Earthpawz Cleans Up the Official GRAMMY Gift Bags: Presenters and performers and their pets will be going green when they receive Earthpawz® pet friendly cleaning products in their official gift bag at the 53rd Annual GRAMMY Awards®. Included in this year's gift bags will be Earthpawz Doggie Slobber Window & Glass Cleaner, as well as Earthpawz Dirty Dog Floor Cleaner & Mud Remover. Earthpawz is a Canadian-based company, founded by Taren de St. Croix, focused on providing healthy and safe cleaning products. After Taren's dog became ill from the cleaners she was using in her home, she decided to meet with a chemist and formulate safe products that were completely toxic free. The products worked so well, she decided to found Earthpawz and make them available to everyone that wants to use safe and 100% natural products around their pets and homes.
Betterclean Services launches its franchise opportunity: New commercial cleaning franchise opportunity Betterclean Services is offering entrepreneurs the chance to become involved in an industry, which generated £4.6 billion in 2009 within the UK. Founded in 1995, Betterclean Services is involved in the commercial cleaning of premises such as theatres, dental surgeries, office premises, holiday parks, doctors' surgeries and car showrooms – and holds contracts with organisations including the Dartmoor National Parks Authority. The business now predominantly exists as a commercial contract cleaning operation, with 90 per cent of the turnover associated with this field of expertise. The remaining 10 per cent is attributed to cleaning windows (sub-contracted), carpets, ad hoc cleaning such as house lets, seasonal cleaning work within the holiday industry, hard floor cleaning and small consumable products that they supply, such as sanitary provisions to existing clients.
A strict reading of Ashland's business license law says that any adult engaged in an activity with an intent to make a profit needs a license. "If someone is strumming a banjo on the sidewalk, are they performing for a profit? I don't know," said Ashland Finance and Administrative Services Director Lee Tuneberg. Ashland has no threshold for the amount of money a person has to make, or even a requirement that the person actually realize a profit. Tuneberg said city staff are awaiting more direction from the Ashland City Council about business license rules. The council is considering requiring vendors that rent booth space to buy a license, too. A public hearing is planned in February but no date has been set yet. Tuneberg's staff members send out about a dozen notices a year to people who are operating businesses in town without a license. Tuneberg said the notices are generally sent out after the city receives complaints, or if an unlicensed business activity comes to the attention of city staff.
Tuneberg himself turned in information about a roving window-washer who came to his house offering cleaning services, but who didn't have a business license. As evidence that a person is engaged in unlicensed business activity, city staff will look for TV, radio and newspaper ads, door hangers, ads on the side of a car, signs and other forms of advertising. They haven't gone to the level of checking out all the fliers people post on bulletin boards around town offering goods and services, Tuneberg said. People are allowed to sell their own personal household items, as long as the sales method — such as a garage sale — lasts less than four days a year.
Twenty two years ago he was “a Tyneside window cleaner with a passion for painting”, according to one newspaper article of the time. Alexander Millar has come a long way since then. Firmly established at the commercial end of the art spectrum, his prints and original paintings hang in the homes of celebrities and ordinary people around the world. Sting, Cheryl Cole and Led Zeppelin frontman Robert Plant own examples of his work but it strikes a chord with many people who see, in Alexander’s jovial working class figures, echoes of their roots in the industrial north.
Fall in UK police officer numbers; The number of police officers in England and Wales fell by more than 2,500 last year, the first significant fall for at least six years, figures showed today. There were 142,363 officers on September 30, a drop of 1.7% compared with the previous year, the Home Office figures showed.
In the comments section: My local newspaper today carries a front page report on how large numbers of police officers (starting salary, £23,000 per year - not too bad) are moonlighting. No wonder they continually feel the need to tell transparent lies about falling crime figures. It doesn't look good, I suppose, when a member of the public is burgled and there's no police officer available because they're all out driving taxis and window-cleaning.
On Jan. 21, 1993, D.C. Council members condemned a move by then-Mayor Sharon Pratt Kelly that prevented them from viewing the presidential inauguration parade from the District Building, today known as the John A. Wilson Building. While Kelly had been inserting herself in photo ops with newly-inaugurated President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore, she had left the Wilson Building’s windows unwashed, and changed the locks so council members couldn’t use the building to watch the inaugural parade. (The mayor had earlier dragged her feet on allowing the council to use her official reviewing platform.)
As Washington City Paper wrote in its Jan. 29 issue: The council thought it had found a way to get around its exclusion from the mayor’s reviewing stand by having the windows washed on the District Building so council-members and their staff could watch from the offices... but the mayor’s Department of Administrative Services said it did not have the money in its budget to clean the windows.
Then, the Friday before the Inauguration, the mayor had the locks changed on her old offices at the District Building because the council had a key to get into the prime parade-viewing space. By that time, the Apartment and Office Building Association (AOBA) an organization of downtown landlords eager to curry favor with the council, had a found a Virginia firm willing to clean the windows for free. So the council had the locks changed the following Monday to let the window cleaners in. The next day, the mayor had them changed again. This is the way your elected officials really behave when their egos are swollen. Click picture to enlarge.
Micky Flanagan's brilliantly observed 2007 Edinburgh Fringe show about his rise from working-class Herbert to middle-class ponce, finally and deservedly made the comic red hot property on the comedy circuit. The show brought him acclaim from critics and audiences alike, as well as a Best Newcomer nomination at the if.comedy awards (now renamed the Edinburgh Comedy Awards). Since then, the animated Cockney has become a sought-after act, not only on the live circuit, but also on the small screen. He is now in the unique position of selling out 60 nights at some of the largest and most prestigious theatres around the country. Not bad for a former Billingsgate Market fish packer and window cleaner from Bethnal Green. "No, not bad at all really," agrees Micky, with comic understatement. See Micky here.
Motorists could soon be forced to pay up to £1.40 an hour for on-street parking. Under plans set out by Surrey County Council, ten streets in Mole Valley will see pay and display machines installed by November. Around 3,500 short-term spaces have been identified across the county, including a total of 170 in Dorking, Leatherhead, Ashtead and Bookham. Opponents claim the charges would hit motorists and traders at an unstable economic time. "There will be additional costs to retailers for window cleaners and other tradespeople carrying out necessary work to their premises."
Move into security helps firm to clean up: A County Armagh cleaning and security firm has defied the recession with £3m worth of growth. Robinson Services, best known for its cleaning work, has diversified into a number of different areas in recent years. Mr Huxley said this creative approach to their business model has been crucial to thriving in the recession. "We are continually looking at new services we can offer. Last year, we began to provide gritting services," he said. "In November we bought two gritters and then had one of the worst winters in living memory. So it's all about a combination of good business acumen and a bit of luck." Robinson Services began life in 1968 as a window cleaning venture, started by James Robinson. Today, son David Robinson is at the helm and the company employs over 1,200 staff.
On the outside of Capitol Dome: When Aulson Sr. returned in 2002 to clean and paint the dome, he found that security had become “a lot more intense” since the terror attacks of 2001, and contractors could no longer build scaffolding from the ground to reach the outside of the dome. “From a contractor’s point of view, we were horrified that we had no access from the ground,” said Aulson, Sr. Security at the U.S. Capitol includes numerous barricades, checkpoints and security details, and the entire area can be quickly shut down if needed, according to project foreman Chad Lampert.
In order to gain access to their work area whenever it was on the cupola part of the dome, they rode in controlled-descent devices, grabbing a rope when they wanted to stop. The ropes lowered them to their worksite on Bosun’s chairs, which are similar to window washer’s platforms, according to Lampert. Then they would climb back up to the top on a permanently mounted ladder and descend to another work area on bosun’s chairs. They also wore separate safety harnesses connected to a rope system that would stop them if they fell.
One of the 16 little-known private villas at the Trump National Golf Club-Westchester in Briarcliff Manor is now on the market for $1.95 million. This three-story townhome at 14 Shadow Tree Lane Westchester features three bedrooms, four and a half baths and 5,200 square feet of luxurious details — from a remote-controlled marble steam room to a 720-bottle wine cellar. And let's not forget the four fireplaces, the whole-house audio system, the surround-sound home theater and the top-of-the-line Bilotta kitchen with granite countertops, a six-burner stove and three ovens.
The prestigious location with an expansive view overlooking the 17th hole also entitles the homeowner to privileges at the elite golf club, including exclusive clubhouse events, the tennis pavilion, pool house, and rubbing shoulders with high-profile golf club members such as former President Bill Clinton, former New York Yankees manager Joe Torre, actor/director Clint Eastwood, sportscaster Bob Costas, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and, of course, Donald Trump himself. And the services are sublime — window washing, changing light bulbs in the hard-to-reach cathedral ceilings, snow removal, personalized security and forwarding mail to owners when they're in other locations.
Town Hall chiefs in Sheffield will today decide on plans to spend £53,700 extending a scheme they say ‘animates’ run-down and vacant shops by putting art in empty city centre store windows. The Sheffield Showcase scheme was dreamt up in July 2009 after the ambitious Sevenstone retail development was put on hold because of the recession. The £600 million retail scheme was meant to turn rundown streets between Barker’s Pool, The Moor and Pinstone Street into a shoppers’ paradise – but when developers Hammerson postponed the project council bosses decided to put public money into keeping the area tidy until the scheme could go ahead.
In the last 18 months the council has spent £188,000 on the “outdoor gallery” which they say helps boost footfall. The scheme – managed by The Source training organisation but funded by the council – gives artists and designers a public display platform and gives retailers free advertising space. But it does not come cheap. Costs include employing a visual merchandising manager, administrative assistant and apprentices, as well as paying for electricity bills, window cleaning and legal fees. Now officers want to spend £53,708 to keep the project running until the end of 2011. That figure does not include staffing costs – which need to be found from additional grants. Also here.
Stormy's Furcast is a winter-long series testing the weather predictions of the good-natured folks at the nearly 200-year-old Farmers' Almanac against an equally good-natured fox that lives at the Maine Wildlife Park in Gray. The almanac is based on science and secret formulas. This week's prediction: What's one of the best days to wash windows this month? The choices: 1) Jan. 15 2) Jan. 20 3) Jan. 29
The Farmers' Almanac says: Jan. 29 (Contradiction alert: The almanac's weather section calls for snow on that day, but its astrology section says it's a good day for window washing. Almanac Philom. Peter Geiger explained in a phone call that no one says it won't be a good day for indoor window washing. Hmmm ...).
The Avengers: The Complete Series 6 - Throughout the 1960s The Avengers bestrode the televisual world like a colossus. Twisted, kinky and confident, the flamboyant spy series echoed precisely the pop-cultural moods of that tumultuous decade. The latest volume in Optimum’s re-mastered and extras-stuffed reissue programme covers over eight discs the era of John Steed (Patrick McNee) and Tara King (Linda Thorson), when proceedings began to go a bit prog and the shirt collars could take your eye out. Even so, series six, from 1968, contained some of the show’s finest, furthest-out episodes - Fog, for example, where a reincarnation of Jack the Ripper stalks Soviet peace delegates through the streets of Whitechapel, or The Super Secret Cypher Snatch in which evil window-cleaners (no, really) brainwash operatives of the intelligence services. Like Sherlock Holmes going on the Magical Mystery Tour or The X-Files rewritten by PG Wodehouse, The Avengers was hip and smart as a whip, set in a fevered Home Counties fantasia where thought control, killer super-computers and mind-transference were just mildly irksome facts of life. Minimal extras.
Trollull/Oscar Weil has been a manufacturer of steel wool products for more than 100 years. The history of the company is marked by a long series of new products that have shaped the steel wool market. Due to unsurpassed premium quality, strong products and customer-oriented service, satisfied customers in the UK and many European countries trust Trollull Premium Quality steel wool. New attraction shown on the TotallyDIY is the Trollull GlassCleaner. The Trollull GlassCleaner is a scratch-free sponge which easily removes paint and dirt from window glass and tiles – soft and safe! The working side is made of extra fine stainless steel wool. This unique product can be applied several times either dry or in combination with chemicals, e.g. solvents. PDF download here.
Allstate and American Family Insurance are taking different approaches to their marketing targeting Hispanic consumers. A spin-off of its national general market advertising campaign, "Mayhem," Allstate is introducing an effort with the antagonist "Mala Suerte (bad luck)," who represents unfortunate circumstances. The word "mayhem" has no literal translation in the Spanish language, which led Allstate to create "Mala Suerte" to resonate more directly with Hispanics.
"Mala Suerte" is introduced as a polished and confident-looking man. However, his mere presence creates a series of misfortunes that are intended to remind people of what can go wrong and the protection Allstate can provide when it does. He startles a window-washer, which causes a bucket to fall several stories and land on the hood of a car. The ad closes with the voiceover, "Dollar for dollar, nobody protects you like Allstate."
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