text:
The storm followed a predicted track along the state's coast, threatening with its most punishing winds a stretch from West Palm Beach to Jacksonville.
Live Updates: Florida braces for Hurricane Matthew
Florida Gov. Rick Scott issued a blunt warning to the state's 1.5 million coastal residents: "This storm will kill you."
Forecasters said Miami and Fort Lauderdale, the state's most densely populated areas with over 4 million people, would likely escape the worst winds but would still face tropical-storm force winds of between 39 mph and 73 mph.
West Palm Beach and the Cape Canaveral areas, home to NASA's Kennedy Space Center, however, were bracing for the main force of the storm as it rolled northward.
Along Southwest Florida's coast, the storm sent downpours and steady winds, but nothing fierce like what is expected to last throughout the day Friday as the hurricane works its way toward South Carolina.
As of 5 p.m. EDT Thursday, Matthew had intensified to a Category 4 storm, with sustained winds ranging from 130 mph to 156 mph, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center.
The strong winds not only threaten to knock down trees, shatter windows and rip roofs from houses, but also to churn up dangerous storm surges as high as 11 feet — at high tide — along the Florida coast. Forecasters say some areas could be drenched by up to 15 inches of rain.
The storm was centered about 100 miles east-southeast of West Palm Beach and moving northwest toward the state at 13 mph, according to the NHC.
Southwest Florida to feel edges of Hurricane Matthew
In Washington, President Barack Obama declared a state of emergency in more than two dozen Florida counties as the potentially catastrophic storm approached. The directive authorizes the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate efforts to alleviate suffering caused by the hurricane.
Obama's approval means the federal government will provide Florida with food, water and tarps. Scott followed up with a request for electric generators and pumps, spokeswoman Jackie Schutz said.
Scott also activated another 1,000 members of the Florida National Guard, bringing to 3,500 the troops assisting in evacuating the estimated 1.5 million residents and visitors.
In Haiti, the interior minister said the death toll in that country increased to 108. At least four died in the Dominican Republic, Haiti's neighbor on the island of Hispaniola. Deaths also were reported in Colombia and St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
"The storm has already killed people. We should expect the same impact in Florida," Scott said Thursday afternoon as Matthew's outer bands of rain appeared across the state.
The governor's message was clear: "Evacuate, evacuate, evacuate. Time is running out. We don't have much time left."
Up to 2.5 million Florida Power & Light customers, or about half of those served by the company, are expected to lose power because of Hurricane Matthew. Outages could extend from Jacksonville to Miami and also could affect Fort Myers, spokesman Bud Fraga said.
Despite the company's $2 billion investment on its grid and better technology since the 2004 and 2005 hurricanes, FPL might have to rebuild its electric system because wind speeds are expected to exceed what the system has been designed to withstand, spokesman Rob Gould said.
This is one of the most significant storms the company has ever dealt with in terms of size, he said.
Hurricane Wilma caused 3.2 million customers to lose power in 2005, and 60 percent of them got it restored by the fifth day, Fraga said. It took 18 days for the last customer to get reconnected.
Florida's Space Coast and Treasure Coast areas are most vulnerable to the dangerous hurricane, if the storm stays on its expected track through Friday.
Many gas stations were low on fuel or sold out. A string of gas stations in Port St. Lucie closed mid-afternoon Thursday after selling out of gas. Store employees wrapped dried up pumps with transparent wrap to keep them secure during the storm.
Plywood also was in high demand Thursday. One Home Depot sold out of plywood mid-Wednesday, but hundreds of customers bought other kinds of material Thursday, including plastic and sheet metal, to shield their homes' windows.
Hurricane Matthew: Cancellations in Southwest Florida
It hasn't been since hurricanes Frances and Jeanne in 2004 that store employee Carl Beatty in Port St. Lucie has seen crowds like this.
"Everyone's been supportive and helping each other. No fights or anything like that," Beatty said. "The community has really drawn together to get their houses ready."
Brevard County Emergency Management worked under a Level 1 activation Thursday, with representatives from several agencies hunkering down in the operations center in Rockledge to monitor the storm.
Melbourne's historic downtown district was shuttered and quiet by 2 p.m., with sandbags piled outside against restaurant doorways and storefront windows covered with plywood, metal shutters and strips of duct tape.
A whirring sound emanated from Gil Hedley's power drill, a few doors off the New Haven Avenue commercial drag. He labored shirtless atop a ladder attaching boards to the 40-odd windows of his stately six-bedroom, two-bathroom home, which was built in 1926.
"Ninety-year-old house. Ninety-year-old windows," Hedley said, shaking his head.
Weather forecasters describe the impending threat by Hurricane Matthew as an "extreme" threat to life and property of residents in Brevard County, including infrastructure such as traffic lights, power lines, utility poles and roadways, county leaders said.
At 3 p.m. Wednesday, a mandatory evacuation took effect for Brevard County barrier island residents, including Merritt Island. That evacuation affected about 90,000 beachside inhabitants, said Don Walker, county spokesman.
One of the biggest threats could be storm surge, or water pushed toward the shore by force of winds moving around a storm. How high the surge is depends on intensity, speed of the storm, size, angle, barometric pressure and size of the storm.,
A storm surge is also more potent when it coincides with high tide.
How much storm surge the Space Coast receives depends on how close the center gets to Brevard, experts say.
"I would imagine we can get waves, certainly 10-foot waves," said George Maul, professor of ocean engineering and sciences at Florida Tech. "Out at sea, the waves could be larger than that, 30 foot waves easily."


text:
Lockbox & Smartcard Info
ASVB Reaches Fundraising Milestone
by Juanita Sorrell | Mar 15, 2016 | Awards Banquet
Thank You For Participating!
The ASVB wishes to thank our very generous sponsors who donated over $182,000 at the 40th Annual Awards Banquet and helped us reach an incredible milestone!
Over the past 17 years, $2,008,505 has been donated to our supported charities.
ASVB Supported Charities
Donations from this year's event will be donated to Family Supportive Housing, JW House, Next Door Solutions, Project Hired, Ronald McDonald House, Second Harvest Food Bank, Stroke Awareness Foundation, and the Morgan Autism Center.
Proceeds from the event are donated to selected charities who are recognized for their life-changing efforts in assisting those in need throughout the Silicon Valley. The ASVB Annual Awards Dinner provides fundraising opportunities through the sale of tickets and various sponsorship options. The ASVB covers its annual operating expenses through member dues and other services, thus 100% of all money raised from its philanthropic efforts goes directly to its selected charities.
Awards Banquet
Mentioned Topics
ASVB Event Sponsors Awards Banquet Charities
All Rights Reserved. ©2023 Association of Silicon Valley Brokers, Inc. | P.O. Box 9458 San Jose, CA 95157 | (408) 202-5549 | Produced by My Internet Scout LLC

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Planning for long-term care can be overwhelming. However, with a bit of forethought and a little investigation, you can breakdown long-term care planning into more manageable segments. Learn how to compare online information on long-term care planning, get ready to set in motion an advanced directive plan, find what types of benefits are available to older adults, quickly identify warning signs for older drivers, and handle safety issues in order to prevent falls for older adults.
When researching online information about long-term care, you want to know that what you're viewing is quality information. Websites offer comparative rankings and user reviews of everything from restaurants to electronic products to colleges. And long-term care is no different. Dozens of sites offer comparisons of hospitals, nursing homes, and doctors. But how much weight should you place on any of these sites? And how do you compare the comparisons? What are their strengths and what do they lack?
The website of the Informed Patient Institute (IPI) can help. IPI is an independent, nonprofit organization created to provide unbiased information about health care quality online report cards from both governmental and private sources. It does not rate individual healthcare providers. The ratings are based on 15 criteria in six areas: the site's content, timeliness, presentation, ease of use, information to help make decisions, and special features.
Start by entering your state and the type of provider you are investigating. For example, you live in Colorado and are looking at nursing homes. Eight websites are rated, with rankings from B to D. Each rating has sections called "What we like" and "What we don't like" and a link to each website so you can make your own judgment.
Medicare's site Nursing Home Compare gets a grade of "B." IPI likes its nationwide database, its inclusion of many different types of information, including results of state surveys, and quality of care. Nursing Home Compare uses a 5-star quality rating system, points out nursing homes with persistently poor performance, and makes the information available in Spanish. On the negative side, Nursing Home Compare does not have information on resident or family satisfaction with the homes, cost, or resident demographics. The rating of Nursing Home Compare is the same for every state.
Colorado's state website also gets a "B," but with different likes and don't likes. On the positive side, there is clear information about complaints, state inspection surveys, and other required reports. But it provides limited other information and "makes it hard to determine which nursing homes are best." The rest of the sites have different like/don't like profiles but there is a pattern in the "don't likes" of failure to provide information about costs, resident and family satisfaction, and outdated information. Many sites are disliked because they are difficult to navigate.
Websites with doctor ratings are generally prepared by specialty organizations or local physician organizations. For example, Michigan has 12 sites in this category, with no A rankings, three Bs, four Cs, and one each ranked U and D. In general, IPI doesn't like magazine sites that proclaim "100 Best Doctors in Your City" because they become popularity contests rather than quality measures.
Not all states currently have specific hospital ratings online, but all states will eventually be included. The states with current online hospital rating comparisons are: Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Colorado, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, North Dakota , and South Carolina.
California, for example, lists 13 websites ranking hospitals — all Bs and Cs, with two Us (one a website on infections). The review of HospitalCompare, a Medicare site, likes its wide range of information, patient satisfaction results, and quality measures on treatment for diseases such as pneumonia and heart attack. But some information is too technical for the average user, and it's hard to determine which hospitals do better overall.
The website also has a series of tip sheets for handling quality problems in selected states. The first states on this list are California, Maine, New York, Pennsylvania, and South Carolina. And there are links to news reports about report cards, quality measures, and other topics, as well as a list of other resources.
IPI's website is easy to navigate and makes clear the strengths and limitations of websites that compare health providers. Users can comment on the site (but these comments are not published) and suggest other websites to be reviewed. One area that is missing, and may be included in time, is assisted living. Although you may disagree with some of the ratings, and will still need to do much more research, looking at the websites for nursing homes, hospitals, and doctors will prepare you to be a much more critical user.
For older adults and their families, driving is often a flash point. When is it time to give up the keys? Waiting until there is a serious accident is not advisable. Most older drivers are safe drivers, but some monitoring and caution are appropriate. Here are some warning signs for older drivers from "We Need To Talk: Family Conversations with Older Drivers," produced by The Hartford.
The driving behaviors listed here could cause safety problems. They are ranked from minor to serious. Many of the less serious issues may be overcome with changes in driving behavior or physical fitness, while the more serious behaviors may require your immediate action. Since driving ability seldom changes drastically in a short time, you should be able to track changes over time to get a clear picture of overall driving ability.
Here's how to use this list.
Observe driving over time, keep notes to help you understand changes in driving ability.
Look for a pattern of warning signs and for an increase in the frequency of occurrence.
Decrease in confidence while driving.
Difficulty turning to see when backing up.
Other drivers often honk horns.
Scrapes or dents on the car, mailbox or garage.
Increased agitation or irritation when driving.
Failure to notice important activity on the side of the road.
Failure to notice traffic signs.
Not anticipating potential dangerous situations.
Bad judgment on making left-hand turns.
Delayed response to unexpected situations.
Ticketed moving violations or warnings.
Failure to stop at stop sign or red light.
Confusing the gas and brake pedals.
Stopping in traffic for no apparent reason.
Long-term care planning has so many facets that it's sometimes difficult to know where to start. One useful approach is to start with prevention. And in that broad category preventing falls is critical. Falls are not only harmful in themselves but they often lead to declines in independence and function. Most falls happen at home, so that's where you should start.
emergency departments because of falls.
Falls are often due to hazards that are easy to overlook but easy to fix. The following tips are from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention's checklist for preventing falls at home. Use this checklist to help you find and fix those hazards in your home.
The checklist asks about hazards found in each room of your home. For each hazard, the checklist tells you how to fix the problem. At the end of the checklist, you'll find other tips for preventing falls.
Put a non-slip rubber mat or self-stick strips on the floor of the tub or shower.
Maintain uniform lighting in a room. Add lighting to dark areas. Hang lightweight curtains or shades to reduce glare.


Set up in early 1976 by brothers Tony and Brian Lewis, A. B. Lewis Ltd. was born from the success of previous businesses in the timber industry.
Over the last 30 years we have been successful in securing close ties with sawmills and factories all over the world enabling us to offer niche products to our customers at competitive prices.
A specialist importer and distributor of sawn and further processed quality hardwoods, and more recently solid and engineered wood flooring, the company situated on the outskirts of Liverpool Docks has a nationwide distribution base, fully able to store and dispatch products and services throughout the UK and overseas.
The company is a member of the Timber Trade Federation, Forests Forever and is also proud to be Forest Stewardship Council ® (FSC®) certified (FSC® C007915) ensuring supplies come from responsibly managed forests, whilst at the same time protecting Global wildlife, plants, soil and ensuring biodiversity.


text:
Keyword Search of biophysics
Independent Study Resources
Biophysics Club
Transfer Credit Policies
Ph.D. Admissions
Biophysics Preview
Ph.D. Program Details
NextProf
Biophysics Graduate Student Council
Remote Lab Course Leads to Publication on RNA NMR
Sarah Keane, assistant professor, Chemistry and Biophysics
In typical lab courses, students run experiments and write up lab reports, which are only read by the professor or teaching assistants. Students may feel isolated from the broader science community where sharing your results beyond your research group and publishing are essential. When labs went remote in the "age of COVID," students may have felt even further removed from the scientific process without the ability to interact with an instrument or pour a solution into a test tube.
The virtual approach to teaching labs in spring 2021 gave Sarah Keane an opportunity to deeply connect her students with the scientific community. An assistant professor in the Departments of Biophysics and Chemistry, she taught Biophysics 450, an upper level class for undergraduates and graduate students that covers essential laboratory skills, including modern research methods such as Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, a tool for identifying molecular structure.
Twenty or so of Keane's students analyzed never-before-recorded NMR data on RNA molecules, added this new information to a database for NMR scientists, and published their findings in a paper in Biomolecular NMR Assignments. The course module immersed students in the middle of a real research project. "Instead of teaching about NMR spectroscopy in an abstract way, I find the best way of teaching is to have students work with data," says Keane.
In this course module, Keane and students added chemical shifts for RNA molecules to the Biological Magnetic Resonance Data Bank (BMRD). Chemical shifts are like a fingerprint of every hydrogen and carbon atom in a molecule. These shifts can be measured using 2D NMR spectroscopy. The shift for each carbon and hydrogen atom is read out from a peak in the spectra.
In her research, Keane and her graduate students students identified 12 specific RNA sequences whose shifts were missing from the BMRB database. They synthesized these RNA, measured their 2D NMR spectra, and assigned the peaks to each atom in the molecules. For the course, Keane deleted some of the assignments and gave the spectra to the undergraduate and graduate students to independently assign the peaks.
Focus on RNA
The importance of RNA molecules in medicine and biology has come into stark focus with the advent of mRNA vaccines against the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Recent studies have also shown that RNA also plays important roles in protecting DNA and researchers continue to uncover more functions of RNA molecules. RNA researchers rely on accurate predictions of the 3-D structures to develop therapeutics or drugs to target RNA or to uncover ways the RNA might be used in the cell.
RNA molecules are "strings" of nucleotide bases—adenine, cytosine, uracil, and guanine— in various sequences. Each hydrogen and carbon in a unique chemical environment, such as in one of these bases, has a unique chemical shift. Software exists to make accurate predictions of RNA molecule's 3D structure, but the programs base their predictions on known chemical shifts in the BMRB. RNA scientists need this database to be robust in order to keep creating amazing new RNA technologies, but the database's library of RNA molecules is fairly sparse compared to more popularly studied proteins. Keane and her students have now filled in some gaps in the database of chemical shifts for RNA molecules.
Unambiguously identifying these chemical shifts in RNA is a laborious process because many of the hydrogen and carbons are in such similar chemical environments that the shifts can show up near or on top of each other. For example, the structures of adenine and guanine consist of very similar carbon rings with three group changes between them (highlights in pink, tan, and teal show differences). Because the hydrogen and carbons in these structures are in such similar environments, their chemical shifts are very similar.
In addition to the environment within a base, the base pairs directly next to a certain base in the RNA sequence can change the chemical shift. So, in a triplet sequence like Uracil-Adenine-Adenine, the flanking Uracil and Adenine affect the central Adenine's chemical shifts. The shifts can even be subtly affected by which bases flank the sides of a core three-base-pair sequence. These subtle changes to the chemical shifts affected by base pairs flanking triplet sequences are precisely what Keane and her students determined in their experiments.
Contributions to science
This dearth of chemical shift data in the BMRB provided an opportunity for Keane and her students. The class uploaded their findings to the BMRB, expanding this database and connecting this project to the larger RNA NMR community. Now other researchers may be able to predict the chemical shifts of new RNA molecules implicated in disease or unknown cellular functions which could lead to new treatments or new insights in cell biology, increasing the power of the predictive software and making these tools even better for future RNA scientists.
Aside from contributing to the database, this work also provided another benefit to the students—they learned about publishing a scientific paper. Instead of a lab report, the students helped prepare a manuscript to report on the structure of these 12 previously unidentified chemical shifts. While participating in the complete manuscript preparation was voluntary, the students that did help are co-authors on the paper published in Aguust 2021 in Biomolecular NMR Assignments.
Next Step: 2D to 3D
Despite the difficulty of using 2D NMR with RNA molecules, this module took many of the students all the way from a limited knowledge of 2D NMR to a having a scientific publication based on novel 2D NMR data. Keane plans to include this module in future versions of Biophysics 450 and update it as lab courses go back to being taught in person. Keane says she would love to eventually include a second module of the course where students perform some of the basics of 3D structure calculations using the data they upload to the BMRB. "Ultimately something I'd like to see worked in is using the computational resources that Michigan has and building in a structure determination module," she says.
Keane also hopes to have the students collect some of the data in the future once lab courses are in person. "To be able to put a sample on the spectrometer and for them to see the facility and just learn a little bit more about using the NMR, I think that would be ideal," she says.
The work was supported by Keane's CAREER grant from the National Science Foundation.
Keane Lab
The paper published by the students: Liu Y#, Kotar A#, Hodges TL, Abdallah K, Taleb MH, Bitterman BA, Jaime S, Schaubroeck KJ, Mathew E, Morgenstern NW, Lohmeier A, Page JL, Ratanapanichkich M, Arhin G, Johnson BL, Cherepanov S, Moss SC, Zuniga G, Tilson NJ, Yeoh ZC, Johnson BA, Keane SC. NMR chemical shift assignments of RNA oligonucleotides to expand the RNA chemical shift database. Biomol NMR Assign 15(2):479-490 (2021). (# indicates co-first author)
--Writer Zechariah Pfaffenberger is a PhD Candidate in the Biteen Lab
Tweet Email
930 N. University Ave.
biophysics@umich.edu


More than 100 workers who provide care for people with disabilities at a Lawrence nonprofit plan to strike this week, amid negotiations for higher salaries and lower staff turnover.
Care staff and case workers at CLASS Inc. are set to strike Monday morning and plan to rally outside of the building, according to a statement from the SEIU Local 509 union.
The strike follows contract bargaining sessions with the company that involved a federal mediator, the union said.
The group totals about 115 people who care for people with disabilities through the agency's programs, according to a union spokesman.
Most of the staff members are paid less than $15 an hour, which leads to "high turnover and constant staffing issues that impact the quality of care available to the Commonwealth's most vulnerable," the union said in a statement.
Forty percent of union staff members have worked there for less than two years, the SEIU said.
CLASS could not be reached for comment Sunday afternoon. A voice mail message on its main line said it will not be open for services on "at least" Monday or Tuesday, due to the strike.
"We voted to strike because the low pay at CLASS Inc. hurts us and the individuals we take care of every day," said Krystina Castillo, who has worked at the organization for three years, in a statement.
Union members said the company has spent a lot of money to hire temporary workers who are not properly trained or familiar with the people they serve.
Last week, several politicians and candidates, including Lawrence Mayor Dan Rivera met with CLASS staff to discuss the issues, according to the statement.
The workers unionized in 2014; last year, they secured a one-year contract that included an average 5 percent wage increase, according to the SEIU.
"Despite these wins, workers at CLASS Inc. are still among the lowest paid at peer agencies across the Commonwealth," the union statement said.
Most of the striking staff members work directly with clients on a wide variety of programming to "increase employment opportunities for individuals with disabilities, address issues of health and wellness, and promote social and recreational activities," according to the agency's website.
The strike begins at 8 a.m. Monday, and the rally is at noon at the CLASS building on Parker Street.


Wait. Think. Fast seems like the kind of band that should be commonplace in Los Angeles.
There's a slight risk, perhaps, that the trio could surrender to its more maudlin tendencies on future albums. "Look Alive," for instance, with its antiseptic mid-tempo beats and feel-better positivity seems tailor-made for TV dramas.
For now, however, the act's grasp of a melody and subtle genre-crossing instrumentation ultimately wins out. Think of it as the musical equivalent of Los Angeles sprawl -- without the headaches.


Our modern and synthetic Medical and Hospital Grade Castors come in a variety of sizes to suit your application. The combination of these Medical Castors makes it ideal for hospital trolleys, hospital beds and catering equipment. We provide a variety of Serie 66 and Series 71 Medical Castors and Wheels for this particular industry.


RNLI Trafalgar Night Dinner Dance a huge success!
Our thanks to all who attended the recent RNLI Trafalgar Night Dinner Dance at Lostwithiel Golf Club. As those of you who attended will know it was very successful, 82 guests enjoyed a three course meal, a tot of "Pussers Rum" (The original Navy rum) kindly sponsored by St. Austell Brewery, and dancing to the magnificent "Fine Whines" Jazz Trio.
A raffle of high quality prizes, mainly donated, was very well supported.
As well as being a highly enjoyable evening, we also raised in excess of £440 for the RNLI.


text:
\section{Introduction}
Individual human displacements have a strong impact on many collective social
phenomena, such as the spread of epidemics \cite{vespignani,skufca,belik}
or cultural traits \cite{sneppen}. The availability of quantitative mobility
data has increased in recent years through the widespread use of global
positioning systems \cite{levywalkhuman} and the ability to track cell
phones \cite{gonzalez,song1,song}. These new data show that human displacements
do not follow memoryless processes, like the well-known Markovian random
walk \cite{colding}, rather, they exhibit ultra-slow diffusion and
unusual, long lasting recurrence properties due to the tendency of individuals
to frequently revisit a small number of familiar locations \cite{song1,song}.

Whether unifying principles that govern the movements of humans \cite{song}
and, more generally, of living organisms \cite{nathan} exist is a hotly
debated issue. As with the distribution of city sizes \cite{zipflaw}
or the dynamics of individual tasks \cite{barab}, scaling laws prevail in human
mobility data \cite{levywalkhuman,song,geisel}. In physical systems, scaling
laws are often the outcome of self-organization principles.
Self-attracting or reinforced walks \cite{davis,foster} are non-Markovian
stochastic walks that tend to revisit with higher probability locations visited
in the past. Recently, a new reinforced walk model with preferential return
to previously visited sites, in analogy with preferential attachment
rules used in network science \cite{barabasi}, could reproduce many empirical
human visitation patterns \cite{song}. However, it is also important to
quantify the dependence of individual displacements on more complex external
factors, for instance, transportation \cite{vespignani} and social
networks \cite{slaw}, or the spatial distribution of facilities or
resources \cite{newman}.

In this contribution, we show that the scaling laws characterizing recurrence
in human movements are
similar to those exhibited by some foraging animals, which suggests that
these patterns are not unique to humans and may be generated by a more
generalized set of cognitive mechanisms. We present evidence that, like humans, other animals
also live in heterogeneous habitats where some areas are more valuable to
them than others.
Recurrent patterns of movement, in particular home range behavior, actually
characterize the ranging of a very large number of animal
species \cite{moorcroftlewis,borger}. Here, we use radio telemetry data to
show that the mobility and visitation patterns of capuchin monkeys
({\it Cebus capucinus}) foraging for fruit in a tropical forest are not
only comparable to human cell phone users qualitatively, but exhibit
scaling laws that are strikingly similar in both the short and long time
regimes. In addition, monkeys movements are not
entirely self-organized but also strongly driven by spatio-temporal
variations in resource distribution.

\section{Results}

The data for our analyses come from a study on Barro Colorado Island, Panama, in which
the movements of four radio-collared capuchin monkeys belonging to different social
groups were tracked using an automated telemetry system over the course of
a six month period, from November 2004 to April 2005
(see \cite{megpnas} for details). The locations for each individual were
estimated every $\Delta t_0= 10$ minutes and discretized into square
cells of size 50$\times$50 m, a scale that corresponds roughly to the
measurement error and was taken as the spatial resolution. Unless indicated,
we considered all available positions (night and day) in the analyses.

\subsection{Basic movement properties}

\begin{figure
\begin{center}
\includegraphics[width=8.cm]{Figure1.ps}
\caption{Comparison of monkey and human movement properties.
Data for each of four radio-collared capuchin monkeys plotted separately.
Monkey power-laws exponents (subscript \lq\lq m") of the frequency
distributions are estimated from pooled data using Bayesian Markov
Chain Monte Carlo Estimation. These values are practically indistinguishable
from the MLEs, which are not shown.
Human power-law exponents from \cite{song} (subscript "h") are given in
each plot for comparison. {\bf a)} Displacements between consecutive
telemetry fixes ($\Delta r$ in meters) showed a much steeper decay,
$P(\Delta r) \sim (\Delta r)^{-1-\alpha}$ with larger $\alpha$,
than in humans but {\bf b)} waiting times (1 unit=10 min)
showed a power-law exponent close to humans. {\bf c)} RMS displacement
$\langle({\bf r}(t)-{\bf r}(0))^2\rangle^{1/2}$ (in meters) rose quickly during the
first day but {\bf d)} very slowly thereafter, with values always much smaller
than the size of Barro Colorado Island (diameter$\sim 5$km).
{\bf e)} The number of distinct 50x50 m habitat cells visited, $S(t)$,
as a function of time. {\bf f)} Like for humans, the probability that a cell
received $n$ visits within the 6-month time interval, $P(n)$, decays as a
power-law, but with a smaller exponent.
Estimation cutoffs for $\Delta r$, $\Delta t$
and $n$ were set respectively at 350 m, 12 h, and 35 visits.
In all cases the bounded power-law model was a very good fit to the data
($R^2\ge0.98$) and the frequency distribution with MLE had an Akaike weight
$>0.9999$ when compared to the most likely exponential distribution.
The sizes of the $95\%$ confidence intervals of the exponent values were always
lower than $0.20$.
}  \label{fig1}
\end{center}
\end{figure}

Short time-scale properties of monkey movement paths
followed similar scaling forms as those of human cell phone users
Ref. \cite{song} (see Figure \ref{fig1}a,b). For example, the
distributions of the displacement $\Delta r$ between consecutive telemetry
fixes are good fits to a power-law, $(\Delta r)^{-1-\alpha}$ with
$\alpha\simeq 1.7$ in the range 50 m $<\Delta r<$350 m,
for all four individuals (sample sizes$=$1619, 1998, 3072 and 2097).
This exponent, as well as $\beta$ and $\eta$ below, were obtained by using a
Bayesian Markov chain Monte Carlo simulation with uniform priors and
the Metropolis-Hastings algorithm. For each measure we evaluated the
likelihood of a given value of the exponent of the bounded power-law given
the data. The exponent value is the average obtained from the posterior
support distribution. We also calculated the maximum likelihood estimate
(MLE), obtaining practically the same value.

Similarly, the waiting time $\Delta t$, defined as the number of consecutive
fixes found in the same 50$\times$50 m cell multiplied by the temporal
resolution $\Delta t_0$, follows a power-law distribution,
$P(\Delta t)\sim (\Delta t)^{-1-\beta}$ with $\beta=0.8$, the
same value as reported for humans \cite{song,geisel} and other primates
\cite{gabriel}. The exponents $\alpha<2$ and $\beta\leq 1$ play central roles
in continuous time random walk (CTRW) models of anomalous
transport \cite{geisel,metzler} and of biological L\'evy flights
\cite{gabriel,klafter,viswanathan}.

Like humans, monkeys trajectories are however incompatible with a random
L\'evy walk description at large time-scales, as they exhibit strongly
recurrent patterns of movement. For example, the root mean squared displacement
(RMSD) virtually asymptotes within one day, rather than following a classical
power-law growth with time (Fig. 1c,d). This arrested or ultra-slow diffusion
is a manifestation of home range behavior \cite{moorcroftlewis,borger}.
Likewise, the average number $S(t)$ of distinct cells visited during a time
interval $t$ (Fig. 1e) increases through time as $t^{\mu}$ with $\mu$ smaller
than the waiting time exponent $\beta$, which is what would have been expected
for a CTRW \cite{song,metzler}. One finds $\mu=0.6$, remarkably close to what
measured by Song {\it et al.} for humans \cite{song}. Another intriguing aspect
of recurrence is the highly uneven visitation pattern among cells, see
Fig. 1f. Within the six-month data collection period, the probability $P(n)$
of finding a cell that has received $n$ visits by the same individual
({\it i.e.}, has been entered $n$ times) cannot be described
by a Poisson distribution or a bell-curve centered around a characteristic
value. Instead, it can be fitted
by a power-law, $P(n)\sim n^{-\eta}$ with $\eta=1.0$  ($\eta=1.8$ in
humans \cite{song}). Whereas most sites were visited once or twice,
it is not rare to find popular activity \lq\lq hotspots" or \lq\lq hubs",
with 30 or more visits. In contrast, a random walker bounded
in a closed domain would visit all sites more or less equally frequently.
For all the properties described above, the four individual monkeys showed
very similar exponent estimates. The number of distinct
cells visited by the animals during the six-month period was 568, 488, 606
and 531, respectively.

\subsection{Recurrence and environmental forcings}

Like humans, many animals have sophisticated memory skills \cite{byrne} and
home ranges can emerge
from frequent returns to previously visited locations \cite{vanmoorter}.
In principle, home ranges could even be completely self-organized, arising
as a result of the walker's history. Random walks biased towards the center of mass of
all previously visited sites, or such that, at each step, there is a finite
probability of returning to a randomly selected site visited in the past,
exhibit arrested or very slow diffusion \cite{borger,gautestad}.
In the context of human mobility, the results of Figure \ref{fig1} have been
reproduced assuming that the probability of choosing a given site is
proportional to the number of previous visits to that site (\lq\lq preferential
attachment"), and assuming that the probability of taking a random
step (to a unvisited site) decays algebraically with the number of sites
already visited, $S(t)$ \cite{song}. An advantage of this latter approach
is that it builds  up uneven visits and power-laws for the
distribution $P(n)$.

What these models and those belonging to a much broader class based on preferential
attachment mechanisms ignore is environmental heterogeneity.
A mobile agent may be inclined to visit a place not because it is familiar
but because of some intrinsic quality of the location, ({\it e.g.}, food content).
Heterogeneity is implied in the relationship between the quality of
habitat cells and the probability of cell revisit. Capuchin monkeys home
ranges typically contain millions of tree stems which belong to more than
200 species \cite{crofoot}, vary in size by 2 orders of magnitude \cite{enquist}
and only episodically produce fruit \cite{caillaud}. Consequently, the cells in
our analyses varied widely in the content of monkeys' primary food, ripe fruit.
During the day (from 04:00 to 20:00 hrs), animals are awake and
active \cite{megpnas}, and their primary activities are feeding and foraging
with relatively rare periods of prolonged resting \cite{crofoot}.
During the day, a waiting time of $\Delta t=\Delta t_0=10$ min (one fix,
the minimum observable value) is assumed to correspond to a
\lq\lq transit" through a cell. Given a series of consecutive fixes
in a same cell, the time elapsed between the
first and the last fixes, $\Delta t-\Delta t_0$, can be
taken as a proxy of the ripe fruit content within the corresponding
cell. An individual will tend to spend more time feeding in a tree that
has more fruit and we consider $\Delta t=\Delta t_0$ as the threshold
above which one can tell that a feeding event occurred.
Figure \ref{figfeeding} shows a positive correlation between
the number $n$ of day-time visits received by a cell and the average duration
of a visit at that cell, $\langle \Delta t -\Delta t_0 \rangle_n$
(the average being taken over all visits among cells with $n$ visits).
The latter quantity can be approximated by a scaling law:
\begin{equation}\label{feeding}
\langle \Delta t-\Delta t_0\rangle_n\sim n^{\gamma},
\end{equation}
with $\gamma\approx 0.3$. Although other functional relations may fit
the data, the crucial point is that large $n$ cells have,
on average, longer waiting times and, most likely, higher food content.
A similar, and even clearer, relationship is observed if all night and day
positions are taken into account ($\gamma\approx 0.4$ in this case).
Sleeping trees also represent resources, as not all trees are suitable
for sleep at night.

\begin{figure
\begin{center}
\includegraphics[width=9.cm,angle=-90]{waitingtimesvert.ps}
\caption{{\bf a)} Average visit duration at a cell that has otherwise
received $n$ visits during a time window corresponding to $S=200$ distinct
visited sites (about 2 weeks period). Each point represents an average over
sites with $n$ visits in one time window, over 12 different time windows and
the 4 different monkeys. The curve obtained from all fixes (\lq\lq all data")
has been upscaled by a factor 2 for clarity.
{\bf b)} Mean first return time to a cell as a function of the time spent
on that cell during the last visit. Averages obtained from less than 5
observations were discarded.
The solid lines are least-square fits
and have slopes: $0.41$ and $0.27$ in {\bf a)} (all data and day time data,
respectively);
$-0.39$ and $-0.29$ in {\bf b)} (all data and day time data, resp.).
In all cases, the probability that the variables are
uncorrelated ($\delta=\gamma=0$) is $p<10^{-5}$.}
\label{figfeeding}
\end{center}
\end{figure}

\begin{figure
\begin{center}
\includegraphics[width=7.8cm,angle=-90]{hotspotsDay.ps}

\includegraphics[width=3.7cm,angle=-90]{transient.ps}
\caption{{\bf a)} Day-time (4:00-20:00hrs) positions occupied by the same individual monkey
during successive, non-overlapping periods each containing $S=200$ visited sites. The black dots
represent the 10 most visited cells during the day, for each time period. Chronological order goes
from left to right and top to bottom.
Hotspot probability $\Pi_{hs}$ ({\bf b}) and mean number of visits to a hotspot
$N_{hs}$ ({\bf c}), as a function of the separation $m$ between time windows (see text).
}
\label{figmaps}
\end{center}
\end{figure}

Similarly, the time elapsed between two consecutive day-time visits to a site depends on
the results of the initial visit. We denote MFRT$_{\Delta t}$ as the mean first
return time to a cell where the waiting time was $\Delta t$ at the last
visit. As shown by Figure \ref{figfeeding}b, the MFRT tends to decrease with
increasing patch quality ($\Delta t$). For $\Delta t\leq 100$ min, it
approximately follows the scaling law:
\begin{equation}\label{eqmfrt}
{\rm MFRT}_{\Delta t}\sim (\Delta t)^{-\delta},
\end{equation}
with $\delta\approx 0.3$. Note that the unaveraged first return time is a
variable known to fluctuate widely in simple models like the random
walk \cite{bouchaud}. Similarly here, error bars in
Figure \ref{figfeeding}b increase with $\Delta t$, which may be due to
the fewer available observations at larger $\Delta t$ (Fig. 1b). Averages
obtained from less than 5 observations were discarded.

These results show evidence that, in addition to being non-random, movement choices
are driven by resource availability, with larger food patches visited more often.
Eq. (\ref{eqmfrt}) also holds if night and day positions are aggregated
($\gamma\approx 0.4$).
Hence, a new waiting time is not randomly drawn at each cell visit, as assumed in
CTRW models. Rather, the situation here is analogous to systems with quenched site
disorder \cite{bouchaud}. In trap models, though, the frequency of visits to a
site by a memoryless random walker is independent of the waiting time
($\gamma=\delta=0$).

Unlike supermarkets, gas stations or other human facilities, resources in natural
ecosystems tend to be ephemeral.
Trees produce fruit transiently and often asynchronously, with the fruiting periods of
individual trees lasting from a few weeks to a couple of months \cite{caillaud}.
Capuchin monkeys hotspots, in particular, are not permanent. Figure \ref{figmaps}a shows
the positions of the $5\%$ most visited sites by a single individual during the day
in successive non-overlapping time periods (of about 2 weeks) with $S=200$ visited sites each.
These cells are rarely the same from one time window to the other. The
fluctuating cloud formed by the visited cells suggests a flexible use of space,
despite the stability of the overall home range. Defining hotspots as the most
frequently visited $10\%$ of sites, the probability $\Pi_{hs}(m)$ that a cell which
is a hotspot during a time window $i$ is also a hotspot during time window $i+m$ decays
rapidly with $m$ (Figure \ref{figmaps}b). The average number of visits
$N_{hs}(m)$ received by a cell in time window $i+m$, given that this cell was a hotspot
in time window $i$, also decays with $m$ (Figure \ref{figmaps}c). Very similar curves
are obtained if night and day data are aggregated.

\section{Conclusions}

We have shown that the individual movement patterns of humans are similar
to those of capuchin monkeys. Most notably these patterns exhibit
ultra-slow diffusion (the presence of a home range) and history dependent recurrence
properties obeying scaling laws. In monkeys, we have presented evidence
that these nonrandom walks are caused by the use of memory,
a behavior which is not unique to humans nor evolutionary novel.
These results suggest, but do not prove, that similar cognitive mechanisms
may govern the movements of many animals. Testing such hypothesis would
require data analysis for a variety of species.

Our analyses also indicate that monkey movements are driven by environmental
heterogeneities.
Monkey ranging patterns are thus not \lq\lq self-quenched" into a routine
emerging from initially random movements that would be re-inforced and
dominated at large time by frequent revisits to a small number of known
locations, a mechanism proposed for human mobility \cite{song}. Similarly, it is
likely that human movements are not entirely self-organized, as this would
imply that the locations of activity hotspots would be uncorrelated with
environmental factors. In the real world, many hotspots would clearly be
shared because of some intrinsic property of the location: {\it e.g.}, schools,
transit hubs or office buildings. A difference is that many human resources
last over long time scales, like homes and workplaces \cite{gonzalez}. Yet,
others are transient, like restaurants, trendy night-clubs or fashionable
shops, or seasonal, like swimming pools and ski-resorts. A place can be also
abandoned for another not because it is depleted but because the appetite
for that resource has been temporarily sated.

Despite the similarities between human and monkey movements,
there are important differences. In humans, the home range
size fluctuates widely from one individual to another, ranging
between 1 km and 1000 km approximately \cite{gonzalez,song}. In contrast,
the nearly identical home range sizes found for the four monkeys
(Fig.\ref{fig1}c,d) suggest a narrow size distribution, probably due to
comparable habitats, energetic needs and locomotor capacities. This is
consistent with the fact that the home range
of a capuchin group overlaps with a relatively small number of other
home ranges \cite{megpnas}, which probably limits intergroup interactions
to nearest neighbors or next-nearest neighbors. This
property is not shared by all animal species, though. Territorial prides
of Serengeti lions occasionally make long-range contacts with other prides
as well as with nomadic individuals, producing a denser network of contacts
with the \lq\lq small world" property that characterizes many human social
networks \cite{lauren}.

Similar to random diffusion models of animal movements with intermittent central
attraction \cite{blackwell}, several models of human mobility with preferential
return to home have been introduced recently, showing that recurrence can have dramatic
effects on spreading processes in large populations \cite{vespignani,skufca,belik}.
These latter models typically assume a known set of locations that can be visited and
Markovian, individual-dependent transition rates between locations.
Developing parallel modeling frameworks that adequately represent both
self-organization and environmental forcing will be critical to the success
of human movement models for purposes such as of controlling the spread of
infectious diseases. These alternate models should incorporate cognitive
mechanisms that many vertebrates use, {\it e.g.} spatial representation
mechanisms (cognitive maps or travel cost discounting) and temporal
mechanisms (episodic memory) \cite{boyerwalsh}. How scaling laws emerge from
the interplay between memory and landscape features remains elusive.

\vspace{1cm}

{\bf Acknowledgements}

\vspace{0.3cm}

This work was conducted as a part of the \lq\lq Efficient Wildlife Disease Control:
from Social Network Self-organization to Optimal Vaccination" Working Group
supported by the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis, a centre
funded by the NSF (grant $\#$DEB-0553768), the University of California, Santa Barbara,
and the State of California. Funding for the data collection was provided to MCC by
the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and the Frederik Sheldon Travelling
Fellowship from the Harvard University. Required permits were obtained from the
Autoridad Nacional del Ambiente, Panama and the Smithsonian Tropical Research
Institute Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee.  All research complied with
the laws of the Republic of Panama and the United States.

\newpage

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaArXiv


Huzefa Kanorwala, Founder & CEO, CTRL M Print Management India, will join panelists at the session titled 'In-Store Displays: The Buying Evolution & Market Scenario' as part of In-Store Asia 2019.
Huzefa Kanorwala, Founder & CEO, CTRL M Print Management India, will join as one of the panelists at a knowledge session titled "In-Store Displays : The Buying Evolution & Market Scenario" at In-Store Asia 2019 (now a part the family of EuroShop Düsseldorf, the world's #1 retail fair), the largest retail experience expo and convention in the Indian subcontinent. The upcoming edition of the event is scheduled to be held during March 14-16, 2019, at Bombay Exhibition Centre, Goregaon, Mumbai.
Kanorwala pioneered the print management concept in India and has over 15 years of print / POP experience. He was Country Head, India for a global print management company and worked in UK, Singapore and Dubai print /POP markets before moving back to India.
Currently, he is founder and CEO of CTRL M Print Management India. At CTRL M Kanorwala helps clients with insights about maximizing their business potential through print and guides his team towards excellence and success. In a short time span, he has developed and managed a team of over 70 people across India.
Kanorwala graduated from the London College of Printing and pursued a General Management from ISB.


A lot of time and effort can go into the process of "getting ready" on wedding day. There are so many things to remember: the shoes, the veil, the lipstick, the bobby pins, the something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue, and a penny for your shoe! WHEW!
These special details are ones you will remember forever with my photojournalistic style of photography. I have a special eye and notice "the little things" that become precious memories for years to come.


text:
from django.conf.urls import patterns, include, url

from django.contrib import admin
admin.autodiscover()

import sqltables
sqltables.autodiscover()

urlpatterns = patterns('',
    # Examples:
    url(r'^$', 'demo.views.home', name='home'),
    # url(r'^blog/', include('blog.urls')),

    url(r'^admin/', include(admin.site.urls)),
    url(r'^tables/', include(sqltables.manager.urls)),
)

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Styling is made easy when your favorite staples make it easy to slip on and go. We're channeling our inner cool girl by embracing the effortlessly cute pull-on shorts. Show off your legs in a range of comfortable and casual styles perfect for any warm weather outing on your agenda.
The curve, frayed hem and cute tassel ties. A pair of woven mules to rock a boho-chic look. Available in other colors. Available in size XXS-XXL.
Staying comfortable in warmer weather. The drapey linen, front patch pockets, and cozy drawstring waistband. Available in other colors. Available in size XXS-XXL.
The lightweight linen and flattering thick waistband. A pair of espadrilles to keep things casually cool. Available in other colors. Fabric: Linen weave. Available in size XS - L.
Lightweight and perfect for a hot summer. Also, they are not as wrinkly as most linen fabrics. These shorts fit true to size. Available in other colors. Available in size XS-XXL.
They are made so well and are so cute! You can even roll them for a different look. The pull on is awesome! Atie-front top and some fashion sneakers. Available in other colors. Available in size 0-16.
An active lifestyle or lounge day. Available in other colors. Inseam: 3.5"
Running errands or covering up at the pool. The relaxed fit and sporty curved hems. Available in other colors. Available in size XXS-XXL. Inseam: 3.5".
An alternative to maternity shorts these would do great and they did. Get compliments all the time. A breezy v-neck white tee can be styled up with. Available in other colors. Available in size 0-16. Inseam: 3.5".
Any summer outing that calls for showing a little leg. The comfortable mid-rise fit, drawstring waistband, and flattering roomy fit .Available in other colors.Available in size XS-XXL. Inseam: 4"
Breathable fabric, super soft feels, and flattering fits provide you with all the pull-on perfection you need to go forth and conquer the summer. Scroll to shop our 10 best pull-on shorts to wear right now!


text:
Roncevaux Terra este numele dat părții de nord a părții puternic reflectorizante a satelitului Iapetus al lui Saturn. Jumătatea de sud a acestei laturi este numită Saragossa Terra.  Cealaltă jumătate a lui Iapetus, numită Cassini Regio, este extrem de întunecată. Se crede că culoarea lui Roncevaux Terra este culoarea de bază a lui Iapetus, în timp ce Cassini Regio a fost formată fie dintr-o substanță care a acoperit gheața mai strălucitoare a restului satelitului, fie dintr-un reziduu rămas din sublimarea gheții de tip Roncevaux. Pentru mai multe detalii, vezi articolul principal despre Iapetus.

Roncevaux Terra poartă numele bătăliei de la Trecătoarea Roncevaux, subiect al epopeei franceze Chanson de Roland, după ale cărui personaje sunt denumite formele de relief ale lui Iapetus.  "Terra" este un termen folosit în geologia planetară pentru a se referi la mase de uscat extensive.

Referințe

Legături externe

 "Roncevaux Terra".Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature. USGS Astrogeology Research Program.
 Map of Iapetus

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Dr. Ruby & Dr. Rochon are avid supporters of the Santa Barbara and Santa Ynez communities. They participate in many local charities, auctions, and volunteer year round at nearby preschools to introduce pediatric dental health and awareness to parents and children. Dr. Ruby is a regular visiting teacher for UCLA's School of Pediatric Dentistry and helps educate the students on proper technique and etiquette while also offering his experiences as a Pediatric Dentist.
If your school or organization is interested in having our team come and speak to your students, please contact our office and we would be happy to talk with you about the services we offer.


Leader: Lord, let me hunger enough that I not forget the world's hunger.
People: Lord, let me hunger enough that I may have bread to share.
Leader: Lord, let me hunger enough that I may long for the Bread of Heaven.
People: Lord, let me hunger enough that I may be filled.
All: nor try to live by bread alone. Amen.
Theme: Are we sharing the bread we have? Are we sharing the bread we have been given?


I heard what Scott Nicholson had planned for September a couple of weeks ago, and I was intrigued. Ok, I wasn't just intrigued, I was jealous. It's a superb idea and I think it's going to work very well for him. Scott is very clever, always looking for an angle, and we are fortunate to be able to stand on the sidelines and watch and learn. Without further ado (can you tell I'm in the middle of writing a wedding speech), here's Scott. *** Indie authors have the same tools—content creation, formatting, editing, graphic design, and distribution—as publishers when it comes to developing ebooks, whether the indie author tackles the job alone or outsources some of the tasks.
Scott Nicholson has been picked up by Amazon's increasingly busy imprint Thomas & Mercer. He signed a two-book deal which will include his self-published title, Liquid Fear, and the forthcoming sequel, Chronic Fear. Both will be released by Amazon on December 20 this year. Summer is traditionally a slow period in publishing. Not for Thomas & Mercer, who have also snapped up Michael Wallace and J Carson Black in the last ten days, adding them to their earlier batch of summer signings JA Konrath, Barry Eisler, and Blake Crouch. Along with some of the popular backlist titles of Ed McBain, Thomas & Mercer have an extremely strong line-up heading into the holiday season and beyond.


During negotiations this morning, Tuvalu made another impassioned plea for the world to realize that its very survival depends on a binding and effective agreement.
Negotiations this afternoon went back and forth as the parties are still divided about whether or not to abandon the Kyoto Protocol in favor of a totally new agreement.
Annex-I countries, however, such as Canada, Japan, Switzerland and Sweden all stated that the Kyoto framework will not be effective enough to keep climate change below the 2 degree number. They each stressed the need to merge the Kyoto document into a new binding agreement that eliminates the two-track system.
The 5th meeting of the CMP is now adjourned.
This entry was posted in AOSIS, Behind the Scenes, China and G77, Copenhagen and Denmark, Europe, Rules and Regulations, Uncategorized and tagged CMP5, COP15, g-77, Ian Fry, plenary meeting, Tuvalu, two track. Bookmark the permalink.
← Renewable Energy Advocates Get Upclose Look at Middelgrunden Windfarm.


text:
Scientists found the number of photons produced by all the stars in the Universe, and our minds are blown
Have you ever stopped to wonder exactly how much light has been produced by all the stars in the Universe, over all the time that has passed? Well, now you can wonder no more. An international team of astronomers has actually calculated the amount of starlight in the cosmos.
And it's teaching us new things about the early years of our Universe.
In the time since the Big Bang – roughly 13.7 billion years – our Universe has produced many, many galaxies, and many more stars. Perhaps around two trillion galaxies, containing around a trillion-trillion stars.
For decades, scientists have known that knowing how much light these stars have produced over the course of the Universe's lifespan would be a powerful tool for understanding the early Universe, as well as the history of star formation.
But, well, it's not exactly an easy thing to measure. While there are a lot of stars out there, producing many photons, space is incredibly vast, and starlight incredibly dim. There's also interference from zodiacal light and the Milky Way's own faint glow. The Universe's starlight cannot really be observed directly.
But astrophysicist Marco Ajello of Clemson University and his team discovered an indirect method of quantifying starlight. They used gamma ray photons.
"These are photons that are high energy, typically a billion times the energy of visible light," Ajello told ScienceAlert.
"While travelling through space, gamma rays can be absorbed through interactions with starlight photons. And if there are many starlight photons, there will be more absorptions; so we can count the number of absorptions that we see to understand the density of the starlight of the photon field between us and the gamma ray source."
Using nine years' worth of data from NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, Ajello and his team analysed the light from 739 blazars (strong gamma-ray sources) throughout the Universe to determine the rate of absorption into the extragalactic background light (EBL), the Universe's accumulated background radiation.
This gave them the density of starlight photons in the EBL – and, because the blazars are at different distances, they were able to do so across a range of time periods.
Once they accounted for and subtracted light from other sources, such as the glowing accretion discs around supermassive black holes, they could multiply this density by the volume of the Universe to arrive at the number of photons produced by stars since the beginning of time.
"We basically have a tool, like a book, to tell the stories of starlight across the history of the Universe, and finally we found it, and we can just read it," Ajello said.
"So we did. We measured the entire star formation history of the Universe."
It is pretty simple to explain, but it was painstaking and complex to actually do. It took the team three years – and it was worth it.
We now know that, as of the time Fermi's data was collected, the Universe's stars had produced 4×1084 photons.
Do you need that spelled out? Here: 4,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.
Yep, it's a four followed by 84 zeroes. Or four octillion octodecillion. That's a pretty cool trivia fact, so file it up your sleeve for later.
But you bet the science actually gets much cooler. Because that cool number actually lifts the veil on a particularly mysterious time in our Universe's history – the Epoch of Reionisation, which started around 500 million years after the Big Bang. We often hear the term "holy grail" chucked around, but the EoR really IS one.
It's basically when the Universe's lights switched on.
Before the EoR, space was opaque. Then something came along and ionised all the neutral hydrogen, so that radiation – including light – could stream freely through the Universe.
"With our measurement, we can reach the very first billion years of the Universe, and that's a very interesting time of the Universe, so distant from us that all the really powerful telescopes can't really see. The objects there are so far away and so faint that we can't really see them. Instead, we still see the light from those objects," Ajello explained.
The team found two things of note in that time: a very large number of UV photons, which was expected for the reionisation process; and that the sources of those UV photons were populations of irregular galaxies – small, blobby, asymmetrical galaxies that produce a lot of UV radiation.
These could be the drivers behind reionisation. It's expected that the James Webb Space Telescope, scheduled for a 2021 launch, could tell us more about the EoR.
Meanwhile, Ajello and his team are going to apply their book of the stars to a deeper study of the cosmos – such as the rate of the Universe's expansion, the Hubble constant, which has been really difficult to pin down.
"It turns out our measurement is very sensitive to the expansion rate of the Universe," Ajello said. "This can be used to make a measurement of the Hubble Constant right now, so that's something that we're going to do."
The team's research has been published in the journal Science.


text:
PC Brian Riddell wins in Cambridge
The Canadian Press has called the race in Cambridge for Brian Riddell of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario. The electoral district was previously represented by Belinda Karahalios of the New Blue Party of Ontario.
Riddell (PC) was declared the winner with 37.68 per cent of 18,961 ballots counted as of 9:31 p.m. Marjorie Knight (NDP) was in second with 21.3 per cent of votes and Surekha Shenoy (Liberal) was in third with 21.02 per cent.
Brian Riddell: 7,144 votes (37.68 per cent)
Marjorie Knight: 4,038 votes (21.3 per cent)
Surekha Shenoy: 3,986 votes (21.02 per cent)
Belinda Karahalios: 2,066 votes (10.9 per cent)
Carla Johnson: 1,727 votes (9.11 per cent)
As of 9:31 p.m. the Canadian Press is projecting the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario has won a majority government. The party has won or is leading in nine of 124 electoral districts. The Ontario New Democratic Party has won or is leading in 26 electoral districts. The Liberal Party of Ontario has won or is leading in nine electoral districts. The Green Party of Ontario has won or is leading in one electoral district. Other candidates have won or are leading in one electoral district.
As of June 2, 763 vote-by-mail packages had been issued to registered voters in the riding. There are a total of 70,904 eligible voters in Cambridge.


Learning how to buy Zcash with credit card, PayPal, or Bitcoin can be confusing.
That's why we made this guide – today you'll learn about the best place to buy zcash, and how to do it yourself. Don't have any experience buying cryptocurrency? Don't worry! This guide is geared towards beginners.
You cannot directly purchase Zcash with USD. In order to buy, you must first purchase another cryptocurrency with USD, then trade it for Zcash.
Before buying Zcash, you have to buy Bitcoin or Ethereum first. To learn how to buy Bitcoin, follow our guide.
After buying Bitcoin, you need to send it to an exchange that trades Zcash. In this guide, we will be using Binance.
After your Bitcoin transfers to Binance, then you can purchase your Zcash.
Back on the Balances tab, search for ZEC and click Trade. In the dropdown menu, select ZEC/BTC.
In the middle of the screen, select the Market tab. In this tutorial, we will be buying Zcash with a market order. There are other types of orders, but market orders are the easiest to use.
Enter the amount of Zcash you would like to buy. The price you pay per Zcash will be shown at the top right in dollars and in Bitcoin. After entering the amount you would like to buy, click Buy ZEN. Binance will take a .1% fee from your transaction.
After buying, you should be able to view your Zcash in the balances tab.
Step 3: Safely Store Your Zcash!
Once you buy, your Zcash is stored on the exchange wallet. Although your Zcash has been received, it is not totally secure. Every wallet has a private key, or a sequence of numbers or letters. Each private key is unique to one wallet, and allows access to the contents of that wallet.
If you have Zcash on an exchange wallet, they control the private keys. This leaves your tokens more vulnerable to manipulation by others. If the exchange is hacked, the hackers will use your private keys to access your Zcash.
The best way to store cryptocurrencies is usually a hardware wallet, as they combine security and accessibility. Some cryptocurrencies are unable to be stored in hardware wallets, but Zcash is hardware wallet compatible.
Zcash is an ERC20 token, a type of token based on the Ethereum blockchain. All ERC20 tokens can be stored on hardware wallets, but in order to do so, you must configure your hardware wallet with an ERC20 software wallet. One of the most popular ERC20 software wallets is MyEtherWallet (MEW).
Contrary to popular belief, most cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin, aren't as private as they might seem. The traditional blockchain acts as an open ledger – all transactions are entirely transparent. In Bitcoin's case, wallet balances and addresses are transparent.
Zcash is a decentralized peer-to-peer token. In fact, it is a fork of Bitcoin. Moreover, similar to Bitcoin, Zcash also has 21 million token cap.
Although, unique from most other projects, Zcash harnesses the power of advanced cryptography to offer complete privacy to its users. If anonymity is important to you, Zcash may be a good token to consider.
Zcash utilizes zk-Snarks or Zero-Knowledge Succinct Non-Interactive Arguments of Knowledge to achieve its high level of privacy.
The token allows you to choose which kind of transaction you'd like to make. You can make a transparent transaction or a private transaction. Simply choose to send Zcash to the recipient's transparent address (t-addr) or shielded address (z-addr).
For a transparent transaction, send from your transparent t-address to the recipient's transparent address. For shielded transactions, send to/from the shielded address. Easy, right?
For more information regarding Zero-Knowledge Succinct Non-Interactive Arguments of Knowledge, Zcash's algorithm and how everything works, check out Blockgeeks' guide.
At this point, you know how to buy Zcash – although, before you invest your hard earned money, you probably want to know what you're investing in.
In the next section, you'll learn about Zcash's development team, community, and use cases. This way, you'll be able to make a more informed decision before you decide to spend (or not spend) your money.
Zooko Wilcox is the cryptocurrency's founder and CEO. With more than 20 years of experience with decentralized systems, cryptography and information security, Wilcox is fit for the job.
He is also the founder of Least Authority Enterprises. They were founded to create freedom-compatible technologies, believing in the importance of internet privacy.
He is recognized for his work on DigiCash, Mojo Nation, ZRTP, "Zooko's Triangle", Tahoe-LAFS, BLAKE2, and SPHINCS. He is also the Founder of Least Authority.
Other members of the team have attended prestegious schools such as UC Berkeley, MIT and Johns Hopkins University.
For more information regarding Zcash's development team and other employees, click here.
Zcash has a blog on their website. They also have a significant following on reddit, with over 12,000 readers.
Additionally, they have a Telegram channel and a Twitter account with a significant following of 66K users.
Zcash is the only altcoin (that i know of) designed and built by professional and academic cryptographers. Hard to ignore... Zcash's privacy tech makes it the most interesting Bitcoin alternative. Bitcoin is great, but if it's not private, it's not safe.
Since Zcash is a fork of Bitcoin, it also has a hard cap of 21 million coins. The total token supply is not expected to be completely mined until 2032. Furthermore, the token is not ICO funded or pre-mined.
A group of investors funded the project with $1 million in an effort to kickstart the development. The investors incrementally received 10% of the total token supply over the first 4 years of as a reward for their initial investment.
Zcash is focused on the privacy of its users – therefore, anyone looking for a privacy coin should consider Zcash. The token improves upon Bitcoin's blockchain by enabling semi-transparent processing. User data is revealed selectively.
Zcash protects consumer data by keeping their transactions private. However, it is difficult to say that Zcash will be adopted by businesses, as it is imperative to track spending for record keeping and tax purposes.
On the other hand, Zcash is an important asset for those looking to preserve their privacy.


It's not often someone can purchase the perfect ready to wear shirt. At Uncommon Man our shirts are cut to the client to fit with ease including a vast arrangement of collars and cuffs.
Every tuxedo needs to be finished off with the perfect tuxedo shirt. Uncommon Man's tuxedo shirt is the final touch to finish off your Uncommon Man tuxedo.


My newly adopted city was a mere 45 minutes by train from Amsterdam, which I convinced myself was nothing compared to my former daily commute by subway from East Flatbush, Brooklyn to lower Manhattan. I could get back and forth to Amsterdam with ease, even daily if I wanted. And I thought I might want to. I had friends, favorite restaurants, libraries, coffee shops, and seemingly places to be in Amsterdam. In order to tolerate life in this new city, I would surely have to make frequent trips back to the only city that mattered.
And sure enough, after I made the move, I was making those frequent trips back to Amsterdam. I paid for a monthly train subscription that allowed for unlimited weekend rides, as the roundtrips were adding up at €11+ each. And to the best of my ability, I tried to keep in time with Amsterdam. I wouldn't be one of those people who moved to The Hague, never to be seen or heard from again.
But as time went by, I started skipping some weekends in Amsterdam. And I started paying attention to the neighborhoods I passed through as I got lost on my way to wherever. And wait, what's this? The Hague is super cute! And wait, who's that? The Hague has Black people, too?! Veggie-friendly restaurants (a vegan restaurant on my corner), multiple libraries with free wifi, lovely parks, coffee shops, friendly neighbors with happy dogs. Even my neighborhood bike repair guy is from Ghana, yay (he fixed my tire for free). Turns out this underrated city has a lot to offer – much of it within walking distance.
And then I finally went to the beach. A legitimate beach, just ten-minutes from home by bike. It's a wrap – you have my heart!
That beach looks really wonderful. It's great that you were able to adjust and really liked it!
Hey. Random question – I moved to Amsterdam a couple of months ago and I am a black woman. I have been searching for black community and social events in English but haven't found any; what I see on the net is in Dutch. Would you have ideas and suggestions of where I can go to find black community in Amsterdam? Thanks.


Question: You have said that Christ's death for our sins was a satisfaction to God's justice. Why don't all professing Christians believe that?
Some professing Christians have rejected the historic understanding of Christ's death as a satisfaction for sins. This is nothing new. Faustus Socinus (1539–1604), a forerunner of modern Unitarianism, raised a number of objections against this doctrine. The Socinians made Christ more of a teacher and example than a redeemer and priest.
What reasons do they give against the doctrine that Christ satisfied God's justice?
G. H. Kersten outlined Socinus's objections, and explained why they are false (Reformed Dogmatics , 261, 263).
Objection 1: The satisfaction of God's justice by Christ is not necessary. God is not bound to do justice. He is merciful and can simply forgive.
Objection 2: The satisfaction of God's justice by Christ is absurd. How can the innocent one be punished, and the guilty one be acquitted? This would set a bad example and corrupt society.
Objection 3: The satisfaction of God's justice by Christ is impossible. No one can pay someone else's moral debt to God. No one can obey in someone else's place.
Objection 4: The satisfaction of God's justice by Christ is harmful. It makes Christ's love greater than God's mercy, because Christ was willing to pay when God was not willing to forgive. It also opens the door for people to sin because Christ paid for their sins.
How do you answer those objections?
1. The satisfaction of God's justice by Christ is necessary because God is righteous and just in His very being. The Bible insists that God is just and the justifier of sinners who trust in Christ's blood (Rom. 3:25–26). Forgiveness does not mean God pretends that no evil has been done. God forgives the guilt based on the satisfaction that He Himself paid in His Son.
2. The satisfaction of God's justice by Christ is not absurd but most wise because glorifies both God's mercy and justice. It shows that God's righteousness and love do not compromise each other or fight against each other, but operate in perfect harmony. It does not corrupt society, but it saves corrupt men and makes them like God in both mercy and justice.
3. The satisfaction of God's justice by Christ is possible because Christ, as a divine Person, has the power and freedom to lay down His life and take it up again (John 10:17–18). He therefore could be the Surety, binding Himself to pay our debts to God, for He as God the Son was free from all debts.
4. The satisfaction of God's justice by Christ is beautiful and helpful because it displays God's mercy in Christ's dying love. Christ did not give Himself against the Father's will, but was sent by the Father because of the Father's love for sinners (John 3:16). This does not give people permission to sin, but, if they truly receive Him, motivates them to also give their lives in service to others (Eph. 4:32–5:2).
Therefore, it is biblical and right for us to say that Christ acted as a substitute for His elect. He stood in their place to obey God's law, bear the curse of sin, and pay the full price required to satisfy God's justice.
God is mercifully just and justly merciful. Let us not fall into the error of Jacob Arminius, who said that God has a throne of mercy and a throne of justice, and His throne of mercy is exalted above His throne of justice. God has one throne, and there mercy and justice dwell together in infinite brightness and joy.
Both justice and mercy shine forth from the cross of Jesus with unspeakable beauty. Yes, His mercy shines all the brighter when seen in the light of His justice. His mercy is for hell-deserving sinners. Nor is it a reluctant mercy. God delights in mercy. That is why, as Luther said, Jesus Christ was reckoned the greatest sinner who ever lived. He that knew no sin became sin to satisfy the justice of God. God's mercy did not ignore the debt, but paid the price.


Rename the downloaded templates so they are easily recognizable if you want to use them again. Check the packaging to make sure you have the correct template before printing. Choose the foldable card template you need to use.
Postcards are a simple method to send personal and company communications for various functions. They are a convenient marketing tool for each company through which they can inform their target niche about their latest offers, special discounts, events, etc. A postcard of an obverse and a reverse is created. The use of Microsoft Word templates is a really simple means to produce postcards for a company with a limited budget.
The postcard is a fantastic approach to convey your messages and also has the marketing messages. Nowadays, postcards are offered for virtually any purpose and there are many styles, designs and color themes that can be used to produce the specific look to which it points. Printable postcards are a great help. Today you have your own postcard!
Print only the number of postcards you request. Whenever you have the postcard the way you would like to print it, click on File and then on Print. Once you have selected the type of postcard you want, you can now click on the design you want on the corresponding side of the screen. Postcards are among the most frequent and effective methods of communication. Even postcards of clipped newsletters are known for their impressive results.
There are many things that should be taken into account when selecting a template to make a size similar to the electronic publication (number of pages, margins, headings, subtitles, etc.) and the amount of space you would like for the images and graphics. Avery provides some templates, which makes buying the ideal card to print a range of postcards on a single sheet very easy. The signs designed from free templates are an excellent method to advertise your company, advertise sales, events or show the superior work you have done in a job site. Currently, there are free templates of postcards available that you can download from Word Template Online. They are a great tool for small business owners to market and promote their businesses with minimal pressure on the company's budget. There are different types of absolutely free postcard templates available on the Internet and you need to download the one that suits your needs. There is a totally free postcard template below the publication that is a roadmap to design different types of postcards.
Save the file for a document file that works with a different file name, which will allow you to reuse the template later. The Avery 8387 Template can also be used by others to complete the necessary information. However, instead of visiting the local card store, it is now possible to download a template that allows you to make your own postcards. The completely free templates for brochures that can be found on the Web allow the small business owner to complete a professional-looking desktop publishing project with whatever personal and creative style he or she would like to include.


text:
Fox News Fires All Male Employees
Roy Riffle
In an abrupt move, the Fox News Channel has fired all male employees.
New York, NY — In what some are calling a rash and hasty action, The Fox News Group, parent company of the News Channel, has fired all 253 male members of its staff and replaced them with an all female employee base.
The embattled channel has seen several recent controversies involving claimed sexual harassment of female employees by their male counterparts which led to the abrupt resignation of former Fox News CEO Roger Ailes and termination of Bill O'Reilly who had the channel's most popular prime-time show.
In November 2016, Fox News former anchor Megyn Kelly wrote in her book about the details of her sexual abuse allegations against Ailes. According to Kelly, when she first joined Fox News, Mr. Ailes would have meetings with her, during which he would make sexual remarks. On April 19, 2017, Fox News announced that O'Reilly would not return to their primetime lineup amid sexual harassment claims.
The move, which has been criticized even by critics of the right-leaning news channel, sent shock waves through the cable industry. According to a brief memo released by the Fox News Group, all male personnel have been removed from the network including personalities such as Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson, Bret Baier and any special appearances by Ann Coulter. Greg Gutfeld is staying on.
Previous articleMichael Moore Terrorizes Buffet Owners
Next articleDoctors Rushing to Remove Sally Yates' Foot from Ted Cruz's Rectum
https://www.facebook.com/roy.riffle.5
Our youngest columnist, Roy Riffle gained fortune, though not necessarily fame, when at 9 years old he coined the phrase "Obey Your Thirst". Some of his smugness stems from "having read the bible and understanding the metaphors." Roy is currently the only Millennial on Gish Gallop payroll. And hopefully the last.
How To Become a Libertarian in 15-ish Steps, by Loretta Splitair
Caltech Physicist: Rock N' Roll Actually Euphemism For Fornication
Area Man Stakes Gold Claim in Irrigation Ditch
Kent, WA Chosen for Immediate Syrian Refugee Relocation
IBM To Continue Its Long Relationship with Authoritarian Regimes
Exclusive! Leaked Job Offer Letter For New Fox News Female Employees
Area Woman Can't Spell 'Medical Marijuana'


The juice extractor is made of eco-friendly and materials, with high squeeze speed BAP free, healthy drink every day, the juicer cup will works.
When the cup is working properly, it will shuts down automatically after running 90s, then the green light will bright, if you want to start again, just repress the switch. When you use it charge 3 to 4 hours and you can make 8 to 10 cups of juice, enjoy healthy and fresh lifestyle.
The juicer cup's body and bottom can be separated, you can clean it easily with the bonus sponge brush.
380ML fruit mixing machine, portable and great for traveling, outdoor, not only for making a protein shake, juice and used as common cup and juice blender, blender can mix kinds of fruit and vegetables.
The USB juicer cup can be easily charged by power, laptop, computer, mobile phones or other USB devices. Micro USB charging cable attached with package.
1.Please take extra care not to wet the bottom half of the dive, it is the charging port.
2.Turn on: long press switch 4 seconds.
3.You should cut the pulp into small pieces.
4. When you first use it charge 3 to 4 hours.


Is it permissible to enter into a sisterhood/brotherhood contract with a male cousin and shake hands and speak with him?
According to Islamic Shari'ah, it is not permissible for a girl and a boy to have any kind of relationship with each other before marriage regardless of whether the relationship is direct or indirect (e.g. speaking), if it is with the intention of seeking pleasure or when it entails corruption and it is feared that they might fall into a sin. However, there would be no problem in conventional speaking with a non-Mahram provided that the two sides do not seek sexual pleasure and that they abide by the limits and the girl observes the Islamic dress code. Hence, you can speak with your cousin and have family relationship with him, if you observe modest dress and do not have lustful intention.
1. In Islam, there is no such thing as "brother" and "sister" relationships outside of actual sibling relationships. In fact, brotherhood contract has been recommended among men, a step taken by the Messenger of Allah (S) following his migration to Medina. Obviously, the bond which was built on the basis of some commonalities among them was upheld and continued to be preserved. For example, the Holy Prophet (S) created brotherhood relationship between Abu Bakr and Umar; Uthman and Abdur Rahman bin 'Awf; Talha and Zubair. The Prophet (S) himself established brotherhood relationship with Imam Ali (A.S.).
When it comes to your contract with your cousin, it had been wrong in the first place.
2. You cannot shake hands with each other in the name of brother and sister relationships. There is no such a relationship to make you mahram to each other and it is, therefore, haram and sinful to shake hands with your cousin with the assumption that he is your brother .
3. According to Islamic Shari'ah, it is not permissible for a girl and a boy to have any kind of relationship with each other before marriage regardless of whether the relationship is direct or indirect (e.g. speaking), if it is with the intention of seeking pleasure or when it entails corruption or when it is feared that they might fall into a sin. However, there is no problem in conventional speaking with a non-Mahram without lustful intention provided that the two sides abide by the limits and the girl observes the Islamic dress code. Hence, you can speak with your cousin and have family relationship with him, if you observe modest dress and do not have lustful intention.
4. Boy-girl friendship is not allowed because it is feared that they might fall into a sin. However, there is no problem in a job-related relationship, if it does not entail any corruption and that the Shari'ah rules are observed. The conclusion is that you cannot make friendship with your cousin.
In a nutshell, you can speak with your cousin to the necessary extent and benefit from his guidance in ironing out your problems provided that you should observe the limits and abide by Shari'ah standards.
For further information, refer to answers 6912 (site: 6998), 6943 (site: 6933) and 1408 (site: 1428).
 - Extracted from answer No.6843 (site: 6933).
 - Extracted from answer No.2036 (site: 2092).
 - Extracted from answer No.1408 (site: 1428).
 - Gulpaigani, Sayyid Muhammad Reza Musavi, Majma'ul Masail, vol.2, p. 229, Dar al-Quran al-Karim, Qom, 2nd edition, 1409 A.H.; Mahmoodi, Sayyid Mohsen, Masail Jadid from the Viewpoint of Grand Religious Authorities, vol.1, pg.137-138, Sahib al-Zaman Cultural and Scientific Publications, Waramin, 14th edition, 1381 (en4766).


Only 2 left in stock order soon. Find great deals on ebay for rustic star furniture. Not only will we price match our lowest competitor but we will also guarantee that price for up to 60 days.
Unique and exotic rustic furniture in san diego.
Rustic star furniture. Rustic bedroom western living room solid wood tables and dining huge selection of solid wood desk and lots of outdoor furniture. Best prices largest inventory. All rustic furniture pieces can be customized to any dimensions.
Rustic furniture depot is the largest rustic western furniture rustic and western accessories store in the united states. At demejico we showcase the art of fine craftsmanship all manufactured from solid woods and hand forged wrought iron. Rustic star storage bench handmade solid wood entryway vintage paris style seat see more like this.
The rustic cape cod star decorative furniture cubes set of 2 sustainable wood quality hardware driftwood gray 15 34 x 15 34 x 15 34 and 11 x 11 x 11 inches by whole house worlds. Our company is your number one source for rustic furniture accessories and leather sofas. 6900 69 00 prime.
Offering quality star rustic furniture online since 1999. Tex star rustic carries a full line of mexican pine furniture in a natural dark and painted finish. Skip to main content.
We surpass the competition in not only price but value as w. Visit our showroom in los angeles ca. We have a lot of fun and delicious events planned for april a farmer dinner honoring kong thao a charity luncheon with billy harris and a cookbook dinner celebrating our friends gayle pirie john clark from san franciscos beloved foreign cinema.
Our handcrafted texas star rustic furniture are uniquely designed which will give you a western rustic look and affordable solutions for any room in your home and provide years of comfort and enjoyment. Open to the public 858 537 9348. By whole house worlds.
The rustic mile offers well crafted and moderately priced rustic style and leather furnishings. A star furniture 60 day low price guarantee a star furniture guarantees the lowest price in the usa. That means when you purchase your furniture at a star furniture you have 60 days to look for a lower price.
Furniture hardware lone star collection drawer ring pull iron 2 716 rustic see more like this. Free shipping on eligible orders. Our spanish furniture catalog features unique one of a kind pieces with the rich texture of hand cut details.


text:
Character building – a wealthy phenomenon
May 1, 2016 May 1, 2016 admin 0 Comments a wealthy phenomenon, Character building, Marwa Mehboob
By Marwa Mehboob.
Everyday is a new day. Sometimes we have to face tough decisions and sometimes we enjoy the blessings of liberty. This is how we react to our daily life routine. But important is that we shape our character in a way which carries strength to assist the external factors involved in our lives. There's a great saying, to reach a port we must sail, sometimes with the wind, and sometimes against it. But we must not drift or lie at anchor.
As a parent, and a working woman I encounter several circumstances each day which test my patience, my character and my peace of mind. And what i believe is that the most valuable asset in one's life is the solid foundation of values that guides and shapes our priorities and reactions. They have a potential to serve as our markers to tell us if our life is heading in the right direction and if it is turning out the way we want it to.
Core to problems and emotional drama that we experience in our lives is based on a strong relationship between the values we set and the actions we do. Actions and words are aligned with our values, life is generally good and we feel content, confident and satisfied. But when our behaviors don't match up with our values, we soon begin to sense an uneasiness that begins to swell and grow inside of us and the end result is a complete destruction of not only an individual character but the whole society.
When you are trying hard to polish your character and encounter such uncomfortable feeling which tells you that not all is good with the world right now. You feel isolated and come under the source of anxiety and unhappiness which slowly deteriorate the process of character building.
Under such circumstances what you need to do is to make a deliberate and conscious attempt to identify which values are the most important to keep the anxiety and happiness low and sense of personal worth and self-awareness high.
Nevertheless, if we concede values do naturally exist. Our lives can become less stressful and more productive and we will start honoring these values no matter what may come.
Before going into the details of my chosen subject I would shed light on those cardinal principles of Islam which are bestowed upon us for the success in this world and hereafter. When we speak of Islamic character we get to know that it carries high aspirations because of its faith and certainty and belief in the promise of Allah and because it realises the honour attained by being a Muslim and a follower of the Prophets. The aspirations attached with a Muslim will be proportional to his level of faith because here also the actions are connected to that which is settled in the heart of certainty, faith and belief with a strong resolve and sound religious commitment. This is something that holds the element of explicity for everyone and also with contemplation to any issue.
If we specifically highlight the significance of Islamic character, we see that it is based on belief in Allah and His Messengers and of course in accordance to Islamic conduct in a complete way, which includes truthfulness, honesty, chastity, modesty, good attitude, kindness to neighbors, hastening to do good, helping people to do what is right, refraining from harming others, and other aspects of Islamic conduct. If we look into the above mentioned aspects we can come up with an easy conclusion which relates these facets directly to the process of character building.
What's more important to understand here is that Islam wants its followers to deal with the question of making friends too on the criterion of merit. Regardless of the religion he or she belongs to. A good Muslim can have friendship with all other good humans, whether Muslims or non-Muslims, so as long as they respect his beliefs and not be a cause of threat to his spiritual and moral life. He must avoid the company of those Muslims and non-Muslims who have dubious character and who make fun of his religion. This gives us quite an obvious understanding of how important the character is which is free from the element of biasness not only in Islam but it's application beyond the Islamic boundaries have bear cherishable results for number of societies around the world. And its impact on the well-being of individuals and communities is equally essential so that the accurate image of true Islam and its impact on people's life may be presented.
I just can't conclude my writing without extending the pivotal role of a teacher in a society. The responsibility on a teacher's shoulder is very important because the main aim of the teacher is the character building of the students through academics. Teachers have to activate the minds as well as the body of our students without restricting them to what is written in the textbook but should try to come up to the student's expectations for which education should not be confined to merely delivering lectures. A teacher should teach the students to respect people, regardless of the social status .Teacher is not supposed to cram the student's head with facts but to prepare them for a life of purity and sincerity and this total commitment to character building should be the highest goal of a teacher. If I sum up the role of educational institutions in character building it can be said it is a place where all national and social features are grown up and watered with professional approach and if not carried in the said manner the consequences could be disastrous. Has anyone of us ever thought how powerful this source of individual learning really is, just imagine when an individual learns to invest one's surfeit strength, knowledge and power to serve other people in order to produce such more people having same qualities thus developing a new energy resource namely CHARACTER ENERGY which is equally significant like physical energy. That is when one feels himself out of this world. Don't you like to be a part of this immensely exciting state of mind, woo, just amazing!!!
My very last but not the least point which is whole of the above parts, SOCIETY. It has a deep influence on families and other social institutions. Being a member of all these institutions man becomes their product and what comes as a result, his character attributes are sown in the fields of society and waters by its institutions and he's tagged as an exclusive individual of a society. On the other hand the catastrophic situation of my society is being played right before my eyes. Unfortunately social , cultural , religious norms and values are disappearing from our society. The disastrous conversion from a nation to mob is taking place at very high speed.
What we all need to do is to focus all our attention in character building of our coming generation. The discussed values also resonate with me and these values are the most important for me to live by and the ones I want to pass along to my children and everyone in my life. But in order to reap the benefits we have to set the basis for nation building and nation building starts from individual building which is rooted with the character development of each and every citizen of this Green Nation.
Marwah Mehboob writes on social issues and is a media analyst. She can be reached at Twitter; @marwahmehboob
← Gurdwara Panja Sahib, Hassan Abdal
India's overstretch doctrine →
Impact of schools built in houses
Texting Magic
Yasir Akhtar: Multi Talented Star Reveals What He Is Planning Next From England