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At the top of the news this week is the VW diesel emissions scandal, which among other things draws attention to the failure of attempts to cut carbon emissions via mass conversion of vehicles to “clean diesel”.
Bloomberg: Climate Politics and the Volkswagen Scandal
A third scandal, even more costly than the first two, also needs to be noticed and examined. It concerns the economic and environmental policies that first set European car manufacturers and consumers on course to this pile-up. Remember that “clean diesel” was a government-led initiative, brought to you courtesy of Europe’s taxpayers. Beginning in the mid-1990s, mindful of their commitments to cut carbon emissions, Europe’s governments embarked on a prolonged drive to convert their car fleets from gasoline to diesel. With generous use of tax preferences, they succeeded. In the European Union as a whole, diesel vehicles now account for more than half of the market. In France, the first country to cross that threshold, diesel now accounts for roughly 80 percent of motor-fuel consumption. What was the reasoning? Diesel contains more carbon than gasoline, but diesel engines burn less fuel: Net, switching to diesel ought to give you lower emissions of greenhouse gases. However, there’s a penalty in higher emissions of other pollutants, including particulates and nitrogen oxides, or NOx. Curbing those emissions requires expensive modifications to cars’ exhaust systems. To facilitate the switch, Europe made its emission standards for these other pollutants less stringent for diesel engines than for gasoline engines. The priority, after all, was to cut greenhouse gases. Except that the switch to diesel probably didn’t cut greenhouse gases.
The usual mix of stories below the fold – conventional O&G projects under threat, Russia considers breaking Gazprom’s export monopoly, a court orders Pakistan to take measures against climate change, Norway to cut gas pipeline tariffs, how international trade agreements could derail the Paris Climate Conference, renewables outstrip coal in UK, Drax to abandon CCS, investors shun Hinkley, a mobile renewable energy generating plant (with diesel backup), the Trinity portable wind turbine, a grim picture in the North Sea, the record hurricane drought in US continues, how the sun controls Antarctic climate and how global warming is shortening the tongues of bumble bees.
Despite efforts to cut costs, the petroleum industry can’t make money on $1.5 trillion in pending investments on conventional and North American shale drilling projects with $50 oil, Wood Mackenzie estimates. The estimated $1.5 trillion in oil projects represent prospects that drillers haven’t yet sanctioned for investments. With oil at $50 a barrel, “this spend is very much at risk,” said James Webb, Wood Mackenzie upstream research manager, in a written statement. “A prolonged period of low oil prices over a number of years is likely needed to bring about profound, structural changes to industry costs,” Webb said. But Wood Mackenzie believes prices will start a recovery in 2017, likely pushing costs toward levels before the oil price slump. The oil industry has cut an estimated 196,000 jobs worldwide since the oil bust began, with nearly half of that figure squeezed out of the oil field service sector, according to energy consultant Graves & Co.
Oil prices are back on the rise after more evidence emerged that Opec’s war on its supply rivals is taking affect. Brent crude for October delivery surged 2.5pc in London after the latest report on the number of drilling rigs in the US showed another sharp decline. Only 644 oil rigs are actively operating onshore in the US, down 57pc from the end of December as drillers cut back in response to oil prices sinking below $50 per barrel. Analysts are now concerned that the pace of rig shutdowns in the US could accelerate after operators resisted the need to cut back in the hope that prices would return to higher levels. Commerzbank said: “We actually believe that the decrease in US oil production will pick up pace in the near future: for one thing, hedging deals agreed at higher oil prices are expiring, while for another the low chances of the environment improving in anything like the near future are likely to prompt creditors to pull the ripcord.”
Financial Times: North Sea oil report paints grim picture
North Sea oil explorers will find it almost impossible to make any money without further severe cost cuts, according to one of the Scottish National party’s favourite oil economists. Alex Kemp, professor of petroleum economics at Aberdeen university, issues his warning in a paper published on Wednesday that will make grim reading for oil companies, the Treasury and supporters of Scottish independence. Mr Kemp and his colleague, Linda Stephen, say that only by implementing cuts of between 20 and 30 per cent can explorers begin to make money out of the oil they are hoping to find. The report is another illustration of how difficult it is to do business in the North Sea since the oil price slumped from $115 a barrel last June to approximately $50 a barrel now. Exploration has been one of the principal casualties in the North Sea oil sector from the falling price of crude. New sources of oil have become increasingly hard to find after 50 years of drilling: from 2012 to 2014, only 10 per cent of the oil that was running out was being replaced by new finds.
Wall Street Journal: Investors Lose Gas Pipeline Fight With Norway
An Oslo court ruled on Friday the Norwegian government can cut tariffs on a gas pipeline network owned by some of the world’s largest investors, in a judgment that could cost these funds almost $2 billion in lost revenue. The case has been described by some investors as a landmark decision that could add uncertainty to infrastructure investments in countries long deemed as being investor friendly. The court upheld the Norwegian government’s 2013 decision to slash tariffs by as much as 90% for transporting natural gas on the Gassled network that hooks up North Sea oil-and-gas fields to terminals around Europe. The government had argued that cutting the tariffs would boost exploration and development for the local oil-and-gas industry, currently under pressure from low commodity prices. A group of Gassled investors, including Germany’s Allianz Capital Partners GmbH, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board—Canada’s largest pension fund—and Abu Dhabi’s sovereign-wealth fund, had sued, arguing in court papers the tariffs were set under “agreed and crucial assumptions” during negotiations and should have been fixed until at least 2028. “Of course this verdict will have negative consequences for the investment climate in Norway,” said Kurt Georgsen, chief executive of Silex Gas Norway, one of the investors in the suit, which is fully owned by Allianz.
Stratfor: Gazprom Promotes Nord Stream II
Gazprom’s proposed Nord Stream II pipeline is part of the Russian natural gas firm’s new European strategy. Previously, Gazprom pursued a divide-and-conquer strategy that involved reaching bilateral agreements with individual countries. Gazprom’s new strategy appears to focus on flexibility in supply routes, markets and possibly even pricing; on dealing with the European energy market as a whole instead of piecemeal; and on leaving natural gas on Europe’s doorstep to be transported to market through internal European pipelines. Western Europe’s natural gas supplies from the North Sea, particularly from the United Kingdom, are in decline and could fall by at least 50 bcm over the next 20 years. By building an export pipeline to Western Europe, Gazprom can send more natural gas directly, avoiding the hefty transit fees that come with sending natural gas through multiple countries. Considering the decline in North Sea production, Gazprom has even considered building a pipeline spur to the United Kingdom. The lack of transit fees and the shorter route from Russia’s natural gas fields to Gazprom’s customers would put the company in a position to undercut more expensive remote offshore fields in the Norwegian and Barents seas, unconventional natural gas development in the United Kingdom and emerging liquefied natural gas exporters such as the United States. Even if Russian natural gas were uncompetitive, the state-owned Gazprom could still flood the market for political reasons as a way to discourage Western companies’ investment in other energy projects in and around Europe.
Russia is looking at allowing companies other than Gazprom to export natural gas, Energy Minister Alexander Novak said on Thursday. Russian energy giants, including the world’s top listed oil producer Rosneft and gas producer Novatek, have long been vying for lucrative exporting rights. Gazprom, Russia’s top gas producer, has had the pipeline gas exporting monopoly since 2006, generating more than half of its revenues from selling gas to Europe. Rosneft and Novatek have already successfully challenged Gazprom’s monopoly to export seaborne liquefied natural gas. Rosneft has claimed that in order to make its far-flung gas projects in East Siberia viable, it should be allowed to export gas.
China is expected to be allowed to build a nuclear power station in Essex as George Osborne embraced the world’s most populous country as an ideal partner for British business. The chancellor, on a trade mission to the country, argued that Britain should “run towards China” to help boost the UK economy and signalled that China could build a nuclear site in Bradwell, Essex, as part of a wider nuclear co-operation worth tens of billions of pounds. Speaking at a press conference, Osborne sidestepped concerns over Downing Street’s growing proximity to Beijing. When asked about what US officials have called Britain’s “constant accommodation” of Beijing, Osborne added: “I think it is important that, as China grows, it rightly takes its place at the top table.” The Bradwell site is owned by EDF, the French energy company. EDF is also the lead partner with two Chinese companies in the building of Hinkley Point C in Somerset, the first nuclear power station to be built in Britain for a generation – and on Monday Osborne unveiled a £2bn loan guarantee for the plant.
Investors don’t want to put their money into the proposed £24.5bn Hinkley Point nuclear plant because they fear it will suffer cost overruns and delays, the boss of EDF has admitted. The troubled European Pressurised Reactor (EPR) technology that is due to be used at Hinkley is to be ditched by EDF for future projects in France in favour of a cheaper and better model the company is now developing, Jean-Bernard Levy, the French energy giant’s chief executive disclosed. Major problems in the construction of the EPR at sites in France and Finland – which have seen costs spiral and timescales slip – have made would-be investors wary of backing Hinkley, Mr Levy said. EDF has repeatedly insisted it has learnt the lessons of the problems elsewhere but in a frank interview Mr Levy acknowledged investors were not convinced. “For third parties observing the announcements of delays and cost overruns for the EPRs under construction, it is difficult to commit,” he told French financial daily Les Echos.
Vincent de Rivaz, chief executive of France’s EDF Energy, told the BBC the project was not too expensive. He said power from nuclear plants would cut bills compared with low carbon without nuclear power. The project has come under fire for both its £24.5bn cost and delays to investment decisions and the timetable for building. Another controversial issue is a government guarantee that EDF will receive £92 per megawatt hour, twice the current wholesale price for power. EDF said it needed that because the price of energy would be much higher in the future: “You cannot compare the price in the next decade with the price of today, which is being depressed by the current low price of gas. We have to protect ourself against volatility.” Mr de Rivaz said it was a similar situation to a consumer replacing their car with a new one, “more expensive but you will get a much better car”. He rebuffed suggestions that building gas power plants would be more cost effective, saying that would mean the UK importing billions of dollars of gas from elsewhere, putting the country at the mercy of geopolitics.
Renewable energy has for the first time surpassed coal in supplying the UK’s electricity for a whole quarter, according to government statistics released on Thursday. The revelation of the surge in wind, solar and bioenergy to a record 25% comes in a week when the government has been heavily criticised by business leaders and Al Gore for cutting support for clean energy. The high performance of renewable electricity between April and June, the latest period data is available for, was due to both more wind and sun and more turbines and solar panels having been installed, compared to the same period the year before, when renewables contributed 16.4% of electricity. Gas-fired power stations provided the most electricity – 30% – with renewables second. Nuclear power was third with 21.5% and coal – the most polluting fuel – fell back to fourth, with 20.5%. Ageing coal and nuclear plants have been closing in recent years, while renewable energy has been rapidly rolling out.
Ian Marchant hit out at the new Conservative government saying it is “institutionally incapable” of delivering policy which can support the UK’s security of energy supply. “The question is: do we have an energy policy? And the answer is no,” he told delegates of a British Institute of Energy Economics event. Marchant’s criticism follows months of government intervention in renewable energy support through cuts planned for both large and small scale renewables projects. He also slammed the government for failing to provide an impact assessment for its planned cuts to the Renewables Obligation (RO) until two months after its announcement, in what he called a “ready, fire, aim” approach. The need for effective policy to bring forward investment is key, he added. Marchant said the three major coal plant closures which have taken place in recent months contributed 6 per cent to the UK’s generation mix last winter, asking: “Where will that come from now? Since 2010 we have started construction on one CCGT in this country.” Marchant also took aim at the government’s drive to secure investment for the Hinkley Point C new nuclear project, saying its reactor design is too expensive and a “proven failure” in other countries. “It’s an interesting situation for a country to find itself in, saying ‘the first two [reactors] are so over budget and over schedule that we’d like the third, please’.”
Yorkshire Post: Drax pulls out of £1bn carbon capture project
DRAX power station in North Yorkshire has withdrawn from a £1bn plan to build a carbon capture project at its site, amid concerns over Government green policy changes. The “White Rose” plan has been to deliver the world’s first commercial scale, carbon capture and storage coal-fired power plant in Yorkshire on the Drax site. The region is thought to ideally placed to develop this technology capturing millions of tonnes of CO2 each year from large industrial sites and power stations and pipe it out to a facility beneath the North Sea. Drax said it would stil complete the feasibility study on a carbon capture and storage (CCS) project to catch up to 90 per cent of emissions from a power station and store them permanently under the North Sea, but would not invest any further in the “White Rose” scheme. Drax was given European funding for the project, called White Rose, last July. It would have seen a new plant built new to Drax’s existing power station and would create enough energy to power 630,000 homes, with the majority of CO2 transported by pipelines for storage under the North Sea. However the firm has blamed the “drastically different financial and regulatory environment” which has seen the wholesale price of electricity drop and moves by the Government to rein back support for low carbon technology.
The worst nuclear disaster since the 1986 Chernobyl meltdown never should have happened, according to a new study. In the peer-reviewed Philosophical Transactions A of the Royal Society, researchers Costas Synolakis of the USC Viterbi School of Engineering and Utku Kânoğlu of the Middle East Technical University in Turkey distilled thousands of pages of government and industry reports and hundreds of news stories, focusing on the run-up to the Fukushima Daiichi disaster in 2011. They found that “arrogance and ignorance,” design flaws, regulatory failures and improper hazard analyses doomed the coastal nuclear power plant even before the tsunami hit. The authors describe the disaster as a “cascade of industrial, regulatory and engineering failures” leading to a situation where critical infrastructure — in this case, backup generators to keep cooling the plant in the event of main power loss — was built in harm’s way. At the four damaged nuclear power plants (Onagawa, Fukushima Daiichi, Fukushimi Daini and Toka Daini), 22 of the 33 total backup diesel generators were washed away, including 12 of 13 at Fukushima Daiichi. Of the 33 total backup power lines to off-site generators, all but two were obliterated by the tsunami. Unable to cool itself, Fukushima Daiichi’s reactors melted down one by one. “What doomed Fukushima Daiichi was the elevation of the EDGs (emergency diesel generators),” the authors wrote. One set was located in a basement, and the others at 10 and 13 meters above sea level — inexplicably and fatally low, Synolakis said.
For a few hours on Sunday, Paris will grow unusually quiet when it hosts its first car-free day, silencing the usual din of humming engines and honking horns. Between 11 am to 6 pm, designated zones across the city including parts of the iconic Champs-Elysees, the Montmartre area and the trendy Canal Saint-Martin will be closed to traffic with the ex-ception of taxis, buses, emergency vehicles and bikes. Certain roads, including parts of the Champs-Elysees and the Voie Georges Pompidou, which stretches along the Seine on the Right Bank, will also be reserved exclusively to pedestrians. In other parts of the city, traffic movement will be restricted to 20km/hr. The initiative takes place five days after World Car Free Day, which was observed September 22. But unlike many cities where the initiative is voluntary and appeals to drivers’ good will, the project in Paris has the backing of the mayor, who will mobilize city workers to block off the streets and enforce the temporary traffic rules. The move is also part of a major public relations campaign in advance of COP21, as Paris has been spending the past year grooming itself to host the UN climate conference in November and December.
Ahead of the Paris climate change talks, a new report argues that international trade deal contracts must be amended to ward off lawsuits that could potentially scuttle any agreements reached on climate change. Gus Van Harten, an associate professor at Toronto’s Osgoode Hall Law School, calls for a trade deal exemption clause in his new report, An ISDS Carve-out to Support Action on Climate Change. Any number of trade deals contain a mechanism known as an investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS). ISDSs allow foreign corporations to directly sue governments for financial compensation if new laws or practices are introduced that negatively impact corporations’ bottom lines. The Council of Canadians is championing Van Harten’s report, saying that if any climate deal reached at Paris is going to stick without vexing multi-million-dollar lawsuits, then trade agreements require the amendment. Many people aren’t looking at the background economic policies that might prevent a real agreement from ever coming to fruition, Maude Barlow, the national chairperson of the Council of Canadians, told National Observer. Barlow said if any climate change agreement reached in Paris isn’t fool-proof, it may not last once countries try to put it into practice. “If you don’t trade-proof it, you’re going to find when you get back home in your capitals, it’s going to take an awful lot of political will to stand up to the corporate anger you’re going to face and the corporate challenges.”
Huffington Post: Elon Musk Says Climate Change Refugees Will Dwarf Current Crisis
Elon Musk, co-founder of electric carmaker Tesla Motors, warned on Thursday that climate change will spark a refugee crisis of catastrophic proportions if no action is taken. In a speech in Berlin, the Tesla chief executive said Europe’s current wave of people seeking asylum, prompted mostly by political violence, will be dwarfed as fresh water becomes scarce, food supplies become insecure and weather changes in the coming decades. “Today’s refugee problem is perhaps a small indication of what the future will be like if we do not take action with respect to climate change,” Musk told an audience at Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy. “Today, the challenge is in terms of millions of people, but in the future, based on what the scientific consensus is, the problem will be in the hundreds of millions and much more severe.” Volkswagen’s ongoing scandal over cheating on nitrogen oxide emissions tests on its diesel vehicles is troubling, Musk said, but it’s a small issue compared with the problem of overall carbon dioxide emissions.
Christian Science Monitor: Climate action comes thirteenth on the UN’s seventeen global goals list
At the United Nations General Assembly this week, leaders from around the world will meet to agree on a new list of goals that will combat hunger, eradicate poverty, and improve the quality of life for people around the globe. The list, called the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, expands upon the list of 8 Millennial Development Goals (MDG) that were put in place in 2000 and are set to expire this year. Here’s the list ….
Climate Change News: Court orders Pakistan to enforce climate law
Pakistan’s federal government must start implementing its climate change plans a judge at Lahore High Court said last week, ruling on a legal challenge brought by a farmer. Lambasting the inaction of national and provincial authorities, Judge Syed Mansoor Ali Shah said there had been “no progress on the ground” despite a National Climate Change Policy since 2012 and an implementation framework on the books. In his September 14 judgement Shah ordered the establishment of a national Climate Change Commission (with named members) with a clear remit to ensure effective implementation, along with a number of other practical institutional measures. The case against the Pakistani government had been brought to Lahore High Court’s Green Bench by an individual petitioner, Asghar Leghari. Using public interest litigation (PIL), Leghari who relies on agriculture for a living, charged the government and relevant authorities with failing him as a citizen. He accused them of failing to develop the required resilience to climate change as required under the government’s own framework for implementation of National Climate Change Policy 2013.
Prague Post: A mobile solar and wind power station
An alternative energy generating container developed by Czech companies makes its domestic debut at NATO Days and Czech Air Force Days in Ostrava, North Moravia. Three Alfons Mobile Energy Containers, equipped with collapsible solar panels, collapsible wind turbines, batteries and back-up diesel generators produce electricity for potential applications such as powering a field hospital. The container not only reduces reliance on fossil fuels, which have been blamed for climate change, but reduces the need to create a supply line to ship fuels long distances. Getting sufficient fuel to disaster areas or other remote sites has often been a stumbling block in starting emergency operations. The basic model has collapsible 5.2 kW or 9.2 kW solar energy system comprised of highly efficient PV modules, a 5 kW collapsible wind turbine, a battery with a maximum output of 80 kWh and a backup 11.2 kW diesel generator.
Gear Junkie: The Trinity portable power station
We covered Minnesota-based Skajaquoda a year ago when it launched a portable wind generator product that weighed 4 pounds and packed up small enough to take on a wilderness trip. The company is back with an improved unit, the Trinity Portable Wind Turbine Power Station. It looks like a mini windmill but folds up to pack small like the original design. Like a portable solar panel, the Trinity units harness the elements to create electricity anywhere. You plug in a device to recharge from the unit’s internal li-ion battery pack. Unlike solar, a turbine can be used at night or in low light. A USB port on one end gives compatibility to recharge phones, cameras, GPS units, and other products. The company notes the turbine is capable of generating up to 2.5 watts in as low as 4mph wind. The smallest unit weighs 1.4 lbs and starts at $369.
As of today, no major hurricanes, defined as Category 3 or above, have struck the continental U.S. in a record-breaking 119 months, according to hurricane data kept by the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Hurricane Research Division (HRC) dating back to 1851. Last year, President Obama warned that hurricanes will become “more common and more devastating” because of climate change. But Obama is now the longest serving president (since the 1851 start of NOAA’s data) not to see a major hurricane strike the U.S. during his time in office. The last major hurricane to make landfall on the U.S. mainland was Hurricane Wilma, which came ashore on October 24, 2005. That year was one of the most active hurricane seasons in recorded history, according to NOAA. Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma all wreaked havoc on the U.S. during an intense two-month period between August 29 and October 24 of 2005. However, during the nearly 10 years since Wilma struck the U.S., no major hurricanes have made landfall and none are expected by the end of the current hurricane season.
A paper published today in Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics finds a “strong and stable correlation” between the millennial variations in sunspots and the temperature in Antarctica over the past 11,000 years. In stark contrast, the authors find no strong or stable correlation between temperature and CO2 over that same period. The authors correlated reconstructed CO2 levels, sunspots, and temperatures from ice-core data from Vostok Antarctica and find “that the variations of SSN [sunspot number] and T [temperature] have some common periodicities, such as the 208 year (yr), 521 yr, and ~1000 yr cycles. The correlations between SSN and T are strong for some intermittent periodicities. However, the wavelet analysis demonstrates that the relative phase relations between them usually do not hold stable except for the millennium-cycle component. The millennial variation of SSN leads that of T by 30–40 years, and the anti-phase relation between them keeps stable nearly over the whole 11,000 years of the past. As a contrast, the correlations between CO2 and T are neither strong nor stable.” Thus, the well known ~1000 year climate cycle responsible for the Holocene Climate Optimum 6000 to 4000 years ago, the Egyptian warm period ~4000 years ago, the Minoan warm period ~3000 years ago, the Roman warm period ~2000 years ago, the Medieval warm period ~1000 years ago, and the current warm period at present all roughly fall in this same 1000 year sequence of increased solar activity associated with warm periods.
The tongues of two Rocky Mountains species of bumblebees are about one-quarter shorter than they were 40 years ago, evolving that way because climate change altered the buffet of wildflowers they normally feed from, according to a study published Thursday in the journal Science. In one of these species, the tongue had been half the size of the bee’s body — the equivalent of a human tongue going down to the waist. But because the flowers where the long tongue is required have dwindled, the bees didn’t need that much tongue. Keeping long tongues requires bees use more energy, so the bees evolved a shorter tongue that allows them to sample a wider variety of flowers, said study lead author Nicole Miller-Struttmann at the State University of New York, Old Westbury. While biologists have tracked how global warming has altered the developmental, migration, timing and other behavior in plants and animals, what makes this study unusual is the physical changes in the bees, said study co-author Candace Galen at the University of Missouri. “It speaks to the magnitude of the change of the climate that it’s affecting the evolution of the organisms,” Galen said. “It’s a beautiful demonstration of adaptive evolution.”


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Do you want to read a compellingly beautiful story of love and healing? This is definitely a lovely, 5 stars read!
Synopsis: Marie Durant Chagall, the well-educated daughter of a wealthy shipping merchant, is living a privileged childhood with her half-sister, Solange, in Marseille when their cultured world is shocked into change with the chaos of World War I. Feeling restless and a desire to contribute, Marie volunteers as a nurse with the French Red Cross and quickly finds herself embroiled in the brutal, bloody battlefield of Verdun. Injured both mentally and physically and suffering a severe crise de tristesse sombre, a crisis of black melancholy, Marie eventually returns to life through the unexpected gift from her mother, who had died a few weeks after giving birth to Marie: a house among the lavender fields on the Meuse River, which Marie reluctantly opens up to care for fellow wounded souls. The Lavender House in Meuse presents an emotional, intriguing, and sensitive account of the crises of World War I and one woman's journey towards recovery and growth.
What an impressive story. Told through lovely lyrical prose, it is a story of a young woman of Jewish heritage who leaves her home to become a nurse on the war front during World War I. It is very much a tale of trauma and injury and healing.
When Marie leaves her sister and father in their Marseille home for the front, she returns injured and emotionally harmed. The world has changed and her father and sister prepare to leave France for America. As she heals, she learns she has inherited her late mother's home in Meuse surrounded by fields of lavender, and decides to forego joining her father and sister to make a new life for herself.
Alone for the first time in her life, she finds tranquility and healing there, despite accepting desperately wounded soldiers for nursing. Through Marie's point of view, the reader experiences her emotions and journey of healing. Wonderful descriptions of people and places really bring to life rural France. This book is definitely worth reading - poignant, real, and historically fascinating!
Thank you to the author and publisher. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

domain: library


1,809 Iraqi civilians, 79 U.S. troops killed in August
Above: Two funerals this week, taking place two days and half a world apart. The AP count of Iraqi dead is at best an estimatge, as the Iraqi government has stopped releasing figures.
Civilian deaths rose slightly in August as a huge suicide attack in the north two weeks ago offset security gains elsewhere, making it the second deadliest month for Iraqis since the U.S. troop buildup began, according to figures compiled Saturday by The Associated Press.
U.S. deaths remained well below figures from last winter when the U.S began dispatching 30,000 additional troops to Iraq.
At least 1,809 civilians were killed in the month, compared to 1,760 in July, based on figures compiled by the AP from official Iraqi reports. That brings to 27,564 the number of Iraqi civilians killed since AP began collecting data on April 28, 2005.
The August total included 520 people killed in quadruple suicide bombings on Yazidi communities near the Syrian border. The horrific attacks made Aug. 14 the single deadliest day since the war began in March 2003.
Eighty-five coalition troops - 81 American and four British - died in August, down from 88 the month before, including 79 Americans.
Read the rest at the Guardian
Report: Civilian deaths in July exceed pre-surge levels
Report: Daily attacks in Iraq hit new high in June
Report: Civilian death toll in Iraq rises to nearly 2,000 in May
Report: 726 bodies found in Baghdad in May, 70% rise over April
UN Report: Iraq hiding civilian death toll data


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New & Forthcoming
Directions & Parking
Shipping & Returns
Inside Solar Lodge, Behind the Veil. Foreword by Martin Starr (New)
by Shiva, Frater
Book ID: DST12BTV, DST12BTV
Please inquire for availability
Los Lunas, NM: Desert Star Temple, 2012. First Edition - Limited Softcover. 8vo. xl + 314pp. glossy illustrated wrappers, b&w illustrations, appendices, endnotes. Foreword by Martin P. Starr, scholar of Aleister Crowley and New Religious Movements. Solar Lodge was arguably one of the most controversial of the many occult groups that sprung up in 1960s America. It was founded by a student of one of the original initiates of Agape Lodge of the O.T.O. and taught a system of magick closely based on that of Aleister Crowley. The author, Frater Shiva, joined Solar Lodge at its inception and rose through its ranks before leaving at the time of its implosion in 1972. In 2007 Frater Shiva released "Inside Solar Lodge - Outside the Law," a book which is part reminiscence, part "insider history" of the group. At the time of publication Frater Shiva was reticent about chronicling all aspects of the group's activities, in particular their use of the "silver talisman," "Ceremonial Magick," and "Legal LSD." Now, in 2012, Frater Shiva feels that the time is right to "disclose everything in great detail." The result is this book, "Inside Solar Lodge - Behind the Veil," a work which lays bare the history of "Solar Lodge" and for the first time "chronicles the historical, legal use of LSD in mid-1960's America by a magickal group who took the A.'. A.'. 'Tasks of the Grades' as the measuring-stick of their common, everyday reality." This new publication contains the complete core text of "Inside Solar Lodge - Outside the Law," largely expanded (to nearly double the size) by Shiva, and adds new insights by former Solar Lodge members Frater Taurus, Frater Jon, and Frater Anubis and well-known Thelemic commentator Jerry Cornelius. It also includes (mostly) different illustrations to those published in "Inside Solar Lodge - Outside the Law." New book. Print-on-demand type production values.
The Complete Mystical Records of Dr. John Dee: Transcribed from the 16th-Century Manuscripts Documen
Llewellyn Worldwide, Ltd.
A lavishly packaged, two-volume box set containing the most faithful and accurate versions of John Dee's journals ever published. This is a must-have treasure for Dee aficionados and esoteric scholars who absolutely need the most meticulously detailed version of these highly influential works. A labor of love twenty years in the making, these volumes include transcripts of four manuscripts from the British Library and one from the Bodleian Library in Oxford. Two of these manuscripts have never b...More
Deconstructing Gurdjieff: Biography of a Spiritual Magician
Inner Traditions / Bear & Company
In November 1949, architect Frank Lloyd Wright announced the death of "the greatest man in the world," yet few knew who he was talking about. Enigmatic, misunderstood, declared a charlatan, and recently dubbed "the Rasputin who inspired Mary Poppins," Gurdjieff's life has become a legend. But who really was George Ivanovich Gurdjieff?
Employing the latest research and discoveries, including previously unpublished reminiscences of the real man, Tobias Churton investigates the truth beneath th...
Treading the Mill: Workings in Traditional Witchcraft (Revised and expanded)
Pearson, Nigel G
In Treading the Mill
, Suffolk witch Nigel Pearson presents an extensive and thorough exploration of the working ways of the modern traditional witch, including Compass rites, directional virtues, tools & their hallowing, spellcrafting, wortcunning, transvection, spirit familiars, faerie lore, the old gods, self-dedication and much more.More
Tarot Sola Busca: Ferrara XV Century
One of the oldest tarot decks ever created, the Tarot Sola Busca
is known for its alchemical symbolism and for having inspired many of the minor arcana of the Rider Waite Smith deck. The first entry in Lo Scarabeo's new Anima Antiqua
series (Ancient Soul), this deck has been lovingly printed with great care from originals found in the greatest collections of rare tarot decks. This is a limited-edition, numbered deck printed on the highest quality stock.
The companion booklets f...
Jim Maynard's Celestial Influences 2018: Pacific Time (9" x 12")
is an essential astrological reference. It is the best astrological calendar available. It opens to 12 x 18 inches. The zodiac months are highlighted with a colored tint and the zodiac illustrations are in full color.
12 x 9 inches, 48 pages, full-color cover, full-color illustrations.


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- Inflatable Dock Shelter


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Taste of Home Christmas: 465 Recipes For a Merry Holiday! by Taste of HomeTaste of Home Christmas is a holiday cookbook filled with appetizers and beverages, breads, sides, sweets—cookies, candies, cakes, pies and more. Included is classic fare, as well as updated twists on old-time favorites.
Let Taste of Home help you plan your holiday parties and menus with this idea-packed cookbook. There are wonderful appetizers and beverages, company-worthy entrees, delectable breads, an array of sides and best of all dazzling, divine sweets—cookies, candies, cakes, pies and more. Included is classic fare, as well as updated twists on old-time favorites.
Festive Appetizers & Beverages
Christmas Dinner Menus
Special Gifts of Food
Caramel Cashew Clusters
Chocolate Hazelnut Truffles
Apple Cider-Glazed Ham
Cheese-Topped Roasted Vegetables
Colorful Gazpacho Salad
Herb-Crusted Prime Rib
Old English Trifle
Raspberry Lemon Cake
Yorkshire Pudding with Bacon and Sage
Asiago Chicken Spread
Cherry-Brandy Baked Brie
Hot Spiced Wine
Shrimp Wrapped in Bacon
Warm Pomegranate Punch
Cranberry-Chocolate Chip Cookie Mix
Orange Pear Jam
Cracked Pepper Cheddar Muffins
Rustic Pumpkin Bread
Almond Pistachio Baklava
Caramel Apple Cheesecake
Frozen Peppermint Delight
Holiday Walnut Torte
Au Gratin Potatoes ’n’ Leeks
Carrot Cake Doughnuts
Overnight Raisin French Toast
Golden Roasted Turkey
Maple-Oat Dinner Rolls
Sausage Raisin Dressing
Brown Sugar Cutouts
Cranberry Shortbread Bars
Dark Chocolate Butterscotch Brownies
Raspberry Sandwich Spritz
7 WINTER PARTIES
The seven winter parties will be organized into 7 themes, with menus and holiday entertaining ideas (e.g. A snowflake invitation) for each.
Festive Open House
During the busy holiday season, it can be challenging to pick a time and date to get-together with all you friends. An open house allows people to stop by during the day when it’s convenient for them. Let your open house go for 4 to 6 hours and youre sure to enjoy a casual time.
Recipes include Roast Beef and Pear Crostini, Apricot Chicken Wings, Grape Juice Sparkler, and Warm Spiced Nuts.
Bring on the bubbly! A spirited evening of festive cocktails and bite-size appetizers awaits. Set up the bar with cranberry mixers and deck the buffet with shrimp and crostini, it’s time to mingle and be jolly with old friends and new.
Recipes include Fast Coconut Shrimp, Goat Cheese-Pesto Crostini, Bubbly Cranberry Mixer, and Orange Razzletini.
Welcome friends and family inside for a post-caroling meal. This make-ahead feast will be ready to greet you from the cold.
Recipes include slow-cooked Round-Up Chili, slow-cooked Tuscan Pork Stew, Rosemary Garlic Focaccia, and Truffle Hot Chocolate
Holiday Movie Night
Coming to a living room near you, Miracle on 34th Street, A Christmas Story, and more. Gather the gang, pass the pizza and cuddle up with a batch of chocolaty fudge cups for screenings of your favorite holiday classics.
Recipes include: Pizza Rusticana, Tijuana Tidbits, and Coconut-Almond Fudge Cups.
No matter how cold it is outside, a hot cup of Chai or a tangy cranberry tea makes it easy to enjoy the warmth of the season. Guests will be served platters of tea sandwiches and petite pastries, as well as poppy seed scones and Vienna Triangles to add a traditional touch to a memorable and merry tea party.
Recipes include Vanilla Chai Tea, Petite Apricot Pastries, and Turkey, Gouda & Apple Tea Sandwiches.
Let It Snow Celebration
If the flurry of holiday duties has you flustered, and the snow’s a fallin’, call up some friends for an afternoon of skiing, sledding, snowshoeing and ice skating. Let It Snow Celebration If the flurry of holiday duties has you flustered, and the snow’s a fallin’, call up some friends for an afternoon of skiing, sledding, snowshoeing and ice skating. Afterwards, warm your bellies with some hearty fare. Recipes include Shredded Pork Sandwiches and Snowmen Cookies.
Lunch with Friends: Let’s do lunch! Because theres no better time to show your appreciation for your closet chums than during the holiday season. You can offer a delicious soup, salad and sandwich with a sophisticated holiday twist.
Recipes include: Roasted Red Pepper Bisque, Spinach Festival Salad, and Grilled Cheese Supreme.
Christmas Dessert Recipes Taste of Home's Treasury of Christmas Recipes
Cristina Cooks: "Taste of Home Recipes Across America"
For 25 days, we are featuring cookie recipes that are perfect for your holiday party, cookie swap or next family gathering. Head to our full guide here all month long for the most beautiful, fun, seasonal, delicious holiday cookies worthy of your new Christmas traditions. These festive holiday cookies are loaded with eggnog, making them the ideal way to treat yourself this holiday season. You can also customize them into any shape using your favorite cookie cutters! Cream butter and sugar. Beat in eggnog, baking soda and nutmeg. Gradually add flour and mix well.
This fast, delicious dessert always makes an appearance during our Christmas celebrations.—Cheryl Newendorp, Pella, Iowa. In a large bowl, cream the butter, almond paste and 2 cups sugar until light and fluffy. 1 bar: calories, 5g fat (2g saturated fat), 17mg cholesterol, 27mg.
you had me at meow book
Taste of Home Best Loved Cookies and Bars
Each year, "Taste of Home" receives more than 11, ideas and recipe submissions from real home cooks across the country. Just under 2, recipes are tested and then featured in "Taste of Home" magazines, cookbooks, and on tasteofhome. Click here to get your copy of Cristina's cookbook, " Big Bowl of Love ". Fold in crab. Transfer to a greased 9-in.
It's almost that time of year again — baking all sorts of sweet treats, filling your home with the smell of buttery goodness. From chewy gingerbread to classic Canadian Nanaimo bars, create a dazzling selection of sweets to eat, exchange and give this holiday season with our festive cookie and square recipes. Holiday Guide. A drop of peppermint extract ups the cool, minty flavour. To achieve the decorative stripe pattern, roll the batter into balls, then flatten them with tines of a fork that have been dusted with flour. Get ready for recipe requests for these ravishing squares!

domain: food


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Please Become a Friend of Brighton, Hove and District Samaritans
The continuing pandemic has made life difficult for all of us but especially for those facing financial hardship, loneliness, bereavement, or struggles with mental health. The past year of illness and hardship as seen added pressures on the most vulnerable in our community as well as those in all walks of life.
You can help us face the challenge of being there for our callers by becoming a Friend of Brighton, Hove and District Samaritans.
As a charity, we rely on donations from the public to help us keep our services going. Sadly, the pandemic has temporarily put an end to the fundraising events that have traditionally sustained us. We need your help now more than ever.
Costs of providing our services:
£400 - Trains one new Samaritan volunteer
£50 - Supports 10 distressed callers
Please select your preferred giving option of £5, £10, £20 (or an amount of your choice)
In return for your kind donation, you will receive periodic updates on how your donations are helping our volunteers support the local community.
If you would prefer not to become a Friend at this time but would like to make a one-off donation we would be very grateful. You can do that right here
Thanks to the generosity of supporters like you, Brighton, Hove & District Samaritans can continue to be there for those in our community who need a lifeline.

domain: sociology


Navigating the Complex Media Landscape
The South African political landscape is a dynamic and complex arena where parties vie for voter support against a backdrop of diverse voices, opinions, and rapidly evolving narratives.
The media, spanning print, online, broadcast, and social platforms, serves as both a conduit and a battleground for political messages. Given this, media monitoring has become a critical element of the pre-election media management playbook.
3 reasons why media monitoring is important
- Crisis Communication Management
- Early Detection: Media monitoring tools offer real-time alerts, enabling parties to swiftly identify emerging issues and respond promptly, mitigating reputational damage.
- Sentiment Analysis: These services offer sentiment analysis, helping parties gauge public sentiment surrounding their campaigns. By understanding how their actions and messages are perceived, parties can tailor their responses accordingly.
- Competitor Tracking: Political parties can monitor their rivals, keeping tabs on their media coverage and responses to emerging issues. This competitive intelligence allows parties to stay ahead of their opponents.
- Measuring Media Coverage
- Comprehensive Monitoring: These services encompass print, online, broadcast, and social media. This holistic approach ensures that no media outlet or platform goes unnoticed.
- Data-Driven Insights: Media monitoring tools provide detailed metrics on media coverage, including reach, frequency, and media type. This empowers parties to gauge the effectiveness of their communication efforts and make informed decisions.
- Monthly Reports: Regularly delivered media analysis reports offer deep insights into campaign performance. These reports not only provide a retrospective view but also offer actionable recommendations to refine campaign strategies.
- Optimising Campaign Strategies
- Tailoring Messages: Through media monitoring, parties can identify which campaign messages resonate most with the electorate. This insight allows for the customization of messages to address voter concerns effectively.
- Targeted Media Engagement: Parties can identify influential media outlets and journalists to engage with, amplifying their campaign messages and ensuring broader coverage.
- Adaptation and Refinement: Continuous media monitoring allows for the ongoing refinement of campaign strategies. Parties can adapt to changing circumstances, seize emerging opportunities, and optimise their outreach efforts.
Media monitoring provides political parties with a real-time radar for potential crises or controversies. Here's why it's crucial:
Media monitoring services offer comprehensive tracking across all relevant media channels. Here's why it's essential:
Media monitoring plays a pivotal role in honing campaign strategies for political success:
Media monitoring a compass
As South Africa stands on the brink of yet another consequential election, the role of media monitoring in the media management strategy of political parties cannot be overstated.
It's a compass that guides parties through the labyrinthine media landscape, helping them steer clear of crises, measure their media footprint, and refine their campaign strategies. In a world where information is power, media monitoring is the key to political success. I
t's time for all political parties to embrace it fully as they embark on their journey to win the hearts and votes of the South African electorate.


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THE BIG U 4/1/21
When we feel misunderstood it is an opportunity to ask where we are not clear inside
In life when we communicate our main objective is to be understood, to convey clearly a message to another so that we feel heard and recognized. So it is a charged experience if we feel misunderstood. It can make us seem unrecognized and misrepresented which can cause frustration and irritation towards another, however like all experiences that we attract to ourselves this is another opportunity to look at the reflection and why The communication is not landing.
The main issue here is wanting to be heard , Yet underneath that is wanting to truly be seen. For the person we communicating with to recognize what is really going on for us and Yet quite often the reason our communication is Being misunderstood is because we are misrepresenting our authentic self. We can be trying to be clever ar quite often in an attempt to protect ourselves We are talking about an issue that seems to be important yet the real issue is being hidden underneath.
The opportunity here is to take a breath stop thinking at these times and check in with our feelings. To really feel why we are been triggered and what it is within us that we are trying to protect. From this place we can access our vulnerability and then courageously Share from this place which creates compassion and the true connection that we were yearning for all along.
Please like , share and comment below and join my mailing list at my website
IF YOU ARE READY FOR YOUR OWN SELF REVOLUTION , then For Self Revolution Coaching Sessions email email@example.com.
#paulgotel #innerpower #thebigu #bigu #evernow #selfrevolution #selfhelp #selfdiscovery #inspiration #lifeteachings #love #reflection #gift
#experience #discover #wellness #HuManOS3 #connection #communication #courage #authentic #compassion #understanding #frustration

domain: psychology


He also said that consumers had changed their habits in new and unusual ways.
"It's fallen off a cliff," Buffett told CNBC. "Not only has the economy slowed down a lot, but people have really changed their habits like I haven't seen."
Buffett predicted that unemployment would rise.
Furthermore, he claimed that the current economy was pretty much following his vision of the worst-case scenario.
However, Buffett remains optimistic in the long-run:
"Everything will be all right. We do have the greatest economic machine that's ever been created," Buffett said.


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Join The Fun
August 8, 2020
Summer Nights, Paper Pumpkin Alternative Projects
Video and blog with Paper Pumpkin alternate projects for Summer Nights, July 2020, Stamp Designs with Denise, http://stampdesignswithdenise.net/
Do you like it?

domain: hobby


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Virginia Woolf’s novel “Orlando: A Biography” charts 300 years in the life of a male nobleman who, beginning in the times of Elizabeth I, eventually experiences an unexplained sex change at age 30. Orlando then lives the rest of her days as a woman. The 1928 book remains a classic of gender and feminist studies but is largely considered the first great work of trans fiction, later inspiring Sally Potter’s own 1992 movie, “Orlando,” with Tilda Swinton.
Now, the book is the subject of trans theorist Paul B. Preciado’s “Orlando, My Political Autobiography,” a playful French-language cinema essay in which more than 20 trans and non-binary people take on the role of Orlando, using Woolf’s words to ground their own experiences. It sounds heady and challenging on paper, but Preciado’s film is an irreverent mix of art-directed social manifesto and moving documentary in which individuals recount less their struggles for acceptance than their triumphs and pride in their identity. “Orlando” received four prizes at the Berlin Film Festival before heading to the Telluride, Toronto, and New York film festivals.
More here from the official synopsis: “Come, come! I’m sick to death of this particular self. I want another.” Taking Virginia Woolf’s novel “Orlando: A Biography” as its starting point, academic virtuoso turned filmmaker Paul B. Preciado has fashioned the documentary as a personal essay, historical analysis, and manifesto. For almost a century, Woolf’s eponymous hero/heroine has inspired readers for their gender fluidity across physical and spiritual metamorphoses over a 300-year lifetime. Preciado casts a diverse cross-section of trans and non-binary individuals in the role of Orlando as they perform interpretations of scenes from the novel, weaving into Woolf’s narrative their own stories of identity and transition. Not content to simply update a seminal work, Preciado interrogates the relevance of Orlando in the continuing struggle against anti-trans ideologies and in the fight for global trans rights.
Janus and Sideshow Films release “Orlando, My Political Autobiography” on November 10 in New York City and November 17 in Los Angeles, with an expansion to follow. IndieWire shares the exclusive trailer below.


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Item | FB029
Serving Size 2 Tablets
|Amount Per Serving||%Daily Value|
|Vitamin A (from beta-carotene)||8,500 IU||170%|
|Vitamin C (from ascorbic acid and acerola)||225 mg||375%|
|Vitamin D (as ergocalciferol)||400 IU||100%|
|Vitamin E (as natural mixed tocopherols)||30 IU||100%|
|Niacin (as niacinamide)||50 mg||250%|
|Vitamin B6 (as pyridoxine hydrochloride)||15 mg||750%|
|Folic Acid||400 mcg||100%|
|Vitamin B12 (as cyanocobalamin)||30 mcg||100%|
|Pantothenic Acid (as calcium pantothenate)||25 mg||250%|
|Calcium (as calcium carbonate and phosphate)||625 mg||63%|
|Iron (as ferrous glyconate)||8 mg||44%|
|Iodine (from kelp)||150 mcg||100%|
|Magnesium (as magnesium oxide and ascorbate)||150 mg||38%|
|Zinc (as zinc glycinate)||15 mg||100%|
|Selenium (as selenomethionine)||75 mcg||107%|
|Chromium (as chromium polynicotinate)||60 mcg||50%|
|Potassium (as potassium chloride)||90 mg||3%|
|Choline (as choline bitartrate)||150 mg||*|
|para-Aminobenzoic acid||85 mg||*|
|Ribonucleic acid (RNA)||50 mg||*|
|Energy Plus Blend Dong Quai root powder*; Aloe Vera leaf powder*; Methionine*; Chamomile flower powder*; Rosemary leaf powder*; Bee Pollen powder*; Peony root powder*; Chlorella*; American Ginseng root powder*; Dandelion Root powder*; Chinese Licorice Root powder*; Betaine hydrochloride*; Alfalfa Juice concentrate*||74 mg||*|
*Daily Value not established.
Other ingredients: Stearic acid, silica, and magnesium stearate.
Directions: As a dietary supplement for adults, take 2 tablets daily with meals or as directed by your healthcare professional.
WARNING: Accidental overdose of iron-containing products is a leading cause of fatal poisoning in children under 6. Keep this product out of reach of children. In case of accidental overdose, call a physician or poison control center immediately.
CAUTION: Bee Pollen is known to cause allergic reactions in certain allergy-prone individuals. If you are susceptible to bee or pollen-type allergies, please use caution when taking this product.
Contains no yeast, wheat, gluten, corn, soy, dairy, sugar, salt, starch, artificial coloring or preservatives.
We know how important your health is to you and your loved ones. That’s why we’re focused on delivering only high quality products you can trust at the best value.
Our lab evaluates every product to make sure it’s compliant with strict standards and government regulations, and we fully believe in and stand behind our products. If you’re dissatisfied for any reason, we’ll give you a full refund and pay return shipping.
We are dedicated to offering the highest quality products at the best price. Find out more about how we ensure such a high standard in everything we do.Learn More

domain: chemistry


“This writer will be responsible for feeding a new Kathie Lee and Hoda blog that will have 10-15 posts a week, focusing on newsy, quirky, or viral moments of the broadcast.”
Wanna come party with us? Apply away…
reblogging because i’m pretty sure this is a dream job. and one of you deserves it.
Indeed it is. We consume cocktails in the AM, mac ‘n cheese in the PM.
You had me at mac ‘n cheese. Oh, okay, and ‘cocktails in the AM,’ too. (As long as you drink the good stuff.)


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VIDEO: Diamond Platnumz Ft. Rayvanny – Iyena MP4 DOWNLOAD Diamond Platnumz released the official video of “Iyena” featuring Rayvanny Writers: Nasibu Abdul Juma Issaack / Raymond Shaban Mwakyusa
South African Music
Rayvanny – Makulusa ft. DJ Maphorisa & Dj Buckz MP3 DOWNLOAD Tanzanian sensation “Raymond Rayvanny” teams up with well renowned DJ Maphorisa and DJ Buckz to deliver this dope joint
DOWNLOAD MP3 : Fid Q – Fresh Remix Ft. Diamond Platnumz & Rayvanny Fid Q present the remix for Fresh featuring Diamond Platnumz and Rayvanny. Listen below and share!

domain: artistic


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It is a good game but not a good Zelda game because there is next to no Zelda gameplay or music in it.
I consider myself a Zelda fan, I've enjoyed very much almost every Zelda that has ever existed, and I wasnt that crazy- and still am not- with BOTW. I do like the game a lot, thats for certain, but I wouldn't count it amongst the best of the series, much less the very best, as some people like to think. So you can imagine when a game like this comes out as part of a console launch and the general hype overrates it way too much its a bit of an overkill for me. Anyway, I expect in due time, the conversations we have about this game are gonna be very different. Much like how it happened with Force Awakens.
Different strokes for different folks I guess. Breath of the wild is the best game I've ever played, and I have been gaming over 30 years.
I never played a mainline Zelda game until Breath of the Wild, but it was good enough to make me a Zelda fan and earn a spot of being one of my favourite games of all time.
Have you ever climbed a ladder IRL? Do you know that you do not really use any energy when resting, since your own leg bones hold you up? If you can stay still on a ladder for hours, so can Link.
Speaking as someone who hasn't played Zelda Breath--and I do want to play it eventually--it's kind of funny how unexciting it looks from screenshots and such.
I was thinking about this the other day after reading a thread with a lot of people saying it was perfect. It's just that none of the comments made me feel super interested. It was mostly superlatives that wouldn't mean anything to someone who hasn't played or comments like, "yeah, other games have that but it's better in Zelda Breath."
I'm not saying it's not a fantastic game or anything like that, it just struck me as peculiar that it doesn't *look or sound* all that interesting from the outside in terms of normal game-play. It's extremely pretty, certainly, but that's not what grabs me about games.

domain: game


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(makes 3-4 servings, 5 min prep, 15 min cook)
Ingredients: Chop 2 cups sweet potato, 1 cup portabella mushrooms, 1 cup chopped dinosaur kale, 6 oz. salmon, 2 tsp garlic, 2 tsp turmeric, 1 tsp ginger, 1 tsp ground black pepper, eggs.
- Chop 2 cups sweet potato and 1 cup portabella mushrooms. Add them to a large skillet over medium heat with 2 Tbsp organic grassfed butter, ghee, or coconut oil.
- After about 5 minutes, add 1 cup chopped dinosaur kale, 6 oz. salmon (I like the Wild Planet brand, because it is sustainably caught and non-GMO), 2 tsp garlic, 2 tsp turmeric, 1 tsp ginger, and 1 tsp ground black pepper. Stir and allow to cook for approximately 5 more minutes or until the kale begins to wilt.
- Crack your desired number of eggs on top and allow to cook to your desired hardness (about 3 minutes for a runny yolk and about 6 minutes for a harder yolk). Serve and enjoy!
Turmeric and ginger are both potent anti-inflammatory roots that have been found to be as effective as hydrocortisone or Mortin, but without the nasty side effects. In fact, research has shown that turmeric is an effective treatment for inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn's disease, and ulcerative colitis as well as rheumatoid arthritis and cystic fibrosis. Ginger and turmeric have both been shown to have protective effects against cancer as well.


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On 23 July, the Booksellers Association launched “Green Bookselling: A Manifesto for the BA, Booksellers and the Book Industry”, as part of its ongoing commitment to reducing waste across its membership and throughout the supply chain. The manifesto calls on publishers and distributors to phase out single-use cardboard in favour of recyclable materials and to take up environmental commitments, including reviewing both the delivery and "inherently wasteful" returns processes, and stopping sending out unsolicited book proofs and marketing materials to booksellers.
Collected news links from external sources related to topics concerning the Book Chain Project.
The Global Canopy's 'Forest 500' assesses the 350 most influential companies in forest-risk commodity supply chains and the 150 financial institutions that support them. Nearly half of the 500 assessed companies have made commitments to eliminate deforestation by 2020, but none of the companies and financial institutions assessed in 2018 are on track to meet their target in time.
The Accountability Framework initiative will organize a webinar to help people learn more about the framework. An overview of the Accountability Framework's principles and guidance related to setting commitments, taking action, and demonstrating progress will be presented.
The Accountability Framework is a set of common norms and guidance for establishing, implementing, and monitoring responsible supply chain commitments, aiming to help companies and others to set commitments, take action, demonstrate progress, and support broader positive impacts. The Accountability Framework initiative is led by a diverse group of civil society representatives including Forest People Program, Greenpeace, WRI, WWF, etc.
Ministers attending the 24th Conference of the Parties (COP 24) to the UNFCCC adopted the 'Ministerial Katowice Declaration on Forests for Climate', which highlights the significant role of sustainable forest management in achieving climate change commitments in the Paris Agreement.
India “has the capacity to clean up, but not the political will”. This piece from the Economist’s Asia edition cites political apathy towards pollution and failures to listen to middle classes as two of the most significant factors in India’s continuing struggle with environmental protection. The country also shows mixed responses to their climate change commitments, as data shows a significant preference for coal power generation over cleaner gas-fired plants.
Over the past few months, our annual Book Chain Project conference has been the focus for the team in London. The event involved a day of panel discussions and delved into topics on all aspects of the Book Chain Project, all under the theme of ‘The Story of Books’.
Set against panoramic views of the WWT London Wetlands Centre, we gathered together 11 speakers covering 5 sessions, and invited participating publishers, mills and suppliers to attend. Altogether, we had a packed room with over 60 people in attendance and speakers from a variety of companies.
The speakers covered various topics including; the economics behind recent pulp price rises; the various pressures on mill groups around the world; deforestation hotpots and NGO efforts to keep corporate commitments on track. We also dedicated a session to the issue of plastic where we had the lead Plastics Campaign manager from Friends of the Earth examining the different recyclable alternatives available and how these options could be implemented into the book making industry. In addition to that, with pressure to tackle human rights abuses in all supply chains from the Modern Slavery statements, we ran a session on human rights and heard some hard-hitting examples of corporate engagement to correct previous abuses with the help of the Forest Peoples Programme.
The day was a great success and ended with a tour of the wetlands and feedback has been incredibly positive with 50% of attendees rating the event as ‘Very Good’.
The Accountability Framework initiative (AFi) is a collaborative effort to accelerate progress and improve accountability for responsible supply chain commitments in agriculture and forestry. Recently, the initiative has released the first draft of their framework for improving accountability for responsible supply chain commitments in agriculture and forestry, including as set of the core principles & definitions, a practical operational guidance. The initiative is now preparing to expand on the principles in an operational manual, and they are inviting input and feedback from as many companies, government entities, non-profits, and other stakeholders as possible.
EPN have published their third report on the state of the global paper industry, presenting an analysis of the world’s pulp and paper industry, and the commercial, social and environmental risks and opportunities facing it. The report examines the performance of the industry against each of the goals of the Global Paper Vision; 1) reducing global paper consumption and promote fair access to paper, 2) maximising recycled fibre content, 3) ensuring social responsibility, 4) sourcing fibre responsibly, 5) reducing greenhouse gas emissions, 6) ensuring clean production and 7) ensuring transparency and integrity. Key themes include the need to bring paper consumption down to sustainable levels, to address climate chain impacts across the supply chain and to drive action around commitments.
- Environmental Paper Network
- Climate chain
- ensuring clean production
- ensuring transparency and integrity
- Global Paper Industry
- Global Paper Vision
- maximising recycled fibre content
- Paper consumption
- promote fair access to paper
- pulp and paper industry
- reducing global paper consumption
- reducing greenhouse gas emissions
- sourcing fibre responsibly
- suring social responsibility
Even as the logging industry lobbies the Canadian government to further delay measures that would protect the country’s diminishing woodland caribou herds, research and satellite images of the boreal released last month by NRDC clearly illustrate the failure of voluntary industry commitments to protect woodland caribou habitat.
A report by World Economic Forum and Tropical Forest Alliance 2020 states that the transfer to deforestation-free supply chains could represent an investment opportunity of approximately US$ 200 billion annually. However, although companies are making commitments to deforestation-free pulp and paper in their supply chain, due to the underestimation of the risk, they may have issues meeting their time bound commitments.
"Zero deforestation” champion creates new risks for Indonesia’s forests and carbon-rich peatlands with mega-scale pulp mill
A recent study released by 12 international and Indonesian NGOs reveal that Asia Pulp &Paper (APP) is building one of the world’s largest pulp mills without a sustainable wood supply in South Sumatra. This analysis indicates that the current planted area owned by APP is insufficient in supporting this new mill as well as the 2 existing mills. This report suggests that APP may fail to meet its ‘zero deforestation commitments’ made in 2013 which included ‘100% sustainable plantation wood for pulp’.
Greenpeace have released a scorecard on 14 companies' progress on eliminating deforestation from their supply chains. Nestle and Ferrero scored the highest and Colgate-Palmolive, Johnson & Johnson and PepsiCo scored the lowest. Greenpeace has encouraged these companies to work with an implementation partner to recognise their commitments as well as seek third party verifications on their progress.
As more than two-thirds of deforestation globally have been caused by commercial agriculture, both governments and private sectors have make many promises to tackle the problem. However, neither is likely to achieve goals by working on their own. Forest experts at Environmental Defence Fund (EDF) propose private sectors to work with REDD+ and other government initiatives, laws, and regulations as a new approach to implement forest commitments.
Scientists at UCL have defined three phases of global forest loss, the third of which we are living through now. They believe this third phase poses dangerous consequences if not correctly managed at a global scale. They believe the first phase happened over 6000 years ago when hunter-gatherers moved into tropical forests. The second phase saw the emergence of tropical agriculture. Despite altering the forest both of these phases maintained its overall health. The third phase – known as ‘Global Integration’ - has much greater impacts and is defined by distant decision-makers directing forest and agricultural land use. There have been positive moves, such as the UN’s New York Declaration of Forests agreeing to halt deforestation and restore 150 million hectares. But moves to expand the palm oil industry in to Africa are concerning and the study worries about the implications for the continent’s natural forests. The report calls for a renewed attention on forests at the Paris climate talks, where commitments to reduce deforestation and secure alternative finance are essential to success.
Environmentalists have called Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff’s commitments on reducing deforestation and supporting renewable energy ‘weak’ and representing little more than maintaining the status quo. Greenpeace Brazil say the target of restoring 12 million hectares of forest represents only half of the reforestation requirements under Brazil’s Forest Code and are just another commitment to comply with existing laws, not a bold new initiative.
Brazil has, however, worked to reduce greenhouse gas emissions more than any large country over the past decade, with emissions from all sectors having fallen by around 40% since 2005, with an 85% cut in carbon dioxide from deforestation.
Indonesia has long been accused of not managing forests in a sustainable manner and of failing to curb illegal logging and trade in regard to the export of forest-sourced products. The demand to implement sustainable forest management policies is getting stronger. The voluntary PEFC/IFCC (the Indonesia Forest Certification Co-Operation) certification has been seen as a “passport” for the companies to allow their products to entre countries that set sustainable forest management preconditions. Forestry companies’ policies need to be tested on the ground.
Archer Daniels Midland, the third largest global supplier of agricultural commodities and one of the world’s leading soy traders, is launching their Responsible Soy Standard. Under this new programme, yearly assessments will be conducted by expert third parties to determine if growers are complying with a number of environmental, legal, social and agronomic standards.
Despite soy production acting as a leading driver of deforestation across South America, palm oil has remained the priority commodity for companies in the fight against deforestation. While 117 private companies have pledged to reduce the impact of their involvement with palm oil, only 27 have done the same with soy. It is hoped that ADM’s commitment could lead to other organisations following their lead and expanding their commitments to deforestation across commodities.
Experts have warned, however, that although commitments like these have led to deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon, the problem is simply being moved elsewhere. Much of the conversion of natural ecosystems for soy cultivation now occurs in other areas including Argentina, Bolivia and Paraguay.
The think tank Innovation Forum held a two-day conference in Washington DC entitled “How business can tackle deforestation” attended by 160 representatives from companies, NGOs and investors. Whilst multiple major consumer goods companies have declared their commitments to achieving zero deforestation in their supply chains many others have raised concerns over the term and what the policy actually means in practice.
Rainforest Alliances’ recent position paper, ‘Halting Deforestation and Achieving Sustainability’ warned that zero deforestation commitments may not be enough to protect the world’s forests, due to two reasons. Firstly, though many major companies have signed up for these commitments, many other producers and buyers will not. These companies will continue to rely on deforestation to produce their goods, unless a way is found to address underlying issues, such as growing worldwide demand for forest products. Secondly, focusing solely on deforestation risks drawing attention away from other business practices within the commodities supply chain which may deserve equally urgent attention e.g. water scarcity and labour laws. In addition, the use of ‘zero deforestation’ as a catchphrase is problematic because there remains no clear agreement over what the term means. Rainforest Alliance emphasises the need for greater education, auditing and transparency so that consumers know the impact of what they are buying and are able to trust companies’ sustainability claims. Though a commendable step in the right direction, ‘zero deforestation’ commitments need to be backed up with comprehensive action plans if they are to deliver credible results.
1. Zero deforestation commitments. 2015 may be the year that many of the zero deforestation commitments are actually implemented.
2. Joko Widodo’s forest commitments. As Indonesia’s new president takes on the challenge of reforming the forestry sector, look out for greater scrutiny of concession licensees, as well as a crack-down on forestry-related corruption.
3. The Brazilian Amazon. There are concerns that Brazil’s current downward deforestation trajectory may not last.
4. Will Paris product a binding climate framework? Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation is expected to have a central role in the climate talks in Paris at the end of the year.
5. Where are the new deforestation hotspots? Data from the WRI suggests that deforestation may be rising in several countries, including Cote d’Ivoire, DRC, Ecuador and Ghana amongst others. 2015 will also uncover new studies and tools that will help better quantify change in forest cover.
6. Falling commodity prices. Lower prices reduce the profitability of converting rainforests for palm oil plantations. On the other hand, companies may be less likely to adopt environmental measures if they have less cash on hand.
7. Myanmar. As Myanmar opens up further to foreign investors, concerns about the fate of the country’s forests will rise.
8. Dams in the Amazon. Indigenous groups and environmentalists are ready to fight against Brazil’s hydro projects in the Tapajos basin.
9. RSPO and zero deforestation. If the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) does move towards zero deforestation it has a critical tool in place to do so: last year members were required to submit the GPS coordinates of their concessions.
10. Jurisdictional initiatives. Sub-national efforts to develop forest-friendly policies and initiatives will move forward in 2015.
Pulp and paper giant APRIL (Asia Pacific Resources International Ltd) has been found to be violating its own sustainability policy by continuing to source fibre from peatlands in Riau, Indonesia. The investigation, from Eyes on the Forest, shows that APRIL affiliate Riau Andalan Pulp & Paper (RAPP) is operating in breach of APRIL’s pledge not to clear potential high conservation value (HCV) areas. Dramatic photographs released by Greenpeace-Indonesia in June clearly showed natural forest clearance on deep peat areas, and ongoing preparations to turn the land in to plantations. APRIL says this activity doesn’t violate its policy commitments and clearing is only taking place in non-HCV areas. APRIL is under mounting pressure to clean up its supply chain since its largest competitor, APP, signed a comprehensive zero deforestation policy in 2013. APP’s subsequent commitment to support conservation and restoration of forests equal in size to its own operations was also applauded by environmental groups. APRIL has since said that it will match APP on this commitment – see APRIL’s letter responding to the Greenpeace photographs in June 2014.

domain: news


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Now available from University of North Carolina Press: A Crisis of Community: The Trials and Transformation of a New England Town, 1815-1848
Mary White, farm wife and mother of ten, kept a dairy of everyday life in her rural town of Boylston, Massachusetts. From the 1820s through 1840s – years later characterized nostalgically as a pastoral age of homespun — Mary’s diary records a remarkable tale: unremitting local conflict. Much that had sustained her village in the past — established church, gentry leadership, neighborly obligations, family bonds – were threatened. People were resisting the old ways. The rising generation, especially, pushed to realize the new nation’s expansive promises of liberty and improvement. Deference to authority and common good, submission to community norms, demands of family farms, all seemed like frustrating fetters to those seeking self-determination or social improvement. The result was a deeply troubled time of wrenching personal and family conflicts and village contention.
In Crisis of Community, examines the tumultuous Jacksonian era at the intimate level of family and community. The social world of Boylston’s parlors and tillage fields, taverns and town meetings was no longer centered on age-old goals of community well-being. In farm towns across New England, corporate unity was shattered by individual striving, battling religious sects, crusading reform movements, factious party politics, expansive associations of choice and interest, and most powerfully, the individual pursuit of self-reliance. Boylston’s story brings to life the troublesome creation of a new social, political, and economic order as people chose to redefine belonging and refashion relationships.
Blending family records and a rich trove of community archives, A Crisis of Community examines the “age of revolutions” through the lens of a rural community that was swept up into the networks of an expanding and urbanizing New England region. This finely detailed history lends new depth to our understanding of a key transformative moment in American history.
Pingback: Forthcoming in 2014 | Mary Fuhrer·


text: Last summer, my older sister passed away due to drugs, it came down on me very hard, and I fell in a state of depression for a couple months. Recently, (this started about 5 months ago) I've been having drastic mood swings ranging between extreme depression to being on top of the world. Even more recently, about last month, I've been getting extreme feelings of paranoia, (ie. The feeling of being watched etc.) When I was about 10 1/2 I was going to a therapist because my parents had gotten divorced, and I abseloutely hated it, she would say "I won't repeat anything" and then go and tell my parents everything I said, so that pretty much ruined my trust in therapists and counselors. My school doesn't have a school conselour and I'm not even sure who to talk to. This week all I've been thinking about is hurting myself and suicide, I've been cutting this year and it helps a bit, but honestly it hurts me more. I don't know what to do right now. I'd appreciate it a ton if somebody in/was in a similar situation could give me advice..Thank you for taking the time to read this if you have.

domain: health


text:
Jain created her dance programme Masala Bhangra, as a fusion of the traditional Punjabi dance form and western fitness, over two decades ago. A lifestyle programme where the Dhol drum beats meet the glamour of Bollywood; with easy-to-follow choreography, for people of all ages, is how she describes it. “The concept of Masala Bhangra
was created out of my garage, 21 years ago and today it is one of the top five workout programmes in the US,” Jain told TIMESOFINDIA.com from New York City where she lives.
She has produced over 15 workout videos and has appointed 250 Masala Bhangra
ambassadors who represent Indian culture with pride to their students. “I have also launched an on-demand gym programme in which anyone around the world can dance anytime,” she says.
Born and raised in southern California by her Indian parents who migrated to the United States
in the 70s, Jain says she grew up with the best of what the West
has to offer without forgetting the East
. “My dad made sure to send us to India every summer to spend time with our family members, our grandparents and to learn to appreciate what Indian culture is all about,” she recollects. And growing up in southern California, surrounded by her family's Indian culture, it was not difficult for her to bring together her two passions of culture and fitness. It was her father, she remembers, who taught her to respect the culture that they came from and to be independent and stand on her own feet. His sudden death, after a massive cardiac arrest, when he was just 47 was a big shock. But her father’s death also inspired her to create Masala Bhangra to honour his memory. “I wanted to tell him that not only am I proud to be an Indian woman living in the US but now I teach aspects of our culture through fitness.”
Jain has not formally learnt Bhangra, but was drawn to it in her youth. “I danced with a team called Dhamaka. We did many dance competitions and often won first place,” she recollects. And that’s where the confidence to launch an Indian dance form in the US fitness world came from. Now it’s popular globally, she proudly says. Even as she continues to build her brand, she has pivoted to offering virtual classes as soon as the lockdown hit due to Covid restrictions in the US. “When the pandemic hit, everyone was confused. But a week after shutdown, Masala Bhangra instructors adapted to the virtual land and took off. It was trial and error in the beginning, but we made it. It has been one-and-a-half years since we have been online and it’s working,” she says.
Later in 2021, after the first lockdown was lifted, Jain launched the concept of outdoor sessions of ‘Bhangra in the Plaza
’ to get New York City up and moving again, as she describes it. “I produced this event for New Yorkers to get out of the house, and come outside and dance with us. To promote culture as well and bring people together through Indian music and dance. It was a huge success,” she says. The business model that she now follows is a hybrid one, with people of all ages and fitness levels around the US and even from different parts of the world being able to attend classes or join ‘on demand gym’ sessions. Masala Bhangra events are organised both indoors and outdoors. The USP of the programme, even after 21 years, remains the high energy Bhangra and Bollywood dance movements in an easy-to-follow fitness format, Jain explains.
She considers herself lucky to have grown up in the US amidst both Indian and western cultures. “I grew up with a large desi community and I was super involved in all the activities. I was also raised in the environment of what the West had to offer. I loved my upbringing and I hope to bring this to my kids. The Indian culture is important to me hence I promote it every day through Masala Bhangra,” she says. She has a lot of extended family in India and visits often. “I also got married in Jaipur,” she says.


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Nonantum (from an Indigenous American Algonquian word meaning “true blessing or prayer”) is amongst the thirteen areas of Newton, Massachusetts, furthermore called Silver Lake or The Lake.
The lake concerned was filled with structure particles in addition to built over from the 1930s till its total fatality in 1971. The community young people eliminated the snow each winter season and played hockey on it via the 1950s. The town is simply one of the centers of the Italian population in Newton. The business location has various restaurants as well as furthermore food facilities including Italian food.
Nonantum figures in really early Massachusetts background as your home of Waban, amongst the initial Native Americans in Massachusetts to transform to Christianity. He had in fact been exposed by John Eliot.
Lake Talk is a cryptolect talked particularly amongst older Italian-American property owners. The beginnings of Lake Talk are unclear. A 2001 short article in the Boston World hypothesized that it is a mix of Italian and also some of The second world war code, nevertheless others have in fact seen resemblances to Angloromani or Italian Romany jargon. Initially, Nonantum was an Irish community, as a large amount of the streets are Irish names. In the late 1800’s truly early 1900’s Natives of Castelvenere an area together with comune in the Location of Benevento, Campania Location, Italy cleaned up in Nonantum, the extremely first Italian immigrants. Numerous people in the community currently that assert are the initial to discover the “Lake” are children of individuals of San Donato Val di Comino, Italy.

domain: geography


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AFMW: The Beach Boys
It’s 50 years and counting for The Beach Boys. The group that helped define the ’60s and the sounds of summer is still going strong.
FOX News Radio’s Mitch Davis spends “A Few Moments With” The Beach Boys’ Mike Love and Bruce Johnston; talking about the music, the past, and what’s ahead for the band.
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text:
Smart Computers – In the world of navigation, GPS technology (global positioning system) has a very important role to support its development in the current era of technology. If in the past GPS was only used for military purposes, now there are many innovations from this technology so that it can be used for purposes other than military.
In what ways can GPS tracking be very useful?
GPS Tracker can be used for track the whereabouts of the vehicle. GPS tracker is generally used by expensive vehicles, vehicles that contain important items, or other needs.
For example a logistics company that has many large vehicle assets that travels a lot out of town. They use GPS tracker to monitor the movement of the vehicle. Even the technological innovations have been equipped with many features, one of which is the company's owner can manage the car remotely, such as turning off the engine, turning on the alarm warning, and others.
GPS tracker for travelers
Both GPS that is already available on smartphones or GPS in the form of third-party (third-party devices), may be very useful for travelers, especially those who are expediting to remote, outermost, even mired. GPS can be a navigation tool that shows direction and location. Of course this is very efficient from all sides, both energy and mind time.
In addition, GPS can also be a tracking device in the event of the worst conditions for the traveler. There is a minimum track record of the locations that have been passed, then an investigation is conducted. However, this is back again to the features that exist on the GPS whether it supports it or not.
GPS tracker to track children's journey
Today there are not a few parents who hold their children smartphones. In general, one of the reasons parents entrust smartphones to their children so that it is easy to communicate during emergencies. Although worry always overshadows because there are not a few negative impacts that can be caused.
But on the positive side we can easily track the activity / journey of the child with GPS technology (both of which have been embeded with a smartphone or a special additional GPS device). Especially if it is equipped with optional features for parenting purposes, it will certainly make it easier for us to control children remotely.
After seeing some of the cases above, the GPS role is very useful, of course, it will be an additional new reference for us.
Talk about GPS tracking, I'm amazed by the product that will be launched by one of the companies that developed GPS technology, AIBLUE . The plan is AIBLUE will release its flagship product named GoFindMe. For complete information, click this link .


The coolest thing about working at Lifetime Products is our dedication to innovate and make stuff that just doesn't exist yet. Our newest basketball system - the Power Flex System - is my favorite system that we make because of just that. In an industry that is saturated with competition, we were able to come up with an in-ground basketball system that is unique in many ways.
First, we started with the height adjustment mechanism. Our engineers were able to patent new technology with a gas-assist, triggerless handle adjustment called the Power Lift® XL Height Adjust. This new Power Lift XL is similar to our existing Power Lift® mechanism that Lifetime invented in 1996 - which was the first pneumatic height adjustment mechanism for basketball hoops. However, our new Power Lift® XL has larger handle to help make raising and lowering even easier. Just push up or pull down on the ergonomic handle to adjust the rim height within a range of infinite height possibilities between 7.5’ and 10’. It might not seem like much but simple adjust on a basketball system is becoming a must have with our customers.
The second thing we looked at is how the basketball system flexes. Traditional systems break away at the rim leaving the system itself very stiff. We wanted to look at a different way to break away. So we invented the Power Flex™ Rim that has a patented Heavy Duty Power Flex Compression Spring. The spring absorbs the full shock of even the most aggressive dunk and allows the entire upper end (backboard and rim) of the system to flex under the force of the dunk creating a surging euphoric feeling of dominating power and performance in the user… it is also easier on the joints.
This in-ground basketball system is fun to play on especially when you lower it down and dunk like a pro. It has a great 54" tempered glass Clearview backboard which eliminates the backboard braces to create a clear target and increase rebound stability. This model (90230) is sold at Dick’s Sporting Goods. Get to your local store and check it out. You won’t be disappointed.


text:
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text:
The apartment on the outskirts of Graal-Müritz is located in the attic. It has a double bedroom, a combined living and kitchen area with a balcony and a bathroom with shower and toilet. On the comfortable sofa bed in the living area can be for the 3. Person to be bedded.
The kitchen is u. a. equipped with coffee maker, microwave and hotplates. The living room has a flat-screen TV. In the entire apartment Internet via wifi is at your free disposal.
The entrance to the apartment is shared with the apartment in the basement. A free parking space can be found on the premises in the immediate vicinity.
Our apartments in the district of Gelbensande in front of the gates of the Baltic Sea resort Graal-Müritz we offer for the first time from the season 2019 on. They have been refurbished by specialized companies and have got a modern and contemporary decor. In the price of the apartments Internet via wifi is included. Free parking is available 30 meters from the apartment. The apartments are located within a holiday district outside of Graal-Müritz in a forest area. The entrance gate is closed in the evening and is only open for holiday guests. Also located in the quarter is a restaurant that is open seasonally. There is a bike path right next to the hotel and it is only a half hour walk to the beach of the Baltic Sea through the forest.

domain: travel


text:
- The House voted on a resolution affirming Israel’s right to exist on Tuesday.
- All but two members who cast a vote, voted for it.
- Rep. Rashida Tlaib voted “present,” while Rep. Thomas Massie voted against it.
The House of Representatives on Tuesday overwhelmingly passed a resolution affirming Israel’s right to exist, and only two members did not vote in favor of it.
Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, the sole Palestinian American in Congress, voted “present,” while Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky voted against it.
Introduced by Republican Rep. Mike Lawler of New York, the resolution affirms a variety of widely accepted facts about Israel and the Jewish people, including the atrocity of the Holocaust and the history of persecution of Jews.
However, the resolution made no mention of Palestinians — who have their own historical claims in the region — even as it stated that Jewish people are “native to the Land of Israel.”
In a statement, Tlaib argued that the resolution “ignores the existence of the Palestinian people” and “brings us no closer to peaceful coexistence.”
The resolution also states that “denying Israel’s right to exist is a form of antisemitism” — which Massie took issue with.
“Antisemitism is deplorable, but expanding it to include criticism of Israel is not helpful,” Massie wrote on X.
It’s not the first time the House has voted on a resolution like this — though it’s the first time in a while that most progressive “Squad” members have voted for it.
In October, 16 lawmakers voted either “present” or against a resolution in support of Israel, and in July, 9 House Democrats voted against a resolution declaring that Israel is “not a racist or apartheid state.”
Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York, a progressive “Squad” member who voted for the resolution, nonetheless expressed frustration over the vote.
“It seems like we vote on some form of this resolution every single week,” said Bowman. “Do Palestinians have a right to exist? Is someone going to write that resolution? And when it’s written, are we going to vote on it, or are we going to continue to have one conversation without the other?”
Minutes earlier, a separate resolution condemning Hamas and calling for the release of hostages passed unanimously.
The vote comes as Israel increasingly faces criticism of its handling of the war against Hamas. Thousands of Palestinian civilians have died since the initial Hamas attack on October 7, and Democrats in particular have begun talking openly about placing conditions on aid to Israel.
Furthermore, the brutality of the conflict has underscored the ongoing stasis in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
“For many years, the United States has provided Israel substantial sums of money — with close to no strings attached,” Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont wrote in a recent op-ed, saying that “while we are friends of Israel, there are conditions to that friendship” and that “we cannot be complicit in actions that violate international law and our own sense of decency.”
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