That's a lot of ...

You know all those horses pulling wagons and buggies and coaches through the streets of towns and cities in the nineteenth century? And all those folks riding into town and through town on their horses?

Each horse produced about 40 pounds -- yes, 40 POUNDS -- of manure daily. And they did not wait until they got out of town to let it go, so to speak.

Fortunately, folks did not have to rely on civic-minded neighbors to clean the streets. Stable owners and others collected the manure and sold it to farmers for fertilizer.

Now if only there were some way to capture gasoline fumes and recycle that.

What was going on in 1955?

Click on image to read text.

Spirit of Carmel?

Michael sent me a link to a fitness app that he uses to track his exercise and food intake. (He is a wee bit compulsive, but you didn't hear that from me.) At any rate, he used to be a Carmelite friar, and at one time in their monastery in Milwaukee, they had a license to sell a cure-all by the name of Karmelitengeist. They needed a license because of the alcohol content -- 75%. Although it had been popular in Bavaria, where the friars had come from to Wisconsin, it did not become a big seller in Milwaukee. It was not, in other words, the drink that made Milwaukee famous.

The strange thing is that Michael ran across the nutritional information for the stuff on the database on his fitness app: 
 

Calories in Regensburger Karmeliten Geist 75% Alkohol Klostergeist Aus Kräutern Und Gewürzen -nach Uraltem Rezept

Nutrition Facts

Regensburger Karmeliten Geist - 75% Alkohol Klostergeist Aus Kräutern Und Gewürzen -nach Uraltem Rezept

1. Servings:

Calories	42	Sodium	0 mg
Total Fat	0 g	Potassium	0 mg
Saturated	0 g	Total Carbs	6 g
Polyunsaturated	0 g	Dietary Fiber	0 g
Monounsaturated	0 g	Sugars	0 g
Trans	0 g	Protein	0 g
Cholesterol	0 mg
Vitamin A	0%	Calcium	0%
Vitamin C	0%	Iron	0%

*Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calorie needs. 

The German says that it is made from herbs according to an ancient recipe. A serving is about two teaspoons.

Not, I think, a real health drink. 

For more information, however, visit the Austrian Carmelite home page: Karmel

 

Quite an undertaking

This calendar was released as a one-off thing in 2008 in order to raise money for a breast cancer charity.

Sociological Images posted an article about how the calendar could be seen as an attempt to "humanize funeral directors."

Damien's note: The guy with the horse looks happy, but the hunks in the cover photo look pretty, dare I say, grave?

Bang, Bang!

In the face of a declining military budget, the Defense Ministry of the Netherlands issued confidential instructions to commanders in July that during training exercises, to preserve dwindling ammunition, soldiers should simply shout “Bang Bang” instead of firing their weapons. Said a soldiers’ advocate, “Even if you have no bullets, you [still] have to train with your weapon.”

Source: Reuters via RT.com (Moscow), 8-3-2015

Damien's note: Whereas in the good old US of A, armed civilians have been showing up at military recruiting offices armed to the teeth. You know, to prevent crazy people with guns from shooting up the military. 

Cher's hit song, by the way, was released in 1966. It was one of her biggest hits of the decade. Ironically, all things considered, it was written by then-husband Sonny Bono, whom she divorced in 1975, not shooting him down so much as freeing him up for a political career.

If I only had a ...

Daniel is mentoring a young man who is a nice enough guy, divorced with three children, one in high school already. You would think such a person would have a modicum of common sense, but of late this has been in doubt. He calls Daniel to ask for advice on the most trivial of matters and then goes off on his own and essentially falls for variations on the Nigerian-prince internet scam without consulting anyone.

Now he is in a dither because he keeps running into the number 666.

As you most likely know, thanks to bad movies and worse Christian preachers, the Number of the Beast (Greek: Ἀριθμὸς τοῦ θηρίου, Arithmos tou Thēriou) is a term in the Book of Revelation, of the New Testament, that is associated with the Beast of Revelation in chapter 13. In most manuscripts of the New Testament and in English translations of the Bible, the number of the beast is 666. In critical editions of the Greek text, such as the Novum Testamentum Graece, it is noted that 616 is a variant.

I suggested that Daniel mention this to his friend and see if he had been running into the number 616 all the time. He thought, with better knowledge of his friend's quirks, that this would simply add to the list of anxieties.

Anyway, next time someone tells you that 666 is the number of the Beast, and then proceeds through elaborate manipulations of the alphabet in Hebrew, Greek and Arabic, to prove that the Beast is therefore Barack Obama/Donald Trump/Sarah Palin/Pope Francis, just mention that everyone knows that the real number is 616, and that the number 666 has been perpetrated on unsuspecting believers so that they will not recognize the Beast when that being arrives on the scene.

You may wish to create a schema of manipulated alphabets and numerological systems to prove that the Beast is, in fact, Christopher Hewitt, snotty star of television's Mr. Belvedere. Hewitt is alleged to have died in 2001 from diabetes. But the truth is otherwise! Just look into his eyes ...

I can't understand this

The Welsh language is such a severe mutation of the original English spoken in the Middle Ages that, to the inexperienced eye, it is barely distinguishable from, say, Klingon. 

In fact, in July, the Welsh government, responding to queries about a possible UFO sighting near Cardiff airport, playfully issued its galaxy-friendly response in Klingon -- “jang vlDa je due luq,” meaning that further information will be provided. 

In Welsh, for example, “I cannot understand Welsh” is “nad oes modd i ddeall Cymraeg.”

Recently, in Swansea, Wales, alleged drug dealer Dwaine Campbell, 25, adamantly refused to leave his cell for a court hearing because he feared being judged in Welsh--until authorities promised to transfer the case to Campbell’s native England.

Source: Wales Online 

Damien's note: The red Welsh dragon's sign says, "I'm speaking Welsh."

The good sort of governmental intervention

In July, the mayor of the town of Ador, Spain (pop. 1,400), officially enacted into law what had merely been custom--a required afternoon siesta from 2 to 5 p.m. Businesses were ordered to close, and children were to remain indoors (and quiet).


Source: The Local (Madrid), 7-16-2015

Damien's note: An idea worthy of export to America!

Vacation queerness

The United States is sometimes called the No-Vacation Nation. Europeans have always felt more comfortable taking long breaks from work, but Americans used to think that was why we led the world in productivity. In fact, not so much on the productivity scale and certainly not on happiness scales. Europeans often get six weeks of paid vacation -- PAID vacation. Americans are lucky to get three weeks, and often they are not allowed to take more than one week at a time. Today studies show that Americans do not take even the vacation days they are granted by their jobs because they are afraid of losing said jobs. Works out well for employers, I guess, who can claim they are offering generous vacation benefits when in fact folks feel obliged to come in to work anyway.

Whatever. Daniel and I are heading north to spend a few days with friends in Wisconsin. When we return, I will have to get serious about final preparation for the fall term at PPHU.

I hope you are getting a break from your usual haunts!

God bless America!

California’s San Diego County Fair in June included the debut of the deep-fried Slim-Fast bar. A 200-calorie “diet bar” is breaded in pancake batter, fried, dusted with powdered sugar, and drizzled with chocolate. 

The process adds about 500 calories to the Slim-Fast Chocolate Chewy Bar.

Source: Huffington Post

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Damien's note: My father used to drink Slim Fast shakes for breakfast, but he always made them double-sized. When asked about it, he said that he figured he would lose weight twice as fast that way.

I am not making that up.

Sanctity of Marriage: Texas-style

A 20-year-old man in East Texas has jumped into a quickly arranged marriage after a judge told him he had a choice of getting hitched or spending 15 days in jail on an assault charge.

According to court documents, Smith County judge Randall Rogers gave the option to Josten Bundy, who was arrested in March on a charge of assault causing bodily injury, a misdemeanour. 

Bundy had gotten into a fight with the ex-boyfriend of his then girlfriend and now wife.

The judge said he would grant probation if Bundy married his 19-year-old girlfriend, Elizabeth Jaynes, within 30 days, wrote Bible verses and attended counselling. 

If he declined, he would go to jail, according to a transcript of the proceedings obtained by local TV broadcaster KLTV.

"Is she worth it?" Judge Rogers asked Bundy.

The bride's father was angry at the judge for pressuring the pair into marriage and was looking into whether this was judicial misconduct, he told KLTV.

"He [the judge] can't do this by court ordering somebody to be married," the bride's father, Kenneth Jaynes, said.

The judge was not available for a comment.

The couple, who had talked about eventually getting married but did not have immediate wedding plans, is happy that they have tied the knot but did not appreciate being forced into it, they told the broadcaster. 

"It just felt like we weren't going to be able to have the wedding we wanted," the new bride said. "I didn't even have a white dress."

The couple did, however, post the traditional Facebook image of the wedding day, as you can see above.
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Damien's note: I am trying to wrap my head around a couple of things. I guess Judge Rogers is Christian -- Southern Baptist, if I know Smith County, Texas, and I do -- and so he thought asking the guy to write out Bible verses was appropriate. On the other hand, in that case, how does he reconcile forcing the couple into marriage as part of punishment? Or does he view himself as an over-aged Cupid? Or WTF?

Why isn't this man running for GOP nomination for President?

Michigan State Rep. Todd Courser planned the distribution of a fictional email alleging he had sex with a male prostitute in a bid to conceal his relationship with Rep. Cindy Gamrat, according to audio recordings obtained by The Detroit News. 

 Courser, a Lapeer Republican, said on one recording the email was designed to create “a complete smear campaign” of exaggerated, false claims about him and Gamrat so a public revelation about the legislators’ relationship would seem “mild by comparison.” 

Interviews with former House employees and the recordings show freshman lawmakers Courser and Gamrat, R-Plainwell, used their taxpayer-funded offices to maintain and cover up their relationship. Courser, 43, and Gamrat, 42, rose from the ranks of tea party activism, battled establishment Republicans to win seats in the House last year and formed their own legislative coalition. 

A now-former House aide recorded Courser in mid-May directing him to send Republican activists and operatives an email that would appear to be from an anonymous political enemy that said Courser had been “caught behind a Lansing nightclub” having sex with a man. 

After House aide Ben Graham rejected Courser’s May 19 request to take a sick day on May 20 and send the mass email to Republicans across Michigan, he says he had duties removed in subsequent weeks. By early July, Courser fired Graham and Gamrat ended the employment of her aide, Keith Allard — about a month after giving them both pay raises — without explanation. During the May 19 meeting, Courser instructed Graham to send rank-and-file Republicans across Michigan what he called “an over-the-top story that’s obscene about me.” 

It was designed, Courser said on the recording, to “inoculate the herd” — an apparent reference to Courser and Gamrat’s followers in the tea party movement. “It will make anything else that comes out after that — that isn’t a video — mundane, tame by comparison,” Courser, a married father of four, told Graham.

Watch out!

The Nico Gerard Pinnacle Watch features a fully functional Apple Watch on the underside of the wrist band. It comes in a stainless steel version for $9300, or a gold version for $112,000.
Their tagline is "Be Uncompromised." Because clearly, having only one watch on your wrist would be a compromise.



via OhGizmo

So ... 50 Cent, huh?

50 Cent Reveals $108K-a-Month Expenses in Bankruptcy Court, Including $12K on Grooming and Gardening!

50 Cent in court on Tuesday

Jefferson Siegel/New York Daily News/AP

By Naja Rayne

50 Cent, real name Curtis Jackson, has revealed in bankruptcy court that his monthly expenses total $108,000 – including bills for security, gardening, grooming and his wardrobe, The Associated Press reports.

The rapper-turned-actor filed for bankruptcy in the middle of an ongoing lawsuit brought against him by Lastonia Leviston, whose sex tape he allegedly posted online.

During testimony in the Leviston case, Jackson denied owning a multitude of expensive cars and living a lavish lifestyle. However new bankruptcy filings state that he owns seven cars, including a Rolls Royce and three Chevy Suburbans, AP reports.

Other monthly expenses for the Power actor include $72,000 a month for his 50 room mansion, including utilities, mortgage, property tax and insurance. Additionally, Jackson spends $9,000 for security, $5,000 for gardening, $1,000 for grooming and another $3,000 in wardrobe per month.

Despite spending $3,000 a month on his wardrobe, 50 owes his stylist, Erin McSherry, $5,245 in back pay according to the filing. The document also includes unspecified amounts owed to his barber and personal trainer.

Jackson, who's due back in court Wednesday, also gives $14,600 per month in support of his two kids and grandfather.

Mamma mia!

Maryland state Delegate Ariana Kelly was charged with trespassing and indecent exposure in July after she arrived at her ex-husband’s home to drop off their kids and learned that his girlfriend was inside. According to police, she started banging on the door and ringing the bell repeatedly and, aware that her husband had a camera trained on the doorway, she faced it, exposed her breasts and shook them, one in each hand, toward the lens. Eventually, she dared an officer to arrest her.

The Washington Post reported that Kelly is a member of a legislative task force studying maternal mental health issues.

Source: The Washington Post

International Friendship Day

Michael and Daniel both reminded me that today is International Friendship Day. Which means it is an international observance of friendship, not that it is a celebration limited to friends who come from different nations. Although I do appreciate my friends from places beyond the shores of the US of A.

At any rate, here's to all of you!

PS -- This actually is a holiday created originally by the greeting card industry, but it seems to have blossomed beyond that.