Thursday, December 30, 2010

Type casting, George Reeves, Mel Gibson




You know how they could have saved George Reeves' career?

He had starred as Superman on TV. But that ruined him. When he appeared in a movie around that time, members of the test audience saw him and started murmuring, "Superman! It's Superman!" His part was trimmed down to nothing.

Here's the way out of the typecasting. They should have put him in a movie where he'd go through the whole thing with his leg in a cast and he could constantly hurt himself. Maybe have him appear in a gun battle. When the other guy runs out of bullets, he could throw the gun at Reeves, hit him in the head and knock him down.

"OW! OWWWWW! My head! My head! Owwwwww!" Reeves could have said.

The audience would forget all about him having been Superman.

Other actors have done things sort of like that.

After playing Moses and Ben Hur, Charelton Heston played a swingin' architect in Earthquake and an equally swingin' pilot in Airport '75.

Steve McQueen's wife did most of the driving in The Getaway, and his character had very poor driving skills in The Hunter.

So here's what Mel Gibson should do. He should do a sequel to his old Australian movie, Tim. He had played a developmentally disabled 18-year-old gardener who marries his middle-aged employer. In the sequel, Tim could be a widower. Lonely and depressed, he innocently joins a neo-Nazi group, but soon realizes his mistake and quits in disgust.

Thursday, December 23, 2010

Another thing about the cheap camcorders

A fifteen dollar camcorder is the perfect gift. It's cheap. No embarrassing gratitude from the recipient. Potentially fun to mess around with, but I don't think many people would waste fifteen dollars on one for themselves. I didn't. Just bought them as gifts.

Announcement of Regular and Special Holidays for 2011

Proclamation 84 by the President of the Philippines states that 

R.A. 9492 - ALL holidays except those are religiuos in nature will be moved to the nearest Monday unless otherwise modified by law.
R.A. 9849 - Eidul Adha is celebrated as a national holiday.

Section 1 - The following Regular and special holidays for the year 2011 shall be observed in the country:
Regular Holidays:
New Year's Day - January 1 (Saturday)
Araw ng Kagitingan - April 9 (Saturday)
Maundy Thursday - April 21
Good Friday - April 22
Labor Day - May 1 (Sunday)
Independence Day - June 12 (Sunday)
National Heroes Day - Last Monday of August
Bonifacio Day - November 30 (Wednesday)
Christmas Day - December 25 (Sunday)
Rizal Day - December 30 (Friday)

Special Non-working Holidays:
Ninoy Aquino Day - August 21 (Sunday)
All Saints Day - November 1 (Tuesday)
Last day of the Year - December 31 (Saturday)

Special Holiday (for all Schools):
EDSA Revolution Anniversary - February 25 (Friday)

Section 2 - The proclamations declaring national holidays for the observance of Eid'l Fitr and Eidul Adha shall be issued after the approximate dates of the Islamic holidays have been determined in accordance with the Islamic Calendar (Hijra) or the lunar calendar or upon Islamic astronomical calculations, whichever is possible or convenient. The National Commission on Mislim Filipinos (NCMF) shall inform the Office of the President on which day the holiday shall fall.


Pilipinas Win Na Win will End on December 31

There have been rumors that ABS-CBN's Pilipinas Win na Win will soon end. Seems like that rumor has come true. ABS-CBN has confirmed that the five month old noontime show will stop by end of this year. The vacant timeslot will be temporarily be filled by the talent-search program Showtime.

Pilipinas Win na Win was premiered only last July 31, 2010 as Wowowee's replacement. They were suddenly forced to replace the show because of problems with its host Willie Revillame. The first batch of hosts for Pilipinas Win na Win were
Kris Aquino and Robin Padilla with some of Wowowee hosts like Mariel Rodriguez, Valerie Concepcion, at Pokwang.

Pilipinas Win na Win encountered a lot of criticism and problems with its five months. Robin and Mariel filed for indefinite leave because they suddenly got married. Kris Aquino was not helping the show so was asked to leave to make room for The Hitmakers, which composed by Rico J. Puno, Rey Valera, Nonoy Zuñiga, and Marco Sison. ABS-CBN was also trying out new faces like Janelle Jamer, Gee Canlas and K Brosas.

Lots of people will not agree with this but I think Pilipinas Win na Win was doomed from the beginning. Its boring and honestly not entertaining. I'm happy that ABS-CBN finally swallowed their pride and stopped the show. Showtime deserves the timeslots. It's fun to watch it has a catchy opening song. Everything in Pilipinas Win na Win seems not to live up to its predecessor, Wowowee. Hopefully "Showtime" will do better. And I think it would. 

In a statement by Mr. Bong Osorio, Corporate Communication ng ABS-CBN, "Pilipinas Win na Win (PWNW) will have its last episode on December 31, 2010. The ABS-CBN management thanks the The Hitmakers, Valerie Concepcion, Kaye Brosas, and Pokwang, the PWNW production group and most important, its viewers for their support to the program. In the meantime, Showtime will occupy the slot left by PWNW. With its extended time, Showtime will continue to bring more great fun, and hope to Filipinos worldwide."

Source: www.pep.ph

Monday, December 20, 2010

Megan Fox Slimmer Than Usual

Megan Fox looked very thin while on a beach in Hawaii. Megan's ribcage and hip bones were clear to see as she walked to the beach. Comparing Megan in her movie Transformers, you can see the difference. Camera tricks aside she is slimmer.

Megan Fox is the second woman in history to be the FHM's Sexiest Woman Alive crown two years running in 2008-2009. But lost this year to Victoria's Secret model Marissa Miller.






Source: www.dailymail.co.uk

Sunday, December 19, 2010

Christmas camcorders


Well, it's the Christmas season, and this year, all the young people on my Christmas list are getting camcorders. Cheap ones. There are only a few kids I buy for.

Aiptek is selling a couple of refurbished models on its website for $10 or $15 each. So I ordered a few of them.

I did a search on You Tube for reviews and examples of video shot with the cameras in question. They seemed okay. For fifteen bucks, they were great. The kids they're for are all teenagers. I don't know if they'll be pleased, or if they'll be frustrated and disappointed when they try using them, or if they already have camcorders or camera phones or digital still cameras with video settings. The cameras are standard definition, so they'll look pretty good on You Tube as long as there's plenty of light while filming, but may not be so great on a TV screen.

Maybe I'm just an old person unaware that, in this day and age, video is no longer a novelty. Like the old people in my day who'd give you a transistor radio for Xmas and think it was a space age marvel because, during the Depression, owning a radio was a tremendous luxury. Not that I didn't appreciate my transistor radio.

If nothing else, they can do what these people did with their cheap camcorder:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEj23gDb6Gs

Saturday, December 18, 2010

Community access TV guy in the news

One community access TV guy sort of hit it big. At least he's making a bigger spectacle of himself than usual.

A fellow named Barry Sommer had a show on the local cable access channel. He would sit and read anti-Muslim items he apparently got off the internet. For example, one thing he read was a complaint by the British television writer Ben Elton that the BBC cut a Muslim joke from a show but he didn't think they would have cut a similar joke about an Anglican. It didn't seem like much of a comment on Islam, but Sommer seemed to feel it was deeply significant.

In addition to his community access TV show, he's apparently self-published a book attacking Islam. It appeared to be available only on kindle. I haven't seen it, but judging from its title and looking at his TV show, my guess is that it's a copy-and-paste job, a compilation of stuff he found on the internet.

Sommer is 56. He's unemployed and has a high school diploma. He lives in a trailer in an unincorporated area between Eugene and Springfield.

But Sommer proposed that he teach a non-credit course on Islam at the local community college, and for some reason, they went along. They offered his course. No one signed up for it. A Muslim civil rights group pointed out Sommer's background to the college. On his blog, Sommer supported a constitutional amendment to ban the practice of Islam in the United States. He described it as “brilliant, crystal clear and something to seriously consider in the face of Islamic supremacism”.

LCC dropped the class. Not surprisingly, Sommer is claiming to be a victim. And now that "civil rights" group Pat Robertson started is threatening to sue to reinstate the class.

Interesting thing is how polite the press has been about Sommer's "qualifications". They mention his book and his TV show. They don't mention that his only qualification to do the TV show is that he paid a ten dollar annual membership fee to the TV station and that he paid to have his "book" "published". My guess is that no one reporting on this has seen either one.

The Muslims he quotes in the book and on the show ought to sue him for copyright infringement.

Pacifica Forum

Sommer used to be part of Pacifica Forum which was designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, for whatever that's worth. It's a strange little discussion group made up of aging crackpots.

It started out as a much more serious pacifist discussion group. They were critical of Israel, as any genuine peace group is. This resulted in their being targeted by local Jewish and pro-Zionist groups. They were smeared as "anti-Semitic" and run out of their regular meeting place. The founder of the group was a retired law professor. As a retired professor, he was entitled to use classrooms at the University of Oregon for meetings, so they started using rooms at the university.

That's when things started getting weird. Being critical of Israel, they attracted a Lithuanian anti-Communist who blamed Jews for socialism. He wanted to give a lecture to the group. Members didn't want him because he was clearly an anti-Semite, but the 90-year-old founder overruled them in the name of "free speech".

What they did after that didn't make sense. Local Zionists called them Nazis. They inexplicably responded to what I think were false accusations of Nazism by inviting actual Nazis to speak. A "historical revisionist" spoke there (although he stuck to the topic of Palestine) and they invited David Irving to speak (he had just gotten out of prison in Austria where he'd been locked up for denying the Nazi genocide.)

This attracted the one aging local Nazi, a short gray haired guy who keeps showing up in a kilt. Then HE wanted to speak there. He gave a presentation and showed a video from a Nazi rally he attended in California.

That brought on a wave of protests against Pacifica Forum that went on for months. University students wanted the group off campus.

Barry Sommer, who is Jewish, joined Pacifica Forum after the protests started and gave his own lecture, not on Islam but on the Nazi genocide. I was there. There was a large crowd, nearly all of them protesters in addition to the dozen or so elderly people who made up Pacifica Forum.

Sommer spoke for about an hour. The main thing that stood out to me was that he doubted that there had been gas chambers. He dismissed eyewitness testimony as "anecdotal evidence." He doesn't know what anecdotal evidence is.

It wasn't long after that that Sommer and another couple of guys, including the Lithuanian who had started the group's downward spiral, left Pacifica Forum to devote themselves to their hatred of Islam.

One more thing about video

I didn't want to be seen at Sommer's lecture. I didn't want anyone thinking I was part of Pacifica Forum, certainly, and I didn't especially want people to think I was part of the anarchist groups protesting. But there were cameras everywhere!

In the old days, I would attend a rally or an event and would be one of only a handful of people taking pictures or filming. Now everyone has a cell phone camera or digital camera and they take pictures constantly. It's free. They're not wasting film. You can't stay out of the crossfire.

Thursday, December 16, 2010

Philippine Peso Bill's New Design with Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas New Logo

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) or Philippine Central Bank has unveiled the new designs of the peso bill from P20 to P1,000. BSP says that they would be releasing the new designed bills tomorrow. We can still use the old currency / bills / money for the next 3 years. After that, the notes will become useless. The BSP said the new bills have improved security features, which will make them harder to counterfeit.
Here are the changes for the Philippine Money / Currency / Bill

20 Pesos: A younger Manuel Quezon is seen in the new P20 bill, with the Banaue rice terraces seen at the back instead of the Malacañang.

50 Pesos: Sergio Osmeña as is on the P50 bill, with the Taal Lake and the Maliputo fish at the back instead of the National Museum.

100 Pesos: Manual Roxas  as is on the P100 bill, with the Mayon Volcano and the Butinding of Sorsogon at the back instead of the Central Bank Building. 

200 Pesos: Diosdado Macapagal, the father of former President Gloria Arroyo, is on the P200 bill, with the Chocolate Hills and tarsier at the back.

500 Pesos: The new P500 bill shows both former Senator Ninoy and former President Corazon Aquino. It is the first time a bill showed both parents of a sitting president, whose signature is also on the bill. At the back of the P500 bill is the underground river in Palawan and the blue-naped parrot.

1,000 Pesos: Josefa Llanes Escoda, Jose Abad Santos and Vicente Lim are still on the P1,000 bill, but at the back are the Tubbataha Reef and the South Sea Pearl.

The new banknotes will have the new BSP Logo unveiled last June. The following description for the logo comes from the bank’s website:

The new BSP logo is a perfect round shape in blue that features three gold stars and a stylized Philippine eagle rendered in white strokes. These main elements are framed on the left side with the text inscription “Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas” underscored by a gold line drawn in half circle. The right side remains open, signifying freedom, openness, and readiness of the BSP, as represented by the Philippine eagle, to soar and fly toward its goal. Putting all these elements together is a solid blue background to signify stability.

Principal Elements:

1. The Philippine Eagle, our national bird, is the world’s largest eagle and is a symbol of strength, clear vision and freedom, the qualities we aspire for as a central bank.

2. The three stars represent the three pillars of central banking: price stability, stable banking system, and a safe and reliable payments system. It may also be interpreted as a geographical representation of BSP’s equal concern for the impact of its policies and programs on all Filipinos, whether they are in Luzon, Visayas or Mindanao.

Colors
1. The blue background signifies stability.
2. The stars are rendered in gold to symbolize wisdom, wealth, idealism, and high quality.
3. The white color of the eagle and the text for BSP represents purity, neutrality, and mental clarity.

Font or Type Face
Non-serif, bold for “BANGKO SENTRAL NG PILIPINAS” to suggest solidity, strength, and stability. The use of non-serif fonts characterized by clean lines portrays the no-nonsense professional manner of doing business at the BSP.

Shape
Round shape to symbolize the continuing and unending quest to become an excellent monetary authority committed to improve the quality of life of Filipinos. This round shape is also evocative of our coins, the basic units of our currency.


Source: www.abs-cbnnews.com ; www.bsp.gov.ph

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Accessing Multiple Gmail Accounts Now Easier to Manage

Have multiple Gmail Accounts? Well Google announced a new Gmail feature today, called e-mail delegation. The new feature will allow you to easily manage multiple Gmail accounts without signing in and out of Gmail to switch accounts. 

Originally, e-mail delegation was made primarily for personal assistants and the likes. Now with the latest changes, the feature is useful to any Gmail user with multiple accounts of his or her own.

If you want to use this great feature, just sign into your primary Gmail account then grant access to your other Gmail accounts. Click "settings" in the top right corner of Gmail's web interface. Under the "Accounts and Import" tab, there's now a new section entitled, "Grant access to your account." Here, you can add any other Gmail accounts you control to your primary Gmail account.

When you add an account, you'll have to accept access from a verification e-mail sent to the to-be-added account. Once the account is successfully added, you can simply toggle between your Gmail accounts without logging in and out. You can see the toggle beside the settings tab. You do have to wait for few hours for the toggle to take effect and be seen.

Here is a short video on how to set up "Gmail Delegation" for multiple Gmail Accounts


Taylor Swift and Her Boyfriend Jake Gyllenhaal

Taylor Swift and her boyfriend Jake Gyllenhaal was seen holding hands outside a local grocery in New York. Things are likely becoming more serious as Jake introduced Taylor to his movie star sister Maggie Gyllenhaal. Taylor was holding hands with Maggie's four-year-old daughter, Ramona. After grocery they joined Jake's sister Maggie for dinner.

Taylor, who turned 21 this week and Jake who is turning 31 on December 19. Despite the age gap they seemed to be happy together. Singer Taylor and actor Jake started dating just this October, a year after his break up with Reese Witherspoon.



Source: www.dailymail.co.uk

US to Allow Openly Gay Soldiers?

The US democratic-led House of Representatives has voted 250-175 to repeal a ban on openly gay men and women serving in the US military. Backed by President Obama, the bill is now on to the Senate for approval. Democrats who support repeal say that they they are confident and expects to get 60 votes in the 100-member Senate to pass the legislation. 

The "don't ask, don't tell" policy, which came into force in 1993 which forbids gay soldiers from acknowledging their sexual orientation. The law is "the only law in the country that requires people to be dishonest or be fired if they choose to be honest", said Democratic Representative Jared Polis, of Colorado.

The Pentagon released a report which found that "allowing openly gay troops would have little, if any, impact on the readiness and cohesion of America's armed forces."

Source: www.bbc.co.uk ; oudaily.com

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Facebook Global Friend Connections

Ever wonder what a graph of Facebook friend connections around the world will look like? A Facebook intern Paul Butler wondered and made the Facebook Social Graph. In the graph you can see the connections and concentration of friendships. Notice the graph, U.S. has the highest concentration of Facebook friendships, and Africa has the lowest concentration. As expected, most of Russia and China has almost no facebook users at all. The rest of the world is easily identifiable.

Although looks not that much but this was hard to make. Butler explained in a Facebook note some of the challenges he faced creating his visualization:


"I began exploring it in R, an open-source statistics environment. As a sanity check, I plotted points at some of the latitude and longitude coordinates. To my relief, what I saw was roughly an outline of the world. Next I erased the dots and plotted lines between the points.

After a few minutes of rendering, a big white blob appeared in the center of the map. Some of the outer edges of the blob vaguely resembled the continents, but it was clear that I had too much data to get interesting results just by drawing lines. I thought that making the lines semi-transparent would do the trick, but I quickly realized that my graphing environment couldn't handle enough shades of color for it to work the way I wanted.


Instead I found a way to simulate the effect I wanted. I defined weights for each pair of cities as a function of the Euclidean distance between them and the number of friends between them. Then I plotted lines between the pairs by weight, so that pairs of cities with the most friendships between them were drawn on top of the others.


I used a color ramp from black to blue to white, with each line's color depending on its weight. I also transformed some of the lines to wrap around the image, rather than spanning more than halfway around the world.
"

Source: www.cnn.com

Violence Against Women in Sudan

 This horrible video of laughing Sudanese policemen flogging a woman and publicly humiliating her. The video led to 50 women protesting outside the justice ministry in Sudan. The police surrounded them and dozens were arrested. 

The women said they had tried to get permission for the protest but had been refused. (View Full Article for Video)



The video follows 2009 's case of Lubna Hussein, the UN worker and a Sudanese journalist who was arrested with 12 other women for wearing trousers at a party in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum. The 12 others accepted the punishment of 10 lashes but she refused and challenged the verdict in court. She still lost the case but due to international criticism, she was released with a fine instead of lashes.


Source: www.dailymail.co.uk

Hubert Webb and 6 Others in Vizconde Massacre Case Acquitted

In a vote 7-4-4 earlier by the Supreme Court, acquitted Hubert Jeffrey Webb, Antonio Lejano, Michael Gatchalian, Hospicio Fernandez, Miguel Rodriguez, Peter Estrada and Gerardo Biong in the Vizconde massacre case in 1991.

A supreme court spokesman and Court Adminisrator Atty. Jose Midas Marquez said that the Court acquitted the seven accused as the prosecution failed to prove their guilt beyond reasonable doubt.


The Paranaque Regional Trial Court Branch 274 convicted Webb and others for killing three members of the Vizconde family in January of 2000. After five years the Court of Appeals upheld the conviction. Then Webb brought the case to the Supreme Court. He asked that the semen found on Carmela Vizconde's body be tested. It was found that the semen sample was lost. Webb's party insists that the semen sample would have proven Webb's innocence.

The basis for the acquittal was said to be the following:
- The Court took into consideration the inconsistencies in the testimony of Jessica Alfaro, who was an agent of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), but she was not an eyewitness.
- The SC also took into consideration the argument of Webb that he was in the United States during the commission of the crime.
-The SC did not take into consideration the DNA test.

Those who voted for the acquittal of the 7 suspects:
Associate Justices Roberto Abad, Conchita Carpio-Morales, Diosdado Peralta, Lucas Bersamin, Jose Perez, Jose Catral Mendoza and Maria Lourdes Sereno. 

Those who Dissented:
Chief Justice Renato Corona, and Associate Justices Martin Villarama, Jr.; Teresita Leonardo-de Castro and Arturo Brion.
Those who did not participate in the voting:
Associate Justices Antonio Carpio (he testified during the trial of the cas)
Antonio Eduardo Nachura (he was the Solicitor General at the time of the commission of the crime)
Mariano del Castillo (one of the accused is a client of the law firm of his wife)
Presbitero Velasco, Jr. (close relationship to a party in the case)

Source: www.spot.ph ; www.mb.com.ph

Monday, December 13, 2010

What if Clint Eastwood had starred in The Pawnbroker?


It's amazing the movies people take seriously now.

There was a ridiculous movie called Homicide written by David Mamet. A Jewish detective investigates the murder of a Jewish shop owner. It turns out they were involved in some Zionist group which has a secret cache of weapons. The Jewish detective comes to embrace his Jewish identity by blowing up a building if I'm remembering correctly, and this was presented a good thing.

It was like if Mickey Spillane tried to write a novel about anti-Semitism. I was amazed that people took it seriously. It got good reviews at the time but has disappeared since then.

And I finally watched the movie Gran Torino starring elderly California millionaire Clint Eastwood.

It reminded me of the spoof movie trailers they used to show on Mad TV and the old cartoon The Critic. They showed trailers for movies with bizarre casting decisions. They had Woody Allen in a Die Hard-like action film---terrorists take over the prep school for Korean girls where he works as a clarinet teacher. "More violent than his early, funnier movies," they quote one critic as saying.

Gran Torino was like The Pawnbroker starring Clint Eastwood as Dirty Harry.

In The Pawnbroker, Rod Steiger played a traumatized concentration camp survivor who now works as a pawnbroker in a bad neighborhood. He tries to repress all emotion. An ineffectual social worker tries to counsel him and he teaches his trade to a young ethnic.

In Gran Torino, Clint Eastwood plays a traumatized Korean War veteran who is a horrible person. An ineffectual Catholic priest tries to counsel him and he teaches his trade to a Hmong neighbor. And he threatens people with guns, saying Dirty Harry-like things to them as they stand watching him reach into his jacket for a gun.

I may be giving too much away here, but this might have been considered a serious film because Clint Eastwood didn't actually kill anyone.

Call of Duty Cyber Attack Caused by a 17 Year Old Boy

A 17 year old boy was arrested in the Beswick area of Manchester by the Metropolitan Police's central e-crime unit in connection with a cyber attack which put the online Call of Duty game out of service.

The attack is aimed for "denial of service" which in other words causes the website unusable. This caused large numbers of users unable to play the game online. Activision contacted police in September this year.

 
"The attack came about via a malicious program called "Phenom Booter", which was also being offered for sale on a web forum which allowed those playing Call of Duty to score more points while stopping other people playing the game."

The teenager is arrested on suspicion of offences under the Computer Misuse Act and is currently in police custody.

Source: www.bbc.co.uk

Millions of Twitter Accounts Compromised


A website called Gawker was hacked last Sunday and 1.3 million user account passwords compromised that enabled spammers to break into thousands of Twitter accounts where users had used the same passwords.

A file containing those details was then published on a file-sharing site "Bittorrent" by a group "Gnosis". The 500MB file contains data taken from Gawker.

Gawker published a statement on its homepage regarding this matter. They say that although the stored passwords were encrypted, simple passwords are very much vulnerable.

Source: www.bbc.co.uk

Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens Break Up

Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens, one of Hollywood's young couples has broken up. They ended their three year relationship last Monday. They first met on set of the hit movie High School Musical and became close. Zac is now 23 and Vanessa who just turned 22. The couple says that there is no third party involved and that they just grew apart.



usmagazine.com: 'They are still talking and still friends. There's no drama. No one cheated. They just grew up.'

Source: www.dailymail.co.uk

Jet-propelled Flying Squid

Looks fake right? We all heard of the flying fish but a flying squid? These are real photos taken south of Japan by British photographer Graham Ekins, a retired deputy head teacher from Boreham, Essex. About 1,000 kilometres off the Bonin Islands in the north Pacific, just in Japanese waters. One of the most bizarre sights you'll ever see in our world.


The flying squid or "Todarodes pacificus" in Latin are eight inch-long blue creatures. The flying squid swim in shoals and leap from the surface of the water which uses jet propulsion to leap out of the sea and fly up to 65feet to avoid predators. The squid fly looking backwards, with their tentacles dangling behind them and fins acting like wings, keeping them balanced in the air.
Source: www.dailymail.co.uk

President Obama in Mythbusters Episode

The President made a guest appearance on the December 8 episode of Discovery Channel's "Mythbusters". More than 2 million people tuned in to show. 

The December 8 episode of Mythbusters was taped on July 27. The episode is called "Archimedes Solar Ray."

President Obama  challenged "Mythbusters" hosts Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage "to revisit an ancient and somewhat-controversial myth: Did Greek scientist and polymath Archimedes set fire to an invading Roman fleet using only mirrors and the reflected rays of the sun?" in short asked the mythbusting duo to solve the legend of Archimedes' solar ray.


Discovery Channel's "MythBusters" is a reality series that sends adventure-seekers to discover the scientific truth behind famous urban legends.

President Obama was seen with hosts "MythBusters" hosts Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage in a White House Science Fair where the President announced "I can announce today that I taped a special guest appearance for their show, although I didn't get blow anything up...I was a little frustrated about that."

The said myth was said to be already tested by the show twice in episodes in 2004 and 2006. A discovery channel representative said that "Regarding the Archimedes myth, fans are constantly asking the MythBusters to re-test it under different circumstances. Archimedes Solar Ray was ultimately chosen by the White House because it provided the greatest opportunity to get students involved in STEM [science, technology, engineering and math] in the most real way possible. We enlisted the help of 500 middle- and high school-aged students from Alameda, California, to help with the testing."

Source: news.cnet.com ; www.washingtonpost.com ; www.cnn.com

Prince William Engagement Pictures with Kate Middleton

The whole world is talking about the royal wedding of Prince William and his fiancee Kate Middleton. The engagement became even more official with release of a pair of engagement photographs.

The engagement photographs are taken by Mario Testino on November 25 at St. James' Palace in London. The engagement pictures was then sent by Prince William's press office and distributed by the Press Association.

The royal wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton will be on April 29, 2011at London's Westminster Abbey. And the wedding day will be a national holiday, said Prime Minister David Cameron. Of course, who would want to miss the wedding of the century.

Professional hair care and skin care products A lot of you may wonder, when did he propose? and how? Well our Prince has style. Prince William proposed to Kate Middleton after dating for eight years, on October 20 in a remote spot 10,200 feet above sea level on Mount Kenya, Africa's second highest peak.



Source: www.cnn.com ; www.mariotestino.com

Sunday, December 12, 2010

Ishmael Reed on Obama and anger

During the presidential campaign, when right-wingers accused Obama of wanting to take away their guns (I don't think he ever mentioned gun control) someone pointed out that a white candidate would have done what John Kerry did---get a rifle and a camera crew and go hunting. But Obama couldn't do that. A black man with a gun would frighten white voters.

I hope Democrats in Congress can stop the lousy tax deal Obama made with the Republicans, but, on a similar note, here's from an essay by Ishmael Reed that appeared in the New York Times. There's a link to it below:

...I’ve been thinking recently of all those D’s for deportment on my report cards. I thought of them, for instance, when I read a response to an essay I had written about Mark Twain that appeared in “A New Literary History of America.” One of the country’s leading critics, who writes for a prominent progressive blog, called the essay “rowdy,” which I interpreted to mean “lack of deportment.” Perhaps this was because I cited “Huckleberry Finn” to show that some white women managed household slaves, a departure from the revisionist theory that sees Scarlett O’Hara as some kind of feminist martyr.

I thought of them when I pointed out to a leading progressive that the Tea Party included neo-Nazis and Holocaust deniers — and he called me a “bully.” He believes that the Tea Party is a grass-roots uprising against Wall Street, a curious reading since the movement gained its impetus from a rant against the president delivered by a television personality on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.

And I’ve thought about them as I’ve listened in the last week to progressives criticize President Obama for keeping his cool.

Progressives have been urging the president to “man up” in the face of the Republicans. Some want him to be like John Wayne. On horseback. Slapping people left and right.

One progressive commentator played an excerpt from a Harry Truman speech during which Truman screamed about the Republican Party to great applause. He recommended this style to Mr. Obama. If President Obama behaved that way, he’d be dismissed as an angry black militant with a deep hatred of white people. His grade would go from a B- to a D.

What the progressives forget is that black intellectuals have been called “paranoid,” “bitter,” “rowdy,” “angry,” “bullies,” and accused of tirades and diatribes for more than 100 years. Very few of them would have been given a grade above D from most of my teachers....

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/12/opinion/12reed.html


Reed's got a point there. But...

I didn't think Obama was a progressive or a liberal to begin with. I'm still disappointed by him.

They're mad at him for the continuing ban against gays in the military. I'm not sure I'm against "don't ask, don't tell". As long as it's in effect, they'll never be able to bring back the draft.

There are two are three wars going on, depending on how you count them, and the U.S. and Israel are intent on starting at least one more. They don't have enough troops. They're calling back people who left the military years ago and they're sending National Guard to war. So far, the only ones calling for a draft are "liberals" who think it would only be fair to force young people who oppose the war to fight in it and imagine this would energize the anti-war movement.

As it is now, if they try bringing back the draft, every eighteen-year-old boy and his best friend will register as domestic partners the day they graduate high school.

During World War Two, all you had to do to avoid the draft was say you were a homosexual. Back then, it was unimaginable that anyone would falsely claim to be gay. By the time the Vietnam War rolled around, draft boards started demanding proof, or at least evidence. And, today, it's unimaginable that any young man would allow himself to be sent off to war when all he had to do was say he was gay. And with same-sex marriage and civil unions, becoming officially gay has never been easier.

Hopefully Democrats will stop the tax deal in Congress. And maybe it won't be such a bad thing if Republicans block the repeal of "don't ask, don't tell."

Thursday, December 9, 2010

Prince Charles and Royal Car Attacked

The royal car containing Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall has been attacked by angry protesters. The protest is caused by the MP's vote to raise university tuition fees in England. A window was cracked and their car hit by paint, but the couple were unharmed. Prime Minister David Cameron said it was
"shocking and regrettable" that protesters had attacked the prince's car.






Source: www.bbc.co.uk/news

Emma Watson and Harry Potter Co-stars to Re-shoot Final Deathly Hallows Scenes

Emma Watson wanted to set a mark in leaving the role of Hermione in Harry Potter. So she chopped off all her hair.
'I needed a change, and that’s what the haircut is about.' she says. But there's a problem. She and her Harry Potter co-stars Daniel Radcliffe and Rupert Grint, are called back to re-shoot some scenes for Deathly Hallows: Part 2 over Christmas.

After breaking down on the final day of filming, crying and everything it was irritating for them to have to return to Platform 9 and 3/4 to re-shoot the important closing scenes, which take place 19 years in the future. The scene like in the book is where
Harry, Ron, and Hermione, as well as Ron's sister Ginny went to King's Cross Station to send their own children off to Hogwarts.


Source: www.dailymail.co.uk



Kate ­Middleton: Future Princess

Catherine Elizabeth "Kate" Middleton is now the fiancée of Prince William of Wales. On 16 November 2010, the office of the Prince of Wales at Clarence House announced their engagement and the marriage would take place on 29 April 2011 at Westminster Abbey.


Kate was born on January 9, 1982 at Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading, Berkshire. First daughter of Michael Francis Middleton (a flight dispatcher in 1980 and an airline officer in 1982 for British Airways) and Carole Elizabeth Middleton (flight attendant). In 1987 Michael and Carole Middleton founded
Party Pieces, a mail order company that sells party supplies and decorations. That's when they became millionaires.



Professional hair care and skin care productsShe grew up in Berkshire and after attending Marlborough College, went to the University of St Andrews, where she met Prince William, also studying there, in 2001.

More about the engagement Click Here 
Here are more earlier pictures of Kate.

"It was March 27, 2002, the night of the annual Don’t Walk charity fashion show at the five-star St Andrews Bay Hotel, and William had paid £200 for a front-row ticket. As Kate shimmied down the catwalk wearing black underwear and a daring, see-through dress, William turned to his close friend Fergus Boyd and whispered: ‘Wow, Kate’s hot!’"

Source: www.dailymail.co.uk

Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Oprah Winfrey Lesbian?

The rumors of the talk show queen, Oprah Winfrey being a lesbian has been around for years. People have focused on Winfrey's friend Gayle King being her lesbian partner. Winfrey says that relationship is close but in a different way. "She is ... the mother I never had. She is ... the sister everybody would want. She is the friend that everybody deserves. I don't know a better person. I don't know a better person," Winfrey says while choking up.

Winfrey, now 56, stated again and again that she is not a
lesbian. "I'm not even kind of a lesbian" she tells Barbara Walters in an interview on ABC. "And the reason why the rumor irritates me is because
it means that somebody must think I'm lying. That's number one. Number two ... why would you want to hide it? That is not the way I run my life."

Source: www.people.com

Stars and Celebrities Without Make Up

Ever wonder how would your favorite star look like in person? Seeing a picture of your favorite star without makeup is the closest thing you can get. Saw this site where they show side by side pictures of celebrities with and without makeup. I do warn you that you may be disappointed if you think they are all perfect. Here are 14 pictures of Hollywood celebrities without makeup.

 Cameron Diaz-with no makeup
 Gwyneth Paltrow with no makeup
 Halle Berry with no makeup
 Hilary Duff with no makeup
 Jennifer Garner with no makeup
 Jennifer Lopez with no makeup
 Jessica Alba no makeup
Kate Winslet with no makeup
 Madonna with no makeup
 Miley Cyrus with no makeup
 Pamela Anderson with no make up
Reese Witherspoon no makeup
 Vanessa Hudgens with no makeup
 Adriana Lima with no makeup

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More images on stars with no makeup visit  www.estilodiario.com

Source: www.estilodiario.com ; www.dare-to-dream.us