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A Man Who Really Wants to Get into the World Cup

Best T-Shirt Design


What Will You Be When You Grow Up?


Don't Worry, It's a Refrigerator Magnet

A Valentine's Day Incident

This month, February, is a costly one for me. Not only is it Valentine's Day, but the next few day are also my wife's birthday and our wedding anniversary. Then our second child decided to be born on our sixth anniversary so I have his birthday too. I went to the card store and there were all the men buying Valentine's Day cards. I picked up four cards, one for each of the above events. A man saw me holding four cards and with eyebrows raised said, "Just how many girlfriends do you have?" I just smiled and walked away!

Getting Older...Still!

I've noticed another disturbing trend as I get older...many of the famous people are younger than I am. I've gotten used to seeing new actors and actresses come onto the scene who are years younger than I, but...

FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THE HISTORY OF MANKIND...

The president of the United States is younger than I am! He was born a year after I was!

This trend is truly disturbing! If it continues, I see a time when everyone on Earth will be younger than I. What will happen then? Will I win some kind of contest?

Time to Get Serious, Part 2 - Lying for God

I receive so many forwarded messages from several well-meaning individuals, most of which were written by the original poster taking umbrage at some incident that proves that America is moving away from God. The only problem is that most of the time those incidents never happened! The most recent exclaims that the words "so help us God" were left out of a quote from Franklin Delano Roosevelt that is engraved on the World War II Memorial here in Washington, D.C. The problem here is that the quote from a speech that FDR gave never says those words in that part of the speech. Many of the emails are even more obvious in their fallacies. Another one I just got recently states that Budweiser has stopped delivery to a store in California after Sept. 11, 2001, because the beer delivery man saw the Muslims inside celebrating. Again, this has been disproved, including by Budweiser itself.

Oh, there are so many other stories that are like these. They are almost universally sent by those who have a far-right or a religious agenda and usually fall into one of these categories:

1. Someone or some organization is trying to delete God from our country.
2. An inspiring story from 9/11.
3. During the months leading up to the election, something proving that Obama was a fundamentalist Muslim, or a God-hater, or an atheist, or...well, almost anything else that is negative and not true.

When I receive one of these stories, I like to check for myself whether they are true, because sometimes, though rarely, they are. Luckily, there are impartial research organizations that check these all the time. One of the best ones is www.snopes.com. There is a search window there and you can just type in a keywords, such as "World War II Memorial", and you'll see any stories that relate to that subject. Right at the top it will say whether the story is True or False and then give a very good explanation as to why. I highly recommend it to anyone.

A little skepticism can help us to avoid falling for so many lies. That leads me to the question...why do people lie to promote the idea of God? When the original writer of an email writes about something that is made out of whole cloth (for my foreign readers, that's an expression in English that means something is not true), even if the email promotes giving yourself over to Jesus Christ as your Savior, do they believe that Jesus approves of their lies? Do they think Jesus thinks it's OK to lie on His behalf? If so, how much further down the road do they have to go before they think it's OK to steal or kill on His behalf?

Time to Get Serious, Part 1 - Tolerance

Not only do I believe in tolerance, I believe in acceptance. I believe we should accept each other no matter our beliefs or backgrounds. The only thing that makes me want to distance myself from someone is an individual's actions, not beliefs, fears, kinky ideas or anything else. I don't promise to respect your beliefs if they are different from mine, but I will not mock you or try to convince you to abandon your beliefs. If you ask me about mine, I will share freely. If you ask me about yours, I'll tell you what I think without being condescending (I hope). If you try to belittle me for what I believe, don't expect me to be happy about it.

No, nothing has happened today to make me write this. It's just an overall conclusion I've reached after a lifetime of experience.

Cool Demo from Adobe!

Adobe has a new cool demo for its latest version of Adobe Creative Suite. Click here to see it for yourself.

Be sure to move the red bar at the bottom all the way to the right to see the whole animation. Be sure also to have your speakers on.

The Spirit Leaves the Body...

I was using Skype Video to talk with our friend Gina, who is in Preston, England, for a few months. At a certain moment, I saw her spirit leave her body and took a picture of it, which you see here. I promise you I did not retouch this photo in any way!

I believe this is the first time in history that anyone has actually taken a picture of the moment that the spirit leaves the body.

Oh, please don't tell me that this is due to slow connection and slow screen refresh! No, no, there are no technical reasons behind this. The fact that Gina is alive and well has nothing to do with anything! She was just temporarily separated from herself. The fact that she felt nothing different during this process means nothing! Now give me a million dollars! :-)

These Guys Really Mean It

Can you "hear" the message any louder than when a chain is attached to the pen? Don't Steal Our Pen!

I took this picture at a local restaurant!

The Video Phone Has Arrived

Several times a week, I speak with mom with Skype video, absolutely free. Thank you, Skype, for giving us this option! It's so cool to talk to mom, here with Sally and Klaus (the dog), this way - almost like being there. The video looks a lot sharper than what you see here, but because it's often after dark there when we talk (it's winter now, short days plus the time zone differences), they're often in semidarkness whereas I have sunlight coming through the window caressing my delicate skin!

Our First Snowfall of the Winter

Not that we had any snow in the Summer or Fall, mind you!

The first picture I took through my window, a night shot of course. This is my front yard.

The second picture I took a few minutes later. It's my backyard and I used a setting to capture more light.

The third is the morning after. They had plowed the road, as you can see, and my son was getting the ice off his back window - using the claw of a hammer! It worked very well.

In the movie, you can see my son performing a maneuver to get his car into our garage. The slick ice on the driveway required a slick maneuver! No problems - he's a pro!

Aluminum Foil Wonder!

I got this from a friend.

Whoever looks at the end of the aluminum foil box?

You know when you try to pull some foil out and the whole roll comes out of the box. Then you have to put the roll back in the box and start over. It never goes back in the way it came out and it always comes out at the wrong time.

Well, I'd like to share this with you. Yesterday as I went to throw out an empty Reynolds foil box for some reason I looked at the end of the box. And written on the end it said, "Press here to lock end."

Right there on the end of the box is a tab to lock the roll in place.

How long has this little locking tab been there? I then looked at a generic brand of aluminum foil and it had one, too.

I looked at a box of Saran wrap and it had one, too!

I can't count the number of times the Saran wrap roll has jumped out when I was trying to cover something up. The only box that doesn't have this feature is the Wax Paper box.

It's a small thing, but this little bit of information may just save your day when you're in a hurry.

Goes to show you learn something new --- every day.

Mom and Klaus

Isn't this a cute photo of mom and Klaus? He protects her, watches over her and especially keeps a keen eye on her when she is going up and down the stairs.

Thanks to my sister for this photo. You can see her blog by clicking on the link to the left, the first one in the Friends and Family section.

President Bush Commemorative Collectibles

Being sold through my local right-wing newspaper. Why on Earth would I want to be reminded of the tragedy of the last eight years any longer than necessary?

And, really, a cigar?

Unforgettable Places to See Before You Die

So, there's this book, see? It's called "Unforgettable Places to See Before You Die" by Steve Davey. This is the list of places he believes we should see. I tend to agree with many if not all of them. My question to all of you is: what's missing from this list? Additional questions: Which of these have you visited and of them, which do you recommend and why? I've placed a star next to the few I've seen. I really do want to see the Grand Canyon!

01. Angkor Wat, Cambodia
02. St. Petersburg, Russia
03. Havana, Cuba
04. Wat Phra Kaeo, Bangkok, Thailand
05. Grand Canyon, Arizon, USA
06. Taj Mahal, Agra, India *
07. Eilean Donan Castle, Scotland
08. The Alhambra, Granada, Spain
09. Aitutaki, Cook Islands
10. Pyramid of Kukulcan, Mexico
11. Venice, Italy *
12. Dead Vlei, Namibia
13. Iguassu Falls, Brazil and Argentina
14. Petra, Jordan
15. College Fjord, Alaska, USA
16. Karnak Temple, Luxor, Egypt
17. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
18. Taman Negara Rainforest, Malaysia
19. Jaisalmer Fort, India
20. Galapagos Islands, Ecuador
21. Manhattan Island, New York, USA *
22 Lake Titicaca, Bolivia and Peru
23. Monet's Garden, Giverny, France
24. Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania
25. Santorini, Greece
26. Drakensbert, South Africa
27. Zanzibar, Tanzania
28. Makalu, Himalayas, Nepal *
29. Lalibela, Ethiopia
30. Machu Picchu, Peru
31. Uluru, Australia
32. The Ghats, Varanasi, India
33. Great Barrier Reef, Australia
34. Lhasa, Tibet
35. Yangshuo, Guilin, China
36. Dubrovnik, Croatia
37. Ephesus, Turkey
38. The Bund, Shanghai, China
39. Samarkand, Uzbekistan
40. Killary Harbour, Ireland

Be careful if you get this on Skype

I got this strange and potentially very dangerous instant message on Skype. Somebody named "Computer Alert" that warns me that my system is infected and to click a link to download a patch.

I'm absolutely sure that the patch that I would download if I clicked the link would be a nice little virus that will infect my system.

Don't click that link or any other suspicious link, especially one that comes to you in this way!

Two Millon Strong...and...

Two Million people at the Inauguration of Barack Obama...and not one arrest!

More Ice Water Holes

Another lake, this one close to my house, with lots of birds resting around the melted ice surrounding the fountain.

My dog finds the whole scene rather curious, sitting in the car.

Make sure you click the photos to enlarge them!

Appunti di un Volontario di Barack Obama

Yes, this is in Italian. I wrote it for an Italian website. Sorry if you don't read Italian! (By the way, if there is a heaven, they speak Italian there...so if you want to get into heaven, you'd better start learning Italian!)

Appunti di un Volontario di Barack Obama
Di Joe (“Giuseppe”) Ganci

A questo punto tutto il mondo sa che Barack Obama ha vinto la presidenza degli Stati Uniti, un evento storico su tanti livelli. Naturalmente è storico perché Obama è il primo uomo a vincere che non abbia la pelle bianca, ma questo fatto troppe volte oscura una cosa ancora più importante. Barack Obama rappresenta la speranza che ci porterà via dall’incubo degli ultimi otto anni di George W. Bush. Sotto l’amministrazione di Cheney-Bush (sì, ho messo per primo Cheney), il nostro benamato paese ha abbandonato molti dei principi democratici che hanno reso gli Stati Uniti un’ispirazione per tanti nel mondo. Ha invece cercato di controllare i nostri citttadini con la paura e l’ansia. Bush, che ha fallito in tutto ciò che ha provato a fare durante la sua vita, ha infine fallito anche a governare il nostro paese, al punto che gli USA sono disprezzati e anche odiati da tanti. Una guerra illegale, Guatanamo Bay, l’economia distrutta per le sue polizze e molte altre ragioni farebbero meritare a lui e ai suoi colleghi una lunga permanenza in prigione. C’è chi dice pure che il solo fatto che hanno svelato Valerie Plaine come agente della CIA per fare dispetto al marito di Plaine, che come giornalista aveva scritto la verità sui delitti dell’amministrazione Bush nel New York Times, è un atto di tradimento che di solito porterebbe alla pena di morte.

Sta per finire questo periodo di tenebre, ora che i miei concittadini hanno finalmente capito l’errore di avere votato per il traditore e hanno invece votato per un uomo onesto e bravo che farà del suo meglio per risanare il paese.

Naturalmente, non sarebbe riuscito a vincere da solo. Invece, aveva bisogno di aiuto – e anche tanto. Molti di noi, circa otto milioni infatti, abbiamo sacrificato tanto tempo per portare Sgr. Obama alla Casa Bianca.

In tutti gli stati, Obama ha avuto molti centri elettorali stabiliti per la sua campagna. Sono andato ad iscrivermi come volontario al centro più vicino a casa mia e ho chiesto come potevo essere utile. Mi hanno subito messo a lavorare. Dopo una breve riunione durante la quale ci hanno dato delle istruzioni, sono andato alla zona a me designata a bussare alle porte di quegli indirizzi indicati nell’ elenco che mi è stato dato. Tutto era ben organizzato. L’elenco indicava solo quelle persone che non si erano già dichiarate per Obama o McCain e tutti gli indirizzi erano nella stessa zona. Per qualche ora ho fatto alcune domande che mi erano state date, alle persone che rispondevono alla porta. Indicavo le loro risposte sui moduli e alla fine riportavo tutto indietro al centro per inserire i dati nel computer.

Dovevo indicare nei moduli, quelli che non erano a casa. Ogni tanto si capiva se qualcuno era per Obama semplicemente perché avevano messi fuori casa un cartello che lo indicava. Nello stesso modo potevo capire certe volte se qualcuno era per McCain, ma anche se c’era un cartello, se non c’era nessuno a casa, dovevo scriverlo, perché magari il cartello era stato messo dal marito e la moglie non era d’accordo, o vice-versa. Se non c’era nessuno a casa, lasciavo alla porta un depliant.

Le reazioni variavano fra quelli che erano a casa Certi erano simpatici e rispondevano volentieri alle mie domande. Altri mi hanno sbattuto la porta in faccia. C’era chi appena visto che era scritto Barack Obama sul mio pachetto si arrabbiava e mi mandava via con parolacce.

Alcuni casi me le ricorderò per sempre:

• L’uomo che è diventato rosso di rabbia dicendomi che Obama era l’anticristo e che io ero il servo del diavolo!

• La donna che mi ha detto che se Obama non avesse vinto, sarebbe andata a vivere all’estero.

• L’uomo che non ha potuto parlare perché ha dovuto farsi levare la mascella, probabilmente come risultato di un cancro, e avevo un buco alla gola per respirare.

• Diversi che mi hanno chiesto come potevono diventare volontari per Obama anche loro

• Una donna nera che si è messa a lacrimare, dicendomi che per tutta la vita le era stata detto di non fidarsi dei bianchi, ma ora non ci crede più perché i bianchi lavorano insiemi ai neri e a tutte le altre razze per eleggere un uomo nero.

Un altro modo in cui ho aiutato la campagna elettorale è stato di stare seduto nel centro dei volontari, telefonando a molte persone, di nuovo indicate negli elenchi che mi sono stati dati. Gli organizzatori mi hanno detto che ho una voce molto soave e che era perfetta per telefonare alle persone per fare loro delle domande, domande molto simili a quelle che avevo fatto andando da porta a porta. Ma ho trovato che al telefono le persone erano disposte ancora di più ad essere oneste. Il bello è che gli elenchi indicavano alcuni dati personali: nome, indirizzo, e anche l’età. Ho telefonato a migliaia di persone. Molti erano giovani, dai 18 anni in poi, ma c’erano anche gli anziani che avevano più di 100 anni! Il più anziano aveva 108 anni. Ho trovato bello il fatto che non potevo presupporre che gli anziani fossero conservativi contro Obama. Infatti, molti di loro erano molto felici di aver potuto vedere il nostro paese andare un passo così avanti prima di morire.

Alcuni casi che mi ricordo dalle telefonate che ho fatto:

• La donna anziana che si è arrabbiata subito e mi ha gridato di non telefonare mai più, che detestava il nome di quel diavolo Obama e che non voleva mai più sentire quel nome. Ho resistito nel dirle che sarebbe stato meglio per lei abituarsi visto che Obama aveva un bella possibilità di vincere!

• La giovane donna che ha cercato di flirtare con me al telefono!

• L’uomo che ha cercato di flirtare con me al telefono!

• L’uomo che mi ha detto che se Obama avesse vinto, sarebbe andato a vivere all’estero (proprio l’opposto di quella donna con cui avevo parlato a casa sua!).

• L’uomo che mi ha detto che ero la quinta persona a telefonargli quel giorno per fargli delle domande e che era stufo di parlare di politica!

L’ultimo raduno di Barack è stato proprio qui in Virginia, non tanto lontano da casa nostra, il giorno prima dell’elezione. Anche se eravamo già andati ad un’altro raduno circa un mese prima, naturalmente siamo andati anche a quest’ultimo raduno prima di votare. Figuratevi – non siamo stati gli unici!! Circa 100.000 persone sono venuti a condividere il loro entusiasmo per Obama.

Alla fine tutte le nostre fatiche sono state ben premiate. Non solo Barack Obama ha vinto, ma Gli Stati Uniti hanno vinto, anche se non tutti riescono ancora a crederci!

http://www.360-us.com/obama200pix.swf

Crop Circles...No. Water Circles...Yes!

It's been cold here in Washington, D.C. but we haven't had much snow, just a little bit the other day and it melted quickly. The many ponds and lakes in our area got a very thin layer of ice cover - don't you dare try to skate on it! The ice is so thin that they haven't turned off most of the fountains in these man-made bodies of water, which creates these interesting water circles. They're kind of interesting, kind of pretty. Of course, it may be only me that thinks so!



The geese here seem puzzled by what they see!

Brilliant Sidewalk Chalk Art

Julian Beever, Pavement Picasso

Julian Beever is an English artist who is famous for his anamorphic art on the pavements of England, France, Germany, USA, Australia and Belgium. Beever gives an amazing illusion to his drawings, so that the objects appear to be three dimensional rather than flat as they actually are.

Art for the people. My art is for anybody, it's for people who wouldn't go into an art gallery. It's art for the people. Art shouldn't be locked away in galleries and libraries and books. Art should be for everybody and not just art buffs, historians and so-called experts.

Julian works in chalk, so his art, which takes up to 3 days to complete, is there only as long as the elements allow. If it rains it means I've done a lot of hard work for nothing, but I usually manage to avoid that.

The important thing for me is to get a photo of it at the end. For me, I'm working towards building a photograph as my end result, and if I get that I'm happy.

The secret is to set up a camera on a tripod and keep it in one spot and check every mark you make. It's really just playing with perspective to make it appear different to what it really is.

The 3D aspect to his work came much later while he was working in Brussels. I decided to get into 3D after seeing the effect of tiles being removed from the street, and later trying to recreate the sense of depth in a drawing.


Make Poverty History The front view is above and the side view is below. This is 40 feet long!



Politicians get sucked into a pit. Who will save them? Once I realized you could make things go down, I realized you could make them appear to go up and I began experimenting.



Today I'm drawing Felix the Cat gate-crashing the Chinese New Year of the dog. He's popping out of the ground in a Chinese dragon costume.
Chinese Dragon with Felix the Cat



There is no hole in this pavement.



Land Use



Canal Street - New Orleans



Rafting - Watch Out!



Hosing down the street - Everything is fake, even the hose and water!



People avoid the hole.



Did you spot tiny Julian Beever on the Top of the Bottle?





Hard to believe that the little boy is standing flat on the pavement!









Julian Deever - Self Portrait