Whether you are grandparents looking to purchase a big item for your grandchild, friends who are clubbing together to buy something that is on your friends baby wish list or work colleagues who have had a collection and are looking to purchase something special for your colleague before they head off on maternity/paternity leave – This baby shower gift guide will showcase some fabulous collaborative gifts that you might want to purchase.
The Shnuggle Basket is the original Modern Moses Basket which is a hard shell basket rather than wicker construction. Due to the design of the basket it doesn't make noise when baby moves, not creaking or cracking so helping baby sleep through the night (yay!). And unlike wicker, the Shnuggle Basket will not weaken with use, so can be used again & again, offering. Available in a choice of vintage pastel colours (ivory, grey, white, pink, green & blue), hygienic airflow mattress and matched with luxurious 100% cotton waffle covers it overs a luxurious sleeping area for baby and a statement piece that everyone will comment on when they visit.
The Shuggle Basket is priced at £74.95 and available from Amazon , Mamas & Papas, Mothercare and all other good nursery retailers. Stands and accessories are also available from these stockists.
One of the biggest decisions and expenses new parent face is their pram, pushchair and car seat. Each shopping trip will become a mini test drive for each new pushchair that they spot in a shop before they find the one that they love – then it turns into the 'I'll just double-check I still love it' test drive.
Whether grandparents decide to club together and treat their grandchild to the wheels and car seat of their parents choice or whether work colleagues opt to get gift vouchers for the store that they know their colleague is buying their pram, pushchair and car seat from. With many stores offering payment plans for big budget items like pushchairs you could help your friend/family out by helping towards the new pram.
Take the Silver Cross Wayfarer (which is top of my wish list) it comes complete with the chassis, carrycot, seat unit and hood & apron in a choice of stunning colours (although it has to be Damson for me). It comes with the car seat adapters should you wish to add-on the Silver Cross Simplicity car seat to complete the travel system.
The Silver Cross Wayfarer Pram & Pushchair is priced from £595.00 and available from Silver Cross, Mothercare, Toys R Us and all other good pushchair retailers.
The new and innovative Rainforest Friends Take Along Swing & Seat is two products in one; combining an infant seat with vibrations and a soothing swing. The item is quick and easy to convert by simply locking or unlocking the seat. The swing includes new Smart Swing technology* which soothes and relaxes your baby with six swing speeds in addition to ten songs and two sound effects. When it's playtime your baby can bat at the two adorable toys, a lion and an elephant, hanging overhead. The best part for parents is that the swing and seat easily folds compactly for storage and has a handle for portability.
Rainforest Friends Take Along Swing & Seat is priced at £82.99 and is available from Amazon, Mothercare, Toys R Us and all other leading baby retailers.
The Tommee Tippee Perfect Prep is priced at £119.99 (usually available on offer for around £80.00) and is available from Amazon, Argos, Mothercare and all other good nursery retailers.
The Tommee Tippee Express and Go is priced at £74.99 and is available from Mothercare.
I think collaborative gifts are the way forward, who want to buy things others have already got!


Immerse yourself in Mexico's extraordinary food culture and learn to cook Mexican traditional dishes that you can replicate back home. Enjoy a hands-on cooking class.
4:00 pm: We will start your experience with a mezcal tasting and "agua fresca" while learning about the history of Mexican cuisine.
4:30 pm: Then we will share with you detailed explanations of recipes and ingredients to be ready to head to the kitchen for a hands-on cooking experience.
6:30 pm: Afterwards, enjoy the meal you've prepared with a pairing of a Margarita, handcrafted Mexican beer or wine.
Vegan and vegetarian option available.
Aura Cocina Mexicana. Building with blue façade.
"Will come back for more!"
I did the afternoon/evening cooking class without the market tour. I had a really really wonderful time. I was literally dancing the entire time of the cooking class because of joy. Cooking classes have been big highlights of my trips to Mexico and this one was a star. The class was hands-on, very well organized informative and delicious. I learned a lot of on techniques especially on how to prepare and garnish the food Mexican style. It was so incredibly delicious. It was very memorable cooking experience! Will definitely recommend it to my family and friends!


This week is going to a tough one and I wish you the best of luck dear sisters! I think that this week is so hard to teach because you really just don't want to call out kids that you deem immodest. So what I wanted to do for this week it to share the WHY behind modesty.
"Modesty is at the center of being pure and chaste, both in thought and deed. Thus, because it guides and influences our thoughts, behavior, and decisions, modesty is at the core of our character. Our clothing is more than just covering our bodies; it reflects who we are and what we want to be."
"The next time you approach the temple, pause to look at the temple grounds. Have you ever considered why the temple is surrounded by beautiful plates, reflecting pools, and architecture? They give an outward presence and feeling that prepares the patron for the sacred ordinances that await inside the temple...Our clothing is equally important. It is the "landscaping" for presenting our bodies as temples. Just as the temple grounds portray the sacredness and reverence for what takes place inside the temple, our clothing portrays the beauty and purity of our inner selves."
I really just want to print Elder Hales talk and just blow it up and put it up everywhere so that we cam always remember why it's so important to be modest. Now when he said 'landscaping' it got me thinking that maybe just maybe we can use that to help these precious children WHY we dress modestly.
Now due to copyrights and me not wanting to me sued, you will need to do a Google search for two pictures. A house with a messy, unkempt yard and another of a clean, manicured yard. Below are links to a couple pictures I think would be just perfect comparisons for the lesson.
Print these out onto full sheets and at the beginning of your lesson ask "which looks more inviting?" "which would you rather spend time playing in?" "Why is it more inviting/do you want to play there?
Write the children's responses and add your own if you like.
By just looking at this picture -hold up the manicured lawn- we know that this owner loves their home and wants to take care of it.
Just like this lawn, we can show Heavenly Father that we love and are grateful for our bodies by taking care of it. One way we can take care of our bodies is by dressing modestly. As we dress modestly we invite the Spirit to be with us. When we choose to dress modestly we send a message to those around us that we know who we are, sons and daughters of God.
I also found this article in the Friend that I think talks about modesty beautifully without getting into the clothing too terribly much.
To add a bit more to your lesson you can bring in items to represent each point and have the kids pick the items then discuss.
Courage to Choose Modesty - this talk is AMAZING and clearly goes over the doctrine, many of this is more for parents than children but I think you can add and incorporate it's teachings.


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Our recent Pro bono Attorney honorees tell us why they do the work
JOHN BERMINGHAM, ESQ. Mr. Bermingham was recognized for his tremendous long-term dedication to the clients he represents in Landlord-Tenant Court through the Volunteer Lawyer's Attorney of the Day Project. Since 2014, Mr. Bermingham has assisted 43 needy clients, volunteering more than 60 hours of his time this past year. His motivation? "There is almost always a satisfactory outcome, a chance to do some good. It's incredibly rewarding to be that advocate."
DEBRA BROWN, ESQ. Ms. Brown has effectively and compassionately represented some of the Project's most vulnerable matrimonial clients for the past eight years. As a former social worker, Debra Brown draws heavily on previous experience. She explains, "I understand the impact that addiction and chronic illness have on families, and I'm used to working with people in crisis. This is where my skills lie." Ms. Brown encourages other attorneys not currently accepting Project referrals to do so, commenting, "Lawyers who don't do pro bono are missing out on the complete calling of our profession."
JODI ANN DONATO, ESQ. Ms. Donato has continuously donated her matrimonial legal services to the Project since the 1990s and is one of our most committed practitioners, providing hundreds of hours of pro bono assistance to the Project's matrimonial clients. Ms. Donato identifies with her clients and is eager to provide the professional assistance she knew, first hand, to be essential. She states, "I believe I have an ethical responsibility to use my skill as a divorce attorney to help those who can't possibly afford to hire an attorney on their own."
EDWARD FLOOD, ESQ. For the past three years, Mr. Flood has vigorously represented his pro bono clients, victims of domestic violence, in divorce proceedings. What's the payback? "I saw my clients break this cycle of dependency and start to stand up for themselves. It's a really rewarding thing to witness."
JOHN JOSEPH LEONARD, ESQ. Mr. Leonard joined the Project eager to receive new referrals. His experience in working with victims of domestic violence greatly impacted his desire to represent individuals in need. Within a year, he was representing four pro bono clients, most of them victims of physical or emotional domestic violence and financial exploitation. He's grateful for the opportunity to gain exposure in Judge Crecca's Integrated DV Part and the experienced attorneys appearing there. He notes, "These pro bono cases gave me a better understanding of domestic abuse and the methods of control used by the abuser."
EVE NOWACK, ESQ. Ms. Nowak is a loyal volunteer, regularly devoting time to the Project (over 250 hours during the past 12 months alone), responding to many of the hundreds of calls lighting up the Project's switchboard each week. "I've been very lucky to have a good life. I wanted to get involved again after raising my children to give back and do something good. Public service is in my blood!"
MARIA SCHEURING-ELBERT, ESQ. Ms. Elbert has represented several of the Pro Bono Project's divorce clients. Having devoted so much of her time with an exceptional commitment to serving her community, she is very deserving of this recognition. She says she got involved because, "I knew I eventually wanted to do legal work that empowered people who felt trapped by their circumstances."
SCOTT SCHNEIDER, ESQ. As a veteran pro bono attorney, he has consistently provided clients with Chapter 7 bankruptcy assistance since 1994. Over the past decade, Schneider has helped over 120 indigent Nassau County residents discharge their debts. "These individuals are among the most vulnerable in our society. They are precisely the ones who need my assistance the most to achieve peace of mind."
WILLIAM TIMMONS, ESQ. Mr. Timmons joined the Project in 2016. He is grateful for the opportunities the Project provides to fight for accountability and justice for his severely disadvantaged clients. When asked why he will continue accepting the Project's referrals, Timmons explains, "If justice is just a moniker for those who can afford it, then the concept of justice is just a myth." Timmons believes he has gained, personally and professionally from accepting his pro bono referrals. He notes, "My pro bono cases placed me in opposition to high profile law firms in New York City and Long Island. Exposure to these polished and professionally elite attorneys sharpened and enhanced my own skills."
JOSEPH TONETTI, ESQ. Mr. Tonetti has taken on a substantial amount of pro bono work, defending clients in personal injury cases free of charge. He firmly believes, "If attorneys don't engage in pro bono work, then people with meritorious claims won't have access to the system. Without it, people become disenfranchised."
JOHN WEBER, ESQ. Over the past seven years, Mr. Weber has contributed greatly to the work of the Project by volunteering his bankruptcy skills to our clients. Many of these clients are saddled with tremendous amounts of consumer debt, often connected to a loss of employment, illness or disability. Mr. Weber has a very modest view of his substantial contribution to the Project, characterizing it as simply "a little way of paying back." While the Project greatly appreciates his work, Mr. Weber doesn't consider it a sacrifice. Weber asks, "If I have to be in court for a paying client anyway, why not also be there for a pro bono client on occasion?"
MARGARETT WILLIAMS, ESQ. Ms. Williams is the Director of Employer Relations at Touro Law Center. During her years of practice in family law, she was inspired to take pro bono cases. Since joining Touro's administration in 2008, she continued this important work, often handling multiple pro bono referrals at one time. "I've always felt it's important as an attorney that I give back by helping those who can't afford to hire a lawyer," Ms. Williams says. She also finds that her pro bono work enhances the service she provides her Touro students. "It gives extra credibility to my counseling because I'm still working with clients and I'm still in court."

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Sierra Monitor Corporation
Over the Years
Sierra Labs Incorporated
Our Sierra Monitor Corporation journey started with a very small company whose mission was to create the best portable personal gas monitors possible. Just two short years later, our name changed to Sierra Monitor Corporation and our focus slightly shifted to fixed installation gas detection systems. The name change in 1980 also brought along production expansion to facilities from Palo Alto to Sunnyvale.
Gordon Arnold, CEO
Gordon Arnold was a member of the founding team of Sierra Monitor Corporation. He became President in 1984 and was subsequently appointed Chief Executive Officer, Secretary, and Chief Financial Officer. Prior to joining Sierra Monitor, Gordon held various supervisory and management positions in semiconductor and electronics firms with responsibilities related to quality control, production management, and manufacturing logistics. He has participated in the management of numerous electronic product design teams including the development of mil-spec level instruments and microprocessor based gas detection systems.
Introduction of TELCO Products
The TELCO 2450 product was one of our pioneering CEV Gas Monitors. To this day, Sierra Monitor remains the only CEV Control System used by major telephone companies.
Moved to Milpitas
Shortly after our TELCO industry debut, we moved our head offices to Milpitas, where we are still located today.
NAVSEA
A big win in Sierra Monitor's history came in the early 90's with the installation of fixed H2S Monitors for all Navy ships. To this day, the Navy only allows Sierra Monitor brand H2S Monitors on all of their ships.
FieldServer Technologies
After the acquisition of Diamond Process Associates, FieldServer Technologies was born. Initially, Sierra Monitor kept FieldServer as a separate entity choosing not to mix protocol translation devices with gas detection systems. Eventually, the FieldServer brand was incorporated with Sierra Monitor and now serves as a subsequent product line.
Milpitas Expansion
With the continuous growth of both FieldServer and Flame and Gas Detection product lines, a larger manufacturing and inventory facility was needed. It was at this point that we expanded into the building across from us -- internally, we refer to is as Building 2.
Sierra Monitor's cloud offering first started as strictly Point of Presence functionality -- namely, FieldPoP. After much consideration, we took the leap into cloud technology and are excited to be offering our customers secure remote connectivity with all FieldServer IIoT gateways, giving users the ability to configure, update, and support all connected industrial devices.
As Gordon Arnold prepares for retirement, Jeff Brown joins the Sierra Monitor family as the new CEO. Jeff is an experienced Chief Executive Officer with a demonstrated history of success across a number of companies and industries. He is skilled in Go-to-market Strategy, Mobile Applications, Management, Software as a Service (SaaS), IoT, Mergers & Acquisitions and eHealth. He is a strong business development professional with experience in network, software, and client businesses. We are thrilled to see where he takes Sierra Monitor next.


I am putting apps on an intel mac. I have downloaded and installed the PAppsLionPatch but getting an error message of "an error has occurred while preforming this patch". Help?
Did you get any error in Console? Could you post it?


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Find out the most recent images of Cat Coloring Pages here, and also you can get the image here simply image posted uploaded by Aurora Kaydence that saved in our collection.


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Functional characterization of polymorphisms in 3'untraslated regions of autism-linked genes: role of miRNA-mediated control and splicing in the physiopathology of autism - Joint Project 2014
Lievens Patricia
Autism is characterized by DEFICITS IN VERBAL COMMUNICATION and social interaction. Modulatory factors such as genetic variations in autism-linked genes may contribute to the pathogenesis and to the "nuances" of the phenotypes. Genetic variations in protein-coding DNA (<5% of the genome) did not explain the pathogenesis of autism. For example, Genome Wide Association Studies (GWAS) identified several genes, such as FOXP gene subfamily (including FOXP2 the "LANGUAGE GENE") that are potentially linked to the verbal deficits observed in autism. However, these studies FAILED to demonstrate that genetic variations in protein coding regions of these genes could play a significant role to the onset of the verbal deficits observed in autism. On the other hand, accumulating data on microRNAs, and other post-transcriptional control elements in the 3'untranslated regions (3'UTRs) of mRNAs, demonstrated the involvement of additional control layers in the physiopathology of human diseases such as cancer and neurodevelopmental disorders. THESE CONTROL LAYERS HAVE NOT BEEN adequately EXPLORED IN AUTISM and therefore their impact might be underestimated. WE HAVE SHOWN THAT variations occurring in miRNAs and their target sites are involved in cancer (Naccarati et al 2012, Pardini et al 2013), and that miRNAs control the expression of Foxp2 (Clovis et al 2012), Foxp1 and potentially other autism related genes. WE HYPOTHESIZE that variations in 3'UTR of autism-related genes (such as FOXP2/Pl) might contribute to the verbal deficits observed in autism. By focusing on genetic variations in 3'UTR of autism-linked genes, WE WILL IDENTIFY THE OCCURRENCE OF THESE VARIATIONS IN AUTISM PATIENTS affected by different degrees of verbal deficits. Next, we will perform functional validation to identify the molecular relevance of these variations in human neurons. The proposed exploratory study could set the stage for the direct investigation of similar variations in additional disease-linked genes.
COSTO TOTALE DEL PROGETTO: 129.000,00 €
NOME ENTE FINANZIATORE: Università degli Studi di Verona
IMPORTO: 37.000,00 €
PARTNER ESTERNO: Fondazione Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia
CONTRIBUTO PARTENR ESTERNO: 66.000,00 €
COFINANZIAMENTO DIPARTIMENTO: 26.000,00 €
Dipartimento di Scienze Neurologiche, Biomediche e del Movimento
Syllabus: JOINT PROJECTS
Fondazione Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia
Davide De Pietri Tonelli


Peanut seems like an appropriate name for this guy. Beautiful handmade squirrel necklace on an adjustable length cord Antiqued look with patina. This necklace is reversible with a mirror on the opposite side.


Your Owners Manual that came with the bike should tell you if the winking CEL diagnosis method is still available without needing to go to a dealer if problems come up.
If the dealers are anything like they were when I got my RE, none of them could afford the expensive diagnostic tool thing so none of them had it.
As for my question about the switch, I was talking about the right hand switches.
As I'm sure you remember, on the older models there was a headlight/parking light/ off switch (that didn't work on stock USA models).
I know the "always on" rule applies to these new models but it looked like there was something like a switch (?) in the old spot and I was wondering what it was.
after 9 years the tool roll has been replaced with a bit better item plus it appears a few extra tools too. overall a better presented tool rool compared to the original stuff.
Now you have a starter button, everyone's favorite kill switch button, and a nice piece of blank plastic where the useful sliding light switch used to be since the dawn of time.
Seems like every time we take a step forward in design, we lose useful items like the ability to shut off the headlight when it's not needed.
Stupid Eurocrapic input into a so called safety feature. Modern motorcyclists think it is safer to ride with headlight on at all times, all it does in the right/wrong conditions is blind the on coming driver with the headlight, hiding the motorcycle, espeacially as modern Euro cars have the same stupid headlights on system so all you see is a plethora of headlights without understanding whats behind them.
Never mind the missing switch, is that a poodle-turd brown throttle grip I see? In the name of all that is holy, since when did Enfield fit poodle-turd brown handlebar grips?
Good point. I didn't see that. So is that color supposed to look like leather or just supposed to be something of a match to the bike's overall color (probably more likely)?
The Chrome C5's had tan seats and grips to simulate leather, but the grip in the picture does look a little darker...shall we say, maybe... "Tootsie Roll" brown?
As for the headlight switch, it looks like you could buy a switch and drop it into the hole behind that block off plate, but would the new switch come with a "pigtail" harness and plug, and would it plug in?
I wonder if that yellow stripe is just for looks or does it really locate the center of gravity of the bike?
So on these specials then, what is the covering on the engine cases asks a curious mind?
Is it a plastic or paint? I forgot to look when I viewed a stealth at the bike show I saw it at.
It's a nice looker though wildbill.
Is it a plastic or paint?
the yellow stripe did indicate the centre of gravity on the flying flea but probably not this one. i'd say its some type of heat proof casing on the motor and exhaust.


How would Eckhart Tolle do in a concentration camp with his gospel of the Power of Now Hypnosis?
Would he be able to hypnotize the prisoners into his Power of Now ideology, and thus help them to go through the daily horrors of their incarceration, without suffering the typical, concentration-camp-generated psycho-spiritual torment?
Would his Power of Now Hypnosis be helpful at all?
In order to find out if a particular methodology has a real transformational, and mind-empowering value, we must test that methodology under the most adverse psycho-spiritual circumstances.
The proposal here is that, we take Eckhart Tolle Power of Now ideology, and see how useful it would be, under the extremes of the physical and mental torment of a concentration camp.
How useful would it be in helping the prisoners to deal with their utterly horrible situation?
How could we test the value of Eckhart Tolle Power of Now Hypnosis against the realities of a concentration camp?
We could do this by finding someone who has been a prisoner of a concentration camp, and who could say something with authority about the realities of a concentration camp, in the context of Eckhart Tolle Power of Now ideology.
A perfect authority figure, who could deliver just that is Viktor Frankl.
Viktor Frankl, a former Professor of Neurology and Psychiatry at the University of Vienna, had been through a few concentration camps, and in his books, wrote - amongst other things - about what was the most important mental orientation (think - hypnosis) of a concentration camp prisoner, in the context of his or her survival potential.
Eckhart Tolle gospel of the Power of Now Hypnosis speaks against the so typical, human, mental orientation towards the future.
It not only speaks against the future, it seems to abhor it!
It claims that, whatever real power - over our human negative states of consciousness - we can ever access, comes only from being in the now.
Into this ideology, Eckhart Tolle has been trying to hypnotize tens of thousands - perhaps even hundreds of thousands - of people worldwide.
Following Tolle's logic, the prisoners of concentration camps - in theory - should benefit tremendously from being exposed to the supposedly empowering value of the Power of Now Hypnosis.
Implicitly, through the whole body of his work Eckhart Tolle claims that, if some of the concentration camp prisoners had been powerfully influenced, (think - hypnotized) into following his BE-IN-THE-NOW prescription for a liberated living, they would have done so much better than those, who were striving to stay alive, by feeding their minds with the thoughts about their future liberation.
In theory, if somehow, Eckhart Tolle cold be transported back in time, onto the grounds of Auschwitz, and allowed to hypnotize the prisoners into a trance of BEING-IN-THE-NOW, he should be able to tremendously increase the average prisoner's concentration-camp-survival-potential.
Let's see what Viktor Frankl has to say about it.
Viktor Frankl writes that, the "sensation of futurelessness", with its potential of hypnotizing the prisoners into behaving like "living corpses", was the greatest enemy of life in the concentration camps.
Precisely, because the "NOW" of concentration camps was so horrific, the only way to overcome it, was to escape into the future.
It is obvious that, what Viktor Frankl presents from his own experience, clashes with what Eckhart Tolle presents only from his theoretical musings.
At the beginning of this article I've asked a question: How would Eckhart Tolle do in a concentration camp with his gospel of the Power of Now Hypnosis?
After reading what Viktor Frankl had to say about the Power of the Future Hypnosis, as the only known to him power, capable of sustaining lives amidst the horrors of concentration camps, I must conclude that, what Eckhart Tolle preaches is not a practical truth.
It belongs to the category of an idealized truth - perhaps not even that - and for sure, it can create a lot of quite damaging confusion in the minds of those who are striving to put it into practice, and finding out that they can't.
From what Viktor Frankl wrote about the realities of life in a concentration camp, it is obvious that, only those who were able to self-hypnotize themselves out of the unbearable camp reality, and into some kind of pleasant, and desirable reality waiting for them in the future, were able to survive.
Viktor Frankl Power of The Future Hypnosis - experientially derived wisdom - definitely wins over Ekhart Tolle Power of Now Hypnosis, at least on the grounds of a concentration camp.
Considering the fact that, Eckhart Tolle Power of Now Hypnosis breaks down under the weight of the circumstances - it remains to be treated with great suspicion as a useful prescription for a liberated living.


Be like Guillermo Tell. Control your pulse and point with security and shoot to the apple over the head of your helper. If you miss the blood will flow.
Last part of the Yeti Saga where you will remove all penguins shooting the ice balls from the naughty animals. Use your mouse to define the direction and the power of each shoot.
Show us your skills and help this dude get the treasures, after destroying the enemies. Find the colourful treasures and you'll get the skill to eat and kill the monsters. Use WASD or arrow keys to move and X to collect treasures.
In this FPS game your mission is to find which strange things are happening in the polar station. Move with W,A,S,D. Press E to open doors. Use the mouse to orientate yourself while you are walking, grabbing objects, shoot and more. Change weapon with 1,2,3. Press R to reload.
Have you a good aim? Show it in this shoot game and eliminate all terrorist of every level. Use your mouse as gun.
Have fun with Plant vs Zombies, Christmas edition. Shoot the balloons to let them fall and get speed bonuses. Hit arrow keys to move up and down and space bar to shoot.
Kill all the zombies that get in your way if you don't wanna be eaten. Use the W,A,S,D keys to move. Press the space bar to gather new guns. Point and shoot with the mouse.


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Before you decide which car suits you best, find out why you should buy a used model from Johnsons Toyota by clicking here. Contact us if you have any questions regarding our used Toyota vehicles. You can also arrange a test drive with us in the vehicle model of your choice, and at a time that suits you.


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What James Bond can teach us about sex and money
When gender testing first came to the Olympics in 1966, Ukrainian track and field stars Tamara and Irina Press disappeared from the sports scene. Yet the methodology is still disputed.
I'd like to suggest a quicker and easier test: identifying movie preferences.
Generally speaking, women love films about loss and self-sacrifice (Love Story, Casablanca) whereas men prefer stories of conflict and victory, especially where the hero easily destroys hosts of enemies (James Bond, Arnold Schwarzenegger). For women, tear-jerkers; for men, jerk-tearers.
But don't look down your noses at 007, ladies: Bond has much to teach us about the world. Last night I watched the remake of "Casino Royale", starring Daniel Craig. In this yarn, the superspy ruins his arch-enemy in a high-stakes poker game with a pot of $150 million. When the spoils are stolen, he recovers them in a shootout in Venice that involves sinking a whole building into the marshes.
It's prescient: a movie from 2006 about financial speculation ending in a housing collapse.
There's a further lesson. When you have won all the chips on the table, you don't give them back to your competitors; you stand up and walk away. So it is with investment: now that a tiny elite has cornered most of the income and capital, why on earth would they re-enter the market?
Brevity is the soul of wit:
"... the USA went broke trying to swindle itself into prosperity."
Killer facts about Prohibition in the USA (1919 - 1933)
The 18th Amendment to the US Constitution allowed you to continue using alcohol, and also to make it for your own consumption. What was prohibited was its commercial manufacture and distribution.
As a result, cirrhosis death rates for men dropped by two-thirds. Admissions to state mental hospitals for alcoholic psychosis halved. The homicide rate, which had soared between 1900 and 1910, did not increase significantly during Prohibition.
Prohibition was ended in order to raise taxes for the Federal Government. It was supported by labor unions and wealthy industrialists.
The 21st Amendment, which repealed the 18th Amendment, made unregulated imports of alcohol illegal.
During Prohibition, national alcohol consumption decreased by an estimated 30 - 50%. After repeal, it increased. In 1989, alcohol was implicated in over 50% of homicides (and drugs in 10 - 20% of them). Alcohol was then also believed to be the cause of over 23,000 motor vehicle deaths - more than twice the number of drink-related homicides.
Iceland banned beer for 73 years (1915 - 1988). But for the first thirty years of its existence, Pakistan allowed the free sale and consumption of alcohol; restrictions were only introduced in 1977.
Hands off the raggle-taggle gypsies
I was, I don't know, six. The teacher asked brightly what we knew about gypsies. Ever eager to show off my knowledge, I stood up and said they stole children. I don't know what story I'd got that from.
Half a century later and we're still giving them prejudice. Dirty thieves etc. France is moving them on; in Istanbul, they're knocking down and rebuilding houses as "transformation projects" and offering the romanies the chance to buy the new houses (which they can't afford) or fresh rentals 40 kilometres away. These people, ironically, had been among the first to abandon their ancient nomadic life.
Here's a couple of gypsy blogs: Pesha's blog and Clearwater Gypsies.
And for those who missed it, here's the recent Channel 4 programme "My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding". A community where even the tough guys fear God and the girls are chaste until they marry.
I've never been happier than when leaving somewhere.
Several Bloghounds members have been offering musical selections. Try listening to the Al Andaluz Project - seven of their tracks are available to click on. I heard something by them on R3's "World Routes" a fortnight ago.
From the same programme I heard Marko Markovitch's tremendously vibrant jazz band. You can't get it on iPlayer but here's a site with samples, and here's "Romany wedding" which would make even the lame dance.
BOBAN MARKOVIC-RROMANO BIJAV-LA BELLEVILLOISE
Uploaded by aceituna11. - Watch more music videos, in HD!
A response to "Capitalists@Work"
"City Unslicker" has posted a feelgood piece and entitled it "Bearwatch". If this is intended as a tease, looking sideways at my first blog which started three years ago and forewarned of the credit crunch*, banking collapse etc, then it's worked. Not that I claim any wisdom, but a strong gut feeling got me looking around for sources of information other than the useless Press.
Perhaps I should feel flattered that anyone from stockbroking or banking pays me any attention; or maybe it's just a naming coincidence. Nevertheless, here is my reply: you experts can be both right and wrong at the same time.
I'd like to have made a graph for the FTSE over the period I think we should be looking at, but that index only started in 1984. Besides, ours is a mixed economy, doing the hokey-cokey between privatisation and nationalisation, so it's very difficult to discern the reality underlying all the fudge.
So instead, here's the history of the US stockmarket "boom" of 1974. The blue line is the nominal index, and then I reinterpret the figures in the light of the Consumer Price Index. We start at the beginning of 1974 and continue for 10 years.
*"a systemic risk that could have really serious consequences is the possibility of a major failure in the mortgage and credit markets, which could then roll on to the banking sector." - 31 July 2007
A green query
Are designer eco-homes more environmentally friendly than not building them?
As Scott Adams says:
The greenest home is the one you don't build. If you really want to save the Earth, move in with another family and share a house that's already built. Better yet, live in the forest and eat whatever the squirrels don't want. Don't brag to me about riding your bicycle to work; a lot of energy went into building that bicycle. Stop being a hypocrite like me.
I prefer a more pragmatic definition of green. I think of it as living the life you want, with as much Earth-wise efficiency as your time and budget reasonably allow.
Is the well-heeled greenie not unlike Marie Antoinette, tending her washed (and "heavily perfumed") sheep in a sylvan fantasy?
I'm only jealous, of course. I can't wait to join the middle-class lotus eaters, as soon as my Lotto ticket pays out the Big One.
Underneath the headlines, debt continues to increase
There's much argument on the wires about the issue of inflation vs deflation. As James Quinn points out, the mainstream media aren't helping much because if they comment at all, they may still misunderstand what they're reporting. The official figures appear to show that debt in the US is reducing, but this needs to be reinterpreted in the light of write-offs:
If consumer debt was $13.8 trillion at the end of 2008 and the banks have since written off 5.66% of that debt, total write-offs were $800 billion. If total consumer debt now sits at $13.5 trillion, then consumers have actually taken on $500 billion of additional debt since the end of 2008. The consumer hasn't cut back at all. They are still spending and borrowing. It is beyond my comprehension that no one on CNBC or in the other mainstream media can do simple math to figure out that the deleveraging story is just a Big Lie.
Reading around, it seems that a lot of credit card debt has been written-off, but better-risk customers may be increasing their usage, especially business owners (perhaps finding a way around the dearth in other forms of bank lending):
Credit cards are now the most common source of financing for America's small-business owners. (Source: National Small Business Association survey, 2008)
44 percent of small-business owners identified credit cards as a source of financing that their company had used in the previous 12 months —- more than any other source of financing, including business earnings. In 1993, only 16 percent of small-businesses owners identified credit cards as a source of funding they had used in the preceding 12 months. (Source: National Small Business Association survey, 2008)
Gold up, shares down?
Hot on the heels of China, which has recently increased its gold hoard to over 1,000 tonnes and intends to accumulate far more, comes Russia, which has acquired an extra 10% in the last seven months.
This is at a time when the wealthy are turning pessimistic about the economy again. As I said two years ago, generally I now see newspapers as useless, except for tidbits like that: "Other than weather forecasts, the last usable information I can remember is from the summer of 1987, when I learned that Sir James Goldsmith had sold all his shares on the Paris Bourse, which confirmed my feelings about the way the market was going - but that item came from Private Eye magazine." The current pessimism is reflected not only in last night's close on the Dow (now below 10,000 again), but also in a surge in demand for safe government bonds, as "Jesse" reports.
I said a few days ago that the price of gold was well above its inflation-adjusted trend, but the interest of foreign countries, bearish millionaires and speculative funds boosted by cheaply borrowed money may keep the market buoyant for some time yet.
And I'm sure we'll all be watching the stockmarket with some interest this autumn.
Labels: Gold & Silver, Sackerson
Don't look at the FTSE, all is NOT well here
Gary Dorsch points out that the UK bond market is a better indicator of local economic conditions than the UK stockmarket:
FTSE-100 companies equal about 85% of the market capitalization of the London Stock Exchange, and nearly half the companies are headquartered outside the UK. Roughly one-third of the FTSE is concentrated in the natural resource sector. Thus, the Footsie is viewed as a global bellwether rather than a reflection of the state of the British economy.
Right now the sharp downward trajectory of UK gilt yields is flashing warning signals of a sharp downturn in the British economy, which could trigger deflation in wages and UK home prices.
Time to invest in helium?
One for the commodity punters: the Daily Mail reports on the potential price boom in helium:
The world's biggest store of helium - the most commonly used inert gas - lies in a disused airfield in Amarillo, Texas, and is being sold off far too cheaply.
But in 1996, the US government passed a law which states that the facility - the US National Helium Reserve - must be completely sold off by 2015 to recoup the price of installing it.
This means that the helium, a non-renewable gas, is being quickly sold off at increasingly cheap prices, making it uneconomical to recycle [...] The US stores around 80 per cent of the world's helium and so its decision to let it go at an extremely low price has a massive knock-on effect on its market. [...] The only way to obtain more helium would be to capture it from the decay of tritium - a radioactive hydrogen isotope, which the U.S. stopped making in 1988.
The article says that because of the too-low price, it's being used very much faster than it can be replaced and reserves will be used up in 25 years. Professor Robert Richardson of Cornell University is arguing for a return to the free market in this commodity.
According to this site, major companies supplying helium in the US are Air Products (NYSE: APD) and Praxair (NYSE:PX).
Too exciting for me as an investor, and besides I don't know when in the next 25 years the market surge might start, if at all. But it's another story in the saga of finite world resources.
When will the bear market end? How bad will it get?
Tim W. Wood at Financial Sense reckons the last bull market ran from 1974 to 2007 (extended by government interference or support, depending on your point of view). His research tells him that bear markets last one-third as long as the preceding bull market, so he sees the present stockmarket rally as a "dead cat bounce".
That's my gut feeling, too, though I'm aware of the dangers of confirmation bias.
Below, I give two charts showing the course of the Dow from August 1929 (close to its pre-Crash peak) to August 2010, 82 years later. The first shows the raw index, which as you see only breached the 2,000 mark in the late 80s, making the last 20 years look freakish.
The second adjusts the Dow for inflation as measured by the CPI, so we can see where we are "in real terms" in comparison to the great speculative bull market of the late 1920s. Note that the recent low point (March 2009) is above the high point of the bull run that ended in January 1966, whereas the low of June 1982 was less than 40% of the 1929 peak.
If the eventual market bottom this time has the same relationship to the 1966 peak, as 1982 had to 1929, the Dow should go below 5,200 points (adjusted for inflation between now and the future low point).
So much has changed over the last 3 generations that the attempt to turn historical data into predictable cycles may be fruitless. On the one hand, debt is now an even greater burden than in 1929; on the other, big companies are multinational and the fortunes of Wall Street are less bound up with those of Main Street.
Yet global trade means that the fortunes of sovereign nations are increasingly interconnected, and while China is set to overtake Japan in size of economy, it is also (apparently) heading for a Western-style banking bust; should China choose to raid its overseas investments to tackle such a crisis, then the American markets (where China holds over $1 trillion of assets) are in trouble.
I still feel that a major breakdown is on the way, I just don't know exactly when. It's like waiting for the Big One in California: every day it's "not today", yet it's never "never".
Killer facts about the British standard of living
Average income in the UK is lower than in the Falkland Islands.
Iceland's per capita income is 14 rungs higher than ours.
Norwegians earn 2/3rds more than we do.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2004rank.html?countryName=Iceland&countryCode=ic&regionCode=eu&rank=20#ic
Gold, inflation and the Dow Jones Industrial Index
Republished from the Broad Oak Blog:
I give below two charts that look at how gold has fared since President Nixon de-linked it from the dollar in 1971. In inflation terms (as measured by the US CPI-U), gold now worth is almost twice as much as its long-term average; but in turn, the Dow is still running very high against gold.
It may or may not be the case that gold is overpriced (perhaps we should be looking at inflation as measured by average earned income, or GDP, or something else) but either way, the Dow is still extraordinarily high. It does indeed look as though there was a "new paradigm" from the early 1990s; but perhaps a dangerously misleading one. Will gold double? Will the Dow halve?
Gold and Goldman Sachs
It appears that Goldman Sachs will simultaneously predict a rise in the value of gold, and a fall, depending on how valuable a client you are. Mind you, that could reflect the difference between the advice one gives to active traders as opposed to buy-and-holders, so it's not enough evidence to convict, I think.
I looked at gold's longer-term price history in February of last year, starting in 1971 when President Nixon finally severed the official link between the US dollar and the precious metal on which it used to be based. Since then, and adjusted for the American Consumer Price Index, gold has averaged 2.8 or 2.9 times its September 1971 price. I reproduce the graph below:
In September 1971, gold was trading at $42.02 per ounce, when the CPI index was at 40.8 . As I write, the New York spot price is $1,232.40 and July 2010's CPI figure is 218.011. So "in real terms" gold is now worth 5.49 times as much as in the autumn of 1971, i.e. nearly twice its long-term, inflation-adjusted trend.
As I've said before, we're now not looking at gold as a "good buy" because it's undervalued, which it isn't (it was, 10 years ago). Instead, it's assuming its role as a form of insurance against economic breakdown. I've noted recently, as doubtless you have too, how shops and internet sites have been springing up, offering to buy your gold. There must be a reason - though remember that these purchasers often don't give you the full melt-down value of your jewelry, so there's a profit margin for them already.
It may be a sign of the times, but that also means that it's a temporary phenomenon. Unless you're willing to keep a sharp eye out for price movements and can sell fairly quickly when you have made a gain, perhaps you should keep out of this speculative market.
Unless you believe the future is rather more catastrophic. In that case, as some are now advising, you may wish to build up your personal holding of the imperishable element. But consider the ancient buried hoards that have been discovered over the last few years by people with metal detectors: presumably those ancients thought they'd come back for their goods, but were overtaken by events. If you really have the disaster-movie outlook, maybe there are other, more useful things you should be doing to ensure that you survive and thrive.
Beating inflation safely
UK investors who are concerned about the threat of inflation have recently (19 July) lost access to an ideal solution, the NS&I Index-Linked Savings Certificate. Now a building society is offering something to fill that gap in the market.
National Counties are marketing an index-linked cash ISA. This is not quite the same as NS&I's product, because the investment is for a fixed amount (the maximum cash ISA allowance, i.e. £5,100) and no withdrawals are permitted within the 5-year term of the plan. As with NS&I, the return is linked to the Retail Price Index (RPI), plus 1% p.a. For further comment by Citywire, see here.
A lot depends on what you think may happen in terms of inflation, which brings us to the great inflation-deflation debate. Some commentators are saying that Western economies are so indebted that we have reached a turning point and people will spend less and save more (or pay down debt, which amounts to the same thing). Governments are going to have to follow suit, and the UK government is currently busy trying to demonstrate its commitment to do so, fearing that bond markets may lose confidence in our financial management and will then charge higher interest, which would really put us in a pickle.
So demand is reducing. We see this in the recent bankruptcies of UK holiday companies and the pages of cut-price cruise adverts in the middle-class press. If this is the pattern generally, then holders of cash will benefit as prices reduce - the pound in your pocket will grow more valuable, quite safely. Even better, this type of deflationary gain is not taxed, at least not until the government nerves itself up to simply confiscate your savings.
But that's not the whole picture. While demand for luxuries is lessening, there are other things that we still have to buy, especially food and energy. Here, prices are rising. And if interest rates do rise, that will also increase RPI, which unlike the Consumer Price Index (CPI) includes housing costs. So it is quite possible that inflation as measured by RPI could be high, even as the economy slows down. It's worth noting that the government has recently changed rules on private sector occupational pensions so that their benefits will increase in line with CPI instead of RPI, which suggests that our rulers believe that one way or another, RPI will rise faster than CPI in years to come.
The BBC appears to have bought the official line that we should ignore food and energy costs, referring to CPI as "core" inflation and noting that it's now a mere 3.1%, as opposed to RPI which is running at 4.8%. However, unlike the mandarins at Broadcasting House, the rest of us need to eat and keep warm; or, to be a little fairer, food and energy is a more significant part of most people's budgets than it is for the upper echelon of the mediaocrities.
An RPI-linked cash product is a good each-way bet: if prices do reduce, then your money becomes more valuable; if prices increase, the value of your savings is preserved; and either way, you benefit from that extra 1% p.a. sweetener.
Reasons not to? You may find you need access to cash within the 5 year term; and if you're a gambler, you may be looking at investments that could outpace inflation (think of the current fever for commodities such as gold, silver, oil and agricultural products). But you shouldn't put all your eggs in one basket, and most ordinary people aren't gamblers when it comes to their nest-eggs, so this product is worth a look.
Growing ownership by foreigners
One indication of our plight is the balance of ownership between ouselves and foreigners - who owns more (including official debt) of whom? The Econbrowser blog reproduces the following graph from a study of the US position:
And I give below a graph I've constructed from official figures, showing what's happened here in the UK:
For those inclined to blame solely New Labour for the economic disaster, this should be an eye-opener - look where we were in 1997.
Chinese spam
Recently, I've been getting short, apparently irrelevant comments in Chinese, often quoting proverbs. Is this a dry run for commercial spam campaigns, or probing for vulnerabilities in preparation for some system-wide serious cyberattack?
Away for a week, but I read the papers, and on the same day they told me that (a) £5 bn pa is lost through fraud and error in social security payouts, and (b) UK banks have awarded £10 bn in bonuses this year. Which cheat-riddled benefits system should we reform first?
Campbell trial continues
If you think positive thinking is annoying, you haven't considered negative thinking
Do you believe in Affirmations, also known as Cosmic Ordering, the Law of Attraction etc?
Believers in this New Age alleged horse-puckey:
Scott Adams (creator of Dilbert)
Noel Edmonds (what's the betting Rachel Cooke didn't rush off to try it herself? Surely it would disqualify you for working for the Guardian)
... and, I think, Richard Templar, author of bestseller "The Rules of Work". I suspect the most important thing he has to say is in the foreword, because that's where he reveals the formative experience. He was competing for a promotion against someone who was less qualified and capable, but the other man won. Templar discussed his disappointment with a colleague, who told him that it was because he didn't walk like a manager. Templar started looking and found that managers did indeed walk in a different way. When he fixed that for himself, promotion came.
I don't think it's essentially about conning other people, or about starting to con yourself (how can you do that and not know you're doing it?); I think it's about accepting that you may already be doing it, but in a negative way. If that is so, then the implications are challenging - and hopeful.
Is gold a safe haven?
I've looked at gold a number of times on Bearwatch, trying to see whether it's a protection against inflation and/or falls on the Dow Jones Index.
The trouble is, there's so much wealth in the world that the relatively small market in gold can be manipulated by speculators, so it doesn't compensate for inflation etc in a smooth way.
It is also, many suspect, manipulated by central banks and governments, in order to preserve the illusion that the economy is under control. Sharp rises in the price of gold are traditionally seen as a vote of no confidence in national economic management, especially paper money (the last official link between gold and the US dollar was broken in 1971).
The graph below correlates gold and the Dow since the beginning of the 20th century. It's interesting because it shows how major crises impact on investment and gold.
It's also interesting because it suggests some sort of cycle, and the logarithmic scale makes the peaks link up in a straight line. Less so the troughs - many "gold bugs" keep looking back to the panicky spike in the gold price in 1980, which was clearly very exceptional (though the gold bugs still hope it's a benchmark for the future).
Beware: the human mind is very good at perceiving patterns, and will force them onto random data, which is why people used to think they could see canals on Mars.
Having said that, note the green line on the graph, which indicates the long-term trend. In particular, note that the blue line is now well below it, though nowhere near previous troughs. This could mean that gold is overpriced, yet still in the zone where a "bigger fool" may come along and pay even more for it. Such is our vanity, we tend to think we'll never be the biggest fool, ourselves.
On the other hand, since this graph relates gold to the Dow, it could suggest that the Dow is underpriced, and I have been reading a number of commentators who expect a continuation of the recent recovery in the stockmarket, though this opinion is not universally shared.
A further caveat: the graph looks as though it's a fairly regular cycle, but there are features of our present situation that are not cyclical, at least not in the usual few years/couple of decades frame. Some see the downwave of several longer-term cycles coming together in the not-too-distant future - here's an example from Charles Hugh Smith:
Here are some other reasons why the present recession (I believe it hasn't finished and has only been disguised by recent official financial intervention) may not be part of the "normal" business cycle:
The ratio of total personal and public debt to GDP is the highest in modern history - higher even than just before the Great Crash of 1929
There's been a social change in the West over the last generation or two, that has seen families become dependent on two earned incomes instead of one, so the option to earn more by sending one's partner out to work has already been exercised by many
In developed and developing economies (e.g. China), the average age of the population is increasing. This means that more of the populace is looking to spend money on their needs (and older people need more healthcare), and fewer are in work and saving money
National economies have become much more closely linked with one another. Many Western economies are in a similar, difficult financial situation and many Eastern economies have come to depend on trade with us, so that global fortunes are co-dependent in some ways. Investors may not be able to escape these problems by moving their money into other countries
International trade has put highly-paid Western workers in much closer competition with workers in other countries where wage levels are far lower. Western wages per hour, already stagnant in real terms since somewhere in the 1970s, must (I believe) eventually come closer to Eastern pay rates; yet mortgages and other personal debts won't reduce just because the pay packet gets smaller
Developed nations have set up expensive public systems of health treatment, education and social welfare benefits. It is going to be extremely hard to reduce these commitments in order to reduce taxation
Respected commentators like Mike Shedlock and Marc Faber (see yesterday) believe that the US, UK and other countries will not be able to square the circle. They differ only in how they think the disaster will play out.
In short, I would say that investing in gold is indeed a speculation, and to get into that market now appears to be coming a little late to the party, but if you share the wider outlook of many of the "bears" I've been following for the last 3 years, it may still be worth considering as an insurance against disaster. Perhaps we're at the point where we might even be prepared to accept a degree of loss on such a speculation, rather than lose far more if we remain in cash and see inflation destroy the value of money.
Investing in gold isn't the only precaution to consider. Look at what Faber says in the interview I posted yesterday - he's thinking in much bleaker terms and talks about buying agricultural land, moving out of the city etc. Faber isn't the only gloomy one: US Congressman Ron Paul is predicting social unrest when the government begins to fail on its commitments to citizens.
In short, the recent past is no guide to the future. Those graphs issued by investment funds and financial retail outlets, showing growth over 3 or 5 years (or whatever carefully-selected period makes their recommendation seem promising) are, in my opinion, pretty much useless. Whichever view you take, it is now important to make that a wider, longer view, because macroeconomic factors have become more significant.
And yes, the doomsters could also still be wrong, either about how things will go, or how soon, or both.
Inflation or deflation? Crisis, either way.
Mike "Mish" Shedlock, financial analyst at Sitka Pacific, and Dr Marc Faber (Thailand-domiciled investment guru and economic commentator) are thought to represent opposite points of view - deflation versus inflation, respectively.
In this interview, it's clear that to some extent they agree: the US Government will see huge budget deficits for years to come, and it's not going to be a re-run of the 1970s: there is no ability of the people to take on more debt because (as Mish says) we've now gone from 1- to 2-wage households (where work is available).
Faber accepts that the government may eventually choose to default with respect to foreign creditors, but otherwise he sees monetary inflation to cover the public funding gap and stimulate economic demand. Mish sees price rises as compatible with his judgment that the economy will deflate.
Too much wealth tied up in houses
A release from the Office for National Statistics, widely reported in the papers today, says that the UK's net worth is £6,669 billion. Of this, 61% (£4,048 billion) is tied up in housing.
According to Credit Action in April 2010, 11.1 million households have mortgages, at an average of £111, 612 per mortgage. The total of personal debt in the UK (including mortgages) is £1,464 billion; UK GDP in 2009 was an estimated £1,396 billion.
Much of the value of housing depends on the inflationary effect of lending. According to a release by the Council of Mortgage Lenders, in May 2010 the average loan to value for first-time buyers was 75%, and for house movers it was not much less (67%).
Housing has become a far more important element in our economy, over the last 50 years. Here is Table 1 of a press release by the Halifax in May 2010:
Since 1959, total net household wealth has increased 5 times in real terms. But houses have gone up in value 11 times, and mortages are 23 times bigger. Consumer credit is also 13 times greater.
I don't think we can really run a successful economy on the basis of inflating the value of our huts by getting into hock with moneylenders. Sooner or later, we have to get out there and hunt something.
Killer facts about Prohibition in the USA (1919 - ...
Underneath the headlines, debt continues to increa...
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Gold, inflation and the Dow Jones Industrial Index...
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Small Wars Council > Military Art & Science Applied > Training & Education > Think Like a Green Beret: Don't Stress
View Full Version : Think Like a Green Beret: Don't Stress
https://loadoutroom.com/15058/think-like-green-beret-dont-stress/
Think Like a Green Beret: Don't Stress
Five of 16 Americans survived. Of the 410 indigenous civilian irregular defense group soldiers in the camp, only about 122 survived. Men like Bennie Adkins are a rare breed, but they seem to appear in disproportionate numbers among Green Berets. The Army has put a great deal of effort into understanding why such men seek out service in Special Forces and what makes them different. New research has provided some insight into the nature and causes of that difference.
Dr. Andy Morgan of Yale Medical School studies the effects of stress. His biggest challenge was finding a controlled environment where people are exposed to high stress. The Army, as it turns out, had been doing this for years. It reaches the pinnacle at the Resistance Training Lab (RTL) in SERE school at Ft. Bragg.
There does appear to be some aspect of nature involved, but I think nuture is equally important and points to the necessity to maintain rigourous standards in special operations training and not reduce the standards to enable females to get through the training. If they make the training under existing standards more power to them. There is room in our ranks for high performers regardless of gender. The accumulation of hard and dangerous training over time does develop a great deal of personal resiliency. If GEN Milley is right about the character of future war, then all the services need to invest in tougher training and not just special operators.
1970's vintage SF Recruiting Poster.
Seems applicable, no matter the MOS.
https://i.imgur.com/1Y5hpuW.jpg


Nepal Telecom (NT) has plans to bring improvement in their service by switching to advanced technology. The network provider will start replacing all its Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) to Internet Protocol (IP)-based PSTN service from the fiscal year 2014/15 to provide modern telecommunication service to its subscribers and increase fixed line subscribers. It plans to provide the new service within three years.
The state-owned telecom operator currently has 650,000 fixed line subscribers. With the launch of the new service, it aims to increase the number of fixed line subscribers to 1 million.
Under IP-based PSTN service, users will get voice, high speed data and cable television all through a single cable.
NT´s revenue from land line has been decreasing in recent years. Currently, the average revenue per user (ARPU) of land line stands at Rs 450 per line per month.
With mobile phone becoming increasingly popular, many people do not prefer landline these days. But NT officials are hopeful that launch of IP-based PSTN service will change the scenario. "As the new service provides telephone, Internet and cable TV service in a single package, we are hopeful that people will be interested to get fixed lines in their homes," Buddhi Prasad Acharya, officiating managing director of NT, told Republica.


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Demonstracij proti vladnemu zakonu o malem delu se je 19. maja 2010 v Ljubljani udeležilo okoli 15.000 študentov in dijakov iz cele Slovenije. Demonstracije sta pripravili Študentska in Dijaška organizacija Slovenije.

Ob prihodu demonstrantov pred stavbo parlamenta je prišlo do tedaj najhujših izgredov v slovenski zgodovini; poslopje parlamenta je bilo poškodovano, več oseb pa je bilo aretiranih in poškodovanih.

Ozadje
Povod za proteste je bil zakon o malem delu, ki ga je pripravila vlada. Protest sta organizirali Študentska organizacija Slovenije in Dijaška organizacija Slovenije. Protest je potekal 19. maja 2010 v Ljubljani. Protest so podprli v Zvezi svobodnih sindikatov Slovenije, Društvu upokojencev Slovenije in Društvu pisateljev Slovenije.

Leta 2011 se je Katja Šoba, ki je kot predsednica ŠOS pomagala pripraviti proteste, včlanila v Slovensko demokratsko stranko in tega leta na listi SDS tudi kandidirala na državnozborskih volitvah. Šoba je v času protestov zavračala kakršnokoli zanimanje za politiko. V prispevku v Mladini so se zato spraševali, ali je bila priprava demonstracij deloma politično motivirana.

Potek
Organizatorji so navedli, da so o protestu primerno obvestili pristojne institucije, prav tako pa večja trgovinska podjetja v okolici protesta pozvali, naj poostrijo nadzor nad prodajo alkohola mladoletnim, medtem ko so udeležence pozvali k neuživanju alkohola med protestom.

Udeleženci so imeli iz raznih koncev Slovenije zagotovljen brezplačen prevoz v prestolnico in tudi opravičen izostanek od pouka. Tisoči udeležencev so se na Prešernovem trgu začeli zbirati že v dopoldanskih urah pred uradnim začetkom protesta; trg je bil pred začetkom že zapolnjen. Nekateri študenti naj bi se protesta udeležili neresno in rekreativno; z namenom druženja in zabavanja. Demonstracije so bile najštevilčnejše do tedaj; protesta se je udeležilo okoli 15.000 študentov, dijakov in podpornikov.

Protest se je pričel na Prešernovem trgu. Sprva je glasbeno-kulturna prireditev potekala na Kongresnem trgu, nato pa se je del demonstrantov odpravil proti Trgu republike.

Izgredi
Po prihodu množice pred stavbo parlamenta so se protesti sprevrgli v izgrede (najhujše v slovenski zgodovini). Demonstranti so proti poslopju parlamenta začeli metati različne predmete, med drugim jajca, toaletni papir, plastenke, pločevinke piva, steklenice, kamne, granitne kocke in prometne znake. Vržena je bila tudi ena molotovka (po predhodnih navedbah navijaška bakla), ki je osmodila pročelje in požgala bližnji grm. Množica je ob povzročanju škode navijala. Po prihodu okoli 100-ih policistov (tudi pripadnikov specialnih policijskih enot) so izgredniki začeli s predmeti obmetavati tudi njih. Policisti so protestnike neuspešno poskušali poriniti proti Kongresnemu trgu.

Organizatorji so demonstracije zaradi izgredov po lastnih navedbah predčasno prekinili in udeležence pozvali k razhodu, policija pa je pridržala okoli 30 protestnikov. Več oseb je bilo poškodovanih, med drugim vsaj 9 policistov.

Povzročitelji izgredov
Izgred naj bi povzročili huligani in neonacisti, ki so se pred parlamentom pomešali med protestnike. Moč je bilo slišati vzklikanje navijaških sloganov nad policijo (npr. »Malo vas je, malo vas je, pičkice!«). Udeleženci protesta izgrednikov niso izobčili, temveč so se jim nekateri pridružili v kričanju in obmetavanju. SOVA je v poročilu o aktivnostih skrajnih skupin iz leta 2012 odgovornost za vzpodbuditev izgredov pripisala levičarskim skrajnežem. Kasneje so bili na podlagi poročanja o prisotnosti vsaj enega člana Blood & Honour in kasnejših razkritij na podlagi dokumenta obveščevalne agencije potrjeni sumi, da so bili v incident vpleteni tudi neonacisti oz. skinheadi.

Predsednica ŠOS Katja Šoba je navedla, da naj bi do izgrede povzročile skupine anarhistov, ki so bile pomešane med protestnike.

Gmotna škoda
Zaradi obmetavanja je bilo na več mestih poškodovano poslopje državnega zbora, sicer objekt kulturne dediščine in spomenik posebnega pomena (kaznivo dejanje, za katerega je zagrožena zaporna kazen do 8 let). Nastala je obsežna škoda na prednji fasadi; razbita je bila večina oken, poškodovani pa tudi kipci na vhodnem portalu. Nekateri predmeti so prileteli v notranjost stavbe. Manjše poškodbe so prejele bronaste plastike, kot tudi površinski kamen, ter vrata in podboji; popolnoma pa je bila uničena bakrena obloga spodnjega dela vrat. Samo škoda zaradi razbitega stekla je znašala okoli 27.000 evrov.

Odzivi
Študentska organizacija Slovenije in Dijaška organizacija Slovenije sta nasilje obsodili in se od izgrednikov distancirali. Prav tako so se od nasilja distancirale organizacije, ki so proteste podprle. Organizatorji so navedli, da ne bodo prevzeli finančne odgovornosti za nastalo škodo, ker zanjo niso odgovorni.

Zaradi izgredov je bila prekinjena seja parlamenta. Predsednik DZ Pavel Gantar je dogodke kasneje označil kot »vandalizem brez primere« in izpostavil, da je šlo pri dejanjih za poškodovanje kulturne dediščine in spomenika posebnega pomena. Prav tako je navedel, da so izgredniki zagrešili dejanje, ki se ga lahko kaznuje z do 8 let zaporne kazni. Predsednik RS Borut Pahor je nad razpletom dogajanja izrekel obžalovanje.

Viri in opombe

Demonstracije v Sloveniji
2010 v politiki
2010 v Sloveniji

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Leucopis pseudomelanopus is een vliegensoort uit de familie van de Chamaemyiidae. De wetenschappelijke naam van de soort is voor het eerst geldig gepubliceerd in 1961 door Tanasijtshuk.

Chamaemyiidae


I 'm still not sure how my back deck went from being a space for relaxing and grilling to an apparent all-out garden center. At least, that's the way it looks with so many plants and flowers now occupying the space.
These are just a few of the plants and flowers that my daughter, Cameron has been cultivating as part of her own private, personal gardening effort.
She certainly has a little bit of everything in her pots, including herbs, a handful of colorful flowers, lettuce, potatoes and other veggies and flora.
Cameron is even growing several watermelon plants in large planters. I didn't know you could grow watermelon in pots but they actually look pretty good right now.
We'll see how they turn out.
Every day after school (in fact, every morning before school too) she scurries out here to the deck to check on the plants and their level of overnight growth.
She shuffles and re-arranges the pots and brushes the plants off and generally inspects each and every one.
She's most proud of this little green pepper and she's anxious to pull it.
Clearly, we encourage her green thumb efforts but it was getting a little crowded.
So, in the interest of everyone involved I decided to organize the space a little better so humans and plants can better co-exist.
I started with a trio of wrought iron baker's racks which would provide an easier way for Cameron to access her plants.
These racks were reasonably priced and even better they're fold-able.
If we ever have to take them off the deck and store them, they'll be easy to store and because they collapse.
OK, here's another look at what we started out with when I decided to makeover this space.
Here's a look at it now.
NOTE: Individual shelves can also remain flipped up (as I did here with the left and center shelves) to accommodate the height of plants on a lower shelf.
The racks allow us to move everything from the center of the deck and take advantage of all that empty vertical space on the back wall.
Cameron can now see how everything is growing with one wide glance.
Since humans still need to share the space with the plants, I decided to keep this space people friendly.
I removed the large circular table that was here and replaced with the matching Bistro table and chairs that had been out in the back yard.
Of course, no Bistro table is complete without a few new custom cushions and these were super simple to make.
(1) Remove the padding from old cushions. (2) If foam or padding is loose, create a new pillowcase with muslin. (3) Measure old cushion fabric and cut new fabric to size, add piping, stitch. (4) Stuff muslin-covered pillow form into new covering and stitch closed.
I also covered two 18-inch, store-bought pillow forms for even more impact (and additional comfort for the wrought iron Bistro chairs).
Here's how the Bistro table and chairs look now with new, colorful cushions.
NOTE: There's a screen-in porch area right next to this deck area and I made matching throw pillows for that space too. I'll share that outdoor living space here later in an upcoming post.
Meanwhile, Cameron loves the new space and her plants, veggies, flowers and herbs are now much easier to access and view.
Somehow, I think the plants are happier too.
Here are a few more photos of Cameron's healthy harvest which includes basil, begonias, tomatoes, watermelon and one green pepper so far (which she plucked).
This space is now so much neater and more organized.
Moving the plants up against the wall and replacing the large circular table opens up the deck even more, making it look larger and feel roomier than before.
Bottom line, it also just looks a whole lot better now too.
This was a quick and easy makeover and as a result the plants are happy, Cameron is happy and now, so am I.
Whether it's sprinkled in cereal or just tossed in the mouth for snacking, Granola is a delicious food favorite.
Coming up on Monday (6/17), I'll share a super easy and very tasty Granola recipe that you can whip up in a jiffy.
By the way, my FRIDAY FOODIE segment is taking a summer hiatus and briefly moving to Mondays.
Next week, I'll launch my first fill-in segment called THE MONDAY MUNCH.
THE FRIDAY FOODIE will return this Fall.
Hope you pop by this blog again next week for GREAT GRANOLA and THE MONDAY MUNCH.
I think it looks great! Great idea on the bakers racks!
I live in a 3rd floor apartment, so container gardening is the gardening of necessity. I grow impatiens, swedish ivy and herbs. Love the herbs – they smell so good when I'm watering everything. The nice thing is that it all can come in the house in the fall; the plants help keep moisture in the air once the heat is on.
Looks like you've found a perfect solution to your expanding plant collection. It's great the Cameron is discovering the world of gardening!
I'm having a heck of a time with my deck garden. The chipmunks have already eaten through 3 tomatoes and they keep visiting my peppers. At least they are leaving the herbs alone.


Here at Monticello, we firmly believe in the Montessori way and the benefits our students enjoy in our program. Here's what some of our parents think.
"A year ago my nights and mornings were filled with tears and heartache. I had a little girl who was absolutely terrified to go to school and make a mistake. When taking her to school, I had to physically drag her to her classroom. After the Christmas break, when things were still severe, I decided I had had enough. I called Monticello Montessori and talked with the secretary. I took both my kids out of school and brought them to the school to look around. They both decided on the spot that they wanted to give it a try.


Through one-on-one tutoring, students work on academic areas indicated by their classroom teacher's referral or their family's preference in a casual summer environment. Step Up also provides meaningful work experience in the education field to students considering teaching as a career.
We would like to thank the following organizations for supporting the continued growth and success of the Step-Up Program: RBC Foundation, the Bulkley Valley Credit Union, Northwest Community College, Raise-a-Reader, School District #54 and Hy-tec Drilling .


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Borrowers with bad credit could be more on edge in 2017
TransUnion says the availability of more credit to subprime borrowers -- and expected rate hikes -- could drive up delinquencies for credit card payments and auto loans, but not mortgages, in 2017.
Susan Tompor
Detroit Free Press Personal Finance Columnist
The Federal Reserve is expected to boost short-term interest rates by a quarter point on Wednesday.
A quarter-point rate hike would drive the prime rate to 3.75% from 3.5% currently.
Some are concerned about growing auto loan delinquencies, particularly among subprime borrowers.
A much freer flow of credit, particularly to consumers with bad credit, is expected to drive up delinquency rates for auto loans and credit cards in 2017.
A stronger economy has enabled lenders to feel more comfortable about loosening their credit standards for car loans and credit cards in recent years, making credit more available to subprime borrowers.
Nidhi Verma, senior director of research and consulting in TransUnion's financial services business unit, said an uptick in the prime rate would put some additional pressure on consumers with variable-rate loans, including many credit cards. Monthly payments on some loans would go up slightly with rate hikes, but some consumers who are already near the edge could find it tougher to juggle bills.
The Federal Reserve is expected to boost short-term interest rates by a quarter-point today. Some economists expect two or more rake hikes ahead in 2017. The TransUnion study takes into account one more quarter-point rate hike in the second quarter of 2017, after the expected rate hike today.
The prime rate is currently 3.5% but would go up to 4% after two quarter-point rate hikes.
"As interest rates rise, you have to pedal harder to pay down the debt," said Greg McBride, chief financial analyst for Bankrate.com.
More Susan Tompor columns:
►Oprah sprinkles love from Detroit to Oakland County
►Mortgage rates head higher on Trump's growth agenda
►Younger, part-time workers lack 401(k)s. Should state set them up?
"There's not a big impact on minimum payments with each Federal Reserve rate hike, but it is like pedaling your bike into a progressively stiffer headwind."
Many rates on credit cards are not fixed and may rise when the prime rate goes up. Consumers who carry revolving balances would need to realize that monthly payments would go up as rates go up.
For example, on a $5,000 balance on a credit card with an annual rate of 16%, the minimum payment would be $116.67 a month. The minimum payment goes up about $2 a month after two quarter-point rate hikes.
A TransUnion forecast released today indicated that an increase in subprime lending has already begun to have some impact on delinquency rates.
After 22 straight quarters of declines in credit card delinquency rates between 2010 and 2015, lenders saw an increase in credit card delinquency rates in the third quarter of 2015. And since then, delinquency rates have shown an uptick.
By the end of 2017, TransUnion projects that credit card delinquency rates will hit 1.82% but still well below the 2.97% rate for the fourth quarter of 2009 following the deep recession and financial meltdown.
A year from now, auto loan delinquency rates are expected to reach their highest point in eight years. TransUnion is projecting that delinquency rates on auto loans will hit 1.4% by the end of 2017 — the highest level since 1.59% at year-end 2009.
Last month, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York noted that there's been a worsening performance among subprime auto loans.
The Federal Reserve Bank of New York noted in a blog post that the 90-plus-day delinquency rate for auto loans increased only slightly in 2016 through the end of September.
"But the relatively stable delinquency rate masks diverging performance trends across the two types of lenders," the Fed researchers stated.
"Specifically, a worsening performance among auto loans issued by auto finance companies is masked by improvements in the delinquency rates of auto loans issued by banks and credit unions."
Researchers expressed some concern about increased levels of distress associated with subprime loan delinquencies, noting that the problems would likely have ongoing consequences for affected households.
TransUnion expects the 60-day-plus auto loan delinquency rate to reach 1.36% in the fourth quarter this year — up from 1.27% in the fourth quarter of 2015.
Lenders have made a deliberate decision to accept more risk when it comes to making more loans available to borrowers with damaged credit, according to Jason Laky, TransUnion's senior vice president and automotive and consumer lending business leader.
"An increase in delinquency is the natural consequence of that strategy," Laky said in a statement.
"We do not expect to see a surge in auto delinquency unless there is an economic shock."
As of the third quarter, there were 74.8 million auto loan accounts — including 25.1 million loans made to non-prime borrowers or those with a VantageScore 3.0 credit score of 660 and below. The non-prime accounts grew by 7.5%, up from 23.3 million in the third quarter last year.
Get ready to pay more for some bills when rates go up
Some forecasts call for auto sales to level off or trend down slightly in 2017, as interest rates are expected to rise next year.
TransUnion expects auto sales to still grow but at a slower rate than experienced in recent years.
Average auto loan balances are expected to reach $18,435 in the fourth quarter this year, compared with $18,840 forecast for the end of 2017.
"Average auto balance growth began to slow at the beginning of 2016, and we expect this more moderate growth to continue through 2017 if wage growth continues," Laky said in a statement.
What's helped consumers, of course, is that wages have grown, as well as household income. So increases in rates could be balanced by some anticipated wage growth.
The mortgage market, by contrast, is showing less vulnerability when it comes to payments that are 60 days or more late.
Lower unemployment rates, growth in median household income and rising home values can give consumers more cushion when it comes to making their mortgage payments.
"As home values rise, it gives consumers much more confidence to keep paying their mortgages," said TransUnion's Verma.
Many first-time home buyers and others entering the mortgage market recently have had stronger credit histories. TransUnion expects the industry could see nearly 3 million first-time buyers in 2016 and 2017.
TransUnion projects that serious mortgage delinquency rates will decline slightly in 2017 from a projected 2.21% at the end of 2016 to 2.11% by the end of next year.
The subprime borrower is still a small part of the mortgage market. Nationwide, 66.9 million consumers had a mortgage balance in the third quarter of 2016, the latest data available. But of that group, 8.5% were subprime borrowers — well below the 15.5% in the third quarter of 2009 when 73 million consumers had a mortgage balance.
Debt levels are expected to rise by nearly $4,000. The projected average mortgage amount nationwide is $194,875 for the fourth quarter this year, compared with a forecast of $198,435 for the fourth quarter next year.
Contact Susan Tompor: stompor@freepress.com or 313-222-8876. Follow her on Twitter @Tompor.


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What do 'Sopranos' and the world's greatest books have in common? Just this
"The Sopranos," launched 20 years ago, jump-started a whole new age of "long form" TV storytelling. Dickens would have approved.
What do 'Sopranos' and the world's greatest books have in common? Just this "The Sopranos," launched 20 years ago, jump-started a whole new age of "long form" TV storytelling. Dickens would have approved. Check out this story on northjersey.com: https://www.northjersey.com/story/entertainment/2019/01/06/sopranos-new-kind-story-old-kind-storytelling/2431185002/
Jim Beckerman, North Jersey Record Published 7:00 a.m. ET Jan. 6, 2019 | Updated 2:20 p.m. ET Jan. 10, 2019
HBO's "Sopranos" crew filmed a scene at Ocean Terrace and Ocean Ave. in Long Branch on April 6, 2007. Actor James Gandolfini arrives on set.(Photo: FILE PHOTO)
With "The Sopranos," born 20 years ago Jan 10, TV took a big leap into the future.
TV storytelling, meanwhile, took a big leap into the past.
Bewildered by today's "long form" TV? Can't keep up with the intricate plots and sub-plots, myriad characters that pop in and out, as shows like "Game of Thrones," "The Americans" and "Breaking Bad" run on and on for three, four, five years?
Welcome to your great-great grandmother's world.
Those long, long books by Dickens, Thackeray and George Eliot, assigned by sadistic English teachers, were originally published in installments — episodes. "David Copperfield" was a series, just like "Six Feet Under" ("David Copperfield" ran from 1849 to 1850).
Charles Dickens published many of his works as serials (Photo: Getty Images)
Audiences would breathlessly await the next big reveal, the next big twist, grabbing chapters almost literally as they came off the press, sometimes gathering in groups to have them read aloud, and then critiquing them just as modern podcasts and online communities do today.
Final episode spot: At Holsten's, where 'The Sopranos' ended, customers dish about a possible prequel
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"I think in the Victorian era, people would form a community of readers, and would discuss among themselves," says Angus Kress Gillespie, professor of American studies at Rutgers University. "Just the same way, today if you're a really big fan, you have not only the face-to-face community, but also an online community where you can analyze the plot."
"Game of Thrones" (HBO): The juggernaut fantasy series follows the warring kings, queens and pretenders in Westeros, including Kit Harington and Emilia Clarke. (Photo: Macall B. Polay, courtesy of HBO)
That kind of long story arc, unspooling over many episodes and involving many subplots and characters, was more or less new to TV in January 1999, when Tony Soprano, Uncle Junior, Big Pussy and Carmela gang-busted their way into American living rooms. That's not the way TV stories used to be told.
"Gunsmoke," "Star Trek," "Columbo," had recurring characters, but no single storyline. Each episode was a self-contained adventure. Usually, there was no reference to anything that had happened in a previous installment. The characters' minds were theoretically wiped clean, like an Etch A Sketch.
The "long form" story survived, in rudimentary form, in soap operas (including prime time soaps like "Dallas") and children's movie serials. Otherwise, it lay dormant for a century before HBO brought it roaring back.
TV dramas like "Lost," "Counterpart," "House of Cards," "Empire" and "Scandal," descendents of "The Sopranos," are also a nod to the kind of old-school storytelling that kept our forefathers and foremothers on the edge of their over-upholstered chairs.
"Is Little Nell dead?" yelled New Yorkers to passengers on docking English ships, bearing copies of the latest installment of Dickens' "The Old Curiosity Shop." That book, like many other Dickens novels, was published in "shilling parts" — 50 to 100 pages, unbound, and wrapped in green paper. Readers could pick up each installment at the newsstand, take it home and share it with friends.
Story continues after podcast
Binge-reading
When the run of the novel ended, you could get all your chapters bound together in book form — the 19th-century equivalent of buying the entire DVD set. When you read "Bleak House" or "Vanity Fair" in a single volume, as most people do today, you are essentially binge-watching.
Other classic books, like "The Three Musketeers" by Alexandre Dumas, "Anna Karenina" by Leo Tolstoy, "Madame Bovary" by Gustave Flaubert, and "Uncle Tom's Cabin" by Harriet Beecher Stowe, were originally published as magazine serials.
"Uncle Tom's Cabin" was originally published as a magazine serial (Photo: courtesy)
Telling a story the long way — on or off the tube — leads to a different relationship between artist and audience. It allows for feedback, course correction.
Dickens originally meant Sam Weller to be a minor figure in "Pickwick Papers." Readers loved him so much that he became the star of the show. Something similar happened with the character of Jesse Pinkman in "Breaking Bad." He was originally supposed to be disposed of in the first season, but audience response was such that he remained as a central character.
The "long form" story, popularized by "The Sopranos," may be the single greatest format shift since TV programming began in the 1940s
What spurred it? Partly changes in the TV business. Partly TV technology itself.
"Mannix," "Gilligan's Island," "Mission: Impossible" were produced with an eye toward syndication. Once their network run was over, these shows would be sold to local channels, which would broadcast them in any order, at any frequency, they chose. So each episode had to be self-contained. Each one had to be comprehensible to someone who had never watched the show before.
But now, with the advent of DVDs, TiVo, and streaming, people can watch TV shows at their own pace. They can catch up on previous episodes, download what they've missed. They also can hit rewind — just as readers reread a paragraph — if there's something they don't understand.
"You can pause it and catch the nuances," Gillespie says. "Just as a reader puts down the book and say, 'Hmmm, I wonder what that means?' "
Email: beckerman@northjersey.com; Twitter: @jimbeckerman1
More on 'The Sopranos'
Future viewing: Big-screen 'Sopranos' prequel reportedly in the works
That's a wrap: (Archive) Going out with a Bada Bing! - 'Sopranos' wraps up at strip-joint hangout
Imitating life: (Archive) Bada Bing! Filming of 'The Sopranos' draws mob to Lodi
Read or Share this story: https://www.northjersey.com/story/entertainment/2019/01/06/sopranos-new-kind-story-old-kind-storytelling/2431185002/
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Simone Tulumello is a post-doc researcher at the University of Lisbon, Institute of Social Sciences and former Fulbright Visiting Scholar at the University of Memphis, Department of City and Regional Planning (2016). His research interests are: critical studies of urban security; planning theory and cultures; power and politics in planning; urban futures; neoliberal urban trends; Southern European cities and the geography of crisis.
Tulumello. S. (2017). Fear, Space and Urban Planning: a Critical Perspective from Southern Europe. Cham: Springer.
Tulumello. S. (2016). Reconsidering neoliberal urban planning intimes of crisis: urban regeneration policy in a "dense" space in Lisbon. Urban Geography, 37(1) 117-140.
Tulumello. S. (2016). Towards a critical understanding of urban security within the institutional practice of urban planning: The case of the Lisbon Metropolitan Area. Journal of Planning Education and Research, online first.
Tulumello. S. (2016). Multi-level Territorial Governance and Cohesion Policy. Structural Funds and the Timing of Development in Palermo and the Italian Mezzogiorno. European Journal of Spatial Development, 62, 1-23.