Saturday, October 31, 2009

Musical Interlude of the day



I was planning to post the Halloween sequence from Fantasia at first, but actually this is my favorite part of the film.
The original film is here (can't embed)

ENJOY

The Day of the Dead

Tomorrow is All Saint's day here in the Philippines, so everyone will go to their home town and spend time at the cemetary cleaning up the grave, putting flowers and candles on the gravesite, and of course having a snack.

Here, the vendors even come into the cemetary selling candles, drinks and snacks for the kids.

No beer, please, (but people will sneak in some San Mig with their ice chests).

But if you are Mexican, it is called the day of the dead.

Professor Bob has podcasts about Halloween, about all Saints day and on the Mexican day of the dead.

and if you need a recipe for sugar skulls, check this link.

Ghost stories

The Philippine Inquirer has some ghost stories told by a local priest who does exorcisms. Two of the ghosts in this story were women who died in their pregnancies:

Shortly after heeding his colleague’s advice, Tuazon began having disturbing experiences.

When he was having breakfast one morning, his oatmeal bowl flew a few feet from his seat and broke.

Then two of his Sto. Niño statues shook and fell to the floor; their heads separated “as if neatly sliced away.”

Says Tuazon: “I suspect it was one of the women who caused it. The bowl is similar to the outline of a pregnant belly. And the Sto. Niño, as we know, represents the Child Jesus.”


Of course, such visions are not limited to the Philippines.

Many Native Americans have their houses blessed to protect them, and my grandmother, when noises and door slammings kept her awake at night, had a Mass said for the soul, which never returned.

And then there is the story of Denver airport, which was built over a Native American sacred spot, and when it opened kept having problems with various devices such as the baggage handling machinery.

I first heard about the haunting from a Comanche patient: their medicine man had been approached to hold a ceremony, but he refused, since they were not Comanche spirits. Eventually they found someone else to hold a ceremony, and things settled down.

As for me, I've never seen a ghost or seen a vision.
But if I get a funny feeling about something wrong with a patient, I pay attention to that feeling...because often it means something is going on that we are missing...

Is this a "sixth sense" or merely because of experience?

Calling Art Bell, calling art bell...

Typhoon anyone?

It's been steady rain since last evening. some wind but not strong. We are signal two.

Typhoon is hitting south of Manila instead of going through our area, so we should be okay.

Most of the farmers have completed the rice harvest so this rain won't ruin the remaining crop that survived the previous two typhoons.

Friday, October 30, 2009

Children performing an illegal act

It's not often that people risk putting a video of an illegal act on Youtube, let alone showing children involved in illegal activities, but here is one.



looks innocent, doesn't it? but open expressions of Christian faith can get you jailed or deported if you live in Saudi...

Musical interlude of the day



turn up speakers and dance!

Things you need to know.

Need a coffin? You no longer have to buy one from Costco: Walmart is now selling them on line.

----------------------
In the UK, some areas have microchipped "wheelie bins" in to check on your garbage.

It wouldn't work here: people just sneak the trash into the vacant lots.

-----------------

First they came for fluffy toilet paper, and now they are nixing hot showers.

and why do I get the feeling that those who say we should hang the sheets outside instead of using driers
are either men or childless women?...


---------------

The last typhoon wrecked the flower industry in the Philippines, but Thanks to greenhouses, there will be enough flowers for people to decorate the graves of their loved ones this weekend...
--------------------------

Major US newspapers are allowing rabid antiCatholic editorials by leading "intellectuals"...
Never mind that they get their facts wrong, this is war...


and why do I get the feeling that this isn't going to help?


-------------------------------------------
and finally:
Ten reasons why those pilots overshot the airport at Minneapolis.

Typhoon due tomorrow


LINK 2

It's headed right toward us, although right now we are only signal 1.

The government is advising folks to stay home, get in a food supply, and not travel home for All Saint's day (AKA the day of the dead, when everyone goes to the ancestral cemetary to pray and picnic). They are worried that those traveling will be stuck in the provinces after the storm.

This morning, we sent a delivery of rice to Manila (so it would arrive before the holiday). It is starting to cloud up, but no rain yet.

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Craft item of the day



HelloKitty Mummy...

Also at the link:HelloKittyDracula and HelloKitty Zombie.

(headsup PapercraftBlogspot)

It was Twenty years ago this week

Twenty years ago this week, the Cold war ended with a Victory for the West.



But before this came years of struggle that lit the spark,in the least likely place imaginable:


And the yearning for freedom had another friend, who at the time was hated and ridiculed by the European press even more than they hated and ridiculed Bush:

Ghosts!

Librivox presents Ghost stories collection number six...

more HERE. and HERE.

If you would like a romantic ghost story, YouTube has The Ghost and Mrs.Muir (in ten minute sections) HERE

but the most famous Ghost scene in movies is this one:

Another day...

Another day, another typhoon scheduled to hit us on November 1...
This is celebrated in the Philippines as the Day of the Dead, (AKA All Saints day) when everyone goes home to clean up and decorate their family's tomb.

-----------------------------
Another day, another insult against Jesus on HBO.

We Catholics have a response to this: we pray..

Political post of the day for you to ignore


IF you want to read Landesmann's speech to the NEA which is bringing so much ridicule from the left wing blogs, the whole speech is here.

My problem is that he mentions Oklahoma by citing a country western singer.
No, no mention of Maria Tallchief...or Tulsa's Philbrook Museum or the Mozart festival in Bartlesville as examples of grass roots support for the arts.

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

The difference between Bird Flu and Swine Flu

What is the difference between Bird Flu and Swine Flu?

For bird flu you need tweetment and for swine flu you need oinkment.

(From GrouchyoldcrippleBlog)

Family news



I got a cellphone with camera for my birthday...still trying to figure it out.

You know you are old when your granddaughter has to show you how to put in the SIMS card.

Sigh.

Paranoia alert

does the climate change treaty mean the US and all other countries will lose national sovereignty over their own affairs? Or is the British writer just crazy, as the UK Guardian claims?

Well, Ban Ki-moon (of the UN) wrote this in a NYTimes Editorial:

"...A deal must include an equitable global governance structure. All countries must have a voice in how resources are deployed and managed. That is how trust will be built...."

no, letting dictatorships and kleptomaniacs who run countries as their private fiefdom have the same voice as Democratic countries is bad enough, but when countries with fewer people than McKeesport PA have votes equal to China or the US, maybe someone should question his assumptions.

but Sense of Events Blog argues that the treaty cannot override the constitution HERE.

Calling Art Bell...calling Art Bell...

(Haloween) Musical interlude for today

Stuff below the fold

The big story here in the Philippines: The Mar-Corina wedding...

everyone who is anyone was at the wedding...except for Gloria
...

photo EDWIN BACASMAS


------------------------
What country produces the most movies a year? Bollywood, of course. But who comes in as number two?
Nollywood.
Nigeria does it by using HD (digital) cameras and computer editing, then releasing the films on DVD for home use or to show to small groups.
and many of the films have Christian themes...

---------------

George Bush goes to war.
that's George P Bush,( pronounced Horhe)
Heh, the next President Bush may be a Hispanic
...
----------------------

A Colombian football team visiting Venezuela was kidnapped and executed by ELN, a Colombian terror group hiding in that country.
But why is Venezuela preventing them from collecting the bodies?


-----------------------------
In the US, it is "driving while black" or "Driving while Indian"..
In the UK it now seems to be "Driving while middle aged".
and then there are crimes such as "overfilling a wheelie bin"...


------------------------
Curry...the latest health food.
Not only may Tumeric kill cancer cells, but curry may slow down dementia and help your arthritis...

recipe links here
--------------------
Cancers that disappear?
How many "small" cancers that we now can detect would have been destroyed by the body's own immune system?
(headsup Instapundit)


------------------
I wrote in BNN that the MSM and US president are ignoring the Asian aspects of "giving up" in Afghanistan.
Another misunderstood problem misunderstanding how tribalism works... LINK is a good background article...

If you see the clan leaders as the Chicago ward leaders, then paying off the boys makes sense.

--------------------
And the really important post of the week:
How to zombie proof your home:
You can zombie-proof a home by removing the main food source for zombies, which is brains. I know entire neighborhoods and counties that are practically impervious to zombie attack.


Dustbury
comments: certainly DC will be safe...

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Hannah Montana!

the big "in" party for young women this year is Hannah Montana...
so Ruby is having a Hannah Montana birthday party later today. Including blond wig.

Sigh.

For the clueless, she is a rock star on Disney channel:


Teaching materialism to young girls, one kid at a time.

BBC Reality show

while checking stuff on you tube I came across the ultimate Reality show.

Heck, anyone can eat spiders or live a fake survivor show at Borachay, but are you a man enough to survive in....a monastery?

Stuff below the fold

Yesterday was the years "most unproductive work day".
if you didn't feel like working, now you know you're not alone.

funny pictures of cats with captions
see more Lolcats and funny pictures

when Galaxies collide

Monday, October 26, 2009

Cat photo of the day

funny pictures
moar funny pictures

Stuff below the fold


world's scariest animals
(from webecoist)

------------------------


Who kept Grant sober?

-----------------------
Global cyberwar, coming to a computer near you

----------------
Should banks be broken up under anti trust laws?

-----------------
Kidnapped priest still missing here in the Philippines...lack of information makes them worry he died...but five environmental workers were released.

-------------------photo:Killifish in a tank at the University of Tokyo. (Mainichi)
FISH IN SPACE!

Musical Interlude of the day



turn up speakers and dance!

She cares for babies


The Atlanta JC paper has the story of Margaret Freeman, who "adopts" and buries children found dead after being abandoned by their parents.

(Photo AJC Brant Sanderlin)

“This is the kind of stuff that you could never imagine happening,” Freeman said. “But it has happened.” A self-appointed mother of the dead, the Covington retiree said she “adopted” the child afterward and gave him a name – Angel Baby Harrison...."

Instead of a nameless state burial, Freeman arranges a full funeral with the help of a local undertaker and cemetary owner.

Sunday, October 25, 2009

BUG EYED BUG


a Damsel bug ...from the UKTelegraph

Family news

The typhoon missed us...puttered out into a mere storm and only affected the very north of the Philippines.

We went to Dr. Angie's place for her birthday party. When we arrived, there were three security guards with guns out front. No, not for Angie, but for a politician who was there and taking no chances.

Bennie was there and gave Lolo the gifts from Danny etc. Thanks guys. He and the kids are going to beautiful Borachay today or tomorrow for a vacation.

Then in the middle of the night, Lolo's dog Blackie went into labor...she had four puppies, three white with black spots and one dark brown.

Since I didn't get much sleep we didn't get to church. Sigh.
Guess helping a dog in labor is more important than Mass.

Saturday, October 24, 2009

NSFW

Another day, another "award winning film" which is about perversion ...alas, too many award winning films seem to be about perversion of one sort or another...

so before spending your hard earned money to see a movie, check if it passes the Worf test:

Religious headlines below the fold take two

"...Mehdi Karroubi has watched from his home in Tehran in recent months as his aides have been arrested, his offices raided, his newspaper shut down. He himself has been threatened with arrest and, indirectly, the death penalty.
Skip to next paragraph
Olivier Laban-Mattei/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Mehdi Karroubi, an opposition candidate, in Tehran at a June protest of the disputed election.

His response: bring it on..,"

Religious headlines below the fold

Bishop Chaput on accepting children who are less than perfect, but essentially summarizes why the Catholic bishops support universal health care, but worry about the abortion provisions in the Obama Health Care bill...and the eventual provisions for rationing/"futile" care denial and other forms of euthanasia...

The real choice in accepting or rejecting a child with special needs is never between some imaginary perfection or imperfection. The real choice is between love and unlove, between courage and cowardice, between trust and fear. And that’s the choice we face as a society in deciding which human lives we will treat as valuable, and which we will not....

Every child with Down syndrome, every adult with special needs—in fact, every unwanted unborn child, every person who is poor, weak, abandoned, or homeless—is an icon of God’s face and a vessel of his love. How we treat these persons—whether we revere them and welcome them or throw them away in distaste—shows what we really believe about human dignity, both as individuals and as a nation....

Here’s what that means. Catholic public officials who take God seriously cannot support laws that attack human dignity without lying to themselves, misleading others, and abusing the faith of their fellow Catholics.

Catholic doctors who take God seriously cannot do procedures, prescribe drugs, or support health policies that attack the sanctity of unborn children or the elderly, or that undermine the dignity of human sexuality and the family.

And Catholic citizens who take God seriously cannot claim to love their Church and then ignore her counsel on vital public issues that shape our nation’s life. God will demand an accounting. As individuals, we can claim to be or believe whatever we want. But God knows our hearts better than we do. If we don’t conform our hearts and actions to the faith we claim to believe, we’re simply fooling ourselves.

Medieval Help desk



Headsup from Madwillie

Gift item of the day


Maple Bacon Lollipops!

"...we use sustainable, organic, cured bacon- we kinda felt that it went well with the pure Vermont maple syrup we were using as a base, you know?
"



Or if you prefer something different, try the Wasabi Ginger lollipop...

Musical interlude of the day



turn up speakers and dance!

Friday, October 23, 2009

Headlines that make you say WTF

UN Biscuits give rescuers a "high" in the Philippines...
"....The “high-energy biscuits” distributed by the United Nations have become a favorite provision of the province’s rescue workers and disaster response teams, who said the rations gave them extra strength as Benguet province prepares for yet another typhoon..."


More HERE.

Maybe they should rename them "lembas"...
--------------------------------
FYI: Lembas recipe HERE.

-------------------
Save the Planet: eat the dog.
it takes 0.84 hectares to feed Fido.

They compared this with the footprint of a Toyota Land Cruiser, driven 10,000km a year,...vehicle's eco-footprint is 0.41ha – less than half of the dog's.

They found cats have an eco-footprint of 0.15ha – slightly less than a Volkswagen Golf. Hamsters have a footprint of 0.014ha – keeping two of them is equivalent to owning a plasma TV.

Well, we do eat dog here, so why not?

On the other hand, why not just feed fido a vegetarian diet?
More HERE.
-------------------------

Someone asked for the wrong "vanity plate" for their car:

-------------------------


When Photo Ops go horribly wrong....

there is even a video at the link

This is the same broad that had a reporter for the Western Standard magazine arrested for asking her questions...
sounds like the Republicans are turning into Democrats..
-----------------------------------

Michelle Obama HulaHoop star
...
as I said, the press can't decide if they like her or not.
And if you read down, she also double-dutched...
proving she is a real girl from the neighborhoods...

For those who aren't aware of the sport, here is an example from Trenton NJ.


-----------------------

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Gift Item of the day


Flesh eating Zombies Play Set

that glows in the dark.

Recipe of the day


Make yourself an Obama sushi plate.

in the Obama rolls, the skin is made of shrimp and the hair bits are made of black sesame. As for the teeth, nothing beats good old fish paste!
More at link

Good news of the day

Surfing the web improves your brain.

Getting granny online could boost her brain power significantly, new research presented this week at a neuroscience conference reveals.

BE PREPARED!


headsup Instapundit

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

If you have nothing to do this weekend, well just mosey on down to Ben Wheeler Texas, the feral hog capital of the U.S.

This weekend, they are holding the Second Annual Feral Hog Festival.

"...The event will feature Wild Hog Follies, a Wild Hog Ball, and of course, the Hog Queen Pageant. That pageant will be open to men and women..."


(headsup from FreeRepublic)

Science stuff

Nanotech item: Using salt and algae paper to make batteries.

--------------------
Chinese vs western Dyslexia.

---------------------
First, the school system decided mom's packed lunches were no good and you had to eat the lunch from hell...
now they will make you eat what they "experts" say or starve...
LA Schools to serve kids "healthy" foods and limit their calories, sugar and salt.

Presumably they will start searching kids for illegal Snickers bars and poptarts, so that they keep to their diets.

and I guess they didn't read the AirForce study that high fat foods improve your ability to concentrate...
----------------------

a viral cause of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome?
------------------
watch out for that Skiing robot:

Gift Item of the day

A maternity GeekTeeshirt from ThinkGeek:

"...Is your body the staging area for a future geek? Or do you know a gestating female mammal who's growing her own?
Celebrate the miracle of birth with our Geek Inside shirt... There'll be no question of what sort of toys to buy the little tyke with this guidance.

Break out the USB-powered crib mobile, the Hoberman blocks, and the caffeine-laced pacifier
...."

Speaking truth to power



headsup VIA LGF.

Philippine political gossip


to understand politics here, you have to know that all the "families" are related in one way or another.

So when we read the lovely Korina (ABS CBN reporter/celebrity) is being married, one discovers she is marrying a VP candidate. But there is more:


MANILA, Philippines—One of the five godfathers in the long-planned but scaled-down wedding of Sen. Manuel “Mar” Roxas II and broadcast journalist Korina Sanchez is Sen. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III...

The best man is Paolo Roxas, the groom-to-be’s teenage son by an earlier relationship.

As is widely known, Aquino is Sanchez’s ex-boyfriend. He is also the standard-bearer of the Liberal Party, and Roxas is his running mate

Dog photo of the day


Halloween dog costumes: the Fifth Annual Times Square Dog Day Masquerade

and did you know that the Naked Cowboy has his own webpage, and is on twitter?

Family news

Ruby's little white dog Angel had three puppies yesterday afternoon...two are brown/white and one is white.

They called me when she went into labor and we got her settled down behind some chairs, and I stayed with her until the second puppy came (we worry about obstructed labor since she is small, but she seems to do okay), when a thunderstorm started.

The bad news is that I had left my laptop on when I ran upstairs to help the dog... I ran down to turn it off, and found the BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH.
Sigh. Will have to work on it today, I guess.

But while in my room, I heard the cry of one of our two-month-old kittens, and found it in a two inch puddle right outside the room. Mama cat had started to carry the kitties into our ceiling space and dropped her on the way out. Luckily, I got her out before she drowned or the dogs found her, but I got soaked in the process.

So today, all kittens and puppies are okay.
And Blackie, Lolo's dog, is large and miserable...she'll probably be the next one to go into labor. Right now she's sleeping in my easy chair...
(And yes, we fixed her, but it didn't take.)

Today it is cloudy, and we are waiting for the rain from the next typhoon, which is supposed to hit tomorrow...

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Slamming Michelle again


Ramesh Ponnuru asks:

Why did Valerie Jarrett call Michelle Obama the "first woman" on Meet the Press? Is "first lady" insufficiently PC these days? (It's so hard to keep up.)

A Freudian slip? After all, unlike the President, she is a gal from a working class neighborhood, and not automatically part of "Them". When she wrote her thesis at Princeton it was this observation of subtle upper class racism (as opposed to the "Archie Bunker" types, who are openly racist but live in the neighborhood and interact with their black neighbors).

Or is it jealousy: That she doesn't have to cover up her upper arms, and dares to show cleavage?

If a Republican did it it would be called racist.

there is actually a web page on Michelle HERE.

You see, Lady has connotations of poise, grace, and dignity. And despite the sniping of the uppity class, Michelle is indeed a lady.

The equivalent for a male spouse of a head of state is "first Gentleman" (or FG as they call him here in the Philippines).

Calling her a first 'woman" implies she is lower class, and an insult.

CSI case of the day

I remember a couple years ago, a priest was convicted of murdering a nun...he now tells the newspapers he is innocent. No big deal, you say, since murderers always claim innocence.

But if you read the entire story, you find:


Lawyers for the Ohio Innocence Project are continuing tests to determine whether DNA under Pahl's fingernails matches someone else. The DNA doesn't match Robinson, and it also didn't match the Rev. Jerome Swiatecki, the late priest whom Robinson's attorneys believed should have been a suspect.


another clue: He was never removed from the priesthood...making one wonder if the bishop knows something we don't...

Headlines below the fold

Ah, Obama is getting "advice" on Afghanistan from mothers of soldiers who died there.
Well, fuzzy thinking will get you the Oprah vote.

I am bemused at the Eurocentric discussions about Afghanistan...uh, fellahs, it is part of Asia...

But the acidtongues Spengler at the Asian Times summarizes the problem thus.

The region is full of geopolitical mines. To be name some of them:
# India can't let the fundamentalist side of the Pakistani military take power without responding.
# Iran can't let Pakistan's Sunnis crush the 20% Shi'ite minority.
# Israel can't allow for the possibility of Iran developing nuclear weapons.
# Saudi Arabia can't let Iran dominate Iraq.
# Turkey can't let Iraq's Kurds form an independent state.
# China can't let Turkey agitate among the 100 million Muslim ethnic Turks within its borders.

Without America to mediate, scold and restrain, each of the small powers in the region has no choice but to test its strength against the others.

------------------------------------------
Confessions of a cultural Dropout.

more HERE.

------------------------
I guess it's okay to discriminate, as long it's against hard working Asians.

----------------
Near Death experience: Real or imagined?

----------------
Another (adult) stem cell triumph: Growing facial bones from one's own fat.
They took dead donor bone and injected the stem cells to make it live bone, then covered the bone with periosteum from his leg...

-------------

Monday, October 19, 2009

Still awaiting another typhoon

typhoon Ramil (aka Lupit) is sitting there off the east coast of the Philippines, trying to decide if it will hit Northern Luzon on Wed night or turn north to hit Taiwan.

In preparation, they are evacuating the areas in the north that are vulnerable, and releasing water from irrigation dams here.

Sigh.
From the Inquirer:
Widespread flooding killed 380 people and displaced 4.34 million others in and around Manila on Sept. 26 as Ondoy brought record rainfall to the metropolis, the NDCC said in an updated toll.

Pepeng hit northern Luzon a week later and hovered over the region for over a week, triggering landslides and floods that left 438 people dead and displaced 3.8 million others, it added.

About 266,000 people remain in crowded evacuation camps more than two weeks later, and a bacteria-borne disease called leptospirosis has killed another 93 people in flooded areas since then, the health department said.

In the meanwhile, there are half a million squatters who need to be resettled

Sunday, October 18, 2009

Textiles in indigenous Japan

"...Attus are made from the bast fibers of a Japanese elm tree that is native to Hokkaido. First the tree is cut down and the bark is removed. The fibers, taken from the inner layers of the bark, are soaked in water to soften, bleached in the sun, and then split into fine, fibrous strands. The strands are joined together into thread and this thread is woven into cloth. The finished product is a thick, stiff cloth of a brownish color, like the bark fibers This cloth is then sewn into an attus..."

more links HERE.

The Jomon of Japan

Are the Jomon of ancient Japan are the ancestors of the Ainu...are they also related to Kennewick man?

the Jomon DNA is higher in the Samurai...

More HERE

Bookmarked for later reading.

This film has the usual "indigenous people living in harmony with nature until a more modern people(i.e. farmers) took over" hype but has some nice photos.

Women's fashions take two




A HELLO KITTY BURQA

Buy one for someone you love...

The History of Crinoline




The skirts of these dresses presented problems of their own. "...They increased in size and had to be supported by layers of heavy petticoats which were very hot and unhygienic - particularly in the summer. Bustle-like structures made of down-filled pads or whalebone and stiffened petticoats helped give added support....:\"

Then came "cage Crinoline" which was lighter and allowed you to move your legs.
(headsup TeaAtTrianon)

ah, but such things never stopped women if the fashions made them look pretty...

Turn up speakers and sing!

Saturday, October 17, 2009

Family News

Big trade fair in Manila...Chano et al went down yesterday afternoon...
we're hoping to get more overseas orders for our capiz products...
Workmen busy working 18 hour days to try to get the orders finished.

Sun is shining today...but another typhoon may hit by Thursday. Typhoons are nothing big (usually the Philippines gets ten a year) but after the double whammy everyone is worried.

and now: Leptospirosis.

Stuff you can use

Via Instapundit;
A recipe for Candied bacon Ice Cream...

Well, you'll die happy.

The site also links to:

Homemade bacon vodka

Your daily bacon

Bacon for boo-boos

Pig candy

Bacon baklava

Bacon toffee

now, if I can only find where to buy decent bacon in the Palenke....

Friday, October 16, 2009

Musical Interlude of the day



turn up speakers and enjoy!

Inklings news

At one time, Tolkien and CSLewis planned to write a book about language, but it fell through, probably because they both went on to other projects, not to mention that their theories on language were quite different (philology/old English vs philosophy/Elizabethan English).

A lot of Tolkien's failed projects ended up in the various books edited by his son, because he edited things over and over again and saved everything, but usually CS Lewis wrote quickly and threw out everything.

But now, Professor Beebe has found the lost manuscript.

Lingwe blogspot provides this old newspaper article that mentions it:

headsup First Things.

SIGH

song chart memes
see more Funny Graphs

Musical interlude of the day

You know ACORN has made it into history

when they get their very own South Park episode...

Attention Frodo

Chinese scientists have created a table top black hole

No, not a gravitational black hole, but one that sucks in light and could lead to an invisibility cloak.

Surfers to the rescue and other flood news

Earlier, I posted about using jet skis and inflatable mattresses to rescue people and deliver supplies to those stranded.

The lastest way to deliver needed supplies?

Surfboards.


For isolated areas, helicopters are life saving.



the bad news: it's been cloudy with thunderstorms for the past two days (but no steady rain thank the Lord).

--------------------
And did you know that not only did the US help with personnel, rubber boats and helicopters here in the Philippines, but they also did the same in Indonesia, where an earthquake left 200 thousand homeless?

Thursday, October 15, 2009

It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown



full cartoon on you tube

The Happy Pumpkin

turn up speakers and enjoy!



;-)

Gift item of the day




Why buy a "witch" costume for Haloween. That type of costume only emphasizes that you are ugly.

instead, buy a "plus size" tavern wench costume, and become the sex object of your honey's dreams...

and don't forget the beer...

Boing Boing spots another fraud


The website Boingboing reported that this adwas photoshopped.

After all her head is wider than her hips.

So what did Lauren do?
He sued Boing Boing for copyright infringement and fired the model for being "too fat".

She is a size 4 after all.

And here is the "real" Filippa Hamilton:

imagine a world where real women could be models...

We are Pumpkins



From one pumpkin to another!!!!!!!

A woman was asked by a coworker, 'What is it like to be a Christian?'

The coworker replied, 'It is like being a pumpkin.' God picks you from the patch, brings you in, and washes all the dirt off of you. Then He cuts off the top and scoops out all the yucky stuff.

He removes the seeds of doubt, hate, and greed. Then He carves you a new smiling face and puts His light inside of you to shine for all the world to see.

your email of the day from TiaMaria

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Would you forgive?

WhispersInTheLoggiaBlog links to the talk that Sister Genevieve Uwamariya gave to an African Bishop's meeting...

"...On August 27th 1997 at 1 p.m., a group from the Catholic association of the “Ladies of Divine Mercy” led me to two prisons in the region of Kibuye, my birthplace...Jubilee of 2000. They said: “If you have killed, you commit yourself to ask for forgiveness from the surviving victim, that way you can help him free himself of the burden/weight of vengeance, hatred and rancor. If you are a victim, you commit yourself to offer forgiveness to those who harmed you and thus you free them from the weight of their crime and the evil that is in them.”

This message had an unexpected effect for me and in me....

After that, one of the prisoners rose in tears, fell to his knees before me, loudly begging: “Mercy”. I was petrified in recognizing a family friend who had grown and shared everything with us.

He admitted having killed my father and told me the details of the death of my family. A feeling of pity and compassion invaded me: I picked him up, embraced him and told him in a tearful voice: “You are and always will be my brother”.

Then I felt a huge weight lift away from me... I had found internal peace and I thanked the person I was holding in my arms.

To my great surprise, I heard him cry out: “Justice can do its work and condemn me to death, now I am free!”

Influenza education films

Yucky warning on sneezing...but the music is nice:



and then there is this:




instructions on how to sneeze if you are a tomato and have no arms.

Headlines below the fold

Is God (or the "god particle") sabotaging the Hadon collider?
superstitious nonsense. But the alternative suggestion, that they were careless, is a lot more embarrassing to admit.


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The agricultural losses from the floods here are devastating. Instead of a good harvest, we'll have to import food again this year.

LINK
LINK LINK
a lot of roads are impassable LINK

The gov't will donate counterfeit clothes to the victims instead of destroying them. LINK
and is a new "low pressure area" headed here? this time it's aiming at the south, which was not destroyed by the earlier two storms...


photo slideshows HERE. and the cleanup continues...

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Heh. Pinoy Peacekeepers are patrolling the Golan Heights.

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Catholic Film link of the day: Life of St. Therese (the "Little Flower")
on you tube...headsup WingsOfMyDreamsBlog.


and Placido Domingo interview on EWTN podcast link...
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The "We're all gonna die" post of the day from BelmontClub
Pertinent quote: “Rational actors do not fight nuclear wars, but history is not written about rational actors behaving in a rational manner.”


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TehranPhotoblog has cute pictures from the Digital Medias Festival...

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USA Today has a great article about "The Miracle on the Hudson"...
it really was a miracle that all survived the plane crash
.
(Photo USAToday/By Steven Day, AP
)

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Nobel prize judges gave it for giving in to Iran and Russia and for planning to disarm the US of nuclear weapons
and admit it is a bribe to encourage him to continue doing the same...

Maybe they should name it the Chamberlain peace prize...

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Musical interlude of the day



a song to cheer you up from Larry the Cucumber

Family news

Hot and sunny today.
Chano is busy with orders for the Christmas market.

And the helicopters are going over from Ft. Magsaysay, meaning the US/Phil joint training is going on, or else they are ferrying out supplies to the Cordilla/mountain regions where the roads are blocked.

Old films headsup

A lot of old films are now on you tube.

A couple days ago, I posted a link to a dance scene from of "The Seven Little Foys"...well, that is there, as is Mrs. Minover and The Bishop's wife.

Today's link: All this and Heaven Too...


sort of the anti "Jane Eyre"...
and based on a true story.

True, you have to watch it in ten or so parts, but it's better than watching "monster garage" or the latest mindless violent film on HBO...

(Headsup Tea at Trianon)

Headlines below the fold

The Anchoress compares reflexive political hatred to the "Nerds vs jocks" mentality of highschool:
A hatred that has nothing to do with reality.

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WaPost notes:
The Nobel committee's announcement Friday that Obama won the Peace Prize was a fresh reminder that much of the world expects him to lead the way toward a global climate pact....."

Here in the Philippines, such "gifts" are called bribes.
..

and RobertReich reminds the EU elitists about an inconvenient truth: such things have to go through Congress...
Who are influenced by campaign contributions from big business
(again here in the Philippines, we call such things "bribes")



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FARC is recruiting child solders from indigenous Indians to kill...indigenous Indians.
Just hear the protests...anyone? anyone?

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Hmm...40% of Swedes were involved in "file sharing"... after government crackdown, it is less than 20%.
Guess they found out about other legal ways to listen to the music they want...

Monday, October 12, 2009

Musical Interlude of the day

Attention Homeland Security

coffee is fine, but watch out for that coffee creamer...

don't try this at home, Takato...


Gift item of the day


When full of piping hot nectar the cup turns white and is emblazoned with the word ON in black letters, and as it cools it turns black and clearly screams OFF at you in white letters.
... It's the mug that keeps you posted on the toastyness of your vital cuppa...

(headsupgadgetsclub)

How do you send a telegram in Chinese?


TheGraniteStudioBlog has a link to SinoSliceBlog about how did they used to send a Chinese telegram in the olden days...see Wikipedia...


and Slate has an article about Chinese keyboards...yes I said keyboards, since there are several systems.

One way to solve it is to use a tablet to input the characters.

And you thought QWERTY was hard to learn...

Headlines below the fold

From StrategyPage:Fried foods win the air war...

Recent U.S. Air Force studies have shown that pilots that eat high fat (lots of butter and oil) diets perform better in tests of alertness, and mental performance in general.


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Questions about that hijacked Russian ship continue...
hijackers claim they boarded the ship to ask for help...but why did they change the name of the ship?


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Terrorist starting a new "infatada" against Israel?
why not? It worked in 1996...


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in the Philippines, many mountain areas remain cut off...and much of the northern coast remains flooded...as those helping get through, expect the death toll to rise.
This week, the US/Phil military joint exercises are being diverted to bring aid...the US usually comes with helicopters for this training, and helicopters are badly needed to bring aid to cut off villages, and food is even being airlifted to Baguio...one highway to Baguio is open to "light" traffic, but they keep having to keep clearing mudslides.


Hopefully we will have a few sunny days to help the cleanup.


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American wins another prestigious prize:
Mathew Cox, from Milwaukie in the US, has won this year's Golden Spurtle award at the World Porridge Championships in Invernessshire.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Arroz caldo

I'm a bit down because George our killer dog killed two half grown kitties this week...usually we can protect the small kitties, but usually lose half our kittens once they start to roam around on their own...
We'd get rid of George, but he is our main protection against thieves etc.

When I am sick, Lolo feeds me Arroz caldo...here is Peachy telling you how to make it.



Things that make you say WTF

UK, US and NGO's say: Let the terrorists go (so they can restart the war)...

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Brain activity surges at the point of death....

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Big meals of certain foods can make you sleepy...

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AntiOxidants can raise diabetes risk...and may help cancer cells...

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The India link in Afghanistan

Feynman

The video comes from this BBC intervew...
Feynman discusses how his observation of a spinning plate and his desire only to do things he enjoys lead to his ideas on quantum physics.


The problem that I have with Obama's Nobel prize is that it is elitists giving him a bribe to continue to push their agenda...
But the US is full of hoi polloi who left Europe (and now Asia) so that they don't have to go along with the elitists. Indeed, that is one reason that there are more Norweigian Americans in the US than in Norway...the poor and unimportant voted with their feet...

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Family news update

Joy and Ruby said the road to Cabanatuan is flooded, so they couldn't go there for Ruby's Saturday class.

Our cook said that St Roche area was flooded, and that there are almost no veggies left in the palenke due to roads being flooded (we are eating those from our garden...I am not sure about the road to our farm...)

See previous posts...the rain is coming down from the northern mountains, and they opened the dams to prevent the dams from collapsing and causing a real disaster.

But we are high and dry, thank the Lord.

Musical interlude of the day



Actually, the reason I posted this is not about any modern wars, but because a podcast from this course discussed the tendency of southern US to fight if their honor is at stake: because much of that culture is that of the highland ScotsHERE.
who fled the highland clearances...and explains why they are so prone to fight from a sociological point of view...more here (although the book is badly written, it did open some people's eyes to the culture).

Craft item of the day

Slime 'em...
or a video on how to make slime.

Camping out? Try these recipes

TheArtOfManliness website has a bunch of cowboy recipes for your gastric pleasure.

For those of you who like to eat offals, try the SOB stew. Ingredients include calves heart, liver, thymus, intestines, brain, marrow gut, and to cover the taste, Louisiana hot sauce...

Family news

the rains stopped yesterday at noon, and we are fine. Some puddles in the streets but not a couple inches of water like yesterday, and the drainage ditches (sewers) are still full and running the water off.

But there is a lot of flooding in the area, and the irrigation dams of course were opened to prevent overtopping and failure of the dams.

Flooding is really bad in the north, and in Pangasinan, and so the emergency continues.

Friday, October 09, 2009

Haloween party food


OurBestBitesblog has a bunch of quick and easy Halloween party foods...
This one is slimy worms on a bun...made with sliced hot dogs and barbecue sauce.

But check out the mummy dogs and the spiderweb salsa and the MonsterJaws at the link.

(headsup Tastespotting)

commercial of the week

(via TokyoMango) You'll have to go to the links, alas.

Come on, you always wanted to see a commercial starring Tommy Lee Jones as a coffee drinking alien, didn't you?

or Kiefer Sutherland saving the world with Caloriemate?

Family news: We are well

Here in the Philippines, it has been raining...and raining...and raining. We got hit by rain by the typhoon that hit the Manila area, and now we are getting rain and the water run off from the typhoon that hit Northern Luzon.
But today the sun is shining.
The Phil Inquirer story HERE.

We are just south of the mountains, so get the run off.

The spillways of the irrigation dams have already been opened to prevent the dams from collapsing, and people are on alert for flooding. The main problem in our area is the loss to agriculture.

But furthur north, which was hit twice by this second smaller typhoon, it is worse.

As of 10 p.m. Thursday it was located in the vicinity of Mountain Province and forecast to move west slightly.

And of course, mudslides are a worry, especially in areas where the slopes are denuded by illegal logging or illegal mining. And some of the roads up north are blocked by landslides and mud.


Our main problem is crop damage; But parts of Manila are still under water, and the Laguna lake region has whole towns under water.

And yes, the US Navy is here with supplies...more HERE.
(we have relative in the Navy,but he is back home now)

Report moved to BNN

Cute photo of the day


Cheerybees, from Cotton Candy Bakeshop..

headsup from Epicute

Headlines below the fold

the banking system problems
and The slide of the dollar

Last week, a guy on c2c said the same thing.....you know the average American isn't taught anything about the economy, except on talk radio: and that is a scary thought.

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Chubby Lib?!
(viaInstapundit)

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Swine flu: fewer cases the second time around?
If so, that would be good news for us, since we were hit early in the epidemic.


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Thursday, October 08, 2009

LOL photo of the day

funny pictures
moar funny pictures

Family news

it's been raining steadily all day.

No big deliveries yet. We have three workers here making capiz lamps for an order Chano got last week at a trade fair, so a lot of cooking is going on.

Musical interlude of the day




The "Bluebirds" is a reference to the blue uniforms of the RAF who defended England against the odds in the Battle of Britain...

Headlines below the fold

High Blood pressure: A major killer in Asia.
It's the soysauce, of course...


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Code Pink confronts reality:
a quick pull out would not mean peace, it would mean a new dark age for women..

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Attention Burlars:
Beware of snooping wives.

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the Wilson Rev unplugged reminds us:


Remember the first Seige of Vienna in 1529


Father Z
says: Remember the Battle of Lepanto.

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the Webecoist has photos of cliffs...including the White Cliffs of Dover and the cliffs that isolated the leper colony at Molokai..

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