Interesting Facts - Antarctica

Antarctica is the only land on our planet that is not owned by any country.
Ninety percent of the world's ice covers Antarctica. This ice also represents seventy percent of all the fresh water in the world.
As strange as it sounds, however, Antarctica is essentially a desert; the average yearly total precipitation is about two inches.  Although covered with ice (all but 0.4% of it,) Antarctica is the driest place on the planet, with an absolute humidity lower than the Gobi desert.

"Buddy"

The other day I met a man who told me his dog was in fact a wolf.  The animal was outside and it looked pretty tame to me, so I sacrificed a piece of the sausage I was eating and asked the man if I could give it to "Buddy."  He said he would love it.  So out I went to meet him and he was indeed happy with the proffered gift.  He was very tame and I enjoyed being with him.  Now the man had been a personal body guard to some rich client for some time so I didn't want to upset him.  The fact is I don't think it was a wolf at all.  More likely a Malamute, one of which I knew very well some years ago.  Here's a Malamute below, and you can see that he's not much different to the wolf above.

The fact is that wolves are truly wild animals and not domesticated to the point where I would trust them.

Video - Happy

My friend Keith has been on a roll. He's recently sent me a couple of great videos for the Monday video track.  This one last five minutes but it's a wonderful thing to enjoy - take the time out of your busy day to watch. https://www.youtube.com/embed/Pwe-pA6TaZk?rel=0  I wonder who picked up this fellow's travel expenses?

Sunday's Column - Wolf Fitness

This Sunday's column is about my local gym - Wolf Total Fitness.  I've been going here for about six months since my other gym closed down.  This is one of the problems with smaller gyms, they just don't stay in business.  Chris Wolfe is an ex-CEO of a large corporation and knows what it takes to stay in business, plus he's a fitness fan himself; running marathons and also boxing.  You can read the entire column at http://www.sbsun.com/trevorstravels/ci_22152617/path-eternal-youth

Tirade - fiscal cliff

I don't know about you but I'm getting a little tired of all this fiscal cliff talk and the blame game that our elected officials like to play with us.  After all it is not us that  caused this problem, it is the very same politicians that got us here.  I would like to suggest that the GOP stop all this procrastinating and allow the Dems to do what they want.  Of course, it would be useful if someone with some common sense explains sensibly what is likely to happen to the job market when we stick up taxes and penalise the achievers - read Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged for a possible outcome.  It might only take about a year for things to go the way the GOP fears, and then they are in a position to say a very large "told you so!"  However, if taxing the achievers and giving free stuff to those sitting in the wagon, works, then hey, let's all climb back on.  This is not tough stuff to figure out.  Come on People!

Right Track - Fiscal Cliff

Now let's see if I've got this right.  Earlier in the year, both parties were unable to agree on how to reduce our deficit and increase prosperity for all.  The Dems wanted to increase taxes, and cut back on the armed forces and defense overall.  The Republicans wanted to reduce our entitlements which will not last indefinitely in their present form.  The solution at the time was to kick the can down the road until the end of the year, when they will institute an increase in taxes and cut back on defense.  This was referrred to as going over the fiscal cliff, as it was generally believed that the policy would cause a recession.
Now it seems as if both sides are back where they were with no compromise possible.  But wait, if we go over the cliff, the Dems get big increases in taxes, and a reduction in that provocative defense budget - which makes the world hate us - plus an added bonus; all the blame can be put on the Republicans.  As for the economic catastrophe, well if you want to end the unfair practice of capitalism, so that the shining white monolith of socialism can rise up, what better method?  I think we have to accept that the Dems are a lot better at the political game than the GOP!

Music Track - Stravinsky

When this music was first played in 1913, it drove people mad.  One man was taken outside after he had been pounding out the rhythm on the bald head of the man sitting in front of him.  It's still pretty controversial today, and made more so when the female dancer seems to lose her shoulder strap.  The BBC is soon about to put on an erotic music live concert in London, and I think The Rite of Spring is to be included. It takes about seven minutes here to see the entire clip of "the sacrifice." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7pV2cX0qxs&feature=related

Oregon - Gas Pumping

On our motorcycling trip Michael and I learned an interesting fact.  You can't pump your own gas in the state.  We stopped just over the border in O'Brien to fill up, and there loitering at the pumps was a man whose job it was to pump the gas, as it's illegal for motorists to do it themselves.  However he didn't fancy gassing us up and stood by and let us get on with it.  Filling motorcycles can sometimes be difficult, with those little bellows things and the chance of blow back.  He said, the reason for the law was that the governor of the state's son needed a job as he wasn't too bright!  Do you think he might have been joking?

Punch Ups

The other evening, She Who Must Be Obeyed (S.W.M.B.O.) and I were popping out for a quick aperitif at one of our favorite places.  It was about six and all was quiet.  However as we turned into the street there were about six or seven men brawling.  Now this is not the sort of thing one expects at that hour.  I can't comment on later as I'm rarely out then.  But here we were trying to get down the street and fellows were all over the road.  We eventually made our way through and entered an empty bar - everybody was outside watching or engaging in the fray.  Eventually the sheriffs arrived and made a couple of arrests.  One was of a young man who stupidly tried to hit one of the officers.  Not a bright chap obviously.
What was interesting was that the fight was nowhere near as good as those shown in movies.  There everything is choreographed beautifully, whereas in the real world there's a lot of shouting and pushing, a few wild punches thrown that didn't seem to land anywhere and one torn shirt.  Still enough to get the adrenaline up - particularly for the participants!

PING!

I was sent this by my friend Geoffrey.  I think it's rather interesting as well as inspiring.

On Monday, I played the Disney, Lake Buena Vista course. As usual the starters matched me with three other players. After a few holes we began to get to know each other a bit.

One fellow was rather young and had his wife riding along in the golf cart with him. I noticed that his golf bag had his name on it and after closer inspection it also said "wounded war veterans".  When I had my first chance to chat with him I asked him about the bag. His response was simply that it was a gift.  I then asked if he was wounded and he said yes. When I asked more about this injury, his response was "I'd rather not talk about it, sir".

Over a few holes I learned that he had spent the last 15 months in an army rehabilitation hospital in San Antonio Texas.  His wife moved there to be with him and he was released from the hospital in September. He was a rather quiet fellow; however, he did say that he wanted to become good at golf.

We had a nice round and as we became a little more familiar I asked him about the brand new set of Ping woods and irons with which he was playing.  Some looked like they had never been used. His response was simple. He said that this round was the first full round he had played with these clubs.

Later in the round he told me the following.  As part of the discharge process from the rehabilitation hospital, Ping comes in and provides three days of golf instruction, followed by a club fitting.

Upon discharge from the hospital, Ping gives each of the discharged veterans, generally about 40 soldiers, a brand new set of custom fitted clubs along with an impressive golf bag.

The fellow I met was named Ben Woods and he looked me in the eye and said that being fitted for those clubs was one of the best things that ever happened to him, and he was determined to learn to play golf well enough to deserve the gift Ping had given him. Ben is now out of the service medically discharged just a month ago. He is as fine a young man as you would ever want to meet.

Ping, whose products are made with pride here in America ( Arizona ), has the good judgment not to advertise this program.

God Bless America and the game of golf.

Thank you PING !!!

Video - more magic

My friend Keith sent me this five-minute video on a magic act in France, I think it is.  I'm not a great lover of such things but this one is easy on the eye. http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=sKns1uatyNg&vq=medium

Sunday's Column - M/C Trip

I'm glad to report that all is back to normal at The Sun and my weekly columns should now be up on the site.  This week is the second part of the motorcycling trip I took a couple of months ago.

After we "turned the corner" in Oregon we headed for Mount Shasta and this was the view as we left that spot.  A wonderful trip all round and you can read the account at www.sbsun.com/trevorstravels

Tirade - Cowboys

I'm not a huge football fan; I have a few teams I quite like, The Cowboys, Raiders and Broncos, but the other day I was watching the last few minutes of a Cowboys game.  It was down to the last five seconds and the Cowboys had 15 yards to go with two downs left.  They were three points behind and so it was pretty exciting stuff.  Tony Roma snapped the ball and then the program switched off to go to commercials.  Along the screen came some rubbish that "contractual obligations" meant they had to go to another game.  And eventually this other game began with time wasting and the usual kick off.  Now by all that's holy what lunatic writes a contract that allows such stupidity?  Five damned seconds for heaven's sake? Come on People!

Right Track - only in America

I'm grateful to my friend Frank for this.  He warned me that it might send my blood pressure up.  Sadly I am aware of most of these foolish anomolies.

TOP-10 "Only In America " Observations ~ by a Canadian:

1) Only in America , could politicians talk about the greed of the rich at a$35,000.00 a plate campaign fund-raising event.

2) Only in America, could people claim that the government still discriminates against black Americans when they have a black President, a black Attorney General, and roughly 18% of the federal workforce is black while only 12% of the population is black.

3) Only in America, could they have had the two people most responsible for our tax code, Timothy Geithner, the head of the Treasury Department and Charles Rangel who once ran the Ways and Means Committee, BOTH turn out to be tax cheats who are in favor of higher taxes.


4) Only in America , can they have terrorists kill people in the name of Allah and have the media primarily react by fretting that Muslims might be harmed by the backlash.

5) Only in America, would they make people who want to legally become American citizens wait for years in their home countries and pay tens of thousands of dollars for the privilege while we discuss letting anyone who sneaks into the country illegally just 'magically' become American citizens.

6) Only in America, could the people who believe in balancing the budget and sticking by the country's Constitution be thought of as "extremists."

7) Only in America, could you need to present a driver's license to cash a check or buy alcohol, but not to vote.


8) Only in America, could people demand the government investigate whether oil companies are gouging the public because the price of gas went up when the return on equity invested in a major U.S. oil company (Marathon Oil) is less than half of a company making tennis shoes (Nike).

9) Only in America, could the government collect more tax dollars from the people than any nation in recorded history, still spend a Trillion dollars more than it has per year - for total spending of $7-Million PER MINUTE, and complain that it doesn't have nearly enough money.


10) Only in America, could the rich people - who pay 86% of all income taxes - be accused of not paying their "fair share" by people who don't pay any income taxes at all.