 |
|
||||
 |
 |
 |
||
|
|
 |
 |
|
|
||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||
 |
|||||||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||||||
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
|
Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for more details |
A.M. Costa Rica's Second news page |
|
|
|
San
José, Costa Rica, Monday, Jan. 12, 2015, Vol. 15, No. 7
|
||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
|
By Andrew Heslop
of the The World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers They are alarming statistics. 61 dead. 70 dead. 74 dead. 47 dead. 44 dead. 74 dead. These figures represent the number of journalists who have died each year
Shocking as it is, the fatal attack on the newsroom of Paris' leading satirical news weekly is not an isolated incident, but rather an extreme example of the brutal, often violent reality for thousands of news professionals worldwide. Speak to newsmen and women in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Pakistan, Mexico, and countless other countries, and the shock and fear that has stunned France is all too familiar. That this attack happened in a country that, while struggling with its multicultural identity, is nonetheless committed to believing in difference and diversity, liberté, egalité, fraternité, is a tragic blow for those determined to celebrate these values. What is exceptional in this instance is that the climate of hatred that fuels attacks on journalists worldwide has reached the heart of European newsrooms. As we grieve, and as the reasons unfold and the story develops, I hope it will deeply register in the minds of ordinary Europeans just how precarious our freedoms have become; that anyone, anywhere, should be killed for exercising their right to freedom of expression is a travesty. Whether it is Paris, Sana’a or Baghdad, there is no exception. Only in solidarity can we hope to withstand assaults like this. But the reality, based on the lack of reaction to countless other tragic slayings of journalists over the years, is that until it happens in your own back yard, it often goes unregistered as being a threat at all. Wednesday’s attack strikes at the fabric of democracy, and aspiring democratic societies, the world over. An attack on a publication like Charlie Hebdo, unafraid, imperturbable, unwavering in its acerbic political satire and penetrating social commentary, is intended as an attack on the values our societies uphold. That we are no more damning to others as we are to ourselves is a philosophy that has kept Europe at peace since World War II and in some ways has become the ultimate measure of our progress. Learning to respect difference yet providing no exception to the rule that “I may not like what you say, but I shall defend to my death your right to say it.” Perhaps never has a phrase held such poignancy. This attack also looks to rip open the continent along fault lines that are wearing increasingly thin. Any fundamentalist thinking, right wing, left wing, economic, cultural or religious, will seek to exploit the perceived fragmentation of Europe and drive its people back into the cauldron of bitterness, hatred and sectarianism that pockmarks our history. Europe survives precisely because of its diversity, its differences. Any dogma, religious, economic, political or otherwise, that seeks to impose a single vision on European society, especially through violent means, is destined to be rejected. And where this belief wavers, where attacks aim to wear thin the resolve, the press has a responsibility to remind Europeans of their past and to project a potential future according to the values that so many fought and died for prior to the birth of the modern continent. Attacks such as yesterday’s aim to exploit the fears that difference in religion and culture bring. We must not let this be the case. We should be careful not to react with calls for tighter legislation that can be harmful to the very freedoms a critical press is designed to protect. The lessons of our American cousins and the post 9-11 Patriot Act as a response to terror should remind us that threats to our freedoms can come from many directions. Let us take the time to react, but let us first take the time to mourn this latest attempt on our freedom. We can neither predict nor prevent the actions of crazed fundamentalists, but we can entirely control our reaction to their devastating acts. In the face of this most recent tragedy we must reject the fear it was calculated to spread. The victims were martyred, not in the name of a prophet, a cause, or a twisted religious belief, but by a warped vision of our own world. We have a duty to those who died to resist that vision. They lived in the name of freedom, and died its truest practitioners.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of
this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Ro Colorado S.A 2015
and may
not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details |
||||||
A.M. Costa Rica Third News Page |
|
| San José, Costa Rica, Monday, Jan. 12, 2015, Vol. 15, No. 7 | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| The fingerprints will tell the tale on some forgetful
fugitives |
|
|
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
But there are plenty of other reasons individuals submit to fingerprinting in Costa Rica. And there are several reasons why they should not. The section of the ministry that does fingerprints is called Dactiloscopía in Spanish. And workers there still use a system based on ink. That may be why some 72 applicants for pistol permits last year were bold enough to provide their prints. The ministry reported that this is the number of individuals who were snagged on outstanding criminal warrants. The most recent was last week when a man seeking a pistol permit was detained at the issuing office in Barrio Francisco Peralta. The man was the subject of two warrants, each alleging that he abused a minor. They were from courts in Turrialba and Guápiles. |
 Ministerio de Gobernación, Polieia y
Seguridad Publica photo
Fingerprints
are still taken with ink.
The bulk of those seeking pistol permits are individuals who are seeking jobs as guards. Some expats who seek to carry weapons for self protection have complained about the delays in issuing. |
| Stranded kayaker
gets a tow By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Members of the Servicio Nacional de Guardacostas in Flamingo pulled another individual ashore last week. The latest case involved a Costa Rican in a kayak who overturned near a small island called Pitahaya in the Pacific off Playa Zapotal in Santa Cruz. The man, identified as José Aguilar Otoya, appears to have been yet another victim of strong winds. A coast guard launch towed the man and his kayak ashore. The man appears to be unhurt but he sought a medial checkup, the coast guard said. The coastguard from the same station retrieved a U.S. citizen who fell while hiking on another island, the Islas Catalinas. The injured man had a cell telephone to seek help. |
 Servicio
Nacional de Guardacostas
Kayaker is towed to shore. |
| You need to see Costa Rican tourism information HERE! |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of
this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado S.A.
2015 and may
not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details |
||||||
 |
|
||||
| A.M. Costa Rica's Fourth News page | |||||
| San José, Costa Rica, Monday, Jan. 12, 2015, Vol. 15, No. 7 | |||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| Volcano eruptions get the blame for stalled global warming |
|
|
By the Lawrence Livermore National
Laboratory
news staff The warming hiatus that has occurred over the last 15 years has been caused in part by small volcanic eruptions. Scientists have long known that volcanoes cool the atmosphere because of the sulfur dioxide that is expelled during eruptions. Droplets of sulfuric acid that form when the gas combines with oxygen in the upper atmosphere can persist for many months, reflecting sunlight away from Earth and lowering temperatures at the surface and in the lower atmosphere. Previous research suggested that early 21st-century eruptions might explain up to a third of the recent warming hiatus. New research available online in the journal Geophysical Research Letters further identifies observational climate signals caused by recent volcanic activity. This new research complements an earlier paper published in November, which relied on a combination of ground, air and satellite measurements, indicating that a series of small 21st-century volcanic eruptions deflected substantially more solar radiation than previously estimated. “This new work shows that the climate signals of late 20th- and early 21st-century volcanic activity can be detected in a variety of different observational data sets,” said Benjamin Santer, a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory scientist and lead author of the study. The lab is operated by the U.S. Department of Energy. The warmest year on record is 1998. After that, the steep climb in global surface temperatures observed over the 20th century appeared to level off. This hiatus received considerable attention, despite the fact that the full observational surface temperature record shows many instances of slowing and acceleration in warming rates. Scientists had previously suggested that factors such as weak solar activity and increased heat uptake by the oceans could be responsible for the recent lull in temperature increases. After publication of a 2011 paper in the journal Science by Susan Solomon of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, it was recognized that an uptick in volcanic activity might also be implicated in the warming hiatus. Prior to the 2011 Science paper, the prevailing scientific thinking was that only very large eruptions — on the scale of the cataclysmic 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption in the Philippines, which ejected an estimated 20 million metric tons (44 billion pounds) of sulfur — were capable of affecting global climate. This conventional wisdom was largely based on climate model simulations. But according to David Ridley, an atmospheric scientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and lead author of the November paper, these simulations were missing an important component of volcanic activity. Ridley and colleagues found the missing piece of the puzzle |
 Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory photo
The Tavurvur Cone in Papua
New Guinea was erupting when this image was captured Nov. 30, 2009. The
eruption is one that may have contributed to a warming hiatus.at the intersection of two atmospheric layers, the stratosphere and the troposphere — the lowest layer of the atmosphere, where all weather takes place. Those layers meet between 10 and 15 kilometers (six to nine miles) above the Earth. Satellite measurements of the sulfuric acid droplets and aerosols produced by erupting volcanoes are generally restricted to above 15 km. Below 15 km, cirrus clouds can interfere with satellite aerosol measurements. This means that toward the poles, where the lower stratosphere can reach down to 10 km, the satellite measurements miss a significant chunk of the total volcanic aerosol loading. To get around this problem, the study by Ridley and colleagues combined observations from ground-, air- and space-based instruments to better observe aerosols in the lower portion of the stratosphere. They used these improved estimates of total volcanic aerosols in a simple climate model, and estimated that volcanoes may have caused cooling of 0.05 degrees to 0.12 degrees Celsius since 2000. The second Livermore-led study shows that the signals of these late 20th and early 21st eruptions can be positively identified in atmospheric temperature, moisture and the reflected solar radiation at the top of the atmosphere. A vital step in detecting these volcanic signals is the removal of the climate noise caused by El Niños and La Niñas. “The fact that these volcanic signatures are apparent in multiple independently measured climate variables really supports the idea that they are influencing climate in spite of their moderate size,” said Mark Zelinka, another Livermore author. “If we wish to accurately simulate recent climate change in models, we cannot neglect the ability of these smaller eruptions to reflect sunlight away from Earth.” |
Here's reasonable medical care
Costa Rica's world class medical specialists are at your command. Get the top care for much less than U.S. prices. It is really a great way to spend a vacation. See our list of recommended professionals HERE!amcr-prom
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The
contents of
this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado S.A.
2015 and may
not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details |
||||||
|
A.M. Costa Rica's Fifth
news page
|
||
 |
 |
|
| San José, Costa Rica, Monday, Jan. 12, 2015, Vol. 15, No. 7 | |||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
 |
 Voice of America
photo
From left, Israel's
Benjamin Netanyahu, Mali's Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, France's Francois
Hollande, Germany's Angela Merkel, the EU's Donald Tusk, and
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas march during the unity rally in
Paris.Massive
march in France
draws many world leaders By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
World leaders joined nearly 4 million people in the streets of Paris and around France Sunday in solidarity with the victims of a terror spree last week that killed 17 people. More than 40 heads of state and government joined French President Francois Hollande in linking arms for a brief walk through Paris. Immediately to Hollande's left walked German Chancellor Angela Merkel and to his right Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita. France intervened to help fight Islamist rebels there two years ago to the day. Other leaders included Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. U.S. Ambassador to France Jane Hartley represented the United States at Sunday's event. French officials said it was the largest street demonstration in the country's history. Late Sunday, the Interior Ministry said at least 3.7 million people demonstrated across France. A ministry spokesman said that 1.2 million to 1.6 million people had marched in Paris and about 2.5 million people in other cities around the country. Several thousand police and military forces were deployed to the streets as well. A massive crowd remained outside for hours, filling the route between two of the capital's major plazas, Place de la Republique and Place de la Nation. After world leaders left the march, Hollande stayed to greet survivors of the Charlie Hebdo attack and their families. Later Sunday night, Hollande and Netanyahu attended a memorial ceremony at the Grand Synagogue in Paris for the victims of Friday's terror attack at a kosher supermarket. At the synagogue, Netanyahu thanked French citizens, including Muslims, for speaking out against terrorism and anti-Semitism. Mamoun Abdelali, an imam from the Paris area, was among many Muslims at the rally denouncing militant Islam. The assailants, he said, didn't avenge the Prophet Muhammad, they insulted and dishonored him. Another Muslim, 17-year-old Amina Tadjouri, brandished a Jewish newspaper that read: "I am Jewish, I am Charlie." French officials have called the Wednesday massacre at the Paris offices of the satirical weekly magazine Charlie Hebdo and a series of deadly attacks that followed acts of terrorism. Twelve people, including eight journalists and two policemen, were massacred Wednesday at the offices of Charlie Hebdo, a satirical magazine known for poking fun at all religions, including Islam. Two Islamic militant brothers, Cherif and Said Kouachi, carried out the attack. They were ambushed and killed by French police Friday. A video believed to show Amedy Coulibaly, who French police said is tied to the fatal shooting of a policewoman and a deadly siege of a kosher grocery store in the days after the newspaper was targeted, emerged posthumously on social media Sunday. In it, a man describes how the killings were coordinated as retribution for the U.S.-led anti-Islamic State air campaign, in which France is a partner. Following the attack on the grocery Friday, in which four hostages were killed, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would welcome Jewish immigrants from France. Security is expected to remain tight across the nation for weeks as investigators continue their hunt for Coulibaly's girlfriend. Police originally suspected that 26-year-old Hayat Boumeddiene, described as armed and dangerous, was at the supermarket with her partner. But Turkish officials say the woman entered Turkey Jan. 2 and is now likely in Syria. Coulibaly was an associate of brothers Cherif and Said Kouachi. The siblings have been identified as perpetrators of Wednesday's attack on the staff of Charlie Hebdo. As security forces closed in on the brothers Friday outside Paris, Said Kouachi told reporters by phone that he received training and financing from al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP. American, European and Yemeni sources confirmed he trained with AQAP, which has publicly praised the attack on the offices of Charlie Hebdo. Sunday, German police said they detained two men suspected in an arson attack against the Hamburger Morgenpost newspaper, which republished controversial cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad seen in Charlie Hebdo. No one was injured. The Belgian newspaper Le Soir was also evacuated Sunday after it received an anonymous bomb threat. The paper republished cartoons from Charlie Hebdo, which was well-known for its provocative and irreverent tone that frequently targeted religious figures. U.S. plans to host summit against violent extremism By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The United States said it will host a summit in Washington next month on preventing violent extremism, as European and American leaders call for stronger measures to monitor people online and at borders. U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced the Feb. 18 meeting from Paris on Sunday, where he joined an emergency conference on terrorism in the wake of a terror spree in France last week that killed 17 people. "We must deal not only with holding accountable those people who would perpetrate such heinous acts. We must also deal with underlying causes that cause these things to occur, that somehow radicalize these people to take actions that we all find to be an affront to humanity," Holder said. "We will bring together all of our allies to discuss ways in which we can counteract this violent extremism that exists around the world," he added. In a statement, the White House said the meeting will highlight best practices and emerging efforts from several U.S. communities carrying out pilot programs to address extremism. Speaking on CBS's Face the Nation program, Holder also said the decimation of core al-Qaida has reduced or eliminated that group's ability to carry out a 9/11-style attack, but he said affiliates like al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula have stepped in to try to inspire people to carry out smaller attacks. “I think the possibility of such attacks exists in the United States,” he said. “It is something that, frankly, keeps me up at night worrying about the lone wolf or a very small group of people who decide to get arms on their own and do what we saw in France this week,” Holder added. However, Holder said Americans should feel secure with U.S. officials' efforts to prevent attacks by Islamist militants. Interior and justice ministers from Europe and the U.S. gathered in Paris on Sunday, calling for increased Internet surveillance and stricter border security to counter attacks like the massacre at the Charlie Hebdo weekly newspaper. Journalists and police were reportedly targeted in the deadly shooting, raising questions about freedom of speech and of the press. French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve, who convened the ministerial meeting, said Europe must improve information sharing across borders and better track passengers traveling between countries. "We are convinced of the necessity of this system at a European level to monitor those who go to theatres of war to fight as terrorists and come back, and to fight against organized terrorist networks," Cazeneuve said. Cazeneuve said that fundamental liberties would be still respected under increased surveillance measures. One of magazine murderers trained with al-Qaida branch By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Western and Yemeni officials say one of the two brothers who carried out Wednesday's deadly attack on a French satirical newspaper trained with al-Qaida's branch in Yemen a few years ago. American, European and Yemeni sources close to the investigation say Said Kouachi traveled to Yemen in 2011 to train with Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP. AQAP, formed in 2009 through a merger of the Saudi and Yemeni branches of al-Qaida, is one of the network's most active and lethal affiliates. The group has carried out many attacks in an insurgency in Yemen, with the highest concentration in the southern part of the country. Most of the targets appear to be government facilities, with a particular focus on intelligence and security services. At the same time, AQAP maintains a goal of striking Western targets and has orchestrated a series of high-profile attacks. One of its most notable operations occurred in 2009 when the group dispatched a Nigerian-born man, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who failed in trying to set off explosives sewn to his underwear aboard a commercial flight over the U.S. He thus became known as the underwear bomber. The following year, ASAP launched Inspire, an English online publication geared toward helping the group build its brand and spread its message of Jihad, or holy war. Many extremists motivated by radical interpretations of Islam have reportedly been influenced by the magazine and have used its bomb-making instructions. One of the most notorious figures linked to AQAP was Anwar al-Awlaki, a U.S.-born cleric who by 2011 had become a senior figure in the group and its public face. He was killed in 2011 in a U.S. drone strike. A senior Yemeni intelligence source said Friday that Said Kouachi met with Awlaki when he trained in Yemen. While the world was riveted this week on the tragic events unfolding in Paris, more than 30 people were killed in a car bomb explosion on Wednesday near a police college in the Yemeni capital, Sana'a. AQAP has been suspected of carrying out the attack. SpaceX booster crashes in barge landing attempt By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
A huge rocket carried an unmanned supply ship loaded with cargo for the International Space Station into orbit Saturday, but a pioneering attempt to reland the booster on an ocean barge failed. The cargo capsule is expected to reach the space station today. But SpaceX founder Elon Musk, in a tweet sent after the early morning launch, said the booster rocket broke apart when it landed too hard on a recovery platform afloat in the Atlantic Ocean. Despite the rocket breakup, the billionaire Musk said he was encouraged that the 14-story booster managed to reach the platform in an almost successful controlled descent. He said the near-success bodes well for the future. Musk said that recovering and reusing rockets, rather than discarding them at sea, is becoming essential to increasing the frequency and lowering costs of future launches. The launch from Cape Canaveral was the fifth mission under a $1.6 billion SpaceX contract with the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The cargo capsule is carrying 2,300 kilograms (more than 5,000 pounds) of food, experiments and other supplies to space station crew members. The shipment became crucial after another company's space station supply ship exploded on a launch pad in October, seconds after liftoff. The entire payload of an Antares rocket belonging to Orbital Sciences Corp. was destroyed at a launch facility in the U.S. State of Virginia. U.S. shoppers disregard label giving meat's origin By the Kansas State University news service
When shoppers pick up a pound of meat from the grocery store, did they noticed the label indicating where the meat originated? According to new research, most shoppers have no idea the label exists. But that little label is causing a big stir among the U.S., Canada and Mexico. In October 2014, the World Trade Organization ruled in favor of Canada and Mexico, finding that the mandated country-of-origin labels in the U.S. are not trade compliant and hurt business in nearby countries. The U.S. is appealing the decision. However, research from Kansas State University, in collaboration with Oklahoma State University, finds that most consumers aren't willing to pay extra for the label. "Less than one-third of the participants surveyed know that it is a law to label where the meat originates," said Glynn Tonsor, associate professor of agricultural economics at Kansas State University. "Effectively, producers lose and consumers lose because we have not observed an aggregate demand increase in response to that origin information." The labels were implemented in 2009 to provide shoppers more information about the origin of their meat. In 2013, the labels were revised to provide more specifics about the origin, including where the animal was born, raised and slaughtered. Tonsor surveyed consumers in 2009 and in 2013 and found the same results: The majority of shoppers aren't interested in these labels. "Time and time again, we find that food safety, price, freshness and taste tend to be attributes, regardless of the meat product we're talking about, that rank highly in importance and drive purchasing decisions," Tonsor said. "Social issues like origin, environmental impact and sustainability matter to consumers, but do not drive purchasing decisions." A decision on the appeal is expected in early 2015. In the meantime, country-of-origin labels are still being used. One AirAsia flight recorder found by divers in Java Sea By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Authorities in Indonesia say divers have retrieved the flight data recorder from downed AirAsia Flight 8501. Search and rescue chief Bambang Soelistyo told reporters today that divers are still trying to find the other black box, the cockpit voice recorder, which will give investigators a clearer picture of what was happening in the cockpit during the crash. The recovery of the flight recorders is likely to be critical in learning why the aircraft went down Dec. 28, killing all 162 people onboard. The Airbus 320 vanished from radar screens over the northern Java Sea less than halfway into a two-hour flight from Indonesia's second-biggest city of Surabaya to Singapore. Forty-eight bodies have been recovered so far. Authorities hope most of the rest of the victims can be recovered from the several large pieces of wreckage that have been detected on the ocean floor. Before takeoff and during the last moments of the flight, the pilots requested to fly at a higher altitude to avoid a storm. The request was not approved because other planes were in the area. Search teams working off the coast from the West Kalimantan town of Pangkalan Bun have sought the wreckage in water up to 30 meters deep, but are facing very low visibility due to large amounts of silt stirred up by strong currents. An initial report into the crash could then take several weeks, with a formal report expected to take up to one year. Initial investigations by Indonesia’s meteorological department said a heavy monsoon storm was the key factor in the crash. Indonesian President Joko Widodo has said the accident exposed widespread problems in the management of the air transportation sector in Indonesia. The Indonesian Transport Ministry has already launched an audit of the aviation sector and an investigation into AirAsia’s operations on the Surabaya-to-Singapore route. Asia’s fast-growing aviation sector has come under the spotlight over the past year with the disappearance in March 2014 of Malaysian Airlines MH370 with 239 passengers and crew. Despite intense efforts off the west coast of Australia, that aircraft’s wreckage has still not been located. In July, Malaysian Airlines Flight 17, carrying 298 passengers and crew, was shot down over eastern Ukraine. |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The
contents of
this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado S.A.
2015 and may
not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details |
||||||
| A.M. Costa Rica's sixth news page |
|
||||||||
| San José, Costa Rica, Monday, Jan. 12, 2015, Vol. 15, No. 7 | |||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
||
|
If you love to garden, the worst thing you can have is a cold. Now, if you live in a temperate climate, the worst times to have a cold are spring, when you want to be out there planting things, and the fall, when you want to be out there harvesting things. After all, if you are sick
So, that’s where I was, in bed with a small dog snoring next to me, wondering how fast the weeds are growing, how many nutrients are being washed out of the soil, and how much soil is even left in my mounded beds. I agree with the dog, it’s depressing. There are, however, compensations. After all, it is winter in the temperate zones and there is pretty much nothing growing in my friends’ gardens right now. No, they are covered with snow in New York and feeling the effects of temperature even in Georgia. It will be quite a while until they look out the window and see even a weed poking its head out of the ground. Here, on the other hand, I look out at heliconia and torch ginger in bloom. The bromeliads are blooming too, and I have my eye on an orchid that is budding nicely. With a little luck, there will be a break in the rain and even a ray of sunshine on wet leaves. It may not last long, but it is a sign of hope, a bit of comfort as I reach for another cup of ginger tea and reach over to pet the dog. Having a cold in the rainy season? Maybe it’s not so bad after all…
If you would like to suggest a topic for this column, simply send a letter to the editor. And, for more garden tips, visit the Arenal Gardeners Facebook page. Gasoline to take 85- to 109-colon dip By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
As expected, the price of gasoline continues to decline along with the world price of petroleum. The Autoridad Reguladora de Servicios Públicos said Friday that the super gasoline would decline in price 109 colons per liter to 580 colons. Plus gasoline would decline 103 colons a liter to 552 colons and that diesel would decline 85 colons to to 522 colons. The decreases are from 15.5 to 20 U.S. cents per liter. The calculations were based on petroleum at $70 barrel. The current price is about $47 a barrel, but the Costa Rica price fixings are always about six weeks behind. The prices will go into effect sometime this week after the calculations are published as a decree in the official newspaper. The gallon prices will be super $4.03; plus, $3.82. and diesel, $3.63. |
| Costa Rican News |
AMCostaRicaArchives.com |
Retire NOW
in Costa Rica |
CostaRicaReport.com |
| Fine Dining
in Costa Rica |
The CAFTA Report |
Fish
fabulous Costa Rica |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The
contents of
this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado S.A.
2015 and may
not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details |
||||||
| From Page 7: Obama says that 2014 was a great year for U.S. By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
U.S. President Barack Obama says 2014 was a breakthrough year for America and he has the evidence to back that up. The president said in his weekly address Saturday that 2014 was the strongest year for job growth since the 1990s, with unemployment falling faster than it has in three decades. Obama said thanks to the Affordable Care Act about 10 million Americans obtained health insurance last year. In December alone, Obama said, American businesses created 240,000 jobs and the unemployment rate fell to 5.6 percent. President Obama delivered his address at Pellissippi State Community College in Tennessee where he unveiled his new plan to make two years of community college free for every responsible student. The president said he was also in Tennessee to establish a new hub that will bring more good-paying, high-tech manufacturing jobs to the country. |
