Amanda’s Random Rantings

Palestine’s Children is a new list just finding itself. We believe that Palestine should be fully free and that all God’s children are equal… however due to the existence of Israel as the Jewish State Palestinian voices have been oppressed and very much pushed aside. Therefore, we prefer not to be yet another forum for Jewish voices at this point in time. We prefer to be a forum for Arab voices. That will change when Palestine really is fully free. No hate mongering here please. We believe in American ideals and Palestinian freedom.

 As we walked those streets along the Mississippi River, I didn’t get the sense that time was contracting or being wasted. In fact, I felt time expanding as the things we needed to do that day got done naturally without any special sense of urgency and without any need to “save time.”

Google Earth is different. It provides a 3D rendition of our world that transcends traditional computer mapping products. Therefore, it can be tricky to convey to users how to use this unusual product. I hopeful that this blog can help bridge this gap.

Hi Rich,

Thanks for setting this up for the carnival…submissions are coming in slowly right now, but once the carnival is rolling this will be a good spot for updates and links to host sites, assuming the carnival travels.

Only the state that brought you Devo in the 70’s could produce an act like Gil Mantera’s Party Dream today. Composed of brothers Gil Mantera and Ultimate Donny, the music of Youngstown, Ohio’s Gil Mantera’s party dream is equal part Devo and equal part John Hughes movie music. You get synthesizers, unrestrained usage of vocoders, and surprisingly catchy melodies.

As it happens, I didn’t actually end up using a recipe from this old, undated book, the inside covers of which had been glued with seemingly ancient, browned magazine cuttings of further cocktail recipes. I flicked through the book and immediately found a classic favourite of mine, decided I prefer my own way of making them, and set to it. I still had the beautifully retro-looking Angostura Bitters bottle in my cupboard from the last time I made them (several years ago).

As greasy, slimy, pale-skinned, fat with cash but gaunt with drugs as promoters are, sometimes I wish I could be a club promoter. For what better career in the world is there than to cruise from lush club to plush club with your entourage and throw the best damned parties that anyone has ever experienced? I love the music, I love the dancing, but what I would love the most is seeing everyone enjoying themselves. What a rush. Throwing parties gives me a rush.

Our conversation began pleasantly enough, as we chatted about Islam and world events. Within a few minutes, he launched into a virulently anti American and and anti George Bush tirade, insisting that George Bush ‘lied’ and that there were never any WMD’s in Iraq and that George Bush lied to the American people when he said there was a connection between 9/11 and Saddam Hussein. We replied that Mr Bush had never said there was a connection between 9/11 and Saddam and that Saddam most certainly had manufactured and used WMD’s.

Here is the FRAUD COVERED UP, along with DEAD FOSTER CHILDREN COVERED UP! Tom DeLay and Senske the (Lawyer) from Lutheran Social Services showed up on June 6, 2004, to thwarth this Congressional Investigation. Now we know why!

I went to a party to celebrate friends and their milestones. As I looked over at the Hudson river from the roof, with silent, lit boats plowing, and the NY skyline in view, Herve, in a moment of loose melody says, “Yeah, I swam the Hudson today.” What an opening line for a conversation.

Everybody knows that Greenhills has long been known as some sort of a “pirate’s den” and it took the OMB this long to do the raid? Yes, they may raid the area every now and then but I bet a whole month’s salary that the purveyors of pirated stuff will be back hours after the raiding team leaves the place. This is a sad fact and unless the local government of San Juan cooperates with OMB, the unofficial title of “pirate’s den” will contiue to be stuck to the Greenhills shopping area.

The Beatles are having their catalog digitally remastered again. This time to not just release the new masters on a digital medium like compact discs but to offer the songs for download on the Internet. The records are currently available on compact discs from remasters done in the 1980s. The records are not available for digital download. The Beatles catalog would certainly be a hot item in the growing Internet music retail industry. Contrary to demand from both the retailers and the public, Apple Corps has refused to make the records available. Apple Corps representative Neil Aspinall said “It would be better to wait and try to do them both simultaneously so that you then get the publicity of the new masters and the downloading, rather than just doing it ad hoc.” Translation: We’re still making good money on just CD sales so we can let the bidding war between Internet retailers escolate until we’re offered enough for our grandchildren’s grandchildren to retire.

IBM expert warns of short life span for burned CDs,” Kurt Gerecke, a physicist and storage expert at IBM Deutschland says, “If you want to avoid having to burn new CDs every few years, use magnetic tapes to store all your pictures, videos and songs for a lifetime.” The article states that cheap CDs may last two years, while higher quality CDs may last five years. (If your experiences have been better than that, you should be very thankful.) This is in stark contrast to the 100 year life span of CDs that is often discussed. According to Gerecke, magnetic tapes are better for long-term storage since they have a life span of 30 years to 100 years. However, no storage medium will last forever, so timely migrating from one storage media to another is necessary.

I return home from work to find that my husband has distributed every last piece of the three pounds of candy we had bought. (Well, except for two measly Smarties’ rolls, which I immediately claimed and devoured.) He didn’t save even a single bite-sized chocolate bar for his candy-ravenous wife. Apparently, he’s a softie for 4-year-olds in head-to-toe Elmo outfits and gave out candy by the handful. Sucker.He did, however, prepare homemade candy…

… So I suppose I can forgive him.

In a heavy pan, stir together sugar, corn syrup, water and salt. Using a candy thermometer, cook and stir over medium heat until sugar dissolves, carefully, so that you don’t splash this on the sides of the pan.

Once sugar has dissolved, don’t stir it any more, just keep cooking until the candy thermometer shows 260 F. Take off heat immediately.

I’m been researching articles and websites for some chapters I’m writing on videoconferencing. I found tons of candy: “My students really enjoyed it”, “They liked seeing the elephants”, and “My students learned a lot about videoconferencing.”

That’s right, folks, you read it correctly:  my parents are coming for a visit.  This is the first visit since the new baby.  Tomorrow.

In many African countries school fees is still paid by parents. In some countries, governments have introduced programmes like Ghana has done to relieve parents from the burden.

This has not gone down well in some countries because some parents when relieved this way, use their income on extravagant lifestyles instead of saving for important purposes like establishing businesses that will give them extra income that their children can use whenever there is need.

Oh yeah, that’s what I’m talkin’ about. LOL Our parents never did *anything* half that cool for either of us growing up. We never even got the non-commital coat of paint. LOL We’ve got a THEME ROOM goin’ on in our house.  And yes, our three girls share this room. Our boy has a room all to himself. We can’t wait to do his room. We’re thinking either Buzz Lightyear or Superman. That will be awesome.

A lack of privacy at the meets is also a cause for complaint amongst parents. Teachers on their part have their grievances too. ‘Parents are quick to blame the school and teachers if the child fares badly,’ says Renu Das, who teaches children of grade IV in a reputed school. Teachers also feel that parents are ignorant about the teaching process and classroom realities.

The Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation has filed suit against John Kerry. If this gets to trial Kerry and those who made slanderous claims about the conduct of American soldiers in Vietnam will have to support their contentions in a court of law with the possibility of perjury charges if they (again) lie about what they saw.

When John Kerry slandered an entire generation of men who fought in Vietnam he branded them as “war criminals.” Today, much of the same thing is being said about our young men and women in Iraq. Now, a lawsuit filed in Philadelphia’s Court of Common Pleas will test the very foundation of Kerry’s anti-war persona for the first time. It isn’t dubious medals or Kerry’s disputed service record in Vietnam that is being called into question. This time Kerry may finally be forced to answer for the events that launched his public career, one that made him an anti-war hero for many American liberals and a turncoat for millions of Vietnam veterans. The lawsuit challenges the basis, the factual accuracy of then Lt. (j.g.) Kerry’s acrimonious testimony before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 1971.

I don’t want to dwell on this too long, but I have to point out something that really annoyed me, aside from the intentional or unintentional insinuation that Kerry made, which was in fact quite atrocious.

An all-girl gang of teenage apartment burglars has been arrested in Santiago, Chile.
According to the BBC, the girls “were infamous for climbing up buildings in Santiago to burgle luxury apartments… Lurking in the gardens of expensive parts of Santiago, the four girls hurled ropes and hooks up to balcony railings, hauled themselves up and walked through the flat windows. They then walked out of the buildings as if they were visitors.”

Have you ever seen the guys caught on video dashing to the clothes line and franticly yanking off underwear and scurrying away. Those guys kill me. Unfortunately they look like your average backwoods louts. I’d much prefer the traditional bandit mask-striped shirt-dollar sign bag get up.

This was the first time I have ever dropped my water bottle as I tried to stick it in the cage! If that happens the race I’m gonna just leave it and suffer thirst.

We have a lot of fun things that we do in our apartment to keep Ezra (and ourselves) entertained. Ezra and I will play a game kind of like hide-and-go-seek, but instead of Ezra ever finding me, I jump out and scare him and chase him all around the apartment. Ezra also likes to get “stuck.” This involves tickle torture. We also have been known to engage in water bottle fights.

I was at a graduation where the Rabbi spoke of dignity and the lack of general respect displayed in the secular world. He expressed shock and dismay to witness that senators at a conference were given water bottles with no cup. (I spaced out as to HOW he witnessed this, certainly not through the “idiot box” as they call it) To him, this was a symbol of our society’s decline.

Whether it is due to parasites–giardia or coccidia—worms–round or tape, although I’ve wormed them once already, feline leukemia (probable and they are being tested right now as I write this) or because they lack proper nerve development, as manx’s, to their bladdar and bowel, I don’t know.

Ma has decided to let us see her latest litter. There are 4 kittens, one black, one grey and two tabbys. One tabby is pale and smoky colour and one has very clear markings. They all seem to have blue eyes. They are 7 weeks old and Ma is starting to get a bit fed up with them. We think we have homes for 2, but if anyone wants one - let me know.

My grandparents had - on average - five cats at a time throughout their lives. When my family and I would visit their house, I would see white cats, tabby cats, pregnant cats; bowls were strewn everywhere, along with various fishes and meats. On my trip to my grandparent’s kitchen, to nose through their fridge, I would be attacked by these purring beasts that knew only absolute gluttony and laziness.