mar

Better Breaks - A summary of projects funded between Apiril 2014 and March 2015

The Better Breaks funding programme is focused on improving the range and availability of short break opportunities for disabled children and young people, particularly those with multiple support needs, including short break opportunities that families can enjoy together, or which allow parents and siblings to have time away from their caring responsibilities. This is the summary report.




mar

Creative Breaks, A summary of projects funded between September 2014 and October 2015

The Short Breaks Fund helping to make breaks better and brighter for unpaid carers and cared-for people in Scotland. Launched in 2010 for one year, the fund has now been running for five years and has proved to be a lifeline for many carers. During the past five years the Scottish Government, through Shared Cared Scotland has distributed 12,547,409 to 697 projects to deliver innovative, tailor made breaks to groups and individuals.




mar

#59: It's a Dark Mark Life




mar

#87: Trailer Talk Marathon




mar

#140: Are YOU Smarter than John Noe?




mar

#203: Potter Got Smarter




mar

Labor market restructuring and its possible permanence

We find 3 new hires for every 10 layoffs caused by the shock and estimate that 42 percent of recent layoffs will result in permanent job loss. That is from a new paper by Jose Maria Barrero, Nick Bloom, and Steven J. Davis, top experts on this and related topics.  As for policy: Unemployment benefit […]

The post Labor market restructuring and its possible permanence appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.




mar

Facts about labor markets ouch, when are rising wages bad edition

Workers in the bottom quintile of the wage distribution experienced a 35 percent employment decline while those in the top quintile experienced only a 9 percent decline. Large differences across the wage distribution persist even after conditioning on worker age, business industry, business size, and worker location. As a result, average base wages increased by […]

The post Facts about labor markets ouch, when are rising wages bad edition appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.




mar

Coronavirus sports markets in everything, multiple simulations edition

For $20, fans of German soccer club Borussia can have a cut-out of themselves placed in the stands at BORUSSIA-PARK. According to the club, over 12,000 cut-outs have been ordered and 4,500 have already been put in place. Here is the tweet and photo. And some sports bettors are betting on simulated sporting events.  (Again, […]

The post Coronavirus sports markets in everything, multiple simulations edition appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.




mar

Primary care in Scotland: workforce, funding and delivery of care

When: Wed Jan 27, 2016

Where: Scotland: workforce, funding and delivery of care
Event Status: confirmed
Event Description: This conference will provide a timely opportunity for delegates to consider the future of primary care in Scotland. For further information, please visit the event website



  • http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#event

mar

KunstlerCast 326 — Confab with David Collum of Cornell U about Corona Virus, Markets Gone Wild, and Politics

Support this Podcast by visiting Jim’s Patreon Page   David Collum is the Betty R. Miller Professor of Chemistry at Cornell University. He is the intellectual utility infielder of internet commentary, covering all the bases: culture, politics, finance, science, and technology, with often surprising views on the the predicaments of our time. Here we attempt to more »

The post KunstlerCast 326 — Confab with David Collum of Cornell U about Corona Virus, Markets Gone Wild, and Politics appeared first on Kunstler.




mar

NFPA and ESFI work to reduce fatalities caused by electric shock drowning in pools and at marinas

With summer in full swing, the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) and Electrical Safety Foundation International (ESFI) are joining forces to remind people about the potential electrical hazards in swimming pools, hot tubs and spas, on board boats and in the waters surrounding boats, marinas and launch ramps.




mar

How to Stop Resentment from Ruining Your Marriage

When two people meet and decide to pursue a romantic relationship with each other, they always start with high hopes. They are very happy and look at the other person through rose-colored glasses. But as most of us know, that loving feeling doesn’t always last forever. It does for some couples, but for many, they [...]Read More...




mar

Target Circle Deals March 29th - April 4th: 40% Off Turtle Beach Battle Buds

Lots of gaming headphone deals for those brave enough to go into stores.
These are the deals:

30% Off Turtle Beach Elite Atlas Aero Wireless headset for PC (Expires April 4th)

30% Off Turtle Beach Elite Atlas Pro Wired PC Gaming headset (Expires April 4th)

40% Off Turtle Beach Battle Buds In-ear Gaming headset (Expires April 4th)

15% Off Turtle Beach Stealth 600 Headset All Varieties (Expires April 4th)

30% Off ROCCAT Kone Aimo Owl-Eye Mouse Black & White (Expires April 4th)

30% Off ROCCAT Sense Aimo Mousepad for PC Gaming (Expires April 4th)





mar

Maryland and Washington, DC: Latest updates on coronavirus

Here is the COVID-19 situation in Maryland and Washington, DC.




mar

High Vibe Honey: Week Of 29th March 2020 + I Am My Own Hero!

In this wild time, you might be looking around and noticing that people are losing their collective shit! In this climate, it is more important than ever to truly use your tools, cut off negativity, and feed your mind with material that makes you feel STRONG, rather than fearful. This is your moment to become […]

The post High Vibe Honey: Week Of 29th March 2020 + I Am My Own Hero! appeared first on Gala Darling.



  • High Vibe Honey

mar

Puzzles for smart: Cats

Puzzles for smart: Cats is a fairly simple, educational game. Collect the puzzle of kittens from separate fragments of the picture. The game of puzzles will seem to your child very fascinating as he will gradually achieve that he wants to see rather. It will take the child's attention for a long time, and you will be pleased to watch his actions. This educational game will allow you to spend time with your baby. For fans of the popular puzzles of different complexity. From simple puzzles with the image of cats and kittens to complex. At any age and level of play. In this section, selected puzzles with cats. White, gray and black kittens. One cat or several cats. Collect a puzzle with the image of these small animals. Key game features: - The game has 12 levels of difficulty - The game has 12 different images of kittens - Unlimited puzzle time - Suitable for all ages - Achievements!




mar

Oregon Deputy Fire Marshal Receives National Award for Home Fire Sprinkler Advocacy

NFPA’s  Fire Sprinkler Initiative and the Home Fire Sprinkler Coalition (HFSC) are pleased to announce that Chase Browning from the Medford Fire Department, is the recipient of the 2019 Bringing Safety Home Award.   The award recognizes




mar

'Star Wars': Summary of the franchise and its effect on space technology

A long time ago — roughly four decades — the world was introduced to Jedi knights, lightsabers, droids and the Force. Before long, elements of the space fantasy had an effect on real-life space technology.




mar

The UAE is going to Mars. Here's the plan for its Hope orbiter.

The United Arab Emirates had its sights set on Mars the day before it launched its second satellite ever.




mar

grammar is relationships


This is not a post about American versus British English. I hope you’ll indulge me. It's come out of some Twitter conversations this afternoon.

It started when I read this sentence in James Pennebaker’s book The Secret Life of Pronouns:
Function words require social skills to use properly.

And I wondered how it had got(ten) past a copyeditor. So I did a Twitter poll to see if other people were happy with the sentence. The poll looked like this: 


So, 25% of more than 300 people thought it sounded fine. 75% felt there was something weird about it. Given how I phrased the question, it's possible that the 75% had 100 different reasons for thinking it weird. But considering some of the tweet-replies I had, I know that at least some people had the same reaction that I did. 

The problem with the sentence for me is that there is no reasonable subject for the verb to use. Compare it to this sentence with the same kinds of parts in the same order:  
 The law requires every driver to drive safely.

In that case, the subject of the infinitive to drive is every driver—every driver is to drive safely. So, what you've got is:
  • Main verb: requires
  • Subject of main verb: the law
  • Object of main verb = infinitive clause: every driver to drive safely

But that doesn't work for Pennebaker's sentence. Social skills to use properly is not a complete clause because (a) there's no object of the verb to use (to use what properly?), and (b) social skills is in a position where it could be the subject of to use (as in the driving example), but it's not.  The sentence could be "fixed" in a number of ways that involve making it clearer that function words are the things being used.
  1. Make the infinitive into a passive, so it's clear that function words is the object of use: Function words require social skills to be used properly.
  2. Move use closer to function words so that it's clear how they relate to each other: To use function words properly requires social skills. (Or Using function words properly requires social skills.)
  3. Move function words closer to useIt takes social skills to use function words properly.
Number 1 is a little ambiguous (it sounds a bit like function words are bossing social skills around), so I'd prefer 2 or 3, where it's really clear that function words is the object of use

But there are sentences with require that do work more like Pennebaker's sentence:
Crops require water to grow.

Here, it's not the water that's growing, it's the crops. So it doesn't work like the driving sentence—the object of require is not water to grow. In both sentences, I've put the object of require in blue, so you can see that the sentences have different structures. Another way that you can tell they're different structures is that you can replace to with in order to in one and not the other and can rephrase one with that and no to, but not the other.
The law requires every passenger in order to drive safely.
Crops require water in order to grow.
 The law requires that every driver drive safely. [or drives if you're not a subjunctive user]

Crops require that water grow.

So one of the reasons I wanted to write this post is to make this big point:
Grammar isn't just where words go in a sentence, it's how they relate to each other.
The fact that the crops sentence is the same shape as Pennebaker's sentence doesn't mean that Pennebaker's sentence is grammatical, because it still has the problem that there is no subject for to use. Notice that it can't be rephrased in either of the ways that the other two can:
Function words require social skills in order to use properly
Function words require that social skills use properly
The last possibility is to interpret use as being in middle voice (as opposed to active or passive voice). This is when the verb acts kind of like a passive (where what would have been the active object becomes the subject), but doesn't get the passive be +past participle form. English has some verbs that work this way.
I cut the bread easily. (active voice: subject is the cutter)
The bread is cut easily. (passive voice: subject is what's cut)
The bread cuts easily. (middle voice: subject is what's cut)
Grammar Girl has a podcast and post on middle voice in English if you're interested. English has more of a 'middlish' voice than a 'middle', as we're really limited in how we can use it and it doesn't have a special verb form, as it does in some other languages. As Grammar Girl notes:
[English] middle-voice sentences usually include some adverbial meaning, negation, or a modal verb, or a combination of the three. “The spearheads didn’t cast very well” has both negation (“didn’t”) and an adverb phrase (“very well”). “The screw screwed in more easily than I thought it would” has the adverb phrase “more easily than I thought it would.”
While Pennebaker's sentence does have an adverb, properly, it's not one that I'm super-comfortable using with a middle construction (?The bread cuts properly), but maybe some people would like it better than I do. (Proper is used more as an adjective and adverb of intensity in some colloquial BrEs than in my AmE.)

So, are the 25% who like the sentence reading it as having middle voice? I'm not totally convinced, because I think that the English middle doesn't do well with fancier sentence constructions as with require:
?That bread requires a good knife to cut easily.
?That bread requires a steady hand to cut easily.
Putting an object between requires and to makes it confusing—is it the bread or the knife/hand that is cutting easily? If it's the knife or hand, then the sentence would usually require an it to stand for the bread: The bread requires a good knife to cut it easily. 

So, anyhow, when I put the Pennebaker sentence up, some people wondered if it was like this dialect phenomenon, found in some parts of the US (particularly western Pennsylvania) and some parts of the UK (particularly Scotland):
The car needs washed.
It was natural for them to make that connection because both Pennebaker's sentence and the needs washed sentence would work in other dialects if the final verb were made passive. But note that what needs to be added to the sentences to create a passive is different in the two cases. In needs washed, the washed is in the past participle needed for a passive. But in Pennebaker's sentence the infinitive verb is not in any way in passive form.
The car needs to be washed.
The function words require social skills to be used properly.

So, I asked the 25% who accepted the sentence to write back and tell me where they were from. And it turns out they're from anywhere.... New Jersey, California, New England, southeastern US, eastern and western Canada, up and down the UK, the Caribbean. That makes it look like it's not a dialect feature. 

An interesting thing about the 25%, though, was that a few got in touch to say: "I clicked that the sentence was fine for me, but once I started thinking about it, I was less sure."

After the dialect idea didn't pan out, I joked that the next step was to give personality tests to people who didn't like the sentence. And while it was a joke, I think there is probably something to the idea  that some people read for meaning and don't get the grammatical 'clang' that I got because getting the meaning is good enough. If they can get the meaning without a deep look at the grammar, the grammar is irrelevant. I'd wonder if people who get a 'clang' with this sentence are also more likely to also notice misplaced modifiers and dangling participles. A lot of us who notice these things notice them because we've been trained in looking at language analytically, or we're just very literal readers. Had I heard Pennebaker's sentence, I probably wouldn't have noticed that there was no workable subject for the verb use. I would have just understood it and gone merrily on my way. But in reading, CLANG.


Anyhow, the main reason I wanted to blog this was to make that point that Grammar is how words relate to each other. That two sentences with the same shape can be working in very different ways. And on that note, I'll leave you with an experiment that Carol Chomsky did way back when. She gave children a doll with a blindfold over its eyes and asked them if this sentence was true—and if not, to make the sentence true.
The doll is easy to see. 
Notice how that sentence doesn't work like this sentence:
The doll is eager to see.
In the first, the doll is being seen. We can paraphrase it as The doll is easy for me to see. In the second, the doll is who will do the seeing. We can't paraphrase it as The doll is eager for me to see, because it means The doll is eager for the doll to see. The words easy and eager determine how we interpret the relations of the other words in the sentence. In linguistic terms, they license different relationships in the sentence. (In these sentences it's adjectives doing that relationship-determining, but in most sentences, it's the verbs. In our requires sentences above, we can see that require licenses a range of possible sentence structures—words do that too.)

Understanding that a blindfolded doll is easy to see is something that most kids don't master till they're into their school years. When asked to make the doll easy to see, the younger kids take off the doll's blindfold. This shows us that kids take a while to fully take account of the grammar, not just the words, in sentences.

Hope you didn't mind my little grammatical foray...
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mar

ReGen Villages plans smart, circular communities in Sweden

Silicon Valley-based ReGen Villages has teamed up with Swedish architecture firm White Arkitekter to develop ReGen Villages Sweden, a vision for smart, self-sufficient communities throughout the Scandinavian country. Developed to meet the United Nations' 17 Sustainable Development Goals, the proposal combines a wide variety of high- and low-tech environmentally friendly systems from organic gardens for local food production to the integration of artificial intelligence on a community-wide scale. The two firms hope to break ground on a ReGen Villages Sweden pilot project in 2020. [...]




mar

Marine veteran converts a school bus into a nonprofit traveling art studio

It's safe to say that Marine veteran Jessica Rambo is not one to rest on her laurels. After 10 years of service in the Marine Corps, the mom of two worked day in and day out for two years in order to convert a 1997 Blue Bird school bus into a full-time tiny house on wheels that also serves as a roaming art studio. Now, Rambo and her two kids are about to embark on a long road trip to bring her nonprofit art organization, The Painted Buffalo Studio, to veterans around the country.[...]




mar

The Dem Primary is Over, and We Need Bernie Sanders to Lead on Health Care From the Senate

On Tuesday, I cast a joyless vote for the very much politically doomed Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in the Illinois primary, in an elementary school where hushed whispers and fearful glances had replaced the normal din of an election day. There was no one standing just outside the perimeter hustling me to vote for this […]




mar

If Trump Declares Martial Law Due to Coronavirus, Can He Suspend the Election?

Following the criticism that he has mismanaged the nation’s response to the coronavirus epidemic, Trump has declared himself a “wartime president.”  If martial law is next, what will happen to the November election?




mar

Samantha From 'Sex And The City' Thirsting Over Mario Is What We Crave

By Dan Duddy  Published: May 07th, 2020 





mar

Back in my day, if you had a headache you had to walk 5 miles to get Rosemary and by the time you got there the headache was gone





mar

Nursing School: Where Smarty-Pants Kids Go to Learn Their Measurements





mar

Old Man Yells At Cloud (Marvel edition)

So Martin Scorsese said that the Marvel movies are “not cinema” and the internet kind of blew up because it is inherently polarizing, and the possibility that Scorsese is both one of our most talented living directors and also wrong about this particular subject is not particularly fun discourse for a lot of people on […]




mar

Maryland and Washington, DC: Latest updates on coronavirus

Here is the COVID-19 situation in Maryland and Washington, DC.




mar

STOP Marketing Your Business and Make the Home Business Lead Come to You!

Do you want your leads to come to you? Right lets get straight into it...




mar

How to Make Your First Year in Network Marketing a Success - 5 Essential Tips

Your first year in network marketing can be a real struggle.? There are many challenges.? This includes rejection, time wasters, and much more.




mar

How to Replace Your 9 To 5 With Network Marketing Jobs - 5 Tips to Financial Freedom

Would you like to leave the rat-race and replace your 9-5 with network marketing jobs? Here are 5 tips to financial freedom.




mar

How to Generate More MLM Network Marketing Leads in 90 Days Than You Can Handle

Whether this is your first year in network marketing or not you will want to know how to generate an abundance of leads into your business. Lets face it, if you have more leads than you can handle, you can eliminate the desperation to sign up just about anyone into your business. So here are 5 tips to achieve this in 90 days.




mar

Do Not Buy MLM Network Marketing Leads - Use Attraction to Grow Your MLM Home Business Opportunity

Building an mlm home business opportunity is hard work. If you run out of warm list leads you have to think of ways to get leads to keep your business growing. In these cases most will try buying mlm network marketing leads. This Article will explain why you should not do this and explain another better alternative approach.




mar

MLM Network Marketing Leads - 5 Tips to Start Building Your MLM Home Business Opportunity Online

If you look online for information to Start Building Your MLM home business opportunity Online you will be overwhelmed. This articles objective is to give you 5 high level tips that explain the Basic concepts of marketing your business online to generate your own MLM Network marketing leads.




mar

4 Marketing Tips to Achieve YourNetBiz Success - The Must See YourNetBiz Opportunity Marketing Guide

If you are new to marketing the YourNetBiz Opportunity you will soon come to see that it is not as easy as you thought. There is a lot of conflicting information and strategies. If you want YourNetBiz Success follow this guide and try and master the strategies.




mar

Aggressive Home Business Lead Generation Using Video Leverage - Why Top Marketers Use This Method

If you are serious about home business lead generation using video marketing you know that it takes a lot of work and dedication to create your content. This article will reveal why the top marketers use video leverage to generate hundreds of leads.




mar

How to Get an Abundance of Success University Leads in Your First Year in Network Marketing

To be successful and generate Success University Leads you need to think in a different way and have a system that will work for you and your future team. This article will give you some tips on what you need to focus on in your first year in network marketing to get an abundance of Success University leads.




mar

How Can I Really Market One of These Platinum YourNetBiz Opportunity Packages?

So you now have a YourNetBiz Opportunity. You have invested your money and you have setup your website. Now what? Well the good news is you are in the right place my friend. This article will explain how you can focus your efforts and market the right way.




mar

Jonathan Budd (MLM Mentor) Review - What Does He Really Do For the Network Marketing Industry?

Have you heard of Jonathan Budd? This Article documents the detail about Jonathan Budd (MLM mentor) what he does and what his business provides to its clients. It also tackles the controversial question, should you do business with him?




mar

How to Use MLM Prospecting to Win in MLM Network Marketing!

Learn how to use MLM Prospecting to get the edge in MLM Network Marketing. Use this easy secret tip to dominate your competition.




mar

Is it Really Possible to Generate More Than 20 Leads a Day Using Article Marketing Secrets?

Come on now, is it really possible to generate 20 leads a day using article marketing secrets? That is the question! Well I am going to discuss this right now because it has been questioned a few times.




mar

What is the Correct Social Marketing Theory? Learn 2 Tips to Capitalize on It!

I am going to explain what, in my opinion, is the correct social marketing theory. Not just that, I am also going to explain 2 ways to make good use of it in your business.




mar

How Can You Use Viral Marketing Techniques to Get Free Home Business Leads?

So, you are here to learn how you can use viral marketing techniques to get free home business leads! Well great stuff I have a few magical tips for you to achieve just that.




mar

Discover 3 Article Marketing Tips That Will Explode Your Blog Traffic!

When you are working out how to market your blog it is important to focus on what is most effective. Not only that, you need to go with what is also cost effective. I have some article marketing tips that will truly explode your blog traffic.