The RoofTX® range is a CE marked series of 3-layer vapour permeable/air barrier low resistance (LR) roofing underlays and breather membranes for walling - which allows the passage of moisture whilst also resisting the penetration of air.
Specifically designed to allow the ready transfer of moisture through the underlay, thereby reducing the risk of condensation in the roof structure, RoofTX® also offers excellent protection against the elements. The RoofTX® range is Agrement certified by BBA in the UK for use in warm non-ventilated, cold ventilated and non-ventilated pitched roof systems and walling; as well as IAB certified in Ireland.
RoofTX® is suitable for fully supported or unsupported, cold and warm, roofing applications.
The RoofTX® range consists of six products of varying weight and construction to suit your roofing underlay or breather membrane requirements.


No waiting on this top of the line Terrace in the highly sought Kendall Yards area. Designer town home has private bath for every bedroom, wet bar & loft with a deck overlooking the city. Upgrades at every turn from solid hdwd floors, designer window coverings, & epoxy flooring in the 2 car garage plus extra tandem spot. Enjoy the centennial trail, restaurants, summer concerts, farmer's markets, winery, retail & art all within walking distance of your front door. HOA covers W/S/G, lawn care & snow removal.
I was searching for a Property and found this listing (MLS® #201912266). Please send me more information regarding 2011 W Summit Pkwy, Spokane, Washington, 99201. Thank you!
I'd like to request a showing of 2011 W Summit Pkwy, Spokane, Washington, 99201 (MLS® #201912266). Thank you!


text:
\section{Introduction}

The cosmic microwave background's (CMB) ability to constrain the cosmological parameters has driven a large variety of CMB experiments.  The high quality measurements of the temperature and polarization of the CMB are compatible with a flat universe with nearly scale invariant fluctuations. The sensitivity to small angular scales of recent experiments such as WMAP5~\cite{WMAP:2008ie}, ACBAR~\cite{Acbar:2008ay} and CBI~\cite{CBI:2009ah} give us a better understanding of anisotropies from local large scale structure (LSS) and from non-linear effects such as weak
gravitational lensing. The non-Gaussianity of these fluctuations can have an effect in the estimation of the cosmological parameters, especially for future experiments. However, possible non-Gaussian effects have not been considered in previous analyses, under the assumption that they are negligible.

Non-Gaussianities show up as contributions to the
four-point correlation function, or trispectrum in Fourier space, of the
CMB temperature fluctuations~\cite{Hu:2000ee,Zaldarriaga:2000ud}.
The four point correlations quantify the sample variance and covariance
of the two point correlation of power spectrum measurements~\cite{Scoccimarro:1999kp,Cooray:2000ry}.  To adequately understand the
statistical measurements of CMB anisotropy fluctuations a proper understanding of the four point contributions is needed.
Given the high precision level of cosmological parameter
measurements by current and future surveys, a careful consideration must be
attached to understanding the presence of non-Gaussian signals at the
four point level. The goal of this paper is  to understand to
what extent these non-Gaussianities affect constraints on the cosmological parameters

As explored in previous work (e.g.~\cite{Cooray:1999kg,Spergel:1999xn,Zaldarriaga:1998te,Peiris:2000kb}),
one of the most important non-linear contributions to CMB temperature
fluctuations results from weak gravitational lensing.
Contributions to the four point level arise from the non-linear
mode-coupling nature of the lensing effect, as well as correlations between
weak lensing angular deflections and secondary effects that trace the
same large scale structure. The trispectrum due to lensing alone is
studied in~\cite{Zaldarriaga:2000ud}, and further considered under an all-sky
formulation in~\cite{Hu:2000ee}.

In our analysis we include contributions to the trispectrum from three
well known secondary sources. First, we consider the contribution of the
trispectrum to the power spectrum covariance due to lensing.  We also
consider contributions from the integrated Sachs-Wolfe effect
(ISW;~\cite{Sachs:1967er}) and the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect
(SZ;~\cite{Sunyaev:1980nv}), both which cross-correlate with lensing to produce non-Gaussianity. Each of these effects becomes non-negligible on small
angular scales and must be taken into account for a more complete treatment of cosmological parameter constraints.

In a situation without instrumental noise, the lensing contribution to the trispectrum can increase the values along the diagonal of the covariance matrix on the order of about $10\%$~\cite{Cooray:2002fy}. The SZ contributions are greater than the lensing by as much as an order of magnitude. However, with noise added follows the possibility that these effects on the trispectrum become negligible. Most experiments thus far have been too noisy at small angular scales to observe these non-Gaussian effects on the cosmological parameters. We explore how firmly this holds for the ACBAR and CBI data sets when combined with WMAP five-year data as well for future Planck and CMBPol measurements.

Moreover, we consider the weak lensing scaling parameter $A_L$ in our analysis.
This parameter scales the power spectrum of the CMB lensing potential $C_l^{\phi \phi}$ such that
$A_L = 0$ corresponds to an unlensed scenario, whereas $A_L = 1$
renders the expected lensed result. It was first reported that in an
analysis of the ACBAR data set this parameter is incompatible
with the expected  value of $A_L = 1$ at $2.5\sigma$~\cite{Calabrese:2008rt}.
ACBAR has since updated their data set with a new calibration,
and the ACBAR team finds that the amplitude is consistent with the expected value of unity \cite{Reichardt:2008ay}.
However, given that this parameter is sensitive to physics at high multipoles, such as that
encapsulated in the trispectrum, we also include $A_L$ as an extra parameter in our
calculations.

Our analysis of the ACBAR and CBI data sets, combined with WMAP 5-year data, show that secondary contributions in the trispectrum have a negligible effect on the uncertainties of the cosmological parameters. At most the constraints on the cosmological parameters change by no more than 10\%. We find that these modifications are negligible due to the increase in noise at large multipoles (as shown in Fig.~\ref{fig:sig_noise}).

However, in a mock Planck data set with realistic noise contributions, the non-Gaussian effects coming from the trispectrum become more important, with error constraint degradations up to $20\%$ (as shown in Table \ref{tab:planck}). For the case of CMBPol this rises to $\lsim30\%$. For this reason, future experiments with at least Planck-level sensitivity at high $l$ should consider non-Gaussianities from the trispectrum in order to have proper error bar estimates.

Lastly, we show $A_L$ to be consistent with the expected value of unity, primarily due to the same reasons that Ref.~\cite{Reichardt:2008ay} found it to be consistent with the theoretically expected value. If we had used the original ACBAR dataset, prior to their most recent update, we find that
$A_L$ is inconsistent with unity at the same confidence as found by Ref.~\cite{Calabrese:2008rt}.
We also find that this parameter remains consistent with unity when both trispectrum effects and the running $dn_s/dlnk$ of the spectral index $n_s$  are included in the analysis.

In \S \ref{sec:analysis}, we review the calculation for the trispectrum contribution to the
covariance matrix. In \S \ref{sec:results}, we
calculate the impact of the trispectrum on the cosmological parameters for current and future experiments considering a set of parameter configurations.  The fiducial cosmologies considered can be found in Table~\ref{tab:fiducial}. In \S \ref{sec:summary}, we conclude with a summary.

\section{Analysis}
\label{sec:analysis}

\subsection{Lensing Trispectrum}
We begin with a review of how to calculate the various contributions of the trispectrum to the covariance matrix. For a comprehensive introduction and derivation of these
equations, see~\cite{Cooray:2002fy}.

In the flat sky approximation, the power spectrum and trispectrum are defined via:
\begin{eqnarray}
\left< {\Theta}^{\rm t}({\mathbf{l}}_1){\Theta}^{\rm t}({\mathbf{l}}_2)\right> &=&
        (2\pi)^2 \delta_{\rm D}({\mathbf{l}}_{12}) C_l^{\Theta}\,,\nonumber\\
\left< {\Theta}^{\rm t}({\mathbf{l}}_1) \ldots
       {\Theta}^{\rm t}({\mathbf{l}}_4)\right>_c &=& (2\pi)^2
\delta_{\rm D}({\mathbf{l}}_{1234})
        T^{\Theta}({\mathbf{l}}_1,{\mathbf{l}}_2,{\mathbf{l}}_3,{\mathbf{l}}_4)\,. \nonumber \\
\end{eqnarray}

In computing these quantities  the band powers are obtained, as

\begin{equation}
{\cal C}_i = \int_{{\rm s}_i}
{d^2 l W_i\over{A_{{\rm s}_i}}}
\frac{l^2}{2\pi} {\Theta}({\bf l}) {\Theta}(-\bf l) \, ,
\end{equation}

where $A_{{\rm s}_{i}} \equiv A_{\rm s}(l_i) = \int d^2 l W_i$ is the area of 2D shell in multipole space, $W_i$ is the $i^{\rm th}$ window function and the subscript ${\rm s}_i$ stands for the $i^{\rm th}$ shell in multipole space over which we are integrating.  The signal covariance matrix $C_{ij}$ is given by

\begin{eqnarray}
C_{ij} &=& {1 \over A} \left[ {(2\pi)^2 \over A_{{\rm s}_i}} 2 {\cal C}_i^2
+ T^{\Theta}_{ij}\right]\,,\\
T^{\Theta}_{ij}&=&
\int {d^2 l_i W_i \over A_{{\rm s}_i}}
\int {d^2 l_j W_j \over A_{{\rm s}_j}} {l_i^2 l_j^2 \over (2\pi)^2}
T^{\Theta}({\mathbf{l}}_i,-{\mathbf{l}}_i,{\mathbf{l}}_j,-{\mathbf{l}}_j)\,,
\label{eqn:variance}
\end{eqnarray}

where $A$ is the survey area in steradians. The first term of the covariance matrix $C_{ij}$ is the Gaussian contribution to the
sample variance and includes, in addition to the primary component, contributions through lensing and secondary effects. The second term $T_{ij}$
represents the non-Gaussian contributions contained in the trispectrum.

The surveys we consider also include instrumental noise. The noise is incorporated into our Gaussian variance as an additional contribution to the power spectrum
\begin{equation}
C_l^{\rm t} = C_l^{\Theta}+N_l\,
\end{equation}

where $N_l$ is the power spectrum of the detector and other sources of noise
introduced by the experiment. These noise contributions are included in respective experiment's publicly released data and significantly impact the covariance matrix, in particular on small angular scales.

For the power spectrum covariance, we are interested in
the case where ${{\bf l}_2} = -{{\bf l}_1}$  with $|{{\bf l}_1}|=l_i$, and
${{\bf l}_4} = -{{\bf l}_3}$ with $|{{\bf l}_3}|=l_j$. These conditions render parallelograms for
the trispectrum configuration in Fourier space.

To account for the lensing contribution to the trispectrum, we must compute
\begin{eqnarray}
&& T^{\Theta}({\mathbf{l}}_i,-{\mathbf{l}}_i,{\mathbf{l}}_j,-{\mathbf{l}}_j) = \nonumber \\
&&C_{l_i}^{\Theta} C_{l_i}^{\Theta} \left[
C_{|{\bf \hat{l}}_i+{\bf \hat{l}}_j|}^{{\phi\phi}} \left[ ({\bf \hat{l}}_i+{\bf \hat{l}}_j)\cdot
{\bf \hat{l}}_i\right]^2 +
C_{|{\bf \hat{l}}_i-{\bf \hat{l}}_j|}^{{\phi\phi}} \left[ ({\bf \hat{l}}_i-{\bf \hat{l}}_j)\cdot
{\bf \hat{l}}_i\right]^2 \right] \nonumber \\
&+&C_{l_j}^{\Theta} C_{l_j}^{\Theta} \left[
C_{|{\bf \hat{l}}_i+{\bf \hat{l}}_j|}^{{\phi\phi}} \left[ ({\bf \hat{l}}_i+{\bf \hat{l}}_j)\cdot
{\bf \hat{l}}_j\right]^2 +
C_{|{\bf \hat{l}}_i-{\bf \hat{l}}_j|}^{{\phi\phi}} \left[ ({\bf \hat{l}}_i-{\bf \hat{l}}_j)\cdot
{\bf \hat{l}}_j\right]^2 \right] \nonumber \\
&+&2C_{l_i}^{\Theta} C_{l_j}^{\Theta} \Big[
C_{|{\bf \hat{l}}_i+{\bf \hat{l}}_j|}^{{\phi\phi}}  ({\bf \hat{l}}_i+{\bf \hat{l}}_j)\cdot
{\bf \hat{l}}_i({\bf \hat{l}}_i+{\bf \hat{l}}_j)\cdot {\bf \hat{l}}_j \nonumber \\
&& \quad \quad -
C_{|{\bf \hat{l}}_i-{\bf \hat{l}}_j|}^{{\phi\phi}} ({\bf \hat{l}}_i-{\bf \hat{l}}_j)\cdot {\bf \hat{l}}_i
({\bf \hat{l}}_i-{\bf \hat{l}}_j)\cdot {\bf \hat{l}}_j \Big] \, ,
\label{eqn:lenTri}
\end{eqnarray}
where $C_{l_i}^{\Theta}$ is the TT power spectrum and $C_{l_i}^{{\phi\phi}}$ is the lensing power spectrum. This equation includes all terms with no additional permutations. Similarly, for the lensing-secondary trispectrum effects, such as lensing-ISW and lensing-SZ, we calculate
\begin{eqnarray}
&& T^{\Theta}({\mathbf{l}}_i,-{\mathbf{l}}_i,{\mathbf{l}}_j,-{\mathbf{l}}_j) = \nonumber \\
&&2 \left({\mathbf{l}}_i \cdot {\mathbf{l}}_j\right)^2 \left[
\left(C_{l_i}^{\phi{\rm s}}\right)^2 C_{l_j}^{\Theta} +
\left(C_{l_j}^{\phi{\rm s}}\right)^2 C_{l_i}^{\Theta} \right] \nonumber \\
&-& \left[\left[{\mathbf{l}}_i \cdot ({\mathbf{l}}_i+{\mathbf{l}}_j)\right]^2
\left(C_{l_i}^{\phi{\rm s}}\right)^2
+\left[{\mathbf{l}}_j \cdot ({\mathbf{l}}_i+{\mathbf{l}}_j)\right]^2
\left(C_{l_j}^{\phi{\rm s}}\right)^2 \right]C_{|{\mathbf{l}}_i+{\mathbf{l}}_j|}^{\Theta}
\nonumber \\
&-& \left[\left[{\mathbf{l}}_i \cdot ({\mathbf{l}}_i-{\mathbf{l}}_j)\right]^2
\left(C_{l_i}^{\phi{\rm s}}\right)^2
+ \left[{\mathbf{l}}_j \cdot ({\mathbf{l}}_i-{\mathbf{l}}_j)\right]^2
\left(C_{l_j}^{\phi{\rm s}}\right)^2\right] C_{|{\mathbf{l}}_i-{\mathbf{l}}_j|}^{\Theta}
\nonumber \\
&+& 2\left[{\mathbf{l}}_i \cdot ({\mathbf{l}}_j-{\mathbf{l}}_i)\right]
\left[{\mathbf{l}}_j \cdot ({\mathbf{l}}_j-{\mathbf{l}}_i)\right]
C_{l_i}^{\phi{\rm s}}C_{l_j}^{\phi{\rm s}} C_{|{\mathbf{l}}_j-{\mathbf{l}}_i|}^{\Theta} \nonumber \\
&-& 2\left[{\mathbf{l}}_i \cdot ({\mathbf{l}}_i+{\mathbf{l}}_j)\right]
\left[{\mathbf{l}}_j \cdot ({\mathbf{l}}_i+{\mathbf{l}}_j)\right]
C_{l_i}^{\phi{\rm s}}C_{l_j}^{\phi{\rm s}} C_{|{\mathbf{l}}_i+{\mathbf{l}}_j|}^{\Theta} \nonumber \\
\label{eqn:secTri}
\end{eqnarray}

where the $s$ is a place holder denoting either the ISW or SZ contribution.

\begin{figure}[!b]
\centering
\includegraphics[scale=0.43]{fig1}
\caption{The impact of varying the lensing scaling parameter on the lensed CMB temperature power spectrum, for $A_L$ = [0,2,5,10].}
\label{fig:AL}
\end{figure}

\subsection{SZ Trispectrum}

In addition to the lensing contributions to the trispectrum above, we consider contributions from the inverse Compton scattering of the CMB photons. The SZ contribution to the trispectrum is given by~\cite{Komatsu:2002wc,Cooray:2001wa}:

\begin{eqnarray}
 \nonumber
 T^{\Theta}_{ij}&=& g_\nu^4 \int_0^{z_{\rm max}} dz \frac{dV}{dz}
              \int_{M_{\rm min}}^{M_{\rm max}} dM \frac{dn(M,z)}{dM}\\
 \label{eq:tl}
	& &\times \left|\tilde{y}_i(M,z)\right|^2
	\left|\tilde{y}_{j}(M,z)\right|^2,
	\label{eqn:komSZ}
\end{eqnarray}

where $g_{\nu}$ is the spectral function of the SZ effect, $V(z)$ is the comoving volume of the universe integrated to a redshift of $z_{\rm max} = 4$, $M$ is the virial mass such that $[{\rm log}_{10}(M_{\rm min}), {\rm log}_{10}(M_{\rm max})] = [11,16]$, ${dn}/{dM}$ is the mass function of dark matter halos as rendered by~\cite{Jenkins:2000bv} utilizing the linear transfer function of~\cite{Eisenstein:1997jh}, and $\tilde{y}$ is the dimensionless two-dimensional Fourier transform of the projected Compton $y$-parameter, given via the Limber approximation \cite{Limber:1954rt} by:

\begin{equation}
 \label{eq:yl}
  \tilde{y}_l= \frac{4\pi r_{\rm s}}{l_{\rm s}^2}
  \int_0^\infty dx x^2 y_{\rm 3D}(x)
  \frac{\sin(lx/l_{\rm s})}{lx/l_{\rm s}},
\end{equation}

where the scaled radius $x=r/r_s$ and $l_s=d_A/r_s$ such that $d_A$ is the angular diameter distance and $r_s$ is the scale radius of the three-dimensional radial profile $y_{\rm 3D}$ of the Compton $y$-parameter. This  profile is a function of the gas density and temperature profiles as modeled in \cite{Komatsu:2001dn}. Hence, we incorporate the contributions obtained from the SZ effect along with those from lensing, lensing-ISW, and lensing-SZ effects to the covariance matrix in Eqn.~3.

\subsection{The Weak Lensing Scaling Parameter $A_L$}

To first order in $\phi$, the weak lensing of the CMB anisotropy trispectrum can be expressed as the convolution of the power spectrum of the unlensed temperature $C_l$ and that of the weak lensing potential $Cl^{\phi \phi}$~\cite{Calabrese:2008rt,Lewis:2006fu,Zaldarriaga:1998ar}. The
magnitude of the lensing potential power spectrum can be parameterized by
the scaling parameter $A_L$, defined as
\begin{equation}
 \label{eq:wel}
 C_l^{\phi \phi} \rightarrow A_L C_l^{\phi \phi}.
\end{equation}

Thus, $A_L$ is a measure of the degree to which the expected amount of
lensing appears in the CMB, such that a theory with $A_L=0$ is
devoid of lensing, while $A_L=1$ renders a theory with the canonical
amount of lensing. Any inconsistency with unity represents an unexpected
amount of lensing that needs to be explained with new physics, such as
dark energy or modified gravity \cite{Calabrese:2008rt,Calabrese:2009tt}. The impact of
this scaling parameter on the lensed CMB temperature power spectrum can be
seen in Fig.~\ref{fig:AL}. Qualitatively, $A_L$ smoothes out the peaks in
the power spectrum and can therefore also be viewed as a smoothing
parameter in addition to its scaling property. Given that $A_L$ primarily
affects the temperature power spectrum on small angular scales, we also explore the possibility that
it deviates from unity  as secondary non-Gaussianities are accounted for in the analysis.

\section{Results}
\label{sec:results}

\subsection{Analysis Using ACBAR and CBI Data}

\begin{table}[htbp]
  \centering
  \begin{tabular}{@{} |c|c|c| @{}}
    \hline
     & ACBAR & CBI \\
    \hline
     $H_0$ & 72.0 & 73.2 \\
    $\Omega_b h^2$  & 0.02282 & 0.02291 \\
    $\Omega_c h^2$ & 0.1108 & 0.1069 \\
    $\tau$& 0.088 & 0.086 \\
    $n_s$ & 0.964 & 0.960 \\
    $\Delta^2_R$ & $2.41\times10^{-9}$ & $2.09\times10^{-9}$ \\
    \hline
  \end{tabular}
  \caption{Fiducial model used to generate $C_{l_i}^{\Theta}$ and $C^{\phi \phi}_{l_i}$ in CAMB for ACBAR and CBI.}
  \label{tab:fiducial}
\end{table}

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics[scale=0.47]{fig2}
\caption{The ratio of the diagonal of the covariance matrix plus trispectrum effects with the diagonal of the covariance matrix neglecting trispectrum contributions for ACBAR (top) and CBI (bottom). The $x$ in the
$C_l^{\mathrm{Gauss+x}}$ is the specific contribution being added. We see that
both the combined lensing effects and SZ alter the covariance matrix by at most a few
percent. The choppiness is due to two issues: the covariance matrices provided by ACBAR and CBI are not smooth and the window functions used to bin the data take on different shapes and are themselves not smooth.}
\label{fig:ratio}
\end{figure}

We compute $C_{l_i}^{\Theta}$ and $C^{\phi \phi}_{l_i}$, separately for each aforementioned experiment by utilizing the publicly available\footnote{\rm http://camb.info/} Fortran code CAMB~\cite{Lewis:1999bs} for the fiducial models found in Table~\ref{tab:fiducial}. These fiducial models were taken from NASA's Lambda website\footnote{\rm http://lambda.gsfc.nasa.gov/} which houses many best fit fiducial models derived from several different data sets.
From these spectra, we use Eqns.~\ref{eqn:lenTri}--\ref{eqn:komSZ} to determine the trispectrum
contributions from lensing, lensing-ISW, lensing-SZ, and SZ effects.  We then add each corresponding trispectrum contribution to each experiment's
publicly available covariance matrix.

For our analysis, we use the same multipole binning as the aforementioned experiments, which are obtained from the window functions plotted in Fig.~\ref{fig:windows}.  These window functions force proper normalized bins when we integrate over $l$ space. To factor in the area of each survey, we note that the ACBAR survey covers 600 sq. degrees and CBI covers 143 sq. degrees.

Fig.~\ref{fig:ratio} shows the diagonal ratio of the covariance matrix
together with non-Gaussian contributions, with the purely Gaussian
covariance matrix, for the ACBAR and CBI surveys.  We plot only the
diagonal, as these entries are several orders of magnitude larger than the
off-diagonal pieces. All contributions along the diagonal of the covariance leave
corrections no larger than on the order of $1\%$.

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics[scale=1.15]{fig4a}
\centering
\includegraphics[scale=1.15]{fig4b}
\caption{The absolute values of the Gaussian covariance plus trispectrum matrix divided by the Gaussian covariance matrix alone. In the top figure we show corrections to the ACBAR data set, and in the lower figure to the CBI data set.
The trispectrum contribution to the cross-correlations is about 100 times larger than the Gaussian contribution.}
\label{fig:cbi_divide}
\end{figure}

Cross-correlations become significant when the trispectrum is considered, since a fully Gaussian theory should not have any cross-correlation terms in the covariance of the temperature power spectrum. As seen in Fig.~\ref{fig:cbi_divide}, the non-Gaussian corrections to the cross-correlations lie on the order of a factor of 100 as they correct off-diagonal terms that otherwise are negligible.
However, as will be shown, despite the large corrections to the cross-correlations, the trispectrum effects on the cosmological parameters are negligible.

Having obtained corrections to the binned covariance matrix from
trispectrum effects, we now compute the impact of these on the cosmological parameter constraints.  The method we use in our analysis is based on the publicly available Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) package CosmoMC~\cite{Lewis:2002ah} with a convergence diagnostic done through the Gelman and Rubin statistics. We sample the following seven-dimensional set of cosmological parameters, adopting flat priors on them: the baryon and cold dark matter densities $\Omega_b$ and $\Omega_c$, the ratio of the sound horizon to the angular diameter distance at the decoupling, $\theta_s$, the scalar spectral index $n _s$, the overall normalization of the spectrum $A_s$ at $k=0.002$ Mpc$^{-1}$, the optical depth to reionization, $\tau$, and the weak lensing parameter $A_L$. We use the same window functions and band powers supplied from the considered
experiments (see Fig.~\ref{fig:windows}). We only use the band
powers for $l > 900$ for both ACBAR and CBI in our CosmoMC analysis,
and use WMAP data for calculations on larger angular scales. The non-Gaussian contributions
to the trispectrum are incorporated into the binned covariance matrix for use in CosmoMC.

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics[scale=0.47]{fig5}
\caption{The window functions used for our analysis of the ACBAR and CBI
data sets.}
\label{fig:windows}
\end{figure}

\begin{figure}
\centering
\includegraphics[scale=0.47]{fig7}
\caption{The multipole-dependent  ratio $C_l/\Delta{C_l}$ for the considered experiments (ACBAR in dot-dashed, CBI in dotted, Planck in dashed, and CMBPol in solid).}
\label{fig:sig_noise}
\end{figure}

\begin{figure}[!t]
\centering
\includegraphics[scale=0.5]{fig8a.eps}
\centering
\includegraphics[scale=0.5]{fig8b.eps}
\includegraphics[scale=0.5]{fig8c.eps}
\caption{The 68\% and 95\% confidence intervals in cosmological parameter constraints for the mock Planck run. These parameters are those with the largest shifts as seen in Table \ref{tab:planck} plotted against $\Omega_b h^2$. The red regions are those without the trispectrum, whereas the blue regions are those with the trispectrum.}
\label{fig:contours}
\end{figure}

\begin{table*}
\centering
\space
\caption{
The first column represents the cosmological parameters considered. In the second column we quantify the parameter constraints without non-Gaussian effects. The cosmological parameters
determined from the combined ACBAR, CBI and WMAP five-year CMB data sets along with the non-Gaussian contributions from the trispectrum are shown in the third column.   The same data without the trispectrum but with the variation of $A_L$ is shown in the fifth column.  The columns denoted $\Delta \sigma$ represent the percent change of the 1$\sigma$ errror bars.
}
\begin{tabular}{|c||c||c||c||c||c|}
\hline\hline
Parameter & CMBData & CMBData+Tri.  & $\Delta \sigma / \sigma$ & CMBData+$A_{L}$  & $\Delta \sigma / \sigma$
 \\
\hline
$    \Omega_b h^2 $  &  $ 0.02284 \pm 0.00058 $  &  $ 0.02283 \pm
0.00059 $ & $ 2\% $ &  $ 0.02300 \pm
0.00063 $ & $ 9\% $ \\
$    \Omega_c h^2 $  &  $ 0.1103 \pm 0.0060 $  &  $ 0.1105 \pm 0.0061
$ & $ 2\% $ &  $ 0.1082 \pm 0.0061
$ & $ 2\% $ \\
$    \theta $  &  $ 1.0408 \pm 0.0026 $  &  $ 1.0410 \pm 0.0028 $ & $ 8\% $ &  $ 1.0413 \pm 0.0028 $ & $ 8\% $ \\
$    \tau $  &  $ 0.090 \pm 0.017 $  &  $ 0.089 \pm 0.017 $ & $ 0\% $ &    $ 0.090 \pm 0.017$ & $ 0\% $  \\
$    n_s $  &  $ 0.966 \pm 0.014 $  &  $ 0.966 \pm 0.015 $ & $ 7\% $ &  $ 0.968 \pm 0.015 $ & $ 7\% $ \\
$    A_{L} $  &1&1 &  -  &  $ 2.32 \pm 0.93 $ & -  \\
$    {\rm log}[10^{10} A_s] $  &  $ 3.180 \pm 0.047 $  &  $ 3.178 \pm 0.048
$ & $ 2\% $  &  $ 3.166 \pm 0.048
$ & $ 2\% $\\
$    \Omega_\Lambda $  &  $ 0.741 \pm 0.029 $  &  $ 0.740 \pm 0.029 $ &
$ 0\% $ &  $ 0.752 \pm 0.030 $ &
$ 3\% $  \\
$    {\rm Age/GYr} $  &  $ 13.67 \pm 0.13 $  &  $ 13.67 \pm 0.14 $ & $ 8\% $ &  $ 13.63 \pm 0.14 $ & $ 8\% $  \\
$    \Omega_m $  &  $ 0.259 \pm 0.029 $  &  $ 0.259 \pm 0.029 $ & $ 0\% $  &  $ 0.247 \pm 0.029 $ & $ 0\%$ \\
$    \sigma_8 $  &  $ 0.815 \pm 0.031 $  &  $ 0.801 \pm 0.033 $ & $ 7\% $ &  $ 0.789 \pm 0.035 $ & $ 13\% $\\
$    z_{re} $  &  $ 10.5 \pm 1.4 $  &  $ 10.4 \pm 1.4 $ & $ 0\% $ &  $ 10.4 \pm 1.4 $ & $ 0\% $ \\
$    H_0 $  &  $ 71.9 \pm 2.6 $  &  $ 71.8 \pm 2.7 $ & $ 4\% $ &  $ 73.1 \pm 2.8 $ & $ 8\% $ \\
\hline\hline
\end{tabular}
\label{tab:orig}
\end{table*}

\begin{table*}
\label{table:runTri}
\centering
\space
\caption{
In the second column, we quantify the cosmological parameter constraints incorporating the additional free
parameters $A_L$ and $dn_s/dlnk$. In the third column, we show the cosmological parameters determined from the combined ACBAR, CBI and WMAP 5-year CMB datasets with contributions from the trispectrum, along with the
additional free parameters $A_L$ and $dn_s/dlnk$.
}.
\begin{tabular}{|c||c||c||c|}
\hline\hline
Parameter & CMBData+$A_L$+Run & CMBData+$A_{L}$+Run+Tri.  &
$\Delta \sigma / \sigma$ \\
\hline
$    \Omega_b h^2 $  &  $ 0.02283 \pm 0.00080 $  &  $ 0.02269 \pm
0.00081 $ & $ 2\% $ \\
$    \Omega_c h^2 $  &  $ 0.1135 \pm 0.0089 $  &  $ 0.1136 \pm 0.0090
$ & $ 1\% $  \\
$    \theta $  &  $ 1.0410 \pm 0.0029 $  &  $ 1.0410 \pm 0.0030 $ & $
3\% $  \\
$    \tau $  &  $ 0.090 \pm 0.017 $  &  $ 0.090 \pm 0.018 $ & $ 6\% $  \\
$    n_s $  &  $ 0.997 \pm 0.048 $  &  $ 1.001 \pm 0.049 $ & $ 2\% $  \\
$    A_{L} $  &  $ 2.10 \pm 0.90$  &  $ 2.02 \pm 0.94 $ & $ 4\% $  \\
$    dn_s/dlnk $  &  $ -0.014 \pm 0.024 $  &  $ -0.017 \pm 0.025 $ & $
4\%$  \\
$    {\rm log}[10^{10} A_s] $  &  $ 3.167 \pm 0.049 $  &  $ 3.167 \pm 0.049
$ & $ 0\%$  \\
$    \Omega_\Lambda $  &  $ 0.726 \pm 0.047 $  &  $ 0.723 \pm 0.048 $ &
$ 2\% $ \\
$    {\rm Age/GYr} $  &  $ 13.67 \pm 0.16 $  &  $ 13.69 \pm 0.17 $ & $ 6\% $  \\
$    \Omega_m $  &  $ 0.275 \pm 0.029 $  &  $ 0.277 \pm 0.029 $ & $ 0\% $  \\
$    \sigma_8 $  &  $ 0.810 \pm 0.039 $  &  $ 0.807 \pm 0.041 $ & $ 5\%$ \\
$    z_{re} $  &  $ 10.8 \pm 1.5 $  &  $ 10.8 \pm 1.5 $ & $ 0\% $  \\
$    H_0 $  &  $ 71.0 \pm 4.0 $  &  $ 70.7 \pm 4.1 $ & $ 3\% $  \\
\hline \hline
\end{tabular}
\label{tab:origTri}
\end{table*}

\begin{table*}
\label{table:runTri}
\centering
\space
\caption{
In the second column, we show the cosmological parameter constraints from mock Planck data. In the third column, we quantify the non-Gaussianity induced shift of the best fit parameter values defined as the ratio of the parameter shift with the uncertainty. Simulation results combining the trispectrum with the Planck mock are shown in the third column.}.
\begin{tabular}{|c||c||c||c||c|}
\hline\hline
Parameter & Planck & Planck + Tri.  & $\Delta p_i /\sigma$ &$\Delta \sigma$ \\
\hline
$    \Omega_b h^2 $  &  $ 0.02281 \pm 0.00016 $  &  $ 0.02271 \pm
0.00018 $ & $ -0.62 $ & 13\% \\
$    \Omega_c h^2 $  &  $ 0.1122 \pm 0.0016 $  &  $ 0.1132 \pm 0.0018
$ & $ 0.63 $ & 12\% \\
$    \theta $  &  $ 1.04095 \pm 0.00037 $  &  $ 1.04084 \pm 0.00044 $ & $
-0.30 $  & 19\%\\
$    n_s $  &  $ 0.9570 \pm 0.0042 $  &  $ 0.9538 \pm 0.0047 $ & $ -0.75 $  & 12\% \\
$    {\rm log}[10^{10} A_s] $  &  $ 3.211 \pm 0.017 $  &  $ 3.224 \pm 0.020
$ & $ 0.73 $  & 18\%\\
$    \Omega_\Lambda $  &  $ 0.7330 \pm 0.0086 $  &  $ 0.727 \pm 0.010 $ &
$ -0.67 $ & 14\% \\
$    {\rm Age/GYr} $  &  $ 13.686 \pm 0.028 $  &  $ 13.704 \pm 0.033 $ & $ 0.65 $ &  18\% \\
$    \Omega_m $  &  $ 0.2670 \pm 0.0086 $  &  $ 0.273 \pm 0.010 $ & $ 0.67 $ & 14\%  \\
$    \sigma_8 $  &  $ 0.8071 \pm 0.0068 $  &  $ 0.8113 \pm 0.0076 $ & $ -0.08 $ & 12\% \\
$    z_{re} $  &  $ 10.395 \pm 0.071 $  &  $ 10.447 \pm 0.081 $ & $ 0.74 $ & 14\%  \\
$    H_0 $  &  $ 71.12 \pm 0.76 $  &  $ 70.62 \pm 0.86 $ & $ -0.67 $  & 13\% \\
\hline \hline
\end{tabular}
\label{tab:planck}
\end{table*}

\begin{table*}
\label{table:runTri}
\centering
\space
\caption{
In the second column, we show the cosmological parameter constraints from mock CMBPol data. Simulation results combining the trispectrum with the CMBPol mock are shown in the third column.}.
\begin{tabular}{|c||c||c||c||c|}
\hline\hline
Parameter & CMBPol & CMBPol + Tri.  & $\Delta p_i /\sigma$ &
$\Delta \sigma$ \\
\hline
$    \Omega_b h^2 $  &  $ 0.02292 \pm 0.00013 $  &  $ 0.02279 \pm
0.00016 $ & $ -1.01 $ & 23\% \\
$    \Omega_c h^2 $  &  $ 0.1111 \pm 0.0014 $  &  $ 0.1126 \pm 0.0017
$ & $ 1.09 $ &  21\% \\
$    \theta $  &  $ 1.04111 \pm 0.00028 $  &  $ 1.04110 \pm 0.00036 $ & $
-0.52 $ & 29\% \\
$    n_s $  &  $ 0.9603 \pm 0.0036 $  &  $ 0.9558 \pm 0.0044 $ & $ -1.23 $  & 22\%\\
$    {\rm log}[10^{10} A_s] $  &  $ 3.198 \pm 0.015 $  &  $ 3.216 \pm 0.018
$ & $ 1.19 $  & 20\% \\
$    \Omega_\Lambda $  &  $ 0.7392 \pm 0.0072 $  &  $ 0.7309 \pm 0.0091 $ &
$ -1.15 $ & 26\%\\
$    {\rm Age/GYr} $  &  $ 13.663 \pm 0.023 $  &  $ 13.689 \pm 0.030 $ & $ 1.11 $ & 30\% \\
$    \Omega_m $  &  $ 0.2608 \pm 0.0072 $  &  $ 0.2691 \pm 0.0091 $ & $ 1.09 $  & 26\%\\
$    \sigma_8 $  &  $ 0.8026 \pm 0.0057 $  &  $ 0.8088 \pm 0.0071 $ & $ -0.08 $ & 25\% \\
$    z_{re} $  &  $ 10.336 \pm 0.059 $  &  $ 10.410 \pm 0.073 $ & $ 1.25 $ & 24\%  \\
$    H_0 $  &  $ 71.69 \pm 0.65 $  &  $ 70.95 \pm 0.79 $ & $ -1.15 $ & 22\%  \\
\hline \hline
\end{tabular}
\label{tab:cmbpol}
\end{table*}

Table~\ref{tab:orig} shows the extent to which the trispectrum contributions affect the constraints on cosmological parameters for ACBAR and CBI data sets combined with WMAP five-year data. The trispectrum has a negligible impact on the cosmological parameters for these simulations.  For the cases where the weak lensing scaling parameter and the running of the spectral index are included the constraints on the cosmological parameters change by less than 10\%.

\subsection{The Weak Lensing Scaling Parameter}

Using a prior ACBAR dataset, it was found that the weak lensing scaling parameter $A_L$ is inconsistent with the expected value of unity at $2.5\sigma$~\cite{Calabrese:2008rt}. This led to an apparent revision by the ACBAR team and resulting in a recalibration of the data. This apparently removed the result first demonstrated by Calabrese et al. \cite{Calabrese:2008rt} and the ACBAR team's own revised analysis showed $A_L$ to be consistent with unity at a significance around 1.1$\sigma$ \cite{Reichardt:2008ay}.
However, given that this parameter is strongly sensitive to small angular scales where other secondary anisotropies contribute and non-Gaussianities become important, we have also chosen to include this parameter into our analysis. We have explicitly carried out two runs with this scaling parameter. For the first run, we incorporated  $A_L$ without any assumption of priors or the addition of other parameters, as shown in Table~\ref{tab:orig}. We find $A_L$ to be consistent with unity at $1.4\sigma$, for the same reasons that the ACBAR team found this parameter to
be consistent with the theoretical value in the fiducial cosmological model.

For the second simulation, in addition to $A_L$, we incorporated secondary non-Gaussianities and allowed the spectral index to run as this parameter is sensitive to physics on small scales. However, the constraint on the lensing amplitude remains unaffected. Nevertheless, it is possible that non-Gaussian effects are partly responsible for the inconsistency of the scaling parameter with unity, and future data sets with less noise on small angular scales are required to determine this.

\subsection{Mock Runs}

In order to understand the extent to which the trispectrum impacts the cosmological parameters in a prospective survey with less noise, we created TT mock datasets assuming the best fit WMAP5 cosmological parameters, with the optical depth fixed at $\tau = 0.087$, and with noise properties consistent with Planck's 143 GHz channel. Instead of considering cross-correlations, we only use the diagonal entries of the binned covariance matrix.

Table~\ref{tab:planck} shows the results of the Planck mock simulation. Since Planck has significantly less noise at high $l$, the trispectrum effects on the cosmological parameters is more apparent and the confidence regions of the most extreme changes are seen in Fig.~\ref{fig:contours}. Here, the 1$\sigma$ parameter constraints weaken by up to 20\%. Thus, the trispectrum has a more significant impact for measuring the constraints on the cosmological parameters in experiments with a noise-level comparable to that of Planck on small angular scales.

Furthermore, in anticipation of CMBPol~\cite{Baumann:2008aq}, which should have noise an order of magnitude less than Planck, we have carried out a mock CMBPol-like run
with noise estimates consistent with the EPIC concept mission \cite{Bock}.
The results of this run are seen in Table~\ref{tab:cmbpol}. For surveys with noise level comparable to that of CMBPol, non-Gaussian contributions in the trispectrum weaken the parameter constraints by up to 30\%.

We have included in Table~\ref{tab:planck} and Table~\ref{tab:cmbpol} the parameter shifts induced in one realization of the mock CMB spectrum. Although the size of the parameter shifts extend up to 1.5$\sigma$, the shifts are not statistically significant as errors are correlated. We expect that for a set of realizations the shifts will cancel on average.

\section{Conclusions}
\label{sec:summary}

Secondary non-Gaussianities in the trispectrum from weak lensing, the ISW effect, and the SZ effect have the potential to weaken the constraints on the cosmological parameters in experiments with high enough sensitivity to physics on small angular scales. While recent experiments such as ACBAR and CBI are too noisy for the trispectrum to become important at large multipoles, future surveys need to incorporate the trispectrum to avoid over-confident parameter estimation. The underlying cosmology constrained by Planck suffers a 20\% degradation when these secondary contributions to the temperature anisotropies are properly incorporated, and this rises to 30\% in CMBPol. Accounting for secondary non-Gaussianities in our analysis shows the weak lensing scaling parameter to be consistent with unity at $1.5\sigma$.

\acknowledgments

We thank Erminia Calabrese, Eiichiro Komatsu, and
Alessandro Melchiorri for helpful discussions. J.S. and S.J. acknowledge support from GAANN fellowships. This work was also supported by NSF AST-0645427.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaArXiv


text:
Q: Why doesn't pselect adjust the timeout argument? The manual page for select/pselect [1] along with this LWN article [2] explicitly mention that calls to the library function pselect will not modify the timeout argument whereas the select call might, depending on the implementation. The LWN article mentions that the system call pselect does modify the timeout, and the library function is hiding that from the caller.
Why was the library method pselect specified to not modify the timeout parameter? It seems like a useful feature to know if a timed method returned with time to spare.
For example, I'd like to wait up to some timespec for X bytes to be received. I could implement a loop that calls pselect to wait for data, accumulates any data read, accumulates time spent waiting, and then decides whether to loop again depending on whether enough bytes were read or enough time has elapsed. Since pselect doesn't modify the timeout parameter with the remaining time, I would have to call gettimeofday to calculate the remaining time window.
[1] http://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man2/select.2.html
[2] https://lwn.net/Articles/176911/

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Ever since the advent of the blockchain technology so many projects have been introduced jn different sectors of the economy. DNAtix has not been left out. DNAtix is a blockchain based genetics platform that provides anonymous and encrypted genetics services including: Analysis, storage and transfer of digitized DNA sequences through D2C platform (Direct-to-consumer). The DNAtix ecosystem will be created to offer an easy, transparent and anonymous genetics services. The DNAtix also will enable users to take ownership of their genetic data, and also encouraging them to manage their health by moving from reactive to preventive medicine.
Despite the enormous growth in the genetic ecosystem, there are still major barriers facing the Direct-to-Consumer (D2C) genetic services.
Government Regulations: Government regulations have being seen to be a major barrier facing the D2C genetic services. The Worldwide Health authorities have shown inability to decide on D2C genetics services thereby rendering it obsolete till this moment.
Costly: The total practice of full Genome Sequencing is too expensive to operate thereby rendering the services in accessible to all and sundry.
Anonymity: Since data is highly sensitive, the distribution of genetics data over the internet ensuring privacy and integrity of data in the old traditional way was limited.
To solve the above mentioned barriers, DNAtix has come to proffer solution by leveraging blockchain based genetics platform that provides anonymous and encrypted genetics services including: Analysis, storage and transfer of digitized DNA sequences through D2C platform (Direct-to-consumer).
The DNAtix platform is leveraging blockchain technology for Genetic storage and transfer.
The DNAtix ecosystem aims to provide complete anonymous and encrypted genetics services.
The DNAtix platform is user-friendly where customers can get their own DNA.
DNAtix aims to move genetic research to develop and enhance new health solutions.
DNAtix offers specific big Data for small capital.
DNAtix aims to arrive accurate personalizes medicine.
DNAtix platform enables users to upload, store and transfer DNA sequences.
The DNAtix platform is an innovative and advanced blockchain genetic platform built to deal with large data files.
DNAtix also aims to develop the most efficient and innovative Genetic crypto-wallet that can be used to perform and pay for different Genetics services. Users will be able to upload DNA sequences to the DNAtix blockchain.
The DNAtix Virtal Machine is a virtual machine developed by the DNAtix platform; the machine will be running or be operated as a node on the DNAtix blockcchain technology. The DNAtixVM will be distributed and arranged by different service providers in the Genetic ecosystem-These are genetic labs, genetic researchers, hospitals, genetic research institutes and any companies that provide full genome sequencing, crypto miners and etc.
DNAtix has developed an effective, enhanced and dedicated compression algorithm for digital Partial or Full Genome Sequences. The reason for the creation of the compression algorithm is for the conversion of 4 Genetic Code letters into a 2-bit code, which can then represent any of the 4 letters; C,G,T,A. The current working algorithm can compress any sequence to approximately 25% of its size.
For more information about DNATIX please visit the below links.


text:
Dream Sutton
Minutes of the Meetings
Municipal By-Laws
Municipal Contracts
to Citizens
Quality of Life Advisory Committee
Registry and Legal Affairs Office
Assessment Roll Service
Urban & Land-Use Planning
Urban Planning By-Laws
Graphic matrix and zoning
Application for a Permit or Certificate
Planning & Sustainable
Developement Advisory Committee
Demolition Committee
Public Works & Fixed Assets
Ecocentre
Reporting non-urgent issues
Fire Safety and Prevention
Description of Fire Safety Service
Civil Safety
Cultural Life in Sutton
Support For Cultural Organizations
Cultural Directory
Sutton Cultural Calendar
Cultural Recreation Activities
Recreation and Sports Life
Intermunicipal Agreements
Active Circuits
Support for Organizations
Recreation and Sports Events
Recreation and Sports Directory
Support for Community Organizations
Living in Sutton
Town Profile
List of Mayors
Exceptional Landscapes
Sutton Tourism
Minutes of the Council Meetings
Services to Citizens
Urban and Land-Use Planning
Graphic matrix and
assessment role
Planning & Sustainable Developement Advisory Committee
Fire Safety and Prevention Service
Living Sutton
Discover Sutton
Contact us 450 538-2290
Updating the urban plan: the Town of Sutton invites the population to a citizen participation session on Wednesday, May 26, 2021
Sutton, May 12, 2021 — The Town of Sutton has undertaken to update its urban plan and modernize the regulations in force. This approach is in line with the urban plan and by-laws adopted in 2009 and takes into account the issues and challenges currently facing the Town.
To this end, a participatory process will be held by the Town of Sutton in collaboration with the firm Stantec, in order to obtain feedback from Sutton's citizens. Their participation will enhance the thinking of the project team, as well as helping to identify the needs and aspirations of the community for the future of the town.
Therefore, the Town of Sutton invites the entire population to join a meeting in virtual form on Wednesday, May 26, 2021, at 7:30 p.m. Citizens are invited to share their ideas, questions, and comments through surveys and question periods set up online. The results will be fed into the updating of the urban plan. The meeting platform will be accessible from 6:30 p.m. on May 26 so that everyone can test their connection ahead of the meeting. Support services will also be available to help participants connect to the platform.
Citizens must register for this citizen participation session by sending an email to the following address: [email protected], before Friday, May 21. The connection instructions will then be sent back by email once the citizen has been registered.
WHEN: 7:30 p.m., Wednesday, May 26, 2021 (platform accessible from 6:30 p.m.)
WHERE: Virtual platform on ZOOM (details will be sent after registration)
HOW: To participate, register by Friday, May 21, 2021, by emailing your name at [email protected]. Please write "Registration for the May 26 consultation" in the subject line and include your first and last name.
Isabelle Capmas
Communications Coordinator
Tel.: 450 538-2290 ext. 227
Leisure and community
Council Min. of the Meetings
PSDAC Min. of the Meetings
11 Principale St. South
Sutton (Quebec) J0E 2K0
8:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. and
© 2023 Town of Sutton. All rights reserved.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Included: Reykjavik accommodation for 2 nights in a single, double or triple room, Reykjavik hotel pick up, 3 separate guided minibus tours.
Bring with you: Warm clothes, hiking shoes, packed lunch (we will also stop at a diner / restaurant).
Map of the route: See here below, or click here.
Note: For all our combined tours it is necessary to arrive in Iceland at least one day before tour departure. You can book your extra night with us. We recommend booking airport transfer here. Keep in mind that each day trip ends in Reykjavík again, so you go on three separate tours, with three separate guides.
We travel along the South coast of Iceland, stop at various locations including glacier hiking at Solheimajokull glacier which is a part of Myrdalsjokull glacier. On the way back we head to a staging point, where you can purchase refreshments before heading out again on the search for northern lights.
Pick up is from 9.00 – 9.30 at your Reykjavik accommodation. After that we drive east for an adventure day at the south coast. Our first stop is at Seljalandsfoss, a beautiful waterfall that sometimes is possible to walk behind, but watch out, that path can get very slippery! Next up is the glacier hike. Don't worry, we provide you with everything you'll need and it is a fairly easy hike, therefore suitable for most. After conquering the white ice we'll go the black sand beach, Reynisfjara, with beautiful basalt columns and the basalt sea stacks Reynisdrangar. It has been ranked as one of the ten most beautiful non-tropical beaches in the world. Here you have to be very careful as the waves are extremely powerful. On our way back to Reykjavik we'll stop at Skogafoss waterfall, one of the south coast highlights. According to a legend there is a Viking-treasure hidden behind the waterfall, you should ask your guide if you want to know more. In between we head to Ingolfsskáli a staging point for our Aurora Tours, here you will have time to boost up your energy with some refreshments before heading out again for the northern lights hunting. Like with all natural phenomena, you can't order the lights to turn on as you like. But with a little bit of luck and a little bit of clear sky our chances are quite good. Our guides are specially trained to read the forecasts and they will take you to some beautiful locations where the chances are the highest to catch them.
Next up is a caving trip to Leiðarendi magma chamber. This trip is only about 4 hours so afterwards you can relax and enjoy downtown Reykjavik.
Pick up is at 9.00 – 9.30 at your Reykjavik location. Our destination is only a short drive from Reykjavik, at Reykjanes peninsula, so in about 20 minutes we'll arrive. Leiðarendi cave is about 900 metres long and was first mapped in 1992. We will enter through narrow cave entrances and find they open out to reveal an extraordinary scenery of lava formations and unexpected colours. The tour is suitable for most people but you will have to be able to walk on uneven surfaces and sometimes on all four.
Last but not least we will go the circle no one can miss when in Iceland. The Golden Circle complete. The tour has many stops on the way and takes about 8 hours.
After pick up from 9.00 – 9.30 we'll go straight out of town where our first stop will be the Geothermal Exhibition at Hellisheidavirkjun, the largest power station of Iceland and the second largest geothermal power station in the world. The exhibition gives you insight into geothermal energy utilization in Iceland in a modern way via interactive multimedia installations, wall displays and presentations. Second stop will be the volcanic crater lake Kerið, a beautiful sight with water in it, that looks kind of like a peacock feather from air. It is on our way to the circle route. Next we warm up for Gullfoss at Faxi waterfall, a beautiful waterfall popular with white water kayakers. Up next is the breathtaking Gullfoss, so powerful that it really reminds us how small we humans are in comparison to the nature. We will have lunch at a local place close to Gullfoss and then move on to Geysir geothermal hot spring area. The famous Geysir will be there as well as the geyser Strokkur who erupts every 8 – 10 minutes. It's very impressive to see, the steaming water goes up around 18 – 30 metres (60 – 100 feet). Efstidalur is a charming litlle farm we'll visit next. There you can taste an amazing ice cream, produced straight from the cows living there. It is close to Laugarvatn lake and that will be our second last stop. Laugarvatn is a small town with 200 habitants, but what is interesting to see is the geothermal area the town is built on. Perhaps we will visit a geothermal bakery, where rye bread is dug only few centimeters out of the earth. Now we will be closing the circle with a visit to Thingvellir National Park. Thingvellir holds a great historical importance and the landscape is breathtaking. For instance the American and Eurasian tectonic plates meet here and the oldest parliamentary site in the world, Althingi, was formed at Thingvellir in 930 AD. The area has been designated UNESCO world heritage site. After this it is time to head back home to Reykjavik city, where we will arrive probably somewhere around 6 o'clock.
If the Northern Lights don't show up on your tour you can contact our sales team: info@extremeiceland.is and we will book you on the Magical Auroras tour, free of charge. Please remember to mention your booking number in the email.


For salad and more, you go to Salad and More! In other words, SEM. Biological salads, fresh juices, coffee and sugar-free cakes. Also to go!
The good thing about this salad bar is that everything is nice and healthy. You can therefore enjoy all the delicious food whilst feeling guilt-free! This means that you leave with a good feeling. The interior is sweet, with beautiful furniture and lamps. There is even a record player to play good music. It is definitely 'salad and more'.
Is it your birthday soon? Come to Amersfoort in the week of your birthday! If you show your valid ID, then you will receive nice presents from different shops, cafes and more in the centre of Amersfoort!
At Sla en Meer, you will get a free cup of coffee or tea.


text:
Why are so many Filipino healthcare workers dying?
5th June 2020 9th June 2020 Nicole De La Cruz
18,584 people working in the NHS are of Filipino heritage. They make up 1.8% of the 1.5 million strong work force- the third largest ethnic group following White British and Indian. The latest estimates place the death toll of NHS workers at 190, with Filipinos making up 13% of all COVID-19 related deaths in the UK.
Beyond numbers, Kuya Carlos is the 24th Filipino healthcare worker to die.
In Tagalog- one of the two official languages of the Philippines, the other being English- "Kuya" is used to denote respect. Its closest translation in English is "uncle", however it means so much more. The term is used to recognise, and pay respect to, someone who is older than you. Through their contributions to the community, these individuals become family members and given the title "Kuya", regardless of their actual familial relation. So it is right to use it here, "Kuya" reflects Carlos' 'gentle and respectful nature, his generosity of spirit'. It shows the respect we must pay for those who died.
This veneration of our NHS workers is justified. These are the workers who worked tirelessly, even before a global pandemic took hold.
Yet, despite the clapping and the pledges for more PPE, the question as to why so many Filipino healthcare workers are dying remains unanswered.
Speaking to Anita, a Filipina healthcare assistant who has worked for the NHS for the last ten years, she explained why Filipinas make such good nurses.
"Our behaviour, out attitude, the way in which we look after our parents. It shows we are caring and have empathy".
"We also have a healthcare system that is based on the American system. We idolise America".
In her book, Empire of Care: Nursing and Migration in Filipino American History, Professor Catherine Ceniza Choy points out that the willingness to leave the Philippines is an overhang of US colonialism. After the Philippine-American war, the Philippines became an American colony. Under the pretence of civility, Uncle Sam set out to "modernise", establishing a system of schools and hospitals, with nurses trained to American standards. Even today, school pupils at all levels are taught in English.
Though Filipino independence was declared in 1946, the American influence remained strong. The "civilising project" fostered idealism, a replica of the vaunted American Dream on a global-scale, promising home ownership and financial success. In the 1970s, under the dictatorship of President Marcos, emigration became institutionalised with the creation of state agencies, catering primarily to nurses who, having been trained to American standards, proved popular with overseas recruitment agencies.
Nursing is the largest exported profession for those who have already qualified in the Philippines. The Commission on Filipinos Overseas reports that 27.5% of migrants between 2007 and 2017 were nurses. The vast majority emigrate to the US, where there are approximately 4 million individuals of Filipino heritage.
The UK, by comparison, receives far fewer Filipino emigrants, though the number of Filipino workers is growing. Between 2007 and 2017, the number of Filipinos that migrated to the UK grew by close to 9,000.
Yet, despite the attainment levels of Filipino emigrants entering host nations, many do not immediately become nurses. In the UK, rigorous rules are enforced to maintain high standards of care across the NHS. In order to work as a nurse or midwife, individuals who are trained outside of the European Economic Area must pass a two-stage qualification process. This includes a computer-based multiple-choice exam (accessible globally), followed by the OSCE, a practical clinical examination that is only available in the UK. These exams must be completed within 8 months of applying for a UK Visa.
During this time, nurse applicants must also prove their proficiency in the English language. The most popular method is completing the International English Language Testing System Exam, or IELTS. Though this test is available globally, it is expensive. The cost varies according to region, in Metro Manila for example, the cost for the standard IELTS test is PHP 11,300- around £180. This equates to nearly 10% of the average yearly wage for nurses in the Philippines. Though the test may be completed in the UK, it is more expensive and must be completed alongside their already-long working hours.
These exams are crucial.
Without them, it is not possible to progress beyond the lowest paid bands, which for healthcare assistants and domestic team leaders, is capped at £19,337 after six years' experience. These structural barriers partially explain why so few Black, Asian and other ethnic minority groups make up the highest paid bands.
Anita is a qualified midwife in the Philippines, and like many of her Filipino colleagues, is fluent in multiple languages. When I asked Anita if she felt as though she was overqualified for her role, she answered plainly, without hesitation.
'Yes, definitely'.
This has impacts beyond money. It also accounts for why so many Filipino workers come into contact with COVID-19. Lower band roles tend to be more general, what Priti Patel deems "low-skilled". Yet the role is broad and demands a number of skills, including taking blood and offering invaluable care and reassurance. This abundance of skills means that nurses, as well as lower-band workers are transferrable, capable of working across a number of different wards, including those recently set aside for COVID-19. The nature of the work puts them in closer proximity to those with COVID-19, as opposed to the higher-paid, managerial roles typically dominated by their White British colleagues.
The reasons as to why so many Filipino healthcare workers are dying are structural.
Filipinos are one of a number of groups disproportionately affected by COVID-19. It is not the 'Great Equaliser'; instead, it reveals the structural failures that have existed for decades. Recently, the government released a report investigating why Black, Asian and other ethnic minority groups are more likely to die than their white counterparts. However, as Matt Hancock admitted in the House of Commons, it does not account for occupation, underlying health conditions or obesity- all of which cannot be divorced from income and racial disparities.
The adulation, the war-time rhetoric, these are mere tokens if they do not amount to action. Effecting real change to address these issues will be the best way to honour those who have died. We say Kuya to pay respect, the government must endeavour to do the same.
Photo Credit : U.S. Air Force/Senior Master Sgt. J.C. Woodring
Tagged FilipinaNHSnurses
Working through the boredom: Essays from lockdown
Second-Year Biology Students Given Option to Extend Degrees


text:
WTTC warns South African economy could see losses of ZAR 181 million
September 9, 2021, 12:00 pm By By : Tourism News live comments
According to research conducted by the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC), the South African economy could face massive losses of more than ZAR 181 million every week it's on the UK's 'red list' for travel.
The comprehensive study conducted by WTTC, reveals the staggering consequences the UK 'red list' represents to the South African Travel & Tourism sector, and the nation's economy, which have both been devastated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
All UK travellers, regardless of their vaccine status, travelling to countries on the 'red list', which includes South Africa, are required to cover the expensive cost of a 10-day hotel quarantine upon returning to the UK, plus the fees for COVID-19 tests.
The approach taken by other European countries such as Germany, France and Switzerland, where quarantine is no longer required for fully vaccinated citizens travelling to South Africa, can still slow the spread of COVID-19 while enabling mobility and providing a boost to the economy.
Based on 2019 UK visitor numbers and spending, the global tourism body's research shows these restrictions, which are deterring Brits from travelling to South Africa, could represent losses of over ZAR 790 million every month, equating to more than ZAR 26 million every single day.
Virginia Messina, Senior Vice President, said: "The impact the UK's traffic light system imposes on 'red list' countries is not only damaging the Travel & Tourism sector, but also economies around the world. Our data shows that every day South Africa remains on the UK's 'red list', the country faces losing millions of dollars, effectively delaying the global socio-economic recovery.
"Our data shows how vital the Travel & Tourism sector is to rebooting the country's economy.
"As a result of the pandemic bringing Travel & Tourism almost to a halt, hundreds of thousands of jobs have been lost across South Africa, pushing more people into poverty, which shows how crucial it is to restart safe international travel and reduce mobility restrictions.
"WTTC is calling on governments around the world to accelerate the rollout of vaccines as a catalyst to restart international travel and rescue the struggling global Travel & Tourism sector.
"Furthermore, we are also encouraging governments of 'red list' countries to work closely with their UK counterparts to ensure the very latest data is shared, so the country can be moved from the economically damaging red list, to the amber list as soon as possible."
In the UK, more than half of all adults have been fully vaccinated, which significantly reduces the risk of any citizens travelling abroad. Whilst the vaccine rollout has picked up pace, the figure is considerably lower in South Africa.
It is therefore critical for the South African government to continue ramping up the vaccination programme to restart international travel, and enable the economic recovery as a result.
According to WTTC's annual Economic Impact Report (EIR), in 2019 South Africa was among the most popular destinations for UK travellers, accounting for 7% of international visitor spending, representing ZAR 9.4 billion.
WTTC's report also shows the punishing impact the pandemic has had over the country's employment, with over 470,000 jobs lost due the lack of international travel.
The EIR also reveals the terrible effect COVID-19 had on South Africa's economy, with the Travel & Tourism sector's contribution to the national economy falling from ZAR 363 billion (6.9%) in 2019, to just ZAR 182 billion (3.7%) in 2020.
International visitor spending also plummeted by 66%, from more than ZAR 134 billion in 2019, to a mere ZAR 46 billion in 2020.
Kashmir valley in grip of freezing cold
The 'B2B' meet of leading tour operators in the…
7-day home quarantine mandatory for all…
WTTC and UKinbound praise the removal of…
Making Tourism Stronger and Ready for the Future
Impetus to Tourism Sector: Union Minister Hands Over…
Tagged with: outh African Travel & Tourism sectorred listWTTC


It is spring and the flowers are blooming in Arizona.
Do you recognize the plants? I believe they are smallseed sandmat, Chamaesyce polycarpa.
In any case, ants were all over them.
I could see the front of the ant's head was covered with pollen.
Two more workers, with equally yellow mandibles.
The Dorymyrmex workers were definitely visiting the flowers* (see below).
I also saw Pogonomyrmex californicus workers in the sandmat.
They weren't visiting the "flowers," though.
The Pogonomyrmex workers were searching under the plants. I saw a lot of gasters in the air. Perhaps they were searching for seeds? I also wondered if there were extrafloral nectaries under the leaves or on the stems that were attracting the ants.
Frankly, I wasn't that familiar with these little plants, so I wasn't sure where the nectaries were.
In any case, it seems like this plant would be a great one to add to an ant garden. I'm looking forward to learning more about it's life cycle and how ants interact with it.


Want help from a designer like North Chelsea Home?
My design journey over the years has taken me from a textile librarian, to designing the room settings and homes for IKEA, to creating funky rooms for children on HGTV.
A well designed space should reflect the people who live there, fitting their lives both beautifully and functionally. It should be timeless but also open to change and evolve, just as the people who live in the space change and evolve.
I embrace culture and eclectic ideas, which shows in my designs. My style is modern while keeping a hand on the door to the past, creating eclectic and beautifully coordinated designs for living.


Place raw cane sugar into mixing bowl and mill 15 sec Speed 10.
Add frozen berries and crush 20 sec Speed 8. Scrape down sides of mixing bowl with spatula.
Add whipping cream and blend 40 sec Speed 5 with aid of spatula, moving clockwise and anticlockwise. Transfer ice cream into a freezable container.
Place the ice cream in the freezer for an hour before serving.
Tip: For a smoother texture, freeze ice cream till it is firm and repeat step 2.
Variation: Freeze any fruits into small cubes to use in recipe.


text:
Звенигородка — річка в Україні у Звенигородському районі Черкаської області. Ліва притока річки Гнилого Тікичу (басейн Південного Бугу).

Опис
Довжина річки приблизно 10 км, найкоротша відстань між витоком і гирлом — 7,21 км, коефіцієнт звивистості річки — 1,39. Формується декількома струмками та загатами. На деяких ділянках річка пересихає.

Розташування
Бере початок на східній стороні від села Хлипнівка. Тече переважно на південний захід через село Гудзівку (Поповий Ріг) і в місті Звенигородка впадає в річку Гнилий Тікич, ліву притоку річки Тікичу.

Цікаві факти
 На річці існують водокачка, газгольдери та газові свердловини.

Примітки

Джерела

 Словник гідронімів України — К.: Наукова думка, 1979. — С. 210

Малі річки України
Річки Черкаської області
Річки Звенигородського району

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Yes, I find myself yet again, in another unique position of having both the Starhub MaxMobile service as well as the M1 Broadband service running from the same computer. Not at the same time of course, since the active connection can only come from either source. However, because my laptop has an internal SIM card slot and I have the M1 Broadband dongle as well, I save the trouble of having to replace SIM cards when I want to test either connection.
Prior to connecting my Starhub MaxMobile for the first time, I experience bad connection problems with my M1 Broadband. Not only was the connection slow, but the graphics seemed distorted as well. Initially, I thought I needed a new driver for the display, but in an unusual twist of events, I realised that it was a graphic degradation due to slow downstream speed. Of course, it's easy to push the blame to M1.
To me, 99.98% coverage means nothing to me if I am having problems getting a connection. To me, it was 0% coverage. Probability doesn't work here. It's not as if I am getting 99.98% uptime from my 0% coverage location. Don't you just hate statistics?
So, here's the golden question. Which is the better choice? To some people, it might be even a platinum question, but I digress.
One of the better ways to compare is to do a speed test – upload/download and ping from a particular site. On 29th April 2008 at 19:17, this test was done – but it seemed like a particularly bad day for testing because all the speeds were down – way down from being optimal. Perhaps it's the feng shui.
*The upload for Wireless@SG was not successfully completed on multiple tries.
There's a caveat to this test though. The M1 Broadband is subscribed under the lowest band, which is up to 1.8 Mpbs while Starhub's MaxMobile is under the 7.2 Mbps plan – since they only have a single plan. For a rare moment, Wireless@SG outperformed both mobile broadband services. Of course, I didn't mention about frequent dropping of connections.
However, it is also known that different areas have difference coverage. For me, the place where I spend 10 hours a day at has 0% coverage from M1 Broadband, and barely GPRS speed at home; while Starhub MaxMobile provided better coverage in the day and night for me. For me, it's quite a clear cut choice.
One thing's for sure. Ever since M1 went unlimited with their M1 Broadband, it was all down the drain.
Next: LTA did not say why it is raising ERP charges?


Parking Hair Babe Studio is located on the second floor within Sola Salon Studios in the heart of downtown Asheville. Overlooking historic Pack Square Park in a beautifully renovated 1920s building. Convenient & ample metered on street parking or covered parking garage (across from courthouse) just a half a block away.


text:
Zane Lovitt: Author of The Midnight Promise
Melbourne writer Zane Lovitt's first book is The Midnight Promise. Told over a collection of 10 crime mysteries, it is the story of private inquiry agent, John Dorn. It has already garnered critical praise and comparisons to Australian crime writer, Peter Temple.
Zane Lovitt was formerly a documentary filmmaker before turning his hand to crime fiction, and his short stories have appeared in Scribe's New Australian Stories 2 and in the Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. In 2010 he was awarded the SD Harvey Short Story Award for 'Leaving the Fountainhead'.
Click play to listen. Running time: 23.08
* Please note these transcripts have been edited for readability
Thank you for joining us, Zane.
First of all can you just tell us a bit about your book, The Midnight Promise?
Sure. Well, it's called The Midnight Promise. It's a collection of ten stories narrated by the central character, John Dorn. He's a private investigator working in Melbourne, in contemporary Melbourne. While each of the stories – they're meant to be discrete, self-contained stories, and they are – I don't mind calling them sort of hard-boiled crime stories, as much as one hates to just reach for labels. I think it's fair to call them that.
So, what's going on, as much as they are sort of self-contained stories, what's going on in the background of these stories, John's personal journey where he's having to come to terms not only with all the miserable stuff he gets exposed to in his day to day job, but also with his own sort of self-destructive methods of dealing with all of that miserable stuff, you know? He uses his humor as a crutch, and he uses his drinking as a crutch, but the thing about a crutch, of course, is that it's by definition not a permanent solution. And that dictates the direction he's going in and it is what comes to a head for him at the end of the book.
It's quite a unique way to tell a story of one character, essentially through ten short stories. What came first for you, John or those stories?
It definitely would have been John. I think I decided like ten years ago that I was going to write a crime book, and I was immediately confronted by the issue that I didn't know how to write a crime book. So, I had play with it. The method I sort of resolved to do was to alternate my time between developing a full length story, and that's really what I thought I was starting out by doing, like a regular novel. And, also spending time writing short stories, what were going to be very, very short stories, like a couple of pages each, just as exercises to sort of get my head around a character and get my head around the voice.
That's sort of what I started out doing. What basically started to happen was something that was very new to me, which is I really started to like what I was doing, I really started to like what I was writing. I'm sure there are writers listening to this who know what it's like to be more or less overwhelmed by self-loathing in response to the quality of work you produce.
My point is certainly now exception in all of the artistic pursuits that I was involved in. There was stuff that had merit, but nothing that I thought that was actually good, like ask people to pay to see it good.
So when I began to enjoy reading back on what I had written and what I found myself – when I found myself excited to get back to the stories, when I was rushing back to the desk to write more I was feeling surprised. And as those stories sort of grew longer, as I sort of unpacked them, the full length novel which I thought I had been writing wasn't really exciting me, it wasn't the reason I was rushing back to the desk. So I worked on that less and less until I eventually realized these shorter stories were going to be what the book was.
But, in answer to your question, it was only then when I sort of stepped back, and I really did have like seven or eight of these stories done when I realized that was going to be the book, it was only then that I was able to step back and see what was happening for John, and the direction he was moving in.
So it certainly began with the character. I was very interested in writing a hard-boiled, as it were again, private investigator-style story. The stories themselves really just began as exercises.
I guess it probably happened quite organically then. Once you had decided on this series of short stories how did you plan the book so that there was that common link throughout? So that you could tie it altogether as one book?
Well, like you say I mean it really was a very organic thing, there was no planning – there was no planning happening, which was good because the stories themselves are meticulously planned. I don't really put pen to paper until I know a huge amount of what's going to happen and I know entire dialogue interactions, and certainly how the story is going to result. So that part is very carefully planned. I know there are a lot of writers out there who don't really appreciate the idea of planning or sketching an outline, whatever term you want to use, but it was certainly what I was doing for the short stories. And, ironically enough there was nothing like that going on for the bigger picture, which makes that bigger picture, to me, sort of quite exciting… the thing that I find most exciting about the book, because everything else had been so carefully thought through, this sort of what you might call the foreground stories had been so carefully thought through. But, what was happening in the background was just sort of John's own thing.
You kind of had John in your head the whole time, but where did the inspiration for these stories come from, because I know the first story particularly – I love that. It was so clever, and I wonder where they came from. Are these from real life happenings?
None of the stories are from real life, but certainly – I mean I was doing a law degree when I was writing the book mostly, and there was a lot of real life stuff that sort of sneaked in. I mean that first story you refer to, you may remember there's sort of a little anecdote that John tells about Jim, who's a bloke who falls asleep in a park, that's a real story. That's actually a real case that really took place in terms of what happened to that poor guy when the police came along and picked him up.
There's some real-ish kind of stuff that happens in the background like that throughout the book, but the stories themselves – that's just my imagination to a large extent.
And it's me trying to reach for it. It's a lot of similar kind of stuff to what Sherlock Holmes traditional stories were, you know the short stories, or Continental Op stories by Dashiell Hammett, perfectly self-contained little private detective stories, basically. That's what I was reaching for.
Before you were writing you were a documentary film maker, is that right?
So what inspired you to move from that to writing?
The writing has always been the thing that I wanted to do, I can say that without doubt, as far back as I can remember. But, for about ten years I thought that the means by which I would deliver the stories that I created to an audience would be by cinema. And as much as I did do a lot of work in non-fiction film, I was also really interested in the fictional stuff as well. But, what eventually had to happen, about five years ago, is I had to accept that I don't really have the right personality to be a filmmaker, to be someone who leads a film crew. I came to realize there are people who are writers, and there are people who are leaders, and those groups very rarely overlap because you're fundamentally different kinds of people. Writers are fair more voyeuristic, they prefer to sort of step back from the action and watch it unfold and then just kind of judge it. Often they only want to be sort of as much involved in any given scenario as a system will provide them with some kind of insight into that scenario or system, but they don't really want any responsibility. Leaders on the other hand have to focus not on what's happening around them in order to analyze it the way a writer would, they sort of focus on themselves. They want responsibility as a way of focusing attention on themselves. Leaders are people who really do consider themselves to be at the centre of their universe. As much as that sounds pretty narcissistic, it's absolutely necessary if they want to be confident enough to inspire people to follow them. That's what a film director absolutely has to be. That's how you get a film crew to work for you for 24 hour stints and for ten years at a time. It's how actors are made to feel safe enough to open up their vein, which they feel they have to do.
There are very few directors, I think it's fair to say, and this includes sort of the great auteur, there are very few directors who are also writers, who sort of started out with just a black page and wrote their own screenplays. Many of them were part of a writing team, or adapted their material from a play or from a book, but they hardly ever really started from scratch and wrote and directed their own stuff. There are exceptions to that. But the reason for that is because they're not just different skill sets, they're just different personalities. They really do require totally different personalities, in my opinion.
When I sort of came to the terms with the fact my personality was that of the writer, I was suddenly free to focus on that. Now with my first book coming out, I'm very happy that's what I did.
Yes. Was there anything in film-making that has helped your writing? Anything about that creative process that's similar, or helpful in any way?
Absolutely. Mostly I'd say it's kind of the innovation and story structure that films can demonstrate. You would have noticed that a lot of the stories in my book are not told chronologically, and the order things happened causally and not the order in which they are presented to the reader, and that's something in which I find endless entertaining as a reader, or as an audience member. I really do consider playing with time to be an end unto itself. I don't think you need a formal reason to do it. I wish more books did that. I love reading stories and watching movies that sort of make me work. One of the best ways to do that is by messing with the chronological structure, and that's something that movies and TV, I think, are willing to do more than prose fiction. I mean certainly, again, there are exceptions.
But people talk about how there are less and less readers of books these days, and people are often claiming that this going to some kind of – not ignorance – not only ignorance, but kind of a general dumbing down of the audience, of a laziness of audiences, where they prefer to flop in front of a movie screen, or TV screen, or computer screen to have a story told to them. My feeling is exactly the opposite. Audiences are accustom to very complex tricks and very complex methods of story telling, largely unaccountable, the movies of all things. And, I don't think books are really kind of keeping up. People want to be made to work. They want to be given two dots and a pen and join the dots themselves rather than being spoon-fed information. It seems to me writers of books – they need to do more than just create quirky characters, and list all of their favourite adjectives, and rely on cliché, which I think happens reasonably often. They really need to get the reader to work, really from the very first sentence. I think that's something movies do more than books. I certainly try to do it in this book. I feel like that largely comes from watching too many movies.
I was going to ask actually if you watch a lot of movies.
Yes. I think it's fair to say that I do. I think there would be no end to the hyperbole that you'd hear from my wife you were to ask her if was into the movies. She would highly agree with that.
So are you also a long-time fan of Sherlock Holmes?
I am. They're still stories that I reach for. Just the other day I was thinking about, there was a story, I think it's in the first – I've got three collections of short stories, and the first one is called The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. I think it's in there, it's called "The Red Headed League." I was thinking about that the other day, I was thinking, "That could be the closest thing I can think of to a perfect story." There are plenty of other candidates, but that one is just a beautifully put together very simple, but wonderfully eloquent unfolding of a classic Sherlock Holmes set-up, which is that there's a paradox that he gets presented with, and it turns out that the bad guys were kind of brilliant in what they were trying to do, but they just didn't count on coming against someone even more brilliant and he sort of resolves it at the end.
It's something that I still find myself reaching for. It's one of the reasons why I think I was interested in writing short stories, because I like to sit up in bed at night and read a short story before I go to sleep. The potential to get a beginning, and a middle, and an end all in one sitting is still very attractive. And I don't think there are too many more satisfying reads than a Sherlock Holmes story, because of that classic Sherlock Holmes structure of paradox development resolution, you know? I still find that very attractive.
Yeah. It's tough to do that successfully, with fewer words. Have you ever found it hard to get the story that's in your head into the shorter form?
Yes, and those stories are in the book. I mean some of the stories are like 15,000 words long. There are others which turned into 20,000 words, and they had to go.
Maybe one of the reasons they had to go was they didn't quite cut it, but also when you're writing a book that you eventually realize, "OK, this is going to be a collection of short stories, even if we want to call it a novel," which I dare say I do, it is going to be a collection of stories and you can't just chuck in a bunch of novellas, or very, very long short stories. So, yeah, some of them got out of hand in terms of word length.
But the challenge of trying to get a reasonably complicated, or at least reasonably complicated characters and their interactions out in a very small amount time, I mean there is a story in this book called "Comedy is Dead," in which it's just a conversation between two people. I mean that's pretty much it. There's a little bit at the end, but it's pretty much just a conversation, but that conversation in all of – I think it's only about 4,000 words long, really needs to produce a whole world around the two characters, one of whom, of course, is John and the other one is the guy he's talking to.
But, the challenge that is sort of the reason why I want to do it. It's finding a way to just glimpse something, in this case an interaction between two people, and it's sort of from that glimpse the world in which they live, and all of their back story and the reason why there's so much tension in what they're doing within that moment, that's certainly the challenge, but it's also the reason why I think I want to do, and the reason why I wrote it, because that challenge is the fun type.
Yes. So, are you working on anything at the moment?
I certainly am.
Long form or short story still?
I think it's time to try to write something that more than a few thousand words long. It's definitely going to be crime fiction, but I'm pretty sure that's the only kind of stuff that I'm ever going to want to write.
More than that I can't really go into, not because I'm being to precious about, I honestly don't know. It's all sort of stuff that's sort of swirling around in my head at the moment, but I'm definitely going to be trying to write something that you're more inclined to call a novel.
So, at the moment you've still got it swirling around your head. Once you get to the writing stage do you have some sort of routine that you stick to when you're writing?
I do, it's sort of all influx at the moment, because I'm working full time, but I wrote most of The Midnight Promise, when I was starting I could generally kind of dictate my own hours, in a sense. But, it's always the first thing I do when I wake up.
I could certainly say that. And pretty much without exception it's been the very first thing that I've done every single day for about six years now. I also sort of try to squeeze in a second session later in the day, if I can.
But, look, the fundamental part of my routine would have to be caffeine. It's a very, very close friend, and I would marry coffee, if it were legal. It wakes me up, and writing earlier in the morning is a wonderful time to do it, because you don't have that added guilt of having to be at work, or running an errand, or calling somebody on the phone. And, usually our neighborhood is quiet enough for me to get something done.
The coffee shop is open nice and early as well?
A lot of this book was written in coffee shops.
I've moved on from that. That's not the routine that I've got anymore, but certainly there was a time when three or four places, I suppose, right throughout the northern suburbs would be, would see me walking through the door first thing in the morning, sitting down with my laptop.
I don't do that anymore. I get too distracted when I'm sitting in a café.
Of course. Just one final question for you. Do you have any advice for new writers?
Yeah. I find it a really interesting question, actually. I read about Paul Auster driving, he was interviewed for something or other. And Paul Auster was asked exactly that same question, "What's your advice for new writers?" His response was, "Don't do it, get a real job. Because if you commit to a life of writing fiction, then you're committing to a life of frustration, poverty, and loneliness."
And those are three, I think reasonably appropriate words for it, in a sense. It's a very lonely pursuit, as opposed to other art forms. There's not a lot of money for it, even if you are reasonably successful. And, of course, there's a lot of frustration and rejection that comes along with it. I'm not at the point of suggesting that is good advice to new writers. Thankfully, it's too early for me to reach that level of cynicism. But I find it kind of mind blowing that someone like Paul Auster, he's extremely successful, you know Underworld is dedicated to him. He's like the definitive New York intellectual.
And here he is miserably saying, "I made a mistake. If I could do it all over again I wouldn't." It's kind of disturbing.
Yeah, it's always easy to say that from that position of power, though.
It's like when you've made you can sit there and say, "Yeah, I don't know how I feel about this anymore." But, look, the only thing that I'd say – the best lesson that I think I could impart is simply to play the long game. It took me five years to write this book, and that was five years of never once thinking, "OK, now it's ready to send to a publisher," or, "I'll send a publisher this draft and see what they think." I really did work on it every day for five years without showing it to anybody really, until eventually my girlfriend, now my wife, needled me into showing her some of the stuff I was writing, but that resolved to get it as good as I could get it before actually presenting it to the world, I think it's the reason why I got published. If I had sent it to text two years ago, or three years ago, I may have had a decent enough draft, but I'm not sure if a decent enough draft is really good enough these days, publishers being sent as many manuscripts as they generally are.
I think the advice I'd give is not just the obvious stuff, you know, like learn to deal with rejection because that's what is coming down the pipe, I think sort of learn to be patient and get the thing to as good a level as you can, because if you don't and you get a knock back you might find yourself never completing it. You'll find yourself never redrafting it, because you lose your confidence. That's as much as I can offer, I think.
It was very good advice. Thank you for taking the time to talk to me today.
You're very, very welcome.
Posted on May 5, 2013 1:49 am
Ep 276 Meet Amie Kaufman, international bestselling author of YA and middle-grade fiction.
Ep 303 Meet Sarfraz Manzoor, author of 'Greetings From Bury Park', now a hit movie.
Ep 268 Crime writing for the young adult market and meet children's author R.A. Spratt.
Ep 245 When to hire an editor. And meet Paul French, author of 'City of Devils'.
Ep 249 Iceland Writers Retreat; and meet Dianne Blacklock, author of 'Jack and Kate'.
Ep 220 Behind the scenes of 'The Woman Who Fooled the World: Belle Gibson's Cancer Con' by…
Ep 255 How to rock an author reading. And meet John Purcell, author of 'The Girl on the Page'.
Ep 229 Get into a writing habit. And meet Danielle Clode, author of 'The Wasp and The Orchid'.


Appearances can be debatable as most of the big things come in small package. Never has this been truer than in the case of Aprilia Scarabeo. Watch this lean machine rule the road and find out on your own.
It might not have that intimidating appearance, but Scarabeo is pinning its hope on this Aprilia Scarabeo to find its lost glory once again. The retro look of Aprilia is sure to increase the swag.
Only 200 pounds in weight, it offers excellent weight-to-power ratio. Don't read this boring text about its technicalities, just watch the video on what you can do with Aprilia Scarabeo.


In the notes for the CD of her violin concerto Exultet composer Edith Canat de Chizy explains that "The idea of 'sound matter' is very important to me. I started to compose after having been involved in exploring acoustic materials. I first came into contact with this matter at the [Paris] Conservatoire with Ivo Malec. So the starting point of composition for me was when I began to work a block of matter. I start with the raw material. I sculpt it and it slowly takes form".
Classical music and acoustics are inseparable and there are also close links between music and architecture: Iannis Xenakis worked with Le Corbusier and John Cage worked with Ernő Goldfinger, Wagner specified a sound diffuser at Bayreuth to achieve the perfect remix for his operas, while Bruckner built cathedrals of sound as monuments to his "beloved God". However the sonic architect par excellence was Bach, as a concert yesterday by the Academy of Ancient Music and Richard Egarr illustrated so graphically. Musically the concert was guaranteed to be auspicious: the AAM under Egarr are one of the best early music bands around, and you cannot go far wrong with Bach's four Orchestral Suites. However the venue was hardly auspicious, a new municipal multi-purpose auditorium in Bury St Edmunds, a provincial town in the English home counties with no tradition of classical music. But when Richard Egarr told the audience in Bury last night that "you have a gem of an auditorium here" he was dead right. And he is putting his money where his mouth is by staying at the Apex - seen above - this week with the AAM to record the Orchestral Suites for Harmonia Mundi.
Built in 2010 at a cost of £18.5m on the site of Bury's former cattle market, the Apex is part of a major redevelopment to revitalise the town centre. Hopkins Architects designed the 500 seater hall and in an inspired move the town council retained top consultants Threshold Acoustics to voice their new auditorium. Chicago based Threshold Acoustics has worked on venues including LSO St Luke's and the Barbican in London, and the Verizon Hall in Philadelphia, while the pitched wooden roof of the Apex seen above contributes to the signature bloom of the sound and has resonances – in more ways than one – of nearby Snape Maltings. As if sonic excellence was not enough, the auditorium seating rests on floating air-bearing wagons that allow the hall configuration to be changed with power-assistance – watch the video here. In a reversal of current trends for multi-purpose venues, the American white oak faced and carpet-free auditorium is voiced in favour of unamplified music, a decision which prompted limited post-build fine tuning to the unusually live sound.
Classical music's new orthodoxy preaches that acoustically excellence venues such as the Apex must be sacrificed on the altar of populism. Which is spinach: acoustics are part of the complex DNA of classical music which nobody fully understands – least of all those preaching the new orthodoxy - and we tinker with it at our peril. It is a pity that those who are telling classical music how to reinvent itself were not in Bury St Edmunds last night. Richard Egarr has declared that his mission is to bring the spontaneity and subjectivity back into early music; his direction is flamboyant and the Academy of Ancient Music musicians – brass and winds play standing – moved in the Bach in more ways than one. The Apex, with its light airy public spaces and views across the town centre is not at all forbidding - see photo below. Spontaneous dress code on and off stage was smart-casual and there were many young faces in the audience – the front two rows were taken up by a diverse college party. Early music on a wet February Sunday night in the provinces is not the easiest sell, but the Apex was almost full. And, most importantly, the music and the sound rocked - job done.
Also on Facebook and Twitter. My ticket for the Acaemy of Ancient Music concert was bought at the Apex box office. Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s).
A lot of good news in this post. I especially like, "brass and winds play standing". On a whole different plane, my little group did some Dixieland jazz this past weekend, and I played the banjo standing - bopping along with the rhythms - and got a lot of people moving/dancing with us.
Part of what can make classical music seem like "other" to me is players acting and looking like automotons instead of human beings. That makes performances seem more like rituals of the past than something fresh and in the now.


1928: Taking the perfect photograph can be murder . . .
Indomitable sleuth Kate Shackleton is taking a well-deserved break from her detective work and indulging in her other passion: photography. When her local Photographic Society proposes an outing, Kate jumps at the chance to visit Haworth and Stanbury, in the heart of Brontë country, the setting for Wuthering Heights.
Armed with her wit and wiles, and of course her trusty camera, it's up to Kate to crack the case, and get that perfect shot too . . .
The Headingley Photographic Society decides on an outing to Haworth to celebrate the opening of the Brontë museum. This museum is vital to all literary fans. Indeed the Bronte sisters have been well known in the area for many years as their father was the local priest.
Sisters Emily, Anne and Charlotte are the most famous literary sisters in history having written Wuthering Heights, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and Jane Eyre to name but three.
The Brontë parsonage was indeed opened in August, 2018 to the public on the present site. The first Museum opened in 1895 above the Yorkshire Penny Bank on Haworth Main Street. The Bronte Society which had been set up to continue and preserve the family legacy began to purchase items at auction, which were either owned or had something to do with the Brontes.
In 1928, Haworth Parsonage was put up for sale for around £3000, by Sir James Roberts, a Haworth-born wool merchant and lifetime member of the Brontë Society member. He gave the deeds to the Brontë Society and history was born.
Haworth where the family lived and wrote their novels, where they set their novels is evoked in the novel as is the village of Stanbury and Ponden Mill where the characters stay. This is Bronte Country.
A novel set at the time of the opening of the Bronte museum? The characters from a local photography society who want to see it, and take pictures of the area made famous in the Bronte novels? Well that was me sold.
The setting and era is the star of the show as everything takes place fully immersed in this literary landscape. The Bronte parsonage opens its doors and we see the excitement of what that meant at the time, what a big deal it was.
And now to the murder case of course! – why should seven photographers end up at in Bronte country, only to find that six return? It's a good mystery from the start and even though I guessed the reveal, it's more about the journey in the characters and of course Kate Shackleton our famous detective, getting there. A bit like Columbo in many respects and I loved it all the more for that.
What with the interest in the photography group, the wild moors directly from Wuthering Heights and the historical intrigue from the start, this is a fine mystery with a particularly apt title.
There's a whole cast of characters to enjoy and hearing their POVs added to Kate's voice and narration. They're always so colorful in Frances' books and I can always picture them in my mind.
A jaunt around the Bronte countryside, looking at Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall brought the opening of the Bronte parsonage to life. It makes you realise how important this place is not just for readers but historians and also for photographers.
A snapshot of murder has many tones, shades and mysteries making up the big picture.


text:
Q: Javafx WebEngine read secured cookies i need to read and write, secured and unsecured cookies from the JavaFx WebEngine.
I lost the whole day on this problem and tried the following ways:

*

*Get the cookies from the cookie store -> here I only get cookies without the secured flag. For more information about that I have this issue: Setting a cookie using JavaFX's WebEngine/WebView

*

*Try to get the cookies over a self written cookie store -> same issue

*Try to get the cookies with javascript -> restricted through security restrictions

*Try to get the cookies from the WebEngine dom -> no result
I hope someone can help me...

A: Okay,
if everybody have the same Issue, here is the solution:
The function get(URI) from the cookie store is broken and delivers only cookies where the secure flag is false.
This is not working:
for(URI uri : manager.getCookieStore().getURIs()) {
    for(HttpCookie httpCookie : manager.getCookieStore().get(uri)) {
        System.out.println("test> " + uri.toASCIIString() + " # " + httpCookie.toString() + " - "+httpCookie.getSecure());
    }
}

This is working:
for(HttpCookie httpCookie : manager.getCookieStore().get(uri)) {
    System.out.println("test> " + " # " + httpCookie.toString() + " - "+httpCookie.getSecure());
}

If you need the URI for a specific cookie, you have to create it from the HttpCookie.getDomain() getter.


text:
Dou Miao, död 172, var en kinesisk kejsarinna, gift med kejsar Han Huandi. Hon var Kinas regent från 168 till 172 som förmyndare för kejsar Han Lingdi. Hon var den femte kvinna som styrt Kina som regent, efter Liang Na.

Hon regerade med assistans av sin far Dou och konfucianen Chen, och lyckades effektivt slå ned Qiangs uppror. Hon blev dock år 168 utsatt för en palatskupp av hoveunuckerna, som dödade hennes rådgivare, tillfångatog den lille kejsaren och placerade henne i husarrest. Hon kvarblev i husarrest, även om hon på papperet behåll ställningen som regent mandatperioden ut.

Referenser

Kvinnor
Födda okänt år
Avlidna 172
WP:Projekt Kina
Personer i Kina under 100-talet
Kvinnliga regenter under 100-talet
Kinesiska kejsarinnor
Kinas regenter


text:
Michał Paszkowski herbu Zadora (ur. 1618, zm. 1670), duchowny greckokatolicki, od 1666 tytularny greckokatolicki arcybiskup smoleński, archimandryta ławryszewski.

Życiorys
W latach 1633–1635 studiował w Kolegium jezuitów w Braniewie, następnie w papieskim kolegium w Wilnie (listopad 1635-sierpień 1637). W 1666 mianowany tytularnym greckokatolickim arcybiskupem smoleńskim a 3 sierpnia 1668 dodatkowo także archimandrytą kobryńskim.

Przypisy

Bibliografia
 Ks. Kazimierz Dola, "Katalog arcybiskupów i biskupów rezydencjalnych eparchii polskich obrządku grecko-unickiego od Unii Brzeskiej (1596) do roku 1945", [w:] "Historia Kościoła w Polsce" t. II 1764-1945, cz. 2 1918-1945, Poznań-Warszawa 1979, s. 310.

Arcybiskupi smoleńscy obrządku greckokatolickiego
Michał Paszkowski
Szlachta greckokatolicka w Polsce
Urodzeni w 1618
Zmarli w 1670