A Bit of a Stretch

Author: Chris Atkins
Publisher: Atlantic Books
ISBN: 1838950168
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 342

Book Description
'Shocking, scathing, entertaining.' Guardian 'Incredibly compelling.' The Times 'Heart-breaking.' Sunday Times Where can a tin of tuna buy you clean clothes? Where is it easier to get 'spice' than paracetamol? Where does self-harm barely raise an eyebrow? Welcome to Her Majesty's Prison Service. Like most people, documentary-maker Chris Atkins didn't spend much time thinking about prisons. But after becoming embroiled in a dodgy scheme to fund his latest film, he was sent down for five years. His new home would be HMP Wandsworth, one of the largest and most dysfunctional prisons in Europe. With a cast of characters ranging from wily drug dealers to senior officials bent on endless reform, this powerful memoir uncovers the horrifying reality behind the locked gates. Filled with dark humour and shocking stories, A Bit of a Stretch reveals why our creaking prison system is sorely costing us all - and why you should care.

Relax Into Stretch

Author: Pavel Tsatsouline
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780938045281
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 166

Book Description
Conventional stretching attempts to literally elongate your tissues, which is dangerous and ineffective. Relax into Stretch simply teaches your muscles to relax into a stretch. If you compare traditional training to a messy hardware reorganization, then Relax into Stretch is an efficient software upgrade.While stretching tissues may take years, changes in the nervous system are immediate Your muscles will start noticeably elongating from your first Relax into Stretch practice-and within months you will have achieved a level of flexibility uncommon in our species.-Pavel Tsatsouline. Own an illustrated guide to the thirty-six most effective techniques for super-flexibility. How the secret of mastering your emotions can add immediate inches to your stretch. How to wait out your tension-the surprising key to greater mobility and a better stretch. How to fool your reflexes into giving you all the stretch you want. Why contract-relax stretching is 267% more effective than conventional relaxed stretching. How to breathe your way to greater flexibility. Using the Russian technique of Forced Relaxation as your ultimate stretching weapon. How to stretch when injured-faster, safer ways to heal. Young, old, male, female-learn what stretches are best for you and what stretches to avoid. Why excessive flexibility can be detrimental to athletic performance-and how to determine your real flexibility needs.Plateau-busting strategies for the chronically inflexible

Stretch

Author: Neal Pollack
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 0062006924
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 259

Book Description
From Neal Pollack, acclaimed author of Alternadad and The Neal Pollack Anthology of American Literature, comes Stretch: The Unlikely Making of a Yoga Dude. Here is the hilarious but true account of an overweight, balding, skeptical guy who undergoes a miraculous transformation into a healthy, blissful, obsessively dedicated yoga fiend.

Stretch

Author: Scott Sonenshein
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062457233
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 215

Book Description
Wall Street Journal Bestseller A groundbreaking approach to succeeding in business and life, using the science of resourcefulness. We often think the key to success and satisfaction is to get more: more money, time, and possessions; bigger budgets, job titles, and teams; and additional resources for our professional and personal goals. It turns out we’re wrong. Using captivating stories to illustrate research in psychology and management, Rice University professor Scott Sonenshein examines why some people and organizations succeed with so little, while others fail with so much. People and organizations approach resources in two different ways: “chasing” and “stretching.” When chasing, we exhaust ourselves in the pursuit of more. When stretching, we embrace the resources we already have. This frees us to find creative and productive ways to solve problems, innovate, and engage our work and lives more fully. Stretch shows why everyone—from executives to entrepreneurs, professionals to parents, athletes to artists—performs better with constraints; why seeking too many resources undermines our work and well-being; and why even those with a lot benefit from making the most out of a little. Drawing from examples in business, education, sports, medicine, and history, Scott Sonenshein advocates a powerful framework of resourcefulness that allows anybody to work and live better.

The Whartons' Stretch Book

Author: Jim Wharton
Publisher: Harmony
ISBN: 1984822683
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 288

Book Description
Introducing Active-Isolated Stretching, the revolutionary yet remarkably simple flexibility program—featuring 59 stretches for over 55 different sports and everyday activities! Whether you’re a serious competitor or weekend warrior, you know that proper stretching before and after your workout can improve your performance, increase your flexibility, help prevent injury, and make you feel better. But did you know that the traditional way of stretching—lock your knees, bounce, hold, hurt, hold longer—actually makes muscles tighter and more prone to injury? There’s a new and better way to stretch: Active-Isolated Stretching. And with The Whartons’ Stretch Book, the method used successfully by scores of professional, amateur, and Olympic athletes is now available to everyone. This groundbreaking technique, developed by researchers, coaches, and trainers, and pioneered by Jim and Phil Wharton, is your new exercise prescription. The routine is simple: First, you prepare to stretch one isolated muscle at a time. Then you actively contract the muscle opposite the isolated muscle, which will then relax in preparation for its stretch. You stretch it gently and quickly—for no more than two seconds—and release it before it goes into its protective contraction. Then you repeat. Simple, but the results are outstanding. The Whartons’ Stretch Book explains it all. Part I contains the Active-Isolated Stretch Catalog, with fully illustrated, easy-to-follow stretches for each of five body zones, from neck and shoulders to trunk, arms, and legs—over fifty stretches in all. Part II offers specific stretching prescriptions for over fifty-five sports and activities, from running, tennis, track, and aerobics to skiing, skating, and swimming. You’ll also find advice on stretching for daily activities such as driving, working at a desk, lifting, and keyboarding. Part III discusses stretching for life, with specific recommendations for expectant mothers and older athletes. It also includes specific stretching exercises that could help you avoid unnecessary surgery. Give Active-Isolated Stretching a try for three weeks. You’ll never go back to your old stretching routines again.

Stretch to the Sun

Author: Carrie A. Pearson
Publisher: Charlesbridge Publishing
ISBN: 1580897711
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 36

Book Description
"Visually appealing and enjoyable to read aloud, this book is a versatile introduction to redwood trees and forest conservation." —School Library Journal Step into the magical, but true, world of a coast redwood forest -- one of nature's most diverse environments. Experience the life of one tiny tree as it survives despite all odds and grows generation by generation into the tallest tree on earth today. A recipient of a silver Eureka! Award from the California Reading Association for outstanding nonfiction. A children's book about how a once tiny seedling, deep in the forest of Redwood National Park, that was protected by the animals and plants that surrounded it, stretched toward the sun to become the tallest known tree on earth. It survived ecological and human threats and flourished for over 1200 years. Logging in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries depleted the coastal redwood population significantly. But the creation of northern California's Redwood National Park in 1968 helped to save some of the ancient trees, like this one. The tree was discovered by tall tree scientists in 2006, but in the hopes to keep the tree safe, its exact location is kept secret. Susan Swan’s eye-catching illustrations are made of found objects and hand-painted papers bringing a natural depth and texture to the story. Peppered with impressive facts about trees and extensive backmatter, Pearson proves that every tree has a story to tell.

The Sense of an Ending

Author: Julian Barnes
Publisher: Random House Canada
ISBN: 0307360830
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 162

Book Description
Winner of the 2011 Booker Prize and #1 international bestseller, The Sense of an Ending is a masterpiece. The story of a man coming to terms with the mutable past, Julian Barnes's award-winning novel is laced with his trademark precision, dexterity and insight. It is the work of one of the world's most distinguished writers. Tony Webster and his clique first met Adrian Finn at school. Sex-hungry and book-hungry, they navigated the girl drought of gawky adolescence together, trading in affectations, in-jokes, rumour and wit. Maybe Adrian was a little more serious than the others, certainly more intelligent, but they swore to stay friends forever. Until Adrian's life took a turn into tragedy, and all of them, especially Tony, moved on and did their best to forget. Now Tony is in middle age. He's had a career and a marriage, a calm divorce. He gets along nicely, he thinks, with his one child, a daughter, and even with his ex-wife. He's certainly never tried to hurt anybody. Memory, though, is imperfect. It can always throw up surprises, as a lawyer's letter is about to prove. The unexpected bequest conveyed by that letter leads Tony on a dogged search through a past suddenly turned murky. And how do you carry on, contentedly, when events conspire to upset all your vaunted truths?

The Original Curse: Did the Cubs Throw the 1918 World Series to Babe Ruth's Red Sox and Incite the Black Sox Scandal?

Author: Sean Deveney
Publisher: McGraw Hill Professional
ISBN: 0071633855
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 257

Book Description
IN THE GRAND TRADITION OF EIGHT MEN OUT . . . the untold story of baseball’s ORIGINAL SCANDAL Did the Chicago Cubs throw the World Series in 1918—and get away with it? Who were the players involved—and why did they do it? Were gambling and corruption more widespread across the leagues than previously believed? Were the players and teams “cursed” by their actions? Finally, is it time to rewrite baseball history? With exclusive access to surprising new evidence, Sporting News reporter Sean Deveney details a scandal at the core of baseball’s greatest folklore—in a golden era as exciting and controversial as our sports world today. This inside look at the pivotal year of 1918 proves that baseball has always been a game overrun with colorful characters, intense human drama, and explosive controversy. "The Original Curse is not just about baseball. It is a sweeping portrait of America at war in 1918. . . . In the end, the proper question is not, ‘How could a player from that era fix the World Series?’ It’s, ‘How could he not?’” —Ken Rosenthal, FOX Sports, from the Introduction "Sean Deveney plays connect-the-dots in this intriguing account of a possible conspiracy to throw the 1918 World Series. Thoroughly researched and well written, The Original Curse is a must-read for baseball fans and anyone who loves a good mystery. Is Max Flack the Shoeless Joe of the 1918 Cubs? Deveney lays out the case and let's readers decide if the fix was in." —Paul Sullivan, Cubs beat writer, Chicago Tribune "This book gives the reader a fun and honest look at baseball as it used to be-- the good guys, the gamblers, the cheaters, the drunks, the inept leaders. But, more than that, it puts those characters into the context of Chicago, Boston and America at the time of World War I, and you wind up with a unique way to explain the motivations of those characters." —David Kaplan, host, Chicago Tribune Live and WGN's Sports Central “Deveney’s painstaking study of the 1918 World Series between the Cubs and Red Sox argues that the Black Sox scandal was not an aberration and might have had an antecedent. Deveney’s scholarship does not detract from his ability to spin a good tale: his tendency to imagine players’ conversations will remind readers of Leigh Montville’s The Big Bam: The Life and Times of Babe Ruth.... A welcome companion to Susan Dellinger’s Red Legs and Black Sox: Edd Roush and the Untold Story of the 1919 World Series, Deveney’s book contributes greatly to our understanding of this decisive period in baseball and American morals." —Library Journal

Moving Stretch

Author: Suzanne Wylde
Publisher: North Atlantic Books
ISBN: 162317175X
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 225

Book Description
Manage everyday pain with this effective, trainer-approved program that uses resistance stretching to increase strength, release tension, rejuvenate tissues—and much more. This accessible guide gives step-by-step instructions for people who feel tight or older than they should, people with poor posture, athletes who want to boost their performance, and those who want something more than conventional stretching. This book provides you with many different stretches for the whole body including the hands and feet, as well as routines for specific goals such as improving posture, helping office workers stay healthy, stretching the back, and more. Even those with sedentary lives will see and feel a difference, with just 10-20 minutes of stretching yielding benefits that may last the whole day. Many of us are limited in our movements, hunched over, or tight. Ideally, we would move in a variety of ways throughout the day, keeping our bodies fresh and youthful. However, office jobs and sofas can lead to bodies that are imprisoned in a cage of tension, whose tissue is dehydrated and stuck together, with some areas that are very weak or tight. Normal stretching is not strong enough to break us out of that state. When we tense our bodies and move through that tension, we engage the fascia and recondition it into a more youthful state, restoring great posture, elasticity, and power.

Journey

Author: Aaron Becker
Publisher: Candlewick Press
ISBN: 153622071X
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 40

Book Description
The winner of the prestigious Caldecott Honor, and described by the New York Times as 'a masterwork', Aaron Becker's stunning, wordless picture book debut about self-determination and unexpected friendship follows a little girl who draws a magic door on her bedroom wall. Through it she escapes into a world where wonder, adventure and danger abound. Red marker pen in hand, she creates a boat, a balloon and a flying carpet which carry her on a spectacular journey ... who knows where? When she is captured by a sinister emperor, only an act of tremendous courage and kindness can set her free. Can it also guide her home and to happiness? In this exquisitely illustrated book, an ordinary child is launched on an extraordinary, magical journey towards her greatest and most rewarding adventure of all...