Beach Trading Blog

You can do your part to help the environment by wearing a rash guard…

Simply make the switch to a rash guard for your UV protection and you will use much less sunscreen, (chemicals), and more importantly: the plastic bottles they come in.

The over-abundance of plastic in the ocean is one of the most alarming of today’s environmental stories. Plastic, like diamonds, are forever! Because plastic does NOT biodegrade, no naturally occurring organisms can break it down.

Today, most of the debris in the ocean is made up of plastic. In fact there are areas in the Pacific Ocean where scientists have found six times more plastic than zooplankton, (the stuff that fish and whales eat)!! That’s outrageous, disgusting and just plain sad…

We don’t want to bum you out, but this information is very important and the word about this needs to get out because many people just don’t realize it.

In an effort to help save the oceans we play in and love, along with the creatures and fish who live in it, (and who are part of our food chain), we will be posting more information about what we’re doing to harm our planet and what we can do to help, so stay tuned…

A final installment of Mark’s memories of Heal the Bay, with the “Baywatch” babes

Pop culture  HtB’s involvement in popular culture has always been memorable.  From “Baywatch” to KTLA’s Coastal Cleanup Day specials, we ended up in the more popular media in a lot of ways.  Who could forget “The Solution,” a benefit CD with Bad Religion, Blink 182 and Black Eyed Peas contributing tracks?  Evidently nearly everyone — it didn’t sell much.  In the movies, we had our star turn in the thriller “Cellular” starring Kim Basinger, Jason Statham and Chris Evans.  The kidnapping occurred on the pier during a Heal the Bay “benefit.”  The band was supposed to be Incubus, but they had a conflict.  HtB also showed up on an exploded bus billboard in “Speed” and a billboard in the John Cusack end-of –the-world  saga “2012.”  And I lost track of the number of fishbone HtB cameos in TV shows, from “thirtysomething” to “Hannah Montana” to “Modern Family.”

Malibu  So much work.  So much contention.  Yet there is no way to walk away from fighting for that incredible coast. One memory: “Surf Doctor” Jeff Harris setting up a PSA shoot at Malibu Lagoon with Mel Gibson.  The focus was on the impacts of Tapia’ summer discharges on Malibu Lagoon and Surfrider Beach.  I have never seen anyone more agitated in my life.  The guy was being stalked by the paparazzi  — helicopter overhead and guys behind bushes.  This was a real “Conspiracy Theory” They were out to invade his privacy.  On the good news side:  the Regional Board ordered Tapia’s discharge out of Malibu Creek from April through October, a major boon to Surfrider’s water quality because the lagoon berm breached less frequently.

Bravery  I’ll always remember the courage of the volunteers that gave Heal the Bay everything they had even when they were fighting cancer.  Jean Howell and Bob Hertz for Speakers Bureau.  Joe Crocker, our first board treasurer.  And of course, Dorothy.

Heroes  Finally getting to see my idol, Jacques Cousteau, speak about saving the oceans. It was at a Marina del Rey chamber of commerce lunch. I took Mark E Pollock.  It was surreal. Cousteau was wearing a powder-blue leisure suit and he stood on bright green Astroturf.

Science!  I’ve always been partial to hiring very strong technical staff for the science and policy department. At one time, we had four doctorates (all UCLA Environmental Science and Engineering grads):  myself, Mitzy Taggart, Craig Shuman and Shelley Luce. One Shelley story stands out. She was our science and policy director and she applied for the executive director position for the Santa Monica Bay Restoration Commission. I encouraged her to apply, but I was majorly concerned about losing such a valuable staff leader. The search committee included David Nahai and myself. We thought that the lead candidate, the highly experienced and extremely bright Nancy Sutley, would get the job in a heartbeat. After all she had recently left the state Water Board and Cal-EPA assistant secretary position. For some reason, Nancy wasn’t on her game during the interview, and Luce blew us away and got the job, where she’s flourished ever since. Sutley became Mayor Villaraigosa’s deputy Mayor for energy and environment and is now serving in the Obama adminsitration as the director of the President’s Council of Environmental Quality. It worked out for the best for all of us.

Smart propositions  The fight for clean stormwater led to the successful Prop O (Los Angeles) and Measure Y (Santa Monica) funding measures.  For the 0 million Prop O, I remember enviro groups and engineering firms pulling together under the leadership of Eric Garcetti and Jan Perry to make it happen.  And the measure passed with over 76% of the vote! Now that was a fun celebration.  Of course none of this would have happened without then Chief Legislative Analyst Ron Deaton’s decision to draw up the measure and go for it.  The Measure V success was a little different.  Craig Perkins convinced councilmembers like Bobby Shriver and Richard Bloom to push for the ongoing stormwater funding measure to reduce Bay runoff pollution and reduce flood risk and increase local water supply.  The integrated approach and ongoing funding was great.  The decision to make me campaign chair and plaster my ugly mug all over direct mail campaign pieces was really uncomfortable.  Measure V only passed by 100 votes.

Fishy business  During the height of the state and federal government’s natural resources damages lawsuit and the EPA’s Superfund enforcement actions, Heal the Bay undertook a fish contamination study on white croaker sold in local markets.  Staffer James Alamillo led the effort along with chemist Rich Gossett, and we found that locally sold croaker was highly contaminated: one fish had a concentration of DDT over 30 parts per million!  Talk about hazardous to your health.  As a result, the study was used by the government in its enforcement case.  Heck, the polluters even hired renowned UCSB  ichthyologist Milton Love to redo our study.  Since the contaminated croaker was largely found at Asian community markets, the Center for Biological Diversity actually sued those markets for supposedly knowingly selling croaker after the release of our study,  a Prop 65 violation.  We never predicted that litigious outcome, and we even got deposed on the case.  Due to the threat of third party litigation, the local white croaker fishery ended up closing down.

No seismic shift  Even an earthquake last year during a joint Heal the Bay-NRDC plea to the EPA office of water for more protective beach water quality standards couldn’t shake up the status quo in Washington D.C.  The recently released draft criteria are weaker in many ways than the 1986 criteria despite the completion of dozens of studies in the beach water quality microbiology and epidemiology fields.

Ballona  The fight for the future of Ballona has gone on for over 30 years. I remember the proposal from former councilwoman Pat Russell that would have destroyed the wetlands. In response to public uproar, Ruth Galanter got elected as the Save Ballona candidate. Poring over reams of Playa Vista EIR documents and design specifications for the freshwater treatment marsh was enormously time consuming and tedious. But the turning point was the environmental group debates leading to the state purchase.  Areas A and B, the main wetland, were for sale and California had the bond money to buy it. Governor Davis’ days were running out because of the recall, so those in favor of the wetland purchase had to act fast. Environment Now hosted a series of meetings where the environmental community was split between buying the wetlands for the exorbitant price of 0 million, or opposing the purchase. The opposition didn’t want to pay more than -10M for the wetlands. The opponents were concerned that the extra revenues would enable Playa Vista to finish their development (Phase I was largely completed at that point.) After heated discussions, some of us (NRDC, Heal the Bay and Friends of Ballona to name a few) expressed our strong support for the purchase. I remember saying, “30 years from now, our kids won’t care what we paid for Ballona Wetlands. They’ll just care that they exist and they are preserved.” Luckily, this sentiment prevailed with Mary Nichols, the Secretary of Resources at the time.

The Staff of Life  Watching Alix Hobbs grow from an 18-year-old receptionist to Programs Director to the Associate Director of the organization. Seeing Meredith McCarthy go from a Coastal Cleanup Day coordinator to the Programs Director and a force for greening L.A.  Admiring the growth of a couple of UCSB Bren graduates into the water quality director, Kirsten James, and the coastal resources director, Sarah Sikich They’ve become environmental leaders locally and in Sacramento.  Receptionist Gabriele Morgan greeting me every day, usually with a bad pun or a political joke. Callers to Heal the Bay have been heard the soothing tones of Gabriele’s voice for a long time.  I’ll miss her voice, but not nearly as much as her biting commentary. Matt King, the best communication director in the business, constantly drawing on obscure film, news and sports references.  Kudos to Vicki Wawerchak, who has progressed from being a Key to the Sea educator to ably running our Santa Monica Pier Aquarium, a community asset beloved by children and parents alike. I’m thankful for having a decade of Karin Hall as Heal the Bay’s No. 2 – helping to build the aquarium, keeping the board engaged and managing staff.  Lee Myers sharing stories of the trials and tribulations of raising three kids while healing the Bay.  And James Alamillo, Big Game James, my closest friend on staff, providing innovative ideas and providing a quick critique, and always there in an emergency or when you want to kill some time talking about sports. I will miss you guys!

Filed under: Water Quality
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Helpful to in the process of loading flatbed for pickup trucks materials to produce both a fall prevention system and office for jobsite set ups the packaging materials found in constructing your shipping pet crates for merchandise. Some of the highlights of the platform will be that it is 45′ long by 72″ broad and runs from a lessened height of 5′ to a maximum raised height of 12′-6″ with a complete platform volume of 1500#. The podium can move in towards and away from the flat bed trailer for a powered travel base well guided by a couple of rails that happen to be anchored on the floor. The travel distance on the way to and out from the trailer is roughly 6′.

The platform possesses two third party control stations with a single located in the place by the access gate and the other devoted to the platform period. There is also a flooring mounted Pedestal control train station which includes Urgent Stop, Y-Axis movements (forward & backwards), Z-axis movement (podium raise reducing) and a selector switch that decides whether the settings on the podium work independently or if you would need the two controls stimulated in order to work the raise. This selector is a the main customers basic safety program to make sure that if a couple are on the woking platform working it is very important to have the two operators in the rear of the platform out from the work area. Or should there be only one staff they can regulate the platform coming from just one regulate station. This function is picked out at the flooring mounted stand.

Other features incorporate a dunnage (storage) location behind the back railing for saving packing resources that are found in securing the item on the trailer home. There is also a basic safety rail, running the length of the woking platform, mounted on the middle rail from the platform allowing for addition of drop prevention lanyards. Located by the control panels are contacts for air flow tools and electrical stores.

How to Attain Better Gas mileage For Flatbed Trucks

Gas mileage is no scam anymore. In nearly 5 various bucks your gallon, energy is a truck’s largest cost. Cost of diesel-powered fuel might be make or break intended for owner driver flatbed for pickup trucks materials. Fuel utilization can differ significantly on the same trucks depending on the driver. Many factors like wind lug, driving behavior etc could affect your energy mileage.

The thought is to use your lease degree of fuel to achieve the job done. This implies accelerating the18 wheeler gently on top of things and tossing cruise regulate on when you get there. Nevertheless cruise regulate isn’t ideal as it is built to maintain route speed. When you lose surface, cruise could power as well as try to help make road rate back. Sail doesn’t be aware of the difference between headwinds or a hill, many it is aware is that a force is actually slowing down the18 wheeler and it will feed as much energy to the motor as it would need to maintain the fixed road rate. A good driver can spot the top of the hillside before getting there and ease off the gasoline, sure you can buy to route speed a bit slower but would conserve a lot of energy.

Drivers will need to tarp their own loads to make sure that there are no free pieces of tarps amongst gamers and minimize your wind lug. Another prevalent bad driving a vehicle habit is usually to stay way too close to a vehicle that you are pursuing. Every time the18 wheeler gets way too close to the motor vehicle, backs out there and then grabs up, it wastes plenty of fuel. It is best to maintain plenty of distance relating to the vehicles you’re following.

Green living is a great example of an area of information where you have to separate fact from fiction on the net.

What we have noticed, more and more, is just doing a basic search does not always yield the most suitable information. Avoid feeling like it is something that only happens to you because it is not. That is what motivated us to put this article together for you about green living. You can acquire this advice and improve on it in your own research efforts.

I’m certain you have seen the commercials on television for the brand new all electric automobiles. We’re not talking about the hybrids which seem to be flooding the market by storm, but we are talking about vehicles that run entirely on electricity. I remember years ago watching The Twilight Zone and seeing an episode that had an electric car and pondering just how great this would be if it was reality, which now it is. This is not something which every auto manufacturer has jumped on the bandwagon with, but they are being created today by various companies. Here we hope to explain to you a few of the positive aspects and also disadvantages of owning an electric car.

With regards to one of the benefits of this kind of vehicle you need to realize that the major benefit isn’t needing to buy fuel for this car ever again. By not investing a small fortune each week on gas, this is in fact money that you’ll end up saving. The majority of individuals in the United States spend more than $60.00 each and every week on gas, and when you fall into this category you’ll discover that you can end up saving $3000 each year by not needing to purchase gas. You will not only be able to improve your everyday life with an extra $3000 each year, but you are going to also love the fact that you will not need to stop at gas stations any longer.

Together with the benefit of you saving all this money you are going to also discover that you aren’t contributing to the pollution of our planet. My means of travel is very important in my line of job as an ultrasound technician, that’s why I regarded electric autos as an edge. This means that not only will you not be decreasing pollution on account of the exhaust of your vehicle, but you’ll also not be contributing to the big oil businesses. The pollution of our planet is something which is extremely serious and anything you can do to help reduce this will be advantageous.

Of course with any new type of technology you’re going to find drawbacks and there’s no exception here. The mileage which you can go on a charge is one of the down sides of an electric car, and with most electric automobiles you will have the ability to drive about 100 miles before needing to charge your vehicle again. For the majority of individuals this is not going to be an issue as this is much greater than their daily commute back and forth to work. Nevertheless you’ll find other folks who have a problem with this if they wish to take their vehicles on long trips. This is most certainly not the type of vehicle that you would want to take on a cross country excursion.

All right, we have gone over the first couple of points concerning green living, of course you realize they play a significant role. But there is a great deal more that you would do well to learn. We believe they are terrific and will aid you in your pursuit for solutions. It should not need to be said that you must conduct closer examination of all pertinent points. We are not finished, and there are just a couple of very strong suggestions and tips for you.

When it comes to saving the planet you’re going to find that electric vehicles are going to be something that can definitely help. Obviously the cost of these vehicles are far more expensive than you would end up paying for regular gas powered vehicle, but the cash you save makes it worth your while. Acquiring an electric car out of my ultrasound technician salary is perfectly the most appropriate regardless of the huge investment. Not just because it serves beneficial to the community but also because I would be able to save gas in the long run. Within 10 years you will actually be able to pay for one of these automobiles just by utilizing the fuel savings that you will be earning. In other words, the benefits of owning an electric vehicle are much greater than any of the disadvantages you will probably find that comes with them.

There is a huge amount to know about green living, and that is the reason why we have saved some very juicy info for you. But never think this is all there is, quite the opposite we do have to admit. We will describe in more detail why people need to be cautious when they read about this.

Dr. Aliza pinch hitting for Mark at a Beach Report Card presser

Beach Report Card  Most of the best BRC stories aren’t mine, but I have a few.  I remember sitting down with my first staff hire, Roger Gorke – now with the EPA office of water in D.C. –  to create the first report card.  It was an annual study and only included Santa Monica Bay beaches.  The early report cards often resulted in irate calls from electeds that somehow blamed us for their poor water quality.  We had many press conferences with Dr. Aliza (Lifshitz) providing a medical perspective and talking to the Spanish language media.  One year, she had to carry the whole press event at Cabrillo Beach because I literally had no voice!  James Alamillo and Mike Grimmer have taken the BRC through many incarnations, but the efforts of former Microsoft exec Jeff Littrell and former staffer Tom Fleming in making the leap to a statewide report card on the website was huge!  Amy Smart has come through as a spokesperson for the Beach Report Card, Annual Dinner, Day Without a Bag and Coastal Cleanup Day. I’m so glad Heal the Bay is honoring her at the annual dinner on May 17 this year.

Starstruck  An event at a Santa Monica bar where rock  Hall of Famers John Densmore and Ray Manzarek from the Doors made a generous donation, and The Surfers (Kelly Slater, Peter King and Rob Machado) played in front of an enthusiastic crowd including Pamela Anderson.

My dissertation research on pathogens in stormdrain runoff and the fate and transport of runoff plumes on the beach.  It never would have been possible without dozens of volunteers collecting samples during all sorts of conditions, support from the Santa Monica Bay Restoration Project, and the analytical efforts of L.A.’s Environmental Monitoring Division, and virologist  Charlie McGee and his crew at the Los Angeles and Orange County Sanitation Districts.  The research demonstrated that human sewage was getting into stormdrains, which led to the first-ever epidemiology study on swimmers in runoff contaminated waters. The study demonstrated that people that swim at runoff polluted beaches were far more likely to get sick.  These results were the catalyst for AB 411,  a state bill that established California beach water quality standards and a beach monitoring and reporting program.

Cleanups  So many cleanups.  The scope and scale of trash at Compton Creek, year after year.  James Alamillo finding 10- foot-high marijuana plants in the creek bed. All of the weird items found during Coastal Cleanup Day:  I’ve always been partial to the pumpkin filled with eggs and the whole bathroom found on the PV coast.  My grey tabby-cat Ballona, now 11, a rescue from Ballona Creek. The Coastal Cleanup Day specials – KTLA GM Don Corsini and new Board chair Stephanie Rodriguez always made them happen.  Beach cleanups with the Lakers’ Fisher, Van Exel and Ceballos.  Sparks with Lisa Leslie. And the most memorable one : last year with the Dodgers’ Fernando, Garvey, shoulda-been-MVP  Matt Kemp, Shawn Green, and Sweet Lou Johnson.  I loved the stories from Johnson and Garvey.

Stream Team  Mark Abramson, or Abe, has always been the highlight.  The chain-smoking, Altoid popping, quad-vente swilling architect of the Stream Team program is one of a kind.  There are so many different Abe stories, ranging from his covert mapping activities on Ahmanson Ranch, to walking through stinging nettles on a stream mapping foray, to getting profiled on “Dirty Jobs” for removing a steelhead passage barrier in Solstice, and fighting with him because he wanted to sue everyone under the sun.  He even got evicted from his guest house in Serra Retreat because he wanted the Arizona Crossing replaced with a bridge (a major benefit for Malibu Creek). But my favorite moment was visiting him while he was removing the Texas crossing in Malibu Creek.  He was sitting in a folding chair while his crew members were breaking their backs removing all of the cement by hand!  A great restoration success, and Abe didn’t even break a sweat that day.

Acquiring the Aquarium  I negotiated with UCLA for two years to develop a partnership to co-manage the aquarium. Former Heal the Bay intern and longtime Fenton Communications  executive Parker Blackman helped make the negotiations happen with his Dad, vice chancellor Pete Blackman.  We finished the negotiations and then UCLA decided that the fiscal crisis of the early 2000s was too much to keep the aquarium going.  So they gave the aquarium to Heal the Bay – an organization-changing event that gave us a public face and provided educational opportunities on Bay biodiversity, pollution prevention and marine conservation to visitors from the region and beyond.  The early days when every rain was an adventure because the aquarium had a roof like a sieve. How the water running down the electrical conduits never caused a fire is a mystery to me.  And who could forget the eight- legged vandal that made international news by flooding the aquarium!  My best memories  are seeing my son Zack work behind the tidepool counter as a volunteer and daughter Natalie dragging me back to the life support to see the animals not on display.

Gutter Patrol was an enormous program that had volunteers stencil 50,000 plus catch basins with a “No Dumping.  This Drains to Ocean” message. You can still see some of the original stencils with fishbones on some catch basins in L.A.  Lisa Dobbins was dubbed the Gutter Queen for leading this enormous effort.  I still remember when we invited her over for dinner and asked her to bake a cake.  She made a chocolate cake and decorated it with the catch basin stencil.  The dinner party was in fact a surprise birthday party for Lisa.  She baked her own B-day cake!

Sickening stories  There have been a lot of dramatic beach water quality stories.  The most tragic was that of the young Pepperdine student Danny Villanueva, who died of a Coxsackie B heart infection (cardiomyopathy) in 1992. I still remember when he called me before his first heart transplant because our report on viruses in Malibu Lagoon had just come out. He was so sure that he got sick from surfing at Surfirder even though the virus could have come from other sources.  Perhaps the most famous incidences of illness from swimming were the lifeguards that worked at the beach in front of the Pico-Kenter drain in the 70s and early 80s. Although cause and effect was never demonstrated (most of the cancers were different), the focus on lifeguard safety in polluted waters became a major cause that helped lead to the creation of Heal the Bay.

The skirmish in Surf City  The most vivid beach battle I remember was over the sources of pollution to Huntington Beach during the summer of 1999. AB 411 began implementation that year so beach monitoring increased statewide.  Surf City was so polluted that the health agencies closed the beach during the height of the summer season, including Labor Day.  As a result, approximately million was spent over the next few years to find out what caused the pollution problems during the summer of 1999.  Unfortunately, the effort was like chasing ghosts.  The water quality never got as bad again as it did that summer.  Great research was done by a wide variety of agencies that helped on beach water quality modeling and better understanding how water quality can vary with tidal cycle and tide magnitude.  Also, the enormous sanitary survey did result in some small sources getting abated and the sewage treatment plant outfall’s discharge getting cleared as the likely source of beach pollution.  My most vivid memory was a public hearing/witch hunt in Huntington hosted by then Assemblyman Scott Baugh.  I felt like I was hearing from the Amity mayor in “Jaws.”  All of the discussion was about the economic impacts of beach closures, and how AB 411 needed to be revealed.  I played the Dreyfus role by speaking passionately about the health risks of swimming in waters highly polluted with fecal bacteria.

Road warrior  Running in the Santa Monica Classic while suffering through a gout attack.  Enough said.

Countless memories of Dorothy  Press conferences where she called runoff a witch’s brew of toxins. Dorothy chairing our annual meetings and the first few annual dinners.  Slide shows of her trips with her beloved husband Jack.  Nine carousels was the record. Debates over the issues.  Learning how to effectively advocate. Admiring how she treated every volunteer as if they were the key to Heal the Bay’s success.  Numerous meetings in her living room where every Heal the Bay detail was discussed.  Monthly lunches with Paula Daniels and Madelyn Glickfeld.  Board meetings.  Science and Policy Committee meetings. Watching her in awe as she continually battled cancer and stood up to polluters.  My disappointment that DWP Commission members and environmental leaders Dorothy Green, Mary Nichols and Mike Gage couldn’t even turn that agency around on water recycling and rainwater capture. The joy on Dorothy’s face when she finally finished her book on managing California’s water crisis. Cindy Horn hosting the book event.  Working with Paula to record her final op-ed on what California needed to fix its ongoing water crisis.  Thinking of Dorothy every Wednesday night in winter as Paula and I teach the UCLA Leadership in Water Management Class in her honor.

Tomorrow: a few more memories

Filed under: Heal the Bay Tagged: Heal the Bay anecdotes, Mark Gold
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Kitchen improvement or remodeling may appear like days of dust and also noise together with slight likelihood of complications nevertheless it shouldn’t be fiascos or a task! Take it like a makeover for that better where the prospect associated with family spending time in the kitchen would have been a good one after it is done. A fantastic and quick job can still be done with the proper contractor and also planning, hence fret not necessarily!

The kitchen will be the area within your house which takes on a crucial part with your family’s well being (what with the idea being where the meals are grilled and all) and also would support the most accessories, meaning your main cupboards and also items in it might remain in exactly the same position unless of course should your cooking area undergo reconstruction again.

Do you also know that it is the one particular place in the house that is more than likely to decline the fastest due to constant heat, grease and also moisture from the cooking and also cleaning? To help expand emphasize the value of procuring a great contractor task for the kitchen area, is that should any leaks occur be it in your level or to the unit below your own, HDB will not pay you, hence a good reconstruction job is important!

A good practical kitchen offers the family having a safe natural environment for cooking and also dining, and it saves money by being easy to maintain. Extra effort comes into the design and style, the construction picking the right materials to ensure the commitment of a good investment inside years to come.

If the contractor can a poor job, the repercussion would not be quick and it may well show itself over time to come such as the slow cracking of laminates used on counter tops or the cracking of ceramic tiles. Small tip on the reason why tiles split, it is possibly

a) the cement was not spread correctly on the porcelain tile before it was placed, only dollops upon each place were used hence the cracking or

n) the placing of the ceramic tiles were way too close not necessarily allowing for growth especially if individuals areas are usually near heat sources much like the back with the fridge or near a stove.

Remember that there are different firms under different guises on the market, such as an enclosed design firm posing as a contractor firm giving internal advice at the same time. It is best to select a dedicated builder so as to be sure of the top quality with the contractor’s encounter and discover how.

Better suggestions, detailed information will be given at the same time the most important coming from all, after sale service where a period would be given for that tenants that will there become any defects, the builder can rectify it.

Expect this has recently been enlightening around the importance of deciding on a good builder for your kitchen renovation, and remember a good builder allows property owners to be with the work site constantly, do not be mollycoddled in to thinking that your own supervision just isn’t needed as your presence is often more than loved especially if virtually any disputes or last minute selection should crop up.

Jayden Ram­rez has been a experienced coach for 12 years & has studying exquisite ideas in hdb renovation in part with her involvement from Creative Minds Group ,a new creative team for creative persons. Learn All about her famous interior designer in singapore website to read more about her singapore interior hub advice over the years.

There are so many different gadget watches on the market today that it doesn’t matter what kind of features you want your watch to have, it’s highly likely that you will be able to find them. There are some gadget watches that have been made for really particular activities like hiking and running and there are others that are just fun to walk around wearing or to use as starter pieces for conversations. In the following paragraphs, we’ll tell you about some of the more interesting gadget watches that we’ve found. A watch is unquestionably a must-have gadget in case you’re employed as an ultrasound technician. I realized a year ago during one of the seminars sponsored by different ultrasound technician schools, concerning the fast paced hours of working in a big hospital.

Sphere Gadget Technologies makes a watch that is watch, camera, video camera and spy camera all at the same time. When you have this watch (which, by the way, is also USB compatible), you also have the ability to capture up to three hours of 640 x 480 DVD quality video footage. You can then transfer this footage to your computer, and it’s both PC and Mac compatible and upload your photos or footage to your website, YouTube, Facebook, etc. The photos and videos captured by your watch is comparable to the photos and videos captured by higher end cameras and camcorders. Though spy cameras can be fun and useful, you should be careful about publishing such footage without people’s permission, as this can lead to legal problems. The fact is that, for these same legal reasons, you won’t have the ability to record audio with your watch. My boyfriend actually purchased a costly one by means of his ultrasound technician salary as a gift for my birthday. The Casio G-Shock Bluetooth is a watch that is connected to Bluetooth so that you are better able to use it in conjunction with your mobile phone. The watch isn’t actually a phone but it does help you keep track of the messages you get. Compared to other models of this type, the Casio version has the advantage of being able to go two years on just one battery. The watch is going to beep at you when your phone gets a call, email or when one of its alarms goes off. The Casio G-Shock doesn’t support every single phone–only those that are enabled with the new energy saving feature called Bluetooth Low Energy. This watch is very helpful if you want to make sure you get all of your calls and messages but if you always have your smart phone with you it isn’t really essential.

The Casio Pathfinder is a watch that was constructed specifically for hikers and it has a bunch of features to help you get through the outdoors. It has a digital compass in it with sixteen points of measurement which makes it easy to know precisely where you are going all the time. The watch includes a barometer function which has the ability to keep track of the weather and tells you when a storm is approaching. If you like rock climbing or mountain climbing, the watch has a built in altimeter that will help you keep track of your altitude, all the way up to 10,000 meters in height. This watch even comes equipped with a thermometer which not only tells you the temperature outside, but can also measure your skin temperature. Whether you’re really into hiking or are more of a mountain climber, you’ll find the Pathfinder watch by Casio a great accessory. Gadget watches have many uses, and some are mainly worn as fashion accessories while others are genuinely helpful for performing various tasks. It’s a good idea to make a list of the different features that you want your watch to have and most of the time you’ll be able to find at least one gadget watch that can do everything that you need or would like it to do.

A hare-brained idea: having Gov. Gray Davis get up close and personal with the invertebrates at Heal the Bay's S.M. Pier Aquarium

Mark shares some more of his more memorable moments at Heal the Bay:

The Ahmanson Ranch campaign.  I remember: touring the watershed with Board President Tony Pritzker and former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, representing Washington Mutual.  Flying up to a WaMu shareholders meeting with Rob Reiner and Alfre Woodard on a private jet to protest the development.  The coalition of Hollywood (Chris Albrecht and Reiner), electeds, Native Americans, Mary Weisbrock and Save Open Space, Heal the Bay (Mark Abramson’s covert maps of Ahmanson Ranch riparian habitat were key), and the brilliant campaign work of Chad Griffin and Steve Barkan.  Getting screamed at by Reiner at a meeting.  The only other person that ever yelled at me like that was my dad.  I can only imagine what would have happened if we lost! The anti-climactic press event celebration when the state purchased the land (Governor Davis was being recalled).  The joy of taking my kids, Zack, Jake and Natalie, to the Ranch just days after it opened to the public.

Litigation  I’ve always been a “sue as a last resort” kind of advocate, but sometimes litigation is the only solution.  NRDC’s Joel Reynolds and I spent countless hours with former L.A. County Sanitation Districts’ GM Jim Stahl to settle the full secondary treatment lawsuit about the Carson plant.  Once we got through the “sewage is good for the fish arguments” (thank you Willard Bascom of the Southern California Coastal Waters Research Project in the late 1980s) and the “sewage solids are needed to cover up the DDT and PCB contaminated sediments” or “two wrongs make a right” argument, we were able to negotiate a resolution quickly.  In fact, it only took the Sanitation Districts four years to build its full secondary facilities.  Also, we partnered with NRDC on some industrial waste litigation and an industrial stormwater lawsuit against the Port of Long Beach (led by current criminal court judge Gail Ruderman Feuer).  I still remember all the inspections of pretty nasty Port facilities.

TMDLs  The litigation over EPA’s failure to implement the Total Maximum Daily Load requirements for L.A. and Ventura Counties’ impaired waters was an enormous victory for clean water.  Also, the settlement process and consent decree negotiations took my working relationships with David Beckman of NRDC and Steve Fleischli (then at the SM Baykeeper) to the next level.  That effort made us brothers in arms.  We all wanted numeric limits in stormwater permits and TMDLs  gave us the chance to make that happen for the region’s most polluted waters.  Also, like any set of brothers, there were a lot of insults flying around and silly, macho one-upmanship.  Science versus the law – to the death on the battlefield of regulation! Our caustic banter was great fun for the three of us, but it freaked out all of our staffs. I’m pretty sure that most dischargers got a little intimidated when the three of us walked into a regional or state board hearing room to argue a permit or a TMDL.

Water Board memories are endless: The David Nahai era when the most far-reaching Total Maximum Daily Loads (fecal bacteria, trash and metals) and the 2001 stormwater permit were approved.  Getting the “band” back together when NRDC’s David Beckman, the Waterkeeper  Alliance’s Steve Fleischli (now at NRDC), SM Baykeeper’s Tracy Egoscue and myself testified successfully on getting the beach bacteria TMDL limits in the stormwater permit. I remember when a Board in the early 1990s approved five L.A. County Sanitation Districts sewage discharge permits on the consent calendar despite the fact we had commented on the permits.  I arrived at the hearing in Glendale at 9:30, right after the Board vote. In 1996, we culminated a 40-day fight for a tougher stormwater permit (with help from Andy Goodman and the Environmental Media Assn.) with a big rally: T-shirts, Baykeeper Terry Tamminen leading protest chants, Julia Louis Dreyfus speaking at a press event, and a unanimous Board support vote.

Working with Linda Sheehan, the brilliant, attention-deprived, kick- boxing, lawyer from the Ocean Conservancy and the California Coastkeeper Alliance (now at Earth Law working on Rights of Nature issues).  The MIT chemical engineer with a law degree from Berkeley may be the most efficient person I’ve ever worked with.  She can crank out a 30-page comment letter in two days, and she has on issues ranging from nonpoint source management to stormwater to chemicals of emerging concern to once through cooling.  She’s the only person I know that can text, listen, write and negotiate at the same time.  Richard Katz is close though.

Passings  Getting the news from then Heal the Bay E.D. Adi Liberman that a policeman was on the phone from Vancouver.  I was told the devastating news that my father had passed away of a heart attack while I was at my desk. Talking to my mom seconds after that was among the hardest things I’ve ever done.

Clean Beach Initiative  Then-Assemblymember Fran Pavley calling us to ask how bond money could be used to clean up California’s most polluted beaches.  Two hours later, we created the Clean Beach Initiative, and Pavley ran with it. To date, over 0 million has gone to cleaning up beaches and beach scientific research.

More Pavley She partnered with then-Heal the Bay legal director Leslie Tamminen on the Education and Environment Initiative. Fran carried the bill.  Leslie and I came up with the audacious idea to require environmental education in all public schools.  Leslie did everything possible to make it happen.  The bill signing ceremony was at our aquarium, with Governor Davis and Pierce and Keely Brosnan there for the announcement.  I still remember how mortified Davis was when aquarist Jose Bacallao and I gave him a sea hare to hold.

The Den Mother Leslie watchdogged the EEI bill every step of the way.  There was no way that the measure wouldn’t get implemented on her watch.  It cost her a lot of baked goods, cards, flowers and other gifts to ensure that the EEI’s 85 units were finished and approved by the Department of Education in a timely fashion.  Leslie was also the den mother for Heal the Bay.  In 1999, I had an incredibly stressful four-month period with two back surgeries and a heart surgery.  Clearly, my stress addiction had consequences.  On top of that, Lisette gave birth to our daughter Natalie before my heart surgery.  Leslie was there for me every step of the way to help me through it.  Lisette and I will always be thankful for that.

Throughout the week: more nostalgia …

Filed under: Heal the Bay Tagged: anecdotes, Heal the Bay, Mark Gold
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