Jesus Christ, Someone Killed My Cabbie!

"What, you ain't gonna talk to me?"

"Did you curse or want to talk?"

"Sorry, wanna to talk," as me and He, we be friends who do try to use "proper" english and yet still disobey spell check at times for effect in dialect.

Breathe in the good through the nostrils; let out the bad through the mouth.

Count to 10.  Ten breaths.

"Talk.  Listen please, when I lost my phone, the Mears dispatcher, Heather, said she only had 1 Matt working that night and he brought me back my phone, going out of his way, and I only tipped him $3 for the second trip."

"$3?"

"'Tweren't a cell phone but a walk around Christmas gift from my sainted sis' who still talks to me and had 2 more.  Iffen I'd of known it his last night on earth, would have given him my BOA Cubs debit card and my Personal Identification #."

"What do you want me to tell you besides Ecclesiastes chapter 3?

"Something I haven't read or heard since a child?"

"Every step a human takes leads to their last."

"'Ceptin' me, right?"

"Sure," He said with a wink and ironic smile for he to me looks like the statue at my Trinity Lutheran Church, downtown Orlando above the altar, reaching down to me.

He really doesn't "talk" to me, but let "my" fiction be.  It makes me happy even if imbued with irony.

[According to a paid obituary, donations for Matthew's son Christopher can also be sent to the McLeod Law Firm at 48 East Main Street in Apopka.]
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/os-vfw-breakfast-cab-driver-killed-20110129,0,2698563.story

McLeod Law Firm, Apopka, FL: http://www.mcleodlawfirm.com/contact.aspx

Did Something Happen in Egypt While I Slept?

Apparently so.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jan/28/egypt-cairo-protesters-defy-curfew-elbaradei-mubarak

International Holocaust Remembrance Day: "Auschwitz was liberated on January 27, 1945"

[The anniversary of the camp's liberation has been observed by different groups and nationalities for some time, but it was only in November 2005 that the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 60/7, deeming January 27 an international day of remembrance.

Before the commencement of the ceremonies Thursday, German President Christian Wulff said that each generation must grapple anew with the questions of how civilization broke down in the Nazi era and work to prevent such crimes from ever being repeated.]  emphasis added 

http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/europe-marks-international-holocaust-remembrance-day-1.339539

Ken Bradshaw: "Because every wave is different."

[“I was trying to make my point without getting in trouble.”

Trouble? Ken, like which kind? This is a man who rides waves so heavy they shake the earth when they break. Who has sacrificed comfort and wealth to do it. Who has willingly suffered the derision of conventional minds for the choices he has made. Who recently married for the first time, and to a much younger woman. Who may give her children. Who knows that she may break his heart. Who accepts that we are all alone when we die. Who rides with a single-mindedness that no one can equal—crouched low on his board in a predatory stance, left foot forward, body coiled, intently assessing the contours ahead, swerving and carving through the salt water. And for what? To do it again without repetition. And why? Because he is an athlete. Because every wave is different.

Last winter was an El Niño winter, and conditions on Oahu were extreme. Most of the inside breaks were trashed. The crowds of pretenders stayed away. Bradshaw reveled in it, taking on giant waves at the outside breaks over volcanic reefs a mile or more offshore. These were huge ocean swells that rolled in from distant storms and reared up to twice their height over the shallows, forming vertical faces that stood 50 feet high before curling and lunging forward with unfathomable force. Fifty-foot waves are five times higher than the highest waves that most surfers ever ride. Bradshaw rode them in obscurity, with no expectation of gain, absorbing the hits and hold-downs, spitting up blood, and continuing on for hours. His subsequent tumble down the stairs seems minor by comparison, though it broke two of his bones. We spoke about it the next day. He described his loss of balance, one foot missing a step and the other stepping into air, and the perception of inevitability that followed. He said that because he is accustomed to falling from heights the tumble seemed to happen in slow motion. He curled to protect his head, rolled in flight, and bounced once hard on landing. I sympathized with him for his injuries, but expressed greater concern for the stairs.]

http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2011/02/big-wave-surfer-201102?currentPage=all

hat tip the Agonist

Canopy of Greed Holding the World Down

[(Reuters) - Poverty and unemployment reared their heads at the World Economic Forum on Thursday, with speakers urging the elite audience to bridge a growing gap between booming multinationals and the jobless poor.

Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou, who also chairs the Socialist International group of center-left parties, said the global crisis had led to an "unsustainable" race to the bottom in labor standards and social protection in developed nations...

Maurice Levy, chairman and chief executive of French advertising giant Publicis, said there was "a huge suspicion about CEOs, bankers, corporations."

"People do not understand that these large corporations are doing extremely well, while their lives have not improved and without the support of the people, there is no way we will be able to grow," he told a panel discussion.

"We have been led by greed. We have been led by only the bottom line, the profit and we have sacrificed the workers in order to please the stockholders."]  emphasis added

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/01/27/us-davos-greed-idUSTRE70Q75Z20110127

Egyptian Government Kills Internet to Quell Unrest

[Computerworld - The Internet blockade imposed by the Egyptian government in response to growing civilian unrest is unprecedented, both in its nature and scope, according to network monitoring firms.


Unlike other incidents where governments in Iran, Tunisia and elsewhere tried to control the flow of information by throttling specific Internet services and sites, the Egyptian government seems to have simply pulled the plug on all Internet services nationwide.


As of this morning, just a few dozen networks inside the country, including the Egyptian stock exchange, appeared to be up and running. Usually, between 3,000 and 3,500 are operating on a daily basis, according to Internet monitoring firm Renesys. It is still not entirely clear what these networks are or how they are still up and running given the total shutdown of Internet connectivity.


"This is on a different level entirely," said James Cowie, CTO at Renesys. "There's no cutting off the finger to save the patient here. This really is the Armageddon approach."] emphasis added
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9206923/Egypt_s_Net_blockage_an_Armageddon_approach_?source=CTWNLE_nlt_pm_2011-01-28

Wave of Police Shootings

[A spate of shooting attacks on law enforcement officers has authorities concerned about a war on cops.

In just 24 hours, at least 11 officers were shot. The shootings included Sunday attacks at traffic stops in Indiana and Oregon, a Detroit police station shooting that wounded four officers, and a shootout at a Port Orchard, Wash., Wal-Mart that injured two deputies. On Monday morning, two officers were shot dead and a U.S. Marshal was wounded by a gunman in St. Petersburg, Fla.

On Thursday, two Miami-Dade, Fla., detectives were killed by a murder suspect they were trying to arrest.More U.S. news

"It's not a fluke," said Richard Roberts, spokesman for the International Union of Police Associations. "There's a perception among officers in the field that there’s a war on cops going on.]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41235743/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/

Sophisticated Bomb on MLK Parade Route

Must have a progressive bomber in Spokane, never listened to Beck or Limbaugh, .

[The bomb found along a Martin Luther King Day parade route in Spokane, Wash., may have been packed with a blood-thinning chemical that's found in rat poison in an effort to inflict worse injuries.

Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich told theSpokesman-Review that the bomb -- which officials have already described as sophisticated, with the potential to be devastating -- had some sort of chemical in it, and authorities have speculated that it may be a chemical found in rat poison. The bomb, which was defused without incident last Monday, has been sent for testing to a lab at the Marine Corps base in Quantico, Va..

..the bomb was also packed with shrapnel.

The theory is that someone hit with a piece of shrapnel covered in an anti-coagulant is more likely to bleed to death. Israeli officials haveclaimed in the past that Palestinian terrorists were using rat poison to make their bombs more deadly.]

http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/01/spokane_official_mlk_day_bomb_may_have_been_filled.php?ref=fpblg

A Style Question: 2 spaces after a sentence ending period?

Recently, the internet told me NOT to place 2 spaces after a sentence ending period.

Silly moi, but I proudly adopt the title of curmudgeon, dinosaur or choose your preferred perjorative--poltroon anyone?--and will ever type placing 2 spaces after a sentence ending period just as learned as a lad.

One ought still spell "endeavour" as bloody well "endeavour" springs from a rich history of actual English, history, and even a space shuttle name NASA once misspelled on a banner: Endeavour.

Of course with me, this does verge on affectation and adopt archaic English spelling such as "colour," et cetera.

I just love to piss off spell check tools even though 1 taught me to spell grammar with 2 "a"s.

Red line me, damn youse spell check tools.

Don't blame software nor programmers nor engineers nor even journalists who can't even fail to use an apostrophe wrongly as in "last week's games."

Blame instead the evolutionary nature of our English language, now devolving with text tweeting twits trying communicating in 140 characters or less: ROFLMAO, BFF, or whatever cursed contractions people who don't actually learn to write use instead with that media.

So, place commas properly with appositives.

Use "well " as the adverb to modify a verb instead of "good: "We played good."

Join me, ye journalists, scribes, downtrodden, disgraced dinosaurs, .

Join in the noble fight.

"Rage, rage against the dying of the [language]"

Then, have a couple libations of your choice--choose beer--then fuhgedaboutit.  You can't hold back the tide of evolving Engish.

Just try to teach your children well with respect for style, spelling and grammar, honoring what came before while still allowing their style to evolve.  Teach Your Children [Live]

Kids, honour thy father and mother.

"What's the least you can believe in and [become] a Christian?"

["What's the least I can believe and still be a Christian?" What a great question! Danny's provocative question prompted me to write a new book, using his question as the title. Part one of the book presents 10 things Christians don't need to believe. In short, Christians don't need to believe in closed-minded faith. For example, Christians don't need to believe that:

• God causes cancer, car wrecks and other catastrophes
• Good Christians don't doubt
• True Christians can't believe in evolution
• Woman can't be preachers and must submit to men
• God cares about saving souls but not saving trees
• Bad people will be "left behind" and then fry in hell
• Jews won't make it to heaven
• Everything in the Bible should be taken literally
• God loves straight people but not gay people
• It's OK for Christians to be judgmental and obnoxious

On the other hand, there are things Christians do need to believe, which is the focus of part two of my book. They need to believe in Jesus -- his life, teachings, example, death and resurrection. A great benefit of these beliefs is that they provide promising answers to life's most profound questions including:

• Who is Jesus?
• What matters most?
• Am I accepted?
• Where is God?
• What brings fulfillment?
• What about suffering?
• Is there hope?
• Is the church still relevant?
• Who is the Holy Spirit?
• What is God's dream for the world?]  emphasis added

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/martin-thielen/whats-the-least-you-can-b_b_811353.html

So people wonder why I say I mainly talk to Jesus and not His Daddy nor to Jesus Christ.  Can't really believe in the old, bearded, angry white dude of GREAT wrath.  As for using the term Christ, Jesus never used it in the Gospels to my knowledge.  Tried to convince a Mormon that Jesus also character of God and therefore worshipped as Son of God and The Christ and could only find in the Gospel of John (chapter 11 or 14, Pastor?  {John10:30)} where He tells the Jews that if they have seen him, they've seen the Father, which they deemed as blasphemous.

Besides, see Jesus' role as the forgiving one, although he did preach brimstone as well as peace and love.  But my job, 'tain't judging but doing, trying to become a christian.  Also don't use capital "C" when calling myself 1.  Google spell check also hates MY spelling.

So do prefer Gospel'n' rather than 'Pistl'n and do take the Old T' with a grain of salt'.

peace

Postscript:  OK, Lord,  I do have a kind of problem with judgmental "Christians" who never fail to condemn other humans to Hell yet I try to not judge them--except for the RepubliKKKan ones.  Hey, I'm working on it so don't damn me!  Don't Damn Me

Well, might as well lay my life out on line if not ON the line.

Heck, people at Campus Crusade for Christ gave me a job in the payroll department for 4 years tolerating for a time my progressive side.  As things go, they eventually let me go so filed for unemployment under the laws of my state of FL.

While a top CCC for Christ official testified in front of the Orange County, FL, county commission, on nature of the corporation as a church resourcing organization in hearing to build their new world center out near Lake Nona on donated land in a very rural area, another testified under oath in a FL Dept of Labor hearing that CCC was a church and therefore did not have to pay unemployment.

After prevailing at the Dept. level ,the Unemployment Appeals Commission, and FL 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, they had to pay me a pittance because of, frankly, my failure to file for weeks claimed.

Now, read the "funny" part.

After a number of years, maybe 10, called my old supervisor--sort of on a 6 step program as still drink beer but at least have refrained recently since May '10 from pouring vodka into the hole in my soul--to tell him how much he'd help me learn about life and not just Jesus but his whole knowledge of the Bible and role as parent and person.

His wife answered the phone and refused to even allow me to leave a voice mail msg.

Still wroth me even after a decade, she judged me, "I don't where you are in your walk with the Lord, but you should never have sued Campus Crusade for Christ!," taking me completely aback.

I kind of looked at it from the "render under to Caesar" thing, something which reasonable christians can disagree on and not judge each other.

If he gives me permission, I will publish his name and staff number for contributions to support his ministry because because I think him a good and decent man, husband, and father even though disagreeing with his politics and biblical exegetics.

Lord, forgive me for this, but you can contribute for his family and mission through searching for his staff #, #0109310.

I (Almost) Quit the Cubs

[...I'm quitting sports. It's a matter of self preservation.

An anecdote: At 10:00 pm EST last night, I called on the phone my younger brother Reece, 15. Upon answering, he immediately asked, "Why did you do this to me?"


The phone call took place shortly after the New York Jets fell heartbreakingly short in the AFC Championship Game. My brother was begging to know why I had made molded him into a Jets fan, why I had influenced him from an early age to have such a fervent passion for an often hapless football team. Why had I inflicted such suffering on him?


...I had created an addict, in my own image. And once again, with a Ben Roethelisberger first down pass, our hearts had been broken, our spirits crushed.


Why do we do this? What sense of joy, beyond fleeting adrenaline rushes, does it bring us? Nightly, six months out of the year, I tune into my New York Mets...


The sum total of what I received in exchange: a soul-destroying loss in the National League Championship Series...


Of course, that loss of self and love was followed by two summers of crushing late season collapses, and two subsequent seasons of misery, so the baseball injuries have only gotten worse.


Johann Santana, the Mets' best pitcher, had surgery on his elbow last year. I check in on his status more than I do my own. And I'm a heart patient.]
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jordan-zakarin/i-quit-a-jets-fans-lament_b_813109.html

The Clash: "Lost in the Supermarket"`

Lost in the supermarket indeed. So break off a Lincoln, or Hamilton or Grant or brothers and  to help your fellow humans.  Links to the right.

peace

The Clash: "London Calling"

US Fascist Terrorism

Not as isolated as you might want to think.  Dammit, guess I'll have to disagree with Dad when he spouts tea party insanity.  Golly, next Christmas might become a bitch.

http://crooksandliars.com/david-neiwert/violence-directed-liberal-and-govern

More Humans Needing Help

[Tashi has a husband, called Wash on her blog. Wash was diagnosed a few months after they married with glioblastoma multiforme, stage four. For those of you who are not in the neuro-know, glioblastoma multiforme at that stage carries a one-hundred-percent mortality rate. The primary population diagnosed with it is men in their fifties..

One in forty-three million people will be diagnosed with a glio at that age.

I thought *I* had it bad: one in five hundred thousand people will be diagnosed with my particular type of oral cancer this year. I have oodles of company when compared to Wash.

Wash has survived past expectations: he's lived fourteen months with either a tumor or the threat of the tumor coming back, which is *huge*. Unfortunately, that survival has come with costs: Both he and Tashi have had to drop out of school. Tashi had to quit her job once it became clear that Wash couldn't be left home alone due to loss of memory and inhibition.

They survive now on state aid, which, being as they live in Arizona, isn't much. Plus, Tashi has to reapply every so often to the various programs in order for them to keep covering rent...

She needs money. Plain and simple: she needs cash to buy drugs, or pay for gas, or pay the heating bill. She's asking people to adopt a bill for her here. Please help.]

http://head-nurse.blogspot.com/2011/01/okay-people-you-want-something-to-do.html

Full story here: Love until Cancer Doth Part

Grateful Dead: "Sugar Magnolia"

The Day My America Died: 8 January 2011

Having nephews and then nieces saved my life in many ways: wanting to do better than before, set a good example, keep a stiff upper lip in adversity.

Held all four as squirming infants on my knee, had the boys visit me in the to them big city of Orlando--Michael wore me out as had not had roommate for years nor job with much human interaction (graveyard shift) and he chattered non-stop, forcing me to listen and care and interact; while his brother David settled for riding around the Orena and babbling 'bout meeting Shaq, also challenging me to hear, listen, and care..

Now the boys can drink and teenage nieces tolerate their dinosaur uncle while he tries to keep up a brave front.

Nevertheless, some days my "gravity fails and negativity won't pull me through," leaving me no words for my nieces.  Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues

What if one were on a high school student council and inexplicably got shot, what would I tell her sister and mine?

Nothing.

An embarasing admission for 1 as glib as me but at rare times words fail even me.

So maybe would fall back on my last line of defense.

Lie.

Lie to them just like I lie to myself in the morning to get myself out of bed, affirming the life giving lie my acts can make my corner of the world the tiniest bit better.

Yes, live the lie of hope and spit in the face of my eventual demise and keep hope alive my nieces and nephews can build a world just a bit better than the 1 they  inherited.

Lie to myself and perform daily ablutions, dress, and seek 1 positive thing to do and learn on the day Life gave me.

[Christina-Taylor Green's short life was pinned between two national tragedies: She was born Sept. 11, 2001, and she died as a gunman apparently targeting Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) shot 20 people in Tucson.]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/09/AR2011010902186.html

US Representative John Dingell Reading Violent Rhetoric

Even as a staunch defender of First Amendment rights to Free Speech--1 who will defend the right of expression especially for those whos disagree with me, defend until at least mild discomfort for myself--perhaps we in the United States can agree as a polity can agree on metaphors to avoid.

To wit, a list compiled at Talking Points memo:
1. Refrain from telling supporters that winning the election may require active exercise of their "second amendment" rights.
2. Refrain from suggesting it's time for "armed revolution", even if Thomas Jefferson once kinda sorta suggested that.
3. Refrain from holding political fundraisers focused around use of automatic weapons, especially target practices with initials, name or images of your political opponent.
4. Refrain from telling supporters you want them to be "armed and dangerous."
5. Refrain from making campaign posters with opponent's head in gun sights.
6. Refrain from saying that bullets will work if ballots don't.
7. Suggest that supporters not bring weapons to opponents' political rallies.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2011/01/tpm_guide_to_the_perplexed_1.php#more

Tim Tebow Walks on Water, Leads Homeless Man to ESPN Fantasy Football Win

[Tebow helps homeless man win big in fantasy football

by Jeff Barlis

Perhaps it was divine intervention.

How else could one explain a homeless man beating 3.1 million people to win ESPN’s prize-eligible Fantasy Football league and a $3,500 gift card?

Well, Florida Gators icon Tim Tebow did his part.

The man, 33-year-old Nathan Harrington of Salem, Mass., became homeless after a 2009 car accident left him with nerve damage and unable to work. He was eventually forced to move his fiancee, and their 3-year-old son into a motel.

To play fantasy football, Harrington said he knocked on strangers’ doors at the motel, asking to use their computers, used the computer at his father’s nursing home, called in roster moves to friends and swung by his mom’s house and the library when he could.

Going into the last week of the season and sitting in seventh place, Harrington says his decision to start Tebow in the final, fateful week is what put him on top.

“I was sitting at my mother’s computer going nuts,” Harrington told The Salem News,recalling the debate about whether to put Tebow in the lineup. “I thought ‘I’m going to live with this guy, or die with this guy.’ I put him in, then took him out. I was thinking ‘I can’t put everything on Tebow.’ ”

Then, Harrington’s 17-year-old son, Nathan Jr., chimed in.

“Just go with Tebow,” he told his dad.

“This is right before 1 p.m., right at crunch time, I had a matter of minutes to get him in,” Harrington said.

Tebow came through with two passing touchdowns and another on the ground in a 27-point fantasy performance. It put Harrington on top by 0.8 points, a final result so close that even a single yard difference might have cost him the top prize.

Harrington says he is selling the $3,500 Best Buy gift card to his mother for $2,500 and will use the money to help move his family into a new apartment.]  emphasis added

http://editorsdesk.blogs.gatorsports.com/10294/tebow-helps-homeless-man-win-big-in-fantasy-football/

Might as well call it divine intervention.  Now, Lord, about my Cubbies...

"Don't Feel Like [Blogging] but I am Today"

Ramones: "Gimme, Gimme, Shock Treatment" (4th 0f 4)

Hat tip Lawyers, Guns, and Money: http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2011/01/r-i-p-don-kirschner

Domestic US Terrorism Targets MLK Parade in Spokane

[An official familiar with the case has said the bomb left along a Martin Luther King Day parade route in Spokane, Washington had a devastating potential to inflict a number of casualties. In an Associated Press article, the official is quoted as saying "They haven't seen anything like this in this country," and "This was the worst device, and most intentional device, I've ever seen."

Thankfully, a city worker noticed the bomb before the parade marched past the device last Monday. When law enforcement officials saw a wire coming out of the package the bomb squad was called and the parade was re-routed. The bomb squad was able to defuse the bomb, and now officials are discovering the sophisticated nature of the device. The device was designed to be detonated remotely through something akin to a garage door opener. Shrapnel was also strategically placed in the package to cause more injuries after to anyone within the blast range.

The FBI has said the time and location of the device are inescapable, leading them to believe there was a social or political agenda behind the attempted attack. The FBI has called the attempt an act of "domestic terrorism."

Despite the gravity of the story, the mainstream has paid relatively little attention to the story...]
http://www.examiner.com/political-buzz-in-national/mlk-parade-bomb-spokane-called-worst-device-ever-seen-this-country

Nicotine Now Killing Bees: Maybe the Whole Human Race?

"A new generation of pesticides is making honeybees far more susceptible to disease, even at tiny doses, and may be a clue to the mysterious colony collapse disorder that has devastated bees across the world, the US government's leading bee researcher has found. Yet the discovery has remained unpublished for nearly two years since it was made by the US Department of Agriculture's Bee Research Laboratory.

The release of such a finding from the American government's own bee lab would put a major question mark over the use of neonicotinoid insecticides – relatively new compounds which mimic the insect-killing properties of nicotine, and which are increasingly used on crops in the US, Britain and around the world.

Bayer, the German chemicals giant which developed thei nsecticides and makes most of them, insists that they are safe for bees if used properly, but they have already been widely linked to bee mortality."
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/nature/exclusive-bees-facing-a-poisoned-spring-2189267.html

Photo Essay: " Haiti, Hope and Heartbreak"

http://motherjones.com/photoessays/2011/01/haiti-mark-murrmann

"Compassion for the Other"

"Compassion for the other comes out of our ability to accept ourselves. Until we realize both our own weaknesses and our own privileges, we can never tolerate lack of status and depth of weakness in the other."

- Joan Chittister

From Sojourners

"Big Baby" Davis Bashes Dwight Howard

“Just make him a finesse player,’’ Davis said. “He’s a great player, you know, but he’s not the hardest to guard. I think it’s easy to guard him.’’
http://www.boston.com/sports/basketball/celtics/articles/2011/01/18/pierce_wasnt_late_to_help_out/


D. Howard C 43:08 10-19 13-18 0-0 -6 5 13 3 0 1 3 1 33

U2: "Bad"

U2: "Pride in the Name of Love"

Cage the Elephant: "Back Against the Wall"

"Guess I'm a coward scared to face the man I am."

Who Knew? Rules for Raising Daughters

[But, help may be at hand, thanks to a group of private girls' school headteachers who next month will publish a book offering tips on how to raise daughters. However, experts are questioning the value of advice from those working in the sheltered world of independent schools...

[But not everyone believes that people such as Dr Wright, who is head of £28,950-a-year St Mary's Calne boarding school in Wiltshire, are best qualified to comment on most parents' experience of bringing up girls in Britain...

Davina McCall, Broadcaster

"Girls are fabulous and complicated; I've had extraordinary luck with my mother. The trick is to make women feel confident and imbue them with respect for the world around them."

Martha Lane FoxOnline entrepreneur

"The worst thing you can do is give them a false self. I see it a lot in boarding schools where girls arrive independent and diverse and all end up the same: wearing the same clothes and having the same expressions. That's a catastrophe. What you want to do is encourage difference."]

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/here-come-the-girls-how-to-bring-up-daughters-2185727.html

Allah Akbar Algebra

Despite fevered fetishes of American exceptionalists, what exists now has a foundation on what came before, and much of what we consider "modern" came from Baghdad.  Ignorant savages indeed.

[The story begins in AD830. The place: The House of Wisdom, Baghdad, Persia in the Islamic Golden Age. Works from around the world were brought to Baghdad for translation. Scholars of Babylonian astronomy, Indian numbers and Greek mathematics all came to the richest city in the world to embrace its powerful intellectual culture. A paper mill had been built in the city, and due to this minor industrial revolution, there was a proliferation of books and libraries.

Mohammad Bin Musa Al-Khwarizmi was the father of algebra. He introduced the idea of the zero (brought from India) as a place-holder in arithmetic, which give our calculations their columns of hundreds, tens and units. He also wrote the book that probably changed our world as much as any other: Hisab al-jabr wa al-muqabala, which translates as "The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing". From al-jabr came the word "algebra".

The study of al-jabr progressed in the East, but it took hundreds of years for the scholars of western Europe to advance. Most notable of those who took the Lady Algebra to her next incarnation was Leonardo of Pisa, more commonly known as Fibonacci (c1170-1250).

Fibonacci, the most talented western mathematician of the Middle Ages, spread throughout Europe the use of the Hindu-Arabic numeral system, the system we use today. He also showed that new methods could be used to find solutions of some cubic equations, something that many students still learn, but which, at the time, was a stupendous advance.

The essence of algebra is solving or "reducing" equations to their simplest form. Taking away the confusion and the noise, and making sense of it all. To do that, we have to find specific methods. These methods are known as algorithms – the Latin and English corruption of al-Khwarizmi's name. You can try to solve algebraic equations in different ways. Guessing at solutions, for instance, is one way. It is possible, if you try for long enough, to guess the exact solution of a simple equation. Another way to find a solution is by means of geometric construction. The Greeks favoured this. But it is the invention of further algorithms that has driven, and will continue to drive forward, the language of algebra.]
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/carol-vorderman-when-x--y--z-the-goddess-algebra-smiles-and-i-worship-her-2185633.html

Haiti: Lack of Potable Water and World Cares Naught

[Port-au-Prince, Haiti -- On a Sunday afternoon in Camp Kasim, water is nowhere to be found. Once the Oxfam-supplied tanks run dry for the weekend, they will not be refilled until Monday. If cholera were to strike on a Sunday, life-saving rehydration may be but a theoretical possibility.


The cholera epidemic, which has now claimed the lives of over 3,000 people, is only the most recent and urgent symptom of a larger and ongoing violation of the right to water in Haiti. Cholera represents a special threat to the one million internally displaced people (IDPs) living in camps that often lack access to water and toilets.


For cholera, a disease that is waterborne and kills by dehydration, access to clean water is imperative to both prevention and treatment. Despite this, the cholera response has not led to significant improvements in access to clean water.]
http://www.alternet.org/story/149504/haiti_still_lacks_safe_drinking_water_and_the_international_community_is_partly_to_blame

"Chicken" McNuggets: Half Chicken, Half Stuff

[Do you put dimethylpolysiloxane, an anti-foaming agent made of silicone, in your chicken dishes? How about tertiary butylhydroquinone (TBHQ), a chemical preservative so deadly just five grams can kill you?

These are just two of the ingredients in a McDonald's Chicken McNugget. Only 50 percent of a McNugget is actually chicken. The other half includes corn derivatives, sugars, leavening agents and completely synthetic ingredients.

There's no doubt processed food like that from McDonald's is not part of a healthful diet, and I'm grateful I've never had a chicken McNugget. But man {most}y Americans cannot say the same.

This sentiment was echoed by Federal Judge Robert Sweet in a lawsuit against the restaurant chain in 2003: "Chicken McNuggets, rather than being merely chicken fried in a pan, are a McFrankenstein creation of various elements not utilized by the home cook."

Time Magazine reported that Judge Sweet "questioned whether customers understood the risks of eating McDonald's chicken over regular chicken."

Seven years later, I still wonder whether McDonald's customers truly understand the risks of consuming fast food on a regular basis.] emphasis added
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-mercola/whats-infast-food_b_805190.html?utm_source=DailyBrief&utm_campaign=011311&utm_medium=email&utm_content=BlogEntry&utm_term=Daily+Brief

"What can mere mortals do to me?"

[When hard pressed, I cried to the LORD;
  he brought me into a spacious place. 
The LORD is with me; I will not be afraid.
  What can mere mortals do to me?]

Psalm 118:5,6

Habitat for Humanity: Building Haiti

On January 12, 2010, an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.0 struck the Caribbean nation of Haiti just 10 miles west of the capital, Port-au-Prince. The earthquake damaged nearly 190,000 houses, of which 105,000 were completely destroyed. Of the more than two million affected survivors, 1.3 million are still displaced today."  (emphasis added)
http://www.habitat.org/disaster/active_programs/haiti_earthquake.aspx?tr=y&auid=7610872

G 'N' R': Civil War

Speakers broke so have no clue on sound quality.  Hey, when did having no clue stop me from expressing an opinion?"