http://www.flashearth.com/

Google earth with a Ferrari engine

http://www.infinitewheel.com/

http://www.interviewwithgod.com/beatitudes/index.htm

“A difficult situation can be handled in two ways: We can either do something to change it or face it. If we can do something, then why worry and get upset over it - just change it. If there is nothing we can do, again, why worry and get upset over it? Things will not get better with anger and worry.”

http://www.embedtube.com/uploads/33101407Realage.swf

Self-Experimenters: Psychedelic Chemist Explores the Surreality of Inner Space, One Drug at a Time

Alexander Shulgin endured a government crackdown and hallucinations of his bones melting in pursuit of new mind-bending compounds

By David Biello

<!– | 23 Comments –> 

• Spacer
• Back
• IMAGE 1 of 2
• Next

aArticleImages = new Array; aArticleImages[0] = new Object; aArticleImages[0].title = “”; aArticleImages[0].caption = “”; aArticleImages[0].credit = “”; aArticleImages[0].url = “”; aArticleImages[0].alt = “”; aArticleImages[0].src = “/media/inline/C419F901-D435-B868-2BCBDC32D2C0C398_1.jpg”; aArticleImages[0].thisImageNumber = “1″; aArticleImages[1] = new Object; aArticleImages[1].title = “”; aArticleImages[1].caption = “”; aArticleImages[1].credit = “”; aArticleImages[1].url = “”; aArticleImages[1].alt = “”; aArticleImages[1].src = “/media/inline/C419F901-D435-B868-2BCBDC32D2C0C398_2.jpg”; aArticleImages[1].thisImageNumber = “2″;

MORE TO EXPLORE

• Overview Self-Experimenters Step Up for Science
• Sidebar Day 1: Self-Styled Cyborg Dreams of Outwitting Superintelligent Machines
• Sidebar Day 2: Filmmaker Gained Weight to Prove a Point about Portion Size
• Sidebar Day 3: Malaria Vaccine Maven Baits Irradiated Mosquitoes with His Own Arm
• Sidebar Day 4: To Purge Binges, Alcoholic Cardiologist Self-Prescribed an Experimental Drug
• Sidebar Day 5: Can 200,000 Hours of Baby Talk Untie a Robot’s Tongue?
• Sidebar Day 6: Self-Experimenter Freed Himself from Insomnia, Acne and Love Handles
• Sidebar Day 7: Daughter of MRI Researcher Offered Her Brain for Virtual Dissection

Alexander Shulgin is the world’s foremost “psychonaut.” The 82-year-old chemist has not only created more of the 300 known consciousness-altering (or psychoactive) compounds than anyone living or dead, he has, by his own account, sampled somewhere between 200 and 250 of them himself—most of them cooked up in the musty lab behind his home in the hills east of Berkeley, Calif., where he has shared many a chemical voyage with his wife of 26 years, Ann.

“I take them myself because I am interested in their activity in the human mind. How would you test that in a rat or mouse?” says Shulgin, known to friends as Sasha.

He has paid the price for his avocation. Some of his creations have induced uncontrollable vomiting, paralysis and the feeling that his bones were melting, among other terrors. And though some believe Shulgin has opened the doors of perception to a new class of potentially therapeutic mind-altering compounds, others argue that he bears responsibility for the damage that ongoing abuse of such now-illicit substances can cause.

As a student at the University of California, Berkeley, in the 1950s, Shulgin’s gateway drug was mescaline, a naturally occurring psychedelic found in peyote and other groovy cacti. “It introduced me to new colors which I had never seen before,” Shulgin says. “It allowed me to interpret whatever I was looking at with an entirely new vocabulary…. And yet, what a simple structure!”

In the 1960s, while working as a biochemist at The Dow Chemical Co. in San Francisco, he couldn’t resist tinkering with the potent mescaline molecule. He synthesized entirely new compounds that retained similar, trippy qualities. Some variations were less potent, but others were even more powerful or imparted their own unique twist.

Shulgin, who left Dow in 1965 to consult for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) among other pursuits, offered the best of his new chemical darlings to Ann, his second wife; the most promising of these were passed along to a close circle of 10 friends until the mid-1990s, when the DEA, no longer paying for his services, raided his lab and revoked his license to work with illegal drugs.

His personal favorite, which he describes as “extraordinarily comfortable and quite erotic,” is known simply as 2C-B for its chemical makeup.

One by one, Shulgin has seen many of the compounds he invented or experimented with become illegal in the U.S., including some that have never been synthesized by anyone and some that he thought might prove therapeutic, such as MDMA (3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine), better known as ecstasy. “I was very sad to see MDMA achieve the status of a Schedule 1 drug,” a designation that prohibits its manufacture or use in the U.S., he says. “I felt that it would inhibit research into its medical value and that’s the way it’s turned out.”

Some researchers agree that the government’s response to psychoactive drugs has deprived them of a unique window into human consciousness. After all, rodents will happily ingest most intoxicants and narcotics —from marijuana to heroin—but not the headier psychedelics.

“Peculiarly, not only did we make them illegal, but we backed away from them scientifically,” says neuroscientist Roland Griffiths of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, one of the researchers who is restarting basic research into psychedelics. His lab has shown that psilocybin, the active ingredient in the variety of fungi known as magic mushrooms, can bring on lasting feelings of well-being. This may indicate that it could be harnessed to help clinically depressed or addicted patients.

Shulgin, who continues to study cacti for new chemical routes to altered states, predicts that by the year 2060, the number of different known psychedelics will have grown from 300 to 2,000. He intends to discover—and perhaps sample—as many of them as he can. “It is like opening a door to a hallway,” he says, “that has unopened doors for its entire length, and behind every door is a world with which you are totally unfamiliar.”

TURN YOUR FACE TO THE SUN AND THE SHADOW FALLS BEHIND YOU- Maori Proverb

I finally decided to write my book today because it’s Frebruary the 29th…I thought that if i died today they’ll celebrate my anniversary once every four years.
                              CHAPTER ONE
Hey Dude, can you pick me up at the Memorial Hospital?

What happened..are you ok?

I’m ok…how long?

about twenty minutes…you mean the one on Hollywood Boulevard?

C’mon Dude…do you know of any other Memorial Hospital in Hollywood?

No…

Dude…. wake up and smell the coffee…are you a cab driver or not?

Oh…sorry dude…I’ll get there in a flash..

I have a hard time remembering the Dude’s name. We all called him Dude because he used to put that word on his sentences as if it was a comma…so to everyone he was the “Dude”.

All the cab drivers in Broward County knew who he was, and kept away from him. He was a boat’s capitain, an helicopter’s pilot, a champion surfer… a perfect compulsive liar.
He just couldn’ help lying on anything…it was so obvious and imbarassing, but he wasn’t a bad person he had a hart and that was very hard to find in 1997 driving a taxi in Fort Lauderdale.
I “picked him up” from Hollywood Beach one day, almost wasted from the various joints he had smoked even if it was before lunch.. he was going to get busted soon or later by selling bags of pot on the beach so i told him he could drive a cab and make an honest living.

He accepted and I spoke to Mike, our supervisor. He got a cab a week later and I had a “Dude” living with me.

The good part was that I was never at home. I was living at 1536 Fletcher street at that time and the year was 1997. The neighbour was friendly and safe back then and  the rent was only 280 a month.

I was single, happily single in a region that had more girls willing to give it away than palms,so i wasn’t even thinking about getting married,start a family and such.
Before the Dude moved in with me I was living only with the “Girl” a 12 year old black Labrador that I adopted from my landlady when she decided to get her 12 year old son a “new dog because that one was blind”. I’ll talk about the “Girl” later though.
What happened Dude?
I fell from my bike and broke my arm
Where?
Near Pier 21 in Port Everglades… I went over the railroad tracks and the front wheel got stuck in the rail..flipping me airborne..when  I landed on top of my hand I felt the pain, someone took me to the hospital an here I am.
Holy Shit..that must have hurt.
Still does..can you take me home now?
Sure…but   how are you going todrive a cab now?
Good question Dude  good question…I’ll think about that tomorrow  now i just want to get some sleep.

I let my thoughts wandering about as we were driving South on US1 as i was unusually seated in the passenger’s seat of a taxi.
Ten years…i thought…ten years I have been driving a cab…how many people..
It was like going to the movies for me, getting behind the wheel early in the morning,trying to catch longer rides to MIA the airport in Miami. I was eager to see what kind of “Humanity” would have show in my back seat.
Most of my passengers talked about their problems to me as if I was some kind of priest listening to their confessions. They knew chances to see me again were slim, so they opened up and talked, asked, cried, laughed,offered grass, cocaine or sex in exchange for a ride..
(continues…)

Chapter One

Continuation…
.

I wasn’t considering myself a new Mother Theresa or a Ghandi but if my word could make a passenger feel better..i never backed off.

I rolled the window down all the way.

South Florida evenings…i thought. that warm wind blowing inside, sucking the air conditioning out of the Dude’s cab like a straw.. I enjoyed the temperature in the late evening as I did at night, driving with my windows down.
The Dude was addicted to the air conditioning.

What are you doing man?
You know that i don’t like the ac Dude…it makes me sick…it makes you sick too..
can’t we just enjoy tthe breeze for awhile?
Ok man sice you broke your arm i’ll forgive you.
Dude, look at the finger of my broken arm…can you read between the lines?
Ahahah..

We reached Fletcher Street and turned left from US1 just before the Hollywood Dog Track.
Our apt was just two block east and was quiet as usual.
Irwin parked the Chevy on the grass and we went inside greeted by the Girl who was laying in the front door as usual waiting for my return as a good friend.

Just before i fell from the bike, I was meditating on my life as a cabdriver and the outcome wasn’t that good.
I was still single at the age of 41, I only had about 5 thousand dollars saved up for the rainy days  and i didn’t know where my life was taking me , as if it was a small sail-boat adrifted in a tropical storm.
No. I wasn’t happy. I needed a change.
As this thought entered my mind I found myself flying and falling abruptly on the concrete smashing my arm and hand under my 180 pounds.
The pain was terrible.

Now, when i think back of that day I see it as if the destiny had set up a date for my ass.
I complained about my status and my conditions and I fell from my bike as if a Giant’s Hand had decided to take control over my ragged life and give it a twist.
Not only one twist though but three…in the same day.

As i reached home, the Landlady rang my bell

Hi pio

Hi Marylin what’s new?

Hey…!! What happened to your arm? (i told her the whole story)

Oh I’m so sorry. I have one bad news for you.

Hit me!

You going to have to leave the apartment in a month…i sold the house.

Oh great…no problem..i’ll manage…
The third blow came over the phone.

This is the yellow cab company..is Pio in?

Speaking.

We found out what was wrong with the cab you brought in today…

And…?

You Blew the engine…so either you come up with 2500$ or you are out?

2500$? I blew the engine? what are you talking about? Let me speak to Mike the supervisor.

Mike?

Yes?

Is this some kind of a joke?

No Pio it’s all true and there is nothing I can do about…either you pay or you’re out…

But..Mike…I..

Goodbye I got to go.

I hung up and crashed on the bed.
That was my really lucky day  I thought… the bike accident.Lost the apt.Lost my job.
All in the same day.
I looked at the ceiling fan rotating over my head,trying to see a clear solution out of this mess while the Dude was nervously going back and forth from the chitcken to the bedroom smoking a joint and complaining loudly about the fact that we had to look for a new place.
I hit the “pause” button on him. So he was talking and talking but I wasn’t really listening at all, trying to see clear trough that mess I wasn’t helped either by his talking,neither from the pain biting my arm now that the painkiller they gave me at the hospital was losing its effect.

I saw the Dude coming towards me talking but it was like on the TV when you press the “mute” I wasn’t hearing a word he was saying but I saw the hand with the joint coming my way
…
No..no  Dude.You know I don’t smoke when I have to drive you know…

Well you ain’t driving Pio are you?

You are right Dude.

So I took a couple of hits from the sweet grass and fell back on my back. Ten  minutes later, after i took the second paikiller for the day I fell asleep like a baby.

SOUTH BEACH IN THE EIGHTIES (a tough place)

I remember when South Beach looked like a parking lot for elderly people left there by their rich children. I often cruised the strip with my Yellow Taxi in the daytime, (at night it was too dangerous), and watch the building facing the ocean on the West side of Collins Avenue. From the twenties all the way down to fifth street all you could see back then was a quantity of old people sitting on the outside looking at the beach. Who could have ever imagined that years later this would turn out to be the world’s famous South Beach. Miami Vice was being filmed and the eighties were great years for many.

Also for the druglords, attracted by the temperatures and the free hunting for new places to open their vicious markets. Every day i turned the radio on there was a shooting involving this or that particular mafia. The Jamaicans, the Italians, the Cubans, trying to set their territory from one another.

After the killings, and the division of the territory between the druglords, the big money started to flow in faster than the Gulfstream and they had to be re-invested clean and fast.

Bulidings, hotels banks and restaurants came into life in the next years like mushrooms in the woods after heavy rain.

The Skyline of Miami, Miami Beach, South Beach changed from a quiet simple line to the one we know and see now.

It was safe to drive down the strip anytime day or night. The “old farts” that sat in front of the hotels were dumped somewhere else and the casting companies, the fashion artists, and the movie industry moved in changing the looks and the feeling of South Florida forever.

Hallandale looked like a quiet place to live and I rented a small room on 214 terrace, just east of old Federal Higway.It was just a room, if I needed to take a shower i had to ask the owner to go into the house. It was cheap, that is all I cared for.

All the money I had when I came from a small town of Northern Italy was gone. Three hundred dollars, in one night, in New York, after I decided to stay overnight in Manhattan. It was the day of my twentythird birthday when I landed for the first time of my life at JFK.

October 15 1979. I will never forget that ride on the back seat of a Checker Cab, going into Manhattan I could see the skyline getting closer and closer, like a forest of buildings. The Autumn’ sun right behind the Chrisler looked like a huge organge, and by the time we got into the hart of fifth ave, it was dark red.

So i decided that i wanted to live it up, and ended up into a strip-joint, where my money evaporated faster than the steam from the sewer. My first and last time in such a club costed me three hundred and the (kept) promise to never set my “grease-ball” foot again in a night club.

So by the time I landed into the Fort Lauderdale Airport I had only the emergency money that I managed to save between my sock and my left foot. It amounted to fiftysix dollars.

I took a bus South and when I felt it was right, i stepped out and the sign red: US1 and Hallandale Beach Boulevard.

There was an Italian Restaurant there named Doria’s. Went in and got a job as a salad boy, helping Hassan, the pizza man from Iran who was making pizza faster that any italian pizza-men I ever met.

He was hooked on the dogs. There was a Dog-Track, just a few blocks from the restaurant and it seemed to him that the faster he could make those pizzas, the earlier he could go to throw his money away. Hollywood Dog Track, on Pembroke and US1.

I took that really small room from an old man. He asked fifty bucks for the week. I had to take it, I was broke, after all…I couldn’t excpect to be sleeping at the Fointanbleu, after all.

That night i felt asleep as fast as I layed my head on the bed. The room was just big enough to contain the bed.

Later I found out that it was a tool shack reshaped for the occasion (my lodging)…..to be continued

Here below are some of the companies who will pay you for writing on the net. Find the one that is most suitable to you and start earning some extra money.

http://www.triond.com/

http://storymash.com/

http://www.xomba.com/

http://creamaid.com/

http://www.reviewparty.com/

http://www.matrixmails.com/

21 Suggestions for Success

By H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

1. Marry the right person. This one decision will determine 90% of your happiness or misery.
2. Work at something you enjoy and that’s worthy of your time and talent.
3. Give people more than they expect and do it cheerfully.
4. Become the most positive and enthusiastic person you know.
5. Be forgiving of yourself and others.
6. Be generous.
7. Have a grateful heart.
8. Persistence, persistence, persistence.
9. Discipline yourself to save money on even the most modest salary.
10. Treat everyone you meet like you want to be treated.
11. Commit yourself to constant improvement.
12. Commit yourself to quality.
13. Understand that happiness is not based on possessions, power or prestige, but on relationships with people you love and respect.
14. Be loyal.
15. Be honest.
16. Be a self-starter.
17. Be decisive even if it means you’ll sometimes be wrong.
18. Stop blaming others. Take responsibility for every area of your life.
19. Be bold and courageous. When you look back on your life, you’ll regret the things you didn’t do more than the ones you did.
20. Take good care of those you love.
21. Don’t do anything that wouldn’t make your Mom proud.

http://goodwatermusic.com/

http://omgwtf.superlime.com/pong.swf

Calif. court: Medical pot not OK at work

Updated on January 24th, 2008 @ 7:05pm
Source: Associated Press

By PAUL ELIAS,
Associated Press Writer

SAN FRANCISCO - Employers can fire workers who use medical marijuana even if it was legally recommended by a doctor, the California Supreme Court ruled Thursday, dealing the state another setback in its standoff with federal law enforcement.

The high court upheld a small Sacramento telecommunications company’s firing of a man who flunked a company-ordered drug test. Gary Ross held a medical marijuana card authorizing him to use the drug to treat a back injury sustained while serving in the Air Force.

The company, Ragingwire Inc., argued that it rightfully fired Ross because all marijuana use is illegal under federal law, which does not recognize the medical marijuana laws in California and 11 other states.

The justices upheld that argument in a 5-2 decision.

“No state law could completely legalize marijuana for medical purposes because the drug remains illegal under federal law,” Justice Kathryn Werdegar wrote for the majority.

The U.S. Supreme Court declared in 2005 that state medicinal marijuana laws don’t protect users from prosecution. The Drug Enforcement Administration and other federal agencies have been actively shutting down major medical marijuana dispensaries throughout California over the last two years and charging their operators with felony distribution charges.

Ragingwire said it fired Ross because it feared it could be the target of a federal raid, among other reasons.

The Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority and the Western Electrical Contractors Association Inc. had joined Ragingwire’s case, arguing that companies could lose federal contracts and grants if they allowed employees to smoke pot.

The conservative nonprofit Pacific Legal Foundation said in a friend-of-the-court filing that employers could also be liable for damage done by high workers.

Ross had argued that medical marijuana users should receive the same workplace protection from discipline that employees with valid painkiller prescriptions do. California voters legalized medicinal marijuana in 1996.

The nonprofit marijuana advocacy group Americans for Safe Access, which represents Ross, estimates that 300,000 Americans use medical marijuana. The Oakland-based group said it has received hundreds of employee discrimination complaints in California since it began tracking the issue in 2005.

Safe Access attorney Joe Elford said the group will now focus on urging the Legislature to pass a law protecting workers who use medical marijuana.

“We remain confident that there will be a day when medical marijuana patients are not discriminated against in the workplace,” he said.

Assemblyman Mark Leno, a Democrat who represents part of San Francisco, said he will introduce legislation addressing those concerns in the next few weeks.

The ruling “strikes a serious blow to patients’ rights,” he said.

Eleven states have adopted medical-marijuana laws similar to California’s: Alaska, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.

The American Medical Association advocates keeping marijuana classified as a tightly controlled and dangerous drug that should not be legalized until more research is done

http://mashable.com/2007/09/08/5000-resources-to-do-just-about-anything-online/

Tips for Bloggers http://www.feedicons.com/

<a href=”http://www.blogcatalog.com/directory/art/photography-art” title=”Photography Art Blogs - Blog Catalog Blog Directory”><img src=”http://www.blogcatalog.com/images/buttons/blogcatalog1.gif” alt=”Photography Art Blogs - Blog Catalog Blog Directory” style=”border: 0;” /></a>

• How to Make Footnotes in Blogger?                                                    
• Picture Headings in Sidebar.
• Free Screenshots for Bloggers.
• How to Upload files to Free Hosting?
• Upload Multiple Pictures to your Post in Blogger.
• Add Pop-Up Warning to Blog.
• How to Delete a Picture?
• How to Add a Paypal Donation Button?
• Add Blog Sitemap to Google Webmaster.
• Provide Code for Other Bloggers to Link to your Blog.
• Put an Image as Posts Separator.
• Add Page Elements to Posts Column and Blog Header.
• Show Posts According to Author.
• Put Feedburner Feedflare in Your Blog.
• New Slideshow Widget for Bloggers.
• Move Newer, Home and Older Posts Links to top of Post.
• Share This, Add This Social Bookmarks for Blogs.
• Create a Navigation Menu Bar.
• Create Spoilers in Blog Posts.
• How to Delete Blog?
• Beautiful Blockquotes for Blogger.
• How to Make a Private Blog?
• Sign Blog Posts with an Image.
• How to Remove Content from Google?

1. FreeFoto: FreeFoto.com claims to be “the largest collection of free photographs on the Internet.” They’re available for offline projects as well, as long as you’re not using them to make a profit.
2. KAVEWALL: Look for images and textures in unique categories like tattoo, smoke, and food.
3. Digital Dreamer: Free, royalty-free stock images can be found here.
4. Free Photos Bank: This features a handful of the newest photos in their directory, so check back often.
5. Free Digital Photos: Find gorgeous, easy-to-download photographs in categories like animals, celebrations, home & garden, and lots more.
6. PD Photo: Browse through the categories and subcategories in this site’s database, most of which depict the urban and rural landscapes of the United States.
7. Visipix: Search over a million photographs and fine art pieces.
8. Cepolina: On cepolina, you can choose to save photos in up to five different formats.
9. DexHaus: A wide array of beautiful images are found on this well-organized site.
10. FreeStockImages.net: Chances are you’ll find whatever it is you’re looking for on this terrific site.
11. TurboPhoto: TurboPhoto has 10 categories keep the high res photos easy to find.
12. Yotophoto: An immensely popular site, Yotophoto is worth checking out.
13. Stockvault: Search by photo subject or by the newest and most popular photos on Stockvault.
14. Dreamstime: While most of the photos on this site cost a fee (some as low as $0.26/image), Dreamstime provides a few free stock photos.
15. Open Stock Photography: This site offers over one million images for you to download and use however you want.

http://www.timemachiner.com/

http://www.realhealth.tv/topics/Exercise/Benefits/index.php