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Here's something perfectly serious for everyone.....
Every 5 minutes, someone is diagnosed with a blood cancer.
You can help to find a cure by sponsoring me in my participation in Team In Training, a program of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Check out my sig.
What you are doing is a such a NOBLE cause and so worth the support....
I wish I could contribute but have finished contributing fincially in the thousands already. Have a family member in the same boat. Otherwise I would in a heartbeat.
BTW I privately volunteer my personal/resources/time thousands helping damaged abused/neglected children. Helping to save abused women/children.
These lives are so important too in a culture that is anti-family values.
The impact of children falling through the cracks harmed by parental neglect, dv/dsyfunction.
Sad when so much of charity contributions goes to admin upkeep/salaries and so little actually persons.
But keep going.....Everyone needs to do their part& some do very little! You deserve to be commended!
We can be both serious and fun minded. Balancing Act though... <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />
So hey out there who have extra REMEMBER too support Cinderella 5 star stellar efforts!
You know, if I don't raise it, it comes out of my pocket....I'm committed to raising the money one way or another. Anyone want to have a yardsale. My house or I can see if I can have it where I go to church.
A doctor, a lawyer and a fundraiser arrive at the Pearly Gates at about the same time.
St. Peter tells them that they each may have one thing to take with them into Heaven.
The doctor is first, and she asks for $1 million. This is given, and she enters Heaven.
Her example is not lost on the lawyer, who asks for $2 million!
St. Peter says 'very well', and the lawyer takes his $2 million into Heaven.
Finally, it is the fundraiser's turn, and St. Peter asks him what he would like to take into Heaven.
The fundraiser moves up very close to St. Peter, and in a low voice he asks, "If it's not too much trouble, could I just have the names of those two people who were ahead of me in line?"
A local charity had been following the successes of the town's most successful lawyer, but they had never gotten a donation.
The major gifts manager contacted him to try to solicit a gift.
"Our research shows that you make over $750,000 per year, but don't give anything to charity. Would you consider a significant gift to help the community?" asked the fund-raiser.
The lawyer responded, "does your research also show that my elderly mother is quite ill and has medical bills far exceeding her assets and income?"
"Well, no," said the manager.
"Or does your research show that my brother was recently in a debilitating accident and is now unemployed?"
"Or that my sister's husband recently died after 10 years in the hospital leaving her penniless with three kids?"
The humiliated manager quietly said, "I had no idea."
"So," said the lawyer, "if I am not giving any money to them, why would I give any to you?"
A hip young man goes out and buys a 2001 Ferrari GTO. It is the best and most expensive car available in the world, costing about $500,000.
He takes it out for a spin and while stopping for a red light, an old man on a moped pulls up next to him.
The old man looks over the sleek, shiny surface of the car and asks, "What kind of car ya' got there, sonny?"
The young man replies, "A 2001 Ferrari GTO. They cost about a half million dollars!"
"That's a lot of money," says the old man, shocked. "Why does it cost so much? "Because this car can do up to 320 miles an hour!" states the cool dude proudly.
The moped driver asks, "Can I take a look inside?" "Sure," replies the owner. So the old man pokes his head in the window and looks around.
Leaning back on his moped, the old man says, "That's a pretty nice car, all right!"
Just then the light changes so the guy decides to show the old man what his car can do. He floors it, and within 30 seconds the speedometer reads 320 mph.
Suddenly, he notices a dot in his rear view mirror. It seems to be getting closer! He slows down to see what it could be and suddenly, whhhoooossshhh!
Something whips by him, going much faster! What on earth could be going faster than my Ferrari?!" the young man asks himself.
Then, ahead of him, he sees a dot coming toward him. Whoooooosh!
It goes by again, heading the opposite direction! And it almost looked like the old man on the moped! "Couldn't be," thinks the guy.
"How could a moped outrun a Ferrari?!" Again, he sees a dot in his rear view mirror!
Whooooosh
Ka-BbblaMMM! It plows into the back of his car, demolishing the rear end.
The young man jumps out, and it IS the old man!!! Of course, the moped and the old man are hurting for certain.
He runs up to the old man and says, "Is there anything I can do for you?"
The old man moans and replies, "Yes. Kindly unhook my suspenders from your side-view mirror!"
Whatever the cause of a laugh, what happens next is not fully known.
Scientists are actually starting to put people into functional MRI machines and make them laugh in order to find out.
In a recent study at Stanford, researchers showed Bizarro comics to people while their brains were monitored by an MRI.
They were able to prove for the first time that laughter (or at least humor) stimulates the parts of our brain that use the "feel good" chemical messenger dopamine.
That puts laughter in the category of activities you want to do over and over again, such as eating chocolate or having sex.
Dopamine systems that get out of whack can lead to addiction, says Emory University neurologist Gregory Berns.
This finding explains why kids want to keep playing silly games until parents can't stand it anymore.
Laughter is pleasurable, perhaps even "addictive," to the brain.
Running shoes in these days are more and more technologically advanced.
I went in this store and they told me this new model of running shoes can even predict the weather!
I asked how and the salesperson told me: "Leave your shoes outside the window for a little while: if they are wet it's raining, if they are dry it's sunny, if you cannot see them it's foggy."
Michael Johnson, the Olympic gold medal runner, was on his way to a club with some friends.
At the door, the bouncer turned to him and said: "Sorry, mate, you can't come in here — no denim." Michael was quite annoyed at this and retorted: "Don't you know who I am? I'm Michael Johnson."
"Then it won't take you long to run home and change, will it?" replied the bouncer.
There was this atheist and he was in the woods. And suddenly he heard some leaves cracking. He looked behind and there was a huge bear behind him.
He started running and running and soon the bear was right on top of him and his paw was on top of him like he was going to swat him but suddenly he saw this big light appear and said;
“For all these years you have despised me and now you call for my help.”
The atheist said, “I’m sorry God. If you can’t help me, can’t you at least turn the bear into a Christian?“
Then the light disappeared. Then the bear knelt down and said,
“Bless me Lord for this meal I’m about to receive!”
Machiavelli: So that its subjects will view it with admiration, as a chicken which has the daring and courage to boldly cross the road, but also with fear, for whom among them has the strength to contend with such a paragon of avian virtue? In such a manner is the princely chicken's dominion maintained.
Hippocrates: Because of an excess of light pink gooey stuff in its pancreas.
Jacques Derrida: Any number of contending discourses may be discovered within the act of the chicken crossing the road, and each interpretation is equally valid as the authorial intent can never be discerned, because structuralism is DEAD, DAMMIT, DEAD!
Thomas de Torquemada: Give me ten minutes with the chicken and I'll find out.
Timothy Leary: Because that's the only kind of trip the Establishment would let it take.
Douglas Adams: Forty-two.
Nietzsche: Because if you gaze too long across the Road, the Road gazes also across you.
Oliver North: National Security was at stake.
B.F. Skinner: Because the external influences which had pervaded its sensorium from birth had caused it to develop in such a fashion that it would tend to cross roads, even while believing these actions to be of its own free will.
Carl Jung: The confluence of events in the cultural gestalt necessitated that individual chickens cross roads at this historical juncture, and therefore synchronicitously brought such occurrences into being.
Jean-Paul Sartre: In order to act in good faith and be true to itself, the chicken found it necessary to cross the road.
Ludwig Wittgenstein: The possibility of "crossing" was encoded into the objects "chicken" and "road", and circumstances came into being which caused the actualization of this potential occurrence.
Albert Einstein: Whether the chicken crossed the road or the road crossed the chicken depends upon your frame of reference.
Aristotle: To actualize its potential.
Buddha: If you ask this question, you deny your own chicken- nature.
Howard Cosell: It may very well have been one of the most astonishing events to grace the annals of history. An historic, unprecedented avian biped with the temerity to attempt such an herculean achievement formerly relegated to homo sapien pedestrians is truly a remarkable occurence.
Salvador Dali: The Fish.
Darwin: It was the logical next step after coming down from the trees.
Emily Dickinson: Because it could not stop for death.
Epicurus: For fun.
Ralph Waldo Emerson: It didn't cross the road; it transcended it.
Johann von Goethe: The eternal hen-principle made it do it.
Ernest Hemingway: To die. In the rain.
Werner Heisenberg: We are not sure which side of the road the chicken was on, but it was moving very fast.
David Hume: Out of custom and habit.
Jack Nicholson: 'Cause it (censored) wanted to. That's the (censored) reason.
Pyrrho the Skeptic: What road?
Ronald Reagan: I forget.
John Sununu: The Air Force was only too happy to provide the transportation, so quite understandably the chicken availed himself of the opportunity.
The Sphinx: You tell me.
Mr. T: If you saw me coming you'd cross the road too!
Henry David Thoreau: To live deliberately ... and suck all the marrow out of life.
Mark Twain: The news of its crossing has been greatly exaggerated.
Molly Yard: It was a hen!
Zeno of Elea: To prove it could never reach the other side.
Chaucer: So priketh hem nature in hir corages.
Wordsworth: To wander lonely as a cloud.
The Godfather: I didn't want its mother to see it like that.
Keats: Philosophy will clip a chicken's wings.
Blake: To see heaven in a wild fowl.
Othello: Jealousy.
Dr Johnson: Sir, had you known the Chicken for as long as I have, you would not so readily enquire, but feel rather the Need to resist such a public Display of your own lamentable and incorrigible Ignorance.
Mrs Thatcher: This chicken's not for turning.
Supreme Soviet: There has never been a chicken in this photograph.
Oscar Wilde: Why, indeed? One's social engagements whilst in town ought never expose one to such barbarous inconvenience - although, perhaps, if one must cross a road, one may do far worse than to cross it as the chicken in question.
Kafka: Hardly the most urgent enquiry to make of a low-grade insurance clerk who woke up that morning as a hen.
Swift: It is, of course, inevitable that such a loathsome, filth-ridden and degraded creature as Man should assume to question the actions of one in all respects his superior.
Macbeth: To have turned back were as tedious as to go o'er.
Whitehead: Clearly, having fallen victim to the fallacy of misplaced concreteness.
Freud: An die andere Seite zu kommen. (Much laughter)
The most unfair thing about life is the way it ends. I mean, life is tough. It takes up a lot of your time. What do you get at the end of it? A death. What's that, a bonus? I think the life cycle is all backwards. You should die first, get it out of the way. Then you live in an old age home. You get kicked out when you're too young, you get a gold watch, you go to work. You work forty years until you're young enough to enjoy your retirement. You do drugs, alcohol, you party, and you get ready for high school. You go to grade school, you become a kid, you play, you have no responsibilities, you become a little baby, you go back into the womb, you spend your last nine months floating... you finish off as an orgasm.
<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> (Had to go to Google to learn about Mork from Ork <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />)
Just got this through internal mail...
HEALTH QUESTION & ANSWER SESSION
Q: I've heard that cardiovascular exercise can prolong life; is this true?
A: Your heart is only good for so many beats, and that's it... Don't waste them on exercise. Everything wears out eventually. Speeding up your heart will not make you live longer; that's like saying you can extend the life of your car by driving it faster. Want to live longer? Take a nap.
Q: Should I cut down on meat and eat more fruits and vegetables?
A: You must grasp logistical efficiencies. What does a cow eat? Hay and corn. And what are these? Vegetables . So a steak is nothing more than an efficient mechanism of delivering vegetables to your system. Need grain? Eat chicken. Beef is also a good source of field grass (green leafy vegetable). And a pork chop can give you 100% of your recommended daily allowance of vegetable products
Q: Should I reduce my alcohol intake?
A: No, not at all. Wine is made from fruit. Brandy is distilled wine, that means they take the water out of the fruity bit so you get even more of the goodness that way. Beer is also made out of grain. Bottoms up!
Q: How can I calculate my body/fat ratio?
A: Well, if you have a body and you have fat, your ratio is one to one. If you have two bodies, your ratio is two to one, etc.
Q: What are some of the advantages of participating in a regular exercise program?
A: Can't think of a single one, sorry. My philosophy is: No Pain...Good!
Q: Aren't fried foods bad for you?
A: You're not listening.... Foods are fried these days in vegetable oil. In fact, they're permeated in it. How could getting more vegetables be bad for you?
Q: Will sit-ups help prevent me from getting a little soft around the middle?
A: Definitely not! When you exercise a muscle, it gets bigger. You should only be doing sit-ups if you want a bigger stomach.
Q: Is chocolate bad for me?
A: Are you crazy? HELLO Cocoa beans! Another vegetable. It's the best feel-good food around!!
Q: Is swimming good for your figure?
A: If swimming is good for your figure, explain whales to me.
Q: Is getting in-shape important for my lifestyle?
A: Hey! 'Round' is a shape! !
Well, I hope this has cleared up any misconceptions you may have had about food and diets.
And remember: "Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways - Chardonnay in one hand - chocolate in the other - body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming, "WOO HOO, What a Ride!"
I grew up drinking whole milk. I had, for the longest time, assumed that Dad bought it at the grocery store, like all normal families. But when I was ten I learned otherwise.
“Dad, we’re out of milk!” I had called upstairs to him one morning as I scavenged the fridge for something else to go with my breakfast.
“Uh-oh,” Dad answered, trundling down the stairs. “I guess I’ll have to go milk the yak this afternoon.”
“The what?” What was a yak? And why didn’t Dad just go to the store for milk?
“You haven’t been told about the yak yet?” my Uncle Harvey questioned me. He was seated in our kitchen, his feet propped up on the table and a bowl of cereal with the last of the milk in his hands. He gave me a discerning look that asked, 'How could you not know about the yak?' and crunched a mouthful of cereal, a dribble of milk slowly rolling down his chin stubble.
“No,” I answered. “What’s a yak?” I asked this cautiously. I couldn’t trust my uncle not to make up stories, especially about milk. After all, last time he drank the last of the milk he told me that I could put water on my cereal and it would taste just the same. It didn’t, so don’t you go and find out the hard way.
“Oh we’ve had that yak for ages,” my Dad began. “We had her when Harvey and I were kids. Of course, the neighborhood wasn’t as developed back then. We had about a half mile between houses and several acres to the backyard, so we used to let the yak roam free within our tree line. It was pretty dangerous for us kids back then, but then again, kids were more careful in those days.”
Uncle Harvey interrupted his munching to give me a pointed look and shake his spoon at me. Milk droplets splattered on the table.
“Why?” I asked. “Why is the yak so dangerous?”
A wise smirk grew on Dad’s face… was he pulling my leg? Uncle Harvey beat him to the answer.
“Well yaks are kind of like… carnivorous cows. They’re a bit bigger than your average cow, with long, shaggy orange hair. They’ve got big horns, big teeth, and big hooves. They prefer to eat small children, but we keep ours going on sirloin steak. They’re pretty slow creatures though, so as long as you’re quick on your feet and have a lot of steak on hand, you’ll be alright.”
My eyes were wide, but my brain was still having a hard time grasping this.
“Is he lying, Dad?” I asked. Uncle Harvey chuckled.
“It’s not funny, Harvey,” Dad admonished. Then he turned to me. “Of course we’re not lying to you! How do you think Gramps’ memory got so bad? He was gored in the head by the yak, Jesus, the poor old man! This was years before you were born…” Dad’s voice trailed off and his eyes became unfocused.
Gramps is my Dad’s dad. He lives in a nursing home now. Dad and Uncle Harvey took him there two years ago after months of sitting around the dining room table talking about his memory loss and some disease he’d developed… oldtimer’s? Allsimmers? I couldn’t remember the odd name. It’s probably what you get when you’ve been gored in the head by a yak.
I suddenly realized that I was alone in the kitchen. I had been standing in front of the kitchen window, staring dazedly out towards what I now knew to be the white-picket yak fence in the back yard. Dad had left to walk Uncle Harvey out to his truck. The refrigerator door was still open to my left, waiting for me to grab the orange-juice or some yogurt. A sudden urgent thought popped into my head and I whipped open the freezer door, my eyes searching frantically.
“Dad!” I called. “Dad, we don’t have any more sirloin steak!”
“Don’t worry!” he shouted back, “I’ve got some more in the deep freezer in the basement!”
