text:
Q: Is there a problem with the $monthlyInvoices variable? This is my job.
When I run this job the online invoices query doesn't display anything, but what is intriguing is that when I swap the places of the $onlineInvoices and the $offlineInvoices variables the $onlineInvoices query works while the $offlineInvoices doesn't.
It worked fine when I redefined the $monthlyInvoices again below the $offline_sales variable, But I would like to know why this occurs.
<?php

namespace App\Jobs;

use App\Models\Invoice;
use App\Models\InvoiceMonthlyStatistics;
use Carbon\Carbon;
use Carbon\CarbonPeriod;
use Illuminate\Bus\Queueable;
use Illuminate\Contracts\Queue\ShouldBeUnique;
use Illuminate\Contracts\Queue\ShouldQueue;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Illuminate\Foundation\Bus\Dispatchable;
use Illuminate\Queue\InteractsWithQueue;
use Illuminate\Queue\SerializesModels;

class InvoiceMonthlyStatisticsJob implements ShouldQueue
{
    use Dispatchable, InteractsWithQueue, Queueable, SerializesModels;

    /**
     * Create a new job instance.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function __construct()
    {
        //
    }

    /**
     * Execute the job.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function handle()
    {
        $period = CarbonPeriod::create('2021-08-18', '1 month', Carbon::now()->toDateString());
        foreach ($period as $date) {
            $monthlyInvoices = Invoice::
            whereRaw('YEAR(created_at) = ?', $date->format('Y'))
                ->whereRaw('MONTH(created_at) = ?', $date->format('m'));

            $total_sales = $monthlyInvoices
                ->sum('net_price');

            $offline_sales = $monthlyInvoices
                ->where('type', '=', 'offline')
                ->sum('net_price');

            $online_sales = $monthlyInvoices
                ->where('type', '=', 'online')
                ->sum('net_price');

            $invoiceStats = (new InvoiceMonthlyStatistics)->create([
                'total_sales' => $total_sales,
                'online_sales' => $online_sales,
                'offline_sales' => $offline_sales,
                'month' => $date->format('m'),
                'year' => $date->format('y')
            ]);
        }
        $invoiceStats->save();
    }
}

A: This is because $monthlyInvoices is a query builder.
When you add a where statement, it remains even after you called sum:
$offline_sales = $monthlyInvoices
                ->where('type', '=', 'offline') //here
                ->sum('net_price');

That's the problem, because when you do:
$online_sales = $monthlyInvoices
                ->where('type', '=', 'online')
                ->sum('net_price');

->where('type', '=', 'offline') is still here, because you previously added it.
In a sense, your second query is the same as doing:
$online_sales = $monthlyInvoices
                ->where('type', '=', 'offline')
                ->where('type', '=', 'online')
                ->sum('net_price');

Now you probably see the problem here. One quick way to solve this is to clone the query builder before each query.
$offline_sales = (clone $monthlyInvoices)
                ->where('type', '=', 'offline')
                ->sum('net_price');

$online_sales = (clone $monthlyInvoices)
                ->where('type', '=', 'online')
                ->sum('net_price');

By cloning $monthlyInvoices, you are basically saying "don't use the same query builder, but a new one that is identical". This temporary query builder will only be used in this particular query and where('type', '=', 'offline') (or whatever you do) will not be "persisted" into the original $monthlyInvoices query builder.


text:
Zervos, Christian
Zervos, Christian. PABLO PICASSO. 33 volumes in original flexible binding with glassine jacket. Presented in 9 linen slipcases. Paris, Cahier's d'Art, 2013.
This beautifully reproduced edition of the Zervos features over 16,000 works in 9 linen slipcases, with 33 volumes in total. Each volume is bound in a flexible binding with a glassine jacket, echoing the original, which was first published in 1932. Up to 50 corrections have been made at the direction of the Picasso Administration. Six drawings in the original were attributed to Picasso and have been correctly attributed in this new edition to Cocteau. Available in French or English.
See all items in Art Books
See all items by Christian Zervos

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
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text:
Q: Facing Issue on Getting Current Tabs and Selected Tab URL on Chrome API I am trying to get the URL of all opened Tabs and Selected Tab using thiese two snippet
// For Getting URL of All Opened Tabs
chrome.tabs.getCurrent(function(tabs) {
for (var i = 0; i < tabs.length; i++) {
    console.log(tab.url);
     }
});

// For Getting URL of Selected Tab
chrome.tabs.getSelected(function(tab) {
     console.log(tab.url);
});

but neither of them working. For getting All Tabs I am getting this error:

Error in response to tabs.getCurrent: TypeError: Cannot read property 'length' of undefined

and for getting the selected Tab

undefined

can you please let me know why this is happening and how can I fix it?

A: chrome.tabs.getSelected has been deprecated. so we should use tabs.query({active: true}... instead.
chrome.tabs.getCurrent passes a single tab to the callback function. It doesn't "Getting URL of All Opened Tabs", it:

Gets the tab that this script call is being made from. May be undefined if called from a non-tab context (for example: a background page or popup view).

So:
// Write the URL of the current tab to the console
chrome.tabs.getCurrent(tab => console.log(tab.url));

This requires the "activeTab" or "tabs" permission in the manifest. If there is an error it won't throw an exception, instead it will populate chrome.runtime.lastError.
I find it easier to deal with all the callbacks using an asynchronous or promise wrapper library like chrome-extension-async. This let's us use async/await syntax and a regular try-catch:
try {
    const currentTab = await chrome.tabs.getCurrent();
    console.log(currentTab.url);
}
catch(err) {
    // Handle errors
}

In your popup.html you can't access chrome.tabs.getCurrent - you have to use chrome.tabs.query instead:
async function writeAllTabUrlToConsole() {
    try {
        // Get all the tabs
        const tabs = await chrome.tabs.query({});

        // Write all their URLs to the popup's console
        for(let t of tabs)
            console.log(t.url, t.active);
    }
    catch(err) {
        // Handle errors
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Last night was truly incredible. I know some of you came feeling depleted and probably skeptical of what we could bring to you, asking yourselves "How Might We be of service to you." I want to thank you on behalf of all of us here, for your immense courage for participating in something different, for being open to being vulnerable, to share and give to one another. I truly hope that we were able to be of service to you, to pass onto you the seed for growing connection, empathy and empowerment.
My method of facilitating is different from the norm on purpose, it's organic, meant to engage, likely to disrupt some folk's comfort zone, and designed for you to gain deeper learning and understanding by your own journey in discovery, through feeling and experiencing, instead of sitting there being talked to. It's along the lines of "the harder you had to work to get through it, the bigger gain and accomplishment you feel." Part of this is to mimic life itself, an unpredictable experience. I hope in hindsight you found it worthwhile. I hope that with the help from my amazing friends/collaborators/assisting facilitators, Joe and Bix, that we managed to give you a meaningful and valuable experience, one that may have been in some way transformational for you, no matter how small.
It was incredibly humbling for me observe and listen to everyone, I've come to discover so much more, and loved seeing the comraderie and compassion rise through. I believe we all are teachers to one another; It's through interactions, communication, and connectivity, then through introspective and reflection that we arrive at these learnings. So on this note, I would like to suggest that you take some time out today and the next few days to reflect on moments that stood out to you throughout your experience. Ask yourself the questions below, perhaps jot some notes down each day. By the way, jotting down words on paper gives power and further realization to what you observe and gain in knowledge… it is an incredibly powerful way to own what you thought, felt, and learned upon deeper reflection.
What moments stood out for me, stimulated me?
Why did this moment stand out?
What feelings came up and why?
What thoughts came up and why?
What insights have I gained during, and after?
Once you have some items of How Might I/We think about if you need help with achieving these. Think about who can be of service to you?
It's about finding the right people and you will find the help you need. Remember you now also have a growing village of people here, so feel free to reach out to us.
We need to nurture a trickle up effect, spread the empathy and get those who are suppose to represent us citizens and ensure the well being of the citizens, are engaging with empathy and not apathy. Of course, we must have empathy for the people who we look to for help as well. We are looking to break down walls of apathy, miscommunication, preconceived knowledge and limited perspectives, so let's help them to understand and empathize. Remember how you felt at the beginning of the workshop last night, then compared to how you felt at the end. What we each felt in the end, we each need to do work to help others feel what you felt and feel. It begins with you. Think about your network, who of those do you know are in jobs or know people who would benefit from being a part of our movement of engagement, empowerment, and taking action. Do you know folks in the health and public sectors? Share & engage with them on behalf of all of us.
So to grow this, we must connect and communicate. Here are some avenues in which you can keep in touch with us as a whole group, and also share with others. Our volunteer team, myself included, would also really love to hear your feedback and insights gained from your experience of the workshop in general, please let us know that if what we're doing is making an impact and how. We'd be grateful for it.
Well, that's sums it up for now. Thank you all so much, again.


text:
READER FORUM
REHAB DIRECTORY
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8 Reasons Why I Wish I Went to Rehab
By Kelly Fitzgerald Junco 07/04/16
I was too proud, too stubborn, and my ego was too big. If I could go back, I would go to rehab with bells on. I'll explain why.
I knew addiction treatment existed, but I was terrified of going.
When I made the decision to get sober in 2013, I didn't really know I'd be getting sober. I knew I was sick and tired of being sick and tired, and that I needed to change. I was prepared to stop for awhile, but I didn't really know what sobriety would entail. Like most people who hit bottom, I had no idea where to start. I didn't even know asking for help was an option. I was too proud, too stubborn, and my ego was too big. Knowing what I know today after being sober for 3 years, treatment is readily available and help is out there, but most people never ask for it. At the time I knew addiction treatment existed, but I was terrified of going or even considering the possibility. If I could go back, I would go to rehab with bells on. I'll explain why.
1. I wouldn't have been so lonely.
At the beginning of my sobriety I felt extremely alone. Addiction is a very isolating disease. During my first year of my sobriety, I was pretty much the only sober person I knew. Because I was too stubborn to go to treatment I missed out on connecting with others who have been through the same situations I've been through. I didn't have the chance to really connect with others in early sobriety, for that reason I still felt extremely alone.
2. I would have gotten answers.
Like everyone in early sobriety, I was a mess. I was hurt, confused, and overwhelmed by a variety of different emotions. I didn't know whether what I was feeling was normal or not. I was vulnerable and scared. Going to treatment for my addiction could have given me a lot of the answers I was looking for. Was I going to be okay? Was it normal to feel that way? How do I do this thing? With addiction professionals and peers who are going through the same thing, a stay in rehab could have helped me answer these questions.
3. I could have talked face-to-face with therapists.
Therapists and addiction professionals exist to help people like me. Unfortunately, I deprived myself of this help. I didn't believe I needed face-to-face help at the time I got sober, but now I know that I could benefited from it greatly. Being able to communicate with someone who is trained in helping you cope with your addiction issues is imperative to getting better. These therapists could have helped me endure those first grueling months of sobriety. They could have taught me healthy coping mechanisms.
4. I could have heard of the war stories of others like me.
One of the most powerful components of my recovery is hearing other people's stories and sharing my own. In my first year of sobriety, I read a lot of books about drinking, including memoirs. Hearing those stories really resonated with me, but it was nothing like hearing them in person. When I finally began to attend 12-step meetings I loved the speaker meetings where real people shared their experience, strength, and hope through stories. Still to this day, it's the type of meeting that I can relate to most. If I had gone to rehab in the beginning I could have heard more of these stories from the start and may have healed at a quicker rate.
5. Someone could have explained to me what the 12 steps were.
During my first months of sobriety I was too terrified to even go to a 12-step meeting. I was ashamed and couldn't face people in real life, and I didn't know what to expect at a meeting. I tried attending a few meetings online in chat rooms, but I didn't understand what anyone was talking about or what literature they were referencing. Eventually I quit those. If I had spoken up and gone to rehab, I would have had someone explain to me the 12 steps, how they work, and what the meetings are like. This could have eased my fear about attending them in the future.
6. I could have detoxed in a safe way.
I don't know if my body was physically addicted to alcohol. I say that I don't think it was, but I definitely remember experiencing some withdrawal symptoms days and weeks after quitting. I felt exhausted, slept badly, felt bloated, sick, and depressed. It was only after I began to learn about addiction and withdrawal that I realized that's what I might have been experiencing. Going to rehab would have given me a proper diagnosis and medical treatment if needed. Detox could have helped me rid my body of the harmful substances I was using and set me on the path to recovery under safe medical care.
7. I could have explained better what was happening to me.
Being without answers for the first year of my recovery left it difficult for me to explain myself to others. I was open about my sobriety from the beginning and I told my family and friends I was quitting. Some of them understood, others did not. Had I known more about the disease of addiction, how it progresses, and how it is treated, I could have passed this information onto the important people in my life. After a lot of research and writing myself, I am now better equipped to explain addiction.
8. I would have had camaraderie from the beginning.
For those of us in recovery we know that connection is incredibly important. I didn't understand how important it was until I started attending 12-step meetings 1.5 years into my sobriety. Women rallied around me, loved me, were there for me, and I finally began to understand the word camaraderie. I also began connecting with other sober bloggers and forming a sense of community online. This component of camaraderie is one I've incorporated into my recovery program that I wish I could have gotten from heading to rehab when I first made the decision to get sober.
Rehab offers us a bridge between addiction and recovery. It can be the help we are so desperately seeking, but are afraid to ask for.
Kelly Fitzgerald is a sober writer based in Southwest Florida whose work has been published on the Huffington Post among other sites. She writes about her life as a former party girl living in recovery on The Adventures of The Sober Señorita.
Please read our comment policy. - The Fix
12-step
Kelly Fitzgerald Junco
Kelly Fitzgerald Junco is a sober writer based in Southwest Florida who is best known for her personal blog The Adventures of a Sober Señorita. Her work has been published across the web including sites like Huffington Post, Medium, The Fix, Ravishly, SheKnows, Elite Daily, and AfterPartyMagazine. You can find Kelly on Linkedin and Twitter.
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This SoCal program fosters a regimented but respectful recovery environment, where teens learn how to live sober through plenty of 12-step meetings and life-skills classes—not to mention "equine-assisted psychotherapy" and mixed martial arts.
The Holistic Sanctuary
Founder Johnny Tabaie treats addiction, PTSD, and more with plant medicines; alumni from this Baja sanctuary emerge transformed, with no cravings and no withdrawals.
Oceanside Malibu
Oceanside alumni praise flexible treatment which includes care for underlying mental health conditions, staff who go the extra mile, luxury amenities, and activities such as surfing and horseback riding.
AToN Center
This San Diego luxury rehab provides customized treatment by highly qualified staff and, according to one alum, "Sets the gold standard for all other treatment centers."
Ardú
The ultimate goal of treatment at Ardú is not just sobriety, but to teach clients how to "live with purpose and passion." According to alumni, they're succeeding.
Sunshine Coast Health Centre
This non-12-step men's facility in Canada offers individualized and comprehensive addiction treatment which leads to personal transformation. The goal is men "who are inspired to live with a renewed sense of vitality and purpose."
Alumni from this North Carolina rehab praise the individualized treatment and loving, family-like environment: "The whole establishment is caring and invested in your recovery."
Hawaii Island Recovery
Clients at Hawaii Island Recovery come for the view but stay for the treatment.
SOBA Recovery Center
This laid-back Malibu beachfront rehab charts a holistic path to recovery, which suits the twenty- and thirtysomethings who come here—you just might have to clock a few extra miles on the sand to burn off Chef Monte's hearty home-cooking.
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text:
Home LIB Life Hotel Africa: From Lap of Luxury to Latrine
Thomas house
Hotel Africa: From Lap of Luxury to Latrine
Robin Dopoe
The skeleton of what is left of Hotel Africa is now being used by residents as a public latrine, which is yet to attract the attention of authorities, the Daily Observer has gathered.
Built in 1979 in Virginia, outside of the capital city of Monrovia, the once-famous Hotel Africa, constructed under the reign of former President William R. Tolbert Jr., has over the last four years been used as a toilet, with feces scattered in all locations, and wild growing bush and palm trees seen everywhere.
In addition, the one-time popular hotel garden has now been turned into a huge dumpsite, with the attendant bad smile, and is rumored to be home to hardened criminals.
Not exempt from the decline, the beach outside the hotel has also been turned into a defecation site, making it increasingly difficult for anyone passing by to walk the area surrounding the hotel, as one is bound to step on feces lying all over the place.
In an interview with residents, they claimed that they don't have a choice but to use the hotel and beach as toilets.
"Most of us came here after the war, and the houses we built are just temporary structures with no toilet facilities," a female resident explained, adding, "in the absence of public toilets or our homes having some, the hotel and beaches here are the only toilet options for many of us. Although it is not safe, we just have to do it."
Another community resident, Patrick Lassana, who said he does not have a toilet facility at home, said the government should not be blamed for the people's actions, but it is rather the responsibility of every homeowner to have toilets in their homes, which they have failed to do.
"However, I'm appealing to government and humanitarian organizations to make available public toilet facilities for us. We need them urgently. We want to stop using the hotel and the beaches.
"We need toilet facilities, and decent ones, most especially for our children, who risk their health by going to ease themselves in the hotel and beaches, which is not safe for them," Patrick said.
Salome Gray noted that since the hotel has now become a home to criminals, they have scavenged everything from the hotel, making it difficult for people to see the beauty of the once prestigious Bacardi Bar and Restaurant.
Additionally, Nelson, as he is identified, said the community lacks clean and safe-drinking water due to the unavailability of hand pumps. He said there are not enough public toilets for the huge population and the sea has also damaged some of the pumps.
"We need water especially hand pumps. The ones that are here are not enough; the people are many, and the sea has also washed away some of the hand pumps," he appealed.
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– is the design traditions of the past from a modern perspective.
The French Charm project represents a subtle blending of different styles and contrasts. The project makes it possible for the dignified classics and brick walls to peacefully coexist. Victoria Vitkovskaya has drawn her inspiration for this project from Paris since it is the city with a perfect balance of modern tendencies' freshness and classical techniques' elegance.
We look forward to welcoming you as our guests. Come and have a look at one of the most exceptional projects by V. Concept Design Studio. There, as well as in Paris, you will definitely find something very personal – something elusive, something alluring and slightly romantic.
The French Charm project – is the design traditions of the past from a modern perspective.


text:
The Great Pet Debate
Do your homework before you ask: "How much is that doggy in the window?"
Thinking about adding a pet to your family? The right animal can make a great companion for your child. But falling for a cute little kitten without doing any research in advance is one of the biggest mistakes you can make. Before choosing a family pet, consider this expert advice:
Evaluate your family's lifestyle. How much time do you have to devote to a pet? Are you out of the house a lot? Do you travel often? Does anyone have allergies that make certain pets off-limits? These are all questions to consider when narrowing down your pet options.
Decide if your child is ready for a pet. "Although there's no magic age, many experts say a child should be at least 6 years old before you bring a pet into the family," says Stephanie Shain, director of outreach for companion animals at the Humane Society of the United States. To gauge your child's readiness, be sure he shows self-control and obeys the word "no." Also, observe his behavior around other people's pets to see if he is gentle and respectful with them.
Do your homework. Even within dog breeds there's a huge range in how much exercise and attention dogs need. You'll want to choose an animal and breed that suits your family's lifestyle. Borrow some guidebooks on the pets you're considering from the library, and read them with your child.
PLUS: AQUARIUM FISH GUIDE
Involve your child in choosing a pet. "Expose her to animals before buying or adopting one," advises Shain. "If you're considering a dog, let her spend time with a neighbor's friendly pup." Also, don't try to sub an animal she doesn't want for one she does. "If your child asks for a dog, don't bring home a rabbit," says Tracy R. Dewhirst, DVM, a veterinarian in Knoxville, Tennessee.
Consider the cost. Food, medical care, grooming — the expenses of owning a pet add up. How much can you expect to spend? Caring for a cat costs about $400 a year, according to the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). A small or medium dog costs about $500 a year, and big dogs even more.
PLUS: GUIDE TO SMALL PETS
Age-Appropriate Pets
Your child's age is a key consideration when choosing a pet. If you have a preschooler, you'll need to assume all responsibility for pet care and be vigilant about supervising pet-and-kid play and hygiene. While there are no hard and fast rules for older kids, experts do offer some suggestions:
5 to 10 years old: For this age group, the ASPCA recommends "shelf pets" such as fish or mice. "Hamsters, gerbils, rats, and other small rodents are better suited to the older end of this age range — say, 8 to 10 years," says Shain. "They like a lot of interaction, but they require particularly gentle handling, which very young children may not understand."
10 to 13 years old: Rabbits are good pets for kids in this age group, who can learn how to handle a bunny properly to avoid injuring him. Dogs and cats can also be great. When selecting one, research breeds carefully and look at adult animals, suggests Shain. The reason: puppies and kittens are babies themselves and are still learning about the world around them. As such, kittens are more likely than older cats to scratch and puppies to chew everything in sight.
14 years old and up: For teens who are involved in a lot of activities and have less time to devote to a pet, birds and fish can be great low-maintenance options.
Remember that getting a pet is a long-term commitment. Pets can be with your family for 10 to 15 years or more. In other words, the cat you get for your 10 year old will likely become your responsibility when your child leaves for college — so be sure you're ready for that before you bring a new pet home.


text:
In the Know: Menswear News
People, places and things—talking points from the world of Menswear.
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Model Minority
The controversy about the lack of racial and body-type diversity on the runways hasn't permeated men's as much as women's. (Where is the handwringing about impressionable young boys?) There's an aesthetic dichotomy in men's that has always produced more diversity on the runways, at least in one sense. Some designers consistently cast fragile-looking, skinny, somewhat interchangeable boys, while others reliably produce a parade of Adonis types genetically blessed with lean muscle and chiseled faces. Recently, Givenchy's Riccardo Tisci has been forging a third way. He strongly favors non-Caucasian models whose inverted-triangle physiques display a serious and intimidating dedication to weight lifting. This unconventional model is inherent to Tisci's streetwise vision, rather than a product of tokenism, and it's beginning to influence editorials.
—Jean Scheidnes
Next: The high price of commodities >>
The Price Isn't Quite Right
Fashion's price squeeze is going to continue for a while. Despite rising commodity prices—a pound of cotton cost 73 cents at the end of April, up from 40 cents a year earlier, and wool increased to $3.51 a pound, up from $2.49—there is little chance that retailers will be able to push higher prices onto skittish consumers this early in the recovery.
"It's important to note that men's wear prices have fallen sharply this past year as commodity prices have risen, squeezing margins," says Charles McMillion, president and chief economist with MBG Information Services. Men's apparel prices were 2.3 percent lower in April than they were a year earlier, according to the Labor Department's Consumer Price Index. Compared with five years earlier, April prices were down 4 percent, and in 10-year comparisons, they were 11.3 percent lower.
In the height of the recession, the ability to pass on rising commodity prices was limited by a couple of factors, says McMillion. Overcapacity for producers limited their ability to pass prices along, and retailers, already burdened with large inventories, were also faced with a very sluggish market in which consumers cut back drastically on expenditures as unemployment rose and wages stagnated. As the economy has shown signs of life, McMillion notes, "If job and wage growth continues to improve, then the market condition for retailers and producers will improve. More consumers will have money to go out and spend, and retailers will be able to raise prices and catch up what they lost over the last year."
—Liza Casabona
Next: Haspel turns 100 >>
Anyone who has ever made the mistake of wearing a wool suit in the summer owes a thank-you to Joseph Haspel Sr., who founded his brand in New Orleans 100 years ago and with it introduced the country to seersucker, the puckered cotton fabric known for its merciful cooling properties.
Originally a blue-collar fabric, seersucker took on a new role in suit form and came to epitomize Southern casual style under the auspices of the Haspel brand. Preps, movie stars and presidents cottoned to the lightweight suit, as well.
A century later, Haspel, still partially owned by the family, endures as a go-to label for the lawn-party set, but the brand is upping the ante in its anniversary year with the goal of dressing men head to toe and year round. Polos, dress shirts and ties have already joined the line's range of suits, and this fall, the brand will unveil its first coat collection. Because as much as one hates to admit it, summer doesn't last forever.
Several other important brands are celebrating milestones in 2010:
• Brioni—Still independently owned and operated, the luxury Italian manufacturer turns 65 this year.
• Tommy Hilfiger—The quintessential American designer, who has taken his red, white and blue sensibility to countries around the world, marks his 30th anniversary.
• Dolce & Gabbana—The duo celebrates two decades of design with a Milan extravaganza.
• Bergdorf Goodman Men—The New York City retailer gave men's its own 40,000-square-foot home across the street in 1990.
• John Varvatos —The designer created his first men's wear line in 2000.
Next: Great quotes >>
The Things They Said
"I was very surprised because what I knew of Dubai was that it was like Vegas in the desert. And my first question was very direct: Are you sure you want me? Because my style is very minimalistic."
"I think France is a place to enjoy life, and it's where people take time—and shopping and dining are two of the most important things."
—Ralph Lauren on why he likes Paris
"It's a good time, but a little wet."
—Jean Paul Gaultier of the leather underwear he claimed to be wearing at an amfAR gala.
"I only know two French words: ballet and buffet."
"It's now accepted that absolutely no commitment is what the male wants and increasingly what the woman wants."
"I like to preserve some sense of self-deprecation. Montaigne said it beautifully: 'No matter how high you are sitting on your throne, you are still sitting on your own behind.'"
"I think [British style] has to do with the weather. We have terrible weather. It's very gray and drizzly, so we need things to cheer us up.
"When we spoke to men, they told us they care about sex, sports, sex and then their community. Fashion is just not up there as something that drives men."
—Mike Kelly, executive vice president for Phillips-Van Heusen Corp., on why sports marketing works in selling apparel to men
"There is no connection between saggy pants and the ability to succeed. Just look at what buttoned-up America has done to the rest of the world and each other."
—Russell Simmons, on New York State Senator Eric Adams' campaign against sagging pants
"We believe that [David] Hasselhoff's popularity [or lack thereof] is relevant for the investment community."
—Credit Suisse analyst Paul Lejuez explaining different tastes in the U.S. and Europe
"A lot of companies don't make jeans for athletes very well. We have a bigger butt and bigger thighs. I think there's less of an effort to adapt to our body type than to a woman's."
—Bode Miller on his personal style
Next: Brazil's fast-growing fashion market >>
Hot Spot: Brazil
Host of the World Cup in 2014, the Olympics in 2016 and, in the meantime, one of the most promising markets in the world for luxury goods, Brazil is getting ready to do a global samba.
After years of political, social and economic instability, the South American country has emerged as one of the fastest-growing markets for international fashion labels. Global gross domestic product growth is expected to increase 3.6 percent this year, according to a recent report from the World Bank, and the country boasts both a significant middle class as well as a hefty wealthy contingent.
Among the brands that have moved into the country are Ermenegildo Zegna, Missoni, American Apparel, Replay and many others.
The city of São Paulo attracts the most interest from the luxury sector. With a population of more than 11 million, it's Brazil's largest city and boasts the largest number of billionaires in Latin America. There are more than 70 malls in the city, the best of which are the Eldorado, Ibirapuera, Iguatemi, Morumbi and the Pátio Higienópolis. But perhaps the most desirable shopping destination is the Rua Oscar Freire, in the Jardins neighborhood, which is home to Louis Vuitton, Giorgio Armani, Montblanc, Cartier, Zegna, Versace and Diesel. Other prominent shopping streets in São Paulo include both the Rua Augusta and the Rua Haddock Lobo, as well as the Alameda Lorena.
Other Brazilian cities that are attracting interest from fashion brands include Jardim, Rio de Janeiro, Recife, Porto Alegre, Belo Horizonte, Curitiba and Brasília.
Brazil, By the Numbers
2004 183,864,000
Expenditures on Apparel and Footwear
2004 14.61 billion
2009 32.79 million
Annual Disposable Income
2004 $413.57 billion
2009 $1 trillion
Households With Annual Disposable Income More Than $10,000
2004 9.2 million
2009 22.4 million
Source: 2010 Euromonitor International
Next: Taking inspiration from style icons past >>
Who's Your Daddy
They might still be whippersnappers, but they rely on the Old Guard for inspiration.
Three next-generation men's wear designers go back at least two decades in citing their style icons. "My sartorial hero is Morrissey—more specifically, Morrissey in the Eighties, when he was in The Smiths," said modernist sportswear designer Patrik Ervell. Meanwhile, for Richard Chai, who launched men's in 2008, it's "River Phoenix and Kurt Cobain—for their carefree and effortlessly cool attitudes." And denim lover Simon Spurr singled out Yves Saint Laurent. Noting that the late designer once said he wished he had invented blue jeans because "they have expression, modesty, sex appeal, simplicity," Spurr called YSL "the epitome of modern elegance."
—Alex Badia
Next: Photographer Josh Olins >>
Point, Click
Just 30 years old, Josh Olins has enjoyed an enviably prolific career over the past decade, shooting for pretty much every leading-edge fashion title: Pop, Love, Dazed & Confused, British Vogue, V and Japanese Vogue Hommes among them. This spring, he scored two of the biggest men's advertising campaigns—Louis Vuitton and Giorgio Armani—as well as the unisex Benetton ads. For fall, he'll again shoot for Vuitton and Benetton.
A photogenic chap himself, British-born Olins got his start studying photography at Middlesex University, but left school to become a freelance assistant to several top lensmen, including the duo Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott. Encouraged by his older sister, Kim Sion, a well-known fashion photo agent and creative consultant, Olins struck out on his own in his early 20s and found quick success after a breakthrough shoot for Another magazine. Describing his men's work, Olins says: "With a couple of exceptions, I'd say I always try to capture the character of a very masculine man. Someone who is desired by both women and men alike."
Next: Suits by Umberto Angeloni >>
A New Definition
Each season, fashion houses try to outdo one another on and off the runway, hoping their latest collections will translate into increased sales. For Italian entrepreneur Umberto Angeloni, that incessant display of one-upmanship is "repulsive."
"Brands today try to impress by sheer size, by ubiquity, by celebrity association—all things that are completely irrelevant to the renaissance man," Angeloni says.
Instead, the former chief executive officer of Brioni Roman Style SpA proposes an alternative, or "antidote," as he puts it. A year ago, Angeloni, launched Uman, a concept wardrobe for the thinking man.
"At the moment, the affluent consumer has a choice between a custom tailor who will make him something very traditional or a fashion house that will make something very seasonal. But nothing relates to his way of life, to his passions, to his skills, to his values," Angeloni says from his studio in Via Gesu in Milan. "We are building a community to address these concerns and a wardrobe to accommodate."
Angeloni commissioned a study of 3,500 contemporary men to ascertain the ultimate iconic silhouette created to fit and dress all gentlemen. By average, Angeloni notes, he means "a man of 40 who lives in London, Milan or Paris, successful, on the move and in good condition."
So far, the wardrobe comprises silhouette-conscious navy suits as well as six "passion jackets," including an alpine version and even a derivation of a golfing coat.
"We need suggestions and interaction with the renaissance man—we are not sitting on a pedestal and deciding. In a reset world, everything is two-way."
To fully understand the essence of Uman, you'd need a manual. And Angeloni has obliged. Called Uman, The Lexicon, the book is a six-chapter definition and clarification of the concept, which will be on sale in the fall at Uman corners including Barneys New York in New York and San Francisco, Harrods and Lane Crawford.
—Emilie Marsh


Three times in one day, Ford Grundling had spat blood. Never, never, never had he imagined that the Kaiser could be so hard to kill. They'd been naive, he supposed, the whole American lot of them, to think that the Teutonic discipline of death and waste-laying was anything less than a birthright. God, those men could kill -- and kill by the tens of thousands.
Above the trenches, starbursts of artillery lit the sky, dissolving into green and red and orange streaks. Grundling's ears were full of whistling from the soaring shells -- or his right ear was full of whistling, anyway. His left ear was full of water from when he had slipped in the sludge at the bottom of a blast crater during his last charge. He had lost his bayonet and he had come close to drowning as he floundered in the hole. He would probably get pneumonia now, or at least an ear infection.
Somebody needed to do something to bust the stalemate soon. It seemed to Grundling that there had to be a limit to the number of men who could die for a single piece of earth. With every detonating shell, the ground itself seemed ready to stand up and give itself over to whichever side happened to be closest at the moment. It wasn't even worth the fight anymore -- now they were only buying a morass of blood.
In the distance, Grundling heard a new sound. It wasn't the rat-a-tat of the machine guns, nor the dull shocks of the artillery. It curled through the air, wheedling and guttural like the sound of a snake coiling around and around a metal lamppost. "What is it?" Grundling asked. Leaning forward, he lifted his field glasses.
A shell erupted overhead, spraying no-man's-land with color and light, and Grundling saw what the sound was. Two hundred yards out in the cratered wilderness, a pack of chrome wolves jumped up and down, preceded by their great spinning mouths. At the next moment of illumination, Grundling got a better look. He could see now they were motorized bicycles with enormous tires in the front and back. Earnest men in spiked German helmets crouched behind their thick handlebars, riding up and over the broken terrain like ships bucking coastal waves. They were coming on fast, and there were a lot of them.
The heavy-caliber machine guns all around leapt to life. Grundling swung his own gun around toward no-man's-land as well, but absolute darkness had returned. In the blackness, the banshee roar of a thousand combustion engines Dopplered louder and closer with every passing heartbeat.
It seemed only two breaths until the sky was lit again, but already the line of wolves was suicidally close, lunging at the bewildered machine gunners. The earth in front of Grundling was alive with dancing chrome tracers of reflected light. He wanted to fire, but by the time he was able to command his wits, he was already among them -- smelling their sharp gasoline breath and falling down underneath thick treads that stamped a tattoo of blood and grease across his mutilated body.
For three solid seconds Ram was aware of nothing except the ground rushing past and the blue-flame sting of combustion, pure exhilaration like a shot of whiskey suddenly bombed down his throat. It opened his eyes, it cleared his sinuses, and it rocked him hard from his thighs to his shoulder blades. Good God, it hurt -- it hurt like a hundred rock hammers tapping at his spine. It hurt, but it was a pain he could get used to. It was a pain he could grow to enjoy, a pain he could get addicted to.
"Oh, yeah." Ram's belly cooled as the combustion dwindled to a slow burn, and he wiggled a moment in light-headed vertigo. His eyes glazed, he opened his mouth, and his skin erupted in big round beads of cold sweat. It felt as good as vomiting.
Bat ran up to Ram, holding his hat tight on his head, coat flapping in the electrified and fume-sweetened air. "Good God," he whooped. "Ninety-seven miles an hour in three seconds."
Ram constricted his lungs and belched out a balloon of carbon dioxide. "I want to do it again."
Out of the corner of his eye, Ram saw the metal tubes gleaming and quivering all through his body. Bat reached out to touch them. "You're a beautiful man," whispered Bat. "A beautiful machine." After the war, Ram hadn't thought that anybody would ever call him beautiful again. The bombs and the gangrene had made him only half a man -- but Bat had reversed all that. Now he was more than a man, a perfect primitive god carved in chrome. "We're going to change the world together," said Bat. "We'll make those highways sing."
Ram slid away from Bat's hand -- a reflex -- but the other kept pace, holding him tight. Ram turned over his engine three times, six times, nine times, feeling the hot gasoline roar in his veins and his belly again leap into flame. He arched his chassis and spread his axles, chrome glinting everywhere under the sun. Ram never wanted to taste morphine again -- he only needed premium gasoline and a flat desert to incinerate.
Ram shifted gears in a heartbeat -- in a revolution -- and suddenly his tires gripped the sand tightly. "Good God?" he said, the taste of rust and lubricant on his tongue. "I am your God now, man."
Bat fell back from Ram's coughing body, startled, and Ram exploded across the desert, chrome trimmings shining like molten velocity in the heavy air. In five seconds, Bat had all but vanished in the heat haze, and Ram's back rattled out two simultaneous melodies of pain and life. Rising over a dune, his wheels left earth for an instant and he hung stately and weightless, big tires spinning lazily and slicing the air, until he smashed down again with a hatred for stillness and silence, and a fever of one hundred and thirty miles an hour.
Saint Magnum hated chromepunks. Them and their bodyrockets, ripping up the city streets a hundred times every night, exploding in nitrous fireballs on the honest highways. He hated them all -- the andrettis, the earnhardts, the jamesdeans, all of them. It was his job to hate them. That'd been drilled into his brain years ago and now nothing else revolved in him but hatred, hatred, hatred, three thousand times a minute.
He licked asphalt and concrete as he rode, tasting for the telltale alcohol compounds of the chromepunks. The streets were still and silent, all of the honest fords and hondatoyotas at home for the evening, idling monstrously like hungry dogs in garages up and down the streets. In these lawless midnight moments, seven hours away from either rush hour, the chromepunks slunk out of their homes and stepped into their own particular suicide dreams.
Andrettis were low and flat, like an aerofoil on ball bearings. The earnhardts were longer, boxier, and when they crashed they tended to punch their way through walls before exploding. But Saint Magnum hated the jamesdeans most of all. This was something he had learned himself -- they hadn't told him to hate any of them more than the others. That extra-sharp hatred was probably just Saint Magnum's last shred of humanity slipping through the gearshafts and pistons, as it did from time to time.
Saint Magnum paused on the street above a rainbow slick of oil and gas. There was a jamesdean out that night. He could taste it, not four minutes gone. Saint Magnum swerved off again down a boulevard, sweeping across dotted lines and solid lines, searching for the bodyrocket. Something rushed past him in the night, going so quickly that he saw it as nothing more than a momentary interruption of the streetlamps against the pavement. It was the jamesdean, playing chicken like the cocky sons-of-trabis always did.
Saint Magnum spun in the street and roared off in pursuit. He could see the jamesdean splitting the illumination of the streetlamps off its chrome body, humming along next to the concrete median. A cloud of steam-hot exhaust waggled behind in a diffusive white dance. Saint Magnum punched himself harder still, stripping the tread from his tires in an unraveling rubber trail. No jamesdean could ever outrun the maniac energy of his turbocharged eight-cylinder. Oh, how he wanted to grind that chromepunk in his grille. It boiled his oil just to think of it.
Three seconds later, Saint Magnum was only twenty yards back. He spread his grille, tasting nothing but the sweet stench of burning hydrocarbons and seeing nothing but the mesmeric play of yellow lights against the silver-blue chrome of the jamesdean. Saint Magnum pulled up behind the bodyrocket and licked his bumper lips. The valves and gear shafts in his mind spun faster and faster, spark plugs flickering with anticipation. He could see the chromepunk inside -- hunched over the gearshift of the bodyrocket. Saint Magnum had been like that kid once, but now they had made him better and faster. He wouldn't even mind the blood splashing his mudflaps.
The chromepunk turned around for a split second, his helmeted face staring at the giant beast behind him. Saint Magnum was too close to miss now -- he shut his eyes and reached out, working the grinding peristalsis of his gullet, rows of chrome teeth flashing bright and wicked in the night.
There was a sound that Saint Magnum had never heard before, and then his engine suddenly seized up. His entire chassis shook and Saint Magnum spun to a stop, flinging off momentum and kinetic energy. His eyes rolled back in their sockets and he idled -- shuddering and coughing -- for a moment. The jamesdean had sprayed him with additives, with additives and lead. It left a repugnant taste in his mouth that no amount of oil seemed able to wash out.
Cold and quiet on the asphalt street, Saint Magnum shuddered again and tried to find his way to first gear. A single human thought wound its way around his engine. He'd been slamming head to head with the chromepunks for over a year now, and Saint Magnum didn't think he'd ever kill them all -- but he could see clearly enough how he was going to die. Fenders would meet in the street one night, and Saint Magnum's crumple zones wouldn't be enough anymore. He'd lie on his roof, wheels spinning, leaking transmission fluid onto a totaled bodyrocket. With his last revolution, Saint Magnum was sure he would see the chromepunk in his fireproof jumpsuit climbing out of the wreck and slipping away into the darkness -- alive and free to walk away.
Forty years ago, Rush had been their last best hope. Now he was older than asphalt, and so was his machine. He'd be lucky to make it up the onramp, let alone all the way down the highway. But he didn't want to make it all the way down anyway. He simply wanted to pack it all in on the same spot where he'd first blown it all out in a pretty hothouse bloom of exhaust and aerodynamics. It had been twenty years since he'd even been on the highway, but he still felt that he belonged. He belonged there more than those damned soulless atomic ghosts did, anyway. But they'd killed his way of life, so they might as well kill him too.
Rush strapped his goggles on his face. Long ago, they had pushed deep lines permanently into his cheeks and forehead from riding too long at three hundred and fifty miles an hour. That was what they did back then, back when he was a god. They had done three hundred and fifty mph on combustion engines and rubber tires and asphalt roadways. Now they'd changed it all -- even a commuter could do five hundred without blowing his radiator.
Rush's machine kicked to life underneath him. It was an engine with a chrome cage that held a seat and a set of wheels. Everything else that added weight or drag or drained power was gone. There were no headlights, no mirrors, no airbags. Hell, the best cars forty years back hadn't even had brakes. Those boys had just kept going, burning their fuel in a hellfire digestion until they had run out of gas or road or guts. That was how records got set.
Nowadays, it was a science. They didn't smear one another all over the highways anymore -- after all, that would mean a meltdown on wheels and nobody wanted to be responsible for that. Well, nobody except Rush.
Rush checked his watch. They'd be coming down in half a minute. All he had to do was drive up the onramp in front of them. He would never be able to keep up, and they would never be able to stop in time. He imagined getting slammed in the tailpipe by half a dozen atomic landjets doing eight hundred and seventy-five miles an hour. It would turn the night into day, unchaining all those nuclear reactions and stirring them together. But Rush didn't really care about that. He just wanted to hit four hundred mph before he died.
Eyes glued to his speedometer, Rush slammed both feet down against their pedals. His machine squealed with an archaic blast of adrenaline and screamed up the onramp. Coming up against the highway, he checked his right-of-way. For the moment, it was clear. Rush slammed into a blur -- and then he was gone.
Linus Persson started his career after time in the service. He currently works as a web designer and finds himself struggling to stay awake after long workdays and nightly art sessions. While he started with oil paintings, he now prefers the medium of computer art; his subject matter ranges from portraits of athletes to hospital signs, but he prefers anatomy studies of people and SF/fantasy motifs. In his spare time, Linus is also a movie buff and a music lover.


The Repeal the Job Killing Health Care Law Act has been passed by the House in what is expected to amount to a symbolic move by Republicans – foreshadowing what's to come on the political battlefield.
Will you keep your health plan after reform kicks in?
Recent research shows that more small employers plan to drop their health plans than larger employers after healthcare reform is firmly in place.
How much cash would your company have to save by dumping its health plan – in exchange for paying penalties – to make up for the ill will it would create among workers?
How soon before reform sparks a slowdown in the pace of healthcare spending? About four years, according to new government estimates.
Keeping healthcare costs down just became more daunting for employers — at least in the short term.
Think your employees will go for this new health cost-cutting scheme?
Healthcare providers have brought back an old concept to try and reduce the cost of care for employers. The question is will their fresh spin on the idea work — or crash and burn?
One too many part-time workers could soon make some smaller businesses subject to steep penalties.


text:
Bundesstrasse 110 är en 161 kilometer lång förbundsväg i det nordtyska förbundslandet Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Vägen börjar i Garz vid den tysk-polska gränsen och går till Rostock, via Anklam och Demmin.

Externa länkar

Tysklands förbundsvägar
Vägar i Mecklenburg-Vorpommern

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Alternative TreatmentComplicationsDiagnosisLiving WithRelationshipsRisk FactorsSymptomsTreatment
https://www.healthcentral.com/article/could-hard-water-contribute-to-infant-eczema
Could Hard Water Contribute to Infant Eczema?
Eileen BaileyHealth Writer June 21, 2016
Credit: Thinkstock
There's something in the water and it might explain the disproportionate way in which children are affected by eczema. Case in point: some states have nearly double the amount of children diagnosed with the chronic skin condition. And while the overall prevalence rate of eczema in children is roughly 10 percent, it is as high as 18 percent in some states, according to the National Eczema Association.
Recently, researchers have begun homing in on hard water as a possible cause. But before we get into that, it's important to know that water with high levels of minerals, such as calcium and magnesium, isn't necessarily bad for your health, and partly helps us meet our dietary needs. Hard water is not toxic and there's even some evidence it can reduce the risk of heart disease.
However, a new study published by scientists at King's College in London, has uncovered a possible connection between hard water and eczema in young children.
The study looked at 1,300 three-month-old infants, data on the hardness levels of the water in the children's households, and local water supplies. In cross-examining this information, researchers hoped to determine if hard water was a factor in areas with high rates of eczema.
What they found was that _children living in areas with hard water had an 87 percent increased risk of developing eczema. _ And even when the researchers factored in other variables that might play a role in infant eczema (such as chlorine levels in water and mutations in the FLG gene that can cause an impaired skin barrier), the results showed that children in areas with hard water were still more susceptible to eczema.
Dr. Carsten Flohr, the lead author of the study, isn't sure exactly why hard water is associated with an increased risk. "It's not yet clear whether calcium carbonate has a direct detrimental effect on the skin barrier, or whether other environmental factors directly related to water hardness, such as the water's pH, may be responsible," he says. Flohr adds that he plans to complete further studies looking into whether installing a water softener can reduce the risk of developing eczema.
How to deal with hard water
Areas that use groundwater are most susceptible to having hard water. As the water passes through rock and stone, it picks up naturally-occurring minerals that remain in the water. The midwest region of the United States tend to have the highest levels of hard water while the Pacific Northwest, some parts of the Southeast, the Gulf States and New England have the "softest" water, with a supply that contains very little minerals and metals. You can look at a map of water hardness throughout the country on the United States Geological Survey's (USGS) website.
Some signs that you have hard water include water residue such as soap scum on your sink, spots on your glasses and build up in your plumbing pipes and appliances. You may have water if you need more soap to get your clothes, body, hair and dishes clean or if your clothes never seem clean or wear out quicker than in areas with soft water. Your local water utility company should be able to provide you with information on water hardness levels in your area.
However, there are ways you can combat the effects of hard water in your laundry or on your dishes. Some of these include adding a rinse agent or distilled vinegar to your dishwasher, or buying soaps formulated for use with hard water. And if you want to combat the effects of the water on your child's skin, try installing a water softener system in your home. The upfront costs can be expensive upfront, but in the long run it may help protect your child's health and allow you to save money on soap or having to replace appliances and plumbing.
For more information on childhood eczema:
The Link Between Eczema and Asthma
The Link Between Eczema and Food Allergies
Eczema in Infants and Children
Eczema & Children: What Parents Can Do
Eileen Bailey is a freelance health writer. She is the author of Idiot's Guide to Adult ADHD, Idiot's Guide to Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Essential Guide to Overcoming Obsessive Love and Essential Guide to Asperger's Syndrome. She can be found on Twitter @eileenmbailey and on Facebook at eileenmbailey.
Eileen Bailey
@eileenmbailey
Eileen Bailey is an award-winning author of six books on health and parenting topics and freelance writer specializing in health topics including ADHD, Anxiety, Sexual Health, Skin Care, Psoriasis and Skin Cancer. Her wish is to provide readers with relevant and practical information on health conditions to help them make informed decisions regarding their health care.


Facebook has been named as an associate member of the Cellular Operators Association of India, which represents mobile service providers and telecommunications equipment manufacturers in that country.
Other COAI associate members include Alcatel, Cisco Systems, Ericsson, GTL Infrastructure, Huawei Technologies, IBM, Indus Towers, Intel, Nokia, Qualcomm and ZTE India.
Over 85 percent of the world's population lives in areas with existing cellular coverage, yet only about 30 percent of the total population accesses the Internet. Affordability and awareness are significant barriers to internet adoption. Facebook believes that overcoming these barriers and connecting people has immense value, from empowering people to exercise their rights to freely express themselves, promoting transparency and democratic values and allowing people to access affordable data services in areas such as health care, education and information, which they otherwise cannot afford. Access equals opportunity, creating more economic, social and political opportunities for everybody.
Joining COAI as an associate member reflects our focus on mobile technologies, access and our continued desire to work in collaboration with the industry to increase connectivity. We look forward to playing an active role as a member.
We welcome Facebook India Online Services to the COAI family. Social networking, especially Facebook, has changed the way Indians work, play, communicate, socialize and do business. We believe this will further grow to become a crucial part of and influence the socio-economic culture in the country. We feel that Facebook's active participation in COAI activities will result in mutual value addition and bring the much needed synergy of functioning between the service providers and the content/VAS (value-added services) players.


text:
from flows.FlowsManager import FlowsManager
from flows import Global

def main():
    my_flows_manager = FlowsManager()

    try:
        my_flows_manager.start()
    except KeyboardInterrupt:
        Global.LOGGER.info("Quit command received")
        my_flows_manager.stop()

if __name__ == "__main__":
    main()

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Chrome 11 comes with a new feature that converts your mellifluous voice into surprisingly accurate text in the browser, and we've got a quick guide on how to use it.
Google has introduced a way that you can talk to your browser, as long as that browser is Chrome. It won't talk back, but it will do your bidding. These instructions cover the basics of the new speech-to-text feature, which is functional but has yet to be implemented widely.
First off, be sure that you're using Google Chrome 11 (download for Windows | Mac | Linux)or later, and that you've got a microphone. Next, you have to navigate to a site that supports the new speech API. Currently, that's limited to Google Translate, which itself is limited to translations that originate in English. Expect that to change as site developers begin to implement the feature. One other hitch is that because this is a brand-new feature, it's also limited at present in Google Translate to translations originating in English.
So: Set Google Translate to English, then click the microphone that appears in the lower right-hand corner of the input box. Speak the sentence you want translated. When you're done talking, Google will automatically translate it. You can also use the site's Listen option (to the right of the text field) to hear what's the translation sounds like.
There are currently some unofficial options for playing with the Speech-to-HTML API. The Web2Voice site that I discovered in a Chromium HTML5 Google groups forum has implemented basic YouTube compatibility using the new speech API. Click the microphone icon and say, "Green Lantern trailer," to search for trailers from the upcoming movie. If you click and say, "Play official trailer" it will play the trailer with those words in the title. To pause it, click and say "stop." To resume, click and say "play."
This isn't an official implementation, since that would appear on the YouTube site. But this certainly gives a strong indication of what the API is capable of. Unfortunately, having to click the microphone for every input is a bit of a pain. You might as well just click the pause button yourself. Also annoying is that the feature has trouble distinguishing between audio playback from the computer and your voice.
What this likely will be extremely useful for is accessibility within the upcoming Google Chrome OS. If you're spending you're entire computing time in the browser, as you will be in Chrome OS, and using the keyboard isn't easy for you, then having on-demand speech-to-command options are a must.
If you discover more options for the API, let me know in the comments below.


There's a great new article in New Scientist about what the surfaces of other planets – with their variable air pressure and chemical humidities – might actually sound like.
Unfortunately, the article is subscriber-only, so I'll have to summarize a few of its more interesting points.
The basic trouble, the article says, is that we haven't sent microphones to many of the places we know so well visually.
Imagine listening to babbling brooks of methane on Titan, or hearing deep thunder booming through Venus's dense, noxious atmosphere. Or what about the creaking and groaning of ice on Jupiter's satellite Europa, which could reveal whether the moon's frigid exterior hides a warm ocean, hospitable to life?
But acoustics play second fiddle in most scientific investigations of other planets.
Our sonic understanding of other planets is thus rather lacking – leaving us, more or less, to guess.
Call it speculative acoustic planetology.
[Image: The canyonlands of Mars; courtesy of NASA].
So it may not immediately be obvious that things will literally sound different on other planets; but atmospheric chemistry and air pressure – or the complete lack thereof – are two major factors in the transmission of sound waves.
While a typical scream on Earth might still be audible a kilometre away, it would only travel about 16 metres on Mars.
This "low sound speed" would also "lower the pitch of your voice" – and give burgeoning screenwriters something to consider.
[Image: A stunning view of Venus, which looks more solar than planetary; courtesy of NASA].
On Venus, meanwhile, "sulphuric acid rains down through a CO2 atmosphere with a crushing surface pressure 90 times greater than Earth's." A Soviet lander actually brought microphones there in 1982 – picking up "deep rumbles that might have been thunder" – but we have no real idea of what Venus actually sounds like.
We can speculate, however, using some kind of computer program, that "only low-frequency sounds carry well in the crushing CO2 atmosphere," nearly cutting treble altogether.
It's a planet perfect for hip-hop.
But what do these moonquakes sound like?
Titan, meanwhile, one of Saturn's moons, actually has been heard before: a microphone attached to the Huygens probe, in 2005, "recorded the whistle and whoosh" of the probe's own distant arrival.
In any case, Titan's atmosphere is actually "a factory for complex hydrocarbons." The sky thus has "all this photochemistry going on," one scientist is quoted as saying, with the result that Titan's surface is dotted with "dark hydrocarbon lakes" – and these lakes will probably be bubbling, we read, and each bubble will probably "pulsate like a vibrating bell" when it bursts.
[Image: The cracked icy surface of Europa].
Finally, Europa, one of Jupiter's moons and a celestial body long suspected of hosting life, is covered with a shell of ice. That ice, however, is constantly compressed by Jovian gravity, causing huge fissures and breakages – with, I'd think, spectacular, micro-continental bursts of atonality and noise.
First, we have to get a microphone there to find out.
Personally, I'd love to hear music that's been deliberately tuned for alien atmospheres – slow, shuddering drones, or crystalline symphonies of accelerated acoustics. Even more, I'd love to read an acoustic analysis of different landscapes here on Earth: how far a scream propagates in the gardens of Versailles, for instance, or in the new Orange County Great Park. Or whether your voice sounds deeper in the deserts of Utah. Or whether you can unexpectedly overhear people talking far away, on some humid curve in the Parisian Seine.
It's the science of acoustic planetology.
There was a microphone attached to the ill-fated Mars Polar Lander, but that sadly crashed into the surface of Mars some years ago, the casualty of some faulty landing software.
It sounds awesome and lovely already.
It is strange, indeed, that we don't record the sounds on other planets when we land (or pass them by). The public perception is that acoustics is somewhat mysterious (read some of the comments sometime on our Champions of Sound blog, about acoustics in buildings). In the scientific community, though, there is a ton of research going on for underwater acoustics, atmospheric acoustics, etc. The sessions at Acoustical Society of America conferences are dominated by such topics, leaving those of us working on theatre acoustics feeling a bit lonely at times.
It seems, though, that a lot of research for earth-based acoustics is about trying to locate stuff in the sea and air (and, often, how to target it to shoot at it!). The money is there for defense, and there is a very specific goal in mind.
I love sound… and therefore would love to hear other planets. I also love scientific investigation for pure curiousity's sake. Many others don't, however, and I'm not sure what the exact reason for listening to other planets would be (come up with one, please!!!).
Someone did come up with a reason to listen to solar flares, though, and even came up with a way for us to listen to them. Check out this post: Staring at the Sun and Listening to it which can even get you to a recording via the BBC website.
There was a band where planetary acoustics has been appreciated. Anyone remembers Disaster Area? 42!


Breeasy is a platform for Freelancers, Consultants, and Contractors. It started as project for a consultant that needed a way to improve productivity, track time, create invoices and manage projects. After a few years, he decided to make it available to others. There is a lot here and and a lot planned. We invite you to checkout our products, and join our mailing list for updates, specials, and interesting changes and commentary regarding the gig economy.


After Banos we again headed south to a small city named Azogues, which is about 30 minutes from the tourist destination of Cuenca, Ecuador. Azogues has a population of about 40,000 residents whereas Cuenca has a population of over 600,000. We chose Azogues because it was a small town with fewer tourists and the Airbnb apartments were about 30% - 40% cheaper than comparable units in Cuenca.
Omar with his coffee cup in front of the El Tradicional Panaderia.
Our first stop in Azogues was at a local bakery (la panaderia) where we had coffee and baked goods. The smells and the fresh baked items we consumed were out of this world.
The apartment we rented in Azogues was certainly one of the nicest places we have stayed during our travels in Latin American, and our Airbnb hosts could not have been friendlier. After showing us around the apartment, they gave us a map listing all the nearby sights we ought to see while we were in Azogues. They also invited us for Christmas Eve dinner with their family. That's hospitality Latin American style.
The apartment itself was fully equipped, spotlessly clean and furnished with very comfortable stylist furniture. The Airbnb hosts even had a Christmas tree in the family area to lift our spirits and help get us in the holiday mood. I included a short video showing the apartment, which I hope will give you an idea of what you can rent in Ecuador for less than $35 a night. Note, in the video I referenced Honduras by mistake. Obviously, I intended to say Ecuador.
Like the other cities we visited in Ecuador, the Catholic Church plays an important role in the Azogues community. Although there are several other Catholic churches in the area, the most prominent is the Cathedral of St. Frances (Catedral San Francisco). The Cathedral dominates the skyline of Azogues and is the first structure that catches your eye when riding into town. Needless to say, the people of Azogues are very proud of the church and encourage tourists like Omar and me to visit it.
View of the Cathedral from apartment terrace.
The city also has many Catholic elementary and secondary schools, and a Catholic University.
Park that ajoins the river that passes through Azogues.
Translation: In all honest men there is a germ of revolution.
Walking around town we came across a very nice park the follows the river for a couple of miles. We also discovered several interesting businesses, including El Che Bar themed after Che Guevara.
In addition to touring the Cathedral, we also took a ride to the Ingapirca Ruins located about 30 miles outside of town. They are reported to be the most extensive Inca and pre-Inca ruins in Ecuador. According to our guide, the Cañari people first established the site over 2,500 years ago. Then in the 14th and 15th centuries the Inca became the dominate force and built a temple on the hilltop to worship their sun god. The temple was built in the classic Inca style with finely sculpted stones that do not need mortar to bind the stones together. Along one side of the sun temple are the remains of the Inca Road that connected the Inca empire all the way from southern Colombia to northern Chile. I'm sure we will be seeing more of these types of structures as we continue to head south into Peru.
Over the years nearby farmers had taken stones from the ruins before it was recognized as a National Archeological Site. These stones were subsequently returned.
One thing that impressed me during our tour of the Ingapirca Ruins was the tremendous pride our guide took in his heritage. Several times during our tour he stated quite emphatically that his ancestors were Cañari not Inca. And that the Cañari people originally built the site two thousand, five hundred years ago. Thus, the Inca were relative newcomers who enhanced it. Unfortunately, both cultures were superseded by the Spaniards who invaded and eventually conquered the Inca empire in 1572. Since neither the Cañari nor the Inca had a written language, much of their history was lost as a result of the conquest.
On our ride back to Azogues Omar spied a little dog along the side of the road that appeared to be homeless, very thin and needing help. He stopped to see if the puppy would come to him so that he could give it some food. The little dog was very fearful and didn't want anything to do with Omar even though he offered food. After trying unsuccessfully to find its owner, Omar left some food and we continued our ride back to our apartment in Azogues.
Omar couldn't get the thought of this helpless little creature out of his mind, and later in the day he went back to see if he could get the puppy to take food and water from him. He was somewhat successful, but the puppy was still very afraid and would not come near him. Tomorrow Omar will see if he can capture the little dog and find it a good home in Azogues. I will provide an update on Omar's efforts in a later post.
Tomorrow will also be a very interesting day for me. I have arranged through a friend of our Airbnb hostess to help distribute toys and candy to poor children in a remote village about 40 miles from Azogues. We learned that many fathers have left these villages seeking work in other countries, including the United States. Unfortunately, some of the fathers stop sending money back to their families and never return to Ecuador. Thus, the women and children left behind are in very difficult situations with little means of support.


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Q: Group topology induced by group action Let $G$ be a group, $X$ a topological space and $G\times X \longrightarrow X$ a group action so that $\begin{align*}
X\longrightarrow X \\
x \mapsto g\cdot x
\end{align*}$ is a homeomorphism $\forall g \in G$. Is there a coarsest topology on $G$ so that:

*

*$G$ is a topological group

*The group action is continuous

?
I have showed that the topology induced by the maps $\begin{align*} G \longrightarrow X \\
g\mapsto g\cdot x\end{align*}$ and
$\begin{align*} G \longrightarrow X \\
g\mapsto g^{-1}\cdot x\end{align*}$ $\forall x\in X$ makes inversion, left action and right action continuous on $G$.

A: If $X$ is hausdorff and has compact and connected neighbourhoods around each point, the answer is the topology induced by the homomorphism $G\longrightarrow \text{Homeo}(X)$ defined by the group action, where $\text{Homeo}(X)$ is the homeomorphism group equipped with the compact-open-topology. To prove it:
Let $\tau$ be a topology on $G$ so that $G$ is a topological group and the group action $G\times X\longrightarrow X$ is continuous. Since $X$ is hausdorff and locally compact, the exponential object $X^X$ exists in the category $\text{Top}$. By the universal property of exponential objects $\exists!$ continuous $G \overset{\phi }{\longrightarrow} X^X$ so that

commutes. $X^X$ can be constructed as $X^X=C(X,X)$ equipped with the compact-open-topology. $\text{Homeo}(X)\subseteq X^X$. $\text{Im }\phi\subseteq\text{Homeo}(X)$. $G\overset{\phi}{\longrightarrow}\text{Homeo}(X)$ is precisely the homomorphism defined by the group action. There's a theorem stating that if $X$ is hausdorff and has compact and connected neighbourhoods around each point, $\text{Homeo}(X)$ equipped with the compact-open-topology is a topological group https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/30037630.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3A0a25ff84e89d996eeaf57120097c8447. Define $\tau_i$ to be the topology on $G$ induced by $G\overset{\phi}{\longrightarrow}\text{Homeo}(X)$. Then $(G,\tau_i)$ is a topological group from the universl property of induced topology and since $\phi$ is a homomorphism. Since $(G,\tau)\overset{\phi}{\longrightarrow} \text{Homeo}(X)$ is continuous, $\tau_i\subseteq \tau$. That means $\tau_i$ is the coarsest topology so the action is continuous and $G$ is a topological group.


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The state and federal governments' new eviction policies, explained
Happy Wednesday! I'm Rebecca Plevin, immigration reporter for The Desert Sun in Palm Springs. But first, an American Airlines pilot on Sunday night called the control tower at Los Angeles International Airport to warn that his plane had just flown past someone in midair, wearing a jet pack. It sounds […]
Happy Wednesday! I'm Rebecca Plevin, immigration reporter for The Desert Sun in Palm Springs.
But first, an American Airlines pilot on Sunday night called the control tower at Los Angeles International Airport to warn that his plane had just flown past someone in midair, wearing a jet pack. It sounds like science fiction, but the Los Angeles Times reports that there are a "handful" of companies around the world that power a single person up into the air.
On that note, let's blast off into today's news.
In California brings you top Golden State stories and commentary from across the USA TODAY Network and beyond. Get it free, straight to your inbox.
California's new eviction policy, explained
State inks contract for new COVID-19 tracking system
LA Pride names new board president
Legislature leaves many environmental balls on cutting room floor
It's not Pumpkin Spice weather quite yet
Gov. Newsom on Monday signed an eviction ban, as millions of renters in California are struggling to play for housing amid the coroanvirus pandemic.
Under the new policy, no eviction for nonpayment of rent due to COVID-19 can take place until Feb. 1. On that date, tenants will have to pay the full amount of their rent to be protected from eviction. The Desert Sun has this handy breakdown of what the policy means for renters and property owners.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also came out with an order this week that prevents evictions due to nonpayment of rent related to the pandemic. But it's moot in California, since the state's moratorium on residential evictions has a greater level of protections than the federal policy.
Meanwhile, there is growing evidence of "possible widespread fraud" in the state's unemployment benefits system, the LA Times reports. The state Employment Development Department has confirmed that it's investigating whether people have filed dozens of bogus claims during the pandemic.
California officials have awarded a $15 million contract to a software company to design a new COVID-19 tracking system capable of collecting greater amounts of detailed data on the spread of the virus, the Associated Press reports.
The news comes about a month after the state disclosed its tracking system had produced inaccurate case numbers, leading to a significant undercount in confirmed cases.
The replacement will be "built to really handle that high volume of test results, both negatives and positives," Health and Human Services Secretary Mark Ghaly said in an online briefing. It will enhance "the state's ability to not just see where transmission is happening, but to understand some of the more detailed, nuanced pieces."
Having accurate information about the virus' transmission is critical, since the state uses such data to make decisions about reopening businesses and schools.
Speaking of reopening: L.A. County officials announced Wednesday that barbershops and hair salons can operate indoors again, but shopping malls must remain shuttered. Barbershops and salons will be allowed to operate at 25% capacity if they adhere to requirements for social distancing and employees wear masks and follow other health-related mandates, the LA Times reports.
Education is ch-ch-changing
Bobby Duke Middle School Principal Michele DeJournett hands out textbooks and iPads to students during a drive-up distribution at the school in Coachella, Calif., on Tuesday, August 11, 2020. Coachella Valley Unified School District begins online instruction on Aug. 14.
University of California schools can no longer consider students' SAT and ACT test results in deciding undergraduate admissions, a judge has ruled.
Alameda County Superior Court Judge Brad Seligman said the school system's "test optional" policy at some UC campuses provides students who submit standardized test results a "second look" during the admissions process, giving them a potential advantage over those who don't submit results, USA TODAY reports.
The UC system announced in May that it had suspended the SAT and ACT testing requirements for applicants through 2024, as it looked to create its own standardized tests. The system allowed for a "test optional" policy at some campuses, but the judge ruled that the tests are "treated as a plus factor, and thus test-submitters are given a second opportunity for admission consideration."
That's not the only way that education as we know it is being upended this year:
Christopher Street West, the nonprofit organization that produces LA Pride, has named a Black transgender woman as president of its board, the LA Times reports. Sharon-Franklin Brown will lead the organization, which produces one of the nation's oldest and largest LGBTQ celebrations.
"It's never been a more important moment for the LGBTQ-plus community and its allies to continue fighting for all of us," Brown said in a statement. "As a robust community across Los Angeles, we value inclusiveness and diversity."
Brown is taking the helm of the group just months after it announced that it was leaving the iconic LGBTQ-friendly city of West Hollywood. It has not announced the new location of its parade and festival for 2021.
Monday at midnight marked the deadline for California lawmakers to pass bills out of the state legislature. But as The Desert Sun reports, a majority of the environmental agenda was left to die on the cutting room floor.
"We only have until 2030 to prevent the most catastrophic impacts of the climate crisis and prepare for what's happening, and right now there's no clear vision or agenda from leadership in Sacramento on how to tackle this challenge," Mary Creasman, CEO of the California League of Conservation Voters said in a statement.
The Desert Sun has a rundown of the few environmental bills that made it to Gov. Gavin Newsom's desk, including one that targets thousands of substances that fall within a group of synthetic chemicals known as PFAS or "forever chemicals, as well as those that died when they couldn't overcome political roadblocks, like a bill mandating a statewide, 2,500-foot buffer zone between oil and gas wells and homes and schools, and those that ran out of time.
Noemi Amador, 15, cools off in a water feature in the front yard of her home in Thermal, Calif., on Friday, July 31, 2020. An excessive heat warning has been issued for the Coachella Valley.
Starbucks has started selling Pumpkin Spice everything and Labor Day is around the corner, but don't be fooled: Summer isn't over just yet.
A dangerous heat wave is forecast for Southern California this holiday weekend, with temperatures reaching up to 115 degrees in the Coachella Valley, according to the National Weather Service.
Of course, for those of us in the desert, this heat wave is just more of the same. This year, Coachella Valley endured the hottest August on record, as well as the third-hottest summer on record, according to The Desert Sun. If these temperatures stick around, I'm going to be eating pumpkin-flavored ice cream well into the fall.
Correction: Tuesday's newsletter contained an error. Under the eviction bill, renters are expected to pay back the money they owe from missed payments between March and Aug. 31 but that cannot be the basis for their eviction.
In California is a roundup of news from across USA TODAY Network newsrooms. Also contributing: Associated Press, Los Angeles Times.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: New California and federal eviction policies, explained
Tagged in : eviction explained federal governments policies State
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We launched a new Ultimate Member extension called Celebrations. It's a nifty plugin that takes UM date fields and converts them to dates to be celebrated. Like taking user's birthday date from their profile and create a list of all upcoming birthdays. Yeah! We think it's sweet too.
It's that time of the year again and we wanted our fans to get something off from us too. So we are offering 50% off all plugins including the UM Starter Suite for Black Friday to Cyber Monday. So yes! Black Friday and Ultimate Member is gonna make a lot of persons happy!
This is the most important thing to us and we are trying to keep you happy. Like I said, it's been a tough month. We have some catching up to do but overall, everyone is happy. We hope to continue making you all happy.
We have a new extension coming in December!!! Get ready for Classifieds for Ultimate Member! We have already built this out and are currently testing this new plugin out before setting it loose to you guys. It will be a part of UM Starter Suite so if you want to save and save some more, then better get it while sales are happening.
We are working on a way to give you all some more transparency on what we are working on and get you involved. We would love to hear your ideas so we can build for your needs. In December, we are going to have something in place where we can exchange ideas and get feedback.
Christmas and Hanukkah and Everything else. Whatever you are doing for December, we wish you the best!
NextNext post:Big ole thank you and Welcome!


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Guildhall Greenwich Time Ball Restoration project wins National Lottery support
Categories: Leisure & Culture
Hull City Council has been successful in securing a confirmed £281,100 National Lottery grant to fully restore the Guildhall Greenwich Time Ball.
Dating back to 1918, Hull's Guildhall Greenwich Time Ball is the only such timepiece on a municipal building and one of only a few nationally. It reflects the importance of maritime timekeeping, the link with navigation and the need to fix longitude from the John Harrison period (1720s) to the present.
Hull's Time Ball is also one of the last in the UK to have been built – and the highest. Part of the significance of the building is that Hull's Time Ball is a very late example of telling time in this way. The Time Ball, which was installed from April 1915 to November 1916, was perhaps one of the last of its kind in Britain.
The historic building will now undergo a programme of physical restoration works, along with a programme of community activity and engagement. This will include the collection of memories, learning, skills and knowledge from the current Clock Custodian through oral history and an appeal for public memories associated with the Guildhall Time Ball.Complementary activities and brand new interpretation will also be on offer enabling visitors to see the Time Ball in full-working order for the first time in over 100 years.
Other elements include the renovation to parts of the clock tower and its historic stonework, lantern and iron step repairs and a new electrical installation to supply the Time Ball mechanism with internal lighting.
Once complete, it will join a handful of other working time balls in the UK, including Greenwich London, Carlton Hill in Edinburgh, two in Kent and one in Brighton. None of these have public access to the time ball mechanisms.
Councillor Daren Hale, Portfolio Holder for Economic Investment, Regeneration, Planning, Land and Property, said:
"This is great news for Hull. This funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund shows further support and commitment for the city. My thanks also go to National Lottery players – it couldn't have happened without them. The restoration will mean the Hull Time Ball can tell its full story and become a popular visitor attraction. People will be able to hear the carillon bells chime and watch the time ball rise and fall.
Developing a learning and activity programme for the Hull Time Ball will also be a unique opportunity for local communities, residents and schools to learn about a truly one-of-a-kind piece of maritime heritage."
David Renwick, Head of HLF Yorkshire and the Humber, said: "This is a fabulous project for Hull. The Greenwhich Time Ball is a real landmark in the city and a timepiece of great heritage importance being one of the last built in this way. It's fantastic news for Hull's residents and visitors that, thanks to National Lottery players it will be restored to full working order as part of the Hull City of Culture legacy.
"In total HLF has given just under £50million to over 125 projects in Hull from large scale investments to small community projects – the restoration of Pearson Park, Beverley Road Townscape Heritage, and the Revealing Hull grant scheme in 2017 to name but a few. The Greenwich Time Ball will now join a host of wonderful heritage projects in the city that people can be proud of."
For more information on the Guildhall Greenwich Time Ball, visit www.cityplanhull.co.uk/index.php/guildhalltimeball/
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Whether you are interested in joining us for a day, a week, a month, or a lifetime, we strive to make your stay with us relaxing and enjoyable.


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Jorge Escala requests the withdrawal Jorge Glas title
Jorge Escala
MPD Assemblyman, Jorge Escala, asked the Escuela Politecnica del Litoral to withdraw the title of electrical engineer specializing in electro mechanics of Jorge Glas, candidate for vice president of Alianza País. Escala confirmed that their actions lies in the figure of abuse of power, because Glas took over as Chairman of the Solidarity Fund, among others, without that title, hence he asked the Attorney General's Office, Galo Chiriboga to take the appropriate actions.
Finally Escala, former president of the National Union of Teachers, said that in December of 1997, the University Council of the Central University of Ecuador withdrew the title of doctor of laws to Sandra Correa, former Minister of Education of Abdala Bucaram. Escala said that "Sandra Correa fell short next to Glas."
Pedro Vargas, director of the thesis of Jorge Glas at the Escuela Politecnica del Litoral, who has been a professor in the ESPOL since 1976 said, "I take responsibility for facilitating practical theoretical material, and simulations to my students and postgraduate students of any form." He claims that there is plagiarism in the thesis of Jorge Glas.
Electoral campaign starts on Friday
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