HYDRA LERNAIA
"HYDRA LERNAIA was a gigantic, nine-headed water-serpent, which haunted the swamps of Lerna. Herakles was sent to destroy her as one of his twelve labours, but for each of her heads that he decapitated, two more sprang forth. So with the help of Iolaos, he applied burning brands to the severed stumps, cauterizing the wounds and preventing regeneration. In the battle he also crushed a giant crab beneath his heel which had come to assist Hydra.The Hydra and her crab ally were placed amongst the stars as the Constellations Hydra and Cancer."
Monday, September 11, 2006
Sunday, September 03, 2006
Kyoto Imperial Palace
Kyoto Imperial Palace
Kyoto Imperial Palace (Kyoto Gosho) used to be the residence of Japan's Imperial Family until 1868, when the emperor and capital were moved from Kyoto to Tokyo. It is located in the spacious Kyoto Imperial Park.
The palace burnt down and was moved around the city several times over the centuries. The present reconstruction dates from 1855. The palace complex is enclosed by a long wall and consists of several gates, halls and gardens. The enthronement ceremonies of Emperors Taisho and Showa were still held in the palace's main hall, but the present Emperor's ceremony took place at the Tokyo Imperial Palace.
Kyoto Imperial Palace (Kyoto Gosho) used to be the residence of Japan's Imperial Family until 1868, when the emperor and capital were moved from Kyoto to Tokyo. It is located in the spacious Kyoto Imperial Park.
The palace burnt down and was moved around the city several times over the centuries. The present reconstruction dates from 1855. The palace complex is enclosed by a long wall and consists of several gates, halls and gardens. The enthronement ceremonies of Emperors Taisho and Showa were still held in the palace's main hall, but the present Emperor's ceremony took place at the Tokyo Imperial Palace.
Monday, August 28, 2006
Fa-hien (Fa Xian, Faxian, Fa Hsien)
Fa-hien, also commonly written as Fa Xian, Faxian, Fa Hsien, was the first Chinese Buddhist pilgrim to leave an account of his travels to Central Asia, India, and Sri Lanka. The name of this monk may correctly be pronounced as Faxian but is also written as Fa-hsien. A native of Shanxi (Shansi), he left home at the tender age of three to join the Buddhist Sangha. After his novitiate, Fa-hien wanted to go to India to search for the treatises of the Vinaya Pitaka, the monastic rules of buddhism. He was perhaps sixty-four when, in 399 AD, he departed for India.
Travelling through Central Asia and Northwest India, Fa-hien reached northern India and then visited the holy Buddhist sites located in the Ganges valley: Kapilavastu, the birthplace of Buddha; Bodhgaya, the site of Buddha's enlightenment; Sarnath, where Buddha preached his first sermon, and Kushinagara, the place of Buddha's nirvana. He spent much of his time visiting and describing mid-India or Magadha. Fa-hien did not visit peninsular India, and left India by sea to return to China after visiting Sri Lanka. His is the only firsthand account of that island from a Chinese Buddhist pilgrim. Fa-hien returned to China in 414 AD after enduring many hardships at sea.
It took Fa-hien six years to reach Central India from Changan (then the capital of China); his itinerary there extended over another six years; and on his return it took him three years to reach Qingzhou (Ch'ingchou) in modern Shandong, a coastal province in east China.
Travelling through Central Asia and Northwest India, Fa-hien reached northern India and then visited the holy Buddhist sites located in the Ganges valley: Kapilavastu, the birthplace of Buddha; Bodhgaya, the site of Buddha's enlightenment; Sarnath, where Buddha preached his first sermon, and Kushinagara, the place of Buddha's nirvana. He spent much of his time visiting and describing mid-India or Magadha. Fa-hien did not visit peninsular India, and left India by sea to return to China after visiting Sri Lanka. His is the only firsthand account of that island from a Chinese Buddhist pilgrim. Fa-hien returned to China in 414 AD after enduring many hardships at sea.
It took Fa-hien six years to reach Central India from Changan (then the capital of China); his itinerary there extended over another six years; and on his return it took him three years to reach Qingzhou (Ch'ingchou) in modern Shandong, a coastal province in east China.
Sunday, August 13, 2006
Sigmund Freud: The Interpretation of Dreams (1900)
Sigmund Freud: The Interpretation of Dreams (1900)
"Dreams are not comparable to the spontaneous sounds made by a musical instrument struck rather by some external force than by the hand of a performer; they are not meaningless, not absurd, they do not imply that one portion of our stockpile of ideas sleeps while another begins to awaken. They are a completely valid psychological phenomenon, specifically the fulfillment of wishes; they can be classified in the continuity of comprehensible waking mental states; they are constructed through highly complicated intellectual activity.
But as soon as we delight in this discovery, a flood of questions assails us. If, according to dream analysis, the dream represents a fulfilled wish, what creates the astonishing and strange form in which this wish-fullfillment is expressed? What transformation have the dream thoughts undergone to shape the manifest dream which we remember when awake? Through what means has this transformation taken place? What is the source of the material which has been reworked into the dream? Where do the many peculiarities which we notice in dream thoughts come from, for instance that they may be mutually contradictory? Can a dream tell us so mething new about our inner psychological processes? Can its content correct the opinions that we have held during our waking hours?
I suggest that we set these questions aside for the moment and follow one particular path further. We have learned that a dream represents a fulfilled wish. Our next concern will be to discover whether this is a universal characteristic of dreams. . . We must leave open the possibility that the meaning may not be the same in every dream. Our first dream was a wish fulfillment; but perhaps another will prove to be a fulfilled fear; a third might contain a reflex; a fourth may simply reproduce a memory. Are there other wish-dreams? Or perhaps nothing but wish-dreams exist.
It is easy to demonstrate that dreams often have the character of blatant wish-fullfillments; so much so that one wonders why the language of dreams was not understood long ago. For instance, there is a dream that I can experience at will, experimentally, as it were. When I eat sardines, olives, or other strongly salted foods in the evening, I am awakened in the night by thirst. But the awaking is always preceded by a dream with the same content: I gulp the water down; and it tastes delicious to me as only a cool drink can when one is dying of thirst; and then I wake up and really have to drink. The cause of this simple dream is the thirst which I feel when I awaken. This feeling causes the desire to drink, and the dream shows me this desire fulfilled. It thereby serves a function which I can easily guess. I am a good sleeper, unaccustomed to being awakened by any need. If I can slake my thirst by dreaming that I am drinking, I don't need to wake up in order to be satisfied. Thus this is a convenience dream. The dream is substituted for action, as so often in life.
Recently this same dream occurred in a somewhat modified form. I had become thirsty even before sleeping and drained the glass of water which was standing on the nightstand next to my bed. A few hours later during the night I had a new attack of thirst which was more inconvenient. In order to get some water I would have had to get up and take the glass standing on my wife's nightstand. I dreamed therefore that my wife gave me a drink out of a vessel. This vessel was an Etruscan funerary urn which I had brought back from a trip to Italy and had since given away. However, the water in it tasted so salty (plainly because of the ashes) that I had to wake up. It is easy to see how neatly this dream arranged matters; since it its only aim was wish-fulfillment, it could be completely egotistical. A love of convenience is not really compatible with consideration for others. The introduction of the funerary urn is probably another wish-fulfillment; I was sorry that I didn't own the vessel any more--just as the water glass beside my wife was inaccessible. The urn also fit the growing salty taste which I knew would force me to wake up.
I very commonly had such dreams of convenience in my youth. Always used to working deep into the night, it was always difficult for me to wake up early. I used to dream then that I was out of bed and standing in front of the washstand. Eventually I had to recognize that I was not up, but meanwhile I had slept some more. The same lazy dream in a particularly witty form was told to me by one of my colleagues who evidently shared my sleepyheadedness. The landlady he rented rooms near the hospitals from had strong instructions to wake him up at the right time every morning; but she had a difficult time carrying out these orders. One morning he was sleeping especially sweetly. The woman called into the room, "Mr. Pepi, get up. You have to go to the hospital. " At that point the sleeper dreamed that he was lying in a bed in a room in the hospital, on which was a placard which read "Pepi H., medical student, age 22." Dreaming, he said to himself, "Since I am already in the hospital, I don't have to go there," so he turned over and slept on. Thus he openly confessed the cause of his dream.
It is just as easy to discover wish-fulfillment in some other dreams that I have collected from normal people. A friend who knows my dream theory and had shared it with his wife said to me one day, "I must tell you that my wife dreamed yesterday that she had her period. You know what that means." Certainly I knew; since the young woman had dreamed that she had her period, it meant that her period had not come. I could well believe that she would liked to have enjoyed her freedom a little longer before beginning the burdens of motherhood. It was a clever way of announcing the onset of her pregnancy. Another friend writes me that his wife recently dreamed that she noticed drops of milk on her blouse front. This is always a sign of pregnancy, but not a first pregnancy; the young mother wanted to have more milk for the second child than she had had for the first. . . .
These examples will perhaps be enough to show that dreams which can only be understood as wish-fullfillments, and which clearly reveal their content, occur often and under manifold circumstances. These mostly short and simple dreams stand out pleasantly in contrast with the confused and overly complex dream compositions which have mostly absorbed the attention of writers. . . .
We recognize that we might have gotten at the understanding of the concealed meaning of dreams by the shortest path if we had simply followed common ways of speaking. Proverbs indeed sometimes speak dismissively of dreams; people think they are being properly scientific when they say, "Dreams are froth." But in common usage dreams are predominantly the fulfillers of dreams. We cry out, delighted, "I would never have imagined such a thing even in my wildest dreams" when we find that reality has surpassed our expectations. . . .
There still remain anxiety dreams (1) as a special subdivision of dreams with a painful content whose interpretation as wish-fulfillment dreams will be most unwillingly accepted by the unenlightened. However, I can deal briefly with anxiety dreams here; they do not represent another aspect of the problems posed by dreams; rather it is a matter of understanding above all neurotic anxiety. The anxiety that we feel in dreams is only apparently explained by the dream's content. When we try to discover the meaning of a dream's content, we note that the anxiety felt in a dream is no better explained by its content than the anxiety felt in a phobia (2) is explained by the mental image which induces the phobia. For instance, is it quite true that one may fall out of a window, and therefore one may reasonably exert a certain amount of caution around a window; but this does not explain why in its phobic form the fear is so powerful and the sufferer pursued by the fear far beyond its cause. The same explanation is valid for phobias as for anxiety dreams. The anxiety is in both cases only loose ly linked to the association, and actually derives from another source.
Since dream anxiety is intimately related to neurotic anxiety is must explain the first by reference to the second. In a short publication on anxiety neurosis . . . I argued that neurotic anxiety derives from sexual life, and is the expression of unsatisfied desire which has been diverted from its goal. This formula has since then been proven valid. It enables us now to say that the sexual content of anxiety dreams is the result of transformation of sexual desire."
"Dreams are not comparable to the spontaneous sounds made by a musical instrument struck rather by some external force than by the hand of a performer; they are not meaningless, not absurd, they do not imply that one portion of our stockpile of ideas sleeps while another begins to awaken. They are a completely valid psychological phenomenon, specifically the fulfillment of wishes; they can be classified in the continuity of comprehensible waking mental states; they are constructed through highly complicated intellectual activity.
But as soon as we delight in this discovery, a flood of questions assails us. If, according to dream analysis, the dream represents a fulfilled wish, what creates the astonishing and strange form in which this wish-fullfillment is expressed? What transformation have the dream thoughts undergone to shape the manifest dream which we remember when awake? Through what means has this transformation taken place? What is the source of the material which has been reworked into the dream? Where do the many peculiarities which we notice in dream thoughts come from, for instance that they may be mutually contradictory? Can a dream tell us so mething new about our inner psychological processes? Can its content correct the opinions that we have held during our waking hours?
I suggest that we set these questions aside for the moment and follow one particular path further. We have learned that a dream represents a fulfilled wish. Our next concern will be to discover whether this is a universal characteristic of dreams. . . We must leave open the possibility that the meaning may not be the same in every dream. Our first dream was a wish fulfillment; but perhaps another will prove to be a fulfilled fear; a third might contain a reflex; a fourth may simply reproduce a memory. Are there other wish-dreams? Or perhaps nothing but wish-dreams exist.
It is easy to demonstrate that dreams often have the character of blatant wish-fullfillments; so much so that one wonders why the language of dreams was not understood long ago. For instance, there is a dream that I can experience at will, experimentally, as it were. When I eat sardines, olives, or other strongly salted foods in the evening, I am awakened in the night by thirst. But the awaking is always preceded by a dream with the same content: I gulp the water down; and it tastes delicious to me as only a cool drink can when one is dying of thirst; and then I wake up and really have to drink. The cause of this simple dream is the thirst which I feel when I awaken. This feeling causes the desire to drink, and the dream shows me this desire fulfilled. It thereby serves a function which I can easily guess. I am a good sleeper, unaccustomed to being awakened by any need. If I can slake my thirst by dreaming that I am drinking, I don't need to wake up in order to be satisfied. Thus this is a convenience dream. The dream is substituted for action, as so often in life.
Recently this same dream occurred in a somewhat modified form. I had become thirsty even before sleeping and drained the glass of water which was standing on the nightstand next to my bed. A few hours later during the night I had a new attack of thirst which was more inconvenient. In order to get some water I would have had to get up and take the glass standing on my wife's nightstand. I dreamed therefore that my wife gave me a drink out of a vessel. This vessel was an Etruscan funerary urn which I had brought back from a trip to Italy and had since given away. However, the water in it tasted so salty (plainly because of the ashes) that I had to wake up. It is easy to see how neatly this dream arranged matters; since it its only aim was wish-fulfillment, it could be completely egotistical. A love of convenience is not really compatible with consideration for others. The introduction of the funerary urn is probably another wish-fulfillment; I was sorry that I didn't own the vessel any more--just as the water glass beside my wife was inaccessible. The urn also fit the growing salty taste which I knew would force me to wake up.
I very commonly had such dreams of convenience in my youth. Always used to working deep into the night, it was always difficult for me to wake up early. I used to dream then that I was out of bed and standing in front of the washstand. Eventually I had to recognize that I was not up, but meanwhile I had slept some more. The same lazy dream in a particularly witty form was told to me by one of my colleagues who evidently shared my sleepyheadedness. The landlady he rented rooms near the hospitals from had strong instructions to wake him up at the right time every morning; but she had a difficult time carrying out these orders. One morning he was sleeping especially sweetly. The woman called into the room, "Mr. Pepi, get up. You have to go to the hospital. " At that point the sleeper dreamed that he was lying in a bed in a room in the hospital, on which was a placard which read "Pepi H., medical student, age 22." Dreaming, he said to himself, "Since I am already in the hospital, I don't have to go there," so he turned over and slept on. Thus he openly confessed the cause of his dream.
It is just as easy to discover wish-fulfillment in some other dreams that I have collected from normal people. A friend who knows my dream theory and had shared it with his wife said to me one day, "I must tell you that my wife dreamed yesterday that she had her period. You know what that means." Certainly I knew; since the young woman had dreamed that she had her period, it meant that her period had not come. I could well believe that she would liked to have enjoyed her freedom a little longer before beginning the burdens of motherhood. It was a clever way of announcing the onset of her pregnancy. Another friend writes me that his wife recently dreamed that she noticed drops of milk on her blouse front. This is always a sign of pregnancy, but not a first pregnancy; the young mother wanted to have more milk for the second child than she had had for the first. . . .
These examples will perhaps be enough to show that dreams which can only be understood as wish-fullfillments, and which clearly reveal their content, occur often and under manifold circumstances. These mostly short and simple dreams stand out pleasantly in contrast with the confused and overly complex dream compositions which have mostly absorbed the attention of writers. . . .
We recognize that we might have gotten at the understanding of the concealed meaning of dreams by the shortest path if we had simply followed common ways of speaking. Proverbs indeed sometimes speak dismissively of dreams; people think they are being properly scientific when they say, "Dreams are froth." But in common usage dreams are predominantly the fulfillers of dreams. We cry out, delighted, "I would never have imagined such a thing even in my wildest dreams" when we find that reality has surpassed our expectations. . . .
There still remain anxiety dreams (1) as a special subdivision of dreams with a painful content whose interpretation as wish-fulfillment dreams will be most unwillingly accepted by the unenlightened. However, I can deal briefly with anxiety dreams here; they do not represent another aspect of the problems posed by dreams; rather it is a matter of understanding above all neurotic anxiety. The anxiety that we feel in dreams is only apparently explained by the dream's content. When we try to discover the meaning of a dream's content, we note that the anxiety felt in a dream is no better explained by its content than the anxiety felt in a phobia (2) is explained by the mental image which induces the phobia. For instance, is it quite true that one may fall out of a window, and therefore one may reasonably exert a certain amount of caution around a window; but this does not explain why in its phobic form the fear is so powerful and the sufferer pursued by the fear far beyond its cause. The same explanation is valid for phobias as for anxiety dreams. The anxiety is in both cases only loose ly linked to the association, and actually derives from another source.
Since dream anxiety is intimately related to neurotic anxiety is must explain the first by reference to the second. In a short publication on anxiety neurosis . . . I argued that neurotic anxiety derives from sexual life, and is the expression of unsatisfied desire which has been diverted from its goal. This formula has since then been proven valid. It enables us now to say that the sexual content of anxiety dreams is the result of transformation of sexual desire."
Saturday, August 12, 2006
Muddy Waters: Mannish Boy
Muddy Waters: Mannish Boy
Ooooooh, yeah, ooh, yeah
Everythin', everythin', everytin's gonna be alright this mornin'
Ooh yeah, whoaw
Now when I was a young boy, at the age of five
My mother said I was, gonna be the greatest man alive
But now I'm a man, way past 21
Want you to believe me baby,
I had lot's of fun
I'm a man
I spell mmm, aaa child, nnn
That represents man
No B, O child, Y
That mean mannish boy
I'm a man
I'm a full grown man
I'm a man
I'm a natural born lovers man
I'm a man
I'm a rollin' stone
I'm a man
I'm a hoochie coochie man
Sittin' on the outside, just me and my mate
You know I'm made to move you honey,
come up two hours late
Wasn't that a man
I spell mmm, aaa child, nnn
That represents man
No B, O child, Y
That mean mannish boy
I'm a man
I'm a full grown man
Man
I'm a natural born lovers man
Man
I'm a rolllin' stone
Man-child
I'm a hoochie coochie man
The line I shoot will never miss
When I make love to a woman,
she can't resist
I think I go down,
to old Kansas Stew
I'm gonna bring back my second cousin,
that little Johnny Cocheroo
All you little girls,
sittin'out at that line
I can make love to you woman,
in five minutes time
Ain't that a man
I spell mmm, aaa child, nnn
That represents man
No B, O child, Y
That mean mannish boy
Man
I'm a full grown man
Man
I'm a natural born lovers man
Man
I'm a rollin' stone
I'm a man-child
I'm a hoochie coochie man
well, well, well, well
hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry
Don't hurt me, don't hurt me child
don't hurt me, don't hurt, don't hurt me child
well, well, well, well
Yeah
Ooooooh, yeah, ooh, yeah
Everythin', everythin', everytin's gonna be alright this mornin'
Ooh yeah, whoaw
Now when I was a young boy, at the age of five
My mother said I was, gonna be the greatest man alive
But now I'm a man, way past 21
Want you to believe me baby,
I had lot's of fun
I'm a man
I spell mmm, aaa child, nnn
That represents man
No B, O child, Y
That mean mannish boy
I'm a man
I'm a full grown man
I'm a man
I'm a natural born lovers man
I'm a man
I'm a rollin' stone
I'm a man
I'm a hoochie coochie man
Sittin' on the outside, just me and my mate
You know I'm made to move you honey,
come up two hours late
Wasn't that a man
I spell mmm, aaa child, nnn
That represents man
No B, O child, Y
That mean mannish boy
I'm a man
I'm a full grown man
Man
I'm a natural born lovers man
Man
I'm a rolllin' stone
Man-child
I'm a hoochie coochie man
The line I shoot will never miss
When I make love to a woman,
she can't resist
I think I go down,
to old Kansas Stew
I'm gonna bring back my second cousin,
that little Johnny Cocheroo
All you little girls,
sittin'out at that line
I can make love to you woman,
in five minutes time
Ain't that a man
I spell mmm, aaa child, nnn
That represents man
No B, O child, Y
That mean mannish boy
Man
I'm a full grown man
Man
I'm a natural born lovers man
Man
I'm a rollin' stone
I'm a man-child
I'm a hoochie coochie man
well, well, well, well
hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry
Don't hurt me, don't hurt me child
don't hurt me, don't hurt, don't hurt me child
well, well, well, well
Yeah
Monday, August 07, 2006
Streamlined Woman
Streamlined Woman
"While Streamlined Woman offers us a glorious historic glimpse at a young McKinley Morganfield, the solos can border on repetitive in casual listening. But attention to the subtle differences in each song will be rewarding. Songs like “Down South Blues” and “Rollin' and Tumblin'” have the same distinctive shuffles and beats, but we are interested in the attitudes to each respective take. That attitude is called a sound, and listening to the sound of Muddy Waters is to listen to the sound of the blues."
"While Streamlined Woman offers us a glorious historic glimpse at a young McKinley Morganfield, the solos can border on repetitive in casual listening. But attention to the subtle differences in each song will be rewarding. Songs like “Down South Blues” and “Rollin' and Tumblin'” have the same distinctive shuffles and beats, but we are interested in the attitudes to each respective take. That attitude is called a sound, and listening to the sound of Muddy Waters is to listen to the sound of the blues."
Animal Fighting Laws
Animal Fighting Laws
"One animal fighting law that can make an enormous difference in cracking down on this illegal activity is a prohibition on the possession of animals for fighting purposes. In states that do not ban keeping or selling fighting animals, police must catch animal fighters in the act of fighting. Infiltrating animal fighting circles can be a difficult task, as they are often highly clandestine, held in remote locations, and involve closed circles of participants. But animal fighters are often easily identifiable by the way they keep their animals, the fact that they possess training equipment, and have animals with multiple scars."
"One animal fighting law that can make an enormous difference in cracking down on this illegal activity is a prohibition on the possession of animals for fighting purposes. In states that do not ban keeping or selling fighting animals, police must catch animal fighters in the act of fighting. Infiltrating animal fighting circles can be a difficult task, as they are often highly clandestine, held in remote locations, and involve closed circles of participants. But animal fighters are often easily identifiable by the way they keep their animals, the fact that they possess training equipment, and have animals with multiple scars."
Saturday, July 15, 2006
Minamoto Yoshitsune
Minamoto Yoshitsune
"Japanese military leader and tragic hero, brother of Minamoto Yoritomo. Yoshitsune was placed in a monastery after his father's death in an unsuccessful rising against the dictatorship of Taira Kiyomori, but he escaped and in 1180 joined a rebellion against the Taira clan launched by Yoritomo. His first, spectacularly successful campaign (1184) was against his unruly cousin Yoshinaka; later that year he led a surprise assault on the Taira forces camped at Ichinotani, demoralizing and dispersing them. In 1185 he finally annihilated the Taira in the naval battle of Dannoura, but Yoritomo's suspicions, already aroused, were exacerbated by the retired Emperor Go-Shirakawa's attempts to use Yoshitsune against him. Yoshitsune was forced into rebellion against Yoritomo late in 1185, but most of his few followers died at sea as he fled north. Betrayed and attacked by his allies, he finally committed suicide after killing his wife and daughter. His story has been retold in many chronicles and plays, establishing him as the archetype of doomed valour."
"Japanese military leader and tragic hero, brother of Minamoto Yoritomo. Yoshitsune was placed in a monastery after his father's death in an unsuccessful rising against the dictatorship of Taira Kiyomori, but he escaped and in 1180 joined a rebellion against the Taira clan launched by Yoritomo. His first, spectacularly successful campaign (1184) was against his unruly cousin Yoshinaka; later that year he led a surprise assault on the Taira forces camped at Ichinotani, demoralizing and dispersing them. In 1185 he finally annihilated the Taira in the naval battle of Dannoura, but Yoritomo's suspicions, already aroused, were exacerbated by the retired Emperor Go-Shirakawa's attempts to use Yoshitsune against him. Yoshitsune was forced into rebellion against Yoritomo late in 1185, but most of his few followers died at sea as he fled north. Betrayed and attacked by his allies, he finally committed suicide after killing his wife and daughter. His story has been retold in many chronicles and plays, establishing him as the archetype of doomed valour."
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Monsters & Demons
Monsters & Demons
"Going to the movies may not seem like a novel way for little kids to spend an afternoon. But have you ever brought your child to see a Disney flick and ended up viewing trailers for Jeepers Creepers 2 or Freddie vs. Jason?
When this happened in a Birmingham, Alabama cinema last year, parents became concerned about what the main attraction would be. But before the managers at the cinema could turn off the previews, the main attraction came on, and it wasn't Piglet. Instead they were presented with the gruesome opening of Wrong Turn, an 18-rated slasher flick in much the same vein as the previews."
"Going to the movies may not seem like a novel way for little kids to spend an afternoon. But have you ever brought your child to see a Disney flick and ended up viewing trailers for Jeepers Creepers 2 or Freddie vs. Jason?
When this happened in a Birmingham, Alabama cinema last year, parents became concerned about what the main attraction would be. But before the managers at the cinema could turn off the previews, the main attraction came on, and it wasn't Piglet. Instead they were presented with the gruesome opening of Wrong Turn, an 18-rated slasher flick in much the same vein as the previews."
Toads and frogs
http://allaboutfrogs.org/weird/general/frogtoad.html
"Generally speaking, though, when we think of frogs, we generally picture what are called "True Frogs"....members of the family Ranidae, containing more than 400 species.
The term toads tends to refer to "True Toads"....members of the family Bufonidae, containing more than 300 species.
The physical distinctions, however, can easily get blurred because sometimes the features appear mixed or less obvious, and certain species even legitimately fall into both categories. It is not uncommon, for example, to find a warty skinned frog that isn't a toad, or even a slimy toad! Even the more invisible stuff like cartilage structure has been found to sometimes fit both categories!"
"Generally speaking, though, when we think of frogs, we generally picture what are called "True Frogs"....members of the family Ranidae, containing more than 400 species.
The term toads tends to refer to "True Toads"....members of the family Bufonidae, containing more than 300 species.
The physical distinctions, however, can easily get blurred because sometimes the features appear mixed or less obvious, and certain species even legitimately fall into both categories. It is not uncommon, for example, to find a warty skinned frog that isn't a toad, or even a slimy toad! Even the more invisible stuff like cartilage structure has been found to sometimes fit both categories!"
Friday, July 07, 2006
Cats-n-Dogs
Cats-n-Dogs
"Air travel with pets falls into two categories, in-cabin and cargo. In-cabin pets must be small enough to fit into a carrier that will slide under the seat in front of you. Pets too large to fit comfortably in a carrier must travel in cargo. Cargo holds are heated, cooled and pressurized, just like the passenger compartment.
Before you make a reservation, be sure the airline will accommodate your pet. Some airlines do not take pets in-cabin; some discount airlines don't accept pets at all. So if you purchase your airline tickets through the Internet, make sure your pet will be able to travel with you.
Pet passengers require a reservation, whether traveling in-cabin or cargo. Airlines have restrictions on the number of pets they will carry in order to provide safe travel for all. So making your pet's reservation at the same time you purchase your ticket is a good idea. Extra charges for both in-cabin and cargo pets will be assessed."
"Air travel with pets falls into two categories, in-cabin and cargo. In-cabin pets must be small enough to fit into a carrier that will slide under the seat in front of you. Pets too large to fit comfortably in a carrier must travel in cargo. Cargo holds are heated, cooled and pressurized, just like the passenger compartment.
Before you make a reservation, be sure the airline will accommodate your pet. Some airlines do not take pets in-cabin; some discount airlines don't accept pets at all. So if you purchase your airline tickets through the Internet, make sure your pet will be able to travel with you.
Pet passengers require a reservation, whether traveling in-cabin or cargo. Airlines have restrictions on the number of pets they will carry in order to provide safe travel for all. So making your pet's reservation at the same time you purchase your ticket is a good idea. Extra charges for both in-cabin and cargo pets will be assessed."
Monday, July 03, 2006
Squirrel search tips
Squirrel search tips
"As of June 2006, Google shows 27.6 million hits for the word "squirrel". Many of these links, on the other hand, don't have much to do with actual squirrels, but with things like SQL clients and programming languages. The Latin name Sciurus returns 787,000 hits, but not even all of these are squirrel links. The name of the squirrel family, Sciuridae, gets 258,000 hits. Even doing a Google image search for large full-color JPG files gets 13,500 hits, which is a lot of squirrel pictures (with a lot of non-squirrel pictures mixed in). When I started this page, a search for "squirrel" turned up a few hundred pages at most, but these days, there are far too many pages to check out even a tiny portion of them.
"There are two ways to sift through this vast sea of links. One is to narrow down the search: from "squirrel" (27.6M) to "red squirrel" (856,000) to "red squirrel" +michigan (35,200). Another is to look up the word for "squirrel" in a random dictionary, such as Italian (scoiattolo, 510,000 hits) or Portuguese (esquilo, 562,000 hits). The problem with that is that not enough dictionaries have a word for "squirrel" listed. One way to find words for "squirrel" is to use Google Advanced Search, type a Latin name in the search box, and select a language from the language box. For instance, Google returns 900 pages in Polish for the word Sciurus, from which you can find that "wiewiórka" seems to be a Polish word for a kind of squirrel. (It also is apparently a Polish surname.) Another is to visit the English Wikipedia "Squirrel" page and click one of the links in the box marked "in other languages".
"As of June 2006, Google shows 27.6 million hits for the word "squirrel". Many of these links, on the other hand, don't have much to do with actual squirrels, but with things like SQL clients and programming languages. The Latin name Sciurus returns 787,000 hits, but not even all of these are squirrel links. The name of the squirrel family, Sciuridae, gets 258,000 hits. Even doing a Google image search for large full-color JPG files gets 13,500 hits, which is a lot of squirrel pictures (with a lot of non-squirrel pictures mixed in). When I started this page, a search for "squirrel" turned up a few hundred pages at most, but these days, there are far too many pages to check out even a tiny portion of them.
"There are two ways to sift through this vast sea of links. One is to narrow down the search: from "squirrel" (27.6M) to "red squirrel" (856,000) to "red squirrel" +michigan (35,200). Another is to look up the word for "squirrel" in a random dictionary, such as Italian (scoiattolo, 510,000 hits) or Portuguese (esquilo, 562,000 hits). The problem with that is that not enough dictionaries have a word for "squirrel" listed. One way to find words for "squirrel" is to use Google Advanced Search, type a Latin name in the search box, and select a language from the language box. For instance, Google returns 900 pages in Polish for the word Sciurus, from which you can find that "wiewiórka" seems to be a Polish word for a kind of squirrel. (It also is apparently a Polish surname.) Another is to visit the English Wikipedia "Squirrel" page and click one of the links in the box marked "in other languages".
Stinging Caterpillars
Stinging Caterpillars
"Most people know that bees, wasps, hornets and some ants can sting to defend themselves or their nests. Only a few people realize, usually from first hand experience, that handling some caterpillars can produce some painful results. Recognizing the few stinging caterpillar species may prevent irritating encounters.
"Caterpillar stages of moths often have spines and barbed hooks. Generally, these are for show and are quite harmless. But there are a few Stinging caterpillars of various shapes, sizes and colors. Stinging caterpillars possess hollow quill-like hairs, connected to poison sacs, that are used as defensive weapons. When these hairs are touched they break through the skin releasing the poison. Reactions can range from a mild itching to the more severe pain, dermatitis, and even intestinal disturbances. "
"Most people know that bees, wasps, hornets and some ants can sting to defend themselves or their nests. Only a few people realize, usually from first hand experience, that handling some caterpillars can produce some painful results. Recognizing the few stinging caterpillar species may prevent irritating encounters.
"Caterpillar stages of moths often have spines and barbed hooks. Generally, these are for show and are quite harmless. But there are a few Stinging caterpillars of various shapes, sizes and colors. Stinging caterpillars possess hollow quill-like hairs, connected to poison sacs, that are used as defensive weapons. When these hairs are touched they break through the skin releasing the poison. Reactions can range from a mild itching to the more severe pain, dermatitis, and even intestinal disturbances. "
Caterpillars
Caterpillars
"Caterpillars are voracious feeders. When large numbers occur together, they can completely strip the leaves from a tree. Several colonies of the eastern tent caterpillar helped themselves to this wild cherry. Their silk tents can be seen in the branch forks."
"Full-grown caterpillars are 2-1/2 inches long with a white stripe down the back and blue spots on either side. After completing their development, eastern tent caterpillars leave their host tree and wander in search of suitable places in which to spin their cocoons. Inside the cocoons, they transform into moths which mate and lay eggs once again on cherry, apple, and other suitable host trees."
"Caterpillars are voracious feeders. When large numbers occur together, they can completely strip the leaves from a tree. Several colonies of the eastern tent caterpillar helped themselves to this wild cherry. Their silk tents can be seen in the branch forks."
"Full-grown caterpillars are 2-1/2 inches long with a white stripe down the back and blue spots on either side. After completing their development, eastern tent caterpillars leave their host tree and wander in search of suitable places in which to spin their cocoons. Inside the cocoons, they transform into moths which mate and lay eggs once again on cherry, apple, and other suitable host trees."
Friday, June 30, 2006
Search for El Dorado The Lost City of Gold
Search for El Dorado The Lost City of Gold
"CLUES FOR THE HUNT: In 1502, Columbus-on his 4th and last expedition to America-reached Venezuela, so named because its coast looked to him like "an odd little Venice." He had been told that there was "a gold city 10 days from the Ganges." Since he still thought he was in India, he mistook the Orinoco River for the Ganges. Earlier, he momentarily thought he had found El Dorado in Haiti, where nuggets were the size of hen's eggs. In 1510 Balboa, already at the Pacific Ocean and not impossibly far from Cundinamarca, was contemptuously told by an Indian as he knocked a handful of ornaments out of Balboa's hand, "I can tell you of a land where they eat and drink out of golden vessels and gold is as cheap as iron is with you." Cortes, too, had been informed of this land by an Indian slave girl whom he baptized-and then used for 6 years as both translator and mistress. She had merely pointed in the direction of Bogota. "
"CLUES FOR THE HUNT: In 1502, Columbus-on his 4th and last expedition to America-reached Venezuela, so named because its coast looked to him like "an odd little Venice." He had been told that there was "a gold city 10 days from the Ganges." Since he still thought he was in India, he mistook the Orinoco River for the Ganges. Earlier, he momentarily thought he had found El Dorado in Haiti, where nuggets were the size of hen's eggs. In 1510 Balboa, already at the Pacific Ocean and not impossibly far from Cundinamarca, was contemptuously told by an Indian as he knocked a handful of ornaments out of Balboa's hand, "I can tell you of a land where they eat and drink out of golden vessels and gold is as cheap as iron is with you." Cortes, too, had been informed of this land by an Indian slave girl whom he baptized-and then used for 6 years as both translator and mistress. She had merely pointed in the direction of Bogota. "
Friday, June 23, 2006
History of The Simpsons
History of The Simpsons
"The Simpsons are the brainchild of Matt Groening. He started out as a cartoonist by drawing a weekly comic strip for a set of regional newspapers, called "Life In Hell." They featured a rabbit called Blinky (yes, that's the name of the three-eyed fish in The Simpsons) and detailed the dark side of life. Books of these early cartoons are sold in bookstores."
"The Simpsons are the brainchild of Matt Groening. He started out as a cartoonist by drawing a weekly comic strip for a set of regional newspapers, called "Life In Hell." They featured a rabbit called Blinky (yes, that's the name of the three-eyed fish in The Simpsons) and detailed the dark side of life. Books of these early cartoons are sold in bookstores."
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Bottlenose Dolphins
Bottlenose Dolphins
Scientific Classification
Habitat and Distribution
Physical Characteristics
Senses
Adaptations for an Aquatic Environment
Behavior
Diet and Eating Habits
Reproduction
Birth and Care of Young
Communication and Echolocation
Longevity and Causes of Death
Conservation
Books for Young Readers
Bibliography
Scientific Classification
Habitat and Distribution
Physical Characteristics
Senses
Adaptations for an Aquatic Environment
Behavior
Diet and Eating Habits
Reproduction
Birth and Care of Young
Communication and Echolocation
Longevity and Causes of Death
Conservation
Books for Young Readers
Bibliography
Megiddo and Armageddon
Megiddo and Armageddon
Megiddo (me·GID·o), or Tel Megiddo (TEL-me·GID·o), an ancient fortified city, is one of the most famous battlegrounds in the world. Historians believe that more battles were fought at this location than anywhere else on earth. "When Edwin Robinson stood on the imposing hill known as Tell el-Mutesellim in 1838, he jotted down in his diary the words, 'I wonder where Megiddo could have been.' Ironically, the mound on which he was standing, rising seventy feet above the surrounding plain and occupying an area of ten acres on its summit (with lower levels even larger) soon proved to be the site of Megiddo"
Megiddo (me·GID·o), or Tel Megiddo (TEL-me·GID·o), an ancient fortified city, is one of the most famous battlegrounds in the world. Historians believe that more battles were fought at this location than anywhere else on earth. "When Edwin Robinson stood on the imposing hill known as Tell el-Mutesellim in 1838, he jotted down in his diary the words, 'I wonder where Megiddo could have been.' Ironically, the mound on which he was standing, rising seventy feet above the surrounding plain and occupying an area of ten acres on its summit (with lower levels even larger) soon proved to be the site of Megiddo"
Friday, June 09, 2006
MILITARY VEHICLES
MILITARY VEHICLES
"Military Vehicles from Jeeps to Tanks of all ages and types for private collectors, museums and commercial users. Military Vehicle, Militaria and Ex Military Equipment dealers and private advertisers - updated every 12 hours. Military Vehicle, Militaria and Re-enactor events. "
"Military Vehicles from Jeeps to Tanks of all ages and types for private collectors, museums and commercial users. Military Vehicle, Militaria and Ex Military Equipment dealers and private advertisers - updated every 12 hours. Military Vehicle, Militaria and Re-enactor events. "
Thursday, May 11, 2006
Andromeda Galaxy
Andromeda Galaxy
"Wider and possibly brighter than our own Milky Way, the Andromeda Galaxy was once thought to be the dominant member of the Local Group of galaxies. Although it is Milky Way's nearest large galactic neighbor, this large spiral galaxy (type Sb with two arms) lies around 2.52 ± 0.14 million light-years (ly) from the Solar System (Ribas et al, 2005). It can be found in (0:40:27+40:40:12, J2000; and 0:42:44.3+41:16:9.4, ICRS 2000) Constellation Andromeda, the Chained Maiden. It is located northwest of Mu and Beta Andromedae (Mirach); west of Nu Andromedae; northeast of Theta and Sigma Andromedae; north of Pi, Delta, and Epsilon Andromedae; and south of Theta and Omega Cassiopeiae. Andromeda can be seen by Human eyes from Earth without a telescope as a "little cloud" (see Akira Fujii's photo to better relate the galaxy's location to the brightest stars of Constellation Andromeda)."
"Wider and possibly brighter than our own Milky Way, the Andromeda Galaxy was once thought to be the dominant member of the Local Group of galaxies. Although it is Milky Way's nearest large galactic neighbor, this large spiral galaxy (type Sb with two arms) lies around 2.52 ± 0.14 million light-years (ly) from the Solar System (Ribas et al, 2005). It can be found in (0:40:27+40:40:12, J2000; and 0:42:44.3+41:16:9.4, ICRS 2000) Constellation Andromeda, the Chained Maiden. It is located northwest of Mu and Beta Andromedae (Mirach); west of Nu Andromedae; northeast of Theta and Sigma Andromedae; north of Pi, Delta, and Epsilon Andromedae; and south of Theta and Omega Cassiopeiae. Andromeda can be seen by Human eyes from Earth without a telescope as a "little cloud" (see Akira Fujii's photo to better relate the galaxy's location to the brightest stars of Constellation Andromeda)."
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