Fucking co-workers

Really, I'd love to know how some people have the mental capacity to keep breathing! How fucking stupid can you get? I'm quality checking a little stack of copies about 300 pages thick. I should have been done already. I'm about a quarter of the way through it. If there is anything you can do wrong while making a damn photocopy, this person did it. How can you not notice that you just sent 5 pages stapled together through the document feeder? Or that your copies are so light that you can't read them? Or how could you not know that you should take the post-it notes off the paper before you copy it? Maybe it would be a good idea to copy it on a different page? Maybe the client might actually want or even need to see the text the post it note is covering? Or really, best of all, WHY WOULD YOU STAPLE A SINGLE SHEET? What are you stapling it too? Maybe an invisible sheet of paper? I guess I had best remember to bring my fucking invisible glasses to work tomorrow, hadn't I? That way I'll be able to see that it's more than just one bloody page with a staple in it!
Oh, and Asshole, no I don't want to train New Girl, especially with this particularly irritating bit of miserable shit I'm working on! If I wanted to train people, I would have stayed in my management position at fucking Kinko's, you retard. One of the (many) reasons I took this job is because I am not a good teacher, & I hate trying to train people. That's why you're the supervisor, you hapless bastard.

clockwork

Like two clocks

out of sync

we try to wind

ourselves together

somehow

no matter

how hard we try

to meet in the middle

we always end up

with our hands

pointing in

opposite directions

(04-18-06)

Is this cow a human-animal hybrid?

In his 2006 State of the Union address President Bush slipped in a call for a ban on "human-animal hybrids." It's probably a phrase that brings thoughts of centaurs, fauns and harpies to some minds.
But, despite the President's stern disapproval of mixed-species clones, we may soon find food products derived from them not just in our research labs, but on our kitchen tables within the next year.
A Dutch biotechnology company called Pharming has genetically engineered cows, outfitting females with a human gene that causes them to express high levels of the protein human lactoferrin in their milk. According to Pharming's website, the proteinwhich is naturally present in human tears, lung secretions, milk and other bodily fluidsfights against the bacteria that causes eye and lung infections, plays a key role in the immune system of infants and adults and improves intestinal microbial balance, promoting the health of the gastro-intestinal tract.
Scientists have tested the toxicity of the proteinisolated from the cows' milkon rats. They found thateven at the high level of 2,000 mg recombinant human lactoferrin per kg body weightorally consumed human lactoferrin has no adverse effects to complement all the supposed benefits already mentioned.
Pharming has, therefore, filed a notification with the FDA asking that their lactoferrin be labeled "Generally Recognized As Safe" (GRAS). If the FDA approves this product, human lactoferrin derived from these cloned cows could be in America's yogurt, popsicles, sports drinks and snack bars within months.
To create human lactoferrin-lactating cows, Pharming's scientists introduce human DNA coding for the protein's production into the nuclei of fertilized bovine eggs. The cells that successfully incorporate the foreign DNA or "transgene" are then selected, and each is fused with a second egg cell that has had its nucleus removed. The fused cells are then implanted in a surrogate cow's uterus. If all goes well, the cow becomes pregnant with a transgenic calf that, upon maturity two years later, will produce milk containing human lactoferrin. Despite that one component of its milk, the calf is all bovinebut technically remains an example of the dastardly human-animal hybrid.
The "humanness" of the protein may be both its strongest selling point and the label that will delay and possibly squash its eventual release to the marketplace. Surveys consistently show that Americans are wary of using genetically modified animals, specifically cloned animals, for food. In fact, a 2005 survey by the Pew Initiative On Food And Biotechnology found that only 23% of American consumers believe that food from cloned animals is safe, while 43% believe it is unsafe.
Despite the public sentiment, the FDA is still working out its official policy on transgenic animals. The agency currently asks that any company looking to introduce transgenic animals into the food supply contact the Center for Veterinary Medicine for instructions on how to prepare an investigational file. It has not yet approved any food from transgenic animals, but according to Singh, the organization has approved a handful proteins made through mammalian cell culture technology, where cells are cultured in a synthetic environment.

"The Federal policy on transgenic animals is under discussion at the White House level," said an FDA spokesperson via e-mail. "Those discussions will ultimately produce a seamless interagency approach to the regulation of genetically engineered animals."
Products from transgenic animals have seen no real success in passing through any approval agencies, thus far. According to the BBC, in February, the European Medicines Agency turned down an application to license Atryn, an anti-clotting agent collected from the milk of transgenic goats, because of insufficient scientific research into its safety and benefit. California-based Ventria Bioscience filed a GRAS notification on human lactoferrin produced in rice back in December, 2004. The status of the application is still listed as pending—every other notification from 2004 was closed by mid-2005. Singh isn't worried that his human lactoferrin protein will face a similar fate.
"Regulatory agencies both in the US and Europe have not said to companies who are working with this sort of technology that they have any issues with the technology itself," Singh said. "There are different uses and different applications; I think this is a relatively straightforward application. If there aren't any issues with the protein itself, I would expect the regulatory agencies would not have any serious concerns."
As for the President's State of the Union remarks, the FDA had no comment. Singh said he'd received feedback from others in the biotechnology industry that Bush was not talking about these sort of transgenic animals but rather about animals created purely for human organ harvesting, such as mice capable of growing human ears on their backs.
Even though Pharming has run multiple tests on their protein to ensure it is safe, and the FDA's claims that it's open to transgenic technology, human lactoferrin from transgenic cows faces an uphill climb from the lab in the Netherlands to the shelves at your local grocery store. The people at Pharming are just hoping that regulatory agencies recognize that transgenic milk does a body good. Very good.

Read It? Watched It? Swap It

For Heather Perlmutter, a 41-year-old investment portfolio manager in Manhattan, the Web site with the whimsical name made perfect sense. Like many Americans, she found herself awash in CD's, DVD's and VHS tapes that were seldom if ever played anymore. They just took up valuable space in the Upper West Side apartment where she lives with her husband and two young children.
Then a friend of a friend told her about Zunafish, a new Web site that matches people with discs and tapes to trade and video games and paperback books, too.
"You feel like you're getting something special, that you're getting the better part of the deal," Ms. Perlmutter said. "Wow, somebody wants your stuff. I guess it's one man's trash is another man's treasure."
That was certainly the thinking of Dan Elias and Billy Bloom, the unlikely founders of Zunafish.
In a highly competitive era, independent tinkerers who are convinced they have a big idea can face big problems getting the idea to market. Even video games, once famous for whisking their creators from makeshift workshops to fast fortunes and expensive cars, are mostly made today by corporate teams of designers and programmers in sprawling office parks.
But Mr. Elias, a television news anchor in western Massachusetts, and Mr. Bloom, the owner of a volleyball league in New York City, both self-described amateurs at creating a digital service and company, spawned Zunafish, a singularly simple-to-use media trading site.
"We have no background in technology," said Mr. Elias, a 45-year-old native New Yorker who now lives in Northampton, Mass. "I think we always thought from the start that it was a big idea. There are hundreds of billions of dollars of idle media materials sitting in people's homes."
Mr. Bloom, 47, said of the company's humble origins, "If we lived in the country, it would have literally been created in one of our garages."
The site, which looks remarkably similar to a prototype Mr. Bloom sketched on notebook paper four years ago with Mr. Elias, trades only one-for-one items within the same category CD's, DVD's, VHS tapes, video games, audio books or paperback books. No item (for example, a seven-disc DVD set of the first season of the television series "24") is worth more than any another (say, a DVD of Peter Jackson's "King Kong").
Traders using the site determine the relative value of an item by choosing to swap or not. No one is ever forced to make a trade, Mr. Elias noted.
Each trader pays Zunafish $1 through credit or debit card for each trade. The site then calculates the postage costs and creates addressed mailing labels that can be downloaded and printed out. Each trader, Mr. Bloom said, is responsible for paying the postage and mailing the item promptly.
Like buyers and sellers on eBay, the traders on Zunafish rate each other, providing a confidence index for future transactions.
One notable feature is how easy it is to post items on Zunafish to be traded.
Mr. Bloom said Zunafish used a database that was updated weekly. Type in the name of an item or its universal product code (usually found near an item's bar code) or the I.S.B.N. number for books and the database pulls up a full description of the item and a digital photograph of its cover. If the match is correct, the user clicks O.K. and the item is posted.
There are other online trading sites, including Peerflix and BarterBee, which started last summer, that offer trading in similar categories. But other sites tend to offer a more limited range of items, or they use more complicated systems, requiring points and memberships to execute trades.

Man Ticketed For Changing Red Lights To Green

A Longmont, Colorado man has been ticketed $50 for suspicion of interfering with a traffic signal, but he says he really enjoyed using it.
Jason Niccum told The Longmont Times-Call that he bought a device that let him change traffic lights from red to green, called an Opticon, on eBay for $100.
He told the newspaper the device "paid for itself" in the two years he had it, helping him cut his time driving to work.
Niccum was cited on March 29 after police said they caught him using the strobe-like device to change traffic signals. Police confiscated the Opticon, and informed Niccum it was illegal to possess it.
"I'm always running late," police quoted Niccum as saying in an incident report.
An Opticon shines a strobe light on the optical sensors set atop some traffic signals, causing lights to jam.
City traffic engineer Joe Olson said traffic engineers plan to update the city's system this year to block unauthorized light-changing signals. He estimated that a new system, which would be able to block out all unauthorized light-changing signals, will cost taxpayers about $75,000.
The Opticon devices, which are becoming more commonplace, are marketed through many different avenues. Dealers are instructed to sell only to "authorized users" such as volunteer first responders, doctors and security personnel, but it is easy for anyone to buy the devices online.

12 Volunteers to Start Getting HIV Vaccine

12 Volunteers to Start Getting HIV Vaccine

Human volunteers this week began signing up for an experimental HIV vaccine developed at Atlanta's Emory University.
Twelve people are expected to take part in the trial at four participating research centers.
Volunteers should begin getting shots any day now, said Don Hildebrand, the chief executive of GeoVax Inc., the Atlanta biotechnology firm that licensed the vaccine.
It's a phase one trial, in which healthy, uninfected volunteers are given low doses in a check for safety and immune response, Hildebrand said Friday.
A second, higher-dose trial _ with 36 people _ is expected to begin in a few months.
If these trials are successful, future trials will be done to see if the vaccine actually prevents the virus from causing AIDS, he said.
The GeoVax product is one of more than 30 preventive AIDS vaccines in early stages of human clinical trials in approximately two dozen countries, according to the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative, a not-for-profit organization devoted to AIDS prevention.
One of the furthest along is a Merck & Co. vaccine, which tries to build immunity using a modified cold virus. About 3,000 people are being enrolled in Merck's phase two trial of the vaccine.
The GeoVax vaccine is administered in four doses, spread over the course of about two months. The first two doses contain fragments of HIV DNA, which prime the patient's immune response system. The second two doses contain an altered poxvirus designed to boost the immune system, Hildebrand said.
It was developed by a scientific team led by Harriet Robinson of Emory's Yerkes National Primate Research Center. Emory researchers began working on the vaccine in 1997. It worked in rhesus macaques, protecting 22 of 23 vaccinated monkeys from AIDS for more than 3 1/2 years.
In 2003 and 2004, the DNA component of the vaccine was tested in 30 HIV-negative volunteers in Birmingham, Seattle and San Francisco. It was deemed safe, Hildebrand said. The new trials are testing both the components, he explained.

Orangoo spell check

Orangoo spell check

This little application lets you spell correct from any system or computer that has Internet access. Spell check is avalible in 28 languages.


I have to say, I find spell checking in 28 languages pretty impressive, although I doubt ever needing to spell check in anything but english.

Science-Astronomy-The Sky Really Is Falling!

Large Chunk of Ice Falls From Sky in California

A chunk of ice dropped out of the sky and left a huge hole in the ground this weekend at Oakland's Bushrod Park in California, and not even astronomy experts know where it came from.
Jacek Purat, a witness to the falling ice, grabbed a piece and is storing it in his freezer. He says it came out of the southwestern sky, slammed into the ground and exploded into pieces.
It burrowed about two-and-a-half feet into the ground, where Oakland firefighters retrieved it.
"They just pulled it out and threw it on the sidewalk and it broke into pieces," Purat said.
Ron Wilson, an aviation consultant for ABC7/KGO-TV in San Francisco, said it probably didn't come from an aircraft. He believes the only possible way it could have come from an airplane is if the plane's valve for freshwater had leaked at a high elevation.
The other possibility is that it is a chunk of ice from space.
"It's very unlikely for a piece of a comet to make it down to our surface, mainly because of the shock waves it encounters as it's entering our atmosphere," said Ryan Diduck at the Chabot Space and Science Center.
If the ice contains chlorine, it more than likely came from an airplane's freshwater tank. If not, scientists would like to see if it contains impurities from space that make up the solar system, like dust and dirt.
"It produced some little bit of inflammation, sensation of the tips of your fingers as if it had a little bit acid maybe or something like that," Purat said.
So far, no one has asked to analyze Mr. Purat 's chunk of mysterious ice.



Falling ice perplexes scientists
Theories abound after 2 chunks land in state in a week.

The skies are raining big chunks of ice, and experts ranging from scientists to federal investigators are scrambling to learn what's going on.
For the second time in a week, California was the victim of an aerial, icy assault, the latest being early Thursday when a chunk of ice the size of a microwave oven plunged out of a cloudless sky into the San Bernardino County town of Loma Linda. The ice punched through the metal roof of a recreation center, leaving a hole up to 2 1/2 feet wide, then fragmented into opaque, brilliant white chunks, one as big as a bowling ball. No one was hurt.
The simplest, least controversial hypothesis is that the ice was dropped from airplanes, but there's little direct support for that view. A few experts who study such phenomena have suggested that similar occurrences around the world owe more to exotic causes, perhaps even global warming.
In both cases, the ice was clear or whitish -- not bluish, as one would expect of ice that had leaked from an airplane's restroom, for instance.
Legends about plunging ice go back for centuries. They didn't begin to receive serious scientific attention until a few years ago, however, when Spain and other countries were pelted by the mystery intruders.
Possible explanations range from the mundane to the bizarre.
One theory is that ice is somehow forming on the outside of aircraft, perhaps in areas that aren't protected by deicing equipment, said David Travis, a climatologist at the University of Wisconsin at Whitewater. Last year, he and 11 others co-wrote an article on the ice-fall mystery in the Journal of Atmospheric Chemistry.
Lead author Jesus Martinez-Frias of the Planetary Geology Laboratory in Madrid and his colleagues have collected reports of 40 cases around the world since 1999 of puzzling falling ice, or "megacryometeors," as they call the strange objects.
Martinez-Frias hypothesizes that the ice forms in the upper atmosphere by a process similar to the formation of hail inside thunderstorms but without a thunderstorm. But how can ice fall from a cloudless sky? Martinez-Frias speculates that global warming is causing the lower part of the atmosphere -- the troposphere, where we live -- to expand and rise. This means that the tropopause, which is the so-called roof of the troposphere, is forced to a greater height, where it cools more than normal.
Thus, he suggests, the new, steeper temperature difference between warm and cold air in the upper atmosphere generates turbulent up-and-down winds that repeat the hail-formation process, without a thunderstorm.

Science- Why is the sky blue? Facts you should know

Why is the sky blue? Facts you should know

Scientists offer 10 basic questions to test your knowledge.

Think you know you know your science? Recently, several science gurus -- Nobel Prize winners, institute heads, teachers and others who spend most of their time thinking about science -- were asked, "What is one science question every high school graduate should be able to answer?"

Take their quiz and see how you do.

1. What percentage of the earth is covered by water?

ROBERT GAGOSIAN, WOODS HOLE OCEANOGRAPHIC INSTITUTE

2. What sorts of signals does the brain use to communicate sensations, thoughts and actions?

TORSTEN WEISEL, ROCKEFELLER INSTITUTE, NEW YORK

3. Did dinosaurs and humans ever exist at the same time?

ANDREW C. REVKIN, NEW YORK TIMES SCIENCE REPORTER

4. What is Darwin's theory of the origin of species?

JONATHAN WEINER, 1995 PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING AUTHOR

5. Why does a year consist of 365 days, and a day of 24 hours?

LESLIE SAGE, NATURE MAGAZINE

6. Why is the sky blue?

ROY GLAUBER, 2005 NOBEL PRIZE WINNER; HARVARD UNIVERSITY

7. What causes a rainbow?

KIM KASTENS, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

8. What is it that makes diseases caused by viruses and bacteria hard to treat?

HELLE GAWRYLEWSKI, JOHNSON & JOHNSON (AND THE AUTHOR'S MOTHER)

9. How old are the oldest fossils on earth?

PAUL NURSE, 2001 NOBEL PRIZE WINNER; ROCKEFELLER INSTITUTE

10. Why do we put salt on sidewalks when it snows?

ARTHUR KNUDSEN, BRIDGETON, N.J., SCHOOLS

Extra credit: What makes the seasons change?

If this quiz wasn't as easy as you thought it would be, you're not alone. According to a recent National Science Board survey, 90 percent of Americans are interested in science, but only 15 percent consider themselves well-informed. In high schools, only 60 percent of students complete a general biology class, while only 40 percent complete a general chemistry class and a scant 27 percent complete a physics class, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

Answers:

1. About 71 percent of the earth's surface is covered by water.

2. The single cells in the brain communicate through electrical and chemical signals.

3. No. Dinosaurs went extinct at the end of the Cretaceous period, 65 million years ago. Modern humans did not appear until around 200,000 years ago.

4. Darwin's theory of species origination says that natural selection chooses organisms that possess variable and heritable traits and that are best suited for their environments.

5. A year, 365 days, is the time it takes for the earth to travel around the sun. A day, 24 hours, is the time it takes for the earth to spin around once on its axis.

6. Solar radiation sunlight is scattered across the atmosphere by a process called diffused sky radiation. The sky is blue because much more short-wave radiation -- blue light -- is scattered across the sky than long-wave radiation -- red light.

7. Rainbows can be seen when there are water droplets in the air and the sun is shining. Sunlight, which contains all colors, is refracted, or bent, off the droplets at different angles, splitting into its different colors of red, yellow, blue, etc.

8. Influenza viruses and others continually change over time, usually by mutation. This change enables the virus to evade the immune system of its host so that people are susceptible to influenza virus infection throughout their lives. Bacteria mutate in the same way and can also become resistant if overtreated with antibiotics.

9. About 3.8 billion years; they're bacteria-like organisms.

10. Adding salt to snow or ice increases the number of molecules on the ground surface and makes it harder for the water to freeze. Salt can lower freezing temperatures on sidewalks to 15 degrees from 32 degrees.

Extra credit: Seasons occur because the earth is tilted at an angle of 23.5 degrees. At certain times of year the top half of the earth leans to the sun and therefore gets more sun and has summer. When that same half of the earth leans away from the sun it gets less light and has winter.

Science-Enviroment- Giant Deep-Sea Volcano With "Moat of Death" Found

Giant Deep-Sea Volcano With "Moat of Death" Found


Beneath the waves of the South Pacific lies a volcanic realm nearly as strange as that featured in TV's hit drama Lost.
But instead of a mysterious island, scientists have found a bubbling submarine volcano whose weird features include a swirling vortex, a host of strange animals, and a fearsome zone of toxic waters dubbed the Moat of Death.
The volcano sits within the crater of a gigantic underwater mountain rising more than 4,500 meters (15,000 feet) from the ocean floor near the island of Samoa.
The seamount, called Vailulu'u, is an active volcano, with a 2-mile-wide (3.2-kilometer-wide) crater. The cone rising within it has been dubbed Nafanua, for the Samoan goddess of war.
Five years ago Hubert Staudigel of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California, and his colleagues mapped the mountain using remote-sensing techniques.
When they returned to the site in 2005 for a more thorough study with submersible vehicles, the scientists found that the seamount had grown a new, 300-meter (1,000-foot) lava cone, a sign of renewed volcanic activity.
The peak of the cone, 700 meters (2,300 feet) below sea level, turned out to be teeming with life.
"It was just full of eels," Staudigel said. "When we sent the submersible down, we found hundreds of eels scurrying out of the rock. Normally you'd see one or two."
Moat of Death

The moat lies between Vailulu'u's encircling crater and the rim of the cone inside it.
It's an extremely toxic environment, Staudigel said, where oxygen levels are dangerously low and volcanic vents fill the water with iron soot "almost like underwater smog."
The volcano is also spewing liquid carbon dioxide, which combines with seawater to make a deadly acidic mix.

Going Nuclear - Greenpeace founder changes mind, supports nuclear energy

Going Nuclear

In the early 1970s when I helped found Greenpeace, I believed that nuclear energy was synonymous with nuclear holocaust, as did most of my compatriots. That's the conviction that inspired Greenpeace's first voyage up the spectacular rocky northwest coast to protest the testing of U.S. hydrogen bombs in Alaska's Aleutian Islands. Thirty years on, my views have changed, and the rest of the environmental movement needs to update its views, too, because nuclear energy may just be the energy source that can save our planet from another possible disaster: catastrophic climate change.
Look at it this way: More than 600 coal-fired electric plants in the United States produce 36 percent of U.S. emissions -- or nearly 10 percent of global emissions -- of CO2, the primary greenhouse gas responsible for climate change. Nuclear energy is the only large-scale, cost-effective energy source that can reduce these emissions while continuing to satisfy a growing demand for power. And these days it can do so safely.
And although I don't want to underestimate the very real dangers of nuclear technology in the hands of rogue states, we cannot simply ban every technology that is dangerous. That was the all-or-nothing mentality at the height of the Cold War, when anything nuclear seemed to spell doom for humanity and the environment. In 1979, Jane Fonda and Jack Lemmon produced a frisson of fear with their starring roles in "The China Syndrome," a fictional evocation of nuclear disaster in which a reactor meltdown threatens a city's survival. Less than two weeks after the blockbuster film opened, a reactor core meltdown at Pennsylvania's Three Mile Island nuclear power plant sent shivers of very real anguish throughout the country.
What nobody noticed at the time, though, was that Three Mile Island was in fact a success story: The concrete containment structure did just what it was designed to do -- prevent radiation from escaping into the environment. And although the reactor itself was crippled, there was no injury or death among nuclear workers or nearby residents. Three Mile Island was the only serious accident in the history of nuclear energy generation in the United States, but it was enough to scare us away from further developing the technology: There hasn't been a nuclear plant ordered up since then.
Today, there are 103 nuclear reactors quietly delivering just 20 percent of America's electricity. Eighty percent of the people living within 10 miles of these plants approve of them (that's not including the nuclear workers). Although I don't live near a nuclear plant, I am now squarely in their camp.



The original article is more in-depth, and includes some common myths & concerns about nuclear energy.

Science-Astronomy-Tenth planet turns out to be a shiner

Brilliant! Tenth planet turns out to be a shiner.

Xena, unofficially called the 10th planet, is the second-most-shiny known object in the solar system, new observations show. Scientists are scrambling to explain where Xena got its sparkle. Some suggest that it might have enough heat to belch methane, despite being in the coldest region of the solar system.
The new notion of Xena arises from Hubble Space Telescope images that were released this week. The images reveal that Xena, the most distant known object in our solar system, isn't quite the big shot that scientists had thought it was.
Researchers have difficulty determining the size of remote denizens of the solar system because a large object that reflects a small amount of sunlight looks the same as a small object reflecting a lot of light.
But for Xena, the sharp Hubble pictures erase that ambiguity.
The relatively small size shown in those images indicates that the body reflects 86 percent of sunlight. Brown says he was "thoroughly shocked" by that finding. Researchers had assumed that Xena's surface was similar to that of Pluto, which reflects 60 percent of sunlight. Saturn's moon Enceladus, recently shown to be shooting out a geyser of water vapor is the only solar system object known to have a higher reflectivity, notes Brown.


The distant sun shines on Xena, often called the 10th planet, in this illustration. Inset: The Hubble Space Telescope image that revealed Xena's size for the first time.
A. Schaller, NASA, ESA; (Inset) Brown, NASA, ESA

ARRGGGHHHH!

Will you just shut the fuck up? Really, if you can't stop being bitchy and negitive for a whole minute even, then I don't want to be anywhere near you! I am so sick of your pissy attitude. Maybe if you didn't think that everything and everyone else is beneath you, they wouldn't be so irritating to you! Oh, and I've also had enough with the whole tolerate and respect everyone's beliefs & opinions, as long as you agree with them. AAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, I feel better now.




________________________________________________________________
Comments:

Patience:

And breathe!

What happened?

Patience

___________________________________________________________

Aeryn:

Nothing really, just a friend/co-worker with a persestently negitive, whiney, bitchy attitude lately. Needed to vent before I spoke out of anger, that's all. Oh, and the incredulus, almost laughing "Why would you do that?" when I mentioned that I was going to church on Sunday. (And probably Friday night too.)
I knew that if I ddin't get it off my chest, I'd be likely to say something I'd regret later.

CoA - The Church of Areaology

CoA - The Church of Areaology

Come on, you know you want to join!

The Original David Bowie's Area webpage

Everest Expedition Uncovers Exotic Species

Everest Expedition Uncovers Exotic Species

Mount Everest and the Himalaya mountain range conjure images of llamas and Sherpas loaded with heavy packs. But tucked into the cold shadows of the world's tallest mountain are biologically diverse hotspots filled with poorly known plants and animals found nowhere else on the globe.

Scientists from Conservation International and Disney's Animal Kingdom recently launched a two-month scientific expedition into six regions of the Tibetan "Sacred Lands" in the mountains of Southwest China and Nepal.

Today they announced the discovery of a pocket of the world rich in extraordinary flora and fauna.
Here's a sampling of the outlandish critters:
Giant hornets so deadly locals call them "Yak Killers"


Jumping "Yeti" mice


A new grasshopper species in which the males hitch piggy-back rides on the females


Baby blue-faced golden monkeys, the region's largest primates


Hamster-like pikas that eat their own feces


A couple of new frog species, eight new insect species, and ten new species of ants to add the more than 11,000 already known.
More critters can be viewed here.

The full results of the expedition will be shared with numerous governments, scientists, and environmental and conservation organizations to develop strategies to protect the many unique species of the region.

Disney's film crew was rolling tape during the mission for a 2-hour documentary that will premiere April 15th at 8:00 PM (ET) on Discovery's Animal Planet

The Lover Style Profile Test

The Surprising Lover

59% Partner focus, 28% Aggressiveness, 60% Adventurousness

Based on the results of this test, it is highly likely that:

You prefer your romance and love to wild and daring rather than typical or boring, you would rather be pursued than do the pursuing and, when it comes to physical love, your satisfaction comes more from providing a wonderful time to your partner than simply seeking your own.

This places you in the Lover Style of: The Surprising Lover.

The Surprising Lover is a wonderful Lover Style, and, like the name implies, is often filled with hidden delights and talents that might not be apparent from a surface knowledge of the person. The Surprising Lover is rather like a geode--sometimes rough on the exterior, but filled with beauty and wonder. The Surprising Lover is thus a gem to find, though it can sometimes be difficult to do so because they often tend to be humble and unwilling to reveal their inner greatness unless they're in a rewarding relationship.

In terms of physical love, the Surprising Lover really shines, often highly imaginative and utterly devoted to bringing the heights of pleasure to the one that they truly love. Given a rewarding, reciprocative relationship, and the right lover, the Surprising Lover can be a delight in bed.

Best Compatibility can probably be found with: The Carnal Lover (most of all) or the Exotic Lover, or the Suave Lover.

The Lover Style Profile Test

The Nerd? Geek? or Dork? Test

The Nerd? Geek? or Dork? Test

Outcast Genius 86 % Nerd, 56% Geek, 56% Dork

For The Record: A Nerd is someone who is passionate about learning/being smart/academia. A Geek is someone who is passionate about some particular area or subject, often an obscure or difficult one. A Dork is someone who has difficulty with common social expectations/interactions. You scored better than half in all three, earning you the title of: Outcast Genius. Outcast geniuses usually are bright enough to understand what society wants of them, and they just don't care! They are highly intelligent and passionate about the things they know are *truly* important in the world. Typically, this does not include sports, cars or make-up, but it can on occassion (and if it does then they know more than all of their friends combined in that subject). Outcast geniuses can be very lonely, due to their being outcast from most normal groups and too smart for the room among many other types of dorks and geeks, but they can also be the types to eventually rule the world, ala Bill Gates, the prototypical Outcast Genius. Congratulations!

The Underwear Oracle

***What Your Underwear Says About You***

When you're bad, you're very bad. And when you're good, you're still trouble!

You're sexy, in that pinup girl, tease sort of way.

What Animal Were You In a Past Life?

You Were a Polar Bear

A bit of a loner, you enjoy introspection and solitude
You are a fighter, and you will seek revenge on those who harm you.


What Animal Were You In a Past Life?

Boy gets caught in toy-filled 'claw' machine

Boy gets caught in toy-filled 'claw' machine

Devin Haskin isn't the first little boy to find the inside of a toy machine too enticing to resist.
When the 3-year-old Austin, Minn., boy crawled through the discharge chute of a Toy Chest claw machine at a Godfather's Pizza in his hometown, he ended up on the other side of the glass surrounded by stuffed animals.
Rescuers had to pry the door open to get Devin out, though the boy was in no hurry to leave.
"When we got it open, he didn't want to come out," Fire Chief Dan Wilson said Tuesday. "One of my firefighters had to reach inside and get him. He was happy in there."
Two years ago, a boy crawled inside a toy machine at a Piggly Wiggly in Sheboygan, Wis., and was rescued with the help of a locksmith. Last year, a toddler climbed into a toy machine at a Wal-Mart in Elkhart, Ind. Workers used tools to free the boy.
Wilson said there was a lot of activity at Godfather's on Sunday when the boy got inside the machine. He estimated that 75 to 100 people were in the restaurant when rescuers arrived and that three birthday parties were taking place. But there was plenty of air in the machine and people were taking pictures of Devin.
He said the gap Devin squeezed through was about 7 inches by 9 inches.



How? That's all I really want to know. Not how did he squeeze through that tiny hole, but how in hell could you pay that little attention to your child? It was a 9x7 inch hole. It had to have taken him some time to get in there! Really, you would think the mother would have noticed her toddler was missing. Some (most) people just shouldn't be allowed to breed!

Suspect in downtown shooting charged with murder

Suspect in downtown shooting charged with murder

After police moved a group of arguing people outside a Block E movie theatre about midnight Friday, suspect Derick D. Holliday, 21, pulled a handgun, fired it in the air and started chasing a man who fled on foot, said murder charges filed today.
Holliday, of Minneapolis, fired repeatedly at the fleeing man as he fled through a parking lot by Sixth Street. He missed his target, but a bullet hit and killed Alan Reitter, who was walking with friends by the parking lot.
Holliday tried to enter the Karma Bar, but employees stopped him until Officer Jomar Villamor arrived and arrested him. He was charged today in Hennepin County District Court with first-degree murder, attempted murder and first-degree assault for aiming a gun at an officer.
"This is premeditation because Holliday deliberately fired multiple gunshots as he chased after another person on a crowded street," said County Attorney Amy Klobuchar. "The intent follows the bullet."

Updates in Fatal Uptown Shooting

2 Arrested in Fatal Uptown Shooting

A woman and a juvenile male were arrested without incident about 5 p.m. near 33rd and Emerson Avenues N., according to police.
Zebuhr, 25, was shot in the head about 9:55 p.m. on a Saturday when two males approached him, his mother, his sister and a friend as they returned to their car after having dinner at Calhoun Square. They robbed his mother and reportedly fled in a white car.
The victims didn't resist and did everything they should have in a robbery, police have said, adding that the shooting was an aberration.

Police say Uptown shooter is in custody

A 17-year-old boy and a 22-year-old Minneapolis woman were arrested Monday when the department's Violent Crime Apprehension Team spotted the teenager getting into a car near 33rd and Emerson Avenues N. Police said they are still searching for three more juveniles, one of whom is charged in connection with the death of Michael Zebuhr.
"We are extremely confident that the person responsible for the shooting is the 17-year-old" arrested Monday afternoon, said Assistant Police Chief Timothy Dolan.
Of the five suspects, only the woman arrested is an adult. Authorities have issued an arrest warrant for another juvenile involved, who wasn't identified.


2 arrested after car sought in Uptown case found burning

A burning car that police found in Brooklyn Park turned out to be the vehicle robbers used to flee the scene of the shooting of a man in the Uptown area of Minneapolis.
Minneapolis police had been asking for the public's help Tuesday in finding a white 1994 Ford Taurus with a Minnesota license plate number of GFG 527. About 10 p.m., several people called Brooklyn Park police about an explosion in the 6500 block of 66th Avenue N., said Capt. Greg Roehl. The callers also gave police a description of two people leaving the scene in a car.
A 33-year-old Minneapolis man and a 22-year-old Duluth woman were booked on suspicion of arson. One of them is related to a juvenile suspect who is still being sought in the shooting death.
Minneapolis police Capt. Rich Stanek said police had not been seeking the two people arrested Tuesday by Brooklyn Park police. Investigators are trying to determine if the two are connected to Zebuhr's death. Stanek reiterated that anybody who interfered with the investigation or aided any suspects could face criminal charges.

Well, it seems that they're narrowing in on the suspects on pretty quickly. I'm glad to hear it. It's a damn shame that someone had to die before they brought some of our police back to the neighborhood though.

Gift - Leonard Cohen

You tell me that silence
Is nearer to peace than poems
But if for my gift
I brought you silence
(For I have know silence)
You would say
This is not silence
This is another poem
And you would hand it back to me

the great self therapy project, phase one

Okay, although I knew this whole sharing more about myself thing wasn't going to be easy, I don't think I'm quite ready to start putting down current things right now.
I think that I'm going to start with some older stuff, journal entries, poems, and what not. Keep an eye out for some possible introspective rambling at the end!
So yeah, expect to see older stuff mixed in with my more current thoughts & feeling. I'll always post the date on the top, if it's not something current, so that you'll know.

I hope I don't scare anyone away with all this crazy!

Random downtown shooting

Victim of downtown random shooting identified

A bystander was killed late Friday near Block E in downtown Minneapolis, prompting questions about the area's safety.
Police and community leaders said the shooting of Reitter near the Block E entertainment complex was a senseless act, and the death raised questions about safety downtown and led to calls for renewed efforts to stop gun violence in the city.
About a minute after the 11:35 p.m. shooting, police arrested a 21-year-old Minneapolis man, after a foot chase.

Numerous officers had converged on the area in response to a large fight and a report of shots being fired. But Dolan said the suspect has told police that he was not being threatened or assaulted, nor was he trying to defend himself when he began firing shots.
The suspect "just shot into a crowd of people," Dolan said.
Police said multiple shots were fired.

Reitter, the victim, was not involved in the fight. He was struck in the head as he was walking with friends. He died later at Hennepin County Medical Center.

Chris Greising, a worker at the Borders bookstore in Block E, was upstairs right before the shooting, looking at lines of perhaps 200 people outside the theater. Suddenly the crowd started running and screaming, and he heard at least two gunshots, he said.
"It was just sort of anarchy," he said of the people scattering. More than a dozen people started to rush into the bookstore, prompting Greising to call his manager and say, "We need to close now."

I was down there on Friday night. I was at a concert at the 7th St Entry, right across the fucking street. That could have been me. If the show had started on time, we would have been leaving at 11:30.
I think it's about time to start thinking about geting the hell out of here. Once you add this to the random shooting in Uptown two weeks ago, that was just blocks from my apartment. I don't want to live someplace where I have to be afraid to get get shot for no reason just going around the corner for a fucking cup of coffee.

Platypus!

I have no real reason for posting this. I just felt like putting up a picture of platypus.

Gravity

If John was earth, Kyle is water, and Colin would have been fire, does that mean that you will be air, my dearest heart, my twin soul? What does that symbolize for us?
Will you be the one to not only lift me up, but to give me wings? Are you truly the other half of my soul, my balance, my gravity? It certainly seems that you hold my breath in your heartbeat, my heart in your hands.
Are you any less deadly to me than any of the other loves I have known? Or will you become a tornado, breaking me to pieces when I try to hold you to me? Even so, I will reach out to enfold you in my arms, and take the risk that I will be dissolved in your embrace.
Oh how I love you, Irene, my darling, my dearest. I don't know what all this really means, or why it has happened. Honestly, I really don't care.
I just want to be able to hold you in my arms, to kiss you, to protect & take care of you, to make you smile. Just to wake up beside you would be heaven, to be able to touch you.
I have not yet touched you, or even looked upon your face in person, yet I am sure that I can not live with out you.

mist

In the end we are all ghosts here. Screaming to be noticed in voices they never hear.
We become corporeal only when they want to take possession of us. Sometimes pleasant, sometimes distasteful, but almost always leaving us still empty inside. They only understand one way to fill us.
Why is it that men never seem to notice that we spend too much time invisible for our smiles to ever reach our eyes?

Scientists discover swimming ants

Scientists discover swimming ants

North Queensland scientists have discovered a new type of ant, believed to be the only species that can live, swim and navigate under water.
The ants nest in submerged mangroves and survive by hiding in air pockets and then swimming to the surface.
Dr Robson says it is amazing that the ants can survive in such a hostile environment.
"We've been doing a lot of studies on their foraging behaviour and there's a lot of things that eat them, so when they're swimming, fish will sometimes eat them, mud skippers will eat them, crabs will attack them," he said.
"It seems a very nasty place to live and we're still trying to work out how they manage to do so."

wierd! and kinda cool

Too much of a good thing?

It seems that for some reason I draw love to me. Powerful, life long love. Love that I have not asked for, or tried in anyway to get. Love that is all encompassing. Love that sometimes I don't necessarily want, at least not in the way it is offered.

My forever unrequited lover, Colin. The one who is also made of fire. That is why it would never, could never have been.
One kiss is all it would have taken. I know I would have been yours, helplessly bound to you. But I know that you would have belonged to me, as surely as I would have belonged to you. So we danced around this, lest we chain ourselves to each other.
It would have been ill fated from the start. I think that you knew it just as well as I did. The fire would burn too hot. We would burn each other to ashes. But oh, how badly I once wanted to let you consume me.

There was John, my first true passion, the one who tried to steal my fire.
You were earth. I had believed you were the rich soil in which to plant my dreams, to nurture and care for me for all of my days. There was just enough soil on the surface to hide the fact that you were really cold, hard rock. Just enough soil to get me to try to dig.
By the time I hit the rocks my hands were already so dirty that I believed I had no choice but to try to chip those rocks away, to discover what was hidden beneath them. I chipped & chipped at the stone. I dug & dug. No longer a furrow to plant my dreams in, but a grave to bury my heart, my soul, and all of my tomorrows.
I dug deeper, and deeper, with my bare and bleeding hands, while you piled stones upon me.. Stones with names like possession (which you called love), ownership (which you called sex), degradation (which you called honesty, or nothing at all), abuse, most often emotional, sometimes physical (these too you called love, or honesty, or sometimes an accident, or a misunderstanding).
I still wonder how I managed to pull myself out of that hole alive. Granted, I had many hands ready to help from the other side, but somehow I still had to dug far enough out to reach for them.
Your love tried to consume me. It almost did too. But I learned the strength of the phoenix, and rose from the ashes, refined by the fire inside of me, ready to burn me alive. You taught me of strength, the price of my soul, and my own self worth. In the end the price of your love was too high to pay. It doesn't mean I loved you any less. Now I can look back with sadness, and even a little fondness. I'm starting to be able to remember the good times.
I learned strength, and pain, and neither were easy. But such important lessons. I learned what I don't want, and who I don't want to be. I think both are as important as knowing what you want, and who you want to be, if not more so.

Kyle, my darling, my ocean. So deep, and endless, and seemingly calm. I know water's violence can be just as fierce, and just as deadly, as fire's hunger, or the weight of stone.
You lifted be up, and floated me away from all that caused me so much pain. You washed over me, cleansing me, purifying my soul and my heart.
So very stable, and so very vast, I am scared that someday I will drown in this calm. Oh, I know you will never do this intentionally, but you'll do it all the same. As you send waves of stability and serenity towards me, they turn into emptiness, and stagnation. Little by little they douse my fire around the edges.
Someday there will be nothing left of me all. Just a little pile of ashes, too soggy to rise from ever again. But so long as I am here, will you ever notice that you have clipped my wings, and drowned the spark in my soul?

And then there is Irene, my wings, the one who is my gravity, who I think will get her own post.

I feel like I'm missing the point somewhere. I have so much love in my life, so very much. What is in store for me, that I would need to draw such love to me?

talking

All I want is someone to talk to
all I want is someone to talk to
all I want is someone to talk to
all I want is someone to talk to
Is there anybody out there I can talk to?
There must be someone out there
that I can tell everything to
There must be someone who will understand me
somewhere
All I want is someone to be able to tell everything to
All I want is someone I can talk to

perpetual motion

Thoughts on my need to be constantly in motion, in a state of change. After talking to a friend who is the same way.

Maybe it's not an attempt to flee our emotional problems at all. Maybe it's the appeal of the challenge & the adversity. Not in a Goth, depressed, mopey, hold ourselves down sort of way.
Instead for the emotional and/or intellectual stimulation of being challenged. The desire to keep testing ourselves, to be assured that we won't ever be found wanting. To be sure we're still sharp, still alive. Because we are more fulfilled by the things we have to work for, the things won at a cost.
Or maybe I just want to convince myself that what I'm doing isn't unhealthy, that it's not just running away from my emotional issues.




_____________________________________________________________
Comments:

Patience

Change is good... it brings about character and sometimes tests our faith in God... but sometimes it's just as important to be still and wait on God's direction and his hand to move. That doesn't mean that you're lazy, it just means that you're content with waiting on God's voice... sometimes the still gentle whispers - don't miss them Aeryn.

Patience

Security Flaws Could Cripple Missile Defense Network

Security Flaws Could Cripple Missile Defense Network

"The network that stitches together radars, missile launch sites and command control centers for the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) ground-based defense system has such serious security flaws that the agency and its contractor, Boeing, may not be able to prevent misuse of the system, according to a Defense Department Inspector General's report released late last month.
The network, which was also developed to conform to more than 20-year-old DOD security policies rather than more recent guidelines, lacks a comprehensive user account management process, the report said. Neither MDA nor Boeing conducted required Information Assurance (IA) training for users before they were granted access to the network, the report stated.
Because of this poor information security, the DOD IG report said, MDA and Boeing officials "may not be able to reduce the risk and magnitude of harm resulting from misuse or unauthorized access or modification of information [on the network] and ensure the continuity of the system in the event of an interruption."
Stephen Young, an MDA analyst at UCS, said the security flaws could affect operation of the entire GMDS project. "The network is absolutely essential to GMDwithout it, the system can't work."
A MDA spokesman said his agency would not answer any press questions until it responds to the IG report on March 24.
MDA budget documents describe the GCN as a fiber-optic network interconnected with military satellites. These budget documents said the GCN connects the two missile silo sites with control and communications nodes at Fort Greely and Shriever Air Force Base and the Cheyenne Mountain Operations Center, both in Colorado, as well as radars in Alaska and a test bed in Huntsville, Ala."

Gee, this is comforting

Credit Agencies Adopt New Credit Scoring Sysytem

Agencies Adopt New Credit Scoring System

"Consumer Credit Reporting Agencies Create New Credit Scoring System to Simplify the Loan Process.
The nation's three major consumer credit bureaus have created a new credit scoring system designed to make it easier for financial institutions to evaluate loan applications and to give consumers a better way of measuring their financial health.
The credit reporting agencies -- Equifax, Experian and TransUnion -- announced Tuesday (03/15/06) that they're introducing "VantageScore" to banks, mortgage lenders and credit card companies immediately. The new scores will be available to consumers after the lender rollout, probably later this year.
The credit reporting agencies said in their announcement that VantageScore "will provide consumers and businesses with a highly predictive, consistent score that is easy to understand and apply."
In addition to the credit agency scores, some large lenders generate their own internal scores, often using credit bureau data. And many lenders, especially those in the mortgage business, use FICO scores, which are named for the Minneapolis-based Fair, Isaac Corp. that developed them.
Thomas G. Grudnowski, the chief executive officer of Fair, Isaac, said that "for the past 20 years, we've been both cooperating and competing with the credit bureaus ... and that will continue." He added that it could take a long time to establish a competing system.
Dana Wiklund, senior vice president for predictive sciences at Equifax, said that VantageScore "is a new, competitive product to give lenders greater choice, and hopefully greater accuracy, in credit scoring." He added: "The rate of adoption will determine ultimately if the (new) score replaces any in-house or generic scores in the market."
VantageScore ratings will range from 501 to 990. The top end is slightly higher than scores currently in use.
In a separate statement, Experian said the new scores will be grouped on "the familiar academic scale." Experian gave these groupings, with A and B being the best potential borrowers and D and F being the weakest."

Interesting. I wonder how banks and other lenders will start implementing the new system, and how long it will take for it to fully replace the old sytem.

These folks need some family therapy...

Messy Daughter Fights Back By Humiliating Dad

"An exasperated father has discovered to his cost that cyberspace is not the ideal arena for family feuds. Two weeks ago Steve Williams became so fed up with his daughter's messy bedroom that he built a website featuring pictures of his slothful offspring's lair in an attempt to shame her into action.
But the public humiliation proved a short-lived victory. While it did spur his daughter, Claire, into tidying up her room, it also whet her appetite for revenge. With the help of her father's friends, the 20-year-old business student has now set up a rival website that displays photos of him in a variety of compromising situations.
"The boot's on the other foot now, but I suppose I deserve it," said Mr Williams
Despite the embarrassment, Mr Williams said he had no regrets.
Mr. Williams' site,www.shameit.com, has proved hugely popular with disgruntaled families from all over the world. Nearly 40,000 people have visited the site in it's first fortnight."

I can not say how much their behavior disgusts me.

Man Shot In Head During Uptown Robbery

Man Shot In Head During Uptown Robbery

A 25-year-old man is in critical condition after a Saturday night shooting in Uptown.The man was walking with his mother, sister and her friend after they finished dinner in a restaurant at Hennepin Avenue and Lake Street.
According to police, two men approached the group about 10 p.m. at 31st Street and Girard Avenue South. The suspects allegedly stole the mother's purse. Then, even though the victims didn't put up a fight, the suspects allegedly fired two shots, hitting the man in the head.
Ronald Barry, who lives in the apartment building next to where the shooting occurred said, "I heard the shots ... a lady screaming. I called 911 and ran to their aid. There was obviously nothing I could do for the guy. I mean, it was a horrible sight."
The victim's mother was visiting from Virginia. The group was attacked only blocks away from the restaurant where they ate.
Kris Arenson, an inspector from the Minneapolis Police Department said, "Usually when the purse is given up, or even if the purse isn't given up, we haven't had any (people) that have been shot."
Police said the suspects immediately fled the scene, jumped into a white car and headed south on Girard Avenue.
While the area is not known for violence, resident Justin Ellis wasn't surprised there would be a robbery outside his building. "Last summer, I was walking to my car early in the morning before work, I had an early meeting, and I got mugged," Ellis said. That day, Ellis got away, but a woman on Hennepin Avenue didn't.
Police gave vague descriptions of the suspects, only saying they are men between 17 years old and 22 years old and were both wearing dark clothing. Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to call the Minneapolis Police Department at 612-692-8477.


Victim of Uptown shooting dies

Minneapolis police said today that a man who was critically wounded in a shooting in Uptown on Saturday night died Sunday.
Robberies in Minneapolis' Uptown area, where Michael Zebuhr of Buckhannon, W. Va., was shot, have spiked several times in the past year. That brought an increased police presence, arrests and a temporary lull in Uptown robberies, police leaders say.
Police have been focusing patrols on the nearby Whittier and Stevens Square neighborhoods along Franklin Avenue, which have traditionally had more of the Fifth Precinct's street crime, said Inspector Kris Arneson. That may have pushed crime toward Uptown, she said.
Residents and business owners share police concern about the violent, but unusual, robbery.
Zebuhr was shot about 10 p.m. while returning to a car with his mother and two others from an Uptown restaurant.
He was a 2005 graduate of Davis & Elkins College in Elkins, W. Va., and is a graduate student in bioengineering at Clemson University in Clemson, S.C. He was in Minneapolis to visit his sister with their mother, Suzanne Strong. Police said Zebuhr was shot after two men grabbed his mother's purse. Police had made no arrests Monday, and they said there may also have been more suspects in a getaway vehicle.
Arneson noted that robbery has increased in the precinct this year, but not significantly in Uptown, where crime often occurs just outside the commercial hub on side streets.
Police say street crimes like robbery seem to be moving south and west from the Whittier and Stevens Square neighborhoods toward Hennepin and Lake.
Robberies in the Fifth Precinct have increased 43 percent to about 100 so far this year over last, Arneson said. Citywide, robberies grew 39 percent in the same period, according to police data through March 13.
Authorities said that despite the violence of Saturday's robbery, few victims are shot if they oblige a robber's request.
It is unclear whether Saturday's incident is linked to other cases. Lubinski said there were no "strong constant" patterns in robberies this year, which are up in each precinct.
Anyone with information about the robbery is asked to call 612-692-TIPS.

This was just 4 blocks from my apartment. And they did everything you're supposed to if you get mugged. Everything. And this guy still got shot. I'm about ready to move to the country.

One More Poem

Glazed eyes staring out into the cold
grey skies, grey heart
all the color has bleed away
no blacks, no whites, it's all shades of grey

a silence descends on my soul
left here with out a voice
waiting for the purity of snow
to lay a blanket over me

night and day cycle endlessly
each as grey as the last
while all my regrets
cycle endlessly in my brain

I look to the sky in vain
searching of any sign of change
any pale hint of color
any sign of life over the horizon

(03-03-06)

Two new poems (mostly finished)

You shine on me gently
a distant star
in the cold, unforgiving night

I fear your disintigration
as the frozen space
tries to close you in

I want to bring you close
to keep you from the darkness
to keep you warm

a swirling supernova
you hold such power
in a single word, a sigh

you have woven a net
star-fire, to cover over me
I can not fight this

enraptured by your light
I wait silently
longing for your embrace
(03-03-06)


A shining supernova
in the expanse of darkness
I am enraptured by you

a net of star-fire
a shining silken ribbon
your likely snare

I can not fathom it
the power you hold
for you I'd burn oceans

you hold heaven in your eyes
fire on your lips
in your heartbeat is my breath
(03-03-06)




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Comments:
(Originally posted on myspace on April 25th)

Patience

04/27/06 8:28am

She is certainly a lucky girl to have caught your attention like that!

Patience

____________________________________________________________

Aeryn

04/27/06 10:58am

*S* A Ralph Waldo Emmerson quote comes to mind-
"Thou art a delicious torment to me."

Poetry

If the moon
refused to shine
if the sun
hid from us his face
my world
would not be dark
you are my light
water in the desert
the voice
calling me home
into your arms
into refuge
from the cruel world
where everything changes
you always stay
close to me
(01-01-05)

If love
was all butterflies
it would be easy
to stay together
forever
life is never
simple
never a fairytale
we fight each day
to keep in step
the bitter makes the sweet
which we hold so close
that binds our souls
locked
in each other's arms
even my dreams
are of you
(01-01-05)

Luscious vision of summer
it felt like death
beneath you
sweet wind
whispering my name
(01-01-05)

Drunk in the moment
never was winter so sweet
like rain
honey
the moon
a spring in the forest
a dream of light
an eternity in your arms
I will sleep tonight
singing in shadows
(01-01-05)