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from stevenjohnson803:
Ashes to ashes; dust to dust
Gainesville, Florida
By Steve Johnson
“Ashes to ashes; dust to dust.”
Its origins come from Genesis 3:19 (King James Verison): “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.”
We celebrate death in so many different ways. From sky burials in Tibet, to hanging coffins in ancient China, how we honor the dead is varied and changing.
In the United States and Canada, vault burials have grown in popularity since the early 1900s. With more than 19,000 funeral homes and 8,000 embalmers in the U.S. alone according to the National Funeral Directors Association.
So when Reuters contacted me about a conservation cemetery, one of four in the country, I was intrigued with the very niche market.
from Tax Break:
Calendar
Some important tax and accounting events in the week ahead.
Monday, May 13 - Thursday, May 16
* Government and private sector attorneys and accountants speak to Practicing Law Institute program, Basics of Accounting for Lawyers. New York.
* Federation of Tax Administrators electronic filing symposium. New Orleans.
Tuesday, May 14
Voters in south Florida's Miami-Dade County go to polls to decide whether to increase local hotel taxes to help pay for a $350 million upgrade to the Miami Dolphins stadium.
from FaithWorld:
Three popes in Vatican as Egypt’s Coptic leader visits Francis
(Pope Francis (R) and the Coptic Orthodox leader Tawadros II pose during a private audience in the pontiff's library at the Vatican, May 10, 2013. REUTERS/Andreas Solaro/Pool)
At the Vatican on Friday not one, not two, but three popes were inside the tiny city-state's walls at the same time.
from Alison Frankel:
Patent trolls and multidistrict litigation: It’s complicated
One of the key anti-troll elements of the America Invents Act of 2011 was the patent reform law's restrictions on joinder. After September 2011, patent owners could not file complaints that named multiple, otherwise unrelated defendants who happened to make use of the same IP. The idea was to make it more expensive for plaintiffs to bring and litigate patent suits, to prevent forum shopping and to limit trolls' leverage. Conventional wisdom was that the new law's joinder restrictions were going to lead to an uptick in requests for the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation to consolidate cases for pretrial proceedings. If plaintiffs could persuade the JPMDL to consolidate cases for pretrial proceedings - especially if they could direct consolidated litigation to sympathetic judges - they could take some of the sting out of joinder restrictions.
As usual, reality is more complicated. Prompted by a squib about a patent MDL at the Gibbons blog IP Law Alert, I went to the JPMDL's site to see if, in fact, plaintiffs have flocked to the panel since patent reform. Here's what I found. There are 19 active MDLs categorized as patent matters. Three of them are Hatch-Waxman litigation between brand and generic drugmakers, so I eliminated them from additional consideration. Of the remaining 16 consolidated proceedings, five preceded the effective date of the patent reform law. So in the 15 months since AIA, the MDL panel has consolidated 11 patent matters. That seems to be a higher rate for consolidating patent litigation than we saw before patent reform, but the JPMDL still considers far more product liability, consumer and antitrust matters than patent litigation.
from FaithWorld:
Jerusalem police shield Jewish women activists in confrontation at Western Wall
(Israeli policemen block ultra-Orthodox Jewish women as members of "Women of the Wall" group (not pictured) leave the Western Wall after a monthly prayer session at the Western Wall in Jerusalem's Old City May 10, 2013. REUTERS/Amir Cohen )
Israeli police held back thousands of ultra-conservative Jews who tried to drive liberal women worshippers from Judaism's sacred Western Wall on Friday, marking a shift in the authorities' handling of a long-running religious schism.
from FaithWorld:
“Messiah” is increasingly popular as name for U.S. boys
(A newborn baby in Brooklyn, New York on October 31, 2011, the day the world's population reached seven billion according to projections by the United Nations. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson )
Sophia tops the list of names for American baby girls for the second year in a row, while King and Messiah are becoming increasingly popular names for boys, the U.S. Social Security Administration said on Thursday.
from Photographers Blog:
Showtime at the Lucha Libre wrestling
Los Angeles, California
By Mario Anzuoni
Cinqo de Mayo, Spanish for the fifth of May, commemorates the Mexican army's 1862 victory over France at the Battle of Puebla.
Living in Los Angeles, there are many ways this date is celebrated. One of them in particular attracted my attention this year. It was the Lucha VaVoom, a show of Lucha Libre Mexican wrestling and Burlesque performances at the Mayan theatre in Los Angeles.
from FaithWorld:
French Muslims look to science to determine start of Ramadan
(A crescent moon is seen with the planet Jupiter in the sky over Amman December 1, 2008. REUTERS/Ali Jarekji)
France's Muslim leaders have agreed to end almost 1,400 years of Islamic tradition and use modern astronomy to determine the start of the holy month of Ramadan and other Islamic holidays.
from Tax Break:
Essential reading: Falling deficit alters budget debate, and more
Welcome to the top tax and accounting headlines from Reuters and other sources.
* Falling deficit alters debate. Damian Palleta - The Wall Street Journal. Rising government revenue from tax collections and bailout paybacks are shrinking the federal deficit faster than expected, delaying the point when the government will reach the so-called debt ceiling and altering the budget debate in Washington. Link
* Who would win or lose on online sales tax. Jayne O'Donnell and Hadley Malcolm - USA Today. Major retailers and local stores will be the big winners if the House follows the Senate and requires Internet retailers to collect sales taxes on online purchases. Link
from India Insight:
Tracking Sensex: Top five gainers, losers this week
The BSE Sensex ended above the 20,000 mark on Friday after gaining 2.6 percent in the last five trading sessions. The index has now risen for four straight weeks. Here are the top five Sensex gainers and losers of the week:
GAINERS
Tata Motors: The automaker’s stock surged 8.15 percent in the week ending May 10, making it the best Sensex performer. Though the stock is still flat in 2013, it has gained nearly 15 percent since April. However, Ambareesh Baliga of Edelweiss Financial Services advises caution: "Tata Motors' overdependence on Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) to negate the Indian underperformance makes it a risky investment at this juncture especially in view of lower margins at JLR"
