Sad news today in the mint world. Velamints' creator, Dolf Angrogen, passed away at 82.

RIP Mint Creator Angrogen. It has finally died.

Velamints Creator Dies at 82.

Dr. Mario Macgyver

British boiler engineer Tal Golesworthy fixed his own heart. Why? He has Marfan syndrome, a connective tissue disorder that often leads to a weakened aorta. The typical treatment for a dilated aorta involves a rough and invasive surgery, as well as a lifetime of anticoagulation therapy. Not surprisingly, that sounded unappealing to Tal. And his experience with pipes gave him an idea: when a pipe bulges, plumbers wrap it with tape. Why not wrap the aorta with something to support it?

The Audacity of Self-Repair: How A Boiler Engineer Repaired His Own Heart | iFixit

A nurse has recorded the most common regrets of the dying, and among the top ones is 'I wish I hadn't worked so hard'.

Top five regrets of the dying | Life and style | guardian.co.uk

Explanation: In the shadow of Saturn, unexpected wonders appear. The robotic Cassini spacecraft now orbiting Saturn drifted in giant planet's shadow for about 12 hours in 2006 and looked back toward the eclipsed Sun. Cassini saw a view unlike any other. First, the night side of Saturn is seen to be partly lit by light reflected from its own majestic ring system. Next, the rings themselves appear dark when silhouetted against Saturn, but quite bright when viewed away from Saturn, slightly scattering sunlight, in this exaggerated color image. Saturn's rings light up so much that new rings were discovered, although they are hard to see in the image. Seen in spectacular detail, however, is Saturn's E ring, the ring created by the newly discovered ice-fountains of the moon Enceladus and the outermost ring visible above. Far in the distance, at the left, just above the bright main rings, is the almost ignorable pale blue dot of Earth.

APOD: 2011 September 4 - In the Shadow of Saturn

Explanation: In the shadow of Saturn, unexpected wonders appear. The robotic Cassini spacecraft now orbiting Saturn drifted in giant planet's shadow for about 12 hours in 2006 and looked back toward the eclipsed Sun. Cassini saw a view unlike any other. First, the night side of Saturn is seen to be partly lit by light reflected from its own majestic ring system. Next, the rings themselves appear dark when silhouetted against Saturn, but quite bright when viewed away from Saturn, slightly scattering sunlight, in this exaggerated color image. Saturn's rings light up so much that new rings were discovered, although they are hard to see in the image. Seen in spectacular detail, however, is Saturn's E ring, the ring created by the newly discovered ice-fountains of the moon Enceladus and the outermost ring visible above. Far in the distance, at the left, just above the bright main rings, is the almost ignorable pale blue dot of Earth.

APOD: 2011 September 4 - In the Shadow of Saturn

The risks associated with iodine-131 contamination in Europe are no longer "negligible," according to CRIIRAD, a French research body on radioactivity. The NGO is advising pregnant women and infants against "risky behaviour," such as consuming fresh milk or vegetables with large leaves.

French group warns citizens about Fukushima fallout

Decius wrote:

A U.S. recruiter is hiring nuclear power workers in the United States to help Japan gain control of the stricken Fukushima Daiichi plant, which has been spewing radiation.

The qualifications: Skills gained in the nuclear industry, a passport, a family willing to let you go, willingness to work in a radioactive zone.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRcle-JgnFA

RE: Exclusive: WANTED: U.S. workers for crippled Japan nuke plant | Reuters

This is interesting...

Traffic has never been higher at websites that display data from radiation monitoring stations.

We list three such sites below.

One of the sites is an amateur effort anyone can participate in:

Mineralab, a Prescott, Arizona, company that sells geiger counters, maintains radiationnetwork.com, “a nationwide grass roots effort to monitor the radiation in our environment.”

The network collects data from private citizens nationwide who keep their geiger-counters running, with data uploading automatically to the website in real time.

I really want a gieger counter now. Figure they should be easy to pick up on ebay in about 6 months. :)

The EPA's own monitoring system appears to be down:

The Environmental Protection Agency’s RadNet system is designed to detect radiation from accidents like the Fukushima disaster in Japan and from foreign nuclear tests. It displays a map of the United States with monitoring stations highlighted. Click on one for a graphic representation of its data.

Last night the graphs were displaying no data—in the wake of EPA’s revelation that radiation had been detected in rainwater. Above empty frames appeared the message, in bold: “To-date, levels recorded at this monitor have been thousands of times below any conservative level of concern.”

Censorship? Consider this view: (and make sure you click through to the various source links, including about deep water horizon - especially the present dolphin kill going on in the gulf...)

The EPA has pulled 8 of its 18 radiation monitors in California, Oregon and Washington because (by implication) they are giving readings which seem too high... The EPA is considering drastically raising the amount of allowable radiation in food, water and the environment.

When things like this happen its worth asking yourself if this is one of those two times a day when the stuck clock is right.

Three Sites Where You Can Monitor U.S. Radiation Levels - Jeff McMahon - The Ingenuity of the Commons - Forbes

So I reckon Michelle Obama sits around, forcibly drugged on valium and thorazine so that she doesn't kick her husband right in the ass for being such a turncoat to anyone but Republicans, robber barons and Wall Street.

Rather than tackle poverty or inequality or the fact that our nation is falling into the sewers faster than you can say "one term," our first lady has been killing time like a schoolyard bully picking on fat kids.

"You kids are fat, and that means you can't serve in the military for us, so skip dessert, eat a bowl of rice a day and live your life like a North Korean peasant. Here's your green smock. They only come in one size, so lose weight, you fat little shit." She basically says to the youth of America.

One kid raises his hand.

"Miss Obama! All we can afford are fatty, undernourishing foods like McDonalds and the shit they sell at Aldi because my dad lost his job three years ago, your husband is forcing us to buy health insurance and he took all our money to help banks in their quest to fuck 99% of our nation. Oh, and I forgot about the OBAMA tax cuts. We used to call them the Bush tax cuts, until your husband embraced them, while telling us he didn't embrace them, but passed them anyway. I mean, if starving to death on some days while gorging on trans-fat laden chemical beef helped allow gays to serve in the military, then it's all worth it. I call that a fair trade-off."

"You are mistaken, on one point, kid" The first lady said, "We let the rich have the Obama tax cut so that the middle class could retain their tax cut, too."

"Um...what's the middle class?" The kid shifted in his desk, which cracked and whined under his girth.

"It's this family that lives in Illinois, down the block from where we used to live. They make sixty thousand dollars per year. Do you really want to see them pay more in taxes?"

The kid slumped over onto his desk, dead of a heart attack.

At least Chris Christie, the teacher-hating governor of New Jersey supports poor, drugged up, silenced Michelle in her quest to help make every man, woman and child, gay or straight, physically fit enough to die overseas in the courageous act of protecting the wealthy people in our nation.

Chris Christie says: "I think it's a really good goal to encourage kids to eat better. I've struggled with my weight for 30 years. And it's a struggle. And if a kid can avoid that in his adult years or her adult years, more power to them. And I think the first lady is speaking out well,"

So, when it's Michelle Obama, who seems relatively fit, telling you that you are a fat fuck, it is easy to dismiss the sentiments as bullying.

When a big fat piece of shit such as Chris Christie calls you a fat fuck, at least you know what he is talking about. He is one of the most morbidly obese people I have ever seen! The local press ran a picture of him in shorts and a white (sweaty) t-shirt picking strawberries, a few months ago. He looked like a bucket of shit! He was so fat that if he fell over, you know he couldn't get back up again. So fat that his wife would suffocate trying to give him a blowjob!

I urge all of you to email the office of Chris Christie, governer of New Jersey and ask him when was the last time he saw his dick! You just KNOW that fucker pisses all over the seat and then leaves it there.

Fat Chris Christie Fights the Obesity of Others...

Well, after a long stretch in Federal Prison for decapitating my neighbor and feeding her remains to this panhandler who apparently wasn't lying all those times he told me he needed "to get something to eat" I have returned to www.memestreams.net. And while some of you may know that I have always had half of a love-hate relationship with the memestreams concept and community, I might say that this site, upon reflection, is nowhere near as stupid and shitty as Facebook, Twitter, Myspace or most of the other inanely named pieces of shit littering the side of the information superhighway.

So, in exchange for your forgiveness, I offer you...

The recipe for Coca Cola.

The recipe:
Fluid extract of Coca: 3 drams USP
Citric acid: 3 oz
Caffeine: 1 oz
Sugar: 30 (unclear quantity)
Water: 2.5 gal
Lime juice: 2 pints, 1 quart
Vanilla: 1 oz
Caramel: 1.5 oz or more for color

The secret 7X flavor (use 2 oz of flavor to 5 gals syrup):
Alcohol: 8 oz
Orange oil: 20 drops
Lemon oil: 30 drops
Nutmeg oil: 10 drops
Coriander: 5 drops
Neroli: 10 drops
Cinnamon: 10 drops

Go make millions! I'd advise you to put the cocaine back in the stuff, though. That'll give it an edge the other cola makers don't have.

An Apology and a Peace Offering!