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Italian marble statues – the phrase brings up any number of images, from ancient examples like Augustus Caesar to the achievements of the Renaissance. Given that these kinds of works are priceless, even with all the money in the world they could not be bought, assuming they were offered for sale in the first place.

But replicas of such marble sculpture are available for every person to appreciate, with a degree of faithfulness that’s belied by their affordability. Museum-quality replicas of such masterpieces are a fantastic way to enjoy art in your own home or office.

Greek vases, Italian statues, Flemish canvases – any variety of reproductions could be bought to adequately appoint any setting, lending an elegance or austerity to your interiors or exteriors.

Of course, not everyone who purchases replicas is interested in such high-minded matters. Actually, one of the largest class of clients for such fare is the entertainment industry. Stage or screen, production assistants are regular shoppers of highly accurate props, though interestingly enough there exists some controversy as to how much verisimilitude is really necessary.

Many directors insist on painstaking accuracy, not only in historical terms and not even also in technical terms but right down to every ding, scratch, or other such detail. Most take a more practical approach with an eye on the budget, where the role of the prop determines the amount of attention paid to its details.

That said, however, it ought to be noted that museum replicas frequently don’t merit such intense scrutiny simply due to the fact that they’re usually employed as a part of the background and no more than that. Accuracy is most likely not too great a concern in these instances, although in the 1980s Spielberg hit “The Goonies,” Michelangelo’s David had to be anatomically correct in order for a sight gag to work!

Catholic saints are people canonized by the Catholic Church, officially recognized for their piety as residents of Heaven. Nevertheless, in a technical sense, all who are in Heaven who had once been human on earth are, by definition, saints, individuals perfected in holiness; this is the view subscribed to by the Eastern Orthodox Church.

And while the list of Catholic saints can vary between almost a thousand and a half names to over ten thousand, depending on who’s doing the counting (inexplicably, there appears to be no comprehensive official list), it’s frequently understood in many quarters that many pious souls are obscure and outright lost to human history.

Therefore the term “Catholic saints” refers to those formally recorded and so honored while not making the claim that such a list are the only such people of piety and thus the only group in Heaven. Canonization is the process whereby an individual’s life and deeds is examined for evidence of such recognition by the Church.

It is lengthy and can take many years, and even entire centuries. Beatification is an official declaration that an individual is near sainthood. The final determination rests, however, on the provenance of two posthumous miracles of some importance.

In a certain sense, miracles are one of the most crucial aspects of a saint; the veneration of saints frequently rests on this point for numerous lay Catholics. Patron saints are those designated as being particularly associated with certain professions, causes, or qualities.

Saints are not considered to have power in their own right, but only that which has been granted by God. Yet the bodily remains and other relics of a saint is believed to be holy and might be used in certain ceremonies. Originally, saints were mostly martyrs, but over time other considerations became just as prominent.

The Sea Eagle 435ps PaddleSki inflatable catamaran-kayak. Yes, that’s a mouthful – and the boat is quite an eyeful, too! But the included boat seats, even in the “pro” and “ultimate” packages, leave much to be desired. They definitely look cool, all sleek and hi-tech in black, but they don’t offer much in the way of comfort, barely supporting a kayaker up!

Indeed, the boat seats included in the cheaper packages, which are standard inflatables, seem to be a great deal more comfy. Every thing else provided by Sea Eagle makes a great impression, nevertheless. To be fair, the black high-back seats are supposed to be much more performance oriented, and that means comfort was a deliberate second-place consideration. Being closer to the water offers far better stability and a lot more paddling power.

In the final analysis, it’s performance in the water that really matters, and in this regard the PaddleSki is very excellent. It tracks well and is quite fast, thanks to its length and catamaran-style pontoons, respectively. The pontoons keep most of the boat above the surface of the water, making for less drag.

Stability and speed. Sea Eagle’s PaddleSki offers both important characteristics in spades. It’s a very friendly craft only marred, perhaps, by the boat seats available for it. Otherwise, it’s a extremely sturdy animal, with fantastic handling suitable for fishing or camping trips along the river. By being an inflatable, the PaddleSki is easily stowed away. Unfortunately, it weights a whopping fifty or sixty pounds when packed, but seems very light, if a bit unwieldy, when fully inflated.

Accessories consist of such useful items as a side motor mount for electric or gasoline engines and a sliding seat and frame for rowing. Sailing is also possible thanks to Sea Eagle’s sailing rig. They all cost a lot of money, however – anywhere from a third to a full half of the price of the most inexpensive PaddleSki package available!

In most communities, water damage restoration isn’t considered a very pressing concern, seeing as most communities simply aren’t prone to flooding in a capacity that makes it terribly vital. Only after Hurricane Katrina and the flooding of New Orleans did water damage restoration become a concern for people, or at least an issue worth recognition, even to people outside New Orleans who reasonably considered the flooding of an entire city to be a bad thing. At that time mold was also familiar but due to their circumstances, mold removal didn’t come to mind. What few Americans realize is that the flooding of New Orleans was a relatively small devastation compared to flood scenarios experienced in other parts of the world.

While Hurricane Katrina was undoubtedly a national disaster of unbelievable proportions, whose flooding claiming at least 1,836 lives, it pales comparability to an event like the 1938 Yellow River flood in China, where the death toll is estimated to have been as high as a million people, with several million more turned refugees and forced to flee their homes and the areas affected by the flooding. The geographical effects of this flood alone lasted for nearly 10 years, the entire course of the Yellow river itself having been diverted and necessitated efforts of water damage restoration far beyond those demanded by New Orleans.

Unlike the flooding just after Hurricane Katrina, the 1938 flood was a man-made disaster. In 1938, China was already in the second year of war against the invading armies of Imperial Japan during the second Sino-Japanese war, and by that point Japan had taken control of nearly the entire northern portion of the country. In order to stop the Japanese advance and to stall their seizure of the major Chinese cities Wuhan and Xi’an, the Chinese made the drastic determination to open dikes along the Yellow river, flooding the river valley and annihilating infrastructure vital to the Japanese advance.

To be able to catch the Japanese by surprise, the Chinese made no effort to notify Chinese civilians living in areas that may be impacted by the flooding, and subsequently, hundreds of thousands were drowned in their sleep. More fatal than the actual flooding was the threat of waterborne diseases, such as Botulism, Cholera, Dysentery, Malaria, and Typhus, which likely claimed hundreds of thousands more lives than the waters themselves. The floods having submerged nearly 21,000 square miles of land demolished local crops ending in famine and starvation among the local population not yet afflicted by the other consequences of the flood.

In 1946 and 1947, after the end of the Second World War, the dikes were rebuilt in one of China’s largest efforts in water damage restoration, ultimately rebuilding the Yellow river to its pre-1938 course. To this day, the Chinese government still conceals most of the details regarding the disaster from the public.

Racing strategies for alleycat races can be very individualistic. An alleycat race is an informal bike race, likely made popular by bicycle messengers. Of course, informal racing has always existed, but the adjective “alleycat” is really a fairly recent addition; the first official use was by a 1989 Toronto race. Messengers participating in that and subsequent alleycats helped spread the name and idea far and wide.

As individual as the strategies are the rules involved, for one characteristic of an alleycat race is its extremely localized nature, with just about everything tailored to local conditions and practices. Team racing may be fairly rare, as the work of a bicycle messenger that these races reflect is solitary.

On the other hand, relay races are fun for the contestants precisely because it puts an interesting social twist on the otherwise singularly solitary nature of their work on the weekdays (alleycat races take place around major holidays so that messengers, who live paycheck-to-paycheck with little to no benefits, can be involved).

Alleycat races involve not only speed, but traffic handling skills and a rider’s intimate knowledge of local routes. As might be imagined, alleycat races heavily reflect the bicycle messenger subculture, not least of which is the fact that they are of questionable legality in most jurisdictions.

Originally spontaneous, their growth has meant increasing organization, which in turn means working with local authorities, such as obtaining all essential permits. But organization has also meant that alleycat races can be very creative and themed with social causes such as global warming and bicycle advocacy.

In keeping with its anti-establishment roots, numerous alleycat races resist formality, particularly in the form of acquiring permission. The right to free assembly is evoked to justify these primarily spontaneous races. Sadly, motorized vehicles occupy such a venerable place in American culture that authorities curtail such rights in favor of maintaining automobile convenience.

Green energy. You hear about it all the time these days. The U.S. needs it. China is getting ever more involved with it. Green energy. But what does it all mean? Our newspapers tell us that it’s the wave of the future, the only way forward. Yet nothing is happening in this country, where most green technologies have been invented, and it is China that seems poised to dominate this industry of the 21st Century.

So what makes for green energy, and why is it so important? The term is much more accurately referred to, technically speaking, as sustainable energy, energy that meets present needs without compromising the environment upon which future generations will also depend.

To be regarded as sustainable usually means to be renewable in such a way as wind, solar, and water-generated power is. Conventional fission power, or nuclear, power is technically a green form of energy though many environmentalists believe that its potential hazard far outweighs the advantages to be derived.

Moreover, disposable of spent nuclear fuel rods is a major challenge, with a high likelihood of leagage in most scenarios. Now how has China gotten into the issue? Well, it’s not just the world’s fastest-growing economy, but also its fastest-growing polluter, rivaling the United States.

It also happens to be the largest market for eco-friendly technologies and, as the “workshop of the world” also the single largest manufacturer of all the hardware involved. And so any conversation on anything eco-friendly must, in the end, focus on the role of China.

But what is China’s position in all of this? As it’s always been: driven by necessity. With the world’s largest population living only on a mere fraction of its arable land, the country is highly sensitive to all kinds of issues related to the environment, energy policy, and economic growth. Going green, China’s leaders recognize, is the best chance they’ve got to not only survive in the post-industrial world but also to prosper.

The recent PBS/POV documentary “Wo Ai Ni Mommy” concerns the adoption of a Chinese eight year-old by an American family. More specifically, it is a video chronicle of a slightly handicapped older child’s integration into the social milieu of a Long Island Jewish family. Most of the documentary may be rather uncomfortable to watch, in a creeply queasy way, the cringe-worthy kind reminiscent of family get-togethers, as audiences are treated to some potentially unflattering details which collectively seem to make the case for better pre-adoption screening beforehand.

It’s not recognized from the ninety minutes of screentime whether such matters were involved, as the filmmakers intent appears to be a simple record of what occurs in such cross-cultural/racial/national adoptions. However, even a psychological evaluation can only do so much, since it is difficult to guage the subtle aspects of human motivation, which also usually happen to be those bearing the most weight.

In the documentary “Wo Ai Ni Mommy,” one such subtlety concerns the very fact of a cross-cultural/racial/national adoption. While the Sadowskys, the American family featured by this film, were asked why they happened to pick a Chinese girl as compared to any number of kids in the United States, there was never actually an answer given.

It was just love at first sight, claims the mother, which begs the question of why she had happened to choose to view Chinese babies first. And even though one with an understanding of the wider context of the popularity of Chinese adoptions in turn-of-the-century America might point out that she had many friends who had also adopted girls from China, the ultimate question of just why China, of all places, remains unanswered.

A fine look into some of the nitty gritty details of older-child adoptions further complicated by language, cultural, as well as physical barriers as a result of mild disformity, “Wo Ai Ni Mommy” is heartwarming while wistful, raising a lot more questions than it intends to answer, in the process highlighting just how complex an adoption may be.

Taxes and all of those forms… Let’s face it, tax forms can usually be confusing. There are scores of questions most people ask when they get or need to send out tax forms. One of the more popular questions is, if you receive a W9 form request, just what should you do with it?

Well if you get a W9 request then according to the Internal Revenue Service you will need to answer it, so long as that person asking for it is responsible to give you a 1099 form (this is an information return). If they are not required to give you a 1099 form (information return), well that would be a completely different story.

So what will happen if you will not respond to the tax form W9 request?

If you don’t respond to the W9 tax form request you will be subject to a penalty of $50 and also future backup withholding. Backup withholding? you might possibly ask, well if decide not to give the data needed to a required filer of an 1099 Form (information return, not to be confused with a 1040 form) they are required to withhold up to 28% which is remitted to the government.

When in the market for a self study CPE course, here are three consumer tips that may save you time and money. First, make sure that the credits you would earn are even acceptable to whatever certifying body governs your professional license.

It may seem absurd, but you can find actual cases on record of individuals – otherwise fully qualified professionals – who have overlooked such a minor detail and gone on to take a course and earn credits that turn out not to be recognized by the board with jurisdiction over their licensure.

Secondly, inquire whether there are any pilot CPE courses, programs which are experimental in nature for which tuition is totally free (or drastically reduced) in exchange for, typically, some type of student feedback at the end. Such trial programs, nonetheless, bear actual credits.

The primary stipulation typical to such pilot programs is that students really complete the program. Occasionally, the only other obligation is that detailed feedback be provided to help improve the course for full-fledged deployment. Other times, all of the data that course-designers want to know are test scores and the like, with no other suggestions needed. Whatever the case, pilot programs are a win-win situation for all concerned.

Last but not least, consider an online CPE instead of conventional correspondence through the mail. Some of these web-based courses may even include familiar fare for example workbooks and the like, but more often than not every thing is online, immediately accessible and available at a much lower cost as a result of not needing to print and bind materials and pay for the postage to send them to a student.

Technology even makes these kinds of programs much better, with multimedia and interactivity often built into the design of the course, allowing for more interesting and pedagogically helpful presentations. Perhaps best of all, test results are virtually always instantaneous!

The rapid growth of virtual assistant jobs reflects the prevalence of corporate management trends in this age of downsizing and cost-cutting. Especially popular with start-ups and other firms of the Knowledge Economy, virtual assistant jobs enable firms to minimize their in-house support staff as they search for increased profitability.

After all, from management’s perspective, nothing more is needed than someone who will basically – even only – transcribe records or answer phones. Virtual assistant jobs allow the business to avoid paying for expenses beyond wages or salaries.

Firms save a great deal by not having to offer health insurance, sick days, and the like. Now take the idea another step further, and it’s easy to see that firms don’t even need to deal with any administrative hassles at all, like performance reviews and so forth, simply by hiring what is in essence a contractor!

So what does the worker get out of it? Well, for individuals that require non-traditional work opportunities, these virtual work at home jobs are especially attractive. Such work most often involves general clerical duties that may be easily fulfilled outside of an office. Some positions, nonetheless, can require advanced abilities for example computer programming or internet research.

But these jobs aren’t some bad old-fashioned work-at-home scam where victims are made to assemble tchotchkes or stuff envelopes with fliers. They are real honest-to-goodness employment opportunities made possible by an ever more interconnected world.

More and more entrepreneurs now hire actual live virtual assistants to give their fledgling start-ups a respectable appearance, creating the professional impression of a full-staffed operation. If you are a student, a homemaker, retired, or just do not wish to deal with a conventional lifestyle, you now have a lot more options than ever to be, in a very real sense, your very own boss! Thanks to the marvels of modern technology, it is simpler and much more practical than ever prior to to work off-site, even in one’s own home.

Aching muscle relief is something often encountered among older athletes. For largely unknown reasons, the aging process causes muscles to tighten and causes their use to be much hindered, usually resulting in soreness and even outright pain. A muscle relief gel is utilized by many to treat such conditions, people who refuse to be consigned to the much less active lifestyles typically recommended by their doctors.

As per the old adage about the truth being “somewhere in-between,” maybe the best course of action would be to heed the healtcare providers’ advice to a certain degree, relieving aching muscles while not totally giving up long-cherished hobbies – which is, modifying their pursuit in deference to age or the advancement thereof.

Of course, such a course of action is tough for athletes used to giving their all and pushing performance envelopes. But it must be learned, and practiced and mastered the same as any new skill, to be able to lay the proper foundation for a physically rigorous, but also safe, life. The older athlete faces enough challenges without bringing on more, such as creating problems outright by refusing to accommodate nature’s inevitable progression.

Decline is inevitable. What is not unavoidable is catastrophic break-down, and that depends in big part on the older athlete’s psychological acceptance of significantly changed circumstances. Go with the flow, working with Mother Nature, and you’ll be able to typically expect a vigorous enough life still.

Listen to your body. Learn its new language, its reduced syntax. The range of physical expression diminishes, but vibrancy is still possible when appropriately channeled.

That is the challenge for the older athlete, pain or no pain. It is to learn anew how to work with the limits of one’s body, encouraging it to excel its capabilities even while respecting those limits. It is the obstacle of any athlete at any age, but advanced ages make the challenge much more plain.

Being an “agent” ordinarily refers to commissioned sales, and selling is one of the toughest jobs to be found anywhere – and anytime – but what about as a career? Most peopel would really burn out, but the successful ones tend to move into more managerial sorts of positions, which explains how they are able to make an actual career out of sales. After all, it’s tough living on commission-only your whole life, especially at the lower end of things where one is doing showroom sales of items less than ten grand apiece!

Then there are people like Zalman Silber who are able to parlay their talent for sales into serial entrepreneurship. In fact, selling is the lifeblood of any business, so in a way it’s no surprise that successful salesmen and women should be able to combine that skill with more managerial ones to create their own companies.

But what is this mysterious art of selling that’s so necessary to any enterprise? Is it purely a matter of horse-feathering one’s way through a potential customer’s defenses? Do successful salesmen and women lie better than most? What’s the fine line between representing your product or service positively and doing whatever it takes to make your monthly, weekly, daily, or even hourly quota?

Believe it or not, it’s basically a lot like the dating game, and it’s no secret that successful sellers – “agents,” if you prefer – also tend to be quite the Casanovas (and whatever is the equivalent term for females). After all, successful selling is nothing more than successful seduction.

Not the way a Zalman Silber would put it, in all probability, but it’s possible for people to be very good at something and yet not know exactly why. And the truth is that the same thing which makes one successful at sales is precisely what makes one successful at finding lovers.

It’s all about getting enough information. Think about it. If you absolutely knew that someone wasn’t interested in you – that there would be no chance in hell – would you still waste your time? Of course not. So the key, whether at dating or selling a product or service, is to get as much information as possible. It is, in other words, a matter of intelligence (pun intended!)….

But we are not telepathic or clairvoyant, however, so the only way to find out is to observe. To really listen. And to ask the right questions – or use the right pick-up lines.

By “right pick-up lines” it isn’t meant some magical quip that will easily open the lady’s heart (and legs!) but questions – or even non-interrogative statements – that allow you to plumb her mind, her soul. The goal is to find out what she wants, and what she’s willing to settle for – to find out what her needs are, and how much she’s willing to pay.

Just like with a prospective customer.

As one of the most promising platforms to have shown up at the turn of the century, Microsoft’s Xbox 360 was initially greeted with widespread derision as a Johnny-Come-Lately to the nine billion-dollar videogaming market (which is at present worth many multiples of billions more annually). Currently the Xbox is considered cutting-edge and competes directly with Sony’s similarly exceptional Playstation, but lately the stakes were elevated with Microsoft’s introduction of its Kinect technology that claims to do away with game controllers altogether, using the player’s own body movements to direct all onscreen actions. The highly sophisticated motion-detection technology makes it possible to scan even facial gestures!

Greek vases help us comprehend a lot of what we know about the civilizations of ancient Greece. Over a hundred thousand pieces have been cataloged so far! In comparison, very little painting from those times has survived. Due to their relative durability, Ancient pottery Greek vases remain the best record we have of what life was like back then, with various styles giving a clue to their apparently representative cultures.

Vase painting is what Greek vases are mostly about for the typical archeologist, and several categories exist. The earliest period is named Protogeometric for the use of circles, triangles, arcs, and wavy lines, most likely produced with the help of compasses and multiple brishes.

The next time period is labeled Geometric for the much more complex motifs and geometric decorations that distinguish works of this class. The earliest part of this period is dominated by purely abstract forms while the second half abounds in human figures and illustrations of scenes from mythology.

The so-called Orientalizing Style defined the next period in ancient Greek pottery, which was inspired by the city-states’ regular contacts with the Eastern powers in such places as Asia Minor, the Levant, and Persia. Perhaps the most iconic style, nonetheless, is that dominant during the so-called Black Figure Period, silhouetted figures with incised details engaged in a variety of tasks.

This gave rise to Red Figure pottery, a technique where details were rendered by directly painting onto the surface. The white-ground method that developed later forms still another glorious time period of ancient Greek craftsmanship, a sort of last hurrah before the gradual decline of the Hellenistic Period.

The ancient Greeks typically used their vases for storing oils, perfumes, and other cosmetics. They were as popular then (as the sheer number of surviving examples suggest!) as they are today in the form of museum replicas, faithful copies that permit art lovers to take pleasure in the glory that was Greece in their own homes or offices.

Soundproofing walls usually means the use of soundproofing drywall, a special kind of insulation product designed to damper sound. Soundproofing refers to any methods of reducing sound pressure by employing noise reduction and noise absorption.

The former term involves blocking the passage of sound, often by means of prolonged distances as well as the use of obstacles along the path of a sound. The latter operates by altering the sound itself, usually through the suppression of characteristics like resonance and reverberation.

Cheap soundproofing has traditionally been a misnomer, as the technologies employed are typically state-of-the-art: after all, few have the money for a nusiance that is typically considered part of the price of living in modern day society. But recent advances have made it possible for some true “bang-for-the-buck” bargains, specifically with regards to windows.

The primary focus of residential soundproofing plans is the windows. Unless building from scratch, the windows will be essentially the most practical point of focus, as it presents the most cost-efficient opportunities. For starters, specially developed curtains are available that use honeycomb-like air chambers to dampen sounds. Then you will find double-pane windows, as well as the installation of a second, or interior, window.

But if you’re due for a renovation, or are newly constructing, be sure to check out the new soundproofing technologies built-into modern sheetrock specially designed to dampen sound. These products save not only money but floorspace at the same time, fully replacing standard techniques involving resilient channels and mass-loaded vinyl.

Such innovative drywall meet all the usual safety and performance standards that govern their regular cousins on the market, and are available in common sizes and thicknesses. Plus, despite their added capabilities, they’re just as simple to use. Residential or commercial, soundproof drywalls usher in a new era of noise reduction and elimination.

Ancient Greek vases are a testimony to one of the founding civilizations of Europe, one that extended well over seven hundred years. It is the one seminal culture that is most responsible for making the West what it really is. Through its own genius, and the genius it inspired in the Romans, ancient Greek techniques have gone on to influence lands far outside of Europe and countries far different than any on the continent.

Part of the beauty behind Greek vases has to do with the beholder’s own awareness of such a storied legacy. Contemporary science, politics, mathematics, and philosophy are greatly indebted to ancient Greek thought. Of course, art and culture have been considerably Greek at their core for centuries too. So profound has been this influence that historians and general thinkers-at-large frequently wonder why modern Greek society seems such a pale reflection.

The meditative contemplation that comes with a deep consideration of Greek vases may lead one on such flights of intellectual fancy as to draw startling connections tantalizing and tenuous as a result of their novelty. For instance, China, the other great foundational influence in the human heritage (and certainly within their respective part of the world), is now rising up.

Modern greece, however, is hamstrung by the cynicism and greed of its own citizens. Businessmen in China and Greece both realize how endemic corruption and bribery is in both countries, and yet it is odd how China can still manage to challenge even the United States despite such deficiencies while Greece needs European Union help. Is it simply a matter of size?

What exactly is it that determines that one people should prosper, and prosper again, while another shall only ever have prospered within the past? What’s the magic factor here? Is as simple as the “destiny” and “fate” that both ancient Greek and ancient-modern Chinese culture regards so highly?