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We choose our destiny in the way we treat others. - Wit
. To be beautiful means to be yourself. You don’t need to be accepted by others. You need to accept yourself. -Thich Nhat Hanh
. If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion. -Dalai Lama
. Be gentle first with yourself if you wish to be gentle with others. -Lama Yeshe
. We may have all come in different ships, but we're in the same boat now. -Martin Luther King Jr.
. When there is no enemy within, the enemies outside cannot hurt you. -African proverb
. The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your riches but to reveal to him his own. -Benjamin Disraeli
. The heart of a fool is in his mouth, but the mouth of a wise man is in his heart. -Benjamin Franklin
. Genuine sincerity opens people's hearts, while manipulation causes them to close. -Daisaku Ikeda
. Compassion and happiness are not a sign of weakness but a sign of strength. -Dalai Lama
. The thought manifests as the word. The word manifests as the deed. The deed develops into habit. And the habit hardens into character. -Buddha
. Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them, humanity cannot survive. -Dalai Lama
. Judge nothing, you will be happy. Forgive everything, you will be happier. Love everything, you will be happiest. -Sri Chinmoy
. Friendship isn't a big thing. It's a million little things. -Unknown
. When you live on a round planet, there's no choosing sides -Wayne Dyer
. The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good. -Samuel Johnson
. When you begin to touch your heart or let your heart be touched, you begin to discover that it's bottomless. -Pema Chodron
. In separateness lies the world's great misery, in compassion lies the world's true strength. -Buddha
. I have just three things to teach: simplicity, patience, compassion. These three are your greatest treasures. -Lao Tzu
Friendly fire - isn't.
. Recoilless rifles - aren't.
. Suppressive fires - won't.
. If it's stupid but it works, it isn't stupid.
. Try to look unimportant; the enemy may be low on ammo and not want to waste a bullet on you.
. If at first you don't succeed, call in an air strike.
. If you are forward of your position, your artillery will fall short.
. Never share a foxhole with anyone braver than yourself.
. Never forget that your weapon was made by the lowest bidder
. If your attack is going really well, it's an ambush.
. The enemy diversion you're ignoring is their main attack.
. The enemy invariably attacks on two occasions: when they're ready. when you're not
. Five second fuses always burn three seconds.
. There is no such thing as an atheist in a foxhole.
. A retreating enemy is probably just falling back and regrouping.
. Or else they're trying to suck you into a serious ambush!
. The important things are always simple; the simple are always hard.
. The easy way is always mined.
. Teamwork is essential; it gives the enemy other people to shoot at.
. Don't look conspicuous; it draws fire.
. Never draw fire; it irritates everyone around you.
. If you are short of everything but the enemy, you are in the combat zone.
. Incoming fire has the right of way.
. No combat ready unit has ever passed inspection.
. No inspection ready unit has ever been in combat.
. If the enemy is within range, so are you.
. The only thing more accurate than incoming enemy fire is incoming friendly fire.
. Things which must be shipped together as a set, aren't.
. Things that must work together, can't be carried to the field that way.
. Radios will fail as soon as you need fire support.
. Radar tends to fail at night and in bad weather, and especially during both.
. Anything you do can get you killed, including nothing.
. Make it too tough for the enemy to get in, and you won't be able to get out.
. Tracers work both ways.
. If you take more than your fair share of objectives, you will get more than your fair share of objectives to take.
. When both sides are convinced they're about to lose, they're both right.
. Professional soldiers are predictable; the world is full of dangerous amateurs.
. Military Intelligence is a contradiction.
. Fortify your front; and you'll get your rear shot up.
. Weather ain't neutral.
. If you can't remember, the Claymore is pointed toward you.
. Napalm is an area support weapon.
. Mines are equal opportunity weapons.
. Sniper's motto: reach out and touch someone.
. Killing for peace is like screwing for virginity.
. The one item you need is always in short supply.
. Interchangeable parts aren't
. The side with the simplest uniforms wins.
. Combat will occur on the ground between two adjoining maps.
. If the Platoon Sergeant can see you, so can the enemy.
. Never stand when you can sit, never sit when you can lie down, never stay awake when you can sleep.
. The most dangerous thing in the world is a Second Lieutenant with a map and a compass.
. Exceptions prove the rule, and destroy the battle plan.
. The enemy never watches until you make a mistake.
. One enemy soldier is never enough, but two is entirely too many.
. A clean (and dry) set of uniforms is a magnet for mud and rain.
. The worse the weather, the more you are required to be out in it.
. Whenever you have plenty of ammo, you never miss.
. Whenever you are low on ammo, you can't hit the broad side of a barn.
. The more a weapon costs, the farther you will have to send it away to be repaired.
. The complexity of a weapon is inversely proportional to the IQ of the weapon's operator.
. Field experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.
. No matter which way you have to march, its always uphill
. Air strikes always overshoot the target, artillery always falls short.
. When reviewing the radio frequencies that you just wrote down, the most important ones are always illegible.
. The tough part about being an officer is that the troops don't know what they want, but they know for certain what they don't want.
. To steal information from a person is called plagiarism. To steal information from the enemy is called gathering intelligence.
. When you have sufficient supplies and ammo, the enemy takes 2 weeks to attack. When you are low on supplies and ammo the enemy decides to attack that night. . The newest and least experienced soldier will usually win the Medals
. Body count Math: 3 guerrillas plus 1 probable plus 2 pigs equals 37 enemies killed in action.
. The bursting radius of a hand grenade is always one foot greater than your jumping range.
. All-weather close air support doesn't work in bad weather.
. The combat worth of a unit is inversely proportional to the smartness of its outfit and appearance.
. The crucial round is a dud.
. Every command which can be misunderstood, will be.
. There is no such place as a convenient foxhole.
. Don't ever be the first, don't ever be the last and don't ever volunteer to do anything.
. If your positions are firmly set and you are prepared to take the enemy assault on, he will bypass you.
. If your ambush is properly set, the enemy won't walk into it.
. If your flank march is going well, the enemy expects you to outflank him.
. Density of fire increases proportionally to the curiousness of the target.
. Odd objects attract fire - never lurk behind one.
. The more stupid the leader is, the more important missions he is ordered to carry out.
. The self-importance of a superior is inversely proportional to his position in the hierarchy (as is his deviousness and mischievousness).
. There is always a way, and it usually doesn't work.
. Success occurs when no one is looking, failure occurs when the General is watching.
. The enemy never monitors your radio frequency until you broadcast on an unsecured channel.
. Whenever you drop your equipment in a fire-fight, your ammo and grenades always fall the farthest away, and your canteen always lands at your feet.
. As soon as you are served hot food in the field, it rains.
. Never tell the Sergeant you have nothing to do.
. The seriousness of a wound (in a fire-fight) is inversely proportional to the distance to any form of cover.
. Walking point = sniper bait.
. No battle plan ever survives contact with the enemy.
. The problem with taking the easy way out is that the enemy has already mined it.
. The buddy system is essential to your survival; it gives the enemy somebody else to shoot at.
. The quartermaster has only two sizes, too large and too small.
. If you really need an officer in a hurry, take a nap.
. There is nothing more satisfying that having someone take a shot at you, and miss.
. Don't be conspicuous. In the combat zone, it draws fire. Out of the combat zone, it draws sergeants.
Avoid loud noises, there are few silent killers in a combat zone.
. Never screw over a buddy; you'll never know when he could save your life.
. Never expect any rations; the only rations that will be on time and won't be short is the ration ofshit.
. Respect all religions in a combat zone, take no chances on where you may go if killed.
. A half filled canteens a beacon for a full loaded enemy weapon.
. When in a fire fight, kill as many as you can, the one you miss may not miss tomorrow.
. It is a physical impossibility to carry too much ammo.
The technique, called motion capture, has become a recognized tool for helping athletes and non athletes recover from injuries, said Chris Bregler, an associate professor of computer science and director of the Movement Lab at New York University.
. It’s just a matter of time before it goes into not just sports medicine but making a team better, Dr. Bregler said.
. With little public notice, motion capture technology has caught on in an increasing range of athletic endeavors.
. In one permutation, a company found a way to create the illusion that a football player was immersed in an EA Sports Madden-style video game.
. This allows an athlete to train against life-size animations whose movements are based on statistics of specific opponents.
. The real player — while wearing 3-D goggles — runs, jukes and throws as the EA Madden characters chase him.
. Researchers have also used similar technology to create and transmit life-size images of dancers, allowing people in two locations, say New York and Los Angeles, to practice dancing together.
. A version of the technique called tele-immersion has also been used for a kind of “distance coaching,” in which a coach in one location can watch a team perform drills in three dimensions in another location.
. This has been particularly helpful to elite wheelchair-basketball teams, which find it difficult to travel.
. Operating largely in secrecy, a few baseball teams have begun using the technology on a large scale with the hope of avoiding injuries, adjusting pitchers’ motions and batters’ swings and even helping players in slumps.
. At least three teams — the Boston Red Sox, the San Francisco Giants and the Milwaukee Brewers — are recording dozens of players, according to trainers, doctors, and technicians familiar with the work.
. In football, the Green Bay Packers tested an early version of the system, according to officials with a company involved in developing the technology, and a motion capture laboratory was recently built on the campus of the New England Patriots in Foxborough, Mass.
. The Foxborough program is part of the Massachusetts General Hospital Sports Performance Center, located in a large health clinic next to the Patriots’ stadium.
. The program, which also involves research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is led by Dr. Eric Berkson, an orthopedic surgeon and team doctor for the Red Sox.
. He provided a glimpse of the system on the condition that he would not discuss his work for the Red Sox.
. Inside the cavernous laboratory, Phil McCarthy, a lanky young amateur pitcher from Old Dominion University in Virginia who had been recruited for the demonstration, went methodically through his workout, throwing fastballs, changeups, curveballs and a dipping split-finger pitch.
. About 75 small white globes were stuck to his body as if he had contracted some alien disease.
. Above him was a ring of 20 high-speed cameras, each glowing an eerie scarlet, capturing images of the reflective globes with an infrared strobe.
. The disembodied cloud of globes appeared on a large video screen, and then — flash! — a computer program connected the dots, and a sketchy but biomechanically exact twin of Mr. McCarthy appeared on screen.
. His windup and delivery had been captured in three dimensions, with enough detail to calculate the stress on his wrist and the angular velocity of his shoulders.
. Some sports insiders predict that once the programs become more widely known, they could set off a technology race and give younger, technically savvy coaches a new edge over traditionalists.
. Bill Schlough, the chief information officer for the San Francisco Giants, declined to let reporters see his team’s system or even confirm its location, but he said:
. There are some coaches that see it as some sort of hocus-pocus.
. Are there going to be a lot of coaches like that left in 20 years? I doubt it.
. He added: It’s not the holy grail. It’s another tool in our arsenal to improve performance.
. Trainers and team doctors are still grappling with how to use the overwhelming amount of information the analysis provides.
. But if an athlete is captured when healthy and performing with peak effectiveness, a second recording can effectively let the athlete “step inside” himself or herself after an injury or a slump, compare the two sequences and reveal in precise detail what has changed and how to focus rehabilitation.
. By capturing dozens or even hundreds of players, teams hope to better understand mechanical problems — say, a pitching motion that puts too much stress on an elbow — and correct them before an injury occurs, said Jason Long, a biomedical engineer at the Medical College of Wisconsin Sports Medicine Center in Milwaukee, which operates a motion capture system that is used by the Brewers.
. The Brewers’ pitching coach, Rick Peterson, said, “It’s getting an M.R.I. of a pitching delivery — you see everything that’s going on, how efficient the kinetic chain is.”
. Mr. Peterson is a co-founder of 3P Sports, a company that analyzes amateur pitchers’ motions through video.
. Mr. Peterson said that at least three Brewers pitchers — Yovani Gallardo, Randy Wolf and John Axford — had made adjustments based on the motion capture system, and that “some other pitchers have had velocity increases in the minors, too.
. Perhaps the most tantalizing and hotly debated possibility is that the data will help trainers and coaches crack the code of a nearly perfect swing or the safest throwing motion and improve the performance of healthy players.
. But whatever the ultimate uses, the technology opens an analytic universe that is not available with standard video.
. They’re the automobile versus the bicycle,” said Glenn S. Fleisig, the director of research at the American Sports Medicine Institute in Birmingham, Ala., where much of the research that forms the basis for the new work has been done over the years.
. Experts in motion capture think that even with the latest initiatives, athletes are still only scratching the surface of the technology.
. One of the most sophisticated applications is the system that enables football players to essentially practice against “a virtual defense,” said Rob Moore, the vice president and chief technology officer for EA Sports.
. He’s getting the reps in without getting the physical punishment.
. All of these new possibilities have sparked questions on whether they could help college teams evade rules on how much athletes may train with coaches, although an N.C.A.A. spokesman indicated that no immediate concerns had been raised.
. Peter Bajcsy, a research scientist at the University of Illinois and the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, said that whatever its other uses, the technology offered an unparalleled medium for capturing great athletic performances.
. If we don’t record Michael Jordan doing a slam dunk today, a hundred years from now, nobody will know how he moved, Dr. Bajcsy said.
Most of us have heard of Murphy's law but few of us have any clue as to how it evolved
. So here is the origin of Murphy's law
. Murphy's Law which says simply "If anything can go wrong, it will" was born at Edwards Air Force Base in 1949 at North Base in California.
. It was named after Capt. Edward A. Murphy, an engineer working on Air Force Project MX981, a project designed to see how much sudden deceleration a person can stand in a crash.
. One day, after finding that a transducer was wired wrong, he cursed the technician responsible and said,
. "If there is any way to do it wrong, he'll find it."
. The contractor's project manager kept a list of "laws" and added this one, which he called Murphy's Law.
. Actually, what he did was take an old law that had been around for years in a more basic form and give it a name.
. Shortly afterwards, the Air Force doctor (Dr. John Paul Stapp) who rode a sled on the deceleration track to a stop, pulling 40 Gs, gave a press conference.
. He said that their good safety record on the project was due to a firm belief in Murphy's Law and in the necessity to try and circumvent it.
. Aerospace manufacturers picked it up and used it widely in their ads during the next few months, and soon it was being quoted in many news and magazine articles. Murphy's Law was born.
. The Northrop project manager, George E. Nichols, had a few laws of his own.
. Nichols' Fourth Law says, "Avoid any action with an unacceptable outcome."
. The doctor, well-known Col. John P. Stapp, had a paradox: Stapp's Ironical Paradox, which says,
. "The universal aptitude for ineptitude makes any human accomplishment an incredible miracle."
. Nichols is still around. At NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, he's the quality control manager for the Viking project to send an unmanned spacecraft to Mars.
The following is an old extract from the writings of a famous Greek
Claudius Ptolemaeus (Greek: Κλαύδιος Πτολεμαῖος Klaúdios Ptolemaîos
He lived from AD 90 – 168
He was known in English as Ptolemy (pronounced /ˈtɒləmɪ/)
He was a Roman citizen of Egypt who wrote in Greek
He was a mathematician, astronomer, geographer, astrologer and a poet of a single epigram in the Greek Anthology
He lived in Egypt under Roman rule, and is believed to have been born in the town of Ptolemais Hermiou in the Thebaid.
He died in Alexandria around AD 168
. Ptolemy was the author of several scientific treatises, at least three of which were of continuing importance to later Islamic and European science.
. The first is the astronomical treatise now known as the Almagest (in Greek, Ἡ Μεγάλη Σύνταξις,
. "The Great Treatise", originally Μαθηματικὴ Σύνταξις, "Mathematical Treatise"). . The second is the Geography, which is a thorough discussion of the geographic knowledge of the Greco-Roman world.
. The third is the astrological treatise known sometimes in Greek as the Apotelesmatika (Ἀποτελεσματικά), more commonly in Greek as the Tetrabiblos (Τετράβιβλος "Four books"), and in Latin as the Quadripartitum (or four books) in which he attempted to adapt horoscopic astrology to the Aristotelian natural philosophy of his day. . The following is what he wrote about the Afghans
. Imagine this being common knowledge today
. Ptolemy speaking in his ninth table of the Kabolitae (Kabul Tribes) calls them the aristocratic or noble tribes
. The Afghans call themselves children of Is(sa)rael, from Issa, "woman and also earth," Sons of Mother Earth
. But if you call an Afghan a Jew he will kill you
. The names of the supposed twelve tribes and the names of the real tribes, the same in number, of the Afghans, are the same
. Same as what?
. The alleged twelve tribes of Israel
. He goes on to say
. The Afghans being far older, at any rate their Arabic stock, than the Israelites, no one need to be surprised to find such tribal names among them such as Yusafzais or sons of Joseph in Panjkora and Buner; the Zablistanee (Zebulon); Bney-Menashshe (sons of Menashshe) among the Khojar Tartars; Isaguri or Issachar etc etc
. The whole twelve names of the so called twelve tribes of Israel are names of the signs of the zodiac
. At any rate, the names of the oldest Arabic tribes, retransliterated, yield the names of the zodiacal signs and of the mythical sons of Jacob likewise
. Where are the traces of the Jewish twelve tribes?
. Nowhere
. But there is a trace and a good one, that the Jews have tried to deceive people with the help of those names
. And it goes on however our interest can stay on what he is saying here
. That there never were twelve tribes of Israel, only two.
. And that the Israelites took the idea of twelve tribes from the Afghans
. The Afghans who named twelve tribes after the signs of the zodiac
. Lo later we find the Israelis using the same idea, but inventing ten new tribes as they only had two
. Curious when we consider what is going on in Afghanistan today
. I wonder how many Afghans know the history of their tribes and names?
. And how many Israelis know there were never twelve tribes of Israel?
In an old townhouse in East Boston an elderly stooped man is tending rare orchids in his shabby office. . His Labrador Sally lies on the floor between stacks of academic papers watching him as he shuffles past. . This is Dr Gene Sharp the man now credited with the strategy behind the toppling of the Egyptian government. . Gene Sharp is the world's foremost expert on non-violent revolution. . His work has been translated into more than 30 languages, his books slipped across borders and hidden from secret policemen all over the world. . Key Steps on the Path to Revolution . Develop a strategy for winning freedom and a vision of the society you want . Overcome fear by small acts of resistance . Use colours and symbols to demonstrate unity of resistance . Learn from historical examples of the successes of non-violent movements . Use non-violent "weapons" . Identify the dictatorship's pillars of support and develop a strategy for undermining each . Use oppressive or brutal acts by the regime as a recruiting tool for your movement
Isolate or remove from the movement people who use or advocate violence . As Slobodan Milosevic in Serbia and Viktor Yanukovych in Ukraine fell to the colour revolutions which swept across Eastern Europe, each of the democratic movements paid tribute to Sharp's contribution, yet he remained largely unknown to the public. . Despite these successes and a Nobel Peace Prize nomination in 2009 he has faced almost constant financial hardship and wild accusations of being a CIA front organisation. . The Albert Einstein Institution based on the ground floor of his home is kept running by sheer force of personality and his fiercely loyal Executive Director, Jamila Raqib. . In 2009 I began filming a documentary following the impact of Sharp's work from his tranquil rooftop orchid house, across four continents and eventually to Tahrir square where I slept alongside protesters who read his work by torchlight in the shadow of tanks. . Gene Sharp is no Che Guevara but he may have had more influence than any other political theorist of his generation. . His central message is that the power of dictatorships comes from the willing obedience of the people they govern - and that if the people can develop techniques of withholding their consent, a regime will crumble. . For decades now, people living under authoritarian regimes have made a pilgrimage to Gene Sharp for advice. . His writing has helped millions of people around the world achieve their freedom without violence. . As soon as you choose to fight with violence you're choosing to fight against your opponents best weapons and you have to be smarter than that, he insists. . People might be a little surprised when they come here, I don't tell them what to do. . They've got to learn how this non-violent struggle works so they can do it for themselves. . Catching fire . To do this Sharp provides in his books a list of 198 "non-violent weapons", ranging from the use of colours and symbols to mock funerals and boycotts. . Designed to be the direct equivalent of military weapons, they are techniques collated from a forensic study of defiance to tyranny throughout history. . These non-violent weapons are very important because they give people an alternative . If people don't have these, if they can't see that they are very powerful, they will go back to violence and war every time. . After the Green uprising in Iran in 2009 many of the protesters were accused at their trials of using more than 100 of Sharp's 198 methods. . His most translated and distributed work, From Dictatorship to Democracy was written for the Burmese democratic movement in 1993, after the imprisonment of Aung San Suu Kyi. . Because he had no specialist knowledge of the country he wrote a guide to toppling a dictatorship which was entirely generic. . But Sharp's weakness became the strength of the book allowing it to be easily translated and applicable in any country of the world across cultural and religious boundaries. . The book caught fire figuratively and literally. . From Burma word of mouth spread through Thailand to Indonesia where it was used against the military dictatorship there. . Its success in helping to bring down Milosevic in Serbia in 2000 propelled it into use across Eastern Europe, South America and the Middle East. . When it reached Russia the intelligence services raided the print shop and the shops selling it mysteriously burned to the ground. . The Iranians became so worried they broadcast an animated propaganda film on state TV - of Gene Sharp plotting the overthrow of Iran from The White House. . President Hugo Chavez used his weekly television address to warn the country that Sharp was a threat to the national security of Venezuela. . Jailed for nine months in 1953-4 for protesting against conscription of young men to fight in Korean War . Albert Einstein wrote the foreword to his first book - Gandhi Wields the Weapon of Moral Power: Three Case Histories - published in 1960 . His 1968 Oxford University D Phil, The Politics of Nonviolent Action, formed the basis of a book with the same title, published in 1973 . Professor (now emeritus professor) of political science at the University of Massachusetts since 1972, while simultaneously holding research positions at Harvard University . Founded the Albert Einstein Institution in 1983, a non-profit organisation advancing the use of non-violent action in conflict around the world . The Serbs who had used his books as a theoretical base for their activities founded their own organisation called the Centre for Applied Non Violence (CANVAS), and alongside their own materials have carried out workshops using Sharp's work in dozens of other countries. . When I met Srdja Popovic the director of CANVAS in Belgrade in November he confirmed that they had been working with Egyptians. . That's the power of Sharp's work and this non-violent struggle, he says . It doesn't matter who you are - black, white, Muslim, Christian, gay, straight or oppressed minority - it's useable. . If they study it, anybody can do this. . By the time I arrived in Tahrir square on 2 February many of those trained in Sharp's work were in detention. . Others were under close observation by the intelligence services and journalists who visited them were detained for hours by the secret police. . My own camera equipment was seized as soon as I landed. . When I finally reached one of the organisers he refused to talk about Sharp on camera. . He feared that wider knowledge of a US influence would destabilise the movement but confirmed that the work had been widely distributed in Arabic. . One of the main points which we used was Sharp's idea of identifying a regime's pillars of support, he said. . If we could build a relationship with the army, Mubarak's biggest pillar of support, to get them on our side, then we knew he would quickly be finished. . That night as I settled down to sleep in a corner of Tahrir square some of the protesters came to show me text messages they said were from the army telling them that they wouldn't shoot. . We know them and we know they are on our side now, they said. . One of the protesters, Mahmoud, had been given photocopies of a handout containing the list of 198 methods but he was unaware of their origins. . He proudly described how many of them had been used in Egypt but he had never heard of Gene Sharp. . When I pointed out that these non-violent weapons were the writings of an American academic he protested strongly. "This is an Egyptian revolution", he said. . We are not being told what to do by the Americans. . And of course that is exactly what Sharp would want. . Gene Sharp: Author of the non-violent revolution rulebook By Ruaridh Arrow . Ruaridh Arrow's film, Gene Sharp: How to Start a Revolution, will be released in spring 2011
A paraprosdokian is a figure of speech in which the latter part of a sentence or phrase is surprising or unexpected in a way that causes the reader or listener to re-frame or re-interpret the first part.
. It is frequently used for humorous or dramatic effect.
. For this reason, it is extremely popular among comedians and satirists.
. Here are someI asked God for a bike, but I know God doesn't work that way. So I stole a bike and asked for forgiveness.
. Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.
. I want to die peacefully in my sleep, like my grandfather, not screaming and yelling like the passengers in his car.
. Going to church doesn't make you a Christian any more than standing in a garage makes you a car.
Courtesy of Toothpaste for dinner
. The last thing I want to do is hurt you. But it's still on the list.
. Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.
. If I agreed with you, we'd both be wrong.
. We never really grow up; we only learn how to act in public.
. War does not determine who is right - only who is left.
. Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit; Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
Evening news is where they begin with 'Good evening' and then proceed to tell you why it isn't.
. To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism. To steal from many is research.
. A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk, I have a work station.
. How is it one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?
. Some people are like Slinkies ... not really good for anything, but you can't help smiling when you see one tumble down the stairs.
. Dolphins are so smart that within a few weeks of captivity, they can train people to stand on the very edge of the pool and throw them fish.
. I didn't say it was your fault; I said I was blaming you.
. Why does someone believe you when you say there are four billion stars but check when you say the paint is wet?
. Why do Americans choose from just two people to run for president and 50 for Miss America ?
. Behind every successful man is his woman. Behind the fall of a successful man is usually another woman.
. A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.
. You do not need a parachute to skydive. You only need a parachute to skydive twice.
. The voices in my head may not be real, but they have some good ideas!
. Always borrow money from a pessimist. He won't expect it back.
. A diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you will look forward to the trip.
. Hospitality: making your guests feel like they're at home, even if you wish they were.
. Money can't buy happiness, but it sure makes misery easier to live with.
. Some cause happiness wherever they go. Others whenever they go.
. I used to be indecisive. Now I'm not sure.
When tempted to fight fire with fire, remember that the Fire Department usually uses water. . You're never too old to learn something stupid.
. To be sure of hitting the target, shoot first and call whatever you hit the target.
. Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.
. Some people hear voices. Some see invisible people. Others have no imagination whatsoever.
. A bus is a vehicle that runs twice as fast when you are after it as when you are in it.
. If you are supposed to learn from your mistakes, why do some people have more than one child?
. Change is inevitable, except from a vending machine.
. Courtesy of Mister Micawber
. I enjoyed reading these, I hope you did too
Pharmaceutical firms have stoked demand for their sex disorder products, a scientist has claimed
. Female sexual dysfunction – which is claimed to affect up to two thirds of women – is a disorder invented by the pharmaceutical industry to build global markets for drugs to treat it, it is claimed today.
. Drug companies have invested millions in the search for a female equivalent of Viagra, so far without success. . But while doing so they have stoked demand by creating a buzz around the disorder they have created, according to Ray Moynihan, a lecturer at the University of Newcastle in Australia.
. Corporate employees worked with medical opinion leaders, ran surveys aimed at portraying the problem as widespread and helped create the diagnostic instruments to persuade women that their sexual difficulties deserved a medical label. . But sex problems in women are far more complex than they are in men, encompassing lack of desire, lack of arousal and lack of orgasm and the drug industry's narrow focus is failing them.
Mr Moynihan, who first investigated the drug industry's role in female sexual dysfunction a decade ago, says it illustrates a wider problem about the creation of new diseases . And the widening of existing boundaries for treatment with designations such as pre-diabetes, pre-hypertension and pre-osteoporosis, for which the latest treatments are aggressively promoted.
. In his new book, Sex, Lies and Pharmaceuticals, which is previewed in the British Medical Journal
He says: Drug marketing is merging with medical science in a fascinating and frightening way. . Perhaps it is time to reassess the way in which the medical establishment defines common conditions and recommends how to treat them.
. In 2005, Pfizer, makers of Viagra, funded a survey which showed 63 per cent of women had sexual dysfunction and that testosterone and Viagra might be helpful. . In 2006, Procter and Gamble, makers of a testosterone patch for women, sponsored a survey showing one in 10 postmenopausal women had hypoactive [low] sexual desire disorder (the company sold its drug business in 2009). . In 2008, Boehringer Ingelheim, makers of flibanserin which is claimed to boost the female libido, sponsored a survey which also showed one in 10 women was in need of help.
. Efforts by the companies to meet the need have subsequently foundered. . Pfizer pulled Viagra from the market for women after trials showed it had no greater effect than placebo. . Procter and Gamble's testosterone patch was rejected in 2004 in the US, over fears it raised the risk of cancer and heart disease . Beohringer Ingelheim's drug, flibanserin, was rejected by the US Food and Drug Administration in June on the grounds it had failed to deliver the agreed benefits while carrying the risk of serious side effects.
. Mr Moynihan warns that although the drugs have so far failed, more are in the pipeline and claims that "the drug industry shows no signs of abandoning plans to meet the unmet need it has helped to manufacture". . A spokesman for Pfizer said: "We currently have no plans to develop medicines for FSD."
. Failed female treatments
. Viagra Initial indications suggested the drug's success for men could be repeated for women.
. But trials failed to show a benefit over placebo.
. Testosterone A testosterone skin patch to correct a hormonal deficiency in women was rejected in the US over fears it increased the risk of cancer and heart disease.
. Flibanserin Developed as an antidepressant, the drug was claimed to boost libido. But its risks were deemed to outweigh benefits.
Nothing improves with age.
. Sex has no calories.
. Sex takes up the least amount of time and causes the most amount of trouble.
. Sex appeal is 50% what you’ve got and 50% what people think you’ve got.
. No sex with anyone in the same office.
. A man in the house is worth two in the street.
. If you get them by the balls, their hearts and minds will follow.
. When a man’s wife learns to understand him, she usually stops listening to him.
. The qualities that most attract a woman to a man are usually the same ones she can’t stand years later.
. The best way to hold a man is in your arms.
. Sow your wild oats on Saturday night – Then on Sunday pray for crop failure.
. The game of love is never called off on account of darkness.
. Sex discriminates against the shy and the ugly.
. There may be some things better than sex, and some things worse than sex. But there is nothing exactly like it.
. Love is a matter of chemistry, sex is a matter of physics.
Do it only with the best.
. Sex is a three-letter word which needs some old-fashioned four-letter words to convey its full meaning.
. One good turn gets most of the blankets.
. It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.
. Never lie down with a woman who’s got more troubles than you.
. Never argue with a women when she’s tired — or rested.
. A woman never forgets the men she could have had; a man, the women he couldn’t.
. It is better to be looked over than overlooked.
. Never say no.
. A man can be happy with any woman as long as he doesn’t love her.
. Beauty is skin deep; ugly goes right to the bone.
. Never stand between a fire hydrant and a dog.
. Love comes in spurts.
. The world does not revolve on an axis.
. Smile, it makes people wonder what you are thinking.
. Don’t do it if you can’t keep it up.
. There is no difference between a wise man and a fool when they fall in love.
. Never go to bed mad, stay up and fight.
. Love is the delusion that one woman differs from another.
. This won’t hurt, I promise.
The people of Kalama asked the Buddha who to believe out of all the ascetics, sages, venerables, and holy ones who, like himself, passed through their town.
. They complained that they were confused by the many contradictions they discovered in what they heard.
. The Kalama Sutta is the Buddha's reply.
. – Do not believe anything on mere hearsay.
. – Do not believe in traditions merely because they are old and have been handed down for many generations and in many places.
. – Do not believe anything on account of rumors or because people talk a a great deal about it.
. – Do not believe anything because you are shown the written testimony of some ancient sage.
. – Do not believe in what you have fancied, thinking that, because it is extraordinary, it must have been inspired by a god or other wonderful being.
. – Do not believe anything merely because presumption is in its favor, or because the custom of many years inclines you to take it as true.
. – Do not believe anything merely on the authority of your teachers and priests.
. – But, whatever, after thorough investigation and reflection, you find to agree with reason and experience, as conducive to the good and benefit of one and all and of the world at large, accept only that as true, and shape your life in accordance with it.
. The same text, said the Buddha, must be applied to his own teachings.
. – Do not accept any doctrine from reverence, but first try it as gold is tried by fire.
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