It's a strange, strange world we live in, Master Jack.

Saturday, March 29, 2014

Trail Life

If you are not familiar with Trail Life, checck out their website.They are one of the groups founded after the Boy Scouts agreed to accept gay members.

While I was visiting a friend in Texas today, a young man and his son showed up to sell car air fresheners as a fund-raising project for this group. Both the man and his son wore the green Trail Life uniform, which seemed a bit odd because the colors (chosen to distinguish them clearly from the khaki and tan Boy Scouts) are actually the colors associated with the Girl Scouts.

Both the man and his son were very pleasant. After my friend bought an air freshener -- in the shape of Texas, needless to say, and costing six bucks -- and was assured that she would receive it in about a month, we wished them good luck and they left.

My friend turned to me and said, "What a cute little girl."

I explained that the cute little girl was a cute little boy and told her the background of the group.

What can I say. I see many challenges ahead for Trail Life.

Last night I saw upon the stair, a little man who wasn't there ...

Seeking a Town on the Border of Fiction and Reality




The former Agloe fishing lodge near the intersection of Morton Hill and Rockland Roads in the fictional town of Agloe, N.Y. Mapmakers invented the town in the 1920s to guard against copyright infringement. Credit Niko J. Kallianiotis for The New York Times
SOMEWHERE NEAR AGLOE, N.Y. — It is one thing to lose your keys or your iPhone, even the love of your life, but to lose an entire town? Yet that is what just happened in upstate New York. Last week, Google did something it almost never does — it wiped a town off its maps.
Don’t blame Google. The town’s provenance was suspect.
How, Agloe, a speck of a hamlet in the western Catskills, wound up on maps 90 years ago remains a cartographic enigma. How it persevered is an existential riddle.
“I’ve never heard of it before,” said Matt Nelson, manager of Beaverkill Angler in Roscoe, a tiny town within shouting distance of Agloe, at least on some maps.
Describing Agloe as a mere hamlet is particularly apt. When it was first acknowledged, on a free road map distributed by Standard Oil Company of New York, or Socony, gas stations in 1925, its population was given indeterminately as from zero to 500, which was probably a peak.
Agloe’s anomaly begins with its name. Is it a-GLOE or AG-loe?
“You can take your choice on how you want to pronounce it,” Roscoe’s official historian, Joyce Conroy, said.



A postcard depicting the fishing lodge. Credit Collection of the Colchester Historical Society

Even the precise location of Agloe has been a conundrum. The Driving Route Planner website lists its exact geographic coordinates (for the record, latitude 41.964111300, longitude –74.907832100). Complying with those coordinates would deliver you just beyond Bill and Darlene Beers’s backyard in the Town of Colchester in Delaware County, barely across the Sullivan County line from Roscoe.
Following Google’s slightly vaguer driving directions, before they were deleted from the web, would still leave you in Sullivan County near a secluded concrete shaft protruding from the Pepacton Reservoir.
“We were thinking of putting up a historic sign,” said Elaine Fettig, the former president of the Roscoe-Rockland Chamber of Commerce, “but where, exactly, would we put it?”
Last week, a reporter for The New York Times noticed a mention on Twitter about fake towns, which mapmakers would invent to guard against copyright infringement. An Internet search turned up Agloe and the Google map, complete with the driving directions. Agloe was a mapmaker’s creation.



“It wasn’t uncommon for cartographers to put something fictitious so if they spotted another work with it they knew it was lifted,” said William Spicer, the president of Maps.com.
Among those countless copyright traps, Agloe achieved a rare distinction: The name stuck. As early as the 1930s, a fishing lodge named Agloe opened nearby (which later helped Rand McNally successfully claim in a lawsuit that the Agloe on its own map had not been copied from Socony’s).
Agloe survived on road maps by Esso and Exxon into the late 20th century and even long enough to evolve from a so-called paper town into a digital one on websites like Google, where it made its debut only last year.

It was even mentioned in a 1957 travelogue in The Times about “scenic drives through the Catskills,” which rhapsodized about “an unmarked country road that goes north through Rockland and Agloe.”



A 1948 map with Agloe, N.Y. The town in the western Catskills of New York wound up on maps 90 years ago, but visitors will no longer find it on a Google map - or at all. Credit William P. O'Donnell/The New York Times

As recently as 2008, Agloe gained a modicum of notoriety, and, since then, an occasional teenage tourist, because it figured in the climax to John Green’s young adult novel “Paper Towns.” (Last week, Fox 2000 announced that it would turn the novel into a film.)
A team of local experts — Mrs. Beers, Mrs. Fettig, Dr. Conroy, and the historians of Colchester and Delaware County, Kay H. Parisi-Hampel and Gabrielle Pierce — was asked to dissect Agloe’s pedigree.
What inspired the name? The original mapmakers, Otto G. Lindberg and Ernest Alpers of General Drafting Company, scrambled their initials to form it.



Darlene Beers in front of her house in Roscoe, N.Y. According to some maps and websites, the community of Agloe is just beyond her backyard, in Colchester, N.Y. Credit Niko J. Kallianiotis for The New York Times

Why did they plant Agloe in upstate New York? According to Mr. Lindberg’s obituary, he went fishing one day in 1923 and got lost going home. “A mapmaker by profession,” the article said, “he made up his mind to provide the public with maps to prevent such situations.”

Any serious trout fisherman, like Mr. Lindberg, would have eventually found his way to Roscoe (where there also happened to be a Socony gas station). In 1930, five years after Mr. Lindberg invented Agloe, Ms. Beers’s grandfather, the son of an immigrant Irish family that fled the potato famine and was squeezed by the Depression, sold off a prime angling spot flanked by the Beaver Kill and Spring Brook. The buyers called their new venture Agloe Lodge Farms.

How had life imitated art? “Among the first guests at Agloe,” a local newspaper explained in 1944 when the lodge was already run down, was “an official of a map publishing firm, who suggested to the owner that he ‘put the place on the map.’ He did.”

On March 17, though, Google removed it, within hours after The Times inquired about its provenance.



Joyce Conroy, the Roscoe town historian, said about Agloe: “You can take your choice on how you want to pronounce it.” Credit Niko J. Kallianiotis for The New York Times

“As we’ve said in the past, we’re always working on making Google Maps as useful, accurate and comprehensive as possible,” Susan Cadrecha, a Google Maps spokeswoman, said. “The inclusion of Agloe is no exception — stay tuned in the coming months for places as varied as Mos Eisley, Narnia and the lost city of Carcosa.”

Just as Google had promised, the 123-mile trip from Manhattan to Agloe took about two and a half hours. For any latter-day Magellan, though, the challenge on arrival was proving a negative: that you can’t get here from there.

Today, where “here” is supposed to be, Agloe groupies can still find a surviving barn; a pale yellow former creamery; a tiny wooden hangar that served a private airport; a reputedly haunted fairy tale castle, which belongs to the Masonic Order; and, of course, the derelict white frame, green-trimmed former Agloe fishing lodge near the intersection of Morton Hill and Rockland Roads.

“I don’t know anything about it,” said William Ksiazek of Montvale, N.J., the lodge’s current owner. “I know it as the Hempel place.” 

A weather-beaten screen door still bears the initial “H,” after its former owners.

While there appears to be no visible legacy of Agloe, it still remains on some maps — poised, perhaps, as it nears its 100th year, to reappear.

“Is it real?” Mrs. Fettig said. “What’s your definition of real? If it exists in enough minds, it’s real.”

Friday, March 28, 2014

Out of pocket





Family business takes me away for the next ten days or so. I may have an opportunity to blog, but I know internet connections will be weak. Don't worry. I'll be back. 

Stay weird!

Wednesday, March 26, 2014

From Americablog

Is Hobby Lobby circumcised?

Hobby Lobby, an arts and crafts chain run by an uber-Christian family, says it should be exempt from the Affordable Care Act’s (Obamacare’s) contraceptive mandate because the store’s owners, and thus the store itself, is “Christian.” 
 
As a person of faith, Hobby Lobby says it shouldn’t be compelled by the government to act against its Christian beliefs.

But I was having a hard time understanding how a store could be a person, let alone a person of faith. And the more I thought about it, the more confusing it became.

So, if Hobby Lobby is really a person of faith, I have some questions for it:
  1. Is Hobby Lobby circumcised?
  2. Is Hobby Lobby baptized?
  3. When was the last time Hobby Lobby went to confession?
  4. If Hobby Lobby went to confession, what kind of sins would it confess?  (Dear Lord, I coveted my neighbor’s bridal shop?)
  5. Does Hobby Lobby only date other Christian stores?
  6. Are there Mormon stores too? And do they spend a lot of time telling coffee chains how to live?
  7. Has Hobby Lobby ever been married? (I’ll bet Walmart’s looking for an uptight Christian brand who knows its place.)
  8. How old should a store be before it can merge?
  9. How does Hobby Lobby feel about inter-racial mergers — you know, when, say, an arts and crafts store wants to merge with a sports store? Is that an abomination?
  10. Is American Girl a jezebel?
  11. Is Abercrombie kinda gay? And if so, do we now need a Defense of Corporate Marriage Act?
  12. Has Hobby Lobby ever been divorced?
  13. Is there a corporate hell that bad stores go to?
  14. Are Jewish stores going to hell?
  15. Are all Muslim stores terrorists?
  16. Is bankruptcy abortion?
  17. Did Entenmann’s kill Jesus?

Tuesday, March 25, 2014

Who knew that some of the richest people in American were getting rich off the poorest -- and off your tax dollars.

Ranking among the 100 wealthiest Americans


For the first time, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is citing its dependence on customers using food stamps in order to maintain its revenues and profits.

Wal-Mart's annual report to the Securities and Exchange Commission included a required cautionary statement which informs the public of factors that could harm future profitability, according to The International Business Times on Tuesday. Wal-Mart's statement included usual warnings such as as natural disaster, civil unrest, changes to income and corporate tax rates, and ongoing investigations against the company, but said the public assistance inclusion was new.


 "Our business operations are subject to numerous risks, factors and uncertainties, domestically and internationally, which are outside our control," the Wal-Mart statement said. "These factors include ... changes in the amount of payments made under the Supplement[al] Nutrition Assistance Plan and other public assistance plans, changes in the eligibility requirements of public assistance plans, ..."

"In other words, Wal-Mart for the first time in its annual reports acknowledges that taxpayer-funded social assistance programs are a significant factor in its revenue and profits," wrote Angelo Young of the International Business Times. "This makes sense, considering that Wal-Mart caters to low-income consumers. But what's news here is that the company now considers the level of social entitlements given to low-income working and unemployed Americans important enough to underscore it in its cautionary statement."

Wal-Mart has blamed the brutally harsh winter and food stamp cuts for a decline in late season sales, according to the Wall Street Journal's Market Watch blog in January. The weather was a theme for negative sales reports for other outlets as well, reported Market Watch.

"In all, retailers have reported more than 35 pre-announcements and earnings misses, according to research from Susquehanna Financial Group," wrote Steve Goldstein of Market Watch in January. "The Susquehanna report said Kroger, Supervalu and Safeway could also be hit by food-stamp cuts. Some of those supermarkets saw bigger losses on the day than the roughly one percent decline seen for Wal-Mart. The world's largest retailer has lost more than six percent year-to-date."

unReality TV strikes again!

Chrisley Knows Best: Todd Chrisley Net Worth, Bankruptcy Sparks Debate

Posted: March 25th, 2014 in Chrisley Knows Best, Julie Chrisley, Todd Chrisley by LALATE
 
Chrisley Knows Best: Todd Chrisley Net Worth, Bankruptcy Sparks Debate


[Damien's Note: You can save time by just looking at the unerlined bits.]

LOS ANGELES (LALATE) – "Chrisley Knows Best" is prompting debate [Damien: Who is debating this again?] if Todd Chrisley’s net worth is being twisted for reality television viewers. In a show that is all about money and work, how rich is Todd Chrisley, what does Todd Chrisley do for a living, what is Chrisley’s net worth, and where did he make all his money from?

[Damien: What does he do for a living? Overact on this television show. What is his net worth? I don't know, I haven't seen the net. The one he wears on his hair at night? Or the one he uses to fish for weak laughs?]

Todd Chrisley and Julie Chrisley tell viewers that a Chrisley and Company Department Store is the future multi-million dollar project that will convey the family’s “brand”. That family includes Savannah Chrisley, Chase Chrisley and other children Lindsie, Kyle and Grayson.

Todd Chrisley tells "Chrisley Knows Best" viewers that he makes millions of dollars per year. But Todd’s bankruptcy trustee claims that Todd allegedly does not even work. Even worse, Todd’s attorney claims that his client has doesn’t have millions of dollars in the bank. Rather, his total cash net worth of checking and bank accounts is allegedly one hundred fifty-five dollars ($155.00)?

Chrisley Knows Best has become more about what we are not told about Todd Chrisley than what we are told. First, what does Todd do for a living? Viewers see very little of his employment. Rather we hear more than see it. “I have made 95% of my money in real estate”. The vague statement is followed up with the reality TV catchphrase viewers have grown to dislike; Todd Chrisley is working on his “brand”, his “lifestyle brand”.

Todd tells news “and I am now going to be able to … have a life in fashion. This is my closet. Things are organized by season. In a year we spend $300,000 in clothing. Chrisley and Company is a department store that we are branding after our family. … it is not just apparel, it is a lifestyle brand.”

Second, what is Todd Chrisley’s net worth, how rich is he, and how much money does he make per year? First he says “I love my businesses” (plural). But what are they? Then he adds “I make millions of dollars a year”. But doing what?

Third, we are told of his future spending limits. “The building is for sale for $4.5 million. We are investing 35% of our net worth in this business.”

And finally as to his oldest son he says “I have spent a million dollars to have find yourself.” The cash register for Todd Chrisley keeps on ringing. But much of this is even real?

Does Todd Chrisley make two million dollars per year working? No, claims Jason Pettie. Who is Pettie? He is Todd Chrisley’s bankruptcy trustee. Even worse Pettie claims “Neither [Chrisley nor his wife, Julie] has been employed since 2012,” Does Todd Chrisley have thirty-five percent of his net worth to invest in a department store? According to Todd Chrisley’s attorney, Todd has $55 in a checking account and $100 in cash. How about that three hundred thousand dollars in clothing spending per year? Chrisley allegedly owes the IRS nearly six hundred thousand dollars in unpaid federal taxes.

And it’s even worse. Chrisley claims that he has allegedly $4.2 million in assets. It remains unclear where those assets are. His mansion featured on the show was listed previously at more than that price. But it is now for sale for around two million dollars. Chrisley has twelve million dollars in mortgages. And added to all this, Chrisley has filed for bankruptcy. In total, Todd Chrisley claims $155 in cash, $4.2 million in assets, and $49.4 million in debt.
--------------------------------------------------
Okay, we all know reality tv is not real. Don't we?

Apparently not.

When Duck Dynasty loons make homophobic remarks, then conservative politicians get all excited and supportive because those guys represent "real America" and you can tell just by watching their show. Oh, yeah. The beards? The clothing? Well, there are lots of photos of the guys prior to the "reality show" wearing golf shirts and looking like the country club folks they pretty much want to be. Not the faux rednecks they claim to be.

Of course, Duck Dynasty has started tanking in the ratings -- no matter how you spin it -- due to overexposure, not to any LGBT backlash. I am seeing all sorts of Duck Dynasty crap on clearance at Walmart. It is time for some other faux celebrity to get his/her 15 seconds in the sun lamp.

Even without this latest news -- which may just be another marketing effort for all we know to punch up ratings -- I could not figure out why anyone would want to watch this Chrisley show. It's more grisly than anything, though in a bloodless and lifeless way.

And if that man's wife thinks ... well, you know.

Just sayin'.
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On a side political note: When conservatives get all in a dither about class warfare, they should look at the image projected by shows like this. It's not the lesbian mothers on a Disney show that are the social problem. Its the Kardashians, the Chrisleys, the ....

The End of Civilization as We Know It



Michael and Tom
March 24, 2014
Winona, Minnesota

Monday, March 24, 2014

Because sandal season can't be far away ...

With Solafeet you can make your feet match your existing tan... or go for the tanned-feet-only look! It's only $229 (plus shipping). Available only from Solafeet.com!




Sunday, March 23, 2014

Pareidolia


What do you see in the photo? A man holding a baby/toddler or the face of ... Jesus perhaps?


Now look just at the section outlined in red. Try to ignore the rest of the photo entirely. See the child, wearing a bonnet, sitting on the man's lap with her right arm lying across her lap?

This is not even an intentional optical illusion. It is an example of how our brain fools us.

Pareidolia (/pærɨˈdliə/ parr-i-DOH-lee-ə) is a psychological phenomenon involving a vague and random stimulus (often an image or sound) being perceived as significant, a form of apophenia. Common examples include seeing images of animals or faces in clouds, the man in the moon or the Moon rabbit, and hearing hidden messages on records when played in reverse.

I have been pondering the role of a sort of social or cultural pareidolia, whereby entire groups of people see the impoverished but nonetheless working class as being lazy, stupid or even wicked. My brain is socially conditioned to see this pattern: hard work = success = financial prosperity. When I see someone working but not becoming prosperous, my brain tells me that what I see -- a person holding down two part time jobs and putting in 60 hours of back-breaking work each week while trying to raise a family but never having enough to save or improve his or her life -- must not be what is there. So what I see is someone who is stupid or lazy.

That is an example of how politically conservative people might be fooled into seeing what isn't there or fail to see what is there. This mechanism can work, however, for/against all people: liberals, centrists, Tea Party, Green Party, libertarians, socialists, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, agnostics and on and on and on.

What template am I imposing on the world that causes me to fail to see what is there?

 

Friday, March 21, 2014

Following up on fast food slumlords ...

Shake Shack, a burger chain with locations in Florida, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Washington, D.C. as well as international locations in the Middle East, Russia, Turkey, and the United Kingdom, pays starting workers $9.50 an hour outside of New York City and $10 an hour for New Yorkers, CEO Randy Garutti told ThinkProgress. It also offers full-time employees health, dental, vision, retirement, and disability benefits plus paid time off.

But on average, workers get $10.70 an hour thanks to a program it calls Shack Bucks. Every month, it gives employees a percentage of the company’s top-line sales. “It’s sort of immediate revenue sharing, not a long-term program,” he noted.

The company pays about 70 percent of employees’ health care premiums and also matches contributions to their 401(k)s. He added that he is “more excited” than all of these perks about how many employees move up into manager roles. “There are a lot of people who started making $9 an hour and are now general managers in our restaurants making very good money,” he said. The owners started in fine dining and brought the compensation practices from those restaurants into its original burger and hot dog stand.

When asked if these practices have come with concrete benefits for the company itself, he responded, “Absolutely,” adding, “Our turnover is lower, we can hire the best, they stay longer, and we can grow them into management.” And it pays off for customers. “If the team feels taken care of, then they’ll go out and take care of the guests.”

And he thinks other business owners in the fast food industry can take this approach and see similar results. “I know they can,” he said. “Because I just know that it works.”

And Shake Shack isn’t the only eatery taking this approach to its workforce. Michigan’s Moo Cluck Moo pays entry-level workers $15 an hour, a move its owners say leads to less turnover, better customer service, and more skilled employees. In-N-Out, a West Coast burger chain, pays $10.50 an hour for entry-level employees. Outside of the burger world, Boston-based burrito chain Boloco pays starting workers anywhere from $9 to $11 an hour, which the owner says increases loyalty and productivity and, in turn, profitability.

In light of the conversation to raise the minimum wage, others have decided to join in. Two pizza companies in St. Louis will soon pay at least $10.10 an hour. It has also spread outside of the food industry: clothing retailer The Gap recently announced it will also raise its lowest wage to $10.

But the fast food industry is notorious for low pay, where workers make so little that they consume $243 billion in public benefits each year just to get by. And while some executives argue that these jobs are just a starting place for teens earning extra cash, the reality is that the majority of workers are well out of their teenage years. Meanwhile, the average low-wage worker brings in half his or her family’s income, while more than a third of fast food workers are supporting children.

Supplemental income

After a couple of years, the pants pockets of a New Jersey public works inspector are getting a well-deserved break.

Thomas Rica, 43, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to stealing $460,000 worth of quarters over the course of more than two years.

Rica apparently used a master key to enter a Ridgewood Village Hall room loaded with parking-meter quarters, taking regular deposits in the hundreds of dollars every couple of days. To avoid detection, he would deposit the coins in machines at several different bank branches.

Rica finally was caught in the act last year in the middle of a $500-plus heist, Time reports.

"It was just temptation," Bob Galantucci, Rica's attorney, told the New York Post. "He was in a room with a lot of money. He was raising a family. As a result, he thought he would supplement his income with that."

The penalty for bagging more than 1.8 million quarters? Not much with the guilty plea -- Rica won't have to go jail, but he will have to return the money he stole within five years, including a lump sum of $69,000.
---------------------------------------------------------------
Supplemental income: additional funds earned through a means that is different from your normal income stream

It is sometimes also qualified as not a living wage.

If he considered almost a quarter million dollars a year supplemental income, it does make me wonder what his salary is.

Thursday, March 20, 2014

Not (I hope!) your parents' creationists!


 The Creativity Movement (formerly known as World Church Of The Creator), is a white separatist organization that advocates the whites-only religion, Creativity. It was also a descriptive phrase used by Ben Klassen, that included all adherents of the religion. The use of the term creator does not refer to a deity, but rather to themselves (white people). Despite the former use of the word Church in its name, the movement is atheistic. Creativity is a White Separatist religion that was founded by Ben Klassen in early 1973 under the name Church of the Creator. After Klassen’s death in 1993, Creativity almost died out as a religion until the New Church of the Creator was established three years later by Matthew F. Hale (photo) as its Pontifex Maximus (high priest), until his incarceration in January 2003 for plotting with the movement’s head of security, Anthony Evola (an FBI informant), to murder a federal judge.



The following is from their website, http://creativitymovement.net/

We ... believe that in 6000 years of recorded history, Nature's Eternal Religion is the most profound and meaningful religious book ever written for the survival of the White Race. It is a fundamental creed, based on the eternal Laws of Nature for the survival, expansion and advancement of the White Race, the noblest creation in Nature's realm. We are confident that the White Race will soon return to reality, embrace our powerful new Religion, regain control of its own destiny, and advance forward to new heights never before dreamed of.
It is towards this noble objective, the survival, expansion and advancement of the White Race, that Nature's Eternal Religion is dedicated. It is for this reason our dynamic religion was founded. We call our religion Creativity, and members thereof, Creators, because, we believe these words, in essence, best describe the characteristic soul of the White Race.
We completely reject the Judeo-democratic-Marxist values of today, and supplant them with new and basic values, of which race is the foundation. We take a new, revolutionary and dynamic approach to the problems that face the White Race today in its desperate struggle for survival.
Although our religion is new, the laws embodied in our religion are not new, nor are they something we have invented. On the contrary, we have only observed and put into words that which Nature in her eternal wisdom has decreed for the survival of all her creatures from the beginning of time.
Nor is it at all remarkable that we should have observed these laws and based our religion on them. What is most strange is that the creative White Race has not done so centuries ago. In fact, it is amazing that the Romans and the Greeks failed to do so in their time. Going back even further, it is hard to understand why the highly gifted Egyptians failed to do so in their great White civilization 5000 years ago. Had the White Race done so in its earlier history, it would not now be trapped in the idiotic and precarious struggle for survival in which it now finds itself ensnared.


Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Yeah, but the other 48% are fine, right?


Excellencies of St. Joseph

 March 19 is the Solemn Feast of St. Joseph, Spouse of Mary, for Catholics and some other Christians. Fr. Jerome of the Mother of God (Jerome Cracian), a close friend of St. Teresa of Avila, wrote a book about the excellencies of St. Joseph, to whom Teresa was extremely devoted. Excerpts from the book have been translated into English.

Among other things, the good Father mentions that St. Joseph  was handsome and had all his teeth, because it would have been unseemly for the man chosen as protector of the Virgin Mother of God and the Christ to have some physical flaw. 

On the other hand, he did not say that Joseph had all his hair. Fr. Jerome was pretty bald, although he was reputed to be handsome, too.

All in the eye of the beholder, I guess, and in the pen of the author.

Some Christians make much about how the Holy Family (Joseph, Mary and Jesus) is a model for families today. Since it was by all accounts a non-traditional family in many ways, perhaps they are right.

Monday, March 17, 2014

Okay ...

 The firm 3D Babies has begun selling (for $800) 8-inch-long fetal sculptures manufactured from 3-D ultrasound images developed with computer graphics and 3-D printing technology (“printing” successive layers of material continuously, eventually creating a physical object). (Four-inch and two-inch models are available for $400 and $200, respectively.) For celebrity hounds who are not planning imminent parenthood, the company sells one fetal sculpture off the shelf: the Kim Kardashian-Kanye West fetus (“Baby North West”) for only $250. [FastCoDesign.com, 1-17-2014]

Imagine holding your baby before he or she is born.
New Year's Special!
Use the coupon "30-OFF" to get 30% off the price of your
Halfsize (4 inch) or Mini (2 inch) 3D Baby.


Your pregnancy with this child is a once in a lifetime experience. Recall those feelings with your own 3D Baby™.

At 3D Babies™, we create an adorable baby sculpture resembling your baby's facial features and body position. Through doctoral studies in Bioengineering, we understand what technology can do to make our lives better.  As parents, we know how to feel love for a developing child.  Using technology, we capture a parent's loving feelings and excitement about the coming birth.  We want all parents to feel the joy that we and our customers experience and prolong it, using this combination of science and emotion.
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If the above paragraph disturbs you, visit the webpage.

As for the obvious questions in your mind, I have no idea! To paraphrase Faux News: I report. You decide.

It's an alternative approach:


A pinch for St. Patrick's Day?

Recently I mentioned the custom of pinching people who did not wear green on St. Patrick' Day. I went online to see if I could find a reason, and I found so many that it probably means that no one really knows.

Some people claim the that custom arose in Ireland itself to punish the Irish who did not participate in the battle to keep Ireland out of the hands of the English. Others that it arose in the States among immigrants to punish any Irish who tried to conceal their national background to escape persecution.

And there is the group that blames the leprechauns. There are conflicting explanations on this score, but it seems the leprechauns only pinch those not wearing green because those wearing green to honor the saint are thereby rendered invisible to the pesky pinching little people.

At any rate, may you have a happy and pinch-free day!

Sunday, March 16, 2014

Mercy


Fred Phelps Sr., the founder of the Kansas church held in disgust worldwide for its antigay protests of prominent funerals, is in hospice care and "on the edge of death," according to one of his estranged sons.

Nate Phelps posted the information on Facebook Saturday night, adding the revelation that his father had been excommunicated from the church in 2013. A church spokesman told the Topeka Capitol-Journal that Phelps was indeed in the hospice but that Nate Phelps "is not well informed." The spokesman also refused to comment on the allegation that the elder Mr. Phelps has been excommunicated.

Another son, Mark Phelps, told the Capitol-Journal that its information on his father's health "is accurate."
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A number of people have commented that Mr. Phelps will be surprised when he gets to the Pearly Gates for any number of reasons. Others assert confidently that the Pearly Gates are not going to be his destination for any number of reasons. Some claim that a man who fostered so much hate deserves no mercy or forgiveness, divine or human.

G.K. Chesterton, in one of his Father Brown stories, had that little priest tell someone that it was true that some things were humanly unforgivable. But that was why he held out for divine mercy -- because he knew human mercy had not the strength required.
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Equality Kansas (formerly the Kansas Equality Coalition) today urged members of the Kansas, United States, and worldwide LGBT communities to respect the privacy of the family of Fred W. Phelps, notorious pastor of the Westboro Baptist Church. “If the reports of Fred Phelps’ declining health are accurate, then his family and friends are certainly saying their good-byes and preparing to mourn his loss,” said Sandra Meade, chairwoman of Equality Kansas. “We ask that everyone understand the solemnity of the occasion, and honor the right of his family and friends to remember and mourn his loss in private without interruption or unseemly celebration,” Meade said.

“For over 20 years, Phelps and the members of his Topeka-based church have harassed the grieving families of LGBT Kansans and others,” said Thomas Witt, executive director of Equality Kansas. “He and his followers showed utter disregard for the privacy and grief of others for many years. This is our moment as a community to rise above the sorrow, anger, and strife he sowed, and to show the world we are caring and compassionate people who respect the privacy and dignity of all,” Witt said. Equality Kansas asks that its members, supporters and allies refrain from protests or demonstrations should reports of Phelps’ imminent passing prove true. “Our focus must remain on our mission: ending discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity,” Meade said.
Amen!

Saturday, March 15, 2014

Ever feel a little inadequate?


The International University of Nescience is the educational arm of The Universal Church Triumphant of the Apathetic Agnostic.  It was founded to provide degrees to members and clergy of the Church in recognition of the high degree of effort and intellectual rigor required to understand the finer points of doctrine of Apathetic Agnosticism. 

For more information, click on this link.

I feel so proud, and just a little bit adequate.

Now you see it ...



At first glance, this photo appears to show a parrot perching on a tree - sporting a curved beak, colorful feathers and a pointed tail. 

But, in fact, as may be easier to see in the larger version below, it is a woman whose entire body has been cleverly painted to resemble the tropical bird.

The spectacular work of art was created by Johannes Stoetter, a former world champion body painter.


Look closer: This parrot is, in fact, a woman whose body has been cleverly painted to resemble the tropical bird

The 35-year-old artist, who lives in Italy, spent four weeks painstakingly planning how he could transform the female model into a parrot.

He took four hours to paint the woman's body using special breathable paint - adding intricate detail, dark shading and even a bright green eye.  

He then spent a further hour positioning her on a tree trump, before taking a series of photographs.
The finished creation sees the model's outstretched left leg become the parrot's tail feathers, while her right leg and arm become its wings.


Amazing: The spectacular work of art was created by 35-year-old Johannes Stoetter, a former world champion body painter. He spent weeks painstakingly planning how he could transform the female model into a parrot

Concentration: He painted the woman's body using special breathable paint - adding intricate detail and colours

And her left arm - wrapped around her head - forms the tropical bird's head.

Mr Stoetter, who was crowned World Body Painting Champion in 2012, said he had chosen to position the model on a tree stump to enhance the 'parrot's' life-like appearance. 

'Getting the scene set up took about five hours, then it took about another four hours to paint the model and an hour to get her position right,' he said. 


Incredible: The finished creation sees the model's outstretched left leg become the parrot's tail feathers, while her right leg and arm become its wings. Her left arm - wrapped around her head - forms the tropical bird's head

But will you give me a refund for what I already paid over the decades?


Caesar!


Friday, March 14, 2014

Just in time for Easter? (Sorry, but this has Weekly World News written all over it.)

Evangelical Christians want access to more corpses … to hone their ‘raising the dead’ skills

TYLER Johnson runs a ministry called the Dead Raising Team in the US. He claims to have brought 11 people back to life. He says he even persuaded the authorities in his state to issue him with an official photocard which lets him through police lines at car accident sites.
Johnson, according to this BBC report, appears in a new documentary film called Deadraisers, which follows enthusiasts as they trail round hospitals and mortuaries trying to bring people back to life.

Bring out your dead: This lot, who feature in the documentary, want to practice their resurrection skills.

Bring out your dead: This lot, who feature in the documentary, want to practice their resurrection skills.

Sadly, those they pray for in the film remain resolutely dead.

According to the DRT site:
Tyler and his wife Christine are blissfully married with four kids. They hope to see a DRT started in every city in the world, so that nobody could die without being prayed back to life. Tyler is a graduate from Bethel’s School of Supernatural Ministry.


DRT

Johnson is unwilling to provide successful case studies. And in general, the proof that believers cite is a bit unconvincing ­– for example, there is an American heart surgeon who allegedly brought a heart attack patient back from the dead with prayer … oh, and a defibrillator.
Other doctors find the story entirely unremarkable. One wonders why.
The BBC’s Jolyon Jenkins then got to meet Alun and Donna Leppit, a British couple who are convinced that the dead can be raised through the power of prayer.

Alun and Donna Leppit
Alun and Donna Leppit

The evangelic loons were subject of a BBC 4 programme today called Out of the Ordinary: The Power of Prayer.
During the course of the broadcast, Donna lamented that there aren’t too many corpses in the UK that they can practice on.
The one that they did try to resurrect to was Donna’s brother,  who died of a heart attack.
By the time they got to the mortuary, he had been dead for eight hours. They prayed over him for nearly an hour, and although at one stage they thought they saw him move, that was as good as it got.
Are they discouraged? ‘Not at all,’ says Alun. ‘Practice makes perfect,’ adds Donna. ‘But in this country, we don’t often get access to dead bodies.’
Jenkins added:
And it takes a lot to shake Alun and Donna’s faith. Alun himself has serious medical problems. He was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis in his 20s, has had complications, major surgery, and is now on a waiting list for an ileostomy. He needs a miracle. But so far, and despite the prayer, none has come.
The Leppitt are the UK end of a worldwide fellowship of evangelical Christians called Global Awakening. In countries like Mozambique and Brazil, Global Alliance missionaries are converting people to Christianity with spectacular displays that claim to heal through prayer. They say they cure blindness and deafness in big open air meetings.

From another healer, Ian Andrew in Somerset, Jenkins heard of a woman who got a new heart as a result of prayer.
Literally, a new heart?
Yes.
What happened to the old one?
It was replaced.
These claims are, by any standards, implausible. But in the world of Pentecostal healing, no-one worries about that. In fact, the more impossible the miracle (and they use the term without embarrassment) the better, because it’s more effective for spreading their message.