politburo joyan: January 2012

Monday, January 16, 2012

Will?Man City lose?3rd straight?

By ROB HARRIS

AP Sports Writer

Associated Press Sports

updated 11:27 p.m. ET Jan. 13, 2012

LONDON (AP) -Rather than bemoaning Manchester United's Premier League recent struggles, Rio Ferdinand is upbeat about the champions' prospects of overhauling Manchester City from the summit.

Amid an injury crisis that has prompted Paul Scholes to come out of retirement, United lost its past two league matches before rebounding with an FA Cup victory over City.

"You always know there will be ups and downs during the season," Ferdinand said Friday. "We had a bad week the one before, losing two games ... but I don't think we have the advantage now because of one result (against City). It is too early to say.

"We are all round the same area and fighting for the same thing. You all have your peaks and troughs, hopefully Manchester City and Tottenham will experience lows that go on a lot longer, we can get a few players back from injury and push on."

City has a three-point lead over United and Tottenham despite its own recent slump. But that advantage could be wiped out by the time City goes to Wigan on Monday if United beats Bolton or Tottenham overcomes Wolverhampton Wanderers on Saturday.

City's first back-to-back home losses since the petrodollars began to pour in during 2008 have started to erode the club's air of invincibility.

Both setbacks came in cup competitions - to United in the FA Cup last weekend then to Liverpool in the League Cup semifinals on Wednesday - but City had won only one of its previous three league matches before those games.

"No one expected us to continue winning games without having a difficult moment," City assistant manager David Platt said. "We can't accelerate the season by four months to see how it is going to turn out."

Despite the FA Cup defense being ended by United, City is still in the hunt for the League Cup, with the second leg to come against Liverpool at Anfield.

"We are still in the Carling Cup semifinal (with the second leg on Jan. 25) and our players are quite capable of turning the situation around, and 19 clubs would like to be where we are in the championship," Platt said at the weekly media briefly usually attended by manager Roberto Mancini. "It is not a bad position to be in - some crisis."

Tottenham is the form team, having picked up more points than both City and United since beginning the season by losing to the Manchester rivals.

"Spurs are not third in the Premier League because someone has walked through the door at White Hart Lane and slapped a bundle of money on my desk," Tottenham manager Harry Redknapp said. "City can pay players 200,000 pounds ($307,000) a week, it's unbelievable."

United, City and Tottenham look the only title contenders, with Chelsea now eight points adrift in fourth and Arsenal a further point behind.

Chelsea hosts Sunderland on Saturday and Arsenal is at Swansea the following day when Thierry Henry will be hoping to get a chance to repeat his goal-scoring exploits on Monday when he clinched a 1-0 victory over Leeds in the FA Cup.

Arsenal's 34-year-old all-time top scorer has returned to north London on a loan deal from the New York Red Bulls during the Major League Soccer offseason.

"If you asked 10 legends whether they would come back, I am not sure they would have been brave enough," said Arsenal striker Robin van Persie, who was rested against Leeds. "I am sure he will get loads of games because I have seen him in training and I don't want too put too much pressure on, but he is looking really good."

Things are not looking quite so good for Blackburn, which is last going into Saturday's match against Fulham. But Blackburn's Indian owners are backing manager Steve Kean despite fan protests.

"Most of the time the club, the board and the owners will give in after a couple of weeks and we, the managers, are gone," Fulham manager Martin Jol said. "But they have stuck with him and you get a different situation. This could be the first time probably in the history of the Premier League that a board stuck with their manager (under such pressure)."

Blackburn is a point behind Wigan and two behind Bolton in the relegation zone.

With Queens Park Rangers just a point and a place from danger, manager Neil Warnock was fired and replaced by Mark Hughes this week to stop the promoted club's decline, starting Sunday at Newcastle.

Also Saturday, Aston Villa hosts Everton, Liverpool takes on Stoke and West Bromwich Albion faces Norwich.

More newsAndrew Yates / AFP - Getty Images

Will?Man City lose?3rd straight?

Manchester City's first back-to-back home losses since the petrodollars began to pour in have started to erode the club's air of invincibility.

Jamie Squire / Getty Images

Wenger No. 1

Andrew Wenger looked a bit sheepish the moment he was asked what teams and players he followed growing up. He knew his reply wasn't all that daring.

Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/44031201/ns/sports-soccer/

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Sunday, January 15, 2012

About New York: Vision for Cheap Power Even if Indian Point Nuclear Plant Is Closed

[unable to retrieve full-text content]If the Indian Point nuclear plant closes in the next few years, the 2,000 megawatts of electricity that it produces will have to come from somewhere else.

Source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=0066f39b719d0e1d9903a347d89788dd

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Saturday, January 14, 2012

Norfolk Animal Care and Adoption Center ? Pets for Patriots

Visit Norfolk Animal Care and Adoption Center Website

Norfolk Animal Care and Adoption Center
5585 Sabre Road Norfolk, Virginia

About Norfolk Animal Care and Adoption Center

The City of Norfolk?s Animal Care and Adoption Center provides dog and cat adoptions and will help Pets for Patriots members find their new best friend. The shelter cares for nearly 6,000 animals each year and has a wide variety seeking permanent homes. In addition to pet adoption, the City is responsible for animal control, cruelty investigations and enforcement of all applicable animal codes.

To support the bond between pets and people, the shelter maintains a lost pet directory that helps reunite owners with missing pets. The friendly staff are proud of their work on behalf of the community?s homeless animals, including the immaculate shelter environment and excellent care they provide to the pets in their charge.

The Norfolk Animal Care and Adoption Center welcomes monetary donations through the Friends of Norfolk Animal Care Center, as well as contributions of pet food, toys, leashes and collars, laundry and office supplies; see their complete wish list for details. For a more hands on experience, become one of their valued volunteers or pet fosters.

Adoption fees include:

Spay/neuter

Microchipping for permanent identification

Primary vaccinations

Heartworm testing (dogs)

Feline leukemia/FIV testing (cats)

De-worming

Flea preventative

Hours of Operation

Tuesday ? Wednesday 11am-4:30pm

Thursday 2pm-7pm

Friday ? Saturday 11am-4:30pm

Sunday 12pm-4:30pm

Source: http://petsforpatriots.org/norfolk-animal-care-and-adoption-center/

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CES 2012: LG Spectrum delivers sports in HD with ESPN ScoreCenter (Gadgetell)

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Source: http://wik.io/info/US/308510714

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Thursday, January 12, 2012

In La Jolla people-versus-seals battle, tide has yet to turn

Reporting from San Diego?

On the beach at the Children's Pool, curious tourists and locals, many with cameras at the ready, approached the dozens of harbor seals sleeping in the noonday sun.

From her vantage point on the sidewalk overlooking the horseshoe-shaped beach, Dorota Valli, a volunteer with the unofficial Seal Watch Campaign, was ready with her bullhorn.

"Ladies and gentlemen," she announced sternly, "please stay behind the rope. The seals are pregnant and they need their rest. No picture is worth hurting the seals."

At the other end of the sidewalk, near the lifeguard tower, were activists of an opposing stripe who believe Valli and her group are robbing the citizens of San Diego of the right to enjoy the breakwater-protected beach and its tranquil access to the ocean.

"They're shutting down the only man-made beach dedicated by trust for the children," said David Pierce of the San Diego Council of Divers. "You don't have to be against the seals to be in favor of humans."

In a city with chronic financial problems and the usual set of urban dilemmas, there appears to be no issue that has engendered as much passion for the last two decades as the confluence of people and seals at the Children's Pool beach in La Jolla.

Opposing sides in the dispute have set up tables, large informational signs and stacks of handout literature that they believe bolsters their cases. Both sides are armed with cameras.

Each will tell tales on the other. Each feels the other is misguided and selfish.

The pro-seal group has pictures and videos that they say show seals being harassed or injured. The divers have information about how the pro-seals attorney was once cited for using a stun gun and sentenced to anger management classes.

To Valli, the Children's Pool is the only seal rookery on the mainland south of Santa Barbara County. To Pierce, it's where spear fishermen for decades entered the ocean to hunt lobsters and white sea bass and where families taught their children to swim.

The dispute over whether seals or humans should have priority at the Children's Pool has flared since the seals, for reasons unknown, appeared en masse, abandoning their historic haunts on the large rocks just offshore.

In recent years the dispute took on renewed fervor when the city of San Diego put up a rope barrier to discourage people from approaching the marine mammals during the pupping season, from mid-December to mid-May.

After the city put up the rope barrier last month, Pierce's group held a protest on the beach, thrusting a real estate-style banner saying "open" into the sand near the seals.

On Friday, the La Jolla Friends of the Seals filed a lawsuit against Mayor Jerry Sanders and City Atty. Jan Goldsmith to force them to fulfill a promise by the City Council to close the beach entirely during pupping season.

The current barrier allows humans to stand a dozen or so yards behind the seals or flank them to the right to gain access to the water. "You shouldn't have to tiptoe around the seals to get into the water," Pierce said.

Meanwhile, the city's request for a permit for a year-round rope barrier is pending before the California Coastal Commission. "Barrier," however, is a bit of misnomer because it is easily breached.

Although the two sides are still passionate about the Children's Pool, the reigning emotion over the issue at City Hall is exhaustion after years of litigation and an estimated $1 million in legal fees.

For years, the city was in the middle of a legal pingpong match: a federal judge saying the Marine Mammal Protection Act demanded that the seals be protected; a state judge saying the 1931 Tideland Grant required that the beach be kept open for children.

In hopes of finding an endgame, the council asked the state Legislature in 2009 to amend the grant, which originally called for the beach to be for children, as requested by philanthropist Ellen Browning Scripps, who financed the breakwater.

A bill allowing the city to declare the beach a marine sanctuary was passed and signed by then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Amid the legal and political wrangling over their presence, the seals have become a tourist magnet. Tour buses bring visitors daily. Rare is the day when the sidewalk is not crammed with people admiring the sleeping animals.

Bryan Pease, attorney for La Jolla Friends of the Seals, says it is wrong to pose the issue as an inter-species dispute.

"It's not seals versus people,'' Pease said as a line of tourists and locals walked by slowly. "Look at all these people: They love the seals. It's those guys" ? pointing to Pierce and the others ? "versus all the people."

As for the stun gun issue, Pease said that was six years ago and he was being accosted by a drunk.

tony.perry@latimes.com

Source: http://feeds.latimes.com/~r/latimes/news/science/~3/wGZWNLhOCG0/la-me-seals-20120109,0,3681323.story

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Wednesday, January 11, 2012

How Do We Know If We Need a Wedding Planner?

A wedding planner can help you find your vendors, manage all the logistics on the big day, take care of your wedding to-dos (there are over 150 of them) and in many cases act as your BFF when your mom, fiance and friends stop replying to your emails.

Some experts will suggest that you hire a wedding planner early in the process but you can book someone at any time. You may start planning on your own and then decide a few months in that you need some help or decide the month before that you need help the last few weeks and on the day of. Just know that great planners book up fast and not everyone offers day-of services.

Talk to friends who have worked with a wedding planner about their experience and schedule appointments with a few planners to learn more about their services, prices and how they can help you.

Make sure to check references and view portfolios. Don?t hire someone who you don?t feel comfortable with and make sure you can afford their services. Read the contract carefully so you understand what they will and won?t do.

If a deal seems to good to be true, such as a really low price, it may be someone with limited experience. That doesn?t mean he or she can?t do the job, but double check their references and try to learn as much as you can about their background/experience before signing a contract.

Source: http://from-i-will-to-i-do.blogspot.com/2012/01/how-do-we-know-if-we-need-wedding.html

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Monday, January 9, 2012

Lenovo's IdeaTab S2 10" does tablet transformation, packs a 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon (update: hands-on)

This wouldn't be the first time for Lenovo to release a tablet-plus-keyboard combo, though the illusive IdeaPad U1 Hybrid was merely adding Windows to the updated LePad via the keyboard dock. That said, Lenovo's freshly-announced IdeaTab S2 10" is a full package dedicated to Android 4.0, and it sports a 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon 8x60A or 8960. Compared to the ASUS Transformer Prime and Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, this 10-inch IdeaTab comes close to or even beats them with a 0.34-inch (8.69mm) thickness and a 1.27-pound (580 grams) weight -- certainly much better than its Chinese counterpart, the LePad S2010. Other features include a 1,280 x 800 LED-backlit IPS display, 3G with call support, 1GB LPDDR2 RAM, SSD of up to 64GB, HDMI Micro connection and front (1.3MP) and rear (5MP with autofocus) cameras. As for battery life, the tablet alone can keep cranking for up to 9 hours, and sliding it into the keyboard dock gets you an additional 9 hours plus two USB 2.0 ports, a multitouch trackpad and an SDHC card reader. No word on availability or pricing yet, so we'll keep poking Lenovo until we hear something.

Update: We now have hands-on photos and video -- the latter after the break, as usual. Something interesting we spotted was the grid-like LeLauncher, which consists of square-shaped widgets that expand to bigger widgets or launch the relevant apps. Lenovo's folks also mentioned that compared to the ASUS Transformer series, the S2's "clam dock" slot hinge is designed in such a way that makes it easier to snap the tablet onto it, and we agree with them.

Gallery: Lenovo IdeaTab S2 10"