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A couple walks on a snow covered road near the Lake of Eymir, Ankara, Turkey, on Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012. Winter temperatures and recent snowfall has partially paralyzed life in Turkey. (AP Photo/Selcan Hacaoglu)
A couple walks on a snow covered road near the Lake of Eymir, Ankara, Turkey, on Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012. Winter temperatures and recent snowfall has partially paralyzed life in Turkey. (AP Photo/Selcan Hacaoglu)
Coots fight for a piece of bread on the frozen Lake of Eymir, near Ankara, Turkey, on Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012. Winter temperatures and recent snowfall has partially paralyzed life in Turkey. (AP Photo/Selcan Hacaoglu)
Coots run for a piece of bread on the frozen Lake of Eymir, near Ankara, Turkey, on Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012. Winter temperatures and recent snowfall has partially paralyzed life in Turkey. (AP Photo/Selcan Hacaoglu)
BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) ? A severe and snowy cold snap across central and eastern Europe has left at least 36 people dead, cut off power to towns, and snarled traffic. Officials are responding with measures ranging from opening shelters to dispensing hot tea, with particular concern for the homeless and elderly.
This part of Europe is not unused to cold, but the current freeze, which spread to most of the region last week, came after a period of relatively mild weather. Many were shocked when temperatures in some parts plunged Monday to minus 20 Celsius (minus 4 Fahrenheit).
"Just as we thought we could get away with a spring-like winter ..." lamented Jelena Savic, 43, from the Serbian capital of Belgrade, her head wrapped in a shawl with only eyes uncovered. "I'm freezing. It's hard to get used to it so suddenly."
Officials have appealed to people to stay indoors and be careful. Police searched for the homeless to make sure they didn't freeze to death. In some places, heaters will be set up at bus stations.
Still, 18 people, most of them homeless, died in Ukraine from hypothermia and nearly 500 people sought medical help for frostbite and hypothermia in just three days last week, the Emergency Situations Ministry said.
Temperatures in parts of Ukraine fell to minus 16 C (3 F) during the day and minus 23 C (minus 10 F) in the night. Authorities opened 1,500 shelters to provide food and heat and closed schools and nurseries. More than 17,000 people have sought help in such shelters in the past three days, authorities said.
In Poland, at least 10 people froze to death as the cold reached minus 26 C (minus 15 F) on Monday.
Malgorzata Wozniak, a spokeswoman for Poland's Interior Ministry, told The Associated Press that elderly people and the homeless were among the dead. Police were checking unheated empty buildings for homeless people they could take to shelters.
Warsaw city authorities decided to place more than 40 heaters in the busiest city transport stops to help waiting passengers keep warm.
City authorities in the Czech capital of Prague set up tents for an estimated 3,000 homeless people. Freezing temperatures also damaged train tracks, slowing railway traffic.
In central Serbia, three people died and two more were missing, while 14 municipalities were operating under emergency decrees. Efforts to clear roads blocked by snow were hampered by strong winds and dozens of towns faced power outages.
Police said one woman froze to death in a snowstorm in a central Serbian village, while two elderly men were found dead, one in the snow outside his home. Further south, emergency crews are searching for two men in their 70s who are feared dead.
In Bulgaria, a 57-year-old man froze to death in a northwestern village and emergency decrees were declared in 25 of the country's 28 districts. In the capital of Sofia, authorities handed out hot tea and placed homeless people in emergency shelters.
Strong winds also closed down Bulgaria's main Black Sea port of Varna, while part of a major highway leading to Bulgaria and Greece from Turkey was closed after a heavy snowfall. Nearly 200 Turkish Airlines flights to and from Istanbul's Ataturk Airport were canceled, and a city sports hall was turned to a temporary shelter for some 350 homeless people.
The temperature in Turkey's province of Kars, which borders Armenia, dropped to minus 25 C on Sunday night.
The situation was similar in Romania, where reports said four people have died because of freezing weather. There, authorities sent prison inmates to shovel snow and unblock paths leading to a shelter with some 300 stray dogs and puppies.
Weather forecasts say the cold snap will continue.
"We are getting some 'real' winter this week," Croatian meteorologist Zoran Vakula said.
_____
Associated Press writers across the region contributed to this report.
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Since our review of Aperture 3.0 at its launch, Apple has been busy not only tightening the app by making it more stable and correcting minor glitches in specific cases, but also adding new capabilities like support for iCloud, iOS 5, and Lion multi-touch. Among an extremely capable field of pro photo-workflow software?especially Adobe Lightroom ($299, 4.5 stars), ACDSee Pro ($99.99, 4 stars), and the impressive newer arrival, CyberLink PhotoDirector ($99.99, 3.5 stars)?Aperture's smooth user interface, Faces and Places features, plentiful output options, and good camera raw support stand out. For Mac users who want a big step up in power from iPhoto, Aperture is a natural. But Lightroom goes further for the pro or very serious amateur, with not only the enforced workflow, but with specific lens-based corrections for geometry, vignetting, and chromatic aberration.
Aperture is available either from the Mac App Store for $79.99, or as a free trial downloadable from www.apple.com/aperture. It's a Mac-only application, so Windows and Linux users are out of luck, but are well served by Adobe's competing Lightroom, PCMag.com Editors' Choice photo workflow app, which is also available for the Mac. Another new Mac and Windows offering, Corel AfterShot ($99.99, 2.5 stars) has a ways to go before catching up with the two major players from Adobe and Apple.
Interface
Programs in Aperture's class are all about workflow. The progression is generally from importing and organizing to adjusting and editing to outputting your photos to print and web. Lightroom, ACDSee, AfterShot, and PhotoDirector take the approach of segmenting each of these phases of the workflow with different "modes" in tabs or buttons, usually along the lines of Organize, Edit, and Output. The progression often makes sense, but there are times when you may just want to jump around and perform an organizing action in the midst of photo editing.
Aperture is non-modal, meaning you can do just this, performing any action at any point in your process from its single Inspector panel. The tabs on this panel for Library, Metadata, and Adjustments, along with the interface's buttons and the app menu, give you access to everything in the program at any stage of the process. Your process will determine which is best for you: the more methodical types will prefer Lightroom's approach, while Aperture will better suit the more ADD types, who want to jump around between functions.
The modal approach will be comfortable for many photo pros, and it epitomizes an actual "workflow." But navigating Aperture's easy full-screen view, with optional "heads-up" display for the Inspector, becomes second nature pretty quickly. This new full-screen capability makes it easier to show nothing but your big glorious photo. Lightroom still has three levels of "full screen" and requires extra steps to hide all the panels and toolbars. However, neither Aperture nor Lightroom let me undock the panels the way ACDSee did.
Aperture lets you view your library as large thumbnails in full screen mode, and its thumbnail-size slider makes adjusting them easier than in Lightroom. Aperture also has a nice zoom with the mouse-wheel option. New support for OS X Lion gestures means you can pinch and unpinch on a trackpad to zoom in and out as well. Rotating and cropping also benefits from multitouch gestures. Another feature lacking in Lightroom but available in Aperture is the virtual Light Table; this lets you arrange photos in different sizes in a single view and save them as one PDF or JPG. I'm not sure how useful this is for most photographers, but it's been brought up on Adobe Lightroom forums by those who miss it.
Import and Organize
When you import photos from a memory card, Aperture saves files in its own area as "managed" photos, only accessible by Aperture, but you can save the images to a regular disk folder and have Aperture treat them as "referenced" files for editing. Any edits will be saved in Aperture's database, but the master images remain where you placed them on the drive. You can also export a managed file to a disk file visible in Finder. The raw import settings for my Canon EOS Rebel T1i turned out beautiful images. And the software can perform some image processing as it imports, such as applying adjustment presets, and even Apple ActionScripts that you can download from enthusiast sites.
Like most current photo-editing software, Aperture is "non-destructive," meaning it keeps a master of the original image you imported and saves your edits in a database. Any of your edited images is called a "version" (as opposed to the master?the original). I think Lightroom makes it a little easier to take snapshots and view before/after comparisons, though you can do this in Aperture through menus. Lightroom also makes it easier to see a split view of one side showing your original and the other your edited version. And while tethering my T1i worked flawlessly in Lightroom 3 beta, Aperture wouldn't play. I contacted Apple about this and assume it will support this most popular of DSLRs soon.
Aperture lets you organize your images in several hierarchies?at the top level, your Library contains Projects, which can be subdivided into folders, albums, and Smart albums. Stacks is a feature in both Aperture and Lightroom that lets you group related photos, and both can auto-group photos into stacks based on the shots' timestamps. Aperture makes a bigger deal out of stacks, giving the feature its own menu (Lightroom offers a choice under its Photo menu). And Aperture has a nice expanding animation when you reveal a stack's photos.
Aperture offers all the extensive metadata support you could want?camera and EXIF, ratings, captions, keywords, and much more?including support for the standard IPTC Core spec. One thing I'm used to is right-clicking to get properties, but that's not an option in Aperture. For my Canon T1i, Aperture could show me the focus points, but Lightroom couldn't. A very complete filter dialog lets you view just photos that meet the criteria you want, though in a minor quibble, Lightroom makes it easier to filter by EXIF info such as which lens you used.
Aperture also now displays video and lets you do basic trimming, something Ligthroom users will have to wait for in version 4. I do wish it were easier to filter the library view by just video, though. The video editing like what you get on the iPhone?very basic. But it can be useful for slideshow presentations, and it's more than you get it Lightroom 3, which only displays videos in the betas I've seen so far.
iCloud Photo Stream
New for version 3.2 in Aperture, a Photo Stream entry appears by default in your Library tab in the side panel. The first time you click on this, you'll see a message asking whether you want to turn the feature on or not. After responded in the affirmative, a confirmation dialog appeared, telling me I had to enable iCloud in System Preferences. The relevant control panel opened, where I could sign into my Apple ID. After returning to Aperture and hitting the Turn on Photo Stream button, two project thumbnail trays appeared at the bottom of the window. My guess is that this was because I had iCloud Photo Stream syncing set up on a Windows PC, too, but shooting a couple more photos with my iPhone quickly populated both sets with the new photos.
By default, any photos I added to my Aperture Library were automatically added to Photo Stream, which wasn't a good thing for my storage limit. A complicated series of rules apply if you upload from multiple computers. One smart feature of Photo Stream is that it can make raw camera files viewable on your iPhone or iPad.
A striking point about Photo Stream (and in some ways iCloud as a whole) is that it's almost more generous with Windows PC users than with Mac users. The service works with all recent versions, including XP, Vista, and Windows 7, whereas only the latest version of Mac OS X is compatible: Leopard and even Snow Leopard users are less favored than Windows users.
Also, on Windows, you get a standard folder under My Photos for your Photo Stream, where on the Mac the folder is hidden, with the photos only accessible through iPhoto or Aperture. This means Lightroom users on Windows can point to this as an auto-import folder, so Lightroom has no Photo Stream disadvantage compared with Aperture.
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Samsung monitors have long been known for their style and solid image quality, and the SyncMaster S23A550H ($259.99 list) continues the trend. This 23-inch beauty delivers outstanding color quality and great dark grayscale performance, and does so without using much power. However, it only has one digital input and is short on features.
Design and Features
Fans of Samsung's Touch of Color design will appreciate the S23A550H's Rose Black finish, which happens to be the same finish used on the Samsung SyncMaster T220D. The 23-inch 1,920-by-1,080 TN+ panel is framed by reddish black bezels that are covered with clear trim and are slightly curved, giving the monitor a sense of style and preventing it from appearing too box-like. The Samsung logo appears on the lower bezel as well as on the back of the monitor. The 7 pound glossy black cabinet measures 1.5 inches at its thickest point and is supported by a clear round base with piano black trim. The mounting arm provides tilt adjustment, but lacks height and swivel movement. It also has a cover that unsnaps, so you can tuck cables away and keep them out of sight.
Input connections are sparse; you get an HDMI port and a VGA port, and that's it. A secondary HDMI port, like the one on the ViewSonic VX2753mh ($349.99 list, 4 stars), would make it much easier to connect to a gaming box or external Blu-ray player. In keeping with the clutter-free motif, a rounded cover snaps onto the back of the cabinet to hide the cable connectors.
There are six touch sensitive buttons on the right side of the lower bezel. In addition to the power switch, there's a Menu button that launches the on-screen display (OSD) menu, an ECO button that doubles as a navigation button, a brightness button that is also used for menu navigation, an input source/navigation button, and an Auto Adjust button for use with an analog signal. Pressing any button activates on-screen labeling above each button with icons that show you what the button does, making it easy to work your way through the menu system.
Picture settings include Samsung's Magic presets; MagicAngle lets you select one of six viewing angle modes optimized for your viewing position. For example, if you lean way back on your chair to the point where you look up to see the screen you can choose one of the Lean Back modes. There are also modes for standing and viewing from the side, but side angle viewing is already quite good on this monitor. You will get a better picture if you happen to be standing or sitting at an off angle, but the best all-around picture comes with this feature disabled and the monitor positioned for optimal viewing.
MagicBright consists of five presets offering brightness and contrast level settings that are optimized for specific applications. Standard mode gives you the best picture for everyday use and Cinema mode is useful for watching movies in a dimly lit room. Colors in the Game mode are way too oversaturated, and the Dynamic Contrast mode offers automatic brightness and contrast control depending on the content and is a bit sharper than Standard mode. Users can create their own preset using the Custom mode.
When enabled, MagicColor enhances skin tones and punches up colors in Full mode, while Intelligent mode enhances everything except skin tones. Both MagicColor settings produce slightly oversaturated colors and cannot be used when the MagicAngle feature is enabled. You can also tweak Red, Green, and Blue color levels, color temperature, and gamma settings.
The ECO button takes you to a screen with several neat power saving options; there's an ECO Motion Sensor setting that when enabled will put the monitor into power saving mode if no motion is detected. You can choose one of five time intervals (5, 10, 20, 30, or 60 minutes) for the sensor and have the screen turn off or go dim if no motion is detected during the selected time frame. You can also select one of three ECO Saving modes (Off, 75 percent, 50 percent). When set to Off the panel uses only 19 watts of power, which is great for a 23-inch panel, but not quite as good as the 24-inch Lenovo LS2421P Wide ($219.99 direct, 4 stars) (16-watts). Changing the setting to 75 percent knocks power usage down to 18 watts with only a slight decrease in luminance, while the 50 percent setting brings it down to 14 watts with a more noticeable loss of luminance. All things considered, I'd suggest leaving the ECO Saving mode off as this mode offers the best picture and doesn't use much power anyway. Either way, the S23A550H's low power characteristics and useful power-saving options earn it our GreenTech stamp of approval.
Performance
The S23A550H produces inky blacks, which in part helps it to deliver bold, well defined colors. The panel had no trouble displaying every shade of dark gray on the DisplayMate 64-Step Grayscale test, although light grays were a bit washed out at the bright end of the scale. Colors scaled evenly from dark to light on the Color Scales test and there was no noticeable tinting or oversaturation. Small text was sharp and easy to read at 5.3 points (the smallest font on the DisplayMate Scaled Fonts test), and as mentioned above, viewing angle performance was quite good from the sides. There is, however, some color shifting when viewed from the top and bottom angles.
Although the S23A550H lacks the necessary ports to be considered a gaming monitor it does have a speedy 2-millisecond (g-g) pixel response and does a fine job of displaying fast motion sequences. I hooked the monitor up to my PS3 via the HDMI port and fired up the fast action racing game Need for Speed Carbon and did not detect any blurring or ghosting while zipping through the city streets at a high rate of speed. The Cohen Brothers True Grit in HD, streamed via Netflix, looked great on the 23-inch screen, which delivered natural-looking skin tones and crisp colors.
If you're looking for a 23-inch monitor that delivers bold colors and deep blacks, the Samsung SyncMaster S23A550H is right up your alley. You don't get many ports with this model, and its light grayscale performance could be better, but it'll save you a few bucks on your utility bill and bring a touch of style to your desktop. That said, the Editors' Choice Lenovo LS2421p Wide offers equally impressive performance and energy efficiency, comes with a four port USB hub, and gives you a slightly bigger screen. It's around $30 cheaper, too.
COMPARISON TABLE
Compare the AOC e1649Fwu with several other monitors side by side.
More monitor reviews:
??? Samsung SyncMaster S23A550H
??? Samsung Central Station (SyncMaster C23A750X)
??? AOC e1649Fwu
??? Lenovo ThinkVision LT1421
??? Asus VG278H
?? more
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) ? The United States is placing renewed priority on Asia as it winds down wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but has no desire for new bases in the region, the head of U.S. forces in the Asia-Pacific said on Friday.
Admiral Robert Willard, head of the U.S. Pacific Command, said the military's goal is to have a network of places close to the sea lanes of Southeast Asia where American forces can visit on rotation, avoiding the costly maintenance of bases.
"There is no desire nor view right now that the U.S. is seeking basing options anywhere in the Asia-Pacific theater," he told reporters in Washington.
Willard spoke as U.S. and Philippine officials were wrapping up two days of strategic talks in Washington that prompted speculation that Washington aimed to reopen bases in the Philippines. The Pentagon flatly denied having new basing plans.
He said his Hawaii-based Pacific Command preferred a model along the lines of plans to set up a Marine training facility in northern Australia and to rotate warships through Singapore.
"As I look at where the forces are and where they need to be present day-to-day, we are biased in Northeast Asia, and when we look at Southeast Asia and South Asia, the pressure is on Pacific Command to deploy and sustain forces there day to day," said Willard.
The Pacific Command has 50,000 U.S. forces stationed in Japan and 28,000 in South Korea.
Willard noted that media and public discussion of the U.S. strategy in Asia portrayed the policy as being aimed at China, with its fast-growing military budget and assertiveness over maritime territory claims in contested waters of the South China Sea.
But the admiral said the Pacific Command's primary mission was protecting sea lanes in the South China Sea that carry $5 trillion in commerce annually, including $1.2 trillion in trade with the United States.
The U.S. goal with China's military was to build closer military-to-military ties, overcoming differing philosophies on the purpose of such contacts, "trust factor" issues and other disputes, said Willard.
High-level U.S.-China dialogue and leaders' meetings like next month's U.S. visit by Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping has resulted in a situation where "the military relationship at that strategic level has been ... sustaining itself," said Willard.
"In other ways, at the operational and tactical level, getting our two militaries more acquainted with one another through operations or through counterpart visits have not advanced," he added.
"I'm not satisfied that the military relationship is where it needs to be," said Willard.
(Reporting by Paul Eckert; Editing by Sandra Maler)
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UNITED NATIONS?? A shipment containing 16 kilograms of cocaine was seized last week at the U.N.'s mail intake center, a New York Police Department spokesman said Thursday.
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Paul Browne, NYPD's chief spokesman, said the drug was in a white bag evidently masquerading as a diplomatic pouch that raised suspicions when it was being scanned because it was stamped with what looked like a poorly concocted version of the U.N. logo.
Browne said here was no name or address on the shipment sent from Mexico City through Cincinnati.
U.N. security officials called the NYPD and Drug Enforcement Administration, which confirmed the substance inside the shipment intercepted Jan. 16 was cocaine, the police spokesman said.
U.N. undersecretary-general for safety and security Gregory B. Starr told reporters Thursday evening that "there is nothing to indicate that this had anything to do with anybody at the United Nations."
Starr said the drug was actually stashed in two bags that were stamped with the sky-blue U.N. logo of a world map in an apparent effort to masquerade as diplomatic pouches, which are not supposed to be inspected. Inside the bag, the drug was hidden in hollowed-out notebooks, he added.
The U.N. official showed journalists a photograph of the bags that were seized, and compared them with a real diplomatic pouch used by the U.N., which is somewhat larger and made of a different material.
"This did not come from a United Nations facility," Starr said of the shipment. "It was not, in my opinion, not intended to go to a United Nations facility."
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46156386/ns/world_news/
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Courtesy of reszatonline, who brings us the following allegory by way of Tim Coldwell, we are happy to distill (no pun intended) all of modern economics and finance in a narrative that is 500 words long, and involved booze and broke alcoholics: in other words everyone should be able to understand the underlying message. And while the immediate application of this allegory is to explain events in Europe, it succeeds in capturing all the moving pieces of modern finance.
From reszatonline
Helga is the proprietor of a bar.
She realizes that virtually all of her customers are unemployed alcoholics and, as such, can no longer afford to patronize her bar.
To solve this problem, she comes up with a new marketing plan that allows her customers to drink now, but pay later.
Helga keeps track of the drinks consumed on a ledger (thereby granting the customers? loans).
Word gets around about Helga?s ?drink now, pay later? marketing strategy and, as a result, increasing numbers of customers flood into Helga?s bar. Soon she has the largest sales volume for any bar in town.
By providing her customers freedom from immediate payment demands, Helga gets no resistance when, at regular intervals, she substantially increases her prices for wine and beer, the most consumed beverages. Consequently, Helga?s gross sales volume increases massively.
A young and dynamic vice-president at the local bank recognizes that these customer debts constitute valuable future assets and increases Helga?s borrowing limit.
He sees no reason for any undue concern, since he has the debts of the unemployed alcoholics as collateral!!!
At the bank?s corporate headquarters, expert traders figure a way to make huge commissions, and transform these customer loans into DRINKBONDS.These ?securities? then are bundled and traded on international securities markets.
Naive investors don?t really understand that the securities being sold to them as ?AA? ?Secured Bonds? really are debts of unemployed alcoholics.
Nevertheless, the bond prices continuously climb!!!, and the securities soon become the hottest-selling items for some of the nation?s leading brokerage houses.
One day, even though the bond prices still are climbing, a risk manager at the original local bank decides that the time has come to demand payment on the debts incurred by the drinkers at Helga?s bar.
He so informs Helga.
Helga then demands payment from her alcoholic patrons, but being unemployed alcoholics they cannot pay back their drinking debts.
Since Helga cannot fulfil her loan obligations she is forced into bankruptcy.
The bar closes and Helga?s 11 employees lose their jobs.
Overnight, DRINKBOND prices drop by 90%. The collapsed bond asset value destroys the bank?s liquidity and prevents it from issuing new loans, thus freezing credit and economic activity in the community.
The suppliers of Helga?s bar had granted her generous payment extensions and had invested their firms? pension funds in the BOND securities. They find they are now faced with having to write off her bad debt and with losing over 90% of the presumed value of the bonds.
Her wine supplier also claims bankruptcy, closing the doors on a family business that had endured for three generations, her beer supplier is taken over by a competitor, who immediately closes the local plant and lays off 150 workers. Fortunately though, the bank, the brokerage houses and their respective executives are saved and bailed out by a multibillion dollar no-strings attached cash infusion from the government.
The funds required for this bailout are obtained by new taxes levied on employed, middle-class, non-drinkers who have never been in Helga?s bar.
(38 votes)
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MELBOURNE, Australia ? With Novak Djokovic clutching his leg and struggling to breathe, it looked like the "Big 4" semifinal lineup at the Australian Open might not come together.
Then Djokovic's championship instincts kicked in.
The top-ranked Serb held off No. 5 David Ferrer in a second-set tiebreaker Wednesday night and then raced through the third set for a 6-4, 7-6 (4), 6-1 win, setting up a rematch of last year's final against fourth-ranked Andy Murray.
Order was restored.
For 10 days, nearly everyone at Melbourne Park has talked about the top four players and how they are on a higher level than the rest of men's tennis. But with the other three already in the semis, Djokovic looked to be in trouble in the second set.
"No, I don't have any physical issues," Djokovic said, playing down any health concerns. "I feel very fit and I feel mentally, as well, very fresh.
"It's just today I found it very difficult after a long time to breathe because I felt the whole day my nose was closed a little bit. I just wasn't able to get enough oxygen."
The win ensured that the top four men reached the semifinals for the third time in four Grand Slams. Murray beat Kei Nishikori 6-3, 6-3, 6-1 earlier Wednesday, while second-ranked Rafael Nadal and No. 3 Roger Federer were already preparing for their semifinal showdown, their 10th clash at a major but their first meeting at that stage of a Grand Slam since 2005.
Doubts about Djokovic's temperament surfaced after he won his first major at the 2008 Australian Open. He went another 11 majors before reaching another Grand Slam final, which he lost.
In his first title defense in 2009, he struggled with breathing problems and the heat and had to retire from his quarterfinal match against Andy Roddick.
Trying again to defend the Australian Open title, and again in the quarterfinals, the 24-year-old Djokovic was leading by a set and a break when he dropped a service game against Ferrer.
At break point, he scrambled to hit a defensive lob on his backhand and didn't even wait for it to land out before turning to face the back of the court, grabbing at the back of his left leg. He leaned over and rested his head on the top of his racket. Ferrer was back in contention.
For the rest of the set, Djokovic sneaked looks at his coaches and team in the stands. He cajoled himself at the baseline and took time between points.
At times he looked exhausted. At times he looked sore.
"Look, you know, in these conditions, at this stage of the tournament, when you're playing somebody like David, somebody that has great shots from both sides from the baseline, makes you always play over five to 10 shots in the rally, your physical strength and endurance comes into question," Djokovic calmly explained of his on-court demeanor. "Actually I'm not concerned about that at all.
"I'm really fit and I have no concerns of recovering for the next match. It's just a matter of breathing better through the nose."
That may not be how Murray's new coach, Ivan Lendl, sees it. Lendl has been working with Murray this month, trying to help him break his Grand Slam title drought ? the Briton has lost three major finals without winning a set, including the last two in Australia.
Lendl lost the first four Grand Slam finals he contested, before winning eight of his next 15.
He was doing some scouting Wednesday night at Rod Laver Arena, sitting about 15 rows behind the Djokovic group, surrounded by people waving Serbian flags. He couldn't have missed the sideways glances from Djokovic to his support crew, or the fact that he sat down in a line judge's chair when Ferrer challenged a line call. Murray and Djokovic have been playing each other since they were 12, and know each other so well they sometimes hit together and kick a soccer ball around.
But they haven't been on the same side of a Grand Slam draw for a while. Murray said he always seems to be drawn with Nadal, while Djokovic and Federer have frequently been on the same half.
Murray said he's not necessarily more relaxed in Australia, "just more used to being in this position because of the experience."
"Definitely have more experienced than I had at this point last year because I played deep in the Slams the last five or six of them."
To him, the prospect of not playing Nadal in the semis "doesn't make a huge difference."
"Not like the match on Friday's going to be easy, because Novak's obviously playing great tennis," he said. "It doesn't change too much."
Nadal and Federer will play on Rod Laver Arena on Thursday night, with the Australian great in attendance ? partly to celebrate 50 years since he completed his first Grand Slam of winning all four majors in 1962.
In the day session, 2008 Australian Open winner Maria Sharapova will play reigning Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova, and defending Australian champion Kim Clijsters will take on No. 3 Victoria Azarenka. Three of the four ? excluding Clijsters ? can finish the tournament with the No. 1 ranking.
Azarenka is the only one of the semifinalists who hasn't won a major ? the last eight women's titles have been shared among six women.
Not so the majors on the men's side, which have been much more tightly held.
The "Big 4" have reached the semifinals of the last two Grand Slams, and three of the last four. But it needs to be put into perspective: that has only happened twice before at the Australian Open, in 1988 and 2005.
And if it's any omen for Federer and Murray, No. 3 Mats Wilander beat No. 4 Pat Cash in the '88 final and No. 4 Marat Safin beat No. 3 Lleyton Hewitt in the '05 final.
It's only the 14th time since the Open era began in 1968 that the top four seeded players reached the semifinals in a major.
The top three have 30 Grand Slams between them. The rest of top 10, based on the pre-Australian Open rankings, had none.
And with Djokovic and Murray winning their quarterfinals in straight sets, the "Big 4" had dropped only three sets between them in five rounds.
Players ranging from former No. 1 Andy Roddick to retired greats have talked about the gap between the top four and the rest of men's tennis widening. No. 7 Tomas Berdych, after losing in the quarterfinals in a rematch of the 2010 Wimbledon final against Nadal, said it was "probably the toughest time to play because of those four really strong guys ... making almost history every week."
On Wednesday night, Ferrer confirmed the gap.
"I think the top four players, they are better than the other ones," the Spaniard said.
And he wasn't sure the disparity will be closed any time soon.
"No, I don't think so. Because the last year, the top four players plays all the finals in the Grand Slams," he said. "They were there in the final rounds. And this year they are doing it again, so ...
"I think the top four, it's another level."
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MEXICO CITY ? Prosecutors in Mexico say they have seized an 11th child in the case of an apparent child-trafficking ring in the western city of Guadalajara that aimed to supply babies to Irish couples.
The Jalisco state prosecutor's office says the 4-month-old girl was taken from her mother's home.
The office's statement Wednesday also says federal prosecutors are analyzing whether to take over the case.
Prosecutors say at least 11 Irish couples are involved in the case. It says 15 Irish citizens have been questioned by authorities and none of them face charges. All have returned to Ireland.
Police are looking for two lawyers who were handling the adoptions and have detained nine Mexicans in the case. No one has been charged.
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WE CAN kid ourselves about big questions. What is the origin of mass? What is dark matter? Does time really exist? But in our heart of hearts there is only one question we desperately want to answer: what is life and how did it come about?
Astrophysicist Dimitar Sasselov argues that we are on the brink of being able to answer this question, and his enthusiasm is infectious.
Sasselov cites two key developments. The first will come as no surprise: the discovery of planets outside our solar system. The total stands at over 700, with new ones being discovered every day. Rarely in the history of science can a field have advanced at such a breakneck pace.
Of crucial importance to the life question, which explains Sasselov's title, is a certain type of extrasolar planet, a super-Earth. These are solid planets of rock and ice between 1 and 10 times the mass of the Earth. We never suspected they existed because, in our own solar system, with its rocky terrestrial planets and bloated gas giants, such bodies are conspicuous by their absence.
It is these super-Earths that are key, argues Sasselov. They are even more attractive as life-bearing worlds than our home planet. They have a relatively small surface area to volume ratio, for instance, so they are better at holding on to their internal heat than Earth. That makes them likely to have the plate tectonics necessary to prevent carbon dioxide from volcanoes building up to dangerous, Venusian levels. If born with sufficient ice, super-Earths may even have giant oceans spanning the surface, 10 times deeper than any ocean on Earth. Think of those as habitats.
But most importantly, according to Sasselov, the surfaces of super-Earths will be at temperatures that permit large molecules to survive over long periods of time and attain the concentrations necessary for the chemistry of life.
What chemistry? Ah, this is where the second development crucial to the life question comes in: synthetic life. More specifically, the creation of a chemical system enclosed in a "vesicle" and capable of life's main functions. According to Sasselov, this field will enable us to overcome our most crippling handicap: that we know of only a single instance of life. It will enable us to explore the limits of biology, to extrapolate from the specific to the general. And here Sasselov sees the two developments feeding off each other. Super-Earths will tell us about the chemical environments for alien life, which will help those seeking synthetic life to zero in on other biochemistries.
And the results of all this striving? To know ourselves, of course. Only by knowing what is possible, says Sasselov in this inspirational book, can we ever understand how life got going on Earth and why it has the characteristics it has. Sasselov quotes T. S. Eliot: "We must never cease from exploration. And the end of all our exploration will be to arrive where we began and to know the place for the first time."
Book Information
The Life of Super-Earths: How the Hunt for alien worlds and artificial cells will revolutionize life on our planet
by Dimitar Sasselov
Published by: Basic Books
?17.99/$25.99
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ALHAMBRA, California (AP) ? A man who masqueraded as a Rockefeller on the East Coast and is now accused of murder in California has been confronted in court by witnesses who say he tried to sell them an Oriental rug with a bloodstain.
Christian Gerhartsreiter is charged with murdering 27-year-old John Sohus, whose bones were unearthed in a backyard in a wealthy Los Angeles suburb in 1994, nearly 10 years after Sohus and his wife vanished.
Robert Brown testified Monday during a preliminary hearing that in 1985 the man he and his wife knew as Chris Chichester showed up with the rug among belongings he wanted to sell because he was going away.
Brown says his wife looked at the rug, pointed out the bloodstain, and Chichester quickly rolled it up and left.
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SOCHI, Russia (Reuters) ? Russia believes there is a good chance that talks between global powers and Iran on Tehran's nuclear program could resume soon despite a planned EU oil embargo and other sources of tension, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Monday.
Lavrov emphasized Moscow's opposition to Western sanctions against Iran, saying they reduced the chances of ending the confrontation over Iran's nuclear program, which the United States and Europe fear is aimed at developing weapons.
"Despite these aggravating factors, we still have a strong hope to resume talks in the nearest future," he said of long-dormant talks between Iran and six global powers -- Russia, China, the United States, Britain, France and Germany.
He said Russia would try to deter both Iran and the West from making counterproductive moves that would further jeopardize the chances for talks, but did not explain how it would do so.
The European Union banned imports of oil from Iran Monday and imposed a number of other economic sanctions, joining the United States in a new round of measures aimed at pushing Iran into reining in its nuclear activities.
Veto-wielding U.N. Security Council member Russia has emphasised it opposes any further sanctions beyond the four rounds of measures it approved in the council in recent years.
Lavrov said last week that additional sanctions were aimed at triggering popular discontent in Iran by "strangling" the economy and the civilian population.
Russia has proposed a plan under which existing sanctions would be eased in return for steps by Tehran to instill trust and wants the proposal to be discussed if the talks, stalled for a year, resume.
Iran said last week that it was in touch with the six powers to reopen talks soon, but the European Union denied it, and Western nations said Iran must show it is serious about demonstrating that its nuclear activities are purely peaceful.
(Reporting by Alexei Anishchuk; writing by Steve Gutterman; editing by Thomas Grove and Tim Pearce)
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DALLAS (AP) ? Texas Instruments will close two of its older computer-chip factories, one in Houston and one in Hiji, Japan, and lay off about 1,000 workers to cut costs.
The company announced the cutbacks Monday in its fourth-quarter earnings report. Its results topped analyst estimates, but the company offered tepid forecast for the first quarter of this year.
Texas Instruments shares gained $1.11, or more than 3 percent, to $34.30 after the earnings and layoff announcements.
The planned layoffs represent about 3 percent of the 34,800 workers that Texas Instruments Inc. employed as of Sept. 30. Texas Instruments picked up about 5,000 additional workers four months ago when it completed its $6.5 billion acquisition of another chip maker, National Semiconductor.
Closing the two factories will save Texas Instruments about $100 million annually. The Houston plant is 42 years old while the Japan factory opened 32 years ago. The closures are to occur in the next 18 months. Production will be shifted to other Texas Instruments plants.
Texas Instruments will absorb $215 million in charges to pay for the closures. About $112 million of that amount was recorded in the fourth quarter. The remainder will be scattered through 2013.
Despite the charges, Texas Instruments still fared better in October through December than analysts and its own management anticipated.
CEO Rich Templeton said the pleasant surprise stemmed from improving demand for most of the company's products, leading him to believe that the company is moving beyond a downturn that undercut its financial performance for most of last year.
The company, which is based in Dallas, earned $298 million, or 25 cents per share, in the fourth quarter. That was a 68 percent drop from net income of $942 million, or 70 cents per share, at the same time in 2010.
Wall Street had been bracing for a steeper decrease to 23 cents per share, according to FactSet.
The past quarter's earnings were lowered by a charge of 16 cents per share to account for the residue of National Semiconductor and the plant closure charge, which worked out to 7 cents per share for the period.
Fourth-quarter revenue dipped 3 percent from the previous year to $3.42 billion, but was about $160 million high than analysts forecast on average.
The company projected its earning per share for the three months ending in March will range from 16 cents to 24 cents. Analysts had been expecting 32 cents per share. Texas Instruments believes its first-quarter revenue will range from $3 billion to $3.28 billion. Analysts projected first-quarter revenue of $3.22 billion, according to FactSet.
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As the strange case of file-sharing site Megaupload continues to unfold, many wonder if the federal government will begin to clamp down on similar sites that function like Megaupload, with easy sharing and hosting of copyrighted files.
Already, two well-known file-sharing services, Uploaded.to and Filesonic have disabled several features of their sites this weekend because of the Megaupload scandal. Others are sure to follow.
But Derek Labian, CEO of popular cloud-based file-hosting site MediaFire, told VentureBeat in an interview today that he isn?t too concerned about the government going after his company because, unlike Megaupload, MediaFire doesn?t incentivize piracy.
?We don?t have a business built on copyright infringement.? Labain said. ?Like many other cloud-based sharing services like Box.net and Dropbox, we?re a legitimate business targeting professionals.?
When it comes to Megaupload, Labian described Kim Dotcom and his organization as ?shady? and said the $175 million in revenues the company made should give people pause. He noted that Megaupload?s structure gave users monetary rewards for uploading pirated content. Users of the service could upload without a cap but users who want to download a large file (or download it faster) would have to pay for it. Those who uploaded the best files would be given free account upgrades or even cash.
?Megaupload was making a ridiculous amount of money with a ridiculously bad service,? Labian said. ?We frankly don?t see ourselves in the same space.?
A little more background on MediaFire: The privately funded company out of Woodlands, Tex. was founded in 2006 and has steadily offered better ways to host and share large files. Because it offers an incredibly easy to way to share 200MB files for free with other people, the company has attracted employees at 86 percent of the Fortune 500 for sending files that are too large for e-mail. It offers unlimited downloads and file storage, and if you want to upload larger files with long-term storage, you can pay $9 a month for a Pro account or $49 a month for a Business account.
But the company?s free file-sharing solution can also be used easily for sharing copyrighted files, especially music, with friends, relatives or anyone on the web. A Google search for a song name, an artist name and ?MediaFire,? for example, will likely bring you to a copy of that file that can easily be downloaded from a MediaFire page.
When asked about the Googling issue, Labian said that MediaFire is a ?private service? and the only reason Google indexes a MediaFire page is when it has been shared by a user on a third-party site. He said MediaFire isn?t at fault for this and said Google should look into the issue.
?We try to steer clear of things that would attract scrutiny,? Labian said. ?If people are pirating on our service, we don?t want those people to use it.?
Another reason Labian said he wasn?t worried about the government stepping in is because the company maintains a ?good relationship? with various government bodies, including ?Homeland Security, ICE, and the FBI.? Following DMCA protocols, whenever MediaFire is notified of a copyrighted file being shared inappropriately, the company immediately takes it down.
As for the future, MediaFire is optimistic about what?s to come. Labian said the company has been working for a year on its next set of products, which will emphasize collaboration and focus on business users. He teased what was coming by saying that cloud storage providers Box.net and Dropbox significantly disrupted the cloud storage space, but MediaFire would do it next.
?This is a tough market to be in, but we?re constantly looking to innovate,? Labian said. ?Sharing will always be important, but it?s not the only important aspect for our customers.?
Previous Story: Ex-con looking to fund over 15,000 inventions designed while?incarcerated
Companies: Filesonic, MediaFire, megaupload, Uploaded.to
People: Kim Dotcom
Source: http://venturebeat.com/2012/01/22/mediafire-megaupload-business-model-piracy/
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Damien Echols and his wife Lorri Davis, producers of the documentary film "West of Memphis," are interviewed at the premiere of the film at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, Friday, Jan. 20, 2012. The film uncovers new evidence surrounding the arrest and conviction of three men -- Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley Jr. -- for the 1993 murders of three eight-year-old boys in West Memphis, Arkansas. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
Damien Echols and his wife Lorri Davis, producers of the documentary film "West of Memphis," are interviewed at the premiere of the film at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, Friday, Jan. 20, 2012. The film uncovers new evidence surrounding the arrest and conviction of three men -- Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley Jr. -- for the 1993 murders of three eight-year-old boys in West Memphis, Arkansas. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
Damien Echols, left, a producer of the film "West of Memphis," mingles with Mark Byers at the premiere of the documentary film at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, Friday, Jan. 20, 2012. Echols spent 18 years on death row in Arkansas after being accused, along with Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley Jr., of the 1993 murders of three eight-year-old boys including Byers' son Christopher. In August 2011 the three men were released from prison after entering pleas that allowed them to maintain their innocence, while acknowledging that prosecutors had enough evidence to convict them. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
Damien Echols, center, a producer of the film "West of Memphis," mingles with Pam Hobbs, left, and Mark Byers at the premiere of the documentary film at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, Friday, Jan. 20, 2012. Echols spent 18 years on death row in Arkansas after being accused, along with Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley Jr., of the murders of three eight-year-old boys including Byers' son Christopher and Hobbs' son Stevie. In August 2011 the three men were released from prison after entering a plea that allowed them to maintain their innocence, while acknowleding that prosecutors had enough evidence to convict them. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
Amy Berg, left, director and screenwriter of the documentary film "West of Memphis," poses with, from left, producers Damien Echols and his wife Lorri Davis, and producer Peter Jackson at the premiere of the film at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, Friday, Jan. 20, 2012. The film uncovers new evidence surrounding the arrest and conviction of three men -- Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley Jr. -- in the 1993 murders of three eight-year-old boys in West Memphis, Arkansas. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
Damien Echols, left, a producer of the film "West of Memphis," mingles with Mark Byers at the premiere of the documentary film at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, Friday, Jan. 20, 2012. Echols spent 18 years on death row in Arkansas after being accused, along with Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley Jr., of the murders of three eight-year-old boys including Byers' son Christopher. In August 2011 the three men were released from prison after entering pleas that allowed them to maintain their innocence, while acknowledging that prosecutors had enough evidence to convict them. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
PARK CITY, Utah (AP) ? Peter Jackson believes Damien Echols would be dead now if not for a 1996 documentary that cast doubt on the man's guilt in three child murders.
And Amy Berg, Jackson's colleague on the Sundance Film Festival premiere "West of Memphis," believes former Death Row inmate Echols and two other men might still be in prison if not for the independent investigation launched by "The Lord of the Rings" filmmaker and his wife, Fran Walsh.
There's no better testament at Sundance to the power of art and artists than "West of Memphis," which premiered Friday night at Robert Redford's independent-film showcase. Sundance films often come from mavericks who challenge the establishment. "West of Memphis" is a tale of artists not only challenging the system, but also beating it.
Jackson, Walsh and Berg said "West of Memphis" amounts to the fair trial Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley ? known as the West Memphis Three ? never got as Arkansas teenagers when they were convicted in 1994.
"We went into this case believing that they didn't do it, and the facts and the evidence we came out with at the end completely supported that," Jackson said in an interview. "So is the documentary sort of providing the prosecution's point of view? No, it's not. We're not interested in that. They had their go back in 1994. ... The documentary, it's the case against the state, really."
The case was a shocker in the rural Arkansas community where 8-year-old Cub Scouts Michael Moore, Steve Branch and Christopher Byers were slain in 1993. Found naked and hogtied, two of the boys drowned in a drainage ditch, while the third bled to death, his genitals mutilated, evidence prosecutors used to claim the children were killed in a satanic ritual.
The defendants were convicted based in part on a confession Misskelley later recanted. Misskelley and Baldwin were sentenced to life in prison, while Echols was condemned to death and once came within weeks of execution.
The case became a cause after Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky's documentary "Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills," which premiered at Sundance in 1996 and questioned whether justice or misguided public opinion was served in the trial. Over the years, celebrities such as Johnny Depp, Patti Smith, Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam and Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks joined the effort to free the men.
Jackson and Walsh watched "Paradise Lost" in 2005 and were outraged over the case. From their home base in New Zealand, they got in touch with Lorri Davis, who had met and married Echols while he was on Death Row and was leading the fight to free the men.
"Justice should be beyond popular opinion, and in this case, it wasn't," Walsh said. "The popular opinion was these guys were guilty, therefore, they're going down. It really was a done deal."
Over the next six years, Jackson and Walsh financed their own investigation, hiring forensics experts, gathering DNA evidence and tracking down witnesses to show that the prosecution had convicted innocent men.
"The way Peter and Fran just attacked the case, it made us feel like we had hope for the very first time," Echols, 37, said in an interview alongside Davis.
The hope was well-founded. Helped by evidence Jackson and Walsh's investigation collected, the case seemed headed toward a retrial.
Then last August, both sides agreed to a rare legal maneuver in which Echols, Baldwin and Misskelley entered guilty pleas that allowed them to maintain their innocence and gain their freedom for prison time already served.
Some people in Arkansas, including the family of one of the murdered boys, still believe the three men are guilty. Yet as the years passed, even the families of the other two dead boys became convinced that prosecutors went after the wrong suspects. The mother of one boy and stepfather of another came to Sundance, sharing hugs at the premiere with Echols, who said he's "happy to call them friends now."
Three years into their investigation, Jackson and Walsh contacted director Berg, whose 2006 priest-molestation documentary "Deliver Us from Evil" earned an Academy Award nomination. Berg signed on to direct "West of Memphis," which traces the 18-year history of the case and features interviews with Jackson and many witnesses and experts he and Walsh worked with.
"I would submit this film to court, so that's how strongly I feel about it," said Davis, a producer on the film along with Echols, Jackson and Walsh.
The film also builds a case that a stepfather of one of the murdered boys should be investigated.
Jackson said that without "Paradise Lost," ''Damien would be dead by now, so I do believe that film saved his life. And I'm hoping that our movie goes some way toward exoneration and catching the person that killed those three kids."
Walsh and Jackson stop short of saying their efforts led to the release of Echols, Baldwin and Misskelley. Yet Berg thinks the evidence brought to light by Jackson and Walsh was crucial.
"Without the discovery of the DNA, there's no way that these guys would be walking free, and that came so much from Peter and Fran and their investigation," Berg said.
Since his release, Echols has lived a nomadic life with Davis. He went to New Zealand to visit the set of Jackson and Walsh's upcoming "Lord of the Rings" prequel "The Hobbit" and has been staying with other friends while trying to decide on his future.
Sitting with his arm entwined around Davis', Echols said the hardships he endured were worth it because of the life he now has ahead of him.
"If I had to go through everything I did in the last 18 years to be with Lorri and to be in this situation, no, I wouldn't change it," Echols said. "I would go through it again if it meant being with Lorri."
___
Online:
http://www.sundance.org
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Soul singer Etta James, whose hits include “At Last” and “Somethings Got A Hold On Me”, died of leukemia complications at the age of 73. [...]
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Source: http://stupidcelebrities.net/2012/01/20/singer-etta-james-dead-at-73/
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Childhood asthma is back in the news as parents in a Maryland school found that their asthmatic children had more episodes after being back in school from winter break, reports ABC 7. Their concerns are prompting another look at asthma and what families can do to help make life easier for kids who have it.
* The American Academy of Asthma, Allergy and Immunology (AAAAI) describes asthma as an inflammation of the airways that causes wheezing, chest pain and shortness of breath.
* There are several kinds of asthma: occupational (or environmental), allergic and childhood asthma. If a child is going to develop any one of these kinds of asthma he will most likely do so before age five or at least by his teen years.
* According to the CDC, nearly 10 percent of children have some form of asthma. Parents who have asthma or those with a family history of asthma are much more likely to have children with asthma.
* AAAAI says asthma is usually triggered by one of several things: exercise, cold air and air quality problems. AIRNow offers state-by-state air quality alerts to help asthma sufferers prepare for attacks.
* One of the most dangerous triggers is second hand tobacco smoke. The CDC advises smoker parents with asthmatic children to only smoke outside the home and avoid smoking in the car or around children.
* Other triggers in the home include: dust mites, mold, pet fur and dander, wood smoke and cockroaches. The CDC advises parents to keep an asthma-prone child's environment vacuumed and free of clutter. Children should be kept away from campfires and excess bulky bedding that traps dust. Running an air conditioner, heating with gas instead of a wood stove and keeping furry pets clean and brushed helps, too.
* Maryland parents said that school was another place where kids experience problems with asthma. One mother said that since returning to school after winter break her son was back on his asthma medication, double doses in fact, when he had needed none at home, says ABC News.
* Triggers at school include fluctuating temperatures from antiquated heating and ventilation systems. Most schools are little used during vacation and dust and mold build up caused problems too.
* Cold winter temperatures outside plus stale air inside make asthma conditions worse, too, says WebMD. They advise parents to be vigilant about taking medications and make sure children dress warmly, including wearing a scarf over the mouth.
* There are several asthma treatment methods available for children. Parents, along with the child's doctor should create an Asthma Action Plan so that all family members, caregivers, babysitters and school staff know how to help the child in case of an asthma attack.
* The CDC encourages parents to educate their children about asthma and help them plan strategies to avoid triggers and prevent attacks. There are several websites for children about how to manage asthma, including BAM, Airnow Kids and AAAAI Just for Kids.
Marilisa Kinney Sachteleben writes about parenting from 23 years raising four children and 25 years teaching, K-8, special needs, adult education and homeschool.
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