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This Portfolio (dobby)
Just Sayin' ...
An ongoing collection of writings about important (IMO, anyway) issues.
NaNo Prep 2020
These are the prompts and my responses to the NaNo Prep 2020.
Ashes (scene 1)
Ashe realizes exactly how dangerous he is to others, and is forced into running again.
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Ressurection Music Contest Entry - Using "Simple Man"
Printed from https://www.writing.com/main/view_item/item_id/1571063-Flicker
by Dobby
Rated: E · Fiction · Children's · #1571063
Flicker is a children's story about a young dragon who can't breathe fire.
Created: June 13th, 2009 at 6:14pm
Modified: June 13th, 2009 at 6:14pm
Paging: Next Item
Genres: Children's, Fantasy, Mythology
Flicker nudged his dozing mother with his nose. "Mamma, I'm bored. Will you play with me?" The sun was barely up, but he had been awake for what seemed like hours.
The sleeping dragon's eyes fluttered half-open. "It's not time to get up yet, little one," she said with a yawn.
"But I'm not tired and I want to play," he said, his voice almost a whine. "Please, Mamma?"
A cough of smoke escaped his mother's mouth as she raised her head from her paws. "Not now, Flicker," she said gently. "Mamma's tired."
Flicker's face fell. He knew that all of the grown-up dragons had worked long into the night, preparing for the annual Sun Festival that was to begin in just a few days. It was the dragon clan's way of thanking the Sun for it's gift of fire, the most important day of the year. But Flicker was too little to help. Flicker couldn't even breathe fire yet. "Sorry, Mamma."
"Go and find your sister," Flame suggested as her eyes drifted shut again.
Head hung low, Flicker plodded slowly out of the cave, his still flightless wings fluttering at his sides. He supposed he could look for his sister, Ember, but she didn't like it when he tagged along and he didn't like her friends. Their favorite game was teasing him.
'Maybe, if she's alone, she won't mind,' he thought as he trotted toward the mountain meadow where they liked to play. Feeling a little happier, he began running faster and faster until he tripped headlong over a fallen tree trunk and tumbled once, twice, three times, landing on his nose in the middle of the clearing.
Peels of laughter greeted his ears as he slowly opened his eyes. "Um…Hiya?" he said, trying to sound brave, trying to sound as if that was exactly how he had planned to enter the meadow. He sat up with a groan, wiggling his nose to see if it was alright. "Hi, Ember," he said hopefully.
Ember covered her face with a leathery wing. "Swell," she mumbled. "Just what I needed…my baby brother."
"I'm not a baby," Flicker shouted. He glanced around, unhappily aware that all of Ember's older, meaner friends were with her. He screwed his face up, thinking hard about heat and smoke and fire, but nothing but a loud grunt came out of his mouth. "Heh…well, I'll just…"
"Aww, Smokeless doesn't want to play," taunted Inferno, the largest and meanest of the group.
"Toddle on home to Mommy," suggested another. "No fireless dragons allowed."
Ember's tail twitched nervously. Flicker knew that she wanted to impress this gang, but he knew that she knew she would be in huge trouble if she didn't stick up for him. "I'll…uh…just make sure the little guy gets home alright." She snorted, a plume of smoke floating up from her nostril as she prodded him on the shoulder. "C'mon, kid."
Sadly, Flicker slowly walked from the clearing with his sister close behind. He wished the older dragons would stop making fun of him. It wasn't his fault he couldn't breathe fire like them. "You shouldn't hang around with those jerks," he sniffed over his shoulder.
"They're not so bad," Ember said. A tendril of smoke curled from her nostril and coiled its way upward, disappearing in the canopy of leaves. "Have you seen the tricks Inferno can do with his fire?"
Flicker rolled his eyes and shrugged. "Whatever. He's still a bully. Dad doesn't like him, you know."
"Yeah, so?" Ember said with a toss of her head. "Daddy doesn't need to know we're friends, now does he, baby brother?" She gave him another push with her snout. "Just go home."
Flicker stumbled forward. "Fine," he mumbled as he trundled back down the path toward the family cave. He was almost home when a soft hoot above him made him stop and look up. "Isn't it bedtime, Professor Hoot?" he asked the great horned owl perched on a low hanging branch.
"Indeed it is, young dragon," he answered with a yawn. "I think I'll turn in."
"Professor?" Flicker said as the owl spread his wings to fly home. "May I ask you a question?"
Professor Hoot blinked his great, amber eyes and, somewhat reluctantly, closed his wings. "I suppose. But I'm very tired, so I do hope it's not a long question."
"No. Well…I don't think so…" He nibbled his lip, hesitating, and the blurted out: "Why can't I breath fire? Do you know? Owls are wise, right? So I thought you might, maybe, be able to tell me."
The Professor blinked his eyes slowly, once, twice, three times as he pondered his answer. "It is true that owls know many things and that we are considered wise. But, my young friend, it is not for an owl to know the ways of a dragon for you have a magic within you that I do not."
Flicker sighed sadly. He had been sure that someone as wise as Professor Hoot must know everything about everything, even dragons. "Oh, well…thanks anyway."
"Have you asked your father, young Flicker? I have heard he is quite wise in the ways of your kind."
Flicker slowly shook his head. He didn't want Firebrand, the fiercest and bravest dragon of the clan, to know how worried he was because he couldn't breathe fire yet. "I…I can't ask him that."
"Hmm." Professor Hoot closed his eyes for a long moment. "Perhaps if you asked another of your magical fellows? They may be able to explain how your magic works. Perhaps…" he paused for a moment, as if considering all the possibilities. "Perhaps a unicorn?"
"A unicorn?" Flicker asked. "But they live way down there." He tilted his head down the mountain toward the distant valley, hiding far below in the silvery morning mist. "Do you really think they can help, Professor?"
"I can't be certain, my young friend. But, yes, they may know. Unicorn magic is powerful, much like your own. It seems logical that there are similarities."
"Logical. Hmm. Um…so…you think I should go?" he asked. The owl blinked his great, yellow eyes but didn't answer. "Well…" Flicker glanced back over his shoulder at the woodland path that would take him home. He should go home. He knew that. The unicorns' meadow was in the valley, far below. He would be gone a very long time and he was bound to get in trouble. Not to mention, that dragons tended to make unicorns very nervous.
'But I'm just a little dragon,' he reasoned, 'one who can't even breathe smoke so they shouldn't mind me too much.' He glanced down the pathway and then turned to look once more towards home. With a sigh, he trotted down the path through the forest.
It was a narrow path and a treacherous one. Rocks and stones skittered beneath his feet and gnarled roots tried to trip him, but Flicker pressed on. If the unicorns could help him find his fire, he needed to at least try to find them. He was breathing hard and his belly was growling when the path widened and flattened out. The ground beneath his feet was no longer hard and rocky, it was soft, the grass tickling his tired feet.
Panting, he stopped for a moment to get a better sense of where he was. The heavenly gurgle of a stream laughed in his ears. He followed the sound to a merrily rushing ribbon of water tumbling through the cool green grass. With a sigh, he lowered his head and gratefully slurped the cool water.
Feeling refreshed, he lounged for a moment, looking all around. The valley meadow was greener than the one at the dragon's keep. Jewel-bright flowers - daisies and sunflowers, lavender, hollyhocks and even some snap dragons - danced upon the grass, swaying in the warm breeze, their faces turned up towards the sun.
"Wow," Flicker breathed as he waded carefully across the shallow stream. Once across, he dried his feet on the grass and continued looking around. There was not a unicorn in sight, but he was sure that such a lovely meadow must belong to them. He had never met a unicorn, of course, but his Mama had told him that they were quite lovely, even if they weren't dragons, and Mama always told him the truth. 'I'll wait,' he thought, 'and maybe explore a little.'
His stomach rumbled again, reminding him that it had been a very long time since breakfast. He jogged along the edge of the meadow, looking this way and that, hoping to find something, anything, to eat. It didn't take him long to find an apple tree, heavy with ripe red fruit.
He pulled a plump apple from the branch with his teeth and with a munch and a crunch, gobbled it up. A second, a third, a fourth followed quickly. He contemplated a fifth, but his tummy was happy now. With a soft burp, he stretched out on the soft grass and, without planning it, nodded off, snoring contentedly in the warmth of the sun.
Poke. Flicker grunted and rolled over.
Another poke. "Stop it, Ember," he mumbled.
Poke. Poke. Poke. "Hey!" he yelped. His eyes flew open, reminding him that he wasn't in his family's cave but in a warm, sunny meadow far away from home. He blinked a few times, yawned, and blinked again. Finally his eyes popped open. And then they opened even wider as he realized who had been poking him.
The creature was a shimmering, silvery white. She had long-lashed eyes the color of the summer sky and a single glittering, twisted horn on her head. "You're a...a unicorn!" he said excitedly. "A real, live unicorn!" He giggled, giddy with excitement. "Wowzers."
The unicorn backed up a few paces, glancing anxiously around herself. "Um. Yes. I am. And you're a...you're a...a dragon." She shivered slightly, her silver mane rippling behind her. "You're not going to eat me, are you?" she asked bravely.
"Eat you?" Flicker asked. "No way!" He got to his feet, stretching his body to wake up the rest of the way. "I'm Flicker."
"Dewdrop," she said with a sigh of relief. "Aren't you kind of far from home?" She glanced up towards the mountain where the dragon fires burned, almost at the top.
He followed her gaze. Home suddenly looked very, very far away. "Kind of," he mumbled. "I...I wanted to find a unicorn."
"But not to eat?" she asked. Clearly, she was still a little nervous.
"To talk to," Flicker said. "I...I wanted to ask a unicorn...you, if you please, a question."
"What kind of question?" Dewdrop asked. "If I don't know the answer I can go find my mother."
"It's about magic. Unicorn magic. Do you...do you know how it works?" he asked, hoping he sounded like he was doing a report for school and not like he was desperate for the answer.
"Kind of," said Dewdrop. "My mother says that our magic is in our horns." She moved forward and touched her lovely horn to Flicker's forehead.
A warm current of energy flowed through his body at the brief touch. He felt different, somehow. Stronger. Braver. "Cool. So…how does it work?"
Dewdrop shrugged. "No idea, really. I just know that it makes things feel better."
"But, how, exactly do you know that? And…and how did you learn to use it?" he asked desperately.
"I don't really know. I never really thought about it, but one day I was playing tag with some bunnies and one of them got hurt. I remembered what my mother told me, so I touched her and she was better, just like that. I guess I did it because I needed to. Isn't it like that when you learn to breathe fire?"
Flicker hung his head, not wanting to see the disappointment in the unicorn's eyes. "I can't do it," he mumbled. "I…I should go." He turned away, ready to make the long, lonely journey back home.
"Oh. Really?" Dewdrop asked. "Can't you stay and play?"
Flicker stopped in his tracks and turned slowly back toward the unicorn. "You…you want to play? With…with me?"
"Well, sure!" Dewdrop said, giggling. "We're friends, aren't we?"
"Friends?" Flicker asked, his eyes suddenly misty. "You want to be my friend?"
"Why wouldn't I?" she asked. "You're nice, even if you are a dragon."
"But, I can't breathe fire."
"Well, neither can I," she laughed. "Come on, I'll race you to the end of the meadow and back. And no fair using your wings!"
"You're on!" Flicker shouted. "Ready…set…go!"
The unlikely pair pelted across the meadow. Flicker was happy to find that he was able to keep up with the quick-footed unicorn. He even managed to race past her once or twice, but in the end she beat him by a nose. Breathing hard, the newfound friends plopped down onto the soft grass where the spent a pleasant few hours trading stories and telling jokes until Dewdrops mother cantered across the meadow.
She stopped when she caught sight of Dewdrop laughing merrily with a baby dragon. "Dewdrop," she said softly, "who's your new friend?" There was a note of fear in her low, gentle voice.
"It's okay, Mom," she said matter-of-factly. "Flicker's my friend."
"You're far from home, child," she said kindly. "Are you lost?"
"No, ma'am," he said in his politest voice. "I know how to get home."
"Your mother will be worrying," the elder unicorn reminded him. "It will be evening soon. The sun is low in the sky now."
Flicker gulped nervously. He hadn't realized quite how much time had passed since he had left Professor Hoot. "I should go…"
"Will you come and play again?" Dewdrop asked eagerly. "May he, Mom?"
"I…I suppose so…" she said uncertainly.
"I can't breathe fire, Mrs. Unicorn," Flicker said solemnly.
"Yet," Dewdrop added. "You'll get it. I know you will!" she whispered.
"I guess I'll go now," he said. "See you later?" He turned away, ready now to abandon his quest and go home. He had a friend, a real, true friend. That was almost as good as breathing fire.
"Hey wait," Dewdrop called. "Maybe…maybe my Mom knows something."
Flicker paused and took a few steps back toward the beautiful pair of unicorns. A ray of hopefulness warmed his heart. "Mrs Unicorn?"
"Yes, Flicker?"
"Can you tell me about magic? I really, really want to learn how to breathe fire."
"The only magic I know is my own," she said softly. "Unicorn magic was a gift from the Lady of the Moon. I remember my grandmother telling me the stories."
"Did she ever tell stories about dragon magic?" he asked hopefully.
"I'm sorry," she said, shaking her head. "The only thing I know about dragon's and their magic is that it was a gift from Father Sun. Don't worry, Flicker. You'll understand your magic and how it works when you need it. Run along, home. Come on, Dewdrop. Your father's waiting for us."
"Bye, Flicker," Dewdrop called as she cantered away after her mother. "See you soon!"
Flicker watched them as they disappeared into the forest on the other side of the meadow. He squinted up at the sun, blazing brightly as he dipped lower and lower in the sky. "Um…Father Sun?" Flicker asked nervously. "Can you tell me how to breathe fire?"
But Father Sun didn't answer. He simple continued on his slow descent until plumes of red and pink and purple began to tinge the clouds. Flicker's heart began to race as he realized that it would soon be dark and he was still very far from home.
Flicker jogged back across the meadow, fully intending to give up his quest, at least for today. He'd had a great adventure for a very small dragon and he'd made a new friend. If that wasn't a good day, he didn't know what was. Still, he'd come a long way to leave without learning the answers that he needed.
He was breathing hard by the time he reached the path. The sun was almost down now, painting the sky with coral and lavender. It would be a difficult walk home. He sighed heavily, knowing that he needed to be on his way or he would be in very big trouble. But as he turned to head back up the path toward home, a glint of silver caught his eye.
Flicker turned very slowly. A silvery finger pointed in the opposite direction. 'Go home, Flicker,' he told himself. 'Just go home now.'
But the silvery finger seemed to be beckoning him in the opposite direction. Unsure what to do, he looked up into the darkening sky. The full moon shone brightly above him. "Lady Moon?" he whispered.
She didn't answer, but Flicker had a funny feeling she was listening. He could see her face, smiling down at him. He glanced back at the pathway, the one that led away from home. It was very steep and very rocky. He really should go home.
The moon crooked her silvery finger. Flicker looked back and forth between the pathway home and the one that led to who-knows-where. He tilted his head back up at the moon. "Is the secret to breathing fire up there?" he asked.
Lady Moon said nothing, but the silver finger slid a little farther up the unknown path.
Flicker gulped nervously. "Will you show me the way?"
The moon glowed brighter, illuminating the pathway.
Flicker's eyes followed the light up the path. He glanced back at the pathway home, once, twice and then, throwing his shoulder's back bravely, he began to follow the moonlight.
It was a very long, very difficult journey. The air had grown chilly. "One more step. One more step." He repeated the words over and over, fighting the coldness and the weariness that made him want to give up and run as fast as he could to his warm and cozy cave. It was only the promise of an answer and the Moon's reassuring light that kept him moving forward.
"Just a little further," he breathed. "One more step…"
"No more steps, I think," said a gruff voice. "Who are you and what are you doing on my mountain?"
Flicker shivered and stopped in his tracks. "I…I…I…" He took a deep breath and spoke again. "I'm Flicker, sir, and I didn't know that this mountain belonged to anybody. I…I'm on a quest," he added bravely.
"Quest, you say?" said the gruff voice from the shadows. "What does your quest have to do with me and my home?"
"I don't know, exactly," Flicker answered. "I just know that this is where I'm supposed to come."
"That so?"
"Yes," Flicker said firmly. "I'm sure of it."
"Hmmph."
Flicker took a tentative step forward. "Um…so is it okay if I keep going? Only I've come a really long way and I'm probably in a ton of trouble so I'd really, really, really like to get my question answered before I'm grounded for life."
The gruff voice snorted. "Depends."
"On what?" Flicker said.
"I think I deserve a few answers before I let you traipse all over my home."
"Ok, but only if I can see who I'm talking to. It's kind of rude to hide in the bushes, you know."
The owner of the gruff voice hissed out a laugh and stepped out into the pool of moonlight.
Flicker gasped out loud. The gruff voice belonged to an ancient dragon with scales the color of pure gold. His eyes were cloudy but Flicker guessed that they were probably copper. He was enormous, the biggest dragon he'd ever seen, and his heavy body bore the scars of many hard-fought battles. "Who are you?" he whispered. "I thought there was only one dragon clan in these mountains."
"So there is," said the elder dragon. "One clan and me. They used to call me Vulcan."
"Vulcan? Vulcan? The Vulcan?" Flicker's eyes widened. "But you're a legend! My Dad's told me stories about you!"
"Don't believe everything you here, kid," he grumbled. "I thought I was the one asking the questions."
"Right," Flicker breathed. "Vulcan…wow…no one's going to believe I met…"
"No one's going to know, more like. I like my peaceful life. Don't want a pack of nosy kids sniffing around all the time. Once you've gone, don't come back."
"Oh, but…fine, " Flicker mumbled. "I won't tell. I swear."
Vulcan stared at him for a full minute, nodding slowly. "Guess you look trustworthy enough, not that I have much choice. Now, what is a young dragon doing so very far from the clan so very late at night?"
"I told you, I'm on a quest."
"Quest. Right. Must be very important. Some kind of dare?"
"No, sir, it's not a dare."
"Good, good," said the elder dragon. "Those only ever lead to trouble. Remember that, kid. So if it's not a dare, what, exactly are you looking for, young Flicker?"
"I…I need to know the secret to dragon magic. How to breathe fire. I…I can't do it." Flicker hung his head, embarrassed to admit it.
"That's it? That's the big quest?" Vulcan rasped. "Kid, you'll breathe fire when you need to. That's all you really need to know."
"But I want to breathe fire now," Flicker said sadly. "I just want to be like everyone else. I should have been able to do it months and months ago."
"Sit down, kid," the elder dragon said, his voice a little less gruff.
Flicker did as he was told, dropping immediately onto his haunches. He shivered, hugging himself and rocking back and forth to keep warm.
The elder dragon watched Flicker for a moment. "Bit chilly out here," he said. He shuffled around for a few minutes, gathering wood and twigs, and, with a quick breath of flame, had a bone-warming fire.
Flicker inched closer to the flames, feeling their warmth seep into his skin. "Thank you."
"Welcome. If we're going to chat we may as well be comfortable. Now, kid, I'm a very old dragon, so I know a few things about dragon magic."
"Is that why the Moon brought me here?" he breathed. "Will you tell me the secret?"
"I told you. You'll breathe fire when you need to and not a moment before."
"But there must be something I can do, some way to make it happen sooner."
The old dragon paced back and forth by the fire. "The secret of fire magic is within you. It's in all dragons. It's not like memorizing your multiplication tables. It's the thing inside you that makes you who you are, Flicker. You'll breathe your fire."
"But…I just want to be like all the other kids. Please, can't you help me?"
"Why do you want to be like everyone else? Can't you be happy just being yourself?" said Vulcan.
"I'm just 'Flameless Flicker.' Nothing special." He stared into to fire, wishing with all his heart that he could make one.
"Nothing special, eh?" the old dragon said with a snort. "Turn around, young Flicker."
Flicker did as Vulcan asked. He found himself looking down over the unicorn's meadow. Far, far away at the top of another mountain he could see the fires of his clan. He hadn't realized how far he'd come until this very moment. "I can see home."
"Yes. You've come a long way to find your answers. A very long way for someone who is nothing special. How did you come so far?"
Flicker shrugged. "I don't know. I didn't really think about it. I just…needed to find out so I went to talk to Professor Hoot. He didn't know, but he said maybe another magical creature could tell me. That's how I made friends with Snowdrop. She's a unicorn that I met down in the meadow." Flicker grinned as he remembered his afternoon with his new friend. "She told me that her magic comes from the moon, like dragon magic comes from the sun. So I tried to ask the Sun but he wouldn't answer. I was about to go home and then…then the Moon kind of wanted me to come this way. So I did."
"Extraordinary!" Vulcan said, shaking his head. "Do young dragons from your clan make journeys like this all the time?"
"Well, no," Flicker admitted. "Never."
"Can't you see how very unusual you are? Don't you understand the courage and heart it's that has brought you here? Believe in yourself and you will find your fire."
"What if I don't? What if I never breathe fire?" It was the worry that had brought him here.
"There's more to being a dragon than breathing fire. There are many talents and gifts that contribute to life in the clan. Fire or no fire, you'll find your place."
"You had a place in the clan once," Flicker said. "And then you just…left. Why?"
"It's complicated, kid."
"I told you my story," Flicker said bravely. "Don't you trust me? I can keep a secret," he assured the elder dragon.
"I let myself believe that I was better than the others. Fiercer, braver, the best hunter, the best...everything…"
"From what my Dad says, you were."
"Was I? I don't believe, not anymore. I got reckless…and…someone got hurt. I couldn't stay, knowing what I'd caused. It was a long time ago."
"You should come home. Dragons need to be with other dragons, not out on their own."
"I'm used to it now. I can't undo the past. It's too late for me to go back. Besides, I'd just be a burden to the clan…I'm not the best anything anymore."
"But…didn't you just tell me that there are lots of things to do in the clan? You don't have to be a hunter or a guardian or…anything like that…" Flicker protested. "You…you could teach us all kinds of things. The other kids would go nuts, learning from a living legend."
Vulcan let out a smoky snort. "It's a nice thought, kid, but I wouldn't be welcome. You on the other hand need to get home. I'm sure your parents are sick with worry."
Flicker glanced back across the valley at the distant, dancing fires of home. "I don't want to go home until I can breathe fire," he said firmly. "I came all this way and I'm not leaving."
"You don't get to choose your talents and gifts, kid. If you breathe fire someday, that's great. If you don't, is it really the end of the world? Be happy with who you are! Will your parents love you less if you never breathe even the tiniest of sparks? Will your unicorn friend not want to play with you?"
"I…well, no, I guess not. But…I really, really want to be able to do it."
"There are many types of dragons, Flicker, and many types of dragon fire. Some are ordinary, like the fire I breathed to make that fire. Others are rare and special gifts of deepest magic and even healing. Ordinary dragons breathe ordinary fire without thinking about it everyday. It's the fire that sustains the clan so it's the most common and shows itself early in life. Some of the other fires, the rare and special ones, they only come around once in a great while. They may not show themselves for many years, but when they are needed, the dragon who possesses them will use them with as much ease as the more common gifts. And, yes, Flicker, there are sometimes dragons that don't breathe fire at all. Why, one of the best hunters I ever knew didn't have a lick of fire within him and he bested me in battle more than once. Ever heard of Titan?"
"Everyone's heard of Titan! Do you mean he never, ever breathed fire?"
"Couldn't even make smoke rings," Vulcan said with a deep chuckle.
"But…he's like…almost as big a legend as you! One of the bravest and most daring dragons the clan's ever had. And he…he couldn't breathe fire, not ever?"
"Not ever," said Vulcan.
"Did he ever try to find out why?" Flicker asked softly. "Did he wonder?"
"I never asked and he never mentioned it," said Vulcan. "He had many other strengths and talents and he used them all very well. As you will, young Flicker. Whether you breathe fire tomorrow, or ten years from now or never, I see great things in your future. You just need to stop trying to make them into what you think they should be. Be brave and bold. Ask the tough questions. Make friends with unicorns and grumpy old dragons…"
"Friends? You want to be my friend?" Flicker breathed. "Woohoo."
The old dragon smiled, a whisp of smoke spiraling upward from between his sharp teeth. "I would be honored, young Flicker." He stood up and dowsed the fire with a few swipes of his heavy, armored tail. "And now, I think it's time for young dragons to be in bed. Have you flown with your mother or father?"
Flicker nodded slowly. Holding onto another dragon's scales was a tricky business and he had never flown quite so far. But it was late and he was very sleepy. "'Kay."
The wind whistled in his ears as they glided over the valley to the dragons' mountain. Flicker was happy to be going home and his heart leapt when his clan's fires grew bigger and bigger. Vulcan touched down with a gentle thud and Flicker slid off.
The entire clan was gathered around the fire. Flicker quickly spotted his Mom, Dad and Ember.
His Mom rushed forward and nuzzled his shoulder with her snout. "We've been so worried!"
"Where have you been, Son?" asked his father gruffly.
"I'm sorry, Mom, Dad. I was trying to learn how to breathe fire and, well, one thing led to another and I ended up all the way across the valley. I met Mr. Vulcan and he brought me home. I...I think it would be cool if he stayed with the clan. Would…would that be okay, do you think?"
"Vulcan is and has always been welcome in our clan. I'm happy you've brought him with you, Flicker, but that doesn't let you off the hook. You know you shouldn't have wandered so far from home."
"I know, Dad," Flicker said, hanging his head. "But it was important and…I learned a lot."
"What did you learn?" asked his mother gently.
"I learned that breathing fire isn't the most important thing about being a dragon. I need to be proud of who I am and not worry so much. I might breathe fire tomorrow, or next week, or next year. Or I may not ever breathe fire and that's just fine too. I'm happy with who I am and that's what really matters."
"It sounds like you've learned a lot on your adventure," said his Dad.
"I did!" Flicker. He told the entire clan about his quest in great detail, grinning as they 'ooh'd' and 'ah'd' and shook their heads in surprise.
"That's my boy," Flicker's Dad said proudly.
"Not bad, little brother," said Ember. "I…I'm really sorry about this morning. I shouldn't have let them pick on you."
"It's okay, Ember," said Flicker. "Just…don't worry so much about being just like them. You are a pretty cool big sister…most of the time." He yawned, his eyes suddenly very heavy.
"Time for bed, I think," said his Mother. She nudged him toward their cave, gently pushing him home. He was asleep in an instant, dreaming of new friends and exciting adventures, happy, at last, to be Flicker, the dragon who couldn't breathe fire.
© Copyright 2009 Dobby (dobby at Writing.Com). All rights reserved.


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The Year Ahead: harnessing the power of tourism to build a better world
Published on : Wednesday, January 4, 2017
I write to you as I begin my final year as UNWTO Secretary-General, a position I have been privileged to hold for almost seven years at an Agency I have been proud to serve for the past decade. During …
Sofitel Queenstown relaunches lavish Penthouse No.10
Queenstown's award-winning Sofitel Hotel has unveiled a lavish new-look top suite, Penthouse No.10, following an impressive NZ$2 million upgrade completed to coincide with the destination's peak summer season.Sofitel General Manager Vincent Macquet is "delighted" by the result and expects the …
Burj Al Arab Jumeirah and AmStur Enter GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS for the Largest Tin of Caviar
Burj Al Arab Jumeirah joined forces with AmStur Caviar, the premiere US supplier of world-class caviar, to set the GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS title for the largest tin of caviar ever created. Hoda Khachab the official adjudicator from GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS …
Saturday Roast at The Red Lion English Pub
Indulge in a special Saturday Roast at The Red Lion, regarded as one of the oldest and most-loved English pubs in Dubai, where family and friends can enjoy the traditional feast all day. Whether you crave for chicken, roast beef or …
View Japan's Spectacular Winter Sceneries Via Tobu Railway
Dining in an igloo, meeting snow "monsters" and walking through a "Samurai Village"; Japan offers beautiful natural sceneries and unique experiences during winter. Tobu Railway Co. Ltd, the biggest private railroad company in Kanto, Japan, offers routes to various winter wonderlands in Kanto …
Passengers benefitting after investment and upgrades across the network during festive period
Passengers returning to work todayare benefitting from a more reliable and safe railway after a programme of investment and upgrades across the network over Christmas and the New Year. On the route from London Euston to Carlisle via the …
Anglia Christmas railway upgrades completed
A long-standing speed restriction in place on the railway between Shenfield, Essex and Seven Kings, London during the summer can now be lifted, following completion of important railway improvement works over Christmas, benefiting all passengers travelling between Norwich and London. …
Aussue summer getaways to boom with January surge
Nearly 70 per cent of Australians will be taking a break over the summer months with three in ten people (30 per cent) packing their bags in January for a much deserved holiday, according to a national poll commissioned by …
Christmas sees Cambridge North station 80% complete
Major progress was made over Christmas at the site of the new Cambridge North station, which is now 80% complete, to get it ready for its opening in May this year as part of Network Rail's Railway Upgrade Plan. …
Crossrail works successfully delivered by Network Rail over Christmas
In the biggest single engineering operation ever mounted by Network Rail for the Crossrail project, major works were completed to the existing railway in outer London, Berkshire and Essex with over 4,000 workers delivering improvements over Christmas. Works will …
The Height of Luxury: Four Seasons Hotel New York Downtown Unveils Specialty Suites
Open just a few months, the all-new Four Seasons Hotel New York Downtown has quickly become the preferred address for visitors to Lower Manhattan thanks to its welcoming accommodations, unique hotel features and unparalleled service. Among its 189 light-filled guest …
JW Marriott Debuts Stunning Beach Resort on Marco Island
Published on : Tuesday, January 3, 2017
JW Marriott Hotels & Resorts, the global luxury brand that is part of Marriott International's luxury brands portfolio, has debuted JW Marriott Marco Island Beach Resort. Following an extensive $320 million renovation facilitated by ownership group Mass Mutual, the Marco …
Moroccan tourism revenues increase by end of 2016
By the end of November 2016, Moroccan tourism revenues reached MAD 59.4 billion, making Morocco "the top African country attracting tourists." This was confirmed by Abderrafie Zouitene, Director of the Moroccan National Tourist Office (ONMT). Zouitene said, "Before that …
2017 FoodTrekking Awards announced by WFTA
On 2nd January, it was announced by the World Food Travel Association (WFTA), the world's leading authority on food and beverage tourism, that the 2017 FoodTrekking Awards for excellence in food and beverage tourism are now open. These awards are …
Celebrate Ontario's 150th Anniversary in 2017
The kickoff to an exciting year has begun as Ontario celebrates the 150th anniversary of Confederation. The government is recognizing the historical significance of 2017 with Ontario150, a year-long commemoration that will honour Ontario's past, showcase the present and …
Qatar Airways and Qatar Duty Free Celebrate The Exxonmobil Open Men's Tennis 2017 Tournament
Qatar Airways and Qatar Duty Free (QDF), the official airline and retail sponsors of the Qatar ExxonMobil Open Men's Tennis 2017, are welcoming fans to the first tournament of the 25th annual ATP World Tour 250 Series in Doha. Held …
Nigeria and Seychelles hopes for a consolidated tourism industry
Lai Mohammed, Nigeria's Minister for Tourism, Information and Culture is in the Seychelles for a working fact finding visit and yesterday (Jan 2nd) he had a meeting with Alain St. Ange, the island's former Minister of Tourism, Civil Aviation, Ports …
ABTA names Kerala as 'Destination to watch' in 2017
The Association of British Travel Agents (ABTA) has named Kerala as a 'Destination to Watch' in 2017. ABTA is the U.K.'s largest and the most influential body of travel agents and tour operators. Kerala, known as 'God's Own Country' and …
The Westin Resort Nusa Dua, Bali Celebrates a Year of Successful Achievements
2016 has been another year of impressive accomplishments and milestones for The Westin Resort Nusa Dua, Bali. Throughout 2016, a long list of awards and industry accolades have been received to emphasize the resort's standing as a leading business and …
Michael Palin supports Responsible Travel's new Trip for a Trip initiative
Justin Francis, CEO of Responsible Travel has set up the initiative with the aim of addressing the inequalities in tourism. He hopes to give children the chance to appreciate the wider value of their culture or ecosystem. Justin, who is …
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Curative juice for alopecia is suggested here. Alopecia is a medical term for baldness where loss of hair mostly occurs on the scalp, but sometimes other parts of the body are also involved.
•	Extract their juice and mix well.
•	Parsley is a good source of vitamin C that helps improve circulation in the scalp.
•	Use of spinach, cabbage, legumes and eggs enhances hair growth.


text:
Q: How to minimize a text in a table? My document looks like this:
Is there any way to minimize the font to make it look more attractive?

A: It is possible to use the package tabu. It is very simple to use.
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[english]{babel}

\begin{document}

Without specifying width for last column:
\begin{center}
    \begin{tabular}{| l | l | l | l |}
    \hline
    Day & Min Temp & Max Temp & Summary \\ \hline
    Monday & 11C & 22C & A clear day with lots of sunshine.
    However, the strong breeze will bring down the temperatures. \\ \hline
    Tuesday & 9C & 19C & Cloudy with rain, across many northern regions. Clear spells
    across most of Scotland and Northern Ireland,
    but rain reaching the far northwest. \\ \hline
    Wednesday & 10C & 21C & Rain will still linger for the morning.
    Conditions will improve by early afternoon and continue
    throughout the evening. \\
    \hline
    \end{tabular}
\end{center}

With width specified:
\begin{center}
    \begin{tabular}{ | l | l | l | p{5cm} |}
    \hline
    Day & Min Temp & Max Temp & Summary \\ \hline
    Monday & 11C & 22C & A clear day with lots of sunshine.
    However, the strong breeze will bring down the temperatures. \\ \hline
    Tuesday & 9C & 19C & Cloudy with rain, across many northern regions. Clear spells
    across most of Scotland and Northern Ireland,
    but rain reaching the far northwest. \\ \hline
    Wednesday & 10C & 21C & Rain will still linger for the morning.
    Conditions will improve by early afternoon and continue
    throughout the evening. \\
    \hline
    \end{tabular}
\end{center}

\end{document}

Visit this link: https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/LaTeX/Tables

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Of Love & War, by Lynsey Addario. Penguin Press. 272 pages. $40.
Heavy, by Kiese Laymon. Scribner. 256 pages. $26.
The Letters of Sylvia Plath. Harper. 1088 pages. $45.
that a person in a position of power who sees what's happening and the gross injustices and human rights abuses and deaths of women and children won't be moved to action. It's unfathomable.
Addario is aware of the contradictions inherent in her own position. Wishing to be both an objective observer and a chronicler of people's lives from their own points of view, she is nonetheless dependent for advice and access on the American soldiers she embeds with. She writes to her mother about a Baghdad cancer ward crammed with victims of exposure to depleted uranium from Gulf War–era bombs, and in another letter remarks that she'd often thought that her death might come "at the hands of the Americans." Speaking of her subjects' desire to let the public know, through her work, about the scale of the civilian casualties and "that their privacy in their homes was often being violated by troops with the American military," she clearly feels the irony that here she comes, the American journalist, camera aloft, into those same homes—and still the casualties continue.
Heavy is a palimpsestic document that begins with a statement of the author's initial desire to write it entirely differently.
I wanted to write a lie.
I wanted to do that old black work of pandering and lying to folk who pay us to pander and lie to them every day. . . . I wanted white Americans, who have proven themselves even more unwilling to confront their lies, to reconsider how their lies limit our access to good love, healthy choices, and second chances. I wanted the book to begin and end with the assumptions that if white Americans reckoned with their insatiable appetites for black suffering, and we reckoned with our insatiable appetites for unhealthy food, we could all be ushered into a reformed era of American prosperity.
Since Laymon feels so keenly the issue of who should be addressed and how, it is especially striking that throughout the book he speaks to a black woman, a "you" who is his mother, the mother who teaches college and barely scrapes by, caught in her own cycles of fear, shame, and violence, who damages him even as she gives him the tools to understand his predicament, to read and revise the world around him. A conflicted mother figure looms just as large in volume 2 of The Letters of Sylvia Plath (Harper, $45), which, spanning the years 1956 to 1963, is a marginally less vast and more intriguing book than its predecessor. In both volumes, suppressed fury and resentment are blended so expertly with the good-girl ache to please and measure up that for hundreds of pages they only rarely break the surface.
Much of this collection's newsworthiness comes from the presence of the letters Plath wrote to her shrink, Ruth Beuscher, about the dramatic end of her marriage to Ted Hughes following his affair with Assia Wevill. These are unusually frank by Plath's standards, and they cover the brief period of greatest interest (both prurient and literary), during which she wrote her best and best-known poems. (The same period is not covered in her unabridged journals, thanks to one destroyed and one mysteriously lost notebook.) Choice details already seized on last year in the British papers include Plath's claim that "Ted beat me up physically" shortly before her miscarriage, and that he expressed more than once the wish that she would kill herself. Hughes's glaring failings as a husband will surely surprise no one at this point. Their daughter, Frieda Hughes, contributes a pained introduction explaining how she came to allow the inclusion of these letters. The note of special pleading she strikes when insisting there was "context" for the alleged beating—which apparently took place after Plath tore apart some of Hughes's manuscripts—is understandable, perhaps, given what Plath's children and their father were put through in the decades after her death. Though, incidentally, Frieda's reminder that Plath's ripping of papers was a far graver offense in 1961 than it might seem to us in an age of scanners and word processors may be unnecessary for those readers who have slogged through the accounts of her typings and retypings offered elsewhere in these couple of thousand pages. Plath, we learn at length, was highly dedicated to the project of making Hughes famous, constantly working over and sending out his manuscripts as well as her own. The feminist injunction "never learn to type" evidently came too late for her.
Frieda's characterization of her parents' marriage as claustrophobic for all involved is rather confirmed in Plath's account. And it's hard to tell how literally to take Plath's assertions that Hughes wished her dead, which may seem more of a piece with her sense at that time that he was "a vampire on my life, killing and destroying all." Certainly it is true that the violence of and in the psyche was one of Plath's great subjects, and that twentieth-century poetry would be much the poorer without her gift for overstatement. What's more important is that her rage and disillusionment prompted an artistic shift, unleashing her from "the cow sludge of domesticity" and brushing aside the mental debris that litters much of her correspondence. Here is the more or less abrupt shedding, in extremis, of the "stiff," "artificial" voice that infected her early poems and stories and from which she had been working to free herself for many years.
The book provides, in the end, an account of an ordinary anguish out of which Plath produced something extraordinary. Working from four or five each morning "until the babies wake up" was "like writing in a train tunnel, or God's intestine," like an eerie inversion of the "blind, doorless and windowless corridor of pain" forever awaiting the woman in labor in The Bell Jar, subjected to "just the sort of drug a man would invent." This volume's policy on footnotes is spartan, but it is striking to see those that simply list, beneath one of the anguished letters of her final months, the poems completed that same week. She was often finishing an indelible work per day.
In reading the late letters, the still-too-common tendency to pathologize Plath and even to suggest that the power of her posthumously published collection, Ariel, came from her death—because "what their author threatened, she performed," as Howard Moss put it in The New Yorker—seems once again deeply misguided. Of course it's true that it was her dying that made Plath a phenomenon and the victim of endless lurid speculation. But the authority of the late poems is in their surreal clarity of sight and in their voice, and had Plath survived her last depression, the command she had attained could surely have been turned to other subjects.
In The Silent Woman, Janet Malcolm wrote of her and Plath's generation that "we lied to our parents and we lied to each other and we lied to ourselves, so addicted to deception had we become." There's a shadow of this in one of Laymon's incantations: "We will lie like Americans lie." Malcolm's description, like the plight of the Plath one finds in many of these letters, was historical, about a generation not yet able to "face the post-Hiroshima and post-Auschwitz world." Late in the book Plath castigates her mother, writing, "It's too bad my poems frighten you—but you've always been afraid of reading or seeing the world's hardest things—like Hiroshima, the Inquisition or Belsen." In this century there are, as Laymon confirms, still plenty of things we are discouraged from looking at head-on.


American College of Embryology (EMBCOL) launched the Know Thy Embryologist campaign to educate patients and the public about the essential role of embryologists in achieving a healthy pregnancy using IVF. EMBCOL is an organization that serves patients, embryologists, and the public by fostering and advocating excellence in the practice and ethics of assisted reproduction. Dr. Dubey was named "Embryologist of the Month" in June, 2013, for his contributions and achievements in ART and IVF.
Ivflabconsulting.com is the home website for consulting services provided by Anil K. Dubey, PhD, HCLD and his team. Dr. Dubey has been working in the field of medical assisted reproduction technology (ART) and In-Vitro Fertilization (IVF) for over 24 years.


text:
\section*{Introduction}

Transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) monolayers are direct-bandgap semiconductors of which the conduction and valence band extrema consist of two valleys \cite{Mak2010,Splendiani2010}. The broken inversion symmetry of the lattice gives rise to optical selection rules that enable valley-selective, inter-band excitation of electrons using circularly polarized light \cite{Mak2012,Cao2012,Zeng2012}. A strong Coulomb interaction results in the subsequent formation of excitons\cite{Mueller2018}, which maintain a valley polarization that is determined by the ratio between the intervalley scattering time and the exciton lifetime\cite{Mak2012,McCreary2017}. Such valley-polarized excitons have been proposed as carriers of information and play a central role in the field of valleytronics \cite{Mak2018,Schaibley2016}. As such, understanding the processes that govern the exciton lifetime and associated valley polarization is important for assessing the potential applicability of valley-polarized excitons in devices.

Under optical excitation, a charge-density-controlled chemical equilibrium between neutral and charged excitons (trions) forms in a TMD monolayer \cite{Lien2019,Ross2013,Siviniant1999}. The conversion into trions reduces the exciton lifetime\cite{HL2020} and may therefore be expected to lead to a large valley polarization of excitons that are created via valley-selective optical pumping, but demonstrating this effect has thus far remained elusive.

The charge density of TMD monolayers can be controlled via electrostatic gating or chemical doping \cite{Lien2019, Mak2013,Ross2013,Tanoh2019,Wang2019,Amani2015,Peimyoo2014,Mouri2013,Tongay2013}. While electrostatic gating is a flexible technique that allows a continuous change of the charge density \cite{Mak2013,Ross2013, Lien2019}, chemical doping provides a convenient alternative that requires no microfabrication and is well suited for achieving high doping levels \cite{Tanoh2019,Wang2019,Amani2015,Peimyoo2014,Mouri2013,Tongay2013}. Here, we study the valley polarization of excitons and trions in monolayer $\text{WS}_{2}$ and show that chemical doping via aromatic anisole (methoxy-benzene) quenches the exciton photoluminescence and causes the spectrum to become dominated by trions with a strong valley polarization. A spatial study of the remaining exciton emission shows that also the excitons attain a strong valley polarization, which we attribute to the rapid doping-induced conversion into trions. We extend a rate equation model describing exciton-trion conversion \cite{Lien2019} to include the two valleys and use it to explain the observed valley polarization in terms of the doping-controlled chemical equilibrium between excitons and trions.

\section*{Results}

When doping a TMD monolayer using aromatic molecules such as anisole, Hard Soft Acid Base (HSAB) theory allows predicting whether the dopant will be n- or p-type \cite{Wang2019}. Electrons hop between the adsorbed molecules ($A$) and the monolayer ($B$) to compensate for the difference in chemical potential $\mu$ between both systems\cite{Pearson1992}. The chemical hardness $\eta$ of the materials determines how quickly an equilibrium is reached, leading to an average number of transferred electrons per molecule $\Delta N$:
\begin{equation}
\Delta N=\frac{\mu_A-\mu_B}{\eta_A+\eta_B}.
\end{equation}
For both anisole and monolayer $\text{WS}_{2}$, the chemical potential and chemical hardness has been calculated using density functional theory\cite{Camacho-mendoza2018,Zhuang2013}. Using these values (Supplementary Section S1) we find $\Delta N=0.22$, such that we expect the monolayer to be n-doped upon physisorption of anisole molecules (Figure 1a).

To study the effect of chemical doping with anisole on the valley polarization properties of $\text{WS}_{2}$, we start by characterizing the photoluminescence of exfoliated $\text{WS}_{2}$ monolayers on 280 nm Si/$\textrm{SiO}_{2}$ substrates. The emission spectrum of an as-prepared monolayer shows the characteristic bright exciton resonance at 2.01 eV (Figure 1b, black line)\cite{McCreary2016}. After chemical doping by a two-hour treatment in liquid anisole at 70 C$^\circ$, the bright exciton resonance is strongly quenched and only a weak emission peak that is red-shifted by $\Delta E=23$ meV remains (Figure 1b, red line). Because the increased binding energy of trions compared to excitons should lead to such a red shift\cite{Mak2013} and the expected n-type doping by the anisole molecules should favour trion formation, we attribute this peak to emission associated with trions. This conclusion is further supported by spatial studies of emission spectra showing both exciton and trion components that we will describe below. As expected, the trion emission is weak due to its long radiative lifetime and strong non-radiative decay attributed to Auger recombination\cite{Lien2019,Hanbicki2016,Kurzmann2016}.

Doping by adsorbed carbon-hydrogen groups\cite{Zhang2019} was previously shown to result in an increase of the longitudinal acoustic LA(M) mode in the Raman spectrum of WS$_2$ monolayers. Our treatment causes a similar increase of the LA(M) Raman mode (Figure 1c), which we therefore attribute to the adsorption of anisole molecules. In addition, we find that the double-resonance 2LA(M) mode remains unaffected by the doping, indicating that our treatment does not significantly change the monolayer's electronic structure\cite{Berkdemir2013}.

To study the valley polarization of chemically-doped WS$_2$ monolayers, we use near-resonant excitation with a 594 nm circularly polarized, continuous-wave laser that is focussed to a diffraction-limited spot. The resulting photoluminescence is polarization filtered and collected using a home-built confocal microscope (see Methods). Before detecting the emission with an avalanche photodiode (APD), we apply a spectral bandpass filter with a transmission window centred around the exciton and trion resonances (see the shaded area in Figure 1b).

We quantify the valley polarization $\rho$ via polarization-resolved photoluminescence measurements according to
\begin{equation}
\rho=\frac{I_{\sigma_+}-I_{\sigma_-}}{I_{\sigma_+}+I_{\sigma_+}}.
\end{equation}
Here, $I_{\sigma_+}$ and $I_{\sigma_-}$ represent the intensities of the right- and left-handed emission by the sample under $\sigma_+$ excitation and the total photoluminescence is given by $I=I_{\sigma_+}+I_{\sigma_-}$. By scanning the sample while detecting its emission using the APD, we make photoluminescence and valley-polarization maps of our flakes, before and after treating them.

Before the anisole treatment, the photoluminescence is characterized by bright exciton emission (Figure 2a, left panel) with no valley polarization (Figure 2b, left panel). Strikingly, the trion emission that remains after chemical doping (Figure 2a, right panel) has a valley polarization of about 25\% (Figure 2b, right panel). We consistently observe the emergence of strong valley polarization after anisole treatment in multiple samples (Supplementary Section S2).

Next, we demonstrate the substrate independence of the effect of our treatment by repeating the measurements on an yttrium iron garnet (YIG) substrate. YIG is a magnetic insulator that was shown to effectively negatively dope $\text{MoS}_{2}$ monolayers at low temperatures, possibly due to dangling oxygen bonds at the YIG surface\cite{Peng2017}. As such, the total level of doping could be larger for monolayers on YIG due to additional doping from the substrate.

We exfoliated monolayers $\text{WS}_{2}$ onto polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) stamps and deposited them onto the YIG substrates\cite{Castellanos-Gomez2014}. As before, the emission of the monolayers is strongly quenched after chemical doping and a valley polarization of about 20\%-40\% emerges (Figure 3, Supplementary Section S2). Compared to the monolayers on Si/SiO$_2$ substrates we conclude that these data do not indicate significant additional doping from the YIG substrate.

To assess the spatial homogeneity of the doping, we characterize the photoluminescence and valley polarization of a relatively large-area monolayer flake on YIG (Figure 3a-b). In most parts of the flake, we observe a valley polarization of about 40\%. In addition, at multiple spots in the monolayer, we observe an enhanced photoluminescence and reduced valley polarization. A comparison with an atomic force microscope topography image (Figure 3c) shows that these spots are associated with wrinkles in the flake. Spectrally, the spots are characterized by the simultaneous presence of an exciton resonance and a trion resonance, with the exciton resonance rapidly vanishing as we move off the spot (Figure 3d, Supplementary section S3) and the trion brightness and polarization remaining approximately constant (Figure 3e-f). The stronger exciton emission at wrinkles indicates that the doping is less effective, possibly resulting from the restricted physical access to the monolayer at wrinkles or from a decreased substrate-induced doping due to the increased substrate-monolayer distance. In addition, the exciton and trion formation could be altered at the wrinkles as a result of local strain \cite{Harats2020}.

Strikingly, the excitons at the wrinkles also attained a strong valley polarization, as can be seen from the spectra in Figure 3d. We extend an existing rate equation model\cite{Lien2019} to argue that this is the result of the doping-induced conversion of excitons into trions (Figure 4a). This conversion acts as a decay channel for the excitons, enhancing their valley polarization and quenching their photoluminescence. The model predicts that the excitonic valley polarization starts to increase strongly when the conversion rate into trions $\Gamma_{\text{T}\leftarrow \text{X}}$ becomes comparable to the intervalley scattering rate $\Gamma_{\text{iv,X}}$ (Figure 4b, green line). Since $\Gamma_{\text{T}\leftarrow \text{X}}$ is proportional to the electron density as described by a law of mass-action\cite{Ross2013,Siviniant1999}, indeed an emergent exciton polarization is expected when doping is strong.

Strongly valley-polarized excitons are expected in the limit of large doping (Figure 4b). For our flakes, doping is strongest in the flat areas away from the wrinkles as reflected by the low photoluminescence in these areas. Because we are unable to spectrally distinguish the weak exciton emission from the dominant trion emission in these areas, we analyse the valley polarization of the integrated photoluminescence spectrum using our APD. When plotting the local valley polarization against the local photoluminescence (Figure 4c), we observe a non-monotonous behaviour with a maximum at low photoluminescence. According to our model, this maximum occurs because the exciton valley polarization (green line in Figure 4b) increases with doping while the exciton photoluminescence vanishes. As a result, the trion contribution (red line) starts to dominate the total signal (black line). These results highlight that the exciton valley polarization becomes large because of the rapid conversion into trions.

On wrinkles, we observe that the excitons have a lower valley polarization than the trions (Figure 3d). In contrast, our model predicts that the local valley polarization of the trions cannot exceed that of the excitons even at low doping (Figure 4b, Supplementary Section S4). This indicates that the observed spectra on wrinkles are a result of spatial averaging over less-doped, wrinkled areas with a strong exciton contribution and strongly-doped surrounding areas with a dominant trion emission (Supplementary Section S5). Such averaging is expected from the diffraction-limited optical spotsize of our confocal microscope (diameter: $\sim500$ nm).

In summary, we have demonstrated that chemical doping with anisole is an effective method to generate highly valley-polarized excitons and trions in monolayer $\text{WS}_{2}$ at room temperature. The emission spectrum of as-prepared monolayers is characterized by a bright exciton resonance that exhibits no valley polarization. After chemical doping, a trion resonance appears with a polarization up to 40\%. The doping is less efficient at wrinkled areas, which are marked by the simultaneous presence of exciton and trion resonances. The excitons have a robust valley polarization, which we attribute to the  rapid conversion into trions induced by the doping. A rate equation model captures the quenching-induced valley polarization, indicating the presence of excitons with a higher polarization than trions in the limit of maximal quenching. Our results shed light on the effect of the doping-controlled conversion between excitons and trions on the valley polarization in single layers of $\textrm{WS}_{2}$ and highlight that valley polarization by itself does not necessarily reflect optovalleytronic potential, since a strongly-quenched carrier lifetime and emission may constrain its application in devices.

\section*{Methods}

\subsection*{Experimental setup.} Our samples are excited by a lowpass-filtered 594 nm OBIS laser (Coherent) of which we control the polarization using achromatic half- and quarter-wave plates (Thorlabs). A 50X, NA=0.95 (Olympus) objective focuses the laser to a diffraction-limited spot and collects the emission from the sample. The handedness of the excitation and detection is controlled by a second quarter-wave plate, which projects both circular polarizations of the photoluminescence onto two orthogonal linear polarizations of which we select one with the polarizer. The emission is longpass filtered (2x Semrock, BLP01-594R-25) to eliminate the laser reflection. We use a mirror on a computer-controlled flipmount to switch between a fiber-coupled spectrometer (Kymera 193 spectrograph with a cooled iVac 324 CCD detector) and an avalanche photodiode (APD, Laser Components) for the detection of the photoluminescence. Before the emission is detected by the APD, it is filtered with a pinhole and bandpass filter (Semrock, FF01-623/32-25). The sample is mounted on an xyz-piezo stage (Mad City Labs, Nano-3D200FT) to allow nanoscale positioning of the sample. An ADwin Gold II was used to control the piezo stage and read out the APD. All measurements were performed at room temperature.\\
\subsection*{Sample fabrication.} The $\textrm{WS}_{2}$ monolayers were exfoliated from commercially-purchased bulk crystals (HQ Graphene) on PDMS stamps, and were transferred to Si/$\textrm{SiO}_{2}$ and YIG chips. The 245 nm thick YIG films were grown on a gadolinium gallium garnet (GGG) substrate via liquid phase epitaxy and were purchased at Matesy gmbh. YIG samples were sonicated in acetone and cleaned in IPA before stamping.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaArXiv


text:
Army, Coast Guard boats damaged by blast allegedly by NPAs in Masbate
Speed boats of Philippine Army and Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) were damaged in an explosion in Masbate City which authorities suspect was caused by the New People's Army (NPA) early Monday.
Capt. Joash Pramis, spokesman of the Army's 9th Infantry Division, said an improvised bomb explosion occurred at Pier Site, Brgy Bapor, Masbate City around 12:30 am.
"The explosion resulted to the damage of speed boats of the Army and PCG. No reported casualty on the incident," he said.
"The Army rescue boat was totally damaged while the speed boat of PCG partially damaged," he added.
Pramis said the most damaged part of the boat was the tail part or the area where the engine is located.
Pramis said the military is looking at the possible involvement of the NPA.
We are looking at the possible involvement of the NPA because first of all here in Bicol region based on the incidents and history, the only group capable to manufacture these kind of bombs are the NPA, and it is the NPA who only have the history on using bomb in this area," he said.
Capt. Armando Balilo, PCG spokesman, said the explosion site is around 100 meters from the PCG station.
He said according to the witnesses a small motorized boat was seen roaming at the blast site before the explosion occurred.
"Witnesses disclosed that prior to the incident, a small motorized banca was seen roaming the vicinity of the incident," said Balilo.
Pramis said the blast is a "possible diversionary tactic... to divert the ongoing operation that we have in Masbate because we have a lot of accomplishments and tactical victory in Masbate in the past months." Robina Asido/DMS.


Government employed nurses received their November salaries last week without the 13th cheque annual bonus despite a commitment by Treasury to "do something that will be a thank you to those who have worked so hard through the year".
Information minister Monica Mutsvangwa would not be drawn on the issue during her weekly post-cabinet media briefing at Munhumutapa Building on Tuesday.
"I will give you that information later," she said when asked about the bonus payments.
"We (Cabinet) deliberated on many things but I cannot share more than what I already have on what we discussed today."
Finance minister Mthuli Ncube is due to present his maiden budget this Thursday with little expected by way of giveaways to government employees who are agitating for salary increases and that wages must be paid in US$ dollars.
The minister has already announced tough austerity measures with more expected in his 2019 budget as he looks to get a grip runaway government expenditure.
Earlier this month Prof Ncube hinted that public sector employees would likely get their traditional 13th cheque.
"I won't say what will happen with bonus this year yet, but you can be sure that we are going to do something that will be a thank you to those who have worked so hard through the year, but at same time cognisant of the need to tighten our belts," he told a parliamentary pre-budget conference.
However, government nurses received their salaries last week without the bonus.
"It's like we are being punished for something we do not know of, imagine no bonus in such a tough economic climate coupled by the first lady's continued 'surprise' visits which seem to be targeted only at nurses."
Zimbabwe Nurses' Association (ZINA) secretary general Enock Dongo said government must honour the bonus commitment to civil servants.
"We were told that the bonus is our right and, considering the hard work that nurses are doing, government should really appreciate and pay our 2018 bonus without any compromise," he said.
"We want our bonuses without any compromise; no funnies. Government should look for money to pay our bonuses timeously; preferably this year."
Dongo would not say what action the association would take if the bonus is not honoured.
Hundreds of nurses were fired earlier this year by vice president Constantino Chiwenga after going on strike over night duty allowances.
Most were reinstated following the intervention president Emmerson Mnangagwa who had away attending an international event in Europe when his deputy made the drastic dismissal decision.


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Five Minute Profit Sites Review-Does this Software Works or Scam? TRUTH!
Posted on June 11, 2018 January 11, 2019 Author William James	Comments Off on Five Minute Profit Sites Review-Does this Software Works or Scam? TRUTH!


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Buzz Rankings: 4/10.
Cory Graves April 10, 2014
This Week, Power Trip Sold Out.
Each week, we take a survey of the local music scene and try to determine which acts in town are really putting in work and seeing it pay off. Which bands have the most intriguing shows coming up? Which bands are getting the most press around town? Which bands have accomplished the most notable feats of late? Based off these criteria, our music writers submit a list to be weighted and compiled into a master list revealed each week in this here space. We like to think it's fairly revealing. Check out our previous Buzz Rankings here.
What's traditionally the most marginalized genre in local music? We've heard arguments from each of the hardcore, country and hip-hop sets in recent years. And, sure, there was probably a time when each of those genres were underrepresented in the local media or discriminated against by a handful of local club owners.
These days, though, that couldn't be further from the truth. Take the top third of the bands in this week's rankings, for instance, where country outfits Madison King and Pat Green, hip-hop acts The D.O.C and Snow tha Product, and hardcore heroes Power Trip represented their genres well.
But how did each those acts earn their spots this week?
Power Trip, who actually didn't show up on any PBS shows this week, have been selling test pressings, out-of-print shirts and other rare merch items via eBay to help its frontman Riley Gale settle some debts so he can move to Chicago in the not-too-distant future. As such, the band's headlining turn tomorrow night at Dada is reportedly one of the band's last — if not the last — before that move comes.
Meanwhile, last week's Buzz champ, Madison King, is still riding high of the release of her latest disc, which has gotten positive reviews from everyone and their dog. And, though it's been somewhat overlooked in the many reviews of Bruce Springsteen's free performance last Sunday, local import Pat Green also performed earlier on that bill.
On the hip-hop front, The D.O.C spoke at the premiere screening of new documentary We From Dallas earlier this week. As part of those remarks, the onetime creative force behind N.W.A. indicated that he believes the Dallas hip-hop scene will one day get its moment in the sun.
And you can look no further than part-time Fort Worth resident Snow tha Product for evidence that said day may come sooner than later. The rapper headlines a show at Trees this weekend.
Speaking of locals headlining Trees this weekend: TEAM* will pull off the feat on Friday. Other headlining acts from this coming weekend include Reverend Horton Heat at Gas Monkey, Bad Sports at Double Wide and Warbeast at Rail Club.
Elsewhere; Two Knights released its debut LP; Ejecta released a new NSFW video; The Slack reunited; and 100 Proof Hatred landed an Observer cover story, if, granted, for all of the wrong reasons.
(Also receiving votes this week: Somebody's Darling, Def Rain, Hazardous Dukes, Slobberbone, Brutal Juice, Missing Sibling, The Slack, WishFM, Fox & The Bird, The Longshots, Toadies, Street Arabs, True Widow, Senor Fin, Baboon, Final Club, War Party, County Lines, Danny Diamonds, Drug Animal, The O's, Ronnie Heart, J. Charles and the Trainrobbers, SoMo, Fungi Girls, Lazy Summer, Ghost Image, Sin Motivo, Texas Gentlemen, Foxtrot Uniform.)
Previous ArticleBridging The Gap.
Next ArticleOn Tap.


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Recommendations to Strengthen the International Audit and Ethics Standard-Setting System
Associations & Practice	 2058 VIEWS
Thursday, July 16, 2020 / 08:17 AM / By IOSCO / Header Image Credit: Ecographics
The Monitoring Group (MG) yesterday presented its recommendations Strengthening the International Audit and Ethics Standard-Setting System.
The MG is responsible for the overall governance of the international audit and ethics standard-setting process and the review of its effectiveness. The set of recommendations fulfills the overall objective that the MG set out when the effectiveness review began in 2015 - to strengthen international audit and ethics standard-setting to enhance its responsiveness to the public interest and improve audit quality.
Specifically, the recommendations are designed to achieve the following objectives:
Achieve an independent and inclusive, multi-stakeholder standard-setting system;
Reinforce the consideration of the public interest within the standard-setting process and throughout the full cycle of standards' development, with enhanced independent oversight and standard-setting guided by the Public Interest Framework; and
Foster the development of timely, high quality standards that respond to an accelerating pace of change.
The Monitoring Group developed these recommendations through extensive outreach including the following:
Issuance of a public consultation in 2017 (See Monitoring Group Consultation and Summary of Feedback);
Discussions with international audit and ethics standard-setting, oversight, and auditing professional stakeholders;
Discussions held around the world with investors, regulators and other stakeholders; and
Discussions within and among the Monitoring Group member organizations.
The future structure, governance, process of standard-setting and funding goals of the international audit and ethics standard-setting system as outlined in the recommendations represent significant enhancements to the current structure. These key enhancements to the current structure will strengthen the standard-setting process, which should result in standards that are more responsive to the public interest and in turn lead to improved audit quality.
As a result, the MG believes that it is in the public interest to publish these recommendations so that stakeholders can begin implementation as quickly as possible. The MG envisages that a transition plan will be established within the next nine months and that these recommendations will be implemented within three years thereafter.
Under the recommendations, the PIOB will continue to have the critical role of providing independent oversight of the public interest responsiveness of audit and ethics standard-setting. The MG looks forward to working with the PIOB and the standard-setting boards to achieve enhancements in the standard-setting system in the public interest and improvements in audit quality.
Ms. Ana Martínez-Pina, Co-Chair of the Monitoring Group said: "Today is a significant day in our long journey to develop these important recommendations, where the contribution from all MG members and the key stakeholders has been key. We are eager to begin the transition phase which will allow us to put the recommendations in place so that we can begin to see the improvements in audit quality that we expect to result from their implementation."
Mr. Sagar Teotia, Co-Chair of the Monitoring Group stated: "The hard work of each of the MG member organizations and key external stakeholders, along with the feedback from the public throughout this process, culminated in the recommendations being published today. Thank you to each of you that have participated in the process. We are pleased to begin the next phase of transition and implementation and are eager to see the improvements to audit quality."
About the MG
The Monitoring Group (MG) is a group of international financial institutions and regulatory bodies committed to advancing the public interest in areas related to international audit-related standard-setting and audit quality. This publication is part of its ongoing global effort to promote high-quality international auditing and ethical standards.
Further information can be obtained from here.
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The Embassy of the Republic of Indonesia in Vienna and the University of Vienna invited to a Gamelan and Dance Performance under the motto "An Ancient Cultural Heritage of Indonesia" taking place at the campus of Vienna University. Visitors of the event had the possibility to enjoy Pendet Dance performances by Balinese women accompanied by Gamelan music (performed by the Gamelan Group Altenberg), as well as many other traditional Indonesian music and dance.
The opening remarks were held by H.E. Dr. Darmansjah Djumala, Ambassador of the Republic of Indonesia and Prof. Dr. Stephan Müller, Vice Dean of the Faculty of Philological and Cultural Studies of Vienna University.


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16th August, 2021 | Australia, Comment, Commercial, Demand response, Efficiency, Electric Vehicles, For Consumers, PPAs, Projects, Pumped hydro, Renewables, Solar, Solar, Solar Projects, Storage, Transmission, VPPs, Wind, Wind Projects |
Australia is in transition. The ways we draw our power have changed so vastly in a relatively short time that our grid infrastructure is being stretched. The traditional model, where we draw the majority of our energy from fossil fuels and natural gas, is evolving. Solar, wind, waves and even hydrogen now make up the energy mix.
While a proactive approach is the right way forward in reducing emissions and ultimately decarbonisation, the fact remains parts of the grid are not yet ready for a mass scale-up to accommodate a large proportion of renewable energy.
As a visual representation, when compared to the maze-like layout of countries such as the US and UK, Australia's electricity grid is akin to one single thread, connecting the northernmost tip of Queensland around the coast through NSW and Victoria to South Australia and Tasmania, with a few branches reaching out along the way.
The result of this layout is that a serious connection breakdown anywhere can have a sizeable impact thousands of kilometres away. With a government priority being to increase renewable take up, and land acquisition no longer the critical bottleneck, conversations have turned more towards the capability of the grid.
Primary function
A connected grid must produce energy as its primary function, as well as deliver power at the right voltage and frequency at a local level, usually around 50Hz. It can be a lengthy, complicated process to identify a transmission line that new generation can be connected to, especially with all the different interacting inputs now joining the mix from renewable sources. There is the added risk that these will become too much for the protection systems currently in place to prevent equipment damage – it was mis-specified protection systems that contributed to the infamous 2016 blackout in South Australia.
At the time of the South Australia blackout, wind power was blamed for the outage. Though it was a rare event that even the most thorough simulations were unlikely to have predicted, the issues of our relatively sparse transmission grid had been laid clear for the world to see. Since then, we have witnessed a surge in the demand for rooftop solar and a commitment from the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) to have a grid capable of managing instances of 100% instantaneous penetration of wind and solar generation by 2025.
Let's take that second point for a moment. An entire country's grid powered by renewable energy in fewer than four years. It's hard to imagine that such a feat would be possible, but it is … if some critical steps are addressed first.
At Vysus Group we have repeatedly seen the consequences of errors being made at important steps in the initial planning and development stage, causing delays, financial issues and strained relations with investors.
Interestingly, however, our weak energy grid has resulted in Australia having some of the most stringent connection regulations in the world. A whole raft of potential impacts pertaining to safety and performance are analysed closely at an early stage, yet issues still arise. In fact, many of our clients come to us to resolve issues which may have been prevented with closer insight.
Realistic scenarios
To take a renewable energy project from conception through to construction can be a lengthy procedure. Even at an early stage there is a lot of work going into computer modelling and simulations, the results of which determine whether a project can advance. These involve subjecting the simulation to different energy inputs and disturbances and creating as many realistic scenarios that the grid could encounter based on all current and planned renewable energy sources generating at once.
Using these models and simulations is key for getting a holistic overview. By demonstrating robustness to disturbances at all points on the grid, the simulations unearth solutions that will ultimately improve efficiency and return on investment. And because this happens before spades touch the ground, the scope is there to rectify any complications not previously considered in preliminary consultations. There is already a sizeable backlog of solar projects caused, in part, by this very reason.
To give an example, the Limondale Solar Farm project in West Murray, a notoriously weak part of Australia's grid, underwent a series of grid-connection studies to support its registration in 2020. Without these, the project would have fallen victim to compliance regulations and costly delays would have been inevitable.
Challenges in weak grids
Perhaps one of the main lessons to take from Limondale, and similar large-solar farms gaining consent on an increasingly frequent basis, is that developers need to be made more aware of, and understand better, the challenges of renewable energy technology in weak grids. Only then will the full potential of what the project can safely and consistently deliver become clearer.
Because our grid was constructed with fossil fuel energy in mind it is not always possible to simply connect and go. There are plenty of other factors to resolve, some possibly not even within 100km of the site. Limited synchronous generation, which AEMO head Daniel Westerman likened to riding a bike "really, really slowly", is one such issue.
Synchronous generation, traditionally provided by rapidly spinning machinery but in principle any "stiff" source that can force through the ideal voltage, is needed to keep the frequency where it needs to be and ensure alternating currents are "in synch" across the system. The challenge comes when the destination for those currents is far from the generator, causing a much weaker synchronising signal which the rest of the grid latches onto and moves further out of synch, in the worst case leading to a feedback loop that the grid simply cannot contain.
Viable solutions
The secondary challenge, you may not be surprised to hear, is rectifying this. Technology is already being developed to enable wind and solar inverters (rather than the rotating machinery used in coal and gas plants) to provide "grid-forming" voltage and stability across "normal" and emergency conditions, which would also bring down maintenance costs. But the immediate plan could be to use the US model of repurposing machinery from closing thermal energy plants as synchronous condensers, or the use of batteries, which are now being seen as a solution to energy fluctuations and expanding storage capabilities. Both are viable, though further discussions between developers, regulators and consultants will need to take place before either can be brought out on a mass scale.
Batteries are also being seen as a solution to providing a more continuous flow of energy from a naturally fluctuating source, or conversely, matching the energy flow to a fluctuating load.
The fast uptake of solar and renewables in Australia, roughly 10 times the global average uptake per capita, is a double-edged sword. While we're absolutely making strides towards our ambition to be a leader in renewable power, we are up against challenges that many other countries are not having to address (yet), especially around stability.
Across Australia, managing the technology shift with renewable energy is a juggling act for which engineers are figuring out solutions.
Mark Andrews is vice-president grid and power systems at engineering and technical consultancy Vysus Group.
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Pope Francis to visit the U.S.
(CNN) — Pope Francis accepted the invitation of Philadelphia Archbishop Charles J. Chaput to attend the World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia next year, the Catholic News Service reported Friday.
It would be the Pontiff's first visit to the United States as Pope.
The news service, which is the official publication of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said Chaput made the announcement Thursday before giving his homily during the opening Mass of the Tekakwitha Conference in Fargo, North Dakota.
"Pope Francis has told me that he is coming," said the archbishop as he invited his fellow Native Americans to the celebration being held in Philadelphia on September 22 to 27 in 2015.
The Catholic News Service also reports the Rev. Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman, as saying Pope Francis has received invitations to visit other cities as well, which he is considering. Those invitations include New York, the United Nations, and Washington.


Can I work while my social security disability application is pending?
If you have not worked for one year and your Application is still pending at any level, you can try to work. There are cases where people return to work and find that they cannot continue to work because of their impairment(s). If you try to work but have to stop working within 6 months due to your impairments, Social Security will consider this period an "unsuccessful work attempt". This work attempt will not affect your Application for disability benefits. With regard to an application for SSI benefits, any money earned will be deducted from the amount of retroactive benefits you may be entitled to for the months you worked.


Consumers' confidence in the economy has been very strong soon for one year. The consumer confidence indicator (CCI) stood at 23.1 in October, having been 23.7 in September and 23.5 in August. In last year's October the CCI received the value 15.8. The long-term average for the CCI is 12.2. The data are based on Statistics Finland's Consumer Survey, for which 1,184 people resident in Finland were interviewed between 2 and 19 October.
Of the components of the CCI, expectations on own and Finland's economy improved slightly in October compared with September. Expectations concerning the development of unemployment remained more or less unchanged and estimates on households' saving possibilities weakened a little. Compared with the corresponding period last year, all CCI components improved in October.
In October, consumers' expectations concerning Finland's economy and unemployment were very optimistic. Consumers' assessments about their own economic situation and saving possibilities were also bright.
Consumers regarded the time very favourable for taking out a loan and for a long time also for saving. Buying of durable goods was also considered worthwhile. Employed consumers felt in October that their personal threat of unemployment has decreased in recent months.
In October, 48 per cent of consumers believed that Finland's economic situation would improve in the coming twelve months, while 10 per cent of them thought that the country's economy would deteriorate. In September, the respective proportions were 46 and 9 per cent and in last year's October 41 and 17 per cent.
In October, 29 per cent of consumers believed that their own economy would improve and 10 per cent of them feared it would worsen over the year. One month earlier, the corresponding proportions were 27 and 11 per cent, and one year earlier 26 and 13 per cent.
Altogether 48 per cent of consumers thought in October that unemployment would decrease over the year, while 16 per cent of them believed it would increase. One year ago, the corresponding proportions were slightly pessimistic at 29 and 32 per cent.
Sixteen per cent of employed persons reckoned in October that their personal threat of unemployment had lessened over the past few months, while 13 per cent thought it had grown. Thirty per cent of employed persons felt that they were not threatened by unemployment at all.
Consumers predicted in October that consumer prices would go up by 1.7 per cent over the next 12 months. In October last year, the predicted inflation rate was 1.5 per cent, and its long-term average is 2.2 per cent.
In October, 46 per cent of consumers thought the time was favourable for buying durable goods. General intentions to spend money were moderate in October. Eighteen per cent of households were fairly or very certain to buy a car during the next 12 months. Six per cent of households considered buying a dwelling. In October, 18 per cent of households were planning to spend money on renovating their dwelling within a year.
In all, 67 per cent of consumers considered saving worthwhile in October. One month ago the respective proportion was 63 per cent and one year ago 57 per cent. In October, 67 per cent of households had been able to lay aside some money and 78 per cent believed they would be able to do so during the next 12 months. In October, households mainly planned on saving for a rainy day or for a holiday trip. Next to various bank accounts, the most planned investment targets were investment funds.
In October, 74 per cent of consumers regarded the time good for raising a loan. The long-term average proportion is 62 per cent. This October, 12 per cent of households were thinking of taking out a loan within one year.
In October, consumers' confidence in the economy was strongest in Northern Finland and Greater Helsinki, weakest in Eastern Finland. Among population groups, upper-level salaried employees were clearly most optimistic. Pensioners and unemployed persons had the gloomiest expectations concerning economic development.
The balance figures are obtained by deducting the weighted proportion of negative answers from that of positive answers. The consumer confidence indicator (CCI) is the average of the balance figures for the CCI components. The balance figures and the confidence indicator can range between -100 and +100 – the higher (positive) balance figure, the brighter the view on the economy.
Explanations for Outlook column: ++ Outlook is very good, + Outlook is good, = Outlook is neutral, - Outlook is poor, -- Outlook is very poor. Deviation of balance from average has been compared to standard deviation.
The (seasonally adjusted) Consumer Survey results for all EU countries are released on the European Commission website: European Commission, DG ECFIN, Business and Consumer Survey Results .
ISSN=1799-1382. October 2017. Helsinki: Statistics Finland [referred: 21.4.2019].