Dreaming.. dreaming

I've been depressive again. I don't know why.

Gotta love em foals.





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emergency in icy Massachusetts * Story Highlights * Declaration frees federal aid to help in storm recovery * 180,000 Massachusetts custo

emergency in icy Massachusetts

* Story Highlights
* Declaration frees federal aid to help in storm recovery
* 180,000 Massachusetts customers were without power Saturday
* 1,300 expected to spend the night in shelters
* Much of ice melted Saturday but refroze during the night
A severe ice storm prompted President Bush to declare Saturday that a state of emergency exists in northern Massachusetts, a move that authorizes the use of federal aid to help the recovery effort.
This week's ice storm felled many trees in Boston and elsewhere across Massachusetts.

This week's ice storm felled many trees in Boston and elsewhere across Massachusetts.

The Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency are to coordinate relief efforts in the counties of Berkshire, Bristol, Essex, Franklin, Hampden, Hampshire, Middlesex, Suffolk and Worcester.

By Saturday night, there were 180,000 customers without power, said James Mannion, deputy public information officer for the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency.

The declaration "frees up resources from other states around us," he said, adding that state officials have asked FEMA for cots to be used in 70 shelters, where 1,300 people were expected to spend Saturday night.

In addition, 750 National Guard troops were deployed in the affected area, he said.

Though much of the ice melted Saturday, it refroze Saturday night.
Don't Miss

* Storm leaves 1 million without power in Northeast

"The big problems here are, obviously, the power outages," he said.

Some towns, like Westford, a town of 16,000 residents in northeastern Massachusetts, had no power, he said.

Officials were working to clear roads so that power crews could get in.

Gov. Deval Patrick declared a statewide state of emergency on Friday in response to the storm, which struck Thursday and continued into Saturday.

Milder weather was forecast for Sunday.

Ninjai's still famous!

The Essentials: Ninjai

Welcome to The Essentials, a weekly column at ANImosity spotlighting cutting edge animation that paved the way, started a movement, or is just plain too awesome to miss.

Face it. Ninjas are played out. We've been bombarded with ninja movies, tv shows, video games, ninja advice columns, ninja Facebook applications and countless ninja t-shirts so much that they're no longer a badass icon, but rather a washed out pop culture joke.

But not all is lost, some seek to restore the ninja to it's former fabled glory. Ninjai is a series that tells the story of a young ninja who has lost his memory and sets out to find his purpose. Along the way he runs into a few friends and a few enemies. Well, mostly enemies.

ninjai_moon.jpgThis brings us to hallmark number one of the Ninjai series: the violence. Yes, thecharacter of Ninjai may only be 8 or 9 years old, but nearly every episode has him decapitating at least one foe in full digital glory. The actionis fast and extremely stylized, to the point where you might wonder which big Hollywood director had a hand in the action scenes. Even the orchestral music is original and sounds like something off the big screen and has a distinctly oriental flavor. There's also a great mix of humor and quiet moments that really add some depth to each episode and remind you that, even though he just killed a horde of enemy ninjas, Ninjai is still just a child.

takabath.jpgAs the series goes on, you'll gain a little (and I stress a little) more of the backstory, but what really drives the plot is the fight for survival that goes on in nearly every episode. Most episodes (or chapters, as they call them) leave the door open for the next episode while completing the subplot from the last one. Sadly the series is incomplete and currently ends on a cliffhanger after the 12th episode. Even after enjoying some airtime on cable TV's G4, the creators still haven't finished off the series, however they still claim to be interested in doing so.

Ninjai really sets the watermark high for all action cartoons, online
or otherwise. There's lots of ninja cartoons out there, but Ninjai
really sets itself apart with it's fantastic art, fast action,
professional caliber music and it's charming characters. If you're into action, if you're into ninja's, if you're into anime, if you're into animation at all, this is one of the defining works of animation, NOT done by big studios, but a group of people who just wanted to make something cool.

Animosity Online

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Feed them Cheese, A Modern Day Queen of Scots

Some logic going. :)

An Italian solution: Parmesan for the needy

MILAN, Italy – Let them eat cheese. With data showing a growing underclass and food lines now in most major cities, the Italian government has come up with a way to help the needy while propping up one of its iconic industries.

Agriculture Minister Luca Zaia has committed to buying 100,000 66-pound (30-kilogram) wheels each of Parmigiano Reggiano and the very similar Grana Padano cheese to donate to the needy.

Producers sought government help in the face of prices that have fallen some 25 percent over the past five years, said Giorgio Apostoli, who represents dairy farmers for the Coldiretti agriculture lobby. The producers faced pressure from distributors who offer sharp discounts on the grateable cheeses to lure shoppers into supermarkets,

The government said it will buy 3 percent of the annual production at market prices. The Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana Padano consortia put the value at euro50 million ($66 million).

"It's a help. It doesn't resolve the problem, but it is a help," Apostoli said Thursday. "This is a crisis of pricing, not of consumption," Apostoli said, noting that while consumption of the more expensive Parmigiano Padano has fallen slightly in the last year that of Grana Padano has risen slightly.

Apostoli said the measure doubles the usual government acquisition of Parmigiano and Gran Padano under an EU program to provide food for the poor. Italy was allocated euro66.4 million in 2008, which will nearly double to euro129 million next year, according to the Agriculture Ministry.

The government also plans to convene a round table with distributors to negotiate sales promotions that will be fairer to producers, as well as launch campaigns to promote Italian Parmesan abroad, where it can command higher prices.

An overwhelming 85 percent of the Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana Padano produced is consumed in Italy; Coldiretti estimates that some 60 percent of that is sold at discounted prices.

Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana Padano cheeses are produced according to very strict traditions tied to their geographic origins — primarily the Po River Valley of northern Italy — specifying everything from the aging process to the origin of the milk used. Italy is jealous even of the name Parmesan, having gone to the EU seeking to ban its use by copycats cashing in on the culinary tradition.

Yahoo! News

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Of vets and christmas

I would be so stoked if someone gave me a nativity for Christmas. Of course it's the last thing anyone would think of getting me tho. :'(

Vietnam vet with PTSD goes to Iraq: 'It made me worse'

DAVENPORT, Iowa (CNN) -- Bob Konrardy carried the guilt with him for more than 40 years. A platoon commander in Vietnam, Konrardy was wounded when shrapnel tore through his body. Four comrades carried him to safety in a poncho for more than an hour while the firefight raged.
While in Iraq, the Humvee Konrardy was riding in came under attack. "I could've been killed," he says.

While in Iraq, the Humvee Konrardy was riding in came under attack. "I could've been killed," he says.
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"These four guys went back to help the platoon because they were still fighting, and all four of those guys got killed," Konrardy says. "I felt guilty for 40-something years."

Two years ago, Konrardy got to thinking: He'd be a Santa of sorts for soldiers in Iraq as a way to help him deal with his conscience.

He would collect autographed college and pro footballs, letters from local kids and other mementoes from home to help inspire the troops in Iraq. Then, he would have the goods delivered to his old platoon serving in Iraq, the First Cavalry Division.

He initially thought he'd have the material shipped. But his plan changed when the military signed off for Konrardy to deliver the goods in person and work as an embedded journalist for a local paper.

The 65-year-old grandpa was about to head to one of the world's most dangerous places. Video Watch "I could have been killed" »

"I wanted to maybe bury some Vietnam demons and just make a difference with this platoon and maybe make up for what I didn't do with my old platoon," he says. "I thought it was going to go one way. It went the other. It made me worse."

He adds, "I couldn't sleep before, but now it's worse. I hate to see it get dark. I get extremely nervous. I get uptight. I just don't like to see it get dark. And once it is dark, I'm on edge until it gets dawn."

Konrardy's story is one of patriotism, heroism and torment -- a war veteran unable to escape what happened in 1965, when he was just 23.

"Here's a guy who is a true American hero in his own right. He was wounded in action in the Iadrang Valley, and he comes into a combat zone 40 years later," says Maj. Chris Rogers, the operations officer of the 1st Battalion, 5th Cavalry, when Konrardy embedded with them.

"In my opinion, he's a guy who has done it all -- bled for his own country -- and he's more interested in telling the story of today's generation of young heroes than trumpeting his own horn."

Konrardy was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder shortly after he retired from John Deere in 2002, when he says his disorder really kicked in. He once sleep-drove to a Wal-Mart about 20 minutes from his home at 3 a.m. He doesn't recall how he got there or how he got home. He only remembers a guy mopping the floor asking if he could be helped.

Other times, he'd patrol the neighborhood in the wee hours of the night with his loaded 9-mm pistol on his hip. His counselor with the Department of Veterans Affairs once asked what he would do if the police ever stopped him.
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* Iraq: Transition of power
* Obama taps Shinseki to head VA
* Iraq vets and PTSD: No easy answers
* Soldier finds voice blogging from Iraq

"I said, 'I'll just shoot out his windows and escape and evade back to the house. I think it'd be fun.' She didn't like that answer," he says with a laugh. "So I'm lucky because that's probably what I would've tried to do."

Konrardy checked himself into a VA facility in Des Moines, Iowa, to get help for his PTSD. He chuckles more when he recounts trying to escape from the place and police approached him. "I rolled down a hill and started running so they couldn't catch me. They said that was the wrong thing to do." Learn about PTSD and how to get help »

He says he was then put in an isolation ward for 11 days and nights, and eventually released. It was August 2005.

Fast forward to the fall of 2006. That's when Konrardy spoke to his grandson's eighth-grade class about his war experience. They thanked him for serving his country. "Nobody had ever done that before, for serving in Vietnam," he says.

He started e-mailing members of the Army's First Cavalry Division as part of his grandson's "adopt a platoon" project. He got autographed footballs from the Green Bay Packers and Indianapolis Colts, as well as from the University of Tennessee and University of Georgia.

Even the players at local St. Ambrose University chipped in with a football of their own: the game ball from their championship game. "I just wanted to do something and make up for what I didn't do for my guys," Konrardy says.

His family gathered for Christmas that year and he told of his plans to travel to Iraq. "Everybody cried," he says. "I said, 'Hey, this is a chance of a lifetime. I have to go.' "

Quizzed about why a man who was held in a VA facility a couple years earlier was cleared to travel to Iraq, Konrardy laughs. He says CNN is the first to ask that question.

But he adds the original plan was for him to not go into combat. "On the way over, I didn't think I'd be going out."

By March 2007, the old warrior's boots were on the ground in Baghdad. His plan was to hand out the 95 pounds of goods and kick back with the soldiers at base camp, collecting their stories and gathering video to give to their families back home. Konrardy handed the St. Ambrose football to a soldier named David W. Behrle, a 20-year-old from Tipton, Iowa. He scooped it up and cherished it.

Konrardy was officially in Iraq as an embedded journalist to file blog posts for "The Quad-City Times." He had not intended to go into combat, but that quickly changed. He says the commander said if he wanted to get to know the troops "you've gotta be proactive."

Konrardy says he hopped into a Humvee and began patrolling the tight streets of Baghdad with the unit. He was assigned the back right seat for four days.

His Humvee once struck a dud of a roadside bomb that blew the tire out underneath where he was sitting. Gunfire erupted. "Looking back, I'm thinking, 'Wow, I could have been killed,' " he says.

He's still haunted by another time in Iraq -- not because of what happened, but because of what he didn't do.

"I'm going to the bathroom and I hear somebody crying. My first instinct was to be a grandpa: I'm going to go in and I'm going to hold this young kid whoever it is and just say, 'I know where you're coming from. I've been there. Let's just talk.' "

He adds, "But I chickened out. I didn't do that. Now, I wish I would have."

A few weeks after he left Iraq, soldiers he befriended were riding in a Bradley Fighting Vehicle on patrol around Baghdad. He says the soldiers had recently saved a young Iraqi girl who had been shot in the head from insurgent crossfire. But on this day, May 19, 2007, a roadside bomb went off, killing all six soldiers inside.

One of those killed was Spc. David Behrle, the soldier who loved the football hand-delivered by Konrardy.

"I took that hard. It still bothers me," Konrardy says.

Outside his Iowa home, a flagpole stands on Konrardy's lawn. A fallen soldier monument sits at its base with a pair of boots, rifle facing down and helmet with the name "Behrle" on it.

Behrle's family was so moved by Konrardy they had it built for him. Kneeling next to the monument, Konrardy says, "It reminds me of Dave. But it also reminds me of the Behrle family and how close we've gotten with them and how great they've been in my grieving for Dave and helping me ... try to readjust to the things I went through in Iraq."

"They say I helped them; I say they helped me."

The lifelong Republican recently did something he thought he'd never do: He says he voted for a Democrat for the president of the United States. Thousands of American troops will soon be returning home in need of help just like him.
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Konrardy, who is still getting PTSD treatment, wishes the rest of the nation could better understand what that's like.

"I just want them to realize the life of a soldier is not what you think," he says. "It changes you for the rest of your life."

Source

poor dude.. he needs to pray or something.

Awesome musicians

Here's some other vids: all around pretty awesome stuff.


Christmas is just around the corner... unlike my parents, I have some kind of innate love for nativity scenes. I like it much better than anything else about Christmas.
And of course, don't forget to watch your daily Ninjai Chapter

Dogs are smarter

Scientists are so dumb. I knew this already. I see it with my dogs all the time.

Why dogs can sense fair play

LONDON, England (CNN) -- Dogs appear to experience a range of complex, unpleasant emotions such as jealousy and pride, scientists have discovered.
Dogs hate their owner showing affection to other dogs.

Dogs hate their owner showing affection to other dogs.

Until now, this type of behavior had only been shown in humans or chimpanzees, but researchers suspected that other species that live together could be sensitive to fair play -- or a lack of one.

"We are learning that dogs, horses, and perhaps many other species are far more emotionally complex than we ever realized," Paul Morris, a psychologist at the University of Portsmouth who studies animal emotions, told The Sunday Times.

"They can suffer simple forms of many emotions we once thought only primates could experience."

Scientists noted that dogs hate to see their owners being affectionate to other dogs and can suffer if a new baby or partner arrives on the scene.

To test the theory, Friederike Range and colleagues at the University of Vienna in Austria asked 33 trained dogs to extend a paw to a human.

The animals performed the trick virtually all of the time whether they were given a reward or not -- when alone or with another dog.

But the dogs' enthusiasm waned when they saw other dogs being rewarded but received nothing themselves.

Dogs that were ignored extended their paws much less often, doing so in only 13 out of 30 trials. They also showed more stress, such as licking or scratching themselves.

"They are clearly unhappy with the unfair situation", Range told New Scientist magazine. She also suspects that this sensitivity might stretch beyond food to more abstract things like praise and attention.

"It might explain why some dogs react with 'new baby envy' when their owners have a child," she said.

Source

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This is something we've probably never had: happy family.. mixed.. haha check out these ligers.