Facebook Improves Its Functionality Photos

Facebook has made some small improvements, but useful for photos of the property.

Noting in a blog Friday that more than 250 million photos are uploaded every day, Facebook said it was always looking for ways to improve functionality.

An improvement was concluded last week showing your uploaded photos in a higher resolution. Images are now displayed at 960 pixels, compared to the previous size of 720 pixels, which means that the images are sharper and more detailed. All the images you've downloaded from the website will automatically appear in higher resolution.

People see your photos will now be able to see "twice as fast," according to Facebook, which apparently accelerated the time it takes for an image to load.

Finally, Facebook has changed its Photo Viewer based on feedback from its users. The new viewer will replace the current threshold of black and white background, a company that will put more attention on the picture and less frame.

Not all Facebook users will see improvements for now. At the end of last week, Facebook said it is making gradual improvements over several days.

Facebook has been busy lately re-setting some properties. Last week the company announced changes to the privacy settings that allow people to block unwanted photographs and other items were added to their pages. On Friday, Facebook has pulled the plug on its range of products, offering users a discount coupon for local businesses.

Millions of school leavers and graduates with 'fairly useless' degrees

Millions of school leavers and graduates with 'fairly useless' degrees are unemployable because they lack basic skills, a major business lobby group will warn today.
　　The devastating
　　report, from the British Chambers of Commerce, reveals small businesses are frustrated at the quality of applicants, who they say can barely concentrate or add up.
　　Nearly half of the 2,000 firms surveyed said they would be 'fairly or very nervous' about hiring someone who has just finished their A-levels。
　　The report warns: 'Too many people [are] coming out with fairly useless degrees in non-serious subjects.'
　　Its findings raise serious questions about the type and standard of education and skills training in Britain.
　　The group questioned the owners of 'micro-businesses', those with fewer than ten employees. Many have vacancies which they are desperate to fill but were scathing about the quality of candidates.
　　The report states: 'In general, younger people lack numerical skills, research skills, ability to focus and read, plus written English.'
　　One unnamed entrepreneur told researchers: 'Plenty of unemployed, mostly without experience in my sector. The interpersonal skills of some interviewed in the past have been very poor.'
　　Dr Adam Marshall, director of policy at the British Chambers of Commerce, said the fault lies with the education system, not with the young people themselves.
　　He said new courses spring up because there is demand from would-be students – but not necessarily from businesses.
　　Dr Marshall said: 'There may be a course in underwater basket weaving, but that does not mean anybody will actually want to employ you at the end of it.'
　　He cited the American television crime drama CSI as a prime example. It sparked a huge growth in the popularity of forensic science courses, but Dr Marshall said demand for these graduates is low.
　　Dr Marshall said he is desperate for the country to listen to business and create the right courses to fit the jobs that are available.

A Love Story

Which may have had something to do with John Lucas one evening in 1943 in Kinston waiting and waiting for Blondola Powell to emerge for their for 8 o'clock date.

The second hand made a bunch of trips around the clock.

But no Blondola.

So Lucas asked Powell's roommate what the deal was.

"She said, 'I'll go let her know, again.' And when she came back that time she told me that I had promised to be there at 8, and it was about five minutes after 8 when I got there, so she had changed her mind and had decided to do something else," Lucas said.

Perhaps down, but Lucas was not out, because this is the same guy who not too long before that had seen Powell, a new teacher at the school where he'd been teaching, and for whatever reason was absolutely mesmerized.

"I began staring at her and staring at her," Lucas said.

A fellow teacher asked Lucas why he kept gazing at the woman.

Lucas remembered saying, "I believe I see my wife."

Love bears all things.

Blondola Powell became Blondola Powell Lucas on August 12, 1945 at a ceremony in Charlotte, Blondola's hometown.

But Uncle Sam needed John Lucas in the Asiatic-Pacific theater for World War II. The young man went across the water, did his part to help handle America's business and returned to his bride in Kinston, where he resumed his teaching career and became an assistant principal.

John Lucas, from Rocky Mount, accepted a principalship at a school in Oxford. Blondola began to teach school in Oxford.

And then Hillside High School called on John Lucas to be principal, and that's how the Lucases got to Durham, where Blondola Lucas served as assistant principal at Shepard Middle School.

Love endures all things.

"We've been quite a team," John Lucas said. "Of course, you have differences of opinions to discuss. But you resolve them."

Ah, so that's why the Lucases have been married so long.

Today is their 66th wedding anniversary.

Yet today married couples will call it quits after just six years. Some couples might not last six months.

"I guess it's dedication to purpose and belief that all things are possible if you have a strong faith and belief. A faith that will not shrink," John Lucas said. "Belief in God creates unity of purpose and goals and togetherness.

"We not only lived together, we worked together. We were in church together," John Lucas said.

Wait a minute -- John and Blondola Lucas are best friends?

"Oh, yes!" said John Lucas, 91.

Love does not insist on its own way.

Blondola Lucas, 90, doesn't say much these days. But she pushed through the limitations Father Time has put on her and mustered the strength to let it be known John Lucas still is her big man.

"You have to accept your challenges and your opportunities," explained John Lucas, who said he's given up many of the things he wants to do in order to spend the days with his wife at Hillcrest Convalescent Center, where Duke University basketball players including Nolan Smith have dropped by to visit.

John Lucas said Smith, drafted by the Portland Trail Blazers, played basketball with his grandson, John Lucas III, a member of the NBA's Chicago Bulls and son of former NBA player and coach John Lucas Jr., one of the great athletes to come out of Hillside.

John Sr. and Blondola Lucas have a daughter, Cheryl, who was an educator in Washington, D.C. The elder Lucases have a total of three grandchildren by John  Lucas Jr. and his wife, DeEdgra.

A new Durham middle school is being named to honor John Lucas Sr., former president of Shaw University in Raleigh. Back in June during a reunion of Durham high schools, John Lucas Sr. was dubbed Father of the Decade.

Quite frankly, the recounting of all of John Lucas Sr.'s accolades could go on for quite some time. The man's been walking around on this terra firma more than nine decades.

Yet the old educator would tell you none of those accomplishments mean as much as the achievement of having stayed married to the same woman for 66 years.

"Oh, no!" John Lucas Sr. insisted. "Marriage is No. 1."

John Lucas Sr. said he couldn't recall a time when the sun went down and he and his wife were mad at each other.

In fact, John Lucas Sr. can't remember a day when the two didn't put forth the effort to maintain communication. Even when he was away at war, he said daily he'd write her a letter or little note, and she was back in Kinston putting words on paper for him.

"You work at it by being together, and sharing, caring. Sharing each others' accomplishments and sharing each others' sorrows, and aches and pains," John Lucas Sr. said. "I'm not certain that there has been a day that we haven't either been together, talked by telephone or wrote each other."

And that was before cell phones and email and Facebook and Skype.

"Frequent and steady contact with each other, which allows love to grow," John Lucas Sr. said.

Of course, the younger generation manages frequent and steady communication with friends. The contact just doesn't always carry over to spouses, according to America's divorce rate.

Like he does every evening, John Lucas Sr. will sit with his wife until she falls asleep at the rest home. Then he'll he go home to rest over there on Washington Street where he once lived with his bride.

Blondola Powell Lucas said she loves her husband now as much as she ever did. John Lucas Sr. said the feeling is mutual, and then some.

"It's more and more each day," John Lucas Sr. said. "Love is eternal and is in evolution. There's no end to it."

Love never fails. 

6 Summer Savers Health!

You'll never make a celebrity out of the sun, without shadows with good reason. It also helps to leave more invasive the paparazzi, sunglasses good (ie, those that prevent both UVA and UVB), it is important to keep your eyes healthy and to minimize the development of annoying wrinkles.

Sun damage can contribute to cataracts, photokeratitis (a temporary but painful cornea), and basal cell carcinoma on the eyelids, making sunglasses absolutely essential when venturing outdoors.

Squinting in the sun can cause wrinkles around the eyes, increasing the chances of the ultra-aging crows feet appear - EEK! To keep your eyes healthy, and the skin around them to look younger longer, look for the big sunglasses that block 99-100 percent of UVA and UVB rays, and steer clear of cheap frames to fashion that have not UV protective qualities.

Hair donor: 'I am so privileged'

Linda Johnson-Lundquist, president of IEA Wealth Management in Ankeny, last week made her second donation to Locks of Love, a nonprofit that creates affordable and realistic wigs for children with medical hair loss. Johnson-Lundquist was inspired by her late mother - whose long locks were lost during chemotherapy - to donate her own hair in memoriam.

"It took me 3 1/2 years to get the required length, but I finally did it," said Johnson-Lundquist. "It was so much fun getting this done, and I am so privileged that I was able to do it."
With the support of friend and fellow small-business owner Carol Torrents, Johnson-Lundquist had her locks cut by stylist Natalie Bohnenkamp of Great Clips in Ankeny.

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Bill Odriscoll Archstone is a recognized leader in apartmentinvestment and operations. The companys portfolio is concentratedin many of the most desirable neighborhoods in and aroundWashington, D.C., Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, New York,Seattle and Boston. Archstone strives to provide great apartmentsand lace front wigs great service to its customers—backed byservice guarantees. As of June 30, 2010, the company owned or hadan ownership position in 442 communities located in the UnitedStates and Europe, representing 82,104 units, including units underconstruction. Utilizing this tremendous amount of expertise andinstitutional knowledge, Archstone now also offers comprehensiveadvisory services to owners and lenders who want to maximize thevalue of their assets through Archstone Real Estate AdvisoryServices.Rusmin Kudinar, president of Zeta Instruments, noted, “Z-Dottechnology provides precision measurement advantages for an arrayof lace front wigs difficult-to-measure surfaces and isideally-suited to benefit solar cell and biotechnologyapplications. We are delighted that Bosch has found our solution tobe best in class and honored to supply this lace front wigscritical component of their metrology process. A gravesideservice will be held Friday, Oct. 8, at 11 a.m. in WoodlawnMemorial Gardens, 6309 lace front wigs Virginia Beach Blvd.,Norfolk.As part of its international expansion efforts, CompassPlus established an office in St. Louis, Mo., less than lace frontwigs a year ago. The office is headed by Doug Varble, NorthAmerican vice president for Compass Plus.

Friends with Benefits? Well, It’s Complicated

Jul. 22 2011 - 6:39 pm 

Looks like the just released  Friends with Benefits is going to be a big hit. The early reviews will definitely help.  Manohla Dargis in the NY Times writes it’s “a breezy, speedy and (no kidding) funny comedy with a nicely matched Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis.” Peter Debruge notes “Kunis is a natural with comedy, and now we know she can carry a movie, while Timberlake exudes the kind of star wattage that put Will Smith on top.”

See for yourself, the trailer reveals some PG sparkle from this R-rated rom-com.

But there’s more here to pull people into theaters than star power, witty sit-com timing, and genre bending play. There’s even more, as Juliet Lapidos complains about at Slate, than just the post Harry and Sally cliche that men and women (especially gorgeous, athletic, successful—basically sexy—men and women) can’t be “just friends.”

What there is is sex. Messy, fleshy sex and what it does to people. Friends with Benefits is an effervescent pop-culture attempt at wrangling messy, disregulating sexual experiences into neat, well-regulated categories. You gotta love ‘em for trying. When Kunis’ character says “No emotions, just sex” and then immediately puts the kibosh on Timberlake’s character’s cliched stab at being emotionally supportive, the movie is not just turning a standard romantic comedy cliche on it’s head. Rather, it’s offering soothing reassurance to everyone who has ever felt the out-of-control demi-madness sexual experience can bring—let’s get down to business and do it right! Because the two are not “in a relationship” they felt free to go sex crazy, and they had tremendous fun doing it.

Of course, having so much pleasure with another person is going to leave its mark. So, forget Hollywood’s refracted vision, does it actually work to be a friend with benefits in real life where everyone is much more complicated, needier, and not quite so beautiful. What happens to friendship once sex starts playing a role? Can people just ignore all the psychological, as well as physiological, consequences of sexual experience?

In a word, no. You can’t ignore the consequences of sex anymore than you can those of baseball, dinner, or spending a hot summer afternoon giggling together in a cool movie theater. But sex is even more powerful. Trying to be “friends with benefits” is like trying to make ice cream in a hot oven. It’s the flip-side of a sexless relationship, which is like trying to cook a steak in the freezer. Something’s going to give. With FwB sometimes people become lovers, other times a couple. Often the sex just stops. Or the friendship. Or both.

Unfortunately, ice cream in the oven can also make a real mess. Rebecca Plante, a sociologist at Ithaca College, has been part of a team conducting a multi-campus interview study about sexuality. Concerning the friends with benefits arrangement she said:

“research shows that perhaps the most frequent consequence is awkwardness, accompanied by strained or ceased contact and eventually either future hook ups or the resumption of a non-sexual friendship”

So why bother trying?

“Friends with benefits is a way to explore some sexuality within a friendship, an existing framework of some care and knowledge of one another”

via “Friends with Benefits” Lets Couples Get Close But Not Too Close.

Of course, college students are a unique demographic still relatively untarnished by adult life. My clinical experience is consistent but different as one would expect knowing older people for a longer period of time who have less of a need to explore and a greater need to get on with their lives. For adults, what I’ve seen is that FwB status is usually  transitional, both in intent and outcome. Instead of looking for Mr. or Ms. Right, it’s a way of enjoying Mr. or Ms. “She/He will do for now.”  Like the movie, it’s often a way to find someone while on the rebound. Or like Natalie Portman in last year’s No Strings Attached, its a sexual rest area when someone is  just too busy with career. It’s a way to go sex crazy in “an existing framework of some care and knowledge of one another”  rather than trying to do so with a stranger or with someone who may have different expectations. It may put a friendship at risk, but life is risk.

So, does this all mean one shouldn’t try? Of course not, especially if it’s with Justin Timberlake or Mila Kunis. But don’t expect it to work out as planned. Remember, once those benefits are in the picture, it’s complicated.