National Clean Diesel Program: grants and funding
http://www.epa.gov/otaq/diesel/grantfund.htm

Norfolk Island—located in the heart of the South Pacific between Australia and New Zealand and spanning just 34 sq km (13 square miles)
 Captain James Cook discovered Norfolk Island in 1774.
 The Island was a British penal colony from 1788 to 1855. In 1856, the prisoners were removed.
 In 1856, Norfolk Island was resettled by Pitcairn Islanders, descendants of the HMS Bounty mutineers—and their Tahitian companions.
 More than 1/3 of the island is subtropical rainforest preserved within National Parks and reserves.
 Norfolk Island is home to the earth’s largest tree ferns.
 June 8, Bounty Day commemorates the most infamous naval mutiny in modern history—the HMS Bounty—and the arrival of the Pitcairn Islanders in 1856.
 35% of the Island’s current inhabitants are direct descendents from the Bounty mutineers.
 English is the primary language spoken on Norfolk Island, but locals still speak Norfolk—a delightful mix of 18th Century English and Polynesian.
http://www.norfolkislandspecialists.com.au/

A bee, as used in quilting bee or spelling bee, is an old word to describe a gathering of friends and neighbors to accomplish a task or to hold a competition. The tasks were often major jobs, such as clearing a field of timber or raising a barn, that would be difficult to carry out alone. It was often both a social and utilitarian event. Jobs like corn husking or sewing, could be done as a group to allow socialization during an otherwise tedious chore. This use of the word bee is common in literature describing colonial North America. The earliest known printed example of the term was the use of spinning bee in 1769, but most printed occurrences of the word didn’t occur until the 19th century. Some types of bees (with the date that they first appeared in print) include:
spinning bee (1769)
husking bee (or cornhusking) (1816)
apple bee (1827)
logging bee (1836)
spelling bee (1825) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bee_(gathering)

It's always risky to mix sports metaphors, but it's hard to resist the notion that the basketball-themed "More Than a Game" is a knockout of a sports documentary. Destined against its will to be known as "the LeBron James movie," it is all that, and a good deal more. James, of course, is one of the NBA's most impressive players, someone so gifted that he was drafted in 2003 by the Cleveland Cavaliers right out of high school. Given that this film is coming out around the same time as his autobiography, "Shooting Stars," it may sound like part of a calculated media blitz, but the film's origins are considerably more complex. "More Than a Game" has been in the works for quite some time, before most people outside of his home state of Ohio knew about James. Director Kristopher Belman, also from Ohio, was a 21-year-old graduate student at Loyola Marymount University when he heard about James and his teammates at Akron's St. Vincent-St. Mary High School and gradually wangled his way into being able to film the team at home and on the road during its junior and senior years. http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-game2-2009oct02,0,1938605.story

The movie stars LeBron James, Dru Joyce, Romeo Travis, Sian Cotton and Willie McGee as the “fab five” who grew up friends and teammates in Akron, Ohio. I recommend this heart-warming film.

Banana trivia A cluster of bananas is known as a hand and the 10 or 20 bananas found in the hand are called fingers. A banana plant is the largest plant that does not have a wood stem. They are considered a giant herb in the family along with orchids, palms, and lilies. Bananas replenish necessary nutrients burned during physical exercise such as glycogen, body fluids, and carbohydrates. They are also a great source for dietary fiber, Vitamin C, and potassium. Bananas have not cholesterol, fat, or sodium. Over 28 pounds of bananas are eaten by the average American every year.
http://thelongestlistofthelongeststuffatthelongestdomainnameatlonglast.com/trivia78.html
Bananas are the most popular fruit in the world. Members of the genus Musa (part of the family Musaceae), they are considered to be derived from the wild species Musa acuminata (AA) and Musa balbisiana (BB). It is believed that there are almost 1000 varieties of bananas in the world, subdivided in 50 groups. The most commonly known banana is the Cavendish variety, which is the one produced for export markets. The origin of bananas is placed in Southeast Asia, in the jungles of Malaysia, Indonesia or Philippines, where so many varieties of wild bananas still grow at present. Bananas have later travelled with human population. The first Europeans to know about bananas were the armies of Alexander the Great, while they were campaigning in India in 327 BC. In the Middle Ages, the banana was thought to be the forbidden fruit of paradise by both Moslems and Christians. The Arabs brought them to Africa. Africans are credited to have given the present name, since the word banana would be derived from the Arab finger. The Portuguese brought them to the Canary Islands. Bananas changed during all these trips, gradually losing its seeds, filling out with flesh and diversifying. When Spaniards and Portuguese explorers went to the New World, the banana travelled with them. In 1516, when Friar Tomas de Berlanga sailed to Santo Domingo, he brought banana roots with him. From there, bananas spread to the Caribbean and Latin American countries. http://www.unctad.org/infocomm/anglais/banana/characteristics.htm