Just An Inconsequential Comment

Just an Inconsequential Comment

I was going to leave you a comment,
Tom says they don't really matter,
they said the same for ratings,
Gather keeps them 'round for fodder.
Nothing matters no more 'ceptin' ad, umm
(oops, I really meant to say "page"), views.
But how would you ever know, today
I viewed your article or picture if
I didn't leave an inconsequential comment?

The Year of the RAT - Your Chinese Zodiac

Chinese Year 4705 - 2008 Gregorian The Chinese calendar is lunar based and begins on the second new moon after the winter solstice. Tonight's new moon brings about Chinese New Year 4705, or 2008 in the Western calendar. This is the Year of the Brown Earth Rat. This year of the rat begins a new 12 year cycle of the Chinese zodiac. Rats are water signs and it is said that they make a very good match for monkeys and dragons, but do not get along well with rabbits, horses and roosters. The brown earth influences of this year also make oxen a favored friend of the persevering rat but add conflict to the year as the elements of earth and water seek a balance - especially during the early part of the year. In China, it is said that there are few poor rats. It is considered very auspicious to be born in the year of the earth rat. Babies born under this sign are intelligent and hard working. They are intelligent, curious, sociable born leaders who do well in any group, but value ties with family and close friends more than social contacts. The earth influences balance the rat's water nature for those born in this year making them able to control the flights of intellect that often draw the rat away from a good course. The selfish and calculating aspects of the rat are toned by the nurturing earth force. These are leaders to be followed with trust and good partners for a life filled with good fortune. The rat is clever, sometimes too clever. When mixed with the passion and charm of this sign, the rat can be manipulative as a life partner or business associate. The ability to initiate new ideas and work hard to reach a goal led the rat to the first place of honor at the side of Buddha. These are traits that bring success in both business and personal affairs. The rat's stone is the deep red garnet, the color of joyful celebration. It signifies the loyalty and passion of the most honorable traits of the sign that will rule the year ahead. The names of the earthly branches of the Chinese Zodiac have no English counterparts and are not the Chinese translations of the animals. Alongside the 12-year cycle of the animal zodiac there is a 10-year cycle of heavenly stems. Each of the ten heavenly stems is associated with one of the five elements of Chinese astrology: Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water. The elements are rotated every two years while a yin and yang association alternates every year. The elements are thus distinguished: Yang Wood, Yin Wood, Yang Fire, Yin Fire, etc. These produce a combined cycle that repeats every 60 years. This year is Yang Earth. The last time the earth rat was seen as the ruling influence was February 10, 1948 - January 28, 1949. Baby boomers who were born under this sign will be celebrating their 60th birthday looking back on many years of good fortune and looking ahead to many more. Since the Year of the Rat begins a new cycle, remember that decisions made during this year will carry long term consequences. Do not make changes without careful planning especially during the beginning of the year.

What year were you born in the Chinese zodiac calendar? Browse the calendar to find your birth year and more about your Chinese zodiac sign :

Rat 1924 1936 1948 1960 1972 1984 1996 2008 Ox 1925 1937 1949 1961 1973 1985 1997 2009 Tiger 1926 1938 1950 1962 1974 1986 1998 2010 Rabbit 1927 1939 1951 1963 1975 1987 1999 2011 Dragon 1928 1940 1952 1964 1976 1988 2000 2012 Snake 1929 1941 1953 1965 1977 1989 2001 2013 Horse 1930 1942 1954 1966 1978 1990 2002 2014 Sheep 1931 1943 1955 1967 1979 1991 2003 2015 Monkey 1932 1944 1956 1968 1980 1992 2004 2016 Rooster 1933 1945 1957 1969 1981 1993 2005 2017 Dog 1934 1946 1958 1970 1982 1994 2006 2018 Pig 1935 1947 1959 1971 1983 1995 2007 2019

Giants Win the Pennant! Giants Win the Pennant! Giants Win the Pennant!

Giants Win the Pennant!

Ooops...wrong team, wrong game...must be having a M*A*S*H flashback :-()

The Giants win Super Bowl XLII 17-14 over the Patriots!

With heavy betting favoring that Brady and his New England cohorts, who were undefeated - 18-0 - through the regular season and two playoff games, would win their fourth championship in six years, the game went off with the Patriots giving 12 points to the Giants. The Giants entered the championship game having won 10 straight on the road, and began the season as a 20:1 favorite to win the Super Bowl in the Vegas sports books.

Curious bit of trivia: This Super Bowl was played at the University of Phoenix Stadium. University of Phoenix is an private institution of higher learning known for its online and evening business classes...the school does not have a sports program much less a football team! The stadium name is misleading, but is actually quite common in the world of corporations and municipal sports venues, it is located in the Phoenix suburb of Glendale and is the home of the NFL's Arizona Cardinals and plays host to college football's BCS Fiesta Bowl.

Bare in the Air

You've heard of the Mile High Club...maybe you're even a card-carrying member...but...would you go butt-naked at 30,000 feet?

Flying the friendly skies skye-clad is back in vogue!

Yes, "back", as in bareback, and also as in "has returned"!

A new airline called Bare Air, following in the barefoot steps of the former U.S. charter airline Naked Air, has been launched by a German firm with a series of nude flights for those travelers "with nothing to declare but their immodesty."

Naturist holidays are an old tradition amongst Europeans. Naturism, or FKK "free body culture" as it is known in German, was banned by the Nazis but blossomed again after WWII. Clothing-optional resorts are becoming more popular with American vacationers too, as witnessed by the increasing numbers of Caribbean and Mexican resorts catering to adult couples. So why not fly skye-clad if you're going off to a week of sun and fun at a nude resort?

"Everybody flies naked and nobody worries."

Bare Air will be flying direct to Baltic Sea nudist resorts. Back in 2003-2004, the charter service Naked Air partnered with Castaways Travel and flew out of Miami to the Mexican resorts of El Dorado Resort & Spa, Hidden Beach Resort and Au Naturel Club near Cancun.

"Naked Air - where the only thing you wear is a seat belt."

Passengers are to remain clothed until they have boarded the plane. However, it does bring up the question that if you are selected for a strip-search at the security checkpoint, do you have put your clothes back on...

Sorry to disappoint any voyeurs, but the flight crews will be keeping their uniforms on.

And to the relief of those cowering in horror under they desk reading this - these flights are "Adult Only"...hmmm...all the more reason to book a seat on this airline!

Carbon: of Coal & Diamonds - Release Your Brilliance

Release Your Brilliance

The 4 Steps to Transforming
Your Life and Revealing
Your Genius to the World

Simon T. Bailey

"I'm just and old chunk of coal,
But I'm gonna be a diamond some day.
I'm gonna grow and glow 'til I'm perfect,
I'm gonna put a smile on e'rybody's face."
- Billy Joe Shaver - I'm Just an Old Chunk of Coal

I think almost everyone would like to be able to aptly display their talents and brilliance, and be revered by family, friends and colleagues as a genuine genius.

I can't say that I found Simon to have unearthed a whole lot of new ideas in Release Your Brilliance. This genre - Self-Help books - has been deeply mined and is fairly saturated, but I won't goes so far as to say, "if you've read one, you've read them all."

Simon builds this book around the DeBeers Diamond Cartel and the Gemology Institute terminology and advertising campaigns relying heavily on the "4 C's" of selecting a diamond - Clarity, Color, Cut, and Carat. The book is formulaic, not surprising given Simon's background as a corporate motivational speaker. The book is also filled with his personal remembrances and experiences, giving it a light and cheery nuance.

Having read a few other books in this genre, had corporate speakers, and attended a couple of the large personal growth/success ralleys with speakers such as Zig Ziglar, Colin Powell, Gen.Swartzkopf, and various Olympic athletes, I did not gain a lot from this book.

However, if you have never attended a personal growth type rally or read, or have not read or attended in a few years, a cheerful guidebook to self-actualization, I think you will find Simon's book - Release Your Brilliance - a book worth your time reading.

Release Your Brilliance is a small book, just 200 pages and on a small footprint, a little larger than a typical paperback, which really might have been a better format.
Suggested price - $19.95.
Simon T. Bailey © 2008
Published by Collins

Simon Bailey has penned a small franchise of related books:

Simon Believes...Success Is an Inside Job
Simon Believes...Brilliant Service Is the Bottom Line
Simon Says...Meditate on Your Personal Brilliance
Simon Says...Meditate on Your Professional Brilliance

Today is Martin Luther King Day

"I Have A Dream"

January 21st - ToDay is Martin Luther King Day.

ToDay is Martin Luther King Day. This day of remembrance was established as a national holiday in the United States in 1986. The holiday falls on the third Monday of January.

Martin Luther King, Jr., born January 15, 1929, was a primary leader of the American civil rights movement. King was a Baptist minister, one of the few leadership roles available to black men at the time. He became a civil rights activist early in his career. He led the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955 and helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference serving as its first president.

King was assassinated by James Earl Ray on April 4, 1968, in Memphis, Tennessee. The assassination led to a nationwide wave of riots in more than 60 cities. Ray confessed to the assassination, but he recanted three days later.

He is perhaps most remembered for the 1963 March on Washington, where he delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech. Here he raised public consciousness of the civil rights movement and established himself as one of the greatest orators in U.S. history. In 1964, King became the youngest person to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to end segregation and racial discrimination through civil disobedience and other non-violent means. King would be posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Jimmy Carter in 1977. In 2004, King was posthumously awarded a Congressional Gold Medal.

Quote for ToDay:

"To invent,you need a good imagination and a pile of junk"-Thomas Edison (1847-1931)

"Winnie-the-Pooh" by A.A.Milne

"...bump, bump, bump...here is Edward Bear, coming down the stairs now on the back of his head. It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming downstairs, but sometimes he feels that there really is another way, if only he could stop bumping for a moment and think of it."

January 18, 1882 - A.A. Milne, Creator of Winnie-the-Pooh, was Born Today

Today, eighty-two years after it was first published, Winnie-the-Pooh remains one of the best-selling children's books of all time. Alan Alexander (A.A.) Milne, the creator of this wildly popular cast of characters - which includes Winnie-the-Pooh, Owl, Eeyore, Rabbit, Kanga and Roo, and of course, Piglet - was born in Hampstead, London on this day in 1882. Milne was a gifted child, teaching himself to read at age two and to write soon there after.

He would become a prolific author, playwright, and poet; penning novels and collections of short stories for both children and adults, and over two dozen plays. A.A.Milne is best remembered for his two collections of stories for children - Winnie-the-Pooh and House at Pooh Corner - which have sold over 40 million copies in English and have been translated into dozens of other languages, making Pooh one of the most recognized and beloved characters around the world.

Milne and his wife Daphne would settle on Cotchford Farm in Sussex, England with their young son Christopher Robin. This bucolic landscape would inspire the beautiful realm of wonder and adventure - the 100 Acre Woods - that Christopher Robin would explore with Pooh and Piglet, and their stuffed friends.

"...bump, bump, bump...here is Edward Bear..." - is how we are introduced to Christopher Robin and his stuffed-toy bear. However, Winnie begins with a real bear cub brought to England by a Canadian infantry lieutenant on his way to the first World War. Lt.Harry Colebourn would name the cub Winnie in honor of his hometown - Winnipeg, Manitoba - and it would become the brigade's mascot. Colebourn gave the bear cub to the London Zoo when his brigade departed for France. Winnie was a popular attraction at the zoo, and was a favorite of the young Christopher Robin, who would rename Edward, his stuffed-toy bear, after Winnie and a favorite goose on the Cotchfold Farm - Winnie-the-Pooh.

Winnie-the-Pooh was soon joined by Eeyore and Piglet in the nursery, and later by Kanga and Roo, and finally by Tigger. Rabbit and Owl were woodland creatures of the farm that caught the attention of Christopher Robin. A.A.Milne's stories would be inspired by his son's play with the stuffed animals and around the farm.

Generations have grown up loving Pooh and his friends. Milne's Pooh books are timeless, and fancifully illustrated by E.H.Shepard in the original printings. Shepard would illustrate many of the children's books and poetry written by Milne.

(colored plate from the 1954 edition)

In 1966, the rights to Winnie-the-Pooh and the other characters would be sold to Walt Disney. The characters would then take on new dimensions in illustration as well as in other media and marketing projects. Pooh and Piglet have also been used to explain the concepts of Taoism in the books - The Tao of Pooh and The Te of Piglet - by Benjamin Hoff. All pretty heady stuff for a "silly old bear".

"While Eeyore frets...

...and Piglet hesitates

...and Rabbit calculates

...and Owl pontificates

Pooh...just is."

*beginning quote from"Winnie-the-Pooh", ending quote from "The Tao of Pooh" by Benjamin Hoff, all illustrations are by H.E.Shepard, including the "Tao of Pooh" cover which has been modified by B.Hoff - stuffed animals photo by H.Ries, images were scanned from my copies of these books*

the AIR BOOK -- MacWorld Update

the AIR BOOK -- MacWorld Update

At 10:00 AM PST this morning at MacWorld in San Francisco, Apple's Steve Jobs confirmed the rumors ofa new MacBook notebook computer - "Today we're introducing a third kind of notebook, and it's called the MacBook Air. In a sentence, it's the world's thinnest notebook!"

The "Air" is a sub-notebook, a smaller lighter laptop computer with a 13.3" diagonal screen weighing in at less than 3lbs. and just ¾" thick at the hinged edge tapering down to about 3/16" at the front. The Air so thin, it can fit inside one of those office-to-office manila envelopes!

The Air borrows heavily from the iPhone in styling - an aluminum case with black and glass features. As small as it is, the Air does not skimp on the important features. The screen is LED backlit, it has a full-size keyboard, 2 Gb memory and 80 Gb hard drive. This system utilizes a specially designed for Apple Intel Core 2 Duo chip set running at 1.6GHz on the standard model, with an option to step up to a 1.8GHz processor. The MacBook Air has MagSafe, a smaller 45 watt power adapter, and the usual ports and 802.11n wireless ships standard with the new MacBook, plus Bluetooth 2.1 and EDR.

The MacBook Air's Remote Disk feature allows you to install software from a neighboring (assuming it's friendly) Mac or PC's optical drive. However, no optical drive is built in the Air, Apple has designed an add-on optical drive available for $99.

Its 13.3-inch widescreen LED backlit display delivers 1280-by-800 resolution which produces vibrant images and rich colors. The LED technology also helps conserve battery life.

The MacBook Air trackpad adopts many of the innovative multi-touch gestures from the Apple iPhone, so you can pinch, swipe or rotate by simply moving your fingers. Double-tapping moves a whole window, rather than just the cursor. Moving around a photo is like on the iPhone, a two-finger approach on the touchpad when viewing a photo allowing pinching, as well as zooming in and out of photos.

The MacBook Air launches at $1799.00 for the 1.6GHz standard model. There is also an upgraded model with a 1.8GHz processor couple with a 64Gb "solid-state" hard drive (think flash memory) that is currently listed at $3098.00. Both models are currently in pre-order status and should ship in 2 to 3 weeks. Besides Apple's own stores and website, Amazon.com is taking pre-orders for the new MacBook Air computer.

Citigroup Posts Record $18 Billion Loss

Citigroup Inc., operating as Citi and the mother company of CitiBank, posted the biggest loss in the bank's 196-year history as rising defaults on home loans forced it to write down the value of subprime-mortgage investments by $18 billion.

The fourth-quarter net loss of $9.83 billion, or $1.99 ashare, compared with a profit of $5.1 billion, or $1.03, a year earlier. Citigroup reduced its dividend by 41 percent and is selling $14.5 billion of preferred stock to investors including the government of Singapore and two Arabian financial firms - Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, the investment arm of the United Arab Emirate Abu Dhabi government and Kingdom Holding Company owned by Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal ofSaudi Arabia - to shore up the company's depleted capital.

Citigroup fell 7.3 percent on the New York Stock Exchange today as the largest U.S. bank warned of rising loan delinquencies on its $214 billion portfolio of home loans and also stated that more credit card and autoloans were going bad. The bank cited a slowing economy in setting aside $5.2 billion to cover loan losses in its U.S.consumer division, about five times the year-earlier amount. The markdown on subprime home loans, almost double what the company had forecasted in November, was the biggest amount so far among the world's top financial companies, far exceeding the $14 billion write-off taken by Zurich-based UBS, Europe's largest bank.

Citigroup also announced it will eliminated 4,200 jobs (a little over 1% of its workforce) and plans to make more cuts in the near future. Many of the jobs to be eliminated are in the investment banking division. The investment banking division contributed an $11 billion loss to Citigroup for 2007, compared to a profit of $1.75 billion in 2006.

Standard & Poor's reduced its long-term rating on Citigroup to AA- from AA reflecting the severe losses and the probability that the bank's 2008 performance will continue to be below par for some time to come.

The fourth quarter is shaping up to be the worst earnings period for thefinancial industry since the Great Depression. More bad news expected shortly to come in the financial industry:

• Merrill Lynch & Co., the largest U.S. brokerage firm, is expected to report a record loss of more than $3 billion after writing down mortgage-related securities.
• Bank of America Corp., the second-largest U.S. bank, may report an 80 percent drop in fourth- quarter net income next week.
• JPMorgan Chase & Co., the third-biggest U.S. bank, may post a 31 percent decline in earnings as early as tomorrow.

According to Forbes Global 2000 in March 2007, Citigroup is the largest company in the world with total assets of US $2.4 trillion, 375,000 employees, and operations in over 100 countries around the world.

The Flu Flew In

Well, I've got all those nighttime, sniffling, sneezing, coughing, aching, fever symptoms from the TV ad...and just for fun and games I have them during the daytime hours, too!

No, I don't take Nyquil® or any of those other cold and flu concoctions. I have both aspirin and ibuprofen in the cabinet for aches and pains, preferring aspirin for these kind of aches. Some herbal tea soothes my throat and an occasional Hall's couch drop for the, well, coughing. They are good to suck on in between mugs of tea. In the evening when I want to zone out, I just add a splash of brandy to the tea. After all, that's what's in most of those cold/flu remedies - something for aches, a cough suppressant, and alcohol to knock you out! My home remedy tastes a whole lot better than any of those on the shelf at the drugstore!

So I'm staying home. Blowing my nose in between the chills and fever hills and valleys. And sipping tea. How are you today? Healthy? What do you when you get hit by the cold or flu bug?

Some TILE Trivia & Many Mural Thanks

I thought the members of the Capture This group might find this bit of tile trivia interesting because of last week's theme of "Mosaic"

The largest glass tile mosaic mural in North America is the 4300 square foot entryway to the Hong Kong based Wing Lung Bank in Alhambra, California (near Los Angeles).

The image was inspired by the San Gabriel Mountains of southern California.

The installation won the 2007 Spectrum Awards (the topindustry award for excellence in tile design and implementation) for the firm -Becoming Tile - and took about 2 months to install after the design was approved and the some 600,000 tiles were created.

I also want thank all the Capture This members that posted such nice comments about the Aborigine mosaic! I just snapped the photo, the artist and crafts-people that created the walkway mural deserve the real credit, I am so glad that you all enjoyed the picture! Thanks!!!

!!!WoW! What a Way to Start the New Year! - Featured on the Front Page!!!

!!!WoW!

What a Way to Start the New Year!

Featured on the Front Page!!!

To blow my horn (yes, the same horn I was blowing at midnight!) my article - 2008 - you survived New Year's Eve...now what? - written around the Jethro Tull lyric - "it was a new day yesterday, but it's an old day now" - was selected as a Featured Conversation today on the Gather Front Page!

YIPPIE KAI YAI YAYYYY!!! This is the first time I have been on the Front Page, I am quite excited!

Thank you to everyone for reading my articles on Gather!

When Do You ... ???

When Do You ... ???

You hung them with care.

How long do you enjoy them?

You worked so hard to get them up.

You posted photos and shared them with all your Gathering friends.

When do you take down your Christmas decorations?

When I was little, we would take down the decorations just after January 6th. My mother would then keep the naked tree watered and green until Easter. Some years we would even make egg decorations and re-decorate the tree just before Easter.

2008 - you survived New Year's Eve...now what?

OK, you survived New Year's Eve.

You drank, but you didn't drive!

You partied like it was still 1999

maybe your head is pounding,

but that too shall pass...now what???

"...it was a new day yesterday, but it's an old day now" - Jethro Tull

So, just what does this new day -ummm- New Year hold in wait for us?

For starters, do you have any resolutions or predictions you wish to share?

Pace yourself, it's going to be a long year, a whole day longer, it's Leap Year!

There will be pipers, and their taxes, to be paid come April 15th.

Summer sun and fun, followed by a new school year.

We will cast our lot, along with our vote, in November...will it really matter?

And before we know it, we'll again be proclaiming our Thanksgivings just before dashing out the door to attempt to resuscitate the economy for another year as we settle into the season we have just left.

Will you arrive at December 31st saying:
"it was a new year just yesterday, but it sure seems like an old year now!"

Pull out your crystal balls and share with us what you foresee in 2008. What are your dreams, plans, resolutions, predictions, hopes, and fears. Tell us your "what nows".