Can you spot the counterfeit groceries? probably not

I have often thought about buying a pallet of plain water bottles filling them with tap water and applying an EVIAN label to it then reselling it to the shadey bodega up the street at cut rate prices. The chinese keep beating me to the punch on all of my scheming schemes. Humans when faced with either being broke or having money typically go with having money... if that means counterfeiting purses or boxes of kraft mac and cheese then so be it.


http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/27/world/asia/27cnd-China.html?ex=1340596800&en=634c2bccc2bebeef&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

Still, the government has moved aggressively in recent months to enforce the nation’s food safety regulations and to crack down on fake and counterfeit foods.

But Tuesday’s announcement, which appeared on the web site of the country’s top quality watchdog, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, has added fuel to concerns about rampant fraud in the food industry here.

Regulators said 33,000 law enforcement officials combed the nation and turned up illegal food making dens, counterfeit bottled water, fake soy sauce, banned food additives and illegal meat processing plants.

“These are not isolated cases,” Han Yi, director of the administration’s quality control and inspection department told the state-run media.

China Daily, the nation’s English language newspaper, said industrial chemicals, including dyes, mineral oils, paraffin wax, formaldehyde and malachite green, had been found in everything from candy, pickles and biscuits to seafood.

Regulators said they also learned that sodium hydroxide and hydrochloric acid were being used to process shark fin and ox tendon.

These industrial chemicals are often toxic or corrosive and can be used in everything from drain cleaners, detergent and fertilizer to surfboard wax.

Its a coal coal world.

My grandfather had a 700 acre cattle farm where he raised black angus in West Virginia in the 70's. I haven't visited it yet but I plan on it. I have found out that a man by the name of Quilly Ward owns it now. This property was sold to Quilly and my grandfather decided to hang on to the mineral rights for the kittaining coal far under the surface. I occasionally get mail from the city clerk from Harrison County telling me to pay up my share for the taxes on the mineral rights. It seems that there is one gentleman by the name of Mike so and so who goes around buying up the mineral rights from those who have not paid their taxes. The legislation and regulations make it somewhat difficult to snap these up (sometimes requiring two years of non-payment)... however, my sisters and I have already lost 16% of our share to this fella. Its an interesting lesson though and I have taken note of it.


http://www.house.gov/mollohan/harrisonhistory.htm source for quote below

The rich coal, gas and petroleum reserves of the county began to be exploited after 1900. The boom that this economic activity created caused the population to more than double from 1900 to 1920 -- rising from 27,690 in 1900, to 48,381 in 1910, and 74,793 in 1920. Glass factories also sprang up in the 1890s and early 1900s, utilizing the abundant natural gas of the county. Coal production was 126,594 tons in 1888, rose to 5,710,982 tons by 1920, and hit an all-time high of 12,744,276 tons in 1945. The population of the county peaked in 1950 at 85,296.

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/06/voting_for_coal_1.php

Maine enacted Solar rebate in 2005

http://www.renewableenergyaccess.com/rea/news/story?id=34187

Maine's first solar energy rebate program in decades passed the legislature on June 17 2005 and was signed into law on June 29 by Governor John Baldacci, one of its major proponents. The rebate should cover approximately 25% of the cost (including installation) of the average-sized residential or small business solar electric or solar thermal system, making it one of the more aggressive solar rebate programs available in U.S. states.

This passed 2 years ago... is anyone moving to increase the 500,000$ cap that is currently on this? 500k is not enough for this program to really do much good. It is a step in the right direction or more like turning your head in the right direction but not really making the step yet. Or like glancing sideways at the right direction. You get the point, more cash needs to be focused on creating a distributed self sufficient power base in the state of maine.

Underworld band member RICK SMITH hospitalized after brutal anarchist bumrush

http://www.residentadvisor.net/news.aspx?id=8733

Rick Smith from electronic duo Underworld was taken to hospital in Athens after a gang stormed the Ejekt Festival on Saturday.

Smith together with vocalist Karl Hyde and tour DJ Darren Price were due to close out the festival when a group of thirty "anarchists" wearing masks and wielding tear gas, iron bars and baseball bats forced their way into the festival grounds at approximately 11.20 p.m. during the Beastie Boys' performance.

Cars were set on fire and property was vandalised forcing festival officials and police to evacuate the baseball stadium where the festival was being staged.

Smith was one of several persons injured along with security staff. He was kept in hospital for a short time in Athens before returning home to the UK for additional treatment. The other members of the band were not harmed.

Yesterday, Underworld announced the details of their fifth studio album 'Oblivion with Bells', which is due for release in October 2007.

law enforcement against prohibition

Watch this fantastic 10 minute vid about law enforcment people coming out to end the failed policy of drug prohibition.

http://stopthedrugwar.org/videos/leap

Ram Bomjon

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ram_Bahadur_Bomjon


Moved to make a 6 year committment to meditation and in the process capturing the worlds attention, Ram Bomjon continues his meditation underground.

On March 26, 2007 Inspector Rameshwor Yadav of the Area Police Post Nijgadh found Bomjon inside a bunker-like square ditch of seven feet. A police team, under the command of Yadav, had gone to the place after word of Bomjon being on underground meditation spread in the area. “His face was clean and hair was combed well,” Yadav said. According to him, “the bunker” has been cemented from all sides with roof of tiles. Indra Lama, a local, who has been deployed as caretaker for him since he began meditation, said the “bunker” was prepared as per Bomjon’s order. “After granting audience a week ago, he expressed his desire to meditate inside the ground; so we built it,” he said

http://irregulartimes.com/index.php/archives/2005/11/25/ram-bomjon-investigation/

After reading the user discussion from the site above, I picked this gem out. The discussion sounds a bit like this:

"this cant be possible" Ralph from Waukegan

"prove this scientifically" Mortimer from Toledo

"gautama buddha had to fight demons while attempting to achieve enlightenment and this kid wont even let a doctor examine him, PUH LEASE" gwynn from toronto

"its a hoax"

"you have no faith... maybe he is the real deal"

etc etc etc... all the way to this fella.

"that was a very nice idea if you put that in to practiced go for it men do it Make an ACTION, I will support you, Remember the great quote say’s “Action is louder than speak”, you should be like the Great Mother Theresa, Ram Bomjon “says I need six years of Deep Meditation” even though it,s not completed yet, but he does, so therefore his word and his action is ONE, so Roberto if your will is strong enough to HEPLP PEOPLE FROM POVERTY,SICNESS,ETC. THAT WOULD BE A REMARKABLE AND GREAT ACOMPLISHMENT."

http://software.seekingalpha.com/article/29891

Summary: Cowan software analyst Peter Goldmacher thinks WebEx Communications (WEBX) will be making the wrong move if it sells itself to Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO) for its $3.2 billion/$57 a share offer. To be sure, the price (28x 2007 free cash flow) is reasonable. But Goldmacher thinks networking giant Cisco doesn't really understand nor have the wherewithal to capitalize on the "on demand" data software that is WebEx's strong suit. Enterprise software giants such as International Business Machines Corp. (IBM), SAP AG (SAP) or Oracle Corp. (ORCL) could do a far better job growing out WebEx's applications that allow workers to share information simultaneously. WebEx CEO Subrah Iyar insists that Cisco does understand the potential of on-demand, and says he doesn't think he's selling his company's potential short. He also says Cisco told him they would enter web-based collaboration with or without WebEx. Goldmacher speculates a counter-offer may be in the making.

Shantaram by Gregory Roberts

Shantaram = man of peace

In this case the man of peace is an ex junky in jail for armed robbery who escapes from jail to meander around in the Mumbai underworld. Drug and weapons smuggling rings aside the main character is a MAN OF PEACE first and foremost.

I am 250 pages into this beast and thus far it has been a nice quick entertaining read. I am not one of these people who gets irate that the author took some poetic license to tell a better story ITS A NOVEL- ITS NOT REAL. In fact this same thing pissed me off about reviews I read about Papillon and people pissing on Henri Charrier. I dont know about the rest of you but I do not care if the author is a criminal or a liar when reading NOVELS. If I was reading a biography or a non fiction book I might start caring about those other facts. Listening to NPR I came across the book description and decided to pick it up from B&N. I'm glad I did thus far... we will see if I am still this positive 600 pages from now. Gregory David Roberts has dredged up alot of haters in the amazon review section for this book as well as a TON of lovers. I think it speaks well of the Shantaram that it has created a bit of heated discussion.



Here is one of the better Shantaram Skeptic reviews.
-----------------------------------------------

Have you ever had an experience where a gregarious, but slightly dodgy stranger engages you in conversation and launches into a rambling series of tall tales about their life to which you respond by smiling and saying "Really? How interesting." in an attempt to be polite and non-judgmental - but as time goes on inconsistencies within the narrative become more and more glaringly apparent until with dawning horror you realize that you are in fact sitting next to a delusional psychopath who not only considers you a gullible fool, but possibly intends you mortal harm? Reading Shantaram I experienced just such an uncomfortable feeling of being taken for a ride by a career grifter.

I missed the hype surrounding the initial launch of the book so I don't know whether it is intended to be a real life story presented as actual fact, or a deliberately hyperbolic allegory built upon a skeleton of events from the author's life. Clearly a lot of the success of the book so far has depended on its being perceived as the former, and since the incidents in the story are outside my (and probably most readers') direct experience, or otherwise unverifiable (Mumbai underworld activities, mujehadeen guerilla warfare) I am quite willing to give the benefit of the doubt. However, small implausibilities in the more mundane sections of the novel chip away at the writer's credibility and gradually bring into increasing doubt the veracity of the whole. For example, overhearing a conversation in Urdu between Karla and Nazeer, Lin says that he understands only every third or fourth word - but conversational Urdu is practically the same as conversational Hindi in which he claims to be fully fluent. Later he says that he can perform twenty sets of thirty pushups with a minute of rest between sets - please try this at home - it's a pretty tall order for even an Olympic athlete, let alone someone drying out from a three month heroin binge. On another occasion he writes that nine men were able to survive for a month in the mountains of Afghanistan with no other food but the flesh of a single goat - how? These are just a few random examples, but the point is that if we can't trust the author's account of his language abilities, diet or workout routines, can we really trust the more sensational accounts of his apparently superhuman fighting prowess, ability to withstand torture and sexual success with a string of smoking hot babes? Of course it could be that Roberts' intention is to present events in the hyperbolic, super-real style of 80s Bollywood in which Indian everymen are able to overcome insuperable odds and take on armies of evil gangsters with their bare hands - in which case the novel succeeds brilliantly as a sort of psychadelic, smellovision fable for our times. But if he is presenting the events of the novel as autobiographical fact with a completely straight face then one can't help suspecting that we are reading the delusional ramblings of a self-aggrandizing windbag. Structurally the book suggests comparisons with Sade's longer works - sprawling lists of sensational incident separated by babbling philosophical treatises - but spiritually the character Lin has most in common with is Tomb Raider's Lara Croft. If, as I suspect, the book is in fact no more than a colorful fabrication purporting to be true I can't really understand why James Frey was hung out to dry whilst Roberts remains the toast of the town.

OH yah.. so I went to the preakness a while back.

1) reflections on baltimore
a) upon entering the city I smelled the sweetest smell in the air and proceeded to ask my friends what they thought it was... after looking over my shoulder and seeing the domino sugar factory I had my answer.
b) a bar called "i dont know where do you want to go"
c) the downtown touristy area can be summed up as follows... ESPN restaurant, The Aquarium, Museum of Science, Triton Boats, people who get paid to say hello to you on the harbour walk (apparently to make you feel like baltimore is friendly) HOOTERS, a submarine touting baltimores ties to the creation of the first unterseeboat,
d) it looks like a philadelphia kind of but less artsy and more working class.

reflections on the preakness

1) drunk people
2) trash everywhere
3) people chanting USA USA USA when jets fly overhead
4) drunk people kicking the crap out of other drunk people
5) FRATS FRATS FRATS
6) oh yah the horses are running but i couldnt tell cuz im so drunk
7) people pissing in things that they normally wouldnt... like empty beer boxes or on my foot, or perhaps right out in the open in front of 500 people.
8) 12 little kids stomping on a guy and then running away before you can say ... blitzkrieg
9) exchanger: why did you do so well for 3/4 of the race and then lose. You bum. You did make the race a little more interesting though. I was actually screaming and pumping my fists... something i really did not expect to do.
10) black eyed susans (vodka and lemonade)
11) and how could I forget.. crab related delicasies. yah i know what you are thinking. no way crabs in baltimore?

near the top of mount royal... While I was balancing on a handrail I nearly fell backward and died. That was DAMN close. Maggie can attest to that!

We also found the best random sign ever... all it said was "Funky hip hop RAP" it was very north of the city just off the side of the road. I decided a shoulder stall into a backspin was necessary. Even in the rain in my new nautica polo.

mutek reflections

I'm back home and the proud owner of a good nights sleep... something the mutek festival and montreal couldnt really afford me with all that was going on for the past week.

It has been a long time since I have been really amazed by live electronic acts but that time is over and I am absolutely impressed. Cobblestone Jazz, The Mole, Jicheal Mackson, Gui Borratto, Heartthrob... They all blew me away and had me dancing like the ohio players were dropping by. The thing that suprised me was how little I knew of the "now sound". I have been stuck in some sonic subgenres and ways of thinking that this festival helped to blow out of the back of my head in all the right ways. Stephon Beaupre was the only artist I purchased music from during the weekend and I must say. WOW. this guy is amazing, I would love to see him live someday. Reminded me of a a more fucked up and funkier Akufen.

I arrived at around 5PM on Thursday, checked into my hotel on Rue Ontario (right near the corner of St. Dennis and Ontario) in the latin quarter. Afterwards it was on to the hotel Godin to pick up my ticket to the rest of the weeks festivities. I immediately noticed the "mutekkers" gathered around outside the hotel on St Laurent so I didn't need to ask for directions despite not knowing which street the hotel was on. Mutekkers are easy to pick out of a crowd btw, super angular eyeglass frames, hip german techno record label t shirts, or straight up geometric patterned outerwear were a dead giveaway.

Maggie Schier was coming along for the ride with me and despite her dislike for my brands of techno I did get her to come to one of the A/Visions shows on Thursday night. The first act was barely watchable and we ducked out to get some mediocre sushi... a bowl of miso, seaweed salad, some tuna... the food was ok but the service was very iffy. Maggie and I went back to the Ex Centris theatre and enjoyed the last set by a very talented Haushka. Haushka was playing a modified piano wherein he had taped various surfaces to the piano wires where normally a hammer would bang them and produce a typical sounding A or G or what have you. In this case you may have heard a cymbal or a crunchy ball of tinfoil being squished. I would say a 1/3 of the keys were modified so he still had lots of keys to work normally with but those randomly spaced surprises were just amazing. They introduced so much chance and circumstance into the performance and more of a drum solo aspect one is not normally associating with a piano solo. There were some moderately well done visuals accompanying the piano performance by a group called semi-conductor.

The picnik location was my favorite... Accessible by Metro train. Park Jean de Drapeau offered many memorable moments. The view of the biosphere from beneath the metal sculpture we were dancing below was breathtaking... as a big fan of buckminster fullers it made me feel so connected to technologies positivity for a while. I was there with some friends and we spent a good portion of the time rolling joints and making drinks by the riverbanks just talking while we listened to the music in the background still quite loud. It was idyllic. I caught most of heartthrob and the first 30 minutes of wighnomy brothers... I wish I had stayed for the rest of the w. brothers though.