"You see, Wendy, when the first baby laughed for the first time, its laugh broke into a thousand pieces, and they all went skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies." James M. Barrie Peter Pan.

Friday, August 14, 2009

Through the Looking Glass with a Twist!

I can't decide which is my favourite!



Not exciting but what would YOU look like at 400?



Icelandic scientists have found a 400-year-old clam, nearly twice as old as any other animal in history.

The clam — a qahog or, technically, Arctica islandica — spent those centuries in the frigid Atlantic waters off Iceland’s north coast. As the press release notes, “When this animal was a juvenile, King James I replaced Queen Elizabeth I as English monarch, Shakespeare was writing his greatest plays Hamlet, Othello, King Lear and Macbeth and Giordano Bruno was burnt at the stake for espousing the view that the Sun rather than the Earth was the centre of the universe.”


Thursday, August 13, 2009

Mr. Lego uncovered

I am fond of cows --- really!

Capitalism and Cows

TRADITIONAL CAPITALISM -- You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull. Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows. You sell them and retire on the income.

AN AMERICAN CORPORATION -- You have two cows. You sell one, and force the other to produce the milk of four cows. You are surprised when the cow drops dead.

FRENCH CORPORATION -- You have two cows. You go on strike because you want three cows.

A JAPANESE CORPORATION -- You have two cows. You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk. You then create clever cow cartoon images called Cowkimon(tm) and market them world-wide.

A GERMAN CORPORATION -- You have two cows. You re-engineer them so they live for 100 years, eat once a month, and milk themselves.

A BRITISH CORPORATION -- You have two cows. Both are mad.

AN ITALIAN CORPORATION -- You have two cows, but you don't know where they are. You break for lunch.

A RUSSIAN CORPORATION -- You have two cows. You count them and learn you have five cows. You count them again and learn you have 42 cows. You count them again and learn you have 12 cows. You stop counting cows and open another bottle of vodka.

A SWISS CORPORATION -- You have 5000 cows, none of which belong to you. You charge others for storing them.

A HINDU CORPORATION -- You have two cows. You worship them.

A CHINESE CORPORATION -- You have two cows. You have 300 people milking them. You claim full employment, high bovine productivity, and arrest the newsman who reported the numbers.

AN ARKANSAS CORPORATION -- You have two cows. That one on the left is kinda cute.

ENRON CORPORATION -- You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so that you get all four cows back, with a tax exemption for five cows. The milk rights of the six cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman Island company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who sells the rights to all seven cows back to your listed company. The annual report says the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more. Sell one cow to buy a new president of the United States, leaving you with nine cows. No balance sheet provided with the release. The public buys your bull.

ARTHUR ANDERSON, LLC -- You have 2 cows. You shred all documents that Enron has any cows, take 2 cows from Enron for payment for consulting the cows, and attest that Enron has 9 cows.

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Tiny

Main Entry: tiny
Part of Speech: adjective
Definition: very small Synonyms: Lilliputian, bitsy, bitty, diminutive, infinitesimal, insignificant, itsy-bitsy, itty-bitty, little, microscopic, midget, mini, miniature, minikin, minimum, minuscular, minuscule, minute, negligible, pee-wee, petite, pint-sized, pocket, pocket-size, puny, slight, teensy, teensy-weensy, teeny, trifling, wee, yea big

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Forget the beard ... the background is amazing!

The Longest Way 1.0 - one year walk/beard grow time lapse from Christoph Rehage on Vimeo.

November 9th 2007 - November 13th 2008
one year on foot - 4646km through China
unlimited beard & hair growth
thelongestway.com
musical score by the kingpins ( myspace.com/theoneandonlykingpins ) and zhu fengbo

Additional info:
- I never finished my original goal of walking to Germany. Instead, I walked for a year and roughly 4500km, passed the desert of Gobi, and then decided to stop walking for now.
- All of the distance from Beijing to Ürümqi has been completed solely on foot, straight good old walking. There are instances where you can see me in the video sitting on a plane or riding a boat, but those are during breaks I had to take from walking, either to sort out bureaucracy issues or to take care of some personal things.
- I had been planning this trip for over a year before I even started, and getting as far as I got was an experience for which I am very grateful.
- Obtaining the necessary visa for a trip like this was not very easy, hence I had to go back to Beijing a few times to resolve some issues.
- The songs I used in the video are 1) Zhu Fengbo - "Olive Tree" and 2) The Kingpins - "L'aventurier" - visit the Kingpins website if you want to know more, they are very cool I think.
- This is not a strict "1 pic a day" video, because I wanted to make it a bit more alive by adding some additional movement. Sometimes during the film you would follow me turn around, or something would happen in the background. I tried to capture these moments to make the video more interesting.
- The core of this project is in fact my website "www.thelongestway.com" where I have posted my extensive travel diary, starting from day 1 (Nov 9th 2007) and describing every single day until the end one year later.


All aboard!

There comes a time on every family outing when the little ones can go no further and demand to be carried the rest of the way.

Luckily for these six fluffy cygnets, Mummy was happy to oblige. One by one, under her watchful eye, the brood clambered aboard her back for a ride.

Having checked all were present and correct, the mother swan gently tucked back her wings to stop them falling off before gliding back to her nest.



Hop aboard: The mother swan checks on the six cygnets tucked beneath her wings

The mute swan and her fluffy cargo were caught on camera by Richard Meston on a visit to Bicton Park Botanical Gardens near
Sidmouth, Devon.

Mr Meston, 32, said: ‘The cygnets had been splashing in the water around their mum. They looked like they
were starting to get tired and one by one started to scramble up on their mum’s back. She didn’t mind at all and even gave them a
nudge up.’

The father of three from Bournemouth added: ‘After they got settled in, she covered them with her wings protectively like a
cushion and went on her way.



Precious cargo: The tiny birds could be seen peeking from the swan's feathers at Bicton Park in Devon

‘She kept looking back to make sure they were still there. It was almost as if she was giving them a quick telling-off to keep them in line. I could imagine them like kids in the back of the car saying, “Are we nearly there yet?” and squabbling.’

Julia Newth, of the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust in Slimbridge, Gloucestershire, said: ‘Mute swans are very protective of their young and will vigorously defend them from any threats. But this one is definitely showing the gentler side of her instincts in giving her young a lift on her back.’


Close to "home" but made me smile.....

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