☆ March 28, 2012 ☆

Good afternoon! I'm still checking out new social sites & finding some that are great & some that just aren't my style. Empressr didn't really impress me, so I won't be visiting that one again, but as usual enjoyed listing & bidding on eBay, one of my favorite sites since it opened. The temperature has been steady in the 70s for the last 12 hours, it's very nice out today. FD County meeting in Josephine tonight.

10 e-mail no-no's:

1. Forwarding off-color jokes.
2. Using all CAPITAL LETTERS!
3. Spreading gossip.
4. Writing about personally sensitive issues.
5. Criticizing others.
6. Complaining about your boss.
7. Detailing a personal mishap.
8. Using e-mail to avoid face-to-face discussion.
9. Going into detail about personal health problems.
10. Arguing with family or friends.

Bedroom:
Making your bed should be part of your morning routine. It should be no different than brushing your teeth. In fact, to save time make your bed while you brush your teeth! No one said it has to be perfect.

Belle epoque:

A period of high artistic or cultural development; especially : such a period in France around the end of the 19th century.

Nob Hill remains a symbol of San Francisco's belle epoque, those golden days of the late 1890s when the city was awash in money, mansions, & elegance.

In the years before WWI, France experienced a period of economic growth that produced a wealth of artistic & cultural developments. That era has been described as excessive, glittering, gaudy, & extravagant, & the tumultuous days of war that followed it inspired the French to call that productive period la belle epoque - literally, "the beautiful age." By the mid-1950s, "belle epoque" had found its way into English, where it came to be used to refer not only to the glory days of late 19th-century France, but to any similarly luxurious period. It is now used as an elegant alternative to another nostalgic expression, "the good old days."

Duke lacrosse team suspended following sexual assault allegations (2006):

Duke University officials suspend the men’s lacrosse team for two games following allegations that team members sexually assaulted a stripper hired to perform at a party. Three players were later charged with rape. The case became a national scandal, impacted by issues of race, politics and class. In April 2007, all charges against the young men were dropped due to lack of credible evidence and the district attorney was eventually disbarred for his mishandling of the case.

On March 13, 2006, the Duke lacrosse team held a party at an off-campus house and hired two strippers to perform. The following day, one of the dancers, Crystal Mangum, told police in Durham, North Carolina, that three white lacrosse players forced her into a bathroom and raped her. On March 23, the team’s 46 white members provided police with DNA samples and were photographed. On March 28, Duke suspended the team for two games; soon after, their coach was forced to resign and the school’s president cancelled the rest of the lacrosse season. On April 10, defense attorneys revealed that DNA test results showed no match between the players and the accuser. Nevertheless, Durham County District Attorney Mike Nifong, who labeled the players “hooligans,” vowed to continue investigating the case. On April 17, Collin Finnerty and Reade Seligmann were charged with rape, sexual offense and kidnapping. On May 12, defense attorneys announced a second round of tests found no evidence of any player’s DNA on the accuser’s body or clothing on the night of the party.  On May 15, a third lacrosse player, David Evans, the team captain, was indicted on charges of rape, sexual offense and kidnapping. All three players maintained their innocence and had cell phone records and time-stamped photographs to demonstrate they couldn’t have committed the crimes.

The case raised issues of class and race because the accuser was a poor, black, single mother from the Durham area and the three lacrosse players were out-of-staters from affluent backgrounds. Nifong, who was running for district attorney when the rape allegations were first made, was accused of aggressively pursuing the case to gain favor with Durham’s African-American community. Additionally, the case sparked a national debate about the behavior of college athletes.

In late December 2006, the accuser altered several key details of her story and Nifong dropped the rape charges but kept the kidnapping and sexual offense counts in place. On December 28, the North Carolina State Bar Association filed a prosecutorial misconduct complaint against Nifong. In January 2007, Nifong, facing growing criticism, asked North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper to take over the case. In April of that year, the attorney general announced Evans, Finnerty and Seligmann had been wrongly accused and dismissed all charges against them. Nifong was heavily criticized for his rush to judgment and his heavy reliance on the faulty testimony of the accuser. He was disbarred in June and later convicted of criminal contempt for making misleading statements to a judge. The three accused players received an undisclosed financial settlement from Duke University and later filed a lawsuit against Nifong, the city of Durham and the investigating police officers.

Interiors:

In Woody Allen's first dramatic film, the disintegration of an upper class couple's marriage forces their three grown daughters (Diane Keaton, Mary Beth Hurt and Kristin Griffith) to reveal their feelings about them and each other. But none are able to provide ample support to their devastated mother. The film received five Oscar nods, including Best Director, Best Actress (Geraldine Page) and Best Supporting Actress (Maureen Stapleton).

Labelbox:

☆Keep up to date on our facebook page www.facebook.com/steply.☆
☆Check out FUSIONCAM , a brand new photo app by the creators of Labelbox.☆
☆ You asked for it - Tapes are now movable and auto-extends to fit your typing☆
** Labelbox the number 1 photo app in 46 countries and top 5 app in 77 countries. **
--REVIEWS--
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AppAdvice - " it can add a nice touch to those filtered and fake Polaroid images. With the free price tag, there’s no harm in trying the app to see if you like it."
--DESCRIPTION--
Labelbox is a simple, easy to use, photo labeler using a variety of beautiful tapes that stylishly labels your photos.
Select, swipe and type.
Labelbox helps you highlight areas, label items in your photo in an artistic, creative and fun way. You can even use different labels to create frames inside your photo.
Features include:
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☆ Masking tape, sticky tape, Ribbons, Candy Wrappers
☆ 4 Cloth labels in an in-app purchase, Camouflage, Polka dots
☆ 4 European labels in an in-app purchase, Kilt, Doily, Black Lace, Picnics
☆ Type in all directions
☆ Create funky frames using the tapes
☆ Steply Photo Network
☆ View shared amazing photos from around the world
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Marie Osmond:

How could you not love the "country" half of the Donny & Marie Show duo, who modeled a new haircut & crocheted top for us?

Original run of Futurama debuts & like all good shows, it cancelled by FOX. (1999)

What is the significance of the fictitious street in Scranton, Pennsylvania, where the Dunder Mifflin Paper Company is headquartered in the TV sitcom The Office?
The street, Slough Road, is named for the town in which the original British version of the show is set.

What phrase and symbol on the Great Seal of the U.S. also serve as the motto and mascot of Sport Lisboa e Benfica, Portugal’s popular soccer club?

Which library has the most, 2nd most, & 3rd most books?
A. N.Y. Public Library
B. Library of Congress
C. National Library of China
BCA. The Library of Congress is the largest in the world, with more than 29 million books on 530 miles of bookshelves. Bring your reading glasses - & a bike.

Which planet has the least, 2nd least, & 3rd least gravity?
A. Venus
B. Jupiter
C. Mercury

You definitely need good, level term life insurance policies. You don't need accidental death & dismemberment. Think about it, dude. You're not more dead if you die by accident. Dead is dead! You need to make sure your family is taken care of in the best way possible, no  matter how you die.