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Idle Champions: Console Celebration!
Posted in Idle Champions.
Tags: console, xbox, PlayStation.
It's finally here! This is the week we launch Idle Champions on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. To mark the occasion we have a number of exciting activities planned starting with the launch of our brand new Founder's Pack on Steam, Android Tablets, and iPads starting today.
It features an exclusive undead skin for Celeste based on lore from Neverwinter's Module 12. Chantelle Tatum, Game Designer at Cryptic Studios, shared the complete backstory with us:
In Neverwinter's Module 12, the Jungles of Chult, Celeste joined our adventurers on their trip to Chult, however, their ship was destroyed on route by a Dragon Turtle. Celeste was washed ashore on the coast of Chult, where she then tried to find her way to Port Nyanzaru. However, her misfortunes didn't end there. As she tried to survive the trip through the Jungles of Chult, Celeste had to deal with the dangerous wildlife, including a run in with the monstrous Tyrannosaurs Rex; only to fall captive to a tribe of Batiri and taken to their village Yellyark. Unfortunately, this is where she met her demise.
Our adventurers, sent by Nanny Pu'pu to eradicate the Batiri tribe, found the deceased Celeste in one of their prisoner cages. Since Acererak had his Soulmonger in use, there was no way to truly resurrection Celeste. So, with some skepticism, our adventurers turned to Nanny Pu'pu for help, who was able to revive Celeste temporary… undead; Celeste was very put out about this when she came to. Only after confronting Acererak and bringing an end to the Soulmonger, was Celeste able to be revived as her normal self.
The undead process may or may not have involved sacrificing Batiri with the help of Makos. Also, the gem in her forward was part of that ritual, where it may or may not be tethering her soul to her undead body.
They will be available on both PS4 and Xbox the same day that the game launches on those platforms. Finally, we also details of our week-long in-game celebration starting on Friday.
The new undead Celeste skin available exclusively in the Founder's Pack.
Similar to how we celebrated our Anniversary, we are launching our in-game Console Celebration Week starting this Friday! From December 14th until December 21st, players will be able to earn daily rewards by logging in. All you have to do is check in and play every day to pick up a Console Celebration Chest. Each of these chests contains four unique items curated by our own Live Services Manager, Chris Dupuis, on behalf the Idle Champions team.
Then throughout this week and next, we're going to be talking to all the content creators who have a Champion in the game, starting with Scott Kurtz and his character, Binwin Bronzebottom, tomorrow. To cap it all off, we have an exclusive interview and reveal our latest upcoming Champion, Nerys Kathon, created by Jim Zub & Max Dunbar on Friday the 21st.
Follow the official twitch.tv/dnd channel, the Idle Champions Mixer Channel, and our Steam store page, so you don't miss any of the awesome interviews.
Also, be sure to download and play Idle Champions on PlayStation 4 starting tomorrow and Xbox One this Friday, 14th December.
Console Celebration Interviews!
Tags: console, xbox, PlayStation, interviews, streams.
To celebrate the launch of the Idle Champions on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, join our livestream interviews with the content creators whose D&D characters will now appear in-game on console.
Check out the full schedule of interviews below. The fun starts with a special episode of Binwin Plays featuring our very own Dylan as a secret character. Then we end the interviews with Jim Zub, a writer for Marvel and DC Comics as well as the writer of the Baldur's Gate comic series.
Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms will be available for PlayStation®4 on December 11th and Xbox One on December 14th, 2018 in North America.
Idle Champions coming to PlayStation and Xbox
Posted in Codename News, Idle Champions.
Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms, Coming to PlayStation®4 and Xbox One
We are delighted to announce the launch dates of Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One this December! If you own a PS4, be sure to check the PlayStation Store on Tuesday 11th December when the game will be available. XB1 owners will be able to install the game on Friday 14th December.
At launch, players will be able to buy a Founder's Pack we've created to celebrate the launch of Idle Champions on both consoles. This awesome new package contains a serious amount of cool content that will enable players to kick off their campaigns in style. But don't worry - this new pack won't be console-exclusive! That's right: the Founders Pack will be available across all platforms, so even if you don't have a PS4 or XB1, you won't miss out!
The launch of Idle Champions on PS4 and XB1 also debuts a significant design update that we're extremely proud of. The game's user interface has been completely redesigned from the ground up to work with console controllers, and we think players will agree that it is a great new look for the game.
Founders Pack
In honor of the launch of Idle Champions on PS4 and XB1, we have created a brand new Founder's Pack to help you kick off your adventure! The Founder's Pack is full of exclusive goodies at an awesome discount!
For USD $19.99, you'll get:
42 Gold Chests.
5 guaranteed Shiny loot cards (50% stronger than their non-shiny counterparts).
5000 Gems that you can use for silver or gold chests, or familiars to help you adventure
10 epic potions and contracts that you can use to help you push further in your adventures.
An exclusive buff for 1 week: Increasing the gem drops by bosses by 50%.
An exclusive familiar (Iris the Beholder)*
An exclusive skin for Celeste (Undead Celeste from Neverwinter's M12 module)
* Iris the Beholder familiar will be available once you reach area 66 in any adventure.
Celebration Week
Our final new big update is that starting on December 14th, we'll be celebrating the launch on Console with a week of in-game freebies on all platforms! That's right, whether you play on PS4, Xbox, PC, iPad or Android tablet, you'll be able to come back for daily rewards during an epic event all week long. All you have to do is log in and play every day to pick up a console celebration chest which has four unique items selected by the Idle Champions team! Collect 4 of the chests to unlock an additional five Gold Chests, and a free Golden Epic card for Joe Manganiello's Arkhan the Cruel!
Mark your calendars! We are very excited to welcome even more fans to the Idle Champions' family.
Announcing: Binwin Plays Idle Champions
Tags: idle, champions, binwin plays.
"You can kill the man, but you can't kill his brand."
—Binwin Bronzebottom
As we announced in our livestream last week, Binwin Bronzebottom, who most recently critted a javelin throw into the Xanathar's eye and was subsequently petrified and disintegrated in front of the Wafflecrew, is back! Today we're unleashing even more Idle Champions fun onto the D&D Twitch channel! The only-mostly-dead Binwin Bronzebottom makes his triumphant return to the D&D Twitch channel for his new show, Binwin Plays Idle Champions!
Tune in every Tuesday at 12:00pm Pacific to join Binwin for an hour wisecracking and fun, while he learns the best way to sub-optimally play Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms. Comment on his formation! Make him RAGE! Watch him try to kill all the seagulls! Come for the chest code, stay for the laughs!
That's right, Chris Perkins: you can kill the man, but you really can't kill his brand!
Binwin Plays Idle Champions will air on the Official Dungeons & Dragons Twitch channel on Tuesdays between 12:00pm and 1:00pm Pacific before Mike Mearls' Happy Fun Hour. No Binwins or Twinwins were disintegrated in the making of this production. Praise Perkins.
Twitch Plays Idle Champions Launched Today
Tags: idle, champions, early, access, twitch, plays.
Twitch Plays Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms Launched Today
VICTORIA, BC – December 14, 2017 - Codename Entertainment is proud to announce the launch of Twitch Plays Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms. Now players can combine their idle clicker expertise and play the highly-rated PC game together with thousands of other members of the community 24 hours a day.
Twitch Plays Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms enables fans to play collaboratively, entering commands, and voting on significant actions in real-time. The options include choosing the formation strategy of the party, when to use Ultimate Attacks, and even when to reset and start a new adventure.
Twitch Plays Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms is available to play right now on its own dedicated Twitch channel (www.twitch.tv/twitchplaysidlechampions) plus it will be featured regularly on the official Dungeons & Dragons Twitch channel (www.twitch.tv/dnd).
Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms is an official free-to-play Dungeons & Dragons-based clicker game. Assemble a party of Champions and master the art of Formation Strategy. Upgrade your heroes, collect unique gear, and unlock new Champions in regular new events.
Go to www.IdleChampions.com for further information on the game and search for Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms on Steam.
About Idle Champions
Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms, the world's first idle clicker game set in the celebrated universe of the Forgotten Realms. The game is indie studio Codename Entertainment's first licensed video game in partnership with Dungeons & Dragons. The game has appeared consistently in the Top 100 games by concurrent player count since launch: store.steampowered.com/stats
About Codename Entertainment
Codename Entertainment Inc. is the award-winning indie video game studio based in Victoria, British Columbia. The studio's previous game, Crusaders of the Lost Idols, has remained popular since launching in 2015. It has stayed in the Top 1% of games by concurrent player count on Steam. It's also one of the Most Played games out of more 113,000 on Kongregate.com, and it is consistently ranked in the Most Popular Games on Armorgames.com.
About Wizards of the Coast
Wizards of the Coast LLC, a subsidiary of Hasbro, Inc. (NASDAQ:HAS), is the leader in entertaining the lifestyle gamer. Wizards' players and fans are members of a global community bound together by their love of both digital gaming and in-person play. The company brings to market a range of gaming experiences under powerful brand names such as Magic: The Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons. For more information about our world renowned brands, visit the Wizards of the Coast Web site at www.wizards.com
The characters Arkhan and Chango are trademarks of 3:59, Inc. and are used with permission. © 2017 3:59, Inc. All Rights Reserved. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
Clive Gorman
clive@codenameentertainment.com


Abstract: This set of 27 Policy Briefs on SDG 7 and its interlinkages with other SDGs has been compiled by the multi-stakeholder SDG7 Technical Advisory Group. It provides fact-based assessment on where we are now and what needs to be done between now to 2030 to scale up and accelerate energy innovation, finance and capacity-building. This three-part briefing will serve as a global platform to launch the "Accelerating SDG7 Achievement: Policy Briefs in support of the first SDG7 review at the UN High Level Political Forum 2018" .


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Interview with Oceans Ate Alaska
I did really want that banana…
MR's Nathan Daniel had the chance to catch up with all of Oceans Ate Alaska at Hit The Deck Festival. They've had a lot going on of recent, signing to Fearless Records not so long ago and releasing their debut album. Here's what they had to say.
You guys have had a huge year so far, and we're only 4 months in! For those that might not have been so aware, would you mind giving us a little bit of a history to OAA?
James: We're Oceans Ate Alaska, we started the band 3 years ago and we're from Birmingham. Most people will say it's a weird name or "what are you named after?" Basically, our name is after the biggest tsunami in human history that happened in the 1950s in the US and it comes from a newspaper headline!
Chris: I'm Chris the drummer – I hit things with sticks, I write things and I record things as well.
James: Chris and Jibs have been friends for years. They originally started the band off together with two other members that have left us to go to uni. They came across me on an online advertisement on a website called 'joinmyband.com' and we had a few practices together under a different name and they decided that we'd work on something together. Over the next year, we found our guitarist and bassist!
Have you had chance to step back and take in the reception that Lost Isles has received? What's it been like for you guys?
We've seen the response, yeah. It's been crazy, just the response of people from countries that you wouldn't expect. On the last European tour, we were playing places we'd never even heard of and never been to and then these people are rocking up and singing all the words to our stuff that's only been out for about a week. That's sick. Seeing the physical CD on sale in Japan and stuff is mad, too!
What have you guys made of Hit The Deck so far, then? How was Bristol?
It was great! We played the furthest venue away from the main academy, but we still got a brilliant turn out and it was fun! The only down side was nothing to do with our set – after we finished, it started raining, so we couldn't really go out and see anyone else because of the walk between the venues! We wanted ribs, but we couldn't leave the van to get ribs, haha! But then we did find ribs…
Recording the album out in Michigan must have been an amazing experience – despite sleeping in the studio. If you could pick anywhere to go to record, where would it be?
Yeah, sleeping was the worst part! The first night was the worst, but after that it was okay. Having no running water for 5 weeks was pretty shite, no showers and minus 20 degree temperatures!
There's that place that Architects went to record their last album, I think it was in Sweden? It's sick there; they let you record after they've finished their hours, which would be pretty cool. We do a lot of our demos and track stuff ourselves – the cover of 'Drunk In Love' was tracked at home and sent out from there.
So then, how about the weird banana story about the guy from Nottingham when you toured with Blessthefall, have you bumped into him?
He's here today, hanging out. We couldn't believe it! Every time we've played here, he's been here. I mean, it's cool and we do appreciate it. It was just a funny impression for the first time meeting someone and he's definitely mellowed out over the past couple of years. But, on a serious note, I did really want that banana.
You've still not let it go?
You really wanted that banana!
Adam/Jibs/Chris – You guys have done guitar and drums play through recently! When did you all start playing and have you got any advice for anybody starting?
Chris: Don't just play metal is my advice. The amount of drummers I've come across that listen to metal, write metal and then decide to learn drums in metal – all I see when they play is just big gaps. They just need the whole foundation; just learn how to play drums. Obviously enjoy it, but learn everything properly and don't cut corners. I've been playing my whole life! Since I could walk, I've played drums.
Chris – you've joined the Vic Firth family recently. How huge is that?
Chris: I'm announcing more soon, as well! Vic Firth is great though, they're the greatest company in the world. They look after me well and they're really nice. They posted out a photo of me yesterday rock climbing!
You obviously tend tour with a lot of bands that have a similar sort of sound. What artists would you tour with if you had the choice to pick from any genre?
We'd just discussed this, actually. We'd go with Issues, Architects or Bring Me The Horizon.
Sweet! Is there any settling on how the name for the '432 crew' came about?
It's a secret, we can't say. It keeps people guessing and we don't want to ruin that. People have been working it out, though. It's all interesting stuff, so keep guessing. Whatever people think about it, though, if you like our music, you're part of the 432 crew.
The Kerrang! Awards are coming up pretty soon. Are you set to get Best British newcomers, then?
Just to be on the list would be absolutely awesome. We've asked people to nominate us and see what happens. Even if we got down to the final five and didn't win, that wouldn't be a massive deal. Just to be a part of it with people in that category would be great.
Cheers for your time guys. Enjoy your set and I'll catch you there.
OOA on Facebook
Jason.Guest

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


1. Kevin Durant: A true scoring machine that plays in a small market with a great point guard and a team full of role players. I know the knock on Durant, he is a scorer and a scorer only… but, without Durant I think OKC is lottery team.
2. Kobe Bryant: As much as I hate to admit it, it's true. Through everything that the Lakers have been through, Kobe has remained as reliable and dominant as ever. Losing team leader and point guard Derek Fisher along with all around player Lamar Odom was a big hit. Add in the enigmas that are Ron Artest (refuse to call him Metta World Peace, see previous blog) and Andrew Bynum, and Bryant might as well have been playing with the And 1 Mixed Tape Tour Team. Offensively and Defensively Bryant has been solid this year, while having to keep a team together and bearing the load of a new coach and scheme.
3. Rajon Rondo: Kind of a stretch I know, but honestly I think the "old celtics" wouldn't be half the team they are without Rondo. I know he has great talent around him, but it's "aged talent". Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, and Ray Allen are in the twilight of their careers, and are by no means in the prime like Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh. Rondo is the perfect PG for this team, runs the offense to a T, and has shown that he can be counted on to score when needed. Multiple Triple Doubles (including 2 already this post season) show how versatile and important Rondo is to his team. Without Rondo at the point, Boston would be a .500 team in my opinion. Showing just how VALUABLE he is.
Those are my thoughts, i'm interested to hear yours. I try to put my hatred and bias aside when criticizing LBJ, but sometimes he just makes it too easy. Without James the Miami Heat are still an upper echelon team, therefore proving to me LBJ is NOT the MOST VALUABLE PLAYER.
This entry was posted in life, sports, Uncategorized and tagged BASKETBALL, BOSTON CELTICS, KEVIN DURANT, KOBE BRYANT, LA Lakers, LEBRON JAMES, MIAMI HEAT, MOST VALUABLE PLAYER, MVP, NBA, OKLAHOMA CITY THUNDER, RAJON RONDO, sports. Bookmark the permalink.


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The court system in Tamarac, Florida is a government institution of Florida to settle disagreements involving residents of, or events that occurred in, Tamarac.
More likely than not, you will interact with the courts of Tamarac, Florida at least once or twice in your life.
Jury Duty: If you are an adult U.S. Citizen, and live in Tamarac, Florida, you are probably eligible to serve on a jury, and are required to do so if you get a letter from a Tamarac court telling you that you have been selected for jury duty. The selection process is random, and is usually drawn from a list of names on voter registration rolls, or a list of drivers licenses. When you show up, you, and many other possible jurors, will be directed to a courtroom in which there is an upcoming trial. You will then go through the jury selection process, where the lawyers for each side are allowed to summarily dismiss a certain number of jurors, for any reason they want. If you are dismissed in this manner, your service is complete, and you can go home, usually after signing a few documents.
Filing a Lawsuit: if you sue someone in Tamarac, Florida, you will most definitely interact with the local court system - a lot. Even if the case never goes to trial, you will have to deal with pre-trial motions, discovery requests, and case management conferences. You will definitely become more aware about the Tamarac, Florida court system than you ever wanted to be.
Being Sued: Likewise, if you are sued, you will have your work cut out for you in the courts of Tamarac, Florida. You, or your attorney, will have to file an answer to the complaint, and many other documents. You might also have to attend discovery proceedings, or case management conferences.
Divorce: While not all divorces in Tamarac, Florida require the partners to spend a significant period of time in court, some of them do, especially when disagreements arise that the spouses can't settle amongst themselves.
How Can A Tamarac, Florida Tort Lawyer Help?
Most people who have to deal with Tamarac, Florida's courts do so because they are facing extremely perplexing legal issues, or disputes that they cannot resolve on their own.
Thus, it's prudent to consult with an experienced civil attorney in Tamarac, Florida if you feel that you will be encountering the court system in the near future.


Despite recent progress in some areas, Malawi remains one of the poorest countries in the world: 6th poorest based on their GDP and 170/188 countries on the Human Development Index. 70% of the population lives below the international extreme poverty line of $2 a day. Malawi's HIV prevalence is one of the highest in the world, with 9% of adults living with HIV. The most recent data found that Malawi only had one doctor for every 55,000 people (in the UK, it is 1: 350). Only 62% of Malawi's adult population can read and write. 7% have access to electricity.
We train and support churches of all denominations across the country so they can help hundreds of communities. Our staff team are based in the head office in Blantyre, with field offices in Lilongwe, Zomba, Chikwawa, Balaka and Mzuzu.
Famine hit Malawi in 2002. Living Waters Church set up Eagles to help tackle hunger in the villages and find long-term solutions to the food crisis. Our vision, now a reality, was to equip churches in every district to work with their communities to bring change using local resources and reach those most in need.


709 E. Taylor was home to Harold Sinclair when he wrote "The Horse Soldiers", later a movie starring John Wayne and William Holden.
Abraham Lincoln was among those who gathered at 705/507 E. Grove, the home of Kersey Fell, known as the social center of Bloomington.
President Grant was a guest at a reception at the home of Judge Lawrence Weldon at 407 E. Grove.
Dimmitt's Grove neighborhood has a rich historical heritage. Many of our homes date from the mid-1800's, with diverse architectural styles, including Queen Anne, Italianate, and Four Square. Residents throughout our history have made important contributions to our community, with influences reaching beyond central Illinois.
We want to share our history with people who drive or walk around Dimmitt's Grove.One way to accomplish this will be to install signs in front of some of our homes that illustrates our history. You may have noticed the signs that were installed to 13 homes last year in our first round. They were a huge success, and you may have read the article in the Pantagraph showcasing them.
These colorful signs are 18" X 24", printed on aluminum with historical facts about each home. Information will include the builder/architect, date of construction, architectural style, residents and their accomplishments.
The content and location of each sign will be developed as a result of collaboration between the homeowner and our neighborhood sign committee. Each sign will have a unique QR code which will link "smart phone" owners to additional information on our website. If you are interested in participating, but don't know very much about your home, we can help research.
The cost of each sign and installation will be shared equally between the homeowner and DGNA. If we have 12 sign designs ready to go the total cost for sign production and installation will be $100 for home owner and $100 by the neighborhood association.
If you would like to participate please fill in the form, then mail it with a check (Dimmitt's Grove Neighborhood Association) to: Ken Kashian, 510 E. Grove St, Bloomington, IL, 61701. Applications and payments are due by June 30, 2019. Please remember that if you are having trouble with your house's history we can help.
We are installing 12 signs this year. Please let us know of your interest ASAP. First come…First served.
For further questions please email: kenkashian@yahoo.com.


Punjabi is the language of Punjab state in India. We are provding free punjabi fonts for download. After download install the punjabi font on your system then you. GHW Dukandar, an informal font, designed to look like Punjabi shorthand, for example the kind of handwriting that a All fonts available here use this key map . All rights reserved. Font family. Punjabi. Font subfamily. Normal. Unique subfamily identification. Alts:Punjabi. Full font name. Punjabi. Name table version .
India Time: PM; Dhaka: PM; Dubai: PM; Qatar: PM; UK: PM; New York: PM; Sydney: AM. Home > Punjabi Fonts. Download Punjabi Fonts for Windows and Macintosh. Browse by popularity, category or alphabetical listing. Search results for tag: punjabiClearView All Tags. Typing Tutor Software for Hindi Mangal Unicode Punjabi Raavi Unicode and Asees Font Training Punjabi Fonts All In One Punjabi Font Gurmukhi Akhar.
Download Free Unicode font for Punjabi Language. Type in Punjabi language using these free Punjabi Fonts for Windows. Download Gurmukhi / Punjabi Fonts. Download Gurmukhi / Punjabi Fonts from here. . All fonts available here use this key map. keymap. All fonts available here use this key map Click "File" and then "Install New Font" . fonts with variations in display that are suitable for writing modern Punjabi.


Chartering at the highest level is highly addictive and demand for charters is always extremely high, especially during the peak season months of July and August or during the Christmas/New Year period. Although our brokers are skilled at finding yachts with last minute availability, we strongly recommend that clients book as early as possible to have the best choice of yachts. Contact one of our charter brokers to start planning your next charter in good time.


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Phillies Get Solid Effort from Kyle Kendrick, Howard homers in Shutout of Braves
May 8, 2011 / chrismsports
After managing just two hits and zero runs in the previous night against the Atlanta Braves, the Phillies offense did not score runs in bunches, but then again just about anything is better than the lack of offense from the previous night.
More importantly, the Phillies (22-10) came away with a 3-0 win over the Atlanta Braves on a cool night at Citzens Bank Park.
On a night where the offenses of both teams didn't necessarily overwhelm anyone, the Phillies managed to push across enough runs to put them over top thanks to a solo homerun to right center by first baseman Ryan Howard and an RBI triple by Shane Victorino that scored Jimmy Rollins. Second baseman Pete Orr drove in a run on a ground out.
Even though Charlie Manuel likes to see his team push across lots of runs with the big inning, he is just going to have to accept those nights when the team scores three runs or less and can come away with a win. That's not a bad thing at all.
The Phillies went up against 20-year-old rookie Julio Teheran, who was rated as one of the top young pitching prospect in the Braves organization by Baseball America and was making his major league debut. In four and two-thirds innings, Teheran allowed three runs on four hits with a strikeout and a homerun. The Phillies were impressed with the youngster's potential.
"I think he's got good stuff, he's got a good change up, he mixed it up pretty well," Howard said. "He's got a good curve ball. I think once he gets more experience and he'll mix it up better. Just for him he needs more experience and he'll be alright."
With Roy Oswalt on the disabled list, Kyle Kendrick (2-2) didn't have a Cliff Lee or Roy Halladay-like performance, but he was solid in five innings of work and came away with the win. He allowed no runs on just two hits with three strikeouts and a walk. In 15 of his last 30 starts he's allowed two runs or less.
"He kept the ball down good tonight," Manuel said. "I thought the fast ball was his biggest weapon. I thought that he moved the ball in and out. He didn't throw too many balls high, especially to left-handed hitters. He did a good job with lefties tonight."
The major area in which Kendrick has improved as a pitcher is that he has increased his arsenal of pitches. In addition to his fast ball and his sinker, he's added a cut fastball and a changeup.
"It's definitely a lot better than the last couple of years," Kendrick said. "I think it's just maturing and working on your pitches. My cutter has gotten a lot better and my changeup, too. It's helped me out a bunch. Like we talked about back in 2008 when I got sent down (to the minors) to work on my offspeed pitches. I think it's come a long way and it makes pitching a lot easier."
Relievers J.C. Romero, Michael Stutes, Antonio Bastardo and Ryan Madson,who got the save, closed the door on the Braves and allowed just two hits from the sixth through the ninth inning.
"All of pitchers and that includes our whole bullpen have been pretty good," Manuel said. "I'd say we are a pitching team."
The Phillies scored their first run of the game in the second inning on an RBI ground out by Pete Orr that scored Ben Francisco.They increased their lead to 2-0 on a solo shot to right center by Howard to open the fourth inning.
With that homerun, Howard hit his 260th career and moved into sole possesion of second place past Del Ennis on the Phillies all-time career home run list. During the Phillies postgame show, Phils color commentary Gary "Sarge" Matthews read a letter from Ennis's wife, Liz, congratulating Howard on his accomplishment.
In the fifth, the Phillies scored their final run of the game on a run-scoring triple by Victorino that brought home Rollins.
← Lee Strikes Out 16, but Gets No Run Support in Phils Shutout Loss to Atlanta
Lee shuts down his old team, Howard breaks out of his slump →


We interviewed Dr. Alfred R. Mele, Director of the new John Templeton Foundation grant program, "Big Questions in Free Will." Mele is the William H. Lucyle T. Werkmeister Professor at Florida State University. The purpose of the program is "to improve our understanding of free will in three spheres: science (especially neuroscience and social philosophy); philosophy; and theology."
You are a noteworthy contributor to discussions on free will, agency, rationality, consciousness, and philosophy of action. First, give us a summary about your own work and your perspective on free will. How did you get into this area? What do you find interesting about it?
I have some sense of the causal path that led to my deciding to tackle free will. My dissertation was entitled Aristotle's Theory of Human Motivation. During my first few years as an assistant professor, I thought I would devote my career to ancient Greek philosophy. But I soon got caught up in the issues in the philosophy of action that concerned Plato and Aristotle. My first book (Irrationality, 1987) is on weakness of will (or akrasia in Classical Greek), self-control, and self-deception; my point of departure on the first two topics was classical work on them. My second book, (Springs of Action, 1992) is a step toward the development of a general causal theory about how intentional actions are to be explained. Not long after I completed it, I came to believe that a theory of this kind might help improve our understanding of free action.
In my opinion, the main competing theories about the concept of free will (or free action) have been developed much more thoroughly than was the case even fifteen years ago, and we have a much clearer view of the main problems for each position and interesting proposed resolutions of some of those problems. Perhaps the dispute between compatibilists and incompatibilists will persist as long as philosophy does, but progress on an issue doesn't require universal agreement about it. My own tack – both in Autonomous Agents (1995) and in Free Will and Luck (2006) – has included developing two overlapping conceptions of free will: one for compatibilists and the other for incompatibilists. Given my incompatibilist conception, whether any human being ever acts freely is a challenging question. The answer depends on, among other things, whether human brains are suitably indeterministic. And who knows what future neuroscience may turn up? If my compatibilist conception of free will is correct, it is a good bet that there is a lot of free action.
What do you see as some prevailing trends (say, within the last 10 to 15 years) between scientific, philosophical, and theological discussions on free will?
One trend in scientific work on free will is skepticism about its existence. Each of the following claims has been defended in the scientific literature on free will and consciousness in the last few years (and earlier): your brain routinely decides what you will do before you become conscious of its decision; there is only a 100 millisecond window of opportunity for free will, and all it can do is veto conscious decisions, intentions, or urges; intentions never play a role in producing corresponding actions; and free will is an illusion. In Effective Intentions: The Power of Conscious Will (2009), I take up each of these claims and I argue that the evidence offered to support them is sorely deficient. I also argue that there is strong empirical support for the thesis that some conscious decisions and intentions have a genuine place in causal explanations of corresponding actions.
Another trend in scientific work on free will is a backlash against the skeptical claims. Psychologist Roy Baumeister has been a strong critic of those claims.
In philosophical work on free will, one trend that I see is persistence. Compatibilists persist in replying to incompatibilist arguments and in developing their own positive views. Incompatibilists persist in developing arguments against compatibilism, and some incompatibilists continue to develop and defend positive libertarian views. Another trend is to investigate folk conceptions of free will by means of survey studies of the sort conducted by experimental philosophers. I see both trends as contributing to progress in understanding how to conceive of free will.
In the sphere of the theology of free will, I am an amateur. I teach an undergraduate course in the philosophy of religion on a regular basis, and in it I devote a very enjoyable block of time to issues about human free will and divine foreknowledge. But I have not published in this area, and I am not qualified to venture an opinion about trends. In this sphere, I see myself as a student; and I'm happy to learn.
What are you hoping to accomplish with the grant program from the Templeton Foundation? Who all is involved (and how) in the decision-making for any of the proposals?
I'm hoping that the grant will enable us to make much more progress on free will than would be made without it. In science, we hope to encourage studies that target free will more directly than much existing work in the science of free will does. In philosophy, we'll encourage, among other things, development of improved models of free will; and the same goes for theology.
In each of the three areas, we'll solicit letters of intent and then invite some of the letter writers to submit full proposals. Decisions about letters of intent and proposals will be made by five-person panels – different panels for different fields. A representative of the John Templeton Foundation and I will be on each panel. On this see the Big Questions in Free Will website: http://www.freewillandscience.com.
Can you give us a broad sweep of the four-year projects related to this program?
To what extent (if at all) should proposals be interdisciplinary or at least attentive to interdisciplinary issues?
We are especially encouraging interdisciplinary work in the science branch of the project.
For the grant program, are you intending to encourage a particular view of how science and religion (theology) or science and philosophy are to relate to each other?
We believe that work in each area should be informed by work in the other areas whenever that would be useful. We also believe that this will often be useful.
Are you more likely or less likely to seriously consider a proposal if the operating philosophical assumptions tend to support or reject a physicalistic view of free will? Are you more likely or less likely to seriously consider a proposal if the operating philosophical assumptions tend to support or reject a dualistic view of free will? Can you briefly elaborate?
The Theoretical Underpinnings arm of the Big Questions in Free Will program does have a special interest in incompatibilist models of free will, including both developments and critiques of such models. Compatibilist critiques of incompatibilist models, views, and arguments will certainly be considered seriously. Proposals for projects that assume that compatibilism is true probably would not be competitive.
Such questions as "Is free will possible if substance dualism is true?" and "Is free will possible if physicalism is true?" are legitimate topics of investigation. A scholar might approach the first by assuming that dualism is true and the second by assuming that physicalism is true. But, of course, these assumptions apparently leave it open whether the answer is yes or no.
How do you think self-identified Christians or theists working in philosophy or philosophical theology can potentially contribute to work on free will for this program?
Some self-identified Christians are, of course, major figures in contemporary work on free will – for example, Tim O'Connor, Eleonore Stump, and Peter van Inwagen. Work of this caliber from members of the EPS would obviously be highly valued. For information on theology of free will projects, see the "theology of free will" grants section on the Big Questions in Free Will website.
I've always believed that the best defense is a good offense. Culturally speaking, however, the New Atheists have been the ones on the offensive in their attacks on religious belief in general and Christianity in particular. Christian apologists have made some very good replies to most of their attacks on Christian belief (which are really nothing more than the same old tired arguments that we've had to put to rest before). Yet, the New Atheists are getting a lot of rhetorical mileage in the popular culture with their incessant charge that religious belief is inherently irrational, without evidence, motivated by psychological needs.
How refreshing, then, to read Jim Spiegel's new book, The Making of an Atheist, in which he makes an end run around all the lame anti-theistic arguments and baseless psycho-analyses of believers, and goes on the offensive by exposing the nonrational, psychological and (im)moral foundations of atheism. In this work, Spiegel shows that, contrary to the pretensions of contemporary atheists, their unbelief is not based on evidence (or a lack of evidence for theism), but is ultimately the result of sin and rebellion as indicated by the apostle Paul in Romans 1.
In chapter one, Spiegel briefly reviews two of the major lines of argument utilized by the New Atheists in their critique of theism: "the problem of evil and the scientific irrelevancy of God" (p. 24). Concerning the former, Spiegel mentions the major theodicies employed by theists in response, but notes that the evidence of evil can never really count for atheism because (1) it doesn't nullify all of the abundant positive evidence for the existence of God, and (2) the whole idea of evil is incoherent unless God exists (since values like good and evil presupppose God). As for the scientific irrelevancy of God, Spiegel rehearses the well-known problems with positivism and scientism, and points out that naturalism can account neither for the existence and design of the cosmos nor for the value and meaning of human life.
Interestingly, Spiegel ends chapter one with a discussion of the positive insights of atheism. For instance, atheists are right to point out that numerous evils have been done in the name of religion. Also, the moral complacency often displayed by professing believers as well as their tendency to engage in God-of-the-gaps reasoning in science are places where unbelievers are correct to raise concerns. These and other problems Spiegel call "theistic malpractice," and he notes that while they do call Christians to greater consistency in Christian living, they actually confirm the Christian doctrine of sin, being what we would expect to be the case if Christianity were true.
Chapter two demonstrates the irrationality of atheism in two ways. First, by outlining the abundant evidence for the existence of God found in the laws of nature, the incredible fine-tuning of the universe for life, and the origin of life. Second, by describing Alvin Plantinga's argument to the affect that naturalism, coupled with Darwinism, proves to be self-defeating by undermining the very possibility of knowledge. But if atheism is so clearly false, why are there atheists at all? Spiegel offers a biblical diagnosis, namely, that atheists are morally deficient (Ps. 14:1; Prov. 18:2; Eph. 4:17-19; Rom 1:18-23, etc.). The problem is not a lack of intelligence or of evidence, but "the 'wickedness' of the unbeliever works to 'suppress' what is manifest in nature. Consequently, the unbelievers's capacity for rational thought is compromised" (p. 53). This diagnosis finds some anecdotal confirmation in the bitterness and rage displayed toward God by some of the New Atheists as well as in Spiegel's personal observation of atheists who fell into unbelief after some episode of personal rebellion. These observations seem symptomatic of nonrational factors at work in producing atheism.
The heart of the book is chapter three. Here Spiegel provides empirical evidence to support the biblical diagnosis of atheism that he offered in chapter two. First, he sketches the research of Paul Vitz who has shown that atheists typically suffer from what he calls "the defective father syndrome." Surveying the lives of many renowed atheists, Vitz revealed that in each case they had either a father who died when they were very young, a father who deserted the family wheny they were young, or a father who was abusive or ineffectual, or otherwise unworthy of respect. Spiegel extends Vitz's research to show that those New Atheists who we have enough information about (Dennett and Hitchens) also suffer from the defective father syndrome. Apparently, having a defective father provides a necessary condition for atheism. A person with a poor relationship with his earthly father is disposed to project the bitterness and resentment he has toward him onto his "heavenly Father" as well.
Of course, a necessary condition is not a sufficient condition. Combined with the defective father syndrome, Spiegel points out, there is also "a persistent immoral response of some sort, such as resentment, hatred, vanity, unforgiveness, or abject pride. And when that rebellion is deep or protracted enough, atheism results (p. 81). The most egregious of these moral defects that lead to atheism is "chronic sexual misbehavior." To prove his point, Spiegel surveys the works of Paul Johnson and E. Michael Jones who demontrate that prominate atheist and agnostic intellectuals lived egotistical, callous (ignoring or abandoning children), sexually promiscuous lifestyles. And it seems evident not only to Speigel, but to many of these intellectuals themselves, that there was a direct connection between their lifestyles and their unbelief. For example, P.B. Shelley remarked that "the philosophy of meaninglessness was esentially an instrument of liberation," and Aldous Huxley admits, "Those who detect no meaning in the world generally do so because, for one reason or another, it suits their books that the world should be meaningless."
Spiegel closes chapter three by discussing the role of the will in the production of atheism. Appealing to William James's concept of the "will to believe," Spiegel argues that atheists, though traumatized by defective fathers and motivated by perverse sinful desires, ultimately choose to disbelieve in God. The arguments and "evidences" offered by atheists for unbelief are simply smokescreens and facades. The real reason for atheism is rebellion.
In chapter four, Spiegel deals with the "obstinacy of atheism," the fact that atheists can be deeply and dogmatically entrenched in their unbelief (in the same way that believers can be entrenched in religious belief). He helpfully explains this entrenchment in terms of worldviews and Thomas Kuhn's scientific "paradigms." Appealing to Kuhn's notions of the incommensurability of paradigms, the near-impossibility of falsifying them, and the nonrational factors that play a role in paradigm shifts, Spiegel shows why believers and unbelievers seem to live in different "worlds," and why atheists cannot seem to see what appears so obvious to believers, namely, the overwhelming evidence for God. Atheist can't see that evidence because the worldview paradigms in which they have entrenched themselves (materialistic naturalism and relativism) prevent them from seeing it--Spiegel calls this "paradigm-induced blindness."
Spiegel takes the reader at this point to Calvin's notion of the sensus divinitatis. All human beings are born with an innate capacity for direct and personal awareness of God. This "sense of the divine" is primarily what explains the pervasiveness of theistic belief. What is it, then, that leads to the paradigm-induced blindness that the atheist suffers from? Following Plantinga, Spiegel answers that it is the congnitive malfunction of the sensus divinitatis. With this, Spiegel's analysis if the psychology of atheism is complete. He summarizes it thus: "The descent into atheism is caused by a complex of moral-psychological factors. . . . The atheist willfully rejects rejects God, though this is precipitated by immoral indulgences and typically a broken relationship with his or her father. . . . The hardening of the atheistic mind-set occurs through congitive malfunction due to two principle causes. First, atheists suffer from paradigm-induced blindness. . . . Second, atheists suffer from damage to the sensus divinitatis, so their natural awareness of God is severly impeded" (pp. 113-14).
In the fifth and final chapter, Spiegel calls "The Blessings of Theism." Perhaps a better title would be "The Blessings of Virtue." He begins by pointing out that the life of virtue lived by Christian theists is a powerful apologetic tool, especially for atheists who, because of their paradigm-induced blindness, may be incapable of appreciating the merit of our apologetic arguments. Movever, living the virtuous life helps to maintain faith and theistic belief because it helps avoid those vices that can give one a motive for unbelief. Also, given the truth of theism and the connection between virtue and truth acquisition, "the more viruously one lives, the more truths one is able to access, including truths about God and how to obey him" (p. 117). Spiegel goes on to show that theistic belief has some special emotional benefits unavailable to the atheist, such as the right to complain in the face of injustice and the privilege of thanksgiving. He concludes with an admonition to Christians to live virtuously for the sake of reaching atheists with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
The Making of an Atheist is a welcome addition to the growing literature responding to the New Atheism. Its unique contribution lies in its head-on attack on the root causes of atheism, turning the tables by showing that it is not the theist who suffers from an irrational psychological wish-fulfillment, but the atheist who is in fact in the grip of a powerful, self-induced delusion. The book is written in a popular style and at a level for the lay reader. It will no doubt be criticized for its lack of philosophical rigor in places (places where Spiegel summarizes the more detailed work of others), but Spiegel effectively throws down the gauntlet before the atheist and challenges him to respond to the charge that his unbelief is unjustified and motivated by sin. It will not do for him to simply reply that Spiegel's attack is just an ad hominem one. Spiegel has provided ample evidence that not only are atheists guilty of sinful, rebellious behavior, but that this sinfulness affects their arguments. Christians need to read this book for the encouragement it gives them and the insight it provides into the psychology of unbelief. Atheists need to read it because of the serious challenge that it makes to their unbelief, a challenge that confirms Paul's assertion that unbelievers "are without excuse" (Rom 1:20).


text:
Q: ClojureScript Dropdown Menu I have a html page that contains a navigation bar at the top of the screen. In the navigation bar, I have a search box and what I want it to do is, you type in this box, hit enter and the results are displayed as a dropdown menu

<input type="text" id="search-bar" placeholder="Search">

This is the html search input box. I have given it an id search-bar to eventually create the dropdown menu in ClojureScript
(when-let [section (. js/document (getElementById "search-bar"))]
                (r/render-component [search-bar-component] section))

Currently I have a search-form that looks like the following
(defn search-form
  []
  [:div
   [:p "What are you searching for? "
    [:input
     {:type :text
      :name :search
      :on-change #(do
                    (swap! fields assoc :search (-> % .-target .-value))
                    (search-index (:search @fields)))
      :value (:search @fields)}]]
   [:p (create-links @search-results)]])

(defn- search-component
  []
  [search-form])

This is my search-component.
What I want to happen is when you type in the input box on the navbar (say "hello", it calls search-index from the search-form with the parameter being the value you type in ("hello") and then returns the results as a dropdown menu below.
search-form works right now as a form on a html page, where you input some text into a form and then the results are displayed below. I want to change it to be on the navbar instead of as a separate page, where the input form is on the navbar and the results are displayed below
How would I have to change my search-form in order to do this?
I think I can do something along the lines of this
(defn search-bar-form
      []
      [:div
       [:input
        {:type :text
         :name :search
         :on-change #(do
                       (swap! fields assoc :search (-> % .-target .-value))
                       (search-index (:search @fields)))
         :value (:search @fields)}]
       [:p (create-links @search-results)]])

(defn- search-bar-component
       []
       [search-form])

Any help would be much appreciated.

A: re-com provides a typeahead component. It looks like you're using reagent, so you could just use that, otherwise you can use it as inspiration.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


We're sorry but the gallery is now fully booked for this year's Fringe.
We've managed to squeeze in 65 performances including music, theatre, comedy, poetry and storytelling. Tickets will go on sale on 1st April.
The Green Man is one of only three managed venues in Buxton Fringe and it is very popular with performers.
Contact us early next year to avoid disappointment.


An assortment of our sandwiches made as yummy wraps. We use tomato basil, honey wheat and flour tortillas to bring flavor and color to our delicious wraps. The 6-10 serving includes 12 half pieces, the 10-20 serving includes 24 half pieces.
A pairing of wraps to our recipes.
A new take on the traditional sandwich. Our wraps are made with a selection of four delicious tortillas paired with our signature sandwich recipes.
The pairings end up tasting great and offers your guests a way to enjoy a new experience for lunch.
Each tortilla is carefully wrapped and cut in half to your guests to enjoy.
We also offer our wraps with a limited menu as a pinwheel party platter which are wraps cut into small bite sized appetizers.
The wrap platter includes an assortment of wraps that we hand select for your event, it includes vegetarian choices.
However, you do have the option of customizing your own wrap selection. To do so, simply leave a note at checkout with your selection or contact a concierge to make the changes.
10-20 Serving size includes 12 full wraps cut in half for 24 half pieces.
Additional wraps can be added if needed. Leave a note at checkout or contact a catering concierge.


text:
Covid-19: PCC backs campaign to protect key workers
Matthew Scott has spoken to the Chief Constable of Kent Police about the important role pharmacists are playing in the fight against Covid-19.
The Pharmacists' Defence Association contacted Police and Crime Commissioners, including Mr Scott, calling upon them to support a campaign to prevent violence in community pharmacies.
Mr Scott raised the matter with the Chief Constable at one of his regular holding to account meetings earlier this month. These are taking place regularly but remotely while the PCC and his staff observe social distancing.
Afterwards, Mr Scott said:
'I take the issue of violence in any workplace extremely seriously and was a supporter of the need for improved legislation to protect those who protect and serve the community. I condemn anyone who, especially at this difficult time, chooses to attack key workers. I have been reassured by the force that it will always ensure that where appropriate, legislation is used to prosecute offenders.
'In addition, I am aware that police patrols are visiting pharmacies to offer reassurance to both the public and the staff.'


Stone and pearls are embellished on golden threads that come along with roli and chawal. The black satin pillow has a text printed in white - Being brother and sister means always being there for each other. Personalization can be done by adding a photo of 300 dpi resolution.


Hi Tilal, any chance you could drop Google Music into the next build?
Nope sorry. I want to keep it as close to CM 9 as possible. I can make a flash able zip for you though.
are we nearing a newer release ? or are you waiting to fix bigger things like HW acceleration etc to release a new version ?
Graphics glitches and bluetooth audio fixes will be great when they come!
Thanks for your efforts, VERY appreciated, you're faster than an army of Chinese guys!
Hw video decoding is now working!!
Was it "just" a lib file or a kernel fix? I'm asking because I have a blade and we used your animation fix too.
Unfortunately not YouTube :( that requires more research.
It's not just youtube that's not working, it's actually any steaming media. Apps like 8tracks don't work neither does html5.grooveshark.com or bandcamp. I think it might be related to the youtube issue.
This rom's changelog mentions fixing youtube fc maybe it's the same error? Might worth looking at it.
Is everyone else running this ROM have high battery drain? I lost 30% over night.
Tried this yesterday and it's so good!! Seems surprisingly stable too considering how soon its come out. Keep up the good work!
Is the Bluetooth audio going to be a difficult fix tilal?
ah does the camera work with another camera app or is it totally broken with this rom?
don't flash cyanogen if your expecting a camera, epic closed source problems.
Deepsleep, graphics glitches and Bluetooth audio fixes would be great when possible. I hope tilal is having a break and hasn't died at his desk of sleep deprivation!
i also hope tilal is having a break. great mind. i'm trying to build the 3.0 kernel for the HW acceleration at the minute, proving to be a quite hard task haha.
My Bluetooth headset works on cm7 but not on this rom.
Re the camera fix, I believe the HD2 is an arm v6 phone.
It seems to have been fixed on this thread, http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1434860, is this of any use in extracting fix?
By the way a great job so far, if this is of no use then my apologies.
deep sleep and graphics glitches are true, what are bluetooth fixes? I'm having no bluetooth problems.
its running pretty well but hope an update comes soon.
How's your kernel getting along? Care to share?
No its not I'm afraid.


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text:
Assessment of the effectiveness of the macroprudential measures implemented in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic
Author(s): Lucas Avezum, Vítor Oliveira, Diogo Serra
Date published: Aug 2021
by Lucas Avezum, Vítor Oliveira and Diogo Serra1
Keywords: Macroprudential policy, capital buffer, Covid-19.
In this Policy Brief, we assess the effectiveness of the macroprudential capital buffers' release on loans granted to households, implemented in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic. We obtain causal estimates by exploring differences in the availability of regulatory buffers prior to the pandemic shock among European countries and accounting for the time-varying effect of unobservable confounding variables with the synthetic control method. We find evidence that the buffers releases contributed, on average, to mitigate the procyclicality of credit to households, specifically for house purchase and for small businesses purposes. For the aggregate household lending, we find that the average treatment effect for both the release of the CCyB and that of the SyRB were positive. However, the results suggest that, for credit associated to small businesses purposes, only the release of the CCyB had an effect.
In 2020, we have witnessed an unprecedented exogenous shock that has disrupted social and economic life across the globe caused by a pandemic of a coronavirus (COVID-19). The containment measures that the great majority of countries across the globe has implemented in order to protect human lives and safeguard public health resulted in a synchronized global sudden stop in economic activity. This makes the global Covid-19 crisis unique, as it negatively impacted both supply and demand (Boissay and Rungcharoenkitkul, 2020).
In addition to the aforementioned measures targeted at preserving public health, several authorities (governments, central banks, regulatory authorities) have put forward other type of policy measures, of a fiscal, monetary and regulatory nature, to mitigate the well-known long-lasting adverse effects the former ones and of the pandemic itself on the economy. In what regards measures taken by the regulatory and supervisory authorities to safeguard financial stability, the materialization of risks caused by the pandemic prompted the implementation of several measures aimed at complementing the aforementioned fiscal and monetary policy responses, ensuring that the balance between preserving financial stability and sustaining economic activity is maintained. These measures include the temporary flexibility in complying with part of the capital requirements and Pillar 2 guidance, with a view to encouraging institutions to make use of their capital buffers, and the release of some macroprudential buffers. The principle of building up capital (and liquidity) buffers to deal with systemic risk materialisation underlies regulatory changes in the wake of the previous international financial crisis, with the purpose of preventing procyclical behavior of the financial system during troubled times, which could exacerbate the effects of an adverse shock. Therefore, by reducing requirements and increasing management buffers, capital releases are expected to incentivise banks in supporting the non-financial private sector.
In recent work, we provide evidence on the effectiveness of releasing macroprudential capital buffer on loans granted to households in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic (Avezum, Oliveira and Serra, 2021). Effectiveness is measured as the average difference between household loan growth in countries where macroprudential requirements were released versus an estimated counterfactual scenario of no buffer release.2 Specifically, the analysis reviews the impact of releasing the Countercyclical Capital Buffer (CCyB) and the Systemic Risk Buffer (SyRB). The assessment focuses on the household sector to minimize the confounding effects that might arise from the interaction with state-guaranteed-loans, which have been mostly intended to support NFCs. Furthermore, to improve the identification, the analysis excludes those European countries with extensive public support measures which could have impacted households beyond buffer releases.
Results suggest that macroprudential buffer releases contributed to mitigating the procyclicality of credit provision to households. Between March and August 2020, credit to households grew, on average, 0.99 percentage points more in countries where buffers were released, when compared to the estimated counterfactual scenario of no release (Figure 1). The intervention period considered starts in March 2020, when most national authorities announced the release of capital buffers. Given implementation lags on the side of banks, it is reasonable to observe a weak effect in March. As a wide range of policy measures were implemented (or relaxed) in 2020, it is reasonable to expect that uncertainty on the estimated effect could increase on impact. Combined, these considerations suggest that the estimated effects during the months of April, May and June should be the most reliable for analysing the impact of buffer releases on lending. Results are in fact statistically significant at the 5% level for the second quarter of 2020 and are robust to a number of tests and further analyses. At the same time, cautiousness is warranted given the modest magnitude of most of the macroprudential releases and the difficulty to identify macroeconomic effects during crisis periods. Nevertheless, the identified results suggest that capital buffer releases supported lending growth during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Figure 1. Impact of buffer releases on household lending
Sources: SDW, OECD data and authors' calculations.
Notes: The gap in cumulative loans growth (black line) is the average difference between the loan growth in countries where a buffer release was implemented and the estimated counterfactual scenario where the buffers were not released. The vertical dashed line separates the pre- from the post-buffer release periods. The dark and light shaded area contain the confidence interval at 10% and 5% level, respectively. The confidence intervals are obtained by bootstrapping placebos, following Acemoglu et al. (2016) and Berger et al. (2020). Therefore, we conclude that a result is significant if the gap in cumulative loans growth is outside the confidence interval.
Both the CCyB and the SyRB releases seem effective in sustaining lending to households. Investigating both releases separately is useful as only the CCyB was conceptually designed to be released; this feature, and the general lack of experience with macroprudential releases, could make banks expect authorities to allow a shorter window to replenish the SyRB and could be thus less effective in relative terms. Nevertheless, between March and August 2020, credit to households grew on average 0.90 and 1.11 percentage points more in countries where the CCyB and SyRB were released, respectively, when compared to the counterfactual (Figure 2).
Figure 2. Impact on household lending by type of capital buffer
The effect of releasing capital buffers on lending to households appears to be driven by lending for house purchase and other lending. On average, between March and August 2020, lending for house purchase grew 0.46 percentage points whereas other lending grew 2.85 percentage points more in countries where buffers were released (Figure 3). The result for lending for house purchase suggests that the overall impact of buffer releases was driven by lending for house purchases (Figure 1). Buffer releases appear to have contributed to mitigating the pandemic's impact on households' real estate investment decisions. Furthermore, the strong result on other lending suggests that released buffers also allowed banks to meet the demand for liquidity in the form of loans granted to households for small business and debt consolidation purposes. Conversely, the effect of buffer releases on credit for consumption was not statistically significant (Figure 3). This result may reflect the impact that containment measures and the uncertainty surrounding the course of the pandemic had on private consumption and, consequently, on credit demand for this segment.
Figure 3. Impact of capital buffer releases on the segments of household lending
Notes: The gap in cumulative loans growth (black line) is the average difference between the loan growth in countries where a buffer release was implemented and the estimated counterfactual scenario where the buffers were not released. The vertical dashed line separates the pre- from the post-buffer release periods. The dark shaded area contains the confidence interval at 10% level. The confidence intervals are obtained by bootstrapping placebos, following Acemoglu et al. (2016) and Berger et al. (2020). Therefore, we conclude that a result is significant if the gap in cumulative loans growth is outside the confidence interval.
In this Policy Brief we assess the effectiveness of the macroprudential measures implemented in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, in particular the impact of the capital buffers' release on loans granted to households.
We find evidence that macroprudential buffers releases contributed, on average, to mitigate the procyclicality of credit to households. Compared to countries that did not release buffers, credit growth to households was 0.99 percentage point higher in countries where there was a buffer release. Our results suggest that the release of capital buffers contributed, first, to mitigate the impact that the containment measures and the uncertainty with respect to the development of the crisis had on households' investment decisions, and, second, to provide finance to loans to households for business purposes, but had a muted effect on loans for consumption. In addition, for aggregate household lending, we find that the average treatment effect was positive for both the countries where the CCyB was released and for the countries where the SyRB was released. However, the results suggest that for credit associated to households' business purposes only the release of the CCyB had an effect.
Our study is the first, to the best of our knowledge, to find a difference in the effect of the release of cyclical and structural buffers on lending. The uncertainties related to capital generation in stressed period and the expectation banks may have that supervisors will require structural buffers to be build up in a shorter period than the CCyB may explain the different effects. Hence, taking into account the policy concern of limiting the procyclical nature of lending and capital requirements, the evidence provided in this study points to the need to further discuss an adjustment of the capital regulation framework to allow for more releasable capital buffers.
Abadie, A. and Gardeazabal, J. (2003). The Economic Costs of Conflict: A Case Study of the Basque Country. The American Economic Review, 93 (1).
Abadie, A., Diamond, A. and Hainmueller, J. (2010). Synthetic Control Methods for Comparative Case Studies: Estimating the Effect of California´s Tobacco Control Program. Journal of the American Statistical Association, 105 (490).
Acemoglu, D., Johnson, S., Kermani, A., Kwak, J., and Mitton, T. (2016). The value of connections in turbulent times: Evidence from the United States. Journal of Financial Economics, 121(2), 368-391.
Avezum, L., Oliveira, V., and Serra, D. (2021). Assessment of the effectiveness of the macroprudential measures implemented in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, Banco de Portugal, Working Papers. Available at: https://www.bportugal.pt/sites/default/files/anexos/papers/wp202107_0.pdf (Accessed: 21 July 2021).
Berger, E., Butler, A., Hu, E. and Zekhnini, M. (2020), Financial Integration and Credit Democratization: Linking Banking Deregulation to Economic Growth. Journal of Financial Intermediation 45:100857.
Boissay, F. and Rungcharoenkitkul, P. (2020). Macroeconomic effects of Covid-19: an early review. BIS Bulletin, no 7, April.
Lucas Avezum is an Economist in the Macroprudential Policy division, in the Financial Stability Department at Banco de Portugal and a PhD candidate in economics at Tilburg University. His current research interests include financial stability, macroprudential policy, and banking.
Vítor Oliveira holds a permanent position as Senior Economist in the Macroprudential Policy division, in the Financial Stability Department at Banco de Portugal. He also holds a non-permanent position as Assistant Professor or Finance in Universidade Autónoma de Lisboa. His current research interests include financial system, in particular the banking system, studying its main risks (idiosyncratic and systemic risks), its regulatory policies (micro- and macroprudential) and the links to the real economy. He has published articles in international journals, such as the International Journal of Central Banking, Financial Markets, Institutions and Instruments, The Journal Network Theory in Finance and Studies in Economics and Finance. His education includes a Master degree in Finance at the Lisbon School of Economics and Management (ISEG-UL) and a Ph.D. degree in Finance in the same University.
Diogo Serra is an Economist in the Macroprudential Policy division, in the Financial Stability Department at Banco de Portugal. His current research interests include financial stability and macroprudential policy. His education includes a Master's degree in Economics at the Nova School of Business and Economics (Nova SBE) and a Bachelor's degree in Economics at the Faculty of Economics of University of Coimbra (FEUC).
Contact: lavezum@bportugal.pt, vmboliveira@bportugal.pt, dserra@bportugal.pt.
The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Banco de Portugal nor of the Eurosystem.
2. ↑ The counterfactual scenarios are obtained using the synthetic control method of Abadie and Gardeazabal, 2003 and Abadie, Diamond, and Hainmueller, 2010. The confidence intervals are obtained by bootstrapping placebos, following Acemoglu et al. (2016) and Berger et al. (2020).
SUERF Policy Briefs (SPBs) serve to promote SUERF Members' economic views and research findings as well as economic policy-oriented analyses. They address topical issues and propose solutions to current economic and financial challenges. SPBs serve to increase the international visibility of SUERF Members' analyses and research. The views expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the institution(s) the author(s).


Dev Note: No new content, this patch focuses more on quality of life features and bug-fixes and spelling error fixes.
Wrong font was being used in the inventory for the display of Health and Mana Stones.
Made it so that in Windows mode you can change windows size.
"Mana Steal" from "Blade Upgrades" now restores 4 mana instead of 2 mana.
"Manawoven" from "Bracer Upgrades" now restores 2 mana instead of 1 mana.
Healing Potions will now heal for 25% of your health instead of 50%, this is to encourage the use of other potions and elixirs.
Stamina Potion will now restore 70% of your stamina instead of 50%.
Stoneskin Elixir will now increase damage resistance by 30% instead of 20%.
Stoneskin Elixir will now cost -1 Collisa Petals and +1 Ore Chunk to brew.
Sharpshooters Elixir will now increase bow damage by 30% instead of 20%.
Conjurers Elixir will now lower arrow cost by 30% instead of 20%.
NOTE: All Elixir will now last 90 seconds instead of 60 seconds.
Lock game logic to framerate (only when above 55) ??
Changed Audio Sample-rate from 41000 to 48000 in order to avoid vibration and artifacts in the base sound.
The "Frost" gate in Haunted Crag is lit up and it will now give you a hint!
Lowered the brightness for the Lore Book pages.
More than 20+ spelling errors and grammar errors have been fixed.
Fixed some missing tiles in one of the Scarab caves and a cave in the Ungola Deeps area.
Fixed an issue where cancelling The Keepers dialogue in the Tower, it played the wrong sound.
Fixed an issue where the wrong icon was being shown for Sharpshooters Elixir on Desert merchant's Shop.
Fixed an issue where The keeper in the Illegarde cave kept respawning and repeating the same hint.
Fixed an issue where going into User Interface while standing next to the house door in Illegarde caused issues.
Made the "Horrid Spider" challenge slightly easier.
Fixed an issue where the "Completionist" achievement only synced in the Main Menu.
Added "Heroic Mode". (You must beat the game in "Normal Mode" to unlock it.) NOTE: due to a bug that has been fixed in this patch, the players who have played the game before the release of patch 1.1.0, have to beat the Final Boss again for the progress to be saved).
Added a number of lore books in the game, these books will explain a few things about the Sacred Lands and more importantly give you an understanding of the bigger world outside of the Sacred Lands.
Fire Arrow tool-tip will no longer tell you that it deals twice damage since it's damage was changed in previous patch.
The Talking Statue in Dreadmire will better explain and "Show" you where to find the key for Deepmire Hollow.
The Soundtrack for "Sandstone Temple" has been changed.
When selecting the Sword, Armor or Bracers icon in inventory, their description will now show how many upgrades you have unlocked.
The Keeper will now show up in Shandri Wastes and tell the player how important it is to sleep and SAVE the game.
The Keeper will show up in a cave in Haunted Crag and tell the player about one of the hidden treasure chests.
You can now catch a new fish called "Diamond Crest Gourami" in the fishing pond.
In The cave where the player finds the Bow, the keeper will now show at the entrance to ensure that the player doesn't miss the conversation with him.
Added some minor performance improvements that nobody will even notice.
Increased drop rate for gold and crafting materials for Normal Mode.
You can now completely skip a dialogue by pressing the "Cancel" button.
Added additional barrels in Tikkie Tower.
Made the Final Boss significantly harder to beat.
The Game Files in Main Menu will now show Difficulty instead of Total Gold.
Removed Social Media Spam from the Pause Menu.
All pre-patch 1.1.0 Players have been returned to Brode's house in Illegarde… For their own safety!
Fixed a visual issue where in the Sword Upgrade menu the letter "e" in "when" was changing it's position when switching between "Life Steal" and "Mana Steal" in the item description.
Some pre-patch 1.1.0 players ended up with extra "Mana Stones" or "Life Stones" at the end of the game due to previous bugs. Extra Mana and Life Stones are now removed from the inventory screen.
There was a bug with the "Mana Stone" sold by the Ghost Merchant in Dreadmire, the bug has been fixed but pre-patch 1.1.0 players will have to purchase it again.
Fixed a visual glitch for one of Ghost Merchant's shop display where a "Mana Stone" was pretending to have been purchased.
Fixed a problem where collision was mission for two of the walls in a cave.
There was a problem with the Final Boss, the progression "That you have defeated the boss" wasn't being saved. Pre-patch 1.1.0 will have to defeat the Final Boss again.
Fixed an audio glitch that sometimes happened when the game launched.
Fixed a spelling error where Bernard was saying "Trail" instead of "Trial".
Fixed an issue where "The Keeper" was misspelling the word "Challenge".
Fixed an issue where "The Keeper" was misspelling the word "Extremely".
The "exclamation mark" for Sorra when she says: "Oh my" was not properly showing up sometimes.
Replaced the old "Sandstone Temple" track with new one.
Changed the background of "Album Cover" so that it looks similar to the background of the soundtrack's Steam Stores Header.
Fixed a problem where the "Treasure Hunter" achievement wasn't working for some players.
The Original Soundtrack is now available, featuring 24 tracks. Each track ~2 minutes long.
Click here for the Soundtrack.
The Keeper will show up in two additional places and give the player some extra tips.
The second Dungeon Boss was too easy, made it harder.
The third Dungeon Boss was too hard, made it easier.
Significantly increased base Mana regeneration.
The collision of some traps and explosions was a bit unfair so I have slightly reduced them.
Fixed an issue where the wrong prompt was being shown for one of the portal Tooltips.
Changed the health of some monsters, made some of them stronger and some of them weaker.
Changed base damage of some arrow types, also made it so that some monsters take extra damage from some arrow types and less damage from other arrow types.
Added more Barrels in the Final Dungeon and made some cosmetic changes to the Dungeon's design.
Made some changes to the Twitter prompt in the Pause Menu.
Added "© 2018 Johnny Ostad" in the Main Menu.
Fixed a typo where an NPC was supposed to say "Fun" but instead was saying "Fan".
Fixed a spelling error where an NPC was saying "Studieng" instead of "Studying".
fixed and issue where buying final upgrades from one of the NPCs caused the game to crash.
Fixed an issue where one of the Ghost Merchants was selling the wrong collectible item.
Fixed an audio Issue where talking to some of the Ghost Merchants and transiting to the shop UI the wrong sound effect was being played.
Fixed an issue where using Steam Overlay's Screenshot function was not working.
ACHIEVEMENT: Resolved an issue where eating Chicken Stew five times would only count towards the achievement "Brode's Finest" if you eat the stew from the first bag slot, now it works from any bag slot.


Description: This is a social and fun class for players of all ability levels. While doing the ultimate, full body, calorie burning aerobic workout, you will also be training for tennis and learning stroke technique, strategies, and tactics. Students must bring their own racquet.


A serious accident occurred on the 15th March at the Kilgallioch Wind Farm, in which a construction worker fell 480ft to his death.
For any business, maintaining employee wellbeing and keeping your staff safe is paramount as well as ensuring you have workable and effective emergency response plans and procedures in place. This helps to ensure your business is prepared and your employees know what is expected of them, when an emergency or incident occurs. For businesses, keeping workers safe is a top priority and a serious accident in the workplace is every employer's worst nightmare.
A serious accident occurred on the 15th March at the Kilgallioch Wind Farm, South Ayrshire near Barrhill, in which a construction worker fell, resulting in a fatality inside one of the 96 planned wind turbines, according to the Galloway Gazette.
Both the renewables company and the contractor are fully cooperating with the investigating police and health and safety executives, who are still trying to find out how this occurred and what could have happened in the lead up to this fatal accident.
All current work including construction of the wind turbines has been paused while the Scottish Police carry out their investigations although construction is set to be resumed later this year.
At the beginning of this year, during construction one turbine was weakened after some extreme weather conditions and collapsed, raising more questions about the health and safety of the site.


Step Up Packs (or Extreme Packs) let you purchase tiered "steps," where the higher levels contain more cards, and a better chance at rarer cards, for more money.
Originally introduced in late 2012 / early 2013, many earlier Step Up Packs included reprints of a Limited Edition Series. In addition, starting with Step Up Packs 7, most have included at least one exclusive card of the highest rarity currently available at the time, that is otherwise unobtainable.
In early 2015, "Step Up Packs" were rebranded as "Extreme Packs," although the tiered mechanic remained the same. There have also been smaller "Three Step Packs" which only include 3 steps or tiers (whereas full Step Up / Extreme Packs include 7 tiers).
This page was last modified on 27 October 2016, at 13:52.


The mission is to collect new, unwrapped toys each year and distribute those toys as Christmas gifts to less fortunate children in the community. We strive to deliver a message of hope to less fortunate children that will assist them in becoming responsible and productive citizens.
The mission is to give children new backpacks filled with school supplies to go back-to-school while inspiring the values of kindness, philanthropy and volunteerism.


text:
<?php

namespace Slick\WebStack;

use Slick\WebStack\Controller\ControllerMethods;

/**
 * Controller
 *
 * @package Slick\WebStack
 */
abstract class Controller implements ControllerInterface
{
    use ControllerMethods;
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


That Lloyd. He has vision and he just can't pass up a bargain. Usually these things work in my favor, but I think that even he will admit that it causes some discomfort before that magic time actually happens.
Way back in October, he saw some sturdy outdoor benches at a surplus auction. "Those would be great for your school's future playground," he said. "You mean three years from now?" I asked. I pointed out that there were way, way too many benches, but he pointed out that some of them were in bad shape and you could use the extras for parts. I pointed out that you could accomplish the same thing with just two or three benches. We kept pointing things out, but eventually I got tired of it and left to go shopping.
When I returned, we were the proud owners of a bunch of benches.
I admit that it was a good deal, but there was still the problem of where to store them for three years. He said he knew a guy.
Well, he did know a guy, but after a couple of months that guy needed the benches moved offa his property. We had a plan to keep them at a friend's farm, but she wasn't available today, so Lloyd drove them home.
Now there are six or so benches on my back porch. God bless Harold (Strongest Man In The World) and our neighbor Mr. Durre (super nice guy and Truck Saver) as they helped Lloyd get them from the trailer to the backyard.
It seems like the benches are disappearing though -- If I counted correctly there are 11 in the first picture, 5 on the trailer and 4 in your backyard. Termites?
Ha! There are two more benches behind that back one in the yard picture -- my flash couldn't make them show up, but you're right: Where are the other benches, Lloyd? How many did you buy?
There were a total of about 16 benches at the auction. The first couple went for $25 each then $20; then $15; then a few for $10 each. Then I bought the remaining 7 benches for $8. So they cost about $1.25 each with tax. Not bad for $700 benches.
Messiah Lutheran was going to take two of them to use in an outdoor worship area and they were going to store the rest of them until we had a new pre-school, but that fell through.
They are made of redwood, and the hardware is really well done. You don't see anything but wood from the front. They are the benches that used to be at UNL.
Looks like you have a good supply of wood for the firepit.
Here's my suggestion: Keep the benches on the lawn & have outdoor movie nights when the weather is nice. I've done this in the past (without the benches) & it's alot of fun. I would assume Lloyd has picked up a projector & screen in his travels. Be sure to have lots of food.
So are you going to keep them in your yard for three years now, or will they eventually go to your friend's farm?
I think they make a lovely addition to the back yard.
Arrange them around the edge of that concrete. You will have seating for lots of people. Brats, anyone?
Dad says you take after your Mom, bargain hunter, but the truth be known Dad is the better bargain hunter. Sigh, I guess Lauren there is No way he could pass up a bargain. He comes by it naturally.


Brews Espresso Machine: 1000 Watt high power brewing system delivers 1-10 cups of hot, fresh coffee within minutes . Steam heat forces hot water through coffee ground, coffee ground could achieve the strongest brews. Powerful and quick!
Simple Coffee Maker: These have a simple on/off switch, and window viewer. The simple button make it simple to operate. Only one switch, could brew your favorite coffee. The window viewer to see how much water you are placing in unit is large and conveniently placed on machine.
Keep Warm Coffee Pot: This has hot plate on base, the warmer plate keeps your coffee hot at the steady 178°optimal temperature. Sleek with the black and stainless steel, looks great on counter and matches other appliances.
Easy to Clean: The coffee maker comes with a reusable filter and a coffee scoop. Removable filter basket for convenience. The lid is huge, that is lifted up to access the filter and water well is very large (encompassing the entire top of the machine). It is very easy to clean.
Safety Auto Shut-Off: Once there is no water in unit, it will automatic power off. No risk there. 2 years warranty.


text:
claims to fame :-)
madameshawshank
Location: Penrith (where jacarandas remind me of change), New South Wales, Australia
Posted: Thu Jan 11, 2007 9:32 am Post subject: claims to fame :-)
Have been reading a piece on Carlo Ponti...he died recently. Seems he was the first Italian to order a copy of Dr Zhivago...now that's a claim to fame if ever there was one.
My top of the pops one in my personal list...when Neil Armstrong & Co were in Sydney all those years ago....saw the open-topped the car go past.....now remember I was all of 19 or 20...keen as mustard!
raced to the hotel...saw the red carpet...velvet cord on either side...the days of no security....there I was....'n there they were...walking from the street...and before I knew it, I'd ducked under the cord...raced down and shook Neil Armstrong's hand...in a flash...a nanosecond...
a bit naughty I know...and if it happened today...well it wouldn't..because there's no way I'd be able to get anywhere near them...
Margot Fonteyn patted me on my head when I was a little girl...
ok...famers...let's go! don't hold back...this is for total fun..
"I've never accepted the external appearance of things as the whole truth. The world is much more elaborate than the nerves of our eye can tell us." - James Gleeson
Location: a Dutchie in HongKong
Posted: Thu Jan 11, 2007 10:25 am Post subject:
Margot Fonteyn, that's special!
Since I work in the airport the chance of meeting famous people is there. But I never do, or well, maybe I do, but I never recognize them!
You could put the entire dutch footballteam (soccer I mean) in front of me and I wouldn't have a clue.
But...I did meet our crownprince once, and checked in actor Jeroen Krabbé (you might know him from movies as left luggage, discovery of heaven and a James Bond movie as well), I have checked in the entire Kelly Family. Didn't recognize them, was wondering about all those last names (their name really is Kelly but I finally understood when one of them was doing ballety things at my desk ),
And recently, I didn't meet them, but we had a lot of fun when we had on the same flight to milan, all in businessclass (and oh, how I wanted to reseat them next to eachother!! But I behaved well...) Prince (the singer), Paris Hilton, and cardinal Simonis, one of the most famous and highest people in church in Holland...
I did meet, very briefly, Mrs Madeline Allbright, a very impressive lady. I talked to her assistant (had to get a bag back from the belly of the plane that she mistakingly checked in and mrs Albright needed those papers during the flight...she was so relieved when we found it! So she hugged me, does that count?!)
then there are the wonderful singers of acapella group 'the Nylons', (they were in 'my'bar!!!), some dutch soap-actors, and oh, yes, ofcourse: Gordon Ramsey!! I had lunch in his restaurant in Londen and he was there, didn't shake his hand, but hey, he was there...
Location: buried under a pile of books somewhere in Adelaide, South Australia
One of my friends and her sister danced on stage with Dame Margot here in Adelaide about 30 years ago when they were little girls. And neither of them dances now. That must have been a huge thrill for a young ballerina.
Greg and I recently travelled business class and sat just across from former Australian Prime Minister, Bob Hawke, and his wife.
Years ago my parents were travelling to the US via Honolulu and were in First Class with Joe Cocker and some of his band (the rest were in economy). It happened that my Mum's closest friend was the Flight Director on the plane, and she took a Qantas menu around all the band members and got them to sign it for me. I still have it .... somewhere.
One of my friends' grandsons was one of the original 15 kids trained by Jamie Oliver, even though he wasn't English or underprivileged. We watched the TV show every week to see Johnny, but he wasn't on the show much, although he did manage to cut his hand quite badly during the dress rehersal for the restaurant opening and had to go to hospital to get stitches. He's now working as a chef at a hunting lodge in Canada.
Doing what you like is freedom
Liking what you do is happiness
www.cupcakerecipebook.com.au
well Carlo Ponti, unless I'm much mistaken, was also the producer of dR Zhivago...
as for my claims to fame...
first my ancestors : my aunt spit on Marechal Petain...and my great grand mother shook Elizabeth II's hand....
As for me, I stay with the French...I met Robert Hossein, Line Renaud, Annie Girardot, Jean-Paul Belmondo and shook hands with Jacques Chirac..
Darlink,... I once met Madame Shawshank, how's THAT for a claim to fame?! Also, I have been famous for years... ok, notorious, but it's much the same thing.
I admit, I haven't yet met Clotilde, nor the Mighty Pesto Man, but one day... one day... sigh!
I very almost once met Bacall... of course Lauren, not Zeppo Bacall!! How could you even ask, he said flouncing pointedly!
Confusion comes fitted as standard.
I sang on stage with Peter Yarrow at a conference for educators! We sang "Don't Laugh at Me", a song about respecting others, and "Puff the Magic Dragon" - which he swears is about leaving childhood behind! He is a pretty amazing fellow!
Location: Santa Barbara, CA
I sang for the Queen (the real one, not Helen Mirren ) two years ago but I have to admit that it was as part of my choir - for a concert to commemorate the 60th anniversary fo VE Day - not solo! (And yes, Prince Philip did nod off during the concert.) However, infinitely cooler than that was the time five years ago when I was having lunch with a friend in the UCL Union and who should walk in and sit down a few tables away but Brian May! I was mystified for ages as to what the ex-guitarist of Queen was doing having lunch with a bunch of academics but later found out that he's quite the respected astronomer...
And on a slightly more fanciful note, when I lived in Paris I lived just down the street from the epicerie whose owner Amelie played nasty tricks on. I only found out two years after that that I had been living not only in Amelie-land, but in Clotilde-land - and I didn't know about her or C&Z! Ah well...
Posted: Thu Jan 11, 2007 10:53 pm Post subject:
Well, as long as we're speaking of Queens, I had dinner in a Thai resto in NYC sitting right next to Helen Mirren! I managed to control my admiration and left her alone! I did have trouble concentrating on the Pad Thai, however!
Location: Gold Coast Australia
Let's see:
Madame Shawshank -that's real fame!
George Benson and he gave me free tickets for his concert.
Prince Edward because we thought we were in the queu at the drinks bar.
Bill Clinton and I regret to this day I didn't reach up and kiss him on the cheek rather than shake his hand.
Posted: Fri Jan 12, 2007 12:30 am Post subject:
When I was a teenager, I was nuts about old movies and musicals. I waited outside the stage door when Joel Grey was in town doing a play and gave him a drawing I had done of him. He said it was a good image. I also wrote to James Cagney and got a very nice reply. Both big deals to me at the time. Sadly, nobody famous since.
A looong time ago, when he was the hottest hottie around (don't laugh)--
Fabian. (Anybody remember him?) A family friend was a record distributor (no, not CDs) in our city and Fabulous Fabian was promoting a new album. I was probably 15, he was 17 or so. Got to ride to the airport with him in friend's Jaguar, then parade through the airport next to him. Many envious stares from the other girls. I just remember that he was gorgeous, wearing a silk suit and suede shoes. I was barely able to speak, let alone make him fall in love with me (which was the plan).
More recently, many chefs of renown, thanks to a job in a culinary store/school. Most interesting lesson I learned was that the most famous are the nicest. It's the middle tier who have swollen heads.
My younger daughter encountered Bill Clinton some years ago on a flight from SFO to NY (or vice versa). One of his secret service guys asked her if she'd like to meet him. Duh. Anyway, she said that in that packed airplane, he had the ability to make her feel she was the only other person there--and the absolute only person he wanted to be talking to.
I miss Big Bill.
Well, to be fair, I live in Los Angeles so you could be in line for a movie and XXXXX or YYYYYYYY turns around and says "would you mind not bumping into me with your purse". So I'm limiting it to people I have had relationships with. My favorite is Gretchen Corbett who was Jim Rockford's attorney on The Rockford Files.
Her daughter went to the same elementary school as my girls and when I first recognized her she was very wary of another star struck fan. Really stand offish. As it turned out, we were the only ones in the same neighborhood 10 miles away from the school so we became a carpool and good friends. She's a lovely lady and her daughter is what we all wish our kids would turn out to be. Kind, brilliant, poised, creative and gorgeous. We raised our kids together. Real moms in the urban jungle.
But my other favorite (everyone please put down your cups and swallow any liquid) is Paul Fleiss (daddy to Heidi Fleiss) (if you're not in the US just google her) was my kids' pediatrician. He's a kind man and I still remember the morning I read the breaking story that he said he always believed that she was making millions of dollars every year as a high school drop-out real estate agent. Sooooo completely trusting. So Paul Fleiss! So LA.
Location: Vermont, USA
I shook hands with John Kennedy when he was running for president. He spoke in a shopping center parking lot and later was sitting on the back of a convertible. I edged closer and closer through the crowd, and as I came within reaching distance behind him, I was sure he would soon turn around in my direction. When he did, I was ready with an outstretched hand and got the handshake. Of course, such a maneuver would not be possible today.
May I present a once-removed claim to fame? My daughter-in-law, a musician, was recently in the orchestra that performed Sir Paul McCartney's new work. She took along an album cover "just in case" and received not only his autograph but a kiss on the cheek!
Ohhhhhhhhhhh! I wonder how many people there are in the world who would like to give him a reassuring kiss on the cheek as he goes through this certifiably awful and soul-grinding divorce in the tabs.
Hurray for your d-i-l!
emilyj
Wow, mine seem really lame next to all of yours
I once sat on Hugo Weaving's (from Priscilla Queen of the Desert amongst other things) knee when I was little- ok, ok, I know he is only semi-famous and even then only really in Australia
I saw Billy Connelly walking down the street in Adelaide when he was here for his tour.
I saw Bill Clinton when I was in Hanoi.
Oh, and my ancestor may or may not have signed the death warrant for King Charles I... (depending on who you talk to!)


I'm seeking for a mature female interested in NSA, or a FWB situation. Would like to spend time with you.
It is a BMW w4m Tall with intense pboobsion and a real silver lining. Right now I am single and finding myself craving the idea of humiliation.
Waiting for you I am a sweet laid back lady that is waiting For someone to walk the dog with go to movies Dinner and get to know each other.