The master referred to as the Berlin Painter, who lived in Athens in the early fifth century BC, was an artist whose name, nationality, and even gender remain unknown, but whose distinctive and confident illustration in the red-figure style stands out as clearly as any signature. The first phase of the Berlin Painter’s career coincided with the birth of democracy in Athens, and the early works—which portray ordinary people caught in simple moments of daily life in much the same way that other vase painters treated gods and heroes—demonstrate the humanism of that political evolution.
Author: signordal
Why Shopping Online Doesn’t Have To Lead To Stolen Packages
In the dark ages of the 1980s, people used to have to drive to the store and buy their own toilet paper. They would then load it into their cars and drive it to their homes and carry it inside.
It seems like such a foreign concept today. Just thirty-something years later, we can press a button in our bathroom closet and have a drone deliver our toilet paper to our front porch hours later. Alright, maybe most people don’t have drones dropping off their toilet paper, but that IS an option today, especially with more people buying things, even necessities, online and having them delivered.
There’s almost no reason to leave your house for supplies anymore in most major cities. You can even have your groceries and prescriptions delivered right to your house.
But, there’s just one problem.
With the uptick in E-commerce, there has been a corresponding uptick in theft from mailboxes and front porches.
In the last five years alone, E-commerce has more than doubled. Online sales are expected to almost double again over the next five years, reaching $523 billion a year by 2020. Unfortunately, in 2016 alone 11 million people had packages stolen from their front porches, three-quarters of which happened when they weren’t home.
Because of this, a large number of people say they are worried about having their packages stolen from their doorsteps, particularly when they aren’t delivered on the first attempt. This makes delivery more difficult for delivery drivers. It drives up the cost and, subsequently, extends the amount of time it takes to receive packages. It also makes people wary of ordering online, which is scary for online retailers and delivery services.
There are a lot of factors that can prevent packages from being delivered on the first try. And theft isn’t the only thing preventing you from getting your packages on time.
If there isn’t a safe and dry place to leave a package, it can get destroyed by the weather. If something is too big to fit inside a mailbox, a mail carrier might not be able to leave it there. More often, there are items that can’t be delivered without a signature.
So, if you have to sit around all day waiting for the delivery man, how is that supposed to save you from going to the store?
Online shopping makes things easier for many people. There is a greater selection of merchandise you can choose from and there are search algorithms that can make the process a lot easier. You will never have to leave your house to go out searching for what you need.
Unfortunately, that convenience ends when you get that package stolen off your front porch. All kinds of solutions have been developed to combat this problem, including doorbells that can record videos of people trespassing your front porch. Unfortunately, those doorbells can’t actually stop those thieves. By the time you see their videos, your new dress or your heart medication are already gone.
So, why not give the delivery person a secure place, like a smart mailbox, to use for your packages? Having a locked place means no more missed deliveries and a serious decrease in the likelihood of theft.
Secure mailboxes are nothing new. Remember that keyed mailbox at your first apartment complex?
Secure mailboxes are more necessary today than they ever have been before. Today’s smart mailbox can communicate with you when you have a package delivered or when it is en route. It can even give you the option to communicate with the delivery driver in case you don’t want your package delivered on a specific day.
Options for preventing stolen packages include:
Security cameras
Pro: deterrent
Con: once it’s gone, it’s gone
Delivering to Work/Another Address
Pro: someone will usually be there
Con: you still have to schlep it home
Rerouting Packages
Pro: have it delivered when you will be home
Con: longer wait, more hassle for the delivery driver
Smart Mailboxes
Pro: packages delivered anytime are kept secured and safe from the elements
Con: Big and bulky, more expensive than a regular mailbox
More options mean more flexibility and security for everyone involved and that’s just good business. Learn more about how to prevent package theft from this infographic. A better way to deliver packages could even usher in the next big wave of E-commerce ideas. You might find yourself asking, “Why hasn’t anyone thought of this before?”
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The Art of Difference
The story Diane Arbus told with her camera was about shape-shifting: in order to understand difference one had to not only not dismiss it, but try to become it. “I don’t like to arrange things,” she once said. “If I stand in front of something, instead of arranging it, I arrange myself.”
Jim Olson from Olson Kundig Architects Renovates a Cottage Enveloped by a Thick Forest
I am fully convinced that nature is something that the vast majority of people enjoy. Feeling that direct contact gives us tranquility, relaxes us, and disconnects us from the pressures of everyday life. This beautiful cottage, nestled in a forest of tall trees and thick vegetation, was renovated and patiently expanded over the course of many years by the architect Jim Olson from Olson Kundig Architects, who has owned this..
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The natural beauty of Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona…
The natural beauty of Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona is undeniable.The colorful landscape, open skies and unique formations make for excellent hiking and photography. But that beauty is all a bonus on top of the important scientific mission of the park. The fossil record at the Petrified Forest preserves everything from fossil pollen to some of the earliest dinosaurs, and allows for the reconstruction of several ancient environments through time. Photo by Hallie Larsen, National Park Service.
Top Benefits Of Being Cheap
I went from this:
To this:
This is an Old Pontiac I bought for $1000 with an infinite amount of miles.
To the onlooker, I am cheap. In reality, however, I’m frugal. I do not save money at anyone else’s expense and I care about value, not cost. I do not worry about money, nor do I have much of it.
But, I am aware of its power and so I think carefully of its use. I’ve rid myself of most things I consider liabilities and keep only the bare necessities. I own one pair of jeans and 3 pairs of shoes. I sold my phone and bought two, one of which I shared with my father.
This simpler and cheaper phone allows me to work as a software engineer. Even with a mild amount of debt, I can now concentrate on doing what I love, instead of running the endless treadmill of monetary pursuit.
See Also: How to Live a Frugal Life and Get Rich
It felt like a breath of fresh air being rid of a car debt. I was relieved from the pretense of owning a flashy new car and I had more disposable income.
This, of course, was one of the many big changes I made through the course of six months. I stripped myself of many financial shackles, such as paying less interest on my debts. The benefits of spending less are endless, but here are some the highlights on how I transitioned to frugal living.
I Distinguish Needs Vs. Wants
The most important benefit of them all is that I am finally able to know whether I need something or I’m just enchanted by the thought of having something new.
As much as possible, I avoid any type of purchases. If a purchase is necessary, I do it with prior research and I check it against a list of priorities. Sometimes, I laugh whenever I realize that I’m just convincing myself that I need something when, in fact, I just really want it.
I usually avoid feeling regretful by waiting before I actually spend the money. The wait allows me to settle and calm my “materialistic urge”. My most recent example of this was a pottery wheel. I had convinced myself that I loved pottery and a pottery wheel was all I needed in my life.
Money Is My Friend, Not My Enemy
Just looking at credit karma at my location, it shows my credit is 88% better than the average. Though not the most accurate measurement, this number reaffirms that I am on the winning side of the never-ending financial battle. The other 88% aren’t.
If a monetary decision causes me distress, I take a step back. Just like a good friend, some money is always there when I need it. So, for every purchase I’m supposed to make, I put 50% to 100% into savings. That’s not too hard to do when you own one pair of jeans.
I Am free
My fiancé and I recently returned from a trip to Spain and Italy. It’s one of the many benefits of routing money into the right place. We can travel monthly, even though we only make the average income in our poor area.
When we are not traveling, we make meals for our families and friends. We invest all the extra money that could have gone to interest payments or the newest phones. It is vital to be frugal with a strategy and an end-purpose. Our aim is to do what we love and not be a slave of our paychecks.
We have hidden talents that can bring enormous value to someone out there, like this article. It’s something I could not have written if I was still working full-time.
Buying another pair of shoes because they’re 50% off doesn’t mean you saved half the money. It means you lost half in an item you probably didn’t need.
I do not buy anything to portray a better image of myself unless it’s a suit for a job interview. This could be the result of frugal living or the other way around, but the end result is that I am free from having to live for the sake of appearances. I get to route money into things that matter and avert all other cash leaks.
What have you done to put yourself on the path to freedom?
See Also: 10 Ways To Save Money Without Compromising Your Lifestyle
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The Force Turns Forty
Hi, I’m Mrs. Han Solo, and I’m an alcoholic. I’m an alcoholic because George Lucas ruined my life. I mean that in the nicest possible way . . . George is a sadist. But, like any abused child wearing a metal bikini chained to a giant slug about to die, I keep coming back for more.
—Carrie Fisher, roasting George Lucas at the 2005 American Film Institute ceremony where he received a Lifetime Achievement Award
Star Wars turns forty this week, the first movie in the saga premiering in three dozen market-testing cinemas on May 25, 1977. One of the venues was on Hollywood Boulevard, and as the crowds gathered for the matinee screening, Lucas happened to be across the street in a restaurant, having lunch with his wife. He had been up all night and morning trying to finish the soundtrack before the movie’s general release; as described in Brian Jay Jones’s recent biography George Lucas, the director was oblivious to the launch of his own intergalactic fame:
“It was like a mob scene,” Lucas recalled. “One lane of traffic was blocked off. There were police there . . . There were lines, eight or nine people wide, going both ways around the block.” He and Marcia finished their lunch, then stepped out into the street to see what all the fuss was about. “I thought someone must be premiering a movie,” Lucas said later.
Someone was. Emblazoned in huge letters on the marquee on both sides of the entrance above the loud, teeming crowd were two words: STAR WARS
Carrie Fisher’s memoirs, written in her trademark mix of stand-up comedy and breakdown pathos, tell their own prequel-sequel saga of how she felt inextricably chained to Star Wars throughout her “Leia-laden life.” Wishful Drinking closes with a description of the Leia’s save-the-Empire hologram message in the movie — (“This is our most desperate hour. Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi — you’re my only hope”) as a George Lucas “poem” that drove her into dependency: “I can’t forget that stupid, fucking hologram speech! That’s why I did dope!” In The Princess Diarist Fisher describes other life-imitating-art moments, such as the day she landed, at age nineteen, the Princess role and the double-bun look to which she became wedded: “My life had started all right. Here I was crossing its threshold in a long white virginal robe with the hair of a seventeenth-century Dutch school matron.”
In How Star Wars Conquered the Universe, Chris Taylor traces the evolution of a $35 billion franchise industry (one so exacting, joked Fisher in her AFI roast of Lucas, “that every time I look in the mirror I have to send you a check for a couple of bucks”). In The World According to Star Wars, Cass R. Sunstein explores how we engage with the saga on multiple levels — religious, political, Oedipal, technological, and more — and how Lucas’s worldview is especially concerned with the issue of free choice. Sunstein is an eminent legal scholar with an interest in behavioral economics; he is also co-author of the bestseller Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth and Happiness. That book is also about free choice: by nudging individuals toward their best possible options, private and public sector “choice architects” can “influence choices in a way that will make choosers better off, as judged by themselves.” The Star Wars universe is driven, says Sunstein, by nudging, whether towards Jedi or Sith behavior:
Here’s Leia, speaking of Han’s apparent desertion of the rebellion in A New Hope: “A man must follow his own path. No one can choose it for him.” Here’s Obi-Wan to Luke, again in A New Hope: “Then you must do what you think is right, of course.” Here are Lucas’s own words: “Life sends you down funny paths. And you get many opportunities to keep your eyes open.” He was talking about his own life, but he might as well have been talking about Star Wars and the characters who populate it.
Fisher’s memoirs sometimes convey that she felt as if her life had been over-nudged, sometimes that she herself had failed to keep her eyes open to her best path choices. In the last months of her life she became a nudger herself, writing an advice column for The Guardian newspaper. Her encouragement to “Alex,” who had asked about coping with the same sort of mental problems that afflicted Fisher, has an Obi-Wan ring to it: “Move through those feelings and meet me on the other side. As your bipolar sister, I’ll be watching. Now get out there and show me and you what you can do.”
The Barnes & Noble Review http://ift.tt/2qjWIsq
Estudio Peña Ganchegui Designs a Spacious and Luminous Home in San Sebastian, Spain
This modern house, located in San Sebastián, Guipúzcoa, Spain, covers an area of 170 square meters and was designed by Estudio Peña Ganchegui in the year 2016. Its curved ceilings with glazed glass walls are the most prominent feature on its façade, and the imposing rock wall behind it highlights this aspect of its structure. With large gardens in its exterior that are dotted with terraces ready to offer us..
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Top 10 Most Popular Sports Leagues In The World
Great players make a name for themselves by competing against the best and the most popular leagues make that a possibility. Today, we’re counting down our picks for the 10 top sports leagues in the world.
For this list, we’ve considered leagues from across the globe that have the most appeal both at home and abroad. We’ve also considered their financial success, the most popular sporting atmospheres and, of course, top notch competition.
Australian Football League
Aussie Rules Football and Rugby may seem like very similar sports but, apart from the shape of the ball, the two are vastly different.
Aussie Rules is played on an oval pitch with four giant posts sticking out from each end. Eighteen players per side take the field in a game full of passing, kicking, and top-notch tackling. The league consists of 18 teams, with each team competing in a 23-game regular season which is followed by a single-elimination playoff series.
Melbourne is the heart and soul of the league, as 9 of the 18 teams call the coastal city home. With a country full of passionate fans, the AFL is a completely unique sporting experience.
Bundesliga
There are a number of incredible football leagues around the world, and considering Germany produces some of the best talents the game has to offer, it’s no surprise they offer up one of the most exciting leagues, as well. The top division of German football, the Bundesliga, is home to some of the best teams in the world.
Bayern Munich has won The Champions League five times while Borussia Dortmund boasts some of the most passionate fans in Europe. In addition, the Bundesliga is also arguably the best-run league in world football, pulling in $2.84 billion dollars in revenue while still offering some of the cheapest tickets available. Seriously, you can get your hands on Bayern Munich season tickets for as little as 104 Euros. Can’t beat that.
See Also: 3 Of The Best European Football Grounds
PGA
You may not have expected to see golf on this list, but those who’ve learned to appreciate the game know exactly why the PGA Tour finds itself among the top sports leagues in the world.
The truly great golfers in the game test their mettle on the Tour, with the best of the best earning coveted ranked positions. The Tour organizes some of the biggest tournaments in the world, hosting championships like the Masters and The U.S. Open.
The PGA is tax exempt and, as a result, the league’s total revenue isn’t clear. However, with impressive television ratings, the Tour is probably pulling in some equally impressive sponsorship money.
Indian Premier League
Though this cricket league has only been around since 2008, it’s hard to argue against its unprecedented rise as a fan favorite and a hub for the best competition. The Indian Premier League includes eight franchises, each representing major cities in India. They play in a home and away round robin before the four best teams enter a playoff to determine a champion.
The IPL’s quick rise is due, in large part, to their adoption of the newest format of cricket, Twenty20 (20-20), which involves games that last around 3 hours instead of 3 days. It’s fast paced and exciting and fans have responded. As a result, the IPL ranks fifth in the world in attendance for outdoor sports, averaging nearly 32,000 fans per game.
Formula One
NASCAR might be the tire-squealing champion of America but the world’s favorite and fastest racing sport is, without question, Formula One. Rather than having its drivers race each other on an oval, Formula One takes them on a ride through complex tracks where they’ll have to maneuver sharp turns.
This tests their skills to see which cars can come out on top. With Grand Prix events all over the world, fans of Formula One line the tracks to get a glimpse of the world’s best drivers in action.
NBA
The National Basketball Association is the world’s premier basketball league, drawing the top talents in the U.S. and from all around the globe. Right now, that includes the likes of LeBron, Curry, Durant, Westbrook and other popular names spread throughout a competitive 30-team league. It also has a storied past which includes legends of the game like Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Magic Johnson. There are the classic rivalries, like Celtics/Lakers and Bulls/Knicks, too.
When it’s finals time, the whole world tunes in. Game 7 of The 2016 NBA Finals between the Warriors and Cavs reached 44.5 million viewers. Not bad, considering it was on at the same time as Game of Thrones.
NHL
There’s just something about hockey that gets people excited.
Is it the speed of the game? The tremendous goals? The fighting? Who’s to say?
What we do know, though, is that the NHL is special. It’s a testament to the sport that the league has recovered from two major lockouts since 2004, proving just how dedicated and passionate hockey fans truly are. The NHL has seen legends, like Wayne Gretzky and Bobby Orr, grace the ice as well as current world-class stars like Alex Ovechkin and Sidney Crosby. When playoff season comes around and the beards start to grow, magic is in the air for one of the greatest and most competitive tournaments in sports.
MLB
This one’s all about history, folks.
Major League Baseball is about more than just baseball; it’s part of a Nation’s identity. America’s favorite pastime, baseball is a total experience. It’s about grabbing a hot dog outside the stadium, trying to catch a foul ball, getting up on the big screen, chanting, booing and making signs. But, let’s not forget the competition.
We could talk about the ugliness of steroid abuse, but we’d rather talk about the Sox vs the Yankees, or the Cubs and their curse or the Giants and Dodgers. And even though you may think baseball is losing popularity, in 2015 the MLB still pulled in nearly 10 billion in revenue, so they’re doing just fine… Batter up!
NFL
Are you ready for some football?
Baseball may be America’s pastime, but football is “America’s Game”. Despite having a short season, running from September to February if you count the playoffs, the NFL is a money-making machine. For its 17 weeks of regular season, Americans give up their Sundays to enjoy a day’s worth of televised pigskin and, come playoff time, football fever’s in the air. This all leads to huge advertising bucks, but that hasn’t sacrificed any of the sport’s tradition. In fact, it’s added to it. Tailgating has created its own market for products, while tons of viewers check out the Super Bowl just for the commercials.
For its 17 weeks of regular season, Americans give up their Sundays to enjoy a day’s worth of televised pigskin and, come playoff time, football fever’s in the air. This all leads to huge advertising bucks, but that hasn’t sacrificed any of the sport’s tradition. In fact, it’s added to it. Tailgating has created its own market for products, while tons of viewers check out the Super Bowl just for the commercials.
Before we unveil our top picks, here are a few honorable mentions.
– UFC
– La Liga
– NASCAR
Premier League
The world’s most popular sport deserves the world’s most popular league. Boasting some of the most exciting, fast-paced football from some of the best players on the planet, the Premier League is the gold standard for football.
Teams are solid from the top of the table to the bottom and on any given match day, you can witness an upset. With famous and storied clubs such as Manchester United, Liverpool, and Arsenal, Premier League rivalries are a sight to behold.
The Premier League boasts the most lucrative television contract in sports, securing its global reach and bringing in fans from anywhere and everywhere. In March 2015, Liverpool vs United drew 700 million viewers. By comparison, the Super Bowl only had 114 million.
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A Wooden Home in the mountainous Vorarlberg region of Austria
Designed by architectural firm Bernardo Bader Architects, this beautiful building, which appears to emerge from the hillside, is located in the mountainous Vorarlberg region of Austria. It has a total of 1,000 meters squared of terrain, in which we also find approximately 200 meters squared occupied by the building itself. Additionally, being in the mountainous region, it is located about 1,000 meters above sea level. Its beautiful wooden exterior stands..
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Sig Nordal 