CAROLINA NATURALLY: Sep 16, 2009

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Daily Horoscope

Today's horoscope says:

Today's events will create too many details for most people to handle, but for you it's a great day for making plans!
Your curious brain will flourish under the heavy downpour of dates, times, facts and figures.
Embrace all the chaos, and tie up all those loose ends into a beautiful bow.
You are entering a time of great organizational skill, when multitasking isn't just a trait you can put on your resume -- it's a philosophy you should live by!

Sounds like plan to me.

Reading Kafka improves learning ... If you say so

New research suggest that exposure to bizarre, surreal story lines such as Kafka's "The Country Doctor" can improve learning. Apparently, when your brain is presented with total absurdity or nonsense, it will work extra hard to find structure elsewhere. In the study by the University of British Columbia psychologists, subjects read The Country Doctor and then took a test where they had to identify patterns in strings of letters. They performed much better than the control group.

From Science Daily:

"People who read the nonsensical story checked off more letter strings –– clearly they were motivated to find structure," said Proulx. "But what's more important is that they were actually more accurate than those who read the more normal version of the story. They really did learn the pattern better than the other participants did."

In a second study, the same results were evident among people who were led to feel alienated about themselves as they considered how their past actions were often contradictory. "You get the same pattern of effects whether you're reading Kafka or experiencing a breakdown in your sense of identity," Proulx explained. "People feel uncomfortable when their expected associations are violated, and that creates an unconscious desire to make sense of their surroundings. That feeling of discomfort may come from a surreal story, or from contemplating their own contradictory behaviors, but either way, people want to get rid of it. So they're motivated to learn new patterns."

Reading Kafka Improves Learning, Suggests Psychology Study

Connections From Kafka: Exposure to Meaning Threats Improves Implicit Learning of an Artificial Grammar

More Water On Mars

Vanished lakes may have left behind networks of cracks on the floors of Martian impact craters.

Cracks on Mars hint at dried-up lakes

Is it just me, or are the wing-nuts becoming more openly racist?

No, it is not just us ... they are, and the wing-nuts prove it in their responses to the question.

Follow the link and see for yourself how the mental midgets all jerk on cue in unison.

Is it just me, or are the wing-nuts becoming more openly racist?

Tales of the Weird

It was 40 years ago today that an article first appeared in a university student newspaper which gave birth to a weird rumor about the greatest rock band of all time.

Birth of an urban legend: Paul is dead

This is why they call it 'DOPE'

Ill. teacher accused of giving teens pot, alcohol, prescription drugs for work around her home

A northern Illinois teacher faces felony charges after allegedly giving two teenage girls marijuana, alcohol and prescription drugs in exchange for work around her home.

Calif. man accused of trying to trade his father's car for $50 worth of crack

Authorities arrested a man they said tried to trade his father's car for $50 worth of crack cocaine.

*****

And, you wonder sometimes ...

Floor mats in cars cause fatal crashes

Toyota issues floor mat warning

Toyota and Lexus dealerships are ordered to inspect floor mats that may cause fatal crashes.

What to look for

Also:

Surgeons implant tooth into woman's eye to restore her vision

To start the procedure, surgeons remove a healthy tooth and part of the patient's jawbone. The tooth and bone were then shaved and sculpted, and a hole was drilled into them to hold the prosthetic lens. Then the whole unit was implanted into Thornton's chest and left for several months, allowing the tooth and lens to bond. This was then implanted into her eye.

Full Story

Wrestler Donates Brain to Research

Former WWE Superstar “The Promise” Antonio Thomas, is combining brains with brawn—literally.

Thomas is the latest professional wrestler to donate his brain to concussion research.

The Sports Legacy Institute (SLI), founded by former WWE wrestler Chris Nowinski and Dr. Robert Cantu, is the recipient of Thomas’s donation, which is part of an effort to further understand concussions and their effect on the brain.

The SLI, founded in 2008, is dedicated to advancing the health and wellness of athletes and improving the safety of sports & other athletic endeavors.

“It’s the least I can do, to help other wrestlers and athletes after me,” Thomas says of his involvement with the SLI.

Former NHL star Keith Primeau, whose career was cut short due to multiple concussions, is among the professional athletes who’ve pledged to donate their brains after death, joining several pro wrestlers in the cause.

Wrestling-wise, “The Promise” will appear at the New England Championship Wrestling (NECW) “Tag Team Classic” on Saturday, September 19, in Quincy, MA.

Thomas was tight-lipped but excited about the event.

“The fans will have to wait and see what I have in store, and I’ll have to wait to see their reaction. But it’s going to be awesome,” Thomas says of the NECW event in Quincy.

Thomas is fresh off an appearance on “The Figure Four Daily,” a very popular Internet radio show about wrestling, hosted by pro grappler Bryan Alvarez. Thomas appeared on September 8.

“’Figure Four Daily’ is a major wrestling talk show,” Thomas said when asked about his appearance. “It’s really big, and I’m proud to be a part of it now.”

For more information about the SLI and its mission, visit www.sportslegacy.org.

One year after being laid off

Four Americans reflect on a tough year they've spent soul-searching and looking for employment.

Their advice

Also:

Cat strays 2,400 miles

A kitty named Clyde reunites with his owners three years after wandering off.

How he was found

Also:

Trade war with China could hurt U.S.

A trade war with China could deeply downgrade American living standards, an economist says.

'We will lose'

Also:

When to fish or when to cut bait

When to save and when to cut your debt

Simple math suggests it's better to reduce debt first, but that's not always the smart move.

Best strategies

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Hidden causes of exhaustion

That run-down feeling could be due to one of these commonly undetected health problems.

Infection, allergies

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Most overused office buzzwords

If your co-workers can win "Office Bingo" listening to you, it's time to cut back on these 10 clichés.

Like 'circle back'

Also:

Secretary by day, royalty by night

A DC-area woman is shocked to learn she's been made a king in Ghana.

» How she'll rule

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Best brain foods

Best brain foods for every age

Different age groups need specific foods to boost their brain power, experts say.

Dark greens or bright fruit?

Also:

Angler madness

World-record fish or genetic cheat?

A record-setting 48-pound trout stirs controversy in the fishing world.

» Compared to Barry Bonds

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New hot spot for the young and wealthy

Young adults who make over $100K are gravitating toward one U.S. city in particular.

Jobs, climate key factors

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A tip is a tip is a tip ... sometime

$29,000 tip makes trouble for worker

Sara Gaspar thought she had got a lucky break from the University of Notre Dame.

Why the school wants it back

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Health care plan doesn't close all gaps

The Senate's proposal gives smaller rebates to some middle-class families, analysts say.

Who wins, who loses

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It's all an illusion anyway

Optical illusions that trick the brain

Experience the full effect of this and seven more optical illusions.

How they work

Also:

Student kills burglary suspect with Samurai sword

On Monday, someone had burglarized college student John Pontolillo's Baltimore house and nabbed two laptop computers and a videogame system. Late that night, Pontoilillo heard noises in his garage. So he grabbed his samurai sword and went to check it out. When the prowler lunged at him, Pontoilillo killed him with the sword. The state's attorney's office will consider whether to bring any charges against Pontoilillo. From the Washington Post:

The student "was backed up against a corner, and either out of fear or out of panic, he just struck the sword with force," said city police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi.

Pontolillo, who rents the off-campus home, nearly severed the man's left hand, inflicting what police called a "spear laceration."

Donald D. Rice of Baltimore, 49, a repeat offender who had been released from jail Saturday, died at the scene.

Hopkins Student With Samurai Sword Kills Theft Suspect

Charges against Pontoilillo?! Typical though ... the thief has all rights to your stuff, yet you have no right to defend it or your life.
Well, around here we have no Samurai swords but more than a few Claymores and Dirks and Battle Axes which would serve.

Teabaggers Lie (as if that is news)

Skippy posted this over on Skippy the Bush Kangaroo today:

teabaggers: 2 million! us: you lie!
media matters, via steve benen, traces how confusion became a lie, and a lie became their story (and they're sticking to it!):

several conservative blogs have been quoting national park service spokesman "dan bana" as saying the 9/12 protest was "the largest event held in washington, d.c., ever." this appears to be a repurposing of this quote from david barna (who, unlike dan bana, appears to be a real person):

david barna, a park service spokesman, said the agency did not conduct its own count. instead, it will use a washington post account that said 1.8 million people gathered on the us capitol grounds, national mall, and parade route.

"it is a record," barna said. "we believe it is the largest event held in washington, d.c., ever."
very impressive! unfortunately, as little green footballs pointed out, that quote was actually about the inauguration:

this is so pathetic i don't know whether to laugh or cry.

dozens - if not hundreds - of right wing blogs are running with this quote, portraying it as a statement about the tea party held last weekend: 'we believe it is the largest event held in washington, d.c., ever.'

the quote is from january. the national park service spokesman was talking about barack obama's inauguration
...imaginary abc news reports, unnamed universities, invented quotes, and for safe keeping, the journalistic equivalent of "i heard this one dude say."

from pam geller:

here's the video over at cspan of millions on the mall. incredible. look at the pan of the crowd shot. the left fascists are debating the number to take the focus off what happened in washington, d.c., this weekend. i'll go with the parks department estimates, thankyouverymuch.

a 9-12 participant in dc claims to have overheard dc police discussing the crowd numbers. they put the numbers at over 2 million -- and those were only the people who could make it into the city. the local authorities as well as many participants claim that many many more could not even get into the city to the core of the protest.
yes, she cited someone who "claims to have overheard dc police discussing the crowd numbers." your conservative blogosphere, ladies and gentleman.
add this to the propensity this weekend of the hardly-ever-right to claim a pic of the promise keeper's march in the 90's as their own tea-bagging. tampabay.com:

pete piringer, public affairs officer for the d.c. fire and emergency department, said the local government no longer provides official crowd estimates because they can become politicized. but the day of the rally, piringer unofficially told one reporter that he thought between 60,000 and 75,000 people had shown up.

"it was in no way an official estimate," he said.

we asked piringer whether there were enough protesters to fill the national mall, as depicted in the photograph.

"it was an impressive crowd," he said. but after marching down pennsylvania avenue to the capitol, the crowd "only filled the capitol grounds, maybe up to third street," he said.

yet the widely posted photograph showed the crowd sprawling all the way to the washington monument, which is bordered by 15th and 17th streets.

there's another problem with the photograph: it doesn't include the national museum of the american indian, a building at the corner of fourth street and independence avenue that opened on sept. 14, 2004. (looking at the photograph, the building should be in the upper right hand corner of the national mall, next to the air and space museum.) that means the picture was taken before the museum opened five years ago. so clearly the photo doesn't show the "tea party" crowd from the sept. 12 protest.

also worth noting are the cranes in front of the smithsonian museum of natural history. according to randall kremer, the museum's director of public affairs, "the last time cranes were in front was in the 1990s when the imax theater was being built."

it appears that the photo was actually taken in 1997 at a rally for promise keepers, a group for christian men. according to the group's web site, nearly 1 million people attended the event. photos of the oct. 4, 1997, event that were posted on various web sites in 2003, 2008 and earlier this year show either the same picture or a similar photo that has identical tents and what appear to be tv screens in the same locations.

conservative bloggers who originally posted the picture have backed down.
you can see a pattern emerging: the same ol' "if we say it's true, it is, because we say it's true."

*****

To put what really occurred number-wise we can go back to this Carolina Naturally post posted yesterday:

So Glenn Beck's hate rally produced about 60,000 fuckheads to march on Washington.
Sounds like a lot?
Well, on Saturday, Sept. 5, Alabama and Va Tech sold out Atlanta's Georgia Dome to the tune of 71, 500 fans.
So this outpouring of Beck's special brand of douchebaggery produced less interest on a national scale than a college football game played in Georgia.

~ Mark in Morehead City, NC

Damn, living in their fantasy world has to be hard.

Court sets execution date for DC sniper mastermind

A Virginia judge has set a Nov. 10 execution date for John Allen Muhammad, mastermind of the 2002 sniper attacks in the Washington, D.C., area.

Court sets execution date for DC sniper mastermind

Tailgating 101

Ahhh, football season.

It signals the return of cookouts, especially tailgating parties

Cooks know how to feed football fans

Child Killer Romell Broom Survives Execution

The State of Ohio is trying to kill Romell Broom by lethal injection but they can't find a vein.

Child Killer Romell Broom Survives Execution

The shrub, clueless (you don't say)!

From the "Tell us something we didn't know" Department:

A new book from a cabal insider illuminates again just how phenomonally clueless the shrub was.

Fossil or concretion?

After visiting the site Tuesday, Oregon state paleontologist William N. Orr, Bill Hanshumaker of the Hatfield Marine Science Center and Guy DiTorrice, an amateur paleontologist who bills himself as "Oregon Fossil Guy," couldn't decide whether they were looking at a turtle or a tortoise, or whether it was a fossil or a concretion.

Huge rock baffles experts

Do You Have the Right to Flip Off a Cop?

Yes you do.

David Hackbart was mad and he wanted to show it, but he didn't think he would end up in Federal Court to protect his right to a rude gesture and demanding that the City of Pittsburgh stop violating the First Amendment rights of its residents.

Full Story

Army keeps noise down for students

South Korea's army has agreed to keep the noise down while millions of students take their exams this month.

Full Story

Health Care Hell In America

Now THIS IS a tragedy!

Crystal Lee Sutton, the real-life sweatshop worker who inspired Sally Field's movie Norma Rae, has died at the age of 68... after chemotherapy was denied by her health insurance.

It's a Tragedy of epic propotions

Nepal runs out of goats to sacrifice

The government has been forced to send officials into the countryside to look for animals to help ease the shortage in Kathmandu.

Full Story

He spoke the truth ... again

There is no 'fallout' except to highlight the sorry state, of what laughingly calls itself 'the Media' today, is in..
The President spoke the truth. West was a jackass. Why do people have such a hard time with the truth? And why bother with trivia while actual news and work needs reporting and done?

Obama comment raises questions

Publication of the president's off-the-record opinion of Kanye West sparks a debate.

Reminiscent of past incidents

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President Carter sparks new round in race debate

Carter sparks new round in race debate

Jimmy Carter's remarks on Joe Wilson's outburst upset the congressman's son.

'It's absolutely ludicrous' No it's not! See below.

Also:

Upset the idiot's son all you like it's the truth. The Mrs., grew up with the moron and we've known about him for over fifty years and Hitler loved Jews more than this bigot tolerates blacks.

Proverbial Wisdom

Use your enemy's hand to catch a snake.

Persian Proverb

And I Quote

There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.

There is another theory which states that this has already happened.

~ Douglas Adams

Planet Earth Found (or a reasonable facsimile there of)

Rocky planet 'like the Earth' found

Astronomers reveal a major discovery in the attempt to find life elsewhere in the universe.

'Lava planet'
Also:

Unusual Holidays and Celebrations

Today is

Trail of Tears Commemoration Day

Daily Almanac

Today is Wednesday, Sept. 16, the 259th day of 2009.

There are 106 days left in the year.

Today in History, September 16.

Our Readers

Some of our readers today have been in:

Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada
Brescia, Lombardia, Italy
Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Mexico
Nairobi, Nairobi Area, Kenya
Oshawa, Ontario, Canada
Bath, England, United Kingdom
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Kaunas, Kauno Apskirtis, Lithuania
Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
Timmins, Ontario, Canada
Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Munich, Bayern, Germany
Berlin, Berlin, Germany
Rotterdam, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands
London, England, United Kingdom

as well as Serbia, and the United States

Welcome to ...

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

teabaggers: 2 million! us: you lie!

Nepal runs out of goats to sacrifice

Naturally Friends

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