APRIL FOOL PICTURE TEST

I thought I would have a little April Fool Fun with everyone so I posted a few pictures labeled A-M. Some of these pictures could be REAL some could be FAKE. All could be REAL and all could be FAKE. Take a look at them and you try to guess what is what.
To find the answers just click the COMMENT link at the bottom of this post. Let me know how you did.
To see the actual size of the pictures just click on them and hit the back arrow to return to the post.

4000 Men and Women Lost

4000 SOLDIERS DEAD.

Our prayers and thoughts are with the families and friends of these fallen men and women.

I'm not going to preach if we should be in Iraq or not. I just wanted to take a moment to honor our fallen brothers and sisters.

May we all find Peace and Hope and have our soldiers come home as soon as possible.

Happy Easter 2008

The Great Easter Egg Contest 2008

The competition is on again at the hospital I work at in New Haven, Connecticut. Now you have to understand that myself and my co-workers are on a winning streak that we have every intention on keeping up ( we won “The Christmas Tree Decorating Contest in 2006, “The Decorate A Halloween Pumpkin Contest” in 2007 and the now famous “Decorate A Gingerbread House Contest” in 2007. As the “team leader” Marsha put it, “It’s not about winning a prize, it’s all about WINNING.” Now that’s the spirit I’m looking for in the fight for the gourmet Easter Basket (The prize).

The contest this time is “Decorate A Easter Egg”. The hospital gave us a Styrofoam egg. Marsha, the mastermind behind this project, went with the “Easter Beagle” theme. The final product is just stunning! OK, I might be a little bias on this seeing that WE WANT TO WIN!

“Want to win” might be an understatement when we look at the bigger picture. As a “back up”, incase Marsha didn’t come through with a finished product (I won’t even start to tell you about the “Kentucky Derby Hat Decorating Contest” in 2007), Scott and I came up with the “Peep” bird house made out of a back up egg. Now this egg is ingeniously done up like a bird house with a family of Peeps sitting in a living room watching a television.

Between the Easter Beagle and The Peep House there’s no way we could lose, unless a backlash against our mega talents comes to light from the people who are haters of the cool. Now I’m not selling the other eggs short. They’re all wonderful pieces of work and art. We have a couple of Humpty Dumptys, a couple of Birds, and a Hot Air Balloon among other entries.

The bottom line is that this contest is once again all in fun. All the eggs are really nice (ours are better) OMG I can’t stop pushing our egg! OK, I have a better grip. The other eggs I really like are the Hot Air Balloon and the Yellow Bird (they’re NO WHERE close to the imagination and quality in our egg) DAMN!! I DID IT AGAIN. Just look at the pictures of the eggs and make your own choice and don’t be bias.
VOTE FOR US!!!!!!!!!!!

Update (March 20th): We got the news this after noon that our stunning egg DIDN'T win the contest that was sponsored by the Cafeteria. "Now what egg won?", you might be asking yourself. The Egg designed by the CAFETERIA!

To show we're not sore losers I just wanted to say that I can't express how happy I am for the Cafe for putting on this contest and how thrilled we all are that their egg somehow won. After all it was a..... nice egg. It was yellow. Yellow is.... nice. Oh, and it had a sign on it asking "How are the pancakes?" Even though none of us understood this apparent inside joke we all agreed that pancakes are .... nice. So let's all give a hand to the winning egg (cough *fixed* cough).

I hope that the next contest the cafe FIXes up for us is just as fun. The lesson we all learned from this is that we shouldn't use our talents and skill to create a work of art. We should lower our exportations and think "simple" and throw in a pun on a sign that no one gets and stick it on our entry and make sure that the people judging the contest work with us so they could make us the winner over the far superior masterpieces .... OH MY GOD.. I'M SUCH A SORE LOSER!

(secret message to Lisa) "The climate is changing".. there I said it! Damn you Lisa.

(click on the image to view full size)

Daylight Savings Time Trivia

It's that time of year again. We're all going to "spring ahead" one hour on March 9th for the start of Daylight Savings Time. Now for those few out there who might be asking why we do such a crazy thing with our clocks here's some answers and useless facts (OK, they could be useful if you're on a game show like Jeopardy.)

Benjamin Franklin was the first person to suggest the idea of Daylight Saving Time. He thought that by changing the clocks ahead in the summer it would give the working man some time to spend with his family while the sun was still high in the sky. This idea wasn't taken to seriously by most people of the time.

In 2008 most of the world follows Daylight Savings Time in one way or another. The change in time has proven to save energy. But if that's not interesting enough for you, here are some facts about Daylight Savings Time you might not know.

Last year the date to change back to Standard Time was pushed from the last week in October to the first week of November. This change effected Halloween trick or treaters in a positive way. Halloween night more children are struck and killed by cars than any other time of the year. The number dropped drastically after the change because it was still light out when most kids went trick or treating. Also more candy was sold because more children went to door to door for treats because they had more time.

In September 1999, the Palestinian West Bank was on daylight saving time while Israel had just switched back to standard time.

West Bank Palestinians prepared time bombs and smuggled them to Arab Israelis, who misunderstood the time on the bombs.

As the bombs were being planted, they exploded—one hour too early—killing three terrorists instead of the intended victims—two busloads of people.

Patrons of bars that stay open past 2:00 a.m. lose one hour of drinking time on the day when Daylight Saving Time springs forward one hour.
This has led to annual problems in numerous locations, and sometimes even to riots.

For example, at a "time disturbance" in Athens, Ohio, site of Ohio University, over 1,000 students and other late night partiers chanted "Freedom," as they threw liquor bottles at the police attempting to control the riot.

Widespread confusion was created during the 1950s and 1960s when each U.S. locality could start and end Daylight Saving Time as it desired.

One year, 23 different pairs of DST start and end dates were used in Iowa alone.
For exactly five weeks each year, Boston, New York, and Philadelphia were not on the same time as Washington D.C., Cleveland, or Baltimore—but Chicago was.

And, on one Ohio to West Virginia bus route, passengers had to change their watches seven times in 35 miles!

The situation led to millions of dollars in costs to several industries, especially those involving transportation and communications.

Extra railroad timetables alone cost the today’s equivalent of over $12 million per year.

So remember to set your alarm clock to the right time and try to find time to make up for the hour of sleep you're about to lose.

USS New York

Every now and then something pops up to remind us of September 11, 2001. Today the USS New York, a naval assault ship, was was christened. This ship is not your ordinary navy ship. This ship was built from 7.5 tons of steel from The World Trade Center. The slogan "Never Forget" is painted on it's bow along with two gray bars representing the twin towers. It seems so fitting that they used the steel from the towers in this ship because this ship's main purpose is to help fight terrorism. It's ironic that from a building that terrorist help knock down a ship rises from the rubble to stop the very people that lead this horrible act.

The billion-dollar, 25,000-ton vessel is 684 feet long, 105 feet wide. It is the fifth in a new class of warship, designed for missions that include special operations against terrorists. It can carry a crew of about 360 sailors and 700 combat-ready Marines to be delivered ashore by helicopters and assault craft.

USS New York's prospective commanding officer is Cmdr. F. Curtis Jones, a native New Yorker. It is to be commissioned, essentially added to the fleet, next year. It could be used as part of peaceful missions or as part of war, said Adm. Gary Roughead, the Navy's chief of operations.

That it could be used in war did not bother Lee Ielpi, president of the September 11th Families' Association, whose son, Jonathan, a firefighter, died in the attacks. The ship won't be used for war "unless you bother us," he said in an interview.

"We're sending a message that we're standing strong," he said, adding: "This ship, as it cuts through the water, is going to send a ripple. That ripple will say, 'We cherish our freedom.'"

Also from the twisted steel of the World Trade Center are steel beams that are the foundation of the Freedom Towers that's begun to rise in the spot the WTC once stood. The use of the steel seems settling in many ways. It shows us that we will not soon forget the victims and heroes of that day.