Welcome to ...

The place where the world comes together in honesty and mirth.
Windmills Tilted, Scared Cows Butchered, Lies Skewered on the Lance of Reality ... or something to that effect.


Sunday, July 26, 2009

Native American Community Adopts LED Street Lighting

From Treehugger:

Eastern Band of Cherokee adopts Lumec LED lighting image
Image credit: Philips Lumec LED and the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians of western North Carolina

Eastern Cherokee Band Chooses LED Street Lighting


LED streetlights are gaining momentum - from Dusseldorf's replacement of gas lamps for LEDs, to Anchorage's LED street light plan that, it is said, will save the city $360,000 a year, this seems to be the cutting edge of street lighting technology. Now a Native American community in western North Carolina looks set to become the latest community to choose LEDs to light their town and pave the way toward a more energy efficient future.

Article continues: Native American Community Adopts LED Street Lighting

Giant 'soap bubble' found floating in space

The "Cygnus Bubble" nebula may actually be a cylinder that is being seen from one of its ends. This image was taken with the Kitt Peak Mayall 4-metre telescope in Arizona (Image: Travis A. Rector/U of Alaska Anchorage/Heidi Schweiker/NOAO)

Giant 'soap bubble' found floating in space

It looks like a soap bubble or perhaps even a camera fault, but a newly discovered object is actually the ghost of a star like our sun

Plants get a boost from love hormone

The "cuddle chemical" oxytocin is being put to a different use by farmers in India: boosting the growth of pumpkins and cucumbers.

Police Bust Canary Fighting Ring In Shelton

Multiple state law enforcement agencies busted up a bird fighting ring in the town of Shelton Sunday morning.

Canary Fighting Ring

Dillinger's derringer nets $95,600 at auction

A gun once carried by bank robber John Dillinger has brought $95,600 at a Texas auction.

Dillinger's derringer

Woman represented by phony lawyer appeals case

A woman convicted of trying to hire someone to kill her son's father is appealing her case because the man who represented her has been found guilty in North Dakota of impersonating a lawyer.

Woman represented by phony lawyer

Banning Al Jazeera In Palestine

President Mahmoud Abbas' Palestinian Authority has banned Al Jazeera television from any territory under its control because Al Jazeera interviewed senior Palestine Liberation Organisation leader Farouk Kaddoumi and Kaddoumi claimed Abbas "conspired with Israel in 2003 to kill Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat ".

Banning Al Jazeera In Palestine

Wall Steet Vampire Squids

The blood-sucking parasites on Wall Street (who continue to suck, even now) have been likened to many things - most can't be mentioned in polite company - but the assertion they are akin to Vampire Squid is a gross disservice and a huge insult to the squid as this video from National Geographic shows ...

Being Poor

From Bits and Pieces:

Being poor is knowing exactly how much everything costs.

Being poor is getting angry at your kids for asking for all the crap they see on TV.

Being poor is having to keep buying $800 cars because they’re what you can afford, and then having the cars break down on you, because there’s not an $800 car in America that’s worth a damn.

Being poor is hoping the toothache goes away.

Being poor is knowing your kid goes to friends’ houses but never has friends over to yours.

Being poor is going to the restroom before you get in the school lunch line so your friends will be ahead of you and won’t hear you say “I get free lunch” when you get to the cashier.

Being poor is living next to the freeway.

Being poor is coming back to the car with your children in the back seat, clutching that box of Raisin Bran you just bought and trying to think of a way to make the kids understand that the box has to last.

Being poor is wondering if your well-off sibling is lying when he says he doesn’t mind when you ask for help.

Being poor is off-brand toys.

Being poor is a heater in only one room of the house.

Being poor is knowing you can’t leave $5 on the coffee table when your friends are around.

Being poor is hoping your kids don’t have a growth spurt.

Being poor is stealing meat from the store, frying it up before your mom gets home and then telling her she doesn’t have [to] make dinner tonight because you’re not hungry anyway.

Being poor is Goodwill underwear.

Being poor is not enough space for everyone who lives with you.

Being poor is feeling the glued soles tear off your supermarket shoes when you run around the playground.

Being poor is your kid’s school being the one with the 15-year-old textbooks and no air conditioning.

Being poor is thinking $8 an hour is a really good deal.

Being poor is relying on people who don’t give a damn about you.

Being poor is an overnight shift under fluorescent lights.

Being poor is finding the letter your mom wrote to your dad, begging him for the child support.

Being poor is a bathtub you have to empty into the toilet.

Being poor is stopping the car to take a lamp from a stranger’s trash.

Being poor is making lunch for your kid when a cockroach skitters over the bread, and you looking over to see if your kid saw.

Being poor is believing a GED actually makes a goddamned difference.

Being poor is people angry at you just for walking around in the mall.

Being poor is not taking the job because you can’t find someone you trust to watch your kids.

Being poor is the police busting into the apartment right next to yours.

Being poor is not talking to that girl because she’ll probably just laugh at your clothes.

Being poor is hoping you’ll be invited for dinner.

Being poor is a sidewalk with lots of brown glass on it.

Being poor is people thinking they know something about you by the way you talk.

Being poor is needing that 35-cent raise.

Being poor is your kid’s teacher assuming you don’t have any books in your home.

Being poor is six dollars short on the utility bill and no way to close the gap.

Being poor is crying when you drop the mac and cheese on the floor.

Being poor is knowing you work as hard as anyone, anywhere.

Being poor is people surprised to discover you’re not actually stupid.

Being poor is people surprised to discover you’re not actually lazy.

Being poor is a six-hour wait in an emergency room with a sick child asleep on your lap.

Being poor is never buying anything someone else hasn’t bought first.

Being poor is picking the 10 cent ramen instead of the 12 cent ramen because that’s two extra packages for every dollar.

Being poor is having to live with choices you didn’t know you made when you were 14 years old.

Being poor is getting tired of people wanting you to be grateful.

Being poor is knowing you’re being judged.

Being poor is a box of crayons and a $1 coloring book from a community center Santa.

Being poor is checking the coin return slot of every soda machine you go by.

Being poor is deciding that it’s all right to base a relationship on shelter.

Being poor is knowing you really shouldn’t spend that buck on a Lotto ticket.

Being poor is hoping the register lady will spot you the dime.

Being poor is feeling helpless when your child makes the same mistakes you did, and won’t listen to you beg them against doing so.

Being poor is a cough that doesn’t go away.

Being poor is making sure you don’t spill on the couch, just in case you have to give it back before the lease is up.

Being poor is a $200 paycheck advance from a company that takes $250 when the paycheck comes in.

Being poor is four years of night classes for an Associates of Art degree.

Being poor is a lumpy futon bed.

Being poor is knowing where the shelter is.

Being poor is people who have never been poor wondering why you choose to be so.

Being poor is knowing how hard it is to stop being poor.

Being poor is seeing how few options you have.

Being poor is running in place.

Being poor is people wondering why you didn’t leave.

Worst college football teams

5 worst college football teams

These squads could be in for long and dreary seasons in 2009.

5 worst

Also:

Ban sees first-hand impact of climate change in Mongolia

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon spent time with a traditional herder community in central Mongolia today as he highlighted the impact of climate change on landlocked countries on the latest leg of his official visit to Asia.

First-hand impact of climate change

Pakistan arrests pro-Taliban cleric Sufi Muhammad

Mian Iftikhar, information minister for the North West Frontier Province, said police arrested Mohammed on Sunday in Peshawar for speaking against the government and encouraging violence and terrorism.

Pakistan arrests pro-Taliban cleric

Drive-thru Bandit Holds up Ten Restaurants in Ten Days

Police in Dallas, Texas are searching for a man who has tried to rob as many as 10 fast-food restaurants over the past ten days.

Drive-thru Bandit

And I Quote

Double, double toil and trouble; fire burn and cauldron bubble.

~ William Shakespeare

Create an unhackable password

Create an unhackable password

Avoid the usual password pitfalls with this quick, clever way to foil identity thieves.

Create an unhackable password

Also:

Unusual Holidays and Celebrations

Today is Take Your Dog To Work Day.

America's best-loved new cars

America's best-loved new cars

J.D. Power's latest car owner satisfaction survey includes some good news for Chrysler Group and Hyundai.

America's best-loved new cars

Also:

Top careers no one knows about

Top careers no one knows about

Workers in these 10 "best-kept-secret" fields often find the process of landing a job easier.

Top careers no one knows about

Also:

Daily Almanac

Today is Sunday, July 26, the 207th day of 2009.

There are 158 days left in the year.

The moon is waxing.

Today In History July 26

Our Readers

Some of our readers today have been in:

Prague, Hlavni Mesto Praha, Czech Republic
Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India
Bangalore, Karnataka, India
Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
Sidney, British Columbia, Canada
Mexico City, Distrito Federal, Mexico
Campbell River, British Columbia, Canada
Randbury, Gauteng, South Africa
Kuala Lumpur, Wilayah Persekutuan, Malaysia
London, England, United Kingdom
Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India
Brussels, Brussels-Hoofdstedelijk Gewest, Belgium
Calcutta, West Bengal, India
Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

as well as Korea, Scotland, Brazil, and the United States

Daily Horoscope

Today's horoscope says:

If ever there was a time that's perfect for you to figure out a plan for letting someone down gently, this is it.
Planning is, after all, your specialty.
Your first and best rule will be to 'do no harm' -- to either of you -- even if that's much easier said than done.
In other words, don't let them goad, manipulate or persuade you into staying longer than you should.
If you're done, you're done.

Done and gone.