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"Colin McRae Rally is a racing video game series developed and published by Codemasters. Started in 1998, the franchise has been a critical and commercial success and is generally acknowledged as a pioneer of realistic rally sports racing games. The series is named after the World Rally Championship driver Colin McRae, who provided extensive technical advice during development. With the release of Colin McRae: Dirt in June 2007, Codemasters changed the naming scheme in the series, dropping the "Rally" designation, giving way to the Dirt series of games. Games =Colin McRae Rally (1998)= Colin McRae Rally, the first title in the series, was released for the PlayStation and Microsoft Windows platforms in January 1998 in the United Kingdom and in September 1999 in the United States. The game featured real cars and drivers from the 1998 World Rally Championship season. Colin McRae's Subaru Impreza was featured on the game's cover. In Novice mode there are only 3 stages per rally, each followed by a Service Area, making it easier to adjust the vehicle to the different conditions of each stage and repair the damage. =Colin McRae Rally 2.0 (2000)= The second game in the series, and it features the works-entered cars and the rallies of the 2000 World Rally Championship. There are 3 difficulty levels, namely Novice, Intermediate and Expert. New features include Arcade mode, with direct head-to-head competition against AI drivers or another player, and a cleaner and more minimalistic menu system, which would be retained for the rest of the series until the release of Dirt 2 in 2009. The game was a bestseller in the UK,UK Playstation sales chart, April 2000, published in Official UK PlayStation Magazine issue 57 and again later in the year.UK Playstation sales chart, September 2000, published in Official UK PlayStation Magazine issue 62 A version for the iOS was released in June 2013. IGN gave it a score of very high 9.4/10. =Colin McRae Rally 3 (2002)= This was the first Colin McRae game released for the Xbox, as well as the PlayStation 2. It features rally cars from the 2002 World Rally Championship. A GameCube version was announced but it was cancelled. It uses an autosave feature. IGN ranked it as the 91st best PlayStation 2 game. The staff praised its improvement and technology. =Colin McRae Rally 04 (2003)= This fourth incarnation of the Colin McRae Rally series, unlike in the previous three games, has no official WRC team license. All of the cars' liveries are either fictitious or taken from championships other than the WRC. =Colin McRae Rally 2005 (2004)= The 2005 incarnation of the McRae franchise was released for PlayStation 2, Xbox, Microsoft Windows and PlayStation Portable and has over 70 stages spread over nine countries. There are over 30 cars available. There is also a revised graphics and damage engine that enables paint scratches on the car, and a new 'career' mode where the player starts out in the lower club leagues and works their way up to compete with Colin McRae in his 2004 Dakar Rally Nissan Pick-Up. In 'Championship' mode the player takes the role of Colin himself competing in six rallies using any 4WD car. The game's graphic engine allows for more realistic damage effects and a blurred vision effect if the player comes into contact with a hard object. An OS X version of this game, renamed as Colin McRae Rally Mac, has been published by Feral Interactive and developed by Robosoft Technologies and represents the first Macintosh release of a CMR series game. It was released on 26 October 2007, just six weeks after McRae's death in a helicopter crash. The development of the game was fraught with problems. Apple's switch to Intel Macs, some behind-the-scenes changes at Feral and other issues conspired to keep Colin McRae Rally Mac from being released until fairly late into 2007, despite it being based on PC-game underpinnings that Windows gamers had been enjoying since late 2004. Feral chose to make this release as independent of the PC franchise as possible to avoid any issues that might date it, calling it "Colin McRae Rally Mac" rather than attaching a year to it. Two mobile game versions of this game were created, a N-Gage title developed by Ideaworks3D and a J2ME title developed by IOMO and published by Digital Bridges. The N-Gage version reused stages from Colin McRae Rally 2.0. Both were nominated for BAFTAs in the Mobile and Handheld categories respectively. =Colin McRae Rally (2013) = The 2013 game Colin McRae Rally shares the same name of the 1998 release but the game's content and driving model are taken directly from the 2000 title Colin McRae Rally 2.0. This version was released on iOS in 2013 and ported to Windows, OS X and Android in 2014. References External links * Category:Codemasters franchises Category:Racing video games Category:Video game franchises introduced in 1998 "
"Laureen Ann Harper (née Teskey; born June 23, 1963) is a Canadian graphic designer. She is the wife of Canada's 22nd prime minister, Stephen Harper. Life and career The eldest of three, Laureen Ann Teskey was born in Turner Valley, a rural town southwest of Calgary, to rancher parents who owned an electrical contracting company. Her parents, Barbara and Dennis Teskey, divorced in 1991, after 29 years. After graduating from Oilfields High School, she attended the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology where she studied journalism and photography.Gignac, Tamara, "From Turner Valley to 24 Sussex Drive" , Calgary Herald, p. A1, January 28, 2006. She was first married to New Zealander Neil Fenton from April 1985 to 1988.Kingston, Anne, "Wife of the party" , Maclean's, August 13, 2007 Teskey joined the Reform Party of Canada in the late 1980s. She met Stephen Harper in 1990 while working for GTO Printing, a computer graphics firm operating in Calgary that helped create professional graphs and tables for Harper's major paper for his master's degree in Economics at the University of Calgary. They married on December 11, 1993. =Surname= There was initially confusion in the Canadian media about which surname Laureen Harper uses — at different times, media references to her have called her Teskey, Harper, or Teskey Harper (not hyphenated). She used the name "Laureen Teskey" after her 1993 marriage to Stephen Harper, but after her husband's victory in the 2006 federal election, she began using the name "Laureen Harper" in her public role as a spouse of the Prime Minister. =Campaigning= When her husband ran in the 2006 elections, she campaigned alongside him. She was frequently seen at the podium on behalf of and with her husband. Within the Conservative Party of Canada, she was not nicknamed the "secret weapon". =Public life= Harper (second from right) at 2006 G8 Summit Harper (second from left) at 2008 G8 Summit in Japan She had an active public life while at 24 Sussex Drive. She supported causes such as the National Arts Centre where she was Honorary Gala Chair starting in 2005. She was also an active supporter and campaigner for animal welfare organizations such as the Ottawa Humane Society. She accompanied her husband on international trips, for example the G8, G20 and others. Mrs. Harper hosted the spouses of G8 and G20 leaders in June 2010 in Toronto, Ontario. She created some controversy when she notified the National Arts Centre on September 24, 2008 that she would not be able to fulfill her role as Honorary Gala chair on October 4. This announcement came just days after her husband said that rich galas aren't something that resonate with ordinary people. Harper later responded saying that the circumstances of her being unable to attend had nothing to do with her husband's comments. On June 3, 2013, Harper and Ottawa city councillor Allan Hubley announced a new federal anti-bullying strategy to train approximately 2,400 teenagers across Canada in delivering peer education workshops and presentations against bullying to their fellow students."Feds pledge $250K to youth-led anti-bullying project". CBC News, June 3, 2013. See also * Spouse of the Prime Minister of Canada References External links * Official biography and photo from the website of the Prime Minister of Canada * Category:1963 births Category:Canadian graphic designers Category:Living people Category:People from Calgary Category:People from the Municipal District of Foothills No. 31 Category:Southern Alberta Institute of Technology alumni Category:Spouses of Prime Ministers of Canada Category:Stephen Harper "
"The Guanay cormorant or Guanay shag (Leucocarbo bougainvillii) is a member of the cormorant family found on the Pacific coast of Peru and northern Chile. (The Argentinian population on the Patagonian Atlantic coast appears to be extirpated.) After breeding it spreads south to southern parts of Chile and north to Ecuador, and has also been recorded as far north as Panama and Colombia – probably a result of mass dispersal due to food shortage in El Niño years. Its major habitats include shallow seawater and rocky shores. Immature on Rt - Pucasana coast - Peru The Guanay cormorant is similar in coloration to the rock cormorant, Phalacrocorax magellanicus, but larger, measuring 78 cm from the tip of the bill to the end of the tail. Its bill is grayish with some red at the base. The face is red with a green eye-ring. It has roseate feet. The head, neck and back are black as are the outer parts of the thighs. The throat patch, breast and belly are white. In breeding plumage it has a few white feathers on the sides of the head and neck. Breeding occurs year-round with a peak in November and December. The nest is built of guano on flat surfaces on offshore islands or remote headlands. There are up to three nests per square meter in high-density colonies. The Guanay cormorant lays two or three eggs of approximately 63 x 40 mm in size. It feeds mainly on the Peruvian anchoveta, Engraulis ringens, and the Peruvian silverside, Odontesthes regia, which thrive in the cold Humboldt Current. The Guanay cormorant is the main producer of guano. Habitat loss and degradation and over-fishing have resulted in a steady decline of the population of about 30% from an estimated figure of 3 million birds in 1984. This species is listed as Near Threatened by IUCN. Some taxonomic authorities, including the International Ornithologists' Union, place this species in the genus Leucocarbo. Others place it in the genus Phalacrocorax. The scientific name commemorates the French explorer Louis Antoine de Bougainville. The bird's droppings were such an important source of fertilizer to the peoples of the Andes that it was protected by Inca rulers, who supposedly made disturbing the cormorants in any way punishable by death. References * Guanay cormorant Category:Birds of Chile Category:Birds of Peru Category:Birds of Ecuador Category:Birds of Patagonia Category:Western South American coastal birds Guanay cormorant "