Dowbrigade

An artist rendering released by NASA Friday shows four
concepts being considered for the design of the Orbital Space Plane.
A capsule, a lifting body, a sharp
body with wings and a blunt body with wings. In just five years, astronauts
may journey to the International Space Station in a stripped down four
seater
instead of the mammoth and aging space shuttle. NASA, in effect, hopes
to commute to orbit in a sleek sedan instead of an 18-wheel Mack truck.
(AP Photo/NASA)

from AP

Every day I tell myself that I am the luckiest man in
the world to get paid to blog.  Wait a minute – nobody pays me to
blog! But some people do get paid to do what they love……

An ice-ream taster. A wine taster. A sports mascot. A professional poker
player. A chaise-lounge tester. Thing is … some folks really
do
get
paid to hold
these jobs. Read about them

from MSNBC

Pakistani Shi’ite Muslims parade on a street during a
rally in Karachi, August 31, 2003. The Imamia Students Organization held
the rally to condemn Friday’s car bomb attack in Najaf, Iraq, which killed
some 75 people, including a Shi’ite leader

from REUTERS

In the last few years competitive eating has been transformed
into a national circuit complete with television coverage,
prize money and its own governing body, the International Federation
of Competitive Eating.

The federation oversees 150 events and counts 3,000 eaters in its register.
Its competitions boast strict rules and regulations — vomiting leads to
automatic disqualification; any food in the mouth at the buzzer counts
if swallowed thereafter.

Its competitors include superstars like the 144-pound Japanese
professional speed-eater Takeru "Tsunami" Kobayashi, a 25-year-old who
holds the world record of 50 1/2 hot dogs and buns in 12 minutes. Kobayashi
is said to make more than $150,000 a year between the American and Japanese
circuits.

from the New York Times

Humans have relied on silk for more than 2,000 years,but
scientists have never been able to unravel the mystery of how silkworms
produced their incredibly strong fibers.

Now, a Tufts team has figured
out how, which could have
far-reaching implications for
everything from hospital dressings to body armor.

from
the Tufts E-News

SPENCER, MA– Mike and Kathy Warren insist there’s no such thing as
bad publicity. Especially when you make your livelihood training piglets
named Hammy Faye Bakker and Elvis Pigsley to race around a small track
and jump into a swimming pool.But this weekend, when the Warrens pulled
into town with their eight-pig team, they ran into controversy.

from
the Boston Globe

KABUL, Afghanistan — The country is fighting an uphill,
”David and Goliath” battle to control opium production, which is being
used to
fund terrorism in some parts of the nation, Antonio Maria Costa, chief
of the United Nations antidrug agency, said yesterday.

Costa said Karzai is about to sign the first antidrug law in Afghanistan
and has created a counternarcotics arm of the National Security Council.
But its annual budget is only $3 million, compared with estimated revenues
from opium production in Afghanistan last year of $1.2 billion.

”Today it is David against Goliath, and it is a huge Goliath, and it
is a very small David,” Costa said.

from the Boston Globe

Iguanas Multiplying
in Florida

In neighborhoods from Key Biscayne to Boca Raton, it is the night,
and day, of the fearsome-looking iguana.

Escaped from captivity, or turned loose in the wild by pet owners, the
large, usually green-skinned reptiles that can reach 6 feet in length
are multiplying rapidly.

"They eat the flowers, (go) in the pool and mess it up," complained
Condo manager Ralph Lindberg.

A female, on average, lays 50 papery-skinned eggs at a time, and may
breed twice a year. With no natural predators to keep their numbers in
check, the big reptiles appear to be thriving.

from the
Contra Costa Times

100 Years of
Harley Davidson

If you live in the Midwest, that rumble you hear outside your window
these days is probably coming from a Harley-Davidson motorcycle.

There are approximately 300,000 bikers converging on Milwaukee this
weekend because the company and its famous motorcycles are turning 100
years old. It will be one big birthday bash. .

from ABC
News

Rush Reviews Standing CPR

Nobody is shocked by Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears "honoring" Madonna
by making out with her at the Mtv Music Awards, but everyone is acting
as if they are. One year, there was none of this sort of thing at the
Awards and the columnists freaked out the next day. Now it’s mandatory
that some staged "outrage" occur. It’s boring and anything
but spontaneous or scandalous.

This is simply an example of our culture’s decline: people acting like
fools because they think they have to. You know, we keep hearing how
these terrorists hate our amoral culture. Isn’t it possible, some might
ask, that some Al-Qaeda thug could see this kissing (and more of them
are watching in their caves than will ever admit it) and decide to punish
us? Who knows what they might do!

from Rush
Limbaugh