The saga of Biscuit, a 37-pound feline from the St. Louis area, isn't quite done yet. The tubby tabby had to find another home after his first one didn't work out after leaving an area shelter in mid-March. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports Ed and Lisa Pyatt of Eureka, Mo., were the lucky recipients of Biscuit after the City of St. Charles Animal Control Services reviewed more than 110 offers for homes. The huge cat didn't get along with the Pyatts' other cat. Luckily, a specialized animal shelter stepped in to help.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/egypt-says-not-discuss-emergency-loan-imf-103701708.html
andrew bailey the village dallas fort worth tornado dallas tornadoes dallas weather nike nfl uniforms ben and jerrys free cone day
From Your Health Journal?..?A very interesting article from Red Orbit that I wanted to promote here entitled Could Obesity Help Prevent Heart-Related Deaths? An interesting finding from the UK which states that obese cardiac patients are actually less likely to die from their heart-related condition than those who maintain normal body weight. The study discovered that subjects who participated in physical activity at least one time per week and who did not smoke had a lower risk of dying, no matter their weight. They also discovered obese patients who did not exercise nor follow other healthy lifestyle recommendations still had a lower risk of death than their normal weight counterparts who smoked or did not exercise. Very interesting finding, and you are encouraged to visit the Red Orbit web site (link provided below) to read the complete article. There is probably a little more research needed in this area to confirm these findings, but nonetheless, very helpful information.?
Leaf, the Cambridge, Mass.-based company that offers a point-of-sale solution based on its own Android tablet for small- to medium-sized businesses, announced that it will soon launch an app store for its service. The company, as its CEO Aron Schwartzkopf told me earlier this week, aims to build an ecosystem for offline merchants that allows them to connect to their consumers at the point of sales. The best way to do this effectively, he believes, is to create an open platform that combines the usual point-of-sale features like sales and inventory management with analytics and, now, an app store that allows third-party developers to hook into Leaf’s backend and create apps for its tablet. Thanks to its open nature, the Leaf, as Schwartzkopf told me, wants to “get rid of the segregation of all the different devices and platforms” that you can currently find in any given small business (and especially in restaurants). The service is vendor agnostic and allows merchants to choose their own payment providers, loyalty programs and other core features they need to run their businesses. The new app store will feature about 10 apps at first and launch later this spring. At first, the store will be stocked with apps from the likes of PayPal and LevelUp, as well as a number of reservations systems and mobile ordering services. During the beta, the store will remain closed to outside developers, but the company plans to launch its full developer platform later this year. Then, developers will be able to create everything from payment apps to HTML5 apps that run in its merchant backend and Android apps that run right on the tablet. “As we?ve seen in other mobile app marketplaces, there are talented and creative developers out there, and we?re excited to see the innovations they can bring to the small business community on top of the Leaf platform,” Schwartzkopf said in the company’s announcement today. Last year, Leaf raised a $1 million seed round?and has since launched its tablet and expanded the scope beyond just providing payments.
Music?Festival?from the 5th?? 7th?April. The weekend boasts the best in Irish Music with De Danann and the Kilfenora Ceili Band featuring amongst others.
What better way to enjoy the first ever F?ile Neid?n Festival than staying in one of the many?Bed and Breakfast?s?on offer in Kenmare. Comfortable accommodation and reasonably priced.
Federal regulators are investigating Microsoft for allegedly bribing foreign governments for favor in software contracts. “Lawyers from the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission are examining kickback allegations made by a former Microsoft representative in China, as well as the company’s relationship with certain resellers and consultants in Romania and Italy,” sources familiar with the allegations, tell The Wall Street Journal, which broke the story earlier today. An anonymous tipster alleges that Microsoft’s China division instructed him to offer kickbacks in exchange for signing off on software contracts. To further complicate the allegations, the tipster was also involved in a labor dispute with the software giant. The tipsters contact with Microsoft ended in 2008. “Like every large company with operations around the world we sometimes receive allegations about potential misconduct by employees or business partners,” John Frank, Microsoft’s vice president and deputy general counsel, tells The Journal. “We cooperate fully in any government inquiries,” Frank added. The probe is also investigating bribery practices in Italy, related to consultants of Microsoft’s customer loyalty program. Consultants were used as “vehicles for used such consultants as vehicles for lavishing gifts and trips on Italian procurement officials in exchange for government business.” Federal investigators are conducting the probe under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and a new whistleblower program at the Securities and Exchange Commission. “Filing allegations simultaneously with the company and the government provides whistleblowers some job security. Companies can face private lawsuits for sacking employees in retaliation for submitting allegations to the SEC, even if the tips never lead to an enforcement action,” explains the Journal. While Microsoft says it is diligent about investigating corruption, it has offices in over 100 countries and roughly 640,000 partners businesses around the globe. Interestingly enough, ZDnet argues the claims against Microsoft should be taken with a healthy dose of skepticism, since The?Journal itself was recently investigated for bribery, but never pursued by the U.S. government. “It comes only a few days after the Journal itself was investigated by U.S. federal authorities over what appear to be claims of bribery, but were not pursued by the U.S. government. Instead, the Journal, owned by the Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation empire, blamed China for retaliating against the newspaper’s critical reporting of Beijing in recent weeks,” writes Zack Whittaker. More on this story as it develops.