Politics is changing in Europe and none more so than in Spain. With European nationals able to vote in a country in which they are legally registered, Spanish parties are having to amend their campaign tactics. Now they must seek votes from non Spaniards who in many cases have a totally different outlook on politics in general and on how their town should be run. The wind of change is blowing in the Spanish political arena.
June 5, 2007
June 3, 2007
International Herald Tribune reports Canada is gaining favour as an outsourcing partner due to its stability, proximity and cultural similarities. Some are refer to this as ‘nearshoring’ or ‘remote contracting’.
“Companies are willing to pay a premium for a destination that is close to home. The customer on the end of the phone will be able to relate much better to a representative in Canada than one in the Philippines.”
Best estimated that Canada had 26,300 call-center “agent positions,” or work stations, serving the United States. The actual number of workers is probably much higher, since each position is basically a phone line and a cubicle. At some call centers, three employees working separate shifts will staff a single phone during each 24-hour period. The figure, however, looks almost insignificant when compared to the 2.85 million call-agent posts that remain in the United States.
This fun tool comes courtesy of Visual-Literacy.org, an e-learning site educating visitors about “a critical, but often neglected skill for business, communication, and engineering students, namely visual literacy, or the ability to evaluate, apply, or create conceptual visual representations.”
(Hat tip to Cool Tools.)
posted by Diane Levin @ 5:12 PM 0 comments
Thursday, April 19, 2007
“Verdict on American Lawyers”: ADR and collaborative law missing from one-sided depiction of lawyers and justice
Negative attack on lawyers overlooks changing legal professionAmerican lawyers by now may be inured to media attacks on the legal profession. We expect it from Fox News. But this week lawyers drew fire from an unexpected source: a National Public Radio broadcast.
On Point, a week-day radio news magazine produced by NPR member station WBUR in Boston, broadcast a show this week titled “Verdict on American Lawyers”. From the show’s description:
Thursday, November 25, 2004
Europeans Working for India Outsourcers
BBC News reports entry and mid-level employees are being recruited from European countries to work in India.
“Prashant Sahni, chief executive officer of Tecnovate, says the way it works is simple. ‘We hire people from various parts of Europe to work for us on Indian salaries and it’s been very successful.’”
“Mr Sahni says the European employees are recruited for a minimum period of a year, but many extend their stay. And although the employees are paid local salaries, they receive other compensation in the form of free housing, a furnishing allowance and subsidised meals.”
S THIS CANADA YEAR FOR LORD STANLEY?
It has been so long, since a Canadian National Hockey League (NHL) team. has won the Stanley cup, it has been fourteen years to be exact, in which the Montreal Canadians won the Stanley cup in the 1992-93 season.
The past two NHL season, three years to be exact due to the lockout of the 04-05 NHL season. It has been a close call for the teams north of the boarder in the country of Canada. Just last season alone the Edmonton Oilers had a nice run and force a game seven, before losing the cup to the Carolina Hurricanes. The season before the lockout of 03- 04, the Calgary Flames seem to have everything going for them. Before that powerful lighting strike, that hit the saddle dome in overtime during game 6.
In which Martin St. Louis, scored the game winning goal. that would send the series back to the sunshine state of Florida, for a game seven, in what would turn out to be a the first Stanley Cup in history for the Tampa Bay Lighting.
This year it could be different, and in what better closing of this NHL season would turn out to be if that first Stanley cup team since the Montreal Canadians won it in the 92-93 season. That it would be a team from Canada national capital of Ottawa and it would also be the first Stanley cup in the team history of the senators.
Canada lord Stanley is calling, this will be the third time in a row, a Canadians team has played for Lord Stanley is this the year? I think so, but like always, time will only tell and that is what has Canada on the edge of its seats waiting for that call from Lord Stanley.
Start your engines for the INDY 500
Its time to your engines, for this year 91st running of the Indianapolis 500 or as its simply called the Indy 500 but in the early days of what has now become one of the biggest sporting events in the world, race track officials had a hard time choosing the name of its race.
The first race was advertised as the “International 500 mile sweepstakes “from 1911 -1916. In 1919, then the race was referred to as the “Liberty Sweepstakes” then after the following of WWI.
From 1920-1980, the race was revered to as the “International Sweepstakes “after slight variations of names over the time, in 1981 race track officials adopted “the Indianapolis 500-Mile Race” name.
The Indianapolis 500 is now annually held over the Memorial Day weekend, however the first 500 was held on Memorial Day on May 30th, 1911, in that first race Ray Harroun was piloting his yellow Firestone-shod #32 Marmon “Wasp” which was outfitted with his invention the rear view mirror to victory. Rather than riding the mechanic specified in the rules, which created controversy, but it was ultimately allowed in the end.
Ray went on to win the race, with an average speed of 74miles per hour, in which created another controversy; to this day, some say a scoring error cheated Ralph Mulford of his rightful victory, Ray, who came out of retirement to race in the first Indy 500 and as it turn out that was his last race.
The attendance at the Indianapolis 500 has never been a problem since it started the race, the first race in 1911, drew eighty thousands and two hundred people, who had paid one dollar to see the race. Since then the attendance at the Indy 500 has double into the two hundred thousand ranges and the prices of the tickets now ranges from 25 dollars all the way up to one thousand dollars.
In the end, this is one of those sporting events that have become a major part of our American culture, on this weekend we also take time out to remember and say thank you to those who have served and are serving in the United States armed forces.
Enjoy this great race, on such a great holiday weekend and thank you again to all that have served and are serving this great country of ours the land the of the free.
Peon
This is Just In: NHL Playoff Hockey is far better then the NBA Playoffs.
Everyone up to our north in Canada knows it and now I will tell you why playoff hockey is far better then the National Basketball Association (NBA) equivalent of postseason play, their are three reasons in my view; the first reason is the flow of the game, second is the prestige of the Stanley Cup and the third is the apparition for athletic talent.
The flow of a National Hockey league (NHL) playoff game and the athletic ability of the players are two of the best reasons out of the three in my view; the flow of the game is so intense, that when your team shoots and makes a goal you feel like you will be having a heart attack in a mater of moments and when the other team shoots and gets the goal, you feel like you have just been hit by a semi truck.
The athletic ability, of the players in the NHL are amazing, whether it be in a playoff game or not the players athletic ability and toughness and their desire are really true sights of athletic ability, imagine being slam into the boards and with in the matter of seconds you get up and go towards the player who has the puck and then play defense, remember you are doing all of this on ice skates.
The prestige of the Stanley Cup is well known around the sporting world but it has even a meaning in Canada then in other country in the world, as in today NHL game it is extremely rare that a team from Canada wins lord Stanley, but that could end this year as Canada has only one team left in this year quest for the cup, but unlike the last two years when a Canadian team has lost a Stanley cup finals series (Calgary to Tampa in 04 and Edmonton To Carolina 06) this year team the Ottawa Senators could actually win it but they first have to take care of the Buffalo Sabers in the eastern conference finals.
But the most important thing is how much an entrainment value do you get from it, to be able to sit down and actually watch these two professional leagues playoff games on television, but for me, i get more entertainment value and fun by watching the NHL playoffs and so does the country of Canada.
June 2, 2007
We got towed into the nearest town and managed to get one used tire. Still need to rip AAA a new one for dropping the ball, big time. Them passing the buck to the local authorities could’ve cost us our very lives. And we paid for AAA premium membership for this? Heads will roll, believe it… Anyway, we made it to Tupelo, MS and crashed at a truck stop for the night. The good folks at the Tupelo WalMart got us rolling again with some nice new rubber for the road.
Around Memphis, TN I noticed the brakes were a teeny bit strange. Not mushy. Certainly not squeaky. I attributed it to the nasty roads, poor design (some cities should never exceed maximum density in favor of economic sustainability), and the locals’ lunchtime rush. Once we hit open road again the brakes were a non-issue.
Arkansas- hooray!!! The flatlands were good despite all the construction. Hills were fine too, but there were storms moving in as we got into the mountains. Dusk came quickly with the darkening clouds and we still had to reach the Bull Shoals area. There was a little more than an hour’s drive until we reached our temporary rental. So, here I am with a van full of two road-weary, cranky children, a pissed-off cat in a carrier, a scared little Sir Barksalot, and an aggrevated hubster who’s hollering at all of them to shut up as I try to get our overly-laden conveyance to Nirvana. Of course all this was happening on an extremely twisty high mountain road with no freakin’ guard rails or anything.
We hit a roller coaster steep hairpin downslope without warning.
Tap the brakes gently, repeatedly.
(Houston, we have a problem…)
Step on brakes firmly, strong staccatto rhythym.
Under mounting pressure, Bush repeatedly has said it is too early to pull out of the war, but he sympathizes with parents of soldiers.
Bohlen and Rebecca Bahr, also of Scottsdale, arrived in Crawford on Wednesday afternoon, where about 200 protesters have gathered since Saturday.
Much of the media attention has been on Cindy Sheehan of Vacaville, Calif., who is camped on a roadside near Bush’s ranch. Sheehan has vowed to stay put until she speaks with Bush about her son.
Casey Sheehan, 24, of the Army’s 1st Battalion, was killed in Iraq on April 4, 2004, five days after he arrived.
Bahr was not available for comment Thursday. She has a daughter stateside who is a member of the Marine Corps.
Bohlen’s son, Thor, 36, joined the Army two years ago after the Sept. 11 attacks.
“He wanted to serve his country,” Bohlen said Thursday.
She said she believes military men and women serve their country honorably.
“But there is nothing honorable about a war based on lies.” she said.
Bush went to war “knowing there were no weapons of mass destruction,” Bohlen said.
Bohlen said Sheehan announced Thursday that if Bush has not spoken to her before he returns to Washington on Aug. 31, she will follow him to the White House, where she expects to be joined by other anti-war groups.
“We want to keep the pressure up,” Bohlen said.
Update yer blogrolls…
I know we all love blogger.com and hell-o-scan so much, but I was getting tired of this platform’s instability, the outages, the “we’re updating the servers and it’ll work perfectly from here on out” crapola. I have moved to what I think is a quieter neighborhood, with lovely, soothing shades of the Caribbean to counter the hideousness of the people running this Administration.
She praises Sheehan for empowering people to speak out against the war.
Bohlen compared Sheehan to Rosa Parks, a Black woman who defied segregation laws when she refused to sit in the back of a bus in Montgomery, Ala., 50 years ago.
Did I mention we were being tailgated by two vehicles?
Smoke starts billowing from the van accompanied by the stench of asbestos.
Jam brake pedal into the floorboard, white-knuckling the steering wheel. No emergency brake.
(Oh, shit!!! Thank you Great Mother for another 24 hours clean and sober. Today was a good day. Thank you for everything, good, bad, or indifferent. Thy Will, not mine be done. So mote it be!)
Spot a clear area on an incline. Throw tranny into neutral. Stand on brake pedal. Don’t scream.
The van finally stopped forward motion at the side of a shallow ditch. The smoke was so thick that the only way I knew that there were two tailgaiters behind us was the two sets of tail lights that sped past. And the assholes never even bothered to stop. Long story a little shorter… When the brakes were done in October the mechanic didn’t bother with the calipers. They were rusty and extended. The rust flaked off into the pads, friction ensued, and **voila** Fried brakes for supper, anyone?
ND of SUMMER SALE: FREE shipping on purchases totalling $25.00 OR more.
We are liquidating our items and not purchasing any more summer inventory this season. Bathing suits, layette items, and more. Please visit our store
DRAGONFLIES and LADYBUGS for more information
posted by The Mom’s Cafe’ @ 5:47 AM 0 comments links to this post
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
Great New Checklists For MOMS
Childproofing Your Home
To make sure that your home is a safe haven for your children - and you - learn to spot and eliminate hazards throughout the house. This checklist will show you how. Register with ClubMom to customize this checklist by assigning due dates, adding new tasks, scheduling email reminders, and more.
Register with ClubMom now to customize this list.
Step inside the laundry room and you think you have gone to heaven. It has room for a stand up freezer and it has more cabinets. There are 2 cabinets above the washer and dryer with a hanger bar for clothes between them. On the opposite wall, there are 12 cabinets (6 top and 6 lower) with a counter that is over 7′ in length. A great place for folding clothes or setting plants.
There is also a custom built-in shoe rack for placing shoes when you come in from the back yard.
The hall has custom covered wall socket plates and switch plates and a new 3 light fixture for more light. The closet has floor to ceiling shelves for lots of storage space.
The first bedroom is perfect for children with its bright dual Disney colored walls and angel print border. It has a custom shelf over the window for collectibles you don’t want children to reach and also a rod for curtains. The wall plates and sockets are all custom designed covers and the closet has 4 sliding doors to access its large inside.