Kaci's focus on self-directed healing and natural fertility enhancement uplifts the individual and supports their journey towards a balanced life and reproductive system. She views clients as partners in their fertility journey, not as patients. Kaci offers private coaching and consultations that are useful for those currently using medical assistance for conception as well as those who are trying to avoid medical treatment. From just starting out to completely worn out, Kaci works with people in all phases of their fertility journey.
Her background in birth and women's health as a doula and aspiring midwife taught her the importance of treating conception, birth and postpartum from a holistic perspective that incorporates emotional and relational fortitude as well as nutritional and environmental support.
As her practice grew she came in contact with more women suffering from reproductive health issues and families trying to conceive who were having difficulties. She realized that her passion, dedication and experience would be of great value to families who were still yearning for their chance to conceive. She recognized that support along the journey makes all the difference in successful birth outcomes, and that families TTC also needed extra support in their journey towards parenthood to achieve the best possible outcomes.
Seamlessly, Kaci transitioned from supporting families during pregnancy to supporting them during preconception and devoted her life to helping others conceive and carry to term happy, healthy babies. She met with experts in various fields: doctors, psychologists, nutritionists, acupuncturists, chiropractors, midwives, health advocates, reproductive endocrinologists and more in addition to further training as a health coach. In her research she sought out the best evidence based practices that are conducive for a balanced reproductive system and built her practice around these techniques.
Kaci is now expecting a baby after a smooth conception and pregnancy that she attributes to excellent preconception care. She looks forward to helping others do the same.
Read one woman's account of why she doesn't use the word infertile and doesn't think you should either.


text:
How Washington Was Lost, What to Do Now
John Solomon writes with perspective about what happened along with advice for the future of the republic in his article How the GOP lost control of Washington, and what comes next. Excerpts in italics with my bolds.
News Analysis: Democrats owned the narrative and rules of the 2020 election. Will Republicans learn from it?
The November election (and Tuesday's Georgia curtain call) wasn't won and lost by the tactics, spending, individual players and messaging in the weeks before Nov. 3, according to interviews conducted with more than three dozen frontline players.
Rather, its outcome was cemented long before Labor Day 2020 by a Democratic machinery of former Barack Obama proteges, like David Plouffe, John Podesta, David Axelrod and Stacey Abrams, who worried far less about the tactics of ads, travel (Joe Biden hardly did!) and fundraising and far more about the strategy of how to control the narrative and the rules that would shape the outcome.
They even told the Republicans and the public what they planned to do. Just read Plouffe's book, "A Citizen's Guide to Beating Donald Trump." They even boastfully predicted days before how the vote count would roll out on election night and for several days later. Trump would lead early, and Biden would surpass late, they said. They were right. Why?
Change the Rules in Your Favor
First and foremost, they usurped the powers of GOP-controlled state legislatures in the five battleground states and rewrote the rules of how votes would be cast and counted, using the pandemic as an excuse.
Mail ballots could be sent to everyone, even if they didn't ask for one, and wide swaths of Americans could vote by mail. Voter ID requirements could be suspended for those who felt homebound by COVID's wrath. Mobile ballot boxes could be deployed. Spoiled ballots that legally were supposed to be discarded could be "cured" by election clerks. Legally required voter roll purges could be skipped. And a single billionaire could donate $350 million directly to the election clerks, judges and vote counters in the states, requiring them in some cases to register voters, and create more poll locations in Democratic strongholds.
And Republicans — who controlled the legislatures in Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia and Arizona and the constitutional right to set the rules — hardly put up a fight. Instead, they urged their voters not to take advantage of the loosened rules and to vote the old-fashioned way. They, in the words of the Trump-loving Georgia Democrat Vernon Jones, simply unilaterally disarmed.
Democrats understood that in a pandemic and in an America with millions of new millennial, urban and minority voters, the easier you make casting a ballot the more likely a low-propensity voter is to vote. Send it to them, help them register, make easy drop-off locations or the mailbox the final destination, and voters will vote a lot more willingly.
In other words, the liberal brain trust engaged in cutting-edge warfare, while Republicans tossed their comfortable set of horseshoes from the 1980s, hoping the good old recipe of evangelical GOTV, direct mail, talk radio and Fox News would deliver yet another election win as it had done for decades.
It didn't.
To be fair, Donald Trump mustered — by a mile — the largest national vote ever assembled by a Republican at 75 million-plus voters and barnstormed the country, risking COVID and criticism without fear. Kevin McCarthy picked an all-star slate of candidates and picked up seats. Mitch McConnell raised a ton of money, and Ronna McDaniel put together one of the most impressive get-out-the-vote efforts ever assembled.
But all that could not overcome the advantage of a rewired electoral system in the five battlegrounds, as the Georgia runoffs showed Tuesday, said Tom Price, a former congressman and Trump Cabinet secretary.
Democrats "leap-frogged Republicans' process, strategy, technology and tactics, and that is to the credit of folks on the Democratic side," Price told Just the News. "They have perfected harvesting, I believe it is harvesting, of absentee ballots, and I think the numbers will show in these runoff races, the same as they did in November, that Republicans who lost by close margins won the vote on Election Day, won on early voting in person and lost heavily in absentee ballots."
Control the Narrative by Means of Media Allies
Secondly, liberals spent two decades building an alliance with the mainstream media, the social giants and the search giants and the permanent government bureaucracy until they could control the narrative, even when it wasn't true. They had it perfected by the time Donald Trump took office.
Those who objected were canceled and shamed. Intelligence and law enforcement and private investigators were misused to create false realities. True facts and legally protected speech were outright censored long enough to create the narrative needed to win.
Trump colluded with Russia, and bribed Ukraine to investigate his political opponents … though he didn't. The Hunter Biden corruption story was Russian-fed conspiracy theory …. though it is really true, and he was under criminal investigation the last two years … American towns could be burned to the ground and police defunded because a Kenosha, Wisc., officer shot an unarmed man … who turned out to be wanted by police and armed with a knife.
Owning the information superhighway of the 21st century, like the rules of the election, was far more powerful than choosing where to run ads, campaign in person or spend money.
Liberal Donors Contracted Returns on Their Investments
Finally, the liberal oligarchs club — George Soros, Mark Zuckerberg, Mike Bloomberg et al — spent more than ever to win. But they also transformed the way political donations were spent by imposing corporate governance and specific returns on investment.
Every recipient had to deliver very specific outcomes to keep getting money, governed by lengthy contract-like documents. And the outcomes and deliverables were mapped to the two larger goals of controlling the narrative and the rules of the election.
Advice: Act Now to Change the Rules and Own the Narrative
That's what interviews with three dozen experts revealed. So what do those same experts advise Republicans do to change their fortunes? Exactly what the Democrats did. Don't point fingers, change the rules, and own the narrative, they said.
Reset Rules for Fair Elections
Phill Kline, the former Kansas attorney general, led the Amistad Project's efforts to challenge some of the Democrats rule changes. He said the the GOP legislatures in the key battlegrounds must reassert their constitutional right to set the rules of election.
Universal mail ballots can be ended, limited only to those who absolutely need it. Voter IDs can be mandated. Exemptions and legal settlements could, by law, be required to be approved by the legislature. Setting the rules of the election are easy if there is a will, Kline added.
"I think the discipline of the party should be all about de-powering Washington and empowering the states, especially the state legislatures," Kline told Just the News.
Secondly, conservatives need to build their own information ecosystem that rivals what liberals have: a vibrant press that covers conservatives honestly, and powerful delivery channels that can rival YouTube, Twitter and Facebook.
New services like Rumble, Parler, Real America's Voice, Citizen Free Press and CloutHub are incubating and attracting millions. They need to be grown and spread to tens of millions along with trusted news sources so conservatives have as big a bullhorn to the next generation of GenZ, millennials and cable-cutters as they have had to Boomers, talk radio and Fox News fans, the experts said.
"We are just playing to a draw," Price explained. "We are not reaching a lot of folks. And we have to be creative about how we reach them, and I think we've got to be able to control a lot of that messaging, and right now we just don't."
Finally, conservative donors need to have a new approach, stolen from the ROI model of the Soros and Bloomberg NGOs, so their millions don't just enrich consultants but have measurable outcomes in setting the rules and narratives that win the next elections. Everything from civic education and empowerment for state legislators to media-platform building needs to be funded, the experts said.
"Funding on the left seems much more strategic than funding on the right, which is predominantly tactical," explained Steve Hantler, who advises several high-net-worth conservative donors. "Liberal elites have for decades controlled the levers of power in education, media and entertainment and have used that power to indoctrinate generations of Americans against America's founding values.
"Now is not the time for for hand-wringing and finger-pointing. Now is the time for honest, critical self-evaluation."
via Science Matters
https://ift.tt/3oja6fn
January 7, 2021 at 09:52AM
SPAIN RECORDS LOWEST EVER TEMPERATURE AT -34C
Biden Administration II

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Q: How to get dictionary variable within an object? I'm writing a pokemon like turn base battle simulator. I have gotten pretty far so well but I'm having a problem. I'm trying to write the moves as a dictionary so that I can then specify the move set for every monster in it's object. This way I have 1 dictionary holding all the moves and damage they do. Then I just pass those moves to the monsters which are the objects. This allows me to give each monster unique movesets and not have to specify the damage each move does everytime. The problem I'm having is in the while loop when the user picks the attack I'm getting the error
AttributeError: 'set' object has no attribute 'get'

I'm trying to get the attack the user inputs so that it grabs the damage and subtracts it from monster1hp
If I put the dictionary in the object it works fine but then every object has to have it's own dictionary I want to just have 1 dictionary for all moves and then specify the moves for each object in it's move set, if that makes sense.
import random

class Monster:
  def __init__(self, name, types, hp, region, disc, strength, weakness, moveset):
    self.name = name
    self.type = types
    self.hp = hp
    self.region = region
    self.disc = disc
    self.strength = strength
    self.weakness = weakness
    self.moveset = moveset

moves_dict = {
    "hyperbeam": 14,
    "flames": 34,
    "water": 27,
    "cent": 33,
    }

Ariol = Monster("Ariol", "shadow", 1000, "Xevor", "A monster from hell", "psychic", "electricity", {"hyperbeam", "flames", "water", "cent"})
Xenos = Monster("Xenos", "shadow", 300, "Xevor", "A monster from hell", "psychic", "electricity", {"hyperbeam", "flames", "water", "cent"})
Siance = Monster("Siance", "shadow", 500, "Xevor", "A monster from hell", "psychic", "electricity", {"hyperbeam", "flames", "water", "cent"})
Mammy = Monster("Mammy", "shadow", 3000, "Xevor", "A monster from hell", "psychic", "electricity", {"hyperbeam", "flames", "water", "cent"})

def choose_monster():

    monster_menu = {
    "Ariol" : Ariol,
    "Xenos" : Xenos,
    "Siance" : Siance,
    "Mammy" : Mammy,

    }

    #choosemonster
    trainer_monster = input("What monster do you want to use?\n")
    #variable is holding monster chosen
    monster_chosen1 = monster_menu.get(trainer_monster)
    #get monster 1 hp
    computer_choose = random.choice(list(monster_menu))
    computer_chosen1 = monster_menu[computer_choose]
    print("You chose", monster_chosen1.name,"!")
    print("Your opponenet chose", computer_chosen1.name, "!")

    #this dict not used
    moveset_dict = {
    "1": 14,
    "2": 34,
    "3": 27,
    "4": 33,
    }

    #how to get monster hp from above
    #monster1hp = Ariol.hp
    monster1hp = monster_chosen1.hp
    monster2hp = computer_chosen1.hp

    while monster1hp or monster2hp <= 0:
            #monster1 moveset
            for x in monster_chosen1.moveset:
                print(x)
            choose_attack = input("What move would you like to use?\n")
            attack_chosen = monster_chosen1.moveset.get(choose_attack)
            monster2hp = monster2hp - attack_chosen
            print(monster_chosen1.name, "used ", attack_chosen, computer_chosen1.name, "has", monster2hp, "hp")
            if monster2hp <= 0:
                print(computer_chosen1.name, "was knocked out", monster_chosen1.name, "wins!")
                break
            attack_chosen = random.choice(list(computer_chosen1.moveset))
            monster1hp -= computer_chosen1.moveset[attack_chosen]
            print(computer_chosen1.name, "used", attack_chosen, monster_chosen1.name, "has", monster1hp, "hp")
            if monster1hp <= 0:
                print(monster_chosen1.name, "was knocked out", computer_chosen1.name, "wins!")
                break

    else:
        print("Battle over")

choose_monster()

A: One solution to the last paragraph of your question:
You can set up a dictionary in your class without using self and when you update it for one of the objects it will also update it for all of the other objects. This is called a Class Variable.
Here is an example that I coded up to show you what I mean:
class testGlobal:
    def __init__(self):
        here_for_no_real_reason = True

    testDict = {'hello': 'hello', 'goodbye': 'goodbye'}

def driver():
    obj1 = testGlobal()
    obj2 = testGlobal()

    print(obj1.testDict)
    print(obj2.testDict)

    obj1.testDict["I'm new"] = "I'm new"
    obj2.testDict['hello'] = "goodbye"

    print(obj1.testDict)
    print(obj2.testDict)

driver()

Output:
{'hello': 'hello', 'goodbye': 'goodbye'}
{'hello': 'hello', 'goodbye': 'goodbye'}
{'hello': 'goodbye', 'goodbye': 'goodbye', "I'm new": "I'm new"}
{'hello': 'goodbye', 'goodbye': 'goodbye', "I'm new": "I'm new"}

From this output you can see that when you change something in the dictionary using obj1 it also changes it for obj2 and vice versa. Hope this helps!
If you have any further questions let me know I'm happy to try and help

A: Your problem is this line (I take only one monster as example)
Ariol = Monster("Ariol", "shadow", 1000, "Xevor", "A monster from hell", "psychic", "electricity", {"hyperbeam", "flames", "water", "cent"})

In here you define his attacks as a set of options. And a set doesn't have a get method.
So you have to take your dmg value from moves_dict:
choose_attack = input("What move would you like to use?\n")
while not choose_attack in monster_chosen1.moveset: #check if the move is in the moveset
    choose_attack = input("Invalid Move\n") # if not in the moveset try again
attack_chosen = moves_dict.get(choose_attack) # take the dmg value from the moves_dict which has a get method.

of course if you want to have different dmg value for each monster, you can replace that set with a dict and in this way you can play around with the dmg value with would make the moves_dict obsolet.
A similar change has to do with the attack the computer choose. But because he always choose valid moves he doesn't need a while loop of course. But the dmg value has to be taken from the moves_dict.
monster1hp -= moves_dict[attack_chosen]

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


I think there is something to be said for quantity in the formative years. When I first started out I thought I knew what my style/focus was… but it wasn't until I really had my nose to the grindstone that my style started to emerge and I realized where my focus really was. It was radically different from where I started.
I agree about clarity. Knowing what your own definition of success is critical. You have to manage your own expectations and know what you're after to have any shot at getting it.
Yep, thanks for your comment!


text:
Booking an Escort Service How to Guarantee a Good Time
When you hire an escort in Stretford, you're paying for a particular kind of service. As a customer, it's reasonable to expect satisfaction in exchange for giving up some of your hard-earned money. But how can you guarantee a fun time with someone you barely even know? Hiring an escort Stretford online means you only have access to the profile they've made available. How do you know you're going to get along well in real life? While Stretford escorts are really friendly and will make you comfortable if you're nervous, there are other ways to ensure you'll have a good time.
3 of the Best Stretford Activities to Do When You're in Town
If you're planning to meet up with a Stretford escort, they can probably tell you the best sights to see and the great places to eat. However, you can also plan a series of activities on your own. After all, you're the one whose travelling here and let's face it, you're the one who will spend. Stretford is one of the most interesting places in the Greater Manchester Area. It's not just about the football or cricket, but it's also about the several notable personalities who have called the town home, including suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst.
So what are the best activities to do in Stretford?
Why Being an Escort Guarantees Lots of Freedom
You probably have notions about why someone decides to be an escort in Stretford. Most think about the financial situation as the reason a perfectly nice young lady would want to join the escort business. While the allure of money is certainly there, you would be surprised to know that some of our ladies become Stretford escorts because they truly enjoy the job. And doing the work actually guarantees lots of freedom.
Being an escort means you make the decisions
© 2020 AGENCY


text:
Hillfields prostitutes Prospect
Sex Partners Wanting Free Sex Older Sexy Searching Woman Wants Sex
Officers say targeting kerb crawlers is part of their tactic against prostitution. It was revealed last week that the city has one of the highest rates of persistent street prostitution recorded in the country.
Jerrine
Seeking: Ready Sex Meeting
City: Prospect
Relation Type: Maried Woman Seeking Divorced Parents
In Great Britain England, Wales and Scotlandprostitution itself the exchange of sexual services for money is legal, [2] but a number of related activities, including soliciting in a public place, kerb crawlingowning or managing a brothelpimping and panderingare crimes.
In Northern Ireland, which previously had similar laws, paying Peospect sex became illegal from 1 June I want to make a girlfriend online in Morphett Vale Great Britain it is illegal to buy sex from a person younger than 18, [5] although the age Naughty reviews Armadale consent for Free Wollongong links sex is 16 throughout the United Kingdom.
The total number of prostitutes in the United Kingdom is not known exactly and is difficult to Prospdct. In authorities and NGOs estimated that approximatelyHillfields prostitutes Prospect in the country were engaged in prostitution. Thirty-five different countries of origin were identified.
The sex trade in the UK takes diverse forms, including street prostitution, escort prostitution and prostitution conducted from premises.
The premises used include massage parlourssaunas, private flats and Soho Hillgields. In undercover police visited the lap dancing club Spearmint Rhino on Tottenham Court Road in London and claimed that it was a front for prostitution. Westminster had the highest number with 71, compared with 8 in Southwark.
For this study the researchers had posed as potential customers and had telephoned brothels that had advertised in local newspapers. Many brothels operated through legitimate businesses which were licensed as saunas or massage parlours. However, the vast majority were in private flats in residential areas. The report found 77 different ethnicities among the prostitutes, prostiutes many Hillfields prostitutes Prospect areas such as Eastern Europe and Hilfields Asia.
Surveys indicate that fewer British men use prostitutes than in other countries.
The authors stress the difficulty of finding reliable data given the lack of prior research, differences in sample sizes, and possible underestimates due to the prosittutes concerns of survey respondents.
A survey of street-based sex workers found that the average age of entry into prostitution was In the Home Affairs Select Babes Warrnambool conducted its first ever enquiry into the sex industry.
In Great Britain England, Wales and Scotlandprostitution itself the exchange of sexual services for money is legal, [2] but a number of related activities, including soliciting in a public place, kerb crawlingowning or managing a Charming massage Endeavour Hillspimping and panderingare crimes.
In Northern Ireland, which previously had similar laws, paying for sex became illegal from 1 June Throughout Great Britain it is illegal to buy sex from Hillfields prostitutes Prospect person younger than 18, [5] although the age of consent for non-commercial sex is 16 throughout the United Kingdom.
The total number of prostitutes in the United Kingdom is not known exactly and is difficult to assess. In authorities and NGOs estimated that approximatelypersons in the country were engaged in prostitution. Thirty-five different countries of origin were identified.
Prostitution in Hillfields is "no surprise" but still "unacceptable" say city cops - CoventryLive
The sex trade in the UK takes diverse forms, including street prostitution, escort prostitution and prostitution conducted from premises ; the premises used include massage parlourssaunas, private flats and Soho walk-ups. In undercover police visited the lap dancing club Spearmint Rhino on Tottenham Court Road in London and claimed that it was a front for prostitution. Westminster had the highest number with 71, compared with 8 in Southwark.
Many brothels operated through legitimate businesses which were licensed as saunas or massage parlours. However, Hiklfields vast majority were in private flats in residential areas; the report found 77 different ethnicities among the prostitutes, with many Hillfields prostitutes Prospect areas such as Eastern How to Ballarat with breakup for guys and South-East Asia.
Hillfields prostitutes Prospect Wanting Sex Meet
Surveys indicate that fewer British men use prostitutes Pretty girls Prospect in other countries. The authors stress the difficulty of finding reliable data given the lack of prior research, differences in sample sizes, and possible underestimates due to the privacy concerns of survey respondents.
A survey of street-based sex workers found that the average age of entry into prostitution was In the Home Affairs Select Committee conducted its first ever enquiry into Hilltields sex industry.
Reasons for choosing to work in prostitution included homelessness and addiction to drugs. ❶Under the Sexual Offences ActIt is an offence for a person to keep a brothel, or to manage, or act or assist in the management of, a brothel. Three British ministers, Vernon CoakerBarbara Follett and Vera Bairdvisited the Netherlands to study their approach to the sex trade, and came to the conclusion that their policy of legal prostitution was not effective, and therefore ruled out the legalisation of prostitution in the UK.
A Soho walk-up is a flat in Soho, London, United Kingdom, that is used by a female sex worker for the purposes of prostitution. Douglas herself became pregnant.
Prostitution in the United Kingdom
The level of prostitution was high in Victorian England, but Meet my Fremantle girls nature of the occupation makes it difficult Hilpfields establish the exact number of prostitutes in operation.
The Contagious Diseases Acts were introduced in the s, adopting the French system of licensed prostitution, with the goal of minimising venereal disease. Century center Wodonga prostitution have advertised in specialist contact Hillfields prostitutes Prospect for decades despite a common law offence of "conspiracy to corrupt public morals" which was created in to prohibit such advertising.
Archived from the original on 12 December The attack differs from the canonical murders in that Tabram was stabbed rather than slashed at the throat and abdomenmany experts do not connect it with the murders because of the difference in the wound pattern; the canonical five Ripper victims are Mary Ann NicholsAnnie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, Mary Jane Kelly.
An archeological dig by the Museum of London Archaeology Service in uncovered graves in Cross Bones, dating Hillfields prostitutes Prospect between and Retrieved 9 January Some women complain that the police wash their hands of the area and they feel segregated from the protection of the local Hillfiedls.
Coventry Telegraph: Stop police crackdowns Prospect
Retrieved 27 October Mother Douglas was born around to a well-to-do Submissions new Gladstone times family named Marinet, she had three sisters and at least one brother. Page |Sex Hillfields prostitutes Prospect Sarah Valance and Jemma Lewis pleaded guilty to robbing the victim after the former had slashed at his face and neck.
A prostitute attacked a man with a pair of scissors when he refused to give Hillfieldz and a fellow sex worker money for drugs. Both women had denied Hillfields prostitutes Prospect robbery, but as they were about to stand trial Sarah Valance changed her plea to guilty, while Jemma Hillfields prostitutes Prospect admitted the offence shortly after Prospecf trial began, reports the Coventry Telegraph. Lewis, Hillfelds, and Valance, 38, were both jailed Massage chinatown new Richmond four years for the robbery by a judge Hillfields prostitutes Prospect Warwick Crown Court.
Adults Friend Searching Hot Whores Lonely Local Women Seeking Teens Wanting Sex Hillfields prostitutes Prospect
But Lewis was given a consecutive one-year sentence after she admitted robbing a ten-year-old boy on postitutes doorstep of Prosspect home just five days after she had been granted bail.
And Valance received a two-month consecutive sentence after pleading guilty to a theft while she was also on bail. Proatitutes Hugh Williams, said the sex workers met their joint victim at a bus stop in Paynes Lane during the afternoon of May 7 last year.
The man, who knew Lewis, was on his way home, and they went with him Gay adds in Australia his flat where they had some Hillfields prostitutes Prospect the meal he had prepared. Valance then began complaining about needing drugs, pprostitutes both of them asked him for prostitutez to buy drugs.
When he refused, both women attacked ;rostitutes, punching and kicking him, and Valance picked up a pair of scissors and tried Sir lanka Quakers Hill sex cut a hole in his jacket pocket to get to his wallet.]development of a coordinated prostitution strategy for England and Wales.
The Proapect will address the underlying issues and offer Hillfields prostitutes Prospect prospect of an alternative way of life. The Government's Hillfields Community. HMP/YOI. A Hillfields prostitutez says prostitution in the area is worse than ever - with an increasing number of women loitering around the streets and offering.
studied were Earlsdon, Canley and Hillfields, chosen as neighbourhoods with very different social long-standing problem of prostitution on the streets. Contrasting issues and a clear determination to improve the area's prospects. ○.
I Am Wants Sex Chat
Wanting Cock
Black Women Looking Dating Agencies


This sculpture is a finely crafted, highly detailed work of art from the Ebano collection. You will be very pleased with this quality statue of a half horse supported by semi precious stones and rested marble base. Art exploiting equine beauty, strength and elegance is truly appreciated in three dimensions; this 47 cm tall statue will add beauty to any modern interior. It is casted using the traditional lost wax – also known as hot cast method and rested on amethyst semi precious stone. Meet Ebano, the artist who made this wonderful artwork.
Manuel Vidal: self taught artist, an ardent admirer of the human form and dedicated to the search of formal perfection. He has become known through many artistic statements such as exhibitions, museums, small scale collections and also unique life size sculptures for public places. Ebano International has reproduced his work in bronze using the lost wax casting process. After an artisan process of patina applied with fire, each piece results in the renowned quality characteristic of Ebano's collections.


Vitamin B12 is necessary to convert carbs to glucose. This leads to increased energy to counteract fatigue and lethargy.
Vitamin B12 benefits us in the regulation of the nervous system, helping reduce stress, depression and helping with healthy brain function.
Vitamin B12 benefits the body in the prevention of heart disease and related cardiovascular diseases such as stroke and high blood pressure. Vitamin B12 is necessary to regulate cholesterol levels.
Vitamin B12 Benefits the body's cell reproduction and is therefore essential to skin and hair as well as all other vital organs.
Vitamin B12 benefits the body in the protection against cancer. Making sure you get enough vitamin B12 (as well as other vitamins) helps the body to battle many forms of cancer.
Vitamin B12 is vital to cellular reproduction and maintenance. It is absolutely essential in the metabolizing of fats and carbohydrates, and is necessary to the metabolism of every cell in the human body. Vitamin B12 is necessary to the creation and maintenance of DNA (the body's genetic material). Without it, cellular reproduction cannot occur.
Vitamin B12 is necessary for the formation of red blood cells. Red blood cells deliver oxygen to the many trillions of cells. The increased metabolism as a result of increased oxygen delivery allows the body to function at a much higher level of efficiency. This higher functioning metabolism means the body can burn those unwanted calories much more efficiently. If you've been struggling to burn off those unwanted pounds after years of poor dietary habits, you may very well be suffering from a lack of vitamin B12.
Why do I need to supplement with B12?
The older you get the more your digestive system breaks down, especially if your diet has not been that great! Specifically the lining of your stomach gradually loses its ability to produce hydrochloric acid which releases vitamin B12 from your food. The use of antacids or anti-ulcer drugs will also lower your stomach acid secretion and decrease your ability to absorb vitamin B12.
Well, the answer simply put is… not all types of B12 (cobalamins) are created equal.
Even though cyanocobalamin B12 is probably the most popular form of B12 in supplements (because it's the least expensive), it is the least effective. That distinction goes to methycobalamin (methyl B12).
Studies suggest that methyl B12 may be better utilized and retained in the body.
Methyl B12 is the active form of vitamin B12 and evidence indicates it has some applications not shared by other forms of vitamin B12.
With other forms of B12, your body must convert them into a coenzyme form for you to benefit. Not so with methyl B12… it's already in the active coenzyme form naturally in your body.
You can eat plenty of meat, poultry, lamb's liver, brewer's yeast, clams, eggs, herring, mackerel, kidneys, milk, dairy products, or seafood — and still have low levels of B12. How can that be?
It could be because your body is unable to absorb it from your gut. You see B12 needs the help of a protein in order to be absorbed. That protein is called intrinsic factor. And because the lining of your stomach makes intrinsic factor, people with less-than-optimal gastrointestinal health often need to supplement with B12.
Most of them contain 100-200 micrograms of B12. But, if you actually took 500 micrograms of B12, you'd get an absorption of about 1.8 micrograms. Let me repeat, only 1.8 out of a total of 500 micrograms. That's an absorption rate of only one third of one percent! But, that's only half of the story.
In other words, analogs get created when crystalline B12 interacts with other nutrients in multivitamin products, such as vitamin C, iron and copper — increasing your body's need for B12. Does the company selling the multivitamin tell you this vital bit of information? Probably not!
Most multi-vitamins sold today are a complete waste of money when it comes to their B12 quality and performance.
Injectable B12 (methylcobalimin) is the best way to get B12, it avoids "first pass effect" which means it enables full absorption without being affected by the stomach lining and the liver.
Homocysteine is amino acid found to be linked to cardiovascular disease and stroke. Deficiencies of the vitamins folic acid (B9), pyridoxine (B6), or B12 (cobalamin) can lead to high homocysteine levels. Taking B vitamins helps to transform homocysteine into compounds which are helpful in the body – SAM-e and glutathione. High homocysteine is also associated with cognitive decline. Recent research suggests that intense, long duration exercise raises plasma homocysteine levels, perhaps by increasing the load on methionine metabolism (homocysteine is metabolized into methionine – that's how your body tries to reduce it – with the help of b vitamin coenzymes, using up the B vitamin stores).
Methionine is a protein-based amino acid which assists with metabolic function, breaks down fat, and is the primary source of sulfur in the body. As one of the compounds known as a lipotrophic, a fat burner or antioxidant, methionine is also critical for the removal of heavy metals, such as lead and mercury, from the body. Some of its other primary purposes include ensuring healthy liver, kidney, bladder, and artery functions; the maintenance of healthy nails, hair, and skin; and it is essential for muscle growth and energy.


If you're looking to play roulette online as well as receive great bonuses, then the checklist we have now furnished below ought to help you in your own hunt. We have put together a lit of several casino sites for you to play and get on line roulette bonus deals of up to 100%.
Aztec Riches Casino is an on-line gambling site where you could enjoy all your favorite casino games including Slot machine games, Online video Poker, Progressives, and table games such as http://elucky8.com Roulette and Craps. Download their totally free software and get online roulette added bonus of up to $850 absolutely free. Once you register with Aztec Riches Casino, you will receive 3 separate online roulette bonus offers with your first three deposits made to your actual account.
The Aztec Riches Casino online roulette bonus functions progressively. Upon very first deposit, you receive 100% online roulette bonus up to $100 free of charge. During your second and third deposit, your current bonus percentage is actually somewhat lowered however, you still get up to $250 (50%) as well as $500 (25%).
The Desert Dollar Casino have several games that fall into the following broad categories: Table online games, Parlor Online games, Online video Poker, Power Poker, Video slots, Slot machines, Added bonus Slots, and Progressives Slot machine games.
When you sign up for an account with this online casino, you get on-line roulette bonus deals as high as $10 absolutely no deposit needed or even 300% online roulette bonus match up of up to $300 on first deposit. You also receive yet another 150% online roulette bonus as much as $60 once you come up with your first deposit. In addition to that, the Desert Dollar Casino provides alternative purchase online roulette bonuses for the following payment methods: Click2Pay, FirePay, and NETeller.
The Vegas Villa Casino presents several on-line roulette bonus offer options for brand new gamers or current members generating additional deposits. In order to claim your online roulette bonus points if you're a brand new sign up, you only need to down load their free of charge casino computer software or even purchase their free CD software program through their website.
Once you've completed the registration process, you are right away eligible to come up with your first deposit of a minimum of $20 so as for you to get the online roulette bonus of 300% as much as $300. You can also obtain online roulette bonus points of up to $10 even if you do not yet make any kind of deposit yet. And if you utilize the Click2Pay, FirePay, NETeller, as well as Solo & Switch as your payment method, you receive an additional 10% free online roulette bonus of up to $100.
There are plenty more websites that give online roulette bonus deals along with other online game bonuses. Whatever we've listed above are but just a few.


Whole fruit, whole vegetables and…nothing else. Snacking doesn't get much realer than that. Fuel up with these chewy snack strips crafted with no added sugar and all the power of the organic, non-GMO produce inside.


text:
Q: iphone: get User Defined variable in Target's setting by code? My project have multi-targets. Each target has its own Class file for setting stuff. I want to store that Class name in a target setting (Info.plist or Target's Building setting). So that I can define which class I need to use in each target based on this setting.
According to this question, I put "a target-specific User Defined variable" in each Target's Building Setting.
But don't know how to get it back in my code?

A: As the Info.plist file is preprocessed too, you can use this approach:
Define a User defined setting in your build settings, for Example CLASS_NAME.
And a key to your Info.plist-file. Name the key CLASS_NAME and set the value to ${CLASS_NAME}.
You can then access this setting by:
NSString* className = [[[NSBundle mainBundle] infoDictionary] valueForKey:@"CLASS_NAME"];

A: You can not directly use a variable defined in the build settings. These variables are meant to be used by build tools.
Instead define a preprocessor macro in the Preprocessor Macros Variable like 'MYVAR=5'. You can access these macros in your code like:
#if MYVAR==5
    //Do something
#endif

Please note, that the evaluation of these expressions happens at build-time not at runtime.
It is very typical use to just define a Macro without caring for the value. For example define 'DEBUG=1' in the debug build settings and 'RELEASE=1' in the release build settings.
You can then test using #ifdef or #ifndef
#ifdef DEBUG
    // Log
#endif


Ribas's app, HoursTracker, has been available in Apple's App Store since 2009 but it's still bringing in five figures a month. The income is more than Ribas says he can make from a full-time job and he works just 20 hours a week at his former gig, as a .Net developer.
As Ribas recounts in a Medium post, in early 2009, his former boss cajoled him into creating an iPhone app. The boss, who is unnamed in the post, had just read about Ethan Nicholas, another developer, who struck it rich by releasing a lite version of his game, iShoot.
"Part of me wondered about my boss telling me I should quit my job, but I really appreciated the encouragement to try new things," Ribas recalls. Ribas then read up on Objective-C, the iPhone SDK and Apple's design guidelines. Ribas had a flip phone at the time, but he borrowed his wife's iPhone. Browsing the App Store, he saw that there wasn't a decent app that would let her keep track of her hourly job.
On July 12, 2009, Ribas released HoursTracker, a sort of virtual punch clock. The app got a positive write-up in Lifehacker. Apple then created the video below for HoursTracker and for a while it was more popular than even Angry Birds.
While Ribas's story is unique, he offered a few pointers for aspiring app developers. Ribas views advertising as a necessary evil. The free version of HoursTracker has ads, which bring in 10% of the app's revenues, but that situation isn't ideal. "
I know I've done a great job when the user spends the least amount of time in my app and yet still tracks their time accurately. That's not good for an ad-supported product. So, if I'm trying to make more money from ads, then I'll be working against my customer's needs and thus my own best interests.
The message tells users they can erase their existing data to start the 21-day cycle again and "continue to use the free edition until you're ready to buy." As he explains, "this language creates an understanding that you're expected to buy the app if you're satisfied with how it works for you."
Some people install the app, experiment with it briefly, and know pretty quickly if it suits their needs or not. Others choose to live with it for a few weeks and make their decision slowly, often trying several apps simultaneously. The goal is to make sure the app is a known quantity, just like that morning coffee, before making a purchase decision.
Ribas also advises to experiment with pricing. "Try a price reduction promotion to see if a lower price yields more revenue. If you can stomach it, let the discounted price stand long enough to get a feel for network effects. Try the opposite — check if increasing the price works better."
While Ribas claims the success of HoursTracker flies in the face of claims that no one makes money off apps anymore, some commenters on Hacker News pointed out that Ribas had a huge advantage because he released the app in the early days of the App Store. "Yes, it is still possible to make money, even a lot of money, writing an app but that doesn't mean early adopters didn't have a big advantage," wrote one. Others pointed out that HoursTracker shows up high in App Store searches, giving it a leg up over new competitors.
"I have a similar app, onsite time tracker, and it makes way less. like a few hundred dollars per month," wrote another. "I have always been curious how much Hours Tracker makes. It dominates the app store searches."


text:
Home Business No more diesel: Largest solar farm in Seychelles fully powers a remote island
No more diesel: Largest solar farm in Seychelles fully powers a remote island
Web Desk Nov 6th, 2018 Comments Off on No more diesel: Largest solar farm in Seychelles fully powers a remote island
The remote island of Alphonse is now completely powered by the largest photovoltaic farm in Seychelles, meaning diesel fuel is no longer needed to make electricity, said a top official of the Islands Development Company.
A total of 2,220 dual glass high-efficiency solar panels have been installed on 0.7 hectares of land -- half towards the east and the other half towards the west -- to produce electricity for the whole island.
The project is an initiative of the Islands Development Company (IDC) as a source of alternative energy to cut costs and reduce the amount of heavy diesel fuel used to power two electricity generators on the island. The project will also help to protect the environment from pollution.
The IDC's chief executive officer, Glenny Savy, said that the project is a real cost efficient project which will save the island a lot of money.
For the past months only five barrels of fuel has been used to power the standby generators as compared to five and seven barrels of fuels used every day previously," said Savy.
Located 400 kilometres southwest of Mahe, the main island, the Alphonse atoll is part of the Alphonse group which also includes St. Francois and Bijoutier. The atoll has a single resort comprising of beach bungalows and suites.
The green energy project is a combination of the solar panels and lithium batteries for storage that has resulted in covering 90 percent of the island's energy use. The solar panels produce around 800 kilowatts of electricity per day, more than half above the normal total electricity used every day on the island.
Savy said that this initiative will not only save money going towards fuel consumption but also that which is going towards the transportation of fuel to the island.
IDC is making a profit on the electricity that it is producing by selling it. The money will go towards infrastructure development on the island, said Savy.
Financed by a South African company, Mettle Solar Investments, the PV farm cost $1.5 million. IDC has injected a total sum of $37,000 (SCR500,000).
The Minister for Environment, Energy, and Climate Change, Wallace Cosgrow, said that the project is one that other islands can follow as well as Mahe, which can one day be fully powered by renewable energy.
Aside from Alphonse, a similar PV farm will be set on Astove and Farqhuar islands by March 2019 and the bigger one on Desroches island by July next year. By early 2020 all islands under the management of IDC will be 90 percent powered by green energy.
Seychelles -- a group of 115 islands in the western Indian Ocean -- relies heavily on imported fossil fuel for power generation and transportation. Currently, only 2.5 percent of the island nation's electrical energy is from renewable sources.
The 2.5 percent is expected to increase to 5 percent in the coming three years with several renewable energy projects.
Seychelles is also planning to install Africa's first utility-scale Floating Solar Photovoltaic system on the lagoon at Le Rocher, in the district of Les Mamelles.


text:
/*
* @Author: Sze Ka Wai Raymond (FakeC)
* @Date:   2016-01-15 02:51:20
* @Last Modified by:   Sze Ka Wai Raymond (FakeC)
* @Last Modified time: 2016-01-16 15:50:37
*/

const Hapi = require('hapi');
const server = new Hapi.Server();
server.connection({host: 'localhost', port: '3000'});

module.exports = server;

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
LA City Attorney Mike Feuer wants to put stop to sale of flavored liquids used for vaping
LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Los Angeles City Attorney Mike Feuer wants to put a stop to the sale of flavored liquids that are used for vaping.
"Cereal flavors, candy flavors, fruit flavors....skittles and gummy bears. Who are they designed to appeal to?" Feuer asked.
An investigation into the first known death in Los Angeles County related to the use of e-cigarettes, is shining a light on the issue better known as vaping.
"We have a real crisis when it comes to our kids," Feuer said. A 2017-2018 statistic shows a 78% increase in the number of high school students who vape. One in every five students vapes, according to Feuer. "This is not an accident - there is marketing to kids," he said.
Feuer said "We should have learned something from tobacco. Our nation got addicted to tobacco especially targeting kids. The vaping companies have done of a good job of circumventing those rules to the detriment of public health and public safety and our economy and it's time to put a stop to the sale of those flavored liquids."
California considered stopping the sale of liquids "then the vaping interests got all over state legislators and watered down the legislation. Los Angeles should do it. The county is thinking of this for next week, the city should follow suit," Feuer commented.
United States health officials said they had identified 450 possible cases of serious breathing illnesses associated with e-cigarettes in 33 states. The count includes newly reported deaths in Indiana and Los Angeles County.
politicslos angeleslos angeles countyhealthe cigarettesvaping


text:
Unclaimed Funds
Transferring Property
Process for Transferring and Recording a Deed
1. Deed Goes to the Engineer's Office
The Engineer checks the legal description on the deed against their record and stamps the deed to approve it for transfer. The transfer approval stamp is valid for 60 Days.
2. Then to the Auditor's Office
After the engineer stamps the deed as approved for transfer, a conveyance form from the Auditor's Office must be completed and signed. The fees due at the Auditor's office consist of a conveyance fee at the rate of $4.00 per $1,000 of the sale price of the real estate, plus a $.50 line fee per parcel. Payment for the conveyance must be received before it is processed. After the deed is reviewed for accuracy, it is then stamped as transferred by the auditor's office. The deed may be taken to the Recorder's Office after it receives this stamp.
3. Lastly, the Deed Goes to the Recorder's Office
The Recorder's Office is where the deed is recorded. The deed is examined to make sure it has been executed correctly. The Recorder checks to see that the Engineer's Office and Auditor's Office have put their stamp on the deed showing approval. As of October 17, 2019, the recording fee is at a rate of $34.00 for the first 2 pages and $8.00 per page after. The deed is held for a period of time by the Recorder's Office for microfilming and data entry. The original recorded deed is then mailed or may be picked up.
Auditor Menu
Auditor Home
Vendor's License
CAUV
Contact the Auditor's Office
Auditor Sale
COVID-19 OFFICE INFORMATION
Tweets by MarionOHAuditor
Budget Commission Meeting
Budget Commission
Presidents' Day – Office Closed


ARMONK, NY	- 26 Oct 2006: IBM (NYSE: IBM), the global information technology services leader, today announced that it has been chosen to receive the prestigious VARBusiness Tech Innovator of the Year Award. IBM received the award based on its Express Managed Services Portfolio for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs).
The VARBusiness Tech Innovators' project is based on channel partners' assessments of technical innovation and development efforts of vendors. IBM was honored this week at the CMP XChange Tech Innovators conference in Huntington Beach, California. VARBusiness is one of the leading channel publications in the United States.
"Innovations like what we've seen from IBM demonstrate the vibrancy and vitality of the industry," said Lawrence M. Walsh, VARBusiness Editor. "They represent breakthroughs that will benefit our solution-provider readers and, in turn, the users of technology."
"IBM is honored to have our services recognized as making our clients more innovative," said Jim Corgel, IBM general manager, Global Services, Small and Medium-Sized Businesses. "IBM is committed to working with our business partners to provide solutions specifically designed for small and medium-sized business -- IBM's Express Managed Services are proof of this commitment."
IBM's Express Managed Services were built specifically for SMBs to be easy to understand, implement and manage and are priced to fit mid-market budgets. The Express Managed Services Portfolio was also designed to be sold primarily through the Business Partner channel. Easy-to-sell, packaged offerings such as email security, online backup for distributed servers and desktop management are designed to be bundled with IBM Business Partners to create high-value solutions that better meet customer requirements.
"IBM's broad range of new solutions for our small business customers is impressive," said William Abram, President of Pragmatix, an IBM business partner based in Elmsford, New York. "We're clearly able to demonstrate how using IBM's managed services, like email and web security, online backup, and desktop management services, allow customers to focus on their core business by letting IBM's experts handle day-to-day IT tasks. We've never seen anything like the Express Managed Services Portfolio before from IBM."
According to AMI Partners, the managed services market is forecasted to grow to $163 billion by 2010, which marks a significant shift in the way SMBs are evaluating and purchasing IT services.
IBM also received two other top awards from VARBusiness, including: Tech Innovator Company of the Year and Tech Innovator of the Year award for IBM Continuous Data Protection for Files in the Storage category.
For more information about IBM and VARBusiness visit www.ibm.com or www.varbusiness.com.


text:
Rahul Sarpeshkar is the Thomas E. Kurtz Professor and a professor of engineering, professor of physics, professor of microbiology & immunology, and professor of molecular and systems biology at Dartmouth. Sarpeshkar, whose interdisciplinary work is in bioengineering, electrical engineering, quantum physics, and biophysics, is the inaugural chair of the William H. Neukom cluster of computational science, which focuses on analog, quantum, and biological computation. The clusters, designed by faculty from across the institution to address major global challenges, are part of President Philip Hanlon's vision for strengthening academic excellence at Dartmouth. Prior to Dartmouth, Sarpeshkar was a tenured professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and led the Analog Circuits and Biological Systems Group. He is now also a visiting scientist at MIT's Research Laboratory of Electronics.

Research fields

His research has contributed to the fields of:
 Analog circuits and analog computation
 Molecular, systems, and synthetic biology
 Ultra-low-power and ultra-energy-efficient systems
 Energy-harvesting design
 Glucose-powered medical implants
 Bioelectronics
 Bio-inspired and biomimetic systems
 Cytomorphic (cell-inspired) systems
 Analog supercomputing systems
 Quantum and quantum-inspired analog computers
 Medical devices
 Cochlear implants
 Brain-machine interfaces
 Control theory

Research summary

Sarpeshkar's recent TEDx talk 'Analog Supercomputers: From Quantum Atom to Living Body' summarizes some of his unique and interdisciplinary research . His research leverages analog circuits and analog computation to architect innovations in bioengineering and synthetic biology, biological supercomputing, ultra energy efficient computing, and quantum computing. For example, by mapping log-domain analog electronic circuits to log-domain analog DNA-protein circuits in living cells
,
Professor Sarpeshkar's work in the May 2013 edition of Nature (doi: 10.1038/nature12148) pioneered the field of analog synthetic biology . Recently, three awarded patents and one pending patent of his have shown how to emulate quantum physics with classical analog circuits rigorously. He has used it to create novel quantum-inspired architectures that do spectrum analysis like the biological inner ear or cochlea, i.e. a 'Quantum Cochlea'. Professor Sarpeshkar's book  introduced a novel form of electronics termed Cytomorphic electronics, i.e., electronics inspired by cell biology . It is based on the astounding similarity between the Boltzmann exponential equations of noisy molecular flux in chemical reactions and the Boltzmann exponential equations of noisy electron flow in transistors. Hence circuits in biology and chemistry can be mapped to circuits in electronics and vice versa. Therefore, this 'cytomorphic mapping'  enables one to map analog electronic motifs to analog molecular circuit motifs in living cells as in the work in Nature and also to simulate large-scale feedback networks in cells with analog electronic supercomputers. Thus, his work has led to a novel and fundamental analog circuits approach to the fields of synthetic biology and systems biology, both of which are highly important in the future of biotechnology and medicine  and . For example, the synthesis of biofuels, chemicals, energy, molecular and cellular sensors, network drug design, treatments for cancer, diabetes, auto-immune, infectious, and neural diseases can all impacted be impacted by his fundamental work on analog synthetic and systems biology.

Sarpeshkar's work on glucose powered medical implants has been featured in the Economist, WIRED, and Science News and was highlighted by Scientific American among 2012's top scientific breakthroughs . Professor Sarpeshkar's work on a hybrid analog-digital circuit that mimics feedback networks in the brain has appeared on the cover of the journal Nature and has received wide media attention . His work on an ultra-low-power analog cochlear-implant processor for the deaf has had wide impact and been featured in articles in the New York Times , Technology Review, and IEEE Spectrum, as has his work on ultra-low-power brain-machine interfaces for the blind and paralyzed and for cardiac and non-invasive monitoring. His group holds several first and best world records in the fields of medical devices, medical electronics, ultra low power, analog, and bio-inspired design .

He has authored more than 139 technical publications and is an inventor on more than forty two awarded patents. He is the inventor of the RF Cochlea, a rapid radio-frequency spectrum analyzer inspired by the human ear . His book Ultra Low Power Bioelectronics: Fundamentals, Biomedical Applications, and Bio-inspired Systems is published by Cambridge University Press and provides a broad and deep treatment of the fields of analog, ultra low power, biomedical, biological, energy-harvesting and bio-inspired design. It is based on a course that Sarpeshkar has taught at MIT for many years, which emphasizes how the universal language of analog circuits provides a pictorial and intuitive method for analyzing differential equations in physics, chemistry, biology, engineering, and medicine. He has won the Junior Bose award and the Ruth and Joel Spira award for excellence in teaching at MIT.

Sarpeshkar has received several awards including the NSF Career Award, the ONR Young Investigator Award, the Packard Fellows Award, and the Indus Technovator Award. He is a Fellow of the IEEE and a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors.  He is an Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Circuits and Systems and serves on the program committees of several technical conferences. His recent TEDx talk 'Analog Supercomputers: From Quantum Atom to Living Body' summarizes some of his unique and interdisciplinary research . His invited Google Tech talk at the 2011 Frontiers of Engineering Conference, hosted by the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) summarizes his earlier work on an ultra low power programmable analog cochlear implant processor and other ultra-low-power implantable devices .

Education
Sarpeshkar received B.S. degrees in electrical engineering and physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Ph.D. degree in computation and neural systems from the California Institute of Technology. His adviser at Caltech was Carver A. Mead. He was a member of technical staff at Bell Labs in its Department of Biological Computation within its Physics Division.

References

External links
Analog Supercomputers:From Quantum Atom to Living Body TEDx Video
Cell Power
Thomas E. Kurtz Chair
Analog Circuits and Biological Systems Group
Analog Synthetic Biology
Glucose Powered Medical Implants receives wide media attention
Professor Sarpeshkar's book
Transistors Mimick Cells MIT news article.
Cytomorphic Electronics MIT news article.
RF Cochlea MIT news release on the RF Cochlea that led to several other news articles.

American bioengineers
American electronics engineers
21st-century American physicists
Living people
Synthetic biologists
Year of birth missing (living people)

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Q: select specific columns from complex lines I have a file that contains lines with the following format. I would like to keep only the first column and the column containing the string with the following format NC_XXXX.1
484-2117    16  gi|9634679|ref|NC_002188.1| 188705  23  21M *   0   0   CGCGTACCAAAAGTAATAATT   IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII   AS:i:-6 XN:i:0  XM:i:1  XO:i:0  XG:i:0  NM:i:1  MD:Z:0G20   YT:Z:UU
787-1087    16  gi|21844535|ref|NC_004068.1|    7006    23  20M *   0   0   CTATACAACCTACTACCTCA    IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII    AS:i:-6 XN:i:0  XM:i:1  XO:i:0  XG:i:0  NM:i:1  MD:Z:19T0   YT:Z:UU
.....
....
...

output:
484-2117 NC_002188.1
787-1087 NC_004068.1

A: Something like this in perl:
#!/usr/bin/env perl
use strict;
use warnings;

while (<DATA>) {
   my ( $id, $nc ) = m/^([\d\-]+).*(NC_[\d\.]+)/;
   print "$id $nc\n";
}

__DATA__
484-2117    16  gi|9634679|ref|NC_002188.1| 188705  23  21M *   0   0   CGCGTACCAAAAGTAATAATT   IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII   AS:i:-6 XN:i:0  XM:i:1  XO:i:0  XG:i:0  NM:i:1  MD:Z:0G20   YT:Z:UU
787-1087    16  gi|21844535|ref|NC_004068.1|    7006    23  20M *   0   0   CTATACAACCTACTACCTCA    IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII    AS:i:-6 XN:i:0  XM:i:1  XO:i:0  XG:i:0  NM:i:1  MD:Z:19T0   YT:Z:UU

Output:
484-2117 NC_002188.1
787-1087 NC_004068.1

Which reduces to a one liner of:
perl -ne 'm/^([\d\-]+).*(NC_[\d\.]+)/ and print "$1 $2\n"'   yourfile

Note - this specifically matches a first column made up of number and dash - you could do this with a wider regex match.

A: awk to the rescue!
$ awk -F' +|\\|' '{for(i=2;i<=NF;i++) if($i ~ /^NC_[0-9.]+$/) {print $1,$i; next}}' file
484-2117 NC_002188.1
787-1087 NC_004068.1

if the space is a tab char, need to add to the delimiter list
$ awk -F' +|\\||\t' ...

A: Using gnu-awk below could be solution:
awk '{printf "%s %s\n",$1,gensub(/.*(NC_.*\.1).*/,"\\1",1,$0)}' file

Output
484-2117 NC_002188.1
787-1087 NC_004068.1

A more restrictive version would be
awk '{printf "%s %s\n",$1,gensub(/.*(NC_[[:digit:]]*\.1).*/,"\\1",1,$0)}' file

A: With perl:
perl -anE'say "$F[0] ",(split /\|/, $F[2])[3]' file

or awk:
awk -F'\\|| +' '{print $1,$6}' file

A: awk -F'[ |]' '{print $1,$10}' file
484-2117 NC_002188.1
787-1087 NC_004068.1


text: Incorporating activity into my life was a very important piece of the plan. I remember sitting in meetings and hearing the Lifetime members talk about how they had made activity nonnegotiable. salomon uk I started slowly, purchasing exercise DVDs for athome workouts. Sometimes, the callus grows inward towards the base layer of the skin, leading to the formation of a thick, hard core that tunnels inward (but does not break the skin). This is also called an intractable plantar keratosis, and is often mistaken for a wart.salomon scarpe running Finally, sweat and other skin glands can fill with keratin material, forming a small pinpoint callus called a porokeratosis. They can be sexy and elegant; they be worn officially. The simplicity helps inspire people to be creative with how they can dress themselves. Most of them are available at rates as low as below $100. This article was originally distributed via PRWeb.salomon lab The company entered a Leapfrog Lighting Facebook awareness contest, and won $1000 worth of Leapfrog's LED retrofit lamps.Ottawa, Ontario (PRWEB) May 09, 2013Leapfrog Lighting announced today the award of $1000 in retrofit Leapfrog Lighting LED lamps to Tanda Shoes. The contest was designed to raise awareness of the importance of LED lamp retrofits for socially responsible businesses. outlet salomon "He said, 'Coach, I think I'm mad at you,' and I looked at him and said, 'Brian, you're mad at me? You're an NFL superstar,'" Faith explained. "He said, 'But, yeah, if you had played me at quarterback in high school, I might have been a quarterback in the NFL and been making Peyton Manning money.' ... It's a true story, but he was joking.". If you fall between two sizes it's best to choose the larger one. Don't sacrifice style over comfort. If your feet hurt you will feel miserable. Los Angeles TimesArchaeologists from the University of California, Los Angeles, and Ireland have discovered the world's oldest leather shoe, an exquisitely preserved, 5,600yearold laceup, in a cave in Armenia.The shoe, 1,000 years older than the Great Pyramid of Egypt, was in such pristine condition that at first researchers thought it was just a few centuries old. It was stuffed with grass that may have been used to keep the wearer's foot warm or to preserve the shoe's shape for storage, the researchers reported Wednesday in the online journal PLoS One.Both grass and shoe were well preserved, like other organic materials discovered in preliminary excavations of the cave on the border between Armenia and Iran, including three human heads preserved in jars and winemaking apparatus complete with grapes.Most such materials degrade over time; the team attributed the unusual preservation to the cave's perennially cool temperature and low humidity and a concretelike layer of sheep dung that sealed everything in.Before the discovery, the oldest known footwear from Eurasia was found on Otzi, the Iceman discovered on a glacier in the Otztal Alps between Austria and Italy. Those shoes are about 5,300 years old but were in relatively poor shape.The oldest known footwear were discovered in Missouri and are about 6,900 years old.


The Hyperlite Process Wakeboard Boots are were designed for the maniacal skills of Nick Davies. When you are riding cable as hard as he does, you need supreme board feel and a snug fit. Your cable or boat riding will never be the same after slipping these bad boys on. The level of precise control and comfort you will experience are hard to replicate in any other wakeboard setup. A fully lasted, heat moldable liner will shape itself to your lower leg and foot, and the 2 to 1 lacing locks you into the boot so you can apply maximum power and control to your board. Plus, an Ultron® insole and heel inserts dampen impacts so you can keep on stomping huge hits like it's your job.
2 to 1 Lacing Zones – Allows for added retention as the laces are tightened, pulling a rider's heel snugger into place.


April's edition includes thoughts on Volume I, love's changing shapes, Genghis Cohen, Common Core, Burger King promotional kids' meals, perfumed frauds, quota systems, jasmines and stars, and the planet's sixth mass extinction.
May's edition includes thoughts on Operation Honeybee, the Keepers of the Earth, walking in the rain, 1937, bible boxes, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and the dialectic of the film industry.
June's edition includes thoughts on the great force of gravity, MP3 mixtape life, Roundup-resistant crops, piano proteges in the making, an evolution of gained rights, the Azeroth server, and techniques of personalization.
July's edition includes thoughts on the Artful Dodger, a male feminist, a zombie-eyed doper, personality-heavy journalism, and the Indominus Rex.
August's edition includes thoughts on Mr. Radioman, homing pigeons, the devil's lasso, hands up, and satirical documentary images.
September's edition includes thoughts on Gregarious Rick, a lumbering humanoid, a nod to her youth, the greatest Tweet ever told, bad-tempered words, your lover's kiss, bumpin' rides streaming rap music on 24s, and someone to watch over me.


Hihi. Totally new to oDesk and still trying to figure everything out. I reviewed job posts and it doesn't give all the info I wished it did.. so I figure I ask people who have done them.
1. What are the most common jobs posted for writers?
2. What are the usual requested time frames based on the type of job they are?
3. How good does good have to be to be passable in the eyes of a job poster?
I asked the third question because mastery in writing requires a lot of work and revision. This may not be possible with contract writing with time limits, so just wanted to know.
I remember when I first started out. I wish I had been smart enough to post questions like these in the forums.
1. There are a wide range of postings! Some clients are looking for rewrites of documents for their websites or businesses (usually, because their personal English or writing skills are not very good). Some are looking for eBooks (working on one of these myself and its great fun). Many are looking for 500 word blog postings, either for a specific company or niche or for a variety of industries! Editing and proofing jobs are also quite common.
2. Blog postings usually work within a time frame of one week. Sometimes a client only wants one per week; sometimes a client wants five to ten! It all depends on their individual needs. Usually blog posting jobs are for the long haul, though and you will have a quota per month or week. My revision/proofreading contracts are usually on an 'as-needed' basis- my clients shoot me a message when they need me, but I do not proofread documents for them every single week. My eBook is quite long, and I have been working closely with my client to complete it for 6 months now.
3. The higher the quality of the work you put out there, the faster your reputation will grow! I have gotten many word-of-mouth referrals to my profile among individuals who work together or are friends in the 'real-world', based upon my communication with my clients and the quality of my work. Yes, under a time limit it can be difficult to create an absolutely perfect document. However, as long as you always proof read and do your very best with the time you've been alotted, you'll be successful.


Prior to joining Lilly, Tim was the Chief Security Architect at the Mayo Clinic. He was the senior technical security leader and worked closely with Mayo's CISO to build the program from the ground up. He launched major initiatives in network security and segmentation, cloud services like O365 and Azure IAAS, identity and access management, technology governance, and mobility. He also designed a full SIEM redeployment, tool portfolio rationalization and optimization, and groundbreaking analytics.
Tim's approach to cybersecurity is heavily influenced by his decade with Lockheed Martin designing and deploying solutions to some of the hard cybersecurity problems in the national security space: cryptography, embedded systems, aircraft, satellites, networks, hardware security, supply chain and third party security, and industrial control systems using a blend of best-of-breed from the commercial space coupled with groundbreaking custom technology now patented by Lockheed. He was an early advocate of intelligence driven cyber defense, and has experience designing and defeating security mechanisms, bringing both perspectives when evaluating and developing solutions.
Tim left the enterprise to co-found Reveal Risk because he saw a growing need for experienced practitioners to partner with companies as they transform their transform their information security programs to embrace cloud technology, the Internet of Things, block chain and artificial intelligence.


There's a statistic that's been floating around for a few years that the average American consumes over 100,000 words per day*. Think about that for a moment. That's like reading almost two novels in 24 hours (although I believe "reading" is a fairly fluid term in this case). In addition to the consumption of random information, most of us process about 85 emails a day, plan the logistics of at least three local trips, attend meetings, call and text, do the actual work we're supposed to do to thrive/survive, and respond to all of the promises we optimistically made back when we thought we'd "have more time".
And then there's the holidays.
At this time of the year it's like we can't win in the peaceful, mindfulness department. Here lately, I've been feeling like my brain has been stuffed full in the same way I see my clients' junk drawers - old batteries (still good or used up?), thank you cards never sent, broken pieces to things that will likely never get fixed, and dozens of scribbled notes. Oh, the notes. So many things to remember, buy, check off, respond to, deal with. The other day I headed to the store specifically to pick up stamps. I came home with coffee, paper towels, and yogurt. You guessed it - no stamps. This is my brain on clutter.
I think a disorganized brain can be far more insidious than a disorganized space. For one thing, it's easier to hide (at least to the outside world). It can also be tougher to control with so many "shiny object" bits of information on social media and in the news to take our attention. And worst of all, we don't even realize the clutter is building up until it results in things like insomnia, short tempers, and overall exhaustion. Small wonder we over-eat, over-shop, and make lots of other questionable decisions.
1. Meditation. I use the Insight Timer meditation app (https://insighttimer.com/) to get a few clear moments in the morning. The timer keeps me on track, and the vast number of user-rated guided meditations ensures I have a variety of time lengths and techniques to choose from. Depending upon how you set it up, you can get a lovely "Thanks for meditating with me," message from other users around the globe. Affirmation is a good thing.
2. The book Five Good Minutes In The Evening by Jeffrey Brantley, MD and Wendy Millstine, NC was recommended to me by a sleep specialist several years back when my insomnia was at its worst. You have to love a doctor that prescribes a book, right? Part of the "Five Good Minutes" series, this one has 100 very short exercises to help you refocus after a hectic day. Whenever I start feeling overwhelmed and can't sleep, it always does the trick.
3. I do a serious "brain dump" by listing out every single thought that's nagging at me - whether on paper or on a list app like Wunderlist. I don't have to solve or ponder them, I just have to get them out of my head. Getting them down in writing somehow lessens their power over me. When I return to them, most of them don't seem like such a big deal.
4. I believe it was Steve Jobs who said, "Focusing is about saying no." So hey, let's practice that. No, I can't make that party. No, I can't volunteer for the committee. No, we don't need a meeting. No, I can't bring cookies. No, I don't need that __________. Saying no more often, enables me to say yes when it really counts.
5. I pet my dogs. Not just a cursory pat on the head, but for like, more than five minutes. I scratch behind the ears, rub their bellies, appreciate those brown eyes. It's hard to think about other things when you concentrate on your pup, and it's been proven that spending time with pets reduces stress, can lower blood pressure, and keep heart disease at bay. And of course, cat-lovers, it works with felines (and maybe even guinea pigs, ferrets and rabbits too).
So this holiday season, give one or two of these ideas a shot when you're at your wits' end. Or, if you have mind clutter hacks of your own, please share with us in the comments.
Just remember, I'm good for you.
*Bohn, Roger. How Much Information? 2009 Report on American Consumers. University of California, San Diego.
Very eye-opening statistics - especially for folks who claim they don't have time to read books. How much time do they waste consuming "junk food" in the form of Internet memes, celebrity gossip, etc.?
No kidding, although I have to admit I'm guilty of falling into the social media black hole from time to time. It's potato chips for the mind. It's so easily accessible, yet when I take a break from it I'm always better off.
Ah yes, the fear of forgetting. That's huge, and also contributes to the mind clutter. Thanks for the kind words, and for stopping by the Haystack!


text:
If you're interested in the work that IFES is doing to promote democracy, then you need to check out their Career opportunities.
Posted by Willy Franzen on August 7, 2011. Jobs updated daily.
Displaying 1-10 of 41,059 results.
Democratic Elections and Political Process Technical Director
Washington, DC View
Regional Director - Europe u0026 Eurasia
Assistant Director of Communications for Politics
Senior Director, Finance and Grants
Field Human Resource Business Partner
Senior Program Manager for Political Data Capacity
Program Officer, Americas
DEPP Research, Evaluation and Learning Director
DEPP Youth Specialist
International Foundation for Electoral Systems
Although the United States may not have invented democracy, but we certainly made it popular. That's not to say that we always get it right, but we've built a model of government that has inspired a lot of people (the people who work within that model aren't nearly as inspirational). Our nation went through a brutal war to achieve the system that we have in place, and now we're watching similar processes happy in many places across the world. The International Foundation for Electoral Systems or IFES is a non-profit organization that "promotes democratic stability by providing technical assistance and applying field-based research to the electoral cycle in countries around the world to enhance citizen participation and strengthen civil societies, governance and transparency." They're based out of Washington, DC, but they obviously do a ton of work internationally. IFES has been around for just under 15 years, and they've already worked in more than 100 countries.
Wear Your IFES
Elections are the key to democracy, and running elections properly is hard. Not only are there often individuals and groups opposed to allowing the democratic process to take place, but there are also various technical challenges. Even something as simple as ensuring that everyone gets the chance to vote can be difficult, and so can prohibiting people from voting more than once. IFES has developed significant expertise in overcoming these technical challenges. They operate as a neutral third-party and focus on making elections run as smoothly as possible. If you're interested in the work that IFES is doing, then you need to check out their Career opportunities. As much fun as their Chief of Party position sounds, it's not entry level. However, they are looking for a Program Coordinator for Europe and Asia, and the position looks like it could be a good fit for a new or recent grad.
IFES.org
Jobs at IFES
About IFES
Staff at IFES
IFES FAQs
IFES Divisions and Projects
IFES News
What do you know about IFES
We've identified International Foundation for Electoral Systems as having career opportunities in the following categories:


Galco Hearing Aid Service specializes in hearing evaluations, fitting & dispensing of hearing instruments using the most innovative technologies. Galco Hearing Aid Service has been providing hearing help to those with hearing loss since 1964. With locations in Seabrook and Galveston, Galco is an easy drive for patients from Alvin, Texas City, Pearland, South Houston, Texas City, Baytown, LaPorte and nearby communities.
Mark Busscher, owner and Licensed hearing instrument specialist, has been helping Texans hear better for more than 30 years. Mark is committed to your total hearing health. Mark's full service approach includes follow up visits and regular maintenance with every hearing aid provided by Galco. Mark delivers better hearing results with state of the art testing and fitting equipment and an extensive line of digital hearing aids that have proven themselves to be the leading edge in hearing aid technology.
Mark Busscher, a Michigan native but a Texan since 1983, lives in Alvin with is wife and daughters. Mark is avid sports enthusiast and an accomplished bowler. Mark has won 4 national titles; TCBA National Team Championships in 2003, 2006, 2007 and 2010 as well as being a member of SASBA; State Championship in 2004.
With a personal service commitment from hearing instrument specialist Mark Busscher, and two locations, you'll receive the best care possible close to home.


Open your Bibles to Philippians 4:14-20. Today is our second to last sermon in this series from the book of Philippians. Next week, I will be wrapping it up, and on the 28th I will be preaching about Church Membership with the hope that I will convince many of you to become committed members of Cornerstone Church. Not because we want to put your name on a list, but because the Bible encourages deep partnership within the local body.
Then starting in July, I will be beginning a two month series that I am entitling, a "Summer of Psalms," where each Sunday I will be unpacking a Psalm. With that said, I would ask that all of you pray for me as I start to wade into those waters, for it is new territory for me to preach from the Psalms, and I want to above all handle the word rightly. But today and next week, let us choose to finish strong in the book of Philippians. Let us read our text, pray, and allow God's Word to work on our hearts.
Let us begin by way of review. The book of Philippians is written by Paul to the Saints in Philippi. This relationship between Paul and this local Church began with the conversion of Lydia. This event is documented in Acts 16:14.
Shortly after the conversion of Lydia came the conversion the conversion of the Philippians jailer.
Paul is thanking God for causing in the hearts of the Philippians to desire to give to the mission of sharing Christ to the nations. Paul continues to talk about this partnership of giving in our text today.
The Saints in Philippi were set apart by their radical giving. No Church compared to the regular sacrifice and partnership in the spread of the Gospel In fact their giving almost killed on of their members.
Epaphroditus nearly died in the delivery of the gift to Paul. This was not just about writing a check and tossing it into a box, it was about total commitment to the mission of making disciples.
Why? Why was this local body of believers so radical in their giving? Why did they stand out amongst the dozens of Churches when it came to their sacrificial partnership in proclaiming the Gospel? I believe that over the last 6 months we have been answering just that question.
The catalyst to giving can be summed up with one word, the Gospel. The Church in Philippi had been radically and forever changed by the Gospel of Jesus Christ. God had begun a work in them. They had become partakers of Grace. They were filled with the fruit of righteousness. They accepted the battle cry that to live is Christ and to die is gain. They did nothing out of selfish ambition. They emptied themselves and took the form of servants, working out their salvation with fear and trembling knowing that it was God who worked in them to will and work for his good pleasure. And while doing so they held fast to the word of life, and poured themselves out like drink offerings. They were brothers, fellow workers and fellow soldiers of God. They counted everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus, specifically knowing the power of his resurrection. Because of the Gospel they no longer set their minds on earthly things, but recognized that their citizenship was in Heaven, and because of that they rejoiced in the Lord always, which flowed into a peace with God that surpassed understanding. Producing a life of contentment due to the power of Christ working in their weakness and making all things possible.
It was out of this gospel transformation that they gave. When no one else was giving, the Philippians gave. They were not concerned what others Churches did, they gave from a heart that was bursting with the Spirit of God.
And this is what happens when Christ takes up residence in your heart. You give. When you repent and turn towards Jesus, and place your faith in the sufficiency of his sacrifice, and you commit your like to him as your Master, Jesus comes and lives in you heart. This morning we talked about this is Hebrews 8.
This is the essence of the new covenant. The effectual call of God drawing us to His Son by the irresistible power of the Spirit transforms you into a new creation from the inside out. And this new creature is not a consumer, but a giver. And you can see this sacrificial giving produced by the gospel time and time again in the Scriptures.
John the Baptist says this in John 3:30 about Christ, "I must decrease and he must increase." You see it again in the apostles John and James who left their boat and their father and followed Jesus. You see it in the apostle Matthew upon Jesus saying two simple words "follow him." Without hesitation, he quit his job of collecting taxes and lining his pockets with the dust of this world and instead gave of himself to the point of martyrdom. You see it in the conversion of Zacchaeus in Luke 19:8 when Zacchaeus pays back fourfold of what he had taken from the poor. You see it in the women with the alabaster jar in Matthew 26, pouring it on the head of Jesus in sold out sacrificial worship while those around scoffed at the waste. You see it Joseph of Arimethea, a rich man who gave his grave to bury the Author of Life. The list could go on and on, for every time someone goes from death to life, the life they live is one of love. Love for God and love for others. In fact, one sign that you may not be saved is your lack of giving.
Some of you in this room may be asking, am I saved? This is not a bad question to ask ourselves from time to time. It is good to examine our hearts. In fact, Jesus gives us a diagnostic for our hearts.
If upon examining your heart, you find that the treasure of your heart is consuming things for your comfort, for you pleasures, for your desires, this may be evidence that you are not a new creation, but that you are still dead in your trespasses and sins, and set on a collision course with the wrath of God.
What is the power of God that makes rich men give up everything to follow Christ? It is the Gospel. The Gospel is the power of God for salvation, a salvation that produces radical, reckless, self-sacrificial giving. It was a Gospel that touched the hearts of the Philippians, and they couldn't help but give. It was their new spiritual DNA.
The question for us today, is it ours? Is the DNA of Cornerstone consumption or Gospel giving? Are we the rich young ruler, or are we the Philippians Church? Do we spend our money on ourselves, or do we lay it at the feet of God? Do we work our 40 hours to line our pockets, or do we work as if working for the Lord? Are we spraying the perfume of our wealth upon our necks, or pouring it on the head of our Savior?
Now here is the interesting thing about Gospel giving. It is not really giving to lose, but it is actually giving to get. Look at verse 17.
Verse like this make some people nervous, for they do not like the idea of reward in the realm of God's grace. They believe that if we are motivated by our reward that we are cheapening his grace, but are we? Are these things mutually exclusive? Not at all. This things are perfecting harmonious. Because at the center of giving to get is faith. Faith in God. Faith in His sovereignty, faith in His promises, faith in His Son, faith in His Gospel, faith in His Word, specifically verse 17.
The real question when it comes to giving for the fruit that increases to your credit, is do you believe it? Do you trust God enough to implement it in your life? Do you trust that will hold up His end of the bargain? Many people do not. They are not willing to take the risk, they instead want to maintain the control that they have in their life and build bigger bins. This however is foolish, for we are chasing dust instead of the eternal riches our our Maker. Perhaps Jesus said it the best.
Jesus, commands us to lay up treasures in heaven. Paul is encouraging the same behavior. Gospel giving does not produce less, it produces more. I do not think that it is a coincidence that the Philippians Church is a gospel church, it is a giving church and it is a joy-filled Church. I pray that we will be the same.
Open your Bibles to Philippians 4:10-13. We are nearing the end of our 6 month journey through the book of Philippians. For those of you of have joined our Church since January 1st, or for those who have missed Sunday's due to travel or sickness, I want to remind you that you can go to our website and find the sermon's online. They exist in written form and some of them are also on video. The reason I mention this is because when you work through such as we are today we need to understand the context surrounding the text. Obviously, due to time we cannot cover the entire book each Sunday so if you are interested you can fill in some gaps by means of our resources online. With that said, let us read out text, pray and exegete our text.
Today we are focusing our attention on the disposition of contentment. In verse 11 we see the Apostle Paul say, "Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content." So let us start with the question, what does it mean to be content?
If we look around the text we can get a picture of what Paul means by being content. We see in verse 11 that contentment is the absence of being in need. This being is, however, modified by verse 12 which tells us that this being does not mean that you are born with a silver spoon on your mouth, for it says this being may include a circumstance of lowness, a circumstance of hunger. Therefore you can be content and have absolutely nothing.
Likewise, being content does not mean the absence of circumstantial swings. Paul speaks of being low and then abounding. He speaks of hunger and plenty. He speaks of need and then abundance, through it all, he can say like we sang earlier, "It is well." For Paul is content dispute the highs and lows of life.
And don't forget the current condition of Paul as he pens these words. He is without a job, no money, without a family, chained to a Roman guard 24 hours a day, and waiting to find out if he will be killed. It is in this circumstance that Paul has contentment. Therefore the contentment that Paul is speaking of is not conditional on one's external situation, it is conditional on one's internal state of mind.
For those who were here last week you will recall how we spent a fair amount of time discussing the effects the Fall had on the mind of man, and how at conversion the curse of the mind is reversed through Christ. A verse that summarizes what we discussed last week and transitions nicely in our discussion for today is Ephesians 4:20-24. Just briefly turn with me to this passage. It is the book right before Philippians.
To be a disciple of Christ means to put on the new self and to be renewed in the spirit of your mind. Conversion is an inward change to how you view reality. Upon learning about Jesus and accepting the truth that is Christ, your heart changes, but the world does not. You will still work where you work, you are still be married to whom you are married, your kids will still be your kids, your finances will still be your finances, your physical condition will still be your physical condition. Through believing in Christ you, not your situation, becomes new, a new being, not the world.
With that said I want to spend some time talking about the old you. The person you were before you learned of Christ, before your eyes were opened to your need for a Savior. The understanding of who you were pre-conversion will help us wrap our minds around this idea of contentment.
This old self is described in Ephesians 4:22 as "corrupt through deceitful desires." Prior to the renewal of your mind, you were a slave to your passions and your desires. Your hard heart craved to be satisfied with the things of this world. Some of you sought satisfaction in experiences, for some it was money, for it is your business, for some it was American Dream, for some relationships.
Having said this, the pursuit of these pleasures never produced in you a satisfaction. Your corrupt heart cried out for more food, more alcohol, more money, more stuff, more success, more independence, more education, but none of these things fulfilled what they promised. With each addition to your life came more discontentment. Your heart still cried out for more. You were still unsatisfied, despite the world being your oyster. This is the reality of every person on this planet that does not have Christ. Everyone, apart from Christ is a prisoner of discontentment. I realize I use this parable a lot but it speaks so well to the plight of the unsaved.
Prior to finding Christ, we are constantly searching for a pearl that will produce in us satisfaction, and this life of discontentment is exhausting. It is a life of searching and never finding. The purpose of life is nomadic, with no clear direction, wandering about in the wilderness, no rest, no peace, always moving, always looking for the next best thing, never satisfied, discontent. We are people who live for the weekend, for vacations, for retirement, and we come to find that they too are not the answer.
This women had spent her entire life searching for satisfaction in men. She was discontent and her thought was that if I just could find the right man, everything will be well. However her desires deceived her. Her pursuit of pleasure did not produce what it promised. Her desires gave rise to sin which then manifested into her shame. This women was a prisoner of her discontent, and now before her stood the Pearl of Great value, the Living Water that can satisfy her thirsty soul.
Oh how many married couples need to hear this message! Do not be deceived, the grass is not greener on the other side of the fence. Leaving your spouse to find satisfaction in the arms of someone else will not produce in your contentment, it will only produce brokenness. Stop looking for satisfaction in the well of your sin, and look up and see Christ! This is the beginning of the secret of contentment, only in him will your heart be satisfied.
And this is the secret in which Paul speaks of in verse 12 of our text. It is the secret of facing our present reality, not through the futility of our minds, or the ignorance of our hard hearts, but through Christ. Paul says in verse 13, "I can do all things through him who strengthens me." This may be one of the top five wrongly quoted verses in the Bible. People love to post this verse In relation to climbing Mount Everest, or winning some pointless sports event, or losing weight. This is not the point of this text, the point of this text is being content no matter what your circumstances are.
And the fundamental starting point is Jesus Christ. If you do not have Christ in your life, you will never be content. So square one of contentment is Christ. You must repent and place your faith in the sufficiency of Jesus Christ as your Savior and your Lord. If you do not, then you have zero hope for your weary soul, and you will forever be a slave to discontentment, wandering this broken world before you plunge into Hell for all eternity.
For those who have placed your faith in Christ, God has started a good work in you and has begun the process of the renewing of your mind, however, we must admit that you still struggle with discontentment from time to time. We still find our minds drifting towards the things of this world. We still complain, covet, and crave for something different. This discontentment is the sin that still clings to you, that Christ want's to free you from.
To you I say, first, take heart, for Paul was not without his moments of discontentment. Look at verse 12, "I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need." Behind this statement of learning is a process. I think it is wrong to understand this teaching of Paul to be one time event. God doesn't regularly work this way. The Seminary of God is usually through the trials of this life. This secret of contentment was taught to Paul over a period of time, and we can see this in 2 Corinthians 12.
I believe this passage is one of the lessons taught to Paul by God, and it gives us some good practical understanding of how we can also learn the secret of contentment.
Lesson two, in the moment of difficulty all that we do have is a gift from God. Yes, Paul had a thorn in his life, and yes it was annoying, and yes there was pain, but Paul was forgetting all that God had provided. Paul, in that moment, had forgotten about the grace of God. His life, his breath, his heartbeat, food, water, clothes, a roof over his head, and most importantly salvation through Jesus Christ, all of this was God's grace. How selfish is it for us to receive all that we have and then complain about it. We are acting ljust like Israel after the were freed from the slavery of Egypt. Constantly complaining and discontent. They were acting like divas, like spoiled brats, and we act the same way when we are unsatisfied with the Grace that God has given us.
Lesson three, through our circumstances, God is doing something for His Glory. Too often we walk through this world totally ignorant of God's purposes. Paul's thorn was a powerful, and crucial instrument for God's purpose. It kept Paul humble, and it magnified the Glory of God. Too often, when things aren't going right for us, we throw ourselves a pity-party. What a waste! God has given you your trial and tribulation so that God's power can be displayed through your life. You should not be discontent, you should rejoice in your difficulties, because it is in these difficulties, you can display the power of Christ in you. In fact, this is the point of the monotony of your life. For many of you, God has placed you in the midst of a bad job so that you can display your contentment in Christ despite the humdrum of life.
Lesson four, pray. The only reason Paul knew any of these things is because he cried out to God, and God answered him. Paul started praying with a discontent heart, asking God to remove the thorn. God did not answer Paul's prayer the way Paul wanted, but instead gave him eyes to see the rose attached to the thorn. We likewise need eyes to see all that God has done and all that God is doing through the ups and downs of our lives, and be able to sing "It is well" without being hypocrites.


James Deane is Director of Policy and Learning of BBC Media Action, the BBC's international development charity. He has more than 30 years experience in support to independent media around the world, including being a founding member and executive director of the Panos Institute, London. His most recent publication is Fragile States: the role of media and communication.