Portrait of the late, great Astra the Whatpup as a young woman.
She was a Greyhound X Airedale and was 15 years old. May she have great and fortunate rebirths.

Ta much, MadnessReigns!

First World Problems

111+ sports channels and none dedicated to the arts, time warner?!

Ta much, dear Edosan!

Ta much, MadnessReigns!

April 25 (Reuters) - Heavy use of the world's most popular herbicide, Roundup, could be linked to a range of health problems and diseases, including Parkinson's, infertility and cancers, according to a new study.

The peer-reviewed report, published last week in the scientific journal Entropy, said evidence indicates that residues of "glyphosate," the chief ingredient in Roundup weed killer, which is sprayed over millions of acres of crops, has been found in food.

Those residues enhance the damaging effects of other food-borne chemical residues and toxins in the environment to disrupt normal body functions and induce disease, according to the report, authored by Stephanie Seneff, a research scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Anthony Samsel, a retired science consultant from Arthur D. Little, Inc. Samsel is a former private environmental government contractor as well as a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists.

"Negative impact on the body is insidious and manifests slowly over time as inflammation damages cellular systems throughout the body," the study says.

We "have hit upon something very important that needs to be taken seriously and further investigated," Seneff said.

Environmentalists, consumer groups and plant scientists from several countries have warned that heavy use of glyphosate is causing problems for plants, people and animals. ...

By way of MadnessReigns

By way of MadnessReigns

An ancient Egyptian harbor has emerged on the Red Sea coast, dating back about 4,500 years.

“Evidence unearthed at the site shows that it predates by more than 1,000 years any other port structure known in the world,” Pierre Tallet, Egyptologist at the University of Paris-Sorbonne and director of the archaeological mission, told Discovery News.

Built at the time of the Fourth Dynasty King Khufu, [who built] the Great Pyramid of Giza, the port was discovered by a Franco-Egyptian team of archaeologists at Wadi el-Jarf, nearly 110 miles south of the coastal city of Suez.

The site was first explored in 1823 by British pioneer Egyptologist Sir John Garner Wilkinson, who found a system of galleries cut into the bedrock a few miles from the coast. He believed they were catacombs.

“The place was then described by French pilots working on the Suez Gulf during the 1950s, but no one realized that it concealed the remains of an ancient pharaonic harbor,” Tallet said.

Tallet has been excavating the area since 2011 with archaeologist Gregory Marouard, of the University of Chicago’s Oriental Institute, topographer Damien Laisney of the French National Center for Scientific Research, and doctoral students Aurore Ciavatti and Serena Esposito from the Sorbonne University. The team first focused on the most visible part of the site: the galleries described by Wilkinson.

The excavation revealed 30 of these galleries, measuring on average 65 feet long, 10 feet wide and 7 feet high.

Inside the galleries Tallet and his team found several fragments of boats, ropes and pottery dating to the early fourth dynasty. Three galleries contained a stock of storage jars, which probably served as water containers for boats.

Underwater exploration at the foot of the jetty revealed 25 pharaonic anchors — and pottery similar to that uncovered in the galleries — all dating from the Fourth Dynasty.

About 200 meters from the sea side, the archaeologists also found the remains of an Old Kingdom building where 99 pharaonic anchors had been stored.

“Some of them were inscribed with hieroglyphs, probably with the names of the boats,” Tallet said.

Most interestingly, the storage galleries also contained hundreds of papyrus fragments.

Among them, 10 were very well preserved.

“They are the oldest papyri ever found,” Tallet said.

Many of the papyri describe how the central administration, under the reign of Khufu, sent food — mainly bread and beer — to the workers involved in the Egyptian expeditions departing from the port.

But one papyrus is much more intriguing: it’s the diary of Merrer, an Old Kingdom official involved in the building of the Great Pyramid of Khufu. [AKA Cheops]

From four different sheets and many fragments, the researchers were able to follow his daily activity for more that three months.

“He mainly reported about his many trips to the Tura limestone quarry to fetch block for the building of the pyramid,” Tallet said.

“Although we will not learn anything new about the construction of Khufu’s monument, this diary provides for the first time an insight on this matter,” Tallet said.


Edosan hipped me to this story :)

It’s an embarassment to its sex and species…..if it’s even human.

Thanks, MadnessReigns, I think.

libertarianism = don’t take care of the elderly except MY parents and ME when I get old and dribbly

hyper-randian libertarianism = don’t take care of the elderly except MY parents and ME when I get old and dribbly

…Multiple exterior materials characterize Queen Anne style architecture….


… A home on Avery Street features a Dutch gambrel-style roof. …


…This gracious home on Avery Street is a classic Queen Anne….


… In Woodbridge and the adjacent historical Woodbridge Farms, apartment houses and terraces (row houses) mingle with stately homes that were residences of upper-middle-class Detroiters…

Lovely house; shame a very nasty “lady” with an obnoxious and hyper-overreactive burglar alarm lives there. :(


“A mansard roof with original slate shingles is so rare,” Savage says. “Most of these houses have replacement roofs.” Other features include terra-cotta window hoods.

The Woodbridge/Woodbridge Farms neighborhood is named for William Woodbridge, who served as territorial Governor of Michigan (1839-41). Other noted residents included James E. Scripps, founder of The Evening News, which became The Detroit News; Ellen Scripps (James’ daughter), who married George Booth, founder of what became the College of Creative Studies and Cranbrook; and Detroit Tiger Ty Cobb.


My ‘hood rocketh!

Ta much, MadnessReigns!

Ta much, dear MSiegel!

Evolution in Action: The Silver Fox Experiment

This is absolutely fascinating!

Ta much, dear MSiegel!