Robin Williams Enjoying His Honeymoons in Paris

Robin Williams and his new wife Susan Schneider are celebrating their honeymoon in Paris, and they spent their first day abroad sightseeing, according to an eyewitness.

The newlyweds arrived Tuesday morning and, after checking into a boutique hotel, set out for a walk, the source tells PEOPLE.

Williams, 60, who speaks French fluently, took Schneider for a traditional café lunch opposite the Tuileries Garden at L'Imperial on the rue de Rivoli.

Afterwards, the eyewitness said, the couple strolled through the Place Vendôme "hand in hand, with a number of little kisses between them," before going into the Dior shop briefly.

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Dark energy

In the study of the physical universe Dark Energy is a mysterious phenomenon. For years there was a little understanding of what it actually is. But the study of three astronomers Saul Perlmutter, Brian Schmidt, and Adam Riess shed some light on the mysterious darkness. and as result, the have snagged the 2011 Noble Prize for Physics.

A curious phenomenon has been referred as Dark Energy. It has been well documented for years that universe is expanding. But the most curious thing is that this expansion is acually picking up in pace. The idea is that something must be making it to do that. While it still is not known exactly about the force that is causing this acceleration. Saul, Brian Adam and all astronomers spent years to collect data and understand the concept of dark energy and to observe the increasing expansion of the universe over 20 years ago, when the light from distant supernova was weaker than expected.

       They concluded that the universe was expanding faster, they took it upon themselves to largely carry the torch in the continued study of dark energy since then. it is now thought that dark energy makes up about 75% of the universe. 21% is supposed to be dark matter, with the rest being ordinary matter. 

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How to Improve your Concentration

Techniques to concentrate

We all have the ability to concentrate -- sometimes. Think of the times when you were engrossed in a super novel. While playing your guitar or piano. In an especially good game of cards. At a spellbinder of a movie. Total concentration.

But at other times your thoughts are scattered, and your mind races from one thing to another. It's for those times that you need to learn and practice concentration strategies. They involve (1) learning mental selfregulation and (2) arranging factors that you can immediately control.

Training Your Wandering Mind: Learning Mental Self-Regulation for Improved Concentration

Improving concentration is learning a skill.

Learning a skill takes practice... whether it is shooting baskets, dancing, typing, writing, or concentrating. Do not confuse these strategies with medicine. When you take a medicine, it acts on the body without your having to help it.

Concentration strategies require practice. You probably will begin to notice some change within a few days. You'll notice considerable improvement within four to six weeks of training your mind with some of the skills that follow. And that's a short period of time considering how many years you've spent not concentrating as well as you'd like.

Begin by practicing these techniques:

• Be Here Now,
• The Spider Technique, and
• Worry Time.

Then try any of the Other Mental Strategies that sound promising to you. Give them an honest try -- use them for at least three days. If you notice a little change, that suggests that the skill will be valuable and, with continued practice, will greatly improve your concentration. There are also Other Factors You Can Change now in your environment that may be helpful.

Be Here Now

This deceptively simple strategy is probably the most effective. When you notice your thoughts wandering astray, say to yourself

"Be here now"

and gently bring your attention back to where you want it.

FOR EXAMPLE:
You're in class and your attention strays from the lecture to all the homework you have, to a date, to the fact that you're hungry. As you say to yourself

"Be here now"

you focus back on the lecture and maintain your attention there as long as possible.

When it wanders again, repeat

"Be here now"

and gently bring your attention back.

You may notice that your mind often wanders (as often as several times a minute at times). Each time just say

"Be here now"

and refocus. Do not try to keep particular thoughts out of your mind. For example, as you sit there, close your eyes and think about anything you want to for the next three minutes except cookies. Try not to think about cookies...When you try not to think about something, it keeps coming back. ("I'm not going to think about cookies. I'm not going to think about cookies.")

When you find your thoughts wandering, gently let go of that thought and, with your "Be here now," return to the present.

You might do this hundreds of times a week, if you're normal. But, you'll find that the period of time between your straying thoughts gets a little longer every few days. So be patient and keep at it. You'll see some improvement!

The Spider Technique

This is another strategy that sounds deceptively simple. But it is the basis for concentration because it helps you to maintain your concentration and not give in to distractions.

Hold a vibrating tuning fork next to a spider web. The spider will react and come looking for what is vibrating the web. Do it several times and the spider "wises up" and knows there's no bug and doesn't come looking.

You can learn that. Train yourself not to give in to distractions. When someone enters the room, or when a door slams, do not allow yourself to participate. Rather, keep your concentration on what's in front of you.

Use the "Be here now" technique to help you regain concentration when you do become distracted momentarily.

Practice this in a variety of settings, such as:

• In lecture classes practice letting people move or cough without having to look at them - just let them "be out there" while you form a tunnel between you and the lecturer.
• When talking with someone keep your attention on that person, look at his face, and note what is being said. Let the rest of the world just be "out there."

Worry or Think Time

Set aside a specific time each day to think about the things that keep entering your mind and interfering with your concentration. For example, set 4:30 to 5:00 p.m. as your worry/think time. When your mind is side-tracked into worrying during the day, remind yourself that you have a special time for worrying. Then, let the thought go for the present, and return your focus to your immediate activity.

There's research on this, believe it or not! Persons who use a worry time find themselves worrying 35 percent less of the time within four weeks. That's a big change!

The important steps are:

(1) set a specific time each day for your time,

(2) when you become aware of a distracting thought, remind yourself that you have a special time to think about them,

(3) let the thought go, perhaps with "Be here now," and

(4) be sure to keep that appointment with yourself at that special time to think on the distracting thoughts of the day.

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Death threat of David Letterman by jihadist website

David Letterman was the subject of a death threat made Tuesday by a frequent contributor to an online forum said to be popular with radical Muslims -- and it's a death threat the FBI is taking seriously.
A contributor using the name Umar al-Basrawi posted his threat in response to the late-night host's comments about the early June death-by-airstrike of Ilyas Kashmiri, Al Qaeda's alleged new leader after U.S. Special Forces killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan earlier this year.
"Is there not among you a Sayyid Nosair al-Mairi ... to cut the tongue of this lowly Jew and shut it forever?" Al-Basrawi wrote, referring to El Sayyid Nosair, convicted of the 1990 killing of Jewish Defense League founder Meir Kahane, and to Letterman, who is not Jewish.
According to the post, one of 1,200 or so on the site by Al-Basrawi (likely an alias), Letterman "showed his evil nature and deep hatred for Islam and Muslims, and said that Ilyas Kashmiri was killed and he joined bin Laden. Then the despicable one put his hand on his neck and demonstrated the way of slaughter!!"
The comment was brought to light by SITE Intelligence Group, a private company that monitors extremist trends, including those in the jihadist movement. SITE is an acronym for "Search for International Terrorist Entities."
The threat was made on Shumukh-al-Islam, an online destination that a SITE analyst described to EW as "a clearing house for al Qaeda material" -- one where messages from the terrorist group often appear first online in the U.S.
“We take every potential threat seriously," said Jim Margolin, spokesman for the FBI's New York office, who said the bureau is looking into the threat. CBS had no comment for the AP or EW.

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‘Rick Perry' : ‘The real bigot here is Ed Schultz’ defended by 'The Daily Show'

After Texas Gov. Rick Perry spoke earlier this week of a “big black cloud that hangs over America,” referring to the nation's enormous debt, MSNBC host Ed Schultz called racism. Schultz was sure the big black cloud Perry spoke of was none other than President Obama.
Wait, rewind.
Schultz later apologized for his interpretation, but “The Daily Show” couldn’t resist pointing out how ludicrous it was. Jon Stewart started out the ribbing with a montage of clearly innocuous statements featuring names of colors before declaring: “The real bigot here is Ed Schultz.”
Stewart also noted that, to be fair, “debt” was only two words after “cloud” in Perry’s comments.
“That’s the thing about clouds,” Stewart joked, “some people see a racist dog whistle, while some people see George Washington wrestling a leprechaun.”
Earlier this week, Stewart stuck up for Rep. Ron Paul, spurring Mediate to write, “Stewart seems to be making a lot more friends in the Republican Party that he has for himself in a while.”

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Nation’s Top-Paid Employees: Los Angeles Firefighter

The Los Angeles labor leader who represents the highest-paid firefighters in the U.S. is running for the City Council on a pledge to preserve public-safety spending even as the city faces $911 million in deficits during the next four years.
Pat McOsker, 51, president of the United Firefighters of Los Angeles City since 2003, set the fastest pace for campaign contributions among 18 candidates and is endorsed by four of the biggest public-worker unions for a special election to fill an open seat Nov. 8.
The nation’s second-largest city wrestled with deficits of about $500 million this year and the preceding one, and will be short a total of $911 million through 2016, according to budget documents. The police and fire departments accounted for 69 percent of unrestricted spending last year.
“It is vital that we protect public safety,” McOsker said in declaring his candidacy last month. “I will fight any cuts to police and fire protection and work to bring long-needed reforms to City Hall.”
Los Angeles firefighters made an average of $126,258 last year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, more than twice the national mean. Fifty-three of the city’s 100 top-paid employees in 2010 were firefighters. Each collected more than the $195,869 earned by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. In an interview, McOsker said his pay was $145,000.
The mean wage for the nation’s 302,000 salaried firefighters was $47,730 in 2010, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. In the Los Angeles metropolitan area, which includes other cities as well as county employees, the figure was $95,000. That compared with $57,360 in the Chicago area, $51,710 in Boston and $66,800 in metropolitan New York.

Overtime Pay

Los Angeles firefighters collect a greater share of overtime pay than other public employees because staffing rules require replacements for those who are sick or on vacation, according to Maritta Aspen, who negotiates with public-safety unions in the city manager’s office.
“This has been going on for years,” said Kris Vosburgh, executive director of the Los Angeles-based Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, which advocates for lower taxes. “The public-employee unions are the most powerful force in state and local politics. No politician wants to stand up to them, so they continue this gravy train.”
The City Council has taken steps to reduce fire department expenses, including eliminating 318 positions to save $190 million in the next three years, according to budget documents.

Firefighter Ratio

Los Angeles’s 3,460 firefighters are required to work overtime, some punching the clock as much as 75 hours per week, while firefighters nationally average 48, McOsker said in a telephone interview. Los Angeles has just under one firefighter for every 1,000 residents. The national average in 2009 was 1.72 career firefighters per thousand, according to the National Fire Protection Association.
“We’re dangerously understaffed,” McOsker said.
The son of a firefighter from the blue-collar Los Angeles neighborhood of San Pedro, McOsker has a brother, Mike, who is a retired firefighter and the union’s business representative. Another brother, Tim, served as chief of staff to the previous mayor, James Hahn.
Four of Los Angeles’s six largest public employee unions have endorsed McOsker’s campaign, according to Barbara Maynard, a spokeswoman for the Coalition of Los Angeles City Unions. He was the first of 18 candidates to reach $50,000 in contributions, according to the city’s ethics commission. McOsker said most of the money came from individual donors.

Recall Attempt

McOsker is not beloved by all of his fellow firefighters, some of whom launched an unsuccessful attempt to recall him as union president this year, according to Ron Harmon, a 50-year- old captain who says he started in the same class as the candidate.
McOsker’s tough stance in negotiations over department funding has alienated City Council members, residents and some firefighters, Harmon said.
“This is a guy who is firmly stuck in the early 20th century, being truly antagonistic to anyone who disagrees with him,” Harmon said in a telephone interview. “We don’t live in a vacuum. There was not a sense of responsibility to the guy on the street, the taxpayer.”
Firefighters have made contract concessions by skipping pay raises, lowering pension benefits for new hires and contributing 2 percent of their salaries toward health care in retirement, McOsker said.
“Our pay has stayed stagnant, we’ve made sacrifices, we’re helping the city get through the crisis,” he said.

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Man jailed over $12 theft at police station

ORANGE -- An Athol man has been sentenced to a year in jail for stealing $12.
The prosecutor said that may seem harsh, but it wasn’t the theft was so shocking, but where it happened, and who witnessed it.
Authorities say 37-year-old John Hayes took the money last September from a Jimmy Fund can in the lobby of the police station, in front of his 13-year-old son.

He was sentenced this week after he was found guilty of larceny by a judge.
Police say Hayes was caught on video surveillance taking the can from the counter, walking into the men’s room, and walking out seconds later without the can.
Hayes’ lawyer said his client is remorseful.
The Jimmy Fund raises money for cancer research for the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

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