An FB friend put as her status that the object of the game was for all her FB friends to respond with a completely fabricated story of how we met. As I read the responses, one of them was brilliant, and I was reluctant to try because I didn't think I'd be able to come up with anything good. I don't mean to toot my own horn (oh who am I kidding, of course I do), but here's what I wrote:
I awakened in pain, with bright lights blinding me, strange noises all around, and no knowledge of where I was or how I had gotten there. I realized I was strapped in on a cold table, and as my eyes adjusted to the light, I saw there were 2 figures on each side of me, gesticulating wildly. When my vision cleared, I realized they were each holding what appeared to be medical instruments...but worse...they weren't human. I screamed, and they turned toward me in surprise, and adjusted something strapped to my arm. I felt as though I were falling...then nothing.
When I awoke, I was in a small clearing with several others. We were all dazed, then began frantically asking each other if they knew what was going on. I was crying and you came to reassure me. You introduced myself and told me not to worry, that it had happened to you several times and everything would be fine. We began to share our experiences, and the pandemonium around us settled as people began realizing that they weren't alone in their experience, and it seemed to be over.
As the talk quieted down, we heard one man mumbling incoherently to himself. We approached him to see if we could help, but we couldn't seem to get through to him. He was extremely paranoid, and thought we were part of some conspiracy or another, but we couldn't make sense of what he was saying. He wouldn't come with us, and since we were hungry, tired, and disoriented, the group decided we had to leave him there, hoping we'd be able to send help once we found civilization.
When we stumbled into a small town, we tried to get help from the local Sheriff, but it became increasingly clear that he was getting ready to call the men in the white coats. We somehow all knew when to stop trying to convince him, and you came up with the cover story that we had been to a party, and suspected someone must have put something in our drinks.
You and I became close friends, and, as far as we knew, we weren't abducted again. One night you invited me for dinner, and turned on the TV in the kitchen as you were cooking. "Quick! Come here!" you exclaimed, and when I went into the kitchen I saw you agape, pointing speechlessly at the TV. It was the man we had left behind! At first we were relieved, because we had always felt guilty about not being able to send a rescue party. As we listened, we realized he was just as incoherent as we had left him...yet appeared to have his own TV show! I think you readers can guess what happened next: our national nightmare, The Glenn Beck show, had begun.
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Jab that could put a stop to stress without slowing us down | Mail Online
"Academics say they are close to developing the first vaccine for stress - a single jab that would help us relax without slowing down." I'll be a guinea pig. Maybe this is what happened to my brain cells.
Side Dishes
"Shall we have salmon with our mercury? Shall we have chicken with our antibiotics? Shall we have water with our arsenic? I'm starving."Open And Closed Thinking Modes « Steps & Leaps
“We all operate in two contrasting modes, which might be called open and closed. The open mode is more relaxed, more receptive, more exploratory, more democratic, more playful and more humorous. The closed mode is the tighter, more rigid, more hierarchical, more tunnel-visioned. Most people, unf..."Great story about how 'Fawlty Towers' came to be as well
7 Scientific Reasons a Zombie Outbreak Would Fail (Quickly)
"Realistically, the zombies would all be dead long before you even got a chance to fire up that chainsaw motorcycle you've been working on."Franklin D. Roosevelt Quotes
"Those newspapers of the nation which most loudly cried dictatorship against me would have been the first to justify the beginnings of dictatorship by somebody else."
Charlotte Iserbyt - Deliberate Dumbing Down of the World
"Charlotte Iserbyt served as Senior Policy Advisor in the Office of Educational Research and Improvement (OERI), U.S. Department of Education, during the first Reagan Administration, where she first blew the whistle on a major technology initiative which would control curriculum in America's classrooms..."Howard Zinn quotes
"I'm worried that students will take their obedient place in society and look to become successful cogs in the wheel - let the wheel spin them around as it wants without taking a look at what they're doing. I'm concerned that students not become passive acceptors of the official doctrine that's handed down to them from the White House, the media, textbooks, teachers and preachers.”
OilChangeInternational
"Find out if your U.S. senators are 'bobbing in petroleum.' Track how many Big Oil dollars have made it into the pockets of Senate politicians, then spread the word to help break their bad habits -- and break America's addiction to oil."
Researchers Link Brain Disease to Trauma - NYTimes.com
Lou Gehrig may not have had Lou Gehrig's disease. "A new study says concussions and brain trauma can cause degeneration very similar to A.L.S., known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, raising speculation that Gehrig himself may not have died of the disease he made famous."GOP relies on black and white Reagan footage, scary music to slam Dems | Raw Story
"Yet, today's Republicans seem intent on pretending their most successful leader in the last three decades is someone he's not, which is theoretically why you should vote for them. President Reagan's fiscal policies and foreign misadventures left the U.S. saddled with trillions in debt, leading to a devastating recession and widespread joblessness, and it cost his Republican predecessor a potential second term."
Understanding Evolution
"Understanding Evolution is a non-commercial, education website, teaching the science and history of evolutionary biology. This site is here to help you understand what evolution is, how it works, how it factors into your life, how research in evolutionary biology is performed, and how ideas in this area have changed over time."The Video The US Army Doesn't Want You To See.
Please watch, but close your eyes when you see the puppy.
CIA - The World Factbook -- Country Comparison :: Debt - external
USA ranks number 1 in external debt. "We're number one. We're number one." Sigh.
Noam Chomsky Quotes
29 quotes and quotations by Noam Chomsky
"Either you repeat the same conventional doctrines everybody is saying, or else you say something true, and it will sound like it's from Neptune."
Most countries fail to deliver on Haiti aid pledges
"Six months after a devastating earthquake struck Haiti, most governments that promised money to help rebuild the country have not delivered any funds at all, a CNN investigation has found. nly four countries have paid anything at all: Brazil, Norway, Estonia and Australia. The United States pledged $1.15 billion. It has paid nothing, the money tied up in the congressional appropriations process."Private Prisons Might Gain From New Immigration Law - Phoenix News Story - KPHO Phoenix
"The private prison industry houses illegal immigrant detainees for the federal government. Those companies could gain contracts with state and local agencies to house illegal immigrants arrested for state violations. Corrections Corporation of America, or CCA, holds the federal contract to house detainees in Arizona. The company bills $11 million per month. CBS 5 Investigates learned that two of Brewer’s top advisers have connections to CCA."
Selected Quotes from Robert F. Kennedy | Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice & Human Rights
“Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls..."Michael Shermer: Why people believe strange things
"Why do people see the Virgin Mary on cheese sandwiches or hear demonic lyrics in 'Stairway to Heaven'? Using video, images and music, professional skeptic Michael Shermer explores these and other phenomena, including UFOs and alien sightings. He offers cognitive context: In the a..."Skeptic Money » Blog Archive » I Now Have A Solution To The Pledge Of Allegiance – One Nation Und
"I hate when I am in a group and they say the Pledge of Allegiance. If you read my blog you know, I am not much of a follower and the idea of a forced pledge of any kind makes me a little ill. Then and in 'Under gOd' and I get pissed. Why do groups still do this?"one Nation UNDER CANADA, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all :)
How We Believe, 2nd Edition: Science, Skepticism, and the Search for God
"Recent polls report that 96 percent of Americans believe in God, and 73 percent believe that angels regularly visit Earth. Why is this? Why, despite the rise of science, technology, and secular education, are people turning to religion in greater numbers than ever before? Why do people believe in Go..."Strategic Gullibility Pt. 2: New truer approach to science religion reconciliation | Psychology Toda
"Last week I had started something I'll try to finish here. I had argued that we all have the right to believe what get us through the night. I called that the Right to Believe. I also argued that, collectively we need to be able to be able to deploy unfettered the most productive methods availabl..."Confirmation bias - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"Confirmation bias (also called confirmatory bias or myside bias) is a tendency for people to favor information that confirms their preconceptions or hypotheses regardless of whether the information is true.[Note 1][1] As a result, people gather evidence and recall information from memory selectively..." More details and explanations for something I think we've all pretty much figured out on our own.
Learn Sarver Heart Center's Continuous Chest Compression CPR | College of Medicine
Learn a hands-only CPR method in 5 minutes that doubles a person's chance of surviving. "Every three days, more Americans die from sudden cardiac arrest than the number who died in the 9-11 attacks. You can lessen this recurring loss by learning Continuous Chest Compression CPR, a hands-only CPR method that doubles a person’s chance of surviving cardiac arrest. It’s easy and does not re..."
Husbands Who Earn Less Than Wives Are More Likely To Cheat
"If a guy earns less than his wife or live-in girlfriend, he's more likely to cat around, according to a study that looked at trends in infidelity. On the other hand, women who made less than their mates are more prone to fidelity."Quote / Hunter S. Thompson / Multiple quotes on truth, corrupt politicians, stupid wars and more « T
"We have become a Nazi monster in the eyes of the whole world, a nation of bullies and bastards who would rather kill than live peacefully. We are not just Whores for power and oil, but killer whores with hate and fear in our hearts. We are human scum, and that is how history will judge us. No redeeming social value. Just whores. Get out of our way, or we’ll kill you. Who does vote for these dishonest shitheads? Who among us can be happy and proud of having all this innocent blood on our hands? Who are these swine? These flag-sucking half-wits who get fleeced and fooled by stupid little rich kids like George Bush? They are the same ones who wanted to have Muhammad Ali locked up for refusing to kill gooks. They speak for all that is cruel and stupid and vicious in the American character. They are the racists and hate mongers among us; they are the Ku Klux Klan."Secret society quotes & quotations
“There is nothing so despicable as a secret society that is based upon religious prejudice and that will attempt to defeat a man because of his religious beliefs. Such a society is like a cockroach -- it thrives in the dark. So do those who combine for such an end.” William Howard Taft quotes (American 27th US President (1909-13). 1857-1930)
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Is This Common Kitchen Appliance Harming Your Health?
"Your microwave oven will NOT help you prepare healthy food--and will threaten your health by ripping the molecules in your food apart, rendering some nutrients inert and others carcinogenic." Mercola has been fined for the FDA for quack-like behavior, so I'd want to go look all this stuff up and not take his word for it (except the BPA bit), but it's food for thought. I'd heard about the nutrients and that a leak checker is recommended...I guess I hadn't read it all put together before.
CDC Newsroom Press Release: August 25, 2010
CDC Study Finds Annual Cost of Motor Vehicle Crashes Exceeds $99 Billion. How much public transportation would $99 billion buy?
National Coalition for Homeless Veterans - Background & Statistics
NCHV will end homelessness among veterans by shaping public policy, educating the public, and building the capacity of service providers." If our military men and women are so honored, why is it that nearly 20% of the American homeless population are veterans? This is the main reason why I think we should have a moratorium on immigration from ANY country: we can't take care of the people we've got.ADOPTION - Very Demotivational - The Demotivational Posters Blog
"ADOPTION You're probably better off never knowing who your real parents are."
Did the CIA feed a French town LSD?
New documents add weight to claims a French town could have been the victim of an LSD experiment in 1951.
The billionaire Koch brothers’ war against Obama : The New Yorker
I couldn't finish this but I think people should know what's in here. "A REPORTER AT LARGE about billionaire libertarians Charles and David Koch and their funding of think tanks, grassroots groups, and other organizations that oppose the Obama Administration’s policies. With his brother Charles, who is seventy-four, David Koch owns virtually all of Koch Industries, a c..."BLIZZCON 09' ** Ozzy ** Crazy Train ** Featuring 9 year old guitarist Yuto Miyazawa
"One song from Ozzy's concert at the closing ceremony from Blizzcon 2009 My favorite parts are: 2:55 - 3:22 4:53 - 5:01" Lots of other clips of this talented kidOf Course You’re Awesome! Now Pay $10 a Month to Hear Someone Else Say It - TIME NewsFeed
"Longing for a pick-me-up? Have some spare funds? Then why not take part in the ongoing monetization of everyday social connection? OK, that's probably just NewsFeed being cynical. The premise of AwesomenessReminders. 'So if you're in need of a pat on the back, you could sign up -- or, for $7.50 a month, you could give just a quarter to a homeless person every day and feel real good about yourself.'"
The Pledge of Allegiance - A Short History
"Francis Bellamy (1855 - 1931), a Baptist minister, wrote the original Pledge in August 1892. He was a Christian Socialist. In his Pledge, he is expressing the ideas of his first cousin, Edward Bellamy, author of the American socialist utopian novels, Looking Backward (1888) and Equality (1897)."
Dumb Things Americans Believe | Newsweek
"Chances are that by now you've heard that nearly one fifth of Americans (mistakenly) believe that President Obama is a Muslim. In fact, a remarkably high number of Americans believe the most unusual things. Although the portion of poll respondents who believe Obama is a Muslim has risen recently, so..."
"We're heard some, but a few new (or forgotten) ones including, 'barely half of Americans were correctly able to state that Judaism was older than both Christianity and Islam.' I suspect the half that didn't know that might have been mostly Christians."
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