The Magic Shop

Featuring more than 60 of Washington's greatest mountain bike rides, this one-of-a-kind guide takes you from the lush rainforests of the Olympic Peninsula to the rugged, glacier-capped mountains of the northern Cascades; from the moonscaped ridges of Mount St. Helens east over tulip fields and seas of wheat to the Selkirk and Blue Mountains. Mountain Bike America: Washington is a unique look into our northwesternmost state, capturing its history, culture and incomparable beauty. This guide contains comprehensive trail descriptions, from beginner to advanced, GPS-quality, digitally designed relief maps detailing each ride and accurate route profiles showing the ups and downs of each ride. Detailed directions get you to the ride without getting you lost. There are mile-by-mile directional cues, difficulty ratings, elevation gain, trail contacts, local information and much more.

Completed in 1747, Mark Catesby's Natural History of Carolina, Florida, and the Bahama Islands was the first major illustrated publication on the flora and fauna of Britain's American colonies. Together with his Hortus Britanno-Americanus (1763), which detailed plant species that might be transplanted successfully to British soil, Catesby's Natural History exerted an important, though often overlooked, influence on the development of art, natural history, and scientific observation in the eighteenth century.Inspired by a major traveling exhibition of Catesby's watercolor drawings from the Royal Library, Windsor Castle, this collection of interdisciplinary essays considers Catesby's endeavors as a naturalist-artist, scientific explorer, experimental horticulturist, ornamental gardener, and early environmental thinker in terms of the interests held by the various, overlapping communities in which he functioned—particularly as those interests related to the British colonial enterprise.The contributors are David R. Brigham, Joyce E. Chaplin, Mark Laird, Amy R. W. Meyers, Therese O'Malley, and Margaret Beck Pritchard.The contributors:David R. Brigham (Worcester Art Museum)Joyce E. Chaplin (Vanderbilt University)Mark Laird (University of Toronto)Amy R. W. Meyers (Huntington Library & Art Collections)Therese O'Malley (National Gallery of Art)Margaret Beck Pritchard (Colonial Williamsburg Foundation)

Samuel will be a big brother soon, and on Monday during show-and-tell he announces that he is having a baby.  Before long, his kidergarten classmates join in the fun and by Friday, each of them is "expecting" to add a new member to the classroom family--from triplets to a beagle to a stegosaurus and even a dump truck!But Samuel's excitment dampens as he worries about sharing his toys with the new baby, stinky diapers, and too much crying.  Maybe having a baby isn't all fun and games after all.Can Samuel's eager friends and a caring teacher help him to be ready for the big day?

GEN X CHEFS MAKING THEIR MARK - ARTICLE SUMMARYOn the culinary side of life, the US is enjoying a steady increase in the number of talented gen-Xers in the kitchen. Why such a surge in GenX talent in the US? In understanding what spawned this trend, we can begin to see where it is going and how you can turn this trend into a personal and professional advantage.ABOUT TREND WATCH LIST EXTENDEDTrend Watch List Extended - Get the Trend POV! Trend Watch List Extended gives you critical insight into emerging trends that affect your organization's strategic future. Make better strategic decisions with full understanding of how these trends affect each other, your industry and your organization. INSIGHT AND INNOVATIONThese full length, well researched articles by Dr. Amy Vanderbilt on emerging trends in business, education, the world stage, travel and food provide insight into ways you can turn these trends into a personal and professional advantage. Each article contains data and statistics you can use along with unique insight on exactly how to use each trend in innovative ways for a competitive edge.ABOUT THE AUTHORDr. Amy Vanderbilt is an author, speaker and commentator from the Washington DC area. For over a decade, Dr. V has used local, national and global trends to give her academic, government and industry clients a personal and professional advantage. Now she is bringing that advantage to audiences world over via her innovative book series, speaking and media commentary. She reveals critical trends in education, business, management and the world stage; and gives readers the tools to harness those trends for their families, themselves and their careers.

On June 1, 2001, the heir to the Nepalese throne, Crown Prince Dipendra, donned military fatigues, armed himself with automatic weapons, walked in on a quiet family gathering, and, without a word, mowed his family down before turning a gun on himself. But Dipendra did not die immediately, and while lying in a coma was declared king. He was now a living god. Award-winning journalists Amy Willesee and Mark Whittaker set out to understand what could have led to such a devastating tragedy, one that fascinated and appalled the world. Exploring Kathmandu and other parts of the kingdom, they conducted exhaustive interviews with everyone from Maoist guerillas to members and friends of the royal family, gaining insight into the people involved in and the events behind the massacre. At the heart of the story is the love affair between Dipendra and the beautiful aristocrat Devyani Rana, whom he was forbidden to marry. Culminating their portrait of Nepal is a chilling reconstruction of the events of that fatal day.As conspiracy theories circulate and rebels threaten to topple the monarchy, the future of this small Himalayan kingdom, promises to be as tumultuous as its past. Revealing a country where the twenty-first century mingles uneasily with the fourteenth, Love and Death in Kathmandu is both an enlightening portrait of a place that is a world apart and a riveting investigation of an incredible crime.