Thursday, May 31, 2007

Gift item of the day


a hello kitty floor buffer.

Lest We Forget

May 30 2007 writers' almanac by Garrison Keillor

It was on this day in 2002 that city workers held a wordless ceremony marking the end of the recovery and cleanup at Ground Zero in New York City.

The cleanup crew had consisted of more than 7000 firefighters, policemen, construction workers, and volunteers. The site covered 17 acres and rose 150 feet above the street. Some of the steel columns pulled from the piles glowed red. The workers eventually removed 1 1/2 million tons of debris in more than 100,000 truckloads.

The ceremony on this day in 2002 took place at 10:29 a.m., the precise time at which the second of the twin towers collapsed. A New York City firefighter struck a bell 20 times, the traditional ceremony for a fallen firefighter. The New York City Fire Department had lost 343 firefighters on September 11th.

A group of firefighters and police officers played bagpipes and drums as a flatbed truck carried away the last steel beam to be removed from the site. Many of the workers had written their names on the beam. ...

Your podcast of the day



The Machine stops

When I read about people living in My life and touting the joy of cypersex/cyberfriends etc. I always think of this book...mp3 now available for downloads.

The mystery of the golden bathtub

File picture of a bathtub similar to the one missing
The missing bathtub, which is made of 18-carat gold, weighs some 80kg
How does one steal a bathtub made of gold, weighing 175 lbs, located on the tenth floor, and behind padlocked doors?


Japanese police spokesman comments:

"We really don't know how this happened at this stage. But what we can assume now is that more than one person was involved in this incident."

Yum!

Pizza flavoured beer

Heads up Davebarry

Danger danger danger!--or maybe not

Big headlines about the Diabetes drug causing heart attacks. Big bad drug company killing people. Docs incompetent. Yada yada yada.

We docs went thru this in 1970 with Orinase. But how much is politics? according to one doc at Medscape,

“The NEJM was irresponsible to go to [Drs Bruce] Psaty and [Curt] Furberg for the editorial--they were always going to emphasize concerns about drug safety; that’s what they do," he commented. “But I’m not surprised this paper was published like this. The three major medical journals are becoming more like British tabloid newspapers--all they lack is a bare-chested woman on page 3," he jibed.

My take is HERE. Translation: tiny risk, major disease, and what the hell a lot of the time it's the only medicine that works. And anyway, it's probably better to maybe increase your risk of heart attack by half a percent than to feel lousy all the time and end up losing your foot from high blood sugar.

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

A symbol of hope



Live simply. Love generously.
Care deeply. Speak kindly.
Leave the rest to God.

Your email of the day from the Library Lady

Japanese Haiku book

now on line at sacred-texts.com

Designs for living

“A billion customers in the world,” Dr. Paul Polak told a crowd of inventors recently, “are waiting for a $2 pair of eyeglasses, a $10 solar lantern and a $100 house.”

A museum dedicated to inventors who make cheap, useful items to help the world's poor live more comfortably.

headlines below the fold

Forget about terrorists in airplanes: Worry about the guy coughing next to you.
Drug resistant TB is the latest airplane threat.

Syria's president won with 97% of the votes, with 96% of voters participaing...and a government spokesman said the vote"showcases Syria's political maturity and our multi-party politics"...

Here in the Philippines, despite all the ruckus, ten of twelve senators leading in votes are opposition to the president, including two ex coup leaders. Now, that's democracy. Of course, the government is complaining about "statistical overstretch"...

Radical Christian protest? Yup. In New Zealand...and the protesters included a lot of Maoris who are upset the government will rewrite history.

Love Cuban healthcare? NYTIMES has an expose on how good it really is. Ptomkin villages, anyone? (via Instapundit)

Tony Blair asks:Why aren’t they angry about the people doing the killing? The odd thing about the conversation is I could tell it was the first time he’d heard this argument.

Instapundit comments: But then, maybe he was talking to a BBC viewer.

Corruption Bribery? But one doubts it will get much coverage in the NYTimes.

And finally, the rainy season has arrived....Manila is flooded, but we are okay.

Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Family News

Lolo got his hearing aid fixed. Now he can hear us without having to yell in his good ear.

The monsoon/rainy season has indeed started. We still have one field to harvest. I have no idea why they waited so long to plant.

Did I mention Danny's and Chonas gifts arrived safely?

Thanks. Lolo wore one of the polo shirts yesterday, they fit okay.

Monday, May 28, 2007

Family News

We're going to Manila to get Lolo's hearing aid adjusted.

f

Headlines below the fold

41 prisoners liberated from Al quaeda torture chamber in Iraq: Americans got a tip from locals who are now helping in the fight. NYTimes yawns.. Jules Crittenden calls it the "body count" mentality...nope, no bias here, folks, just move along.

Michael Yon's
site has a summary about Anbar provence.

Although there is sharp fighting in Diyala Province, and Baghdad remains a battleground, and the enemy is trying to undermine security in areas they’d lost interest in, the fact is that the security plan, or so-called “surge,” is showing clear signs of progress. The city of Hit, for instance. Only about a hundred days ago, Hit was a city at war. Today, the buildings are still riddled with bullet holes, but the Iraqi people are opening shops and painting over the scars. They are waving and smiling while hundreds of men are volunteering to join the police. I saw a “policeman” on duty today whose “weapon” was a plastic pistol. I photographed the toy. And so this man was on “duty” with a toy pistol, though he has not yet attended the police academy and is not even being paid. A writer could probably squeeze bad news from that story, but I won’t try. In fact, Hit is a place where writers who wish to escape combat and bad news should visit.

Again, another day passes, and I have no bad news to deliver other than what amounted to a trivial attack with a very small bomb.

Saturday, May 26, 2007

Attention Homeland Security


Better start confiscating Strawberry Pop tarts...
on the other hand, plugging in a toaster at 35 ooo feet might be a problem...

(headsup from worstontheweb)

Gift item of the day


A SUSHI CLOCK...

Meet me at half past shrimp....

Bento hot dogs!


Tired of plain, ordinary hot dogs? Well, go to the link for cute ways to serve hot dogs for the holiday weekend...
This pattern is an octo dog...
Bento is the small lunchbox used by the Japanese...they usually try to make food look attractive.

MamaDog and puppies

 
Posted by Picasa

Jane Austen alert

Period piece film about a poor clergyman's daughter loves a boy who needs to "marry well"...sounds like a Jane Austen novel...or maybe the life of Jane herself...

Happy Memorial day Weekend



Your email of the day from Col. Updraft...

Headlines below the fold

Birdflu outbreak in Wales? Four people sick....no deaths.

Media manipulation? Nah, never...and torture by "insurgents" is expected, so not news, of course...

Rosaryphobia
?

Old fashioned "special effects" on PiratesIII...
More riots in China, this time over the one child policy....

Friday, May 25, 2007

Headlines below the fold Thursday

Chirac has 30 million euros stashed away in Japan...Hmmm...bribe money?

John Edwards thinks there is no war on terror, which is news to those of us in the Philippines, where Alqaeda has been active since the mid 1990's. Guess he doesn't think Alqaeda related terror in India, Indonesia, Bengaladesh, Thailand or the Philippines is "real" terror, since he can't blame it on Bush.

The Anchoress points out that troops complain that good news is ignored, or buried under headlines of bombs, making it appear that there is no good news from Iraq. Tet redux?

But Time Magazine notices the positive changes in Anbar, which was written off by the press a couple months ago...

Trying to see everything thru a politically correct template can lead to some real absurdities. Take this "Historian" who has a long essay essentially saying the government is manipulating the recovery of captured soldiers as propaganda. He is an "expert" because he wrote a book about recovering bodies from VietNam using "the theoretical insights of Judith Butler, Michel Foucault, and Emmanuel Levinas..".
Um, perhaps instead he should have used the theoretical insights of Sophocles on why many people feel need to rescue and bury friends and relatives, even at the risk of one's life.

Family news

We were late in planting the dry season rice, and the farmers finished the harvest yesterday, and it was poor. Of course, we grow organic, so it is lower than using regular fertilizer/herbicide. But the other bad news is that the rainy season has started early--evening rain three times in the last week, so we are worried the rice will not dry properly. Sigh.

This morning at 4 am I work due to a dog crying, and then all the dogs started to whine. At first, I thought it was a puppy fell into a hole, but instead found that the motherdog had dug a cave in the soft ground to have her puppies, and a rock tumbled in pinning her at the neck.
This would be the third litter since we had her "fixed". Guess it didn't work.
----Update: Six puppies. One white, two black and four brown. She finally found a "hole" beneath the cubbyhole shelf with our "mama Mary" shrine.
---------------

Lolo still coughs but is better now, and he is jogging every morning.

I finally found my receipt and emailed Dell, so they will send me my backup windows discs, probably to Bennie at work. A virus ate my programs and I accidentally deleted the partition when I tried to remove it. I got the computer working by fixing it with an old windows disk from my Gateway laptop, but Microsoft wants money now or they say the software will destruct in thirty days. Sigh.

Thursday, May 24, 2007

Coburn: making waves as usual

Heh.

Senator Coburn isn't just stepping on people's toes by stopping pork projects, he is now making trouble by pointing out that Rachel Carson might be a saint to the Environmental movement, but her book, which inspired the world to ban DDT to save the birds, has resulted in half a million dead kids every year due to the resurgence of malaria by banning this cheap, essentially non toxic insecticide.

I wrote an essay pointing out the same thing here...

Help The Rabbits!

second headline of the day

Viagra helps hamster jetlag.

This is a PG site, so I'm not touching that one with a ten foot pole. But yes, it did have "erotogenic" side effects.

Ah, this dates me

I know it's around here somewhere

Universe may disappear from view

Your headline of the day

Aggh the pirates are back

Ruby is waiting for Shrek 3 to open here, but I am waiting for Pirates of the Carribean.

Headlines below the fold

The Good news: most American Muslims are assimilated.
The Bad news: A quarter of their kids think it's okay to bomb innocent civilians "to defend Islam".
The good news:satire site Iowahawk reports Midwest Lutherans mostly reject violence.
Kohut pointed to one of the study's key findings that only 29% of all respondents agreed that "bloody, random violence against infidels" was "always" or "frequently" justified, versus 56% who said such violence was "seldom" or "never" justified. The approval of violence rose slightly among younger Lutherans and when the hypothetical violence was targeted against Presbyterians, but still fell well short of a majority...More than 95% supported "pancake breakfasts" "popcorn fundraisers," but support dropped to less than 80% for "cow tipping" and "T-P'ing infidel houses." Support dropped even more dramatically for more violent means of conquest, such as "suicide bombing" (28%), "decapitation" (24%), and "running over Presbyterians with my Ski-Doo" (23%).

In related stories, Iowahawk reports:

Peace Elusive In Strife-Torn Midwest

Newsweek Lutefisk Story Sparks Riots Across Volatile Midwest

Ah yes, Lutefisk.

What is sad is that CAIR spokesman Ahmad Al-Akhras claims a poll where some 25% Americans think bombing civilian targets in a war might be justified is the same as supporting the deliberate killing of civilians who have little or nothing to do with your grievences.

And ten tons of Lutefisk for this gentleman, please.

Now they're using turkey poop

Good Morning


Headsup from miss cellenia

Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Wind, Sand and Stars


Excerpts from the classic book about flying by Saint Exupery are on line...

He also links to this site, which has the Little Prince in lots of different languages. Alas, the publishers took off the English version. But there is a link for you to read it in Spanish here...oe Basque here...and the official French website is HERE

Excuse me as I get shorter

Miscellaneous headlines

Three links: The Myth of Muslim Silence
from Instapundit
who also links to Gateway Pundit's coverage of Iranian protests...

"All men and women of goodwill -- Protestant, Orthodox, Jewish, Muslim, and many others, including those who profess no religion -- depend on Rome as a kind of backstop. Her pope and bishops have the most solemn duty to maintain difficult positions, that help others who are smaller hold their difficult positions, against the world’s ghastly realities."
writes David Warren. He points out the need for Bishops to be articulate against the culture of death...ah yes, but the press prefers an idiot like Falwell to an articulate Bishop Chaput...r

Monkey business

THE PLAGUE! THE PLAGUE!

Monkey eats squirrel, monkey dies of plague...Actually, IHS docs, especially in the Navajo area, see one or two cases a year, and it's found in squirrels or prairie dogs. But having it pop up in Denver is a problem.

"insurgents" say: attack us and the monkey dies...well, the gorilla anyway.
Animal rights groups are probably hyperventillating. They worry more about Buster than the 97 park rangers killed, or the four million dead in the conflict.

WaPo
celebrates Rachel Carson:
"...Carson's book "Silent Spring," published in 1962, led to the banning of the pesticide DDT, the launch of modern environmentalism and her enshrinement as a kind of patron saint of nature...."

Ah, but did Rachel Carson care more about birds than children?
Buried in paragraph 27, and paraphrasing the Congressman, The Washington Post concedes that "numerous" deaths might have been prevented by DDT...Just how "numerous" is numerous? Wouldn't you ask that question? The Post never asks that question. Why? Because the answer devastates Rachel Carson and her followers. According to these CDC figures, malaria kills more than 800,000 children under age five every year.


Did a meterorite kill the mastadons? LINK

Monday, May 21, 2007

How to raise kids pirate style

n Guide to Pirate Parenting you’ll learn:
• Ten benefits of raising a pirate
• At what age your child should be able to remove a bottle cap by taking out his glass eye and using his eye socket as an opener
• Which offense requires administering The Flying Dutchman Wedgie
• How to prevent sogging the quartermaster
• The best place to maroon your disobedient child
• How to remove chewing gum or a giant octopus from your child’s hair
• The difference between plundering and pillaging
• How to convert your minivan into a pirate schooner
• When to smack your teenager in the side of the head with an oar

(headsup from Deansworldblog)

Comancheria

Alternative history: what would have happened if the Comanches were not there? Probably Texas would have stayed Mexican if the locals didn't welcome settlers to build up and protect them from the Commanches.

And what would have happened if the Texans had allowed them to become an independent land? Would the Mexican American war have been stopped?

On the other hand, the Apaches might not have liked the idea
Headsup from the StingyScholar.

Headlines below the fold

Mugabe builds himself a shrine...well, why not? Inflation is a record 4000 percent...

The misery of post war cleanup is nothing new...LINK

Globalization
is nothing new...

OH NO....now they want our goldfish....


It's a bird....it's a plane, no....it's a flying garden shed...LINK

Sunday, May 20, 2007

News below the fold

Good news of the day:
Scotty has been found...

Legolas alert: Beware of cross dressing elves
(headsup DaveBarry)

Manolo has a list of wedding superstitions HERE
It’s good luck for the bridal party to see a black cat, a grey horse, or an elephant on the way to church.
It’s bad luck for a pig to run across the path of the bridal party on their way to church.

And, finally your invention of the day: MicrosoftWord for Blonds

Your bedtimes story of the day

You've seen the Blair witch project and it's hundreds of imitations on TV...
Now see the ultimate horror:

THE BLAIR PEEP PROJECT

Friday, May 18, 2007

Mark your calanders

Sunday is Ducktape across America day

Family news

Lolo is still coughing, but feeling better. He says he will go jogging tomorrow

It rained last night, which was good since it got up to 97 yesterday. What else was good is that the roof didn't leak...guess the third time was the charm...finally got fixed.

Chano met with gov't Dept of Agriculture about helping local farmers plant organically grown veggies (using our fertilizer of course). Since cheap veggies from China and Belgium under price local veggies, if it succeeds the farmers might go back to making a profit.

Rubie has a small pup now, named Puffy. Blackie's four puppies are being weaned, so will probably get stolen or adopted in the near future. They are medium sized, with the pit bull mix dog as the father...And the brown dog Coco is huge...last time she had six...we think the neighbor's black German shepherd is the father, since she has figured out how to climb the fence...

So right now you can't walk anywhere without watching you aren't treading on a puppy.

My Dell is still dead, so I reloaded Windows. I have to get back to them about sending replacment disks so I will be legal...

Scots monkey business

Pittsburgh Zombies!

horror film fans know George Romero's Night of the Living dead was filmed near Pittsburgh.
well, it is now on line, free

For those who want less gory stuff, try Prehistoric women...or try Flash Gordon conquers the Universe

Your software download of the day

an Anna Nichole Smith screensaver

More beasts for worse children

Classic book by Belloc...your download of the day

They also have the tale of squirrel Nutkins

Hint: Download PDF so you can get the drawings.

Headlines below the fold

In Zimbabwe, inflation hits 3,731%...my friend writes that Zim is like an animal with three legs, just limping along. If it wasn't for a thriving black market and money sent from relatives working outside the country, no one would survive...

Fluff piece on train uniting the Koreas HERE...essentially the south paid 80 million dollars for a single train run, to assure it's population that their asskissing of the North is working.(sorry for the vulgarity...I just don't know a better word to describe this)

Hell freezes over: BBC has a report praising US troops in Iraq...

Estonia hit by Russian Cyberwar...a hint of things to come?

Creation of the undermen? UK to allow chimeras (human animal hybrids) to be developed. The problem is not adding one or two human genes (heck, we already to this)the problem is this:
The draft bill allows the creation of human embryos that have been physically mixed with one or more animal cells. However, true animal-animal hybrids, made by the fusion of sperm and eggs, remain outlawed. And in all cases it would be illegal to allow embryos to grow for more than 14 days or be implanted into a womb.

And NASA's photo of the day: LINK

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Millimeters matter

headsup from Improbable research


Turn up speakers and enjoy!

Headlines below the fold

Senate refuses to end the war...Hillary caves in to the extreme left, meaning she has lost the Regan Democrats for the next election.

Amazon starts download service. Sigh. Won't affect me.

Prince Harry won't go to Iraq...well, after all the publicity, his unit would have been targeted. Don't know if this says more about our enemy or our press...

Blogfather links to Bernard Lewis:LINK essentially saying that primitive types are bullies who don't respect whining, they only believe you if you hit them back. I'd agree with him as a mother, but Lewis is an expert in the Middle East...

Pajamas Media profiles Gibson of the Dambusters...but my favorite in that group of pilots was Leonard Cheshire, ..."

Former Pink Floyd member Roger Waters once described Cheshire as "the only true Christian I've ever met"....


Family News

Lolo is sick in bed with a chest cold.

He is on antibiotics and coughing, but appetite is good.

Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Kids links


Good news!

Heidi is now on line...


Free sheetmusic....
Headsup from the stingyscholar

Map your favorite composer HERE

Fatbusting desk....right. Put a dozen in every school to keep the kids fit.....and Wait till someone falls, and sues them...

Tasmanian winds
...good article on weather systems and ecology.

They also have an article on Fairy penguins.

Yum!

Miss Cellania has a post up about food...some R rated jokes, so be warned.

She includes links to Mr Toast's blog...

Headlines below the fold

Opposition win here in the Philippines.

Known troublemaker kills cop, then runs over him...but NYTimes went out of their way to "balance" the story...is it because they hate cops?

Darwinism as pseudoscience...it's not evolution that is the problem, but the philosophy of Darwinism that claims to be the unified theory to explain everything...

Why do tar pits bubble? Now you know...

Praise for Jerry Falwell in the WAPO? Well, yes. Falwell supported Israel and opposed anti Semitism in conservatives.

Heh

(Headsup from Instapundit) Nah. Don't expect someone to actually care about Human rights abuses by the allies of the left (Castro, Mugabe, Islamofascists). They only care about politically correct people.

Fred Thompson as another Reagan?

Also from Instapundit: Attention Rosie.
“[A] seismology report prepared at Columbia University provides a glimpse into how that damage [to the southwest corner of WTC7] was caused. The report notes that the collapses of the Twin Towers caused little ground instability, but nevertheless discharged a massive amount of energy—as much as 107 joules in the kinetic energy of dust and debris. Except for temperature, the effect was similar to the energy contained in the pyroclastic ash given off in volcanic eruptions. ‘Only a very small portion of the [gravitational energy associated with the collapse of each tower] was converted into seismic waves,’ the report states. ‘Most of the energy went into deformation of buildings and the formation of rubble and dust.’”

The report continues: “Most of the effects of those collapses on adjacent structures and people were related to the kinetic energy of falling debris and the pressure on buildings exerted by dust- and particle-laden air mobilized by falling debris.” From 300 hundred yards away—the distance from the North Tower to WTC7—that debris cloud devastated the base of World Trade Center 7. —Davin Coburn

Probably this will get me another "READ THE EVIDENCE" post from a "truther", as if I should take the word of an unknown person on the internet over a magazine that I've been reading for about 50 years, and one that would lose a large readership of knowledgeable engineers who would respond by canceling their subscription if the magazine tried to fake information. Link
And unlike Rosie, I actually took some physics in college, so understand what they are talking about.

Family News

It is hot and the internet keeps going off, and my computer keeps crashing. So my blogging yesterday didn't get posted.

And my computer keeps crashing due to a virus. Dell won't send my backup discs because the computer was bought by Bennie, and I don't have the address. Guess I'll have to get it reprogramed by the local computer store.

Lolo is well, jogging every morning. But he has choked a few times on ice water...a ministroke? Allergy? He won't see a doctor, of course.

Monday, May 14, 2007

How to...

Sutree has lots of boring vlogs...

but unlike Youtube, they are teaching vlogs. The above link has advice on how to do a manicure, how to straighten your hair and how to wax your legs.

And for men, try this one: How to fold a teeshirt in two seconds.

Or how to make an expresso martini

Headlines below the fold

Actually, I moved the rant to Bloggernews. Might as well get paid for it. (10 cents a rant).

Pajamasmedia has a long essay by a Russian showing how US reporters misreported what was going on in Russia because they interpreted the story into a "left wing good right wing bad" template, ignoring that the nationalist anti semetic anti Western right wing had a lot more in common with the nationaistic anti semetic and western left wing, and that together they ended up destroying Russia's fragile democracy.
He then goes on to show how a similar template is destroying the will of the US in Iraq, and allowing a moral equivalence of some very very evil men in the name of objectivity.

My essay points out a similar template in Colombia (where I have relatives) and in the Philippines similarly demonizes the good in the right, ignores the bad in the left, and ignores the huge growing middle class who would suffer the most with the win of the left wing and islamicist extremists in all these countries.

Craft item of the day

I don't do needle work, but the link is to a program that takes a picture from your video camera or other image file, and makes it into a cross stitch pattern.

Get it from CNET Download.com!

Family News

For Mother's day we went to the mall to eat. Joy's mom and dad were here and went with us.
They are raising a grandchild so she was here and kept Ruby company.

While at the restaurant, the election observers (fat 30ish men with ponytales and vests proclaiming their job) came in to eat. Luckily they chose the barbecue not the Pusit Adobo, which gave me food poisoning the last time we ate there.

Today is election day, so we'll probably avoid going out. Everyone is worried, especially since another candidate was shot at last night nearby. But we don't vote.

It's very hot so we stay indoors. It's starting to cloud up at night, so maybe the monsoon will come early.

Sunday, May 13, 2007

Mother's day take two

AOL tv has the Flintstones Pebbles episode...hope it plays in your area

Happy Mother's day

Check out Miss Cellania's Mother's day salute...lots of stories and links, and a link to this movie:

Saturday, May 12, 2007

Beam me up, scotty

They had planned to put Scotty's ashes into space, but they had problems...and so the ashes are somewhere in New Mexico...

The mathematical life of plants

The fragrant Honeysuckle spirals clockwise to the sun
And many other creepers do the same.
But some climb anti-clockwise; the Bindweed does, for one,
Or Convolvulus, to give her proper name.

Rooted on either side a door one of each species grew
And raced towards the window-ledge above;
Each corkscrewed to the lintel in the only way it knew,
Where they stopped, touched tendrils, smiled, and fell in love.

Said the right-handed Honeysuckle
To the left-handed Bindweed:
'Oh, let us get married
If our parents don't mind; we'd
Be loving and inseparable,
Inextricably entwined;
we'd Live happily ever after,'
Said the Honeysuckle to the Bindweed.

To the Honeysuckle's parents it came as a shock.
'The Bindweeds', they cried, 'are inferior stock,
They're uncultivated, of breeding bereft;
We twine to the right-and they twine to the left!'

Said the anti-clockwise Bindweed
To the clockwise Honeysuckle:
'We'd better start saving,
Many a mickle maks a muckle,
Then run away for a honeymoon
And hope that our luck'll
Take a turn for the better,'
Said the Bindweed to the Honeysuckle.

A Bee who was passing remarked to them then:
Tve said it before, and I'll say it again;
Consider your off-shoots, if off-shoots there be,
They'll never receive any blessing from me!

'Poor little sucker, how will it learn
When it is climbing, which way to turn?
Right-left-what a disgrace!
Or it may go straight up and fall flat on its face!'
Said the right-hand thread Honeysuckle
To the left-hand thread Bindweed:
'It seems that against us
All fate has combined ...
Oh my darling, oh my darling
Oh my darling Columbine,
Thou art lost and gone for ever,
We shall never intertwine.'

Together they found them the very next day.
They had pulled up their roots and just shrivelled away,
Deprived of that freedom for which we must fight-
To veer to the left or to veer to the right!

Flanders and Swan

Shakespear Manga

The bard gets the Japanese comic book treatment:

The Prince of Denmark now inhabits the "cyberworld" of 2017, when global climate change has devastated the planet. Hamlet's famous soliloquy begins in familiar fashion, "To be or not to be ... that is the question", but then jumps to "To die, to sleep, to sleep, perchance to dream..." - completely dropping the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and the sea of troubles.

Friday, May 11, 2007

Manolo does the Eurovision contest

Check link.

And you thought American Idol was bad...

Stuff below the fold

I wrote two posts on boring things so I posted them on Bloggernews.net.

One was the pros and cons of the "cancer vaccine".

Another was that the courts after 21 years have decided that if you picket an abortion clinic, you are not the same as the Mafia. The case has large civil rights implications for any group that stages peaceful protest (i.e. it was not against violent protesters) but will probably be ignored by the MSM. After all, this is a MSM that just discovered the Pope is Catholic...

Your gift item of the day


An electronic guinea pig.

Thursday, May 10, 2007

Family news

Lolo and I are both a bit sick. It is hot. No other news

Spin City

Former Spook, who knows more about these things than I do, hits the spin on "missing national Guard equipment", a spin that started within hours of the Tornado destoying Kansas...i.e. before anyone had time to evaluate what was actually there (80% of the NG equipment was available, and nearby states had more equipment available, not to mention that the governor could ask private sources to go there: in farm areas, most farmers have backhoes, tractors and other earth moving equipment).

Start at the top and work down to here

He also points out how the press spun civilian deaths from US bombs in Afghanistan...that they bombed the Taliban who held the civilians as human shields...and that some of the "civilians" were probably Taliban or supporters of them. But the headline doesn't say that.

Gift Item of the day

A radio controlled dragon fly...
Demonstration HERE...

Blue ear disease and other medical stuff

Blue Ear pig disease, anyone?
Virus that kills the macrophage white blood cell is the cause of pig deaths in southern China. Luckily it doesn't bother numans.

One of these days the MSM will stop reporting about Paris Hilton and notice the economic devestation to Asian economies by Avian Flu, Foot and mouth disease, and other epidemics.

In other farm news: Coconuts as biodiesel? The Philippines is intrigued. We have coconuts all over.

And LINK is the story of cantelopes, corn and ...penicillin.

Electricity rationed in Zimbabwe

Households in Zimbabwe are to be limited to four hours power supply a day in the latest setback to hit the country's struggling economy.

The measure, meaning electricity will only be available in homes between 1700 and 2100 local time, is likely to come into force immediately.

The move is designed to support the country's wheat farmers who need power to irrigate their crops.

Rampant inflation has led to widespread shortages of fuel and food.

The monthly rate of inflation rose to 2,200% in March, the highest in the world. ...


Actually, limiting electricity to several hours a day is a common thing in the third world. We here in the Philippines have rolling blackouts, and sometimes announce that businesses will shut early due to the heat and large need for electricity. But here the problem is airconditioning, and is mainly now, at the end of the dry season, when it is very hot and our hydroelectric power is low.

In Zim, if I remember correctly, they have Kyle and Kariba for hydroelectric power...but it is the end of the rainy season so is the "rationing" partly due to low water levels?

Wednesday, May 09, 2007

Gunfight at the G.C. Corrale

Politicians and their bodyguards had a big gunfight...21 now arrested...

GAPAN CITY, Nueva Ecija — Re-electionist Nueva Ecija Rep. Rodolfo Antonino and 21 others, among them two police officers, have been charged with two counts of murder, frustrated murder and attempted murder before the Nueva Ecija Prosecutor’s Office.

alternative story here: LINK

The security forces of 4th District Rep. Rodolfo Antonino and former Jaen Mayor Prospero Antonio Esquivel figured in a gunfight in Jaen on the night of April 26, resulting in the death of a candidate for councilor and a policeman, and the wounding of 12 others, including two sons of Esquivel.


Tuesday, May 08, 2007

The Really really most important news of the day


Shrek three is coming...

The Chicago kid says it's for five year olds...so I guess that means Ruby will see it ten times...

Craft item of the day

The incredible turkey hat...if you start now, you can have it made in time for Thanksgiving.

Oh yes, CatherineBonnet now has a blog...

Stuff below the fold

Stuff like: The incredible erupting volcano cake. Make one for someone you love...

It's the children, stupid

Why is it that every fad and "crisis" that has been hyped over the last 50 years, the solution is ....to get rid of kids?

The sexual revolution...get rid of the kids
The feminist revolution...get rid of the kids.
The population explosion...get rid of the kids.
Now: Global warming...get rid of the kids.

Am I missing something here?

Gates of Vienna has the ten commandments of Political correctness here: and number four?
4. The Earth would be better off without human beings.
Humankind is a scourge, an affliction, upon the face of the planet. We must reduce our ecological “footprint”, preferably to zero. The human population must be drastically reduced.
Exception: we Greens will remain, in order to decide who has to die.


Ah yes, shiva...
And why do I get the idea that these low carbon impact greens would gross out if they saw how people with low carbon impact really live?

The really important headlines of the day

Lileks reports that the StarTrib is stopping his column, and instead wants him to write local stories.

DaveBarry comments: "...the Minneapolis-St.Paul Star-Tribune, has decided to kill his column and have him write straight local news stories. This is like the Miami Heat deciding to relieve Dwyane Wade of his basketball-playing obligations so he can keep stats."

If you don't know Lileks, you should. Perhaps I should rephrase that. If you are sane, you probably don't know about Lileks. But if you are a normal human being, Lilek's combination of nostalgia and topical is just the thing to brighten your day. Here's his website with links to his daily bleat, his matchbook collection, his photograph collection, and various other oddities that defy description...and all G rated to boot.

Now that I no longer live in Minnesota, I tend to read his bleat more than his newspaper column: Here's an example where Lileks discusses Wally Schirra, Rudy, 24, and Lurch's panoramas... in the same article...

His Daily Quirk in the StarTrib has a similar museful quality. Here's excerpts from his discussion of summer classes for children..and why parents love them:
The brochures might as well be frank:

"Fun With Art 101." Using crayons and paint, children will draw rainbows over and over again while you spend the morning running errands with just the little one instead of all three in the back seat, hitting each other with lightsabers and WILL YOU STOP IT? THANK YOU.

"Theater: Designing costumes." Three teenagers from the high-school drama class, using the techniques of European theatrical traditions, take the kids off your hands for three consecutive afternoons.

"Harry Potter and the Whatever of Whatever." Our trained staff will distract your children for half a day with words like "Muggle" and "Voldemort" so you can weed the garden.

Now, if I could write like that, I'd retire to a tropical island and become a lady of leisure...whoops been there done that. But you get the idea. It's not a dour intellectual discussion worthy of a GREAT NEWSPAPER...and to make it worse, about 0.1% of his writings betray a....conservative bias. Tch tch. Can't have that.

There must be an explanation of the StarTrib's decision, and I found it HERE: Altogether now: It's the senility stupid...and the cure? Well, these scientists say physical and mental exercize is one way to prevent senility. So send them a copy of Mommy Knows Worst, and then go to this link and try not to smile.

And if you are at work and someone says you're wasting time, tell them you are taking your daily antisenility lesson.

Monday, May 07, 2007

Stop Pollution! Stop development

Guess who will chair the UN commission on sustainable Development? Zimbabwe.

Not so NICE

IN "That Hideous Strength", the NICE was a eugenics organization retraining honest criminals.

But in the UK, it is an organization using "scientific" formulas to justify not treating the old and handicapped.

Yawn...no news today

World yawns...

Zimbabwe deteriorating into humanitarian disaster...the world yawns. Mugabe is a socialist. stop picking on him...

Saudis send jihad missionaries to a secular "muslim" Bosnia...
The world yawns. Repeat after me: The Saudis are our friends...the Saudis are our friends...

Rapunzel update: several hundred mistreated OFW are rescued...the world yawns.

Zambian ex president convicted of stealing 46 million dollars of the public's money.
Actually this is news, not because he stole the money but because he was actually convicted of stealing the money.

And for those who think pollution is a western problem, think again...Yawn.

Can't blame them on Bush...most predate him and most aren't even by US companies...

And anyway, if we get polluted, it will probably be from THIS agreement.

Copper Clapper Caper


Headsup from Pajamasmedia

Sunday, May 06, 2007

Headlines below the fold

Most rural people know that they have to be careful when they drain or top off their antifreeze, because if any spills, dogs will lap up the sweet liquid and be poisoned.

Well, with all the pets dying from contaminated gluten from China, the NYTimes reporter did a good job on tracing how a similar chemical caused deaths in Haiti, and many other countries..and the Panama poison cough syrup ingredient also came from China.

Saturday, May 05, 2007

Flowers flowers flowers

Plants that changed history

When Daffodils bloomed in midwinter...the sad story behind the "miracle".

Colombia makes a lot of money exporting roses to the US. Kenya is trying to do the same, but the "carbon footprint" idea may destroy that business...more poor people thanks to ecology...He told the Guardian that cut flower companies in Kenya employ 500,000 people and perhaps a million more who work in related service industries. “Food miles is a valuable concept,” he said, “but it must be looked at in the whole.”

And everything you never wanted to know about a hypercube...

And more little people photos HERE

Headlines below the fold

The married goat has committed suicide...

Mirrors on the highways will stop moose from running in front of cars.

Mercury in the new light bulbs? Snopes reports, you decide

Lileks discusses Wally Schirra, Rudy, 24, and Lurch's panoramas...the last one is really neat...

check out LINK for more panoramas.

Nanotechnology to make cheap Hydrogen fuel? LINK

Carbon offsets: The new selling of indulgences? Actually, I thought it was a con job so third world politicians could make money: Keep your people poor (i.e. carbon neutral) while your government (i.e. the politicians) can earn (steal) a lot of money.

Microfinance is big here...TheDistributionist Review points to a Pinoy coop that won an award where the private sector helped a local coop to make jobs HERE.

Friday, May 04, 2007

Pikachu vs. Grimpoteuthis


Headsup from boingboing

Origami yamah motorcycle

Your craft item of the day

Headlines below the fold

VDHanson has a screed about rewriting history

Glen Beck discusses global warming, not...doesn't mention rice or cows though...

And guess who is the problem? China...they prefer pollution to being poor...

AlQaeda targets another girl's school...this one could have killed all the students. Ah hear the silence of the feminists...

And Iran jails women protesting for more rights...yup...more silence

More Nigerian kidnappings...they are in it for the money...again silence, it's only Pinoys so who cares...

And for news of what's going on here, LINK
Soldiers and Comelec control to stop the killing.

Global warming now it's the water buffalo

Global warming: It's the rice paddies, stupid...their solution? Get rid of the five thousand year old organic method of growing rice, use less water (which means you will have to use herbicides to kill weeds) and less manure (which means using expensive fertilizer instead) and of course the reason that China has decreased rice emissins is their forced abortion policy....

Thursday, May 03, 2007

Paper shredder take two


Of course, Gato will shred paper for free...

Gift item of the day


Hey Alice.

Why should your little hamster run in his wheel all day, and waste all that kinetic energy.



Buy one of these and put him to work.

Light blogging

The Fiesta is over.
The brownouts are starting.
My computer has crashed. My backup computer keeps losing internet connection.
The puppies are climbing out of their box and pooping all over the floor. I just gotta clean the place.
Chano and Joy visited a friend in the hospital yesterday. He's one of the politicians who had been shot last week.
The Gov't is sending in the army to stop all the killing of politicians and bystanders by the hit men of other politicians.
Isn't living in the PHilippines wonderful?

Wednesday, May 02, 2007

Quote of the day

"In this election, it is a question of whether the heritage of May '68 should be perpetuated or if it should be liquidated once and for all....(the Left) "systematically takes the side of thugs, troublemakers and fraudsters against the police".

no not Guilliani, Sarkozy

Headlines below the fold

The Democrat war vote: It's about politics, stupid... one wonders if they know Alqaeda in Iraq is run by an Egyptian and uses Saudi suicide bombers to kill Shiite Iraqis...or that the Iraqi Sunnis have decided they hate Alqaeda more than the Americans...LINK

But of course it's not about Iraq, it's about aging yuppies reliving their glory days...guess they forgot about these folks...

Should Mayday become a day to celebrate those killed by communism? LINK2 well, they finally will get a museum to remind us about them...

Leftist rally in Manila on Mayday...they are one of the alternatives to the corrupt oligarchy... Yet Chinese corruption is almost as bad as here...wonder if the pet food probe will make this fact known in the USA?

Pot can make people psychotic...yup. We know that...but the yuppies love it anyway.

Before Richardson cleaned up the place, we had to watch where we hiked in New Mexico, since it was dangerous to stumble across someone's marijuana patch. So now the rumor is that Judith Campbell, the Peace Corps volunteer who was killed in northern Luzon, may have stumbled across something...

From Freerepublic's archology forum:Tsunami or storm surge? LINK...and did the Lisbon earthquake's tsunami contribute to the high death toll? LINK
Did Climate change kill off the Neanderthals? LINK LINK2

Tuesday, May 01, 2007

The European union vs the Chihuahua

The Eurocrats have an old law that they are trying to make legal in all Europan states...forbidding about 40 breeds because they have

"anatomical, physiological and behavioural characteristics which are likely to put at risk the health and welfare of either the offspring or the female parent".
Yup...there goes Lassy, the English bull dog and Gidget from Tacobell...
List of breeds HERE

TicTacToe

Your timewaster of the day from Col. Updraft...

Election time in the Philippines

LINK2

Yesterday at the parade, normal police presence but we did see a small army unit in a APC.

The shootings last week have everyone upset. However, the death rate is below that of previous elections: 25 in comparison to 2001's 100 plus.

The reason may be found in this item:

Earlier, however, he said only 52 of 90 known private armies controlled by politicians nationwide had been dismantled and that some 2,000 people illegally carrying guns were arrested.

Headlines beneath the fold

Surge, what surge? Instapundit notes the NYTimes story about succeses in Iraq which doesn't mention the surge...but a reader notes it occured before the surge, and that the surge is allowing them to use the same tactics elsewhere..

(Also via Instapundit) Simultaneous raids... turned up truckloads of explosives and weapons, including 130 grenades, an improvised rocket launcher and 2,500 rounds of ammunition belonging to the small, but mightily armed, Alabama Free Militia.

A Rudy hit job in Hillary's favorite magazine...nah, couldn't be...

Please don't feed the lions...they are not pets.

Dafur is being blamed on Bush, even though he is doing his best. (hint: it's China's fault) ...
But although Dafur is on the front burner, Zimbabwe is trying to be number two...by blocking the work of NGO's that feed one third of their people...ah, hear the outrage? anyone? anyone?

The polar ice cap is melting...it's all Bush's fault...

Scientists from Nasa say that Mars has warmed by about 0.5C since the 1970s. This is similar to the warming experienced on Earth over approximately the same period. Since there is no known life on Mars it suggests rapid changes in planetary climates could be natural phenomena.

Rosy O'Donnell has new plans for a show so teenagers can talk about sex and coming out...one doubts she will discuss these studies...

Attention conspiracy theorists: Is Israel hating Soros behind Obama?
I'm a Democrat, but since all the Democrats just love cutting up half born infants, I won't vote for them. If McCain runs, maybe I'll vote for him...

And finally, behind all the finger pointing, one reporter at NBC actually read Tenet's book, and notices the Alqaeda-Saudi connection...