If your cat could describe you, how would it?

It Turns Out Ahmadinejad Was Honest

GALLERY

Is Photography Dead?

The last art form to be tethered to realism, its factual validity has lately been manipulated and pixelated to the point of extinction. Photo: Cindy Sherman

Sometime next year, developers will boot up the next generation of supercomputers, machines whose vast increases in processing power will accelerate the transformation of the scientific method, experts say.

The first "petascale" supercomputer will be capable of 1,000 trillion calculations per second. Thats about twice as powerful as todays dominant model, a basketball-court-size beast known as BlueGene/L at the Energy Departments Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California that performs a peak of 596 trillion calculations per second.

The computing muscle of the new petascale machines will be akin to that of more than 100,000 desktop computers combined, experts say. A computation that would take a lifetime for a home PC and that can be completed in about five hours on todays supercomputers will be doable in as little as two hours.

Effective and enjoyable new techniques to speak, memorize and think in Japanese

Debby Cantlon, who plans to release Finnegan, the young squirrel, back into the wild, bottle-fed the infant squirrel after it was brought to her house.

When Cantlon took in the tiny creature and began caring for him, she found herself with an unlikely nurse?s aide: her pregnant Papillion, Mademoiselle Giselle.

Finnegan was resting in a nest in a cage just days before Giselle was due to deliver her puppies.

Cantlon and her husband watched as the dog dragged the squirrel?s cage twice to her own bedside before she gave birth.

Cantlon was concerned, yet ultimately decided to allow the squirrel out and the inter-species bonding began.

Finnegan rides a puppy mosh pit of sorts, burrowing in for warmth after feeding, eventually working his way beneath his new litter mates.

Two days after giving birth, mama dog Giselle allowed Finnegan to nurse; family photos and a videotape show her encouraging him to suckle alongside her litter of five pups.

Scientists dont know how it happened, but the oxygen-starved atmosphere of Saturns moon Titan contains chemicals that on Earth can serve as building blocks for complex organic molecules.

Scientists used an instrument on the Saturn-orbiting Cassini spacecraft and found heavy negatively charged ions in Titans upper atmosphere, despite the absence of oxygen.

On Earth, oxygen is needed to ionise molecules in the lower ionosphere.

"Their existence poses questions about the processes involved in atmospheric chemistry and aerosol formation," says Dr Andrew Coates, with University College Londons Mullard Space Science Laboratory.

The molecules have additional rings of carbon and can become what are called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons.

Scientists believe these polycyclic molecules can serve as a starting point for simple microbial life.

?Influenza virus is more likely to be transmitted during winter on the way to the subway than in a warm room,? said Peter Palese, a flu researcher who is professor and chairman of the microbiology department at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York and the lead author of the flu study.

Dr. Palese published details of his findings in the Oct. 19 issue of PLoS Pathogens. The crucial hint that allowed him to do his study came from a paper published in the aftermath of the 1918 flu pandemic, when doctors were puzzling over why and how the virus had spread so quickly and been so deadly.

Irish teenage literacy rated highly

Only one EU country, Finland, achieved a higher score than Ireland in reading.

We compulsively wash our hands, spray our countertops and grimace when someone sneezes near us?in fact, we do everything we can to avoid unnecessary encounters with the germ world. But the truth is we are practically walking petri dishes, rife with bacterial colonies from our skin to the deepest recesses of our guts.

All the bacteria living inside you would fill a half-gallon jug; there are 10 times more bacterial cells in your body than human cells, according to Carolyn Bohach, a microbiologist at the University of Idaho (U.I.), along with other estimates from scientific studies. (Despite their vast numbers, bacteria dont take up that much space because bacteria are far smaller than human cells.) Although that sounds pretty gross, its actually a very good thing.

Read this one, and read it carefully.

Sick Notes

Trouble is said to have earned a number of enemies due to its habit of biting.

Want more proof of just how biased the United Nations is?

A group of reporters representing the conservative newspaper Environment & Climate News were refused press credentials to attend the U.N.s climate change meeting in Bali this week.

But the event lost any claim of impartiality when organizers rejected attempts by representatives of Environment & Climate News to receive press accreditation for the conference.

I guess only reporters that buy into the global warming myth are considered accredited.

Hidden in the mysterious Bandiagara Cliffs of southern Mali, West Africa, live a people who claim to be the conduit between heaven and Earth: the people of the Dogon.

It must be one of the most stomach-churning medical treatments ever devised.

A grandmother who contracted a potentially fatal superbug in Scotland has been saved after a hospital fed her daughter?s faeces to her.

Ethel McEwan, an 83-year-old from Guardbridge, Fife, was near death after contracting Clostridium Difficile, the Daily Record reported.

But she was saved after receiving a "faecal transplant" from her daughter, Winnifred.

The treatment involves liquidising a sample of faeces from a close relative of the patient, and feeding the liquid down a tube into the stomach.

The treatment restores the bacteria to levels at which they help the recovery process.

"When you tell people about the treatment, they wrinkle their noses," Mrs McEwan told the Daily Record.

"But it?s not like they put it on a plate and have you eat it. You don?t ever see or smell a thing.

"People will have a blood transplant or a kidney transplant ? what?s the difference with this?"

A commenter at Tigerhawk put me onto this DOE document that is a Rand Corp report from the 2005 timeframe (its a PDF so youll need Acrobat reader).

A cat has survived for 19 days with a peanut butter jar stuck on its head.

The Cain family of Bartlett, Tennessee, have fed the feral cat, which they call Wild Oats, for several years.

They saw the cat several times with the jar on its head and tried in vain to catch it. But after not seeing it for a week, they feared the worst.

"I thought she was going to die with that jar on her head," said Tabitha Cain, 25.

They finally found the once chubby cat, too thin and weak to flee, and used some oil to get the jar off her head. They gave her water and treated her wounds and she is eating again.

The family are know thinking of changing the cats name to Survivor.

In their office in San Franciscos Mission District, Matt and Jessica Flannery and Premal Shah work with the fervor and techno savvy of an Internet startup aiming for an IPO. But they arent chasing the cash for themselves.

Theyre doing it for Esther Egbulu in Nigeria, a mother of six who wants an $800 loan to stock her shop with frozen chickens and turkey, or 31-year-old Choeun Sonin, whos requesting $1,000 to purchase a motorcycle taxi ? just two of 15,000 entrepreneurs from 36 countries that their company, Kiva, has already helped.

BleachBypass is a Photoshop-compatible plug-in designed to digitally simulate the traditional ?bleach bypass? technique, producing pleasing film-like results. The bleach bypass, or ?bleach skip? technique involves the partial or complete skipping of the bleaching stage during the processing of a colour film. This prevents the silver from being removed from the negative, and the result is a contrasty image with muted colours. The technique is often used extensively in motion pictures, such as ?Saving Private Ryan? and ?Three Kings?.

Protesters fight for rights at Guantanamo

What is the Story of Stuff?

From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. Itll teach you something, itll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.

Rich renewing pursuit of luxury afterlife, build private mausoleums

BRAINTREE - In designing his eternal resting place, Thomas R. Hudson Jr. wanted to spend his afterlife in much the same fashion he is spending this one: in luxury.

He didnt want to be covered in dirt, forgotten on a mantel, or stuck with the hoi polloi in a public mausoleum. Hudson, who has made a fortune running a Connecticut-based hedge fund called Pirate Capital, wanted to be with those closest to him, and like any patriarch, provide for generations to come. So he decided on the champagne of interment options: a private family columbarium.

Anti-Empire Report

By Bill Blum

In a sound-bite society, reality no longer matters

Last month, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told assembled world leaders at the United Nations that the time had come to take action against Iran. "None disagrees," she said, "that Iran denies the Holocaust and speaks openly of its desire to wipe a member state - mine - off the map. And none disagrees that, in violation of Security Council resolutions, it is actively pursuing the means to achieve this end. Too many see the danger but walk idly by - hoping that someone else will take care of it. ... It is time for the United Nations, and the states of the world, to live up to their promise of never again. To say enough is enough, to act now and to defend their basic values."[1]

In a 1996 address to the General Assembly, Cuban Vice-President Carlos Lage stated: "Each day in the world 200 million children sleep in the streets. Not one of them is Cuban."

But a Nepali wildlife reserve appears to have done just that.

Raja Gaj, or king elephant, was estimated to be 11 feet 3 inches (nearly 3.5 metres) tall at the shoulder, some two feet taller than the average Asian elephant. The bull was one of the main tourist attractions at Bardia National Park in southwest Nepal.

An official said today he has been missing for a year and may well be dead.

"When I saw it last it was lean and thin, and finding it difficult to carry its own weight," Phanindra Kharel, a senior conservationist at the park, said. Raja Gaj is - or was - more than 70 years old.

"There is very little possibility of finding such an old animal alive."

Kharel said he could not be sure if Raja Gaj had been killed by poachers, an illegal but common activity in the region.

BRATTLEBORO, VT ? Hes got waterproof, size-11EEEE New Balance sneakers, a bright yellow poncho and a plan. Hes got outrage in his heart, a Web site in his name and much of his retirement savings sunk into his cause.

John Nirenberg, a 60-year-old Ph.D., author and academic, plans to walk from Boston to Washington, D.C., to confront House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in hopes of persuading Congress to take up the impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Cheney.

Hes no activist, he says. Hes not sure hell make a difference. But hes going to try.

On Sunday, hell hit the road from Faneuil Hall, walking 15 miles a day until he gets to Capitol Hill, making symbolic stops at the Statue of Liberty, Independence Hall and Trenton, N.J., as he makes his way to the U.S. Capitol.

Wearing a "Save the Constitution, Impeach Bush and Cheney," sandwich-board style sign, he hopes to rally support for an issue Pelosi has said is no longer on the table.

We all know that too much stress is bad for us, that it wrecks our health and our relationships and makes us miserable. But too little stress is just as harmful. Life becomes dull and meaningless, and that causes its own health and performance problems.

Just the right amount of stress, the optimal amount for you, and you feel challenged, fully alive and at your personal best.

Chocolate Lovers May Be Hard-Wired That Way

FRIDAY, Oct. 12 (HealthDay News) -- Even if you dont watch what you eat, your body will. Thats the message from a small new study that suggests that diets "imprint" themselves on the metabolic system, attuning people to the food they prefer to chow down.

Researchers found that the bodies of chocolate fans reacted differently when they ate the candy, compared to other people.

"The body appears to become attuned to a particular diet, which can have both positive and negative health consequences, but which could also ultimately open the door to novel dietary regimes," said study co-author Sunil Kochhar, a researcher with the Nestlé Research Center in Lausanne, Switzerland.

The Nestlé company, best known in the United States for its chocolate products, paid for the study, which is expected to be published in the Nov. 2 issue of the American Chemical Societys Journal of Proteome Research.

A joint investigation by Austrian authorities, environmentalists, and hunters was launched this past summer after the local chapter of the World Wide Fund For Nature raised the alarm about the vanishing bears.

ATTORNEY: Are you sexually active?
WITNESS: No, I just lie there.

ATTORNEY: What was the first thing your husband said to you that morning?
WITNESS: He said, "Where am I, Cathy?"
ATTORNEY: And why did that upset you?
WITNESS: My name is Susan.

ATTORNEY: Now doctor, isnt it true that when a person dies in his sleep, he doesnt know about it until the next morning?
WITNESS: Did you actually pass the bar exam?

ATTORNEY: Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for blood pressure?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY Did you check for breathing?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you began the autopsy?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: How can you be so sure, Doctor?
WITNESS: Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.
ATTORNEY: But could the patient have still been alive, nevertheless?
WITNESS: Yes, it is possible that he could have been alive and practicing law.

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Explanation: Comet Holmes refuses to fade. The unusual comet that surprisingly brightened nearly a million-fold in late October continues to remain visible to the unaided eye from dark locations. Night to night, Comet 17P/Holmes is slowly gliding through the constellation Perseus, remaining visible to northern observers during much of the night right from sunset. Pictured above, Comet Holmes was captured from Hungary last week. The remarkable snowball continues to retain a huge coma, but now shows very little of a tail. To the far right is the open cluster of stars NGC 1245. How much longer Comet Holmes will remain visible to the unaided eye is unknown.

Initial excavation of a site on the Svalbard Islands in August yielded the remains, teeth, skull fragments and vertebrae of a reptile estimated to measure nearly 40 feet long, said Joern Harald Hurum of the University of Oslo.

"It seems the monster is a new species," he told The Associated Press.

The reptile appears be the same species as another sea predator whose remains were found nearby on Svalbard last year.

His team described those 150-million-year-old remains as belonging to a short-necked plesiosaur measuring more than 30 feet ? "as long as a bus ... with teeth larger than cucumbers."

The short-necked plesiosaur, or pliosaur, was a voracious reptile often compared to the Tyrannosaurus rex of the oceans.

Built-in microwave combo wall ovens pose fire hazard, company says; no injuries reported.

LONDON (CNNMoney.com) -- General Electric said Wednesday it was recalling 92,000 microwave combo wall ovens due to fire hazard.

The recall includes built-in units sold under the GE, GE Profile and Kenmore brands. The appliances were manufactured in the U.S.

The recalled units were sold from January 2000 to December 2003 and cost between $1,500 and $2,000, according to GE, which announced the recall with the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

The company said there have been about 35 incidents of property damage that have occurred, but no injuries have been reported.

GE is offering a free repair on GE and GE Profile units or a rebate toward the purchase of a new product. Sears is doing the same for Kenmore units.

Consumers should contact GE at 888-240-2745 or www.geappliances.com. Sears can be reached at 888-679-0282 or www.sears.com. 

The Office

But one little-noticed fact may have a major impact on Republican ranks in the House after ?08, no matter what their numbers:  that with so many of the seventeen including prominent moderate GOPers, odds are strong that the trend toward the terms ?Republican? and ?conservative? becoming mutually inclusive will continue after the next election.

It won?t happen, but the time may be sooner rather than later that an election cycle leaves the term ?liberal Republican House Member? a phrase to describe an extinct species. 

214 - The Blonde Map of Europe

Q: How do you get a blonde out of a tree?
A: Wave

Want to know how you can calculate your Federal income tax refund or return for free?

Maybe youre wondering how much your tax refund will be, or you might want to know if youre going to owe money at tax time. If you would like to find out, then I suggest using an online Federal income tax refund - return calculator.

To calculate your tax refund or return, you must first find a website with tax calculating software such as TurboTax Online. Start by creating a user account at the website you have selected. Now youll be able to use their tax preparation program to calculate your taxes. Depending on your situation, this should take about 30 minutes or less to complete.

You can go to Turbo Tax Online and use their Tax Refund Estimator for Free. Just create a user account, and your ready to start. The only time theres a fee, is if you decide to print or efile your tax return. Try Turbotax Online today and see how large your tax refund will be.

Iran declares victory after U.S. nuclear report

Deal or No Deal Game

Want to play the deal or no deal game for yourself and stand the chance of winning a HUGE cash prize? If youve ever imagined yourself playing the popular channel 4 TV show Deal or No Deal and winning a huge sum of cash, then you should try playing the deal or no deal game online.

Where to play the Deal or No Deal Game? 

RIP Facebook?

A lot of people say that Facebook has jumped the shark. That?s flat out wrong. In fact, Facebook is now being devoured by the shark. There?s so much blood in the water, it?s attracting other sharks. And if Facebook?s not careful, one of them is bound to come along and finish it off. I?ve never seen anything like it in the annals of fast-rising tech companies that fail.

The really weird part of this story is that there?s absolutely nothing wrong with Facebook. It works as well as it ever has, and many of the people who use it (my kids for instance) are unaware of the worsening situation about its privacy-invading Beacon social ads scheme that tracks people?s web-surfing habits even when they?re not on the site. That?s bound to change. The market is fickle, something better is in the wings, and as soon as it arrives, the alienated and angry mob will race to it. Delphi?s errors begat Prodigy and its errors begat AOL, which was crushed by the Web.

Disappearing Island Nations

Burning Rage
Naturally, I?m incensed at all this, especially when I read stories about the apparently imminent disappearance of several entire island nations due to the rising sea levels that are, in turn, a result of global warming. And, assuming that global warming is in fact caused by greenhouse gases (as most people do), it is astonishing that people continue driving gas-guzzling SUVs and smoking cigarettes and, you know, generally showing contempt for the future inhabitants of the planet as a whole and those island nations in particular.

Amazon Oddities - 7 Really Weird Products selling on amazon

Amazon, the world?s biggest bookstore, has expanded in innumerable directions. The firm offers books, DVD?s, videos, auto parts, toys, tools, electronics, home furnishings, apparel, health and beauty goods, prescription drugs, and groceries. They also offer some really weird products. Like a Deer Rear, a Toilet Monster, Anti-Monkey Butt Powder, Solid Gold Stop Eating Poop, Gorilla Snot, a Wedding Chapel, and of course the Hillary Nutcracker.

Aufregung um homosexuellen Mohammed

Eine Künstlerin in Holland hat Morddrohungen erhalten, weil in ihrem Werk Fotos von homosexuellen Männern mit einer Mohammed-Maske vorkommen.

ET confirms the news that a man was critically injured when he was attacked by a tiger at a wildlife preserve run by Golden Globe-winning actress TIPPI HEDREN.

The 40-year-old man was bitten repeatedly by the tiger at the Shambala Preserve, located at the edge of the Mojave desert about 40 miles outside of Los Angeles. He was airlifted to a hospital, where he is now in stable, but critical condition.

Hedren founded the preserve in the 70s, according to the Associated Press. She is perhaps best known for her starring role in ALFRED HITCHCOCKs The Birds and is also the mother of actress MELANIE GRIFFITH.

Hanf-Initiative gibt viel zu reden

Der Nationalrat hat am Mittwoch die Diskussion über die Volksininitiative «für eine vernünftige Hanf-Politik» in Angriff genommen. Nicht weniger als 37 Einzelredner hatten sich für die Debatte eingeschrieben.

What is SEO?

This video is from Linknet Promotions - online promotion

This is a weird shot but it?s of a white tiger, underwater, ready to pounce on a chunk of meat. This was from a family outing to Six Flags Discovery Kingdom in Vallejo, CA. There?s a twice-a-day feeding of the tigers in the water which you can view through a window. The railing and legs you see in the image are reflections on the glass of the watching crowd, and the red thing is a suspended piece of meat that was just tossed and has the full attention of the hungry tiger. At least I?m assuming he?s hungry.

Alternately titled ?Ghost Tiger? and ?If Looks Could Kill?

Shot with a Canon 5D, Canon 70-200mm lens.

Maurice Fox received a letter from Kirkham Street Sports and Social Club in Paignton asking him to consider his actions, which "disgusted" members.

Mr Fox, a club regular for 20 years, said: "I am happy to oblige them, there is no problem. I do get a bit windy - I am an old fart now."

Knowledge has been the presidents enemy ever since his skull failed to completely fuse, leaving him with a spongy head and a brain thats susceptible to bruising. His other lifelong enemy, by the way, is a fork without a protective wine cork pressed onto its dangerous, eye-poking tines. Im joking about the skull thing.

But now it appears as if having the knowledge to be able to build a nuclear bomb is enough to let slip the neocon jagoffs of war -- whether or not a nuclear weapon is actually being constructed. President Bush during Tuesdays press conference:

Why else would President Bush cite knowledge as the qualifier? Knowledge is also the simplest justification to lie about due to the fact that its so insanely difficult disprove. Oh, and its a perfect fit for rallying the presidents dingus base -- they hate anything that has to do with knownin shit.

--
Bob Cescas Goddamn Awesome Blog! Go! BobCesca.com

River runs purple, contaminates Greek town

?I believe that sex is one of the most beautiful, natural, wholesome things that money can buy.?
- Tom Clancy

?You know ?that look? women get when they want sex? Me neither.?
- Steve Martin

?Having sex is like playing bridge. If you don?t have a good partner, you?d better have a good hand.?
- Woody Allen

?Bisexuality immediately doubles your chances for a date on Saturday night.?
- Rodney Dangerfield

?There are a number of mechanical devices which increase sexual arousal, particularly in women. Chief among these is the Mercedes-Benz 380SL.?
- Lynn Lavner

?Leaving sex to the feminists is like letting your dog vacation at the taxidermist.?
- Matt Barry

?Sex at age 90 is like trying to shoot pool with a rope.?
- George Burns

?Sex is one of the nine reasons for reincarnation. The other eight are unimportant.?
- George Burns

?Women might be able to fake orgasms. But men can fake whole relationships.?
- Sharon Stone

Organizers of Sandy, Utah?s Festival of Trees have kicked out a display that honors the state?s fallen war heroes. A woman who helped dedicate the soldiers tree says one of the festival organizers told her that the display did not deserve any more recognition than someone who had died in a car accident or passed away in a hospice.

Titled ?Our Heroes,? the tree is dedicated to nearly 50 Utah soldiers who have died in military service.

Utah?s CBS Channel 2 (KUTV) reports festival chairwoman Edyth Hansen removed the tree from the main exhibit area because she said it was too tall ? had more than one picture ? and was not dedicated to children. Says Hansen ? ?Once you change the rules for one person you have change them for everyone.?

However KUTV reports several trees still in the exhibit hall also feature multiple pictures, honor people other than children, and are of similar height to the soldiers? tree.

Reiki is a Japanese technique for stress reduction and relaxation that also promotes healing. It is administered by "laying on hands" and is based on the idea that an unseen "life force energy" flows through us and is what causes us to be alive. If ones "life force energy" is low, then we are more likely to get sick or feel stress, and if it is high, we are more capable of being happy and healthy.

The word Reiki is made of two Japanese words - Rei which means "Gods Wisdom or the Higher Power" and Ki which is "life force energy". So Reiki is actually "spiritually guided life force energy."

So it was unsettling, to say the least, for some longtime members when Christ Church, which is believed to be the first church established in Georgia, voted recently to part ways with the Episcopal diocese it had been a part of for more than 200 years to join an Anglican diocese in Uganda.

At issue for these breakaway parishes is whether churches that condone same-sex relationships are still following the Bible, and the Episcopal denomination is not the only one affected by the debate.

?That would make the case a pure property case rather than a religious liberty case,? Mr. Witte said. ?They will have to argue that their church is closer to the values of the late 18th century? than the Episcopal Church is today.

And that, he added, is ?an argument that hasn?t been tested in federal courts.?

Researchers have thawed ice estimated to be perhaps a million years old or more from above Lake Vostok, an ancient lake that lies hidden more than two miles beneath the frozen surface of Antarctica using novel genomic techniques to determine how tiny, living "time capsules" survived the ages in total darkness, in freezing cold, and without food and energy from the sun.

Lake Vostok is located beneath four kilometers of ice in East Antarctica. The lake is approximately 250 km long and 50 km wide. The overlying ice provides a continuous paleo-climatic record of 400,000 years, although the lake water itself may have been isolated for as long as 15 million years.

Ghosts?
PG-Rated

A professor at the University of West Virginia was giving a lecture on the supernatural. To get a feel for his audience, he asks ?How many people here believe in ghosts??

About 90 students raise their hands.

?Well, that?s a good start. Out of those of you who believe in ghosts, do any of you think you?ve seen a ghost??

About 40 students raise their hands.

?That?s really good. I?m really glad you take this seriously. Has anyone here ever talked to a ghost??

15 students raise their hands.

?Has anyone here ever touched a ghost??

3 students raise their hands.

?That?s fantastic. Now let me ask you one question further? Have any of you ever made love to a ghost??

Billy Ray, way in the back raises his hand.

The professor takes off his glasses, and says, ?Son, all the years I?ve been giving this lecture, no one has claimed to have made love to a ghost. You?ve got to come up here and tell us about your experience.?

WHEN IT IS ONE OF THOSE DAYS - HERE S A THOUGHT:

Handle every situation like a dog.

ARE YOU READY FOR THIS?

(SCROLL DOWN)

PORTLAND, Oregon (Reuters) - An Oregon high school teacher on Tuesday sued for her right to bring a gun into the classroom for personal protection, clashing with anti-gun advocates fighting for years to rid U.S. schools of weapons.

The teacher, who has a legal permit to carry a concealed handgun, filed a lawsuit against the Medford school district in southwestern Oregon to overturn the districts rule that prohibits teachers from bringing a weapon onto school grounds.

After a student shot dead 32 people at Virginia Tech University in April, some pro-gun advocates have argued that teachers and perhaps students should be armed to prevent such tragedies in the future.

Carlos Camejo, 33, was declared dead after a highway accident and taken to the morgue, where examiners began an autopsy only to realize something was amiss when he started bleeding. They quickly sought to stitch up the incision on his face.

"I woke up because the pain was unbearable," Camejo said, according to a report on Friday in leading local newspaper El Universal.

His grieving wife turned up at the morgue to identify her husbands body only to find him moved into a corridor -- and alive.

Reuters could not immediately reach hospital officials to confirm the events. But Camejo showed the newspaper his facial scar and a document ordering the autopsy.

A highly controversial, 150 page National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran?s nuclear programs was coordinated and written by former State Department political and intelligence analysts ? not by more seasoned members of the U.S. intelligence community, Newsmax has learned.

Its most dramatic conclusion ? that Iran shut down its nuclear weapons program in 2003 in response to international pressure ? is based on a single, unvetted source who provided information to a foreign intelligence service and has not been interviewed directly by the United States.

Although it is impossible to know how Monet wanted his canvases to look, Dr. Marmor?s research suggests that understanding physical infirmity can help assess his work. Whatever Monet intended, his eyes provided little help. ?He couldn?t judge what he was seeing or see what he was painting,? Dr. Marmor said. ?It is a mystery how he worked.?

Find millions of historical newspaper pages, dating from 1759 to the present year. Search newspapers from the Great Depression in the 1930s or articles about Queen Victoria during her reign from 1837 to 1901. Every newspaper can easily be searched by date.

Shop for the new DVD movie and music CD releases at low prices and save. DVD movie and music CDs customers in USA will enjoy FREE Shipping on orders containing three or more items. We also offer competitive and customer friendly international shipping. So visit us often for all your DVD movie and music CD needs!

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Holy smoke! Police find cannabis in nunnery

ATHENS (Reuters) - A Greek Orthodox nunnery was turned into a marijuana plantation by two men posing as gardeners for elderly nuns, police said on Tuesday.

Acting on a tip-off, officers raided the nunnery in the village of Filiro, near the northern port city of Thessaloniki, and found more than 30 large cannabis plants in the enclosed garden.

"The nuns did not know what they were and assumed they were large decorative plants," he said.

Police did not arrest the nuns and have launched a hunt for the culprits.

Deadly Staph Infection Superbug Has a Dangerous Foothold in U.S. Jails

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention CDC has rightfully called MRSA (pronounced mer-sa) the "cockroach of bacteria." It spreads silently and stealthily, and moves quickly from one location to the next. Once its around, its also incredibly difficult to get rid of because this virulent mutation of staph is resistant to all but the most rare and expensive antibiotics. Sometimes, even the super drugs dont work against this superbug, resulting in some 19,000 deaths in 2005, amounting to more than one in five of the estimated 94,000 Americans walking around MRSA lurking on skin surfaces and in nasal cavities.

SAVANNAH, Ga. ? For 274 years, there has been one Christ Church here, and it is a congregation with a proud history.

So it was unsettling, to say the least, for some longtime members when Christ Church, which is believed to be the first church established in Georgia, voted recently to part ways with the Episcopal diocese it had been a part of for more than 200 years to join an Anglican diocese in Uganda.

At issue for these breakaway parishes is whether churches that condone same-sex relationships are still following the Bible, and the Episcopal denomination is not the only one affected by the debate.

The religious rifts, including the one here, have flooded courts nationwide with civil lawsuits over church property, an area of jurisprudence where courts, as they try to navigate First Amendment separations of church and state, are notoriously uncomfortable.

Researchers in New York believe they have solved one of the great mysteries of the flu: Why does the infection spread primarily in the winter months?

The answer, they say, has to do with the virus itself. It is more stable and stays in the air longer when air is cold and dry, the exact conditions for much of the flu season.

?Influenza virus is more likely to be transmitted during winter on the way to the subway than in a warm room,? said Peter Palese, a flu researcher who is professor and chairman of the microbiology department at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York and the lead author of the flu study.

As long as flu has been recognized, people have asked, Why winter? The very name, ?influenza,? is an Italian word that some historians proposed, originated in the mid-18th century as influenza di freddo, or ?influence of the cold.?

The Vision
Seizing the power of television to expand social consciousness, FSTV fuels the movement for progressive social, economic, and political transformation. By exposing the public to perspectives excluded from the corporate-owned media, FSTV empowers citizens to fight injustices, to revitalize democracy, and to build a more compassionate world.

But if we are truly in a slowdown, this may be as good as it gets for middle-class families in the highly-touted, much celebrated business cycle of the 2000s.  If so, it will be like the 1990s without the good part -- the part where prosperity was broadly shared for a few years before the bubble burst. 

This lack of shared prosperity is the signature characteristic of todays economy.  Any politician who isnt taking about what he or she intends to do about it isnt worth listening to.

1 stick of unsalted butter, softened
handful of fresh herbs (any combination is fine. My fav is basil and parsley)
1-3 cloves of garlic, smushed in garlic press

Massively salt your steaks 15 min - 1 hour before grilling.