Liberty

The Liberty Bell, the scribe behind a classic road movie and more

Just in time for the holiday, The New Republic reviews "The Liberty Bell," a "fast-moving and engaging history" by Gary B. Nash. "In the 18th century, liberty was the dominant value of Anglo-American political culture, but its meaning remained vague and vacuous," writes reviewer Jack Rakove. "To see its existence as a struggle, and not a simple heroic legacy, better captures its essential meaning, and Gary Nash’s nifty quick treatment of this icon explains exactly why."

Hitting the road is also an American tradition; the website The Selvedge Yard takes a photographic look back at "Two Lane Blacktop," the classic 1971 road movie. In it, James Taylor (yes, the singer), Dennis Wilson (yes, the Beach Boy) and Warren Oates (the actor) race along Route 66. The screenplay was written by Rudy Wurlitzer, and before the film was released, was printed in its entirety in Esquire magazine.

Gina Frangello, a major force in Chicago's literary scene and author of "Slut Lullabies," tells Chicago Subtext, about another kind of freedom. Even though a publisher went bankrupt on the eve of her novel's publication, and she's struggling to keep her publishing house, Other Press, vital. "The online community is amazing for indie publishers," she says. "It's basically leveling the playing field so much more than was possible even a few years ago.... Now, the literary community has become very virtual, in a lot of ways."

Feel awkward about using emoticons in your sentences? At Good magazine, Anne Trubek explores the history of emoticons and discovers that way back in 1887, author Ambrose Bierce suggested that a bracket "be appended, with the full stop, to every jocular or ironical sentence." Vladimir Nabokov, too, wanted a curved smile. So if you're tempted to use an emoticon, feel free -- they have quite a literary pedigree.

Plans to ease Ashmore traffic congestion

Council has unveiled concept plans to ease traffic congestion at Ashmore, with a proposed upgrade and two-lane extension of Ashmore Road between Activity Crescent and Smith Street.

The Ashmore Road to Smith Street Connection Project is a $17 million Council initiative designed to improve road safety and reduce commuter times.

Engineering Services Committee Chair and Divisional Councillor Dawn Crichlow said Gold Coast roads were becoming more congested and road infrastructure needed to keep pace with the increasing number of road users.

“The Increased traffic along Ashmore Road travelling through to industrial areas has already led to greater congestion and this could affect road safety for drivers, cyclists and pedestrians into the future,” said Cr Crichlow.

“With more than seven schools, TAFE and a major university located within surrounding areas, Ashmore has become a popular route for students.

“The new university hospital at Parklands, scheduled for completion in 2012, will only add to the number of road users through the area and this project will provide a faster and safer connection for students, residents and commuters.

“Local residents have been contacted and Council will be working hard to minimise disruption to the community.

“An Environmental Impact Study has been completed and the proposed route is designed to limit the number of directly affected residents.”

Banana

Banana is the common name used for herbaceous foliage of the genus Mesa, and is also the name given to the fruit of these plants. They are resident to the tropical region of Southeast Asia, the Malay Archipelago, and Australia. They are cultivated primarily for their fruit, and to a lesser level for the production of fiber and as ornamental plants. Because of their size and structure, banana plants are often wrong for trees. The main or upright growth is called a pseudo stem, which for some species can gain a height of up to 2–8 m, with leaves of up to 3.5 m in length. Each pseudo stem produces a single group of bananas, before dying and being replaced by a new pseudo stem.

Bananas are grown in 132 countries worldwide, additional than any other fruit crop. In popular culture and commerce, banana usually refers to soft, sweet dessert bananas that are usually eaten raw. The bananas from a collection of cultivars with firmer, starchier fruit are generally used in cooking rather than eaten raw. Bananas may also be dried up and ground into banana flour. Although the wild species have fruits with numerous large, hard seeds, virtually all culinary bananas have unplanted fruits. Bananas are classified any as dessert bananas or as green cooking bananas.

Dance

Dance generally refers to association of the body, usually rhythmic and to music, used as a form of expression, social interaction or presented in a spiritual or performance setting. Dance is also used to describe methods of non-verbal communication (see body language) between humans or animals, action in inanimate objects (the leaves danced in the wind), and certain musical forms or genres.

Definitions of what constitutes dance are dependent on social, cultural, aesthetic, artistic and moral constraints and sort from functional movement (such as folk dance) to virtuoso techniques such as ballet. In sports, gymnastics, figure skating and synchronized swimming are dance disciplines while martial arts kata are repeatedly compared to dances.

Dance can be participatory, common or performed for an audience. It can also be ceremonial, competitive or erotic. Dance movements may be without significance in themselves, such as in ballet or European folk dance, or have a gestural vocabulary/symbolic system as in various Asian dances. Dance can embody or express ideas, emotions or tell a story.

Historical perspective

Based on the available evidence, scientists have reconstructed detailed information about the planet's past. Earth is estimated to have formed approximately 4.55 billion years ago out of the solar nebula, along with the Sun and other planets. The moon formed relatively soon afterwards.

Initially molten, the outer layer of the planet cooled, resulting in the solid crust. Outgas sing and volcanic activity produced the primordial atmosphere. Condensing water vapor, augmented by ice delivered by comets, produced the oceans. The highly energetic chemistry is believed to have produced a self-replicating molecule around 4 billion years ago.

Continents formed, then broke up and re-formed as the surface of Earth reshaped itself over the course of hundreds of millions of years, occasionally combining to make a super continent. Roughly 750 million years ago, the earliest known super continent Rodinia, began to break apart. The continents later recombined to form Pannotia which broke apart about 540 million years ago, then finally Pangaea, which broke apart about 180 million years ago.

Power

Power is the rate at which work is performed or energy is transmitted or the amount of energy essential or finished for a given unit of time. It is many types of conversion
Power.
Power (physics) is the quantity of work done or energy transferred per unit of time. Motive power is power which moves great, such as output of a motor. Electric power generation is the process of converting any form of energy to electrical energy.

Power station, a capability for generating electricity, nuclear power, the conversion of nuclear force to electricity, solar power, the translation of solar energy to electricity, wind power, the conversion of wind energy to electricity, wave power, the conversion of signal energy to electricity, tidal power, the conversion of energy of the tides energy to electricity, geothermal power, the conversion of geothermal power to electricity, hydropower, the conversion of possible or kinetic energy of water to electricity, Optical power of a lens is the opposite of its focal length, Effective radiated power in radio telecommunications is a calculate of radio station antennas.

Earth

Earth is the fifth largest planet in the solar system, third in order of distance from the Sun. It is the largest of its planetary system's terrestrial planets and the only place in the universe known to support life.

The most prominent features of the earth's climate are its two large polar regions, two relatively narrow temperate zones, and a wide equatorial tropical to subtropical region. Precipitation patterns vary widely according to location, ranging from several meters of water per year to less than a millimeter. About 70 percent of the surface is covered by salt-water oceans. The remainder consists of continents and islands, with the vast majority of the inhabited land in the Northern Hemisphere.

Earth has evolved through geological and biological processes that have left traces of the original conditions. The outer surface is divided into several tectonic plates that gradually migrate across the surface over geologic time spans, which at least several times have changed relatively quickly. The interior of the planet remains active, with a thick layer of molten Earth mantle and an iron-filled core that generates a magnetic field