Tchotchke (pronounced choch-kee) are small toys, gewgaws, knickknacks, baubles, lagniappes, trinkets, or kitsch. The term has a connotation of worthlessness or disposability, as well as tackiness,[1][2] and has long been used by Jewish-Americans and in the regional speech of New York City.
The word may also refer to swag, in the sense of the logo pens, key fobs, and other promotional freebies dispensed at trade shows, conventions, and similar large events. Also, stores that sell cheap souvenirs in tourist areas like Times Square, Venice Beach, and the ABC Stores in Hawaii are sometimes called "tchotchke shops."
Leo Rosten, author of The Joys of Yiddish, gives an alternate sense of tchotchke as meaning a desirable young girl, a "pretty young thing." Less flatteringly, the term could be construed as a more dismissive synonym for "bimbo." These usages are not common outside of Jewish circles.
when i learn, you learn.. cuz am da best mane, ah deed it!
The apostle Paul in his first Thessalonians' correspondence provides a sign-condition that must exist in the world before the day of the Lord's judgment: the ungodly will be saying, "There is peace and security." But look around...it is not the case. The opposite is true today. The ungodly are saying, "There is unrest and insecurity." Therefore, according to the apostle Paul, Jesus cannot come back on May 21 as Harold Camping is predicting.
(1) Now on the topic of times and seasons, brothers and sisters, you have no need for anything to be written to you. (2) For you know quite well that the day of the Lord will come in the same way as a thief in the night. (3) Now when they are saying, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction comes on them, like labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will surely not escape. But you, brothers and sisters, are not in the darkness for the day to overtake you like a thief would.
(1 Thess 5:1–4)
By the time of the New Testament era, the two terms for “times” and “seasons” (chronos and kairos) were synonymous, so one should not read into this any temporal distinctions. It is a literary feature called a hendiadys, which is an expression of two words that express a single idea for emphasis (we have similar expressions in our contemporary English, e.g., “nice and easy”). Paul’s statement, “you have no need for anything to be written to you,” indicates two things:
(1) a question arose about the times and seasons of Christ’s return.
(2) they have previously been instructed on this matter (e.g., 2 Thess 2:5).
On a surface level, it is often assumed by interpreters that Paul is rebuffing their question about the timing of the Lord’s coming. For example: “Paul, what day is Jesus coming back? Dear Thessalonian church, I cannot tell you since he is coming back as a secret thief.” This is a careless reading of the context. The Thessalonians are not asking for some specific calendric year-day-hour timing of the Lord’s return. This is a misguided interpretation, for Paul’s answer reveals that they are asking not about a calendric “when” but a conditional “when.” In other words, Paul will answer that Jesus will come when a particular spiritual condition is met in the world.”
He gives the reason why he does not need to write them about the times and seasons: “For you know quite well that the day of the Lord will come in the same way as a thief in the night.” Apparently, Paul had already used this thief simile at the time he planted the Thessalonian church, but they did not grasp the full implications. The thief simile is common in the New Testament concerning Christ’s return (cf. Matt 24:43; Luke 12:39–40; 2 Peter 3:10; Rev 3:3; 16:15 ). We should not erroneously import into this thief image the theological system of imminence. One will look to no avail to find anything in any thief passages that teaches imminence. In addition, interpreters have wrongly read into the thief image meaning “unpredictability,” but verse 4 contradicts this notion. Instead, the image conveys a warning for spiritual readiness. If you are not spiritually ready for Christ's return it will come upon you suddenly, with negative consequences. Obedience eliminates the possibility that our Lord's return will be as a thief to those who are watchful. We belong to Christ, so we are to live with an attitude of expectancy—spiritual watchfulness—not imminence.
In verse 3, Paul teaches that the result of the Lord’s return as a thief to the ungodly will be sudden destruction. He is summarizing the beliefs of unbelievers when he says they will say, “There is peace and security.” He consistently notes a peace and security (albeit a surface-level quality) that will precede the day of the Lord. But this peace and security is illusory, a false security, for unbelievers because unforeseen sudden calamity will come on them just as unexpected labor pains on a pregnant woman (cf. Matt 24:37–39; Luke 21:34–36).
This condition does not exist in the world right now. And for Paul, to cite this condition it must be real, and not some subjective environment. In my futurist eschatology, I believe that an Antichrist figure one day will come on the scene to provide the ungodly with this "peace and security." But that day has not come. Nevertheless, right now, the world is not saying, "There is peace and security." Therefore, judgment day is not coming upon the ungodly until the condition exists. Persecution upon the entire global church will come first before the day of the Lord's wrath when He will punish our wicked persecutors.
please read the following post as if i had posted this exactly one week ago upon my return from my camping trip (get it?) since my computer went nuts the last time i tried posting this:
uhhh.. what is everyone STILL doing here?? were none of you saved?? maybe i'm too deep a sleeper and i didnt feel the earthquake either.. ohh well, im sure Harold Camping will be missed... wait WHAT?? he's still here too???
His doomsday predictions caused so much anxiety. And when the day arrived, the much publicized prediction turned false. Now 89-year-old Harold Camping says he’s “flabbergasted” the world didn’t end last weekend sounds somewhat pitiful. “It has been a really tough weekend,” Camping said Sunday, after emerging from his Alameda, California home for the first time to talk to a reporter from the San Francisco Chronicle.
“I’m looking for answers ... But now I have nothing else to say,” he said, adding that he would make a full statement. Camping’s PR aide, Tom Evans, told the L.A. Times that the group is “disappointed” that 200 million true believers weren’t lifted up to heaven on Saturday while everyone else suffered and eventually died as a series of earthquakes and famine destroyed the Earth.
“You can imagine we’re pretty disappointed, but the word of God is still true,” Evans said. “We obviously went too far, and that’s something we need to learn from.” The group posted 2,000 billboards around the country warning of the rapture, while Camping, an uncertified fundamentalist minister spread the word on his radio show.
Camping’s Family Radio, which airs on 66 United States stations, has apparently rebranded itself quickly. Business Insider notes that the station’s website has scrubbed all mentions of the Judgment Day. The site previously featured a countdown clock to the May 21 rapture on its homepage.
But the false prediction might not be so easily effaced from the lives of Camping’s followers. The L.A. Times writes that Keith Bauer, a 38-year-old tractor trailer driver, took a road trip with his family to see the Grand Canyon before the world ended.
“With maxed-out credit cards and a growing mountain of bills, he said, the rapture would have been a relief,” the paper writes. But Bauer is not angry at Camping for his false prediction. “Worst-case scenario for me, I got to see the country,” he told the paper. “If I should be angry at anybody, it should be me.”
Robert Fitzpatrick, who spent $140,000 of his life savings to advertise the rapture in New York, said he was dumbfounded when life went on as usual Saturday. “I do not understand why ...,” he told Reuters while awaiting the event in Times Square. “I do not understand why nothing has happened.”
An NPR reporter talked to two Camping followers on Sunday. “One man, his voice quavering, said he was still holding out hope that they were one day off. Another believer asserted that their prayers worked: God delayed judgment so that more people could be saved, but the end is ‘imminent,’” she reported.
Evans, Camping’s PR aide, told NPR he hopes Family Radio will reimburse followers who spent their savings in anticipation of the rapture, but that he can’t guarantee it. Protesters gathered outside Camping’s radio headquarters to mock the false prophecy over the weekend. Some of them set aloft a toy cow with balloons to lampoon the idea that a select elite would ascend to heaven. Meanwhile, other religious groups tried to recruit disappointed Camping followers.
and now, a public service for all mah readers. lets call this "what does the Bible say about your stupid comments":
"It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by His own authority"
Acts 1:7
“Therefore if they say to you, ‘Look, He is in the desert!’ do not go out; or ‘Look, He is in the inner rooms!’ do not believe it. 27 For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be."
Matthew 24:26-27
"But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction. 2 And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed. 3 By covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words; for a long time their judgment has not been idle, and their destruction does[a] not slumber.
4 For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved for judgment; 5 and did not spare the ancient world, but saved Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly; 6 and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly; 7 and delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked 8 (for that righteous man, dwelling among them, tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds)— 9 then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment, 10 and especially those who walk according to the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise authority. They are presumptuous, self-willed. They are not afraid to speak evil of dignitaries, 11 whereas angels, who are greater in power and might, do not bring a reviling accusation against them before the Lord.
12 But these, like natural brute beasts made to be caught and destroyed, speak evil of the things they do not understand, and will utterly perish in their own corruption, 13 and will receive the wages of unrighteousness, as those who count it pleasure to carouse in the daytime. They are spots and blemishes, carousing in their own deceptions while they feast with you, 14 having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin, enticing unstable souls. They have a heart trained in covetous practices, and are accursed children. 15 They have forsaken the right way and gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Beor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness; 16 but he was rebuked for his iniquity: a dumb donkey speaking with a man’s voice restrained the madness of the prophet. 17 These are wells without water, clouds carried by a tempest, for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.
18 For when they speak great swelling words of emptiness, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through lewdness, the ones who have actually escaped from those who live in error. 19 While they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage. 20 For if, after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the latter end is worse for them than the beginning. 21 For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them. 22 But it has happened to them according to the true proverb: “A dog returns to his own vomit,” and, “a sow, having washed, to her wallowing in the mire.”"
2 Peter 2:1-22
" I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at[a] His appearing and His kingdom: 2 Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. 3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; 4 and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. 5 But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry."
2 Timothy 4:1-5
and in the words of natalien the day before the "rapture":
Supposedly some pastor in the U.S. said tomorrow is the end of the world. Pfft! A reporter asked him if nothing happens on the 21st what does that mean? He answered "That means that God is a liar"....Heretic.
my response? not just a heretic, but one word: "idiot". where is his fear of God? thats not something you say, especially when you came up with some stupid theory by using stupid calculations that other stupid people have tried to do in the past and failed, making themselves out to be the stupids that they are, and their followers even stupider for following them, and not fleeing for their lives from these stupids. am i upset? yeah. i am. at the willful ignorance of so many people on biblical themes such as these, while calling themselves believers. ugh.
"when you are as good at creating problems as i am, you have no choice but to get good at solving them"
-insaner
as true today as it was when i said it.. ugh.. new linux fix post to come (well, not really "linux" fix, but since only linux matters to me, i guess it could fall under that category.
so my computer decided to go on strike right after i got back from my spec ops camping trip. but im back now.. theres a post to come about the recently experienced apocalypse.. so you dont have to worry about that.. (cuz i know you are)
ugh, again my computer decided to take a bit of a nap.. and man, konqueror is awesome! (i just need to fix the javascript for the blog poster..) and it feels much smoother than with firefox (im still talking about the blog poster) anyways, my computer decided to take a nap, ie, freeze/crash and when i loaded it back up, i figured i would have to retype this post, but nah-ah, the post was saved in the text box.. yay.. not the tags though, but oh well.. ok before this thing crashes again, maaaane, ah deed it!
dear everyone, we are going camping for the weekend (hmm, didnt notice the pun till just now), if the WORLD ENDS, please be so kind as to let us know.. thanks in advance
ps, in case you hadnt heard, the guy who invented this date, err, i mean "calculated", said that if it doesnt happen, then "God is a liar".. what an idiot.
There are three main theological camps on the issues of law, gospel, and the structuring of God's redemptive relationship with humankind: dispensationalism, covenant theology, and new covenant theology. Many have written to us asking about the differences between these three views, and so before discussing John Piper's perspective we will give an overview of each.
Dispensationalism
It can be hard to summarize dispensational theology as a whole because in recent years multiple forms of it have developed. In general, there are three main distinctives.
First, dispensationalism sees God as structuring His relationship with mankind through several stages of revelation which mark off different dispensations, or stewardship arrangements. Each dispensation is a "test" of mankind to be faithful to the particular revelation given at the time. Generally, seven dispensations are distinguished: innocence (before the fall), conscience (Adam to Noah), government (Noah to Babel), promise (Abraham to Moses), Law (Moses to Christ), grace (Pentecost to the rapture), and the millennium.
Second, dispensationalism holds to a literal interpretation of Scripture. This does not deny the existence of figures of speech and non-literal language in the Bible, but rather means that there is a literal meaning behind the figurative passages.
Third, as a result of this literal interpretation of Scripture, dispensationalism holds to a distinction between Israel (even believing Israel) and the church. On this view, the promises made to Israel in the OT were not intended as prophecies about what God would do spiritually for the church, but will literally be fulfilled by Israel itself (largely in the millennium). For example, the promise of the land is interpreted to mean that God will one day fully restore Israel to Palestine. In contrast, non-dispensationalists typically see the land promise as intended by God to prophesy, in shadowy Old-covenant-form, the greater reality that He would one day make the entire church, Jews and Gentiles, heirs of the whole renewed world (cf. Romans 4:13).
In many ways it is thus accurate to say that dispensationalism believes in "two peoples of God." Although both Jews and Gentiles are saved by Christ through faith, believing Israel will be the recipient of additional "earthly" promises (such as prosperity in the specific land of Palestine, to be fully realized in the millennium) that do not apply to believing Gentiles, whose primary inheritance is thus "heavenly."
Covenant Theology
Covenant theology believes that God has structured his relationship with humanity by covenants rather than dispensations. For example, in Scripture we explicitly read of various covenants functioning as the major stages in redemptive history, such as the covenant with Abraham, the giving of the law, the covenant with David, and the new covenant. These post-fall covenants are not new tests of man's faithfulness to each new stage of revelation (as are the dispensations in dispensationalism), but are rather differing administrations of the single, overarching covenant of grace.
The covenant of grace is one of two fundamental covenants in covenant theology. It structures God's post-fall relationship to mankind; pre-fall, God structured His relationship by the covenant of works. The covenant of grace is best understood in relation to the covenant of works.
The covenant of works, instituted in the Garden of Eden, was the promise that perfect obedience would be rewarded with eternal life. Adam was created sinless but with the capability of falling into sin. Had he remained faithful in the time of temptation in the Garden (the "probationary period"), he would have been made incapable of sinning and secured in an eternal and unbreakable right standing with God.
But Adam sinned and broke the covenant, and thereby subjected himself and all his descendants to the penalty for covenant-breaking, condemnation. God in His mercy therefore instituted the "covenant of grace," which is the promise of redemption and eternal life to those who would believe in the (coming) redeemer. The requirement of perfect obedience for eternal life is not annulled by the covenant of grace, but is rather fulfilled by Christ on behalf of His people, since now that all are sinners no one can meet the condition of perfect obedience by his own performance. The covenant of grace, then, does not set aside the covenant of works but rather fulfills it.
As mentioned above, covenant theology emphasizes that there is only one covenant of grace, and that all of the various redemptive covenants that we read of in the Scripture are simply differing administrations of this one covenant. In support, it is pointed out that a covenant is in essence simply a sovereignly given promise (usually with stipulations), and since there is only one promise of salvation (namely, by grace through faith), it follows that there is therefore only one covenant of grace. All of the specific redemptive covenants we read of (the Abrahamic, Mosaic, etc.) are various and culminating expressions of the covenant of grace.
New Covenant Theology
New covenant theology typically does not hold to a covenant of works or one overarching covenant of grace (although they would still argue for only one way of salvation). The essential difference between New Covenant Theology (hereafter NCT) and Covenant Theology (CT), however, concerns the Mosaic Law. CT holds that the Mosaic Law can be divided into three groups of laws--those regulating the government of Israel (civil laws), ceremonial laws, and moral laws. The ceremonial law and civil law are no longer in force because the former was fulfilled in Christ and the latter only applied to Israel's theocracy, which is now defunct. But the moral law continues.
NCT argues that one cannot divide the law up in that way, as though part of the Mosaic Law can be abrogated while the rest remains in force. The Mosaic Law is a unity, they say, and so if part of it is canceled, all of it must be canceled. On top of this, they say that the New Testament clearly teaches that the Mosaic Law as a whole is superseded in Christ. It is, in other words, no longer our direct and immediate source of guidance. The Mosaic Law, as a law, is no longer binding on the believer.
Does this mean that believers are not bound by any divine law? No, because the Mosaic Law has been replaced by the law of Christ. NCT makes a distinction between the eternal moral law of God and the code in which God expresses that law to us. The Mosaic Law is an expression of God's eternal moral law as a particular code which also contains positive regulations pertinent to the code's particular temporal purpose, and therefore the cancellation of the Mosaic Law does not mean that the eternal moral law is itself canceled. Rather, upon canceling the Mosaic Law, God gave us a different expression of his eternal moral law--namely, the Law of Christ, consisting in the moral instructions of Christ's teaching and the New Testament. The key issue that NCT seeks to raise is: Where do we look to see the expression of God's eternal moral law today--do we look to Moses, or to Christ? NCT says we look to Christ.
There are many similarities between the Law of Christ and Mosaic Law, but that does not change the fact that the Mosaic Law has been canceled and that, therefore, we are not to look to it for direct guidance but rather to the New Testament. For example, England and the US have many similar laws (for example, murder is illegal in both countries). Nonetheless, the English are not under the laws of America, but of England. If an English citizen murders in England, he is held accountable for breaking England's law against murder, not America's law against murder.
The benefit of NCT, its advocates argue, is that it solves the difficulty of trying to figure out which of the Mosaic laws apply to us today. On their understanding, since the Mosaic Law is no longer a direct and immediate source of guidance, we look to the Law of Christ for our direct guidance. Although the Mosaic Law is no longer a binding law code in the NT era, it still has the authority, not of law, but of prophetic witness. As such, it fills out and explains certain concepts in both the old and new covenant law.
John Piper's position
John Piper has some things in common with each of these views, but does not classify himself within any of these three camps. He is probably the furthest away from dispensationalism, although he does agree with dispensationalism that there will be a millennium.
Many of his theological heroes have been covenant theologians (for example, many of the Puritans), and he does see some merit in the concept of a pre-fall covenant of works, but he has not taken a position on their specific conception of the covenant of grace.
In regards to his views on the Mosaic Law, he seems closer to new covenant theology than covenant theology, although once again it would not work to say that he precisely falls within that category.
really great post, and its interesting to see that piper does not consider himself CT. though i find that it missed what i consider to be an important distinction between NCT and CT, and thats that the church started at pentecost. why is that important? well, because if the church started with Christ's ministry, then peter denying Him 3 times does not exclude him from salvation. if the church started before creation, then david being a murderous adulterer does not exclude him from salvation. to clarify, by saying "it does not exclude him from salvation" i dont mean that they are excluded from salvation because of having done those things, but rather, that there would be no point of argument against those who calling themselves "christian" do any of these things. in other words, if the church began before david's sin or before peter's sin, (and we do consider these two as being of the elect of God and saved), then that means that anyone TODAY who forms part of the church (not just the elect, but actually currently saved) could argue that though it was "wrong" of them to sin in that same way, that it doesnt exclude them from salvation, because "hey, david and peter did it!" and yet, paul's and john's writings are packed full of these exclusions, saying that adulterers, murderers, liars, thieves, and cowards all have their place in the lake of fire!!
without conviction of sin there can be no repentance, and if these people, doing these things do not realize that these are signs of a lack of salvation, then they will not repent unto salvation. this is a more serious problem than a mere "doctrinal" distinction. if denying Christ, adultery, and murder do not exclude us from the church, then holiness becomes a matter of mere "preference" or just something "good" to aim for but not really as something "without which nobody will see the Lord", as hebrews 12:14 tells us. the fact of the matter is, that without holiness, NOBODY will see the Lord. holiness isnt just a "good" thing to aim for, it is the telltale sign of salvation, it is the fruit of repentance.
This red-crested tree rat (Santamartamys rufodorsalis), a guinea-pig-sized rodent not seen since 1898 and thought perhaps to be extinct, is seen at the El Dorado Nature Reserve in Colombia
take that all you nay sayers who thought the red crested tree rat was gone forever, its NOT! woohoo!!
red crested tree rat: 1, nay-sayers that thought the red crested tree rat was gone forever: 0
Human urine mixed with wood ash was the ultimate eco-friendly fertiliser, according to researchers
Gardeners keen to boost their crop of tomatoes may be surprised to learn they can turn to an unusual and free source of fertiliser.
Allotment growers can enrich the soil and therefore their plants using their own wee, according to a new study.
Scientists discovered the unusual addition made crops up to four times larger.
A team of Finnish researchers found that sprinkling tomatoes with human urine mixed with wood ash was the ultimate eco-friendly fertiliser.
It worked just as well with cucumber, corn, cabbage and other crops.
Although scientists have previously tested urine on plants, this is the first one to mix it with wood ash.
The mixture produced bumper harvests when compared to untreated plants.
It could one day be substituted for costly synthetic fertilisers.
The university study, published in this month's Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry, found using nitrogen-rich urine does not carry any risk of disease.
When combined with wood ash is perfect to provide minerals and reduce the acidity of soil.
Report author Surenda Pradhen said the findings could lead to a new source of cheap fertiliser without the need to use potentially dangerous chemicals.
'The results suggest that urine with or without wood ash can be used as a substitute for mineral fertiliser to increase the yields of tomato without posing any microbial or chemical risks,' she concluded.
Two Mexicans are stuck in the desert after crossing into the United States , wandering aimlessly and starving. They are about to just lie down and wait for death, when all of a sudden Luis says.........
"Hey Pepe, do you smell what I smell. Ees bacon, I theenk."
"Si, Luis, eet sure smells like bacon. "
With renewed hope they struggle up the next sand dune, and there, in the distance, is a tree loaded with bacon.
There's raw bacon, there's fried bacon, back bacon, double smoked bacon ..... Every imaginable kind of cured pork.
"Pepe, Pepe, we ees saved. Ees a bacon tree."
"Luis, maybe ees a meerage? We ees in the desert don't forget."
"Pepe, since when deed you ever hear of a meerage that smell like bacon...ees no meerage, ees a bacon tree."
And with that, Luis staggers towards the tree. He gets to within 5 metres, Pepe crawling close behind, when suddenly a machine gun opens up, and Luis drops like a wet sock. Mortally wounded, he warns Pepe with his dying breath,
"Pepe... Go back man, you was right, ees not a bacon tree!"
and im pretty sure i ripped off a mole on my back.. ill let you know in the coming days.. a few days ago i thought i had a pimple which i tried to pick at.. it sort of wasnt (actually not sort of, it wasnt a pimple, it indeed was a mole) and everytime i reached back there it felt like a pimple, so i kept picking at it like it was one.. and today i think i mightve officially ripped it clean off.. yeah.. i know.. i know.. in any case, ill tell y'all in the coming days..
btw, anyone notice that theres been just waaay too many earthquakes lately? haiti, japan, new zealand and now slightly weaker ones in spain, costa rica?? and who knows how many other places im missing.. *dons an aluminum hat* its the HAARP project!! the US is attacking everyone while they test out their earthquake weapon! haha.. ah well.. at least osama was finally "killed" (cuz the conspiracy nuts are claiming "no photo no evidence no believe!") ok sleep time soon.. by the way, no sneezing or boogeys today! i had a vitamin C before sleeping (on top of my previous vita-boost.. which is vitamin C, zinc, and calcium + vitamin D combo.. which i only take on occasions when i feel ive consumed too much milk, so i vita-boost myself to not get milk-sick like i did this week.. who knows if it works, plus the new calcium + D combo we got now has magnesium, which has me worried, cuz i dont want to overconsume on vitamins and minerals.. which can also be very bad) and i when i went to sleep, i put a towel beside my pillow so my nose could drain into it while i slept (i sleep face down).. also if you sleep face up, you are more likely to have the liquid boogeys go down into your stomach and give you the stomach portion of your milk-sickness.. which is for SURE the worst.. that stuff can take me out for a week without eating or even being able to get out of my bed due to the pain.. ok, sleep time just giving you all a heads up on my health, cuz i know you caaaare!
ok time to finish my set of posts that i promsed for last week.. so, last saturday was one of the most interesting set of things ive done in a span of a couple hours in a looong time. so we (my lovely asian wife and i) went to a type of mini science fair, there was a couple of stands, one where you could extract the DNA from a banana for example, but here are the highlights:
one of the coolest things was that i finally played with oobleck!! in case you dont know, oobleck is a non-newtonian fluid, which means that it is a fluid that does not behave like say, water. there are apparently some incredible applications of the stuff (beyond making grown children *cough* get giddy with excitement at this God-created natural toy) but it apparently can also be used as armor!!
after the oobleck fun (i just played with it, i didnt do any of that stuff they are doing in the videos) played with some dry ice.. yeah, i burnt my finger a bit with the dry ice.. it felt really interesting, like someone was pinching my skin.. really cool too! and the last thing i shall share of what i did at the fair was to touch a piece of meteorite.. really interesting as well..
this however was not just a science fair, it was also next to the farmer's market, so we scoped it out (before the science actually) and we saw a stand where they were selling huge strawberries, and these vegemables (vegetables for you spelling challenged) called "fiddleheads" aptly named, because they were shaped like the heads of violins.. the guy explained that you prepare them like you would spinach.. so when luz and joelie came over that night, the chefs prepared them with a bit of garlic and margarine and salt i think.. and they were pretty good! nice and crisp like cabbage, and indeed a bit of a spinachy taste..
i also wanted to make some smoothies, since we recently caught the smoothie bug, and we had bought a watermelon and some kiwis, so i wanted to use that to make em.. but for whatever reason (besides the fact that i had to do laundry while the ladies were cooking) peeling the kiwis took forever (luz said it was the watermelon that took me forever, but shes.. uhh.. "incorrect".. it was the kiwis.. she also got in mah way while i was trying to do the watermelon, so i blame her in part too, just in case we were all wondering about that) everyone was getting exasperated, and the smoothies turned out not so smooth, since i didnt use enough ice (i think i will blame my wife for not having made the ice after she had washed the trays.. lets distribute the blame evenly here) so i got all depressed, so i call them my depressive smoothies. yeah, stupid depressive smoothies.
BUT, and this is a big butt.. the other day i had the craziest dream (well, it wasnt really crazy, just needed a proper adjective to get you excited to read this next part after all that other excitemening stuff --hmm, thats a really cool typo, i think i will leave that there as is) anyways, so i had this dream where i was watching "matt" (my movie) and it now included the new "snow" scene!! cool! hopefully in a couple of weeks i will have had my first bear-sighting.. i hope.. but more so than that, i hope it is a safe one..
before my happy posts, let me just paste the angry technology rant to a separate post, lets not mix emotions here people (this was going to go in the next post, but why ruin your mood after a great post?):
and before i go, i just have to rant a bit about my stupid computer.. yes, i need it, i need the rant time. my computer has just been getting more and more unusable.. im not sure what it is, but its definitely a combination of things.. not just the stupid forced upgrade (yeah, thanks fedora) and all the things that naturally break when you have to upgrade software that is being maintained by people who dont care about usability or the people who use their software (thats you kde and gnome and fedora!! im looking RIGHT at YOU!!) where i am forced to now put up with a whole different slew of problems and usability "adjustments" (read "loss of features") in order to do ONE new thing (that yeah, needed to be done so necessarily that it outweighed the potential problems.. but not in hindsight) so now i have to use a custom kernel (because the standard fedora one does not even BOOT), which i wouldnt mind since ive done this for yearsnow, and i think its pretty cool.. but now the kernel i compiled (does it help that it was a release candidate, and not a "stable" version? probably) but now firefox runs smooth only about until i start going into the swap (thats virtual memory for you windows peoples) at which point even switching tabs takes literally several seconds.. which is unacceptable.. oh nono, dont misunderstand me, i dont mean, "load a new page into a new tab" nononono.. i mean "switch from an open tab, to any other already open tab, while nothing else is going on" for some reason this triggers the cpu usage to hit 100% for a couple seconds.. something that should NOT happen.. this might have to do with a couple of kernel features (that i might have posted on before, and were the original reason for me going into this RC kernel instead of the stable one) that were not fully mature.. i GUESS.. or hope? but in any case, iafter weeks and weeks of utter frustration, and trying to figure out what could possibly be the problem, i have found something that might give me a clue to a fix.. it might have something to do with page swapping.. so in order to test that, i just now set my swappiness to 0 (and now to 10) from the original 60 which ive had it at for a while now, to see if this might be it.. it does actually feel a bit smoother, almost right away, but we shall see if its just in my mind.. i was so ready to throw this stupid computer out the window ugh.. for weeks now. seriously, imagine typing something in your tab and pressing enter to launch your super practical firefox shortcut bookmark which saves you 3 page loads and clicks.. thats a lot of time.. ONLY to have it take almost half a minute to load.. unacceptable, i do not have that amount of time (err, patience) on my hand, and i do NOT need this stress. anyhooze, i will report back and see.. im this close to compiling the new kernel (which is a stable 2.6.38.6 --notice theres no RC in there, and that the last number is .6.. thats a good thing.. ) so, swappiness at 10 for a while (it seems 0 was making the processor go a bit crazy) it shall be.. we'll see if that helps. for those of you interested, heres how to check your swappiness:
$ cat /proc/sys/vm/swappiness
and heres how to change it (notice you have to have super user privileges, ie, be root):
# sysctl vm.swappiness=10
and now for the second part of my rant, is my mouse.. my mouse that i love, because its a scroll wheel mouse with a ball, NOT that stupid laser which i hate.. why rant about my mouse that i love? because its middle click button is now broke, but not fully, so i cant middle click paste properly anymore.. GAH!! one of the features i MOST love about a unix X graphical system is the middle click paste, and now mine doesnt properly paste.. ive resorted to punching the middle button to see if it might be grease stuck in there thats preventing the proper contact.. but it hasnt fixed the problem.. (not that it will stop me from punching it.. i need the release) the problem is that the solution is not as easy as "go out and buy a new one!".. since, well, these mice do not exist anymore!! and who in the world decided this?? who had the bright idea of saying "hey, i know, lets make ALL computer mice be optical! yeah, so that nobody can use a mouse except on a mouse pad! so screw all those people who like using their mouse on ANY surface they want, who cares about them!?" ugh.. anyways, i think im done ranting for now. let me just end by saying "fedora sucks" the end.
ah no, one last thing, now that i pasted this into a sepaate post.. it seems the swappiness trick is not really working.. its better, but not really "eureka!" kind of solved.. im going to try to restart firefox in a moment and see..)
friday the 13th.. just thought id mention that.. and that is completely unrelated to the fact that im sick now.. thats a little more related to the milk sickness from last week PLUS the fact that my wife had the "great" idea of opening the window full blast on my face several times last week, despite my telling her not to.. its like i keep telling joelie: "joel, dont get married" yeah, dont get married or you will get sick, like me. sick in the HEAD
and the timing could be worse, but it would take much more.. im going to do that wall climbing stuff that ive always wanted to do for the first time.. i wonder how it will work with half my brain leaking out my nose..
agh, and while im at it.. i bought new shoes yesterday, it might have been the fastest ive ever decided on buying shoes.. a lot to do with it being my style, my color, and yep, my kind of price.. as in, less than HALF what my last pair cost me.. and thats considering i used a gift card i won in a short promotional video contest that a friend asked me (and my wife) to be in.. anyways, it took me all but 5 minutes to try on, walk around and say "ok ill take it" (after a couple "should i take it??" to my wife.. oh and the short delay where i tried another pair of a different style/color at her behest -- yes, lets learn vocabulary!) ok now i sleep, so i can take a bit of a nap today, and be a little "less" sick..
look! i added a pagerank meter! (check the counter.. nevermind that the counter is inaccurate.. somehow a bunch of the results got lost.. i have an idea how, but oh well for now.. )
and while im still awake.. let me give you all a couple of updates from the last few days.. in progressive chronological order (that means oldest events first) to the best of my ability:
friday, we had a nice big dinner, cuz we like to eat together, and all our women friends like to cook.. so we, being gracious mens, like to let them cook for us.. and we especially like to eat their delicious foods. so luz brought her massive nuclear meatballs (not because they are spicy, or irradiated.. hmm.. though they might actually be irradiated.. anyways, they are nuclear because they are so humongous) and so i was happily eating and, worthy of note, obviously breathing.. when *WHOMP* oops, something went up the wrong pipe... and yes, i do mean "up".. as in, something went up into my nasal pipe. so, investigative work led me to look at my plate and try to discern what in the world this mysterious object that went up into by dasal cabidy is. i see couscous, meatballs the size of a kid's fist, and beef and home fries (for the uninitiated, these are just large, cooked (usually fried) potato cubes-- ok i guess technically these were just potato cubes that were part of the beef stew.. quit being so nit-picky!) guess what was my first guess.. if you guessed mutant meatballs, you are wrong.. so i kept trying to see if it would just go back down, since i figure that "breathing" (the activity that brought me into this situation) would not drive the food too high up into my nasal tube.. certainly not into my nasal cavity. so there i am making a complete A-double-hockey-sticks of myself trying to dislodge the piece of rebellious food, at which point it was noticeable that i was upto something, so i had to announce it to the table. joelie seems to find it funny when this kind of thing happens to me.. while luz finds it hilarious.. but im too busy trying to end my agony.
swallow hard, drink something, try to click the back of my throat.. gah, nothing works. ok lets try and get this piece of human fuel out the other way then. its getting annoying because the food seems to have something spicy on it, which is making me feel spicy in places ive never felt spiciness. goodness me.. i try to blow my nose.. i try again.. it doesnt even feel like it has moved at all.. try to swallow.. try to swallow again and then blow my nose.. gah! nothing! and by now, my nose was slightly running, you know, because of the spiciness up id by dasal cabidy. i decide to go sit back down and continue to try eating..
"did you get it?"
that joelie, he really cares for me.
i eat a bit more, but man, its up in there.. i wonder if its a bit of rice from the meatballs. agh, i gotta go back to blow my nose again.. i try hard, but i doesnt work. back to the table. yeah, they think its funny too. me? not so much, im too focused on the issue at hand.. the issue of course being how a piece of food in my nasal cavity is preventing me from eating my food at a pace acceptable to me. i get up another time.. im pretty sure the food is moving now.. i can feel its not at the same place it was at least at the beginning.. this gives me hope.. it shall be out of a place where only oxygen and mucus belong! i blow a couple more times, but still nothing.. i sit down and i can feel victory is at hand..
i see that there number of meatballs in the pot is dwindling, so the situation is dire if i am to fill mah belly to satisfaction. i tell them the story of the lady (or guy?) who just had terrible breath, and one day went (after im sure the person's spouse's incessant insisting) to the doctor to see what was wrong, and what it was-- at this point luz interrupted my story, so that i wouldnt interrupt her ability to continue eating.. but since you guys arent eating now, ill tell you how it ends: this person had a rotting bean in their nasal cavity.. haha crazy huh? anyhooze, at this point i rise, and walk to the washroom, and perform my best nostril isolation blow, one for the left, one for the right *PFOOT!* NAILED IT!!!! yeah!! many would be grossed out to check, and i would be too if i didnt know that the only mucus there was fresh and transparent, so not really gross. i needed to see my trophy. and yes, it was indeed a piece of the meatball.. about the size of the windows logo on your windows key on your keyboard (unless for some reason you have one of those oversized keyboards, or like me, a keyboard without the windows logo -- one more reason to love my awesome mini-keyboard) yeah, it was quite large for something that had to make the trek up my trach into by dasal cabidy add out bah dose. but there it was, finally out. for some reason this really impressed my wife. just one more reason why i love her, my amazing feats of skill that nobody appreciates, sometimes she recognizes as such and is blown away by them (oh yes, the pun is quite intended). joelie seemed to be impressed too, if i remember correctly, he said something like "if there was ever someone capable of doing what you just did, its you" haha, i guess a truer word did not get spoked.
just to clarify, since i think it needs to be clarified, no, i didnt show it to anyone.. but i did tell them what it was, and its size. so they knew.. oh, they knew indeed..
next story in the next post.. after i sleep.. cuz im dead tired
heres a good socialist lemma that is "too honest for comfort" that i came up with the other day while watching a political show:
"parents, let the government raise your children, while you can both go work hard to pay your taxes"
when written like that, suddenly government sponsored (read: "controlled") daycare is no longer such a hot idea, is it? especially in light of the high taxes they like to rake up so that the government can control it all.. now, if they sponsored one of the parents to stay home and raise these kids.. that would be a different story wouldnt it? the problem is that if the gov pays for it, the gov controls it, and the gov has its own set of morals that are most likely radically different than yours.. do you want the gov to be the one to be the compass of morality in society? really?
“Put a gun to my head and tell me to deny the vicarious atonement and I’ll tell you to the pull the trigger. Put a gun to my head and tell me to deny my eschatology and I’ll tell you to put down the gun and we’ll talk about it.”
this is something i was going to post a while ago.. yeah, like months ago.. so here it is.. for all you baldies:
i was researching some stuff on pyrithione zinc (the active ingredient in most dandruff shampoo) and i ran into this article on hair loss
The effects of minoxidil, 1% pyrithione zinc and a combination of both on hair density: a randomized controlled trial.
Abstract
BACKGROUND:
Recent studies of antidandruff shampoos or tonics containing antifungal or antibacterial agents produced effects suggestive of a potential hair growth benefit.
OBJECTIVES:
The purpose of this 6-month, 200-patient, randomized, investigator-blinded, parallel-group clinical study was to assess the hair growth benefits of a 1% pyrithione zinc shampoo. The efficacy of a 1% pyrithione zinc shampoo (used daily), was compared with that of a 5% minoxidil topical solution (applied twice daily), a placebo shampoo and a combination of the 1% pyrithione zinc shampoo and the 5% minoxidil topical solution.
[...]
RESULTS:
Hair count results showed a significant (P < 0.05) net increase in total visible hair counts for the 1% pyrithione zinc shampoo, the 5% minoxidil topical solution, and the combination treatment groups relative to the placebo shampoo after 9 weeks of treatment. The relative increase in hair count for the 1% pyrithione zinc shampoo was slightly less than half that for the minoxidil topical solution and was essentially maintained throughout the 26-week treatment period. No advantage was seen in using both the 5% minoxidil topical solution and the 1% pyrithione zinc shampoo. A small increase in hair diameter was observed for the minoxidil-containing treatment groups at week 17. Assessments of global improvements by the patients and investigator generally showed the benefit of 5% minoxidil. The benefit of the 1% pyrithione zinc shampoo used alone tended (P < 0.1) to be apparent only to the investigator.
CONCLUSIONS:
Hair count results show a modest and sustained improvement in hair growth with daily use of a 1% pyrithione zinc shampoo over a 26-week treatment period.
interesting, huh? now you can all start washing your shiny heads with dandruff shampoo and have it sprout like a chia pet! by the way, i use dandruff shampoo on my skin too, since its good for cleaning the oil off of it, and removing pimples etc.. so its not like a chia recipe for wherever you wash with it.. you won't magically start growing hair on your nose for example.. you won't start looking like a wolfman.. oh, a picture would be great at this point:
thats the indian wolf child -- Pruthviraj Patil.. not because he is wolf-like in behavior, but because he is really hairy.. lay off the dandruff shampoo, pruthi!
![red crested tree rat](http://ph.cdn.photos.upi.com/view/1ed09863a71fa0e85a327ef14fc3c71f/Red-crested-tree-rat-reappears-in-Colombia-South-America.jpg"")
get your own ads on insaner.com for just $1