Burger review: Whiskey Cake in Plano

After several ventures into the darkest bars Dallas has to offer, it was time for a change for the crew at Burger Breakdown. It was time for a burger that hadn’t been cooked on a grill that may or may not have been cleaned in the last year, and it was time for a place where you could actually see who was sitting across the table. It was time to visit somewhere where it was okay to be sober past noon.Choose from our large selection of cableties, It was time for a visit to Plano, and time for a visit to Whiskey Cake.

The change couldn’t have been bigger. Plano and Whiskey Cake feel like a world away from the Lakewood dive bar scene. Brightly lit and overflowing with exceedingly friendly waiters and waitresses, the restaurant offers a homey,Grey Pneumatic is a world supplier of impactsockets for the heavy duty, small-town feeling that you don’t often find in Dallas area eateries. And even though it’s packed to the gills with eager patrons rushing through their lunch breaks, there is hardly any wait at all for a table. The restaurant, the brainchild of restaurateur Randy DeWitt and design consulting group Plan B, is set up like an old warehouse, with hanging light fixtures and exposed brick throughout. And while the walls and hanging lights may look ancient, the polished, hardwood floor and beautiful oversized windows look brand new. But pretty ornamentation isn’t the only reason to visit. The main reason to visit Whiskey Cake – and it’s obvious because they’re on almost every table in the place – are the burgers.

The Basic burger ($11) may be just that, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s plain. Chef TJ Legnick’s creation is served on a small brown ceramic piece of tile covered with a bit of butcher paper and a small skewer holding the burger together, on top of which is a large pickle that manages to drip all over the top of the bun. While some may think this small inconvenience would dampen the meal, it really only adds to it. And don’t make the mistake of thinking basic means small, either,Broken chinamosaic Table. because it does not. Half of this burger is enough to please a normal man. Served on a slightly toasted/buttered challah bun, the brisket patty is grilled medium with little to no pink in the middle. Charred well, but not at all burned, the meat, topped with thick slices of Swiss and American cheese, was moist and meaty,Welcome to projectorlamp. benefiting from accompanying bacon, veggies, and mustard.

The Basic is stuffed with tomatoes, romaine lettuce, and strips of red onions, which all tasted like they had just been harvested that day. The bacon is crispy, and the crunch goes well with softness of the bun and patty. However, the mustard is the star of the burger. It blends well with the cheeses and meat and adds just the right amount of bite.

And then there is the OMG Burger ($12). The thing is a mess – a delicious mess – but still a mess. It comes to the table with a giant steak knife plunged through the middle to hold it all together. The second the knife is removed the whole thing collapses on itself and all that’s left is a pile of soggy challah bun, roasted crimini mushrooms, a giant onion ring and a brisket patty all smothered in Port Salut cheese. Honestly, it’s best to just attack this thing with a fork. To compare the OMG and the basic is pretty simple; it has the same bun, same patty,Get information on airpurifier from the unbiased, independent experts. same veggies and slightly fancier mustard (a grain mustard, but the taste is similar to the mustard on the basic. The main differences are the onion ring and the mushrooms. The onion ring could be a meal in itself. It’s massive. Stacked under the bun and on top of the patty, it’s impossible to get at all of the items in one bite. What really kicks the flavor in the pants is the mushrooms. Creamy and moist, the roasted crimini mushrooms make the whole burger. The combination of the Port Salut, brisket patty, and mushrooms is a pleasant surprise.,

It may be far away or too bright and fancy for the dive bar burger aficionado, but Whiskey Cake offers amazing burgers at reasonable prices. Yes, it’s a burger that sounds like it belongs in a preteen girl’s text message, but it’s well worth the drive.

Lost in the piles and files

I was frantically looking for a document the other day so I could finish my taxes. I began in the master bedroom, moved to the kitchen where papers are sometimes piled up, and then went on to the home office. After cleaning off two desks and the top of a filing cabinet, I began to clean out a box. I didn’t find the document but I did discover three unopened envelopes that contained offering checks to our church—dated July 2011. Oops.

I then moved to the church office down the highway and began the same process there. After taking a couple of hours to go through piles of stuff on my desk and a box of more stuff I kept in the shower (Yeah, I know), I opened a desk drawer. There I saw it. No, not the sought after document. Rather,Grey Pneumatic is a world supplier of impactsockets for the heavy duty, I saw a file folder marked “Urgent.Diagnosing and Preventing coldsores Fever in the body can often trigger the onset of a cold sore.” Behind it was a file folder marked “Important.Stone Source offers a variety of Natural stonemosaic Tiles.” The stuff in the “Urgent” file was dated 2005 and 2006. I guess it wasn’t that urgent after all. I couldn’t bear to look in the “Important” file. Who knows how long it had been in the drawer?

As embarrassing as this story is to tell, in the great scheme of life the misplaced and forgotten items were of little long-term significance. Everyone misplaces things, even important things. The tragedy is when we lose and misplace ourselves, intending—someday—to make things right.

As a pastor, I know scores of people who are “used-to-be’s.” That is, they are people who used to be committed,GOpromos offers a wide selection of promotional items and personalized gifts. faithful Christians. They used to be dependable church members. Perhaps they used to be Sunday School teachers, board members, youth workers, or children’s workers. I know people who used to be ministers, pastors, priests, and even bishops. Some of these people used to be tithers and generous givers. They used to be examples that inspired people. They used to pray. They used to read the Scriptures. They were people upon who the Church could depend. But no more.

Some are pale shadows of who they used to be while others are not who they used to be at all. Somewhere, somehow, they lost themselves in the boxes, and piles, and files of life. They have become, for all practical purposes, of no value. The checks that sat in my cardboard box in the basement office did no one any good. They had potential but not as long as they remained lost. There are those who were once useful, vibrant,The beddinges sofa bed slipcover is a good ， even powerful, but have sadly become “used-to-be’s.” You know who you are.

Easter is the highest, holiest day in the Church calendar. It is also the day that most commemorates and celebrates the return of hope to those who had become hopeless. It is a day of being “found.” It is a day where people who have lost themselves and have lost their way can return to God, to Church, and to usefulness.
Be found this Sunday. Hide from God and His purposes for your life no longer. Don’t stay lost in the piles of stuff that life heaps upon you. Go home to Church. If you don’t have one, find one. If you would like an invitation, come to my church—even if only for one Sunday. God will restore you and life will become good again—but you must want to be found. Your file really is marked “Urgent.” Don’t ignore it—please!

SCAMMERS TARGET SMALL BUSINESSES IN OCEAN CITY

Several merchants are speaking out after scammers have continuously attempted to victimize their businesses.

Skip Tolomeo, the owner of Sea Oats, a Children's clothing store on Asbury Avenue in Ocean City, said a Toronto based scammer has been exploiting his company for the past 2 years.

As part of the scam, Tolomeo's account information was stolen and people throughout the country, who were told they had won a secret shoppers sweepstakes, cashed bogus checks with Tolomeo's account information on them worth $4,500.

In order to complete the sweepstakes the victims were instructed to use $150 to buy merchandise at a retail store, fill out a form critiquing the store's service, and then mail the critique to a P.O. box number according to Tolomeo.

He said the "sweepstakes winners" were then asked to wire $1,500 to an account number. After the money was sent the victims would get their money but instead they found out the checks were bogus leaving them without their "prize winnings" and their $1,500.

"How they ever got a hold of that check and reproduced it, I just will never know and that's the scary part, you have to be very vigilant on all things you do," said Tolomeo.

Sea Oats received calls about the bogus checks from people in 48 states according to Tolomeo. The owner said he had to shut down the account to stop the scammer from trying to exploit his business.

Tolomeo estimates that if all the checks had been processed, his company would have lost nearly $300,000 in the last 2 years.

John Szabo, the owner of Positively 4th Street Café & Coffee Bar in Ocean City has also been targeted by scammers.

Szabo said the business receive 3 calls a week from a person placing a large order for chicken salad sandwiches.

"What happens is they dial a number and they get a deaf relay operator and the deaf relay operates as a middle person so I never hear the scammer," said Szabo.

The scammer orders around 200 sandwiches, pays with a stolen credit card and then asks to have the sandwiches delivered to a personal deliveryman.

"What they want us to do is run the charge, but in addition they want us to wire them money to pay for the delivery fee which is often $1000 to $2000," said Szabo.

Szabo said he caught on to the scam and will not follow through with the order unless enough identification is produced to prove it is not a scammer.
In wake of the local scam attempts the Ocean City police are asking all merchants to be very cautious of how they do business.

"If you are a merchant, and something doesn't feel right, you need to call us right away, you can't wait a day, you can't wait 2 days," said Captain Steven Ang with the Ocean City Police Department. "Get that reported to us immediately and we can get on top of it."

Majestic raises glass to big profits increase

Wine merchant Majestic posted strong half year results yesterday, although analysts warned that its sales could be affected by weakening consumer confidence.

Unveiling a 20 per cent rise in half-year profits for the second year in a row, Majestic said revenues rose by 8.7 per cent to 127.8m in the six months to September 26 – 2.7 per cent higher on a like-for-like basis.

But in the period since then, like-for-like sales were down 1.1 per cent after two weeks of disappointing sales amid the economic turbulence in mid-October.

Majestic, which has 176 UK stores, insisted it was still well placed for the Christmas season and pointed out that sales of still wine priced at 20 per bottle or more increased by a fifth during the half year.

The average spend per transaction at its stores also rose by 3 to 125, with the average bottle price of still wine now 7.13 from 6.67 last year.

Majestic has been one of the success stories of the high street in recent years, leading to yesterday’s half-year profits of 8.8m.

It opened new stores in Evesham, Weston-super-Mare, Fleet, Livingston, Hale, Dundee, Worthing and Bury St Edmunds in the half year.

It has also opened stores in Clitheroe, Ripon and Braintree since then.

Further shops are planned for Chesterfield and West Kirby on the Wirral.

The company said it believes it has the potential to expand to at least 330 UK locations. David Jeary, of Investec Securities, said the product and service proposition continued to resonate with customers.

He added: “As one of the few organic growth stories in the UK retail sector, Majestic should continue to remain in favour with investors.”

Analysts at Liberum Capital described the half year results as “solid” but key trading risks remained.

In a note issued yesterday, Liberum said: “Majestic is reliant on the November and December trading period – it accounts for around 30 per cent of revenues and 50 per cent of profits – which provides a risk if consumer sentiment weakens further.

“The company is testing the potential of TV and national press advertising for the first time starting today.

“The excellent long-term structural growth story remains intact but there will be a better entry point over the next six months. We reiterate our hold recommendation.”

The statement added: “Management remain bullish on the long-term potential of the rollout story.

“Majestic’s UK wine market share has increase from 3.7 per cent in August to 3.9 per cent today.

“However, we do not expect a repeat of the strong Christmas sales last year and management state that the economic environment continues to be challenging.”

Liberum Capital praised the company’s consistent earnings track record and said it remained positive on the “long-term structural growth story”.

Frequently Exchanging Stocks at OTCBB

Wall Street started flat as investors stay undecided regarding the direction of attempts to rescue Europe from its debt crisis. In this uncertain trading environment, some stocks are trading actively include MediSwipe Inc , Advanced Cell Technology, Inc. and Avstar Aviation Group . MWIP and ACTC are currently trading more than their average daily volume whereas AAVG is trading below it.

Let’s have a more thorough look on these penny stocks.

A merchant payment solutions and financial products firm for the medical health care industry and its fully owned subsidiary 800 Commerce Inc. a leading enabler and turnkey ecommerce solution source counting mobile payment solutions, recently declared new merchant services agreements for September surpassing eight million dollars in monthly gross processing volume. Its shares gained 120.93% to $0.0095 with the total traded volume of 41.17 million shares beating the average volume of 1.21 million.

The latest merchant processing agreements comprise wellness centers, e-commerce and high risk merchant accounts. Under the recently signed agreements, MediSwipe and 800 Commerce will offer merchant services, gift/ loyalty cards and personal digitized healthcare records to the fresh merchant network. The Company will also inform shareholders on the correct filing date of the 800 Commerce Spin-off and dividend share within the coming few days.

A leader in the field of regenerative medicine, declared today that the company’s chairman and CEO, Gary Rabin, will give presentation at two upcoming conferences: the Rodman & Renshaw 13th Annual Healthcare Conference in New York and Terrapinn’s Stem Cells USA & Regenerative Medicine Congress 2011 in Boston.

Mr. Rabin will give updates on the company’s two continuing human clinical trials using hESC-derived RPE cells to treat macular degeneration and further programs. Its shares slipped 2.82% to $0.172 with the total traded volume of 6.59 million shares beating the average volume of 3.70 million.

An Inside Look at Groupon from the Merchant's Perspective

Groupon is not the only Daily Deal site out there, in fact there are 500 worldwide, however Groupon is certainly the largest with 50 million subscribers and 22 million "deals" sold since November 2008, as of January 2011.

Before you decide this is the way to grow your business, McKeon shares some advice and information from someone who's been there, done that.

First of all, Groupon is very selective about merchants it works with. McKeon says that he's not sure if he'd even pass the vetting process now (but he got in early). Groupon looks at FaceBook, Yelp, and City Search to check out your business. They reject 85 percent of the merchants that apply. McKeon says that sometimes getting a response back after applying can be problematic. He suggests contacting a merchant who has run a deal recently in your area and asking for the contact information of the Groupon account manager they're working with. This can help you "get a foot in the door."

Even before you are approved, you need to make sure it is financially viable for your business. Groupon takes 50 percent of the total deal price. So if your product is usually $100 and you offer a Groupon deal for $50, you're actually only going to receive $25 for it. McKeon explains that you must be willing and able to sell your product for a 75 percent discount, or this is not for you.

You must also be able to provide the same product six months from now. You will likely get a rush of orders in the first week or two, but then they settle down to a steady flow. However, the customer has six months to redeem the coupon, so you must be able to provide the exact same product at that price six months from when you run the Groupon.

You must be set up to handle the influx of calls and emails on the day your Groupon runs, and the subsequent weeks as customers redeem their coupons. On the day it runs, someone needs to monitor the Groupon forum where potential customers post questions and comments. It's very important for your credibility to be able to handle the calls, emails, and forum quickly and efficiently or you may lose sales, and certainly will lose repeat buyers (which is the whole point of running a Groupon deal).

On a positive side, there is no cost up-front. McKeon recounts a time where he spent thousands of dollars on an airline magazine ad that generated one sale. The advantage of Groupon is you pay a portion of what you sell.

According to McKeon, approximately 20 percent of all Groupon deal purchasers never actually redeem their coupon. He adds that anyone who redeems their coupon are then your customers.

As an online retailer, he doesn't have concerns about people driving long distances to get the cheaper deal but never becoming a repeat customer. It doesn't matter where in the country his customers are (and in fact, McKeon runs Groupon deals in local markets all over the United States).

Since running his first Groupon, his customer base has gone from 8,000 to 60,000. He offers his printing services on other unusual materials (such as metal), so he finds he gets repeat customers purchasing different types of products other than the canvas deals he offers on Groupon.

Groupon's payment structure is interesting. They pay one third of the total sales one week after your Groupon deal runs. Then they pay another third one month later, and the final third comes two months later. This helps to even out the funds in relation to when the coupons are redeemed, but you may get more than a third of the orders within the first week, so you need to be prepared for that.

Groupon is certainly not for everyone, but for some types of businesses, even those online like McKeon's, it can increase business exponentially. You do really need to have a very detailed plan before taking on something like this. As McKeon shared, "Growing this fast just isn't natural!"

Gold & Silver Higher as Eurozone Downgrades

Gold and, particularly, silver are higher in European trading, especially in Japanese yen, which has come under pressure again today. The initial "repatriation funds" yen rally in the days after the natural and nuclear disaster has abated.

Gold is again close to record nominal highs in yen (119,000/oz) and other currencies. The outlook for the yen is not good due to massive fiscal and demographic challenges, zero percent interest rates and ongoing currency debasement – none of which will be helped by the nuclear disaster.

Risk appetite remains high with investors buying equities and shrugging off considerable geopolitical and sovereign debt risk. The downgrades of Portugal and Greece have led to new record high 10-year bond yields for both – at over 8.02% and 12.73% respectively.

Gold is supported at $1,410/oz and at $1,380/oz and €995/oz. A close above the record nominal high of $1,447.82/oz would likely see gold rise to psychological resistance of $1,500/oz in short order.


Gold in US Dollars - 17 February 2010 - 30 March 2011 (Tick)

Gold commenced 2011 at $1,420.78/oz and with two days of trading left in the first quarter, gold is marginally higher at $1,420/oz. It is therefore flat for the quarter after another quarter of correction and consolidation.

A lower quarterly close would be the first lower quarterly close in nine quarters. This may be beneficial to some of those short the gold market who may be attempting to "paint the tape" and engineer a lower quarterly close – in the forlorn hope that this could lead to momentum selling by trend, following hedge funds and traders.

A lower quarterly close may be achieved but the fundamentals of anemic supply and continuing strong demand both from the investment sector, but also from the jewelry and industrial sectors (dental and electronics primarily) internationally, and particularly in China and Asia in general will likely see gold continue to rise in 2011.

Gold in US Dollar - 1 January 2010 - 30 March 2011 (Daily)

Interestingly, March 2010 and the first quarter last year (see chart above), also saw gold flatline prior to strong gains in April and the second quarter of 2010 (Q2 10). Gold rose by nearly 6% last April and by nearly 12% in the quarter.

The unresolved eurozone debt crisis and the emergence of the Japanese natural and nuclear disasters and geopolitical risk in oil producing nations means that the fundamentals today are as sound as they were in 2010 – if not more sound.

Bearish predictions that higher gold prices would lead to sharp falls in industrial and jewelry demand are being proven wrong as seen in the figures released by the CPM group this morning (see news).

Ship Rejected in China Port on ‘Abnormal’ Radiation Heading Back to Japan

A ship that had “abnormal” amounts of radiation after passing 67 nautical miles (124 kilometers) off Japan’s Fukushima prefecture, site of a crippled nuclear-power station, was heading back to the country after being rejected by authorities in China.

The MOL Presence is due to arrive in Kobe on March 30 from Xiamen, according to AISLive Ltd. ship-tracking data on Bloomberg. A Xiamen port official, who declined to give their name in a telephone call today, confirmed that the vessel had left and declined to elaborate.

An inspection detected “abnormal” amounts of radiation on the deck and the surface of containers on the Mitsui O.S.K. Lines Ltd. vessel after it arrived in Xiamen on March 21, according to a March 25 notice on the website of the Xiamen Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau. There were normal levels in crew areas, it said.

Kazumi Nakamura, a spokeswoman for Tokyo-based Mitsui O.S.K., said today she couldn’t comment as she was traveling. Calls to the City of Kobe’s port general affairs office and to the Port of Kobe’s general affairs office went unanswered.
Radiation Concerns

Concerns about radiation leaking from the Dai-Ichi power station have disrupted shipping from Japan with Hamburg-based Hapag-Lloyd AG halting Tokyo calls, the Japan Coast Guard advising ships to keep at least 30 kilometers from the plant and overseas ports scanning cargos. Tokyo port has tried to ease fears through steps including posting information about radiation levels online.

“Radiation is not at a level where we should be concerned,” Junko Tashiro, a port spokeswoman, said today by phone. The nuclear-power plant, damaged following a magnitude-9 earthquake on March 11, is about 220 kilometers north of Tokyo.

Companies including Sony Corp. and Toyota Motor Corp. have curtailed production since the quake and a subsequent tsunami because of damaged factories or parts shortages. The nuclear- power plant crisis has also caused electricity shortages.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection scanned 355 boxes at the Port of Los Angeles onboard the first container ship to arrive in the country from Japan following the quake, according to operator APL Ltd., a unit of Neptune Orient Lines Ltd. All boxes on the vessel, the APL Korea, were cleared for delivery.
Container Volumes

Japan accounts for about 3 percent of global container volumes, compared with about 30 percent for China, according to Barclays Plc. It is the third-largest container shipper to the U.S. behind China and South Korea, with auto parts being the largest component of cargos, according to Piers, a shipping data unit of United Business Media Ltd.

The MOL Presence used a berth in Xiamen before leaving and anchoring offshore on March 23, according to the port bureau. There was contamination at the berth, the bureau said. China is Japan biggest export and import market, according to the Japan External Trade Organization.

Hapag-Lloyd has omitted port stops in Nagoya, Tokyo and Yokohama because of “the current situation,” it said in a statement on its website dated March 22. A March 25 update showed that it was continuing to avoid these ports. A Hapag- Lloyd spokesman couldn’t immediately be reached to comment.

Other lines are continuing business in Japan as usual. Seoul-base Hyundai Merchant Marine Co. is operating its usual services, Lee Jun Ki, a spokesman, said by phone today. STX Pan Ocean Co., South Korea’s biggest bulk carrier, is also operating its vessels normally at Japanese ports, said Lim Wang Joo, a spokesman.

APL is continuing its regular calls to Kobe and Yokohama, Mike Zampa, a spokesman said today by phone. The shipping line has directed vessels to stay 200 nautical kilometers from the Fukushima area, he said.

The company has also stopped taking bookings for cargos to be hauled by land or barge into “high risk merchant account” areas near the nuclear plant, he said.

--Henry Sanderson. With assistance from Seonjin Cha in Seoul, Anand Menon and Patricia Lui in Singapore, Chris Cooper in Tokyo, Makiko Kitamura and Takehiko Kumakura in Osaka and Alaric Nightingale in London, as well as Holger Elfes in Dusseldorf. Editors: Neil Denslow, Hellmuth Tromm.

Merchant e-Solutions Selected to Provide Robust, Secure Payment Transactions Solutions to TheStreet

Merchant e-Solutions (MeS) announced today that TheStreet, a leading digital financial media

company, has selected MeS as its new payment platform.  As one of the fastest growing

processors in the e-commerce space MeS is uniquely positioned because of its complete in-

house e-commerce technology, inclusive of a payment gateway, authorizations, clearing and

settlement processing as well as tokenization.  MeS' payment technology will help assure

quick, secure payment processing for TheStreet's subscribers.

TheStreet has implemented MeS' cutting edge services including recurring billing

functionality, tokenization of card data and Visa and MasterCard's Account Updater service. 

In addition, TheStreet can employ pre-paid and gift card identification during authorization,

enabling informed decisions on whether to use a card for a future recurring payment.  All of

these features combine to reduce the burden of PCI compliance and maintain the latest card

holder data, helping to maximize profitability of TheStreet's recurring revenue stream.

"When measured by the value of our responsive service, robust technology platform and real-

time web-based reporting platform, we were able to come out ahead of our competitors," said

Kevin Gallagher, General Manager of e-Commerce for Merchant e-Solutions.

TheStreet is a leader in subscription-based premium services that provide investors with

insightful commentary, actionable trading ideas and market screeners across a broad spectrum

of asset classes.  In addition, it delivers a deep offering of financial and business

editorial content and videos on ad-supported properties.

Daniel Flax, TheStreet's Chief Information Officer, said, "We place a great deal of emphasis

on providing our subscribers with seamless, high quality financial information through the

safest, most efficient and reliable digital mediums available.  We evaluated a number of

options and after careful consideration and a high degree of scrutiny we are confident that

Merchant e-Solutions is the best provider of payment processing solutions available."

About Merchant e-Solutions (MeS)

Merchant e-Solutions, founded in 1999, provides Internet-based payment processing solutions

for merchants and banks.  Merchant e-Solutions currently processes more than $14 billion

dollars in payments for more than 65,000 merchants, supporting 150 global currencies and all

major credit, debit and alternative payment solutions.  The company specializes in services

for e-commerce and card-not-present merchants and provides a comprehensive suite of payment

solutions that are PCI compliant and designed to reduce merchant risk exposure.  Merchant e-

Solutions is headquartered in Redwood City, CA, with operations in Spokane, WA, and satellite

offices in Minneapolis, MN, and Columbus, GA.

I enjoy the fact that every day is different

Jolynn Dobson Cook, RN, COE (Laurel Eye Clinic and Laurel Laser & Surgery Centers in Brookville, Pa.). Ms. Cook is the administrator of the Laurel Eye Clinic and the Laurel Laser & Surgery Centers, a position she has held for 13 years. As administrator, she oversaw the development and construction for both ophthalmic ASCs owned by the practice. A certified ophthalmic executive, Ms. Cook is a registered nurse and also holds a degree in healthcare administration. She is an annual presenter at the national ASOA Congress and the Hawaiian Eye meetings. In 2010, she completed her second term as the president of the National Board of Certified Ophthalmic Executives. In addition, she has authored articles for Administrative Eyecare and BSM Connection, a publication associated with business management and training company BSM Consulting. Ms. Cook is a member of the BSM Advisory Board, which provides guidance into BSM Consulting's distant learning and practice management content and development, and has authored two ophthalmic educational courses.

Lynda Dowman Simon (St. John's Clinic: Head & Neck Surgery in Springfield, Mo.). Ms. Simon is the administrator at St. John's Clinic: Head & Neck Surgery. Ms. Simon has been at her center since 1994. Prior to coming to St. John's, she worked for 13 years at a local hospital in the open heart center and urology. According to Ms. Dowman Simon, St. John's is the only ASC in Missouri dedicated solely to ENT procedures, and the center's patient satisfaction rating currently sits at 98.17 percent. "Coworkers [who are] hired, stay," she says. "I have not hired a new person in over 3.5 years." The center, which is part of Mercy Health systems, performed its 30,000th case on July 5, 2010.

Vicki Edelman, RN, CASC (Blue Bell Surgery Center in Blue Bell, Pa.). Ms. Edelman is the administrator of Blue Bell Surgery Center, a four-room, multi-specialty ASC that opened in Sept. 2008. Surgeons specialize in orthopedics, ENT, pain management, plastic surgery, general surgery, ophthalmology and gastroenterology. Blue Bell sees around 225 patients monthly and is managed by Ambulatory Surgical Centers of America. Ms. Edelman has been with Blue Bell since May 2008, during the center's construction phase. Ms. Edelman credits her center's success to the energy, resourcefulness and dedication of her team. "My job would not be possible without their tireless efforts to maintain our high standards, and their support in providing quality patient care to the community we serve," she says. She has been a nurse for 32 years and began her career in medical surgical nursing and high-risk obstetrics. Her first management role was as assistant nurse manager at Philadelphia's Albert Einstein Medical Center's short procedure unit and admission discharge unit.

Carolyn Evec, RN, CNOR (The Surgery Center at Beaufort in South Carolina). Ms. Evec opened a surgery center in Mississippi and served as its nurse manager prior to joining The Surgery Center at Beaufort. She has 30 years of nursing experience and has held various management positions including director of surgery, director of medical and surgical services, vice president of patient services and director of rural health clinics. Ms. Evec has helped improve efficiency at her center in many ways. "With the help of the staff, we developed an ordering system for supplies that now involves all of the staff and eliminated a part-time staff position," she says. "We now order supplies two days a week, and it takes only about an hour to complete the process." Ms. Evec says, "I love the privilege and challenge of being involved in all aspects of the operations of the center. Coming from a clinical background, I have really enjoyed learning and being responsible for the business side of operations as well. I enjoy the fact that every day is different and that I have the ability and support of the medical staff to affect change when needed."

Andrea Fann (Orthopaedic South Surgical Center). Ms. Fann serves as the administrator of Orthopaedic South Surgical Center, a United Surgical Partners International facility. She has served in the position — her first administrator role — since 2005, before which she worked as business office manager for Buckhead Ambulatory Surgery Center and as director of front office operations for Atlanta Outpatient Surgery Center (both HCA facilities). She prides herself on providing an honest, warm and caring atmosphere for everyone who enters her center: employees, physicians, visitors and patients. "When we take care of our employees and provide strong leadership, they are more productive, and their happiness is seen by our patients and physicians," she says. Ms. Fann doesn't take her role for granted. She firmly believes that a manager does not automatically become a leader and that installing the right team is essential for ASC success. In 2010, Orthopaedic South Surgical Center was recognized as a Clayton County Chamber of Commerce Small Business of the Year Finalist.

Helping Consumers with Data from Twenty Million Credit Cards

This allows them to build consumer tools in the same vein as Mint, but with a deep foundation of information to compare to right from the first user. Last week I sat down with CEO Jaidev Shergill, CTO Phil Kim and data scientist Alex Hasha to learn more about what they're doing with such a powerful data set.

The first question they wanted to address was the obvious one of how do they ensure privacy and security when dealing with such sensitive information? Everything is held in a secure data center, and no direct personally identifiable information is included in the histories - everything's anonymized. The team also takes further steps, like identifying and removing healthcare-related payments. I asked them though, doesn't it still make people a bit uncomfortable? Their response was that their whole business was based around helping consumers, and their investor Citi only shares the data on very strict conditions because they believe Bundle's work will make customers lives better.

CTO Phil Kim laid out their philosophy:

    Bundle takes great pains to protect the privacy of users. First, we hold ourselves to strict, bank-level information security standards, which means that sensitive data is held in a secure data center and access is heavily restricted, and that the Bundle application is heavily scrutinized for vulnerabilities on a regular basis, to prevent accidental or malicious leakage of user data. Second, much of the data analysis and synthesis work we do relies on data that has been sampled, modeled, flattened, or otherwise transformed -- we rarely work with raw transaction data, and we never work with data that has a direct linkage back to a named customer. Last but not least, Bundle is very much focused on building tools to help consumers -- remember that this data is not new... large companies use data just like this to market products and make business decisions -- Bundle is simply trying to share this data with consumers.

Alex Hasha described how he'd worked in the finance industry as a quant, working in a team of over two hundred PhDs to analyze financial instruments. The attraction of Bundle.com for him was the chance to work on something that offered direct benefits to ordinary users, a refreshing change from the abstract world of high finance.

Users upload information from their own bank and credit card accounts onto the site, and in return they get back a score card showing how their spending compares to people like themselves. For example, you might discover that you're spending a lot more on groceries than other people in your neighborhood, and you'd be better off switching to a cheaper supermarket.

The key to all of their work is the value that they're able to extract from aggregate information, things like how much people in a particular zip code spend on particular categories such as eating out, groceries and transportation. Because this is the result of blending and averaging large numbers of different accounts, it helps reduce the risk that any sensitive information will leak out.

What's really impressive about the data they possess is its broad coverage. Almost every merchant in the U.S. will be represented, and it has the potential to offer the deep customer analytics that website publishers are used to. I could imagine it being used by restaurant owners to spot when they're losing previously loyal customers for example. Bundle.com won't speculate on where they will take their product in the future, but did want to emphasize how everything was driven by their mission to help consumers.

I spent a bit of time talking with them about the technical challenges of their work, too. Credit card systems are often 30 or 40 years old, and so the data they get back is often very messy. You know how you look at your statements and try to decipher what "MCDON 94117" could be? That's one of their biggest obstacles, the names of the merchants are often incomplete and unclear, so they have a whole system devoted to making sense of this unstructured data. "MCDON", "MCD" and "MCDONALDS" all likely to refer to the restaurant, which allows them to categorize any transactions as food purchases.

A large amount of their code is written in Perl, since they're big fans of CPAN's rich repository of libraries, and runs in-memory, so it's not a classic big data problem. They also rely on R for some of their analysis, thanks to its rich toolkit of statistical functions.

The data mining of billions of credit card transactions is bound to raise a lot of questions, but it was clear to me that Bundle.com is serious in its mission to help consumers. Its product certainly seems to offer a lot more value to the wider world than anything that Wall Street's quants have produced.

2011 National Signing Day Rutgers Recruiting Roundup

Happy belated Valentine's Day to my Scarlet kinfolk, and welcome to my 4th Annual 4-

Week Late National Signing Day Mostly Ignorant and Largely Misinformed Recruiting

Roundup!

RECRUITING!!!  It's not just for players anymore!
It was 4 days after Christmas in 2004 when Syracuse University athletic director Daryl

Gross decided to fire then head coach Paul Pasqualoni, leaving the team and their

incoming recruits in the lurch.  Glenroy Lee and Courtney Greene, a pair of New

Rochelle, NY teammates who were pretty set on Syracuse, sought guidance from their

teammate, a 3-star defensive back who had verbally committed to the Orange the previous

summer.  Whatever which way he went, they said, so too would they go.  Well, their good

friend, one Raymell Rice, didn't like the uncertainty of the head coaching situation in

the frozen tundra of upstate New York and switched his allegiance to Greg Schiano and

Rutgers University.  Glenroy Lee followed suit, as did a reluctant Courtney Greene. 


Needless to say, Courtney Greene started from Day 1 and enjoyed one of the best careers

we've seen on the Banks before heading off to the NFL.  Ray Ray . . . well, all he did

was change the face of Rutgers football forever.  Glenroy Lee?  Best known for being on

the receiving end of a Mike Teel punch/slap at the end of a loss to Navy, but still . .

. the point is that sometimes, you can't make your own luck, but you sure as sugar can

jump all over the mistakes of others.  So when Pitt fired Coach Wannstedt (good friend

of Schiano, by the way) this past winter, Rutgers wasted no time going out and

snatching up their offensive coordinator, their defensive backs coach, and more

recently, their tight ends coach.  Now, I can see how some people might not be all

worked up about hiring coaches that were basically fired for not meeting expectations,

but a couple of things should be noted.  First and foremost, Jeff Hafley (defensive

backs coach) is recruiting dynamite, particularly in New Jersey.  He is directly

credited with stealing 4-star DT Marquise Wright, 3-star DE Max Isaaka, and at least

partially 3-star QB Gary Nova out of New Jersey, and he was just as responsible for

dragging them all back home after each pretty much wanted nothing to do with their

state university.  Given a full year, I think he and WR Coach PJ Fleck will be like Pop

Rocks and Coke on the 2012 recruiting trail.  Second, Frank Cignetti (offensive

coordinator) runs a classic pro-style offense, exactly the kind of offense we want to

see, and I don't think I've ever seen Pitt run the "Wild Panther", let alone every 3rd

play.  Honestly, how could you DEprove our offense from last year anyway?  ("Deprove"

is the antonym of "improve", FYI.  Look it up.).  You can't.  So he's an immediate

upgrade by default.  A very good recruiter in his own right, he also gets most of the

credit for turning Nova to the Scarlet side.  Recruiting is the lifeblood of any

program, and these guys are like blood thinners.  I'm excited.