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In observance of January as National Cervical Health Awareness Month, HHS is encouraging women to get screened for cervical cancer and utilize the Breast and Cervical Cancer Services program.
Texas Launches Opioid Misuse Prevention Website to Fight Addiction, Overdoses
Texas HHS is launching a new website featuring videos, the latest information and helpful resources to promote TTOR, which is a statewide public health effort to fight against opioid addiction and overdose.
State Hospitals Receive First Shipments of COVID-19 Vaccine
HHSC announced it received the first shipments of COVID-19 vaccine for state hospitals in Austin, San Antonio, Terrell and Wichita Falls.
Innovative Job Training Program Puts High School Seniors, Adults on Career Path to Success
The first graduates from HHSC's new partnership pilot program, Texas Works Path to Success, are beginning their careers with HHSC and connecting Texans with services like food benefits and health care.
Demolition Complete, Construction Begins on New, State-of-the-Art Austin State Hospital
Construction crews have completed demolition of vacant buildings on the Austin State Hospital campus to make way for the construction of a 240-bed standalone replacement hospital.
HHSC Showcases Construction Progress at Rusk State Hospital
Construction crews are busy at work on a nearly $200 million project to build a 227,000 square-foot patient complex and replace the administration building at Rusk State Hospital.
Texas HHSC Encourages Breast Cancer Screenings During Awareness Month
In observance of October as Breast Cancer Awareness Month, the Texas Health and Human Services Commission is encouraging women to get screened for breast cancer.
HHSC Continues Efforts to Address the Opioid Crisis
Texas HHSC has secured a two-year, $104 million grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration to help people and families negatively impacted by opioids.
HHSC Awards $125 Million in Substance Use Disorder Treatment Grants
The Texas Health and Human Services Commission is awarding nearly $125 million in Substance Use Disorder treatment grants to 100 awardees to provide prevention, intervention, and treatment services for individuals at-risk for substance use disorders.
Statewide Behavioral Health Coordinating Council Launches Redesigned Mental Health Resources Website
To better serve Texans seeking mental or behavioral health assistance, the Statewide Behavioral Health Coordinating Council is launching its redesigned Mental Health Texas website.


Known for its bright colourways, unique designs and whimsical touches (not least of all a recent collaboration with Barbie), accessories label Charlotte Olympia has once again found fashion inspiration in an unusual place – this time, looking to the contents of our phones.
Specifically, the latest capsule collection of ballet flats uses our beloved emoji as its muse.
Titled #Emoticats, the range is a playful spin on the label's usual Kitty footwear, with three embroidered velvet designs – #lolkitty, #cheekykitty, and #flirtykitty – coming in a range of colours, as well as two clutch bags.
Turns out it's not cheap to let your feet do the talking – available on uk.charlotteolympia.com and harrods.com, prices start from £395 – but my, they are cute.
Click through our gallery below to see the full range.


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Galapagos 2008–Skadoosh!
I left Canton about 6 A.M. on Saturday, December 13. I met my colleague Caroline Collins at the 18 Wheeler Restaurant and we car pooled down to the airport in St. Louis. A few students were already there, and the rest trickled in, except one latecomer. I waited for her while the others went through security. When she arrived, I got her checked in, which had been tricky for the first of us. We went through security to the gate. There was a screaming kid on the plane all the way to Atlanta. After a layover of a couple hours, we took the long flight to Quito, Ecuador. We met our guide, Jorge Pineiros. He has a Portuguese last name, like me. The bus took us to the San Francisco Hotel in downtown, the old part of Quito. I had my first Pilsener in a year. Delicious! We stayed up talking for a bit, and got to bed at about 2 A.M.
Sunday morning we had breakfast at the hotel and took the bus to the Inti-Nan museum, which is on the actual equator. This is distinct from the Mitad del Mundo, the big tourist trap that is about 300 meters off. The Inti-Nan emphasizes native culture. Our guide, Natali, showed us the native huts, monuments, and various "experiments" (mostly pseudoscientific) illustrating the unique properties at the equator. A dude in native costume danced with some of the students. There was a shop of native handicrafts there, very inexpensive.
Nikki walks the equatorial line.
Kevin and Kyle dance with the costumed dude.
On the bus ride we had to stop for a crew that was clearing a landslide that had blocked the road. While we were waiting a guy came around selling ice cream. We must have made his day because we bought him out. Blackberry (mora) ice cream is awesome. I had many milkshakes and juices of mora in the coming days. We bussed up to Mindo and had lunch in a local cafe. A short distance away we went to Sachatamia, land of the hummingbirds. We hiked a trail in the mist and rain through the cloud forest. It was gorgeous and lush. We saw many types of vegetation, flowers, a lizard and a caterpillar. There was a pool formed by dammed creek. Some of the students wanted to swim. The guide said it was OK, and I didn't have a problem with it. The water was cold and they were mostly soaked for the rest of the day. Some had not come prepared for swimming. None had any regrets, however.
A hummingbird at Sachatamia.
Crazy kids splash down.
When we got back to Quito, it was Sunday night and all the shops were closed. For safety, we went as one group to a sort of mall on the Grand Plaza and found a restaurant. I had a fritada, a traditional dish of pork and boiled corn. It was yummy. While we were there, one of the guys practically became engaged to a cute local girl. Some bought stuff at a gift shop. On the way back to the hotel, some of us saw what was apparently a drug deal going down. One thing I learned was that they don't insulate the walls in the tropics. So hotels are noisy. My room was adjacent to the street, and I heard every truck that rumbled down it.
I got up at 5 A.M. Monday, December 15. We were bussed to the airport , where I got a ham sandwich and blackberry juice. We met a couple who worked at the Missouri Botanical Garden, did research in Ecuador, and were vacationing in Galapagos. From Quito we flew to Guayaquil, and on to the Galapagos. For lunch we were served…ham sandwiches. Upon landing in Baltra, we met our guides, Geoconda and Maria Fernanda. We took the short bus ride across Baltra to the Strait of Itabaca, the ferry across that, then the bus ride to Puerto Ayora. Half way there, we stopped at the big pit craters, Los Gemelos. We checked in to the Fernandina Hotel, which was a bit better than our hotel last year, but not as close to the downtown area. We toured the Darwin station and had lunch at La Garrapata. I think I had a burger. We walked to the dive shop and were fitted for wetsuits, except for three of us that had brought our own snorkeling gear. And one student who we lost on the way. We found her later at the hotel. We swam in the pool and some of the students tried snorkeling there. We got in the hot tub, which was barely luke warm to start, but eventually got too hot to stay in (how do you say "thermostat" in Spanish?). Kevin and Kyle were doing crude somersaults off the edge of the pool and repeating "No flippies off the dock!" I don't know what movie that comes from. So I decided to show them how it's done, being a former varsity diver. The edge of the pool had a funny rounded edge to it, but I was not that bothered by it. I got plenty of height and rotation and held a good tuck. I completed the back somersault thinking it was going great, felt my feet and lower body enter the water…then my chin hit the edge of the pool. It was kind of like getting kicked in the head in karate, and I'd had plenty of that in the past (explains a lot, I know). Kyle said I cut my chin, but I didn't think so. Further inspection proved him right. I didn't really want to go to the emergency room that late, so I taped it shut with bandaids. I didn't sleep well, thinking I was not going to be able to snorkel the next day.
Sea lion on a buoy in the Strait of Itabaca.
Female lava lizard.
Galapagos mockingbird–very tame.
Land iguana–sleepy.
Tuesday I woke up with some blood on my pillow and sheets where it had soaked through my bandaids. I had our student nurse, Jennie-Rebecca, bandage it in the morning. Kyle taped it for good measure. We departed via bus at 8 A.M., and returned immediately for Anele, who is normally so quiet we did not even notice she was missing. The bus took us over Santa Cruz Island to the Strait again, where we boarded our boat, the Northstar and headed for Daphne Major. We met our boat guide, David, the captain, Guillermo, and the first mate, Armando. We motored around Daphne Major and saw a lot of birds up close, as well as sea lions and turtles. At one point, a big manta ray jumped right next to the boat. It jumped once more, but I only saw the ripples after it entered. We continued to Daphne minor, and saw some baby sea lions. We stopped off of Mosquera for our first snorkel. The waves were high, and the water was cold and deep–just how I didn't want it to start! We only had one student panic. Kyle, a lifeguard, pulled Anita back to the boat. She did rejoin us for snorkeling later. The incredible density of fish was far above anything we saw last year. I saw a really cool eel with strikingly contrasting lateral stripes. I couldn't stop to photograph it because I was so far behind the rest of the group. This was the maiden voyage of the underwater camera. I was having some trouble seeing anything at all on the LCD display anyway. I thought, "Man, this camera is crap." Then I discovered that it wasn't turned on. Results were decidedly better after t
hat. The bandage was barely hanging off my chin by that point. I pulled it off and stuck it in my wetsuit. Note: next time take waterproof bandages. We saw a stingray, turtles, a shark, and numerous invertebrates. It was a long stretch of good snorkeling. We motored over to the opposite shore, which I think was Baltra, and snorkeled a bit more. Lots of bat stars there, and these little red fish in schools up close to the rocks. There were also schools of tiny fish fry in the water. Reproduction is a good thing! We motored to a calm bay on Baltra. Some snorkeled there, but I was too cold at that point. Next time I bring the full length wet suit. We ate lunch in the bay right on the boat–hot fish and rice. It was damn good. We were motoring around the Northeast side of Santa Cruz when whales were spotted. We followed them around for about an hour, and got some good views of orcas up close. This was a real bonus, as whales are rarely sighted. We motored over to Gordon Rocks, a well known SCUBA spot. We saw a couple of Galapagos fur seals, also uncommon. Almost everyone slept during the remaining hour ride back to Puerto Ayora. When we got off the boat, Geoconda met us and took me straight to the ER. It happened to be a busy night. When I finally saw the physician. He looked at my chin for about 5 seconds and said, "Esta cerrado." It's closed. A nurse cleaned it with alcohol and iodine, then sent me on my way. No charge. After returning to the hotel we went back downtown for shopping and dinner. I had ceviche, a kind of seafood salad, also a very traditional Ecuadoran dish.
Swallowtailed gull.
Baby sea lion–it's pupping season…
…which may be why orcas are on the prowl.
A little gecko on the wall of the hotel.
Wednesday morning we walked down to the docks and got on our boat again. The Northstar took us to Santa Fe in about an hour, but the ride was rough, with the wind-driven swells causing large amplitude rolling of the boat. I stared at the horizon to avoid sea sickness, but it's a good thing the ride wasn't another hour longer. As I was staring into the distance I saw a splash. I looked at the spot for a minute and a manta ray jumped. I'm sure I was the only one to see it. We cruised around the island, seeing many boobies, baby sea lions, and plunge diving birds. Every time a booby would fold its wings and pierce the water, we'd yell, "Skadoosh!" Not sure what it means, but it sounds good. Along the steep-walled cliffs we saw the Galapagos Hawk, another species we had not seen last year. We started snorkeling in a nice, warm bay, but the stinkin' bull sea lions kept patrolling the coast and making me nervous. There were bazillions of fish in this spot. We swam out of the bay into the open ocean to see more and larger fish. So cool. We took the boat to a small island off Santa Cruz where last year one student had been washed up on the rocks and cut up pretty badly. It's about the only place to swim with marine iguanas and the best for snorkel with sea lions, but I was rather wary. I did see an iguana underwater, and even got the shot, but was soon occupied by pulling our girls out of the rocks. The sea lions (usually friendly juveniles and females) didn't show.
Blue-footed booby, with actual blue feet.
Galapagos hawk, a juvenile.
We motored back to Tortuga Bay, a calm, sunny beach that we had had to hike to last year. As we pulled in, I saw the kayak guy go ashore, lock up his kayaks and leave. No kayaking for us! Didn't matter. We saw rays, turtles and many sharks. Just when we arrived, we saw sharks mating. Our guide had only seen it twice in his lifetime. This was one of many lucky events in this trip. We ate lunch on the boat and played soccer on the beach. I didn't make much of a contribution, but we had many able players including the guide, Miki (a former college player), Anele, Nikki, and Collins on our team. We won 3-2. I rested in the shade while some students played a game of chicken. Anele and Anita won. The students made a sandman and took a group photo. We hiked the peninsula, seeing many iguanas, the American oystercatcher and a juvenile yellow-crowned night heron. When we got back to Puerto Ayora I bought a white T shirt with Charles Darwin on the front. I had an idea to have all the students sign it, and I happened to have a permanent marker. I also had them put funny quotes on it, which I will collect here later. We all had dinner at The Rock. It was quite fun, as they played videos from 1970s era musicals (Grease, Saturday Night Fever, Dirty Dancing) and the kids sang along. Anele left early, feeling a bit ill. We all went back to the hotel later. I had one beer in the hotel bar. I met some locals and heard a good Spanish pun. The guy said the girl's eyes were the color of miel-da. This sounds like honey (miel), but also poo (mierda). Ha ha.
Kyle spots a white-tipped shark.
Nikki and Miki show their enthusiasm for the beach.
Thursday we loaded up into 5 pick-up trucks. A white pick-up is the standard cab in Puerto Ayora, double cab, usually a Toyota. The beds were full of mountain bikes and we drove a few miles out of town to begin our mountain bike ride. I helped get people fitted to their bikes and their seats adjusted. I had been led to believe we were going to start at the top of the island and coast downhill to the beach. It didn't work out that way. There were lots of hills, some of them steep. Shifting difficulties took out a few people, and the hills many more. The trucks followed behind and picked up those that dropped out. Good thing I ride a lot of hills around Canton. By the time I caught up to the lead group, Miki had fallen and scratched her knee. We stopped at a little store, where I rinsed off her leg, cleaned it as well as I could, and coated it with neosporin. While we rested, a torrential rain came down for a few minutes, the hardest I've seen in the Galapagos. It was a good example of the rainshadow effect, given our location. From there it was mostly downhill. We passed a donkey, which brayed at Miki, and some chickens that crossed the road. Anele almost ran one over. The leaders stopped at a point with a nice view of the ocean. I watched as, almost in slow motion, Miki rolled up behind them and locked her brakes. The bike skidded and she rolled off of it. I should mention that, while short segments were paved, most of the route was covered in volcanic rock and cinder. It cuts. When she came up, her shoulder was scraped over a large area and her other knee was thoroughly cut up, including a dime-sized hole. I again pulled out the first aid kit (new Spanish word of the day: botiquin). I patched her up as best I could, but had no way to scrub the dirt out of her wounds. She never sh
owed a sign of pain. Tough kid. She rode in the truck after that, and those riding bikes coasted down to the parking area. They were doing road work and I had to wait for a track hoe to get out of the road.
Finches afoot.
Fiddler crab about an inch long.
White-cheeked pintails in a row.
We hiked the short trail down to the beach. It was low tide, and we saw many little fiddler crabs in one area. There were no flamingoes in the lagoon this year, but several white-cheeked pintails. The Darwin's finches were everywhere. It had been a wet year, and lots of vegetation to show for it. Finches reproduce well under those conditions. Many were very tame, landing on our packs, feet, and even heads, especially when we had food. Little beggars. Some students swam, but not much or for very long. We found a dead sea turtle on the beach, reduced to mostly bones. Anele had done the ride, but lay in the shade most of the time. We walked or rode back to the trucks, where all but Kyle got in and were driven to the lunch site. I could have ridden it, but not as fast as Kyle. He's a 6 foot 6 inch superman. Lunch was at a beautiful villa/plantation kind of affair, where the students lounged in hammocks and we enjoyed a huge lunch of chicken. Kyle and Nikki played volleyball with the locals for a bit. Both of them are varsity players. Anele wasn't feeling well, and sat in the truck. The kitchen staff made a bowl of chicken soup just for her. Kari sat with her while she ate it. She felt like she had a fever to me, so she, Miki and I rode in one vehicle to the hospital. Neither wanted to go, but I insisted. I take care of my kids. They cleaned and disinfected Miki's wounds, and gave her a shot in the butt. They gave Anele prescriptions for some pills. She didn't have a fever, apparently. It was a relatively early end to our scheduled activities that day, so we took a cab back to the hotel for naps and showers. Another student had diarrhea pretty badly. I gave her some Imodium, which seemed to get it under control. So if you're keeping track, we totaled three visits to the doctor, just like last year.
Lava heron in the toxic manzanillo tree, I believe.
Friday I knew we had a two-hour boat ride, and I took a Dramamine accordingly. I felt great and fell asleep after one hour. Armando the deckhand was quite a singer, and he serenaded us (well, mostly Laura) much of the time. When we arrived at Floreana, a small panga ferried us to the dock. We took the bus to the highlands and hiked up to the place where they put all the tortoises that are hybrids or of unknown origin. The native subspecies is extinct; that's why I call it the Island of Misfit Tortoises. The students had a great time hand feeding them stalks of corn. We saw the pirate caves, evidence of early settlements, the spring and the look-out. The bus took us back down to the coast, where we had lunch at the Wittmer's, descendents of early German settlers. They had the most awesome soup, followed by fish and more. We poked around on the beach some, then got into the boat. We cruised east on the coast to a little bay, where we saw for the first time the endemic Galapagos Penguin. There were just a pair of them sitting on the rocks, but we were very excited (we didn't see these last year). The guide took the boat really close so that we could get a good view and pictures. We snorkeled around one shore of Floreana, seeing sharks, many fish and sea stars. We moved to the coast of the small island of Champion, where a long snorkel through the shallows provided the best snorkeling of the trip. The colorful fish let us approach closely, and there were many invertebrates. At one point I came up to see red-billed tropicbirds flying overhead. It doesn't get any better. The battery died on my underwater camera just before the end, but that's OK. We got back in the boat and cruised around Enderbee, which provided good views of courtship dances in Nazca boobies and displays of magnificent frigate birds (the ones with the big inflatable red throat pouch). This was a dream come true for me, having seen these behaviours on TV, but never thinking I'd ever see them in person. On the trip back to Santa Cruz, Armando sung us some tunes, mostly gospel and love songs, and all in Spanish. But his efforts were interspersed by those of our own Kari, who it turns out, can sing like a bird. She did some favorites from Disney movies (Little Mermaid, Pocahontas), and when she ran out we made requests. Then we started joining in. Never in my life would I have guessed that we would all sing for two hours all the way back to port. Even I sang, which I normally only do in the car. Alone.
Courting Nazca boobies.
Magnificent frigate bird.
Big, bad marine iguana.
Galapagos penguin.
On our return, we shopped a bit, and some of us ate chicken on a stick for $1.50. We returned to the hotel, showered, and went out walking around. At one point the students all shared in a toast–to me. It was touching. We went to a disco, where everybody danced. Some of the girls danced with the locals, which worked well until their grinding became a little too intimate. I've seen golden retrievers that were more subtle. Outside, we had more chicken on a stick, and walked back to the hotel for cake.
At this point I must back up and describe the purpose of the cake. On the flight down earlier in the week, Anna asked Laura how to say curse words in Spanish. Laura, being very savvy and commonsensical, told her that the Spanish for the F-word was peluche. Peluche is short for osita de peluche, or teddy bear. So Anna goes around all week saying peluche this and peluche that. All the rest of us know what it really means. Even the boat captain and hotel bartender are in on it. It's hilarious. I've never been party to a practical joke of such magnitude that worked so well. So, to the cake. Kyle bought it and had them put "Peluche, G Crew 2008" on it. We presented it to Anna in a ceremony in a hotel room, and Kyle told her what peluche really means. It was said later that we never saw a black person turn red before. She said, "That's not cool." But took it with a smile." If she didn't love teddy bears so much, she might have been mad. In a striking coincidence, she loves teddy bears, has a large collection, and even a tattoo of one on her shoulder. I think Brian got this all on film.
It was with heavy hearts that we got up on Saturday morning and got on the bus. Nobody wanted to leave. it was a sad bus ride across the island. It was then I learned that our guide (spelled Geoconda, not Yocanda) had had a C-section 20 days earlier. She would have done everything with us otherwise. I had wondered why we had her, plus another guide on land (Maria Fernanda) and another on the boat (David). She walked
us all the way through to check-in. Last year's guide had left us to fend for ourselves at the ferry. We got some last minute shopping in at the airport. The flight to Guayaquil and Quito was uneventful. Our Quito Guide, Jorge, was there actually waiting for a different group, as he thought our flight was two hours later. Fortunately, he had a bus waiting, which took us straight to the hotel. Sort of. Everyone was out Christmas shopping and traffic was thick. What a contrast to the previous week, where all was deserted. We walked downtown to the municipal theater square. A live band was playing a benefit for an environmental group trying to stop mining in Ecuador. We sat at an outdoor cafe and had dinner. Well, I had a banana split, as I didn't think my stomach was ready for meat. Some of us bought blank T shirts at a nearby shop and had the environmentalists iron on their propaganda. The percussion band was AWESOME. Too bad they weren't selling a CD. The next band was rock/ska, and they were great too. Meanwhile, jugglers and acrobats were performing. Pretty good deal for free. On the walk back to the hotel we stopped at a couple of soccer shops, where many of us bought $5 soccer jerseys. Let's say they were probably not officially licensed merchandise. I went up on top of the hotel and took photos of various churches and El Panecillo. We hung out in the hotel lounge and watched a video of Indian songs and dances that Laura had bought. We watched a part of Kung Fu Panda in Spanish too. We talked Kari into singing again. She did "Part of Your World" from Little Mermaid. She sounds a lot better without twin 200 hp Yamahas in the background. She has one of those voices that bring a tear to your eye. I had my last Pilsener.
Jugglers and acrobats.
A big church in Quito at night.
The percussion band.
An early wake-up, and we took the bus to the airport. We checked in and paid our $40.80 fee to exit the country. Most people got some food before the final check in and search of our carry-ons. Miki was chosen for the random search of her checked bag. Poor thing; she was a little nervous. I waited while everyone else got on the plane. Finally, Miki came back and we boarded. There was a slight delay, then we flew out of Quito. It was pretty cloudy, and we couldn't see much from the plane. After it cleared, I was able to see the Panama Canal, Cuba and Florida. After landing in Atlanta, we had to go through four steps to our next gate. At the baggage claim, Laura's back pack did not show up. They wouldn't let her file a claim until we got to St. Louis. At security, Brian was flagged for an outstanding warrant and taken aside. I wasn't there to see it. They said he had a DUI in New Mexico. He was nowhere near New Mexico at the time, but someone had stolen his wallet prior to that. They said that "they were coming to take him away" and they wouldn't let him call me. Fortunately, they discovered it was a case of mistaken identity and let him go. Meanwhile, everyone else had made it to the gate. I waited for them to collect there. They guy across from me gave me two meal vouchers. I gave one to Laura and we ate at a hot dog place. Our flight was delayed about an hour. The plane was kind of small; Kyle couldn't stand up all the way and walk down the aisle without bending at the neck. The flight attendant had to shush us almost immediately (she should see this group when they're really wound up!). At the baggage claim, Anna's main bag didn't show up. We said our goodbyes, broke into groups and went our separate ways. Kari, Caroline and I caught a shuttle to the parking lot. I drove and dropped them off at the 18-Wheeler two hours later.
A peninsula off the west coast of the Panama Canal.
A blue lagoon in Cuba.
I have to say this was a truly outstanding trip. We saw an amazing diversity of wildlife, some of which was quite rare. We had excellent snorkeling, and plenty of it. Moreover, our group had a certain chemistry. We went almost everywhere together, not because we had to, but because we wanted to. We all bonded with each other. Everyone was included in the constant festive atmosphere. It was sunny and warm every day. No one was seriously hurt or ill. It could only have been better for me if I had not been slightly sick almost every day and if my family could have been there. Most of the students are trying to figure out how they're going to go back. Some might make it, but it won't be the same. Our MVP was Laura, whose command of Spanish was extremely useful, and whose efforts to take care of everyone were so appreciated. If you want to see more of my photos, get on Facebook and friend me, as I have posted many there. Here are a few more, taken with the underwater camera.
Black triggerfish.
Yellow-bellied trigger and king angel.
Large-banded blenny.
Sea cucumber.
Chocolate chip sea star and pencil urchin.
« December 10 – Finals week
Christmas 2008 »

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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While Apple's iMovie and—to a far greater extent—Final Cut Pro X allow you to edit video in wondrous ways, oftentimes all you really want to do is lop off the beginning and end of a clip, and possibly cut a few seconds from the middle. For such simple operations iMovie and Final Cut are overkill.
One alternative is Apple's $30 QuickTime 7 Pro (which, yes, Apple continues to sell) but it can be a clumsy tool when dealing with multiple splits. Thankfully, there is a utility to make these seemingly simple edits easier: Movavi's $35 Split Movie for Mac.
The app's interface is mostly straightforward. Thumbnails of images within your movie appear at the bottom of the window, with a timeline and large viewer pane above. You can navigate through your movie file by clicking on the timeline or within the thumbnails area. Along the right side you find a clips bin, with Split and Join buttons below.
Split Movie's workflow is pretty simple, as well. Just launch Split Movie and drag a video file into the window. When you do, the video is placed in the bin as a single clip; thumbnails from the movie appear at the bottom of the window. The app's controls—which appear above the thumbnails pane—then become active.
Removing a clip doesn't delete that portion of video from the movie. Rather, it simply removes the split points that defined the clip. Within the bin you can also merge clips by selecting them and choosing Merge Scenes from the Edit menu, or by right-clicking and choosing Merge from the resulting menu.
You can easily delete or merge clips in the bin.
Another way to edit your movie is to use the Select and Deselect buttons. These two buttons give you control over real-time editing. For example, suppose you're playing your video and want to cut out a portion of it. Although you could adjust the timeline and insert splits, you can instead drag the playhead a couple of seconds before the point at which you want to make the edit, start playback, and then click and hold the Deselect button. When you reach the end of the bit you wish to cut, just release Deselect. The resulting section will be colored gray rather than blue, indicating that it's deselected and not part of any clip in the bin.
If you're interested in trimming your movie, place the playhead where you'd like the video to begin or end, and then click the appropriate border control, left (start) or right (end). This deselects the portion of the clip that appears before (in the case of the left border) or after (the right border) the playhead. As with any other selections you make, you can fine-tune where they begin or end by dragging on the left or right edge of a selection above the thumbnails area.
Once you've made all your edits you can export the results. The means for doing so are the Split and Join buttons that appear below the clips bin. Click Split, and any clips in the bin are exported, in their native format, as individual movies. Click Join, the clips are joined (minus the bits you've deselected and trimmed) and exported as a single movie. The app supports AVI, MOV, WMV, MP4, FLV, MKV, MPG, MTS, M2TS, TS, and TOD files—you edit and export files in their native formats, so no format conversion is required. On the other hand, while it's convenient that the app edits videos in their native formats, it would be terrific if you could choose to encode the results of your work in a different format when splitting or joining.
You can select or deselect portions of your movie as it plays.
Split Movie lives up to its name, but its interface needs some work. One control is called Invert Scenes, which might lead you to believe that in addition to its other talents, it inverts the colors in any selected clips. But no, what it does is deselect selected clips and selects those clips that were previously deselected. I'm not entirely sure how that's helpful.
Keyboard shortcuts, such as they are, could also be improved. Assigning Command-S to do anything but save a file (here, to split a clip) is unintuitive. And although you can undo an action by clicking an Undo button, or redo an action using the Redo button, there are no keyboard shortcuts for these actions. I'm accustomed to using standard Mac keyboard shortcuts when editing video, and the lack of them in Split Movie is frustrating.
But the un-Mac-like stuff goes deeper. For example, the Edit menu, which should be found next to File, is instead located to the right of a Playback menu; and the Preferences command is in a separate Settings menu rather than in the application menu. Overall, the app looks like it was ported to the Mac and then not tweaked to better conform to OS X interface standards.
That's not to say that I don't appreciate the capabilities Split Movie has. Once you get the hang of the app, you can cut movies pretty quickly. I just think that those capabilities could be presented in a cleaner and more intuitive, Mac-like way.
Movavi Split Movie is a useful—though not entirely intuitive—tool for splitting a single movie into multiple parts as well as for trimming unwanted parts and then joining together the results.


Our masthead photo for February 2017 (also used in October 2016) features a foggy day in Middlewich captured by Bill Armsden. Bill says that, as far as he remembers, the photo was taken in the winter of 2015.
In fact we're looking at a scene which is very urban indeed. This is King's Lock in Booth Lane. Out of shot to the left is the pub which takes its name from the lock - one clue to its nearby presence is those picnic tables which, during the summer, are thronged with people enjoying a drink in the open air.
Out of shot to the right, on the other side of Booth Lane, is that justly famous Middlewich institution,Etta Mault's chipshop.
And lurking in the mist behind the bush, left of centre, are the utilitarian industrial buildings which were once part of the ERF Service Centre, built on part of the old ICI Alkali Works.
Perhaps the only real clue as to the true location of Bill's photo is the HGV tractor unit on the right trundling through the fog on its way to Sandbach or the M6 motorway.
* This would, of course, be impossible. There are no locks on the Trent & Mersey between Middlewich and Preston Brook.


All my maintenance service has been performed by Greg LeBlanc Toyota Houma dealership and has always been outstandin. Jackie and Stacy has always kept me up to date on service, recalls, and or options and specials. Great working with them, a full 5 star for theses ladies, Joe with a 2.5 cause he said so. All exceptional personnel and should be recognized for treating the customers like they are first. Good job y'all.
Had my Prius service there.


text:
define(function (require, exports) {
    "use strict";

    /**
     * List of Events to be used in the extension.
     * Events should be structured by file who emits them.
     */

    // Brackets events
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    exports.BRACKETS_PROJECT_CHANGE = "brackets.project.change";
    exports.BRACKETS_PROJECT_REFRESH = "brackets.project.refresh";
    exports.BRACKETS_DOCUMENT_SAVED = "brackets.document.saved";
    exports.BRACKETS_FILE_CHANGED = "brackets.file.changed";

    // Git events
    exports.GIT_USERNAME_CHANGED = "git.username.changed";
    exports.GIT_EMAIL_CHANGED = "git.email.changed";
    exports.GIT_COMMITED = "git.commited";
    exports.GIT_NO_BRANCH_EXISTS = "git.no.branch.exists";
    exports.GIT_CHANGE_USERNAME = "git.change.username";
    exports.GIT_CHANGE_EMAIL = "git.change.email";

    // Gerrit events
    exports.GERRIT_TOGGLE_PUSH_REF = "gerrit.toggle.push.ref";
    exports.GERRIT_PUSH_REF_TOGGLED = "gerrit.push.ref.toggled";

    // Startup events
    exports.REFRESH_ALL = "git.refresh.all";
    exports.GIT_ENABLED = "git.enabled";
    exports.GIT_DISABLED = "git.disabled";
    exports.REBASE_MERGE_MODE = "rebase.merge.mode";

    // Panel.js
    exports.HANDLE_GIT_INIT = "handle.git.init";
    exports.HANDLE_GIT_CLONE = "handle.git.clone";
    exports.HANDLE_GIT_COMMIT = "handle.git.commit";
    exports.HANDLE_PUSH = "handle.push";
    exports.HANDLE_PULL = "handle.pull";
    exports.HANDLE_REMOTE_PICK = "handle.remote.pick";
    exports.HANDLE_REMOTE_DELETE = "handle.remote.delete";
    exports.HANDLE_REMOTE_CREATE = "handle.remote.create";
    exports.HANDLE_FTP_PUSH = "handle.ftp.push";
    exports.HISTORY_SHOW = "history.show";

    // Git results
    exports.GIT_STATUS_RESULTS = "git.status.results";

    // Remotes.js
    exports.GIT_REMOTE_AVAILABLE = "git.remote.available";
    exports.GIT_REMOTE_NOT_AVAILABLE = "git.remote.not.available";
    exports.REMOTES_REFRESH_PICKER = "remotes.refresh.picker";

    // utils/Terminal.js
    exports.TERMINAL_OPEN = "terminal.open";
    exports.TERMINAL_DISABLE = "terminal.disable";
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Blueprints for Building Better Girls: Fiction
Firebirds: An Anthology of Original Fantasy and Science Fiction
Firebirds Rising: An Anthology of Original Science Fiction and Fantasy
The Science Fiction Hall of Fame: Volume II A (The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, #2A)
The Mad Scientist's Guide to World Domination: Original Short Fiction for the Modern Evil Genius
Writing Fiction: A Guide to Narrative Craft
The Almost Legendary Morris Sisters: A True Story of Family Fiction
The Complete Harvard Classics - ALL 71 Volumes: The Five Foot Shelf & The Shelf of Fiction: The Famous Anthology of the Greatest Works of World Literature
Selected Non-Fictions
Gold: The Final Science Fiction Collection
Beginnings, Middles & Ends
Where the God of Love Hangs Out: Fiction
Maps in a Mirror: The Short Fiction of Orson Scott Card
The Turn of the Screw and Other Short Fiction
Tomorrowland: Our Staggering Journey from Science Fiction to Science Fact
The Fire in Fiction: Passion, Purpose and Techniques to Make Your Novel Great
The Art of War for Writers: Fiction Writing Strategies, Tactics, and Exercises
Hooked: Write Fiction That Grabs Readers at Page One & Never Lets Them Go
The Emotional Craft of Fiction: How to Write with Emotional Power, Develop Achingly Real Characters, Move Your Readers, and Create Riveting Moral Stakes
36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction


text:
Friends: Rachel Green star slashes odds of show's return after viral post
Friends recently celebrated it's 25th anniversary with fans once again reigniting rumours the show could one day make a comeback. However new odds have revealed this could be the case. The Rachel Green star announced her arrival on Instagram yesterday by posting a picture with all six of her famous co-stars. Jennifer's co-stars Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe Buffay), Courteney Cox (Monica Geller), Matt LeBlanc (Joey Tribbiani), David Schwimmer (Ross Geller) and Matthew Perry (Chandler Bing) joined her in front of the camera to share the snap with fans.
Since the post, the bookies have cut odds from 10/1 to just 5/1 on the gang getting together to film a one-off special or film in the next year.
Alex Apati of Ladbrokes said: "Fans are expecting a Friends special of some sort and we wouldn't be surprised in the slightest to see exactly that in a day, a week, a month, or even a year from now."
The news may come as a surprise after stars have repeatedly shut down any word of the show's return.
The cast and creators have been questioned on it in the past and the responses have always been a mix.
Friends movie: Rachel star Jennifer Aniston gives REUNION update
Rumours the show would return were have repeatedly been squashed by co-creator Marta Kauffman who told recently told fans she "doesn't want to mess up a good thing" by giving the show another run.
Speaking on 'The Lateish show with Mo Gilligan', Ross star David Schwimmer agreed, confirming he is happy with the way the show ended.
David said: "Well, no. I mean…no, I think we all feel it kind of ended in the perfect way."
However, speaking to Variety in a recent interview, the Rachel actress revealed the cast are on board.
She told the publication: "Our producers wouldn't want it, wouldn't let us. Look, it's not been without our desire to, because our fans have wanted it so much.
"It depends. I mean, we haven't all sat in a room, but would we have loved to have done something together?
"Yeah. It would have been fun. We could have redesigned it for a couple episodes. But whatever. Maybe it's better this way, but we'll never know."
Meanwhile, one of the show's many guest stars has spoken out about their time on the show.
Glee: Producer hits back at reboot rumours [INTERVIEW]
The Walking Dead season 10: Beta star was hospitalised during filming [INTERVIEW]
Game of Thrones: Jon Snow star spills all on first scene with Daenerys [INTERVIEW]
Jennifer Coolidge played Amanda Buffamonteezi on the show, who fans will remember as Phoebe's bolshy rather annoying ex-roommate.
Now, speaking to Metro.co.uk, the American Pie star revealed she was intimidated by the cast when she first arrived despite knowing one of the stars before appearing on the show.
The actress revealed: "I have to say, I was kind of intimidated, even though I knew Lisa because she was in a comedy group.
"But I didn't know the rest of them and I was very intimidated because they were all so attractive and had it going on."
Friends: Guest star spills all on 'intimidating' experience on set
The star went on to reveal things weren't quite as light-hearted backstage as it came across on TV.
Jennifer added: "Sometimes I think people want to hear my ad libs when I get on a show and they really don't.
"Sometimes I come in and throw some lines and they come up and say, 'You know Jennifer, we're just going to stick to the script'.
"…That was a serious show. The vibe was pretty serious; I don't think they wanted my input and I could really feel that…sticking to their own stuff. So I didn't have the guts to push."
Watch Friends daily on Comedy Central – The Complete Series 1-10 is available now on Blu-ray, DVD and Netflix.
Tickets for FriendsFestive can be purchased at www.FriendsFestive.co.uk. Tickets cost £34.50 including booking fee and a festive drink.
Tags Aut ctp_video entertainment TV
Athletics: Olympic marathon set for Sapporo to beat heat
Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively Take Newborn Baby to Nature in First Pic of Third Child
Holly Willoughby details agony watching Denise van Outen after injury on DOI 'Was tough'
Dancing on Ice: Holly says it was 'tough to watch' Denise Holly Willoughby, 39, and Phillip Schofield, 58, were on...


text:
Q: Why does "Hoeffding's bound greatly overestimates the probability of large deviations for distributions of small variance"? I've read in a paper using Hoeffding's inequality to derive a bound on the probability of the difference of means of two samples being larger than a threshold that "Hoeffding's bound greatly overestimates the probability of large deviations for distributions of small variance; in fact, it is equivalent to assuming always the worst-case variance $\sigma ^{2}=\frac{1}{4}$" but I'm having a tough time figuring out why it is the case.
Thank you in advance for any help.

A: I would have said that was true for moderate deviations rather than large deviations. One way to look at it is to compare Hoeffding's inequality, which only uses the upper and lower bounds, with Bernstein's inequality, which uses explicit variances.
Hoeffding's inequality says
$$P( |\bar X_n-\mu_n|>t)\leq 2\exp\left(-\frac{2nt^2}{(b-a)^2}\right)$$
Bernstein's inequality says
$$P(|\bar X_n-\mu_n|>t)\leq 2\exp\left(-\frac{nt^2}{2\sigma^2+2ct/3}  \right)$$
where $\sigma^2=\frac{1}{n}\sum_{i=1}^n\mathrm{var}[X_i]$ and $c$ is a bound on $|X|$.  We can reasonably compare these by taking $2c=(b-a)$
When $t$ is small (so $\bar X_n$ is o(\sqrt{n}) standard errors away from its expectation), the second term in the denominator of Bernstein's inequality is small. Bernstein's inequality then has $nt^2$ scaled by $1/(2\sigma^2)$ and Hoeffding's has it scaled by $2/(b-a)^2$. These are the same if $\sigma^2=(b-a)^2/4$, which is the largest value it can possibly have for a variable restricted to $[a,b]$ -- the value it would have for a binary variable that's equal to each endpoint 50% of the time.
For any other bounded variable (and small $t$), you gain by using the actual variance $\sigma^2$ rather than the upper bound.  For large $t$ it's not so simple: the second term in the denominator of Bernstein's inequality dominates, and the bound is much weaker than the Hoeffding one.
You can also see that as $n\to\infty$, the Bernstein bound gets relatively close to the Normal tail probability from the Central Limit Theorem.  It doesn't reach the Normal tail probability -- it shouldn't, it's an upper bound -- but the normal density $\phi(t)$ is larger than the tail probability $\Phi(t)$, only by a factor of about $1/t$, not an exponential.
(note: there are lots of ways to write these two inequalities, I used the forms from here)

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Fugitive doctor found in tented Alpine hideout
Tony Allen-Mills, John Follain
He wanted to be the invisible man. Yet the tracks that Mark Weinberger left in the snows of the Italian Alps last week ended a five-year European odyssey that won him the improbable title of America's most notorious fugitive nose doctor.
Yesterday, US authorities were preparing an extradition application for Weinberger, a wealthy Indiana sinus specialist who abandoned his wife during a Greek holiday in 2004 and went into hiding as hundreds of former patients sued him for alleged malpractice.
Weinberger's arrest at a tent he had pitched 6,000ft up a snow-clad mountain near Mont Blanc was greeted with grim satisfaction this weekend by his former wife, Michelle Kramer, who divorced him in absentia in 2006. He had lured her to Mykonos with the promise


text:
Biography of August Bondi
August Bondi was a splendid figure in the annals of Kansas for fully half a century, and had been fitly described as soldier and patriot and one of the immortal followers of John Brown.
From the city of culture and of old world civilization, Vienna, Austria, it is a far cry to the plains of Kansas where were performed those deeds which will ring down through history. August Bondi was born at Vienna July 21, 1833, a son of Hart Emanuel and Martha (Frankl) Bondi, who were also natives of Vienna. His father was a Jewish manufacturer of cotton goods. August Bondi was educated at the Catholic College of the Order of Piarists. He also had a private tutor. At the age of ten he was admitted to an institution of normal grade, and in 1847 began the study of the English language. When fourteen he became a member of the Academic League and fought under Kossuth during the Hungarian war for liberty. He had just been admitted to the University of Vienna, but his participation in the war caused him to be exiled.
On September 6, 1848, he started for the United States with his parents, and they landed at New Orleans on the 10th of November. From there a boat brought them up the Mississippi to St. Louis, where he landed November 23. After a few months of employment as a typo in St. Louis, he taught school a year in that city, and another year was employed as a tencher in Texas. He became a naturalized american citizen on July 21, 1854. For one year he was in the clothing business at St. Louis.
A practice which August Bondi began early and hept up to the end of his days was the writing of a diary. From this record it is possible to trace with absolute accuracy his varied relationship with many important affairs and events. From this diary it is learned that he arrived in Kansas May 26, 1855. He was from the first an intense anti-slavery partisan. From St. Louis he had gone up the river on the steamer Polar Star to Kansas City, which point he reached April 2, and on April 4 he arrived at Lawrence. After two weeks at Lawrence he made a trip through the eastern section to acquaint himself with affairs on the border. With a partner he squatted on a claim on the Mosquito branch of the Pottawatomie in Franklin County. There in the fall of 1855 be became acquainted with John Brown. He opened a general store at Lawrence, and that was one of the first places of business there. He kept it until 1856.
After the buruing of Lawrence he joined the company of John Brown, Jr. When this force disbanded he joined John Brown. Sr., and took part in the engagement at Black Jack, and was with Brown in his different raids along the border until the final fight at Ossawatomie in September, 1856. During the border warfare his own property was destroyed by Quantrell's men, and some years later the Federal Government allowed him $1,000 in damages.
In February, 1857, he laid out the Town of Greeley in Anderson County and was appointed postmaster in the same year, holding the office just a year. From that time to the outbreak of the Civil war he kept the underground railway station at Greeley. In 1858 he was appointed enrolling officer for Kansas Territory for the Eighth Brigade in Anderson County.
On April 29, 1861, he took the oath of allegiance and on December 23, 1861, enlisted in Company K of the Fifth Kansas Cavalry, and during his service of three years was present in nearly all the engagements in which the regiment took part. In 1862 he became commissary sergeant and later first sergeant. Several times he was wounded, and on September 14, 1864, sustained a grave injury and was made prisoner by the Confederates near Pine Bluff, Arkansas, and was left for dead on the battlefield. On November 10, 1864, he was discharged at Leavenworth.
For a short time Mr. Bondi conducted a grocery store at Leavenworth, but in 1866 located at Salina, where he also opened a store. From the first he was closely indentified with the public life of the town and county. He served as probate judge of Saline County from 1876 to 1878 was register clerk in the United States Land Office in 1879, was also police judge and in 1880 was member of the commission to appraise the old Fort Harker Military Reservation. In 1884 he was appointed a member of the State Board of Trustees of Charitable Institutions. He held many other offices. For three years during President Cleveland's last term he was postmaster of Salina. In 1896 he was admitted to the practice of law. He was an active member and contributor to the Kansas State Historical Society, and his thorough scholarship made his recollections especially available for historical material. He was a thirty-second degree Mason, belonged to the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
In 1898 Mr. Bondi went back to revisit his old birthplace in Vienna. While visiting the German consult in the city of St. Louis he fell dead on the street September 30, 1907.
On June 28, 1860, at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, August Bondi married Miss Henrietta Einstein. She was born in Germany October 15, 1833, a daughter of Iarsel and Sophia (Kettner) Einstein. Mrs. Bondi died at salina August 24, 1900. The fruit of their union were ten children, eight daughters and two sons. Rosa R., born April 28, 1861, married Jacob Bower on June 28, 1884, and they now live at Mattoon, Illinois, their four children being Sarah, Ethel, Albert and Jules. Helene, the second child, was born November 27, 1865, and died August 27, 1866. Ella, born December 14, 1868, was married January 15, 1893, to Frank Schuloff, and they reside at Mattoon, Illinois, and have a child Florence. Isidore Israel, born April 29, 1868, was married July 26, 1911, to Tennie Suzak, and he had had three children, Helen, August Mendle, and Caroline Martha, the last being deceased. Emma, born December 17, 1869, married January 5, 1898, Leo Sinn, and they reside at Kewance, Illinois. Minnie Esther, born February 22, 1871, was married January 22, 1896, to Sigmond Stiefel, Mr. Stiefel was born January 17, 1871, in Germany, and for many years was the leading dry goods merchant at Salins, where he died January 19, 1911. He was an active member of Salina Lodge No. 718, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. Mrs. Stiefel whose home is at 441 South Santa Fe Avenue in Salina, had two children, Henrietta Bondi, born October 27, 1900, and Benedict Frankl, born August 15, 1903. Hart Emanuel, the next child younger than Mrs. Stiefel, was born March 5, 1878, was married July 21, 1905, to Miss Cora Strouse, and their two children are Henrietta Carrol and Leon August. Lillian, born October 8, 1874, married January 24, 1904, Adolph Hess. Lydia, born July 16, 1876, was married August 22, 1905, to Julius Cohn, and they have one child, Joseph Bondi. Josephine Sophia, born February 23, 1879, married June 1, 1912, Isidore Vehon, and they live at Salina.
Bondi,
Anderson County, Clay County MO, Greeley Kansas, Jackson County MO, Leavenworth County KS, Leavenworth Kansas, Platte County MO, Salina Kansas, Saline County KS, St. Louis Missouri,
Connelley, William E. A Standard History of Kansas and Kansans . Chicago : Lewis, 1918. 5v. Biographies can be accessed from this page: Kansas and Kansans Biographies.


text:
C. alba  may refer to:
 Calidris alba, syn. Crocethia alba, the sanderling, a small wader species and a circumpolar Arctic breeder
 Carex alba, white sedge
 Chiococca alba, a flowering plant species native to Florida and the Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas in the United States, Mexico, Central America, Caribbean and tropical South America
 Copernicia alba, a palm tree species found in Bolivia, Paraguay, Colombia, Brazil and Argentina
 Cornus alba, the Siberian, white or red-barked dogwood, a large shrub or small tree species
 Correa alba, the white correa, a shrub species endemic to Australia
 Cryptocarya alba, the peumo, an evergreen tree species found in Chile
 Cyclaspis alba, a crustacean species in the genus Cyclaspis

See also
 Alba (disambiguation)

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


The LSSU (Large Scale Storage Unit) offers large scale temperature controlled storage capabilities specific to biotech, biorepository and pharmaceutical customers.
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text:
You are here: Home / Questions of Women & Men / Everybody's Big, Dramatic Question: How Much Should People Mean to Us?
Artist and Aesthetic Realism consultant Marcia Rackow tells about how this question affected the life of 19th century journalist Nellie Bly
I learned from Aesthetic Realism—and my life changed because of it—that there is no limit to the feeling we should have about people, because they represent the world we were born to know and like. Aesthetic Realism shows this great fact: the more we want to know and value other people and things, the more honest feeling we will have—and the more we will like ourselves. Eli Siegel explained too that there is also a fierce opposition in us to caring much for anything besides ourselves. This is contempt, the "feeling that if we couldn't make things less, despise them, we should be nobody in a large, intricate, and dark world" (TRO 162).
I was in a big fight all my life between wanting to care for people and having contempt. In college I thought seriously of becoming a social worker, but my secret scorn made me incapable of having the feeling I hoped for. I wrote in my diary:
Who are we kidding—immorality, suffering, cruelty will always be. The world will not change. People haven't and people won't.
I had a cynical, inaccurate, and mean way of seeing people. This, I learned, was the very thing that made me feel lonely and empty, and was the cause of my nervousness around people. It was criticized and changed when I began to study Aesthetic Realism, and I'm unboundedly grateful for the life I have now—so large and rich in feeling I once thought I would never have.
A way of seeing people which held up my life was in motion as I grew up in my grandparents' house in Queens, with my parents, my older brother, and my uncles Louie and Mac Rumanoff. I was Louie's "favorite niece" (in fact, he had no other nieces) and he was my "favorite uncle." I enjoyed complaining to him in my girlish way about everything—how my friend Leslie's house was nicer than ours; that she had a dog and I only had turtles, and how my brother could go places without me, and it went on and on. I remember secretly being glad Louie didn't marry because I liked the importance he gave me. When my grandmother thought he should do something, like take an umbrella, she would say, "You tell him. He'll listen to you."
I thought that Louis Rumanoff couldn't live without me: that without me he couldn't select the right tie and shirt when he was going somewhere special. But I didn't respect him for making so much of me: I thought he was stupid to let me have such power. Mr. Siegel said critically to me in an Aesthetic Realism class: "By the time you were three, you felt you were smarter than every man you knew."
In 1973, when my uncle was ill, I felt very bad and I wrote to Mr. Siegel, asking how I could be most useful to him. And in a class Mr. Siegel said to me with such good will: "I would like Louie Rumanoff to feel Marcia Rackow is kind. Did you tease him—did you present yourself with some generosity and coyness? Has this been a tendency on your part in general?" "Yes," I answered. "Is that kind?" he asked. "No," I said.
Mr. Siegel explained: "Love has been seen as permission for unkindness. If you have motives without feelings, you are on the high road to villainy. Ambition, making one's way, getting importance for oneself is never extinguished…Every person has motives, but they are not accompanied enough with magnanimous feelings. Could that make you feel bad?" "Yes, it has," I answered. He continued: "So, would you like to have greater feelings?" "Yes, I would."
Mr. Siegel asked: "What is the problem every person has? The problem of selfishness and unselfishness. …Selfishness is a disproportionate desire to please ourselves and forget what other things deserve. If you have good will, you should give the greatest thought and not be coy a bit in thinking about the family."
I am infinitely grateful to Mr. Siegel for encouraging me to think honestly about Louis Rumanoff, a person I had felt I owned and contemptuously summed up. When I visited Louie during his recovery, we spoke about his life in a way we never had before. I learned about the building business his father started when he came to this country from Vilna, Russia, and the house they built in Jamaica in the early 1920's when it was still farmland, and then the devastating effects of the Depression. As I learned about his life, I had more feeling for him and for what other people endured.
Changing how I saw him enabled me to be a critic of my purposes with other men: I began to see a man not as a possible conquest, someone who should praise and adore me, but as standing for the world. Real love for a man would have been impossible in my life—and Aesthetic Realism has made it a happy, proud reality in my marriage to Ken Kimmelman, whom I love and respect for his work as a filmmaker, for his deep, sweet, critical humor, and for his passionate desire to have Aesthetic Realism known so that people get justice—economically, socially, and as individual selves.
I. The Fight in a Woman of the 19th Century
A woman who had a large debate between caring for people, and wanting not to care for them, is Elizabeth Cochrane Seaman, the 19th century journalist, known as Nellie Bly—named after the Stephen Foster song. She was noted all over America as an "audacious investigator of abuses," admired for "her compassion and social conscience" and for trying to better the lives of people through her work. She had a true anger at the poverty and injustice she saw around her, writing, for example, about the inhuman conditions in the Blackwell's Island insane asylum and the Cook County prison. She exposed fraudulent employment agencies as well as the illegal sale of infants. When other journalists disparaged unions, she wrote important interviews with Emma Goldman and Eugene V. Debs. "She targeted specific situations or individuals," writes her biographer Brooke Kroeger, "in an effort to right wrongs."
Yet, even as she tried to oppose injustices to people—she had another desire—to be superior and aloof. Born in 1864, in Pennsylvania, to Michael Cochran, a judge and mill owner, and Mary Jane Kennedy, Elizabeth was one of their 15 children. As a child she liked reading books from her father's library, and also writing "love and fairy stories by the score…for her own delight or the gratification of the young companions to whom she would relate them."
She was still very young when her father died, leaving no provision for the family. Their home was sold and her mother was given a widow's dower and meager support. She remarried, but left her second husband because of his drinking, when Elizabeth was 14.
"It would not be long," writes Brooke Kroeger,
before [Elizabeth] would begin to see herself as the one responsible for everyone else's well-being, the one who could right this seeming injustice and every other one she ever encountered. Despite having two active and devoted older brothers, [she] took upon herself the role of [her mother's] champion and protector.
II. A Beautiful Responsibility
"A responsibility for other people is in every person," Eli Siegel writes.
No matter how cynical someone may be, if he hears a person groaning a few feet away, he becomes part of the groan. The tendency to become of other things is in the full meaning of the word responsibility. Responsibility is the power of responding to what is not ourselves. This responsibility has no limits. We can cry at any moment over an accident in Malaysia.
In 1884, at the age of 20, Elizabeth got her first job on the Pittsburgh Dispatch as a result of a letter she wrote, vehemently objecting to their article against the right of women to work. In her first articles, writes Kroeger, she boldly criticizes the rich,
for their lack of concern for the female poor, hard at work in low-paying or health-imperiling jobs: "They read of what your last pug dog cost and think of what that vast sum would have done for them—paid father's doctor bill, bought shoes for the little ones.
Her series on the plight of the "factory girls of Pittsburgh" made people aware of these girls' feelings, by telling not just of "the drudgery of the workday" but of "these women's lives after work."
In 1887, she got a job on the New York World. The editor challenged her to expose the inhumane conditions in the Women's Lunatic Asylum by feigning insanity and getting herself admitted. She was there for ten days, and what she revealed shocked people throughout the country. Her articles, titled "Behind Asylum Bars" told of the brutality of the attendants, the lack of warm clothing, the wretched food, the lack of salt, the freezing cold baths. And she told of how foreign women were committed just because they couldn't make themselves understood. She wrote these courageous, deeply felt sentences:
What, excepting torture, would produce insanity quicker than this treatment?…I would like the expert physicians who are condemning me for my action, which has proven their ability to take a perfectly sane and healthy woman, shut her up and make her sit from 6 AM to 8 PM on straight-back benches, do not allow her to talk or move during those hours, give her no reading and let her know nothing of the world or its doings, give her bad food and harsh treatment, and see how long it will take to make her insane.
Shortly afterwards her book, Ten Days in a Mad-House came out. "I have one consolation for my work," she wrote, "on the strength of my story the committee of appropriations provided $1 million dollars more than was ever before given, for the benefit of the insane."
In 1894, in the midst of the Pullman railroad strike in Chicago, Nellie Bly went there to interview the workers, wrongly assuming they were at fault, without knowing the facts. George Pullman had fired half his work-force and cut the wages of the remaining workers without lowering their rents in his "so-called model" company town. The union went on strike and he closed the plant, refusing to negotiate. President Cleveland sent in federal troops against the strikers, overriding the protests of Governor Altgeld who was on their side, and they open-fired on the workers, killing 30 men. Nellie Bly was enraged, and said in a speech at the American Railway Union after the strike:
I visited the town, intending in my articles to denounce the rioters and bloodthirsty strikers….Before I had been half a day at Pullman, I was the most bitter striker in town.
And she wrote about George Pullman and what she saw:
When I walked to the rear of the town and saw the miserable…tenements, I felt like tearing down the sham front and showing the filth and poverty behind it….[The strikers] are not firebrands; they are not murderers and rioters….They are quiet, peaceful men who have suffered beneath the heel of the most heartless coward it has ever been my misfortune to hear of.
This is beautiful. But as much as she was against the terrible conditions she reported on, she never questioned the economic system that was the cause of these injustices. That cause, Aesthetic Realism shows, is contempt, and contempt is at the very basis of a cruel and unjust economy that allows one person to use the lives of other people for profit. And this way of seeing people begins in the self of every one of us.
As her life went on, a sense of her own importance and superiority fought with her desire to have feeling for people, and made her colder. The beautiful fury she had had about injustice to other human beings diminished. Surprisingly, she became president of the Ironclad Manufacturing Co. during her marriage to the industrialist Robert Seaman, a marriage that was quite painful from the beginning. While she established better working conditions and wages, and also provided a library, recreational facilities, and a small hospital, it was she who had the power and made the profits. This description by her General Manager shows her contemptuous, patronizing attitude to people: "She maintains that it is the duty of every employer of labor to take care of his own, who have produced his wealth."
That her own importance became a compelling motive is in her writing what she would do if she had a million dollars:
I would become the greatest benefactor in the world. I would become to suffering humanity what no human creature has ever been. I would immortalize my name with undying fame.
This use of the misfortunes of others as a means of one's own glory hurt Nellie Bly very much; it made for a deep emptiness in her, and for the depressions she complained of. She later wrote in one of her columns:
[Do] not let the world know you…If the world knows you, you are prey. Your heart and soul are exposed and un-protected. If you are an open book to the world, you are doomed.
Mr. Siegel said to me in an Aesthetic Realism class: "You get a value out of thinking you are secret and immune." And he asked me a question I value tremendously and which Nellie Bly needed to hear: "How much do you want to be in relation to things and the world?" Before her death in 1922 she wrote self-critically:
You may evade and fool an acquaintance or even those near and dear, but you cannot fool your own soul. It is your master and you cannot still its voice so long as you live. And the older you get, the louder gets that voice of your soul. You cannot evade, you cannot shake it off, you cannot kill that voice which will make you say in deepest misery: "If I only had—"
I believe the voice of Nellie Bly would say now—"If I only had had more feeling for people, been kinder. This is the deep desire in every person, including the woman I tell of now:
III. This Is What She Learned
Abbey Gray, a young woman from Dover, NJ, studying Aesthetic Realism in consultations teaches reading in an after-school program and has a part-time secretarial job. She told us that because her parents had divorced when she was three, she'd come to feel she couldn't trust anyone and should keep her distance from people. She definitely had the big, dramatic question we're speaking about tonight: how much should other people mean to us? One person crucial in this question was her mother, Estelle Gray, with whom she was very angry.
In a consultation we asked her if she would like to write about opposites she saw in her mother. She was hesitant, but in the next week, she did the assignment, and was surprised to see that the woman she thought was only against her, had many thoughts and feelings about things she hadn't known before: that her mother was both sure and unsure, could be gentle and also severe; and that she was herself in a fight between wanting to care for things and people and wanting to care less for them. She wrote:
My mother is watching my cats [while I'm moving] and says she can't wait to get rid of them. Meanwhile she buys them treats and toys and a special bowl and tells everyone what funny things they do. It seems she loves having them around even though she tells me she can't wait until I take them.
We asked Ms. Gray did she think that her mother has an attitude to the whole world from which she could learn? "Do you think she has a hard time saying she likes something without getting embarrassed?"
AG: I never thought about it. But yes.
C: Have you?
AG: Yes, I do.
C: So are both you and your mother trying to make sense of being for the world and against it, caring more for people and caring less?
AG: Yes, we are.
C: Do you think seeing this has you less angry with her?
AG: I think so!
C: Do you think you can get excited by knowing people as such? Can your mother be a beginning point for this?
AG: Yes, she can!
Abby Gray is learning what Eli Siegel described in his lecture Aesthetic Realism and People:
There is not a person who has ever lived who can't tell us something about ourselves….The importance of people is that they are reality in the richest form.
The study of Aesthetic Realism shows that in knowing people, in finding meaning in them, a woman can be honestly proud. This is the glorious education everyone in the world deserves!


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I'll be taking you to one of the most memorable days of my life: my sister's wedding, where I held my first public speech, my niece stole the show and I caught the bouquet (YES BIH). Mind you, today it's the two-month anniversary of her wedding! Also we're going sailing with my best friend, going BTS of my beloved partner in crime's photoshoot and you're gonna meet some of my family members.


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Q: Why I cannot define an column named "index" in jpa? I use jpa to persist an object to mysql databse.
When I define a column named "index" like below, the table will not be generated in database.
When I delete it or rename it, the jpa works fine.
import java.util.Date;
import javax.persistence.Column;
import javax.persistence.Entity;
import javax.persistence.Id;
import javax.persistence.Table;
import play.db.jpa.GenericModel;

@Entity
@Table(name="QA_ASSETVM")
public class QAAssetVM extends GenericModel{

     private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;

     @Id
     @Column(name="vmassetname")
     public String vmassetname;

     @Column(name="assetvm_index")  //this works fine!
     public int index;
     /*
     @Column(name="index")  //When I add this, the table "QA_ASSETVM" will not be generated by jpa in database.
     public int index;
     */
}

A: As Hannibal pointed out, index is a reserved keyword in MySQL therefore you cannot use it directly as a column name, but you have to escape it.

*

*If you are using Hibernate 3.5+, try with hibernate.globally_quoted_identifiers=true, which will quote all database indentifiers (source: Automatic reserved word escaping for Hibernate tables and columns)

*In JPA 2.0, you can use the annotation: @Column(name="\"index\""), which is the new standardize way to escape a single column

A: I haven't tried using mysql, but 'index' seems to be a reserved word.
check this out.

A: Because index is the reserved word. In order to use index as a column name you have to use write it within []. like this :
@Column(name="[index]")


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