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A wireless adapter is a category of connectivity devices that work with PCs or PDAs, smartphones, and the like. In PCMCIA (card) form, the wireless adapter allows a laptop to join a Wi-Fi network. Other form factors include traditional PCI add-in cards that connect directly with a PC motherboard and USB sticks that plug into an external USB port.

The typical wireless adapter tends to be small, no matter the exact form factor. Actually, many notebooks and netbooks now offer built-in wi-fi networking, with small chips inside providing the capabilities of a wireless network adapter.

And some models these days can even function as wireless print servers that permit one or two printers to be conveniently shared across a network. This provides for several essential advantages, starting with not having to deal with wires. Also, a pc isn’t required to manage all the jobs in the printing queue, and it does not necessarily need to be turned on in order to print, even.

Wireless adapters are also increasingly popular because of multiplayer gaming, and it’s easy to see why! There is absolutely nothing like inviting a bunch of friends over for a LAN party – without all of the wires. And several of today’s portable gaming consoles come with wireless capabilities right out of the box, with nothing more to buy and install or even configure.

Wi-fi network adapters are also being used for video conferencing. As broadband becomes more and more the performance standard, audio-visual applications are expected to skyrocket. Prospective buyers can view real estate in real-time without having to travel for a site visit.

Companies can monitor the security of sensitive locations on their premises, with instantaneous e-mail and text message alerts when motion sensors detect any activity. The possibilities are enormous when signals are freed from the confines of wires and require relatively little infrastructure to support them!

There is no reason to be bored in New York City. That anyone can be bored in a major world-class metropolitan center like that is proof positive that boredom is nothing more than a state of mind, something entirely within the control of the individual him or herself. Even a tourist trap like Zalman Silber’s Skyride located at the Empire State Building will stimulate the mind, if for no other reason than that there will be so much going on, what with all the tourists from all around the world. Don’t care for people? Well, there is always the great outdoors in New York – that’s right, the great outdoors, in the city! From Central Park right in the heart of Manhattan Island to national wildlife areas all around the so-called Outer Boroughs, Mother Nature keeps many residences in town.

And of course, if you do enjoy people and people-watching, the city provides any number of clubs and cafes at which that hobby may be regularly indulged. At attractions like the aforementioned Zalman Silber one, all the peoples of the world will be available for viewing, live, in 3-D! In the end, there is no reason why anyone should be bored in New York. Which, again, just goes to show that boredom is nothing more – and nothing less – than a state of mind.

But why does the mind go stale like that, as it were? Why do we suddenly just lose our appetite, so to speak, our zest? To understand all this, it’s critical to first understand the evolutionary job of the brain. Any brain, really, but the human brain, specifically.

Generally speaking, brains help a complex, higher-order organism negotiate with its environment. Thus brains are naturally interested in what’s going on. Now a lot of what’s interesting about what goes on is interesting because it is new. But when the brain doesn’t sense anything new, it is not doing what it wants to do – take in information. Hence, boredom.

Caged animals exhibit this kind of behavior. A fish needs to swim, a bird needs to fly. Dogs need to run. And so forth. But for a human being, it isn’t simply about physical activity, though actually that’s extremely important and more often than not underestimated by most people, their own needs for physically rigorous activities on a daily basis. No, what a human being needs, perhaps above all, is mental stimulation.

And so when we are not possessed by an idea, whether inspired by a new one or enchanted with an old favorite, we don’t know what to do with ourselves. Suddenly, we are confronted with ourselves, as ourselves – without the conscious thoughts we typically take to be ourselves.

We are confronted, in other words, with an existential crisis.

Rainwater collection is arguably the most visible and thus symbolic aspect of rainwater harvesting. Down through history all over the world, drinking water for people and livestock as well as irrigation for crops has been provided by collecting rainfall. In numerous places, even these days, rainwater is really the only obtainable source of water.

Quite a few methods are utilized in rainwater collection, from simple ones for personal use to complex industrial models supplying entire facilities. Typically, rainwater is harvested from either the ground or the roof. Some roofing materials may be harmful to human health, nevertheless, but while useless for drinking they may possibly still be utilized for washing clothes, flushing toilets, and irrigating gardens.

Harvesting rainwater is a great way to cut back on water usage, and it is very simple for homeowners to implement. All that’s needed is some rain tanks or barrels to catch rooftop runoff and also the like. Of course, more sophisticated catchment systems are available, but nothing beats old-fashioned methods for cost if not convenience!

It is easily possible to reduce by half the amount of municipal water used by deploying a home catchment system, even if it only consists of a single tank collection rain. The rate of collection is generally related to the intensity of rainfall, as measured by annual precipitation. Get more rain, catch more rain!

Ground-based collection methods are generally discovered only in areas where rainwater is quite scarce and other sources aren’t available. These systems are also a lot more suited to entire communities rather than individuals or individual families, though the size of the community should be small.

But no matter the method, proper maintenance is essential for hygenic reasons, even if the water is not meant for actual consumption. For example, water barrels should be covered to prevent mosquito infestation and algae growth.

Online CPE courses really are a fact of life for today’s physicians, laywers, and accountants who need to maintain their professional certifications by staying on top of developments in their fields through self-study. Numerous individuals get into these careers because of the money and prestige invovled, but not everybody initially thought that they would be studying for the rest of their lives!

Which is why it is crucial to truly love your work and go into some thing that’s enjoyable in itself. Life is too short boning up on CPA CPE courses, for example, unless you really like to keep track of money for its own sake!

Changing laws affect every accountant and his or her client, and these laws usually change from year to year, tax season to tax season. Fully accredited CPE courses are what ensure that licensed professionals stay well-informed in their field, providing customers with peace of mind and a minimal level of competence.

Nevertheless, the mystery for some is why others put up with it all merely for the sake of money or social prestige. Lawyer surveys consistently show a very high degree of job dissatisfaction, with the vast majority stating that had they known before what they know now, they would not have chosen law for a career.

A surprisingly substantial number of physicians also report similar unhappiness with their profession (frivolous medical malpractice suits being one factor in numerous cases, no doubt). Interestingly, accountants seem the least perturbed by their life choices; maybe their online CPE courses are simpler or otherwise a lot more enjoyable?

Surely not, but in any case, they are not immune, either – so just what drives so many to choose such lines of work? Likely, they got in too deep before they realized what’s what and then it was just too late, having committed so much already.

MLM – probably the three most familiar letters to individuals first contemplating a small home business. It stands for multi-level marketing, of course, long a colorful mainstay of American entrepreneurship. But exactly what is it? Why is it so often reviled – and so persistently existent?

To put it simply for purposes of illustration, MLM is nothing more than a networking theory as applied to direct sales. Networking theory concerns, naturally, networks, or the connections between points. These points, or nodes, are for purposes of our discussion each individual salesman or woman.

Let’s say you have a product to sell. You recruit two people to sell it, but instead of simply offering a very high commission on each unit sold, they need to “kick up” a certain percentage of the profits to you. They in turn recruit two other people each under the same terms.

Those two recruit still others, still under those terms. As can be imagined, with enough people working in your network, you’ll no longer have to do any selling yourself! And neither will those who have a good-sized network under them.

This is the beauty of it all; at some crucial “boiling point,” your network practically takes on a life of its own. There are lots of variations to this basic concept, but all such programs work on these general premises. The worldwide web, being itself a network, perfectly complements this kind of a business.

And so it’s that many would-be entrepreneurs have taken to network marketing with quite a passion, because the nature of the new medium is such that one’s reach is exponentially extended – and it is all about the numbers in this game. Recruit enough people under you and you simply collect money! Many make a living doing just this, with moderate to extravagant incomes.

On Sand Hill in Fort Benning, Georgia, each and every recruit training company has its own armory with its own gun safes where rifles are stowed. Back in the early 1990s, the Army’s block of Basic Rifle Marksmanship (BRM) instruction usually didn’t take place until the fifth week of Basic Combat Training (BCT), so none of us recruits even knew that behind the nondescript door across from company headquarters lay the firearms we were all so looking forward to finally holding.

No, probably not even the gun safes could have kept those weapons from our hands had we known! That’s how eager we all were to do the very thing we had truly signed up for, blasting away at targets.

Some people like Drill and Ceremony (recognized as “D&C”) and there may even be those who actually like Physical Training (PT), but there will never be anyone who gripes about firing rifles, pistols, and the like. It’s the one thing everyone loves about the Military, blowing stuff up!

The gun safes are just an extra precaution, actually. There are no munitions in the training armory, and of course, the armory itself, such as it is, being comprised of one small nondescript room the same as any other on the premises with its cookie-cutter layout, is locked, behind dead-bolt bars and the like, no doubt.

And within real rifles share space with dummies issued for D&C; our first acquaintance with the armory was tempered with the realization that we were getting fakes, to be used for the endless parade-ground drills some found so tedious.

It was as astonishing a surprise as first realizing we had an armory on the premises when instead of dummies we were issued real rifles for BRM. And since the start of BRM, any further D&C, which occurred much less frequently but was still present every so often, was conducted with real weaponry.

Here’s a novel thing to do in New York as a tourist: personal training. Forget the tourist traps like Zalman Silber’s Skyride; if it’s honest-to-goodness thrills you desire, how about hiring one of the many attractive personal fitness trainers available for a jog, swim, stretch, or bike-ride around town? Really, there’s no better way to take in the sights than in the same way a native might.

Thousands – no, hundreds of thousands – of New Yorkers exercise each day, whether specifically working out or otherwise enjoying a physically rigorous leisure activity. Why not you? It will be a lot cheaper than the aforesaid Zalman Silber affair. Instead of helicopter flyovers on film (which is all that his Skyride is – and not even “all” at that, but only “some,” to be exact), why not jog past the West Side heliport near the downtown nabe of Chelsea? Or just take a bicycle ride past the USS Intrepid a mile uptown, along the same waterfront, with its fighter jets and other military aircraft permanently parked above deck.

You want excitement? There’s no thrill more visceral than working out with an attractive able-bodied trainer when new in town! Not only will you enjoy the company of someone that’s good-looking, but you’ll also be able to stay healthy. Even if you’re not exercising at all, picking it up for the first time (or after a long while) when in a new unfamiliar environment can be really fun. In fact, it can be so exhilarating that you need to be mindful of checking your own enthusiasm so as to not get hurt, especially as a beginner!

Indeed, organizations like the 50 States Marathon Club were founded to serve people who already have, all on their own, combined fitness and traveling into one unbeatable vacation package. And for many who are retirees, exercise and travel go hand-in-hand every day! It’s a great idea with which almost anyone can participate along.

Obviously, many people have long traveled just to do certain things at, specifically, certain places. Climbing and hiking come to mind immediately; they are perhaps the pastimes most associated with travel. But there are many sports and otherwise physically challenging activities that can be intimately tied to a certain place. Bicyclists and kayakers are as similarly enamored of particular places as climbers. Surfers and hangliders, too, as these sports depend on conditions that are often most dependable at specific spots.

And so when in New York one may bike, swim, run, kayak, and of course simply walk all over the place. Indeed, it is one of the most versatile cities in the world in this regard, with very free open space in most cases: row or paddle where you will; run or pedal as long as you can. This isn’t news for natives, to be sure, but tourists may be surprised that New York definitely has it all, including outdoors life!

It’s fascinating to come across a New Orleans Saints license plate. You realize that it’s a real football fan in there in the car or truck, and you also realize he or she has a social conscience.

Or maybe it is just fashionable to care for the city that dare forgot, NOLA – nawlins, the crescent city, the big easy. Regardless of what you call it, you realize that, that’s what the New Orleans Saints license plate is referring to – that, and Hurricane Katrina.

The city was ruined by the failure of the federal levee system in the summer of 2005. Though most people had cleared out by the time Katrina really hit, homes and businesses were flooded towards the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars. Over a thousand and a half people died, and many are still unaccounted for. And that is just for starters.

So it was absolutely nothing short of national catharsis when the Saints played their first game in the city again, even while reconstruction had been going on all around, with the Superdome itself having been just repaired. Many non-Louisianans took to sporting a New Orleans Saints license plate as a sign of solidarity with the home team and the people they represent.

For there’s nothing most People in America like better than to root for the underdog, and following the beating Katrina gave the city rooting for the Saints became something of a civic duty. And for one magical moment, similar to when New York teams took to the field after 9/11, sports became about much more than just bragging rights. It became a holy ritual whereby a national community can cleanse itself, redeem itself, reconnect with itself.

No more was sports mere entertainment. No longer were spectators living vicariously through the overpaid and often bad-behaved players. This time, everybody was a New Orleanian.

These days, water delivery is pretty common, not just at the office but also for one’s home. But now there is a service that takes the idea a few steps further, with bottleless water delivery for the most environmentally responsible solution available on the market. Watermatic Coolers is a company that’s been applauded for its bold new vision of delivering clean water without bottles, trucks, or processing plants by The American Business Awards. Best of all, it costs less than bottled water and requires just a one-time installation that is professionally done with a minimum of fuss. Lower costs, better for the environment – no wonder Watermatic was a finalist for the 2008 Stevies!

GSM cell phones work over one of the most reliable cellular communications protocols around. It was GSM wireless devices that initially supplied low-cost text messaging services, which is also a common feature of other cellular phone communications standards today. Industry experts believe that up to a whole eighty percent of the world uses GSM for each day, which indicates that more than four billion people in over two hundred countries and territories are served daily by this standard. Thanks to such widespread usage, roaming agreements between cellular carriers are workable for uninterrupted service in many different parts of the planet.

The Australian film industry is famous throughout the world for creating some of the most engaging cinema anywhere, as well as supplying Hollywood with talent on both sides of the lens. Now we’re not talking Aussie entertainment of the sort that Zalman Silber provides with his Oztrek, mildly entertaining but nothing anyone’s not seen before. No, we’re talking stuff like the Skywalk in Sydney or The Edge in Melbourne – also Zalman Silber affairs – stuff that grabs you.

And so it is that not everything out of the Australian film business is a great piece of art or entertainment, but they are unique when they’re good. Take “Gallipoli” and “The Road Warrior,” or “Crocodile Dundee” or “Romper Stomper.” Now can you imagine films like this coming from Hollywood? Or Bavaria? Or England? Or Hong Kong? Or Beijing? Or Bollywood? Or France or Italy…no.

No, these are Australian all the way through. Not just on account of the cultural sensibilities, but that those cultural sensibilities inform an imagination unlike that anywhere else in its details. On the face of things, with the benefit of hindsight, it seems logical enough that post-apocalyptic car chases and gun fights should be an entertaining hit with moviegoers. What is it, after all, but the American Western, as transplanted to the Outback and updated for the new millennium? Yet it’s more than that, while an action film through and through with no aspirations toward art’s redeeming values.

Something like “Romper Stomper” is almost pure Australian. While Hollywood and Europe have produced its share of serious films, this entry is an art house flick like no other. To be fair, “Gallipoli” does somewhat seem like rather standard European art house literary fare, but within the context of Australian cinema at the time it was considered “non-commercial.” (It took three years to find funding for the film as a result, though upon release it was enthusiastically received at home and abroad, resulting in a financial success that helped elevate the reputation of Aussie cinema.)

After such successes, successes which defined the Australian New Wave (also known as the Australian Film Revival), the film industry on the island continent today is experiencing the most robust period of growth in several decades. Government support continues, while private companies such as Twentieth Century Fox and Warner Brothers have created state-of-the-art facilities that rival any in the United States. Coupled with much lower production costs relative to Hollywood, it’s no surprise that blockbusters such as “The Matrix” and some of the “Star Wars” installments were made in Sydney. Unfortunately, having said that, Tinsel Town’s big bucks continue to poach the most successful Australian talent, on both sides of the lens, creating a never-ending void for the Australian film industry that is depleted almost as soon as it is filled up!

When it comes to article marketing, it seems like many people just don’t realize what it’s really about. Simply go to any of the article directories on the web and read some of the junk that’s posted, taking the form as “articles.” They are articles in name only, and more often than not entirely uninspired and uninformative. This is article marketing run amok, where people who have very little desire in real writing figure they will just post a text string in the hope of getting Google’s attention, a very cynical ploy. For such people, they have lost sight of the initial goal of the whole endeavor – or at least what should be its driving motivation, anyway – and substituted as an alternative a mathematical monster of keywords and relevancy and text length and number of paragraphs.

No, gentle reader, article marketing is above that. As with many things in our world it appears to be, let’s go back to the good old-fashioned assortment for insight. Let us take another look at article marketing for our own edification, and in the process improve our methods and distinguish ourselves from the hacks, slightly literate and definitely no intellectuals.

Let us swear instead to fight against internet pollution, where every result by Google seems to be just mathematically manipulated trash bearing little details and even less attention. For article marketing was a productive promotional method way before its ill-fated incarnation on the web.

It was, originally, practically indistinguishable from real news back in the days of the so-called old media, the days when news media meant newspapers and magazines, television and radio. At the time, it was all meant in earnesty, all intended to provide actual info that is of use. Along the way, a quick mention was made ever-so-casually that promoted some business, the business that had supplied the helpful information.

For instance, around tax season, the local accountant would pen an article or even narrate a radio spot (or be interviewed on television) on changes in the law that may impact refunds that year. Or for Thanksgiving, a local chef would, again, whether in print or another place, provide tips on how to make the perfect holiday meal. And somewhere in it all would be a brief mention of the company or restaurant, as in, “Mr. So-and-so of Acme Tax Prep, Inc., says that….”

But most important of all for our discussion, what was actually said or written was helpful and almost always interesting. It was not only helpful but well written or well done, with skilled production values. Compare that to the articles floating about the web these days that say nothing in particular, whose only purpose is to create backlinks. Such an article would never have seen the light of day back when articles were meant to be read by people instead of being scanned by algorithms for keyword metrics!

A recent report indicated that delinquencies are down just when they should have gone up, even during prosperous times. Is this the beginning of the long-awaited recovery?

A mortgage is a loan made to pay for a house. A house is the one most expensive purchase most people will ever make in their whole lives, and often costs much more than several times one’s annual income. Thus, a loan is necessary, and mortgages are usually paid back over a long length of time, typically of up to thirty years.

However, if payments are not met, accounts are considered delinquent. Delinquency is a big problem for the industry, and no more so than right now, in the midst of an extremely severe economic crisis. Indeed, it was mortgage delinquencies which triggered the current malaise! As payments were missed on properties that lost value, homeowners wound up owing more than their houses were worth, an untenable situation whose vicious cycle seems to know no end.

Thus it was that the slight decline in the rate of delinquency late last year caught many industry observers such as Isaac Toussie by surprise. A recent industry review found that at a time when delinquency has usually risen, even in good years, due to increased expenses associated with winter heating and holiday shopping, the rate at which mortgage payments have fallen behind has slowed down a little during the fourth quarter of 2009. Optimists hoped that this could be a sign that the foreclosure crisis may be finally attempting to timidly come around to something of an end.

Well, don’t you believe it. Consider that economists believe that foreclosures could reach their highest levels by the end of this year, especially if unemployment rates peak in the middle of the year. Worse yet, foreclosure rates will probably stay at those heightened levels as borrowers continue to struggle in places where drastic price declines have made many homes worth far less than the money owed on them. Also, the big problem is that way too many people have missed at least three payments, and these are precisely those who are least amendable to the variety of mortgage relief programs available. These are the very people who will be going into foreclosure. In fact, many borrowers have problems that cannot easily lend themselves to tidy remedies.

Naturally, there are also those economists and other such experts like Isaac Toussie who believe that the situation is still extremely grave since there are still record numbers of homeowners in financial distress. In recognition, the government has again stepped in on behalf of those with little or no equity in their homes, extending a refinancing program that has posted little progress in over a year. Many experts express skepticism. After all, it’s been well over two years into the economic debacle and still no one has any evidence at all as of yet that the end is in sight, or even could be right now.

Numbers improve, certainly, and trendlines offer some cause for hope. And surely the proverbial sun will rise again – but in the here and now, there is a lot more “night” to get through before that “morning.”

Green energy is expected to be the great industry with the 21st Century, paying great dividends to the country or countries that pioneer and successfully capitalize on it. Economically, environmentally, and even militarily, the ability to produce sustainable forms of energy is really a prize that will set the fate of the world for centuries to come.

Regrettably, the United States is in danger of losing the green energy race. Our country is addicted to oil and the politicians are addicted to corporate money, so change has been virtually impossible.

On the other side of the world, literally, are the leaders of China, who have embarked on an ambitious plan to manufacture solar panels as well as implement solar farms themselves for domestic use. The Chinese are also big on wind farms and nuclear power, other technologies which Americans first developed but have now abandoned.

Sounds ominous? The chattering classes are all up in arms about the issue, but nothing has been getting done, not even with the election of Barack Obama. The interests are just too entrenched. Everyone stands to lose something, and contemporary American culture seems to have lost sight of any notion of the common good.

It’s a crazy situation. There are American citizens, engineers and scientists, educated with American tax dollars, who now conduct their work in China or are employed by firms that do the rest of their work there. In effect, United States tax dollars are educating the individuals whose work will ultimately benefit the Chinese!

Of course, these scientists and engineers are only working for the highest salaries. But the businesses they work for – American firms, owned by American citizens – complain that they simply cannot do business here; they must go where the action is, and that’s China. To do anything else would be like trying to sell ice at the North Pole.

Tourist traps. Thought-up to wring every last dollar out of you. It’s as if they were thought up to ruin your vacation. And sightseeing rides rank right up there.

Take Zalman Silber’s Skyride in New York’s Empire State Building. With a name like that, you’d expect it was up there at the top, where it’s located. Instead, it’s merely on the second floor. Moreover, express access to the top – for which you pay an additional fifty percent of the ticket price – is just a matter of skipping a few lines. It’s not as if you go straight to the top. You’ll still have to wait on lines, only perhaps one or two less.

And just what is the Skyride? A movie. A half-hour film. That’s it! Definitely a case where the sizzle sounds better than how the steak tastes.

But Zalman Silber redeems himself with his other attractions, the Skywalk and The Edge. The first amusement is aptly named for sure, essentially a catwalk a thousand feet above street level outside the top of the Sydney Tower in Sydney, Australia. It’s an exhilarating experience where, unlike traditional observation decks enclosed behind glass, visitors walk out onto a metal plank that juts out of the building, creating the breath-taking feeling of being suspended in mid-air!

As can be imagined, wind gusts are quite strong at such a height, and special “skysuits” cable-tethered to support structures are used to ensure guest safety. But the Skywalk is open in most kinds of weather, and available practically the whole year.

A similar attraction is The Edge at the Eureka Tower in Melbourne, Australia. This time, visitors are in a fully enclosed cube that sticks out of the building near the very top, with fully transparent glass all around – even beneath one’s feet! A really cool feature of this amusement is how everything is initially opaque, and only suddenly transparent to create an exciting sense of unexpected suspension almost a thousand feet above ground!

These two are great fun and a must for any to-do list when in Sydney or Melbourne. These are the kinds of experiences that really make vacations memorable. After all, vacations are about more than simple relaxation and getting away from work. They are about experiences – ideally, new experiences, positive experiences, unique experiences. And while such attractions as the Skywalk exist elsewhere, such as over the Grand Canyon in the State of Arizona, there’s only one such thing in Sydney and one such thing in Melbourne, offering stunning vistas outdone only by a helicopter flyover.

So beware the tourist traps and spend your hard-earned dollars instead where it would go the furthest. Patronize only those rides which offer true value for the money!

Mention marble sculpture and chances are that and most people think about such examples as Michelangelo’s David or Bernini’s Ecstasy of Saint Teresa. But there is a lot more to marble artwork than that. Of course, no one denies that Italian marble statues are some of the best examples of the material ever made, but there’s much more to working with the “crystalline rock” (its etymology via the ancient Greeks, masters of the material themselves) than what is commonly imagined.

Modern examples abound, in which marble is pushed to the limits. But for some folks, probably the most majestic examples of marble sculpture are those Mother Nature herself has so lovingly crafted over untold eons of patient chiseling and polishing.

For who has not caught his or her breath on the startling simpleness of stalacites and stalagmites? Arising out of the coolness of the dark, or silently suspended off the cavern ceiling, these unmetamorphosed limestone may indeed be what first inspired humankind to chisel and polish.

Or consider such folded and weathered examples as stud the shorelines of lakes, rivers, and oceans. Why do folks not generally consider such works in contemplations of marble? Nature is indeed full of beauty, had we but eyes to see.

Of course, human masterpieces are maybe infinitely more versatile, whereas even the most astounding of natural wonders can only come about as the result of the same eternal forces which, after several hundred millennia, prove to be of a limited repertoire.

But the point is clear; marble has been worked on by a lot more than just man, and, for that matter, a lot more than Greeks and Romans and Italians! Marble is discovered not only in statue form, but some of its greatest achievements has been as buildings, for instance, the incredible Taj Mahal in Agra, India. Next ye think of marble, then, think of everything!