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| A spot of window cleaning: Maritime Museum, Lingang New City, China. |
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| A window cleaner passes a lighter to his colleague while rappelling from a new building in Tianjin. |
Smoking Really Is Nearly Inescapable in China: On the sidewalk, in a hospital, directly in front of a "No Smoking" sign. Smokers are a nearly inescapable part of life in China, though the government is trying to change that. Earlier this week, China's Ministry of Education banned smoking in public schools. To enforce the rule, schools must now install smoke alarms or surveillance cameras to spot violators. They'll also have to stop selling tobacco products at their canteens, and can't accept sponsorships or ads from cigarette companies. Universities can no longer allow smoking inside academic buildings, though they can maintain designated smoking areas on campus. It's only the latest in a string of efforts to curb the nation's smoking habit. Though citywide bans are rarely observed or enforced, China also announced plans to ban smoking on all public property nationwide at some point this year.
Window washers deal with bitter cold temperatures - Despite the dangerously cold temperatures, some still have to work outside and the particularly unlucky ones also have to deal with water. Any job that requires you to work with water is going to be particularly hazardous in this extreme cold, but not even window washers got a break on Monday. Nathan Elston, of Sapphire Window Cleaning and Power Washing, said there are two components to getting through a day like today. The first is layers. "I have a pair of thermals on, and then I have my Sapphire polo shirt on and then a hoody on after that," said Elston.
The second is protecting your hands from the water. "If you get it on your hands, especially when it's this cold, it's gonna freeze and it's gonna be miserable. You know, once your hands get wet you're miserable. So, you just try to keep your gloves as dry as possible," he said. But waking up to see a temperature of minus 2 degrees, "I didn't want to get out of bed this morning. It was pretty chilly. But once you get started, you just crank the heat up in the truck and you just try not to think about it," he said.
Elston says this weather isn't enough to make him hate his job. "Actually, no. It sounds weird: I love window washing. But, yeah, you kind of second guess yourself," he said. But it's the paycheck that helps him to wipe away the doubt. Fortunately for Elston, none of his jobs today involved going up high-rises so he didn't have too much trouble with the wind.
People cleaning up after massive winter storm in Northeast: PHILADELPHIA - People in the Midwest and Northeast are now cleaning up after this week's massive winter storm that canceled thousands of flights across the country. At the iconic Apple store on 5th Avenue, one of the giant window panes cracked. A snow plow accidentally rammed into it. It's going to cost almost half a million dollars to fix. The large glass panel was part of Apple's distinctive '"cube" store on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. The estimated cost to repair it is $450,000, according to 9to5Mac.
NOLA: The greatest event to take place every year in the window cleaning and pressure washing world. It is hosted by the Provincial Hotel in amazing New Orleans LA. Awesome Speakers, and amazing atmosphere. The event is held to only 75 people, so those who go are a lucky few! Put on by Thad from the PWRA. If you want to learn how to be a fast window cleaner, join the window cleaning speed contest. If you want to improve your business, this event is for you!
Firefighters in the North Coast region are on alert with high temperatures and low humidity forecast for the next few days. The mercury is expected to rise to 38 degrees in Gympie today and 39 tomorrow. The director of operations for the Rural Fire Service, Peter Varley, says firefighters have contained all current blazes but will continue to monitor them. "There's none of them that are out of control at this stage," he said. "We've had water-bombing aircraft working on a couple of those fires over the last few days. "So at the moment we are pretty happy with where they are but we'll certainly be keeping an eye on them."
He says the extreme weather conditions are perfect for fires to ignite and spread quickly. "The three things that make things worse for us, and high temperatures that's one of them, the other is low humidity and then of course the winds behind it as well," he said. "Fortunately those winds are looking pretty good but those temperatures are certainly going to be high today and Wednesday."
Outdoor tradesmen are doing what they can to schedule their workloads outside the extreme heat of the day. Sunshine Coast window washer Cullen Ball says starting early is essential. "I usually start at around five o'clock, try to get the jobs done, earlier if we have to, sometimes we have to travel to Brisbane, so sometimes I'll leave at four if I have to," he said. "Just whatever really to get the job done, before the heat kicks in, can't get the work done then."
Jakarta Stays Alert Despite Floods Receding on Thursday: An officer cleans the window panes of a bank in Jatinegara, East Jakarta, on Jan. 23, 2014, after floods inundated the area and forced the bank to close for days. Jakarta began to dry out on Thursday after days of heavy rain and floods soaked large swaths of the Indonesian capital.
The floodwaters had receded in most areas and displaced residents began to filter back home to begin the long cleanup. But just as life looked like it would return to normal, the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) warned of heavy rains and floods Thursday evening.
“They’ve begun cleaning their houses, although many of them immediately returned to shelters when they heard reports of incoming floods,” said Bambang Musyawardana, the head of the Jakarta office of the BNPB.
The UK government said it will save £1.5 billion by managing contracts more effectively, for example “through reducing wasteful energy consumption and through the public sector sharing in savings on insurance”. It will also make efficient use of space from subletting or mothballing surplus building space. The third step the government will be taking is to “review soft service requirements so that the public sector does not buy more than it needs when specifying facilities management such as window cleaning and frequency of decoration”.
Green activists pose as cleaners to scale corporate highrise, unfurl protest banner (MUMBAI): Twelve Greenpeace activists in tiger costumes scaled the headquarters of a corporate giant at Mahalaxmi and spent five hours dangling off the skyscraper to put up a huge banner to protest against allocation of a coal block that allegedly threatens forest land and endangers the livelihood of villagers dependent on it. The protesters gained access to the top of Essar's corporate office highrise posing as window cleaners, and unfurled a giant banner around 2pm, which read 'We Kill Forests: Essar'.
Essar stated on its website: "In a blatant and anarchic act of trespassing, some people, at the behest of Greenpeace, masqueraded as building cleaning agents and gained access to the Essar office in Mumbai. In this illegal act, the trespassers misused the office premises to spread anti-corporate, misleading and false propaganda."
Payoff for Highly Insulating Windows Takes Decades - While comfort and other benefits are more immediate, it takes two decades or more for the triple-pane highly insulating windows to pay off financially based on utility-bill savings, according to a report by energy efficiency experts at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). For this study, the PNNL team studied the effect of replacing aluminum-frame double-pane windows, which are common in homes across the country, with newer, triple-pane windows, also known as highly insulating windows. The team found that the newer highly insulating windows saved, on average, 5,821 watt-hours per day (W·h/day) or 279.5 kilowatt hours (kW·h) over the 70 days of the experiment.
The overall whole-house energy savings were 11.6% ± 1.53% over the 70 day period. But because of the cost of the highly insulating windows, it would take anywhere from 23 to 55 years for the reduced energy cost to make up for the increased expense. “A savings of 12 percent on whole-house energy consumption is substantial, especially when you’re talking about changing a relatively small percentage of a home’s envelope,” said Parker, a founder of the Lab Homes project. “But the windows are expensive.” The team notes that there are many other factors to consider in addition to money when deciding whether to install highly insulating windows.
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| The MIT system uses nanoparticles embedded into a transparent material that can be fitted to any window or glass. These particles are tuned to scatter certain wavelengths, colours or lights in order to display the moving image, pictured, while letting other wavelengths pass through. |
The sticker that turns any window into a PROJECTOR SCREEN: Scientists create transparent adhesive film that shows moving images - Transparent displays may seem like the kind of features found exclusively on high-end devices such as Google Glass, but researchers from Massachusetts plan to change all that. A team of graduates from MIT have developed see-through displays that can be applied as a thin plastic coating on any window or piece of glass, including lenses. Moving images can be then be projected onto these displays and the designers claim they are easier to make, and could cost significantly less, than current technology on the market.
Many current ‘heads-up’ display systems use a mirror or beam-splitter to project an image directly into the user’s eyes. This makes the display appear to be hovering in space. However, because the image is beamed at a set angle, the range of view is limited and viewers must be stood in the right spot to see the image clearly. With MIT’s new system, the image appears on the glass itself, and can be seen from a wide range of angles.
Similarly, other transparent displays are limited because they use electronics, including LEDs and transparent circuits, that are built directly into the display. This limits the level of transparency, for example. The secret of MIT’s system is that nanoparticles are embedded into the transparent material that are tuned to only scatter certain wavelengths, colours or lights, while letting other wavelengths pass through. This means the glass remains transparent enough to see the colours and shapes clearly.
The particles could be incorporated in a thin, inexpensive plastic coating applied to the glass, in a similar way to how tinting is applied to car windows. To demonstrate the system, the team projected a blue image in front of a scene containing cups of several colours, all of which can clearly be seen through the projected image. While the team's demonstration used silver nanoparticles, approximately 60 nanometres wide, to produce the blue image, researchers claim it should be possible to create a full-colour display using the same principle.
‘The glass will look almost perfectly transparent,’ said MIT Professor Marin Soljačić, ‘because most light is not of that precise wavelength.' He added that scattering allows the projected image to be seen in much the same way that smoke in the air can reveal the presence of a laser beam passing through it. Such displays might be used, for example, to project images onto store windows without obstructing the window displays, or to more accurately display directions via a heads-up display onto the windshields of cars and planes.
Soljačić added that his group’s demonstration is just a proof-of-concept, and that much work remains to optimize the performance of the system. The system is described in a paper published this week in the journal Nature Communications, co-authored by Professor Soljačić, colleague Professor John Joannopoulos, graduate student Chia Wei Hsu, and four others.
New SOM building sparks controversy: Some residents have expressed concern over the modern design of the building in light of the more traditional architecture in the area previously. Although Foster had stated publicly that the extensive use of glass was intended to facilitate connection and encourage transparency, some locals remain unconvinced. “[Evans Hall] got the ‘Eye Sore architecture Award’ from Trump Enterprises, and the ‘Classy Glass Building Award from Pyrex,’” Hamilton said. “Window Washers of the World salute you.”
Since the construction was not in a historic district, Yale was not subject to local preservation laws in the building’s construction, New Haven Preservation Services Officer of the New Haven Preservation Trust John Herzan said. Yale was determined to proceed and shared a different vision than the New Haven Preservation Trust, he continued. Some residents wanted to see Yale incorporate the old building into the final design to protect what some residents argued were parts of New Haven’s history. “The lesson Yale could have taught is to think of preservation as a part of what management should be about,” Ahern said. “The greatest building is the one that is already built.”
How to get fit whilst you clean - Cleaning whether you enjoy it or not is a chore, pure and simple, but it's also a great weight loss tool. Perfect if you really loathe exercise. A survey by Betta Living revealed that the average UK adult spends 8 hours per week Cleaning and tidying and has the potential to wipe away 1lb in weight per week without forking out extortionate gym costs. We clock up 30.5 ‘mop miles’ a year when mopping and vacuuming, and scale the equivalent of a small mountain climbing the stairs and ladders during a 12-month period of being house-proud. But according to the research, which questioned 2,000 UK adults, the majority of us aren’t stretching ourselves to our full fat burning potential and are missing out on crucial calorie cutting as we dust, sweep and polish our homes because we’re doing it in short bursts and also not really ‘going for it’.
Window and laundry squats - perform squats while cleaning windows, lifting the washing basket or when cleaning inside your kitchen cupboards. Squat low to the ground (feet shoulder width apart, back straight, sitting down into your bottom) to get water on your cloth, and then stretch up high moving arms in a circular motion to sculpt your shoulders! This will give your arms and legs the perfect dual Workout.
Lenoir man builds earth berm home: Ehlers built his basement house on land he already owned, and he did much of the work himself. He hired a licensed electrician and a plumber, but he did all the framing himself. Together, he and his wife did the roofing. The house is set 8 feet into the ground — the walls, pre-made, were essentially lowered into a house-sized hole in the ground. During the day, tubular skylights fill the home with natural light; it doesn’t feel dark or underground until a normal house would: At night. People have questions about the house when they visit, but it wasn’t designed to be an oddity. Ehlers, who works as a commercial window cleaner for a living and sometimes rides his unicycle through downtown Lenoir between jobs, describes it as “a low-tech way to have an energy-efficient house.”
Solicitor: 100 block of Prospect Avenue. A window cleaner reportedly dropped off literature after cleaning windows in the area at 11:26 a.m. Police talked to the window cleaner’s supervisor who promised to pick up the worker a few minutes later.
The surge in digital hitchhiking has been slammed as highly dangerous by Queensland police. Thomas Jones, 25, a window cleaner from Brisbane CBD this week posted an ad in classifieds offering a lift to the Gold Coast. "That is what people are doing these days to help with the cost of going on a holiday. Petrol costs are really high and I have found that you can meet interesting fun people. I don't worry about the dangers, I like to believe there are a lot more good people than bad in the world,'' he said. Jo Hall manager of Chill Backpackers in Brisbane told the Courier Mail that they do not recommend lift sharing. "It is our policy for security reasons not to post any ads on notice boards for people looking to share cars,'' she said.
Boy, 2, was 'roughhousing' before crashing through window, falling 17 stories to death (EAST CLEVELAND, Ohio) — The 2-year-old boy who fell to his death from a 17-story window on Monday was roughhousing with his 3-year-old brother shortly before his mother heard glass shattering, reports stated on Tuesday. The Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner ruled the death an accident Tuesday, concluding that Alijah R. Glenn crashed through a floor-to-ceiling window Monday at the Crystal Tower apartments on Terrace Road. The child's death left those who knew the family saddened and Crystal Tower residents wondering if more safety features could have prevented the tragedy.
Two residents said on Tuesday they were concerned about the safety of the windows in the building. Experts on Ohio's building code say the code requires floor-to-ceiling windows on high-rises to be more fortified than other windows, but that it doesn't require the glass to be unbreakable. Experts said windows must have "safety glass" that is strong enough to withstand wind and debris. Ron Gerome, an independent housing inspector in Cleveland and Medina, said the safety glass required is similar to a windshield. "Safety glass is something that when it breaks it shatters," said Gerome, the owner of Signature Home Inspection. "There's plastic in between to protect you. If you break it, it falls into thousands of pieces so it doesn't cause any extra injury." Crystal Tower property manager K&D's corporate attorney Mark Schildhouse said the company inspects all their properties at least once a year. He said he was unsure if the company was planning to make any changes to the windows or alert residents of a potential danger.
NUEVO ITALIA, Mexico – The thousands of federal police and military troops who have descended on the troubled Mexican state of Michoacan have been busy arresting suspected drug cartel members, disarming untrustworthy local police officers and standing guard on street corners of its tiny towns, assault rifles at the ready.
The troop buildup has so far deterred the region’s vigilante “self-defense” groups from broadening their fight against the powerful Knights Templar drug cartel and helped President Enrique Peña Nieto avert a domestic disaster. Pictured: Members of a peasant group battling a drug cartel take their positions after arriving in the town of Nueva Italia
But the risk of violence remained high Thursday in the agricultural region known as Tierra Caliente, or Hot Land. Late Wednesday, shots were fired at the office of the federal prosecutor in the city of Apatzingan, according to the news service Quadratin. A 25-year-old window washer was injured.
The filing deadline for the Urban County Council district races and three at-large seats is Jan. 28. Several incumbent members and first-time candidates filed to run during the past week. They include: Michael Stuart, a small-business owner and longtime community volunteer, in the 2nd District, which extends from the west end of downtown to Masterson Station and surrounding neighborhoods. Stuart, who serves on the LexArts board of directors, was president and board member of the Living Arts & Science Center for seven years. He volunteers for the West End Alliance. Stuart, 34, has owned a window-cleaning business for 13 years.
Marion Stuart, a prominent African-American entrepreneur in Indianapolis and one of the few surviving community leaders from the World War II era, has died. Stuart, founder of Stuart’s Household Moving & Storage Co., passed away Jan. 23 at the age of 97. Stuart formed his company in 1936, during the Great Depression, the worst economic crisis in United States history. In what became an inspiring story of success, he overcame economic and racial diversity to build one of the state’s most stable enterprises.
Born in Indianapolis, Marion Henry Byrd Stuart was the second child of nine born to Dr. William Weir Stuart and Mae Lewellyn Stokes Stuart. Stuart came from an enterprising family. His father was a dentist, and his brothers, Charles and Joseph, were co-founders of Stuart Mortuary. At an early age, however, Stuart realized he could not take his family’s stability for granted, and sought ways to generate an income of his own. He embarked on entrepreneurial efforts at a time when individuals could not rely on much government assistance and pervasive racism was found even in Northern cities such as Indianapolis.
In a 2011 interview with the Recorder, the Crispus Attucks High School graduate recalled how he once worked several jobs, including cleaning up a haberdashery (shop with clothing materials) on Monument Circle for $3.80 a week. He and a friend then formed a window washing enterprise for stores on Pennsylvania Street. “We washed windows in the morning, and I would go back and trim windows at night,” Stuart said. “Back then you could go in places and request work. You didn’t have people standing around waiting for someone to give them a loan. You did whatever work you could find and worked hard.”
Chris Eichler, 29, of Yakima died Thursday at Yakima Valley Memorial Hospital. Mr. Eichler was born in Yakima. He worked as a high-rise window washer for Intermountain Cleaning Service. Survivors include his fiancee, Jennifer Bales of Yakima; two daughters, Mackenzie Eichler and Maycee Eichler, both of Yakima; his mother, Janice Moss of Yakima; his father, David Eichler of Wenatchee; three sisters, Dana Stokes of Issaquah, Dyanna Harrington of Yakima and Coreen Moss of Des Moines; a brother, Evan Eichler of Wenatchee; and his grandparents, Floyd and Janita Overacker of Wapato.
John J. Long Jr. of Warrington died Sunday, Jan. 26, 2014. He was 86. He was the husband of 59 years to Annabelle J. (Brown) Long. Born in Parsons, Pa., he was the son of the late John J. and Agnes (Davitt) Long Sr.
Mr. Long was a U.S. Army Veteran. He was employed with the U.S. Postal Service in Hatboro, and retired as postmaster of Horsham. John also founded LWC Services and was affectionately known in Hatboro as John the Window Cleaner.
Relatives and friends may call from 6 to 8 p.m. Thursday and from 9:30 to 10:30 a.m. Friday at Louis Swift Plunkett Funeral Home, 529 N. York Rd., Hatboro. A Funeral Mass will be celebrated at 11 a.m. Friday at St. Joseph's Church, Columbia Ave. and Easton Rd., Warrington, PA 18976. Interment will be in Whitemarsh Memorial Park, Horsham.
Second Defendant Pleads Not Guilty In Eastport Home Invasion Murder - Matthew D. Rooney, 22, of East Moriches pleaded not guilty to a single count of second-degree murder and first-degree assault before Judge Ambro on Thursday afternoon and was remanded to the Suffolk County Jail without bail. He appeared in court with his brother and parents, who all refused to comment to The Press, on the advice of Mr. Rooney’s attorney, Pietrina Reda of Merrick. Ms. Reda said during the arraignment that her client disputed the allegations against him. She declined to comment further outside the courtroom.
Ms. Newcombe, the lead prosecutor, said that while Mr. Batterson was the one who pulled the trigger, Mr. Rooney was also armed and took part in the robbery, and present at the time of the murder. She said the two were friends, but would not comment further on their relationship. Both Mr. Batterson and Mr. Rooney admitted to others that they were involved in the incident, Ms. Newcombe said during both of Thursday’s arraignments. Both defendants face 25 years to life in prison if convicted of the crimes. Mr. Burke noted that Mr. Batterson (pictured) lived with his parents and worked as a carpenter and window washer prior to his arrest earlier this month.
Four men have admitted being involved in a major drug dealing operation in West Lothian. Ryan Mayberry, Patrick McKervey, Hugh McAnna and Gordon Stewart were all arrested in 2012 following a police surveillance operation. The High Court in Edinburgh heard almost £2m of cannabis and amphetamine was seized in the operation. All four men admitted being concerned in the supply of drugs. Sentence was deferred. Mayberry was later stopped by traffic officers and found to be carrying more than £7,000 in cash. He claimed the money was from the sale of a window cleaning business and he was travelling south to buy a vehicle.
