Romans 1:16

I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.

Romans 1:16 (New International Version)

Frozen snake found along Ohio River

This is some interesting news. Would you expect to find an eight-foot boa constrictor in the middle of winter? Well that is exactly what happened to some workers clearing debris next to the Great Miami River in southwest Ohio.

‘We never expected this to happen,’ said Chris Miller, who was working with other McGraw-Kokosing Inc. workers to clean debris from recent floods and fill a sinkhole. ‘We’ve been entertaining ourselves. It’s been a lot of fun, really.’

A similar snake, an eight-foot Colombian red-tail boa was stolen in November. It was worth $2,000. That snake has been returned.

Source: losangeleschronicle.com

Toy remote control Airbus 380s!

Do you have a few thousand bucks? How about buying these toys? Below are neat pictures of scale-model Airbus 380s. Enjoy! (oh, by the way, they really fly…)

Please click on the images to view them larger.

  

  

Why “Books on Tables”?

Carlos and I had many ideas about what domain we would choose for this weblog. We finally decided on booksontables.com because it would be memorable by Portuguese and English speakers- our intended audience. There is an on-going joke in Brazil, that the only thing said in English is “the book is on the table.” There has been some music (quite awful) called “The Book is on the Table”, and there are some idiots that were on a Brazilian sitcom that “spoke English,” but all they said was the book is on the table, the book is on the table. So…. there you have it; the etymology of “booksontables.”

Wikipedia- History of saffron

The history of saffron cultivation and usage reaches back more than
3,000 years and spans many cultures, continents, and civilisations.
Saffron, a spice derived from the dried stigmas of the saffron crocus,
has remained among the world’s most costly substances throughout
history. With its bitter taste, hay-like fragrance, and slight
metallic notes, saffron has been used as a seasoning, fragrance, dye,
and medicine. Saffron is native to Southwest Asia, but was first
cultivated in Greece. The wild precursor of domesticated saffron
crocus is Crocus cartwrightianus. Human cultivators bred C.
cartwrightianus specimens by selecting for plants with abnormally long
stigmas. Thus, sometime in late Bronze Age Crete, a mutant form of C.
cartwrightianus, C. sativus, emerged. Saffron was first documented in
a 7th-century BC Assyrian botanical reference compiled under
Ashurbanipal. Since then, documentation of saffron’s use over a span
of 4,000 years in the treatment of some ninety illnesses has been
uncovered. Saffron slowly spread throughout much of Eurasia, later
reaching parts of North Africa, North America, and Oceania.

Read the rest of this article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_saffron

_______________________________
Today’s selected anniversaries:

1565:
The Deccan sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire in the Battle
of Talikota, ended the last Hindu kingdom in India.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Talikota)

1700:
The magnitude 9 Cascadia Earthquake took place off the Pacific coast
of the American Northwest, as evidenced by Japanese records of
tsunamis.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1700_Cascadia_earthquake)

1788:
The British First Fleet, led by Captain Arthur Phillip, landed at
Sydney Cove just outside present-day Sydney, establishing the first
permanent European settlement in Australia.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Fleet)
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Phillip)

1950:
President Rajendra Prasad succeeded Rajaji the last Governor General
as the head of state of India and the Commander-in-Chief of the Indian
armed forces.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rajendra_Prasad)
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._Rajagopalachari)

1983:
The hugely popular spreadsheet program Lotus 1-2-3 was first released.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lotus_1-2-3)

_____________________
Wikiquote of the day:

The only gold is love,A coin that we have minted from the lightOf
others who have cared for us on EarthAnd who have deposited in us the
powerThat nerves our nerves to seize the burning stars. — Philip
José Farmer
(http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Philip_Jos%C3%A9_Farmer)

Chinese proverbs

Man who run in front of car get tired.
———
Man who run behind car get exhausted.
———
Man who walk through airport turnstile sideways going to Bangkok
———
Man with one chopstick go hungry.
———
Man who scratch ass should not bite fingernails.
———
Man who eat many prunes get good run for money.
———
Baseball is wrong: man with four balls cannot walk.
———
Panties not best thing on earth! But next to best thing on earth.
———
War does not determine who is right, war determine who is left.
———
Wife who put husband in doghouse soon find him in cat house.
———
Man who fight with wife all day get no piece at night.
———
It take many nails to build crib, but one screw to fill it.
———
Man who drive like hell, bound to get there.
———
Man who stand on toilet is high on pot.
———
Man who live in glass house should change clothes in basement.
———
Man who fish in other man’s well often catch crabs.
———
Crowded elevator smell different to midget

Analysis of Brazilian Anti-Americanism (and anti-semitism)

There is a writer in Brazil named Olavo de Carvalho who writes freely about leftism and anti-Americanism there. I just read a very good article that he wrote, and it can be read here.

Apparently, he has been fired from several newspapers for his non-mainstream views.

I found the text while looking for his writing. I am not sure of the views of the site where this text is located, but you can read it there. The political position of that site is irrelevant.

The many stripes of anti-Americanism

I stumbled across this article just now, and I thought it was an interesting read.

Read it here: http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/01/15/america/web.0115americanism.php

Why I fired my secretary

Why I fired my secretary

Last week was my birthday
and I didn’t feel very well
waking up on that morning.

.I went downstairs for breakfast
hoping my wife would be pleasant
and say, “Happy Birthday!”, and
possibly have a small present for me

As it turned out,
she barely said good morning,
let alone “Happy Birthday.”

I thought…
Well, that’s marriage for you,
but the kids….
They will remember.

My kids came bounding down stairs to
breakfast and didn’t say a word.
So when I left for the office,
I felt pretty low and somewhat despondent.

As I walked into my office,
my secretary Jane said,
“Good Morning Boss,
and by the way Happy Birthday! “
It felt a little better that at least someone had remembered.

I worked until one o’clock,
when Jane knocked on my door
and said, “You know,
It’s such a beautiful day outside,
and it is your Birthday,
what do you say we go out to lunch,
just you and me.”
I said, “Thanks, Jane,
that’s the greatest thing
I’ve heard all day.
Let’s go!”

We went to lunch.
But we didn’t go
where we normally would go.
She chose instead a quiet bistro
with a private table.
We had two martinis each
and I enjoyed the meal tremendously.
On the way back to the office,
Jane said, “You know,
It’s such a beautiful day…
We don’t need to go straight back to the office, Do We ?”

I responded,
“I guess not. What do you have in mind?”
She said, “Let’s drop by my apartment,
it’s just around the corner.”

After arriving at her apartment,
Jane turned to me and said,
” Boss, if you don’t mind,
I’m going to step into the bedroom
for just a moment.
I’ll be right back.”
“Ok,” I nervously replied.

She went into the bedroom and,
after a couple of minutes,
she came out carrying a huge birthday cake .
Followed by my wife, my kids,
and dozens of my friends and co-workers, all singing “Happy
Birthday.

And I just sat there…

On the couch…

Naked.

Roswell Democrats

Clearing Things UpMany will recall that on July 8, 1947, witnesses claim an unidentified Object with five aliens aboard crashed on a sheep and cattle ranch just Outside Roswell, New Mexico.

This is a well known incident that many say has long been covered up by The US Air Force and the federal government.

However, you may well NOT know that in the month of March 1948, exactly Nine months after that historic day, Albert Arnold Gore, Jr.; Hillary Rodham; John F. Kerry; William Jefferson Clinton; Howard Dean; Nancy Pelosi; Dianne Feinstein; Charles E. Schumer; and Barbara Boxer were born.

That piece of information has now cleared up a lot of things.