All over the land they’re bending it like Beckham. Sporting films and videos are as much in fashion as replica shirts. The latest, featuring the life and times of Bobby Moore, has received rave reviews and it seems that if directors want a hit these days, they need to give it a sporting spin.So in all seriousness, I pass on the news that a young London- based Indian director has just shot a film of his own mother making samosas which he likens to the fight sequences in Raging Bull. According to Nilesh Patel, cooking is like a martial art, and he depicts the scenes of his mum rolling and folding the pastry as if they were rounds of boxing. The potato peeling is done to a background of Robert De Niro shadow boxing. I kid you not. “It is a celebration of skill, speed and accuracy but using female palms rather than a male gloved fist,” he says. Called A Love Supreme it lasts nine minutes and may sound like a load of old Bollywood but Patel is hoping Naseem Hamed will back the distribution of his “anti- racist comedy-drama”.

Edouard Duval-Carrie was born in Haiti, but when he was a child, his family fled Papa Doc Duvalier’s regime. He studied in Montreal and at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris before moving to Miami. From this long perspective he explores the theme of “Migrations” in his new paintings, sculptures and installations.In Miami, migration is a major item on the evening news. Thousands of Cubans have arrived since the Mariel mass exodus, many in small, makeshift rafts. Rickety boats loaded with desperate Haitians continue to be intercepted; the bodies of those who drown have washed up on our beaches. Jose Bedia, one of the best known of Miami’s Cuban emigre artists, obsessively fashions schematic compositions using Afro-Cuban-Indian symbols to evoke his own transit from the Caribbean to the urban mainland. Duval-Carrie’s version of the theme projects not a personal narrative but his reflection, spiced with humor and political bite, on a long tradition of sacred images. He cheerfully appropriates the traditional folk style of Haitian painters and the island’s pantheon of Voudou gods and goddesses (”loas” in Creole), and he uses both style and symbol to comment on political and cultural realities. At the Miami Art Museum, Duval-Carrie created an installation that filled the New Work Gallery. It included a wall inspired by the architectural format of a Renaissance altarpiece, inset with sculpted figures in niches and round, square and rectangular paintings, all of modernized Voudou deities, which like the ancient gods can be seen as personifications of nature and of human types and temperaments. Erzulie, for example, the Ioa of love akin to the Greek Aphrodite, is updated as a gaudy exotic nightclub dancer. This hybrid wall demonstrates migration of styles and ideas; migration as the movement of peoples is evoked in the larger-than-life Ioas with flocked surfaces in hot colors who sit disconsolately in a flotilla of wooden boats hanging in midair. They represent Baron Samedi, spirit of death and sex, Erzulie, spirit of female power, and others. In Duval-Carrie’s imagination, everyone is leaving a desolated Haiti, even her presiding spirits.

At Steinbaum, Duval-Carrie showed, along with a small installation, an explosive array of large, emblematic paintings in sea greens and blues heated with Caribbean magentas, reds and oranges. The figures and symbols are as flat, frontal and linear as Byzantine icons; the intricate floral backgrounds tame jungle vegetation into elegant patterns. In some compositions, Duval-Carrie includes a group of tiny palm trees at the right of the image and on the left, a cluster of skyscrapers as the destination of the silhouetted boatload of migrants who traverse the lonely space between.

Several paintings allude to the political and social history of Haiti. Confiserie Sucre Noir (Black Sugar Confections) refers to French’ control of the sugar industry through the importation and use of black slaves. It parodies the kind of picture that could advertise the brand name of such a product on an 18th-century candy box. Against the background of a wallpaper pattern of repeated black heads, the black face in the center, fixed in place by a lacy collar, hovers above a flowery hemisphere.

Duval-Carrie presents his canvases in wide, wooden frames that become part of the painting-as-object. Some frames show remnants of a gold-leaf Rococo decoration (Duval-Carrie uses a stencil sold by Ralph Lauren to produce a “traditional” effect) on which layers of tropical sea-blue resin encroach, studded with carved emblems like hearts, anchors, infants and Haiti’s royal palm tree. His frames increase esthetic distance, emphasize the artfulness of the images they contain and, like all of Dural-Carrie’s pensively comic work, suggest the palimpsest of history.

Although fans of the hometown Indians might frown on the analogy, The Cleveland Clinic–arguably the central service world’s equivalent to the New York Yankees–used its size and an impressive collection of financial and human resources to its best advantage and came away as the 2002 winner of the Healthcare Purchasing News Central Service Department of the Year award It can rightfully be said that the larger institutions have the means as well as the motive to improve their performance, teamwork, efficiency and the like. But it’s still up to the hospital and its managers and staff to fulfill that potential, and the prestigious Ohio medical center certainly did that. In overwhelming fashion, The Cleveland Clinic finished as the top vote-getter from judges in an outstanding field of hospitals to win this year’s honor. One judge even handed the Clinic a perfect score, the only such accomplishment on the score sheet. Among the leaders in the field were runner-up Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle, as well as Women’s Hospital, Baton Rouge, LA, and Baylor University Medical Center, Waco, TX. Congratulations are in order for all entries. Each of these facilities submitted impressive credentials.

“World class care deserves a world class processing department.” In 1998, the surgical processing department (SPD) of The Cleveland Clinic stepped up efforts to improve their delivery of quality products to their customers. In order for the staff of the SPD to achieve their goals, they needed to update their department’s mission statement and plan a comprehensive strategic plan that was sensitive to the needs of their customers. This plan also needed to be communicated to their customer and provide opportunity for customers participation with very little time taken away from patient care.

The fundamental values that form the foundation of the Cleveland Clinic culture: quality, integrity, compassion, collaboration, and commitment. The mission of the surgical processing department: “To provide surgical instrumentation and related hardware which has been decontaminated, inspected, assembled, packaged, sterilized, stored and delivered according to quality assurance procedures for the operating rooms in a manner to support and accomplish the goals and objectives of The Cleveland Clinic.”

Today, the SPD supports 59 surgical operating rooms with an annual caseload of 34,000-plus surgical procedures, performing 16,800 sterilization loads and processing more than 373,860 sets of instruments to include the inspection and handling of over 6.25 million reusable surgical medical devices per year. This type of performance and statistical indicators would not be feasible without the professional dedication of the 70 FTEs in the SPD.

But this story is more than just numbers. It’s about how one SPD achieved success and won this year’s award. “Customer Service is the key,” says Richard Schule, who has led the department since 1994 and sounds as much like a motivator as a department head. “Never get discouraged over the day’s events. Perseverance and a positive attitude will endure.” With that in mind, the SPD has developed and implemented numerous tools to meet and exceed their customer’s expectations.

Innovative ideas

The Clinic developed several resource tools designed to raise the level of efficiency and awareness of the production process. For example, the SPD assisted in the development and implementation of an instrument daily usage report from the OR scheduling system. This report identifies the types and quantities of instruments needed to support the next day’s surgery schedule and to help prioritize the workload.

Inside the department, visual aids were posted throughout the production process featuring oversized graphics portraying the loading of washer loading racks with reusable medical devices, instrument tray assembly, sterilizer loading cart set up, sterile storage and case cart production, to help staff identify with consistent replication of quality production.

Another improvement was the way in which sharps were reported to the staff and SPD customers. The staff took a site visit to Invacare, a large homecare products supplier. Says Schule, “We noticed how a picture of a green safety cross was colored to represent the number of injury free production days for a given month. The SPD created a picture of a syringe with 31 squares to represent each day of the month and to have a colored square for each day that a sharps event takes place.”

Improvements begin with a will to do and knowledge to understand the reasoning. The SPD staff at Cleveland Clinic came to recognize the importance of communicating with their customers as well as with each other. With that in mind, a “communications board” was designed to capture monthly statistics and include production indicators and volume. “This board allowed us to communicate safety issues such as the number of sharps incidents that were occurring each month in addition to what types of sharps the staff were being exposed to,” says Schule. “Such communication has been received favorably by our customers, and the raised awareness has reduced sharps occurrence by 64 percent.”

In a decision that reverberated from coast to coast, Iowa’s Sweet Corn Technical Institute in Des Moines voted to change the name and logo of its athletic teams from the “Grasshoppers” to the “Indians,” a course running counter to current fashion. “This tribute to the courage, dignity and historical tenacity of an often-derided minority is long overdue,” said Athletic Director Giffer Goffer.

“We are proud to emphasize our cultural kinship with a group which in the face of overwhelming odds during this nation’s founding maintained ethnic pride and whose accomplishments since should bring a blush, so to speak, of admiration to us all” he added after the unanimous vote of students and faculty.News of the Sweet Corn decision caused the New York Times to reverse one of that paper’s more foolish policies: A Times editorial thundered that “it is about time the silly campaigns by local governments and many schools to eliminate such team names as `Indians,’ `Braves’ and `Redskins’ is recognized for the absurdity that it is. We regret our past endorsement of such demeaning efforts to deny America’s indigenous people the emblematic prominence they deserve. It is inspiriting that this challenge comes from Des Moines, the heartland of the heartland, and we trust the bold decision will be emulated widely.” The Washington Post, noting the Times’ policy retreat, several days later also published a lead editorial: “Bravo to the faculty and students of Sweet Corn Technical Institute for asserting that symbols can be eloquent. For our part, this newspaper will no longer use the term `Native Americans,’ realizing that the very imprecise usage is insensitive to immigrants and their descendants. We salute Iowa’s Democratic senator, Tom Harkin, for his quick appreciation of the decision in his state: `What’s good enough for Sweet Corn is good enough for me,’ the ultraliberal Harkin said at a press conference.”

Whoa! Enough whimsical improbability.

The cult of “victimhood” first cousin to multicultural faddism, is too embedded at the moment for any actual transition to mother wit to occur. Indeed, there is a bow-wave of enthusiasm for promoting “group identities” and erasing supposed denigration of minorities. This daft confusion of perspective was exemplified by former vice president Al Gore, when at a campaign rally he slyly translated one of the nation’s mottos, E pluribus unum (From Many, One) as “From One, Many.” When questions arose, his handlers insisted the reversal was inadvertent.

The most recent nonsense comes from — where else? -the nation’s capital. An organization composed of representatives from the city and surrounding jurisdictions passed a resolution urging that the owner of the Washington Redskins professional football team change its name by next season.

In the overheated rhetoric usual in these peevish squeakings, the resolution proclaimed, “The use of this degrading and dehumanizing term for a team name is offensive and hurtful to Native Americans and to many people who reject racial stereotypes, racial slurs and bigotry as socially and morally unacceptable.” Two members of the body voted against the addled motion and five abstained. The resolution is toothless: Such a coagulation of governmental officials has no enforcement power.

The trend frequently in cases such as this is for the offending school or team immediately to grovel and acquiesce to the demand for change — notwithstanding that students and parents often object. Happily, at least so far, the Washington Redskins are not impressed. A spokesman for the team said, “We have no intention of changing our name.”

Actually, changing the name of any National Football League (NFL) team would require a decision by NFL Big Chief Paul Tagliabue. The last time there were mutterings about renaming the Redskins, he sensibly demurred.

A similar feel-good assault on athletic nomenclature in 1997 led Washington’s pro-basketball team to change its name from the “Bullets” to the “Wizards.” The notion behind that episode was that “Bullets” was suggestive of violence and guns and it might lead impressionable younger fans to secure pistols or antitank guns.

In the midst of a vastly important mobilization in the war against terror, and the national consensus that is supporting it, the niggling efforts to get team names changed and to enforce other tenets of liberal political rectitude are as germane as flying a kite in a hurricane.

If anything, the continual involvement of governmental bodies in such flapdoodle makes an irrefutable case (as if it needed making yet again) that the United States now suffers from excessive layers of officialdom. Too many of these puny panjandrums do not have enough serious labor to concentrate their attention.

Traditions are not immune to criticism or change, of course, nor should they be. It is well, however, that fiddling with them ought to be consensual — ought to meet even a modestly democratic concurrence — rather than be the result of promiscuous itches by politicians seeking feel-good issues.

Nobody likes to have his fashion sense questioned, but Mariners reliever Arthur Rhodes is a shining example of someone who takes self-expression too far. After the Indians’ Omar Vizquel complained that Rhodes’ diamond earrings were causing a distracting glare in a day game last Saturday, the two players began yelling at each other. Rhodes became so incensed he eventually was tossed. “He started pointing at my head,” Vizquel says. “He was pointing at me like he was going to hit me or something.” Maybe Vizquel wasn’t accessorizing right.You can nominate a major league player for the Doghouse. Call Kevin Wheeler’s show, 6-9 a.m. ET Saturdays on Sporting News Radio. For an affiliate near you,

The physical appearance of LieutenantGeneral Arthur Percival was not that of a Great Captain. His was an awkward, angular shape, not suited to tropical shorts. He had buck-teeth and lacked the jaw-line of Slim or Alanbrooke. These attributes worked against him when the knives were out after Singapore fell in 1941, as did his recent `staff experience. But he had fought nobly with the Bedfords on the Western Front in the Great War, a leader by example, loved by his men. awarded the DSO, MC and three mentions. And after 1918, he secured total victory over the Bolsheviks on the Dvina River when with the Royal Fusiliers under Ironside. Later, as Intelligence Officer of the Essex Regiment, he won in Ulster the reluctant respect of the IRA, before moving to staff appointments at home and abroad, including Nigeria and, from 1935 to 1937, de facto Chief of Staff, Malaya.Winston Churchill, then Prime Minister, described the fall of Singapore as `this grievous and shameful blow . . . the worst disaster and largest capitulation in British history’. It is General Kinvig’s contention that the blame for the catastrophe lay not primarily with General Percival, GOC Malaya Command, but in the fallacy that the island ever was a defensible ‘fortress’, and in Churchill’s own failure to give the defence of Malaya a high priority in aircraft, tanks and jungle-trained soldiers.In fact, the island itself had no landward defences. Plans had always been based on holding the land attack in Johore or further north, but the means to implement the plan, in terms especially of armour and fighters, had been diverted to the USSR whose survival was judged by Churchill to be that sine qua non of final victory which that of Malaya could not be. And the great man, beset by menace in Europe and the Middle East, either did not believe in an imminent, effective Japanese threat, or hoped that it would not happen, or even imagined it as the occasion for longed-for US intervention.

In 1937 the island had contained only two British battalions, while one single Indian battalion and some vestigial local forces were thought adequate to defend the whole Malayan peninsula. Percival, warning of Japanese intelligence penetration, and of vastly improved military capacity, and the likelihood of delay in the arrival of the British Main Fleet, had then recommended considerably augmented air, infantry and local naval support. When he returned in 1941 as GOC his Army was still 17 battalions short of the (inadequate) Chiefs of Staff estimate for six brigades, while the Air Force lacked 178 aircraft out of the 336 which the Chiefs had agreed, against the 566 locally recommended. (Sixty of those were Brewster Buffaloes, no match for Zeros and flown by pilots straight out of flying school). The Main Fleet, including Prince of Wales and Repulse, did not arrive until December, without the essential aircraft carrier: ‘A lovely sight’, correctly commented Lady Diana Cooper, `but on the petty side.’

The Japanese then landed in the north-east, pre-empting Matador, the planned British attempt to seize Thai bases before they could be taken by the Japanese. Percival’s subordinate, Commander of 3 Indian Corps, was Lieutenant General Sir Lewis Heath, older and more senior, the knighted victor of Keren. Relations between the two deteriorated, to the detriment of the whole campaign, after Heath had blamed Percival - `You lost your honour in the North’ for not activating Matador.

In the north-west, the Japanese captured a marked British map. The three raw brigades of 11th Indian Division, losing vast quantities of arms and with 3,000 soldiers - often without Urdu-speaking officers - surrendering, were roundly defeated at Jitra. The RAF was reduced, often on the ground, from 110 operational aircraft in north Malaya to 50, destroyed largely by the espionage of the British Captain Keenan. Prince of Wales and Repulse, without air cover, were sent to the bottom. There followed a gruesome record of treachery, incompetence, failure to communicate, leading to endless botched withdrawals in east and west Malaya against Japanese command of air and sea, superior armour and outflanking tactics, as later against Slim in the Burma retreat. No useful contribution was made by the Resident Minister, Duff Cooper, nor by Lord Wavell, the Supreme Allied Commander.

The Hurricanes which now started to arrive in crates could not compete with the Zeros. Not enough Hudson or Blenheim bombers arrived. The last, frequently deplorable retreats led finally to a successful withdrawal by 31 January to Singapore island, which now contained about 95,000 men, few of whom were trained and reliable. But although 18 Division, unacclimatised and desert trained, disembarked on 29 January, Singapore was untenable now that the mainland had been lost, a fact admitted by Wavell. Despite Churchill’s demand that Singapore should become an Asian Masada - `Commanders and senior officers should die with their troops’ - an immoral request that `Indians, Australians and Singaporeans should die for the Empire’, Wavell gave discretion to Percival to cease resistance. Troops were looting, deserting or escaping; the failure of the water supply was imminent, with certainty of epidemic; petrol was exhausted; ammunition was running out; most of Percival’s soldiers had given up the struggle. He signed the surrender document on Sunday, 15 February.

As smart-client teller solution, S1 Enterprise Teller v3.5 provides tools that facilitate application management and promotion of front-office efficiencies and cross-sell opportunities. Single launch screen can present 80% of most common tasks on user interface, and administrators can graphically map business processes to reduce keystrokes and individual tasks required by systems. Teller applications are maintained centrally on server and deployed over Internet. ATLANTA, Feb. 16 - S1 Corporation (NASDAQ:SONE), a leading provider of customer-interaction software for financial services, announced today the release of the S1 Enterprise Teller 3.5 solution into its Managed Introduction Program. As the industry’s first smart-client teller solution, S1 Enterprise Teller helps financial institutions lower deployment and system management costs while providing tools that facilitate greater front-office efficiencies and cross-sell opportunities.

“The release of Enterprise Teller marks the first of our Enterprise 3.5 suite of solutions to be rolled out this quarter,” stated Matt Hale, group president for S1 Corporation. “We are pleased with the recent progress made against our Enterprise strategy, and by working closely with a few select customers in our Managed Introduction Program, we are ensuring complete organizational readiness for broad-based implementations of these solutions later this year.” With this release, S1 has combined its domain expertise and 20+ years of experience in branch automation solutions with its knowledge of smart-client technology to offer banks a new approach to teller software - a single launch screen that can present 80 percent of their most common tasks on a user- friendly interface. Globally, S1 has more than 1,100 customers using its branch solutions today and continues to forge new territory in improving efficiencies and business processes around customer centricity and operational risk reduction with the teller line.

According to Bart Narter, senior analyst for Celent Communications, a leading research firm focused on financial services IT, “With the boom in branch banking, bankers now realize that branches need to change from account- focused transaction machines to customer-focused cross-selling environments. Branch automation solutions that give a single and complete view of the customer can enable branch personnel to provide financial solutions to customer problems instead of the traditional product push.”

Key Features

As a smart-client solution, S1 Enterprise Teller combines real-time connectivity with a depth of offline capabilities to overcome the risks of previous web-based teller applications. The solution drastically reduces deployment costs associated with typical teller product implementations, because the applications are maintained centrally on a server and deployed over the Internet to local teller stations. After initial deployment, system enhancements and modifications can be made more rapidly and efficiently, enabling the bank to equip tellers with the latest tools to better serve customers and more easily adapt to changing market conditions.

In addition, S1 Enterprise Teller uniquely leverages the S1 Enterprise Platform capabilities to let system administrators graphically map business processes that can in turn be used to reduce keystrokes and individual tasks required by many systems. Not only does this improve the efficiency of the teller, but it also reduces teller training costs that plague many banks with high teller turnover ratios. More than 300 workflows, including branch image capture, are delivered out-of-the-box to help banks immediately begin reaping the benefits of the system’s ease-of-use. With its currency transaction reporting capabilities, the new solution also helps banks automate the process of meeting regulatory requirements by centrally storing and managing cash transaction information across the enterprise.

Targeted marketing messages can be matched to individual customers and delivered by the teller. Delivering targeted messages, along with on-line scripts, allow tellers to experience greater success in offering products right at the teller line. Increasing the likelihood of message acceptance builds teller confidence in the sales process, ultimately resulting in additional sales. Automated routing of referrals ensures that sales opportunities are completed in a timely manner.

S1 Enterprise Teller is among the company’s seven major applications integrated on the S1 Enterprise Platform. These applications also include S1 Personal Banking, S1 Business Banking, S1 Corporate Banking, S1 Sales & Service Platform, S1 Enterprise Call Center, and S1 Enterprise Marketing Center. The applications are available independently or collectively as an integrated solution that gives banks one view of their customers across channels.

MDM Group, Inc. (OTC: MDDM) advises that MDM Group subsidiary, Harrington Group Limited (HGR.AX) earlier today advised the Australian Stock Exchange of the appointment of an additional three world-renowned homeland security experts as founding members of the Harrington Group Advisory Board.

Joining Colonel John Alexander, a global authority on non-lethal weapons and defense, will be Dr. Christopher Green, a forensic medicine and electrophysiology specialist, Dr. Edward Stephen, a specialist in pharmacology and bioterrorism defense, and Dr. Allen Bain, a leading pharmacologist focused on specialised drug development including new treatments for disorders of electrically active tissue. The combined expertise of the Advisory Board will provide Harrington with outstanding guidance in strategic product development and commercialisation, and grow the Company’s profile in the law enforcement, defense and homeland security sectors.

Harrington Group CEO Marshall Couper said: “All four Advisory Board members have extensive knowledge of Harrington’s ShockRounds(TM) electric ammunition technology, as well as outstanding expertise in less-than-lethal weapons, Homeland Security issues and human effects.

“Harrington is focused on accelerating its product development, formalising strategic and commercial relationships and securing the expertise of leaders in the field. The formation of a world class Advisory Board is an important step forward in this strategy.” Dr. Green is in the practice of forensic medicine (American Academy of Forensic Sciences) and neuroimaging (Detroit Medical Center/Harper University Hospital/Wayne School of Medicine). His work clinically relates to his expertise as a neurophysiologist with a specialty in electrophysiology. A special research interest involves the way cognition in “making decisions under stress” are modulated by brain systems and neuromuscular control. He is both a faculty member at the Medical School and Fellow in Diagnostic Radiology, and Executive Director for Emergent Technologies.

Dr. Green serves on numerous Department of Defense, Intelligence and National Academy of Sciences Commissions. He Chairs the Science Board for the Undersecretary of the Army for Operations Research and has served as Chair of the Board on Army Science and Technology. He holds the National Intelligence Medal for investigations in forensic intelligence and served as an Officer and continues as a consultant with the Central Intelligence Agency.

Edward L. Stephen, DVM

Dr. Edward L. Stephen is a specialist in bioterrorism and biodefense and in this field also heads up the biodefense division of MDM Group, Inc (OTC: MDDM).

His initial working assignment was at Ft. Detrick where, in the Special Operations Division, he played key roles in bioterrorism defense including assessment of vulnerability of limited targets such as the New York subway system and the Pentagon. Further, he was involved in the R&D of a range of weapons and helped to test and evaluate various kinds of drugs, chemicals, and toxins as they might relate to capture or restraint.

Most recently and for the past five (5) years, Dr. Stephen has been a Senior Project Manager at the International Science and Technology Center (ISTC; www.istc.ru). In this role, he has been evaluating the scientific experience and expertise of scientists and support personnel involved in the R&D of biological weapons of mass destruction (BioWMD). He has reviewed the credentials and publications of scientists and support personnel of literally thousands of individuals as the initial step of integrating this experience and expertise into collaborative bio-defense research projects between the governments of Russia and the US. During future visits to Russia, he will be discussing the current and future R&D needs of the Harrington Group with various organisations.

Allen I Bain, PhD

Dr. Bain is a pharmacologist focused on new drug development including, treatments for disorders of the brain, heart and other electrically active tissue. As a co-founder, officer, or director of several companies spanning nearly two decades, Dr. Bain has participated in leadership roles in both the business and the science of drug discovery. Most notably, Dr. Bain co-founded Cardiome Pharma, whose flagship ion channel modulating drug to treat cardiac arrhythmias is in Phase 3 clinical trials in the U.S., supported by a large pharmaceutical company. Until recently, Dr. Bain was an honorary lecturer at the Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics at the University of British Columbia, where he was awarded his doctorate in pharmacology in 1994 for his work in neuroscience.

Sola Resource Corp. (TSX VENTURE:SL) (the “Company”), is pleased to announce a non-brokered private placement of up to 4,000,000 Units, for a total amount of CDN$2,600,000.00 in the capital of the Company (the “Offering”). Each Unit will be comprised of one common share and one non-transferable share purchase warrant (the “Warrant” or “Warrants”). Each Unit will be priced at CDN$0.65 and each two warrants will entitle the holder to purchase one common share of the Company at an exercise price of CDN$0.90, for a period of 18 months from the date of issuance of the Units. The Offering also includes a “greenshoe” or “over-allotment” option of 1,000,000 Units, for additional proceeds of CDN$650,000.00.

The Company intends to pay a finder’s fee in accordance with the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange. Warrants issued as finder’s fees will be exercisable for two years at CDN$0.65.

The Company will use the proceeds of the Offering for the exploration and development of its mineral resource properties in Brazil, including the commencement of testing of its diamondiferous kimberlite pipe located thereon, and for working capital and general corporate purposes.

The Kobrand people are getting creative with their events these days, as evidenced by the “Pinot and Pork” tasting they held in New York last month. The swine included dishes made from tasty Niman Ranch Pork, and the wines weren’t exactly swill. Tasters washed down the divine swine with the likes of Taittinger Prestige Cuvee Rose, Louis Jadot Burgundies and Domaine Carneros Pinot Noir.I’d like to see more events like Kobrand’s that bring wine into new situations and pair it with unexpected foods. How about a fried chicken and Champagne festival? Any volunteers for a white-wine-with-meat/red-wine-with-fish dinner?