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Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Books
Last Updated: Administrator
Angel of Storms
Author: Trudi Canavan
Publisher: Orbit, 2015
Series: Millennium's Rule: Book 2
1. Thief's Magic
2. Angel of Storms
3. Successor's Promise
4. Maker's Curse
Book Type: Novel
Sub-Genre Tags:
Avg Member Rating:
(2 reads / 1 ratings)
Rheex
Tyen is teaching mechanical magic at a school respected throughout the worlds. News arrives that the formidable ruler of all worlds, long believed to be dead, is back and enforcing his old laws - including the one forbidding schools of magic. As teachers and students flee, Tyen is left with no home and no purpose...except the promise he made to Vella, the sorcerer imprisoned in a book. Tyen must decide what he is willing to do to free her.
After five years among the tapestry weavers of Schpeta, Rielle's peaceful new life has been shattered by a local war. As defeat looms, the powerful Angel of Storms appears and invites Rielle to join the artisans of his celestial realm. But what will he require in return for this extraordinary offer?
When Betzi had gone to bed before anyone else, claiming to have a headache, Rielle knew she was up to something. Something very dangerous. Something Rielle doubted she'd talk her friend out of.
So she said nothing. Before retiring she slipped into the studio and took two of the weaving combs, hanging them on the old tapestry that served for a door to the room they shared. When the jangle of metal against metal woke her, followed by Betzi's curse, she quickly sat up.
"You don't really think I'm going to let you go out there alone," she murmured.
Betzi turned, her skirts rustling. And I was right about that, too, Rielle thought. She went to bed in her clothes so the sound of her dressing wouldn't wake me.
"You can't stop me going," Betzi replied, removing the combs.
"Betzi, it's too dangerous for..."
But the girl ignored her, slipping past the tapestry. Rising, Rielle went in pursuit. The faint light of early dawn, penetrating through the seams around the window shutters, sliced the dusty air. The younger woman paused at the top of the ladder to the next floor as she saw that Rielle had followed.
"Why are you dressed?"
"Because I am not going to let you go out there alone."
The girl's scowl disappeared. "You're coming with me?"
"As you said, I can't stop you going."
The frown reappeared. "Master Grasch told you to, didn't he?"
"He may be blind, but he's not stupid."
Betzi shrugged, then started down. Her shoes made no noise - because they were slung by their laces over her shoulder. Rielle hadn't thought of that. Sleeping in her boots had been very uncomfortable.
She followed Betzi down to the living room. The weavers' workshop contained three floors: the main work space on the same level as the street, the living room above it and the sleeping quarters at the top. "Living room" was an apt description as it was where everything other than sleeping and working was done. Privacy and space were scarce resources in Schpetan homes. Only the front door to the house and the toilet door were solid, everything else was a tapestry or hanging - those above the workshop were almost too faded for anyone to make out the original image.
They sat on a bench next to the stove while the younger woman bound on her boots. Not for the first time Rielle envied her friend's dainty feet. Betzi was closer to the idealised Schpetan woman than the typical one. Short and shapely with small hands and feet and a pale, heart-shaped face surrounded by a mass of blonde curls, she attracted admirers everywhere. Next to her, Rielle felt big, lanky and dark, whereas among her own people she had been merely "plain", though Izare had thought her "pleasing" and "interesting".
Izare. She hadn't thought about her former love in a long time. The heartache she'd once felt at their terrible parting had faded, and the guilt at what she had put him through had dulled, though it still stung her sometimes, lying awake at night and thinking about the past.
After five years, I expect he thinks of me as little as I do of him - and no doubt would prefer not to at all.
She occasionally wondered what he was doing now. Did he still live in Fyre? Did he still paint for a living, or had she ruined his reputation by association? A lot can change in five years. He could be married and have the children he craved. I hope so. I may not pine for him any more, but I don't wish him to be unhappy either.
Betzi rose and headed for the small room between the living room and weaving studio where Master Grasch met with visitors. Reaching behind one of the small sample tapestries, she drew out a small bundle tied with a string and secured it to her waistband. She moved to the main door and carefully slid aside the heavy bar across the back. Without a pause to consider what she was venturing out into, or to check if the street was empty, she stepped outside. Rielle followed, and was relieved to find no other people about. Taking the chain attached to the end of the bar, she threaded it through a hole beside the door frame and pulled it when the door was closed, dragging the bar back into place.
It was impossible to do this quietly, and Betzi hissed at the noise.
"We can't leave them unprotected," Rielle pointed out.
"I know, Rel, but can't you do it silently?"
"If you thought that was possible you should have done it yourself," Rielle retorted. She fed the chain back through the hole. It clattered against the inside of the wall. Somewhere inside, a baby began to cry. Betzi grabbed her arm and pulled her away, across the road and into the shadows of a side street. She paused to make sure they were alone, then let go of Rielle and set off.
Her stride was full of confidence. If Rielle had not known better she'd have assumed it was the naïve arrogance of a spoiled and pretty young woman who got what she wanted too easily. That was certainly how she had regarded Betzi at first. The boldness was not an indication of weakness and ignorance, however, but of strength and determination. Betzi's short life had been a difficult one, but every setback had only made her want to seize every moment of happiness she could.
Even if that meant venturing out into the streets of a desperate city too long under siege.
"Come on, Rel," Betzi said, lengthening her stride. "We won't be allowed near the wall if fighting starts again."
Turning away, Rielle hitched her skirts high enough that she could lengthen her stride and catch up with her friend. Betzi's eyebrows rose but she said nothing, since nobody else was around to see. The younger woman had the advantage, having grown up wearing the many layers of clothing the Schpetans considered decent attire. Rielle had never been able to move as quickly in them as the local women did. She had more easily adopted the local habit of leaving hair uncovered in public, since she'd always resented having to wear a scarf, though it meant her dark, straight hair marked her as a foreigner.
They both checked their stride as a soldier turned into the street. He walked with a limp and a sway, and did not look up as he approached. Drunk, perhaps? There wasn't supposed to be any liquor left in the city. Had someone's hidden stash of provisions been discovered?
As he passed she heard his breath catch each time he put his weight on his right leg. Looking back at him, she saw a glistening, dark patch on the back of his trousers.
"He's wounded," she whispered.
"He's walking," Betzi replied.
They exchanged a grim look, then hurried on.
Stories of ill-treatment of the citizens had begun not long after the king and his army had arrived. Doum had been crowded with soldiers in the beginning. As the siege wore on, boredom and starvation set in, and the familiar maze of streets had slowly become a different kind of battlefield. Lack of food made thieves of desperate people. Men hardened by battle and fearful they were reaching the end of their lives sought any last pleasure available.
It was safest to stay indoors. Fortunately, the older weavers still recalled tales of how their grandmothers had survived the previous siege by growing food on the roof. They'd sent the younger weavers up with the tops of root vegetables and handfuls of precious seeds.
Most of us thought the siege wouldn't last long enough for anything to grow, she remembered. We did it to placate them. Lucky we did.
The siege had lasted over three halfseasons so far - or foursets in the local way of counting days. Fifty days. The desperate little crops growing in pots and cracks were the only food they had left other than the small animals, normally considered vermin, the children caught.
Most of the weavers tolerated being locked way. Being of a restless temperament, Betzi had begun slipping outside. It started after a few of the army captains, seeking to ease the boredom during a long stretch of no fighting, came to see the creators of the famous tapestries of Doum. She told Rielle later that the moment her eyes had met Captain Kolz's she had fallen in love with him - and he with her.
Having seen the two together, Rielle had no reason to doubt their affection was real. And having once been similarly consumed by passion, she understood why Betzi took such risks to see him.
At least she has a friend to protect her.
They were nearing the wall now, and Betzi's pace quickened. Rounding a corner, they entered a street blocked by a knot of three soldiers. Unlike the wounded soldier they'd passed, the men immediately noticed them. Seeing Betzi first, they straightened a little, but when their gazes shifted to Rielle they frowned. She was used to scowls from people here. She understood that these were not of hostility most of the time, but puzzlement. They did not know what to make of her. She was not local, yet she was clearly not from any land Schpetans knew of or hated. Which had been the point of her coming to a land so far from her own, to begin a new life where none knew of the crimes she had committed.
The civil war had not been part of the plan.
Betzi had paused, but now she started towards them. "Do any of you brave men know where Captain Kolz is?"
They exchanged glances. "Nope," one replied.
"Not seen him," another said, turning to face her.
"I think he's dead," the third added.
"He's not dead." Betzi's chin rose. "I would know if he was."
The men looked amused. "Oh? How so?"
She crossed her arms. "I would just know. Would one of you please escort us to him? I have something of great importance to give him."
Rielle groaned silently.
"What would that be?" the shortest of the men asked, tucking his thumbs in his hip pockets and sauntering towards her.
"That is for him to know, not you."
Oh, Betzi, Rielle thought as she reached out towards the girl's arm. You rely too much on Kolz's name to get you out of trouble. Not every soldier liked the captain, who had grown more inclined to punish their attacks on citizens since he'd met Betzi.
"Let's go," she whispered.
Betzi took a step back as the short man neared. "Well, if you won't..."
He darted forward and grabbed the arms that she lifted instinctively to ward him off. "What little gift have you brought for the handsome captain?" he asked. Seeing the bundle tied to her waistband, he let go of a wrist and grabbed it. "Is it this?" The cloth covering tore as he tried to yank it off her waistband, and out spilled the scarf Rielle had watched Betzi make - hours of spinning fleece stolen from her own pillow then deftly looping it into a cloth with a bone needle using a technique Rielle had never got the hang of.
"Give that back!" Betzi demanded as he gathered up the scarf. As she made a grab for it Rielle caught her waistband.
"Let him have it," Rielle advised. "You can make another from my pillow," she added as the other soldiers moved close.
Betzi ignored her. "Captain Kolz will not be happy when he learns - ow, Rel!" Yet she didn't fight as Rielle pulled her backwards. The short man had let her go in order to inspect the scarf, and to Rielle's relief Betzi took the opportunity to reverse their path. Her expression shifted from defiant and angry to fearful as she faced Rielle. Then her eyes widened and they were both jolted to a halt. Rielle looked beyond to see that the man's hand was still wrapped around the string secured to Betzi's waistband.
And the other soldiers were striding forward to surround them.
"Rielle!" Betzi gasped as she tried to slap away the short man's hands. "This is one of those times!"
Rielle's stomach turned over. Betzi was right. If the threat of being reported to the captain didn't worry them, then either Kolz was dead and the men answered to someone more powerful, or they intended to ensure no report could ever be made.
"Angels forgive me," she whispered. Hooking an arm around Betzi's, she turned to face the closest of the two men now reaching for her. Drawing a little magic, she grabbed his hand and thought heat!, hoping that she could still remember the trick her friend had taught her.
He recoiled, yelping in pain. As she turned to the second man a curse came from behind her. Betzi suddenly dragged Rielle forward, towards where the men had originally been standing. Trusting her friend knew what she was doing, Rielle twisted around and ran with her.
No footsteps followed behind them. As they reached the end of the street Rielle turned to see the trio standing together, glowering. Her senses caught two glimmers of Stain, the darkness where she or Betzi had removed magic from the world.
Magic that belonged to the Angels. Rielle shivered. Here, in Schpeta, it was believed that the Angels did not mind if magic was used in circumstances of extremity, to defend one's life. The Angel she had met at the Mountain Temple had said as much to Rielle, before sending her across the world to begin a new life: "I give you permission to, if your life is in danger and you have no other choice."
The words had echoed in her mind many times since the siege had started.
We can't be certain they intended to kill us, Rielle worried. But I'm not going to wait until the moment a blade slices my throat to be sure. Too many other women had been found abused and dead on the streets of Doum for her to take the chance. Besides, if the Angels are as unforgiving as the priests of my homeland believe, my soul is already doomed. I'm not exactly in a hurry to find out who is right.
They emerged into the wider road that separated the town's houses from its wall. The younger girl paused, arm still linked with Rielle's, and steered them towards a stone staircase leading up to the battlements. The remaining soldiers of the king's army fit enough to fight either stood along the top of the wall or rested below playing games, talking and attending to weapons, armour or injuries. Their ranks had thinned since Rielle had last come here, and nearly all wore some kind of bandage.
They look tired, she observed. Frightened. Angry. Or all three.
Betzi stopped abruptly. "There he is," she said in a hushed tone. "Captain Kolz!"
Following Betzi's gaze, Rielle saw a tired-looking young man leaning on the crenulated rail of a tower further along the city wall. Her friend pulled Rielle into a near-run, hurrying to meet her lover. Something in her hand whipped back and forth. Rielle laughed as she saw it was the scarf: Betzi had rescued it as well as herself.
The captain glanced down at the street and Rielle was not surprised that his attention moved to them, standing out because they were the only people moving with any energy. The smile that lit his face made her heart lift, then sink a little. It was possible the attraction between him and Betzi would not last once the present grim circumstances ended - even if they survived them - but she could not help feeling sure that she would eventually lose her only friend to him.
Betzi let go of Rielle's arm and dashed into the tower, nimbly climbing the stairs within. Following more sedately, by the time Rielle reached the top she found her friend and the captain completely absorbed in each other, with several amused soldiers pretending not to notice. The scarf was around his neck already, she noted.
"...said you were dead! I did not believe them," Betzi said. She grinned as Rielle joined them. "We--"
Her words were drowned out by a loud horn blast, which was repeated up and down the wall. Answering peals came from outside the city, followed by a sound she had only heard during festivals - the roar of many, many people shouting. The captain's smile vanished and he and the other fighters hurried to the outer edge of the wall to peer carefully through the gaps of the crenulations.
"They're attacking." He looked back at them. "Go home."
But Betzi drew closer, keeping away from the openings. Rielle followed suit.
"I am safer here than on the streets during the fighting," Betzi told him, her voice uncharacteristically serious.
Kolz considered this quickly. "Then go below, into the tower, and stay there until I can escort you home."
She nodded, then beckoned to Rielle and hurried to the stairs. As they began to descend, a whistling in the air not far above made them duck. They dove into the stairwell, then stopped to look up. Several dark lines flashed overhead. Cries came from the street below, muffled by the tower walls.
But they were soon drowned out by the roar of the approaching army. Soldiers jostled past as Rielle and Betzi hurried down the stairs. They each squeezed into a corner of the topmost room. A single archer remained on the same level, moving from narrow window to window, bow notched and ready.
Outside, the roar of the attackers joined with the shouts of the besieged, then fragmented into bellows and screams, the blare of horns and the clang and thump of weapons as the enemy reached the wall. The archer loosed arrow after arrow, then when his supply ran out he hurried away, leaving them alone. Betzi turned to Rielle, eyes wide. Looking back, Rielle realised she had been frozen with terror. Now, as her friend moved to peer out of the window facing the battle, her limbs unlocked. Heart hammering, she approached the window from the other side.
"Don't get yourself shot," she told Betzi, even as she snuck a look outside.
Rielle peered through. A familiar view lay beyond. Jagged rocky peaks emerged behind domed hills. The first time she had seen the landscape she'd thought it looked like black teeth set into green gums - and indeed the Schpetan name for the peaks meant "Angel's teeth".
The hills weren't so green now that most of the fields had been trampled into mud or harvested to feed the Usurper's fighters. The enemy encampment lay several hundred paces away. Between it and the city wall were several straight ridges that had not been there before.
Extending her senses, she was relieved to find no Stain. Though the civil war had been brutal and unforgiving, neither the king nor the Usurper had risked the Angels' wrath by ordering the use of magic. Everyone had speculated on whether one or the other side would stoop that low at some point, but she doubted they would. Only priests had the freedom to grow proficient at magic, and she doubted the king or Usurper would find any willing to use it for warfare.
Another horn blast came from somewhere beyond the wall, but this was a different sound than before. The noise outside the tower lessened for a moment, then the tone of it changed. A call went up, which was repeated over and over, close to the tower and also in the distance. Soldiers rushed up and down the stairs, forcing Rielle and Betzi to return to the corners again.
"They're retreating," someone bellowed atop the tower. Rielle recognised Kolz's voice. Betzi's worried expression vanished.
"Is it a trick?" a fainter voice called from somewhere in the street below.
"Might be. Did any survive the breach?"
"I'll check."
Returning to the window, Betzi and Rielle watched the Usurper's forces withdraw, the soldiers disappearing over the ridges before marching into sight again beyond them. One of the peaked structures of the enemy encampment abruptly collapsed, then another.
"Are they packing up?" Rielle wondered.
"Who is that, walking up the road?" Betzi asked.
Rielle squinted, searching for the people Betzi had seen. "Where?"
"Three men, one with a gold-coloured coat, two in strange clothing. Foreigners, maybe."
"Your eyes are much better than mine," Rielle said. "Perhaps if they come near..." Her breath caught in her throat as she saw the trio.
"The one wearing gold might be the Usurper," she heard Betzi say. "The others..."
Rielle opened her mouth, but could not find the air to speak.
"...they look a little like priests," Betzi continued. "Didn't you say they wear dark blue in the north? Rel?"
Rielle's lungs began to protest. As her throat unclenched, air rushed in.
"What's wrong, Rel?"
Rielle shook her head, but she could not take her eyes from the trio approaching the city. Hope and fear tumbled over one another in her heart. If this is... if they are...
"...escort these two women from the battlements to their home," a voice said at the entrance of the stairway above.
"But, Captain--" Betzi began.
"Go home, Bet," Kolz said. "Lock the door. I will send news to you, when we know what the situation is."
A hand grasped Rielle's arm and pulled her away from the window. A memory she kept well bound to the past broke free and she felt an echo of terror and a vision of a desperate man, his hand brandishing a knife. She closed her eyes, gathered the memory up and locked it away again. When she opened them again it was Betzi's face she saw.
"Come on, Rel." Betzi linked her arm in Rielle's and guided her down the stairs. The tower now reminded Rielle of another. A mountain prison. A young priest leering. A scarred priest. An Angel, more beautiful than any mortal could hope to be...
Bright sunlight made her wince and brought her back to the present. Betzi stopped. The young archer stood a step away, a scowl on his face as he saw Rielle properly for the first time. Taking a deep breath, Rielle pushed away the memories, and the urge to run back to the tower window and confirm that she was mistaken.
Because she had to be, surely.
"Are you all right, Rel?" Betzi asked.
Betzi turned to the archer. "Lead on," she said brightly, and they set forth into the subdued streets of Doum.
Copyright © 2015 by Trudi Canavan
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Banana Squash
This item was last sold on : 11/27/19
• 6 Recipe Ideas
• 5 Sharess
Banana squash can grow to be very large in size, averaging 60-91 centimeters in length and 18-22 centimeters in diameter, and have a cylindrical, slightly curved shape. The thick-walled rind is smooth and depending on variety, can be salmon pink, blue, yellow, or variegated in color. The orange flesh is firm, dense, and meaty with a hollow seed cavity encasing stringy pulp and cream-colored, hard, flat, and oblong, small seeds. When cooked, the flesh of the Banana squash is fragrant, dry, rich, and earthy sweet.
Banana squash is available year-round, with peak season in the fall and winter.
Banana squash, botanically classified as Cucurbita maxima, is a large winter squash that belongs to the Cucurbitaceae family along with pumpkins and gourds. Banana squashes have a long cultivation period, can weight up to thirty-five pounds, and the plant requires ample space as the vines can roam over six meters. There are many cultivars of Banana squash, including pink and blue varieties, hybrid varieties often labeled as "rainbow," and heirloom varieties. Banana squashes were extremely popular in the early twentieth century, but they eventually fell out of favor to modern winter squash varieties such as butternut, acorn squash, and baking pumpkins. Today Banana squashes are known for their large size, unusual shape, and versatility in culinary applications.
Banana squash contains vitamins A and C, some B vitamins, calcium, iron, and fiber.
Banana squashes are best suited for cooked applications such as steaming, roasting, baking, grilling, and frying. As a true winter squash, it can be used in place of other orange-flesh winter squash varieties such as butternut and kabocha. Banana squashes are commonly sliced into rings or cubes, roasted, and added to soups, chili, and stews. They can also be served as a stand-alone side dish or shaved thinly and added as a pizza topping and to fresh green salads. Banana squash pairs well with butter, creme fraiche, aged sheep's cheeses, cream, pork belly, lamb, truffles, apricot preserves, orange juice, and herbs such as thyme, bay, sage, rosemary, cumin, curry, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg. They will keep for a couple of months when stored in a cool place with relative humidity.
The popularity of Banana squash, since its introduction, has predominantly been in the Americas, most notably in the western states of North America, but the pink varieties of Banana squash are also popular among the Mennonite farmers of Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. Banana squash is often sold in slices at markets as consumers can be intimidated and overwhelmed by its large size. Banana squash is also valued for its novelty, but its popularity has decreased as personal sized squashes such as the acorn have established a presence in the market as an easily prepared squash with a healthier serving size.
Squashes of Cucurbita maxima can trace their origins back to South America, especially to ancient sites in Peru, and the family of Banana squashes was introduced into the United States by R.H. Shumway in 1893. Though the Shumway seed catalog would be the initial Banana squash orientation within the U.S., other seed catalogs would soon follow, and by the early twentieth century, the Banana squash became a popular winter squash variety. Today most Banana squash variety seeds are housed among heirloom seed savers and are rarely found in the commercial marketplace. If available, Banana squashes can be found at specialty grocers and farmers markets in the United States and select regions of Central and South America.
Recipes that include Banana Squash. One is easiest, three is harder.
Cafe Johnsonia Vegan Banana Squash Coconut Curry
The Sisters Cafe Roasted Banana Squash Soup
Firesign Farm Pink Banana Squash Pie
Cooking with Ruthie Brown Sugar Banana Squash
Everything Begins with an E. Roasted Pumpkin Soup
Jules Food Roasted Banana Squash with Tarragon
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What Donald Trump's Presidency Might Mean for the Arctic
by Rob Huebert
News Deeply
The world is still digesting the election of Donald Trump as the U.S. president. It will be some time before the impact of his election will be fully understood. But what is already known is that he has achieved the Republican nomination as well as the presidency by trusting his own counsel and challenging orthodox wisdom. He will no doubt continue to disregard conventional wisdom and the advice of those outside of his immediate circle and do things "his way" to "make America great again." So, what then can we expect in regards to his policies concerning the Arctic?
First, it is highly probable that the United States will return to a policy framework that is significantly more oriented toward unilateralism than multilateralism. As a result, the support of the Arctic Council, which has been one of the major elements of the Obama administration, will likely decrease. Trump will support the Arctic Council only so much as it directly supports American interests, as he understands them. Thus, any effort toward cooperation simply for cooperation's sake should not be expected to continue. Nor should anyone think that there will be any effort by Trump to ratify the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. This means that the United States will remain outside the process of determining the outer limits of their continental shelf in the Arctic region.
Second, Trump has also indicated a support for the development of North American-based energy supplies. He has stated, on record, his support for the construction of new pipelines and the development of new North American-based supplies. This will undoubtedly mean a decrease of support for measures dealing with a mitigation of climate change and a greater focus on developments of North American energy sources, including those in the Arctic. There could also be a renewed search for new energy sources in Alaska. How quickly this is done will depend on market forces that will entice companies such as Shell to return. But the Trump administration can encourage a return and improve the business environment by decreasing the existing regulatory system and reducing any new policies meant to protect the environment for the sake of promoting oil and gas development.
Third, and most confounding, will be Trump's policies regarding Arctic security. On the one hand, he has continually expressed an admiration for Russian president Vladimir Putin, and Trump's tendency to personalize his policies means this could lead to a new relationship between the Russians and the Americans that may result in a greater willingness to work with the Russian government. But, on the other hand, he has also criticized the NATO alliance and suggested that the United States may no longer support it unconditionally. He has singled out the Baltic States for "not pulling their weight." Such messages may act to encourage the Putin administration to try to separate these states from the alliance through some of the techniques learned in Ukraine. If this happens, Western security arrangements may be undermined, which may embolden Russian military actions in Europe, including in the Arctic region. If this were to occur, Arctic regional security might be at risk.
It is, of course, too soon to know with any certainty what paths Trump will actually take, but given his propensity to do what he says he will do, it is probable that we will soon see a U.S. Arctic policy that will be more unilateral, more focused on resource development and much more uncertain regarding military security. Under the Obama administration, the United States had moved from being a "reluctant Arctic power" to one that was increasingly active as an engaged partner in the region. It is probable that Trump will soon return the United States to the more normal policy of ignoring the Arctic, except in terms of Alaskan politics.
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It's a Saturday afternoon at the Brookline Teen Center, a sleek modern building filled with couches and pool tables and walls painted in primary colors. Inside, hip-hop plays over the PA and a handful of kids are bent diligently over their work, designing logos they'll print onto T-shirts.
The sketch is based on the cover art from Barroso's EP, "Pharmacy Drive-Thru" — three wry, catchy indie rock numbers recorded under the moniker Questionable Dog.
"We based a lot of the EP around Waxahatchee," Barroso says, referring to the unruly-yet-wistful solo project from the Philadelphia musician Katie Crutchfield. Waxahatchee is one of Barroso's favorite bands, but when the group performed in Boston this summer, the teenager wasn't able to go.
If you're a teenage music fan in Boston, this is all too common. In fact, the majority of shows around here are 21-plus. Underage crowds don't spend money on drinks, and many clubs view them as a legal liability. (Hence the extra fees for all-ages shows.) For decades, young people have found ways to enjoy live music anyway, by throwing shows in basements and teen centers and YMCAs. But it's always been tough for underage musicians and fans to find places to gather. It may even be getting harder.
Wild Painting will be one of 17 musical artists — from punk bands to rappers to singer-songwriters — all youth from across Greater Boston. (There's also a visual art showcase.) For Yes Fest's performers, the event is a chance to reach a wider audience.
Yes Fest's organizers dream of making it an annual event. "It would be cool if Yes Fest turned into something like Boston Calling, but for teens," Jarjour says.
This segment aired on October 20, 2017.


On behalf of John Alcorn of The Law Offices of John R. Alcorn, APC posted in Immigration Detention on Thursday, June 16, 2016.
A class action lawsuit filed by the Northern California branch of the American Civil Liberties Union may result in some change to immigration detention facilities. A former detainee filed the complaint against Immigration and Customs Enforcement after he was denied the ability to make phone calls and receive messages while he was being held in a California jail where ICE has rented facilities.
The main plaintiff in the case is a Jamaican man who moved to the United States at the age of 10. As an adult, the man served in the U.S. Air Force and married a U.S. citizen. After he was detained by ICE, the man found that it was extremely difficult to obtain the legal documents that he needed to fight his impending deportation. The difficulty was caused by limited access to a telephone and the inability to leave messages or receive messages.
Calls going out from the detention facility where the man was being held were automatically dropped after 15 minutes. Just getting a call started was difficult as the detention center's phone system only allowed collect calls. If the man reached a voicemail or an automatic phone system, his call would drop automatically. Eventually, the man was able to reach a nonprofit organization that provided him with legal representation from an attorney and got him out of the detention facility.
It can be very difficult for people to represent themselves in a deportation proceeding, especially when the person has already been detained. Contacting an immigration attorney may be the best way to begin the process of trying to obtain a release.


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Driver Guides Sri Lanka
Budget Taxi in Kandy
05 Nights 06 Days
Anuradhapura, Mihintale, Habarana, Minneriya National Park, Sigiriya, Pidurangala Rock, Bullock Cart Riding, Kandy
Meeting and Tour Starting Point : Airport or Kandy
This itinerary you will get one Free Safari jeep + Water Bottles.
Day 01 & 02 : Anuradhapura
Our driver will meet you at air port and driver directly to anuradhapura. Next Day Visit Anuradhapura And Evening Mihintale. Over night anuradhapura.
Anuradhapura city became the Capital of Anuradhapura Kingdom in the 4th Century BC. It remained as the capital city for 15 centuries and was a prominent political and trade center in South Asia during this period. Ruwanwelisaya, an ancient stupa, is revered by the Buddhist community. Thuparamaya enshrines the collarbone of the Buddha and is considered to be the first dagaba, or pagoda, built in Sri Lanka. Lovamahapaya also known as the Brazen Palace is between the Ruwanvaliseya and Sri Maha Bodhiya. Jetavanarama is the largest stupa in Sri Lanka. As well as these beautiful places there are other stupas and relics, soaring over the vast acres of paddy fields in the area.
Mihintale is a mountain peak near Anuradhapura in Sri Lanka. It is believed by Sri Lankans to be the site of a meeting between the Buddhist monk Mahinda and King Devanampiyatissa which inaugurated the presence of Buddhism in Sri Lanka
Day 03 & 04 : Sigiriya
After Break Fast Going To Habarana To Elephant Riding And Evening Minneriya National Park Jungle Safari By Jeep. Next Day Visit Sigiriya Rock And Pidurangala Rock Evening Bullock Cart Riding To See Sri Lanka Rural Village Style. Over Night Sigiriya.
Sigiriya an ancient rock fortress and palace ruin encircled by the remains of a widespread network of gardens, reservoirs, and other structures. Sigiriya consists of an ancient castle built by king Kassapa during the 5th Century AD. It is a popular tourist destination. Sigiriya has it all and its prehistoric paintings (frescos), which are significant of the Ajanta Caves of India. The Sigiriya rock is believed to be a hardened lump of granite from long-eroded volcano. The rock itself rises 370 m (1,214 ft) above the sea level and stands high above the surrounding plain, visible for miles in all directions. The Sigiriya site has the ruins of an upper palace sited on the top of the rock, a mid-level terrace that includes the Lion Gate and the mirror wall with its frescoes, the lower palace that clings to the slopes below the rock, and the walls and gardens that extend for some hundreds of meters out from the base of the rock. Regardless of its age, the magnificence of the palace still furnishes an astonishing insight into the resourcefulness and imagination of its builders.
Pidurangala is a massive rock formation located a few kilometers north of Sigiriya in Sri Lanka. It has an interesting history closely related to that of the Sigiriya Rock Fortress. The rocky outcrops that surround the central rock gives one an indication of what the area around Sigiriya may have looked like prior to its clearing and preparation as a royal citadel.
Day 05 : Kandy
After Break Fast Proceed To Kandy. On The Way Hindu Temple, Spice Garden, Evening Kandy Cultural Dance Show. Over Night Kandy. Matale Hindu Temple, Muthumariamman Temple or Arulmigu Sri Muthumari Amman Kovil is a temple in Matale, Sri Lanka. The prefix "Muthu", literally means "pearl". "Mari" means rain and "Amman" means mother.
Day 06 : Kandy & Drop
Morning visit around kandy.Drop to negimbo or air port or to any your destination drop.
Temple of Tooth, Sri Dalada Maligawa or the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic is a Buddhist temple in the city of Kandy, Sri Lanka. It is located in the royal palace complex of the former Kingdom of Kandy, which houses the relic of the tooth of the Buddha
Peradeniya Botanical Gardens, Peradeniya are about 5.5 km to the west of the city of Kandy in the Central Province of Sri Lanka. It attracts 2 million visitors annually. It is near the Mahaweli River. It is renowned for its collection of orchids.
According to your idea some changes are possible, before given tour agreement.
You can customize your tour package on your own for experiencing Sri Lanka in your own way. We can also lend you a helping hand in designing a perfect customized holiday, if you would like so. Contact us with details regarding travel period, budget and number of people travelling. Accordingly we will write up a detailed itinerary along with a quotation and get back to you as soon as possible.
Best Day Tours
Kandy Day Tour
Pinnawala Day Tour
Nuwara Eliya Day Tour
Kitulgala Day Tour
Ella Day Tour
Sigiriya Day Tour
Anuradhapura Day Tour
Polonnaruwa Day Tour
Best Multi-day Tours
Scenic Tour
Ancient Tour
Nature Tour
Little England Tour
Round Tour
All Island Tour
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No.100/A Ampitiya Road, Kandy, Sri Lanka
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BILLERICA -- When the textile industry struggled, they found a way to go on. When they were displaced by a fire, they found a way to go on.
But Classic Elite Yarns and its affiliated retail location, Hub Mills Store, have reached the end of their rope.
Owner Betsy Perry announced this month the yarn-distribution company and store will close within the next few weeks, though no exact date has been set.
"I think it's no secret small retail has changed a lot," said Perry.
The closure of the business, which has its roots in Lowell textile manufacturing, is a sorry discovery for many knitters.
"End of an era! Wonderful people and great shop. You will be missed," one person posted on Facebook, alongside dozens of others expressing disappointment and well wishes.
Perry, who is 68, said she decided to close partially, because of family needs, partially because she wanted to retire. She declined to say whether she tried to sell the business.
The changing retail landscape and the increasing number of people directly selling their products online also affected Classic Elite Yarns, which stopped manufacturing its own yarn two decades ago and now operates as a wholesale distributor, Perry said. They also sell directly to knitters at Hub Mills Store, which operates out of the same location on 16 Esquire Road in Billerica.
"It's just a very tough business environment at the moment," said Kristin Nicholas, who worked for Classic Elite Yarns for 16 years until 2000 and later sold her own yarn line through the company.
Nicholas, who now is a writer, said she doesn't know exactly why Classic Elite Yarns is closing, but in a blog post compiled a long list of challenges facing the industry from new trends in dyeing and farm-raised wool to internet sales to the dwindling number of independent yarn stores.
She said many knitters don't want to buy from "big yarn companies." Others don't want to pay for yarn that costs a lot to produce.
Classic Elite Yarns is known for its high quality, mostly natural fiber, yarn, Nicholas said. Though she argues it's a misconception, Classic Elite Yarns is seen by some knitters as one of the bigger yarn companies.
"Classic Elite was one of the really big names," she said, before adding, "This has left a really big void in the hand-knitting world."
Perry said her company employs 10 people and at its peak sold yarn to 650 yarn stores across the United States and Canada.
The current business grew out of a textile manufacturing and spinning mill in Lowell owned by the Chew family. It was created as a marketing division of the mill and sold to hand weavers and designers.
Before long the brand -- which made yarn using materials like mohair, cotton, silk, alpacas, wools and natural fiber blends -- started presenting at industry trade shows, producing hand knitting designs and appearing in the pages of international fashion magazines, according to the store's website.
The company stopped producing its own yarn in the 1990s around the time it vacated its building on Jackson Street in Lowell following a fire, according to Perry. They moved to Western Avenue Studio where they were one of the first tenants, she said.
Perry started at the company in 2003 as a sales manager and purchased the business from a descendent of the Chew family in 2009.
Classic Elite Yarns, like many yarn companies, was owned and, for the most part, operated by women, Perry said. The same is true for the small business owners that bought their yarn, she said.
"Our customers are primarily women who own small businesses and I love working with women who own and take a chance on small businesses," she said.
By 2011, Perry said the Western Avenue building was transitioning away from commercial spaces, so the company moved to their current location in Billerica.
For Perry, her retirement will give her time to spend with family, including her granddaughter. For those that buy yarn, she is sure the knitting will go on.
"If knitters are out and about, they'll find yarn," she said.


The book of John is all about believing. Believing that Jesus is Messiah, God's son come to Earth as a man to redeem a people for himself.
A people that would love, follow and obey Him, a people who would deeply desire a relationship with the God who made them, a people that understood their flaws and fallen-ness but who also understood God's mercy and grace.
In the book of John we find twelve disciples who believed deeply in Jesus (John 2:11) so much so that they left everything to follow Jesus. We see Nicodemus a ruler of the Jews who discovers what it means to be born again (John 3). John tells us of a used and abused Samaritan woman who found the "living water" of Jesus and true forgiveness. It is she who lead the whole village of Sycar to believe in Jesus (John 4).
We see a Gentile official believing in Jesus after Jesus healed his son (John 4). Many believed in Jesus as he healed, fed and ministered to the crowds (John 6-7). Let us not forget about the man who was born blind. Jesus not only heals his physical blindness but he heals his spiritual blindness as well. Jesus performed many miracles but by far the greatest miracle was when he raised Lazarus from the dead.
He did it powerfully and publically. No other miracle produced more believers that this one miracle.


Last week I had the opportunity to sit down with Orbica CEO's Kurt Janssen and data scientist Sagar Soni.
Kurt has worked in the Geographic Information Systems (GIS) industry for more than 14-years. Last year he started his own company, Orbica, which does GIS consulting for organisations in the public and private sector. Orbica invests some of its consulting revenue into developing its own product. A major – and rewarding – investment has been hiring data scientist Sagar.
Sagar was taught machine learning during his master's degree and had the opportunity to put it into practice developing an earth rock image classification system at Dharmsinh Desai University and using deep learning algorithms like Recurrent Neural Networks to solve medical entity detection problems at US health care solutions provider ezDI. Last year he immigrated to NZ and had just the skills and experience Orbica was looking for.
Orbica's first product automatically identifyies buildings and waterways from aerial photos. This manually intensive job is traditionally done by geographers and cartographers who draw polygons on maps identifying these features using digitising techniques. The first product identifies buildings in urban areas. The 15 million-pixel (4800×3200 ) photos have each pixel covering a 7.5×7.5cm square . Sagar has built a convolution neural network that takes these photos and outputs the vectors representing the polygons where it believes the buildings are.
They have a good amount of training, test and validation data from Land Information New Zealand that consists of the images and polygons that have been hand drawn. Because of the size of the image, Sagar has tiled them into 512×512 images . He built the model over a couple of months with a little trial and error testing the various hyper parameters. The existing model has nine layers, with the standard 3×3 convolutions. He's currently getting 90 per cent accuracy on the validation set.
The water classification is very similar, working with 96 million pixel(12000×8000) images, but with smaller resolution 30x30cm pixels. The output is the set of polygons representing the water in the aerial images, but the model also classifies the type of water body, e.g. a lake, lagoon, river, canal, etc.
The commercial benefits of these models are self-evident: Orbica can significantly improve the efficiency of producing this data, whether it does this for a client, or it is sold as a service to city and regional councils. These are done regularly – to identify buildings that have been added or removed, or to track how waterways have changed.
Another opportunity has come from the Beyond Conventions pitch competition in Essen, Germany, where Orbica won the Thyssenkrupp Drone Analytics Challenge and the People's Choice Award. Orbica's pitch was to use machine vision to analyse drone footage of construction sites to automatically generate a progress update on the construction project. This is a more complex problem given its 3-dimensional nature. Thyssenkrupp has now resourced Orbica to put together a proof of concept, which Sagar is busy working on. Should this go well, Orbica will probably hire at least one other data scientist.
Because the technology is developing quickly, Sagar keeps up to date with the latest developments in deep learning through Coursera and Udacity courses. He's a fan of anything Andrew Ng produces.
To me, Orbica's use of machine vision technology is an excellent case study for how New Zealand companies can use the latest advances in artificial intelligence. They have a deep knowledge in their own vertical; in this case GIS. They develop an awareness of what AI technologies are capable of in general and have a vision for how those technologies could be used in their own industry. Finally, they make an investment to develop that vision. In Orbica's case, the investment was reasonably modest: hiring Sagar. A recurring theme I'm seeing here is hiring skilled immigrants. New Zealand's image as a desirable place to live – coupled with interesting work – will hopefully make this a win-win for all involved.
For those that would like to hear more. Kurt is speaking at AI Day in Auckland next week.


Tasting wine is a part of my job. I have taken wine courses and received certifications in wine. I am also lucky to taste a broad diversity of wines while working with wine regions around the world. I organize trade events for them, as well as visit wineries to write about them. But no matter how much you know about wine, you realize how much more there is to know. Nothing makes you realize this more than blind wine tasting and that is why it is the Please The Palate pick of the week.
The highlight of this past week was being invited to participate in a blind tasting with Wine & Spirits Magazine. Wine & Spirits Magazine, like most wine publications and wine writers, receive numerous wine samples on a regular basis. Ever wondered how particular wines are included in an issue? Well, that is what I was able to be a part of.
Some reviewers do not taste blind but the Wine & Spirits Magazine team does taste blind. The wines are categorized by variety and by general regions. The wines are tasted blind by a panel. Wine are given a yes, no or maybe and those that receive unanimous "yeses" are moved to the next level. In the next level, the critic who specializes in that region will blindly taste through the wines again and ultimately wines will be selected to be featured in the magazine.
Blind wine tasting is challenging on many levels. You taste to see if the wine is sound and to describe it but then you have to think about whether it is representative of the variety; for example a pinot noir should not taste like a cabernet sauvignon. In this blind wine tasting we were doing, we knew the variety, the region and the vintage. The region gave some hints as to whether wine is from a cool climate or a warm climate and the vintage let us know if the wine had a few years of age on it or was a current release.
But, blind tasting really puts all the years of study and travel to the test. We did seven flights of five wines each and tasted grenache, syrah, rhone blends, cabernet blends and a few other reds (zinfandel, nebbiolo). It was a really good, and challenging, learning experience as tasting five glasses of grenache blind side-by-side is different than when you can see the bottle and perhaps know the winery.
Despite all the spitting, my teeth were a shade of purple when we finished. But, it was an honor to be on the panel. Whether it is an official panel or in your home, I highly recommend doing some blind wine tastings. That is why blind wine tasting is the Please The Palate pick of the week. It is great palate practice. It is an opportunity to improve your palate and also encourages you to really trust your own palate and your knowledge. At the same time, it is a learning experience because with wine, you never stop learning. I thank Wine & Spirits Magazine for the opportunity to continue my quest to learn about wine.
This entry was posted in Wine and tagged Blind Wine Tasting, pick of the week, Please The Palate, Wine, Wine & Spirits Magazine, wine tasting by Allison Levine.


Dario Tokur received a diploma in sports science with focus on information technology in 2012 at the Institute of Sport Science (IfS) at TU Darmstadt (TUD), Germany. He is currently a Phd candidate in the Locomotion Laboratory. He is part of the B.A.L.A.N.C.E.-Project and researches human balance mechanisms and strategies during perturbations. He's focusing on the mechanical reactions of the lower limbs and leg muscles. Furthermore comparing human data with modelling approaches that represent specific (human) leg features to establish valid gait models.


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Signs of Problem Gambling:
Compulsive gambling - Mayo Clinic
Locate a meeting near you or talk to someone right away by phone
Lists state-by-state hotlines
National Problem Gambling Helpline Network Helpline: 1-800-522-4700
Provides resources and referrals for all 50 states, Canada and the US Virgin Islands.
Help is available 24/7 and is 100 percent confidential
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) National Helpline: 1-800-662-HELP (4357)
24/7, 365-day-a-year treatment referral and information service (in English and Spanish) for individuals and families facing mental and/or substance use disorders.
How has the "crack cocaine of gambling" affected Illinois? The state hasn't bothered to check. - ProPublica Illinois
How Illinois Bet on Video Gambling and Lost - ProPublica Illinois
USA Casinos - Gambling History, Laws & US State Casino Map
Gambling: State of the states (2017 report)
How close is my state to legalized sports betting? - ESPN
The most gambling addicted states - WalletHub
State of the States 2018: The AGA Survey of the Commercial Casino Industry - American Gaming Association
A Fighting Chance?
Defense Dept. Cashes In On Overseas Slot Machines While Problem Gambling Among Military Personnel Is Largely Undiagnosed
Ashley Lisenby
Holly Edgell
There are more than 2,000 slot machines on U.S. military bases overseas. (Credit: Pixabay)
In August 2018, President Trump signed into law the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), to fund the nation's military operations for the 2019 fiscal year. It includes a provision that has been absent for about 15 years: required problem-gambling screening for members of the Armed Forces.
The National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG) says about 56,000 active-duty military personnel are problem gamblers out of more than a million service men and women. The Department of Defense (DoD) reports about 120 active military sought treatment in 2017. About 10 percent of veterans using Veterans Affairs services are problem gamblers, according to the NCPG.
Problem Gambling or gambling addiction
Gambling behavior patterns that compromise, disrupt or damage personal, family or vocational pursuits. Characterized by an increasing preoccupation with gambling, a need to bet more money more frequently, restlessness or irritability when attempting to stop and "chasing" losses. National Council on Problem Gambling
Members of the Armed Forces serving overseas don't have far to look to find ways to gamble. There are about 2,000 slot machines (not 3,000 as some have reported) on more than 60 overseas bases. The DoD generates $100 million each year from active-duty military personnel playing on those slot machines.
None of the money goes toward problem-gambling treatment.
Who serves?
There are 1.2 million active-duty military
Racial and ethnic minority groups make up 40 percent of active-duty military
Jessica Maxwell, a spokesperson for the office of the Secretary of Defense, said the slot machines "are provided on military installations overseas as recreational options to eligible morale, welfare and recreation patrons (active duty, family members, DoD civilians, and foreign national civilians). Revenues are returned to programs to support other recreational activities."
Stateside bases removed slot machines in the 1950s, but bingo is played on 72 out of approximately 418 stateside bases, Maxwell said.
"It's clear that the Department of Defense in some ways is a large casino operator, given that they have thousands of slot machines on our overseas bases in addition to a tremendous amount of on-post bingo throughout the continental United States," said Keith Whyte, NCPG executive director.
Greater Risk
Screening questions to detect problem gambling in the military were discontinued in the early 2000s. The NCPG has lobbied ever since to restore those questions, because military personnel tend to be at greater risk for problem gambling than some other groups.
Maxwell contradicted the assertion about risk and said screening questions were discontinued "because the prevalence of the condition in the military population was low."
The screening questions are back now, in part, said Maxwell, because "problem gambling often heralds other treatable addictions and mental-health conditions. Additionally, problem gambling is a security threat inasmuch as sufferers could be compromised by adversaries."
Today, about 2 million, or 1 percent of adults, in the U.S. are estimated to meet the criteria for pathological (severe) gambling. Another 4 million to 6 million would be considered problem gamblers.
About 2 percent of active military personnel meet the criteria for problem gambling.
"The other important part of screening is that unlike substance abuse or other disorders that have more outward physical signs, gambling addiction is what we often call the hidden addiction," Whyte said.
Why is gambling addictive?
Gambling can stimulate the brain's reward system much like drugs or alcohol can, leading to addiction. Exactly what causes someone to gamble compulsively isn't well-understood. Like many problems, compulsive gambling may result from a combination of biological, genetic and environmental factors. Mayo Clinic
He said because the military stopped screening, a whole generation has gone undiagnosed and untreated. And military personnel often suffer in silence.
"They don't want to lose their security clearance," Whyte said. "They may not even know that what they have is a treatable disorder. A lot of people from the outside think it's simply bad money management, or you're immoral for gambling in the first place, or you're weak because you can't stop."
These concerns and others — including separation from a unit or fear if a crime has been committed because of gambling — are reasons the addiction goes unreported in many cases.
Whyte and other advocates say veterans also have higher rates of problem gambling than the rest of the the population. In 2012, he penned a letter to then-U.S. Veterans Affairs leader Secretary Eric Shinseki:
"Gambling addiction is a serious health problem that affects veterans and active duty service members. It is highly co-occurring with other serious conditions and complicates the treatment of those disorders," the letter reads.
"Despite overwhelming evidence that pathological gambling is common and serious complicating comorbidity, veterans seeking mental health or substance abuse care in VHA are not generally screened for gambling problems nor has problem gambling been integrated into substance use disorder, co-occurring disorder or mental health treatment programs."
The NDAA provision for screening does not include veterans.
On The Front Lines
The VA hosptial in St. Louis, Missouri. (Credit: St. Louis Public Radio)
Marcena Gunter, a spokeswoman for Veterans Affairs (VA), said internet gambling also gives overseas Armed Forces members easy access to gaming. Once they leave the military, many veterans the agency works with become addicted to video slot machines. Homeless veterans appear to be more addicted to scratch-off games and the lottery, she said.
One counseling service that helps gambling addict who are veterans and active military is the Life Crisis Center housed at Provident, Inc., in St. Louis.
People struggling with various mental-health issues can call the 24-hour hotline for free counseling over the telephone. The hotline is funded partially through money provided by the state's gaming commission.
Missouri spends an average of 4 cents per capita, or $258,000 a year, on services and treatment for problem gambling. The national average is 37 cents per capita. 2016 Survey of Problem Gambling Services in the United States
The center receives hundreds of calls a day that come through Missouri's 1‑888BetsOff hotline, run by an alliance of public agencies. By one Friday afternoon in early October, the center's counselors had answered 77 calls since midnight. That's about six calls an hour.
Clinician Jessica Vance pointed to her computer screen to show the questions counselors ask, including whether callers are at risk for suicide. According to the Nevada Council on Problem Gambling, up to half of people in treatment for problem-gambling disorder have thought about suicide and about 17 percent attempted it.
"We try to assess for suicide on as many gambling calls as possible, because that is often symptomatic of struggling with a gambling addiction," Vance said. "And I don't know the stats on the portion of our gambling callers who are veterans, but I would say that it is a good chunk of them."
The clinicians at Provident who handle calls from problem gamblers said one of the biggest hurdles for callers is shame. They say callers struggle to understand that gambling is a valid addiction similar to other substance-abuse problems.
"Maybe there is some traumatic history, maybe something horrible that they witnessed in the line of duty," Vance said. "But sometimes it's not the case. Sometimes people just gamble because it's fun. It's legal. It's a stress release. Sometimes it's something people do to cope with loneliness, and then it can just snowball out of control and turn into an addiction."
A Victory?
It took about a decade for lawmakers and the federal government to turn their attention to problem gambling among active military personnel.
In Nov. 2018, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) questioned Thomas McCaffery, nominee to be Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, about the matter of problem gambling and the military.
In 2015, the Senate adopted an amendment introduced by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) requiring the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to produce a study on problem gambling in the military.
Two years later, the GAO released this report, which shed light on the fact that there are thousands of slot machines on military installations overseas, yet the DoD doesn't systematically screen military personnel for gambling disorder. The GAO recommended that the DoD incorporate questions on gambling disorder in its annual health assessments and DoD-wide surveys.
In June of 2017, Warren introduced the Preventing and Treating Gambling Disorder in the Military Act of 2017, which would require the DoD to screen servicemembers for gambling disorder and include gambling disorder in certain surveys.
This provision didn't make it into the Senate version of the 2018 NDAA. In 2018, Warren tried again, working with Sen. Ted Daines (R-MT) to introduce a new bill, the Gambling Addiction Prevention Act, which included the provision to require DoD to screen and survey servicemembers for gambling disorders, as well as a new provision requiring the DoD to develop policies and programs to prevent and treat gambling problems. This measure made it into the 2019 NDAA which passed and was signed by the president.
In November, Warren questioned Thomas McCaffery, nominee to be assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, about the matter of problem gambling and the military.
Referring to the overseas slot machines, she asked, "Do you think it's a good idea to have slots on these bases to fund other recreational activities?"
McCaffery said he was unaware of the slot machines on bases but pledged to give his attention to the matter and how it "links to some of [Sen. Warren's] concerns regarding gambling disorder." He then committed to enforcing the NDAA provision.
Whyte of the NCPG would like to see the government go even further.
"Our call (in addition to screening) is just that they devote some of that money to making sure that, again, their own troops and their dependents have adequate and effective prevention education and treatment," Whyte said. "It's a simple proposition if you operate in profit from gambling, you need to minimize harm."
Ashley Lisenby worked as the race, identity and culture reporter at St. Louis Public Radio from Dec. 2017 to Dec. 2018, as part of the Sharing America collaborative. She came to KWMU from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch where she was a general assignment reporter who mostly covered county municipal government issues. Before making the switch to radio, Ashley covered Illinois government for The Associated Press in Springfield, Illinois, and neighborhood goings-on at a weekly newspaper in a Chicago suburb.
Holly Edgell is the editor of Sharing America based at St. Louis Public Radio. She is a journalist with more than 20 years of experience. In addition to working as a television news producer in several cities, in 2010 she launched 12 St. Louis-area websites for Patch.com. She also served in leadership positions for E.W. Scripps in Cincinnati, Kansas City, and Cleveland. Holly was also a journalism professor at the Missouri School of Journalism and Florida A&M University.
Fixed Odds is a reporting project from Sharing America, a public radio collaborative including Connecticut Public Radio, St. Louis Public Radio, KCUR and OPB. The series explores the impact of problem gambling on communities of color and the extent to which states provide money for problem gambling treatment.
For Native Americans, Tribal Casinos Help And Hurt
Helping Or Hurting? For Some Native Americans, Tribal-Casino Gambling Collides With Gambling Addiction
The Lure Of Luck
How Gambling Can Turn Addictive For Refugees From Southeast Asia
'No Estamos Locos'
Problem Gambling In One Of Oregon's Latino Communities
This public radio collaboration covers the intersection of race, identity and culture. Funded by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), Sharing America includes reporters at Connecticut Public Radio, St. Louis Public Radio, KCUR (Kansas City), and OPB (Portland, Oregon) and an editor based at St. Louis Public Radio.
Sharing America is a Collaboration of:


Employers need to consider disability accommodation under the ADA and FEHA before terminating employees unable to return from medical leave.
Last week the California Court of Appeal held that an employer's mandatory arbitration policy was unenforceable because it was unconscionable (i.e. too one-sided and unfair to be enforced). The opinion is a good reminder that simply having an arbitration agreement does not need mean it will be enforceable when a dispute arises.
New amendments to CFRA require employers with 20 or more employees to provide up to 12-weeks protected leave for baby bonding.
New section of California Labor Code will make it unlawful for employers in California to ask applicants about their pay history.
New amendments to California Labor Code 98.7 Make it Easier for Employees to Prove Unlawful Retaliation.
California Court of Appeal holds that knowledge and intent not required to recover wage statement penalties under PAGA.
Should Employers Require Employees to Sign Arbitration Agreements?
Employers are increasingly using arbitration agreements as a strategy to mitigate the risks of potentially costly litigation. Generally speaking, there are several benefits for employers to consider when deciding whether to adopt an arbitration policy. A few of these benefits, and their limitations, are described in this blog post.


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Q: Calculation of an expectation for the 'part' of a vector Let $x$ be vector in $R^n$. Let $\pi(⋅)$  be a permutation on the set $\{1,\ldots,n\}$  with a uniform distribution.  Let $|m|\leq n, m \in Z$.
Calculate
$$
E\left|\sum_{i=1}^mx_{\pi(i)}\right|^q, \quad q\geq 2.
$$
Thank you.

A: If $n\geqslant2$ and $q=2$, the result is
$$
\frac{m(n-m)}{n(n-1)}\sum_{k=1}^nx_k^2+\frac{m(m-1)}{n(n-1)}\left(\sum_{k=1}^nx_k\right)^2.
$$
A similar (but more tedious) expansion is possible for $q=4$ and more generally for every even integer $q$.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Covid-19: Latest number of new cases in Flintshire and Wrexham
Covid-19: Over 1,000 new cases in Flintshire and Wrexham
By Joe Robinson @joerob_leader Reporter
Coronavirus figures
OVER 1,000 new Covid-19 cases have been confirmed in Flintshire and Wrexham.
Public Health Wales data released on Monday (January 10) shows that there were 1,199 new cases confirmed in the two counties in the 48-hour period between 9am on Friday and 9am on Sunday.
Of these, 620 were in Wrexham and 579 in Flintshire.
Across North Wales as a whole, 3,002 new cases were confirmed during this 48-hour period.
As of January 2, there were 239 people being treated for Covid in North Wales hospitals - making up roughly 11 per cent of all inpatients.
The number of people being treated for the virus in North Wales hospitals has grown to the biggest number since January 2021 - during the second wave of the virus.
Sadly, a further 16 people who had tested Covid positive in the last 28 days died in Wales in the 48-hour reporting period. This takes Wales' total number of confirmed suspected Covid-related deaths to 6,650.
Over 1.7 million people in Wales have now had a Covid booster jab.


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text:
Q: Why do proofs of Bernoulli's equation assume that forces on opposite ends point in different directions?
I've read 4 different books and yet nobody explains why forces $F_1$ ($=p_1A_1$) and $F_2$ ($=p_2A_2$) point in different directions. Shouldn't $F_2$ point in the same direction as $v_2$?
Since we're assuming that parts of fluid between $a$ and $b$ have the same kinetic and potential energies (same holds for $c$ and $d$), why do all proofs state that the change in work: $W_2 - W_1$ is equal to the change in energy $E_2 - E_1$? Work is equal to the change in kinetic energy, so $W_2 = W_1 = 0$ (because we assumed that fluid between each pair of points has the same energy).
Then there's the problem of signs, how do we determine which sign to choose and how do potential energies come into the equation?

A: It's the definition of pressure. The pressure force is the force the stuff (fluid) external to the fluid in blue is exerting on the fluid in blue.  It's like tension in a string, except with the sign  changed.
In a string under tension the string outside the length you are interested in is pulling at both ends; in a rod or fluid  under compression  the outside  is pushing at both ends.

A: @mike stone Does a great job at addressing your first point. To address you second point, it is true that the net work changes the kinetic energy, i.e. $W_{net}=\Delta K$. However, we are interested just in the work done by the external forces acting on the fluid. This means that $W_\text {ext}=\Delta E$. This is the work done by your forces on either end of the fluid segment.
Your third question is somewhat unclear to me, and this question runs dangerously close to being too broad by asking multiple questions, so I'll just leave it at this.


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Understanding how Economic factors affect business is essential to making smart decisions and guiding your company to greater heights. However, this begins with understanding the role of environmental and external factors, and how they come into place in business.
Environmental analysis is the term given to the process of looking at all of the different external factors that affect a business. Like most other parts of business analysis, this is particularly useful for executives in any company who are looking to beat competitors, increase revenue streams, and grow their organization.
One of the most prominent tools in environmental analysis is PEST analysis, or its derivatives (such as PESTLE analysis!). PEST analysis takes into account four separate factors whose initials create the eponymous acronym 'PEST': Political ones, Economic ones, Social ones, and Technological ones. Although plenty of other variations exist (like PESTLE analysis which includes Legal and Environmental variables) this is where economic factors come into play in business.
As previously mentioned, economic factors are included in one of the bread-and-butter techniques of all business analysis — PEST analysis. This is because economic factors play a large part in deciding how a company makes its decisions (especially financial ones).
Economic factors are connected with goods, services, and money. Despite directly affecting businesses, these variables refer to financial state of the economy on a greater level — whether that be local or global. The reason for this is that the state of the economy can decide many of the important details that come up in an operating company, including topics such as consumer demand, taxes and asset value.
Interest rates — Interest rates might appear in a range of different places, imposed by a range of different people. It's obvious that the status quo for interest rates is of great interest to banking institutions, but it might also affect companies whose strategies rely on taking out large loans.
Exchange rates — Exchange rates are a complicated topic, but they clearly have to apply to those who deal with export or import. Changing exchange rates might affect how much a company has to pay to its international supplier to satisfy them, which can affect profit margins, as well as take a lot of resources to stay on top of.
Recession — An economic recession (of whatever scale) has the potential to change the purchasing attitude of customers, which might force companies to drop their prices or clear smaller volumes.
You can find an entire PESTLE analysis of Anthropologie here.
A full PEST analysis of the UK is available here.
In conclusion, economic factors are one of the many environmental, external factors which can affect businesses. Although they relate to the economy on a greater scale, they have a profound effect on the inner-workings of any and every company. Examples include interest rates, exchange rates, and taxes — and can be seen in all organizations, from relatively small fashion chains like Anthropologie to world-leading countries like the UK.
What do you know about how economic factors affect business? Be sure to include it below with any questions or comments you might have.


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text:
Sigle
 Body mass index  – indice di massa corporea
 Broadcast Music Incorporated  – organizzazione per la protezione e l'esercizio dei diritti d'autore nel campo musicale

Aziende
bmi  – British Midland Airways Limited compagnia aerea britannica

Codici
BMI – codice aeroportuale IATA del Central Illinois Regional Airport di Bloomington (Stati Uniti d'America)
bmi – codice ISO 639-3 della lingua bagirmi

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Quandary for a quartet
Which finale for Beethoven's Op 130 should you pick— cheerful sonata-rondo or a fugue like no other?
Jonathan Gaisman
Integrity and intelligence: The Endellion Quartet prefers Beethoven's original ending (©ERIC RICHMOND)
The 2019-2020 concert season is to be the Endellion string quartet's last, after 41 years of music-making. As its cellist David Waterman announced, "We have decided to hang up our collective quartet bows."
There are many reasons to regret the departure from the stage of an ensemble which has always exhibited such integrity and intelligence. Not the least of these is its attitude to one of its "favourite" works, Beethoven's Op 130 quartet in B flat, which it is playing at some of its farewell concerts. This is sometimes said to be the hardest to decipher of any of the five late string quartets. More particularly, and as music-lovers know, it contains a conundrum, because it provides performers with a choice of alternative finales. Beethoven wrote two, and the contrast between them could scarcely be greater. The music world is divided in its preferences as to which should be performed.
The quartet is made up of six movements. It is an extreme example of Beethoven's late style, of which Adorno said that he "no longer draws together the landscape, now deserted and alienated, into an image. He illuminates it with fire ignited by subjectivity", making no attempt to achieve a harmonious synthesis. Even more than the other late quartets, this one is marbled with dissociation and contrast. Part recognisably classical, part wilfully anarchic, it is scored with fissures which break apart the essential connectedness of early 19th-century music. It simultaneously observes and subverts the assumed conventions which are the context of the listener's experience.
Deciding which is the more fitting last movement requires an especial focus on two of the preceding five. It is sometimes said, in relation to the present debate, that the movements of this quartet echo the form of an 18th century divertimento. This is certainly not true of the first: with the exposition repeat (correctly observed in its recording by the Endellion), it lasts for over 13 minutes. Such a substantial opening bookend calls for something of corresponding heft by way of conclusion. It also gives prominence at the outset to a four-note cell played in unison followed by a rising sixth, of which—it is immediately evident—we will be hearing more. In addition, the main business of the movement concerns the conflict (and partial resolution) of two widely dissimilar ideas. All these features are relevant to the choice of finale.
One may for present purposes pass over the ensuing quicksilver scherzo, which has the character of an absurd joke told with almost inaudible rapidity, a genial poco scherzoso andante, and the naïve and palindromic alla danza tedesca. However, we must pause at the fifth movement, the deeply felt, operatic cavatina. A friend of Beethoven said that the mere thought of this movement could bring him to the verge of tears. Most extraordinary here is the short central section, uniquely marked beklemmt, meaning choked or oppressed. Grove points out that the grammatically correct word is beklommen, as in the text of Schubert's charming song Alinde, but that "in words as in music Beethoven is always original and always right".
Here, the first violin, having imitated the voice of a singer for 39 bars, becomes so overcome by an awareness of its own emotion as to be lost for words. Nothing else in the whole of the composer's output is as raw: the listener is grasped by the lapel and forced directly to witness a grief ordinarily kept hidden. The only possible comparison is with the arioso dolente of the Op 110 piano sonata, but the collapse here is even more extreme. The question then is how to follow such a profound, if short-lived confession. In Op 110, as in the case of the tragic adagio of the Hammerklavier sonata, Op 106, the composer purged his deepest despair through the transfiguring effect of a fugal finale.
In the string quartet too, the composer's original finale was a fugue; but it is a fugue like no other composed before or since. Described by Beethoven as "tantôt libre, tantôt recherchée" ["in part free, in part studied"], it does not even obey its own rules; someone has gone to the trouble of estimating that only 45 per cent of its 741 bars are strictly fugal. As the German musicologist Klaus Kropfinger says, it "arches over the entirety of the work, from beginning to end". Like a black hole in its density, it seems to draw the musical material in the remainder of the quartet irresistibly into itself. Extraordinary to listen to even now—Stravinsky described it as "contemporary forever"—this 15-minute piece baffled the original audience in 1826. The Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung condemned it as "incomprehensible, like Chinese".
To hear it for the first time even now is to be overwhelmed by its energy and complexity. Can the composer really have intended such ungracious sounds? Is it not likely that he would have repented of inflicting such an ordeal on listeners? He did not attend the first performance, but one answer to these questions lies in the fact that when he heard of the enthusiastic response to the second and fourth movements, he growled "What, those trifles? Why not the fugue?" This story, told on good authority, suggests that if the audience had been capable of "rising to the heights of" Beethoven's spirit and appreciating the movement's "mysterious beauties" (to quote the French composer Vincent d'Indy) and had not been "cattle and asses" (to quote Beethoven), there would have been no question of an alternative finale ever being written.
What happened after the first performance is controversial. Following the bewildered reception of the fugue in March 1826, Beethoven decided (in September) to write a new finale. His early biographers suggest that this was a case of his friends and publisher prevailing upon him to do so, with the added inducement of an offer to remunerate him for both the quartet and for the discarded fugue, to be printed independently (as the self-standing Grosse Fuge Op 133).
The alternative view is that Beethoven himself had second thoughts, and realised that the original finale was, as Hans Keller believed, a mistake in its original place, and would be better appreciated as a single movement work. Indeed, Beethoven later made a four-handed piano arrangement of the fugue alone. Obviously, the decision to write a new finale was ultimately his; he set to it with enthusiasm (it was the last substantial piece he ever wrote), and produced another masterpiece, albeit in a less ambitious and very different vein. Mark Steinberg of the Brentano quartet calls Beethoven's decision "one of the great mysteries of musical history". The fact that he made it does not prove that he ever changed his original preference.
There were many pressures on the composer at this stage of his life, and it seems less useful to try to discern his true intentions, which may anyway not have been consistent, than to approach on aesthetic principles the choice of which finale to perform. Moreover, even where recorded, Beethoven's opinions on his own late works were pragmatic and occasionally fallible. We should remember that he contemplated in a letter to Ferdinand Ries the unthinkable possibility of performing his Hammerklavier sonata without the closing fugue and, in the more celebrated case of the ninth symphony, he had not only originally envisaged a quite different, purely instrumental finale, but even afterwards (according to his former pupil Carl Czerny) expressed the view that the choral last movement may have been a "blunder".
The view, put forward by musicologists such as Barry Cooper, that the fugue is too massive and unwieldy a movement to sit at the end of the preceding five may be countered on several grounds. First, the opening movement is itself a huge piece, not much less long than the fugue. Secondly, the four-note cell plus the sixth already mentioned are transformed into one of the two main ideas developed in the fugue. This link, together with certain correspondences of tonal architecture between the two movements, and the fact that they share the notion of conflicting ideas opposed and resolved, suggests that Beethoven conceived them as in some strong sense paired. The composer Robert Simpson sees them as "clearly part of a grand design". Thirdly, although the sound-world of the original finale surpasses the first movement in its scale and strangeness, we again need look no further than the ninth symphony for a model of a "disproportionately" huge, formally unprecedented finale, whose novelties, coming at the conclusion of an already lengthy work, strain the endurance and credulity of the unfamiliar listener. Fourthly, the fact that, in each of the works under discussion, Beethoven plumbed new depths to produce such unimagined novelties should in itself make us hesitate before rejecting any of them, in the absence of firm evidence that he had recanted of his creation.
This is all the more so because we are concerned with a finale. The notorious "last movement problem"—how a composer creates a finale that is a true climax, as first realised in Mozart's "Jupiter" symphony—was regularly and definitively solved by Beethoven alone. Works by subsequent 19th-century composers rarely managed a solution that Beethoven pulled off time and again.
The second finale to the Op 130 quartet, composed in November 1826, is by contrast with the first a cheerful and witty sonata-rondo. Edward Dusinberre, first violinist of the Takács quartet, has written candidly that he is more drawn to this finale not least because it is "less taxing to muscles and psyche", but he acknowledges that audiences can feel "cheated of the heightened emotional drama" of the original by an alternative which "brushes off past conflicts and anguish". Simpson says of this movement that "vast issues may be hinted at, or dismissed, by a joke, but they cannot be exhausted." The second finale is an example of the exalted and rough humour which one finds strewn through the last quartets. One could never wish it out of existence. Maybe it is a piece more in proportion to at least some of the preceding movements. But it indeed does not exhaust or satisfyingly resolve the central paradox posed by the quartet: how is the irreconcilable to be reconciled?
Only the Grosse Fuge provides the complete musical answer. As the audience applauds at the end of the complete quartet in disbelief at both the composer's and the players' achievement, it is hard to imagine a listener wishing that the later-composed finale had been played instead. (A solution sometimes adopted in concert performance is for the quartet to be played as initially conceived, followed by the alternative finale as an encore. In this way, Beethoven's last work becomes the concert's last word, while the integrity of his original conception remains undisturbed.)
The Endellion quartet is therefore right to prefer playing Op 130 with the original finale. This is all the more so given that we can nowadays familiarise ourselves through repeated listening with the themes which make up the fugue's initially intractable material, and which are then worked out with the abstract resources of pure genius. The better one knows this music, the more it fits in with all that precedes it, and the shorter the movement seems to become. While its first main section tests the powers of players and the attention of listeners almost to destruction in its depiction of a seemingly imminent chaos, the texture thereafter lightens, and the intellectual rigour, while never relaxed, is gradually tempered with a sense of reconciliation which finally resolves itself into a pure lightness of being. The experience of this resolution after 45 minutes of music-making is a rare thing. Whereas listening to the Grosse Fuge on its own can make the piece seem merely a noble eccentricity, understanding it as responding to and surpassing the challenge laid down in the opening movement, and as exorcising through sheer contrapuntal energy the intimate desolation of the cavatina, unlocks the key to Beethoven's supposedly most enigmatic quartet once and for all.
A glimpse of heaven
Schumann's setting of Faust is an aesthetic and spiritual triumph—and can truly be called heavenly
Contemplating the abyss
Bruckner and Mahler were very different but their epic ninth symphonies have much in common
Enchanted garden of song
A dozen of the best Schubert Lieder to take the listener beyond the three great song cycles


In this work, we focus on the most crucial units in a chemical technology, the chemical reactors. Using a commercially available CFD software package, COMSOL Multiphysics, 3D mathematical models of a batch reactor with different impeller geometries have been investigated. The reasonable agreement between the experimental and simulation results indicates the validity of the developed CFD model. The effect of the impeller design, e. g. number of blades on the mixing efficiency is evaluated based on the simulation studies. The proposed measure to determine the energy efficiency of mixing (i. e. mixing index) is based on the calculated velocity field and energy usage. The information about the homogeneity of the mixed phase in the system can be extracted from the developed velocity field. Hence, we proposed histograms of velocity fluctuations on a logarithmic scale as an efficient tool to measure the achieved homogeneity of the phase in case of different impellers and rotational speeds.
Till, Z., Molnár, B., Egedy, A. and Varga, T. (2019) "CFD Based Qualification of Mixing Efficiency of Stirred Vessels", Periodica Polytechnica Chemical Engineering, 63(1), pp. 226-238. doi: https://doi.org/10.3311/PPch.12245.


BRISTOL, Conn. — Beam them up, Scotti.
Mission accomplished for right-hander Anthony Scotti, whose 4 1/3 innings of shutout relief helped South Shore National of Staten Island inch closer to the Little League World Series, with a 3-2 victory over Somerset Hills (N.J.) last night.
South Shore grabbed the No. 1 seed for the semifinal round of the Eastern Regional and will face No. 4 seed Delaware today. The winner gets a berth in the Mid-Atlantic championship game on Monday. That winner heads to Williamsport, Pa., for the World Series.
Scotti, who had not pitched in this tournament, entered with South Shore trailing 2-0 in the second inning and kept Somerset Hills (18-1) quiet with some help from ace lefty Angelo Navetta, who got the game's final two outs.
Because Navetta threw only six pitches, he'll be available to pitch today. South Shore manager Michael Zaccariello indicated he probably will start Navetta, who struck out 13 batters in his team's 7-4 victory over Delaware earlier in the tourney.
South Shore, which had scored 28 runs in the first three games here, got the jolt it needed in the fourth. Pinch hitter Robert Mastroddi cleared the centerfield fence for a two-run homer, giving South Shore (15-0) its first lead.
Mastroddi said it was just a matter of time before South Shore's offense put something together.
Somerset Hills scored two runs in the first, one of which was unearned, against Nick Pucciarelli. After Somerset Hills got consecutive singles to start the second the game was entrusted to Scotti, who got the first batter he faced to hit into a double play before getting the final out without a run scoring.
South Shore got an unearned run in the third to pull within 2-1 before John Zarella singled leading off the fourth. Mastroddi's blast ensued.
Somerset Hills will be the No. 2 seed in the semifinals and will face Moon Township (Pa.) tomorrow.


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