Ninja cat!

Reminds me of Chibi... (karate kat ... kucing yg zen master)
h/t to Gene E.
==================================================

Fly & Spider | Fliderspy?

by Terry at: http://bentobjects.blogspot.com/

nothing important to say

Let's stop deforesting the Earth! Save the neem tree, protect mangroves, kelp forest and coral reefs.
http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080917/full/news.2008.1114.html

um, no, adik, i didn't get a haircut, i just buka topi je :p



[I've always liked this classic rock song, I've seen all good people by Yes]

Didja notice the vocal refrain of John Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance" mixed in? tight!

pening...demam?

pening... demam... pedas? lapar sket.


had a bit of a tension headache earlier, took a few aspirin, now ok.
perhaps a slight fever? (update: better now I guess.)

===================================================================
Stathmin: motherhood, socializing, amygdala
fearless_mice_are_neglectful_mothers_but_social_butterflies

Brain asymmetry in vertebrates = multi-tasking
asymmetrical_brains_help_fish_and_us_to_multitask

h/t Ed Yong

bites, flights & sights

oops! http://stickgal.blogspot.com/


mariposa: metamorphosis


award video: who sees t' day?

*randomness*

when hate is stronger than love

ingat lah ...
the innocent victims ~ al fatiha
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bravery & belligerence & boundaries


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when love is stronger than hate

alas_my_loves casalamballiekumselam ramaramadanmariposa

alas (English) sympathy ~ alas (Español) wings ~ alas (Melayu) base

Love bridges all of us... together.

daud di nor qalif, kampung kuala walu wiki

ps. Here's a love letter to Pulau Nu Yorkistan from Cheryl @ Intersection love_letter_to_new_york
p2s. Graph @ Gene E. & Talk Islam who was responsible for 911
p3s. btw, i was told by one guy, "that's not a (sky)bridge, that's a bra strap!" :| macam madonna?
p4s. Petronas twin towers originally designed by Calif. Arc. firm KCG
p5s. I provided some small funding for it and other projects via Bank Negara.

pendek jumpa tinggi

“It is not the critic who counts: not the one who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena..."

'Citizenship in a Republic' US Pres. Theodore Roosevelt
Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910 (h/t zaidhakim)

Perhentian Islamarina Seadiving Clinique: natural healing treatment of respiration disorders, back pain, dietary, stress mgmt...
(PISC ~ pisces/pesca/fish/ikan, pronounced 'peace')

7?

http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/08/16/egypt.septuplets.birth.ap/index.html#cnnSTCText?iref=werecommend

The father wanted required a son. (agrarian sociodynamic tribal patriarchy)

He had 3 daughters.

So his wife took fertility drugs,

and now he has 6 daughters...

and 6,666,666,666 kin.

http://somethinguniqueforall.blogspot.com/2008/08/how-many-kids-will-you-have-it-all.html

petnatzet copla ~ Siber-Alaskan Lynx~ mal du mer

sable


Chai Samovar of Turkey, Greece, Central Asia and Russia traditions

In the service of the Russo-American Telegraph Company that attempted to carry out the plans of Major Collins to make an electric connection between Europe and the United States by way of Asia and Bering's Straits in the 1860's.

Even varied by glimpses of the Mexican coast, the occasional appearance of a whale with its column of water thrown high into the air, and the sportive action of schools of porpoises which is constantly met with.

The cosmopolitan character of San Francisco is the first thing that impresses a visitor. Almost from one stand-point he may see the church, the synagogue, and the pagoda. The mosque is by no means impossible in the future. During my stay in California, I visited the principal gold, copper, and quicksilver mines in the state, not omitting the famous or infamous Mariposa tract.

The day before we came in sight of land, my dog repeatedly placed his fore feet upon the rail and sniffed the wind blowing from the coast. His inhalations were long and earnest, like those of a tobacco smoking Comanche. In her previous voyage the Wright carried a mastiff answering to the name of Rover. The colonel said that whenever they approached land, though long before it was in sight, Rover would put his paws on the bulwarks and direct his nose toward the shore. His demonstrations were invariably accurate, and showed him to possess the instinct of a pilot, whatever his lack of training. (Malayo-Polynesians had dogs on their seagoing conquests.) Salmon form the principal food of the Kamchadales and their dogs. The fishing season in Avatcha Bay lasts about six weeks, and at its close the salmon leave the bay and ascend the streams, where they are caught by the interior natives. In the bay they are taken in seines dragged along the shore, and the number of fish caught annually is almost beyond computation.

The "samovar" or tea-urn is an indispensable article in a Russian household, and is found in nearly every dwelling from the Baltic to Bering's Sea. "Samovar" comes from two Greek words, meaning 'to boil itself.' The article is nothing but a portable furnace; a brazen urn with a cylinder two or three inches in diameter passing through it from top to bottom.

Mr. Fluger had been only two years in Kamchatka, and was doing a miscellaneous business. Boardman's agent confined himself to the fur trade, but Fluger was up to anything. He salted salmon for market, sent a schooner every year into the Arctic Ocean for walrus teeth and mammoth tusks, bought furs, sold goods, kept a dog team, was attentive to the ladies, and would have run for Congress had it been possible. He had in his store about half a cord of walrus teeth piled against a back entrance like stove wood. Phillipeus was a roving blade. He kept an agent at Petropavlovsk and came there in person once a year. In February he left St. Petersburg for London, whence he took the Red Sea route to Japan. There he chartered a brig to visit Kamchatka and land him at Ayan, on the Ohotsk Sea. From Ayan he went to Yakutsk, and from that place through Irkutsk to St. Petersburg.

There is a story of a man in California who followed the track of a grizzly bear a day and a half. He abandoned it because, as he explained, "it was getting a little too fresh." There is a story of a traveler who paid his hotel bill in a country town in Minnesota and received a beaver skin in change. The landlord explained that it was legal tender for a dollar. Concealing this novel cash under his coat, the traveler sauntered into a neighboring store. "Is it true," he asked carelessly, "that a beaver skin is legal tender for a dollar?" "Yes, sir," said the merchant; "anybody will take it." "Will you be so kind, then," was the traveler's request, "as to give me change for a dollar bill?" "Certainly," answered the merchant, taking the beaver skin and returning four muskrat skins, current at twenty-five cents each.

The sable is the principal fur sought by the merchants in Kamchatka, or trapped by the natives. Dogs are fed almost entirely upon fish. They receive their rations daily at sunset, and it is always desirable that each driver should feed his own team. The day before starting on a journey, the dog receives a half ration only, and he is kept on this slender diet as long as the journey lasts.

A new company was formed and chartered in July, 1779, under the title of the Russian-American Company, with its chief office in St. Petersburg, where the Directors formed a kind of high court of appeal. It was authorized to explore and place under control of the crown all the territories of North-Western America not belonging to any other government. It was required to deal kindly with the natives, and endeavor to convert them to the religion of the empire. It had the
administration of the country and a commercial monopoly through its whole extent. All other merchants were to be excluded, no matter what their nationality. At one time so great was the jealousy of the Company's officers that no foreign ship was allowed within twenty miles of the coast.

The Imperial Government required that the chief officer of the company should be commissioned in the service of the crown, and detailed to the control of the American Territory. His residence was at Sitka, to which the principal post was removed from Kodiak. In the early history of the Company there were many encounters with the natives, the severest battle taking place on the present site of Sitka. The natives had a fort there, and were only driven from it after a long and obstinate fight. The first colony that settled at Sitka was driven away, and all traces of the Russian occupation were destroyed. After a few years of conflict, peace was declared, and trade became prosperous. The Company occupied Russian America and the Aleutian Islands, and pushed its traffic to the Arctic Ocean. It established posts on the Kurile Islands, in Kamchatka, and along the coast of the Ohotsk Sea. It built churches, employed priests, and was quite successful in converting the natives to Christianity.

For many years the Company prospered. In 1812 it founded the colony of Ross, on the coast of California, and a few years later prepared to dispute the right of the Spanish Governor to occupy that region. The natives were everywhere peaceable, and the dividends satisfied the stockholders. The slaughter of the fur-bearing animals was injudiciously conducted, and led to a great decrease of revenue.

When our Secretary of State purchased the Emperor's title to the western coast of America, there were various opinions respecting the sagacity of the transaction. No one could say what was the intrinsic value of the country, either actual or prospective. The Company never gave much attention to scientific matters. Veins of copper have been found near the Yukon, but so far none that would pay for developing.

Building stone is abundant, and so is ice. Neither is of much value in commerce. The fur trade was the chief source of the Company's revenue. The principal fur-bearing animals are the otter, seal, beaver, marten, mink, fox, and a few others. There is a little trade in walrus teeth, mammoth tusks, whalebone, and oil. The rivers abound in fish, of which large quantities are annually salted and sent to the Pacific markets. The fisheries along the coast are valuable and of the same character as those on the banks of Newfoundland.

An hour after dropping the Danzig we stopped our engines and prepared to run under sail. The whole crew was called on deck to hoist out the screw, a mass of copper weighing twenty-five thousand pounds, and set in a frame raised or lowered like a window sash. With strong ropes and the power of three hundred men, the frame and its contents were lifted out of water, and the Variag became a sailing ship. The Russian government is more economical than our own in running ships of war.

What a hindrance to a traveler and literal man of the world is this confusion of tongues! There is no human being who can make himself verbally understood everywhere on this little globe. In the Russian empire alone there are more than a hundred spoken languages and dialects.

Major Abasa and the Ispravnik of Ghijiga escorted us from the landing to their quarters, where we soon warmed ourselves with hot tea, and I took opportunity and a couple of bearskins and went to sleep. Late in the day we had a dinner of pea soup, reindeer meat, and berry pudding. The deer's flesh was sweet and tender, with a flavor like that of the American elk.

In this part of Siberia there are many wide plains (_tundras_) covered with moss and destitute of trees. The blueberry grows there, but is less abundant than the "maroska," a berry that I never saw in America. It is yellow when ripe, has an acid flavor, and resembles the raspberry in shape and size. We ate the maroska in as many forms as it could be prepared, and they told us that it grew in Scotland, Scandinavia, and Northern Russia.
http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/world/readfile?fk_files=102529&pageno=48

[At lunch, I had just been reading a historical novel about an American family from San Francisco which moved to Alaska during the Russian fur trade and discovered gold, that's why I included this article here, it provided some background.]

Ampang Medikal = Amateur Medikal?

"jangkitan jaundice dimata"?

Is jaundice an eye infection? Of course not, it's a liver condition. The symptoms include yellow-orange skin tone & sclerae (white portion of the eyes) from accumulation of bilirubin pigment. My mother had jaundice when going through her cancer treatment, there was no "eye infection".

http://www.merck.com/mmhe/sec10/ch135/ch135b.html

Ampang Medical, an attempted copycat of Grey's Anatomy, based in Malaysia, obviously needs professional medical advisors aboard. Nobody needs false medical information on public television, especially kampong folk that might think Ampang Medical is actually representing real doctors and hospitals.

'Ampang Medikal', Please seek medical help immediately. STAT. Good luck!

h/t bakawali

malaria

http://www.afreeman.org/2008/02/28/great-interview-week-scientific-serendipity-in-sydney-2/

Chromera velia, a unicellular photosynthetic symbiotic brown algae found associated with coral reefs, which leaves when the reef water becomes too warm resulting in bleached coral, has been found to be related to malarial Plasmodium and other apicomplexan parasites like toxiplasmosis.

Apparently, these blood-borne parasites derive from coral cell symbiont alga, and still contain vestigial chloroplasts (chlorophyll compounds, like in tree leaves that construct tissue from hydrocarbons using sunlight energy) , but now obtain energy from their animal hosts.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6468381.stm

Newsletter folding

nothing much, few hundred newsletters to fold, a bit late due to technical difficulties with internet router etc.

I had my one meal of the day earlier this evening, shared with a bunch of other guys.

Sunny windy day

Blue sky & sunny, but a very wintery wind came, from the north mountains.

Well September is here now, summer is flying south. Happy Labor Day!
~sehari cuti~

Blues by the Bay this weekend http://www.redwoodcoastmusicfestivals.org/

For a month now, I've been eating typically one lunch meal per day, for no reason.
But I won't mention about coffee consumption. uhum. nobody's perfect. salam selam...

I lost something precious recently, a belief thingy. nothing important.

I just found something this morning, a keychain thingy. nothing important.

I'm still breathing, and I still don't know why. Please forgive my ignorance, errors, faults.

~ Ramadhan Mubarak ~ daripada daud di nor calif, anak kanaka haoli, kuala walu wiki, US

MDR-PS-Speech

[Update Nov. Some of this is now outdated. Oral communication while at depth was indeed done, via clicking.]

Speech, though completely dependent upon the
mouth/larynx, is not particularly sensorial. Eating, breathing,
sniffing, sneezing are all face-sense-related, talking isn't. Talking
is all about internal air valve control.

One cannot talk underwater, yet if not for underwater air valve
control, speech would not have happened.

In a way, both speech (audio sense only) and physical gestures (visual
sense only) require an absence/reduction of other of senses, otherwise
risking interference. (Compare the small eyes of echolocating
cetaceans (especially river dolphins, which are almost blind) vs huge
eyes of ancient non-echolocating marine reptiles.)

What is the physiological opposite of the anaerobic MDR Mammalian
Divers Reflex which occurs at depth? Instant exhalation
(photic/pressure/thermal induced) & aerobic breathing at surface, with
optional controlled exhalation vocalized speech. Has anyone
immediately upon surfacing from a *long* dive, spoken during the first
exhale? I think humans are programmed/selected not to, just like
seals. First exhale, then speak/bark. Not sure though.

I think also that the LCA Hominoid/Hominid could not call while
floating vertically, possibly due to (water) pressure on the
throat/sac/hyoid/thyroid cartilage. Only when pressure was eased,
could a vocal sound be produced (compare to having a "knot in ones
throat" or feeling choked up), I guess. This allowed breathing clearly
through the nose during floating, then upon grasping and lifting up or
wading, the air sac pressure is off, and oral breathing and calling
can start.

[{Highly significant}]
This might have been a predecessor of being able to suction feed in
Homo underwater, having the oral breathing disconnected during
submersion, allowing the open pharynx for feeding and swallowing, then
upon re-emergence to light/pressure change, the larynx reopens to the
mouth and instantly exhales but with no vocalization, just a pure
instant complete air exchange of the lungs, trachea, mouth. Only the
little air in the nasal area is not forcibly exchanged. Why? Either
because the sinuses and eustacean tubes were pre-flooded with seawater
(per Seb Murat), or because of some other reason (high-pressure nasal
sneeze might cause damage to delicate nasal
veins/arteries/turbinates/olfactory nerves/middle ear/inner ear
barotrauma).

Today's scuba divers and free divers instead keep their chin down near
the throat, with their eyes 60 to 90 degrees from the streamlined linear
posture (and more like a vertical floating ape posture), which differs
from this ancient diving technique, and may indicate why the photic
sneeze "doesn't work" in today's divers.

no clue

yeah though i walk thru the valley of the shadow of death

i will fear no evil

but i have no staff or rod to comfort me, and no wife to join me.

and the still waters are icy...

and the bonobots climb after the $ and status

just another day



~ daud di nor calif ~

tears like rain

Human emotional tears are anti-fungal, thanks to salt, protein defensins and dermcidin. This developed as a result of living around seawater for millions of years, where both salt and water are abundant. The same is true of eccrine sweat.

Chimps, gorillas and orangutans left the mangrove rich seashores millions of years before, their rare tears and sweat are not saline, because there is almost no salt in the rainforest.

There is very little inland Iodine and Selenium (plentiful in the sea), so hypothyroidism, cretinism and goiters are often found in people living far from the sea, or on mountain islands without easy access to the lower shores.

Common chimps don't weep tears, rather they become enraged. (I hate you!)
Pygmy chimps also don't weep, rather they have sex play. (I distract you!)

Humans do weep, those that don't, are in a more primitive state of emotion; a stronger brittle shell but a more fragile center. Prisons are full of people who never weep. Psychiatric hospitals have people that can't release their emotions in a healthy way, so doctors medicate, but usually only dull the senses.

Tears release tension which otherwise destroys bonds.

"Tears : Tears produced by emotional crying differ in chemical content from those caused by irritants such as onion juice. Emotional tears contain more protein than tears induced by irritants. Researchers are now examining the contents of emotional tears for substances such as endorphins, ACTH, prolactin and growth hormone, all of which are released by stress. While the research on psychoactive substances in tears is just beginning, there is reason to think that emotional tears may be important in the maintenance of physical health and emotional balance.

Crying is not grief; it is a way of getting over your grief. Trembling isn't the same as fear. Rather it is part of a letting go of fear. In the same manner, embarrassed laughter, yawning, and even rapid, excited talking are parts of the healing process that get mistaken for symptoms of the problem".
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Somebody must care about the forest, the field, the ocean, more than the individuals, otherwise the individuals overpopulate and destroy the environment ("tragedy of the commons").

But if nobody cares about that somebody, then it doesn't matter.
It just becomes numbers, and resource warfare, which just escalates, until people stop planting food crops, being too busy destroying and defending property and rituals. Then only wild forest food is easily obtained, but that soon disappears, leaving famine and chaos. This can happen anywhere there are humans.


Penghutanan al khalifah, daud di nor calif
Univ WI, Univ Malaya, Trop Forestry Ctr


UPM edu.my Dogathon 2008

did i say that out loud?

World Shelters

Yesterday, I was in Arcata, where I chatted with Bruce LeBel, the exec. dir. of World Shelters, a non-profit organization providing emergency temporary housing to victims of earthquakes, tsunamis, other disasters around the world. He showed me around, I checked out the Qshelter, octahut and icosa Udome, where they are working on insulation and a snow peak.

http://worldshelters.org/

on the walk around the bay, I plucked lots of sweet blackberries along the trail.

Now I'm resting from the long hike through the brambles, watching the ladies go to their friday yoga class. Their room is temporarily full of a variety of nests, including birds nests featuring the dune dwelling snowy plover*, and artistic renditions of nests, for this month's Arts Alive gallery.

Funny how a Udome or round hut is an upside down nest, both utilize the spherical principle of 'maximum space enclosed by minimum material' (least surface area and structural support). Also, the tubular quonset Qshelter resembles buckytubes.

Olympic stadium in China the "birds nest"

* Although the show's theme is nests, the snowy plover, like many other shorebirds, does not actually build a woven nest, unlike tree roosting birds which do. They usually just dig a shallow hole in sand or pebbles or grasses and deposit their camouflaged eggs; some seabirds deposit non-rolling eggs in rocky clefts hidden from view.

It's a very hot day, absolutely perfect for diving.

Invisible cloak?

Little Red Invisible Riding Hood



honey_wheres_my_supersuit




Cultural perceptions: East & West

Holistic vs Analytical Eyes-mouth vs nose (Hat tip to Ed Yong)



Geophysics of ice cream


"Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere."
- Albert Einstein, scientist (1879 - 1955)
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Melanin, Grouping, Anatomy

Pleiotropy in the melanocortin system, coloration and behavioural syndromes

Article

In vertebrates, melanin-based coloration is often associated with variation in physiological and behavioural traits. We propose that this association stems from pleiotropic effects of the genes regulating the synthesis of brown to black eumelanin. The most important regulators are the melanocortin 1 receptor and its ligands, the melanocortin agonists and the agouti-signalling protein antagonist. On the basis of the physiological and behavioural functions of the melanocortins, we predict five categories of traits correlated with melanin-based coloration. A review of the literature indeed reveals that, as predicted, darker wild vertebrates are more aggressive, sexually active and resistant to stress than lighter individuals. Pleiotropic effects of the melanocortins might thus account for the widespread covariance between melanin-based coloration and other phenotypic traits in vertebrates.

ps. Is this accurate or not? Please inform. (Hat tip to Razib at Gene Expression)

=================================================================================================
Evolving forgiveness
"For instance, his description of Robert Axelrod’s work on game theory modeling and cooperation is extremely insightful and resounding proof that natural selection actually leads to a nicer world in the long run. Primate studies, as he describes them, also suggest that the standard response - and healthy - mechanism of closure to an act of aggression is forgiveness and reconciliation. Human psychology studies back this up, and identify the components of apologies that elicit forgiveness the best.

And in the next-to-last chapter, he debunks the notion that religion is the shortcut to forgiveness and compassion. True, as McCullough notes, religious individuals often forgive more readily - *if* the offender is part of the same social network, and particularly if the offender is part of the same religion. Moveover, devoutly religious individuals are more likely to exhibit more intolerant and vengeful attitudes towards offenders who are outsiders, on the margins of society, etc."

in sum: Group bonding requires internal similarity, external dissimilarity. ie. oil and water don't mix without surfactants due to differing polarities or so.

==============================================================================================

Your inner beast
Human anatomy article

Human anatomy is a formative experience in the training of future physicians -- it is the students' grand introduction to the body, when they memorize the names of bones, organs and nerves as they painstakingly dissect a real cadaver. That first year, as well as in years after, the medical students were curious about what kind of doctor I am. I am a fish paleontologist who studies finned creatures that have been extinct for more than 370 million years. Seeing the history inside our bodies is like peeling an onion: The first layers we see reveal the history we share with primates (large brains and opposable thumbs). Peel deeper and we find the layers of history shared with other mammals (hair and breasts), reptiles (our distinctive way of chewing food), fish (arms, legs, backbones and heads), worms (an anus on one side of the body and a mouth on the other), jellyfish (the DNA recipe that builds our bodies), sponges (our many celled bodies) and so on.

Earthquake in Eureka!!

My kampong going goyang-goyang just now ~ haiyo ~




http://quake.usgs.gov/recenteqs/
http://quake.wr.usgs.gov/recenteqs/Quakes/nc51207076.html
http://www.uwsp.edu/geo/faculty/hefferan/geol320/strikeslip.html

They say 4.6, but I think it was a 5.3, maybe here a bigger jolt due to the soft wet silt ground foundation surrounding the Kuala Walu Wiki (Humboldt Bay), on the Cascadia Subduction Zone of the west coast of America. It was quite a sharp lurch to the brick building, no bricks shaking apart, but I heard the walls moving and the floor jolted. I almost dove under the desk! abes!

Hope nobody gets a big tsunami! InsyaAllah.


_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/^\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_/\_


Salam Merdeka ~ Indonesia ~ Malaysia ~ Singapura ~ United States of America

nasi goreng mamak

Hungry bear "finds" fish snack. (Winnie the pooh prefers honey)

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Kitty kat air terjun (kedua)




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Nasi Goreng Mamak | You + Me = Rice + Oil


Comic Steve Martin : "I like a woman with a head on her shoulders. I hate necks." Silly. haha

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Got a bunch of Malaysian and Indonesian students here in Eureka just arrived.

muka muka malu, selamat datang ke kampung kuala walu.
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ps. thanks to Patty for the sweet pea flowers on my desk, very pretty and sweet scent.

Kwiz Kampong Dunia

[The city and country name are at top, quickly click where you think they belong]

This Traveler IQ challenge compares your geographical knowledge against the World's First Travel Blog's other 2,924,506 travelers who have taken this challenge as of Monday, August 11, 2008 at 12:57AM GMT. (TravelPod is part of the TripAdvisor Media Network)

Wei, susah! I got travel IQ: 113 and level 10. Make sure your mouse is very smooth and double click if it doesn't register your guess. Small islands are not visible, so it's hard to know where they are located, like Palau, Micronesia. Just try it now, it's fun. Here's the one for Asia, I got 122 pts IQ, not so good hahaha. ta pe, fun je.

This Traveler IQ challenge compares your geographical knowledge against the World's First Travel Blog's other 2,924,641 travelers who have taken this challenge as of Monday, August 11, 2008 at 01:45AM GMT. (TravelPod is a TripAdvisor Media Network member)

Things fall apart

ARCH COLLAPSE

Gravity, erosion rob Utah of it's bedrock arches

erosion = body radiation due to chemical/physical plane/surface bond fracturing
gravity = earth's center density accumulates, pressurizes/displaces subsurface

arch based on compression of stone particles due to tension of earth's gravity, when enough particles have eroded (cement bonds broken), the matrix faults and shifts and eventually collapses.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Reading a 1958 classic book by Nigerian author Chinua Achebe, called Things Fall Apart about a family of the Ibo tribe in traditional Nigeria, especially focused on the main character's relationships with family, village, clan, and foreign colonials. The book's plot is here: link. On page 57 at the moment, a challenging read, the title doesn't connect with the story yet, though I'm sure it will.

Shog bo Yoruba! Hausa! Ina su Igbo! Swahili! Ma dun belly full! My friends, brothers and sisters of Africa. Peace in your hearts, food in your stomachs, clarity in your sight.

While studying at Univ. Wisconsin, I had some Nigerian friends, I do miss them sometimes, especially Alaro (she & I worked one summer in dorm cleaning with other int'l. students) and Nnamdi (so much like Eddie Murphy), and recall Ene (he distrusted Americans, we enjoyed argueing) and "crazy" On'e who tried to kill me with a kitchen knife (I belly-laughed so hard, he joined me in laughter and put away the knife). The book's main character reminded me of him, I hope he has limited himself to killing goats. InsyaAllah.

Morocco imam competition link
call of the muzzein: survival of the fittest loudest? The clearest call surely comes from within. No need to electrically amplify, is not the high decibel traffic in the modern city already loud enough, especially near hospitals where calm is of the essence? I do like hearing the call, just hoping for a bit of balance in congested areas. An alarm clock should not be turned to maximum, that is a symptom of lethargy, sloth and lack of awareness, an unhealthy combination. Now I sound like I'm preaching, sorry, not my job.




Alhamdulillah waselamaleykumselam

daud di nor calif

That joke is soooo old!! But it's new to me...

# humor post for restroom - benjo - banio - tandas - bilik air - comfort room - WC #

The world's oldest joke, 3900 years ago, is a saying of the Sumerians, who lived in what is now southern Iraq and goes: "Something which has never occurred since time immemorial; a young woman did not fart in her husband's lap." [silently I'm sure kut .. eewww .. honey.. busuk! lulz..]

A 3600 yr old gag about a pharaoh, said to be King Snefru of Egyptian pyramid fame, comes second -- "How do you entertain a bored pharaoh? You sail a boatload of young women dressed only in fishing nets down the Nile and urge the pharaoh to go catch a fish." [wei, jom sapo nak gi mancing! haha]

The oldest British joke dates back to the 10th Century and reveals the bawdy face of the limeys -- "What hangs at a man's thigh and wants to poke the hole that it's often poked before? Answer: A key." [kalo ta paham, ta pe, lagi inosent, lagi baek]

The oldest American joke is XXXsensorXXX ta bleh wat kat DCB sori, noti lahhh ;)

Jokes don't change much, just the way they're pronounced.

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World's oldest head covering (tudung knit net fabric): 25,000 years old female figurine, the Willendorf Venus
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080807/ap_on_sc/sci_austria_voluptuous_venus_1

Quote of the Day - Marie Curie - "Be less curious about people and more curious about ideas."

Sincerity, Trust, Balance, Focus, Guidance

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Kitty kat Thousand Islands