Did you know that between 80-90% of what we taste is dependent on its smell?
Taste itself is focused on distinguishing chemicals that have a sweet, salty, sour, bitter, or "umami" taste. However, interactions between the senses of taste and smell enhance our perceptions of the foods we eat.


The look for things on ebay.com with and without keying mistakes integrates the advantages of both searches. Thus, besides products with typing errors likewise normal things are located. This sort of search after that has an excellent advantage compared to the typical search if you are trying to find deals that are only extremely hardly ever offered at ebay.com. With the added look for these items with typing errors you will certainly locate fairly definitely additionally a genuine offer.
"CD4 cells are sometimes called T-helper cells which ... of number of CD4 cells," said the official adding that viral load testing and CD4 test are completely different.


Control rooms are mission-critical facilities, and serve as the nexus that connects sensors to the decision makers.
In the design of control rooms, we address cardinal requirements for Visualisation and Collaboration, and propose the most relevant and cost-effective solutions tailored to the unique operating context of each customer. These solutions include integrated Video Wall Solutions, KVM switching technologies, and wireless collaboration which will greatly enhance the situational and informational awareness of the decision makers, and enable quick and effective responses to be made in the most efficient way.


text:
module RuboCop
  module Cop
    module Style
      # Checks for comma (,) not followed by some kind of space.
      class SpaceAfterComma < Cop
        include SpaceAfterPunctuation

        def space_style_before_rcurly
          cfg = config.for_cop('Style/SpaceInsideHashLiteralBraces')
          cfg['EnforcedStyle'] || 'space'
        end

        def kind(token)
          'comma' if token.type == :tCOMMA
        end
      end
    end
  end
end

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Do Pinto Beans Grow Faster Than Kidney Beans?
By Suzanne S. Wiley
Most Heat-Tolerant Vegetables
How Big Are Baby Watermelons Supposed to Get Before You Harvest Them?
Corn vs. Bean Plant Growth
Greenhouse Cucumber Varieties
Types of Cantaloupe
Both kidney beans and pinto beans (both Phaseolus vulgaris) are cheap, long-lasting dry foods that provide essential protein and fiber. Used in both regional dishes and school science experiments, these two beans are also interesting crops to try in your home garden. Their overall growth rates depend on the variety and the care you give them, but pintos have a slight edge over kidney beans in terms of time to maturity.
Same Species, Different Taste
Kidney and pinto beans are both dry beans, also called field beans or common dry beans. Kidney beans can be dark red, light red or white; pintos are tan with darker speckles. Kidney beans are better known as a component of dishes such as chili, soup, and red beans and rice, while pintos are the beans used in refried beans and a lot of Tex-Mex dishes. Both types are available canned and dried.
Pintos Win the Race
The University of Wisconsin Extension's Alternative Field Crops Manual notes that kidney beans tend to mature a little later than pinto beans, and seed catalogs generally back this up with kidney bean varieties having estimated dates to maturity that are about four to five days longer than those of pinto beans from the same company. For example, LocalHarvest, a directory of farms and local food services, notes its pinto beans mature in about 66 days and their dark red kidney beans in 70. Heirloom Organics claims its pintos mature in 80 to 100 days, and the kidney beans in 90 to 100 days. However, depending on growing conditions, care and the exact seeds you get from a seed company, you could end up with kidney beans that mature slightly before pintos. Richland Elementary School in Auburn, Alabama, noted that when one of its classes experimented with bean growth rates, one of their kidney bean plants had a small bean after five weeks, while a pinto bean plant was still in the flowering stage.
Mad Scientist Mode
If you already have bean seeds waiting, you could try testing the seeds to see which types will grow faster. Set up a few small cups with potting soil or get some peat pots, and perform your own grade-school bean-growing experiment, planting a few kidney and pinto beans in them. The indoor growing conditions will be somewhat different from those the seeds will eventually face outdoors, but you'll still get an idea of what to expect. The disadvantage of this is that you have to either do the experiment several months before growing season starts outdoors, or you have to wait a year until the next growing season. Both beans take nearly three months to mature, so this is not a test you can do a couple of weeks before you start sowing seeds in your yard. Seeds tend to be viable for a few years.
Considerations Before Growing
Unless you manage to find varieties that mature very, very quickly -- seed catalogs will have the estimated days to maturity listed for each type of plant -- the difference in growth times is minimal for the two beans. If you're growing these for food, you might be better off going by taste preference, rather than speed of harvest. Growing common dry beans in amounts great enough to provide some for storage takes a lot of space, and the Arizona Cooperative Extension actually suggests buying dried beans instead, and growing more space-efficient crops if you have a small garden. But if you just want to grow them for the sake of knowing you can, plenty of varieties are available.
Arizona Cooperative Extension: AZ Master Gardener Manual: Beans
University of Wisconsin Extension: Alternative Field Crops Manual: Fieldbean
AuburnSchools.org: Which Bean Is Best?
Suzanne S. Wiley is an editor and writer in Southern California. She has been editing since 1989 and began writing in 2009. Wiley received her master's degree from the University of Texas and her work appears on various websites.
When Are Peanuts Ripe?
What Is the Fastest Growing Bean Plant?
What Kinds of Beans to Use for a Three Sisters Garden
Differences of Black & Yellow Sunflower Seeds
What Do the Seeds of Moonflowers Look Like?
The Best Producing Okra to Plant
Types of Cucumber Plants
Growing Carrots Year-Round
What Do Black Turtle Beans Look Like While Growing Before Picking?
1 When Are Peanuts Ripe?
2 What Is the Fastest Growing Bean Plant?
3 What Kinds of Beans to Use for a Three Sisters Garden
4 Differences of Black & Yellow Sunflower Seeds

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Bedroom Expressions | Pleasant to my own blog site, with this period I will demonstrate with regards to Bedroom Expressions. And now, this can be the primary image: High quality furniture is avaliable here.
Thanks for visiting my blog, article above(Bedroom Expressions). Published by admin at September, 30 2018.


Choose from one of three classic renditions of the stone soup tale donated by Leigh's Favorite Books in Sunnyvale: Stone Soup by Jon J Muth, Marcia Brown, Ann McGovern. Your kit will include a "stone" in it's own hand made pouch lovingly crafted my Mama Alis and Grandma Bertie. Two packets of organic, easy to grow seeds. Mixed carrot featuring different color carrots like purple. Pole beans that can be added fresh or dried to soup. Last but not least, this kit includes a healthy celery plant that will add incredible flavor to all your stone soups!
This herb garden kit features plants, stone plant markers, preschool friendly recipes and a hand made lavender pocket. Plant an herb garden with your child that he/she can harvest herbs from and cook into dinner: Chives, Sage, Oregano, Peppermint, Lavender. This kit comes with one recipe card for each herb, on one side of the card is an easy to follow recipe that involves the help of the child. The other side of the card is a pictorial version of the recipe illustrated by Seth Whitman Mountain school alumni. The name rocks are illustrated with matching drawings as the recipe cards so that your preschooler can easily identify which herb to "harvest". Your kit will include a lavender pocket hand made by Mama Alis and Grandma Bertie.


text:
Posts Tagged 'Foxnews'
Foxnews,Iran Protests,Isfahan,Maryam Rajavi,MEK,Mujahedin-e Khalq,National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI),NCRI,PMOI
An Unstoppable Force: the Rising Tide of Iran's Protest Movement
Written by Admin on August 4, 2018 . Posted in MEK (PMOI) IN MEDIA
A young Iran protester shows victory sign, while joining fellow protesters to push back on repressive IRGC forces in Isfahan
On Friday, August 3rd, Fox News published an article on its website from Ben Evansky, titled "Iran's Widespread and Growing Protests Push Citizens to Brink". Evansky outlined the rising discontent among the Iranian population.
His article comes at a prominent moment. The residents of Isfahan have joined the nation's truck drivers in their protests, and protests in Tehran continue to rage.
The economy is in sharp decline as decades of mismanagement has caused rampant currency inflation. On top of a spiralling economy, Iranian's have to contend with water shortages and price increases for basic essentials like food and drink.
A Growing Protest Movement
Evansky describes how in these uncertain times, the Iranian protest movement is rapidly expanding. The People's Mujahedin Organisation of Iran (MEK) and their activists have published footage on social media of the protests in Iran. Tehran's residents can be heard chanting "the mullahs must get lost".
#IranProtests against Khamenei's regime reach the capital Tehran tonight w/ chants of "The mullahs must get lost" (Video via MEK activists in Vali Asr Street) For 3 days protests have rocked Iran's major cities #FreeIran2018 @realDonaldTrump @GMarquis45 @PressSec @mercedesschlapp pic.twitter.com/2YKYWyRnnE
— M. Hanif Jazayeri (@HanifJazayeri) August 2, 2018
Similar images have been released from Arak. Protestors there are using the slogan, "no to Gaza, no to Lebanon, my life for Iran" (referring to the mullahs use of Iranian finances to fund foreign conflicts and terrorist organizations abroad while Iran's own population goes hungry and thirsty).
In his article, Evansky analyzed the slogans used by the Iranian population during the protests and discovered they provide significant insight into the opposition movement. Firstly, the women of Isfahan province are among the chanters and protestors. Fox News based on analysis of an Iran analyst, asserted that the women of Najafabad in Isfahan province "used to be a traditional bastion of regime support". Now, these same women are in the streets shouting, "they fed Syria but made our young people turn old".
It is not just the women of Isfahan, other segments of the regime's support base are turning against them. The urban and rural poor, the day laborers, the farmers, and the factory workers have all joined the protest movement, uniting all segments of Iranian society in opposition.
Fox News goes on to suggest that this could be a pivotal moment for the Iranian opposition. The residents of the regime heartlands have been the mullahs' foundations of support. Those residents are now beginning to realise that the mullahs do not have their best interests at heart. This realisation casts uncertainty on the mullahs' future in power.
The Role of the US
Many in the US government have proposed supporting the Iranian protestors. In his article, Evansky cited a spokesman for Republican Senator Ted Cruz who said that "the United States should be doing everything possible to support these protestors".
The US government's stance towards the mullahs is hardening. Since Donald Trump withdrew the US from the Iran deal, he has passed a new round of sanctions, urged European nations to adopt a tougher stance, and put a resolution through Congress pledging US support to the Iranian protestors.
Falling Dominoes
The latest protests and the hardening position of the international community towards the mullahs has set in motion a series of events that will lead to the ultimate collapse of the clerical regime. Like falling dominoes, the rapidly expanding protest movement will become too great for the mullahs to repress and silence.
The mullahs have no solution for containing the chaotic state of the economy and all their measures and plans have failed. Sacking the Central Bank's president, arresting bazaar merchants, spreading lies and false pretenses are no longer effective. #IranRegimeChange#Iran
— Maryam Rajavi (@Maryam_Rajavi) July 30, 2018
The President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), Maryam Rajavi, emphasized the importance of keeping the current movement going. In a statement, she exclaimed, "Iran's risen and revolting cities are joining the protests, one after the other. The cry for freedom is becoming louder, and the uprising is expanding more and more every moment."
Rajavi ended her statement by celebrating the powerful political force the Iranian public hold in their hands and their voices. "The is no force more powerful than the united force of young people".


Mary Beckman's current research focuses on phonological development. This the process by which babies learn to pick out words and other structures in the speech addressed to them and to match these up to the sounds patterns they themselves produce, and then gradually grow a vocabulary and a "grammar" for combining sounds and words into completely novel utterances. It also involves learning to listen like a native speaker as well as learning to sound like someone who belongs in the ambient speech community.
Eric Fosler-Lussier is the director of the Speech and Language Technologies Laboratory in the OSU Department of Computer Science and Engineering. The overall goal of the lab's research is to find meaningful ways to integrate acoustic, phonetic, lexical, and other linguistic insights into the speech recognition process through a combination of statistical modeling and data/error analysis. He was a co-PI on the NSF grant that funded the Math-to-Mouth project from 2008-2011 and he remains involved with OSU learningtotalk.org personnel.
Andrew Plummer's research focuses on the conceptual foundations and computational modeling of the earliest stages of phonological acquistion during infancy. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher in Eric Fosler-Lussier lab at OSU, working on the speechkitchen project. [Link to his dissertation on The acquisition of vowel normalization during early infancy: Theory and computational framework.
Jennifer Zhang earned an undergraduate degree in Lingusitics at the Ohio State University, where she participated in research on fricative acquisition with Ya-ting Shih and Jeff Kallay, before teaching for a year in Chile and Nicaragua. She is interested in phonetics and language acquisition. She would like to do more research to improve acoustic measures of fricative acquisition and also to investigate how 3rd language acquisition affects 2nd language acquisition and how these effects can be measured acoustically.


text:
View the Texas Rent Relief Program Dashboard (Dashboard in English)
TEDP
English Español 한국어 普通话 Tiếng Việt
As of January 2023, Texas Rent Relief has distributed nearly all available funding. As additional funds become available, we will contact individuals who already applied and continue to process applications until all payments are distributed. If you've recently received an email or text message from the program about processing your application and you still need assistance, please call us as soon as possible at 1-833-989-7368.
Payment System Update January 2023
In January 2023, TRR began using a new payment system. For more information, please visit our payments page.
Helping renters who are behind on rent or utility bills.
The Texas Rent Relief Program has helped over 300,000 Texans.
COVID-19 has affected Texans across the state. We've provided over $2B in emergency funds to help Texas renters pay rent and utility bills (including past due rent and utilities).
Already submitted your application?
For Information, Call Toll-Free:
1-833-9TX-RENT • 1-833-989-7368
Monday-Friday • 9 a.m. - 6 p.m. CST • Help is available in multiple languages.
About the Texas Rent Relief Program
Both landlords and tenants were able to use this website to create an account and submit their application.
If you need assistance with a previously submitted application, our customer service staff can assist you by phone by calling 1-833-9TX-RENT (1-833-989-7368).
The Texas Rent Relief Program has helped renters with the following costs starting as far back as March 13, 2020.
Past due, current and up to 2 months of expected rent costs
Past due, current and up to 2 months of expected utility and home energy expenses
After the initial 3 months of current/future assistance, renters were able to apply for 3 additional months of assistance if funds were still available
Landlord Application
For Landlords who applied for unpaid or future rent on behalf of tenants.
Login as a Landlord
For households who applied directly for unpaid or future rent or utilities.
Login as Tenant
Unable to Access Your Existing Online Application?
Tenants who are unable to access their existing online application may call the call center for assistance, and documentation related to existing applications may be accepted by postal mail at the following address.
Postal Mail:
Texas Rent Relief Program
Answer a few quick questions to see if your household qualifies.
Rental assistance payments will generally be made directly to landlords participating in the program, unless they cannot be reached, their relationship with the tenant application cannot be established in a timely manner, or they do not agree to accept the payment. If a landlord is not paid, the payment will be made directly to the tenant. Starting October 10, 2022, all new utility assistance payments are issued directly to the tenant to ensure timely and accurate utility assistance payments.
Click Here For Information about Accepting Payments
Eviction Diversion
A portion of the funds have been set-aside specifically for households whose landlords have already sued for eviction in their local court. Applications in this set-aside will be processed first to decrease application processing time and increase the likelihood of evictions being diverted.
View The Texas Eviction Diversion Program Highlights
To Report Fraud, Waste, and Abuse
All TDHCA employees and contractor employees have a responsibility to report waste, fraud and abuse within the agency. The public is also invited to share such concerns.
If you suspect fraud, waste or abuse please call (833) 61-FRAUD or (833) 613-7283.
Texas Coronavirus Relief Bill Rental Assistance Program administered by the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs
Falsification of documents or any material falsehoods or omissions in an Application to this program, including knowingly seeking duplicative benefits, is subject to state and federal criminal penalties. Landlords and tenants are particularly put on notice that 18 U.S.C. §1001 provides, among other things, that whoever knowingly and willingly makes or uses a document or writing containing any false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or entry, in any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the United States will be fined not more than $10,000 or imprisoned for not more than five years, or both.
This program has specific eligibility requirements and not all households may be eligible.
Funds may not still be available by the time a household applies.
Other program limitations may also apply – please see https://www.tdhca.state.tx.us/covid19-response.htm for details.


text:
Rafe Mair – the champion of all he surveys
I often think Don Quixote lives on in Canada and the bigger, more prominent and more challenging the target windmill, the happier he seems to be, either leading or joining the charge against it.
Allan Hewitson
Now nearing 80, the seemingly tireless crusader I would identify as closest to a real-life reincarnation of Miguel de Cervante's 17th century champion-in-chivalry and heroics is BC's own environmental and always-for-honest-government battler, Rafe Mair.
I have followed Rafe Mair's often-pugnacious escapades and earnest campaigns for more than 20 years. I still regularly read his blog, his articles in The Tyee and on the Commonsense Canadian website.
I've faced off with him a couple of times in my previous life and more recently. I must say he is very adept at "knife to a gun fight" scenarios.
I don't have his frenetic energy level, despite being a few years younger. There's little ambivalence in most people about Mair. Some love him, some hate him. I suspect he prefers being liked, but doesn't much care one way or the other.
The former BC MLA, lawyer, cabinet minister, broadcaster, radio commentator, writer and avid environmental windmill-tilter and angry-man has added a whole lot of additional issues to his list of targets since he first emerged to oppose situations he did not agree with such as the Kemano Completion Project in BC and the Meech Lake and Charlottetown constitutional accords nationally.
This week, as I surfed my e-mail, Rafe was again front and centre, urging his website supporters to be active "as our own media" in recirculating his thoughts to their own e-mail friends, because he feels unable to count on the integrity or reliability of BC's mainstream media to alert British Columbians to the many indiscretions of the federal government, the conspiratorial activities of what he describes freely as "the corrupt B.C. Liberal Government", or the legion of doomsday scenarios facing this province, this country and the world environment at the hands of big corporations..
An avid angler, Mair is still an ardent supporter of "saving BC rivers", but for him that challenge has taken on a more serious and multi-national hue as he scraps with the province and its support for proponents of dozens of private run-of-the-river hydro-electric projects which he fears are combining to destroy scores of vital wild salmon habitats as well as hastening the bankruptcy and privatization of BC Hydro, forced by government to buy the power produced by these projects at uneconomically-sustainable prices – and at times when it is not needed.
Mair fully believes that BC waters are endangered by dangerous oil and gas pipeline plans, the existing and the future planned supertanker commercialization of the Douglas Channel, North Coast, Haida Gwaii, Burrard Inlet, Gulf Islands and other waters.
Countless salmon rivers and creeks could be crossed by oil and gas pipelines that will ("it's a matter of time", he says) leak and pollute those coastal waters.
It appears that the Auditor-General of B.C. has finally acknowledged what Rafe et al, have known forever, that BC's environmental assessment process is a sham and I have little doubt that his view is accurate, but equally little confidence in the government's ability to adjust legislation to improve assessments.
Many other issues remain of deep concern to Mair, including multi-national West Coast fish farming practices and related impacts on wild salmon, gas exploration and fracking of natural gas deposits in the north-east, items of past injustices and inaction – such as the murky events leading up to the mysterious sale of BC Rail – wind power and non-green "green" projects, the continuing HST fiasco where
BC will stand on the Liberals if new premier Christy Clark waits till May, 2013 before going to the people in a new election, Enbridge's Gateway project, existing oil exports from Vancouver and so on.
His latest blogging effort, attacking corporations supporting shark fishing for the purpose of de-finning the animals for popular shark-fin soup, an oriental delicacy, demonstrates Mair shows absolutely no signs of slowing down or backing off in pursuing his beliefs: right and good in principle – and supportive of a highly-energetic friend, Anthony Marr, a UBC-educated wildlife preservationist.
Not surprising, I guess, because Marr shows on his own website that there's a mutual-admiration society between Rafe and himself when he says, under the heading "Oil Spill a Certainty" by Rafe Mair, that Rafe is " THE most environmentally conscious and passionate broadcaster and public figure in Canada, or the world for that matter, that I've had the pleasure to know…"
Anyway, this all boils down to my personal acknowledgment that Rafe Mair does hold some special status as a pre-eminent commentator on matters environmental in British Columbia and his advancing age certainly seems to be a non-factor in his productivity.
That being said, he isn't necessarily always right – or always wrong, for that matter.
But he remains a highly opinionated, persistent, impatient and powerful fighter for issues he opposes.
In this particular shark-fin instance and in many of his other fights, I support his points of view, but not in everything. Taking on the Asian world for sharks is a big step…
ahewitson@telus.net
Dykes without dredging a recipe for continued disasters
Freedom if Information request update


text:
Grope Things External
Posted on April 1, 2014 by steve
…Sorry, that should be "hope springs eternal"….man, have we needed this. After a harsh winter that tried even the hardiest of souls among us, the Boys of Summer are back with their grand old game and not a moment too soon, Opening Day at last. Cue the massed choirs of the Hallelujah chorus, bring on the William Tell Overture, "Auld Lang Syne","Take Me Out To the Ballgame" and whatever other celebratory music seems appropriate. Play it all, make it festive and stirring because once again, our prayers have been answered. The grass (OK, some fake stuff too), the crack of bat on ball, the whoosh of a high, hard one, the ballet of a niftily turned double-play, even the rancid scent of stale hot dogs and overpriced swill-beer …man, have we ever needed this.
The return of baseball is such a balm and a blessing, especially when the nice weather is dragging its butt and we're not out of the winter woods yet. Its arrival comes with other perks too, like the appearance of the first box-scores in today's morning papers. Amid all the wrenching chaos of change – which, after all, is nothing but the gradual stripping away of all that we hold dear – there's something very comforting in knowing that people have been digesting these lovely, tiny columns of numbers and abbreviations along with their corn-flakes and coffee for well over a century now. Keep progress, give me the box-scores. They provide much better morning reading than the sordid, loutish miasma of politics, business and celebrity-worship that pollutes the newspapers. At least when a box-score says Bryce Harper went 2-for-4 with a double and a walk, you can believe it.
Of course, many blessings are mixed…..after all, spring also brings the tax-man and his fangs. And Opening Day can bring disappointment, depending on how your team makes out. For Blue Jays' fans, yesterday's dismal 9-2 loss to the Rays mostly brought a feeling of deja-phooey about their team, as in "here we go again". Much of the off-season commentary about the Jays sensibly and repeatedly pointed out four keys to the team's fortunes – improved defense, staying healthy, a good start and above all, the quality of the starting rotation – oh well, I guess one out of four is better than nothing.
The defense should be better at several sore spots, if only by subtraction in a couple of cases. It's anybody's guess how well Ryan Goins will hit, but it's a sure bet he's a defensive upgrade at second base over Emilio Bonafacio, who played the position last year like a man defusing a bomb while wearing oven mitts. And behind the plate…well, not to knock J.P. Arencibia or anything, but their catching improved as soon as they let him go. Never mind Dionner Navarro… hell, Rick Cerone would have been an upgrade and he must be at least 60 by now. And now that Melky Cabrera can actually move again, left-field should be better too, so the defense should be improved, which will help the pitchers, and if yesterday was any indication they're gonna need it.
Now, I know it was only the opener and one game does not a season make. And I know that R.A. Dickey has had success in the past and had a good second half last year and all that. But seeing as he's the ace and everything, it would have been nice if he'd at least set the tone for the season by pitching like one, or at least close to it, but no dice. Plainly put, he was not very good, with gusts toward awful. I mean, just five innings pitched, six walks (tying a career-high), five hits (three of them screaming doubles but miraculously no homers) and six runs, all of them earned? Where's the leadership in that? It's all very noble of him to take the blame for this and say it's all on him, but I'm getting tired of hearing it, just as I'm getting weary of his philosophical musings about how elusive and hard to control the knuckler is and how he needs to be better and blah-blah-blah. Don't say it, R.A., do it, and sooner would be better than later.
Although it was already too late, Esmil Rogers did a nice job in relief with two shutout innings. Jeremy Jeffress can throw the ball at 97 m.p.h. till the cows come home and that's great, but the good news about him ends there, because – at least judging by the one really ugly inning he pitched yesterday – he doesn't seem to have much of an idea where the ball is going to go. In one inning he hit two batters (both of whom came into score), walked another, and gave up three ringing hits and three earned runs while striking out nobody, despite his heat. Yeeeeshhhh.
As bad as the pitching was, news on the health front was maybe even worse, as the brilliant (but brittle) shortstop and table-setter Jose Reyes re-aggravated his bothersome hamstring and came out of the game after just one at-bat. And Jays' fans thought things were rough last year when Reyes went down after 10 games. He's been placed on the 15-day DL and exactly how serious the injury is remains unclear, but this is not good news, not in any way, shape or form. Reyes has had trouble staying in the line-up before last year and the problem for the Jays is not so much replacing him defensively, but in the batting order. It's a double-whammy – he's their only legitimate lead-off hitter and if he's out for any length of time, it leaves a huge hole and means the Jays have to drop a weak-hitting replacement middle-infielder into the bottom of their batting order, which is already weak enough. Seeing as Reyes injured his tender hamstring earlier in spring training and is so vital to the team's fortunes, the question becomes: Why did he play in both the exhibition games in Montreal? I understand they were of some importance in a ceremonial and feel-good sense, but as baseball games that counted, they were meaningless. Who is making these decisions and why? Closer Casey Janssen is also on the DL to open the season, but at least the team has the bullpen depth to replace him for a while – in theory, anyway.
As for getting off to a good start, these injuries don't help and beginning the season with a four-game series against the Rays in Tampa is not exactly what the doctor ordered either. The Jays have a tough enough time beating the Rays in Toronto, but the Orange Juice dome (or whatever it's called) has been a graveyard for them, pretty much the fifth circle of Hell.
I'd probably like the Rays more if they played in another division or even in the other league, so the Jays didn't have to face them so often. I do admire them though. No matter how many players they lose due to a low payroll and their fickle fan-base, they always seem to have good starting pitching and lots of it, some relievers and they play terrific defense. They have baseball's smartest manager in Joe Maddon and only one real star in Evan Longoria, but they surround him with good athletes who know how to play the game and don't make many mistakes. Ben Zobrist, Matt Joyce, Wil Meyers, super-sub Sean Rodriguez and (aarggh) Yunel Escobar – they don't all have pretty hitting numbers, but they seem to know how to play as a team and win. I guess I would be less irritated by the Rays if the Jays showed a little more of this kind of moxie, instead of making plays like Jeffress did yesterday. Jeffress got in Lawrie's way as Brett was charging to field a grounder which he had the better angle on, then fielded it awkwardly himself, airmailing the throw to first base. Given their other problems and question marks, the Jays have to start helping themselves by playing heads-up baseball. It's another dispiriting aspect of yesterday's rout, along with their hitters striking out nine times with just one walk.
However, the great thing about baseball is that it's everyday and they get to go out and try again tonight to redeem themselves, which could happen, it's a funny game. Not a good start though.
Luckily, I'm not just a Jays' fan, but a fan of the whole game itself, and there was plenty to cheer about elsewhere yesterday. There were a number of big-league managerial debuts, by Bryan Price with the Reds, Ryne Sandberg with the Phillies and Brad Ausmus with the Tigers. I wish Ausmus well and he has a good team to work with, but I'm going to miss Jim Leyland and his impassive, time-ravaged baseball face. And his calm, reasoned, dignified manner of speaking, whether after a tough loss or a triumphant win. There were also some good games, including two minimal 1-0 affairs won by the Cards and the Pirates, Pittsburgh's coming on a 10th-inning walk-off bomb by Neal Walker, their bopping second baseman. And there was another 10-inning walk-off win by the Tigers, 4-3 over the Royals, and a 2-1 nail-biter won by the Orioles over Boston. That game featured two players I'll be watching closely in the early going. There were splashier deals this past winter, like the Mariners signing Cano or the Yankees acquiring Tanaka, but I think the best move might turn out to be the Orioles getting Nelson Cruz to play left-field. Really, he's a right-fielder, but no matter, left-field was a big hole for them and they filled it with a proven 30-homer, 100-RBI guy. I have no idea how their pitching will be, but if Machado can come back to play third base like he did last year, along with Chris Davis, Matt Wieters, J.J. Hardy and an outfield of Markakis, Jones and Cruz, their everyday line-up should be killer.
The other player I'm watching and really pulling for is Grady Sizemore, who's making a bid to return to the majors as Boston's everyday center-fielder, after two years lost to injury. It's a long shot, he's 31 or 32 now, but he looked good in the spring and he had two hits yesterday, one of them an absolute bomb of a home run, accounting for Boston's only run. So far, so good. You may think I'm in his corner because I'm a Red Sox fan, and you'd be partly right – the Sox badly need a guy in center to replace the departed Jacoby Ellsbury, but that's only some of it. In his early years with the Indians from 2005 – 2008, he was one of the best, most complete players in baseball, a true five-tool player and a favourite of mine. There was just something about the look of him playing the game – going to get the ball in center or running the bases, lashing doubles all over the place – that gave me that old-timey baseball feeling, he looked like a player from the '30s or '40s. He was in the middle of another excellent season in 2009 when knee injuries felled him and he played only about 100 games over the next two seasons. Careers being sandbagged by injuries are sad to watch and I'm really hoping Sizemore can buck the odds and make it all the way back this year. I'd be cheering for Grady even if he was trying to do this with the Yankees, not that they'd need to bother with the likes of him after spending $400 trillion in the off-season.
Along with the squeakers, there was a wild one yesterday between the Phillies and the Rangers in Texas. Philly won 14-10 – two touchdowns against a touchdown and a field goal. There were 31 hits, with 4 doubles and 4 homers, including the 200th of Jimmy Rollins' career. Cliff Lee's ERA at game's end was something like 37.00 – and his team won. And, don't look now, but good old J.P. Arencibia, who landed with the Rangers, actually drew a walk. Yes, that's right, I kid you not. After drawing exactly 18 walks – I repeat,18 – all of last season, J.P. is on a pace after yesterday's game to draw 162 this year. Somehow though, unless he's found a way of getting some scrapings of genetic material from Ted Williams into his morning smoothies, I don't think he'll be able to keep this up.
Arencibia was driving me seriously crazy by about halfway through last season, but by the end I'd gone over the edge, it became personal, even irrational. Watching him have maybe the worst overall season by a catcher in history, I didn't just want him traded, I wanted him dead. Toward the very end of the season, a good friend took me to a Jays/Yankees game in Toronto. The real upside of it was we saw Mariano Rivera record the final save of his great career, something to cherish forever. The downside was watching Arencibia make it look so easy. After already striking out twice on a total of six pitches earlier in the game, you not only knew he'd strike out on three from Mo, but could practically recite the sequence in advance. Cutter right over the middle – take, strike one. Cutter outside – fouled off, strike two. Cutter off his shoelaces, swing and miss, see ya later. Jeezus.
Seriously though, now that he's with Texas, I wish J.P. all the luck in the world, in much the same way that I wish A-Rod a nice, restful, navel-gazing year off from baseball, followed immediately by his permanent retirement.
4 thoughts on "Grope Things External"
Terry Sheard on April 1, 2014 at 10:07 pm said:
"" Sordid, loutish miasma of politics and celebrity worship"
Steve, I hear a Shakespearean (sp) phrase like that and I think of
all my forbears for whom the language was vital and wish they could
be around to hear you. People like my grandmother Virna (5 books)
and Judy's aunt Judith Robinson,journalist terror of the establishment,
fired from both the Globe and the Star.
See you soon. Terry.
chris edge on April 1, 2014 at 10:27 pm said:
…it was painful….we are really big fans of R.A.. …his determination and work ethic….always wish him well…but suggest if the first in your rotation…your ace….who has chosen to be the champion of the knuckleball…has to admit he never really knows what the ball will do when it leaves his hand…thoughts shared by his catcher…then don't give up on making a deal for at least 1 pitcher to help the cause….on a musical note thanks for the good music from the bandstand at the rex and taking the time to say hello….see you in the clubs
Joe Coughlin on April 2, 2014 at 6:59 pm said:
With yesterday's win, the Jays are .500! Buck up Steve. It's a long season.
Nacia Miller on April 2, 2014 at 8:44 pm said:
I used to have this quote taped to my office wall. Bart Giamatti: It [baseball] breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone."


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Ozark Folk Center State ParkMountain View, AR, United States Ozark Folk Center State ParkMountain View, AR, United States Ozark Folk Center State ParkMountain View, AR, United States Ozark Folk Center State ParkMountain View, AR, United States Ozark Folk Center State ParkMountain View, AR, United States Ozark Folk Center State ParkMountain View, AR, United States Ozark Folk Center State ParkMountain View, AR, United States
Jewelry Class - Make a Wire Wrapped Bracelet
14 Dates Through Oct 17, 2023
Total Cost of Class $147. Registration fee $22. Class cost of $125 includes materials
Learn to make a beautiful sterling silver and gold-filled wire bracelet with the fine wire wrapping like the one in the picture. All materials are provided. Tools are also furnished but if you have your own feel free to bring them. This class requires some hand strength. If you need glasses to see close please bring them.
This class is for students ages 16 and up. Call the park at 870-269-3854 for more information.
Taught by Linda Widmer
Total Cost of Class $122. Registration fee $22. Class cost of $100 includes materials and is due directly to Linda at the beginning of class.
Lodging is available in the park at our Cabins at Dry Creek, newly remodeled duplex-style hotel rooms. There is a Folk School discount for students booking more than 3 days. Call the Cabins office at 800-264-3655 to book with the discount. To book rooms for less than 3 days, click here.
Linda and Charles Widmer
From the humblest of beginnings – a cheese burger and wood carving – came the elegance and beauty that is Widmer's Jewelry Shop in the Ozark Folk Center craft village.
Charles and Linda Widmer met when she was working as a waitress.
"He walked in and ordered a cheeseburger," she said. "We left town together three days later."
"I had to get back to Silver Dollar City," said Charles, who worked there carving wood. "That was 40 years ago."
He smiles across at Linda. "I'm getting old, she's not."
Linda's family is from the Mountain View area, she's a Cartwright. Charles' dad has been coming here since the late 1950's. Charles came here in the early 1960's when the roads were still all dirt.
"I remember hauling cedar and pulpwood from Melbourne to Allison," said Charles. The road was one lane around some steep, tight curves. "You just laid on your horn when you went into the curve and hoped no one was on the other side. If they were, one of you had to back up."
Charles and Linda worked together carving for many years and developed a name and a following. They have carvings in collections around the world. Probably the best known of their carvings is the larger-than-life eagle that they did the winter of '84-'85 for past-President Jimmy Carter's Library at Emory University in Atlanta. She did the finer detail work, while he did the heavier cuts.
"We carved together," said Charles, "and she made wooden jewelry in her spare time."
Charles told how Linda carved miniature figures of people and animals.
"She carved itty bitty critters," he said, holding up his thumb and forefinger. "Little people less than an inch tall with all their features, little potbellied kids."
That's how Linda Widmer began making jewelry. That background and a love of stones combined to start her on her way to the designs she creates today.
"I started collecting stones when I was little," said Linda. "I've always loved gem stones. I'll keep them and hoard them. I had to find something to do with them."
Charles was working at the Ozark Folk Center as a wood carver when then craft director Kay Thomas asked Linda if she would come make jewelry in a shop that was empty in the Craft Village. That year, Linda shared that shop part time with Joe Jewell who made instruments. She began developing her style and the focus of her jewelry.
"I like using antique buttons, glass – I'm always looking for new stones," said Linda, who is working with some new cloisonné beads. "If I can get a piece of wire around it, I'm happy."
In the mean time, wood carving was becoming hard on Charles' hands. He grew interested in metal casting and the history of Babbitt. He proposed a casting demonstration to then Ozark Folk Center manager Bill Young.
"He was enthused," said Charles, who loves sharing the history and importance of the Babbitt bearing journal with visitors. They set up a casting demonstration. Soon Charles and Linda were sharing the shop they have now, with wire-wrapped gems stones and silver casting.
Charles still carves the molds and casts ornaments and figures, however humidity adversely affects the metal and he can't cast when the humidity is high. So Charles also makes jewelry. His current specialty is rings. The beautiful gemstone spiders and insects that grace the crannies of the shop are also his creations.
Charles and Linda work well as a team, both in the shop and teaching. They teach wire-wrapped jewelry classes several times a year at the Folk Center.
This class is for students ages 16 and up.


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There's no doubt that over the past year to eighteen months we've seen a swell in interest in how to successfully introduce and adopt a different approach to performance management.
In a more agile workplace, many organizations know that the one-off, annual performance process – ratings or no ratings – no longer works. Instead what's needed are more regular check-ins between managers and employees that allow for routine goal alignment, ongoing feedback, and in the moment coaching.
Fortunately, this is where technology can help. Over the past year we've had the good fortune of helping more than 400 companies of all industries, geographies, and sizes make the move toward continuous performance management.
We know from our own research that customers adopting a culture of more open, ongoing coaching and feedback are realizing a number of benefits, including improved employee performance, higher employee engagement, increased productivity, and better loyalty and retention.
What we have also learned is that customers using Continuous Performance Management are seeing an increase in sales performance due to enhanced transparency and better and more frequent coaching. In addition, customers are reporting better differentiation of employees, even in scenarios where they have eliminated ratings, leading to smarter decisions when it comes to staffing, merit increases, bonuses, etc.
For these reasons and more, SAP SuccessFactors remains committed to providing organizations the capabilities they need to successfully adopt new performance processes that stimulate engagement. From a capabilities standpoint this means ensuring that both employees and managers have access to feature-rich, user-friendly applications – both mobile and web – that are easy and intuitive to use as part of everyday work life.
That is why we're excited to announce that as part of the Q3 SAP SuccessFactors release, we've expanded our Continuous Performance Management capabilities with faster ways for employees to perform everyday tasks and stay engaged.
For example, now as part of the Q3 release, employees can add an achievement and link it directly to a performance or development goal in their goal plans. This provides greater flexibility to users wanting to more efficiently create an achievement that's linked to a goal without having to first create an activity, then link it to a goal, and then covert it to an achievement.
Achievements can be linked to directly to performance goals, development goals, or both.
Also new is the ability for employees to easily and quickly change the status of an activity directly from the Activities view by accessing a simple dropdown.
Users can update the status of an activity with a simple click.
In addition, comments on activities are now time-stamped, so employees, managers and HR leaders can track updates more efficiently.
Time-stamping of comments makes it easy to track updates.
With the Q3 release, users can also group their achievements by performance or development goals rather than viewing only the achievements tied to performance goals, as before. This improves visibility into goals without requiring navigation to various goal plans.
Users can group their achievements by performance or development goals.
Lastly as part of the Q3 release, users now have enhanced flexibility to customize some of the theming aspects of the application. This allows customers to tailor aspects of the application to their own look and feel.
We are excited about these enhancements as many of them are in response to direct customer feedback, and rest assured, there are more enhancements planned with future releases.
Are you interested in shifting to a more continuous performance model within your organization or running a pilot of Continuous Performance Management with certain segments of your company? Would you benefit from learning what other companies already on the continuous performance path are doing – tips on effective change management, barriers other customers have faced, business impacts being realized, metrics being utilized to evaluate ongoing success, etc.? Our HCM research team led by Steven Hunt is conducting a research study on this topic and will be publishing an insightful best practices paper in early Q4 so be sure and stay tuned.
Transforming Performance Management 2: The Move to Continuous Performance Management 2:45-3:45 Thursday, August 31 Performance management involves the following series of activities that must be distinct to be effective but linked to be impactful: aligning performance expectations, providing ongoing coaching, and assessing contributions. This three-session series takes a deep look at how different customers are transforming these activities by creating innovative methods to address different business and industry needs. As a participant on this panel, Columbia Sportswear Company will share their journey to a continuous performance model, including how they are using SAP SuccessFactors solutions to enable more frequent two-way manager-employee dialogue and ongoing coaching and feedback. As another panel participant, Deloitte Consulting will share valuable insights for companies seeking to make the shift to a continuous performance model including change management guidance and best practices for accelerating end user adoption.
Solution Adoption Roundtable: Continuous Performance Management (English) 10:15-11:15 Wednesday, August 30 Note this session is first-come, first-serve with a room capacity of 20.
Solution Adoption Roundtable: Continuous Performance Management (Spanish) 11:30-12:30 Wednesday, August 30 Note this session is first-come, first-serve with a room capacity of 20.
You won't want to miss these great opportunities to see, hear and learn how Continuous Management Performance can help you achieve new levels of performance management effectiveness. I hope to see you at this year's event.
Also, make sure to download the mobile application for SuccessConnect 2017 to keep up with the latest news and updates. See you in Las Vegas!