Congratulations, The Anagram Server. Ah.. makes scrambles so easy. (I recommend using the advanced features, to trim the word list a bit)
Veteran's Day. Thank you, to all the people that served, and those who continue to serve in order to keep people protected and free.
Someone is tarring a roof outside. I stepped out earlier to collect my mail, and get a "breath of fresh air," and instead got a snootful of gag-choke-gasp-blech.
Random Scotto factoids/stream of thought (isn't my whole journal? all links will have hover info, too) maybe to be rewritten later in a more coherent fashion:
Watching the Angry Beavers this afternoon, I idly noticed that they have a wagon wheel chandelier in the dam. This set off a lot of old memories, because the crew I used to hang with when I was sixteen or so ate at a "Bonanza" (later it changed into Ponderosa, and then into a Perkin's, and eventually became a cheezy under 21 teen "nightclub") restaurant near our school in Delray Beach at the time, and it was lit by the same "frontier-style" decor. It was a super-cheap food spot to eat at, and the waitresses were cute in little pseudo-western outfits, so it was a natural place to go after school, or on the weekends. They had fantastic Texas toast and corn on the cob, and really large hamburgers. The French fries were not so great. That place was where we planned the vast our deviltry, far from prying ears of parents or anyone who might care.
One such harebrained plan that actually came to fruition was the theft of a life-size "Mac Tonite" statue from a nearby McDonald's, and then drowning it at the bottom of a nearby canal, with a flashing street barricade folded underneath to hold it underwater... there was something great about looking at Mac, maybe fifteen feet underwater, only occasionally giving off bubbles and strobing in an eerie amber light. I remember wanting to keep the head, but we feared that keeping it would be evidence against us. I brazenly figured that being under 18 meant that I could get away with it, but was convinced if my parents found out that the punishment would far outstrip the crime.
Speaking of heads, my partner in this crime was Brent, a former fellow student at ACHS, coworker at the Library, (and only other guy willing to actually participate in the more goofy teen schemes we all dreamed up) who died years later from a frying pan hitting the back of his skull. He came to a sudden stop in his jeep on the way home from camping and he hadn't secured all the junk in the back. He was killed pretty much instantly, and I didn't find out about it until I saw something about it in LWC's school newsletter, about six months later. I called his mother, to offer my condolences and she pretty much went to pieces on the phone. He was one of my three best friends during the 80s, and we totally drifted apart after I left the library and college.
Saudis 'fear sand shortage'
Saudi Arabia has reportedly imposed strict border checks to enforce a ban on the export of sand.
There are fears that the growing demands of the construction industry could lead to a shortage in the desert kingdom.
The Arab News newspaper reports that neighboring Bahrain needs to import large quantities of sand for reclaiming land from the sea.
Demand is also expected to grow as the process of reconstruction in Iraq gathers pace.
Although sand remains plentiful in Saudi Arabia, construction experts say the high costs of bagging and transporting make exploiting it difficult.
Experts have told the newspaper that if a mechanism could be devised to move sand from the vast desert region known as the Empty Quarter, it could be a very profitable proposition.
As the paper points out, there is more sand in the kingdom than oil.
Cement is also in high demand, the report says, with many cement factories having to expand their production capabilities to meet domestic demand.
Who'd have thought? What's next... South Florida having an Old Folk Shortage?
The cutest Anime versions of Cthulhu I've seen.
The Norman Saunders Gallery "He was renowned for his luscious palette and exciting action scenes, his sexy women and his ability to shoot from the hip when facing a deadline! Norman Blaine Saunders' illustration career was as big and successful as any artist could hope for, and no single genre could contain his remarkable talent. He painted them all - aliens and aviators, heroes and hunters, detectives and demons, quarterbacks and comic books, sex kittens and serial killers, westerns and wacky packs!"
Here are some very entertaining LJers on my list. Hover for the real name, and click to read their journal.
Tired Hem
A Jubilee
Less Yam Stew
Eaten Decoy
No Feds Needed
Tiny Air Funk
Hooray for German thumb-biters! Man 'caught burglar with his teeth'
A German man who caught a burglar in his home bit the intruder's thumb and wouldn't let go until police arrived.
Police in Düsseldorf say the 43-year-old returned home in the evening to find his door was locked with a chain from the inside.
He broke into his flat and came face to face with two burglars. One of them managed to escape through an open window, but the other went for the man and punched him in the face.
He reacted by biting into the burglar's thumb, and kept hold of it between his teeth to stop him from escaping.
The man dragged the burglar up to the first floor and made a neighbor call the police as he couldn't use the phone with the burglar's thumb still in his mouth.
Police arrested the intruder, 18, as well as four men who later appeared in the area in a car searching for him.
Both the owner of the flat and the burglar had to be taken to hospital for treatment.
theBot is a flash application that runs around the web looking at your text scrap of choice, returning with extracts from matching sites which it then scrolls across the screen, converting what it finds in text to speech. I fed it "scottobear" and got an interesting result. (you may need to disable your pop up blocker for the initial load)
"When fed a search term by a visitor, theBot performs a search for the word or phrase in a search engine. It then selects one page from the choices returned by the search engine, and reads a piece of text from the page. From there, it crawls to a linked page, and continues reading scraps of text from each page it visits as it crawls from page to page. If theBot cannot link out from a page or gets tired after too long on a given server, it backs up along its path and moves out in a different direction. Easily bored, theBot tries to move between different servers as much as possible and will never visit the same page twice unless fooled into it. As something of a reverse search engine, theBot provides a look (and listen) into the narrative of the web - or at least into the stream of consciousness of a web Bot. "
Very Nice, my fittest PT visit is Friday at 9am. Good of them to call me back and make sure all is well! I just have to call ACIM and let them know what my schedule is looking like.
*burp* Leftover Panak Paneer makes a belly happy! However, I'm now out, and must get resources for more. Newt is as interested in curry as he is in mint, by the way. He won't take salmon from atop sushi from Danny, though. The little orange boy is a weirdo, but I love him nonetheless.
Talked a lot last night with Cathi and Dave. They're busybusy, with the new house, and new baby coming. They invited me to Mayah's Birthday later this month, and I'd like to attend if at all possible. Plus, it's an excuse to go with Danny to Toys R Us! They're swinging by this afternoon for a little while...that'll be nice.
A kindergarten report on Incas and Guinea Pigs.
Cobblestone Minefield -Simply get from the top right square to the bottom left. Your psychic abilities will let you know how many mines are nearby. Use logic and kittens to navigate a clear path. Try and step on as many stones as possible for a higher score. A nifty, if gory variation on minesweeper. Don't sacrifice the kittens too early!
Ed Lu has the greatest view (500k jpg, 1000x655, well worth the download) on (of) the planet. Luckily he’s taking photos: Sunlight reflects off of the lakes of Quetico Provincial Park, Ontario. The area lies between Lake Superior and Lake of the Woods, just north of the U.S.-Canada border. The long vertical clouds in the image are condensation trails produced in the wake of jet airplanes, probably from heavy air traffic around Chicago O’Hare. ISS007-E-12858 (August 17, 2003, 180 mm lens).
See more at NASA's Astronaut Photography of the Earth microsite, if microsite is the right term for a website containing 476,363 images. Search All Photography of Earth, via a click map / grid.
Gorg the Movie. Gorg is a furry creation of a Swedish(I think) snowboard company. If you like watching giant creatures straight out of Sesame Street dancing in a cave and chewing on soccer balls, this is for you. How else can I describe it, just watch. It's got a groovy soundtrack to boot.
No thrilling climax, just Gorg. Good ol' Gorg. 15.7 meg quicktime
According to Fathers Who Breastfeed, male breasts also can produce milk -- which comes in handy for the times mother is unavailable or father wants to gross out his friends.
Breadmakers Feel Pain From Atkins Diet -
Some bakers around the country are seeing a similar drop in business: With millions of people trying the diet created by the late low-carb guru Dr. Robert Atkins, overall bread sales are flat or down slightly, while bread-bashing seems to be at an all-time high.
A sign in Stephen Lanzalotta's bakery reads, "Senza il pane tutto diventa orfano." In Italian, that means, "Without bread everyone's an orphan."
But fewer customers are buying his European-style breads and pastries these days _ thanks to the Atkins diet, many regulars are cutting back on carbohydrates. Lanzalotta says the low-carb diet has contributed to an estimated 40 percent drop in business at his shop, Sophia's.
Some customers have even stopped by to apologize.
"They'll say, 'I'm sorry. I haven't been in for six months because I'm on the Atkins diet,'" said Lanzalotta, whose muscular arms are a testament to long hours spent kneading dough.
The National Bread Leadership Council, which says 40 percent of Americans are eating less bread than a year ago, has scheduled what it calls a summit this month in Rhode Island focusing in part on low-carb diets and how to educate the public that breaking bread is still part of a healthy lifestyle.
"It's too bad that we just can't eat all foods in moderation. But no, we have to do something dramatic all the time," said Judi Adams, president of the Wheat Foods Council and a registered dietician, referring to the Atkins diet. "We have to look for this magic bullet."
Estimates of the number of Americans on low-carb diets vary widely, from 5 million to 50 million. Their boycott of bread has exacerbated a sluggish sales trend that was in place before low-carb diets became popular, said John McMillin, a food industry analyst with Prudential Equity Group Inc. in New York.
When Lanzalotta opened his bakery, bread accounted for 75 percent of sales. Now it accounts for just 15 percent. He boosted his dessert offerings and began offering sandwiches to try to make up the difference. He also adapted by selling artwork, including his own paintings.
At Standard Baking, co-owner Alison Pray said sales are nearly flat after previously growing 10 percent to 15 percent a year.
Pray sees plenty of couples stopping by, but often only one partner is eating. The other is cutting carbs.
She's a bit incredulous when customers ask if she produces anything consistent with the Atkins diet. "This one person asked me, 'Can you make a low-carbohydrate bread?' I said, 'I wouldn't know how to do it,'" she said.
Others are adapting. At Anthony's Italian Kitchen, owner Tony Barassa said his customers are ordering Syrian wraps without the wrap and panini sandwiches without the panini. They're also ordering meatballs without the spaghetti.
On Atkins, people can eat cheese, eggs and meat as long as they strictly limit carbohydrates and avoid refined carbs like white flour. White bread, pasta, potatoes and other carbo-loaded foods are blacklisted. The diet was once scorned by the medical establishment, but recent studies have shown that people lose weight without compromising their health.
The Wheat Food Council's Adams, who is based in Colorado, believes low-carb diets are just another fad. And she wonders if they're really helping.
She noted that the nation's obesity rate has continued to grow as flour consumption has declined. Wheat flour consumption has dropped by about 10 pounds a year per person since 1997, she said, calling Americans' tendency to eat too much of everything the real problem.
"We eat 300 more calories a day than we did in 1985," Adams said. "We supersize everything. We eat constantly."
Big Sky Baking Co. in Portland appears to have avoided the worst of the low-carb fallout because its whole wheat bread is the kind recommended for carb-cutters who can't resist a slice every now and again.
Owner Martha Elkus recognizes that times are changing. "The food pyramid has been turned upside down," she said.
Bread bakers aren't the only ones hurting. The pasta industry, the tortilla industry, bagel makers and even brewers of beer have taken their lumps for having too many carbohydrates.
The Tortilla Industry Association held a seminar last spring titled, "An Industry in Crisis: The High-protein, Low-carb Diet and Its Effects on the Tortilla Industry." The National Pasta Association has a "Diet Matters" section on its Web page that focuses on low-carb diets.
Joshua Sosland, executive editor of Milling and Baking News in St. Louis, said it's difficult for consumers to find good information amidst all of the hype that served to overshadow the science behind the diets. Often overlooked is the fact that bread and grains remain an important part of the federal government's diet guidelines.
"Here we have about the most healthy thing in the diet," Sosland said, "and it's being treated like it's poison."
Bakers are changing their products even as they seek to get out the message that bread remains part of a healthy lifestyle.
Flowers Foods' low-carb bread, "Nature's Own Wheat 'n Fiber," has proven to be the company's most successful new product launch to date, said Mary Krier, spokeswoman in Thomasville, Ga.
George Weston Bakeries Inc. has launched "Carb Counting" bread under its Arnold label that carries the Atkins seal. Maine-based Lepage Bakeries has introduced Country Kitchen "Lower Carb" wheat bread.
Panera Bread, a fast-growing chain that offers soups, salads and sandwiches in addition to bread, is also making changes to meet the evolving tastes of its customers. The company is testing three whole-grain breads with fewer grams of carbohydrates per slice.
"Our view of it is not to resist (the low-carb trend) but to recognize it as a real niche," CEO Ron Shaich said.
That's a drastic change. I'm not really able to do the Atkins thing, but it looks like it works really well for some folks. My points thing is pretty harsh to most bread, as well. A world without bread... that's a fundamental step of man becoming an more peaceable, stable, agrarian people. Bread is probably my favorite comfort food... but I guess it's got to change with the times, too.
posted by Scottobear at
7:29:00 PM
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