Konecranes’ New Zealand MHC order
In the third quarter of this year, Northport Limited ordered an eco-efficient Konecranes Gottwald Model 6 Mobile Harbour Crane for their deep-water facility at Marsden Point, on the north island of New Zealand. The crane will be delivered and commissioned in the first quarter of 2020. It will expand the facility’s container handling capacity and help to handle general cargo and bulk materials.
Northport is the northernmost multi-purpose, dry-cargo port in
New Zealand, with its three berths handling traffic to and from most
of the country’s international markets. Northport is looking to grow, and therefore decided to invest in a new crane to work alongside the Konecranes Gottwald Model 4 Mobile Harbor Crane they’ve been operating since 2015.
“Since we started handling containers, we’ve received outstanding support from Konecranes,” says Jon Moore, CEO of Northport. “They’ve provided a high-performance crane that gives us wide flexibility in handling any kind of cargo. Once we had decided to expand our capacity, it was an easy decision to work with Konecranes again.”
This time, Northport opted for a Konecranes Gottwald Model 6 Mobile Harbor Crane in the G HMK 6507 variant. With this new crane, Northport can now serve container vessels up to post-Panamax class. The crane’s maximum lifting capacity of 125 tons extends their flexibility in handling general and heavy cargo. Equipped with a motor grab, it can also handle bulk materials. In addition to the eco-efficient diesel-electric drive, an external power source can be used to operate the crane, which gives the possibility to use back-up power options and complies with the New Zealand government’s strict guidelines for sustainable energy use.
“It’s been a pleasure working with Northport,” says Michael Green, Regional Director Sales APAC, Konecranes Port Solutions. “We admire their long-term commitment to providing reliable and efficient cargo handling. We look forward to continuing our relationship with them in the future.”
Konecranes is a world-leading group of Lifting Businesses™, serving a broad range of customers, including manufacturing and process industries, shipyards, ports and terminals.


Midori teams up with pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet for Beethoven Sonatas. "Sonatas are really musical conversations between two artists. Melodies are traded back and forth. Timing is critical. There is no room for error in the absence of a large orchestra. Truly they are performances without a net. Midori and Thibaudet proved a deft pair. " - Hillrag. Com
Label: WARNER CLASSICS
Beethoven: Complete Violin Sonatas [Digipak]
Artist: Midori
CD - Digipak
1. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 1 in D Major, Op. 12, No. 1: I. Allegro Con Brio
2. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 1 in D Major, Op. 12, No. 1: II. Tema Con Variazioni (Andante Con Moto)
3. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 1 in D Major, Op. 12, No. 1: II. Tema Con Variazioni (Andante Con Moto) - Variation I
4. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 1 in D Major, Op. 12, No. 1: II. Tema Con Variazioni (Andante Con Moto) - Variation II
5. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 1 in D Major, Op. 12, No. 1: II. Tema Con Variazioni (Andante Con Moto) - Variation III
6. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 1 in D Major, Op. 12, No. 1: II. Tema Con Variazioni (Andante Con Moto) - Variation IV
7. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 1 in D Major, Op. 12, No. 1: III. Rondo (Allegro)
8. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 2 in a Major, Op. 12, No. 2: I. Allegro Vivace
9. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 2 in a Major, Op. 12, No. 2: II. Andante PiÃ¹ Tosto Allegretto
10. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 2 in a Major, Op. 12, No. 2: III. Allegro Piacevole
11. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 3 in E-Flat Major, Op. 12, No. 3: I. Allegro Con Spirito
12. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 3 in E-Flat Major, Op. 12, No. 3: II. Adagio Con Molt'espressione
13. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 3 in E-Flat Major, Op. 12, No. 3: III. Rondo (Allegro Molto)
14. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 4 in a Minor, Op. 23: I. Presto
15. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 4 in a Minor, Op. 23: II. Andante Scherzoso, PiÃ¹ Allegretto
16. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 4 in a Minor, Op. 23: III. Allegro Molto
17. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 5 in F Major, Op. 24, "Spring" No. 1: I. Allegro
18. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 5 in F Major, Op. 24, "Spring" No. 1: II. Adagio Molto Espressivo
19. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 5 in F Major, Op. 24, "Spring" No. 1: III. Scherzo (Allegro Molto)
20. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 5 in F Major, Op. 24, "Spring" No. 1: IV. Rondo (Allegro Ma Non Troppo)
21. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 6 in a Major, Op. 30, No. 1: I. Allegro
22. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 6 in a Major, Op. 30, No. 1: II. Adagio Molto Espressivo
23. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 6 in a Major, Op. 30, No. 1: III. Allegretto Con Variazioni
24. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 6 in a Major, Op. 30, No. 1: III. Allegretto Con Variazioni - Variation I
25. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 6 in a Major, Op. 30, No. 1: III. Allegretto Con Variazioni - Variation II
26. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 6 in a Major, Op. 30, No. 1: III. Allegretto Con Variazioni - Variation III
27. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 6 in a Major, Op. 30, No. 1: III. Allegretto Con Variazioni - Variation IV
28. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 6 in a Major, Op. 30, No. 1: III. Allegretto Con Variazioni - Variation V
29. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 6 in a Major, Op. 30, No. 1: III. Allegretto Con Variazioni - Variation VI
30. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 7 in C minor, Op. 30, No. 2: I. Allegro Con Brio
31. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 7 in C minor, Op. 30, No. 2: II. Adagio Cantabile
32. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 7 in C minor, Op. 30, No. 2: III. Scherzo (Allegro)
33. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 7 in C minor, Op. 30, No. 2: IV. Finale (Allegro)
34. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 8 in G Major, Op. 30, No. 3: I. Allegro Assai
35. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 8 in G Major, Op. 30, No. 3: II. Tempo Di Minuetto, Ma Molto Moderato E Grazioso
36. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 8 in G Major, Op. 30, No. 3: III. Allegro Vivace
37. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 9 in a Major, Op. 47, "Kreutzer": I. Adagio Sostenuto
38. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 9 in a Major, Op. 47, "Kreutzer": II. Andante Con Variazioni
39. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 9 in a Major, Op. 47, "Kreutzer": II. Andante Con Variazioni - Variation I
40. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 9 in a Major, Op. 47, "Kreutzer": II. Andante Con Variazioni - Variation II
41. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 9 in a Major, Op. 47, "Kreutzer": II. Andante Con Variazioni - Variation IV
42. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 9 in a Major, Op. 47, "Kreutzer": II. Andante Con Variazioni - Variation III
43. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 9 in a Major, Op. 47, "Kreutzer": III. Presto
44. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 10 in G Major, Op. 96, No. 1: I. Allegro Moderato
45. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 10 in G Major, Op. 96, No. 1: II. Adagio Espressivo
46. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 10 in G Major, Op. 96, No. 1: III. Scherzo (Allegro)
47. Sonata for Piano and Violin No. 10 in G Major, Op. 96, No. 1: IV. Poco Allegretto


Crown Electrokinetics Releases Form 8-K Announcing New Sales Agreement, Expects to Initiate Deliveries by Summer 2022
LOS ANGELES, March 28, 2022 — McapMediaWire — Crown Electrokinetics Corp. (NASDAQ: CRKN) (“Crown” or the “Company”), a leading smart glass technology company, released a Form 8-K, disclosing entering into a Master Supply Agreement with a large Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT).
Crown will supply its window tinting products to the client in selected locations in three states. The terms of the agreement will be disclosed in a future joint press release.
Crown expects to achieve product launch in Summer 2022, as outlined in Mr. Doug Croxall Shareholder Letter on March 23rd, 2022.
The potential market for Crown’s products targets US commercial office buildings. According to results from the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) 2018 Commercial Buildings Energy Consumption Survey (CBECS), as of 2018 there were 5.9 million U.S. commercial buildings containing a total of 97 billion square feet.
You can access the Form 8K Filing by accessing the Company’s website under the Investor Relations Section (https://ir.crownek.com/sec-filings).
About Crown Electrokinetics
Crown is a smart glass technology company and the creator of DynamicTint – We Make Your Glass Smarter . Originally invented by Hewlett-Packard (HP, Inc.), our technology allows any glass surface to transition between clear and dark in seconds. With applications to a wide array of windows, including commercial buildings, automotive sunroofs, and residential skylights, we partner with leading glass and film manufacturers for mass production and distribution. At the core of our technology is a thin film that is powered by electrically charged pigment which not only replaces common window tints but is also a more sustainable alternative to traditional window treatments. With its unique ability to be retrofitted to existing glass, DynamicTint offers myriad benefits related to reducing carbon emissions. The company is supported by a robust patent portfolio.
Safe Harbor Statement: Statements in this news release may be “forward-looking statements”. Forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements that express our intentions, beliefs, expectations, strategies, predictions, or any other statements relating to our future activities or other future events or conditions. These statements are based on current expectations, estimates and projections about our business based, in part, on assumptions made by management. These statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions that are difficult to predict. Therefore, actual outcomes and results may, and are likely to, differ materially from what is expressed or forecasted in forward-looking statements due to numerous factors. Any forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this news release and Crown Electrokinetic Corporation undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this news release.
This press release does not constitute a public offer of any securities for sale. Any securities offered privately will not be or have not been registered under the Act and may not be offered or sold in the United States absent registration or an applicable exemption from registration requirements.
Crown Electrokinetics
IR Email: info@crownek.com
Source: Crown Electrokinetics: www.crownek.com
ALYI Confirms Latin America EV Expansion Update Coming This Thursday
Green Stream Holdings Inc (GSFI) Announces That It Is Cancelling The VGTL Merger


Would “Sword Art Online” Be a Bad VR Game?
Posted by Rampant Coyote on November 7, 2022
In the fiction, November 6, 2022 was the launch day for the game “Sword Art Online,” chronicled in the books, manga, and anime series of that name. In a launch day disaster that makes the Ford Edsel, New Coke, and the Microsoft Zune look like speed bumps in comparison, the players become trapped in VR and the headset will fry their brain if they die or if the headset is tampered with. Thanks to a crazy head engineer with a god complex, ten thousand players are now playing an ultra-realistic fantasy game in a virtual world with real-world stakes.
Now the real world date has caught up with the science fiction, as it always does. When the stories were first penned twenty years ago, I’m sure 2022 seemed a long way away, and Virtual Reality as we now enjoy it probably seemed almost as distant as the Matrix-like “Full Dive” experience the author described. The closest we had was a short-lived “Virtuality” arcade systems in the mid-to-late 1990s, with something like 5 frames per second with flat-shaded, untextured polygons. (Which gave me VR sickness back then, too…) Oh, and the disappointment of Nintendo’s “Virtual Boy.” But Massively Multiplayer Online RPGs were the hot new thing (EverQuest launched in 1999, and World of Warcraft was only on the horizon). So author Reki Kawahara drew on his familiarity with the games of the day and their systems to create what he thought would be a super-cool virtual reality game.
Once consumer VR hit in 2015, we discovered a lot about VR game design. A lot of what we learned was how the timeworn conventions and standard practices of 2D projection (“pancake”) gaming played with a game controller differed from the optimal VR experience. Now, those who have actually followed this blog for a long time know that I am a big fan of experimentation and don’t believe that just because something has become a convention means it is the “best.” We are a long way off from being able to say anything definitive about what is truly the “best” VR experience, and the technology continues to evolve and change. It could be that full-dive VR, if it ever happens, will have a whole new set of rules that will have little in common with the best we can do now.
Let’s say Sword Art Online did release today using current VR technology. Minus, of course, the “death game” element. Would it be a good VR game? Or a bad one? Let’s take a look at a few factors. Not all of these are VR specific, but I’ll focus on that.
High Stakes
Obviously, killing off your player base is not a plan for long-term success. But what about having high stakes? We have many games now with character permadeath (or as an option, often called “iron man” or “hardcore” mode). We’ve had MMORPGs with some pretty high “death penalties.” Higher stakes certainly raise the thrill of a game. But with the enhanced thrill of winning, so comes the increased frustration with losing. Higher stakes encourages a slower, more methodical, and more “grindy” experience. In general, a subset of gamers really enjoy these higher stakes (I often do), but it doesn’t have broad appeal. Most MMOs have reduced the “death penalty” to a minor inconvenience that doesn’t do much more than prevent players from brute-forcing combats with respawned characters.
Not much else is said about the death mechanic in the other game worlds of the series. In Alfheim Online, players would (originally) respawn back in their home city, which meant onerous travel back to the combat zones if they were not resurrected on time. In Gun Gale Online, it is a massively PvP environment, and the stakes (outside of tournaments) are unknown, but unlikely to be very high. In the spinoff series, one emotionally unstable character really wants to raise these stakes herself, planning suicide if she dies in a tournament.
Are higher stakes good or bad? It really depends. I think character permadeath (my watered-down version of Aincrad’s lethal stakes) is bad for building the community that you want in an MMO, though it can work great in smaller-scale multiplayer games. Below that… it really depends on how narrow and hardcore you want your audience to be. A lower death penalty retains more casual players. I’m leaving this one in the fuzzy neutral territory.
World Scope
Aincrad consisted of 100 hand-crafted levels of tremendous detail, down to the taste of individual foods that were largely unique across the dozens of eateries in each town (of which there were usually several on each floor). Each floor had its own theme and style. The first floor was 10km in diameter, and each subsequent floor was a little smaller. The first floor therefore had a radius of 5 km, which means its playable area was approximately 78.5 square kilometers. We also learn that there are some massive dungeons that appeared below the first level over time, although a certain guild tried to keep those to itself.
By comparison, Skyrim VR (a great if clunky port, especially with mods) has a total map size of about half that, at 37 square kilometers, about a quarter of which is unplayable “border.” Not including dungeons and expansion territory. I believe that Skyrim is a mix of hand-crafted and procedurally (or at least tools-generated) content, and it could be a pretty fair comparison. Anyway, bottom-line, we’re talking about 150-200 Skyrims of content for all of Aincrad. Which is kind of ridiculous to imagine (especially if every level was fully hand-crafted), especially when we assume that there is a larger library of objects with a higher level of interactivity than Skyrim offers (even modded in VR).
As an MMO, this would spread out the player base pretty badly – especially with only 10,000 players from the first day. This is true in the fiction, as most of the players remain in the starter town on the first floor, or in headquarters near the front-line levels, with a few finding residence scattered across several levels in the late game almost two years later. The first level was probably pretty packed the first month, but after the first several months a solo player like Kirito would be able to do a lot of free space to play solo.
In a traditional game, player movement speeds are exaggerated, in part to compensate for how much smaller things seem on a flat screen. Realistic speeds seem way too slow. However, in VR, this scale changes, and a kilometer actually feels like a kilometer. Especially if you are walking or running them on a treadmill.
While there are some negatives, I think overall players would love to see a VR world with this much scope. Most VR players, finding themselves with a mix of Half-Life: Alyx detail, BoneLab‘s free-form interactivity, and Skyrim’s scope, would never want to log out even if the button is available. This would be an absolute win (but a budgetary nightmare as a developer).
Level-Based Advancement
SAO is kind of inconsistent on how level impacts play. There are some episodes / stories that suggest it is paramount, and there are others that suggest that the player’s own skills, equipment, and meta-gaming can bridge a significant level-gap. In the later game Alfheim Online, level and skills were all but ignored, emphasizing player skill like a shooter or fighting game. Gun Gale Online seemed to take a hybrid approach, with players building up their stats over time to use better equipment.
In general, level-based gaming is great for small groups that can level together, and can act as a “gate” to higher-level content. For a community, it limits the ability of friends to play together. Many MMOs have taken some interesting approaches to get the best of both worlds. In the better VR games, player skill and direct interaction takes on a pretty big role, as it should. Without the character’s stats and growth, you just have an action game rather than an RPG. Without direct player action, you don’t have much of a game. When both work together, you get the reason why people play RPGs in the first place.
“Player skill” shouldn’t be limited to physical action and how you swing a sword or throw a knife, either. As illustrated in the stories, a deep knowledge of the game systems, world, and lore combined with logic and quick thinking should confer an advantage.
Sword Skills
In Aincrad, players could trigger a combo skill as in a fighting game, launching into an unstoppable sequence with often devastating results. In fighting games as in SAO, this has a downside of other players being able to detect and counter these sequences if they knew what they were doing, and the initiating player being unable to stop themselves. This leads to the downfall of Kirito at the end of the Aincrad story arc, and nearly results in Asuna’s death in the recent film Sword Art Online: Aria of a Starless Night.
In a console game, this is cool, because a skilled player can use a very limited interface of a gamepad and a few buttons to launch into some extremely cool moves that look cool and demonstrate mastery from a third-person perspective. In first-person VR, however, you ARE the avatar, and taking control of it away from the player is generally a no-no. At best, it breaks immersion and frustrates the player. Worse, it can cause VR sickness. This is likely a “Twinkie Denial Condition” for a VR MMO.
Cutscenes in an MMO?
In the Sword Art Online: Progressive novels, certain plotlines are punctuated by forced events which are effectively cutscene events. Regardless of the character’s stats or the player actions, triggering one of these events forces certain things to happen to the players and NPCs. This normally only happens in “safe” zones, but one of the books has a transition between locations. Since everything is supposed to happen in real-time, there’s no instantly teleporting to the target destination, and the characters are forced to wait through a long transition… (and, let’s just say Bad Things can happen during this transition when other players aren’t trapped by this unskippable scene…)
Even in the books, this is presented as a pretty terrible idea even without the deadliness of the game. It’s a bad idea outside of VR, too.
Procedural Plot Generator
In the stories, the game system uses AI to generate storylines, NPCs, and rewards procedurally based on real-world literature, folklore, and mythology. Given what we’re seeing with AI-generated art, this technology doesn’t seem as far-fetched as it did five years ago. The results are often kind of bizarre, and can trap players or ruin the game geography (I’d call that a bug…). This meant the entire game could run on autopilot without designer input for a couple of years and still provide new and intriguing (if occasionally bizarre) content.
In theory, the tech is there to do that now. How would it play? As a supplement to hand-created plots and as an alternative to randomly generated fetch-quests, I think that would be a win in VR or pancake games. (The image to the left is AI procedurally generated art based on the Wizard of Oz…). Trapping players or destroying entire levels is probably a no-no and there would have to be failsafes in place to prevent that. But this is kind of a holy grail of game design for me, so I’d love to see it work.
Worldwide Gated Content
Until the “level boss” is defeated, nobody can proceed to the next level. It requires the entire community to work together to allow anyone at all access to more content. I like the concept in theory. It is great for a story. In practice, I think it would be a source of frustration. This is even hinted at by the books, especially when it took an entire month to find and defeat the first floor boss. Those late to the party are forever denied the chance to take on the “real” boss. While I don’t think this is a full-on “Twinkie denial condition,” I think it’s generally a bad idea to have player experiences so heavily influenced by the actions of others.
Non-Private Data
Players have the ability to “peek” over another player’s shoulder at their UI when they have it up. That’s a pretty bad idea. I can see toggling visibility temporarily to validate information (especially when it comes to trades and so forth), but in general these things need to be plainly visible to all, invisible, or selectable by the player. People shouldn’t be able to sneak peeks in their VR headsets while another player isn’t paying attention.
Frauds / Scams / Exploits / Sleep PK / etc.
The SAO stories are at their best when the characters are playing detectives investigating how certain loopholes / scams / exploits in an otherwise robust and literally lethal game system might be taking place. They make for great plot elements in the stories. Obviously, these are intended to be flaws in the game system, and not something a real-world SAO would seek to emulate.
Overuse of Menus / Abstracted Interactions
VR is at its best when the interactions are natural, and feel just like doing a thing in “real life.” In SAO, a lot of the interactions are done by tapping objects and bringing up menus, or simply tapping them. This is an artifact of console games with more limited controls. Even with current technology and the limitations of hand and body tracking, this is unnecessary except with more complex interactions. In general, interactions with objects can and should be a lot more natural, with very few menus. You don’t tap the cream and tap the bread to put cream on it… you pick up the cream and pour it on the bread. While this isn’t a big negative, this would be an unnecessary break in immersion.
Limited Fast-Movement Options
Aside from the one teleport gate in the main city in each level, teleportation or any kind of fast-travel is cost-prohibitive in Aincrad. In general, teleport crystals are so expensive that they are only used in an emergency or to facilitate a major raid. It sounds great for realism, and it can be a lot of fun when you are first exploring, but it quickly becomes tedious. Especially with realistic movement speeds in VR. It’s even worse in an MMO when you want the community to be able to play together, but friends may have to take hours to meet up.
Knockback
A lot of the enemy actions can toss players in the air. This is even worse than canned avatar actions, and can easily cause VR discomfort. If this is a required gameplay mechanic, a real-world SAO should allow comfort options to prevent them from witnessing their tumbling avatar in the first person. Otherwise, boss fights will be followed by vomit-fests from all but the most jaded VR players.
Aincrad for Modern VR
So where are we? If we were to literally create SAO for modern VR, should it look much like the game from the books, manga, and anime?
Yes and no. I think the idea of skill activation and canned animations are a bad idea, and getting rid of those–as they are described–might change the feel of the entire system. Maybe. Would diehard fans care? Probably not, especially if they had a reasonable substitute. I think that would be key. Sword skills might allow you to get better numbers if you perform them right, but you never lose control over your avatar.
Interactions should be made more natural than suggested by the books and shows, which would only enhance the experience. Obviously, the flaws and exploits should be avoided.
One of the challenges with VR, as in all MMOs, is maintaining framerate. A ton of PCs and dynamic items filling a scene not only makes it hard to move or interact, it can cause a VR player to become sick. This is a challenge current VR MMOs are tackling. I assume they are doing so successfully, as I’ve never noticed a significant problem in Zenith VR or Orbus VR. Maybe I am just lucky.
And we are getting pretty lucky. We now have a handful of MMOs built from the ground up for VR, with a few more in development. Developers are tackling these kinds of issues, although their budgets are nowhere near what would be required to really build something of the scope and scale of Aincrad.
Ultimately, I believe that Sword Art Online gained its popularity as much for its concept and timing than its execution. VR has long promised the ability to visit other worlds in our lifetime. This concept has been visited many times before (I started with the Dream Park series, by Larry Niven and Steven Barnes), but SAO packaged it up at a time and in a format where we could almost see it happening. While “full-dive” technology to completely immerse us in VR is still a long way off, we’ve made a giant leap in this direction with modern VR, and I want to take advantage of it.
VR has changed the rules for me for computer RPGs as significantly as CRPGs changed things up from the dice & paper world. Playing an RPG in VR is something else, especially in those few titles that allow cooperative multiplayer. Something like Karnage Chronicles, which is more like a game of Gauntlet than a true RPG, is an absolute blast with friends. I’m still playing Skyrim VR, and it is pretty long-in-the-tooth both for the original version and the VR conversion.
We may never see a “true” VR MMORPG of the scope imagined by these authors. That’s fine. I’ll keep reading. But the next best thing is within our grasp, and I certainly hope to see our VR fantasy worlds grow bigger, better, and more interactive–and in some ways, even better than these science fiction stories promised. At least more fun as a game.
But with a logout button, of course.
Filed Under: Virtual Reality - Comments: Comments are off for this article


Top 10 craziest things Jerry Falwell ever said
Last week I gave Rev. Pat Robertson a lifetime achievement award for inflicting pain on humankind and shame on the body of Christ. Helen Eisert was quick to nominate Jerry Falwell as another possible candidate. Looking at the following top 10 list, it is hard to argue with her nomination. Any other votes for the Rev?
10. “The idea that religion and politics don’t mix was invented by the Devil to keep Christians from running their own country.”
9. “The ACLU is to Christians what the American Nazi party is to Jews.”
8. “I hope I live to see the day when, as in the early days of our country, we won’t have any public schools. The churches will have taken them over again and Christians will be running them. What a happy day that will be!”
7. “AIDS is the wrath of a just God against homosexuals. To oppose it would be like an Israelite jumping in the Red Sea to save one of Pharaoh’s charioteers … AIDS is not just God’s punishment for homosexuals; it is God’s punishment for the society that tolerates homosexuals.”
6. “Nothing will motivate conservative evangelical Christians to vote Republican in the 2008 presidential election more than a Democratic nominee named Hillary Rodham Clinton – not even a run by the devil himself … I certainly hope that Hillary is the candidate. She has $300 million so far. But I hope she’s the candidate. Because nothing will energize my [constituency] like Hillary Clinton. If Lucifer ran, he wouldn’t.” –at a “Values Voter Summit”
5. “Grown men should not be having sex with prostitutes unless they are married to them.”
4. “Billy Graham is the chief servant of Satan in America.”
3. “He is purple — the gay-pride color, and his antenna is shaped like a triangle — the gay pride symbol.” –from a “Parents Alert” issued in Jerry Falwell’s National Liberty Journal, warning that “Tinky Winky,” a character on the popular PBS children’s show, “Teletubbies,” may be gay
2. “You’ve got to kill the terrorists before the killing stops. And I’m for the president to chase them all over the world. If it takes 10 years, blow them all away in the name of the Lord.”
1. “The abortionists have got to bear some burden for this because God will not be mocked. And when we destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we make God mad. I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way — all of them who have tried to secularize America — I point the finger in their face and say ‘you helped this happen.'” –on the 9/11 attacks
http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/stupidquotes/a/falwellquotes.htm
Jim Rigby, Top 10 craziest things Jerry Falwell ever said
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Home » Wiesel
December 30, 2016 By Olivier Melnick 3 Comments
Antisemitism in 2016: A Year in Review (Part II)
For Part I go here.
July 2016: Holocaust Memory: What Would Elie Wiesel Do?
Elie Wiesel passed away on July 2nd, 2016 at the age of 87. In a sense, the passing of this giant is the silencing of one man who chose to perpetuate Holocaust memory in any way he could. He leaves behind him 57 books, too numerous to list or recommend here except maybe for his death camps Memoir Night, written in 1960. To Wiesel who received the Nobel Peace prize in 1986, much remained to be accomplished to remember the past and alleviate a similar future.
To him, apathy or indifference was one the worst evil in the world. That is exactly why he spent the bulk of his life educating a world in shock that later morphed into a numb world to eventually become the postmodern world in denial that it currently is. He once said “I decided to devote my life to telling the story because I felt that having survived I owe something to the dead and anyone who does not remember betrays them again.” He had always felt guilty of not being able to do more for his dad during their imprisonment in the camps.
He leaves us with a tremendous challenge. We must continue his fight. If we remain silent, his voice will fade away into oblivion or worse, get relegated to a couple of statements about an event that many are already starting to doubt or deny. To honor the memory of Elie Wiesel is more than appropriate, but to remember the Holocaust is vital to the survival of Western civilization. As a matter of fact, to remember the Holocaust and teach it to the next generation IS to honor the memory of Elie Wiesel.
August 2016: Does World Vision’s Entanglement with Hamas show Naiveté or Malice?
World Vision International (WVI) humanitarian work has become the hallmark of Christian love and aid over the decades, so much that their yearly revenue nears $3 billion. Their published mission statement says “World Vision is an international partnership of Christians whose mission is to follow our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in working with the poor and oppressed to promote human transformation, seek justice, and bear witness to the good news of the Kingdom of God.”
In August 2016, Israel’s internal security service accused WV Gaza office manager, Mohammed El Halabi of using up to $50 millions of charity funds to pay Hamas fighters, build tunnels and buy weapons. He was arrested in June and detained for fifty days before the accusation was made public. The Shin Bet claims to have more than sufficient proof that will be produced in court. Consider a few more facts about World Vision:
• When the Palestinian movie “With God on Our Side” came out in 2010, It was endorsed by World Vision VP, Steven W. Haas. His endorsement read “I dare anyone to see this film and remain unchanged.”
• On the World Vision website, all the countries helped by the organization are listed. While Palestine and/or Israel are not listed by names, “Jerusalem/West Bank/Gaza are listed. They made a clear choice in their labelling.
• in 2007, World Vision International, which by all standards is NOT A CHURCH, decided to change its fiscal status to a “Church Status” enabling them to no longer file the IRS form 990s. By changing their status to a church, they limit the amount of financial information they have to share. All these elements related to the reputation of WVI give us a picture of a shady organization with less integrity that they would like us to believe they have.
September 2016: Go ahead, build a security wall…Unless of course you are Israel!
Most people have heard about the Great Wall of China, started in the 7th century AD and continued for almost 1,000 years. It was built to originally protect China from repeated Eurasian invasions and continued to be used for border control over the centuries. It measures over 13,000 miles. A much smaller wall is currently being erected in the northwest part of France in the town of Calais. It has already been dubbed “The Great Wall of Calais.” Of course, Israel has been working on their security fence/wall for several years since 2003 and hundreds of lives have already been saved because of the fence. It has been a very difficult diplomatic and political battle for Israel, constantly accused of being an “Apartheid State.” Comparing Israel to South Africa is far from honest since Apartheid in South Africa was based on racial tension and falsely assumed elitism, while Israel has been building its wall solely for security reasons.
The double-standard used regarding the building of walls (including the recent one started by Saudi Arabia to also protect itself from ISIS terrorists) is upholding. France and England build a wall to protect themselves from illegal migrants who most likely include sleeper ISIS members, and that’s OK! Saudi Arabia builds a 600 miles wall to keep ISIS out, and that’s OK! So why is Israel building a wall to keep terrorists out considered to be a human rights violation?
October 2016: When fighting antisemitism, it is never too little or too late!
While they have the same source, roots and much of the same history, Christianity and Judaism have been at odds for as long as man can remember. Many of the Church Fathers such as Justin Martyr, Chrysostom, Augustine and others set the stage for Christianity to alienate Judaism by reinterpreting the Bible. Slowly, laws were passed and enforced. Jewish life became hard and often near impossible, but against all odds and because of God’s grace, the Jewish people are still here today. In spite of the Middle Ages Blood Libel, the Crusades, the Inquisition, the Pogroms and the Holocaust, we are still standing. Christianity has had a difficult relationship with the Jewish people, so much so that the default mechanism for most Jewish people today is to believe that all Christians are antisemitic. That is why, whenever a Christian figure makes a repentant statement in favor of the Jewish people, it should be noted.
The 105th Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby made such a statement. He recently stated “The fact that antisemitism has infected the body of the Church is something of which we as Christians must be deeply repentant.” This would appear to be a simple statement, but it isn’t. Welby wrote a powerful piece titled “Vigilance and resolution: Living antidotes to an ancient virus.” in which he says “It is a shameful truth that, through its theological teachings, the church, which should have offered an antidote, compounded the spread of this virus.” Welby appears to be trying to bridge the gap between Christians and Jews. The simplest antidote to antisemitism can be found on the pages of the entire Bible. Many of its readers have re-interpreted it to exclude and even damn the Jews and Israel. Maybe I am hopelessly optimistic, but Welby’s words could help in preventing further damage in Judeo/Christian relations. We certainly could use a little respite.
November 2016: Unprecedented Rise in Anti-Semitism Confirmed at ADL Summit in New York!
The Anti-Defamation League’s current CEO, Jonathan Greenblatt said at the opening of their first summit on antisemitism on November 17, 2016 in Manhattan: “ADL had never before convened a summit like this on anti-Semitism. This is a first. ….And yet, today, I think all of us fear that something has changed. There are troubling signs. Now they may be subtle, they may go unnoticed by the vast majority of Americans, but we see them. We know…the American Jewish community has not seen this level of anti-Semitism in mainstream political and public discourse since the 1930s.” This is what I brought back from attending such a powerful summit:
• American Jews are worried about their future.
The elections brought out a vast amount of anti-Jewish sentiment expressed in the media with probably the most of it coming from social media. Like one speakers said “if it happens on Twitter, it could very well transfer into real life events.”
• Criticism of Israel is different from demonization.
Nobody fights the idea that Israel can be criticized for certain decisions that its government makes or has made. But criticism is very different from demonization. Natan Sharansky reminded us of the real danger facing us today as he spoke of the three Ds against Israel he so eloquently defined years ago: Delegitimization, double-standards and demonization.
• Our greatest threat might come from American Universities.
US campuses are where the next generation of American leaders are being molded and mentored. Regardless of your political inclination, it is an accepted fact that most US campuses are very liberal and the radical Left BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanction) movement is spreading like wildfire on American campuses. This is a battleground that cannot be ignored, but to the dismay of most of the speakers, Jewish students on various campuses are too often poorly equipped at best and uninformed at worst, to fight BDS.
• The time to act is NOW!
While the focus of the summit was on how to fight anti-Semitism, other minorities were represented throughout the day. The reason is rather obvious; those who oppose and harass Jewish people will seldom stop there. Bigotry is always an equal opportunity hater.
I applaud the ADL for its efforts, and I encourage all of you who read me to be more vocal and more involved because NEVER IS NOW and to quote Mr. Greenblatt one last time: “We need to educate where we can, oppose where we must, and lock arms with those who embrace our mission.”
December 2016: Battles against ISIS can be won, but what about the war?
Not a week goes by anymore without the world being affected by radical Islam. The latest victim of this barbaric, medieval ideology, was Berlin, Germany. In a scenario similar to the one that took place in Nice, France on July 14, 2016, a terrorist drove a truck through a crowded Christmas market, killing 12 and wounding 49. Anis Amri, the Tunisian immigrant who attacked the Christmas market was caught and shot as he was on the run in Italy. He had sought asylum in Germany a few years ago but was denied because of possible ties with radical Islam. Just days prior, Andrey Karlov, the Russian Ambassador in Turkey, was shot seven times in public in Ankara, while the Turkish shooter screamed Allahu Akbar (God is great) in Arabic, followed by “Do not forget Aleppo! Do not forget Syria! Do not forget Aleppo! Do not forget Syria!”
The Islamic State seems to be the ideological thread between these violent murders across the planet.
• The Islamic State murders: They will kill in many ways using men, women AND children to further their agenda of death as they seek Islamic bliss in paradise by killing more infidels. The culture of death that drives ISIS seems unstoppable against a world that values and respect life.
• The Islamic State infiltrates: The Russian Ambassador’s shooter had a connection to ISIS. The November 2015 Bataclan massacre in Paris was facilitated by the migrant crisis ebb and flow throughout Europe. At least one of the protagonists came to Paris through that venue and they will continue to do so all over the world until better vetting systems are in place.
• The Islamic State recruits: For reasons that remain hard to figure out, they also have been rather successful at recruiting Westerners. This makes profiling much more complicated. Social media has also been a very fruitful platform for radical Islam recruiting.
• The Islamic State inspires: But the most dangerous aspect of the Islamic State is the fact that even outside of infiltrating or recruiting, they inspire! Their apocalyptic ideology of death is inspiring people to act on their behalf even without having been trained in Syria or elsewhere.
The old optimistic adage of “losing the battle but winning the war” has been reversed for our generation. I am convinced that we will successfully win many battles against Islamic terrorism but we might never win the war!
In conclusion, the Jewish people continue to be seen by many as the guilty people, responsible for many of the ills of the world, far beyond the “disputed territories and/or the settlements as the United Nations, Mr. Obama and Mr. Kerry seemed to believe in the last days of 2016. While there is much unknown with the coming new US administration and the upcoming French and German elections, the Jewish people will most likely continue to be the scapegoats of humanity. 2016 wasn’t the worst year for Jewish people, but then again, a good day for the global Jewish community is seldom measured on how good it was but rather on how bad it could have been. You can call me a fatalist but based on my work of the last 17 years, I prefer to call myself a realist.
Filed Under: Antisemitism, BDS, Bible, Christianity, Eschatology, European Union, God, Holocaust, ISIS, Islam, Islamo-Fascism, Israel, Jewish, Middle East, Muslims, Palestinians, Political Correctness, Terrorism, United Nations, United States, Yeshua Tagged With: ADL, Elie Wiesel, Hamas, Welby, Wiesel, World Vision, World Vision International


Research Hydrocephalus Treatment and Outcome in African Infants with Myelomeningocele: What We Have Learned So Far
Hydrocephalus Treatment and Outcome in African Infants with Myelomeningocele: What We Have Learned So Far
Neurosurgery | December 15, 2010
We estimate that around 2000 infants in Uganda develop hydrocephalus (HC) each year. Post-infectious hydrocephalus (PIH) accounts for 60% of all cases, and several lines of investigation are underway to determine the pathogens and their mode of transmission. HC associated with myelomeningocele (MM) is the second most common etiology, accounting for 15% of cases.
Access to treatment for hydrocephalus in Africa is inhibited by poverty, politics, poor infrastructure, and a paucity of neurosurgeons. These also present obstacles to follow up and emergency care for treatment failure, making death from future shunt malfunction a serious enduring threat.
We explored the role of endoscopic treatment for hydrocephalus in African infants, and found that combined endoscopic third ventriculostomy and bilateral choroid plexus cauterization (ETV/CPC) was significantly more successful than ETV alone in those less than one year of age. Infants with myelomeningocele benefitted the most from this approach, with a 76% success rate. In contrast to shunt failure, nearly all ETV/CPC failures become evident within 6 months of surgery. We have demonstrated factors that are independently predictive of ETV/CPC outcome, and have generated a new outcome prediction score (the Uganda Score) that is currently being evaluated across several centers in Africa.
In addition to safety and long-term efficacy of ETV/CPC in the myelomeningocele population, we also demonstrated that those treated in this way performed as well or better on the Bayley Scales of Infant Development over the course of their early childhood development than those who were shunted. Furthermore, we found no correlation between performance and ventricle size. We recently investigated whether the presence of HC or its method of treatment affected 5 year survival in these children, and were surprised to find no difference. Importantly, the most important determinant of survival was involvement in a community-based rehabilitation program. The five year mortality for these children was close to that of their unaffected peers (16%); whereas the mortality for those with no access to such a program was more than triple (50%). Deaths were mostly from causes not directly related to the underlying neurological conditions.
ETV/CPC is a safe and effective alternative to shunt-dependence in children with myelomeningocele. In Africa, any long-term survival advantage of shunt-independence may be obscured by diseases of poverty and neglect. “Life-saving surgery” in these children must be wedded to community-based support programs that promote their access to adequate health care and nutrition.
Cerebrospinal Fluid Research
myelomeningocele


Sonic: The Lost Land
Sonic - The Lost Land is a hack of Sonic the Hedgehog for the Sega Mega Drive. The game is comprised of 7 levels, each filled with traps and badniks intent on bringing down Sonic once and for all. There is also a special realm consisting of 6 Chaos Emeralds. If you have collected at least 50 rings by the time you finish the level, you will see a giant ring. Jump into it to be taken to the secret realm. A dynamic palette system is set up, making each act load its own palette (à la Knuckles' Chaotix), as well as a dynamic music system, allowing each act to load its own music.
The Lost Land. A beautiful island paradise, once inhabited by creatures known only as the ancients. Unfortunately, it has recently come under threat by the evil Dr Eggman. Sonic knows that Eggman must be stopped, and with the help of Shadow, who is contemplating his future, he sets off to put an end to Eggman's plans.
Sonic - The Lost Land allows for two playable characters, with the evil Dr Eggman as the antagonist.
Sonic is a blue, 15-year-old hedgehog who lives on the planet Earth. He has the ability to run at supersonic speeds, hence his name. He is always running all over the world, rarely stopping for anything. He is carefree and relaxed; however, he is also very intolerant of injustice, and he will do anything he can to help those in need. He has also got a quick wit, short temper, and a fairly large ego.
Shadow the Hedgehog
Shadow is the ultimate life form experiment, a joint-creation of Professor Gerald Robotnik and Black Doom aboard the space colony ARK. His exact age isn't approximated, but he is assumed to be around 50 years old. Once hungry for revenge after the death of Maria, Gerald's granddaughter, he is now aware of his past, and who he "is." He prefers to be a loner, but he occasionally tags along with Sonic and his friends when Eggman is up to no good. He is black, with red stripes down his spines and arms. He uses his ability, Chaos Control, to harness the powers of the Chaos Emeralds to enhance his natural abilities. While he is unable to move very quickly on his own, he possesses fire-powered jet skates, which allow him to move much faster than he would be able to without them.
Please note: Shadow is not available in the current or previous releases of this hack.
Dr Ivo Robotnik (EGGMAN)
With an IQ of 300, and self-proclaimed the greatest scientific genius in the world, Eggman stops at nothing in his attempts at world conquest. While his plans are constantly foiled by Sonic, this only makes him more determined to conquer the world. Will he succeed?
The Levels
Seven zones are in the hidden area of the Lost Land, each of them filled with many traps and dangers, intent on putting a stop to Sonic's heroic efforts. These levels are:
A tranquil hillside area by a sparkling lake. Feel the grass under your feet as you run along. Loop-de-loops are fun, but don't land on the spikes. Ouch!
Roman Ruins
Watch your step as you tackle the lava-filled marble ruins of an ancient civilisation. Many of the traps are still active, so be very careful.
Bounce around on the many springs while avoiding the traps and badniks that are present in this lush mountainside garden. Ride platforms to great heights, but when the time comes, will you be courageous enough to take a leap of faith? Whee!
Marine Maze
A mysterious labyrinth that has been flooded with water. You can only survive for 30 seconds underwater. Be sure to grab an air bubble or return to the surface if you're running low on oxygen.
Construction has long been abandoned in this magnificent city, located high in the sky. Ride the loop-de-loops and platforms, all the while keeping a lookout for any traps or badniks. If you fall, it'll be to your doom, so watch out!
Egg Empire
You've found Eggman's base, where the EggRobo has fled. You've got him in your sights, but what's this? A barrier prevents you from getting to the final arena. You'll have to search for another way in.
Final Fate
This is it. The final arena, where you will fight EggRobo to decide the fate of the world. Don't let him succeed! Good luck!
The current version (Release 4) of Sonic: The Lost Land is available here.
The Shadow Realm is © 2008 Shadow Fire
Design by Striker


Five Athletes to Watch at the Paralympics
Paralympics Sports Tokyo 2020
Hidden Wonders Paralympics
[Hidden Wonders of Japan] Trying Out Para Sports One Year after the Tokyo Paralympics
A New Year's Look at the Most-Read Paralympic Stories of 2021
[Hidden Wonders of Japan] Paralympic Triathletes Celebrate Diversity in ‘Abbey Road’ Shot
[ODDS and EVENS] Tokyo Paralympics Strengthened Our Appreciation of Athletes' Love of Competition, Pursuit of Excellence
Culture Paralympics
EDITORIAL | Paralympians Do the Impossible, and Show Sports Can Transform Lives
Some of the world’s most successful Para athletes are returning to the spotlight at the Tokyo Games.
Jim Armstrong
Markus Rehm soars through the air in the men's long jump event at the German Athletics Championships on June 6 in Braunschweig, Germany. (Annegret Hilse/REUTERS)
Whether spectators will be allowed at the Tokyo Paralympics set to begin on August 24 is still under discussion. Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has said the decision will be in line with the COVID-19 situation.
One thing for sure is, with or without spectators, there will be many stirring moments, as there were for the Olympics.
This the 16th edition of the Paralympic Games and the second time they have been hosted in Tokyo following 1964.
Here are some of the athletes to keep an eye once the Games begin.
Markus Rehm is a two-time Paralympic long jump champion.
Markus Rehm ー Athletics
Nicknamed “The Blade Jumper,” Markus Rehm is one of the most recognizable athletes at the Paralympics.
A three-time Paralympic gold medalist, the 32-year-old German has taken the world of long jumping by storm. His mark of 8.48 meters is not only a world record but would have been enough to win gold at 2008, 2012, 2016 and 2020 Olympic Games.
Rehm, who has a blade-type leg prosthesis, also claimed the gold medal in the 4x100-meter relay at the Rio de Janeiro Paralympics.
In Tokyo, he will be seeking his third long jump gold medal that would solidify his place as one of the top Paralympians of all time.
Rehm attempted to qualify for the Rio Olympics to become the second bladed athlete to compete at the Olympics following runner Oscar Pistorius at the 2012 London Games.
Rehm took his case to the IAAF (now known as World Athletics) but track and field’s governing body denied him permission to participate in the 2016 Olympics.
Sebastian Coe, the organization’s president, commented on the decision in June 2016. “Rehm still has to prove that the prosthetic doesn’t give him an unfair advantage and he has not been able to show that,” Coe was quoted as saying by The Associated Press.
Despite the ruling, Rehm still hopes the day comes when he sees Paralympians competing side-by-side with Olympic athletes.
“If I would see one day that there’s a relay between Olympic and Paralympic athletes, as a connection event, I think I would start crying, because this is something I have been talking about for so many years,” Rehm told Olympics.com.
Rehm had his right leg below the knee amputated after a wakeboarding accident in 2005 when he was 14.
Shingo Kunieda competes in the French Open men’s wheelchair quarterfinals on June 4 in Paris. (Benoit Tessier/REUTERS)
Shingo Kunieda ー Wheelchair Tennis
World No. 1 Shingo Kunieda is set to compete in his fifth straight Paralympics. The 37-year-old won gold medals in men’s singles at the 2008 Beijing Games and the 2012 London Games.
In 2020, Kunieda beat two-time defending champion Alfie Hewitt 6-3, 3-6, 7-6 in the wheelchair tennis men’s final to capture his seventh U.S. Open singles title.
In a statement released by the Japanese Paralympic Committee, Kunieda expressed his appreciation for being able to take part in the Games in these challenging times.
“I will not forget my appreciation for everybody who worked to make [the Games] possible,” he said. “I understand that there are various regulations due to the coronavirus pandemic and will follow them when taking part in the competition.”
Kunieda was defeated in the quarterfinals of the Rio Games so he will have plenty of motivation to capture the gold on home soil.
A native of Chiba, Kunieda is paralyzed in the lower half of his body due to a tumor in his spinal cord found when he was 9.
Devendra Jhajharia won the Paralympic javelin event at the 2016 Rio Games. (Press Information Bureau/Government of India/via WIKIMEDIA COMMONS)
Devendra Jhajharia ー Athletics
India’s most successful Paralympic athlete, Devendra Jhajharia will be aiming for a third Paralympic gold medal in the javelin event.
The 40-year-old Jhajharia was 23 when he was first crowned Paralympic champion in Athens in 2004. He also won gold in the men’s javelin F46 in Rio.
Jhajharia, whose left arm was amputated when he was 8, set the world record of 62.15 meters in Athens, eclipsing the previous mark of 59.77.
In Rio, he won the gold again and set a new world record of 63.97. He will be looking to better that in Tokyo.
“When I set the world record for the first time in 2004, It stayed until 2016 when I broke the record myself,” Jhajharia told Olympics.com. “Now, for Tokyo, I have set myself the target to further extend the world record so that it stays in my name for many years.”
Poland’s Natalia Partyka competes in both the Olympics and Paralympics. (Luisa Gonzalez/REUTERS)
Natalia Partyka ー Table Tennis
Born without a right hand and forearm, Natalia Partyka has been a dominant force in table tennis for 20 years. The 31-year-old native of Poland has competed in both the para and able-bodied disciplines. She is an eight-time Paralympic Games medalist since making her debut in Sydney when she was just 11 years old when she became the youngest Paralympian in history.
Partyka, who will compete in the Tokyo Paralympics, won a record fourth consecutive singles gold medal at Rio 2016, competing in the women’s class 10 category.
As an Olympian, she reached the last 32 in women’s singles at the London Games in 2012. She was eliminated in the second round at the Tokyo Olympics on July 25, and also participated in the women’s team competition.
Brad Snyder in an August 2012 file photo. (PUBLIC DOMAIN)
Brad Snyder ー Triathlon
A retired U.S. Navy Explosive Ordnance Disposal officer, Brad Snyder served in both Iraq and Afghanistan. In September of 2011, he was blinded after stepping on an improvised explosive device. While his arms and legs were unaffected, he lost his eyesight. Just one year later, Snyder won gold in the men’s S11 400-meter swimming freestyle at the 2012 Paralympic Games and left London with a total of two gold medals and one silver. Four years later in Rio, Snyder won four Paralympic medals.
In Tokyo, the seven-time Paralympic medalist will be seeking a medal in the paratriathlon after switching to the sport in 2018.
Author: Jim Armstrong
The author is a longtime journalist who has covered sports in Japan for more than 25 years. You can find his articles here, on JAPAN Forward.
Related Topics:athleticsBrad SnyderDevendra JhajhariaEditor's PickJim ArmstrongMarkus RehmNatalia PartykaparalympicsShingo Kuniedatable tennistokyo paralympicstrack and fieldtriathlonwheelchair tennis
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Grof, Stanislav, 1931-
Existence: July 1, 1931-
Stanislav (Stan) Grof, noted psychiatrist, author, consciousness researcher, and pioneer of transpersonal psychology, was born on July 1, 1931 in Prague, Czechoslovakia to Stanislav (a chemical engineer) and Maria Petnik Grof. Heavily influenced by the works of Freud early in his studies, Grof was inspired to become a psychiatrist and earned an M.D. at the Charles University School of Medicine in Czechoslovakia in 1956, and a Ph.D. at the Czechoslovakian Academy of Sciences in 1965. Dr. Grof’s interest in the clinical use of psychedelic substances was spurred in the 1960s when the Sandoz pharmaceutical company approached the Psychiatric Research Institute in Prague, requesting that studies be conducted on LSD-25 in order to ascertain whether or not the substance had therapeutic properties. Grof subsequently volunteered to participate in a research program which explored LSD as a tool for experiential training, allowing psychiatrists and psychologists to experience the “inner-world” of psychotic patients. He eventually became principal investigator of this program, and has gone on to devote his career to examining the therapeutic potential of psychedelic substances. In 1967, he was invited to Johns Hopkins University as a research scientist, and in 1969 continued on at the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center where he served as Chief of Psychiatric Research and Assistant Professor of Psychiatry. In 1973, Grof became a scholar-in-residence at the Esalen Institute, a non-profit organization devoted to the exploration of human potential in Big Sur, California. While there, he authored books, lectured, and developed Holotropic Breathwork, an innovative form of experiential psychotherapy, with his wife Christina. Dr. Grof is also the founder and president of the International Transpersonal Association (ITA), and has organized major international conferences on transpersonal psychology. Grof’s major fields of research interest include therapeutic and heuristic aspects of non-ordinary states of consciousness, the use of psychedelics and non-drug techniques in psychotherapy, alternative approaches to psychoses, spiritual emergency and treatment of transpersonal crises, biology, brain research, and consciousness studies. He also maintains interests in other non-ordinary states of consciousness such as shamanism, Eastern spiritual systems, mysticism, the rites of passage of aboriginal cultures, and near-death experiences. Dr. Grof is a Professor of Psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) in the Department of Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness, and also teaches in the Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara, CA. In October 2007, Dr. Grof received a VISION 97 award granted by the Foundation of Dagmar and Vaclav Havel in Prague. The foundation’s mission supports cultural and social projects with the potential to bring meaningful change to the future. Dr. Grof has written extensively on LSD and its use in psychotherapy and about other methods and types of psycho-spiritual work.
Born in Prague, Czechoslovakia; son of Stanislav Grof and Maria Petnik Grof.
Student at the Charles University School of Medicine, Prague, Czechoslovakia.
Participation in clinical LSD research and the study of artistic expression of psychiatric patients.
Psychiatric residency at the State Mental Hospital in Kosmonosy, near Prague.
Participating researcher in a multidimensional dynamic study of psychedelic drugs and anticholinergic delirogens in the Research Institute in Prague.
Outpatient Psychiatrist at the Psychiatric Clinic of the National Institute of Health, Prague.
Principle Investigator in a psychedelic research program at Psychiatric Research Institute, Prague, Czechoslovakia. Also involved in a team studying the mechanisms of psychogenic disorders and psychotherapy.
Completes postgraduate training at the Czecho-slovakian Academy of Science, recieves Ph.D. degree (Doctor of Philosophy in Medicine).
Clinical and research fellow, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD.
Chief of Psychiatric Research, Maryland Psychiatric Research Center, Catonsville, MD. Assistant professor of Psychiatry at the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD.
Scholar-in-residence at the Esalan Institute in Big Sur, CA.
Self-employed, conducting professional training in Holotropic Breathwork and transpersonal psychology, lecturing, and writing.
Professor of Psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS), Institute of Psychology, Cosmology, and Consciousness, San Francisco, CA.
Stanislav Grof papers
Identifier: MSP 1
Abstract This collection contains writings that document the career and research interests of psychiatrist and author Stanislav Grof. It consists primarily of published research articles and clippings discussing the therapeutic effects of psychoactive substances as well as some first-hand accounts of transcendental experiences.
Found in: Purdue University Archives and Special Collections / Stanislav Grof papers
More about 'Grof, Stanislav, 1931-'
Names Forms
Grof, Stan, 1931-
Grof, Brigitte (Associative with Related, Person)
Brigitte Grof is married to Stanislav Grof.
Agent Relation: 2016
Subject: Hallucinogenic drugs -- Therapeutic use X


Cassidy Perry
A team from the Gustave Roussy Institute in France has succeeded in eliminating localized metastases in the liver thanks to a robot that can guide the diffusion of microwaves directly into tumors. A first which went “perfectly”.
The treatment of metastatic liver cancer is most often local. And today, the development of interventional radiology makes it possible to destroy metastases without going through invasive surgery. In a press release published on July 9, the Gustave Roussy Institute explains that for the first time, the team of the therapeutic imaging department of the Institute went further by using a robot to “guide the destruction by microwaves of metastases localized in the liver”.
“Ballistic precision”
The liver is an organ difficult to reach because it is located “in a region anatomically dense in vital organs with the presence of important arteries and veins”, specifies Professor Thierry de Baere, head of the service. Before the patient’s operation, which took place on July 7, an artificial intelligence scanner was performed, allowing the Quantum Surgical robot to “plan the position, axis and depth at which the needle which delivers the treatment must be introduced”.
“The robot helps us by positioning with ballistic precision where to insert the needle through the skin and its inclination to reach its target by following a straight path without damaging tissue,” says Professor de Baere. [It] allows us to stop doing intermediate images during the process of inserting the needle to the tumor. Without the robot, we must move forward step by step, checking several times with the scanner that we are following the route that we have previously planned, often with iterations and repositionings. This saves patients from extra rays during the operation.”
A technique that could be democratized
According to him, the robot “successfully completed its mission. The patient is fine, he is out of the hospital. ” The intervention was carried out as part of a clinical trial on 20 patients, aimed at “assessing the safety and performance” of the device. “If its safety and performance are demonstrated, the Quantum Surgical robot should make it possible to democratize this technique of hepatic tumor ablation which to date is carried out only in expert centers”, concludes Professor de Baere.
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Cassidy is a certified dietician with a focus on patients suffering with diabetes. She has more than 10 years of experience, working with patients of different background. She writes health-related article for the Scientific Origin.
Explainable AI: The Importance of Interpretability and Transparency in Machine Learning Models
SpaceX’s Starship could drastically change the future of space exploration
Steven PeckDecember 13, 2021
Google sues Russian hackers for being masterminds of the glupteba botnet
Shakes GillesDecember 7, 2021


At least three generations of the Drew family in Plymouth, Massachusetts were sailmakers.
The first known in the lineage was David Drew, who was born in 1752 in Plymouth, the son of Nicholas and Bathsheba Kempton Drew. Nicholas was probably a sailmaker too but conclusive evidence has not been found to support it yet.
David established his business in Plymouth serving the ships in that area. As whaling and trade expanded from New England throughout the Atlantic, so did his work. New sails were needed for the ever expanding fleets and repairs were in constant demand. Ship owners maintained their ships then as we do our expensive commercial vehicles today. They weren’t making money in port or without efficient operation. Sails were the engines of the craft and the stress and wear on them was enormous.
The sailmaking craft stayed in the family. David brought his sons David and Atwood in to the business as young men. David Jr., eventually took over the business while his younger brother, Atwood became a ship captain, sailing the oceans of the world.
David established his ownership of the business when his father died at the young age of 55. Business was good in the sail loft producing enough revenue for the Drews to build a large home a short distance away at 51 Pleasant Street. The home remained in the Drew family for four generations until the 1920’s.
Drew Home on July 4th 1907
Drew Home in 1996
The walk to work wasn’t too long. A stroll up Pleasant Street that turned into Market Street. A right turn on Church Street after glancing to the left at First Church and Burial Hill and then a leisurely walk east as Church Street turned into Leyden after crossing Main Street. The walk ending at the third door on the left on the north side of the road at the Drew Sail Loft.
David Jr’s son, David III, took over the business in 1825 when his father became ill and died. He kept the business thriving for years until the sailing fleets began to dwindle because of the downturn in whaling and the replacement of wind powered craft with fossil fuel power.
There was still enough revenue to support his family but not to entice his sons to enter the business. All of his sons left Plymouth in their early manhood to establish lives in other locales and occupations. David Lewis, moved across the county to Calaveras County, California during the gold rush. Harrison was a sailor who moved to Florida for a time and while there helped salvage a wrecked lumber ship. He married there and moved back to Plymouth to work and support his family. Austin worked in textiles and leather and traveled south to New York and other surrounding states before passing away.
The sail loft was sold when David was in his advanced age. The work must have agreed with his constitution, because he lived to the ripe old age of 94.
The era of the Drew Sail Loft passed into history. It supported generations of the family and while the work was extremely taxing physically, it was also rewarding, both from a monetary standpoint and from the knowledge that your work was traveling the world as the the power source on the grand sailing ships of Plymouth.
Worn, calloused knobbly knuckles and knees from sailmaking left the visage of the men of the family when the loft was sold. David’s descendants have explored numerous fields of endeavor. Most have continued in fields of expertise that has brought power to the vehicles and equipment of their era.
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Posted by Lee Drew at 7:02 PM 2 comments:
Labels: Drew, Plymouth Massachusetts, Sailmaker


Leopoldo Gómez
https://www.centrodeartefloral.com
Hometown: Cuautitlán Izcalli
Favorite flower: Nepenthes, a carnivorous flower also known as Monkey Cups
2016: Fifth place, Barcelona’s World Flower Cup
2016: Main Stage Presenter, AIFD Symposium, Orange County, California
2018: Grand Prize Winner, Gateway to the America’s Cup Competition
Leopoldo Gomez is a renowned international teacher of Floral Design, based in Mexico City. His style is widely acclaimed and sought after for its striking color palettes, vivid combinations of textures, and masterfully-crafted armatures and structures. He describes his work as “introspective” in which the essence of nature can be perceived and intrinsic treasures can be discovered.
Mexico City – from the ultramodern architecture and beautifully preserved historical landmarks, to its rich culture – has provided Gomez with a very unique setting in which to draw inspiration for his intricate works.
Leopoldo’s captivating body of work has been published in numerous periodicals including Fleur Créatif (Belgium), Flowers& (USA), Florists’ Review (USA), Nacre (France), Revista Clip (Spain) and Today Magazine (Korea), with the most notable being Isabel Gilbert Palmer’s trendsetting book, Formidable Florists in 2015. After several years of working and teaching for Smithers Oasis Mexico, Gomez co-founded the Centro de Arte Floral. It offers a full curriculum for floral professionals and novices. Gomez teaches year-round at his school, which offers international courses on-site at the facility as well as intensive courses abroad.
Besides floral design and teaching, his hobbies include football, basketball, traveling, gardening and cooking.
Leopoldo Gomez is representing Mexico on behalf of FTD.


Viacom18 Studios and Aamir Khan Productions announce upcoming film 'Laal Singh Chaddha'
Starring Aamir Khan, the film will release on Christmas 2020
ETBrandEquity
Published On Jun 21, 2019 at 07:42 PM IST
Viacom18 Studios in association with Aamir Khan Productions has announced their upcoming Indian film 'Laal Singh Chaddha', inspired by Paramount Pictures’ Oscar winning movie, Forrest Gump.
Laal Singh Chaddha will be directed by Advait Chandan of Secret Superstar fame and is being written by Atul Kulkarni. The film will release in Christmas 2020, the company said.
"For every cinephile out there, the must watch list of films would be incomplete without the mention of Forrest Gump. To be able to adapt the classic for Indian audiences is a long-cherished dream for many of us. Knowing Aamir’s burning passion for this subject for many years, he is the perfect partner to bring to life this dream," Ajit Andhare, COO, Viacom18 Studios said.
Read Also: Kannada Kotyadipathi to go on air on Colors Kannada from June 22
While Aamir Khan will essay the titular role in the film, Kareena Kapoor Khan will be seen paired opposite him for the third time.
“We’re thrilled to be in business with Aamir Khan Productions and Viacom18 Studios, and to see them bringing this timeless story to a whole new generation of audiences,” Andrew Gumpert, chief operating officer of Paramount Pictures said.
Forrest Gump is a 1994 American comedy-drama film based on the 1986 novel of the same name by Winston Groom. The story depicts several decades in the life of Forrest Gump (Hanks), a slow-witted but kind-hearted man from Alabama who witnesses and unwittingly influences several defining historical events in the 20th century in the United States.
Viacom18
Viacom18 Studios
Aamir Khan productions


NATO Secretary general applauds Jacksonville-based fighter wing's role as tensions rise amid crisis in Ukraine
Clifford Davis
Amid growing anxiety in Europe over Russian intervention in the Ukraine, NATO Sec. Gen. Jens Stoltenberg visited Jacksonville and its 125th Fighter Wing on Thursday.
About 200 members of the Florida Air National Guard wing and 12 of its F-15C fighters have been deployed to Eastern Europe since March, flying sorties and working with air forces in Bulgaria, The Netherlands and others.
Understandably, during a briefing by Brig. Gen. James Eifert and the 125th's commanding officer, Col. Brian Simpler, Stoltenberg's questions focused around the Russian threat and what the Air National Guard could do about it.
NATO VISIT: Stoltenberg at FANG
"Do you do a lot of intercepts of other planes approaching your airspace?" Stoltenberg asked. "Are there Russian planes?"
Simpler said his unit has trained for that mission and is capable of it. Maj. Gen. Robert Branyon cited an instance where it happened.
"Last year, [a Russian bomber] left from somewhere in the eastern part of Russia and they came down to San Francisco," Branyon said. "Alaska had F-22s intercept them and Canadians intercepted them."
Robert Bell, defense advisor to the U.S. Ambassador to NATO, said the move was absolutely intentional.
"The Russians were clearly sending a message," Bell said. "They came north to south down the West Coast and made a left turn, like a simulated bombing run at San Francisco, went right into the air defense identification zone and penetrated it.
"It wasn't accidental, you don't fly that far and fly a flight profile like that unless you're …"
Branyon added it was the first time the Russians sent fighter escorts along with the bomber.
The pilots and planes of the 125th - based at Jacksonville International Airport - specialize in air interdictions like this, Simpler said. "With the F-15, we call it air dominance," he said. "Our job is to gain and maintain air superiority over the battlefield.
"In other words, the F-15 is designed to shoot down other aircraft."
Recently outfitted with one of the most powerful air-to-air radars in the world and a long-range targeting system, the 125th Fighter Wing's F-15Cs have been upgraded like none other are currently.
"They are the most capable F-15s in the Air Force at this point," Simpler said.
Assuredly, the capabilities of the pilots and planes of the 125th were at least part of the reason the wing was chosen to be the first Air National Guard unit to take part in Operation Atlantic Resolve in Europe - an effort to assure America's allies in the region after the Russian intervention in Ukraine.
Russia began sending arms, weapons and troops into Ukraine when Russia-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych was ousted after he refused to sign an association agreement with the European Union, something many saw as a first step to becoming part of NATO.
This week, Ukrainian government officials met with senior NATO leadership in Kiev, Ukraine's capital, according to the L.A. Times. However, Ukraine's new president, Petro Poroshenko, said the country could likely not meet the defense alliance's membership requirements until 2020.
"What we have said is that we will assess an application from Ukraine in the same way we will assess any other application," Stoltenberg said. "Ukraine has not applied for membership.
"We just have to make clear that this is a decision that is going to be made by 28 allies and the applicant country.
"No one else has the right to veto or stop the enlargement of NATO. It's a sovereign right of every nation to decide its own path."
However, NATO's foundation lies in collective defense. In other words, an attack on one country is considered an attack on all others.
Clifford Davis: (904) 359-4103


Gloss on Games, Storytelling, and Breaking the String
by Ben Underwood
A gloss to Games, Storytelling, and Breaking the String
Costikyan’s contention that some games aren’t enhanced by the addition of story relies on the difference between play and narrative. In other words games don’t necessarily require stories.
Costikyan’s contention that some games aren’t enhanced by the addition of story relies on the difference between play and narrative. In other words games don’t necessarily require stories. Walter Benn Michaels, in The Shape of the Signifier, argues that games also don’t rely on the subject position of the players, or on their beliefs: “In chess, for example, the person playing white doesn’t think the person playing black is mistaken; the conflict between them is not about who is right but about who will win: what matters in a game is not what you believe to be true but which side you’re on” (32). Michaels’s claim becomes thorny, however, in a discussion of role-playing games in which the subject positions of the players and characters are, at least in part, the object of the game, and the game itself consists of what the players believe.
At a Heightened Level of Intensity: A Discussion of the Philosophy and Politics of Language in John Cayley’s Digital Poetics
by John Cayley, Scott Rettberg


Greta Van Fleet: Beyond the Pleather Pants
2019, editorials by rockamagazine May 28, 2019 April 13, 2021
There are only a handful of acts I refer to as “my bands”. They’re ones I found when they were seedlings; bands that I know will make a come up one day and blow everyone out of the water, except for me. No band has ever made as great of an impact on my spirit and passion for music as Greta Van Fleet.
Whether it’s getting stopped in coffee shops and asked about my shirt, sitting in dressing rooms and convincing other bands to tune in, or forcing every single one of my friends to listen to a song at some point, Greta Van Fleet is the most “my band” of them all. And although most of my male peers refuse to acknowledge my grasp on the majority of their taste, let the record show that I was the source.
It was November of 2017 when my father first sent me the link to Greta’s music video for “Highway Tune”, their hit song off of their debut EP, “From the Fires”. I first ignored the link, probably too busy with homework or other activities to give it any attention. Later on, my father insisted on me watching the video and after passing the phone down at a dinner table, I cupped my hand around the bottom of his phone and heard the first screech of Josh Kizka.
The video was simple. A bunch of semi-long haired guys wearing ripped clothing in a garage fashioned for nothing else than a set up rock concert. The guys looked like they hadn’t showered in a few days, maybe weeks, and the whole video had an edge. One that cut the overly sexualized, conceptual music videos that clutter the typical feed. Greta Van Fleet has been about The Music from day one.
I was stunned. Yes, the music was good, but I was more shocked by how young they are. In my narrow scope of the world, teenage boys and young adult “men” aren’t good for much. They are lazy, rarely shower, and smoke electronic cigarettes faster than you can say “addiction”. Here was a group of young guys who had a style, a voice, and a damn good sound.
At the time, I was writing for another publication at the time and reached out to the band’s manager to do an interview. After months of setting one up, my dreams of having a chat with the young rock stars came to a halt. In the week before the interview, the band’s following grew phenomenally. They went from tens of thousands of followers to hundreds in the time span of a week. There was no longer time for small publications and wasted press time. Now, the public had its eyes on Greta.
About a year later, I found myself showing up alone to their concert in Denver. I met up with a friend at the back of the line and delighted in the wait. The line that wrapped around the venue twice which struck me as vindication of everything I had ever said about the band. There were people of every age, every hair color, every piercing, on every drug and throbbing with excitement.
Greta works because there’s no way they can’t. Not only are they appealing to the nostalgia of the generations who grew up with the iconic bands we now refer to as “classic rock”, but they are appealing to me– teenagers with a nostalgia for something we’ve never experienced.
We’ve seen our parents old tour t-shirts, various paraphernalia at record stores, and have essentially romanticized a life we’ve never lived. So here stands a group of boys who are on their way to becoming the Led Zeppelin of our generation. It is impossible to stunt their success, no matter how many balding, pretentious music critics are crying at their heels.
I’ve been to many concerts. Many great ones, too. But Greta Van Fleet gifted me an experience I will never forget. I’m sure my ears won’t either.
I will sum that experience up into three details.
I lost my voice after the second song.
I bonded with a forty year old English teacher who put two Rocka stickers on his bare chest, three frat boys on Adderall, and a middle aged woman in a sequined bra.
Music had never, in my entire life, felt so good.
Greta Van Fleet put on a show like they used to be put on. Some lights. Some smoke. But the core was music. There were no crazy introductions, no over-stimulating visuals, no unspoken barrier between musician and listener. The night was about music.
After the show, as I leaned on the poorly painted purple drug store across the street from the venue– and no, I wasn’t hallucinating–I pulled my hair back and realized the bottom half of it was drenched in sweat. Those frat boys could move. I watched as people took long drags of cigarettes, rolled joints in parked cars, hugged each other, and talked about what they had just experienced. Everyone stuck around the lawn of the venue for a while after and a dad even came up to my friend and me, fist bumping us and shouting “great show!” to the entirety of downtown Denver. I had never seen people like that before. It felt real. It felt honest. That’s why people fall in love with music in the first place. The rest of it is just fluff.
Although I tend to cringe at some of the outfit choices and I roll my eyes at their forced attempts to seem deep and profound on their Instagram posts, Greta Van Fleet has the live presence that my other dreamy, bedroom pop indie bands cannot even touch.
Many compare Greta Van Fleet to be a mere resurrection of one of the most legendary rock bands of all time, Led Zeppelin, and there are similarities, conscious or not. Josh Kizka’s voice is downright uncanny to that of Robert Plant. You know, the manly squealing over sharp chords and heavy bass. His on stage mannerisms are also blatantly similar, relying on cryptic hand movements and gestures, focusing on the upper half of his body. I have many pet theories for why this is, but maybe it’s just the power of the pleather leggings.
The band has been accused of mirroring certain riffs of Zeppelin, particularly referring to “Highway Tune” sounding awfully similar to “The Rover”, off of Led Zeppelin’s 1975 release, “Physical Graffiti”. Despite their debut EP causing quite the debate between paying respect and blatant copying, Greta’s debut album, “Anthem of the Peaceful Army” is an entirely separate entity that shows the band’s true colors.
Leading up to the album release in October of 2018, Greta set their message and aesthetic in stone. Wearing nude colored tunics and colorfully embroidered vests, the band came waltzing onto the popular music scene reeking of something different. Not new, but different.
Straying away from the typical, reckless view of “sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll”, Greta promotes “peace, love, and unity”, even making some of the song releases completely interactive and forcing listeners to travel to a park in order to download. While Zeppelin on one famous track (“Dazed and Confused”) claims that “the soul of a woman was created below”, Greta has a kinder approach to sexuality, one summed up in a few lustful howls of “mama”. Who is going to argue with “peace, love, and unity”?
To shut Greta Van Fleet down under the sole reason of “they’re Led Zeppelin wannabes” is to stunt the growth of rock music in the twenty first century. While other genres have evolved with time gradually and acceptably, like country and rap, rock music is treated with a stunningly different attitude. The peak was reached in the 60’s and 70’s, but there is still an entire mountain. The Earth still rotates. The tectonic plates shift. Scaling these new mountains does not mean abandoning the old ones. In fact, is is vital that we preserve the foundations that not only music, but culture and politics has been built upon. Greta Van Fleet is the leading force of that movement. With their charisma, their broad demographic, their positive message, and their tunics, Greta Van Fleet is absolutely unstoppable.
Nor should we dismiss the talent and passion of Greta’s members. Greta was nominated for four different Grammy awards: ‘Best New Artist’, ‘Best Rock Album: From the Fires’, ‘Best Rock Performance: “Highway Tune”’, ‘Best Rock Song: “Black Smoke Rising”’. I’m not saying nominations and awards mean a band is any good. The awards show that something is working, and it’d be an absolute shame to ignore the flourishing talent of a group promoting a peaceful oasis from the chaotic world that surrounds us. Without a doubt, Greta Van Fleet is a resurrection of the golden age of rock. Nothing stands in Greta’s way as they approach new levels of fame, so long as we’re ready to explore new mountains.
I acknowledge that it is pretty easy to dismiss me as “just another fangirl”, but that doesn’t quite work for the thousands of middle aged men, the frat boys, and the women in sequin bras.
From Princess to Performer: Cece Coakley
Moving Mountains with Great Gable


U.S. Coast Guard stresses water safety as summer approaches
By Melissa Stephens
Published: May. 9, 2018 at 11:35 AM EDT
With the official start of summer quickly approaching, many will be heading out to the lake for some fun in the water.
The United States Coast Guard station in St. Joseph, Michigan, is promoting water safety as the season kicks off.
The U.S. Coast Guard stresses the importance of being cautious in the water, especially around this time of year, because of the cold temperature of the lake.
They also say that wearing life jackets at all times is key, especially while on a boat.
“Even the best of swimmers can get caught in something,” said BM2 Casey Johnson of Station St. Joseph. “For 2016, we had almost the highest number of fatalities and a lot of those came from paddle boarders or kayakers.”
On May 19th, at the Berrien County Sheriffs parking lot, the U.S. Coast Guard from Station St. Joseph will be teaming up with local Michigan counties to promote Safe Boating Week.


Please support our global conservation work.
The forests on the front line of climate change
Mangrove trees are born survivors – and as coastal defences and carbon sinks, they’re invaluable in helping to mitigate global warming. ZSL has long worked in the Philippines to protect and restore their extraordinary ecosystems.
Mangroves are a remarkable group of trees that have adapted to live in the intertidal zones of tropical coastlines and estuaries. They have learned to thrive in conditions that would kill off most plants, including salty water, advancing and retreating tides, and low-oxygen soils. Many sit on exposed, stilt-like roots that anchor them against the tide and allow them to take oxygen directly from the air.
Most mangrove forests are a muddy, mosquito-heavy tangle of swampy vegetation and tree roots. They might not be everyone’s idea of a marine wildlife paradise – yet they offer shelter and sustenance to a huge range of species (including us). Their intricate root systems provide a safe haven and nursery for aquatic life, including many young fish and crustaceans that later move out to populate reefs and oceans.
Mangroves are also unsung heroes of fight against climate change. They shield inland habitats and communities from the tropical storms that are expected to increase in intensity as the planet warms. And it’s now known that coastal forests such as mangroves capture and store far more carbon for their size than terrestrial rainforests.
Globally, however, mangroves are in trouble. Between 20% to 35% of the world’s mangroves are thought to have disappeared since 1980, and one in six mangrove species is under threat. And living as they do between land and sea, mangroves are themselves potentially vulnerable to climate change impacts such as rising sea levels and temperatures. All this isn’t just bad news for biodiversity – it could have a serious impact on the planet’s capacity to store carbon, deepening the climate crisis.
The island of Panay in the Philippines is the focus of ZSL’s mangrove conservation work. Like other mangrove strongholds worldwide, it has lost many of its coastal forests to development – chiefly, commercial fishponds. ZSL scientists embarked on a community-based mangrove rehabilitation project in 2007, empowering local people to restore disused fishponds to flourishing mangroves.
Since then, over 100ha (an area around the size of 140 football pitches!) of run-down fishponds have been regenerated; ZSL has trained over a thousand people in mangrove rehabilitation; and six marine protected areas in the region have been extended to include mangroves and seagrass meadows as well as coral reefs – giving these often-undervalued habitats the recognition they deserve.
Mangrove restoration is not only good news for wildlife and carbon capture; it’s also a cost-effective, nature-based solution to strengthening coastal defences against devastating typhoons like Haiyan, in an island nation on the front line of climate change.
Meanwhile, ZSL continues to seek out opportunities to provide coastal communities with more sustainable livelihood choices through its projects, creating win-win-win situations for people, wildlife and the planet. These include opening mangrove eco-parks to boost ecotourism, and offering extra sources of income through its innovative fishing-net recycling and seaweed farming enterprises.
After all, if we are to truly solve the huge environmental challenges facing the world today, we’ll need to find sustainable ways to share the planet with our fellow species, and develop nature-based solutions that work not just for mangrove forests, or for climate action, or for coastal communities – but find the common ground. Above all, we need to recognise that in protecting mangroves, we protect countless other species too – including ourselves.
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