Mark & Lynn had driven into the city a couple of times and our driver recommended this place as a kind of comfort food mecca (an overused descriptor these days to be sure). But, to our surprise the place really was a kind of comfort food shangra-la (Sp?). In any event, the place's Edward Hopper like mystique is considerable with a juke box full of so bad its cool music, offbeat looking clientelle and tough dame waitresses.
Long Island Vineyards just finished up the Jazz on the Vine series of the annual Long Island winterfest series. Of note was the appearance of one of America's musical greats, the composer, performer and all-around mensch David Amram. Amram, most famous for his musical scores for The Manchurain Candisated and Splendor in the Grass played a one hour set at the Castello di Borghese vineyard in Cutchogue. Mark had the good fortune to interview the great man for Film Score Monthly and Amram graciously remembered us and invited us back to his upstate farm. He said he was going to play in Madison Square Garden with Bruce Springsteen in May (for "about 3 minutes, there are about 40 bands lined up"). In any event, Amram graciously spoke to regualar folk about their own musical careers in high school band and signed copies of his autobiography.
New York, March 10, 2009 - Which wine tastes best with pork chops in a maple glaze? Does rosemary-marinated grilled halibut invite red or white wine? Are there also great food pairings for beer, spirits, cocktails, coffee and tea?
To answer these questions and thousands more, the web site NatalieMacLean.com now offers a new Drinks Matcher widget, a portable version of the site's existing food-and-wine pairing tool. You can download the free Drinks Matcher widget in just three clicks to your computer desktop, web site, blog or social media page like Facebook, MySpace or iGoogle from www.nataliemaclean.com/matcher.
"The variety of food-and-drink combinations has exploded in the last five years," says Natalie MacLean, publisher of North America's largest wine e-newsletter. "Chicken isn't just chicken anymore: Now we eat it stuffed with pancetta and fresh herbs, rubbed with curry spices or sautéed in an orange balsamic sauce. We're looking for more interesting flavors, both on the plate and in the glass-and we want them to work together."
During the eight years that Natalie spent testing the combinations for her Drinks Matcher, she found two extremes when it comes to food and wine pairing: "Some people say that it's complete nonsense, while others insist that there's only one perfect match for every wine. Neither approach helps wine lovers."
"People want some guidance, even though the pairings are subjective. It all comes down to balancing flavors and textures. I'm a thoroughly hedonistic researcher. Of the thousands of combinations I tried, some were delicious, others were a disaster. I share the ones that worked in the Drinks Matcher."
On Saturday Night we had tuna tartar and a simple mixed green salad that was both light and substantial. The tuna in particular was a nice shot of protein with a beautiful presentation layered for a nice aesthetic affect. The bartender (who was a particularly pleasant fellow) made both of us a classic vodka martini (Mark's with a hint of Chartreuse). Of special interest was the strip of ice on the bar utilized to keep drinks cold.
The Living Room Bar at the W Hotel in Times Square is nice, but where is the food?
Mark and Lynn love a great bar an the Living Room bar in the W/Time Square is achingly chic with sleek, retro/modern furnishings an artful bar display, a shifting projection of abstract patterns and plenty of attractive bartenders to keep things interesting for the clientelle. The area is near the check in and it was tempting for Mark and Lynn to simply drop everything and have a cocktail during early afternoon check-in.


Sheriff Craig Webre announced the arrest of Taj Harris (age 31) of Raceland on Monday, April 25. Shortly after 1:30 p.m., patrol deputies in the Raceland area initiated a traffic stop on a vehicle after the driver was found to be speeding on Saint Louis Street. Deputies made contact with the driver and identified him as Taj Harris. They detected a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage coming from Harris, and he admitted to drinking prior to driving. Harris performed poorly on a field sobriety test, and a breathalyzer test indicated he had a blood alcohol content of .111g%. Deputies learned Harris had two prior DWI convictions, and his license was currently suspended. Harris was arrested and transported to the Lafourche Parish Detention Center in Thibodaux where he was booked with DWI (3rd Offense), speeding, and driving under suspension. His bond is set at $11,100.


Who do you like for the Heisman Trophy?
Somebody's got to win that bad boy.
Well, somebody other than Peter Warrick, the Florida State deep threat, whose deep-discount purchase at the local Dillard's discounted any hopes he had of collecting the most coveted piece of hardware in college football.
Joe Hamilton? Drew Brees? Ron Dayne? Chad Pennington? Thomas Jones? Shaun Alexander? Shana Alexander? Lavar Arrington? LeVar Burton? Richard Burton? Elizabeth Hilton Wilding Todd Fisher Burton Warner Fortensky? None of the above? Any of the above?
I have no clue (hey, quit nodding your heads. I see you).
This is one of those years where there's not only no clear-cut favorite, there's no consensus as to what criteria the voters are looking for in a Heisman candidate.
Will there be a stats-are-too-big-to-ignore winner like Barry Sanders (1998) or Andre Ware ('89)? A lifetime-achievement-award winner like Ricky Williams ('98)? A politically correct let's-give-it-to a-defensive-player winner like Charles Woodson ('97)? A highlight-reel winner like Doug Flutie ('84), Rashaan Salaam ('92) or Tim Brown ('87)? A Florida school national championship QB winner like Danny Wuerffel ('96), Charlie Ward ('93) or Gino Torretta ('91)? A best-available-Notre Dame-player winner like (too numerous to mention)? Or will it be a would-someone-please-explain-this-one-to-me winner like Gary Beban ('67)?
More than 800 media people and all living Heisman winners get to choose. Even one of The Morning Herald sportswriters, the one with the last name I'm too tired to spell out right now, has a vote (he's still undecided, by the way).
So this is as good a year as any to give you, yes, I mean you, a voice in the selection of the Heisman winner.
For the first time, the fans are being given a chance to cast a vote - well, to be precise, the chance to cast approximately one-78,750th of a vote - for the nation's most outstanding college football player.
The American Suzuki Motor Corp., which along with Time Inc. and Turner Broadcasting System is now "sponsoring" the Heisman, is distributing ballots at its dealerships nationwide and over the Internet (at www.suzuki.com) for fans to vote for their favorite players. Fill 'em out and mail 'em in or drop 'em off at your local Suzuki dealer (the closest "local" dealers are in Gaithersburg and Winchester).
The winner of the fans' balloting will actually receive one vote in the official Heisman balloting. So if you and about 40,000 other Maryland fans can stuff the ballot box for, say, Omar Cheeseboro, the Terps' wide receiver will officially be a "Heisman runner-up," and your collective votes will cancel out anything that Parasiliti (did I get all the vowels in?) does.
As an extra incentive, your fan ballot automatically enters you in a sweepstakes. Prizes include a Suzuki vehicle and an expense-paid trip for two for next year's Heisman banquet and awards ceremony in New York, where you can congratulate Omar personally (remember, your balloting this year positioned Mr. Cheese as a top contender for the Heisman in Y2K).
The fan voting is now in progress and will continue through Nov. 30, a week before those writers like whatsisname have to turn in their ballots.
1. George W. Bush (his presidential campaign isn't taking any chances).
Boonsboro 22, Smithsburg 20 - Go with the Warriors in this war for Md. 66 bragging rights.
North Hagerstown 15, South Hagerstown 14 - The game's a tossup, but the South faculty is a lock to win the relay race at halftime.
Williamsport 24, Francis Scott Key 12 - Will 7-3 get the Wildcats into the playoffs? It'll be close.
Middletown 13, Walkersville 7 - MVAL saves its best game for last.
Brunswick 26, Catoctin 6 - Next stop for Railroaders is the postseason.
Martinsburg 44, Jefferson 24 - 'Dogs will be in their own house for first playoff game.
Greencastle 30, Susquehanna Township 21 - The Devils, you say.
Central Dauphin 49, Waynesboro 13 - On Pac-Man's 20th birthday, Indians get Chaumped.
West Perry 43, James Buchanan 6 - Rockets' mission put on hold until next fall.
Hancock 29, Berkeley Springs 23 - Panthers leave their winless rivals panting.
Chambersburg 28, Carlisle 21 - Trojans marshal a win over the Thundering Herd.
Mercersburg Academy 37, St. James 13 - Saints get little mercy from Mercersburg.
Shippensburg 40, California (Pa.) 21 - Vulcans will need more than phasers to stun Ship.
Frostburg State 27, Greensboro 10 - Bobcats prowl closer to Atlantic Central title.
Maryland 35, North Carolina State 25 - Terps couldn't do the Duke, but if they can't smack the Pack, they're in trouble.
Penn State 30, Minnesota 16 - I won't gopher the upset pick here, although it's tempting.
Navy 37, Rutgers 33 - Mids could be waylaid by winless Knights.
Virginia Tech 50, West Virginia 13 - The CBS eye will be looking away by the third quarter.
Shepherd 51, West Liberty 20 - Rams still unranked? Baaaaa!
Redskins 25, Bills 20 - No magic from Flutie this week.
Panthers 30, Eagles 19 - In my mind, I'm going with Carolina.
Browns 23, Ravens 20 - Maybe Baltimore should switch to the single wing.
Steelers 12, 49ers 10 - You'd be better off popping a CD-ROM in your PC and matching up the '75 Steelers vs. the '89 Niners.


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text:
What's In a (University) Name?
An organization's name is an important part of its identity. Names can also be valuable signals to market participants about mission, values, and strategy. Certainly, names seem to matter: a 2001 paper by Michael J. Cooper, Orlin Dimitrov, and Raghavendra Rau, "A Rose.com by Any Other Name," documented a positive and significant stock-price reaction to announcements of adding "dot-com" to company names. (No word on the reaction to the reverse, as when Monster.com changed its name to Monster in 2003.)
Two universities in my state have gotten into the act. In 2005 Southwest Missouri State University changed its name to Missouri State University to reflect a more national orientation. (In most US states the "University of XYZ" is the original state university and "XYZ State University" is the newer, land-grant institution; in Missouri, however, the land-grant designation was given in 1870 to the already-existing University of Missouri, officials of which strongly opposed giving the name Missouri State to a rival institution.) Now the University of Missouri system has announced that the University of Missouri-Rolla, one of four campuses in the state system (and home of guest blogger Chihmao Hsieh), will change its name to Missouri University of Science and Technology. The name change is "is part of chancellor John S. Carney III's goal of making UMR one of the nations top 5 technological research universities by 2010," according to a news release. But will it smell as sweet?
Update: My old college classmate Jim Surowiecki, author of The Wisdom of Crowds, wrote about corporate name changes for Slate back in 1997.
30 April 2007 at 10:35 pm Peter G. Klein 10 comments
Tips for Academic Presentations
Good tips from Jonathan Shewchuk (via Craig Newmark). Written for computer scientists but mostly applies across the board. Highlights:
A talk of 30 minutes or less should be an advertisement for the paper, not a replacement.
It is disturbing that so many presentations have large wasted bands of space on the border of every slide, as if to taunt the audience — "I could have used a readable font, but it's just you."
You communicate most powerfully when your every movement, facial expression, and utterance is in the service of the words you are saying right now, and no unproductive movement takes place.
Good speaking is about rhythm. The most common type of bad speaker delivers one talk-length paragraph at a uniform speed, never slowing for emphasis.
Most everything else, especially aesthetics, is learned through practice and feedback.
Includes great cartoons, like the one above.
See also this and this on PowerPoint.
30 April 2007 at 12:00 am Peter G. Klein Leave a comment
The Dark Side of Capital Pooling
The great advantage of joint-stock companies, whether public or private, is the ability to create value by pooling capital. Unfortunately, capital pools can also be channeled to activities that destroy value. (HT: Against Monopoly.)
28 April 2007 at 10:51 am Peter G. Klein 1 comment
Teaching Management through Demotivators
Like many of you, I've considered using teaching my managerial economics course using a Dilbert collection as a secondary, or even primary, text. There are so many good ones! One could also use the wickedly funny Demotivators to illustrate key managerial and organizational theories and concepts. For example:
Gains from trade: Consulting
Agency costs: Get to Work, Indifference, Mediocrity
Human capital: Incompetence, Potential
Time preference, discounting: Procrastination
Risk aversion: Risks
Relative performance evaluation, internal labor markets, tournaments: Blame, Delusions, Elitism, Success
Organizational innovation, strategic change management: Change
Free riding, teams: Irresponsibility
Hierarchy: Power
Role of the institutional environment: Effort, Underachievement
28 April 2007 at 8:14 am Peter G. Klein Leave a comment
How Well Do You Know Your Advisor?
| Chihmao Hsieh |
Unless you've already seen it, here's a quite popular comic strip glorifying and lampooning school, and particularly graduate studies. Below was the comic for 04/23 (infinitely clearer version here). Another recent good one is the sheet used for Seminar Bingo. (Caution: The comic's archive is a happily illuminating time sink.)
27 April 2007 at 2:53 pm hsiehc 1 comment
The Language of Economists (and Sociologists)
From the "news that will shock no one" department come the results of this linguistic analysis of four economics journals, the American Economic Review, Economic Journal, Journal of Economic Perspectives, and American Journal of Economics and Sociology, along with a control group containing the American Journal of Sociology, Journal of Microscopy, and Journal of the American Mathematical Society:
The present study aims to add to our knowledge about economic rhetoric by conducting a data-driven analysis of economic academic discourse, both synchronically in its contemporary form, and diachronically over the past four decades. We find (1) that linguistically, economics is clearly an academic genre of its own, (2) that there are at the same time clear differences in vocabulary and style usage across economic journals, and (3) that there have been major developments in economic prose during the past four decades. We argue that there is some, albeit tentative, evidence that the discipline may face an increasing methodological gap.
Here is the paper, "What Do Economists Talk About? A Linguistic Analysis of Published Writing in Economic Journals" by Nils Goldschmidt and Benedikt Szmrecsanyi (American Journal of Economics and Sociology 66, no. 2, April 2007). The "gap" is between journals like the AER and EJ that use increasingly formal, empirical (scientistic?) terminology and journals like JEP and AJES that favor broader, social-science terms and concepts ("justice," "society," "culture," "institutions"). Interestingly, use of social-science terminology in the AER, relative to the other journals, dropped between 1965 and 1980 but rose again between 1980 and 1990. Too early to reflect the Freakonomics phenomenon, to be sure, but perhaps a marker for economic imperialism more generally?
27 April 2007 at 2:10 pm Peter G. Klein 1 comment
Political Instability and Financial Development
The latest salvo in the debate over the role of legal origin in financial-market performance comes from Mark Roe. In "Political Instability and Financial Development" (with Jordan Siegel) he argues that political instability is a more important determinant of financial development than trade openness, latitude, and, particularly, legal origin as modeled by LLSV. "Surprisingly, despite the widespread view in the law and finance literature of legal origin's importance, not only is political stability highly robust to legal origin, but, for many years, our results for key indicators and specifications neither show Common Law to be consistently superior nor French Civil Law to be consistently inferior to other legal families in generating strong financial development outcomes."
See also my "Politics and Productivity" on the interaction between political institutions, economic freedom, and national economic performance.
The Market for Organization Equals USD 7.6B
Home organization (in 2009), that is.
A CNN article posted online last month has re-appeared in the headlines today, probably in response to the woman who is virtually selling virtually (sic) all her belongings in one single auction on EBay (see the actual listing here). To spare you the reading, the article essentially describes our "hyper-consumptive society deluged by its own belongings," mentions the TV shows and firms that create products and promote services to help us organize our belongings, and highlights associations like the new-but-fast-growing National Association of Professional Organizers.
Personally, in the last few years I've become much more mindful of the number of discrete items I keep at home, that mindfulness mainly a side effect of thinking in terms of this kind of complexity theory and this subfield of cognitive science.
26 April 2007 at 5:00 pm hsiehc 3 comments
Five Blogs That Make Me Think
When Nicolai and I started this blog a year ago we were hoping for a plural readership. Now that we've hit that target we can move on to the next: making our readers think. Fortunately, we've already succeeded with at least one reader: Nijma of Camel's Nose, who named O&M one of five blogs that make her think. This is one of those "memes" in which each blogger named is supposed to name five bloggers who make him think, who in turn name five bloggers that make them think, and so on, until everyone is nested under someone else, sort of like Amway but without money changing hands.
The Thinking Blog's Ilker Yoldas is responsible for all this (and for supplying the nice graphic above). Yoldas describes the exercise as a humanistic alternative to blog ranking systems like Technorati based on quantitative analysis of linking patterns, just as "human-powered" search engines like ChaCha are alternatives to Google.
Anyway, I'll play along. Here are five blogs that make me think. (To make things interesting I've excluded the sites listed already on the blogroll below.)
Eunomia by Daniel Larison
Social Science Statistics Blog by a bunch of Harvard professors
God of the Machine by Aaron Haspel
3 Quarks Daily by Abbas Raza and guests
Mouthing Off by the editors of Food and Wine Magazine (does thinking with my stomach count?)
26 April 2007 at 2:35 pm Peter G. Klein 2 comments
Reminder: Abstract Submission Deadline
Next Tuesday, May 1, is the deadline for submitting an abstract to the University of Missouri's Frameworks for Entrepreneurship Research conference. Keynote speakers include O&M favorites Pierre Desrochers and Randy Westgren (who comments as REW) so you don't want to miss it.
26 April 2007 at 9:15 am Peter G. Klein 2 comments
Puzzles and Problems Redux
In an earlier post, "Economics: Puzzles or Problems?", I noted the tendency of talented young economists to focus on clever, yet ultimately unimportant, puzzles rather than the traditional "big problems" of economics (inflation, unemployment, poverty, economic growth, regulation, political economy, etc.). Steve Levitt, and the brand of "Freakonomics" he inspired, is usually singled out as the main culprit here. A recent piece in The New Republic, "Freaks and Geeks," takes Levitt and company to task not only for wasting their time and talent, but also for being dilettantes who get key facts wrong (a point raised by Steve Sailer). Here are responses from Levitt (very unhappy), Joshua Angrist (also unhappy, though not for personal reasons), Josh Wright (mildly unhappy), and Greg Mankiw (neutral). Sadly, no one has picked up my (very clever) reference to the relationship between Wittgenstein and Popper.
Fabio Chaddad to Join Missouri Faculty
I'm pleased to announce that Fabio Chaddad of IBMEC is joining the Division of Applied Social Sciences at the University of Missouri. Fabio's research deals with networks, supply-chain management, cooperatives, corporate finance, and other aspects of strategy and organization. He may even be worthy of a guest-blogger spot at O&M!
25 April 2007 at 11:15 pm Peter G. Klein Leave a comment
Happy Birthday to Us
April 25, 2007 marks the one-year anniversary of Organizations and Markets. Thanks to our readers and to guest bloggers Joe Mahoney, Dick Langlois, Lasse Lien, David Gordon, Cliff Grammich, Steve Postrel, and Chihmao Hsieh for making the past year so much fun and challenging. We look forward — if Nicolai will forgive the pomo phrase — to "continuing the conversation."
Does Hayek Still Matter?
| Nicolai Foss |
I may be wrong, but I have the feeling that the thought of Friedrich von Hayek is receiving less and less attention. This worries me for personal reasons — I wrote my Master's Thesis in economics in 1989 on Hayek's business cycle theory, and his work has continuously served as an important source of inspiration to me (e.g., this paper) as well as to countless others — and for the reason that Hayek's thought is too important to vanish in influence. (more…)
25 April 2007 at 3:17 am Nicolai Foss 7 comments
Frank Knight and the Chicago School
Frank Knight is generally regarded, along with Jacob Viner, as the founder of the Chicago school of economics. But Knight's relationship to the later Chicago school of Friedman, Stigler, and Director is ambiguous. Knight's theories of capital and competition were incorporated into the mainstream Chicago (and contemporary neoclassical) tradition but his account of profit and entrepreneurship, his quasi-Austrian methodology (inherited from his teacher Herbert J. Davenport), and his eclectic social and political theories were largely ignored or forgotten.
Ross Emmett has a new paper, "Did the Chicago School Reject Frank Knight? Assessing Frank Knight's Place in the Chicago Economics Tradition," exploring this in detail. The conclusion: "Without [Knight's] initiation of eaching price theory and persistence in defending it, there ould be no Chicago tradition. Yet the methodological approach and research infrastructure which propelled the Chicago School to a central position in the economics profession owe little or nothing to him."
(Incidentally, critics of economics often target a stylized version of Chicago economics circa 1970 (see here), but these critics often seem unaware that the Chicago school of economics no longer exists. While there is still a (top-notch) economics department at the University of Chicago, there is no longer a distinct Chicago approach. The economics taught at Chicago is the same as the economics taught at MIT, Harvard, Stanford, or any other top mainstream department.)
24 April 2007 at 11:31 pm Peter G. Klein 3 comments
How is What is an Opportunity a Valuable Research Question?
In introducing the April 2007 Special Issue of Small Business Economics, guest editors Jeffery McMullen and Lawrence Plummer, and Zoltan Acs ask "What is an Entrepreneurial Opportunity?" First, the abstract:
The nature and source of entrepreneurial opportunity are important issues for understanding how markets function and come into being. In addition to describing the forum held on the topic and summarizing the contributions of the articles that appear in the special issue, this article shares a number of lessons learned during the workshop and the editorial process. We explore three of the most important reasons for confusion about the opportunity construct: (1) the "objectivity" of opportunity, (2) the perceived importance of one particular individual in determining the direction of the social world and (3) what distinguishes the sub-class of "entrepreneurial" opportunity from the broader category of opportunity in general. Finally, we offer some directions for future research by illuminating important issues that emerged from the workshop but that remain largely unanswered by the papers of this special issue.
Needless to say, the authors courageously untangle some fundamental concepts (i.e. different types of 'objectivity' as it might relate to the notion of opportunity). Yet a sentence in the article's second paragraph gave me pause: "…without a clear understanding of the nature of opportunity, formulating logically consistent prescriptions for both policy and practice is problematic because any theoretical basis of empirical results would be incomplete" (p. 273). (more…)
The Growth of Cities: A Formal Model
Luís Bettencourt, José Lobo, Dirk Helbing, Christian Kühnert, and Geoffrey West's paper "Growth, Innovation, Scaling, and the Pace of Life in Cities" (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104, no. 17, April 24, 2007) is getting a lot of attention, garnering plugs in Scientific American and Nature. They use data on innovation, employment, wages, GDP, consumption, crime, disease, housing, and infrastructure from US, European, and Chinese cities to estimate a "power law scaling function" linking demographic, socioeconomic, and behavioral indicators to city size. Such indicators, are related to population according to
Many diverse properties of cities from patent production and personal income to electrical cable length are shown to be power law functions of population size with scaling exponents, that fall into distinct universality classes. Quantities reflecting wealth creation and innovation have (increasing returns), whereas those accounting for infrastructure display (economies of scale). We predict that the pace of social life in the city increases with population size, in quantitative agreement with data, and we discuss how cities are similar to, and differ from, biological organisms, for which Finally, we explore possible consequences of these scaling relations by deriving growth equations, which quantify the dramatic difference between growth fueled by innovation versus that driven by economies of scale. This difference suggests that, as population grows, major innovation cycles must be generated at a continually accelerating rate to sustain growth and avoid stagnation or collapse.
For more on cities see these posts on Jane Jacobs and this one on clusters. Here is Ed Glaeser's influential 1992 paper (with Hedi Kallal, Jose Scheinkman, and Andrei Shleifer) on growth in cities. Other important Glaeser papers on cities include this one with Jesse Shapiro, this one with Albert Saiz, and this one with Christopher Berry. Here is Glaeser's review of Richard Florida's Creative Class and here is Florida's blog. And here is an interesting special issue of the Review of Austrian Economics on the new urbanism.
Update: Here is Florida's take on the paper.
Contronymns
Re Chihmao's post: English also has quite a few contronyms, words that are their own antonyms. Here is a list, including these that appear often in business administration and social-science research:
consult — ask for advice, give advice
custom — usual, special
discursive — proceeding coherently from topic to topic, moving aimlessly from topic to topic
enjoin — prescribe, prohibit
first degree — most severe (e.g., murder), least severe (e.g., burn)
handicap — advantage, disadvantage
mean — average, excellent (e.g., "plays a mean game")
oversight — error, care
rent — buy use of, sell use of
transparent — invisible, obvious
HT: LRC.
23 April 2007 at 10:53 am Peter G. Klein 22 comments
Theoretical vs. Teórico vs. 理论: How the Precision of Foreign Language Relates to the Cost of Innovation
Recently, bloggers Nicolai and Peter have highlighted the unfortunate confusions corresponding to the usage of the terms conceptual vs. theoretical, as well as usage of "method" vs. "methodology."
A few inquiries could deserve some attention. First, is this confusion specific to those terms as they appear in the English language? For instance, perhaps other languages have their own labels indicating the concepts of "conceptual" and "theoretical" but the root words (e.g. concept, theory) involved are less substitutable. I'm also guessing that other languages have distinct labels for "method" and "methodology," whereby less confusion emerges. (more…)
Media, Dummy Variables, Fame, Fathers of Sociology, and School Shootings
By now, all readers of this blog are probably well-aware of the massacre at Virginia Tech that took 33 lives. (My own prayers go out to all those affected by the tragedy.)
Some controversies are bound to be re-visited during and after the investigation (e.g. gun control) but others are starting to reveal themselves as mainstream for the first time. Namely, the media itself may be promoting these types of shootings. (more…)
21 April 2007 at 4:54 pm hsiehc Leave a comment

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Healthcare can incorporate SDoH data into daily workflows and operations.
Earlier in June I wrote about that necessary marriage of costs, coding, and the Social Determinants of Health (SDoH). I was proud to be a guest on ICD10monitor's Talk-Ten-Tuesdays to continue this dialogue. The interest and response was powerful, and there was little surprise, given the strong industry attention on SDoH. However, through Talk-Ten-Tuesdays' Q&A, another layer of the topic's onion emerged: whether risk adjustment strategies to account for SDoH would be incorporated into the readmission equation. This is a vital theme that bears consideration and discussion.
I've long said that any practitioners' efforts are only as good as their assessments, independent of professional discipline and practice setting. Well, the same can be said about coding, for it is only as meaningful and accurate as the assessment and corresponding documentation allow for it to be. In the context of SDoH, achieving accurate assessment is challenging due to the very many moving parts. In fact, many experts would profess that SDoH have become among the most difficult topics to reconcile due to their vast reach over the domains of economic stability, education, neighborhoods and physical environment, food, community and social context, and the healthcare system. These areas yield concerning health outcomes across diagnostic groups and populations impacting mortality, morbidity, life expectancy, healthcare expenditures, health status, and functional limitations. As a result, those persons most predisposed to SDoH become part of an endless game of ping-pong, bouncing back and forth between the home and hospital. Making the vital interconnections among their care episodes and social needs bears directly on quality, care, and cost outcomes for the providers and practitioners involved.
Keen assessment and inclusion of accurate risk stratification of populations have yielded some opportunities to reduce costs while improving health and behavioral health outcomes. While the SDoH involve more than one single ingredient, using the myriad forms of data associated with them packs a flavorful punch. The identification and incorporation of this data into care practices and processes is a must. For those wondering if the health industry has the technology to assess and leverage this data properly, that would be a YES. Electronic health record systems are rapidly including SDoH data, with powerful results. This number has risen from 1.7 percent of products in 2012 to 25.2 percent today.
Managed care organizations already incorporate SDoH data into their processes. Predictive analytics and risk stratification tools are demonstrating their merit. Several health plans, including Gateway Health, have moved into serious action. Gateway serves approximately 600,000 Medicare and Medicaid managed care members across seven states (Pennsylvania, Delaware, West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Arkansas, and North Carolina). SDoH data is used throughout the system to enhance patient engagement, with dramatic improvement, often producing 40 percent or higher engagement rates across conditions. This is a clear win, since 86 percent of current healthcare spending overall is related to chronic conditions, with the SDoH having an impact on 60 percent of outcomes.
The Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation State Innovation Models Initiative (CMMI-SIM) has been on the cutting edge of program development to enhance health and wellness for beneficiaries. Recognizing the strong impact of SDoH, CMMI-SIM funded the Accountable Health Communities model; the goal is to connect beneficiaries with the necessary community services to address health-related social needs. Thirty-two grants were awarded to entities in 2017, allowing participation in the model over a five-year period. Funds were secured to ensure the provision of navigation services to assist high-risk beneficiaries with accessing community services, as well as building strategic community partnerships to provide care. To date, more than $950 million has been awarded to involved states, linking their clinical, public health, and community-based resources: those geared to the SDoH.
The ICD-10 "Z" codes 55-65 are an important start, but could benefit from expansion. Just ask any front-line hospital social worker and/or case manager for recommendations of needed non-clinical additions, such as transportation. The industry has more evidence and validation than it knows what to do with toward proving the cost impact wrought by SDoH, with further validation released this month. Savings from $2,400 to over $2,600 per patient annually have been reported in populations directly linked with social service needs. Health organizations must incorporate case management models with professionals who are educated and trained in how to assess for the social and psychosocial factors that impact health (e.g. social workers, professional case managers, etc.). Linking patients across the transitions of care with appropriate non-clinical and social services, when possible, is a win toward achieving better health outcomes and financial incentives.
of predictive population health analysis. The outcomes were clear in that using professionals on the front lines who can assess for the SDoH was as, if not more, effective than reliance on the technology-driven data from electronic health records.
Back to that question posed on the June 5 Talk-Ten-Tuesdays broadcast: will risk adjustment strategies to account for the SDoH be incorporated into the readmission equation? The answer should be a resounding "yes!" Organizations can no longer afford for the non-clinical factors aligned with the SDoH to be ignored. The industry has the evidence, technology, and knowledge to assess and incorporate SDoH data into daily workflows and operations. In the end, assessment of the SDoH should be the primary ingredient of the coding, cost, and care "sauce," as opposed to the best-kept secret. Like any other professionals, coders are only as effective in their efforts as the documentation allows for them to be.


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Australia's Hastings puts career on hold due to lung condition
Medical condition causes his lungs to bleed every time he bowls
Reuters in Sydney
Former Australia all-rounder John Hastings will stop playing cricket indefinitely to battle a medical condition that causes his lungs to bleed every time he bowls and could potentially kill him, the 32-year-old said on Friday.
Hastings, who signed for the Sydney Sixers in May but will not play in the Big Bash League this season, said he had endured a difficult period over the last few months as doctors were still unable to diagnose the problem.
"Every time I've been trying to gear up and get ready to bowl, I've been coughing up blood. I won't be able to bowl this year or probably moving forward unless this situation gets sorted out," Hastings told RSN's the Breakfast Club. "It's just something that they can't say, 'look, you're not going to have a fatal bleed on the field' or it's not going to cause long-term damage... at this stage, unless something miraculous happens, I won't be able to bowl."
Hastings played one Test match, 29 one-day internationals and nine Twenty20 matches for Australia before his retirement from international cricket in 2017.
The all-rounder said the condition, which first surfaced years ago but worsened this year, had left him shattered as it did not affect him during activities like boxing and rowing.
"I've come to terms with it now, but over the last four or five months it's been a very tough period," Hastings added. "I've played this game my whole life and I wanted to keep playing it. I wanted to play tournaments all around the world. That's one of the reasons I retired early from one-day and four-day cricket. To see it maybe slipping away, it's tough to take."
Imamul Haq ruled out of Abu Dhabi Test with finger injury
PSL draft to take place on November 20 in Islamabad
Cheeky fan rushes Kohli to get Test embrace


My, but we have some strong opinions!
Come on . . . are things really that bad in the Golden State?
According to a new U.S. News & World Report survey, California looks downright pathetic when you see where we sit on the quality-of-life measuring stick.
Compared with the other 49 states, California fares better in the survey when you consider specific metrics such as education, crime or health care. But when we're judged by just good ol' day-to-day existence, we'd all do better moving to Arkansas. The Natural State – whose motto is Regnat Populus, which is Latin for "the people rule" – is ranked Number 7, though that certainly looks like a typo, doesn't it?


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Q: How to make xubuntu boot faster on old computer? I recently reinstalled my computer with xubuntu to 16.10 with hopes to get faster boot again, but boot still takes about two minutes. What settings do i change to prevent already checked checks and/or loading support for hardware i dont have present? My pc is old Pentium 4 at 3Ghz with 80GB hdd and 3GB ram. Wired internet, no wireless nonsense. Dualboot with Win XP.
edit: cant paste it, too big, so i saved it to text file here.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


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Camera IconProtesters linked to the Yellow Vests movement have sparked new demonstrations during the annual Bastille Day ceremony.Picture: AFP
French police fire tear gas at Yellow Vest protesters as violence erupts after Bastille Day parade in Paris
AFP, AAPNews Corp Australia Network
NewsWorld NewsQLD NewsNT NewsRegional WAVIC News
French police fired tear gas at protesters during a tense standoff in central Paris on Sunday in the aftermath of the annual Bastille Day military parade on the Champs-Elysees, AFP reporters said.
Officers attempted to disperse dozens of protesters, who chanted anti-government slogans, knocked down security barriers erected for the parade and set fire to refuse bins.
Camera IconProtesters linked to the Yellow Vests (Gilets Jaunes) movement take part in a demonstration at the annual Bastille Day ceremony, on the Champs-Elysees in Paris.Picture: AFP
France, in particular Paris, has been rocked since late last year by the "yellow vest" protest movement against the government of President Emmanuel Macron.
Sunday's violence was the worst seen in central Paris since March.
Many analysts had believed that the yellow vest movement had lost momentum.
But the demonstrators in central Paris were not wearing the yellow vests that marked out the movement.
Police had earlier not allowed those wearing the garments past barriers and some had carried yellow balloons instead.
Camera IconMembers of the Gendarmerie stand in front of the Arc de Triomphe as protesters linked to the Yellow Vests (Gilets Jaunes) movement take part in a demonstration.Picture: AFP
The clashes tarnished the July 14 national day that commemorates the 1789 storming of the Bastille fortress in Paris during the French Revolution and is marked every year by a military parade.
Mr Macron sought to showcase European military co-operation in the parade, hosting key EU leaders including German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.
Earlier some protesters had jeered and whistled at Mr Macron as he stood in an open-top command car alongside France's chief of staff General Francois Lecointre.
Camera IconFrance's President Emmanuel Macron in command car during the Bastille Day military parade down the Champs-Elysees avenue in Paris.Picture: AP, Eliot Blondet/AP
Before the current clashes erupted, Paris authorities said 152 people had been detained.
French police have fired tear gas to disperse protesters from the Champs-Elysees avenue a few hours after President Emmanuel Macron had presided over the Bastille Day military parade alongside other European leaders.
The boulevard in central Paris was reopened to traffic on Sunday as soon as the parade finished but a few hundred "yellow vests" tried to occupy it.
Originally published as Cops fire tear gas at Paris protesters


OP-ED: Roy Moore Lost. The Constitution Won.
Our amended Constitution made this possible. Everyday Americans had the power to triumph last Tuesday because our Constitution is stronger than Roy Moore. It's even stronger than the Supreme Court. But it isn't certain to remain so. Only with the sustained, active commitment to the future of our country that we saw from the majority of voters in Alabama can We the People keep it that way.
We should not be surprised that Moore would pine for a bygone constitutional era. This is the man, let's not forget, who nostalgically cited the antebellum years as the last time America was great (a "time when families were united, even though we had slavery," he said). In the wake of Moore's failure to win his race for the Senate, however, it is worth pointing out that he clearly understands the progressive arc of our Constitution's text and history, and fears its strength. After all, the very Amendments he would see repealed are at the root of his electoral downfall.
Moore's defeat is a reminder to everyone in America and around the world that our Constitution – an imperfect work-in-progress since the very beginning – is an incredibly resilient document. Our founders designed a Constitution that enshrines enduring values, even as it can be amended to adapt to changes in our dynamic society.
In subsequent decades, the right to vote for more people was protected through additional amendments to our Constitution addressing women, people over age 18, and those blocked from the ballot box because of inability to pay poll taxes. We also extended the right to vote for a certain federal office – that of United States Senator – placing that power in the hands of the people instead of state legislators so corrupt that, in some places, they were selling Senate seats to the highest corporate bidder.
"[S]ome of these amendments have completely tried to wreck the form of government that our forefathers intended," Moore said. If by "wreck," he meant shifting power away from state institutions and state government officials to other institutions and officials more willing and able to protect our rights, fixing flaws in the founders' original design, then Roy Moore was right. That was the entire point.
But those Amendments – and the people who drafted and ratified them – didn't merely "try" to do this. Hundreds of thousands of men and women from the Civil War and Reconstruction era, the Progressive era, up through the women's suffrage and civil rights and movements, toiled, bled, and died to sweep aside many of the vicious inequities allowed by our original Constitution. There is still much more work to do, but their sacrifice made our nation's founding charter more perfect.
Last Tuesday proved that. To a degree almost no one predicted, Roy Moore's nostalgia for America's pre-Civil War constitutional past was repudiated. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans and women in Alabama flooded the polls, exercised their right to vote for U.S. Senator, and elected Moore's opponent, Doug Jones. They did this in spite of a defective and dangerousruling from the U.S. Supreme Court, written by Chief Justice John Roberts, that flashed a green light to officials like those in Alabama who passed malicious laws to suppress their votes. It is no coincidence that the very people who Moore's vision would exclude, once again, from participating in our democracy were the same people who sent him packing.


Virtual Huddersfield, established 2001, is a truly local website to help you plan your shopping and business trips to Huddersfield and surrounding villages.
Browse over 2000 real shops & businesses with exterior photographs laid out on Virtual Streets, exactly in the location they are on the real streets.
Use your mouse or finger to move around with the Map, A-Z Search or Virtual Taxi, always at the top of your screen, no typing needed!
Use the Road Signs to cross-over or go to the next street. Help and other links are at the bottom of your screen. 30 second 'How To' videos are in Help, always top right.
See Huddersfield LIVE on our Webcams and see local events and Shop Promotions on Web Videos.
Taking a personal interest in your family and business needs.
Looking for business premises in Huddersfield?
JPB Jewellery, Half Moon St.


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Category: Slipstream
By Theresa Skora It's All Theatre experienced the most tragic scene in its history. The loss of our father, Daniel Skora, was an enormous shock to our family and friends, and to the theatre community. Over the last 2 months, we have begun to find ways to honor his life and to keep his spirit … More Best of the Season 2017-18
Tartuffe Divides Household in Old Detroit at Slipstream
By Daniel Skora "Tartuffe", by French playwright and actor Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (Moliere, as he was known by his stage name), is a classic of world literature. The comedy has a long and cherished history dating back to its first performance at the Versailles in 1664. It deals with Tartuffe, a man with religious pretentions who … More Tartuffe Divides Household in Old Detroit at Slipstream
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Slipstream's "Dr. Heidi Jekyll" Remakes a Classic
By Daniel Skora The latest classic to get the Slipstream Initiative Theatre makeover is Robert Louis Stevenson's "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde". The revamped version is called "Dr. Heidi Jekyll", and though the play still deals with the transformation of its title character from a good, decent (wo)man to a self-centered, … More Slipstream's "Dr. Heidi Jekyll" Remakes a Classic
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Accept payment for paid account upgrades using FirstData.com.
Once the plugin is installed and activated, it automatically shows as a payment option on the account upgrade page.
Users can submit payment via FirstData.com using a credit card on their own merchant account.
Many more, depending on your merchant account.
* Note: Before you buy this plugin you should setup an account with FirstData.com and ensure they permit your site to be used using your preferred payment methods. Not all payment methods may be available, they also may be restricted by the type of business. Contact FirstData.com to clarify beforehand.


In the second glyphosate personal injury case to go to a jury trial, a federal jury in the case of Hardeman v. Monsantomatter returned a unanimous verdict of $80 million for the plaintiff against the defendant. The verdict ended a two-part trial over the plaintiff's allegations that his exposure to glyphosate over a period of approximately 25 years of spraying Roundup on his 56-acre property caused him to develop Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. In the first phase, which ended last week, the jury found that the plaintiff's exposure to glyphosate caused his cancer. In the phase that occurred over the last week the jury determined additional elements of liability as well as damages. The jury heard evidence that Monsanto was allegedly aware of various studies linking its glyphosate-based Roundup product to cancer, but failed to warn consumers about it. The jury was also presented alleged evidence that Monsanto engaged in ghostwriting multiple articles which, according to the plaintiffs, were written in an effort to mislead federal regulators and the public about glyphosate's safety.
Monsanto vigorously defended the matter. Among other defenses, it argued that, until recently, no health organization or government body had found that glyphosate could cause cancer. Moreover, as to that aspect of plaintiff's case seeking punitive damages, the defendant argued that, in order to prevail, the jury would need to essentially find that Monsanto engaged in conduct that would be akin to criminal conduct.
Of the $80 million verdict, $200,967 represented economic damages. The jury awarded $5 million for past and future noneconomic damages (pain and suffering). The remaining $75 million reflected punitive damages award.
The defendant will likely appeal this award. Back in October, the same defendant appealed the $289 million jury in the first glyphosate verdict against it, which resulted in the award being lowered to $78 million. The judge in that case found that, under the U.S. Supreme Court case of State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co. v. Campbell, which provides a framework for evaluating whether a punitive damages award violates the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, the ratio between the punitive damages award and compensatory damages award should be one-to-one. Assuming an appeal is taken, the defendant will likely make similar arguments in appealing this second verdict. The defendant will also likely appeal other aspects of the trial.


Executives of the NDC in the Offinso North District have accused their District Chief Executive; Samuel Kojo Appiah Kubi of tarnishing the image of President John Mahama and the NDC.
Party executives who spoke to rawgist.com describe him as a arrogant, disrespectful and a snob.
A petition sent to the President by the party executives also accuse the DCE of being selective in the execution of his duties.
Youth Organizer of the Party Hussein Suleman, recounted how the DCE actively marred the Offinso North Constituency Executive Conference by targeting a group of aspirants he claimed were the chairman's group. He tells rawgist.com the DCE has vowed to make things very difficult for the current leadership of the party.
The youth Organizer says all attempts to resolve whatever impasse there is has been fruitless as the DCE has refused to budge.
He also alleges the DCE does not attend functions in the district, does not help party faithful, refuses to grant the press interviews and most times not at post.
Husein Suleman said about 13 executives of the party including himself are calling on the national executive to immediately investigate and take action to protect the fortunes of the party in the forthcoming elections.


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Gerald Ratner Athletics Center
Designed by famed architect Cesar Pelli, the Gerald Ratner Athletics Center opened to the University of Chicago community in the fall of 2003. The building is named in honor of Gerald Ratner (A.B.'35, J.D.'37), who was an outfielder for Chicago during its days as a member of the Big Ten Conference.
Located at the southwest corner of Ellis Avenue and 55th Street, the air-conditioned, 150,000 square-foot facility features the 50-meter x 25-yard Myers-McLoraine Swimming Pool; the Bernard DelGiorno Fitness Center with cardiovascular exercise equipment, selectorized weightlifting machines, and free weights; a multipurpose dance studio; competition and auxiliary gymnasia; classroom and meeting room space; permanent and day lockers and locker rooms; the University of Chicago Athletics Hall of Fame; and the athletic department offices.
The Ratner Center also serves as the home of the University of Chicago basketball, volleyball, and wrestling teams. The 1,658-seat competition gymnasium has played host to the 2006 NCAA Division III Great Lakes Regional Wrestling Championship, the 2004, 2007, 2010 and 2013 University Athletic Association Wrestling Championships, as well as the 2009 UAA Volleyball Championship. In addition to hosting numerous UChicago Swimming & Diving events, the Myers-McLoraine Swimming Pool served as the the host site of the 2005, 2009 and 2013 UAA Swimming and Diving Championship and the 2009 Speedo Illinois Senior Championships.
In its first year of operation, the $51 million facility received awards from the American Council of Engineering Company, the American Institute of Steel Construction, and the Consulting Engineers Council of Illinois for its excellence in engineering and design.
Among the notable features of the two-story facility is a roof that is suspended by cables attached to five masts that peak 100 feet from the ground.
Recreational memberships are available for purchase for University and Hospital faculty, staff, alumni, and retirees as well as their spouses and children. Registered University students may acquire memberships at no charge.
Bernard J. DelGiorno Fitness Center
The Bernard J. DelGiorno Fitness Center within the Ratner Athletics Center occupies two levels of the facility plus the rotunda area. Open and full of light, the fitness center includes two selectorized weight circuits, free weights, rowing ergometers, elliptical trainers, recumbent and upright bicycles, step mills, and treadmills – many with cardio theatre options.
Additional fitness center opportunities are available at Henry Crown Field House, which include cardio, resistance, and weight training equipment.
Gymnasia
The Ratner Center houses a competition gym and auxiliary gym, both of which are available to recreational users. The Competition Gym features a practice and game site for varsity basketball, volleyball, and wrestling which converts to two recreational courts.
The Auxiliary Gym includes a multipurpose court that allows for indoor soccer, as well as basketball, volleyball, and badminton.
The most prominent feature of the Ratner Center is the Myers-McLoraine swimming pool. The 50-meter by 25-yard pool includes up to 20 lanes in the 25-yard dimension and nine lanes in the 50-meter dimenson, and contains a moveable bulkhead which allows for simultaneous activities.
In addition, two one-meter diving boards are available. The pool depth ranges from four feet in the shallow section to 13.5 feet in the diving well.
The University of Chicago varsity athletic teams practice and compete on the fields located directly behind the Ratner Athletics Center. The Maroons play football, soccer and softball at Amos Alonzo Stagg Field; baseball at J. Kyle Anderson Field; and hold meets on Ted Haydon Track.
Contact Ratner
5530 S. Ellis Ave.


171 Daniel Webster #9 Highway (MLS #4638367) is a commercial leases listing located in Belmont, NH. This commercial leases listing is on a lot of 81,022 sqft (or 1.86 acres) and is 13 years old. This property was listed on 06/03/2017 and has been priced for sale at $7.
Nearby zip codes are 03220 3444, 03246, 03264, 03269 and 03276. This property neighbors other cities such as Gilford, Laconia, Meredith, Sanbornton and Tilton.


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First UMC Denton: Director of Music and Worship
First UMC Denton, Denton, TX
First United Methodist Church of Denton, a church celebrating over 160 years in a college community renowned for its musical diversity and talent, is seeking a Director of Music and Worship to provide leadership to the Worship Planning team in creating and presenting meaningful worship opportunities for the congregation.
The Music and Worship ministry of FUMC Denton features diverse worship service styles and engages talented professionals and laypersons in a broad range of music including classical, gospel, jazz and modern Contemporary Christian genres. The Director supervises, directly or indirectly, all choirs (adult, youth, children), handbell choirs and the praise and worship bands.
Bachelor's degree in music (preferably with choral conducting emphasis) required; Master's degree in music preferred
Significant experience in directing volunteer choral ensembles
Significant experience in planning and leading traditional worship
Keyboard skills in multiple musical genres desired, with sufficient keyboard (piano) skills to effectively lead rehearsals
Skill at choral and instrumental music composition and arranging
Demonstrable recruitment skills
Broad historical knowledge of sacred choral music
Fluency in Finale or Sibelius, MS Office, multi-media worship and other software
Knowledge of church audio and video technology systems
Competence in music diction (esp. Latin, German, French, Spanish)
In collaboration with the Worship Planning team, plan, coordinate, and implement the overall vision of the music and worship ministries of the congregation. This includes, but is not limited to:
Lead the worship planning team in weekly meetings, to plan services for the congregation.
Maintain an annual schedule of worship participation for all performing ensembles and AV technicians.
Conduct the adult Chancel Choir, Men's Ensemble, and Chamber Singers; recruiting new participants. Supervise the maintenance of membership databases and care of choir robes.
Schedule concerts and events that build an atmosphere of teamwork including fundraising events, presentation of major choral masterpieces, production of theatrical events and social activities.
Supervise the organist, children's choir director, youth choir director, handbell director, jazz service worship leader, adult choir section leaders, music librarian, and AV technicians. Supervise the Director of the church's Fine Arts Academy and serve on its advisory board. Coordinate with each of these leaders in planning an annual schedule of worship participation.
Supervise maintenance and expansion of music library, ensuring full compliance with copyright law.
Formulate and maintain the Music and Worship ministry budgets. Oversee payroll for professional musicians and AV technicians.
Lead the Ford-Marcy Foundation committee and other endowment fund sources in the planning, implementation, and accounting of the expenditure of annual distributions from those musical endowments.
Hire additional musicians and AV technicians as needed for Sunday services, high holiday services, memorial services, and weddings including submission of required paperwork to the Business Administrator.
Coordinate with the Director of Marketing and Communications to produce media presentation materials for traditional and jazz worship, including weekly bulletins for those services. Maintain and supplement the associated database of hymns, worship songs and video loops used in worship.
Oversee operation and maintenance of AV systems in the Sanctuary, Monroe worship space and Cole Chapel.
Oversee maintenance of principal musical instruments, including the Sanctuary pipe organ, concert grand piano and other pianos, organs, and drum kits elsewhere on the campus.
Maintain an open, positive relationship with the faculty and administration of the College of Music at the University of North Texas and Texas Woman's University, actively seeking collaborative projects with both entities.
Demonstrate a willingness to create new performing groups from within the congregation as warranted.
The Director of Music and Worship must be a committed Christian who models faithful living and a person who exhibits humility, teachability, accountability and servant leadership in all relationships. The Director of Music and Worship must lead in a way that supports the mission, vision and ministries of the United Methodist Church.
This is a full-time salaried position with benefits. FUMC Denton offers a competitive salary between $65,000 and $75,000 that is commensurate with experience.
Paid Personal Time Off (PTO)
Health Insurance with HSA account, Life Insurance, Short and Long Term Disability Insurance
403-b Pension Account
Flexible [weekday] schedule
Qualified candidates should send resumes to Business Manager Alan Heath.
Interviews will be scheduled in January. Candidates chosen for an interview should be prepared to send work product samples, examples follow:
*Copies of performances by choral ensembles (MP3 file format or video), preferably mixed choirs, women's choirs, and men's choirs
*Copies of choral compositions/arrangements
*Digital copies or links to publications in professional journals, especially items published in church music/worship publication


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Biografia

Gli inizi
Adiléia Silva da Rocha nacque nel quartiere di Saúde dal sergente della Marina Armindo José da Rocha e da Josefa Silva da Rocha, e nei primissimi anni si spostò con la famiglia nella zona nord di Rio, abitando nei sobborghi di Irajá e Pilares. Cagionevole di salute, contrasse da piccola una febbre reumatica che le causò pesanti strascichi ai danni dell'apparato cardiaco. Già da bambina manifestò la passione per la musica: a tre anni cantava e a cinque prendeva parte alle feste popolari che si svolgevano nel quartiere.

Partecipò a un programma radiofonico per Rádio Tupi condotto da Ary Barroso e intitolato Calouros em desfile, che presentava cantanti esoridienti, risultando vincitrice; e quando nel 1942 il padre morì lasciando la famiglia in difficoltà economiche, la vedova incoraggiò la figlia a iniziare la carriera, così da essere di supporto finanziario. Perciò Adiléia nel 1946 approdò al night club Vogue e successivamente alla Rádio Nacional, nella trasmissione Programa César de Alencar, dove mutò il proprio nome in Dolores Duran, ritenuto più appropriato per lo stile della cantante.

La carriera

Dolores Duran iniziò a frequentare i personaggi di spicco della musica carioca, da Johnny Alf a João Donato a João Gilberto, bazzicando anche un gruppo di intellettuali che le modellarono addosso l'immagine di un'artista tormentata così come angustiate erano le canzoni che interpretava e che ben si addicevano al suo nome d'arte. Nelle notti carioca, oltre ai tanti musicisti conterranei conobbe Charles Aznavour ed Ella Fitzgerald, dalla quale ricevette apprezzamenti per l'interpretazione di My Funny Valentine. Al 1951 risale la sua prima registrazione, Que bom será, di Ailce Chaves, Salvador Miceli e Paulo Marques, e Já não interessa, di Domício Costa e Roberto Faissal per l'etichetta Star; e l'anno seguente incise la samba-canção Um amor assim, di Dora Lopes, e Outono, di Billy Blanco; in seguito fu la volta di Tradição, di Ismael Silva, e Bom é querer bem, di Fernando Lobo, Canção da volta, di Antônio Maria e Ismael Neto, O amor acontece, dei fratelli Celso e Flávio Cavalcanti; e nel 1955 Praça Mauá, di Billy Blanco, il choro Carioca 1954, di Antônio Maria e Ismael Neto, Manias dei Cavalcanti e Pra que falar de mim di Ismael Neto e Macedo Neto. Con quest'ultimo la Duran si sposò, ma i due si separarono dopo tre anni e la cantante intraprese una relazione effimera con João Donato che l'anno successivo si trasferì in Messico.

Durante questi anni Dolores Duran aveva cominciato anche a comporre: Se é por falta de adeus è la sua prima creazione scritta in tandem con un giovane Tom Jobim; qualche tempo dopo avrebbe scritto il testo di Estrada do sol e, improvvisandolo di getto, quello di Por causa de você, entrambe su musica di Jobim. Nella seconda metà degli anni cinquanta compose e incise singoli o album con diverse canzoni proprie o composte da altri artisti, partecipò a spettacoli radiofonici e televisivi, e si esibì sul palco – oltre che in Brasile – in Uruguay, in Argentina, in Unione Sovietica e in Francia.

La morte
All'alba del 24 ottobre 1959, dopo essersi esibita al Little Club ed essere poi andata in giro per altri locali, tornò a casa stanca dando istruzioni di non essere svegliata. La ventinovenne cantante morì nel sonno, forse per una mistura letale di alcool e barbiturici	.

Discografia

Album

 1955 - Dolores Duran viaja
 1957 - Estrada da saudade
 1957 - Dolores Duran canta para você dançar
 1958 - A noite de Dolores
 1958 - Dolores Duran canta para você dançar nº 2
 1959 - A música de Dolores
 1959 - Esse Norte é minha sorte

78 giri

 1951 - Que bom será/Já não interessa
 1952 - Outono/Um amor assim
 1954 - Praça Mauá/Carioca
 1954 - O amor acontece/Canção da volta
 1954 - Tradição/Bom é querer bem
 1955 - Não se avexe não/Nossos destinos
 1955 - Nigraj manteloj * Coimbra -/Sinceridad
 1955 - Manias/Pra que falar de mim
 1956 - Zefa Cangaceira/Pano legal
 1956 - A fia de Chico Brito/Na asa do vento
 1957 - Só por castigo/Coisas de mulher
 1957 - Tião/Estrada da saudade
 1957 - Tá pra acontecer/Minha agonia
 1958 - Nel blu dipinto di blu/Quem foi?
 1958 - Love me forever/Onde está meu amor
 1958 - Por causa de você/Estatutos de boate
 1959 - A noite do meu bem/Fim de caso
 1959 - Te cuida, Zeca/Tá nascendo fio

Postumi

 1972 - Dolores Duran e Tito Madi
 1978 - Dolores Duran e Tito Madi
 1979 - Dolores Duran
 1997 - Dolores Duran
 1999 - Dolores - Um musical
 1999 - Dolores bem acompanhada
 2000 - Bis - Dolores Duran

Note

Bibliografia

Voci correlate
 Samba
 Musica popolare brasiliana

Altri progetti

Collegamenti esterni

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Techniques: wet felting, embroidery, painting, dyeing, silk paper, machine embellishing, crochet, knitting, beading, lettering.
Description: This collage was inspired by a magazine photo of an old growth forest. Many different materials and techniques have been incorporated to symbolise the diversity and complexity of plant forms found in nature. The finished collage includes many small and subtle details designed to intrigue and delight the viewers.
Created with Sue Ford and Lyn Baxter as one of the collaborative projects during my 2012 Artist-in-Residency at Brisbane Botanic Gardens, Mt Coot-tha.
Pictured in the ATASDA magazine "Fibreline" in 2013.


An initiative of Argentinean Internet entrepreneurs seeking to develop opportunities and harness the collective knowledge in food and agribusiness sector.
[ClickPress, Thu Aug 27 2009] After several improvements on Alpha version, online since March 2009 for 500 users, the Farmsphere.com enterprise launched a new version that integrates new tools for the exchange of experiences between users, related to the Food & AgBusiness sector.
The new platform features are designed to facilitate search of interest professional profiles, promoting the exchange of knowledge functionality of questions – answers and improvement the interaction among users, groups and organizations.
Farmsphere.com is a company created by three Argentine profesionals and is an online platform oriented to develop the oportunities and leverage the collective knowledge in Food & AgBusiness globally, starting from armed thematic networks of professionals, entrepreneurs, researchers and students, who can only join the network through an application or the recommendation of colleagues.
From a pre-registration, the user completes a form with information that aloud us to validate your interests and relationships with agribusiness and food items. Once he is discharged, the user can create their own discussion and interest groups and begin interacting with other professionals. For the month of October, Farmsphere.com expects to add new features based on geo-positioning of content and a module for interactive review of industry developments and technology.


TransUnion Auto is fast becoming the standard of vehicle intelligence in South Africa. The only provider of current market values of used vehicles in the country, TransUnion supplies this essential information for the buying and selling of vehicles, as well as operates an online auction portal.
As the largest mobile operator in Namibia, Mobile Telecommunications Limited (MTC) is a company that requires enormous amounts of business intelligence (BI) in order to successfully serve its customer base.
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University of Toronto chemists create vitamin-driven battery
Dwight Seferos, holding the nickel-sized prototype, hopes the team's breakthrough could lay the groundwork for metal-free batteries to support the next wave of consumer electronics (photo by Diana Tyszko)
Environmentally-friendly battery is long-lasting and high voltage
A team of University of Toronto chemists has created a battery that stores energy in a biologically-derived unit, paving the way for cheaper consumer electronics that are easier on the environment.
The battery is similar to many commercially-available high-energy lithium-ion batteries with one important difference. It uses flavin from vitamin B2 as the cathode: the part that stores the electricity that is released when connected to a device.
"We've been looking to nature for a while to find complex molecules for use in a number of consumer electronics applications," says Dwight Seferos, an associate professor in U of T's department of chemistry and Canada Research Chair in Polymer Nanotechnology.
"When you take something made by nature that is already complex, you end up spending less time making new material," says Seferos.
Background battery basics
To understand the discovery, it's important to know that modern batteries contain three basic parts:
a positive terminal – the metal part that touches devices to power them – connected to a cathode inside the battery casing
a negative terminal connected to an anode inside the battery casing
an electrolyte solution, in which ions can travel between the cathode and anode electrodes
When a battery is connected to a phone, iPod, camera or other device that requires power, electrons flow from the anode – the negatively charged electrode of the device supplying current – out to the device, then into the cathode and ions migrate through the electrolyte solution to balance the charge. When connected to a charger, this process happens in reverse.
The reaction in the anode creates electrons and the reaction in the cathode absorbs them when discharging. The net product is electricity. The battery will continue to produce electricity until one or both of the electrodes run out of the substance necessary for the reactions to occur.
Organic chemistry is kind of like Lego
While bio-derived battery parts have been created previously, this is the first one that uses bio-derived polymers – long-chain molecules – for one of the electrodes, essentially allowing battery energy to be stored in a vitamin-created plastic, instead of costlier, harder to process, and more environmentally-harmful metals such as cobalt.
"Getting the right material evolved over time and definitely took some test reactions," says paper co-author and doctoral student Tyler Schon. "In a lot of ways, it looked like this could have failed. It definitely took a lot of perseverance."
Schon, Seferos and colleagues happened upon the material while testing a variety of long-chain polymers – specifically pendant group polymers: the molecules attached to a 'backbone' chain of a long molecule.
"Organic chemistry is kind of like Lego," he says. "You put things together in a certain order, but some things that look like they'll fit together on paper don't in reality. We tried a few approaches and the fifth one worked," says Seferos.
Building a better power pack
The team created the material from vitamin B2 that originates in genetically-modified fungi using a semi-synthetic process to prepare the polymer by linking two flavin units to a long-chain molecule backbone.
This allows for a green battery with high capacity and high voltage – something increasingly important as the 'Internet of Things' continues to link us together more and more through our battery-powered portable devices.
"It's a pretty safe, natural compound," Seferos adds. "If you wanted to, you could actually eat the source material it comes from."
B2's ability to be reduced and oxidized makes its well-suited for a lithium ion battery.
"B2 can accept up to two electrons at a time," says Seferos. "This makes it easy to take multiple charges and have a high capacity compared to a lot of other available molecules."
A step to greener electronics
"It's been a lot of trial-and-error," says Schon. "Now we're looking to design new variants that can be recharged again and again."
While the current prototype is on the scale of a hearing aid battery, the team hopes their breakthrough could lay the groundwork for powerful, thin, flexible, and even transparent metal-free batteries that could support the next wave of consumer electronics.
The team's paper outlining the discovery appeared in the July issue of Advanced Functional Materials.
Peter McMahon
Research & InnovationFaculty of Arts & ScienceChemistrySustainabilityEnvironment


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