text:
Q: Which crc algorithm is used in these intel hex files, and how to recalculate it on changing data? `I need to identify which algorithm is used to get this CRC
I need to modify data in these files and recalculate the CRC at the end using a c# application.
I have no idea which CRC algorithm is used, in the three examples below, we have true CRC.

The image labels the last byte of every line as a "line checksum", and the last 2 bytes before that in the last line as a "CRC 16".
File example 1 with real crc (0x623d)
:20000000000103FEFFFEFC0100000000FFFFFFFFCACCFFFF3231303430343833503031FF0E
:20002000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFE0
:20004000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFC0
:20006000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFA0
:20008000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF80
:2000A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF60
:2000C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF40
:2000E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF20
:20010000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
:20012000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFDF
:20014000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFBF
:20016000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF9F
:20018000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF7F
:2001A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF5F
:2001C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF3F
:2001E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF1F
:20020000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFE
:20022000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFDE
:20024000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFBE
:20026000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF9E
:20028000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF7E
:2002A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF5E
:2002C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF3E
:2002E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF1E
:20030000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFD
:20032000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFDD
:20034000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFBD
:20036000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF9D
:20038000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF7D
:2003A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF5D
:2003C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF3D
:2003E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF623D7C

File example 2 with real crc (0x6A3C)
:20000000000103FEFFFEFC0100000000FFFFFFFFCACCFFFF3231303637313735503031FF07
:20002000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFE0
:20004000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFC0
:20006000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFA0
:20008000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF80
:2000A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF60
:2000C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF40
:2000E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF20
:20010000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
:20012000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFDF
:20014000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFBF
:20016000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF9F
:20018000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF7F
:2001A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF5F
:2001C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF3F
:2001E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF1F
:20020000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFE
:20022000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFDE
:20024000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFBE
:20026000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF9E
:20028000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF7E
:2002A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF5E
:2002C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF3E
:2002E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF1E
:20030000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFD
:20032000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFDD
:20034000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFBD
:20036000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF9D
:20038000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF7D
:2003A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF5D
:2003C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF3D
:2003E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF6A3C75

File example 3 with real crc (0x6D3A)
:20000000000103FEFFFEFC0100000000FFFFFFFFCACCFFFF3231373438343834503031FFFE
:20002000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFE0
:20004000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFC0
:20006000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFA0
:20008000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF80
:2000A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF60
:2000C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF40
:2000E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF20
:20010000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
:20012000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFDF
:20014000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFBF
:20016000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF9F
:20018000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF7F
:2001A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF5F
:2001C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF3F
:2001E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF1F
:20020000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFE
:20022000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFDE
:20024000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFBE
:20026000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF9E
:20028000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF7E
:2002A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF5E
:2002C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF3E
:2002E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF1E
:20030000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFD
:20032000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFDD
:20034000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFBD
:20036000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF9D
:20038000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF7D
:2003A000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF5D
:2003C000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF3D
:2003E000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF6D3A74


It occurs to me that the audience to whom I am writing will be a mix of folks. Some may wish to make a few pieces of their own and I am here to fully support your endeavor. I am not a writer (although I love to write!) and I am not a teacher (although I probably have the patience to be one). My method of teaching will mostly be to share my journey and hopefully inspire you along the way.
As you read previously, it started small….so please know that you too might become a glass junkie if you are inspired as I was back in 2009. Half of my basement and half of my garage are now dedicated to the Glass Junkie studio/shop.
Here are a few things I will throw out there as guidelines….
I have always firmly believed there is artist in everyone, which is why I have never hesitated to share technical aspects (or as some would call them, trade secrets). Every person (artist) will develop their own style and for that reason artists are not competitive. The way I see it, if a person doesn't want to invest in my one-of-a kind pieces who am I to prevent them from creating some for themselves. My giving spirit wants anyone who tries to be successful.
The possibilities are endless. Right now my studio space seems pretty tight. Things are grouped together on the floor, on the workbench, on the "think tank" table. The Glass Junkie FB page contains hundreds of photographs of past and current inventory. Best advice I can give is to start with an inspiration piece of glass or pottery.
Build from it as I did with the topper for my very first piece. Decide how big of a piece you want to make. Start hitting flea markets, estate sales, garage sales and resale shops. Look for items that might coordinate with your inspiration piece. When shopping, turn pieces upside down. Sometimes (almost always) they flow better that way. Also be aware that not all colored glass is real colored glass…. some only have a film of color. These will present a problem if left in the direct sun. Cracked glass and pottery should be avoided, but chips are completely ok! In another post I will share a very important story about chips.
The piece I am working on assembling currently started with the unusual paperweight. As it was coming together and quite by "accident" my hand reached into my marble collection and the 7 marbles that came out just so happened to coordinate with the unusual paperweight. This to me felt like a little divine guidance, which honestly happens frequently when I am creating. This is a torch flower in the making.
My hope is that you have found this helpful and that you feel comfortable asking me questions. I welcome pictures of works in progress and offer my artist eye to help you create your own masterpieces. Oh and by the way, we turned the clocks forward an hour in Michigan last night and the prospect of increasing daylight has me quite energized today. No telling the accomplishments I will make! Until next time, hoping all is well in your world!
Several years ago I ran across the colorful facebook page of a very creative woman named Joy Cunny, aka The Glass Junkie. Her beautiful pieces created from old glassware have inspired me for almost a decade. I asked Joy to write some guest blog posts to explain a little about her creative process and show gardeners what can be done to enhance a garden using objects no one else wanted. Below you'll see how she organizes her collection of glassware for maximum inspiration and efficiency.


What is the purpose of an Air Waybill?
Documentary evidence of the conclusion of the contract of carriage.
Proof of receipt of the goods of shipment.
Certificate of insurance (if carriers insurance is requested by the shipper).
Guide to carriers staff in handling, dispatching and delivering the consignment.
Who is responsible for the completion of the Air Waybill?
The shipper is responsible for the correctness of the particulars and statements relating to the goods which he inserts in the Air Waybill or which are inserted on his behalf.
What does an Air Waybill look like?


Today (after a brief hiatus due to illness), I bring a new video where I explore the innumeracy bias. The central question I explore is this: are our minds naturally built to think in terms of probabilities and ratios? (They're not, it turns out.) And if not, then what, as poker players, can we do about it?
If you have any questions, thoughts, or reflections, please leave a comment! And if you haven't checked it out already, do check out the audiobook, recently released on iTunes and Amazon (available for FREE if you're new to Audible).


Which command will remove all files that belong to a Debian package?
What command will update a single Debian package named figlet?
Which command will update the list of available packages for APT?
In which file are repositories stored for Debian package management?
Which is not a tool used for Debian package management?
How can you determine the Debian package that owns a file?
How can you remove a package but not its configuration files with Debian package management?
Which command may be used to get a list of the installed Debian packages?
Which command will show the dependencies of a Debian package?


text:
Commissioner Carl Bentzel Discusses State of US Ports at International Forum
Susanne T. Stirling
The commissioner of the Federal Maritime Commission, Carl Bentzel, joined the California Chamber of Commerce on October 5 to discuss the state of U.S. ports and short- and long-term challenges in the shipping industry.
The discussion was part of a virtual international forum moderated by Council on International Trade Chair Stuart Woolf. Woolf is president and CEO of Woolf Farming & Processing, and serves on the CalChamber Board.
Bentzel serves on the five-member Federal Maritime Commission with a term expiring in 2024. Prior to this position, the Commissioner served as vice president of a full-scale public relations firm, the DCI Group.
Largest Meltdown Since WWII
Forum attendees.
Bentzel begins the forum by giving viewers a background overview of the Federal Maritime Commission (FMC), which is an independent and non-partisan federal agency responsible for the regulation of oceanborne international transportation of the United States.
The shipping challenges the nation is currently experiencing are, he says, "the largest meltdown since World War II." It is the first time since WWII that cargo shipments are not getting into the U.S. at a time when people want shipments.
There are two primary factors behind this meltdown. The first reason is the dislocation of products and closures brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic. In California alone, cargo decreased by 20%–30% for a three-month period. The second factor is the resumption of activity after the COVID-19 closures, which led to an almost 30% surge in cargo. So, the industry quickly saw a swing of 60% in volume, he explains.
U.S. ports, especially in Los Angeles, were ill-suited for this surge and ran out of containers and berth space for unloading cargos, leading to a backup of vessels in harbors. These problems were further exacerbated by issues related to the COVID-19 pandemic in the Suez Canal and then China, and now in Vietnamese ports, Bentzel says.
The congestion is now bleeding into rail terminals in the U.S., as there simply are not enough intermodal rail cars to provide service. There is simply not enough equipment to handle what is being transported, he says.
The backups are also threatening supplies due to the "just in time" delivery mode by which many manufacturers operate. The situation is so dire that Bentzel worries that essential supplies and products, like medical supplies, car parts and water purification equipment, will not get to where they're needed.
In spite of the congestion and inland backups—for example, currently 60 vessels are waiting offshore, and 30 are waiting onshore for space at Los Angeles ports—companies are still making record profits. In the year before the pandemic, the industry saw $1 billion in profit, while the first two quarters of this year brought in $54.9 billion in profit.
The price of containers has increased by 300%, going from $2,000 at the start of the pandemic to $6,000 now. Profits are being made throughout the system and it's contributing to inflation, he says.
Commission, Government Efforts
The FMC works very hard to detect cases of unfair practices and has implemented audits to look at all the major ocean carriers, Bentzel says. The process has been challenging because while the commission has received a few formal complaints, the commission must conduct independent investigations and gather its own set of facts when no complaints are filed, a process that is very labor-intensive and burdens the agency.
The agency has also: announced a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) on detention and demurrage to get further clarification on what requirements are mandated for the fair imposition of penalties for detention and demurrage; formed a shipping advisory committee to receive recommendations from importers and exporters; and is in talks with Congress over potential legislation that will make changes to laws affecting the shipping industry.
In closing his remarks, Bentzel points out that the problems we are seeing in the shipping industry are not just a U.S. problem, they are a global problem as well. He predicts that it will take a year-and-a-half before the ports see congestion alleviated as new vessels being ordered come online.
Answers to Questions from Viewers
After his remarks, viewers had several questions for Commissioner Bentzel. Woolf asks what he thinks the short-term and long-term issues affecting the industry are, and what he thinks will resolve the long-term issues.
Bentzel answers that trucking is a huge problem at the moment and that we are also seeing challenges in congestion and the compensation of workers. In the long term, we need to set up a better "mousetrap," and be able to communicate better by sharing information more fluidly. For example, it would help to be able to track where chassis are in order to identify which have not been moved in weeks and are therefore available to be used. Better exchange of information with exporters would help them know when they can go to a port and deliver cargo. Overall, there needs to be a better system of coordinating information and interface between shippers, carriers and warehouses.
Another question presented to Bentzel is whether the U.S. is looking to subsidize containers to get more capacity and containers at shipping facilities.
Bentzel says that the FMC is looking primarily at port infrastructure and opportunities for efficiency. The U.S. doesn't have a major presence in shipping so it cannot contribute to capacity. In shipping, less than 1% of international service is done by U.S. flag carriers. A substantial portion of the world's fleet is Chinese-owned and 100% of marine and intermodal rail containers are built by three companies in China.
Asked about technology and innovation at ports, Bentzel replies that the use of advanced technology is ad hoc at the moment. In the U.S., there is semi-automation in East Coast ports and it's still being evaluated at West Coast ports. In some places, automation is not necessary, so it's mainly the bigger ports in Los Angeles and New York that are looking into it. Moreover, the main problems we're seeing are located outside the ports. It's not that we're slow from ship to truck, he points out, the problem is getting cargo through the system and finding enough warehouse space.
"It's set up so that it's a delicate ballet. If not everything is moving in the right way, at the right time, to the right people, there can be catastrophic…failures that break up everything," Bentzel says.
Presentation Available
The PowerPoint presentation used by the Commissioner during his remarks is available at: https://advocacy.calchamber.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/CalChamber-Port-Congestion_InternationalForum-100521.pptx.
Port Commissioner
Susanne T. Stirling, vice president, international affairs, has headed CalChamber international activities for more than four decades. She is an appointee of the U.S. Secretary of Commerce to the National Export Council, and serves on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce International Policy Committee, the California International Relations Foundation, and the Chile-California Council. Originally from Denmark, she studied at the University of Copenhagen and holds a B.A. in international relations from the University of the Pacific, where she served as a regent from 2012 to 2021. She earned an M.A. from the School of International Relations at the University of Southern California. See full bio.
Lt. Governor Eleni Kounalakis Redesignated as the Governor's Top Trade Representative
Boom Time for India Promises Benefits for Relations/Trade with U.S., California
CalChamber Welcomes British Trade Minister to Quarterly Dinner with Other International Representatives

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Rediff.com » Sports » Why shooters are disappointed...
Why shooters are disappointed...
June 24, 2019 10:14 IST
IMAGE: Manu Bhaker is one of the youngest ever to win a senior World Cup gold medals for India. Photograph: ISSF/Twitter
Former shooters Suma Shirur and Deepali Deshpande are unhappy over the sport being left out of the 2022 Commonwealth Games, but at the same time feel India has gone beyond that level and is ruling the game on the world map.
The Executive Board of the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) recently met and approved the inclusion of women's cricket, beach volleyball and para table tennis into the games programme for the Birmingham edition in 2022.
However, shooting has been left out,dealing a big blow to India which won as many as 16 medals, including seven gold, at the 2018 edition in Gold Coast.
"Of course it is very disappointing, specially because Indian shooting was doing very well at the Commonwealth (Games). India stood out on the world map specially due to shooting in the Commonwealth Games," Shirur said.
"I am extremely disappointed. It deprives chances to young shooters to win a couple more medals at the international level, (as) now CWG Games has become a do-able medal experience. I am extremely sad that it is no longer here," said the 45-year-old former shooter, who won three medals, including a gold, at three different CWG events.
Shirur, who runs a shooting academy in neighbouring Panvel, said it is now time to stamp India's authority at the world level.
"I would say that, thankfully, Indian shooting has gone way beyond the Commonwealth level and right now we are ruling the roost at the world level. So, I think we should do at the world level what we did at the Commonwealth level. And we are already on the road and close to achieving that.
"It is disappointing, but on the other hand I am also very happy that Indian shooting has moved way beyond the Commonwealth level," added the shooter-turned-coach, who also won a couple of medals at the Asian Games.
Deshpande is also unhappy that shooting has been dropped and women's cricket included in the next CWG.
She said the shooters are disappointed as they are set to lose out on monetary gains by this decision.
"Definitely shooters are disappointed because they lose out on a big chunk of money and that is very important for their career and for life generally," the 49-year-old ex-shooter said.
"Commonwealth shooting, as far as shooting as a sport is concerned, has no recognition or standard, if you think in terms of the shooting sport worldwide. But for us - Indian shooters and sportsmen - it makes a difference only because of the monetary benefit they get. That is why it is important," she said.
Related News: Commonwealth Games Federation, CWG, Suma Shirur, India, Deepali Deshpande
India women win FIH Series Finals
Blow to India! Shooting not included in 2022 CWG


Happy World Photography Day! We're celebrating by featuring this video showcasing photographs from ProShow fans around the world. Images were submitted all the way from Dubai to Australia to Canada, and so many other locations.
The key to launching a new book is widespread media presence. While reviews in magazines, newspapers, and trade journals are important, many publishers introduce new titles with a book trailer, something that can be easily created with ProShow.
This week's spotlighted show comes from Margaret Goodwin, a Vancouver Island based fine art photographer. She is inspired by the natural world, and particularly flowers, her work has a soft and dreamy aesthetic.
Today's guest post comes from landscape and portrait photographer Gareth Rockliffe.


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text:
'Australia has lost its way'
When Paul Keating wrested the prime ministership from Bob Hawke 30 years ago, he came to the nation's top job with an audacious philosophy of political leadership and an ambitious agenda to turn Australia in a new direction.
He viewed the prime ministership as an agency for action, saw leadership as the combination of courage and imagination, and understood how to gain and use power. He dreamed big dreams, challenged Australians to reconsider their country's past and future, and coupled elevated oratory with slashing attacks on his opponents to achieve his aims.
In his only interview to mark three decades since he became Australia's 24th prime minister, sworn in on December 20, 1991, Keating discusses leadership, "the big picture" and contemporary policy issues. At age 77, he remains visionary, unbowed and, as ever, indignant.
"I saw the prime ministership as a chance to move away from the economic reconstruction of Australia to Australia's geo-strategic repositioning in the region," Keating tells Inquirer. "I had thought about these issues all my political life. When I became prime minister, I knew exactly what I was doing, what I wanted to do and how to achieve it."
On December 19, 1991, Keating defeated Hawke in a Labor leadership ballot by 56 votes to 51. The great political duo had terminated six months earlier, when Keating first challenged Hawke after reneging on a secret agreement to hand over the leadership made at Kirribilli House in 1988.
He had long coveted the prime ministership – not to preside but to lead. His two decades in parliament had been a study in power. Now, having seized it, he reshaped the government. Hawke's profound belief in consensus politics gave way to Keating's crazy-brave, thrilling, highwire conviction politics.
"While the modalities of the process of government between the Hawke government and mine were pretty much the same, I knew any government that I would lead would have a wholly different set of objectives," Keating explains.
"We had to have a new approach to leadership, one where there was a political premium for good policy and one which was able to convince the public that good policy brought its own reward. If you look at my approach to public life, it has always been about instructing the public – about educating them to the problems; to bring them with me."
He communicated bold ideas with intensity and passion. He viewed parliament like a gladiator viewed the coliseum: blood sport. His verbal assaults were legendary. But so was his oratory, such as that honouring the unknown Australian soldier in 1993. That speech is engraved on the Australian War Memorial.
Although recognised as the architect of Australia's modern economy as treasurer (1983-91), Keating's achievements as prime minister have often been overlooked. His "big picture" framework encompassed economic, social and foreign policy between 1991 and 1996.
"The big picture is shorthand for talking about the large geo-strategic and geo-economic forces," Keating explains. "Those forces are now virulent and therefore command the thinking of a national government about how one pilots a society through and in the face of those forces. The big picture does change nations but there are relatively few artisans in the craft of nation building."
First, was reckoning with Australia's past. He gave the original apology to Aboriginal Australians in the landmark Redfern address in 1992. This was followed by the legislative response to the High Court's Mabo judgment with the Native Title Act in 1993.
Second, he put the republic on the agenda and won majority support for it in the polls. In 1993, he briefed Queen Elizabeth II on his republican plans. And in 1995, he presented a model to the parliament. And he supported a new Australian flag, without the Union Jack.
Third, he continued the economic reforms with privatisation of Qantas and the Commonwealth Bank; universal superannuation, now worth $3.4 trillion; enterprise bargaining, which energised productivity, and minimum award rates of pay; national competition policy, which boosted growth; trade liberalisation, which turbocharged competitiveness; and the Working Nation policy, which introduced mutual obligation in the provision of welfare.
Fourth, he deepened relations with Asia. He engaged in shuttle diplomacy to establish the APEC leaders meeting, an idea he presented to George HW Bush in Sydney in 1992 and then won support from other regional leaders. He negotiated a security treaty with Indonesia, the manifestation of his belief in finding security in, rather than from, Asia.
Fifth, he articulated a new identity for Australia, promoted arts and culture, recognised 60,000 years of Indigenous heritage, celebrated multiculturalism, and envisaged Australia as an outward-looking, confident, independent republic blazing its own path.
Keating saw politics and leadership as inexorably linked, as two sides of the same coin. He outlined his ambitions for leadership in an off-the-record address at the National Press Club in 1990, when he waxed lyrical about "doing the Placido Domingo", trying to marry politics and policy.
As the former prime minister surveys Australia today, he sees a nation with unlimited potential but held back by lacklustre leadership and lack of ambition.
"Australia has lost its way," Keating says. "We are at odds with our geography. We are the only nation in the world given an island continent and we have had choices about what we do with this great gift."
He is a strong critic of the AUKUS partnership with the US and the UK to acquire nuclear-powered submarines. It is not simply a pro-China and anti-US view. It is about Australia's independence and sovereignty, and a realpolitik approach to the region. He wants the US to remain engaged in the Asia-Pacific.
"I don't believe that the US is able to maintain strategic hegemony in Asia with the rise of China," Keating says. "So, I've taken the view, as far back as 20 years ago, that the US should be the framer and guarantor of the Atlantic but not of the Pacific. In Asia, it should be the conciliating and balancing power. And we need it to be.
"Scott Morrison, a pass-through prime minister of no policy account, wilfully and secretly alienated the sovereignty of his own country to that of another state – the US, a country his limited strategic vision cannot see beyond. His secret negotiation delivered to the US military effective strategic control of Australian naval forces, the sovereign policy options of the Australian nation.
"The most effective weapon you can have is not another bunch of submarines or missiles but a competent foreign policy. We are a frightened country. We continue running to a strategic guarantor – it used to be the UK and now it is the US. The fact that this has happened is a terrible indictment upon us and, of course, broadly they have had the complicity of the Labor Party."
It would have been far better, Keating argues, to build the relationship with Indonesia rather than seek refuge in great and powerful friends and follow the US into Iraq and Afghanistan half a world away.
"The ANZUS-worded security agreement I put together with Indonesia was a golden asset for Australia, but John Howard lost it over East Timor," he says. "We could have spent the last 25 years building a security and military relationship with Indonesia, a country that is centrally important to us strategically. How much more productive than the commitments to Iraq and Afghanistan by Howard. And how much safer would we be."
This is an ex-prime minister still in the arena. This year, effectively solo, Keating waged a campaign to ensure the legislated increase in the superannuation guarantee to 10 per cent, and 12 per cent by 2025, was not jettisoned. It was a victory due to Keating's relentless advocacy – nobody within Labor, the unions or industry packs a bigger punch.
In 1993, Keating led Labor to a fifth term, winning endorsement for his "big picture" program. He demolished John Hewson's Fightback! package in an election that was also a judgment on the Coalition. Labor's primary vote and parliamentary majority increased. No government has won a fifth term since.
Although he never scaled the heights of personal popularity, and could be polarising and divisive, Newspoll showed Australians respected Keating for his strength and vision. After 13 years in power, longer than any government since 1972, Labor was heavily defeated at the 1996 election.
Had he won in 1996, Keating argues, Australia would be a republic with a new flag. He would have taken control of the Murray-Darling Basin and restructured water pricing. Superannuation would have increased to 15 per cent, substantially lifting retirement incomes. He would have apologised to the stolen generations. He favours a treaty, which has "uprightness and power", as the principal instrument for reconciliation.
"We would have been a radically different country," he imagines. "With the economic changes and the competitive, open economy Labor created, we would have been a cosmopolitan republic finding our way in the Asian construct."
Labor's true believers remain spellbound by Keating's approach to politics. But the parliamentary party has been more circumspect. While the 20th and 30th anniversaries of Gough Whitlam and Bob Hawke's governments were celebrated with gala events and commemorative dinners, no approach was made by the party to Keating for his anniversaries.
The party has, since 1996, never fully embraced the Hawke-Keating model. "Philosophically, Labor is moving towards the Hawke-Keating model," Keating judges. "Anthony Albanese's views about aspiration record a shift in sentiment inside Labor whereas the Bill Shorten model was essentially redistributive, taking economic resources from higher-income groups and distributing them to lower-income groups.
"Bob and I wanted to make the place wealthier, richer and do things to improve the creation and distribution of wealth, and at least provide a level playing field for everybody. We always had the sunny uplands in the policy. The sunny uplands, the notion where everybody found a place, disappeared at the last election and is reappearing somewhat now."
Keating is the most respected of Labor's living former leaders. His appeal transcends generations, as voters look for leadership and find both major parties wanting. Keating has admirers on the other side of politics, who regularly seek his counsel. Thirty years on, "the big picture" still resonates with many Australians.
"Politics today works within a narrow political spectrum of thoughts and policies," Keating says. "There is no radical conception of policy now, partly because there is an absence of imagination. Imagination carries no premium, including in those most likely to profit from its power.
"What has happened with public life today is that the political professionals have taken over and now it is about playing a game within a bubble. Both the Coalition and the Labor Party have played into that bubble in a way, of course, that I absolutely shunned."
Via: Troy Bramston is the author of Paul Keating: The Big-Picture Leader


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Jo Barker
*Featured photo: Dappled Circle Orange, 81 x 150cm, wool, cotton, linen & embroidery threads. Private collection USA copyright Jo Barker
Jo Barker (b.1963) fiber artist originally from Cumbria, a county of north-west England, graduated from Edinburgh College of Art and currently lives and works in Edinburgh.
Fleeting Moment, 76 x 147cm, wool, cotton & embroidery threads, copyright Jo Barker
The tapestries that the artist designs and weaves by hand are the result of a skilful combination of painting, drawing and weaving. The design phase is fundamental, starting from a drawing made of gestural brushstrokes, spontaneous and not studied, with watercolors, acrylics or ink.
In a second moment the project is scanned on the computer and digitally modified, creating overlaps of color, lights and shadows that form suggestive effects of depth and movement.
Dark Shimmer, 75 x 87cm, wool, cotton & embroidery threads, copyright Jo Barker
It is then during the weaving phase that the work really comes to life thanks to the soft yarns, the wool, the cotton and above all thanks to the artist's great ability to explore the qualities of light and to materialize them in the weaving, in the meeting of weft and warp, shaping velvety shades of black that act as a counterpoint to layers of shimmering color in a combination that offers a richness and depth of chromatic nuances that enchant. The final image is abstract, deliberately ambiguous and contrasts, as the artist herself declares, with the idea of having to be identified with a specific object or image.
Flow, 70 x 137cm, wool, cotton, linen & embroidery threads, copyright Jo Barker
There are numerous exhibitions in which her works have been exhibited, both at home and abroad, receiving awards and prizes such as the Cordis Prize for Tapestry in 2016.
Her publications include the Contemporary International Tapestry, Carol K. Russell – Schiffer Publishing Ltd; Textiles: The Art of Mankind, Mary Schoeser – Thames & Hudson; Tapestry Weaving: Design and Technique, Joanne Soroka – Crowood Press.
Radiance, 73 x 94cm, wool, cotton, linen & embroidery threads. Private collection UK copyright Jo Barker
Barker tapestries are part of important collections including that of the Victoria & Albert Museum, London; The House of Lords, London; National Museums Scotland, Edinburgh; Aberdeen City Art Gallery & Museums; Royal Victoria Infirmary, Newcastle and the Scottish Executive, Edinburgh.
Source: https://jobarkertapestry.co.uk/
The photos were taken from the artist's website and are protected by copyright


What is 500 divided by 4?
Find the limit of 2/x, as x approaches infinity.
SInce 2 is a constant, we can bring it out of the limit. We arrive with 2 (limit of 1/x, as x approaches infinity). We can observe that as x approaches infinity, the value of 1/x becomes smaller and smaller, approaching 0. Therefore the limit of 1/x as x approaches infinity is 0, 2 multiplied to 0 is 0. Therefore, limit of 2/x, as x approaches infinity is 0.
Find two consecutive numbers if the sum of the two numbers is 2 more than three times the smaller number.
Let x be the smaller number and x+2 be the larger number. The sum of the two numbers, which is x+(x+2) is said to be 3x+2. Equating the two expressions, x+(x+2)=3x+2. Isolation the variable x, we arrive with x= 0. Therefore, the two consecutive numbers are 0 and 2.


A creative teaching strategy was implemented in the fall of 2014 in order to fuse the content of two independent fashion merchandising courses. Blue Jeans Go Green Denim Recycling Program was created by Cotton Incorporated in 2006 as a call-to-action to recycle denim on college campuses. The recycled denim would be given new life as UltraTouch Denim Insulation and a portion of it donated for use in civic buildings and for communities in need across the U.S. The two fashion merchandising courses included Advanced Textiles and Fashion Promotion which shared the same enrolled students.


All about Starship Games for your smartphone, your iPhone or any phone.Starship Games Game. Screenshots, frames, scenes, images and plays of Starship Games video game. Computer and Video Games or video game consoles.
Animated gifs and animations of Starship Games to share on social networks, download or send to other phones for Whatsapp, Line or Skype.


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Philip L. Martin
http://agecon.ucdavis.edu/people/faculty/philip-martin/
Agricultural & Resource Economics, University of California, Davis
Philip Martin is Emeritus Professor of Agricultural Economics at the University of California, Davis and a member of the Commission on Agricultural Workers established by the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. He is the author of numerous studies and reports on immigration, including Trade and Migration: NAFTA and Agriculture (1993). Prof Martin has guest-edited two issues for Migration Letters on Competitiveness in US and Japan, Migration and Development; comparing US and Mexico, and on Migration Expert Commissions. He has also been co-chair of Turkish Migration Conferences organised by Regent's Centre for Transnational Studies in London.
Ibrahim Sirkeci
http://sirkeci.co.uk
Regent's Centre for Transnational Studies, Faculty of Business and Management, Regent's University London
Ria Professor of Transnational Studies and Marketing; Director of Regent's Centre for Transnational Studies, Faculty of Business and Management, Regent's University London. Prof Sirkeci can be reached at @isirkeci and via sirkeci.co.uk
Home > Vol 13, No 1 (2016) >	Martin
CONFERENCE REPORT: Turkish Migration Conference and Migration Challenge
Philip L. Martin, Ibrahim Sirkeci
Rough estimates suggest that there are five to six million movers (migrants) originated from Turkey and, with the recent influx of Syrians, the volume of movers into Turkey reached record between three to four million. Turkey passed a qualitative and quantitative threshold as a country of movers: Millions moved out whilst millions moved in. The three Turkish Migration Conferences since 2012 reflect that reality. The breadth of topics and depth of discussions highlight a growing academic community interested in this particular case of human mobility. The debates about Turkish migration experiences are rich and reveal patterns of regular, irregular, and circular moves. Different perceptions and legal frameworks point to different implications for Turkey and its Diaspora.
Turkish migration; movers; mobility; refugees; Syrians; migration research


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WASHINGTON, April 27, 2010 - Australia performed quite well on the international education rankings put out by the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in 2000. For instance, Australian students tied for second place in math scores. The data shows that socio-economic context have little effect on science performance.
In 2006, OECD's data showed Australia to be sixth on a worldwide scale for reading, and eighth for science. It slipped several spots down for math. The findings reveal, however, that the Australian students' achievement was not slipping; other nations are rising and becoming more competitive.
These results are not bad by any account. But anyone who has attended an Australian sporting competition can tell you that Australians take competitions very seriously. Perhaps it is the same drive that has compelled the country to reform its education system so it can do better.
It was perhaps the OECD's findings on Australia's reading scores that catalyzed the latest reform agenda. Barry McGaw, who was head of education at OECD and currently part of the Australian Ministry of Education, noted that the debate in Australia was previously focused on how to choose between an agenda or excellence and one of equity. Australia's scores in math and science, however, showed that students had high achievement, regardless of socio-economic backgrounds. But in reading, Australia proved high achievement for advantaged students, and lower ratings for poor and minority students. In other words, excellence and equity can co-exist, but in some areas, more advantaged students did better. "There are some serious equity problems that needed to be addressed," concluded McGaw.
The current reforms are driven by four factors:
Australia is adopting a national curriculum.
Although Australia has had national approaches to teaching and learning since 1989, it will soon adopt a national curriculum. Proponents argue that students have common needs: to be prepared for a global, sustainable future. They also argue that by pooling expertise, everyone wins. The curriculum and its supporting tools are open for public consultation, primarily taking place online. The first part of the curriculum, including scope and sequence as well as annotated student work, will be published online and rolled out in schools in the coming three years.
Schools and systems will be closely monitored.
Schools will participate in national surveys and international benchmarking tests. Results will be studied, and reform efforts adjusted as necessary.
School performance will be transparent.
A website will publish school data, including indicators, deviations, and means. The data is publicly available and can be sorted easily. Schools and communities can find peers with similar profiles and share best practices.
The government increases support to schools.
The federal government has launched an ambitious plan to double school funding, target disadvantaged areas, and set up a leadership institute.
Given its past successes and its transparent reporting system, the world is watching Australia to see if it can achieve its biggest win of all for the future generation.
Barry McGaw is the chair of Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority. He spoke at the Learning with the World conference, organized by Asia Society and the Council of Chief State School Officers.
Explore School Systems Around the World


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HEARTS IN DARKNESS
Surviving the Darkness: LOVE IN THE LIGHT–Review and Giveaway
Hi there! I'm so excited to share a review for a new contemporary romance from bestselling author Laura Kaye. LOVE IN THE LIGHT is the long-awaited sequel to HEARTS IN DARKNESS, a novel of two people finding love in a tight situation: trapped in an elevator during a power outage. I just adored Makenna and Caden and was so glad to have an HEA for them once the rescue was long past. This sequel, however, deals with the darkness that creeps in when we least expect it: depression, and PTSD, and finding a way back to the light of love. It was really touching for me, a depression survivor.
Catch my review below and be sure to enter to win one of three totes filled with book swag.
Two hearts in the darkness…
Makenna James and Caden Grayson have been inseparable since the day they were trapped in a pitch-black elevator and found acceptance and love in the arms of a stranger. Makenna hopes that night put them on the path to forever—which can't happen until she introduces her tattooed, pierced, and scarred boyfriend to her father and three over-protective brothers.
Must fight for love in the light…
Haunted by a childhood tragedy and the loss of his family, Caden never thought he'd find the love he shares with Makenna. But the deeper he falls, the more he fears the devastation sure to come if he ever lost her, too. When meeting her family doesn't go smoothly, Caden questions whether Makenna deserves someone better, stronger, and just more…normal. Maybe they're too different—and he's far too damaged—after all…
Praise for LOVE IN THE LIGHT:
"Readers that have been anxiously waiting for more of this story will be thrilled with the passionate and poignant way Kaye dives back in with this complicated and much loved couple. Love in the Light will have readers falling in love with Caden and Makenna all over again!" ~ Jay Crownover, New York Times Bestselling Author of the Marked Men Series
"Sexy, emotional and incredibly heartwarming, fans of Laura Kaye won't be disappointed!" ~ Monica Murphy, New York Times Bestselling Author of the One Week Girlfriend Quartet
"Laura Kaye has a gift for writing beautifully damaged men and Caden Grayson leads the pack with enough vulnerability to twist your heart in knots." ~ Tessa Bailey, New York Times Bestselling Author of the Line of Duty Series
"This book delivers – sweet romance, smoking hot sex, an entire tissue box full of angsty drama, and such love shining off the pages that it will blind you." ~ Christi Barth, Author of the Shore Secrets Series
"This follow up to one of the most beloved couples in romance is delivered in the emotional and touching way that only Laura Kaye can do. Love in the Light is everything I could have wanted for Makenna and Caden–and more!" ~ Jillian Stein, Read-Love-Blog
This is the second book in a series, and can be read as a standalone, but best enjoyed after reading HEARTS IN DARKNESS.
**SPOILER ALERT**(of Hearts in Darkness…because it's super relevant to the second book!)
So, Makenna and Caden met two months ago when they were trapped in an elevator for hours. Caden is a paramedic; he chose this profession because his family was in a horrific wreck when he was fourteen, and he was trapped for hours upside-down in a drainage ditch with no assistance. His father was unconscious and his mother and younger brother were killed. His family shattered that night, with his father living a half-life that had no love or affection for anyone, not even Caden. Caden still suffers PTSD and claustrophobia as a result of the wreck, but he's a damn good paramedic, and thrives on his level-head while assisting people in emergencies. While trapped in the elevator Makenna helps Caden with his clautrophobia-induced panic attack. They bonded over them each losing their mothers when young–Makenna's mom died when she was a toddler.
Fast forward to Thanksgiving. And LOVE IN THE LIGHT. Caden hasn't had a family holiday since the car wreck. He usually works overtime at the firehouse so guys with families can have the holiday off, but Makenna's family wants to meet him, so they drive to Philly. There, Caden has to face the gauntlet of Makenna's three brothers and father. He actually holds his own, despite his anxiety, and is even able to tolerate the appearance of Cameron–bestie of Makenna's brother Ian and also Makenna's former serious boyfriend–former fiance, truth be made clear. And Cameron's sure he wants Makenna in his life.
This book is told from both Caden and Makenna's POV, so we get to experience the highest of highs and lowest of lows. And boy howdy, does it get dark. Caden's been asymptomatic for PTSD for a while, but he finally has someone real in his life–Makenna–to lose. And Cameron, successful, attractive doctor, is certainly better-suited to giving his beloved Makenna a far better life than Caden can. Right?
Enter depression and complete freak out and Makenna having her own sincere challenges–that include a pushy Cameron, medical issues, and an unshakable love for Caden. This is a romance that started with an HEA, got mired in the depths of depression, and worked hard to find the light of love. And succeeded. As a depression survivor, the descent into darkness that Caden experiences is eerily reminiscent of my own personal history. The love that Makenna has, and Caden has for that matter, are really intense. Life is not easy, as they both learn, and–what may be more relevant: life doesn't wait for you to get your act together. So many good parts of the book that touched off memories for me–big family, lots of nosy siblings, ulterior motives, and the helplessness/hopelessness of depression.
The end is a bit of a thrill ride, with Caden facing his worst fears and coming out on the side with joy he never dared to dream. While Makenna tells a lot of this story, I really felt that Caden's journey was more compelling. Mostly because she's being excellent and supportive and dealing while Caden is a complete wreck inside and out that must get fixed right this time.
I wonder if we'll hear more of their love story, but even if we don't…I'm sure they make it.
Interested? You can find LOVE IN THE LIGHT on Goodreads, Amazon, Amazon UK, iBooks, Barnes & Noble and Kobo
Click this Rafflecopter giveaway link for your chance to win one of three totes filled with book swag.
Don't forget to pick up HEARTS IN DARKNESS–Currently on sale for $.99!
Two strangers…
Makenna James thinks her day can't get any worse, until she finds herself stranded in a pitch-black elevator with a complete stranger. Distracted by a phone call, the pin-striped accountant catches only a glimpse of a dragon tattoo on his hand before the lights go out.
Four hours…
Caden Grayson is amused when a harried redhead dashes into his elevator fumbling her bags and cell phone. His amusement turns to panic when the power fails. Despite his piercings, tats, and vicious scar, he's terrified of the dark and confined spaces. Now, he's trapped in his own worst nightmare.
One pitch-black elevator…
To fight fear, they must reach out and open up. With no preconceived notions based on looks to hold them back, they discover just how much they have in common. In the warming darkness, attraction grows and sparks fly, but will they feel the same when the lights come back on?
Laura is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of over twenty books in contemporary and paranormal romance and romantic suspense. Growing up, Laura's large extended family believed in the supernatural, and family lore involving angels, ghosts, and evil-eye curses cemented in Laura a life-long fascination with storytelling and all things paranormal. She lives in Maryland with her husband, two daughters, and cute-but-bad dog, and appreciates her view of the Chesapeake Bay every day.
You can catch up with Laura online on her website, Facebook, Twitter, and Newsletter SignUp.
January 13, 2016 Veronica Rundell adult contemporary, Contemporary Romance, Depression, HEARTS IN DARKNESS, Laura Kaye, LOVE IN THE LIGHT, PTSD Romance Leave a comment
Finding HEARTS IN DARKNESS
Makenna James is an overworked accountant whose cell phone takes a catastrophic leap as she enters the elevator, thankful for the small mercy that SOMEONE held the door. She needs to get home. Her date with her couch and a bottle of red is way overdue.
The copiously-inked paramedic who holds the elevator, Caden Grayson, finds the harried red-haired woman in front of him…amusing. Who doesn't like a woman spitting obscenities?
And then the power goes out.
HEARTS IN DARKNESS, a novella by Laura Kaye, explores the 'chance encounter becoming more' story in elegant alternating viewpoint.
Caden, survivor of a wreck that killed his mom and brother, suffers from claustrophobia and the blackness of elevator has him strangled with panic. It's Makenna's hysterical laughter which snaps him back to reality. Over the course of several hours in the dark, Makenna and Caden talk to keep his demons at bay.
Fave colors, foods, first times…you know, all the stuff you'd spill to a stranger in a confined space.
Through all the confessions, they develop a bond that goes far beyond the physical. When the power returns, Makenna is stunned to discover the pierced, tattooed man who has captured her heart is as gorgeous as she imagined. And, she's surely too plain for him, right?
Caden senses Makenna drawing away and can't figure out why. He's determined to keep her close however he can. And the result: passion, baby.
I loved the flow of this from the first scene. It's a great read with heat that steams, not scalds.
It is available for Kindle or Nook.
August 6, 2013 Veronica Rundell elevator love, HEARTS IN DARKNESS, Laura Kaye, New Adult Romance 1 Comment


Intelligence is a raffle. All classes produce their quota of genius, competence, mediocrity and the cognitively impaired. The vast majority are in the middle, encompassing competence and mediocrity. This book is about the mediocre but more particularly the mediocre that are born into the upper and middle classes. The problem is that they need somewhere to go. They would be perfectly able shop assistants, machine minders and telephone sanitizers but such callings do not befit their social status. Their social status demands appropriate rank and place in society. The social order provides them with appropriate rank and place in society; for which they are not competent. These are the drones.
Graeme Minchin is a practicing barrister in Auckland NZ. Academic writings are Buying a Risk: An Ppplication of Insurance Law to Legal Gaming and Sentencing Problem Gamblers. He is currently working on an enquiry into the rule of law tentatively titled: 'The foundation, evolution and demise of the rule of law as a constitutional convention.
Sociologists. Not enormous. General interest.


Elizabeth "Anne" Corbello is a native of Lafayette. She attended Milton Elementary/Middle School and St. Thomas More High School and graduated with honors. Anne played and lettered in basketball at STM for all four years. She was also a member of the Cajun Soccer Club from the age of 13 to 19. Following high school she remained involved in soccer and basketball as a coach for both youth soccer and basketball. Anne attended University of Louisiana at Lafayette and graduated with honors with a bachelor's degree in Exercise Physiology. She was a member of the inaugural Division I Women's Soccer Team at ULL during her senior year. Anne decided to further her education by attending Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale, FL, where she graduated in 2007 with honors, earning a dual degree with a Bachelor's degree in Physician Assistant Studies and a Master's degree in Medical Science.
After finishing graduate school she was ready to return home and put her skills to work to help people in her hometown. Anne worked in neurosurgery for almost 5 years and then decided to make a change to the specialty of orthopedic surgery. She has been working with Dr. Vizzi since 2011 assisting with surgery as well as handling non-surgical care management. She enjoys her work in orthopedic surgery and has found it both challenging and rewarding. Being a former athlete, she understands an athlete's mentality and enjoys taking care of athletes in the sports medicine setting. Anne also enjoys working with our older patients with arthritis and our young patients with acute fractures. She finds it fulfilling to help people prepare for surgery, to assist in their surgeries, and then to see them through recovery and return to their activities.


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Intel, Rackspace Target OpenStack Development
July 27, 2015 by George Leopold
Chipmaker Intel and OpenStack leader Rackspace are joining forces to promote enterprise applications and cloud scaling within OpenStack source code.
As part of a new cloud initiative announced by Intel, the partners said they would establish an OpenStack Initiative Center that would include an OpenStack developer cloud with a pair of 1,000-node clusters. The Hybrid Cloud Testing Cluster will be made available to developers for large-scale testing of OpenStack performance code and new features.
The testing clusters are expected to be available to developers in the next six months, Intel and Rackspace said. The innovation center will be based at Rackspace's corporate headquarters in San Antonio, Texas.
The partners said the resulting enterprise features and enhancements would be "aligned" with the OpenStack Enterprise Working Group. Along with accelerating the development of enterprise cloud capabilities, Rackspace said the collaboration would boost the number of developers contributing to upstream OpenStack code.
OpenStack software controls large pools of compute, storage and networking resources throughout a datacenter, managed through a dashboard or via the OpenStack API.
The partners said they would also offer new courseware modules designed to increase the number of open source developers contributing to OpenStack. A joint OpenStack engineering group will focus on eliminating software bugs and developing new enterprise features. The group also will recruit new engineers to work on OpenStack development.
"We don't believe in creating proprietary OpenStack distributions," Scott Crenshaw, Rackspace's senior vice president of product and strategy, said in a statement. The innovation center's "contributions will be made available freely, to everyone."
The OpenStack community currently includes more than 520 member companies and 27,000 individual contributors across 167 countries, according to Rackspace. OpenStack revenue is expected to reach $1.26 billion in 2015. Rackspace claims to operate the world's largest production OpenStack cloud and manages OpenStack private clouds both in its datacenters and on customers' premises.
Separately, Intel launched a "Cloud for All" initiative designed to "take the training wheels off [the] cloud." In a blog post, Jonathan Donaldson of Intel's Cloud Platform Group, said the initiative would seek to speed deployment of software-defined cloud infrastructure (SDI). Those SDI stacks would then be optimized to maximize efficiency across different workloads, Donaldson said.
Also, the Intel initiative will promote standards and development to accelerate cloud deployment. "New cloud service providers are seeking to compete on a cost parity with large providers, and industry standard solutions that can help have been slow in arriving," Donaldson noted. "The industry simply isn't moving fast enough to address these very real customer challenges."
The cloud initiative also seeks to ensure "that a choice of SDI solutions supporting both traditional enterprise and cloud native applications are available," Donaldson said.
The chipmaker added that it expects to announce additional cloud partnerships and investments over the next year.
Categories: Cloud
Tags: Intel,OpenStack,Rackspace


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Home Reviews Seven Stages ...
Seven Stages To Achieve Eternal Bliss review
Sam Inglis
Claire and Paul (Kate Micucci and Sam Huntington) move to LA for her new job at an ad agency. They find a very cheap apartment, but there's one catch: the cult members who drop by on a regular basis to commit ritual suicide in their bathtub.
Seven Stages To Achieve Eternal Bliss is an odd little film; a small scale but often self-consciously wacky comedy that also has a streak of black humour running through it. The tone is slippery from scene to scene, meaning the screenplay by Christopher and Clayton Hewitson and Justin Jones doesn't always knit together well, but two things help the film find some consistency.
The first of these things is Kate Micucci, who came to my attention through Garfunkel and Oates; her musical comedy project with her friend Riki Lindhome. Here, her wide-eyed expressiveness works perfectly as Claire is at first baffled by the cultists coming in through her window to find their way to the paradise they believe is coming, and for the way she is gradually sucked in once she begins reading the Book of Storsh. Micucci is just funny, the rhythm of her line readings, her persona especially when set against some of the things she does here (for instance, one very funny sequence in which Claire and Paul find themselves ineptly helping along a cultist who has miscalculated how much his chosen method will hurt). Beyond that, the films does offer her one brief moment that has at least a layer of drama behind the veneer of its silliness, as Claire lays out a story to tell, Cartwright (Dan Harmon), the inept cop who investigates all the deaths at their apartment, it's clear that what she's saying is actually about her and Paul. Micucci pulls both sides of this off very nicely, finding a little resonant moment.
The rest of the cast scores laughs as well, whether it's Huntington's dim bulb of a boyfriend, Harmon's cop, more interested in his screenplay than in any of the increasingly suspicious deaths at Claire and Paul's apartment, or the cameos that drop in to off themselves, the highlight being a typically manic and hilarious Maria Bamford.
The other thing that helps the film is that, while they often feel more like isolated moments, pretty much every scene here has at least one or two laughs. A sunny montage of deaths in the bathtub and Claire and Paul both succeeding at their work is one particularly amusing moment, another is the jarring (but laugh out loud ridiculous) moment the first cultist breaks in to the apartment and yells "Do you yield?" at Paul. A few jokes could be carried a little further, for instance, one funny moment has Cartwright coming in to the apartment like the most cliché of action movie cops, it might have been fun to see that feature throughout his performance. When gags do fall flat, there's another on the way quickly enough that hits should come fairly regularly. For me the only consistent miss was Taika Waititi, who doesn't seem especially engaged in his recurring cameo as the cult's figurehead.
Vivieno Caldinelli's direction definitely shows the film's low budget origins, but there are some recurring motifs that he finds laughs in and the design, though a little twee, works in reflecting the characters and helping to make the apartment where much of the film takes place a character in the film.
The problem with all of this, and with reviewing any comedy, is that it will either work for you or not. I found myself laughing a lot and largely charmed and amused by the quirkiness on display, if you don't I can imagine you not following all of the Seven Stages To Achieve Eternal Bliss.
Despite an inconsistent tone, this offbeat comedy scores plenty of laughs thanks to the always amusing Kate Micucci and some equally funny cameos.
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seven-stages-to-achieve-eternal-bliss-reviewDespite an inconsistent tone, this offbeat comedy scores plenty of laughs thanks to the always amusing Kate Micucci and some equally funny cameos.


SHELTON, Conn., Dec. 6, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- BIC, a recognized world leader in manufacturing safe, high-quality stationery, lighters and shavers, announced today that it has filed lawsuits before the International Trade Commission ("ITC") and the United States Federal District Court for the Eastern District of New York to stop the importation and/or sale in the United States of low-quality, Chinese-made knock-off pocket lighters that imitate the iconic design of BIC's lighters. This infringement of BIC's registered trademarks not only negatively impacts the brand equity and reputation that the Company has earned in connection with its pocket lighter over the past 45 years, but more importantly has allowed the defendants to introduce products into the marketplace likely to confuse and mislead the American consumer.
The ITC complaint, which was officially filed on December 6, 2018, also alleges that the defendants have engaged in unlawful acts, including the unlicensed importation into the United States, sale for importation into the United States, and/or sale after importation into the United States of certain pocket lighters. The defendants named in the ITC complaint include Arrow Lighter, Inc. doing business as (d/b/a) MK Lighter, Inc. and MK Lighter Company, Zhuoye Lighter Manufacturing Co. Ltd., Wellpine Company Limited, Benxi Fenghe Lighter Co., Ltd., Excel Wholesale Distributors Inc. and Milan Import Export Company, LLC. The imitation pocket lighters are sold under the brand names MK, TuTu and Star.
"For more than 40 years, BIC's pocket lighter, with its iconic look, has become famous in the minds of consumers and trusted for its consistent high-quality and unyielding commitment to safety," said Steve Burkhart, Vice President and General Counsel at BIC. "The companies importing and selling these imitation lighters are attempting to free ride on BIC's success by appropriating BIC's distinctive registered trademarks and confusing American consumers into believing that they are buying a BIC product, which is trusted for its high-quality and safety. The confusion is real, and so are the consequences. As the industry-leader, BIC is adamant about defending our consumers, customers' employees, and our brand, and that includes using every resource afforded under the law to remove these low-quality imitation products from the marketplace."
BIC tested the MK lighters and found that they do not conform to the same stringent safety and quality standards as BIC's. MK merely imitates BIC's iconic appearance, selling consumers an inferior, unsafe product hoping to take advantage of BIC's immense consumer goodwill.
BIC urges consumers and customers to always confirm they are purchasing a safe, high-quality BIC lighter, buying only from reputable retailers.
The defendants' attempts to free ride on BIC's goodwill includes copying BIC's Material Safety Data Sheet, which provides essential safety, transportation and storage information. This again misleads consumers and customers into believing the imitation lighters are of the same quality and specifications as genuine BIC lighters.
Safety is a cornerstone of BIC's business and is the number one priority for BIC Lighters. BIC is committed to producing the safest and highest quality products, which begins with the manufacturing process and continues through the delivery and use of each pocket lighter. BIC manufactures nearly a million pocket lighters in the United States daily. All BIC® pocket lighters are fully compliant with all applicable safety standards in every country where BIC operates, and meet or exceed international safety standards. Additionally, the Company actively educates consumers, traditional retail customers, and e-commerce sellers directly about the importance of choosing BIC lighters, the lighter they can trust everywhere, every time.
For more information about this lawsuit, or about BIC's unparalleled commitment to safety, please visit: us.bicworld.com.
BIC is a world leader in stationery, lighters, and shavers. For more than 70 years, BIC has honored the tradition of providing high-quality, affordable products to consumers everywhere. Through this unwavering dedication, BIC has become one of the most recognized brands and is a trademark registered worldwide for identifying BIC products.
The BIC Lighter is recognized worldwide for producing a safe, reliable flame for millions of consumers every day. Every BIC lighter undergoes more than 50 separate, automatic, quality checks during the manufacturing process. Each day, BIC produces more than 7 million lighters a day worldwide and, since 1973, has sold more than 30 billion lighters in more than 160 countries.


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Satanic: Women Proudly Take Abortion Pills Outside Supreme Court to Express Support for Killing Babies
For the folks who seek to normalize abortion as just another medical procedure, this approach does nothing but expose that lie. While demo...
For the folks who seek to normalize abortion as just another medical procedure, this approach does nothing but expose that lie.
While demonstrating outside of the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday during opening arguments of a case that poses a direct challenge to the court's Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion, a handful of female protestors were cheered on as they swallowed tablets that were purportedly abortion pills.
"ABORTION PILLS ARE IN OUR HANDS & WE WON'T STOP 🖤," a tweet from Shout Your Abortion captioned a video clip from Wednesday's protest.
"Taking Mifepristone at the Supreme Court today," the post concluded, along with the hashtag #AbortionPillsForever.
The short video featured four young women standing in front of a banner that said "WE ARE TAKING ABORTION PILLS FOREVER" as they fumbled with small white boxes labeled "abortion pills" with large black block letters.
After several chants of their slogan, the women in frame popped small tablets into their mouths and sipped from water bottles in either a moment of symbolic triumph — or in a demonic public act of child sacrifice.
If these women were indeed pregnant and the tablets were genuine mifepristone, what we have witnessed is the moment they carried out a death sentence against their own babies as a means of protesting a court case that could restrict such crimes against humanity.
The reaction on social media was a mix of disgust, astonishment and sobering realizations about the evil of abortion.
Contrary to feminist memes and mantras, abortion is not routine health care that is necessary to save women's lives. If it were, there would be no need for such a public display or a concerted campaign to "normalize" it.
Instead, abortion is the most sickening and barbaric act of depravity a mother can inflict on her own offspring, a fact that makes people instinctively recoil from the very idea of it despite decades of trying to turn it into a women's rights issue.
But the supposed right to end the life of an unborn child is the defining evil of our time, more insidious than mass extinctions that took place under totalitarianism, communism or Nazism.
Concentration camps and killing fields full of corpses drew the kind of public attention and disgust that eventually mobilized the forces of good to make it all stop.
But abortion happens in sterile clinical settings where the corpses are carted away and disposed of as medical waste or, as these women may soon find out, in the lonely privacy of bathrooms in office buildings, homes and college dormitories.
It has remained a mostly unseen atrocity and has therefore survived challenges as the de facto law of the land ever since the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973 — but that may be about to change.
The Supreme Court began hearing oral arguments Wednesday in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, a challenge to Mississippi's Gestational Age Act that bans abortions after 15 weeks gestation.
Experts believe that because the ban would take effect before the currently accepted age of viability — one of the pillars of the Roe decision to allow abortions before 24 weeks — it could undermine the entire premise on which the right to abortion is currently hinged if the court finds the Mississippi law constitutional.
The balance of so-called conservative justices might be enough to overturn the Roe decision, which would go down in history as another awful precedent.
Pro-lifers are hopeful, while pro-abortion advocates are desperate to maintain the evil practice that has become the high sacrament in the church of woke.
That desperation is what brought these women to the Supreme Court and was the impetus for their macabre publicity stunt that potentially ended the lives of their own children — and that tells us all we need to know about proponents of abortion.


I regret not volunteering my time with a literacy advocacy group, when this was requested of me some years ago.
I scoffed at the idea that knowledge would make any difference, I was somewhat erudite at the time and I couldn't see myself learning anything because there didn't seem to be anything important to learn from reading narratives. I'd done that since childhood.
Academics have proved a mythical bell curve in which the ability for intelligent cognition for 98% of the population has modest mental capacity and 2% are bright. Regardless of our rational ability, however, we are not so differentiated in terms of emotional cognition, perhaps because this is more difficult to measure scientifically. The term, emotional intelligence is itself confusing.
The nature of agency makes us territorial and self-centered and emotional cognition tells us how anything encountered may impact our selves. From this set of responses, we weave the tapestry of our understanding of ourselves and the world which makes up personal narratives.
Like title insurance, which supports the fiction of ownership of land and buildings so rent is paid to the persona named on the title, our identity cards and numbers set the boundaries of our individual agency just as title insurance guarantees that taxes will be paid by the person named on the title and that that person alone can say who uses the property. Can you imagine how the Homestead Act affected the native population?
Narrative fiction has value for readers. Popular fiction and nonfiction are generally more likely to be an opiate for the masses, guidance for agency. A popular narrative annoying me today is the myth of democracy in America. The election of a president and congress is produced at a cost of hundreds of millions, mostly in media purchases. Every 4 years a feeding trough is set up for media companies. The myth of democracy would collapse if those people over 60 chose not to vote. We should try that next time.
That's the reason for candidates like Ralph Nader and Bernie Sanders, to give the appearance of rational choices about salient differences. The other two candidates, the real candidates, are ambiguously related to concerns of most people. It's not that these candidates are selected because their notions are irrelevant. Electoral government is based on the idea that a person can represent the interests of a number of others and as the size of a constituency grows, the less likely it is they will be represented. Plato felt 5000 is a maximum number and we number 400 million. On the evidence, it's absurd and the result is that people complain that congress doesn't reflect the interests of the electorate?
Unfortunately because the actual control of government is concentrated in a power structure and the power of a corporate body this size is immense, it looks like a no-exit march to environmental destruction now because the priorities those holding the power are thoughtless of the effect on the many.
We've been losing an arms race to ourselves. There are a few choices but they all move the focus of public expenditure from military, technology and policing to social welfare. To accomplish this only requires that we tell the truth that politics is local. The most corrupt aspects of our justice system are local. All social services are locally administered. Governance should logically be local and Plato's model will probably work.
It's symptomatic of a recent failure of our form of government that an unprecedented number of formerly deployed servicemen are committing suicide, including some whose, work was operating drones from a base thousands of miles from action. If my employees commit suicide as a result of their employment, you'd shut down the business. A crowd of people dressed in black would surround my place of business, carrying torches, screaming, like Dr. Frankenstein.


Sr Mary Fermio rsj will lead an hour reflection, prayer and discussion around aspects of the life and contribution of Mary MacKillop to our spiritual and secular lives. Following the time of reflection, prayer and discussion participants will join Sr Mary Fermio for light refreshments in our Refreshments area.
This is to become a regular event on the 15th day of each month (or the nearest Monday) in recognition of Mary MacKillop's birthday on the 15th January 1842 in Newtown (now Fitzroy).
This is a unique opportunity for people to learn more about Mary MacKillop. The theme for 2019 is Mary MacKillop – Inspiration for Today.
Come along and bring a friend who may appreciate the opportunity to celebrate the life and legacy of St Mary MacKillop through reflection, prayer and discussion.
For catering purposes please RSVP by the Wednesday prior. Donations gratefully accepted.
For more information please contact MMHC on 03 9926 9300 or email Sr Mary Fermio rsj.


You could create a contract builder with the techniques explained below.
The first image below shows the structure of the example. The second image shows the formulas involved – nothing too complicated. You can download the example at the bottom of the post.
If you want to see formula rather the results use Ctrl + ` (the key below the Esc key). It's a toggle, it shows or hides formulas. Be prepared for columns sizes to change when you use it.
Clicking the Check Box for a sentence changes whether the sentence is included in the paragraph in cell B8. To see my blog post on the Check Boxes click here.
The Check Boxes insert TRUE and FALSE in column A. I've used the Custom Format ;;; to hide the entries in Columns A.
The IF functions in column C uses the TRIM function on the sentence, if it is used, to remove any leading and trailing spaces, then it adds a space at the end to make all the used sentences consistent. The IF function displays a blank cell if the sentence is not used.
The formula in cell B8 for the paragraph uses the & symbol to join all the used sentences together. Wrap Text format is applied to this cell.
You can copy and paste cell B8 into Word.
This technique could be used to create a contract, agreement or report based on selections made by the user.


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Rachel and the Stranger is a 1948 American Western film starring Loretta Young, William Holden, and Robert Mitchum. The Norman Foster-directed film was one of the few to address the role of women in the pioneer west, as well as portray early America's indentured servant trade. It was based on the Howard Fast short story "Rachel".

While the film had a low budget, it was RKO's most successful film that year, making $395,000.

Plot
In colonial America, David Harvey (William Holden), a recent widower farming in the wilderness, decides that his young boy Davey (Gary Gray) needs a woman around to help raise him. The following spring, he goes to the nearest settlement and consults Parson Jackson (Tom Tully) and his wife. In view of the dearth of women in the settlement, David is persuaded to buy the contract of an indentured servant named Rachel (Loretta Young). David accepts that he will have to marry her, for the sake of propriety.

Their marriage, however, is in name only. David is still grieving for his dead wife Susan and Davey resents what he sees as an attempt to replace his mother. Despite her hopes, Rachel is treated as a servant and not a wife. She is naturally upset by this but keeps her sorrows to herself. Unlike Susan, she is unskilled in the use of a musket, but resolves to learn to shoot to connect with the boy and through him, with the father. She practices secretly in the cabin's cellar. This will stand her in good stead later.

Jim Fairways (Robert Mitchum), a hunter who is a family friend (and former suitor of Susan's), visits and becomes attracted to Rachel. She blossoms under Jim's attentions and discloses, to David's surprise and embarrassment, that she can play Susan's spinet. They enjoy a pleasant evening of instrumental music and singing. Later, Davey interrupts the beginnings of a mutual understanding between David and Rachel.

On his next visit, ostensibly to retrieve his forgotten guitar, Jim brings presents, including a dress for Rachel. David is disturbed by the easy way in which Jim has become friendly with Rachel and he slowly becomes jealous and irritated as Jim stays weeks longer than expected. He takes the opportunity of a night out hunting foxes with the dogs, to tackle Jim and encourage him to leave. Davey defies Rachel and stays outside the cabin to listen to the sounds of the hunt. A prowling mountain lion threatens Davey and the stock. At the sound of a gunshot the men come running and Rachel admits that she killed the animal. As a result, she rises in Davey's estimation.

When Jim offers to buy her, David's resentments come to the surface and they fight. Rachel has to intervene. She is quietly furious and feels that both men appear to regard her more as a commodity to be traded than as a wife. She decides to leave and walks back to the settlement, daring David to take her to law over the indenture. David is angry but also concerned about her traveling alone in view of the possible presence of Shawnee nearby. It has slowly dawned on him what a fine woman she is and what her loss would mean to him. Jim intends to press his own suit. Taking Davey, they ride after her.

That night, while they are camped, Jim makes an offer to Rachel to come away with him. At Davey's urging, David makes an awkward bid for her to return home. She does not respond to either man. Later, they see a glow in the night sky and fear the Shawnee are attacking settlers. The two men send Rachel and Davey on horseback to the settlement for safety while they run back to the cabin to see what is going on.

Rachel is worried about David and after a while sends Davey on for help while she follows the men. She reaches the cabin to find them besieged. She is dragged from her horse by one of the attackers, but David and Jim make a sally and manage to get her into the cabin where she uses her new-found skill with a musket to aid the defense. The Shawnee set the cabin on fire and the trio retreat to the cellar. Early next morning, Parson Jackson and the local militia arrive to drive off the attackers. David and Rachel survey the burnt-out cabin, making tentative plans for the future. Rachel knows she has been accepted as a wife when David tells his son to "do as your Ma says" and enfolds her in a tender embrace.

Cast
 Loretta Young as Rachel Harvey
 William Holden as David Harvey
 Robert Mitchum as Jim Fairways
 Gary Gray as Davey
 Tom Tully as Parson Jackson
 Sara Haden as Mrs. Jackson
 Frank Ferguson as Mr. Green
 Walter Baldwin as Gallus
 Regina Wallace as Mrs. Green

Production
Filming took place in Eugene, Oregon.

Reception
The film recorded a profit of $395,000.

After Mitchum was arrested for possessing marijuana, RKO rushed to release the film to take advantage of the news of Mitchum's arrest.

References

External links

1948 films
1948 Western (genre) films
1948 drama films
American Western (genre) films
American black-and-white films
1940s English-language films
Films based on short fiction
Films directed by Norman Foster
Films scored by Roy Webb
Films set in Ohio
Films set in the 18th century
Films shot in Eugene, Oregon
Films with screenplays by Waldo Salt
RKO Pictures films
Revisionist Western (genre) films
1940s American films

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia