"In poverty, too, as in all other misfortunes, people think friends to be their only refuge….
David McKnight at the Durham Farmer's Market, Sept. 2014.
David encountered many challenges in the years between being voted Most Likely to Succeed in high school and ending up living on the streets in Durham. All along the way, however, were friends who both were drawn to David because of his gifts and who he was, and who also nurtured those gifts and David. As a result, sometimes, together they brought about amazing events.
A heads-up: this is a long post, but it all seemed essential to the final installment on friendship and David. Read it as you wish. I suggest a glass of your favorite beverage and finding a little time. Or just listen to the music, watch the videos, look at the pictures and browse around.
Between 2009 and 2016, several things happened that substantially improved David's life. In 2009, he began playing his violin each Saturday at the Durham Farmer's Market. The $100 he could make in tips became his main source of income and provided him more predictability about his resources after two decades of playing on the street. And the exposure to people who otherwise might never have heard or seen him brought joy to many, as witnessed by the mother and child with David above.
And then, about 2013, a few years after David began playing at the Farmer's Market, something remarkable happened. David accepted a long-standing invitation to share with a young man a two-bedroom side of a duplex only a couple of blocks from 9th Street and near the bus lines. David had held off accepting that invitation for a long while, but he turned 65 that year, and the results of aging, the lack of sleep, and his weight were taking a toll on him. The duplex was a god-send. It eliminated living on the street and thus ended David's mind-boggling 20-year-long daily routine.
In 2014, yet another good thing happened, thanks to friends who helped David to apply and qualify for Social Security benefits.
This seemed an insoluble problem until Sybil had an idea.
"Well, yes," David responded with a quizzical smile.
Amazingly, David laughed, and signed.
From the album "Changin' My Mind," by Cleaver Smith Swenson & McKnight. Composed by David McKnight and John Wenberg. David McKnight – Guitar, Fiddle, Piano; Bill Cleaver – Guitar; David Spencer – Mandolin, Electric Guitar; Joe Swenson – Bass; Robert Smith – Harmonica; Bill Erchul – Pedal Steel Guitar; Time Rae – Percussion.
As if to cap off this good news, in 2016 David attended the 50th reunion in Charlotte of our Garinger High Class of '66 in Charlotte. In the months leading up to our high school reunion in May of 2016, Sybil and I wrote David regularly, urging him to attend. He was very enthusiastic about the prospect, and he remembered our classmates far better than I did. Bill Yaeger offered to David to take him to the Durham train station to buy tickets and to take him to buy a new pair of slacks and a shirt, which David had identified as items he needed for the reunion. All looked good. But at the last minute David became nervous and emailed Bill, saying that something had come up and he could not go with Bill to the train station. Nor to the store. I wrote David, and after a few days finally he wrote back with the time of the arrival of his train in Charlotte. We had no idea whether he would actually show up. My lifelong friend Ike Casey went with me to the Charlotte station, and when the passengers came through the tunnel to disembark, there was David at the end of the line, with a big smile, a bag, and the folding chair he carried with him everywhere for when he needed to take a rest break from walking.
We stopped off at the Elizabeth Creamery and sat in the pleasantly warm sun on the quiet side street, enjoying a double-scoop waffle cone in the beautiful spring day. "This is the life," he said with a smile. I heartily agreed. In fact, it was a wonderful day and weekend for me, too. The re-connecting with David and my other high school friends, and re-connecting David with them, was so very meaningful for me. And David now had a regular gig at the Farmer's Market, an apartment, social security benefits, and a host of high school friends to add to his friends in Durham. This is the life.
It seemed like the next day, but a few months later, it became obvious that something was wrong with David. His friends in Durham noticed that David had started forgetting words and had even more trouble walking. One day in November Bill Yaeger receive a call from David asking for help — the first time he'd ever asked Bill for help. Calling from the Duke library, David said, "I can't move my body." When Bill came to pick him up, David refused to go see a doctor. So Bill took him home, where he seemed somewhat better. The duplex was a mess: simply nothing was ever thrown away, and newpaper were piled up everywhere. Bill brought food to David for several days.
But that follow-up visit never happened, for soon there was a time when no one saw David for days. Bill Yaeger was the first one to get to David's duplex. He could tell David was in the bedroom, lying on the floor, with his considerable girth blocking the door. Bill was able to get the door open, and found David and the room in terrible condition. In addition to the usual newspapers and junk piled everywhere, David had lost control of his bowels and the room was putrid. When the ambulance and the EMS workers arrived, David protested that they had no right to take him from his home. Eventually they were able to get David into a chair and carried him in that chair to the ambulance.
Bill rode in the ambulance with David to try to keep him as calm as possible. One of the EMS workers recognized David as the street musician and treated David as a celebrity, which improved David's mood. Another stranger showing compassion and understanding for David. At the Duke hospital, the doctors put David on an anti-psychotic drug, one of the rare times in his life he took medicine for his mental challenges.
Friends and family rallied around him, getting him into a good extended care facility only two miles from where David had played the violin on 9th Street all those years. He had visitors every day, including high school classmates Nancy Gaillard and Sybil Huskey, who came from miles away and stayed in town for days to be with David. Former band member Joe Swenson flew in from California. Carson, her daughters Meg and Lorrin and their families, Pete, and other family came to spend time with David. Even a policeman who knew David came and serenaded David with his guitar. Lorrin and Pete worked with the doctors and nursing home to get David the best treatment. Pete drove from Roanoke, Virginia, to Durham, and back again the same day to Roanoke, a two and one-half hour drive each way. Friend Bill Pope visited frequently, and Bill Yaeger spent time with David almost every day.
It's heart-breaking for friends and family to have such conversations with someone who is ill and in an institution. There was some solace for Carson: when family took David to Elmo's Diner on his last birthday to have dinner with some of his friends, he announced to the table his deep appreciation of his sister and her importance to him.
His many friends in Durham decided to pull together an event to honor David, to play his music and to let him know he was loved. The event was set for Sunday, January 15 at the Blue Note Grill in Durham.
Musician friends Rebecca Newton and Pattie LeSueur posted an invite on the Blue Note's website: "Pattie LeSueur and I want to have a few hours of great music for him, and Bill and Andrea graciously gave us The Blue Note Grill on Jan 15th. This may well be the last time David gets out to hear live music. We hope MANY folks will be involved in this tribute to him.
When Sunday came, over 200 of David's friends showed up to celebrate David. The three-hour event was live-streamed to David's room in the long-term care facility in hopes that he would be able to watch. The friendship, love and joy that poured forth that night were inspiring. Pattie LeSueur called out the love of the group to David, and then she and Jack LeSueur played a song they had sung with David when the three of them formed the group "Triangle" back in the 1970s.
Pattie and Jack Le Sueur, accompanied by Mike Foster. Written by Carlene Carter . Video by Bill Erwin of CelebrationVideos.com.
Another song featured that night was David's "Mecklenburg Waltz." David at one point said he was going to write a waltz for every one of North Carolina's 100 counties. If this one is any indication, I sure wish we'd had the other 99. Here is David playing the violin on the waltz, in 2011.
Everyone there found it such a moving and meaningful event.
As has been the case for me with other before, I knew David was going to die soon, but I still felt shocked.
Words fail about moments like these. In his life David said so much with his music, and in death he left us a song he'd authored and recorded in memory of the death of his own father, "Last Call." It's exactly the right song for those of us who knew and loved David.
David McKnight, Piano, Violin, Viola; Bill Cleaver; Joe Swenson Bass. Written by David McKnight.
Last call, with its definitive ending. But his friends were not ready to let David go.
After the shock of David's death wore off, the discussion began of a memorial to David, with lots of ideas. Ultimately it was decided that a bench would be placed at the edge of the Durham Farmer's Market, right where David played his music. Brother Pete worked tirelessly to make the idea a reality. He was instrumental in raising the money for the bench and getting it designed and fabricated and to Durham. The tribute concert for David raised over $2,000. Pete and Bill Yaeger and others went to the Farmer's Market to ask people to tell their stories about David and to seek funds for the bench. Family and friends gave gifts, and the City of Durham cooperated to make the memorial a reality. Many people came to honor and give thanks for David.
After David's death, stories about him – tributes really – ran in Indy Week, The Charlotte Observer, The Durham Herald, and Duke Magazine. Reading the latter tribute I realized a mistake I'd made in my first post. David did go back and graduate from Duke, in 1974. I don't think he ever told me that.
I have one more story to tell, about the day after Christmas, 2016. The last time I saw David was that morning. David was sitting on the bed side talking with his friend Bill Yaeger, and his face lit up when I came in. He knew who I was, but he had trouble calling out my name. "I was just telling Bill about the election results in two nearby counties where Hillary had such a big victory. And I was saying that if the Democrats had just been able to…." The thought that had started out clearly became impossible to follow. The cancer was doing its horrible work on his brain.
I sat in my car and cried.
Later that same day after Christmas, David's friend and long-time musical partner Bruce Emery (together they created three CD's) came to visit David. Here is Bruce's story.
David McKnight, mandolin, and Bruce Emery, guitar.
Recorded at PruittHealth – Durham, December 26, 2016.
In my previous post I questioned whether David's friendships met Aristotle's idea of a complete friendship, given David's character flaws. I concluded that in asking for perfect virtue/excellence for those in a complete friendship, Aristotle has gone beyond what observation shows, and he has set too high a standard. None of us are perfect in our traits. For example, me. When David voiced ideas about moving back to Charlotte, I did not explore that further with him, not being willing to imagine what it would be like for me if David were living here. His last email to me, on November 4, 2016, focused on his ideas about moving back to Charlotte. I never encouraged him in that idea. Nor did I travel enough to Durham to visit him.
And it was difficult to be friends on a daily basis with David. His paranoia, his refusal to accept medical help, his fierce and sometimes seemingly irrational independence, his lack of personal hygiene, and other traits made it a challenge. David kept putting off applying for Social Security, yet it did not seem to occur to him that friends were supplementing his busking income so he could have food and shelter. As a house guest David paid little attention to cleanliness. He ate an enormous amount of food, understandable since he might not know when he'd have his next meal, but he was helpless about preparing meals or cleaning up afterwards.
When I look at friendships I've known and observed in my life, I feel an overwhelming admiration for both David and his friends. When I think of the type of thing a friendship is and what it can be, I am convinced that his were complete friendships. Who could imagine more than what David's friends gave to him, and what David gave to his friends? David was a friend to all those people and to me. He gave of himself joyfully, and people gave to him willingly. While certainly they must also have felt some sense of obligation, friends who visited him in the hospital wanted to be there with David and for David. Another statement from Aristotle rings true for me now: "friendship is not only necessary but also noble; for we praise those who love their friends, and it is thought to be a fine thing to have many friends; and again we think it is the same people that are good people and are friends." I am inspired by those many good friends of David, by their and David's nobility. They are indeed friends and good people.
You could give David the name of any city or town in North Carolina, and David could tell you the corresponding country.
I began these three posts on friendship and David McKnight by asking whether his life was a tragedy. I wasn't with David daily like his friends and family. I didn't know the daily heartbreak of dealing with his mental challenges. I did know the young and beautiful David, and I saw his world come tumbling down, bit by bit. When I think of what might have been for David, without his mental issues, without the cancer, his life is tragic.
But when I think of all the lives that David touched for the better, of the over 200 friends and musicians who turned out for a benefit and tribute to him near the end of his life, of all the people he enjoyed and knew were his friends, of the joy he brought to his friends, when I think of the beautiful music he played and recorded all these years, even when homeless, I think not just of tragedy but of overcoming, of triumph, of transcendence, of redemption, of a small world of people brought together by music, stories, laughter and friendship.
And I think of someone who in many ways lived life on his own terms, despite his limitations. We all live lives within our limitations; most of ours just aren't as readily visible as David's.
David, you were not only gifted, but you gave us irreplaceable gifts. Thanks for it all, David. I still miss you. We all do.
Some say David isn't totally gone. Some say he is back in Texas again, or somewhere else, thinking about coming back to Carolina. Listen to his voice and his violin here, and you will know that his spirit lives in his music.
There are several options: YouTube, I-Tunes, Amazon music, and CD's. For the online sources, search for "Cleaver Smith Swenson" to pull up both the earlier album "Back Home Again" and also the later album when the group had become Cleaver Smith Swenson & McKnight, "Changin' My Mind." I will list below specific songs by David. You can also order these CD's from Robert Smith, robertdsmith@mindspring.com . Bruce Emery and David McKnight have 3 CD's, of which the first is Christmas music and others familiar tunes: "All is Calm, All is Bright"; "Night and Day"; and "Windy and Warm." You can order from Bruce, bruceemery@mindspring.com. I recommend all five of these albums.
Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics, Book 8, chapter 1, W.D. Ross translation (The Internet Classics Archive, http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/nicomachaen.html ), with minor changes by Frederick.
 Bill Pope, unpublished memories about David McKnight, 2017. Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics, Book 8, chapter 1, translated and notes by C.D.C. Reeve (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 2014. Durham Herald-Sun, Jan. 21, 2017.
 Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics, Book 8, chapter 1, Ross translation.
Wow ! What a wonderful tribute compiled by a great friend to David and to many of us!
Thanks so much, Cynthia! And thanks for your friendship over these many years.
Well told. I too feel like I should have done more along the way and I will continue to think of and miss David. I often mention David when I talk with Bill Pope. "What would David say about this?", etc.
Thanks for your comment, Robert. And thanks so much for all your help which helped me know more about David's story. I like knowing that you still talk with Bill Pope about David. You and Swenson and Cleaver made some simply wonderful music with David, and I know how very much that must have meant to him.
Norris, your tribute to David and to friendship was beautiful and honest and It touched my heart in so many ways. The description of the feelings you had that you "never encouraged him" in his idea about moving back to Charlotte and you had not traveled "enough" to Durham to visit him brought out similar regrets I had after his death.
Our high school class was so large that there were many people I never got to know outside the classroom. David was one of those classmates. At the reunion I found myself engaged with him in a wonderful conversation where I found him to be witty and charming and so obviously intelligent. I was totally unaware of the hard life he had lived for so much of his adult life. Soon after the Reunion, I was one of the recipients of the email you mention that he had sent out to some classmates thanking us for the "refreshment and healing" he felt having been in our collective "enchanting and rejuvenating company once again". I remember reading his email and thinking that if he did move back to Charlotte it would be nice to forge a new friendship with him. When I saw the emails and Facebook posts about his terminal brain cancer and his rapid decline and death, I felt regret that I had not done more to be one of David's close friends you described, particularly in his last few months. After reading your tribute to him, I realize even more how much I lost by not doing more to get to know him.
Kris Kristofferson in his song Me and Bobby McGee wrote "Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose" and if that is true, David might have lived with more freedom than any of his friends. While that might help soothe some of the sadness of his life and death, it does not ease the pangs of regret that comes with lost opportunities. May we all make an extra effort to be a friend when we feel those urges to do so.
Rebecca, I am so glad that my writing on David touched your heart. He touched mine, too, so much so that it took me getting a year away from his death before I could write this.
Your writing is beautiful and thought-provoking. I loved hearing that at the reunion you found yourself "in a wonderful conversation where I found him to be witty and charming and so obviously intelligent." And it's wonderful that you had no idea about his hard life — he wanted so much for his classmates not to judge him for that.
And thanks for summing up the lesson for many of us — to make extra efforts for our friends.
Thanks so much for your insightful email about this post, Hope. I really like your "I laughed" and "I cried" sentence, as it mirrored much of what I thought about my time with David. I'm glad to know you liked this series the best, and of those that your favorite was the most recent post.
I like the line you quoted. too: I was thinking of the issue of freedom and determinism off and on while writing this piece, and that line is related, of course.
Reading Norris's last episode about David, these were my thoughts.
I was touched by the exploration of both poverty and friendship. Here was a man who was steeped in poverty and the mental illness that force many people into poverty, yet is surrounded by friends who enjoy his company. Where does that put him in life, society, evolution, philosophical endeavors? It puts me more in touch with myself – my True Self.
The music is who David really is. Is it who we all are, maybe we just have not found it. I remember what a talented musician David was and how much it meant to him. Where does Music fit into our search for True Self and Happiness? Just listen to David's licks on the pieces here and you will understand David.
It was a pleasure to read this and remember all the old friends that David and I shared, some whom we have since lost, Nancy Gilliard is the biggest loss to me in the group mentioned here. We will all be going away in the next few years. That is life. Norris is the best friend a man or woman could have. His writing will keep David and David's music alive for years to come. Thanks to a great friend. Let's all stay close and keep David in our memories. Norris will be the touchstone.
Your insightful comments mean a great deal to me, and they have provoked all sorts of thoughts in my mind about our true self,music, and all of our old friends, whom as you mention some we have lost. For me, too, Nancy is the biggest loss of those friends. I will disagree with you on only one thing: YOU are the greatest friend anyone could have.
What an amazing and heartbreaking story. So much talent and it feels as if the world was cheated out of the young man that took Garinger by storm. But the gifts that he left and the people that he touched and loved are a legacy we could all strive to obtain. Norris, you have beautifully captured David's life and have rendered a tribute which touches all who read it. You have kept David alive.


Who Can Value Liberal Arts?
Students invariably choose garbage hauler.
This is part of the discussion of why students see absolutely no value to the college education but that of getting a credential needed to find a job. It's a class thing. You need to be of a certain social class (and I mean social, not economic. You can be poor as a church mouse) to value liberal arts education because it expands your horizons and offers you access to the most beautiful achievements of humanity.
This is to say that the many folks who see a college degree as nothing but a gateway to a job are just as right as those few who see it as a chance to experience the pleasure of learning. They come at it from different realities, and each approach makes sense in their particular reality.
If your colleague is asking about jobs to see who values a liberal arts education "because it expands your horizons and offers you access to the most beautiful achievements of humanity", asking people to choose between a garbage hauler or a doctor is a poor way to see it.
If you're asking about salary, of course people are going to think in terms of cost-benefit to themselves. A garbage hauler doesn't need to go into debt and has a 40 hour a week job. Nobody is calling a garbage hauler into work for emergency garbage hauling. A lot of garbage haulers are unionized.
Here's an article on the drop in the percentage and absolute number of humanities majors (which doesn't include STEM).
The example about the garbage haulers is evidence of the class difference I'm talking about. I'd never consider a garbage hauler job even if it paid a million dollars. And not surprisingly, I went to college in search of truth and beauty. It never occurred to me to think about a paycheck at the end of the road as a guiding principle in choosing a major, for instance. Even though I was an immigrant and lived in the kind of poverty my classmates couldn't imagine.
In order to understand all this chatter about how reading Proust makes you a better human being that we keep offering students, you need to come from a very particular background. To me, a life spent not reading Vargas Llosa is a life not worth living. But we can't teach students from this position because it's very alien to them.
And still, cashiers and garbage haulers don't consume a lot of high culture. So it's not all about having time.


Bentley's Grill Wine Steward Mark Jacklich shares his wine stories, recommendations and tips in his blog series: Wine Notes with Mark. Enjoy!
As a wine steward living in the middle of the most renowned wine regions in the world, exploring our local vineyards is a big priority for myself and other team members at Bentley's Grill. It's important to me that we learn as much as we can about the wines we serve: from their soil and the vines to their microclimate and the vintner's techniques.
Once a month we set aside a Sunday to get together and visit a local winery to gain knowledge about our area and the different stages of the grapes and the wine making process.
Last month, we made a trip out to Cristom Vineyards. I was informed that this was a "Hiking Tour" which made me excited because I'm all about getting out there in the fields and getting a sense of the land in which the wine comes from.
Cristom Vineyards produces mostly Pinot Noir, along with Pinot Gris, Viognier, and Syrah. They were also recently name the #1 Restaurant Pinot Noir by Wine and Spirits magazine.
The Marjorie Vineyard is the oldest and the original plantings from 1982.
The Louise Vineyard is at its lowest elevations (300feet) and was planted on Missoula flood sediments called Helvetia, a very deep, moderately drained silt loam that formed over clay. As the Louise vineyard elevation rises towards its 445-foot peak, the soil changes to volcanic.
The Eileen vineyard is 540-705ft in elevation so we had a bit of an up hill trek. Once we were on top of the vineyard, the views were spectacular. It really made up for the physical effort exerted.
The Jessie Vineyard is the steepest on Cristom's property. This was the last spot on our hike and when we got there we knew why. Jessie is on a very steep slope, we imagined during harvest having to stake yourself down, because with one slip you could end up down the hill. It is the vineyard with the greatest elevation change and most diverse soils.
After we made it down, we tasted the wine produced from the very vines we just walked through. While tasting through various vintages and single vineyards we were able to identify wines that we liked personally while the tasting room manager, Jeri, provided us with some key information that explains what makes Cristom Vineyards unique.
She mentioned they have had the same vineyard manager and winemaker for 20yrs+. I explained to our staff how this is important because having been there for those years together they get a real sense of the microclimate and growing season so they can fine tune the wine making based on the hand Mother Nature deals. This translates into top-notch wines and will for years to come!
Ask us about our local wineries, like Cristom Vineyards, next time you come in! We invite you to join us for wine tastings every second and fourth Wednesday when we feature a local winery from 5 p.m.-6 p.m. Also, be sure to ask your server about our Wine Flights and "A bottle among friends" every Thursday! This is another great way to try new wines for a discounted price- comes with a complimentary appetizer!


text:
Owners of Distressed Buildings in Lagos State Risk Forfeiture
Written by Adekoya on March 18, 2019
Owners of distress building that have been marked for demolition risk forfeiting the property to government if they fail to pull them down by themselves.
In a statement the Commissioner for
Physical Planning and Urban Development, Prince Rotimi Ogunleye said government would take over such structures if it pulled them down.
The statement says that the state government will not hesitate to invoke Section Seventy four of the Regional Planning and Development Law.
The law provides that property owner or developer could forfeit the property of buildings that collapsed as a result of negligence on their part.
It appealed for the co-operation of members of the public to rid the State of distressed structures.
Prince Ogunleye said that the state government had already demolished forty of the one hundred and forty nine distressed
and defective buildings in different parts of the State.
He said that thirty eight buildings have been slated for demolishon in the second phase.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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"...the niched features pre-date the use of the tomb for the burial of Khentkawes."
"It can only be concluded, therefore, that the niched-facade had weathered considerably before the Old Kingdom masonry was added."
On a related note, recall that the RCD studies which suggest an earlier provenance (by only a few centuries) used only surface samples of mortar and not deep samples, a scenario that invites new carbon to contaminate the dating to produce what still could be an artifactually more recent than actual provenance.
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 24-Dec-16 18:37 by Origyptian.


When the College Football Playoff title is decided at Levi's Stadium in neighboring Santa Clara, the off-field activities will center in the Bay Area's largest city, which is more used to high tech conferences.
Carlos Carrerira beamed with pride last Wednesday evening as he started to introduce his daughter before the assembled throng of media and San Jose officials gathered at his family's Adega restaurant for a celebratory dinner.
Ready to sample some of the best San Jose restaurants virtually? During a recent escape to San Jose and the greater San Jose area, we had our fair share of delicious "eats" thanks to the Team San Jose folks and some of their partners.


Home Photos and Negatives Symbol of Nazi "kulture"
Title Symbol of Nazi "kulture"
Summary A victim of the Gardelegen Massacre, a man's charred body.
Notes "GERMANY -- This charred body was once a man. He was among the 150 Russian, French, Polish and Jewish political prisoners of the Nazis who were burned to death by SS troops in a large barn on the outskirts of Gardelegen. Nazis lured their victims into death house with promises of food. Instead they were given a lethal spray of gasoline topped with the touch of a torch. Atrocity was exposed when U.S. 9th Army troops captured the area before Nazis had time to remove evidence. Victim shown in photo seems to have been trying to rise and escape from his horrible, inevitable death."; "RADIOTELEPHOTO... RADIOTELEPHOTO"; "RW 757506... NEW YORK BUREAU"; "BU #1 SPEC MX SJ 70 CAN (RM)"; "CREDIT LINE (ARMY RADIOTELEPHOTO FROM ACME) 4-21-45"
LC Subject Headings United States. Army. Armored Division, 9th.
Gardelegen Massacre, Gardelegen, Germany, 1945.
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Maine is fortunate to have a rich variety of molluscan or bivalve shellfish in its coastal waters.
Soft shell clams live in mud, sand and gravel intertidal areas. It takes about three to four years for a clam to grow to legal size, which is two inches. Harvest season is year round, peak is May through October. Soft shelled clams are regulated by the state DMR and most coastal towns. Many towns require recreational licenses. Recreational limit is 1 peck per person daily. No state license is required for recreational harvest.
The blue mussel is a common native bivalve mollusks that lives from the intertidal zone to depths of several hundred feet, and is found frequently clinging to the rocky shoreline. Mussels can be harvested all year. Mussels are regulated by DMR. The personal use limit for recreational harvest of mussels is 2 bushel per person daily.
Hard clams are found in the sand and mud habitats of the intertidal and sheltered subtidal. They are referred to by different names depending on their size. In the order of largest to smaller, these clams are called: Quahogs (Chowderhogs), Cherrystones, Topnecks, Littlenecks, and Countnecks. Hard clams are regulated by DMR and a few coastal towns. Many towns require recreational licenses. No state license for recreational harvest. The recreational harvest limit is 1 peck per person daily.
Surf clams are very large and fast growing clams which can grow to 8 inches or more, and weigh over a pound. They live burrowed into the sand beneath the turbulent waves of the surf breaker zone. Surf clams are regulated by DMR and some coastal towns. Many towns require a recreational harvest license, no state license for recreational harvest. The recreational harvest limit is 3 bushels per person daily, unless a municipal ordinance further restricts the limit.
The American or Eastern oyster is native to the east coast of North America. They have two rough, whitish, irregular shells. They naturally grow on oyster reefs but most of Maine's American oysters are now from aquaculture lease sites. American oysters are regulated by DMR and a few coastal towns. Many towns require a recreational license. In the Damariscotta River, there is a Vibrio Control Plan in place that restricts recreational harvest from May 1st to October 1st each year.
European Oysters are characterized by their rounder, flatter shell. European oysters were first grown by aquaculturists in Maine, but established wild populations. European oysters are regulated by DMR and a few coastal towns. Many towns require recreational licenses. In the Damariscotta River, there is a Vibrio Control Plan in place that restricts recreational harvest from May 1st to October 1st each year. There is a seasonal closure statewide from June 15th to September 15th every year. Minimum harvest size is 3 inches. Recreational harvest is limited to 1 peck.
Brittle, bivalve clams most commonly found from Canada to New England and are distinguished by their long thin shells. Razor clams are primarily found in shallow subtidal flats close to the shoreline. Harvested Razor Clams generally range in length between 4-6 inches. Razor clams are regulated by DMR and a few coastal towns. Many towns require recreational licenses. The minimum size for harvest is 4 inches.
Mahogany quahogs are small hard shell clams that are harvested from Maine's subtidal waters. Mahogany quahogs are typically harvested at about 1 � - 2 � inch shell length. Legal size is one inch thickness measured across the hinge width. Mahogany quahogs are fish for by draggers and regulated by DMR and the National Marine Fisheries Service. The personal use limit for Mahogany Quahogs is 3 bushels per person daily.
The common periwinkle is the most common intertidal snail. Common Periwinkles grow to 1 � inches in length. Minimum size is determined by a numerical count. If a one quart sample contains more than 220 periwinkles they are considered undersize. The personal use limit is two quarts per day without a license.
Moon snails are a large species of snail gray to tan in color that can grow to 4 inches in shell length. These snails are found subtidally but can also be found along beaches.
Waved whelks are medium sized with both axial and spiral ridges on their shell. Adult waved whelks are two to four inches in length and are found subtidally. Legal size is 2 � inches shell length. The personal use limit is up to � bushel of whelks per day without a license.
Stimpson's whelks have a spindle-shaped shell that is dark in color. Adults are 1 to 3 inches in length. They are found subtidally to deep water.


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U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Health Law & Managed Care
Utilities & Transport
Hitachi Automotive Systems Americas Settles EEOC Disability Discrimination Suit
Auto Parts Manufacturer Refused to Hire Employee Who Needed a Reasonable Accommodation, Federal Agency Charged
ATLANTA -- Hitachi Automotive Systems Americas, Inc., a global supplier of automotive parts located in Monroe, Ga., will pay $85,000 and provide other significant relief to settle a disability discrimination lawsuit filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the federal agency announced today. The EEOC charged that Hitachi unlawfully discriminated against an assembly operator when it refused to accommodate her disability and rescinded an offer of permanent employment.
According to the EEOC's lawsuit, Misti Huff King, an assembly operator at Hitachi's Monroe facility, had a medical condition that required her to take frequent restroom breaks. After receiving a positive evaluation and successfully completing her probationary period, Hitachi extended an offer of permanent employment to King. During the screening process, King requested a reasonable accommodation - that she be allowed to take additional restroom breaks beyond her lunch break and scheduled 15-minute break. Instead of granting King's request, Hitachi determined she was unable to perform the job and rescinded its permanent job offer.
Such conduct violates the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which prohibits employers from making employment decisions based on an individual's disability. The EEOC filed suit (EEOC v. Hitachi Automotive Systems Americas, Inc., Civil Action No. 1:19-cv-03887-MLB-JKL) in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, Atlanta Division.
In the consent decree settling the suit, Hitachi agreed to pay King $85,000 to compensate her. In addition to providing monetary relief, the decree requires Hitachi to adopt and implement a written ADA policy and a procedure for requesting reasonable accommodations under the ADA. The decree further requires the company to conduct employee training on disability discrimination, post equal employment opportunity notices, and provide periodic reports to the EEOC.
"The EEOC is committed to ending disability discrimination in Georgia and across the country," said Antonette Sewell, regional attorney for the EEOC's Atlanta District Office. "We are pleased that Hitachi agreed to resolve this lawsuit by compensating Ms. King and making the necessary changes to its policy that will assist applicants and employees who request needed accommodations."
Darrell E. Graham, district director of the Atlanta office, said, "The EEOC's mission to end discrimination in the workplace is served not only by Hitachi compensating Ms. King, but by the company's agreement to revise its policies and take steps to ensure future compliance with the ADA."
The Atlanta District Office of the EEOC oversees Georgia and parts of South Carolina.
https://www1.eeoc.gov/eeoc/newsroom/release/3-5-20.cfm
© Copyright U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity CommissionNational Law Review, Volume X, Number 68
UPDATE: Michigan's Paid Medical Leave and Minimum Wage Laws Remain Unchanged for...
Varnum LLP
CFTC Chair Confirms CFTC's Planned Involvement in Policing the U.S. Carbon...
Michigan Court Of Appeals Upholds 'Adopt And Amend,' No Sick Time Or Wage Changes...
Temporary Protected Status Extended for Haiti
Hart-Scott-Rodino Reporting Thresholds and Filing Fee Structure to Change...
Colorado AG Secures Latest Settlement over Unearned GAP Fees
CFPB Report: ID Theft Among Servicemembers Increasing
New Legal Settlement Should Provide Relief to H-4 and L-2 Dependents
Dinsmore & Shohl LLP
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is responsible for enforcing federal laws that make it illegal to discriminate against a job applicant or an employee because of the person's race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, age (40 or older), disability or genetic information. It is also illegal to discriminate against a person because the person complained about discrimination, filed a charge of discrimination, or participated in an employment discrimination investigation or lawsuit.
Most employers with at least 15 employees...
eeoc.gov


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4. Colosseum & Roman Forum: Ancient Rome - 3.5 hours
5. Roman Crypts and Catacombs Tour
at Roman Crypts and Catacombs Tour, Wed, 22 Jan 2020 - Wed, 30 Dec 2020
9. Colosseum & Roman Forum: Express Arena Tour - 90 min.
10. Frascati Wine Tasting & Lunch
St. Peters Basilica, Dome Climb and Vatacombs
When we say that the Dome of St. Peter's Basilica is the place to go for the best possible view of Rome, we're not exaggerating: per Roman law, no building in Rome can rise higher than the Dome! With this tour, you'll climb to the top of the Dome, then head down to explore the Basilica itself.
- See Rome from the best vantage point in the city
- Take a guided tour through St. Peter's Basilica, led by an art historian
- Enjoy the rare opportunity to visit the Papal Crypts
Get ready to see some of the high points of Roman culture—and to see Rome from its highest point! Not only does this tour give you a crash course in history and art—it also lets you see Rome from the Dome of St. Peter's basilica, the best vantage point there is!
You'll start off by meeting your guide—an art history expert—at St. Peter's Square. They'll lead you to the famous Dome, designed by Michelangelo. There are 551 steps to the top of the Dome, but your group will take the elevator part way and then climb the remaining stairs at a leisurely pace, with plenty of breaks. The breathtaking view from the top is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Get ready to whip out your camera!
Once you make your way down from the Dome, you'll head into St. Peter's Basilica, where your guide will fill you in on its unparalleled art and intriguing history. You'll also visit the rarely accessed Papal Crypts and the Vatacombs.
Your e-ticket will be emailed directly to you shortly after your booking is complete. Print it out and bring it to the tour.
Where is the meeting point?
Meet at St. Peter's Square.
Visits to the Basilica of St. Peter may not take place on Wednesdays. In addition, the Basilica is closed to visitors during the liturgical celebrations of the Holy Father, events of the Holy See, and events of the Vatican City State. If the Basilica can't be visited, the guided tour will be carried out only in the Vatican Museums (for about three hours). In this case the ticket purchased will not be refundable.
Don't worry if you're not up for the trek to the top of the Dome. Anyone who feels unable to climb to the top is welcome to remain at the terrace level (where the elevator stops) while those who wish to climb all the way up can do so.
Tips (optional).
Hotel pickup and drop-off.
Largo del Colonnato 1 00193 Rome Italy


text:
Current: Willimantic Center
Willimantic Center of Willimantic, CT
Willimantic, CT 06226 USA
Take 1-84 East to I-384. Take 384 to the end. The highway will fork. Stay right following Route 6 towards Willimantic. Follow Route 6 to the intersection of Route 6 and Route 66. This will be a long stretch of road! Just before the 6/66 intersection, look for Columbia Ford and Motta's Bakery on your right. At the light turn left onto Rte. 6 East. Route 6 becomes a divided highway. Take the first Exit, (Willimantic/Route 32) and at the end turn right onto West Main Street. Go approximately ½ mile through 3 traffic lights. The health center is on the right. It is a long building with an orange roof. It is across from the DMV and Papa's Roast Beef. Turn into the driveway and drive around the back of the building.
Take I-95 N to I-395 N and get off at Exit 81 West (Hartford/Route 2/Route 32). This will put you on Route 2 for a very short time. Take Exit 25 (Route 32 North/Willimantic). At the end of the Exit, take a right . Follow Route 32 approximately 12 miles to Willimantic. Once in Willimantic, go straight through stop light ("Frog Bridge" will be on your right) until you get to 4-way stop signs. Turn right at stop sign (still Route 32). Follow road to the right and over the railroad tracks. At next light, turn left onto Main Street. Follow Main Street less than 1 mile to a fork in the road (Stop and Shop will be on the right). Stay right. The health center is about ¼ mile on the left, just past Capitol Garage. The building has a long orange roof. It is across from DMV and Papa's Roast Beef. Turn into the driveway and drive around to the back.
* Free parking in own lot.


text:
Final Fantasy Forums »
What the hell is wrong with SquareEnix?
Author Topic: What the hell is wrong with SquareEnix? (Read 26289 times)
StickySock
Crazy poster
Re: What the hell is wrong with SquareEnix?
« Reply #50 on: 2014-03-05 17:51:46 »
FFX was a very linear game in the sense that the story shuttled you along from area to area, without leaving a huge amount to explore. The reason why it wasn't a problem is because there are still a lot of extras to do in the games, and secrets to uncover. The story and writing were also great, save for two or three generally unlikeable characters.
People point at 13's flaws of being linear as just the map design. Sure, the map design is laughably linear with no places to go, but that wasn't the only problem. What people (and designers obviously) overlook is the importance of having things to do or discover within whatever map you have. (EDIT: That's the reason why FF13-2 and Lightning Returns still have a weird feeling of linearity, even though the maps are significantly bigger. There needs to be things to do and they need to be interesting). P4G has maps that are as linear as you can get but if "feels" less linear because the areas are jam packed with things to do and secrets to uncover. Not to mention the writing in P4G is absolutely stellar, and makes those secrets so interesting and addictive. 13 had absolutely nothing to uncover until the very end of the game, and when you finally had something else to do (side missions on pulse) it was as boring, bland, and poorly written as the rest of game.
What people are really missing in these games are secrets to uncover and non-essential side missions that are cleverly written or interesting in some way. Square seems to dump most of their money into graphics and QA (most of Square's games run flawlessly, which is admirable when compared to some other companies), but they don't realize that it's those little secrets which reward players for investing their time and attention into the world that makes players really appreciate it. TWEWY and KH are games that seem to understand that, and that's the biggest reason I still have some hope reserved for FF15, despite all the negativity generated from the 13 trilogy.
« Last Edit: 2014-03-05 17:55:22 by StickySock »
gjoerulv
Quote from: genesis063 on 2014-03-04 20:50:22
I believe X was far from Linear.
All FF's (not counting spinnoffs, MMOs and sequels) are linear. Both story and exploration wise. Some hide it more than others. (Even Gta is linear).
Concerning character growth, I think 8, 10 and 12 are the most non-linear. 10 kinda depends whether you choose simple or advanced spheregrid. Simple = linear character growth as busywork.
Reading through this topic I see some hidden assumptions on what a good game is...
What the hell is wrong eith squeeny? No passion. The top ups may have some passion for their work, but the staff is only doing their job.
Helladen
Fast newbie
Deviant Designer
Final Fantasy 15 is the key to reviving Final Fantasy. Turn-based battles are not that popular anymore, they are dead in a sense. Bravely Default kind of brings some new life to turn-based battles, but it needs more than that to come back to life.
Self proclaimed number 1 Sephiroth fanboy
Quote from: StickySock on 2014-03-05 17:51:46
Going off of this I guess it doesn't help that they are doing what five projects at a time?
Quote from: gjoerulv on 2014-03-05 19:38:58
I don't know about that. I would say the director and writers hold most of the blame, though I don't know how high up you would consider their status. The programmers and artists seem to have done an amazing job on all three 13 games. The flaws in the games are more fundamental than just lazy work by the team.
This is a classic case of wishing we knew how things work so we can give our concerns to the right people instead of dumping it all on Nomura. I love the designs on all their games as well. I just wish we could tell the people where it is lacking on how we like to see it fixed.
Covarr
Covarr-Let
Just Covarr. No "n".
Quote from: Helladen on 2014-03-05 20:25:34
Bravely Default kind of brings some new life to turn-based battles, but it needs more than that to come back to life.
South Park: The Stick of Truth has surprisingly deep turn-based battles, at least from what I've played so far. In particular, I like the "bleeding" mechanic, which is like poison but stackable, and the ability for enemies to swap their weakness on-the-fly by changing stances adds a fair bit of depth also (though not a lot because you can have a melee weapon and a ranged weapon equipped at the same time).
I think the reason turn-based battles aren't popular these days is largely because studios don't have the confidence to try. When I look at recent games with turn-based combat, I see very few games coming out (Bravely Default, Fire Emblem), but those I do see seem to be getting good reviews. I think if more studios would just release these games, they would do well.
LeonhartGR
~Whatever...~ Marriage defeated by Ultimecia (mil)
The stick of truth is a surprise refreshment for todays standards! I like it as well and wish to play it sometime!
« Last Edit: 2014-03-06 20:24:08 by LeonhartGR »
Yes the graphics are amazing.
Lack of passion =/= lazy. It's a lack of passion in general amongst the whole team.
Mass Effect 3 had the same problem.
Oh, Stick of truth. Can't wait to play it!
SilverSpades
Love the FF games. Not the fanbase.
RPGs are not restricted to a specific kind of battle-style such as turn-based.
Stick of truth did what Square should have done with their battle system long ago before releasing the new FFs... And they could still keep their awesome graphics in the game.
DLPB
The ascension of the ordinary man
Quote from: Silver_Spades on 2014-03-09 03:34:25
No they're not. But when you replace a system with another, you should make it work just as well, if not better. The systems in FF12 13 and beyond are inferior to 7s. 1- 10 had tactics... the implementation of their battle system could hve been better, but the actual systems are far more intelligent and have a much greater potential.
Having mindless slashing and numbers flying all over with no idea what is going on is lazy design.
« Last Edit: 2014-03-09 21:36:34 by DLPB »
Quote from: DLPB on 2014-03-09 13:35:17
...numbers flying all over with no idea what is going on...
Haha... that sounded so like from the mouth of an old folk (like us though)
I completely agree. There are some very good action RPGs out there. But through fourteen years of turn-based Final Fantasy games, putting that name on it DID imply turn-based. They had a concept, and with each iteration they evolved and expanded upon it... until FFXI, where they began a new trend of making each new entry completely different. Making games with different combat styles is fine, but it was never in keeping with what Final Fantasy was.
cmh175
Quote from: LeonhartGR on 2014-03-09 13:32:30
Agreed I was actually impressed with how they did that. Not only that but that they're releasing patches and updates taking care of gameplay issues before worrying about DLC content. Very refreshing with developers like WB Montreal no longer supporting glitches in Arkham Origins and now only focusing on dlc. Who the hell is buying dlc content for a broken game that's likely to never be fixed?
Off subject, but yeah FF and Square have been gradually adapting to western game styles more and more.
Erdrick The Hero
There are two sides to this question for me:
SIDE A: The side that has been talked about in this thread: Why did they ruin Final Fantasy?
My first FF game was Final Fantasy for the NES. Sure, the game's almost 10 years older than I am, but my mom kept her NES and all her games around, and now they sit in my bedroom. I grew up playing, besides Mario, SE's two major franchises: Dragon Quest (originally known in the States as Dragon Warrior) and Final Fantasy. Anyways, I went from FF1 to FF7, as at the time we didn't have a SNES. (We have one nowadays, but still don't have IV/VI for it... I've got them both on the PS1 though.) Of course, being like 5 years old when I started being able to read on my own, I never finished either of them because I was an impatient child. We've got every main FF game up to 12 in some form or another now, but I have yet to finish any of them, actually. I'm working on VII now though. But I've noticed that none of the games past IX, including spinoffs, (besides Itadaki Street which I was able to import - though I got that for the Dragon Quest side mainly) are any fun for me. Besides what has already been mentioned by others, I don't really have anything to add here.
SIDE B: Why won't Square Enix release more Dragon Quest games in the US (or other non-japanese countries)? I mean, seriously! I know this forum is for FF fans, but for those here who haven't played any Dragon Warrior or Dragon Quest game, you really should try one (or mulitple, or all of them) out. Dragon Quest has evolved throughout the years, yes, but it has managed to maintain storytelling and a classic JRPG feel throughout it's run. Even Dragon Quest X, which is an MMO, is fun - even fun enough to play in a language I don't understand. (Unfortunately, though I managed to play during the PC open beta, I cannot afford to pay the monthly fee to keep playing currently. And even if I had the money, I wouldn't be getting what I was paying for, you know, not being able to understand any of the story.) The only DQ game I feel (Beside X, because I can't judge it in japanese) that is lacking in story, is DQIX on the DS. It was disappointing, but I can chalk that up to being an experimental game - it was Dragon Quest's first foray into multiplayer. (Who thought that a multiplayer RPG on a handheld system would work? I guess it worked OK in japan due to the massive fanbase, but internationally I feel it was a bit of a flop.)
Also, I have to agree with Kalderasha about DQ8 being the best RPG on the PS2, but I really didn't like the "enhancements" made for the international release. Chalk that up to notalgia though. Oh, and load times.
« Last Edit: 2014-06-19 13:33:48 by Jaki »
Quote from: Jaki on 2014-03-11 06:24:59
What if the next FF is good? Should we ask what the hell is wrong with this thread?
No, that wouldn't change anything that has been said here. And the chances of the next one being good are almost 0.
North American FFX had simple Sphere Grid only.
Anyway, I absolutely loathed FFX. As I said, it was the game that made me stop buying games in the series near release date. I still rank Tidus one of the most obnoxious main characters ever written for a video game.
Tekkie.X
Formerly known as DragonNinja
Quote from: Dark Phoenix on 2014-03-12 02:36:11
I still rank Tidus one of the most obnoxious main characters ever written for a video game.
"This is my story, MY STORY, MY STORY"
fern off you annoying twunt, it's Yuna's story, you're just here for the ride 'cause yo daddy is a giant monster you floppy haired prick.
FFX would have been far more enjoyable if Tidus wasn't a worthless moron. It had a really good plot and the battle system was actually really good.
Him and Blitzball ruined that game. Pretty much the only reason I ever replay it is because of Auron.
Thanks guys! I thought I was one of the few who thought Mr. "meh... meh... meh... I'm a dream!" was an idiot...
Quote from: Shard on 2014-03-12 13:28:26
Am I the only one that sees him as ignorant? You have to understand he is brand new to that world. More or less it really was his story everything in the game was related to him. The Aeons chose him to end their sleep not Yuna. So imagine you are in Tidus's shoes in a new world of course you be excited and dumbfounded on countless occasions. He and Aaron actually had the most sense out of the bunch. Everyone else is all gun hoe about the whole sacrifice your guardian to become a new final Aeon. Tidus was the only one to question that it could be a bad idea and it was really fishy. I think people underestimate him and judge him to much. As for the father thing who doesn't have atleast some parent issues in your life at one point in time? On another note yes Aaron was pretty bad ass.
Of course it was "his story", he is the main protagonist that the player identifies with and guides. And when someone is telling a story from their own perspective, they don't say "let me tell you about my friend's story" . That's just nitpicking.
I also don't see his voice actor as any worse than what is normally in the games industry. I thought it was generally very solid for a game.
Nightmare799
Quote from: Tekkie.X on 2014-03-12 11:32:33
f*ck off you annoying twunt, it's Yuna's story, you're just here for the ride 'cause yo daddy is a giant monster you floppy haired prick.
Why so much hate? He was actually pretty pretty cool and likeable. I cant really remember him being ass to anyone ever.
People say he was a crybaby, but I would like to see anyone out of people who played this game being torn away from their world, friends, family etc. , and being thrown into different completely unknown world (or rather age) and being perfectly fine with all that.
Not only that, but the guys father was a drunkard that dissapeared when he was 10 years old (not to say Yecht was a bad person, as he deeply regretted what kind of father he was), and his mother died of anguish soon afterwards. After he finally finds his place in the zanarkand as player of zanarkand abes... *WHOOSH* Nice life you had there buddy, now it is gone.
That is a lot of bad stuff to happen to ONE person, so give the guy a break already.


We are a translation team that specializes in English and Spanish. We take on every project with a positive attitude, regardless of its size or complexity. Given that we follow the ISO-9001 requirements for our quality management system, we take pride in always delivering high-quality, on-time translations.


text:
IGF Student Showcase winners announced
By Tom Senior 2011-01-10T15:07:13.9Z
The Independent Games Festival Student Showcase winners have been chosen. Previous winners include Narbacular Drop, the creators of which went on to work on Portal. Another winner, Tag, created the paint mechanic that will be in Portal 2. This year the eight games represent the best of an extremely strong field of new and inventive indie entries. You'll find details of the games below, most of which are free to download and play.
In e7 (Gymnasium Koniz Lerbermatt) you play as an interstellar probe on an alien world. You have to find and deactivate a bomb that threatens Earth. To do this you have to manipulate the spongy surface of the planet, using it to catapult your probe around the minimalist landscapes while dodging the deadly beams of the alien flying saucers guarding the bomb.
Fract
Fract is a first person adventure game set in an environment reminiscent of Darwinia's polygonal worlds. The universe is full of bizarre machinery that must be reanimated to open up new areas of the world.
Glid
In GLiD you must guide your insectoid robot through a spooky ambient world, collecting fuel seeds to fix the broken machines that lie about the landscape.
Octodad
Octodad is about a married father of two who is also a secret Octopus. The aim of the game is to stay undercover, all the while breaking down towers and completing challenges using your boneless octo-arms.
A simple game about a paper plane , which you fly around the idyllic farmland environment, collecting childhood memories from the objects scattered around the landscape.
Solace has you fighting your way through the five stages of grief. Every explosion forms a musical note, turning the spectacular battles into an improvised symphony reflecting the theme of each level.
Tiny and Big
Tiny and Big is a small man with a neat weapon, a powerful laser that can slice up the environment. It's the perfect tool to help him complete his noble quest to reclaim his Grandfather's lost underpants.
Toys is a simple puzzle game controlled entirely by the movement of your mouse. Your task is to rearrange the coloured blocks into a set position to tidy them up and move on to the next challenge.
[via Gamesetwatch ]


Yarn: My own handspun — from ITW Yipes!Stripes!
I had spun the yarn thinking "socks", and then decided a 2-ply really wasn't going to be a sturdy enough yarn for socks. Brought the yarn with me on travel, and started thinking about hats (since I'd left mine behind and missed it).
This is largely "Ribbed for His Pleasure", a simple beanie pattern for a man's hat. I didn't do the ribbing throughout, because I wanted to see the yarn and its color evolutions in stockinette. I left 8 rib channels throughout, and started bringing in the other channels gradually (4 rows and then adding the next) to make a step process. When I had 4 rows of all-ribbing re-established, I started the crown. I did all of that with the thinner 2-ply I had made.


So what'll it be? D-SLR? Nope, too big and too clunky. Mirrorless? Hmm, not sure I really need interchangeable lenses. Compact then? Nah, those titchy sensors aren't so good in low light and, besides, I still want a real camera, not a toy. Ah, OK… how about a digital rangefinder camera then? Whaaat? Do you think I'm made of money? Good point.
If you've been having a debate along these lines, then Canon reckons it's created the camera to tick all those boxes. The new PowerShot series flagship is what you'd get if you dropped the EOS 800D, EOS M5 and PowerShot G5X into a blender and mixed thoroughly.
It looks very much like the mirrorless M5 – which mimics the styling of a D-SLR anyway – and has the same 'APS-C' size sensor and 'DiG!C 7' processor combo that's currently doing service in a number of Canon ILCs, including the M5, M6, 800D, 77D and 200D. It also has the excellent 'Dual Pixel CMOS AF' which delivers imager-based phase-difference detection measurements, plus an EOS-style menu design which contains familiar EOS-type functions such as the 'Picture Style' presets, and the 'Auto Lighting Optimiser' and 'Highlight Tone Priority' (HTP) processing. Like the M5, it has a high-resolution OLED-type EVF that is centrally located and a dial-based external control layout that is complemented by a touchscreen monitor.
Unlike the M5, it has a magnesium alloy bodyshell with weather sealing and, on the inside, sensor-based five-axis image stabilisation for shooting video clips and a 'Dual Sensing' system that also involves optical stabilisation to give up to four stops of correction for camera shake. The lens is a zoom equivalent to 24-72mm which is a handy focal range and, being fixed, it's matched optically to the sensor so there's no need to worry about in-camera corrections (or dust, for that matter). You'd think today's camera market already covered all possible configurations, but the PowerShot G1X Mark III is actually currently the only fixed-lens compact camera which combines an 'APS-C' sensor and a zoom (with the EVF and weather-sealed metal body making it even more of a unique brew).
Interestingly, Canon makes no reference to its mirrorless cameras in relation to the G1X III and instead prefers to see it as a compact rival to a D-SLR – "D-SLR performance in a compact body" is the tag line – but it's closer to being a fixed-lens EOS M5 than anything else. The target audience, says Canon, is "serious amateurs" and anybody looking for something to back up their D-SLR… with the emphasis again being on the combination of capabilities and compactness, but also the "D-SLR like shooting".
The dials for mode selection and exposure compensation are going to be familiar, but less so the arrangement of the front and rear control wheels and the multi-function control ring around the lens which are definitely more from the compact camera world. Setting the lens ring to act as the manual focusing collar will help restore some familiarity, but it can also be assigned to zooming (seamless or stepped), aperture setting, ISO setting, changing the aspect ratio, white balance correction (handy for on-the-fly adjustments), or for engaging the 'Auto Lighting Optimiser'.
The front and rear control wheels plus a small selection of buttons are multi-functional, but the scope for customisation isn't as extensive as offered by, for example, Panasonic on many of its Lumix models. As on the EOS M5, there's a customisable 'Quick Set' control screen which displays a series of function tiles down either side of the live view image. These can be navigated conventionally or selected via the G1X III's touchscreen which is very well implemented and extends to the menu system, status displays, replay and review functions, AF point selection and switching, and shutter release.
Commendably, you can use the touch screen for AF point selection while also using the EVF and even specify a particular area of the panel with a 'relative' or 'absolute' positioning of your fingertip. The monitor panel itself is adjustable for both tilt and swing while the display can be adjusted for brightness. There's the option of auto switching between the monitor and EVF, using a proximity sensor in the latter's eyepiece.
The camera's EVF looks to be the same 0.39-inch OLED panel as is used in the EOS M5 and which refreshes at 120 fps to minimise lag. It has a resolution of 2.36 megadots and 0.62x magnification which means it's a bit on the small side, but still quite comfortable to use.
Overall, the G1X III handles well and the ergonomics are good, but if you are a convert from a D-SLR, the power zoom's lever – which is located around the shutter release – can easily cause you to make accidental triggerings. It takes a delicate touch if you're not to also inadvertently depress the shutter release in the process of zooming.
As already noted, the sensor is the same 22.3x14.9 mm device Canon is using on a range of interchangeable lens bodies at present, and has a total pixel count of 25.8 million.
The effective pixel count is 24.2 million which gives a maximum image size of 6000x4000 pixels. There's a choice of four image sizes for JPEG capture with two levels of compression and crops for the 4:3, 16:9 and 1:1 aspect ratios. RAW images are captured in the maximum size only, but with 14-bit colour. The RAW+JPEG capture can be configured for any size JPEG.
An optical low-pass filter is retained to counter moiré effects, and the native sensitivity range is equivalent to ISO 100 to 25,600. The single memory card slot is for the SD format with support for UHS-I speed SDHC and SDXC types. Its compartment is in the camera's base and shared with the battery pack so it isn't easily accessible (if at all) when the G1X III is mounted on a tripod.
The eight 'Picture Style' presets include the Fine Detail mode and an Auto setting which is an adjunct of the camera's scene recognition capabilities. The adjustable picture parameters also include the newer tweaks for more control over sharpness and which are labelled Strength, Fineness and Threshold. There are also adjustments for colour saturation, hue and contrast, with the latter two replaced in the Monochrome preset with B&W contrast filters and a selection of toning effects. Additionally, up to three 'Picture Styles' can be user-defined and saved in-camera.
Canon reverts to PowerShot thinking with the G1X III's presentation of special effects which are packaged up with subject/scene modes and special shooting modes, giving 17 settings in all that are accessed via the 'SCN' position on the main mode dial. The subject/scene modes are Self-Portrait, Portrait, Smooth Skin, Star, Handheld Night Scene, Underwater and Fireworks. The special effects are Grainy B&W, Soft Focus, Fish-Eye, Art Bold, Water Painting, Toy Camera and Miniature. The special shooting modes are Panorama, Panning and HDR. Panoramas are created by panning, and the frames then stitched together in-camera. They can be either horizontal or vertical with a maximum image size of 24,064x2800 pixels or 16,000x4200 pixels respectively.
The panning mode – activated when the shutter button is depressed to the half-way position – determines a subject's speed and then sets the shutter speed needed to give a blurred background. The HDR mode captures three shots in quick succession, adjusting the exposure for each and then merging them in-camera to give an expanded dynamic range. There is no provision for setting the amount of exposure variation, but there's a choice of edge effects called Art Standard, Art Vivid, Art Bold and Art Embossed.
If you're one of the "serious amateurs" that Canon talks about then you're probably not going to want any of these gimmicks and it's just as well they're all in the one place where you don't ever need to go. The good news is that in terms of being in charge of your camera settings, the G1X III is indeed in the same league as a mid-range D-SLR or mirrorless camera.
As noted previously, the sensor has Canon's 'Dual Pixel CMOS AF' architecture which employs a pair of photodiodes at each pixel point. These are read separately for phase-detection autofocusing and together for imaging, giving a massive 80 percent coverage of the frame which is obviously particularly beneficial when shooting moving subjects. And the faster PDD measurements help with tracking too, as well as reducing response times.
The lens's minimum focusing distance is ten centimetres at 15mm and 30 centimetres at 45mm. Curiously, the macro mode doesn't go any closer, but simply restricts the longest distance to 50 centimetres which helps reduce focusing times.
Up to 49 focusing points – arranged in a 7x7 grid – are available for individual selection with the option of a 'Smooth Zone' mode which uses a cluster of nine points and automatically selects however many points are required by the subject matter. Additionally, the 'Smooth Zone' can be moved around the frame using touch-and-drag control (or the navigator keys) with the autofocusing performed at the same time (and, if preselected, automatic shutter release).
In the single-point mode, the focusing zone can be adjusted to one of two sizes, although even the biggest is still pretty small. Point selection can again be via the touchscreen or conventionally using the navigator wheel. Face recognition AF is also available with the option of adding identification for increased selectivity. A magnified image – either 5x or 10x – is available with both AF and MF operation – and there's a focus peaking display in a choice of three colours at one of two levels to also help with manual focusing. Switching between single-shot and continuous AF operations has to be done manually, but there's the option of setting the camera to always autofocus without needing the shutter release button to be first pressed to its half-way position (which makes it even faster).
A little confusingly though, Canon calls this "Continuous AF" – probably because it labels continuous autofocusing – as in the definition accepted by everybody else – as "Servo AF".
The G1X III can shoot continuously at up to 9.0 fps with the autofocusing fixed to the first frame, and at up to 7.0 fps with frame-by-frame AF adjustment.
Exposure control is based on 256-zone evaluative metering with the options of centre-weighted average or spot measurements, but not the selective area mode that's offered on all EOS models.
The program and semi-auto exposure control modes are supplemented by an AE lock, up to +/-3.0 EV of compensation and auto bracketing over three frames with up to +/-2.0 EV of adjustment. The shutter's speed range is 30-1/2000 second with a bulb setting available in the manual mode for longer exposures. Being a leaf-type shutter in the lens, flash sync is possible at any speed which enhances balancing possibilities when shooting in daylight (but only when using the built-in flash). The camera's flash is neatly integrated into the front of the EVF's housing and is supplemented with a hotshoe. E-TTL auto flash control is available when one of Canon's EX series Speedlites is attached.
The automatic white balance correction is supplemented with seven presets (including one for underwater shooting, as a marine housing is available), provision for creating one custom setting and manual colour temperature setting over a range of 2500 to 10,000 degrees Kelvin. There's fine-tuning, but no auto bracketing for white balance.
Both the EVF and the monitor can be cycled over three display configurations, including one which has both a dual-axis level indicator and a real-time histogram. Additionally, the histogram can be set to either brightness or RGB channels and one of two sizes. There's also a selection of three guide grids.
The playback screens can be cycled through five displays (although you can set just one if that's your preference) which comprise the full image alone or with basic capture info and thumbnails with either just a brightness histogram or also accompanied by the RGB channel graphs, the white balance settings (including fine-tuning) or the 'Picture Style' settings.
There's a choice of thumbnail pages for six, 12, 42 or 110 images, zooming (from 2.0x to 10x) and a slide show with adjustable image display times and a selection of transitions.
Additionally, the slide show can be set to only replay selected images – for example, according to the date of capture, the folder name or a star rating. As noted earlier, the touchscreen is available for browsing via swiping or selecting an image from the thumbnails. The thumb-and-forefinger pinch or spread actions respectively delve deeper into the thumbnails or magnify an image.
A selection of in-camera editing functions can be accessed via a conventional menu or a 'Quick Set' menu with, once again, there is the convenience of easy selection via the touch screen. In addition to most of the 'Creative Filter' effects, the editing options include resizing, cropping, red-eye correction, photobook set-up and RAW-to-JPEG conversion.
As with the M5, the G1X III has both WiFi and the Smart Bluetooth 'always on' connectivity which adds to the wireless control options with your smartphone, including activating WiFi.
When you use WiFi from the camera, there's the convenience of quick NFC-enabled hook-ups for Android users, and the Canon Camera Connect app allows for extensive remote control capabilities.
Test images captured as JPEG/large/fine files using shutter-priority auto exposure control, auto ISO adjustment and the Fine Detail 'Picture Style' preset. Consequently, definition is enhanced to give crisply reproduced fine details and seamlessly smooth tonal gradations. Colour reproduction is excellent and even the trickier shades are well handled. The sharpness and saturation are well maintained all the way to ISO 1600.
Loaded with our reference SD memory card – Lexar's 128 GB SDXC UHS-II/U3 (Speed Class 3) '2000x' device – the PowerShot G1X Mark III fired off a sequence of 26 JPEG/large/fine images in 2.913 seconds which represents a shooting speed of 8.92 fps. This is as close to Canon's quoted spec as makes no difference and with a slightly longer burst length. The test files had an average size of 10.8 MB. Even with this fast card, the camera still took quite a while to empty the buffer (so clearly anything quicker than UHS-I makes no difference) and essentially locks up while it's happening.
We've applauded Canon's 'Dual Pixel CMOS AF' on previous cameras and it's equally impressive here, being both extremely fast and very reliable even when tracking subjects moving erratically. It also stays unerringly on-target in low light conditions.
The lens's optical construction includes a total of four aspherical types (three of them doubled-sided) to correct for distortion and optimise centre-to-corner sharpness. While the zoom is a lot sharper overall at its telephoto end than at the widest-angle focal lengths (although this is still very good), it's also a lot slower than would be the case with any comparable interchangeable lens, even a kit-level 'cheapie'. At the effective focal length of 72mm, the maximum aperture has stopped down to just f5.6 which potentially means either using a slower shutter speed or a higher ISO setting (or breaking out the tripod which you may not want to do if you've picked the G1X III because you want to travel extra-light). It also limits what you can do with the shallower depth-of-the-field that would otherwise be available with this size of sensor. Essentially it's the price you pay for having such a compact lens - and a zoom at that - but we suspect many potential users might have been prepared to trade pocketability for a faster maximum aperture range. And while we're here, the small battery pack also comes at a price… a pretty ordinary range of around 200 shots so, if you are planning to travel with the camera, a spare (or possibly even two) will be an essential additional purchase.
JPEGs exhibit lots of crisply-defined details and look to be subjectively sharper than those delivered by the EOS M5, with accurate colour reproduction and seamlessly smooth tonal gradations. The noise reduction processing appears to better balanced too, effectively banishing any artefacts so that sharpness and saturation hold together very well up to ISO 1600, but are also still more than acceptable at ISO 3200 and 6400. The dynamic range is very good straight out of the camera, but Canon's ALO processing will help get more out of the shadows without compromising tonality in the highlights. As we've found with other recent Canon cameras, the Fine Detail 'Picture Style' preset really sharpens things up even more and works especially well with subjects which contain a lot of fine detail.
For travellers who want to supplement their stills with some atmospheric video clips, the PowerShot G1X Mark III will do a good job, but it's really not the camera for anything more serious. For starters, there's no 4K recording or features such as a stereo audio input or manual audio level adjustment. On the plus side there's 'Dual Pixel CMOS AF' – which works especially well when shooting video – touch screen control, five-axis image stabilisation, ND filter and a time-lapse function (but, as with the EOS M5, strangely there's no intervalometer function for shooting full-size stills).
Continuous AF operation is available with face recognition and subject tracking, while exposure control can be either fully automatic – including with auto scene mode selection – or fully manual. Exposure compensation can be applied while shooting. Most of the processing functions for still photography are also available for shooting video, including the 'Picture Style' presets, some of the 'Creative Filter' special effects and both the 'Auto Lighting Optimiser' and 'Highlight Tone Priority' processes. The sensitivity and white balance can also be set manually. Manual focusing is assisted by a magnified image and a focus peaking display in a choice of three colours and two intensity levels.
Full HD 1080p video is recorded at either 50 or 25 fps in the MP4 format using MPEG 4 AVC/H.264 compression. HD 720p resolution footage can also be recorded at 25 fps. The NTSC speeds of 60 and 30 fps are also available. The G1X III has built-in stereo microphones – which are actually particularly good quality – and while the sound levels can't be adjusted manually, there's both a wind-cut filter and an attenuator. It's enough, but only just.
Like the EOS M5, the PowerShot G1X III is a bit of a roller-coaster ride of great highs and some lows. Again, Canon has got the fundamentals right in terms of packaging an 'APS-C' sensor – especially its brilliant 'Dual Pixel CMOS AF' design – into a very compact, but very well-made camera that offers the benefits of weather-proofing. The sensor and its companion processor deliver exceptional AF performance, brilliant image quality (including at high ISO settings) and continuous shooting at 9.0 fps. The EOS-style feature set and menus also enable the G1X III to punch well above its weight. Then there's the excellent touch controls, wireless connectivity (rivals take note… this is how easy it should be) and OLED viewfinder (plus the various display options).
The lows? Well, it's expensive for a fixed-lens compact and the same money will buy you the EOS 77D or even Sony's A77 II, both of which offer a lot more bang for your buck. There are many more mirrorless alternatives, but let's just note that the Sony A7 with its full-35mm sensor is possibly cheaper if you shop around. The G1X III is also hobbled by its fixed zoom lens and its small battery pack, both of which make you pay in one way or another.
On paper the G1X III looks like a very viable alternative to a D-SLR or mirrorless camera, but this proves to be less than the case in practice… ironically because Canon has possibly concentrated just a little too much on getting the size down without considering all possible ramifications, especially in terms of the lens's design.
This said, if you really need a pocket-sized camera which delivers 'big sensor' performance then the PowerShot G1X III is it. Nothing else delivers the same combination quite as effectively so, as far as the intended objective goes, you'd have to say that Canon has conclusively has met the brief.
Type: Fully automatic, fixed lens digital compact camera.
Lens: Canon 15-45mm f2.8-5.6 (equivalent to 24-72mm). Nine elements in eight groups (including four aspherical types). Power zoom and 4.0x digital zoom.
Weight: 375 grams (without battery or memory card).
Price: $1499 (estimated average street price).
A brand new 'APS-C' D-SLR for under $500? How does Canon do it? Ah, well, suffice to say it will still make a profit on every one it sells.
A winning full-35mm format, full-featured D-SLR aimed at enthusiasts, as well as pros who want a second compact and lightweight body.


Sally May Melia has been added to 9 tunebooks.
# Added by fanche 7 years ago .
Here is our transcription for that lovely tune.
Can be heard on track 5 of the "Renagade" album (featuring Sharon Shannon, Mike McGoldrick, Dezy Donnelly and Jim Murray).
Sharon Shannon: "This a tune for my gorgeous little godchild, Sally, daughter of my sister, Mary, and her husband, Darren".
We put it in GM since "The Session" doesn't support EbM, the original key.
# Posted by fanche 7 years ago .


While there are obviously many issues that will divide Republicans and Democrats once the Trump administration takes office the one that most IT security professionals will be watching most closely will be the debate over encryption.
President-elect Donald Trump has already signaled his intention to side with law enforcement officials that contend encryption tools provided by the IT industry is being employed by terrorists and other criminals to hamper their investigations. At the same time, however, the IT industry is essentially arguing that increased usage of encryption is needed to protect data from all manner of cybercriminal activity.
This week a bi-partisan Encryption Working Group made up of Congressional representative sitting on the House Judiciary Committee and House Energy and Commerce Committees published a Year-End Report that says usage of encryption to protect the growth of the digital economy is in the national interest.
At the same time, however, the committee is not insensitive to the challenges facing law enforcement officials. The committee appears to be trying to balance the needs of law enforcement officials against a Fourth Amendment that limits the government's ability to engage in unreasonable search and seizure processes and a Fifth Amendment that guarantees that individuals can't be forced to incriminate themselves by being compelled to give up encryption keys and passwords.
The committee essentially recommends that rather than compromise the integrity of encryption by forcing the IT industry to create backdoors that might be exploited by cybercriminals, law enforcement officials should share intelligence with each other about ways to engage in "legal hacking." Furthermore, the report notes that law enforcement officials should make greater use of unencrypted metadata to achieve their goals. In that context, the report makes a distinction between what laws apply to data at rest versus data moving across a network that would be subject to existing telecommunication regulations that law enforcement officials can use to gain permission to access data by invoking, for example, The Patriot Act.
It's unlikely that any law enacted by Congress to weaken encryption is going to come down to a vote along party lines. Each representative and senator is likely to have a bias one way or the other that not necessarily result in them voting in one direction or another. There are many Democrats, for example, that will favor pleas from police departments for more access. There are also more than a few Republicans concerned about government overreach.
Any effort to weaken encryption is likely to be subject to legal proceedings that will ultimately wind their way to The Supreme Court. In fact, a court case concerning whether the U.S. can compel Microsoft to release data stored in servers in Ireland is only the first of many cases involving how data is stored that the court is likely to address in the years ahead.
In the meantime, IT security professionals should avail their expertise to both local courts and lawmakers. The more informed justices and politicians are about the state of IT security the more likely it is they will come up with reasonable course of action. Of course, not everyone in the IT security community necessarily agrees on what those actions should be. But the one thing that should be clear to all is that not participating in the debate in the first place will most definitely lead to an outcome no one is ultimately happy with.


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text:
Posted inDownturn Diaries
#DownturnDiaries: SAIT student worried about lack of employment opportunities in oil and gas
by MATT SUTTON March 4, 2015 September 4, 2020
How further education is becoming increasingly appealing as jobs become unavailable for graduating students
In just a few short weeks, Caitlin Kerr, 21, will be graduating from the Energy Asset Management program at Calgary's SAIT Polytechnic, a program Kerr originally entered because she thought it would springboard her into a variety of jobs in the oil and gas industry. But now, due to the current economic downturn, Kerr fears that there will be no room for her once she graduates in April.
Kerr entered into the program on the advice of a friend's mom who works in oil and gas and told her that a diploma in Energy Asset Management would allow her to do pretty much anything she wanted to do in oil and gas.
"I was deciding between this program and production accounting," explained Kerr. "And I ended up choosing this one and I love it. I do the accounting side, the land side, marketing — all of that I'm able to do."
Now in her last semester, Kerr and others in the program are, for the first time, feeling the negative effects of the oil and gas industry.
"My friends at school and stuff are feeling it. None of us are able to get jobs," Kerr said. "[Those] of us that had summer jobs last year, that got promised summer jobs again aren't getting those promises fulfilled any more."
The few jobs that remain make for stiff competition with employers able to be especially choosey.
"Now they're wanting such high GPA for any job. A lot of them are looking for like 3.5 or higher," Kerr said.
Although the program can prepare its students to play numerous roles in the oil and gas industry,
Caitlin Kerr weighs her options over coffee at a Calgary Starbucks.
Photo by Matt Sutton Kerr said, it won't be able to prepare students for what happens when the jobs disappear.
"A lot of my teachers have talked about why it's happening, what's going on with it and how we can work with it," Kerr said. "But there's not a lot of prepping, like what you do if you can't get a job. Once we're done we're just done."
Kerr is grateful she still has her serving job, but even there, she's noticing some changes due to the faltering economy.
As a server at the Cattlebaron Steakhouse, she's noticing the impact on her wallet.
"It affects the service industry because no one wants to go out, people are getting laid off," Kerr said. "I'm not getting enough hours at work, I'm not making enough tips."
Kerr said that if things don't turn around quickly, she would have to rely on her back-up plan.
"Since there isn't a lot of jobs right now I might as well continue with school," said Kerr. "So I don't have to sit there for six or seven months with no job and then employers are like, 'Ah, she's been out for so long.'"{cbrelatedarticle show="right" ids="2691,2678,2670″ /}
Kerr is especially interested in taking more schooling in Scotland, where she is looking into a program called International Business Management. Kerr explained that each year in the program would improve upon her diploma. One year would give her a bachelor's degree, a second year, an honors degree and three years would supply Kerr with a masters degree.
"It's always kind of been in my mind that I should take the opportunity to do it because they have one program in Scotland and who wouldn't want to go to Scotland? But it's definitely more of an option now because there isn't a lot of job opportunities."
Ideally, Kerr said she would like to have it both ways.
"I really want to get a summer job with an oil and gas company so I can get the experience with a company and then go off to school," Kerr said. "But if I can't then I can't and I will just accept serving for the summer. I'll still have a great degree at the end of my time abroad so hopefully the market won't be as bad when I come back."
msutton@cjournal.ca
Read this Calgary Journal special report for an in-depth comparison between Jim Prentice's response to the current drop in oil prices and Don Getty's response in the 1980s.
Calgary Cat Festival is a purr-fect help for local animal rescue groups
Muriel Folkes
by MATT SUTTON, Calgary Journal

#DownturnDiaries: SAIT student worried about lack of employment opportunities in oil and gas

by MATT SUTTON, Calgary Journal
March 4, 2015

How further education is becoming increasingly appealing as jobs become unavailable for graduating students

In just a few short weeks, Caitlin Kerr, 21, will be graduating from the Energy Asset Management program at Calgary's SAIT Polytechnic, a program Kerr originally entered because she thought it would springboard her into a variety of jobs in the oil and gas industry. But now, due to the current economic downturn, Kerr fears that there will be no room for her once she graduates in April.

Kerr entered into the program on the advice of a friend's mom who works in oil and gas and told her that a diploma in Energy Asset Management would allow her to do pretty much anything she wanted to do in oil and gas.

"I was deciding between this program and production accounting," explained Kerr. "And I ended up choosing this one and I love it. I do the accounting side, the land side, marketing — all of that I'm able to do."

Now in her last semester, Kerr and others in the program are, for the first time, feeling the negative effects of the oil and gas industry.

"My friends at school and stuff are feeling it. None of us are able to get jobs," Kerr said. "[Those] of us that had summer jobs last year, that got promised summer jobs again aren't getting those promises fulfilled any more."

The few jobs that remain make for stiff competition with employers able to be especially choosey.

"Now they're wanting such high GPA for any job. A lot of them are looking for like 3.5 or higher," Kerr said.

Although the program can prepare its students to play numerous roles in the oil and gas industry,Caitlin Kerr weighs her options over coffee at a Calgary Starbucks.
Photo by Matt Sutton Kerr said, it won't be able to prepare students for what happens when the jobs disappear.

"A lot of my teachers have talked about why it's happening, what's going on with it and how we can work with it," Kerr said. "But there's not a lot of prepping, like what you do if you can't get a job. Once we're done we're just done."

Kerr is grateful she still has her serving job, but even there, she's noticing some changes due to the faltering economy.

As a server at the Cattlebaron Steakhouse, she's noticing the impact on her wallet.

"It affects the service industry because no one wants to go out, people are getting laid off," Kerr said. "I'm not getting enough hours at work, I'm not making enough tips."

Kerr said that if things don't turn around quickly, she would have to rely on her back-up plan.

"Since there isn't a lot of jobs right now I might as well continue with school," said Kerr. "So I don't have to sit there for six or seven months with no job and then employers are like, 'Ah, she's been out for so long.'"{cbrelatedarticle show="right" ids="2691,2678,2670″ /}

Kerr is especially interested in taking more schooling in Scotland, where she is looking into a program called International Business Management. Kerr explained that each year in the program would improve upon her diploma. One year would give her a bachelor's degree, a second year, an honors degree and three years would supply Kerr with a masters degree.

"It's always kind of been in my mind that I should take the opportunity to do it because they have one program in Scotland and who wouldn't want to go to Scotland? But it's definitely more of an option now because there isn't a lot of job opportunities."

Ideally, Kerr said she would like to have it both ways.

"I really want to get a summer job with an oil and gas company so I can get the experience with a company and then go off to school," Kerr said. "But if I can't then I can't and I will just accept serving for the summer. I'll still have a great degree at the end of my time abroad so hopefully the market won't be as bad when I come back."

msutton@cjournal.ca

Read this Calgary Journal special report for an in-depth comparison between Jim Prentice's response to the current drop in oil prices and Don Getty's response in the 1980s.

This article first appeared on Calgary Journal and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.


According to a local title company, the Notice of Default filings in Valley County continue to see sharp decreases. A Notice of Default (NOD) is a notification given to a borrower stating that he or she has not made their payments by the predetermined deadline. It dictates that if the money owed (plus an additional legal fee) is not paid in a given time, the lender may choose to foreclose the borrower's property. In the most recent foreclosure report, NOD's in Valley County are down a whopping 75% from the same time period in Jan-Aug 2010. NOD's are down 31% from this same time last year. In fact, Tamarack Resort has had only one new NOD filing since February. Two of the Tamarack properties still currently listed on the updated foreclosure list are ones in which I have offers on working through successful short sales. To find out any other Tamarack propertis still on the list with a set foreclosure date, contact me directly via my website. As of today, Tamarack only has one bank owned home available, and by reviewing the foreclosure lists, it's unlikely we'll see too many more.


BlackRadioIsBack.com Music: OhsoKool Presents: 21 Love Salute - A Tribute To Sade | BlackRadioIsBack.com - Official Blog of the Syndicated FuseBox Radio Broadcast!
Just wanted to share this really great Soul Music tribute mix by my New York City area peoples of the radio and DJ family of OhSoKool created in anticipation of Sade's album release (February 9, 2010 here in the States, drops in the rest of the world a day before...lucky).
There are some really nice blends and remixes that were put together of classic Sade joints for all of her fans and is a good intro for those who aren't familiar with her music...give the collection a download and let us know what you think!