Entries Tagged 'Cool' ↓

I found this handy tool which helps you locate images on Flickr of the same colour. You can choose one or more colours, and the images are then displayed according to your selection.

The classical natural wonders are huge and hard to miss – vast canyons, giant mountains and the like. Many of the most fantastic natural phenomena, however, are also least easy to spot. Some are incredibly rare while others are located in hard-to-reach parts of the planet. From moving rocks to mammatus clouds and red tides to fire rainbows, here are seven of the most spectacular phenomenal wonders of the natural world.

SAILING STONES

The mysterious moving stones of the packed-mud desert of Death Valley have been a center of scientific controversy for decades. Rocks weighing up to hundreds of pounds have been known to move up to hundreds of yards at a time. Some scientists have proposed that a combination of strong winds and surface ice account for these movements. However, this theory does not explain evidence of different rocks starting side by side and moving at different rates and in disparate directions. Moreover, the physics calculations do not fully support this theory as wind speeds of hundreds of miles per hour would be needed to move some of the stones.

COLUMNAR BASALT

When a thick lava flow cools it contracts vertically but cracks perpendicular to its directional flow with remarkable geometric regularity – in most cases forming a regular grid of remarkable hexagonal extrusions that almost appear to be made by man. One of the most famous such examples is the Giant’s Causeway on the coast of Ireland (shown above) though the largest and most widely recognized would be Devil’s Tower in Wyoming. Basalt also forms different but equally fascinating ways when eruptions are exposed to air or water.

BLUE HOLES

Blue holes are giant and sudden drops in underwater elevation that get their name from the dark and foreboding blue tone they exhibit when viewed from above in relationship to surrounding waters. They can be hundreds of feet deep and while divers are able to explore some of them they are largely devoid of oxygen that would support sea life due to poor water circulation – leaving them eerily empty. Some blue holes, however, contain ancient fossil remains that have been discovered, preserved in their depths.

RED TIDES

Red tides are also known as algal blooms – sudden influxes of massive amounts of colored single-cell algae that can convert entire areas of an ocean or beach into a blood red color. While some of these can be relatively harmless, others can be harbingers of deadly toxins that cause the deaths of fish, birds and marine mammals. In some cases, even humans have been harmed by red tides though no human exposure are known to have been fatal. While they can be fatal, the constituent phytoplankton in ride tides are not harmful in small numbers.

ICE CIRCLES

While many see these apparently perfect ice circles as worthy of conspiracy theorizing, scientists generally accept that they are formed by eddies in the water that spin a sizable piece of ice in a circular motion. As a result of this rotation, other pieces of ice and flotsam wear relatively evenly at the edges of the ice until it slowly forms into an essentially ideal circle. Ice circles have been seen with diameters of over 500 feet and can also at times be found in clusters and groups at different sizes as shown above.

MAMMATUS CLOUDS

True to their ominous appearance, mammatus clouds are often harbingers of a coming storm or other extreme weather system. Typically composed primarily of ice, they can extend for hundreds of miles in each direction and individual formations can remain visibly static for ten to fifteen minutes at a time. While they may appear foreboding they are merely the messengers – appearing around, before or even after severe weather.

FIRE RAINBOWS

A circumhorizontal arc (properly a circumhorizon arc and never the recent uninformed and misleading term ‘fire rainbow’) is an optical phenomenon. It is not a rainbow, it is an ice-halo formed by ice crystals in high level cirrus clouds.

The complete halo is a huge and beautiful multi-coloured band running parallel to the horizon with its center beneath the sun. The distance below the sun is twice as far as the common 22-degree halo. Red is the uppermost colour. Often, when the halo forming cloud is small or patchy, only fragments of the arc are seen.

There is a myth that the halo is rare. How often it is seen depends on location and in particular latitude. In the United States it is a relatively common halo seen several times each summer in any one place. In contrast, it is rare in mid-latitude and northern Europe.

The annual Lemon Festival also known as “Fête du Citron” in Menton, a town located on the coast of the French-Italian border, built these amazing statues made out of citrus fruits. Made completely out of LEMONS,ORANGES, GRAPEFRUITS, AND LIMES. This is quite something even on photo’s, I can’t imagine what it must be like in real life – imagine the flavors in the air?!

So I’m hooked on facebook too… Hahaha. Just to let you all know that I decided to try it out a while back, and that I’m now totally addicted to it

I found so many school friends and people who I’ve met randomly, but lost contact with. Its really really cool

I have been reading so many new blogs lately. I found a couple which I have already added to my feeds. I’m always surprised by the diversity of blogs. Its incredible that there are people in every industry and walk of life who blog.

Its amazing to read everyone’s stories. I really find it quite cool. For now I have to finish up work (my usual excuse).

So if you’re looking for something to read, make sure to visit Bongi’s blog. He’s a South African “general surgeon working in the notorious South African province of Mpumalanga.” I find his bizarre stories interesting, and I’m sure you will too – especially if you’re from abroad, and you’re normal to a hospital running similar to what is portrayed in ER.

The other blog that has caught my attention is Diary of a Killer. You can read random posts, but its best to start at the beginning – its a fictional blog about a woman wanting revenge.

Hope you all have a good weekend!

We all know those cute little computer symbols called “emoticons,” where:

means a smile and is a frown.

Sometimes these are represented by &

Well, how about some “ASSICONS?”
Here goes:

(_!_) a regular ass

(__!__) a fat ass

(!) a tight ass

(_*_) a sore ass

{_!_} a swishy ass

(_o_) an ass that’s been around

(_x_) kiss my ass

I‘m not a gamer. You might know this already, but I’m not one for all these high quality pc or play station games. I’ve tried a couple, but they just can’t get me hooked?

What I do like, is Mario Bros. Its amazing how those old games still have their addicting effect on me. Tetris – plain old MS-DOS tetris. I love that game. And I can still spend hours planning a house for the SIMS.

Playing with the characters isn’t always so much fun, but designing the house is sooo cool. I downloaded a Mario & Luigi game, just not sure which version it is. If you want it, its free at Acid-Play.

I think I’m gonna get my old games out this weekend and PLAY.

…a Pizza Hut?

When I saw that photo that song immediately came up in my mind. I can’t get it out now

Got them in an e-mail from my sister, here are other cute ones which were included in the mail…

[Happy Easter] [Gas mask?]

For millions of sleep-deprived mothers around the world, this woman’s findings could be a miracle! Priscilla Dunstan, a mom from Australia with a special gift, says she’s unlocked the secret language of babies.

When Priscilla was a toddler, her parents discovered she had a photographic memory for sound. At age 4, she could hear a Mozart concert on the piano and play it back note for note.

Priscilla says her gift has helped her hear a special “second language” beyond English, allowing her to detect moods and even diagnose illnesses! “Other people might hear a note but I sort of get the whole symphony,” Priscilla says. “So when someone’s speaking, I get all this information that other people might not pick up.”

That mysterious second language took on an astounding new meaning when Priscilla became a mother to her baby, Tom. “Because of my gift for sound, I was able to pick out certain patterns in his cries and then remember what those patterns were later on when he cried again,” Priscilla says. “I realized that other babies were saying the same words.”

Here is the short version:

• Neh=”I’m hungry”
• Owh=”I’m sleepy”
• Heh=”I’m experiencing discomfort”
• Eair=”I have lower gas”
• Eh=”I need to burp”

Those “words” are actually sound reflexes, Priscilla says. “Babies all around the world have the same reflexes, and they therefore make the same sounds,” she says. If parents don’t respond to those reflexes, Priscilla says the baby will eventually stop using them.

Priscilla recommends that parents listen for those words in a baby’s pre-cry before they start crying hysterically. She says there is no one sound that’s harder to hear than others because it varies by individual. She also says some babies use some words more than others.

The Dunstan Baby Language DVD is currently available. Visit www.dunstanbaby.com to order your copy.

And NO, I do not have children, I just find this extremely interesting. I was an au pair for a while, but for babies who were talking / starting to talk. It’d be interesting to try this out though, so those of you with babies, let me know if it works please?

Sources: Oprah

Yes, we all knows we have to recycle – paper, glass, who know what else, so here I’m going to make my contribution and recycle an old post Thanks to Beth who tagged me, I bring to you the bit below from a post I did about a year ago (June,20th – 2006)

“Life is all about ass” You’re either covering it, laughing it off, kicking it, kissing it, busting it, trying to get a piece of it, or behaving like it!

And now, for the ones who are to be tagged…. I present to you

Kristyn-Marie | Tisha Best | Kuntry Gurl | Kelly | Barbara