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leaf peeper

2007-06-19 20:14:52

It's that time of year again. The days are getting shorter, the nights are getting a bit chilly, and the leaves are starting to change color. Starting in October and usually lasting for about six weeks, leaves will be changing to red, orange, yellow, brown, and other hues too numerous to mention. Whether you're a seasoned "leaf peeper" or planning your first fall foliage tour, the questions are the same. Where do you find the most vibrant colors? Which scenic highways and byways provide the best opportunities for your viewing pleasure? Where are the best places to see the show? The best places to see brilliant autumn colors and awe-inspiring mountain vistas are right here, in the western mountains of North Carolina. The hills and mountains in and around Asheville are world-renown for their "fall color show". This area is consistently ranked high on "Best Places to Visit" lists because of it's natural beauty and southern charm. Many believe that autumn is the best time to be here. The Blue Ridge Parkway is a perennial favorite. Breath-taking panoramas and leaf-carpeted forests are abundant in this timeless oasis. But, if you're the one driving, keep your eyes on the road. The stunningly beautiful sights along this drive can be a big distraction. And, at those elevations, you do not want to run off the road. Stop at the designated "scenic overlooks" to take your turn gazing, or switch drivers occasionally if you can. During leaf season the Blue Ridge Parkway can become a little crowded. If you want to get off the beaten path you might consider the drive through Hickory Nut Gorge, or The Pacolet River Scenic Byway. In early October the leaves start to change in the higher elevations along the parkway, beginning around Mount Mitchell, the highest peak east of the Mississippi River. Along the parkway you'll find campgrounds, picnic areas, trails, waterfalls, and recreation areas. The parkway also passes right through Asheville, so there is a wide range of exciting tourist destinations and shopping nearby. Popular destinations north of Asheville include Grandfather Mountain and Linville Falls along US 221 near Boone, Craggy Gardens on the Parkway, and Roan Mountain, on the Tennessee border. To the west you can raft down Nantahala River, see the highest dam this side of the Rockies at Fontana Lake, or hike up Cold Mountain, made famous by the book and movie of the same name. Also west of Asheville are the towns of Cherokee and Maggie Valley, offering a diverse range of native crafts and eclectic shops. To the southeast, near Hendersonville, you'll find Lake Lure, (where Dirty Dancing was filmed), and Chimney Rock Park,which Boasts one of the highest waterfalls in the state, at 404 feet.. And southwest of Asheville, near Brevard, are several popular diversions such as Dupont State Forest, Looking Glass Falls, and the Forest Discovery Center at the Cradle of Forestry Historic Site. Closer to Asheville, colorful views abound at Mount Pisgah or Graveyard Fields along the parkway. Magnificent views and aesthetically pleasing architecture combine at Biltmore House and Grove Park Inn. To see a wide variety of native foliage up close, stop in at the North Carolina Arboretum, just off the parkway at mile marker 393 or The Botanical Gardens of Asheville, near UNCA. Driving through is a good way to see lots of color, but you may get more out of it if you immerse yourself fully in the experience. As mentioned earlier, you could take a hike or go rafting under the multi-colored canopies. You might enjoy a scenic train ride on The Great Smoky Mountain Railroad in Dillsboro, or if you want a completely different perspective, you might find consider flying above it all in a hot-air balloon. Remember you may have to book most of these excursions in advance. If you plan an overnight visit, remember that local lodging becomes quite crowded as well. Consider making reservations in advance or planning your trips for Sunday through Thursday, if possible. You might even want to stay at places a bit farther away from the more frequented routes. Items you may want to bring along include a warm jacket, a camera, extra food, drinks, a cooler, a map, a cellphone, and maybe binoculars. And remember to top off your gas tank occasionally. The North Carolina mountains are definitely the place you want to be when the leaves are changing. But be warned, once here, you may never want to leave. Article Source: http://www.articleblender.com

James Rice is a lifelong resident of western North Carolina. Visit Leaf Links for links to resources with more detailed fall foliage information, including more scenic drives and destinations. Also try the NCmountainfun.com home page for more area attractions.


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Economics and Impacts

2007-06-09 15:39:31

The costs of automobile ownership, which may include the cost of: acquiring the vehicle, repairs, maintenance, fuel, depreciation, parking fees, tire replacement, taxes and insurance,[19] are weighed against the cost of the alternatives, and the value of the benefits - perceived and real - of vehicle ownership. The benefits may include personal freedom, mobility, independence and convenience.[20]

Cost and benefits to society

Main article: Effects of the automobile on societies

Similarly the costs to society of encompassing automobile use, which may include those of: maintaining roads, pollution, public health, health care, and of disposing of the vehicle at the end of its life, can be balanced against the value of the benefits to society that automobile use generates. The societal benefits may include: economy benefits, such as job and wealth creation, of automobile production and maintenance, transportation provision, society wellbeing derived from leisure and travel opportunities, and revenue generation from the tax opportunities. The ability for humans to move rapidly from place to place has far reaching implications for the nature of our society. People can now live far from their workplaces, the design of our cities is determined as much by the need to get vehicles into and out of the city as the nature of the buildings and public spaces within the city.[21]

Impacts on society

Transportation is a major contributor to air pollution in the United States, according to the Surface Transportation Policy Project, and nearly half of all Americans are breathing unhealthy air. Their study showed air quality in dozens of metropolitan areas has got worse over the last decade.[22] In the United States the average passenger car emits 11,450 lbs (5 tonnes) of carbon dioxide, along with smaller amounts of carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, and nitrogen.[23] Residents of low-density, residential-only sprawling communities are also more likely to die in car collisions, which kill 1.2 million people worldwide each year, and injure about forty times this number.[24] Sprawl is more broadly a factor in inactivity and obesity, which in turn can lead to increased risk of a variety of diseases.[25]

Improving the positive and reducing the negative impacts

Fuel taxes may act as an incentive for the production of more efficient, hence less polluting, car designs (e.g. hybrid vehicles) and the development of alternative fuels. High fuel taxes may provide a strong incentive for consumers to purchase lighter, smaller, more fuel-efficient cars, or to not drive. On average, today's automobiles are about 75 percent recyclable, and using recycled steel helps reduce energy use and pollution.[26] In the United States Congress, federally mandated fuel efficiency standards have been debated regularly, passenger car standards have not risen above the 27.5 miles per gallon standard set in 1985. Light truck standards have changed more frequently, and were set at 22.2 miles per gallon in 2007.[27] Alternative fuel vehicles are another option that is less polluting than conventional petroleum powered vehicles.

Future car technologies

Main article: Future car technologies

Automobile propulsion technologies under development include hybrid cars, battery electric vehicles, hydrogen cars, and various alternative fuels. New materials which may replace steel car bodies include duraluminum, fiberglass, carbon fiber, and carbon nanotubes.

Alternatives to the automobile

Main article: Alternatives to the automobile

Established alternatives for some aspects of automobile use include public transit (buses, trolleybuses, trains, subways, monorails, tramways), cycling, walking, rollerblading and skateboarding. Car-share arrangements are also increasingly popular – the U.S. market leader has experienced double-digit growth in revenue and membership growth between 2006 and 2007, offering a service that enables urban residents to "share" a vehicle rather than own a car in already congested neighborhoods.[28] Bike-share systems have been tried in some European cities, including Copenhagen and Amsterdam. Similar programs have been experimented with in a number of U.S. Cities.[29] Additional individual modes of transport, such as personal rapid transit could serve as an alternative to automobiles if they prove to be socially accepted. Automotive.
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Other auction terminology

2007-06-09 15:30:40

  • Silent auctions: This is often a variant of an English auction, where bids are written on a sheet of paper, and at the predetermined end of the auction, the highest listed bidder wins the prize. This auction variant is often used in charity events, and many items may be auctioned simultaneously. Participants submit bids normally on paper, near the item. Other variations of this type of auction may include sealed bids. The highest bidder pays the price he or she submitted.
  • Digital art auction: In this indefinitely long auction, designed for unreleased works that are trivially reproducible at zero cost (recordings, software, drug formulas), bidders openly submit their maximum bids (which may be adjusted or withdrawn at any time). The seller may review the bids and close with a price of their choosing at any time — the successful bidders that pay this price are those whose bid meets or exceeds it, and these are the only bidders who receive a copy of the item.
  • Open outcry auction: This type of auction can refer to any auction where the auction is conducted orally for people to hear. This type of auction also refers to what is used in stock exchanges and commodity exchanges, where trading occurs on a trading floor and traders may enter verbal bids and offers simultaneously. Transactions may take place simultaneously at different places in the trading pit or ring. This type of auction is being replaced by electronic trading platforms.
  • Unique bid auction: In this type of auction users post blind bids and are given a range of prices they can place a bid in, often a capped limit. The highest, or lowest, unique bid wins. For instance an auction is given a maximum bid of 10. If the top five bids are 10, 10, 9, 8, 8 then 9 would be the winner being the highest unique bid. This a popular online type of auction.
  • Buy-out auction: This auction has a predetermined buy-out price in which the bidder can end the auction by accepting the buy-out price. The buy-out price is set by the seller. The bidder can choose to bid or use the buy-out option. If no bidder chooses to utilize the buy-out option, the auction ends with the highest bidder winning the auction.
  • Combinatorial auction: A combinatorial auction is an auction in which bidders can place bids on combinations of items, or “packages,” rather than just individual items.
  • Absolute auction, also known as an Unreserved Auction, No-reserve Auction or Auction Without Reserve, is an auction with no minimum bid amount, no set starting bid, no seller confirmation of the high bid price, and no buybacks of the property being offered by the seller of any agents of the seller. The highest bidder will purchase the property no matter the high bid price. This type of auction is designed to attract the maximum participation from the buying public as the seller has committed to convey their property to the highest bidder without limitation. It does offer buyers excellent opportunities from time to time, however. A 2003 Virginia statute defines an absolute auction as "an auction where at the time of the auction sale the real or personal property to be sold will pass to the highest bidder regardless of the amount of the highest and last bid."
In terms of security/privacy, there are two main types of auctions:
  • In a private auction the identities of the bidders are hidden, so anyone that buys the item can remain anonymous. This is normally done for either security reasons such as rare gems or art, or to avoid embarrassment if the item is more risque.
  • In a public auction, the bidders' identities are not hidden and anyone is welcome to attend the auction.
In terms of auctioneers and auction items, we can differentiate three types of auctions:
  • exchange auction — also known as commodity auctions or exchange-commodity auctions, are the most closed to the new participants. The participants include a number of core professional buyers, who monitor each other to ensure that no one is 'cheating' on the community
  • sale auction — for art and one-of-a-kind items
  • dealer auction — for collectibles, cars or machinery
If more than one identical item is sold, there are two possible generalizations of the second-price auction. In a uniform-price auction, all of the winning bidders pay the price submitted by the highest non-winning bidder. Bidders will not typically bid their true value in a uniform-price auction with multiple units. In a Vickrey (or second-price sealed-bid) auction, the pricing rule is more complicated, but preserves the property that bidders will bid their true valuation. It is also possible to auction each identical item individually. Once each item has been priced, the winning bidder is entitled to buy the remaining goods at the same price. Items the winning bidder opts not to purchase are auctioned again. This system creates a tension between the desire to hold back on bidding since later items will almost certainly be cheaper, and the chance that by losing the first round of bidding all possibility of purchasing will be lost. Work in the theory of auctions contributed to Vickrey's 1996 Bank of Sweden Prize.
  • Reverse auction: A type of auction in which the role of the buyer and seller are reversed, with the primary objective to drive purchase prices downward. In an ordinary auction (or also known as forward auction), buyers compete to obtain a good or service. In a reverse auction, sellers compete to obtain business.

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Criticism

2007-06-08 00:13:56

Levi Bryant has criticized the term and concept of addiction as counterproductive in psychotherapy as it defines a patient's identity and makes it harder to become a non-addict. "The signifier 'addict' doesn't simply describe what I am, but initiates a way of relating to myself that informs how I relate to others." A stronger form of criticism comes from Thomas Szasz, who denies that addiction is a psychiatric problem. In many of his works, he argues that addiction is a choice, and that a drug addict is one who simply prefers a socially taboo substance rather than, say, a low risk lifestyle. In Our Right to Drugs, Szasz cites the biography of Malcolm X to corroborate his economic views towards addiction: Malcolm claimed that quitting cigarettes was harder than shaking his heroin addiction. Szasz postulates that humans always have a choice, and it is foolish to call someone an 'addict' just because they prefer a drug induced euphoria to a more popular and socially welcome lifestyle. Therefore, being 'addicted' to a substance is no different from being 'addicted' to a job at which you work everyday. It should be noted that Szasz and Bryant are not alone in questioning the standard view of addiction. Professor John Booth Davies at the University of Strathclyde has argued in his book The Myth of Addiction that 'people take drugs because they want to and because it makes sense for them to do so given the choices available' as opposed to the view that 'they are compelled to by the pharmacology of the drugs they take'. [1]. He uses an adaption of attribution theory (what he calls the theory of functional attributions) to argue that the statement 'I am addicted to drugs' is functional, rather than veridical. Stanton Peele has put forward similar views. Experimentally, Bruce K. Alexander used the classic experiment of Rat Park to show that 'addicted' behaviour in rats only occurred when the rats had no other options. When other options and behavioural opportunities were put in place, the rats soon showed far more complex behaviours.
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