What Would Be In Your Perfect Library?

110 best books: The perfect library

Getting Back At the Bullies

School can be as traumatizing as any battlefield. There are the locker room wedgies, the Dodgeball attacks, the lunchroom shunnings. But even the most cringe-worthy moment from your high school days probably doesn't compare to the humiliation felt by one freshman male from Central Kings Rural High School in Nova Scotia, who dared to wear a pink shirt on the first day of school last year.

The poor boy paid dearly for his fashion choice: A group of older students mocked him relentlessly, threatening to beat him up.

The incident might have served as a warning for other males at the school to avoid anything in pastels. But instead, two senior boys, David Shepherd and Travis Price, took up the bullied boy's cause as a rallying cry.

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Have You Seen A Man In a Red Suit Delivering Presents?

Who Says Angels Don't Look After You?

Now That's What You Call Unlucky

A Bosnian man whose home has been hit an incredible five times by meteorites believes he is being targeted by aliens. Experts at Belgrade University have confirmed that all the rocks Radivoje Lajic has handed over were meteorites.

They are now investigating local magnetic fields to try and work out what makes the property so attractive to the heavenly bodies. But Mr Lajic, who has had a steel girder reinforced roof put on the house he owns in the northern village of Gornja Lamovite, has an alternative explanation.

He said: "I am obviously being targeted by extraterrestrials. I don't know what I have done to annoy them but there is no other explanation that makes sense.

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What Car Do You Have? A Red One.

From Matthew Parris at the Times

My friend Kim can be a little absent-minded. Driven to the shops by her husband last week, she popped in to buy something, leaving him at the wheel. Then out she bustled and leapt into the passenger seat of the waiting car. It did not move. “What's all that hooting from behind us?” she asked, as the car behind flashed its lights and sounded its horn.

“Maybe it's your husband,” said the driver. “I'm not your husband. This is not your car.”

I Knew It! I Knew This Was How The Internet Worked!

Please Explain Yourself MORE CLEARLY

How I laughed. I CAN REALLY RELATE TO THIS.

Boycott China Over Tibet?

What a lovely sentiment.

Pope & Pomp

Does this picture not suggest that something might possibly have gone wrong with Catholicism?

Click to enlarge

How To Keep Your Girlfriend Interested

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63-year-old solves riddle from 1970

Israeli mathematician unravels puzzle that baffled scientists for decades

JERUSALEM - A mathematical puzzle that baffled the top minds in the esoteric field of symbolic dynamics for nearly four decades has been cracked — by a 63-year-old immigrant who once had to work as a security guard.

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What's that you're drawing in your moleskine notebook?

A chance to have a look at some excellent sketches sent in to skineart.

How to Age-Proof Your Memory

An interesting little video on a growing area of understanding. Giving your memory a work out keeps you going as you get older.

http://pokedandprodded.health.com/poked_prodded/2008/03/how-to-age-proo.html

British Army Officer Advert

While the NUT shamelessly votes to ban army recruitment in secondary schools, here is a fantastic advert from the armed forces, doing what they do best.

Careful Which Hotel You Book...

You may get more than you bargained for.

9 hotels you won't believe

Scientifically Proven! People who wear glasses aren’t geeks

And we are even more agreeable as people. Must be all that extra brain power.

So there.

Latest research into myopia or shortsightedness reveals that people who wear glasses are not stereotypical geeks or nerds.

“We have literally busted the myth that people who wear glasses are introverted or have particular personality characteristics. They are more likely to be agreeable and open, rather than closed and introverted,” said A/Prof Paul Baird of the University of Melbourne’s Centre for Eye Research Australia.

Myopia or shortsightedness is a complex eye condition which affects about one in four Australians.

In the word’s biggest study into factors linked to myopia, and utilising the University’s Australian Twin Registry, 633 twins and a comparative group of 278 family members were involved in the study over a four year period.

For the first time in a study into personality and myopia, participants were analysed using a state-of-the-art measure of the five major personality factors (Openness, Conscientiousness, Extroversion, Agreeableness and Neuroticism), administered by psychologists from the University of Melbourne.

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Awesome Creation

Be inspired by these photos of creation by Jim Zuckerman

Smile you're on ele-vision: How a camera attached to an elephant's trunk captured amazing jungle views

The Dailiy Mail revealed the amazing story of how four tiger cubs were captured on special cameras in logs carried by elephants - giving the most intimate insight into their early lives ever recorded. Now, they show for the first time other creatures of the jungle caught in this extraordinary - and pioneering - way.

Cheeky langur monkeys, a rare sloth bear, spotted deer and a leopard with her cub are just some of the other animals that film-maker John Downer came across in his fascinating experiment.

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Autograph Mania

Boston Red Sox pitcher Hideki Okajima is asked for his autographs from the outfield fence before the Major League Baseball regular season game between the Red Sox and the Oakland Athletics at Tokyo Dome in Tokyo, Japan. (AP Photo/Koji Sasahara)

What is it about autographs that people are so keen to get hold of them? I can only guess that it is because people want a piece of you that is unique. But to my mind it still means nothing. If I saw someone famous, I'd rather have some kind of little conversation with them. That would be my memento.

Whoever you are, people want some small piece of you. What autograph do you leave?

25 Photos Taken at the Exact Right Time

It's not often I can get the phone on my camera to take the picture I want it to, because there is about a 2 second delay from the time you press the button. So if I wanted to take any of these shots I would have needed to be able to look into the future.

See More Lucky Shots

Girl Dies After Parents Pray for Healing Instead of Seeking Medical Help

WESTON, Wis. — An 11-year-old girl died after her parents prayed for healing rather than seek medical help for a treatable form of diabetes, police said Tuesday.

Everest Metro Police Chief Dan Vergin said Madeline Neumann died Sunday. "She got sicker and sicker until she was dead," he said.

Vergin said an autopsy determined the girl died from diabetic ketoacidosis, an ailment that left her with too little insulin in her body, and she had probably been ill for about 30 days, suffering symptoms like nausea, vomiting, excessive thirst, loss of appetite and weakness.

The girl's parents, Dale and Leilani Neumann, attributed the death to "apparently they didn't have enough faith," the police chief said.

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Richest Man in the World: Invests like a Girl

Warren Buffett Invests Like a Girl

For as long as I can remember, adding the phrase "like a girl" to the end of whatever you were saying was a put-down, an insult, something to come to fisticuffs over. Little boys the world over hated being told that they, for example, "threw like a girl." I'm not defending the statement, and as a member of the fairer sex, I certainly don't agree with its intent, but hey, that's been the case from the playground on up.

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Lovely Dawn Chorus: Nature's Morning Alarm

It's an ever-present feature of spring and summer mornings, but many people are only aware of the dawn chorus through insomnia or a chance encounter during an early start. Very few of us set the alarm to listen to one of the musical wonders of the natural world.

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Listen to Dawn Chorus

Dawn Chorus here if missing above

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Scientists unveil revolutionary 'racetrack' computer memory

The prospect of iPods that can hold millions of songs and PCs being able to turn on instantly, rather than taking minutes to "boot up", comes much closer today.

A Californian team has developed a new generation of memory that combines the high performance and reliability of solid state "flash" memory, stored in microchips, with the high capacity of the PC's hard disk drive, which is cheap but contains moving parts and is slow.In two papers in the journal Science, Dr Stuart Parkin and colleagues at the IBM Almaden Research Centre in San Jose describe a revolutionary technology dubbed "racetrack" memory, or RM memory.

The team believes that it marks a milestone that could lead to electronic devices capable of storing far more data in the same amount of space than is possible today, with lightning-fast boot times, far lower cost and unprecedented stability and durability.

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Odds of Dying

While not wanting to sound morbid, there are two certainties in life, death & taxes. This pretty little diagram illustrates your comparative odds of dying (1in 1 - a statistical certainty) in a number of interesting ways. (Click to enlarge).

'Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.' Proverbs 4:23

Are We in Spring or Winter? I Can't Tell!

Here are the top ten websites for spring, according to the Telegraph.

Lion Lessons Part II

This was the horrific moment a British teacher was savaged by a lion - coming within inches of death.

The big cat pounced on Kate Drew from behind and dragged her to the ground, sinking its teeth into the back of her neck.

As wardens on a Zimbabwe game reserve rushed to help, the 400lb lion kept the 28-year-old tourist firmly in its grip - but, mercifully, its jaws just missed her brain stem.

Read More & at the Telegraph

The Choir: Boys Don't Sing

Choirmaster Gareth Malone fulfills his dream of leading a 100 strong, all boys choir out on the stage at the Royal Albert Hall.

If you want to catch the very last episode on BBC iPlayer, as of today you've got one day left to view it.

Caption Competition Part IV

Photography by Cosmin Bumbut

"What do you mean, 'I'm not my usual happy self?'"

Karate Expert Gets Taught Lion Moves

Nature sometimes has a great way of pricking the bubble of our awful, overweening pretentiousness. Gitanjali Kolanad is a self-proclaimed expert in so-called Kalaripayat, a Karate style that supposedly emulates the moves of a lion. So when Kolanad decided to do a photo-shoot with an actual lion, the lion decided she needed to learn Lion Move lesson 101, and almost killed her.

The video itself is both hilarious at pricking this lady's presumptious pomposity - I cried with laughter at the seriousness with which she related the events - and also terrifying when you see people having to relearn basic lessons about lions. Here are those lessons learned once again, just in case you might need reminding:

1. Being in a room with a lion is a MISTAKE.

2. The lion is not just being playful. It is just trying to kill you.

3. Pretending to be an expert in lion moves next to a lion and prancing around one like a prize prat may well provoke a lion to kill you.

I hope you've learned something today. If you're religious, turn to holy scriptures. It's there too. 1 Peter 5:8-9.

Watch how the lion in 2 seconds flat sweeps the woman clean off her feet & disables her in step one before a bemused keeper has to kick it in the neck to remove it from its prey. Then have a look how it wants to act like a pussy cat with a mouse. Rolling on to its side so it can go in for the kill. Terrifying. And absolutely hilarious. All at the same time. For a real treat, the link at the bottom is to a TV quality video clip. Definitely worth the extra time it takes to download.

http://www.thestar.com/fpLarge/video/346482

And don't say I didn't warn you. Here's that lesson again. Never play with lions.

Not All Birds Of A Feather Should Flock Together

Just because you are the same genus doesn't mean you are the same species. People make this category error all the time. This picture illustrates clearly: choose who you partner with carefully. You may not be well suited.

Parent Leaves Child In New York To Get Home On Their Own

What is the world coming to?

__________________________

I left my 9-year-old at Bloomingdale’s (the original one) a couple weeks ago. Last seen, he was in first floor handbags as I sashayed out the door. Bye-bye! Have fun!

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25 Worst Ever Answers to Elementary School Test on Bible Knowledge

These answers come from an elementary school test. Kids were asked questions about the Old and New Testaments. The following statements about the Bible were written by children.

They have not been retouched or corrected. All the (incorrect) spelling has been left in.

1. In the first book of the bible, guinessis. God got tired of creating the world so he took the sabbath off.

2. Adam and Eve were created from an apple tree. Noah's wife was joan of ark. Noah built and ark and the animals came on in pears.

3. Lots wife was a pillar of salt during the day, but a ball of fire during the night.

4. The jews were a proud people and throughout history they had trouble with unsympathetic genitals.

5. Sampson was a strongman who let himself be led astray by a jezebel like delilah.

6. Samson slayed the philistines with the axe of the apostles.

7. Moses led the jews to the red sea where they made unleavened bread which is bread without any ingredients.

8. The egyptians were all drowned in the dessert. Afterwards, moses went up to mount cyanide to get the ten commandments.

9. The first commandments was when eve told adam to eat the apple.

10. The seventh commandment is thou shalt not admit adultery.

11. Moses died before he ever reached canada. Then joshua led the hebrews in the battle of geritol.

12. The greatest miricle in the bible is when joshua told his son to stand still and he obeyed him.

13. David was a hebrew king who was skilled at playing the liar. he fought the finkelsteins, a race of people who lived in biblical times.

14. Solomon, one of davids sons, had 300 wives and 700 porcupines.

15. When mary heard she was the mother of jesus, she sang the magna carta.

16. When the three wise guys from the east side arrived they found jesus in the manager.

17. Jesus was born because mary had an immaculate contraption.

18. St. john the blacksmith dumped water on his head.

19. Jesus enunciated the golden rule, which says to do unto others before they do one to you. He also explained a man doth not live by sweat alone.

20. It was a miricle when jesus rose from the dead and managed to get the tombstone off the entrance.

21. The people who followed the lord were called the 12 decibels.

22. The epistels were the wives of the apostles.

23. One of the oppossums was st. matthew who was also a taximan.

24. St. paul cavorted to christianity, he preached holy acrimony which is another name for marraige.

25. Christians have only one spouse. this is called monotony.

Back To The Future: ZX Spectrum Fun

Photography by rvnix

Do you remember Arcadia? Galaxians? Orbiter? Jet Pac? It seems such a long time ago that these prototype PC games were being loaded into the miniscule 48Kb RAM of the Spectrum my parents had scrimped & saved to be able to afford.

This Spectrum Emulator loads all those golden oldies onto a JAVA emulator and you can play them all again! The sights & sounds it evoked took me right back to those days when I was just 11yrs old. And the games are still great fun too.

ZX Spectrum Emulator

20 Actors & Actresses Who Missed Great Opportunities

For every celebrity winning critical acclaim or an Academy Award there’s another celeb or two who turned down that same meaty role. While we’re sure they had good reasons for their decisions, we’re also wondering how hard they kick themselves after realizing they passed up “The Big One.” Behold celebrities who turned down the roles of a lifetime.

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Evolution of Car Logos

This should come in handy for the next time you’re stuck in traffic: have you ever wondered why the Audi in front of you has a logo of four interlocked rings? Did you know that the Cadillac emblem was inspired by a family crest of a nobleman who later turned out to be a fraud? Or that Volkswagen was Hitler’s idea?

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The 100 most beautiful cars of all time: Beauties and beasts

Telegraph readers were asked to nominate the most beautiful cars of all time (in an online poll that began last autumn). The response was as substantial as it was diverse.

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20 of the Best News Sites

Photography by msct66



Everybody has their preferred news sources. Here are mine in the order in which I keep up with current affairs. It has a UK bias for two reasons.

Firstly there's a rich newspaper tradition forged over hundreds of years in England; traditionally there was never much space in UK newspapers so editors were always pushing journalists to write more concisely. It led to a quality of writing that still exists today. Compare the more expansive NY Times or Washington Post with the Times or Telegraph in a like-for-like article and you will get a sense of what I mean. That said, there are some very significant US news sites in my list and they are vital for keeping up with what is happening 'stateside.'

Secondly, I live in the UK. 'Nuff said. So here's my list.

1. Daily Mail
The Daily Mail, known to some as the Daily Rail. This is the paper that knows something has gone wrong with the UK. It's probably got something to do with the Left being in power but honestly it could perhaps tone down its outrage sometimes. No wonder the UK is suffering more professionals emigrating than any other nation in the world (other than Mexico. There's a happy statistic!). Good quality reporting from some heavyweight hacks though with a real feel for what's going to make Britain splutter into their cornflakes in the morning. Don't read if you suffer from outrage fatigue though.

2. Daily Telegraph
Excellent coverage from this broadsheet and a real heavyweight presence in the marketplace. Very good in the morning for putting its finger on the key goings on in the world. Generally doesn't miss a trick with some in-depth pieces.

3. Times Online
I used to read the Times first before both the Mail & Telegraph but then their Web designers did a disastrous re-design and did everything in their power to hide the real news. Either you couldn't find all the news on the front page (what is it with that? Don't they understand headlines?) or you had to take a lucky dip by clicking on the headlines with no description to go on at Times Newspaper Edition. Just goes to show even the biggest organisations can really stuff up on the basics of Web Site design: if only they hadn't done that. Still, the Times is what British people have been reading for hundreds and hundreds of years. Quality analysis of the news & commentary and some of the biggest beasts in journalism report on it. Good blogs too. If you can find any of it, that is.

4. Sky News
This is pretty much our only 24/7 non-state rolling news organisation (run by Rupert Murdoch, of course) but pretty good at being first with Breaking News. Have to say though that not everything that is 'Breaking News' on Sky is breaking news, if you know what I mean but you can't avoid Sky News, particularly if you're not the greatest fan of the BBC, which I am not. And when they are on their game and there's real news to report they do a first class job.

5. The Huffington Post
You cannot ignore Arianna Huffington, no matter how bizarre her plans for world domination. This is the place that really gives you the low down on what is going on in the American political scene. You know that the people that matter in the States are reading this. Some great contributors make this American site fifth in my list.

6. BBC News
I have to put the BBC here but only in sufferance. I can't stand how unbelievably biased they are while pretending to be a) unbiased and b) the voice that speaks for Britain. They are insufferably arrogant but unspeakably left wing and have been so for almost 50 years. And why wouldn't they? They are tax-payer funded after all. In hoc to Labour, simultaneously by choice and terror, they have perpetuated a war against the foundations of this country for years. And it's worked.

Now I have no choice about their existence. If I want to watch any television channels I have to pay them about £10 a month of my money. If I don't pay I get a huge fine. So seeing as I have to pay, I visit their site for the parliamentary coverage they are statutorily obliged to broadcast. It is also impossible to stay intelligently informed about the UK without watching or reading BBC news broadcasts so I have to click on. But if I had my way I would break it up in an instant. And no BBC, the world would not implode.

7. Guardian
The newspaper that rues the day Thatcher was born and lives solidly in its own worldview. It lost many battles over the last few decades but it's winning the war to make Britain a socialist state with its party now in power and its ability to influence the decision makers at the media-arm of the government. If you want a job at the BBC, you'll find the job section carries all the latest vacancies. I read it only to violently disagree with everything it says.

8. CNN
Almost the state broadcaster of the American nation. I was wondering why Americans had such a global outlook till I realised I was looking at the International edition. CNN is my first port of call though to have a look into the big wide world of America.

9. The First Post
A quirky little site with an interesting design feature: it tries to keep all its information at the top of the Web page and doles up some left field articles.

10. Channel4 News
This is the companion site to the news programme of the same name, which has more time to analyse news. As such it sometimes serves up some in-dpeth researched pieces.

11. Newsweek
An absolute classic with world-class journalism.

12. Spectator
Another dreadfully-designed website but because the Spectator is a news magazine (and not a newspaper) its columnists produce top quality editorials.

11. Google News
Cannot be beaten when you want to see the paucity of journalists' editing of the newswires. Good for seeing if different countries have differing slants on news items. And excellent for searching for specific news stories.

12. The Independent
The Independent finds real news far too daunting so I only occasionally dip in just to see what it thinks is going on in the world. Really, it is on another planet altogether. I am sure that if there was some global nuclear tragedy occurring it would do an exclusive on proportional representation or something. And no, it's not independent. Kind of lib-dem lefty-trendy.

13. New York Times
Really it's an outrage that NY Times is below the Independent but this is a personal view: I find it a little 'Financial Times' in its top news stories & a little too interested in political process for my liking. But you can't ignore the NY Times. I remember when I was in Washington DC and I really got into reading it then.

14. Fox News
Unashamedly crusading with Bush. Angry, conservative & dogmatic. But millions of Americans allow it to profoundly shape their worldview.

15. The Drudge Report
An influential blog in the States whose news splashes have changed American history. Two things have botted Matt Drudge's copybook in recent times. First of all getting into bed with the Clintons and allowing them to use his blog to place negative news stories is a scandal all of its own. I mean, who's being more cheap? Drudge or the Clintons? Secondly, what was it with him deciding to release to the world the fact that Prince Harry was on operations in Afghanistan, endangering his safety and the safety of many other British soldiers? Aren't we supposed to be allies? The man is shameful & a blot on the landscape. Can't ignore him, though.

16. ITN News
When ITN had its public remit watered down it shut down its 24hr news channel pronto. But it still has some good journalists working on it. Its disastrous decision to destroy its institutional 10-o-clock news saw it overtaken by BBC who shrewdly moved to its previously unassailable position on telly & parked there. When you make a bad decision, you should correct it quick. Not keep going. It was years before they picked up on their mistake.

17. Washington Post
Get close to the Pennsylvanian Avenue Action with this American institutional broadsheet.

18. WorldNet Daily
One of the stickiest news sites on the Internet (meaning once you go there, you get hooked on their stories). Just discovered it and I'm still looking.

19. MSNBC News
I notice that Diggers are often digging their stories. A little less highbrow but concerned with real life America.

20. Daily Express
The spiritual resting place of Princess Diana, the Express is still in denial over her death. Believe you me, she may be dead for over a decade but as far as Express readers go, she's still front page news. Years ago I used to read the Express as it covered the main stories and was a bit less heavy than the Mail but it got left behind when it balked at the idea of letting people read it free on the Web and has lost market share as a result. Still, if you're after some Diana Kitsch, you'll find it here.

So there's my list; full of holes no doubt. Which news sites did I miss out?

Caption Competition Part III

Photography by Cosmin Bumbut

"What do you mean? 'I'm not driving safely?'"

Incredible 'Photographs' Drawn in Biro

They may look like pin-sharp photographs - but these amazing pictures are actually drawings created with the humble ballpoint pen. The stunning pictures, measuring up to 10ft high, were drawn by a rising star of the art world, Juan Francisco Casas.

Casas, 31, can use up to four 14p ballpoint pens for a canvas and his works are already a sell-out at exhibitions.

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What Colour is Red? And Other Questions

When does red become purple or green become turquoise? This visual colour map (you can view it bigger by clicking on it) gives something approaching an answer to this intriguing question.

The methodology was simply to ask as a survey question of various people, "What colour is this?" of many different swatches of colour. These were then mixed together to give the answers we see here on this elegant colour map.

You can see more at the Dolores Labs Blog.

Ten things you don’t know about the Milky Way Galaxy

Photography by Chandra Xray Laboratory

So you’ve lived here all your life — in fact, everyone has — but what do you really know about the Milky Way galaxy? Sure, you know it’s a spiral, and it’s 100,000 light years across. And of course, Bloggees are smarter, more well-read, and better looking than the average population, but be honest: do you know all ten of these things?

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The Mystery of Pi

It was Pi Day on Friday March 14th (03/14), a celebration of the mathematical ratio that man has been trying to unlock for millennia. But why are we driven to find the answers behind it? As we're all taught at school, pi represents the number you get when you divide the distance around a circle (its circumference) by the distance across (the diameter).

With just a string and a ruler you can quickly measure that pi must be just over three-and-an-eighth (3.125). With more precise measurements, you may be able to narrow it down to 3.14.

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Introducing flickrvision

Flickrvision is a Flickr App which shows photos & the location of their poster around the world as they are posted to Flickr.

It's of minimal use but still there's something rather elegant about it.

Flickrvision

My Brain Jumping Ahead of Itself

Sometimes when I am writing with a pen & paper I notice that instead of writing the next letter, my hand writes the letter after that. I wonder whether it is connected to the fact that occasionally when I am talking fast, I stutter over my words. When I slow down I don't have the same problem.

It is strange though because I know which letter should come next when writing and I end up leaving it out.

Quite odd.

Chap Mixes Music Track Using Only Windows Sounds

Caption Competition Part II

Photography by Cosmin Bumbut

"So my best friend was looking really beautiful in her new dress today, was she?"

Technology Gets Truly Scary

Another leap forward for technology and thus for humanity. It's incredible to watch how almost lifelike & conscious this robot is. But these inventions will be used both for good and for evil. There is not one piece of technology created in humanity's history that is not first pressed into the business of making war more efficient & violent. I can quite imagine how this could become a tool for the worst kind of apocalyptic repression & terror.

Still, enough of the doom and gloom. It really is incredible isn't it? But just think, only now are we beginning to make things that merely mimic the technology hidden in the codes of nature for millennia.

Truth Gatecrashes Clinton Campaign

Carl Bernstein, one of the Watergate journalists, has been writing recently about Clinton's 'difficult relationship with the truth' and his insights have been proving increasingly prescient. A key plank of the campaign team's strategy is to stress her political experience over the 'inexperienced' Obama. Inconveniently, her initial foray into politics during Bill's presidency had been a disastrous health bill. However the challenge remained to paint Hillary as the experienced candidate.

When Clinton claimed she was instrumental in bringing peace to Northern Ireland, quite a few people begged to differ. Reporters eagerly beavered away to look at the extent of her involvement and found it distinctly underwhelming. When David Trimble, former Northern Ireland First Minister, commented otherwise, one of Clinton's staffers heaped insults on him and had to be unceremoniously dumped by the presidential campaign team. Clinton however persisted in this conceit and, disastrously, got bolder still.

Her reminiscences grew more fanciful when she recalled making a dash for cover under gunfire at Tusla Airport while helping to spread her peace-making abilities to Bosnia. This proved one step too far when CBS uncovered footage of Clinton supposedly 'dodging the bullets' at Tusla Airport. The reality looked far different, and Clinton rather less than honest.



These gaffes are not without effect. The Clinton Campaign Team had been running ads trumpeting Clinton's reliability, asking 'Who would you like to see in the White House answering calls at 3am?', the inference being Clinton as the heavyweight choice so Americans could sleep easier in their beds at night.

Clinton realised the Bosnia story was damaging her campaign and was forced to admit that, contrary to popular belief, she was only human at times and had been tired on the campaign trail. Perhaps she had been taking too many 3am phone calls.

The Clinton Team fight to keep the wheels on their bandwagon.

It hasn't helped that the girl in the 3am advert (assisted by the Obama team) has come forward saying she 'doesn't approve the message'. Internetters have been mercilessly lampooning both the 3am advert and the claims of 'War Leader Hillary'. You can see the responses below.

Following is the clip according to Hillary.

To try to be fair, Clinton claims sniper fire was possible as the plane was coming in and the risk genuine. She hadn't wanted to hang around long but felt she should greet an 8 yr old girl who had been patiently waiting on the tarmac.

In great danger, presumably.

World's Earliest Recorded Voice Prompts Fit of Giggles

When Radio 4 Presenter Charlotte Green, usually a bastion of composure as a voice of authority at the Beeb, was presenting about the world's earliest recording of the human voice, a facetious comment from one of the other Today presenters provoked a very uncharacteristic fit of giggles. The recording that provoked the BBC meltdown, made on a device called a phonoautograph, was made 17 years before Thomas Edison's 1877 phonograph introduced the world to recorded sound. At the time the world's first audio clip could be recorded but not played back. Only recently, with digital technology, has it been recovered.

Neither James Naughtie or Ed Stourton would admit to whispering it sounded like a bee buzzing in a bottle but it was enough to crack Ms Green's famous layers of reserve. Immediately the BBC switchboard was inundated with callers and then went into meltdown... with people asking, not to hear the world's earliest recording again, but to hear something far more unusual: Green losing her reserve.

You can listen to the broadcast clip here.

Human Body Parts You Have But Don't Need

From wisdom teeth to ear muscles to male nipples, the human body has a number of apparently "useless" parts - according to evolutionists, leftover remnants giving evidence of prehuman existence. What do you think?

Check out these anatomical extras that humans still have but apparently don't need.

Mum, Can I Go Up to the Cockpit and See the Controls?

Back in the days of innocence, curious little children, if they asked nicely, might be invited up to see the controls of the aeroplane taking them on their package holiday. But now, thanks to a certain inappropriately-named religion, the cockpit door is now firmly locked, with guns stowed at the ready and Secret Service agents riding shotgun incognito. Just how are little boys & girls going to want to become airline pilots if they can't see all the knobs & buttons they get to press?

Step up the Internet: here's the next best thing for little people who love seeing buttons & controls: the cockpit of the Airbus A380 with a full 360 degree view:

http://www.gillesvidal.com/blogpano/cockpit1.htm

Absolutely stunning.

Caption Competition Part I

Photography by Cosmin Bumbut

"All I said was, 'I think George Bush was a good president overall.' I'm sorry, darling! I'm sorry!"

World's Worst Uses of Metaphor

These egregious uses of metaphors were compiled from essays written by high school students. Read them and weep!

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He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

She caught your eye like one of those pointy hook latches that used to dangle from screen doors and would fly up whenever you banged the door open again.

The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.

McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty Bag filled with vegetable soup.

From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and "Jeopardy" comes on at 7 p.m. instead of 7:30.

Her hair glistened in the rain like nose hair after a sneeze.

Her eyes were like two brown circles with big black dots in the center.

Bob was as perplexed as a hacker who means to access T:flw.quid55328.com\\aaakk/ch@ung but gets T:\\flw.quidaaakk/ch@ung by mistake.

Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.

The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

Her date was pleasant enough, but she knew that if her life was a movie this guy would be buried in the credits as something like "Second Tall Man."

Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

The politician was gone but unnoticed, like the period after the Dr. on a Dr Pepper can.

They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth

John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

The thunder was ominous-sounding, much like the sound of a thin sheet of metal being shaken backstage during the storm scene in a play.

The red brick wall was the color of a brick-red Crayola crayon.

Multimedia is Changing. Have You Noticed?

Do not adjust your set: TV is about to blow apart
Andrew Sullivan

Is television over? I don’t mean the technology of course. Television, in many ways, has never been better. High definition – although pretty brutal on Republican frontrunner John McCain – has applied Windolene to the televised world and made nature documentaries as riveting as the latest block-buster. CGI effects have made even Doctor Who as cool as Hollywood.

By television being over, I mean the classic television experience: the ritual of coming home after work, flopping on the couch and simply allowing “what’s on” to flood over you. We still do it of course. As an avenue for the moving image, however, the passive, network-driven model has clearly changed beyond recognition and will soon change still further.

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Some Dogs are Easily Pleased

7 Quick Tips To Using Google You'll Wonder How You Ever Managed Without

I remember when Google was a little sprite of an idea. While most other search engines could be manipulated so that all the big corporate websites were listed at the top, Google appeared with a new way of listing sites using complex algorithms, including such data as how many other websites were linking to it, thus ensuring that when you searched for something it would always return the most relevant pages.

And it worked brilliantly. The rest, as they say, is 'a multi-billion dollar turnover' history.

It's amazing to think that technology now gives you the ability to search through all the billions of pages in cyberspace to list all the pages (in the most relevant way) on whatever topic you care to be interested in, in just fractions of a second. But did you know that you can make Google even more useful? Here are some little tricks to make you into a Google expert. And not a lot of people know these.

1. You can search for specific phrases not just for random words. Suppose you wanted to search for Jane Smith. If you just put Jane Smith into Google then Google will very obediently return all the pages with

Jane Smith

Jane and then Smith somewhere else in the page.

As you can imagine, that would be a lot of pages: 4,750,000 in this example actually. But what if you just wanted pages specifically with the name 'Jane Smith' in? Well Google allows you to search for that too. Just put Jane Smith in quotes like this:

"Jane Smith"

And voila! Now Google returns only those pages specifically with "Jane Smith" in . Now you have only 771,000 pages to look through. That saves you looking through 4 million pages you didn't want. Isn't that useful! This little tip also extends to any combination of words you might be wanting to look for including famous quotes or phrases. That one tip alone can make you an expert at cutting through the cyber-jungle & finding just what you want using Google. But there's more.

2. Suppose you want to find all the pages on the Internet with specific words in but the words don't necessarily have to be together. You do that by putting a +sign in front of the words. You are in effect telling Google that it must return only pages with those words in. Let's stick with our Jane Smith example for now. Suppose you have just watched Doctor Who on television and you actually only want to find pages to do with the "Jane Smith" who appeared on Doctor Who. This is how you would do it.

+"jane smith" +"doctor who"

That means that Google will return only the pages from your original 770,000 which also contain the phrase "doctor who" (notice how we force Google to keep the words 'doctor' and 'who' together). Now with our clever use of the +sign and speech marks we have only 82,900 pages to look through, all of them more useful to the intention of our search.

But here's another thing. Suppose you are looking for a particular episode of Doctor Who with Jane Smith in, you know, the one about the Tardis. Then you search like this:

"jane smith" +"doctor who" +tardis

That refines your search even further, down to 36,000 pages. Hmm. Good, but could be better. So you remember the episode was one with red-haired people in:

"jane smith" +"doctor who" +tardis +"red-haired"

Google will now show you all the pages on the Internet that mention only all of the above in the exact way you specify. 36 actually. So now using Google in a more targeted fashion you can specifically hone in on exactly what you want to search for rather than looking among all the 4,700,000 original pages containing Jane Smith. Not bad. Not bad at all.

3. But get this. On Google you can exclude words or phrases you don't want, and so refine your search even more. Supposing you were searching for "Jane Smith" but the 'Jane Smith' you are looking for is nothing to do with Doctor Who and all those references are getting in the way of you looking. Easy. Just put a -sign next to "doctor who" like this:

"jane smith" -"doctor who"

Now Google will return only 'jane smith' pages without the phrase "doctor who". How brilliant is that?

Funnily enough, while I was looking, I noticed that taking away "doctor who" from "jane smith" actually returns more "jane smith" pages than before. That may be because a lot of people searching for "jane smith" are looking for a reference to the Doctor Who character and clearing 'her' out of the way opens Google to return more generic references to 'jane smith'. It just goes to show how complex those Google algorithms really are.

4. You can search specific websites by specifying the website you want Google to search. Then Google only searches that website. Suppose, for example, you want to search for the show, Dragons' Den on the BBC website. Put the site in the Google box and your phrase, like this:

site:www.bbc.co.uk "dragons' den"

And voila! There are actually 11,600 BBC pages on Dragons' Den. Wow, that's a lot of pages, BBC!

5. You can find out what a word or phrase actually means using Google. Here's how. Type the word 'define' followed by a colon, then the word you want to know about, like this:

define: palaeontology

Notice that that Google returns not only a definition but also

• links to the explanatory pages
• and related phrases it can also define for you.

6. Use Google as a calculator. Type your numbers using +, -, / for division, * for multiplication, etc, then press search. Hey presto. As sure as 1+1=2, Google just got more useful.

7. Google offers lots of other fascinating tools. Follow this link to look at what all the uber-geeks are working feverishly on at the company that is one of the most sought-after companies to work for in the world.

http://www.google.co.uk/intl/en/options/

Google is hoping to become a one-stop shop for all types of knowledge. One of the most interesting to me is that Google has been scanning in thousands upon thousands of books, many copyright-free, from some of the biggest libraries around the world. So it is becoming easier and easier to access information of all kinds using Google. You can search all the books Google has captured so far at http://books.google.co.uk/. Some are limited view but many of the copyright-free books have full-view available.

There are quite a few other neat little tricks that Google does. But these seven tips will help you search the Internet like a true professional. Now all you need to work out is exactly what you're looking for. Happy Surfing.

Sometimes I'm Tempted To Despair

Seeing photos like this, while depressing, is a reminder that we still have a long way to go in combatting anti-intellectualism within the church. Anti-intellectualism manifests itself just as strongly in subtle ways. For instance, whenever you hear the word 'theology' or 'theological', in church just take note as to whether it is being mentioned in a positive or negative context. If my unofficial straw poll is to be believed then you will find almost 90% of references to theology to be pejorative. Theology is the bedrock of our Christian faith. Yet people who spend their time studying to deepen the roots of their faith are decried from the pulpit over and over again.

Another test for anti-intellectualism is when a false distinction is set up between being led by the Spirit and using one's intellectual faculties. (There should of course be no distinction. If you are truly led of the Spirit, this should mean that all your intellectual faculties are engaged in the process of being led of the Lord.) This is particularly dangerous because, very subtly, leaders in the church who feel threatened by those who engage their minds encourage their flock to be unthinking sheep. It's a recipe for disaster.

So for the record, my faith is totally inherently reasonable. In fact, that's why I believe in Christ. I am unashamed to be a thinking, Spirit-filled Christian because God gave me the brain I use to know him. I will never check my brain in at the door of the church.

Reason is the bedrock of my faith in God. So there.

What Do You Get When You Ask A Computer To Design You a Maze?

These mazes are computer-generated image-guided maze constructions and so have amazing complexity built in. There is something rather compelling about a really complex maze, And apart from that it would keep a bored child engrossed for quite a time. Click on the minotaur above for a link to the original, which can be downloaded, resized and printed online, along with some other breathtaking mazes and a scientific paper on how it was all done.

But whatever happens, don't get lost in there.

Never Lost, but Found Daily: Japanese Honesty

Anywhere else perhaps, a shiny cellphone fallen on the backseat of a taxi, a nondescript umbrella left leaning against a subway door, a wad of cash dropped on a sidewalk, would be lost forever, the owners resigned to the vicissitudes of big city life.

But here in Tokyo, with 8 million people in the city and 33 million in the metropolitan area, these items and thousands more would probably find their way to the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Lost and Found Center.

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In Honour of the Snow Today

Reporter Owned By Sled - Watch more free videos

The moral of the tale is threefold. Firstly, when timing a sled race, don't stand at the bottom of the hill; secondly, if you are going to flip out, leave yourself just enough headroom; and thirdly, always, always sign off your reports. It's only professional.

Here's a Time to Pull the Speech of your Life

When video clips of Barack Obama's church pastor, Rev Jeremiah Wright surfaced recently with angry rhetoric about whites, and speeches in which he curses America, it would have been an easy thing for Obama to distance himself politically from his church leader. While unequivocally renouncing his words, Obama could not in good conscience disavow himself from a continued association with his soon-to-be former pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ who married him and inspired his faith. However, Obama's rejection of his pastor's words was not enough and his stance soon began to have a serious effect on his poll ratings. He quickly realised he would have to give a fuller explanation of his position, highlighting issues of race & patriotism as seen from a black point of view.

The only trouble is that politics and the media don't do shades of grey. It prefers black & white. Nuance is easily missed even in these days of vast swathes of column inches & 24 hour media commentary. But just a few days ago, Obama pulled out his pen and wrote the speech of his campaign, taking a real risk in trusting voters to listen carefully.

The speech appears to have been very well received, evoking comparisons with Kennedy and Martin Luther King, and being called one of the bravest and most eloquent speeches on race given by an American politician. You can listen to it below.

How to View the World 80x Slower

Watch more DIY videos on 5min.com

Take a few seconds to watch this super-slow motion camera shot of a man bursting a balloon. Fun.

Kinematic Typography - Very Very Vivifying

Believe it or not, there is a sub-section of humanity that enjoys typography (fonts to you & me) as a hobby. And although I am not a typophile myself, having been involved in Web design over the years, I do enjoy considering the relative merits of different font types. There's even a society, SOTA, The Society of Typographic Officionados. Can you believe that?

But the latest in-thing to hit the radar is called Kinematic Typography, where people produce stunning textual font presentations to audio movie clips. I particularly enjoyed the above clip, both as an example of this new artistic fad and also for the deliciously well-written speech of the protagonist in the film, V for Vendetta.

For more examples, you can visit alwayswatching.org but beware because most of the clips are fairly brutal in content.

Good Friday is an Unusual Day

It's not a day one celebrates; but is still so key in the Christian Calendar. It's a day of paradox - a bittersweet day. We remember the love of God in giving His Son, but also remember the sin of humanity that put him on the cross. We remember the love of God seen in Christ but also remember His justice & righteous anger at sin & evil. As believers we rejoice in forgiveness but ponder the sacrifice that pays the price. A day of paradox & mixed feelings.

In the UK today, Good Friday can seem to merely pass by even for Christians, particularly if they are not from a liturgical tradition. This year, there has been a BBC drama series called The Passion, showing at key times during the week and they have really made an effort with it.

So in loose acknowledgement of Easter Week, here's a post of an article from the Telegraph that should encourage you to get in church and stay in church.

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'Believers are Happier than Atheists'

People who believe in God are happier than agnostics or atheists, researchers claimed yesterday. A report found that religious people were better able to cope with disappointments such as unemployment or divorce than non-believers.

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Sometimes It's Just Not Your Day. Part II

How Not To Roll Cable Up Stairs

Brevity Key to Good Writing

Want to be a good writer? Keep it brief, keep it simple, keep it clear. That's the overwhelming message of Essential English, for Journalists, Editors and Writers by Harold Evans.

Other gems from this former Sunday Times Editor include editing out all superfluous & repetitive detail, and getting to the key point first - very important, particularly if you are writing a news story. This has helped me enormously. I used to double-up on all my adjectives, for instance. Why use one when two will do? So before, when I was completely and totally flummoxed, now, I am merely completely flummoxed.

It's a bit of a geeky read but it's making a substantial difference to my writing. That's the mark of any good book: it changes what you do.

Chicago at night, from 36,000 feet

Chicago at night, from 36,000 feet, originally uploaded by myelectricsheep.

Not all roads lead to Rome. Click on image to enlarge.

Sometimes Even If It Is Your Day, It's Not Your Day!

Student disciplined after stopping out-of-control school bus

A 15-year-old girl who stopped her out-of-control school bus was hit with a Saturday detention because she was supposed to be in class when the accident happened.

Marina High School student Amanda Rouse was on a bus with 40 elementary school students Wednesday morning when the driver fell out of her seat after a turn and hit her head.

Rouse jumped up and applied the brakes, bringing the bus to a halt after striking two parked cars. No one was injured.

But Rouse said she was punished because she wasn't supposed to be on the bus in the first place.
Rouse said she fell ill on the way to school, but instead of calling in sick, she asked the bus driver for a lift back to the bus yard before the accident happened. She must attend Saturday school as punishment for failing to call in sick that day.

"She is in trouble with school because she made the wrong decision," said Rouse's grandmother, Sally Correll. "But I can't help but believe that she was where God wanted her to be."

A spokesperson for the Monterey Peninsula Unified School District could not immediately be reached Saturday.
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Information from: The Monterey County Herald, www.montereyherald.com

Good Cop, Bad Cop

This video clip of a policeman has become an Internet phenomenon in a matter of a few days. It is unusual apparently in two ways. Firstly because it shows a policeman being respectful and polite to protesting members of the public. Secondly, because people have been so blown away by how well-mannered and caring he was that, since it was recorded on the 15th April, it has been viewed over 350,000 times, commented on 1,700 times and added as a favourite clip to watch by 1,146 people!

Either this chap is extraordinarily brilliant in the way he deals with people or he is standing out from the usual behaviour of the rest of his colleagues, which wouldn't be so positive from a police-force point of view.

Either way, isn't it nice when people resurrect old-fashioned principles such as concern for others and good manners? Well done, that man.

I Have Pets

Photography by foreversouls

I keep birds in my garden... wild birds. The only trouble is, because they fly free, I don't always see them. But I have lots of different varieties and they are all very beautiful. The good thing is, they are as happy as larry, flying around, breeding like crazy. I feed them. I have a good bird feeder up in the garden. The other day I saw Flighty & Sprint, two beautiful blue tits. What wonderful colours! It's not only in South America & Africa where multi-coloured birds can be found. As I speak, I can see Coo, one of my pigeons sitting on the neighbour's chimney. He's looking at Poop, who's sitting on my fence. Quite happy, my birds are. Quite happy.

I Wouldn't Say I've Bought You the Most Compact of Cameras, but it takes a Good Quality Picture...

A fascinating article on the world's first ever photograph, first ever captured human portrait, first photomontage, giving the origins of the word camera & photography, etc, etc.

Taking it Literally: A Year of Living Biblically?

Photography by the Telegraph

Presuming it would make him a truly fundamentalist Christian, A J Jacobs, a comedy writer decided to try to follow the Bible literally for 12 months. Other than appearing to completely misunderstand that it was more likely to make him into an orthodox Jew than a Christian (for which a certain understanding of the nature of sin, the need for faith in God's saving grace effected through Christ on the cross and an experience of inner renewal would be required), it is still an amusing diversion from which a book can be written.

One of the funniest reflections that Jacobs has is that of the frustration his wife felt while Jacobs tried to follow ceremonial purity regulations during his wife's time of the month:

'He persevered with not touching his wife, Julie, while she was menstruating. This went down as well as can be expected. The ban extended to sitting in chairs she had used, prompting her at one point to ring him at work to say she had just sat on every seat and chair in the apartment.
Jacobs bought his own collapsible chair. Julie, who isn't religious either, says she still "felt like a leper". She adds: "When it comes down to it, the Bible is very sexist. It was written a long time ago and to follow it literally now is crazy." '

Perhaps Julie has a bit more sense than her husband. Jacobs claims to have read the Bible to extract all the rules he could. Perhaps he didn't quite grasp the message of Christ. That the law merely highlights our sin, our lack of ability to live right in God's sight. And that Christ has made an end to the law by taking the law and putting it to death in his body on the cross. That Jesus' sacrifice makes it possible for us to be made righteous in God's sight through faith in his blood.

Christians don't seek to cherry-pick which parts of the Bible they will live by; rather, by a proper process of right interpretation (the long word for this is hermeneutics) Christians seek to live in a faithful way before God, making careful judgement as to what the Bible as a whole is really trying to say. It isn't about taking the Bible literally, it's about taking it seriously.

How Do You Describe the Glory of Creation?

This beautiful montage from the BBC Motion Gallery is a stunning representation of creation & reminded me of the reason for both this verse in the story of creation:

And God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.

And this one in the Gospels (link goes to the same place):

For God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.

How to Keep The Woman in Your Life Happy (Apparently)

I'm one of the guest speakers at my first ever women's conference soon and one of the potential topics is 'What Men Wish Their Wives Knew'. So I just came across this article from pooma.com giving ten ways to keep the woman in your life happy.

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Since the dawn of mankind, men and women have boggled their minds trying to understand one another. Moreover, men have struggled to figure out what it takes to make the women in their lives happy.

Honestly guys, while women can be very complex, most don’t require much to keep them happy. I asked both single and attached women alike, “What does it take to keep you happy in a relationship?” In no particular order, here’s how they answered in the form of ten helpful tips.

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