 3-pointers, the last with 10:30 left after a 3 by Ty Outlaw for the Hokies, to bolster the Cardinals (17-6, 8-2 ACC). McMahon finished with 17 points.
Kerry Blackshear Jr. scored 21 points for the Hokies (18-4, 7-3).
#17 Iowa State 75, Oklahoma 74: Lindell Wigginton scored 17 points to help lead the visiting Cyclones. Marial Shayok added 16 points, 10 in the final eight minutes, including a crucial off-balance 3-pointer as the shot clock expired with 1:19 remaining, for Iowa State (18-5, 7-3 Big 12). Kristian Doolittle had 19 points and nine rebounds, and Brady Manek scored 16 for the Sooners (15-8, 3-7).
#18 Texas Tech 81, West Virginia 50: Brandon Francis had 16 points as the host Red Raiders overwhelmed the cold-shooting Mountaineers. Texas Tech (18-5, 6-4 Big 12) took control with a 13-0 run midway through the first half. West Virginia (10-13, 2-8) made only nine field goals, matching North Carolina State for the fewest in a game this season..
AP rankings: The top four teams in the Associated Press poll remained unchanged: Tennessee, Duke, Virginia and Gonzaga. Kentucky was fifth, followed by Nevada, Michigan, North Carolina, Michigan State and Marquette.
#1 Baylor 74, #14 Texas 68: Moon Ursin scored 20 points as visiting Baylor (20-1, 10-0 Big 12) held off a fourth-quarter rally by the Longhorns (18-5, 8-3).
#10 Maryland 80, Illinois 66: Freshman Shakira Austin scored 17 points to help the visiting Terrapins (20-2, 9-2 Big Ten) get past the Fighting Illini (9-13, 1-10).
Poll position: Stanford fell three spots to No. 11 in the AP rankings. UConn dropped to fifth, its lowest ranking in nearly 12 years. Baylor remained No. 1 with Louisville, Oregon and Notre Dame rounding out the top five.
Kostic honored: USF forward Lucija Kostic was named the WCC Player of the Week. The freshman scored 22 points (on 11-for-14 shooting) and grabbed 12 rebounds in the Dons' 57-49 win at Santa Clara on Saturday. She added two blocks, two assists and a steal.
Hall additions: Old Dominion's Ticha Penicheiro, Notre Dame's Ruth Riley and Kentucky's Valerie Still are headed to the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame. The seven-person class will be enshrined in June.


of the birth of Lancelot Capability Brown.
In 1764 Capability Brown was appointed by George III as Chief Gardener at Hampton Court Palace and moved to Wilderness House which dates from 1700 and lies within the walls of the palace and was the official home of the palace's head gardeners. Amongst his many achievements was the planting of the Black Hamburg vine in 1768, which continues to flourish as the Great Vine and is the world's largest and most famous grape vine.
From 28 April - 4 September 2016 a temporary exhibition The Empress and the Gardener will bring 60 watercolour paintings of the Hampton Court estate by John Spyers, Brown's assistant back from Russia's State Hermitage museum. John Spyers, Capability Brown's designer at Hampton Court Palace worked as a draughtsman from 1746 - 1783 and it was he who prepared the drawings for many of Brown's park and architectural projects over a period of 20 years. The drawings are the only surviving records of how Hampton Court gardens looked when Brown was in charge.
Opening in the spring, a self-contained family focused walled area with every feature designed to be climbed upon, including a jousting arena, tiltyard towers and a fire breathing dragon. An out-door delight for children and families introducing history through play whilst engaging with nature.
An excursion to Hampton Court Palace in 2016 includes all the added value entertainments in addition to the magnificent Henry VIII State Apartments, Young Henry exhibition, the Baroque Palace of William & Mary, the Tudor Kitchens and the Triumphs of Caesar by Andrea Mantegna in one admission ticket.
Groups of 15 or more enjoy a 10% discount on admission rates. There is no extra charge for Christmas events (excluding the Ghost Tours). Groups can pre-book tickets on 0844 482 7770 or simply turn up and pay on the day at the Group Tickets desk.


Editor's Note: Karl Smesko has been the head women's coach at Florida Gulf Coast University since 2001 and helped start the program from scratch. Since the program's elevation to Division-I in 2007 and becoming eligible for the Big Dance in 2011, he has led the Eagles to six NCAA Tournament appearances, two NCAA Tournament wins and nine ASun regular season titles, and before leaving Division-II, his program completed two one-loss seasons and were national runners up in 2007. He has coached college basketball since 1997, with an NAIA Division-II national championship under his belt. This is the fifth installment of our series on him. We encourage you to also read part one, part two, part three and part four.
In a Naples Daily News article about Karl Smesko from March 2007, a prediction into the coach's future was made.
"He'll likely move on to a higher profile job in the not-too-distant future," wrote the author, presuming Smesko would treat Florida Gulf Coast the same way most coaches treat similarly-positioned schools.
That was 2007. It's now 2019. Nine ASun regular season titles, six NCAA Tournament appearances and two tournament wins later, Smesko is still kicking in Fort Myers.
It's an understandable forecast, though. It's rare to see a coach experience that level of success at a school like FGCU, mainly because they're normally gone before it's possible. Mid and small-majors are accustomed to the revolving door their head coaching positions can become after the titans catch a whiff of a winner.
And Smesko has caught the eyes of bigger fish. He admitted there have been approaches made, and he reportedly interviewed with Oregon State in 2008, Indiana and Illinois in 2014, and was offered the USC job in 2017.
Nothing has been tantalizing enough to attract him away from southwest Florida, although in standard Smesko fashion, he always does his due diligence.
After 17 years at FGCU, Smesko has built up quite a list of program alums, enough that all his assistants are former Eagles who played under his guise. It wasn't like that to start, but as he kept adding more of his past players to his staff and saw the results, it gradually became modus operandi.
Smesko said it helps relationships with current players as his assistants, having gone through the same program, can relate specifically to their needs. He's not the early-30s coach he used to be, and sometimes having an assistant who is closer in age and has the same background as the player can make communication smoother.
But other than the results, there's another reason Smesko prefers to keep his staff in house. It was tough sledding for him when he was trying to break into coaching, and it took a bit of luck, some advice and tons of work to get his start, as covered in our first article on him. Now he's in a position to give aspiring coaches their first break, and he wants to reward those who have aided his program's construction.
It makes sense for a coach who said his greatest joy comes not from wins or personal accomplishments, but rather the success of his old players and assistants, who sometimes overlap.
Smesko doesn't put much emphasis on himself, in his coaching or larger life evaluations. I asked the coach what was something about him people didn't know but he wished they did, and it was the easiest answer of the interview.
It makes sense when you watch him coach. While some are demonstrative on the sideline, jumping and shouting like a Broadway musical, Smesko slowly paces, his slight body shifts to follow the play is the most animation he shows. He will occasionally write notes or calmly gesture a player over for an explanation or tweak.
It bleeds over to his philosophy, which is more about numbers than anything else. That's not to say he doesn't value toughness, attentiveness and other intangibles required for a successful hooper, but to Smesko, math is the core principle to his brand of basketball.
When you break the sport down to that level, it begs the question: is basketball a simple game?
Although Smesko said his system is simple, his team of course works tirelessly for months to get it right, like with all basketball teams. It's a grind to get through a season, including the preseason preparation, a grueling five-month season, the emotional swings and having to do it all over again the next year. There's not much of a reprieve for coaches or players, and there can be days you don't want to go to the gym yet again.
But you do, and you have to. And during those roller coasters throughout the season, managing pain from losses, handling highs from wins and dealing with everything in between, your only choice is to strap in. You have a small group of people – teammates, coaches, anyone else with the team – by your side, but that's it. Otherwise, it's about putting your head down and pushing through.
That's part of what Smesko tries to teach his players, and he said he and his staff use basketball as a vehicle for life lessons. The parallels between sport and life are vast, and it's not lost on him.
All photography courtesy of the athletic department at Florida Gulf Coast University.


text:
The Cornell Daily Sun (https://cornellsun.com/2010/08/23/seeing-the-bands-at-outside-lands-2/)
Seeing the Bands at Outside Lands
By The Cornell Daily Sun | August 23, 2010
As a preface to my review of Outside Lands, I must tell you all a bit about my summer up until August 14th and 15th. The contrast between the two only enhances the positive feelings I gleaned from this awesome experience.
My first postgraduate summer was nothing out of the ordinary. I was back in my hometown, San Francisco, working, seeing friends and hanging out with my dog — the usual routine. Even without a distinctive difference, things clearly felt different. Since stepping off the plane in early June, my days continued to have a similar melancholy quality.
To top it off, my ever present "college is over" freak-out was only exacerbated by the cold. Yes, I know, San Francisco summers are notoriously frigid. We have all heard the famous Mark Twain quote about his coldest winter being a summer in the city by the bay. As a tried and true SF native, I had come to think of Mr. Twain as something of a sissy (clearly, he had never spent a winter in upstate New York). I think I owe good ol' Mark an apology, though, because this summer has been dreadful. Fog and clouds and 50 degree weather can make anyone feel glum.
Therefore, the thought of two days of free music sounded like a welcome relief from the cold and dreary summer I had been having. Even though the location would be the same, I hoped the atmosphere would be a welcome change. Braving one of the coldest summers in the last several decades, I stuffed a down jacket into my backpack and began the mile walk from my front door to Golden Gate Park.
Outside Lands is a relatively new festival in San Francisco, only three years old this year. Not only does the festival showcase a wide range of musical acts, it also prides itself on providing some of the best food and wine San Francisco has to offer.
The result is a pretty bougie affair of mass consumption, where festival goers can purchase a gourmet hot dog next to fresh poke tuna and BBQ oysters. One spot in the 80-acre festival grounds is aptly named "Wine Lands," in which there was a large cabernet colored tent filled with local wineries waiting to fill the glasses of legal drinkers (for a price).
I entered this cultural carnival with trepidation. I had no one to attend the festival with me the first day, so I knew I would be spending the next 12 hours alone. After getting my wristband, I headed straight to the Lands End Stage to watch People Under the Stairs. The grounds looked empty, and I easily secured myself a spot right at the front.
People Under the Stairs is an L.A. based hip hop group comprised of MCs The One and Double K. Several of their songs are featured over old funk and soul samples. The two rappers danced across the stage, rapping about drinking beer and hanging with Mr. Cooper. Even though the crowd was small, audience members enthusiastically sang along with the duo, expressing a clear connection with their lyrics about a hard partying life style.
My next assignment was to find the media tent. Tucked in a corner of the VIP section (aka the section for individuals who want to pay 3 times the entry rate into the venue for some free hors d'oeurves) was the tent designated for members of the press. Somehow, The Cornell Daily Sun qualified me as one of these very important people.
I walked into the white tent to find plush white seats with a killer view of the main stage, a woman waiting to pour me free beer from a Heineken keg, and a group of girls who told me when food from different vendors would be served. Oh yeah, and around the corner I had access to the bathroom vans with real running water. I thought I had died and went to festival heaven.
With a beer in hand, and a free water bottle stuffed into my backpack, I left the tent feeling refreshed. Next, I headed to the Panhandle Stage, a venue powered only by the sun. Framed by solar panels, I watched the relatively new band Dawes while sitting on a haystack set up about 50 feet from the stage.
The setting was appropriate, as Dawes has a country feel about them. Three out of the four band members were dressed in plaid, and all of them looked like the California boys that they were, but as they crooned about love and life, they sounded more akin to Texas based Okkervil River. The lead singer's voice is rough, and the band works a little too hard on stage, but in time it is clear that they will produce a cohesive sound. In the end, the band was not attention grabbing, but enjoyable.
I spent the rest of the day catching beginnings and ends of various sets, including the Levon Helm Band, Bassnectar, My Morning Jacket and Cat Power.
The best of the day was clearly Levon and his gang. The seventy-year-old rock legend is the former lead singer and drummer of The Band. While his voice was severely affected by his battle with throat cancer in the early 1990s, the man can still play the drums like a god. Helm appeared pale and frail, but still put on a mighty performance. Swaying back and forth to "The Weight" amongst a sea of grown up hippies, I felt at ease.
The Levon Helm Band's spot at the top only shined more brightly in comparison to the performances of My Morning Jacket and Cat Power. Both bands were bland, tired and uninterested in interacting with their audiences. It was disappointing on both counts.
Between shows, I stocked up on food and libations at several press friendly venues, and even managed to make some friends. The "summer" weather held up, sprinkling everyone with a large helping of mist. I was definitely glad to be packing my winter coat.
Ignoring my Cornell roots, I opted to go see The Strokes instead of Further for my last show of the day. Throughout the day, the festival had been filled with so many different types of individuals, but as these two very different bands took the stage, the once diverse crowd parted ways. Deadheads and older folk wandered to the Lands End Stage, while anyone born after 1980 headed over to the Twin Peaks Stage.
The crowd grew restless as dusk fell over the park. Prerecorded songs played over the speaker system, providing background music to a sea of fans pushing their way to the front of the stage. In the middle of a song, the stage went black, and a strong beat came over the loud speakers as the members of The Strokes sauntered onto the stage in their black leather jackets and large sunglasses. They looked like a caricature of rock music.
Their performance proved their authenticity. Even though the band had not been on tour for the last four years, they performed with the energy level of seasoned live artists. They paraded out their widely cherished hits, bringing the crowd back to their heyday of the early 2000s. The band's first hits, including "Someday," "Last Nite" and "Reptillia" were mixed in with the more recent "You Only Live Once."
Standing next to me at the show was a father and son. The young boy looked about 5 years old, and wore a Strokes shirt. He spent the duration of the show on his father's shoulders, with his hands stretched into the air as he sang along to the words and shook his head back and forth. Clearly past his bedtime, the boy fought off signs of sleep to watch his favorite band.
All rocked out, I got a ride home, and quickly fell asleep so I could do it all over the next day.
Day two was even more jam-packed than the first. From 2:25 onwards, there was a consistent lineup of shows I wanted to see. My day started in a wonderful fashion. I got to the press tent early, just in time to watch interviews take place with both Chromeo and Phoenix. Surrounded by two of my favorite bands, I knew that this would be a wonderful day.
The second day of the festival was already looking up, as I had friends to spend the day with. I shared my free beer with my entire crew, running in and out of the press tent with full cups. Cups in hand, we watched Temper Trap, Janelle Monae and Al Green, stopping from time to time to lie down under the giant copper statues erected in between two stages.
As the day went on, we were faced with a dilemma. Next in the lineup was Chromeo, which overlapped with Phoenix, which overlapped with Nas and Damien Marley. Our goal was to attempt to make all three shows.
After watching Chromeo's interview for Rhapsody in the media tent, I was already in love with them. More specifically, I was in love with Dave 1 (I really want to be his "Needy Girl," you know, without being needy). Dave is a tall, skinny, slightly awkward, musically inclined Canadian Jew. We are definitely meant for each other.
I waited with anticipation as a stagehand uncovered the band's signature piano stands, comprised of women's legs and bright red heels.
When they finally took the stage, P-Thugg and Dave 1 brought the house down. Some combination of the melodica, auto-tune, and Dave's sweet voice (sigh), created one of the best dance parties I have ever seen. When it came time to leave to make sure we could catch the Phoenix set, I found myself unable to be torn away from Chromeo. The enthusiasm that the group brought to the stage was electric. I truly cannot wait to see them again.
Unfortunately, Phoenix did not bring that same thrilling quality to their performance. Our vantage point was less than desirable, as the stage was packed and we were stuck behind the soundboard. Despite this physical impediment, the live performance sounded distant. Thomas Mars' vocals were weak when compared to his band. Amid rumors of an impending break up, their performance was less than reassuring.
The live rendition of "If I Ever Felt Better" was a clear example of the band's faltering live performance. The chorus, usually sung by all four-band members, fell flat on the mics. Unfortunately, that resulted in everyone standing around me having to hear my rendition of the repeated chorus line. It was nice to hear some of my favorite songs live, but disheartening to know that one of my favorite bands could not bring their creativity and energy onto the main stage.
The final act of the day was Empire of the Sun. My choice to avoid the main stage for the second night in a row was intentional. There was no way I was going to see Kings of Leon, unless their set involved a large helping of stage diving birds. In the end, I clearly made the right choice.
Empire of the Sun played their first show in the United States at Lollapalooza, only two weeks before taking the stage at Outside Lands. Spearheaded by Luke Steele, their performance is theatrical, to say the least. Steele stood at a control stand of sorts, surrounded by keyboards on all sides, as he played his guitar. He donned a variety of metallic headdresses, as six female dancers wore different costumes and danced on either side of him. From pink robot hats to marlin fish masks, the dancers and lead singer acted out scenes in sync with the musical performance. In sum, it was the definition of trippy.
The band's performance distracted the audience from the band's less than choice sound quality. It also provided a memorable experience for everyone watching. Move over Lady Gaga, Empire of the Sun is here.
Danced out and exhausted, I carried myself to KFC and then a local bar, where I proceeded to fall asleep in my seat. The next day I woke up with sunburn, a cold and the sense that getting a press pass to Outside Lands just made my summer.
Original Author: Marisa Breall
Renowned C.U. Donor Paul Milstein Dies
By The Cornell Daily Sun August 24, 2010
Paul Milstein, the wealthy real estate developer and namesake of the College of Art, Architecture and Planning building currently under construction on the Arts Quad, died at his home on August 9.Milstein made his fortune in Manhattan real estate. His family's wealth was valued at $3.8 billion as of March.
Welcome freshmen to one of the finest universities in the world. You got here because throughout your entire life you have been asking questions, taking initiative and working hard.


text:
Nodar Akhalkatsi (em georgiano: ნოდარ ახალკაცი; Tiblíssi, 2 de janeiro de 1938 – Norderstedt, 24 de janeiro de 1998) foi um futebolista e treinador de futebol da Geórgia. Como treinador, o maior sucesso de Akhalkatsi foi vencer a Taça dos Clubes Vencedores de Taças na temporada 1980–81 com o Dinamo Tbilisi.

Futebolistas da Geórgia
Futebolistas da União Soviética
Treinadores de futebol da União Soviética
Treinadores de futebol da Geórgia

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


To conclude this discussion, I should like to allude to a Gospel text: "When these things begin to happen, stand erect and hold your heads high, your deliverance is near at hand" (Luke 21 :28). The words "stand erect" here are associated with the Hebrew words talita kumi, which Jesus used when raising the daughter of J airus to life again. Thus to "stand erect" is to come back to life again, and that is what we must do today. Weighed down by suffering, oppression, and pessimism, we must come back to life as Christians. Jesus tells us that our deliverance is at hand. It is, in two senses. Our life is short, and our deliverance from suffering is not far away, especially if we are truly committed to liberation. But it is near at hand in another sense also. The person who commits himself to work for the coming stage of history here and now is also working for the kingdom of God which has already begun Ilere. We cannot fashion the kingdom of God out of thin air. We must fashion it through concrete historical projects. No specific project in history will completely flesh out the kingdom, but that does not mean we can sit back and do nothing. Some people turn a specific project into an absolute, idolizing their own scheme. The communists do that with communism, for example. But others avoid all commitment and wait for the arrival of an ethereal divine kingdom. That, too, is a mistake. We must commit our lives to concrete work in history. We must feed the hungry and give drink to the thirsty. We must work with dedication and enthusiasm, even though we realize that every specific project is relative, for that is the only way to make the kingdom of God manifest.
The mission of the Christian is not performed solely by building churches. It is carried out by participating in reallife history in its many different aspects. The kingdom of God is fashioned through these projects. If they are not carried out, the kingdom will never come. We must get rid of many of the false antinomies that still weigh down upon us.
When Jesus cured the paralyzed and the sick, he told them that their faith had saved them. We, too, must have faith if we are to be saved. We must "stand erect" and "hold our heads high" because our deliverance is at hand.


To help you get to know us here at Jay Edward Group, we want to take the time to introduce ourselves – starting with President, Michael Shapiro.
As you know, Jay Edward Group manufactures fine case goods and upholstered seating for the global hospitality market. We focus on what matters most to our clients: quality, value and execution by working with select owners, developers, contractors, designers and purchasing agents to enable them to produce the world's best products direct from the factories that build them. Jay Edward Group is one of a very small handful of companies in this industry that actually own a factory overseas. As a full-service solution for hospitality furnishings, JEG is passionate about achieving enduring results for their clients – results that go beyond financial and are uniquely tailored to maximize each project and opportunity.
Throughout Michael's career, something had always been drawing him to focus on the main point of sourcing: quality control. After nearly a decade as Senior Director of Sourcing and Design Development at Starwood Hotels, Michael Shapiro founded Center Point Global (CPG) to address the single largest problem he faced when sourcing furniture, fixture and equipment needs from overseas: inadequate quality control. Managing the sourcing and design development of Starwood's Sheraton, Westin, W, St. Regis, Four Points and Le Meridien brands and launching the Aloft and Element brands, Michael saw an opportunity to perfect the process of product procurement in the quality control realm.
Michael brought this experience and unique insight to lead Center Point Global to address these issues and ensure the success of its client's overseas manufacturing operations. Following this, Michael was VP of Sourcing and Procurement for J Christopher Capital, where he was brought on to build the sourcing and procurement team in both Shanghai and New York City.
Today, Michael Shapiro is extremely proud of the company he has built – with amazing clients, a team focused on providing the upmost quality and results, with an emphasis on transparency – you'll never have questions about your project while it's in Jay Edwards hands.
In his free time, Michael loves to hang out at his family farm in Julian, CA, where they care for a variety of animals including chickens, goats, sheep, cows, miniature donkeys and dogs. Michael currently has six dogs that rotate between the Julian farm and his home in San Diego, taking two dogs at a time back to the city. He starts every day at dawn with long brisk walk that can often go eight to ten miles before heading into the office. The length of the walk is dependent on which dogs he has with him. The basset hounds legs are little too short for long walks, but Belgium Shepherds can go forever.
Michael also travels a great deal for work. Almost 2 weeks out of every month. Jay Edward Group has offices and showroom in Manila, Philippines, a factory in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam and a partner in Shanghai China. This three-country circuit keeps keep's Michael on the go. It is not uncommon for him to wake up and take a moment to consider which country he is in that day.
Don't forget to check out Jay Edward on Instagram, Pinterest, or LinkedIn!


Joseph Galante helped the government in hopes that he'd earn a get out of jail free card, but kept committing crimes.
An ex-member of a violent mob crew in Queens, who worked undercover as a government snitch for a decade, was sentenced Wednesday to 10 years in prison for his role in a gruesome murder.
Joseph Galante, 49, was a member of the notorious Giannini Crew, based in a café on Fresh Pond Road in Ridgewood, when he helped get rid of the corpse of cocaine rip-off victim Thomas Sanjane whose throat was brutally cut in 1991.
Galante was hoping his later service on Team America would earn him a get out of jail card, but he resumed committing crimes and prosecutors tore up his cooperation agreement.
"The defendant committed one of the most heinous crimes you can conceive of committing," Assistant U.S. Attorney Shreve Ariail told Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis.
Although he faced 30 years to life in prison under sentencing guidelines, Garaufis gave him a break because of the extraordinary length of time he served as an informant and making secret recordings of mobsters from the Bonanno, Colombo and Genovese crime families.
"I want to apologize to the victim's family. It's haunted me for the last 25 years," Galante said in Brooklyn Federal Court.


What is Squarespace and why do you use it?
One of the leading website builders and hosts, created by creative people for creative people. I've been using Squarespace for over 7 years and built over 100 sites, I love using it because of it's beautiful design and ease of use. Even if you are not good with computers you can use it and take control of your website.
Can I see your portfolio and testimonials?
"Your 'One Day Web' guide was invaluable in helping me understand exactly what I needed to update my website".
Makers, Artists and Designers who need a simple portoflio site to showcase their work. This is not for those who need a business website, online shop or more advanced site - if you need a more advanced site, please contact me to discuss.
How does the 20% discount code apply?
Because I am setting up your site, you will get 20% off your Squarespace fees for the first year. For the 'Personal' package (which I would recommend for a portfolio site) this gives a saving of approx £25. Read more about Squarespace pricing here.
How many pages would I get?
Please use my Squarespace guide: www.oneday-web.com/the-guide-secure which will guide you through how to prepare your content (words, graphics, images, logins). I recommend organising all your content in folders with a master 'Website' folder in Dropbox or Google Drive. I will then access these files to create the site.
I will give you access to this once you have booked. It is crucial you prepare you content in order to get the most from this offer.
What if I want to add more to my site later, such as an online shop?
That's fine, you can do this yourself (Squarespace is fully scaleable) or book another session with me. You can add an online shop, blog, events page and many more things.
Yes, 50% is due up front when you book, the remainder when the site is ready.
© One Day Web / All words and Images by Yeshen Venema.


The European Commission has asked PwC to write a series of reports and case studies about innovative businesses and business models, which you can find on Business Innovation Observatory. Two of these reports (Crowdsourced Manufacturing and Customer Incentives and Involvement) – based on research conducted by PwC's consultants and interviews with CEOs and founders of innovative companies like Shapeways, Quirky or eYeka – talk about the trend of crowdsourcing, outline this trend's drivers and obstacles, and formulate policy recommendations pertaining its development. Both prove to be very insightful when it comes to the future of crowdsourcing.
The trends investigated this semester are Clean technologies (which refers to innovative products and services which leverage on the latest technological advancements to enable a more productive and responsible use of resources), Smart factories (which looks at how business and production processes are netting with one another, including crowdsourced manufacturing), and Customer experience (which tackles the trend of businesses having become increasingly interested in engaging customers in their product development proces, also through crowdsourcing.) The two former are the ones this blog post is about.
Crowdsourced manufacturing, the process by which manufacturers complement and expand their processes with capabilities, tools, equipment and ideas from a large group of people rather than from their own employees or suppliers, covers various forms of interaction between manufacturers and communities of consumers, specialists and intermediaries.
The other companies that are showcased (Quirky, Shapeways, Hypios, VehicleForge and InnogetCloud) are all offering innovative solutions to enable crowdsourced manufacturing, the common denominator being the way in which they leverage communication technology to spread the request for assistance around the world, and through which they manage to collect huge numbers of ideas and solutions. The report describes the mechanisms that these compenies, including eYeka, use and how that can benefit organizations in various forms.
Interestingly, PwC also recommends to encourage crowdsourcing adoption with possible tax benefits for companies using it: "[Crowdsourcing] adoption could be increased by R&D tax breaks for users," it is written in the report, and "It is also recommended that governments participate in crowdsourced manufacturing." I wonder how that would be perceived by critics of crowdsourcing, particularly in France where even simple crowdsourcing company visits by public officials caused debate. The US, on their side, have embraced and been using crowdsourcing in the public sector for years already.
This second case study looks at crowdsourcing in a different angle. Instead of looking at the trend of crowdsourcing from a production standpoint, it is looking at it from a consumer empowerment standpoint. "Customer incentives and involvement refers to methods and techniques applied by companies to engage customers in the development of new product," the report explains. "By leveraging the creativity, insight and wit of customers, brands are attempting to better target and segment their audience in order to predict market demand and design their marketing campaigns accordingly." Examples of such companies are Adpoints, KBHFF, Logograb, Sampleo, Stafinno and eYeka.
PwC writes that customer involvement activities are a new form of how businesses interact with customers breaking with the traditional seller-buyer relationship, and that today's companies are empowering their customers to reap the benefits from their experience, expertise, motivation and time to come up with data-driven market decisions. The key drivers are customers' willingness to buying products according to their very personal preferences and their level of involvement in the development process, as well as the emergence of a collaborative business-customer relationship, which is reshaping user interaction with companies' products and services. PwC explains that "the improvement of digital tools and crowdsourcing online platforms " is a supplementary enabler.
What are the challenges that PwC underlines for this trend? The critical barriers for enterprises to implement customer involvement processes are the challenge to attract capital for their growth phase, the lack of awareness about existing public support schemes and the need to widen the definition of "innovation." The lack of education of the market on the benefits of customer-driven innovations appears as a major challenge for the uptake of the trend.
The consulting firm formulates policy recommendations like a better access to finance for SMEs, a clearer communications on EU funds and the elaboration of an official definition for "innovation" as a term. Also, there needs to be better education of young people in order to avoid a talent shortage which would be harmful for these innovative companies: "It would be further recommended to create technological hubs, to address the shortage of IT professionals and to encourage the creation of more partnerships between SMEs and public institutions," the firm says, acknowledging the usefulness of consumer (citizen) empowerment even for the public sector.
The reports were commissioned to PwC Luxembourg by the European Commission, and mean to provide Europe's policy makers with recommendations on how to apprehend this trend. The report's content does not necessarily reflect the European Commission's opinions or intentions, as it is being said at the beginning of the reports: "The views expressed in this report, as well as the information included in it, do not necessarily reflect the opinion or position of the European Commission and in no way commit the institution." I think it's important to note this to avoid misunderstandings or misinterpretations.


text:
We're showing you items that ship to CA.
Prichard's Double Chocolate Bourbon
Aged for upwards of 14 years, this chocolate-infused bourbon earned a score of 90 points at the Ultimate Spirits Challenge.
This product is available in: AZ, CA, CO, CT, DC, FL, IL, IN, KY, LA, ME, MD, MN, MO, NE, NV, NH, NJ, NM, NY, NC, ND, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TX, VA, WA Unfortunately, we can't ship to PO Boxes and APO addresses.
About Prichard's Double Chocolate Bourbon
When he passed away in 1822, Benjamin Prichard passed his "still, tubs and utensils thereto" on to his son, Enoch. In the antebellum South, Prichard's Tennessee whiskey — made using white corn and pure Tennessee spring water — was incredibly popular. Enoch eventually gave up the stills, tubs and utensils that his father had passed on to him, and focused his energies elsewhere. In 1997 — five generations later — Phil Prichard took up the family business again when he opened the doors to Prichard's Distillery in Kenslo, Tennessee. The first legal distillery in Tennessee in nearly fifty years, Prichard's Distillery is located just a few miles south of where Phil's great-great-great grandfather distilled whiskey nearly two centuries ago.
Prichard's Double Chocolate Bourbon is made from a mash of white corn, rye and soft wheat. "Today, the vast majority of distilleries making whiskey in this country are making their whiskey with yellow corn," says Phil. "But you and I both know that white corn has a higher sugar content than yellow corn. It makes a fine, fine whiskey." After the grains are mashed and fermented, they are distilled before the whiskey is matured at cask-strength (120-proof) in new, charred American oak barrels for upwards of nine years. Following its initial beauty rest, the bourbon is brought to bottle-proof (90 proof) and aged again in entirely new, charred American oak barrels for an additional three to five years. While expensive and time-consuming, this double-barreling process reinforces the barrel notes of caramel, toffee and vanilla that earned Prichard's Double Barreled Bourbon a score of 94 points from Jim Murray's Whisky Bible and a score of 95 points (tying Pappy Van Winkle's 23 Year Old Bourbon) from the Ultimate Spirits Challenge.
After the bourbon is bottle-ready, it is infused with select, single origin cacao beans that are slowly roasted and stone ground by the Olive and Sinclair Chocolate Company. While the exact process of infusing the bourbon with the cacao beans remains a closely guarded secret, the result — Prichard's Double Chocolate Bourbon Whiskey — has hints of caramel and toffee typically associated with bourbon, but a gentle, chocolaty finish. The flavor of the cacao beans, which accentuates the flavor of the bourbon, is complex yet mellow and earned Prichard's Double Chocolate Bourbon Whiskey a score of 90 points at the 2012 Ultimate Spirits Challenge.
Try a bottle of chocolate-infused bourbon today!
About Bourbon
There are not many things more American than bourbon, and although most of it is produced in Kentucky, it can be produced all over the USA.
It must be made with at least 51% corn and bottled at 40% ABV or higher. So why not give this American classic a try?
Check out our impressive selection of bourbons, find your new favorite in Top 10 bourbons, or explore our treasury of rare & hard to find bourbons.
Complex aroma of chocolate, corn and vanilla. Initial palate has rounded notes of toffee and caramel that gently fade. The chocolate flavor, while mellow and subtle, is ever-present and leads to a lingering, dry finish.
Widow Jane 10 Year Old Straight Bourbon Whiskey
Discover Widow Jane 10 Year Old Straight Bourbon Whiskey 750mL 91 (45.5% ABV) Smaller than small-batch, Widow Jane's 10 Year Old was awarded GOLD for 'Bourbon over 6 years' at the 2018 Whiskies of t...
Eagle Rare 10 Year Old Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey
Discover Eagle Rare 10 Year Old Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey 750mL 90 (45% ABV) Aged for a minimum of ten years, this Kentucky straight bourbon was named the "Best Bourbon" at the 2013 International W...
Blade & Bow Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey
Discover Blade & Bow Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey 750mL 91 (45.5% ABV) This award-winning solera-aged bourbon contains the last remaining stock of whiskey distilled at the original Stitzel-We...
Iron Smoke Straight Bourbon Whiskey
Discover Iron Smoke Straight Bourbon Whiskey 750mL 80 (40% ABV) Iron Smoke Straight Bourbon Whiskey won Double Gold at 2017 North American Bourbon & Whiskey Competition in Louisiana, r...
Breckenridge Bourbon Whiskey
Discover Breckenridge Bourbon Whiskey 750mL 86 (43% ABV) This Breckenridge bourbon scored 1 point higher than Pappy Van Winkle's 23 Year Old Bourbon at the Ultimate Spirits Chal...
Smooth Ambler Contradiction Bourbon Whiskey
Discover Smooth Ambler Contradiction Bourbon Whiskey 750mL 92 (46% ABV) This unique whiskey combines Smooth Ambler's own wheated bourbon with a sourced, nine-year-old high-rye bourbon. *S...
Basil Hayden's Bourbon Whiskey
Discover Basil Hayden's Bourbon Whiskey 750mL 80 (40% ABV) Basil Hayden was the first to introduce small grains into bourbon mash back in 1796. ...
Colonel E.H. Taylor Jr. Small Batch Bourbon Whiskey
Discover Colonel E.H. Taylor Jr. Small Batch Bourbon Whiskey 750mL 100 (50% ABV) Named in honor of the founder of modern bourbon, this whiskey earned a score of 95 points at the 2013 Ultimate Spirits C...


Long-time Culver City resident Jerome "Jerry" Ackerman, an artist-designer and a driving force in the Mid-Century Modern art movement in California, will be the featured speaker at the Culver City Historical Society's general meeting on Wednesday, January 16, 2013, at 7:00 p.m. in the Veterans Memorial Building's Multi-Purpose Room, 4117 Overland Avenue, Culver City, 90230.
Ackerman will discuss his life with his late wife and collaborator, Evelyn Ackerman, in conversation with gallery director Gerard Brien of Reform Gallery.
The Ackermans' works have been exhibited at LACMA, the Craft and Folk Art Museum, and the Mingei International Museum in San Diego. Their ERA Industries Inc. is a still a register business in Culver City where it has been since 1956. Evelyn one of the founding Culver City Arts Committee members and was responsible for placing the Cougars artwork by Gwynn Murrill at the corner of Hannum and Slauson.
There also will be a brief discussion of upcoming programs and projects, as well as updates on the activities and exhibits in the Archives and Resource Center (ARC); the Center will be opened following the meeting.
For more information, please call the Society at (310) 253-6941 or e-mail us.