Tolley's Tax Guide: 1995-96 (Tolley's Tax Annual)

Book Description

This adventure of the hotheaded 18-year-old rookie firefighter comes in a Special Collector's Edition that preserves the original right-to-left Japanese format. In this installment, Daigo Asahina's dream was always to be a firefighter. Now he's fresh out of the training academy and is the new rookie at Medaka-Ga-Hama Fire Station. Gaining the trust and respect of his fellow firefighters isn't easy, especially with Daigo's hot temper. Despite often acting without thinking and taking unnecessary risks, he always manages to save lives. While trying to gain more experience, he develops a rivalry with a rookie from another fire station. Trying to outdo each other, they both risk losing sight of their real purpose. Will Daigo straighten up and go from brash boy to respected man?

Customer Reviews:

Underdog Title Deserves More Love!!.......2007-08-23

This underdog title deserves more love!! It's not a mainstream hit like Bleach or Naruto, but it's worth the read. A rookie firefighter with that uncanny knack of being the one everyone is leary of, especially with the way he is.

The story is good and the art is quite good. I just wish I didn't have to hunt it down like a rare and priceless treasure. Finding the manga means either ordering it online, special ordering it from the local bookstore, or managing to snag some of the newest volumes at a convention.

So bring this one some more love so they'll bring it back to the shelves....:D

This is one of my favorite mangas of all time........2006-01-13

I recently got into mangas. Like a year ago. I have enjoyed the Initial D series, Naruto, One Piece, and quite a few others.

This manga is exceptional but what I dont understand is why they dont carry it in the stores. I live near a comic book store and they have everything you can imagine. Yet, they dont carry Daigo. So I order them online.

The story follows a young fellow that works as a firefighter. His name is Daigo and he works for Company M.

That explains the title. But the illustrations are top notch and story telling is a real page turner.

If you havent gotten into this series, I urge you to. It will be worth it. At least get the first one and if you dont like it, then just let it collect dust. But I assure you, you will like it if you like the other mangas mentioned above.

yoshi

Average customer rating:

Fantastic Reading, Funny, But True!

astray of the herd

Astray of the Herd: Observations, Commentaries and Rants from Outside the Mainstream
Scott, B. Williams
Manufacturer: Lulu.com
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Essays | Humor | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
General | Humor | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

On Island Time: Kayaking The Caribbean

ASIN: 1411622340

Book Description

If you have ever felt left behind, out-of-step or just plain bewildered by the stampeding madness of the herd-like behavior of modern society, come along with Scott B. Williams on an irreverent and humorous examination of the materialism, technology and regulations that pervade contemporary American life. Williams shares his perspective as one who has long lived on the fringes of the mainstream. Just as Henry David Thoreau went to Walden Pond in 1845 to seek simplicity and separation from his peers in nature, Williams chose to go astray by paddling a 17-foot sea kayak to the Caribbean. Astray of the Herd is a collection of observations resulting from his life on "island time" with little money, no job and boundless freedom to ponder the deeper questions of life. Read this book for a laugh, give it to your stressed-out friends, or get inspired to do some straying of your own.

Customer Reviews:

Fantastic Reading, Funny, But True!.......2006-08-04

Do you ever watch people and wonder why they all seem to be doing the same things? Living alike? The Herd mentality? Scott Williams actually lived outside of the herd and his observations are captured in rants that will leave you laughing and begging for more.Read this book and laugh at yourself! I've read all of Scott's books and he is a versatile author that leaves you waiting for his next publication.

astray of the herd.......2005-03-26

hilariously funny look at our "herd mentality" society. makes me want to strap a sleeping bag on my harley & do some straying myself!!---now if i can just remember where i put my gas credit cards!! highly recommended!!
frank w.

Customer Reviews:

When I'm bad..........2003-05-10

In this well-researched book Marybeth Hamilton offers a picture of an brave and individual performer/writer and her work. It was surprising to discover that Mae West was all but washed up by the 1940's, her legend seems so dominating in popular culture. I also learnt more than I could ever have imagined about burlesque theatre and life in early 20th Century America.

All in all, The Queen of Camp an interesting history of the fascinatin' Ms West and the world she inhabited.

Book Description

In the last three decades of the nineteenth century, an American buffalo herd once numbering 30 million animals was reduced to twelve. It was the era of Manifest Destiny, a Gilded Age that treated the West as nothing more than a treasure chest of resources to be dug up or shot down. The buffalo in this world was a commodity, hounded by legions of swashbucklers and unemployed veterans seeking to make their fortunes. Supporting these hide hunters, even buying their ammunition, was the U.S. Army, which considered the eradication of the buffalo essential to victory in its ongoing war on Native Americans.

Into that maelstrom rode young George Bird Grinnell. A scientist and a journalist, a hunter and a conservationist, Grinnell would lead the battle to save the buffalo from extinction. Fighting in the pages of magazines, in Washington's halls of power, and in the frozen valleys of Yellowstone, Grinnell and his allies sought to preserve an icon from the grinding appetite of Robber Baron America.

Grinnell shared his adventures with some of the greatest and most infamous characters of the American West—from John James Audubon and Buffalo Bill to George Armstrong Custer and Theodore Roosevelt (Grinnell's friend and ally). A strikingly contemporary story, the saga of Grinnell and the buffalo was the first national battle over the environment. In Grinnell's legacy is the birth of the conservation movement as a potent political force.

Customer Reviews:

A Life Spent Serving Others.......2007-10-04

Michael Punke has written a very timely account of George Bird Grinnell, the assault on the American buffalo and efforts to keep it from extinction, the creation of Yellowstone National Park, and Grinnell's efforts as a conservationist. Grinnell was able to see into the future to save the buffalo from extinction, and the importance of preserving our environment for future generations. The book deals with poachers who killed buffalo for a living, commercial hunters of birds and fish, and how people felt the supply was inexhaustable. Yellowstone National Park was created in 1872, but many members of Congress voted for it simply because they felt the area was without economic value and setting it aside didn't matter. Grinnell's mentors were Lucy Audubon and Professor Othniel Marsh. Marsh accepted Grinnell as one of a few young men to accompany him out west to search for dinosaur bones. Later Grinnell accompanied George Armstrong Custer's 1874 expedition into the Black Hills of South Dakota on a scientific expedition in which Custer searched for gold. Custer later invited Grinnell to accompany his ill fated 7th cavalry into Montana in 1876, but Grinnell had commitments at the Peabody Museum. Grinnell made the most of his life and devoted it to conserving America's beauty for future generations. It's ironic that his beloved Glacier National Park in Montana is now threatened by global warming. We owe it to him to preserve for future generations what he preserved for us. My copy of this book will go to the local high school in hopes that young people will be aware of the importance of preserving our environment.

A Welcome New Chapter in the George Bird Grinnell Story.......2007-07-18

Considering George Bird Grinnell's impact on conservation, fair treatment of the American Indian, and the national park movement - and those are but three of his many accomplishments - the lack of a full biography of his life seems downright peculiar. Since I first ran into his name more than a decade ago when I moved into an apartment building named Grinnell and wondered who or what "Grinnell" was, I have often pondered why I didn't learn about George Bird Grinnell in school. Surely, his life is as interesting and his contribution to America is as significant as that of Buffalo Bill (whose path he crossed). Consider, this man founded the first Audubon Society, explored Glacier National Park, and would have accompanied Custer at his last stand, except his professor needed his services for the summer at Yale!

Until now, the most complete exploration of Grinnell's life - excluding the unpublished, autobiographical "Memories" which resides in original at Yale and in copy or microfilm in several other libraries - was John F. Reiger's "The Passing of the Great West." Reiger allowed Grinnell to speak for himself, filling out the picture with supplementary writings by and about him. Gerald Diettert's "Grinnell's Glacier: George Bird Grinnell and Glacier National Park" focuses on one period in Grinnell's life and William T. Hagan's "Theodore Roosevelt and Six Friends of the Indian" (Grinell was one of the six "friends"), focuses on one facet of it. Grinnell's own writings reveal much about him. He was a prolific writer with a keen eye for detail, but his writings with an autobiographical slant are either difficult to obtain, like "Memories," or scattered in various places, such as magazine articles about his home in Audubon Park or the semi-autobiographical series of "Jack" adventure books, which he presumably wrote for his nieces and nephews to acquaint them with the "olden days."

While Michael Punke's "Last Stand: George Bird Grinell, the Battle to Save the Buffalo, and the Birth of the New West" is not a complete biography of Grinnell, it is a thorough examination of Grinnell's development from a wealthy and somewhat aimless young man to a mature thinker who grasped the concept of animal extinction and found in himself both the perseverance and tools to combat it.

As Punke succinctly states, "If there were two moral poles in the world of George Bird Grinnell, Cornelius Vanderbilt stood at one of them" and Lucy Audubon, the widow of naturalist and painter, John James Audubon, stood at the other. Punke develops this theme confidently and convincingly throughout his book. Lucy Audubon, who was Grinnell's first teacher and near neighbor in what was then known as Audubon Park, taught him the value of self-denial, which is at the heart of conservation: deny today and preserve so that future generations may enjoy. True, Grinnell probably learned similar lessons from his father, whose reputation remained untarnished and unchallenged (except in the "Brooklyn Eagle") despite two bankruptcies and extended, close business dealings with Cornelius Vanderbilt, the granddaddy of robber barons, but in his later writings, Grinnell gives ample credit to "Grandma" Audubon for her early moral lessons.

Punke is admirable in his ability to keep the various threads of his story moving along simultaneously. Grinnell's maturation, the United States government's subjugation of the American Indian, the near extinction of the buffalo, and the establishment of Yellowstone Park all develop simultaneously, no strand slighted in favor of another. Punke's writing is clear and energetic and his knowledge of the subject matter is extensive.

Occasionally, he misstates a fact; for example, substituting the firm of George B. Grinnell & Co for George Bird Grinnell & Co (George Blake Grinnell did his son a disservice when he named him George Bird - one George B Grinnell too many) and, occasionally he misses an interesting point. September 18, 1873, the day George Bird Grinnell & Co crashed, essentially freeing Grinnell from business and allowing him to return to Yale and embark upon the course that led him west, was the same day that Lucy Audubon, Grinnell's mentor, departed New York City for the last time, returning to Louisville, Kentucky, where she died several months later.

Those bits are tangential, however. This is a splendid book, a welcome addition to the literature about the founding father of American conservation and a very interesting read.
Matthew Spady [...].

Love of the West.......2007-06-29

Michael Punke threads his love of the wilds of the West throughout his informative, thought-provoking and insightful story of the buffalo and their interrleationship with the Native American population. He effectively evolved and linked this period to the issues with which we are dealing today. The author's research served to illustrate and elaborate on the context of the time. I gained a great appreciation from the story for the challenges and significant accomplishments of George Bird Grinnell. The book should is a must read for all Americans to infuse a much needed political consciousness of what we have done and are doing to our western wildnerness and the native people and animals who inhabit it.

Dr. Judith L. Lyon

Relevant History.......2007-06-29

Michael Punke is fast becoming one of the most reliable authors for accessible, fascinating books about the west. He's a vivid writer who really knows how to construct a story. I highly recommend it.

Excellent historical read; .......2007-06-12

By 1902, the US Army estimated that only 23 wild buffalo remained alive in Yellowstone National Park - the pitiful remnants of the massive herds that once blanketed America.

How the buffalo came to teeter on the brink of extinction is the subject of Last Stand by Michael Punke - a gripping historical account of the eradication of the buffalo and the founding of Yellowstone National Park.

Last Stand, by Michael PunkeIn Last Stand, Punke details early conservationist George Bird Grinnell's battle to save both the bison and newly formed Yellowstone Park from hunters and powerful railroad interests.

It opens with a bang; Punke leads with a chilling account of a hunter killing 107 buffalo without leaving his stand, setting the stage for his narrative about the death of the American west.

A better story than most of the fiction I've read, Punke's book focuses on George Bird Grinnell - a man largely responsible for the conservation of much of the American west, but whom remains mostly unknown today.

Opposing him were all the usual suspects: short-sightedness, a belief that the frontier was infinite, a desire to deal with the "Indian problem," commercial interests, and of course, naked greed.

Punke does a commendable job of weaving together the myriad storylines affecting the west, connecting threads from Lewis & Clark to Custer to Bird's battle against congressional inaction in the face of a strong railroad lobby.

George Bird - editor of Forest and Stream magazine - was an early convert to the cause of preserving the American west, and the climax of the book details his last-ditch efforts to preserve the handful of remaining buffalo.

With the help of a US Army Captain fighting a wave of poachers in the park, Bird marshaled his few allies in congress, beat back the railroad lobby (who wanted half of Yellowstone for their own use), and finally - with the help of an outraged public - succeeded in legislating protections against poaching in the National Parks.

The rapid decimation of the buffalo herds is a recurring (and distressing) theme in Punke's book:

"The numbers paint the stark picture at the end. In 1882, the Northern Pacific Railroad alone shipped 200,000 hides to eastern processing facilities, an amount that filled an estimated 700 boxcars. In 1883, the railroad shipped 40,000 hides. In 1884, the total harvest fit in a single boxcar, and according to a Northern Pacific official, `it was the last shipment ever made.'"

Punke even details the lamentable efforts by many hunters to be the "last to kill a wild buffalo."

Hunters acknowledged the damage done in pursuit of what quickly became a marginal commercial enterprise, but shrugged off the buffalo's impending eradication and decided to get what they could while they could.

It's impossible to read Last Stand without drawing some parallels to the perils facing today's parks and wilderness areas - privatization, commercialization, and how to preserve wild game stocks in the face of encroaching domestic stocks.

Today, of course, the Old West is long gone, and the landscape surrounding Yellowstone National Park is populated with cattle, ranches, seasonal towns and hordes of automobile-bound tourists.

It's all the more reason to read Punke's interesting and compelling book, and anyone who has ever read an account of the Lewis & Clark expedition will likely find Last Stand an outstanding read.

Westward Expansion, 1849-1890: (American Popular Culture Through History)

Average customer rating:

Westward Expansion, 1849-1890: (American Popular Culture Through History)
Sara E. Quay
Manufacturer: Greenwood Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Textbook Binding

Popular Culture | Social Sciences | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

General | Americas | History | Subjects | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Nonfiction | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
ASIN: 0313312354

Book Description

As men and women traveled west to settle America's untamed lands, and tried to "strike it rich" in gold, they led a simple existence, often carrying the barest necessities from one location to another. Yet they also carried with them their own popular culture, through folk songs, legends, and literature, that has often been mythologized into our present American popular culture. Through primary sources such as letters, diaries, and photographs, the author draws parallels and makes distinctions between the pioneers and cowboys of the past and those of today. Students and fans of the Old West will find this volume a rich source of history for this time period. Many images and items in today's popular culture were born in the time of westward expansion. Log cabins, cowboys such as the Marlboro Man and Woody of Toy Story fame, and Levi's jeans, all have their roots in the Old West. Outlaws such as Wild Bill Hikock, Billy the Kid, and Jesse James, and "good guys" such as Davy Crockett, continue to fascinate students and western enthusiasts. Traveling entertainments, mail-order houses, and patent medicines, although no longer popular in today's society, tell us much about the nomadic existence of families during this time. With a timeline and a list of everyday products and their prices during the time period, this volume will be an invaluable resource to students and historians tracing the roots of American popular culture.

Average customer rating:
The New York Times Large-Print Crosswords for a Brain Workout: 75 Mind-Building Crosswords from the Pages of The New York Times
The New York Times
Manufacturer: St. Martin's Griffin
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Crosswords | Puzzles & Games | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
General | Puzzles & Games | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
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The New York Times Large-Print Crosswords to Boost Your Brainpower: 75 Large-Print Crosswords to Sharpen Your Mind, Improve Your Crossword Skills, and Increase Your Vocabulary

ASIN: 0312326122

Book Description

Now people of all ages and eye strength can get the benefits of crossword puzzling This Large-Print edition features: -Easy-to-read large type -Two pages per puzzle -75 puzzles from easy to hard for solvers to work their way through as they work out their brains.

The New York Times Large-Print Crosswords for a Brain Workout : 75 Mind-Building Crosswords from the Pages of The New York Times

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The New York Times Large-Print Crosswords for a Brain Workout : 75 Mind-Building Crosswords from the Pages of The New York Times
Will Shortz
Manufacturer: St. Martin's Griffin
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OTLHKO

Book Description

More than just a step-by-step tutorial on rigging in Maya, "Inspired 3D Advanced Rigging and Deformations" helps you develop the skills you need to successfully manage your rigging process from start to finish. You'll learn the reasons behind each step in developing a character rig and learn how that rig fits into the entire pipeline process. The authors provide a unique glimpse at the real-world problems and choices that professional Character Technical Directors face, as well as the solutions they have developed for dealing with high-end digital characters. A follow-up to "Inspired 3D Character Setup," this book takes this difficult and sough-after skill and provides in-depth explanations and techiques.

Customer Reviews:

Poor Presentation.......2007-03-15

I will second doodler's review; the content is in there somewhere, but the presentation is horrible. Pictures are unable to convey any information whatsoever do to their tiny size. Adding to the difficulty in following the instruction are the seemingly endless typos on node names, such as a dropped suffix or a dropped prefix. Whole steps seem to left out of other areas and the errata from the Course Tech website seems to contain only a fraction of the mistakes. This makes actually learning anything in a reasonable amount of time utterly impossible since you will spend most of your time trying to decipher what is a typo and what is not.

warning.......2006-03-29

The main rigging tutorial in this book is very poorly written. What should be a great learning experience becomes a lesson in silly extra long naming pratices that will obscure all the intellegence of the actual rigging process.....the physical size of the book limits the pictures to a decorative effect. No real information is passed by the pictures and they are not included in any of the download data available. The main structure of his rig gets lost in a series of asides and remarks that make following the authors rigging tutorial into a joke. Bearly 3 steps can be included before a page change. This makes checking your work very hard and tedious. The real content just gets lost as every description includes a joint name that borders on 5 prefixes followed by 5 suffixs. By the time you select the right joint you have lost the process he is trying to teach you. So the first 170 odd pages are an exercise in translating his verbose descriptions into something logical. The content is there, it is just poorly presented.

Luckily, there is more then just the one author on this one!

Surprisingly deep for its broadness.......2006-02-23

I got this book specifically to assist in shoulder/arm rigging difficulties i've had with an animation that needed to be anatomically correct, and i wasn't disappointed. The book quickly asserts the scope of the problem, and makes it clear that a good solution requires a careful study of the model geometry, and supplies you with a realistic and powerful idea for a setup. It doesn't provide you with an ultimate solution, but rather suggests very helpfully approaches to specific problems, often supplying MEL scripts to assist, as well as downloadable example files demonstrating theory in practise.

The writing style is fluid and doesn't take you for a fool, and the included interviews with veteran TD's are all interesting. I wish there were more details on weighting and weighting practises aside from a suggestion to weight "backwards" (reducing weight from 1 instead of increasing from 0). In addition, the book attempts to include 3ds MAX in its teaching process, but largely fails, putting 90% emphasis on Maya (good for me!)

I'll recommend it to any novice/intermediate TD. I'd also recommend it to anyone wanting a better understanding of how a rig works, perhaps a modeller seeking to understand how to mend his geometry to best suit rigging.

An excellent guide for Maya users.......2005-11-05

Maya users might already be familiar with the concept of rigging - but any needing a 'course in a book' to develop skills in Maya rigging will find this insider's look at real-world problems to be invaluable, especially if you're already learned from the prior Inspired 3D Character Setup. In-depth explanations and plenty of real-world examples of character rigs, high-res models and more pack in color screen shot samples and illustration. Scripts, functions and polishing results fine-tune an excellent guide for Maya users.

Finally we skip the nonsense ang right to the meat!.......2005-08-17

This book not only re-affirms my workflow, but offers distinct perspectives and techniques that help those who may have their own alternative to rigging. Pipeline issues are the most important element of rigging once you hit a certain level, and this book explains possible things to look out for and prepare for no matter what size of the production. Although skipping the book previous to this, I felt right at home while reading and it fit my 'style' of professionalism when discussing things thoroughly and not avoiding any part of the process no matter how small. The other part I loved that the tutorials and examples given don't hold your hand and treat you like you are just getting acquainted with 3D or a computer for that matter. There are subtleties that get mentioned that the experienced TD can learn to appreciate, but may be ignored by the beginner/novice. If you are a beginner a lot of those subtleties or other discussions throughout may confuse you and while you can pretend you understand you may need the 1st book or other hands on rigging experience to fully grasp it enough to be able to apply the knowledge how you want or see fit. THAT is the most important thing about this book.

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