The Chairman Dances

The Chairman Dances is a 1985 composition by John Adams. Subtitled 'Foxtrot for Orchestra,' the piece lasts about 13 minutes. The piece was composed on commission from the Milwaukee Symphony, and is described by Adams as an "out take" from Act III of the opera he was working on at the time, Nixon in China.

Although the piece incorporates several dance-like tunes, the word "dances" in the title is a verb rather than a noun. It is meant to depict Madame Mao gatecrashing a presidential banquet, hanging paper lanterns, and performing a seductive dance. The Chairman Mao descends from his portrait, and the two dance a foxtrot, back in time together. The piece ends with the sound of a gramophone winding down. Musical references of this piece can still be found in the third act of Nixon in China.

The work has been recorded by the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra (conducted by Edo de Waart) and by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (conducted by Simon Rattle).

The work was also used by the Santa Clara Vanguard Drum and Bugle Corps as the opener for their 2008 production, "3hree: Mind, Body and Soul". Vanguard finished 7th at the Drum Corps International World Championships.

The Chairman Dances appears in the Modern Era soundtrack of Civilization IV, along with several other pieces by Adams.

Antler

Antlers are the usually large, branching bony appendages on the heads of most deer species.

Antlers are unique to cervids and found mostly on males: only caribou and reindeer have antlers on the females, and these are normally smaller than those of the males. Nevertheless, fertile does from other species of deer have the capacity to produce antlers on occasion, usually due to increased testosterone levels.

Each antler grows from an attachment point on the skull called a pedicle. While an antler is growing, it is covered with highly vascular skin called velvet, which supplies oxygen and nutrients to the growing bone. Antlers are considered one of the most exaggerated cases of male secondary sexual traits in the animal kingdom, and grow faster than any other mammal bones. Growth occurs at the tip, and is initially cartilage, which is mineralized to become bone. Once the antler has achieved its full size, the velvet is lost and the antler's bone dies. This dead bone structure is the mature antler. In most cases, the bone at the base is destroyed by osteoclasts and the antlers fall off at some point. As a result of their fast growth rate, antlers are considered a handicap since there is an incredible nutritional demand on deer to re-grow antlers annually, and thus can be honest signals of metabolic efficiency and food gathering capability.

In most arctic and temperate-zone species, antler growth and shedding is seasonal and controlled by the length of daylight. In tropical species, antlers may be shed at any time of year, and in some species such as the sambar, antlers last several years. Some equatorial deer never shed their antlers.

The ancestors of deer had tusks (long upper canine teeth). Antlers appear to replace tusks; two modern species, the musk deer and the water deer, have tusks and no antlers, the muntjac has small tusks and small antlers, and other deer have full-sized antlers and no tusks.^[2] Literature concerning the evolution of antlers concludes that the diversification of antlers, body size and tusk-like upper canines have been strongly influenced by changes in habitat and behavior (fighting and mating).

Caribou and reindeer use their antlers to clear away snow so they can eat the vegetation underneath. This is probably why females of this species evolved antlers. Females may have evolved antlers due to intraspecific female competition during winter foraging.

In moose, antlers appear to act as large hearing aids. Moose with antlers have far more sensitive hearing than moose without, and a study of trophy antlers with an artificial ear confirmed that the antler behaves like a parabolic reflector.

Antlers function as weapons in combats between males, which sometimes cause serious wounds, and as dominance and sexual displays.

Malt

Malting is a process applied to cereal grains, in which the grains are made to germinate by soaking in water and are then quickly halted from germinating further by drying/heating with hot air. Thus, malting is a combination of two processes: the sprouting process and the kiln-drying process. These latter terms are often preferred when referring to the field of brewing for batches of beer or other beverages as they provide more specific information.

The term "malt" refers to several products of the process: (1) the grains to which this process has been applied, for example malted barley; (2) the sugar, heavy in maltose, derived from such grains, such as the baker's malt used in various cereals; or (3) a product based on malted milk, similar to a malted milkshake (i.e., "malts").

Whisky or beer made from malted barley or rye can also be called malt, as in Alfred Edward Housman's aphorism "malt does more than Milton can, to justify God's ways to Man."

Barley is the most commonly malted grain in part because of its high diastatic power or enzyme content. Also very important is the retention of the grain's husk even after threshing, unlike the bare seeds of threshed wheat or rye. This protects the growing acrospire (developing plant embryo) from damage during malting, which can easily lead to mold growth. It also allows the mash of converted grain to create a filter bed during lautering (see brewing). Other grains may be malted, especially wheat.

Malt is often divided into two categories by brewers: base malts and specialty malts. Base malts have enough diastatic power to convert their own starch and usually that of some amount of starch from unmalted grain, called adjuncts. Specialty malts have little diastatic power; they are used to provide flavor, color, or "body" (viscosity) to the finished beer. Caramel or crystal malts are specialty malts that have been subjected to heat treatment that converts their starches to sugars non-enzymatically. Within these categories are a variety of types distinguished largely by the kilning temperature (see mash ingredients).

A new encapsulating technology permits the production of malt granules. Malt granules are the dried liquid extract from malt used in the brewing or distilling process.

Rulers.org

Rulers.org is a website which contains information about political leaders of all countries from about 1700 to the present. The website was founded in 1995 and was located at a Geocities address before it moved to the rulers.org location in 2001. The website is always being expanded and updated. At this time all countries have heads of state, heads of government and foreign ministers, and many countries have information about other ministries and regional divisions; also included are leaders of international organizations.

Perhaps the website owner's most ambitious project began in late 2001, when an index to the website, with biographies of political leaders, began being added. By the end of 2007 it included some 3,000 biographies and another 10,000 short entries. Another important feature of the website is the chronicle of relevant political events, beginning January 1996, which is still updated almost daily. This chronicle, sorted by month, indicates election results, as well as resignations, cabinet changes, and deaths of current or former top leaders.

The website is used by many other websites on the Internet for information about political leaders. Benjamin Schemmel of Heidelberg, Germany, is the owner and editor of the site.

Ampullae of Lorenzini

The ampullae of Lorenzini are special sensing organs called electroreceptors, forming a network of jelly-filled canals.
They were first described by Stefano Lorenzini in 1678. They are mostly discussed as being found in cartilaginous fishes (sharks, rays, and chimaeras); however, they are also reported to be found in Chondrostei such as Reedfish and sturgeon. Lungfish have also been reported to have them. Teleosts have re-evolved a different type of electroreceptors.

These sensory organs help fish to sense electric fields in the water. Each ampulla consists of a jelly-filled canal opening to the surface by a pore in the skin and ending blindly in a cluster of small pockets full of special jelly. The ampullae are mostly clustered into groups inside the body, each cluster having ampullae connecting with different parts of the skin, but preserving a left-right symmetry. The canal lengths vary from animal to animal, but the distribution of the pores is generally specific to each species. The ampullae pores are plainly visible as dark spots in the skin. They provide fish with a sixth sense capable of detecting electromagnetic fields as well as temperature gradients.

The ampullae detect electric fields in the water, or more precisely the difference between the voltage at the skin pore and the voltage at the base of the electroreceptor cells. A positive pore stimulus would decrease the rate of nerve activity coming from the electroreceptor cells, and a negative pore stimulus would increase the rate of nerve activity coming from the electroreceptor cells.

Sharks may be more sensitive to electric fields than any other animal, with a threshold of sensitivity as low as 5 nV/cm. That is 5/1,000,000,000 of a volt measured in a centimeter-long ampulla. Since all living creatures produce an electrical field by muscle contractions, it is easy to imagine that a shark may pick up weak electrical stimuli from the muscle contractions of animals, particularly prey. On the other hand, the electrochemical fields generated by paralyzed prey were sufficient to elicit a feeding attack from sharks and rays in experimental tanks; therefore muscle contractions are not necessary to attract the animals. Sharks and rays can locate prey buried in the sand, or DC electric dipoles simulating the main feature of the electric field of a prey buried in the sand.

The electric fields produced by oceanic currents moving in the magnetic field of the earth are of the same order of magnitude as the electric fields that sharks and rays are capable of sensing. This could mean that sharks and rays can orient to the electric fields of oceanic currents, and use other sources of electric fields in the ocean for local orientation. Additionally, the electric field they induce in their bodies when swimming in the magnetic field of the earth may enable them to sense their magnetic heading.

At least one company sells a shark repellent that makes use of shark electroreceptors. It uses large magnets formed into an ankle bracelet and it is reported that field tests show sharks moving away when coming near them.

The Adventures of Pete & Pete

The Adventures of Pete & Pete is an American children's television series produced by Wellsville Pictures and broadcast by Nickelodeon. The show featured humorous and surreal elements in its narrative, and many recurring themes centered on two brothers both named Pete Wrigley, and their various interactions with family, friends, and enemies.

The show was created by Will McRobb and Chris Viscardi and began as minute-long shorts in 1989 that aired in between regular programs. Owing to the popularity of the shorts, five half-hour specials were made, followed by a regular half-hour series that ran for three seasons (1993–1996) and continued in reruns until around 1999. The N (now TeeNick) aired reruns of the show between 2002–2003. The first two seasons were released on DVD in 2005 and the third was planned for 2006 but was indefinitely postponed.

Pete & Pete is set in the fictional town of Wellsville; like The Simpsons' Springfield, its state is never revealed, even though there is both a town and a village of Wellsville in Allegany County, New York, as well as others in Colorado, Connecticut, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and Utah. In addition, Glurt County, mentioned in the episodes "Yellow Fever" and "The Good, the Bad and the Lucky," does not exist. The show was filmed largely in Cranford, New Jersey with location shots done in a variety of other spots around northern New Jersey. The exteriors of Pete & Pete's house (as seen in the credit sequence and other shots) were filmed on Woodridge Place in Leonia, New Jersey. The football field used for various episodes is actually Bayonne High School in Bayonne, New Jersey.

Bespoke

Bespoke is a British English term employed in a variety of applications to mean an item custom-made to the buyer's specification. While applied to many items now, from computer software to luxury car appointments, the term historically was applied only to tailored clothing, shirts and other parts of men's apparel involving measurement and fitting.

The distinguishing points of bespoke tailoring are the buyer's total control over the fabric used, the features and fit, and the way the garment should be made. More generally, bespoke describes a high degree of customization, and involvement of the end-user, in the production of the good.

The word bespoke itself is derived from the verb to bespeak, to "speak for something", in the specialized meaning "to give order for it to be made". The term bespoke in fashion is reserved for individually patterned and crafted men's clothing, analogous to women's haute couture, in contrast with mass manufactured ready-to-wear (also called off-the-peg or off-the-rack). While widespread in the United Kingdom, the term is rarely employed in the United States, although it may be used by some in the high-end tailoring business.

Bespoke clothing is traditionally cut from a pattern drafted from scratch for the customer, and so differs from ready-to-wear, which is factory made in finished condition and standardized sizes, and from made-to-measure, produced to order from an adjusted block pattern. This opposition of terms did not initially imply that a bespoke garment was necessarily well built, but since the development of ready-to-wear in the beginning of the twentieth century, bespoke clothing is now more expensive and is generally accompanied by a high quality of construction.

While the distinction conferred by haute couture is protected by law in France, the British Advertising Standards Authority has ruled it is a fair practice to use the term bespoke for products which do not fully incorporate traditional construction methods. This position is opposed by the Savile Row Bespoke Association, a trade group of traditional tailors.

The Savile Row Bespoke Association is a group of Savile Row tailors that has attempted to set a standard by providing minimum requirements for a garment to be allowed to use its trademark.

These standards particularly stress:

• hand work used almost entirely on all garments, including the "individual cut of a paper pattern";
• personal service, such as qualified advice, a large selection of fabrics, or the keeping of all records for future orders;
• involvement by participating houses in an approved training scheme.

The association has also specified twenty-one points addressing specific parts of a suit, each dictating some detail such as the length of inlays, or which seams must be hand stitched. Yet the association has not successfully established bespoke as a protected label, comparable to haute couture.

Jābir ibn Hayyān

Abu Musa Jābir ibn Hayyān (born c. 721 in Tus–died c. 815 in Kufa) was a prominent polymath: a chemist and alchemist, astronomer and astrologer, engineer, geologist, philosopher, physicist, and pharmacist and physician. He is considered by some to be the "father of chemistry."

While mentioned as being of Persian ethnicity, other sources, without providing independent documentation, state that he was an Arab; "Muslim" and "Arab" are erroneously used interchangeably by some such sources. Jābir is held to be the first practical alchemist.

As early as the tenth century, the identity and exact corpus of works of Jābir was in dispute in Islamic circles. His name was Latinised as "Geber" in the Christian West and in 13th century Europe an anonymous writer produced a non-trivial body of alchemical and metallurgical writings under the pen-name Geber. This person is usually referred to as Pseudo-Geber.

Jabir was a Natural Philosopher who lived mostly in the 8th century, he was born in Tus (Iran), Khorasan, in Iran (Persia), then ruled by the Umayyad Caliphate. In some sources, he is reported to have been the son of Hayyan al-Azdi, a pharmacist of the Arabian Azd tribe who emigrated from Yemen to Kufa (in present-day Iraq) during the Umayyad Caliphate. Jābir became an alchemist at the court of Caliph Harun al-Rashid, for whom he wrote the Kitab al-Zuhra ("The Book of Venus", on "the noble art of alchemy"). Hayyan had supported the Abbasid revolt against the Umayyads, and was sent by them to the province of Khorasan (present days Afghanistan, Iran, and part of North western Pakistan) to gather support for their cause. He was eventually caught by the Ummayads and executed. His family fled to Yemen, where Jābir grew up and studied the Quran, mathematics and other subjects. Jābir's father's profession may have contributed greatly to his interest in alchemy.

After the Abbasids took power, Jābir went back to Kufa. He began his career practicing medicine, under the patronage of a Vizir (from the noble Persian family Barmakids) of Caliph Harun al-Rashid.

Jābir may have been a student of the celebrated Islamic teacher and sixth Imam Ja'far al-Sadiq and Harbi al-Himyari. His connections to the Barmakid cost him dearly in the end. When that family fell from grace in 803, Jābir was placed under house arrest in Kufa, where he remained until his death.

The crater Geber on the Moon is named after him.

Campari

Campari is an alcoholic apéritif obtained from the infusion of herbs and fruit (including chinotto) in alcohol and water. It is a bitters characterized by its dark red color.

Campari is often used in cocktails and is commonly served with soda water, wine, or citrus juice. It is produced by the Campari Group, a multi-national company based in Italy.

The history of Campari began in 1860 with its invention by Gaspare Campari in Novara, Italy. The original recipe still in use today is kept confidential. According to Gruppo Campari, only one person in the world knows the entire formula. It was originally colored with carmine dye, derived from crushed cochineal insects, which gave the drink its distinctive red color.

In 1904, Campari's first production plant was opened in Sesto San Giovanni, near Milan, Italy. The company required bars that bought Campari to display the Campari Bitters sign. Under the direction of Davide Campari, Gaspare's son, the company began to export the beverage, first to Nice in the heart of the French Riviera, then overseas. The Campari brand is now distributed in over 190 countries.

In the Italian market, Campari mixed with soda water is sold in individual bottles as Campari Soda (10% alcohol by volume). Campari Soda is packaged in a distinctive bottle that was designed by Fortunato Depero in 1932. Campari is said to have been the inspiration for other bitter sweet drinks such as Kinnie, produced in Malta since 1952.

Campari is an essential ingredient in the classic Negroni cocktail, the Garibaldi cocktail, and in the Americano, which was named at a time when few Americans were aware of Campari. Campari also can be used to make a sorbet.

All Mod Cons

All Mod Cons is a 1978 album by the British punk rock/mod revival band The Jam, their third full-length LP. The title, a British idiom one might find in housing advertisements, is short for "all modern conveniences" and is a pun on the band's association with the mod revival.
The album was more commercially successful than The Jam's previous album, This Is the Modern World. The single "Down in the Tube Station at Midnight" was one of the band's most successful chart hits up to that point, peaking at #15 on the UK charts. In 2000, Q magazine placed All Mod Cons at number 50 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever.
British Invasion pop influences run through the album, most obviously in the cover of The Kinks' "David Watts". The song "Down in the Tube Station at Midnight" is a first-person narrative of a young man who walks into a tube station on the way home to his wife, and is beaten by far right thugs. The lyrics of the song "All Mod Cons" criticise fickle people who attach themselves to people who enjoy success and leave them once that is over. Neither the title nor lyrics of the song "English Rose" were printed on the original vinyl release of All Mod Cons due to Weller's feeling that the song's lyrics were too personal. The song English Rose later inspired the name of The Stone Roses.
Paul Weller admitted to a lack of interest during the writing/recording process, and had to completely re-record a new set of songs for the album after producer Chris Parry rejected the first batch as being sub-standard.
The album was released in the US in 1979, with the song "The Butterfly Collector" replacing "Billy Hunt".