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North side of Crystal Pier is my latest habit. I’ve gotten applause for a ride once. Been hooked on my flippers by a fisherman twice. Been told I was thought to be a seal once. That’s so far this year. Different years, different adventures.

from Instagram https://instagr.am/p/DB48I-gSloZ/ via IFTTT




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DVD Talk Presents: The Best Releases of 2018

DVDTalk.com staff writer and film critic Neil Lumbard has compiled a list of some of the best releases of...




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Inclined Bed Therapy: Tilt your bed for healthful sleep

Inclined Bed Therapy or IBT is the brain child of Andrew Fletcher, who discovered in the 1990's that gravity actually helps to drive circulation of the sap in trees. From there, it was a short step to ask whether this was also true for animals and humans. This posed the question "why on Earth do people sleep flat?" So Andrew suggested that people slightly raise the head end of their bed and see if any changes in their health are noticeable. This is one of the numerous anecdotes ... stories of personal success people have reported after raising the head end of their bed by just five or six inches. "Over two years ago I sat in the armchair reading a small advert which asked people to raise their bed by six inches at the head and to reply and tell what benefits had been noted. (No explanation was given) At the time I could not move my neck to my left or right side and it ached continuously. I was unable to sleep at night as i could not get comfortable. I was only able to turn by gently easing myself. It took about three to four turns. Getting out of bed was a major obstacle. I needed help to dress and undress. I spent most of my nights in the chair with the result that I was always tired and had no energy. My problem is osteoporosis of the upper and lower spine. I had tried hormone replacement therapy and wasted a small fortune with bone specialists and osteopaths. I was resigned to living my days out as best I could, having been told that there was nothing more that could be done for me. I expected nothing but had nothing to lose, so Harry raised the bed by six inches. We did not take it very seriously but were happy to try anything. On the fourth night I had the first full nights sleep since I don't remember when. By the end of the week I was sleeping naturally and turning over with ease. My dressing was a problem no longer, each day it became easier. I was able to turn my head without pain, right or left, to see the clock without getting up from my chair. There have been many other benefits too. I have worn glasses from the age of seven years and I am now sixty eight years. Last year was the first time I was told that there was a small improvement. My hair appears thicker, my hair brush needs cleaning less often. Harry had a large suppurating scar since he was six years old. He has had to continually dress it all of his life. But now it has healed up. His ear which constantly gave him trouble with a discharge has now cleared up completely. We both feel that the clock has been put back for us!" Ruby, 2nd April 1998 Other such stories can be found on the Inclined Bed Therapy website and on the facebook page with the same name...




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Einstein and Gödel, at the Königsberg café

About a month ago I wrote this entry which was, I think, somewhat misunderstood, at least by the one confirmed reader of it. In it I tried to argue that there are some fundamental problems involved in conceptualizing time which, in my mind, appear intractable, and hence its existence as a concept contradictory, impossible. To which it was replied that of course time has an existence, as a social convention, a mental framework. Of that I have no doubt-it would be impossible for me to refute even if I wanted to. My point was about metaphysics, not sociology, and in that regard I don’t think it was that much different from that expressed by St. Augustine regarding time: “if no one asks me what it is I know what it is, but if someone asks me I don’t know.” Or, even more notably, Kant, who regarded time, in addition to space, not as an entity, process, or property of the physical world, but as a filter of percpetion, the mental framework which orders our experience of the world.

Which brings me back to science. I just finished reading The Evolution of Physics, by Einstein and Leopold Infeld. Of course Einstein is justly famed for, among many other things, pioneering the idea of space-time. However, I was quite intrigued to discover, while perusing the science section at the National Library in Paris, that Gödel claimed that his late work on relativity and physics, upon which I touched in my earlier post, was inspired by an intense study of Kant. Now, assuming such a dour man as Gödel was not simply being facetious, the implications of this are immediate. In the (apparent) somewhat paradoxical act of tearing down the structure of Einstein’s work while bringing some of its deepest tendencies to fruition, he was working under the influence of a theory which denies the type of external, property-based existence which Einstein implicitly ascribes to time (and space)! As I understand special relativity (always a dubious premise, I grant you), it holds that space and time, as properties of the universe, are perceived differently at every point of view, or coordinate system, as he calls them. But for me it seems a question of the simplest explanation: if everyone is in a relative frame of reference with respect to space and time, is it simpler and more likely that time and space are real properties which are different at every point in the universe, or simply that they are perceived differently by each observer? It seems to me that if one takes Kant’s idea of space and time as elements perception and not of external reality, none of these problems come up, although there may of course be others. Again, it’s hard for me to say what Gödel’s interpretation of all of this is, since no one seems to have engaged and propogated his work on this subject much, but if he was following in the line of Kant’s thinking as well as the tradition of relativity, it would be interesting to see the resuscitation, by “a commodius vicus of recirculation,” of a very powerful and cogent point of view which has nonetheless been largely dismissed by scientists as non-pertinently metaphysical. Perhaps interesting also to note that, in dealing with Kant last year, I protested against his classification of space as a perceptual framework, and even managed to convince my philosophy professor that it is rather the fundamental visual property, before reversing myself and concluding that light is actually the fundamental visible property. Light is also in some ways the fundamental property in Einstein’s system, or at least the one constant in all of the warping of space-time, which somehow doesn’t seem so surprising now…

p.s. For all of those intersted in Spanish literature (which at this point probably composes nearly 100% of our readership), I also came across this article with the following sub-headline: “It is the 400th anniversary of Don Quixote, a more important work than all of Einstein’s theories.” To the extent that the article follows up on this point, I think the claim about the inevitability of scientific discovery is at the very least highly disputable (and even if Cervantes’ work is more inimitable, that does not in itself mean that it is more “important”), but nonetheless a provocative idea, and gratifying to my humanities-leaning heart.




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Bentham's mummified corpse, like Lenin's, remains fresh in appearance

It’s almost comforting that such invidious fluffy-minded sludge as this is floating around, as it seems, like religion, to keep the middle-brows hypnotized by “beautiful sentiments” which are so vague as to keep them from actually getting together and doing anything. It’s sort of weird to hear this weakly Marxist social-democratic pap which used to be shouted from the rooftops now being whispered in a low monotonous whine. The author avows his fealty to Jeremy Bentham, not Marx, and calls it utilitarianism not Marxism, but there are many illegitimate fathers along this line of thought.

The root of the idea is that, now that neuroscience has supposedly made it possible to actually identify what makes us happy, the idea of happiness has become quantifiable, and hence a program of providing the greatest happiness to the greatest number of people has become objectively possible. However, the author does not make the slightest effort to apply these wonders of modern science to actually determining what the alleged sources of human happiness are. The neuroscience tack is really just a defensive ploy to ward off the eternal charges that utilitarinism is simply a euphemism for an authoritarian imposition of values. As for espousing his positive program for what constitutes human happiness, it is simply the usual liberal middle-class canards, with not surprisingly a socialist edge: more time to spend with family, a decent wage for everyone, blah blah blah. But he seems to make two pretty criminally unsubstantiated assumptions: one is these sources are essentially the same for everyone, or at least could be under certain conditions, and the other is that they do not inherently conflict with anyone else’s.

I say under certain conditions could be, because in evaluating our current society he seems to privilege envy of other’s material well-being as the principal determinant of happiness. His theory is that above a certain level of material subsistence people are motivated primarily by status-seeking and the desire for a high rank within their social group. Therefore, the increasing wealth of the society will not increase happiness because people measure their well-being relative to the group, not by their absolute prosperity. This is always been a flaw in the concept of the “war against poverty”; I’m not sure it’s much of an argument for socialist economic redistribution. But actually if you read his section on the value of income taxes carefully, he doesn’t even seem to be arguing that they are useful insofar as they can be redirected to the less prosperous, although he does evidently believe that a certain amount of money contributes more to the happiness of a poor person than to a rich one’s. Rather, he seems to think that taking money away from the properous is valuable in and of itself, because it will supposedly make them less focused on the “rat race,” more family-oriented, etc., etc. In short he seems to be advocating a net impoverishment of society.

All of which may be consistent with the program of a good little socialist, but does not necessarily accord marvelously with his own evidence about the supposedly quantified happiness of humanity. The research that he cites non-specifically supposedly indicates that people’s feeling of happiness has not risen in the last half-century, but he does not cite anything which indicates that it has necessarily declined. He cites rising rates of depression and crime as presumably implicit indicators of greater unhappiness, but he does not seem to acknowledge the possibility that in our hyper-medicated and surveillance-based society perhaps people simply report depression and crime more. In any event, if roughly similar numbers of people today as in the ‘50’s report themselves happy (and we believe them), despite the increase in prosperity, that might perhaps indicate that happiness is not fixed to material well-being. Which may be consistent with his general point, but not with his idea of increasing happiness by manipulating income levels.

And even if it did, it seems rather difficult to countenance any social program predicated upon appealing to one of humanity’s most depraved instincts, namely envy. The author acknowledges that his ideal of taxation is mainly motivated by the desire to pander to people’s envy, but he seems to think that their envy will be sated by the loss of prosperity of those around them and that after that point there will be no more. So the envy of the less prosperous will be satisfied by the losses accrued by the more prosperous, which will somehow not be counter-balanced by the chagrin of the more prosperous at the prospect of seeing their status diminished. Very logical.

One of the more egregious presumptions of utilitarians is that non-utilitarian social systems somehow aren’t concerned with seeking the greatest good for the greatest number of people. On the contrary, that’s the defining problem of practically every social and political theory I can think of, and they all either seek or claim to have found the answer—whether such a solution exists, I have my doubts, but that’s why I’m a skeptic about politics. This is a handy trick by utilitarians: they say “I believe in the greatest good for the greatest number of people.” Which is practically begging the question: “As opposed to whom?” It’s useful because it tends to conceal the fact that their real agenda is generally somewhat more specific, and tends to consist in the autocratic notion that one or two measures of social living can be authoritatively determined to be the sources of happiness, and then divided up in a centralized fashion. Those that are the most insistent on the idea of liberty are generally those that are the most skeptical about the possibility of the notion of happiness being either quantitatively defined or generalizable. In other words, only indviduals can determine their own sources of happiness.

For the author, on the other hand, the fact that certain stimuli trigger certain areas of the brain at the times when test subjects profess pleasure has solved the problem of determining happiness. Of course, as mentioned, he never really bothers with the results that those studies have yielded. Somehow the fact that he considers envy to be a principal element of human happiness does not place very severe limits on the harmoniousness of individual happiness. Nor does it constitute a tyranny of the majority, because he claims that in an ideal utilitarian society the happiness of the most unhappy would be considered of pre-eminent importance. Of course, at the beginning of the article he cited the equal importance of each individual’s happiness as the fouding tenet of his theory, but I’m sure it all sorts out in the end.

Among social factors responsible for unhappiness, he cites divorce and unemployment as of pre-eminent importance. Of course, rates of both divorce and unemployment in the crassly materialistic and religious United States are much lower than in the much more overtly utilitarian-embracing Europe, but it would be a bit embarassing for him to admit this after avowing that all traditional value-systems outside of utilitarianism and “individualism” are dead.

Personally the question of the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people doesn’t exactly compel me constantly, although the issue of personal happiness tends to impose itself intransigently. I would have thought that evolutionary biology would have provided an adequate explanation of this, as well as the recurrence of what we call altruism. But such an idea of course suggests that happiness, whatever that is, is not really the point of our little existences, and that the more imperious competitiveness of life will ultimately subvert all of these little trifles of pleasure and pain. But in the meantime, we have these debased statistical notions of happiness to amuse us in an idle hour.

It seems to me that if one’s “objective” measure of happiness is electrical stimulation in the cerebral cortex, the most efficient utilitarian solution to the problem of human happiness would be strap everyone onto hospital gurneys and stimulate the “happiness” part of their brain all day long. If one does not wish to be this deterministic about it, perhaps one should allow more latitute to individuals to discover their own conception of happiness. Personally, I have found happiness generally to be an idea for the unhappy and something rarely spoken of by the happiness; mention of practically guarantees that it is not present in the environment where it is uttered. I don’t deny that what you might call love is the real bridge between personal happiness and moral obligations, and the only true means by which the desires of oneself and of others are united, but such a sentiment can never be mandated; it is entirely resistant to intellectual compulsion. Utilitarianism, which sometimes does a decent job of faking morality, is nevertheless ultimately predicated on the pleasure principle, and hence is wholly inadequate to uniting the moral and the pleasurable except when love truly pertains. In that case, of course, political theory is entirely superfluous, which is why this is all a waste of time.

p.s. I don’t claim that people’s behavior necessarily reflects what really would make them happy, but presumably it does at least reflect what they consciously value. Hence, if I were the author I would have been a bit skeptical of using the results of “surveys” of what people claim to value when the results don’t correlate with their behavior, i.e. they claim that spending time with family is most important, but they spend a disproportiante amount of time working (at least according to him). So either people are not really being forthright (consciously or unconsciously) in responding to surveys, or there is not actually a problem of priorities. In either case, he’s way over-valuing surveys as a guide to what will make people happy.




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Juristische Fangfrage: Scheidungsantrag beim Verwaltungsgericht

So blöd, wie es auf den ersten Blick aussehen mag, war die Frau keineswegs, die am 19.9.2007 einen Ehescheidungsantrag beim Schleswig-Holsteinischen Verwaltungsgericht einreichte. Welches Ziel hatte sie wohl mit ihrer - laut OLG Schleswig rechtsmissbräuchlichen, im Ergebnis aber doch erfolgreichen - Aktion im Auge?




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Beamten-Dreikampf für Fortgeschrittene: Beschließen, Ausfertigen, Verkünden

Lochen, Heften und Ablegen sind selbst für einen kleinen Beamten keine ernsthafte Herausforderung. Einen wahren Extremsport scheint hingegen das korrekte Inkraftsetzen eines Bebauungsplans darzustellen, zumindest in Nordrhein-Westfalen. Jedenfalls finde ich in der




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Spybot Search and Destroy Update November 13, 2024

The Spybot Search and Destroy Update is intended for updating your detections without the need for the included WebUpdate. To update you need to download and double-click spybotsd_includes.exe, choose the folder that Spybot is installed to, click OK and close when completed. [License: Freeware | Requires: 11|10|8|7 | Size: 8 MB ]




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YouTube for Android 19.45.36

The latest version of the official YouTube app, now with in-page playback! Experience the latest and best version of the official YouTube app.... [License: Ad-Supported | Requires: Android | Size: Size Varies ]




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Page Break Before Every Chapter

If your chapter titles are using the "Heading 2" Style:

  1. View > Styles (F11)
  2. In the sidebar, Right-Click > Modify on the "Heading 2" Style.
  3. Go to the "Text Flow" tab.
  4. On the right side:
  5. Check the box for "Breaks > Insert".

This should automatically add a page break before every chapter.




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Embed Fonts in document

If you use a font that the recipient is unlike to have, select Files > Proprties > Font > Embed fonts in the document before exporting to PDF. Note that embedding will vastly increase the file size if you you have a large number of fonts.




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The Groovy Little Numbers, "A Place So Hard to Find"

Always a sucker for late-80s pogo-stick guitar pop from Scotland, I cannot resist the Groovy Little Numbers, yet another late-80s pogo-stick guitar-pop outfit from Scotland.

They're noteworthy—or at least more of a curiosity than others—and differentiated from contemporaries in a few ways, however. Lead vocals were often shared by Catherine Steven and Joe McAlinden, who started the band and seem to be considered the only core members, and this boy-girl tag-team adds a twist the Pooh Sticks, Close Lobsters, the Soup Dragons, the Hepburns, and most the rest in the scene didn't have.

Additionally, while trumpets were certainly a feature of the post-Postcard Scotish sound, the way these guys laid it in was gentler, sweeter. Generally, they were gentler, sweeter, more reserved Burt Bacharach than twitchy Violent Femmes.

As you might expect, this two-singles group was a sort of power-pop incubator for at least a couple of those involved: McAlinden started Superstar and was in BMX Bandits; Gerard Love got in with Teenage Fanclub at the onset.




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Better Call Saul - Season 04

Highly Recommended

The Show:

Back when I was half joking about the acumen with which Better Call Saul was going in its second season, you knew that it would head down a sad yet inevitable road, right? Jimmy (its second season) would become Saul eventually, despite his best efforts otherwise.

There are two big changes that have occurred since I wrote a lot of words down about the show; one being the death of Jimmy's brother Chuck (Michael McKean, This is Spinal Tap) and the introduction or reacquainting if you will of Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito, Breaking Bad), both of which occur in Seaso...Read the entire review




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Sesame Street: Awesome Alphabet Collection

Recommended

The Show:

As my two-year old goes from infant to toddler and is more of a sponge soaking up data and information I try to keep his media above board with things on education, and having Sesame Street as your driver in the club bag is a clutch one I have to say. He can watch Elmo, or Kermit or Bert and Ernie with content while I get his meals ready, and he gets the chance to learn something in the process. So yeah, damn right I grabbed Awesome Alphabet Collection as a surrogate parent!

The disc is less a series of show episodes and more focused on segments, all of which surround a particular letter of the alphabet, that the Sesame Street puppets and humans talk through in a means of education and illustration. Occasionally a celebrity will pop by, whether its singers like Norah Jones, Pharrell Williams or Smokey Robinson, or actors like Ricky Gervais (Read the entire review




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I Got You Babe: The Best of Sonny and Cher Volume 1

Recommended

I can never get enough of old musical and comedy variety shows these days. I remember them being rather cheesy from what I can remember of their original airings, but they are yet another thing that gets better with age. There were many of these throughout the 1960s and 70s, anchored by star hosts with a never-ending parade of different guest stars every week to do their own musical numbers and join in the comedy sketches. Sonny and Cher were two of the biggest stars in this genre- in 1971 they were set to take up residency for a live show in Las Vegas when they had to cancel because CBS offered them a weekly TV show, five episodes of which are featured here.

...Read the entire review




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The Beatles: Made on Merseyside

Recommended

Back in DVD's glory days, when stores were overflowing with them, you would often have to watch out for so-called "music" discs that were actually not authorized by the artists and didn't include any music from them- instead just containing interviews of anyone remotely associated that they could find. Many of these discs were about the Beatles- in fact some of the very first budget titles out were "Alf Bicknell's Beatles Diary" and "Beatles Celebration". Today the supply of discs in stores is not as plentiful, but a few of these titles still make it out. Checking out "Made on Merseyside" I was expecting it to be that sort of disc, but I've had enough long-time interest in the Beatles that it might still be worth watching.

This focuses on the very early years of the grou...Read the entire review




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Beyond The Door

Recommended

The Movie:

Beyond The Door

Directed by Ovidio G. Assonitis (as O. Hellman) and released in 1974, a year after The Exorcist proved to be box office gold, Beyond The Door introduces us to Jessica Barrett (Juliet Mills), her husband Robert (Gabriele Lavia) and their two kids, smart-mouthed Gail (Barbara Fiorini) and pea soup loving Ken (Davd Colin Jr.). They live a good life and seem quite happy together, but when it turns out that Jessica is pregnant, things get a little tense. Regardless, they decide they'll make the best of the situation but after a visit to Dr. George Staton (Nino Segurini), a man who also happens to be their best friend, Jessica realizes that something is odd: she figures she can't be more than a few weeks into her pregnancy, while he insists she has to be at least three months.

From there, things start to get strange in the Barrett ho...Read the entire review




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Marbelous Stacks of Pancakes




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The Math Behind Cubic Splines




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The Prayer Of Jabez

The short but direct 'Prayer Of Jabez' has been a blessing to many who have plumbed its spiritual depths and excavated its potential. Explore with us how God wants to bless us, deliver us from everything holding us in the past, enlarge our Kingdom influence and grant our petitions for His glory. This message is available at https://www.preachtheword.com now in MP3 audio format...



  • Religion & Spirituality

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Questions About Healing, Faith And Unbelief

In this message on Matthew 17:14-21, David addresses some critical questions about healing and what the Bible says. Some may object to any emphasis on healing as a distraction from the gospel's central message. However, the record of the Gospels and the Acts is that healing was intrinsic to Jesus' revelation of the Father to humanity. In this teaching, learn how faith affects healing and how our unbelief can affect our faith. This message is available at https://www.preachtheword.com now in MP3 audio format...



  • Religion & Spirituality

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Don't Fear, Only Believe

In this story of two overlapping healings - the woman with the issue of blood and the raising of Jairus' daughter - we learn some principles of how God heals. Sometimes, we can be confused about how God does His healing work. In this account, Jesus emphasises the importance of saying 'No' to fear and only believing what God has said. Don't fear, only believe! This message is available at https://www.preachtheword.com now in MP3 audio format...



  • Religion & Spirituality

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Which Report Have You Believed?

Whose message are we listening to? Whose report are we believing? The press, social media, medicine, or Gods Word? What voices are we allowing to influence us, and are those voices faith-inducing or faith-reducing? Isaiah 53 is such a well-known scripture about the death of Jesus and the salvation He has purchased for us. But many have neglected that this core prophetic scripture is explicit that healing has been purchased for us at the cross of Jesus. Learn what Isaiah 53 truly teaches and then ask, 'Do you believe this report?' or, whose report are you believing? This message is available at https://www.preachtheword.com now in MP3 audio format...



  • Religion & Spirituality

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Help My Unbelief

Mark's record of this miracle in Mark 9:14-29 is different in some ways to Matthew's account. One very significant difference is how the father of the afflicted boy confessed his faith in Jesus' ability to heal; but he also admitted that he had unbelief in his heart too. There are many lessons to learn in this story concerning what demonic affliction can do to someone, even from childhood, and how Jesus ultimately set the boy free. However, we see one very encouraging truth in particular: though the boy's father's faith was imperfect, Jesus still honoured it and healed the boy. God answers even imperfect faith. This message is available at https://www.preachtheword.com now in MP3 audio format...



  • Religion & Spirituality

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Antonio Resines Recibe el Premio de Honor en el IV Festival Internacional de Cine de Hellín

El IV Festival Internacional de Cine de Hellín (FECHE) se prepara para tomar el centro del escenario cultural del 16 al 22 de noviembre, convirtiéndose en un faro de actividades cinematográficas en la provincia de Albacete. Con una oferta que va más allá de las proyecciones de cine, el festival promete días repletos de cultura […]

Artículo publicado en : Antonio Resines Recibe el Premio de Honor en el IV Festival Internacional de Cine de Hellín




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Transformación Gastronómica: Antiguo Convento de Las Terreras en Ciudad Real Recibe 1,5 Millones en Inversión

El emblemático convento de la Inmaculada Concepción de Ciudad Real, conocido como el convento de las Terreras, se prepara para una transformación significativa que lo convertirá en un centro de interpretación dedicado a la gastronomía manchega. Esta ambiciosa iniciativa, que busca revitalizar el patrimonio cultural de la ciudad, cuenta con una inversión de 1,5 millones […]

Artículo publicado en : Transformación Gastronómica: Antiguo Convento de Las Terreras en Ciudad Real Recibe 1,5 Millones en Inversión




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Twas the Night Before Christmas by Lobotomy Boy

It's Christmas and Lobotomy Boy has a special version of "The Night Before Christmas" for everyone!

Enjoy this special Holiday Edition of Bedtime Stories My Kids Love.



MP3 File - Click Here to Download Podcast




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Adventures of Man in the Can - Ch 14 - The Great Exodus - No One Left Behind



The destruction of the park has begun!! The Man in the Can quickly realizes a family of squirrels is in the mist of the mayhem. Can Yellow Bird and Man in the Can save the family?

Find out in this episode of The Adventures of the Man in the Can.



MP3 File - Click Here to Download Podcast




GREAT DEALS FOR LISTENERS! CLICK BELOW
!


Save 10% on all your pet's needs at PetMeds.com
Up to 20% off on great athletic gear at Eastbay.com
Save 15% on your favorite stuff at Footlocker.com
Save 20% on your flower order with FTD Fluerop.com
Save $10 off your next order from PetCareRX.com





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Where have we been?

Let's see, in the past 3 months, we:

1. Finished soccer season
2. Had 3 ballet recitals
3. Took the kids on a SURPRISE trip in Disney World
4. moved to a new city 50 miles away (4 days after we returned home from Disney)
5. unpacked our new home
6. drove back and forth between new and old home to get old home ready to rent out.
7. paid $$$$$$$$$$$$$ for a new A/C unit at our old home
8. started some of our schoolwork

So, we've been just a little busy. We have now finished our work on the old house so we're hoping things will start to calm down just a bit.

I'm currently 26 weeks and feeling good. I am starting to get heartburn at night occasionally, but it's not that bad yet. I cannot believe it's almost the 3rd trimester-this pregnancy has completely flown by. Hutch 7.0 still is nameless but hopefully not for long. I go back to the doctor the first week of August and then it's every 2 weeks until 35 weeks where I'll go weekly. Time tends to speed up at this point until about 36 weeks when it slows WAY down. I'll be interested to see how these last months go this time.

My next post (hopefully tomorrow) is going to be our new school curriculum/year.


On one of our many trips to Home Depot/Lowes :) Good thing we have a lot of helpers. 
 




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Pictures from the Park - November 2014

We went to the park back in November to enjoy the nice weather and because Rick took the day off of work. This is one of my new favorite pictures of the kids. Little Luke (exactly 1 month old at the time) was in his little car seat. Maybe he can climb on the slide with everyone this summer. :)


Claire - 8, Miles - 22 months, Kate - 9, Sims - 3

Kate and Miles

Jack - 4

Sims, Jack, Henry - 6, Miles, Kate, Luke - 4 weeks, Claire

Claire and Kate




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Atos Are The Number One Provder of Occupatuional Health Services In The UK.


Last night I was furious to discover that giant multinational IT company Atos is not only responsible for administering the government's hellish Work Capability Assessment, they have also been providing occupational health services in this country for years too, in 2010 they even won an award for it.

So they are declaring the sick capable of work, then if you are lucky enough to get a job (if your not one of more than half the people declared fit for work who end up destitute) you will still probably have to put up with them telling you how much time you can have off when your illness returns. As none of these people being declared fit for work have actually got better, they are just expected to work around their disability, so there is no escape from the bastards it seems.

Yesterday I learned that Co-Op uses their occupational health services, so much for ethics eh? They have posted a statement saying they can't just close the contract but will consider not renewing it. So DPAC are encouraging people to boycott them and go and inform them of this on their facebook page, at least until they issue a statement saying they definitely won't renew the contract.

I did some digging last night and found that:
 
And two county councils I found also use them

Since they are apparently the number one provider of Occupational health services in the UK there must be many more companies and councils using them too, and I saw lots of job vacancies for them posted all over the country.

This post informs you of much money they are raking in with double digit growth in the UK this year, as lives are daily ruined and even ended by the software they own the copyright to. And I'm also learning that this huge multinational company owns oil companies (including Shell and Esso), electronics manufacturers and many more highly profitable companies, more on that to come as I collect the evidence.




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Atos monlogues "Internet Survey number 2" for art action week project.

Picture by Stewart
If we're going to do any of the Atos monologues I'm going to need a lot of volunteers who can record themselves and somehow send the video, because of the amount of time we have I think we can only do a small part. Mainly because we don't have time to send larger videos which would probably have to be sent by post on a disc. There are a lot of lines in this part, and the resulting videos will hopefully be short enough to email or send over facebook. If you just upload them to the art action group I can download them from there.
I've moved this post onto the blog as it's easier to share a link to it, and I can strike through the lines that are already taken.  If you want to take part chose the line you want to read from the list below, record it and you can send it to me through facebook. If you don't use facebook leave a comment and we'll find another way for you to send me the video. And if the line you wanted has a line through it sorry someone has already taken that one.
Here is the full Atos Monologues 2 script: 

http://www.scribd.com/doc/105841602/The-Atos-Monologues2
The part we are doing is on page 13
 

We can't see Post traumatic stress disorder and we've never heard of a hippocampus.
You do not meet my limited definition of being disabled
You drive an Audi. How would you afford it? It would be too difficult for a disabled person to get in.
You can text a friend
You can tweet
You watch TV and soaps and can sit comfortably for half an hour.  
I saw you stand up!
'You're too young'
You can pick up a £1 coin
"You seem alright to me"
"You're smiling"
You look butch. Can't be anything wrong with you.
You could fill in the form.
You brushed your hair this morning and you’re wearing a nice coat
You answered questions that was asked
You traveled by bus
You don’t soil yourself every day.
You could fill in the form
You’re still breathing
You can spell your name backwards
You're not a dribbling, disheveled lunatic howling at the moon and threatening to axe people to death
You hold eye contact
You don’t look disabled enough to me
You brushed your teeth this morning.
You’re faking it.
You can’t have Post traumatic stress disorder because "you've never been in a war zone"
You’re at university.
You have a girl friend.
You don’t look autistic
You can talk
I cannot see anything wrong with you
You moved your leg.
You can lift an empty box up to waist height.
You’re so pretty.
PAUSE
You can’t be disabled because of Tory ideology




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C'est Beau la Rupture !

Le Gouvernement de Nico est pleinement investi des ses responsabilité concernant le bien-être des Français. Dans un souci sanitaire et régulateur, avec augmentation de 30 mn de pouvoir d'achat, La ville d'Ecully s'organise sur le marché de la prostitution....




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Décision le 3 mars sur le site "note2be.com"

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Wave Arts - Tube Sat Vintage 1.0.2

Freeware for PC : Plug-ins & effects / Tube emulation




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Vijesti :: Sigurno i bez pirotehnike u nadolazećim blagdanima

Autor: Redakcija 031 Naslov: Sigurno i bez pirotehnike u nadolazećim blagdanima
Postano: 12.11.2024. 13:22 (GMT 1) Kako bi još jednom pred nadolazeće blagdane, građanima poslali zajedničku poruku da je od izuzetnog značaja tijekom veselja i slavlja voditi računa o sigurnosti.

Zajednički možemo postići da nam nadolazeći blagdani budu mirni i spokojni. Suzdržite se od uporabe pirotehnike i na taj način kreirajte mirno i sigurno okruženje za vašu obitelj, prijatelje, susjede u vašem kvartu. Vodimo računa jedni o drugima posebno u vrijeme blagdana.

Iz policije podsjećaju da petarde i rakete nisu dio blagdanskog ozračja i njihovo neoprezno i nestručno rukovanje može izazvati teške posljedice. Pirotehnička sredstva nisu bezopasna, pogotovo kada su u dječjim rukama, i od njih mogu nastupiti teške tjelesne ozljede šaka, ruku, očiju i lica. Petarde uzrokovati požare, a njihova uporaba može biti itekako opasna u zatvorenim prostorima i na mjestima gdje se okuplja veći broj ljudi.

Kazne za one koji ne poštuju propise su dosta visoke.

Učinite svoju okolinu sigurnom, brinite za svoje susjede posebno starije životne dobi, kao i kućne ljubimce, kojima detonacije petardi nisu nimalo ugodne.


Foto: Pixabay.com/Ilustracija




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Vijesti :: Poznat datum isplate nacionalne naknade za starije osobe

Autor: Redakcija 031 Naslov: Poznat datum isplate nacionalne naknade za starije osobe
Postano: 13.11.2024. 11:49 (GMT 1) U petak 15. studenoga 2024. počinje isplata nacionalne naknade za starije osobe za listopad 2024. korisnicima računa otvorenih u poslovnim bankama.

Nacionalnu naknadu za starije osobe dobit će 17 388 korisnika (80,23 % žena i 19,77 % muškaraca), za što je osigurano 2.591.205,00 eura iz Državnog proračuna.

U skladu sa Zakonom o izmjenama i dopunama Zakona o nacionalnoj naknadi za starije osobe (NN 156/23), nacionalna naknada od 1. siječnja 2024. iznosi 150,00 eura, izvijestili su iz HZMO-a.


Foto: Osijek031.com/Arhiv




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Događaji - najave i recenzije :: 16. Noć kazališta u Osijeku i Belom Manastiru

Autor: Redakcija 031 Naslov: 16. Noć kazališta u Osijeku i Belom Manastiru
Postano: 13.11.2024. 13:00 (GMT 1) 16. Noć kazališta održat će se u subotu, 16. studenog 2024. Noć kazališta već šesnaestu godinu zaredom slavi snagu izvedbenih umjetnosti i bogatstvo scene.

Od svog početka 2008. godine do danas izrasla je u višednevni kulturni događaj koji se odvija diljem zemlje stvarajući jedinstvenu priliku za kazališne užitke nekoliko dana prije i nakon središnjeg događanja.

Ova manifestacija naglašava važnost kazališta, kako profesionalnog tako i amaterskog, te okuplja raznolike izvedbene forme.

Potiče kreativne susrete, razmjenu ideja i poziva publiku da se poveže s umjetnicima.

Kazališta postaju mjesta susreta, otvorena za sve i pružaju priliku za neponovljivo iskustvo koje obogaćuje svakog sudionika.

[Program]

Osijek
HNK u Osijeku
19:00 sati – Fabijan Šovagović – “Sokol ga nije volio” – drama, režija Filip Šovagović. Ulaznice u slobodnoj prodaji

Beli Manastir
Gradsko kazalište Beli Manastir
Petak, 15. studenog 2024.
16:00 – 20:00 sati – Dvorana za produkcije – Umjetnička škola – “Audicija za snimanje filma”. Ulaz besplatan
17:00 – 20:00 sati – Velika galerija CZK – Izložba “Živa povijest kroz umjetnost” autorice Mihaele Vojtek. Ulaz besplatan

Subota, 16. studenog 2024.
18:00 – 21:00 sat – Velika galerija CZK – Izložba „Živa povijest kroz umjetnost“ autorice Mihaele Vojtek. Ulaz besplatan
20:00 sati – Velika dvorana CZK – premijera – “Inspektor Ja” – komedija, Umjetnička organizacija „Do zvijezda“. Ulaznica 4 €
21:00 sat – Velika dvorana – “Ja, debela?”, komedija




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La Chine et les pays d'Am�rique latine et des Cara�bes b�n�ficieront de perspectives plus prometteuses au cours des dix prochaines ann�es

Guid�e par la diplomatie des chefs d'Etat, la communaut� d'avenir partag� Chine-pays d'Am�rique latine et des Cara�bes b�n�ficiera de perspectives plus prometteuses durant la d�cennie � venir, a d�clar� mardi un porte-parole du minist�re chinois des...




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Adding "Maven-Like" Dependency Management To NetBeans Projects with Ivy

When working with Maven projects from NetBeans, some very nice NetBeans features are lost, such as the ability to use the Matisse GUI Builder, developing JSF web applications visually and automatically generating JPA entities from existing database schemas. In this article we explain how to keep all the benefits of Maven without losing NetBeans functionality by integrating Ivy into NetBeans projeccts.








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In welke provincie wonen de beste fietsers?

De Nederlandse man rijdt gemiddeld 50,9 kilometer per keer als hij op zijn racefiets klimt. De Zeeuwen fietsen het snelst ...... Lees verder: In welke provincie wonen de beste fietsers?




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Reins 1,2" Rockvibe Shad

De Rockvibe Shad is hét succesnummer van Reins. Gevist met dropshot, een loodkopje (Aji-Meba Jig Head of Platon !!), texas rig, carolina rig of op een jigkop vangt men op zowel zoet als zoutwater.




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Chicago Bears sign restricted free agent tight end Josh Hill to an offer sheet

The Bears have signed restricted free agent tight end Josh Hill. The New Orleans Saints have five days to match the offer.




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Fantasy Impact: Cleveland Browns sign Robert Griffin III

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You SUCK! Becoming an A-List Blogger

Guy Kawasaki is running a contest to come up with a caption for a cartoon about his:

"abhorrent" article that I wrote called "How to Suck Up to a Blogger." Is this fun or what? I think it's flattering to know that you're worth skewering!
Nice try Guy. First you put your foot in it and then try to spin it off as a joke. A classic PR stunt to save face if there ever was.

Well the joke is on you bud and so the FISK has taken up the challenge to "skewer" his good buddy Guy one more time. Here goes.

Headline:

Schwag won't cut it this time:

So Kiss my Royal...



Bloggers' Response (shouting in unison):

And while you're at it kiss mine too!

DEFINITION of A-List:

"A" stands for anal retentive, and "List" means getting in line behind the rest of the suckers.