Thursday, January 31, 2008

Shave Like Your Grandpa

How To Shave Like Your Grandpa

January 4, 2008

shaving1.pngProper shaving has become a lost art. Today's average male has no clue about the fine art of the traditional wet shave that their grandfathers and some of their fathers used to take part in. Instead, they're only accustomed to the cheap and disposable shaving products that companies market. I'm not sure when or why it happened, but the tradition of passing down the secrets of a clean shave abruptly stopped. Thankfully, this glorious male ritual is making a comeback.

Benefits of The Classic Wet Shave

Reduce costs. An 8 pack of your typical four blade cartridge razors can set you back over $20. $20! That's $2.50 per cartridge. The cost of a double edged safety razor is no more than $.25. You can save some serious money switching over to a safety razor. Additionally, you can save money by using traditional shaving creams and soaps. A can of the chemically packed gel goop that most drug stores sell can cost you up to $5 a can and it doesn't even last that long and they don't give you a quality shave. On the other hand, traditional shave creams and soaps are made out of natural materials. While their up front cost may be a bit more than shaving gels, you require less product to get a proper lather. Thus, you end up saving more in the long run.

Reduce environmental impact. Traditional wet shaving with a double edged safety razor uses less waste than shaving with cartridge razors. The only waste is a single metal razor blade and lather down the sink. Unlike today's razor cartridges, a double edged blade can easily be recycled. The tubes and bowls that most traditional shave creams and soaps are sold in produce less waste than those clunky non-biodegradable aerosol canisters that gels come in.

Better, more consistent shaves. Most men today walk around not knowing they have horrible shaves. Electric razors and the latest 5 blade contraptions irritate the skin more than needed, leaving razor burn, ingrown hairs, and redness. Shaving with a safety razor will eliminate the skin irritation and give your face a clean healthy look because you're just using one blade instead of several that chew up your face in order to cut your whiskers.

You'll feel like a bad ass. It's nice taking part in a ritual that great men like your grandfather, John F. Kennedy, and Teddy Roosevelt took part in.

The Tools

Safety Razor

gilletesafetyrazorvig.jpgSwitching from a cheap disposable razor to double edged safety razor is like upgrading from a Pinto to a Mercedes. A safety razor is a machine. It's nice holding a piece of heavy, sturdy metal in your hand while you're shaving as opposed to a piece of cheap-o plastic.

You can find safety razors in a variety of places. First, ask your grandpa if he still has his. Chances are he does. If gramps doesn't have one, try checking antique stores. I found my 1966 Gillette Superspeed Safety Razor in an antique store in Vermont. I only paid $10 for it. If you don't have any luck there, stop by eBay and do a search for safety razors. You're bound to find a few there. Finally, if buying a used safety razor doesn't fancy you, you can always buy a new one from the several companies that still make them. A highly recommended safety razor is from Merkur. They have several types to choose from at varying prices. Look to spend about $40 for a new safety razor.

Suggested Razors
Merkur Classic Safety Razor, Straight-#178- Made in Germany
Merkur Futur Adjustable Double Edge Safety Razor with Satin Finish- #700- Made in Germany
Merkur Classic Long Handled Safety Razor, Straight

Blades

You can choose from a variety of different blades. Each blade has a unique sharpness and cutting ability. Experiment with different kinds until you find the ones you like.

Suggested Razors
American Personna. You can find these in most drugstores. They're usually marketed as generic brand blades. They're pretty forgiving for the first time user.
Merkur Double Edge Razor Blades- Pack of 10 Blades- Made in Germany

Shaving Brush.

shave2.jpgIf you've never used a brush during shaving, you're in for a treat. A brush helps hydrate the shaving cream in order to form a thick rich shaving lather. Using a brush to lather up helps get the shaving cream up under each whisker which results in better, smoother shaves. Plus, it just feels nice on your face to lather up with a brush.

Brushes are made out of two types of animal hair: boar and badger. Boar bristles are stiffer than badger bristles and hold less water. Boar hair brushes are also cheaper. You can find a boar hair brush at Wal-Mart for about $4. If you really want to have a nice shaving experience, splurge and buy a badger hair brush. Badger brushes create more lather and it feels a lot nicer on your face. You can pick up a nice badger brush at any Crabtree and Evelyn. If you don't have a Crabtree in your area, try Amazon.

Suggested Brushes
Omega Creamy Curved Handle Pure Badger Shaving Brush - #13109
Porter's Badger Shaving Brush
Omega Brownie Junior Badger Shaving Brush with Stand - #63184

Soaps and Creams

If you're like the average guy, you've probably been getting your shaving cream from a can. This blue/green, chemically laced goop does nothing for your face and smells like a hospital. Traditional shave creams and soaps on the other hand are full of natural ingredients that nourish your face and leave you smelling absolutely manly. While these high quality creams and soaps may cost more than the can stuff, just a dab will create enough lather for you to lather up twice.

Suggested Creams and Soaps

Proraso Eucalyptus & Menthol Shaving Cream 150 ml.
Kiss My Face Fragrance Free Moisture Shave, 11-Ounce Pumps (Pack of 4)
Taylor of Old Bond Street Sandalwood Shaving Cream Jar
Proraso Shave Cream Tube
Body Shop For Men Shave Cream

The Technique

Prep your beard. If you want a clean shave, you need to prep your beard adequately. The goal during beard prep is to soften your whiskers so shaving is easier and causes less irritation. The best way to soften your beard is to to shave right when you get out of the shower. The hot water from your shower should hydrate and soften your beard enough for shaving. If you haven't showered, at least wet your beard with some hot water. A hot towel is a great way to soften your beard.

Lather up. Take a small dollop (about the size of nickel) of your shave cream and place it in a mug. Take your brush that you've pre-soaked with water and swirl the cream around until you get a nice thick lather. Apply the lather with your brush in swirling motions. When your face is nice and covered, take a few strokes to smooth everything out.
shave3.jpg

The shave. Unlike shaving with cartridge razors, shaving with a safety razor actually requires some skill and technique. Once mastered, though, you should be shaving effectively in no time. The four keys to a successful shave with a safety razor are 1) use as little pressure as possible; 2) angle the blade as far away from your face as possible; 3) shave with the grain; and 4) go for beard reduction, not beard removal. This will take some getting used to if you have used cartridges your entire life.

You don't need to use pressure because the weight of the safety razor is sufficient to cut your beard. If you press down, you'll end up hacking up your face. To help counter the tendency to apply pressure, try holding the razor by the tip of the handle.

Angling your razor is probably the trickiest part. The proper angle is somewhere around 30 and 45 degrees. To get the proper razor angle, put the top of the razor head directly on your cheek, with the handle parallel with the floor. Now slowly lower the handle until the blade can cut your whisker. Practice on your arm if you're not comfortable practicing on your face.

While shaving against the grain can get you that smooth feel, you risk slicing up your face and causing ingrown hairs. When you're first starting out, shave with the grain of your beard. If you lather up and pass the razor more than once over your face, you're guaranteed to get a smooth finish.

The goal with shaving should be gradual beard reduction, not beard removal in one deft swoop. Most men try to get rid of their beard in once pass of the razor. This hack-and-go technique is what causes the majority of skin irritations. If you want to avoid skin irritation, lather up and pass your razor over your face several times. Your face will thank you.

Post-shave. Rinse your face off with some cold water to close your pores. Treat your face to a nice aftershave. There are several to choose from, so pick the one you like best. Aftershave helps reduce any irritation that may have occurred and will leave your skin looking healthy.

Additional resources

Several resources exist on the internet on traditional wet shaving. Check these sites out for more information.

Badger and Blade (This is an excellent resource. I learned most of what I know about the traditional wet shave from this forum.)
Shaveblog
A Guide to the Gourmet Shaving Experiene

Develop a Stronger Libido and Enjoy Better Sex - Reader's Digest

31 ways to help you reach the health benefits of regular sex

Healthy Sex Drive

Your mom probably never told you this, but it's true: Sex is good for you! (Tell that to your spouse tonight.) Plenty of studies show it: Regular sex increases immunity from viruses, relieves stress, and even helps protect the health of a man's prostate gland by emptying fluids held there. It also triggers the release of chemicals that improve mood and ease pain.

Your doctor probably never told you this, but it's also true: Most people can and should have sex well into old age! While menopause in women does affect sexual drive and function somewhat, there is no reason healthy men or women can't experience sexual pleasure at any stage in life. Sure, the nature and intensity of the sex may change, but the love and pleasure don't!

If your sex drive has stalled out, you have good reasons to rev it back up again. You don't need jumper cables or even little blue pills. Just try a couple of these tips and we guarantee your engine will be turning over again in no time.

1. Have sex tonight! Having intercourse regularly helps to keep your sex drive in high gear by increasing the production of testosterone, which is the hormone mainly responsible for libido in both men and women.

2. Men: If you smoke, ask your doctor to prescribe you the nicotine patch. Why? Because it's scientifically proven that smoking can clog the blood vessels in the penis in the same way it clogs the arteries in your heart. Ever heard a better reason to quit?

3. Go write a list of all the medicine you're taking, then check for party poopers. More than 200 medications can cause erection problems and diminished sex drive, including drugs used to treat high blood pressure, heart disease, depression, and stomach problems. Check the Internet or ask your pharmacist or doctor if any of the drugs on your list could be culprits. Of course, you can't stop taking a drug you need, but you can talk to your doctor about possibly changing the brand, dose, or timing of your medication.

4. Spend tonight planning a steamy vacation. Even if you don't go, spending time together picturing where you'd go, looking at photos on the Web, and imagining yourself in some tropical paradise will be enough of a libido booster to get you to bed -- early. Plus, it's a lot more stimulating to talk about than why your teenager is failing geometry.

5. Women: Practice Kegel exercises. You know what Kegels are -- they're the squeezing exercises your doctor told you to do after pregnancy or because you were having a bit of a problem with leaking urine. What Doc probably didn't tell you is that they're also great for strengthening the pubococcygeus muscle, essential for orgasm. To do Kegels, take note of the muscle you use to stop urinary flow, then practice contracting that muscle, gradually releasing it. Work up to 20 contractions three times a day.

Aphrodisiacs

6. Men: Start taking supplements of ginkgo biloba every day. The herb promotes better blood flow, getting more blood to the brain and...other organs. It doesn't take much imagination to figure out how that might help you! Follow the instructions on the bottle, but check with your doctor first.

7. Make pesto and serve it over pasta tonight. Pesto contains pine nuts, great sources of arginine, the precursor for nitric oxide, a main ingredient in drugs like Viagra. Arginine helps open blood vessels so blood flow improves.

8. Go to the movies with your partner, sit in the back row, and neck like you used to when you were a teenager. You'll be combining the forbidden with the frustrating -- a sure bet to get your juices flowing.

9. Every time you pass your partner, reach out and touch or kiss him or her. Don't allow these moments to go beyond the kiss or hug. Simply increasing the amount of physical contact you have with your partner will help with desire.

10. Sprinkle 1 tablespoon wheat germ on every cup of yogurt and every bowl of cereal you eat. Wheat germ's rich in zinc, which is important to the production of that all-important hormone, testosterone. You can also get your fill of zinc in beef, eggs, and seafood -- especially oysters!

11. When you're at a party or out in public with your partner, take a moment to stare at him/her across the room as if you were still wooing one another. Sex falls out of a relationship when you take one another's presence for granted. So don't!

12. Rent an erotic video and watch it with your partner. Use the time to talk about what you like and don't like during sex (and before and after).

13. Read a sexy "bodice ripper" out loud to your partner. Play-act the parts of the ravishing heroine and her handsome, yet dangerous lover.

14. Open your eyes when you kiss and when you are, um, intimate. Looking into your partner's eyes during such times sends an incredible message of trust and honesty.

Intimate Rituals

15. Say exactly what's on your mind -- sexually, that is. If you're watching your husband pull out the tree stump in the backyard and you get a certain weakness in your legs watching the sweat roll off his back, tell him. If the sight of your wife comforting your teenage son after his first-ever girlfriend dumped him makes you glad all over again that you married her, tell her. Simply expressing how everyday things make you feel deepens your intimacy when said out loud.

16. Pretend you've just met. Remember that weak-in-the-knees, shivers-up-your-back feeling you used to get when you first met? You can have that again. Call her and ask her out on a date. Dress up for lunch with him. Buy new underwear.

17. Create your own intimate rituals. No, we're not talking about sex. But what about waking him up with a steaming cup of coffee instead of the alarm every morning? What about having a hot bath ready for her in the evening? How about a special dinner out every Tuesday -- when most couples are zoned out in front of the TV? Or massaging her feet while you watch a DVD with a big bowl of popcorn? The key is consistency. These are not things you do just once, but over and over again until they become like a secret language between the two of you.

18. Get a massage. Or a pedicure, or a facial, or whatever makes you feel better about yourself. If you take care of your own body, you're much more likely to be able to enjoy it. Another good way to take care of yourself is exercise. A side benefit for both men and women: better blood flow to crucial organs.

19. Turn the timer on for 15 minutes and talk to him (or her) about anything other than kids, money problems, or work annoyances. Tell him about the dream you had last night. The cute teenager you saw at the diner who reminded you of yourself when you were in high school. The great presentation you made today and how it made you feel. When the timer goes off, it's your partner's turn.

20. Go away for a couple of days -- by yourself. While you're away, make a list of all the things you love and like about your partner. Close your eyes and picture yourself making love. Call him/her and have an erotic phone conversation. By the time you get home, you'll be so greedy for each other that the front hall will look like a king-size mattress.

21. Send the kids away and stay home together. Make love in a different part of the house. It can be as steamy as in your bathtub or as romantic as on a blanket in front of your fireplace.

22. Before you go to bed, take a few minutes to write out a to-do list and a list of your worries. This gets rid of the worries that can often interfere with your ability to relax and become aroused.

Mix it Up

23. Spend an hour with your partner touching every part of his/her body -- but you can't use your hands. Use other parts of your body (including your imagination) instead. Conversely, caress one another only with your hands touching every part of the body except the genital zones. This can remove any pressure you might feel to "get right to it" after a hectic day on the job and is a wonderful way, at least for the woman, to relax and escape from the daily grind and transition from her other (oh-so-non-sexual) roles.

24. Open up a dozen oysters. After all, Casanova is said to have had 50 oysters every morning off the breast of a young woman in the bathtub -- so they have to be good for something. Actually, as you read a few tips ago, oysters are loaded with zinc, critical for production of testosterone, the sex hormone in both men and women.

25. Stop at one (or two) drinks at the most. A small amount of alcohol can set the mood; more can drown the flame of desire, or lessen your ability to see your desire through.

26. Go purchase at least one item of sexy lingerie. Okay, this is for the ladies...but the feel of soft silk against your skin will help wake up those sensuality nerve endings. And who knows what will happen when that happens?

27. Re-create your favorite sexy scene in a movie. You know the ones -- the lobster scene in Flashdance. The ice scene in 9 1/2 Weeks. Mena Suvari's cheerleading routine in American Beauty, Clark Gable carrying Vivien Leigh up the stairs in Gone With the Wind, the pottery scene in Ghost, the part in The Bridges of Madison County when Meryl Streep and Clint Eastwood dance in her kitchen. Whew!

28. Create a romance CD for him (or her). Have it playing when your partner returns home. Light a few scented candles while you're at it. Who knows what might ensue?

29. Tell your partner two things you love about him/her every day. Love, affection, and mutual respect are the bases for a steamy sex life.

30. Call your partner at work. Tell him or her in no uncertain terms what you would like to do when he or she gets home. Another option: Set up a private e-mail account and e-mail the message.

31. Do something physical together, like skiing, a long country walk, a stroll along a beach, canoeing. Such activities let you see one another in a different light, creating a sense of physical vitality that readily translates into intimacy.

Apply Unix Style Coding to Your Life

Write simple parts connected by clean interfaces.

(Rule of Modularity)

While much personal productivity software attempts to do everything for you—include contacts, tasks, projects, email, and calendar into one monster package—there's a big advantage to using separate mechanisms for each job. If there's one you want to upgrade or change one aspect of, you can do that without trashing the others. For example, if you tie up your whole life in Microsoft Outlook, moving to a different email or calendar app gets complicated. Likewise, favor apps that have universal interfaces—like RSS feeds and email alerts, or the ultimate universal interface, paper.

Raymond writes:

The only way to write complex software that won't fall on its face is to hold its global complexity down—to build it out of simple parts connected by well-defined interfaces, so that most problems are local and you can have some hope of upgrading a part without breaking the whole.

Clarity is better than cleverness.

(Rule of Clarity)

When you're writing down your events, to-do's and projects, make the instructions you're giving yourself as clear and easy to understand as possible. "Found a company" is a huge, inspecific project that will sit on your list undone forever. "Call Tom to ask how he established his LLC (555) 456-7890" is a much more doable task. Further, when you're tempted to come up with a complicated, coded, hierarchical, contextual tagging vocabulary and sorting algorithm, remember that clarity is better than cleverness.

Code that is graceful and clear is less likely to break—and more likely to be instantly comprehended by the next person to have to change it. This is important, especially when that next person might be yourself some years down the road.

Fold knowledge into data so program logic can be stupid and robust.

(Rule of Representation)

Include all the information you'll need to get stuff done into your system at the entry point. For example, if you have to make a phone call, include the number when you add the call to your to-do list. If you have to go somewhere you've never been before, include directions and address and contact phone number. Make your data as rich as possible, as your system is just a path for moving things along.

When you must fail, fail noisily and as soon as possible.

(Rule of Repair)

The idea of failing "noisily" is not something our culture encourages, but it is the only way a programmer can diagnose and fix a problem. If you've spent time setting up a productivity system (whether it's GTD or just using a new task management app) and you screw up, stop. Figure out all the reasons why you forgot Mom's birthday, missed a deadline, or never followed up with that guy about that opportunity. Be verbose about it. Make a point to "fail noisily" in your mind and tweak your system to prevent it from happening again. Like software development, your productivity system development is an iterative process.

Programmer time is expensive; conserve it in preference to machine time.

(Rule of Economy)

The Rule of Economy could be Lifehacker's mantra. In short, don't do anything the computer can do for you. Instead of wasting time painstakingly filing all your documents into perfectly named folders? Search for what you need on the fly. Learn keyboard shortcuts to avoid having to move the mouse excessively. Automate boring tasks like backing up your files so that you don't have to spend time doing it. Make your computer work for you, instead of you working for the computer.

Prototype before polishing. Get it working before you optimize it.

(Rule of Optimization)

There is no perfect productivity system. Actually, scratch that: the perfect system is the one you're using. You don't have to have the Getting Things Done book memorized to get started organizing your stuff. Decide on one method for getting organized and start using it. Then, tweak as you go. Your productivity prototype should be "live" before it's been optimized. Work your system no matter how imperfect, and modify it as you go.

Design for the future, because it will be here sooner than you think.

10 Things to Cheer You Up

1. Plan Some Fun. Get out your calendar. Next do a search for things to do in your area. Local newspapers usually have a "What's Going On" section. Pick out your favorite 5 or 10 things. And remember the things you choose don't have to be big events. It can be as simple as taking a long drive in the country or going for a walk on the beach. Write them into your calendar. Invite someone to join you on some. For others go and meet some new people.

2. Express Your Creativity. Do some painting. Decorate your house with flowers. Do a paper mache project. Pick up that guitar, practice and write a song. Practice juggling. Make a funny photo album with all those old photos you've got in boxes by adding quirky caption above each picture. Learn how to play the harmonica. Write and illustrate a mini book or comic book. Maybe pick your favorite movie get a friend to act out one of the scenes with you while you videotape it. It doesn't have to be good. Just doing these things will make you feel good. And if you keep doing them you'll naturally get better.

3. Get Outside. Fresh air does wonders for your body and spirit. If you can go to a park or a place in nature, even better. Here are some things you could do: go for a walk, fly a kite, plant some vegetables or flowers, roller skate, ride a bike, or go on a 'treasure hunt" to find things for an art project.

4. Let Music Take You Higher. Turn on your favorite music and sing! Pull down the shades and dance. Rent a video on belly dancing. If you're in your car, you can still move a little to the music. Go for it! What do you care what other people think? Have fun with it! Sing, dance, play an instrument. Practice your favorite song and then go to karaoke and let the world hear your talent!

5. Walk a Dog. If you don't have your own dog, offer to walk a neighbor's dog. Or even better yet, sign up at the local MSPCA to walk the pooches who have no one to love them. What a nice way to make a difference!

6. Volunteer. There are so many ways to help others. Here are a few ideas.
7. A Change Will Do You Good. Get some order in your house. Change your furniture around. Change your decorations, or maybe go minimalist for a change. Clear out the clutter. It doesn't matter where you start. Just pick a place in your home that's been bugging you and attack it! Then sell, throw, or give away stuff you don't need. You'll feel great afterward and you'll have made a dent in making your living space more peaceful. And maybe it will give you inspiration to tackle another area tomorrow.

8. Plan a Party. There doesn't need to be a good reason other than it's time for some fun. Start with a small idea and build around it. Maybe you can get inspired by a theme, certain foods, or your favorite music to get the ball rolling. Then think about who you would like to invite. When and where will you have it? Will you cook, hire caterers, or make it pot luck? A meal or finger foods? Will there be dancing, contests, games, or other fun stuff like costumes? Maybe it will be low key with some jazz music, wine and cheese. Or maybe it will be a Hawaiian luau. Or maybe if you have a lot of singe friends you can have a white elephant party. Call a friend for help with the logistics.

9. Personal Spa and Relaxation Day. Include as many of these ideas as you like or have time for. Get a massage, pedicure, and haircut. Take a bubble bath with candles, music and champagne. Give yourself an egg-white or mud mask facial. Line up 2-3 movies to watch in bed while eating your favorite delights: ice cream, chocolate, whip cream, jello, popcorn, finger food hors d'oeuvre, and more. What else would you include to pamper yourself?

10. Reach Out. Connect with friends and family. When was the last time you wrote and mailed an actual letter? Why not do it today? Or how about making some home made post cards with materials you have lying around the house. Cutout some pictures from magazines or from your photo collection and make a mini collage. Maybe just call one old friend from colleg

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

12 Techniques to Help You Live a Happy and Fulfilled Life

via Dumb Little Man - Tips for Life by Jay White on 1/29/08
It seems that everything comes in a list format nowadays. “Wash, Rinse, and Repeat” or “Open box, Remove Contents, Try and Assemble”. Maybe it is because when we see things in a list format our brain interprets them as a set of instructions - rules that must be followed.

The proliferation of articles about happiness as of late has been astonishing. Everybody is coming up with the magic formula for finding happiness. I don't know about you, but I need to keep things simple and in perspective at all times.

Wouldn’t it be great if there were a simple set of instructions for living a happy and fulfilled life? How about an instruction manual for life? Something along the lines of “Enjoy childhood, Explore young adulthood, Engage in a rewarding career, and Enjoy life.”

Unfortunately, things are not that easy. That doesn’t mean there aren’t techniques and tips you can use in your everyday life that can help you find happiness and fulfillment as you go through the journey of life. Here's how:
  1. Keep life simple. Far too many of us are always over analyzing and looking for the most complicated way of doing things in life. Sometimes life was meant to be simple – a walk through the park, a simple yes or no answer, or a quiet evening with the family. Don’t try and clutter your life with unnecessary decisions by making everything complicated and complex. Keep it simple!

  2. Practice being satisfied. How many times have you heard someone say, “If only I had a few more dollars I’d…” or “If I just had another day off I could….”? Many people don’t know how to be satisfied with what life gives them. They are so busy wanting more that they squander what life has already given them.

  3. Beware of indecision. Nobody said life is easy, and sometimes you have to make the tough choices. Never put off a decision that you can make today. You may miss some of the best and most exciting opportunities in the world because you were indecisive. Successful people didn’t get where they were at by prolonging or going back and forth on decisions!

  4. Practice cheerfulness. You’ve heard it before, and you’ll hear it here again – it only takes a few muscles to smile! You would be surprised at how well being cheerful to others can spread like wildfire. We live in a society where it seems that glumness is the rule of order. A simple smile or kind word can spread through our culture like wildfire – not only will you feel better, but those who interact with you will feel better!

  5. Learn to like people. You don’t have to love everyone you encounter, so learn to like people – especially those who are different than yourself. Often you won’t agree with everything they do, or maybe all of their beliefs, but by learning to get along with them you will open your mind up to change – a critical trait that is absolutely necessary in today’s world.

  6. Live and let live. Is it really your concern what the guy across the street wants to do with his life or who he wants to share his life with? Learn to live your life to the fullest and let others live their life to the fullest. None of us is above anyone else, and none of us should think we should be allowed to dictate how another person should live their life.

  7. Adversity teaches. Adversity can be one of the most powerful teachers we will ever have in our lives. You will learn so much about life by overcoming adversity and learning how to face it head on. Adversity often comes dressed in many different outfits, but you will change your life by learning how to deal with it and prosper from it.

  8. Don’t take yourself so seriously. Here is a secret: it’s ok to be a little goofy now and then! You only get one shot at this life, so make the most of it. Have some fun and show your children and those around you that you know how to have fun. You aren’t the greatest gift to mankind this world has ever had – so don’t act like it! You may find you add years to your life, not to mention a ton of laughter!

  9. Have a sense of humor. Laugh, joke, and now and then pick up a cream pie and throw it! Laughter has been shown to help people live longer, reduce their blood pressure, and help them relate to people from around the world.

  10. Practice objectivity. Be objective in your decision-making and risk-taking. Know the facts and avoid letting racial, social, or any other type of bias influence your decisions. Great leaders perform their best when they act based on facts, not on emotion or prejudices. Become a great leader in your life.

  11. Tolerate your own mistakes. You will make mistakes – in fact, you will make so many mistakes you will never be able to list them all. Learn that mistakes happen and the best thing you can do is to learn from them. Don’t spend your entire life dwelling on a mistake you made years ago – learn from it and move on. The world isn’t going to wait while you live in the past.

  12. Forgive yourself. Stop beating yourself up over things that happened in the past - things you did or didn’t do, and mistakes you may have made with others.

    Forgiving yourself is a skill so few of us have the ability to accomplish. It's such a shame that we spent a lifetime living in the past and never make it to our full potential in the future. Forgive yourself – and just as importantly, forgive others.
It may seem like a rather long list, but I encourage you to read it and then refer back to it every now and then. You’ll see each one ties into the others in some fashion and that these simple steps really do help you live a more meaningful, happy and fulfilled life.

Life happens. Be a part of it.

Written by David B. Bohl of Slow Down Fast.


Careful!


Careful!





New Casio Camera

Casio Computer Co Ltd will release a digital camera "EX-F1" in March 2008. It enables to release a shutter at the right moment with a continuous shooting speed of 60 fps (frames per second) (each frame is 6 Mpixels) and to shoot full HD (1080/60i) H.264 movies. Previously, about 10 fps was the fastest.

In addition, the EX-F1 can take pictures that are invisible to the naked eye (sample movies). The shooting speed can be as fast as 1,200 fps when 336 × 96 pixel pictures are being taken. It is the speed that only expensive industrial cameras could achieve.

Sunday, January 27, 2008

Time to Upgrade Your Computer













The Art of Verbal Intimidation

The Art of Verbal Intimidation : Learn it and fight back!

9012008

An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, but I'd rather be blind than see a coward in the mirror. In our evolutionary history, intimidation was a direct result of physical size. One human being would be intimidated by a larger creature, and even a larger human being. This formula is still in play, you need look only to night-club bouncers, celebrity security guards and biker gangs. As the tolerance for physical violence in our community diminishes, verbal intimidation has found itself a new home in our lives.

Often, the blows from a verbal intimidator can be just as punishing as those from a fist fight. With all matters of survival, if you don't learn to fight, you will lose. Never instigate intimidation, but learn to fight back when somebody tries to intimidate you.

What is verbal intimidation?

Verbal intimidation is often the road of the coward. The intimidator attempts to generate a range of fears in their target by simply using intimidating words. This can be as extreme as the the threat of physical violence. However, I am more interested in verbal intimidation that is non-violent in nature. The kind of intimidation used by lawyers, corporate rivals, police officers and employers.

Intimidation techniques

Every technique employed by the instigator has a single goal: to take your power away from you. Every one of us has a fighting spirit, a confidence that allows us to wake up in the morning, and take on the world. Your verbal attacker is going to try and take this away from you, to leave you nervous, doubting yourself, and even stuttering. Your aim: to never give your power away. You will always have your power if you remain calm, confident, and equipped with the responses provided here.

Cutting-in

This is when the instigator asks a question, and immediately cuts into your answer with the next question. The result of this technique is that the target does not have a chance to explain their answers at all, leaving them scared about what the next question may be. This is most commonly employed by lawyers and police officers. The fear of being misquoted or taken out of context creates a feeling of nervousness, often making the target feel small and taking away their confidence to fight back.

Your Defense - Slow it down

If someone tries cutting-in on your responses. Simply pause, then politely reply:

I'll answer your next question, when I'm done with this one.

You will likely hear the response, "We're moving on.". To this, confidently respond with:

We will move on, when I'm finished.

This needs to be said in a calm and emotionless tone. Do not be scared to respond in this manner. Your aim is to take the power away from the instigator. They will attempt to take control of the conversation by trying to get back to cutting-in. You need to slow the conversation down. Keep saying "I'm not finished." when they try to cut-in.

Shouting

Hot headed upper managers can sometimes feel like gods in their workplace. As well as creating the office in 7 days, they sometimes shout down to employees as though they are children. Do not let this happen to you. There are only two people who are allowed to talk this way to you, your mother and father. The verbal attacker is attempting to convey dominance over you. If somebody is shouting at you in the work place with other people watching, you need to remain calm and completely disarm this individual. If you allow yourself to be yelled at, or get into a shouting match, your attacker will have walked away the victor.

Your Defense - Subtle Humiliation

Although this may sound counter-productive to your career, you need to employ a form of subtle humiliation. In effect, you need to humiliate your attacker by remaining calm and making them out to be a drama queen. I once witnessed a perfect example of this from a work colleague who had a verbal attack instigated towards him by a senior manager. As the manager elevated his voice to declare dominance, my work friend simply said:

I understand the concern. Though I do think you're being very emotional right now. Let's talk about this once you've had a chance to calm down.

The anger in the manager's eyes grew ten-fold. In a desperate attempt to appear dominant, the manager further raised his voice and responded:

No! We're talking about this now!

To which my colleague stood up, and responded softly:

I will talk to you, but I will not let you shout at me. You are my boss and I respect you, but you are not my mother.

My colleague had managed to hold on to his power, and reverse the desired affect of the attacker. In an effort to display dominance, the senior manager was made to look emotional. The dominance was transferred to my colleague, who incidentally took over the management role six months later. Much like Judo, he used the attackers power and weight against him.

Information Flood

This is a tactic used commonly by high powered attorneys who attempt to reach settlement by intimidating a member of the public. By flooding the victim with trade jargon, legal documentation and trade law references, the victim feels overwhelmed and has an emotional drowning sensation. The lawyers who practice this technique are completely aware that members of the general public do not understand the reference codes and precedents. They are not attempting to inform, but to intimidate. By making you feel overwhelmed, you are much more susceptible to co-operate with their agenda. Do NOT allow anybody to make you feel that way.

Your Defense - Active curiosity

Active curiosity is when you are really excited to learn about something new. This attitude will likely drive your attacker crazy. Your goal is to have them explain every little thing to you, and appear to be really eager to learn about it. They are trying to threaten you, yet you act like a kid who is learning to play the guitar. You are smiling, attentive, and inquisitive. As they throw trade practice laws your way, smile, nod, and have them explain all of the fine details to you. Treat it like a college education. Do not give away your power. As long as you have your confidence, you already have a head-start.

The Bait

Much like fishing, the bait is used to lure you in for an off handed attack. The attacker's aim is to plant hurtful or accusatory phrases in seemingly innocent conversation to lure you in. Here's an example:

Hi Sophie, I know you're busy but I need this document written up before noon. It's so easy, even you could do it. Thanks Sophie.

The bait here is "even you". If Sophie is like most people, she will take the bait and respond with:

What do you mean even I could do it? I've been working here for 8 years and …

Your Defense - Skip the bait

Sophie took the bait, and now she is justifying her existence to the instigator. To which the instigator could simply reply, "you're over reacting". Sophie will lose her power in this conversation. Her aim, and your aim should be to NOT take the bait. Ignore it. Pretend you didn't hear it.

This will make your verbal attacker recoil. You did not give them the response they were expecting. You do not need to explain yourself to anyone. If someone throws in a bait, they want you to get upset and emotional - sometimes make a fool of yourself. You simply respond to the question or statement, ignoring the bait altogether. If you repeat this process with serial verbal offenders, they will soon give up entirely.

The lesson here is simple. You are a habitant on this wonderful planet, and you have the right to deny others control over you. When I was young, my father once passed on some great advice to me, which I am proud to share with you. He said, "You may not like the way things are in this world, but if you don't learn the rules of the game and fight back, you will always lose." Learn the rules, don't let others gain control over your emotion, and fight back!

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10 Secrets to Success

What is it that makes people successful and I mean really successful compared to you or me? Are they smarter or do they work harder? Are they risk takers or have powerful and influential friends?

The financial newspaper [1] Investors Business Daily (IBD) asked these same questions a few years ago and started a multi-year search for the answer. They studied industry leaders, investors and entrepreneurs to understand the traits they all had in common that contributed to their success. Reproduced here is their list of 10 Secrets to Success along with my commentary on each no-so-secret, 'secret'.

I decided to reproduce the list here and comment on each of the traits in hopes of motivating you and myself in the process. It's time for me to take my own advice and start on the path to my dreams. I hope to motivate you, by using myself as an example.

I originally came across this list when I was staring at some papers on a refrigerator owned by someone who was very successful – both personally and financially. My family and I had just spent the night as a guest in a great house in the suburbs of Boston. We were living life large as we played pool in the rec room, drank wine from the wine cellar, and enjoyed a dip in the hot tub. The problem was, neither of the couples in the house owned the property or the life we were pretending to have. You see, my friends were house sitting for the original owner and they had invited us to stay for the weekend.

It wasn't until the morning after our little 'party' that I noticed something taped to the refrigerator – something that impacts me each time I read it. It was the IBD 10 Secrets to Success. Once my head cleared, I quickly copied them down and read them over and over again. After our vacation I made copies and posted them in my home office and inside a journal I decided to keep.

The problem was, after a couple of months I forgot about the secrets and they fell by the wayside. And so did my actions towards my goals. At the time the articles 7 Ways to Grow the Action Habit or How To Motivate Yourself – Self Motivation didn't exist and I lost my motivation. Well, I re-discovered the list and want to share it with you now. I hope you take these not-so-secret, secrets to heart and realize your dreams – whatever they may be.

1. How You Think is Everything.

Always be positive. Think Success, not Failure. Beware of a negative environment.

This trait has to be one of the most important in the entire list. Your belief that you can accomplish your goals has to be unwavering. The moment you say to yourself "I can't…", then you won't. I was always given the advice "never say I can't" and I'd like to strike those words from the dictionary.

I've found that from time-to-time my attitude waivers. A mentor of mine once said "it's ok to visit pity city, but you can't stay and there comes a time when you need to leave". Positive things happen to positive people.

2. Decide upon Your True Dreams and Goals: Write down your specific goals and develop a plan to reach them.

Write down my dreams and goals? Develop a plan to reach them? You mean like a project plan? Yes, that's exactly what this means. You may have heard the old adage: A New Years resolution that isn't written down is just a dream, and dreams are not goals.

Goals are those concrete, measurable stepping stones of achievement that track your progress towards your dreams. My goal is to start a second career as a freelance writer – what are your goals?

3. Take Action. Goals are nothing without action.

Be like Nike and "Just do it". I took action by reaching out and started writing. Every day I try to take some action towards my goals. It may be small, but it's still an action. Have you taken action towards your goals?

4. Never Stop Learning: Go back to school or read books. Get training & acquire skills.

Becoming a life long learner would benefit us all and is something we should instill in our kids. It's funny that once you're out of school you realize how enjoyable learning can be. What have you learned today?

5. Be Persistent and Work Hard: Success is a marathon, not a sprint. Never give up.

I think every story of success I read entails long hard hours of work. There is no getting around this and there is no free lunch. But, if you're working towards something that you're passionate about, something you love – then is it really work?

6. Learn to Analyze Details: Get all the facts, all the input. Learn from your mistakes.

I think you have to strike a balance between getting all the facts and making a decision with incomplete data – both are traits of successful people. Spend time gathering details, but don't catch 'analysis paralysis'.

7. Focus Your Time And Money: Don't let other people or things distract you.

Remain laser focused on your goals and surround yourself with positive people that believe in you. Don't be distracted by the naysayer's or tasks that are not helping you achieve your goals.

8. Don't Be Afraid To Innovate: Be different. Following the herd is a sure way to mediocrity.

Follow through on that break-out idea you have. Ask yourself "What would I do if I wasn't afraid?"

9. Deal And Communicate With People Effectively: No person is an island. Learn to understand and motivate others.

Successful people develop and nurture a network and they only do that by treating people openly, fairly and many times firmly. There is nothing wrong about being firm – just don't cross the a-hole line. How do you deal with people?

10. Be Honest And Dependable: Take responsibility, otherwise numbers 1 – 9 won't matter.

Enough said.

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Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Finally a Decent Presidential Candidate

Bill Clinton: 'Screw It, I'm Running For President'

January 23, 2008 | Issue 44•04

CHARLESTON, SC—After spending two months accompanying his wife, Hillary, on the campaign trail, former president Bill Clinton announced Monday that he is joining the 2008 presidential race, saying he "could no longer resist the urge."

"My fellow Americans, I am sick and tired of not being president," said Clinton, introducing his wife at a "Hillary '08" rally. "For seven agonizing years, I have sat idly by as others experienced the joys of campaigning, debating, and interacting with the people of this great nation, and I simply cannot take it anymore. I have to be president again. I have to."

Bill Clinton

"Damn, this feels good," Clinton told supporters as he shook hands in Charleston Monday.

He continued, "It is with a great sense of relief that I say to all of you today, 'Screw it. I'm in.'"

In a show of respect, Clinton then completed his introduction of Hillary Clinton, calling her a "wonderful wife and worthy political adversary," and warmly shook her hand as she approached the podium. A clearly shocked Mrs. Clinton got halfway through her speech about the nation's obligation to its children before walking briskly offstage.

A spokesman for Sen. Clinton's campaign had no comment.

"No longer will I have to endure watching candidates like Hillary Clinton engaging in single-pump handshakes with voters, as I use every last ounce of restraint not to shout out, 'No! Warm double-clasp! Warm double-clasp!'" Clinton said. "America deserves someone who can do it right."

While the announcement has come as a surprise to many, Beltway observers said it was not completely unexpected, citing footage from a recent Democratic debate that showed Clinton fidgeting in his seat, gripping the arms of his chair, and repeatedly glancing at all the television cameras while rapidly tapping his right foot. Analysts also noted one debate in which Clinton mouthed responses to all the moderator's questions while making hand gestures to himself.

Clinton told reporters Tuesday that seeing so many "Clinton '08" posters "really got [him] thinking," and said that the fact that he was already wearing a suit, and smiling and waving on the campaign trail was an added motivator.

"From signing healthcare reform legislation, to working with politicians from across the aisle, to brokering international peace treaties with foreign dignitaries, I goddamn love being president," Clinton said. "For too long has this nation been deprived of a Bill Clinton presidency, and for too long have I been deprived of being president. Now I get to experience all these wonderful things again myself."

"And the applause," Clinton added. "I look forward to the endless roar of applause perhaps most of all."

Since his announcement two days ago, Clinton has raised a staggering $550 million. He has also surged in national polls, rising from a mere 2 percent prior to his candidacy to a commanding 94 percent, ahead of former front-runners Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, who are now tied with 3 percent each. John Edwards withdrew from the race Tuesday, saying only, "I am not worthy."

Although some have pointed out that it is unconstitutional for Clinton to run for a third term in office, he has silenced most critics by urging voters "not to worry about the Constitution for now" and assuring them he will address those legal issues immediately after regaining control of the White House.

"All I am asking of the American people is four more years," Clinton said at a fundraiser Tuesday where tens of thousands of South Carolinians gathered to stare in gape-jawed wonderment at the former president. "Well, maybe eight. Actually, you know what, definitely eight. Eight more years."

Thus far, the response among voters has been positive.

"I love Bill Clinton," said Orangeburg, SC resident Marsha Demarais. "God, he was just so great as president. Can we just make him president again right now?"

Clinton also noted that, if elected, the timing would be perfect for his family, as his wife has recently expressed a desire to move back to the D.C. area.

Saturday, January 19, 2008

Recycle Old Skis into a DIY Sled

via Lifehacker by Gina Trapani on 1/18/08

ski-sled-header.png If you've got an old pair of skis gathering dust in the garage, turn them into a killer sled with an easy mod. The Out Your Backdoor blog explains:

What you do is take a plastic tub sled ($10 hardware store) and screw a pair of XC skis to the bottom of it—if it's a sled for kids—or a pair of metal-edge downhill skis if adults might use it. Use stout, short screws and big washers to avoid pull-thru. Then you glue foam-padding to the inside of the tub.
Apparently the resulting sled goes superfast, straight and far, but good luck turning with it. Looks like a fun project with the kids when hitting the slopes isn't possible.

Find Work that you Love

"So… uhh… how do I find a job that I love?"

Talk about money long enough, and the question inevitably comes up. And it should.

Most of us spend 60-80% of our waking hours doing something work-related. If you don't enjoy that work, then it means you're unhappy 60-80% of the time. Logical, right?

It would also make sense that the quickest way to improve your happiness would be to improve your enjoyment of the thing you spend the most time doing. Since that's work, you wonder if you couldn't find something better.

But the question is, "How?"

Here's what I think: the answer is in the title of this post.

Let's break it down, starting at the end of the title and working our way back to the beginning.

Step One: Define Love

The word "love" describes a huge variety of emotions. What does it mean to you?

  • Meaningful
  • Fun
  • Abundant
  • Relaxing
  • Fulfilling

Most people just think they'll "know it when they find it," but I think that's wrong. You'll find it when you know it, not the other way around.

Take some time and figure out exactly what you mean when you say "love." Envision it. That way, you'll at least know what you're looking for.

Step Two: Define You

It's funny what happens when you try to define a word like love. You start thinking about yourself.

  • Who are you right now?
  • Who do you want to be?
  • What do you really want?
  • Can you really have it?
  • Do you really deserve it?

Finding happiness is more about self-discovery than career advice, and self-discovery usually starts with hard questions. If you want a meaningful career, find the courage to ask them.

Step Three: Define Work

Once you know who you are and what you want, you can start tackling concepts like work. For most people, "work" and "happiness" don't really go together. Work means:

  • Being ticked off at your boss
  • Doing stuff you don't enjoy
  • A never-ending competition
  • Dealing with bureaucracy
  • Fighting to be noticed

If you want work that you love, then you'll have to change your conception of work. You might even want to remove the word from your vocabulary entirely.

Personally, I divide actions into two categories: those moving me toward my objectives and those NOT moving me toward my objectives. I try to always do the former and never do the latter.

Ever since, I've never had a problem finding the motivation to "work." Isn't that interesting?

Step Four: Define Find

The act of "finding" normally involves the act of "searching." So, if you want to find a job you love, you have to commit yourself to searching for it. That means:

  • Reading about other jobs and professions
  • Asking people what their work is like
  • Keeping an eye out for interesting opportunities
  • Updating your résumé
  • Applying for jobs and going on interviews

Think of yourself like a detective, methodically searching for a missing person. You don't just wait for them to appear out of nowhere. You have to go looking for them.

Step Five: Define How

Here's the big question: once you find a job that looks like one you'd love, how do you go about getting it? You might need to:

  • Pay for some specialized training
  • Build your reputation as an expert
  • Network with influencers in industry
  • Get some relevant work experience
  • Actually apply for the job

Whatever it requires, do it. If you get turned down, just keep asking until you either find out why and fix the problem or they hire you because of your persistence. Remember, you're either moving closer, or you're not.

How to Find Work That You Love

Didn't I tell you the answer was in the title? If you look carefully, we've worked through every content word in the sentence, starting with "love" and ending with "how."

You can approach most problems this way. Just break them down, figure out what all of the words mean, and you'll automatically start to understand what to do.

The one thing I'll add is, you might need to go through this process several times. You'll start your dream job, find out you don't like it as much as you thought, and then move onto the next one.

I'm going through that process for the fourth time in nine years. Every time, I get a little closer, enjoying my work a little more.

And know what? It's worth it.

The Astonishing History of Vibrators

The Astonishing History of Vibrators

Mention vibrators, and most people think of women's sexual pleasure. But that was the furthest thing from the minds of the male doctors who invented them more than a century ago. They were more interested in a labor-saving device to spare their own hands the fatigue caused by treating "female hysteria." This condition involved a number of vague, chronic complaints in adult women, including: anxiety, sleeplessness, irritability, nervousness, erotic fantasies, and moisture inside the vagina. Female hysteria was actually women's sexual frustration. The history of vibrators is a strange tale that provides insights into both the history of sex toys, and cultural notions about women's sexuality.

Until the 20th century, American and European men believed that women were incapable of sexual desire and pleasure. Women of that era basically concurred. They were socialized to believe that "ladies" had no sex drive, and were merely passive receptacles for men's unbridled lust, which they had to endure to hang on to their husbands and have children. Not surprisingly, these beliefs led to a great deal of sexual frustration on the part of women.

Over the centuries, doctors prescribed various remedies for hysteria (named for the Greek for "uterus"). In the 13th century, physicians advised women to use dildos. In the 16th century, they told married hysterics to encourage the lust of their husbands. Unfortunately, that probably didn't help too many wives, because modern sexuality research clearly shows that most women rarely experience orgasm from intercourse, but need direct clitoral stimulation. For hysteria unrelieved by husbandly lust, and for widows, and single and unhappily married women, doctors advised horseback riding, which, in some cases, provided enough clitoral stimulation to trigger orgasm.

But many women found little relief from horseback riding, and by the 17th century, dildos were less of an option because the arbiters of decency had succeeded in demonizing masturbation as "self-abuse." Fortunately, an acceptable, reliable treatment emerged: having a doctor or midwife "massage the genitalia with one finger inside, using oil of lilies or crocus" as a lubricant. With enough genital massage, hysterical women could experience sudden, dramatic relief through "paroxysm," which virtually no medical authority called orgasm, because, of course, everyone knew that women did not have sexual feelings, so they could not possibly experience sexual climax.

By the 19th century, physician-assisted paroxysm was firmly entrenched in Europe and the U.S. It was a godsend for many doctors. At that time, the public viewed physicians with tremendous distrust. Most doctors had little or no scientific training, and they had few treatments that worked. But thanks to genital massage, hysteria was a condition doctors could treat with great success. This produced large numbers of grateful women, who returned faithfully and regularly, eager to pay for additional treatment.

But treating hysteria also had a downside for doctors— tired fingers from all that massage. Nineteenth-century medical journals lamented that many hysterics taxed their doctors' stamina. Physicians complained of having trouble maintaining therapeutic massage long enough to produce the desired result. (For a look at 19th century treatment of female hysteria, see the film, The Road to Wellville.)

Necessity being the mother of invention, physicians began experimenting with mechanical substitutes for their hands. They tried a number of genital massage contraptions, among them water-driven devices (the forerunners of today's shower massagers), and steam-driven pumping dildos. But these machines were cumbersome, messy, often unreliable, and sometimes dangerous.

In the late 19th century, electricity became available for home use and the first electric appliances were invented: the sewing machine, the electric fan, and the toaster. These were followed soon after, around 1880, by the electromechanical vibrator, patented by an enterprising British physician, Dr. Joseph Mortimer Granville. The electric vibrator was invented more than a decade before the vacuum cleaner and the electric iron.

Electric vibrators were an immediate hit. They produced paroxysm quickly, safely, reliably, and inexpensively—and as often as women might desire it. By the dawn of the 20th century, doctors had lost their monopoly on vibrators and hysteria treatment as women began buying the devices themselves. Advertisements appearing in such magazines as "Women's Home Companion," "Needlecraft," and the Amazon.com of that era, the "Sears & Roebuck Catalogue" ("...such a delightful companion....all the pleasures of youth...will throb within you....").

Electricity gave women vibrators, but ironically, within a few decades, electricity almost took the devices away from them. With the invention of motion pictures, vibrators started turning up in pornography and gained an unsavory reputation. By the 1920s, they had become socially unacceptable. Vibrator ads disappeared from the consumer media. From the late 1920s and well into the 1970s, they were difficult to find.

But some inventions are so useful that they survive despite attempts at suppression. Today, an estimated 25 percent of women own vibrators, and 10 percent of American couples use them in partner sex. Just think, we owe the world's most popular sex toy to physicians' fatigued fingers.

For more on the history of vibrators, read "The Technology of Orgasm: 'Hysteria,' The Vibrator, and Women's Sexual Satisfaction," by Rachel Maines (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999).

CIA Claims Cyber Attackers Blacked Out Cities

via Slashdot by ScuttleMonkey on 1/18/08
Dotnaught writes to tell us InformationWeek is reporting that the CIA admitted today that recent power outages in multiple cities outside the United States are the result of cyberattacks. "We have information, from multiple regions outside the United States, of cyber intrusions into utilities, followed by extortion demands. We suspect, but cannot confirm, that some of these attackers had the benefit of inside knowledge. We have information that cyberattacks have been used to disrupt power equipment in several regions outside the United States. In at least one case, the disruption caused a power outage affecting multiple cities. We do not know who executed these attacks or why, but all involved intrusions through the Internet."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Friday, January 18, 2008

5 Most Horrifying Bugs

The 5 Most Horrifying Bugs in the World

article image

There are about 10,000,000,000,000,000,000 insects on earth at any given moment. Seriously, that's a real number. For every one of us, there are 1.5 billion bugs.

But some of them are so horrifying, just one is too many. Here are five you want to avoid at all costs.

Japanese Giant Hornet (vespa mandarinia japonica)

From: Japan, obviously.

Why you must fear it:
It's the size of your thumb and it can spray flesh-melting poison. We really wish we were making that up for, you know, dramatic effect because goddamn, what a terrible thing a three-inch acid-shooting hornet would be, you know? Oh, hey, did we mention it shoots it into your eyes? Or that the poison also has a pheromone cocktail in it that'll call every hornet in the hive to come over and sting you until you are no longer alive?

Think you can outrun it? It can fly 50 miles in a day. It'd be nice to say something reassuring at this point, like "Don't worry, they only live on top of really tall mountains where nobody wants to live," but no, they live all over the goddamned place, including outside Tokyo.

Forty people die like that every year, each of them horribly.

More scary shit:
Here's how the Japanese hornet treats other insects (and would presumably treat us, if we were small enough). An adult hornet will fly miles to find some squishy shit to feed to its children. Often times, it finds its food in, say, a hive inhabited by thousands of bees.

What to do? Well, Vespa japonica sprays the nest with some of the acid/pheromone and brings in reinforcements, usually consisting of 30 or so fellow hornets. They then descend upon the beehive like an unholy plague of hell-born death engines and proceed to make this world a scary goddamned place. This is maybe 30 wasps against 30,000 bees and the 30,000 bees do not stand a chance.

Behold the hornets systematically seize them with huge, wicked jaws and literally fucking cut them apart, one by one by one by fucking one. In three hours, there are piles of limbs and heads and just fucking bits of things that could possibly have been alive at one point, and the hornets have stormed the hive and flown away with all the bee's children. Who will then be eaten.

Nature is fucking hardcore.

Bullet Ant (Paraponera clavata)

From:
Rainforests from Nicaragua to Paraguay

Why you must fear it:
It's a full inch long, it lives in trees and thus can and will fall on you to scare you away from its hive--the one you didn't know was there, because it's in a fucking tree. Before it does this, it shrieks at you. This ant, you see, can shriek.

It's called a Bullet Ant because its 'unusually severe' sting feels like getting shot. On the Schmidt Sting Index, Bullet Ants rate as the number one most try-not-to-shit-out-your-spine painful in the entirety of the Kingdom Arthropoda.

Also--and we do feel the need to stress this--they fucking shriek at you before they attack.

More scary shit:
Are you the sort of person who likes to think of yourself as tough? A "badass," perhaps? "Hard," as they say?

Some of the indigenous peoples of the area use Bullet Ants as part of this initiation-to-manhood ceremony that they do. You know the kind we mean, with us it's like, a big party and your relatives give you money and everyone loves you and is so proud of you? Yeah with them, it's these special leaf sleeves with hundreds of bullet ants woven into them, stingers-inwards. They put them on and are immediately stung to holy fucking bejeezus by, and this is important, hundreds of Bullet Ants woven into the sleeves, stingers-inward.

The goal is to leave them on for 10 minutes, after which their arms are stiff, useless lengths of twisting agony, their bodies wracked with uncontrollable spasms for days. And in order to be actually pass the ordeal and become a man, they have to do it 20 fucking times.

Africanized Honey Bee (Apis mellifera scutellata)

From:
South and Central America, the American Southwest

Why you must fear it:
You know how you can spot one of these? You can't. There is no physical way to determine the difference between an Africanized bee and a common European bee. None whatsoever.

You can, however, easily tell the difference based on their behavior. Regular bees will give you about nine seconds of being too close to the hive before deciding you're a threat and then attacking you. So it's pretty easy to just walk past them without any screams. And if you do get them after you, they'll consider you to be 'chased off' after about 300 feet.

Africanized bees do not roll this way. They give you half a second of being too close before they decide it is time to completely fuck your shit up and empty the entire hive--tens, maybe hundreds of thousands of angry, angry bees. When you run, flailing and crying and soiling yourself while screaming "JESUS CHRIST I'M COVERED IN BEES," they will chase you for over half a mile.

More scary shit:
Africanized bees owe their existence to science. Warwick E. Kerr created them in Brazil during the 1950s by crossing a European bee with an African bee. He wanted a bee that could live in the jungle. He got a bee that swarms by the hundreds of millions, is insanely territorial, mindlessly aggressive, has killed anywhere from a few dozen to a few thousand people. And, can live in the jungle.

And after they escaped and swarmed northward, it turned out they were a-OK with deserts, too. They'll be in Montana by 2010.

Army or Soldier Ant (Eciton burchellii)

From:
The Amazon Basin. There's other subfamilies living in Asia and Africa, but these are the most notorious.

Why you must fear it:
By now, you will not be surprised to hear that these ants are, in fact, fucking huge, with the soldiers reaching a half inch in length. You will also not be surprised to learn that they have massive, powerful, machete-like jaws half the length of the soldiers themselves. They're notorious for dismantling any living thing in their path, regardless of size. They're also completely blind, which for some reason makes the whole thing worse.

They're called 'Army' ants because their entire colony, comprising up to and over one million insects, is a 100 percent mobile battalion. They don't make permanent hives like other ants, no, they bivouac down in single locations just long enough for the queen to shit out thousands of eggs, while the soldiers spread out in wide fans daily in search of food ("food" here, means "anything moving"). Then the eggs hatch and they enter the dreaded swarm phase of their existence.

Much like the word "killer," nature takes words like "dreaded" and "swarm" very, very seriously. They carefully pick up their larvae and go on the move, a near-solid mass of insect death and horror moving steadily and swiftly along the jungle floor, flaying alive and disassembling every living thing too stupid, slow or asleep to get the living fuck out of the way. There is no talk of painful stingers or ballistic acid here, no, this is terror of a far more primordial nature--the kind that simply flows over you by the hundreds of thousands and rips you apart with massive, unbelievably powerful jaws, utterly and literally blind to size and species, considering everything in their path to be a threat to the continuation of their colony.

There are reports of animals the size of horses being overwhelmed and shredded by them. Go stand next to a horse and then think about what that means for you.

More scary shit:
Army Ants are masters of wholly-organic, living architecture. For the good of the colony, the ants will use their own living bodies to build any conceivable structure necessary, latching on to each other foot-to-foot to create protective walls and ceilings against the ravages of the weather, bridges to cross otherwise impassable spans, whatever happens to be needed. (Can they form themselves into a crude catapult mechanism and launch themselves at prey? Not yet.)

There is no other living thing in the entire world that does this.

And, they're blind.

Now, time for the disclaimer. If you are squeamish or have a weak stomach or value your sanity in any way, you may want to bail out now.

Okay, here goes...

Bot Fly (family oestridae, genus and species varies)

From:
Most species found in Central and South America, some species found all over the world

Why you must fear it:
Oh boy. Ohhhhh boy. Okay, Bot flies.

There are dozens of varieties of Bot Fly, they're each highly adapted to target a specific animal, they have delightfully descriptive names like Horse Stomach Bot Fly, Sheep Nose Bot Fly and, hey, guess what. One of them is called Human Bot Fly.

They each have a different and elaborate reproductive cycle, all of which end with a fat, half-inch maggot embedded in living flesh. Feeding.

Horse Stomach Bots, for example, lay their eggs in grass. Horses eat the grass. And the eggs. Which hatch in the heat of the horse's mouth. Upon which they chew through the horse's tongue and burrow, through the horse, into its belly. Where they meet up and dig honeycombs into the horse's stomach. And get fat. When they're ready to be flies, they just let go and get pooped out of the system.

The Human Bot Fly lays its eggs on a horsefly or a mosquito, something that will attempt to land on a human. This carrier finds a human and lands on him or her. The eggs rub off onto the human, whose body heat hatches the eggs. The larvae drop onto the skin and burrow right the fuck in. Where they live. Under your skin. Eating.

Here's video of them removing one. DO NOT FUCKING WATCH THIS. Fuck, we don't even know why we linked it.

More scary shit:
Here is the best part. The larvae can grow anywhere in your body, it just depends on where the eggs wind up. Which could end up with you having a fat wormy thing in your tear duct. Or your brain. We know, because that's happened.

A Human Bot Fly larvae, burrowing into your brain. Eating your thoughts.

All this learning and fear remind you of high school? Head over to our video countdown of the 7 Scariest Teachers on YouTube . Or check out the blog, where Michael Swaim will tell you why you should be scared of the government too, and comes up with an awesome name for a rock band in the process.