| Jury-rigged, jerry-built: Maybe a problem?
The word had popped up the week before in The New York Times Magazine article, "The Sleep-Industrial Complex," all about the mattress and pharmaceutical industries. The piece included a reference to a man who was such an enthusiast for Sleep Number Beds that he "jury-rigged something similar for his bulldog." On the subject of exactly how the dog expressed its preference for a particular Sleep Number, the author was silent. Jury-rigging is a term with nautical origins. "Rig" is one of those little words so short that it contains nearly infinite meanings (an early form of nanotechnology). One of its meanings is "the arrangement of masts, sails, etc., on a vessel." In the days of the tall ships, when a vessel on the high seas lost a mast in a storm or a battle, the ship's carpenter would fashion what was known as a jury mast from spare parts down in the hold.
drugstore.com Offers One-Site Shopping With Expanded Selection for the ...
BELLEVUE, Wash., Dec. 6 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- drugstore.com, inc., (NASDAQ: DSCM) a leading online provider of health, beauty, vision, and pharmacy products has expanded its already wide selection to give customers a one-site shopping advantage for the holidays. Customers may choose from thousands of toys and games, gifts, seasonal items such as an organic holiday wreath or a fresh cut Christmas tree, complete gourmet holiday meal, and the latest in power toothbrushes, electric razors, natural gifts, prestige beauty products, fragrances and much more on http://www.drugstore.com. "This is the widest and most complete holiday selection we've ever offered our customers and the first time we've offered fresh and perishable items for the holidays," said Dawn Lepore, Chairman and CEO of drugstore.com.
Starting pitcher rankings: Gallardo rates top 25
He'll still experience some hiccups along the way, but the sky is the limit for this young hurler. 24. Brett Myers, Philadelphia Phillies Myers earned the role of opening day starter for the Phillies before shifting to the closer's role for the balance of the year. Myers excelled in the role, but the addition of Brad Lidge allows him to return to the rotation. He had produced four consecutive double-digit win seasons and came into his own as a starter with sub-4.00 ERAs in 2005 and 2006. The Phillies clearly offer tremendous offensive support, so a return to double-digit wins is a veritable lock. Myers's ascent to a dominant strikeout artist in 2005 is what is most intriguing to fantasy owners as he returns to the rotation. The ability to reach back and post a strikeout is the ERA column's best friend.
We are lucky
Such was the case with the Jan. 6 cover of Parade Magazine, a weekly supplement inserted in many newspapers. Is Benazir Bhutto America's best hope against al-Qaeda? That was the headline-question in The Paper (magazine) across the country. "I am what the terrorits most fear," she was quoted as saying. On Dec. 27, Bhutto was killed. Following are the first two paragraphs, in tribute, from The New York Times obituary. Benazir Bhutto, the daughter of a prime minister of Pakistan who held that post twice herself, died on Dec. 27, 2007 in a suicide attack on a political rally as she campaigned to hold that post a third time. Ms. Bhutto, who was 54 at the time of her death, was a member of one of Pakistan's most prominent families, albeit one touched by tragedy.
Rising seas: Updates and archive
They will swamp the locations of big city airports and major interstate highways.Storm surges worsened by sea level rise will flood the waterfront getaways of rich politicians: the Bushes' Kennebunkport and John Edwards' place on the Outer Banks. And gone will be many of the beaches in Texas and Florida favored by budget-conscious students on Spring Break.That's the troubling outlook projected by coastal maps reviewed by The Associated Press. The maps, created by scientists at the University of Arizona, are based on data from the U.S. Geological Survey.Few of the more than two dozen climate experts interviewed disagree with the one-meter projection. Some believe it could happen in 50 years, others say 100, and still others say 150.Sea level rise is "the thing that I'm most concerned about as a scientist," says Benjamin Santer, a climate physicist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California."We're going to get a meter and there's nothing we can do about it," said University of Victoria climatologist Andrew Weaver, a lead author of the February report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in Paris.
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