DUI charges against Steelers’ Ward dropped and questions for author/comic

Prosecutors have dropped DUI jimmy choo outlet shoes charges against Pittsburgh Steelers receiver and Dancing With the Stars winner Hines Ward.
DeKalb County Prosecutor Sonja N. Brown said Wednesday that Ward pleaded guilty to reckless driving and was given a year on probation. She says he also was fined $2,000 and must do 80 hours of community service. He also must undergo alcohol evaluation.
The 35-year-old Super Bowl XL MVP was arrested last year after he failed to maintain his lane and hit a curb. He failed several field sobriety tests and was booked into the DeKalb County jail and later released on bond.
Ward used to be a primary receiving target but last season wasn’t used as much. He has two years remaining on his deal and has said he’s willing to restructure it to finish his career with Pittsburgh.
1. How are you coping with being 40?cheap womens down vest
The book was a tool to help me deal with my midlife crisis. That and pills. Truthfully, yes, I’m 40, but I look incredible, so I have nothing to be mad at.
2. Why did you dedicate the book to your wife, Martha Hagen-Black?
The book really is a love letter to her. In the last chapter, I address my wife directly and candidly. It makes me embarrassed, which is a good thing.
3. Was it uncomfortable sharing intimate details of your life and marriage?
I am happy to be the butt of the joke, but I didn’t want to write things that might hurt people around me.
4. What’s the thing you’re often told you’re not doing right?
I have never satisfactorily mixed our dog’s wet and dry food. It’s small, but it’s indicative of all of the problems in our relationship and why it will eventually end in divorce, homicide or suicide.
5. Who should read your book?
My experiences are somewhat universal. I’m hoping many readers have never heard of me. To me, show business is the least interesting thing to talk about.nfl jerseys wholesale

It was, Mayor JoAnn Seghini said, one of the ways Midvale — cheap lacoste polo outlet population 30,000 — asserted its civic identity from the looming shadow of Salt Lake City and Salt Lake County.
Tony Mason had been chief of the department for 4½ years, a run that abruptly ended last summer when Midvale was forced to make a heart-wrenching decision.
Faced with mounting costs and declining revenue, the city grudgingly approved the dissolution of its 102-year-old police force and fire department in favor of an unusual merger with four other local police agencies and the Salt Lake County Sheriff’s Department.
“It was a very emotional thing for us to do,” Seghini said. “In the end, though, I think it was the right thing to do.”
The reluctant surrender of a municipal institution has not just been confined to Midvale. It’s happening in cities and towns across the country where persistent budget problems are changing the way basic public services are delivered.
Until the recession, law enforcement was largely spared from budget tensions, but some communities, including Midvale, have reaped both financial savings and operational efficiencies following consolidations or mergers of their police functions. And there is evidence that local government officials are increasingly considering similar dramatic changes in pursuit of more affordable public safety options, according to local government records and law enforcement authorities.
In Pennsylvania, for example, the state police are taking on increasing patrol duties, following recent closures of town and village departments. Since 2010, at least 33 cities scattered throughout Pennsylvania have closed their agencies or scaled back law enforcement operations, according to state records.
Now, when residents of these communities dial 911, state troopers — not local beat cops — are making house calls.
“That’s the way things are going in these places due to the financial strains,” Pennsylvania State Police Sgt. Tony Manetta said, adding that the increasing demands are taxing the state agency.
As the economy continues to sputter, larger agencies, including Oakland, Detroit and Camden, N.J., have raised concerns about their ability to respond to routine residential burglaries, theft and public nuisance calls.
A 2011 Justice Department report addressing the impact of the economic downturn on law enforcement found that agencies are implementing a range of options — from shared SWAT teams, crime laboratories, dispatchers and records units to wholesale mergers and regionalization — that is changing the face of local law enforcement.
A 2011 survey of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the nation’s largest association of top law enforcement officials, found that 77% of its members were providing some form of support for other agencies.
A separate report by the Major Cities Chiefs Association, a group representing the nation’s 63 largest police forces, last year found that 70% were consolidating some law enforcement functions to compensate for recent budget cuts.
Bernard Melekian, director of the Justice Department’s Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) office which produced the Justice Department’s analysis, described mergers as part of “a new reality in American policing,” a trend that will likely continue through the next decade.christian louboutin shoes

Helena Bonham Carter meets queen in tartan and mini top hat

British actress Helena Bonham Carter,christian louboutin evening outlet who’s so good at playing queens, met the real thing on Wednesday when she accepted a CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) honor from Queen Elizabeth II — while attired in a tartan-plaid dress and a mini top hat.
Accompanied by her equally bohemian partner, American director Tim Burton, and their children, Billy Ray, 8, and Nell, 4, Bonham Carter arrived at Buckingham Palace with other esteemed Brits to accept one of the various honors the queen hands out every year. Bonham Carter got hers for services to drama.christian louboutin flats outlet
Nominated twice for Oscars, Bonham Carter, 45, has played two queens in recent years — the Red Queen in Burton’s fantastical Alice in Wonderland, and the queen’s mother, Queen Elizabeth, in The King’s Speech. She played scheming witch Bellatrix Lestrange in the Harry Potter films, starred in a string of British costume dramas such as A Room With a View, and appeared in Hollywood blockbusters such as Fight Club and Planet of the Apes.
The actress, known for her eccentric style (she walked a red carpet once wearing one red shoe and one green shoe), also met the queen last week during a reception to mark the 200th birthday of Charles Dickens, whose Great Expectations is being filmed again, with Bonham Carter as Miss Havisham.
Bonham Carter comes from a prominent English family, and is the great-granddaughter of former prime minister Herbert Asquith. She told reporters at the honors ceremony that her CBE was “very, very special,” according to The Daily Telegraph.fake rolex watchs

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lacoste women short-sleeved shirts outlet A mild winter across the Northeast is injecting extra uncertainty into maple syrup season, but many producers say they’ll just go with the flow, whenever it starts.
Temperatures have been up and snowfall totals have been down throughout the region this winter, raising some concern for the maple syrup crop. But syrup producers say the weather during the six-week season when sap flows matters more than the weather leading up to it.
“The mild winter, I’m sure has some effect on the trees and the soil and the microorganisms and so forth, but as long as you get those freezes and thaws during the actual sap flow season, those are what control how much sap you get,” said Brian Stowe, sugaring operations manager at the University of Vermont’s Proctor Maple Research Center.
Below-freezing nights followed by warm days are necessary to start the sap flowing from maple trees, a period that usually begins in late February or early March. But those conditions arrived early in some areas, prompting producers like Ben Fisk, of Temple, to start collecting and boiling sap Feb. 2, more than a month earlier than he did last year.
“We made syrup the earliest we’ve ever made syrup this year,” said Fisk, 23, a fifth-generation producer who has been making maple syrup since he was 5. “This time of year, there should be three or four feet of snow, and it should be cold out and we shouldn’t even be thinking about making syrup for another couple weeks.”
Though Fisk was happy to get a jump start on the season, it could end early, too, if prolonged stretches of warm weather result in budding trees. That’s the main concern in New York state, where the director of the New York Maple Producers Association has been hearing from plenty of worried members.
“I’ve had more phone calls this year than I’ve ever gotten before. Everyone wants to know what everyone else is doing. ‘Is it time?’ ‘Should we tap?’” said Helen Thomas, who set the 1,700 taps on her family’s farm about a week earlier than usual.
With so little snow, she worries that all it will take is one warm day in March to trick the trees into thinking spring has arrived. Once trees start to bud, the sap develops an “off” flavor, effectively ending the season.
“The snow moderates any warm-up. You can have a 60-degree day in March, but if there’s two feet of snow on the ground, that tends to keep the woods cool, so you can get past that warm day or two,” she said.
In North Andover, Mass., Paul Boulanger of Turtle Lane Maple Farm, has decided not to tap his trees at all this year because he’s already seeing signs of leaf buds on the trees.
“Even if we started tapping right now, we’d only get a couple of weeks of very watered down sap, and it’s just not worth it We just didn’t have winter, and without winter, there’s no spring, and without spring, there’s no maple syrup,” said Boulanger, who still plans to give educational tours of his sugar house by watering down syrup he made last year and turning it back into sap.lacoste polo long-sleeved outlet

lacoste women long-sleeved shirts outlet One can see a logical basis for restrictions on use; you don’t want to put an abattoir next to a residential district. On the other hand, you don’t want to put the factories too far from where the workers live. Or, you don’t want to put poor people where the rich people live.
Unfortunately, these bylaws and rules carry over to today; in many municipalities, zones have minimum floor area requirements specifically to keep out small houses; so much for the Tiny House movement. They don’t allow for second units on a property, that might turn into a slum; so much for the granny flat and back lane housing movement. Everybody talks about the need to increase density, but literally, not in my backyard.
It is a difficult job, finding the right mix; in 1916 New York they tried “to separate the stores from the residence districts, and yet not put them too far away, but always have them within reach.” Today of course, within reach means driving to the mall, the same principle blown up to a completely different scale.
The use rules are also coming back to bite us; many people now working from home are in fact, doing it illegally. Cities are beginning to wonder about if teleworkers should be paying residential or commercial tax rates.
Restrictions on building form make Manhattan the wonderful sight that it is, with the setback requirements giving buildings their distinctive wedding cake shape. But Talen also explains how rules on form can be much more subtle and just as important, with something as simple as the curve radius required at corners. As curve radii go from five feet to fifty, you get a completely different pattern and scale.
Rules determining street width, building height, setback, and lot coverage have produced an urban form that in twenty-first century America, has little ability to define space. Instead, rules have prioritized traffic flow and parking provision, health effects and fire prevention, often based on reasoning that no longer holds.
But what is the alternative?
Today, zoning rules are under attack from economists like Edward Glaeser and Ryan Avent, who claim that they are keeping density down and increasing the cost of housing. But as the planners of 1916 knew, and is still true today, the price of land is a function of the allowable zoning, and if you double the density, it doesn’t halve the cost of land. Look at Toronto, in a building boom; the towers get taller but the price per square foot doesn’t go down, it goes up. Zoning drives the economics of the development industry, but if smartly done, that can be a very good thing.
On the other side, we still have officials and planners that defend sprawl as the American Dream unfolding before your eyes”, and don’t get me started on Agenda 21.
Yet in a system with proper controls, Andres Duany writes that form-based codes can “actually protect the public realm from politicians, fire marshals, corporate interests, engineers, the architectural avant garde and the “vicissitudes of ownership.”
Talen concludes:
gaining better, more sustainable cities, places that are walkable, diverse, compact, and beautiful- will require strong public support and, along with it , a new approach to the rules of city making.lacoste polo shirts men’s outlet

cheap abercrombie bikini Self-Destructing Janitor Satellite to Clean Up Space,can you believe it?
In space, no one can hear you clean. But given the astonishing amount of trash in orbit around our planet, it’s a chore that needs to be done no matter how quietly.
According to NASA over half-a-million pieces of trash, from decommissioned satellites to discarded bits of rocket parts, are orbiting around Earth every day, raising the danger of catastrophic collision with each future venture into outer space. With that in mind, a team of scientists from one of Europe’s tidiest countries, Switzerland, recently announced plans to deploy a series of junk-collecting satellites to remove some of the dangerous space debris currently floating high above our heads as part of a project called Clean Space One.
“It’s time to do something to reduce the amount of debris floating around in space,” says Claude Nicollier of the Federal Institute of Technology at Lausanne. “Most debris comes from satellites that are no longer in use – typically they have run out of energy and their solar panels or batteries don’t work; when they collide it creates lots of debris.”
So how does one go about cleaning up space, humankind’s seemingly immeasurable sweep-under rug? With self-destructing janitor satellites, of course. Taking a cue from nature’s best grippers, Swiss researchers devised small orbiters which find and clasp onto intersteller trash before plummeting back towards Earth where both would be destroyed during the heat and friction of re-entry.
Given the amount of trash in space, and the potential damage to expensive satellites and spacecraft such debris could inflict, the scientists can see a future ripe with their astro-janitorial assistants.
“Space agencies are increasingly finding it necessary to take into consideration and prepare for the elimination of the stuff they’re sending into space,” Swiss Space Center Director Volker Gass told SwissInfo. “We want to be the pioneers in this area.”
If the idea of tentacled litter-busting satellites sounds like quite an imaginative solution for cleaning up space junk, it’s certainly not the most far-fetched. In the last few years, a range of creative suggestions have been put forth to keep mankind’s final frontier from looking like a dump — from using giant gold balloons to gather junk or just firing lasers at it, to recycling that debris into new satellites altogether, the ideas have bordered on science fiction — but then again, so does the notion that we’ve trashed space so much that this has become a problem in need of a solution.cheap abercrombie bracelets

cheap womens jeans shorts Interracial marriage in the USA reached an all-time high in 2010: 8.4% of all marriages, compared with 3.2% in 1980, finds a Pew Research Center study, released today, that analyzes unions between spouses of different races or ethnic groups.
Among marriages in 2010, 15% of couples married outside their race or ethnicity.
“Interracial marriage has gone from taboo to a rarity, and with each passing year, it’s less of a rarity,” says Pew’s Paul Taylor. Pew reviewed Census data from more than 850,000 people in the American Community Survey between 2008 and 2010.
In addition, Pew surveyed 2,003 adults in September and found more tolerance: 43% agree that “more people of different races marrying each other has been a change for the better in our society.” Another 44% say it made no difference; 11% say it’s been a change for the worse.
But questions about race make people cautious, says sociologist Daniel Lichter of Cornell University. “People don’t want to reveal negative attitudes that might reflect badly on them, and they tend to tell interviewers what they want to hear,” says Lichter, whose data analysis last year found similar trends in interracial marriage.
Pew found that minorities, younger adults, the college-educated, those who say they’re “liberal” and those who live in the Northeast and the West are more likely to view intermarriage positively.
Other regional differences were clear in the 2008-2010 data Pew analyzed: 35% of all newlyweds who married outside their race live in the West. In Hawaii, 42% of newlyweds fell into that category; other states with 20% or more are all west of the Mississippi.
Pew also found that among those who married in 2008-2010, 42% had been married before (one partner or both). And some patterns vary by gender among blacks and Asians but not among whites and Hispanics. Among blacks, 24% of newlywed men married outside their race, compared with 9% of women. Among Asians, the opposite is true: 36% of women married outside their race, compared with 17% of men.cheap womens knit tanks

Rajon Rondo suspended two games for throwing ball at ref

lacostebagsinhongkong Stu Jackson, the NBA’s executive vice president for basketball operations, announced the suspension Monday, one day after Rondo received two technical fouls and was ejected late in the third quarter of Boston’s 96-81 loss at the Detroit Pistons.
Rondo was upset that a foul wasn’t called with about 3:00 left in the quarter and tossed the ball at referee Sean Wright. He followed that with a verbal barrage directed at Wright and was ejected from a game for the first time in his professional career.
PHOTOS: Rajon Rondo on the court
“You’re always disappointed when that happens,” said Celtics coach Doc Rivers. “You should never put yourself in front of the team. lacoste polo long-sleeved outlet But it’s an emotional game. We can all agree that it was a pretty bad foul and a clear foul that wasn’t called. At the time, we were getting our butts kicked and the frustration was high and it’s a human game. I can guarantee you five seconds, 30 seconds after it happened, I guarantee you Rondo wished he could take it back.”
Rondo will miss Monday night’s game at Dallas and Wednesday’s matchup with Oklahoma City.
Rivers didn’t seem surprised that the suspension was for two games.
“They told us early to don’t prepare for him playing tonight. When they said that, I felt it meant multiple, otherwise they would have said one game.”
Chiefs CB Brandon Carr — This 2008 fifth-rounder has started since Day 1 and never missed a game. We say keep Carr and fellow CB Brandon Flowers together and worry about inconsistent WR Dwayne Bowe’s situation later. (UPDATE: CB Stanford Routt’s arrival could swing the tag to Bowe.)
Falcons MLB Curtis Lofton — He’s worked his way into being a solid three-down player and defensive leader. We’re giving him the nod over CB Brent Grimes, who battled injuries and inconsistency in 2011 after a Pro Bowl year in 2010.
Bills WR Stevie Johnson — Believe it or not, the only Buffalo payer to ever record consecutive 1,000-yard receiving seasons. (Yes, we checked, and Andre Reed never did it.) Johnson should tone down the antics, but it doesn’t seem to make sense to strip QB Ryan Fitzpatrick of his only deep threat.
Jaguars DE Jeremy Mincey — It seems like Jacksonville has been seeking pass rushers ever since Tony Brackens left. Mincey had eight sacks in 2011, so why not lock up the 28-year-old for at least a year and see if he can do it again?
Jets NT Sione Pouha — Stout 3-4 nose tackles are tough to replace, and the Jets don’t need another problem. Pouha has been more than up to the task of anchoring Rex Ryan’s defense since first replacing injured Kris Jenkins in 2009.
Browns ILB D’Qwell Jackson — The last two times he’s survived a full season, he’s averaged 156 tackles. Problem is, injuries cost him most of 2009 and all of 2010. We’d take a $9 million chance as a prelude to keeping him for a few more years.
Redskins TE Fred Davis — Love the talent. Hate that he managed to incur a four-game drug suspension in a post-lockout environment. Another slip, and he’s gone for a year.lacoste polo shirts men’s outlet

lacoste women long-sleeved shirts outlet No NFL franchise tags have been handed out so far even though Monday marked the first day they could be used.
Still, they remain a very effective way to hinder free-agent movement — no one has switched teams at the expense of the franchise tag’s price of two first-round picks since 1998 — but can also serve as the first step toward signing a star to a multi-year deal.
Traditionally, a dozen or so tags are used each offseason. Teams must weigh the cost of losing a talented player vs. the cost of likely overpaying him — which is why, for example, the Giants probably won’t tag WR Mario Manningham as much as they’d like to keep him — just not for $9.4 million.>
Saints QB Drew Brees — This is a no-brainer, though it’d be even smarter to get record-setting Brees re-signed quickly so the tag could be reserved for all-pro G Carl Nicks or WR Marques Colston.
Texans OLB Mario Williams — He had five sacks in five games in 2011 before a torn pectoral muscle ended his season. We can only imagine what Houston’s all-time sack king could do in a full season under DC Wade Phillips’ tutelage. Restricted free agent RB Arian Foster (who could still be protected by a prohibitive first-round tender even if Williams is tagged) is also a priority, but we’d wait for unrestricted Williams’ situation to be resolved first. Elite pass rushers are harder to find than tailbacks.
Ravens RB Ray Rice — League leader in yards from scrimmage last year certainly deserves a lengthy deal but better to get him locked down first. After all, Baltimore’s offense runs through him.
Patriots WR Wes Welker — Yes, he dropped a pass in Super Bowl XLVI that some in New England are unfairly putting in the Bill Buckner category. Stop. What about the standard reliability, toughness and average of 111 catches during Welker’s five-year stay in New England?
Bears RB Matt Forte — His loss was even more crippling to Chicago than QB Jay Cutler’s in 2011. Forte probably would have had the most rushing/receiving yards in the NFL had he not injured his knee.
Packers TE Jermichael Finley — We wish he’d hang onto more balls, wasn’t quite so chatty and didn’t treat every first down reception like it had just won the Super Bowl. But Finley sure does alter defensive gameplans. Green Bay C Scott Wells is also a major priority.
Cardinals DE Calais Campbell — He’s got 180 tackles and 21 sacks over the past three years, excellent production from a 3-4 end. lacoste women short-sleeved shirts outlet Then there’s that 6-8 frame that makes him a threat to block FGs.
Seahawks RB Marshawn Lynch — He scored in 11 consecutive games at one point last season. He got a lot of tough yards behind an average O-line, a contrast to the days when Shaun Alexander got a lot of easy yards behind an elite front five. Losing Lynch’s relentlessness would be a big blow to a developing team. If Seattle can get something done with Lynch, franchising 323-pound DE Red Bryant is also worthy of consideration.
Lions DE Cliff Avril — His sack total has gone up in all four of his NFL seasons (he had 11 in 2011). No reason to mess with that D-line.
Chargers WR Vincent Jackson — He and GM A.J. Smith aren’t best buds, but the offense sure does blossom when VJ, who’s averaged 17.5 yards per catch during his career, is stretching the field. He does need to stay out of trouble off it.
Eagles WR DeSean Jackson — Didn’t love his attitude in 2011. Don’t love his 175-pound frame. But he sure can change a game quickly, as a deep threat or a punt returner.
Titans CB Cortland Finnegan — He’s not the most beloved player in the league … unless you’re one of his Tennessee teammates. We do love his fearlessness.
49ers CB Carlos Rogers — His last impression wasn’t so good after Giants WR Victor Cruz abused him in the NFC Championship Game. Still, Rogers had a breakout year and gets a slight nod over Pro Bowl S Dashon Goldson. And, yes, QB Alex Smith also needs to be addressed, but we’re not prepared to tag him for more than $14 million.singaporelacostesale

WHEN predicting this year’s BAFTA hair trends, Charles Worthington – the official hair stylist for the event – knows what to expect.
“We’re definitely seeing a more spontaneous look on the red carpets this season,” he told us. “Hair is either worn up in a loose chignon, either behind or to the side – think Charlize Theron’s beautiful side chignon at this year’s Golden Globes – or loose and wavy and more contemporary than past seasons.”
SEE CHARLIZE THERON’S HAIR STYLE FILE
Worthington and his team will be on hand at the BAFTA Style Suites at The Savoy before the event this Sunday, alongside fellow official partners: Asprey, Escada, Hackett and Lancme.
“Many of the nominees and presenters do book in advance on a first come, first served basis, however we do keep some appointments free for last minute reservations,” revealed Worthington. “We also have a team of roamers, myself included, to make personal visits to celebrities’ homes or hotel suites to give that extra care and attention to stars that have perhaps just flown in.”
Charles Worthington’s BAFTA and 25th Anniversary collection is available nationwide. Visit www.charlesworthington.com for more information.