INFORMATION UPLOAD

Torque DROIDZ Dual

sakinlangto2 — Wed, 04 May 2011 08:41:31 +0000

My first entry for so many months now. Just watch the video

Photos: Unbelievably tiny sculptures

sakinlangto2 — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 16:30:56 +0000

Aug 28, 2009

You may have heard of the term “nano-computing”, but what about “nano-sculpting”?

Seen through a microscope, artist Willard Wigan’s Betty Boop sculpture is so small that it fits inside the eye of a needle.

Wigan’s art requires intense concentration to perform such detailed work on an almost unbelievably small scale. Entering a trance-like meditative state, Wigan says he is able to slow his heartbeat, reducing hand tremors and allowing him to sculpt between pulse beats. The tiniest movements, even traffic on the streets outside, can affect the details of his art.

Wigan’s work is currently on a gallery tour around the US, and will be in Chicago in September and Houston in October. You can also see his work at the My Little Eye Gallery in London, and online.

——————————

The artist Willard Wigan works on one of his microsculptures. His work can be seen at the My Little Eye Gallery in London, across from the British Museum.

Remnants of the Pharisees

sakinlangto2 — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 15:49:10 +0000

August 30, 2009

22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Gospel: Mk 7:1–8, 14–15, 21–23

One day the Pharisees gathered around Jesus and with them were some teachers of the Law who had just come from Jerusalem.

They noticed that some of his disciples were eating their meal with unclean hands, that is, without washing them. Now the Pharisees, and in fact, all the Jews, never eat without washing their hands for they follow the tradition received from their ancestors. Nor do they eat anything when they come from the market without first washing themselves. And there are many other traditions they observe, for example, the ritual washing of cups, pots and plates.

So the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law asked him, “Why do your disciples not follow the tradition of the elders, but eat with unclean hands?”

Jesus answered, “You, shallow people! How well Isaiah prophesied of you when he wrote: This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. The worship they offer me is worthless, for what they teach are only human rules. You even put aside the commandment of God to hold fast to human tradition.”

Jesus then called the people to him again and said to them, “Listen to me, all of you, and try to understand. Nothing that enters one from out-side can make that person unclean. It is what comes out from within that makes unclean.

For evil designs come out of the heart: theft, murder, adultery, jealousy, greed, maliciousness, deceit, indecency, slander, pride and folly. All these evil things come from within and make a person unclean.”

——————————–

Personal Commentary

To write the gospel today makes me feel renewed again of my faith since I’ve been missing Sunday masses and holy days of obligations lately as in very often this year. I had my reasons but for what it’s worth, I am guilty of it. Anyways, apart from the guilt, the homily for today’s gospel really interests me.

The gist of the homily is that though it is the right thing to observe the law, it is also equally important to note the motive of observing the law. For example, in a traffic situation, a driver stops the car when seeing a yellow light turned red aside from the fact that there is a MMDA officer and a traffic enforcer nearby. Had there been no stop light or traffic enforcer, would you do the same? Probably not, if you can beat the red light and make a quick screech you would probably do it anyways. What makes you not do it should be anchored on the motivation that you uphold the law and value safety first and not out of fear of getting caught by the officers.

We do things for the right reasons and not otherwise. Quoting from another commentary saying, “For Jesus, holiness is not just a matter of observing a collection of precepts. Rather, holiness is a way of life, striving to love the Lord with all of one’s heart, mind, soul and strength.

Lastly, the homily points out one Filipino character that is too often used and abused- we like to get personal in fact almost everything is personal for Juan dela Cruz. Since this is deeply rooted to family-oriented values meaning we treat each other like members of the family and usually have extended families to go with that. If we can resolve things by giving out favors or being subjective instead of being objective is oftentimes uncalled for.

Fla. highrise has 32 stories, but just 1 tenant

sakinlangto2 — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 07:17:29 +0000

AP – In this photo taken Thursday, July 30, 2009, the 32-story building, in which the only tenants are the …

By CHRISTINE ARMARIO, Associated Press Writer Christine Armario, Associated Press Writer – Sat Aug 1, 3:37 pm ET

FORT MYERS, Fla. – The Vangelakos’ southwest Florida condominium has marble floors, a large pool overlooking a river and modern furnishings that speak of affluence and luxury. What they don’t have in the 32-story building is a single neighbor.

The New Jersey family of five purchased their unit four years ago, when Fort Myers was in the midst of a housing boom and any hints of an impending financial crisis were buried in lofty dreams of expansion and development. They made a $10,000 down payment and eagerly watched as builders transformed an empty lot into an opulent high rise, one that now symbolizes the foreclosure crisis.

“The future was going to be southwest Florida,” said Victor Vangelakos, 45, a fire captain who planned to eventually retire and live permanently in the condo.

Most of the other tenants in the 200-unit condo didn’t close on their contracts, and the few that did have transferred to an adjacent building owned by the same company because more people live there.

The Vangelakos’ mortgage lender will not allow them to do the same.

That leaves them as the sole residents of the Oasis Tower One.

“It’s a beautiful building,” said their attorney, John Ewing, who is representing 27 others who made deposits on units. “The problem is, it’s a very lonely building.”

When the Vangelakos’ travel from Weehawken, N.J., to spend a week or a few days in their Florida home, they have exclusive use of the pool, game room and gym, but they miss having a few tenants around.

“Being from the city, it’s very eerie,” Vangelakos said. “It’s almost like a scary movie.”

A large, circular fountain in front of the building is dry. The automatic glass doors that lead to the front lobby are locked. On the front desk is a guest sign-in sheet. The last entry: Feb. 13, 2009.

“It’s like time froze here six months ago,” Ewing said.

Vangelakos said they closed on the apartment in the fall, unaware the other tenants had failed to follow through. When they visited around Christmas, they didn’t think much of the emptiness. They were just happy to be there.

“We wanted to believe,” Cathy Vangelakos said. “We were looking for what we were offered.”

On subsequent visits, however, the building grew more deserted.

The lights on the pool and palm trees were off. Their garbage shoot was sealed, a trash bin placed in front of their unit instead.

Despite the empty units, they faithfully parked in their assigned spot on the second story of the parking garage. Then those lights went off, too.

Then there were security concerns. One night, someone pounded on their door at 11 p.m. They called the front desk at the next door building, which contacted police. A search turned up no one, though a pool entrance was open.

Another morning they awoke to find lounge chairs in the pool.

The parents and their children sleep with their cell phones by their beds.

“I’m not a chicken, but this is a big building,” Cathy Vangelakos said.

Betsy McCoy, vice president and associated general counsel with The Related Group, which sold the family their unit, said they have tried to help find a solution — even offering them a unit in the building next door, free of cost, while the situation is resolved.

“They haven’t wanted to take us up on that,” McCoy said Friday. “They frankly rejected every solution and offer and proposal that we’ve come up with.”

McCoy said some of the interested buyers who put down deposits lost their jobs, others were unable to get mortgages and some were just nervous when the financial collapse came.

The Cape Coral-Fort Myers metropolitan area in Lee County has some of the worst economic stress — a combination of foreclosures, unemployment and bankruptcies — in the country, according to The Associated Press’ monthly analysis of more than 3,100 U.S. counties.

The latest AP Economic Stress Index, which assigns each county a score from 1 to 100 with higher numbers reflecting the greatest stress from the recession, found Lee County had a score of more than 20. Anything above 11 is considered stressed.

Victor Vangelakos said they don’t want to move to the tower next door because they would still be paying the mortgage and maintenance costs on the condo they own. They paid $430,000 for the unit and took out a $336,000 mortgage — essentially spending their life savings.

He’d like for The Related Group to buy them out.

“They want us to be refugees in Tower II,” Victor Vangelakos said. “That’s not how I expected us to live here.”

The family’s attorney said he has filed two lawsuits on behalf of would-be tenants because the building wasn’t finished as promised. He said they expected a clubhouse, marina, private cinema and restaurants.

McCoy said those amenities could be developed, but were never promised.

On Friday evening, the pool area was dark, most of the doors locked. Cathy Vangelakos and her 19-year-old daughter, Amanda, stepped into an elevator to head up to their unit. “Going up,” an automated voice chimed.

“Going up,” Cathy Vangelakos said. “That’s all we hear.”

The Truth About Bottled Water

sakinlangto2 — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 16:48:41 +0000

By David Zinczenko, with Matt Goulding – Posted on Tue, Jul 21, 2009, 1:35 pm PDT

Eat This, Not That
by David Zinczenko, with Matt Goulding

Imagine you’ve just been given a choice: You have to drink from one of two containers. One container is a cup from your own kitchen, and it contains a product that has passed strict state, federal and local guidelines for cleanliness and quality. Oh, and it’s free. The second container comes from a manufacturing plant somewhere, and its contents—while seemingly identical to your first choice—have not been subjected to the same strict national and local standards. It costs approximately four times more than gasoline. These products both look and taste nearly identical.

Which do you choose?

If you chose beverage A, congratulations: You just saved yourself a whole lot of money, and, perhaps, even contaminants, too. But if you picked beverage B, then you’ll be spending hundreds of unnecessary dollars on bottled water this year. Sure, bottled water is convenient, trendy, and may well be just as pure as what comes out of your tap. But it’s hardly a smart investment for your pocketbook, your body or our planet. Eat This, Not That! decided to take a closer look at what’s behind the pristine images and elegant-sounding names printed on those bottles.

You may actually be drinking tap water.
Case in point: Dasani, a Coca-Cola product. Despite its exotic-sounding name, Dasani is simply purified tap water that’s had minerals added back in. For example, if your Dasani water was bottled at the Coca-Cola Bottling Company in Philadelphia, you’re drinking Philly tap water. But it’s not the only brand of water that relies on city pipes to provide its product. About 25 percent of all bottled water is taken from municipal water sources, including Pepsi’s Aquafina.

Bottled water isn’t always pure.
Scan the labels of the leading brands and you see variations on the words “pure” and “natural” and “pristine” over and over again. And when a Cornell University marketing class studied consumer perceptions of bottled water, they found that people thought it was cleaner, with less bacteria. But that may not actually be true. For example, in a 4-year review that included the testing of 1,000 bottles of water, the Natural Resources Defense Council—one the country’s most ardent environmental crusaders—found that “about 22 percent of the brands we tested contained, in at least one sample, chemical contaminants at levels above strict state health limits.”

It’s not clear where the plastic container ends and the drink begins.
Turns out, when certain plastics are heated at a high temperature, chemicals from the plastics may leach into container’s contents. So there’s been a flurry of speculation recently as to whether the amounts of these chemicals are actually harmful, and whether this is even a concern when it comes to water bottles—which aren’t likely to be placed in boiling water or even a microwave. While the jury is still out on realistic health ramifications, it seems that, yes, small amounts of chemicals from PET water bottles such as antimony—a semi-metal that’s thought to be toxic in large doses—can accumulate the longer bottled water is stored in a hot environment. Which, of course, is probably a good reason to avoid storing bottled water in your garage for six months—or better yet, to just reach for tap instead.

Our country’s high demand for oil isn’t just due to long commutes.
Most water bottles are composed of a plastic called polyethylene terepthalate (PET). Now, to make PET, you need crude oil. Specifically, 17 million barrels of oil are used in the production of PET water bottles ever year, estimate University of Louisville scientists. No wonder the per ounce cost of bottled water rivals that of gasoline. What’s more, 86 percent of 30 billion PET water bottles sold annually are tossed in the trash, instead of being recycled, according to data from the Container Recycling Institute. That’s a lot of waste—waste that will outlive you, your children, and your children’s children. You see, PET bottles take 400 to 1000 years to degrade. Which begs the question: If our current rate of consumption continues, where will we put all of this discarded plastic?

To learn the truth about diet soda, energy drinks and discover the best no-diet weight loss solutions on the planet, check out all of the eye-popping lists at eatthis.com. Also, sign up for your FREE Eat This Not That! newsletter and stay informed about the best choices for you and your family.

To lose your belly fast and get in shape for summer, try a downloadable workout here. And don’t miss the newest book in the Eat This, Not That! series: The Best (and Worst!) Foods in America!

And please share your nutrition and weight-loss tips and tricks with the rest of us.