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.


Saturday, April 16, 2016

The Daily Drift

Welcome to Today's Edition of Carolina Naturally.
Very much so ...! 
 
Carolina Naturally is read in 206 countries around the world daily.   
  
Appreciated ... !
Today is - Husband Appreciation Day

You want the unvarnished truth?
Don't forget to visit: The Truth Be Told
Some of our readers today have been in:
The Americas
Brazil - Canada - Colombia - Mexico - Nicaragua - Puerto Rico 
Sint Eustatius and Saba - United States
Europe
Bosnia and Herzegovina - Bulgaria -Croatia - Denmark -  England 
France - Germany - Greece - Hungary - Ireland - Italy - Latvia 
Netherlands - Poland - Portugal - Romania - Russia - San Marino 
Scotland - Serbia - Slovakia - Slovenia - Spain - Sweden - Switzerland 
Turkey - Ukraine - Wales
Asia
Hong Kong - India - Indonesia - Iran - Malaysia - Mauritius - Singapore
Sri Lanka - Taiwan - Thailand
Africa
South Africa - Tunisia
The Pacific
Australia - New Zealand - Philippines
Don't forget to visit our sister blogs Here and Here.

Today in History

69
Defeated by Vitellius’ troops at Bedriacum, Otho commits suicide.
556
Pelagius I begins his reign as Catholic Pope.
1065
The Norman Robert Guiscard takes Bari, ending five centuries of Byzantine rule in southern Italy.
1705
Queen Anne of England knights Isaac Newton.
1746
Prince Charles is defeated at the Battle of Culloden, the last pitched battle fought in Britain.
1818
The U.S. Senate ratifies the Rush-Bagot amendment to form an unarmed U.S.-Canada border.
1854
San Salvador is destroyed by an earthquake.
1862
Confederate President Jefferson Davis approves a conscription act for white males between 18 and 35.
1862
Slavery is abolished in the District of Columbia.
1917
Vladimir Lenin returns to Russia to start the Bolshevik Revolution.
1922
Annie Oakley shoots 100 clay targets in a row, setting a woman’s record.
1942
The Island of Malta is awarded the George Cross in recognition for heroism under constant German air attack. It was the first such award given to any part of the British Commonwealth.
1945
The destroyer USS Laffey survives horrific damage from attacks by 22 Japanese aircraft off Okinawa, earning the nickname “The Ship That Would Not Die.”
1945
American troops enter Nuremberg, Germany.
1947
A lens which provides zoom effects is demonstrated in New York City.
1968
The Pentagon announces the “Vietnamization” of the war.
1972
Two giants pandas arrive in the U.S. from China.

Here's What Happened When A Group Of Scientists Went To Confront Their Congressional Tormentors

How Jerry Brown quietly saved California

Gov. Jerry Brown (Facebook)
Brown was 36 the first time he had the top job in California; he’s 78 now, and still pushing ambitious agendas to save his state, and maybe even the world.

Coastguard rescue team called into action after report of people floating down river in a fridge

A river search was launched after people were spotted floating inside a fridge. Flint Coastguard Rescue Team received the strange report at 7.34pm on Tueday and launched a search mission.
A member of the public reported that people were inside a fridge on the River Dee near Connah's Quay in Flintshire, Wales. However when the coastguard team arrived the fridge was found empty.
The fridge was then removed and taken to a safe area. Flint Coastguard Rescue Team posted on Facebook: "Team paged by Holyhead CGOC to reports of persons floating down the River Dee in a fridge in the Connah’s Quay area.

"Once CRT on scene persons had left the area leaving behind the fridge on the rivers edge. CRT removed fridge to a safe area making sure it won’t float again. Many thanks to the first informant and members of the public for helping us with our inquiries. Team stood down and returned to station."

Canoodling couple were totally oblivious to armed robbery at bar

A couple smooching at the Tap Inn bar and casino in Billings, Montana, failed to notice the place was being robbed by two armed, masked men.
Camera angle one.

The heist happened at around 1:15am on Monday. Surveillance video captured one of the men pointing a gun at the bartender and demanding money from the register.

The other masked man circled the bar and even walked past the two love birds. Eventually, the couple finally stopped kissing long enough to see the suspects flee the bar with an undisclosed amount of cash.
Camera angle two.

Nobody was hurt and no arrests have been made. Monday’s incident is the latest in a string of crimes to plague the city for the past year, police said.

Ronald McDonald Statue Arrested by Chinese Police

On the streets, they called him Happy Ronnie. You'd better call him that. Because the alternative was Angry Ronnie, who was a criminal terror.
Well, the long arm of the law finally caught up with Happy Ronnie. He's heading off to the big McHouse for a few years. Rocket News 24 reports that police in Guangzhou, China told the owner of a McDonald's restaurant to remove the statue that he kept outside. When he failed to comply, they hauled off the statue.
Now photos from the event are going viral . . .

Retirement Income Is Getting Worse for Most, Unless You Are a CEO

The Mortgage Fraudsters And Their Get Out Of Jail Free Card

The Mortgage Fraudsters And Their Get Out Of Jail Free Card

Mississippi Jails Are Losing Inmates, And Local Officials Are 'Devastated' By The Loss Of Revenue

Fox News Will NEVER Be Able To Say ‘Fair And Balanced’ Again After What Hannity Just Did

There is a saying – “In Politics, a gaffe is when you accidentally tell the truth.” With that in mind, Sean Hannity just committed the...

Lawsuit against maker of rifle used in Sandy Hook school shooting can proceed

Judge: Lawsuit against maker of rifle used in Sandy Hook school shooting can proceed

How cults exploit one of our most basic psychological urges

How cults exploit one of our most basic psychological urges

Georgia woman says she had to let school principal paddle her son or go to jail

“They told me if he could not get a paddling he would have to be suspended and if he got suspended for even one day I WILL go to jail for truancy,” Shana Perez said in a Facebook post.

Math teacher goes bonkers after student reports him for watching porn in class

“I saw something no 13-year-old should ever see in a school,” said Jeffrey, a sixth-grader.

Dear Abby blames girl’s rape on communication breakdown in bewildering advice column gone wrong

Popular advice column “Dear Abby” took a turn for the horrific when the long-time writer blamed a young woman for her rape.

Fox hacks lose it over having to ask permission to touch women

Andrew Napolitano speaks to Fox Business hosts Stuart Varney (screen grab)Fox hacks lose it over having to ask permission to touch women: ‘Yes means yes’ is ‘insane’

You Don't Win Friends with Salad

We are proud to bring you a guest post from Ernie Smith, the editor of Tedium, a twice-weekly newsletter that hunts for the end of the long tail. In another life, he ran ShortFormBlog.
The salad bar is something that many restauranteurs claim to have invented, but we know for sure that just one guy invented the sneeze guard.
In January, a major lobbying group for the school lunch industry won a victory that involved salad bars. The School Nutrition Association, feeling the pressure because of what it called arduous nutrition rules, fought for (and won) a slightly more reasonable policy, including rules that specifically allowed schools to continue to offer salad bars to those super-grubby, messy kids. Some local health inspectors tried to veto the salad bars, claiming they created health hazards. But the updated law Congress came up with clarified that salad bars are safe. Today’s issue ponders why salad bars have become so common and whether the scale is trying to rip us off.
Salad Bar Origins
“You know, I looked at what was the problem with restaurants. You’d go in, the waiter would come up to the table, maybe he wouldn’t, and then he’d take an order, and disappear for a while. You’d fill up on bread. I said I want to let the customer see what he’s getting. And that includes a salad.”
— Norman Brinker, a groundbreaking restauranteur during the 1960s and 1970s, discussing his claimed invention of the salad bar concept for his Steak & Ale restaurant chain. Whether he did or not is a point of dispute, but he most certainly had the most success with it. (He also played a key role in the expansion of two other chains that you’re probably more familiar with, Chili’s and Bennigan’s.) Brinker, who gained status as a business guru before his death, was a master at building a more casual approach to dining—hiring cheery college students instead of snooty waiters and creating a vibe that encouraged repeat visits. And to think, it all started with the salad bar.
Five other key points in salad bar history
In the 1950s, a restaurant called The Cliffs in Springfield, Illinois made its claim to being the originators of the “famous salad bar.” This postcard in the Illinois Digital Archive also makes the case. The Cliffs (which had air conditioning!) came around nearly two decades before Steak & Ale.
Chuck’s Steak House in Waikiki, first founded in 1959 is another of the claimants of having the first salad bar. The chain is still around today, somehow.
In 1971, the Chicago-based restaurant R.J. Grunts launched with a massive salad bar, complete with 40 different items. The restaurant, which ultimately begat a conglomerate called Lettuce Entertain You, was a key part of the salad bar becoming a trend in the 1970s.
The decision by Wendy’s to go all-in on salad bars in 1979 started a trend of salad bars at fast-food outlets, and Wendy’s was out front for much of that period—at one point extending the concept to a Superbar buffet. But Wendy’s eventually pulled out of the concept entirely in 2006—long after its competitors did the same.
In the early 1990s, the salad bar concept began to evolve in big cities, so that many smaller restaurants began to try it on for size. This is around the time that the salad bar concept moved away from all-you-can-eat to the scale-based format, which is also used in grocery stores. “Salad bars have become the cafeterias of the 90′s—cheap, convenient and with something for everyone,” The New York Times wrote about them in 1994.
Pay by the pound: How Whole Foods ruined a good thing
It’s arguable that the biggest problem Whole Foods has with the public is its scales. Its hot and cold salad bars, which would likely be considered a buffet if it didn’t charge by the ounce, probably do more than anything else to give the chain its reputation as “Whole Paycheck.”
Last year, the company found itself the target of some embarrassing headlines in New York City, which were caused in part due to “scales not being calibrated correctly.” The company responded with a blog post and video titled ”Addressing Weight and Pricing: A Message to Our Customers,” which featured two contrite-looking co-CEOs. It’s long been a big problem for the grocer, but it’s been much more of one for consumers, who end up paying extra cash for those rubber-band-wrapped boxes.
(The company eventually settled with the city for $500,000, which is bad, but not nearly as bad as the $800,000 Whole Foods paid out the year before over similar claims in California.)
But let’s assume the scales are calibrated correctly. The food’s pretty good, but there’s sure a lot of couscous, and heavy dressing in the mix. And at the hot bar, they sure are nudging you toward the mashed potatoes, the mac and cheese, and the red beans and rice, aren’t they?
That’s no accident, of course. Those salad bars are designed to be immensely profitable for Whole Foods, which most assuredly does not pay $8.99 per pound for all those ingredients.
Salad bars have in recent years become more aggressive at charging by weight, and they put out ingredients that are specifically designed to add weight, like croutons and dressings. (Many salad-bar strategy guides specifically recommend you buy the heavy ingredients separately and add them to your salad after the fact.)
But Whole Foods has taken this maximize-weight approach to a different level by putting particularly heavy things out there as options. The fried chicken and casserole prey on your worst nourishment tendencies, those moments of impulse that you would otherwise avoid at all costs. And for those who want to eat something more exotic—ooh, johnnycakes!—they have you covered, too.
They’re tricking you into getting more than you actually want, and by the time you’ve realized you’ve put $20 of stuff into a biodegradable bowl, it’s too late. It’s not like you’re gonna put that gravy-covered lump of mashed potato back, are you?
Whole Foods knows that this strategy is brilliant and effective, but it can in fact be defeated. In a 2011 New York Times Magazine piece, statistical genius Nate Silver recommended that people buy goods at the salad bar that cost as much or more elsewhere in the store. Instead of romaine lettuce, get in on the mesclun; get some blue cheese instead of the ranch; and get loads of exotic toppings, which often cost as much or more in the store than the salad you’re getting.
The scales may not be calibrated properly, but there’s still room for you to tip them in your favor.
The Sneeze Guard
“Being the germaphobe that he was, he couldn’t stand people going down the Smorgasbords smelling things and having their noses too close to the food. He said to his engineers, ‘We have to devise something—I don’t want these people sneezing on the food.’” 
— Barbara Kelley, the daughter of sneeze guard inventor Johnny Garneau, discussing the importance of the invention. The plate of glass separating your bacteria from the food that’s just sitting out came about out of a desire for Garneau to innovate at his Pennsylvania smorgasbord business. His timing was opportune—just a few years after filing for a patent on the sneeze guard, the federal government took steps to require that every salad bar had one.
Is It Worth It?
So going back to the start of the piece, it’s worth asking—did those health inspectors who tried to put the kibosh on the school salad bars have a point? Even with the sneeze guards?
Last year, a South Carolina television station worked with a laboratory to test how safe a selection of salad bar food was. They overnighted the ingredients—a mix of raw and prepared food—to a Seattle-area lab, which did a variety of tests on the final result.
They found that while the food did not test positive for any of the tell signs of food poisoning—E. coli, listeria and salmonella—but much of the raw food did show signs of large numbers of microbes and coliform, some above the level of what was considered safe. But at the same time, IEH Laboratories CEO Dr. Mansour Samadpour tried to make clear that food isn’t meant to be sterile, and that coliform levels can seem unnaturally high.
Still, though, it’s a reminder that sneeze guards can only do so much.

Acreage For Genetically Modified Crops Declined In 2015

America Americas North Americbusinessfarm Farmingagriculture Food Commoditiesharvest Arable Landorganic Produce

Mystery of Nazca, Peru's Puquios: Purpose of Ancient Holes Finally Solved By Satellites

by Anna Swartz
For years, spiral-shaped holes, called puquios, that dot the dry landscape in Nazca, Peru have confused archaeologists. But now, using satellite images, a team of researchers has finally solved the mystery of the holes once and for all, reports the BBC.
The holes are actually part of a "sophisticated hydraulic system constructed to retrieve water from underground aquifers," Rosa Lasaponara of the Institute of Methodologies for Environmental Analysis, in Italy, who conducted the research, told the BBC. "What is clearly evident today is that the puquio system must have been much more developed than it appears today."
Lasaponara and her team used satellite images to analyze the placement of the puquios and realized the extent to which they moved water throughout the region. There is a system of tunnels underground, connecting the puquios. Each spiral hole pulls air down into the canals, moving the water through the network and bringing it to people who would have used it for both agriculture and domestic life, Lasaponara told the BBC.
To design such a system would have meant that the ancient Nazca people who built them had extensive knowledge about the geography of the area, Lasaponara said. The irrigation tunnels may also be connected to the Nazca lines, giant geoglyphs of animals, people and shapes carved into the Nazca desert, Lasaponara told the BBC. 
Lasaponara's research will be published in Ancient Nasca World: New Insights from Science and Archaeology this year, reports the BBC.

Giant Rock Sphere Linked to Mysterious Civilization?

A man known as Bosnia's Indiana Jones claims he found a 1,500-year-old giant sphere made by an ancient civilization.

Spreading seeds by human migration

Spreading seeds by human migration
Spreading seeds by human migration
Using DNA collected from corn grown by immigrant farmers in Los Angeles and Riverside, researchers at UC Riverside have found the genetic diversity of corn in some home and community gardens in Southern California far exceeds levels found in commercially available...

Greenland's Melt Season Started Nearly Two Months Early

Warm, wet weather helped set a record for the earliest start to the Greenland ice sheet melt season.

Plants Force Partners to Act Fairly

Plants reward fungi that provide more nutrients -- and starve those that don't.

Loch Ness monster found thanks to underwater robot

A 30ft (9m) model of the Loch Ness Monster built in 1969 for a Sherlock Holmes movie has been found almost 50 years after it sank in the loch. The beast was created for the Billy Wilder-directed The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, starring Sir Robert Stephens and Sir Christopher Lee.
It has been seen for the first time in images captured by an underwater robot. Loch Ness expert Adrian Shine said the shape, measurements and location pointed to the object being the prop. The robot, operated by Norwegian company Kongsberg Maritime, is being used to investigate what lies in the depths of Loch Ness.
VisitScotland and Mr Shine's The Loch Ness Project, which gathers scientific information on the loch's ecology and the potential for a monster, is supporting the survey. Mr Shine said: "We have found a monster, but not the one many people might have expected. The model was built with a neck and two humps and taken alongside a pier for filming of portions of the film in 1969. The director did not want the humps and asked that they be removed, despite warnings I suspect from the rest of the production that this would affect its buoyancy.
"And the inevitable happened. The model sank." Mr Shine added: "We can confidently say that this is the model because of where it was found, the shape - there is the neck and no humps - and from the measurements." The model was floated out to a place in the loch where only a few months earlier claims of sighting of Nessie had been made. The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes was made in the US and UK in 1969 and released in cinemas in 1970.

$70K Worth of Whale Vomit Found By UK Couple

The substance is prized by the fragrance industry.

17-year Cicadas Set to Invade the Northeast

Next month, billions of cicadas will begin to emerge from the ground as their internal clocks hit the 17-year mark.

Why Bearcats Smell Like Buttery Popcorn

Without cooking or eating anything unusual, a shaggy endangered animal has managed to produce the same smell of hot buttered popcorn.

‘Trickle of food’ helped deep sea creatures survive asteroid strike that wiped out dinosaurs

‘Trickle of food’ helped deep sea creatures survive asteroid strike that wiped out dinosaurs
‘Trickle of food’ helped deep sea creatures survive asteroid strike that wiped out dinosaurs
A team led by experts at Cardiff University has provided new evidence to explain why deep sea creatures were able to survive the catastrophic asteroid strike that wiped out the dinosaurs 65m years ago. Like the dinosaurs themselves, giant marine reptiles,...

Animal Pictures