Counting the true cost of the arts cuts.......

                           Photograph by Paul Hughes. Liverpool Central Library.

Unions launch 'Lost Arts' website to record in detail everything we're losing because of the arts cuts

A very good thing, the Lost Arts website, was launched on Thursday in Westminster with the aim of of recording all the organisations, initiatives, projects, commissions, tours and more that will be lost due to cuts in public spending on the arts.

It will also keep a running total of money lost to the arts and the money lost to the Treasury as a consequence.

The initiative is a collaboration between eight unions: the Musicians' Union (MU), Equity, The Writers' Guild of Great Britain, the NUJ, Bectu, Unite, Prospect and PCS.

The shadow culture secretary Ivan Lewis said the campaign marked the end of too much silence from people in the arts and culture community. John Smith of the Musicians' Union, who is also president of the Federation of Entertainment Unions (FEU), said the cuts defied logic, given the money generated by the arts sector. The actor Maggie Steed, speaking for Equity, talked about the arts sector coming under unprecedented attack.

The website is encouraging people to add cuts you about. Don't forget you can also take part in the Guardian's Cutswatch project here.

Here are some extracts from the speeches. Long ones, I grant you, but worth reading.

Smith (FEU) said:

"I do not intend listing the cuts that have already been imposed as a result of the short-sighted ideologically driven policies of the Tory-led coalition. But it's going to be a while before we can assess their full impact, as we know Arts Council England has announced its 3-year plan which becomes operative next year. However, the full impact of the cuts in local authority funding is still far from clear. Just recently Arts Development UK released the results of a survey which demonstrated that the average local authority's arts & culture budget has already fallen by 38% since 2008, 93% of local arts services are expecting severe cuts next year with 10% of them expecting closure. Add this to the Arts Council cuts and we can see that we are in a sorry place indeed.

"But all of this defies logic; we know that we work in one of the truly successful areas of the UK economy. A study by Arts and Business has demonstrated that for every pound that's spent on culture more than two pounds is returned as, what economists call, Gross Added Value to the Economy

"We've got to get away from the use of language and the discourse that surrounds this subject. Central and local governments don't subsidise the arts – they invest in a successful revenue generating industry.

"The trade union movement faces one of its biggest challenges at the moment. We know what is happening across the public sector – attacks on education, attacks on the pay of already low paid public service workers, and attacks on their pensions. The attack on arts and culture is slightly different, on the one hand we're told how valuable we are – how we drive tourism, how we make the world a better place, but at the same time we're told that we have to pay our way, so the very essence and fabric that the cultural sector is built on is been undermined and could be terminally damaged. This is not just about jobs and falls in standards of living of our members. This is an attack on our civilisation itself, turning the clock back so that arts and cultural become the preserve of the rich elite – back to the 18th century when authors, composers, painters, actors and musicians were treated as no more than servants.

"But we will fight back. And today we launch a joint union campaign that bears the title of this rally - Lost Arts. When we get to the end of this three-year funding period we can be pretty sure that we won't get the money that's been cut back. So we will have to be in a position to remind the public just what this nation has lost, and we'll spell it out company by company, orchestra by orchestra, museum by museum.

"The Lost Arts website will be live for the three-year period; it will catalogue everything that we've suffered; everything that's been lost – every regional tour, every exhibition, every education and community project, every commission of a new work and every new production. But you and your colleagues must play your part. The website will need constant updating which means that when you next hear of a cut – however small – you log it. With your help we will grow an incredible and irrefutable record of what affect these savage and brutal cuts have had."

Ivan Lewis said this of the campaign:

"It signals the end of a period of silence from too many in the art and culture sector who have acquiesced to a narrative which says in an age of austerity at a time when the NHS, Education and policing face cuts the arts have no right to a voice.

"If that is the case we lose the right to feel passionately about the way culture transforms individuals' lives, creates jobs and growth for our economy, has been at the heart of transforming many of our towns and cities and brings communities together.

"I am immensely proud of Labour's record in Government on arts policy and funding. But I would never suggest that under Labour there would have been no cuts.

"There would have been because our top national priority has to be to reduce the deficit alongside a credible plan for jobs and growth. But we would have done it differently. The cuts being imposed by this Conservative Led Government are too fast and too deep. They are disproportionate when you consider the combined impact of a 30% cut to the Arts Council budget, severe frontloaded local Government cuts and the abolition of the Regional development agencies. They take no account of the commercial gain which frequently flows from public investment in the arts.

"Simultaneously, we have the attack on arts and humanities degrees in Higher Education, the scrapping of school based creative partnerships and the squeezing out of art and creativity as part of Michael Gove's ideologically driven re-engineering of our education system. At a time when the future success of UK PLC in a competitive global economy and the desire to have excellent public services means we will need creative workers, managers and leaders more than ever before. This vision for our education system is ill conceived and damaging to our long term national interest.

"So the Government's disproportionate cuts and backward looking view of education are wrong but equally Jeremy Hunt has no vision for the future of art and culture. He has sought to remain above the fray leaving others such as the Arts Council to take responsibility for ministerial cuts. What is their commitment to access, participation and excellence? Where does the balance of their priorities lie? Why have they failed so dismally to make the case for the arts with their colleagues in DFE, CLG, BiS and the Treasury? What are they doing to support the export of our culture across the world?

"For the three years prior to the election they made strenuous efforts to persuade the arts world their party had changed in relation to public investment. After only a year it is clear that was a con and it's the same old Tories. Disproportionate cuts coupled with a claim that philanthropy and the national lottery will plug the gap. The extra income from the lottery is a drop in the ocean relative to the scale of the cuts and while we welcome measures to incentivise philanthropy Jeremy Hunt has conceded it will take a generation to achieve a step change in giving. As for the Lib Dems they are a silent partner when it comes to the arts.

"Finally, I urge this campaign to use language and stories which not only preach to the converted but win the hearts and minds of the public and commentators.

"Government funding for the arts is not subsidy but investment. Relatively small amounts of seedcorn funding have fuelled major commercial successes such as Enron, Jerusalem and Warhorse. Our creative industries have been a great UK PLC success story.

"Many of our great actors and artists started their careers in publically funded projects. Manchester, Birmingham, Glasgow, Gateshead and Newcastle have been regenerated through art and cultural investment.

"For so many of our young people the arts are the catalyst for their talent, ambition and dreams. For many people with mental health problems art has helped improve their state of mind. Witness the impact of art and music on older dementia sufferers and their carers. People feel passionately about our great national institutions but also their local theatres, galleries, festivals and community projects.

"Let us use this campaign to mobilise support not simply as a vehicle for protest but as a catalyst for the ideas, vision and passion which can transform public discourse about the importance of the arts to the social and economic renewal of our country."

The acor Maggie Steed said this:

"It is right and proper and very timely for us to make a stand collectively against this unprecedented attack on arts and culture funding.

"The problems we face are coming from so many different angles. We've already witnessed huge central government cuts to the Arts Council, museums, libraries and the BBC. And many of us have been fighting shocking reductions in local authority funding for regional theatres, music services and orchestras across the country. Sadly, I fear, the worst is to come.

"Earlier we heard from John about the purpose of Lost Arts. The website launched today will serve as a vital evidence base as we seek to educate the general public, politicians and policy makers not just about the crisis faced by our sector but also about the real economic and social benefits of the arts.

"Over the next three years it is our responsibility to work together to get the Government to realise its mistake: Arts and culture funding is not a sunk cost, it's a savvy investment. Lost Arts is very modest about the impact that art can make on the economy. The calculations on the website use the widely accepted formula that £1 invested in the arts and culture leverages £2 from elsewhere.

"However, if you ask local authority arts officers and bodies like Arts Development UK they will tell you that investment in the arts can bring in a return of 6 to 1. Not bad. The economic argument for cultural subsidy is easy and obvious. You'd think that a Cabinet full of clever graduates and millionaires would be able to grasp it. Apparently not. It begs the question – are these cuts simply ideological?

"If we are going to win this, we need to take our campaign to our audience members and our communities. We need to build a strong and united voice to resist job cuts and closures wherever they happen. We must involve all those politicians who will listen and talk to us, all those organisations under pressure and our students and young people hoping to one day get a decent job in our wonderful creative industries. I believe this kind of relationship is what a true Coalition should be. Let's work together to show that such a thing can bring a positive outcome.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/culture-cuts-blog/2011/jun/15/arts-funding-public-sector-cuts?INTCMP=SRCH

André Villas-Boas: 'I'm expected to win straight away at Chelsea'....

André Villas-Boas has set himself the ambitious task of transforming Chelsea's players into "social role models" as he seeks to stamp his authority on powerful figures within the squad and revive the club after the least successful season of the Roman Abramovich era.

Chelsea's seventh manager during the oligarch's eight-year ownership acknowledged he must win silverware early in his tenure if he is to see out his £4.5m-a-year contract, which runs to 2013. Much will depend on the 33-year-old's ability to eke the best from senior players at the club, some of whom are nearly as old as the Portuguese and worked with him in his previous capacity as an opposition scout.

Disaffection within the dressing room was instrumental in Luiz Felipe Scolari's abrupt departure from Stamford Bridge two years ago yet, whereas the Brazilian's reputation had been established as a World Cup-winning coach, Villas-Boas is confident he will be able to impose his thinking on the set-up at Chelsea despite boasting only 20 – albeit supremely successful – months as a manager with Académica and Porto.

"We have to raise players' ambitions and motivations to be successful," Villas-Boas said. "We can grab at the amount of trophies we have won in the last six years, and that is a good reference point, but we push ourselves now for a new challenge. The players are responsible and professional enough to respect the manager's position. These are players who deserve respect from me, also, but we want them to triumph as people and as social role models. If they do that, they triumph as players out on the pitch as well.

"Most of them are experienced and have grown to think that talent is just talent, but we think there is something extra we can get out of them: by freeing them up and focusing on ambition and motivation. I have spoken already to a couple of the players on the phone and they told me this is like a fresh new start."

That can be construed as a challenge thrown down to the senior squad to match the ambitions of a manager who was born five months after Sir Alex Ferguson won his first silverware, the Scottish First Division title with St Mirren in 1977. The idea that Villas-Boas can reinvent the image of the playing personnel is bold given the high-profile off-field controversies which have dogged the likes of John Terry and Ashley Cole in recent seasons.

There is an acceptance at the club that standards of discipline slipped at the Cobham training base during recent regimes, with the new manager to outline his own code of conduct – a throwback to José Mourinho's spell in charge, a period in which Villas-Boas was directly involved – when the first-team squad return for pre-season training on 6 July.

There will be no pandering to egos within the squad. Terry, Villas-Boas said, would remain as captain only "as long as he can perform to the utmost of his ability, as he has in the last six years". The notion that the team would be constructed around the £50m record signing Fernando Torres, who endured such a miserable first six months at Stamford Bridge last term, was jettisoned. "We faced a similar situation with [Radamel] Falcao at Porto, who didn't find the net in pre-season and was frustrated, but we didn't fine-tune the team to provide for him," he said. "It's about fine-tuning the whole organisation of the team."

Such an approach will appeal to the hierarchy, who see in Villas-Boas a young, dynamic manager to contrast markedly with previous appointments, and a forward-thinker eager to impose his own ideas on the club from top to bottom. The Portuguese went against the wishes of his family by leaving the Estádio do Dragão to maintain a nomadic lifestyle that has taken him to London, Milan, Coimbra and Porto over the past four years. He likened that decision to giving up a "crazy" salary with Mourinho's Internazionale to take up the reins at Académica, then bottom of the Portuguese top flight.

He suggested, too, that Porto had been willing to better the financial package on offer from Chelsea to retain him last week. His eventual departure provoked a furious reaction in his home town, with supporters dismayed that apparent pledges of loyalty after a treble-winning first season at Porto gave way to pure ambition. "There's nothing I can say that will ease the fans' sense of betrayal, but this was a challenge I had to take," he said. Now he expects to be given the chance to thrive in London and will be hands-on in all aspects of the club.

While he intends to assess the playing squad from next week, he anticipates having a major say on incoming transfers, a role previously taken on by the departed sporting director, Frank Arnesen – Michael Emenalo is expected to be confirmed in a similar role this week – and has already succeeded in having the long-arranged pre-season friendly with Vitesse Arnhem on 9 July cancelled. The likes of Paul Clement, Bryan English and Glen Driscoll have already been moved on from the backroom staff with no ceremony, with Roberto Di Matteo confirmed as his No2 and Steve Holland promoted from reserve- to assistant first-team coach.

"For me, the thing is to be able to judge competence," Villas-Boas said. "There's nothing new in the idea that changes needed to happen. The people who have left did so after tremendous success, and we pay respect to them. Change happens in any structure. But we'll try to implement a future for this club step by step. Hopefully, we will all be involved in that for the next three years or beyond."

Abramovich, who sacked Carlo Ancelotti only 12 months after the Italian delivered Chelsea's first league and cup Double, will expect instant results such as that suffered by his predecessor. "Who expects to stay as Chelsea manager if they don't win anything?" he said. "You are expected to be successful straight away, to win straight away and on a weekly basis. There's no running away from that challenge. That's what I face. I'd be surprised to be kept on if I didn't win. I want to win as soon as possible and build a solid platform for the future."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/jun/29/andre-villas-boas-chelsea

Birmingham City owner Carson Yeung charged with money laundering....

Yeung released on bail after appearing in court.

Carson Yeung, Birmingham City's president and largest single shareholder, has been released on HK$7m (£560,000) bail after appearing in court in Hong Kong charged with money laundering.

The 51-year-old, who has a 23.3% stake in the Championship club and is the chairman of its parent company, Birmingham International, was charged with "dealing with property known or believed to represent proceeds of indictable offences" totalling about HK$721m (£58m). The trial was adjourned until 11 August.
Yeung's lawyer Daniel Marsh told reporters: "All they're saying is that he has got a lot of money, and he hasn't paid a lot of tax. I mean there's lots of money in my bank account, not as much as his, but I don't pay taxes because it's not taxable."

The prosecution had argued that Yeung did not have close ties to Hong Kong, and should not be granted bail because his father had lived in mainland China since 2008 and Yeung was also married to a Chinese woman.
Yeung remained silent throughout proceedings in the packed courtroom except to ask if he could report at an alternative police station during bail. He was also told to surrender his travel documents.

Shares of Birmingham International were suspended on Thursday. The company declined to comment but Yeung's lawyer said in court that trade may resume after he was released.

The Birmingham chairman, Peter Pannu, meanwhile, repeated his insistence that the club's future remains secure, saying there is no connection between the charges and the club.

Pannu said: "I've had it explained to me that the charges relate to the 2001-2007 period – two years before Carson invested in this club so there is no connection there.

"The fans have nothing to worry about. The finances are okay. I'm flying out later today and will be able to tell you more when I come back."

Pannu added: "Understandably the fans are worried about this. But this has got nothing to do with the club and there is no impact on the operations over here. I've spoken on a couple of occasions to Carson and his lawyers and they've assured me there is no link whatsoever."

Yeung bought a 29.9% stake in City four years ago and took full control of the Carling Cup winners midway through the 2009-2010 season in an £81m takeover from David Sullivan and David Gold.

The Football League has confirmed that it is closely monitoring the situation and will continue to do so before deciding whether to take any action.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/jun/30/birmingham-city-carson-yeung-charged

How meditation might ward off the effects of ageing.....

A study at a US Buddhist retreat suggests eastern relaxation techniques can protect our chromosomes from degenerating.

High in the mountains of northern Colorado, a 100-foot tall tower reaches up through the pinetops. Brightly coloured and strung with garlands, its ornate gold leaf glints in the sun. With a shape that symbolises a giant seated Buddha, this lofty stupa is intended to inspire those on the path to enlightenment.

Visitors here to the Shambhala Mountain Centre meditate in silence for up to 10 hours every day, emulating the lifestyle that monks have chosen for centuries in mountain refuges from India to Japan. But is it doing them any good? For two three-month retreats held in 2007, this haven for the eastern spiritual tradition opened its doors to western science. As attendees pondered the "four immeasurables" of love, compassion, joy and equanimity, a laboratory squeezed into the basement bristled with scientific equipment from brain and heart monitors to video cameras and centrifuges. The aim: to find out exactly what happens to people who meditate.

After several years of number-crunching, data from the so-called Shamatha project is finally starting to be published. So far the research has shown some not hugely surprising psychological and cognitive changes – improvements in perception and wellbeing, for example. But one result in particular has potentially stunning implications: that by protecting caps called telomeres on the ends of our chromosomes, meditation might help to delay the process of ageing.

It's the kind of claim more often associated with pseudoscience. Indeed, since researchers first started studying meditation, with its close links to religion and spirituality, they have had a tough time gaining scientific credibility. "A great danger in the field is that many researchers are also meditators, with a feeling about how powerful and useful these practices are," says Charles Raison, who studies mind-body interactions at Emory University in Atlanta. "There has been a tendency for people to be attempting to prove what they already know."

But a new generation of brain-imaging studies and robust clinical trials is helping to change that. Scientists from a range of fields are starting to compile evidence that rather than simply being a transient mental or spiritual experience, meditation may have long-term implications for physical health.

There are many kinds of meditation, including transcendental meditation, in which you focus on a repetitive mantra, and compassion meditation, which involves extending feelings of love and kindness to fellow living beings. One of the most studied practices is based on the Buddhist concept of mindfulness, or being aware of your own thoughts and surroundings. Buddhists believe it alleviates suffering by making you less caught up in everyday stresses – helping you to appreciate the present instead of continually worrying about the past or planning for the future.

"You pay attention to your own breath," explains Sara Lazar, a neuroscientist who studies the effects of meditation at Massachusetts general hospital in Boston. "If your mind wanders, you don't get discouraged, you notice the thought and think, 'OK'."

Small trials have suggested that such meditation creates more than spiritual calm. Reported physical effects include lowering blood pressure, helping psoriasis to heal, and boosting the immune response in vaccine recipients and cancer patients. In a pilot study in 2008, Willem Kuyken, head of the Mood Disorders Centre at Exeter University, showed that mindfulness meditation was more effective than drug treatment in preventing relapse in patients with recurrent depression. And in 2009, David Creswell of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh found that it slowed disease progression in patients with HIV.

Most of these trials have involved short courses of meditation aimed at treating specific conditions. The Shamatha project, by contrast, is an attempt to see what a longer, more intensive course of meditation might do for healthy people. The project was co-ordinated by neuroscientist Clifford Saron of the Centre for Mind and Brain at the University of California, Davis. His team advertised in Buddhist publications for people willing to spend three months in an intensive meditation retreat, and chose 60 participants. Half of them attended in the spring of 2007, while the other half acted as a control group before heading off for their own retreat in the autumn.

It sounds simple enough, but the project has taken eight years to organise and is likely to end up costing around $4m (partly funded by private organisations with an interest in meditation, including the Fetzer Institute and the Hershey Family Foundation). As well as shipping laptops all over the world to carry out cognitive tests on the volunteers before the study started, Saron's team built a hi-tech lab in a dorm room beneath the Shambhala centre's main hall, enabling them to subject participants and controls to tests at the beginning, middle and end of each retreat, and worked with "a village" of consulting scientists who each wanted to study different aspects of the meditators' performance. "It's a heroic effort," says neuroscientist Giuseppe Pagnoni, who studies meditation at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia in Italy.

Many of the tests focused on changes in cognitive ability or regulation of emotions. Soft white caps trailing wires and electrodes measured the meditators' brain waves as they completed gruelling computerised tasks to test their powers of attention, and video recordings captured split-second changes in facial expressions as they watched images of suffering and war.

But psychologist Elissa Epel, from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), wanted to know what the retreat was doing to the participants' chromosomes, in particular their telomeres. Telomeres play a key role in the ageing of cells, acting like a clock that limits their lifespan. Every time a cell divides, its telomeres get shorter, unless an enzyme called telomerase builds them back up. When telomeres get too short, a cell can no longer replicate, and ultimately dies.

It's not just an abstract concept. People with shorter telomeres are at greater risk of heart disease, diabetes, obesity, depression and degenerative diseases such as osteoarthritis and osteoporosis. And they die younger.

Epel has been collaborating with UCSF's Elizabeth Blackburn, who shared the 2009 Nobel physiology or medicine prize for her work on telomeres, to investigate whether telomeres are affected by psychological factors. They found that at the end of the retreat, meditators had significantly higher telomerase activity than the control group, suggesting that their telomeres were better protected. The researchers are cautious, but say that in theory this might slow or even reverse cellular ageing. "If the increase in telomerase is sustained long enough," says Epel, "it's logical to infer that this group would develop more stable and possibly longer telomeres over time."

Pagnoni has previously used brain imaging to show that meditation may protect against the cognitive decline that occurs as we age. But the Shamatha project is the first to suggest that meditation plays a role in cellular ageing. If that link is confirmed, he says, "that would be groundbreaking".

So how could focusing on your thoughts have such impressive physical effects? The assumption that meditation simply induces a state of relaxation is "dead wrong", says Raison. Brain-imaging studies suggest that it triggers active processes within the brain, and can cause physical changes to the structure of regions involved in learning, memory, emotion regulation and cognitive processing.

The question of how the immaterial mind affects the material body remains a thorny philosophical problem, but on a practical level, "our understanding of the brain-body dialogue has made jaw-dropping advances in the last decade or two," says Raison. One of the most dramatic links between the mind and health is the physiological pathways that have evolved to respond to stress, and these can explain much about how meditation works.

When the brain detects a threat in our environment, it sends signals to spur the body into action. One example is the "fight or flight" response of the nervous system. When you sense danger, your heart beats faster, you breathe more rapidly, and your pupils dilate. Digestion slows, and fat and glucose are released into the bloodstream to fuel your next move. Another stress response pathway triggers a branch of the immune system known as the inflammatory response.

These responses might help us to run from a mammoth or fight off infection, but they also damage body tissues. In the past, the trade-off for short bursts of stress would have been worthwhile. But in the modern world, these ancient pathways are continually triggered by long-term threats for which they aren't any use, such as debt, work pressures or low social status. "Psychological stress activates these pathways in exactly the same way that infection does," says Raison.

Such chronic stress has devastating effects, putting us at greater risk of a host of diseases including diabetes, cancer, heart disease, depression – and death. It also affects our telomeres. Epel, Blackburn and their colleagues found in 2004 that stressed mothers caring for a chronically ill child had shorter telomeres than mothers with healthy children. Their stress had accelerated the ageing process.

Meditation seems to be effective in changing the way that we respond to external events. After short courses of mindfulness meditation, people produce less of the stress hormone cortisol, and mount a smaller inflammatory response to stress. One study linked meditators' lower stress to changes in the amygdala – a brain area involved in fear and the response to threat.

Some researchers think this is the whole story, because the diseases countered most by meditation are those in which stress plays a major role. But Epel believes that meditation might also trigger "pathways of restoration and enhancement", perhaps boosting the parasympathetic nervous system, which works in opposition to the fight or flight response, or triggering the production of growth hormone.

In terms of the psychological mechanisms involved, Raison thinks that meditation allows people to experience the world as less threatening. "You reinterpret the world as less dangerous, so you don't get as much of a stress reaction," he says. Compassion meditation, for example, may help us to view the world in a more socially connected way. Mindfulness might help people to distance themselves from negative or stressful thoughts.

The Shamatha project used a mix of mindfulness and compassion meditation. The researchers concluded that the meditation affected telomerase by changing the participants' psychological state, which they assessed using questionnaires. Three factors in particular predicted higher telomerase activity at the end of the retreat: increased sense of control (over circumstances or daily life); increased sense of purpose in life; and lower neuroticism (being tense, moody and anxious). The more these improved, the greater the effect on the meditators' telomerase.

For those of us who don't have time for retreats, Epel suggests "mini-meditations" – focusing on breathing or being aware of our surroundings – at regular points throughout the day. And though meditation seems to be a particularly effective route to reducing stress and protecting telomeres, it's not the only one. "Lots of people have no interest in meditation, and that's fine," says Creswell. Exercise has been shown to buffer the effects of stress on telomeres, for example, while stress management programmes and writing emotional diaries can help to delay the progression of HIV.

Indeed, Clifford Saron argues that the psychological changes caused by the Shamatha retreat – increased sense of control and purpose in life – are more important than the meditation itself. Simply doing something we love, whether meditating or gardening, may protect us from stress and maybe even help us to live longer. "The news from this paper is the profound impact of having the opportunity to live your life in a way that you find meaningful."

For a scientific conclusion it sounds scarily spiritual. But researchers warn that in our modern, work-obsessed society we are increasingly living on autopilot, reacting blindly to tweets and emails instead of taking the time to think about what really matters. If we don't give our minds a break from that treadmill, the physical effects can be scarily real.

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/apr/24/meditation-ageing-shamatha-project?INTCMP=SRCH

Mother-in-law's withering email to bride-to-be goes viral.........

Carolyn Bourne compared to snobbish sitcom character Hyacinth Bucket over description of stepson's fiancee.

A withering email to a "bad mannered" bride-to-be from her future mother-in-law has gone viral, prompting comparison between its author and the sitcom snob Hyacinth Bucket.

In the email sent to Heidi Withers, a PA from West London, last month, Carolyn Bourne describes her stepson Freddie's fiancee as "an ideal candidate for the Ladette to Lady television series", a reality TV show where drunken, foul-mouthed young women are taught the points of etiquette.

But Bourne has found herself compared to the show's comically sour-faced disciplinarians Mrs Harbord and Mrs Shrager – and the social climbing Bucket – after Withers forwarded the disparaging remarks to a few friends, which led to the email being sent on to thousands of people.

In the email, Bourne, 60, from Dawlish, Devon, apparently rebukes Withers, 29, for her behaviour during a visit to the family in April, which she describes as "staggering in its uncouthness and lack of grace".

Bourne, whose company website describes her as a breeder of "award winning perfumed Pinks and Dianthus", seemingly exemplifies the worst stereotypes of mothers-in-law and stepmothers by berating Withers for staying in bed too late, drawing attention to herself and wanting to get married in a castle. She also implies that the PA is marrying above her station and is a potential gold digger.

She writes: "If you want to be accepted by the wider Bourne family, I suggest you take some guidance from experts with utmost haste.

"Here are a few examples of your lack of manners: When you are a guest in another's house, you do not declare what you will and will not eat – unless you are positively allergic to something.

"You do not remark that you do not have enough food.
 You do not start before everyone else.
"You do not take additional helpings without being invited to by your host.
"When a guest in another's house, you do not lie in bed until late morning in households that rise early. You fall in line with house norms.
"You should never ever insult the family you are about to join at any time and most definitely not in public.
"You regularly draw attention to yourself. Perhaps you should ask yourself why. No one gets married in a castle unless they own it. It is brash, celebrity style behaviour.
"If your parents are unable to contribute very much towards the cost of your wedding, it would be most ladylike and gracious to lower your sights and have a modest wedding as befits both your incomes.
"One could be accused of thinking that Heidi Withers must be patting herself on the back for having caught a most eligible young man. I pity Freddie."

Bourne and her husband, Edward, 63, have declined to comment on the email. "We have nothing to say," they told the Evening Standard.

The prospective bridegroom Freddie Bourne, 29, from Putney, London, would also not be drawn on the apparent spat.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/jun/30/mother-in-law-email-viral

Sure-fire Methods to Beat Slot Machines.....

Are there any sure-fire methods for beating the slot machines?

http://www.slotadvisor.com/slot-machines.html

There are methods to improve your chances, but there are no guarantees you'll become a consistent winner on slot machines. It's tough to beat the slots when the house edge averages around 10 percent in brick-and-mortar establishments, ususally a little less at online casinos.
How do you try to conquer the one-armed bandits?
Click and Tell!


Playing slot machines is great fun. With proper strategies, playing the slots doesn't have to be tough on your bankroll and there is always the anticipation of hitting that big jackpot.


Here are the most important things you need to know if you want a better chance of beating those slot machines:


Slot Types: Walk into any land-basedcasino or log on to an Internet casino and you'll beconfronted with a bewildering assortment of slot machines. There are many different games, jackpot sizes, coin denominations and number of coin options.

All slot machines operate completely electronically, a computer chip, known as a Random Number Generator (RNG), determines what symbol combinations come up for every spin. That RNG is programmed to return to the players a certain percentage of all the money that the machine collects.

Payout Percentages:
The payback percentage on slot machines ranges between 80% to as high as 98%, depending on coin size and local competition. Generally, in brick-and-mortar casinos, the loosest slots can be found in Las Vegas. Nationally the average payout percentage is estimated to be around 90%. Online casinos do not have to pay for expensive real estate; they can afford more liberal payouts on their slot games.


Realize that payout percentages are calculated over thelong term, which could mean many millions of spins. If a slot machine is programmed to pay back 95% it will pay out $950,000 out of every one million dollars it takes in, but payouts will come in wildly fluctuating random fashion. A few players will collect huge jackpots, while all others will not be so lucky.

Know the Rules: Read the pay table and all instructions posted on slot machines. If you don't understand everything correctly ask an attendant or, if playing online, contact the casino's customer service center. It is your responsibility to know the rules concerning the number of coins to insert or how many lines need to be activated in order to collect prizes. Should you line up the jackpot symbols without having met the requirements, you'll get a sympathetic "sorry" but no money.


Loose Machines: When playing slot machines in land-based establishments, always look for the highest payout machines you can find. Some casinos advertise 98% percent payback. A slot holding just two percent! Great! But look closely at the advertisement, the fine print probably says "selected machines", or "up to 98%". The 98% machines probably won't be identified. It will be up to you to find them: Try asking casino personnel. Better yet, find out which machines are most popular with local players. Locals don't play tight slot machines.


Coin Denomination: Play the coindenomination that's right for the size of your bankroll. If playing progressives or slots that offer a bonus for playing maximum coins and the dollar level is too rich for your blood, drop down to the 25-cent machines. Look and compare. If the maximum payout on a dollar machine is $300 for single coin play, and a quarter machine pays $300 with three coins (75 cents) inserted, then the quarter machine is the better deal.


Progressive Jackpots: Play the progressives with maximum coins only. You won't collect the jackpot if you don't play the required number of coins. When selecting progressive machines be sure to look around for the best value. One bank of 25-cent slots can have a progressive jackpot of $2,654 while on another carousel nearby the top prize is 3,572. Always look for the best opportunity.

Jackpot Bonus: Always bet the maximum number of coins if the highest jackpot pays a bonus when all coins are played.Example, on a three-coin slot machine, the jackpot pays 1,000 for first coin, 2,000 for second coin and 5,000 for third coin.It's smart to play three coins and qualify for that extra 2,000 coin bonus. But if the third-coin payout was only 3,000 then there would not be any advantage in playing maximum coins.


Money Management: Set a loss limit before you enter a casino or before you go online. You know how much you are willing to risk or how much you can afford to lose. Disciplineyourself and stop playing once you've reached that pre-determinedlimit. For example, if you allotted $100 for this session, stop playing when you have either doubled your money or lost it all. Don't get greedy and don't get caught up in the "I need towin my money back" mentality.


Hit and Run: Continue to play the same slot machine only if it hits at an average of at least every three or four spins. Don't keep feeding a cold machine, hoping it will warm up. The longer you stay at any gambling activity, the greater the odds against you. The casino's built-in mathematical advantage takes effect. You want to "hit and run". Quit when you're ahead, you'll feel much better!

Choose from over 50 online slots at Bodog Casino, where you can play for free or for cash.


Slot Clubs: Land-based casinos give away millions of dollars in comps, free meals, free rooms,show tickets, invitations to slot tournaments, gifts, cash and more. You deserve your share. How much you get is generally based on the number of coins you cycle through the slot machines. Not all comp programs are alike, compare benefits at different casinos. Find out what their requirements are and choose the one that has the best deal for your level of play. Treat slot club comps as a form of profit, but never play slot machines just to get freebies. That's a trap casinos hope you'll fall into.


Online Casino Bonuses: Online casinos can't entice you with free meals or free rooms like their land-basedcounterparts, so in order to attract players they offer bonus money in various forms. The most popular is the new players welcome cash bonus. There are single deposit bonuses, multiple deposit bonuses, and even no deposit bonuses, where they give you money just so you'll try their casino. Be aware thatall bonus monies come with restrictions. Always read the"terms and conditions". Take advantage of the free money only if you find the casino's rules are acceptable.

If you play slots online, the most convenient andabsolutely secure way to deposit and withdraw funds quickly and easily is via Moneybookers. Click for details.


http://www.slotadvisor.com/slot-machines.html

The 10 best money saving websites.....

 By Martin Hickman.

Our list of top money-saving websites has been wildly popular on Independent.co.uk so in the tradition of crowd-pleasers, here is my top 10 budget-boosting sites for this year.

If you haven’t seen the original list, take a look – you may save a few pounds there too.

http://www.independent.co.uk/money/spend-save/the-10-best-money-saving-websites-2010613.html