I had fabulous idea.
To put my pants on fire.
You can see the result here.
[Source]
Daily Archives: May 4, 2012
BOSS Gif – I Have A Car, I Can Fly Everywhere, Edition!
The futuristic cars look amazing.
Who wouldn’t want to take them for a ride, I mean to fly in them.
[Source]
The People’s Car Project is an initiative launched by VW in China to design the new people’s car, an open-source project where citizens can submit ideas to VW’s R&D in China.
This is the case of Jia Wang who thought of a solution for traffic congestion in the city of Chengdu with a small urban vehicle, spherical, connected that can be parked everywhere (even in the air!) with a simplified operation allowing everyone to take the wheel.Starting from these basic concepts, VW’s engineers made this idea become true with an original vehicle using electromagnetic levitation -to provide freedom and comfort- but also safety oriented with distance sensors to avoid crashes.
Like a BOSS
Animated Animal Haiku – Deep Blue Journey, Edition!
Poetic Celebrity Parody – It Wasn’t In The Stars, Edition!
John Edwards ‘was obsessed with mistress’s life of sex and astrology.
Once upon a time
He was a presidential candidate
With 400 dollars haircut
His future couldn’t look brighter
Then he committed a crime
To wine and dine his mistress
He took a lighter
And set his career on fire
Burning campaign dollars
And his marriage to the crisp
He and his mistress believed in astrology
Thought they were brought together by the stars
Nothing further from the truth
His presidency and his success
Wasn’t written in the stars
But stay in prison was more likely
[Source]
News Mash: Cinco de Mayo celebrations break on both on the ground & in space!
For those of you off and ready to celebrate…
This fantastic Cinco de Mayo weekend?
You have ever so MUCH to look forward to.
[via AP] ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Here’s what Cinco de Mayo has become in the U.S.: a celebration of all things Mexican, from mariachi music to sombreros, marked by schools, politicians and companies selling everything from beans to beer.
And here’s what Cinco de Mayo is not, despite all the signs in bar windows inviting revelers to drink: It’s not Mexico’s Independence Day, and it’s barely
marked in Mexico, except in the state of Puebla, where the holiday is rooted in a complicated and short-lived 1862 military victory over the French.
But don’t let that spoil the party.
In Houston, ballet folklorico dancers will ring in Cinco de Mayo by stomping to traditional Mexican music in a city park. New York City will close parts of Spanish Harlem and Queens for street fairs as Mexican flags flap from apartment fire escapes and car antennas. Albuquerque honors the day with a Mariachi concert and free cab rides for those who show their love for Mexico with a little too much Dos Equis XX or tequila. Even West Des Moines, Iowa, has an all-day festival with Mexican food, artwork and live music.
The holiday has spread from the American Southwest, even though most are unaware of its original ties to the U.S. Civil War, abolition and promotion of civil rights for blacks.
Often mistaken for Mexican Independence Day (that’s Sept. 16), Cinco de Mayo commemorates the 1862 Battle
of Puebla between the victorious ragtag army of largely Mexican Indian soldiers against the invading French forces of Napoleon III. Mexican Americans, during the Chicano Movement of the 1970s, adopted the holiday for its David vs. Goliath storyline as motivation for civil rights struggles in Texas and California.
Over the years, the holiday has been adopted by beer companies as a way to penetrate the growing Latino market, even as the historical origins of the holiday remain largely forgotten.
David Hayes-Bautista, a professor of medicine and health services at UCLA and author of the newly released “El Cinco de Mayo: An American Tradition,” said the holiday’s history in the U.S. goes back to the Gold Rush when thousands of immigrants from Mexico, Central and South America came to California during the Civil War.
According to Spanish-language newspapers at the time, this first group of multinational Latinos on U.S. soil identified with the Union Army’s fight against the Confederacy and often wrote pieces about the evils of slavery. Hayes-Bautista said these Latino immigrants were concerned about the Union’s lack of progress and Napoleon III’s interests in helping the South.
“It wasn’t until the news came about the Battle of Puebla that they got the good news they wanted,” said Hayes-Bautista. “Since Napoleon III was linked to the Confederacy, they saw the victory as the first sign that their side could win.”
They didn’t, of course, at least not for a few years. French forces took over Mexico after the Battle of Puebla, and installed Habsburg Archduke Maximilian as Emperor of Mexico. He was captured by Mexican forces five years later and put to death.
But in the years that followed, Latinos in California and the U.S. Northwest celebrated Cinco de Mayo with parades of people dressed in Civil War uniforms and gave speeches about the significance of the Battle of Puebla in the larger struggle for abolition, said Hayes-Bautista.
The Cinco de Mayo-Civil War link remained until the Mexican Revolution, which sparked another wave of Mexican immigration to the U.S. Those immigrants had no connection to Cinco de Mayo – except that U.S. Latinos celebrated it.
“That’s when it became about David vs. Goliath, Indians beating a European force, and it took on a new meaning,” said Hayes-Bautista. “The Civil War ties disappeared.” [Read More]
Just be sure however…
During your celebrations?
You take the time to look UP at the beautiful night’s sky.
[via TheExtinctionProtocol] Aquarid meteor shower to coincide with super moon (May 5th)
May 2, 2012 – SPACE – Earth is entering a stream of debris from Halley’s Comet, source of the annual eta Aquarid meteor shower. Because the shower’s radiant is located below the celestial equator, southern hemisphere observers are favored, but even northerners will be able to see at least a few flecks of Halley-dust disintegrating in the atmosphere when the shower peaks this weekend. The best time to look is during the hours before sunrise on Sunday, May 6th. Bright moonlight will cap the meteor rate at about 30 per hour. In recent nights, NASA’s all-sky meteor network has picked up a number of early eta Aquarid fireballs. –Space Weather [Read More]
Which apparently…
Will be doing a bit of celebration Herself.
Have a Safe & Happy Cinco de Mayo!
News Mash: When it comes to High-Maintenance Friends and Family? Spray responsibly!
Some people LIVE for drama.
Thanks to their seeming inherent dysfunction, which they just LOVE to nurture and propagate over the years…
There are times when they will do so at YOUR expense?
Willing participant or not.
Certain people in your life, at one time or another, whether they be friends or, gawd help you, family…
Will do their utter best, and without a second thought to YOU, to make you pretty damn miserable, and all the damn time via the unneeded stress they heap upon via truckloads of their constant and never-ending BS.
I know you are nodding right now, because you know the EXACT people that I mean.
We all have them.
And because we do?
Lifehacker was nice enough to help us try to figure out a way to handle them.
[via LifeHacker] We all have that one friend or family member who’s a constant drain on our energy. You want to keep that person in your life (or have to), but you could do without the huge amounts of stress. While you can’t change who someone is, you can do a lot to remove the dysfunction from the situation. Whether you’ve got one or many high-maintenance people in your life, here’s how to handle them.
[...]
- Set Clear Boundaries (Because They Will Be Crossed) - [...] If a friend or family member is
continuously crossing a line, you need to ensure they know where that line is. [...] This can be an uncomfortable conversation, especially if you bring it up out of nowhere. If you do that, it may seem as if you’re on the offensive. Because this is an ongoing relationship and not one formed from a business contract, you have the option of waiting until a problem arises. When it does, use that moment to tell your high-maintenance person what is or isn’t okay. Let them know the terms of your relationship, and refer back to them politely anytime they breach those terms. Setting boundaries is important, but it’s also crucial that you are consistent. If you’re not, and you let this person break the rules you’ve set out, they’ll learn that the rules don’t matter. That will only make things worse.
- Nurture the Relationship On Your Terms - High-maintenance people live in a world that revolves around them, so the only schedule that matters is their own. They’ll often forget about, or even ignore, the times you’re busy because they find their time to be more important. [...] If the person is the type to try to get your attention more than you would like, only make yourself available on your terms.
- Choose Your Battles Wisely - High-maintenance people don’t like to be wrong. Because they consider their time of the utmost importance, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that their opinions are highly regarded as well. When you disagree with them, chances are they’ll just fight back until you give up or just become upset with you. [...] You should really know what you’re willing to put up with and what you insist on calling them out on. It’s important to pick only the battles you need to win. If you don’t, you’re just going to end up exhausting yourself.
- Plan for a Little “Crazy” – Life is capricious. It breeds interruptions and imperfections regularly. You can rarely count on things going to plan, but you can plan for potential problems and handle them well. [...] Just remember to set boundaries and prioritize your time first when putting up with their behavior.
- Give Yourself a Break – High-maintenance people often cause high amounts of stress. If they didn’t, you probably wouldn’t be reading this. Like with any stressful situation, it’s important to remember to extract yourself from it from time to time so you have a break. [...][Read More - Read WHOLE Article, Unedited (What - The article was LONG), HERE! Definitely worth it.]
And…
If all else fails?
Well, Anguished Repose was nice enough to stumble across something she wanted to share with you, which in times of crisis and in moments of extreme pain via dealing with the Drama Queens in your life, that will work in a pinch.
It’s an “I don’t give a fly rats %$@” spray.
Seriously.
[via Gizmodo] This Spray Will Get You Instantaneously Drunk—But Just For a Few Seconds
I don’t know when the WA|HH Quantum Sensations spray is coming to the United States, but it’s not coming soon enough. Created by the French American scientist David Edwards, it gets you drunk for a few seconds with no aftereffects. Why? I don’t know why, but I want to try it anyway.
Each dose—administered with a device designed by Philippe Starck—will give you only 0.075 milliliters of alcohol. Edwards claims that, thanks to the way the specially designed spray mechanism pulverizes the liquid into your mouth, the effect is full and instantaneous. However, once it disappears, you will not have any headache. In fact, you can pass any alcohol test after using it. [Read More]
OK…
It’s not exactly “I don’t give a fly rats %$@” spray. But seeing as how this spray claims it can get you instantaneously drunk, in mere seconds, and with no after effects?
It’s about the closest darn thing to THAT reality I could find.
And given the pure sociopathic, narcissistic insanity of some of the people in my life?
Hey…
There are definitely days I would be willing to give it a good shot.
But fear not…
I will forever, and always?
Spray responsibly.
News Mash: Cats are clumsy, just as graceless as the rest of us!
Bag cat
Stuck on a pole
With nowhere he can go
Because he is
Bag cat
Sad cat
Bag.
What a drag?!
Though it is true…
The Bag Cat DID fall at least 20 feet?
Fear not, crazy cat lovers. (And yes, I mean YOU!)
For you see? A cat’s body was made to survive such agonizing falls.
Falls, in which other animals?
Would have NO hope of surviving!
[via io9] Why cats can survive falls that would kill any other animal
Cats can famously fall from skyscrapers and only suffer the most minor of bruises, including the recent story of a cat surviving a 19-story fall in Boston with only a bruised chest. What’s the secret of this feline survival?
There’s a great rundown of just how cats survive these falls over at BBC News, but the short answer is that it’s all about evolution. Domesticated cats are the descendants of arboreal creatures that had to be able to survive the occasional fall while jumping from tree branch to tree branch. That’s added up to an amazing biological toolkit that helps ensure their survival, even when falling from dozens of stories up. The BBC article explains all the major keys:
They have a relatively large surface area in proportion to their weight, thus reducing the force at which they hit the pavement. Cats reach terminal velocity, the speed at which the downward tug of gravity is matched by the upward push of wind resistance, at a slow speed compared to large animals like humans and horses. For instance, an average-sized cat with its limbs extended achieves a terminal velocity of about 60mph, while an average-sized man reaches a terminal velocity of about 120mph…
Through natural selection, cats have developed a keen instinct for sensing which way is down, analogous to the mechanism humans use for balance, biologists say. Then – if given enough time – they are able to twist their bodies like a gymnast, astronaut or skydiver and spin their tails in order to position their feet under their bodies and land on them.
That last trick is known as the aerial righting reflex, and it is crucial to their survival. With their legs in the right place, they can effectively act as shock absorbers for the rest of the body, and their muscles are able to essentially channel the kinetic energy of the fall so that it decelerates the cat as opposed to breaking all its bones. [Read More]
It should be noted, however…
That although a cat’s body is built to absorb the blows of a long fall?
Cover a cat’s face with a Doritos bag or a simple slice of ham & throw its sense (apparently) of ‘which way is down’ out-of-whack and note…
[MaxGif It!][Source]
It is just as clumsy…
Just as graceless?
As the rest of us.
Aporia Politico: CNN reports a “10 people” Romney protest…Wonders why its ratings are are at decade lows!
CNN is in BIG trouble.
Their ratings are crashing.
And by ‘crashing’ I mean lower than at any other point in the last DECADE.
[via NYTimes] When elections and explosions happen, people tune in to CNN, the same way they hurry to a hospital when they think they are having a heart attack. But people tend not to linger in either place — a reality that was reaffirmed for CNN this week when Nielsen ratings showed that April was the channel’s lowest-rated month in 10 years.
CNN, with its vast news-gathering resources and a heap of international channels, is set to make nearly $600 million in operating profit this year, a record high, for its parent company, Time Warner. But the downward ratings trend for CNN/U.S., its flagship channel in the United States, has stirred discontent within CNN and Time Warner. Performance of CNN/U.S. drives public perception — and employee pride — and declines there may gradually damage CNN’s networks as a whole. [Read More]
As harrowing news as that is…
Honestly?
Is anyone surpised.
Especially considering what THEY consider news?
[via Newsbusters]A liberal protest that CNN.com said contained “about 10 people” still merited inclusion in CNN correspondent Jim Acosta’s report on Wednesday’s The Situation Room. Of course, Acosta made no mention of the smallness or brevity of the protest — the chant of “No Swiss Mitt” lasted under five minutes.
Acosta did tout that Democrats were “hounding” Romney to keep him “back on his heels.” As an example of their strategy, he mentioned the protesters with a clip of them chanting “No Swiss Mitt.”
“But Democrats have their own playbook to keep Romney back on his heels,” Acosta reported, “hounding his visit to the Republican National Committee in Washington with chants of ‘No Swiss Mitt,’ in step with a new Obama re-election video.”
According to CNN.com, the protesters were from the liberal group Americans United for Change. They stood outside of the Republican National Committee headquarters chanting “No Swiss Mitt” while Romney was inside visiting, to protest his outsourcing jobs and using a Swiss bank account.
As if the tiny protest wasn’t weak enough, according to CNN.com the group “arrived after Romney was already inside, so he would only have seen them if he was looking out a back window of the Republican headquarters.”
Did CNN give proportionate attention to a January pro-life march in D.C. attended by not 10, but tens of thousands of people? Not quite. That event merited two brief mentions, in contrast with CNN hyping a D.C. Earth Day rally attended by hundreds.
A partial transcript of the segment, which aired on May 2 on The Situation Room at 4:17 p.m. EDT, is as follows:
- JIM ACOSTA: I was out with Mitt Romney earlier today in Chantilly, Virginia, in Northern Virginia. It was amazing to watch, because it was as if the news surrounding the anniversary of the killing of Osama bin Laden had not even happened. Now that the President has played his trump card, and that is the bin Laden death, Mitt Romney wants to play his, that is the economy. While Newt Gingrich – he’s just folding his cards. [Read More - MUCH More At This Funny Political Site!]
If the interest that can be stirred by a ‘ten people’ political protest, is your target block?
Sorry, CNN…
NEWSFLASH: This could be your problem.
One would think that would be fairly obvious.
Then again?
CNN and its reporters have never been the best…
At cluing in to the obvious.
(Pssst, look over your shoulder!)
Waiting for a star to fall, to hold ones destiny, is foolish…But the wise don’t stop trying!
Every fool knows you can’t touch the stars, but it doesn’t stop a wise man from trying.”
~Harry Anderson
[Source]
“Thus shall you go to the stars.” ~Virgil
