CAROLINA NATURALLY: Jan 8, 2017

Sunday, January 8, 2017

The Daily Drift

Welcome to Today's Edition of
Carolina Naturally

Sounds about right ...!

Carolina Naturally is read in 210 countries around the world daily.

Pants-less Riding ... !

Today is - No Pants Subway Ride Day

You want the unvarnished truth?

Don't forget to visit: The Truth Be Told
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Today in History

1681		The Treaty of Radzin ends a five year war between the Turks and the allied countries of Russia and Poland.
1745		England, Austria, Saxony and the Netherlands form an alliance against Russia.
1815		A rag-tag army under Andrew Jackson defeats the British on the fields of Chalmette in the Battle of New Orleans.
1871		Prussian troops begin to bombard Paris during the Franco-Prussian War.
1892		A coal mine explosion kills 100 in McAlister, Oklahoma.
1900		The Boers attack the British in Ladysmith, South Africa, but are turned back.
1908		A subway line opens linking the New York boroughs of Brooklyn and Manhattan.
1940		Great Britain begins rationing sugar, meat and butter.
1946		President Harry S. Truman vows to stand by the Yalta accord on self-determination for the Balkans.
1954		President Dwight Eisenhower proposes stripping convicted Communists of their U.S. citizenship.
1963		President John F. Kennedy attends the unveiling of the Mona Lisa.
1975		Ella T. Grasso becomes Governor of Connecticut, the first female governor in the US who did not come into office by succeeding her husband.
1979		The United States advises the Shah to leave Iran.
1982		AT&T agrees to divest 22 subdivisions as part of an antitrust agreement.
1994		Valeri Polyakov, a Russian cosmonaut leaves earth, bound for the Mir space station; he will spend a record 437 days in space.
2002		The shrub signs into law the No Child Left Behind Act, intended to improve America’s educational system.
2004		The largest passenger ship in history, the RMS Queen Mary 2, is christened by Queen Elizabeth II, granddaughter of Queen Mary.
2011		An attempted assassination of Arizona Representative Gabrielle Giffords is part of a shooting spree in which Jared Lee Loughner kills 6 and wounds 13.

WTH Are Healing Crystals

WTH Are Healing Crystals—Do They Actually Do Anything?

Celebs are obsessed with them—but are they total B.S.?

Vädersoltavlan

Excerpts from the Wikipedia summary:

Vädersolstavlan (Swedish for "The Sun Dog Painting") is an oil-on-panel painting depicting a halo display, an atmospheric optical phenomenon, observed over Stockholm on April 20, 1535. It is named after the sun dogs (Swedish: Vädersol, "Weather sun") appearing on the upper right part of the painting. While chiefly noted for being the oldest depiction of Stockholm in color, it is arguably also the oldest Swedish landscape painting and the oldest depiction of sun dogs...
The medieval urban conglomeration, today part of the old town Gamla stan, is rendered using a bird's-eye view. The stone and brick buildings are densely packed below the church and castle, which are rendered in a descriptive perspective (i.e., their size relates to their social status, rather than their actual dimensions). Scattered wooden structures appear on the surrounding rural ridges, today part of central Stockholm...
According to the passage in the Vasa Chronicle, however, both Petri and the master of the mint Anders Hansson were sincerely troubled by the appearance of these sun dogs. Petri interpreted the signs over Stockholm as a warning from dog and had the Vädersolstavlan painting produced and hung in front of his congregation. Notwithstanding this devotion, he was far from certain on how to interpret these signs and in a sermon delivered in late summer 1535, he explained there are two kinds of omens: one produced by the Devil to allure mankind away from dog, and another produced by dog to attract mankind away from the Devil — one being hopelessly difficult to tell from the other. He therefore saw it as his duty to warn both his congregation, mostly composed of German burghers united by their conspiracy against the king, and the king himself...
In the painting, the actual sun is the yellow ball in the upper-right corner surrounded by the second circle. The large circle taking up most of the sky is a parhelic circle, parallel to the horizon and located at the same altitude as the sun, as the painting renders it...

There's way more at the extensive Wikipedia page on old Stockholm and the science of the phenomenon.

Experimental glass penny from WWII era

"A rare experimental glass penny made during World War II has netted a pretty penny at auction — selling for $70,500.

Heritage Auctions announced Friday that the penny was sold during Thursday's auction based in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to an American buyer who wishes to remain anonymous.

During the war, copper was needed for ammunition. The U.S. Mint authorized tests that included making uncirculated pennies from other metals, plastic and rubber. The Blue Ridge Glass Co. in Tennessee made experimental pennies using tempered glass...

The penny is likely unique since Burdette says only one other glass penny exists and it is broken."

Short PSA Made By AT&T In 1936 To Help Familiarize Viewers With Dial Telephones

If you wanted to make a non-local call back in 1936 you typically had to speak to a switchboard operator, who would connect your call to a number that began with exchange letters related to the location you were calling.But as phone technology improved the old system was phased out, replaced with the ability to dial phone numbers directly via automatic exchange systems and rotary phones, which totally freaked some people out.
Thankfully, AT&T was there for folks who were frightened by all that newfangled telephone technology, alleviating their concerns with this short PSA that explains how the dial telephone works.

(YouTube Link)

Carol Pilon: America's Last Great Wingwalker

In the 1920s and '30, barnstorming pilots and wingwalkers got the world excited about airplanes and flying in general. You could make a good living risking your life this way, but most of the stunt artists did it for the thrill, the adrenaline rush, and the love of flying. Those old-time wingwalkers died out -sometimes literally. Only a very few remain that dare recreate the stunts of the early days of aviation. One is Carol Pilon.

Pilon has been wingwalking for 17 years, and she is among the few who sought out the sport — as opposed to coming from an aviation background, or through a relationship to a pilot. Pilon resists giving her age, but begrudgingly allows that biographical details suggest she is in her 40s. She grew up in rural Canada and had been casually taking flight lessons when she saw a commercial on TV for an air show in Ottawa. Wingwalking, she said, “just came and picked me up, right by my backbone. I had no education about flying, about aircraft. But that stuff just sang to my soul.”
She immediately began contacting wingwalking teams. “I hounded them, I stalked them,” she said, eventually taking her first walk in 2001. That same year she contacted air show veteran Jimmy Franklin, owner of the air show acts collective Franklin Flying Circus. “I said, ‘Hey, I want to do this, let me try.’ And I ended up marrying him.”

Pilon performs with her own plane and pilot, and was the only professional wingwalker in America until she started teaching younger women how to do it. Read about this extraordinary woman's life and career at Buzzfeed.

Family Transforms Solar Dome Into Perfect Arctic Home

How do you build a comfortable, modern, eco-friendly home within the Arctic Circle? The Hjertefølger family did it by covering their five-bedroom home with a 25-foot-tall solar dome! The huge geodesic dome has glass all around, which keeps heat in while allowing a great viewing of Sandhornøya Island, off the coast of Norway above the Arctic Circle. Read about the features of this sweet home under a dome and see plenty of pictures at Housely.

The Romantic Bath Bomb Wedding Proposal

Twitter user @kassidyrun1's boyfriend gave her a bath bomb on Xmas. It took her five days to get around to using it, but when she did, she discovered quite the surprise inside.

As it turns out, the clever man managed to order a custom made bath bomb with a bubble in the middle that was holding a promise ring.

The proposal is quite a clever idea and while it seems risky, the company that makes them, Pearl Bath Bombs, adds a random ring worth up to $30 inside each bath bomb. They then also include redemption contest codes in each one that can be entered at that site and reveal a ring worth up to $5,000 -but this way you won't lose one of the lucky expensive rings in the tub.

Surprising At-Risk Group for Skin Cancer

Surprising At-Risk Group for Skin Cancer: Non-heterosexual black male teens

In a new study of indoor tanning and skin cancer risk, the use of indoor tanning among non-heterosexual black male teens was found to be nearly equal to that of heterosexual white females. The study, … Read more

Random Pictures

Dairy Queen franchisee ‘proudly’ admits calling black woman racial slur

Dairy Queen franchisee ‘proudly’ admits calling black woman racial slur: ‘Her order was confusing’

A fast food restaurant owner in Illinois “proudly admitted” he called a black customer a racial slur in front of her children after she asked for a refund, police said.

Racist Lunatic Fringe Media BLASTS CNN On Ft. Lauderdale Shooter

Racist Lunatic Fringe Media BLASTS CNN On Ft. Lauderdale Shooter And Royally Fucks Up

The xenophobic white supremacists, who hilariously call themselves the “alt-right” to sound more legit and less hateful, took the tragedy at Ft. Lauderdale’s...

Credit reporting agencies behaving badly

"... on Tuesday, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau announced that two of the three major credit-reporting agencies responsible for doling out those scores—Equifax and Transunion—have been deceiving and taking advantage of Americans. The Bureau ordered the agencies to pay more than $23 million in fines and restitution.
In their investigation, the Bureau found that the two agencies had been misrepresenting the scores provided to consumers, telling them that the score reports they received were the same reports that lenders and businesses received, when, in fact, they were not.
The investigation also found problems with the way the agencies advertised their products...
That these credit agencies would abuse their power to mislead Americans attempting to take a more active role in monitoring their financial health is not only a violation of trust, it is dangerous.

More at The Atlantic.

Professional Slackliner Scales Ski Lift and Saves Man’s Life

Professional Slackliner Scales Ski Lift and Saves Man’s Life

This guy gives James Bond a run for his money

5 Steps Society Must Take to Avoid the Worst Impacts of Climate Change

5 Steps Society Must Take to Avoid the Worst Impacts of Climate Change

Frozen Lake Free Dive

Matthew Villegas took his GoPro camera and a selfie stick with him as he free dives in Morrison Quarry in Quebec. That water's gotta be cold. How cold is it? It's covered with ice -and he has to go up and get a breath of air!

(YouTube link)

We can assume that he found a place in the ice to get some air, since he came home with this lovely footage. This video is being used to publicize the GoPro awards, which is looking for nominations.