This 1962 classic from Dr. Seuss is a must have for any family that struggles to get their children to sleep at night! The colorful and entertaining illustrations in this 64 page book will have your little ones, and you, yawning before you know it.
A very small bug named Van Vleck is getting sleepy and yawns "so wide you can look down his neck." Since yawns are contagious, Van Vleck's yawn spreads to his friends and then "across the whole country toward every-which-where." Dr. Seuss uses clever rhyming throughout the bedtime story as well as strategic colors to encourage your little one to unwind and close their eyes. The beginning of the book starts off with bright colors and interesting scenes of Seuss characters getting ready for bed, from yawning to building nests to brushing their teeth. As the book progresses the colors, for the most part, become a much more cooler and dimmer shade of blue. The characters start to get into bed, begin snoring and dreaming, until finally the lights are put out. The lull of the rhyming will practically rock your little one, and perhaps you, to sleep.
Sleep has always been difficult in our house. I have never been good at falling asleep or staying asleep. It becomes stressful at times. Unfortunately, my son has inherited this. We tried routine bedtime, lavender oils, white noises, and even tough love to get him to sleep at night. However, since we have added this book, along with Goodnight Moon, to our bedtime routine, sleep has come much easier to my son, and to me. It wasn't an immediate thing, but now he enjoys just listening to this book as he closes his eyes and drifts off to dreamland.
Seuss is almost a sleep genius in my books by using the combination of clever rhyming, dimming color schemes, characters going through their bedtime routines, and the length of the book.
If you are struggling with bedtime with you little one, I would highly suggest ordering this book and adding it to your bedtime routine.
That the lights are all out and the drawbridge is up.
'Til the milkman delivers the milk, about dawn.


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Home	Banking & Credit	How to Break a Contract Without Paying Dearly
How to Break a Contract Without Paying Dearly
written by sshrx_ns3li1 February 21, 2020
We're taught to keep our promises, but sometimes staying true to our word can be financially devastating. Clearly, you should never flake out on a promise to take grandma out to dinner. But if you've signed a lengthy financial contract with a gym, a cellphone company, a bank or a landlord, continuing to pay for a service or a product may no longer be feasible. For instance, perhaps you've just lost your job.It's times like those when everyone finds themselves asking that age-old question: Can I break my contract?Maybe, maybe not. But if you think you're going to have to try and extract yourself from a contract, remember the following:[See: 11 Expenses Destroying Your Budget.]Honesty is the best policy. If you simply want to stop paying for a service or product, that sort of frank answer might not get you far. But if there's a reason you can't pay – you're no longer employed or perhaps your time is being consumed by taking care of an ill parent or child – share that information. You may find that you'll get a break, says Marc Fitapelli, an attorney at the law firm Fitapelli Kurta, based out of New York City. Fitapelli says he once represented a client who signed a contract to purchase some property and put down a large deposit."After the contract was signed, he started experiencing serious financial problems related to a bitter divorce," Fitapelli says.His client realized he couldn't close on the property and found himself wishing he had that deposit back. Fitapelli's client explained his situation to the seller, who turned out to be sympathetic. Fitapelli says his client didn't get all of the money back and wasn't entitled to, but he did have much of it returned.[See: 11 Ways to Save Time and Money.]Don't be a jerk. That's always good advice, but in this case, along with explaining to the other party why you're asking to break a contract, be pleasant. You may be planning to break your contract regardless, but don't say that. Ask if you can break the contract; don't announce that you will. Give the individual or company a chance to be magnanimous. You may be pleasantly surprised."Empathy goes a long way in contract disputes. Someone is less likely to hold you to the terms you're bound to if they aren't angry at you," says J.R. Skrabanek, an Austin, Texas-based attorney who specializes in civil litigation.Try to negotiate. Maybe there's a compromise both parties can agree to. For instance, many people, when they're struggling to pay off a house or car, will refinance the terms of the loan, so that the payments are smaller. They'll generally pay more in the long run in interest, of course.Perhaps you can negotiate your way out of a contract, so that you're paying something but not everything.If you go the negotiation route and get a satisfactory result, "ask for something in writing if you can, or save any subsequent invoice that shows a zero balance owed," says Shaolaine Loving, an attorney in Las Vegas who specializes in family law and estate planning. In other words, you don't want the same party to come back later and claim you still owe money.Prove the other party broke the contract. This could be a sleazy move on your part if the other party has been perfectly reasonable, and you're just looking for an out. But if this is an individual or company that's been difficult to work with, and particularly if the other party's behavior is part of the reason you want to back out, then start scrutinizing the language in your contract."Obviously, the most arguable way to avoid penalties would be to find a way to say the other party breached the contract," Loving says. "For instance, if the home seller wouldn't allow showings or didn't correct any identified problems in time."[See: 10 Things Teens Should Know About Money.]Minimize the damage. You've explained to the other party that you're going to have to break your contract. You've been nice. You've tried to negotiate a way out. And you've been told that it doesn't matter – you still have to honor the contract.If you're going to go ahead and break it anyway, minimizing the damages you'll cause the other party may mean you're liable for less money if you go to court, says Tom Simeone, a trial attorney at Simeone & Miller, LLP, in the District of Columbia."For example, if you are going to breach a lease, if you give notice ahead of time and leave the premises clean and ready to rent, then a court will find that a landlord can and should relet it out within a few months and not award damages for additional months, even if your lease is for several more months," Simeone says.That isn't just optimistic thinking, according to Simeone."Courts routinely require plaintiffs to mitigate their damages, so anything you can do to minimize the other party's damages will reduce your potential liability," he says.Skrabanek seconds that. "If you break your lease, the apartment complex needs to show it's making a diligent effort to find replacement tenants. They can't just let your apartment sit vacant for months on end with no effort and claim you owe them for the money," he says.And there's always the chance you can break the contract without negative repercussions. That's a gamble, but possibly one worth taking if the money left to pay isn't all that much."If you breach it by failing to pay or otherwise perform, the other side simply may not pursue a claim against you because the cost of doing so – in terms of legal fees and other expenses – may not make it worth their while," Simeone says. "Few people file suit to collect a hundred dollars."10 Ways to Feel Better About Your Money.
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Ive been looking into various recipes and explanations of creating a starter, and i thought id put a summary here.
Pretty well all of the recipes include a replication step like "divide in two, disposing of one half, and adding back a particular ratio mixture as a replacement". A very few have slightly different steps in the first few days but end up with this process at the end.
Additionally almost all recipes have the same general description for success: a mixture that when replicated displays a leavening effect (rises to about double its size) and a sort of "large bubble" foam on a consistant basis over several days. Notably many authors mention that it is common to see a false leavening effect caused by undesirable bacteria in the early phase of the process that then disappears after several days only to be replaced by the real leavening effect a few days later.
Acidic additives: These usually include some kind of acidic juice, with pineapple or orangejuice in the initial steps. The idea is that the juice lowers the ph preventing undesirable bacteria from growing but providing a good environment for wild yeast while at the same time providing sugars for the wild yeast to feed on. Vinegar is also suggested occasionally for similar reasons.
There are a much lower number suggesting using milk products. In this case the intention seems to be to encourage lactobascili, and also possibly the same justification as for the acidic additives.
Diastatic malt is also sometimes recommended with a tiny amount being added in the initial steps, also people that use AP flour will be unknowingly including tiny amounts of this as it usually added by the miller. The intention of this seems to be to provide sugar to the wild yeast, but enzymatically from the starch from the flour. Sometimes sweetener is suggested for similar reasons.
A few sources seem to suggest that you can manufacture wild yeast from commerical yeast, or that commerical bakers yeast will revert to wild.
One or two seem to suggest using things like unmilled rye or barly, or using the skins of wild or field grown grapes.
When i decided to make a starter I had access to a commerical starter "Seitenbacher(c) Natur Saurteig" that is widely available in grocery stores where I live in Germany.
My feeling is that one wants to encourage the wild stuff on the grain to replicate and that introducing things that are totally foreign wont help. Diastatic malt is an exception because it is a substance that does naturally occur in wheat and other grains and so adding a bit more doesnt drastically change things. Also its effect is slower, something that i think is important, providing a steady supply of sugar over time instead of a huge amount at the start which tapers off over time, something which doesnt seem to me to be inclined to make for a stable environment, and after all one thing we are looking for is a stable environment.
Did you take into account that some "experts" describe that wild air-born yeasts get captured into the cuture to produce unique local cutures with their own flavours and behaviours. I'm not sure if this is the case, as some books I have suggest the yeast is off the grain, but others suggest the air-born yeast capture method by delevoping the culture out-side with the lid off.
I'm not sure if there is a "right" answer; may be both are correct and worth exploring.
I enjoyed reading your summary and concur so far.
Yeah, ive seen this suggestion. Its quite common, for instance KAF mentions that kitchens that have been used for a lot of bake a lot tend to aquire a higher wild yeast load in the air and that this can make dough cooked in such a kitchen more "active" and presumably make it more likely for a starter to start.
OTOH I've seen at least one report that when care is taken to sterilize the flour prior to making a starter that you can reliably prevent the starter from forming a culture. Whereas environmental isolation produces negligible results. So it seems that the flour is more important. I guess its probably a bit of both.
TBH tho, from what i can see the real differentiator between starters is in the lactobacillus. At least according to wikipedia the ratio is about 100:1 in terms of bacteria to yeast. So the overconcern with wild yeast seems a little strange actually :-) From what i can tell we are actually looking for one or two specific yeasts which can survive the high acidity environment produced by the bacteria. This is also the idea of deliberately making the starter acidic to start off, basically try to kill off anything that cant survive in a high acid environment from get-go. Although i still think using juices is probably the wrong way (for other reasons).
Personally i think that the air is probably unimportant. More important is grain type and probably actually working the dough with your hands.
By the way i found the following link pretty interesting: What is the Microbiology of San Francisco Sourdough?
Thanks for the extra notes. I agree with your thinking on this.
Flour, plus water, plus patience never fails to result in a sourdough culture - at least in my house.
Reading about the problems some have had, I wondered if maybe my water was magical. Nah. Sourdough has been around for over 4,000 years, so it's not rocket science. I think lack of patience could be a factor for some. The culture I started last November took some time to develop its full flavor. It's still going strong.
Appreciate you posting the results of your Internet research. Very interesting, particularly re: the acidic additives. I always wondered about the purpose of using pineapple or orange juice at the beginning of the process, as some recipes recommend.
Pineapple is one that frankly I really wonder about. It contains bromelain which is a protein digestor, also know as a meat tenderizer. It also contains high levels of ascorbic acid and citric acid. None of this stuff naturally occurs in grain, and frankly I could see all of it interfering with the establishment of the symbiotic relationships that are required for a stable starter. Both ascoribic acid and bromealin definitely have complex chemical consequences and unless I saw some really good explanation of what they did I would use something reliable and measurable like citric acid powder or vinegar in solution if i wanted to make things a litte acidic to start.
As I mentioned, I have seen sourdough recipes calling for citric juices but have never used them. I'm still using a starter I made 10+ years ago from Nancy Silverton's recipe from her book La Brea Bakery , where, at the beginning of the process, she uses organic grapes which worked very well for me. I know there are shorter, easier and less wasteful methods, but hers works if you follow her directions to the letter. It is a 14 day process. If I had it to do today I would probably consider ordering a starter from K.A. or Carls. With her starter I presume at least some of the wild yeast spores come from the skins of the grapes.
Anyway, you've provided some thought provoking information in your posting. Thanks again for sharing the information you have compiled.
I have been reading about problems with starters.. I am about to embark on a sourdough starter. I have also read elsewhere, that the water additives have a good deal to do with it. Like a lot of America, there is a lot of bacteria killing addatives in city water (supplied vs well) flouride, chlorine, and all would kill the bacteria in starters as well. I read that if one has other than well water, it is advisable to let it sit unclovered for an hour or two for the evaporation of these chemicals.
I have well water, but sometimes work in area with supplied water. Any thoughts on this?


Here is Robert Smith's obituary. Please accept Everhere's sincere condolences.
Sadly, on February 19, 2019, we had to say goodbye to Robert Smith (Whangarei, North Island). Family and friends can send flowers and/or light a candle as a loving gesture for their loved one. Leave a sympathy message to the family in the guestbook on this memorial page of Robert Smith to show support.
He was loved and cherished by many people including : his spouse Adele; his children, Murray, Graham, Rhonda and Peter.
There are no additional memories for Robert Smith at this time. You can add a memory to pay tribute to Robert Smith at any time.
Here are the tributes to Robert Smith who passed away in Whangarei, North Island.
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Joe tells us that asking questions can lead to information that will help land a customer in the right car. Questions can in fact attach a customer to a product emotionally as well as logically. The customer's emotional attachment to a product is amplified by getting them in a car so they can see it and touch it.


Opera's most popular double bill comes to dramatic life in this broadcast with a lineup of great singing actors, led by the magnetic Zinka Milanov as Santuzza and the incomparable Richard Tucker as her beloved Turiddu, in Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana. Pagliacci's iconic clown, Canio, is sung by Kurt Baum, opposite Delia Rigal as Nedda—his young wife whose infidelity leads to tragedy and death, in a thrilling scene of life imitating art. The legendary Leonard Warren is Tonio.


You do not need to be a member of ANY club in Canada to breed or own Alaskan Malamutes - or any other breed of dog. As far as registries (ie CKC, AKC, UKC) are concerned, 'purebreds' are about papers, tracking relatives and charging a fee to provide those services, and dog shows and other formal events. By law, in Canada, your dog requires registration papers to be considered a legitimate, legal, purebred Alaskan Malamute. It is illegal to sell a registered Alaskan Malamute puppy as 'purebred Alaskan Malamute without papers' in Canada - and the dog is considered a mixed-breed. It is also illegal to sell 'with papers' at one price and without papers at another price. And, remember, if you find a cheap Alaskan Malamute for sale - or an expensive one - price DOES NOT dictate quality. A $500 dog might actually be the healthiest dog you ever own - but it's not the standard, or average. Generally, quick, cheap sales of questionable pedigrees, backgrounds prove to be costly, long-term decisions.
Many people can 'say' they belong to a club or organization. Asking Alaska Malmute breeders to prove their membership, with their current membership cards (that is why they are given, after all) will let you know exactly what you are dealing with should they not have those cards or find a reason to not show them. Not one member of any club would mind proving they are a member. Not one. Only someone who did not belong to the club, has no ability to prove it, would have an issue with verifying their membership status.
While it is a personal choice to belong to a club, normally most purebred enthusiasts belong to at least one breed-specific club (the AMCA or AMCC for example) and one all-breed dog club (in my case, TIKO but there is no shortage of all breed clubs in Canada or the USA). A few might also belong to a working club (Mush Larose in my case, but there are a number of show clubs that have 'working' in their title, but nothing to do with working events or excursions, which is fine, just different), or Alaska Malemute rescue (AMHL or AMAL in my case, there are other Mal rescues in the USA, too). But to 'belong' to a club one needs to donate one's time, energy, and commitment to participate in the club.
I've also written articles and / or photographed images for the Alaskan Malamute Club of Canada; the Alaskan Malamute Annual (commercial publication), the Alaskan Malamute HELP League (Rescue); and have served as the newsletter editor / designer for both the HELP League and the AMCC at various times. I continue to edit the AMCCs Web site and have for a few years, was Regional Director for the club, for nearly two years and have helped on several other Web sites for different clubs. In 2009, I was honored with 'Alaskan Malamute Club of Canada's Member of the Year.' I have arranged or participated in many working or breed demonstrations, for the breed, obedience, agility, sledding, packing, and dryland - taking the dogs and equipment all over Ontario for the benefit of the general public - for more than 10 years for several of the Club's in which I am involved.
As of 2014 I became a "Mentor / Distinguished Member" for an Alaskan Malamute Club of America's program to help provide information on a variety of topics related to the Alaskan Malamute. In my case, General Information, Conformation, Breeding, Weight Pull, Mushing, Dryland and Health issues. I'm in the processing of qualifying for the Packing - yes, we had to 'prove' we had experience in each of these topics, for which we were sanctioned, and it was a lot of paper work, titles, event wins I had to send in. It was worth it! Tink and Ernie have met the requirements for packing, Dozer is half done, as is Ooky (most of my experience is from competitions, not excursions for certificates). Their paperwork should be done before the end of 2014.
Alaskan Malamute facts are throughout this site but you can find other information at links on this page. I've also helped with many Alaskan Malamute info and working demonstrations, rescue events - and rescuing dogs - for many of the Alaskan Malamute clubs in which I am a member during the past 12 years. Below are the Malamute Clubs or Working dog organizations in which I am a member, or others that have something to do with purebred dogs - but you can't join - such as OFA or AKC.
I get asked a bit, usually by breeders of other breeds, what I am using for this site, seeing as it's pretty popular. Weebly is where the base shell of the Web site comes from. I have edited the code a bit, but really, if you want to edit the code, a lot, NONE of these 'cloud-based' Web editors and tools are all that appropriate. This, however, has been the direction of Web editing for a minimum of 5 years. It happened in the word processing industry (which originated as code-based, then went point-and-click or drag-and-drop), then happened to the desktop publishing industry (which also originated as code-based, then went point-and-click or drag-and-drop). Only die-hard coders would find fault with Weebly. Again. if you want to code, use Dreamweaver. If you want to spend more time on the content, use something like Weebly. I picked Weebly because it had the most features. While I did pay for the upgrade, it was a fair price, for what was received. Only once has my site gone down in all these years. I use a few of the Google Webmaster tools, etc. Statcounter keeps track of the hits. Basically, for ANY breeder or other small business out there, there should be no reason, any more, why you can't build and maintain your own Web site, whether large or small, with tools like these - they are simple! In fact, I start the students out with these same tools, before they get into the much more complicated code-based systems. It gives them excellent design structures to follow for their own Web sites WITHOUT worrying about code. By trade I was a journalist ... but this site is purely for me. I have no intention of working commercially, in design, photography or writing, again. The site is here purely to educated people, give me something to do, for my dogs, and not much else. Hope you enjoyed it!