Since I've started a new blog, I wanted to leave a link here

Brent Hodgson Copywriter

"That's not just good old fashioned Jew hating talk.
It's policy now."

~

"And then you start to wait for it at night. You start to want to hear it. You don't want to sleep. You want them to fight. And you're disappointed when it subsides. It's like when it rains and then it thunders and you're scared, and then something inside you swithces and you accept it, want it to rain harder, thunder more. Or you are in an argument and you try not to snap but you start yelling and suddenly you're happy to be angry. Or you're having sex and that moment comes when you lose your inhibition, stop posing, and you both let loose, claw at each other, howl at the moon. Miss Heidi calls it emergency sex. It must have something to do with remembering you're an animal.

So that's what I'm thinking, just kill each other, you animals..."

         ~ Emergency Sex (and other desperate measures)  True stories from a war zone.

"America needs a full-time President and a full-time Congress, particularly at this time with problems we face at home and abroad."
        ~ Resignation Speech, 1975.

I was looking through my bookmarks for something interesting that I had saved for a rainy day, or just for a spare moment, and I found this.

It's a rather nifty calculator that takes your annual income and places you into a percentile in relation to where you fit on the Global Rich List.

My annual income being about AUD$12000, which works out at about USD$9000, means that I am in the top 13.47% of rich people in the world, and from this it follows that there are just under five and a half billion people poorer than me.

Talk about sobering statistics.

Interestingly, if you enter in USD$400 000, which is the annual salary of the President of the United States, the calculator places them on the 0.001 percentile, and then states that the calculator can't do sums that big anyway.

(By the way, didn't the President of the United States used to only get USD$250 000 p.a? When did it change?)

At least we can all feel vindicated in our disgust of CEO's getting multi-million dollar payouts upon leaving corporate boards and organisations.

So by my calculations we're now within an hour of Space Shuttle Discovery's touchdown at Edward's Air Force base.

The Newsmedia have been treating to the story as a kind of sci-fi suspense thriller, edging everyone on to watch what will either be a (and here's hoping) ridiculously ordinary landing out of the dark Californian sky, or (and let's hope not) a fiery streak of light that stretches across the North American continent.

So as we count down the minutes now to landing, what are your thoughts? What are your hopes for the NASA space program after this mission? And what do you think of the merits, if any, of future human space exploration?

(note: this post will be updated as events come to hand.)


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Don't forget, you can watch NASA tv by following this link (realplayer) or here. (windows media player.)

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It's 7.58 EDT and Discovery is under 1000 miles from Edwards AFB.

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Discovery seems to have made it through re-entry. It's 360 miles to touchdown.

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7.5 mins to touchdown.


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1000ft to go. Everything looks good.

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Discovery is home. The landing looked great, right on the mark.

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So, now the questions begin. Is there still a future for manned flight so long as the most capable vehicle (the Soyuz is only good for transporting humans sans cargo) for doing so is plagued by safety issues?

Will it take a redesign of the shuttle to get ourselves back into space long-term? Or do we need to make the larger leap to Mars?

Bravo! Bravo!

So the new site design rocks. My socks. Right off.

And kudos to the webby-minded people who have finally made the darn thing compatible with firefox.

It rocks so much that I think it even deserves a sparkling new post to my TIGblog (so is that what we're calling them now eh?).

Thus, let us begin the new post. And let us begin it, like this.

Some of you might care to know that I have actually started publishing a serial on a fiction website not so far from this corner of the internet. It's a comedy, but I warn you, it is the furthest thing from a reverential look at life, love, death, and just where exactly God fits into it all. Click here to have a read.

I also have my doubts as to whether it is at all funny. You be the judge.

I think the praise I've had heaped onto it by friends and strangers alike has been encouraging, but I'm not giving up my day job just yet. New chapters can be written in a week, or less, but I don't think chapter 4 is going to be ready for at least 7 days. I've been busy, you see.

Anyway, I imagine I'll be posting again here soon. Maybe start up some sort of running commentary on politics, taxes, and all the other nasty things that always manage to get in our way of doing more important stuff on a regular basis.

I'm going to enjoy stomping around this website again.

Given the large number of UK members here on TIG, has anyone got any info as it comes to hand about what's going on?

My radio is reporting a bus has exploded/is in flames in Central London, and that at least three tube stations have been evacuated, with the phrase 'walking wounded' being used in wire reports and on the BBC website.

Anyone know anything else?

Wouldn't it be cool if TIG had its own internet radio station!?

I can see it now. We could have our own Net50. We could have songs and segments voted on by members. We could even have live webchats. And can you imagine the battle of the bands segment?!? It'd put the Eurovision song contest to shame!!

HeeHee...Nothing quite like the ideas that come to you while you're supposed to be reading up on Media Ownership for an essay that's due next Monday.

(and I'm still blogging over here... )

Something for you all to enjoy.

(courtesy Google Maps)

From Me.

"Forget about the notion that our emotions can be kept at bay."

As the war in Iraq quickly morphed from a whirlwind military victory into a period of prolonged violence, the depiction of what was actually happening there underwent a similarly dramatic transformation. As the extent of the Pentagon’s failure to plan for the post-invasion period became evident, reports from Iraq suddenly became a contrast of official-sponsored claims heralding progress against reports of continued resistance. As the violence escalated, soldiers who were killed in action were honoured in one news-cycle only until the next one came along. But of the casualties on the other side, there is eerie silence. You have to wonder what, or who, accounts for this silence?

Ever since images of combat could be relayed to a nation’s living rooms in real time, casualties have been the guiding compass of warfare. Not only are they the most easily recalled form of statistical analysis of a warzone, but they have the ability to sway public opinion completely. Most of us feel remorse when innocents lose their lives, and there is only so great a burden that a collective conscience can bear until it capitulates into pressure for new leadership and new direction. Supporting the troops is easy from the armchair, but for many, seeing the freshly dug graves with the shiny white tombstones expand from a few to a few dozen is a solemn argument against this (and all) war...

Read more.

Do you want to know what it is?



www.themeatrix.com

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Persons of Mass Dysfunction.

~

Ohio.