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Thirteen years ago, my brother and I ran the Long Beach Half Marathon. I was commuting back and forth to England for a project that proved incredibly time consuming… but I still tried to make time for me and for my family.
In 2018, I ran the full marathon.
Inbetween, I ran a number of events that used part of the beach path for their courses.
And so I should have known what I was getting myself into this morning. Yet somehow I had forgotten the views of the Queen Mary, the lighthouse, and the CalState Long Beach Pyramid.
I also, even having run as many marathons as I have, seem to forget just how LONG 26.2 miles can be.
Life lessons from the Long Beach Marathon:
1) If there is a race day packet pickup, especially for “local” events, I should just pay the extra fee and avoid the mess of going back and forth multiple times. I had to drive down from Hollywood to Long Beach on Friday to pick up my bib… and it was a traffic filled nightmarish trek. The one benefit is that I was able to park and bib and exit the parking structure within the 30 minute grace period so at least I didn’t have to pay for parking!
2) A race that starts at 6 AM is tough on the wake-up, but pleasant for getting it over with… even if one’s time is slower than hoped for.
3) If good fences make good neighbors, non-existent fences make for who knows what?
4) I’m still not sure how to get back to pre-pandemic shape. Once again, I had a decent first half that collapsed in the second half. Today I was able to hold off the 3:25 pace group through 2/3 of the event… and then it all went downhill as the course went rolling along.
5) Fifteen thousand people were involved in the various races of the weekend. They say there were only 1942 marathoners but man were there a lot of people. And I suppose the half marathon had to have a much larger field. But the whole thing felt like a super spreader event waiting to happen. I masked when I could in crowds but rehydration and chocolate milk cartons made me doff the mask a bit too often.
6) The “beach” section of the Long Beach Marathon is maybe 5-6 miles out of the whole thing. The rest is neighborhood and city streets.
7) Finishing matters sometimes more than clock times… but man, do I wish my clock times were getting better.
8) Every finish line is but the start line for the next adventure.


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Not your typical fishing game. More an abstracted view of a fishing and diving career but quite interesting and fun.
are some of the most fun flash games online. Here are 63 of the best free fishing
games / fish games found on the internet. Play as a man fishing in some and play
as the fish in others. Have fun playing online fishing games @ onlinefishinggames.net!
More Games And Fishing Stuff
Free Flash Games
Copyright 2006-2013 Fishing

domain: entertainment


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My little one will turn three soon, and I’m busily planning her birthday party.
Her first birthday was pink and green themed with lots of flowers and sweets.
This year I’ve decided to go with a butterfly and bubbles theme.
She loves bubbles, so I bought a bubble machine to go on the back porch.
I’ve also found tons of butterfly decorations at craft stores.
Here are some of my inspirations from Pinterest.
Butterfly Mobile from Michelle Laulu
Invitations from le petit party
I love the 3D effect.
Possible party favor idea from Plum Party
And, something similar to this display will be the centerpiece via Catch My Party.
I have many more ideas up my sleeve!
Check out more inspirations on my Pinterest board.

domain: artistic


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Gertrude Weil - Interracial Cooperation - Social Justice
A broad dedication to social justice underlay Weil's commitments to the many causes dear to her heart. To her it was a given that all people deserved equal treatment. As she said in 1964, "I felt the same about suffrage as I felt about the interracial problem. I have never understood why we must talk and talk about it. It seems not a quetion [sic] for people to grow eloquent about. It is so obvious that to treat people equally is the right thing to do."
Weil's specific interest in race relations and civil rights dated back at least to her years at Smith. Debating such issues in her classes and at the Home Culture Club, she gained a theoretical knowledge of the social, economic and political context of the "interracial problem" that would prove useful in her civil rights work. With two black members, the Home Culture Club also gave Weil more social contact with the African-American community than she would have had as a child in Goldsboro.
Weil's later social service work, particularly as a Director of Public Relief Work in Goldsboro, exposed her directly to the wide gaps in education and living standards separating the black and white populations in her community. This practical knowledge, combined with her theoretical understandings, informed Weil's passionate commitment to challenging the prevailing social order and made her an effective civil rights advocate.
- Quotation cited in Frank Warren, "Miss Gertrude Weil," Goldsboro News-Argus, December 6, 1964.
- Information about Smith College and Home Culture Club from Sarah Wilkerson-Freeman, "Women and the Transformation of American Politics: North Carolina, 1898-1940," Ph.D. dissertation, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, 1995, 220.
How to cite this page
Jewish Women's Archive. "Gertrude Weil - Interracial Cooperation - Social Justice." (Viewed on October 2, 2023) <https://jwa.org/womenofvalor/weil/interracial-cooperation/social-justice>.

domain: sociology


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FOUR homes are set to be demolished after the horror Ayr explosion as 35 were damaged during the blast.
Some of the houses have been cordoned off because of damage while others have debris on or around the property.
Properties close to the site of the explosion are currently under the control of the emergency services and the utility companies.
Four of the properties within the cordon are likely to be demolished.
South Ayrshire Council have identified around 46 homes which people can safely return to.
The process started yesterday afternoon and is continuing today.
Outwith the cordoned off zone, the horror blast caused widespread damage and properties in the wider area have been affected differently.
Four have been significantly damaged and will need to be extensively repaired before householders can return.
Most read in Scottish News
Other houses have been damaged by debris and some homes are not yet safe to access due to broken windows or debris strewn across the garden area or within the property itself.
Neighbourhood Services teams are on site, working to remove debris from the wider area.
Emergency crews are leading on the operation.
The council are continuing to work with them to preserve public safety in the whole area.
They have also said that they are doing everything they can to enable people who are still displaced to return to their homes safely.
It is complex and detailed work and involves Building Standards team working with the emergency services to inspect each home.
The council are also continuing to provide targeted support for those whose homes remain unsafe.
Leader of South Ayrshire Council, Councillor Peter Henderson said: “I know that council teams, the emergency services and partners have been working tirelessly to help as many people as possible to return to their homes.
“This is no easy task and I am relieved that their painstaking work has allowed some families to get back home today. Of course, it’s still very early days and the devastation caused by this tragic event will take considerable time to rectify.
“We are committed to working alongside our communities and partners to support them through the aftermath of this terrible event.”
We pay for your stories and videos! Do you have a story or video for The Scottish Sun? Email us at email@example.com or call 0141 420 5300

domain: news


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With the IPL6 round the corners, reports are on about the Bollywood stars performing in the opening ceremony which is to be organized at the Salt Lake Stadium in Kolkata on 2nde April 2013.
The Telegraph quoted the co-owner of Kolkata Knight Riders Juhi Chawla as saying, “As of last night, its Jennifer Lopez…apart from her, we have our superstars…one to ghar ka jo hai, unko to dance karayenge hi (superstar in question: Shah Rukh Khan). Deepika (Padukone) and Katrina (Kaif) will also be there.”
Kolkata Knight Riders will host the opening ceremony of IPL6 as they were the winners last year.
Find out more by clicking on the following slides
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Shah Rukh Khan is the co-owner of Kolkata Knight Riders.
Jennifer Lopez is expected to give an electrifying performance at the opening ceremony.


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TCP Corporate Group established Hainan Red Bull Energy Drink Co. Ltd. in 1993, in Hainan province, ancestral homeland of Yoovidhya family. Hainan Red Bull manufactures Red Bull – named Hong Niu in Chinese. In response to the drink’s increasing popularity, Mr. Chaleo and his family established Red Bull Vitamin Drink Co. Ltd. (RBVC) in 1995 with other shareholders in order to serve Red Bull to Chinese consumers nationwide. In May 2020, TCP Group invested more than USD 150 million to expand Red Bull operations in China included new products launch from Red Bull and other innovative products from the brands under TCP Group. TCP Group is now continually launching Red Bull's new products in China.
Domestic manufactured Red Bull, “Red Bull® Vitamin Taurine Drink and “Red Bull® Vitamin Flavor Drink” give the opportunity for Chinese people to try the original taste of Red Bull which imported from its origin, Thailand.

domain: economics


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against opponents have a long and sordid history. Do you really want to go down this path? Don't you remember what has happened to Jews throughout history. Scapegoating, stereotyping, discrimination, have all been the result of such witch hunts. You should know better. If someone has broken a law, prosecute with what remains of your compromised justice system. Don't persecute those who disagree with your policies.
Clashes between IDF and protesters in Bethlehem and East Jerusalem (Reuters)
from the article: Knesset votes to probe Israeli groups accused of 'delegitimizing' IDF

domain: law


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Draconomicon I: Chromatic Dragons describes several varieties of dragons, including red, blue, green, black, and white dragons, as well as three new chromatic. Draconomicon I: Chromatic Dragons describes several varieties of dragons. from $ 14 Used from $ 10 New from $ 1 Collectible from $ . I misplaced my notes at one point, had to re-make a good third of the PDF Draconomicon I: Chromatic Dragons focuses solely on the three.
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Shattered Lands Dark Sun: Perhaps once there were many, but over the years, in-fighting and fighting the younger races have taken their toll.
Draconomicon I: Chromatic Dragons
Except for the youngest dragons, they tend to be quite large—usually at least as big as a horse, and often much larger. Examples of lesser dragons include dragon turtles and wyverns.
May Learn how and when to remove this template message. Almost all species of dragon are highly intelligent at least as intelligent as a human being and are able to speak.
Draconomicon: Chromatic Dragons | D&D4 Wiki | FANDOM powered by Wikia
Guildmasters’ Guide to Ravnica. The “lung dragons” or spirit-dragons of Oriental Adventures are also true dragons.
Magic Gift Pack Dragons are apart from civilization, which is mostly concentrated on the continent of Khorvaire. V Extra Booster 4: The dragons used to rule over Eberron many centuries ago, but at the end of the Dragon-Fiend war, against the demons and devils of Khyber, they departed from Khorvaire to go to Argonnessen.
Wake of the Ravager Dark Sun Online: Pokemon Lost Thunder Out Now! Sony PlayStation 2 PS2.
Draconomicon I: Chromatic Dragons – The Arcane Athenæum
Two comedic dragons that appeared in Dragon Magazine For example, a red dragon fire will have some control over fires. Views Read Edit View history.
They are known as Dragon Overlords. For good-aligned dragons, this may only mean they often consider humanoid races as children, trying to take care of them and educate them; for evil-aligned dragons, they consider humanoids as mere animals, or as toys to play with; at best, they are minions and slaves.
V Trial Deck 5: As far as senses, which vary slightly depending on species, they are superior in most ways to other creatures; like any predator, they have exceptionally acute senses, which only increase with age. Retrieved 27 January Steel dragonsoriginally known as Greyhawk dragons, are a those originating in the World of Greyhawk campaign settinglater appearing in other settings like the Forgotten Realms. Retrieved from ” https: The authors described the ancient dragons as “the most powerful versions of these majestic and deadly creatures, and the ancient blue dragon approaches the pinnacle of all dragon-kin”, surpassed only by the red dragon.
There are only a half dozen dragons known to be left. The hierarchy, from highest to lowest, is iron, chromium, cobalt, tungsten, and nickel. Where dtagons, incorporate items into the main body of the article. These dragons appear to have a particularly malevolent nature to them. The cloud dragon, the Greyhawk dragon, the mist dragon, and the shadow dragon appeared in the Monstrous Compendium Chromatif Appendix

domain: hobby


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The Detox Reset programme is a transformative journey of inner growth and wellbeing
10th November, 2022: Luxury longevity and wellness destination Clinique La Prairie has launched a new programme that continues to offer a holistic and scientific approach to the management of inner growth and wellbeing.
Supervised by medical and leading experts, the programme combines four longevity pillars – movement, nutrition, wellness and medical – to kick-start a healthier lifestyle.
The brand-new five-day Detox Reset promises an easy-access, much-needed recharge. At the core of the expert detox diet plan, this programme focuses on the scientific-driven purification of the body and mind, and delivers the keys of essential nutritional ingredients to be integrated in a daily routine at home.
The transformative journey
The new Detox Reset programme uncovers mental and physical wellbeing through diagnostic procedures and therapeutic treatments. With a focus on natural methods for the purification of the body and mind and nutritional processes to boost gut microbiome, guests will discover a greater sense of purpose and fulfilment through achieving a rested body and a reformed mental balance.
The Detox Reset programme combines these four key dimensions to eliminate toxins and activate the body’s self-healing ability, boost energy, regain inner balance, and ultimately kick-start a healthier lifestyle.

domain: medical


Queensland’s Energy Minister Mark Bailey yesterday announced in a media release that “A formidable team of business, energy, and environmental experts will lead the public inquiry into establishing Queensland’s 50% renewable energy target by 2030.” Being led by a former Macquarie investment banker, the team certainly has some claim to being labelled formidable, but it will struggle with the task set for it by the Government, to “investigate and identify the pathway to adopting the target.” The problem the Taskforce faces is that there is no credible path for Queensland achieving this target by 2030. My strong feeling is that this is not enough time for the more than 5X increase in renewable energy generation required, even if one makes optimistic assumptions about the uptake of battery technology to store solar energy captured from rooftops.
Of course, the Government probably does not even care its target is unachievable, as there is only the remotest possibility it will still be in power in 2030. It appears to have set an unachievable feel good target for political purposes, knowing it will not be held accountable for missing the target in 2030. I actually hope the Government is this cynical, because it means they are less likely to enact costly policies (e.g. solar power subsidies) in pursuit of the ridiculous 50% target.
Finally, another major problem is that the Government is assuming its 50% renewable energy target is desirable in the first place, that it helps us meet our energy needs in the most cost-effective way (accounting for externalities such as any greenhouse gas-induced climate change, of course). I cannot find any research produced by or commissioned by the Government that proves this is the case. The Government needs to make a much stronger case for its renewable energy target, particularly given it goes far beyond the 20% target (for 2020) that was once set at the national level.


The European Commission has today launched a dedicated IT tool, on the ground of articles 34-40 Reg. (EC) No 882/2004, known as the Administrative Assistance and Cooperation (AAC) system to facilitate the exchange of administrative information between national authorities working to combat cross-border violations in Europe.
In the wake of the horsemeat scandal of 2013, the Commission developed an action plan to strengthen controls of the food supply chain. One of these measures was to set up a pan-European mechanism to ensure the rapid exchange of information between national authorities and the Commission in cases of suspected food fraud cases. As a result, the European Food Fraud Network (FFN) was born and tasked with handling requests for cross-border cooperation. Each Member State has appointed a contact point to handle requests from contact points in the other Member States that form part of the network. This network has been operational since July 2013 and since its creation, the Commission has observed a marked increase in the number of exchanges from 30 in 2013 to 90 so far in 2015, adding up to 180 cases in total since its creation.
Cross border cooperation helps to improve the capability of national authorities to:
- detect and prevent cross border breaches of EU food chain rules; and if necessary
- collect the information that is needed to refer a case for further investigation and to ensure appropriate enforcement action
The AAC system will ensure that the Food Fraud Network works even more efficiently and is able to respond more swiftly to information requests.
The Activity Report of the FFN for 2014 reveals that exchanges on suspected frauds mostly relate to mislabelling (for instance with regard to date marking, adding water or ingredients), falsified certification and/or documents and substitution, such as replacement of a higher value species with a lower value species (for example substituting pollock for cod). Importantly, however, statistical conclusions cannot be drawn from these data given that Member States may also exchange information outside of the FFN and that cases which do not have a cross-border dimension, i.e. which occur at purely national level, are not exchanged via the Network.
Next steps and main issues
The system will be used in the first phase by the Food Fraud Network. At a later stage, it will be made available also to the liaison bodies working on cases of Administrative Assistance and Cooperation not related to fraudulent practices.
The details about the AAC systems are provided by Commission Implementing Decision (EU) No 2015/1918, establishing the Administrative Assistance and Cooperation system (‘AAC system’) pursuant to Regulation (EC) No 882/2004 of the European Parliament and of the Council on official controls performed to ensure the verification of compliance with feed and food law, animal health and animal welfare rules, published on the Official Journal of the European Union on 22nd October 2015.
Key points for a smooth functioning of the systems will be:
- coordination with other existing IT systems, namely RASFF and TRACES;
On the first point, the whereas (9) of the Decision is clear:
“In certain cases, information concerning non-compliance with food or feed law is disseminated by and among the competent authorities in the Member States through the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF), established in accordance with Regulation (EC) No 178/2002 of the European Parliament and of the Council , and through the Trade Control and Expert System (TRACES), established by Commission Decision 2004/292/EC. In order to avoid unnecessary duplication, that information should be made available through the AAC system to the liaison bodies designated in accordance with Regulation (EC) No 882/2004, so that the Member State notifying that information to the RASFF or TRACES is not required to upload the same information onto the AAC system for the purposes of administrative assistance and cooperation. Accordingly, the RASFF and TRACES applications should be enabled to provide data to the AAC system in order to streamline the process.”
Regarding data protection and security, art. 10-12 provide a general framework, which is well summarized in the whereas (13) of the Decision. These provisions are necessary to ensure an effective investigative and prosecution activity:
“Where the exchange of information provided for in Regulation (EC) No 882/2004 and in this Decision involves the processing of personal data, a careful assessment should be carried out to ensure that the processing is strictly necessary to achieve the purposes of efficient administrative assistance and cooperation, and that such processing is in accordance with the national provisions implementing Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council and with Regulation (EC) No 45/2001 of the European Parliament and of the Council.
Where exemptions and restrictions of certain rights of the data subjects and obligations of the data controller laid down by Directive 95/46/EC and Regulation (EC) No 45/2001 are considered in order to safeguard the interests referred to in Article 13(1)(d) and (f) of Directive 95/46/EC and in Article 20(1)(a) and (e) of Regulation (EC) No 45/2001, those exemptions and restrictions may only be adopted if they are necessary and proportionate to the objective pursued.
Restrictions to the rights of data subjects should constitute a necessary measure to prevent interference with the official control tasks of the competent authorities and with the assessment of compliance with food law or feed law.
In particular, rights of the data subjects may be restricted, in accordance with Directive 95/46/EC and Regulation (EC) No 45/2001, during the period in which actions are carried out for the purpose of sighting or discrete surveillance, where granting them would jeopardise or undermine the purpose of official controls or investigations.
In order to guarantee a high level of data protection, it is appropriate to establish a maximum timeframe to ensure that personal data do not remain in the AAC system longer than it is necessary to achieve compliance with the rules laid down in Title IV of Regulation (EC) No 882/2004. In particular, a retention period of 5 years, starting from the closure of the administrative assistance and cooperation procedure, should be established, after which time personal data should be removed from the AAC system. The length of the retention period is necessary to give the possibility to the liaison bodies and the Commission to consult the information over a sufficient period of time after the administrative assistance and cooperation procedure has been closed, in order to ascertain the timely identification of reoccurring, connected or widespread non-compliance with food or feed law.”


RATINGS & REVIEWS
Finally a ball repair tool that really works!!!
Made primarily of stainless steel this one-action device not only repairs ball marks properly it does it very fast. By pushing down on the handle, two multi prong teeth first project into the turf in a wedge format. As they go deeper the wedge width closes in and finally towards the bottom of the stroke the teeth become parallel.
This intricate series of actions pulls the turf towards itself lifting it back into place. Final tamping completes the repair. The Klaw performs the most frequently recommended motion to repair ball marks. Repair speed is estimated between 15 - 20 in about two minutes.
Great for weaving plugs back into green.


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An unusually high-calibre group of startups debuted at VCIR, which is billed as Colorado's largest and longest-running tech conference.
At the VCIR conference to showcase the mountain region's startups, Colarado's governor spoke about his state's commitment to tech. In a private meeting with the press, he stressed his mission to turn Colorado into the most pro-business state without jeopardizing its natural beauty.
Editor's Pick Boulder's startup scene is booming right now. Here are 10 innovative companies that exemplify what is happening there.
Are you in the Boulder, Colorado area and have the next big disruptive tech idea?
If so, you’ll want to apply to join a special meetup we are hosting with one of Boulder’s most respected venture capitalists, Foundry Group.
Sun Microsystems co-founder and former CEO Scott McNealy is taking an unconventional approach to launching his new startup: He’s using little more than Twitter to publicize it.
McNealy’s new startup is called WayIn and the company’s website is essentially barren …


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Read an Excerpt from Dan Szczesny's New Book
I've been thinking a lot about music, baby. When you were still in your mom's belly, we'd listen to Dylan and the Beatles and Miles Davis. Three years later, you still perk up at the sound of a trumpet or saxophone. You even own a little plastic horn, yellow and orange and green.
In a month, you'll begin attending dance classes (I could have sworn you were crawling last week).
But your exposure and love of music came into better definition for me over the weekend when


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Flowers are an asset to every garden. They’re pretty, yes. But planting flowers serves another purpose: They attract bees and other pollinators to your garden. Flowers that attract bees and other pollinators are a great addition to the home garden. They attract the good guys, the pollinators who will help make sure that the blossoms on your fruits and vegetables set fruit. Planting perennial flowers for bees means that they’ll be a food source for pollinators for years.
What is a pollinator?
By definition, a pollinator is an insect or small mammal that helps to pollinate plants. This can mean the honeybee that we’re all so familiar with, but butterflies, moths, and hummingbirds are pollinators that you might see in your garden. Even ants can move pollen from flower to flower, encouraging pollination.
Living organisms — including your vegetable plants and fruit crops — have a single goal in mind. They want to reproduce and create offspring. In the plant world, this means making seeds. Your zucchini plant isn’t developing that huge crop of squash so you’ll have dinner every night. It’s end goal is to create seeds to complete the life cycle. (Gardeners can help this life cycle by saving seeds from year to year.)
Pollination occurs when pollen grains are transferred from the male anther of a flower to the female stigma. When that pollination results in successful fertilization, seeds or fruit begin to develop. (See more on pollination here.)
While some pollination can occur as the wind blows pollen around, the odds increase when the pollen is moved around by your friendly neighborhood bees and butterflies, wasps, and other insects.
We want to invite these pollinators into the garden by planting flowers for bees and other insects!
Flowers for bees
Bees and other pollinators feed on pollen and nectar. As more and more land is developed, the food sources for bees diminish. This can lead to exhaustion as they have to fly further afield to find a good source of food. Planting flowers for bees in your garden provides what they need to survive, makes your garden beautiful, and attracts pollinators who will help fertilize your crops.
Opting for perennial flowers that attract bees
Annual flowers are planted in the spring, we enjoy them for a season, and they die off when the weather turns. Perennial plants are those that survive in the garden for a number of years. This means less work for you! With plentiful blossoms that are particularly enticing to bees, the perennial plants listed below are great for tucking into edges near your vegetable garden to attract pollinators.
And at a time when our honeybee population is struggling, offering them a little bit of a buffet in your backyard by planting flowers for bees seems like a good thing to do!
Be sure to consider adding native plant material to your yard to attract native bees, too. This will vary by location; ask at your local nursery or cooperative extension office for their recommendations.
Also known as coneflower, you might be more familiar with echinacea as a health supplement. Turns out, that supplement is made from this plant that sports gorgeous pink flowers that attract bees. Echinacea has a somewhat flat, pink flower that is also attractive to butterflies. More on how to grow echinacea here.
This is not the neon-bright geranium your grandma used to grow. Cranesbill geraniums are delicate looking, low-growing perennials with flowers that attract bees with their pink and purple blooms.
While humans are generally more interested in the leaves of mint, it’s the flowers for bees. Mint can be invasive, though — be sure to plant it in an area where it can run rampant or in a pot where it will remain contained.
This low growing perennial attracts pollinators with purple or pink flowers that seem to float above the leaves on long stems. The flat shape of the flowers are especially welcoming to butterflies. It’s a long blooming flower, producing blooms all summer long.
They’re a great cut flower, too — just be sure to leave some for the bees and butterflies.
There are both annual and perennial varieties of salvia, ranging in color from a beautiful blue purple to a bright red. They all produce flowers that attract bees, but if you choose a perennial variety you’ll enjoy the benefits for many seasons.
Commonly known as Bee Balm, Monarda is a member of the mint family well-known as good flowers for bees. In addition to attracting pollinators to your garden, Monarda can be used to flavor drinks and is used medicinally. There are both annual and perennial varieties of bee balm with many different types of flowers that attract bees.
You know this as a go-to herb in your spice cupboard, but the small flowers on thyme are very attractive to bees. Thyme grows low; try the variety “Mother of Thyme” for a great ground cover that will make the bees happy and be useful to you as well.
You know it for its fragrance; bees love it for the flowers. The flowers differ in shape from variety to variety, but all are attractive to honey bees. Lavender is also considered a culinary herb and can be used to flavor some of your kitchen creations.
There are many, many varieties of aster to choose from, but they’re all on the list of flowers that attract bees. The star-shaped flowers come in purples, pinks, and whites and often bloom in the fall, making it a great nectar source when many springtime flowers have stopped blooming.
Grown for its many medicinal benefits, the flat flower clusters of yarrow are a favorite landing spot for butterflies as well as bees. It’s an easy to grow, low maintenance perennial that tolerates heat and drought well, too.
Buckwheat is not a perennial; in fact, it’s a very fast to bloom annual that’s kaput in just a couple of months. But when it come to flowers that attracts bees, buckwheat does it — and quickly — with its abundant white flowers. I highly recommend that you add it to your repertoire. Read about my success with buckwheat here.
Originally published September, 2014; this post has been updated.

domain: agronomy


The new DYS XM20A V1 ESCs are specially designed for high KV power racing motors. The small size and integrated solder pads make for a cleaner and easier installation and are matched perfectly with the new DYS MR2204/ 2205-2300KV brushless racing motors.
- Input voltage: 3-4s Lipo
- BEC: NO
- Size(mm): 24L*14W*4.5H
- Type: BLHeli Bootloader & Firmware
- Weight: 5.0g


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I have a sculptor friend who is looking for a place to purchase armature for a bird sculpture. I wondered if anyone on the listserv has knowledge of any such company who does this. She will work in clay over it, and the final piece is in bronze.
If you know of any, or have questions, please contact me Off List.
Thank you very much,
Linda M. Feltner Artist, LLC
P.O. Box 325
Hereford, AZ 85615


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outpatient rehab Ventura
Inpatient Vs. Outpatient Rehab Ventura Centers: How to Choose
Choosing the right path to recovery from addiction is crucial for long-term success. Channel Islands Rehab, a full-service addiction recovery facility, offers a range of therapies and detox programs to help individuals overcome addiction. As you consider your options, it’s essential to understand the differences between inpatient and outpatient rehab Ventura programs. In this article, we’ll help you choose the right path by exploring six key aspects of each addiction recovery Ventura program.
–Level of Support and Supervision
Inpatient rehab programs provide 24-hour support and supervision, creating a structured environment where individuals can focus solely on their recovery. Outpatient rehab Ventura programs, on the other hand, allow patients to continue their daily lives while attending therapy sessions and support groups. If you require a high level of support and structure, inpatient rehab might be a better fit.
–Intensity of Treatment
Inpatient programs offer an immersive experience, with intensive therapy sessions and daily activities designed to address addiction and co-occurring disorders. Outpatient rehab Ventura programs provide a more flexible approach, with therapy sessions scheduled around your personal and professional commitments. If you can manage your addiction with a less intensive treatment plan, outpatient rehab might be the right choice.
–Duration of Treatment
Inpatient rehab typically lasts for a minimum of 28 days, providing enough time for individuals to break free from the cycle of addiction and develop new coping skills. Outpatient rehab Ventura programs vary in duration, with some lasting several months or more. Consider the time commitment required for each program when making your decision.
–Cost and Insurance Coverage
Inpatient rehab programs tend to be more expensive than outpatient rehab Ventura programs due to the level of care and accommodations provided. However, many insurance plans cover addiction recovery services, and some even cover the full cost of inpatient rehab. Make sure to verify your insurance coverage and explore payment options before deciding on a program.
Family support is crucial for long-term recovery success. Inpatient rehab programs often include family therapy sessions and visitation opportunities to keep families involved in the recovery process. Outpatient rehab Ventura programs may also offer family counseling, but they typically allow for greater flexibility and involvement in the patient’s life. Consider the level of family support you need when choosing a program.
–Aftercare and Relapse Prevention
Both inpatient and outpatient rehab Ventura programs should offer aftercare services to support patients in maintaining sobriety. These may include follow-up appointments, support groups, and ongoing therapy. Ensure the program you choose has a strong focus on aftercare and relapse prevention.
Many Paths to Recovery
Remember, there are many paths to recovery, and finding the right program is crucial for your success. Consider your unique needs and circumstances when choosing between inpatient and outpatient rehab Ventura centers. Channel Islands Rehab is committed to helping you find the perfect program for you, with various therapies and detox options available.
- Inpatient rehab provides 24-hour support and supervision, while outpatient rehab allows for greater flexibility.
- Consider the level of support, intensity of treatment, duration, cost, family involvement, and aftercare when choosing a program.
- Call Channel Islands Rehab Today
If you or a loved one is struggling with addiction, don’t hesitate to reach out to Channel Islands Rehab, one of the leading addiction recovery centers Ventura. Our recovery specialists are here to help you determine the best course of action for your unique situation. Call us today or request immediate placement into our program and start your journey towards a healthier, addiction-free life.

domain: psychology


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Our Ashby Gym
With a focus on wellbeing and community, it is no wonder we are the longest established gym in Ashby de la Zouch. We have everything you need for a full workout all contained within a fun and friendly gym environment.
A range of group exercise classes including Yoga, Pilates, Spin, HIIT and Zumba. From conditioning and energising cardiovascular workouts to relaxing your mind and body, we have a class to suit you.
Whether you are an absolute beginner, have limited gym experience or an experienced gym goer, everyone can benefit from personal training, We will tailor your plan to your specific ability lifestyle and goals
You are in good company
Over 200 five star reviews on Google and Facebook
If you walk into most gyms these days you will notice that the landscape has changed… for the better. Gone are the days when they are full of muscly men, grunting away, with their tops off and bulging biceps. Nowadays, you will see just as many women amongst the free weights and resistance machines as…
In this article we are going to focus on the triceps muscle. The triceps muscle is the large muscle at the back of the upper arm. It has 3 heads – the long, lateral and medial head (hence Tri) and is attached to the shoulder blade and elbow joint. The triceps muscle is used to…
Why should you keep fit?Everyone should keep their body, inside and outside, in the best condition they can. This can drastically reduce your chances of developing serious medical problems like heart disease, diabetes, and strokes. Exercise delivers oxygen and nutrients around the body helping it to be more efficient. Your muscles and bones become stronger…
This month I’m answering some of the most frequently asked questions in fitness, dispelling a few myths along the way! If I’m not sweating, I’m not working hard enough?False. Sweating is not always an indicator of hard work, but merely the body’s way of cooling itself down. Think of a hot day, you may end…
Whether you’re a complete beginner or a “new-starter”, you might be wondering how physical activity will impact you and your health. Well, there is some great news! Exercising will not only change your lifestyle but will also have some amazing health benefits that you’ll see and feel on your body from head to toe.
The new year is here already, and for many of us, new fitness goals for 2022 will be top of the list. In fact, over 40% of UK adults will vow to ‘exercise more’, with many saying they want to lose weight and to take a more proactive approach to health.

domain: sports


In Teamflect, you can now prevent task owners from making changes to the due date, title, or description of their assigned tasks. This feature ensures that task information remains consistent and accurate.
Here's a quick guide on how to implement this restriction:
Step 1: Access the Tasks Module
Open the Teamflect app and navigate to the "Tasks" module.
Step 2: Create a New Task
Click on the "New task" button to create a new task.
Step 3: Define the Task
Enter the task details, including the title, description, due date, checklist, and recurrence rules (if needed).
Step 4: Lock for Editing
Scroll down to find the setting labeled "Lock for editing."
Step 5: Activate the Restriction
Toggle the button to enable the restriction. This action will prevent the task owner from editing the task's due date, title, or description after it has been assigned to them.
Beneficial Use Cases
Maintain Consistency: Ensure that task details remain consistent and reliable throughout the task's lifecycle.
Deadline Integrity: Prevent accidental changes to due dates, helping to meet project deadlines effectively.
Task Clarity: Keep task titles and descriptions intact, avoiding confusion and miscommunication.
Accountability: Encourage accountability by maintaining the original task information.
By following these simple steps, you can enhance task management within Teamflect by restricting task owners from editing critical task details after assignment, promoting accuracy, and accountability.


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Album Review: The Grates – Dream Team2 min read
Aussie indie/rock three-piece The Grates sell out venues and blow their audiences away with their energetic live show, it’s no wonder that they are one of the nation’s favourite acts in their genre; as well as a decent gig, we love a good album, and the group have released three solid LP’s previously (Gravity Won’t Get You High, Teeth Lost, Hearts Won, and Secret Rituals)-the group also own a cafe! Now the award winning trio return with their fourth album, Dream Team, and our expectations are high!
Opener Call Me is bouncy, the bass line is addictive and the guitar parts are to die for, not to mention it’s refreshing to hear Patience’s voice once again; Holiday Home is different, a punchy bass and the kick introduce the track with some clean vocal work, this was until the song launched itself into a roar of a chorus, a sound you will instantly dig. 7-Eleven is more vocally laid back than the former, airily introducing the track, the instrumentation remains as full as ever; however, not all tracks prove to be as captivating as each other, Dirty Hands doesn’t get interesting until the last few lines. It’s not long though before our attention is regained, It Won’t Hurt Anymore consists of an in depth atmosphere that surrounds you; Wild One brings out the energy and enthusiasm we’ve grown to love from The Grates, it would make for a decent single release.
I’m Staying is a lighter note the album has expressed so far, even when the group downscale their sound they still manage to reel you in; Friends With Scum is pretty short, but not sweet, it’s bitter but in a great way with its explosive ending. What’s Wrong With You is a wonderful little indie ballad with some notable vocal work and a perfect arrangement, it’s too short though and you don’t want it to end; I Wish I Was Alone brings back the full sound with some uptempo drum work and a melody that keeps you on your toes, but is short lived at a mere one minute and fifty seconds in duration. Lastly, Back To Black brings the album to a mixed close, beginning at a slower pace but picking up later on to finish up on their trademark enthusiasm.
The Grates have continued to impress with Dream Team, it has their brand written and delivered throughout its entirety; the overall sound of the album is enticing, they are certainly in an element of their own making. The only thing that could be picked on if necessary was the shortness of songs you wanted to hear more of, particularly What’s Wrong With You and I Wish I Was Alone. All in all, a great new effort by The Grates!


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Feb 7, 2013
Tailgate 2012 celebrates the tradition
A pre-game pep rally featuring the Wolfpack mascots and band. An abundance of great food. Fun and fellowship with CALS alumni, friends and faculty. Generous scoops of Howling Cow ice cream. And an array of College exhibits with everything from face-painting to reptile encounters. It was all there Sept. 15 as the Wolfpack faithful filled Dorton Arena on the N.C. State Fairgrounds at the 21st annual College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Tailgate.


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A new group of Sunraysia farmers will soon join the latest batch of recruits to the Andrews Labor Government’s Young Farmers Business Bootcamp program, giving young farmers an opportunity to innovate and build on their business skills.
Minister for Agriculture Jaclyn Symes today announced that Agriculture Victoria will run two two-day agribusiness skills courses in August and September at SuniTAFE’s Cardross SMART farm campus.
The courses have been well attended across other parts of the state, with young horticulturalists in the Mallee now being invited to come forward and build on their skills.
This bootcamp will focus on upskilling young growers and those new to managing a horticulture business in the Sunraysia area.
The business side of the workshop will make sure participants walk away with cash-flow budgeting skills, a strong understanding of risk management and planning skills to fine-tune their business goals.
The bootcamp will be delivered by Gavin Beever, principal consultant with Cumbre Consultants, and hosted by Agriculture Victoria with support from LaunchVic, Mildura Regional Partnership, SuniTAFE and Northern Mallee Leaders.
Agriculture Victoria is further supporting the next generation of young farmers through initiatives such as stamp duty exemptions, the Young Farmer Scholarship Program, the Young Farmer Advisory Council and the Young Farmer Business Network website.
The Mallee bootcamp will run on Tuesday, 27 August and Tuesday, 17 September. Find out more at agriculture.vic.gov.au.
Quotes attributable to Minister for Agriculture Jaclyn Symes
“The Young Farmer Business Bootcamp program is about building the next generation of resilient, business-savvy farmers.”
“We are proud to be giving young farm owners and managers the skills to tackle the current conditions and think ahead to the longer-term goals of their business.”
Reviewed 19 August 2020


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While BJ was being crafty in the house, I headed out to the garage to work on a puzzle cache. I've had a really nice piece of old, straight-grained fir in my stock for years. It's too heavy for boat building, but was going to be perfect for this project. Two pieces that appear to be nailed together.
With that great wood, I wanted it to be protected from the weather so I built a two story "bird house" to protect it from the weather.
All of the bird house is built from 1/4" Baltic birch that was then varnished to seal it.
Each spot for a nail was counter-sunk and painted red and then the blocks were finished with three coats of clear varnish.
They look like nails because they are - but almost every one was cut short so that they were only for show. The counter sunk concept was to try to keep cachers from trying to use a claw hammer.
Buried inside is a bison tube enclosing the log.
I'd give more details but no sense giving the rest of the design away.
The final product - more or less. It's found a home in a tree near a park, and is seeing some activity. It's always fun to see what the cachers say in their log comments.


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One of the most recognizable and best-selling K-Classic™ K55 Single-Serve K-Cup Pod Coffee Maker, the product blends original design and outstanding features into one popular package. The K-Classic™ coffee maker brews a delicious cup in under a minute at the touch of a button. With hundreds of delicious K-Cup® pod varieties – coffee, tea, hot cocoa, and iced beverages, there’s something for everyone to enjoy. Choose from multiple brew sizes – 6, 8, and 10 oz. – to create your...
‡Pre-Infusing: Pre-infusing is a technique where the dry coffee grounds are initially saturated with hot water, allowing a “bloom” of carbon dioxide to escape. This 45-second(ish) process puts hot water into contact with more surface area around each ground throughout the brewing process, as it’s no longer competing with the escaping gas bubbles. It can improve the quality of the final product, since this more uniform contact creates a more even extraction. It’s a feature that six of the 10 pots we tested incorporated into their designs — as well as all four of our top picks.
“Small things CAN bring you joy. My recent purchase of this Zojirushi coffee maker has made me very happy. Sounds like a commercial, but consider this … Last year, I bought a more expensive coffee maker that made terrible coffee! Instead of using the machine, I started making pour-overs. Something I hate to do … A year and a bunch of customer reviews later, I ordered this new baby, and I am so happy, I am writing about it here. I don’t know if it’s the water filter that water passes through or the fact that the water is introduced to the coffee a little bit differently, but the result is what I consider a perfect cup of coffee.”
Here at the Strategist, we like to think of ourselves as crazy (in the good way) about the stuff we buy (like pillows), but as much as we’d like to, we can’t try everything. Which is why we have People’s Choice, in which we find the best-reviewed (that’s four-to-five-star reviews and lots of ‘em) products and single out the most convincing. While we’ve written about coffee machines, coffee grinders, even gifts for coffee lovers, here, we’ve gone deep on the best espresso machines on Amazon, according to the people. (Note that reviews have been edited for length and clarity.)
Access the world of coffee for inspiration. The De’Longhi combination coffee espresso machine allows you to use either coffee pods for a speedy messfree espresso, or freshly ground beans if you prefer your coffee brewed the traditional way. Espresso is delivered straight to the cup in seconds, perfect every time. The distinct sign of an ideal espresso is its ‘crema’, a creamy, toffee-colored layer that seals in flavor. Your De’Longhi espresso machine will deliver a crema that reflects the quality of the espresso, and the machine that made it. Fancy topping your espresso with a sweet milk foam? It’s easy to brew creamy lattes and velvety cappuccinos too, thanks to our patented cappuccino system frothers.
The machine itself is large, but not as monstrous as some of the other grinders I tested. It's also very bottom-heavy, which makes it feel more durable than other machines and means it won't rattle all over your counter while grinding. The heavy-duty translucent plastic collection cup generates less static cling than the glossy clear plastic cups I tested, and the chute that connects the burrs to the cup collects less debris than other models. Cleaning is simple: Just remove the top burr and use the included wire brush to remove residual grounds.
CR’s take: If you’re an aficionado of fresh ground coffee, this Black+Decker is the brewer to buy. As the name suggests, the Mill & Brew goes that extra mile, grinding whole coffee beans just before brewing. As a result, the machine is capable of making a great pot of coffee. Made of plastic with stainless steel accents, this model is easy to use and to clean, earning a Very Good rating in our convenience tests. It allows you to adjust brew strength, and it’s programmable, so you can set it to grind and brew just before you wake up.
For hundreds of years, making a cup of coffee was a simple process. Roasted and ground coffee beans were placed in a pot or pan, to which hot water was added, followed by attachment of a lid to commence the infusion process. Pots were designed specifically for brewing coffee, all with the purpose of trying to trap the coffee grounds before the coffee is poured. Typical designs feature a pot with a flat expanded bottom to catch sinking grounds and a sharp pour spout that traps the floating grinds. Other designs feature a wide bulge in the middle of the pot to catch grounds when coffee is poured.
CR’s take: The Cuisinart Coffee on Demand is a self-serve model. It stores 12 cups of brewed coffee in a reservoir and has a dispenser instead of a carafe. It makes sense in homes where people are drinking coffee at different times; it keeps coffee hot and ready, so family and guests can fill their own cups. This model is programmable and features a water filter and a cleaning indicator. The reservoir can be removed for washing. In our tests, the Coffee on Demand performs quite well, receiving a Very Good rating for convenience. At less than $100, it can be a terrific choice for entertaining.
This coffee and espresso machine from Miele is designed for ultimate convenience. Its control panel lets you choose from a variety of popular espresso drinks, and it can also be used to brew a pot of your favorite coffee. There’s even a built-in grinder with five settings so you get freshly ground beans every time. You can adjust the coffee strength based on your personal tastes and even create four “user profiles” based on your preferences. Finally, the machine includes a hot water spout so you can quickly make a cup of tea — no kettle required.
Buy from the experts. The team at Whole Latte Love has been selling coffee and espresso equipment since 1997. We have hundreds of videos and blog posts including product reviews, side-by-side comparisons, buying guides, and tech tips so you can shop with confidence. You can also take advantage of our encyclopedic knowledge of coffee on our Support Wiki.
“This is the same coffee maker that I bought years ago. And it’s even the same price. Yep — they do still make things like they used to. And they last forever. It’s super simple, super reliable, compact, and cheap. There are a lot of places where we can spend money, but a simple cup of coffee doesn’t have to be one of them. Once you get the amount of water and coffee figured out to your taste — simply do that. No K-cup, nothing to recycle, fits the car cup holder. And the coffee stays hot in the mug.”
CR’s take: If you like the look of black stainless steel, you can add a hit of the trendy finish to your kitchen with the Bella Ultimate Elite Collection coffee maker. Appearance aside, this model brews a fresh pot in just 9 minutes and is graceful in action, earning strong ratings in our carafe handling tests. It offers programming, brew-strength control, a pause-and-serve feature, and auto-shutoff. Bella drip machines also received a Very Good rating for predicted reliability. At about $50, this affordable, attractive option won’t disappoint.

domain: food


Carpet odour causes can be as obvious as pet stains and as subtle as the grease laden steam coming from your kitchen. They all invite bacterial infestation that leads to a smelly carpet.
Carpet odour causes may be inevitable, but the process that perpetuates nasty smells can be controlled with a regular carpet cleaning and maintenance routine.
Mildew is the hardest carpet odour to clean. Mildew develops when water stains or floods the carpeted area. A mildewed carpet typically smells like moulded fabric. This type of stain requires a heavy cleaning and drying process. Once the carpet becomes mildewed, it may be impossible to remove the stains and smells from the underlying padding.
Household pets are a leading cause of carpet odour. This can typically be attributed to the pet hair, urine, and dirt the animals bring into the home. Several cleaners can remove pet smells from carpets, and it is important to clean the soiled area as quickly as possible. This will limit the long-term damage to the carpet.
Tobacco smoke is another common cause of carpet odour. When a person smokes in a building, the smell of the smoke is trapped and causes the walls, draperies, and carpet to smell of smoke. This smell can be easily removed with a simple carpet-cleaning product.
Most of the problem is still present with the spilled material dried out but remaining in the carpet fibres. Now, here is why some lightly smelly carpet smell a lot worse after proper cleaning. Sometimes deep dusting and properly washing rugs doesn't remove old, inactive and dormant bacteria that are anchored to fibres. Adding water during washing process provides the opportunity for an explosion in growth of these bacteria, lots of gases being released and therefore lots of odours, more than prior to cleaning.
Dirt and motor oil can make a carpet the smell like petroleum. This smell is difficult to remove and often requires the replacement of the carpet and underlying pad. Dirty motor oil can permanently stain carpet and cause a foul gas smell. This odour will smell similar to the odour often found in car service stations.
Beer and alcohol can cause carpet to smell like a hospital. This is a difficult odour to remove from carpet and padding. If large amounts of beer or alcohol are spilled onto a carpet, it should be cleaned with a steam cleaner to ensure the stain is removed from the padding and carpet.
Old carpet has an odour similar to old rotting clothing. This dusty smell happens when the fabric in the carpet begins to break up and deteriorate. It usually is not possible to clean carpet odour out of old carpet, so typically, carpet that smells like this must be replaced. This type of carpet can cause excess dust in a home, which may lead to allergies.


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With all of the varieties available, shopping for apples can sometimes be overwhelming, especially when you need apples for a certain purpose. Today, while grocery shopping, my store was doing an “apple tasting” and handing out these charts. Handy!
Apples are now in season. In addition to tasting delicious, buying in-season produce is an easy way to save at the check-out, since supply and demand tells us that what’s more abundant is usually priced lower.
Especially in the fall, I eat at least one apple a day. My favorite varieties for snacking are: Honeycrisp, Jazz and Pink Lady. (I sampled the Cameo apples at the grocery and they were pretty good, too!)
Note: Of course, for Weight Watchers followers, fresh fruit is 0P+.


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domain: biology


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Federal prosecutors said they were “seeking detention” for Sam Bankman-Fried, asking a judge to revoke his bond after he shared documents with the New York Times that they allege were meant to harass a fellow executive from the FTX empire and potentially influence her testimony.
Sui Foundation Allocates Over $1M to 17 Emerging Projects
Ahmedabad authorities bust international drug ring with cryptocurrency links
Vitalik Buterin Explores Ethereum Protocol Enhancement Strategies
Ethereum Shanghai Upgrade: What you need to know
Why is Ethereum (ETH) price down today?
Nissan files 4 new web3 trademarks, trials sales in the metaverse
News from Twitter:


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Troy Based Ancor Automotive Software Innovation Hub Officially Opens
The brand-new workspace providing solutions for port logistics, mobility industry and battery solutions hosted an innovation panel and ribbon-cutting ceremony with Troy Mayor Ethan Baker.
Troy, Michigan, May 16, 2023 — Ancor Automotive, LLC, the leading Tier 1 Automotive supplier of data management and Automotive label solutions, officially opened its software innovation hub in a 2,000-square-foot space within its current global headquarters at 2360 Bellingham Drive in Troy. The Ancor Automotive Innovation Hub, which will attract high-tech talent and hire full-time employees to build software solutions to improve logistics, mobility and tracking for automotive companies throughout North America, was developed and created by Ancor’s visionary leader and CEO Jose L. Flores.
Flores welcomed Troy Mayor Ethan Baker, who provided welcoming remarks and officially kicked off the grand opening with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on May 11. Mayor Baker said he was extremely proud to celebrate the Innovation Hub as part of the greater Troy community. “We know this Innovation Hub will help set Ancor Automotive a part, which in turn will help set us a part in Metro Detroit,” Baker said.
One of the highlights of the grand opening celebration was a Michigan innovation panel taking place following the ribbon-cutting ceremony. Moderated by Ron Stefanski, host of DisruptED, the panel featured Senior Director of MICHauto Drew Coleman, Interim Chief Mobility Officer of Michigan’s Office of Future Mobility Kathryn Snorrason and CEO of GS3 Lisa Lunsford.
“The Ancor Software Innovation Hub is an example of how Michigan is leading in the battery and manufacturing space with the number of deals that are coming to Michigan, the number of jobs and investment,” Snorrason said. “We want companies to come to Michigan for their first step in innovation.”
Flores said the Innovation Hub will increase his organizational structure by 10%, create dozens of new jobs and ultimately develop software products to address his customers’ needs.
“As a long-established traditional company and with several external factors like the fast pace digitalization and the race to e-mobility we must adapt and stay ahead of this change as a leader in the industry,” Flores said. “Ancor is here to help all of our clients navigate this change, from battery manufacturers, established OEMs, to EV startups based in North America, as well as our vehicle manufacturers importing vehicles to the United States.”
The Ancor Automotive Innovation Hub will initially be focused on launching the Battery Passport a software solution for the tracking and management of critical information cradle to grave of the new electric batteries, along with its flagship product WEBVIEW, will take that headache away by knowing all the important information and elements of the new batteries.
The hub will also launch the Monroney Editor, which will allow automakers to edit documents on the fly to avoid wasting raw material and improve ordering accuracy. For example, an automaker may be importing a vehicle already on a boat to the U.S. However, the customer decides to add a roof rack. By the time the vehicle arrives to its port destination, the correct document will be available since the Monroney Editor allows users to edit documents in real time. This will save automakers time and money.
“These are examples of the great things that we are developing at Ancor as we are part of this race toward digitalization and e-mobility,” said Tom Schneider, Ancor Automotive vice president of Strategy and Business Development. “There is a lot of opportunity for traceability of components and solutions that we are taking advantage of.”
“Ancor Automotive’s Innovation Hub is important for the region, and Mr. Flores and his team are paving the way for modernizing the automotive industry,” said Glenn Stevens, executive director of MICHAuto, a mobility division of the Detroit Regional Chamber.
From economic development and workforce perspectives, Stevens said, Ancor Automotive is “on the forefront of a significant growth part of the (auto) industry.”
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domain: geography


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August 20, 2013
The menu says red snapper, but it’s actually tilapia. The white tuna, meanwhile, is really escolar, while the seabass is Antarctic toothfish.
Welcome to the wild world of modern seafood, where not everything is as it seems. New research is revealing that merchants and fish dealers often mislabel their product as an entirely different species to fetch a better price at market. A study realeased last week by UK researchers found that a number of species in the skate family are sold as “sting ray wings,” while a separate study produced in February by the group Oceana found that, of 1215 seafood samples from 674 restaurants and grocery stores in 21 U.S. states, a full third were mislabeled. In Chicago, New York, and Washington, DC, every single sushi bar that was tested was found to sell at least one mislabeled fish species.
How did the researchers figure all this out? Through the innovative use of DNA barcoding, in which a specific segment of genetic material (analogous to a product’s barcode) in a piece of fish is used to determine exactly which species it truly belongs to. For years, we had no real way of determining the true species of a piece of seafood—a filet of fish, after all, often looks like any other filet—but this new application of an existing scientific technique is rapidly becoming a crucial tool in combating seafood fraud.
Testing a piece of fish to determine its species is fairly straightforward—scientists perfected DNA barcoding years ago, albeit typically as part of other sorts of projects, like cataloging the complete assortment of species in a given ecosystem. Analyzing the DNA in a piece of fish is a relatively similar process.
To start, researchers acquire a piece of fish and freeze it, as fresher and better-preserved tissue samples generally yield more accurate results. Then, in the lab, they slice off a tiny piece of the sample for testing.
To extract and isolate the DNA from the tissue, scientists break open the cells—either physically, by grinding them or shaking them in a test tube filled with tiny beads, or chemically, by exposing them to enzymes that chew through the cell membrane. Next, they remove other components of the cell with various chemicals: proteases digest proteins, while RNAase digests RNA, an alternate form of genetic material that could cause errors in DNA testing if left in place.
Once these and other substances are removed, the remaining sample is put in a centrifuge, which spins it at high speed so that the densest component—in this case, DNA—is isolated at the bottom of the tube in a pellet. A variety of different approaches are currently used to sequence the DNA, but all of them achieve the same end—determining the sequence of base pairs (the building blocks of DNA that are unique to each organism), at one specific location in the fish’s genome. All fish of the same species share the same sequence at that location.
As part of broader DNA barcoding projects, other scientists have analyzed the sequence of base pairs at that same genetic location in thousands of pieces of fish tissue that can definitively linked to species. Thus, by comparing the genetic sequence in the mystery fish tissue to databases of other species’ known genetic sequences, such as FISH-BOL (which stands for Fish-Barcode Of Life and contains the barcodes of 9769 fish species so far), scientists can tell you if, say, the grouper you thought you were buying was actually Asian catfish.
Figuring out which species a piece of fish truly belongs to has significance that goes far beyond gastronomy. For one, cheaper fish species are most often substituted for more expensive ones: tilapia, which goes for around $2.09 per pound, is billed as red snapper, which can commonly fetch $4.49 per pound. (The fact that inexpensive fish is so commonly passed off as a pricier variety, while the reverse occurs much more rarely, indicates that intentional mislabeling by sellers is at play, rather than innocent misidentification.)
Additionally, species that are dangerously overfished and are on the verge of ecological collapse—such as orange roughy—are sometimes substituted for more environmentally-benign varieties. Customers that make the effort to choose sustainable types of seafood, in these cases, are thwarted by mislabeling.
Eating different species can also have vastly different effects on your own health. For one, different fish species can have different fat and calorie contents, so mislabeling can lead the nutrition-conscious astray. Moreover, certain species, like tilefish, are on the FDA’s “do not eat” list for sensitive groups of people (such as pregnant women) because of their high mercury content. The Oceana study, though, found several instances of tilefish being sold as red snapper. Perhaps even worse, 94 percent of the white tuna tested in the study was actually a fish called escolar, which has been found to contain a toxin that when ingested, even in small quantities, can cause severe diarrhea.
So, what to do? Testing the fish’s DNA at home is probably beyond most people’s capabilities. So to avoid being duped, Oceana recommends asking sellers lots of questions about a fish’s origin, scrutinizing the price—if a fish is being sold far below market value, it’s probably mislabeled as a different species—and buying whole fish at markets when possible.
August 12, 2013
Hawaiians knew the value of locally sourced foods decades before the term locavore became a buzzword at every Brooklyn, Portland and Northern California farmer’s market. Because of the 50th state’s isolation, Hawaii has always relied upon its easy access to bountiful local seafood to feed the islands. Seafood-heavy restaurant menus testify to this fact.
Many tourists, it turns out, view these colorful fish-filled menus as a great souvenir of their time in Hawaii. Over the years, thousands of pinched Hawaiian menus have found their way back to the mainland in suitcases and travel bags, only to wind up sitting on an attic shelf or stuffed into a drawer for the next 80-odd years. Kyle Van Houtan, an ecologist at Duke University and leader of NOAA’s Marine Turtle Assessment Program, realized the menus could serve a higher purpose than gathering dust. The stuff of breakfast, lunch and dinner plates, he realized, could potentially fill in gaps of historic records of fish populations by showing what species were around in a given year.
The basic premise is this–if a species of fish can be readily found in large enough numbers, then it’s likely to make it on restaurant menus. Van Houtan and colleagues tracked down 376 such menus from 154 different restaurants in Hawaii, most of which were supplied by private menu collectors.
The team compared the menus, printed between 1928 and 1974, to market surveys of fishermen’s catches in the early 20th century, and also to governmental data collected from around 1950 onward. This allowed the researchers to compare how well the menus reflected the kinds of fishes actually being pulled from the sea.
The menus, their comparative analyses revealed, did indeed closely reflect the varieties and amounts of fish that fishermen were catching during the years that data were available, indicating that the restaurants’ offerings could provide a rough idea of what Hawaii’s fisheries looked like between 1905 and 1950–a period that experienced no official data collection.
Prior to 1940, the researchers report in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, reef fish, jacks and bottom fish commonly turned up on menus. These include pink snapper, green snapper and amberjack. But that quickly changed after Hawaii received its statehood in 1959. By then, those once popular fishes appeared on fewer than 10 percent of menus. Some, such as Hawaiian flounder, Hawaiian grouper and Hawaiian barracuda disappeared from menus completely after 1960. In their place, large-bodied pelagic species, or those that live in deep open water such as tuna and swordfish, began to turn up served with a wedge of lemon. By 1970, these large pelagic fishes were on nearly every menu the team examined.
Diners’ changing tastes and preferences may explain part of this shift away from the nearshore and out to the deep sea, but the researchers think there is more to the story than foodie trends alone. Instead, this sudden shift likely reflects a decline in nearshore fish populations. Because both the early and later menus corroborate well with known fisheries data, the 1930s and 40s menus likely represent a boom in nearshore fisheries, with the 1950s menus standing in as a canary in the coal mine signaling the decline of those increasingly gobbled-up populations. “This helps us to fill in a large gap–between 1902 and 1948–in the official fishery records,” Van Houtan said in an email. “But it also shows that by the time Hawaii became a U.S. state, its inshore fish populations and reefs were in steep decline.”
Those species that disappeared from menus more than a century ago are still present today, but their populations around Hawaii remain too low to support targeted commercial fishing. Some of them are considered ecologically extinct, meaning that their abundance is so low that they no longer play a significant role in the environment. While a few of those species have returned to Hawaiian menus recently, they are usually imported from Palau, the Marshall Islands or the Philippines, rather than being fished from Hawaiian waters.
The menu trick can’t work for every animal in the sea. Populations dynamics of some species, such as shrimp and mollusks, cannot be inferred from the menus since those animals mostly came from mainland imports. On the other hand, other species, the researchers know, were fished at that time but are not reflected in the menus. Sea turtles, for example, used to be harvested commercially, but they were butchered and sold at local markets rather than at tourist trap restaurants.
Investigating past populations of turtles was in fact the motivation for this project. “Green turtles here nearly went extinct in the early 1970s, and lots of blame was put on increasing tourism and restaurant demand,” Van Houtan explains. He decided to examine just how much restaurants contributed to that near-miss for the green turtles, so he started collecting menus. However, he says, “we were in for a surprise.”
He and his colleagues first got ahold of 22 menus from the early 1960s, only to find that not a single listed turtle soup, turtle pie, turtle stir-fry or any other turtle-themed recipe. He found another 30, then 25 and then 40 menus. By this time, he was 100 menus deep, and had found only a single mentioning of turtle anything. “By doing much background research on the fishery, we discovered turtles were sold over-the-counter at fishmongers and meat markets in Chinatown and other open air markets in Honolulu,” he says. The restaurants, in other words, were not to blame–at least not for the turtles.
Left with all of these menus, however, the team decided to take a closer look into the marine life listed there. “When I assembled those data, it became a story of its own, helping to fill a significant gap in our official government records,” he says.
Collecting all of those menus, he adds, was no small task. He hustled between appointments with Hawaiiana experts, archivists, publishers, Hawaiian cooking historians, tourism historians, museums and libraries. But some of the more pedestrian venues proved most useful, including eBay collectors who would occasionally invited Van Houtan over to dig through boxes of hoarded menus. “I met a lot of interesting people along the way,” he says.
Scientists often turn to historic documents, media stories, artwork, photographs or footage to infer past events or trends. And while researchers have used menus to track a seafood item’s popularity over time, not many think to use dining data as a proxy for fish population abundance. The most interesting thing about the study, Van Houtan thinks, is “not that we used menus as much as that no one previously thought to.”
That, he says, and a few of the more odd-ball items that turned up on some of the old menus, like magnesium nitrogen health broth. “I have no idea what that was,” he says. “And pineapple fritters with mint sauce doesn’t sound very yummy to me either!”
August 6, 2013
Media reports have called them the “tigers of the sea” and “white death,” striking potential prey with the “power of a horse
.” Such descriptions are fearsome enough, but it’s the great white shark’s purported appetite for human flesh that sends chills skittering up spines. A 1916 article in the Richmond Times-Dispatch, printed just after the still-famous string of shark-related deaths that year, came to a truly creepy conclusion: Those who believe that the great white’s propensity to dine on humans is real and steadily increasing “have the weight of evidence on their side.”
Thanks to the movie Jaws, the great white’s reputation as a ruthless man-eater pervades to this day. So you can’t be blamed for being slightly concerned if you took
a quiz claiming to match your personality with a shark’s, put together by the Discovery Channel, and found out that you are a great white. Sure, you may indeed be “curious yet cautious” and “aggressive but also recessive;” people may be “dangerously intrigued” by you. But does your personality really match that of such a loathed creature? Can an entire species of sharks be generalized in that way?
Jean Sebastien Finger, a biologist at the Bimini Biological Field Station in the Bahamas may have answers. For a little over a year, Finger has been trying to find out whether sharks have personalit
ies. Personality, by its very name, seems to apply only to a person, e.g., a human. But can a shark actually be shy? Social? A risk-taker? Fierce or mellow?
Though Finger is the first, to his knowledge, to study sharks in this way, he is not alone among animal behaviorists. His work fits with a growing field of research investigating what scientists call “behavioral syndromes,” or ways of acting that differ from one individual to another but are consistent across time and situation. It turns out scientists are finding personality in a whole range of species, sharks now included.
The basic idea that nonhuman animals have personality isn’t all that new. In the 1920s in Conditioned Reflexes, Ivan Pavlov describes his observations of different behavioral responses in dogs “depending on the type of nervous system of the animal.” And in 1938, an American psychologist named Meredith P. Crawford developed a behavior rating scale for young chimpanzees, publishing the work in the Journal of Comparative Psychology. Jane Goodall was a bit more personal, noting in the memoir Through a Window, that the personality of one chimp named Passion was as different from another chimp’s “as chalk from cheese.”
Yet only recently has scientific opinion shifted beyond viewing this variation as meaningless noise. Researchers now want to quantify individual variation and figure out why it exists. For example, scientific observers are increasingly coming to the realization that animals don’t always behave in the best way in a given situation, says Alexander Weiss, a psychologist at the University of Edinburgh who studies evolution of personality. An animal may not go off on its own to look for food, even though that seems like the best choice. “They are behaving suboptimally,” Weiss says, “what is underlying that?”
Imagining primates and even pets with their own personalities isn’t so hard. But some of the most fascinating work stars less predictable animals–birds, fish, hermit crabs and spiders, among others. Unlike the shark quiz offered by the Discovery Channel, the studies distinguish not one species from the next, but individuals within a species.
Finger’s species of choice is the lemon shark, and with good reason. These sharks are the lab mice of the sea. Scientists know a ton about the biology of lemon sharks–they are easy to capture and handle, and they are amenable to captivity. What’s more, Finger works with juveniles, which measure a meter or less in length.
After catching and tagging these sharks in the shallow waters of Bimini, about 60 miles east of Miami, Finger and his colleagues run a battery of tests in experimental pools. In a test looking for sociability, they allow the sharks to swim around together for about 20 minutes, documenting every 30 seconds whether a shark is interacting with its peers. “If you see two sharks following each other, that is typical social behavior,” says Finger. “It’s very similar to humans in the sense that some people will be in groups more often than other people.” In another test looking for an interest in novelty, Finger and his team put sharks, one at a time, in a 40-by-20 foot pen that the sharks have never experienced. The team documented how much each shark explored the pen.
In both cases, sharks are tested again after a week and after six months (returning to their natural habitat during the longer interim, only to be caught once again). The repetition allows the researchers to test for consistency. Preliminary results presented in July in Albuquerque, New Mexico, at the Joint Meeting of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists show that individual lemon sharks do have different degrees of sociability and novelty-seeking. “They are not machines, they have personality,” Finger says.
What’s more, initial data hint at a trade-off: Sharks more interested in novelty tend to be less social, and vice versa. Finger suspects that animals that have the safety of a group take fewer risks. Novelty-seekers venture off on their own and, though more prone to danger, they also don’t have to share the food they find with others. It’s sort of how the risk-takers and game-changers in human societies aren’t always so good at playing well with others.
In time, scientists hope to compare personality data from a range of species to try to understand why animals, including people, have personality and how it evolved. Personality, and even a mix of personalities within a group, may turn out to have huge consequences for survival. “We find in the human literature that personality is massively important for things like work satisfaction, marital stability, how long we live, whether we get heart attacks,” Weiss says.
Until then, Finger’s big message is that “you can’t generalize behavior of one individual to a species.” Even if a species as a whole tends to be more aggressive than another, some individuals within that species could still be pretty mellow.
So although your concept of self isn’t likely to be wrapped up in an online quiz, you may find comfort in Finger’s words. Maybe
you are a great white, but not every great white is the same.
August 5, 2013
People have been fascinated and terrified by sharks for thousands of years, so you would think that we know a fair bit about the roughly 400 named species that roam the ocean. But we have little sense of how many sharks are out there, how many species there are, and where they swim, let alone how many existed before the advent of shark fishing for shark fin soup, fish and chips, and other foods.
But we are making progress. In honor of Shark Week, here’s an overview of what we have learned about these majestic citizens of the sea in the past year:
1. Sharks mostly come in shades of gray, and it’s likely that they only see that way as well. Now, that knowledge is being put to use to protect surfers and swimmers offshore. In 2011, researchers from the University of Western Australia found that, out of 17 shark species tested, ten had no color-sensing cells in their eyes, while seven only had one type. This likely means that sharks hunt by looking for patterns of black, white and grey rather than noticing any brilliant colors. To protect swimmers, whose bodies often look like a tasty seal from below, the researchers are working with a company to design wetsuits that are striped in colorblocked disruptive patterns. One suits will alert sharks that they aren’t looking at their next meal, and a second suit that will help camouflage swimmers and surfers in the water.
2. The thresher shark has a long, scythe-shaped tail fin that scientists long-suspected was used for hunting, but they didn’t know how. This year, they finally filmed how the thresher shark uses it to “tail slap” fish, killing them on impact. It herds and traps schooling fish by swimming in increasingly smaller circles before striking the group with its tail. This strike usually comes from above instead of sideways, an unusual technique that allows the shark to stun multiple fish at once—up to seven, the study found. Most carnivorous sharks only kill one fish at a time and so are comparatively less efficient.
3. How many sharks do people kill each year? A new study published in July 2013 used available shark catch information to estimate the global number—a staggering 100 million sharks killed every year. Although the data are incomplete and often do not include those sharks whose fins are removed and bodies are thrown back to sea, this is the most accurate estimate to date. Slow growth and low birth rates of sharks mean that they are not able to repopulate fast enough to catch up with the loss.
4. The 50-foot giant megalodon shark is a staple of shark week, reigning as the great white’s larger and even more terrifying ancestor. But a new fossil discovered in November turns that supposition on its head: it looks like the megalodon isn’t a great white shark ancestor after all, but is more closely related to the fish-munching mako sharks. The teeth of the new fossil look more like great white and ancient mako shark teeth than megalodon teeth, which also suggests that great whites are more closely related to mako sharks than previously thought.
5. Sharks are worth more alive in the water than dead on the plate (or bowl). In May, researchers found that shark ecotourism ventures—such as swimming with whale sharks and coral reef snorkeling—bring in 314 million U.S. dollars globally every year. What’s more, projections show that this number will double in the next 20 years. In contrast, the value of fished sharks is estimated at 630 million U.S. dollars and has been declining for the past decade. While dead sharks’ value terminates after they are killed and consumed, live sharks provide value year after year: in Palau, an individual shark can bring up to 2 million dollars in benefits over its lifetime from the tourist dollars that pour in just so that people can view the shark up close. One citizen science endeavor even has snorkeling travelers snapping photos of whale sharks in an effort to help researchers. Protecting sharks for future ecotourism endeavors just makes the most financial sense.
6. Bioluminescence isn’t just for jellyfish and anglers: even some sharks are able to light up to confuse predators and prey alike. Lanternsharks are named for this ability. It’s been long known that their bellies light up to blend in with sunlight shining down from above, an adaptation known as countershading. But in February, researchers reported that lanternsharks also have “lightsabers” on their backs. Their sharp, quill-like spines are lined with thin lights that look like Star Wars weaponry and send a message to predators that, “if you take a bite of me, you might get hurt!”
7. What can an old sword tell us about sharks? Far more than you might expect—especially when those swords are made of shark teeth. The swords, along with tridents and spears collected by Field Museum anthropologists in the mid-1800s from people living in the Pacific’s Gilbert Islands, are lined with hundreds of shark teeth. The teeth, it turns out, come from a total of eight shark species—and, shockingly, two of these species had never been recorded around the islands before. The swords give a glimpse into how many more species once lived on the reef, and how easy it is for human memory to lose track of history, a phenomenon known as “shifting baselines.”
8. Sharks know some pretty neat tricks even before they’re born. Bamboo shark embryos develop in egg cases that float on the high seas, where they are vulnerable to being eaten by all manner of predators. Even as developing embryos, they can sense electric fields in the water given off by a predator—just like adults. If they sense this danger nearby they can hold still, even stopping their breathing, so they won’t be noticed in their egg cases. But for sand tiger shark embryos, which develop inside the mother, their siblings can pose the biggest threat—the first embryos to hatch from eggs, at just roughly 100 millimeters long, will attack and devour their younger siblings.
9. Shark fin soup has been a delicacy in China for hundreds of years, and its popularity has only increased in the last several decades with the country’s growing population. This increasing demand has heightened the number of sharks killed every year, but the expensive dish may be losing some fans.
Even before last year’s Shark Week, the Chinese government banned the serving of shark fin soup at official state banquets—and the conversation hasn’t died down since. Countries and states banning the trade of shark fins and regulating the practice of shark finning have made headlines this year. And just a few weeks ago, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo signed a ban of the possession and sale of shark fins in the state that will go into effect in 2014.
10. Shark fin bans aren’t the only method of protecting sharks. The island nations of French Polynesia and the Cook Islands created the largest shark sanctuary in December of 2012—protecting sharks from being fished in an area of over 2.5 million square miles in the south Pacific Ocean. And member countries of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) voted to place export restrictions on five species of sharks in March 2013. Does this mean that the general perception of sharks is changing for the better and that the public image of sharks is veering away from its “Jaws” persona? That, in essence, is up to you!
–Emily Frost, Hannah Waters and Caty Fairclough co-wrote this post
June 21, 2013
Sharks have it tougher than most when it comes to public relations. Unlike a number of disgraced celebrities, politicians and athletes who’ve somewhat managed to come out on the other side of a scandal, the marine creatures haven’t been able to shake their bad reputation for 38 years. What’s more, they probably didn’t even deserve it in the first place.
Stephen Spielberg’s Jaws, which premiered this week in 1975, was adapted from a 1974 novel of the same name. The book was inspired by real-life events, a series of shark attacks along the Jersey Shore in July 1916 that killed four people. The type of shark behind the attacks was never confirmed, but Spielberg picked the prime suspect to be his villain: the great white shark. However, the movie has allowed viewers to paint all kinds of sharks as massive, bloodthirsty killers with a taste for revenge.
That’s about 440 species of sharks. Talk about one fish (unknowingly) ruining it for the rest of them
Here’s the thing: most of these sharks don’t have a taste for human blood—they don’t express special interest in mammal blood as opposed to fish blood. Diets vary across the many species around the globe, but they usually include other fish, crustaceans and marine mammals such as seals. The biggest species, the whale shark (which can reach up to 60 feet in length) only feeds on plankton.
And those supposed voracious appetites that in movies give them unnatural speed?
Most of the time, sharks are just not hungry. While they can reach up to 30 miles per hour or more in sudden bursts, they tend to cruise at a lackadaisical pace of about five miles per hour. And sharks that swim with their mouths open aren’t always in attack mode—they open wide to ventilate their gills.
Not all sharks are big enough to ram into and capsize unsuspecting boats, either. About 80 percent of all shark species grow to be less than five feet long. Only 32 species have been documented in attacks with humans, the repeat players being the great white, tiger and bull sharks. Your lifetime risk of suffering an attack from one of these predators is pretty small: 1 in about 3,700,000. Compare that to your odds of dying in a car accident (1 in 84), a fall (1 in 218), a lightning strike (1 in 79,746) or fireworks (1 in 340,733). Yet many people have an irrational fear of sharks, born from movies like Jaws.
Today, an emerging public relations campaign is underway to show that sharks aren’t the bad guys anymore—they’re the victims. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, 30 percent of open-ocean sharks and stingrays, their fellow sea dwellers, face extinction. True, 12 people are killed by sharks each year worldwide. However, 11,417 sharks are killed every hour by humans, adding up to roughly 100 million a year. Some of these deaths are intentional: sharks are often hunted for their fins to make soup or caught for sport, their toothy jaws kept as trophies. Others fall prey to recreational fishing or nets meant to protect humans. Still others die because their habitats are slowly disappearing due to human activity, which reduces their food supply and pollutes the water pumping through their gills.
The numbers are stark: In some parts of the world, the scalloped hammerhead shark population has shrunk by 99 percent in the last 30 years. In tropical Atlantic waters, the population of silky sharks is now half of what it was in he early 1970s. The Pacific’s whitetip shark population fell by 93 percent between 1995 and 2010.
This spring, an international organization implemented a ban on international trade in the whitetip, the porbeagle and three species of hammerhead sharks. The Shark Conservation Act, signed into law by President Barack Obama in 2011, closed loopholes in existing shark conservation legislation and promoted U.S.-led protection efforts worldwide. Even Discovery Channel’s Shark Week, which for a quarter of a century has hooked viewers with the promise of a fear-filled thrill ride, is partnering with conservationists to help boost sharks’ public image.
But perhaps the biggest shift in the Jaws-dominated shark culture is this: some survivors of shark attacks are actually teaming up to save the creatures that once nearly killed them. As shark attack survivor Debbie Salamone explains on their PEW Charitable Trust website, “If a group like us can see the value in saving sharks, shouldn’t everyone?”


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Malevolent Mouse has done a number of short films that have been entered into various competitions and have also been used to showcase the talent of the actors that we have worked with. Now all the short films are in one place. With titles such as Metastasis, The Hennessy Method, and many more this film is an hour of nonstop Malevolent Madness.
- Metastasis was an official selection for the 2019 Monsters of Horror International Film Festival.
- The Revelations of Light was made as a school project.
- The Hennessy Method was made for the 2015 48 Hour Film Project, an international competition where it received 5th place.
- While shooting to Mock a Kilingbird Ivey and John were laying at the feet of the actors in the back seat while shooting the car scene. The air conditioner could not be used while shooting because the mics were picking up the noise.
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