This is a spin on the traditional roasted turkey breast that is served in The USA. Back home in Jamaica, we like to put our own twist on any recipe that we can find. The Jerk seasoning with the orange glaze mixes together to form the perfect balance between sweet and spicy. This USA-Jamaican fusion will definitely have your family and guests wanting more.
Although Thanksgiving isn't officially celebrated in Jamaica, it is not uncommon for Jamaicans to celebrate the holiday in the USA, and in Canada. Jamaicans have incorporated their traditional recipes into the whole Thanksgiving tradition. That is because so much of the day is centered around food, and if there is food involved, you better believe Jamaicans are interested. So much of our culture is centered around food, anything that has to do with food and recipes, we are drawn to it like a moth to a flame.
This mouth-watering turkey breast recipe puts a spin on the traditional roasted turkey breast. In Jamaica, we spice it up with jerk seasoning.
Place Turkey Breast (cavity down) in roasting pan.
Inject all over turkey breast with a meat injector, the butter, chicken stock, and garlic mixture.
Mix teriyaki sauce with Jerk sauce and rub the entire turkey breast with the mixture.
Pour the remainder 1/12 cup of chicken broth in the bottom of the roasting pan.
Cover the roasting pan loosely with aluminum foil and bake for 45 -50 mins.
Remove turkey breast from oven to rest while u prepare the glaze.
In a saucepan simmer on low heat orange juice and grated ginger reduce to 1/2 cup.
Remove from heat. Strain and remove any pieces of ginger.
Add orange glaze, Grand Marnier and orange juice with ginger and mix thoroughly.
Pour mixture over turkey breast and generously glaze turkey breast.
Return turkey breast uncovered to oven for approximately 20 minutes until golden brown.
Use drippings from turkey breast and add to your favorite turkey gravy.
If you are looking for a quick Papaya salad with shrimp recipe, this is just for you. In Jamaica, we use a lot of the native fruits in our recipes. They are used in salads and main courses alike. This salad can be served as an appetizer, or as a main course for lunch. Papaya makes for an excellent ingredient in salads because the flavor compliments so many other ingredients.
Papaya salad made with spicy shrimp is the perfect appetizer or can be served as a main course. Great for BBQ's or the dinner table.
Marinate cubed papaya in apricot brandy and Meyers rum and refrigerate.
Season shrimp with jerk sauce garlic salt green onions and bay leaves.
In a Dutch oven or heavy frying pan add coconut oil to medium heat until hot. Add annatto to Hot oil. Turn heat up on high.
Add shrimp with all seasoning and stir-fry until shrimp is a pale pink do not overcook. Turn heat off and add vinegar and stir well for approx 5 mins. Let cool.
This recipe can be used to ice your Jamaican Christmas cake. This is a quick and easy icing recipe. You can use it on almost any cake you choose.
Delicious Buttercream Icing Recipe to make your Jamaican Christmas cake beautiful.
Have a cup with warm water and a large knife, Cover entire cake with icing and smooth cake over by dipping knife in warm water. Allow icing to dry for 1 hr.
Fill a Wilton parchment 15" triangle decorating bag with a 106 or 107-star tip. Start piping stars from the base of the cake in rows covering the entire cake. Allow icing to dry.
Jamaican Christmas cake, which is also referred to as Jamaican black cake has long been the most popular Jamaican dessert in Jamaica. Jamaican black cake is thought to be derived from the British figgy pudding, but with an island twist. While it has traditionally been thought of as a Christmas cake, it is actually baked and eaten all year round. It is also frequently used as a wedding cake.
This recipe is the holy grail of Jamaican black cake recipes. It was handed down from my grandmother to my mother and then to me. It has been in my family for over 100 years (as far as I know). This cake has been served at every family occasion throughout my life. This recipe has always been a big hit, not just with family members, but with anyone who's ever tried it. It is with great honor I present to you a piece of my family's culinary history. My grandmother's Jamaican black cake.
To learn how to decorate your cake like the one pictured, please click here.
This delicious cake is a Jamaican jewel. This cake can be found on every table around the holiday season. It is also great for dessert at your next dinner party. I guarantee you it will be a hit.
Cream 16 oz of dark brown sugar and 16 oz of unsalted butter in an electric mixer until smooth.
Add 12 large eggs to your creamed butter and sugar mixture (Add 3 eggs at a time until they are all incorporated into your mixture).
Add 2 tbsp vanilla, 2 tbsp rose water 2 tbsp mixed essence and 2 tbsp of almond flavor to your mixture.
Combine in a bowl, 6 oz all-purpose sifted flour, 6 oz plain bread crumbs, 1 tsp salt, 2 tbs baking powder, 1 tbs baking soda, and cinnamon, 2 tbs ground ginger, 1 tbs mixed spice, 1 tsp nutmeg, and 1/2 tsp ground cloves.
Now it's time to prepare your dried fruits.
Simmer over low heat, 2 cups of port wine and 1 cup of Jamaican White Rum, add 1/2 cup dried raisins, 1/2 cup dried currants, 1/2 cup dried cranberries, 1/2 cup chopped pitted prunes, 1/2 cup chopped dried dates, 1/2 cup candied cherries and 1/2 cup candied mixed peel.
When all liquid has evaporated let your fruits cool.
Alternate your flour and fruit mixture to your cream mixture and blend in your electric mixer (Do not beat).
Add 2 tbs molasses, and 4 tbs browning to your mixture and blend slowly in your electric mixer. (Do not beat).
Fill pans 3/4 full, Heat oven to 350 degrees (Do not preheat).
Remove from oven while still hot, mix together 1/4 cup port wine and 1/8 cup white rum and pour over cakes.
Leave cakes in pan to cool.
Try this amazing stand mixer for all your baking needs!!
The most famous of all Jamaican recipes is ackee and saltfish (codfish). Ackee and saltfish is considered Jamaica's national dish. Ackee is a fruit of West African origin. It made its way to Jamaica around 1798. Ackee and saltfish is usually served as a breakfast dish but can be eaten for lunch, or dinner.
You must be careful if preparing this dish with the raw fruit from the tree. Raw ackee can be poisonous if ingested. You should never eat the raw fruit under any circumstances. You must make sure the fruit is ripe (when the pods open, and the seeds are exposed) before it is harvested for consumption. Then it should be cleaned by removing the seeds and the stringy pieces attached to the inside of the fruit. It should then be boiled before cooking.
There is however canned ackee which the majority of people in Europe, and the USA use. Canned ackee can be found at Walmart and many local supermarkets.
Ackee and saltfish can be served for served for breakfast, lunch or dinner. This is perhaps the most versatile of all Jamaican dishes.
Soak the saltfish in cold water for about 1 ½ hr, then place in a medium-sized saucepan filled with water and boil for about ½ hr. Remove the saltfish from the saucepan, then remove all bones and break the saltfish into flakes.
Add 1 tablespoon of vegetable or olive oil to a medium-sized frying pan and let hear for about 3 minutes until hot. Add your, saltfish, chopped onions. garlic, scotch bonnet pepper, and green pepper to the heated oil, and sauté for approx. 8 minutes over a medium flame.
Add your drained ackee and 1 tablespoon of black pepper, tomato and your thyme to the frying pan and let cook for approximately 15 minutes over a medium flame.
Served with boiled green bananas and boiled or fried dumplings. To reduce sodium, boil salt fish (codfish) until salt dissipates.
Jamaican Rice and Peas served.
Jamaican Rice and peas is the staple of every Jamaican Sunday dinner. The 2 things you can be sure of in Jamaica are sunshine, and rice and peas on Sunday. This delicious dish was first introduced to the island by the slaves that came from West Africa centuries ago. The recipe has changed a little since then, by using ingredients found on the island, such as thyme, and pepper.
My grandmother would scoff at me for using canned coconut milk instead of the fresh coconut milk she used. If only I had a coconut tree in NJ which I could get my own fresh coconuts, LOL. Enjoy your Sunday rice and peas.
This easy to follow recipe will have you cooking like a Jamaican in no time flat. If you're a Jamaican, you better know how to cook rice and peas.
The first thing you must do if you're using dried kidney beans is to make sure you soak them overnight in a bowl of water. This softens the texture of the beans. I prefer dried beans, but you can use the canned kidney beans instead. Drain the water from the beans and rinse thoroughly with water.
Place your beans in a medium saucepan, add about 3 cups of water and boil for about 1 hr under a medium flame. Your beans should now be tender (test by sticking a fork into one of them).
While your beans are simmering, you can now add your unsweetened coconut milk, and stir for about 5 minutes.
Then you add your chopped garlic, scallions (green onions), thyme, allspice seeds and scotch bonnet pepper.
Stir under a medium-high flame for about 5 minutes or so. Then you can add your rice and cook until the rice is cooked and fluffy, which takes about ½ hr to 40 minutes. There you have it, delicious Jamaican rice and peas.
Jamaican Oxtails is one of the most popular Jamaican recipes. It is delicious and easy to make. This dish has European origins, as it was introduced to the island by the British many centuries ago. The British used to enjoy oxtail soup with vegetables in the 17th century and brought it to Jamaica when they arrived. It has since been synonymous with Jamaican cuisine ever since. This is my Jamaican oxtail recipe which I've used to feed many satisfied palates. Let's get going, and learn how to cook Jamaican oxtails.
This tasty dish is loved and served worldwide, While I'm sure all the recipes are delicious, there is something special about Jamaican oxtails.
In a large mixing bowl, add 1 tablespoon of black pepper to your oxtails. You then add 1 teaspoon of paprika, add your chopped onion, scallions (green onions), chopped garlic, scotch bonnet (habanero) pepper, thyme, and allspice seeds. Add Worcestershire sauce and browning sauce to your oxtails. Rub vigorously until your oxtails are completely coated and infused by the seasonings you've just added. Let sit for 1 hour (overnight is ideal for a proper marinade).
Add 3 tablespoons of vegetable oil to a large saucepan under a medium flame. When the oil becomes hot (approximately 5 minutes), place your seasoned oxtails in the saucepan until your oxtails become brown (approximately 5 minutes).
Add 3 cups of water and add your beef bullion cube. Stir occasionally and let cook under a medium flame for about 2 hrs while stirring intermittently. Add the butter beans (remember to drain the water from the can) after about 1/ ½ hr. Let simmer and add a little water if needed. You have just made Jamaican oxtails. Enjoy and don't forget to share it.
Serve with White rice, or traditional Jamaican rice and peas and a side salad.
You can use this amazing instant pot to aid in cooking all of your meat-based dishes.
My name is Court, and one of my all-time favorite pastimes is eating and making the delicious food of my home island Jamaica. I enjoy food from all 4 corners of the world, but Jamaican, and West Indian food has a special place in my heart (and my palate). My love affair with Jamaican food goes back to my childhood, where I spent the 1st 9 years of my life. In Jamaica, there is such a diverse mix of cultures (African, Indian, European, Asian, Native and Indigenous tribes), and ethnicities, that over the years, the cuisine of the island became an amalgam of all these wonderful cultures).
My grandmother who was of Indian descent was hands down the best cook that I have ever known. There was nothing that she couldn't cook. She seemed to have a Rolodex of recipes in her head. I never saw her refer to a written recipe, ever! I was amazed at how she could have 4 pots on the stove, a cake in the oven, all the while, scolding the grandkids to get out of her kitchen while she was cooking. She never scolded me though, because I, unlike my siblings and cousins was always willing to lend a helping hand with the cooking, while their interests laid in stealing from the pot. That was my introduction to learning how to cook real authentic Jamaican food, like curry chicken, curry goat, Jamaican rice and peas, oxtail, jerk chicken, and so many other delicious and wonderful dishes.
I made sure to pay attention to all the ingredients she used, the measurements, the time it took to cook, as well, as the type of cookware required for the different dishes. I, unlike my grandmother, decided to document these Jamaican recipes, which fed so many family members, friends. The beauty of a Jamaican recipe is that the same dish may have 100 different ways to cook it, but the end result is the same, a delicious meal. I plan to teach anyone who has ever been interested in cooking Jamaican food, how to make a real authentic Jamaican meal. We will also explore recipes from other islands of the Caribbean. My recipes are easy to follow and will teach you how to cook like a Jamaican. I will share my Jamaican curry chicken recipe, my Jamaican oxtail recipe, and so much more. You will be the hit at your next dinner party, BBQ, or your own dinner table when you serve up a real authentic Jamaican meal. Sit back, relax, and welcome to my Kitchen, where there's always an extra place at the table for you.


Different flags of countries being represented by their native foods. These creative and colorful meals shaped as different flags of countries is to be seen in the new Sydney International Food Festival in October, 2009. Every flag is representing the native food from that particular country, and it's hard not to get hungry when looking at it.
Well, if they did a USA flag, It would costs millions of dollars. It would consist of hamburgers, turkey legs, corn, and lard. And it would only have 43 stars on it b/c 7 states would probably succeed from the Union by the time it was built!
The third one is Lebanon, not Austria. Get it straight.
Yay for the delicious Australian flag!
No, the third one IS Austrian. If you click on the flag and look at the URL it says Austria.
Yeah it might say Austrian on the URL but their flag doesnt have a tree in the middle, it has a black bird coat of arms. This is the Lebanon Flag.


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Q: Append Existing Custom Node Group in Blender I tried to append my blend file and import the node group in my new environment. I tried different methods on how to append my own custom node group in my environment, and still not working. Here's my boilerplate.
class SHADER(Operator):
bl_idname = "material.append_shader_nodes"
bl_label = "Add Shader"
bl_options = {'REGISTER', 'UNDO'}

def execute(self,context):
    # Importing the blend file (working)
    import_from_library('shader');

    bpy.ops.object.material_slot_add()

    # Creates new Material
    npr_material = bpy.data.materials.new(name='SHADER')
    npr_material.use_nodes = True

    # Remove the default shader
    npr_material.node_tree.nodes.remove(npr_material.node_tree.nodes.get('Principled BSDF'))
    material_output = npr_material.node_tree.nodes.get('Material Output')

    # Problem
    SHADER = bpy.data.node_groups['NPREEVEE'] # Import my custom node group from my different blend file

    # link shader to material
    npr_material.node_tree.links.new(material_output.inputs[0], SHADER.outputs[0])

    # set activer material to your new material
    bpy.context.object.active_material = npr_material
    return {'FINISHED'}

It seems like it didn't import my node group, but when I tried to manually add my custom node group, it displayed on my materials properties. I'm not totally familiar with this package. Is this is a bug or there is something that I missed while creating my node group?

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


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International associated curators
For the 2018 edition of BredaPhoto, the team of Dutch curators has been expanded with three international associated curators. Based upon their rich network and knowledge-area these curators offer BredaPhoto extra eyes and ears for enriching the program of the upcoming edition of the photo festival.
With the effort of these curators BredaPhoto can follow the fast-paced developments in photography at an international level, keeping close to international movements, new knowledge and scouts of international photographers talent. We are happy to introduce these curators to you and invite you to visit their profile and website:
Mohamed Somji | Dubai
Mohamed is a photographer and the director of Gulf Photo Plus in Dubai. In 2016 he was one of the photographers who exhibited work at BredaPhoto. He exhibited his serie 'Substations' showing abandoned gas station. A serie he made together with Siniša Vlajković. About To Infinity and Beyond he says the following: "In the Middle East where I come from our issues are very much to do with the present. We have political turmoil, conflict and issues that have to do with day-to-day survival. So the future is quite interesting as how we see it: the future is a luxury."
Yumi Goto | Japan
Yumi is an experienced independent art and documentary photography curator, editor, researcher and publisher from Japan who focuses on the development of cultural exchanges that transcend borders. You can read more about her and her work here. In thinking about photographers for BredaPhoto Festival she has a specific view on the 2018 theme: "When we are talking about this theme in Japan, we have a kind of history. With war, a tsunami, and earthquakes. From this perspective we are to talk about the future."
Azu Nwogbogu | Nigeria
Azu is the founder and director of the African Artists' Foundation (AAF), a non-profit organization based in Lagos, Nigeria. He is also founder and director of the Lagos Photo Festival, an annual international arts festival of photography. Azu about To Infinity and Beyond: "I like this theme a lot, cause it allows me to work with contemporary African artists who embrace the idea of 'AfroFruturism'; imagining multiple futures because they are displeased with the concept of reality and what society has to offer them today." Read more about Azu or follow him on Instagram.
Dutch curators
In addition to the three 'associated curators', BredaPhoto also has three permanent curators who are responsible for the choice of the festival-theme and the creative choices and production of it. They also supervise photographic projects by BredaPhoto such as the International Talent Program and the Masterclass. Reinout van den Bergh, Geert van Eyck and Jan Schaerlackens programmed 55 photographers for the upcoming edition, who will show their work at BredaPhoto Festival 2018. Get to know the BredaPhoto curators better in the video below.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


The Impella ventricular assist device: use in patients at high risk for coronary interventions: successful multivessel percutaneous coronary intervention in a 62-year-old high-risk patient.
The Impella Recover LP 2.5 (Abiomed, Danvers, MA, USA) is a ventricular assist device that is easily placed and has low adverse events. It helps unload myocardial demand and enables revascularization in patients who are otherwise at extreme risk for percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). It breaks the cycle of cardiogenic shock and is indicated in patients with low ejection fraction (EF), acute heart failure, and concurrent high-risk factors for intervention or surgery. Many case reports have been published regarding use of this device in high-risk PCIs, but successful intervention in two high-risk vessels in one setting has rarely been reported. We describe such a case report here where two critical lesions in LAD and circumflex arteries were successfully intervened on with the assistance of this device.
11568068 - Passive containment and reverse remodeling by a novel textile cardiac support device.
2252678 - Rotacor: a new rotary blood pump.
1554278 - Mechanical circulatory assist using heparin-coated tube and roller pump system.
Department of Internal Medicine, Banner Estrella Medical Center, 9305 W Thomas Rd., Phoenix, AZ 85037, USA.
Previous Document: Is there a gender disparity in treatment of coronary artery disease?
Next Document: Currently available methods for platelet function analysis: advantages and disadvantages.


Mentat is a decentralized market for on-demand human skill and intelligence.
Mentat enables anyone, from anywhere in the world, to offer their skills and knowledge in exchange for instant payment. Yes, you read that correctly. Mentat is an exciting project and one of those that makes you appreciate the vast potential we have as people and how, when done right, can be supercharged with technology. Using human agents, we can work together with applications to create powerful blockchain-backed intelligence.
Headquartered in New York City, the team is gearing up for an upcoming private sale in June following the successful release of its prototype last month. We had a chance to learn more about the project and founder Mitchell Sapoff.
Prior to founding Mentat, I was an operations and biz dev focused co-founder at a software development studio that built and scaled MVPs for early-stage startups, guiding them through the product development cycle. In 2017, around the same time as the crypto craze, we started getting more and more inquiries from clients about building blockchain-powered software (bots, exchanges, dApps, tokens), so we gained lots of knowledge and passion for it through our consulting work.
I saw the disruptive power of the technology, as well as its unfortunate misuse and abuse by many illegitimate ICOs last year, which opened up an immense opportunity to do something actually meaningful in this space. That was the driver behind starting my own blockchain project.
2. What was your inspiration behind the project? How did it all start?
Once my partner from the dev shop (Sam, a talented coder and product manager) and I knew we were going to build our own blockchain-based solution, we decided it was going to be in the travel tech space since this was clearly an industry ripe for disruption. Our initial sketch was a tokenized flight re-accommodation app, but we needed some help aligning the app's economic model, so we brought in an investment banker-turned-crypto economist named Ben.
Together, we were able to solve this problem by introducing an extra party to the ecosystem: "distributed agents" that would function as a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) working on behalf of airlines to handle their customer service. Soon enough, we realized that the power and potential of such a DAO stretched way beyond travel, that airline re-accommodation is just one of MANY applications that can benefit from this system. So we abstracted the concept one layer, from an application offering decentralized customer service for airlines, to a platform offering decentralized human intelligence for applications, and haven't looked back since.
Team, team, team. We see a lot of projects today either with a group of engineers running the show, or business people with an outsourced tech team, or seasoned vets who don't do the grunt work themselves, or young guys with ambition but no ability to execute. What the team at Mentat prides itself most on is their versatile backgrounds, experience levels, and competence in both business and technology.
Most of us have built and shipped code before, we've worked across verticals in finance, marketing, consulting, entrepreneurship, design, and engineering, and our years of experience range from 5 to 25, yet everyone is a doer.
As a response to last year's mayhem, investors have looked to establish stricter portfolio guidelines. However, it's tough to properly vet projects' tech feasibility and commercial viability due to lack of precedent, so they resort to measures of "hype" as indicators of business strength. This form of "caution" only exacerbates the "not enough functional tech" issue in the space by forcing dollars into marketing that could otherwise be spent on engineering.
Our core challenge will be to avoid this vicious cycle by demonstrating that a token-based business can be structured as a compelling investment instrument (and this includes appropriate securities registrations).
If the first half of 2018 is any indication of how fast we move, there's plenty more to come in Q3 and Q4. We started operations in February of this year, yet we'll already be on the testnet by July. Our private sale is happening this month, and that will fuel product development and marketing as we gear up to take this thing to market. The rest of the year will be filled with user testing, community management, partnership development, and of course, lots of coding.
6. Thanks! Is there anything else you would like the community to know?
You can check out our site, watch the demo of our first prototype, or download our whitepaper.Opinions expressed here are the opinions of the author. Influencive does not endrose or review brands mentioned.


In 2010, we started Open Capital Advisors to drive growth, enable investment, and transform markets across Africa. We have supported hundreds of clients to improve operations, define strategies, and achieve growth.
Across more than 300 engagements spanning 20 countries in Sub-Saharan African, we have seen a consistent challenge - companies struggle to find the talent they need to enable ambitious growth plans. We faced the exact same challenge at OCA.
But we also saw so much raw talent - Kenya alone graduates 50,000 students from university every year. In response, we developed an in-house training platform to develop exceptional analysts, middle managers, and business leaders. Our approach has been so successful that it has driven our business to international scale.
Arcadia is our effort to bring the power of our talent development model to clients across Africa, who need it as much as we do. Arcadia recruits talented university graduates to build exceptional analysts and effective managers.
We provide talent to organizations through rotating placements so you have the right person when you need them most.
Arcadia develops high-potential graduates into high-performing professionals through intensive skills training, broad business experience, and cohort-based learning.
Arcadia enables organizations to achieve their goals, providing high-quality talent at critical times to ensure talent is never a barrier to growth.


Traveljunkieindonesia.com – About 70% of Denmark's population lives in urban areas, ±1.5 million of them in Copenhagen. The capital's finest structures. Copenhagen is full of great buildings by some of the world's best architects.
see the exterior of Jean Nouvel's 2009 concert hall by night, when the blue facade glows with projections.
Daniel Libeskind's 2003 Danish Jewish Museum is an interior remodelling of a 17th century structure.
Henning Larsen's 2005 Opera House on the harbourfront was at first criticised, but has since crept into Danes heart.
Foster and partner 2008 elephant enclosure at Copenhagen zoo is sunk into the earth for insulation with a curved, lattice glass roof.
Zaha Hadid's 2005 extension to the Ordrupgaard museum is a black lava concrete slug of a building.
Follow us on Twitter @TravelJunkieID & like us on Facebook.


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Interview: Lori McKenna Shares Hard-Earned Wisdom on 'The Balladeer'
Becky Fluke
Lori McKenna's new song "The Balladeer" isn't autobiographical by any means, but its title certainly describes her. As both a songwriter and an artist, she gravitates toward the slower, sader, storyteller style.
McKenna excels at sharing stories and dispensing wisdom, in fact, and is one of the modern country music landscape's finest in both regards. Two of the Massachusetts native's biggest hits as a writer in recent years are Little Big Town's "Girl Crush" and Tim McGraw's "Humble and Kind." On her new album, The Balladeer, out Friday (July 24), she and frequent collaborators Hillary Lindsey and Liz Rose (together known as the Love Junkies) flip another common phrase on its head in "Two Birds," while she alone writes once again to her children on "When You're My Age" and "'Till You're Grown."
While McKenna is a key player in the Nashville music scene, she's advanced her career from her home state, where she lives with her high school sweetheart, Gene, and their five children. She makes frequent visits to Music City, and has found a comfortable place in its landscape without being there 24/7; in fact, she tells The Boot, not living down south has been an advantage in some ways.
Ahead of the The Balladeer's release, McKenna spoke with The Boot about her new music, her place in the country music community and her glass-half-full outlook on life. Read on for the conversation:
You're very good at writing songs about the wisdom that comes with age that have connected with people, despite the idea in this industry that the older you get, the less commercially viable you become.
I think I'm really in a lucky space where, I know that exists, but I don't [laughs] -- I don't have to deal with it maybe as much as, to be honest, a younger writer would. I've also been lucky with my publishers over the years, I think because I showed up in Nashville as the writer of "Stealing Kisses," which was a weird Faith Hill cut -- like, this kind of strange song -- which was amazing for me, but I think people saw me in a different [way]. The writers in Nashville knew, like, "Oh, she's the one from Massachusetts that writes the weird folk songs."
I always kind of had that going for me, and also, just having the artist side of what I do be such an important role in my writing. Even as a co-writer for an artist or a staff writer that gets their songs pitched to big artists, I think that all sort of served me well, and I was really lucky that it all was part of the picture for me.
There's this whole conversation around the struggles of being a woman in country music, and right off the bat, in the first track, "This Town Is a Woman," you're just straight-up comparing the industry to a woman. Can you tell me a little bit more about writing that song?
That song came from Dave Cobb, and a conversation that I had with him about all the great singer-songwriter women that are in Nashville, in the Americana lane and in the country lane. There's so much talk about country radio and women not getting played enough, and it's sort of been -- I've been coming to Nashville I don't even know how many years now, and from the minute I started walking around Nashville, Tenn., somebody's been like, "Women are coming around!" [Laughs] There's always that hope that we'll get a little bit more of it, but it never seems to ever add up.
"From the minute I started walking around Nashville, Tenn., somebody's been like, 'Women are coming around!' There's always that hope that we'll get a little bit more of it, but it never seems to ever add up."
And so it was a conversation that I had with Dave about that, and I was driving my daughter to school ... and thinking about storms: We name storms after women. We name boats after women. If a town had a gender, it would most certainly be a woman. And I know that I'm seeing it in this motherly way of, like, you go ahead and you go out and you find yourself; I'll be right here. If you need me, come back, and all the different ways that that relationship can go. Or, don't go -- don't ever leave ...
You're very entrenched in what's going on in Nashville, but living in Massachusetts, you're not in the thick of it day to day. Does that put you at an advantage, or even a disadvantage?
Over the years, I would have had a different opinion of this, and there were definitely times where I've talked to my husband about, "Man, my life would be so much easier if I just lived in Nashville. My job would be so much easier if I just lived in Nashville" ... but I can never subscribe to the idea that anybody else needs to suffer for my art, other than me. It's not to say that it hasn't happened with my family from time to time, when I lose balance, but I really wanted to make sure that my family was -- I mean, there's just no option, other than your family being first.
So it didn't really make sense for me to ever move there, because the kids were all over the place. Both of our families are here ... I never wanted to pull anybody to Nashville to just say, "This is easier for me if we all do this." And I never want to lose anybody ... so, years ago, I may have had a conversation or two with Gene, my husband, saying, "Geeze, you know, I could work more, I could write more, if we lived in Nashville. I could network more" ...
But now I understand ... that it has benefited me to not live in Nashville, if just for the reason that I'm not an "everyday writer." I love writing songs, and if I lived there, I would write all the time, and I'm just not good writing all the time ... And I love my friends and my community down there; I love that town. I literally like get off the plane and I'm excited ... but that's also a blessing, too, because, as long as I've been coming there, I still freaking love it. But really I think my greatest gift of not living there is that I haven't overwritten ... I haven't gotten to the place where songwriting isn't still my favorite thing.
Courtesy of Sacks & Co.
There are three songs on here you wrote with your Love Junkies collaborators, Hillary Lindsey and Liz Rose: "When You're My Age," "Two Birds" and "Good Fight." How did Hillary and Liz get brought into the writing process of each song?
"When You're My Age" came first, I think, of these three songs ... and that was a song that I tried to write at home alone for over a month -- like, a month and a half. I picked and picked and picked at that song. I had the first verse and the last verse, and I had no chorus. I never thought to go back to "when you're my age" as the hook, to be honest ...
I had no idea what to do with it, and I brought it to Liz and Hillary, and I'm so thankful I did because I'm so happy with the way it came out. I needed to write that song with them because Hillary has a young daughter -- she's a newer mom -- I have five kids all over the place, Liz has grandchildren at this point, so we all kind of came at that song as different generations ... It took me a long time to be able to sing it without crying. We all cried when we wrote it.
"Good Fight," I kind of had the chorus and I brought it to them. And we just all got it because we've all been in these relationships, knowing that sometimes the fight is a good fight and you have to have it.
And "Two Birds" was just a title I had. I knew there was a way we could write "two birds, one stone" about, you know, two birds and a dude. So that was just a fun write that just came from the title.
There's a throughline with "When You're My Age" and "'Till You're Grown." What made you want to include both of them on this album?
I've had this problem with other records because sometimes I do write some songs that people will be like, "I love that song you write." [Laughs] ...
"When You're My Age," as I said, to me, is the anchor of this album, but "'Till You're Grown" came before. I wrote that probably a year before we wrote "When You're My Age;" I had been singing it, like, almost every show. And that song is a song I wrote for my daughter, Meghan ... [She]'s going to college this year ...
That was in my brain: Do I need both the songs? But ["'Till You're Grown"] became part of my show every night, and people would ask me about it. And it just seemed like if I didn't have a space for it, I would have missed it -- I would have wished that I put it in there.
If "When You're My Age" is the central song on this album, how did "The Balladeer" wind up as its title track?
I did this last time with The Tree: The anchor of The Tree was "People Get Old," and that's such a bad title [laughs], but I could call the record The Tree because it's such a pretty phrase, and it's a family-oriented song, so it all worked.
"The Balladeer" doesn't work quite as well if "When You're My Age" is my anchor, but I just love the word ... and if any song is gonna fall out of me, it's most likely gonna be a ballad. I mean, I'm just so drawn to ballads and slow music and people singing their hearts out.
And I know that [word is] normally, or a lot of times, associated with a man, but it just seemed like the story would be about a woman, and I could identify with her really well, but also, I could tell a story about her that wasn't mine ... So, I allowed myself to write a ballad that didn't follow the rules.
I know it's not autobiographical, but are there parallels between "The Balladeer" and you? Or certain pieces of yourself in her?
Yeah, I feel like other than her getting famous and becoming a rockstar, if I didn't have like my life as a person that got married when they were 19 ... if I had found music younger, didn't know Gene, didn't fall in love when I was in high school, marry this guy, and then if this wasn't my life, it could have been me, other than probably getting famous. [Laughs]
But I love building characters like that. I feel like I know her, and I've had this feeling [before] -- it's always with women [characters] -- with songs that I've been able to write, and I always wonder what novelists feel like when they develop characters, because of course we're only developing a character that lasts three and a half minutes. I can't imagine what it's like to write a novel.
But I just feel like, I like her, and I can identify with her in some way, and it's so fun to build those characters in a song.
In "Marie," you sing about "being saved by my disposition." Were you the glass-half-full type of kid?
My siblings and I all have a different perspective of childhood, like most siblings do, and and losing Mom, we were all different ages ... To this day, I feel like it was just easier for me to to accept [her death] and carry than it than it was for [my sister]. And when I try to think how is that possible, the only thing I can come up with is just your disposition and how you enter this world and the way you're gonna see things.
I think my disposition, in many ways, has served me so many times in my life, because I kind of have this sadness in my songs [but], in general, I'm a very happy person, and I also kind of have a childish way of thinking of things sometimes ...
Do you feel like that part of your personality has stayed with you?
I hope it has stayed with me ... but I've also been really lucky -- kind of, like, crazy lucky, and very blessed, so if it didn't stay with me, it would be a shame, because I have been -- especially in my career in music -- I've just just been blessed in a way that, I've seen so many other people that have worked as hard as me, and beat me in the talent game, not be able to have the blessings and the successes that I have had.
So I don't know how I would have gotten bitter by music, is what I'm trying to say ... but I definitely feel like I've had to push myself to grow up a little bit ... I do tend to see things on a good side of things, thank God.
NEXT: Top 10 Songs By Lori McKenna
Filed Under: Editor's Picks, Lori McKenna
Categories: Albums, Americana, Country News, Exclusives, Folk, Interviews, Longform


text:
Q: Block webpages and display error page I'm looking for a way to block some webpages on a computer. If the user visits, let's say, http://www.google.com/, then an error window will appear (I don't mind if the error is inside the browser or on a separate form). Some antiviruses/web protection softwares do this: please note that I'm interested only in blocking a little and specific number of pages.
I've already searched on the web for this. I found lots of examples, mostly about hosts file.
However, nothing on displaying an error page when the user goes into a "forbidden" page.
The code to edit the hosts file is this:
Dim s As String = My.Computer.FileSystem.ReadAllText("C:\Windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts")
Dim finalFile As String = s & VbCrLf & "127.0.0.1    http://www.example.com/"
My.Computer.FileSystem.WriteAllText(finalFile, "z:\desktop\hosts")
My.Computer.FileSystem.DeleteFile("C:\Windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts")
My.Computer.FileSystem.CopyFile("z:\desktop\hosts", "C:\Windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts")

My application has administrator privileges to copy/delete system files.
I'm working with VB.NET WinForms, Visual Studio 2013.
Thanks,
FWhite

A: How to block webpages and raise an event when doing so.
You are well on your way to blocking a website and getting told
   whenever the user visits a blocked site. Firstly you block the
   website in your hosts file telling the user's computer to go to
   localhost (127.0.0.1) instead of the wanted website. When you go to
   http://example.com/ the domain's server sees that you're trying to
   connect and feed you the corresponding data ( usually a website ).
In this case we will run our own server and instead of feeding the user any data, we will just use the incoming connection as a triggerer to see that the user is trying to access a blocked website.
Step 1:
Block the website and redirect it to localhost (127.0.0.1) using the hosts file ( Windows )
C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc
# Copyright (c) 1993-2009 Microsoft Corp.
#
# This is a sample HOSTS file used by Microsoft TCP/IP for Windows.
#
# This file contains the mappings of IP addresses to host names. Each
# entry should be kept on an individual line. The IP address should
# be placed in the first column followed by the corresponding host name.
# The IP address and the host name should be separated by at least one
# space.
#
# Additionally, comments (such as these) may be inserted on individual
# lines or following the machine name denoted by a '#' symbol.
#
# For example:
#
#      102.54.94.97     rhino.acme.com          # source server
#       38.25.63.10     x.acme.com              # x client host

# localhost name resolution is handled within DNS itself.
#   127.0.0.1       localhost
#   ::1             localhost

# This is our blocked site
127.0.0.1 example.com

This will make all the calls to http://example.com redirected to our local machine, port 80.
To intercept this traffic we setup a server running on the local machine, port 80.
Step 2:
Imports System.Net
Imports System.Net.Sockets
Imports System.Threading

Public Class Form1
    Private Sub StartBlocker()
        'Declare a BlockListener
        Dim blocker As BlockListener
        'Declare a thread to run the server on
        Dim thread As Thread
        'Set the blocker to be a new "Block Listener"
        blocker = New BlockListener
        'Set the current thread to be a new thread ( so that there is no noticable performance drop for the main window )
        'It runs the function blocker.listen ( further described below )
        thread = New Thread(New ThreadStart(AddressOf blocker.listen))
        'Start the thread to run the function
        thread.Start()
        'Add a handler to handle a function whenever a user is blocked ( connected )
        'The event's name is Blocked and the callback function is Restart
        AddHandler blocker.Blocked, AddressOf User_Blocked
    End Sub

    'The function that handles whenever a user is blocked ( connected )
    Private Sub User_Blocked()
        'This function is called whenever a user is blocked
        MessageBox.Show("Blocked")
        'NOTE
        'For some reasons, sometimes there are more than one connection meaning
        'that the Blocked event is raised more than once in turn resulting in this function being called multiple times
        'usually 2-3 when the user actually only connects once.
        'To deal with this you can simply wait one second before you listen for connections again
    End Sub
End Class

'The class to act as the blocker
Public Class BlockListener
    'The block to run the server on ( must be 80 to work with hosts file and browsers, 80 is default for webservers )
    Private port As Integer = 80
    'Declare a TcpListener called listener to act as the actual server
    Private listener As TcpListener
    'Declare a boolean for turning the server's blocking capabilities on or off
    Private BlockUsers As Boolean = True

    'Declare the event to be called whenever a user is blocked ( connected )
    Public Event Blocked As EventHandler

    'The main function of the BlockListener : listen | listen for incoming connections
    Public Sub listen()
        'Create a new listener to act as a server on the localhost with 80 as port
        listener = New TcpListener(IPAddress.Parse("127.0.0.1"), port)
        'Start the listener
        listener.Start()
        'For as long as BlockUsers is true / for as long as you should block users
        While (BlockUsers)
            'Create a connection to the user and wait for the user to connect
            Dim clientConnection As TcpClient = listener.AcceptTcpClient
            'Whenever the user connects, close the connection directly
            clientConnection.Close()
            'Raise the "Blocked" event with no event arguments, so that you can easily handle your blocking elsewhere
            RaiseEvent Blocked(Me, EventArgs.Empty)
        End While
        'When the BlockListener should no longer listen for incoming connections - stop the server ( for performance and compatibility )
        listener.Stop()
    End Sub
End Class

Whenever a user tries to access a blocked site, this program will get the request and raise an event.
Tested on Windows 7 x64 running Visual Studio 2012.
Note.
There are, however one problem with this, well at least a very small one.
The problem with this is that by editing the hosts file, you can only redirect where the user gets redirected - not to which port ( making us run the server on port 80 ). The problem with this is, what if the user is already running a server on 127.0.0.1 port 80 already? This is something that you might want to take into account, although it probably won't happen - there might be a chance it will.


Stanley Grossman (past International Treasurer and DNC member) wrote a piece called "Alphabet Soup" for the first Democrats Abroad (DA) Handbook. It was a helpful guide to the many acronyms that are too-easily tossed around our discussions. The latest version of Stanley's work is from 2013 and available from the DPCA-Leadership archives.
This informal guide draws from Stanley's work and intentions, although it is much less discursive. We hope that these short descriptions will help orient new leaders and we welcome your comments and further questions.
Country Committees are constituent units of Democrats Abroad as defined by the DA Charter. We use the term so often that "CC" has become a very common acronym. Members of DA that don't live in countries served by CCs are served directly by their Regional Vice Chair (RVC).
• No CC has to file any report to the FEC: not monthly, not ever.
• In particular, this means that a CC cannot give money to the DPCA! This counter intuitive fact is central to all fundraising activities. Individual members of a CC—or, indeed, any American citizen—can give money directly to the DPCA. But money given to a CC can never be passed on to the DPCA. On the other hand, the DPCA can pay directly for any political "communication" organized by a CC.
If you have further questions about CC finances or you are planning extraordinary fundraisers, you must check with the International Treasurer and International Counsel to ensure that the arrangement follows all applicable laws and practices. This short entry isn't enough to make informed decisions!
The DPCA is registered with the FEC. If you go to www.fec.org you can see how much money we raised and spent each month going back to sometime in 2001. As a registered party, we are bound by contribution limits. In particular, no American can give us more than $32,400 in each of 2013 and 2014 (the max will be adjusted by inflation in 2015 and 2016).
In addition, we can engage in political activity like taking out pro-Democratic ads and giving money to any federal candidate or political party.
I could stop at that but there is another source of confusion. In our Charter, we refer to "DPCA members." Anyone new to the organisation would find this term confusing. We are all members of DA from the time we sign up, aren't we? Since DA is, in some sense, a synonym for the DPCA, how can someone simultaneously be a member of DA but not of the DPCA? The simple answer is that when the Charter refers to DPCA members, it really means voting members of DA.
However, the FEC treats us as a separate account within the DNC. This is a bit confusing. We are simultaneously the same and different. We are different in the obvious sense that we each file separate FEC reports. If John Mogul contributes $5,000 to the DNC in July 2011, his name will appear in the Democratic Party July FEC report—not in ours. And vice versa: if John gives it to the DPCA, his name appears in our FEC report but not in that of the DNC.
But, in a very important sense, the FEC treats us as an integral part of the DNC. As I said above, the maximum that an individual can give to a political party in 2013 is $32,400. The FEC treats this limit as the combined amount an individual can give to both the DNC and the DPCA. Thus, if someone gives the DNC $20,000 in 2013, she can give only $12,400 to the DPCA.
These three organizations are powerful fund-raisers for Democratic candidates, run by Democratic elected officials. They often publish lists of targeted elections that other parts of the Democratic party use to prioritize GOTV energy and funds (although they do not have formal authority and many parts add or subtract from those lists). The DCCC (Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee) is run by Democrats elected to the US House of Representatives and it is often spoken as "D-trip". The DSCC is run by Democratic US Senators and the DGA is run by Democratic governors. The DLCC (Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee) works to elect Democrats to state legislatures.
This is a core mission of Democrats Abroad and the Democratic Party. For DA, this term covers voter's process from completing the FPCA, through sending back a completed ballot, to checking to verify that the ballot was counted.
The Federal Post Card Application (FPCA) is a form that allows military voters, their families, and civilians living overseas to register to vote and request their absentee ballots. Completing the form accurately requires a reference to state rules, typically either a website like VoteFromAbroad.org or the reference Voter Assistance Guide (VAG) published by the Federal Voting Assistance Program.
The Federal Write-In Absentee Ballot (FWAB) is a form that serves as a "backup ballot" for overseas voters. Completing the form accurately requires a reference to state rules, typically either a website like VoteFromAbroad.org or the reference Voter Assistance Guide (VAG) published by the Federal Voting Assistance Program.
The Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act (UOCAVA) is the name of a 1986 law that required the 50 states (as well as territories) to allow absentee voting for US citizens living abroad. "UOCAVA voters" came to mean the group of US citizens whose voting procedures are governed by that Federal law. The act does not apply to state and local elections, which creates a "Federal-only" status for voters in some states. Subsequent laws that further protected the overseas vote include the Help America Vote Act of (HAVA) of 2002 and the Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment Act (MOVE Act) of 2010.
Ultimately, LEOs decide whether a given FPCA is accepted, when absentee ballots are distributed, and how absentee ballots are integrated into the final count for Federal, state, and local elections. During each Federal election, the troubleshooters of DA's GOTV team interact dozens of times with LEOs to resolve problems that arise between a voter's completion of the FPCA through to the counting and verification of their ballots.
FVAP is a program within the US Department of Defense that helps military voters, their families, and civilians living overseas to register to vote and request their absentee ballots. FVAP is responsible for the reference to state rules called the Voter Assistance Guide (VAG).
If you go to their website--www.fec.gov—and click on "About the FEC" and then "Mission and History," you'll find the following: "In 1975, Congress created the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to administer and enforce the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) - the statute that governs the financing of federal elections. The duties of the FEC, which is an independent regulatory agency, are to disclose campaign finance information, to enforce the provisions of the law such as the limits and prohibitions on contributions, and to oversee the public funding of Presidential elections."
In sum, the FEC enforces campaign finance rules. Each political party and federal candidate must register with the FEC and submit monthly reports. These reports list the money received and spent during the previous month. Every donor of over $200/year must be listed with his/her address. Each registered party must conform to FEC limits on the amount any individual can contribute to a party in a calendar year (currently $32,400 in 2013 and 2014). And every registered party can engage in partisan political activity. Violation of campaign finance law can lead to heavy fines and even prison sentences.
FATCA was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Obama in 2010 to discourage tax fraud and money laundering, and to apprehend offenders. The Act requires both US citizens and their banks to report detailed information to the IRS on accounts in Foreign Financial Institutions (FFIs). The laudable intent was to make it much more difficult for wealthy Americans living in the US to use offshore accounts to hide untaxed earnings from the IRS. But the bill applies to all accounts outside the US — even when they are held by Americans who live abroad. As a result, FATCA is causing grave hardship for Americans living outside the country. Their financial accounts are being closed; for some their relationships with their non-American spouses are under serious strain; and some Americans are being denied positions, promotion or partnership in business. For some, the consequences of FATCA reporting are so severe that they are renouncing or contemplating renouncing their US citizenship.
The expert committee of DA leaders devoted to responding to FATCA has been called: FATCA Task Force, FBAR/FATCA Task Force, and as of June 2017, Taxation Task Force. There is a wealth of information on this wiki about FATCA and other elements of tax law, including the FBAR, which is an abbreviation for "FinCEN Form 114 Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts".
Residency Based Taxation (or RBT) is a system of taxation where a nation imposes tax on income generated within its borderon those who have residencywithin its borders. Citizens of a nation with Residency Based Taxation pay tax on income in the place where the income wasgenerated. If theylive and generate income abroad then their offshore income istaxed abroad andnot taxed by the nation of their citizenship.All developed nations have a system of Residency Based Taxation except the United States. The United States is the only country other than North Korea and Eritrea which taxes its citizens on their income regardless of where it is generated, no matter where they live (and for no matter how long they have lived there) and, but for a limited number of international bilateral treaties for the avoidance of double taxation, regardless of whetherthey are also taxed on the same income in their country of residence. This system is known as Citizenship Based Taxation (or CBT).


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Final Form games are the creators of the acclaimed 2011 PC shoot-em-up Jamestown, a rousing success on the Steam platform and one of the best indie games of the year. For this episode of the podcast, I sat down in person with the three man team that runs the studio – Hal Larsson, Tim Ambrogi, and Mike Ambrogi – to ask them about the ins and outs of game development, the complexities of designing a shmup engine, their experience working with Valve, and their upcoming plans for the studio. Listen in to find out the connection between America's Army and Jamestown, the studio's thoughts on the current gaming landscape, and where they got the idea for creating a shmup on colonial Mars.
A special thanks to JT from the forums for suggesting a few of the questions!
Twinkle Star Sprites FTW!!! That game is SO EFFING FUN!
Thanks for including my questions in this podcast! It was really enjoyable for me to listen to this and hear the Final Form guys respond to my questions. I'm happy to get some more insight into their design process, I just wish I could have been there to see them blush at my praise.


Friday Yuk? Nope. Friday Music.
I'm going to offer a new idea.
We Techies tend to live in our own world- that the sales wonks, the advertising geeks, and the general staff don't understand.
And often, we listen to tunes they don't comprehend. So here's our chance to let our little world share tunes that make us rock.
But our own private tunes that get us thru our week.
The link will get you to both- "It's Not Easy" and "100 Years" both by Five For Fighting.
The lead singer has a beautiful voice and the lyrics are wonderful.
I tend to prefer music that can be sung and with lyrics that have meaning- at least to me.
This particular group has a lit of really good music- assuming you like the genre.
I won't hunt you down for this one Mick. But don't Gloria Gaynor at us, I'm begging you!
Or more technically, "old film clips"?
It always cracks me up when I see the old clips and their chins are just about sitting on their guitars.
Well Mick, cool topic, but it would have been nice to have some warning. would have had a chance to do some searching and be able to contribute.
Is "obscure" the theme to follow, or just what we think is cool?
Ah, how about music yuk?
Got one! Great song, funny video.
Cool and obscure are NOT mutually exclusive.
Like mine today - I think it fits both catagories.
Cool and obscure is the Frijid Pink cover of the same song.
this last week, but it's so good, I thought I do it again.
We saw this band last Friday. Last Friday was definitely better than this Friday. We have to go to a funeral tonight. A friend of ours lost her son this week. It sure ain't supposed to happen this way.
I can't imagine . . . . .
.....a harder thing to deal with than a parent losing a child. You're right, it's not supposed to work like that.
by maecuff · 13 years ago In reply to I can't imagine . . . . .
with my own selfishness. I haven't gone around to see her and her husband (his stepson) yet. My husband took dinner to them on Wednesday, and I didn't go. I'm just dreading seeing her grief. I don't want to. And the crappy thing is, I'm nearly positive, if the situation was reversed, she would have come to see me.
Her son was 25 years old. He had a brain tumor at age 13 and spent 3 years in the hospital. His mental capacity had been diminished, and he was very much like a very young teenager. My 8 year old used to play with transformers and video games with him. About 8 weeks ago, he had a stroke, and just slowly shut down from there.
I just feel like such a sh*t right now. I'll be there tonight and tomorrow, but I still shouldn't have run from it until now.
It isn't selfishness to recognise that you need time to process YOUR feelings. Had you chosen against your better judgement to go over immediately and see her, how would your discomfort have been anything supportive of her?
That you chose instead to get yourself to more solid ground is also a gift. You gave yourself the time you need to come to terms with your own feelings of loss. Now when you go to her, you can offer her your strength- you made sure you had some to give.
It isn't supposed to work this way, but sometimes it does.
Quit beating yourself up. It is counter-productive and you know it. Instead, expend that energy on being as together as you can be so that you have the banked the strength you want to give your friend.
I apologise if I sound harsh. I don't mean to.
All you might need to say is that you have no idea what to say, but that you'll be there for her however and whenever she might need you to be. A hug pretty much says it all.


Theta and delta wave isochronic tones and binaural beats with sun, moon & earth frequencies.
Spiritual Awakening isochronic tones and binaural beats with sun, moon & earth frequencies. Use this track for meditation and relaxation, to connect with your spirituality and consciousness, increase awareness and unity.
What frequency modulations and tones are used in this track?
This is a brainwave entrainment audio session using isochronic tones and binaural beats combined with music.
5.5Hz – (theta) – Inner guidance, intuition, move beyond knowledge to knowing.
To add further power to the isochronic tones and binaural beats stimulation, amplitude modulation effects have been applied to the music, which produces soothing vibrations that are synced with the tones and beats.
I've also used pitch and carrier frequencies for the tones and beats which are associated with the sun, moon, earth and total knowing.
Note: Laptop speakers are usually too small to produce enough bass to hear the entrainment tones effectively. So for better sound quality and results, we recommend using external speakers or headphones.
* Note: You will not be able to download the mp3 music files 'directly' to iPhones or iPads because of limitations with those devices. For info on how to get the MP3 file onto iPhones and iPads, please click here.
I recommend listening to this with your eyes closed, as that will naturally help you to produce more theta brainwave activity.
Drink a glass of water before each session, to make sure you are well hydrated.
You can listen to this track without headphones, as the main brainwave entrainment effect is produced by the isochronic tones. However, to get the full effect and to hear the binaural beats properly, you will need to use headphones/earbuds.
Mp3 player – Plugin external speakers to your mp3 player/iPod or use a music docking station.
Laptop/tablet – A laptop/tablet can be used but you may need external speakers if you are unable to hear the isochronic tones clearly.
CD/DVD Player – If you have access to a CD/DVD player in the bedroom, you can burn the mp3 track onto a disc and use that.
External Speakers – If you are listening on a laptop, you will probably find that the speakers are very small, which means it'll probably be hard to hear the Isochronic Tones effectively. So I recommend plugging in some external speakers for laptops.


text:
In applied statistics and geostatistics, regression-kriging (RK) is a spatial prediction technique that combines a regression of the dependent variable on auxiliary variables (such as parameters derived from digital elevation modelling, remote sensing/imagery, and thematic maps) with interpolation (kriging) of the regression residuals. It is mathematically equivalent to the interpolation method variously called universal kriging and kriging with external drift, where auxiliary predictors are used directly to solve the kriging weights.

BLUP for spatial data

Regression-kriging is an implementation of the best linear unbiased predictor (BLUP) for spatial data, i.e. the best linear interpolator assuming the universal model of spatial variation. Matheron (1969) proposed that a value of a target variable at some location can be modeled as a sum of the deterministic and stochastic components:

which he termed universal model of spatial variation. Both deterministic and stochastic components of spatial variation can be modeled separately. By combining the two approaches, we obtain:

where  is the fitted deterministic part,  is the interpolated residual,  are estimated deterministic model coefficients ( is the estimated intercept),  are kriging weights determined by the spatial dependence structure of the residual and where  is the residual at location . The regression coefficients  can be estimated from the sample by some fitting method, e.g. ordinary least squares (OLS) or, optimally, using generalized least squares (GLS):

where  is the vector of estimated regression coefficients,  is the covariance matrix of the residuals,  is a matrix of predictors at the sampling locations and  is the vector of measured values of the target variable. The GLS estimation of regression coefficients is, in fact, a special case of the geographically weighted regression. In the case, the weights are determined objectively to account for the spatial auto-correlation between the residuals.

Once the deterministic part of variation has been estimated (regression-part), the residual can be interpolated with kriging and added to the estimated trend. The estimation of the residuals is an iterative process: first the deterministic part of variation is estimated using OLS, then the covariance function of the residuals is used to obtain the GLS coefficients. Next, these are used to re-compute the residuals, from which an updated covariance function is computed, and so on. Although this is by many geostatisticians recommended as the proper procedure, Kitanidis (1994) showed that use of the covariance function derived from the OLS residuals (i.e. a single iteration) is often satisfactory, because it is not different enough from the function derived after several iterations; i.e. it does not affect much the final predictions. Minasny and McBratney (2007) report similar results—it seems that using more higher quality data is more important than to use more sophisticated statistical methods.

In matrix notation, regression-kriging is commonly written as:

where  is the predicted value at location ,  is the vector of  predictors and  is the vector of  kriging weights used to interpolate the residuals. The RK model is considered to be the Best Linear Predictor of spatial data. It has a prediction variance that reflects the position of new locations (extrapolation) in both geographical and feature space:

where  is the sill variation and  is the vector of covariances of residuals at the unvisited location.

Many (geo)statisticians believe that there is only one Best Linear Unbiased Prediction model for spatial data (e.g. regression-kriging), all other techniques such as ordinary kriging, environmental correlation, averaging of values per polygons or inverse distance interpolation can be seen as its special cases. If the residuals show no spatial auto-correlation (pure nugget effect), the regression-kriging converges to pure multiple linear regression, because the covariance matrix () becomes an identity matrix. Likewise, if the target variable shows no correlation with the auxiliary predictors, the regression-kriging model reduces to ordinary kriging model because the deterministic part equals the (global) mean value. Hence, pure kriging and pure regression should be considered as only special cases of regression-kriging (see figure).

RK and UK/KED

The geostatistical literature uses many different terms for what are essentially the same or at least very similar techniques. This confuses the users and distracts them from using the right technique for their mapping projects. In fact, both universal kriging, kriging with external drift, and regression-kriging are basically the same technique.

Matheron (1969) originally termed the technique Le krigeage universel, however, the technique was intended as a generalized case of kriging where the trend is modelled as a function of coordinates. Thus, many authors reserve the term universal kriging (UK) for the case when only the coordinates are used as predictors. If the deterministic part of variation (drift) is defined externally as a linear function of some auxiliary variables, rather than the coordinates, the term kriging with external drift (KED) is preferred (according to Hengl 2007, "About regression-kriging: From equations to case studies"). In the case of UK or KED, the predictions are made as with kriging, with the difference that the covariance matrix of residuals is extended with the auxiliary predictors. However, the drift and residuals can also be estimated separately and then summed. This procedure was suggested by Ahmed et al. (1987) and Odeh et al. (1995) later named it regression-kriging, while Goovaerts (1997) uses the term kriging with a trend model to refer to a family of interpolators, and refers to RK as simple kriging with varying local means. Minasny and McBratney (2007) simply call this technique Empirical Best Linear Unbiased Predictor i.e. E-BLUP.

In the case of KED, predictions at new locations are made by:

for

for  or in matrix notation:

where  is the target variable, 's are the predictor variables i.e. values at a new location ,  is the vector of KED weights (),  is the number of predictors and  is the vector of  observations at primary locations. The KED weights are solved using the extended matrices:

where  is the vector of solved weights,  are the Lagrange multipliers,  is the extended covariance matrix of residuals and  is the extended vector of covariances at new location.

In the case of KED, the extended covariance matrix of residuals looks like this (Webster and Oliver, 2007; p. 183):

and  like this:

Hence, KED looks exactly as ordinary kriging, except the covariance matrix/vector are extended with values of auxiliary predictors.

Although the KED seems, at first glance, to be computationally more straightforward than RK, the parameters of the variogram for KED must also be estimated from regression residuals, thus requiring a separate regression modelling step. This regression should be GLS because of the likely spatial correlation between residuals. Note that many analyst use instead the OLS residuals, which may not be too different from the GLS residuals. However, they are not optimal if there is any spatial correlation, and indeed they may be quite different for clustered sample points or if the number of samples is relatively small ().

A limitation of KED is the instability of the extended matrix in the case that the covariate does not vary smoothly in space. RK has the advantage that it explicitly separates trend estimation from spatial prediction of residuals, allowing the use of arbitrarily-complex forms of regression, rather than the simple linear techniques that can be used with KED. In addition, it allows the separate interpretation of the two interpolated components. The emphasis on regression is important also because fitting of the deterministic part of variation (regression) is often more beneficial for the quality of final maps than fitting of the stochastic part (residuals).

Software to run regression-kriging

Regression-kriging can be automated e.g. in R statistical computing environment, by using gstat and/or geoR package. Typical inputs/outputs include:

INPUTS:
 Interpolation set (point map) —   at primary locations;
 Minimum and maximum expected values and measurement precision ();
 Continuous predictors (raster map) — ; at new unvisited locations
 Discrete predictors (polygon map);
 Validation set (point map) —   (optional);
 Lag spacing and limiting distance (required to fit the variogram);

OUTPUTS:
 Map of predictions and relative prediction error;
 Best subset of predictors and correlation significance (adjusted R-square);
 Variogram model parameters (e.g. , , )
 GLS drift model coefficients;
 Accuracy of prediction at validation points: mean prediction error (MPE) and root mean square prediction error (RMSPE);

Application of regression-kriging

Regression-kriging is used in various applied fields, from meteorology, climatology, soil mapping, geological mapping, species distribution modeling and similar. The only requirement for using regression-kriging versus e.g. ordinary kriging is that one or more covariate layers exist, and which are significantly correlated with the feature of interest. Some general applications of regression-kriging are:

 Geostatistical mapping: Regression-kriging allows for use of hybrid geostatistical techniques to model e.g. spatial distribution of soil properties.
 Downscaling of maps: Regression-kriging can be used a framework to downscale various existing gridded maps. In this case the covariate layers need to be available at better resolution (which corresponds to the sampling intensity) than the original point data.
 Error propagation: Simulated maps generated by using a regression-kriging model can be used for scenario testing and for estimating propagated uncertainty.

Regression-kriging-based algorithms play more and more important role in geostatistics because the number of possible covariates is increasing every day. For example, DEMs are now available from a number of sources. Detailed and accurate images of topography can now be ordered from remote sensing systems such as SPOT and ASTER; SPOT5 offers the High Resolution Stereoscopic (HRS) scanner, which can be used to produce DEMs at resolutions of up to 5 m. Finer differences in elevation can also be obtained with airborne laser-scanners. The cost of data is either free or dropping in price as technology advances. NASA recorded most of the world's topography in the Shuttle Radar Topographic Mission in 2000. From summer of 2004, these data has been available (e.g. via USGS ftp) for almost whole globe at resolution of about 90 m (for the North American continent at resolution of about 30 m). Likewise, MODIS multispectral images are freely available for download at resolutions of 250 m. A large free repository of Landsat images is also available for download via the Global Land Cover Facility (GLCF).

References

Further reading
 Chapter 2, Regression-kriging, in Tomislav Hengl (2009), A Practical Guide to Geostatistical Mapping, 291 p., .

External links
 Gstat package (implements KED)
 GeoR package (implements KED)

Interpolation
Geostatistics

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


The following is an excerpt from The Art of Language Invention, by David J. Peterson. Listen to SciFri on October 2, 2015, to hear Peterson talk more about linguistics and inventing languages.
C-3PO relays this message and Jabba says he'll offer 25,000 for Chewie.
C-3PO relays this message and Jabba asks why he should pay so much.
The above isn't subtitled, but Leia pulls out a bomb and activates it.
c-3po: Because he's holding a thermal detonator!
Jabba is impressed by this and offers 35,000.
The above isn't subtitled, but Leia deactivates the bomb and puts it away.
I want you to remember that I was in seventh or eighth grade at the time that I was rewatching this. I was not a "language" guy at that point by any stretch of the imagination. I never dreamed that a human could invent a language, and even if I had, I probably wouldn't have been able to come up with a good reason for one to do so. Furthermore, up to that point, I'd never studied a second language, and the prospect filled me with dread (I had enough trouble understanding my Spanish-speaking relatives who always spoke too fast for me).
But even so, I knew something was wrong here. How on earth does Leia say the same thing twice and have it mean something different the second time? Even if we take C-3PO for an unreliable translator (he is quite loquacious, after all), that applies only to the last two phrases. How could one expect to have an unreliable subtitle? Subtitles are supposed to lie outside the world of the film. If you can't rely on a subtitle provided by the film's creators, how can you rely on anything?
In trying to resolve this conflict, it occurred to me that the only plausible explanation for this aberrant phenomenon is that the language itself was correct, but worked differently from all other human languages. In our languages (take English, for example), a word's meaning can be affected by the context it's in, but if you control for context, the word will always mean the same thing. Thus, if you're telling a story about your dog, and you use the word "dog" several times throughout the story, it will still refer to a fur-covered animal that barks and covets nothing so highly as table scraps. This is fairly standard and uncontroversial.
What would happen if a language didn't do that, though?
Take, for example, the word I have transcribed as yotó above. What if it changed its meaning over the duration of a discourse? Naturally, one would have to define a discourse, but I think it's fair to consider this conversation featuring Leia, Jabba, and C-3PO a single discourse, so we can leave that concern aside for the moment. What if the word yotó has several definitions? Specifically, what if the first time it's used in a conversation it means "this wookiee"; the second time it's used it means "50,000"; and the third time it's used it means "no less" (or the rough equivalent of those)? The same, then, applies for all other words in the language. That would resolve the ambiguity. How could one possibly use such a language? Well, they are all aliens (Star Wars, recall, takes place a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away). Maybe they're just better at this stuff than humans. Why not?
This was where my brain went while rewatching Return of the Jedi for the first time. At some future date I may have shared this with a friend, but if I did, the response was likely an eyeroll. This quirk was just an unimportant detail in an otherwise fantastic movie. Why bother about it?
And so that's pretty much where my thought experiment died. I didn't take it any further, and no one was really interested, so I didn't think about it again until college.
But that, of course, was a different era—a pre-internet era. Who does a teenager have to share news with other than their family, friends, and teachers? Who do they come in contact with? In 1995, that's pretty much only the people who live near you and with whom you interact on a daily basis. How would you ever get ahold of anyone else? How would I have known that someone in the Bay Area, let's say—less than five hundred miles away—had the same idea I'd had and also found that exchange interesting? In 1995, there was no way.
Yes, the internet had been around for a while in 1995, but it wasn't a thing that just anyone could have access to. America Online changed all that. Pretty soon it became a thing to race home from school and go into a chatroom with a bunch of random people to talk about . . . nothing. And that was how we entertained ourselves—for hours. What a world, where you could chat with someone who lived in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, about how Soundgarden rules!
As it turns out, though, I wasn't the only person to pick up on this. Another conlanger I'd later meet at the First Language Creation Conference, Matt Haupt, asked exactly the same question, and devoted a blog post to deconstructing that scene specifically. And we weren't the only ones. The ubese language has its own entry on the Wookieepedia (yes, that's a thing) where contributors have written up an entire backstory for the language that is, first of all, not a full language, and, ultimately, poorly constructed and not worthy of serious consideration.
From The Art of Language Invention: From Horse-Lords to Dark Elves, The Words Behind World-Building by David J. Peterson, published on September 29, 2015 by Penguin Books, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. Copyright by David J. Peterson, 2015.
David J. Peterson began creating languages in 2000, received his MA in Linguistics from the University of California, San Diego, in 2005, and cofounded the Language Creation Society in 2007.


Hall of Judgment PDF File Released!
The (digital) moment has arrived: check your email boxes for a note from Backerkit, because the PDF file for Hall of Judgment has been given approval for distribution.
Thank you all so much for coming along with me this far!
The file as distributed is exactly what the print copy will look like. Hopefully we've caught most/all of the major errata, but there always seems to be a few that slip through.
Such errors can be corrected in PDF, obviously, but not print.
Haven't ordered it yet, but want to? Hit Hosted Pre-Orders on Backerkit and get in on the first print run.
The print file sailed through pre-production, and printing and binding is expected to be complete by August 22.
That's a Wednesday, which means Thursday will see the books nipped over to my fulfillment partner in the UK, and international books should be in the mail that Friday. Backers in the UK could thus see their print copies the following week, still within August, which makes me happy.
The US copies and surplus inventory will head over to Minnesota by airmail, which means that I could be packing and mailing them the following week, assuming no delays at customs (and airmail makes that easier, ironically: less, and less-expensive, paperwork, apparently). So either later that same week, or within the two weeks thereafter (mid-September), all physical copies should be in hand.
I will also be pushing out some VTT-scale map files. These were made available for the Lost Hall of Tyr distribution, and will also be made available with 1-yd hex overlays (for programs with built-in maps, I'll provide a pixels-per-yard conversion).
The maps from ENnie Gold Medalist Cartographer Glynn Seal (he loves saying that, so I figured I'd repeat it) will also be made available. The large-area maps in PDF with a GM-layer for extra info, and the Logiheimli map in 72dpi with a pixels-per-yard conversion as well (though the scale is wide enough that "yards per pixel" is possible but unlikely.
After a deep breath to recover my balance after a long sprint to finish both this and Dragon Heresy, the Eye of Sauron will turn to what's next. I've got ideas for more DFRPG stuff, and more, depending on what SJG wants to consider. More on that later.
I also will compile, after shipping of the physical product, the "where did the money go?" report, likely for both Dragon Heresy and Hall of Judgment, since they'll finish at roughly the same time. I feel that's an important part of Kickstarter fulfillment for projects that wouldn't exist without your backing. Kickstarter can't use the "I" word, but no matter what you want to call it, you guys are important Stakeholders in Gaming Ballistic thanks to your participation in this and other projects, and you deserve to know what happened on this project so that you can understand both the past and the future.
For now . . . thank you. For later: there's more coming.


Brooksbank, R., Garland, R. & Taylor, D. (2010). Strategic marketing in New Zealand companies. Journal of Global Marketing, 23(1), 33-44.
This article examines the contribution of selected "textbook" strategic marketing practices to the competitive success of New Zealand companies employing 20 or more employees, as well as the overall adoption levels of these practices. Data were collected by means of a large-scale mail survey, and 10 hypotheses were tested empirically. The results serve to confirm that the basic strategic marketing practices that are typically advocated in the mainstream empirical and prescriptive literature have a key role to play in the success of New Zealand companies. However, they also indicate that there is scope for New Zealand companies to more fully embrace strategic marketing.


text:
package java.lang.reflect;

import java.lang.annotation.Annotation;

/**
 * {@code AnnotatedType} represents the potentially annotated use of a type in
 * the program currently running in this VM. The use may be of any type in the
 * Java programming language, including an array type, a parameterized type, a
 * type variable, or a wildcard type.
 *
 * Note that any annotations returned by methods on this interface are
 * type annotations (JLS {@jls 9.7.4}) as the entity being
 * potentially annotated is a type.
 *
 * @jls 4.1 The Kinds of Types and Values
 * @jls 4.2 Primitive Types and Values
 * @jls 4.3 Reference Types and Values
 * @jls 4.4 Type Variables
 * @jls 4.5 Parameterized Types
 * @jls 4.8 Raw Types
 * @jls 4.9 Intersection Types
 * @jls 10.1 Array Types
 * @since 1.8
 */
public interface AnnotatedType extends AnnotatedElement {

    /**
     * Returns the potentially annotated type that this type is a member of, if
     * this type represents a nested type. For example, if this type is
     * {@code @TA O<T>.I<S>}, return a representation of {@code @TA O<T>}.
     *
     *
Returns {@code null} if this {@code AnnotatedType} represents a
     *     top-level class or interface, or a local or anonymous class, or
     *     a primitive type, or void.
     *
     *
Returns {@code null} if this {@code AnnotatedType} is an instance of
     *     {@code AnnotatedArrayType}, {@code AnnotatedTypeVariable}, or
     *     {@code AnnotatedWildcardType}.
     *
     * @implSpec
     * This default implementation returns {@code null} and performs no other
     * action.
     *
     * @return an {@code AnnotatedType} object representing the potentially
     *     annotated type that this type is a member of, or {@code null}
     * @throws TypeNotPresentException if the owner type
     *     refers to a non-existent class or interface declaration
     * @throws MalformedParameterizedTypeException if the owner type
     *     refers to a parameterized type that cannot be instantiated
     *     for any reason
     *
     * @since 9
     */
    default AnnotatedType getAnnotatedOwnerType() {
        return null;
    }

    /**
     * Returns the underlying type that this annotated type represents.
     *
     * @return the type this annotated type represents
     */
    public Type getType();

    /**
     * {@inheritDoc}
     *
Note that any annotation returned by this method is a type
     * annotation.
     *
     * @throws NullPointerException {@inheritDoc}
     */
    @Override
    <T extends Annotation> T getAnnotation(Class<T> annotationClass);

    /**
     * {@inheritDoc}
     *
Note that any annotations returned by this method are type
     * annotations.
     */
    @Override
    Annotation[] getAnnotations();

    /**
     * {@inheritDoc}
     *
Note that any annotations returned by this method are type
     * annotations.
     */
    @Override
    Annotation[] getDeclaredAnnotations();
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Löyly is the Finnish word for the steam that rises up when water is poured over hot sauna rocks–it's also the apt name of a stylish spa located in southeast Portland, Oregon.
It was perhaps only a matter of time before the D.I.Y. ethos touched the spa world, and it has done so with style in Portland, Ore.


Cozy one bedroom home nestled amongst mature trees in rural location, 10 minutes from Iroquois Falls. Eat-in kitchen with natural gas fireplace.
...Gorgeous home, inside and out. Hop-Skip-Jump to fantastic Park. Book your showing today to see why Living in Cochrane is Loving where you Live.
...home. BBQ from the Upper Deck, and enjoy the views of Cochrane! Book an appointment today with your Favorite Realtor for your private viewing.
...parking steps away. Privacy, space, views. This unit has it all in a great neighbourhood in the amazing town Cochrane. Book your viewing today.


text:
Clarity New York Clients Have Their Say During Blockchain Week in New York
Clarity Team
consensus 2018, New York Blockchain week
Some 8,200 people attended Consensus 2018, part of Blockchain Week in New York City from May 14—18, and the big surprise is that there weren't many. Except of course if you count the fact that the value of cyrptocurrencies plummeted by week's end.
Myriad satellite events took place throughout the week, and not to toot Clarity's own horn but the Monster Token Event of the Century event we put together for our Securitize client was a raging success, according to everyone who attended. (Toot, toot).
Overheard in the bathroom at the event: "This event is way better than Consensus!"
The team worked for more than a month to pull together the invitation-only gathering at The London Hotel on West 54th Street, just across the street from the New York Hilton Midtown where Consensus was happening.
170+ people attended to gather pearls of wisdom from Securitize CEO and co-founder, Carlos Domingo, and from Gene Grant, CEO and co-founder of VRBex, another Clarity client. They appeared on different panels.
The fact-based discussions centered on the rapid emergence and impact of security tokens, as well as regulation and the overall community's need for more education on these topics.
The panelists all expressed varying levels of astonishment at the fact that so many people still do not fully understand what's happening with security token.
As Domingo said in his opening remarks about what sparked the idea to start Securitize, the thinking was, "Nobody knows how to issue a security token so we began to build a platform. People were laughing at me because of regulation. But one of our goals was not to go to jail."
Price discovery and liquidity are the hallmarks of VRBex's offering, Grant told the audience. He was on a panel titled, "The Reality of Security Tokens and the Select Few Who Are Driving the Space."
VRBex, which opened its security-token presale on April 23, is in the process of building a blockchain-based regulation compliant exchange for buying, selling and storing cryptocurrencies, security tokens and fiat currencies. Grant expects it to be operational by early 2019 at the latest.
Grant criticized what he called the "pump and dump" mentality of the crypto community.
"Security tokens are not well understood," he said. "People are interested in speculation and trading but not in investing." VRBex is structured along the lines of a traditional financial-services company, Grant said.
"Utility tokens don't provide investors protection," he explained. "The #1 investor protection is the right to sue someone. Utility tokens are built on the hope that people will do the right thing," whereas a security token is a protected asset class.
Grant said he spends a lot of time explaining regulation to crypto enthusiasts, including much of his time during Consensus 2018.
Domingo appeared on the second panel, "Security Tokens: Ownership Evolved and the Future of Digitized Assets." He hailed the three main components of security tokens, which he said are capital formation, automation, and liquidity.
Each panelist listed a virtue of security tokens:
They are not locked up for 8-10 years and so give investors liquidity
They bring legitimate investment into the space
They appreciate in value and are regulation compliant
Domingo also made a bold prediction for 2019, the year he said when "security tokens will explode" as an investment class.
You heard it here first. Toot, toot.
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text:
package com.zht.baseproject.http;

/**
 * Created by ZHT on 2017/4/19.
 * 响应数据的"基类",通过指定泛型获取想要的数据类型
 */

public class HttpResult<T> {

    private int count;

    private boolean error;

    private T results;

    public int getCount() {
        return count;
    }

    public void setCount(int count) {
        this.count = count;
    }

    public boolean isError() {
        return error;
    }

    public void setError(boolean error) {
        this.error = error;
    }

    public T getResults() {
        return results;
    }

    public void setResults(T results) {
        this.results = results;
    }
}


text:
Editorial: Victoria centre of political map
Victoria has gone strongly NDP in the past two elections, with popular former city councillor Denise Savoie on the ballot.
Victoria, one of three federal ridings contesting a byelection on Nov. 26, has gone strongly NDP in the past two elections, with popular former city councillor Denise Savoie on the ballot.
But Savoie took early retirement for health reasons and the race to replace her appears wide open, with a collection of relative political neophytes up for election.
The NDP is no doubt anxious to maintain its grip on opposition status, so it's no surprise that federal leader Thomas Mulcair dropped by this week to lend his support to candidate Murray Rankin.
Not to be outdone, the Liberals sent interim leader Bob Rae to Victoria to help candidate Paul Summerville, while the Conservatives had Treasury Board president and former Conservative health minister Tony Clement knock on doors with candidate Dale Gann.
Green Party candidate Donald Galloway had his federal leader, Saanich and the Islands MP Elizabeth May, close at hand for a series of announcements and appearances as well, but she had far less distance to travel than her fellow members of parliament, who hail from Ontario or Quebec.
Does the appearance of all this star power really make a difference in voters' minds? Candidates and other party faithful get fired up when their leaders come to town, but they're already converted.
The big question is, does the leaders' presence interest the disinterested?
Unlike a general election, the future direction of the country does not hinge on the results of this byelection and those in Calgary and Durham, Ont. With that in mind, last year's voter turnout of 68 per cent in Victoria – seven points higher than the national mark – will be difficult to beat.
Then again, the appearance of the party leaders, and the media circus surrounding them, may be an indication that something important is happening. And that curiosity may be enough to encourage people who wouldn't otherwise pay attention to find out more about their candidates and maybe even cast a ballot.
Let's hope.
Column: Take care using social media
Politicians letting dogs get away with murder