Just whatever

This post is always a joy to read.

An Arundel Tomb

Side by side, their faces blurred,
The earl and countess lie in stone,
Their proper habits vaguely shown
As jointed armour, stiffened pleat,
And that faint hint of the absurd--
The little dogs under their feet.

Such plainess of the pre-baroque
Hardly involves the eye, until
It meets his left hand gauntlet, still
Clasped empty in the other; and
One sees, with sharp tender shock,
His hand withdrawn, holding her hand.

They would not think to lie so long.
Such faithfulness in effigy
Was just a detail friends could see:
A sculptor's sweet comissioned grace
Thrown off in helping to prolong
The Latin names around the base.

They would not guess how early in
Their supine stationary voyage
Their air would change to soundless damage,
Turn the old tenantry away;
How soon succeeding eyes begin
To look, not read. Rigidly they

Persisted, linked, through lengths and breadths
Of time. Snow fell, undated. Light
Each summer thronged the grass. A bright
Litter of birdcalls strewed the same
Bone-riddled ground. And up the paths
The endless altered people came,

Washing at their identity.
Now, helpless in the hollow of
An unarmorial age, a trough
Of smoke in slow suspended skeins
Above their scrap of history,
Only an attitude remains:

Time has transfigured them into
Untruth. The stone finality
They hardly meant has come to be
Their final blazon, and to prove
Our almost-instinct almost true:
What will survive of us is love.

Thanks Drom ... posts like your's make it so...

"They would not think to lie so long.
Such faithfulness in effigy
Was just a detail friends could see:
A sculptor's sweet comissioned grace
Thrown off in helping to prolong
The Latin names around the base."

< click > bic lighter held high

BBC
Last Updated: Tuesday, 29 April, 2003, 07:57 GMT 08:57 UK
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Gilgamesh tomb believed found

Archaeologists in Iraq believe they may have found the lost tomb of King Gilgamesh - the subject of the oldest "book" in history.
Gilgamesh was believed to be two-thirds god, one-third human

The Epic Of Gilgamesh - written by a Middle Eastern scholar 2,500 years before the birth of Christ - commemorated the life of the ruler of the city of Uruk, from which Iraq gets its name.

Now, a German-led expedition has discovered what is thought to be the entire city of Uruk - including, where the Euphrates once flowed, the last resting place of its famous King.

"I don't want to say definitely it was the grave of King Gilgamesh, but it looks very similar to that described in the epic," Jorg Fassbinder, of the Bavarian department of Historical Monuments in Munich, told the BBC World Service's Science in Action programme.

Magnetic

In the book - actually a set of inscribed clay tablets - Gilgamesh was described as having been buried under the Euphrates, in a tomb apparently constructed when the waters of the ancient river parted following his death.

"We found just outside the city an area in the middle of the former Euphrates river¿ the remains of such a building which could be interpreted as a burial," Mr Fassbinder said.
Who can compare with him in kingliness? Who can say, like Gilgamesh, I am king?
The Epic Of Gilgamesh

He said the amazing discovery of the ancient city under the Iraqi desert had been made possible by modern technology.

"By differences in magnetisation in the soil, you can look into the ground," Mr Fassbinder added.

"The difference between mudbricks and sediments in the Euphrates river gives a very detailed structure."

This creates a magnetogram, which is then digitally mapped, effectively giving a town plan of Uruk.

'Venice in the desert'

"The most surprising thing was that we found structures already described by Gilgamesh," Mr Fassbinder stated.
Iraq has long been the site of some of the most important historical finds

"We covered more than 100 hectares. We have found garden structures and field structures as described in the epic, and we found Babylonian houses."

But he said the most astonishing find was an incredibly sophisticated system of canals.

"Very clearly, we can see in the canals some structures showing that flooding destroyed some houses, which means it was a highly developed system.

"[It was] like Venice in the desert."

March 30, 2004
Wink, Urge, and Joy? Bimbo Break?

John Ludwig writes about Coca-Cola's trademarks:

I was reading the Coca-Cola annual report tonight. What was most interesting to me was the partial list of all the brands they have worldwide.

* Diet Pop. Now that is marketing magic. Ditto 187168.
* Bimbo Break. I guess we know the target market for that one.
* Diet Almdudler, Drim, Tuborg Squash. Now don't those sound refreshing?
* Beat, Burn, Hit, Shock, and Slap. For the masochists in the crowd.
* I knew about Dr. Pepper and Mr. Pibb, but did you know about their buddies Disney Winnie the Pooh, Fraser & Neave, Master Chill, Master Pour, Mickey Mouse, Pepe Rico, the Pocket Dr., the Robinson Brothers, Samantha, and the Thextons?
* Chivalry and Neverfail sound very uplifting.
* Combine Ripe N Ready and Love Body, which via a Wink, leads to an Urge, and then Joy -- but don't forget Safety First.
* Chaudfontaine, Diet Inka Kola, Guarana Jesus, Jurassic Well, Sparletta Iron Brew, Water Salad. No idea what these are, but I'd buy a can of any of them in a second.

When I visited The World of Coca-Cola in Atlanta some years ago, my favorite part was Tastes of the World, where visitors can sample Coca-Cola beverages not available in the US. It made it worth sitting through Coca-Cola's short film presentation, which was so slickly executed that on my way out of the theater, I found myself almost thinking, "Wow! It's not just a soda -- it's a force for good in the world!" Thankfully, before that thought was fully formed, I caught myself and thought, "Um, this is just sugar water." No doubt, though: Coca-Cola knows marketing.

Posted by Frank Boosman at 09:09 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

"I Want to Wake Up and Read That..."

From Thomas Friedman's column today:

I so hunger to wake up and be surprised with some really good news -- by someone who totally steps out of himself or herself, imagines something different and thrusts out a hand.

I want to wake up and read that President Bush has decided to offer a real alternative to the stalled Kyoto Protocol to reduce global warming. I want to wake up and read that 10,000 Palestinian mothers marched on Hamas headquarters to demand that their sons and daughters never again be recruited for suicide bombings. I want to wake up and read that Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia invited Ariel Sharon to his home in Riyadh to personally hand him the Abdullah peace plan and Mr. Sharon responded by freezing Israeli settlements as a good-will gesture.

I want to wake up and read that General Motors has decided it will no longer make gas-guzzling Hummers and President Bush has decided to replace his limousine with an armor-plated Toyota Prius, a hybrid car that gets over 40 miles to the gallon.

I want to wake up and read that Dick Cheney has apologized to the U.N. and all our allies for being wrong about W.M.D. in Iraq, but then appealed to our allies to join with the U.S. in an even more important project -- helping Iraqis build some kind of democratic framework. I want to wake up and read that Tom DeLay called for a tax hike on the rich in order to save Social Security and Medicare for the next generation and to finance all our underfunded education programs.

I want to wake up and read that Justice Antonin Scalia has recused himself from ruling on the case involving Mr. Cheney's energy task force when it comes before the Supreme Court -- not because Mr. Scalia did anything illegal in duck hunting with the V.P., but because our Supreme Court is so sacred, so vital to what makes our society special -- its rule of law -- that he wouldn't want to do anything that might have even a whiff of impropriety.

I want to wake up and read that Mr. Bush has announced a Manhattan Project to develop renewable energies that will end America's addiction to crude oil by 2010. I want to wake up and read that Mel Gibson just announced that his next film will be called "Moses" and all the profits will be donated to the Holocaust Museum.

Most of all, I want to wake up and read that John Kerry just asked John McCain to be his vice president, because if Mr. Kerry wins he intends not to waste his four years avoiding America's hardest problems -- health care, deficits, energy, education -- but to tackle them, and that can only be done with a bipartisan spirit and bipartisan team.

For a good time call BR-549


(or klik the blue text)

Why is everyone a hyper hamster?

What's today? (That's why.)

Thursday?? ohyeah

Tanks Mac

No prob, Gelis.

(The hamsters are making me loony! )

Iko whatcha mean ... like that midway game'thump a gopher or whack a gopher'

Remember this>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>..

Paul Is Dead

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
The Paul Is Dead hoax was a series of events in the 1960s that led fans of the popular rock band The Beatles to believe that bassist Paul McCartney was actually dead and replaced with a look-alike. McCartney (born June 18, 1942) is not dead.

The hoax really began to build steam by 1969, when Russell Gibb, a radio DJ from Detroit, Michigan, announced that McCartney was dead. Other DJs, television news reporters, newspapers and magazines picked up on the story and began to look for clues.

Members of the media and Beatles fans began to search album artwork and song lyrics for clues about the cover-up and McCartney's supposed death. Hoax believers eventually decided that McCartney had died in a car accident that happened at 5 a.m. on a Wednesday morning (the time and day, mentioned in the song "She's Leaving Home"), and that "he hadn't noticed that the lights had changed" ("A Day In The Life") because he was busy watching the pretty girl on the sidewalk ("Lovely Rita"). According to hoax believers, McCartney had been replaced with William Campbell, the winner of a McCartney look-alike contest.

Other "clues" included:

* The words "number nine, number nine" on the track "Revolution #9" on "The Beatles" (aka The White Album) became "turn me on, dead man, turn me on, dead man" when played backwards. The track also includes other obvious clues, such as the sound of a car crashing, and comments by John which seem to indicate what Paul was doing before he "died" (for example, one comment goes "who can tell what he was saying...his eyes was on fire", while another comment played backwards yields "let me out, let me out!").
* A similar reversal at the end of "I'm So Tired" (also from "The Beatles") revealed "Paul is dead, man, miss him, miss him..."
* Another "The Beatles" track, "Don't Pass Me By", has lyrics that go, "I'm sorry that I doubted you...I was so unfair. You were in a car crash, and you lost your hair..."
* The end of "The Beatles" track "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" has George seem to be calling "Paul, Paul, Paul..." (indicating George missing his colleague).
* Lyrics from the "Sgt. Pepper" track "Good Morning, Good Morning" contain "nothing to do to save his life."
* Another Sgt. Pepper track has these lyrics..."life goes on within you and without you" (from George's "Within You, Without You").
* Hoax believers think that John said "I buried Paul" at the end of "Strawberry Fields Forever" on Magical Mystery Tour (although Lennon claims he is actually saying "cranberry sauce").
* Another Magical Mystery Tour track, "Blue Jay Way", leads hoax believers to think George is giving a eulogy to Paul (with the lyrics "please don't be long, please don't you be very long, please don't be long, or I may be asleep...").
* The line "I believe in yesterday, suddenly, I'm not half the man I used to be, there's a shadow hanging over me. Yesterday came suddenly..." from the song "Yesterday". To hoax believers, this was an admission from McCartney's replacement that he wasn't the same person.
* On the US release, Yesterday and Today, McCartney is sitting inside a trunk. Hoax believers thought that the trunk was supposed to represent McCartney's coffin.
* The Revolver track "She Said, She Said" contains the lyrics "I know what it's like to be dead".
* The Rubber Soul album cover is supposed to look like the other Beatles (and the McCartney look-alike) are looking down into the grave of the real McCartney.
* The Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band cover appears to be a group of mourners standing in front of a freshly dug grave.
* The inside cover of the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album has Paul wearing an emblem on his shirt sleeve whose initials are believed to be O.P.D. (for "officially pronounced dead"). However, it is the emblem of the O.P.P. (Ontario Provincial Police) not O.P.D.
* The yellow flowers on the cover of Sgt. Peppers appear to spell out "PAUL?"
* The Magical Mystery Tour track "I Am The Walrus" clues us in that Paul "died" on a "stupid bloody Tuesday". The chant at the end of the track, played backwards, reveals "Paul Is Dead, Paul Is Dead..." And when played forwards to the end, contains a portion of a BBC radio broadcast of "King Lear" which mentions death. Paul is depicted as a walrus according to both the Magical Mystery Tour album cover and "The Beatles" song "Glass Onion". The depiction of a walrus is another ancient sign of death.
* In a dancing scene in the film Magical Mystery Tour, Paul wears a black carnation while the other three Beatles wear red ones, another indication of death.
* In another scene in the film Magical Mystery Tour, Paul is dressed as an Army Sergeant with a card on his desk that says "I WAS" (indicating that the man WAS Paul).
* On the back cover of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band McCartney is facing backwards, which is supposedly because he was dead and replaced with an imposter in the photograph. (In reality, McCartney could not make the photo session and road manager Mal Evans stood in for him).
* The front cover of Abbey Road is a representation of Paul's funeral procession. Lennon is the clergyman or priest (dressed in white), Ringo the funeral director or pall bearer (formally dressed), Paul the corpse (bare feet & cigarette [Sicilian symbol of death]), and George the grave digger (denim working clothes). Furthermore the license-plate of the white car says LMW 28IF. LMW is said to stand for "Linda McCartney Widow (or Weeps)", and 28IF suggests Paul would have been 28 if he hadn't died. (At the time of the album's release September 26, 1969, Paul was in fact 27.) Additionally, the cigarette in the picture is Paul's right hand, even though Paul is left-handed. On the back cover, a strangely configured and placed "3" in front of the Beatles name indicates three "remaining" Beatles.
* "Come Together" (from Abbey Road) contained these lyrics..."one and one and one is three" (also indicating the three "remaining" Beatles).

In the years after this hoax first began, John Lennon made a couple of jokes about it in various songs, including "Glass Onion" ("Here's another clue for you all/the walrus was Paul"). McCartney himself also made fun of the hoax with the title of his 1993 live album, Paul Is Live.

As of 2004, the Beatles known to be dead are John Lennon (murdered outside of the Dakota building in New York City) and George Harrison (died of cancer).

Because We're Friends

Me and You, we Friends.......

You Fight, I Fight........

You Hurt, I Hurt........

You Cry, I Cry.........

You Jump Off a Bridge....





----- I'm Gonna Miss Your Dumb ass!!!!

You can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, but you can't pick your friends nose ..........

Your turn

This experiment was in the interest of science.

Four worms were placed into four separate jars.
The first worm was put into a jar of alcohol.
The second worm was put into a jar of cigarette smoke.
The third worm was put into a jar of sperm.
The fourth worm was put into a jar of soil.

After one day, these were the results:
The first worm in alcohol -- dead.
Second worm in cigarette smoke -- dead.
Third worm in sperm -- dead.
Fourth worm in soil -- alive.
So the Science teacher asked the class, "What can you learn
from this experiment."

One raised their hand and answered:

"As long as you drink, smoke, and have sex, you won't have worms."

THE SANDY SHORE

Down along the sandy shore
Where fishers' lights are twinkling,
I can hear upon the mountainside
A sheep bell faintly tinkling.

As day fades gently into night,
The frog band starts to play,
And sings throughout the balmy night
Until the break of day.

Slowly I drift into dreamland,
And wake into the early dawn,
To find that the frog band is silent,
And the fishers' lights are gone.

The night awakes and daylight breaks,
And the sun peeps o'er the mountains.
All nature sings of lovely things
As the dew melts into tiny fountains.

I love to wander back in thought
Along that sandy shore,
And as memories golden o'er me stream,
Relive those sweet days of yore

(Poem by my grandmother, "Minnie"-- love abigail)

Satellite to test Einstein predictions

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- A satellite designed to test two fundamental predictions made by Albert Einstein about the universe is ready for launch, 45 years after it was first proposed, NASA and Stanford University officials said Friday.

Since 1959, Gravity Probe B has overcome a half-dozen attempts at cancellation, countless technical hurdles and several delayed launches. The NASA-funded, university-developed spacecraft is now scheduled to begin its mission following an April 17 liftoff from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.

The unmanned, Earth-orbiting satellite is designed to test two of Einstein's predictions about the nature of space and time, and how the Earth and other bodies warp and twist the fabric that combines the two.

At the spacecraft's heart are four pingpong-sized balls of quartz, the most perfect spheres ever made. To ensure accuracy, the balls must be kept chilled to near absolute zero, in the vacuum of the largest thermos ever flown in space, and isolated from any disturbances in the quietest environment ever produced, said Anne Kinney, director of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's division of astronomy and physics.

Once in space and set spinning, the orientation of the balls should change -- unless Einstein was wrong.

He proposed in 1916 that space and time form a structure that can be curved by the presence of a body, like the Earth, warping it like the dimple created by the heft of bowling ball resting on a soft mattress. That distortion accounts for gravity.

Two years later, others suggested that the rotation of such a mass should drag space-time with it, twisting the structure of the fabric.

If theory holds, the mass and rotation of the Earth, 397 miles below the probe, should throw the alignment of the spinning balls off kilter in subtle but measurable ways.

The warping effect has been measured before. The twisting effect, called frame-dragging, has never been directly detected. Gravity Probe B aims to detect both.

Fair and balanced and whatever ..... bookmark

Caveats:


Solipsism Warning:

The consumer should be aware that he or she may be the only entity in the universe, and therefore that any perceived defects in product quality are the consumer's own fault.

Determinism Safety Advisory:

Every citizen be advised that despite the possibility that his or her acts are all entirely predetermined by the blind mechanical nature of the universe and are therefore unavoidable and inescapable, he or she will still incur a legal responsibility and liability for any torts, violations, misdemeanors, or felonies he or she commits.

Knowledge-Definition Warning:

Because knowledge is defined for the purpose of this product literature as "justified true belief", the manufacturer cannot prove that they "know" any of the information provided with this product to be true, correct, complete, or consistent because they cannot demonstrate their internal belief states through the principle of Philosphic Privacy.

Cartesian Evil Genius Alert:

The reader is advised that he or she may be subject to an illusion generated by an evil genius, and that his or her "sensory fibers" may be falsely manipulated at any time with neither advance warning nor any possible legal remedy.

Epistemological Denotation Warning:

The consumer must understand that due to the a-priori impossibility of assuring a shared denotation amongst independent agents, none of the advertising material, product literature, instructions, or safety warnings (including this one), associated with this product may contain what the consumer perceives to be factual information.

Non-Universal Ethics Notice:

Due to the possibility that a common notion of ethics are not universally shared by all sentient beings, and that therefore the manufacturer may have entirely different concept of "fairness", "equity", "honesty", and "integrity" than the consumer, the consumer should not expect the product purchased to conform in any way to the advertised properties of the product.

Godelian Product Disclaimer:

As it has been proven that there are many true but unproveable statements, the manufacturer cannot be held liable for any of its unsupported product claims.

Penrose Addendum to Godelian Disclaimer:

Despite the above warning, the manufacturer is confident that all its product claims are true because of its mystically acquired and computationally unrepudiable organic intuition. Unfortunately, the manufacturer cannot in any way demonstrate that its intuition is correct, or indeed that it has an intuition.

Philosopher-General's Existentialist Tobacco Products Label:

Warning! this product has been found to cause cancer and ephysema, and to lead to increased likelihood of strokes and heart disease. However, as the Universe is a soulless waste inhabited by unthinking machines it doesn't matter in the least whether you smoke or not. Go ahead, light up, it's all the same to me if you live or die.

Hi Frank

Why No One Ever Wants To Play Golf With A Philosopher

Have you ever wondered why no one wants to join you, a philosopher, for a round of golf? The fact of the matter is that, on the golf course, philosophers are a truly tedious lot--always have been!!

No one ever wanted to play with Kant since he was such a stickler about following the rules. He claimed that it was Imperative to do so. Kropotkin, on the other hand, never adhered to any rule. Stories abound about how he teed off from the seventh green, taking aim toward the fourteenth hole. Most golfers considered Kropotkin positively dangerous.

Hearing Thales lament about his lastest round was tiresome. One would think that every hole was nothing but water. Admittedly, Hegel had a more positive frame of mind, but that was no better. He kept claiming that everybodys game was constantly improving, approaching an Absolute Ideal. Marx got so tired of hearing this that he turned Hegel on his head.

Sartre was positively annoying . He would pontificate about how a person is only a bad golfer because that is what he chooses to be. That never sat well with anyone who had just finished a bad round. Berkeley was a bit more subtle, but just as damning. He would claim that the game was entirely mental. That sent Malebranch into despair. He felt that it would take an act of God for your mind to be able to control your body. dHolbach, on the other hand, would attribute his bad rounds on the pre-existing conditions in the universe; he swore that there was nothing one could do to change the outcome.

Philosophers have also managed to take the fun out of any tournament. Hume was skeptical about any reported score. He wanted proof, but would never accept any of the presented evidence as sufficient. Diogenes was just as Cynical, claiming that he had scoured the world looking for an honest golfer. Meanwhile Paley would go around showing everybody this watch he found.

One had to wait endlessly in the clubhouse for Zeno to get started; it seemed like he could never reach the first hole. Abelard was the only one who didn't seem to mind; he was content to sit in the bar and moon over Heloise.

Strangely, though, the philosopher everyone hated the most was Plato. It is not that he ever did anything wrong. In fact, he had perfect Form. People just couldnt stand the fact that he never shot anything but Par.