Playtime
virtual spirograph - java spirograph
ahh so much easier than the real spirograph
http://www.wordsmith.org/anu/java/spirograph.html

Jill Carroll is released!! thank god! I hope it lifts spirits and provides momentum to the others not yet freed Reem Zeid and Marwan Khazaal !!
we know so little:
"TV reporter Reem Zeid and her colleague, Marwan Khazaal, who both work for local station Al-Sumariya, were kidnapped by four gunmen after leaving a news conference at the headquarters of the Iraqi Islamic Party in Baghdad on 1 February." http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/73F087B9-3814-4EF1-B569-B56CD645E613.htm

"Journalists Marwan Ghazal and Reem Zaeed, from the privately owned television station Samaria TV, were abducted by gunmen in Baghdad's Yarmouk district after covering a meeting at the offices of the Iraqi Islamic Party, The Associated Press reported, citing a cameraman working for the station. The cameraman said two other journalists were briefly seized but released."
the International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX)
http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/71968

also see Reporters Without Borders
http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=16351

"Al-Sumariyah (reference to Sumer, an ancient region of southern Mesopotamia in present-day southern Iraq) - This satellite TV channel began broadcasting from Beirut in mid-October 2004, via the Nilesat 101 satellite. Its shareholders are predominantly Iraqi." Radio Netherlands Media Network
http://www.radionetherlands.nl/features/media/dossiers/iraqmediasurvey.html

Al-Sumariyah TV has a website at http://www.alsumaria.tv  
spource http://www.worldofradio.com/dxld6037.txt

george bush is an intelligent man .....Not!
Here Bush Explains Medicare Drug Plan:

Q -- really understand how is it the new plan is going to fix that problem?

Verbatim response: PRESIDENT BUSH:

'Because the -- all which is on the table begins to address the big cost drivers.

For example, how benefits are calculated, for example, is on the table.

Whether or not benefits rise based upon wage increases or price increases. There's a series of parts of the formula that are being considered. And when you couple that, those different cost drivers, affecting those -- changing those with personal accounts, the idea is to get what has been promised more likely to be -- or closer delivered to that has been promised.

Does that make any sense to you?

It's kind of muddled.

Look, there's a series of things that cause the -- like, for example, benefits are calculated based upon the increase of wages, as opposed to the increase of prices.

Some have suggested that we calculate -- the benefits will rise based upon inflation, supposed to wage increases.

There is a reform that would help solve the red if that were put into effect. In other words, how fast benefits grow, how fast the promised benefits grow, if those -- if that growth is affected, it will help on the red.'

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/02/20050204-13.html

Pressure reliever
create your own virtual people

Here is a demo site that lets you play with

• face m/f
  
• age
  
• lips
  
• nose
  
• hair
  
• glasses
  
• height
  
• shoulders width
  
• colors - hair face
  
• dress - shirt necklace
  

(each or three tabs on site's right side give you control)
then play some recorded messages(left side)
This is good for a few laughs when having a crappy day
move mouse around head like a fly, your person just can get enough of it

Nobel peace prize - everything you wanted to know including:
laureates - with links to there lectures

seems nice, but sickening that they post the dinner menus for the last umpteen years
isn't there something ....Well just plain wrong! Maybe the should post the menu found at each refugee camp each year!!!!

In everyone's life, at some time, our inner fire goes out.
It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being.
We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit.
Albert Schweitzer

this was the reading today in the santuary. so beautifully simple

Sweet / cool / rad / hip / whateva
Google maps goes to mars
mars maps
with text search to find locations

"...We've[google] included three different types of data in Google Mars:

• Elevation - A shaded relief map, generated with data from the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA) on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft. This map is color-coded by altitude, so you can use the color key at the lower left to estimate elevations.
• Visible - A mosaic of images taken by the Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft. MOC is like the digital camera you have at home. Basically, this is what your eyes would see if you were in orbit around Mars.
• Infrared - A mosaic of infrared images taken by the Thermal Emission Imaging System (THEMIS) on NASA's Mars Odyssey spacecraft. Warmer areas appear brighter, and colder areas are darker. Clouds and dust in the atmosphere are transparent in the infrared, making this the sharpest global map of Mars that's ever been made."

From reporters without boarders
International Women’s Day : Two women journalists are being held hostage and six others are imprisoned worldwide
7.03.2006 - On the eve of International Women’s Day on 8 March 2006, Reporters Without Borders calls for the release of Jill Carroll and Rim Zeid, held hostage in Iraq, and for six other women journalists who are imprisoned in Cuba, Ethiopia, Iran, Maldives, Nepal and Rwanda.

Darfur can not be erased from our minds

"You may have thought the terrible situation in Darfur couldn't get worse, but it has," Peter Takirambudde, executive director of the Africa division of Human Rights Watch, said in a recent statement. "Sudan's policy of arming militias and letting them loose is spilling over the border, and civilians have no protection from their attacks, in Darfur or in Chad." '

reads the latest NYT story:
"Refugee Crisis Grows as Darfur War Crosses a Border",
Interview with John Prendergast in The New York Times
February 28, 2006
The New York Times
reprinted in http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id=3998&l=1

save us all!
where is that which can?
where is the one who will?

pray for Jill Carroll and her family
and family of Atwar Bahja
with this in mind:
Emily saliers poem / lyrics for this prayer with agnostic modification

now everybody's looking for a little peace of mind
we're a generation running out of time
there's a bomb, there's a man
there's a gun in his hand yeah
nobody smiles at strangers we're scared from birth
afraid the man's gonna take us for all that we're worth
strip us of our pride
make a strike from inside
come on and tell me
how long will we be victims of fear
with a man and a gun and the "day after" fear
...[someone] smile down upon your children
smile down upon your family

even lovers have trouble at hand

what's your preference where do you stand
you get all uptight about it
wanna fight about it
wanna fight about love
no no no
wanting independence separate but equal
a lover here another there
one more for the sequel to the heartache
how much more can we take
won't you tell me
how long will we be victims of fear
with a man and a gun and the "day after" fear
...[someone] smile down upon your children
smile down upon your family

now i'm talking about

altruism and unification
we forgotten what that means
cynicism in this mighty nation
and hatred is spitting us right at the seams

oh but i still believe that good will prevail

and if we don't ever try
it's damn sure that we'll fail
lose another day
the american way
so come all believers
come all races
start looking at the souls
not at the faces
and we're there
and we're learning to care
i want to know baby
how long will we be victims of fear
with a man and a gun and the "day after" fear
...[someone] smile down upon your children
smile down upon your family
...[someone] smile down upon your children
smile down upon your family

impeachment moves from way left to center
Here is an excellent article I read in my son's Harper's magazine......
that shall move the centerists

The Case for Impeachment

Why we can no longer afford George W. Bush

Posted on Monday, February 27, 2006. An excerpt from an essay in the March 2006 Harper's Magazine. By Lewis H. Lapham.
The complete essay, available in the March 2006 issue of Harper's Magazine.

Shooting in Boston
there is an
incredible story in the Boston globe magazine this week
called Silence .....

"Jenry Gonzalez was shot in a crowded park while trying out for Pop Warner football. His unsolved shooting shows how reversing Boston's climate of witness fear will take a lot more than pulling "Stop Snitchin'" T-shirts off the shelves. By Neil Swidey | February 26, 2006"

the story is nothing new, but it is all new, and sends renewed chills into our thoughts....
Prehaps one of the best quotes is from the sister of the boy who was shot:

"...You look at other people, and you see their gray hair, and you think, `How would I look with gray hair? Would I ever get to that age?' ..."

the other is

"IT'S LATE JANUARY, AND BEATRIZ GARCIA is back in her kitchen. The chairs are overturned on the table, so she can get her mop underneath. A year and a half ago, when her son's name was on the news every night, a lot of people made her assurances. They promised help getting her family moved to new subsidized housing. They promised uniformed patrols at all Pop Warner games. They promised to keep her updated on the investigation. And, of course, they promised to bring her son's shooter to justice.

She leans on the mop and squints one eye. "Everything they said they were going to do never happened."

She sees no use in dwelling on that. "Forget them," she says. "I just want for my son to be OK. That's all I need. ..."

what can we do?

PRIMARY COLOUR COLOR COLOURS COLORS
color colour
what are primary colors ... Easy enough to explain to my
techno friends or so I thought
its Yellow red blue . . . YRB
well sort of, but not really
to my surprise there is the old color wheel above
and the REAL color wheel and additive and subtractive

www.realcolorwheel.com/othercolorwheel.htm is link to compelling text for a new color wheel for kids.
This is part of subtractive color. Light comes from a source (the sun)
it hits an object and some is absorbed. The light that bounces back is less!
Something has been subtracted from it. A red ball is reflecting what is left -
"red"! The rest of the color (colour) has been absorbed!

• For a good basic explanation click here
• good java applet for mixing subtractive colors
• good app for showing how printing is done with color

The there is additive RGB which is used on computers. Here are some god java applets

• with hex values as mouse travels over color grid
• mixing additive RGB as move circles of color
• Using with RGB sliders in one square
• Using spot lights and RGB sliders (emission)

pray for peace
enough?
is it enough
is praying for peace enough?
blood stained guilt
want something more

messing with bush's head

http://www.geocities.com/acurran/fun.html

good way to let off some steam

Linear thinking ?
Lineal thinkers ?
binary questions Yes??
binary solutions No???
cause and effect
cause and effect
cause and effect
why not causes and effects
are we not capable
...Again binary!! Damn!
reach again we must
for peace

A drawing is worth 10,000 words
10,000 words can trigger 1,000,000 tears
but linking tears to anger and fears .... How does one postulate it

I fear our thoughts on this subject of freedoms of speech ....Are ....
... Are too shallow too narrow to bring us to where we need to be...
freedomS of speech not freedom of speech ? yes yes yes
"freedoms of speech" is to be saved? From what?
from us I fear......

Best Short Film, Animated
Nominees:

Badgered (2005) - Sharon Colman The Moon and the Son (2005) - John Canemaker, Peggy Stern The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello (2005) - Anthony Lucas 9 (2005) - Shane Acker One Man Band (2005) - Mark Andrews, Andrew Jimenez

Langston Hughes - Dream Deferred
What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore--
And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?


so  where is that dream o yours?

bush - can he blance
The Concord Coalition shows he cant