31 Ağustos 2011 Çarşamba

3 Back to School Tips for Stepmoms

By The Garter Brides for GalTime.com

The first days of school can be a nerve-wracking experience for any mom, but as a stepmom it holds an entirely different set of issues. The stepmother role is one that takes nurturing, care and understanding. Just as it took time for your stepchild to accept and love you for who you are, this will be another phase of your relationship where you'll learn more about each other. This can be a fun new experience for the both of you, so let's make the most of the new school year! Understanding the needs of your stepchild(ren) as well as an understanding of the boundaries between you and their parents is essential. No two relationships are the same but as experts on blended family life, we have a few tips for getting through the first days of school with your step-kids!

Related: Reducing School Anxiety

#1: If you and your partner both already have kids, let the older children tutor their new, younger siblings. It will make homework go by faster and give them the chance to bond throughout the school year.

Related: Moms Dish-- The Truth About Back to School Guilt

#2: Work with your spouse to agree on house rules regarding homework, school night curfews, chores and allowances. Showing all your children a united front can lead to less rebelling, especially from older stepchildren.

Related: Stop the Homework Wars

#3: Getting involved in school activities can be tricky as a stepmother because you don't want to step on anyones toes. We suggest letting the biological parents handle the PTA meetings and Parent-Teacher conferences while you can join in attending the recitals, plays and graduations.

More from GalTime.com

When You Hear, "You're Not My Real Dad"

Single Moms...Minimize the 'Woe is Me'

Can A Multitasking Mom Ever Really Relax?

Getting Your Kids to Talk About School

parent teacher conferences, homework wars, homework school, pta meetings, younger siblings, nurturing care, first days of school, step kids, biological parents, stepchild, blended family, stepmom, stepchildren, stepmother, new experience, recitals, united front, garter, chores, woe

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30 Ağustos 2011 Salı

blue hour in Paris

photo

blue hour in Paris

Paris / France

See where this picture was taken. [?]

Here you can see the large panorama and the original size of the panorama.

my 3333th photo on flikr

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29 Ağustos 2011 Pazartesi

Jetty Buoy

photo

Jetty Buoy

Probably not called a buoy, but spotted it tied up to one of the jetties in Whitby Harbour, just liked its simplicity and thought it would make an attractive mono

Processed in Lightroom with square crop, mono conversion and vignetting and finished off with some tweaks in Topaz to bring out some of the texture in the wood and the water

Camera: Sony A580
Lens: Tamron 70-300
Shutter: 1/1000sec
Aperture: F4
ISO: 100

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lightroom, vignetting, jetties, jetty, topaz, simplicity, tweaks, texture, conversion, sony

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28 Ağustos 2011 Pazar

Brens e Os Prez (Oia, Espaa)

photo

Brens e Os Prez (Oia, Espaa)

Segn subes a la casa forestal de Mougs por la carretera que sube desde la costa, tienes una serie de miradores espectaculares.

Esta sierra litoral, la de A Groba, tiene muchos lugares como este, en los que se puede ver el mar desde la cima de una pequea montaa, ofreciendo panormicas tan bonitas como esta, desde la que se ven los pueblos de Brens y Os Prez, ambos del concello de Oia, encarados hacia el Ocano Atlntico

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St. James Park

photo

St. James Park

Buckingham Palace in the background.

St. James Park. westminster, london.

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27 Ağustos 2011 Cumartesi

Brighton

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EF80 61(Edo-Tokyo Museum)

photo

EF80 61(Edo-Tokyo Museum)

EF80 61

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26 Ağustos 2011 Cuma

summer into autumn | red iv.

photo

summer into autumn | red iv.

cherries on a japanese cherry tree, august 2011.

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25 Ağustos 2011 Perşembe

Isla Mujeres scorcio 4

photo

Isla Mujeres scorcio 4

C'e' anche un Bistro Francese…In vendita!

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23 Ağustos 2011 Salı

Mandy Quinn

photo

Mandy Quinn

Our model for tonight's lighting workshop at the the Tomaree peninsula Photography Club.

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Arboretum 082111 404

photo

Arboretum 082111 404

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Hippo Yawn

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Hippo Yawn

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2011-08-20 009

photo

2011-08-20 009

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22 Ağustos 2011 Pazartesi

Paper + Hate

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Paper + Hate

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Patcharee & Terje's Engagement and Wedding at Rose Garden (Photo by Natthawat Wongrat

photo

Patcharee & Terje's Engagement and Wedding at rose garden (Photo by Natthawat Wongrat

Patcharee & Terje's Engagement and Wedding at Rose Garden Riverside Hotel in Nakhon Pathom, Thailand.

Photo by Natthawat Wongrat / net-photography.com

This image is protected by international copyright laws. It can not be copied or in any way reproduced or published without the consent of the photographer.

More wedding photos are available at
net-photography.com/portfolios/portfolio_wedding/

pre-wedding net-photography.com/portfolios/portfolio_wedding/ netphoto@me.com

Please contact netphoto@me.com for Assignments and Portfolios.

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21 Ağustos 2011 Pazar

Thank you Walt Disney

photo

Thank you Walt Disney

For bringing us the Happiest Place on Earrth!!

Just got home from disneyland.. will visit your streams later and thanks for the comments .. Love you all guys

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20 Ağustos 2011 Cumartesi

Mt gc bi bin Hn Tm

photo

Mt gc bi bin hn Tm

• Camera: Nikon FM
• Film: UXi Super 200
• Popular interesting | Blog | Tumblr

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19 Ağustos 2011 Cuma

One Record Djokovic May Not Match

Can Novak Djokovic craft the best season in tennis history?

In June, Djokovic lost to Roger Federer in the French Open semifinals, falling just one win short of tying John McEnroe's record start to a season of 42-0 in 1984. Since then, Djokovic has won Wimbledon and the Masters event in Montreal, winning 12 straight matches and dropping just five sets.

Entering Thursday's last-16 match against Radek Stepanek at the Cincinnati Masters, that left him with a remarkable winning percentage of 98.2%, better than McEnroe's season-ending percentage of 96.5% in 1984.

[tennis0818] Getty Images

Novak Djokovic, playing this week in Ohio, is winning at a better rate so far this year than John McEnroe did in his remarkable 1984 season.

"Every match I play, I try to win, regardless of which match it is or whoever is across the net," Djokovic said Sunday after winning his ninth tournament of the season in Montreal.

But does that mean that Djokovic is a good bet to exceed McEnroe's season record of 82-3? Not really—unless you believe that Djokovic this year has transcended to a new level of dominance that can't be captured by the ordinary laws of probability, which is a defensible position.

First, the cold numbers. Assuming he stays healthy and motivated, Djokovic is likely to play at least five more tournaments: the Masters that began this week in Cincinnati, the U.S. Open, Masters tournaments in the fall in Shanghai and Paris, and the year-end tour finals in London. Each one should feature most if not all of the world's top male players. But there's another variable that will make it harder for Djokovic to match McEnroe's mark: His Serbian team is in the Davis Cup semifinals, which means he could play as many as four more singles matches in that competition, three of them against top-caliber opponents.

It's difficult to say for sure what Djokovic's chances are of winning in each event: Final entry lists aren't yet available, let alone draws. But even for a player as good as Djokovic, a sophisticated probability model gives him less than a one-third chance of winning an event featuring all of his top peers. Jeff Sackmann, a tennis-stats blogger at Heavy Topspin, has developed a ranking and forecasting algorithm that gives Djokovic a 29.6% chance of winning in Cincinnati this week.

Sackmann also forecast Djokovic's chance of having won Wimbledon at about 25%. Apply that to the U.S. Open, and Djokovic's Cincy chances to Shanghai and Paris, and he has less than a 1% chance of sweeping the three Masters and the U.S. Open, compared to a 26% chance of falling short in all four events, which means he'd take on four more losses, already two more than McEnroe.

The tour final is a bit different, because a player can win it all yet emerge with a round-robin loss—or even lose three matches, by getting swept in the round-robin phase or by advancing to the knockout stage with two losses and then getting knocked out. Djokovic is the current heavy favorite in that tournament, yet Sackmann, based on the current likely tour finalists, gives Djokovic just a 17% chance of winning it undefeated—and a 4% chance of losing three matches.

Davis Cup is even tougher to forecast, because final team lineups aren't set and because Djokovic, even if he does play Serbia's semifinal against Argentina, could play anywhere from one to four singles matches between now and the end of the year. Still, even with a favorable schedule, Djokovic has a 40% chance of taking at least one loss in Davis Cup play.

This all adds up to less than a 1% chance Djokovic loses no more than one more match this season, to better McEnroe's feat; about a 5% chance he'll lose exactly twice and match McEnroe, and an 84% chance he'll lose three matches or more.

"It's really, really difficult what he's doing," said Rafael Nadal, who surrendered his world No.1 ranking to Djokovic in May. "He's having a better season than I had in 2008. Just congratulate him."

Still, Djokovic has a chance to match or exceed McEnroe in respects other than won-loss record, which is, after all, rarely considered the determinant of tennis greatness. If he wins the U.S. Open, the tour finals and Davis Cup, he'll have matched McEnroe in majors and tour finals while one-upping him in Davis Cup, where McEnroe's U.S. team lost to Sweden in the finals in part because he lost his opening singles match in straight sets.

In some respects, Djokovic has already exceeded Federer's 2005 season, in which he finished 81-4 after going two sets up in his final match with a chance to equal McEnroe's record before losing three straight sets to David Nalbandian. Federer reached just two major finals that year, winning them both, which Djokovic already has matched heading into the U.S. Open. Federer also entered just five of the nine Masters events, winning four and losing in Monte Carlo in the quarterfinals; Cincinnati is Djokovic's sixth, and he's already won five, a record total.

Federer was also 15-2 against Top-10 opponents that year, while Djokovic is 16-1, meaning he's already won more against top competition than Federer did, with many big tournaments left to play.

"He's as good an athlete as we have out here," said Mardy Fish following his defeat by Djokovic in the Montreal final last weekend. "He gets to balls, just his racquet on balls that you can't believe he gets to."

Even if Djokovic's chances of beating McEnroe's 82-3 mark appear remote, there are some important caveats: First, he's defied probability already this season with his improbable run, and hasn't needed a lot of luck in most of his wins. Just nine have gone to a deciding set, and in just four of those was the deciding set close.

He could also catch some lucky breaks along the way: Some top players might skip Paris; or potential opponents on rival Davis Cup teams might get injured or skip the tournament. Djokovic can even help himself by skipping one of the later Masters tournament—particularly if he's won the U.S. Open by then, since he'll have little to prove.

Whatever happens, he'll have the world's best players gunning for him, but they have been all season and have consistently fallen short. "I'm aware of the fantastic year that I had and a great streak, but I'm not thinking how many matches will I lose," Djokovic said. "I'm thinking how many matches will I win. As long as it's like that, I think I'm in the right direction."

Write to Carl Bialik at numbersguy@wsj.com

john mcenroe, radek stepanek, novak djokovic, probability model, cincinnati masters, open masters, roger federer, cold numbers, open semifinals, laws of probability, defensible position, cup semifinals, tennis history, which match, davis cup, french open, caliber, dominance, wimbledon, getty

Online.wsj.com

Upper Warlingham, 25.2.05

photo

Upper Warlingham, 25.2.05

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Electrostar
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18 Ağustos 2011 Perşembe

sign

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sign

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2006 Australia's best beach

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The Valley of the Giants treetop walk

valley of the giants, australia online

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Greek Recession Seen Dragging On

ATHENS—Analysts warned that Greece is at risk for a fourth year of recession in 2012, defying official forecasts of a recovery and dealing a further setback to the government's deficit-cutting plans.

Amid plunging consumer demand, weakening global growth prospects and the possibility of fresh austerity measures, analysts said Greece's economy could shrink 2% or more next year, following a 4.5% contraction in 2010 and an expected 3.9% downturn this year.

That would raise questions about the €110 billion ($158.5 billion) bailout the country received last year from its fellow euro-zone members and the International Monetary Fund. Those bailout loans are predicated on the moribund economy returning to growth in 2012 after painful fiscal and economic changes.

The deteriorating forecast could refocus market attention on the country where the euro-zone debt crisis began, after weeks of hand-wringing over the economic woes in Italy and Spain.

A longer recession would hurt Greece's efforts to meet deficit-reduction goals, weighing on its ability to collect tax revenues while boosting outlays on social welfare. The country's debt ratio as a percentage of gross domestic product would deteriorate further. And rising unemployment, now nearly 17%, might further stoke public discontent and imperil the government's ability to push through unpopular fiscal steps.

"I am absolutely convinced that we are headed for further recession in 2012," said George Kyrtsos, a political commentator and editor of the City Press newspaper. "As such, it is a mathematical certainty that the budget deficit will increase next year, while just to keep our debt dynamics stable, Greece needs to have growth of at least 3.5% to 4%."

In the latest predictions prepared by the IMF, the European Commission and the European Central Bank, Greece's €325-billion-a-year economy is seen growing at an annual pace of 0.6% in 2012, down from a previous 1.1% forecast.

The Greek government also has cut economic forecasts several times since Greece received the €110 billion bailout last year. But official forecasters have stuck by their central assumption that the economy would return to growth—albeit modest—next year.

Now, doubts are creeping into official circles as well. At least one senior Greek government official privately admitted the government could revise its the growth forecast in the fall—when it will draw up next year's budget—to show a recession of as much as 2% next year.

Even that may be too optimistic. Giada Giani, Europe economist at Citigroup, said Greece can't escape "the impact of fiscal consolidation on domestic demand as well as tight financing conditions for the private sector." She said she anticipates that Greece's economy will shrink 2.7% next year.

—Costas Paris in London contributed to this article.

Write to Alkman Granitsas at alkman.granitsas@dowjones.com

austerity measures, public discontent, political commentator, economic woes, international monetary fund, growth prospects, mathematical certainty, zone members, social welfare, reduction goals, greek government, budget deficit, debt crisis, debt ratio, economic changes, euro zone, bailout, economic forecasts, deficit reduction, global growth

Online.wsj.com

Tern

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Tern

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17 Ağustos 2011 Çarşamba

rip-off Roman

photo

rip-off Roman

The main hall is a really beautiful space. Inaugural Balls are held there. Except that weekend a craft fair was held there, so we couldn't go out into it.

I think this was taken from the second story. Way upstairs at the top floor there's a pretty narrow balcony where you can look out at the whole space.

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Summer '11

photo

Summer '11

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16 Ağustos 2011 Salı

St Ives,Cornwall

photo

St Ives,Cornwall

© 2011 Mike Watson                                                 View with Flickeflu
No Usage Allowed in Any Form Without the Written Consent of Mike Watson.

             No Icons or flashy graphics please

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© Mike Watson

st ives cornwall, mike watson, nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp nbsp, flashy graphics, boats

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15 Ağustos 2011 Pazartesi

Enclavamiento

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Enclavamiento

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place des Terreaux

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14 Ağustos 2011 Pazar

Leaving Dubrovnik

photo

Leaving Dubrovnik

Dubrovnik is a stunning city - I would urge anyone visiting Venice to take a few days extra and visit Dubrovnik

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visiting venice, stunning city, few days

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13 Ağustos 2011 Cumartesi

Local market parking

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local market parking

Parking sign for the South Tacoma Farmer's Market

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The USS Wisconsin

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The USS Wisconsin

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12 Ağustos 2011 Cuma

The Fountain

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The Fountain

English Park, Palermo, Sicily

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11 Ağustos 2011 Perşembe

Furled

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Stocks Dive Again on Europe, Economy Fears

Stock prices tumbled Wednesday, led downward by some of the world's biggest banks. But bond investors offered a potentially more ominous assessment of prospects for the global economy, pouring money into the safety of U.S. Treasury bonds despite yields that are near their lowest levels in history.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 519.83 points, or 4.62% to 10719.94, more than wiping out the gains posted in Tuesday's sizable late-day rally. It was the Dow's fourth triple-digit move in five days and brings its declines since its April peak to more than 16%. The index is less than 500 points away from officially being in a bear market, defined as a decline of 20%.

Asian shares Thursday morning moved lower. Japan's Nikkei Stock Average fell 1.6%; Australia's S&P/ASX 200 lost 1.4%; South Korea's Kospi Composite dropped 1.8% after slumping over 4% at the opening; and New Zealand's NZX-50 was 0.1% lower.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged to an 11-month low as investors were squeezed between fears of further contagion among European banks and the Federal Reserve's gloomy economic outlook. Paul Vigna has details.

In Europe, rumors swirled about the health of French banks and the possibility that France could lose its AAA credit rating as the country's borrowing costs rise. The main indexes for stock markets in France, Germany, Spain and Italy each shed more than 5% of their value.

The market gyrations and clear worries about the health of the U.S. and European economies sparked a volley of phone calls between senior administration officials, including President Barack Obama and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, and European leaders. Mr. Geithner and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke also met with President Obama Wednesday, but no new steps were announced to address the market volatility.

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York has been calling banks with increased frequency amid the recent market tumult to ask them about the volatility in their stock prices, as part of their ongoing effort to monitor the situation, according to people familiar with the conversations.

In the Treasury market, bond buyers' bleak economic appraisals were evident in the day's auction of U.S. Treasury 10-year notes: Investors eagerly lent money to the U.S. government at an interest rate of 2.14%, a record low yield for a sale of 10-year notes. The sale suggests investors expect weak economic growth and below average inflation for the better part of the next decade.

View Full Image

MARKETS

MARKETS

MARKETS

"It tells you that the economy is expected to be weak for a pretty long period and that any rebound we get is probably not going to be very vigorous," said Michael Feroli, chief U.S. economist for J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., of the low-interest-rate environment.

Worries like these have been magnified by the Federal Reserve, which on Tuesday signaled its concerns about slow economic and job-market growth. While stock investors on Tuesday sent prices higher after taking heart in the Fed's comments—specifically that the central bank would use other tools at its disposal to help juice financial markets—investors have since concluded that the Fed's help still might not be enough.

The U.S. economy barely grew in the first half of the year, and now the European economy is under growing strain from its own debt crisis.

LIVE BLOG: Market Tumult

Follow live coverage, as the world reacts to the U.S.'s downgraded credit rating.

These factors, combined with stock-market chaos, are widening concerns of renewed recessions by depressing business and consumer confidence. Those concerns, in turn, have fed the exodus from stocks and bonds of European countries.

"It's a question of whether you start to have a negative feedback loop," said Laurent Fransolet, head of European fixed-income strategy research at Barclays Capital, where selling pressure begins "feeding on itself."

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MARKETSjmp

MARKETSjmp

MARKETSjmp

The concerns have led to strong demand for Treasurys, despite the downgrade by Standard & Poor's of the U.S. long-term credit rating last Friday. The trend of falling Treasury yields gained steam following the Fed's announcement Tuesday that it would keep interest rates "exceptionally low" though the middle of 2013. Yields on 10-year Treasurys, which fall as prices rise, ended the day at 2.145%, near their lowest on record.

Wednesday's decline in stock prices, with its rumor-driven swings in bank stocks, was the latest in a remarkable string of wild moves in financial markets that harks back to the worst of the financial crisis in 2008.

It marked the fourth day in August that the Dow has closed more than 2% higher or lower. Only one of those sessions, Tuesday's, was a positive move. In contrast, there were only two days with moves of 2% or more in the first seven months of the year.

Stocks wiped out the previous day's gain, with the morning of Aug. 10 starting with sell-offs. The focus is also turning to Europe as questions emerge over France's credit rating. (Photo: AP Photo.)

Amid the turmoil on Wednesday, gold prices surged to yet another record, gaining 2.4% to $1,781.30 per ounce.

There were some winners. Several corporations and other borrowers jumped into the market to take advantage of the tumbling interest rates. Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. and Procter & Gamble Co. led $9.2 billion in corporate bond sales. Mexico and the University of Southern California both sold bonds that mature in 100 years—an unusual but not unheard-of term—guaranteeing themselves a century of low rates.

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In Europe, the stock selloff focused initially on French banks with heavy holdings of troubled European government debt. At one point, shares of France's second-largest bank, Société Générale SA, were down more than 20% before ending 15% lower on the day.

But by late afternoon, the fears had engulfed most major European banks. At least 11 saw their shares fall 8% or more, a grim sign considering that their stocks generally trade in relatively narrow bands during normal times. Outside France, the day's big losers included giant lenders in Italy, Spain and Germany. Credit Agricole fell 12% and BNP Paribas SA declined 9%.

One particular concern that has bubbled up in recent weeks is that it is getting harder for some banks to secure the funds that they need to run on a day-to-day basis.

Many analysts and other experts agree that the worries about European banks facing short-term liquidity problems are overblown. While it has become more expensive, and in some cases impossible, for some banks to obtain funding from investors or rival banks, lenders from euro-zone countries have a fallback option: the European Central Bank. Banks can tap essentially unlimited loans from the Frankfurt-based ECB, which accepts euro-zone government bonds as collateral.

The European banking worries helped propel U.S. stock prices downward. Bank of America Corp., Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Citigroup Inc. all fell more than 10%.

U.S. financial stocks have also been hit hard by concerns about their mortgage exposure with the economy weakening and legal challenges piling up, many dating back to practices during the real-estate bubble. The stock price of Bank of America, the biggest U.S. bank in terms of assets, has dropped 17% since American International Group Inc. sued it Monday morning, seeking $10 billion in damages on its purchase of poor-performing mortgage bonds.

—Sudeep Reddy, Serena Ng and Damian Paletta contributed to this article.

More Markets Coverage

World Markets: Asia | Europe

Earlier: Fed Boosts Stocks | Rally Masks Fears

Call to Downsize Giants of Ratings
Online.wsj.com

10 Ağustos 2011 Çarşamba

Sailing Away

photo

Sailing Away

MV Balmoral flying the Scottish flag as she sails away from Penarth after an afternoon's cruising... Flat Holm Island with its lighthouse is in the distance.

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Wales

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boat

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flat holm island, scottish flag, penarth, balmoral, sails, lighthouse

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Ada Hayden Park

photo

ada Hayden Park

Ada Hayden Heritage Park, Ames
8/7/2011

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Ada Hayden Park

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bike trail

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9 Ağustos 2011 Salı

8 Ağustos 2011 Pazartesi

<HDR> Sydney Harbour Bridge

lt="photo" width="640" height="450">

<HDR> Sydney Harbour Bridge

Sydney Harbour Bridge

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Nikon D100

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WP16-HoheSonne_52.RallyeWartburg_066

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WP16-HoheSonne_52.RallyeWartburg_066

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Hohe

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07.08.2011

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I guess you had to be there.

photo

I guess you had to be there.

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artsy

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7 Ağustos 2011 Pazar

Marina

photo

Marina

Oceania Cruises' 66,000 GRT cruise liner MS MARINA anchored off fowey on 28th July 2011.

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Dhoni

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Dhoni

Another version of the abandoned Dhoni in Kuda bandos. I guess this Dhoni is not there anymore, don't remember seeing this last time I went there.

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6 Ağustos 2011 Cumartesi

Ride 3 N 11 Scotts Valley Kawasaki Exit Second Hairpin

photo

Ride 3 N 11 Scotts Valley kawasaki Exit Second Hairpin

A Scotts Valley officer rides on a Kawasaki.

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Mavericks With Medals

[Olymp] Associated Press

Shaun White

When Johnny Spillane won the first-ever U.S. medal in the Nordic Combined on the third day of the Winter Olympics, his victory was touted as the payoff for old-school Olympic team building: a patient grass-roots effort to establish an American presence in an obscure winter sport. But since that early surprise, most of the biggest names of the Winter Games have been members of Team USA in name only, mavericks notable for training on their own, often in unconventional ways.

In 2007, for example, Bode Miller, who won his first Olympic gold in the men's combined earlier this week, took the unprecedented step of quitting the U.S. Ski Team to form his own Team America, which consisted of a mobile home and his personal entourage, before returning to the U.S. Ski Team this season. Lindsey Vonn, who won the women's downhill, has also worked outside the U.S. Ski Team infrastructure, being coached by her husband, Thomas Vonn, a former U.S. Ski Team racer. The Games' biggest star, Shaun White, the two-time defending gold medalist in the halfpipe, developed and perfected his signature tricks—the Double Cork and Double McTwist 1260—at a secret halfpipe built by sponsor Red Bull in Silverton, Colo.

Speed skater Shani Davis, who won gold in the 1,000 meters and silver in the 1,500 meters, operates even further outside the mainstream. An African-American from the South Side of Chicago, Mr. Davis opted out of the U.S. Speed skating's "athlete's agreement" that would have provided him a modest stipend; he chose, instead, to look for his own sponsors. He's conspicuously absent from the team's promotional materials, and team officials are notably mum on the subject of their biggest star. Short-track star Apolo Ohno hasn't always seen eye-to-eye with the powers that be in his sport. And, of course, figure skating is the ultimate individual endeavor, with skaters like 15-year-old Allison Reed of the Republic of Georgia, by way of Warren, N.J., going so far as to change citizenship in order to compete.

Contrast this rather rough-and-ready approach to athlete development with Canada's methodical, government-sponsored Olympic performance program. At a cost of 112 million Canadian dollars ($105.6 million), "Own the Podium" has produced only 17 medals as of early Friday, well behind the pace of Torino four years ago, when the Canadians captured 24. The U.S. sat atop the medal standings with 32.

This may seem, at first, like a convincing argument for fully privatizing the development of Olympic athletes. The reality is more complex than that. America's Olympians are funded at relatively low levels compared with their international rivals—the U.S. Olympic Committee doled out $58.2 million over four years to national governing bodies of individual sports, roughly half of what Canada's spending. For every Shaun White, there's a Shannon Bahrke, the pink-haired, bronze-medal mogul skier, who started her own coffee line to support her training and that of her teammates. Or the American speedskaters, who turned to comedian Stephen Colbert to raise $300,000 for the team after its major sponsor, DSB Bank, went bankrupt. The bottom line is simple: We won't put a dent in the national deficit with the money we're now spending on our Olympic athletes.

Relying solely on companies like Red Bull won't do it either. Sponsors are looking for an immediate return on their investment and to throw money at sure things. Messrs. Davis, Ohno and White secured big endorsement deals because, as defending gold medalists, they were sure to attract media attention, win or lose.

As Canada has learned the hard way, producing Olympic medalists is a long-term proposition. A lack of funding might distract a mature athlete from giving his best performance, but throwing money at a modestly talented competitor won't put him on the podium.

The first part of the road to future Olympic gold is under way right now. This week, every 10-year-old in the U.S. wants to be Shaun White or Lindsey Vonn or even Bill Demong, who won a gold in large-hill Nordic Combined. The first job of the U.S. Olympic Committee and the governing bodies of the individual sports is to provide the resources so as many of these kids as possible can to try out these sports in the hopes that one in a million will turn out to be the next Bode Miller.

Then comes the hard part, that long slog between gifted youngster and grizzled medal contender. The USOC must recognize that its goal isn't to churn out merely competent athletes by the dozens, but to identify and nurture a few full-blown geniuses. And geniuses often march to the beat of their own drums. Early in his career, for example, Mr. Miller was the first to use shaped skis, while his coaches dismissed them as a gimmick for recreational skiers. And Ms. Vonn, at the urging of her husband, defied conventional wisdom and became the first woman to race—and win—on stiffer, longer men's skis.

For all their talent and charisma, the heroes of Vancouver are also rugged individualists who reinvented their sports, sometimes clashing with coaches who didn't see things their way. It's not hard to envision an alternate reality in which many of them got fed up with bucking the system and ended up in front of the television, watching less talented but more compliant former teammates finish a respectable 12th.

An American version of "Own the Podium" might look like a cross between a school voucher program and venture-capital funding. The USOC and the individual sports federations should offer seed money to the most promising young athletes, and then have the foresight to step back and allow them maximum freedom to think—and train—outside the box. If there's a lesson to be learned from this magical Olympiad, it's that the only thing more important than discovering prodigious talent may be having the good sense to stay out of its way.

—Mr. St. John wrote the By the Numbers column for The Wall Street Journal and is a frequent contributor to SKI magazine.

apolo ohno, shani davis, grass roots effort, thomas vonn, old allison, johnny spillane, gold medalist, american presence, winter olympics, mctwist, speed skater, unconventional ways, husband thomas, ski team, bode miller, republic of georgia, halfpipe, unprecedented step, speed skating, track star

Online.wsj.com

5 Ağustos 2011 Cuma

481_RoyalHistoricalSocietyofVictoria-FormerAustralianArmyMedicalCorpsHeadquarters_Interior_1

photo

481_RoyalHistoricalSocietyofVictoria-FormerAustr alianArmyMedicalCorpsHeadquarters_Interior_1

Melbourne Open House 2011
From the former Officers' Mess room this stairwell leads down to William Street. Built-in seats are a feature of this building.
The Australian Army Medical Corps headquarters was built in 1938 by J. Whitelaw, Richmond, at a cost of 25,947 pounds. The western end of the building became the premises of the Royal Historical Society of Victoria in August 1999.

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Art Deco

MOH

Melbourne Open House 2011

Melbourne

Victoria

City

army medical corps, royal historical society of victoria, australian army, mess room, corps headquarters, officers mess, whitelaw, stairwell, august 1999, open house, premises, richmond

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