A woman's tears

A little boy asked his mother, 'Why are you crying?' 'Because I'm a woman,' she told him.

'I don't understand,' he said. His Mom just hugged him and said, 'And you never will.'

Later the little boy asked his father, 'Why does mother seem to cry for no reason?'

'All women cry for no reason,' was all his dad could say.

The little boy grew up and became a man, still wondering why women cry.

Finally he put in a call to God. When God got on the phone, he asked, 'God, why do women cry so easily?'

God said:
'When I made the woman she had to be special.'
'I made her shoulders strong enough to carry the weight of the world,
yet gentle enough to give comfort.'
'I gave her an inner strength to endure childbirth and the rejection that many times comes from her children.'
'I gave her a hardness that allows her to keep going when everyone else gives up, and take care of her family through sickness and fatigue without complaining.'
'I gave her the sensitivity to love her children under any and all circumstances, even when her child has hurt her very badly.'
'I gave her strength to carry her husband through his faults and fashioned her from his rib to protect his heart.
'I gave her wisdom to know that a good husband never hurts his wife, but sometimes tests her strengths and her resolve to stand beside him unfalteringly.'
'And finally, I gave her a tear to shed.' 'This is hers exclusively to use whenever it is needed.'
'That tear holds more then men could understand.'
'If a man was to shed her tear it
would look enormous.'

'For a woman's tear is full of unconditional love, power, sacrifice, beauty, pain and compassion.'
'All ten fold of what a Man is able to feel.'
'And that my son is, why I made her as close to being Supernatural.'
'She's my gift to the world she's an Angel on Earth.' ''Love her and praise her for there will be no other here on Earth that will Love you like I do than your Mother.'
'You see my son,' said God, 'The beauty of a woman is not in the clothes she wears, the figure that she carries, or the way she combs her hair.'

The beauty of a woman must be seen in her eyes, because that is the doorway to her heart - the place where love resides.'

your email of the day from Tiamaria

Musical interlude of the day

Beer in space

can you brew beer in space?
Slashdot notes it is illegal to drink the stuff on the space station anyway.

Ah, but can you find ingredients to brew it in space?

Gift item of the day

Headlines below the fold

I had a lot of links to currency wars, corruption, press bias, US imperialism in the Philippines, and the Vatican supporting green technology, among other things, but the whole thing was so depressing I erased it.



So instead, here is your LOL cat for the day

Lesson for today

learn to write Akadian in Cunieform letters.
here is how to write the most important words in the language (beer and bread)

what are we teaching our daughters?

while checking out the Stitch vs HelloKitty cooking toys, I ran across this site with online games for girl..
fashion, check.
Cooking, check.
Fantasy animals, check.

Even "skill" games are a bit weird:

Billiards Girl

Use your fashion skills to style up this billiard playing girl so when the boys ask her for a game they won't...

the good news is that Ruby is into Farmville and yesterday mentioned she was playing something similar to civilization.

and did you know there is a CPR game

I'll take number two

see more Engrish

Yum! Siopao!

see more EpiCute

And check HERE and HERE.
The Pinoy recipe for making Siopao is HERE

Stuff below the fold

Father Dubay, RIP.

His lectures on how to pray and spirituality are over my head, but you can find them (via search engine) at EWTN

Addendum: I found they are now posting EWTN on youtube. Check out HERE for Father Dubay.

-------------------------
Lots of knitting/crochet pdf via Books on line

LINK is an example

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"Duh" stories of the day:

hormones can affect thinking....

Reusable Grocery bags breed bacteria.

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Polygamous family being investigated for bigamy.

ever wonder why it's never an ugly woman with five handsome men as an example of polygamy?

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Bad news: Mudslides in Mexico. And the floods in Pakistan are not only there: India is affected, and isolated areas of Afghanistan may have a famine this winter.

Here in the Philippines, it has been drier than normal...we may have to import rice again (and hopefully this time it will go to the poor, not rot in warehouses)
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Beware of the GPS in your boot:

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"Regulatory pressure" is making Cadbury change their slogans, so the Telegraph rewrites other famous line.

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Mark your calenders: World War I is now officially over.

Dog link of the day

quick, before the copyright cops find out:



whoops...they took off part 2 to 8

Stuff below the fold

North Korea passing torch to Kim's son?
More HERE.

-----------------------
photos of Bungee jumpers....in Tehran.
Because not everything is politics.

-----------------------------------
Aliens are sabotaging America and UK's nukes?
no, not undocumented Mexican, but ET ...
---------------------------
Bomb attack in Manila injures 35.
Terrorism? Nope, Frat wars.

-------------------------------
tired of your old fashioned car?

Get a Carstache
Photo: Carstache

cat item of the day

the real fiend behind Stuxnet...

Hey, that would make a good movie

Screenwriter Roger L Simon discusses if Siemens has changed it's spots and helped Israel.

Best line:(Nuclear weapons controlled by Windows? Let’s not even go there.)

His expertise is probably limited, but there are a lot of interesting comments...including information on how European telecom companies helped Iran to put down the Green revolution to discussions of how the virus is hitting Indonesia and India.

more information HERE.

Experts have disagreed when the Stuxnet attacks began — Kaspersky believes as early as July 2009, while Symantec traced attacks back to January 2010 — but they agree that the worm went undetected for months.

ReutersIndia says it is spread by thumbdrives:

* A study of the spread of Stuxnet by U.S. technology company Symnatec showed that the main affected countries as of August 6 were -- Iran, with 62,867 infected computers, Indonesia with 13,336, India 6,552, United States 2,913, Australia 2,436, Britain 1,038, Malaysia 1,013 and Pakistan with 993.

no reports if it has hit here in the Philippines yet.

Asian Headlines below the fold

Philippine flag at Obama's meeting with PNoy was hung upside down...(Here, an upsidedown flag means the country is at war)...

we'll forgive you if you send money...

photo ManilaBulletin
------------------------------------------------

Obama goes against China,
Europe stays quiet, and it is SEAsia and Africa who suffer when their budding industries go bankrupt because they can't compete.

But of course, since China will bribe the gov't officials to get contracts, no one will protest, even when Chinese counterfeit brakes fail on buses, children die of malaria from counterfeit drugs, and they buy blood diamonds.

--------------------------
Anti Asian racism in California.

No, it's only racism if a Republican makes a freudian slip, not if a Democrat does it deliberately.

-----------------
Philippine money laundering...

Topacio said a group of Chinese businessmen was helping jueteng financiers escape Amlac’s scrutiny by depositing large amounts in accounts in Hong Kong banks, with just a ring of the phone.

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stuff below the fold

Poor Michelle, mother told you there'd be days like this: (you can almost see in her expression she is thinking...must not laugh...must not laugh...)

The redhead's husband, the President of Cameroon, has been nominated for the corruption hall of fame by a French Catholic human rights organization:
-------------------------------------------
But Africa could take lessons from us in the Philippines.

P-Noy is going after corruption; and last week, the stubborn old leftie Archbishop Cruz went to congress and named names.

Local queen of the numbers rackett (the governor of nearby Pampanga provence) defends her actions as a poverty alleviation program... Sounds like she helped herself quite a bit too.

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

This film is opening in Manila, and Ruby saw previews and can't wait to see it:


One site called this Australian film "300 with feathers".
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FARC needs this book:. Don't they know that harddrives and flashdrives are forever?


FARC raid left their computers and memory sticks behind...and the Colombians are cracking them open.

The last time this happened, a lot of folks illegally laundering their money or taking their bribes were exposed...wonder who they'll catch this time?

the Fatman Cometh

Governor Christie and Mayor Booker have appeared on Oprah, with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerburg, to discuss reform of public schools.



MZ is giving New Jersey schools 100 million to help...and the guv says to the troublemakers:

At a documentary screening before the event, Christie had stern words for groups that have called the partnership between he and Booker potentially illegal, and threatened to sue the state.

“I have a message for politicians who think their careers are more important than our children – I’m coming,” Christie said. “I have a message to the lawyers who have made a lifetime out of suing us into failure — I’m coming.”

Instapundit has a video of Christie's greatest hits, and wonders:

The Insta-Daughter was propounding a theory a while back that each President is chosen to be the opposite of his predecessor. So, a fat white guy from New Jersey vs. a skinny black guy from Hawaii. . . .?

Don't ask me, I'm for Hillary.

Photos you might have missed

Chariot racer, at Makefaire Detroit.

Looks like the Hittites didn't go extinct, they just emigrated and became good old boys.
PDF on an ancient Hittite text on how to train chariot horses HERE.
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Retired UK Cardinal (WTF? Although "Irish", he uses the "double name" meme of the British aristocracy) complains of "Taliban Catholics" who dare to be "...critical of the bishops for compromising too much with modernity and not promoting Catholic truth " to the ever liberal NCR.

So the ever helpful Father Z produced the picture of the "enemy":


Related item: It' missing a photo of this ever so politically incorrect Catholic warrior:


(image of Potawanami warrior by Tom Shropshire)

and don't forget the atheist branch of the Pope's defenders:

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You heard about that idiot Teaparty lady talking about "mice with human brains" ?
attention class, it wasn't idiocy, it was from Scientific America.

"...No one knows what the consequences will be as the proportion of human cells in an animal increases. Weissman and others, for example, have envisioned one day making a mouse with fully "humanised" brain tissue. The lawyer developmental programme and tiny size of this chimerical mouse fairly guarantee that its mental capacities would not differ greatly from those of normal mice. But what if human cells were instead put in the foetus of a chimpanzee? The birth of something less beastly could not be ruled out...."

calling Doctor Moreau ...calling Dr. Moreau..

----------------------
What would happen if you put your hand in a Hadron Collider?

Stuff below the fold

Obama's mentor finally gets a rebuke by another Democrat: for praising a murderer...
The Emperor is naked story of the day...

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

FDA: 'Suzipoo Issues Allergy Alert On Undeclared Allergen In Lobster Poo'

headline of the day (from NPR_:

(It's actually a candy, and the "allergy alert" is because it contains peanuts)headsup WSJ
----------------------------

Ancient Dog Cemetaries: ritual sacrifice, ordinary dead dogs, or revered deities?

Not really certain yet why they were buried like this... remember all those "cats as deity" memes insisting that cats were so revered that they were mummified? They actually believed Herodotus...until they found thousands of cats, all of which had been killed as offerings before they were mummified.
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Aquino and staff eat hot dogs from vendor.

he's trying to prove he is not wasting our money, as a certain lovely ex-president did with her lavish travel expenses.
----------------------

Comedian Steve Colbert, plays the clown...

Actually, the first thing I though of was Ezechiel, acting like a fool to point out the absurdities of the issue and that government itself was a bigger fool. And the CSMonitor agrees.

------------------
Mr. Stinkbug Goes to Washington.
Via Dave Barry, who says: That's where WE would have sent them...

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

Atlas Obscura has information of Bangkok's The Wang Saen Suk Hell Garden.

And you thought only Christians had crazy religious theme parks.
---------------------------------

Happy Punctuation Day Instruction Video

Warning: Put coffee down before watching video.

Mark your calenders

September 24 is (was) National Punctuation Day

and the recipe for Mrs. Punctuation's Meat Loaf is HERE (PDF)

(HEADSUP THINKGEEK)

Cat item of the day take two

cat item of the day

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

Be Afraid...be very afraid....

(Headsup from Forgotten Classics)

Stuff below the fold

Despite the US media mainly covering the protesters against the Pope in the UK, Melanie Phillips sarcastically notes some politicians in the UK noticed he had a lot of support

How refreshing to find in the Prime Minister a man of rock-like principle, who wouldn’t dream of making opportunistic use of a wildly successful Papal visit which revealed the existence of a huge constituency either signed up or receptive to the message of uncompromising Christianity that the political class has until now brusquely ignored!

Might we now therefore expect the Prime Minister to repeal the pernicious ‘equality’ laws and the whole panoply of totalitarian victim culture and thought crime under which, as the Pope pointed out, Christians in Britain are now being oppressed?

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

BelmontClub blog points out that Afghanistan is only one in a complex mix of local wars...
From Niger to Yemen to Pakistan itself — and in places all across the globe — the administration is fighting against an unacknowledged and loosely organized global force while openly engaged in only one place: the “war of necessity” in Afghanistan. The notion that America is only in conflict with a bunch of Islamic apostates and fighting ‘to end it where it began’ is an inaccuracy bordering on falsehood.

yes, we in the Philippines know that, but with the US help, they can't hide here any more (and the Aussies are helping the moderate Muslims in Indonesia rout out their nut cases too).

What you might have missed is that in Somalia, the African Union troops are doing quite well.

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Forget the smart bombs: Try a smart virus.

Of course, China has been doing that for quite awhile.

Chinese propaganda

I'm watching a chinese propaganda show on Nat Geo. Lots of them there, which is fine, but this one is two Brits revisiting where they grew up; today they are wide eyed in admiration about how the Chinese in Harbin go about their daily work despite "the temperature being constantly under zero" (i.e. 32 degrees F).
and then, to prove how great these Chinese are, they imitate locals and plunge into a frozen river.

Sorry, guys, but I lived for three years in Minnesota, and three years in the mountains of New England, and am not impressed.

Polar bear plunges are done all over the US and canada, and are an old custom (although not as "old" as having a sweat bath and then rolling around in the snow).

If you really want to be "modern" in a Minnesota winter, try this instead:



Kawabunga!

Ditto for ThomasFriedman's naive admiration for China, which I wrote about HERE.

In the essay, I mention the down side of China selling stuff to the world, helped by their underpriced Yuan: They are undermining local industries from starting here in the Philippines, and some African economic sites mention the same thing.

there is a word for this: Neocolonialism.

Dance your PhD thesis

Improbable research asks:

The dreaded question. “So, what’s your Ph.D. research about?” You take a deep breath and launch into the explanation. People’s eyes begin to glaze over…

At times like these, don’t you wish you could just turn to the nearest computer and show people an online video of your Ph.D. thesis interpreted in dance form?

Now you can. And while you’re at it, you can win $1000, achieve immortal geek fame on the Internet, and be recognized by Science for your effort.

headsup Improbable research, which recommends this example:

Dance Your Ph.D. 2010 - The Concord of Collective Nouns and Verbs in Biblical Hebrew: A Controlled Study from Keith Massey on Vimeo.

Stuff below the fold

Heh.
Father Z has written a litany to pray for the internet thugs
an excerpt:

From faceless Facebook admin drones, spare us O Lord.
From tweeting Twitter idiots, spare us O Lord.
From from heart-hardened spammers, spare us O Lord.
From rss feed problems, spare us O Lord.
From server memory resource difficulties, spare us O Lord.

From viruses, trojan horses, and all manner of snares, Lord save us.
From wasting our time, Lord save us.
From our own stupidity, Lord save us.

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

The latest "you don't really need expensive medical care" propaganda from the LATIMES: Mammograms found to be less crucial in preventing deaths

ah but if you look closely, the Norse didn't do mammograms in women over 70, where it is more common than in younger women...and the "decrease" in deaths was still 10%, which in the US would come to 4000 lives a year saved.
also missing: That it gave only death rate decrease, which is has been falling due to better treatment and earlier diagnosis...

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

No, "we" didn't kill off the Neanderthals after all: It was the volcanos.
except for the descendents of those with human boyfriends?

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

Apple cidar vinegar, touted by some folks as the cure for everything, also is one of the ingredients in this homemade fly trap, according to Boingboing.
the trick? Add a few drops of dishwater detergent to the vinegar...it's unclear if the detergent lowers their floatability and they drown or if it's poisonous, but I plan to try it...wonder if palm vinegar works?

Family news

We just got back from Manila, trying to track Lolo's military records.

so no blogging.

The Hobbit

While you are waiting to see if MGM will move to Bollywood or just go belly up, you can watch the Hobbit cartoon on youtube.

Actually I like it, especially the music, which unlike the Jackson movies, were left in.

Mark Your Calenders

September 22nd is Hobbit day, the birthday of Bilbo and Frodo Baggins.

photo JeffCrookBlog
(HEADSUP THINKGEEK)

Musical interlude of the day

Stuff below the fold

Mao beats Hitler, but few notice.

indeed on youtube most of the videos are by right wing types. History Channel's take HERE.

But if you understand Chinese, check out Yuan Tengfei's speech.
----------------------------------------

Look to the sky. Jupiter is making a close pass to earth...look in the east at sunset.
---------------------------
another day, another cyclone...should hit south of here.

what's the difference between a cyclone and typhoon?

The terms "hurricane" and "typhoon" are regionally specific names for a strong "tropical cyclone". A tropical cyclone is the generic term for a non-frontal synoptic scale low-pressure system over tropical or sub-tropical waters with organized convection (i.e. thunderstorm activity) and definite cyclonic surface wind circulation

more HERE.


-----------------------------------
BoingBoing wonders is stoicism is making a comeback.

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


gamma ray flashes coming from earth will be examined by a new satellite:
"The small satellite, with a big mission, is appropriately named "Firefly." Sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the pint-sized satellite will study the most powerful natural particle accelerator on Earth — lightning..."

presumably, unlike it's namesake, it it too small to have it's on "companion" on board.
----------------

Kawabunga!

Dogs of all shapes and sizes took part in the 2nd Surf City Surf Dog tournament in the waves of Huntington Beach, California

Picture: AFP/GETTY IMAGES

hmm...wonder if I can get George, our Killer Lab, to take up surfing...

Rules for bloggers:

I keep six honest serving-men
(They taught me all I knew);
Their names are What and Why and When
And How and Where and Who.

(from JustSoStories).

Too often political reports on blogs twist what was said, where it was said or done, why it was done, when it happened, and merely make up a new version about the who did it.

What is worse, TV news discussions and news reports often similarly ignore these things to make the news fit their opinions or a preconcocted story.

And that is the reason lots of folks can't rely on a single source of news, even the NYTimes.

Insomnia download of the day

audiobook to put you to sleep:
Boswell's life of Samuel Johnson, vol 2.

And for UFO Fans: A report on UFO's.
This report from 1956 takes us inside these initial investigations, separates fact from fiction, and gives insight into who, when, where, and how sightings were reported and researched in open-minded fashion (for which Ruppelt was renowned), rather than in the typical hushed and secretive (and censored) manner most often associated with government and military reports which are released to the public.

Why I think ET's are partly due to imagination:
the UFO books from the 1960's always had adductees being put under a machine that came down from the ceiling that made a hum while examining them.
But reports from the 1980's started to change to being put into a tube and having needles placed into one for the examination.
Interesting, isn't it, that the ET's medical technology mirrors that of the hospitals of the same era of the reports?

History lesson of the day

Ah, but is it Kosher?

Oy vey. Some Brits have their knickers in a knot because they found out some places serve Halal meat.

Well, if there is money to be made, and the meat isn't contaminated with E coli or salmonella, I see no problem with this.

When I was in training, lot of our Muslim docs ate kosher meat to be sure it was Halal.

Indeed, there is some overlap but it's not the same..

.but then "kosher" may not be the same either.

A symbols "k" for kosher is not governed by any authority. Any manufacturer can use it at will. A website guiding Jews about Kosher states "it may take a great deal of detective work to ascertain the standard that a particular rabbi is using." For this reason many Muslims when buying anything kosher look for "u" in a circle which are more conservative Kosher symbol.

So bring on the Kosher pizzarias and the Halal Chinese Restaurants.


As long as they don't sell "double dead" meat, why worry?

on the other hand, the Animal rights folks want to make both illegal.

Stuff below the fold

You know the president is worried about the November elections when he finally decides to go to church..
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How dare she question orthodoxy. Screed at BNN.

However, if you want to read her Tolkien paper, it's over on the FR site.

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Bollywood takeover of MGM?
Can't hurt...Bollywood puts out movies that aim to entertain...

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AYYY!Blog has suggestions on how to dress for bloggers.
no, I don't blog "skyclad"...too many mosquitoes.

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more battles in southern Colombia near the Ecuador border.
Sigh

------------------------
Bill Clinton explains the reason for the Teaparties:

Former President Bill Clinton said Sunday that the Tea Party movement "reflects the feeling of a lot of Americans that they're getting the shaft," ...On CBS' "Face the Nation," Clinton said many Americans were bitter that banks and other "people who caused these problems" had recovered while ordinary people had not....

"I don't know where they stand but I get why they're popular," the former president said.

cat item of the day

2010 brick expo

and mark your calanders:

Talk like a Pirate day was September 17.

check out the many Lego masterpieces at MentalFloss...



and don't forget the LegoPirates movie:


not to be confused with these Pirates:
(turn up speakers and enjoy!)

Instructional video for today

everything you wanted to know about...the Hurdy Gurdy...
from TEDStalks

History stuff below the fold

A short bio of Eleanor of Aquitaine.

Musical interlude of the day

turn up speakers and enjoy!



headsup pertinaciouspapist

Photograph of the day

Crystallised soy sauce (16X magnification) taken at Beijing Language and Culture University in Beijing, China
Picture: YANPING WANG / BARCROFT MEDIA
more winners of Nikon photo contest LINK

It's good to be a Queen...or maybe not

Mel Brooks made famous the line: It's good to be the King...


Michele Obama claims her present life is "hell"...yeah, I'd hate it too.
She was once a well paid lawyer, raising her kids and cuddling her husband, but now she's the nagging mama of America, telling us to straighten up and eat our vegetables...

Michelle Obama Talks Breastfeeding And Weight Loss

Babble (blog) - ‎9 hours ago‎

Michelle Obama, speaking to the Congressional Black Caucus earlier this week, called obesity, especially for black Americans, the “slow, quiet, ...

Michelle Obama Talks Obesity, Breast Feeding and $31 Million to the Black Caucus. Weasel Zippers

Restaurants Urged to Lead Fight Against Kids' Obesity Food Product Design

stuck with doing things like:

First Lady to Host Luncheon for UN First Wives at Blue Hill

DNAinfo - Nicole Bode - ‎1 hour ago‎

Michelle Obama will tout New York's finest organic food at luncheon for UN leaders' wives next week. First Lady Michelle Obama enters her car during a visit ...

Michelle Obama to visit farm next week with global counterpartsUSA Today

Michelle Obama to host diplomats' spouses at NY farm-to-table luncheon New York Post

First Lady Michelle Obama bringing government workers' spouses back to New ... New York Daily


I agree: for me that would be hell on earth. Give me a job at an overflowing hospital in a warzone anyday...
------------------------------
Poor Lady Gaga, she can't wear a nice meat dress without folks sniping at her.








doesn't she know meat is out and veggies are in?

(Photo from Ruby's school which was sponsoring a "eat healthy" day, and included this nice lettuce dress...which is absurd because here we have to import lettuce from Baguio, it's too hot to grow in our area).

and now the older generation is ridiculing her.


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(Image wikipedia)
Attention Hollywood: Not Xena, but Queen Zenobia would make the heroine of a great movie.

Atlas Obscura reports her town of Palmyra is still there, so plan to visit the next time you visit Syria.
more HERE
She ruled the Middle East at a time when the Roman empire almost broke up...but instead of letting her protect their flank from Parthia, they destroyed the uppity woman...


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Disney princesses rule the younger set, but now Ruby is getting older, and wants the real stories of their lives...alas, most of them never "lived happily ever after"...

Librivox audiobook on the Queens of England...

most have sad stories, but Eleanor of Aquitaine's life would also make a good movie.
(Catherine Hepburn played her in A Lion in Winter).

Musical Interlude of the day

since the news is so gloomy, let's turn to a little Beethoven:

Video pick of the day

Just in case the news isn't depressing enough, Bergman's classic film The Virgin Spring is available at youtube, at least until the copyright cops find this out:



and if you really really want to be depressed, Youku has The Seventh Seal for your watching pleasure...with English and Chinese subtitles.

Gift item of the day

A spray on tee shirt.


from the description, one doubts that it will be used to replace one's bloomers...

cat item of the day

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

Headlines below the fold

Chris O'Donnell: Not only supports traditional morality, but is a (GASP!) Tolkien fan...
the horror...the horror...

Best comment:Perfect! Now we will have someone who knows how to handle the orcs in Washington!

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FYI: from a medical standpoint, given the increase in STD's since 2000, including an internet fueled HIV and syphillis epidemic in MSM, there is much to be said about speaking negatively about behavior that contributes to the epidemic of STD's (costing the public $18 billion since 1994) and stopping the epidemics of chlamydia in women and congenital syphillis in kids.

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

when courts order crosses put up by private groups commemorating deaths to be taken down...
this one is to commemorate State troopers, but private shrines/crosses by families where their loved ones die are also being ordered removed by various government officials...

-----------------------
Philippines points fingers at those who contributed to the failed hostage crisis.

Sigh.

_______________

We have typhoons, political murders, crooked politicians, and a Dengue Fever epidemic, but don't say our congress isn't up on fixing things:

House bill criminalizes improper singing of national anthem

The bill requires all citizens to stand at attention and sing “with fervor” the national anthem when being played...Citizen’s arrest or arrest aided by security personnel or ushers in movie houses may be done on violators, it added.

Here's the national Anthem, for your enjoyment. Turn up speakers and sing along!

Gift item of the day

the Despair Inc. 2011 calender.

includes reminders on such anniversaries such as:

Some sample dates of import:

• January 9, 2007: Apple CEO Steve Jobs announces the iPhone. Motorola cringes.
• February 26, 1955: George Smith makes aviation history by becoming the first man to bail out of a jet at supersonic speeds
• March 18, 1947: Patent #2417786 was issued to Hurley Smith for the "Pocket Shield Or Protector". The nerd is born.
• April 28, 1997: Duke Nukem Forever' announced. 12 years later, it remains unreleased.
• May 10, 2001: A USA Today article notes that, while corporations spend billions a year on motivational speakers, retreats, and products, no evidence exists that it makes any difference.!
• June 11, 1948: Albert, the first monkey astronaut launched into space. Sadly he suffocates in flight.
• July 27, 1938: Gary Gygax born, Neutral Good Human Fighter-Mage

Headlines below the fold

War on terror? what war on terror?
Austin Bay on that election in Turkey...the roundup of Iranian backed jihadis in Bahrain (more HERE)....Strategy page on Jihad against everyone...

----------------------------
The Charge of the Drones.
Forget Asimov's Laws of Robotics: These have more in common with the Terminator.

----------------------------------
Uncle Orson explains why Shakespeare is better if you adjust the language...
and how modern authors become dated when they try to be up to date by adding misplaced obscenity.

----------------------------
WSJ has an article about above trendy safe rooms,
Actually, we just used to go into our neighbor's tornado shelter, a simple underground concrete room, when the tornado was near. Usually by the time we got Lolo down the steps, the tornado had passed, but that's another story...
----------------

Women lead men in Doctorates, but except for "health care" doctorates, they tend to bee in fuzzy subjects like education or sociology.
Why do I say "fuzzy"? because I could get a B in these subjects without cracking a book, whereas I had to study Chemistry and Physics.
---------------------------------

Heroine of World War II dies...more HERE... and HERE
the greatest generation indeed.

-------------------------------
And the quote of the day from Father Rutler on the Pope's visit to the UK

When the Pope and the Queen stand together, it will be an image of the last generation that did not mock the concept of heroic faith, hope, and love.

They are the same age and lived through the Second World War which shattered the narcissist ‘s mirror. The self-absorbed and self-indulged baby-boomers of the media seem deeply to resent that, but their self-reflection now has lots of cracks and this will become evident in Holyrood Palace when we watch a man and a woman who have seen more of life than most people who have ever lived....

The largely manufactured hysteria of the last months and weeks is now squeezing into a final few hours, and the prospect is certain: if Satan has been this angry, something very good and holy is about to happen.

cat item of the day

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

Gift item of the day

Bioluminescant Bacterial lightbulbs.



and then there is the luciferase gene...


headsup Oscillatorblog

St Michael, calling St. Michael.

Sr.MaryMarthaBlog has a discussion on the PC folks not letting a kid to chose the name Michael as his Confirmation name because he is an angel, not a person.

Actually, I differ: He is a person, just not a human person. God is a person too...

On the other hand, I loathe the effeminate Michaels in Western art, such as the one above where he wears pseudo Roman armour:(is that a belly button on his armour?)

Nope, can't see that wimp getting the best of a demon.

the Orthodox seem to be able to portray him as a bit less wimpy.



on the other hand, Hollywood seems to try to go too far in the other direction:


Uh, fellahs, get rid of the semi good and nasty angels: There must be someone there in Hollywood who recognizes that a strong masculine person can be good.

Sort of like this?


Gandalf was a Maia, the equivalent of an angel...and his portrayal by McKellan shows that "wimp" and "effeminate" does not imply one's sexual orientation.


Actually, my favorite depiction of how angels work is in some (but not all) of the books of Andrew Greeley...usually his "angels" are good people, especially priests like Blackie (the original meaning of "angel" is messenger...it is a job description, not what type of person who does the job)...but in this book, the angel Michael that saves the heroine is dressed like a Navy Seal...



Yup. works for me.

Stuff below the fold

article on the weirdest homes for sale.

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the NYTimes insists that hand-driers work as well as paper towels.

But the dirty little secret is that after 60 seconds, your hands are still wet, so you "dry" them on your shirt/skirt...
and I've worked in hospitals/clinics where the administration bought the cheapest paper towels, which not only didn't dry your hand, but you ended up with your skin sandpapered off by the end of the day.
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ChicagoBoyz has a series on Palinophobia...
her problem is that she is an uppity working class gal who can articulate what a lot of folks are thinking, but who are usually ignored by the elites who run things.

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Health care "reeducation"
I worked for the IHS....do not, I repeat, DO NOT trust a "medical home"


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Two: wondering about those recent studies proving X medicine is cheaper, but your docs have been brainwashed by big pharmaceutical companies to use the newer ones?my discussion at BNN:

Well, Huffpost notes a lot of side effects with medicines depleting vitamins and minerals... and a lot of them are the same ones being pushed as "cheaper" (thiazide diuretics for blood pressure) or as preventive for problems (statins for minor increase in cholesterol).

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attention John Edwards: defensive medicine costs 55 billion dollars a year...but don't expect any change in the law...the lawyers donate lots of money to politicians...

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CSI gladiators...a lecture on archeology of bones...

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NatGeo has the best Astronomy photos of the day

Photograph courtesy Tom Lowe

The plane of the Milky Way galaxy seems to follow the curve of a bristlecone pine in California's White Mountains, as seen in the winning picture from the 2010 Astronomy Photographer of the Year contest.

In search of the Trojan War

the BBC Michael Wood series on Troy is on Yuku...

they also have in search of Shakespeare...

streaming, but you can download with special software.