We are back again, and in full force. This week we bring to you yet another amazing selection of free and paid applications that we are enjoying. Let's hit the break and check them out without any further delay!
 |  |
greenhouse emporium executive mba in isb hyderabad peach tree funding
conservatories dublin hiawatha evergreens enchanted peach tree
boston seo firm palm tree trimming phoenix brents tree service
the lounge clematis tree pruning austin greenhouse health club
best indoor plants for health building subsidence business schools in hyd
gretna insurance cottage gardens damariscotta maine tree trimming atlanta
isb hyderabad executive mba e&o trading company menu executive mba from isb hyderabad
westenberger tree service atlanta tree trimming bonifant tree service
tree services atlanta arizona tree trimming plano tree service
river birch fruit 1st financial credit card a host of daffodils
tree service in atlanta ga atlanta tree service zimmer versys
the lounge clematis tree pruning austin greenhouse health club
Originally posted at The Car Tech blog
e&o trading co e & o trading co executive mba at isb hyderabad
conservatories dublin hiawatha evergreens enchanted peach tree
From Ned's beheading to Tyrion's tumultuous journey, we recount the key moments to remember heading into Sunday's premiere.
By Josh Wigler
Lena Headey in "Game of Thrones"
Photo: HBO
Swords, kings, dragons and things (and by things, we mean an absurd amount of sex and violence): Where else but "Game of Thrones" can you get all that and then some?
Those who've been thirsting for blood and fire are about to get plenty of both when "Thrones" returns for its second season this Sunday, but considering how much time has passed since poor Ned lost his head, you'd be forgiven for not remembering much of what happened all the way back in season one. Well, never fear, true believers; that's what we're here for!
Keep on reading for everything you need to remember about "Game of Thrones" season one before returning to Westeros later this week.
"Winter Is Coming"
The words of House Stark echo all throughout "Game of Thrones" season one, beginning with King Robert Baratheon's royal visit to old friend and war buddy Eddard Stark all the way north in Winterfell. Robert all but commands Ned to take on the role of Hand of the King — the ruler of Westeros' right-hand man — and Lord Stark begrudgingly accepts. His reason: to investigate the death of the pervious Hand, Jon Arryn, an old mentor of Ned and Robert's, who he believes was murdered by Queen Cersei and members of her wicked family, the Lannisters.
Kids These Days
Ned's investigation does not go smoothly. After arriving in King's Landing to serve as Robert's Hand, Ned learns that Robert fathered many bastard children and that his own supposedly trueborn heirs — Joffrey, Myrcella and Tommen — were not his trueborn children at all, but bastards of Queen Cersei's incestuous relationship with her twin brother, Jaime. Robert dies from a freak injury before Ned can tell him the truth, and Ned takes it upon himself to see that the late Baratheon's younger brother, Stannis, is the next man to sit upon the Iron Throne, as is his right.
Hopeless, Headless Ned
Once again, Ned's plan does not go well. When Lord Stark attempts to persuade the court to recognize Stannis' claim to the throne, newly minted King Joffrey and Queen Regent Cersei have him arrested for treason. A deal is later brokered where Ned will confess to his treachery and recognize Joffrey's claim, in exchange for the safety of himself and his children. But after he publicly confesses to his "crimes," Joffrey pulls a fast one on everyone — characters and audience included — by ordering Ned's beheading. With one stunning stroke, the main character of "Game of Thrones" was dead, before the season finale, no less.
Stark Reality
While they still have their lives, the Stark children aren't faring much better than poor Ned. The youngest son, Bran Stark, is pushed out of a window and subsequently paralyzed after catching twins Cersei and Jaime doing the nasty. Ned's two daughters, Arya and Sansa, are left in very different and very awful positions following his death too. Arya is posing as a boy, traveling north with a group of young men to join the Night's Watch; she's to be dropped off at her home in Winterfell before reaching the Wall. Sansa, meanwhile, is still in King's Landing and still betrothed to the wicked boy king Joffrey, who abuses her physically and emotionally with brutal regularity.
The King in the North
Lord Eddard Stark's eldest son, Robb, on the other hand, is in a position to actually do something about his father's death. Robb has called upon House Stark's bannermen in the northern part of Westeros to wage war on Joffrey and the Lannisters. His goals are threefold: the safe return of his sisters, the official succession of the North from the Seven Kingdoms' purview, and vengeance for Ned. Robb becomes known as the King in the North, an ancient title not held by anyone since Torrhen Stark bent the knee to Aegon the Conqueror nearly 300 years earlier.
Here a King, There a King ...
Robb Stark is not the only man in Westeros calling himself king. There's Joffrey Baratheon, of course, who sits on the Iron Throne. Three other men have their eyes on the crown as well: Balon Greyjoy of the Iron Islands and the two remaining Baratheon brothers, Stannis and Renly. Though Renly is a charismatic and well-liked figure in Westeros, he is also the youngest Baratheon, making his claim weaker than the less-beloved Stannis. It won't matter which Baratheon has the better claim, of course, if one of the other three kings vying for power has their say.
... And There a Queen
There's another player in the game of thrones, and that's exiled princess Daenerys, the last surviving member of House Targaryen, the clan who ruled over Westeros for nearly three full centuries. Dany spends the entirety of season one across the Narrow Sea among the Dothraki, a barbaric people who pride themselves on war and horses. Bad things happen to all "Thrones" characters, but Dany has a particularly rough go of it in season one: Her husband, Khal Drogo, and their unborn son both die, as does her brother, Viserys. (Indeed, that guy is super dead.) On the other side of all that tragedy, Dany is now the proud owner of three brand-spanking-new dragons, the first of their kind in hundreds of years. That's a plus!
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Elsewhere, in another remote area of this fantasy world, Ned Stark's bastard Jon Snow serves as a man of the aforementioned Night's Watch, an ancient order of warriors who patrol the great ice Wall to protect the people of Westeros from the dangers lurking further north. Shortly after becoming a sworn brother of the Watch, Jon saves Lord Commander Mormont from dying at the hands of a reanimated corpse (zombies, ftw!), the latest and most dangerous evidence yet that the Others — a long-forgotten force of evil with unspeakably cold crystal swords and voices that sound like crackling ice — still exist beyond the wall. To investigate further, Mormont takes Jon and other members of the Watch beyond the Wall, where they'll continue to explore throughout season two.
Paying Their Debts
Clearly, season one was crazy busy for Ned Stark and his family, but how about House Lannister? Though Cersei's son sits on the Iron Throne as she had always hoped, the queen suffers a severe blow in the capture of her brother and lover, Jaime, at the hands of Robb Stark. Jaime remains in the northerner's captivity. Meanwhile, the third Lannister sibling — the imp Tyrion Lannister — went through hell and back again as well: He starts in Winterfell as part of Robert's royal party, ends up on the Wall for a time, is captured by Ned Stark's wife Catelyn for his suspected role in Bran Stark's paralysis, is brought to the miles-high Eyrie to pay for his crimes, is eventually liberated from his fate with the help of his own cunning wit and the talented sellsword Bronn and ultimately relegated to the frontlines of lord Tywin Lannister's war against the Starks. As King Joffrey's Hand, Tywin can't exactly win a war and worry about the goings-on of Westeros at the same time. Accordingly, he temporarily passes off his duties as Hand to Tyrion, who is about to prove that a very small man can cast a very big shadow.
A Dink and a Nod
Speaking of very big shadows, you heard about Peter Dinklage's Best Supporting Actor wins at the Emmys and the Golden Globes this past year, right? Well, given what happens to his character in "A Clash of Kings" (the novel that the second season of "Thrones" is based on), Dinklage has only scratched the surface of Tyrion's enormously satisfying arc. If he's as smart as his character, the gifted actor has left some room on the shelf for a few more trophies come the end of the new season.
Are you all caught up for "Thrones" season two? Let us know in the comments section below, or chat with me more on Twitter @roundhoward!
Related Photosfunction of xylem in plants houston tree trimming null ellipsometer
grass roof company xylem tissue in plants transports minerals and reliable acacia
dallas tree service building storage networks arizona tree service
sharrock family tree northern woods tree service alvarado tree service
tree service phoenix westenberger tree service atlanta tree trimming
palm tree trimming phoenix brents tree service isb hyderabad address
dallas tree service building storage networks arizona tree service
business schools hyderabad executive mba in isb business schools in hyderabad
Posted by Dr. Pete
Since the Panda update, more and more people are trying to control their Google index and prune out low-quality pages. I’m a firm believer in aggressively managing your own index, but it’s not always easy, and I’m seeing a couple of common mistakes pop up. One mistake is thinking that to de-index a page, you should block the crawl paths. Makes sense, right? If you don’t want a page indexed, why would you want it crawled? Unfortunately, while it sounds logical, it’s also completely wrong. Let’s look at an example…
Let’s pretend we have a decent-sized e-commerce site with 1,000 unique product pages. Those pages look something like this:
Each product page has its own URL, of course, and those URLs are structured as follows:
Now let’s say that each of these product pages links to a review page for that product:
These review pages also have their own, unique URLs (tied to the product ID), like so:
Unfortunately, we’ve just spun out 1,000 duplicate pages, as every review page is really only a form and has no unique content. Those review pages have no search value and are just diluting our index. So, we decide it’s time to take action…
We want these pages gone, so we decide to use the META NOINDEX (Meta Robots) tag. Since we really, really want the pages out completely, we also decide to nofollow the review links. Our first attempt at a fix ends up looking something like this:
On the surface, it makes sense. Here’s the problem, though – those red arrows are now cut paths, potentially blocking the spiders. If the spiders never go back to the review pages, they’ll never read the NOINDEX and they won’t de-index the pages. Best case, it’ll take a lot longer (and de-indexation already takes too long on large sites).
Instead, let’s leave the path open (let the link be followed). That way, crawlers will continue to visit the pages, and the duplicate review URLs should gradually disappear:
Keep in mind, this process can still take a while (weeks, in most cases). Monitor your index (with the “site:” operator) daily – you’re looking for a gradual decrease over time. If that’s happening, you’re in good shape. Pro tip: Don’t take any single day’s “site:” count too seriously – it can be unreliable from time to time. Look at the trend over time.
I think it’s important to note that this problem only applies to existing sites, where the duplicate URLs have already been indexed. If you’re launching a new site, then putting nofollows on the review links is perfectly reasonable. You may also want to put the nofollows in place down the road, after the bad URLs have been de-indexed. The key is not to do it right away – give the crawlers time to do their job.
Although my example used nofollow and META NOINDEX, it applies to any method of blocking an internal link (including outright removal) and any page-based or header-based indexation cue. That includes 301-redirects and canonical tags (rel-canonical). To process those signals, Google has to crawl the pages – if you cut the path before Google can re-crawl, then those signals are never going to do their job.
It’s natural to want to solve problems quickly (especially when you’re facing lost traffic and lost revenue), and indexation issues can be very frustrating, but plan well and give the process time. When you block crawl paths before de-indexation signals are processed or try to throw everything but the kitchen sink at a problem (NOINDEX + 301 + canonical + ?), you often create more problems than you solve. Pick the best tool for the job, and give it time to work.
Update: A couple of commenters pointed out that you can use XML sitemaps to encourage Google to recrawl pages with no internal links. That's a good point and one I honestly forgot to mention. While internal links are still more powerful, an XML sitemap with the nofollow'ed (or removed) URLs can help speed the process. This is especially effective when it's not possible to put the URLs back in place (a total redesign, for example).
Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!
tree services in atlanta carthamus tinctoria greenhouse insurance
