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HOUSTON (AP) - The first time Jessica Sharon landed at the Houston Center for Sobriety, she was too drunk and strung out on drugs to remember arriving.

She woke up bleary-eyed and confused, surprised to be resting, unshackled, on a firm cot in a quiet warehouse in the shadow of Minute Maid Park; this was decidedly not jail.

Like many of the roughly 7,000 other admissions at the sobering center since it opened 16 months ago, she left fairly quickly the next morning, grateful to have dodged jail time but not quite ready to accept offers to get her into detox.

When Mayor Annise Parker opened the center at 150 N. Chenevert St. last year, the idea was to cut police costs and reduce recidivism, creating a place other than jail for those whose only crime is public intoxication. Prior to the centers opening, police were making about 17,000 arrests a year in Houston for public intoxication, racking up between $4 million and $6 million in police costs.

The sobering center has reduced that number significantly: From June 2013 to June 2014, Houston police booked just shy of 2,500 people on public intoxication, according to sobering center numbers. The center admitted more than double that number during the same time period.

Sharon is among those who have come back to the center for help, weeks or even months after declining more services.

For more than a decade, she has been battling crystal methamphetamine and alcohol addictions that seemed impossible to beat. Stretches of sobriety were eclipsed by hazy weeks spent high or drunk, often both.

Months after her stay at the sobering center, the 32-year-old hit her grace of God moment. She called her recovery coach at the sobering center and asked for help. Then, she came back.

Im honestly terrified because there have been other times where Ive gotten sober and thought I was done and then I relapsed, Sharon told the Houston Chronicle (http://bit.ly/X0bXZH). But it takes what it takes and eventually, it just clicks. I hope this is when its going to happen. I have all the resources I need.

Officials said the sobering center is still not being used to its full capacity, but the numbers should pick up as more jurisdictions turn to the facility. In April, Metro, Harris County Sheriffs Office, constable precincts and University of Houston police started dropping off intoxicated people at the location.

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Sobering center a place for addicts to get help

MINNEAPOLIS (MCT) -- Kristy Allen and Mark O'Rourke are bee ambassadors with deceptively similar messages. Allen, founder of a small business called the Beez Kneez, pedals through the Twin Cities selling honey from a bike trailer and handing out lawn signs that read, "Healthy bees, healthy lives." O'Rourke, a seed-treatment specialist for Bayer Crop Science, travels the country with sleek interactive displays to promote the company's insecticides and its views on honeybee health.

Allen wears a helmet with bobbing antennae. O'Rourke sports a bee-yellow shirt with the Bayer logo.

But behind their cheery outfits, they are polar opposites in an intensifying national conflict over what's killing the hardworking insect that has become a linchpin of the American food system.

In a struggle that echoes the scientific discord over climate change, both are striving to win public support in a fight over the pervasive use of pesticides and the alarming decline of bees. Whoever sways the public could influence the fate of the honeybee long before scientists or regulators render a verdict. "Perception becomes reality," said David Fischer, director of pollinator safety for Bayer AG, a leading manufacturer of the insecticides under debate. "We are a science-focused company. But that's not going to convince beekeepers and the public."

There is remarkably little dispute about the underlying problem: Honeybees are dying. Beekeepers across the United States are losing a fourth to a third of their hives each winter, a decline that has exposed them as a fragile link in the nation's food supply chain.

U.S. agriculture depends on bees to pollinate $15 billion worth of crops annually -- a third of the food we eat. Every year, commercial beekeepers traverse the country with millions of hives, moving them like migrant laborers through blooming fields of almonds, apples, melons and other crops. Even as the number of U.S. hives has dwindled to 2.5 million, the number of crops depending on them has quadrupled.

The adversaries even agree on some of the causes: A flowerless rural landscape dominated by monoculture cash crops, and the spread of invasive parasites and diseases.

But a decade after honeybees began their precipitous decline, they are still in trouble, and the conflict over the role of insecticides is reaching a crescendo. Bayer sponsors an annual "Bee Care Tour" of universities and community events, while its lobbyists work Washington. Kids in bee costumes protest at Home Depot stores, and gardeners have become their advocates at garden stores and nurseries where they wield considerable power on behalf of the bee.

The White House is paying attention. Last month, President Barack Obama ordered his Cabinet to come up with a strategy for protecting bees, including a mandate to "assess the effect of pesticides."

"There needs to be that public pressure," said Jennifer Sass of the Natural Resources Defense Council. "The public can change it -- even if the (government) does not act."

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Battle over insecticide pits beekeepers against big agribusiness

Breathtaking landscape and simple village life simply refreshing.

OUR 1,445km road trip began at 6 oclock on a sunny Saturday morning mid-July.

The journey required two days drive, departing from the east of Holland and heading towards Tuscany.

We aimed to cover 900km on the first day, driving on the German and Austrian autobahns (highways) and making pitstops every two to three hours along the way.

We arrived in Sterzing, the Austrian-speaking part of Italy around five in the afternoon, in a town called Vipiteno where we spent the night at a bed-and-breakfast inn frequented by travellers from northern Europe heading for holidays in the south.

The second day on the road was mapped out to be a more relaxing drive, as we were only about 500km from our ultimate destination a villa in Arsicci, a very small Appenine village in Tuscany situated at about 850m above sea level.

We arrived there at around 5 oclock in the afternoon, long before sunset that happens around 10 in the evening in the summer in these parts of the world.

For a family group with four couples and five children in total, we rented a seven-bedroom villa for one week.

The three-level stone farmhouse included a 5,000sq m private wooded park, a swimming pool, childrens playroom, recreation room with a bar, dance floor and a platform for a band.

It was absolutely beyond our expectations.

Originally posted here:
Tuscany the beautiful

Hotel Fakeout Photos

Above, The Hotel Pelicanos Grand Beach Resort leaves much to the imagination, excluding its beach from its website's marketing. Oyster.com's hotel expert, Jennifer Garfinkel, told travelers, "When you're looking at photos, be suspicious about what they're not showing you."

The Hotel Pelicanos Grand Beach Resort

A view of the same hotel's beach, showing its portion of the beach, the water and the hotel's wall. The hotel admitted later that its "Grand Beach" was less than grand because it had been swept away by hurricanes 10 years ago.

Oyster.com

Above, Las Conchas Chinas boasts spectacular views from its hotel lobby.

Las Conchas Chinas

Here is the same shot at Las Conchas Chinas, in person. Oyster.com's hotel expert, Jennifer Garfinkel, noted, "If you see those bright blues and greens and pinks, and everything's popping, you just need to realize that it's not going to be quite that bright when you arrive."

Oyster.com

On the hotel's website, a viewer can see the appeal of Hotel Portonovo's pool with an equally appealing landscape.

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Photos: Oyster's Hotel Photo Fakeouts

The explosion of new housing projects across San Francisco is threatening to pull the plug on music and dance clubs from North of the Panhandle to Potrero Hill to the Mission.

In a city going through a housing crisis, every unit is badly needed. But for live music fans, the pressure is stereophonic.

On the one hand, nightclubs in the path of progress are being targeted for demolition to make way for housing, including the eclectic indie rock venue the Elbo Room on Valencia Street; Cafe Cocomo, a salsa dance bar at 650 Indiana St.; and the Sound Factory, a dance club on Rincon Hill.

Still other club owners are looking over their shoulders uneasily as housing proposals crop up across the street or next door, because residences and nightclubs often don't mix well.

The Independent on Divisadero faces the possibility of new, upscale housing on both sides: the former Harding Theater to the south and the Alouis Auto Radiator shop to the north. Both properties are slated for nine units over retail. The Independent, which started out as the Half Note jazz club, has been around for 60 years.

"We are very much aware of the fact that residential development has the potential to disrupt the way that we operate," said Allen Scott of Another Planet Entertainment, which handles booking and promotion for the club. "We welcome the extension of the commercial corridor on Divisadero Street, but we do so with our eyes wide open."

Across the street from the Bottom of the Hill on 17th Street in the Potrero Hill neighborhood, developers are hoping to build 395 units at an old Cor-o-van storage center as well as two smaller projects on Missouri Street around the corner. The smaller projects would include units with decks from which condo owners could peer down at Bottom of the Hill's popular patio.

"For us it seems like development is a train coming down the track," said Tim Benetti, an owner of Bottom of the Hill. "We will do our best to negotiate survival, but if it's too big and comes too fast, I don't know how we are going to negotiate that."

Theoretically, those who choose to move close to a rock club know what they're signing up for. But as every club owner knows, what sounds good in theory is very different at midnight when you have an early appointment or are trying to get your baby back to sleep.

"We have had several people move in behind us and the next day they are calling the police," said Jason Perkins, who owns Brick and Mortar Music Hall on Mission Street as well as the New Parish in Oakland. "We have people moving in who look upon this as a bedroom community. They have to go to bed so they can get up in the morning and get to the Google bus."

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Residential development threatens S.F.'s music, dance clubs

Land clearing final step

By: Amanda Chort

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Land clearing final step - Video

Backwoods Land Clearing Video
Backwoods Land Clearing and Services clears acres of invasive trees in a single day, leaving only mulch behind!

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Backwoods Land Clearing Video - Video

Land Clearing Project

By: kaufmanent

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Land Clearing Project - Video

Aug. 11, 2014, 3 p.m.

Land clearing to entice bats away from houses

A bat flies about trees at Lawn Terrace, Capalaba. PHOTO: Judith Kerr IMAGE

Scrub at Lawn Terrace, Capalaba. PHOTO: Judith Kerr

REDLAND City Council will start clearing land housing a bat colony in Lawn Terrace, Capalaba, tonight.

The work, expected to be completed by this Friday, will start 10 days after the federal government issued the council a permit for the work.

The federal permit, known as a "referral decision", was issued on Tuesday (August 5) and allows the council to "nudge" black and grey-headed flying foxes away from houses by clearing scrub bordering nearby Valentine Park.

However, exasperated Lawn Terrace resident Lyn Sloane said it was imperative the council did not miss an August 16 deadline to move the colony before the bat breeding season.

Ms Sloane said she was delighted the works would finally start after three years of being driven batty.

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USED Land clearing to entice bats away from houses

Aug. 11, 2014, 3 p.m.

Land clearing to entice bats away from houses

A bat flies about trees at Lawn Terrace, Capalaba. PHOTO: Judith Kerr IMAGE

Scrub at Lawn Terrace, Capalaba. PHOTO: Judith Kerr

REDLAND City Council will start clearing land housing a bat colony in Lawn Terrace, Capalaba, tonight.

The work, expected to be completed by this Friday, will start 10 days after the federal government issued the council a permit for the work.

The federal permit, known as a "referral decision", was issued on Tuesday (August 5) and allows the council to "nudge" black and grey-headed flying foxes away from houses by clearing scrub bordering nearby Valentine Park.

However, exasperated Lawn Terrace resident Lyn Sloane said it was imperative the council did not miss an August 16 deadline to move the colony before the bat breeding season.

Ms Sloane said she was delighted the works would finally start after three years of being driven batty.

The rest is here:
Land clearing to entice bats away from houses