Math Is Fun Forum

You are not logged in.

#1 2017-08-23 21:45:48

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

1) The General Sherman Tree, a giant sequoia in California's Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park, is the largest tree in the world, and is also among the oldest. It is undoubtedly one of the major attractions of the park for visitors, an awe-inspiring sight that exemplifies the remarkable ecology that warrants the national park's designation as a UN Biosphere Reserve.

Location and Access

The General Sherman Tree is located in Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park in California. Specifically, the tree is located at the north end of Giant Forest, one of the park's five sub-regions. The Giant Forest section offers 40 miles of trails, two of which -- the General Sherman Tree Trail and the Big Trees Trail -- lead directly to the General Sherman Tree. Trail guides are available at visitor centers, and park rangers can give you more information. Another way to reach the tree is by taking the free Sequoia Shuttle, which operates daily from the end of May to the end of September. Route 1 on the green bus stops at the General Sherman Tree, as well as the Giant Forest Museum and the Lodgepole Visitor Center and Campground.

The General Sherman Tree is considered the largest tree in the world by volume. Its volume, most recently calculated in 1975, is 52,500 cubic feet, a figure determined by measuring only the trunk of the tree according to accepted standards. This means that when large branches fall, it does not affect the official size of the tree. According to the National Park Service, the General Sherman Tree is 274.9 feet tall with a circumference at the ground of 102.6 feet. The diameter of its largest branch measures 6.8 feet, the first large branch is 130 feet above the base of the tree, and the average crown spread is 106.5 feet across. It is not the tallest tree in the world -- this title is claimed by a coastal redwood called Hyperion in Redwood National Park, also in California.

The General Sherman Tree is estimated to be between 2,300 and 2,700 years old, with research conducted in 2002 concluding that it is closer to 2,000 years old. It received its moniker in 1879 in honor of the Civil War General William Tecumseh Sherman. A wagon road constructed in the early 1900s passed by the General Sherman Tree, revealing it to vehicular tourists for the first time. Improvements made to the road over the ensuing years improved access to the Giant Forest. In 2005, a 2.5-acre parking lot near the General Sherman Tree was demolished and restored to forest land in order to improve the natural setting.

Fun Facts

The trunk of the General Sherman Tree could theoretically be turned into almost 120 miles of standard sized lumber planks. A branch that fell from the tree in 1978 had a diameter greater than six feet and was at least 140 feet long -- larger than any tree in the United States east of the Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountain ranges. The General Sherman is not the only giant tree in Sequoia National Park; in fact, the five largest trees in the world are all located in the park, with three others found in the Giant Forest section.

#2 2017-08-25 00:33:33

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

2) Epsilon Eridani is the closest star known to have a planet: and maybe two of them. It is the only system that has both precise Doppler data and long-baseline astrometric positional observations, which combined yield the orbital tilt and the true planetary mass. Given its closeness and the knowledge of where it is relative to its star, the planet may become the first ever actually imaged.

The Planet

The circle shows the location of the class K (K2) dwarf star Epsilon Eridani (in the constellation Eridanus). At a distance of only 10.5 light years, the star is the closest to the Sun for which an extrasolar planet is known. With an average orbital radius 3.39 times that of the distance between the Sun and Earth (the Astronomical Unit, AU), 65% of the way from the Sun to Jupiter, the planet takes 6.85 years to make an orbit. Combination of stellar velocity and positional measures of the star show the planet to have a mass 1.55 times that of Jupiter with an uncertainty of only 15 percent. The orbital inclination of 30 degrees to the plane of the sky agrees well with the inclination of a dusty circumstellar disk. Unlike Jupiter, the planet is in a highly eccentric orbit that takes it from as far as 5.8 AU from the star (just farther than Jupiter is from the Sun) to as close as 1.1 AU. The planet will be farthest from Epsilon Eridani proper, 1.7 seconds of arc, late in the year 2010, when we have the best hope of imaging it directly even though it will be 20 million times fainter than the star. Slow changes in the apparent orbit suggest another "Jupiter" with a period greater than 50 years (which would place it at least 13 AU from the star).

The Star

Epsilon Eridani is a fourth magnitude (on the bright side, 3.73) class K (K2) ordinary, though relatively young, hydrogen-fusing dwarf. A mere 10.5 light years away, it is the 10th closest star system to the Earth. Its temperature of 5080 degrees Kelvin (88 percent that of the Sun) and low luminosity (34 percent solar) tell of a lower mass, just 83 percent that of the Sun. Though its rotation speed appears similar to that of the Sun, Epsilon Eridani is much younger (about 800 million years, as opposed to the Sun's 4.6 billion), and displays considerable solar- like activity. Unlike many stars so far found to have planets, Epsilon Eridani is not metal-rich, its metal content actually a bit less than that of the Sun (about 80 percent solar). The star achieved lasting fame as one of the first to be examined for radio signals produced by intelligent life, when Frank Drake turned an 85-foot radio telescope to it and to Tau Ceti in 1960. No signals were found. At least now the star does indeed appear to have a real planet, though as a Jupiter-like body, one incapable of supporting life.

#3 2017-08-26 01:11:11

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

3) The stethoscope is an acoustic medical device for auscultation, or listening to the internal sounds of an animal or human body. It typically has a small disc-shaped resonator that is placed against the chest, and two tubes connected to earpieces. It is often used to listen to lung and heart sounds. It is also used to listen to intestines and blood flow in arteries and veins. In combination with a sphygmomanometer, it is commonly used for measurements of blood pressure. Less commonly, "mechanic's stethoscopes", equipped with rod shaped chestpieces, are used to listen to internal sounds made by machines (for example, sounds and vibrations emitted by worn ball bearings), such as diagnosing a malfunctioning automobile engine by listening to the sounds of its internal parts. Stethoscopes can also be used to check scientific vacuum chambers for leaks, and for various other small-scale acoustic monitoring tasks. A stethoscope that intensifies auscultatory sounds is called phonendoscope.

The stethoscope was invented in France in 1816 by René Laennec at the Necker-Enfants Malades Hospital in Paris. It consisted of a wooden tube and was monaural. Laennec invented the stethoscope because he was uncomfortable placing his ear on women's chests to hear heart sounds. He observed that a rolled notebook, placed between the patient's chest and his ear, could amplify heart sounds without requiring physical contact. Laennec's device was similar to the common ear trumpet, a historical form of hearing aid; indeed, his invention was almost indistinguishable in structure and function from the trumpet, which was commonly called a "microphone". Laennec called his device the "stethoscope" (stetho- + -scope, "chest scope"), and he called its use "mediate auscultation", because it was auscultation with a tool intermediate between the patient's body and the physician's ear. (Today the word auscultation denotes all such listening, mediate or not.) The first flexible stethoscope of any sort may have been a binaural instrument with articulated joints not very clearly described in 1829. In 1840, Golding Bird described a stethoscope he had been using with a flexible tube. Bird was the first to publish a description of such a stethoscope but he noted in his paper the prior existence of an earlier design (which he thought was of little utility) which he described as the snake ear trumpet. Bird's stethoscope had a single earpiece.

In 1851, Irish physician Arthur Leared invented a binaural stethoscope and, in 1852, George Philip Cammann perfected the design of the stethoscope instrument (that used both ears) for commercial production, which has become the standard ever since. Cammann also wrote a major treatise on diagnosis by auscultation, which the refined binaural stethoscope made possible. By 1873, there were descriptions of a differential stethoscope that could connect to slightly different locations to create a slight stereo effect, though this did not become a standard tool in clinical practice.

The medical historian Jacalyn Duffin has argued that the invention of the stethoscope marked a major step in the redefinition of disease from being a bundle of symptoms, to the current sense of a disease as a problem with an anatomical system even if there are no noticeable symptoms. This re-conceptualization occurred in part, Duffin argues, because prior to stethoscopes, there were no non-lethal instruments for exploring internal anatomy.

Rappaport and Sprague designed a new stethoscope in the 1940s, which became the standard by which other stethoscopes are measured, consisting of two sides, one of which is used for the respiratory system, the other for the cardiovascular system. The Rappaport-Sprague was later made by Hewlett-Packard. HP's medical products division was spun off as part of Agilent Technologies, Inc., where it became Agilent Healthcare. Agilent Healthcare was purchased by Philips which became Philips Medical Systems, before the walnut-boxed, $300, original Rappaport-Sprague stethoscope was finally abandoned ca. 2004, along with Philips' brand (manufactured by Andromed, of Montreal, Canada) electronic stethoscope model. The Rappaport-Sprague model stethoscope was heavy and short (18-24 in (46-61 cm)) with an antiquated appearance recognizable by their two large independent latex rubber tubes connecting an exposed leaf-spring-joined pair of opposing F-shaped chrome-plated brass binaural ear tubes with a dual-head chest piece.

Several other minor refinements were made to stethoscopes until, in the early 1960s, David Littmann, a Harvard Medical School professor, created a new stethoscope that was lighter than previous models and had improved acoustics. In the late 1970s, 3M-Littmann introduced the tunable diaphragm: a very hard (G-10) glass-epoxy resin diaphragm member with an overmolded silicone flexible acoustic surround which permitted increased excursion of the diaphragm member in a Z-axis with respect to the plane of the sound collecting area. The left shift to a lower resonant frequency increases the volume of some low frequency sounds due to the longer waves propagated by the increased excursion of the hard diaphragm member suspended in the concentric accountic surround. Conversely, restricting excursion of the diaphragm by pressing the stethoscope diaphragm surface firmly against the anatomical area overlying the physiological sounds of interest, the acoustic surround could also be used to dampen excursion of the diaphragm in response to "z"-axis pressure against a concentric fret. This raises the frequency bias by shortening the wavelength to auscultate a higher range of physiological sounds.

In 1999, Richard Deslauriers patented the first external noise reducing stethoscope, the DRG Puretone. It featured two parallel lumens containing two steel coils which dissipated infiltrating noise as inaudible heat energy. The steel coil "insulation" added .30 lb to each stethoscope. In 2005, DRG's diagnostics division was acquired by TRIMLINE Medical Products.

Current practice

Stethoscopes are often considered as a symbol of healthcare professionals, as various healthcare providers are often seen or depicted with stethoscopes hanging around their necks. A 2012 research paper claimed that the stethoscope, when compared to other medical equipment, had the highest positive impact on the perceived trustworthiness of the practitioner seen with it.

The advent of practical, widespread portable ultrasonography (point-of-care ultrasonography) in the late 1990s to early 2000s led some physicians to ask how soon it would be before stethoscopes would become obsolete. Others answered that they thought the relationship of the various tools (stethoscopes and digital devices) would change but that it would be a long time before stethoscopes were obsolete. A decade later, in 2016, the same two sides of the coin were still recognized. One cardiologist said, "the stethoscope is dead", but a pediatrician said, "We are not at the place, and probably won't be for a very long time", where stethoscopes were obsolete. One consideration is that it depends on the segment of health care (emergency medical services, nursing, medicine) and the specialty. "Stethoscopes retain their value for listening to lungs and bowels for clues of disease, experts agree." But for the cardiovascular system, "auscultation is superfluous", one cardiologist said. Thus, it could be that cardiology in the secondary and tertiary care settings may abandon the stethoscope many years before primary care, pediatrics, and physical therapy do.

Acoustic stethoscopes are familiar to most people, and operate on the transmission of sound from the chest piece, via air-filled hollow tubes, to the listener's ears. The chestpiece usually consists of two sides that can be placed against the patient for sensing sound; a diaphragm (plastic disc) or bell (hollow cup). If the diaphragm is placed on the patient, body sounds vibrate the diaphragm, creating acoustic pressure waves which travel up the tubing to the listener's ears. If the bell is placed on the patient, the vibrations of the skin directly produce acoustic pressure waves traveling up to the listener's ears. The bell transmits low frequency sounds, while the diaphragm transmits higher frequency sounds. This two-sided stethoscope was invented by Rappaport and Sprague in the early part of the 20th century.

One problem with acoustic stethoscopes was that the sound level was extremely low. This problem was surmounted in 1999 with the invention of the stratified continuous (inner) lumen, and the kinetic acoustic mechanism in 2002.

An electronic stethoscope (or stethophone) overcomes the low sound levels by electronically amplifying body sounds. However, amplification of stethoscope contact artifacts, and component cutoffs (frequency response thresholds of electronic stethoscope microphones, pre-amps, amps, and speakers) limit electronically amplified stethoscopes' overall utility by amplifying mid-range sounds, while simultaneously attenuating high- and low- frequency range sounds. Currently, a number of companies offer electronic stethoscopes. Electronic stethoscopes require conversion of acoustic sound waves to electrical signals which can then be amplified and processed for optimal listening. Unlike acoustic stethoscopes, which are all based on the same physics, transducers in electronic stethoscopes vary widely. The simplest and least effective method of sound detection is achieved by placing a microphone in the chestpiece. This method suffers from ambient noise interference and has fallen out of favor. Another method, used in Welch-Allyn's Meditron stethoscope, comprises placement of a piezoelectric crystal at the head of a metal shaft, the bottom of the shaft making contact with a diaphragm. 3M also uses a piezo-electric crystal placed within foam behind a thick rubber-like diaphragm. The Thinklabs' Rhythm 32 uses an Electromagnetic Diaphragm with a conductive inner surface to form a capacitive sensor. This diaphragm responds to sound waves, with changes in an electric field replacing changes in air pressure. The Eko Core enables wireless transmission of heart sounds to a smartphone or tablet.

Because the sounds are transmitted electronically, an electronic stethoscope can be a wireless device, can be a recording device, and can provide noise reduction, signal enhancement, and both visual and audio output. Around 2001, Stethographics introduced PC-based software which enabled a phonocardiograph, graphic representation of cardiologic and pulmonologic sounds to be generated, and interpreted according to related algorithms. All of these features are helpful for purposes of telemedicine (remote diagnosis) and teaching.

Electronic stethoscopes are also used with Computer-aided Auscultation programs to analyze the recorded heart sounds pathological or innocent heart murmurs.

Some electronic stethoscopes feature direct audio output that can be used with an external recording device, such as a laptop or MP3 recorder. The same connection can be used to listen to the previously recorded auscultation through the stethoscope headphones, allowing for more detailed study for general research as well as evaluation and consultation regarding a particular patient's condition and telemedicine, or remote diagnosis.

There are some smartphone apps that can use the phone as a stethoscope. At least one uses the phone's own microphone to amplify sound, produce a visualization, and e-mail the results. These apps may be used for training purposes or as novelties, but have not yet gained acceptance for professional medical use.

The first stethoscope that could work with a smartphone application was introduced in 2015.

A fetal stethoscope or fetoscope is an acoustic stethoscope shaped like a listening trumpet. It is placed against the abdomen of a pregnant woman to listen to the heart sounds of the fetus. The fetal stethoscope is also known as a Pinard horn after French obstetrician Adolphe Pinard (1844 - 1934).

A Doppler stethoscope is an electronic device that measures the Doppler effect of ultrasound waves reflected from organs within the body. Motion is detected by the change in frequency, due to the Doppler effect, of the reflected waves. Hence the Doppler stethoscope is particularly suited to deal with moving objects such as a beating heart. It was recently demonstrated that continuous Doppler enables the auscultation of valvular movements and blood flow sounds that are undetected during cardiac examination with a stethoscope in adults. The Doppler auscultation presented a sensitivity of 84% for the detection of aortic regurgitations while classic stethoscope auscultation presented a sensitivity of 58%. Moreover, Doppler auscultation was superior in the detection of impaired ventricular relaxation. Since the physics of Doppler auscultation and classic auscultation are different, it has been suggested that both methods could complement each other. A military noise-immune Doppler based stethoscope has recently been developed for auscultation of patients in loud sound environments (up to 110 dB).

A 3D-printed stethoscope is an open-source medical device meant for auscultation and manufactured via means of 3D printing. The 3D stethoscope was developed by Dr. Tarek Loubani and a team of medical and technology specialists. The 3D-stethoscope was developed as part of the Glia project, and its design is open source from the outset. The stethoscope gained widespread media coverage in Summer 2015.

The need for a 3D-stethoscope was borne out of a lack of stethoscopes and other vital medical equipment because of the blockade of the Gaza Strip, where Loubani, a Palestinian-Canadian, worked as an emergency physician during the 2012 conflict in Gaza. The 1960s-era Littmann Cardiology 3 stethoscope became the basis for the 3D-printed stethoscope developed by Loubani.

Stethoscopes usually have rubber earpieces, which aid comfort and create a seal with the ear, improving the acoustic function of the device. Stethoscopes can be modified by replacing the standard earpieces with moulded versions, which improve comfort and transmission of sound. Moulded earpieces can be cast by an audiologist or made by the stethoscope user from a kit.

#4 2017-08-28 00:30:06

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

4) The search for extra-terrestrial intelligence

With the cancellation of funding for an alien-hunting telescope in California, we look at the science behind the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence.

Where is everybody?
This was the question reportedly asked by nuclear physicist Enrico Fermi during a lunch at Los Alamos laboratory in New Mexico back in 1950.

It’s now known as the Fermi Paradox. It’s intended to highlight the apparent contradiction between high estimates of the probability that there are alien civilizations in our galaxy, and the lack of any evidence that they really do exist.

There are a number of attempted explanations of why this should be the case, such as alien civilizations being too far away, eventually being destroyed by themselves or by natural events - or because they aren’t there to find.

A decade after Fermi’s question, astrophysicist Frank Drake, the pioneer of the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, created what is now referred to as the Drake Equation to try to estimate the number of alien civilizations in our galaxy.

The equation is based on the star formation rate, the fraction of stars that have planets and the probabilities of, for example, the planets developing life and that life evolving intelligence.The problem is that we don’t accurately know the values of most of the variables, and Drake himself has said that his equation is just a way of “organising our ignorance” on the matter.

Most approaches aimed at detecting aliens involve listening out for signals and hoping we find something.

Listening out
Efforts to detect signs of extraterrestrial intelligence usually use radio telescopes, typically utilising a portion of their time that is not devoted to traditional radio astronomy.

Assuming that alien signals are much like our own, the data analysts are on the lookout for repeating signals with a narrow bandwidth.

But because there is little time dedicated to SETI activities, and resources are scarce, there have only been studies at a handful of frequencies from a few thousand star systems - out of more than 100 bn stars in total.

Arguably the best candidate for the detection of an artificial transmission so far is the “Wow!” signal, picked up in 1977 by the Big Ear radio telescope at Ohio State University.

It lasted for the entirety of the maximum 72 seconds for which it could be observed, suggesting a constant signal, and was at a frequency similar to that of hydrogen resonance, which has been suggested as one at which strong interstellar signals might be transmitted.

Repeated attempts to relocate the signal have not found anything, however.

Because using radio telescopes can only possibly detect civilizations that have reached a certain level of technology, some have suggested finding planets around other stars and monitoring their atmospheres.

This could first determine whether they’re capable of supporting life like that which is found on Earth, and then detect any changes in composition that would result from an industrial revolution.

Announcing our presence
Signals from Earth have been leaking into space, unwittingly announcing our presence to any extraterrestrial civilizations, since the first FM radio and TV transmissions.

Unlike some other frequencies, which bounce off the atmosphere, FM signals can penetrate it and be carried through space.

But any aliens wanting to catch 24-hour rolling news coverage would have to be nearby.

Until recently, TV transmissions have been omnidirectional - they spread out roughly equally in every direction through space. So their power decreases with the square of the distance that the signal has travelled through space, meaning that broadcasts would be extremely difficult to pick up at a range of more than a few tens of lightyears.

It will be even harder in the future because of both satellite television and the digital switchover.

Whereas the old type of broadcasts sent radio waves in every direction, the requirements of satellite TV mean sending them in tighter beams up to satellites and then back down to Earth again, so less of the signal leaks into space.

The UK is also due to switch over to digital rather than analogue broadcasting, and digital signals only need about a quarter of the power, making any transmission even weaker still by the time it reaches neighbouring stars.

But even if accidentally leaked messages are weak, we can still try to make contact deliberately by beaming messages towards a particular location in space.

This has been attempted several times, the best known of which was transmitted by the Arecibo radio observatory in 1974. The message was a sequence of binary digits, which, when decoded shows pictorial and mathematical representations of a human being, our solar system and DNA.

It was aimed at the M13 globular cluster of around 30 000 stars 21 000 light years away, which will no longer be there by the time the message arrives – it was intended more as a demonstration of technology and to be thought-provoking.

Although the power of deliberately transmitted beams doesn’t drop as rapidly as with accidental broadcasts, they are still only likely to be strong enough to be detected within perhaps a few hundred to a few thousand lightyears. The effective range of a transmission depends on several factors, including the frequency, bandwidth and transmission power, as this range-calculator shows.

Even for messages at high power, any extraterrestrials waiting to hear from us could need a radio dish several kilometres across. They may not have the budget for it.

#5 2017-08-29 22:38:09

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

5) The Egyptian Pyramids

The Pharaoh In Egyptian Society

The Early Pyramids

The Great Pyramids Of Giza

The End Of The Pyramid Era

The Pyramids Today

#6 2017-08-31 00:43:17

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

6) General Packer Radio Service

General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) is a standard technology that extends GSM (global system for mobile) voice networks with support for data features. GPRS based networks are often called 2.5G networks and are gradually being phased out in favor of newer 3G/4G installations.

History of GPRS

GPRS was one of the first technologies that enabled a cell network to connect with Internet Protocol (IP) networks, achieving widespread adoption in the early 2000s (sometimes being called "GSM-IP").

The ability to browse the Web from a phone at any time ("always on" data networking), while taken for granted in much of the world today, was still a novelty then. Even today, GPRS continues to be used in parts of the world where it has been too costly to upgrade cellular network infrastructure to newer alternatives.

Mobile Internet providers offered GPRS data services together with voice subscription packages before 3G and 4G technologies became popular. Customers originally paid for GPRS service according to how much network bandwidth they used in sending and receiving data until providers changed to offer flat-rate use packages as is customary today.

EDGE (Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution) technology (often called 2.75G) was developed in early 2000s enhanced version of GPRS. EDGE is sometimes also called Enhanced GPRS or simply EGPRS.

GPRS technology was standardized by the European Telecommunications Standard Institute (ETSI).

GPRS and EDGE deployments are both managed under the oversight of the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP).

Features of GPRS

GPRS utilizing packet switching for data transmission. It operates at extremely slow speeds by today's standards - data rates for downloads range from 28 Kbps up to 171 Kbps, with upload speeds even lower.

(In contrast, EDGE supported download rates of 384 Kbps when first introduced, later enhanced up to about 1 Mbps.)

Other features supported by GPRS include:

i) Short Message Service (SMS) - special-purpose communication protocols designed for text messaging
ii) Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) - extensions to SMS to enable transmission of videos in addition to text
iii) Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) - a specialized communication protocol for mobile browsers, now obsolete

Deploying GPRS to customers required adding two specific kinds of hardware to existing GSM networks:

i) the Gateway GPRS Support Node (GGSN) connects the service provider's cell network to the Internet (or other IP network). These devices manage traffic between the internal and external networks.
ii) the Serving GPRS Support Node (SGSN) sits between the service provider's internal network and the customer-facing equipment (primarily base stations). These devices authenticate and manage phones signed onto the network (including usage monitoring).

The GPRS Tunneling Protocol (GTP) supports the transfer of GPRS data through the existing GSM network infrastructure. GTP primary runs over User Datagram Protocol (UDP).

Using GPRS

To use GPRS, a person must have a cell phone and be subscribed to a data plan where the provider supports it.

#7 2017-09-02 00:57:15

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

7) Taipei 101 Tower

Visiting the Taipei 101 Tower site should be on your list of things to do in this exciting city. Beautiful in spirit and design, one notices immediately that its spire is architecturally influenced by the bamboo plant, native to China.

Taipei 101 Tower was the tallest building in the world from 2004 to 2010, when it was surpassed in height by Burj Dubai.

A mall is found at the base, and visitors can shop after visiting the tower. Upscale shopping as well as a supermarket are all part of the excitement. Built to withstand earthquakes and typhoons, the architectural marvel of Taipei 101 Tower will make your visit to Taipei a truly memorable experience.

About Taipei 101

With a height of 1667 feet or 508 meters, Taipei 101 has the distinction of being the third tallest building in the world, and tallest outside the Middle East. Its spire adds to its height, and the total makes it higher than the Kuala Lumpur Petronas Twin Towers. The name, Taipei 101, is derived from the fact that the building encompasses 101 floors.

It was originally known as the Taipei International Financial Center. Fast moving elevators whisk the tenants to their floors, as well as visitors to the observation deck on the 89th floor in 37 seconds. It is considered the second fastest elevator in the world and is a must-do on any traveler's list.

Symbolism in the Design

Influenced throughout by the spirit and culture of the Chinese, the first thing one notices about Taipei 101 is the influence of bamboo on the outside spire. The pagoda shape is also very evident inside and outside.

The number eight, considered lucky in Chinese culture, has been incorporated by the use of eight sections of the outside building.

Observation Deck and Restaurant

You will enjoy a trip up on the high speed elevator at 55 feet per second and the marvelous views of Taipei; then dine at the highest restaurant in the country, Ding Xian 101. Reservations should be made to secure a table.

On the 35th floor, Elly's Flower & Cafe is found and is known for their marvelous coffee and tea as well as western style lunches and dinners. Two more unique restaurants can be found on the 85th floor.

Getting There

Located in the heart of the city, the Tower is surrounded by department stores, a theater, businesses and a skywalk. The area is a short walk from the MRT station of City Hall on the Blue Line. On foot, it usually takes 15 to 20 minutes from the station; Taipei 101 Tower is located on Hsinyi Road.

The price of general admission to the indoor observation deck is NT$350. Children below the height of 100cm are admitted free. Concession tickets are $320.

If you are interested in accessing the outdoor observation deck, that is an additional NT$100 and is a separate ticket. One must purchase the indoor observation deck ticket as well as outdoor deck if they wish to visit the outdoor deck.

Both observation decks are open from 10 a.m. until 10 p.m.

#8 2017-09-03 23:09:06

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

8) Fear of falling

The fear of falling (FOF), also referred to as basophobia (or basiphobia), is a natural fear and is typical of most humans and mammals, in varying degrees of extremity. It differs from acrophobia (the fear of heights), although the two fears are closely related. The fear of falling encompasses the anxieties accompanying the sensation and the possibly dangerous effects of falling, as opposed to the heights themselves. Those who have little fear of falling may be said to have a head for heights. Basophobia is sometimes associated with astasia-abasia, the fear of walking/standing erect.

In humans

Studies done by psychologists Eleanor J. Gibson and Richard D. Walk have further explained the nature of this fear. One of their more famous studies is the "visual cliff". Below is their description of the cliff:

…a board laid across a large sheet of heavy glass which is supported a foot or more above the floor. On one side of the board a sheet of patterned material is placed flush against the undersurface of the glass, giving the glass the appearance as well as the substance of solidity. On the other side a sheet of the same material is laid upon the floor; this side of the board thus becomes the visual cliff.

Thirty-six infants were tested in their experiments, ranging from six to fourteen months. Gibson and Walk found that when placed on the board, 27 of the infants would crawl on the shallow side when called by their mothers; only three ventured off the "edge" of the cliff. Many infants would crawl away from their mothers who were calling from the deep end, and some would cry because they couldn’t reach their mothers without crossing an apparent chasm. Some would pat the glass on the deep end, but even with this assurance would not crawl on the glass. These results, although unable to prove that this fear is innate, indicate that most human infants have well developed depth perception and are able to make the connection between depth and the danger that accompanies falling.

Elderly persons

For a long time, the fear of falling was merely believed to be a result of the psychological trauma of a fall, also called "post-fall syndrome". This syndrome was first mentioned in 1982 by Murphy and Isaacs, who noticed that after a fall, ambulatory persons developed intense fear and walking disorders. Fear of falling has been identified as one of the key symptoms of this syndrome. Since that time, FOF has gained recognition as a specific health problem among older adults. However, FOF was also commonly found among elderly persons who had not yet experienced a fall.

Prevalence of FOF appears to increase with age and to be higher in women. Age remains significant in multiple logistic regression analyses. The results of different studies have reported gender as a somewhat significant risk factor for fear of falling. Other risk factors of fear of falling in the elderly include dizziness, self-rated health status, depression, and problems with gait and balance.

In animals

Studies of nonhuman subjects support the theory that falling is an inborn fear. Gibson and Walk performed identical experiments with chicks, turtles, rats, kids, lambs, kittens, and puppies. The results were similar to those of the human infants, although each animal behaved a little differently according to the characteristics of its species.

The chicks were tested less than 24 hours after birth. It suggested that depth perception develops quickly in chickens, as the chicks never made the "mistake" of walking off the "deep" side of the cliff. The kids and lambs were also tested as soon as they could stand on their own. During the experiment, no goat or lamb ever stepped onto the glass of the deep side. When placed there, the animals displayed typical behavior by going into a posture of defense, with their front legs rigid and their back legs limp. In this state of immobility, the animals were pushed forward across the glass until their head and field of vision crossed the solid edge on the opposite side of the cliff; the goats and lambs would then relax and proceed to spring forward upon its surface. Based on the results of the animals tested, the danger and fear of falling is instilled in animals at a very young age.

Factors that influence the fear of falling

Postural control

The postural control system has two functions: to ensure that balance is maintained by bracing the body against gravity, and to fix the orientation and position of the features that serve as a frame of reference for perception and action with respect to the external world. Postural control relies on multisensory processing and motor responses that seem to be automatic and occur without awareness. Studies have shown that people afraid of heights or falling have poor postural control, especially in the absence of strong visual cues. These individuals rely heavily on vision to regulate their posture and balance.  When faced with high or unstable ground, the vestibular system in these individuals senses the instability and attempts to correct it by increasing postural sway to reactivate visual balance feedback (postural sway refers to the phenomenon of constant displacement and correction of the position of the center of gravity within the base of support). This often fails, however, resulting in a feeling of increased instability and anxiety, which is often interpreted as fear.

Height vertigo

Closely related to postural control is the sensation of vertigo: a warning signal created by a loss of postural control when the distance between the observer and visible stationary objects becomes too large, and caused by a dysfunction of the vestibular system in the inner ear. In short, it is the feeling of motion when one is actually stationary. Symptoms of vertigo include dizziness, nausea, vomiting, shortness of breath, and the inability to walk or stand. Some individuals are more reliant on visual cues to control posture than others. Vestibular sensations can arise when unsound information is detected along the sensory channels (this happens even to those with normal vestibular function), and feelings of vertigo can result in people with postural control issues.

Space and motion discomfort

Studies have shown that people with acrophobia and/or an extreme fear of falling have higher scores of SMD, or space and motion discomfort. These are physical symptoms elicited by visual or kinesthetic information that is inadequate for normal spatial orientation. Space and motion discomfort arises when conflicting information is detected among visual, kinesthetic, and vestibular sensory channels. Evidence has supported the claim that patients with anxiety and SMD rely more heavily on visual cues for postural changes.

Falling in dreams

According to Sigmund Freud's The Interpretation of Dreams, falling dreams fall under the category of "typical dreams", meaning the "dreams which almost everyone has dreamt alike and which we are accustomed to assume must have the same meaning for everyone". In the fairly recent study, "The Typical Dreams of Canadian University Students", common dreams were investigated by administering a Typical Dreams Questionnaire (TDQ). The results confirmed that typical dreams are consistent over time, region, and gender, and a few themes can be considered almost universal: falling (73.8% prevalence), flying or soaring in the air (48.3%) and swimming (34.3%). In 1967, Saul and Curtis published a paper entitled "Dream Form and Strength of Impulse in Dreams of Falling and Other Dreams of Descent". According to Saul and Curtis, dreams of falling can have various meanings, such as the sensation of falling asleep, the symbolization of a real risk of falling from bed, the repetition of traumatic experiences of falling or sensations of falling from parents’ arms in childhood, birth and delivery, ambition or the renouncement of responsibility, or life experiences such as flying in an airplane. They quote another author, Gutheil (1951), who suggests a range of possible meanings subsumed under the general idea of loss of (mental) equilibrium. These include loss of temper, loss of self-control, yielding, decline of the accepted moral standard or loss of consciousness. Studies performed in recent years on the dream patterns of a group of 685 students attending secondary schools in Milan have concluded that, in dreams, fear is more frequently associated with falling, while happiness is connected with flying, and surprise with suspension and vertical movement (climbing, descent, ladder) content.

Media treatment

In the Alfred Hitchcock film Vertigo, the hero, played by James Stewart, has to resign from the police force after an incident which causes him to develop both acrophobia and vertigo. Early on in the film he faints while climbing a stepladder. There are numerous references throughout the film to fear of heights and falling.

#9 2017-09-05 02:10:31

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

9) 20 Facts About Burj Khalifa

Burj Khalifa - world’s tallest building is marvel of architectural genius of 21st century. Talk of its height or look at its design, this building is all set to leave you awestruck! Breaking several records and bagging new world records, this building sets global standards for affluence. Here are 20 interesting facts about Burj Khalifa that will make you utter only one word – “awesome!”.

2. The observatory deck of the building is located at a height of 1483 feet or 452.1 meters.

4. The Gross Floor Area of the tower is 3,331,140 ft or 309,473 m². The Gross Floor Area is the area within the footprint of the tower and does not include connected buildings and adjoining podiums.

5. The developer/owner of the tower is Emaar and its design architect is Skidmore Owings & Merill and architect of record is Hyder Consulting.

6. MEP (mechanical, electrical and plumbing) engineer as well as structural engineer is Skidmore Owings & Merill.

7. Turner Construction was the project manager for Burj Khalifa while Besix, Arabtec and Samsung C&T Corporation were its main contractors. Dow Corning Corporation supplied sealants for the tower while Otis Elevator Company supplied the elevators.

8. Located in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, this tower was initially named as Burj Dubai. The building was proposed in 2003 but construction work started in 2004 and was completed in 2010.

9. Burj Khalifa is the tallest tower in Dubai, UAE, Middle East and World. It is 3 times as tall as Eiffel Tower and two times taller than Empire State Building.

10. The tower also holds world records for: ‘tallest free standing building’, ‘highest occupied floor’, ‘highest number of stories’, ‘longest travel distance elevators’, ‘tallest service elevator’ and ‘second highest outdoor observatory deck’. Record for highest outdoor observation deck is now held by Canton Tower which was officially opened in December 2011.

11. Total aluminum used in the tower weighs as much as 5 A380 aircraft. Total concrete used in the tower weighs as much as 100,000 elephants.

12. During peak construction days, 12,000 workers were engaged every day.

13. ’22 million man-hours’, ‘55,000-ton steel rebar’ and ‘110,000-ton concrete’ were used to complete the construction of the tower in 6 years.

14. Skidmore Owings & Merill is an American architect firm and they developed the structural system called ‘buttressed core’ that supports 163 floors of the building.

15. So much rebar was used in the construction of Burj Khalifa that if they were laid down end-to-end, the total length would be one-quarter of the total way across the globe.

16. 26,000 glass panels cut individually were used to create the exterior of the building. 300 Chinese cladding experts worked together to design a cladding system for the tower that could withstand Dubai’s summer heat.

17. Burj Khalifa requires a supply of 250,000 gallons of water each day and total electricity consumption of the building is equivalent to the electricity consumed by 360,000 bulbs of 100-watt each burning at the same time.

18. The building has a specially designed elevator system for controlled evacuation during emergency situations like security threats or fire.

19. The building has 12 machines of 13 tons each moving along tracks constructed outside the building. 36 cleaners board these machines to clean the 24,000 reflective windows of the tower.

20. The design of the tower is inspired by the shape of Hymenocallis flower. The flower is known for its long petals extending out from its center.

Please note that all heights are measured from the lowest level of open air, significant, pedestrian entrance. Underground floors are not included in the measurement. The total cost of building Burj Khalifa was $1.5 billion.

#10 2017-09-06 01:00:20

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

10) What is Nanotechnology?

How it Started

The ideas and concepts behind nanoscience and nanotechnology started with a talk entitled “There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom” by physicist Richard Feynman at an American Physical Society meeting at the California Institute of Technology (CalTech) on December 29, 1959, long before the term nanotechnology was used. In his talk, Feynman described a process in which scientists would be able to manipulate and control individual atoms and molecules. Over a decade later, in his explorations of ultraprecision machining, Professor Norio Taniguchi coined the term nanotechnology. It wasn't until 1981, with the development of the scanning tunneling microscope that could "see" individual atoms, that modern nanotechnology began.

Fundamental Concepts in Nanoscience and Nanotechnology

of a meter. Here are a few illustrative examples:

There are 25,400,000 nanometers in an inch

A sheet of newspaper is about 100,000 nanometers thick

Nanoscience and nanotechnology involve the ability to see and to control individual atoms and molecules. Everything on Earth is made up of atoms - the food we eat, the clothes we wear, the buildings and houses we live in, and our own bodies.

#11 2017-09-09 00:47:35

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

11) Sydney

Since convict transportation ended in the mid-19th century, the city has transformed from a colonial outpost into a major global cultural and economic centre. The municipal council of Sydney was incorporated in 1842 and became Australia's first city. Gold was discovered in the colony in 1851 and with it came thousands of people seeking to make money.  Sydney became one of the most multicultural cities in the world after the mass migration following the second World War. According to the 2011 census, more than 250 different languages were spoken in Sydney and about 40 percent of residents spoke a language other than English at home. Furthermore, 36 percent of the population reported having been born overseas.

Despite being one of the most expensive cities in the world, the 2014 Mercer Quality of Living Survey ranks Sydney tenth in the world in terms of quality of living, making it one of the most livable cities. It is classified as an Alpha World City by Globalization and World Cities Research Network, indicating its influence in the region and throughout the world. Ranked eleventh in the world for economic opportunity, Sydney has an advanced market economy with strengths in finance, manufacturing and tourism. There is a significant concentration of foreign banks and multinational corporations in Sydney and the city is promoted as one of Asia Pacific's leading financial hubs. Established in 1850, the University of Sydney is Australia's first university and is regarded as one of the world's leading universities.

In addition to hosting events such as the 2000 Summer Olympics, Sydney is amongst the top fifteen most-visited cities in the world, with millions of tourists coming each year to see the city's landmarks. Its natural features include Sydney Harbour, the Royal National Park, and the Royal Botanic Garden. Man-made attractions such as Sydney Tower, the Sydney Harbour Bridge, and the Sydney Opera House (which became a World Heritage Site in 2007), are also well known to international visitors. The main passenger airport serving the metropolitan area is Kingsford-Smith Airport, one of the world's oldest continually operating airports. Opened in 1906, Central station is the main hub of the city's rail network.

#12 2017-09-10 00:40:02

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

12) July 12, 1962: The Day Information Went Global

Telstar was launched by NASA on July 10, 1962, from Cape Canaveral, Fla., and was the first privately sponsored space-faring mission. Two days later, it relayed the world's first transatlantic television signal, from Andover Earth Station, Maine, to the Pleumeur-Bodou Telecom Center, Brittany, France.

Developed by Bell Telephone Laboratories for AT&T, Telstar was the world's first active communications satellite and the world's first commercial payload in space. It demonstrated the feasibility of transmitting information via satellite, gained experience in satellite tracking and studied the effect of Van Allen radiation belts on satellite design. The satellite was spin-stabilized to maintain its desired orientation in space. Power to its onboard equipment was provided by a solar array, in conjunction with a battery back-up system.

Although operational for only a few months and relaying television signals of a brief duration, Telstar immediately captured the imagination of the world. The first images, those of President John F. Kennedy and of singer Yves Montand from France, along with clips of sporting events, images of the American flag waving in the breeze and a still image of Mount Rushmore, were precursors of the global communications that today are mostly taken for granted.

Telstar operated in a low-Earth orbit and was tracked by the ground stations in Maine and France. Each ground station had a large microwave antenna mounted on bearings, to permit tracking the satellite during the approximately half-hour period of each orbit when it was overhead. The signals from Telstar were received and amplified by a low-noise "maser" (Microwave Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation), the predecessor of the modern laser. After demonstrating the feasibility of the concept, subsequent communications satellites adopted a much higher orbit, at 22,300 miles above the Earth, at which the satellite's speed matched the Earth's rotation and thus appeared fixed in the sky. During the course of its operational lifespan, Telstar 1 facilitated over 400 telephone, telegraph, facsimile and television transmissions. It operated until November 1962, when its on-board electronics failed due to the effects of radiation.

#13 2017-09-16 15:46:12

Registered: 2005-06-28
Posts: 23,196

Re: Miscellany

13) The Element Osmium

Atomic Number: 76
Atomic Weight: 190.23
Density: 22.57 grams per cubic centimeter or 22,570 kilograms per meter cube, The heaviest metal
Phase at Room Temperature: Solid
Element Classification: Metal
Period Number: 6    Group Number: 8    Group Name: none

History and Uses:

Estimated Crustal Abundance:

milligrams per kilogram

Estimated Oceanic Abundance: Not Applicable

Number of Stable Isotopes: 5

Ionization Energy: 8.7 eV

Oxidation States: +4, +3

Electron Shell Configuration:

Board footer

Powered by FluxBB


The Doo-Doo Tribe, led by an elder and guarded by Enkobo (Guardian of the Forest) is the last remaining small tribe located in the west part of the homeland of Minimons, which is located in a distant galaxy. The Doo-Doo tribe, collects rare eggs with minions inside and take care of the minions that come out of these eggs. The minions that come out of the eggs, become strong and protect the physically weak Doo-Doo tribe from dark minions. This is how the tribe has lived and survived for generations. The player is given the task to advance the tribe, collect minions to join the cause and to journey throughout the world to defeat the forces of darkness that have overwhelmed other tribes and made them become hostile minions.

Void background final

The Doo-Doo tribe excavating and finding rare eggs.

The tribe leader reading the ancient scroll.

The mythical scroll read by the Doo-Doo tribe has stated that every 1000 years, the world succumbs to darkness. When the darkness spreads, all minions become aggressive and want to dominate the world, wars erupt and the world falls into chaos. When the world was covered in darkness once again, the Doo-Doo tribe decided to grow their tribe and find more minions to join their side. Those minions would be the key to summoning mythical minions and to prevail against the darkness.

Doo Jr. finds the rare egg in the forest.

After Doo Jr. found a mystical egg deep in the forest, he decided to take the egg to the village of the Doo-Doo Tribe. However, Doo Jr. soon found himself surrounded by dark minions and was forced to make a run for it. Doo Jr. stumbled, the egg flew out of his arms and broke after it landed. A hatch-ling named Enkobo came out of the egg and after seeing that Doo Jr. was in trouble, Enkobo became enraged, which made him transform from a hatch-ling into his bigger form. Enkobo soon found himself receiving support from Umbra, Chi, Rathos and Acqua. After defeating the dark minions, another dark minion named Naxus appeared.

Enkobo hatching from the egg.

Streamingandlinks (1)

Enkobo protecting Doo Jr. After his transformation.

Naxus looking relatively small at first, transformed into a huge dark minion. After Naxus defeated Umbra, Chi, Rathos and Acqua with ease, Enkobo was left to deal with Naxus alone. Even though the odds were in favour of the much bigger Naxus, Enkobo used his awakening and C-strike to successfully defeat Naxus. After the defeat of Naxus, Enkobo vowed to protect the Doo-Doo tribe and start his quest to summon the Dragon God Orochi.

Ad blocker interference detected!


Theocritus is a level 24 quest giver located in the Tower of Azora in the human starting zone of Elwynn Forest.

Theocritus is a mage of some power -- one of the many of those educated by the Kirin Tor left independent by the inaccessibility of Dalaran. He resides in the Tower of Azora, in eastern Elwynn Forest. He is a particularly eccentric mage, keeping a coterie of attendants, ranging from legions of gnomish servants to his own personal clothier, Morley Eberlein. He is known for his interest in enchanting, and those seeking to learn more of the art often visit his tower to speak with its residents.

He is not particularly involved in the day-to-day affairs of the rest of humanity, but he still considers it his duty to battle against the dark mage Morganth of Redridge, both as a personal enemy and as a threat to the Kingdom of Stormwind. Theocritus spent months of research to find a way to communicate with the Shadowhide gnolls, the servants of Morganth, through their pendants. He wants to learn how to send an attack through the pendants, to immobilize any Shadowhide gnolls who wear them. Theocritus has also developed a means of spying on his rival, the Eye of Azora, and can now view him from afar, though his final purpose is to study Morganth's thoughts.

He starts the following quests:

See List of Elwynn Forest NPCs.

External linksEdit

Ad blocker interference detected!


Bullying in schools and offices

Portrait of attractive young woman showing a thumbs up on white background

How to overcome the effects of bullying.
What is EMDR and can it help you?

Do you know someone who has been bullied, in the office? At school by their peers? These produce bad feelings and traumas which had become deeply stuck in the mind … Often causing havoc in the life of a client.  This could be events such as rape, abuse, bullying, domestic violence, failure, seeing or being in accidents.

Just as Rapid Eye Movement (REM) works in your dreams to sort out day-to-day events, this bi-lateral stimulation just seems to sort out the deep-seated memory and the very basic negative cognition attached to the unhelpful events.  Such as ‘I am dirty’, ‘I am weak’, ‘I am not all there’, ‘I am not normal’, ‘I am unworthy’.

What happens when you are traumatised?

Most of the time, your body routinely manages new information and experiences without you being aware of it.  However, when something out of the ordinary occurs and you are traumatised by an overwhelming event (e.g. car accident) or by being repeatedly subjected to distress (e.g. childhood neglect), your natural coping mechanism can become overloaded.  This overloading can result in disturbing experiences remaining frozen in your brain or being “unprocessed”.  Such unprocessed memories and feelings are stored in the brain in a “raw” form. This means that they can be continually re-stimulated when you experience events similar to the difficult experiences you have been through.  Often the memory itself is long forgotten, but the painful feelings such as anxiety, panic, anger or despair are continually triggered in the present.  Your ability to live in the present and learn from new experiences can. therefore, become inhibited.

Can the mind heal naturally in the same way as the body does?

Francine Shapiro is among a group of prominent innovators who discovered that the body has a natural psychological healing process which helps to deal with day-to-day stresses and minor traumas.  This process helps reduce discomfort and enables you to assimilate, learn and grow from new experiences.  Much of this natural coping mechanism has been found to occur during sleep, particularly during that period of sleep when you experience rapid eye movement (REM). In 1987, Francine Shapiro used this insight to developed Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR), initially as a treatment for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Since then, EMDR has evolved into a highly effective therapeutic technique for a wide range of problems.

 Can anyone benefit from EMDR?

As part of a therapy session, EMDR can accelerate therapy by resolving the impact of your past traumas and allowing you to live more fully in the present.  This process is rapid, and any disturbing experiences, if they occur at all, last for a comparatively short period of time. However, it is not, however, appropriate for everyone and more gentle but longer help is available. Nevertheless, you need to be aware of and willing to experience the strong feelings and disturbing thoughts, which sometimes occur during sessions

How do I know this is not just another new untried therapy?

EMDR is an innovative clinical treatment which has successfully helped over a million individuals.  The validity and reliability of EMDR has been established by rigorous research.  There are now at least nineteen controlled studies into EMDR making it the most thoroughly researched method used in the treatment of trauma.  It is recommended by the NICE guidelines for PTSD.

Will I will remain in control and empowered?

During EMDR treatment, you will remain in control, fully alert and wide awake.  This is not a form of hypnosis and you can stop the process at any time.  Throughout the session, the therapist will support and facilitate your own self-healing and intervene as little as possible.  Reprocessing is usually experienced as something that happens spontaneously, and new connections and insights are felt to arise quite spontaneously from within. As a result, most people experience EMDR as being a natural and very empowering therapy.

What is an EMDR session like?

EMDR utilises this natural healing ability of your body.  After a thorough assessment, you will be asked specific questions about a particular disturbing memory.  A specific protocol is followed and, eye movements, similar to those during REM sleep, will be recreated simply by asking you to watch the therapist’s finger moving backwards and forwards across your visual field. Tapping on the knees is also very effective and you may receive a mixture of both movements.  The eye movements or knee taps will last for a short while and then stop.  You will then be asked to report back on the experiences you had during each of these sets of eye movements or knee taps.  Experiences during a session may include changes in thoughts, images and feelings.  Sometimes you may become aware of new, forgotten memories.

With repeated sets of eye movements, or knee taps, the memory tends to change in such a way that it loses its painful intensity and simply becomes a neutral memory of an event in the past.  Other associated memories may also heal at the same time. This linking of related memories can lead to a dramatic and rapid improvement in many aspects of your life. This is called Adaptive Information Processing.

How long does treatment take?

EMDR can be brief focused treatment or part of a longer psychotherapy programme.  EMDR sessions can be for 60 to 90 minutes.

IEMDR require multi-sessional treatments have been proven to help 90% of people suffering from migraine headaches that are not attributed as secondary to a medical condition or medication.

Now your call to action, what will happen if you do this? See the relief and difference the freedom to be doing something far more pleasurable.

So pick up the phone, write a start date down … and just do it for you!

Hypnotherapy/Life Coaching/counselling can help.

If you need any help in coming to terms with anything I have written in this article or just need the help to be nudged into the healthier direction then please call me on 01234 852 930 for an initial free phone chat or appointment. Calmpower Stress Management, Hypnotherapy & Counselling since 1998.

Website: www.calmpower.com email: action@calmpower.com
© 2016 Joanne Waine DipCBT,DipCAH,DipHyp(Paediatrics),DipSC,MNCH(AccHypSup),SQHP, MPNLP, EFT-ADV.

Written by

Joanne Waine is a highly experienced, motivated, professional Clinical Hypnotherapist totally committed to the empowerment of the individual. Specialising is Stress Management, weight loss issues are covered in the Calmpower Hypnoslimmers Programme, Relationship Issues; Anxiety, Stress & Confidence, Insomnia and Phobias. To achieve this she utilises advanced clinical hypnosis techniques in conjunction with Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), counselling, Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP – quantum physics how the mind and body work together), Time Line Therapy™, Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT™) and Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reconstruction (EMDR) that have proven results to assist her clients in releasing all resistance to their goals and reaching their full potential.

Leave a Reply


GoGoAnime for your Android devices from

Ginban Kaleidoscope Description:

Plot Summary: 16-year old Sakurano Tazusa is a Japanese figure ice-skater who considers herself to be worth $10 billion in beauty. While executing her moves in the Women's Figure Skating Grand Prix, she stumbled and landed badly, hence resulting in her loss in the competition. At the same time, in the same city, a Canadian youth by the name of Pete Pumps was performing an air stunt when his plane crashes and he dies. Tazusa starts to hear a strange voices and realises that the Canadian ghost now resides in her body. After futile attempts to get rid of Pete, Tazusa decides to get accustomed to his presence and in the meantime, improve on her techniques in order to get selected for the Olympics.

Genres: comedy, romance, supernatural Themes: Figure skating, Sports
Ginban Kaleidoscope Episodes:


Family Law

The leading authority on all aspects of family law

14 MAY 2009

DIVORCE: Leake v Goldsmith [2009] EWHC 988 (Fam)

(Family Division; Munby J; 8 May 2009)

An application for decree nisi came before the court in unusual and unfortunate circumstances. Following a successful FDR, it had emerged that the district judge had not yet granted decree nisi, having noticed that the marriage certificate was not on the file. The parties asked the FDR judge to deal with the divorce himself, and he agreed. However, the FDR judge then declined to grant a decree on the wife's evidence, because the address given in her oral evidence was not precisely the same as the address given in the petition. The judge therefore gave the wife permission to amend her most recent petition (she had issued two petitions, the second replacing the first), and directed that the case be listed for pronouncement of decree nisi on the following day, the judge being otherwise satisfied that the marriage had broken down irretrievably. Unfortunately, court listed the wrong petition for pronouncement, that is to say it listed the earlier of the two petitions. This was not spotted and both the decree nisi and the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973, s 41 certificate were therefore granted with the wrong petition number; this problem was later identified by the district judge and as soon as it came to his attention the FDR judge alerted the parties to the problem.

There was no scope for amending the order under the slip rule. A consent order would be made (i) to set aside the original orders; (ii) to pronounce a decree nisi on the wife's second petition, as amended; (iii) to grant a new s 41 certificate; and (iv) to abridge the time for decree absolute to 7 days. In the event, because both parties to the marriage were still alive, no major legal issue arose in the case. There had been no need to explore the possible legal implications of the mishap: it was possible that the original decree was valid, but it was also possible that it was not.

Family Court Practice, The

(Red Book)

The Red Book is the acknowledged authority on practice and procedure

More Info from £498.00
Available in Lexis®Library
Female Genital Mutilation

Female Genital Mutilation

Law and Practice


What Exactly Causes Plantar Fasciitis

Heel Discomfort

Heel pain is the most common musculoskeletal complaint of patients presenting to podiatric practitioners throughout the country. It is well-recognized that subcalcaneal pain syndrome, commonly attributed to plantar fascitis, is a disease entity that is increasing in its incidence, owing partly to the fact that it has a predilection for people between the age of 40 and 60, the largest age segment in our population.

Your GP or podiatrist (a healthcare professional who specialises in foot care) may be able to diagnose the cause of your heel pain by asking about your symptoms and examining your heel and foot. You will usually only need further tests if you have additional symptoms that suggest the cause of your heel pain is not inflammation, such as numbness or a tingling sensation in your foot, this could be a sign of nerve damage in your feet and legs (peripheral neuropathy) your foot feels hot and you have a high temperature (fever) of 38C (100.4F) or above - these could be signs of a bone infection, you have stiffness and swelling in your heel, this could be a sign of arthritis. Possible further tests may include blood tests, X-rays - where small doses of radiation are used to detect problems with your bones and tissues, a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan or ultrasound scan, which are more detailed scans.

Non Surgical Treatment

Foot Pain

Surgical Treatment

Like every surgical procedure, plantar fasciitis surgery carries some risks. Because of these risks your doctor will probably advise you to continue with the conventional treatments at least 6 months before giving you approval for surgery. Some health experts recommend home treatment as long as 12 months. If you canât work because of your heel pain, canât perform your everyday activities or your athletic career is in danger, you may consider a plantar fasciitis surgery earlier. But keep in mind that there is no guarantee that the pain will go away completely after surgery. Surgery is effective in many cases, however, 20 to 25 percent of patients continue to experience heel pain after having a plantar fasciitis surgery.

Write a comment

Comments: 0


No Honor in Love and War?

The Philodemic Room

April 16, 2016

The Society gathered for the 141st Richard T. Merrick debate on Saturday, in its best formal attire at a slightly too early hour in the morning to discuss a weighty topic: Resolved: Honor holds humanity back.

Four of our most eloquent seniors keynoted the debate:

On the affirmation:

Mr. Danny Graff (SFS ’16) of California.

 Chancellor Madeleine Ringwald (COL ’16) of New York

 On the negation:

Mr. Andrew Shaughnessy (COL ’16) of Kansas

Chancellor Michael Whelan (COL ’16) of Connecticut

Our four keynoters competed for the Merrick Medal, awarded to the speaker who best exemplifies the Society’s motto of Eloquentiam Libertati Devinctam – “Eloquence in Defense of Liberty”. To award the medal we proudly welcomed our esteemed judges:

The Reverend Charles Currie, S.J., Executive director of the Jesuit Digital Network, highly accomplished President of Wheeling College and Xavier University.

The Honorable Mike Ferguson, Chairman and CEO of Ferguson Strategies LLC, member of Congress from 2001-2009.

The Honorable Joan Plaisted, former Senior Advisor at US Mission to the United Nations, former US Ambassador to the Marshall Islands and Kiribati

 Doctor Gideon Rose, Editor, Foreign Affairs Magazine, member of the Council on Foreign Relations, former Associate Director for Near East and South Asian Affairs at the National Security Council.

Mr. Graff began solemnly, quoting a work of Daoist philosophy to elucidate how Daosim lacks a concept of honor. He defined honor as a concept of morality beyond the law that is particular to a community. For Mr. Graff, the most troubling aspect of honor is its demand for the sacrifice of the ethical in its service – he contended that honor can require us to act inhumanely to preserve our reputations. Thus in forcing us to submit to the court of public opinion, honor creates the fear of being dishonored. Mr. Graff inveighed against the refrain, “death before dishonor,” maintaining that we should not romanticize violence nor be complacent with an unjust system.

In response to the shortcomings of honor, Mr. Graff recommended a Buddhist approach: compassion. Posed counter to honor, compassion and love do not require violence. He counseled that we not be limited by tradition and implored the Society to ask, “Why, Why, Why,” in the manner of Vonnegut in search for a better world.

Mr. Shaughnessy immediately demanded of the Society, “Is there nothing in life worth dying for?” He defined honor as the idea of socially-defined obligations, a concept that is value-neutral and is the mechanism by which we are compelled to follow duty. He claimed that historically, a code of honor was based on retaliation, becoming internalized during the Victorian Age. Honor’s dialectical nature means that it reflects our past and our culture, enabling us to understand notions of human dignity from history. For Mr. Shaughnessy, honor is value-neutral, thus societal context determines the morality of its consequences. He found enormous benefits to honor is its cultivation of civil society, moral conduct in war by the military, and prevention of unjust wars. He affirmed that honor is indispensable to modern society, as it enforces our sense of obligations and remains an intrinsic part of the human condition.

Chancellor Ringwald asked of the Society, “Can we do better?” She examined honor empirically, drawing on psychological findings that societies highly based on honor valued self-defense, retaliation, and hyper-masculinity. The gendered concept of honor led to a code that damaged those left without access to honor as well as those with it, with Chancellor Ringwald citing the 38 million American women who have experienced domestic violence. Honor leaves out women, only giving them honor in chastity, and even leads to honor killings, which draw on the same sexist ideas of a woman’s place. Chancellor Ringwald contended that honor led to grave acts of revenge on the part of the United States for September 11, 2001 in Iraq, at Abu Ghraib, as well as motivating Trump’s campaign to win back American honor. She argued that honor creates an idea of a dignity that is earned, as opposed to inherent dignity. With characteristic passion, Chancellor Ringwald argued that the liberators of society always rejected what was honorable in favor of the right, and that no progress towards a society of self-actualizing individuals will be made if we hold on to our idea of honor.

Chancellor Whelan opened with an idiosyncratic jest, asking if honor had held him back from paying off attendees to support him. Moving to more serious matters, he held that honor is a tool, a duty enforced by social norms, and then sought to capture the essence of honor through an account of space exploration. He read a beautiful quote from Carl Sagan on the “Pale blue dot,” of Earth from millions of miles away, emphasizing the ‘smallness’ of humanity. Yet, what propelled Voyager I into space was the US’s compromised sense of national honor after the Soviet launch of Sputnik! Using the example of the moon landing to show that violence was not always the only way to defend honor, Chancellor Whelan made a case for honor as the key to human greatness. Only by challenging each other’s honor and responding peacefully can we successfully follow our duty to explore the stars, and reach greatness.

Opening the floor, Ms. Kurek asked, following Mr. Graff, “to whom, to whom, to whom?” She argued that honor was about duty in relationships, and that an inherent dignity begets respect in contrast to the zero-sum game of honor. Ms. Caroline Egan (COL ’15) countered that honor creates space of previously marginalized groups to claim it, pushing themselves to the front to say, ‘We have honor too!’ Yet for Ms. Burke, all these movements had dignity, not honor. Using the story of Agamemnon, she argued that honor is game in which the male players use all other people as currency, and as lived, honor served to oppress, with grotesque consequences. Mr. Willis replied that these were not fixed values in honor, but if we broke the vase of honor, we could never get it back, and rather, we should try to progress to new interpretations of honor. Bringing up his thesis, Mr. Kleinman pointed out that absolute ideas of honor lead to large-scale destruction through war yet Ms. Hernick posited that honor was vitally necessary for people to aspire to greatness. Mr. Fletcher countered that honor, by virtue of its reliance on tradition and institutions, impedes freedom for humanity to choose its values, but Mr. Schafer highlighted how honor helps enforce norms and defend societal order.

Returning to the stand, Chancellor Whelan praised the floor’s quality. He followed Mr. Schafer’s argument by positing that honor was a positive means of enforcing liberal, democratic norms today. He pointed to a lack of honor as a public force in compelling virtuous behavior, as evidenced by the continuation of the name of the Washington football team and the destruction of the beautiful Penn Station in 1963. Through the mechanism of public shame, honor functioned to preserve good conduct, but now it has been watered down. He held that in our pluralistic society, we cannot rely on laws alone but instead require honor to enforce liberal democratic norms.

Chancellor Ringwald quickly responded by asking if we agree with all the social norms of today. She agreed that honor is a tool, but one that operates in “ideologically violent way,” and in a sense becomes a weapon to police different groups. Marginalized groups never define the norms enforced by honor, which keeps class, gender, and racial oppression alive today. Chancellor Ringwald argued that honor impedes progress, that each times it requires reconstruction, it slows down beneficial self-actualization. Drawing from Christianity, she illustrated how crucifixion was intended as a dishonorable punishment, noting that many people of justice were not ‘honorable.’ She denounced the physical and ideological violence brought by honor as perpetuating oppression and not bringing liberation.

Mr. Shaughnessy implored the Society to look at honor’s contemporary form, which he claimed implied the protection of human dignity at all costs. He held that we can distinguish between the values behind honor and its form, which is value-neutral. Posing the counterfactual of a world without honor, Mr. Shaughnessy warned of a society requiring a totalitarian system to enforce order and society. For smaller organizations today, honor has a huge existential value, and today, honor is becoming a mechanism to enfranchisement of different groups. He argued that ‘honor killings’ are Orientalized by the West, while domestic violence remains the real problem. On the practical side, honor affords an obligation to something else, to one another. Mr. Shaughnessy emphasized honor’s ‘existential value’ in the understanding that humanity will endure, quoting Winston Churchill to show a strong sense of honor and strength.

Mr. Graff opposed this ‘bleak’ version of the world, imploring the Society to search for progress to a better world. He called the ‘tool’ argument bankrupt, as it did not reconcile with the terrible effects ideologies of honor have had on millions of lives. Mr. Graff demanded that we leave behind systems that compel us to do anything and rather should move to treat humans as agents, not targets of enforcement. In contrast to controlling ideas of honor, Buddhism and Daoism, do not have ideas of honor, he emphasized. Their devotion to compassion extends common love to all. Mr. Graff brought up honor’s negative effects today in honor killings and suffering. He implored the Society to recognize a hope for progress to a better day, ending with the simple exhortation to “be kind.”

And then, as always, the Society divided itself to vote, and with 31 negating, 2 abstaining, and 34 affirming, the resolution was affirmed!

After the debate, the keynotes selected from the floor speakers the person most deserving of the Father Ryder Gavel, designed to recognize the most outstanding floor speech of the Merrick debate. After deliberation, Ms. Ashley Burke emerged triumphant, winning with an uncharacteristically serious speech that still lacked none of her formidable rhetorical abilities.

Our judges then announced the winner of the 141st Merrick medal, Chancellor Madeleine Ringwald! With her family present, it was truly a wonderful celebration of her great talents. Huzzah!

Each of our keynotes brought exceptional eloquence and purpose to their speeches, engaging deeply on these fundamental questions, with Mr. Shaughnessy’s logical mastery, Mr. Graff’s philosophical profundity, and Chancellor Whelan’s pathos. Our floor speeches were also quite exceptionally good this morning. The seniors have made a great contribution to our Society with a truly phenomenal Merrick debate! Huzzah for all!

Garrett Hinck

Leave a Reply

You are commenting using your account. Log Out / Change )

Twitter picture

Facebook photo

Google+ photo

Connecting to %s


Wind, sun and nuclear now generating half of UK's electricity

Low carbon power provided half of the UK's electricity between July and September, official figures show.

Renewables such as wind, solar and biomass produced a quarter of the UK's electricity in the third quarter of 2016, while nuclear power was responsible for another 25%, the Government data reveals.

Meanwhile coal fell to historic lows, contributing just 3.6% of the UK's power mix, down from 16.7% for the same period the previous year, as the polluting fossil fuel continued to decline.

The Government has said it wants coal power plants which do not have technology fitted to store emissions to be phased out by 2025 to tackle climate change.

Gas's share of electricity generation rose from 34.8% in July to September 2015 to 43.6% for the period this year.

In Scotland, where 42% of electricity came from renewables, low carbon power's share of the mix was more than three-quarters (77%), although coal contributed 16% of the power over the three months.

Low carbon generation in the third quarter was up to 50% from 45.3% in the same period last year, with nuclear and renewables on the increase.

Industry body RenewableUK's deputy chief executive Maf Smith said: "The Government took the right decision when it announced the phasing out of coal, and its confidence in low carbon generation has been repaid by growth in the sector.

"Wind is playing a central role as a reliable part of our new modern energy system, delivering reliable low carbon power at low cost."

A spokesman for the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Beis) said: "We have made a firm commitment to reducing the UK's carbon emissions, and these statistics show that we are doing exactly that.

"Nearly £52 billion has been invested in renewables in the UK since 2010, and just last month we reiterated our commitment to spend a further £730 million per year supporting new renewable projects over the course of this parliament."


Las Vegas is one of 44 cities meriting a look as a prospective host city for the 2026 World Cup, according to soccer officials tasked with scouting locations across North America for inclusion in an official multinational bid.

Las Vegas World Cup 2026

Hundreds of thousands of soccer fans could swarm Las Vegas in 2026 if the city passes muster with the United Bid Committee, which is examining locations for inclusion in an official bid for three North American countries to host the World Cup. (Image: Pinterest)

The United Bid Committee (UBC) of the United States, Canada and Mexico on Tuesday sent Requests for Information (RFIs) to city officials as part of a joint effort by the three nations to lobby FIFA for the rights to play host to the quadrennial competition.

Soccer officials from the connected North American countries announced their intention to work together submit to FIFA a joint bid. The RFIs are due September 5, and are meant to gauge a city’s interest and assess its infrastructure capabilities, as the committee seeks to whittle down their initial list of 49 possible stadiums to about 20 or 25.

The UBC is slated to settle on a final list of up to 12 in January for inclusion in an official bid, which is due to FIFA in March 2018. So far, Morocco is the only other country to express interest and have applied for consideration. FIFA will announce their final selection in 2020.

Soccer in Las Vegas?

The stadium that garnered the UBC’s attention for Las Vegas hasn’t even been built yet. But the NFL’s Raiders Stadium is scheduled to be completed in time for the 2020 (American) football season, and is expected to have much of what the committee is seeking in potential host stadiums.

The new Raiders Stadium will seat 72,000, which doesn’t meet the standard of 80,000 required for the opening match or finals, but would be able to accommodate the needs of preliminary group stage matches.

Additionally, Las Vegas is well-equipped and accustomed to handling large masses of international sports fans. Depending on which countries played in a city, up to a quarter-million people could be expected to flock not just to the stadium, but also to the city’s casinos, sportsbooks, and restaurants, much like crowds do for the NCAA’s March Madness or the Super Bowl.

FIFA Feeling Heat

The World Cup is held from the second week of June until the final match, usually on July 15. The temperatures in southern Nevada routinely reach triple digits and this year they ranged from 104 to 114 degrees.

Officials don’t want a repeat of what happened at the 1994 World Cup, where first-round matches in Dallas, Texas, and Orlando, Florida, had some teams playing in climates where the heat index reached 105 degrees. Likewise, FIFA has received international condemnation for awarding the 2022 World Cup to Qatar, which has some of the hottest temperatures on the planet during the usual summer schedule.

The bid for being the 2026 host will be the first selection by FIFA since US law enforcement helped expose major corruption in soccer’s ruling body, which led to the ouster of FIFA boss Sepp Blatter, who stood accused of orchestrating kickbacks, bribes, and money laundering in the host selection process.

It’s still widely believed that Blatter, who avoided arrest but received a six-year ban from FIFA, rigged the selection choices for Russia in 2018 and Qatar in 2022.

The international organization has since changed its structure, instituting term limits for the president and improving the vetting process for countries seeking to host future World Cups, in an effort erase the perception of, or opportunities for corruption.


EC SF loves… Cable Cars

Since August 2, 1873, the city of San Francisco has celebrated it’s favorite method of transportation… the infamous cable car.

Inventor Andrew Smith Hallidie decided that a cable driven, steam engine powered vehicle would be a useful alternative to using the traditional horse and cart. In the late 19th century, new technology was devloping and it was ovbious that steep slopes and rocky cobblestones were uncomfortable for city horses, who would struggle to keep a steady speed. Did you know that the first cable car was tested at 4am on Clay St. which runs horizontally across the middle of San Francisco? However, it was actually Andrew’s father who inspired such technical innovation. During the famous ‘gold rush’ from 1852 onwards, Andrew’s father (also named Andrew) had created a ‘cable-rope’ mechanism which allowed him to move bricks and coal. With the help of his father, Andrew was able to improve this original mechanism and by 1878, ‘California Street Cable Railroad’ was up and running.

This new system of transport was so popular that the city of San Francisco lay down approximately 53 miles of ‘cable car track’, which expanded from the Ferry Building all the way down to the Misson District. Several cross-routes were also established, which meant that attractions such as the Golden Gate Park were also accesible to both local resients and those visiting the city. Sadly, the great 1906 earthquake caused much damamge to San Francisco’s both the city’s famous landmarks as well as its transportation systems. However, by this time electric streetcars had been fully developed which had soon become the transportation system of choice amongst the San Franciscan population. Despite a decline in the new number of original cable car lines, this slightly older method of transportation was still effective for moving up steep, inconvenient hills and to this day, has remained an integral part of Bay Area culture.

So what are you waiting for?! For just $6 you can enjoy the bumpy delights of San Francisco’s hills and observe extraordinary views of the city. For more information about the Powell-Mason and Powell-Hyde routes visit these links below.

*Adapted and sourced from


Remember the astronauts

February 01, 2008|By, BOB LEVERKNIGHT

Five years ago, the Space Shuttle, Columbia, broke up on re-entry over Texas.

In the intervening years, interest in space exploration has seemingly dropped off the face of the universe.

Sadly the lives lost in the space program for Apollo 1, to the Columbia, STS 107, are quickly forgotten. Grissom, White and Chaffee in Apollo 1. Jarvis, McAuliffe, Mc Nair, Onizuka, Resnik, Scobee, and Smith from the Challenger. Husband, McCool, Anderson, Clark, Brown, Ramon, and Chawla, have been relegated to history.

We humans are explorers. The need to see what’s beyond the horizon seems genetic in nature. Had it not been for this penchant, the Vikings and later Columbus would not have braved the Atlantic, to discover a new world. Had we not been explorers, the world we now know would not have ever been created.

Consider, for a moment, the advances that the space industry has brought forth. Remote medical telemetry, ever smaller but more powerful computers, high strength plastics, super light, yet strong metals, heat resistant ceramics, photo maps of the entire surface of the earth, instant communication to almost all points of the compass, safer tires, and many other different types of electrical generation, from fuel cells, to high efficiency batteries, these are all direct descendants of the space program.

However, since the Columbia disaster, space exploration has ground to a crawl. Why?

I see it as an aversion to risk. As a society, we have become fat, dumb and happy. This attitude has infiltrated into the one place, where we, the United States have had a virtual monopoly on. Space.

Space travel is dangerous. So is crossing the street. Both are now very necessary to daily life.

This nation needs to stay in the space business. From the research and development of new and better ways to get to orbit or life support in orbit and beyond, these will eventually be used in our daily lives.

As an example, the computing power, of all NASA during the Apollo program, is now exceeded by the computer, under the dash that operates our cars.

Another example. Take another look at the photo on the front page. I’ll wait.

That photo, was taken with a digital camera, downloaded in a computer, adjusted, for exposure and contrast, separated in to four colors, and printed on the page. Until it is on the presses, the photo, as a physical item does not exist. Even in the Apollo era, photos were either low resolution, when sent back from the Moon, or released after a mission’s return, as high resolution film images.

This technology has come straight from the space program.

To stay in the space business means keeping a technological edge. This edge, needs to stay here, in the United States. Not trickled down, outsourced, off-shored, or sold off to the highest overseas bidder.

Sadly, this has happened, and now, the Chinese among others, such as Japan, and the European Space Agency are our competitors in getting to, and the uses of space.

Over the years, I’ve heard all the arguments against space exploration. Too costly, problems here at home need to be taken care of first, or simply why?

The costs are nearly microscopic in the national budget, even compared to social programs, or even the military. Problems here at home will suddenly become small, when the planet is faced with, say an asteroid impact, or, increased solar activity.

As to, why, there are backyard astronomers, and amateur rocketeers, dreamers of what can be, and those who want to see “what’s out there” are the next Columbus, the next Hillary, or the next Glenn or Yeager that will find answers to questions not even asked yet.

The future is out there. We as a nation need to be there too.

(Staff Writer Bob Leverknight, can be reached at Comment on the online story at

Daily American Articles


Choosing A Doctor To See During Your Pregnancy Can Be Hard

It can be exciting and enjoyable to be pregnant. A lot of folks yearn for the day they become pregnant and hold aspirations of good parenting. If you are pregnant for the first time, you are probably full of questions. The following article will answer many pregnancy questions.

Ease your muscles prior to slumber by stretching each night before bed. Many pregnant women complain about leg cramps due to the added strain on the leg muscles. Stretching before going to bed relaxes the muscles and makes them less likely to cramp in the middle of the night. This is a great way to relax your body and rest soundly.

Do not consume alcohol at all when pregnant. Like most other items a pregnant woman eats or drinks, the fetus receives some of the alcohol an expectant mother consumes. This is why it is recommended that women wishing to become pregnant or those that already are pregnant refrain from drinking any type of alcohol. Drinking alcohol when pregnant can greatly affect the physical and mental condition of a baby. It also increases the risk of miscarriage and premature births.

It you are attempting to get pregnant, keep track of your menstrual cycles. By learning your cycles, you will be more in tune to knowing the best times to try to conceive. It will allow you to also know when you probably got pregnant, helping you to pinpoint an accurate due date.

If you are unsure if your water has broken, don’t hesitate to call the doctor; sometimes it is a small but steady trickle and not the huge gush you have been expecting. Once your water has broken, it is crucial to start delivery in order to minimize the chance of infections, and to ensure a healthy baby.

Do not change your cat’s litter when pregnant. Pregnant women should avoid changing a litter box because of the risk of receiving toxoplasmosis. Cats can be a host for this and the infection can pass to the fetus which can lead to stillbirth, birth defects, or a miscarriage.

Avoid cigarette smoke and alcohol while you’re pregnant to better the chances of having a healthy baby. Drugs, nicotine, and alcohol can be harmful to your baby during pregnancy. Therefore, make sure to stay away from these habits and eat healthily during your pregnancy.

Find a routine that corresponds to your needs. This makes it easier to fall asleep, which can be unusually difficult for some pregnant women. Try to have the end of the day be relaxed and soothing. A warm shower can assist in making you sleepy, and tea that is free of caffeine will help too.

Many pregnant women experience nausea, vomiting and other flu-like symptoms when they first wake up. There are a few steps for you to take to feel better and help your health. Eating smaller meals, at frequent intervals, can help to prevent the nausea. Make sure that you drink a lot of water. When you take your prenatal vitamins, take them with a meal. If you don’t feel well when you eat a particular food, avoid it. Getting enough rest during the day and adequate sleep at night can make a big difference in how well you feel.

There are certain types of food to avoid while you are pregnant to make sure no harm comes to your baby. Unpasteurized milks, soft cheeses and raw seafoods are all on the no-no list.

Don’t neglect your partner while pregnant. They are most likely as nervous about the baby as you are, so they may need reassurance too. Spend some time together; go see a movie, or take a walk. Get the most out of your time together before your baby arrives.

Take prenatal vitamins as soon as you plan on getting pregnant. The initial trimester of your pregnancy is when your baby starts growing his neural cord that eventually develops into a spinal cord and brain. The critical nutrients are calcium, folic acid and iron. These are needed for the baby’s earliest stage of development.

Invest in a body pillow to support your growing belly at night. Most stores offer body pillows especially for pregnant women. If you cannot find one, you could always use a normal pillow to add extra support. Place one pillow beneath your stomach and another under your knee for maximum support.

You have just read a lot of advise on being pregnant. You will probably find that everyone you know, and even some people you don’t know, will give you advise whether you want it or not. Make sure to listen to your gut, and don’t take any advise that seems to be harmful to you.

Becoming a parent can be difficult, especially if you have more than one baby to look after. If you have twins this guide will teach you everything that you need to know about parenting as well as expert tips and advice on how to cope with multiple births-Twins: The Survival Guide.

[18:34:05] Kathryn Peters: