Clipmarks | mugofcoffee's interesting collection

Most beautiful words in the English language

Thu, 09 Oct 2008 17:43:13 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee

Clip Source: www.listology.com

by diaskeaus

adumbrate To very gently suggest.

aestivate To summer, to spend the summer.

amaryllis Bulbous plants which have large red or pink flowers.

asphodel Plants having white, pink, or yellow flowers in elongated clusters.

beatific Befitting an angel or saint.

blandiloquent Beautiful and flattering.

bliss

blossom

bubble

champagne An effervescent wine.

cherish

chimes

cozy

cute

cynosure A focal point of admiration.

delicacy

destiny

effervescent Bubbly.

elysium Any place or state of perfect happiness; paradise.

enthusiasm

epiphany A sudden revelation.

eternity

extravaganza

fantastic

felicitous Pleasing.

fragile Very, very delicate.

galaxy

giggle

glamour Beauty.

gossamer The finest piece of thread, a spider's silk.

grace

gracious

hilarious

home

hush

imbue To infuse, instill.

lagniappe A gift given to a customer for their patronage.

languor Listlessness, inactivity.

laughter The response to something funny.

lithe Slender and flexible.

lollipop

lovely

love

luminous

melody

moment

mother

murmuring

nobility

oeuvre A work.

Unusual Words

Thu, 09 Oct 2008 17:33:40 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee
clipper's remarks: more unusual words @ the site...

Clip Source: users.tinyonline.co.uk

abecedarian

A person who is learning the alphabet

accubation

The practice of eating or drinking while lying down

agelast

A person who never laughs

autotonsorialist

One who cuts their own hair

basorexia

An overwhelming desire to neck or kiss

bathykolpian

Deep-bosomed

cachinnation

Loud or hysterical laughter

cagamosis

An unhappy marriage

cruciverbalist

One who loves doing crossword puzzles

dactylonomy

Counting using one's fingers

dephlogisticate

To make something fireproof

eccedentesiast

One who fakes a smile, as on television

fuscoferuginous

Having a dark rusty colour

gongoozler

An idle spectator

grapholagnia

The urge to stare at obscene pictures

hamartithia

Being likely to make a mistake

interfenestration

The space between two windows

lethologica

The inability to recall a precise word for something

matronolagnia

An attraction to older women, especially ones who have children

nudiustertian

Pertaining to the day before yesterday

petrichor

The smell of rain on dry ground

pyknic

Short and fat

Who Lives in the "Global Village?"

Wed, 08 Oct 2008 07:51:04 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee

Clip Source: www.empowermentresources.com

Donella H. Meadows

Principal author of the influential (9 million in print, in 29 languages) The Limits to Growth (1972). That book's reassessment and sequel, Beyond the Limits, was published in 1992.

If the world were a village of 1,000 people, it would include

584 Asians
· 124 Africans
· 95 East and West Europeans
· 84 Latin Americans
· 55 Soviets (including for the moment Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians and other national groups)
· 52 North Americans
· 6 Australians and New Zealanders

The people of the village have considerable difficulty in communicating

In this village of 1,000 there are

The village has six acres of land per person, 6,000 acres in all, of which

In the village of 1,000 people, there are:

Of the total $3 million:

· $181,000 goes to weapons and warfare
· $159,000 for education
· $l32,000 for health care

buried beneath it enough explosive power in nuclear weapons to blow itself to smithereens many times over

Staying in Japanese Capsule Hotels...

Sun, 05 Oct 2008 00:07:31 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee
clipper's remarks: very interesting site on travel...

Clip Source: www.itravelnet.com

Staying in a Japanese Capsule Hotel

Capsule hotels are mainly frequented by business people staying in town overnight and people who have missed the last train home, so accommodating for bulging backpacks and unwieldy wheelie bags is not usually required.

Upon arrival you take your shoes off, as you would in a Japanese home, and place them into a shoe locker at the front entrance. Hand the locker key to reception and once you are done with check in formalities you are given another locker key attached to a wristband. The number on your wristband is your locker number and capsule number.

When you are ready for bed you go to the locker room and change into your usual nightwear. If you go to bed ala naturale, you are supplied with a yukata (Japanese bathing robe). You are also supplied with a bath towel which is about the size of a tea towel.

- James Clark

Firefox 3 Easter Eggs,,,

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 16:55:45 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee

Clip Source: www.matt-helps.com

by Matt Parkins

There are some moderately amusing Easter Eggs in Firefox 3. Simply type one of the following into the address bar (no spaces or http) and you'll get a message:

about:robots

about:mozilla

about:config

(ok, technically "about: config" isn't an Easter Egg, but the title on the warning screen is relatively amusing!)

Enjoy!

Also, don't forget to check out: Firefox 3 Super Speed Increase - speed up your Firefox with just a couple of changes to the default firefox settings.

Microsoft uses search prizes to close Google gap

Fri, 03 Oct 2008 08:05:16 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee

Clip Source: in.news.yahoo.com

San Francisco, Oct 3 (DPA) In a bid to close the ever-widening gap with Google on Internet searches, Microsoft has started offering consumers redeemable points for using its search service.

The programme was launched as new web traffic figures Thursday showed that Google had extended its lead to 63 percent of the US search market in August. Yahoo came in with a 19.6 percent share, followed by Microsoft with an 8.3 percent share.

Microsoft hopes that its new SearchPerks programme will help counter the trend by giving consumers, who enroll in the programme, tickets for any searches they do using Microsoft's Live Search service. The virtual tickets can be redeemed for prizes, such as airline miles, music downloads and games for Microsoft's XBox video game system.

Microsoft said that tests showed that people were three times more likely to use Live Search when they were offered redeemable points than when they weren't.

Firefox or ie???

Thu, 25 Sep 2008 13:54:34 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee
clipper's remarks: yes, love Firefox, esp. its add-on...

Clip Source: www.sembeo.com

Sun May Be Galactic Hitchhiker...

Mon, 22 Sep 2008 17:30:33 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee
clipper's remarks: Stars could travel from deep within the interior of a galaxy to its outer edges, and might even get passed around in a "spiral arm relay," Roskar told SPACE.com. Our sun currently has an orbit near the outer edge of the galaxy.

New simulation runs confirmed earlier work that showed how star orbits can remain circular despite expanding or shrinking. That counters assumptions that the gravitational tug-of-war would push and pull orbits into wilder elliptical shapes.

Clip Source: www.livescience.com

By Jeremy Hsu, Staff Writer

Astronomers have long believed that most stars are homebodies which stick close to their birthplaces. But a new simulation supports the suggestion that our sun might have once hitchhiked through the galaxy.

Where our sun or another star ends up migrating seems to depend on its position in a spinning spiral galaxy. Stars tagging along behind a massive spiral arm can get a gravitational speed boost that sends them into a bigger orbit around the galactic center. The stars leading in front of a spiral arm may end up getting slowed by the arm's gravitational pull and fall back into a smaller orbit.

This image is from a computer simulation showing the development and evolution of the disk of a galaxy such as the Milky Way. Credit: Rok Roskar

"Our simulation is still like a toy model, but a step more complex than the ones observing migrations before," said Rok Roskar, an astronomer at the University of Washington in Seattle.

Healthy people are happy but happy people are even healthier

Fri, 19 Sep 2008 06:53:56 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee

Clip Source: in.news.yahoo.com

Washington, Aug 30 (ANI): While it is said that healthy people are happy, a new study suggests that people who're joyful and satisfied with their lives are healthier.

Moreover, the benefit comes with a quick turnaround time, with greater happiness possibly boosting health in as little as three years.

"Everything else being equal, if you are happy and satisfied with your life now, you are more likely to be healthy in the future. Importantly, our results are independent of several factors that impact on health, such as smoking, physical activity, alcohol consumption and age," said lead author Mohammad Siahpush, Ph.D.

The researchers looked at data from two waves of an Australian survey conducted in 2001 and 2004. Nearly 10,000 adults responded to items about health indicators including the presence of long-term, limiting health conditions and physical health.

They used the question, "During the past four weeks, have you been a happy person?" to assess happiness.

How Art can Put Your Pain to Sleep...

Fri, 19 Sep 2008 08:41:36 GMT

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Clip Source: www.medindia.com

Art, it is said, transcends all emotion and now scientists have given this view an entirely new perspective. Researchers at the University of Bari in Italy now say that looking at a strikingly beautiful painting can actually distract from real physical pain!

The research team headed by Professor Marina de Tommaso at the Neurophysiopathology Pain Unit questioned a group of men and women to pick the 20 paintings they considered most ugly and most beautiful from a selection of 300 works by artists such as Leonardo da Vinci and Sandro Botticelli.

The volunteers were then asked to contemplate either the beautiful paintings, or the ugly painting, or a blank panel while the team zapped a short laser pulse at their hand, creating a sensation as if they had been pricked by a pin.

The participants rated the pain as being a third less intense while they were viewing the beautiful paintings, compared with when contemplating the ugly paintings or the blank panel.

Top 10 Most Common Passwords

Fri, 12 Sep 2008 22:51:33 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee
clipper's remarks: ...an aggregate sample of passwords (primarily from the UK)....

Clip Source: www.modernlifeisrubbish.co.uk

26 May, 2006 — Stuart Brown

Life these days has become largely dependent on passwords - whether we're checking our emails, transferring funds or shopping online, passwords have their part to play. We're constantly bombarded with horror stories of security breaches, fraud, and phishing sites. Users are consistently told that a strong password is essential these days to protect private data. Why is it, then, that users on websites opt for the same, consistent, insecure passwords time after time?

10. 'thomas' (0.99‰)

First off, at number 10, is the most common format of passwords - the name. Thomas is a perennially popular name in the UK (2nd most popular in 2000), so it is perhaps no surprise that it makes the top 10, with nearly 1 in 1,000 people opting for this ubiquitous forename as their password.

9. 'arsenal' (1.11‰)

8. 'monkey' (1.33‰)

7. 'charlie' (1.39‰)

6. 'qwerty' (1.41‰)

5. '123456' (1.63‰)

4. 'letmein' (1.76‰)

3. 'liverpool' (1.82‰)

2. 'password' (3.780‰)

1. '123' (3.784‰)

Scientists Get Closer to Center of the Earth

Fri, 12 Sep 2008 06:21:38 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee

Clip Source: www.livescience.com

By Jeanna Bryner, LiveScience Staff Writer

Fiery journeys to the center of the Earth occur only in the sci-fi realm, but now scientists have laid out a way to pinpoint our planet’s center of mass, providing a more accurate map of that core destination.

The results will lead to critical information for studying earthquakes, volcanoes, global sea-level rise and warming, and a post-glacial rise in some surface areas related to the melting of ice sheets.

It's tricky finding the center of a giant, squishy object, scientists say.

"By its very nature, Earth's reference frame is moderately uncertain no matter how it is defined," said Donald Argus of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. “The problem is very much akin to measuring the center of mass of a glob of Jell-O, because Earth is constantly changing shape due to tectonic and climatic forces."

our planet is not perfectly round.

The power of love or love for power???

Sun, 14 Sep 2008 04:08:51 GMT

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Clip Source: www.fecalface.com

30 Google Apps You’ve Never Heard Of

Thu, 11 Sep 2008 17:40:55 GMT

clipped by: mugofcoffee
clipper's remarks: On the other hand, there are quite a few apps I have heard of! Still, this list is a highly useful one!
To learn more on this, visit the site pl. Couldn't clip it all...

Clip Source: www.virtualhosting.com

By Laura Milligan

Whenever Google officially decides to take over the world, we will already be well-acquainted with their unending sets of online tools and applications and overall knack for simplifying our lives. If, for some reason, you’re still unaware of how the Google enterprise is revolutionizing the way even non-techies gather information and play on the Web, read below for 30 of the best Google applications that you need to try.

1. Android:

2. Google Scholar:

3. Google Search on China Mobile:

4. Google Answers:

5. Google OneBox:

6. Writely:

7. SketchUp

8. Google Desktop 4:

9. Picasa Web Albums:

10. IMAP for Gmail:

11. Shared Address Book:

12. New Google Talk:

13. Public Calendar Gallery:

14. New Google Docs:

15. Gmail mobile application for BlackBerry® smartphones:

16. Google Apps Premier Edition:

17. Mail Migration Tools

18. Domain Registration:

19. Google Reader

20. AdWords Editor:

21. Google Mobilizer

22. Click-to-Call

23. Page Creator:

24. Gears:

25. Ride Finder:

26. Transit

Vitamin B12 Key to Aging Brain

Tue, 09 Sep 2008 23:04:34 GMT

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Clip Source: health.usnews.com

Deficiency led to more brain shrinkage, study shows

By Amanda Gardner
HealthDay Reporter

MONDAY, Sept. 8 (HealthDay News) -- Older individuals with low levels of vitamin B12 seem to be at increased risk of having brain atrophy or shrinkage, new research suggests.

Brain atrophy is associated with Alzheimer's disease and impaired cognitive function.

Although the study, published in the Sept. 8 issue of Neurology, can't confirm that lower levels of B12 actually cause brain atrophy, they do suggest that "we ought to be more aware of our B12 status, especially people who are vulnerable to B12 deficiency [elderly, vegetarians, pregnant and lactating women, infants], and take steps to maintain it by eating a balanced and varied diet," said study co-author Anna Vogiatzoglou, a registered dietician and doctoral candidate in the department of physiology, anatomy and genetics at the University of Oxford, in England.

Good sources of the vitamin include meat, fish, milk and fortified cereals.