My Map

I thought this was rather cool and had to join in on the rapidly growing trend. Here is my US travel map. I only included states that I visited. No airport only visits.



create your own visited states map
or write about it on the open travel guide


It makes me realize that I need to see more of the USA.

Meet the Fockers

A Sequel to "Meet the Parents" will be made. The title? "Meet the Fockers". Barbara Streisand and Dustin Hoffman might play the parts of Mr and Mrs Focker.

This could be interesting.

Birthdays

What sort of cool stuff happened on your birthday? Ingrid Bergman, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres and John Locke are some of the people that share my birthday. In 1831, Michael Faraday discovers electromagntic induction on this day and the beatles play their final live concert.

Aug 29th, what a cool day!

Classic Movie Quiz

I took the 18 & 27 question quizzes and got the same results on both.

What Classic Movie Are You?

Thanks Jan

Geology, fun stuff

For years I would listen to my dad tell me stories about the canyons, rocks, lakes, rivers, minerals and such in our state. As a child I was interested, but it wasn't until I took a geology course in college that this stuff really became exciting. In the class, the professor had an earthquake map that shows the scientifically calculated earthquake liquefaction amount for each area in the Salt Lake Valley. I loved this map. I would study it after class trying to figure out where I wanted to be when the big earthquake we've all been waiting for hit. After completing the class, I promised myself that I would somehow get my very own liquefaction potential map. Today I found the website of my dreams. It has the coolest information. Here is the liquefaction potential map, although it's not as detailed as the one from the class, it works quite well. According to this information, I should move to a much safer area.

There are other maps that are quite interesting. Although I'm in trouble on the first map, according to the ground-shaking map for a magnitude 7.0, I'm in a rather safe zone. So when the big one hits, I have the following options. 1- be where the ground will shake me up and turn my insides to pudding. Or 2- be where the ground will swallow me up (basically, stay where I am). Hmm.. tough decision.

Levi often talks about his bike rides along paths that follow the Bonneville shoreline. If I could talk Levi into installing a second seat on his bike (one that doesn't require pedals) I'd really enjoy seeing the shoreline up close. Apparently there are 3 different shorelines to see. So what do you say Levi? Can you install an extra seat?

Hot stars

According to MNS Entertainment stars like Viggo Mortensen, Orlando Bloom, and Hugh Jackman are going to score big time this year.

I like how they describe Hugh Jackman as having, "the easygoing charm of Cary Grant, the song-and-dance moves of Fred Astaire, and the graciousness of Jimmy Stewart". I hope this isn't an exaggerated compliment. And although two of the LOTR stars are making it big, the article says Elijah Wood isn't going to join in this A-list popular party. What a shame.

Those who are to have a decline in popularity are Britney Spears (duh, like we couldn't see this coming) and Tom Cruise (right, like I'm going to believe he could possibly loose some of the starlight).

I personally hope to see a few new faces pop up this year and make it big. Even though I just adore seeing Tom Cruise and Mel Gibson in movies, a fresh face is a breath of fresh air.

Sunburn- now what

I was a complete dummy and found myself with a painful sunburn. There are several remedies I have used throughout my life, aloe, vinegar bath, drink lots of water, etc. but those never seem to help enough. My boss told me about a time he was in Jamaica with a bad burn and a local guy applied a homemade ointment of aloe and marij_uana. He said there was instant relief and it lasted all day. I have a feeling that 99% of his relief came from the drug. Since that isn't an option for me, I turned to the good ol' trusty web for new ideas. What do you know, I found some. Tonight I'll be trying the Witch hazel and oatmeal suggestions.

Here is a scary looking remedy.

Lavender Essential Oil is suspected to relieve pain quite nicely. But who on earth can afford such luxuries?

UFO Attack. A nice distraction

For those who can barely keep their eyes open at work, try this distraction

Ban dirty words from TV

There are 7 dirty words Rep. Doug Ose of Sacramento would like to get banned from TV. He's upset that such language is freely broadcasted on the airwaves. The FCC hasn't taken much action, so Ose plans to stir things up a bit.

I'm with him on this. When I was a kid, these words were never heard on TV. They were only whispered among small friends on the playground. Naturally, no one even knew what these words meant, just that they were bad words.
These days, kids may not even recognize the vulgarity of such language.

I applaud Ose for taking a stand. I'm ashamed that we allowed this TV language issue to accelerate to such a degree. Why didn't more Americans take a stand earlier?

Death by a low sodium diet

About a month ago I started a low sodium diet. I suppose this wouldn't have been such a difficult thing had I not the ability to down an entire jar of pickles in one sitting. But as things are, I'm forced to change my eating practices.

After several failed attempts to keep this diet, I decided to turn to the web for help in my endeavor. It was interesting to learn that the body only really needs 500 mg/day, though many tend to eat as much as 4-6 grams/day (or 16-18 grams/day depending on which website you believe). Regardless, universally it's recommended that a low sodium diet is about 2,400/day (this is about the same as eating 2 McDonald kids meals).

Although I have tried to find some good low sodium recipes, today I came across a site that appears to have mastered the low sodium recipe- taste good competition.

Tonight I'll be eating Cjoclem Caccoatpre