March 2011
7 posts
Jacki's Work: County revamps annual Kite Day →
By Jacqueline Raithel, Contributing Writer
It’s not often that hundreds of kites fly together. In Chesterfield that usually only happens once a year – on Kite Day.
The Chesterfield County Department of Parks and Recreation will host the annual family event this year at the Clover Hill…
Prepping your home for resale
By Jacqueline Raithel, Contributing Writer
If you’re looking to sell your home, a few quick improvements can go a long way, and it might be easier than you think.
“Your house needs to shine,” said John Kendig, a Long & Foster real estate agent. “It needs to shine from the moment they drive up the driveway and when they walk in the front door. It should have a fresh aroma, be uncluttered, and...
Jacki's Work: Blind woman sets her sights on the... →
By Jacqueline Raithel, Contributing Writer
Many participants in the Ukrop’s Monument Avenue 10k find the event to be a challenge on its own, but walking the race with severely impaired vision adds an extra set of challenges.
For Renee Haynes, those challenges will be very real on April 2,…
Ninth-grader races to ATV championship title
By Jacqueline Raithel, Contributing Writer
Dylan Butler isn’t allowed to drive a car yet, but that hasn’t stopped him from racing his way to the podium of at least 10 ATV championships in 2010, including six firstplace titles.
Read the full story here, in the Chesterfield Observer.
Jacki's Work: New ballet dances into Chesterfield →
By Jacqueline Raithel, Contributing Writer
There’s a new show in town, literally. The Stavna Ballet Company danced its way into existence in December 2010 and debuted at the Virginia Dance Festival in January.
Chesterfield’s newest nonprofit ballet company drew some attention at the…
Banking on the future
Financial institutions partner with schools
By Jacqueline Raithel, Contributing Writer
It’s never too early to start teaching children about financial responsibility, and with the help of Chesterfield County Public Schools and several local banks, the task has gotten easier.
Three local banks are working with county schools, offering financial literacy courses and encouraging students to...
Jacki's Work: Oral histories honor elders →
By Jacqueline Raithel, Contributing Writer
History is usually written by victors, and the oppressed are rarely given a voice, but a new project through the Chesterfield Historical Society of Virginia is honoring the lives of African-American elders by making sure their stories are heard.
…
February 2011
2 posts
Borders files for Ch. 11 bankruptcy protection →
NEW YORK — Bookseller Borders, which helped pioneer superstores that put countless mom-and-pop bookshops out of business, filed for bankruptcy protection Tuesday, sunk by crushing debt and sluggishness in adapting to a rapidly changing industry.
Couch Surfing: Social Networking Opens Doors for... →
It’s 1 a.m., and I’m in Hong Kong for the first time, sitting in a bar in the Lan Kwai Fong district. I’m waiting for two girls I met on the Internet to show up and take me to their apartment, so my friend Harry and I can stay there for free for a few nights. Having been on flights for the past 24 hours, I am worn out and nervous when they don’t arrive on time.
January 2011
5 posts
Jacki's Work: Alcoholic energy drinks lure teens →
By Jacqueline Raithel, Contributing Writer
Jan. 19, 2011
Alcoholic energy drinks have created quite a buzz in recent years. Unfortunately, their high alcohol content, sweet flavoring and colorful packaging have made them a favorite alcoholic drink for teens.
“The drinks are very sweet –…
Because One Superlative Isn't Enough - Coolest... →
The most valuable contribution a magazine employee can make is to invent a franchise: TIME’s Person of the Year, Fortune’s Fortune 500, People’s Sexiest Man Alive, Franchise Times’ Top 200 Franchises. With magazines dying and the recession not abating, I had to come up with a new franchise to save my job. Which is how, after several minutes of thinking, I came up with...
People volunteer even in bad times, but more help...
By Jacqueline Raithel, Contributing Writer
Dec. 29, 2010
As the holiday season wraps up, county residents have defied a national trend by donating their time for those who need it most. Some nonprofits throughout Chesterfield report that despite the current economy, the number of persons volunteering is actually increasing.
This goes against a UCLA study, indicating volunteering is down...
December 2010
6 posts
Jesus is a liberal democrat -- Stephen Colbert... →
“If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn’t help the poor, either we’ve got to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we’ve got to acknowledge that he commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition, and then admit that we just don’t want to do it.” - Stephen Colbert
Mark Zuckerberg - Person of the Year 2010 - TIME →
For connecting more than half a billion people and mapping the social relations among them; for creating a new system of exchanging information; and for changing how we all live our lives, Mark Elliot Zuckerberg is TIME’s 2010 Person of the Year.
Jacki's Work: Nonprofit fundraising fueled by... →
By Jacqueline Raithel, Contributing Writer
Dec. 8, 2010
With corporate giving still down this year, many Chesterfield nonprofits are counting on the generosity of individual donors to keep their organizations afloat.
“The biggest difference is the lack of corporate support,” said Amy…
Down at the Corner Store - Newsweek →
Mom-and-pop storefronts in New York City
Things the Internet Killed - Newsweek →
It’s hard to imagine life without some of the technological innovations of the last decade. But in a world where connectivity is everywhere, there are some traditions, values, and just plain ways of life that we no longer adhere to. Here’s a sampling of casualties due to our constant mobile and Internet connections.
What Is PostPost? A Social Newspaper for Facebook... →
For Facebook users who don’t have time to delve into their Facebook newsfeed every day, PostPost is something you may want to give a test drive. A real-time “social newspaper,” PostPost is a web-based service created from what your friends post on Facebook, and only the latest in a series of social news aggregators. It’s kind of like Flipboard on the iPad, but accessible...
November 2010
26 posts
National Unfriend Day: 10 Reasons to Unfriend... →
Go Forth and Unfriend
November 17th is National Unfriend Day, and you’re in. Yet, choosing who to keep and who to lose isn’t always so clear. Fortunately, NewsFeed has come up with some guidelines to help you make your selections. Happy unfriending!
Beatles Songs Expected to Go On iTunes -... →
For the next generation of Beatles fans, the wait could soon be over. Apple is expected on Tuesday to announce that it has finally struck a deal with the Beatles, the best-selling music group of all time, and the band’s record company, EMI, to sell the band’s music on iTunes, according to a person with knowledge of the private deal who requested anonymity because the agreement was still...
Blake Gopnik - Facebook's popularity doesn't seem... →
It’s a safe bet that no image in history has been viewed as many times, as intently, as the basic Facebook page. The company claims that its 500 million users spend more than 10 billion hours every month looking at that blue-and-gray Web site. In her five centuries of existence, Mona Lisa has not been ogled as much. She must be jealous.
RELEVANT Magazine - Everything Needs Discernment →
Shaun Groves on how a note about heresy in a Donald Miller book made him rethink discernment.
‘Giving Pledge,’ Promoted by Buffett and Gates,... →
WITHOUT a doubt, the biggest event in philanthropy this year was the Giving Pledge, a commitment by 40 of the wealthiest Americans to give away at least half of their fortunes, about $600 billion.
Training Wheels for Charity - NYTimes.com →
THE jewelry designer Joan Hornig believes that you can lead people to philanthropy, but that only a very special incentive can make charity second nature to them.
In Radio Dabanga raid, Sudan targets last... →
At a market stall in southern Sudan, Darfuri trader Omer Saleh, 45, turned up the volume on his small battery-operated radio. Radio Dabanga, he said - the Dutch-based service that transmits Darfur news by local journalists through shortwave frequencies into Sudan - “is the only way I can know what is happening at home.”
Chinese baby formula activist sentenced to 2 1/2... →
BEIJING - A Chinese court on Wednesday imposed a 21/2-year prison sentence on a man who became an activist after his son experienced kidney problems linked to contaminated baby formula.
Sesame Street's Viral Ambitions - Video - TIME.com →
With video parodies of viral ads and TV shows like Mad Men, Sesame Street is getting kids’ attention online while hooking in their parents, too
Faces at the Finish - Interactive Feature -... →
There were 45,344 runners who participated in the 2010 New York City Marathon. Here are 99 of them right after they crossed the finish line.
Julie Klam, Author of ‘You Had Me at Woof,’ Talks... →
THERE are dog people, there are people who read dog books, and there are people who write dog books. (Many of them.) Julie Klam, author of a new memoir, “You Had Me at Woof,” is, at least in part — and in part to her chagrin — all three.
Facebook brings the Afghan war to Fort Campbell →
AT FORT CAMPBELL, KY. Emily Franks was playing with her toddler when a soldier called from Afghanistan with devastating news.
A massive roadside bombing had killed five soldiers from her husband’s 120-man infantry company. The soldier was calling Franks, who was at the center of a wives’ support network, in violation of a military-imposed communications blackout on the unit.
John Grisham's "The Confession," reviewed by... →
“The Confession” is the kind of grab-a-reader-by-the-shoulders suspense story that demands to be inhaled as quickly as possible. But it’s also a superb work of social criticism in the literary troublemaker tradition of Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle.” The novel’s target — the death penalty and its casualties — derives from John Grisham’s...
Jerry Bock, Composer of ‘Fiddler on the Roof’... →
Jerry Bock, who wrote his first musical in public school and went on to compose the scores for some of Broadway’s most successful shows, including “Fiddler on the Roof,” “Fiorello!” and “She Loves Me,” died on Wednesday in Mount Kisco, N.Y. He was 81 and lived in Manhattan.
Will Training in the Heat Improve Your Performance... →
Can training for hot weather help you to perform better when the temperature outside begins to drop?
Midterms: Why Dems and GOP Are Nostalgic for... →
Nostalgia is a powerful force in American politics. Consider this year’s midterm elections. Democrats wanted to return to the Clinton years, when budgets were balanced and the economy was booming. Glenn Beck and his Tea Party followers yearned for a time before Woodrow Wilson. And while the rest of the Republican Party didn’t pledge to take the country back quite as far—the 1950s, for example,...
VMFA: Upcoming: Picasso: Masterpieces from the... →
“The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts proudly announces a landmark exhibition in honor of its 75th anniversary, Picasso: Masterpieces from the Musée National Picasso, Paris. VMFA is the only East Coast venue for the exhibition’s seven-city international tour. The exhibition, which will be on view from February 19 through May 15, 2011, is co-organized by the Musée National Picasso, Paris and the...
Robert Cargill: The Skeptic in the Sanctuary - O... →
In the end, what you believe is simply not as important as what you do for others. If Christians are saved by faith, it is obedient faith in a Messiah who commanded us to serve others. And if they exist, heaven and hell will take care of themselves if you do what you’ve been asked to do.
Washing Away the Past →
Apoyo Matek! This means “thank you very much” in Luo, the language of Uganda. The locals said it so often on a recent trip that I wondered why they remained so thankful. I found their unshakable attitude for each day and every person they come across amazing, especially in the wake of such a difficult, war-torn past.
Why Are Classrooms Empty in Uganda? →
Education—and its failures for kids—is a hot topic in the States right now. Floods of college grads want to join Teach For America to help inner-city schools, teachers’ unions are up in arms, and the government is searching for the most effective way to improve the education system and get more kids to graduate.
‘Cleopatra - A Life,’ by Stacy Schiff, Captures... →
From the start Cleopatra’s story was larger than life: epic in scale, mythic in symbolism and operatically over the top in its grandeur and its spectacle. As Stacy Schiff describes it in a captivating new biography, Cleopatra’s meeting with Julius Caesar was “a singular, shuddering moment,” when “two civilizations, passing in different directions, unexpectedly and momentously” touched.
Can 'Toy Story 3' Win the Oscar? - Newsweek →
It’s Election Day. Time to talk serious politics—like the Oscars. Toy Story 3 is the most successful movie of the year, and the top-grossing cartoon of all time. It was also adored by 99 percent of America’s movie critics (and it’s on DVD this week, which is why we’re talking about it). Since the Oscars now nominate 10 films for best picture instead of five in an effort...
Giants Win First World Series for San Francisco -... →
ARLINGTON, Tex. — The Giants bolted New York for San Francisco 53 long years ago, back when the Red Sox were cursed, the White Sox were, too, and a Florida Marlin was a fish, not an athlete wearing teal and black. Their fans have shivered through frigid June evenings and wept over October heartbreak, those soul-crushing years of 1962 and 1989 and 2002, watching as seemingly everyone else has...
October 2010
8 posts
IPad a Therapeutic Marvel for Disabled People -... →
OWEN CAIN depends on a respirator and struggles to make even the slightest movements — he has had a debilitating motor-neuron disease since infancy.
Time traveler caught on film in 1928? Filmmaker... →
Hahaha. Did a time traveler get caught on camera in 1928?
Just who does Jon Stewart think he is? →
By Paul Farhi
These days, he can claim to be many things: political satirist, pseudo-anchorman, media critic, author, successful businessman, philanthropist, Emmy Award magnet. On Monday he arrives in Washington in a new, self-anointed role: as our national voice of reason, moderation and rationality — a uniter, you might say, not a divider.
Gilbert Grosvenor steps down as National... →
By Thomas Heath
The Grosvenors, a storied Washington family and heirs to Alexander Graham Bell, will conclude 122 consecutive years of stewardship over the National Geographic Society at the end of the year when Gilbert M. Grosvenor retires as chairman of the board of trustees.