Today's Quote

"Love and kindness are never wasted. They always make a difference. They bless the one who receives them, and they bless you, the giver."

Barbara De Angelis
Author and Expert on Relationship and Love

Rx

A lady walks into the drugstore and asks the pharmacist for some arsenic.

"Ma'am, what do you want with arsenic?" "To kill my husband."

"I can't sell you arsenic to kill a person!"

The lady lays down a photo of a man and a woman in a compromising position. The man is her husband and the woman is the pharmacist's wife.

He takes the photo, and nods. "I didn't realize you had a prescription!"

One word or two?

An elderly couple, who were both widowed, had been going out with each other for a long time.
Urged on by their friends, they decided it was finally time to get married.

Before the wedding they went out to dinner and had a long conversation regarding how their marriage might work. They discussed finances, living arrangements, and so on. Finally, the old gentleman decided it was time to broach the subject of their physical relationship.

'How do you feel about sex?' he asked, rather tentatively.

'I would like it infrequently' she replied.

The old gentleman sat quietly for a moment, adjusted his glasses, Leaned over towards her and whispered 'Is that one word or two?'

The Wayback Juke Box - The Jackson Five - I Want You Back

20 Garden Veggies That Could Each Save You $25 or More (Including One Worth $600)

If you shop at the grocery store for tomatoes, potatoes, zucchini, salad greens or strawberries -- and who doesn't? -- then you are the perfect candidate for becoming a kitchen gardener.

Growing your own will save you an incredible amount of money -- more than $1,200 if you plant all five, according to the analysis of one Maine gardener.

Read more

Jani's at the mercy of her mind

The parents of a 6-year-old schizophrenic search for help against daunting odds for a patient so young and a case so severe.

Read more

Jackson's Chilling Autopsy Report

Harrowing leaked autopsy details show the singer was a virtual skeleton — barely eating and with only pills in his stomach at the time he died.

His hips, thighs and shoulders were riddled with needle wounds — believed to be the result of injections of narcotic painkillers, given three times a day for years.

And a mass of surgery scars were thought to be the legacy of at least 13 cosmetic operations.

Read more

Agave-Sweetened Lemonade

Agave syrup is the sweet nectar of the Agave plant. It is full of minerals and has a low glycemic index, making it far healthier than white sugar. Serve up a tall, cool glass of this lemonade and enjoy without the downward spiral sugar crash afterwards.

SERVES: 4
TIME: 5 minutes

1/2 cup of freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/2 cup light agave syrup
1 quart of water
a few lemon slices for garnish, if you like
Mix everything together, adding a bit more of any ingredient, if necessary, so it’s just the right mix of sweet and tart for your taste.

Today's Blissful Place

10 Things Your Moving Company Won't Tell You

Continuing its series of dirty little secrets of various industries, Smart Money turns its attention to movers. They tell many horror stories, so if you are planning a move, choose your moving company very carefully.

Action Item - Rush Limbaugh Attacks - Help Us Fight Back

Rush Limbaugh and the Dittoheads are urging their supporters to flood Capitol Hill with calls attacking those who voted yes on the landmark American Clean Energy and Security Act. We need your help to fight back.

First, find out if your Rep voted yes on the bill: http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-26-waxman-markey-bill-vote-count/

Then, call the Capitol Hill switchboard — (202) 224-3121. Ask to be patched through to your Rep.

Finally, tell the office staff that you strongly support the landmark climate bill and applaud the Rep. for voting to pass it.

This was a tough vote for a lot of members of Congress. But, thanks to the courage of 219 of them, we now have a chance to move America forward and create the clean energy economy we'll need to compete in the 21st century. This bill will break our addiction to foreign oil, put millions of Americans to work, and, along with cuts from other countries, will help avert the catastrophic threats of run-away global warming.

Please call your Rep now to applaud his/her vote on the landmark climate bill

Sardine Run

Must-see fireworks shows across the USA

From USA Today

What Heckman calls "star-spangled spectaculars" will take place as usual in New York City, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Washington and Boston, which is known for its famous Fourth of July Boston Pops concert, this year featuring Neil Diamond. But here are a dozen more fireworks displays recommended by the American Pyrotechnics Association, including a few scheduled for July 3:

-snip-

Columbus, Ohio: The event known as "Red, White & BOOM!" is held July 3 near Veteran's Memorial in downtown Columbus. It's one of the largest in the Midwest after Chicago's, with a parade and 400,000 folks attending

Come on over. We're supposed to have great weather!!!

Milder Temps

The final week of my parents' lives

Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were members of the Communist Party who were convicted of espionage for allegedly stealing atomic secrets. On June 19, 1953, they were executed--the most prominent victims of the McCarthyite campaign to crush political and social dissent.

Robert Meeropol, one of the Rosenbergs' two sons, has dedicated himself to helping provide for the children of activists who have been persecuted for their political beliefs, founding the Rosenberg Fund for Children. This year, in the days leading up to the anniversary of his parents' death on June 19, Robert wrote this diary, remembering what happened each day 56 years ago.

Here's Another Joke

A couple is dressed and ready to go out for the evening. They phone for a cab, turn on a night light, cover their pet parakeet and put the cat out in the back yard.

The taxi arrives, and they open the front door to leave. Suddenly the cat they put out scoots back into the house. They don't want the cat shut in there because she always tries to eat the bird. The wife goes out to the taxi while the husband goes back in. The cat runs upstairs, with the man in hot pursuit.

The wife doesn't want the driver to know the house will be empty. She explains to the taxi driver that her husband will be out soon. "He's just going upstairs to say goodbye to my mother."

A few minutes later the husband gets into the cab.

"Sorry I took so long," he says, as they drive away. "Stupid hag was hiding under the bed. Had to poke her with a coat hanger to get her to come out! Then I had to wrap her in a blanket to keep her from scratching me. But it worked. I hauled her fat butt downstairs and threw her out into the back yard!

The cab driver hit a parked car.

Here's The Joke

A farmer and his wife had just woken up one morning to the crowing of their rooster.

While still in bed, the farmer's wife says, "Pa, you know our neighbor Mr. Jones?"

"Yes Ma, I reckon I do," replied the sleepy farmer.

"Well, every morning before he leaves the house for work, he gives his wife a big ol' kiss. Why don't you ever do that?"

The farmer sighed and said, "Well, I reckon I can, but I just don't know her very well

Mi Casa

Veggie BLAT

SERVES: 4
TIME: 15 minutes













1 tablespoon olive oil
8 slices vegetarian bacon (you can find good brands made with tempeh)
8 slices organic sprouted whole grain bread (like Ezekiel)
1/2 cup Vegenaise (or your favorite mayonnaise)
coarse salt
freshly ground black pepper
2 very ripe tomatoes, sliced
1 ripe avocado, sliced
1 head baby gem lettuce or 1 heart of romaine lettuce, leaves separated

Heat the oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat and cook the vegetarian bacon for a minute on each side, just enough to warm it through and get it a bit browned. Remove from the skillet and cut each slice in half.

Spread each slice of bread with a tablespoon of Vegenaise or mayonnaise, sprinkle with coarse salt and pepper. Layer the bacon, tomato, avocado and lettuce on four slices of the bread and then sandwich with the remaining four. Cut each sandwich in half and serve.

Doctors regularly fail to disclose abnormal test results

New research shows that physicians often neglect to tell patients about abnormal test results, putting people's health at risk.

On average, one out of every 14 patients with clinically significant abnormal results -- for instance, a stool test that shows signs of blood -- don't get this information from their doctors, according to a new study today in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

That's a dismal performance and one with dangerous consequences. "Failure to report abnormal test results can lead to serious, even lethal consequences for the patient," said Dr. Lawrence Casalino, chief of the division of outcomes research at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City.

Read more

It was greed that killed Michael Jackson

This is a very tragic tale. Makes me wonder if the beatings he took as a child were caused by his father trying to 'beat the gay' out of him.

By Ian Halperin

Whatever the final autopsy results reveal, it was greed that killed Michael Jackson. Had he not been driven – by a cabal of bankers, agents, doctors and advisers – to commit to the gruelling 50 concerts in London’s O2 Arena, I believe he would still be alive today.

During the last weeks and months of his life, Jackson made desperate attempts to prepare for the concert series scheduled for next month – a series that would have earned millions for the singer and his entourage, but which he could never have completed, not mentally, and not physically.

Michael knew it and his advisers knew it. Anyone who caught even a fleeting glimpse of the frail old man hiding beneath the costumes and cosmetics would have understood that the London tour was madness. For Michael Jackson, it was fatal.

I had more than a glimpse of the real Michael; as an award-winning freelance journalist and film-maker, I spent more than five years inside his ‘camp’.

Many in his entourage spoke frankly to me – and that made it possible for me to write authoritatively last December that Michael had six months to live, a claim that, at the time, his official spokesman, Dr Tohme Tohme, called a ‘complete fabrication’. The singer, he told the world, was in ‘fine health’. Six months and one day later, Jackson was dead.

Read more

She's too damn cute

9 Conservative Myths About Right-Wing Domestic Terrorism

This is terrorism we're dealing with. We can't afford to let ourselves be distracted by spin. It's time to set the record straight with the facts.

In Memoriam

The Wayback Juke Box - Shirley & Company - Shame, shame, shame

Interactive Music Video

From VSL

Spanish group called Labuat has created one of the most beautiful music videos we’ve ever seen. And the best thing is, it’s interactive.

As the song — “Soy Tu Aire” (“I’m Your Air”) — kicks off, a line of black ink moves across the screen: You can send it up, down, back, and forth, or swirl it into circles. The line grows thicker along the way and splatters into several shapes: butterflies, red lips, birds. The immersive experience will make you feel like a maestro.

Sigur Ros - Glósóli

This magnificent music video is from the Icelandic band Sigur Ros and is one of my all-time favorites.

Sigur Rós: Glósóli
by dailypenguin

Today's Blissful Place

25 Books You Can't Put Down

I lifted this summer reading list from Oprah.com

Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann
368 pages; Random House

It's 1974, and a man is dancing on a tightrope between the towers of the World Trade Center—risky business, but as Colum McCann reveals in Let the Great World Spin (Random House), so is simply living day to day. This novel, with its web of disparate but connected characters—including a God-battered Irish monk, a swashbuckling prostitute, an artist with a guilty secret, a mother grieving her war dead—is an act of pure bravado, dizzying proof that to keep your balance you need to know how to fall.




Heroic Measures by Jill Ciment
208 pages; Pantheon

After a lifetime together, 70-something Alex and his wife, Ruth, are still smitten—with each other ("He has loved her for so long that he can no longer distinguish between passion and familiarity") and with their elderly dachshund, Dorothy. About to sell their Manhattan walk-up, the couple is caught up in crisis: Their dog is suddenly paralyzed, a truck jackknifes in a tunnel, news channels click into terrorist-hype overdrive. Read Jill Ciment's Heroic Measures (Pantheon) for its painterly depictions of a rattled city, its deliciously biting satire of media and real estate madness, its tender knowledge of the creaturely ties that bind.


Yes, My Darling Daughter by Margaret Leroy
352 pages; Sarah Crichton/Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Margaret Leroy's eerily lovely novel Yes, My Darling Daughter (Sarah Crichton/Farrar, Straus and Giroux) is one of those rare books you'll sit with till your bones ache. The mystery of why 4-year-old Sylvie longs to return to a house she has never seen, a family she cannot have known, takes this peculiar child, her anxious single mother, and a romantically scruffy psychologist onto the windswept beaches of a tiny coastal Irish village—a setting as enchantingly perilous as childhood itself.

Dreaming in Hindi by Katherine Russell Rich
384 pages; Houghton Mifflin

In a lionhearted attempt to shed her past—years of numbing jobs at glossy magazines and two life-threatening bouts with cancer—Katherine Russell Rich voyaged to India to learn Hindi, a language with one word, kal, for "yesterday" and "tomorrow." Fortified with neuroscience and laced with humor ("A lover who speaks the language is a faster route to fluency than any tapes or courses, but perhaps more expensive"), Dreaming in Hindi (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) is a crash course in emotional agility, in an understanding too deep for words.


A Pearl in the Storm by Tori Murden McClure
304 pages; Collins

Maybe it was the snacks: Who wouldn't row alone across an ocean for the chance to eat like a teenager? Whatever it was that propelled Tori Murden McClure to the far side of the Atlantic in her homemade barge, the American Pearl, she muscled through 12-hour days of rowing, capsizing (she rescued the M&M's), being eyeballed by a hammerhead shark and clobbered by a hurricane. In A Pearl in the Storm (Collins), McClure tells how, on land and sea, she exuberantly bucked the tide.

Columbine by Dave Cullen
432 pages; Twelve

You may want to leave the horror behind you—that may be why you haven't yet picked up Columbine (Twelve), journalist Dave Cullen's spectacularly gripping account of the Colorado school shooting that shocked America a decade ago. But Cullen's chilling narrative is too vital to miss, as are his myth-busting revelations: No, the killers were not social outcasts; there was no broader conspiracy; and, yes, the authorities should have known. Read this book for its unflinching honesty, and for the satisfaction, however grim, of setting the record straight.

The Glister by John Burnside
240 pages; Nan A. Talese/Doubleday

A chemically poisoned town, young boys who vanish one by one into the sinister woods, a deadly sin of omission. "Mistakes don't happen in a single moment," writes Scottish poet and novelist John Burnside in The Glister (Nan A. Talese/Doubleday). "They grow invisibly beneath the surface, running for years in the dark like the roots of some patient fungus till something erupts at the surface, some slick, wet fruiting body full of dark spores that stream out into the wind…tainting everything they touch." A dark morality tale, hauntingly told.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith
320 pages; Quirk Classics

Jane Austen might turn in her grave—or possibly rise from it—on reading Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (Quirk Classics), a merry monstrosity devised from Austen's own iconic text, with tweaks and additions by Seth Grahame-Smith; e.g., "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains." Elizabeth Bennet, whose rapier wit is matched only by her swordplay, takes on the arrogant Mr. Darcy as well as the insatiable undead. You go, ghoul.


Admission by Jean Hanff Korelitz
464 pages; Grand Central

How does it work, anyway—that top-secret, convoluted college admissions process that turns high school students and their parents into frantic, wheedling, groveling, soul-searching desperadoes? Reading Jean Hanff Korelitz's novel Admission (Grand Central), about Portia Nathan, a soft-hearted scout for Princeton, and her fateful decisions—academic and otherwise—is like sneaking into the ivy tower and pressing your ear to the wall. An intimate tale of skewed dreams and diverted lives.

he Food of a Younger Land by Mark Kurlansky
416 pages; Riverhead

The Food of a Younger Land (Riverhead), edited and illustrated with woodcuts by Mark Kurlansky, is a banquet of stories and traditional recipes collected in the 1930s for the Federal Writers' Project by the likes of Eudora Welty and Nelson Algren, who journeyed across the land to sniff out what and how Americans ate. Indiana Persimmon Pudding, Depression Cake from the Far West—savory concoctions for a hungry time.

The Peep Diaries by Hal Niedzviecki
256 pages; City Lights

"You need to know. You need to be known." That is the compulsion fueling what cultural critic Hal Niedzviecki calls "peep culture, the bastard love child of gossip"—our mass addiction to twittering, tweeting, snooping, spying, blogging, gawking at reality TV and YouTube, spilling our secrets on Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, Ping…the list goes on. "Call it surveillance with benefits," he writes of our consuming need for human connection in The Peep Diaries (City Lights), a virtual descent into the loneliest of worlds.


Farm City by Novella Carpenter
288 pages; Penguin

Marie Antoinette wore potato blossoms in her hair. Novella Carpenter, on the other hand, finds herself up to her neck in gizzards and sizzling compost. Farm City (Penguin) is Carpenter's delectable story of how she turned a "ghetto squat lot" in Oakland, California, into a working urban farm. Making cameo appearances here: a flashy neighbor called Lana (that's "anal" spelled backward, the woman helpfully explains), a pair of turkeys named Harold and Maude, lettuce-loving Black Panthers, and some engaging future bacon.

Plan Bee by Susan Brackney
208 pages; Perigee

"It takes more than stripes to make a honeybee, honey." Beekeeper Susan Brackney's Plan Bee (Perigee) is a close encounter with a high-functioning (and endangered) society that is essential to our own—a delightful primer on old queens, mellow Italians (of the apian kind), venomless drones, and other hive dwellers whose lives may be short, but oh so sweet.

Poems from the Women's Movement by Honor Moore
200 pages; The Library of America

Beginning in the 1960s, poets like Sylvia Plath, Adrienne Rich, Diane Di Prima, and Sonia Sanchez began coming out—from the closet and the kitchen and the bedroom—to read and write about how they lived. For women, wrote Audre Lorde, "poetry is not a luxury" but a necessary way of dealing with gender, power, and race, sometimes with fury, sometimes with expansive joy. Below, from Honor Moore's rich anthology, Poems from the Women's Movement (The Library of America), a slice of life by Elsa Gidlow.

You say I am mysterious
Let me explain myself:
In a land of oranges
I am faithful to apples

Stormy Weather by James Gavin
608 pages; Atria

People told her she wasn't "colored enough." (Ethel Waters, among others, despised her.) They said she had no sense of rhythm, couldn't sing the blues. But Lena Horne's patrician beauty dazzled white audiences, and in the 1940s, her sexy, stylish cabaret and film performances made her a star. James Gavin's Stormy Weather (Atria) tells how this elegant icon—polite to a fault, quietly enraged by Hollywood racism—spent decades getting comfortable in her skin.


Eye of My Heart edited by Barbara Graham
320 pages; Harper

Among the doting, self-doubting grandmothers in editor Barbara Graham's spry and unsentimental anthology Eye of My Heart (Harper) are Abigail Thomas, who relishes her late-life indolence, and Molly Giles, who watches her spoiled-rotten granddaughter with a mixture of irritation and awe ("Annika at three knows what she likes and doesn't like, and she doesn't like me"). Truth-telling with dollops of love.


One D.O.A., One on the Way by Mary Robison
176 pages; Counterpoint

Eve is a movie location scout in post-Katrina New Orleans. The city is in ruins, and so is her marriage to the invalid Adam, whose alcoholic twin brother and his unbalanced wife mirror the chaos, desperation, violence, and inchoate need of this blighted paradise. A lighthearted summer romance? Hardly. But Mary Robison's telegraphic sentences and blunt-cut dialogue make her latest novel, One D.O.A., One on the Way (Counterpoint), a riveting read

The Heyday of the Insensitive Bastards by Robert Boswell
288 pages; Graywolf

Robert Boswell's stories are packed with latent emotion, like explosives about to detonate. In The Heyday of the Insensitive Bastards (Graywolf), characters move through life with trepidation, as relationships fracture and past collides with present. "Time is not a river," thinks one traumatized young man. "Time is a tree. Branches, roots, limbs, the leafing. Time defoliates. Time buds. Time cracks." An unnerving, fascinating collection.


A Meaningful Life by L.J. Davis
232 pages; NYRB Classics

Stultified by his job (editing a plumbing magazine) and his mind-numbing marriage ("a cross between Long Day's Journey into Night and Father Knows Best"), frustrated novelist Lowell Lake welcomes a new obsession: renovating a monstrously dilapidated mansion in a Brooklyn slum. What follows, in L.J. Davis's deadpan 1971 novel A Meaningful Life, reissued by NYRB Classics, is pure chaos, as Lowell confronts a cast of urban squatters, in some of the most brilliant comic turns this side of Alice in Wonderland. A cathartic read for urban pioneers.


A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
256 pages; Scribner

For its musings on creativity ("Write one true sentence, and then go on from there") and for its heady Parisian ambience, for its poison darts of gossip and vignettes about literary lions from Gertrude Stein to F. Scott Fitzgerald, read the latest incarnation of Ernest Hemingway's A Moveable Feast (Scribner), first published in 1964. His widow, Mary, oversaw the heavily edited original; this one, edited by grandson Seán, takes Hemingway at his word and restores his original manuscript—less a finished book than a trove of sketches, some unfinished, just as the master left them.


Lime Tree Can't Bear Orange by Amanda Smyth
256 pages; Shay Areheart

The death of innocence is like catnip to fiction writers, and Amanda Smyth pounces on it with all four paws in her debut novel, Lime Tree Can't Bear Orange (Shaye Areheart). The Irish-Trinidadian Smyth sets the scene in steamy Tobago, where lovely, parentless Celia lives with her Aunt Tassi and her aunt's husband, Roman, a man who "could crawl under a snake's belly on stilts." It doesn't take a soothsayer (though one happens to be handy) to predict this adolescent's perilous and passionate coming of age.

Camilla by Madeleine L'Engle
256 pages; Farrar, Straus and Giroux

No tropical heat for the lonely, sheltered heroine of Camilla, Madeleine L'Engle's 1951 novel of midcentury Manhattan, republished by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Camilla's elegant mother, Rose, has an unctuous boyfriend who makes the teenager cringe and her father, Rafferty, seethe with rage. Struggling to make sense of all that conflict, walking the snowy city streets with a boy named Frank, Camilla tries to fathom the sweet, slow progress of desire.



Essential Pleasures edited by Robert Pinsky
528 pages; Norton

They slink into your mouth like oysters, like full-bodied wine. When you read a poem aloud (recite is too formal a word), you curl your tongue around its luscious syllables—as with William Carlos Williams's "To Waken an Old Lady": "Old age is / a flight of small / cheeping birds / skimming / bare trees"; or Lucille Clifton's "Homage to My Hips": "these hips are big hips / they need space to / move around in." Essential Pleasures (Norton), edited by Robert Pinsky, is a cache of speakable poems, romantic and ridiculous, somber and sublime. Read one to someone you love.


Provenance by Laney Salisbury and Aly Sujo
352 pages; Penguin

A dapper, fast-talking polymath with a talent for turning heads, John Drewe masterminded the most elaborate art hoax of the 20th century. Forging letters of authenticity, doctoring vintage exhibition catalogs, Drewe bamboozled art experts and revered institutions (including London's Tate Gallery) into accepting a slew of "masterpieces" presumably by Giacometti, Braque, Matisse but actually by gifted down-at-the-heels forger John Myatt. Investigative reporters Laney Salisbury and her husband, Aly Sujo, detail this spectacular scam in Provenance (Penguin), a real-life thriller about the fine art of the con.

He said, She said

He said to me .. . I don't know why you wear a bra; you've got nothing to put in it.
I said to him . . You wear pants don't you?

He said to me . . ..... Shall we try swapping positions tonight?
She said . That's a good idea - you stand by the ironing board while I sit on the sofa and fart!

He said to me. ... What have you been doing with all the grocery money I gave you?
I said to him . .....Turn sideways and look in the mirror!

He said to me. ..... Why don't women blink during foreplay?
I said to him .. . They don't have time

He said to me. . How many men does it take to change a roll of toilet paper?
I said to him .. . We don't know; it has never happened.

He said to me. . Why is it difficult to find men who are sensitive, caring and Good- looking?
I said to him . . . They already have boyfriends.

I said...What do you call a woman who knows where her husband is every night?
He said. . . A widow.

He said to me . .. . Why are married women heavier than single women?
I said to him . . . Single women come home, see what's in the fridge and go to bed. Married women come home, see what's in bed and go to the fridge.

Carrots, Eggs, & Coffee!

You will never look at a cup of coffee the same way again.

A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how
things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make
it and wanted to give up, She was tired of fighting and struggling. It
seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose.

Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and
placed each on a high fire. Soon the pots came to boil. In the first she
placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs, and in the last she
placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil; without saying a
word.

In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the
carrots out and placed them in a bowl. She pulled the eggs out and
placed them in a bowl. Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a
bowl. Turning to her daughter, she asked, ' Tell me what you see.'
'Carrots, eggs, and coffee,' she replied.

Her mother brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did
and noted that they were soft. The mother then asked the daughter to
take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the
hard boiled egg.

Finally, the mother asked the daughter to sip the coffee. The daughter
smiled as she tasted its rich aroma. The daughter then asked, 'What does
it mean, mother?'

Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same
adversity: boiling water. Each reacted differently. The carrot went in
strong, hard, and unrelenting. However, after being subjected to the
boiling water, it softened and became weak. The egg had been fragile.
Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after
sitting through the boiling water, its inside became hardened. The
ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling
water, they had changed the water.

Which are you?' she asked her daughter. 'When adversity knocks on your
door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?

Think of this: Which am I? Am I the carrot that seems strong, but with
pain and adversity do I wilt and become soft and lose my strength?

Am I the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with the
heat? Did I have a fluid spirit, but after a death, a breakup, a
financial hardship or some other trial, have I become hardened and
stiff? Does my shell look the same, but on the inside am I bitter and
tough with a stiff spirit and hardened heart?

Or am I like the coffee bean? The bean actually changes the hot water,
the very circumstance that brings the pain. When the water gets hot, it
releases the fragrance and flavor. If you are like the bean, when things
are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you.
When the hour is the darkest and trials are their greatest do you
elevate yourself to another level? How do you handle adversity? Are you
a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?

May you have enough happiness to make you sweet, enough trials to make
you strong, enough sorrow to keep you human and enough hope to make you
happy.

The happiest of people don't necessarily have the best of everything;
they just make the most of everything that comes along their way. The
brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past; you can't go
forward in life until you let go of your past failures and heartaches.

When you were born, you were crying and everyone around you was smiling.

Live your life so at the end, you're the one who is smiling and everyone
around you is crying.

The Show About Schlong

We never see the humongous dick that gives HBO’s wry new comedy series Hung its title. But why would we, when this show about a financially strapped high-school coach who becomes a prostitute is—like prostitution itself—more about money than sex? In this upscale comedy about downward mobility, our whore and hero is Ray (Thomas Jane), who is not only an underpaid basketball coach, but underpaid in Detroit, a city in the avant-garde of the national economic slump. Ray’s bitter wife (Anne Heche) has left him for a dermatologist, and his two teenaged kids live with him—that is, until the house burns down and he ends up sleeping in a tent. How low can a former high-school jock go? Apparently low enough to sell the only talent he has left: his remarkable penis.

Read more

Uh-Oh.....NOT GOOD

White House Is Drafting Executive Order to Allow Indefinite Detention

Website of the Day - Useless

USELESS is a for-profit company that sells sustainable products and gives 10% of profits to water and sanitation projects.

Rating the Greatest GOP Sex Scandals of the Past 20 Years

From Clarence Thomas to Mark Sanford, the definitive guide to randy Republicans

Give this to Republicans: They know how to conduct sex scandals in style.

Oh sure, Democrats have their sex scandals, but they're not nearly as interesting. For one thing, most Democrats busted in sex scandals aren't the same type of overbearing moral scolds as your average GOP politician. (The one recent exception was former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, whose work shutting down prostitution rings left him open to charges of bald hypocrisy when he was caught rendezvousing with a prostitute himself.)

Additionally, Democratic sex scandals tend to be of the more vanilla nature: affairs with campaign workers and interns are pretty standard fare as far as modern political culture goes, as are visits to high-priced call girls.

The GOP's deviants, on the other hand, have brought a wealth of oddball debaucheries to the table, from failed bathroom-stall hookups to slimy messages sent to underage congressional pages to rumored S&M diaper fantasies. So let's review the past 20 years of Republican sex scandals and rate each one on a scale of 1 to 10 based on factors such as hypocrisy, legal liability, the damage inflicted upon the perpetrators' careers and overall comedy.

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The Girl From Ipanema

Thank you, Governor Sanford, for reminding us that life can be good, that life can be saccharine sweet, but above all else, that life can be really, really, really, really funny.

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Inhaling Exhaust Linked to Premature Babies

Study links pollution from vehicle traffic to serious pregnancy and birth health issues.

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The Most Complicated Pool Trick shot Ever

Here's The Joke

It was a boring Sunday afternoon in the jungle so the Elephants decided to challenge the Ants to a game of soccer. The game was going well with the Elephants beating the Ants ten goals to nil, when the Ants gained possession. The Ants' star player was dribbling the ball towards the Elephants' goal when the Elephants' left back came lumbering towards him. The elephant trod on the little ant, killing him instantly.

The referee stopped the game. "What the hell do you think you're doing? Do you call that sportsmanship, killing another player?"

The elephant replied, "Well, I didn't mean to kill him -- I was just trying to trip him up.

25 Summer-Right Chicken Dinners

Browse this gallery of unique and delicious variations on the perennial favorite―some grilled, some served in a salad, and most of them ready in 30 minutes or less. See some possibilities for dinner tonight, plus grilling tips and wine pairings.

Nixon: Abort Mixed Race Babies

The newest batch of tapes released by the Richard Nixon Library and Museum in Yorba Linda, California will hardly help the infamous president's image. That they're profanity-laced should come as no surprise. According to the Los Angeles Times, the ever-charming Nixon told aid Chuck Colson after the Roe v. Wade decision legalized abortion, "There are times when abortions are necessary—I know that...Suppose you have a black and a white, or a rape." Nixon also said that he'd "cut off the head" of the South Vietnamese leader to end the war. The tapes span January and February 1973, covering Nixon's second inauguration, the Hanoi peace deal, and the trial of the Watergate burglars.

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How to Kill Your Excuses

We all make excuses.

But the successful ones are those who can kill the excuses like the miserable maggots they are.

I’m too tired. I don’t have the time. I don’t feel motivated. I’d rather do nothing. I don’t have the money, equipment, space. I can’t because …

We’ve all made the excuses. Here’s how to kill them.

She finally has a home: Harvard

Khadijah Williams stepped into chemistry class and instantly tuned out the commotion.

She walked past students laughing, gossiping, napping and combing one another's hair. Past a cellphone blaring rap songs. And past a substitute teacher sitting in a near-daze.

Quietly, the 18-year-old settled into an empty table, flipped open her physics book and focused. Nothing mattered now except homework.

"No wonder you're going to Harvard," a girl teased her.

Around here, Khadijah is known as "Harvard girl," the "smart girl" and the girl with the contagious smile who landed at Jefferson High School only 18 months ago.

What students don't know is that she is also a homeless girl.

As long as she can remember, Khadijah has floated from shelters to motels to armories along the West Coast with her mother. She has attended 12 schools in 12 years; lived out of garbage bags among pimps, prostitutes and drug dealers. Every morning, she upheld her dignity, making sure she didn't smell or look disheveled.

On the streets, she learned how to hunt for their next meal, plot the next bus route and help choose a secure place to sleep -- survival skills she applied with passion to her education.

Only a few mentors and Harvard officials know her background. She never wanted other students to know her secret -- not until her plane left for the East Coast hours after her Friday evening graduation.

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Is ACORN providing workers for the 2010 census?

No. ACORN employees will not be taking the census. The group is one of more than 30,000 "partners" that will help publicize the event

Mrs. Sanford: I Will Survive

Can they make her the governor now? Jenny Sanford, the wife of South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford who gained a national following when she refused to stand by his side after he admitted an affair, talked to reporters on Friday about her husband, her first interview since his Wednesday news conference. She told the Associated Press that she discovered the governor's infidelity when she came across a letter he had written and demanded he break off the affair. When he asked to see his mistress in Argentina, she refused, telling her interviewer: "It's one thing to forgive adultery. It's another to condone it." She said the governor told her he was on a writing trip last week and that she was devastated to find out he was in Argentina. According to The New York Times, when asked by a reporter whether she was OK she replied: "I have great faith and I have great friends and great family. We have a good Lord in this world, and I know I'm going to be fine. Not only will I survive, I'll thrive." Once again refusing to carry water for her estranged husband, Sanford told reporters that the governor's political future was "not a concern" to her. "He's going to have to worry about that. I'm worried about my family and the character of my children," she said.

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How to Be Wildly Successful

If at first you don't succeed…ask yourself, Am I an otter? A squirrel? A mouse? The answer could spell the difference between things going swimmingly and squeaking to a halt. Find your own winning style.

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Via Spiritual Wealth

As an example of both the higher sentiments and greater literacy of an earlier age, here is a letter from Sullivan Ballou, a 32-year-old soldier in the Union Army, to his 24-year-old wife:

July 14, 1861

Camp Clark, Washington

My very dear Sarah:

The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days-perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write again, I feel impelled to write a few lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more...

Sarah my love for you is deathless, it seems to bind me with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break; and yet my love of Country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me irresistibly on with all these chains to the battle field.

The memories of the blissful moments I have spent with you come creeping over me, and I feel most gratified to God and to you that I have enjoyed them for so long. And hard it is for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when, God willing, we might still have lived and loved together, and seen our sons grown up to honorable manhood, around us. I have, I know, but few and small claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me - perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar, that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and when my last breath escapes me on the battle field, it will whisper your name. Forgive my many faults and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless and foolish I have often times been! How gladly would I wash out with my tears every little spot upon your happiness...

But, O Sarah! If the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you; in the gladdest days and in the darkest nights... always, always, and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath, as the cool air fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by. Sarah do not mourn me dead; think I am gone and wait for thee, for we shall meet again...

Ballou was killed in the first battle of Bull Run a week later.

Ads From The 30's

Today's Quote

"The kinder and more thoughtful a person is, the more kindness they can find in other people."

Leo Tolstoy
1828-1910, Novelist and Philosopher

A Woman Scorned

Jake was dying.

His wife, Becky, was maintaining a candlelight vigil by his side. She held his fragile hand, tears running down her face. Her praying roused him from his slumber. He looked up and his pale lips began to move slightly.

"My darling Becky," he whispered.

"Hush, my love," she said. "Rest. Shhh, don't talk."

He was insistent. "Becky," he said in his tired voice. "I....I have something I must confess to you."

"There's nothing to confess," replied the weeping Becky. "Everything's all right, go to sleep."

"No, no. I must die in peace, Becky. I...I fooled around with your sister, your best friend, her best friend, and your Mother!"

"I know..." Becky whispered softly, "That's why I poisoned you."

Eulalie by Jesse Winchester

Giant Carbon Clock Unveiled in Center of New York City

Deutsche Bank has erected a seven-story sign in the heart of New York City that ticks off the tons of carbon dioxide being emitted into the atmosphere — a public relations
move designed to raise awareness of global warming.

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Another Blonde Joke

A guy and a blonde girl are having a drink together in a bar. The
man raises his glass and says, "Here's hoping you're in
Heaven ten minutes before the devil knows you're dead!"

"What's that mean?" asks the girl.

"That," answers her date, "is an authentic Irish toast."

"Oh. Well, here's to bread, eggs and cinnamon."

"Bread, eggs and cinnamon? What's that?"

The girl says, "That's French toast."

What I Know for Sure

Found this in the 11/08 issue of Oprah:

1. What you put out comes back all the time, no matter what.
2. You define your own life. Don't let other people write your script.
3. Whatever someone did to you in the past has no power over the present. Only you give it power.
4. When people show you who they are, believe them the first time.
5. Worrying is a wasted time. Use the same energy for doing something about whatever is worrying you.
6. What you believe has more power than what you dream or wish or hope for. You become what you believe.
7. If the only prayer you ever say is thank you, that will be enough.
8. The happiness you feel is in direct proportion to the love you give.
9. Failure is a signpost to turn you in another direction.
10. If you make a choice that goes against what everyone else thinks, the world will not fall apart.
11. Trust your instincts. Intuition doesn't lie.
12. Love yourself and then learn to extend that love to others in every encounter.
13. Let passion drive your profession.
14. Find a way to get paid for doing what you love. Then every paycheck will be a bonus.
15. Love doesn't hurt. It feels really good.
16. Every day brings a chance to start over.
17. Being a mother is the hardest job on earth. Women everywhere must declare it so.
18. Doubt means don't. Don't move. Don't answer. Don't rush forward.
19. When you don't know what to do, get still. The answer will come.
20. "Trouble don't last always." (A line from a Negro spiritual, which calls to mind another favorite: "This too, shall pass.")

I Wonder

Can you cry under water?

How important does a person have to be before they are considered assassinated instead of just murdered?

Why do you have to 'put your two cents in'... but it's only a 'penny for your thoughts'? Where's that extra penny going to?

Once you're in heaven, do you get stuck wearing the clothes you were buried in for eternity?

Why does a round pizza come in a square box?

What disease did cured ham actually have?

How is it that we put man on the moon before we figured out it would be a good idea to put wheels on luggage?

Why is it that people say they 'slept like a baby' when babies wake up like every two hours?

If a deaf person has to go to court, is it still called a hearing?

Why are you IN a movie, but you're ON TV?

Why do people pay to go up tall buildings and then put money in binoculars to look at things on the ground?

Why do doctors leave the room while you change? They're going to see you naked anyway.

Why is 'bra' singular and 'panties' plural?

Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a horrible crisp, which no decent human being would eat?

If Jimmy cracks corn and no one cares, why is there a stupid song about him?

Can a hearse carrying a corpse drive in the carpool lane?

If the professor on Gilligan's Island can make a radio out of a coconut, why can't he fix a hole in a boat?

Why does Goofy stand erect while Pluto remains on all fours? They're both dogs!

If Wile E. Coyote had enough money to buy all that ACME crap, why didn't he just buy dinner?

If corn oil is made from corn, and vegetable oil is made from vegetables,what is baby oil made from?

If electricity comes from electrons, does morality come from morons?

Do the Alphabet song and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star have the same tune?

Why did you just try singing the two songs above?

Why do they call it an asteroid when it's outside the hemisphere, but call it a hemorrhoid when it's in your butt?

Did you ever notice that when you blow in a dog's face, he gets mad at you, but when you take him for a car ride, he sticks his head out the window?

Is Obama planning to increase the federal tax on gun ammunition by 500 percent?

No such proposal has been made by the Obama administration. And nobody in Congress has introduced any bill to increase the 11 percent federal excise tax on ammo.

Today's Blissful Place

A Butterfly Emerges from the Cocoon

Time Lapse Of Butterfly's Wings Expanding from timvid on Vimeo.

Today's Quote

"Cherish the chase as much as you treasure the trophy."

— Joe Caruso

Scientists compare sharks, serial killers: 'There's some strategy going on'

Great white sharks have some things in common with human serial killers, a new study says: They don't attack at random, but stalk specific victims, lurking out of sight.

The sharks hang back and observe from a not-too-close, not-too-far base, hunt strategically, and learn from previous attempts, according to a study being published online Monday in the Journal of Zoology. Researchers used a serial-killer profiling method to figure out just how the fearsome ocean predator hunts, something that's been hard to observe beneath the surface.

"There's some strategy going on," said study co-author Neil Hammerschlag, a shark researcher at the University of Miami who observed 340 great white shark attacks on seals off an island in South Africa. "It's more than sharks lurking at the water waiting to go after them."

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Sizzling Summer Savings

Have some fun in the sun without worrying about your wallet. Here are some savings tips to help beat the summer heat.

• Summer Savings Tip #4 – Consider replacing your incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs). They use about 75% less energy and give off 75% less heat but produce the same amount of light as incandescent bulbs.

• Summer Savings Tip #5 – Make some shade! Awnings, blinds, drapes and glass films reduce the amount of sunlight that enters your home. Install them on windows, skylights, doors and other places where the sun comes through. During the day, closing the blinds and drapes to filter sunlight will keep the room's temperature from rising.

• Summer Savings Tip #8 – On a hot, sunny day, dark-colored roofs can reach temperatures of up to 150º to 190º F, heating the living spaces below. Consider adding a reflective coating, or choosing a lighter color when it’s time
to replace the roof.

Click here for 10 Summer Savings Tips that will help you cut costs on your energy bill.

Memo Reveals US Plan to Provoke an Invasion of Iraq

Those of you who believed the "Invade Iraq to keep U.S. safe from Iraq" should feel pretty stupid now. If you don't, there's something wrong with you.

A confidential record of a meeting between President Bush and Tony Blair before the invasion of Iraq, outlining their intention to go to war without a second United Nations resolution, will be an explosive issue for the official inquiry into the UK's role in toppling Saddam Hussein.

The memo, written on 31 January 2003, almost two months before the invasion and seen by the Observer, confirms that as the two men became increasingly aware UN inspectors would fail to find weapons of mass destruction (WMD) they had to contemplate alternative scenarios that might trigger a second resolution legitimising military action.

Bush told Blair the US had drawn up a provocative plan "to fly U2 reconnaissance aircraft painted in UN colours over Iraq with fighter cover". Bush said that if Saddam fired at the planes this would put the Iraqi leader in breach of UN resolutions.

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The King of Pop is Dead

Michael Jackson at the top of his game.

I remember when this aired on televison. This was the first time the world saw the "moon walk" and it was all the talk at the water cooler the next day.




Michael Jackson-Billie Jean-30th Anniversary Special

Farrah Fawcett Has Died

Panda's Wrestling

How Unions Gave My Redneck Family a Chance at the American Dream

Restoring dignity to laboring America won't be easy. It won't be pretty, and it won't be "within the system." Because the system is the problem.

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Reindeer in sharp decline

34 of 58 major herds are shrinking; logging, warming cited as factors

How many steps will you walk today?

You don't know? What, you don't have a pedometer yet? People who have a number in mind (and track it with a pedometer) walk a whole lot more than people who don't have one. Studies prove it. Honest.

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How to Haggle Even at Department Stores

Retail prices are a lot more negotiable than you might think. But before you go out and try to play hardball to get a discount, learn the rules of the game.

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Today's Quote

"False friendship, like the ivy, decays and ruins the walls it embraces; but true friendship gives new life and animation to the object it supports."

Sir Richard Burton
1821-1890, Explorer

What Possessions Would You Take in the Trunk of Your Car?

From Zen Habits

A recent commenter here on Zen Habits (unfortunately I forget which one) mentioned he tries to keep his possessions so simple he can fit them all into the trunk of his car.

He loves the idea that at a moment’s notice, he could pack up and leave.

That’s either minimalism to an admirable extreme, or someone on the lookout for the law. Let’s assume the former.

So, while I doubt my possessions would fit in the trunk of any vehicle that didn’t have “U-Haul” written on it, and I’m not suggesting you should either, this got me to thinking. (That’s never a good sign.) And it led me to wonder what your responses would be.

So here’s the reader question:

Could you simplify your possessions to fit in the trunk of a car? Which ones would you take?

Mantras May Help Cut Stress

Mantras can help with stress reduction, new research shows.

Mantras, or mantrams, are a word or phrase with spiritual meaning, write Jill Bormann, PhD, RN, and colleagues in the Journal of Advanced Nursing.

The researchers studied 30 veterans and 36 hospital workers at the Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System, where Bormann is a research nurse scientist. In a five-week class, participants chose a mantra and learned to use it to manage stress.

The study shows that the majority of participants used their mantras to help them cope with a wide range of problems, including anxiety, stress from traffic and work, insomnia, and unwanted thoughts.

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How Smart Are You?

IQ Test Scams Facebook Users

Do You Know Your "ID Score"?

Everyone has heard of credit scores, but bet you are not familiar with "ID scores." Under changes to the Fair Credit Reporting Act going into effect on August first, financial institutions and others will have to have methods in place to detect and respond to instances of ID theft. As a result of this, more companies will want to assure themselves that customers they do business with are really who they say they are. To do this, they may use third party applications that help verify your identity. A popular system is to check your ID score -- a number from 1 to 999, where the higher the number the more likely that ID fraud is a possibility. You can get a free copy of your id score (based on one company's calculations) at MyIdScore. You will be asked to optionally input your social security number, among other things. Without your SS#, the system will render a significantly higher score than with it. (MrConsumer's ID score was 70 with, and 303 without.)

Summer Hours trailer

Did Obama order a "swordless graduation" at the U.S. Naval Academy?

This Internet scuttlebutt is false. Graduating midshipmen have gone without swords at graduation for decades, even when Bush and Cheney spoke.

Today's Quote

Eventually I discovered for myself the utterly simple prescription for creativity: be intensely yourself. Don’t try to be outstanding; don’t try to be a success; don’t try to do pictures for others to look at - just please yourself.

~ Ralph Steiner

It'll be years before jobs return to much of U.S.

Unlike the labor market collapse that killed millions of U.S. jobs in a matter of months, the nation's return to peak employment will not be nearly as uniform nor as swift.

While signs indicate that the worst of the recession may be over, only six metropolitan areas across the country are expected to regain their pre-recession employment levels by the end of 2009, according to projections from IHS Global Insight, a leading economic forecaster.

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Is there a move to make Obama eligible for more than two terms as president?

A bill that proposes repealing the 22nd Amendment has been introduced, but so far it has very little support.

Simple Fitness Rules

Health and fitness are usually made to seem too complex.

It’s enough to make you want to give up.

Fortunately, fitness doesn’t have to be that complex.

In fact, you can boil it down to two simple rules:

30 'New' Toxic Chemicals to Avoid

California has identified 30 chemicals that may cause cancer, reproductive problems and other serious health concerns.

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No joke: Cheeseburger in a can

Yes, folks, there is indeed a cheeseburger in a can being sold somewhere out there.

The Evolution of Underwear

From the risqué to the respectable, a daring new exhibit in London celebrates the history of bras, corsets, lingerie, and other unmentionables.

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Vanillekipferl

YIELD: about 10 dozen very small cookies













1/3 cup superfine sugar
1/3 cup ground almonds
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 1/2 cups self-rising flour*
pinch of salt
1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar
*If you can’t find self-rising flour, simply measure out one cup unbleached, all-purpose flour and remove two teaspoonsful. Add a half teaspoon salt and one-and-a-half teaspoons baking powder.

Mix the superfine sugar, almonds, butter, flour and salt together in a bowl with a wooden spoon or your hands. Let the dough chill in the refrigerator for 20 minutes.

Roll the dough into half-inch thick ropes and cut into quarter-inch thick slices. Shape each slice into a small crescent and place on ungreased cookie sheets. You can space them quite close together as they don’t expand that much. Let the cookies rest for half an hour.

Meanwhile, preheat your oven to 350ºF. Bake the cookies for 12 minutes (until they’re barely browned), rotating the trays after six minutes. Move the cookies to a wire rack and let cool for ten minutes before sifting the confectioners’ sugar over them. Allow the cookies to cool completely before eating (if you can).

The Wayback Juke Box - Sunshine Superman by Donovan

This classic comes from 1966 and it got to no.2 in the charts of that very year!

Today's Quote

"Often we allow ourselves to be upset by small things we should despise and forget. We lose many irreplaceable hours brooding over grievances that, in a year's time, will be forgotten by us and by everybody. No, let us devote our life to worthwhile actions and feelings, to great thoughts, real affections and enduring undertakings."

Andre Maurois
1885-1967, Writer

The Wayback Juke Box - Kool and the Gang - Summer Madness