Spinal Tap was a fictional English heavy metal band created by American comedians and musicians Michael McKean, Christopher Guest and Harry Shearer. They are characterized as "one of England's loudest bands"; the band first appeared on a 1979 ABC television sketch comedy pilot called The T. V. Show, starring Rob Reiner; the sketch a mock promotional video for the song "Rock and Roll Nightmare", was written by Reiner and the band, included songwriter/performer Loudon Wainwright III on keyboards. The band became the fictional subject of the 1984 rockumentary/mockumentary film This Is Spinal Tap; this Is Spinal. In the years following the film's release, the actors have portrayed the band members at concerts and released music under the Spinal Tap name. Guest, McKean, Shearer toured in the United States in April and May 2009 and performed as Spinal Tap in a "One Night Only World Tour" on June 30, 2009, at Wembley Arena in London, three days after playing the Glastonbury Festival; the trio portray the fictional American folk music revival band The Folksmen.

Although the 1984 film portrays the band hailing from the United Kingdom, the three actors who play the principal band members - Guest, McKean and Shearer - were born in the United States. Guest was however raised in both the U. S. and Britain, he would subsequently be granted dual citizenship and inherited a title of nobility: 5th Baron Haden-Guest. Kaff and Parnell, who have much smaller roles in the film, are both British. Fans of Spinal Tap have assembled details about the band based on fictional film, albums and related promotional material, including a discography and a list of the band's former members. Within the context of the band's fictional history, Spinal Tap began as a skiffle band called the Thamesmen in the early 1960s, before changing their name to Spinal Tap. In the late 60s, Spinal Tap was a psychedelic pop band, has performed progressive rock, jazz fusion and reggae, but is best known as a heavy metal band. Spinal Tap has been classified as hard rock and rock and roll. Spinal Tap's fictional history includes a succession of drummers, all of whom are said to have died in strange circumstances: one in a "bizarre gardening accident".

Additionally, it is claimed that police described one of the deaths as a mystery "best left unsolved." The band Spinal Tap first appeared in a video aired as part of a 1979 sketch comedy special called "The TV Show", a project spearheaded by Rob Reiner and Michael McKean. The video was for the song "Rock'N' Roll Nightmare", in a sequence, intended as a spoof of The Midnight Special. Participating in the video were Michael McKean, Christopher Guest, Harry Shearer, Loudon Wainwright III, Russ Kunkel; the Spinal Tap band members were at this point unnamed. McKean and Shearer had been members of The Credibility Gap, a comedy troupe that did both spoken word and musical comedy, had released a mini rock opera and at least one musical 7" single. In 1979, Guest and McKean were members of Lenny and the Squigtones, a band, fronted by characters from the hit television series Laverne and Shirley. Guest, on guitar and clarinet, was credited as "Nigel Tufnel", the name he would use as a member of Spinal Tap.

The appearance on "The TV Show" led to the creation of a film, tracing a disastrous tour undertaken by the aging British metal band Spinal Tap. Reiner hosted the film in the character of filmmaker "Marty DiBergi", while Guest, McKean and Shearer took on character names for the project, further developed their Spinal Tap personas. Added to the group was David Kaff and R. J. Parnell. Parnell had been in the band Atomic Rooster, while Kaff had been a member of Rare Bird; the quintet played their own instruments throughout the film. The band Spinal Tap became a going concern, with the group playing gigs and appearing on a 1984 episode of Saturday Night Live to promote the film; the character of Mick Shrimpton having died in the film, R. J. Parnell played his "twin brother" drummer Ric Shrimpton for these and appearances. Spinal Tap "reunited" in 1992 for Break Like the Wind, an album produced in part by T‑Bone Burnett, an accomplished musician and record producer; the album was accompanied by a promotional audition for a new drummer attended by Stephen Perkins of Jane's Addiction, Gina Schock of The Go-Go's, Mick Fleetwood of Fleetwood Mac, who auditioned in a fireproof suit.

Despite the auditions, Parnell remained the band's drummer. Kaff did not return, the "reunited" band now consisted of Guest, McKean and Parnell and new keyboardist C. J. Vanston. A promotional concert tour followed, which included an appearance at the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert, where they performed "The Majesty of Rock," a song they dedicated to Freddie Mercury; the band released the single "Bitch School", which became a genuine cha

The Colombo Centre is a shopping mall located in the parish of Carnide. It is famous in Lisbon and attracts a lot of visitors, it is situated next to the Segunda Circular. It opened on 15 September 1997; the architecture of the space, as well as its original decoration, was themed to the Age of Discovery, one of the most important periods in the history of Portugal. The squares and hallways inside the mall have names alluding to the Elizabethan era, such as "Avenue of the Discoveries" and "Square Tropic of Cancer". From 2007 and 2009, the mall renovated its interior design mixing contemporary concepts with the originals; this mall has been designed with environmental concerns in mind, therefore it has implemented several policies towards energy saving, waste recycling and others. It has shoe shining, clothing stores, food stores, stationery stores, a chapel, a supermarket. Additionally there are a bowling alley, an outdoor garden and over 60 restaurants, it is the biggest shopping mall of the Iberian Peninsula by total number of stores.

It has more stores than any other shopping mall in Portugal, having stores as FNAC, Sport Zone, Adidas Originals and the largest Primark store in Portugal. The mall has 340 stores; the Towers of Colombo, which were seen in the initial project as an integral part of the Centro Colombo, were only started in 2007 due to an embargo by the Lisbon city council, decided in court. "Torre Oriente" was finished first and "Torre Ocidente" finished in 2011. Official site of Colombo Centre

The Alawis, or Alawites, are a sect of Islam centred in Syria. The Alawites revere Ali, considered the first Imam of the Twelver school; the group is believed to have been founded by Ibn Nusayr during the 9th century and established as a religion. For this reason, Alawites are sometimes called Nusayris, although the term has come to be used as a pejorative in the modern era. Another name, Ansari, is believed to be a mistransliteration of "Nusayri". According to Mehrdad Izady, Alawites represent 17.2 percent of the Syrian population, an increase from 11.8 percent in 2010 and are a significant minority in the Hatay Province of Turkey and northern Lebanon. There is a population living in the village of Ghajar in the Golan Heights. Alawites form the dominant religious group on the Syrian coast and towns near the coast which are inhabited by Sunnis and Ismailis, they are confused with the Alevis of Turkey. Alawites identify as a separate ethnoreligious group; the Quran is only one of their holy books and texts, their interpretation thereof has little in common with the Shia Muslim interpretation but in accordance with the early Batiniyya and other Muslim ghulat sects.

Alawite theology and rituals break from mainstream Shia Islam in several remarkable ways. For one, the Alawites drink wine as Ali's transubstantiated essence in their rituals, they believe in reincarnation. Alawites have kept their beliefs secret from outsiders and non-initiated Alawites, so rumours about them have arisen. Arabic accounts of their beliefs tend to be partisan. However, since the early 2000s, Western scholarship on the Alawite religion has made significant advances. At the core of Alawite belief is a divine triad; these aspects, or emanations, appear cyclically in human form throughout history. The establishment of the French Mandate of Syria marked a turning point in Alawi history, it gave the French the power to recruit Syrian civilians into their armed forces for an indefinite period and created exclusive areas for minorities, including an Alawite State. The Alawite State was dismantled, but the Alawites continued to be a significant part of the Syrian Armed Forces. Since Hafez al-Assad took power through the 1970 Corrective Movement, the government has been dominated by a political elite led by the Alawite Al-Assad family.

During the Islamist uprising in Syria in the 1970s and 1980s, the establishment came under pressure. Greater pressure has resulted from the Syrian Civil War. In older sources, Alawis are called "Ansaris". According to Samuel Lyde, who lived among the Alawites during the mid-19th century, this was a term they used among themselves. Other sources indicate that "Ansari" is a Western error in the transliteration of "Nusayri". However, the term "Nusayri" had fallen out of currency by the 1920s, as a movement led by intellectuals within the community during the French Mandate sought to replace it with the modern term "Alawi", they characterised the older name as an "invention of the sect's enemies", ostensibly favouring an emphasis on "connection with mainstream Islam"—particularly the Shia branch. As such, "Nusayri" is now regarded as antiquated, has come to have insulting and abusive connotations; the term is employed as hate speech by Sunni fundamentalists fighting against Bashar al-Assad's government in the Syrian civil war, who use its emphasis on Ibn Nusayr in order to insinuate that Alawi beliefs are "man-made" and not divinely inspired.

Recent research has shown that the Alawi appellation was used by the sect's adherents since the 11th century. The following quote from Alkan illustrates this point: "In actual fact, the name'Alawī' appears as early as in an 11th century Nuṣayrī tract. Moreover, the term'Alawī' was used at the beginning of the 20th century. In 1903 the Belgian-born Jesuit and Orientalist Henri Lammens visited a certain Ḥaydarī-Nuṣayrī sheikh Abdullah in a village near Antakya and mentions that the latter preferred the name'Alawī' for his people. Lastly, it is interesting to note that in the above-mentioned petitions of 1892 and 1909 the Nuṣayrīs called themselves the'Arab Alawī people"our ʿAlawī Nuṣayrī people' or'signed with Alawī people'; this early self-designation is, of triple importance. Firstly, it shows; the Alawites are distinct from the Alevi religious sect in Turkey, although the terms share a common etymology and pronunciation. The origin of the genetics of Alawites is disputed. Local folklore suggests that they are descendants of the followers of the eleventh Imam, Hasan al-Askari and his pupil, Ibn Nusayr.

During the 19th and 20th centuries, some Western scholars believed that Alawites were descended from ancient Middle Eastern peoples such as the Arameans, Canaanites and Mardaites. Many prominent Alawite tribes are descended from 13th century settlers from Sinjar. In his Natural History, Book V, P

Giant resonance is a high-frequency collective excitation of atomic nuclei, as a property of many-body quantum systems. In the macroscopic interpretation of such an excitation in terms of an oscillation, the most prominent giant resonance is a collective oscillation of all protons against all neutrons in a nucleus. In 1947, G. C. Baldwin and G. S. Klaiber observed the giant dipole resonance in photonuclear reactions, in 1972 the giant quadrupole resonance was discovered, in 1977 the giant monopole resonance was discovered in medium and heavy nuclei. Giant dipole resonances may result in a number of de-excitation events, such as nuclear fission, emission of neutrons or gamma rays, or combinations of these. Giant dipole resonances can be caused by any mechanism. Classical causes are irradiation with gamma rays at energies from 7 to 40 MeV, which couple to nuclei and either cause or increase the dipole moment of the nucleus by adding energy that separates charges in the nucleus; the process is the inverse of gamma decay, but the energies involved are much larger, the dipole moments induced are larger than occur in the excited nuclear states that cause the average gamma decay.

High energy electrons of >50 MeV may cause the same phenomenon, by coupling to the nucleus via a "virtual gamma photon", in a nuclear reaction, the inverse of internal conversion decay. Neutron emission M. N. Harakeh, A. van der Woude: Giant Resonances: Fundamental High-Frequency Modes of Nuclear Excitation, Oxford Studies in Nuclear Physics, Oxford University Press, USA, July 2001, ISBN 978-0-19-851733-7 P. F. Bortignon, A. Bracco, R. A. Broglia: Giant Resonances, Contemporary Concepts in Physics, CRC Press, July 1998, ISBN 978-90-5702-570-9 Chomaz, Ph.: Collective excitations in nuclei Brink, G. M.: Giant resonances in excited nuclei Giant nuclear resonances, AssessScience.com Giant nuclear resonance, Answers.com referring to the McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science & Technology Snover, K. A.. "Giant Resonances in Excited Nuclei". Annual Review of Nuclear and Particle Science. 36: 545–603. Bibcode:1986ARNPS..36..545S. Doi:10.1146/annurev.ns.36.120186.002553

Tunisia played until today 45 games against Algeria. The first match took place on 1 June 1957 in a friendly match against the FLN football team when Algeria was a French colony, it was at this time. Indeed, the two teams met six times, between June 1957 and May 1958, with eight victories for the Algerians. After the independence of Algeria, the first official match took place on 15 December 1963, in a friendly match at the Stade Chedly Zouiten in Tunisia; the teams met three times in the qualifying phase of the World Cup in 1970, 1978 and 1986. The overall record is favorable to the Algerians with sixteen wins, fourteen draws and fourteen losses, however Tunisia has dominated Algeria in most of major official games; the last defeat of Algeria against their neighbors dated back to 20 January 2017 during the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations, hosted by Gabon. Before this match, the two teams had met once in the African Cup of Nations finals in 2013, dominated by the Tunisians; the first meeting took place on 1 June 1957 during a friendly match against the FLN team.

It is during this period. Indeed, the two teams clash six times, between 1 June 1957 and 1 May 1958, with the key eight wins for the Algerians; the first official match took place on 15 December 1963, during a friendly match. The two teams faced each other three times in the qualification phase of the world cup in 1970, 1978 and 1986; the overall results are favorable to the Algerians with fifteen victories, twelve draws and twelve defeats. Algeria's last defeat against their neighbors dates back to 20 January 2017. Algeria has not beaten Tunisia in an official match since 1987

The Thick of It is a British comedy television series that satirises the inner workings of British government. Written and directed by Armando Iannucci, it was first broadcast for two short series on BBC Four in 2005 with a small cast focusing on a government minister, his advisers and their party's spin-doctor; the cast was expanded for two hour-long specials to coincide with Christmas and Gordon Brown's appointment as prime minister in 2007, which saw new characters forming the opposition party added to the cast. These characters continued when the show switched channels to BBC Two for its third series in 2009. A fourth series about a coalition government was broadcast in 2012, with the last episode transmitted on 27 October 2012; the series has been described as the 21st century's answer to Yes Minister. It too highlights the struggles and conflicts between politicians, party spin doctors, civil servants and the media. In similar fashion to Yes Minister, the political parties involved are never mentioned by name, although the context makes clear, which during Series 4 when the real life government coalition between the Conservatives and the Lib Dems is reflected in the show.

Iannucci describes it as "Yes Minister meets Larry Sanders". The journalist and former civil servant Martin Sixsmith is an adviser to the writing team, adding to the realism of some scenes; the series became well known for its profanity and for featuring storylines which have mirrored, or in some cases predicted real-life policies, events or scandals. A feature film spin-off, In the Loop, was released in the UK on 17 April 2009. A pilot for a U. S. remake of the show was not successful, but Iannucci was subsequently invited to create Veep for HBO, a programme with a similar tone and political issues, with the involvement of some The Thick of It writers and production members. Armando Iannucci conceived of a modern political satire after "arguing the case" for Yes Minister in a 2004 Best British Sitcom poll for BBC Two, his idea was commissioned by Roly Keating, the controller of BBC Four, who granted Iannucci limited budget, telling him to "turn that into what you can." Iannucci created the first series of three episodes, which aired in May–June 2005, a second series of three episodes, which followed in October.

The series is written by a team of writers led by Armando Iannucci, who directs the series, with Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Roger Drew, Sean Gray, Ian Martin, Will Smith and Tony Roche. Some of the dialogue is improvised rather than scripted, includes some strong language. Peter Capaldi said "Fundamentally; the improvisation just makes it feel more real and not written." Prior to rehearsals, the scripts are sent to a "swearing consultant" in Lancaster called Ian Martin, who adds some of the more colourful language. The programme's producer is Adam Tandy, who has produced all of Iannucci's television projects since 2000; the programme is shot with hand-held cameras to give it a sense of vérité or fly-on-the-wall documentary. The documentary style is furthered by the absence of any incidental laughter track; the action centres on the fictional Department of Social Affairs and Citizenship, which came out of the prime minister's passing enthusiasm for "joined-up government". Thus it acts as a "super department" overseeing many others, with some similarities to the Cabinet Office.

This concept enables different political themes to be dealt with in the programme, similar to the Department of Administrative Affairs in Yes Minister. Hugh Abbot, played by Chris Langham, is a blundering minister heading the department, continually trying to do his job under the watchful eye of Malcolm Tucker, Number 10's aggressive and domineering "enforcer"; the programme features James Smith as senior special adviser Glenn Cullen, Chris Addison as junior policy adviser Ollie Reeder, Joanna Scanlan as civil service press secretary Terri Coverley. The series was revamped for the third series with Hugh Abbot being replaced as head of DoSAC by Nicola Murray, who arrives without her own staff, so Ollie and Glenn find themselves keeping their jobs. From series 4, after a general election which results in a coalition government, Peter Mannion MP is new Secretary of State for DoSAC, supported by his team of special advisers, commanded by Number 10's director of communications Stewart Pearson and thwarted by his new coalition partner, DoSAC's junior minister Fergus Williams MP.

Nicola Murray MP is now leader of the opposition, opposition spin doctor Malcolm Tucker is desperate for a return to power. In the first batch of three episodes, Hugh Abbot is installed as a new minister following the forced resignation of his predecessor Cliff Lawton; these episodes follow his attempts to make his mark on the department by introducing new policies while toeing the party line enforced by Malcolm Tucker. Due to a series of complications and mistakes, this leads to the minister coming close to resignation on a number of occasions; the second batch of episodes takes place before a cabinet reshuffle, follows Hugh's attempts to keep his job. Ollie Reeder is seconded to number 10 "to phone his girlfriend" Emma Messinger, a member of the shadow defence policy team, where he is under the close eye of enforcer Jamie. Meanwhile, Terri Coverley is on compassionate leave following the death of her father, leaving her role to Robyn Murdoch, a senior press officer; the department has to contend with the i