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Tomorrow I start the best job in the world.

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 11:54:13 GMT

clipped by: JohnWaterman
clipper's remarks: I worked as a teacher for 14 years at Grangewood School (a wonderful little special school) until alcohol started ruining my life. Now eight years on and six months sober I am returning in a different capacity; as an intervenor for a lovely six year old lad who is deaf-blind and mentally impaired. I can't wait to get started.

Clip Source: www.georgebrown.ca

Intervenors are the eyes and ears for people who are both deaf and blind

Watch this video to learn more about intervention, intervenors and deafblindness:

Watch the video file about Intervenor for Deaf-Blind Persons Program (long version - 10 min).

Watch the video file about Intervenor for Deaf-Blind Persons Program (short version - 2 min).

Clip Source: www.notbysightfund.org

Why Intervenors

Here is an example:

A deafblind child holds a vase. Would it have any meaning at all?

never seen one to know it can hold water or flowers

what will happen if she drops it

never heard the sound of breaking glass

Now the same experience with an intervenor teaching this child.

moving the small fingers over it's textured sides

Together, they move to the sink and fill the vase with water

they laugh at the surprising feeling of the cold water

smell the fragrance

Clip Source: www.grangewoodschool.co.uk

Welcome to Grangewood School

Grangewood is a primary school for children with severe learning difficulties in the London Borough of Hillingdon.

Clip Source: www.grangewoodschool.co.uk

Golden Rules

Clip Source: www.grangewoodschool.co.uk

Goat Puts Spiderman To Shame - MUST SEE!

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 05:19:37 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: "Being on a tightrope is living. Everything else is waiting." -- Karl Wallenda

Clip Source: flickr.com

I never did find out how this Mountain Goat, Oreamnos americanus, managed to get down. I was there for more than an hour and it kept licking away at the mineral in the rock. It was a sheer drop below, there was no apparent way up or sideways. But then other’s did some amazing feats of climbing that the best mountain climbers would be envious of. Goat Lick Overlook, Glacier National Park, MT

Someone Didn’t Want This Getting Out

Sat, 01 Nov 2008 14:01:59 GMT

clipped by: reimers

Clip Source: www.popcrunch.com

Maybe we’re better off not knowing.

From tahini to the street, all about sesame :)

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 09:03:58 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: "Health Benefits :
Sesame oil rubbed on the skin may soothe a minor burn or sunburn as well as help in the healing process.

It's not unusual to encounter fantastic claims attributed to a single food. Sesame seed oil is said to remove wrinkles when applied to the skin in a facial massage. If this news gets out, there won't be a bottle left on the grocery shelves!

Eat some sesame seeds to relieve constipation and to remove worms from the intestinal tract. They're an aid to digestion, stimulate blood circulation, and benefit the nervous system. Sesame oil makes ideal massage oil because of its excellent emollient properties.

Applied topically, sesame oil is thought to aid in healing chronic diseases of the skin. With its vitamin E content, it's also a benefit to the heart and nervous system. "

Interesting to know... and tasty!

Clip Source: www.vegparadise.com

OPEN SESAME!

Sesame seeds are thought to be one of the oldest condiments

the original homeland of the sesame seed is the Indian subcontinent

The ancient cultures inhabiting Anatolia, today called Turkey, were pressing sesame seeds and using sesame oil about 900 BCE

Sesame oil was the ideal base for making exotic perfumes

Archeological excavations throughout the Middle East revealed the use of sesame oil dating back to 3000 BCE

One tomb, dating back 4,000 years, contains a scene of a baker sprinkling sesame seeds into his dough

Sesame seeds grow on a plant that has a hairy single stalk

The plant blossoms with white, pink or purplish flowers that develop into elongated pods containing numerous seeds stacked horizontally, one on top of the other

In harvesting the sesame seeds, first the plant stalks are cut and stacked vertically. Each stalk is then shaken over a cloth to catch the seeds that fly out from the mature pods.

harvesting could not be done by machine until recently

soothe a minor burn

Clip Source: www.uni-graz.at

Tags: nutrition, sesame

Death to death

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 10:04:38 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: "The technological singularity has been called the Geek Rapture or Rapture of the Nerds, referring to the belief held by some Christians that they will be taken up bodily into heaven to be with Jesus before the Day of Judgment."

is it so?

"Even for those who believe that they don't believe in life after death, it seems impossible to stop imagining technological solutions to the problem."

Though written very simple, it does point to an interesting riddle.

Clip Source: arts.guardian.co.uk

The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living by Damien Hirst (1991)

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

Death to death

thinking it through logically Dan has decided that the technological singularity is likely to happen in his lifetime.

within the next 25 years humanity will create a superhuman intelligence, one that is capable of creating intelligences greater than its own

we'll all be "uploaded" – our entire personalities will be copied into the vast memory banks of these AIs – and we'll live forever

we'll never experience pain or suffering again, all imaginable forms of entertainment will be available to us, along with some that can't be imagined at all

I'm fascinated by the similarities with religion

impossible for many people to comfortably accept that they really are going to die

If we can't believe in God, could technology be the way, the truth and the life?

artist Damien Hirst agree that the mind of a living being cannot conceive its own demise

Tags: death, singularity, religion

"Creative people don’t care about the time or the state of the economy.."

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 06:12:46 GMT

clipped by: einbar
clipper's remarks: “Creativity doesn’t care about economic downturns,” Mr. Lieberman says. “In the middle of the 1970s, when we were having a big economic downturn, both Apple and Microsoft were founded. Creative people don’t care about the time or the season or the state of the economy; they just go out and do their thing.”

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

“To be honest, we had a problem with innovation even before the economic crisis. That’s the reason I wrote my book,” says Judy Estrin

“Closing the Innovation Gap.” “We’re focusing on the short term and we’re not planting the seeds for the future.”

There are important things managers can do to ensure that creative forward-thinking doesn’t go out the door with each round of layoffs. Fostering a companywide atmosphere of innovation — encouraging everyone to take risks and to think about novel solutions, from receptionists to corner-suite executives — helps ensure that the loss of any particular set of minds needn’t spell trouble for the entire company.

She suggests instilling five core values to entrench innovation in the corporate mind-set: questioning, risk-taking, openness, patience and trust. All five must be used together — risk-taking without questioning leads to recklessness, she says, while patience without trust sets up an every-man-for-himself mentality

It Looks Like Heaven but Feels Like Hell

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 09:03:39 GMT

clipped by: abailart
clipper's remarks: So why not a whisper of military intervention to bring democracy and peace to this ravaged nation where millions have died as the world grew fat? Probably because Africa does not exist.

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Eastern DR Congo was once memorably described by the journalist Kate Thomas.

The place "looks like heaven", she wrote, "but it feels like hell".

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

The UN is to send a convoy of food and medical supplies to help the 250,000 people displaced by recent fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the international community must "not allow Congo to become another Rwanda", where 800,000 people died in a 1994 genocide that is seen as the origin of the current conflict over the border.

Tags: dr congo

Live Free or Diebold

Sat, 01 Nov 2008 16:10:58 GMT

clipped by: sahara
clipper's remarks: Video your vote, everyone!

Clip Source: www.bradblog.com

More Vote-Flipping in TX by Machines Other Than Those Made by ES&S

Direct Recording Electronic Voting Systems Made by Hart InterCivic and Diebold Also Reportedly Now Flipping Votes From Democratic to Republican in TX...

We've been reporting for the last week or so on the ES&S iVotronic touch-screen voting machines which are flipping votes from Democratic candidates to others in, so far, at least four states. We've showed you actual footage of it and how even after being "recalibrated" these machines still continue to flip votes.

it doesn't matter what the screen (or even "paper trail" that some of them have) displays. The computer can record any vote it wants, any way it wants, despite what the voter is shown.

But it's not only the ES&S machines that are failing. We now have reports of vote flipping in Texas on both Hart InterCivic DREs and, of course, the always unreliable ones made by Diebold

UPDATE: Seven TX counties are now reporting vote flipping. Kim Zetter at WIRED has the details...

Clip Source: crashrecovery.org

Clip Source: www.yannone.org

Clip Source: www.acslaw.org

Clip Source: www.votefraud.org

Clip Source: nicedeb.files.wordpress.com

Clip Source: gammablog.com

Tags: elections

Blasphemous Frog gets Museum Chief Sacked

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 09:07:11 GMT

clipped by: abailart
clipper's remarks: It makes you stop thinking.

Clip Source: www.telegraph.co.uk

Corinne Diserens, the Swiss director of the museum in Bolzano, in the mountainous north-east of Italy, was dismissed after months of controversy over the bright green, bug-eyed amphibian, which is nailed to a cross and holds a frothing mug of beer and an egg.

She had refused to remove the work by the late German artist Martin Kippenberger despite protests from the Vatican that it was blasphemous.

Pope Benedict XVI condemned the four-foot-high frog, entitled Zuerst die Fuesse (Feet First), when he heard about it during his summer holiday in the nearby town of Bressanone.

Tags: frogs, blasphemy, superstition